Violet Forster's Lover

It was not an easy question to answer.

The problem which the Earl of Cantyre, and in a lesser degree, his friend, had to solve, was, what was to be done? Should they wait for news of Noel Draycott, emanating probably from himself, or should communication be made with the police? The latter all the parties seemed to be most unwilling to do. It meant publicity. The news that the police had been summoned to Avonham would be flashed all over England inside an hour. It was just the spicy sort of tale the public would like. "Strange Occurrence in a Nobleman's Mansion": the earl could see that sort of headline staring at him from the principal news-page of a dozen different journals. "The Avonham Mystery" – that was the kind of title which some inspired journalist would fit to a commonplace, vulgar, sordid incident.

No, thank you. His lordship decided that he would not risk that sort of thing until compelled by circumstances. He would have inquiries set on foot, in a quiet way, in every possible direction; if nothing came of them it would be time to speak to the police.

One small, yet curious occurrence did, however, induce in him a momentary qualm of doubt as to whether it was really the wisest course which he was pursuing.

They had been talking in the hall-the amount of talk which was got through at Avonham that morning was beyond credibility. The earl was just marching off to his own particular sanctum, wishing with all his heart that the people would go, and that there might be peace, when he saw in the hand of a bronze figure which stood on a pedestal-an envelope. It was so placed that he could not help but notice it; as he came along it caught him full in the eye. He had passed that figure only a minute or two before; the envelope had not been there then, or he would certainly have seen it. He took it from the fingers of the outstretched hand. It was inscribed, in Roman letters which had been formed with a soft pen, "To the Earl of Cantyre."

He glanced around; no one was in sight who seemed likely to have put it there. It struck him, even in that moment of irritation, as a little odd. He tore it open. Within was a sheet of his own notepaper. On it, again in Roman letters, formed with the same soft pen, was written:

"Who stole the Ditchling diamonds?

"Sydney Beaton.

"Who killed Noel Draycott?

"Sydney Beaton.

"If in doubt apply for information to Violet Forster."

His lordship had but time to get a cursory glance at these singular questions and answers, when his wife, coming along with the Duchess of Ditchling beside her, snatched the piece of paper from his hand; it was done with a laugh, but it was none the less a snatch.

"My dear boy," she cried, "what have you got there which makes you pull such faces?"

She glanced at the paper she had captured-and her countenance was changed. Something was flashed to each other by the married couple's two pairs of eyes. Then the countess crushed the sheet of paper in her hand, and, without a word to her husband, went on with the duchess.

CHAPTER XXII

The Countess and Violet

Miss Forster's bedroom door was gently opened, and the Countess of Cantyre went softly in. She closed the door as gently as she had opened it, and, remaining motionless, looked inquiringly about her. All was still. The curtains had not yet been drawn. In the apartment, despite its size, was the stuffy smell which comes to a bedroom when the windows have not been opened through the night. Her ladyship, crossing the room, drew the curtains and threw the windows wide open. It was a lovely day; the clean, fresh air came pouring in. The room looked on to the park, over a waving expanse of green which stretched as far as the eye could reach. She stood for a moment to enjoy the glory of the morning.

"That's better," she said out loud. Then she turned to the bed.

Miss Forster's form was dimly outlined beneath the clothes. She had not moved when her visitor entered, or even when the windows were thrown open. She was either sleeping very soundly or she refused to allow herself to notice what was going on.

The countess, going to the side of the bed towards which her face was turned, stood waiting for her to show some signs of life. Presently there was a slight movement beneath the clothes, and a faint voice inquired:

"Who's that?"

"You know very well who it is."

"Margaret, is that you?"

"You know very well it's me. Who but me would take the liberty of coming into your room, drawing the curtains and opening the windows and letting in the air? If you only knew what an atmosphere you've been living in! Do you always sleep with your windows closed?"

The only answer was a sound which might have meant anything, followed by a movement beneath the clothes.

"How's the foot?"

"It seems better." The words were whispered rather than spoken.

"How are you?"

"I'm all right."

"You don't sound as if you were all right. What's become of your voice? And, if you are all right, what are you doing in bed at this hour of the day?"

"I was just going to get up."

"Were you? That's good news. There were no immediate signs of it that I could see. Vi, you and I are going yachting."

"Going what?"

"Yachting. I said yachting. Do you want me to shout? We are leaving here to-day; we are starting on the Sea Bird to-morrow for wherever Captain Slocock likes to take us; you and I alone together."

"Are we?"

"Yes, we are. Is that the dying-duck-in-a-thunderstorm sort of fashion in which you take my surprising piece of information? Move some of those bedclothes and let me see your face, or, if you won't, I will."

Her ladyship did. It was a white, wan face which looked out at her from between the sheets, so white and so wan that her ladyship was quite startled.

"Vi, what do you mean by telling me you're all right? You look like a ghost."

"I wish I were."

"What does the child mean! Whatever for?"

"If I were a ghost I should be dead."

"I see, that's it; and a good, sound, healthy idea, especially for a young woman who is scarcely more than a child."

Her ladyship, drawing forward a big arm-chair, placed herself, not on the seat, but on the back; her feet she placed on the seat. She was such a small person that if she had occupied the position which people usually do upon a chair, Violet, on her high spring mattress, would have been above the level of her head, and she, for the purpose she had in view, at a disadvantage. Balanced on the top of the back of the chair, she was at least on a level with the girl in the bed.

"Vi, I am going to talk to you. I wish I'd been made a foot longer; then I shouldn't be forced to take positions on furniture which people were never meant to take. You're going to tell me all about it. You and I have had our share of troubles in our time, and we've always made a clean breast of them to each other. Now start confessing to me."

"It's easy for you to talk."

"Of course it is; and it will be easy for you when you've once got going."

"You don't understand."

"Oh, yes, I do. Sydney Beaton was here last night."

"Margaret! How do you know?" The girl threw the bedclothes off for herself, starting up from her pillow. "Has that wretch told you?"

Her ladyship regarded the girl attentively; then shook her dainty head.

"No one has told me anything. I just guessed, though perhaps you've told me as much as you very well could."

"I told you? What do you mean?"

"My dear Vi, consider. Could your conduct have been more suggestive? Don't I know you? Aren't I aware that you're the coolest, calmest, most levelheaded of young women? Do you suppose that you acted up to that character last night? My dear Vi, something was wrong with you, so wrong that it had turned the girl I knew into one I didn't. What could it be? We know all about each other that there is to know, so that I knew that there was only one thing which could have on you such a dire effect. How did you know that leather bag was in that chest? Mind you, I'm not asking a question; I'm not trying to force your confidence; I'm only putting it to you if it isn't obvious that there was only one conclusion I could draw?"

The girl was sitting up in bed, white-faced, wild-eyed.

"Then, now you know why I wished that I was a ghost."

Again her ladyship observed her closely, her head a little on one side.

"Aren't you-doesn't it occur to you as being just barely possible that you're a goose?"

"Why am I a goose?"

"May I speak?"

"I can't stop you. You've evidently come here for that express purpose."

"I know you will misunderstand me, and fly at me, and scratch me, and do all sorts of pretty things."

Her ladyship sighed; her tone breathed resignation.

"You needn't be afraid."

"I'm not; only-Vi, if you only knew how sorry I am for you."

"I don't want your sorrow."

"Vi, I am afraid that your Sydney Beaton is a bad lot."

"Don't you dare to say it-you!"

"You can't believe that he isn't."

"I can, and I do."

"Was he Jane Simmons's catspaw, or was Jane Simmons his? I presume they were confederates. Only that could explain the little talk you had with her."

The girl clenched her fists; she drew a great breath.

"Margaret, I want to tell you just how it is with me."

"Tell on."

"I'd give-I'd jump at the chance of marrying him to-morrow."

"I'll do you the justice to say that I don't believe you. Even if you're a lunatic, you can't be absolutely raving."

"Let me explain."

"With pleasure. Your remark will need all the explanation you can lay your hands on."

"Do you know what it is-to love a man?"

"I'm rather fond of mine."

"Fond!" Nothing could have exceeded the scorn which the girl's manner was meant to convey. "Do you know what it is for your love for a man to have become so part and parcel of your being that life means nothing without him?"

"I'm glad to say I don't."

"Then, I do. So that, you see, is where we differ."

"Poor Vi!"

"Don't talk nonsense, Margaret; there's no poverty in such a state as mine. I'm far richer than you, because I have the only thing which life has to offer worth having. Don't speak; let me continue. You've read the fairy tale in which the heroine gets the gift of sight-it's an allegory. She meets one person in whose nature there is nothing hidden from her; she can see into his very heart. Now start laughing: I can see into Sydney Beaton's very heart."

"My dear, I'm very far from laughing. You're not the only girl who has thought she had that gift where a particular man was concerned. What would the police have said if they had caught the gentleman you name in the very act? You know, they don't consider motives, or peer into hearts; they only deal with facts."

"You don't understand."

"Well, make me."

"Aren't I trying to? But you will keep interrupting. Sydney has never been exactly wise-"

"So you've told me."

The girl took no heed of the interruption; she only glared.

"But I will answer for his standard of honour, and honesty, as I would for my own."

"I wouldn't."

"That's because you don't know him, as I do. They lied when they said he cheated. I spoke to some of them last night. Mr. Tickell, who was playing against him, admitted that he knew nothing about it, that he saw no wrong in anything that Sydney did, nothing in the least suspicious in his behaviour. Captain Draycott as good as owned that, in supporting Anthony Dodwell's accusation, he might have been in error; I could see for myself that that consciousness was weighing on his mind. Major Reith tells me that it was all done in the hurry and whirl of a few mad moments. They talked it over after Sydney had gone; they were all agreed that they would have liked to have him back, to have questioned him when he was cooler and they also. I haven't seen Colonel Sandys, who, you know, was in command of the regiment. I haven't had a chance. He's been abroad ever since. But I've been given to understand that, although he wasn't present, he expressed himself on the matter in terms which were unflattering to all concerned; and I've a suspicion that his feeling on the subject had something to do with his retiring. Anthony Dodwell has not become more popular since; I believe, that if the mess was polled, they'd exchange him for Sydney to-morrow."

"Not after last night, my dear."

"I'm coming to that. Until now I've not felt that it became me to interfere. I felt that Sydney might resent my interfering; that he would prefer to take the matter up in his own way, at his own time. But after last night I see how mistaken I may have been. Margaret, if you were a man of honour, consider what your feelings would be if those whom you had esteemed your friends treated you as those men did Sydney."

"It's not easy for me to put myself into such a position; but if I had been in his place, and been innocent, I think I should have recognised the danger of my position, have kept calm, and have had the matter thrashed right out."

"My dear Margaret, you don't seem to realise that all these men were half beside themselves. I can quite fancy what men can be in such a moment. Sydney wanted to fly at Dodwell's throat. I'm sure that I can't blame him; I should have wanted to do the same, wouldn't you?"

"Well, that depends. I can't say that the little I have known of Captain Dodwell has moved me to affection. But, that apart, how do you explain last night?"

"Don't I tell you that I'm coming to that? Margaret, have patience. Sydney left the barracks that night with, it is nearly certain, very little money, and half mad with rage and shame and grief. Then the curtain falls; we know nothing of what happened to him afterwards. But, in the light of last night, can't you imagine?"

"That's the pity of it-I can."

"Yes; but from one point of view only. Can't you conceive of there being another? Can't you imagine what he may have suffered in what, to him, was a new and hideous world-hopeless, helpless, friendless, penniless, alone? I can't think of any way in which Sydney could have earned a farthing, circumstanced as he was. When his money was gone, which probably lasted only a very little time, he perhaps went hungry. Oh, you don't believe that men do go hungry! My dear, since Sydney went, I've seen crowds of men, in London streets and parks and public places, who, I am convinced, go hungry nearly all the time. Margaret-again I give you permission to laugh-as I've been lying here between the sheets I've seen Sydney starving in rags. I'm sure it has been like that. When a man of his position gets down to that, what is there for him to do?"

"That sort of thing would be pretty rough on him, I grant. But, you know, Vi, you're taking a very great deal for granted."

"I've admitted that Sydney was never the wisest or the strongest of men. It is quite possible that in those depths he met those who were even more desperate than himself, who pointed out to him a way of at least getting something to eat. There's something about that woman Simmons which convinces me that she has known something of the sort of thing of which I speak."

"Do you mean that she has known what it is to starve?"

"I shouldn't wonder. There was something about her when she came into this room last night which struck me. When I was talking to her this morning in the hall I saw what it was; it kept peeping out. Margaret, that woman has stood at despair's very gate; she has never forgotten it, and never will. It's taken from her something which you and I have, but which she will never have again; she is not a woman in the sense we are. Although she may not know it, she is as some wild creature which has its back against the wall, and which fights, straining every nerve and every faculty it has, against what must prevail."

The countess was regarding her with her eyes wide open.

"I always have credited you with imagination, but I certainly never guessed that it amounted to this. I must take a look at Simmons myself, and see what my imagination does for me. I don't want to be beaten in a game of that kind."

"I told you you could laugh, and so you can. If I had had my wits about me, I should have stopped Sydney last night; I should have stuck to him tight; I should have made him understand that, whether he would or wouldn't, I would stay by his side, lest worse befell him. I am going to do that now; I am going to leave no stone unturned to find him. When I have found him I'll not lose sight of him again. He has not been very wise; but the world has used him ill. I will stand by his side against the world."

"My dear, you talk as I've always fancied young women talk in plays I've never seen, the sort of plays which I have been given to understand were popular at the Adelphi once upon a time. It may be very beautiful, but it's frightfully silly. Suppose it gets generally known-and these things do get out-that the gentleman in question committed what was really an act of burglary last night, do you imagine that even the most catholic-minded people will want to cultivate his acquaintance, even with you at his side? And, Vi, you know there may be worse than burglary."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Hasn't it occurred to you as just possible that he may have had something to do with what happened to Captain Draycott, who, by the way, is still nowhere to be found? Rupert tries to pretend that he thinks everything is all right, but I can see that he is oppressed by a feeling that he is lying at the bottom of the lake."

"I'm not going to talk to you, Margaret; I can see that it's no use. I'm sure that if Sydney had anything to do with Captain Draycott, that gentleman brought it on himself."

"My dear girl! But will the police think that?"

"Margaret, I'm going to get up. It's no use our continuing the discussion. We not only look out of two different pairs of eyes; we look on two entirely different worlds. In yours it's roses, roses all the way; in mine it's thorns, thorns, thorns. Are you going, or must I dress while you're here?"

The girl, slipping out of the bed, stood before her in her night attire.

"My dear, you often have, but I'll go if you'd rather. Shall I send your maid?"

"Send no one. I'll dress myself; I will do all things for myself in future. And, while you're here, I'll say good-bye. While I've been lying there I've been planning what to do to find Sydney. We're not to see much of each other while I'm doing that, and when I've found him we're likely to see still less. As you put it, he and I are not the sort of persons with whom you and your friends might care to claim acquaintance."

"Then you won't come yachting?"

"Thank you, I will not."

"Vi, don't be a pig! I'm on your side."

"I doubt it, nor, under the circumstances, do I see how you could be."

"But I am, you idiot! I've something of the sort of feeling for you which it seems you have for him, and though I've no doubt whatever that you're more foolish than a goose-because a goose is quite a wise bird-all the same, I'm going to stick as close to you as you talk of sticking to him. So perhaps, before I quit this room, you'll promise that you won't leave the house till you've had another talk with me."

"What will be the use of that?"

"Never mind; you promise."

"Oh, I'll promise; but I shall leave the house this morning all the same."

"You can, and my prayers will go with you; but you're not going in your present frame of mind towards me-that I tell you straight. You've had no breakfast, and it's lunch time. When you're dressed, suppose you come to my room and have something with me; I'll see that we're alone."

"If you like, I'll come, but it will be on the understanding that you will not even try to persuade me not to do what I am going to do."

"I won't try to persuade or dissuade you-only you come."

When the countess was again in the pretty sitting-room which she called her very own she took a sheet of paper from between the buttons of her blouse: it was the sheet of paper which had been contained in the envelope which had been presented to the earl by the bronze figure on the pedestal. The little lady read it carefully through; then she struck a match, and lit it at the corner, holding it in her fingers while it flamed, and she asked herself:

"I wonder who wrote it-could it have been Jane Simmons?"

When the paper had been utterly consumed, dropping the ash on to the floor, she pressed it into the carpet with her shoe, so that none of it remained. Then she rang the bell. To the man who answered it she said:

"There's a maid in the house named Simmons-Jane Simmons. Tell them to send her to me here at once."

Some minutes elapsed, during which the countess, taking her ease on a couch covered with pink satin, opened, one after the other, a number of envelopes which were in a tray upon a table. For the most part just glancing at their enclosures, she dropped them from her on to the floor, and was still engaged in doing this when the man returned.

"It appears, my lady, that Simmons has left the house."

"Indeed?" The countess just glanced up from still another enclosure she was dropping to put the question; no one would have supposed she was interested in the least.

"Yes, my lady. She was missed some time ago. Mrs. Ellis sent to her room, and it was found she was gone. It seems that one of the gardeners saw her walking towards the lake with a bag in her hand."

"Is that so? Tell them to serve lunch in my room-lunch for two-in, say, half an hour."

The man went. The lady continued to treat her correspondence with the same scant courtesy.

"So she has gone. I thought it would be found that she had gone. She was seen walking towards the lake, with a bag. I wonder why the lake, and what was in the bag. Poor Vi!"

CHAPTER XXIII

The Latest Story

Days became weeks, and the mystery of what had become of Noel Draycott was a mystery still. It had got into the papers; to the disgust of the Earl of Cantyre, it had become, in a sense, the topic of the hour. "Where is Noel Draycott?" was the question, set in staring capitals, which faced newspaper readers day after day. The usual things were said about the incapacity of Scotland Yard; and people were assured by the morning and evening Press that the whole affair was but another illustration of how ineffective our detective service really is.

The official methods of dealing with his house and grounds were bad enough, but when it came to the amateur detective, his lordship drew the line. It was a subject on which he expressed himself very freely.

"Think the professional is no good, do they? I can't say that I'm struck with him myself. But compared to these male and female creatures who are aping him-! There's a woman who has taken on the job of what she calls 'solving' the mystery for the Daily Screecher; they tell me they've had the greatest difficulty in keeping her out of the servants' hall, to say nothing of the butler's pantry; and the other day they found her under the dining-room table just as they were starting to lay the dinner. I've given instructions that all such persons are to be warned gently off the premises, and kept off. Of course, if any of them should stray by any unhappy accident into the lake, it will be a misfortune. Privacy is getting a thing of the past. From the tone some of these fellows take, you'd think it was their house, their grounds-not mine."

Miss Forster had gone her own way-her uncle and many of her friends put it, her own bad way. She had gone straight from Avonham to Nuthurst, her uncle's house, which had been her home for so many years. In an interview she had insisted on having with him a very few minutes after her arrival, she had given her uncle one of the surprises of his life.

"You wish me to marry Sir George Beaton?" she had informed him.

"I'm not particular about your marrying George Beaton," the distracted old man declared. "There are hundreds and thousands of men in the world besides. What's the matter with Harold Reith? I thought you liked him."

"I like him too much to marry him."

"Of course, there's that point of view. I said to him: 'If the girl does marry you, you'll want to drown her and yourself inside six weeks.' Well, that didn't seem to cheer him."

Miss Forster looked at the old gentleman with doubtful glance, as if she suspected him of malign intention.