Witness to the Deed Part 25

"My niece, Mr Stratton," said the old lady coldly, "is in Paris."

"No, no," he cried. "They reached Charing Cross not half an hour ago."

"Stratton, old man," whispered Guest, "for goodness sake, contain yourself. Indeed they are not here."

"Hah!" cried Stratton excitedly as a cab drew up to the door; and he grasped how he had, in his excitement, outstripped with a fast hansom the slow four-wheeled cab; and without giving aunt or friend another thought he dashed downstairs and out to the cab door.

Myra was looking eagerly up at the house as the front door opened, and Edie heard her give a hoa.r.s.e gasp as she shrank back into the corner of the seat with her face convulsed by a spasm at the unexpected sight of Stratton.

It was only momentary. By the time he reached the cab door, flung it open, and held out his hand, she had drawn herself up, and it was a calm, dignified, graceful woman of the world who gave the trembling man her hand to help her to alight.

"Ah, Mr Stratton," she said, and her voice thrilled him, "I did not expect to see you here. I hope you have quite recovered from your illness. Thanks. Mr Guest too. Yes, you may take my wrappers. Ah, there is aunt. Aunt dear, we have taken you quite by storm. Papa had letters yesterday which he said must be attended to personally at once.

Can you take us in, or must we go to an hotel?"

This last in the hall, to which, trembling at the meeting, Aunt Rebecca had come down to embrace her nieces.

"Yes, yes, my dear; come in. So glad--so very glad. Mr Guest, would you mind--the cabman?"

She handed the young man her purse, but Myra checked her.

"No, no, aunt dear; papa did see to that. So kind of you to have old friends here as a surprise."

"No, no, my dear, an accident; and--and--they were just going away."

"Yes," said Stratton in a strange voice as he held out his hand and gazed with agonised eyes wistfully in those which looked so calmly in his; "we were just going--Miss Jerrold."

"Mrs Barron, Mr Stratton," said Myra quietly, with just a suspicion of reproach in her voice, as she gave him her hand. "Papa was talking about you the other day. I am sure he will be glad to see old friends again."

She turned from him and shook hands with Guest, while Edie, with tears in her eyes, approached Stratton.

"So--to see you again, Mr Stratton," she whispered, with the "glad"

inaudible, but it was of no consequence, being quite out of place.

He shook hands with her mechanically, but he did not seem to see her or hear her words, and she caught Guest's arm.

"Get him away," she whispered. "It was madness. Pray go, for everyone's sake."

Guest nodded, took his friend's arm, and the pair walked slowly away in silence till Stratton uttered a low, strange laugh, and as Guest met his wild eyes:

"No, old fellow," he said quietly. "I am not going mad--unless it was madness to obey the promptings of my poor, weak nature. Better come with me to my rooms, for something seems to keep on asking me if life is not all one great mistake."

Meanwhile at Miss Jerrold's house, the moment the door was closed, Myra had caught wildly at her cousin's hand.

"Quick!" she cried in a hoa.r.s.e whisper, "take me to our room," and with wild energy she hurried her cousin upstairs to close and lock the door before she gave vent to the wild, hysterical burst of agony that was struggling for exit.

"So cruel--so heartless," she sobbed as she paced the floor, wringing her hands and rejecting every attempt at consolation on her cousin's part. "He must have known. Oh, it's maddening."

"Myra, be calm, be calm."

"Calm!" cried Myra wildly, "it is not possible. Do you think me made of stone instead of flesh and blood like yourself? You--my father--my aunt--all treat me as if I were a child whom a word or two will set free. I tell you again I am that man's wife. In my weakness and folly, blind to what I called my duty, I went headlong into that gulf of despair. I swore before the altar to be his wife till death should us part. It is my fate, and there can be no change."

"But Myra--dear cousin!"

"I tell you, Edie, there is not an hour pa.s.ses without my seeing him once more before me holding my hand, with his eyes telling me that I am his wife, and," she cried pa.s.sionately as a low tapping was heard at the door, "I am waiting for the day when he will be released and come, wherever I may be, to claim me and bid me follow him, whatever may be his future. And I shall have to go--I shall have to go."

"Myra," whispered Edie, throwing her arms about her cousin's neck, "hush, pray! Pray hush! Auntie is at the door; she must not hear you talk like this. These terrible fits are only for me to hear; my own sister, pray, pray be calm."

Her touch, her kisses, had the desired effect; and as the tapping at the door was resumed, Myra sank down sobbing on a chair, and buried her flushed face in Edie's breast.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

BREAKING THE CAGE.

Night at The Foreland--and a dark night; the moon not due for hours, and when she rose not likely to be seen for the heavy clouds which blotted out the stars. Lights were out in the great building, which stood up by day gloomy, many-windowed, and forbidding on the huge promontory, crossed by wall and works, and with sentries between the convict establishment and the mainland. The other three sides had the waves, which washed the nearly perpendicular precipices, for warders, and it was only here and there that an active man well acquainted with the cliffs could descend to the sea, and such an acquaintanceship was not likely to be made by the wretched men marched out, fettered and guarded, to the great quarries day after day, and then carefully watched back to their cells.

At times the sentinel duty outside the building could easily be relaxed on the sea side, for the billows came thundering in, smiting the polished rocks and flying high in air with a deafening din; but on a calm, warm, dark night, when it was possible for a boat to approach close in, a stricter watch was kept, lest one of the more hardened prisoners should contrive to elude the vigilance within the buildings and make a desperate effort to win his freedom.

But, as a rule, attempts at evasion were made when the men were marched out to the quarries, when a dash would be made during a sea fog, or a convict would crawl into some hollow among the freshly hewn stones, and lie there, hoping not to be missed till he had made good his escape.

On this particular night a young member of the warder guard stood, rifle on shoulder, looking out to sea from the mere shelf of level rock near the top of the cliff.

A great steamer was making her way down channel, and her lights shone like stars away on the black waters.

"West Indy or South America; and a Dutch boat, I should say," muttered the sentry; and he turned his eyes to where, well up under the shelter of the great promontory, the lights of several vessels showed where they lay at anchor.

"This is a miserable dog's life," muttered the man, "and I get precious sick of it, but I think I'd rather be here than there. One can feel bottom and be safe--sailors can't. That one nighest in is the little man-o'-war, I suppose, and yon's the big one. How dark it is!"

He stood there trying to pierce the blackness, out of which the anchor lights of the ships stood like stars, but he could see nothing save a faint bluish-greeny gleam now and then far below, where the phosph.o.r.escence of the sea washed gently, like so much luminous oil, over the bases of the cliffs and played among the ma.s.ses of seaweed lying awash.

"How unked the sea is of a dark night. Fancy going sailing right away yonder, not knowing what you may hit upon next. Sh.o.r.e's good enough for me, even if it's being at Foreland convict prison, with a day out now and then."

He turned his face sh.o.r.eward, looking across the bay, dotted with faint lights, to where the red lamps of the harbour shone out with their lurid glow.

"That's better," he said as he followed the curve of the sh.o.r.e, with the faint golden gleam sent up by the gas lamps which dotted the bow like so many bright beads strung along the sh.o.r.e, on and on by the line of houses facing the sea front, till they ran out for a short distance to sea, and ended in quite a cl.u.s.ter, out of which flashed one with a bluish glare, whose rays cut the darkness, for it was the electric light at the end of the pier.

"Band's playing," said the man, listening intently; but the distance across the curve to the town pier was too great, and he could make out nothing but a stray note of a cornet now and then.

"Come, play up louder, old man; can't hear. Nothing like a bit of music now and then. That's one good in being a soldier: you do have a band, while we poor beggars have to carry a rifle without. But there, a man can drop this when he likes, and a soldier can't."

He took a turn or two up and down, and stopped again to look up the steep cliff slope running high above him from the shelf on which his duty lay, this being over one of the spots where it would be possible for a daring cragsman to get down to the sea.

"Shouldn't mind a gla.s.s of beer," he thought. "Salt in the air, I suppose. Well, I can get that by and by. Lord, what's a fellow got to grumble about? How would it be to do one's bit inside! Some of 'em pays pretty dear for their little games, and one can't help feeling sorry for one now and then. Bah! lot's of 'em are best there. They'd think no more of coming behind me in the dark and chucking me into the sea than kissing their hands. Ugh!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, with a shudder, as he gripped his piece more tightly, and gave a sharp glance; round and up above him at the black crags. "What a fool I am to think of such things, only a chap can't help it in such a lonesome place. Well, one side is safe," he muttered, with a half laugh. "So are the others, stupid poor devils! Not much chance for any of them coming out for a quiet pipe to-night."

A faint note or two from the distant band on the pier, floated to the warder, and he went on musing:

"Now, I dessay if I was over yonder having a smoke and listening to that music I should think nothing of it, and be for getting back somewhere to have a bit o' supper; but because I'm here and can't get near it every tootle of that old cornet sounds 'eavenly; and the lights seem grand.