The Golden Butterfly

While he was reading this document his secretary came in, uncalled.

"The Eldorado Stock," he said, in his usual whisper. "Have you decided what to do? Settling day on Friday. Have you forgotten what you hold, sir?"

"I have forgotten nothing," Gabriel Cassilis replied. "Eldorado stock? I never forget anything. Leave me. I shall see no one to-day; no one is to be admitted. I am very busy."

"I don't understand it," the secretary said to himself. "Has he got information that he keeps to himself? Has he got a deeper game on than I ever gave him credit for? What does it mean? Is he going off his head?"

More letters and more telegrams came. They were sent in to the inner office; but nothing came out of it.

That night Gabriel Cassilis left his chair at ten o'clock. He had eaten nothing all day. He was faint and weak; he took something at a City railway station, and drove home in a cab. His wife was out.

In the hall he saw her woman, the tall woman with the unprepossessing face.

"You are Mrs. Cassilis's maid?" he asked.

"I am, sir."

"Come with me."

He took her to his own study, and sat down. Now he had the woman with him he did not know what to ask her.

"You called me, sir," she said. "Do you want to know anything?"

"How long have you been with your mistress?"

"I came to her when her former maid, Janet, died, sir. Janet was with her for many years before she married."

"Janet – Janet – a Scotch name."

"Janet was with my mistress in Scotland."

"Yes – Mrs. Cassilis was in Scotland – yes. And – and – Janet was in your confidence?"

"We had no secrets from each other, sir. Janet told me everything.

"What was there to tell?"

"Nothing, sir. What should there be?"

This was idle fencing.

"You may go," he said. "Stay. Let them send me up something – a cup of tea, a slice of meat – anything."

Then he recommenced his dreary walk up and down the room.

Later on a curious feeling came over him – quite a strange and novel feeling. It was as if, while he thought, or rather while his fancies like so many devils played riot in his brain, he could not find the right words in which to clothe his thoughts. He struggled against the feeling. He tried to talk. But the wrong words came from his lips. Then he took a book; yes – he could read. It was nonsense; he shook off the feeling. But he shrank from speaking to any servant, and went to bed.

That night he slept better, and in the morning was less agitated. He breakfasted in his study, and then he went down to his office.

It was the fourth day since he had opened no letters and attended to no business. He remembered this, and tried to shake off the gloomy fit. And then he thought of the coming coup, and tried to bring his thoughts back to their usual channel. How much did he hold of Eldorado Stock? Rising higher day by day. But three days, three short days, before settling-day.

The largest stake he had ever ventured; a stake so large that when he thought of it his spirit and nerve came back to him.

For once – for the last time – he entered his office, holding himself erect, and looking brighter than he had done for days; and he sat down to his letters with an air of resolution.

Unfortunately, the first letter was from the anonymous correspondent.

"She wrote to him to-day; she told him that she could bear her life no longer; she threatened to tell the secret right out; she will have an explanation with him to-morrow at Mrs. L'Estrange's. Do you go down and you will hear the explanation. Be quiet, and the secret."

He started from his chair, the letter in his hand, and looked straight before him. Was it, then, all true? Would that very day give him a chance of finding out the secret between Lawrence Colquhoun and his wife?

He put up his glasses and read the letter – the last of a long series, every one of which had been a fresh arrow in his heart – again and again.

Then he sat down and burst into tears.

A young man's tears may be forced from him by many a passing sorrow, but an old man's only by the reality of a sorrow which cannot be put aside. The deaths of those who are dear to the old man fall on him as so many reminders that his own time will soon arrive; but it is not for such things as death that he laments.

"I loved her," moaned Gabriel Cassilis. "I loved her, and I trusted her; and this the end!"

He did not curse her, nor Colquhoun, nor himself. It was all the hand of Fate. It was hard upon him, harder than he expected or knew, but he bore it in silence.

He sat so, still and quiet, a long while.

Then he put together all the letters, which the detective had brought back, and placed them in his pocket. Then he dallied and played with the paper and pencils before him, just as one who is restless and uncertain in his mind. Then he looked at his watch – it was past three; the garden party was for four; and then he rose suddenly, put on his hat, and passed out. His secretary asked him as he went through his office, if he would return, and at what time.

Mr. Cassilis made a motion with his hand, as if to put the matter off for a few moments, and replied nothing. When he got into the street it occurred to him that he could not answer the secretary because that same curious feeling was upon him again, and he had lost the power of speech. It was strange, and he laughed. Then the power of speech as suddenly returned to him. He called a cab and told the driver where to go. It is a long drive to Twickenham. He was absorbed in his thoughts, and as he sat back, gazing straight before him, the sensation of not being able to speak kept coming and going in his brain. This made him uneasy, but not much, because he had graver things to think about.

At half-past four he arrived within a few yards of Mrs. L'Estrange's house, where he alighted and dismissed his cab. The cabman touched his hat and said it was a fine day, and seasonable weather for the time of the year.

"Ay," replied Gabriel Cassilis mechanically. "A fine day, and seasonable weather for the time of the year."

And as he walked along under the lime-trees he found himself saying over again, as if it was the burden of a song:

"A fine day, and seasonable weather for the time of the year."

CHAPTER XL

"How green are you and fresh in this old world!"

On the morning of the garden party Joseph Jagenal called on Lawrence Colquhoun.

"I have two or three things to say," he began, "if you can give me five minutes."

"Twenty," said Lawrence. "Now then."

He threw himself back in his easiest chair and prepared to listen.

"I am in the way of hearing things sometimes," Joseph said. "And I heard a good deal yesterday about Mr. Gabriel Cassilis."

"What?" said Lawrence, aghast, "he surely has not been telling all the world about it!"

"I think we are talking of different things," Joseph answered after a pause. "Don't tell me what you mean, but what I mean is that there is an uneasy feeling about Gabriel Cassilis."

"Ay? In what way?"

"Well, they say he is strange; does not see people; does not open letters; and is evidently suffering from some mental distress."

"Yes."

"And when such a man as Gabriel Cassilis is in mental distress, money is at the bottom of it."

"Generally. Not always."

"It was against my advice that you invested any of your money by his direction."

"I invested the whole of it; and all Phillis's too. Mr. Cassilis has the investment of our little all," Lawrence added, laughing.

But the lawyer looked grave.

"Don't do it," he said; "get it in your own hands again; let it lie safely in the three per cents. What has a pigeon like you to do among the City hawks? And Miss Fleming's money, too. Let it be put away safely, and give her what she wants, a modest and sufficient income without risk."

"I believe you are right, Jagenal. In fact, I am sure you are right. But Cassilis would have it. He talked me into an ambition for good investments which I never felt before. I will ask him to sell out for me, and go back to the old three per cents. and railway shares – which is what I have been brought up to. On the other hand, you are quite wrong about his mental distress. That is – I happen to know – you are a lawyer and will not talk – it is not due to money matters; and Gabriel Cassilis is, for what I know, as keen a hand as ever at piling up the dollars. The money is all safe; of that I am quite certain."

"Well, if you think so – But don't let him keep it," said Joseph the Doubter.

"After all, why not get eight and nine per cent. if you can?"

"Because it isn't safe, and because you ought not to expect it. What do you want with more money than you have got? However, I have told you what men say. There is another thing. I am sorry to say that my brothers have made fools of themselves, and I am come to apologise for them."

"Don't if it is disagreeable, my dear fellow."

"It is not very disagreeable, and I would rather. They are fifty, but they are not wise. In fact, they have lived so much out of the world that they do not understand things. And so they went down and proposed for the hand of your ward, Phillis Fleming."

"Oh! Both of them? And did she accept?"

"The absurd thing is that I cannot discover which of them wished to be the bridegroom, nor which Phillis thought it was. She is quite confused about the whole matter. However, they went away and thought one of them was accepted, which explains a great deal of innuendo and reference to some unknown subject of mirth which I have observed lately. I say one of them, because I find it impossible to ascertain which of them was the man. Well, whether they were conscience-stricken or whether they repented, I do not know, but they went back to Twickenham and solemnly repudiated the engagement."

"And Phillis?"

"She laughed at them, of course. Do not fear; she wasn't in the least annoyed. I shall speak to my brothers this evening."

Colquhoun thought of the small, fragile-looking pair, and inwardly hoped that their brother would be gentle with them.

"And there is another thing, Colquhoun. Do you want to see your ward married?"

"To Jack Dunquerque?"

"Yes."

"Not yet. I want her to have her little fling first. Why the poor child is only just out of the nursery, and he wants to marry her off-hand – it's cruel. Let her see the world for a year, and then we will consider it. Jagenal, I wish I could marry the girl myself."

"So do I," said Joseph, with a sigh.

"I fell in love with her," said Lawrence, "at first sight. That is why," he added, in his laziest tones, "I suppose that is why I told Jack Dunquerque not to go there any more. But he has gone there again, and he has proposed to her, I hear, and she has accepted him. So that I can't marry her, and you can't, and we are a brace of fogies."

"And what have you said to Mr. Dunquerque?"

"I acted the jealous guardian, and I ordered him not to call on my ward any more for the present. I shall see how Phillis takes it, and give in, of course, if she makes a fuss. Then Beck has been here offering to hand over all his money to Jack, because he loves the young man."

"Quixotic," said the lawyer.

"Yes. The end of it will be a wedding, of course. You and I may shake a leg at it if we like. As for me, I never can marry any one; and as for you – "

"As for me, I never thought of marrying her. I only remarked that I had fallen in love, as you say, with her. That's no matter to anybody."

"Well, things go on as they like, not as we like. What nonsense it is to say that man is master of his fate! Now, what I should like would be to get rid of the reason that prevents my marrying; to put Jack Dunquerque into the water-butt and sit on the lid; and then for Phillis to fall in love with me. After that, strawberries and cream with a little champagne for the rest of my Methuselah-like career. And I can't get any of these things. Master of his fate?"

"Have you heard of the Coping-stone chapter? It is found."

"Agatha told me something, in a disjointed way. What is the effect of it?"

Joseph laughed.

"It is all torn up but the last page. A righteous retribution, because if Phillis had been taught to read this would not have happened. Now, I suspect the will must be set aside, and the money will mostly go to Gabriel Cassilis, the nearest of kin, who doesn't want it."

CHAPTER XLI

"La langue des femmes est leur epee, et elles ne la laissent pas rouiller."

The grounds of the house formed a parallelogram, of which the longer sides were parallel with the river. In the north-east corner stood the house itself, its front facing west. It was not a large house, as has been explained. A conservatory was built against nearly the whole length of the front. The lawns and flower-beds spread to west and south, sloping down to the river's edge. The opposite angle was occupied by stables, kitchen-garden, and boat-house. Gabriel Cassilis approached it from the east. An iron railing and a low hedge, along which were planted limes, laburnums, and lilacs, separated the place from the road. But before reaching the gate – in fact, at the corner of the kitchen-garden – he could, himself, unseen, look through the trees and observe the party. They were all there. He saw Mrs. L'Estrange, Phillis, his own wife – Heavens! how calm and cold she looked, and how beautiful he thought her! – with half a dozen other ladies. The men were few. There was the curate. He was dangling round Phillis, and wore an expression of holiness-out-for-a-holiday, which is always so charming in these young men. Gabriel Cassilis also noticed that he was casting eyes of longing at the young lady. There was Lawrence Colquhoun. Gabriel Cassilis looked everywhere for him, till he saw him, lying beneath a tree, his head on his hand. He was not talking to Victoria, nor was he looking at her. On the contrary, he was watching Phillis. There was Captain Ladds. He was talking to one of the young ladies, and he was looking at Phillis. The young lady evidently did not like this. And there was Gilead Beck. He was standing apart, talking to Mrs. L'Estrange, with his hands in his pockets, leaning against a tree. But he, too, was casting furtive glances at Phillis.

They all seemed, somehow, looking at the girl. There was no special reason why they should look at her, except that she was so bright, so fresh, and so charming for the eye to rest upon. The other girls were as well dressed, but they were nowhere compared with Phillis. The lines of their figures, perhaps, were not so fine; the shape of their heads more commonplace; their features not so delicate; their pose less graceful. There are some girls who go well together. Helena and Hermia are a foil to each other; but when Desdemona shows all other beauties pale like lesser lights. And the other beauties do not like it.

Said one of the fair guests to another —

"What do they see in her?"

"I cannot tell," replied her friend. "She seems to me more farouche than ever."

For, having decided that farouche was the word to express poor Phillis's distinguishing quality, there was no longer any room for question, and farouche she continued to be. If there is anything that Phillis never was, it is that quality of fierce shy wildness which requires the adjective farouche. But the word stuck, because it sounded well. To this day – to be sure, it is only a twelvemonth since – the girls say still, "Oh, yes! Phillis Fleming. She was pretty, but extremely farouche."

Gabriel Cassilis stood by the hedge and looked through the trees. He has come all the way from town to attend this party, and now he hesitated at the very gates. For he became conscious of two things: first, that the old feeling of not finding his words was upon him again; and secondly, that he was not exactly dressed for a festive occasion. Like most City men who have long remained bachelors, Gabriel Cassilis was careful of his personal appearance. He considered a garden-party as an occasion demanding something special. Now he not only wore his habitual pepper-and-salt suit, but the coat in which he wrote at his office – a comfortable easy old frock, a little baggy at the elbows. His mind was strung to such an intense pitch, that such a trifling objection as his dress – because Gabriel Cassilis never looked other than a gentleman – appeared to him insuperable. He withdrew from the hedge, and retraced his steps. Presently he came to a lane. He left the road, and turned down the path. He found himself by the river. He sat down under a tree, and began to think.

He thought of the time when his lonely life was wearisome to him, when he longed for a wife and a house of his own. He remembered how he pictured a girl who would be his darling, who would return his caresses and love him for his own sake. And how, when he met Victoria Pengelley, his thoughts changed, and he pictured that girl, stately and statuesque, at the head of the table. There would be no pettings and caressings from her, that was quite certain. On the other hand, there would be a woman of whom he would be proud – one who would wear his wealth properly. And a woman of good family, well connected all round. There were no caresses, he remembered now; there was the coldest acceptance of him; and there had been no caresses since. But he had been proud of her; and as for her honour – how was it possible that the doubt should arise? That man must be himself distinctly of the lower order of men who would begin by doubting or suspecting his wife.

To end in this: doubt so strong as to be almost certainty: suspicion like a knife cutting at his heart; his brain clouded; and he himself driven to creep down clandestinely to watch his wife.

He sat there till the June sun began to sink in the west. The river was covered with the evening craft. They were manned by the young City men but just beginning the worship of Mammon, who would have looked with envy upon the figure sitting motionless in the shade by the river's edge had they known who he was. Presently he roused himself, and looked at his watch. It was past seven. Perhaps the party would be over by this time; he could go home with his wife; it would be something, at least, to be with her, to keep her from that other man. He rose, – his brain in a tumult – and repaired once more to his point of vantage at the hedge. The lawn was empty; there was no one there. But he saw his own carriage in the yard, and therefore his wife was not yet gone.

In the garden, no one. He crept in softly, and looked round him. No one saw him enter the place; and he felt something like a burglar as he walked, with a stealthy step which he vainly tried to make confident, across the lawn.

Two ways of entrance stood open before him. One was the porch of the house, covered with creepers and hung with flowers. The door stood open, and beyond it was the hall, looking dark from the bright light outside. He heard voices within. Another way was by the conservatory, the door of which was also open. He looked in. Among the flowers and vines there stood a figure he knew – his wife's. But she was alone. And she was listening. On her face was an expression which he had never seen there, and never dreamed of. Her features were distorted; her hands were closed in a tight clutch; her arms were stiffened – but she was trembling. What was she doing. To whom was she listening?

He hesitated a moment, and then he stepped through the porch into the hall. The voices came from the right, in fact, from the morning room, – Phillis's room, – which opened by its single window upon the lawn, and by its two doors into the hall on one side and the conservatory on the other.

And Gabriel Cassilis, like his wife, listened. He put off his hat, placed his umbrella in the stand, and stood in attitude, in case he should be observed, to push open the door and step in. He was so abject in his jealousy that he actually did not feel the disgrace and degradation of the act. He was so keen and eager to lose no word, that he leaned his head to the half-open door, and stood, his long thin figure trembling with excitement, like some listener in a melodrama of the transpontine stage.

There were two persons in the room, and one was a woman; and they were talking together. One was Lawrence Colquhoun and the other was Phillis Fleming.

Colquhoun was not, according to his wont, lying on a sofa, nor sitting in the easiest of the chairs. He was standing, and he was speaking in an earnest voice.

"When I saw you first," he said, "you were little Phillis – a wee toddler of six or seven. I went away and forgot all about you – almost forgot your very existence, Phillis, – till the news of Mr. Dyson's death met me on my way home again. I fear that I have neglected you since I came home; but I have been worried."

"What has worried you, Lawrence?" asked the girl.

She was sitting on the music-stool before the piano; and as she spoke she turned from the piano, her fingers resting silently on the notes. She was dressed for the party, – which was over now, and the guests departed, – in a simple muslin costume, light and airy, which became her well. And in her hair she had placed a flower. There were flowers all about the room, flowers at the open window, flowers in the conservatory beyond, flowers on the bright green lawns beyond.

"How pretty you are, Phillis!" answered her guardian.

He touched her cheek with his finger as she sat.

"I am your guardian," he said, as if in apology.

"And you have been worried about things?" she persisted. "Agatha says you never care what happens."

"Agatha is right, as a rule. In one case, of which she knows nothing, she is wrong. Tell me, Phillis, is there anything you want in the world that I can get for you?"

"I think I have everything," she said, laughing. "And what you will not give me I shall wait for till I am twenty-one."

"You mean – "

"I mean – Jack Dunquerque, Lawrence."

Only a short month ago, and Jack Dunquerque was her friend. She could speak of him openly and friendly, without change of voice or face. Now she blushed, and her voice trembled as she uttered his name. That is one of the outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual state known to the most elementary observers.

"I wanted to speak about him. Phillis, you are very young, you have seen nothing of the world; you know no other men. All I ask you is to wait. Do not give your promise to this man till you have at least had an opportunity of – of comparing – of learning your own mind."

She shook her head.

"I have already given my promise," she said.

"But it is a promise that may be recalled," he urged. "Dunquerque is a gentleman; he will not hold you to your word when he feels that he ought not to have taken it from you. Phillis, you do not know yourself. You have no idea of what it is that you have given, or its value. How can I tell you the truth?"

"I think you mean the best for me, Lawrence," she said. "But the best is – Jack."

Then she began to speak quite low, so that the listeners heard nothing.

"See, Lawrence, you are kind, and I can tell you all without being ashamed. I think of Jack all day long and all night. I pray for him in the morning and in the evening. When he comes near me I tremble; I feel that I must obey him if he were to order me in anything. I have no more command of myself when he is with me – "

"Stop, Phillis," Lawrence interposed; "you must not tell me any more. I was trying to act for the best; but I will make no further opposition. See, my dear" – he took her hand in his in a tender and kindly way – "if I write to Jack Dunquerque to-day, and tell the villain he may come and see you whenever he likes, and that he shall marry you whenever you like, will that do for you?"

She started to her feet, and threw her left hand – Lawrence still holding the right – upon his shoulder, looking him full in the face.

"Will it do? O Lawrence! Agatha always said you were the kindest man in the world; and I – forgive me! – I did not believe it, I could not understand it. O Jack, Jack, we shall be so happy, so happy! He loves me, Lawrence, as much as I love him."

The listeners in the greenhouse and the hall craned their necks, but they could hear little, because the girl spoke low.

"Does he love you as much as you love him, Phillis? Does he love you a thousand times better than you can understand? Why, child, you do not know what love means. Perhaps women never do quite realise what it means. Only go on believing that he loves you, and love him in return, and all will be well with you."