The Angel Part 17

"You mean Miss Lys?" he said.

The young man with great possessions stopped dead.

"You know her?" he said, in accents of extreme surprise. "Then you know who the--the man was, too? At first I thought--oh, a mad thought!--because of the extraordinary resemblance!"

He was still a little incoherent, and unable to speak the thoughts that were rushing through his startled brain. With shaking hand, he took out a gold cigarette-case and tried to light one of the little white tubes.

A tall policeman came up to them.

"You must move on, if you please, gentlemen," he said. "The pavements must be kept clear at this time of night."

"Look here," Sir Thomas said to Hampson, "my name is Ducaine--Sir Thomas Ducaine. You know something of all this--you know Miss Lys. I want to talk to you. I must talk to you, sir! Now, I live only a few yards from here, my house is in Piccadilly. Won't you come and spend an hour or two with me? It would be a great kindness. I'm sure you want some supper, too, after all this terrible excitement."

Hampson made up his mind immediately. He was attracted to the fresh-looking, strong-faced young man. He liked what he had said about the leprous play, before Joseph's appearance. And he also was terribly bewildered, and needed human companionship and talk. Moreover, he was faint with hunger--the emotions he had endured had robbed his blood of all his strength, and his brain had burnt up the vital force within him.

He would go with Sir Thomas.

"I thank you!" he said, noting with surprise how thin and tired his own voice was. "I shall be glad to come. My name is Hampson, and I am the editor of a weekly newspaper."

"We will go at once," Sir Thomas answered, and crossing the Circus, the strangely a.s.sorted pair walked rapidly down Piccadilly.

They had traversed about a third of that street of clubs and mansions when the baronet stopped at the ma.s.sive door of a large bow-windowed house, opened it with a tiny Bramah key, and Hampson found himself, for the first time in his life, in the house of a wealthy and fashionable young gentleman of London.

A silent manservant took their coats, and the host led the way to a small room, which opened into the hall at the further end of it. Here another and older man was waiting--the butler, evidently. A small round table was laid for supper with dainty richness. A ma.s.s of hothouse violets stood in a silver bowl in the centre; there were tall hock-gla.s.ses of Venetian ware, purple also; and the table-cloth and serviettes were fringed with purple.

"Bring some supper at once, please!" Sir Thomas said. "Something light, Mr. Hampson? Oh, very well! Some _consomme_, _Bryce_, some devilled oysters--yes, and an omelette afterwards. That will do."

"And the wine, Sir Thomas?"

"Oh, bring some hock and seltzer!"

The man withdrew.

"Excuse me one moment, Mr. Hampson," the baronet said. "I am expecting a rather important telegram. If it has arrived, they will have put it in the library. I will go and see."

He hurried out of the room. Hampson looked round him. The walls were panelled in white, and priceless old sporting prints, full of vivid color and movement, had been let into the panels. A great couch, covered in blue linen, with broad white stripes, was drawn up to the cosy fire, and on the tiger skin which served as a hearthrug a little j.a.panese spaniel was lying asleep. In a moment or two Sir Thomas returned. He had changed his evening coat for a smoking-jacket of quilted satin, and wore a pair of straw-woven Italian slippers upon his feet.

"Supper won't be a moment," he said, sinking down upon the couch. "I have trained all my people to be quick. But if you are not too tired, will you tell me, or begin to tell me, what you know? This means more to me than you can possibly imagine."

"How shall I begin?"

"Who is that man who appeared in the theatre, and swayed and held it with the force of his words?"

"He is named Joseph Bethune," Hampson answered, "and he is a great personal friend of my own."

"And why was Miss Lys with him? And what do you know of her?"

With perfect frankness Hampson explained how Mary had saved his life. He told of the strange occurrences in connection with Joseph's accident, recovery, and journey to Wales.

"Miss Lys, I know," Hampson said, "was greatly impressed by Joseph and the occurrences connected with him. Only three days ago I met her, and we talked about him. She had not heard from her brother, with whom Joseph was staying. I had not heard from Joseph, either, for several weeks. We were both distressed."

Suddenly, as he said this, Hampson started. He remembered the great fiery cross that he and Mary had seen hanging over London from the top of St Paul's Cathedral.

Why should he keep back anything? he thought; and in short, graphic sentences he described this marvel also.

Sir Thomas was intensely interested. His face was grave and set, his eyes wide with wonder.

"Of course, I knew Miss Lys had a brother in Wales," he said. "I know her very well. But she has never said anything to me of this man Joseph, whom she sent to stay with him. What you have told me is extraordinary.

Frankly, I could not have believed in all of it had I not been present at the theatre to-night. But I still fail to establish any connection between Joseph in Wales with Lluellyn Lys and Miss Lys with Joseph at the theatre."

"And I am as much in the dark as you are," Hampson answered.

While they had been speaking, the butler had been superintending the movements of a footman who was bringing in the soup and the chafing-dish with the oysters. Now he came up to his master, carrying a silver tray, upon which was a folded newspaper.

"I am sorry, Sir Thomas," he said, "but I could not help overhearing part of what you and this gentleman were saying. You were mentioning some names which made me think that you could not have seen the paper to-day, sir."

"Why, what d'you mean, Bryce?" Sir Thomas asked, in amazement.

The butler took the paper, opened it, pointed to a column, and said:

"The name 'Joseph' and Mr. Lys, sir. Mr. Lys is dead, sir. It's all here, in a special telegram to the _Daily Wire_."

Sir Thomas jumped up from his seat, seized the paper, and spread it out upon the supper-table.

Hampson rose also, and together the two men read the account of the doings in Wales with eyes that were nearly starting out of their heads.

The butler and the footman had meanwhile discreetly withdrawn.

Sir Thomas was the first to break the silence. He read less quickly than the practised journalist, but he was not long in supplying the connecting links of the strange story.

He raised his hand to his head, with a weary and dejected movement.

"It is beyond me," he said. "Since chance has thrown us together, and you have been so frank with me, I will be equally so with you. I, Mr.

Hampson, have long had hopes that Mary Lys would be my wife."

As they sat down to supper, probably even in London, that city of marvels, no couple more unlike could have been found anywhere together at that midnight hour. The one was a millionaire, rich even in this age of huge fortunes. He was young, goodly to look upon, in perfect health, and a universal favorite in society.

The man who confronted him was unknown, of humble origin, frail body, and regarded himself as abnormally lucky to be earning four hundred pounds a year by constant, highly specialized toil, and the exercise of a keen and nimble intelligence.

Yet on this night, at any rate, chance--or may we not say rather the exercise of the Supreme Will?--had brought them together in the strangest circ.u.mstances and under the strangest conditions. Moreover, unlike as they were in temperament, position and way of thought, both were drawn to each other. They had become friends at once, and they were aware of the fact.

For the first few minutes of the meal there was silence. Hampson was physically sick and faint. His whole body cried out for food and nourishment. He did not know that the _consomme_ he was enjoying was a _consomme_ of clear turtle, but almost immediately strength began to return to him. He was not an absolute teetotaller, though it was only on the rarest occasions that he touched intoxicants. So to-night, though he partook sparingly of a simple gla.s.s of golden hock, he was unaware that it was the cuvee of '94, from the famous vineyard of Wauloh Landskrona.

Sir Thomas broke the silence.

"We have been strangely brought together," he said, "and by forces which I do not pretend to a.n.a.lyse or understand. But I can trust you, I know, and I am going to tell you something of my life."

He paused and frowned, as if thinking deeply. Then he began again--

"I have known Mary Lys for a long time," he said slowly and with some difficulty, "and I have loved her deeply almost from the first. To me she is the most precious thing on earth. She is far, far above me--that I know; but, nevertheless, a great love gives courage, and I dared to tell her of mine. I think--indeed, I am sure--that she cares for me. But there has always been a great barrier between us, and one which has seemed insurmountable. It seems more so than ever now, after what I have learnt to-night. I have always been unable to believe in Christianity.