By Wit of Woman - Arthur W. Marchmont (e textbook reader .TXT) 📗

consternation and despair.

CHAPTER XXVIII THE COLONEL'S SECRET

Instantly I thought of Gareth and raised my hand, hoping to still the Colonel's angry, strident tone lest it should reach her.

"He is a villain," he repeated. "I care not now who hears me say it. He lured her from me, planned to make me do murder, and now would have me join in dishonouring my child. You must hear this, Miss von Dreschler, for you know much—and shall know the rest."

"For Gareth's sake, Colonel, she is in that room and may hear," I protested.

"Let her come and let her decide this," said Gustav.

"No. This is for me. I will tell all. I have kept my secret long enough—for your sake, as you know—and will keep it no longer. You came here," he said, turning to me, "to clear your father's memory of the charge brought against him. I can prove it false, and will. He was charged with having murdered the young Count Stephen. It was a lie. This scoundrel here knows it was a lie. Ask him if he dare deny that."

There was no need to ask the question; Count Gustav's face gave the answer, clear and unmistakable.

"You will ruin everything, Colonel Katona," he said. "Not me only, but the Duke, your master, and the great cause—everything."

"To hell with any cause which would sacrifice my child's honour. I will tell the Duke to his face," was the hot reply, very fiercely spoken.

"I am here ready to listen, Colonel Katona."

We all started and turned to find the Duke himself had come out.

"What is this lie which threatens ruin to everything, sir?" he asked very sternly, after a pause.

Colonel Katona drew himself up.

"It is right that I should tell it to you. It was for you and your family that the lie was planned; that you might have the Throne when the time came; and it was continued that this man—your son—might succeed you. Your son, who has rewarded me for my fidelity to your house by stealing my child. It was for you and yours that I consented to dishonour my friend—this lady's father; and have kept the secret inviolate through years of remorse and sorrow."

"Enough of yourself," said the Duke, with a contemptuous wave of the hand. "Speak plainly."

"The scheme has failed, and through this villain's dastardly conduct. The man whom Colonel von Dreschler was accused of having murdered, and whose death would have cleared the way for you and yours to the Throne—Count Stephen—is living, a close prisoner in my house."

"Thank God for that!" I cried, fervently, understanding all now.

Then a gasp of pain, or rage, or fear, or of all three, escaped the Duke's pallid lips. He staggered so that his Excellency put out his hand to help him.

"Is this true?" fell in a whisper from the Duke, his eyes on his son's face, now as white and tense as his own.

There was no answer, and in the silence, I heard the door behind me opened softly, and Gareth came out.

"Ah!" The soft ejaculation, born partly of gladness at the sight of Gustav and her father, and partly of fear at the wrought looks of both, drew all eyes upon her. The silence seemed to deepen suddenly; as though a common instinct of mercy inspired all to attempt to keep what was passing from her knowledge.

A look of bewilderment came over her face as she gazed from one to the other; tender but questioning for the Duke; half fearful anxiety for her father; and infinite love and yearning for her husband. She glanced at him last; but her first word was for him, and it was toward him she moved, murmuring his name and stretching out her hands.

Her father drew his breath quickly, with a sound between a gasp and a sigh; and I thought he was going to step between them, but the Duke glanced at him and raised his hand.

"She is his," he said, his tone no more than a whisper, but distinct to all of us.

The Colonel drew back a pace and put his hand to his forehead.

Gareth passed him. She had no eyes for any but her husband in that moment.

I waited with fear-wrought anxiety to see how he would greet her, for his face had given no sign which we could read.

But she had no fear for him as she had no thought of us. Her faith in him was as staunch and patent as the love which lighted her face and sparkled in her clear shining eyes. Our presence gave her no embarrassment; I believe that we were all forgotten in the absorbing delight of that one supreme moment.

He played the man for once. As she placed her hands in his with just a simple—"I am so glad," he took them, and bending down kissed her on the lips before us all.

But this was more than her father could bear. With an angry "Gareth," he turned to part them.

Scared by his stern look and tone, she shrank back with a little piteous cry: "Father, he is my husband;" as if indeed she would defend him.

I saw the cloud on his face deepen and the words of a harsh reply were already on his lips, when the Duke, who had been watching intently, intervened.

"Colonel Katona, the rest is for us men to settle," he said, waving his hand to the room behind him.

His Excellency glanced at me and motioned toward Gareth, and I crossed to her.

"For a few minutes, Gareth," said the Duke.

She hesitated, and then, as her father was moving away in obedience to the Duke's command, she stepped past me and seized his hand. "Father, you forgive us?"

Just a little yearning plea, pathetic enough to have touched the hardest heart, I thought it. But he had no ears for it. His passion was too hot and fierce against the man whom she included in the appeal.

He turned and looked upon her quite unmoved—his face hard like a rock, and his voice rough and harsh as he answered: "No. You have to choose between us; and if you choose him, you are no longer my child;" and shaking her hand off, he went into the room.

Gareth gave one soft, piteous cry, like a stricken fawn, as I put my arm round her.

I hated him for the merciless cruelty of the rebuff; and I believe all shared that feeling, as we saw how it had cut deep into her tender heart. I know that Karl and his Excellency did, by the glances of pity they cast upon her as they passed me to follow the Duke.

Count Gustav hesitated, seemingly at a loss what to do. I thought he would have taken her from my arms to his; and much as I detested him, I think I would have forgiven him everything had he done so. But, after a second's hesitation, he shrugged his shoulders, passed on and closed the door behind him.

I led her away upstairs to her room, and by the time we reached it she was clinging to me feebly and helplessly. She sank down on her bed with a deep-drawn sigh, and lay there deathly pale and trembling violently.

I hoped that the tears would come to relieve her; but they did not. The shock had been too sudden. The suspense of the separation had worn her down; then the joy of the meeting with Gustav had wrought upon her nerves so that her father's stern and almost brutal repulse had been a blow struck just at the moment when she was at the weakest. The sorrow was too deep for tears, the suffering too acute and numbing.

I threw a rug over her and bent and kissed her, as I whispered: "I think it will all come right, Gareth, dear."

She took no notice; and feeling I could do no more then but just let her grief have its way, I sat down by the bedside, wondering whether I believed my own words; whether, in such a tangle, all could possibly come right; or whether in striving to right things in my own way, I had only succeeded in creating just an impossible bungle.

My thoughts were soon down in the room below. What was occurring there? Far bigger things were in the doing, or undoing, than the breaking of poor Gareth's heart. Fate had bound up that issue with others of much greater import.

If Count Stephen was alive, the whole of the Duke's plans and Count Gustav's scheming were shattered. Would Colonel Katona insist upon making his story public—or would some means be devised to prevail upon him to keep that secret still inviolate? On that question would hinge the future of the Patriots' cause; and so possibly the future of the whole Empire.

In such a balance what weight was the mere happiness of two girls like Gareth and myself likely to have? None; absolutely none. Nor could I bring myself to think it should have, considering the critical consequences there might be to thousands, aye even millions in the Dual Empire.

The Colonel was a hard man, however, how hard he had shown himself within the last few minutes; and I believed he would hold on to his purpose like a steel clamp. If he did, what would result? Either the leadership of the Patriot cause would pass from the Duke to Count Stephen, or the Duke's enemies would seize the occasion to promote a schism which would ruin the cause irreparably.

In that case the main obstacle to Count Gustav's open acknowledgment of Gareth as his wife would be removed; but her husband and father must remain open and bitter enemies; and her choice must be made between them. Poor Gareth!

And so I sat in long, weary suspense, tossed hither and thither by my distracted thoughts, while I waited, my nerves high-strung, to learn the result of the conference below stairs.

I was roused by a long, shuddering sigh from Gareth.

"I am here, dear," I said, bending over her.

"I am so cold, Christabel," she cried, shivering. I felt her hands; they were as cold as stones; but when I laid my fingers on her brow, it was hot with the burning heat of a fever. In much concern I called up Mrs. Perry, and together we applied such remedies as we could devise.

She was quite passive in our hands. Thanked us with sweet smiles, doing just what we told her like a submissive child.

"What has caused this, Miss Christabel?" asked Mrs. Perry. "She is really ill, and should see a doctor."

"She has had a shock," I replied; and the good soul shook her head dismally.

"She is just the sweetest girl that ever happened, but not weather proof against much shock," she said.

Then I heard sounds below; and my pulse quickened. The conference was ended,—how? "Stay here and watch while I am away," I said, and went downstairs.

His Excellency and Count Gustav were in the hall speaking together eagerly.

"Where is Gareth?" asked the Count.

"Upstairs, in her room."

"I will take her away with me. A wife must go with her husband," he answered; his tone curt and bitter.

"She is ill. A case for a doctor, I fear."

"She was well enough just now. Is this another trick? Tell her I am waiting for her. She has cost me enough. I may as well have as much of her as I can."

"You will have her life if you take her away now. But that may be your object." I could not help the taunt, his manner so enraged me.

"Thank you," he said, with a curl of the lip.

"It is no case for harsh words," put in his Excellency.

"And more certainly none for harsh deeds. Gareth cannot go until a doctor has seen her," I declared firmly.

"But for your meddling none of this would have happened," declared Gustav. "Let me see her."

"In your present mood, no. The shock of her father's cruel rebuff has quite unnerved her," I said to his Excellency. "Tell me what doctor