The House of Whispers Part 23

But her father, angered and grieved, turned fiercely upon her and ordered her from his presence. "Go," he said, "and do not come near me again until your boxes are packed and you are ready to leave Glencardine."

"You speak as though I were a servant whom you've discharged," she said bitterly.

"I am speaking to my enemy, not to my daughter," was his hard response.

She raised her eyes to Flockart, and saw upon his dark face a hard, sphinx-like look. What hope of salvation could she ever expect from that man--the man who long ago had sought to estrange her from her father so that he might work his own ends? It was upon her tongue to turn upon him and relate the whole infamous truth. Yet so friendly had the two men become of late that she feared, even if she did so, that her father would only see in the revelation an attempt at reprisal. Besides, what if Flockart spoke? What if he told the awful truth? Her own dear father, whom she loved so well, even though he had misjudged her, would be dragged into the mire. No, she was the victim of that man, who was a past-master of the art of subterfuge; the man who, for years, had lived by his wits and preyed upon society.

"Leave us, and go to your room," again commanded her father.

She looked sadly at the white, bespectacled countenance which she loved so well. Her soft hand once more sought his; but he cast it from him, saying, "Enough of your caresses! You are no longer my daughter! Leave us!" And then, seeing all protest in vain, she sighed, turned very slowly, and with a last, lingering look upon the helpless man to whom she had been so devoted, and who now so grossly misjudged her, she tottered out, closing the door behind her.

"Has she gone?" asked Sir Henry a moment later.

Flockart responded in the affirmative, laying his hand upon the shoulder of his agitated host, and urging him to remain calm.

"That's all very well, my dear Flockart," he cried; "but you don't know what she has done. She exposed a week or so ago a most confidential arrangement with the Greek Government, a revelation which might have involved me in the loss of over a hundred thousand."

"Then it's fortunate, perhaps, that I discovered her to-night," replied his guest. "All this must be very painful to you, Sir Henry."

"Very. I shall not give her another opportunity to betray me, Flockart, depend upon that," the elder man said. "My wife warned me against Gabrielle long ago. I now see that I was a fool for not taking her advice."

"Certainly it's a curious fact that Walter Murie is in Paris," remarked the other. "Was the revelation of your financial dealings made in Paris, do you know?"

"Yes, it was," snapped the blind man. "I believed Walter to be quite a good young fellow."

"Ah, I knew different, Sir Henry. His life up in London was not--well, not exactly all that it should be. He's in with a rather shady crowd."

"You never told me so."

"Because you did not believe me to be your friend until quite recently.

I hope I have now proved what I have a.s.serted. If I can do anything to a.s.sist you I am only too ready. I a.s.sure you that you have only to command me."

Sir Henry reflected deeply for a few moments. The discovery that his daughter was playing him false caused within him a sudden revulsion of feeling. Unfortunately, he could not see the expression upon the countenance of his false friend. He was wondering at that moment whether he might entrust to him a somewhat delicate mission.

"Gabrielle shall not return here," her father said, as though speaking to himself.

"That is a course which I would most strongly advise. Send the girl away," urged the other. "Evidently she has grossly betrayed you."

"That I certainly intend doing," was the answer. "But I wonder, Flockart, if I might take you at your word, and ask you to do me a favour? I am so helpless, or I would not think of troubling you."

"Only tell me what you wish, and I will do it with pleasure."

"Very well, then," replied the blind man. "Perhaps I shall want you to go to Paris at once, watch the actions of young Murie, and report to me from time to time. Would you?"

A look of bright intelligence overspread the man's features as a new vista opened before him. Sir Henry was about to take him into his confidence! "Why, with pleasure," he said cheerily. "I'll start to-morrow, and rest a.s.sured that I'll keep a very good eye upon the young gentleman. You now know the painful truth concerning your daughter--the truth which Lady Heyburn has told you so often, and which you have never yet heeded."

"Yes, Flockart," answered the afflicted man, taking his guest's hand in warm friends.h.i.+p. "I once disliked you--that I admit; but you were quite frank the other day, and now to-night you have succeeded in making a discovery that, though it has upset me terribly, may mean my salvation."

CHAPTER XXI

THROUGH THE MISTS

Sir Henry refused to speak with his daughter when, on the following morning, she stole in and laid her hand softly upon his arm. He ordered her, in a tone quite unusual, to leave the library. Through the morning hours she had lain awake trying to make a resolve. But, alas! she dared not tell the truth; she was in deadly fear of Flockart's reprisals.

That morning, at nine o'clock, Lady Heyburn and Flockart had held hurried consultation in secret, at which he had explained to her what had occurred.

"Excellent!" she had remarked briefly. "But we must now have a care, my dear friend. Mind the girl does not throw all prudence to the winds and turn upon us."

"Bah!" he laughed, "I don't fear that for a single second." And he left the room again, to salute her in the breakfast-room a quarter of an hour later as though they had not met before that day.

Gabrielle, on leaving her father, went out for a long walk alone, away over the heather-clad hills. For hours she went on--Jock, her Aberdeen terrier, toddling at her side, in her hand a stout ash-stick--regardless of the muddy roads or the wet weather. It was grey, damp, and dismal, one of those days which in the Highlands are often so very cheerless and dispiriting. Yet on, and still on, she went, her mind full of the events of the previous night; full, also, of the dread secret which prevented her from exposing her father's false friend. In order to save her father, should she sacrifice herself--sacrifice her own life? That was the one problem before her.

She saw nothing; she heeded nothing. Hunger or fatigue troubled her not.

Indeed, she took no notice of where her footsteps led her. Beyond Crieff she wandered, along the river-bank a short distance, ascending a hill, where a wild and wonderful view spread before her. There she sat down upon a big boulder to rest.

Her hair blown by the chill wind, she sat staring straight before her, thinking--ever thinking. She had not seen Lady Heyburn that day. She had seen no one.

At six o'clock that morning she had written a long letter to Walter Murie. She had not mentioned the midnight incident, but she had, with many expressions of regret, pointed out the futility of any further affection between them. She had not attempted to excuse herself. She merely told him that she considered herself unworthy of his love, and because of that, and that alone, she had decided to break off their engagement.

A dozen times she had reread the letter after she had completed it.

Surely it was the letter of a heart-broken and desperate woman. Would he take it in the spirit in which it was meant, she wondered. She loved him--ah, loved him better than any one else in all the world! But she now saw that it was useless to masquerade any longer. The blow had fallen, and it had crushed her. She was powerless to resist, powerless to deny the false charge against her, powerless to tell the truth.

That letter, which she knew must come as a cruel blow to Walter, she had given to the postman with her own hands, and it was now on its way south. As she sat on the summit of that heather-clad hill she was wondering what effect her written words would have upon him. He had loved her so devotedly ever since they had been children together! Well she knew how strong was his pa.s.sion for her, how his life was at her disposal. She knew that on reading those despairing lines of hers he would be staggered. She recalled the dear face of her soul-mate, his hot kisses, his soft terms of endearment, and alone there, with none to witness her bitter grief, she burst into a flood of tears.

The sad greyness of the landscape was in keeping with her own great sorrow. She had lost all that was dear to her; and, young as she was, with hardly any experience of the world and its ways, she was already the victim of grim circ.u.mstance, broken by the grief of a self-renounced love gnawing at her true heart.

The knowledge that Lady Heyburn and Flockart would exult over her downfall and exile to that tiny house in a sleepy little Northamptons.h.i.+re village did not trouble her. Her enemies had triumphed.

She had played the game and lost, just as she might have lost at billiards or at bridge, for she was a thorough sportswoman. She only grieved because she saw the grave peril of her dear father, and because she now foresaw the utter hopelessness of her own happiness.

It was better, she reflected, far better, that she should go into the dull and dreary exile of an English village, with the unexciting companions.h.i.+p of Aunt Emily, an ascetic spinster of the mid-Victorian era, and make pretence of pique with Walter, than to reveal to him the shameful truth. He would at least in those circ.u.mstances retain of her a recollection fond and tender. He would not despise nor hate her, as he most certainly would do if he knew the real astounding facts.

How long she remained there, high up, with the chill winds of autumn tossing her silky, light-brown hair, she knew not. Rainclouds were gathering, and the rugged hill before her was now hidden behind a bank of mist. Time had crept on without her heeding it, for what did time now matter to her? What, indeed, did anything matter? Her young life, though she was still in her teens, had ended; or, at least, as far as she was concerned it had. Was she not calmly and coolly contemplating telling the truth and putting an end to her existence after saving her father's honour?

Her sad, tearful eyes gazed slowly about her as she suddenly awakened to the fact that she was far--very far--from home. She had been dazed, unconscious of everything, because of the heavy burden of grief within her heart. But now she looked forth upon the small, grey loch, with its dark fringe of trees, the grey and purple hills beyond, the grey sky, and the grey, filmy mists that hung everywhere. The world was, indeed, sad and gloomy, and even Jock sat looking up at his young mistress as though regarding her grief in wonder.

Now and then distant shots came from across the hills. They were shooting over the Drummond estate, she knew, for she had had an invitation to join their luncheon-party that day. Lady Heyburn and Flockart had no doubt gone.

That, she told herself, was her last day in the Highlands, that picturesque, breezy country she loved so well. It was her last day amid those familiar places where she and Walter had so often wandered together, and where he had told her of his pa.s.sionate devotion. Well, perhaps it was best, after all. Down south she would not be reminded of him every moment and at every turn. No, she sighed within herself as she rose to descend the hill, she must steel herself against her own sad reflections. She must learn how to forget.

"What will he say?" she murmured aloud as she went down, with Jock frisking and barking before her. "What will he think of me when he gets my letter? He will believe me fickle; he will believe that I have another lover. That is certain. Well, I must allow him to believe it. We have parted, and we must now, alas! remain apart for ever. Probably he will seek from my father the truth concerning my disappearance from Glencardine. Dad will tell him, no doubt. And then--then, what will he believe? He--he will know that I am unworthy to be his wife. Yet--yet is it not cruel that I dare not speak the truth and clear myself of this foul charge of betraying my own dear father? Was ever a girl placed in such a position as myself, I wonder. Has any girl ever loved a man better than I love Walter?" Her white lips were set hard, and her fine eyes became again bedimmed by tears.

It commenced to rain, that fine drizzle so often experienced north of the Tweed. But she heeded not. She was used to it. To get wet through was, to her, quite a frequent occurrence when out fis.h.i.+ng. Though there was no path, she knew her way; and, walking through the wet heather, she came after half-an-hour out upon a muddy byroad which led her into the town of Crieff, whence her return was easy; though it was already dusk, and the dressing-bell had gone, before she re-entered the house by the servants' door and slipped un.o.bserved up to her own room.

Elise found her seated in her blue gown before the welcome fire-log, her chin upon her breast. Her excuse was that she felt unwell; therefore one of the maids brought her some dinner on a tray.

Upon the mantelshelf were many photographs, some of them snap-shots of her schoolfellows and souvenirs of holidays, the odds and ends of portraits and scenes which every girl unconsciously collects.