The Way of the Strong Part 51

"And I am here to tell you," she cried, with a sharp intake of breath.

"I have lost something. I have lost something which is almost as precious to me as--as your love. I have been told that you can tell me where to find--him."

"Him?" The word rang through the quiet room.

It was the man's only comment, and a dreadful inflection was laid upon the word.

There are moments in life when acts are performed, when words are spoken without thought, even without actual impulse of our own. They are, perhaps, moments when Fate steps in to guide us into the path she would have us tread. Perhaps it was such a moment in Monica's life, in Hendrie's.

Certainly the woman had spoken without thought. She had no understanding of what her words could possibly mean to her husband. And Hendrie, surely he was unaware that murder looked out of his furious gray eyes at what he believed to be the mention of the man for whose downfall he had perjured his own soul.

"Yes--him, him!" cried Monica, becoming hysterical. "My--my dead sister's child."

Hendrie recovered himself at once. He smoothed back his hair like a man at a loss.

"I--don't think I quite--get it," he said slowly. Then his bushy brows lifted questioningly. "Your sister's child? I didn't know you had a sister. You never told me. Say--how should I know where this child is?"

He was puzzled. Yet he was not without some doubts.

Monica swallowed with difficulty. Her throat and tongue were parched.

"No," she said, struggling for calmness. "I never told you because--because I had vowed to keep the secret. Questions would have followed the telling, which I could not have answered. I was bound--bound, and I could not break my promise."

"You best tell me all there is to tell," the man said coldly. "This secrecy, this promise. I don't understand--any of it."

Never had his wife's beauty appealed to Hendrie more than it did at that moment. A great depth of pa.s.sionate feeling was stirring within him, but he permitted it no display. He was growing apprehensive, troubled. His doubt, too, was increasing.

Monica suddenly thrust out her hands in appeal.

"Oh, Alec, it is so hard, even now, to--to break my faith with the dead. And yet I know you are right. It--it is more than time for the truth. I think--yes, I believe if poor Elsie knew all, she would forgive me."

"Elsie?" The man's voice was sharply questioning.

"Yes, Elsie--my poor, dead sister."

"Go on."

"Yes, yes. I must go on." Monica drew a deep breath. "I can't understand. I don't seem to---- Oh, tell me where he is. My Frank, my poor Frank, Elsie's boy. The boy I have brought up to manhood, the boy I have cared for all these years, the boy I have struggled and fought for. He--he is--lost. He has been spirited away as though he had never existed. And--I am told by the detectives to ask you where he is."

Hendrie's eyes were upon the carpet. He was no longer looking into the troubled face before him.

"Tell me," he said sharply; "when did you see him last?"

Monica no longer hesitated. Her husband's manner had become suddenly compelling.

"It was the last night I spent at Deep Willows," she said at once.

"Just before you came home."

Hendrie raised his eyes. They were full of a dawning horror.

"The truth does demand," he cried almost fiercely. "Tell me! Tell me--as quickly as you can."

Monica was caught in the man's sudden excitement.

"Yes, yes, I will," she cried. "Oh, but it is a long story and--and a sordid one. It all happened when I was a young girl. I was only seventeen. Poor Elsie. She had been away a long time from home. Then she came home to me, her only relative. She came home to die, and dying gave birth to her son. You see, she was never married."

She paused, but went on at once at the man's prompt urging.

"She was never married, and the man left her in the hour of her direst need. Poor girl, even in her extremity she did not blame him. She loved him almost as much as she loved his little baby boy. She knew she was dying, nor did she seem to mind, except for her baby. He was her great anxiety. But even in that, her anxiety was chiefly that the child should never know of his mother's shame. So, almost with her last breath, she made me swear that I would bring him up as my own child.

That I would keep her secret from him, and account for his father as being dead, with any story I chose to tell him. And I--I, a girl of seventeen, promised."

She paused. Then she hurried on as the questioning eyes of the man were again raised to her face.

"But what does it matter?" she cried suddenly. "She was my only sister and I loved her. From that day Frank became my own son, and, for nearly twenty years, I battled with the world for him. Nor in our worst trials did I feel anything but the greatest joy in our mutual love. Oh, yes, when he grew up, I had to lie to him. I have had to lie, lie, lie all through. And when you came into my life I had to lie harder than ever.

It was either that, or betray my sister's secret. That I could not do--even for your love. I chose the easier path. I lied so that I should not have to give you up."

"It is not quite clear--the necessity?" The man again raised his eyes to her face, but, almost at once, they turned back to the carpet.

"It is simple enough," Monica went on dully. "If I married you, to keep my sister's secret I must keep Frank in the background. Otherwise I should have to give explanations. To keep him in the background I must tell him a story that made it necessary. I did so. So that he should know nothing of Elsie's shame, and as I had brought him up to call me 'mother,' I did the only thing that seemed to me possible. I took the whole responsibility upon myself. I told him that though he was my son I had never been married. You see, I knew his love for me. I knew his chivalrous spirit. He wanted me to be happy in my newly found love, so--he accepted the situation."

Hendrie shook his head.

"You kept the letter of your promise to your sister, and--betrayed the spirit of it."

Monica hung her head.

"I know. I did it because--I could not give you up."

Hendrie looked up with something like anguish in his eyes.

"Oh, woman, woman," he cried. "Why didn't you take me into your confidence? These lies could have been saved, and--and all these other, and even more, terrible consequences. Listen to me, and I will tell you all the rest. I can see it now. I can see it more clearly than you can tell me. He called himself Frank--Smith?"

Monica started.

"Yes. Whenever he visited me at Deep Willows. His real name was Frank Burton."

Hendrie's gaze wandered toward the window. The street lamps had just been lit. Never in his life had he known what it was to humble himself before another. Never had he known what it was to excuse himself for any act of his. Now he knew he must do both of these things.

Monica stepped eagerly forward from the shadow of the curtains.

"You--you know where he is?" she demanded.

Hendrie nodded. Then a strange thing happened. A harsh, mirthless laugh rang through the darkening room. Monica stared at the man's unsmiling face, horrified, and at a loss to understand.

"Then where is he?" she cried blankly.

"He is in the penitentiary, serving five years for breaking into Deep Willows, and robbing my safe of a bunch of money that belonged to you."

"Oh, G.o.d have mercy!"