Title: The Under-Secretary
Author: Le Queux, William, 1864-1927
Language: English
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CHAPTER ONE.

IS MAINLY ABOUT A MAN.

Two o'clock--two o'clock in the morning.

The bells had just chimed the hour.  Big Ben had boomed forth its deep
and solemn note over sleeping London.  The patient constable on
point-duty at the foot of Westminster Bridge had stamped his feet for
the last time, and had been relieved by his colleague, who gave him the
usual pass-word, "All right."  The tumultuous roar of traffic, surging,
beating, pulsating, had long ago ceased, but the crowd of smart
broughams and private hansoms still stood in New Palace Yard, while from
the summit of St. Stephen's tower the long ray of electricity streamed
westward, showing that the House of Commons was still sitting.

The giant Metropolis, the throbbing heart of the greatest empire the
world has known, was silent.  London, the city of varying moods, as
easily pleased, as easily offended as a petted child; London, the dear,
smoke-blackened old city, which every Englishman loves and every
foreigner admires; London, that complex centre of the universe, humdrum
and prosaic, yet ever mysterious, poetic and wonderful, the city full of
the heart's secrets and of life's tragedies, slept calmly and in peace
while her legislators discussed and decided the policy of the Empire.

The long rows of light on the deserted terrace and along the opposite
shore in front of St. Thomas's Hospital threw their shimmering
reflection upon the black waters of the Thames; the cold wind swept
roughly up the river, causing the gas-jets to flicker, so that the few
shivering outcasts who had taken refuge on the steps of the closed
doorway of Westminster Station, murmured as they pulled their rags more
tightly round them.  Only the low rumbling of a country waggon bearing
vegetables to Covent Garden, or the sharp clip-clap of a cab-horse's
feet upon the asphalt, broke the quiet.  Except for these occasional
disturbances all else was as silent on that dark and cloudy night in
late October as if the world were dead.

Over in the far corner of New Palace Yard horses were champing their
bits, and coachmen and police were waiting patiently, knowing that with
the Twelve o'clock Rule suspended the length of the sitting was quite
uncertain.  Wearied journalists from the Press Gallery, having finished
their "turns," came out singly or in pairs from their own little side
door in the opposite corner of the yard, wished a cheery "good-night" to
the portly sergeant and the two idling detectives who acted as janitors,
and then hurried on through the chill night over the bridge towards
their homes in Brixton or Clapham.  An autumn session is a weary one,
and weighs quite as heavily upon the Parliamentary journalist as upon
the Leader of the House himself.

On the floor of the House honourable members might stretch themselves
and doze; they might wander about St. Stephen's Hall with prominent
constituents who sought admission to the Strangers' Gallery, entertain
them in the dining-room, or take their ease across the way at St.
Stephen's Club, ready to return by the underground passage on the
ringing of the division-bell; but that gallery above the Speaker, the
eye and ear of the world, was never anything else but a hive of industry
from the moment after prayers until the House rose.  Ever watchful, ever
scribbling its hieroglyphics and deciphering them; ever covering ream
upon ream of paper with the verbose and vapid utterances of ambitious
but unimportant members, its telegraphs clicked on incessantly hour
after hour, transmitting reports of the business accomplished to the
farthermost recesses of the King's Empire.  Truly, a strange life is
that of both legislator and journalist within those sombre walls at
Westminster.

On this night a full House was occupied with serious business.  Within
St. Stephen's men collected in groups, talked anxiously, and awaited the
doom of the Government; for the political horizon was black, and the
storm, long threatened, was now to burst.  Contrary to the usual course
of things, the small band of Irish obstructionists, fluent orators,
whose heckling of Ministers caused so many scenes, were silent, for a
matter of foreign policy of the most vital importance had been debated
ever since the dinner-hour.  Member after member had risen from the
Opposition Benches and beneath the soft glow of the electric light
shining through the glass roof had, before a crowded and excited House,
supported the vote of censure, denouncing the Government for its apathy,
its neglect of warnings, and the failure of its diplomacy abroad.  The
scene would have been an ordinary one were it not for the fact that a
five-line whip had been sent out.  An important division was hourly
expected, and as the defeat of the Government was believed to be close
at hand, the excitement had risen to fever heat.

The calmest man in the whole of that versatile House was, perhaps, he
who was at that moment replying from the Treasury Bench.

"Strangers" in the gallery were struck by his youthful appearance, for
he did not seem to be much over thirty.  Tall, dark-haired, with
slightly aquiline features and a small black moustache, his face was
refined, studious, and full of keen intelligence.  Standing beside the
clerk's table, upon the very spot where the late Mr. Gladstone had so
often stood when delivering his masterpieces of oratory, he leaned
easily upon his right hand while he addressed the House calmly and
clearly in defence of Her Majesty's Government.

All the world knew that the Right Honourable Dudley Waldegrave Chisholm,
member for the Albury Division of Surrey and Parliamentary
Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, was a coming man.  Five
years ago, when he was still private secretary to the Marquess of
Stockbridge, Her Majesty's Foreign Minister, the political
paragraphists, as well as those journalists known as "lobbyists," had
predicted for him a brilliant future; and he certainly had shown himself
worthy the position he now held--a very high one for so young a man.

Standing there, a well-groomed figure in evening-dress, the smart fencer
with supplementary questions spoke fluently, without dramatic gesture or
any straining after effect, his sweeping and polished eloquence
annihilating the opponents against whom it had been set in motion.
Deliberately he rebuked the Opposition for their unfounded allegations,
and gave the lie direct to many of the statements that had been made in
the course of the debate.  The speech, a most brilliant and telling
defence of the policy of the Government, recalled the greatness of
Castlereagh.

"And now," he said, in the same calm tone, slightly altering his
position as he continued, and knitting his brows, "the Honourable Member
for North Monmouthshire has hinted at the overthrow of Her Majesty's
Government, and even at a Dissolution.  Upon such a threat let all the
voters in these islands reflect.  The enfranchised public is really
living in an unpractical paradise.  It stands for nothing better than a
puppet Czar.  When the five millions of voters have with infinite pains
been enabled to record their sovereign will and pleasure, and have
succeeded in returning a majority on one side or another, they are apt
to consider that they have returned a Liberal or a Conservative
majority; but, to quote Hosea Biglow, they have done little else than
change the holders of offices.  The new Parliament meets, and the
electors wait to see the results of their exertions.  There is a new
Ministry, no doubt, and, so far, that is to the good; but when the new
Ministry gets to work, it finds itself in a very different position from
that of a Minister charged with a Ukase from a real Czar.  If the
election has taken place upon one specific point, and the response of
the electors has been decisive and overwhelming, then it is possible
that a Bill embodying the views of the voters may pass into law; but
that is only when the will of the electors has been unmistakably made
known, not for the first time, but for the second, or even for the
third."

An enthusiastic chorus of "He-ah!  He-ah!" arose from the crowded
benches behind the speaker, but without a pause he went on fearlessly:

"The Opposition may threaten Her Majesty's Government with overthrow and
ignominy if it choose, but it cannot hoodwink the constituencies.
Experience has taught the electors that they are mocked with a semblance
of power, the real sceptre being held in permanence by the House of
Lords, whose four hundred members appeal to no constituency, but sit by
virtue of hereditary privilege and right of birth, with a perpetual
mandate to veto any and every scheme submitted by this House which they
do not like and which is not literally forced upon them by overwhelming
popular pressure.  The voting public, therefore, while it can make a
statesman a prime minister, and can pass one bill, if it is very angry
and has expressed its opinion with emphasis when appeal was made to it
upon that specific question, has no more power than this."

At these outspoken words, expressions of amazement arose from both sides
of the House; but the Under-Secretary, heedless of all in the warmth of
his defence, continued, reverting to the main question at issue--namely,
the alleged Russian encroachments in the Far East, a subject upon which,
owing to his own extensive journeys in Central Asia, Afghanistan and the
Pamirs, he was a recognised authority.

"It is excessively rare to find, even among educated Englishmen," he
declared, "a perception of the simple fact that the landward expansion
of Russia has been as natural, gradual and legitimate as the spread of
British sea-power, and that the former process has been infinitely the
less aggressive and violent of the two.  Russophobia in this country
rests upon the assumption that the devouring advance of the Muscovite
has been exclusively dictated by a melodramatic and iniquitous design
upon our dominion in India.  There never was a stranger fallacy
springing from jealous hallucinations.  If our Indian Empire had never
existed, if the continent-peninsula had disappeared at a remote
geological epoch beneath the waves, and if the Indian Ocean had washed
the base of the Himalayas for ages, Russian expansion would still have
followed precisely the same course it has taken under existing
circumstances at exactly the same rate."

And so he continued, arguing, criticising, ridiculing and
substantiating, thrusting the truth upon the Opposition; in his eyes a
swift light which swept the House like an eagle's glance; on his lips
the thin smile which his opponents dreaded, until he resumed his seat
amid the wild outburst of cheers from the Government benches.  He had
thrilled the House.  The victory of his party was virtually won.

"The best speech Chisholm has ever delivered," declared one of Her
Majesty's Ministers, a grey-haired old gentleman in black broadcloth, to
his colleague, the Home Secretary, at his side.  "Marvellous!
magnificent!"

"Yes," declared the other enthusiastically.  "He has turned the tide.
It was really excellent."

Everywhere this verdict was accepted, even by the Opposition.  Public
opinion was certainly not wrong: Chisholm was a coming man--a man of the
near future.

But he sat entirely unmoved by the wild outburst of applause.  He had
taken some papers from the pocket of his dining-jacket and was busy
examining them in a manner quite unconcerned.  His dark face was
serious.  He never played "to the gallery," as he termed the Irish
Nationalists opposite, and although he had chosen a public career, he
was at heart a rather melancholy man, who regretted that on account of
his travels and his official position he had become notable.  The one
thing he detested was the plaudits of the public; cheap advertisement he
abominated.

For that very reason he addressed his constituents down at Albury as
rarely as possible.  His enthusiastic electors were in the habit of
cheering him to the echo, for by reason of his travels he was a popular
hero.  After a meeting the crowd would usually unharness the horses from
his carriage and drag him triumphantly back to his hotel.  From that
sort of thing his retiring and studious nature shrank.  Such enthusiasm
might flatter the vanity of the brewer or cotton-spinner, who wished to
get into the Carlton, or of the mushroom financier from the Stock
Exchange, striving to thrust his way into the fringe of society and to
be mentioned in the "social diaries" of the half-penny newspapers.
There were men in the House, whom he could name, ready to descend to any
ruse to obtain a little cheap notoriety; who would readily black the
boots of the editor of the _Times_ in exchange for a twenty-line report
of their speeches.  But Dudley Chisholm was not one of the hungry mob of
place-hunters.  Heir to the Barony of Lynchmere, he was also a wealthy
man by reason of the huge fortune left him by his uncle, the eccentric
old Duke of Lincoln, together with Wroxeter Castle, the historic seat of
the Chisholms up in Shropshire.  Since his entry into political life he
had not been idle.  He had been sworn a Privy Councillor a year ago, was
Deputy-Lieutenant and a Justice of the Peace for Shropshire, and upon
him the Royal Geographical Society had conferred its highest award, the
gold medal for his famous journey through the almost unknown territory
of Bhutan.

All these honours had been thrust upon him.  He had sought none of them,
for at no time had he been a political "log-roller."  When he came down
from Oxford, to find himself possessor of an almost princely income, he
resolved to take up something with which to occupy his time.  He had no
inclination for the life of a sybarite about town; the drawingrooms of
Mayfair and Belgravia had no attraction for him; the Sunday strutting in
the park bored him.  He therefore allowed himself to be nominated for
the Guildford Division, and after a valiant fight was returned,
subsequently being appointed by the Marquess of Stockbridge one of his
private secretaries.

Eight years had gone by since then.  Twelve months after delivering his
maiden speech in the House he had set forth to make himself personally
acquainted with England's oversea possessions, for he declared that no
legislator was competent to criticise a country he had never seen.  To
Australia, to China, and to India he proceeded in turn, and at last he
made his remarkable journey through Central Asia, in order to ascertain
the truth of the Russian advance towards India alleged by certain
sensational journals.  After this came the daring journey across Bhutan.
Then, on his return to England on the eve of a general election, he was
amazed to find himself famous--the man of the hour, as had been long ago
predicted.  Later changes in the Cabinet brought him his well-earned
reward in the position he now held of Parliamentary Under-Secretary of
State for Foreign Affairs.

He sat there unmoved by the applause which greeted his speech, and when
it had ceased he rose.  The tellers were being named, and as he passed
out into the lobby a few minutes later his name was on every tongue.
Men saluted him, but he only bowed slightly on either side in
acknowledgment with haughty courtesy; he held to the imperious,
patrician code of his Norman race, and the plaudits of his fellows were
almost as indifferent to him, almost as much disdained by him, as their
censure.

Dudley Chisholm had much of the despot, but nothing of the demagogue, in
his character.  He had come to the front quickly.  Certainly no man was
more surprised at his own success in the world of politics than he
himself; and certainly no man in London was considered by mothers more
eligible as a husband.

Perhaps it is fortunate for Members of the House that their female
friends are discreetly hidden away behind that heavy iron grille over
the Press Gallery, so that they are invisible save for a neatly gloved
hand which sometimes shows upon the ironwork, or a flash of bright
colour in the deep shadow, caused by bobbing millinery.  Many a husband
or lover addressing the House would waver beneath the critical eyes of
his womenkind.  Indeed, on the night in question, Dudley Chisholm would
certainly not have delivered his telling words so calmly had he been
aware of the presence of certain persons hidden away behind that
Byzantine grating.

The Ladies' Gallery was crowded by Members' wives and daughters,
enthusiastic Primrose League workers, dowagers, and a few of the smarter
set.  Among the latter, at the extreme end of the gallery, sat a
well-preserved, elderly woman of rather aristocratic bearing,
accompanied by a blue-eyed girl in lavender, wearing a costly opera
cloak trimmed with sable, a girl with a countenance so charming that she
would cause a sensation anywhere.  The black toilette of the elder woman
and the lavender "creation" worn by her daughter, spoke mutely to the
other women near them of an _atelier_ in the Rue de la Paix, but as to
their names, these were unknown to every person in the gallery.

When Chisholm had risen to address the House the elder had bent to the
younger and whispered something in her ear.  Then both women had pressed
their faces eagerly to the grille, and, sitting bent forward, listened
to every word that fell so deliberately from the speaker's lips.

Again the aristocratic-looking woman with the white hair whispered to
the girl beside her, so low that no one overheard:

"There, Muriel!  That is the man.  I have not exaggerated his qualities,
have I?  You must marry him, my dear--you must marry him!"

CHAPTER TWO.

CONCERNS CLAUDIA'S CAPRICE.

The division had been taken, the position of the Government saved, and
the House was "up."

Dudley Chisholm, after driving back in a hansom to his chambers in St.
James's Street, stretched himself before the fire with a weary sigh of
relief, to rest himself after the struggle in which he had been so
prominent a figure.  His rooms, almost opposite the Naval and Military
Club, were decorated in that modern style affected by the younger
generation of bachelors, with rich brocade hangings, Turkey carpets, art
pottery, and woodwork painted dead white.  A single glance, however,
showed it to be the abode of a man sufficiently wealthy to be able to
indulge in costly works of art and fine old china; and although modern
in every sense of the word, it was, nevertheless, a very snug, tasteful
and well-arranged abode.

The room in which he was sitting, deep in a big armchair of the
"grandfather" type, was a study; not spacious, but lined completely with
well-chosen books, while the centre was occupied by a large, workmanlike
table littered by the many official documents which his secretary had,
on the previous morning, brought to him from the Foreign Office.  The
electric lamp on the table was shaded by a cover of pale green silk and
lace, so that he sat in the shadow, with the firelight playing upon his
dark and serious features.

Parsons, his bent, white-haired old servant in livery of an antiquated
cut, had noiselessly entered with his master's whiskey and soda, and
after placing it in its accustomed spot on a small table at his elbow,
was about to retire, when the younger man, deep in reflection, stirred
himself, asking:

"Who brought that letter--the one I found here when I came in?"

"A commissionaire, sir," was the old servitor's response.  "It came
about midnight.  And somebody rang up on the telephone about an hour
after, but I couldn't catch the name, as I'm always a bit flustered by
the outlandish thing, sir."

His master smiled.  That telephone was, he knew, the bane of old
Parsons' existence.

"Ah!" he said.  "You're not so young as you used to be, eh?"

"No, Master Dudley," sighed the old fellow with the blanched hair and
thin, white, mutton-chop whiskers.  "When I think that I was his
lordship's valet here in London nigh on fifty years ago, and that I've
been in the family every since, I begin to feel that I'm gettin' on a
bit in years."

"Sitting up late every night like this isn't very good for one of your
age," observed his master, mindful of the old fellow's faithful
services.  "I'll have Riggs up from Wroxeter, and he can attend to me at
night."

"You're very thoughtful of me, Master Dudley; but I'd rather serve you
myself, sir.  I can't abear young men about me.  They're only in the
way, and get a-flirtin' with the gals whenever they have a chance."

"Very well, Parsons, just please yourself," answered Chisholm
pleasantly.  "But to-morrow morning first pack my bag and then wire to
Wroxeter.  I shall be going down there in the afternoon with two friends
for a couple of days' shooting."

"Very well, sir," replied the old fellow in the antique dress suit and
narrow tie.  He half turned to walk out, but hesitated and fidgeted;
then, a moment later, he turned back and stood before his master.

"Well, Parsons, anything more?"  Chisholm asked.  He was used to the old
fellow's confidences and eccentricities, for more than once since he had
come down from college his ancient retainer had given him words of sound
advice, his half-century of service allowing him such licence as very
few servants possessed.

"There's one little matter I wanted to speak to you about, Master
Dudley.  I'm an old man, and a pretty blunt 'un at times, that you
know."

"Yes," laughed Dudley.  "You can make very caustic remarks sometimes,
Parsons.  Well, who's been offending you now?"

"No one, sir," he answered gravely.  "It's about something that concerns
yourself, Master Dudley."

His master glanced up at him quickly, not without some surprise, saying:

"Well, fire away, Parsons.  Out with it.  What have I done wrong this
time?"

"That woman was here this afternoon!" he blurted out.

"What woman?" inquired his master, looking at him seriously.

"Her ladyship."

"Well, and what of that?  She called at my invitation.  I'm sorry I was
not in."

"And I'm very glad I had the satisfaction of sending that woman away,"
declared the ancient retainer bluntly.

"Why, Parsons?  Surely it's hardly the proper thing to speak of a lady
as `that woman'?"

"Master.  Dudley," said the old man, "you'll forgive me for speaking
plain, won't you?  It would, I know, be called presumption in other
houses for a servant to speak like this to his master, but you are
thirty-three now, and for those thirty-three years I've advised you,
just as I would my own son."

"I know, Parsons, I know.  My father trusted you implicitly, just as I
have done.  Speak quite plainly.  I'm never offended by your
criticisms."

"Well, sir, that woman may have a title, but she's not at all a
desirable acquaintance for you, a rising man."

Chisholm smiled.  Claudia Nevill was a smart woman, moving in the best
set in London; something of a lion-hunter, it was true, but a really
good sort, nevertheless.

"She dresses too well to suit your old-fashioned tastes, eh?  In your
days women wore curls and crinolines."

"No, Master Dudley.  It isn't her dress, sir.  I don't like the woman."

"Why?"

"Because--well, you'll permit me to speak quite frankly, sir--because to
my mind it's dangerous for a young man like you to be so much in the
company of an attractive young person.  And, besides, she's playing some
deep game, depend upon it."

Dudley's dark brows contracted for a moment at the old man's words.  It
was quite true that he was very often in Claudia Nevill's society,
because he found her both charming and amusing.  But the suggestion of
her playing some game caused him to prick up his ears in quick interest.
Parsons was a shrewd old fellow, that he knew.

"And what kind of double game is Lady Richard playing?" he asked in a
rather hard voice.

"Well, sir, you'll remember that she called here just after luncheon the
day before yesterday, and had an elderly lady with her.  You had gone
down to the Foreign Office; but I expected you back every moment, so
they waited.  When they were together in the drawing-room with the door
closed I heard that woman explain to her companion that you were the
most eligible man in London.  They had spoken of your income, of
Wroxeter, of his lordship's failing health, and all the rest of it, when
that woman made a suggestion to her companion--namely, that you might be
induced to marry some woman they called Muriel."

"Muriel?  And who in the name of fortune is Muriel?"

"I don't know, sir.  That, however, was the name that was mentioned."

"Who was the lady who accompanied her ladyship?  Had you ever seen her
before?"

"No, sir, never.  She didn't give a card.  She was elderly, dressed in
deep mourning.  They waited best part of an hour for you, then drove
away in her ladyship's brougham."

"I wonder who she could have been," remarked Dudley Chisholm
reflectively.  "I haven't the honour of knowing any lady named Muriel,
and, what's more, I have no desire to make her acquaintance.  But how
was it, Parsons, that if the door was closed, you overheard this very
edifying conversation?"

"I listened at the keyhole, sir.  Old men have long ears, you know."

His master laughed.

"Slow at the telephone, quick at the keyhole, eh, Parsons?" he said.
"Well, somehow, you don't like her ladyship.  Why is it?"

"I've already told you, Master Dudley.  First, because you are too much
with her.  There's no woman more dangerous to men like yourself than a
wealthy young person of her attractions; secondly, because she has some
extraordinary design upon you on behalf of this mysterious Muriel--
whoever she is."

What the old man had said was certainly puzzling.  What possible object
could Claudia have, he wondered, in bringing there a strange woman and
suggesting to her that he should marry a third person?  He would put the
question point-blank to her to-morrow.  Claudia Nevill and he were old
friends--very old friends.  Years ago, long before she had married his
friend Dick Nevill, a noble lord who sat for Huntingdon, they had been
close acquaintances, and now, Nevill having died two years after the
marriage, leaving Claudia sole mistress of the huge estate, together
with that princely house in Albert Gate, he had naturally become her
confidant and adviser.

She was now only twenty-six, one of the smartest women in London, and
one of the prettiest.  After a brief period of mourning, she had again
thrown herself into all the dissipations of the following season, and
was seen everywhere.  She had been so often in the company of Dudley
Chisholm that their close friendship had for months past been remarked.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary had, of course, heard the gossip, and
laughed at it.  He naturally admired her, and once, long before her
marriage, he thought he was in love with her; but after a rigid
self-examination he came to the conclusion that he had not been really
desperately in love with any woman in his life, and promised himself not
to commit any such folly now.  Therefore, he laughed heartily at his old
servant's ominous but well-meant warning.

"I'm not the sort of man to marry, Parsons," he said.  "Truth to tell,
I'm too much of an old fogey for women to care for me.  And as for this
unknown Muriel, well, I don't think you need have much fear that I shall
commit any matrimonial indiscretion with her.  I expect her ladyship was
only joking, and you took her words seriously."

"No, she wasn't joking," declared the old man in all seriousness.  "You
mark my words, Master Dudley, that woman is not your friend."

Again Chisholm laughed airily, and sipped his whiskey, while the old
man, satisfied with his parting shot, went out, giving a grunt of
dissatisfaction as he closed the door noiselessly behind him.

"Poor old Parsons!  He thinks I'm going to the devil!  Well, I wonder
what's in the wind?" observed Dudley aloud to himself when he was again
alone.  "I've noticed a curious change in Claudia's manner of late.
What can be her object in bringing about my marriage, except that
perhaps my alliance with one or other of the insipid young ladies who
are so often passed before me for inspection, might stifle the ugly
scandal that seems to have arisen about us.  She's a clever woman--the
cleverest woman in London, but horribly indiscreet.  I wonder whether
that's really the truth.  But marriage!  _Au grand jamais_!" and he
raised his glass again and took a deep draught.

"No," he went on, "Claudia is never so charming as when she has some
little intrigue or other on hand; but I must really get at the bottom of
this, and find out the _belle inconnue_.  Parsons is no fool, but the
old boy is a Methodist, and hates everything in petticoats," and he
laughed lightly to himself as he recollected the old fellow's sage, and
perhaps justifiable, reprimands in his wilder college days.  "I know
I've been a fool--an absolute, idiotic fool with Claudia--and she's been
equally foolish.  People have talked, but without any foundation for
their impertinent gossip, and now she, of course, finds herself in a
hole.  Dick Nevill was the best of good fellows, but she never loved
him.  Her marriage was merely one of her _caprices de coeur_.  I don't
think she could really love anybody for longer than a week.  Yes,
Parsons is right.  He always is.  I've been an ass--a downright ass!" he
added with sudden emphasis.  "I must go and see her tomorrow, and end
all this confounded folly."

From the table he took up the letter he had received on his return home,
and about which he had questioned his servant.  Again he read it
through, stroking his dark moustache thoughtfully, and knitting his
brows.

"Writing is woman's _metier_.  I wonder what she wants to see me about
so particularly," he went on, still speaking to himself.  "I wired to
her saying, `The House is sitting late,' so she surely couldn't be
expecting me.  But it's rather unusual for her to send out urgent notes
at midnight.  No, _la belle capricieuse_ has no discretion--she never
will have."

And although the great marble clock on the mantelshelf chimed four, he
sat with his dark and serious eyes fixed upon the embers, reviewing the
chapters of his past.

He saw the folly of his dalliance at the side of Claudia Nevill _en
plein jour_.  He put to himself the question whether or not he really
loved her, and somehow could not bring himself to return a distinct
negative.  She was graceful, charming and handsome, the centre of the
smartest set in London, a _grande dame_ whose aid had been useful to him
in more ways than one.  As he sat there in the silence of the night, he
recollected those pleasant hours spent with her at Albert Gate, where
they so often dined together, and where she would afterwards sing to him
those old Italian love-songs in her sweet contralto, beaming upon him
with her coquettish smile, half languid, half _moquer_; those drives
together in the park, and those long walks they had taken when,
accompanied by her mother, she had visited him at Wroxeter Castle.  Yes,
all were pleasant memories, yet he felt that between him and her love
was an impossibility.  As this was the case, the less they saw of one
another in the future, even _en bon camarade_, the better for them both.

This was not a pleasant decision, for Dudley Chisholm made few friends,
and was nothing of a ladies' man.  He looked upon life around him as
_contes pour rire_.  His friends were mostly bachelors like himself, and
in all the wide range of his acquaintances he had scarcely any women
associates, and, except Claudia, not a single one in whom he could
confide.  Women courted him everywhere, of course.  It was not to be
supposed that a popular, good-looking man of his wealth and fame was not
actively angled for in various directions; but to all attempted
flirtations he gave a polite negative.  Hence it was that these
disappointed women revenged themselves by starting the ill-natured
gossip about his relations with Claudia Nevill, the smart little widow,
who was still young, who gave such lavish entertainments, who moved in
the most select set in London, and at whose side he was so frequently to
be seen.

The old baron, his father, who lived the life of a recluse up at
Dunkeld, had written to him upon the subject only a few weeks before,
and to-night even his own servant had frankly expressed his opinion of
her.  _Dieu le veut_.

Dudley Chisholm sighed.  He was an honest man, and these thoughts
troubled him greatly.  He feared for her reputation more than for his
own.  As he was a man, what did it matter?  It did not occur to him how
much it flattered that voluptuous _reveuse_ to possess as her cavalier
the man of the hour, the man about whom half England was at that moment
talking.  All he felt was that they had both been indiscreet--horribly
indiscreet.

Yes; to-morrow he must end it all.  The tongue of scandal must be
silenced at once and for ever.

He had risen to stir the fire when the stillness was suddenly broken by
the sharp ring of the telephone-bell outside the room.  A moment later
Parsons announced that some one desired to speak with him.  As it was no
uncommon occurrence for him to be rung up in the middle of the night by
the Foreign Office officials, he walked up to the instrument and
inquired who was there.

"Is that you, Dudley?" asked the soft voice he knew so well.  "I called
this afternoon, and I've been waiting for you ever since half-past two,
when the House rose.  You've had my note, of course.  Why don't you
come?  Justine will open the door to you.  I know it's very indiscreet,
but I must see you to-night on an important matter--at once.  Do you
understand, Dudley?"

CHAPTER THREE.

IN WHICH DUDLEY CHISHOLM IS FRANK.

The mellow autumn sunlight streamed full into the bright morning-room at
Albert Gate where Dudley Chisholm was standing before the great
wood-fire with his hands behind his back.  It was a handsome apartment,
solidly furnished and fully in keeping with the rest of the rooms in the
huge mansion, which was acknowledged to be one of the finest in the West
End.

Before him, nestling in the cosy depths of her luxurious chair, sat its
owner, young, dark-haired, with soft languorous eyes, her long and
radiant tresses bound carelessly and hanging in as loose and rippled a
luxuriance as the hair of the _Venus a la Coquille_.  No toilette was
more becoming than her pale blue _neglige_ of softest Indian texture,
with its profusion of chiffon about the arms and bosom, a robe the very
negligence of which was the supreme perfection of art; no _chaussure_
more shapely than the little Cairene slipper fantastically broidered
with gold and pearls, into which the tiny foot she held out to the fire
to warm was slipped.  At that moment, perhaps, Claudia Nevill, who was
exquisitely beautiful at all hours, looked her freshest and loveliest.
She sat there thinking, while the sunbeams shone on the dazzling
whiteness of her skin, on the luminous depths of her wonderful eyes, on
her loosely bound tresses, and on the plain gold circlet on her fair
left hand--the badge of her alliance with a dead lord and the signet of
her title to reign a Queen of Society.

Sitting there among her soft cushions she was indeed a lovely woman, an
almost girlish figure, with a face oval and perfect, a countenance sweet
and winning, a true type of English beauty, who had been portrayed in a
very notable picture by a famous Academician.  Acknowledged on all hands
to be one of the prettiest women in London, she was proud and splendid
in the abundance of the power she exercised over her world, which was
enchanted by her fascination and obedient to her magic, let her place
her foot upon its neck and rule it as she would.  There was swung for
her the rich incense of worship wherever she moved; and she gave out
life and death, as it were, with her smile and her frown, with a
soft-whispered word or a _moue boudeuse_.  From a station of comparative
obscurity, where her existence had threatened to pass away in cotton
blouses amid the monotony of a dull cathedral town, her beauty had
lifted her to dazzling rank as wife of one of England's wealthiest men,
and her tact had taught her to grace it so well that, forgetting to
carp, high society agreed to bow before her.  In the exclusive set in
which she moved she created a _furore_; she became the mode; she gave
the law and made the fashion.  Thus by the double right of her own
resistless fascination and the dignity of her late lord's name, Claudia
Nevill was a power in smart London, and an acknowledged leader of her
own spheres of _ton_, pleasure and coquetry.

Her ladyship was herself, and was all-sufficient for herself.  On her
_debut_ she was murmured at, and society had been a little slow to
receive her; but her delicate azure veins were her _sangre azul_, her
white hands were her _seize quartiers_, her marvellous black tresses
were her _bezants d'or_, and her splendidly luminous eyes her blazonry.
Of a verity, Venus needs no Pursuivant's marshalling.

As she sat gazing pensively into the fire a flush had spread over the
fairness of her brow, her fingers played idly with her chiffons, and the
corners of her lips twitched slightly.  Her thoughts were not pleasing.

The man who had been held to her by her magical witchery had been
speaking, and she had shrunk slightly when she heard him.  He had not
obeyed her wilful caprice and visited her when she summoned him, but had
waited until morning.

The words he had just uttered, outspoken and manly, had been fraught
with all she would willingly have buried in oblivion for ever: they
awoke remembrances that caused her to wince; they were of a kind to fret
and embitter her haughty life.  With his calm words there came back to
her all the shame she burned to ignore and put behind her, as though it
never had been; they brought with them all the echoes of that early and
innocent affection to which she had so soon been faithless and disloyal.

She was cold, though she knew coldness to be base; she was restless
under his eyes, though she knew that so much love looked at her from
them; she was stung with impatience and with false pride, though she
knew that in him she saw the very saviour of her existence.

Her eyelids fell, her white forehead flushed, her soft cheeks burned as
she heard him.  She breathed quickly in agitation; at the sound of his
voice the warm and reverent tenderness of long ago once more sprang to
light in her heart.

He watched her, accurately reading her emotions and gazing at the
marvellous change wrought in her.  She was superb; she was like a noble
sculptor's dream of Aspasia.  He looked at her for several minutes,
while speechlessness held them both as captives.

At last she raised her head, and with a sudden pang of unbearable agony,
cried:

"You are cruel, Dudley!--cruel!  I cannot bear such words from you!"

"I have only spoken the truth, Claudia," he replied in the same low,
calm tone as he had before used.  Their eyes met.  She knew that he read
her soul; she knew that he had not lied.

She--now become keenly critical, scornfully indifferent, and very
difficult to impress--was struck as she had never been before by the
authority, the dignity, the pure accent of his voice, and his steady,
thorough manliness.

He stood gazing down at her with a look under which her dark eyes sank.
There was a sternness in his words that moved her with a sense almost of
fear.  The greatness, the singularity, the mystery of this life, that
had so long been interwoven with her own, bewildered her; she could not
fully comprehend these qualities.

Little by little she had been drawn away from him, till between them
scarcely a bond remained.  As he fixed his eyes upon her lovely face, it
occurred to him to wonder whether, after all, he would have been so
selfishly in error, so blind a traveller in the mists of passion, if he
had kept her in his own hands, under his own law and love?  Would he not
have made her happiness far purer, her future safer, because nearer God,
than they now were, brilliant, imperious, pampered, exquisite creature
though she had become?  She was great, she was lovely, she was popular,
she entertained princes, she was unrivalled; but where was that "divine
nature" with which he had once, in the bygone days, believed her to be
dowered?  Where was it now?

"Your words are cruel, Dudley!  That you should speak like this!  My
God!  Tell me that you don't mean it!" she cried suddenly, after a long
silence, restless beneath the fixed and melancholy look which she could
not meet.

"Listen, Claudia," he said, still quite calmly, standing erect with his
back to the fire.  "What I have just said I have long wanted to say, but
have always put it off for fear of hurting your feelings--for fear of
reproaching you for what is mainly my own folly."

"But you have reproached me!" she cried in a hard voice.  "You tell me
this with such a _nonchalant_ air that it has at last awakened me to the
bitter truth--you don't love me!"

"I have spoken as much for your own good as for mine," he answered.  "We
must end this folly, Claudia--we--"

"Folly!  You call my love folly!" she exclaimed, starting forward.  Life
had been so fair with her.  The years had gone by in one continual blaze
of triumph.  She was the smart Lady Richard Nevill, whose name was on
everybody's tongue; she was satiated with offers of love.  And yet this
man had coldly exposed to her the naked truth.  Intoxicated with homage,
indulgence, extravagance and pleasure, her conscience had become stifled
and her memory killed; her heart scarcely knew how to beat without the
throbs of vanity or triumph.  So she had lived her life in freedom--
absolute freedom.  Vague rumours had been whispered in the boudoirs of
Berkeley Square and Grosvenor Gardens concerning her, but with the
sceptre of her matchless loveliness and the skill of a born tactician,
she cleared all obstacles, overruled all opponents, bore down all
hesitations, and silenced all sneers.  "Folly?--you call my love folly,
Dudley?"

"We have both been foolish, Claudia--very foolish," he answered, facing
her and looking gravely into her dark eyes, in which shone the light of
unshed tears.  "People are talking, and we must end our folly."

"And you fear that the teacup tittle-tattle of my enemies may endanger
your official position and retard your advancement, eh?" she asked,
knitting her dark brows slightly.

"Of late our names have been coupled far too frequently--mainly owing to
our own indiscretions."

"Well, and if they have?" she asked defiantly.  "What matters?  The
amiable gossips have coupled my name quite falsely with a dozen
different men during the past twelve months, and am I a penny the worse
for it?  Not in the least.  No, my dear Dudley, you may just as well
admit the truth.  Your father has written to you about your too frequent
presence in my society and our too frequent teas on the terrace--he told
Lady Uppingham so, and she, of course, told me.  He has asked you to cut
me as a--well, as an undesirable acquaintance."

"What my father has written is my own affair, Claudia," he answered.
"You know me well, and we have hidden few secrets from one another.
Surely we may part friends."

"Then you actually mean what you've said?" she asked, opening her
magnificent eyes to their full extent, as with a sigh she raised herself
from her former attitude of luxurious laziness.

"Most certainly!  It has pained me to speak as I have done, and I can
only crave your forgiveness if anything I've said has caused you
annoyance.  But we have to face the hard and melancholy fact that we
must end it all."

"Simply because you fear that a spiteful paragraph regarding us may
appear in _Truth_, or some similar paper, and that your official chief
may demand an explanation.  Well, _mon cher_, I gave you credit for
possessing the proverbial pluck and defiance of the Chisholms.  It
seems, however, that I was mistaken."

He looked at her without making an immediate reply.  He was thinking of
what old Parsons had alleged on the previous night in regard to the
mysterious Muriel.  Should he mention it, or should he reserve to
himself the knowledge of her inexplicable resolve to effect his marriage
with an unknown girl?

As became a discreet man, who dealt daily in the secrets of a nation, he
reflected for a moment.  He quickly came to the conclusion that silence,
at least for the present, was the most judicious policy.

He had once loved this woman, long ago in the golden days of youth, and
their love had been of a purely platonic character.  But during the past
couple of years, now that she was released from the marital bond,
Claudia's actions had exceeded all the bounds of discretion.  And even
now, when the silent passion which he had struggled against so long as
merely a selfish and vain desire was conquered, he was, nevertheless, to
a great extent still under the spell of her marvellous witchery.

"I regret, Claudia, that you should upbraid me for speaking so frankly
and for thus consulting our mutual interests," he said at last, as,
crossing to the table and leaning against it easily, he regarded her
with a melancholy expression upon his face.  "We have been friends for a
good many years; indeed, ever since you were a child and I was at
college.  Do you remember those days, long ago, when at Winchester we
were boy and girl lovers?  Do you remember?" he went on, advancing to
her and placing his strong hand tenderly upon her shoulder.  "Do you
ever recall those sunny afternoons when we used to meet clandestinely,
and go for long walks through the meadows round Abbots Barton in deadly
terror of every one we met lest we should be recognised?  Do you
remember how, beneath the stars that sweet-scented night in July, we
swore eternal friendship and eternal love?"

She nodded in the affirmative, but no word passed the lips so tightly
pressed together.

"And what followed?" he continued.  "We drifted apart, I to Oxford, and
on into the world; and you, like myself, forgot.  You married the man
who was my best friend; but for what purpose?  Claudia, let me speak
plainly, as one who is still your friend, although no longer your lover.
You married Dick Nevill in order to escape the deadly dulness of Abbots
Barton and to enter the kingdom of omnipotence, pleasure and triumphant
vanity, as a sure deliverance from all future chance of obscurity.  You
became at once the idol, the leader, the reigning beauty of your sphere.
Poor Dick was the slave of your flimsiest caprice; he ministered to
your wishes and was grateful for your slightest smile.  He died--died
while you were away enjoying yourself on the Riviera--and I--"

"No!" she exclaimed wildly, rising to her feet and covering her face
with her hands in deep remorse.  "No, Dudley!  Spare me all that!  I
know.  My God!  I know--I know, alas! too well!  I never loved him!"

"Then if you regard our folly in a proper light, Claudia," he said
earnestly, with his hand placed again upon her shoulder, "you will at
once see that my decision is for the best."

"You intend to leave me?" she asked huskily.

"It is the only way," he replied with a catch in his voice.  "We have
courted scandal sufficiently."

"But you cannot cast me off, Dudley?" she cried, suddenly springing
towards him and wildly flinging her beautiful arms about his neck.  "You
shall never leave me, because I love you.  Are you blind?  Don't you
understand?  Don't you see that I love you, Dudley?"

"You loved me once, in those old days at Winchester," he said, slowly
disengaging himself from her embrace.  "But not now."

"I do!" she cried.  "I swear that I do!  You are jealous of all those
men who flatter me and hang about me wherever I go; but I care nothing
for the whole crowd of them.  You know me," she went on; "you know that
I live only for you--for you."  Her words did not correspond with the
sentiments she expressed to the woman who had accompanied her to his
chambers.  He reflected for a moment; then he said:

"Admiration I have for you, Claudia, as the most beautiful woman in
London, but I think in this discussion we may both omit the word `love'
as entirely superfluous.  We are children no longer.  Let us face the
truth.  Our acquaintanceship ripened into love while we were yet in our
teens.  Then in maturer years it faded out completely, the
acquaintanceship being renewed only when, on the death of your husband,
you wanted a friend--and found one in me."

"And now?" she asked.

"Now you have other friends--many others."

"Ah! you are jealous!  I knew you were!" she exclaimed in a reproachful
tone of voice, her glorious eyes flashing.  "You believe that I don't
love you!  You believe me capable of lying to you--to you, of all men!"

Chisholm remained silent.

CHAPTER FOUR.

REVEALS A PECCANT PASSION.

The brilliant woman, ignorant of his meaning, but comprehending only
that he deemed her inconstant and unworthy, stood with tears in her
eyes--tears which sprang partly from sorrow, partly from offence.  She
knew within herself that she was heartless and wrong; but, none the
less, she felt herself aggrieved.

"Claudia," he said at last, looking straight at her, "our mutual
protestations of love ended long ago.  We have been friends--close
friends; but as for love, well, when a woman really loves a man she does
not bestow her smiles upon a score of other admirers."

"Ah! you reproach me for being smart," she cried.  "I am a woman, and
may surely be forgiven any little _caprices de coeur_."

He shrugged his shoulders.

"Your attachment to me was one of your caprices, Claudia."

"Then you don't believe that I really have within my heart one atom of
real affection for you?" she asked seriously.

"Your love for me is dead," he answered gravely.  "It died long ago.
Since then you have made other conquests, and to-day half London is at
your feet.  I, Dudley Chisholm, am a man who has had an unwelcome
popularity thrust upon him, and it is only in the natural order of
things that I should follow in your train.  But, as my place in your
heart has long ago been usurped, why should we, intimate friends as we
are, make a hollow pretence that it still exists?"

His voice remained calm and unbroken during his speech, yet there was an
accent in it that thrilled through her heart.  As she listened, stirred
at heart by a strange emotion, her truer nature told her that she had by
her caprice and folly fallen in his esteem.  She had left the greatness
that was pure and lofty for the greatness which was nothing better than
tinsel.

"Once, Claudia, I loved you.  In those days, before your marriage, you
were my ideal--my all in all.  You wedded Dick, and I--well, I can
honestly say that during those two years of your married life I never
entered your house.  We met, here and there, at various functions, but I
avoided you when I could, and never accepted your invitations.  Why, you
ask?  Well, I'll tell you.  Because I loved you."

Her head was bowed; a stifled sob escaped her.

"When you were free," he went on, "it was different.  In your grief you
wrote to me, and I at once came to you.  At first you were mournful in
your retirement; then of a sudden, after a few short months, you were
seized by an overweening ambition to become a queen of society.  I
watched you; I saw your indiscretions; I spoke to you, and your answer
was an open defiance.  Then it was that my sympathy with you gradually
diminished.  You had become a smart woman, and had developed that
irremediable disorder which every smart woman nowadays is bound sooner
or later to develop--a callous heart.  The crowd of men about you became
as so many puppets ready to execute your imperious will, and soon, as I
expected, the fiery breath of scandal seared your good name.  You
laughed, knowing well that the very fact of your being talked about
added lustre to your popularity as a smart hostess.  I regretted all
this, because my belief in your honesty--that belief which had first
come to me long ago in the green meadows round about Winchester--was
utterly shattered.  The naked truth become exposed--you were deceiving
me."

"No, Dudley!" the woman wailed beseechingly.  "Spare me these
reproaches!  I cannot bear them--and least of all from you.  I have been
foolish--very foolish, I admit.  Had you been my husband I should have
been a different woman, leading a quiet and happy life, but as I am
now--I--" She burst into a torrent of tears without finishing her
confession.

"If you acknowledge what I have said to be the truth, Claudia, we are
agreed, and more need not be said," he observed, when, a few moments
later, she had grown calm again.

"You are tired of me, Dudley," she declared, suddenly raising her head
and looking straight into his eyes.  "We have been--close friends, shall
I say? long enough.  You have found some other woman who pleases you--a
woman more charming, more graceful than myself.  Now, confess to me the
truth," she said with deep earnestness.  "I will not upbraid you," she
went on in a hard, strained voice.  "No, I--I will be silent.  I swear I
will.  Now, Dudley, tell me the truth."

"I have met no woman more beautiful than yourself, Claudia," Chisholm
answered in a deep tone.  "You have no rival within my heart."

"I don't believe it!" she cried fiercely.  "You could never reproach me
as you have done unless some woman who is my enemy had prompted you.
Your father has written to you, that I know; but you are not the man to
be the slave of paternal warnings.  No," she said harshly, "it is a
woman who has drawn you away from me.  I swear not to rest till I have
found out the truth!"

When she showed her _griffes_, this bright _capricieuse_, the leader of
the smartest set in town, was, he knew, merciless.

But at that moment he only smiled at her sudden outburst of jealousy.

"I have already spoken the truth," he said.  "I have never yet lied to
you."

"Never, until to-day," was her sharp retort.  "I suppose you think that,
because of your responsible official position, you ought now to develop
into the old fogey, marry some scraggy girl with red hair and half a
million, and settle down to sober statesmanship and the Carlton.  As you
have found the future partner of your joys, you think it high time to
drop an undesirable acquaintance."

Her words were hard ones, spoken in a tone of biting sarcasm.  In an
instant his countenance grew serious.

"No, Claudia," he protested quickly.  "You entirely misjudge me.  I have
neither the intention nor the inclination to marry.  Moreover, I confess
to you that I am becoming rather tired of the everlasting monotony of
the House.  The scraggy female with the red hair, who, according to your
gospel, is to be the _chatelaine_ of Wroxeter, is still unselected.  No.
You have not understood me, and have formed entirely wrong conclusions
as to my motive in speaking as I have.  I repeat that the step I am now
taking is one for our mutual advantage.  People may talk about us in
Belgravia, but they must not in Battersea."

"And you wish every one to know that we have quarrelled?" she said
petulantly.  He saw by her countenance that she was still puzzled.  Was
it possible that she was thinking of the unknown Muriel, whom she had
declared he must marry?

As a matchmaker, Claudia was certainly entering upon an entirely new
_role_.

"We shall not quarrel, I hope," he answered.

"Why should we?  By mutual consent we shall merely remain apart."

There was another long and painful silence.  Her chiffons slowly rose
and fell as she sighed.  What he had said had produced a greater
impression upon her than he anticipated.  No other man could have spoken
to her as he had done, for every word of his brought back to her the
long-forgotten days of their youthful love, and of those passionate
kisses beneath the stars.  In those brief moments she tried to examine
her heart, but could not decide whether she still loved him, or whether
his intention of leaving her had only aroused within her a sense of
offended dignity.

"And your determination is never to see me?" she asked him in a
despondent tone of voice.

"I shall only meet you upon chance occasions in society," was his
answer.

"And when people have forgotten--then you will return to me?  Give me
your promise, Dudley."

"I cannot promise."

"Ah!" she cried; "why not at once confess what I believe is the truth,
that you have grown tired of me?"

"No.  I have not grown tired," he declared in a fervent voice.  "We have
always been firm friends, and I hope that our friendship will continue.
For my own part, my regard for you, Claudia, is not in the least
impaired.  You are a woman, and the victim of circumstances.  Hence, I
shall always remain faithfully your friend."

"Dudley," she said in a calmer tone, speaking very earnestly, "remember
that women never change their natures, only their faces.  So long have
we been associated, and such intimate friends have we been, that I have
grown to regard you as my own personal property.  _C'est assez_."

"I quite understand," answered the man in whom Her Majesty's Prime
Minister possessed such complete confidence.  "You should, for your own
sake, Claudia, regard this matter in a proper light.  If we do not by
our actions give the lie direct to all this tittle-tattle, then an open
scandal must result.  Surely if we, by mutual consent, remain apart, we
may still remain in _bon accord_?"

"But you are mine, Dudley!" she cried, again throwing her snowy,
half-bare arms around his neck and kissing him passionately.

"Then since you hold me in such esteem, why not act in my interests?" he
asked, for in argument he was as shrewd as a man could possibly be, and
had passed with honours through that school of _finesse_, the Foreign
Office.

"I--well, I decline to release you, if your freedom is to be used in
dallying at the side of another woman," she replied, heedless of his
question.

"But I have no intention of doing so.  Surely you know my nature well
enough?  You know how fully occupied I am as Under-Secretary, and that
my presence here from time to time has scarcely been in harmony with my
duties at the Foreign Office and in the House.  I have little leisure;
and I do not possess that inclination for _amourettes_ which somehow
appears to seize half the legislators sent to Westminster."

"I know!  I know!" she replied, still clinging to him, stroking the dark
hair from his brow with the velvety hand which he had so often kissed.
"I admit that you have always been loyal to me, Dudley.  Sometimes, with
a woman's quick jealousy, I have doubted you, and have watched you
carefully, always, however, to find my suspicions utterly unfounded.  Do
you remember what you told me when we walked together in the park at
Wroxeter that morning last summer?  Do you recollect your vows of
eternal friendship to me--unworthy though I may be?"  She paused, and
there was a slight catch in her voice.

"Alas!  I am fully aware of all my failings, of all my indiscretions, of
all my caprices; but surely you do not heed this spiteful gossip which
is going the rounds?  You do not believe me so black as I am painted--do
you?" and again she stroked his brow with her caressing hand.

"I believe only what I have seen with my own eyes," he answered rather
ambiguously.  "You have been indiscreet--extremely indiscreet--and I
have often told you so.  But your ambition was to become the most _chic_
woman in town, and you have accomplished it.  At what cost?"

She made no response.  Her head was bowed.

"Shall I tell you at what cost?" he went on very gravely.  "At the cost
of your reputation--and of mine."

"Ah! forgive me, Dudley!" she cried quickly.  "I was blind then, dazzled
by the compliments heaped upon me, bewildered by the wealth that had so
suddenly become mine after poor Dick's death.  I was rendered callous to
everything by my foolish desire to shine as the smartest and most
popular woman in London.  I did not think of you."

"Exactly," he said.  "Your admission only clinches my argument that,
although we have been close friends, no real affection has of later
years existed between us.  Frankly, had you loved me, you could not have
acted with such reckless indiscretion as to risk my name, my position,
and my honour."

He spoke a truth which admitted of no question.

"Now," he went on at last, slowly unclasping her clinging arms from his
neck.  "It is already late and I have an important appointment at the
Foreign Office, for which I am overdue.  We must part."

"Never!" she cried wildly.  "You shall not leave me like this!  If you
do, I shall call at your chambers every day, and compel you to see me."

"Then I must give orders to Parsons not to admit you," he answered quite
calmly.

"That man of yours is an old bear.  Why don't you get rid of him, and
have some one less fossilised?" she exclaimed in a gust of fury.  "When
I called the other day with Lady Meldrum, he was positively rude."

"Lady Meldrum!" exclaimed Chisholm, pricking up his ears.  "Who's she?"

"Oh, a woman who has rather come to the front of late--wife of old Sir
Henry Meldrum, the great Glasgow iron-master.  We were driving past, and
I wanted to see you, so she came in with me, rather than wait in the
cold.  Quite a smart woman--you ought to know her."

"Thanks," responded the Under-Secretary coldly.  "I have no desire to
have that pleasure.  Smart women don't interest me in the least."

"That is meant, I suppose, as a compliment," she observed.  "You are
certainly in a very delightful mood to-day, Dudley."

"I have at least spoken the truth," he said, piqued by the knowledge
that for some mysterious reason this woman was conniving with a new star
in the social firmament, Lady Meldrum, wife of his pet abomination, a
Jubilee knight, to effect his marriage with the unknown Muriel--her
daughter, of course.

"You have unearthed and placed before me all the most ugly phases of my
career," cried the unhappy woman with a quick, defiant glance; "and now,
after your flood of reproaches, you declare that in future we are to be
as strangers."

"For the sake of our reputations."

"Our reputations?  Rubbish!" she laughed cynically.  "What reputation
has either of us to lose?"  He bit his lip.  A hasty retort arose within
him, but he succeeded in stifling it.

"We need not, I think, discuss that point," he said very coldly.

She stood in silence waiting for him to proceed.

"Well," she asked at last, with an air of mingled defiance and sarcasm.
"And what more?"

"Nothing.  I have finished.  I have only to wish you adieu."

"Then you really intend to abandon me?" she asked very gravely, her
small hand trembling.

"I have already explained my intentions.  They were quite clear, I
think."

"And you decline to reconsider them?"

"They admit of no reconsideration," he answered briefly.

"Very well then, adieu," she said in a cold and bitter voice, for in
those few moments her manner had changed, and she was now a frigid,
imperious woman with a heart of stone.

"Adieu, Claudia," he said, bending with a stiff courtliness over the
hand she had extended to him.  "You will one day see that this step of
mine has saved us both from degradation and ruin.  Good-bye.  Recollect
that even though we are apart, I remain still, as I have ever been, your
devoted friend."

Her hand dropped limply from his grasp as she stood there like a
beautiful statue in the centre of the room.  With a final glance at her
he turned and walked straight out.

For a moment after the door had closed, she still remained in the same
position in which he had left her.  Then, in a sudden frenzy of
uncontrollable passion, she hooked her nervous fingers in her chiffons
and tore them into shreds.

"He has defied me!" she exclaimed wildly, bursting into a flood of hot
tears.  "He has defied me, and cast me off--_me, who love him_!"

CHAPTER FIVE.

DESCRIBES AN ENGLISH HOME.

Three miles from the long white road that runs between sedate old
Shrewsbury and the town of Wellington, there stood a prominent object in
the landscape, high upon a wooded hill to the right.  It was the ancient
castle of Wroxeter, one of the best preserved and most historic of the
Norman castles of England.

Seen through the trees, golden in their autumn tints, it was an imposing
grey pile, rich in turrets with narrow windows, whence, long ago,
archers had showered their shafts, but which were now half concealed by
an evergreen mantle.  Closer inspection showed that it was a fortress no
longer.  The old moat, once fed from the winding Severn close by, was
now a well-kept garden with gravelled walks and trees cut into fantastic
shapes, while around the building were level lawns sweeping away to the
great park beyond.

One wing of the fine old feudal castle was in decay.  The shattered
state of the tower was due to a siege conducted by Cromwell, and the ivy
had overgrown the ruins.  All the other parts were in good order, stern
and impressive in regard to the exterior, yet luxurious within.  In the
great courtyard, that had through the Middle Ages so often rung with the
clank of sword and the tread of armed men, moss grew between the
pebbles, and the echoes were only nowadays awakened by the wheels of the
high dog-cart which conveyed its owner to and from the railway station
at Shrewsbury.  The old drawbridge had been replaced by a gravel drive a
century ago; yet in the fine oak-panelled hall there still stood the
rust-stained armour of the departed Chisholms, together with the faded
and tattered banners carried by them in tournament and battle.

Built on the site of the Roman city called Vriconium, whilst in the park
and in neighbouring meadows traces of the city wall could still be seen,
the fosse and the basilica were still visible.  The history of Wroxeter
began with the Norman survey, the account given of it in Domesday Book
being as follows:

"Chisholme holds a hide and three roodlands in Wroxeter in this manor,
which was always included in the district of Haughmond, where the castle
is situated.  Roger had half a hide, and Ralph two roodlands.  There is
one plough and a half in the demesne, and seven villeins with ten
bondmen have four ploughs and a half.  The whole value in the time of
the Confessor was six pounds, it has since been estimated at six: but it
is now appreciated at nine pounds."

The portion now ruined was standing in those early days of England's
history, but it was not until the third year of Richard the Second's
reign that the other portion of the old fortress was completed by Sir
Robert Chisholm, who (together with Sir John Calveley of Chester and Sir
John Hawkwood of Haughmond Castle), was a celebrated captain of those
marauding bands that shared in the triumphs of Cressy and Poitiers.  The
following distich, by a mediaeval poet, records his prowess:

  "O Roberte Chisholme, per te fit Francia mollis,
  Ense tuo tollis praedas, dans vulnera collis."

  _O Robert Chisholm, the stubborn souls
  Of Frenchmen well you check;
  Your mighty blade has largely preyed,
  And wounded many a neck_.

During those stormy days of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
Wroxeter withstood many a fierce assault and sheltered not a few of
England's kings and queens as guests of the Chisholms, many of whom had
been favourites at Court and held official positions of high importance.
Queen Elizabeth was the last monarch to visit the castle, and the
memory of that event was kept green by the name given to the old-world
garden over-looking the Severn, which was known as the Queen's Garden.

It was a grand old building, this feudal home to which Dudley Chisholm
returned on the night following the farewell scene which had taken place
between himself and the frivolous woman with whose name his own had been
linked.  He had invited for three days' shooting two men--Colonel
Murray-Kerr, a retired military attache, and Henry Benthall, a man who
had been at college with him, and who had, after being called to the
bar, successfully contested East Glamorganshire.  All three had
travelled down from Euston together; but Dudley, after a sleepless
night, had risen long before his guests and wandered through the vast
and lonely chambers, full of melancholy musings.  He would have put the
men off, for he was in no mood to entertain, but there had been no time.

So he spent an idle hour alone before his guests appeared for breakfast.

He wandered through the great and gloomy hall, the vaulted ceiling of
which had so often echoed to the laughter of the banquets held there in
bygone days.  It was now tenanted only by the many suits of armour that
had belonged to his illustrious forefathers.  His steps sounded in a
grim fashion upon the floor of polished oak, and as he passed the huge
fireplace, where once the oxen had been roasted whole to satisfy the
Gargantuan appetites of mediaeval warriors, a servant threw open the
door leading into the long picture gallery.

What an array of fine pictures was there!  For each member of this
ancient family his or her arms had been painted in the right-hand corner
of the canvas.  The Chisholms were a handsome, stalwart race, the men
strong and the women beautiful.  In the features of nearly all, however,
there was the same predominant characteristic, the stern gravity, which
in Dudley was so often mistaken for actual asperity.  Before the last
portrait at the farther end of the gallery--the picture of a young and
eminently beautiful woman--the young man paused.  It was his mother.

Deep in contemplation, he stood before it for a long time.  His lips
moved, but no sound escaped them.  At last, with a deep sigh, he passed
on, still walking at the same slow pace, plunged in his melancholy
thoughts.

He passed round the big quadrangle, through one great room after the
other: the blue drawingroom, Anne Boleyn's sitting-room, the grand
drawing-room, the library, each an apartment of fine dimensions, mostly
panelled in oak dark with age and containing antique furniture, curios
connected with the family history through eight unbroken centuries, with
many other priceless works of art.

Two or three of the smaller rooms, such as the breakfast-room, the
dining-room, and his dead mother's boudoir, were alone furnished in
modern style.  In all the others there seemed to linger an atmosphere of
bygone centuries.  This was the fine old home which so many mothers
coveted for their daughters.  Indeed, there were a hundred pretty and
well-born girls in London, each of whom was at that moment ready to
become chatelaine of Wroxeter.

But Dudley strolled on slowly, almost like a man in a dream.  He was
seldom at Wroxeter out of the shooting season.  The place was to him
something of a white elephant.  He had spent his boyhood there, but
recollections of the rather unhappy life and early death of that
grave-faced woman, his mother, caused him to dislike the old place.  One
or two memories he would fain forget--memories of his mother's sorrow
regarding her husband's mode of life and eccentricities.  Truth to tell,
husband and wife did not live happily together, and Dudley, knowing
this, had been his mother's sympathiser and champion.

These handsome rooms, with their ancient tapestries, wonderful carpets,
exquisite carvings, old Venetian mirrors and time-darkened gilt, even in
the gay light of morning seemed to him sombre and full of ghosts of the
past.  He only used the library and half a dozen of the smaller and more
modern rooms in the eastern wing.  The splendid state apartments which
he had just passed through he seldom visited.  No one entered them,
except the servants to clean and open the windows, and the upholsterer
who at fixed intervals came from Shrewsbury to examine the tapestries
worked centuries ago by the fair hands of the Chisholm women.

From the great drawing-room, a huge apartment with a rather low ceiling
curiously carved, he passed on, and traversing one of the ante rooms,
found himself in the long corridor which ran the whole length of the
quadrangle.  The stone flooring was worn hollow in the centre by the
tramp of generations of armed men, and the quaint arched doors were
heavy and studded with monstrous nails.  He stood there for a few
minutes, glancing through the diamond panes out into the ancient
courtyard.  His abstracted mood was suddenly disturbed by the sound of
the breakfast gong.  As his guests would be awaiting him, he must throw
care to the dogs for a few hours and try to amuse them.

Turning, he walked down the long corridor.  As he did so he recollected
the strange tradition which he had heard in his youth--namely, that in
this passage had been seen at certain intervals a strange old lady,
humpbacked and small, dressed in rusty black, who "walked" the corridor
even in the middle of the day, and then suddenly disappeared through a
door which for a full century past had been walled up.  This legendary
apparition was known to the family as Lady Margaret, and whenever she
showed herself in the corridor it was a presage of evil to the
Chisholms.

Dudley laughed within himself as he remembered his childish terror when
his old nurse used to relate those dramatic stories about her deformed
ladyship and the evil influence she exerted upon his house.  It is
strange how deeply rooted become many of the convictions of our
childhood, especially where a family superstition is concerned; and
Chisholm, even though he was a level-headed man of the world, had in his
more mature years found himself wondering whether, after all, there had
been any foundation for the legend.

Family ghosts do not, however, appear nowadays.  They were all "laid"
last century.  So he laughed again to himself and continued on his way
across the east wing to the bright breakfast-room, where his two guests
were already awaiting him.

"What a lazy beggar you are, Dudley!" cried Benthall, as his host
greeted them and took his seat at the head of the table.

"No, my dear fellow," protested the Under-Secretary.  "I--oh, well, I've
been up quite a long time, and have already consulted Marston about our
sport to-day.  He says there are some strong birds over in the Dean
Copse, so we'll work that this morning."

"Excellent!  I recollect the splendid sport we got there last year!"
exclaimed the colonel, a tall, white-haired, soldierly old fellow with a
somewhat florid complexion and a well-trimmed moustache.  He was a
first-class shot, and now that he had retired from the Diplomatic
Service, spent the whole of the shooting season at one house or another
in different parts of the country.  He was a popular, all-round
sportsman, always welcome at any house-party, for he was full of droll
stories, a bachelor, and a great favourite among the ladies.  The
announcement of a hostess to the effect that "Colonel Murray-Kerr will
be here," was always received with satisfaction by both sexes.  As he
had graduated as military attache at the Embassies in Vienna, St.
Petersburg, and, finally, in Rome, he was a cosmopolitan of
cosmopolitans, though at the same time a thorough Englishman, and one of
Dudley's most intimate friends.

There were letters on the table for their host, two bulky ones marked
"On His Majesty's Service," from the Foreign Office, and another, the
handwriting on the envelope of which he saw at a glance to be Claudia's.
He glanced at this, then placed it in his pocket unopened.

"Oh, read it, my dear fellow," laughed the colonel, quickly divining
that it was from a woman.  "Don't mind us in the least."

"Only tell us who's the lady," chimed in Benthall merrily.

"Oh, it's nothing," Dudley assured them, rather annoyed, nevertheless.

"From Lady Richard--eh?" suggested the old officer chaffingly.  "By
Jove!" he went on; "she's really charming.  I was staying last week down
at Fernhurst, the place old Meldrum has just bought in Sussex, and she
was there.  Quite a host of smart women were staying there, but she, of
course, eclipsed them all.  I fear she's a sad flirt, Dudley, my boy,
even though they say she's a bit fond of you."

"I know she's a flirt," Chisholm answered, rather thoughtfully.  The
mention of the name of Meldrum brought to his mind what Claudia had
admitted, namely, that she had taken Lady Meldrum to his rooms.

The old colonel, who always maintained a diplomatic smartness in his
attire, was a terrible gossip.  He was a living Debrett, and a guide to
knowledge affecting social affairs in half the courts of Europe.  He
knew everybody, as well as everything worth knowing about them.  This
was his hobby.  Perhaps he rode it all the more perseveringly because a
natural talent for inquisitiveness had been steadily cultivated during
his long service as an attache; for, as all the world knows, an official
of this standing is little better than a spy.  So, without any thought
of hurting his young host's feelings, he continued his reminiscences of
the house-party:

"We had splendid sport down at Fernhurst.  The birds were very strong,
and there were several excellent shots.  But Lady Richard was, of
course, the centre of all the attractions.  Every man Jack among the
males was absolutely her slave, lock, stock and barrel!  By Jove!  I
don't think in all my diplomatic career I've ever seen a woman play them
off one against the other with such _finesse_.  Meldrum seems to have
got into society wonderfully well of late.  The young Grand-Duke
Stanislas was there, and he made desperate love to the pretty widow.
Indeed, so marked were their flirtations, that several of the feminine
contingent declared themselves scandalised, and left.  But, of course,
the real truth was that they knew themselves to be entirely out of the
running.  One thing, however, struck me as curious--very curious: the
hostess, a rather matronly _bourgeoise_ person, seemed to throw the pair
into one another's society as much as possible.  At any rate, the
extravagant flirtation nearly resulted in an open scandal.  To my mind,
Dudley, she's playing a decidedly dangerous game.  Forgive me for saying
so, if she's more to you than a jolly acquaintance; but you know the
proverb about the pitcher going too often to the well."

"Angling after a Grand-Duke sounds bold," observed Benthall, attacking
his cutlet.  "I always thought, Dudley, old chap, that she had set her
mind on becoming mistress of Wroxeter."

"Oh, I know," exclaimed their host impatiently, although trying to
conceal his annoyance, "a lot of rot has been talked!  I'm quite well
aware of what you fellows mean.  But I assure you that I'm a confirmed
bachelor--just as confirmed as you, colonel--and, hang it! if report
speaks correctly, you're one of the worst of the woman-haters in the
whole of the Albany."

"I've never had any necessity to marry," laughed the old officer, his
cheeks flushing with good humour.

"I've piloted some ripping ball-skirts and tailor-made gowns through
half the courts of Europe, but I'm still heart-whole."

"A fine record," observed Harry Benthall with his mouth full.  At that
breakfast-table there was no ceremony, and words were certainly not
minced.

"Well, every one seems to be linking my name with Claudia Nevill's,"
Dudley remarked, after commencing his breakfast, "I really can't see
why."

"But I can," declared the colonel bluntly.  "You're a fool--if you'll
forgive me for saying so."

"Why?"

"A fool for giving a second thought to a woman of her stamp," he
answered.  "Good heavens! if you knew half the tales about her, you'd
cut her dead.  I wonder why the Meldrums invited her?  Suppose they
couldn't help it--or something."

"What tales?" asked Dudley, glancing inquiringly from one man to the
other.

"No.  I'm not going to besmirch any woman's character, my dear fellow,"
replied the elder man.  "Only, take my advice and have nothing more to
do with her--that's all.  She's no good to you, or indeed to any honest
man."

"Some foul scandal about her, I suppose," cried Chisholm, his brow
darkening for an instant.  As a matter of fact, he knew the scandal
quite well.  It was the common talk in every club in town.  But he
intended to champion her, even though he had escaped from her net.  "Why
don't you tell me?"

"It is unnecessary--utterly unnecessary," the colonel answered, making
as if breakfast were more important than gossip.

"A pretty woman, smart and popular as she is, always gets talked about,
and her enemies are sure to invent some cruel story or other.  Half the
women in London are envious of Claudia Nevill, hence all these absurd
and scandalous tales," Chisholm declared.

"Ah!" laughed the colonel, "as I said, you're gone on her, like the
others, Dudley.  You are old friends, every one knows.  It's a pity that
she's so reckless."

"In what manner has she been reckless?"

"Well, if you had been down at Fernhurst and seen her with the young
Grand-Duke, you wouldn't defend her actions as you are now doing--well,
by Jove! you couldn't.  I'm a man of the world, you know, but I must say
that the flirtation was a regular blizzard."

"And is every woman who glances prettily at a man from behind her fan,
or chats to a fellow in a conservatory, to be condemned?" asked his
host.  "If so, then society has suddenly become intensely puritanical.
Remember that the licence not allowed to an unmarried girl may
justifiably be employed by a widow."

"Widow!" laughed Murray-Kerr adjusting his monocle.  "My dear boy, I'm
perfectly with you; but then the fair Claudia is one in ten millions.
She's more like a girl of eighteen, in face, figure, and the choice of
lovers, than the usual prim and stale relict with whom we are all more
or less familiar."

"Just because she's popular, all this confounded gossip buzzes here,
there, and everywhere.  My name is coupled with hers, and all kinds of
ridiculous stories have been started about us.  I know, for too many of
them have come to my ears."

"Then if you know, Dudley, why don't you take my advice and cut her?"
asked the old officer, fixing his host with his keen eyes.

CHAPTER SIX.

IN WHICH THE COLONEL GROWS MYSTERIOUS.

Chisholm was silent.  The two men exchanged glances.  Since they were
his best and most confidential friends, he could not be offended in the
least at what they had said, especially as he knew quite well that they
had spoken plain, hard facts.

"Well," he said at last, in a metallic tone of voice, "the truth is, we
have parted."

"Then I cordially congratulate you, my dear fellow," declared the
red-faced old colonel bluntly.  "Forgive me, but you've been a fool over
her, an absolute fool, and couldn't see that she was deceiving you on
every hand.  Men had begun to sneer and laugh at you behind your back--
and, by Jove! you've had a narrow escape of making a complete ass of
yourself."

"I know.  I'm well aware of it," his host replied in a low tone.  "But
between ourselves, it's all over."

"Why between ourselves?" inquired Benthall.  "The world should, I think,
know, for your own sake?  _Pourquoi non_?"

"No.  I intend to keep it a secret--for her sake."  Both men were
silent.  The conversation had, indeed, been a strange one to take place
between a host and his guests.  But both men saw that although Claudia
and her lover had parted, there still lingered in Dudley Chisholm's
heart tender thoughts of that pretty, callous woman who was one of the
leaders of smart society in London.

"Very well," said Murray-Kerr at length, after a brief period of
silence.  "If you wish us to say nothing, we can only obey.  But,
nevertheless, my dear old chap, I, for one, congratulate you most
heartily upon your resolution.  A man in your shoes can't afford to risk
his reputation any longer.  Forgive me for speaking as I have done,
won't you?"

"Certainly, my dear fellow," he answered with a bitter smile.  "You've
both spoken as friends, and I've told you the plain truth, so what more
need be said?"

"Nothing," said the colonel.  "Stick to your resolution, and let Claudia
Nevill proceed at her own sweet will.  She'll marry some foreign
notability or other, I expect, now that she's in search of big game.
Then you'll be entirely free of her."

Dudley laughed again, and soon afterwards, much to his relief, the
conversation drifted into an easier channel.  Her letter, however,
remained in his pocket unopened.  What words of mad despair, he
wondered, did it contain?

He sat finishing his breakfast and chatting about various subjects.  But
his thoughts were of her--always of her.

When they rose, his two guests went out to see after their guns, while
he, remaining behind upon some pretext, tore open the letter.

It was brief, and had evidently been penned in one of those moments of
remorse which must come sooner or later to such a woman.

"You are cruel to leave me like this," she wrote.  "Surely, if you
really loved me, you would not care what the world might say.  I have
been foolish, I know, but am now penitent.  I see the folly of it all--
the folly of not keeping my secret and playing the hypocrite like other
women.  Surely love is not forbidden between us because you happen to
hold an official position!  Return to me, Dudley--for I love you!"

He sighed, then, crushing the letter in his hand, he flung it into the
fire, murmuring:

"No.  She's played me false--false!"

He recollected what the colonel had said in regard to the Grand-Duke
Stanislas, and saw with chagrin that the world was pitying him.

Before the blazing logs he stood, watching the leaping flames consume
the letter.  When the last spark had died from the black crackling
tinder, he sighed again, and reluctantly went out to join his guests.

The morning was dull and grey.  As they trudged on past the site of the
old Roman cemetery, down through Altringham Wood, across the wide
stretch of moorland known as Uckington Heath, at last crossing the old
highway of Watling Street and entering the Dean Copse, the sportsmen
agreed that October might have behaved in a handsomer fashion.  The
fierce north-east wind that had swept over the Welsh hills had died away
the evening before in a tumbled sea of fiery crimson and dense jagged
drift of sulphurous blue.  For days and days it had torn and shaken the
great elms in Wroxeter Park, until it had stripped them of the last
vestige of their autumn foliage, and now in the calm morning the leaves
in park and copse were lying in a deep, moist carpet of shimmering gold.
Nothing but the oaks had been able to withstand the fury of the blast;
these still bore their leafy flags bravely aloft, thousands and
thousands of their family flying proofs of staunchness on the flanks of
many a noble hill.  On the grass by the lane-side the dew was held in
uncomfortable abundance, and a few belated blackberries showed sodden in
the hedgerows.  On entering the copse the shooters trudged down the
narrow path, which was covered thickly with decaying leaves, and a few
moments later both dogs and guns got to work.

During their walk the conversation had for the most part dealt with the
condition of the birds.  The colonel, keen sportsman that he was,
telling of the execution effected by the six guns at Fernhurst;
describing the big bags made up at Lord Morton's place in Cumberland,
and how scarce the grouse had been in various districts in Scotland.

As Marston, the head-keeper, had predicted, birds were plentiful in the
Dean Copse.  Although the ground was rather difficult to work, the
guests had good reason to praise the Under-Secretary's preserves.  As
for the colonel, who scarcely ever missed, he was now in his element;
the heavier the bag became, the more brightly the old warrior's eyes
sparkled.  So excellent had been the sport, and, in consequence, so
quickly had the time passed, that the guests could hardly believe their
ears when the interval for lunch was announced.  Dudley, who was an
excellent shot, and who, on an ordinary occasion, would have entered
into the sport with becoming zest, throughout the morning had knocked
down the birds in a merely mechanical way, more to please his friends
than himself.  Secretly he wished himself back at the castle, in the
solitude of that old library which he used for his den at such times as
he was all by himself at Wroxeter.

"I think, sir, we ought to try the Holly Wood now," Marston suggested as
soon as they had eaten their sandwiches and drunk their sherry.  In
accordance with this view, they tramped down into the valley by Upton
Magna, and presently came to the spot indicated.  For the past two
seasons Dudley had been down at Wroxeter but seldom, one of the results
being that birds were very plentiful.  All three of the shooters were
kept busy until nearly three o'clock, when, after enjoying a grand day's
sport, the party turned towards the old inn at Uffington, where the
dog-cart was to meet them.

On the way across the brown fields, Benthall, deep in conversation with
Marston, was somewhat ahead, and Dudley walked at the colonel's side, a
smart, well-set-up figure in his drab shooting-clothes.

He was hesitating whether to broach a subject that was puzzling him.
Presently, however, unable longer to conceal his curiosity, he turned
suddenly to his companion, saying:

"You were speaking of Fernhurst at breakfast.  Let's see, hasn't Lady
Meldrum a daughter?"

"A daughter?" observed the colonel, looking at him.  "Certainly not.
There's no family."

"That's curious," Dudley said with an affected air of indifference.
"Somebody said she had a daughter named Muriel."

"A daughter named Muriel!" the old officer exclaimed.  "No, she has a
girl named Muriel who lives with her--a ward, I believe--and a
confoundedly pretty girl she is, too.  She wasn't much _en Evidence_
when I was down there.  I have my suspicions that during the house-party
she was sent away to the quieter atmosphere surrounding a maiden aunt."

"Oh, she's a ward, is she?" remarked Chisholm.  "What's her name?"

"Muriel Mortimer."

"A ward in Chancery, I suppose?"

"I'm not certain," replied Murray-Kerr hesitatingly.  "I only saw her
once, on the day of my arrival at Fernhurst.  She left for Hertfordshire
next day.  Lady Meldrum, however, seemed devoted to her--went up to town
to see her off, and all that sort of thing.  But who's been chattering
to you about her?"

"Oh, I heard her spoken of somewhere.  The fellow who told me said she
was rather pretty."

"Yes," the other answered in rather a strange and hesitating manner,
"she is--very pretty, and quite young."

"Do you know absolutely nothing more concerning her?"  Chisholm asked.
"You always know everything about everybody when you're in the
smoking-room at the Junior, you know."

"In the club a man may open his mouth, but it isn't always wise when
visiting friends," the colonel replied with a laugh.

"I don't quite follow you," his companion said.  "Surely Wroxeter is as
free as Charles Street, isn't it?"

"Well, no, not quite, my dear Dudley--not quite."

"Why?"

"Because there are some things that even I--plain-spoken as I am--would
rather leave unsaid."

Chisholm looked at him and saw the change upon the old fellow's
countenance.

"You're hiding something from me," the younger man said quickly.

"I don't deny that," was the other's response.  "But I really can't see
why you should so suddenly become the victim of an intense desire to
know the history of Lady Meldrum's ward.  Have you met her?"

"No, never."

"Then don't, that's all," was the mysterious answer.

"What the dickens do you mean, speaking in enigmas like this?  Surely
you can speak straight out?"

"No, not in this case, Dudley," the colonel said in a rather softer
tone.  "I told you sufficient this morning about Claudia Nevill, and all
I wish to urge is that you should avoid the pretty Muriel quite as
assiduously as you will her ladyship in future."

Chisholm was puzzled.  His companion was evidently aware of some fact
which, for a mysterious reason, he was reluctant to disclose.

"But I can't see your object in mystifying me like this!" he protested.
"We are friends--very old friends--surely you can at least tell me the
truth?"

"I've told you the truth, dear boy.  Muriel Mortimer is an undesirable
acquaintance for you.  Is not that a friendly warning."

"A warning, certainly--but hardly a friendly one," answered Dudley,
swinging over a stile into the highroad.  "I mention to you a woman I've
heard about," he went on as the pair were walking side by side again,
"and you at once give me these extraordinary warnings, without offering
any explanation whatsoever.  Who is this mysterious ward?  What is she?"

"I've already told you who she is," his companion replied, shifting his
gun as he marched onward.  "What she is I don't know.  All I am sure
about is that the less you see of her the better, Dudley--that's all."

"And how do you know that?"

"Because of something I've discovered," the elder man replied.

"Something about her?"

"Well--yes.  Something about her."

"But you speak as though we were intimate, my dear fellow, and as if I
were about to lose my heart to her!" exclaimed Chisholm.

"You'll probably know her soon, but when you are introduced, remember my
warning, and drop her at once like a live coal."

"You're in a delightfully prophetic vein this afternoon," laughed his
host.  "I suppose it's the dull weather."

At this the elder man halted, turned upon him suddenly, placed his hand
upon his shoulder, and said in a deep and earnest tone:

"Recollect, Dudley, that what I told you this morning at breakfast was
for your own good.  I'm not a fellow given to preaching or moralising,
that you know well.  But I tell you straight to your face that before
long you'll know Muriel Mortimer.  All I urge upon you is not to allow
yourself to be captivated."

"Then you know something distinctly to her detriment?"  Chisholm
suggested, for what his friend had said had shown him plainly that this
girl was mixed up in unsavoury matters.

"I only say that she's not a desirable person for you to know."

Dudley laughed uneasily.  These words were all the more remarkable in
the light of old Parsons' statement.

"You speak just as though you feared I might marry her!" he said.

"Well, there are many things more unlikely than that," was the elder
man's reply.  "We hear of strange matches nowadays."

"And if I married this fair unknown, what then?"

"Well, before you do that just take my advice and swallow an overdose of
chloral, or something of that sort.  It would be a far easier way out of
this work-a-day world than marriage with her."  Chisholm looked at him
quickly.

"My dear fellow," he said, "your words imply that marriage with her
would be tantamount to suicide."

"That was exactly the impression I meant to convey, Dudley," was the
strange reply.  "I can say no more--indeed, I have no intention of being
more explicit, even were I free to make further explanation.  Avoid
her--that's all."

CHAPTER SEVEN.

UNITES REALITY WITH ROMANCE.

The colonel's strange premonition was puzzling.

Chisholm saw quite plainly that his friendship with Claudia Nevill had
caused him to throw his usual carefulness to the winds.  Her letter was
but another proof of her insincerity; while the statement of the old
colonel in respect of the house-party at Fernhurst angered him.  He was
furious that she should risk her reputation openly in such a manner.  At
the same time he was filled with regret that from the charming woman of
four years ago she should have developed into a brilliant leader of
society, acknowledged by all to be the smartest woman in London.

It was dark when they drove into the quadrangle of the castle, and
Dudley, excusing himself to his friends, dressed and retired to the
great library for an hour before dinner in order to examine the official
correspondence that had arrived in the morning.

From the big Foreign Office envelopes he drew a mass of papers which
required his endorsement, and several important letters which he at once
answered.  The duties of Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs are
multitudinous, and the office needs a man who does not hanker after a
sinecure.  Little leisure was Dudley Chisholm allowed, and seldom could
he snatch a few days to run down into the country.  His presence in or
near town was required always for passing reports; he had to sign here,
initial there, and control in a great measure one of the greatest and
most important departments of the State.

It is generally understood by Parliament that answers to questions put
to the Foreign Under-secretary are prescribed by his Chief, His
Majesty's Principal Secretary.  Palmerston would never allow an
Under-Secretary to answer a supplementary question until his superior
had dictated the reply.  But under the Gladstone _regime_ this rule was
gradually relaxed; and such confidence did Lord Stockbridge place in
Chisholm's discretion and power to fence with the Opposition, that,
although he was required to meet his Chief at the Foreign Office between
the hours of twelve and two each Parliamentary day, he was allowed a
practically free hand.  Years ago under-secretaries were but the
mouthpieces of their chiefs.  Old Parliamentary hands recollect seeing
Sir William Harcourt at the far end of the Treasury Bench pass the word
to Sir Edward Grey at the other end not to answer a supplementary
question until he had consulted Lord Rosebery; and once when Lord Edmond
Fitzmaurice asked for notice of a supplementary question so that he
might consult Earl Granville, the Opposition jeered, and Mr. Gladstone
jumped up to declare that Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice had done so by his
orders.  That, however, was all of the past.  Dudley Chisholm was
entirely in the confidence of the Marquess of Stockbridge.  He relied
upon him.

In that sombre old room where the firelight danced upon the rows and
rows of heavy volumes written in days long past, he sat within the zone
of the green-shaded reading-lamp, his attention absorbed by some
official reports.  They were evidently of an unusual nature, for of a
sudden an exclamation of profound surprise escaped him, and with growing
eagerness he scanned page after page of those written lines.

"I don't believe it!" he exclaimed, speaking to himself.  "It can't be
true!  My secret is still safe.  It cannot possibly be revealed any more
than the dead can speak.  And yet cock-and-bull stories do not usually
emanate from that quarter.  It's certainly startling enough--and if
true--well--"

He rose from his chair and thoughtfully paced the room, his hands locked
behind his back, as was his habit when thinking deeply.  The statement
contained in the despatch had alarmed him.  He scented danger, and his
brow was clouded.  The whole thing was so unexpected and so
extraordinary that he could scarcely credit it, although the signature
to the despatch was that of his Chief, Lord Stockbridge.  The matter was
one demanding his immediate attention, and yet he had allowed the
despatch to remain unopened all day.

Up and down the polished floor he paced, plunged in apprehensive
reflections.  It appeared that after he had left the Foreign Office on
the previous day the Minister had attended there and had sent him that
startling despatch under seal.  He paused at the table, and taking up
the envelope for the first time discovered that it had not been through
the post.

Then he touched the bell, and of the man who entered he asked:

"Did a messenger from London leave anything for me this morning, Riggs?"

"Yes, sir.  Two official letters, sir.  He arrived at six o'clock, and I
placed the letters on the breakfast-table."

"Oh, very well," his master answered.  "You signed the receipt?"

"Yes, sir.  It was Mr. Forbes who brought them, sir.  He said he
couldn't wait till you came down as he was driving back to Shrewsbury to
catch the eight-ten up to London."

"He didn't say they were important, or make any remark?"

"No, sir."

"Very well."  And then the man, a smart, middle-aged servant in the
Chisholm livery, withdrew.

"Curious--very curious!" exclaimed Dudley in a low, half-frightened
whisper when the man had closed the door.  "It's certainly a matter that
requires the most searching investigation, otherwise we shall infallibly
find ourselves checkmated, Lord Stockbridge writes.  I wonder what it
can all mean?  Even Stockbridge himself doesn't see any light through
it, apparently."

Again he read the puzzling document, which bore the signature known to
every court of Europe as that of the greatest of living statesmen.  It
bore a postscript also, written by his lordship's own quill: "When read,
please destroy."

He replaced it on the table, and, crossing to the ancient hearth where
the big logs were burning, he stood motionless, gazing blankly at the
fire.

The words he read had aroused within him a suspicion--a grave, terrible,
awful suspicion.  In those moments of deep contemplation he looked fully
ten years older.  His hand rested upon the high overmantel of black oak,
on which was a carved representation of the simple coat of the
Shropshire Chisholms, azure, a chevron, or between three water-bougets
argent.  His brow rested upon his arm as he gazed at the glowing logs.
Truth to tell, that confidential document had caused a flood of
recollections to surge through his brain--recollections whose return he
did not desire.  He had vainly thought the past all buried, and had
forgiven and forgotten his enemy.  But, reading between the lines of
that despatch, he saw that this ghost of the past had again arisen.
Lord Stockbridge had, of course, no suspicion of the truth.  The
confidential communication had been made to him in the ordinary course
of events, in order that he might institute secret inquiries in certain
quarters, and ascertain the feeling of certain influential members in
the House.

But if the truth became known?  He set his jaws hard, and a deep sigh
escaped him.  He dared not contemplate the result.  It would mean for
him ruin, ignominy, shame.

He passed his hot hand wearily across his brow, pushing the thick dark
hair from his forehead.

The dead silence was broken by a low groan--a groan of despair and
penitence.

"God!" he gasped.  "Surely the truth cannot possibly be known?  How can
it?  No," he went on, murmuring to himself.  "Bah!  I'm timid--thoughts
of it always unnerve me.  And yet from this it seems very much as if
some secret enemy had waited through these years until I had attained
position and popularity in order to strike, to crush, to ruin me for
ever!"

He was silent again, silent for many minutes.  He stood quite
motionless, still gazing into the fire.

"But dare I face exposure?" he asked himself, his hoarse whisper
sounding strangely in that old room.  "No.  A thousand times no!  No--
impossible!  A thousand times no!  I'd prefer death.  Yes, suicide.  It
would be the only way.  Death is far preferable to dishonour."

He saw it all--he who could read between those lines.  He detected the
hand of some secret enemy uplifted against him--an enemy who, he did not
doubt, held that secret which through the past six years had been the
skeleton in his cupboard.  In the esteem of men he had risen rapidly,
until to-day he was declared to be one of the shrewdest of England's
legislators, fulfilling all the traditions of his ancient and honourable
house.  And through out these six years he had striven, and striven,
always with an idea of atonement for his cardinal sin; always working in
the interests of the nation he had resolved to serve.

How strange it was that His Majesty's Foreign Minister should have
actually communicated this to him, of all men!  But man works half his
own doom, and circumstance the other half.  _C'est toujours le destin_.

In his despair there had arisen before him that grim and hideous ghost
of the past which had always overshadowed the later years of his life;
that incident which he constantly feared might come to light to destroy
the position he had created, to wreck his popularity, and to cause his
name to be synonymous with all that was base, treacherous, and
ignominious.  For the fault he had committed--a grave offence which he
knew could never be humanly forgiven--he had endeavoured to atone to the
best of his ability.  Other young men of his wealth would have probably
married and taken their ease; but with that secret deep in his heart he
had worked and striven for his country's good, prompted by a desire not
merely to become popular, but to accomplish something by means of which
to make amends.

Men had, of course, never rightly understood his motives.  They had
believed him to be one of a motley crowd of place-seekers, whose
brilliant oratory had fortunately brought him into the front rank,
though this was certainly far from being the case Popularity had been
heaped upon him as an entirely unwelcome reward.  He always declared
within himself that he merited nothing--absolutely nothing; and this
belief accounted for his utter indifference to the plaudits of the
public or the praise bestowed upon him by his Party.  He was
endeavouring to work out his atonement and make reparation--that was
all.

Try as he would, however, he could not put aside the grave suggestion
that some secret enemy was preparing a _coup_ beneath which he must
fall.  The disquieting despatch from Constantinople seemed to portend
this.  It was a presage of his downfall.  To endeavour to prove his
innocence, to try to withstand the storm of indignation that must
certainly sweep over England, or to prevent exposure of the truth, spelt
futility.  He was helpless--utterly helpless against the onsweeping tide
of retribution.

The marquess urged that he--the very man concerned in the disreputable
affair--should make secret inquiry into the truth of the report.  Was
not that a freak of Fate?  Surely Nemesis was already upon him.  What
could he reply to that despatch?  How could he act?

Many men grudged him his position and the fame he had won.  And yet,
would they envy him if they were aware of the terrible truth--if they
were aware of that awful secret ever burdening his conscience?

Suddenly, as though some fresh thought had occurred to him, he crossed
to the opposite side of the room, and, pressing against one of the
shelves filled with old brown-covered folios, opened a part which
concealed a small safe embedded deeply in the wall, hidden from even the
keenest eyes in a manner that could scarcely have been improved.  From
his watch-chain he selected a key, opened the safe and took from one of
its drawers a large official-looking envelope.  Walking back to the
light of the table, he drew out a piece of thin transparent
tracing-paper which he opened and spread upon the blotting-pad.

Upon this paper a letter in a strange, almost microscopic hand, had been
traced.  This he read carefully, apparently weighing every word.  Twice
he went over it, almost as though he wished to commit it to memory;
then, with a hard look upon his dark features, he replaced it in the
envelope, sealed it with a stick of black wax and put it once more in
the safe.  From the same drawer he extracted a second paper, folded in a
small square.  With this in his hand he walked toward the nearest
window, so as to be in the best light for his purpose.  When he was
satisfied in this regard, he undid the packet.  It contained a curl of
fair hair bound together with sewing silk of a faded pink.

As he looked upon it tears welled up into his eyes.  That lock of hair
brought back to him memories, bitter and tender memories which he always
tried to forget, though in vain.  Before him arose a woman's face, pale,
fair, with eyes of that deep child-like blue which always proclaims
purity of soul.  He saw her before him in her simple dress of white
linen--a vision of sweet and perfect beauty.  The words she had spoken
in her gentle voice seemed once again to fall upon his ears with the
music that had so invariably charmed him.  He remembered what she had
said to him--he recollected the whole of that conversation, although
years had passed since it had been held.  He found it impossible to
prevent his thoughts from wandering back to the tender grace of a day
that was dead, when, beside the sea, he had for a few hours enjoyed a
calm and sunny paradise, which had too quickly changed into a wilderness
barren of both roses and angels.

He sighed; and down his cheek there crept a single tear.  Then he raised
the tiny lock of hair to his lips.

"May God cherish her always--always," he murmured.

Twice he kissed the lock of hair before, with every sign of reluctance,
returning it to the packet and replacing it in the steel drawer.
Superstitious persons believe that ill-fortune follows the possession of
hair; but Chisholm was never superstitious.  This curl, which at rare
intervals he was in the habit of taking from its secret hiding-place,
always carried his memory back to those brief days when, for the second
time in his life, he had experienced perfect happiness.  It was an
outward and visible sign of a love that had once burned fiercely within
two hearts.

He had just locked the safe and hidden it in the usual manner, when
Benthall burst into the library, and said in a merry tone of voice:

"I've come just to see what you're doing, old fellow.  The gong went
half an hour ago and the colonel says he's got a ravenous appetite.  The
soup will be cold."

He had walked across to the table, and stood beside it ready dressed for
dinner.

"I--oh!  I was busy," his host answered.  "A lot of official
correspondence from the Foreign Office, you know--things I ought to have
seen to this morning instead of shooting.  Correspondence always crowds
upon me if I go out of town even for a couple of days."

"But you've done now--haven't you?" asked his guest, glancing at the
littered table.

"Just finished.  But I'm awfully sorry to have kept you fellows waiting.
The colonel's so infernally prompt at feeding-time.  They say at the
Junior that he doesn't vary five minutes at dinner once in six months."

"Well, come along, old fellow.  Don't wait to finish."  He seated
himself on the edge of the big writing-table while Dudley busied himself
in replacing some letters he had taken from the steel despatch-box which
accompanied him everywhere.

Smoking a cigarette, and swinging his legs easily, Benthall waited while
his host--who had pointed out that he could not leave confidential
documents open for the servants to pry into--straightened his papers,
and put them together with the communications littering the table, in
the box, afterwards locking it.

Only one was left on the table, the despatch which Lord Stockbridge had
ordered him to destroy.  This he carried to the fire, lit one corner,
and held it until it was all consumed, afterwards destroying the tinder
with the poker.

"What's that you're so careful to burn?" asked Benthall, interested.

"Oh, nothing, my dear Harry--nothing," answered the Under-Secretary in a
nonchalant manner.  "Only a despatch."

"From Stockbridge, or one of the other Ministers, I suppose?"

"Yes."

"But why did you burn it?"

"In order that it shouldn't fall into anybody else's hands."

"Something very confidential, then?"

"Yes, something extremely confidential," answered Chisholm.  "But come
along, old fellow, let's go to dinner, or the colonel will never forgive
me."

CHAPTER EIGHT.

SHOWS A POLITICIAN AND A POLICY.

Dudley Chisholm, with the excuse that his presence was urgently required
at the Foreign Office, returned to town by the first train on the
following day, leaving the colonel and Benthall to continue their sport.
He would probably return in a couple of days, he said, but Lord
Stockbridge wished to explain to him the line of policy which he
intended to adopt towards France, with a view to lessening the tension
between the two nations, and to give him certain instructions as to the
conduct of the forthcoming debate in the House.

As both his guests understood that a man holding such a position was
liable at any moment to be called up to town, they made the best of
their disappointment, wished him good luck when the time came for his
departure, and went out with the head-keeper for a day's sport in
Parnholt Wood.

That same afternoon, in the fading light, the Under-Secretary was
closeted with his Chief, the Most Noble the Marquess of Stockbridge,
K.G., Prime Minister of England, and Her Majesty's Principal Secretary
of State, in his private room at Downing Street.

Next to the Sovereign, this tall, thin-faced, grey-bearded man, with the
rather ascetic, aquiline features and keen dark eyes that age had not
dimmed, was the most potent personage in the British Empire.  The room
in which he was sitting at the big pedestal writing-table was on the
first floor of the Foreign Office, a spacious apartment, solidly
furnished and of a very business-like appearance.  In that room
Ambassadors and Envoys Plenipotentiary had discussed matters of such
importance, in such a way, that if those walls had ears to listen and
tongues to repeat, the whole of Europe would have been in arms on many
an occasion.  Placed as far from the door as possible, the most
conspicuous object in the room was the Prime Minister's table, standing
on the right, close to the fireplace of black and white marble, with a
plain, gilt-framed mirror above, and one of those ordinary square marble
clocks which may be found in almost every middle-class dining-room.  In
a small bookcase close to his lordship's left hand was a library of
reference works; while to his right, in the centre of the apartment, was
a round table covered with books, where the current issue of the _Times_
was lying.

In front of the great statesman was a long lounge, upholstered in dark
green leather, as was the rest of the furniture, and upon the wall
behind the lounge a rack containing a large number of maps.  Two or
three deep armchairs, a couple of other tables and several revolving
bookcases completed the furniture of the private room of the head of the
Cabinet.  At the table sat the marquess toying idly with his quill,
while upon the leather-covered lounge before him sat Chisholm, the
Under-secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.

They were alone, with the door closed against intruders.  The greyness
of the short afternoon had become more and more pronounced during their
conversation, and as neither had risen to switch on the electric light
the room was in semi-darkness.  Chisholm was thankful, for he was
uneasy, and feared that his face might betray him to that keen and
practised statesman beneath whose calm gaze many a diplomatist, whether
British or foreign, had so often trembled.  A rather cold, but
exceedingly courteous man, Lord Stockbridge always spoke with slow
deliberation, and with a gentleness that one would scarcely have
expected from a man of such an austere manner.  He was an autocrat both
at the Foreign Office and in the Cabinet, always ruling with a firm
hand, exhibiting a strange individualism in responsibility, bestowing
but little praise upon any of Britain's hard-working representatives
abroad; but he was a patriot, and every inch a gentleman.
Representatives of certain of the Powers at the Court of St. James held
him in dread--they even hated him, because of his integrity, his calm
dignity, and his shrewd foresight.  They knew that he was not a man to
be tricked, and that in his anger the British lion showed its teeth.

To this rather melancholy man with the grave face and the quick dark
eyes the British nation chiefly owed the retention of its position as
the first Power in the world.  During his fifteen years of office the
European outlook had, times without number, been of a grim blackness,
and the war-cloud had hovered on the political horizon almost
incessantly; yet, by means of his careful statesmanship and the
marvellous tact and _finesse_ constantly exhibited by him, this splendid
politician had succeeded in piloting the ship of state into quieter
waters.

Like his trusted Under-Secretary, he was a man who hated popularity,
although he was equally popular in England and throughout the great
Empire over-sea.  He detested cheap notoriety; he always declared that
he left that sort of thing to the Opposition benches.  In a word, he was
an honest, straightforward, patriotic Englishman, the most trusted of
Her Majesty's Ministers, and the greatest living statesman in Europe.

Had he not acted with firmness and discretion, as well as with quick
foresight, Great Britain would a dozen times have been at war with her
jealous neighbours.  More than once conspiracies, deeply laid and
skilfully engineered, had been in progress in some diplomatic circles
for the purpose of inveigling England into hostilities; but his power of
keen penetration and swift deduction had caused the efforts of our
enemies to be thwarted and they themselves to be discomfited by some
remarkable _coup_ in quite another direction.  It was the cackling cry
of certain leader-writers that English diplomacy was abortive, that
other nations left us behind in the race, and that our Ambassadors and
Ministers were merely bunglers.  These prophets (hired at the rate of
two guineas a column) always conveniently overlooked the fact that the
world virtually owed its peace and consequent prosperity to the
thin-faced, rather haggard-looking, man who was the personal friend,
confidant and adviser of his venerated and peace-loving Sovereign.

He sat there in the half light twisting his quill in his thin hands, a
sign that he was puzzled.

"The situation is undoubtedly critical, Chisholm," he said in a low
voice.  "I confess I cannot make it out in the least.  The whole thing
appears to me an enigma at present."

"Have you received no further despatch from Vienna?" inquired the
Under-Secretary.

"Yes.  One came through in cipher a couple of hours ago.  But it tells
us nothing.  Farncombe is apparently without information."

The younger man breathed more freely.  He had feared that the truth was
already known.  Up to the present, then, he was safe; but the tension
was terrible.  He did not know from one moment to another by what avenue
his exposure, which would mean his inevitable degradation and ruin,
would come.  A despatch from Lord Farncombe, the British Ambassador at
Vienna, revealing the truth, would be his death-warrant, for he had
determined to commit suicide rather than face the terrible exposure that
would necessarily ensue were his secret to become known.

By making a supreme effort he had succeeded in carrying on this private
consultation with his chief without betraying undue apprehension.  He
had shown some alarm, it is true, but the marquess put this down to his
natural anxiety in regard to the serious complications in Europe which,
as it seemed, had been created by what had so mysteriously leaked out
from Vienna and Constantinople.

"I can't understand why Farncombe has not some information on the
matter," his lordship went on deliberately, almost as though he were
speaking to himself.  "It's scandalous that we should be working
entirely in the dark.  But for the present we must wait.  Our only
chance of success is to keep our own counsel and not show our hand.  We
are weak in this affair, Chisholm, horribly weak.  If the Opposition got
wind of it we should have a poor chance, I'm afraid.  It's just what
they've been longing for these three years."

"But they must know nothing!" exclaimed.  Chisholm quickly.  "If the
secret of our weakness comes out, all Europe will be ablaze."

"Exactly, that's just what I fear!" the Minister answered.  "It must be
kept from them at all hazards.  You are the only man in London besides
myself who has the slightest inkling of the situation.  You will, of
course, regard it as strictly confidential."

"Absolutely."

"And you destroyed the despatch I sent you to Wroxeter?"

"I burnt it."

"Good!" exclaimed the marquess, leaning both elbows upon the table and
looking across again at the man sitting there in the falling darkness.
"And now we must form some plan of action.  We must save the situation.
Have you anything to suggest?"

"I really don't know what to suggest," Dudley faltered.  "The whole
affair is so mysterious, and we seem to have nothing to go upon.  To me,
it doesn't seem possible that our friends in Constantinople have
suddenly turned antagonistic."

"Certainly not.  Our relations with the Porte are excellent--and you can
tell the House so.  It is that very fact which puzzles me.  The only
solution of the enigma, as far as I can see, is that it is the outcome
of that dastardly betrayal to Russia of our policy towards the Porte a
year or two ago.  You will recollect it, and how nearly it resulted in
war?"

"Yes," answered Dudley in a faltering voice, "I remember it."  Then he
added quickly, as though to change the subject: "As far as I can see,
the conspiracy is being worked from one of the other capitals."

Her Majesty's Under-Secretary knew the truth, but made a clever pretence
of being no less mystified than his chief.

"Perhaps so, perhaps so," the great statesman remarked.  "But this
affair shows that there is once again a desperate attempt being made
against us--from what quarter we are unable at present to detect."

"Rome is not the centre of activity, I feel sure," Chisholm observed.
"We only see its effect there."

"An effect which may alienate us from Italy at any moment.  With the
Saracco Government in power there, matters are by no means upon a firm
basis."

"But Rathmore is one of our best men.  He'll surely see that such a
_contretemps_ does not occur."

"Difficult--my dear Chisholm," replied the grey-haired Minister.
"Diplomacy is often as difficult in Rome as it is in Petersburg.  The
undercurrents against us are quite as many.  The Powers are jealous of
Italy's friendship towards us and of her resolve to assist us in the
Mediterranean if necessary.  That is the whole _crux_ of the matter.
Happily, they are not aware of the terms I made with Rudini two years
ago, or the war-cloud would probably have burst some time back.  We
can't afford to risk hostilities while Italy is so weak.  In two years
her new armaments will be complete, and then--"

"And then we shall be able to defy them," added the Under-Secretary with
a smile.

The great Minister rubbed his gold-framed glasses and nodded in the
affirmative.

"But the most curious aspect of this sudden development--if the
information is correct, as we suppose it to be--is the apparent boldness
of the diplomatic move on the part of the Porte," the elder man went on.
"It is an absolute enigma how they dare to attempt such a _coup_
without being absolutely certain of success."

"But how could they be?" queried the Under-secretary in a strained
voice.

"Only by the possession of secret information," the other replied.  "It
is the outcome of our base betrayal five years ago."

"Surely nothing further has leaked out!" exclaimed the man seated upon
the leather-covered lounge.

"No.  There are spies in London--a crowd of them.  Melville from
Scotland Yard handed me a list of twenty or so of the interesting
gentlemen last week.  But we have nothing to fear from them--absolutely
nothing.  What I dread is that there is a traitor here, in my own
Department."

"Then what is your private opinion?"

"Well," said the great man, still slowly twisting his quill between his
fingers, "it seems to me, Chisholm, very much as though the person who
is responsible for this clever move to checkmate our influence in the
Mediterranean, like the man who betrayed us before, knows our secret,
and is possessed of absolute self-confidence.  He evidently knows of the
agreement made five years ago, or else he possesses influence in some
quarter or other which may prove detrimental to us."

Dudley Chisholm held his breath.  Truth lived in the last words that had
fallen from the lips of his chief.  The man responsible for the
remarkable _coup_ that had been forecasted from Vienna did indeed
possess influence--over himself--an influence for life or death.  After
a great effort he contrived to remain calm, and, in a voice which to him
sounded cavernous in that great room, he merely said:

"Yes.  I thoroughly agree with your theory--thoroughly."

"Then in that case, Chisholm, you must make a distinct statement in the
House to-morrow regarding our policy abroad and the defence of the
Empire.  If the _coup_ is really attempted, we must have public opinion
entirely with us.  This is not a party matter.  You follow me?"

"Entirely.  I will have a supplementary question put to-morrow, and
reply to it."

"Speak fearlessly and straight to the point.  Assure the House that at
this moment we are in a stronger position than we ever were, and that
our allies are eager to assist us whenever war may break out.  Hint at
certain secret understandings with regard to the Mediterranean, and also
at an Anglo-American alliance.  I detest to play this game, but it is
necessary--highly necessary, having regard to the extreme gravity of the
outlook."

"Very well," replied Chisholm, rising, anxious to escape from that
astute man's presence before his pallid face should confess a part of
the truth.  "I will carry out your instructions.  I quite understand the
line to be adopted--one of nonchalance and self-satisfaction."

And then, after a brief conversation upon other topics, the
Under-Secretary, when he had switched on the light for his chief, walked
out, and went down the great staircase into Downing Street.

CHAPTER NINE.

DEFINES THE DAZZLING DEGRADATION.

At "question-time" on the following afternoon Dudley Chisholm, as
mouthpiece of the Foreign Office, rose to reply to a very pointed and
seemingly awkward supplementary question put to him by an obscure
Member.  There was a big House, and owing to the continual allegations
of England's unpreparedness made by the alarmist section of the Press,
the answer was listened to with almost breathless interest.

The man who stood there addressing the House affected a calmness which
he certainly did not feel.  He knew not but that at any moment some
Member of the Opposition might rise and there publicly show him up as a
political impostor, a man who was sailing under false colours, and who
knew of England's danger yet dare not speak because to do so would be to
expose his own crime.  Nevertheless, even though the terrible tension
had worked havoc with him throughout the long night, preventing him from
sleeping and causing him to tramp for hours the deserted streets of
London, he stood there speaking in his well-known deliberate manner,
from time to time making home-thrusts at his political opponents, and
eloquently assuring the House and the public that the Empire was safe
from attack.

In the course of his brilliant reply he deprecated the popular
assumption that in diplomacy we were always left behind, and hinted, as
Lord Stockbridge had instructed him to do, at certain secret agreements
which, having been of late effected, placed England in an almost
invulnerable position.  Never during the century, he declared, had Great
Britain been on more amicable terms with her neighbours, and never had
her position as the first among nations been more secure.  Then he went
on to speak of the two great tasks Her Majesty's Ministers had
themselves undertaken--the task of drawing all members of this vast
Empire, all the dependencies of the crown in every quarter of the world,
into a close and more organic unity, and the task of providing adequate
defences for this great Empire.  He admitted that it was sometimes held
abroad that this awakening on our part to the obligations of Empire
denoted a new spirit of antagonism in this country towards the
legitimate aims and aspirations of European Powers.  That was not so.
The spirit in which we took up our portion of the task was not one of
antagonism, but of generous emulation, with a view to seeing which of
the favoured nations of the world could do most in the shortest time to
perform the duty owed by them to the countries still oppressed by
savagery, barbarism, or imperfect civilisation.  That spirit was
embodied in a certain secret agreement which he could not, of course,
mention.  The tasks he had spoken of could not be undertaken by their
opponents, who in essential questions were distracted and apathetic.
While the Government would foster true Imperialism, they would not
neglect social and domestic legislation.  The Opposition were living on
the ghosts of the past and amid the tombs of dead policies.

As he resumed his seat there was an outburst of applause.  The country
had long been waiting for some reassuring declaration from the
Government, and this, flashed by the wires from the Press Gallery above,
would in a few hours have the effect of allaying any public misgivings.

But Chisholm, having performed his duty, gathered up his papers and at
once left the House.  In the Lobby one or two men congratulated him, but
he only smiled that rather melancholy smile they knew so well.

The House of Commons nowadays is not such an austere assembly as it was
even a decade ago.  True, Members are sometimes called to St. Stephen's
in October and November, and thus have their vacation plans for Cairo or
the Riviera considerably disarranged; yet the patriotic M.P. now finds
the House the best and cheapest club in London, where he can, if he
chooses, live upon ninepenny steaks and drink gin at twopence a
glassful!  Indeed, nowadays there seems more dining than politics, and
more brilliant entertaining than brilliant oratory.  There are many
distinct coteries in the House, as there must always be among men
divided in political opinion, but the coterie of entertainers is quite
definite and distinct.  Its members are those who have entered upon a
Parliamentary career as a gentleman's due.  They are the political
drones.  They rarely, if ever, speak, but with their many smart
lady-guests support the social side of Parliament right royally.  Harry
Benthall was one of these butterflies among legislators.  When he spoke,
the subject was usually connected with the personal comfort of Members.
Among the boiled-shirt brigade was a man who had sat in the House for
thirty years, and had only spoken once--a speech that lasted one minute;
while Mr. Kinnear, the Parliamentary diarist, has placed it on record
that a certain gentleman representing a county division sat in three
successive Governments without finding his way to the vote office!  The
whole life of such men is taken up in hunting for a "pair."  It is one
of the first duties he feels he owes to himself and to his friends of
the dining-room, or of that latter-day annexe to Mayfair, the Terrace.
Indeed, so popular became the Terrace a couple of seasons ago that each
afternoon it was crowded by _grandes dames_ and young legislators, and
flirting, tea-drinking, and strawberry-eating went on to such an extent
that the merrymaking seriously threatened to stop legislation
altogether.  So that awe-inspiring functionary, the Serjeant-at-Arms,
acting quietly but firmly, issued such orders that "at homes" in
Parliament were suddenly discontinued, and the daily crush at
Westminster became less of a public scandal.

To put it plainly, a new House has grown up.  The old austerity of
legislation in the days of Palmerston and Beaconsfield has nearly
disappeared, and to-day the gentlemen upon whom the right to add M.P. to
their name is bestowed, find to their delight that legislation is really
very largely an arrangement come to between the two front Benches.

As Chisholm passed through the Lobby, pausing at Mr. Pike's office to
obtain some letters, some one cried "Saunderson's up," and all the
idlers knew that the debate upon another matter had commenced, and that
"fun" might be expected.

The Under-Secretary thrust the letters into his pocket, put on his
overcoat, and walked back to the Foreign Office, where some documents
were awaiting his signature, and where he had some instructions to give
his secretary.  On his way across Palace Yard and along Parliament
Street his eyes were fixed upon the pavement, for he was deep in thought
and heedless of all about him.  He walked like a man in a dream.

Before long the blow must fall, he told himself.  How long would it be
deferred?  How many days of grace would his secret enemy give him?

Hour after hour had he endeavoured to find some solution of the problem
how to repel the threatened vengeance.  But there seemed to be no
satisfactory way--absolutely none.

A word from him to his chief might save the situation.  That would mean
open and complete confession.  No, he could not confess to the great
statesman who had reposed such entire confidence in him, and who had
given him the high and responsible office he now held.  He could not; he
dare not face the wrath of Lord Stockbridge, of all men.

He had sinned, and must suffer.  A dozen times during the past night as
he had paced the silent streets of London the suggestion had occurred to
him to resign everything and go abroad at once.  Yet what would that
avail him?  To escape would be only to exhibit cowardice.  The sleep
from which there was no awakening was by far the best mode of release at
which to aim.

Upon a seat at the kerb in Piccadilly, with a ragged outcast as
companion, he had sat a full hour in the most silent watch of the night
thinking the matter over.  After all, he told himself, he was little
better than the shivering wretch beside him.

And now, as he turned the corner of Downing Street, he sighed heavily,
wondering on how many more occasions he would return to his official
headquarters.  Not many, alas!  Nemesis was at his heels.

That night he dined at his club, the Carlton, but returned to his
chambers immediately afterwards.

As he entered his sitting-room, a woman in a striking evening toilet of
pale blue, turning from the fire, rose to greet him.  It was Claudia
Nevill.

"My dear Dudley!" she cried, stretching forth both her hands to him.
"I've been awaiting you for half an hour or more.  Wherever have you
been?"

He had drawn back in annoyance at the moment when she faced him so
unexpectedly.  She was the last person he wished to meet at that moment.

"Oh," he answered rather coldly, taking her hands in greeting, "I dined
at the Club.  I'm not very well," he added wearily.

"But not too queer to go to the Duchess's ball?"

"The Duchess's ball?  I don't understand," he said, looking at her
puzzled.

"Why, surely you keep a note of your engagements, or Wrey does for you?
It's quite three weeks ago since we arranged to go there together."

"To go where?"

"Why, to the Duchess of Penarth's ball.  You of course remembered that
she asked us both, and we promised.  You had a card, no doubt."

"Perhaps I had," he said blankly, for he received so many invitations
that he always left it to Wrey, his private secretary, to attend to the
resulting correspondence.  He had gone little into society, except when
Claudia Nevill took him as her escort.

"Perhaps?" she exclaimed.  "Why, whatever is the matter with you,
Dudley?  You've not been at all yourself for some days past.  Now, tell
me--do."

He was silent for a few moments.

"I told you when I was last at Albert Gate," he said at length very
seriously.  "I thought my words were quite plain, Claudia."

"You spoke all sorts of absurd things about scandals and gossip," she
laughed, reseating herself and motioning him to a chair on the opposite
side of the fireplace.  "But you were not yourself, so I didn't take any
heed of it."

"I told you exactly what I intended doing," he answered, standing before
her, with his back to the fire.  "I am surprised to find you here."

"And who has been putting all these absurd ideas into your head, my dear
Dudley?" asked the brilliant woman in the magnificent Doeuillet ball
toilette.  "You know that we love each other, so what's the use of
kicking against the pricks?  Now go and put on a dress coat and a pair
of gloves and take me to Penarth House, there's a good fellow--the
Duchess expects us."

"Her Grace doesn't expect me, for I declined."

"You declined!" cried his fair companion.  "Why?"

"Wrey declined.  He has recently had orders from me to decline all such
invitations.  Dances only bore me.  I'm too much occupied with official
business."

"Official business!  Bosh!  Leave it alone for a time and enjoy
yourself.  You are really becoming quite the old crony."

"Better that than--well, than to be one of the set who were down at
Fernhurst Abbey."

She glanced at him swiftly, with a curious, half-apprehensive look.

"At Fernhurst?  What do you mean?"

"I mean, Claudia, that there were certain incidents at Fernhurst which
do not reflect much credit upon either the man or the woman."

"And I am the woman, of course?"

He nodded.

"And the man?  Name him."

"A certain foreigner."

"Ah!" she laughed lightly.  "So you've heard all about it already.  You
mean the Grand-Duke.  He was such fun, such a soft-headed fool.  He
actually thought himself in love with me."

"And you allowed him to entertain that impression.  I know the whole of
the facts," he said harshly.

"What you know is, I presume, some absurd tittle-tattle about us," she
replied, a shadow of annoyance upon her face.

"I know sufficient, Claudia, to cause me to alter my opinion regarding
you," he answered very gravely.

"Oh! so you would condemn me unheard?  That is unlike you, Dudley.  I
cannot think chivalry and justice are dead in you."

"I condemn you," he said quickly, looking straight at her.  "I condemn
you for casting aside all your womanly instincts in this mad craze of
yours to lead society and retain your position as a so-called smart
woman.  You cannot see that smartness is merely a synonym for fastness,
and that you are rapidly flinging your reputation to the winds."

"That, my dear Dudley, is a stale story.  You have already told me so
before.  Without offence to you, I would point out that my reputation is
entirely my own affair."

"It concerns me, as well as yourself," he blurted out.  "You cannot
afford to run the risks you are running.  You love distinction, Claudia,
and that is a passion of a deep and dangerous nature.  In a man that
passion is ambition.  In a woman it is a selfish desire to stand apart
from the many; to be, as far as is possible, unique; to enjoy what she
does enjoy and to appropriate the tribute which society offers her,
without caring a rap for the sisterhood to which she belongs.  To be the
idol of society is synonymous with being the butt of ridicule and of
scandal, especially to all who have failed in the same career."

"Oh," she laughed, "you are such a funny old philosopher, Dudley.  You
grow worse and worse."

"I know this," he went on, "that no sooner does a woman begin to feel
herself a leader of society, as you are at this moment, than she finds
in her daily path innumerable temptations, of which she had never before
dreamed.  Her exalted position is maintained, not by the universal
suffrage of her friends, for at least one-half of them would tear her
down from her pedestal, if they were able, but by the indefatigable
exercise of ingenuity in the way of evading, stooping, conciliating,
deceiving; as well as by a continued series of efforts to be cheerful
when depressed, witty when absolutely dull, and animated, brilliant, and
amusing when disappointed, weary, or distressed."

"Oh," she cried impatiently, "I thought we had enough of moralising the
last time we met!  And now you want to re-open the old question."

"No, Claudia," he answered, placing his hand tenderly upon her shoulder,
which was covered only by the strap of pale blue embroidered satin which
held her handsome corsage.  "I only want to show you plainly how in a
woman simplicity of heart cannot be allied to ambition.  The woman who
aspires to be the idol of her fellows, as you do, must be satisfied to
lose this lily from her wreath.  And when a woman's simplicity of heart
is gone, then she is no longer faithful as a wife or safe as a friend.
Her fame is, after all, nothing more than dazzling degradation."

CHAPTER TEN.

MAKES PLAIN A WOMAN'S DUTY.

"And all that philosophy is directed against me?" she asked, looking up
at him seriously.

"It is only just that you should see yourself, Claudia, as others see
you," he said in a more sympathetic tone of voice.  "It pains me to have
to speak like this; to criticise your actions as though I were a man old
enough to be your grandfather.  But I merely want to point out what is
the unvarnished truth."

"All of us have our failings," she declared with a pout.  "You tell me
this because you want to sever your connection with me.  Why not admit
the truth?"

"No.  I tell you this because a woman who seeks to occupy the place you
now occupy is exposed to the pitiless gaze of admiration; but little
respect, and no love is blended with it.  I speak frankly, and say that,
however much you have gained in name, in rank, in fortune, you have
suffered as a woman."

"How?"

"Shall I tell you the actual truth?"

"Certainly.  You will not offend me, I assure you," she replied in a
cynical tone, coquettishly placing her small foot in its neat silk
stocking upon the fender.

"Well, Claudia," he said, "to tell you the truth, you are no longer the
simple-hearted, intelligent, generous, frank and true woman I once
knew."

"Really?  You are extremely flattering!" she exclaimed.  She began to
see that her ruse of boldly returning to him as she had done and waiting
him there, even in defiance of old Parsons, was of no avail.

"I do not speak with any desire to hurt your feelings, Claudia," he went
on.  "I know my words are harsh ones, but I cannot remain a spectator of
your follies without reproving you."

"You would compel me to return to the deadly dulness of tennis,
tea-table gossip, church-decorating and country life in cotton blouses
and home-made skirts--eh?  Thank you; I object.  I had quite sufficient
of that at Winchester."

"I have no right to compel you to do anything," he answered.  "I only
suggest moderation, in your own interests.  On every side I hear
scandalous stories into which your name is introduced."

"And you believe them?" she asked quickly.  "You, my friend, believe all
these lying inventions of my enemies?"

"I believe nothing of which I have no proof."

"Then you believe in what is really proved?"

"Yes."

"In that case you must believe that, even though I possess all the
defects which you have enumerated, I nevertheless love you?"

"In woman's true love," he said slowly, emphasising every word, "there
is mingled the trusting dependence of a child, for she always looks up
to man as her protector and her guide.  Man, let him love as he may, has
an existence which lies outside the orbit of his affections.  He has his
worldly interests, his public character, his ambition, his competition
with other men--but the woman of noble mind centres all in that one
feeling of affection."

"Really?"  She laughed flippantly, toying with her bracelets.  "This is
a most erudite discourse.  It would no doubt edify the House if one
night you introduced the subject of love.  You've grown of late to be
quite a philosopher, my dear Dudley.  Politics and that horrid old
Foreign Office have entirely spoilt you."

"No, you misunderstand me," he went on, deeply in earnest.  "I merely
want to place before you the utter folly of your present actions--all
these flirtations about which people in our rank are always talking."

"Ah!" she laughed; "because you're jealous.  Somebody has been telling
you, no doubt, that the Grand-Duke was always at my side at Fernhurst,
and probably embellished the story until it forms a very nice little
tit-bit of scandal."

"Well, is it not true that this foreigner was with you so constantly
that it became a matter of serious comment?"

"I don't deny it.  Why should I?  He was very amusing, and if I found
him so I cannot see why people should presume to criticise me.  If I had
a husband I might be called upon to answer to him, but as poor Dick is
dead I consider myself perfectly free."

"Yes, but not to make a fool of yourself by openly inviting people to
cast mud at you," he burst forth impatiently.

"Upon that point, Dudley, we shall never agree, so let us drop the
subject," she replied, treating his criticisms airily and with utter
indifference.  "I shall please myself, just as I have always done."

"I have no doubt you will.  That is what I regret, for when a woman
loses her integrity and self-respect, she is indeed pitiable and
degraded."

"Really!" she cried; "you are in a most delightful mood, I'm sure.  What
has upset you?  Tell me, and then I'll forgive you."

"Nothing has upset me--except your visit," he answered quite frankly.

"Then I am unwelcome here?"

"While you continue to follow the absurd course you have of late chosen,
you are."

"Thank you," she replied.  "You are at least candid."

"We have been friends, and you have, I think, always found me honest and
outspoken, Claudia."

"Yes, but I have never before known you to treat me in this manner," she
answered with sudden _hauteur_.  "The other day you declared your
intention of severing our friendship, but I did not believe you."

"Why?"

"Because I knew that we loved each other."

"No," he said in a hard tone, "do not let us speak of love.  Speak of it
to those men who dance attendance upon you everywhere, but with me,
Claudia, be as frank as I am with you."

"Dudley!  It is cruel of you to speak like this!" she cried with a
sudden outburst of emotion, for she now saw quite plainly that the power
she once exerted over him had disappeared.

Chisholm had been sadly disillusioned.  During the past few weeks the
bitter truth had gradually been forced upon him.  Instead of remaining a
real, dignified, high-minded woman of unblemished integrity, Claudia
Nevill had grown callous and artificial, and in other ways hostile to
true womanhood.  But Dudley had always admired her, and once she had
been his ideal.

He had admired her simplicity of heart.  Unquestionably that is a great
charm in a woman, though not a charm so illuminating as integrity,
because it consists more in the ignorance of evil, and, consequently, of
temptation, than in the possession of principle strong enough to
withstand both.  In the days before her marriage her simplicity of heart
was the child of that unruffled serenity of soul which suspects no
mischief to be lurking beneath the fair surface of things--which trusts,
confides and is happy in this confidence, because it has never been
deceived, and because it has never learned that most fatal of all arts,
the mystery of deceiving others.

But all was now changed.  She was no longer the Claudia of old.  She had
degenerated into a smart, brilliant woman, full of arts and subterfuges,
with no thoughts beyond her engagements, her toilettes, and her
vainglorious triumphs.

"I have only spoken what I feel, Claudia!" exclaimed the man still
standing before her.  "I have no power to compel you to heed my
warning."

"Oh, do let us drop the subject, my dear Dudley!" she cried impatiently.
"This lecture of yours upon my duty towards society may surely be
continued on another occasion.  Let us go along to the Duchess's.  As
I've already said, the House has entirely spoilt you."

"I don't wish to continue the discussion.  Indeed, I've said all that I
intend saying.  My only regret is that you are heedless of my words--
that you are blind to the truth, and have closed your ears to all this
gossip."

"Let them gossip.  What does it matter to me?  Now to you, of course, it
matters considerably.  You can't afford to imperil your official
position by allowing all this chatter to go on.  I quite understand
that."

"And yet you come here to-night and ask me to take you to the
Duchess's?" he said.

"For the last time, Dudley," she answered, looking up at him with that
sweet, sympathetic look of old.  "This is the last of our engagements,
and it is an odd fancy of mine that you should take me to the ball--for
the last time."

"Yes," he repeated hoarsely, in a deep voice full of meaning; "for the
last time, Claudia."

"You speak as though you were doomed to some awful fate," she remarked,
looking up at him with a puzzled expression on her face.  Little did the
giddy woman think that her words, like the sword of the angel at the
entrance to Paradise, were double-edged.

"Oh," he said, rousing himself and endeavouring to smile, "I didn't
know.  Forgive me."

"You've changed somehow, Dudley," she said, rising.  She went near to
him and took his hand tenderly.  "Why don't you tell me what is the
matter?  Something is troubling you.  What is it?"

"You are, for one thing," he answered promptly, looking straight into
her splendid eyes.  As she stood there in that beautiful gown, with the
historic pearls of the Nevills upon her white neck, Dudley thought he
had never seen her look so magnificent.  Well might she be called the
Empress of Mayfair.

"But why trouble your head about me?" she asked in a low, musical voice,
pressing his hand tenderly.  "You have worries enough, no doubt."

"The stories I hear on every hand vex me horribly."

"You are jealous of that man who was at the Meldrums' house-party.  It's
useless to deny it.  Well, perhaps I was foolish, but if I promise never
to see him again, will you forgive me?"

"It is not for me to forgive," he said in an earnest voice.  "I have, I
suppose, no right to criticise your actions, or to exact any promises."

"Yes, Dudley, you, of all men, have that right," she answered, her
beautiful breast, stirred by emotion, rising and falling quickly.  "All
that you have just said is, I know, just and honest; and it comes
straight from your heart.  You have spoken to me as you would to your
own sister--and, well, I thank you for your good advice."

"And will you not promise to follow it?" he asked, taking her other
hand.  "Will you not promise me, your oldest man friend, to cut all
these people and return to the simple, dignified life you led when Dick
was still alive?  Promise me."

"And if I promise, what do you promise me in exchange?" she asked.
"Will you make me your wife?"

The look of eagerness died out of his face; he stood as rigid as one
turned to stone.  What was she suggesting?  Only a course that they had
discussed, times without number, in happier days.  And yet, what could
he answer, knowing well that before a few hours passed he might be
compelled to take his own life, so as to escape from the public scorn
which would of necessity follow upon his exposure.

"I--I can't promise that," he faltered, uttering his refusal with
difficulty.

She shrank from him, as if he had struck her a blow.

"Then the truth is as I suspected.  Some other woman has attracted you!"

"No," he answered in a hard voice, his dark brow clouded, "no other
woman has attracted me."

"Then--well, to put it plainly--you believe all these scandalous tales
that have been circulated about me of late?  Because of these you've
turned from me, and now abandon me like this!"

"It is not that," he protested.

"Then why do you refuse to repeat your promise, when you know, Dudley,
that I love you?"

"For a reason which I cannot tell you."

She looked at him puzzled by his reticence.  He was certainly not
himself.  His face was bloodless, and for the first time she noticed
round his eyes the dark rings caused by the insomnia of the past two
nights.

"Tell me, Dudley," she implored, clinging to him in dismay.  "Can't you
see this coldness of yours is driving me to despair--killing me?  Tell
me the truth.  What is it that troubles you?"

"I regret, Claudia, that I cannot tell you."

"But you always used to trust me.  You have never had secrets from me."

"No, only this one," he answered in a dull, monotonous manner.

"And is it this secret which prevents you from making the compact I have
just suggested?"

"Yes."

"It has nothing to do with any woman who has come into your life?" she
demanded eagerly.

"No."

"Will you swear that?"

"I swear it."

"You only tell me that we cannot marry, that is all?  Can I have no
further explanation?"

"No, none."

"Your decision is not owing to the scandal which you say is talked
everywhere?  You give your word of honour that it is not?"

"Yes, I give my word of honour," he answered.  "My inability to renew my
offer of marriage is owing to a circumstance which I am powerless to
control."

"And you refuse to tell me its nature?"

"I regret, Claudia, that I must refuse," he said, pressing her hand.
His lips twitched, and she saw that tears stood in his eyes.  She knew
that the man who had been her lover in the days of her girlhood spoke
the truth when he added, "This circumstance must remain my own secret."

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

DISCLOSES AN UGLY TRUTH.

With hands interlocked they stood together in silence for some minutes.
Neither spoke.  Their hearts were full to overflowing.

This woman, whose remarkable beauty had made it possible for her to ride
rough-shod over discretion, was in those moments of silence seized by
remorse.  She saw that he was suffering, and with a woman's quick
sympathy strove to alleviate his distress.  In a manner that was neither
hysterical nor theatrical, she carried his hand to her soft lips.  Then,
with a sudden burst of affection, she raised her beautiful face to his,
saying:

"All the hard words you have spoken, Dudley, belong entirely to the
past.  I only know that I love you."

He looked at her steadfastly for a few moments, then said:

"No, Claudia.  Our love must end.  It is not fair to you that it should
continue."

"You desire that it should end?" she asked in a strained voice.

"No.  I am bound to leave you by force of circumstances," he replied.
"We can never marry--never."

"But why?  I really can't understand you.  Of late you have been so
strange, so pre-occupied, and so unusually solicitous for my good name."

"Yes," he admitted, "it must have struck you as strange.  But I have
been thinking of your future."

"Did you never think of it in the past?"

"Of the future--when you are alone, I mean," he said gravely.

"What?  Are you going abroad?"

He was silent again, his eyes fixed blankly upon the carpet.

"Perhaps," he said at last.

"And may I not go with you?" she asked in a tender tone of voice.

"No; that would be impossible--quite impossible."  His strangely
despondent state of mind puzzled her.  She tried to penetrate the
mystery which had so suddenly surrounded him, but was unable to see any
light.  She saw, however, that he was nervous and troubled, as though in
fear of some dreadful catastrophe, and endeavoured by low words and soft
caresses to induce him to lay bare his heart.  She, who knew his every
mood and every expression, had never seen him so utterly despondent or
pathetic.  At first she was inclined to attribute it to the failure of
some move on the political chessboard; but he had assured her that such
was not the case.  She could only soothe him by making him feel the
depth of her love.

The words she uttered recalled to him memories of days long past,
recollections of the hours when innocence and youth combined to make
them happy.  Her voice was the same, as sweet and tender as of old; her
face not less beautiful, her lips not less soft, her form just as slim
and supple.  Ah! how madly he had loved her in the days beyond recall!

He stood listening to her, but making no response.  She was speaking of
her devotion to him; of her regret that she had allowed herself to flirt
with others.  She did not know that her lover was hopeless and
despairing--a man condemned to death by his own edict.

As she stood there, the diamonds on her wrist flashing in the lamplight,
he looked at her long and earnestly, and once again marvelled at the
radiant completeness of her beauty.  Was there any wonder that such a
woman was the leader of the smart world, or that every fad or fancy of
hers should become the mode?  No.  She was even more lovely than in the
old days at Winchester.  Her splendid toilettes, often the envy of other
women, suited her handsome features better even than the prim dresses
she used to wear during her girlhood, and she wore jewels with the easy
air of one born to the purple.

Their eyes met, and she with her woman's intuition saw that he was
admiring her, not less ardently than had been his custom until a week
ago.  In his eyes she detected a wistful look, as though he wished to
lay his secret before her, yet dare not.  There was a sadness, a look of
blank desolation, in his face that she had never before seen there.  It
set her wondering.

She knew well the many grave official matters with which he was
constantly called upon to deal at the Foreign Office; of the strain of
speech-making in the House, and of the many weary hours spent in his
private room with his secretary.  Many a time he had confided to her the
causes of his nervousness and gravity; and not infrequently she had been
in possession of official secrets, which, unlike the majority of her
sex, she always preserved, knowing well that to divulge them would
seriously compromise him.

Often and often, after an exhausting evening in the House, he had come
to her at Albert Gate and cast himself wearily upon the blue sofa in her
own cosy boudoir, while she, sitting at his side, had tenderly smoothed
his brow.  It was in those quiet hours that he had made her his
confidante.

She referred to those occasions, and asked him whether he believed her
any less trustworthy now.

"No, not at all, Claudia," he answered, speaking mechanically.  "You
cannot understand.  The secret is mine--the secret of an incident of my
past."

She was silent.  His words were surprising.  She thought that she was
aware of all his past--even of follies perpetrated when he was sowing
his wild oats; but it appeared that there was one incident, the incident
now troubling him, which he had always carefully concealed from her.

"If the secret so closely concerns yourself," she said at last, "surely
I am the person who may know."

"No," he replied briefly.

"But you have told me many other things of a delicate nature concerning
yourself--why may I not know this, and help you to bear your trouble?"
she asked coaxingly.  "However much you may despise me for my frivolity
and vanity, you surely do not think me capable of betraying your
confidence, do you?"

"No," he replied.  "You have never betrayed any secret I have told you,
Claudia, and I have no reason to suppose you would do so now.  But this
matter concerns myself--only myself."

"And you will tell me absolutely nothing?"

"I--I cannot," he declared brokenly.

A long silence again fell between the pair whose names had so long been
coupled by the gossips.  They certainly looked well suited to each
other--he, tall, dark-faced, and undoubtedly handsome; she, brilliant
and beautiful.

"Dudley, dear," she murmured after a pause, placing her hand tenderly
upon his arm, "you are certainly not yourself to-night.  You are in
trouble over some small matter which your own apprehensions have unduly
exaggerated.  Probably you've been working too hard, or perhaps you've
made a long speech to-day--have you?"

"I spoke this afternoon," he replied.  The tone of his voice was
unusually harsh.

"You want a little brightness and relaxation.  Let us go on to the
Duchess's together, and we will waltz--perhaps for the last time."

Those words fell upon his ears with a terrible significance.  Yes, it
would be for the last time.  In his gloomy state of mind her suggestion
commended itself to him.  What matter if people gossiped about them?
They might surely enjoy one last evening in each other's society.  And
how many waltzes they had had together during the past two seasons!  Yet
this was to be the last--actually the last.

She saw his indecision, and hastened to strengthen her argument.

"Your words to-night, Dudley, have shown me plainly your intention is
that we should drift apart.  This being the case, you will not, I'm
sure, refuse me the favour I ask.  You will take me to the Duchess's.
My brougham is below.  I told Faulkes to return at eleven," she added,
as she glanced at the clock.  "Will you not have one last dance with me,
if only as a tribute to the old happiness?"  She spoke in the soft and
persuasive voice that always charmed him.  There were tears in her
wonderful eyes.

"I am really in no mood for a ballroom crush," he answered.  "You know
that I don't care for the Penarth set at any time."

"I know that.  But surely you will let me have my own way just once
more?"

"Very well," he answered reluctantly, with a deep sigh.  "We will go, if
you really wish it."

"Of course!" she cried gladly.  She flung her arms about his neck and
kissed him fervently on the lips.

Did she really love him? he wondered.  And if she did, why did she act
as it was reported that she had acted, flirting outrageously at all
times and in all places with men whose companionship was detrimental to
any woman's good name?  Why had she been planning for him to marry a
girl who was unknown to him?  No.  He could not understand her in the
least.

He touched the bell, and when Parsons came he ordered him to put out his
dress-coat and gloves.

The old man glared at the visitor, for whom he used a title no more
distinguished than "that woman," and went off with a bad grace to do his
master's bidding.

"Parsons doesn't like me in the least," she said with a laugh.  "I
wonder why?"

Though Chisholm knew the reason, he only smiled, and turned aside the
rather awkward question.

Then, when the old man had put his head into the room, announcing that
his master's coat was ready, Claudia Nevill was left alone.

"I wonder what's on his mind?" she mused, sinking into a low chair
before the fire and resting her elbows upon her knees.  "Something
unusual has certainly occurred.  I wonder what story has come to his
ears?--something about me, of course."  The white forehead so
beautifully shaded by her dark hair, which had been well dressed by her
French maid, Justine, clouded slightly, and she stared straight before
her, plunged in a deep reverie; she was indeed a voluptuous _reveuse_.
Life that was _comme il faut_ had no attraction for her.  She was
reflecting upon all that he had said; upon the harsh criticisms and the
ominous warnings of this man whom she had once believed she would marry.
Yes, what he had said was only too true.  Her conscience told her that
she had been at fault; that she had set his affection at nought, and
had, in her mad struggle for supremacy in society, flung prudence to the
winds.  And those ugly scandals whispered here and there?  What of them?
The mere thought of them caused her teeth to set firmly, and her
shapely hands to clasp her cheeks with sudden vehemence.

"No," she said aloud in a mournful voice; "his affection for me has been
killed by my own mad folly.  It cannot have survived all this deception.
To-night is our last night together--the death of our love."

At that moment Dudley re-entered, having exchanged his dinner-jacket for
a white vest and dress-coat, in the lappel of which was a gardenia.
Claudia roused herself quickly, and when she turned towards him her face
betrayed no sign of the _tristesse_ of a moment before.

"I'm quite ready," he said, as, after buttoning his gloves and his coat,
he turned towards the door to open it.

"This is my last visit to you, Dudley," she said, sighing deeply and
gazing round the room with a lingering glance.  "My presence here is no
longer welcome."

What could he reply?  He only looked at her in silence.

She was standing close to him, her pale face anxiously raised to his.
He divined her unuttered request, and slowly bent until his lips met
hers.

Then she burst suddenly into tears.

He put his arm tenderly round her waist saying what he could to console
her, for her emotion distressed him.  Complex as was her character, he
saw that his plain, outspoken words had had their effect.  When he had
told her of his decision that morning at Albert Gate she had been
defiant, treating the matter with utter unconcern; but now, as the
result apparently of full reflection, she had become filled by a bitter
remorse, and was penitent enough to beseech forgiveness.

How little we men know of the true hearts of women!  Could we but follow
the whole course of feeling in the feminine mind; could we trace
accurately the links that connect certain consequences with remote
causes, which often render what we most condemn a necessity from which
there was never a single chance of escape; could we, in short, see as a
whole, and see it clearly, what at present our lack of the right vision
causes us to see in part, and obscurely--all that tempted to wrong, all
that blinded to right--we should not then presume to theorise so glibly;
to set ourselves up as accusers, judges, executioners, in such
unbecoming haste.  We should have mercy upon women, as befits honest
men.

At heart Dudley Chisholm loved the woman he was striving to comfort,
even though his association with her had so nearly wrecked his chance of
succeeding in an official career.  But he hated the artificiality of the
smarter set; he detested the fickleness of the flirt; and he had been
sadly disillusioned by the gossip that had of late sprung up in
connection with the woman who for so long had represented his ideal.

He would have forgiven her without further parley had it not been for
the knowledge that vengeance was already close behind him, and that
before long she must be left without his love and protection.  His
secret caused him to preserve silence; but she, ignorant of the truth,
believed that the spell she had exercised so long was at last broken.

In the hour of her despair she uttered many passionate words of love,
and many, many times their lips met in fervent kisses.  Nevertheless,
both felt that a gulf yawned between them--a wide gulf caused by her own
folly and recklessness.

At length she succeeded in stifling her emotion, drying her eyes, and
concealing the traces of her tears by means of the eau de Cologne he
handed her and a few dexterous dabs with her tiny powder-puff.

Now that she was calmer, he kissed her upon the forehead, drew her cloak
over the still tumultuous breast, and then led her below, where her
brougham was awaiting them.

During the drive to Penarth House, that old-fashioned but well-known
mansion at the western end of Piccadilly, they sat together in silence.

Their hands were clasped.  Both hearts were too full for words.  They,
who had loved one another for so many years, were now together for the
last time.

A deep and bitter sigh escaped Chisholm.  He was going to this ball,
always one of the most brilliant entertainments in London--for the
duchess was a political hostess and frequently entertained "for the
Party"--to drink the cup of pleasure to the dregs, because on the morrow
his place in English officialdom would be empty.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

IS DISTINCTLY ENIGMATICAL.

Distinction among women is rapidly becoming a lost art.  Woman nowadays
is nothing if not modern in her views.  After her presentation, her
natural enthusiasm and charming high spirits usually cause her to take a
too tolerant and rosy view of life, with the result that she degenerates
into being merely smart.  She becomes absorbed in Man and Millinery.
Dress is her keynote.  A lady's luggage has during the past ten years
assumed alarming proportions, and a fashionable woman rushes eagerly to
a house-party for the express purpose of airing the latest triumphs of
Paquin or Lentheric.  She is expected to make as many alterations in her
costume as a quick-change artiste at the music-halls.  In old times a
tailor-made gown was worn for breakfast; but now a smart gown is put on
for the morning meal, afterwards to be changed for a walking-costume or
a suit for motor-driving.  Luncheon demands another dainty gown, and tea
brings out that luxurious and poetical garment, the tea-gown.  At quite
a small party this is sometimes retained for dinner, but for a big
affair a magnificent dress is donned; and the same gown, whether
designed for the morning or the evening, must never be worn twice.

Except when she was entertaining for a political purpose, the Duchess of
Penarth's functions were characterised by an exclusiveness which
belonged more to the mid-Victorian period than to latter-day London.
Her Grace was a well-known hostess, and as her house-parties in
Derbyshire usually included a member of the royal family, her circle of
guests was a small and exceedingly smart one.  If any outsider was
admitted to her balls, he or she was always a brilliant person.  Every
season, of course, sees a new recruit to the ranks of these
distinguished strangers--the latest empire-builder, the newest
millionaire, or the most recently discovered society beauty.  Dudley
Chisholm had several times accompanied Claudia to balls at Penarth
House, and knew well that everything was most magnificently done.

The carriage drew up in the long line that slowly filed into the
old-fashioned courtyard, there to set down the guests.  As Dudley looked
out upon the lights of Piccadilly the rhymer's jingle recurred to him:

  Oh! the tales that you could tell,
                  Piccadilly.
  (Fit for Heaven, fit for hell),
                  Piccadilly.
  Of the folk who buy and sell,
  Of the merry marriage bell,
  Of the birthday, of the knell,
  Of the palace, of the cell,
  Of the beldame, and the belle,
  Of the rest of them who fell,
                  Piccadilly.

Yes, he hated it all.  But it was the end--his last night with the woman
who had for so long held him enthralled.

He believed he had broken the spell when he left her at Albert Gate a
few mornings before; but he now discovered that he had been mistaken.
Her tears had moved him.  Although she was much to blame, he could not
bear to see her suffer.

Up that wide staircase, well-known for its ancient handrail of crystal,
they passed to the ballroom, which, as was usual at Penarth House,
presented a most brilliant _coup d'oeil_.  The women, all of them
splendidly attired, ranged from the freshest _debutante_ to the painted
brigade of frivolous fifty, the members of which exhibit all the pitiful
paraphernalia of the womanhood which counterfeits the youth it has lost
and wreathes the death's head in artificial smiles.  The crush was
great, but even before Dudley and Lady Richard Nevill had entered the
ballroom his beautiful companion was receiving homage from every side.
Her arrival was the _clou_ of the entertainment, and Her Grace, an
elderly, rather stout person, wearing a magnificent tiara, came fussily
forward to greet her.

Chisholm was quick to notice that Claudia had no desire to dance with
any of the host of partners who at once began to petition her.  Many of
the men he knew--and heartily hated.  Young scions of noble houses, a
bachelor millionaire with black, mutton-chop whiskers, a reckless young
peer, in whose company Claudia had often of late been seen, all crowded
about her, smiling, paying compliments, and bowing over her hand.

But to all of these she excused herself.  She was not feeling well, she
declared, and as yet could not possibly dance.  So by degrees her court
slowly dissolved, and for a time she and Dudley were left alone.  As may
be imagined, there was much whispering in all quarters about her
re-appearance in public with Chisholm.

They sat out several dances in a cool anteroom, dimly lit and filled
with palms.  In the half darkness they clasped hands, but they spoke
very little, fearing lest others might overhear.  Chisholm sat as one
dead to all around him.  As he passed through the great ballroom with
its myriad lights and restless crowd he had mechanically returned the
salutes of those who knew him, without recognising a single man or
woman.  In his present mood friends and enemies were alike to him--all
of them so many shapes from the past.

To the woman at his side he clung, and to her alone.  The memory of
their bygone happiness he could not put aside.  He would be compelled to
make his _adieux_ to life very soon--perhaps, indeed, in a few hours--
and his only regret was for her.  He could tell her nothing, and when he
was dead she, like the others, would spurn his memory.

That thought caused him to grip the small, white-gloved hand he held.
His lips moved convulsively, but in that subdued light Claudia could not
detect his agitation.  He was unusually sad and apprehensive, fearful of
some impending catastrophe--that was all she knew.

She had tried to arouse him by making caustic and amusing criticisms
regarding those about them, but all to no purpose.  Her witticisms
provoked no smile.  He seemed utterly lost in his melancholy
reflections.

"Listen!" she said at last.  "There's a waltz.  Let us go."

She rose and led him into the ballroom, where a moment later they were
whirling along together in the smart crowd, compelling even jealous
onlookers to describe them as splendidly matched.  As Dudley steered his
beautiful partner among the other dancers the music caused a flow of sad
memories to surge through his brain--memories of the hundreds of balls
at which they had been happy in each other's love.

He laughed bitterly within himself as he saw her smile at a man she
knew.  Yes, when he was dead she would, he supposed, mourn for him for
the first day and forget him on the second, just as completely as she
had forgotten her indulgent husband.  He saw that look of recognition
exchanged between them; but the man's face was unfamiliar.  He was
young, rather sallow-faced, with a dark-brown beard.

But he made no comment.  As this waltz was their last, why should he
spoil it?  Upon her all argument was expended in vain, he declared to
himself bitterly.

The floor was perfect, the music excellent, and quickly the old flush of
pleasure came back to her face.

"You are enjoying it?" he whispered to her.

"And why don't you, Dudley?" she asked.  "You really ought to put on a
more pleasant expression.  People will remark upon it."

"Let them say what they will," he replied in a hard tone.  "They cannot
hurt me now."

"Well, dear, you look as grave as if you were at a funeral.  Forgive me
for speaking plainly, won't you?"

"I am grave because I cannot take leave of all that I have learnt to
love without a feeling of poignant regret," he answered.  "In future I
shall be debarred from all this."

"Why?  Are you going to enter a monastery, or something?" she asked, her
old easy-going _insouciance_ now returning to her.

"No, not exactly that!" he answered ambiguously.  "Really, I can't make
you out to-night, Dudley," she answered as, now that the waltz had
ended, he was conducting her across the room.  "I do wish you'd tell me
this extraordinary secret which is oppressing you.  Once you used to
tell me everything.  But now--"

"Ah! it is different now," he said.

"Because you mistrust me?"

"No, because our love must end," he replied in a voice so low that none
overheard.

She looked at him swiftly with a pained expression, still unable to
discover the reason of his extraordinary attitude of melancholy and
despair.

"Even if it must be as you have said, surely it is unnecessary to
exhibit your heart upon your sleeve in public?" she argued.  "Your words
have placed upon me a heavy burden of sorrow, God knows!  But I have
learned to wear a mask, and only give myself up to wretchedness in the
silence of my own room."  She spoke the truth.  Well-versed, indeed, was
she in all the feminine artifices.  He knew quite well that her gaiety
was assumed, for he had noticed how her hand trembled, and he had seen
how quickly her breast rose and fell beneath its lace.  Though her heart
was stirred to its very depths, to the smart world in which she
delighted to move she betrayed not a single sign of grief.  She was just
the gay, reckless woman who was so popular as a host and so eagerly
sought as guest, the pretty woman of the hour, the brilliant object of
so much scandal.

"Ah!" he said briefly, "you are a woman."

"Yes," she answered in a deep, intense whisper.  "A woman who has always
loved you, Dudley, and who loves you still!"

At that instant the Duchess of Penarth approached them and carried
Claudia away to be introduced to some notable person--who was "dying to
know" her.  No sooner had she left him than Dudley found himself face to
face with a tall, elderly man who sat for South Staffordshire and was
one of the staunchest supporters of the Government.

Naturally they exchanged greetings, and fell to chatting.  While they
were thus engaged the young brown-bearded man to whom Claudia had given
a covert sign of recognition passed them.

"Do you happen to know that fellow's name?"  Chisholm asked, well aware
that his friend was a popular figure in society and knew every one.

"What, the young fellow now speaking to Lady Meldrum?  Oh, don't you
know?  That's the Grand-Duke Stanislas."

"The Grand-Duke?" echoed the Under-Secretary, as the truth at once
became apparent.  No doubt he had watched them separate and was now on
his way in search of her.

"And is that elderly woman with white hair Lady Meldrum?  I've heard of
her.  Wife of a big iron-founder in Glasgow, isn't she?"

"That's so," his friend answered.  "But haven't you met their ward,
Muriel Mortimer?  She was presented last year.  Awfully pretty girl.
There she is, in cream, sitting close by Lady Meldrum.  You should know
her.  Let me introduce you.  I'm an old friend of the family, you know,
and she's been wanting to know you for ever so long."

At first he held back, declaring that he had to return to the House
before it rose; but the Member for South Staffordshire would take no
refusal, and a moment later the Under-Secretary found himself bowing
before a fair-haired girl with a sweet, innocent-looking face, dimpled
cheeks that blushed slightly as he was introduced, and a pair of large
wide-open blue eyes that looked out upon him in wonder.

About twenty-two he judged her to be, fragile, pretty, almost child-like
in her artless grace.  Her complexion was perfect, and her rather
plainly made toilette of cream chiffon suited her beauty admirably.
Indeed, demure and rather shy, she seemed out of place in that crowd of
the more brilliant butterflies of fashion.

A moment before, Dudley Chisholm had turned away from the dancers and
had intended to drive down to the House in order to while away the rest
of the night, but now this resolution was forgotten, because he had at
once become interested in the girl with whom he had just made
acquaintance, and all the more so when he recollected the colonel's
strange warning down at Wroxeter.  He was bending towards her, speaking
in commonplaces, reflecting the while that there certainly was nothing
in her outward appearance to cause him terror.

And yet the colonel had prophesied correctly in regard to their meeting
and had warned him to avoid her.  Why?  The mystery underlying the words
of his friend was certainly remarkable.

He was really attracted towards her by her childlike absence of
artificiality.  Though the shyness of the _debutante_ had scarcely worn
off, she committed no errors of etiquette.  As she slowly fanned
herself, she talked to him with all the gravity and composure of a woman
of the world.

Lady Meldrum had also been introduced to him by the honourable Member
for South Staffordshire, and she was, he discovered, a rather gushing,
good-looking woman of the type prone to paying compliments quite
indiscriminately.

Women nowadays keep their good looks much longer than they used to do.
The woman of forty, and even the woman of fifty, to-day is not so old as
the woman of thirty was--well, thirty years ago.  For this reason, no
doubt, and because we are becoming so very Continental, the married
women reign supreme, and appear to reign for ever.  It seems absurd to
read in the list of beauties at a ball, the names of mothers and
daughters bracketed together; but, in several instances, if the truth
were told, it should be the daughter's name, and and not the mother's,
which ought to be left out.

"Do you know, Mr. Chisholm, I have already paid a visit to your
chambers," her ladyship laughed.  "Lady Richard Nevill took me up with
her, fearing that I should catch cold while waiting in the carriage.
She has been staying with us down at Fernhurst.  Perhaps you have
heard?"

"She told me so," the Under-Secretary answered, at once summing her up
as a rather vulgar person who had opened the door of society by means of
a key fashioned out of gold.

"And now I must let you into another secret," she went on fussily.  "I
took Muriel to the House the other night, and we heard you speak."

He smiled.

"I don't know what subject you heard me speak upon, Miss Mortimer," he
said, turning to the blue-eyed girl in cream, "but I hope you were
edified."

"I was intensely interested," the young girl said.  "Mr. Blackwood," she
added, indicating the Honourable Member who had introduced them,--"took
us all through the House and showed us the library, the dining-rooms,
the Lobby, and all the places that I'd read about.  I had no idea the
House of Commons was such a wonderful place and so full of creature
comforts."

"Its wonders are very often tiresome," he remarked with a little smile.
"As a show-place, Miss Mortimer, it is one of the sights of England.  As
a place in which to spend half one's days it is not the most
comfortable, I assure you."

"Ah!" exclaimed Lady Meldrum; "of course; I quite understand.  A man
holding such an important position in the Government as you do can have
but little time for leisure.  I saw you with Lady Richard Nevill just
now.  She brought you here, of course."

"Yes," he admitted.  "I go out very little."

"And she induced you to come here with her.  Charming woman!  She was
the light and soul of our party at Fernhurst."

And as the wife of the Jubilee knight continued to make claims upon
Dudley's attention, he was prevented from exchanging more than a few
words with the sweet-faced girl against whom he had been so strangely
warned by the man who for so many years had been one of his closest
friends.

This plump wife of the estimable Scotch iron-founder was a recent
importation into society.  She had, he heard, been "taken up" by
Claudia, and owed all her success to her ladyship's introductions.  It
is not given to every one to entertain a Grand-Duke for the shooting,
and her fame as a hostess had been considerably increased by her good
fortune in this respect.

She chattered steadily until the tall, thin-faced Duke of Penarth
himself strolled past, bowed on catching sight of her, and stayed to
talk for a few moments.  Lady Meldrum did not hesitate when it was
necessary to choose between a sprat and a whale.  She at once turned
aside from Dudley, thus giving him a chance to improve the occasion with
her ward.

Yes, he decided, she was possessed of a charming ingenuousness; and yet
at the same time there was nothing of the school-miss about her.

She had given a very candid and amusing opinion regarding the
controversy which had taken place in the House at the time of her visit,
and had openly expressed her admiration of the determined and outspoken
manner in which he had supported the Government and crushed the
arguments of the Opposition.

"I really suspect you to be a politician, Miss Mortimer," he laughed
presently.  "You seem well-versed in so many points of our foreign
policy."

"Oh," she answered with a smile.  "I read the papers in preference to
novels, that's the reason."

Another waltz was commencing.  As he turned to glance to the centre of
the room, his eyes fell upon a couple gliding together among the
dancers.  He bit his lip, for he recognised them as the Grand-Duke and
the woman who only an hour ago had vowed that she still loved him.

He turned back again to that pale, childish face with the blue eyes, and
saw truth, honesty, and purity mirrored there.

Yet he had been distinctly and seriously warned against her--even her.

Why, he wondered, had the colonel spoken in so forcible a fashion, and
yet refused a single word of explanation?

It was an enigma, to say the least of it.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

TAKES DUDLEY BY A BY-PATH.

To love faithfully is to love with singleness of heart and sameness of
purpose, through all the temptations which society presents, and under
all the assaults of vanity both from within and without.  It is so
pleasant for a woman to be admired and so soothing to her to be loved,
that the grand trial of female constancy is to refrain from adding one
more conquest to her triumphs when it is evidently in her power to do
so.  Obviously her chief protection is to restrain the first indefinite
thoughts which, if allowed to gain clearness and swiftness, may lead her
fancy astray.  Even the ideas which commonly float through the mind of
woman are so rapid and so indistinctly shaped, that when the door is
opened to such thoughts as these they pour in like a torrent.  Then
first will arise a sudden perception of deficiency in the object of her
love, or some additional impression of his unkindness or neglect, with
comparisons between him and other men, and regret that he has not some
quality which they possess; sadness under a conviction of her future
destiny, pining for sympathy under that sadness, and, lastly, the
commencement of some other intimacy, which at first she has no idea of
converting into love.

Such is the manner in which, in thousands of cases, the faithfulness of
woman's love has been destroyed, and destroyed far more effectually than
if assailed by an open, and, apparently, more formidable foe.  And what
a wreck has followed!  For when woman loses her integrity and her
self-respect, she is indeed pitiable and degraded.  While her
faithfulness remains unshaken, it is true she may, and probably will,
have much to suffer; but let her destiny in this life be what it may,
she will walk through the world with a firm and upright step.  To live
solitary may be the cost of her noble behaviour; but often this solitude
will represent a decoration more splendid than any to be received from
the hands of queens and emperors.

I may be accused of a cold philosophy in speaking of such consolation
being efficacious under the suffering which arises from unkindness and
desertion; but who would not rather be the one to bear injury than the
one to inflict it?  The very act of bearing it meekly and reverently, as
from the hand of God, has a purifying and solemnising effect upon the
soul, which the faithless and the fickle never can experience.

Dudley Chisholm sat before the fire in his room until the dawn, trying
to unravel a thousand knots, his mind filled with sad memories and with
bitter regrets in plenty.

Muriel Mortimer had interested him, just as a child sometimes interests
the pedantic philosopher.  He had found hers a frank, open, girlish
nature, as yet unspoiled by its contact with the smart, well-dressed,
vicious set into which the ambitious Lady Meldrum had seen fit to plunge
her.  He admired her as one standing apart from most of the women he
knew, for she had displayed an intelligence and a knowledge of political
affairs that surprised him.  She, on her side, seemed to regard him
rather fearfully, as one of the powers of the State.  This amused him,
and he assured her that he could not honestly claim to be more than the
mouthpiece of the Foreign Office.  Yes, she was as charming as she was
ingenuous.

And Claudia?  He reflected upon all that he had said, and upon all her
answers; yet somehow he could not make up his mind whether she were
really false.

When he recollected the quick passion of her caresses, the tenderness of
her words, the gentle sympathy with which she had asked him to confide
in her, he found it difficult to believe that she could actually forget
him five minutes after leaving him in that ballroom, and waltz airily
with the man with whose name her own was being everywhere coupled.

To him, honest, upright man that he was, this seemed an absolute
impossibility.  He refused to believe it.  Surely she loved him, in
spite of her perplexing caprices; surely she had been seized by remorse
for her own fickleness.

He endeavoured to compare the two women, but the comparison caused him
to start up in quick impatience.

"No!" he cried aloud in a fierce voice.  "A thousand times no!  I love
Claudia--no one else!--no one else in all the world!"

Next day when he entered his room at Downing Street, Wrey, his
secretary, put before him a quantity of documents requiring attention.
He held the responsible office of superintending under-secretary of the
Commercial Department of Her Majesty's Foreign Office, the business of
which consisted of correspondence with our Ministers and Consuls abroad;
with the representatives of the Foreign Powers in England, and with the
Board of Trade and other departments of the Government.  He had been
absorbed in these papers for some hours, snatching only a few minutes
for a glass of sherry and a biscuit at luncheon-time, when Wrey returned
to remind him of a long-standing engagement that evening at the little
town of Godalming, which was in his constituency, four miles from
Albury.

He glanced up from his writing and gave vent to a sharp ejaculation of
annoyance.

"Are you quite certain it is to-night?" he asked, for the reminder was
to him a most unpleasant one.  He avoided speaking in his constituency
whenever he could.

"Yes.  I put it down in the diary a month ago--a dinner given by the
Lodge of Odd Fellows in aid of a local charity."

Dudley groaned.  He knew too well those charity dinners given in a small
room among his honest but rather uncouth supporters.  He dreaded the
tinned soups, the roast beef, the tough fowls, and the surreptitious
tankards of ale in lieu of wine, to be followed by those post-prandial
pipes and strong cigars.  He shuddered.  The dense atmosphere always
turned him sick, so that he usually made his speech while it was still
possible to see across the room.  He was very fond of the working-man,
and subscribed liberally to all charitable objects and associations,
from those with a political aim down to the smallest coal club in the
outlying villages; but why could not those honest sons of toil leave him
in peace?

His presence, of course, gave importance to the occasion, but if they
had found it possible to spare him the ordeal of sitting through their
dinner he would have been thankful.  Out of fifty invitations to
banquets of various kinds, openings of bazaars, flower-shows, lectures,
concerts, entertainments and penny-readings, he usually declined
forty-nine.  As he could not absolutely cut himself aloof from his
Division, on rare occasions he accepted, and spent an evening at Albury,
or Godalming, or some of the less important local centres of political
thought.

The pot-house politician, who forms his ideas of current events from the
ultra-patriotic screeches of certain popular newspapers, was a common
object in his constituency; but in Godalming, at any rate, the great
majority of his supporters were honest working-men.  The little town is
a quaint, old-world place with a long High Street of ancient houses,
many of them displaying the oak-beams of the sixteenth century, and its
politics were just as staunch and old-fashioned as the borough itself.
True, a new town of comfortable villas has sprung up of late around it,
and high upon the hill are to be seen the pinnacles of Charterhouse
School; but, notwithstanding these innovations, Godalming has not
marched with the times.  Because of this the blatant reformer has but
little chance there, and the Parliamentary Seat is always a safe one for
the Conservatives.

Much as he disliked the duty, he saw that it was absolutely necessary to
go down and make pretence of having a meal with that estimable Society
of Odd Fellows.  He rose from his seat at the littered table, at once
feeling a sudden desire for fresh air after the closeness of his room,
and a few minutes later was driving in a cab to Waterloo.  To dress for
such a function was quite unnecessary.  Working men do not approve of
their Member wearing a dinner jacket when among them, for they look upon
a starched shirt as a sign of superiority.  He was always fond of the
country round Godalming, where he had once spent a summer, and as it was
a sunshiny afternoon saw in the occasion an opportunity of taking a walk
through some of the most picturesque lanes in Surrey.

He was tired, world-weary, utterly sick of life.  The duties of his
office pressed heavily upon him; but most burdensome of all was the
ever-present dread that the threatened blow should fall and crush him.
He wanted air: he wanted to be alone to think.

And so, when that afternoon he alighted at Godalming and returned the
salutes of the station-master and book-stall keeper, he started off up
the steep road as far as the Charterhouse, and from that point struck
off by a narrow footpath which led away across the brown ploughed fields
to where the Hog's Back stretched before him in the blue distance.  The
autumn sun shone brightly in the clear, grey sky, and the trees in all
their glory of brown and gold shed their leaves upon him as he passed.

Save the station-master and the book-stall clerk, none had recognised
him.  This was fortunate, for now he was free, out in the open country
with its rich meadows and picturesque hills and valleys, until the hour
when he must dine with his supporters and utter some trite sayings
regarding the work of the Government and its policy abroad.

He was fond of walking, and was glad to escape from Downing Street and
from the House for a single evening; so he strode along down the path
with a swinging gait, though with a heart not light enough for the full
enjoyment of his lovely surroundings.

The by-path he had taken was that which leads over the hills from
Godalming past Field Place to the little old-world village of Compton.
Having crossed the ploughed lands, he entered a thick coppice, where the
path began to run down with remarkable steepness into wide meadows, on
the other side of which lay a dark wood.  The narrow path running
through the coppice terminated at a stile which gave entrance to the
park-like meadow-land.

Descending this path he halted at the stile, leaning against it.  Alone
in that rural solitude, far removed from the mad hurry of London life,
he stood to think.  Each gust of wind brought down a shower of brown
leaves from the oaks above, and the only other sound was the cry of a
pheasant in the wood.

For at least five minutes he stood motionless.  Then he suddenly roused
himself, and some words escaped his lips:

"How strange," he murmured, "that my footsteps should lead me to this
very spot, of all others!  Why, I wonder, has Fate directed me here?"

He turned and gazed slowly round upon the scene spread before him, the
green meadows, the dark wood, the sloping hill with its bare, brown
fields, and the Hog's Back rising in the far distance, with the black
line of the telegraph standing out against the sky.  With slow
deliberation he took in every feature of the landscape.  Then, facing
about, with his back to the stile, his eyes wandered up the steep path
by which he had just descended from the crest of the hill.

"No," he went on in a strange, low voice, speaking to himself, "it has
not changed--not in the least.  It is all just the same to-day, as
then--just the same."  He sighed heavily as he leaned back upon the
wooden rail and gazed up the ascent, brown with its carpet of acorns and
fallen leaves.  "Yes," he continued at last, "it is destiny that has led
me here, to this well-remembered spot for the last time before I die--
the justice which demands a life for a life."

Throughout the district it would not have been easy to find a more
secluded spot than the small belt of dense wood, half of which lay on
either side of the footpath.  So steep was this path that considerable
care had to be exercised during its descent, especially in autumn, when
the damp leaves and acorns were slippery, or in winter, when the
rain-channels were frozen into precipitous slides.

"A life for a life!" he repeated slowly with a strange curl of the lip.
He permitted himself to speak aloud because in that rural, solitude he
had no fear of eavesdroppers.  "I have lived my life," he said, "and now
it is ended.  My attempted atonement is all to no purpose, for to-day,
or to-morrow, a voice as from the grave will arise to condemn me--to
drive me to take my life!"

He glanced at his watch.

"Yes," he sighed.  "Four o'clock!--at this very spot--at this hour on a
wet day in mid-winter--"

And his eyes fixed themselves blankly upon the ground a couple of yards
distant from where he was standing.  "Six years have gone, and it has
remained ever a mystery!"

His face was pale, his brow contracted, his teeth firmly set.  His eyes
still rested upon that spot covered with dead brown leaves.  Certainly
it was strange that the steep and narrow pathway should possess such
fascination for him, for he had wandered there quite involuntarily.  It
is not too much to say that he would have flown to any other part of
England rather than stand upon the spot so closely associated with the
chapter in his life's history that he hoped was closed for ever.

Suddenly he roused himself, and, walking forward a couple of paces,
marked with his stick a square in the dead leaves.  Apparently he was
deep in calculation, for after he had made the mark he carefully
measured, by means of his cane, the distance between the square and the
top of the short ascent.  On either side of the path was a steep
moss-grown bank surmounted by thick hazel-bushes, but on the left a
little distance up was an old wooden fence, grey with lichen.  He
appeared to be deeply interested in this fence, for after going close up
to it he measured by careful pacing the distance between it and the spot
he had marked out.

When this was done, he stood again motionless, his fevered brow bared to
the breezes as though to him that spot were hallowed.  Then, crossing
the stile, he entered the meadow, passing and repassing the narrow lane
as though for the purpose of discovering the exact position an observer
would be compelled to take up in order to watch a person standing at the
point he had marked.

At last he returned, standing again with his back to the stile, his hat
raised in reverence, gazing fixedly upon those dead and decaying leaves.

"Yes," he murmured, "I was mad--mad!  The devil tempted me, and I fell.
Would to God that I could make amends!  But I cannot--I dare not.  No, I
must suffer!"

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

WHICH DEMANDS EXPLANATION.

Chisholm dined that night in the upstairs room of that old-fashioned
hostelry, the Angel, at Godalming, in company with the brethren of the
banner.

He sat at the right of the estimable, fat-handed butcher who presided,
and was informed by him that as the gigantic roast sirloin that was
served was his "own killing," he could recommend it.  They ate, drank,
and made merry, these men banded together by their sacred rites, until
the heat grew so intense that the windows were opened, with the result
that decorous High Street echoed to the volleys of their hearty
laughter.

As drink was included in the cost of the repast, those diners with the
more rapacious appetites--who, indeed, made no secret that they had been
existing in a state of semi-starvation all day in order to eat at
night--drank indiscriminately of the lemonade, beer, wine and whiskey
placed upon the table.  Indeed, as is usual at such feasts, they ate and
drank all within reach of their hands.  But these bearded working-men
and small tradesmen were merry and well-meaning with it all.  After "The
King" had been honoured, they toasted with boisterous enthusiasm "Our
Honourable Member," and joined in the usual chorus of poetical praise,
"For he's a jolly good fellow."

Dudley sat bowing and smiling, yet at heart sick of the whole
performance.  He dreaded the pipes and cigars that would in a few
moments appear.  Shag and clays always turned him ill.  He was no great
smoker himself, and had never been able to withstand the smell of a
strong cigar.

His quick eyes observed a man who was beginning in an affectionate
manner to fondle a well-coloured short clay.  He bent at once to the
chairman, saying that he would now deliver his speech.

"Silence, please, gentlemen!" shouted the rotund butcher, rapping the
table with his wooden mallet after their guest's health had been drunk.
"Silence for our Honourable Member!  Silence--_please_!"

Then Dudley rose eagerly, happy in the knowledge that he was almost
through the ordeal, and, with a preliminary "Mr. Chairman and
Gentlemen," addressed the hundred or so of his faithful supporters,
telling them this and that about the Government, and assuring them of
the soundness of the policy adopted by Her Majesty's Ministers.  It was
not a very long speech, but it was upon a subject of the moment; and as
there were two "gentlemen of the Press" representing the local
advertisement sheets, the one a mere boy, and the other a melancholy,
disappointed-looking man, with a sage and rather ascetic expression, the
speech would appear in the papers, and the Godalming Lodge of Odd
Fellows would receive the credit of having entertained one of England's
most rising statesmen.  The two representatives of the Press, each of
whom took himself very seriously, had been regaled with a bottle of port
and some cigars by the committee, who entertained a hope that they would
thus be induced to give a lengthy and laudatory account of the function.

While Dudley was on his legs the cloud of tobacco-smoke became thicker
and thicker.  Those triumphs of the tobacconist called "tuppenny smokes"
are nauseous when in combination with the odour of food.  Dudley sniffed
them, coughed slightly, sipped some water, and then drew his speech to a
close amid a terrific outburst of applause and a beating upon the tables
which caused the glasses and crockery to jingle.

While this oration was in full blast he noticed a committee-man
uncovering the piano, by which he knew that "harmony" was to embellish
the hot whiskey period.  At last, however, he managed to excuse himself,
upon the plea that he must return to the House for a Division that was
expected; and as soon as he was out in the High Street he breathed more
freely.  Then he hurried to the train, and, entering the express from
Portsmouth, tried to forget the spot he had visited in that small belt
of forest--the scene that too often commanded the most vivid powers of
his memory.

"I was a fool ever to have gone there!--an absolute fool!" he murmured
to himself, as he flung himself back in the first-class compartment when
alone.  "I ran an unnecessary risk.  And that man who came so suddenly
upon me just as I was leaving!  What if he had watched and recognised
me?  If so, he would certainly gossip about my presence there, describe
my actions--and then--"

He was silent; his face became blanched and drawn.

"Even though six years have passed, the affair is not forgotten," he
went on in a hard voice.  "It is still the local mystery which Scotland
Yard failed to elucidate.  Yes," he added, "I was a fool--a confounded
fool!  What absurd whim took me to that place of all others, I can't
imagine.  I'm mad--mad!" he cried in wild despair.  "This madness is the
shadow of suicide!"

Instead of going down to the House he drove back at once to his
chambers.

Upon his table was a note from Claudia, affectionate as usual, and full
of regret that they had not met again on the previous night--when they
had been so suddenly separated at Penarth House.

"What do you think of little Muriel Mortimer?  I saw you speaking with
her," she wrote.  "She was full of you when I met her shopping in Bond
Street this morning.  You have made quite an impression, my dear Dudley.
But don't altogether forget me, will you?"

Forget?  Could he ever forget the woman whom he loved, and yet despised?
Strange that Claudia should have plotted with Lady Meldrum against his
bachelor estate, and should have determined to bring about this marriage
with Muriel Mortimer!

In a frenzy of despair he cast her letter into the flames.  He
recollected the words she had uttered to him in that room on the
previous night, the sweet words of love and tenderness that had held him
spellbound.  No, there was no other woman in all the world save her--and
yet, she was false and fickle, as all the world knew.

Life's comforts are its cares.  He smiled bitterly as he reflected upon
that phrase, which was an extract from one of his many brilliant
speeches.  If a person has no cares, that person must make them, or be
wretched; care is actually an employment, an action; sometimes even a
joy.  And so it is with love.  Life and love must have employment and
action.  There must be responsibility and a striving to reach a goal;
for if not, both the power to endure and the power to give comfort are
shrunken and crippled.

When Dudley Chisholm was young he had long worshipped an ideal.  But
when he found his idol to be undeserving of the idolatry, madness fell
upon him, and he accepted the creed of the prodigal.  Raking over the
ashes of the numerous bonfires he had made, for which his senses had
been the fuel, he now found a revelation of his inner self.  He
recognised for the first time his weakness and his unworthiness.  He
wanted something better than he had known--not in others, but in
himself.  He had discovered a spot of tenderness in his heart that had,
so to speak, remained virgin soil.

"Could a really smart woman possess any nice sense of honour?" he asked
himself for the hundredth time.  If she is endowed with any particular
intelligence, and the world discovers it, then society is prone to think
that she is necessarily a "schemer," and, unless her friends know her
very well, she is soon given a place upon society's black list as an
"adventuress," a term which applies to the whole gamut of West End
wickedness.  No, after all, few women can be both honourable and smart.

His thoughts wandered back into the past, as they so frequently did, and
a moan came from his heart.  He remembered Claudia as an ideal woman of
whom a cruel Fate had robbed him in those days before he learned the
world to be what it is.  And he still loved her--even though this great
gulf yawned between them.

Dudley Chisholm was blind to Claudia's true character.  He was attracted
to her by her intellect and her physical magnetism.  In these days of
her freedom she had dared to be herself, and having knowledge of herself
and of men, she had developed his admiration up to her own standpoint.
She had taught him women as she knew them herself.  She was playing with
all the edged tools of daring because she felt that she was the stronger
of the two, and that he would dare no further than she willed.  She was
charmed with the freedom she allowed herself; while he was, in a manner,
flattered by her apparent constancy to him and by her finding in him
anything that interested a woman of her attainments and popularity.
Thus he had become thoroughly interested, madly infatuated, as well as
honestly in love.

Men so seldom understand the inner nature, the designing nature, if I
may be forgiven the expression, of some women.  Such women are
unscrupulous in their dealings both with men and women.  The West End is
full of them.  They live for what they can get out of their
acquaintances, instead of for what they can do for them.  They give as
much love to all as to one, unless that one should happen to be more
wealthy or distinguished than the others.  Then the wealthy one will get
the largest quantity of attention, while the others will be kept
dangling on the string for use at odd times.  Such women are shrewd.
Mayfair has taught them the art of conversation.  They have reduced it
to a science.  With the innocent face of a child, they learn never to
let the left hand know what the right hand is doing.  And, if the bare
truth be stated, Claudia Nevill was one of these.  She, in her
shrewdness, had handled Dudley with light ribbons.  She had intuitively
understood what kind of woman he preferred, and she had been that
woman--until now, when the bitter truth had been made plain to him.

In this life of ours the tossing between the extremes of happiness and
misery are terribly wearying.  When once life's lessons begin they
continue in a mad headlong rush of events.  During the last few days
Dudley Chisholm seemed to have lived a lifetime.  Fate twisted and
turned him through and round human follies and treachery.  It laughed at
him, beating up all that was false against all that was true in his own
nature, until he found himself in such a _pot-pourri_ of sunshine and
storm that life seemed suddenly too incomprehensible to be endured.

The daintiness of women rivets and enchains men of Dudley's stamp--the
perfume of the hair, the baby-smell of the skin, the frills, the laces,
the violets exuding from the chiffons, the arched foot, the neat ankle,
the clinging drapery--everything, in fact, that means delicate luxury
not to be enjoyed save in the company of a woman.  Awkwardness
disenchants, but well-poised, graceful lines, added to a _chic_ in
dress, hold for ever.  To be essentially feminine places a woman in the
holy of holies in a man's heart.  As Claudia was essentially feminine,
she still held Dudley safe, in spite of that sudden gust of scandal.

Alone, seated in his familiar armchair, he cast aside the heavy thoughts
that had so oppressed him ever since he had stood at that spot deep in
rural Surrey, and looked upon the place every object of which was
photographed upon his memory.  He thought of Claudia, and, remembering
the declaration of her love whispered in that room, felt regret at the
hard words he had uttered.  She had made mistakes and become entangled
in the meshes of the net spread out for her.  Was it not his duty to
extricate her?  He too had made a mistake in not paying respect, at
least outwardly, to the social code, and now the time had come when he
was forced to recognise that necessity.  Yes, in his inner consciousness
he fully realised the mistake he had made.  He had all unconsciously
aided and abetted her in becoming what was known as "a smart woman."

Perhaps, however, his opinion of her would have been a different one had
he been present at that moment in one of the smaller sitting-rooms of
the great mansion at Albert Gate.  It was a cosy apartment, with the
lamplight mellowed to a half tone by the yellow shade; dull greyish blue
was the colour of the silken walls, a cool, restful tint that seemed a
fitting background for the cosy lounge draped with dark Egyptian red and
suppressed greens and yellows.

Upon the couch, in a handsome dinner gown of pale pink trimmed with
black velvet, lazily lounged its mistress among her silken pillows,
slowly waving her fan, while near her in one of the big saddle-bag
chairs sat the Grand-Duke Stanislas smoking a cigarette, his eyes fixed
upon her.

At his throat he wore the ribbon of St. Andrew, one of the highest of
the Russian orders, the splendid diamond cross glittering upon his
shirt-front.  He was on his way to a reception at the Austrian Embassy
given in his honour by the ambassador, but at Claudia's invitation he
had dined with her.

"No, really," she was laughing, "it is not so in England.  I quite admit
that men make it a general accusation against us, as a sex, that we are
ill-natured, unfair, pitiless, in judging one another.  They say that
when women get together, at every word a reputation dies; they say that
as a savage proves his heroism by displaying in grim array the torn
scalps of his enemies, so a woman thinks she proves her virtue by
exhibiting the mangled reputations of her friends; they say--But there
is no end to the witty impertinences and fag-ends of rhymes from
Simonides to Pope, which they fling at us on this subject I have never
heard men so eloquently satirical as when treating with utter scorn the
idea that a woman can possibly elevate herself in the eyes of one of
their sex by degrading, or suffering to be degraded, one of her own; and
in their censure they are right--quite right; but wrong--quite wrong in
attributing this, our worst propensity, to ill-nature and jealousy.
Ignorance is the main cause: ignorance of ourselves and others."

He laughed at her philosophy, and blew a cloud of smoke towards the
ceiling.

"I think, my dear madame, that you must be full of whims, _comme disent
les Anglais_.  A pretty woman like yourself always is," he said in his
marked foreign accent.

"And why not?" she inquired, for he had suddenly changed the channel of
their conversation, and she much feared that he now intended to give her
a _rechauffe_ of his sentimental nonsense.

"Because you brought your friend to the duchess's last night.  I saw
him.  _C'etait assez_."

"You are jealous--eh?"

"Not in the least, I assure you," he answered quite coolly.  "Only it is
pretty folly on madame's part--that is all."

"Why folly?  _O la belle idee_!"

"Madame's _amities_ are of course friendships," he said, raising his
dark eyebrows.  "Nevertheless, she should be warned."

"Of what?"

"Of Monsieur the Under-Secretary," he replied, still regarding her quite
calmly with his dark eyes.  "For her own reputation madame should no
longer be seen with him."

She glanced at her guest quickly, for she was used to men's jealousies.
Yet surely this scion of an Imperial House could not be jealous!

"And for what reason, pray?" she asked, puzzled.  "Because of a
regrettable circumstance," he answered mysteriously.  "Because of a
forthcoming exposure which will be startling.  In a certain
_Chancellerie_ in a certain capital of Europe there reposes a document
which must shortly be made public property."

"Well, and what then?" she asked, not yet grasping his meaning.

"Its publication will bring disgrace and ruin upon madame's friend," he
answered simply.  "That is why I warn you not to be seen again in his
company."

"What do you mean?" she cried, starting up with sudden _hauteur_.  "You
tell me this, in order to turn me from him."

"No, _ma chere_, I tell you a secret which is known in the
_Chancellerie_ of a certain Power antagonistic to your country," he
responded.  "I have told madame the truth for her own benefit."

"You would try to poison my mind against Dudley Chisholm by hints such
as these!" she cried, magnificent in her sudden fury.  "You!--You!  But
let me tell you that I love him--that--that--"

"That you refuse to believe my word!" he said, concluding her unfinished
sentence.

"Yes, that I absolutely refuse to believe you!" she declared
emphatically, facing him boldly in a manner which showed that her nature
had revolted against this attempt to denounce the man she loved.

"_C'est assez_!" he laughed with an air of nonchalance the moment he had
blown a cloud of smoke from his lips.  "Madame has spoken!"

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

IS TOLD IN THE GRASS COUNTRY.

Throughout November Dudley remained in town tied to the House by his
official duties, and saw little of Claudia, who had gone into
Leicestershire for the hunting.  Riding to hounds was her favourite
sport, and she was one of the best horse-women within fifty miles of
Market Harborough.  Each season she went on a visit to Lady Atteridge,
whose husband had a box right in the centre of the hunting-country, and
at every meet she was a conspicuous figure.

An acquaintance she made in the field with the late Empress of Austria,
during a run with the Pytchley across the Grafton country, ripened into
a warm friendship, and on many occasions she had entertained her now
lamented Majesty at Albert Gate.  Nearly every year some foreign royalty
or other is the centre of hunting interest.  Unable to enjoy the race
over the grass in their own land, they come to England for healthful
sport, and generally make Harborough their headquarters.  That season it
was the Grand-Duke Stanislas who rode to nearly every meet, always
accompanied by his equerry.  Hence Claudia and he frequently met, but
since that evening when he had endeavoured to turn her from the man she
loved she had avoided him.  She purposely refrained from attending any
function at which he might possibly be present, and when they were
compelled to meet with the hounds she only bowed, and seldom, if ever,
offered him her hand.

On his part, he was always fussing about her, scolding her for her too
reckless riding across boggy meadows, or at hedges made dangerous by
barbed wires, and always holding himself prepared to render her any of
those many little services which the hunting-man renders the fair sex in
the field.  But on her part she was absolutely indifferent to his
attentions, and at the same time annoyed that he should thus publicly
exhibit his admiration.

Certainly no figure was more neat and _chic_ than hers in its well-cut
habit, her dark hair tightly coiled beneath her becoming hunting-hat.
In the saddle she looked as if she were part of the animal she rode, and
her mare, "Tattie," was a splendid creature, which always came in for a
full share of praise among those who could tell a good hunter when they
saw one.  The men who ride to hounds in the Harborough country are, as a
rule, hard as nails, and as keen and outspoken critics of a woman as of
a horse.  But Claudia Nevill and "Tattie" were both pronounced
first-class, the former because she was so extremely affable with one
and all, even to the farmer's sons who followed the hounds, and blushed
with a countryman's awkwardness when she, the woman of whom the papers
spoke, addressed them.  There was no pride about her ladyship, and the
whole countryside, from Harborough right across to Peterborough,
declared her to be "one of the right sort."

Of course even in the villages there were whispers that she was very
friendly with the Grand-Duke, and the usual deductions were made from
the fact that the latest foreign star in the hunting-firmament was
always riding near her.  But in the country the people are very slow to
give credence to scandal, and the gossip, though active, was not
ill-natured; besides, it had long ago been known that the Foreign
Under-Secretary was passionately attached to her.  Last season Chisholm
had hunted with the Pytchley and had been always at her side, so that
the rustics, and even the members of the hunt had come to regard him as
her future husband, and had pronounced them to be a well-matched pair.

Late one afternoon towards the close of November the end of a busy day
was drawing near.  The meet was at Althorpe Park, Earl Spencer's seat,
and the spinneys all around the park were drawn one after the other; but
although plenty of pretty hunting took place, the hounds did not do any
good.  On drawing No-bottle Wood the greater portion of the large field
managed to get away with the pack as the hounds raced away up wind in
the direction of Harlestone.  The first fox led his pursuers over fine
grass country to a copse near Floore, where the sight of hounds in full
cry, a rare occurrence, caused considerable excitement among the
villagers.  Continuing past Weedon Beck, the fugitive circled round in
the direction of Pattishall, but he was so hotly pressed that he was
obliged to take shelter in a drain near Bugbrook, where it was decided
to leave him.  The second fox, which was started from Dowsby Gorse, gave
a fine run of an hour.  He travelled first to Byfield, thence across the
hilly country back to Weedon Beck, over almost the same district as his
predecessor.  Near Weedon reynard had an encounter with some terriers
belonging to a rabbiting party, but got safely away and finally beat the
pack close to the Nene.

The run had been a very fast one, but both Claudia and Stanislas were
among the few in at the finish.  As many of the hunters jogged homeward
along the Daventry road, the Grand-Duke managed to take up his position
by the side of the beautiful woman whom he so greatly admired.
Stanislas, who was an excellent rider, had left his equerry far behind
in the mad race across hedges, ditches, stubble and ploughed land.
Somewhat bespattered by mud, he sat his horse with perfect ease and with
almost imperial dignity.  To the casual observer there was nothing to
distinguish him from any of the other hunters, for in his well-worn
riding-breeches, gaiters and black coat his appearance was devoid of
that elegance which had distinguished him in London society, and he
looked more like a country squire than the son of an emperor.

They were descending the slope towards a small hamlet of thatched
cottages, when of a sudden he drew his horse closer to hers and, turning
to her, exclaimed in English of rather a pleasant accent:

"Madame is, I fear, fatigued--of my company?"

"Oh dear no," she laughed, turning her fine dark eyes mischievously
towards him.  "Why should I be?  When you are so self-sacrificing as to
leave Muriel Mortimer to Captain Graydon's charge and ride with me, I
surely ought not to complain."

"Why do you speak of Mam'zelle Mortimer?" he asked, at once grown
serious.

"Because you have been flirting with her outrageously all day.  You
can't deny it," she declared, turning to him in her saddle.

"I was merely pleasant to her," he admitted.  "But you English declare
that a man is a flirt if he merely extends the most commonplace
courtesies to a woman.  It is so different in other countries."

"Yes," she laughed.  "Here, in England, woman is fortunately respected,
but it is not so on the Continent."

"I trust that madame has not found me indiscreet," he said earnestly.
"If I have been, I must crave forgiveness, because I am so unused to
English manners."

"I don't think any one need blame you for indiscretion, providing that
Muriel does not object."

"Object?  I do not follow you," he said.

"Well, she may object to her name being bandied about as a woman with
whom you are carrying on an open flirtation."

"You appear to blame me for common civility to her," he observed.  "I
cannot, somehow, understand madame of late.  She has so changed."

"Yes," she answered with a bitter smile; "I have grown older--and
wiser."

"Wisdom always adds charm to a woman," he replied, endeavouring to turn
her sarcasm into a compliment.

"And age commands respect," she answered.

He laughed uneasily, for he knew well her quick and clever repartee.

"I have been wishing to have a word with madame for a long time," he
said, at last breaking a silence that had fallen between them.  "You
have pointedly avoided me for several weeks.  Have I given you offence?
If so, I beg a thousand pardons."

She did not answer for some time.  At heart she despised this Imperial
Prince, before whom half the women in London bowed and curtsied.  She
had once allowed him to pay court to her in his fussy, foreign manner,
amused and flattered that one of his degree should find her interesting;
but all that was now of the past.  In those brief moments as they rode
together along the country road in the wintry twilight, recollections of
summer days at Fernhurst came back to her, and she hated herself.  In
those days she had actually forgotten Dudley.  And then she also
remembered how this man had condemned her lover: how he had urged her to
break off the acquaintance, and how he had hinted at some secret which,
when exposed, must result in Dudley's ruin.

Those enigmatical words of his had caused her much thought.  At what had
he hinted?  A thousand times had she endeavoured to discover his
meaning, but had utterly failed.  If such a secret actually existed, and
if its revelation could cause the downfall of Dudley Chisholm, then it
was surely her duty to discover it and to seek its suppression.  This
latter thought caused her to hesitate, and to leave unsaid the hasty
answer that had flashed into her mind.

"Well," she said at length, "now that you have spoken plainly, I may as
well confess that I have been annoyed--very much annoyed."

"I regret that!" he exclaimed with quick concern.  "If I have caused
madame any annoyance, I assure her it was not in the least intentional.
But tell me how I have annoyed you."

"Oh, it was a small matter, quite a trivial one," she said with affected
carelessness, settling her habit and glancing furtively at the man who
had declared that he held her lover's secret.

"But you will tell me," he urged.  "Please do.  I have already
apologised."

"Then that is sufficient," she replied.

"No, it is not sufficient I must know my offence, to be fully cognisant
of its gravity."

Her brows contracted slightly, but in the fading light he did not notice
the shadow of annoyance that passed across her countenance.

"As I have told you, the offence was not a grave one," she declared.  "I
was merely annoyed, that is all."

"Annoyed by my actions, or by my words?"

"By your words."

"On what occasion?"

"On the last occasion you dined at my house."

For a moment his face assumed a puzzled expression, then in an instant
the truth flashed upon him.

"Ah!" he cried; "I recollect, of course.  Madame has been offended at
what I said regarding her friend, the Under-Secretary.  I can only
repeat my apologies."

"You repeat them because what you told me was untrue!" she exclaimed,
turning and looking him full in the face.  They had allowed their horses
to walk, in order to be able to converse.

"I much regret, madame, that it was true," he replied.

"All of it?"

"All of it."

"And there exists somewhere or other a document which inculpates Dudley
Chisholm?"

"Yes, it inculpates him very gravely, I am sorry to say."

"Sorry!  Why?"

"Well, because he is madame's friend--her very best friend, if report
speaks the truth."  There was a sarcastic ring in his words which she
did not fail to detect, and it stung her to fury.

"I cannot see why you should entertain the least sympathy for my
friend," she remarked in a hard voice.  "More especially for one unknown
to you."

"Oh, we have met!" her companion said.  "We met in Paris long since on
an occasion when I was travelling incognito, and I liked him.  Indeed,
he was dining at the Carlton a week ago at the next table to me."

"And you are aware of the nature of this secret, which, according to
what you tell me, must some day or other bring about his utter
downfall?"

"Ah, no.  Madame misunderstands me entirely," he hastened to protest.
"I am not a diplomatist, nor have I any connection, official or
otherwise, with diplomacy.  I merely told you of a matter which had come
to my knowledge.  Recollect, that a young man in Chisholm's position of
responsibility must have a large number of jealous enemies.  Perhaps it
will be owing to one of these that the secret will leak out."

"It will be used for a political purpose, you mean?"

"Exactly," replied the Grand-Duke.  "Your Government, what with the two
or three contending parties, is always at war, as it were, and the
Opposition, as you term it, may, as a _coup de grace_ to the Government,
reveal the secret."

"But you told me that it was a document, and that it reposed safely in
one of the Chancelleries in a foreign capital, if I remember aright,"
she said.  "Now, tell me honestly, is St. Petersburg the capital you
refer to?"

"No, it is not," he replied promptly.

"And the Embassy in London that is aware of the truth is not in Chesham
Place?"

"Most assuredly not, madame," he replied.

"Cannot you be more explicit," she urged.  "Cannot you, if you are my
friend, as you have more than once declared yourself to be, tell me more
regarding this extraordinary matter which is to create such a terrible
scandal?"

"No, it is impossible--utterly impossible.  If I could, I would tell
madame everything.  But my information really carries me no further than
the bare fact that a certain Power antagonistic to England has been able
to secure a document which must prove the ruin of the most brilliant and
promising of the younger English statesmen."

"And have you really no idea whatever as to the nature of the secret?"

"None."

"From what you tell me one would almost infer that Dudley Chisholm had
been guilty of some crime.  Have you no suspicion of its nature?"

"Absolutely none," her companion declared.  "The only other fact I know
is the whereabouts of the document in question, and that I must keep a
secret, according to my solemn promise."

"You promised not to divulge the direction in which danger lies?" she
said suspiciously.  "Why did you do so?  You surely must have had some
motive!"

"I had none.  The affair was mentioned to me confidentially, and I was
compelled to promise that I would give no indication as to what person
held the incriminating paper.  I told madame of its existence merely to
warn her, and perhaps to prepare her for an unwelcome revelation."

"You refuse to tell me more?" she asked quickly, "even though you must
be aware how deeply this extraordinary matter affects me?"

"I am compelled to refuse, madame," he answered in the same calm,
unruffled tone.  "I cannot break my word of honour."

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

SUGGESTS A DOUBLE PROBLEM.

Fashion, as we call it, is in these decadent days at the mercy of any
millionaire pork-butcher, or any enterprising adventurer from across the
seas.  Victorian literature has declined into the "short story" and the
"problem play," taking its heroines from among women with a past and its
heroes from the slums.  In prose, in verse, and in conversation, the
favourite style is the Cockney slang of the costermonger, the
betting-ring, and the barrack canteen.  Is it not appalling that the
reek of the pot-house, the music-hall, the turf, the share-market, the
thieves' doss-house infects our literature, our manners, our amusements,
and our ideals of life?  Yet is it not the truth?

Dudley, yielding to Claudia's persuasion, gave a large house-party at
Wroxeter during the Christmas recess.  As he was too much occupied with
his public duties to be able to arrange the affair himself, she returned
from Market Harborough and went down to Shropshire to make his
arrangements.  Truth to tell, he was wearied of the nightly discussions
in the House and his daily work at the Foreign Office, and looked
forward to a brief period of relaxation and gaiety, when he could
entertain his friends.  He left everything to her, just as he had done
on several previous occasions.  Very soon after his decision to ask his
friends down to the old feudal castle, Wroxeter was the scene of much
cleaning and garnishing.

Claudia, whose charm of manner was unequalled, was an admirable hostess
of striking individuality, and her own entertainments were always
brilliant successes.  Royalties came to her small parties, and every one
who was any one was seen at her receptions.  She it was who decided what
guests should be asked to Wroxeter, and who sent out the invitations;
then, after seeing that all was in complete readiness, she returned
again to town.  She was a born entertainer, and never so happy as when
arranging a social function, whether it was a dinner, private
theatricals, a bazaar, or a theatre supper at the Carlton.  It follows
that as regards the arrangement of Dudley's house-party at Wroxeter she
was entirely in her element.

A paragraph crept into the papers announcing how the popular
Under-Secretary intended to spend the recess.  This was copied into
hundreds of papers all over the country with that rapidity with which
the personal paragraph always travels.

Of course the invitations were sent out in Dudley's name, and the fact
that Claudia had arranged the whole matter was carefully concealed.  As
the relict of Dick Nevill she had a perfect right to act as hostess on
Chisholm's behalf if she so desired, but Dudley had strenuously refused
to allow this, for people might renew their ill-natured gossip.  He had
no desire to submit either Claudia or himself to a fresh burst of
scandal.

The House rose.  Three days later the guests began to assemble at
Wroxeter, making the old halls echo with their laughter in a manner in
which they had not echoed for many years.  Claudia herself did not
arrive until a couple of days later, but the arrangements she had made
with the housekeeper were perfect.

The guests numbered thirty-three, nearly all of them Dudley's most
intimate friends, including a Cabinet Minister and a sprinkling of
political notabilities.  Among them were, of course, some smart women
and pretty girls; and with a perfect round of entertainment the
Christmas festival was kept in a right royal manner, worthy the best
traditions of the Chisholms.  Holly boughs and mistletoe were suspended
in the great oak-panelled hall, while a boar's head and other old-world
dishes formed part of the fare on Christmas Day.  Outside, the weather
was intensely cold, for snow had fallen heavily and had now frozen,
giving the park and the surrounding hills quite a fairy-like appearance.
It was in every respect such a festival as we most of us desire, "an
old-fashioned Christmas."

The Grand-Duke was in Paris, and Dudley was secretly glad that on this
account he could not be invited.  But among the guests were the portly
Lady Meldrum, whose black satin seemed a fixed part of her, her
inoffensive husband, Sir Henry, and pretty, fair-haired Muriel Mortimer.
Benthall, the Member for East Glamorganshire, was, of course, there,
but the colonel, who had been his fellow-guest for the shooting, had
gone to Cannes for the winter, in accordance with his usual habit.

With such a party, a woman's directing influence was, of course,
indispensable, but Claudia acted the part of hostess in a manner so
unobtrusive that no one could demur.  So skilfully planned was the whole
affair that a perfect round of gaiety was enjoyed each day, with some
amusement to attract everybody.

Compelled to be civil and affable to everybody, Dudley somehow found
himself more often in the company of Muriel Mortimer than in that of
Claudia.  Whether it was that Lady Meldrum's ward deliberately sought
his society, or whether chance threw them together so often, he could
not decide.  At any rate, he played billiards with her, danced with her,
and always found her seat close to his at the head of the table.

On the morning following the revels of Christmas night most of the
guests were late down to breakfast save Muriel, who was one of the first
to appear.  Dudley met her in the great old room and bent over her hand
in salutation.  She had been the prettiest woman at the dance on the
previous night, and her unaffected manner had again attracted him.  But
as he stood before the big wood fire, chatting with her and awaiting the
others, a curious thought crossed his mind.  There, in that very room, a
couple of months earlier, he had been warned against her by the blunt
old colonel; and yet he was now entertaining her beneath his roof.

Their eyes met as they were speaking, and he saw that hers were clear,
blue, wide open, with an expression of perfect frankness.  Yes, she was
altogether charming in her simple morning gown.  Why in the world had
the colonel so distinctly warned him?  What harm could there possibly be
in their meeting?

Claudia, who, strangely enough, evinced no jealousy because of his
constant companionship with her, was standing near the window,
handsomely and becomingly clad, chatting with old Sir Henry Meldrum, now
and then glancing in the direction of the man for whom she had confessed
her love.  Dudley noticed these glances, but went on talking, though
rather mechanically, with the sweet, ingenuous girl whom the colonel had
declared he ought to avoid.  Claudia herself had arranged her seat at
table close to him; she had even suggested on the previous afternoon
that as Muriel liked billiards, her host should play with her, and had
herself whispered in his ear at the dance to invite Lady Meldrum's ward
to be his partner in the "Washington Post."

All this puzzled him, as the truth was slowly revealed to him.  And,
after all, who was this pretty Muriel?

From a dozen different sources he had endeavoured to obtain some
information regarding her birth and parentage, but all he could gather
was of a contradictory nature.  One old dowager had told him that she
was the only daughter and heiress of the late Charles Mortimer, a great
Liverpool ship-owner and intimate friend of Sir Henry's.  From another
source he learnt that she was the daughter of a man who had been for
some years partner with the ironmaster; while a third person hinted
mysteriously that her parentage was unknown, and that she had merely
been adopted by Sir Henry and his wife, chiefly because they were
childless.  All this was perplexing, to say the least of it.

He had laughed heartily when the old colonel had warned him against her,
declaring that he had no desire to make the acquaintance of the pretty
Unknown.  But somehow the mystery surrounding her began to attract him,
and he became eager to fathom it.

Later that morning he met Claudia alone in one of the corridors, and
took her aside to arrange the entertainment for the morrow.  Then, when
they had finished, he put a question to her, point-blank: "Who is Muriel
Mortimer?" he asked.

She glanced at him quickly, evidently taken somewhat aback by the
suddenness of his question.

"My dear Dudley," she laughed, "I should have thought you knew all about
your guests by this time.  She is Sir Henry Meldrum's ward."

"I know that," he said, a trifle impatiently.  "But who were her
parents?"

"I've never heard," she replied.  "I don't think any one knows.
Possibly it is some family secret.  At least, I've always thought so."

"Then you have already endeavoured to find out?"

"Of course.  Curiosity is woman's nature."

"And have you discovered nothing of her birth, or who she is?"

"Nothing whatever.  A month ago I even went so far as to ask Lady
Meldrum."

"And what was her answer?" he inquired eagerly.  "She said that her
parentage was a matter that concerned only Muriel herself.  Indeed, she
seemed quite huffy that I should have dared to broach the subject.  But
you know how sore that kind of person is in regard to certain points."

"Then Lady Meldrum gave no reason why Muriel was her husband's ward?"

"No.  Her reply was a polite negative to all inquiries."

He was silent for a few minutes, leaning against the table and facing
her.

"How did you first become acquainted with this estimable pair, Claudia?
Tell me, for they interest me."

"You mean that Muriel interests you," she laughed mischievously.

"No, I mean that the whole affair appears to me full of mystery."

"I first met Lady Meldrum at a bazaar with which I was connected in aid
of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.  We held a
stall together."

"You had never met her, or known her before?"

"Never.  She was the wife of a Glasgow knight, and quite unknown in
London."

"Was Muriel with her at the bazaar?"

"I did, not see her.  I believe she was away visiting somewhere.  Lady
Meldrum spoke of her, I recollect quite distinctly."

"And it was you who afterwards introduced her in town.  I presume she
owes all her social success to you?"

"Yes, I believe she does," she replied.

"Then I consider it curious that she has never confided in you the
secret of Muriel's birth.  She surely could not expect you to stand
sponsor for a girl of whom you knew nothing?"

"Oh, how absurdly you talk, Dudley!" she laughed airily.  "Whatever is
in your mind?  If Muriel Mortimer amuses you, as apparently she does,
what does her parentage matter?  Sir Henry and her ladyship are
perfectly respectable persons, and even though they may be of somewhat
plebeian origin they don't offend by bad manners.  Can it be that your
thirst for knowledge is due to a vague idea that Muriel might one day be
the _chatelaine_ of this place, eh?"

She looked him full in the face with the dark and brilliant eyes that
had always held him spellbound.  She was a clever woman, and with
feminine intuition knew exactly the power she possessed over the man
whom she loved with a passion so fierce and uncurbed that she had been
led to overstep the conventionalities.

"Muriel Mortimer will never be mistress here," he said in a hard voice,
a trifle annoyed at her final remark.  "You yourself have invited her
here as my guest, and I am bound to be civil, but beyond that--well, I
hope that we shall not meet again after this party breaks up."

"And yet you want to know all about her, with the eagerness of an ardent
lover!" she laughed sarcastically.

"I have reasons--strong ones," he answered firmly.

Again she raised her eyes to his, but rather furtively, as though she
were seeking to discover the reason of this sudden anxiety and was not
quite sure of how much he knew.

"Then if you consider the matter of sufficient importance, why not ask
Lady Meldrum herself?" she suggested.  "To you she may perhaps give a
more satisfactory answer."

"How can I?  Don't be ridiculous, my dear Claudia," said the
Under-Secretary.

"Then if the girl is really nothing to you, let the matter drop," she
urged.  "In what way does her parentage concern either you or me?"

"It does concern me," he answered in a hard tone, his brow clouded by
thought.

"How?"

"For reasons known only to myself," he responded enigmatically.  He was
thinking of the colonel's warning, which had been troubling him ever
since breakfast.  It was the irony of fate that he was now compelled to
entertain the very woman against whom his best friend had uttered the
strange words he recollected so well.  He had broached the matter to
Benthall, but it was evident that the latter was not aware of the
colonel's reasons for denouncing her as an undesirable acquaintance.

A silence had fallen between the pair, but it was at length broken by
Claudia, who said:

"Tell me, Dudley, what is it that is troubling you?"

"Yes," he responded promptly, "I will tell you.  I wish to know the
reason why you invited this family beneath my roof.  You had a motive,
Claudia.  Come now, confess it."

She opened her eyes, startled by his words.

"My dear Dudley," she cried.  "Why, I only invited them because Lady
Meldrum was my friend.  They were extremely kind to me down at
Fernhurst, and I thought that you would be pleased to offer them the
hospitality of the Castle for Christmas.  You had met them at the
Duchess of Penarth's, and both Lady Meldrum and Muriel were never tired
of singing your praises.  They went one night to hear you address the
House, I believe."

"Yes, I know about it.  She told me!" exclaimed the Under-Secretary
petulantly.  "But there's some hidden motive in their actions--of that
I'm absolutely convinced."

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

RECOUNTS CURIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES.

Even though the House stood prorogued for yet another ten days,
formidable packets of documents continually reached Dudley Chisholm from
the Foreign Office, sometimes through the post, and at others by special
messenger.  England's relations with the Powers were, as usual, not very
reassuring, hence the Parliamentary Under-Secretary was kept busy, and
every moment he could snatch from his guests was spent in the library
among the heaps of papers with which his table was always littered.
Wrey, his private secretary, was absent on leave, for the holidays, and,
therefore, the whole of the work fell upon him.

Each night, after the men had finished their whiskey and their gossip in
the smoking-room, he would retire to the big, book-lined chamber, and
plunge into the work, often difficult and tedious, which the nation
expected of him.

Usually during the half hour before dinner some of the guests would
assemble in the great, brown, old room to gossip, and the cosy-corner
beside the big wood fire was a favourite resting-place of Muriel's.  She
generally dressed early, and with one or other of the younger men would
sit there and chat until the dinner-bell sounded.  The fine old chamber,
with its overmantel bearing the three water-bougets argent, its lining
of books, and its oaken ceiling was quiet and secluded from the rest of
the house, the ideal refuge of a studious man.

Dudley, having occasion to enter there on the second evening following
his conversation with Claudia, related in the foregoing chapter, found
Sir Henry's ward sitting alone in the cosy-corner, half hidden by the
draperies.  The light from the green-shaded lamp, insufficient to
illuminate the whole place, only revealed the table with its piles of
papers, but upon her face the firelight danced, throwing her countenance
into bold relief.  As she sat there in her pale-blue dress she made a
picture of a most contenting sort.

"What! alone!" he exclaimed pleasantly as he advanced to meet her,
settling his dress-tie with his hand, for he had just come in from a
drive and had slipped into his clothes hurriedly.

"Yes," she laughed, stretching forth her small foot coquettishly upon
the red Turkey rug before the fire.  "You men are so long making your
toilette; and yet you blame us for all our fal-lals."

"Haven't you been out?"

"Yes," she answered; "I went this afternoon into Shrewsbury with Lady
Richard to do some shopping.  What a curious old town it is!  I've never
been there before, and was most interested."

"True it's old-fashioned, and far behind the times, Miss Mortimer," he
said, smiling, as he stood before her, his back to the fire.  "But I
always thought that you did not care for the antique."

"The antique!  Why, I adore it!  This splendid castle of yours is
unique.  I confess to you that I've slipped away and wandered about it
for hours, exploring all sorts of winding stairways and turret-chambers
unknown to any one except the servants.  I had no idea Wroxeter was so
charming.  One can imagine oneself back in the Middle Ages with men in
armour, sentries, knights, lady-loves and all the rest of it."

He laughed lightly, placed his hands behind his back, and looked
straight at her.

"I'm very glad the old place interests you," he replied.  "Fernhurst is
comparatively modern, is it not?"

"Horribly modern as compared with Wroxeter," she said, leaning back and
gazing up at him with her clear blue eyes.  "Sir Henry was sadly imposed
upon when he bought it three years ago--at least, so I believe."

Dudley was at heart rather annoyed at finding her there alone, for a
glance at his littered table caused him to recollect that among those
papers there were several confidential documents which had reached him
that morning, and which he had been in the act of examining when called
to go out driving with two of his guests.  Usually he locked the library
door on such occasions, but with his friends in the house the act of
securing the door of one of the most popular of the apartments was, he
thought, a measure not less grave than a spoken insult.

He was suspicious of the fair-eyed girl.  Although he could not account
for it in the least, the strange suspicion had grown upon him that she
was not what she represented herself to be.  And yet, on the other hand,
neither in actions nor words was she at all obtrusive, but, on the
contrary, extremely popular with every one, including Claudia, who had
herself declared her to be charming.  He wondered whether she had been
amusing herself by prying into the heap of papers spread upon his
blotting-pad, and glanced across at them.  No.  They lay there just in
the same position, secured by the heavy paper-weight under which he had
put them earlier in the afternoon.

And yet, after all, he was a fool to run such risks, he told himself.
To fear to offend the susceptibilities of his guests was all very well,
but with the many confidential documents in his possession he ought in
all conscience to be more careful.

As the evening was biting cold and the keen north-east wind had caught
his face while driving, in the warmth his cheeks were burning hot.
Muriel, practised flirt that she was, believed their redness to be due
to an inward turmoil caused by her presence.  Hence she presumed to
coquet with him, laughing, joking, chaffing in a manner which displayed
her conversational, mobility to perfection.  He, on his part, allowed
her to proceed, eager to divine her motive.

"We go south at the end of January," she said at last, in answer to his
question.  "Sir Henry thinks of taking a villa at Beaulieu this season.
Last year we were in Nice, but found it too crowded and noisy at
Carnival."

"Beaulieu is charming," he said.  "More especially that part known as
_La Petite Afrique_."

"That's where the villa is situated--facing the sea.  One of those four
white villas in the little bay."

"The most charming spot on the whole Riviera.  By the way," he added,
"one of my old friends is already in Cannes, Colonel Murray-Kerr.  Do
you happen to know him?  He was military attach at Vienna, Rome and
Paris until he retired."

A curious expression passed over her countenance as he mentioned the
name.  But it vanished instantly, as, glancing up, she looked at him
with the frank look that was so characteristic.

"No.  I don't think we have ever met.  Murray-Kerr?  No.  The name is
not familiar.  He was in the diplomatic service, you say?"

"Yes, for about fifteen years.  I had hoped he would have been one of
the party here, but he slipped away a week ago, attracted, as usual in
winter, by the charms of Cannes."

"He gambles at Monte Carlo, I suppose?"

"I think not.  He's, nowadays, one of the old fogies of the Junior
United Service, and thinks of nothing but the lustre of his
patent-leather boots and the chance of shooting with friends.  But he's
so well known in town, I felt sure that you must have met him," added
Dudley meaningly.

"One meets so many people," she replied carelessly, "and so many are not
introduced by name, that it is difficult to recollect.  We haven't the
least knowledge of the names of people we've known by sight for months.
And I'm awfully bad at recollecting names.  I always remember faces, but
can't furnish them with names.  The position is often extremely awkward
and ludicrous."

The false note in her explanation did not escape his sensitive hearing.
Her sudden glances of surprise and annoyance when he had mentioned the
colonel's name had roused suspicion in his mind, and he felt convinced
that she was well acquainted with the man who had warned him against her
in such mysterious terms.

"If I remember aright," he said, "the colonel once mentioned you."

"Mentioned me?" she exclaimed with undisguised surprise, and not without
an expression of alarm.  In an instant, however, she recovered her
self-possession.  "Did he say any nice things of me?"

"Of course," he laughed.  "Could he say otherwise?"

"Ah!  I don't know.  He might if he was not acquainted with me."

"Then he is acquainted with you?" exclaimed Dudley quickly.

"No, why--how silly!  I really do not know your friend.  Indeed, I have
never heard of him.  It seems that if what you tell me is correct I have
an unknown admirer."

Dudley smiled.  He was reflecting upon the colonel's warning, and her
replies to his questions made it all the more plain that she was denying
knowledge of a man with whom she was well acquainted.

"Did he say when he had met me?" she asked.

"I don't really recollect.  The conversation took place while several
other persons were talking loudly, and many of his words were lost to
me."

"He discussed my merits before we met at the duchess's, I presume?"

"Yes.  As I had not at that time the honour of your acquaintance, I took
but little heed of the conversation."

She looked at him with a covert glance, and with her fingers turned one
of her rings round and round in a quick, nervous way.  What, she was
wondering, had Colonel Murray-Kerr said about her?  The fact that she
had been discussed by him was to her extremely disconcerting.

"Well," she exclaimed a moment later, with a forced laugh, "as long as
your friend did not speak ill of me, I suppose I ought not to complain
of having my personal points openly discussed!  Most smart women court
the publicity of a smoking-room discussion."

"Yes," he replied in a hard voice, wondering whether her words were
directed against Claudia, "unfortunately they do.  But there are smart
women and smart women.  I trust, Miss Mortimer, that you have no desire
to develop into one of the latter."

"Certainly not," she answered in all earnestness.

Half rising, she put her hand into her dress pocket, ostensibly to
obtain her handkerchief, but in reality to place there a small piece of
paper which she had crushed into her palm and held concealed when Dudley
entered.

Her deft movement as she hid the paper was so swift that it entirely
escaped his notice, while at the same moment Claudia, accompanied by two
of the male guests, came into the library, thus putting an end to their
_tete-a-tete_.

Dudley, still standing before the burning logs, continued chatting to
Sir Henry's ward, but, owing to the arrival of his other guests, it was
no longer possible to keep the conversation in the same channel.

As he sat at dinner he could not prevent his eyes from wandering across
to Muriel and from allowing strange thoughts to flit through his mind.
At what had the colonel hinted in that very room months ago, when he had
warned him to beware of her?  He knew Murray-Kerr to be an easy-going
cosmopolitan, whose acquaintance with diplomatic Europe was perhaps more
extensive than that of any other living man, yet what possible object
could he have had in urging him to be careful when he met that
innocent-looking woman scarcely out of her teens?

Why Claudia had invited a woman who might become her rival in his
affections was another enigma which was puzzling.  There was some
distinct object in this policy, but its real nature he was quite unable
to fathom.

That night there was, as usual, a dance in the old banqueting hall, the
high-roofed chamber that had long ago echoed to the boisterous
merrymaking of those armoured knights whose coats of mail now stood
round, and whose tattered banners hung above.  Until half a century
back, the old stone flooring, worn hollow by the tramp of generations of
retainers, still existed, but Dudley's grandfather had had an oak
flooring placed over it, and it now served as the ballroom, even though
at one end was the enormous hearth, where an ox could be roasted whole,
while the wooden benches, at which the banqueters used to hold revel,
served as seats for those who did not dance.

Few of the guests, however, refrained from the waltzing, so delightful
were the attendant circumstances.  Once during the evening Dudley found
himself taking a turn with Claudia.

"I've wanted to speak to you for nearly an hour past," she whispered to
him, so low that none could overhear.  "Some man, apparently an
undesirable person, has called to see you."

"To see me--at this hour?  Why, it's past midnight!" he exclaimed in
astonishment.

"He will not give any details regarding his business," she went on.  "He
only expressed a desire that none of the guests should be aware of his
presence, and that he might have an interview alone with you."

"A rather curious request at this time of night," her companion
observed.  She noticed that he had turned pale, and that the hand
holding hers perceptibly trembled.  Their glances met, and he saw in her
dark and brilliant eyes the love-look of old that was so unmistakable.
Upon her countenance there was a look of concern, and this he strove at
once to dispel by saying airily:

"I suppose it is some one who wants assistance or something.  Where is
he?"

"In your secretary's room.  I had him shown there, in order that his
wish regarding the secrecy of his visit should be respected."

"Then you have seen him?"

"Yes.  You were not to be found at the moment, so, hearing the message
he had given the servant, I saw him myself.  He's middle-aged, and
rather shabbily dressed.  From the state of his clothes I should think
that he's walked over from Shrewsbury.  He told me that the matter on
which he desired to see you was of the greatest urgency, and apologised
for calling at such an hour."

"Well," he answered, "I suppose I'd better go and see the fellow,
whoever he is.  He may be some political crank or other.  There are so
many about."

"Yes," Claudia urged; "if I were you I'd go at once, and get rid of him.
It appears that Riggs told him you could not be seen until the morning,
but he absolutely refused to be sent away."

"Very well, I'll go and see who he is," replied the Under-Secretary,
only remaining calm by dint of the most strenuous effort.  Then, leading
his partner to a seat, he bowed, took leave of her, and slipped away
from the ball through several arched doors and down the two long
corridors until he came to a door at the end.

He was in the east wing of the castle, a part to which the visitors did
not penetrate, for to do so it was necessary to cross the kitchen.

Before the closed door he paused, held his breath, and placed his hand
instinctively upon his heart, as though to still its beating.  He dared
not advance farther.

Who, he wondered, was his visitor?  Could it be that the blow which he
had expected for so long had at length fallen?

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

INTRODUCES AN INTERESTING PERSON.

He hesitated for a moment; then, setting his jaws hard in sudden
resolution, he turned the door-handle and entered.

Within, the long, low-ceilinged room was furnished as a kind of office.
From an arm-chair near the fireless grate rose the spare figure of a
grey-haired, grey-eyed, haggard-faced man of a type which might be
described as shabby-genteel, a man who had without doubt seen better
days.  His features were refined, but his cheeks were sunken until the
bones of the face showed plainly beneath the skin, and his hair and
moustache, though grey, had prematurely lost their original colour.  His
tall, slim figure was straight, and he bowed to Chisholm with the easy
manner of a gentleman.  His overcoat of shabby grey Irish frieze was
open, displaying a coat and vest much the worse for wear, while his
up-turned trousers were sodden by the melting snow.

"I understand that you wish, to see me," Chisholm began, glancing at the
fellow keenly, and not half liking his appearance.  "This is a rather
unusual hour for a visit, is it not?"

"Yes," the man replied.  "For the lateness of the hour I must apologise,
but my trains did not fit, and I was compelled to walk from Shrewsbury."
He spoke in a refined voice, and his bearing was not that of a person
who intended to ask assistance.  Dudley possessed a quick insight into
character, and could sum up a man as sharply and correctly as a lawyer
with a wide experience of criminals.

"And what may your business be with me?" asked the master of Wroxeter.

The man glanced suspiciously at the door by which Dudley had entered,
and asked:

"Are we alone?  Do you think there can possibly be any eavesdroppers?"

"Certainly not.  But I cannot understand why your business should be of
such a purely private character.  You are entirely unknown to me, and I
understand that you refused to give a card."  He uttered the last words
with a slight touch of sarcasm, for the man's appearance was not such as
would warrant the casual observer in believing him to be possessed of
that mark of gentility.

"Of course I am unknown to you, Mr. Chisholm.  But although unknown to
you in person, I am probably known to you by name."  As he spoke, he
selected from his rather shabby pocket-book a folded paper, which he
handed to Dudley.  "This credential will, I think, satisfy you."

Dudley took it, glanced at it, and started quickly.  Then he fixed his
eyes upon his visitor in boundless surprise.  The man before him smiled
faintly at the impression which the sight of that document had caused.
The paper was headed with the British arms in scarlet, and contained
only three lines written over a signature he knew well--the signature of
the Prime Minister of England.

"And you are really Captain Cator?" exclaimed the Under-Secretary,
looking at him in amazement, and handing him back his credential.

"Yes, Archibald Cator, chief of Her Majesty's Secret Service," said the
shrunken-faced man.  "We have had correspondence on more than one
occasion, but have never met, for the simple reason that I am seldom in
England.  Now you will at once recognise why I refused a card, and also
why I wished my visit to you to remain a secret."

"Of course, of course," answered Dudley.  "I had no suspicion of your
identity, and--well, if you will permit me to say so, your personal
appearance at this moment is scarcely that which might be expected of
Captain Archibald Cator, military attach in Rome."

"Exactly!  But I have been paying a call earlier in the day, and
shabbiness was a necessity," he explained with a laugh.  "Besides, I
tramped all the way from Shrewsbury and--"

"And you are wet and cold.  You'll have a stiff whiskey and soda."
Dudley pressed the bell and, when Riggs appeared, gave the necessary
order.

"You won't return to-night, of course," suggested Chisholm.  "I'll tell
them to get a room ready for you."

"Thanks for your hospitality, but my return is absolutely imperative.
There is a train from Shrewsbury to town at 4:25 in the morning.  I must
leave by that."

Both men sank into chairs opposite each other in the chill, rather
gloomy, room.  The mysterious visitor who had called at that
extraordinary hour was one of the most trusted and faithful servants at
the disposal of the Foreign Office.  Although nominally holding the
appointment of military attach at the Embassy in Rome, he was in reality
the chief of the British Secret Service on the Continent, a man whose
career had been replete with extraordinary adventures, to whose
marvellous tact, ready ingenuity, and careful methods of investigation,
England was indebted for many of the diplomatic _coups_ she had made
during the past dozen years or so.

In the diplomatic circle, and in the British colony in Rome, every one
knew Archie Cator, for he was popular everywhere, and a welcome visitor
at the houses of the English and the wealthier Italians alike.  It was
often hinted that in the Foreign Office at home he possessed influential
friends, for whenever he wished for leave he had only to wire to London
to obtain a grant of absence.  The supposition was that in summer he
went to his pretty villa at Ardenza, on the Tuscan shore near Leghorn,
there to enjoy the sea-breezes, or in winter over to Cairo or Algiers.
None knew, save, of course, Her Majesty's Ambassador, that these
frequent periods of leave were spent in flying visits to one or other of
the capitals of Europe to direct the operations of the band of
confidential agents under him, or that the attach so popular with the
ladies was in reality the Prince of Spies.

Spying is against an Englishman's notion of fair-play, but to such an
extent have the other great Powers carried the operation of their
various Intelligence Departments that to the Foreign Office the secret
service has become a most necessary adjunct.  Were it not for its
operations, and the early intelligence it obtains, England would often
be left out of the diplomatic game, and British interests would suffer
to an extent that would soon become alarming, even to that puerile
person, the Little Englander.  Officially no person connected with the
Secret Service is recognised, except its chief, and he, in order to
cloak his real position, was at that moment holding the post of attache
in Rome, where he had but little to do, since Italy was the Power most
friendly towards England.

Stories without number of the captain's prowess, of his absolute
fearlessness, and of his marvellous ingenuity as a spy in the interests
of his country, had already reached Chisholm.  They were whispered
within a certain circle at the Foreign Office when from time to time a
copy of a secret document, or a piece of remarkable intelligence reached
headquarters from Paris, Berlin, or Petersburg.  They knew that it came
from Archie Cator, the wiry, middle-aged attach who idled in the
_salons_ of the Eternal City, drove in the Corso, and, especially as he
was an easy-going bachelor, found remarkable favour in the eyes of the
ladies.

He lived two lives.  In the one he was a diplomatist, smart, polished,
courtly--the perfect model of all a British attach should be.  In the
other he was a shrewd, crafty spy, possessed of a tact unequalled by any
detective officer at Scotland Yard, a brain fertile in invention and
subterfuge, and nerves of iron.  In Rome, in Paris and in Petersburg,
only the ambassadors knew the secret of his real office.  He transacted
his business direct with them and with the chief in London, Her
Majesty's Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.  Indeed, British
diplomatic policy was often based upon his reports and suggestions.  The
utmost care was always exercised to conceal his real office from the
staffs of the various Embassies.  They only knew him as Archie Cator
from Rome, the man with a friend high up in the Foreign Office who got
him short leave whenever he chose to take it.

The money annually voted by Parliament for secret service was entirely
at his disposal, and the only account he rendered was to the chief
himself.  The department was a costly one, for often he was compelled to
bribe heavily through his agents, men specially selected for the work of
spying; and as these numbered nearly forty, distributed in the various
capitals, the expenditure was by no means light.  With such a director,
for whose methods, indeed, the staff at Scotland Yard had the highest
admiration, the successes were many.  To Cator's untiring energy,
skilful perception, and exhaustless ingenuity in worming out secrets,
our diplomatic success in various matters, despite the conspiracies
formed against us by certain of the Powers, was entirely due.  The
Foreign Secretary himself had, it was whispered, once remarked at a
Cabinet meeting that if England possessed half a dozen Cators she would
need no ambassadors.  The marquess trusted him implicitly, relying as
much upon his judgment as upon that of the oldest and most practised
representative of Her Majesty at any of the European courts.

If the truth were told, the secret of England's dominant influence in
Central Africa was entirely due to the discovery of a diplomatic
intrigue in Berlin by the omnipotent Cator, who, at risk of his life,
secured a certain document which placed our Foreign Office in a position
to dictate to the Powers.  It was a master-stroke, and as a partial
return for it the popular, cigarette-smoking attach in Rome, found one
morning upon his table an autograph letter of thanks from Her Majesty's
Prime Minister.  When occupying his position as attach he was an idler
about the Eternal City, an inveterate theatre-goer, and a well-known,
and even ostentatious, figure in Roman society.  But when at work he was
patient, unobtrusive, and usually ill-dressed, moving quickly hither and
thither, taking long night journeys by the various _rapides_, caring
nothing for fatigue, and directing his corps of secret agents as a
general does an army.

Knowledge is power.  Hence England is compelled to hold her place in the
diplomatic intrigues of the world by the employment of secret agents.
There are many doors to be unlocked, and to men like Cator, England does
not grudge golden keys.

Riggs had brought the whiskey and soda, and the man whose career would
have perhaps made the finest romance ever written, had drained a
tumblerful thirstily, with a laugh and a word of excuse that "the way
had been long, and the wind cold."

When they were alone again, he twisted the rather stubby ends of his
grey moustache, and with his eyes fixed upon the Under-Secretary said:

"I should not have disturbed you at this hour, Mr. Chisholm, were not
the matter one of extreme urgency."

Dudley sat eager and anxious, wondering what could have brought this man
to England.  A grave and horrible suspicion had seized him that the
truth he dreaded was actually out--that the blow had fallen.  No secret
was safe from Cator.  As he had obtained knowledge of the profoundest
secrets of the various European Powers in a manner absolutely
incredible, what chance was there to hide from him any information which
he had set his mind to obtain.  "Is the matter serious?" he asked
vaguely.

"For the present I cannot tell whether it is actually as serious as it
appears to be," the other answered with a grave look.  "As you are well
aware, the outlook abroad at this moment is far from promising.  There
is more than one deep and dastardly intrigue against us.  The diplomatic
air on the Continent is full of rumours of antagonistic alliances
against England, and even Mercier, in Paris, has actually gone the
length of planning an invasion.  But a fig for all the bumptious chatter
of French invasions!" he said, snapping his finger and thumb.  "What we
have to regard at this moment is not menaces abroad, but perils at
home."

"I hardly follow you," observed the Under-secretary.

"Well, I arrived in London from the Continent the night before last upon
a confidential mission, and it is in order to obtain information from
yourself that I am here to-night," he explained.  "Perhaps the fact that
I have not had my clothes off for the past five days, and that I have
been in four of the capitals of Europe during the same period, will be
sufficient to convince you of the urgency of the matter in hand.
Besides, it may account for my somewhat unrepresentable appearance," he
added with a good-humoured laugh.  "But now let us get at once to the
point, for I have but little time to spare if I'm to catch the early
express back to London.  The matter is strictly private, and all I ask,
Mr. Chisholm, is that what passes between us goes no further than these
four walls.  Recollect that my position is one of constant and extreme
peril.  I am the confidential agent of the Foreign Office, and you are
its Parliamentary Under-secretary.  Therefore, in our mutual interests,
no word must escape you either in regard to my visit here, or even to
the fact that I have been in England.  London to-day swarms with foreign
spies, and if I am recognised all my chances of being successful in the
present matter must at once vanish."

"I am all attention," said Dudley, interested to hear something from
this gatherer of the secrets of the nation.  "If I can give you any
assistance I shall be most ready to do so."

"Then let me put a question to you, which please answer truthfully, for
much depends upon it," he said slowly, his eyes fixed upon the man
before him as he pensively twisted his moustache.  "Were you ever
acquainted with a man named Lennox?"

The words fell upon Dudley Chisholm like a thunderclap.  Yes, the blow
had fallen!  He started, then, gripping the arms of the chair, sat
upright and motionless as a statue, his face blanched to the lips.  He
knew that the ghastly truth, so long concealed that he had believed the
matter forgotten, was out.  Ruin stood before him.  His secret was
known.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

A MAN OF SECRETS SPEAKS.

Archibald Cator's bony face was grave, serious, sphinx-like.  His
personality was strange and striking.

He had detected in an instant the sudden alarm which his question had
aroused within the mind of the man before him, but, pretending not to
observe it, he added with a pleasant air:

"You will, of course, forgive anything which may appear to be an
impertinent cross-examination, Mr. Chisholm.  Both of us are alike
working in the interests of our country, and certain facts which I have
recently unearthed are, to say the least, extremely curious.  They even
constitute a great danger.  Do you happen to remember any one among your
acquaintances named Lennox--Major Mayne Lennox?"

Mayne Lennox!  Mention of that name brought before Chisholm's eyes a
grim and ghastly vision of the past--a past which he had fondly believed
was long ago dead and buried.  There arose the face that had haunted him
so continuously, that white countenance which appeared to him in his
dreams and haunted him even in the moments of his greatest triumphs,
social and political.

The shabbily attired man patiently awaited an answer, his eyes fixed
upon the man before him.

"Yes," answered Dudley at last, with a strenuous effort to calm the
tumultuous beating of his heart.

"I was once acquainted with a man of that name."

His visitor slowly changed his position, and a strange half-smile played
about the corners of his mouth, as though that admission was the sum of
his desire.

"May I ask under what circumstances you met this person?" he inquired,
adding: "I am not asking through any idle motive of curiosity, but in
order to complete a series of inquiries I have in hand, it is necessary
for certain points to be absolutely clear."

"We met at a card-party in a friend's rooms," Dudley said.  "I saw
something of him at Hastings, where he was spending the summer.
Afterwards, I believe, he went abroad.  But we have not met for years."

"For how many years?"

"Oh, seven, or perhaps eight!  I really could not say exactly."

"Are you certain that Mayne Lennox went abroad?" inquired Cator as
though suddenly interested.

"Yes.  He told me that he had lived on the Continent for a great many
years, mostly in Italy, I think.  He often spoke of a villa he had
outside Perugia, and I presume that he returned there."

"Ah, exactly!" said his visitor, again twisting his moustache, as was
his habit when deep in thought.  "And you have not seen him for some
years?"

"No.  But is it regarding Major Lennox that you are making inquiries?
He surely had no political connections?"

"My inquiries concern him indirectly," admitted the man with the hollow
cheeks.  "I am seeking to discover him."

"Surely that will not be difficult.  A retired officer is usually found
with the utmost ease."

"Yes.  But from inquiries I have already made I have come to the
conclusion that he returned to England again.  If so, my difficulty
increases."  Dudley was silent for some moments.  Was this man telling
the truth? he wondered.

"May I ask what is your object in discovering him?" he inquired, feeling
that as he had now answered Cator's questions he might be permitted to
ask some himself.

"I desire to ascertain from him certain facts which will elucidate what
remains at present a profound mystery," the other replied.  "Indeed, a
statement by him will place in our hands a weapon by which we can thwart
certain of the Powers who are launching a powerful combination against
us."

Cator, who occupied the post that Colonel Murray-Kerr had once held, was
himself a skilled diplomatist.  As the confusion caused in the
Under-Secretary's mind at his first question had shown how unlikely it
was that he would get a clear statement of the truth, he proceeded to
work for the information he wanted, and to work in a cautious and
indirect manner.  Chisholm, recollecting the confidential document which
had passed through his hands some time before, and which had aroused his
suspicions, said:

"I think I know the combination to which you refer.  Something regarding
it leaked out to one of the newspapers a few weeks ago, and a question
was asked in the House."

Cator laughed.

"Yes," he said, "a question to which you gave a very neat, but
altogether unintelligible reply--eh?  They were waiting that reply of
yours in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a good deal of
anxiety, I can tell you.  It was telephoned to Paris before you had
delivered it."

"Ah! copied from one of the sheets of replies given out to the Press
Gallery, I expect," observed the Under-Secretary.  "But I had no idea
that our friends across the Channel were so watchful of my utterances."

"Oh, aren't they?  They are watchful of your movements, too," replied
the Secret Agent of Her Majesty's Foreign Office.  "Recollect, Mr.
Chisholm, you as Parliamentary Under-Secretary are in the confidence of
the Government, and frequently possess documents and information which
to our enemies would be priceless.  If I may be permitted to say so, you
should be constantly on the alert against any of your papers falling
into undesirable hands."

"But surely none have?"  Dudley gasped in alarm.

"None have, to my knowledge," his visitor replied.

"But information is gained by spies in a variety of ways.  Perhaps few
know better than myself the perfection of the secret service system of
certain Powers who are our antagonists.  Few diplomatic secrets are safe
from them."

"And few of the secrets of our rivals are safe from you, Captain Cator--
if all I've heard be true," observed Chisholm, smiling.

"Ah!" the other laughed; "I believe I'm credited with performing all
sorts of miracles in the way of espionage.  I fear I possess a
reputation which I in no way desire.  But," he added, "can you tell me
nothing more of this man Lennox--of his antecedents, I mean?"

"Nothing.  I know absolutely nothing of his people."

"Can you direct me to the mutual friend at whose rooms you met him, for
he might possibly be able to tell us his whereabouts?"

"It was a man in the Worcestershire Regiment; he's out in Uganda now.
Perhaps the War Office knows, for doubtless he draws his pension,"
Chisholm suggested.

"No.  That source of information has already been tried, but in vain."
The visitor thrust his ungloved hands into the pockets of his shabby
overcoat, stretched out his legs, and fixed his keen eyes upon the
rising statesman, to interview whom he had travelled post-haste half
across Europe.

"If I knew more of the character of your inquiries and the point towards
which they are directed I might possibly be able to render you further
assistance," Dudley said after a short pause, hoping to obtain some
information from the man who, as he was well aware, so completely
possessed the confidence of the controller of England's destinies.

"Well," said Cator, after some hesitation, "the matter forms a very
tangled and complicated problem.  By sheer chance I discovered, by means
of a document which was copied in a certain _Chancellerie_ and found its
way to me in secret a short time ago, that a movement was afoot in a
most unexpected direction to counter-balance Britain's power on the sea,
and oust us from China as a preliminary to a great and terrific war.
The document contained extracts of confidential correspondence which had
passed between the Foreign Ministers of the two nations implicated, and
showed that the details of the conspiracy were arranged with such an
exactitude and forethought that by certain means--which were actually
given in one of the extracts in question, a grave Parliamentary crisis
would be created in England, of which the Powers intended to take
immediate advantage in order the better to aim their blow at British
supremacy."

Archibald Cator paused and glanced behind him half suspiciously, as if
to make certain that the door was closed, while Chisholm sat erect,
immovable, as though turned to stone.  What his visitor had told him,
confirmed the horrible suspicion which had crept upon him some weeks
ago.

"Yes.  It was a very neat and very pretty scheme, all of it," went on
the man with the hollow cheeks, giving vent to a short, dry laugh.
"During my career I have known many schemes and intrigues with the same
object, but never has one been formed with such open audacity, such cool
forethought, and such clever ingenuity as the present."

"Then it still exists?" exclaimed Chisholm quickly.

"Most certainly.  My present object is to expose and destroy it,"
answered the confidential agent.  "That it has the support of two
monarchs of known antipathy towards England is plain enough, but our
would-be enemies have no idea that the details of their plot are already
in my possession, nor that yesterday I placed the whole of them before
the chief.  By to-morrow every British Embassy in Europe will be in
possession of a cypher despatch from his lordship warning Ministers of
the intrigue in progress.  The messengers left Charing Cross last night
carrying confidential instructions to all the capitals."

"And especially to Vienna, I presume?"

"Yes, especially to Vienna," Cator said, adding, "That, I suppose, you
guessed from the tenor of the confidential report from the Austrian
capital which passed through your hands a short time back.  Do you
recollect that your answer to that embarrassing question in the House
was supplied to you after a special meeting of the Cabinet?"

"I recollect that was so."

"Then perhaps it may interest you to know that I myself drafted the
answer and suggested to the F.O. that it should be given exactly as I
had written, it, in order to mislead those who were so ingeniously
trying to undermine our prestige.  It was our counter-stroke of
diplomacy."

This statement of Cator's was a revelation.  He had been under the
impression that the public reply to the Opposition was the composition
of the Foreign Secretary himself.

"Really," he said, "that is most interesting.  I had not the least idea
that you were responsible for that enigmatical answer.  I must
congratulate you.  It was certainly extremely clever."

The captain smiled, as though gratified by the other's compliment.  As
he sat there, a wan and very unimpressive figure, none would have
believed him to be the great confidential agent who, if the truth were
told, was the Foreign Secretary's trusted adviser upon the more delicate
matters of European policy.  This man with the muddy trousers and frayed
suit was actually the intimate friend of princes; he knew reigning
Sovereigns personally, had diplomatic Europe at his fingers' ends, and
had often been the means of shaping the policy to be employed by England
in Europe.

"I must not conceal from you the fact that the present situation is
extremely critical," the secret agent went on.  "When Parliament
reassembles you will find that a strenuous attempt will be made by the
Opposition to force your hand.  It is part of the game.  All replies
must be carefully guarded--most carefully."

"That I quite understand."

"It was certainly most fortunate for us that I, quite by accident,
dropped upon the conspiracy," the other went on.  "The man through whom
I obtained the copy of the document was a person well-known to us.  He
was in a high position in his own government, but as his expenditure
greatly exceeded his income, the bank drafts that mysteriously found
their way into his pocket were most acceptable."

"You speak in the past tense.  Why?"

"Because unfortunately the person in question fell into disgrace a few
weeks ago, and was called upon to resign.  Hence, our channel of
information is, just at the moment when it would be so highly useful,
suddenly closed."

"Fortunate that it was not closed before you could obtain the document
which gave you the clue to what was really taking place," remarked the
Under-Secretary.  "Cannot you tell me more regarding the plot?  From
which _Chancellerie_ did the document emanate?"

"Ah, I regret that at this juncture I am not at liberty to say!  The
matter is still in the most confidential stage.  The slightest betrayal
of our knowledge may result in disaster.  It is the chief's policy to
retain the facts we have gathered and act upon them as soon as the
inquiry is complete.  For the past three weeks all my endeavours and
those of my staff have been directed towards unravelling the mystery
presented by the document I have mentioned.  In every capital active
searches have been made, copies of correspondence secured, prominent
statesmen sounded as to their views, and photographs taken of certain
letters and plans, all of which go to show the deep conspiracy that is
in progress, with the object of striking a staggering blow at us.  Yet,
strangest of all, there is mention of a matter which is hinted at so
vaguely that up to the present I have been unable to form any theory as
to what it really is.  To put it plainly," he added, with his eyes fixed
upon Chisholm's face, "in certain parts of the correspondence the name
of Mayne Lennox is mentioned in connection with your own."

"In connection with my own!" gasped Dudley, his face blanching again in
an instant.  "What statements are made?"

"Nothing is stated definitely," replied his shabby visitor.  "There are
only vague hints."

"Of what?"

"Of the existence of something that I have up to the present failed to
discover."

Dudley Chisholm breathed more freely, but beneath that cold, keen gaze
of the man of secrets his eyes wavered.  Nevertheless, the fact that
Cator was still in ignorance of the truth reassured him, and in an
instant he regained his self-possession.

"Curious that I should be mentioned in the same breath, as it were, with
a man whom I know so very slightly--very curious," he observed, as
though reflecting.

"It was because of this that I have sought you here to-night," the
confidential agent explained.  "I must find this man Lennox, for he
alone can throw some light upon the strange hints contained in two of
the letters.  Then, as soon as we know the truth, the chief will act
swiftly and fearlessly to expose and overthrow the dastardly plot.
Until all the facts are quite plain it is impossible to move, for in
this affair the game of bluff will avail nothing.  We must be absolutely
certain of our ground before making any attack.  Then the whole of
Europe will stand aghast, and England will awake one morning to discover
how she has been within an ace of disaster."

"But tell me more of this mention of myself in the confidential
correspondence of our enemies," Dudley urged.  "What you have told me
has aroused my curiosity."

"I have told you all that there is to tell at this stage," Cator
replied.  "It is most unfortunate that you can give me absolutely no
information regarding this man; but I suppose I must seek for it
elsewhere.  He must be found and questioned, for the allegations are
extremely grave, and the situation the most critical I have known in all
my diplomatic career."

"What are the allegations?  I thought I understood you that there were
only vague hints?" exclaimed Chisholm in suspicion.

"In some letters the hints are vague, but in one there is a distinct and
serious charge."

"Of what?"

"Of a certain matter which, together with the name of the Ministry from
which the document was secured, must remain for the present a secret."

"If the crisis is so very serious I think I, as Parliamentary
Under-Secretary, have a right to know," protested Dudley.

"No.  I much regret my inability to reply to your questions, Mr.
Chisholm," his visitor answered.  "It is, moreover, not my habit to make
any statement until an inquiry is concluded, and not even then if the
chief imposes silence upon me, as he has done in the present case.
Remember that I am in the public service, just as you are.  All that has
passed between us to-night has passed in the strictest confidence.  Any
communication made by the chief through you in the House will, in the
nation's interest, be of a kind to mislead and mystify our enemies."

"But the mention of my own name in these copied letters!" observed the
Under-Secretary.  "What you have told has only whetted my appetite for
further information.  I really can't understand it."

"No, nor can I," replied Archibald Cator frankly.

And he certainly spoke the honest truth, even though he knew a good deal
more than he had thought it wise to admit.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

THROWS LIGHT ON THE PAST.

Finding that his visitor was determined to travel back to London at
once, Dudley gave orders for the dog-cart to be brought round to the
servants' entrance, for Cator had expressed the strongest desire that
his visit should remain unknown.

"Among your guests are several persons who have wintered in Rome, with
whom I am on friendly terms.  Just now I'm too much occupied to meet
them.  You'll quite understand," he said.

"Perfectly, my dear sir," replied the Under-secretary, mixing another
glass of whiskey for each of them.  "In this matter I shall be perfectly
silent.  From me not a soul will know that you have been in England."

Dudley's spirits had risen, for he imagined that he had successfully
evaded the man's inquiries and by that means had staved off the
threatened exposure and ruin.

"From what I've explained you will readily recognise how extremely
critical is the present situation, and the urgent necessity that exists
for a firm and defiant policy on our part.  But until I discover the
truth the chief is utterly unable to move, lest he should precipitate
events and cause the bursting of the war-cloud."

"Exactly.  I see it all quite plainly," Dudley answered.  "I trust you
will experience little difficulty in discovering the man for whom you
are searching.  I need not say how extremely anxious I shall be to see
the strange matter elucidated, so that the mystery may once and for all
be cleared up."

"I am working unceasingly towards that end, Mr. Chisholm," answered
Cator with a meaning look in his quick grey eyes, as he drained his
glass and rose.  "And now I have only to apologise for intruding upon
you at such an unearthly hour."

"Apology is quite unnecessary," Dudley assured him.  "It appears that
the matter personally concerns me in some extraordinary manner."

"Yes," replied the chief of the secret service.  "So it seems.  But we
shall know more later, I hope.  My staff are on the alert everywhere.
As every confidential agent that England possesses on the Continent is
at work endeavouring to unravel the mystery of Mayne Lennox, I am very
hopeful of success.  And success will allow England to make a
counter-stroke that will paralyse our enemies and `frustrate their
knavish tricks,' to quote a suppressed line from the National Anthem."

"I wish you every luck," said the Under-Secretary, shaking the other's
thin and chilly hand.  "As I can't persuade you to remain the night, I
hope you'll have a comfortable journey up to town."

"Not very comfortable, I anticipate," the captain laughed, surveying
himself.  "I'm in an awful state--aren't I?  It was so late when I got
to Shrewsbury that I couldn't get a conveyance anywhere, so in
desperation I tramped over here."

"Well, Barton shall drive you back; you'll have plenty of time for your
train.  When do you return to the Continent?"

"Perhaps at once--by the eleven from Charing Cross.  It all depends upon
a telegram which I shall receive on arrival in town.  My future
movements are extremely uncertain.  They always are.  From one hour to
another I never know in which direction I shall be hurrying."

Chisholm had heard of this man's rapidity of movement.  Indeed, it was
whispered in his own circle in the Foreign Office that Archie Cator
would often retire to his bachelor rooms in Rome, and cause his man,
Jewell, to give out that his master was indisposed, and confined to his
bed; though, as a matter of fact, the chief of the Confidential
Intelligence Department would be flying across to Berlin, Vienna, or
Petersburg on a swift and secret mission.  He lived two lives so
completely that his ingenuity surpassed comprehension.  In Rome, only
his servant and the Ambassador knew the truth.  Even at that moment the
diplomatic circle in the Eternal City believed their popular member,
Captain Archie Cator of the British Embassy, to be suffering from one of
his acute and periodical attacks of the rheumatic gout which so often
prostrated him.

Dudley himself conducted his distinguished visitor down several stone
corridors into the servants' quarters.  In the courtyard outside stood
Barton with the dog-cart, the light of the lamps showing that the snow
was still thawing into thick slush.

"Good-bye," cried the captain airily, when he had swung himself into the
trap and turned up the collar of his shabby overcoat.

"Good-bye, and good luck!" exclaimed the owner of Wroxeter, with a
warmth that was far from being heart-felt.  Then the trap turned, and
disappeared swiftly through the old arched gateway into the black
winter's night.

Dudley, full of conflicting thoughts, paced slowly back through the
echoing corridors until he reached the ancient banqueting hall, where
the dancing had not long since been in progress.  But all was silence,
and on opening the door he found the place in darkness.  The gaiety had
ended, and his guests had retired.  He crossed the great, gloomy hall,
distinguished by its ghostly-looking stands of armour, on which the
light from the corridor shone in gleaming patches, and, passing down
another corridor of the rambling old place, entered the smoking-room,
where half a dozen men were taking their whiskey and gossiping as was
their habit before going to bed.

"Hulloa, Dudley!" cried one man as he entered.  "We've been looking for
you for an hour past.  We wanted you to take a hand at whist."

"I had some little matters to attend to, so I slipped away," his host
explained.  "I know you will forgive me."

"Of course," the man laughed, pulling forward a chair, into which
Chisholm sank wearily.  When he had allowed a servant to hand him some
refreshment he joined? in the discussion which his entrance had
interrupted.  As it was incumbent upon him to spend an hour with his
guests, he did so, but of the conversation he scarcely had any idea, for
his mind was full of grave thoughts, and he spoke mechanically, heartily
wishing that the men would retire, and leave him at liberty to return to
his study.

At last they all bade him good-night.  As soon as they were gone he
walked slowly to that old room in which he knew he would remain
undisturbed.  He threw himself down in the cosy corner beside the
blazing logs, where he sat staring fixedly at the dancing flames.

For a long time he remained immovable, his face hard and drawn, his eyes
wide open and fixed, until of a sudden he passed his hand slowly across
his brow, sighed heavily, and at last allowed bitter words to escape
from his white lips.

"My God!" he exclaimed in wild despair; "it's all over.  That man Cator
has discovered the clue which must sooner or later reveal the hideous
truth.  If it were any other person except him there might be just a
chance of misleading the chase.  But no secret is safe from him and his
army of confidential agents.  Ruin--nothing but ruin is before me!  What
can I do?"

He rose and paced the room quickly with unequal steps.  His face was
blanched, his eyes were fixed, his clenched hands trembled.

"Ah!" he cried bitterly to himself, "it would have been best to have
resigned and gone abroad months ago, while there was yet time.  Under
another name I might have contrived to conceal my identity in one or
other of the colonies, where they do not inquire too closely into a
man's antecedents.  But, alas! it is now too late.  My movements are
evidently watched, and I am under suspicion, owing to the discovery of
my connection with that scoundrel Lennox.  To resign my appointment is
impossible.  I can only remain and face the ruin, shame, and ignominy
that are inevitable.  I have sinned before God, and before man!" he
cried wildly, his face upturned, his clenched hands held trembling above
his head in blank despair.  "For me there is no forgiveness--none!--
none!  My only means of escape is suicide," he gasped with bated breath.
"A few drops of liquid in a wine-glass full of innocent water, and all
will be over--all the anguish, all the fever.  No, it is not difficult--
not at all," and he laughed a hard, dry, sarcastic laugh.  "And a final
drastic step of that sort is far preferable to shame and ruin."

He was silent for some time.  His lips were still moving as he stood
there in the centre of the room, but no sound came from them.  In the
awful agony he suffered he spoke to himself and heard words that were
unuttered.  The possibility which he had suspected and dreaded during so
many dark weeks was now becoming horribly realised.  His secret sin
would before long be revealed in all its true hideousness, and he,
England's rising statesman, the man of whom so much was prophesied, the
man who was trusted by the Prime Minister, who held such a brilliant and
responsible position, and who was envied by all the lesser fry in the
House, would be rudely cast forth as unfit and unworthy, his name,
honoured for generations, rendered odious.

Truly his position was graver and more precarious than that of
ninety-nine out of a hundred men.  Condemnation was at hand.  Cator, now
that he knew the name of Mayne Lennox, would not be long in laying bare
the whole of the facts.

And then?

He thought it all over, sighing heavily and clenching his hands in wild
despair.  To no single person could he look for assistance, for he dared
not confide in any one.  He could only suffer alone, and pay the penalty
for his sin.

How little the world knows of the inner life of its greatest men!  The
popular favourite, the chosen of fortune in the various walks of life,
is too often an undeserving man, the skeleton in whose cupboard could
not bear the light of day.  Fortune never chooses the best men for the
best places.  Dishonesty grows fat, while virtue dies of starvation.
The public are prone to envy the men who are popular, who are "boomed"
by the newspapers, and whose doings are chronicled daily with the same
assiduity as the movements of the Sovereign himself, yet in many cases
these very men, as did Dudley Chisholm, shrink from the fierce light
always beating upon them.  They loathe the plaudits of the multitude,
because of the inner voice of conscience that tells them they are
charlatans and shams; and they are always promising themselves that one
day, when they see a fitting opportunity, they will retire into private
life.

In every public assembly, from the smallest parish council up to
Westminster itself, there are prominent members who live in daily fear
of exposure.  Although looked upon by the world as self-denying, upright
citizens, they are, nevertheless, leading a life of awful tension and
constant anxiety, knowing that their enemies may at any moment reveal
the truth.

Thus it was with Dudley Chisholm.  That he was a man well fitted for the
responsible post he occupied in the Government could not be denied, and
that he had carefully and assiduously carried out the duties of his
office was patent to all.  Yet the past--that dark, grim past which had
caused him to travel in the unfrequented tracks of the Far East--had
never ceased to haunt him, until now he could plainly see that the end
was very near.  Exposure could not be long delayed.

The turret-clock chimed the hour slowly, and its bells aroused him.

"No," he cried hoarsely to himself, "no, it would not be just!  Before
taking the final step I must place things in order--I must go out of
office with all the honour and dignity of the Chisholms," he added with
a short and bitter laugh.  "Out of office!" he repeated hoarsely to
himself, "out of office--and out of the world!"

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

SOWS SEEDS OF SUSPICION.

Chisholm with uneven steps walked back to the big writing-table, turned
up the reading-lamp and, seating himself, began to put the many official
papers quickly in order, signing some, destroying others, and now and
then making marginal notes on those to be returned to the Foreign
Office.  Many of the more unimportant documents he consigned to the
waste-paper basket, but the others he arranged carefully, sorted them,
and placed them in several of the large official envelopes upon which
the address was printed, together with the bold words "On Her Majesty's
Service."

The light of hope had died from his well-cut features.  His countenance
was changed, grey, anxious, with dark haggard eyes and trembling lips.
When, at last, he had finished, he rose again with a strange smile of
bitterness.  He crossed to the portion of the book-lined wall that was
merely imitation, opened it, and with the key upon his chain took from
the small safe concealed there the envelope secured by the black seal,
and the small piece of folded paper which contained the lock of fair
hair--his most cherished possession.

He opened the paper and stood with the golden curl in the palm of his
hand, gazing upon it long and earnestly.

"Her's!" he moaned in a voice that sounded suspiciously like a sob.  "If
she were here I wonder what would be her advice?  I might long ago have
confided in her, told her all, and asked her help.  She would have given
it.  Yes, she was my friend, and would have sacrificed her very life to
save me.  But it is all over.  I am alone--utterly alone."

Tears stood in his eyes as he raised the love-token slowly and
reverently to his lips.  Then he spoke again:

"For me there only remains the punishment of Heaven.  And yet in those
days how childishly happy we were--how perfect was our love!  Is it an
actual reality that I'm standing here to-night for the last time, or is
it a dream?  No," he added, his teeth clenched in firmness, "it's no
dream.  The end has come!"

The stillness of the night remained unbroken for a long time, for he
continued to stand beside the table with the fair curl in his nervous
hand.  Many times he had been sorely tempted to destroy it, and put an
end to all the thoughts of the past that it conjured up.  And yet he had
grown to regard it as a talisman, and actually dare not cast it from
him.

"Little lock of hair," he said at last in a choking voice, his eyes
fixed upon it, "throughout these years you have formed the single link
that has connected me with those blissful days of fervent love.  You are
the only souvenir I possess of her, and you, emblem of her, fragile,
exquisite, tender, were my faithful companion through those long
journeys in far-off lands.  In days of peril you have rested near my
heart; you have been my talisman; you have, sweet and silent friend,
cheered me often, telling me that even though long absent I was not
forgotten.  Yes--yes!" he exclaimed wildly; "you are part of her--
actually part of her!" and again he kissed the lock of hair in a burst
of uncontrollable feeling.

Suddenly he drew himself up.  His manner instantly changed, as the stern
reality again forced itself upon him.

"Ah!" he sighed, "those days are long spent, and to me happiness can
never return--never.  My sin has risen against me; my one false step
debars me from the pleasures of the world."  His chin was sunk upon his
breast, and he stood staring at the little curl, deep in reverie.  At
last, without another word, he raised it again to his hot, parched lips,
and then folded it carefully in its wrapping.

The envelope he broke open, took out the small piece of transparent
paper, and spread it upon a piece of white foolscap in order to read it
with greater ease.  Slowly he pondered over every one of the almost
microscopic words written there.  As he read, his heavy brows were knit,
as though some of the words puzzled him.

He took a pencil from the inkstand and with it traced a kind of
geometrical diagram of several straight lines upon the blotting-pad.

These lines were similar to those he had traced with his stick in the
dust when standing at the stile on that steep path in the lonely coppice
near Godalming.

Now and then he referred to the small document in the crabbed
handwriting, and afterwards examined his diagram, as though to make
certain of its correct proportions.  Then, resting his chin upon his
hands, he sat staring at the paper as it lay upon the blotting-pad
within the zone of mellow lamplight.

"It seems quite feasible," he said at last, speaking aloud.  "Would that
the suggestion were only true!  But unfortunately it is merely a vague
and ridiculous idea--a fantastic chimera of the imagination, after all.
No," he added resolutely, "the hope is utterly false and misleading.  It
will not bear a second thought."

With sad reluctance he refolded the piece of transparent paper, replaced
it in the envelope, and put it back in the safe without resealing it.
But from the same unlocked drawer he took a formidable-looking blue
envelope, together with a tiny paper folded oblong, and sealed securely
with white wax.  The paper contained a powdered substance.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary carried them both back to his
writing-table, and laid them before him.  Upon the envelope was written
in a bold legal hand, doubly underlined: "The Last Will and Testament of
Dudley Waldegrave Chisholm, Esquire (Copy)."

He smiled bitterly as he glanced at the superscription, then drew out
the document and spread it before him, reading through clause after
clause quite calmly.

There were four pages of foolscap, engrossed with the usual legal margin
and bound together with green silk.  By it the Castle of Wroxeter and
his extensive property in Shropshire were disposed of in a dozen words.
The document was only lengthy by reason of the various bequests to old
servants of the family and annuities to certain needy cousins.  With the
exception of the Castle and certain lands, the bulk of the great estate
was, by that will, bequeathed to a well-known London hospital.

Some words escaped him when, after completing its examination, during
which he found nothing he wished to be altered, he refolded it.  He then
sealed it in another envelope and wrote in a big, bold hand: "My Will--
Dudley Chisholm."

As the names of his solicitors, Messrs. Tarrant and Drew, of Lincoln's
Inn Fields, were appended to the document, there was no necessity for
him to superscribe them.

"All is entirely in order," he murmured hoarsely.  "And now I have to
decide whether to await my doom, or take time by the forelock."  As he
spoke thus, his nervous hand toyed with the little paper packet before
him.

The room was in semi-darkness, for the logs had burned down and their
red glow threw no light.  At that moment the turret-clock struck a deep
note, which echoed far away across the silent Severn.

A strange look was in his eyes.  The fire of insanity was burning there.
As he glanced around in a strained and peculiar manner, he noticed upon
a side table the whiskey, some soda-water, and a glass, all of which
Riggs, according to custom, had placed there ready to his hand.

Without hesitation he crossed to it, resolved on the last desperate
step.  He drew from the syphon until the glass was half-full.  Then he
added some whiskey, returned with it to his seat, and placed it upon the
table.

With care he opened the little packet that had been hoarded since the
days of his journey in Central Asia, disclosing a small quantity of some
yellowish powder, which he emptied into the glass, stirring it with the
ivory paper-knife until all became dissolved.  Then he sank into his
chair with the tumbler set before him.

He held it up to the light, examining it critically, with a sad smile
playing about his thin white lips.  Presently he put it down, and with
both hands pushed the hair wearily from his fevered forehead.

"Shall I write to Claudia?" he asked himself in a hoarse voice, scarcely
louder than a whisper.  "Shall I leave her a letter confessing all and
asking forgiveness?"

For a long time he pondered over the suggestion that had thus come to
him.

"No," he said at last, "it would be useless, and my sin would only cause
my memory to be more hateful.  Ah, no!" he murmured; "to leave the world
in silence is far the best.  The coroner's jury will return a verdict to
the effect that I was of unsound mind.  Juries don't return verdicts of
_felo-de-se_ nowadays.  The time of stakes and cross-roads has passed."

And he laughed harshly again, for now that he had placed all his affairs
in order a strange carelessness in regard to existence had come upon
him.

"To-morrow, when I am found, the papers--those same papers that have
boomed me, as they term it--will discover in my end a startling
sensation.  All sorts of ridiculous rumours will be afloat.  Parliament
will gossip when it meets; but in a week my very name will be forgotten.
One memorial alone will remain of me, my name engraved upon the tablet
in the house of the Royal Geographical Society as its gold-medallist.
And nothing else--absolutely nothing."

Again he paused.  After a few minutes had passed he stretched out his
trembling hand and took the glass.

"What will the world say of me, I wonder?" he exclaimed in a hoarse
tone.  "Will they declare that I was a coward?"

"Yes," came an answering voice, low, but quite distinct within the old
brown room, "the world will surely say that Dudley Chisholm was a
coward--_a coward_!"

He sprang to his feet in alarm, dashing the glass down on the table,
and, turning quickly to the spot whence the answer had come, found
himself face to face with an intruder who had evidently been concealed
behind the heavy curtains of dark red velvet before the window, and who
had heard everything and witnessed all his agony.

The figure was lithe and of middle stature--the figure of a woman in a
plain dark dress standing back in the deep shadow.

At the first moment he could not distinguish the features; but when he
had rushed forward a few paces, fierce resentment in his heart because
his actions had been overlooked, he suddenly became aware of the women's
identity.

It was Muriel Mortimer.

Since he had locked the door behind him as soon as he had entered the
room, she must have been concealed behind the heavy curtains which were
drawn across the deep recess of the old diamond-paned window.

"You!" he gasped, white-faced and haggard.  "You!  Miss Mortimer!  To
what cause, pray, do I owe this nocturnal visit to my study?" he
demanded in a stern and angry voice.

"The reason of my presence here was the wish to find a novel to read in
bed, Mr. Chisholm," she answered with extraordinary firmness.  "Its
result has been to save you from an ignominious death."

Erect, almost defiant, she stood before him.  Her face in the heavy
shadow was as pale as his own, for she perceived his desperate mood and
recognised the improbability of being able to grapple with the
situation.  He intended to end his life, while she, on her part, was
just as determined that he should live.

"You have been in this room the whole time?" he demanded, speaking quite
unceremoniously.

"Yes."

"You have heard my words, and witnessed all my actions?"

"I have."

"You know, then, that I intend to drink the contents of that glass and
end my life?" he said, looking straight at her.

"That was your intention, but it is my duty towards you, and towards
humanity, to prevent such a catastrophe."

"Then you really intend to prevent me?"

"That certainly is my intention," she answered.  Her clear eyes were
upon him, and beneath her steady gaze he shrank and trembled.

"And if I live you will remain as witness of my agony, and of my
degradation?" he said.  "If I live you will gossip, and tell them of all
that has escaped my lips, of my despair--of my contemplated suicide!"

"I have seen all, and I have heard all," the girl answered.  "But no
word of it will pass my lips.  With me your secret is sacred."

"But how came you here at this hour?" he demanded in a fiercer tone.

"As I've already told you, I came to get a book before retiring, and the
moment I had entered you came in.  Because I feared to be discovered I
hid behind the curtains."

"You came here to spy upon me?" he cried angrily.  "Come, confess the
truth!"

The curious thought had crossed his mind that she had been sent there by
Claudia.

"I chanced to be present here entirely by accident," she answered.  "But
by good fortune I have been able to rescue you from death."

He bowed to her with stiff politeness, for he suspected her of
eavesdropping.  He felt that he disliked her, and in no half-hearted
fashion.  Besides, he recollected the prophetic warning of the colonel.
It was more than strange that he should discover her there, in that room
where his valuable papers were lodged.  He scented mystery in her
action, and fiercely resented this unwarrantable intrusion upon his
privacy.

"My own behaviour is my own affair, Miss Mortimer," he said in a
determined voice.

"Yes, all but suicide," she assented.  "That is an affair which concerns
your friends."

"Of whom you are scarcely one," he observed meaningly.

"No," she replied, stretching forth her hand until it rested upon his
arm.  "You entirely misunderstand me, Mr. Chisholm.  As in this affair
you have already involuntarily confided in me, I beg of you to rely upon
my discretion and secrecy, and to allow me to become your friend."

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

REQUIRES SOLUTION.

With his face to the intruder, Chisholm stood leaning with his hand upon
the back of a chair.

"Friends are to me useless, Miss Mortimer," he answered her.

"Others perhaps are useless, but I may prove to be the exception," she
said very gravely.  "You want a friend, and I am ready to become yours."

"Your offer is a kind one," he replied, still regarding her with
suspicion, for he could not divine the real reason of her visit there,
or why she had concealed herself, unless she had done so to learn, if
possible, his secret.  "I thank you for it, but cannot accept it."

"But, surely, you do not intend to perform such a cowardly act as to
take your own life," she said in a measured tone of voice, looking at
him with her wide-open eyes.  "It is my duty to prevent you from
committing such a mad action as that."

"I quite admit that it would be mad," he said.  "But the victim of
circumstances can only accept the inevitable."

"Why, how strangely and despondently you talk, Mr. Chisholm!  From my
hiding-place at the back of those curtains, I've been watching you this
hour or more.  Your nervousness has developed into madness, if you will
permit me to criticise.  Had it not been for my presence here you would
by this time have taken your life.  For what reason?  Shall I tell you?
Because, Mr. Chisholm, you are a coward.  You are in terror of an
exposure that you dare not face."

"How do you know?" he cried fiercely, springing towards her in alarm.
"Who told you?"

"You told me yourself," she answered.  "Your own lips denounced you."

"What did I say?  What foolish nonsense did I utter in my madness?" he
demanded, the fact now being plain that she had heard all the wild words
that had escaped him.  The old colonel had warned him that this woman
was not his friend.  He reflected that, at all costs he must silence
her.  She paused for a few moments in hesitation.

"Believing yourself to be here alone, you discussed aloud your secret in
all its hideousness--the secret of your sin."

"And if I did--what then?" he demanded defiantly.  His courtliness
towards her had been succeeded by an undisguised resentment.  To think
that she should have been brought into his house to act as eavesdropper,
and to learn his secret!

"Nothing, except that I am now in your confidence, and, having rescued
you from an ignominious end, am anxious to become your friend," she
answered in a quiet tone of voice.  Her face was pale, but she was,
nevertheless, firm and resolute.

He was puzzled more than ever in regard to her.  With his wild eyes full
upon her, he tried to make out whether it was by design or by accident
that she was there, locked in that room with him.  That she was an
inveterate novel-reader he knew, but her excuse that she had come there
to obtain a book at so late an hour scarcely bore an air of probability.
Besides, she had exchanged her smart dinner-gown for a dark stuff
dress.  No, she had spied upon him.  The thought lashed him to fury.

"To calculate the amount of profit likely to accrue to oneself as the
result of a friend's misfortune is no sign of friendship," he said in a
sarcastic voice.  "No, Miss Mortimer, you have, by thus revealing your
presence, prolonged my life by a few feverish minutes, but your words
certainly do not establish the sincerity of your friendship.  Besides,"
he added, "we scarcely know each other."

"I admit that; but let us reconsider all the facts," she said, leaning a
little toward him, across the back of a chair.  "Your actions have shown
that the matter is to you one of life or death.  If so, it manifestly
deserves careful and mature consideration."

He nodded, but no word passed his lips.  She seemed a strangely sage
person, this girl with the fair hair, whose parentage was so obscure,
and whose invitation to his house was due to some ridiculous _penchant_
felt for her by Claudia.  Why she had ever been invited puzzled him.  He
would gladly have asked her to return to town on the day of her arrival
if it had been possible to forget the laws of hospitality and chivalry.
The whole matter had annoyed him greatly, and this was its climax.

"Well, now," she went on, in a voice which proved her to be in no way
excited, "I gather from your words and actions that you fear to face the
truth--that your guilt is such that exposure will mean ruin.  Is this
so?"

"Well, to speak plainly, it is so," he said mechanically, looking back
at the glassful of death on the table.

"You must avoid exposure."

"How?"

"By acting like a man, not like a coward."

He looked at her sharply, without replying.  She spoke with all the
gravity of a woman twice her years, and he could not decide whether she
were really in earnest in the expression of her readiness to become his
friend.  One thing was absolutely certain, namely, that she was
acquainted with the innermost secrets of his heart.  In the wild madness
of despair he had blurted out his fear and agony of mind, and she had
actually been the witness of those moments of sweet melancholy when, at
the sight of that lock of hair, he had allowed his thoughts to wander
back to the days long dead, when the world was to him so rosy and full
of life.  Should he conciliate her, or should he, on the other hand,
defy her and refuse her assistance?  That she, of all women, should in
this fashion thrust herself into his life was strange indeed.  But had
she actually thrust herself upon him, or was her presence there, as she
had alleged, a mere freak of fortune?

"You say that I ought to act like a man, Miss Mortimer.  Well, I am
ready to hear your suggestion."

"My suggestion is quite simple: it is that you should live, be bold, and
face those who seek your downfall."

He sighed despairingly.

"In theory that's all very well, but in practice, impossible," he
answered after a short pause.

"Think!  You are wealthy, you are famous, with hosts of friends who will
come to your aid if you confide in them--"

"Ah! but I cannot confide in them," he cried despondently, interrupting
her.  "You are the only person who knows the secret of my intention."

"But surely you will not deliberately seek such an inglorious end--you,
the pride and hope of a political party, and one of a race that has
century after century been famous for producing noble Englishmen.  It is
madness--sheer madness!"

"I know it," he admitted; "but to me birth, position, wealth, popularity
are all nothing."

"I can quite understand that all these qualities may count as nothing to
you, Mr. Chisholm," she said in a tone of voice indicative of
impatience, "but there is still one reason more why you should hesitate
to take the step you have just been contemplating."

"And what is that?"

For a moment she remained silent, looking straight at him with her
splendid eyes, as if to read the book of his heart.  At length she made
answer:

"Because a woman worships you."

He started, wondering quickly if his midnight visitor intended those
words to convey a declaration of love.  With an effort he smiled in a
good-humoured way, but almost instantly his dark features regained their
tragic expression.

"And if a woman pays me that compliment, is it not a misfortune for
her?" he asked.  There was a motive in her concealment there.  What
could it be?

"It surely should not be so, if the love is perfect, as it is in the
present case."

"Well," he said, smiling, "apparently you are better acquainted with my
private affairs than I am myself, Miss Mortimer.  But in any case the
love of this woman whom you mention can be only a passing fancy.  True,
I was loved once, long ago.  But that all belongs to the past."

"And the only relic of the bygone romance is that lock of hair?  Yes, I
know all.  I have seen all.  And your secret is, I assure you, safe with
me."

"But this woman who--well, who is attracted towards me?  What is her
name?" he demanded, not without some interest.

"You surely know her," she answered.  "The woman who is your best and
most devoted friend--the woman in whom you should surely confide before
attempting to take such a step as you are contemplating to-night--Lady
Richard Nevill."

His lips again set themselves hard at the mention of that name.  Was it
uttered in sarcasm, or was she in real earnest?  He regarded her keenly
for a moment, and then inclined to the latter opinion.

"The relations existing between Lady Richard and myself are our own
affair," he said, vexed by her reference to a subject which of all
others, next to the knowledge of his sin, perturbed him most.

"But your secret concerns her," Muriel declared.  "Many times you have
confided in her and asked her help at the various crises in your career.
Why not now?  Her very life is yours."

"Am I to understand that you wish to pay me compliments, Miss Mortimer?"

"No.  This is hardly the time for paying compliments.  I speak the
truth, Mr. Chisholm.  She loves you."

"Then if that is really so, it seems an additional misfortune has
overtaken me," he replied hoarsely, unable as yet to grasp her motive.

"All the world knows that she is madly in love with you, and would be
ready to become your wife to-morrow.  Under all the circumstances I must
say that your indifference strikes me as almost unbelievable."

She was pleading for Claudia, a fact which made the mystery surrounding
her all the more perplexing.  He did not notice that she was calmly
watching the effect of her words upon him.

"You hold a brief for Lady Richard, but I fail to see the reason why.
We are friends, very old friends, but nothing else.  Our future concerns
no one but ourselves," he said.

"Exactly.  The future of each of you concerns the other," she answered
triumphantly.  "She loves you, and because of this all her thoughts are
centred in you."

"I must really confess, Miss Mortimer, that I do not see the drift of
your argument," he said.  "Lady Richard has no connection whatever with
the present matter, which is my private affair alone."

"But since she loves you as devotedly as she does, it concerns her
deeply."

"I repeat that we are friends, not lovers," he replied with some
asperity.

"And I repeat, just as emphatically, that she loves you, and that it is
your duty to confide in her," answered Muriel, determined not to haul
down her flag.

"Love!" he cried bitterly, beginning to pace the room, for as soon as he
thought of Claudia his attempt to remain calm was less and less
effective; "what is love to me?  There is no love for such as I."

"No, Mr. Chisholm," she said earnestly, stretching forth her hand.
"Pardon me, I pray, for speaking thus, but to every man and woman both
love and happiness are given, if only they will accept it."

He was thinking of Claudia, and of the fact that she had first seen
Cator and had contrived to keep him aloof from the guests.  She could
surely suspect nothing, otherwise she would have waited to see him after
the visitor's departure.  Yes, he knew that everything said by this
fair-haired girl was quite true.  That was the unfortunate factor in the
affair.  She loved him.

"Tell me, then," he demanded at last, "what do you advise?  You know
that I have a secret; that I intend deliberately to take my life and to
trouble no one any further.  As you have prevented me from doing so, it
is to you I look for help and good counsel."

"I am ready and eager to give both," she exclaimed, "only I very much
fear that you do not trust me, Mr. Chisholm!  Well, after all, that is
not very remarkable when the short period of our acquaintanceship is
borne in mind.  Nevertheless, I am Claudia's friend, and consequently
yours.  You must really not do anything foolish.  Think of your own
position, and of the harsh judgment you will naturally provoke by your
insane action!"

"I know!  I know!" he replied.  "But to me the opinion of the world
counts for absolutely nothing.  I have sinned, and, like other men, must
bear the penalty.  For me there is no pardon on this side of the grave."

"There is always pardon for the man who is loved."

"A love that must turn to hate when the truth is discovered," he added
bitterly, with a short, dry laugh.  "No, I much prefer the alternative
of death.  I do not fear the end, I assure you.  Indeed, I really
welcome it," and he laughed again nervously, as though suicide were one
of the humours of life.

"No," she cried in earnestness, laying her hand gently on his arm.
"Listen to reason, Mr. Chisholm.  I know I have no right to speak to you
like this--only the right of a fellow-creature who would prevent you
from taking the rash step you contemplate.  But I want you fully to
realise your responsibility towards the woman who so dearly loves you."

"Our love is ended," he blurted out, with a quick, furtive look at the
glass upon the writing-table.  "I have no further responsibility."

"Has it really ended?" she asked anxiously.  "Can you honestly and
truthfully say before your Maker that you entertain no love for Lady
Richard--that she is never in your thoughts?"

Her question nonplussed him.  A lie arose to his lips, but remained
there unuttered.

"You are thinking of that former love," she went on; "of that wild,
impetuous affection of long ago, that madness which has resulted so
disastrously, eh?  Yes, I know.  You still love Lady Richard, while she,
for her part, entertains a loving thought for no other man but you.  And
yet there is a sad, sweet memory within you which you can neither stifle
nor forget."  There was a tone of distinct melancholy in her voice.

"You have guessed aright," he answered in a strained tone.  "The tragedy
of it all is before me day and night, and it is that alone which holds
me at a distance from Claudia."

"Why not make full confession to her?" she suggested, after a short
pause.

Surely it was very strange, he thought, that she, who was little more
than a mere girl, should venture to debate with him his private affairs.
To him it appeared suspiciously as though she had already discussed the
situation with the woman who had introduced her beneath his roof.  Had
they arranged all this between them?  But if his madness had not blinded
him, he would have detected the contemptuous curl of the lip when she
uttered Claudia's name.

"I have neither the wish nor the intention to confess anything," he
answered.  "You alone know my secret, Miss Mortimer, and I rely upon
your honesty as a woman to divulge nothing."

For answer she walked quickly to the table, took up the glass, and flung
its contents upon the broad, old-fashioned hearthstone.

"I solemnly promise you," she said, as she replaced the empty tumbler
and confronted him again.  "I promise you that as long as you hold back
from this suicidal madness the world shall know nothing.  Live, be
brave, grapple with those who seek your downfall, and reciprocate the
love of the woman who is both eager and ready to assist and defend you."

It struck him that in the last words of this sentence she referred to
herself.  If so, hers was, indeed, a strange lovemaking.

"No," replied the despondent man.  "My position is hopeless--utterly
hopeless."

As his head was turned away, he did not notice the strange glint in her
eyes.  For a single instant the fierce fire of hatred burned there, but
in a moment it had vanished, and she was once more the same calm,
persuasive woman as throughout the conversation she had been.

"But your position is really not so serious as you imagine," she
declared.  "If you will only place confidence in me I can help you ever
so much.  Indeed, I anticipate that, if I so wish, I can rescue you from
the exposure and ruin that threatens you."

"You?" he cried incredulously.  "How can you hope to rescue me?" he
demanded sharply, taking a step toward her in his eagerness to know what
the answer to his question would be.

"By means known only to myself," she said, watching him with
panther-like intensity.  She had changed her tactics.

"From your words it would appear that my future is to be controlled in
most respects by you, Miss Mortimer," he observed with a slight touch of
sarcasm in his hard voice.

"You have spoken correctly.  It is."

"And for what reason, pray?" he inquired, frowning in his perplexity.

"Because I alone know the truth, Mr. Chisholm," she said distinctly.  "I
am aware of the secret of your sin.  All of these hideous facts are in
my possession."

He started violently, glaring at her open-mouthed, as though she were
some superhuman monstrosity.

"You believe that I am lying to you, but I declare that I am not.  I am
in full possession of the secret of your sin, even to its smallest
detail.  If you wish, I will defend you, and show you a means by which
you can defy those who are seeking to expose you.  Shall I give you
proof that I am cognisant of the truth?"

He nodded in the affirmative, still too dumbfounded to articulate.

Moving suddenly she stepped forward to the table, took up a pen, and
wrote two words upon a piece of paper, which she handed to him in
silence.

He grasped it with trembling fingers.  No sooner had his eyes fallen
upon it than a horrible change swept over his countenance.

"My God!  Yes!" he gasped, his face blanched to the lips.  "It was that
name.  Then you really know my terrible guilt.  You--a comparative
stranger!"

"Yes," she answered.  "I know everything, and can yet save you, if you
will place your trust in me--even though I am little more than a
stranger."

"And if I did--if I allowed you to strive on my behalf?  What then?"

She looked straight at him.  The deep silence of the night was again
broken by the musical chimes high up in the ancient turret.

"Shall I continue to speak frankly?" she asked at last.

"Most certainly.  In this affair there can be no concealment between us,
Miss Mortimer, for it seems that my future is entirely in your hands."

"It is," she answered, in a deep, intense voice.  "And in return for my
silence and defence of yourself I make one condition."

"And that is?"

She again placed her soft hand tenderly upon the arm of the nervous,
haggard-faced man whom she had just rescued from self-destruction, and
looked earnestly into his pallid face.

"My sole condition is that you shall give me yourself," she answered in
a wild, hoarse voice; "that you shall cast aside this other woman and
give me your love."

"Then you actually love me!" he exclaimed in his astonishment.

"Yes," she cried fiercely, her clear eyes looking anxiously up into his
face.  "Yes, I frankly confess that I love you."

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

RECORDS SOME MATTERS OF FACT.

The house-party at Wroxeter Castle had broken up, and Dudley Chisholm,
having returned to town, had once more taken up his official duties.

Every hour of his day, however, was haunted by the memory of that
strange encounter in the library, and its astonishing sequel.  That
fair-haired girl, whose parentage was so mysterious, and against whom he
had been so distinctly warned, was aware of his secret, and, moreover,
had openly declared her love for him.  Assuredly his was a most
complicated and perilous position.

Muriel Mortimer had at every point displayed marvellous tact and
ingenuity.  She was undoubtedly clever, for at breakfast on the morning
following their interview, Lady Meldrum had announced the receipt of a
letter which compelled them to leave by the midday train for Carlisle.
All sorts of regrets were expressed in the usual conventional manner,
but Muriel exchanged a glance with her host, and he understood.  No word
regarding the midnight interview passed between them; but when she
entered the carriage to be driven into Shrewsbury with Sir Henry and his
wife, and grasped his hands in farewell, he felt a slight pressure upon
his fingers as their eyes met, and knew that it was intended as a mute
repetition of her promise to rescue him.

She alone knew the truth.  If she so desired she herself could expose
him and lay bare his secret.  He was utterly helpless in her hands, and
in order to save himself had been compelled to accept the strange
condition she had so clearly and inexorably laid down.  This fair-faced
woman, about whom he knew next to nothing, had declared that she could
save him by means known only to herself; and this she was now setting
forth to do.

Archibald Cator, the resourceful man whose success in learning the
diplomatic secrets of foreign states was unequalled, was working towards
his exposure, while she, an apparently simple woman, with a countenance
full of child-like innocence, had pitted herself against his long
experience and cunning mind.  The match was unequal, he thought.  Surely
she must be vanquished.  Yet she had saved him from suicide, and
somehow, he knew not exactly how, her declarations and her sudden
outburst of devotion had renewed the hope of happiness within him.

Public life had never offered more brilliant prizes to a Canning, a
Disraeli, or a Randolph Churchill than it did to Dudley Chisholm.  To
him, it seemed, the future belonged.  England was in the mood to
surrender herself, not necessarily to a prodigy of genius, a Napoleon of
politics, but to a man of marked independence, faith, and capacity.  And
all these qualities were possessed by the present Parliamentary
Under-Secretary--the unhappy man who so short a time before had sat with
the fatal glass in front of him.

He was in the hall when Muriel took leave of Claudia.  The latter was
inclined to be affectionate and bent to kiss her on the cheek, but
Muriel pretended not to notice her intention, merely shaking her hand
and expressing regret at being compelled to leave so suddenly.  Their
parting was most decidedly a strained one, and he fell to wondering
whether, on his account, any high words had passed between them.

But a fortnight had gone by, the House had reassembled, and he had
resumed his duties.

Has it ever occurred to you, my reader, what a terrible sameness marks
the careers of front-bench men?

Ancestors who toiled and spun, as some writer in a daily journal has it;
Eton and Oxford; the charmed Commons at twenty-eight or thirty, an
Under-Secretaryship of State two years later; high Government office
three years after that, then a seat in the Cabinet, then the invariable
Chief Secretaryship of Ireland, birthplace of reputations, where they
take the place of colleagues physically prostrated by Irish
_persiflage_.

As Chief Secretary the typical front-bench man, of course, surprises
friends and foes by his unshakable coolness.  If he still has any hair,
he never turns a particle of it while the Irish members are shrieking
their loudest, and branding him with nicknames; which we are instructed
to accept as examples of epoch-making humour.  Well, we are bound to
believe what we are told, but we cannot be described as cordial
believers.

Last scene of all, the ignoble, protesting tumble upstairs into the
House of Lords; a coronet on the door panels of his brougham; his
identity hidden under the name of a London suburb or an obscure village;
while his eldest son who is now an "Honourable," and has always been a
zany, remains down below to fritter away illustrious traditions.

Once Dudley Waldegrave Chisholm had marked out for himself a similar
career, but the events of the past few months had changed it all.
Public life no longer attracted him.  He hated the wearying monotony of
the House, and each time he rose from the Treasury bench to speak, he
trembled lest there should arise a figure from the Opposition to
denounce him in scathing terms.  The nervous tension of those days was
awful.  His friends of his own party, noticing his nervousness, put it
down to the strain of office, and more than one idling politician of the
dining-room had suggested that he should pair and leave town for a bit
of a change.

Would, he thought within himself, that he could leave the town for ever!

He had arranged with the woman into whose hands he had given himself
unreservedly, providing that she placed him in a position to overthrow
his enemies, that she should write to him at his club, the Carlton; but
as the weeks crept on and he received no letter he began to be uneasy at
her silence.

In the _Morning Post_ he had noticed two lines in the fashionable
intelligence, which ran as follows:

"Sir Henry and Lady Meldrum with Miss Muriel Mortimer have left Green
Street for the Continent."  The announcement was vague, but purposely
so, he thought.  He tried to calm himself by plunging with redoubled
energy into the daily political struggle.

Claudia after leaving the castle had gone to Paris with her almost
inseparable friend, the Duchess of Penarth, gowns being the object of
the visit.  _Hors de Paris_, _hors du monde_ was Claudia's motto always.
They usually went over together, without male encumbrances, twice or
three times yearly, stayed at the Athenee, and spent the greater part of
their time in the _ateliers_ of Doeuillet and Paquin, or shopping in the
Vendome quarter, that little area of the gay city so dear to the
feminine heart.

The visit had lasted a fortnight, and Claudia was back again at Albert
Gate.  She had sent him a brief note announcing her arrival, but he had
not called, for, truth to tell, because of the fresh development
springing from Muriel Mortimer's policy he felt unable to continue his
fervent protestations of love.  The web of complications was drawing
round him more tightly every moment.  He tried to struggle against it,
but the feeble effort was utterly hopeless.

One evening, however, he accepted, under absolute compulsion, her
invitation to dine.  In that handsome, well-remembered room, with its
snowy cloth, its shining glass, its heavy plate and big silver epergne
of hot-house flowers, he sat with her _tete-a-tete_, listening to the
story of her visit to the French capital, her account of the pretty
evening gowns which were on their way to her--new and exclusive "models"
for which she had been compelled to pay terribly dear--all about her
meeting with the old Comtesse de Montigny while driving in the Avenue
des Acacias, and the warm invitation, which she had accepted, to the
latter's _salon_, one of the most exclusive in all Paris.  Moreover, she
and the Duchess had dined one evening with Madame Durand, one of her old
companions at the pension at Enghien, and now wife of the newly
appointed Minister of the Interior.  Yes, in Paris she had, as usual, a
most enjoyable time.  And how had he fared?

As Jackson, the solemn-faced and rather pompous butler, who had been in
poor Dick Nevill's service for a good many years, was pouring out his
wine, he hesitated to speak confidentially until he had left.

Claudia certainly looked charming.  She was dressed in black, and had a
large bunch of Neapolitan violets in her low corsage.  They were his
favourite flowers, and he knew that she wore them in honour of his
visit.

"I wrote to you twice from Paris, and received no reply, Dudley," she
said, leaning toward him when the man had gone.  "Why didn't you
answer?"

"Forgive me, Claudia," he answered, placing his hand upon hers and
looking into her handsome face.  "I have been so very busy of late--and
I expected you back in London every day."

"You have only written to me once since I left Wroxeter," she said,
pouting.  "It is really too bad of you."

"I can only plead heavy work and the grave responsibilities of office,"
he answered.  "I've been literally driven to death.  You've no doubt
seen the papers."

"Yes, I have seen them," she answered.  "And my candid opinion is,
Dudley, that the Government has not come out particularly well in regard
to the question of Crete.  I'm quite with you as to your declaration in
the House last night, that we are not nearly strong enough in the
Mediterranean."

Jackson entered again, and, as their conversation was of necessity
prevented from taking on an intimate tone, they kept to a discussion of
matters upon which Dudley had been speaking in the House during the past
week.  She had always been his candid critic, and often pointed out to
him his slips and shortcomings, just as she had criticised him in their
youthful days and stirred within him the ambition to enter public life.

If she knew of the secret compact that he had made with Muriel Mortimer
what would she say?  He dreaded to contemplate the exposure of the
truth.

"Have you heard anything of the Meldrums?" he inquired, as the thought
flashed into his mind that from her very probably he might be able to
learn their whereabouts.

"Oh! they're abroad," she replied.  "They left us very suddenly at the
castle, for what reason I've not yet been able to make out.  Do you
know, I've a horrible suspicion that Lady Meldrum was offended, or
something, but what it was I really have no idea.  She was scarcely
civil when we parted."

"That's very strange," he said, pricking up his ears and looking at her
in astonishment.  "Who was the culprit?  One of the guests, I suppose."

"I suppose so," his hostess answered.  "But at any rate, whatever the
cause, she was gravely offended.  The excuse to leave was a palpably
false one, for there chanced to be no letters for her that morning."

"Where are they now?"

"They first went up to Dumfries, and then came to town and left for
Brussels.  I heard from Muriel a week ago from Florence."

"From Muriel!" he exclaimed.  "Then she is with them?"

"Yes.  Her letter says that they were contemplating taking a villa there
for the winter, but were hesitating on account of Lady Meldrum's health.
It appears that her London doctor did not recommend Florence on account
of the cold winds along the Arno."

In Florence!  It was strange, he thought, that if she could write
civilly to the woman who was her rival, whom she had scarcely saluted at
parting, she did not send a single line to him.  Then the strange
thought flitted through his mind that Archibald Cator was attach in
Rome.  Could her visit to Italy have any connection with the task which
she had taken upon herself to fulfil?

In the blue drawing-room later, after they had taken their coffee and
were alone, she rose slowly and stood with him before the tiled hearth.
She saw by his heavy brow that he was preoccupied, and without a word
she took his hand and raised it with infinite tenderness to her lips.

He turned his eyes upon her, uttering no word, for he hated himself for
his duplicity.  Why had he been persuaded to visit her?  How could he
endure to feign an affection and fill her heart with unrealisable hopes?
It was disloyal of him, and cruel to her.

She, a woman of infinite tact and _finesse_, had suffered bitterly from
the harsh words he had spoken weeks ago, yet she had never upbraided
him.  She had suffered in patience and in silence, as the true woman
does when the man she loves causes her unhappiness.  Jealousy may
engender fury; but the woman whose soul is pure and whose heart is
honest in her love is always patient and long-suffering, always willing
to believe that her ideal is represented by the man she loves.  And it
was so with Claudia.  Gossips had tried to injure her good name by
alleging things that were untrue, yet she had never once complained.
"Tiens!" she would exclaim.  That was all.  It was true that she had
allowed herself to flirt with the young Russian because, being a woman,
she could not resist that little piece of harmless coquetry.
Nevertheless she had never for a single instant forgotten the sacred
love of her youth.

She was essentially a smart woman, whose doings were chronicled almost
daily in the fashionable intelligence of the newspapers; and every woman
of her stamp may always be sure of being persecuted by malignant
gossips.  Were she a saint she could not escape them.  The eternal
feminine is prolific of aspersions where a pretty member of its own sex
is under examination, and especially if she be left lonely and
unprotected while she is still quite young.  It was so with Claudia
Nevill.  She allowed people to talk, and was even amused at the wild and
often scandalous tales whispered about her, for she knew that the man
she loved would give no credence to them.

Dudley had loved her long ago in her schoolgirl days, and she knew that
he loved her now.  For her, that was all-sufficient.

But his preoccupied manner that night caused her considerable
apprehension.  He was not his old self.  Once, while at dinner, she had
caught a strange, haunted look in his eyes.

"Tell me, Dudley," she urged, holding his hand and looking earnestly up
to him.  "Be frank with me, and tell me what ails you."

"Nothing," he laughed uneasily, carrying her soft hand to his lips.
"But whatever made you ask such a question?"

"Because you seem upset," she answered, smoothing his hair tenderly from
his brow.  "If there is any matter that is worrying you, why not confide
in me, as you have done so often before, and let me help you."

"No, really," he protested with a forced laugh.

"Nothing worries me--only matters down at the House."

She looked at him in silence.  In those dark, brilliant eyes of hers was
a love-look that was unmistakable.  She was a woman believed by men to
be utterly frivolous and heartless, yet she loved Dudley Chisholm with
all the fierce passion possible to her ardent soul.  His face told her
that he had been suffering in her absence, and she strove to discover
the reason.

"Why, Dudley," she exclaimed at last, "now that I reflect, you have not
been quite the same since the midnight visit paid you at the castle by
the mysterious man who was so very careful that his presence should not
be made known!  You have never told me who he was, or what was his
business."

He started so quickly that she could not fail to notice it.  This set
her wondering.

"Oh!" he replied with affected carelessness next moment, "the tall
shabby man who called on the night of the dance you mean?  He was a
confidential messenger, that was all."

"I suppose I was mistaken, but his face and voice both seemed quite
familiar to me," she remarked.  "I meant to tell you before, but it
entirely slipped my memory.  The likeness to some one I have met was
very striking, but I cannot recollect where I've met him before.  Is he
an official messenger?"

"Yes," answered her lover vaguely, although alarmed that she should so
nearly have recognised Cator; "he's attached to the Foreign Office.  I
urged him to stay the night, but he was compelled to return at once to
town."

"And he brought you some bad news?  Admit the truth, dear."

"He certainly brought some official intelligence that was not altogether
reassuring," her lover said.

"Are you quite certain that it was official, and did not concern
yourself?" she asked in a low voice which sounded to him full of
suspicion.

"Certain?  Why, of course," he laughed.  "Whatever strange ideas are you
entertaining, Claudia?"

"Well," she answered, "to tell the truth, Dudley, I have a notion that
he came to see you on some private business, because ever since that
night you have been a changed man."

"I really had no idea that.  I had changed," he said.  "You surely don't
mean that I have changed towards you?"

"Yes," she answered gravely, her small hand trembling slightly in his
nervous grasp,--"yes, I think you have changed--even towards me."

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

CONTRASTS TWO LOVES.

When a woman of Claudia Nevill's passionate temperament loves, it is
with her whole soul.  The women with dark flashing eyes, red lips,
arched brows, and oval countenances can never do things by halves.  They
either love fiercely, or else are as cold as ice; they hate with all the
vindictiveness of hell, or are patient, forbearing and forgiving to the
end.  Dudley Chisholm knew this well enough, and was aware how deep and
devoted was the love of the true-hearted woman from whom he had tried to
part, but without whom there seemed a void in his life.

Because gossips had maligned them he had striven, for her sake as well
as his own, to put an end to their affection.  His words had pained him
and had stabbed her cruelly, but they had turned out; to be
inconclusive.  Their lives were bound together, as she had so frequently
declared.

Now that she had approached the subject, he longed to tell her of the
secret in his heart.  But how could he when he had made that strange,
unholy compact with that woman, her rival, who now held his future in
her hands?

With an effort he put such thoughts aside, and with feigned carelessness
strove to assure her that he was in no wise changed.  When, however, a
woman really loves, it is difficult to deceive her.  She reads man's
innermost thoughts as clearly as though they were written upon an open
page.  The wavering of the eyes, the twitching of the lips, the slight
movement of the muscles of the face, and the well nigh imperceptible
swelling at the temples, although entirely unobserved by the woman who
is not in love, are plain and open declarations of the truth to her who
loves the face exhibiting these subtle signals.  Truly the feminine
intuition is marvellous and inexplicable.

Dudley knew that to lie to her was impossible.  Little by little he
managed to convince her that his mysterious visitor had come from the
Foreign Office.  At length he succeeded in turning their conversation
into a different channel.

At his request she crossed to the grand piano at the end of the
magnificent room in which there were so many signs of her exquisite
taste, seated herself at the instrument, and played Mendelssohn's "Rondo
capriccioso" and Chopin's "Valse Op. 70."

Though he made an attempt to turn over the leaves of the music, he found
it difficult to keep himself from becoming absorbed in reverie.  What,
he wondered, could she suspect?  Surely the woman into whose hands he
had given himself had told her nothing.  No.  Had she not promised in
the most emphatic manner that no word of his terrible secret should pass
her lips?  As she had already exhibited marvellous cleverness and
diplomatic _finesse_, he felt confident of her discretion and silence.

He looked down at the dark-haired woman seated at the piano and thought
how her loveliness would have delighted Greuze.  As her slim fingers,
laden with sparkling gems, ran swiftly and dexterously over the keys,
her lawny bosom rose and fell, the diamonds at her throat glittered with
iridescent fire, and the sweet odour of the violets added one more to
the many charms thus spread for him.  She had taken three or four of the
flowers from her breast, and with a single leaf had made up a tiny
bouquet, afterwards placing it in the lappel of his coat, as was her
tender habit when they were alone.  And he was actually deceiving this
affectionate woman, who had been his friend, _confidante_, and adviser
ever since their days of childhood!

He stood behind her, clenching his teeth, hating himself for his
duplicity.

Did he really love her, he asked himself for the thousandth time?  Yes,
he did.  She was all in all to him.  Their love had always been idyllic.
In his eyes no woman was half as fair to look upon; none so full of
innate grace and _chic_; none so sweet in temperament or so full of
charms.  Fate had parted them, it was true, and she had married Dick
Nevill, his best friend.  Yet he had never ceased to love her--though to
her dead lord she had been a model wife during their too brief period of
wedded happiness.

When Dick died he had, at Claudia's own request, gone back to her to
become her platonic friend, to cheer her in her loneliness, and to
advise her in the hundred and one matters which concerned her future.
And again she had grown to love him; again she had worshipped him as her
ideal.

She had finished the valse, and, turning slowly, raised her perfect
face, slightly tragic in its dark beauty, with a mute invitation for his
caress.  He placed his hand tenderly upon her shoulder and bent until
his lips touched hers.  And as he did so, he saw in her bright eyes that
calm expression of tranquil content which comes to such a woman in the
thrill engendered by her lover's kiss.

She rose from the music-stool.  Once more he held her in his arms, as he
had so often done of old, while she, in that soft voice he knew so well,
tried to teach him the height and breadth and depth of her love.

"I know what people say, Dudley!" she exclaimed, hoarsely.  "Tant mieux!
I know that odious reports have reached you regarding me, but surely
you will trust me?  Cannot you see for yourself, dear, that I am yours--
entirely yours?"

"Words are unnecessary, Claudia," he answered, kissing her.  "That you
love me I have never doubted; I give no credence to anything I hear.  I
trust in you implicitly."

"Then if that is so, dear, why not be perfectly frank and tell me the
reason of your sadness?" she urged.

"I am not sad, Claudia," he protested with a feigned air of gaiety.
"How can I be sorrowful when I know that I possess your love?"

"It is not sufficient that you have my affection," she answered.  "I
wish to continue to be your _confidante_ and friend.  Recollect that a
woman's wit is often of value to a man engaged in public life as you
are."

"I know my debt to you is more than I can ever repay," he declared
frankly.  "To your good counsels and personal interest all my success is
due.  I owe all to you--everything."

"And in return you have given me your love, the sum of my desire," she
said contentedly, slowly raising her lips and kissing him.  "You are
mine, Dudley, and you will ever remain so--won't you?"  He held his
breath for an instant.  Then, as he twined his arm round her slender
waist, he said:

"Of course, darling, I shall ever remain yours, always--always."

He lied to her.  Faugh! he hated himself.  For the first time he had
uttered a deliberate falsehood concerning their love; and he felt
positive she knew that he had not spoken the truth.  So close had been
their association for many years, unbroken save for the few months of
her married life, that they read each other's unuttered thought and knew
each other's innermost secrets.

Long ago she had laid bare her whole heart to him, concealing nothing,
and not seeking to excuse herself for any of those flirtations which
from time to time had been the talk of the town.  He knew everything,
and had in return repeated his declaration of love for her.  Indeed,
after that long friendship the life of each was void without the other.
When parted from her by reason of her country visits, there somehow
seemed a blank in his existence, and he found himself thinking of her
night and day.  Until her last absence in Paris it had been their custom
to write to each other every second day.

How; would she act if she knew the truth?  What would she think of him
if she were aware that he had promised himself to another woman, and one
who had come into his life so suddenly, if she continued to shield him
from the exposure of his guilty secret?  Her dark eyes, those splendid
eyes everywhere so greatly admired, were turned upon him.  There was an
air of sweet sadness in their expression.  His eyes fell: he could not
meet her gaze.

"Do you know, Dudley," she exclaimed at last in the soft, sweet voice he
was never tired of hearing, the voice that had so often consoled him and
encouraged him to strive after high ideals,--"do you know, dear, I have
lately thought that your people are endeavouring to part us.  You
recollect your sudden refusal to see me last autumn?  Your cruel action
put fear into my heart.  I am dreading always that I may lose you--that
you will listen to the well-meant counsels of your relations and cast my
love aside."

He saw by her countenance how terribly in earnest she was, and hastened
to reassure her.

"No, darling.  All that is a foolish fancy.  You may rest quite assured
that as I have not already listened to the advice of people who are in
ignorance of the platonic nature of our friendship, I shall never do so.
We have been lovers ever since our teens, and we shall, I hope, always
so remain."

She sprang upon him, clasping her soft arms around his neck, and,
kissing him with a fierce and fervent passion, exclaimed:

"Thank you, Dudley!  Thank you for those words!  You know how fondly I
love you--you know that I could not live without frequent sight of you,
without your good counsels and guidance--for I am but a woman, after
all."

"The best and bravest little woman in all the world," he declared in
words that came direct from his heart.  Then, pressing her closer to
him, he went on: "You surely know how deep and complete is my affection,
Claudia.  The test of it is shown by the fact that were it not for my
love for you I should have forsaken you months ago in order to save my
reputation--and yours."

"It was a foul calumny!" she cried quickly.  "The lie was probably
started by some woman who envied me.  But a scandal is like a snowball--
it increases as it is rolled along.  We invited gossip, and lent colour
to the report by being seen so much together.  I know it too well, and I
have regretted it bitterly for your sake.  With a public man like
yourself a scandal is very apt to put an end for ever to all chances of
high position.  Knowing that, I, too, tried hard to cut myself adrift
from you.  Ah! you cannot know, Dudley, what I suffered when I attempted
self-sacrifice for your own dear sake.  You can never know!" she went
on, panting and trembling.  "But you misjudged me--you believed me
fickle.  It was what I intended, for I wanted you to cast me aside and
save yourself."

"Well?"

"They spoke of my flirtations _en plein jour_ at Fernhurst," she
continued, looking up into his face with an expression full of
passionate love.  "The report, with exaggerations, reached you as I had
hoped it would, but although it caused you pain it made no difference to
your affection.  Therefore, I failed, and we were compelled to accept
the inevitable."

"Yes, Claudia.  What I heard from Fernhurst did pain me terribly," he
answered very gravely.  "Yet I could not believe without absolute proof
that you, whom I knew to be an honest, upright woman, would deliberately
create a scandal, knowing well that it would be reflected upon me.  I
knew that you loved me; I knew that our lives were firmly linked the one
to the other, and that our mutual confidence and affection were based
upon a sure foundation.  That is why I refused to give credence to the
scandalous gossip."

Her small hands trembled with emotion, and as she pressed her lips to
his, mutely thanking him for his forbearance and refusal to believe ill
of her, she burst into tears.

"I know, dearest, how terribly you have suffered," he said in a low
voice as he tried to console her.  "I know well that your position as a
smart woman supplies your enemies with opportunities for wounding your
reputation.  In the clubs men will, with an idle word, take away a
woman's good name, and often think it a huge joke when they hear the
despicable calumny repeated.  Indeed, it seems an unwritten law
nowadays, that the woman who is not talked about and who does not hover
between sacraments and scandals, is not to be considered smart.  If she
gives dinners and supper-parties at the Carlton or Prince's, her name is
usually coupled with one of her favourite guests.  No woman is really in
the running without gossip having ungenerously given her a lover."

"Yes," she answered, "that is only too true?  Dudley.  I know quite well
that the happiness of many a smart woman, as well as her domestic
comfort has been utterly wrecked by the eternal chatter which follows
public entertaining.  A short time ago we gave dinners in our own
houses, as our mothers used to do; but that is all of the past.  The
glitter of the big restaurants has attracted us.  To be _chic_ one must
engage a table at Prince's or the Carlton, smother it with flowers, and
dine with one's guests in the full glare of publicity in a hot and
crowded room, where the chatter is so incessant that one can scarcely
hear one's own voice.  The Italian waiters rush through the courses as
if they wish to get rid of you at the earliest possible moment; there is
clatter, noise, an inordinate perfume of cooked food, and a hasty
gobbling up of gastronomic masterpieces.  I am compelled to give my
dinners amid such surroundings, but how I hate it all!  For me it is
only an ordeal--just as are your political dinners with your friendly
working-men."

He smiled as he recollected what he had so often suffered from the
"tuppenny smokes" of his constituents.

"The restaurant dinner of Aristocrats and Anonymas is a terrible feast,"
he said.  "I suppose the new fashion of entertaining was started by the
_nouveaux riches_ because after the public feast there appeared in what
are called the fashionable columns of the papers paragraphs, supplied by
the restaurants, informing London's millions that Mrs. So-and-So had
been entertaining a big party, among the guests at which were Lady
Nobody, who was exquisitely dressed in black velvet and old lace, and
Lord Somebody, who was looking younger than ever.  You know the style."

She laughed outright at his candid criticism, which was so thoroughly
well deserved.  Half the dinners, she declared, were given by
adventurers from the City to needy men with titles, which were wanted to
lend lustre to prospectuses.  And the whole affair had been so cleverly
engineered by the manager of the restaurants, who nightly gave
paragraphs to the journalists, thus glorifying the givers of feasts and
flattering the guests, that a _mode_ had actually been created, and even
the most exclusive set had been compelled to follow it, royalty itself
being often among the diners.

At his request she re-seated herself at the piano, and to disperse the
melancholy that had settled upon him she sang with infinite zest the
latest song of the Paris cafe-concerts which had been made famous by the
popular _chanteur_, Paulus, at the Ambassadeurs'.  The chorus ran as
follows:

  "Ah!  Monsieur Chamberlain, ca n'etait pas malin,
  Les femmes de l'Angleterre ell's manqu'nt de militaires
  D'leur absenc' tout l'mond' se plaint.
  Car ils sont rigolos, avec leurs p'tits polos.
  A London je le confess' on admir' leur gentiless
  Quand ils march'nt entortillant, en entortillant leur... yes."

The grave-faced Jackson entered and with pompous ceremony served him
with a whiskey and soda, as was usual; then, after she had sung to him
another _chanson_, he rose to go.  As it was already late, and as he was
obliged to return to the House, he was compelled to take leave of her.

"You really love me, Dudley?" she asked in a low, intense voice, as they
stood locked in each other's arms just before he left.  "Tell me that
you do.  Somehow I am so apprehensive, foolishly so, perhaps; but your
words always reassure me.  I feel happier and a better woman after
hearing them."

"Love you, Claudia?" he cried, his hand stroking her beautiful hair;
"how can you ever doubt me?  I swear by all I hold most sacred that no
tender thought of any woman save yourself ever enters my heart.  I am
wholly and entirely yours."  And he kissed her with all the fervent
passion of an ardent lover.

"And you will never desert me--never?  Promise!" she said, in tones
breathing anxiety and earnestness.

"I promise," he answered.  His voice had lost a little of its resonance,
but she did not notice the slight change.  He made a promise which he
himself knew to be incapable of fulfilment.  Hers no longer, he was now
helpless in the inexorable toils of that mysterious woman who alone held
his secret.

She kissed him again in fond farewell.  Outside in the great hall, which
was famous for its fine marble columns and statuary, the man helped him
on with his coat, while Claudia stood above upon the terrace of the
upper hall, laughing gaily and wishing him "good-bye" as was her wont.
Then he went forth in a dazed condition, walking along Knightsbridge in
search of a passing hansom to take him down to the House.

As the door closed behind him when he emerged from the great portico
into the foggy night, the short, dark figure of a rather thin man in a
soft deer-stalker hat and dark overcoat slunk quickly out of the shadow
of a doorway almost opposite, crossed the road, and hurried after him
with laboured breath.

Of a sudden as Dudley, having gone a hundred yards or so, turned to
glance behind him for an approaching cab, he came face to face with the
fellow who, if the truth were told, had for nearly two hours been
patiently awaiting his appearance.

"Pardon, signore!" exclaimed the black-haired, sharp-featured man,
speaking with a decided Italian accent.  He was somewhat taken aback by
the abrupt termination of his rather clumsy efforts at espionage.  "I
beg the signore a thousand pardons, but may I be permitted to have a
parolina [little word] with him?"

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

IN WHICH THE STRANGER STATES HIS MISSION.

"Well, what do you want?"  Chisholm inquired sharply, glancing keenly at
the foreigner, and not approving of his appearance.

"I want a word with the signore," the man who had accosted him answered,
with an air almost of authority.

"I don't know you," replied the Under-Secretary, "and have no desire to
hold intercourse with perfect strangers."

"It is true that I am unknown to the signore," said the man in very fair
English, "but I am here, in London, on purpose to speak with you.  I
ascertained that you were visiting at yonder palazzo; therefore, I
waited."

"And why do you wish to speak with me?  Surely you might have found a
more fitting opportunity than this--you could have waited until
to-morrow."

"No.  The signore is watched," said the man as he began to walk at
Dudley's side among the throngs of people, for in Knightsbridge there is
always considerable movement after the theatres have closed and the tide
of pleasure-seekers is flowing westward.  "I have waited for this
opportunity to ask the signore to make an appointment with me."

"Can't you tell me your business now?" inquired Chisholm suspiciously,
not half liking the fellow's look.  He spoke English fairly well, but
his rather narrow face was not a reassuring one.  An Englishman is
always apt, however, to judge the Italian physiognomy unjustly, for
those who look the fiercest and the most like brigands are, in the
experience of those who live in Italy, generally the most harmless
persons.

"To speak here is impossible," he declared, glancing about him.  "I must
not be seen with you.  Even at this moment it is dangerous.  Give me a
rendezvous quickly, signore, and let me leave you.  We may be seen.  If
so, my mission is futile."

"You have a mission, then.  Of what character?"

"I will tell you everything, signore, when we meet.  Where can I see
you?"

"At my house in St. James's Street--in an hour's time."

"Not so.  That is far too dangerous.  Let us meet in some unfrequented
cafe where we can talk without being overheard.  I dare not, for certain
reasons, be seen near the signore's abode."

The man's mysterious manner was anything but convincing, but Dudley,
perceiving that he was determined to have speech with him, told him at
last to follow him.  The stranger instantly dropped behind among the
crowd without another word, while the master of Wroxeter continued on
his way past Hyde Park Corner and along Piccadilly, where gaiety and
recklessness were as plentiful as ever, until making a quick turn, he
entered a narrow court to the left, which led to Vine Street, the home
of the notorious police-station of the West End.  Half-way up the court
was a wine-bar, a kind of Bodega, patronised mostly by shopmen from the
various establishments in Regent Street.  This he entered, looked round
to see which of the upturned barrels that served as tables was vacant,
and then seated himself in a corner some distance away from the men and
women who were drinking port, munching biscuits, and laughing more and
more merrily as closing time drew near.  Then, about ten minutes later,
the stranger slunk in, cast a quick suspicious glance in the direction
of the merrymakers, walked across the sanded floor and joined him.

"I hope we have not been seen," were his opening words as he seated
himself upon the stool opposite Chisholm.

"I hope not, if the danger you describe really exists," Dudley replied.
After he had ordered a glass of wine for his companion he scrutinised
for a few seconds the narrow and rather sinister face in front of him.
With the full light upon him, the stranger looked weary and worn.
Chisholm judged him to be about fifty, a rather refined man with a grey,
wiry moustache, well-bred manners, and a strange expression of
superiority that struck Dudley as peculiar.

"You are Tuscan," he said, looking at the man with a smile.

The other returned his glance in undisguised wonderment.

"How did the signore know when I have only spoken in my faulty English?"
he asked in amazement.

Chisholm laughed, affecting an air of mysterious penetration, with a
view to impressing his visitor.  The man's rather faded clothes were of
foreign cut, and his wide felt hat was un-English, but he did not
explain to him that the unmistakable stamp of the Tuscan was upon him in
the tiny object suspended from his watch-chain, a small piece of twisted
and pointed coral set in gold, which every Tuscan in every walk of life
carries with him, either openly, or concealed upon his person, to
counteract the influence of the Evil Eye.

"It is true that I am Tuscan," the man said.  "But I must confess that
the signore surprises me by his quickness of perception."

"I have travelled, and know Italy well," was all the explanation Dudley
vouchsafed.

"And I arrived from Italy this evening," said the stranger.  "I have
been sent to London expressly to see the signore."

"Sent by whom?"

"By the signore's friend--a signorina inglese."

"Her name?"

"The Signorina Mortimer."

Mention of that name caused Dudley to start and fix his eyes upon the
stranger with the sallow face.

"She has sent you.  Why?"

"To deliver to you an urgent message," was the man's response.  "I have
here a credential."  And fumbling in the breast pocket of his coat he
produced an envelope, open and without superscription, which he handed
to Chisholm.

From it the latter drew forth a piece of folded white paper, which he
opened carefully.

What he saw struck him aghast.  Within the folds was concealed an
object, simple, it is true, but of a nature to cause him to hold his
breath in sheer astonishment.

The paper contained what Dudley had believed to be still reposing in the
safe at Wroxeter.  It was the revered relic of a day long past, the
token of a love long dead--the little curl he had so faithfully
treasured.

The woman into whose hands he had so irretrievably given himself had
stolen it.  She had secured it by stealth on that night when, conversing
with him in the library, she had confessed her knowledge of his secret,
so that he had been forced by overwhelming circumstances to make the
unholy compact which was driving him to despair.  Time after time he had
risked his life against fearful odds, snatched it from savage treachery,
fought for it in open fight in wild regions where the foot of a white
man had never before trod, plucked it from the heart of battle; but
never had he cast it so recklessly upon the dice-board of Fate as on
that night when she, the Devil's angel, had appeared to him in the guise
of a saviour.

His mouth grew hard as he thought of it.  What did it matter?  Life was
sweet after all, and she had rescued him from suicide.  Impulse rode
roughshod over reason, as it so often does with impetuous men of Dudley
Chisholm's stamp; his inborn love of adventure, which had carried him
far afield into remote corners of the earth, was up in arms against
sober thought.

Upon the paper in which the lock of hair was wrapped were a few words,
written in ink in a firm feminine hand.

He spread the paper out and read them.  The message was very brief, but
very pointed:

"The bearer, Francesco Marucci, is to be trusted implicitly.--Muriel
Mortimer."

That was all.  Surely no better credential could there be than the
return of the treasured love-token which she had so ingeniously secured.

"Well?" he inquired, refolding the paper and replacing it in its
envelope.  "And your message?  What is it?"

"A confidential one," replied the Tuscan.  "The Signorina ordered me to
find you at once, the instant that I reached London.  I left Florence
the day before yesterday and travelled straight through, by way of Milan
and Bale.  She gave me the address of that palazzo where you have been
visiting, and I waited in the street until you came out."

"But you have told me that I am watched," said Dudley.  "Who is taking
an interest in my movements?"

"That is the reason why I am in London.  As the signore is watched by
the most practised and experienced secret agents, it was with difficulty
that I succeeded in approaching him.  If those men track me down and
discover who I am, then all will be lost--everything."

The paper he held in his hand told him that this stranger could be
trusted.  He was essentially a man of the world, and was not in the
habit of trusting those whom he did not know.  And yet, what credential
could be more convincing than that innocent-looking love-token of the
past?

"But why are these men, whoever they are, watching me?  What interest
can they possibly have in my movements?  The day of the Irish agitation
is over," he said in a somewhat incredulous tone.

"The signorina in her message wishes to give you warning that you are in
the deadliest peril," the man said in a low voice, bending towards him
so that none should overhear.

"Speak in Italian, if you wish," Dudley suggested.  "I can understand,
and it will be safer."

The eyes of Francesco Marucci sparkled for a moment at this
announcement, and he exclaimed in that soft Tuscan tongue which is so
musical to English ears:

"Benissimo!  I had no idea the signore knew Italian.  The signorina did
not tell me so."

It chanced that Chisholm knew Italian far better than French.  As he had
learnt it when, in his youth, he had spent two years in Siena, he spoke
good Italian without that curious aspiration of the "c's" which is so
characteristically Tuscan.

"Perhaps the signorina did not know," he said in response.

"The signore is to be congratulated on speaking so well our language!"
the stranger exclaimed.  "It makes things so much easier.  Your English
is so very difficult with its `w's' and its Greek `i's', and all the
rest of the puzzles.  We Italians can never speak it properly."

"But the message," demanded Dudley rather impatiently.  "Tell me
quickly, for in five minutes or so this place will be closed, and we
shall be turned out into the street."

"The message of the signorina is a simple one," answered Marucci in
Italian.  "It is to warn you to leave England secretly and at once.  To
fly instantly--to-morrow--because the truth is known."

"The truth known!" he gasped, half rising from his seat, then dropping
back and glaring fixedly at the stranger.

"Yes," the man replied.  "It is unfortunately so."

"How do you know that?"

"How?" repeated the thin-faced Tuscan, bending towards Chisholm in a
confidential manner.  "Because I chance to be in the service of your
enemies."

"What?  You are in the British Secret Service?" cried the
Under-Secretary, amazed by this revelation.

"Si, signore.  I am under the Signor Capitano Cator."

"And you are also in the service of the Signorina Mortimer?"

"That is so," answered the man, smiling.

"You are actually one of Cator's agents?"

"The signore is correct," he answered.  "I am an agent in the service of
the British Government, mainly employed in France and Belgium.  Indeed,
if the Signor Sotto-Secretario reflects, he will remember a report upon
the Toulon defences which reached the Intelligence Department a few
months ago, and about which a rather awkward question was asked in the
House of Commons."

"Yes, I recollect.  The elaborate report, which was produced
confidentially, I myself saw at the time.  It was by one Cuillini, if I
remember right."

"Exactly!  Benvenuto Cuillini and Francesco Marucci are one and the same
person."

The young statesman sat speechless.  This man Marucci was the most
ingenious and faithful of all Cator's secret agents, and the manner in
which he had obtained the plans of the defences of Toulon was, he knew,
considered by the Intelligence Department to be little short of
miraculous.  The report was a most detailed and elaborate one, actually
accompanied by snapshot photographs and a mass of information which
would be of the greatest service if ever England fought France in the
Mediterranean.

"Then you, Signor Marucci, are really my friend?" he exclaimed at last.

"I am the friend of the Signorina Mortimer," he replied, correcting him.

"And who is the Signorina Mortimer," Chisholm demanded.  "Who and what
is she that you should be her intimate friend?  Tell me."

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.

SHOWS SIGNORI OF THE SUBURBS.

The wiry Italian with the bristly moustache glanced at him half
suspiciously; then a smile lit up his face for an instant.

"The Signorina Mortimer is an English signorina whom I have known a long
time.  Francesco Marucci is a friend of all the English."

"I know.  But in this matter you are actually working against the
efforts of your own department."

"As I have already explained to the signore, I am but the signorina's
messenger," he declared, in a tone which showed him to be a past-master
in the art of evasion.  "She urges you to pay an immediate visit to a
certain person here in London, and to leave for the Continent to-morrow
morning--for Italy."

"To go to her?  Why cannot she come to England?"

"Because just at present that is impossible," the man replied.

"And this visit you speak of.  To whom is it?"  The Italian drew from
his pocket a small and shabby wallet, about six inches square, of the
kind used in Italy to carry the paper money.  From this he took a card,
on which was written an address at Penge.

"She asks you to call at the house indicated immediately this card comes
into your possession," he said.  "As your visit is expected, you had
better go to-night."

"For what reason?"

"For reasons known to her alone," replied the messenger.  "I am not in
the possession of the motives of the signorina in this affair."

"Speak candidly, Marucci," said Chisholm.  "You, as confidential agent
of the British Government, know all about this matter.  You cannot deny
that?"

"I know the facts only so far as it is necessary for me to know them,"
answered the Italian warily.  He was still much impressed by the manner
in which the Signor Sotto-Secretario had pronounced his nationality.

"You know the object of my visit to Penge, eh?"

"No, signore, I assure you that I do not.  I am merely obeying orders
given me by the signorina, and I hope to leave Charing Cross at nine
o'clock to-morrow morning on my return to Italy."

"Did she explain to you the manner in which the truth had been
revealed?" he inquired eagerly.

"No, but I can guess," was his companion's answer, given in a low voice.
"Some one has denounced you, and consequently your English police have
received information which necessitates your flying the country and
remaining hidden until you can prove an unshakeable _alibi_."

Dudley was silent, thoughtfully polishing the silver handle of his cane
with his glove.

"Were no instructions given you as to the mode in which I should escape?
If I am watched, as you allege, then the ordinary routes to the
Continent are under observation and the Channel ports closed to me."

"No instructions were given me," he replied.  "You are to pay a visit to
that address, and afterwards to leave for Florence, where I am to meet
you at the Hotel Savoy.  To-day is Thursday; I shall call for you at the
hotel at midday on Monday."

The hunted man reflected, for the position was both embarrassing and
serious.  Here were peremptory orders from the woman to whom he had sold
himself as the price of his secret, to the effect that he should
renounce everything, leave England, and become known at Scotland Yard as
a criminal fugitive.  He was to part from Claudia, whom he loved, and
who loved him with all her soul; to leave her without farewell and
without any words breathing patience and courage.  And this, after his
solemn declarations of an hour before!

What would she think of him--she who had been just as much a part of his
life as he of hers?

In those brief moments he remembered the wild, uncurbed passion of her
love; how that she had exalted him as her idol, as the one person who
held her future in his hands, the one person whose kiss gave life to
her.  She was wealthy, almost beyond the wildest dreams of her youth;
but riches availed her not.  Her heart was bursting with the great and
boundless love she bore him.  He knew this; knew it all, and sighed as
he faced the inevitable.

What an ignominious ending to a brief and brilliant career!  It had been
a thousand times better if he had cast the offer of the temptress aside,
and swallowed the fatal draught he had prepared!  The jury would have
pronounced him to be the victim of temporary insanity, and all the ugly
story that was now in possession of Scotland Yard would have been hushed
for ever, and the high honour of the Chisholms saved from public
blemish.

Bah!  He had been weak, he told himself, and for his lack of courage he
must now suffer.  His thoughts turned again to suicide, but on
reflection he saw that to take his own life was now unavailing.  The
truth was known at the Home Office, and the police would reveal it at
the inquiry into the cause of his decease.

He was helpless, utterly helpless, in the hands of a clever adventuress.

Long and steadily he looked at the Italian.  This man with the thin,
haggard face, grey moustache and deeply furrowed brow, was actually the
most daring and ingenious of all the confidential agents employed by the
British Intelligence Department on the Continent.  Known to the
Department as Benvenuto Cuillini, it was owing to his astuteness,
indomitable energy, and patient inquiry that the British Government were
often put in possession of information of the highest possible value in
the conduct of diplomacy or of war.  There is, of course, in the
Englishman's mind an emphatic dislike of the employment of spies, but we
have nowadays to face hard facts, and must pander to no sentimentalities
in dealing with avowed enemies.  The recent Transvaal war has shown the
hopeless inefficiency of our secret service in South Africa, and has
taught every Englishman the lesson that, even though he may be
disinclined to employ spies, he must keep pace with other nations.
Furthermore, it has proved to him that knowledge is power and that it
may often be the means of saving many valuable lives.

The barman, feeling thankful that the end of his day's work was at last
reached, shouted in a stentorian voice:

"Time, gentlemen!  Time!"

This announcement caused every one to drain his glass and rise.

"You will lose no time in visiting the house indicated upon the card,
will you?" urged the secret agent.  "And I shall meet you at the Savoy
in Florence on Monday next at noon.  That is a definite appointment."

"If you wish," Chisholm replied mechanically.  And both went out,
walking slowly down the court.

Before turning into Piccadilly, the Italian halted, declaring it was
best that they should not be seen in company.  He therefore wished
Dudley good-night, and "_buon viaggio_."

Should he return to Albert Gate and speak with Claudia for the last
time?  Ah! if only he dared to tell her the ghastly truth; to lay bare
his innermost consciousness and expose to her the secret of his sin!
Ah! if he only could!  If he only dared to ask for her guidance, as he
had so often done at the other crises of his life!  She loved him; but
would she love him any longer when she knew the appalling truth?

No.  It was quite impossible.  Even to the passionate love of a woman
there is a limit.

He stood in hesitation on the crowded pavement, under the portico of the
St. James's Restaurant.  To go down to the House was out of the
question.  Should he return to Claudia?  He glanced at his watch.  No.
It was too late.  What excuse could he make for seeking an interview
with her after she had retired for the night and the great house was
closed.  If he went there he must perforce tell her of his intended
flight--that they must, in future, be apart.  This would result in a
scene; and he hated scenes.

He would write to her.  It was the only way.  After to-morrow he, whose
career had been so brilliant and full of promise, whose life was
supposed by all to be so free from any cares, save those belonging to
his political office, would be a fugitive upon whose track the police
would raise a hue and cry throughout all the various countries which had
treaties of extradition with England.

"It is God's justice," he murmured.  "I have sinned, and this is my
punishment."

Two rough-voiced women jostled him, making some silly remarks about his
star-gazing.

This roused him, and he permitted himself to drift with the crowd along
to the Circus, where, having glanced at the address upon the card the
spy had given him, he hailed one of the hansoms which were slowly filing
past.

When the man received orders to drive to Worthington Road, Penge, he was
sarcastic, and seemed disinclined to take the fare.

"It's a long way, gov'nor," said the driver, when Dudley had announced
his intention of paying well.

"I can't go there and back under a couple o' quid."

"Very well, that's agreed," Chisholm said.  He stepped into the cab,
threw himself into a corner, and gave himself up to a long and serious
train of thought.

He loved Claudia, and hated the mysterious woman, who had in a manner so
remarkable learned the truth regarding the one tragic event in his past.
Muriel's innocent-looking face utterly belied her crafty and avaricious
nature.  Gifted with the countenance of a child, her active brain was
that of an adventuress.  A dangerous woman for any man to associate
with.  And he, Dudley Chisholm, who had so long prided himself upon his
shrewd observance of men and women and his quick perception, had been
utterly and completely deceived.

The long drive across Westminster Bridge and along the wide and
apparently endless thoroughfares with their rows of gas-lamps, through
the suburbs of Walworth, Camberwell, Denmark Hill, and Sydenham, passed
unnoticed.  He was so much preoccupied that he did not realise his
whereabouts until they were descending the hill past Sydenham Station,
where they turned to the right by Venney Road, thus heading for Penge.
The suburban roads were quiet and deserted; the horse's hoofs and the
tinkling of the bell were the sole disturbers of the night.

Presently the cabman pulled up to ask the solitary policeman the
direction of the road which Dudley had mentioned; then he drove on
again.  At last, after making several turns, they passed down Green Lane
and entered a road of small detached villas, rather artistically built,
with red and white exteriors.  Apparently they were only just finished,
for in front of some there still were piles of bricks and building
rubbish, while before others boards stood announcing that this or that
"desirable residence" was "to be let or sold."

The road was a _cul-de-sac_ which terminated in a newly worked
brickfield.  When nearly at the end of it, the cab suddenly pulled up
before a house of exactly the same appearance as its unlet neighbour,
save for the fact that the Venetian blinds were down, and that a gas-jet
was burning behind the fan-light of the door.

"This is it, sir," announced the cabman through the trap-door in the
roof.  Dudley left the cab and passed through the newly painted iron
gate and up the short path to the door, at which he knocked with a firm
and sounding rat-tat.

There were signs of scuttling within.  His quick eye noticed that one of
the slats of the Venetian blind in the bay window of the parlour had
been lifted for an instant by some person who had evidently been
watching for him, and then dropped again quickly.

The low-pitched voices of men sounded ominously within, but the door was
not opened.

He waited fully five minutes, listening attentively the while; he
clearly heard a sound which was suspiciously like the despairing cry of
a woman.

Then he knocked loudly again.

Dudley Chisholm was by no means a timid man.  A dozen times he had faced
death during his erratic wanderings in the almost unknown regions of the
far east.  He was of the type of athletic Englishman that prefers the
fist as a weapon at close quarters to any knife or revolver.  That
whispering within, however, unnerved him; while the woman's ejaculation
was also distinctly uncanny.  The cabman was awaiting him, it was true,
and could be relied upon to raise an alarm if there should be any
attempt at foul play.  The remembrance of this, to a certain degree,
reassured him.

He had come there in obedience to the orders of the woman who held his
future in her hands, but he did not like the situation in the least.

His second summons was answered tardily by an old woman, withered and
bent, who came shuffling down the little hall grumbling to herself, and
who, on throwing open the door, inquired what he wanted.

"I think I am expected here," was all he could reply, handing her the
card which the Italian had given him.

The old hag took it in her claw-like fingers and examined it
suspiciously.

"Are you Mr. Chisholm?" she inquired.

Dudley nodded in the affirmative.

"Then come in--come in.  They've been expecting you these two days."
She closed the door behind and led the way through the barely furnished
hall into a back sitting-room on the left, which contained a little
furniture of a kind to suggest that it had been purchased on the
instalment system.

He seated himself, wondering who were the persons by whom he was
expected.  When his guide had gone he strained his ears to catch any
sound of the woman's voice which he had heard raised in distress after
his first knock at the door.  But all was silent.  Only the paraffin
lamp on the table with its shade of crimson paper spluttered as it
burned low, for it was now about half-past two in the morning.

The association of ideas caused him to recollect all he had ever heard
about strange nocturnal adventures met with by men in unknown houses in
the suburbs; and as he sat awaiting the arrival of the persons who
apparently took such a deep interest in his welfare he could not help
becoming a prey to misgivings.

Suddenly he heard low whisperings out in the hall, and some words,
distinct and ominous reached him.

"Well, if it must be, I suppose it must," he heard a voice say.  "But
recollect I am no party to such a thing."

A low, sarcastic laugh was the sole answer to this protest.  The next
instant the door opened, and there entered two men, one young, tall, and
muscular, with an ugly scar across his lower jaw, and the other very
old, feeble, and white-haired.  Both were foreigners.  Chisholm knew
they were Italians before either of them spoke.

"Buona sera!" exclaimed the elder man, greeting the visitor in a squeaky
voice.  "You are the Signor Chisholm, and the English signorina in
Florence has sent you to us.  Benissimo!  We have been awaiting you
these two days.  I presume our friend Marucci has only just arrived in
London."

"He arrived this evening," said Chisholm.  "But before we go further may
I not know who it is I have the pleasure of addressing?"

"My name is Sisto Bernini.  Our friend here," he added, indicating his
companion, "is Tonio Rocchi."  The younger man, a dark-eyed,
black-haired, rather handsome fellow grinned with satisfaction.
Chisholm glanced at him, but was not reassured.  There was a strange
mystery about the whole affair.

"You have been sent to us because you desire to avoid the police, and
escape from England," the old man continued.  "To get you away is
difficult, very difficult, because you are a man so extremely
well-known.  We often assist our own countrymen to get, safely back to
Italy after any little fracas, but with you it is very different."

"And by what means are you able to get them secretly out of the
country?" inquired Chisholm, much interested in this newly discovered
traffic.

"By various means.  Sometimes as stowaways; at others, in our own
fishing-smack from one or other of the villages along the south coast.
There are a dozen different ways."

"And are none safe for me?"

The old man shook his head dubiously.

"For you, all are dangerous."

"All, save one," chimed in the younger man, exchanging glances with his
companion.

"And what is that?"  Chisholm asked.

"It is our secret," the old man replied, shutting his thin lips tightly
with a grin of self-satisfaction.

"I was informed by Marucci that you were prepared to assist me!"
exclaimed Chisholm in a tone of annoyance; "but if you are not, then I
may as well wish you good-night."

"If the signore will exercise a little patience, he shall hear our
plan," the old man Bernini assured him.  "I am all attention."

"Then let us speak quite frankly," squeaked the old fellow.  "You desire
to escape from the police who, for all we know, are now watching you.
That you have been watched during the past few days is evident.  Tonio,
here, has himself seen detectives following you.  Well, we are prepared
to undertake the risk--in exchange, of course, for a certain
consideration."

"To speak quite candidly you intend to blackmail me--eh?  It isn't at
all difficult to see your drift."

"If the signore desires a service rendered, he must be prepared to pay,"
declared the younger man.  "Sisto has a plan, but it is expensive."

"And how much would it cost me?" inquired Chisholm, still preserving his
outward calm, although he saw that he had fallen among a very
undesirable and unscrupulous set.

"Ten thousand pounds sterling," was the old man's prompt reply.

CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.

WHICH ASKS A QUESTION.

"Ah!" exclaimed the Under-Secretary with affected nonchalance, "I merely
asked out of curiosity.  I have no intention whatever of paying such a
sum."

"For the amount I have named we will guarantee to place you ashore in
Greece, or in any other of the few countries that remain open to
fugitives from justice."

"I have no doubt," Dudley answered with distinct sarcasm.  "But as I
have no intention of being blackmailed, or even of employing any of your
efforts on my behalf, we may as well end this interview."  He rose from
his chair and drew himself up to his full height.

The two men exchanged glances full of sinister meaning.

"Our aid has been invoked by your friend, the English signorina," the
young man exclaimed in a bullying tone, for the first time revealing his
true character.  "We have told you our terms--high, we admit, but not
too exorbitant when you recollect the many bribes that have to be paid."

"Ten thousand pounds, eh?"

"That is the sum."

"Well, I'll make a confession to you both," declared Chisholm defiantly.
"It is this.  My life isn't worth to me ten thousand pence.  Now you
can at once relinquish all hope of bleeding me in the manner you have
arranged."

"The signore is frank," remarked the old man.  "Frankness saves so much
argument in such matters.  I will be frank also, and say that there is
still another, and perhaps more pleasant mode of escape."

"I shall be interested to hear it," said Dudley, folding his arms, and
leaning carelessly back against the table.

The man was silent for a moment, as though hesitating whether to tell
his visitor the truth.  At last he spoke, compressing his scheme into a
couple of words.

"By marriage."

"With whom?"

At that instant the door was flung open suddenly, and there advanced
into the room the woman he believed to be far away in Italy--the woman
who held his future in her hands, Muriel Mortimer.

"Marriage with me," she said, answering his question.

"You!" he cried, thoroughly taken aback at her sudden appearance.  "What
do you mean?  Kindly explain all this."

"It requires no explanation, Mr. Chisholm," she replied, her pale face
hard-set and determined.  "You are in the gravest peril, and I have come
to you prepared to rescue you from the punishment which must otherwise
fall upon you.  To-night you have been with the woman who loves you--the
witch-like woman who has half London at her feet.  I know it all.  You
love her, and intend to marry her.  But you will marry me--me!" and she
struck her breast with her hand to emphasise her words.  "Or," she
added,--"or to-night you will be arrested as a common criminal."

He looked her straight in the face without flinching.  She was dressed
plainly, even shabbily, in rusty black, as though, when out of doors, to
avoid attention.  Her countenance, pallid and drawn, showed how
desperate she was.  He, for his part, perceived that he had been tricked
by her, and the thought lashed him to fury.

"Listen!" he cried indignantly; "I have been enticed here to this place
as part of a plot formed to obtain ten thousand pounds by blackmail, or
else to drive me into becoming your husband, you well knowing that I
should be prepared to pay any sum to be rid of the danger that threatens
me.  You promise me freedom if I consent to one or the other.  The
affection you pretended to feel for me was a sham of the worst kind.
You and your precious myrmidons want money--only money.  But from me you
won't obtain a single halfpenny.  Understand that, all three of you!"

"You intend to marry her!" she said between her teeth.  "But you shall
never do that.  She shall know the truth."

"Tell her.  To me, it is quite immaterial, I assure you," he declared in
defiance.

He saw that this woman, whom he had once believed so innocent, even
childish in her simplicity, was an associate of an unscrupulous gang
that, no doubt, existed by blackmailing those who desired to escape from
England.  He had heard vague rumours of the existence of this strange
association, for it had long ago been a puzzle to the London police why
so many foreigners were able to evade them and fly successfully from the
country, while Englishmen, who knew well the various outlets, usually
failed.

"You made a solemn compact with me that night at Wroxeter," she said.
"And you have broken it.  On my part I have done all that was possible.
Cator would have known the truth long ago had it not been for my
presence in Italy, and for the counteracting efforts of his own
lieutenant, Francesco Marucci.  To my foresight all this is due, yet now
you decline to save yourself!"

"I refuse to be blackmailed."

"You hope to escape and marry her," laughed the fair-haired woman
defiantly.

"I hope for nothing.  My life is, to me, just as precious as it was that
bitter night at Wroxeter."

"And you absolutely refuse to accept the alternative?"

"I will accept nothing either from you, or from your associates," he
replied.

"Then we are to be enemies?"

"If you so desire."

"You prefer the revelations that I intend to make?"

"I do, most certainly," he answered with a forced laugh.

"Shall I tell you one thing?"

"Do, by all means."

"Well, you shall never marry her.  To-morrow she will hate the very
mention of your name," she cried wildly.

"My memory, you mean."

"Why?"

"Because to-morrow I shall be dead, and your chance of plucking the
pigeon will have disappeared," he answered bitterly.

She looked at him with a maddened and fiery glance, as though his
defiance had aroused the spirit of murder within her.  She saw that his
determination to carry out his previous intention of suicide checkmated
her.  All her ingenious wiles had been conceived and operated in vain.

While he still lived, there was a hope of securing the prize which an
hour ago had seemed to be so well within her grasp.

"So you refuse!" she cried in a frenzy of anger.  "You intend to escape
by self-destruction, miserable coward that you are!"

"I am no coward!" he replied with fierce indignation.  "If I were a
coward I would accept the offer of your associates and pay willingly to
be placed beyond the possibility of arrest.  But I prefer to face the
inevitable, and shall do so without flinching."  Then, turning to the
others, he added: "I wish all three of you more success in your next
attempt to squeeze money from an unfortunate criminal--that is all."

He turned to leave, but Tonio, the hot-headed young bully, instantly
sprang forward and drew from his belt a glittering knife, one of those
long, narrow-bladed weapons which the Italian of the South usually
carries out of sight on his person, although his paternal government
forbids him so to do.  Quick as thought Dudley divined the Italian
wished to prevent him from leaving the house, and, seeing the knife held
down threateningly before him, he raised his fist and with a rapid,
well-directed drive from the shoulder struck the fellow beneath the jaw
with such force that he was lifted up and fell backwards upon the table,
overturning the cheap paraffin lamp standing there.

In an instant the place burst into flames.  During the confusion that
followed, while the woman rushed from the room screaming "Fire!"  Dudley
dashed out of the house, expecting, of course, to find his cab waiting
for him.

But it was not there.  While he had been arguing, the old hag had
evidently paid the fare and dismissed the conveyance, a fact which was
in itself sufficient evidence that they had not intended him to leave
the house.

For a moment he hesitated.  Then, recognising how narrowly he had
escaped being struck down by an assassin, he turned and hurried away
across the rough brick-field to which the unfinished road gave entrance.

Shouts of alarm, and loud cries of "Fire!" sounded behind him, but
without turning to look he continued on his way, stumbling along in the
darkness, utterly dumbfounded at his strange adventure and the
remarkable revelation of the true character of the pretty young woman
known in West End drawingrooms as Muriel Mortimer.

For most of the remainder of the night Dudley Chisholm, unnerved by the
strange affair and haunted by the constant dread that he was already
under police surveillance, wandered through the deserted streets of
Penge and Lower Sydenham.  He feared to inquire the way from any of the
constables he met, lest he should be recognised.  As he was entirely
unacquainted with the district, he knew his position was hopeless till
there should be light enough to show him the Crystal Palace.  Once
arrived there, he could easily make his way back to London, for in days
gone by he had often driven down in his tandem from Westminster, once or
twice with Claudia at his side.

The night was dark, starless, and intensely cold.  But he heeded not
fatigue, for his mind was full of the gravest reflections.  That the
woman Mortimer, the mysterious ward of the Meldrums, had laid a very
clever plot, into which he had fallen, was plainly apparent.  But he had
refused her demands, and she was now, of course, his most bitter enemy.
That she would seek vengeance he had no doubt, for she had already shown
herself to be a woman not to be thwarted.

And what was worse than all--she knew his secret.

Through the ill-lit suburban roads he wandered on and on, reflecting
bitterly that with this woman as his enemy there only remained for him
suicide, if he wished to avoid arrest and a criminal's trial.  He came
at last to a railway line running on a low embankment, through market
gardens, and it occurred to him to climb up there and wait in patience
for the approach of a train.  All this time Dudley Chisholm was not in
the least distraught; and yet of all his wishes none was so powerful as
the wish to end his life.

But Claudia's beautiful face arose before him.  Her dear eyes, with that
familiar expression of tenderness, a little sad, but sweet with a
love-look not to be mistaken, seemed to gaze upon him just as they had
done during that blissful hour before midnight, when he had held her in
his arms and breathed into her ear the declaration of his love.

Ah, how passionately he loved her!

No, he could not take farewell of life without once again beholding her!
He descended the embankment and walked along what seemed interminable
miles of streets, until he met at last a bricklayer on his way to work,
carrying his tin tea-bottle in his hand.  This man proved communicative,
and informed him that he was at Rushey Green, on the main road which led
through Lewisham and Deptford, where it entered one of the arteries of
London, the Old Kent Road.

He glanced at his watch and found that it was close upon five o'clock.
Roused by this discovery, he pushed forward at a quicker pace, at length
finding a belated cab in front of a coffee-stall, at which its driver
was refreshing himself.  Then, thoroughly worn out, he got into the
conveyance and was driven back to his chambers.

Old Parsons had a message for him when he reached home.

"A man called to see you during the night, master Dudley.  He wished to
see you very particularly, but would leave no card."

"What kind of man?" inquired his master suspiciously.

"I think he was a gentleman.  At least he spoke like one.  I had never
seen him before.  He wanted to know whether he would find you down at
the House, and I said that it was most probable you were there."

"He wasn't a foreigner?"

"Oh no," the old man answered.  "Some papers have also been brought by a
messenger.  They are on your table."

Dudley passed through into his study, put down his hat, and broke open
the usual sealed packet of Parliamentary papers which reached him each
night, and which contained among others, the draft of the questions to
be addressed to him on the following day in his capacity of Foreign
Under-Secretary in the House.

Without seating himself he took out the question paper and looked at it.

He glanced rapidly from paragraph to paragraph.  Suddenly his gaze
became fixed, and he held his breath.  He read in the precise
handwriting of Wrey, the following words:

"Mr. Gerald Oldfield (Antrim West) to ask the Under-Secretary of State
for Foreign Affairs whether it is true that a certain member of this
House, now a Member of Her Majesty's Government, has sold to the
representative of a Foreign Power a copy of certain confidential
diplomatic correspondence, and further whether it is not a fact that the
Member of Her Majesty's Government referred to is guilty of the crime of
wilful murder."

The blue official paper fluttered from his nerveless fingers and fell to
the ground.

"My God!" he gasped, his jaws rigid, his eyes staring and fixed.  "My
secret is already known to my enemies!"

CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.

CONFESSES THE TRUTH.

The wintry dawn had scarcely broken; he would have to wait several hours
before paying his last visit to Albert Gate.  He threw off his
great-coat and cast himself wearily into the big armchair, his mind full
of conflicting thoughts.  Despair had gripped his heart.  It was hard
that his career should thus be suddenly cut off, harder still that he
must leave the sweet and tender woman whom he had loved so fondly for so
many years.  But he was guilty--yes, guilty; he must suffer the penalty
exacted from all those who sin against their Maker.

Parsons entered to inquire if he wanted anything; but he dismissed him,
telling him to go and snatch some rest for an hour or two.  The faithful
old retainer never went to bed before the return of his master, no
matter to what hour he might be detained in the House.

When he had gone, Chisholm opened the heavy curtains, drew up the blind
and watched the yellow London dawn slowly dispersing the mists over St.
James's Park.  Standing at the window he gazed out upon St. James's
Street, dismal and deserted, with its strip of dull sky above.  It was
the last dawn that he would see, he told himself bitterly, From him all
the attractions of the world would very soon be taken away.  Well, he
left them with only a single regret--Claudia.

He fondly whispered her name.  It sounded to him strange, almost
unearthly, in that silent room.

Yes, he must see her again for the last time, and confess to her the
whole terrible truth.  She would hate and despise him, for from the man
whose hands are stained with the blood of a fellow-creature it would
only be natural for her to shrink.  The awful truth he had to confront
was--that he was a murderer.

The remembrance of the narrow path in the patch of forest near Godalming
came back to him.  In a single instant he lived again those terrible
moments of his madness--the death-cry rang in his ears.  He remembered
how quickly he had slipped away through the wood; how at last he found
himself standing on the high-road; how he reached a railway station and
returned to London.

Then, two days later, the papers were full of it.  He recollected all
the theories that had been put forward; the many mysterious facts that
were produced at the inquest, and the grave suspicion that fell upon
another.  It was all like some horrible nightmare, so horrible, indeed,
that he found himself wondering if he had really lived through it--if he
were really an assassin.

Alas! it was only too true.  Cator had discovered the real facts, and
the crime was now fixed upon him.

He tried to rid himself of these hideous recollections of the past, to
brace himself up boldly, and to face his condemnation and
self-destruction.  But it was too difficult; his strength failed him.

Not only was his secret known to the Intelligence Department, but one,
at least, of his fiercest political opponents, a wild-haired demagogue,
knew the truth and intended to explode that question in the House, as if
it were an infernal machine, in the hope of upsetting the Government by
his action.

From his breast-pocket he took the tiny talisman, the lock of hair which
Muriel Mortimer had so ingeniously stolen, and at last returned to him.
When he had opened the paper, he looked at the curl, long and wistfully.

He was thinking--thinking deeply, while the yellow dawn struggled
through the canopy of London fog and the hands of the clock before him
were slowly creeping forward to mark the hour of his doom.

There were several letters, which had been delivered by the last post on
the previous night, awaiting his attention.  Out of curiosity he took
them up and one by one opened them, throwing them into the waste-paper
basket when read, for, as he bitterly reflected, they would need no
reply.

One of the letters gave him pause.  He re-read it several times, with
brows knit and a puzzled expression upon his countenance.  Dated from
Boodle's it ran as follows:

"Dear Sir,--_I have twice during the past two days endeavoured to see
you, once at the House of Commons, and again at the Foreign Office, but
have on both occasions been unsuccessful.  I shall to-morrow do myself
the honour of calling upon you at your chambers, and if you are not in,
I shall esteem it a favour if you will kindly leave word with your
servant at what hour you will return_.

"_Yours truly_.

"Ralph Brodie."

His features relaxed into a hard smile.  What a curious freak of Fate it
was that caused this man, of all others, to write and ask for an
appointment!  He was a person with whom he had never before held any
communication--the husband of the woman who, years before her marriage,
had given him that lock of hair as a love-token.  She had been one of
the loves of his youth, and since her marriage he had never seen her.
He knew that she had married a wealthy Anglo-Indian named Brodie, and
that he had taken her back with him to India.  When he was in that
country, after his journey across Bhutan, he had been told they were
living on their great estate at Kapurthala, near Jalandhar, in the
Punjab; and there were whispers to the effect that the marriage had been
anything but a happy one.  Brodie neglected her, it was said, and at
Simla she was flattered, so went the report, by a host of admirers,
mostly military, in the usual manner.  It was for that reason that he
did not visit Simla.  She had never once written to him after her
marriage.  Although he held her memory sacred, he had no wish to meet
her and risk the chance of becoming disillusioned in regard to her
character.

He had always suspected that Brodie was aware of the affection which had
nearly resulted in their engagement.  Hence, he had entertained no
desire to meet him.  Strange, indeed, that he should so persistently
seek him, just at the most critical moment in his life.

"Well," he laughed at last, tearing up the letter and tossing it into
the fire, "I've never met the fellow in all my life, and I don't see why
I should put myself out to do so now.  The brute treated May badly,
infernally badly.  If we met I couldn't be civil to the cad."

He had loved May--the daughter of a retired colonel--in the days after
he and Claudia had drifted apart, he to indulge his cynicism, she to
marry Dick Nevill.  But his love for her was not that passionate worship
of the ideal which had marked his affection for the charming little
friend of his youth.  It was a mere midsummer madness, the pleasant
memory of which lingered always in his mind.

He thought over it all, and smiled bitterly when he recollected the
past.

Presently Parsons brought him a cup of black coffee.  It was a habit of
his, acquired abroad, to take it each morning in bed.  When the old
servitor, true to his clock-work precision, entered with the tiny Nankin
cup upon the tray, Dudley was astonished.

"What?  Eight o'clock already?" he exclaimed, starting up.

"Yes, Master Dudley," the old man replied.  "Aren't you going to bed,
sir?"

"No.  Well--at least, I don't know, Parsons," said the Under-Secretary.
"I have several early appointments."

At that moment the electric bell in the hall rang sharply, and the old
man went out to answer the summons.

"There's a gentleman, Master Dudley," was Parson's announcement.  "He
wishes to see you at once very particularly.  He will give no card."

"Well, show him in," his master answered with every sign of reluctance,
swallowing his coffee at a gulp.  As his doom was fixed, what did it
matter who called upon him now?  He smiled bitterly.

Parsons disappeared for a moment.  A few seconds later the heavy portico
was drawn aside, and there stood before Dudley the tall, rather
well-dressed, figure of a man, who halted upon the threshold without
uttering a word.

"You!" gasped Chisholm, springing from his chair.  "You!  Archibald
Cator!"

"Yes," answered the other gravely, closing the door behind him.  "We
have met before, and, doubtless, you know my errand."

"I do," groaned the despairing man.  "Alas!  I do."

"The truth is out, Mr. Chisholm!" exclaimed his visitor, in slow, deep
tones.  "Our inquiries are complete, and there has been discovered
against you evidence so plain as to be altogether indisputable.  There
need be no ceremony between us.  You, esteemed by the world, and held in
high honour by the Government, are both a traitor and a murderer.  Do
you deny it?"

There was a silence, deep and painful.

"No, I do not," was the low, harsh rejoinder of the wretched man, who
had sunk back into his chair with his chin upon his breast.

His visitor deliberately drew from the inner pocket of his overcoat a
big, official-looking envelope, out of which he took several unmounted
photographs.

These he spread before the man whose brilliant career had thus been so
suddenly ended.

"Do you recognise these as reproductions of documents handed by you to a
certain friend of yours--copies of confidential despatches from Sir
Henry Lygon, Her Majesty's Ambassador at Constantinople?"

Chisholm, his face livid, nodded in the affirmative.  Denials were, he
knew, utterly useless.  The whole ingenious network of the British
Intelligence Department on the Continent had been diligently at work
piecing together the evidence against him, and had, under the active
direction of that prince of spies, Archibald Cator, at last succeeded in
unravelling what had for years remained a profound mystery.

His grave-faced, unwelcome visitor, well-satisfied by this admission,
next drew a mounted cabinet photograph from his pocket, and, holding it
out before his eyes, asked, in a low, distinct voice whether he knew the
original.

Chisholm's countenance turned ashen grey the instant his haggard eyes
fell upon the pictured face.

"God!" he cried, wildly starting up, "my God!  Cator, spare me that!
Hide it from my sight! hide it!  I cannot bear it!  It's his
portrait--_his_!"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The clock of St. Anne's, in Wilton Place, had just chimed eleven, and
the yellow sun had now succeeded in struggling through the wintry mist.

Claudia's carriage with its handsome pair of bays and her powdered
footman, with the bearskin rug over his arm, stood awaiting her beneath
the dark portico.

As, warmly wrapped in her sables, she descended the wide marble
staircase slowly, buttoning her glove, Jackson met her.

"Mr. Chisholm has just called, m'lady.  He has been shown into the
morning-room."

Her heart gave a quick bound.  She dismissed the servant with a nod and
walked to the apartment indicated.

Dudley turned quickly from the window as she entered, and greeted her,
raising her ungloved hand to his lips with infinite courtliness.  In an
instant, however, she detected the change in him, for his face was
blanched to the lips, his voice hoarse and tremulous.

"My dear Dudley!" she cried in alarm.  "Why, whatever is the matter?
You are ill."

He closed the door behind her; then, still holding her hand, looked
straight into her dark eyes, and said:

"I have come to you, Claudia, to bid you farewell--to see you for the
last time."

"What do you mean?" she gasped, her cheeks turning pale in an instant at
his announcement.

"I mean that our love must end to-day.  That in future, instead of
entertaining affection for me, you must hate me, as one guilty and
unworthy."

"I really don't understand, dear," she answered, bewildered.  "You are
not yourself to-day."

"Alas!  I am too much myself," he answered in a low hoarse voice.  "I am
here, Claudia, to make confession to you.  I would, indeed, crave your
forgiveness, but I know that that is impossible."  He was holding her
hand in his convulsive grasp, and his eyes were riveted on hers in a
fierce look full of a passionate devotion.

"Confession?" she asked quickly.  "What secrets have you from me?  Has
some other woman usurped my place in your heart?  If so, tell me,
Dudley.  Do not hesitate."

"No," he answered, trying to preserve an outward calm, "it is not that.
I love no woman but your own dear self.  Surely you do not doubt me?"

"I have never doubted you.  Sometimes I have been jealous--madly
jealous, I confess--but always without reason, for you have always been
loyal to me."

"I was loyal because I loved no other woman save yourself," he cried,
kissing her passionately upon the lips.  "But all the joy must wither.
I am here to make confession, to reveal a ghastly chapter in my life,
and to take leave of you--and of life."

She saw how terribly agitated he was, and her woman's solicitude for his
welfare calmed her.  "Come," she said tenderly, leading him towards a
chair.  "Sit down and remain quiet for a little.  You are nervous and
overworked."  She placed her small, soft hand upon his hot brow, and
brushed back the dark hair from his forehead.

Refusing to sit, he stood before her, grasping the chair to steady
himself.

"No, Claudia; do not trouble about me.  It is all useless now.  The end
has come.  Let me confess all to you.  I know that what I am about to
disclose will turn your love to hatred; that my very memory will become
repugnant to you, and that mere mention of my name will fill you with
indignation and disgust.  But hear the secret chapter of my life's
history before you judge.  Let me tell you all," he added hoarsely.
"Let me lay bare the terrible secret that I have carried these six years
buried within my heart.  Let me confess to you, the woman I love."

His words filled her with amazement.  Her brows contracted, and her
breath came and went in short, quick gasps.  Was she actually to lose
him?  It seemed impossible.

"I am all attention, Dudley," she replied in a low, mechanical voice.
"Your confession, whatever its nature, shall find in me a safe
guardian."

"I cannot ask you to forgive, Claudia," he said, "I can only beg of you
to think that I have hidden the truth from you because I dearly loved
you and knew that exposure must result in the abrupt termination of our
love-dream."

"Tell me all," she urged.  "Have no secrets from me."

"Then hear me," he said, his hard face white and drawn, while with his
strong hands he gripped the chair, striving valiantly to remain calm.
"I will relate to you all the hideous facts in their proper sequence;
you will see what a canker-worm of guilt has existed within me all these
years.  For me, there is now no life, no hope, no love--"

"Except mine," she interrupted quickly.

"Ah! yours must turn to hatred, Claudia!  I cannot hope for the pardon
of man or woman.  I have suffered; I have repented deeply on my knees
before my Maker.  But God's judgment is upon me, and the end is near.
My story is a tragic one indeed.  I think you will recollect that, long
ago, after I had come down from Oxford, it was our custom to take happy
walks round Winchester, over to King's Worthy, across the Down to
Hursley, or through the Crab Wood to Sparsholt--do you remember those
still summer evenings in the golden sun-down, dearest, when youth was
buoyant and careless, and our love was perfect?"

"Remember them?" she cried.  "Ah! yes.  I live those happy hours over
again very often in my day-dreams, when I am alone.  They are the
tenderest memories of all my past," she answered in a deep voice,
tremulous with an emotion which stirred her to the very depths of her
being.

"Your marriage came as a natural sequence, Claudia, for as the old adage
has it, the course of true love never did run smooth.  We separated, and
you carried my farewell kiss of benediction upon your brow.  I became
lonely and melancholy when you, the sun of my life, had gone out.  In
order to occupy myself, as you had urged me to do, I obtained by family
influence the appointment of private secretary to Lord Stockbridge, Her
Majesty's Foreign Minister.  You were abroad with Dick, spending the
winter at Cannes, when I became acquainted with a girl named May Lennox,
the daughter of a retired officer who had spent much of the latter part
of his life on the Continent.  I missed you as my constant companion,
and it was merely for the sake of her bright companionship that I
allowed myself to become attracted by her.  Father and daughter were
devoted to each other, and as the colonel was a widower, the pair lived
in furnished lodgings, a drawing-room floor in Hereford Road, which
turns out of Westbourne Grove, close to Whiteley's.  I rather liked the
colonel.  By reason of my frequent visits, we became very friendly.
During the hot days of August they moved down to Hastings, taking up
their quarters at the Queen's, to which place I often ran down to see
them, for I must here confess that a midsummer madness grew upon me, and
I at last found myself in love with her.  From the first, however, I had
been quick to perceive that although the colonel was a thoroughgoing
cosmopolitan and a lighthearted fellow whose only occupation seemed to
be the study of foreign politics from the newspapers--for knowing my
official position he often discussed and criticised with me points in
Lord Stockbridge's policy--yet he was nevertheless entirely opposed to
my suit.  I did my utmost to ingratiate myself with him, for at the time
I believed myself to be hopelessly in love with May."

He paused in hesitation, for he knew that his confession must be a cruel
and terrible disillusionment for Claudia.

But he had taken the initial step, and was now compelled to describe to
the bitter end his downfall, and thus to lose the treasure of her
esteem.

CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.

CONFIDES A MOTIVE AND A MYSTERY.

"One Sunday evening early in September," Chisholm continued at last, in
a hoarse, strained voice, low and yet distinct, "May had retired
immediately after dinner, owing to a headache, and I agreed to accompany
the colonel for a turn along the Esplanade, to smoke a cigar.  The night
was hot and close, prophetic of a thunderstorm.  As we sat together on a
seat close to the St. Leonard's Pier, chatting in the semi-darkness, he
suddenly broached a subject and made a suggestion, the astounding
audacity of which struck me absolutely dumb with horror.  He explained
to me in confidence that he knew there had arrived at the Foreign Office
from Constantinople certain cipher despatches from Sir Henry Lygon, Her
Majesty's Ambassador to the Porte, and that he was prepared to pay
almost any price for copies of these documents.  He pointed how easy it
would be for me, as private secretary to Lord Stockbridge, to photograph
them.  He tempted me, saying that for such photographs I might name my
own price.  Wild indignation seized me; but he only laughed and calmly
lit a fresh cigar, at the same time dropping a hint that my reward for
this suggested service would be his daughter's hand.  May was in
ignorance of all this.  She never knew that her father was a mean and
despicable spy who had constant relations with a foreign Power.  I
refused, and we argued, he and I, until, what with his persuasions and
his promise that May should be my wife, he induced me to comply with his
audacious demand.  He tempted me, and I fell.  Next day, after the
exercise of not a little ingenuity, I succeeded in obtaining possession
of the despatches in question, took them to my rooms, and secured
photographs of each, returning the originals to their place within half
an hour.  I developed the negatives in secret, made some hasty prints,
and delivered them to Lennox at Hastings three days later.  By aid of
the powerful reading-glass which he had bought at an optician's in
Robertson Street, the cipher of the confidential despatches could be
distinctly read, a result which gave him the utmost satisfaction.  I was
young, inexperienced, and did not then fully appreciate the gravity of
my offence.  It was, However, certain that those into whose hands the
photographs eventually passed possessed a copy of the decipher used by
the British Foreign Office, for subsequent events proved that Tewfik
Pasha, the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs, successfully used the
information in his diplomatic juggling with Russia.  I never dreamed
that this untimely exposure of Britain's policy in the near East would
result in such a serious crisis as eventually came to pass; for my theft
was the cause of a grave misunderstanding between England, the Porte,
and the Triple Alliance; so serious, indeed, that a European war was
only narrowly averted by the tact of Lord Stockbridge, combined with
that of Count Murieff, the Russian Foreign Minister."  Chisholm paused
again, with eyes downcast.

"Go on," she said brokenly.  "Tell me all, Dudley--everything."

"I had believed that by doing this scoundrel Lennox a service I had
ingratiated myself with him," the despairing man continued after a
pause; "but, so far from this being the case, he told me on the
following day that it would be better if I remained apart from them, as
my too frequent visits might be suspected by the Foreign Office,
especially after what had transpired.  May was still my unsophisticated
friend, and was quite unaware of the theft I had committed at her
father's bidding; but even in her I fancied I detected a change.  It
required only this to tear down the last barrier between myself and my
conscience; the knowledge that I was a traitor to my Queen and country
began to pierce me like sword.  Of a sudden, a fortnight after the
photographs had passed into the possession of Lennox, the spy settled
his daughter as a paying guest with a family living in Christchurch
Road, Tulse Hill, and then disappeared as completely as though the earth
had swallowed him; but not before he had written me a stiff letter
formally refusing his consent to my marriage with May.  Then I saw how
cleverly I had been entrapped by the adventurer, who knew well that I
dared not expose him, for the sake of my own reputation.  Soon
afterwards the general election was held, and, as a reward for my
services, which were believed, of course, to have been faithfully
rendered, I was given a safe seat at Albury.  Then May and I drifted
apart, for she went to live with an aunt up at Berwick-on-Tweed, while I
entered enthusiastically upon a political career.  The manner in which
Sir Henry Lygon's despatches had leaked out to England's enemies was a
puzzle to the Foreign Office and to the world; but as I possessed the
entire confidence of my chief I remained unsuspected, although my
treachery had cost the country dearly, for by it I had betrayed my
benefactor, Lord Stockbridge, and given to the wily Turk the whip hand
over Europe, enabling the Sultan to defy both England and Russia.
England had held the trump card in the diplomatic game, but by the
premature exposure of her hand all had been lost.  Searching inquiries
were, of course, made by the cleverest detectives and agents of the
Intelligence Department, but the result was absolutely nil."

"There was considerable comment in the papers at the time," remarked
Claudia slowly.  "I recollect Dick speaking of it as a mystery, and
condemning the apparent laxity of Foreign Office rules."

"Some months had gone by, and May's letters, which had been growing
perceptibly colder, at last ceased altogether," he continued, heedless
of her remark.  "In order to become acquainted with my constituents I
had taken up my residence in my Parliamentary Division, at Godalming to
be exact, and it was my habit each afternoon to take long walks alone
through the woods and over the hills of that delightful neighbourhood.
The sequel to what I have already confessed to you," he said, after a
moment's pause, "occurred one autumn day when the trees were almost bare
and the woodland paths were covered with acorns and withered leaves.  I
had been for a long stretch over the Hog's Back, having paid a visit to
my friend Machray, at Wanborough, and was returning by way of Compton,
and then across the meadows and up the hill towards the Charterhouse at
Godalming.  The gusty wind was chilly and the wintry twilight was fading
as I passed Field Place and struck across the wide grass-lands to a
corner where the path was divided by a stile from a dense belt of wood,
the most lonely and secluded spot in the neighbourhood, and a popular
resort of rustic couples.  As I leaped over the stile into the dark
pathway which led up a very steep incline through the wood, I was
startled by being suddenly confronted by a man whom, in an instant, I
recognised as Lennox.  He had evidently been awaiting me there, for he
put his hand upon my shoulder, saying that he desired a few words with
me.  With disgust and hatred I shook him off; but he resolutely placed
himself before me, saying that he desired of me one other service,
namely, that I should secure for him a copy of a certain document which
had that morning reached the Foreign Office by Queen's messenger from
the British Embassy in Paris.  This I flatly refused; whereupon this
enemy of England, who had once held Her Majesty's commission, threatened
me with exposure and ruin if I did not at once comply with his demand.
My blood rose, and, by way of retort, I gave him to understand that I
would inform the police of his presence in England.  High words and
bitter recriminations ensued.  Suddenly, without the least warning, his
hand went swiftly to his hip, and I saw him draw a gleaming knife with
which next moment he rushed at me.  The wild look in his face was
sufficient to show his evil intent, and in a second I drew from my
pocket the small revolver that I always carried.  In the fierce and
desperate struggle we were well matched, and for some minutes we fought
for life.  With wild and fearful oaths he tried time after time to
plunge his weapon into my heart, but only succeeded in twice gashing my
wrist.  I carry the scars to this very day."

He drew up his shirt-cuff and showed her where his assailant's knife had
wounded him.

"Suddenly I felt my strength failing," he went on in a low, hard tone, a
wild look in his eyes.  "Then, in a fury of hatred, I twisted my arm
from his sinewy grasp, and fired my revolver full at him.  I must, I
think have emptied two, or even three, chambers.  He fell forward dead--
with a curse upon his lips.  I--I murdered him--in order to seal his
lips!"

"You, Dudley!" cried the pale, bewildered woman, swaying forward as
though she had received a blow.  "You?--you killed him!"

"Yes, Claudia," said the guilty man, not daring to look her in the face,
"I have confessed to you my double crime.  The truth now stands revealed
to you in all its naked hideousness.  I, the man whom you have trusted
and loved for all these years, am a traitor, and worse--a murderer!"

She could not speak, her heart was too full of grief and suffering.  She
covered her white face with her hands; low sobs escaped her, the
bitterest lamentations of a broken heart.

"And now let me conclude my story," he went on, his own heart almost
breaking because of her agony.  "How I got away I cannot tell.  I
remember but little, save that I rushed from the spot, tore across the
fields to Farncombe station, whence I took train to Waterloo.  From the
accounts in the papers it appears that an hour later the body, stiff and
cold, was discovered by a pair of lovers walking together, and
information was given to the county constabulary.  Nothing was found
upon the man to lead to his identification, and although the greatest
sensation was caused by the tragedy, Scotland Yard was utterly puzzled.
One miserable wretch, a tramp who had been seen loitering in the
neighbourhood, was arrested on suspicion, but was afterwards released.
Detectives searched diligently for some clue, but found nothing to help
them in regard to the identity of the murderer or to that of his victim,
who was buried in a nameless grave in Godalming Cemetery at the expense
of the parish.  Imagine the awful remorse I suffered!  For a few weeks I
remained in London with this terrible guilt weighing upon me, feverishly
scanning the papers, and preparing for a journey to the Far East.  You
will recollect that you were in Pau, when I wrote announcing my sudden
departure."

"Yes," she murmured, "I remember.  Dick's illness had then begun, and
the doctors had ordered him abroad."

"I feared to remain longer in England, and desired to place as great a
distance as possible between myself and the scene of my crime.  I,
belauded by the newspapers as a coming man, was a traitor to my country
and a murderer.  My conscience drove me to madness.  I could not get rid
of the ever-recurring recollections of my crime.  And so it has been
during these later years, whether I have travelled through the eternal
snows of the Himalayas, explored the forbidden lands of Bhutan or Nepal,
or sat on the Treasury Bench of the House.  I have lived in constant
dread of denunciation and exposure.  While in Calcutta, as the guest of
the Viceroy on my return from Chinese Turkestan, I learnt that May
Lennox had married a wealthy man named Brodie, and had gone to live up
at Kapurthala, in the Punjab.  Since that day I have heard nothing of
her.  Four years have passed since my return, years of awful anxiety and
mental strain that have made me old before my time; yet at last
Archibald Cator, the man from whom no state secret is safe--that
midnight visitor at Wroxeter--has discovered the truth.  His secret
agents have penetrated to the archives of the Turkish Ministry of
Foreign Affairs in Constantinople, and from them have secured those
photographs, to which is attached a docket written in Turkish stating by
what channel they were secured.  Thus from the carefully-guarded
storehouse of the Sultan's secrets has the evidence of my crime been
exposed, and my accusation is now at hand.  Guilty of treason and of
murder I have lost your love, Claudia--I can hope for nothing, nothing.
My very name will become a reproach, and the very people who have so
often applauded me will now hate my memory as that of a betrayer.  My
punishment is complete!" he cried wildly, in hoarse despair.  "I have
sinned, and this is God's judgment!"

CHAPTER THIRTY.

TELLS A STRANGE TALE.

"And your secret is known," said the pale, agitated woman despairingly,
her dark eyes still fixed upon the guilty man before her.  Her voice was
scarcely raised above a whisper, for the wounded heart made it difficult
for her to speak.

He nodded in the affirmative.

"To whom?" she asked.

"To Cator, of the Secret Service; to many of his agents, no doubt; to
one, at least, of my political opponents, and to a woman who is your
friend--Muriel Mortimer!"

"To Muriel?" she gasped in abject amazement.

"Yes," he answered; "the woman who, if report speaks correctly, was
suggested by you to Lady Meldrum as a fitting person to become my wife."

"Ah, forgive me!"  Claudia cried quickly.  "I threw you into one
another's society in order to test your love for me.  I was, not certain
whether you really loved me, or whether this younger and prettier woman
might not attract you.  Believe me, I invited her to the house-party at
Wroxeter for the same purpose that I allowed my name to be associated
with that of the Grand-Duke and others--to test the extent of your
affection.  I was foolish--very foolish, I know.  But forgive me,
Dudley, I was jealous."

In answer to her request he related the ingenious manner in which he had
been entrapped, precisely as in the foregoing pages it has already been
described.

"She wished to marry you in order to obtain money," declared the angry
woman, upon whom these revelations had fallen as a crushing blow.  "I
never suspected her; yet now I see it all.  Her ingenuity has been
simply marvellous.  She intended that you should buy from her a freedom
which it was not within her power to sell.  If you had become her
husband she would, no doubt, either have tempted you to commit suicide
rather than face arrest--first, of course, having induced you to make a
will in her favour--or else have expected you to pay heavily for release
from a woman of her stamp."

"But who is she?" he demanded.  "What do you know of her?"

"Nothing, except what you already know, Dudley, that, although the ward
of a respectable family, she is now proved to be an unscrupulous
adventuress.  But I myself will attempt to solve the mystery.  She was
abroad for about a year, she once told me, and she often goes to the
Continent to visit friends there.  There are many facts about her that
are mysterious, and yet Lady Meldrum absolutely adores her.  She cannot,
however, know the truth of her association with these foreign ruffians
who have attempted your life.  Now that I recollect," she added, "I
found one morning, concealed behind one of the cushions in the
cosy-corner of the library, a piece of crumpled paper, which, when
opened, I discovered to be the commencement of a letter in a woman's
hand.  It was in Italian, and began, `Mio adorato Tonio.'  She must have
gone there to write to the man, and, being interrupted, had evidently
crushed the paper in her hand and hid it, and then forgotten it."

"Yes," he said, "I recollect finding her alone there one evening, and
that my entrance seemed to confuse her somewhat.  But," he went on
despondently, "had the scoundrels been successful it would perhaps have
been better for me."  He was no coward, but he saw that for him all
life, all happiness, all love had ended.

"No, Dudley," she answered in a sweet and tender voice, looking straight
at him.  "You are guilty, but both you and I have been the victims of
this ingenious trickster.  She first tried to rob me of your love, and
then, finding herself unsuccessful, resorted to a foul and cunning
strategy."

"Yes," he said in a low voice, his chin still upon his breast.  "I am
guilty, and must suffer.  But," he added, raising his head slowly until
his eyes met hers, "promise me one thing, Claudia--promise that after
to-day you will give no further thought to me.  I have deceived you, and
am unworthy; put me out of your mind for ever."

"But you loved me, Dudley," she cried with a mournful tenderness.  "How
can I allow your memory to pass from me when for so many years you have
been my all in all?"

"In the future we must be parted," he answered huskily.  "From the
consequences of my crime there is no escape--none.  But if I thought
that you had forgotten the grave wrong I have done you, my mind would at
least be easier."

She did not answer for a few moments.  Then, with the passion begotten
of a changeless and profound affection she rushed towards him, threw her
arms about his neck, and cried out:

"No, Dudley, you are mine--mine! we must not part.  I love you--you know
that I do!  You shall not leave me--you hear! _you shall not_!"

"But I must," he replied gravely, a hardness appearing at the corners of
his mouth as he slowly disengaged himself from her embrace.  "I have
given my word of honour to return to my chambers before midday."

"To whom?"

"To Archibald Cator.  The man who, in the exercise of his profession as
chief of our Secret Service, has discovered my secret."  Chisholm,
whatever might have been his follies in the past, was now a man of
unflinching principle.  He had given his word not to attempt to escape.

"Then I will go with you," she said with resolution.  "It is half-past
eleven, and my carriage is outside.  We will drive down to St. James's
Street together."

But in all earnestness he begged her not to accompany him.  He did not
desire that she should be a witness of his degradation and arrest.  He
could not bear the thought.  He knew that the matter would be placed
before Lord Stockbridge himself, and that, in company with Cator, he
would be called into the presence of the grave-eyed Chief in whose
confidence and regard he had for long held so high a place.

"I shall go with you," she said decisively, now calm and composed after
her agitation and flood of tears.  She had braced herself up with what
was, under the circumstances, a remarkable effort.  By way of
explanation she added, half breathlessly: "I love you, Dudley, and my
place in the hour of trial is at your side."

He raised her bejewelled hand tremblingly to his lips, and thanked her
in a husky voice.  He, the Discrowned, dared not kiss her lips.

"Patience and courage," she said, laying her hand upon his shoulder
tenderly, just as she had been wont to do in those early days of his
career when she had so often given him advice.

He shook his head sadly before answering.

"Both are unavailing against the vengeance of Heaven!"

She was silent.  This man, whom she had loved as her own life, was a
murderer.  A gulf had opened between them, his arrest and denunciation
were imminent.  They could no longer be lovers.  All was of the past.

Her tender woman's sympathy for him in his hopeless despair was too deep
for tears.  Her countenance, usually so sweet and smiling, had grown
hard, and her eyes large and serious.  The caprice of her broken heart
was that this last drive to his chambers should be taken in his company.
Many and many a time he had driven with her hither and thither in
London, but this was the last occasion.  After that, then she would be
alone, friendless, unloved--the queen of the silent kingdom, as she had
so often termed the stately mansion, one of the finest in London, where
the servants moved in silence and the huge marble hall and corridors
echoed to the slightest whisper.

They drove together past Apsley House and along Piccadilly without
exchanging a single word.  Once or twice Dudley raised his hat
mechanically to passers-by who, now that the yellow sunlight had
struggled through the clouds, were enjoying a stroll in London's gayest
thoroughfare.  Whenever there is any sunshine in the metropolis, it is
always in Piccadilly.  But the unwonted brightness of that morning
jarred upon Dudley and Claudia.  Few who passed the pair driving in that
handsome carriage would ever have dreamed that the light of that
beautiful woman's heart was extinguished, and that the well-groomed man
at her side was going deliberately to his doom.

Beneath the bear-skin rug their hands met--and clasped.  Their hearts
beat quickly, their eyes met, but no word passed between them.  Both
understood that all words were empty in face of the horrible truth.

Archibald Cator, who had been sitting beside the fire in Chisholm's
sitting-room, rose and bowed when they entered.  He recognised Claudia
at once, and darted a look of inquiry at the accused man.

"Captain Cator, I believe?" she exclaimed, addressing him.  "To
apologise is quite unnecessary.  I know everything.  Mr. Chisholm has
told me the whole terrible story.  You have but done your duty in the
service of your country, and as far as I am concerned your just
behaviour will receive a just verdict."

The tall, thin-faced man was expressing his regrets, when Claudia,
turning to him again, asked:

"In this affair there is still an element of mystery which should be at
once cleared up.  Through my own unpardonable folly in accepting as
friend a woman whom I did not know, Mr. Chisholm has fallen the victim
of a curious conspiracy.  Do you chance to know in Italy a man named
Marucci?"

"Marucci?" repeated the captain; "Francesco Marruci, I presume you mean?
Yes, I know him and have employed him in Rome, and elsewhere, to make
confidential inquiries."

"And do you chance to be acquainted with a woman named Mortimer--a young
woman, Muriel Mortimer?"

"Certainly," he replied quite frankly.  "She is a fair-headed young
person who poses as the ward of an English family named Meldrum.  A
couple of years ago, however, she married secretly an Italian named
Biancheri, then a lieutenant of Artillery stationed at Florence, and she
and her husband are now generally supposed to be agents employed in the
secret service of Italy.  This good-looking woman has been a successful
spy.  Her husband is a black-haired, evil-looking fellow with an ugly
scar across his lower jaw."

"His description is exact.  He was the man who attempted to take my life
last night!" exclaimed Chisholm, astonished at this revelation.  "He
called himself Tonio Rocchi."

When Dudley had briefly described his adventure, Cator said:

"I knew the woman Mortimer was a guest at Wroxeter, and that was the
reason why I wished nobody to know of my visit there.  We are
acquainted, but at that moment I had no wish to meet her."

"Then this woman, her husband, and the Italian Marucci have by some
means learnt my secret, and are actually in agreement as regards this
scheme of attempted blackmail?"

"Most certainly," was Cator's response.  "Biancheri, or Rocchi, as he
calls himself, and his wife are as smart a pair of adventurers as any on
the Continent, and it is well known to us that they have on several
occasions levied huge sums in blackmail when diplomatic and family
secrets have leaked out."

"But the Meldrums!" exclaimed Claudia in astonishment.  "Is it possible
that they, a most respectable family, can actually be aware of this
woman's fraud?"

"I think not," was the captain's reply.  "Muriel Mortimer, the daughter
of a deceased station-master employed on the Great Northern Railway, is
of age, and therefore, of course, her own mistress.  In England she is
still the ward of Sir Henry Meldrum--who had taken her out of charity--
and passes as a single woman, but she secretly married Biancheri while
they were wintering in Florence, and her frequent journeys abroad have
not been undertaken for the purpose of visiting friends, as she pretends
but, in reality, to assist her husband in his ingenious and daring
schemes of espionage and blackmail.  She is an adventuress of the very
worst type."

"But how can she have learnt my secret?" demanded the melancholy man
upon whom the all-reaching hand of justice had so heavily fallen.

"Ah, that is utterly impossible to tell," answered Cator.  "All that is
certain is that she, together with her husband and confederates, will
quickly clear out of England now that you have so determinedly withstood
their efforts and defied their threats."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Archibald Cator had turned away, and was making a pretence of examining
the titles of the books in the bookcase on the opposite side of the room
while Claudia and Dudley stood silently hand in hand.  The captain had
an appointment to see the Marquess of Stockbridge in company with the
Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office at one o'clock, when the serious
charges were to be privately investigated.  The hour was drawing near,
and the white-faced, tearful woman was taking leave of the guilty man,
whom she had so fondly and so truly loved.

There was in her eyes an inexpressible sadness, and the quivering lips
he had so often kissed with tender passion showed plainly the agony she
was suffering.

"Forgive me, Claudia, forgive me for the sake of the love of old!" he
implored, whispering in her ear.  "With your forgiveness I can face my
fate unflinchingly, knowing that my punishment is just."

"Dudley," she answered in a voice broken by emotion, as she uttered what
was to her the dearest of all names, "I forgive you everything.  A
cruel, an inexorable fate tears us apart, but I shall never forget you--
never.  May God forgive you as I forgive you."

"Thank you, my heart, for those encouraging words," he cried, snatching
up her hand and imprinting upon it a lingering kiss of farewell.

As their eyes met for a single instant, in hers he saw a look of blank
despair and mingled sympathy more expressive than any words could
possibly be.

"Farewell, Dudley!" was all she said.  "I shall pray to Him for you."

She turned slowly from him and walked across to the door, while Cator
drew back the velvet _portiere_ and bowed in silence.

At this moment the door was thrown open by Parsons, who carried a rather
bulky letter and a card upon his salver.

"The gentleman who called in the night has called again, sir," announced
the old man.  "I told him you were engaged, but he said he could not
possibly wait, as he was sailing from London almost immediately.  He
regretted missing you, and left this letter."

His master glanced at the card, and saw that it bore the name "Ralph
Brodie," with the word "Boodle's" in the corner.

With nervous fingers he quickly tore open the envelope and drew from it
a note, together with a smaller envelope, rather soiled, sealed with
black wax, and addressed to him in a woman's pointed hand.

Claudia, who had halted, stood watching him.

The note was a brief one, written by Brodie from his club, stating with
regret that his wife had died of consumption a month ago.  Among the
papers which he found after her death was the enclosed, together with
instructions that he should deliver it personally and unopened.  This he
did.  As he had only been in London a few hours on urgent business, and
was compelled to return to India by the _Caledonia_ that afternoon, he
had written this note of explanation in case they could not meet.

He broke the brittle wax of the dead woman's letter, and drew forth a
sheet of thin foreign note-paper, the ink on which was somewhat faded.

Swiftly he scanned the lines of brown ink; then, while looking for May
Brodie's signature, he saw in addition to this another name at the
bottom of of the document--"Muriel Mortimer."

"Impossible!" he gasped.  "Surely this is not a dream!  Look!  Read
this!"  He handed the missive to Cator, who, together with the woman who
had just bidden him a last farewell, read it through eagerly.

"It is the truth!" cried Claudia wildly, a moment later, rushing towards
him, throwing her clinging arms about his neck, kissing him
passionately, and shedding tears of joy.  "You are innocent, Dudley!
innocent!  Think, think!  The truth is written there in the presence of
a witness.  _You are innocent_!"

Some time elapsed before Dudley could grasp the whole of the facts.
What he held in his trembling fingers was a statement written by May
Lennox three years before.  It began in a somewhat rambling manner, was
dated from Kapurthala, and had been written after the doctors had
pronounced her to be suffering from incurable consumption.  The
important paragraph, however, penned in an unsteady hand and rather
smeared, read as follows:

"And now, as I know that before very long I must die, I have resolved to
confess to you the whole truth.  I knew too well of my father's
relations with the Turkish and Italian Governments, and I knew how he
induced you to procure for him photographs of the Anglo-Russian
agreement in the East, offering myself to you as a bribe.  I was
helpless in his hands; he used me as his decoy in the various capitals,
and often accomplished important _coups_ of espionage with my
assistance.  But the photographs you furnished to him proved to be those
of quite unimportant despatches, and utterly valueless.  The photographs
of the actual despatches wanted by Tewfik were procured by a person
named Peynton in the employ of the Foreign Office, who has since died.
My father, however, believed that you wilfully endeavoured to mislead
him and intended to expose him; hence his fierce antagonism, which
caused him to lay in wait for you in that lonely path near Godalming.
As I had gained knowledge of his intention to harm you, I went down
there and watched his movements.  I was present, hidden in the shadow
behind a rail only a few paces from the spot--at the point where, you
will remember, the police found the weeds down-trodden and other signs
of the presence of a third person.  I overheard his suggestion to you,
and your refusal; I saw him draw his knife with intent to strike you.  I
watched your struggle, and in the course of the fracas his revolver fell
unnoticed from his pocket.  As you were both close to me at that moment
I was enabled to reach the weapon.  Then I saw that your strength was
failing, and you fired at him.  You missed.  I believe I know the very
tree in which your bullet lodged.  Seeing your imminent peril, I also
fired--and he fell.  I saved you, but I killed the man whom I was
compelled to call father, though I had good reasons to hate his memory.
He killed my poor mother by sheer brutality and neglect, and made me his
puppet and decoy in his nefarious schemes.  When he fell, you rushed
from the spot, believing that you had killed him, but if you will refer
to the medical evidence you will find that he was struck by a single
bullet beneath the left shoulder-blade.  That shot was the one I fired,
and could not possibly have been fired by you.  In order to tell you the
truth, and yet not commit myself, I sent you anonymously, a few weeks
after the occurrence, a piece of tracing-paper with a diagram upon it,
and a few words, which were purposely rather vague, hoping that the plan
of the spot would show you that you were innocent, and that in case you
were afterwards charged with the crime you would be able to use the plan
in your defence.  Confession I make calmly and of my own free will, in
order that it may be signed by the woman who is my companion and my most
intimate friend, and that it may be opened by your own hand when I am
dead and beyond the reach of man's justice."

There was nothing else.  Only the signature, "May Beatrice Brodie,"
together with that of Muriel Mortimer.

"This clearly explains how the woman Mortimer, or Biancheri, obtained
possession of your secret," observed Cator in surprise, after he had
read it through aloud.  "My inquiries, I recollect, showed that she
entered Mrs. Brodie's employ as companion and was in India for six
months, but that she returned, owing to the climate, and again took up
her abode with the Meldrums.  The explanation given by the Meldrums to
friends was that she had been out to India on a visit.  Having obtained
knowledge of your secret, she imparted it to Biancheri after her
marriage, with the result that he and his associates made the clever
attempt to blackmail you.  She, no doubt, felt herself safe as long as
her late employer was living, and is, of course, in ignorance of her
death and the passing of this confession into your hands."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

An hour later Dudley Chisholm was closeted alone with the Marquess of
Stockbridge in the latter's private room at the Foreign Office, where he
related the whole story.  That any man enjoying the confidence of Her
Majesty's Government in any capacity should have Endeavoured to betray
its secrets was a most heinous and unpardonable offence in the eyes of
the stern old politician who was Her Majesty's chief adviser.
Nevertheless, on carefully weighing all the facts, his lordship came to
the conclusion that the man who had been his private secretary, and who
now held responsible office, had proved himself deeply penitent, and
had, during the intervening years, endeavoured to make every reparation
in his power.  The actual documents Chisholm had photographed were quite
unimportant.  It was manifest that from first to last he had been the
victim of a cleverly arranged conspiracy.  The interview was a long one,
and all that passed between them will never be recorded.  But at last
the Marquess rose and generously extended to Dudley his thin, bony hand
in forgiveness.  He summed up the case as follows:

"It is true that you photographed the despatches with intent to hand
them to the man Lennox, and it is true that the present complications in
Europe are the outcome of the betrayal of our policy, but it is not
true, Chisholm, that you are a traitor.  Your career has encouraged me
to prophesy (and the indiscretion of which I am to-day aware for the
first time has not caused me to alter my opinion) that you are one of
the men who will rise after me to safeguard your country's interests.
The question placed on the paper by the member for West Antrim must be
expunged at once.  I will see to that matter personally, for it is
apparent that the member in question has either received information, or
is himself associated with the unscrupulous persons who endeavoured to
profit by their knowledge of your secret.  Leave it to me.  That
question will never be printed in the paper nor asked in the House.
Only a traitor in association with the representative of some foreign
Power dare endeavour to create a political crisis at this moment by
asking such a question."

"Then I am actually forgiven?"  Dudley asked in a low voice, scarcely
realising the truth.

"Yes, Chisholm," replied the Marquess gravely, pressing the hand of the
younger man, "you are forgiven, and what is more, my confidence in you
is not shaken, for you have been proved a man of sterling worth, and the
unfortunate victim of as vile and ingenious a conspiracy as ever was
formed against us by dastardly spies from across the Channel.  You come
of an ancient and honourable race, Chisholm.  Recollect, therefore, that
throughout the remainder of your life your first duty is always to your
God, and the second to your country and your Queen."

CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.

CONTAINS THE CONCLUSION.

The greyness of the short winter's afternoon was steadily growing darker
and darker, and the lights were already beginning to appear in the shops
and the vehicles in busy Knightsbridge; but within the pretty boudoir,
where an old punch-bowl full of flowers poured sweetness into the air,
two hearts beat in unison, full of new-found joy, full of hope, full of
perfect confidence and love.

Holding his queen in his strong arms, Dudley had asked her a question,
to which she had made answer with all the fervour of her being:

"Yes, I will gladly be your wife, Dudley," she said, in a tender voice.
"As you well know, my heart has ever been yours, and ever will be--until
the end."

In the dim light, which had now become so dark that he could scarcely
distinguish her face, he pressed her closely to him in a wild ecstasy of
love, and as he kissed her on the lips, his heart full of gladness
inexpressible, she fancied that she felt a tear-drop upon his hollow
cheek.

To recount facts already known to every reader of these pages would
serve no purpose, but it will interest some to learn that Marucci
subsequently confessed to Captain Cator that the plot against the
Under-Secretary, devised by Biancheri and his wife, had long been in
progress.  It was certainly at the instigation of this woman that
Marucci had succeeded in obtaining the incriminating documents from the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Constantinople, which he had passed on to
his employer, Archibald Cator; while she at the same time sent an
anonymous letter to Mr. Gerald Oldfield, the Member for Antrim West, one
of Dudley's bitterest political opponents, preferring against him a
charge of murder.  The Grand-Duke Stanislas knew the truth, of course,
from what was told him at his own Embassy.  The Meldrums, a worthy pair,
had always remained in ignorance of the true character of the
station-master's daughter, whom they had adopted out of charity.  They
were first told the truth by Claudia herself, and the blow was a
terrible disillusion, for they had always treated her as their own
child.  To Colonel Murray-Kerr, while he was still attach in Rome, the
secret of the marriage of Muriel Mortimer with Biancheri was imparted by
Marucci, who explained that there was some deep and mysterious
conspiracy on foot against Dudley Chisholm, that Biancheri had left the
Italian army, and that he was undoubtedly a spy.  For that reason the
colonel had uttered his strange warning when shooting with Dudley, but
he had unfortunately not taken Marucci's statement very seriously.

Quite recently Archibald Cator ascertained that the woman Biancheri, who
had so cleverly plotted the grand _coup_, had been deserted by her
scoundrelly husband, and had died alone and in penury in a bare room on
the fifth storey of a rickety house in the Montmartre quarter of Paris.
Biancheri himself is at this moment languishing in prison at Grenoble,
having been arrested by French gendarmes in the very act of making a
plan of one of the Alpine frontier fortresses.

All London is well aware how Dudley Chisholm's marriage, so long
expected, took place, not with the _eclat_ common to a fashionable
wedding in town, but quietly in the quaint old village church at
Wroxeter, where the mellow-toned bells pealed merrily, and the school
children strewed the roses of July in their path.

And every one, both in society and out of it, knows that Lady Dudley
Chisholm still retains her place as one of the smartest women in London;
that all the scandals once whispered about her have been proved to be
false inventions of her detractors; that as _chatelaine_ of Wroxeter she
is one of the most popular among hostesses; and that her husband, whom
she adores, and whose fame is of worldwide renown, will certainly have a
seat in the next Cabinet.

You, my reader, whom curiosity or necessity takes into Mayfair or
Belgravia, must often have seen a slim, sweet-faced woman, remarkable
for the most wonderful eyes, driving in her neat Victoria, her servants
in dark green liveries, and with the three water-bougets of the
Chisholms upon the silver harness.  Beside her there not infrequently
nestles a child with an exquisite face, dark hair, and great, wide-open
eyes that look in wonder on the vast world of London.

You are acquainted with their life-story.  They are mother and daughter,
the wife and child of one of the happiest of men, the Right Honourable
Dudley Waldegrave Chisholm, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign
Affairs.

The End.





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