The House of Whispers

"You told him nothing?"

"I told him nothing," declared Flockart—which was a fact.

"Did he express a wish to see me?" she inquired.

"Of course he did. Is he not over head and ears in love with you? He believes you have treated him cruelly."

"I—I know I have, Mr. Flockart," she admitted. "But I acted as any girl of honour would have done. I was compelled to take upon myself a great disgrace, and on doing so I released him from his promise to me."

"Most honourable!" the man declared with a pretence of admiration, yet underlying it all was a craftiness that surely was unsurpassed. That visit of his to Northamptonshire was made with some ulterior motive, yet what it was the girl was unable to discover. She would surely have been cleverer than most people had she been able to discern the hidden, sinister motives of James Flockart. The truth was that he had not seen Murie, and the story of his anxiety he had only concocted on the spur of the moment.

"Walter asked me to give you a message," he went on. "He asked me to urge you to return to Glencardine, and to withdraw that letter you wrote him before your departure."

"To return to Glencardine!" she repeated, staring into his face. "Walter wishes me to do that! Why?"

"Because he loves you. Because he will intercede with your father on your behalf."

"My father will hear nothing in my favour until—" and she paused.

"Until what?"

"Until I tell him the whole truth."

"That you will never do," remarked Flockart quickly.

"Ah! there you're mistaken," she responded. "In all probability I shall."

"Then, before you do so, pray weigh carefully the dire results," he urged in a changed tone.

"Oh, I've already done that long ago," she said. "I know that I am in your hands, utterly and irretrievably, Mr. Flockart, and the only way I can regain my freedom is by boldly telling the truth."

"You must never do that! By Heaven, you shall not!" he cried, looking fiercely into her clear eyes.

"I know! I'm quite well aware of your attitude towards me. The claws cannot be entirely concealed in the cat's paw, you know;" and she laughed bitterly into his face.

The corners of the man's mouth hardened. He was about to speak and show himself in his true colours; but by dint of great self-control he managed to smile and exclaim, "Then you will take no heed of these wishes of the man who loves you so dearly, of the man who is still your best and most devoted friend? You prefer to remain here, and wear out your young life with vain regrets and shattered affections. Come, Gabrielle, do be sensible."

The girl did not speak for several moments. "Does Walter really wish me to return?" she asked, looking straight at him, as though trying to discern whether he was really speaking the truth.

"Yes. He expressed to me a strong wish that you should either return to Glencardine or go and live at Park Street."

"He wishes to see me?"

"Of course. It would perhaps be better if you met him first, either down here or in London. Why should you two not be happy?" he went on. "I know it is my fault you are consigned to this dismal life, and that you and Walter are parted; but, believe me, Gabrielle, I am at this moment endeavouring to bring you together again, and to reinstate you in Sir Henry's good graces. He is longing for you to return. When I saw him last at Glencardine he told me that Monsieur Goslin was not so clever at typing or in grasping his meaning as you are, and he is only awaiting your return."

"That may be so," answered the girl in a slow, distinct voice; "but perhaps you'll tell me, Mr. Flockart, the reason you evinced such an unwonted curiosity in my father's affairs?"

"My dear girl," laughed the man, "surely that isn't a fair question. I had certain reasons of my own."

"Yes; assisted by Lady Heyburn, you thought that you could make money by obtaining knowledge of my father's secrets. Oh yes, I know—I know more than you have ever imagined," declared the girl boldly. "You hope to get rid of Monsieur Goslin from Glencardine and reinstate me—for your own ends. I see it all."

The man bit his lip. With chagrin he recognised that he had blundered, and that she, shrewd and clever, had taken advantage of his error. He was, however, too clever to exhibit his annoyance.

"You are quite wrong in your surmise, Gabrielle," he said quickly. "Walter Murie loves you, and loves you well. Therefore, with regret at my compulsory denunciation of yourself, I am now endeavouring to assist you."

"Thank you," she responded coldly, again turning away abruptly. "I require no assistance from a man such as yourself—a man who entrapped me, and who denounced me in order to save himself."

"You will regret these words," he declared, as she walked away in the direction of Woodnewton.

She turned upon him in fierce anger, retorting, "And perhaps you, on your part, will regret your endeavour to entrap me a second time. I have promised to speak the truth, and I shall keep my promise. I am not afraid to sacrifice my own life to save my father's honour!"

The man stood staring after her. These words of hers held him motionless. What if she flung her good name to the winds and actually carried out her threat? What if she really spoke the truth? Ay, what then?

CHAPTER XXVII

BETRAYS THE BOND

The girl hurried on, her heart filled with wonder, her eyes brimming with tears of indignation. The one thought occupying her whole mind was whether Walter really wished to see her again. Had Flockart spoken the truth? The serious face of the man she loved so well rose before her blurred vision. She had been his—his very own—until she had sent off that fateful letter.

In five minutes Flockart had again overtaken her. His attitude was appealing. He urged her to at least see her lover again even if she refused to write or return to her father.

"Why do you come here to taunt me like this?" she cried, turning upon him angrily. "Once, because you were my mother's friend, I believed in you. But you deceived me, and in consequence you hold me in your power. Were it not for that I could have spoken to my father—have told him the truth and cleared myself. He now believes that I have betrayed his business secrets, while at the same time he considers you to be his friend!"

"I am his friend, Gabrielle," the man declared.

"Why tell me such a lie?" she asked reproachfully. "Do you think I too am blind?"

"Certainly not. I give you credit for being quite as clever and as intelligent as you are dainty and charming. I–"

"Thank you!" she cried in indignation. "I require no compliments from you."

"Lady Heyburn has expressed a wish to see you," he said. "She is still in San Remo, and asked me to invite you to go down there for a few weeks. Your aunt has written her, I think, complaining that you are not very comfortable at Woodnewton."

"I have not complained. Why should Aunt Emily complain of me? You seem to be the bearer of messages from the whole of my family, Mr. Flockart."

"I am here entirely in your own interests, my dear child," he declared with that patronising air which so irritated her.

"Not entirely, I think," she said, smiling bitterly.

"I tell you, I much regret all that has happened, and–"

"You regret!" she cried fiercely. "Do you regret the end of that woman—you know whom I mean?"

Beneath her straight glance he quivered. She had referred to a subject which he fain would have buried for ever. This dainty neat-waisted girl knew a terrible secret. Was it not only too true, as Lady Heyburn had vaguely suggested a dozen times, that her mouth ought to be effectually sealed?

He had sealed it once, as he thought. Her fear to explain to her father the incident of the opening of the safe had given him confidence that no word of the truth regarding the past would ever pass her lips. Yet he saw that his own machinations were now likely to prove his undoing. The web which, with her ladyship's assistance, he had woven about her was now stretched to breaking-point. If it did yield, then the result must be ruin—and worse. Therefore, he was straining every effort to again reinstate her in her father's good graces and restore in her mind something akin to confidence. But all his arguments, as he walked on at her side in the gathering gloom, proved useless. She was in no mood to listen to the man who had been her evil genius ever since her school-days. As he was speaking she was wondering if she dared go to Walter Murie and tell him everything. What would her lover think of her? What indeed? He would only cast her aside as worthless. No. Far better that he should remain in ignorance and retain only sad memories of their brief happiness.

"I am going to Glencardine to-night," Flockart went on. "I shall join the mail at Peterborough. What shall I tell your father?"

"Tell him the truth," was her reply. "That, I know, you will not do. So why need we waste further words?"

"Do you actually refuse, then, to leave this dismal hole?" he demanded impatiently.

"Yes, until I speak, and tell my father the plain and ghastly story."

"Rubbish!" he ejaculated. "You'll never do that—unless you wish to stand beside me in a criminal dock."

"Well, rather that than be your cat's-paw longer, Mr. Flockart!" she cried, her face flushing with indignation.

"Oh, oh!" he laughed, still quite imperturbed. "Come, come! This is scarcely a wise reply, my dear little girl!"

"I wish you to leave me. You have insulted my intelligence enough this evening, surely—you, who only a moment ago declared yourself my friend!"

Slowly he selected a cigarette from his gold case, and, halting, lit it. "Well, if you meet my well-meant efforts on your behalf with open antagonism like this I can't make any further suggestion."

"No, please don't. Go up to Glencardine and do your worst for me. I am now fully able to take care of myself," she exclaimed in defiance. "You can also write to Lady Heyburn, and tell her that I am still, and that I always will remain, my blind father's friend."

"But why don't you listen to reason, Gabrielle?" he implored her. "I don't now seek to lessen or deny the wrongs I have done you in the past, nor do I attempt to conceal from you my own position. My only object is to bring you and Walter together again. Her ladyship knows the whole circumstances, and deeply regrets them."

"Her regret will be the more poignant some day, I assure you."

"Then you really intend to act vindictively?"

"I shall act just as I think proper," she exclaimed, halting a moment and facing him. "Please understand that though I have been forced in the past to act as you have indicated, because I feared you—because I had my reputation and my father's honour at stake—I hold you in terror no longer, Mr. Flockart."

"Well, I'm glad you've told me that," he said, laughing as though he treated her declaration with humour. "It's just as well, perhaps, that we should now thoroughly understand each other. Yet if I were you I wouldn't do anything rash. By telling the truth you'd be the only sufferer, you know."

"The only sufferer! Why?"

"Well, you don't imagine I should be such a fool as to admit that what you said was true, do you?"

She looked at him in surprise. It had never occurred to her that he, with his innate unscrupulousness and cunning, might deny her allegations, and might even be able to prove them false.

"The truth could not be denied," she said simply. "Recollect the cutting from the Edinburgh paper."

"Truth is denied every day in courts of law," he retorted. "No. Before you act foolishly, remember that, put to the test, your word would stand alone against mine and those of other people.

"Why, the very story you would tell would be so utterly amazing and startling that the world would declare you had invented it. Reflect upon it for a moment, and you'll find, my dear girl, that silence is golden in this, as in any other circumstance in life."

She raised her eyes to his, and met his gaze firmly. "So you defy me to speak?" she cried. "You think that I will still remain in this accursed bondage of yours?"

"I utter no threats, my dear child," replied Flockart. "I have never in my life threatened you. I merely venture to point out certain difficulties which you might have in substantiating any allegation which you might make against me. For that reason, if for none other, is it not better for us to be friends?"

"I am not the friend of my father's enemy!" she declared.

"You are quite heroic," he declared with a covert sneer. "If you really are bent upon providing the halfpenny newspapers with a fresh sensation, pray let me know in plenty of time, won't you?"

"I've had sufficient of your taunts," cried the girl, bursting into a flood of hot tears. "Leave me. I—I'll say no further word to you."

"Except to forgive me," He added.

"Why should I?" she asked through her tears.

"Because, for your own sake—for the sake of your future—it will surely be best," he pointed out. "You, no doubt, in ignorance of legal procedure, believed that what you alleged would be accepted in a court of justice. But reflect fully before you again threaten me. Dry your eyes, or your aunt may suspect something wrong."

She did not reply. What he said impressed her, and he did not fail to recognise that fact. He smiled within himself when he saw that he had triumphed. Yet he had not gained his point.

She had dashed away her tears with the little wisp of lace, annoyed with herself at betraying her indignation in that womanly way. She knew him, alas! too well. She mistrusted him, for she was well aware of how cleverly he had once conspired with Lady Heyburn, and with what ingenuity she herself had been drawn into the disgraceful and amazing affair.

True it was that her story, if told in a criminal court, would prove so extraordinary that it would not be believed; true also that he would, of course, deny it, and that his denial would be borne out by the woman who, though her father's wife, was his worst enemy.

The man placed his hand on her shoulder, saying, "May we not be friends, Gabrielle?"

She shook him off roughly, responding in the negative.

"But we are not enemies—I mean we will not be enemies as we have been, shall we?" he urged.

To this she made no reply. She only quickened her pace, for the twilight was fast deepening, and she wished to be back again at her aunt's house.

Why had that man followed her? Why, indeed, had he troubled to come there? She could not discern his motive.

They walked together in silence. He was watching her face, reading it like a book.

Then, when they neared the first thatched cottage at the entrance to the village, he halted, asking, "May we not now become friends, Gabrielle? Will you not listen, and take my advice? Or will you still remain buried here?"

"I have nothing further to say, Mr. Flockart, than what I have already said," was her defiant response. "I shall act as I think best."

"And you will dare to speak, and place yourself in a ridiculous position, you mean?"

"I shall use my own judgment in defending my father from his enemies," was her cold response as, with a slight shrug of her shoulders, she turned and left him, hurrying forward in the darkening twilight along the village street to her aunt's home.

He, on his part, turned upon his heel with a muttered remark and set out again to walk towards Nassington Station, whence, after nearly an hour's wait in the village inn, he took train to Peterborough.

The girl had once again defied him.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE WHISPERS AGAIN

Was it really true what Flockart had told her? Did Walter actually wish to see her again? At one moment she believed in her lover's strong, passionate devotion to her, for had she not seen it displayed in a hundred different ways? But the next she recollected how that man Flockart had taken advantage of her youth and inexperience in the past, how he had often lied so circumstantially that she had believed his words to be the truth. Once, indeed, he had openly declared to her that one of his maxims was never to tell the truth unless obliged. After dinner, a simple meal served in the poky little dining-room, she made an excuse to go to her room, and there sat for a long time, deeply reflecting. Should she write to Walter? Would it be judicious to explain Flockart's visit, and how he had urged their reconciliation? If she wrote, would it lower her dignity in her lover's eyes? That was the great problem which now troubled her. She sat staring before her undecided. She recalled all that Flockart had told her. He was the emissary of Lady Heyburn without a doubt. The girl had told him openly of her decision to speak the truth and expose him, but he had only laughed at her. Alas! she knew his true character, unscrupulous and pitiless. But she placed him aside.

Recollection of Walter—the man who had held her so often in his arms and pressed his hot lips to hers, the man who was her father's firm friend and whose uprightness and honesty of purpose she had ever admired—crowded upon her. Should she write to him? Rigid and staring, she sat in her chair, her little white hands clenched, as she tried to summon courage. It had been she who had written declaring that their secret engagement must be broken, she who had condemned herself. Therefore, had she not a right to satisfy that longing she had had through months, the longing to write to him once again. The thought decided her; and, going to the table whereon the lamp was burning, she sat down, and after some reflection, penned a letter as follows:—

"MY SWEETHEART, MY DARLING, MY OWN, MY SOUL—MINE—ONLY MINE,—I am wondering how and where you are! True, I wrote you a cruel letter; but it was imperative, and under the force of circumstance. I am full of regrets, and I only wish with all my heart that I might kiss you once again, and press you in my arms as I used to do.

"But how are you? I have had you before my eyes to-night, and I feel quite sure that at this very moment you are thinking of me. You must know that I love you dearly. You gave me your heart, and it shall not belong to any other. I have tried to be brave and courageous; but, alas! I have failed. I love you, my darling, and I must see you soon—very soon.

"Mr. Flockart came to see me to-day and says that you expressed to him a desire to meet me again. Gratify that desire when you will, and you will find your Gabrielle just the same—longing ever to see you, living with only the memories of your dear face.

"Can you doubt of my great, great love for you? You never wrote in reply to my letter, though I have waited for months. I know my letter was a cruel one, and to you quite unwarranted; but I had a reason for writing it, and the reason was because I felt that I ought not to deceive you any longer.

"You see, darling, I am frank and open. Yes, I have deceived you. I am terribly ashamed and downhearted. I have tried to conceal my grief, even from you; but it is impossible. I love you as much as I ever loved you, and I swear to you that I have never once wavered.

"Grim circumstance forced me to write to you as I did. Forgive me, I beg of you. If it is true what Mr. Flockart says, then send me a telegram, and come here to see me. If it be false, then I shall know by your silence.

"I love you, my own, my well-beloved! Au revoir, my dearest heart. I look at your photograph which to-night smiles at me. Yes, you love me!

"With many fond and sweet kisses like those I gave you in the well-remembered days of our happiness.

"My love—My king!"

She read the letter carefully through, placed it in an envelope, and, marking it private, addressed it to Walter's chambers in the Temple, whence she knew it must be forwarded if he were away. Then, putting on her tam o' shanter, she went out to the village grocer's, where she posted it, so that it left by the early morning mail. When would his welcome telegram arrive? She calculated that he would get the letter by mid-day, and by one o'clock she could receive his reply—his reassurance of love.

So she went to her bed, with its white dimity hangings, more calm and composed than for months before. For a long time she lay awake, thinking of him, listening hour by hour to the chiming bells of the old Norman church. They marked the passing of the night. Then she dropped off to sleep, to be awakened by the sun streaming into the room.

That same morning, away up in the Highlands at Glencardine, Sir Henry had groped his way across the library to his accustomed chair, and Hill had placed before him one of the shallow drawers of the cabinet of seal-impressions.

There were fully half a dozen which had been sent to him by the curator of the museum at Norwich, sulphur-casts of seals recently acquired by that institution.

The blind man had put aside that morning to examine them, and settled himself to his task with the keen and pleasurable anticipation of the expert.

They were very fine specimens. The blind man, sitting alone, selected one, and, fingering it very carefully for a long time, at last made out its design and the inscription upon it.

"The seal of Abbot Simon de Luton, of the early thirteenth century," he said slowly to himself. "The wolf guards the head of St. Edmund as it does in the seal of the Benedictine Abbey of Bury St. Edmunds, while the Virgin with the Child is over the canopy. And the verse is indeed curious for its quaintness:"

+ VIRGO . DEUM . FERT . DUX . CAPUD . AUFERT . QUOD . LUPUS . HIC . FERT +

Then he again retraced the letters with his sensitive fingers to reassure himself that he had made no mistake.

The next he drew towards him proved to be the seal of the Vice-Warden of the Grey Friars of Cambridge, a pointed one used about the year 1244, which to himself he declared, in heraldic language, to bear the device of "a cross raguly debruised by a spear, and a crown of thorns in bend dexter, and a sponge on a staff in bend sinister, between two threefold flagella in base"—surely a formidable array of the instruments used in the Passion.

Deeply interested, and speaking to himself aloud, as was his habit when alone, he examined them one after the other. Among the collection were the seals of Berengar de Brolis, Plebanus of Pacina (in Syracuse), and those of the Commune of Beauvais (1228); Mathilde (or Mahaut), daughter of Henri Duke of Brabant (1265); the town of Oudenbourg in West Flanders, and of the Vicar-Provincial of the Carmelite Order at Palermo (1350); Jacobus de Gnapet, Bishop of Rennes (1480); and of Bondi Marquis of Sasolini of Bologna (1323).

He had almost concluded when Goslin, the grey-bearded Frenchman, having breakfasted alone in the dining-room, entered. "Ah, mon cher Sir Henry!" he exclaimed, "at work so early! The study of seals must be very fascinating to you, though I confess that, for myself, I could never see in them very much to interest one."

"No. To the ordinary person, my dear Goslin, it appears no doubt, a most dryasdust study, but to a man afflicted like myself it is the only study that he can pursue, for with his finger tips he can learn the devices and decipher the inscriptions," the blind Baronet declared. "Take, for instance, only this little collection of a dozen or so impressions which they have so kindly sent to me from Norwich. Each one of them tells me something. Its device, its general character, its heraldry, its inscription, are all highly instructive. For the collector there are opportunities for the study of the historical allusions, the emblematology and imagery, the hagiology, the biographical and topographical episodes, and the other peculiarities and idiosyncrasies in all the seals he possesses."

Goslin, like most other people, had been many times bored by the old man's technical discourses upon his hobby. But he never showed it. He, just the same as other people, made pretence of being interested. "Yes," he remarked, "they must be most instructive to the student. I recollect seeing a great quantity in the Bargello at Florence."

"Ah, a very fine collection—part of the Medici collection, and contains some of the finest Italian and Spanish specimens," remarked the blind connoisseur. "Birch of the British Museum is quite right in declaring that the seal, portable and abounding in detail, not difficult of acquisition nor hard to read if we set about deciphering the story it has to tell, takes us back as we look upon it to the very time of its making, and sets us, as it were, face to face with the actual owners of the relic."