A Terrible Secret - May Agnes Fleming (best ebook reader txt) 📗

Sir Victor did not return. Edith still remained at the piano, the gleam of the candles falling upon her thoughtful face, playing the weird "Moonlight Sonata." She played so softly that the shrill whistling of the wind around the gables, the heavy soughing of the trees, was plainly audible above it. Ten minutes more, and her lover did not return. Wondering a little what the telegram could contain, she arose and walked to the window, drew the curtains and looked out. There was no moon, but the stars were numberless, and lit dimly the park. As she stood watching the trees, writhing in the autumnal gale, she heard a step behind her. She glanced over her shoulder with a half smile--a smile that died on her lips as she saw the grave pallor of Sir Victor's face.

"What has happened?" she asked quickly. "Lady Helena's dispatch contained bad news? It is nothing"--she caught her breath--"nothing concerning the Stuarts?"

"Nothing concerning the Stuarts. It is from London--from Inez Catheron. It is--that my father is dying."

She said nothing. She stood looking at him, and waiting for more.

"It seems a strange thing to say," he went on, "that one does not know whether to call one's father's death ill news or not. But considering the living death he has led for twenty-three years, one can hardly call death and release a misfortune. The strange thing, the alarming thing about it, is the way Lady Helena takes it. One would think she might be prepared, that considering his life and sufferings, she would rather rejoice than grieve: but, I give you my word, the way in which she takes it honestly frightens me."

Still Edith made no reply--still her thoughtful eyes were fixed upon his face.

"She seems stunned, paralyzed--actually paralyzed with a sort of terror. And that terror seems to be, not for him or herself, but for _me_. She will explain nothing; she seems unable; all presence of mind seems to have left her. No time is to be lost; there is a train in two hours: we go by that. By daylight we will be in London; how long before we return I cannot say. I hate the thought of a death casting its gloom over our marriage. I dread horribly the thought of a second postponement--I hate the idea of leaving you here alone."

_Something will happen_. All along her heart had whispered it, and here it was. And yet the long tense breath she drew was very like a breath of relief.

"You are not to think of me," she said quietly, after a pause. "Your duty is to the dying. Nothing will befall me in your absence--don't let the thought of me in any way trouble you. I shall do very well with my books and music; and Lady Gwendoline, I dare say, will drive over occasionally and see me. Of course _why_ you go to London is for the present a secret?"

"Of course. What horrible explanations and gossip the fact of his death at this late date will involve. Every one has thought him dead for over twenty years. I can't understand this secrecy, this mystery--the world should have been told the truth from the first. If there was any motive I suppose they will tell me to-night, and I confess I shrink from hearing any more than I have already heard."

His face was very dark, very gloomy, as he gazed out at the starlit night. A presentiment that something evil was in store for him weighed upon him, engendered, perhaps, by the incomprehensible alarm of Lady Helena.

The preparations for the journey were hurried and few. Lady Helena descended to the carriage, leaning on her maid's arm. She seemed to have forgotten Edith completely, until Edith advanced to say good-by. Then in a constrained, mechanical sort of way she gave her her hand, spoke a few brief words of farewell, and drew back into a corner of the carriage, a darker shadow in the gloom.

In the drawing-room, in travelling-cap and overcoat, Sir Victor held Edith's hand, lingering strangely over the parting--strangely reluctant to say farewell.

"Do you believe in presentiments, Edith?" he asked. "I have a presentiment that we will never meet again like this--that something will have come between us before we meet again. I cannot define it. I cannot explain it. I only know it is there."

"I don't believe in presentiments," Edith answered cheerfully. "I never had one in my life. I believe they are only another name for dyspepsia; and telegrams and hurried night journeys are mostly conductive to gloom. When the sun shines to-morrow morning, and you have had a strong cup of coffee, you will be ready to laugh at your presentiments. Nothing is likely to come between us."

"Nothing shall--nothing, I swear it!" He caught her in his arms with a straining clasp, and kissed her passionately for the first time. "Nothing in this lower world shall ever separate us. I have no life now apart from you. And nothing, not death itself, shall postpone our marriage. It was postponed once; I wish it never had been. It shall never be postponed again."

"Go, go!" Edith cried; "some one is coming--you will be late."

There was not a minute to spare. He dashed down the stairs, down the portico steps, and sprang into the carriage beside his aunt. The driver cracked his whip, the horses started, the carriage rolled away into the gloom and the night. Edith Darrell stood at the window until the last sound of the wheels died away, and for long after. A strange silence seemed to have fallen upon the great house with the going of its mistress. In the embrasure of the window, in the dim blue starlight, the girl sat down to think. There was some mystery, involving the murder of the late Lady Catheron, at work here, she felt. Grief for the loss of his wife might have driven Sir Victor Catheron mad, but why make such a profound secret of it? Why give out that he was dead? Why allow his son to step into the title before his time? If Juan Catheron were the murderer, Juan Catheron the outlaw and Pariah of his family, why screen him as though he had been the idol and treasure of all, and let the dead go unavenged? Why this strange terror of Lady Helena's? why her insufferable aversion to her nephew marrying at all?

Yes, there was something hidden, something on the cards not yet brought to light; and to the death-bed of Sir Victor Catheron the elder, Sir Victor Catheron the younger had been summoned to hear the whole truth.

Would he tell it to her upon his return, she wondered. Well, if he did not, she had no right to complain--she had _her_ secret from him. There was madness in the family--she shrank a little at the thought for the first time. Who knew, whether latent and unsuspected, the taint might not be in the blood and brains of the man to whom she was about to bind herself for life? Who was to tell when it might break forth, in what horrible shape it might show itself? To be the widowed wife of a madman--what wealth and title on earth could compensate for that? She shivered as she sat, partly with the chill night air, partly with the horror of the thought. In her youth, and health, and beauty, her predecessor had been struck down, the bride of another Sir Victor. So long she sat there that a clock up in the lofty turret struck, heavily and solemnly, twelve. The house was still as the grave--all shut up except this room where she sat, all retired except her maid and the butler. They yawned sleepily, and waited for her to retire. Chilled and white, the girl arose at last, took her night-light, and went slowly up to bed.

"Is the game worth the candle after all?" she thought. "Ah me! what a miserable, vacillating creature I am. Whatever comes--the worst or the best--there is nothing for it now but to go on to the end."

Meantime, through the warm, starry night, the train was speeding on to London, bearing Sir Victor Catheron to the turning point of his life. He and his aunt had their carriage all to themselves. Still in dead silence, still with that pale, terrified look on her face, Lady Helena lay back in a corner among the cushions. Once or twice her nephew spoke to her--the voice in which she answered him hardly sounded like her own. He gave it up at last; there was nothing for it but to wait and let the end come. He drew his cap over his eyes, lay back in the opposite seat, and dozed and dreamed of Edith.

In the chill, gray light of an overcast morning they reached Easton station. A sky like brown paper lay over the million roofs of the great Babylon; a dull, dim fog, that stifled you, filled the air. The fog and raw cold were more like November than the last month of summer. Blue and shivering in the chill light, Sir Victor buttoned up his light overcoat, assisted his aunt into a cab, and gave the order--"St. John's Wood. Drive for your life!"

Lady Helena knew Poplar Lodge, of course; once in the vicinity there would be no trouble in finding it. Was he still alive, the young man wondered. How strange seemed the thought that he was about to see his father at last. It was like seeing the dead return. Was he sane, and would he know him when they met?

The overcast morning threatened rain; it began to fall slowly and dismally as they drove along. The London streets looked unutterably draggled and dreary, seen at this early hour of the wet morning. The cab driver urged his horse to its utmost speed, and presently the broad green expanse and tall trees of Regent's Park came in view. Lady Helena gave the man his direction, and in ten minutes they stopped before the tall, closed iron gates of a solitary villa. It was Poplar Lodge.

The baronet paid the man's fare and dismissed him. He seized the gate-bell and rang a peal that seemed to tinkle half a mile away. While he waited, holding an umbrella over his aunt, he surveyed the premises.

It was a greusome, prison-like place enough at this forlorn hour. The stone walls were as high as his head, the view between the lofty iron gates was completely obstructed by trees. Of the house itself, except the chimney-pots and the curling smoke, not a glimpse was to be had. And for three-and-twenty years Inez Catheron had buried herself alive here with a madman and two old servants! He shuddered internally as he thought of it--surely, never devotion or atonement equalled hers.

They waited nearly ten minutes in the rain; then a shambling footstep shambled down the path, and an old face peered out between the trellised iron work. "Who is it?" an old voice asked.

"It is I, Hooper. Sir Victor and I. For pity's sake don't keep us standing here in the rain."

"My lady! Praise be!" A key turned in the lock, the gate swung wide, and an aged, white-haired man stood bowing before Lady Helena.

"Are we in time?" was her first breathless question. "Is your master still--"

"Still alive, my lady--praise and thanks be! Just in time, and no more."

The dim old eyes of Hooper were fixed upon the young man's face.

"Like his father," the old lips said, and the old head shook ominously; "more's the pity--like his father."

Lady