A Terrible Secret Part 4

"_Mister_ Juan, Hooper, if you please--_Mister_ Juan. William, my old c.o.c.kalorum, my last rose of summer, how goes it?"

He grasped the family butler's hand with a jolly laugh, and gave it a shake that brought tears of torture to its owner's eyes. In the blaze of the hall chandelier he stood revealed, a big fellow, with eyes and hair raven black, and a bold, bronzed face.

"What, William! friend of my childhood's days, 'none knew thee but to love thee, none named thee but to praise'--not a word of welcome?

Stricken dumb at sight of the prodigal son! I say! Where's the rest?

The baronet, you know, and my sister, and the new wife and kid? In the dining-room?"

"In the dining-room," Mr. Hooper is but just able to gasp, as with horror pictured on his face he falls back.

"All right, then. Don't fatigue your venerable shanks preceding me. I know the way. Bless you, William, bless you, and be happy!"

He bounces up the stairs, this lively young man, and the next instant, hat in hand, stands in the large, handsome, brilliantly lit dining-room. They are still lingering over the dessert, and with a simultaneous cry, and as if by one impulse, the three start to their feet and stand confounded. The young man strikes a tragic theatrical att.i.tude.

"Scene--dining-room of the reprobate 'Don Giovanni'--tremulo music, lights half down--_enter_ statue of virtuous Don Pedro." He breaks into a rollicking laugh and changes his tone for that of every-day life. "Didn't expect me, did you?" he says, addressing everybody.

"Joyful surprise, isn't it? Inez, how do? Baronet, your humble servant. Sorry to intrude, but I've been told my wife is here, and I've come after her, naturally. And here she is. Ethel, my darling, who'd have thought of seeing _you_ at Catheron Royals, an honored guest? Give us a kiss, my angel, and say you're glad to see your sc.r.a.pegrace husband back."

He strides forward and has her in his arms before any one can speak.

He stoops his black-bearded face to kiss her, just as with a gasping sob, her golden head falls on his shoulder and she faints dead away.

CHAPTER IV.

"I'LL NOT BELIEVE BUT DESDEMONA'S HONEST."

With a cry that is like nothing human, Sir Victor Catheron leaps forward and tears his fainting wife out of the grasp of the black-bronzed, bearded, piratical-looking young man.

"You villain!" he shouts, hoa.r.s.e with amaze and fury; "stand back, or by the living Lord I'll have your life! You scoundrel, how dare you lay hands on my wife!"

"Your wife! Yours! Come now, I like that! It's against the law of this narrow-minded country for a woman to have two husbands. You're a magistrate and ought to know. Don't call names, and do keep your temper--violent language is unbecoming a gentleman and a baronet. Inez, what does he mean by calling Ethel his wife?"

"She is his wife," Inez answers, her black eyes glittering.

"Oh, but I'll be hanged if she is. She's mine--mine hard and fast, by jingo. There's some little misunderstanding here. Keep your temper, baronet, and let us clear it up. _I_ married Miss Ethel Dobb in Glasgow, on the thirteenth of May, two years ago. Now, Sir Victor Catheron, when did _you_ marry her."

Sir Victor made no answer; his face, as he stood supporting his wife, was ghastly with rage and fear. Ethel lay like one dead; Juan Catheron, still eminently good-humored and self-possessed, turned to his sister:

"Look here, Inez, this is how it stands: Miss Dobb was only fifteen when I met her first. It was in Scotland. We fell in love with each other; it was the suddenest case of spoons you ever saw. We exchanged pictures, we vowed vows, we did the 'meet me by moonlight alone'

business--you know the programme yourself. The time came to part--Ethel to return to school, I to sail for the China Sea--and the day we left Scotland we went into church and were married. There! I don't deny we parted at the church door, and have never met since, but she's my wife; mine, baronet, by Jove! since the first marriage is the legal one.

Come, now! You _don't_ mean to say that you've been and married another fellow's wife. 'Pon my word, you know I shouldn't have believed it of Ethel."

"She is reviving," Inez said.

She spoke quietly, but her eyes were shining like black stars. She knew her brother for a liar of old, but what if this were true? what if her vengeance were here so soon? She held a gla.s.s of iced champagne to the white lips.

"Drink!" she said, authoritatively, and Ethel mechanically drank. Then the blue eyes opened, and she stood erect in Sir Victor's arms.

"Oh, what is it?" she said. "What has happened?"

Her eyes fell upon the dark intruder, and with a cry of fear, a shudder of repulsion, her hands flew up and covered her face.

"Don't be afraid, my darling," Sir Victor said, holding her close, and looking with flashing, defiant eyes at his enemy; "this coward has told a monstrous falsehood. Deny it, my love. I ask no more, and my servants shall kick him out."

"Oh, shall they!" said Mr. Catheron; "well, we'll see. Now, Ethel, look here. I don't understand this business, you know. What does Sir Victor mean by calling you his wife? It isn't possible you've gone and committed bigamy--there _must_ be a mistake. You are my wife, and as such I claim you."

"Ethel, you hear that," Sir Victor cried in a voice of agony; "for Heaven's sake speak! The sight of this fellow--the sound of his voice is driving me mad. Speak and deny this horrible charge."

"She can't," said Juan Catheron!

"I can! I do!" exclaimed Ethel, starting up with flushing face and kindling eyes; "It is a monstrous lie. Victor! O, Victor, send him away! It isn't true--it isn't, it isn't!"

"Hold on, Sir Victor," Mr. Catheron, interposed, "let me ask this young lady a question or two. Ethel, do you remember May, two years ago in Scotland? Look at this picture; it's yours, isn't it? Look at this ring on my little finger; you gave it to me, didn't you? Think of the little Glasgow presbytery where we went through the ceremony, and deny that I'm your husband, if you can."

But her blood was up--gentle, yielding, timid, she had yet a spirit of her own, and her share of British "pluck."

She faced her accuser like a small, fair-haired lioness, her eyes flashing blue fire.

"I do deny it! You wretch, how dare you come here with such a lie!"

She turned her back upon him with a scorn under which even he winced.

"Victor!" she cried, lifting her clasped hands to her husband, "hear me and forgive me if you can. I have done wrong--wrong--but I--I was afraid, and I thought he was drowned. I wanted to tell you all--I did, indeed, but papa and mamma were afraid--afraid of losing you, Victor.

I told you a falsehood about the photograph--he, that wretch, did give it to me, and--" her face drooped with a bitter sob--"he was my lover then, years ago, in Scotland."

"Ah!" quoted Mr. Catheron, "truth is mighty and will prevail! Tell it, Ethel; the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

"Silence, sir!" Lady Catheron cried, "and don't dare call me Ethel. I was only fifteen, Victor--think of it, a child of fifteen, spending my holidays in Glasgow when I met him. And he dared to make love to me.

It amused him for the time--representing himself as a sort of banished prince, a n.o.bleman in disguise. He took my silly, girlish fancy for the time. What did I at fifteen know of love? The day I was to return home, we exchanged pictures and rings, and he took me out for a last walk. He led me into a solitary chapel, and made me join hands, and pledge myself to be his wife. There was not a soul in the place but ourselves. As we left it we met papa. We shook hands and parted, and until this hour I have never since set eyes on his face. Victor, don't blame me too much--think what a child I was--remember I was afraid of him. The instant he was out of my sight I disliked him. He wrote to me--I never answered his letters, except once, and then it was to return his, and tell him to trouble me no more. That is all. O Victor!

don't look like that! I am sorry--I am sorry. Forgive me or I shall die."

He was ashen white, but there was a dignity about him that awed into silence even the easy a.s.surance of Juan Catheron. He stooped and kissed the tear-wet, pa.s.sionate, pleading face.

"I believe you," he said; "your only fault was in not telling me long ago. Don't cry, and sit down."

He placed her in a chair, walked over, and confronted his cousin.

"Juan Catheron," he said, "you are a slanderer and a scoundrel, as you always were. Leave this house, and never, whilst I live, set your foot across its threshold. Five years ago you committed a forgery of my name for three thousand pounds. I turned you out of Catheron Royals and let you go. I hold that forged check yet. Enter this house again, repeat your infamous lie, and you shall rot in Chesholm jail! I spared you then for your sister's sake--for the name you bear and disgrace--but come here again and defame my wife, and I'll transport you though you were my brother. Now go, and never come back."

He walked to the door and flung it wide. Juan Catheron stood and looked at him, his admirable good-humor unruffled, something like genuine admiration in his face.

"By Jupiter!" he exclaimed, "who'd have thought it! Such a milk-sop as he used to be! Well, baronet, I don't deny you got the upper hand of me in that unpleasant little affair of the forgery, and Portland Island with a chain on my leg and hard labor for twenty years I don't particularly crave. Of course, if Ethel won't come, she won't, but I say again it's deuced shabby treatment. Because, baronet, that sort of thing _is_ a marriage in Scotland, say what you like. I suppose it's natural she should prefer the owner of Catheron Royals and twenty thousand per annum, to a poor devil of a sailor like me; but all the same it's hard lines. Good-by, Inez--be sisterly, can't you, and come and see a fellow. I'm stopping at the 'Ring o' Bells,' in Chesholm.

Good-by, Ethel. 'Thou hast learned to love another, thou hast broken every vow,' but you might shake hands for the sake of old times. You won't--well, then, good-by without. The next time I marry I'll make sure of my wife."

He swaggered out of the room, giving Sir Victor a friendly and forgiving nod, flung his wide awake on his black curls, clattered down the stairs and out of the house.

"By-by, William," he said to the butler. "I'm off again, you see. Most inhospitable lot _I_ ever saw--never so much as offered me a gla.s.s of wine. Good-night, my daisy. Oh river! as they say in French. Oh river!"

The door closed upon him. He looked back at the lighted windows and laughed.