From Out the Vasty Deep by Mrs. Belloc Lowndes (page 4)

did either Bubbles or Bill Donnington.

The doctor recalled a certain terrible day, rather over a year ago, when Varick had broken down utterly! It was the afternoon that poor Milly was being put into her coffin; and, by sheer good luck he, Panton, happened to call in. He had found Varick sitting alone, looking very desolate, in the dining-room of the commonplace little villa, while from overhead there came the sounds of heavy feet moving this way and that.

All at once there had come a loud knock at the front door, and Varick, starting up, had uttered a fearful cry. Then, sitting down again, he had begun trembling, as if he had the ague. He, Panton, had been so concerned at the poor fellow’s condition that he had insisted, there and then, on taking him along to his own house, and he had kept him there as his guest till the day of Mrs. Varick’s funeral.

As these memories came crowding on him, the door of his room opened quietly, and the man who was filling his mind walked in.

Varick was already dressed for dinner, and, not for the first time, the doctor told himself what a distinguished-looking man his friend and host was.

“Panton,” said Varick abruptly, “I have something on my mind.”

The doctor looked up, surprised. “What is it, my dear fellow?” he asked kindly.

“I can’t help thinking that in some inexplicable way I pushed Bubbles Dunster over the edge of that embankment. Has she said anything to you about it?”

Dr. Panton got up and came over to the speaker. He put his hand heavily on Varick’s shoulder, and almost forced him down into the chair from which he had himself risen.

“Look here,” he exclaimed, “this won’t do at all! Pull yourself together, man–you mustn’t get such fancies into your head. That way madness lies. Still, you may as well try and get it off your chest once for all. Tell me exactly what _did_ happen? Begin at the beginning–“

As Varick remained silent, the doctor went on, encouragingly: “I will start you by reminding you that Miss Bubbles was wearing the most absurd high-heeled shoes. Young Donnington spoke to her about them, and that drew my attention to her feet as we came out of the gate. She even tripped when we were just past the bridge. Do you remember that?”

“No, I didn’t notice her at all.”

“Well, tell me exactly what happened just before she fell over the edge of the embankment?”

“I don’t know that there’s very much to tell.” Varick was now staring into the fire, but at last he began in a strained, tired voice:

“Donnington had just shouted out that we were walking rather too near to the edge, and so I took hold of her arm. But you know what Bubbles is like? She’s a queer kind of girl, and she tried to wrench herself free. Then I gripped a little harder and–well, I don’t know exactly what did happen! I suppose her foot turned, for I suddenly felt her weight full on me, and then, and then–“

“Yes,” said Dr. Panton soothingly, “I know exactly what happened. You instinctively straightened yourself to try to put her on her feet again, but she’d already lost her balance–“

“I suppose that’s what did happen,” said Varick in a low voice.

“–And her foot turning again, she rolled down the steep embankment,” concluded the doctor firmly. “You did nothing, my dear chap, absolutely nothing, to bring the accident about! Put that idea, once and for all, out of your mind.”

“I would,” said Varick painfully, “I would, but that I’m afraid–in fact, I feel sure–that she thinks I pushed her in. She turned the most awful look on me, Panton, as she fell over the edge. I shall never forget it.”

“That look had nothing to do with you,” said the doctor decidedly. “It was simply the terrified look of a human being on the brink of a frightful death.”

“You’re a good friend,” muttered Varick, getting up. “I’ll leave you to dress now.”

“Wait a moment!” exclaimed Panton; “there’s one thing about Miss Bubbles’ accident which does trouble me, I admit. It puzzled me at the time; and I can see it is puzzling young Donnington too.”

Varick, who was already at the door, stayed his steps and turned round.

There had come back into his face the strained look which had softened away while he listened to his friend’s sensible remarks. “Yes,” he said impatiently, “yes, Panton? What is it that puzzles you?”

“I wish I knew exactly how long Miss Bubbles was in the water. She was very, very far gone when that boy managed to clutch hold of her. Did you see her go down again, and come up again twice? Forgive me, my dear fellow, I’m afraid I’m distressing you.”

“You asked me that downstairs,” said Varick, “and I told you then that–that I didn’t know.”

“I thought,” said Dr. Panton, “that you remembered so clearly all that had happened–by what you said just now.”

“Yes, up to the moment when she fell in, I remember everything. But once she was in the water everything became blurred. All I can say is that it seemed as if hours drifted by before I saw you all come running up towards me–“

“Come, come,” said Panton, a trifle impatiently. “As a matter of fact it can’t have been more than three minutes. Still, it was long enough for the girl to go as near the Great Divide, as a friend of mine calls it, as I’ve ever known a human being go.”

“I suppose,” said Varick slowly, “that if you hadn’t been there Bubbles would now be dead?”

“Well, yes, I’m afraid that’s true,” said the doctor simply. “I should have expected that clever, intelligent Miss Farrow, to say nothing of Miss Brabazon, to know something about First Aid. But neither of them know anything! The only person who was of the slightest use was young Donnington; and I suspect–” he smiled broadly.

“What do you suspect?” asked Varick rather quickly.

“Well, I suspect that he’s in love with Miss Bubbles.”

“Of course he is.” Varick’s contemptuous tone jarred a little on Panton. “But Bubbles intends to become Mrs. Tapster.”

“I should be sorry to think that!”

“Why sorry? The modern young woman–and Bubbles is a very modern young woman–knows the value of money,” said Varick dryly.

He waited a moment. “I’ll leave you now, Panton, and I’ll see that the dinner-bell isn’t rung till you’re quite ready.”

“All right. I won’t be ten minutes–“

But Varick lingered by the door. “Panton,” he exclaimed, “you’ve been a good friend to me! I want to tell you that I shall never forget it. As long as there’s breath in my body I shall be grateful to you.”

As the doctor dressed he told himself again that Varick had never really recovered from the strain of his wife’s long illness. Under that rather exceptionally calm, steadfast-looking exterior, the man was extraordinarily sensitive. How upset, for instance, Varick had been about Miss Pigchalke’s crazy advertisement. He, Panton, had felt quite sorry that he had said anything about it.

While putting on his tie, he told himself that what the dear fellow wanted now was a good, sensible second wife. And then, as he formulated that thought to himself, the young man–for he was still quite a young man–stopped what he was doing, and rubbed his hands joyfully. Why, of course! What a fool he had been never to think of it before–though to be sure it would really have been almost indecent to have thought of it before. Helen Brabazon? The very woman for Lionel Varick! Such a marriage would be the making of his highly-strung, fine-natured friend.

As he hurriedly finished dressing, Panton plumed himself on his cleverness. With all his heart he hoped the day would come when he would be able to say to Varick: “Ages before _you_ thought of her, old chap, _I_ selected Miss Brabazon as your future bride!” He hoped, uneasily, that Sir Lyon was not seriously in the running. But he had noticed that Sir Lyon and Miss Brabazon seemed to have a good deal to say to one another. Women, so he told himself ruefully, like to be “My lady.” But she was certainly fond of Varick–she had been fond of him (of course, only as a woman may be of a friend’s husband) during those sad weeks at Redsands.

* * * * *

As the doctor came out of his room he decided to go in for a moment and see Bubbles Dunster. Somehow he did not feel quite easy about her. He wondered, uncomfortably, if there could be anything in Varick’s painful suspicion. After her aunt and Helen Brabazon between them had put her to bed, and he had come in, alone, to see how she was, she had said abruptly: “I wonder if it’s true that doctors can keep a secret better than most men?” And when he had made some joking answer, she had asked, in a very serious tone: “You’re a great friend of Lionel Varick, eh?” He had answered: “Men don’t vow eternal friendships in the way I’m told young ladies do; but, yes, I hope I am a great friend of Lionel Varick’s. I’ve a high opinion of him, Miss Bubbles, and I’ve seen him under circumstances that test a man.”

She had looked at him fixedly while he said these words, and then she had opened and shut her eyes in a very odd way. He now asked himself if it was probable–possible–conceivable–that she blamed Varick for her accident? He, Varick, evidently thought so.

And then, as he walked along the darkened corridor, there came over Dr. Panton a most extraordinary feeling–_a feeling that he was not alone._

He stayed his steps, and listened intently. But the only sound he heard was the ticking of a clock. He walked on, and all at once there came a word repeated twice, quite distinctly, almost as if in his ear. It was a disagreeable, an offensive word–a word, or rather an appellation, which the clever young doctor had not heard applied to himself for a good many years. For, twice over, was the word “Fool!” repeated in a mocking voice, a voice to whose owner he could not at the moment put a name, and yet which seemed vaguely familiar.

Then he remembered. Why, of course, it was the voice of that crazy, unpleasant old woman who had called on him last spring! But how had Miss Pigchalke found her way into Wyndfell Hall? And where on earth was she?

He looked round him, this way and that; and his eyes, by now accustomed to the dim light thrown by a hanging lamp, saw everything quite distinctly. He was certainly alone in the corridor now. But Miss Pigchalke had as certainly been there a moment ago. He wondered if she could have hidden herself in a huge oak chest which stood to his right? Nay, there she could not be, for he remembered having been shown that it was full of eighteenth-century gala gowns.

And while he was looking about him, feeling utterly perplexed and bewildered, through a door which was ajar there suddenly passed out Lionel Varick.

“Is anyone in there?” asked the doctor sharply.

Varick started violently. “You did startle me!” he exclaimed. “No, there’s no one in there–I came up to look for a book. But as I told them to delay dinner yet a little longer, would you mind if we went in and saw Bubbles together on our way downstairs? I feel I should rather like to get my first interview with her over–and with you there.”

“I don’t see why you shouldn’t.” But there was a doubtful ring in Dr. Panton’s voice. He would, as a matter of fact, have very much preferred that Varick should not see the girl to-night, especially if there was the slightest truth in the other’s suspicion that Bubbles believed him to have been in any way instrumental, however accidentally, in making her fall into the water.

His mind worked quickly, as minds are apt to work when faced with that sort of problem, and he decided that on the whole he might as well let Varick do as he wished.

“You’d better not say very much to her. Just say you hope she’s feeling all right by now–or something of that sort.”

But when they came to the closed door of the girl’s room he turned and said: “I’ll just go in and prepare her for your visit–if you don’t mind?”

* * * * *

Bubbles was lying straight down in bed, for, at her own request, the bolster had been taken away. Her head was only just raised up on the pillow. By the light of the one candle he could see her slender form outlined under the bed-clothes. Her eyes were closed, her features pinched and worn. There was something almost deathly in the look of her little face.

He wondered if she was asleep–if so, it would be rather a relief to him to go outside the door and tell Varick that she mustn’t be disturbed. But all at once she opened her eyes widely, and there even came the quiver of a smile over her face.

“Doctor?” she said plaintively. “Doctor, come nearer, I want to ask you a question.”

“Yes?” he said. “What is it, Miss Bubbles?”

“I want to ask you,” she said dreamily, “why you brought me back? I was beginning to feel so much at home in the grey world. There were such kind people there, waiting to welcome me. Only one friend I felt sad to leave behind—-“

“Tut-tut!” he said, a little startled. “You were never anywhere near leaving us, Miss Bubbles.”

“I know I was, and you know it, too. But you called me back. Confess that you did!”

“I’ll confess nothing of the sort,” he answered a little shortly.

There was a little pause, and then he went on, “There’s someone outside the door who wants to see you; someone who’s feeling most awfully miserable about you.”

A look of unease and of anxiety came over her face. “D’you mean Mr. Tapster?” she said hesitatingly.

“Good heavens, no!” He was surprised, and a little disgusted. “Can’t you guess who it is?”

He saw the look in her face grow to shrinking fear. “I can’t guess at all,” she said weakly. “You won’t allow Bill to get up–I know that because he sent me a message. Bill’s the only person I want to see.”

“He’ll come soon enough,” said Dr. Panton, smiling.

“It was really Bill who saved me,” she went on, as if speaking to herself.

“Of course it was Bill!” he spoke now with hearty assent. “You’ve a splendid friend in that young man, Miss Bubbles, and I hope you’re properly grateful to him?”

“I think I am,” she said slowly. “I’m trying to be.”

“And the other friend who wants to see you–may he come in for a minute?”

“The other friend? Do you mean Sir Lyon?”

“No, no–of course not!” He spoke with a touch of impatience now.

“Mr. Tapster,” said Bubbles, nervously flying off at a tangent, “wants me to marry him, Dr. Panton. He asked me–was it yesterday morning, or this morning?” She knitted her brows. “Of course, I had to help him out. The moment he’d said it, he began to hope that I’d say ‘No’–so I thought I’d punish him, by leaving him in suspense a bit.”

“He was very distressed at your accident,” said the doctor rather stiffly. Bubbles’ queer confidence had startled him.

“Most men only really want what they feel is out of their reach,” she whispered. “When he thought me gone, he wanted me back again. He’s like that. He’ll make a much nicer widower than he will a husband!”

She looked up and smiled, but he felt as if she was keeping him at arm’s length.

“It’s Mr. Varick who’s outside the door and who wants to come in and see you,” he said suddenly, in a matter-of-fact voice.

Bubbles turned her head away quickly. “Not to-night, doctor; I’m too tired.” She spoke very decidedly, and in a stronger voice than she had yet used. “I’d rather wait till I get up before seeing Mr. Varick.”

“He only wants to come in for a minute–do see him.”

Dr. Panton spoke persuasively, but he told himself that Varick was right–Bubbles _had_ got that extraordinary, horrible notion into her head. “He’s very much upset,” he went on, “he thinks that unconsciously he may have given you some kind of push over the edge of the embankment.”

He saw her face change. It crimsoned darkly.

“Has he told you that?” she muttered.

“Yes, he has; and he’s awfully upset about it, Miss Bubbles.”

“I suppose I had better see him. I shall have to see him some time.”

She said the words between her teeth, and, making an effort, she sat up in bed.

Dr. Panton went to the door, and opened it.

“Come in,” he called out; “but don’t stay long, Varick. Miss Bubbles is very tired to-night.”

Varick came in slowly and advanced with curiously hesitating, nervous steps, towards the bed. “Well, Bubbles,” he exclaimed, “I’m glad you’re no worse for your ducking!”

She looked at him fixedly, but said nothing. Dr. Panton began to feel desperately uncomfortable.

“I hope you’ll be quite all right to-morrow,” went on Varick.

“I think I shall, thank you.”

Bubbles seemed to be looking beyond her visitor–not at him. She seemed to be gazing at something at the other end of the room.

“You’ve brought someone in with you,” she said suddenly. There was a curious tone–almost a tone of exultation–in her voice. “Who is it?” she asked imperiously. “Tell me who it is–Lionel.”

She very rarely called Varick “Lionel.”

He wheeled round with a startled look. “There’s no one here,” he answered, “but Dr. Panton and myself.”

“Oh yes, there is.” Bubbles spoke very positively. “There’s a woman here. I can see her quite distinctly in the firelight. She’s got a fat, angry face, and untidy grey hair. Hullo, she’s gone now!”

Bubbles fell back on to her pillow and closed her eyes. It was as if she was dismissing them.

Varick turned uneasily to the doctor. “Is she delirious?” he whispered.

The doctor shook his head. He also was startled–startled more than surprised. For in just Bubbles’ words would he have described the odious woman who had come to see him last spring, and whose voice he had heard within the last few minutes.

He now had no doubt that Miss Pigchalke had been in the corridor, or, more likely, in some room opening out of it, and that she had followed Varick into this darkened room and then, noiselessly, slipped out again.

Bubbles opened her eyes.

“I’ll come up after dinner for a few minutes,” said Dr. Panton. Bubbles made no answer; her eyes were now following Varick out of the door.

The doctor lingered for a moment. “You’re _sure_ there was someone there?” he asked.

“Of course I’m sure.” Bubbles spoke quite positively. “I’m sure”–and then he saw a change come over her face–“and yet I don’t know that I am quite sure,” she murmured dreamily.

As Dr. Panton went down the shallow oak staircase he felt in a turmoil of doubt and discomfort. To his mind there was no reasonable doubt that Miss Pigchalke had somehow effected an entrance to Wyndfell Hall. She had lived there for long years; she must know every corner of the strange old house.

When he reached the hall where the whole party was gathered together, he went up to Blanche Farrow. “May I speak to you a moment?” he whispered.

“What is it?” she asked anxiously. “Isn’t Bubbles so well?”

“Oh, yes; Miss Bubbles is going on all right. But, Miss Farrow? I want to tell you something that, if possible, I should like to keep from Varick.”

“Yes–what is it?”

“Someone who has a grudge against him, a tiresome old woman who was companion to Mrs. Varick for many years, has somehow got into this house. She spoke to me just as I came out of my room. I didn’t see her, but I heard her voice quite distinctly. And when Varick and I went into Miss Bubbles’ room for a moment, on our way downstairs, she followed us in–Miss Bubbles described her exactly. Then suddenly she disappeared. I am sure she’s hiding in one of the bedrooms.”

“What a horrid idea!” exclaimed Blanche.

“Now comes the question–can we manage to hunt her out, and get her away from the house, without Varick knowing?”

“But why shouldn’t he know?” asked Blanche hesitatingly.

“Look at him,” said the doctor impressively. And Blanche, glancing quickly across the room, was struck by Varick’s look of illness.

“There’s no reason for telling him anything about it,” she admitted. “But hadn’t we better wait till after dinner before doing anything?”

“Perhaps we had.”

Dinner was a curious, uncomfortable meal; even Sir Lyon and Helen Brabazon felt the atmosphere charged with anxiety and depression.

Miss Burnaby alone was her usual placid, quietly greedy self. She had expressed suitable regret at all that had happened, but most of the party realized that she had not really cared at all.

When the ladies passed through into the white parlour, Blanche slipped away. She got hold of her firm ally, the butler, and explained in a very few words what she thought had better be done. Accompanied by Pegler, they went into every room, and into every nook and cranny of the house, upstairs and down–but they found no trace of any alien presence.

Miss Pigchalke, so much was clear, had vanished as quietly and silently as she had come.

CHAPTER XVIII

One–two–three–four–five–six–Bubbles heard the clock in the dark corridor outside her room ring out the harmonious chimes, and she turned restlessly round in her warm, comfortable bed.

It was very annoying to think she would have to wait two hours for a cup of tea, but there it was! She had herself told Pegler she didn’t want to be disturbed till eight o’clock. She still felt too “done,” too weak, to get up and try to find her way to the kitchen to make herself some tea.

She lay, with her eyes wide open, longing for the daylight, and looking back with shrinking fear to a night full of a misty horror.

Again and again she had lived through that awful moment when Varick had pushed her over the edge of the embankment, to roll quickly, softly, inexorably, into the icy-cold water.

She knew he had pushed her over. To herself it was a fact which did not admit of any doubt at all. She had seen the mingled hatred and relief which had convulsed his face. It was with that face she would always see Lionel Varick henceforth.

There had been a moment when she had thought she would tell Dr. Panton; then she had come to the conclusion that there was no good purpose to be served by telling the strange and dreadful truth.

Some noble lines of Swinburne’s which had once been quoted to her by a friend she loved, floated into her mind–

“But ye, keep ye on earth
Your lips from over-speech,
Loud words and longing are so little worth; And the end is hard to reach.
For silence after grievous thing’s is good, And reverence, and the fear that makes men whole And shame, and righteous governance of blood, And Lordship of the Soul.
And from sharp words and wits men pluck no fruit, And gathering thorns they shake the tree at root; For words divide and rend,
But silence is most noble till the end.”

As she lay there, feeling physically so ill and weak, while yet her mind worked so clearly and quickly, she set herself to solve a painful puzzle. Why had Varick tried to do her to death? She admitted to herself that she had never liked him, but she had never done him any harm. And they had been on good terms–outwardly–always.

For hours, amid fitful, nightmarish snatches of sleep, and long, lucid intervals of thought, Bubbles had wrestled with the question.

And then, lying there in the early morning, Bubbles _suddenly knew_. Varick hated and feared her because she had unwittingly raised his wife from the dead. And, believing that if he killed her, he would lay that sinister, vengeful, unquiet ghost, he had deliberately planned yesterday’s expedition in order to do that which he had so nearly succeeded in doing.

Bubbles gave an eerie little chuckle which startled herself. “I’d have haunted him!” she muttered aloud. “He’d have found it more difficult to get rid of me dead than alive.”

Even as she murmured the words, the door opened, and she heard a voice say, hesitatingly, “Then you’re awake, Bubbles? Somehow I felt you were awake, and I thought you might like a cup of tea.”

It was Bill Donnington, with a lighted candle in one hand, and a cup of tea in the other.

How glad she was to see him! How very, very glad! Yet he only looked his usual sober, unromantic self, standing there at the bottom of her pretty old walnut-wood bed, looking at her with all his wistful, faithful soul in his eyes.

Bill was fully dressed, and Bubbles burst out laughing, feebly.

“You _are_ an early bird!” she exclaimed. “And a very proper bird, too. I suppose you thought you mustn’t come into my room in a dressing-gown?”

“I haven’t slept all night,” he said stiffly. “So I got up an hour ago. I came and looked in here, as a matter of fact, on my way to the bathroom. But you were asleep. And then, after I was dressed, I went down to the kitchen, and made myself a cup of tea. I thought I’d make one for you, too, just on chance.”

He came up close to her, and Bubbles, shaking back her short curly hair, took the cup from him. “This _is_ delicious! You _are_ a good sort, Bill!”

He sat down on the end of her bed while she thirstily, greedily, drank the tea he had brought her. In all her gestures there was something bird-like and exquisite. Even when she was greedy Bubbles was dainty too.

“I do hope you’re feeling none the worse”–he began.

And she mimicked him, gleefully, speaking in a low whisper. “None the worse, thank you! It’s a comfort, sometimes, to be with a person who always says exactly what you might expect he would say! I’m always sure of that comfort with you–old thing.”

“Are you?” He smiled his slow, doubtful smile, and Bubbles said suddenly: “You’ve gone and left the door open.”

He stood up, irresolute. “I suppose I ought to go away,” he said hesitatingly.

She exclaimed: “No, no, Bill! I won’t have you go away! I don’t want you to go away! I want you to stay with me. But you must shut the door, for it’s very cold.”

“D’you think I’d better shut the door?” he asked.

And then Bubbles seized his lean, strong hand. “Oh! I see what you mean!” she exclaimed. “You actually think your being in here is more proper if the door is open? But it isn’t a bit–for everyone in the house but us two is fast asleep! Still, that won’t go on long. So shut the door at once! I’ve something very important to say to you–something which I certainly don’t want Pegler to hear me say to you. Pegler may come down any moment–she’s such a good sort, under that stiff, cross manner. It’s so queer she should disapprove of me, and approve of my Aunt Blanche, isn’t it?”

He got up, and going to the door, shut it.

“Lock it!” she called out. “Lock it, Bill! I don’t want to be disturbed;” she repeated in an odd voice, “I’ve something very important to say to you.”

But this time he did not obey her, and as he came back towards the bed he said anxiously, “D’you still feel _very_ bad, Bubbles?”

There was a tone of great tenderness and solicitude in his voice.

“Of course I do. So would you, if you’d died and come to life again.”

“You didn’t do that,” he said in a low voice. “But you were very nearly drowned, Bubbles. However, we must try to forget it.”

Again she mimicked him: “‘We must try to forget it.’ I was waiting for you to say that, too. As if we should ever forget it! But we won’t think about it just now–because we’ve got to think of something else that’s much more to the present purpose.”

“Yes,” he said soothingly. “Yes, Bubbles?”

Poor Bill felt very uncomfortable. He did not wish prim Miss Pegler to come in and find him sitting on Bubbles’ bed, when no one was yet up in the house. These modern, unconventional ways were all very well, and he knew they often did not really mean anything, but still–but still …

“Did you ever hear of the King’s Serf?” asked Bubbles suddenly.

“The King’s Serf?” he repeated, bewildered.

“When the rope which was hanging some poor devil of a highwayman broke–when the axe was too blunt to cut a robber rascal’s head off–when a man being condemned to death survived by some extraordinary accident–well, such a man became thereafter the King’s Serf. He belonged to the King, body, soul, and spirit, and no one but the King could touch him. He lost his identity. He was above the law!”

Bubbles said all this very, very fast–almost as if she had learnt it off by heart.

“What a curious thing,” said Bill slowly.

Bubbles had so many queer, out-of-the-way bits of knowledge. She was always surprising him by the things she knew. It was the more curious that she never seemed to open a book.

“Come a little nearer,” she ordered. “You’re so far away, Bill!”

She spoke with a touch of imperious fretfulness, and he moved a little further up the bed.

“Nearer, nearer!” she cried; and then she suddenly sat up in bed, and flinging her arms round him, she laid her dark, curly head on his faithful heart. “I want to tell you,” she whispered, “that from now onward I’m Bill Donnington’s Serf–much more than that poor brute I’ve told you of was ever the King’s Serf. For, after all, the King hadn’t cut the rope, or blunted the edge of the hatchet—-“

“Bubbles!” he exclaimed. “Oh, Bubbles, d’you really mean that?”

“Of course I mean it! What I gave I had, what I gained I lost, what I lost I gained.”

“What do you mean, darling?” he whispered.

“I mean that the moment that stupid doctor allows me to get up–then you and I will skip off by ourselves, and we’ll say, ‘Hullo, here’s a church! Let’s go in and get married.'”

She waited a moment, but Bill Donnington said nothing. He only held her closer to him.

“In the night,” went on Bubbles, “I was wondering if we’d be married in that strange old church near here, our church, the church with the animals. And then I thought no, we wouldn’t do that, for I am not likely to want ever to come back here again. So we’ll be married in London, in a City church, in the church where John Gilpin and his family went to what I suppose they called ‘worship.’ It’s there you will have to say you worship me, Bill!”

She lifted her head, and looked into his face. “Oh, Bill,” she said, her voice trembling a little, “you do look happy!”

“I am happy, but I–I can’t quite believe it,” he said slowly; “it’s too good to be true.”

“I hope you’ll go on being happy,” she said, again pressing closer to him. “But you know that sometimes, Bill–well, I _shall_ dine at Edmonton while you do dine at Ware. It’s no good my trying to conceal that from you.”

“I–I don’t understand,” he stammered out. What did Bubbles mean by saying that?

“You’ll know soon enough,” she said, with that little wise look of hers–the little look he loved. “But whenever I’m naughty or unreasonable, or, or selfish, Bill–I’m afraid I shall often be _very_ selfish–then you must just turn to me, and say: ‘You know, Bubbles, when all’s said and done, you’re my Serf; but for me you wouldn’t be here.'”

Bill Donnington looked at her, and then he said solemnly and very deliberately: “I don’t feel that you ought to marry me out of gratitude, Bubbles.”

She took her hands off his shoulders, and clapped them gleefully. “I was waiting for that, too!” she exclaimed. “I wonder you didn’t say it at once–I quite thought you would.”

He said seriously: “But I really mean it. I couldn’t bear to think that you married me just because I dragged you out of the water.”

“I’m really marrying you, if you want to know,” she exclaimed, “because of Mr. Tapster! During the last few days–I wonder if you’ve noticed it, Bill?” (he had, indeed)–“that man has looked at me as if I was _his_ serf–that’s a polite way of putting it–and I don’t like it. But I’ve got a friend–you know Phyllis Burley? I think she’d do for him exactly! It would be so nice, too, for she’s devoted to me, and we should have the use of one of their motors whenever we felt like it.”

Bill shook his head decidedly. “We never should feel like it,” he said; “even if Phyllis did marry Mr. Tapster, which I greatly doubt she’d even think of doing.”

“I’m going to tell him to-day,” she went on, “that he’s got to marry her. There’s nothing indelicate about my saying that, because they’ve never met. But it’ll work in his brain, you see if it doesn’t, like yeast in new bread! Then I’ll bring them together, and then, and then–“

“And then,” said Bill deliberately, “you’ll never, with my goodwill, see him again. So find him a wife whom you don’t like, Bubbles.”

She looked at him meditatively. “Very well,” she said. “That will be my first sacrifice for you, Bill. I’ll save him up for Violet Purton. She’s a horrid girl–and won’t she make his money fly!”

He was smiling at her rather oddly.

“Bill!” she exclaimed, startled. “Bill! I do believe you’re going to be master–“

And then she flung her arms again round his neck. “Kiss me,” she commanded, “kiss me, Bill. And then you must go away, for it isn’t proper that you should be here, at this time of the morning, now that we’re engaged!”

CHAPTER XIX

That same morning, but a good deal later, Blanche Farrow woke with a start to find Pegler standing at her bedside with just one letter in her hand.

Pegler was smiling. It was not a real smile, but just a general softening of her plain, severe face.

Pegler knew that her lady had been rather “put out” at not having received her usual Christmas letter from Mr. Mark Gifford. She had spoken of it twice to Pegler, once lightly, on December 27, and then again, in a rather upset way, on the 29th. After that she had pretended to forget all about it. But Pegler felt sure Miss Farrow did remember–often. And now here was the letter–a much fatter letter than usual, too.

Pegler, of course, said nothing. It was not her place to know the hand-writing of any of the gentlemen who wrote to her mistress.

Miss Farrow took the letter, and there came a faint, a very faint, flush over her face. She said: “I hope Miss Bubbles has had a good night. Have you been in to her yet, Pegler?”

“Yes, ma’am. She looks rather excited-like. But as you know, ma’am, that’s a good sign with her.”

“Yes, I think it is, Pegler.”

Pegler slipped noiselessly away, and then Blanche opened the envelope containing Mark Gifford’s long-delayed Christmas letter.

“Home Office, “_December 23rd_.

“MY DEAR BLANCHE,

“‘How use doth breed a habit in a man!’ Well anyhow, as you know, it is my custom, which has now attained the dignity of a habit, always to write you a letter for Christmas. Hitherto I have always known where it would find you, but this year is an exception, for I really have no idea where you are.

“This year is an exception in another respect also. Hitherto, my dear Blanche, I have, with a tact which I hope you have silently appreciated, always managed to keep out of my Christmas letter any reference to what you know I have never given up hoping for even against hope. But this time I can’t keep it out because I have had a really good idea. Even a Civil Servant may have a good idea sometimes, and I assure you that this came to me out of office hours–as a matter of fact it came to me when I was sitting in that funny little old Westminster churchyard where we once spent what was, to me, the happiest of half-hours.

“I know you have thought me unsympathetic and disapproving about that which holds for you so great a fascination. Disapproving, yes; I can’t help disapproving of gambling, especially in a woman; but unsympathetic, no–a thousand times no. Sympathy is understanding, and, believe me, I do understand, and therefore I propose this plan.

“If you will do me the honour of marrying me, I propose that once or even twice every year you should go off to Monte Carlo, or wherever else you like, and play to your heart’s content. I promise never to reproach you, above all never to administer those silent reproaches which I think are always the hardest to bear. Yes, I will always play the game, I pledge myself to that most faithfully.

“Forgive me for referring to something which makes my plan easier to carry out. This year two accidents, the death of one colleague, and the premature retirement of another, have pushed me up the ladder of promotion, and, in addition, there has been a legacy. The English of that is that for our joint _menage_ we shouldn’t want your income at all; we could quite well do without it, and you would be perfectly free to use it in whatever way you like.

“There! That is my plan. Now, dearest of women, say yes and make us both happy, for you would make me so happy that I couldn’t help making you happy too. I wish I had any idea where you will be when you read this letter, on which hangs all my hopes. Perhaps you will read it at Monte, out on the Corniche Road. Don’t let the fact that you have been lucky at play make _me_ unlucky in–you know what!

“Yours ever (this is no figure of speech),

“Mark Gifford.”

Blanche Farrow sighed and smiled, as she deliberately read the long letter through twice. Somehow it warmed her heart; and yet would she ever be able to give up the life which in many ways suited her so well? If she married Mark–dear, kind, generous-hearted Mark–various friendships which, even if they did not mean so much to her as they appeared to do, yet meant a good deal in her present lonely life, would certainly have to be given up. To take but one instance. It had almost been an instinct with her to keep Lionel Varick and Mark Gifford apart. In the old days she had been disagreeably aware of how absolutely Gifford had always disapproved of Varick, and of Varick’s various ways of trying, often successfully, to raise the wind. Of course, everything was now different with regard to this particular friend. Varick had become–by what anyone not a hypocrite must admit had been a fortunate circumstance–a respectable member of society; but, even so, she knew, deep in her heart, that he and the man whose letter she held in her hand would never like one another.

And yet she was tired–so tired!–of the sort of life she led, year in and year out. Her nerves were no longer what they had once been. For instance, the strange series of happenings that had just taken place here, at Wyndfell Hall, had thoroughly upset her; and as for the horrible thing that had occurred yesterday, she hadn’t been able to sleep all night for thinking of it. Nothing that had ever happened in her now long life had had quite the effect on Blanche Farrow that Bubbles’ accident had had. She had realized, suddenly, how fond she was of the girl–how strong in all of us is the call of the blood! As she had stood watching Dr. Panton’s untiring efforts to restore the circulation of the apparently drowned girl there had gone up from Blanche’s heart a wild, instinctive prayer to the God in whom she did not believe, to spare the child.

Perhaps just because she had not broken down before, she felt the more now all that had happened in the way of the strange, the sinister, and the untoward during the last fortnight. And all at once, after reading yet again right through the quiet, measured letter of her old friend and constant lover, Blanche Farrow suddenly burst into a passion of tears.

And then it struck her as funny, as even absurd, that she should cry like this! She hadn’t cried for years and years–in fact, she could hardly remember the day when she had last cried.

She jumped out of bed and put on her dressing-gown, for it was very cold, and then she went and gazed at her reflection in the one looking-glass in the room. It was a beautiful old Jacobean mirror fixed over the dressing-table.

Heavens! What a fright she looked! Do tears always have that disfiguring effect on a woman? This must be a lesson to her. She dabbed her eyes with a wet handkerchief, and then she went over to the writing-table and sat down.

For the first time in her life Blanche Farrow wrote Mark Gifford a really grateful, sincere letter. She said, truly, how touched she was by his long devotion and by all his goodness to her. She admitted, humbly, that she wished she were worthy of it all. But she finally added that she feared she could never find it in her heart and conscience to say that she would do what he wished. She had become too old, too set in her ways….

Yet it was with a heavy heart that she wrote her long letter in answer to his, and it took her a long time, for she often waited a few moments in between the sentences.

How strange was her relationship to this man of whom she saw so little, and yet with whom she felt on close, intangible terms of intimacy! His work tied him to London, and of late years she had not been much in London. He knew very little of her movements. Why, this very letter had been sent to her, care of her London club, the club which had its uses–principally–when she wanted to entertain Mark Gifford himself to lunch or dinner.

His letter had wandered to yet another address–an address she had left at the club weeks ago, the only address they had. From thence it had reached the last house where she had been staying before she had come to Wyndfell Hall. The wonderful thing was that the letter had reached her at all. But she was very glad it had come, if only at long last.

After her letter was finished, she suddenly felt that she must put in a word to account for the delay in her answer to what should have received an immediate reply. And so she added a postscript, which, unlike most women’s postscripts, was of really very little importance–or so the writer thought.

This unimportant postscript ran:

“Your letter had followed me round to about half-a-dozen places. Bubbles Dunster and I have been spending Christmas in this wonderful old house, Wyndfell Hall, our host being Lionel Varick. He struck oil in the shape of an heiress two years ago. She died last year; and he has become a most respectable member of society. I know you didn’t much like him, though he’s often spoken to me very gratefully of the good turn you did him years ago.”

Blanche hesitated, pen in hand. Of course, it was not necessary that she should mention the name of her host. She might rewrite the last page of her letter, and leave the postscript out. It was unfortunately true that Mark had taken a violent prejudice against the man he had befriended to such good purpose years and years ago. She had been still young then–young and, as she was quite willing to admit now, very foolish. In fact, she looked back to the Blanche Farrow of those days, as we are sometimes apt to look back at our younger selves, with amazement and disapproval, rather than sympathy. But there was a streak of valiant honesty in her nature. She let what had been written stand, only adding the words:

“The party is breaking up to-morrow; but Bubbles, who had a disagreeable accident yesterday, will stay on here for a few days with me. All the same, I expect we shall be in London by the ninth; and then, perhaps, you and I might meet.”

It was by Bubbles’ special wish–nay, command, that her engagement to Bill Donnington was publicly announced that very morning, at breakfast, by her aunt. Everyone was much interested, and said the usual good-natured, rather silly, civil things; hence Blanche was glad Bill Donnington had breakfasted early, and so was not there.

Helen Brabazon was extremely excited and delighted at the news. “I suppose it happened yesterday morning!” she exclaimed. “For, of course, they haven’t seen one another alone since then. If they were already engaged, what awful agony poor Mr. Donnington must have gone through while you were trying to bring her to life again?”

She turned to Panton, and he answered thoughtfully, “I could see he was most terribly upset. Don’t you remember how he refused to go up to the house and change his wet clothes?”

Blanche couldn’t help glancing furtively from behind the teapot and high silver urn at James Tapster. His phlegmatic face had become very red. Almost at once he had got up and gone over to the dresser, and there, taking a long time about it, he had cut himself some slices of ham. She noticed, with relief, that he came back with a huge plateful, which he proceeded to eat with apparent appetite.

“And when is the wedding to take place?” asked Helen.

“Almost at once,” replied Blanche smiling. “Bubbles never does anything like anybody else! She’s set her heart on going to town the very moment Dr. Panton allows her to get up. Then they’re to be married without any fuss at all in one of the old City churches.”

“What a splendid idea!” cried Helen. “That’s just how _I_ should like to be married.”

“I, too,” said Sir Lyon, in his pleasant voice. “To me there’s always been something barbaric in the ordinary grand wedding.”

But Blanche Farrow shook her head. “Perhaps because I’m so much older than all of you,” she said good-humouredly, “I think there’s a great deal to be said for an old-fashioned wedding: white dress (white satin for choice), orange blossoms, St. George’s, Hanover Square, and all! I even like the crowd of people saying kind and unkind things in whispers to one another. I don’t think I should _feel_ myself married unless I went through all that–“

And then, at last, James Tapster said something. “Marriage is all rot!” he said, speaking, as was his unpleasant custom, with his mouth full. “There are very few happy married couples about.”

“That may be your experience,” said Varick, speaking for the first time since Blanche had told the great news. “I’m glad to say it isn’t mine. I think marriage far the happiest state–for either a man or a woman.”

He spoke with a good deal of feeling, and both Panton and Helen Brabazon felt very much touched. He had certainly made _his_ marriage a success.

Meanwhile, Blanche suspected that Dr. Panton had just had a letter containing disturbing news. She saw him read it twice over. Then he put it carefully in a note-book he took out of his pocket. “I shall have to go to-morrow, a day earlier than I thought,” he observed. “I’ve got an appointment in town on Thursday morning.”

Then Mr. Tapster announced that _he_ was going to-day, and though Varick seemed genuinely sorry, everyone else was secretly glad.

There are days in life which pass by without being distinguished by any outstanding happenings, and which yet remain in the mind as milestones on the road of life.

Such a day, at any rate to Blanche Farrow, was the day which saw the first disruption of Lionel Varick’s Christmas house party. Though Mr. Tapster was the only guest actually to leave Wyndfell Hall, all the arrangements concerning the departures of the morrow had to be made. Miss Burnaby, Helen Brabazon, and Sir Lyon Dilsford were to travel together. Dr. Panton was going by a later train, as was also Bill Donnington. Blanche herself, with of course Bubbles, was leaving on the Saturday.

As the day went on Blanche realized that Varick much desired that Helen Brabazon should also stay on till Saturday. But she, Blanche, thought this desire unreasonable. Though she had come to like her, she found the good, thoughtful, conscientious, and yet simple-minded Helen “heavy in hand”; she told herself that if Helen stayed on, the entertaining of the girl would fall on her, especially if, as Dr. Panton insisted, Bubbles must not get up till Friday at dinner-time.

Looking back, Blanche Farrow told herself that that day had been full of curious premonitions. Yet it had opened, in a sense happily for her, with the coming of Mark Gifford’s quaint, characteristic letter. Then had come the shock, and it had been a shock, of Bubbles’ engagement, and of the girl’s insistence on its being announced to the rest of the house party at once–at breakfast.

The only outstanding thing which happened, and it was indeed a small thing compared to the other two, was the departure of James Tapster. Blanche felt sorry for him–genuinely sorry. But she philosophically told herself that no amount of money, even had Bill Donnington never existed, could have made Bubbles even tolerably happy tied to such a man.

After Mr. Tapster had gone they all breathed the more freely. Yet Blanche somehow did not feel comfortable. What was wrong, for instance, with Lionel Varick? He looked ill at ease, as well as ill physically. Something seemed also to be weighing on Dr. Panton’s mind. Even Sir Lyon Dilsford was unlike his pleasant easy self. But Blanche thought she knew what ailed _him_.

Her only sheet anchor of comfort during that long, dull afternoon and evening was the thought that Bubbles’ life was set on the right lines at last … and that Mark Gifford had not changed.

CHAPTER XX

“HONBLE. BLANCHE FARROW–Wyndfell Hall–Darnaston–Suffolk–Very private–Meet me outside Darnaston Church at twelve o’clock, midday, to-morrow, Wednesday–MARK GIFFORD.”

Blanche sat up in bed and stared down at the telegraph form. What on earth did this mean? But for the fact that she knew it to be out of the question, she would have suspected a foolish and vulgar practical joke.

She noted that the telegram had been sent off at 9.30 the night before (just after Mark must have received her letter). She also saw that it had been inscribed for morning delivery. That was like Mark Gifford. He was nothing if not careful and precise with regard to everything of a business kind.

Then she began asking herself the sort of rather futile questions people do ask themselves, when puzzled, and made uneasy by what seems an inexplicable occurrence. How would Mark get to Darnaston by twelve o’clock to-day? Surely he could only do so by starting before it was light, and motoring the whole way from London?

She gazed at the words “very private.” What did they portend? Quickly she examined her conscience. No, she had done nothing–nothing which could have brought her into contact, even slightly, with the law. Of course, she was well aware that Mark had never forgotten, even over all these years, the dreadful scrape into which she had got herself by going to those gambling parties in the pleasant, quiet, Jermyn Street flat where she and Varick had first become acquainted. But that had been a sharp lesson, and one by which she had profited.

She next took a rapid mental survey of her family, all so much more respectable and prosperous than herself. The only person among them capable of getting into any real scrape was poor little Bubbles.

Bubbles was now practically well again. She had written out the announcement which was to appear in the _Times_ and the _Morning Post_, and had insisted on its being sent off.

Donnington had been somewhat perturbed by the thought of their engagement being thus at once made public. But Bubbles had observed cheerfully: “Once people know about it, I shan’t be able to get out of it, even if I want to!” To that Bill had said, sorely, that if she wanted to give him the chuck she should of course do so, even on the altar steps. Bubbles had laughed at that and exclaimed: “I only said it to tease you, old thing! The real truth is that I want father to understand that I really mean it–that’s all. He reads the _Times_ right through every day, and he’ll think it true if he sees it there. As for his tiresome widow, she’ll see it in the _Morning Post_–and then she’ll believe it, too!”

Blanche Farrow told herself that this mysterious and extraordinary message might have something to do with Bubbles; and as she got up, she went on thinking with increasing unease of the unexpected assignation which lay before her.

It was a comfort to feel that that disagreeable man, James Tapster, was gone, and that the rest of the party, with the exception of herself and Bubbles, were going to-day.

Something had again been said about Miss Burnaby and her niece staying on, and she had heard Varick pressing them earnestly to do so; but the old lady had been unwilling to break her plan, the more so that she had an appointment with her dentist. Then Varick had asked why Miss Brabazon shouldn’t stay on till Saturday? There had been a considerable discussion about it; but Blanche secretly hoped they would all go away. She felt tired and unlike herself. The events of the last few days had shaken her badly.

What an extraordinary difference a few moments can make in one’s outlook on life! Blanche Farrow was uncomfortably aware that she would never forget what had happened to her on New Year’s Eve. That strange and fearful experience had obliterated some of her clearest mental landmarks. She wished to think, she tried very hard to think, that in some mysterious way the vision she had seen with such terrible distinctness had been a projection from Bubbles’ brain–Bubbles’ uncanny gift working, perchance, on Lionel Varick’s mind and memory. She could not doubt that the two wraiths she had seen so clearly purported to be a survival of the human personalities of the two women who each had borne Varick’s name, and had been, for a while, so closely linked with him….

Yet long ago, when quite a young woman, she had come to the deliberate conclusion that there was no such survival of human personality.

Taking up Mark Gifford’s mysterious telegram, and one or two unimportant letters she had just received, she went downstairs, to see, as she came into the dining-room, that only Varick was already down.

He looked up, and she was shocked to see how ill and strained he looked. He had taken poor little Bubbles’ accident terribly to heart; Blanche knew he had a feeling–which was rather absurd, after all,–that he in some way could have prevented it.

But as he saw her come in his face lightened, and she felt touched. Poor Lionel! He was certainly very, very fond of her.

“I do hope Helen Brabazon will stay on with you and Bubbles,” he said eagerly. “I think I’ve nearly persuaded Miss Burnaby to let her do so. Do say a word to her, Blanche?”

“I will, if you like. But in that case, hadn’t we better ask Sir Lyon to stay on, too?”

“Dilsford!” he exclaimed. “Why on earth should we think of doing that?”

Blanche smiled. “Where are your eyes?” she asked. “Sir Lyon’s head over heels in love with Helen Brabazon; and I’ve been wondering these last few days whether that quiet, demure girl is quite as unconscious of his state as she pretends to be!”

And then, as she began pouring out a cup of tea for the man who was now looking at her with a dismayed, surprised expression on his face, she went on composedly: “It would be rather amusing if two engagements were to come out of your house-party, Lionel–wouldn’t it?”

But he answered at once, in a harsh, decided tone, “I think you’re quite mistaken, Blanche. Why, they’ve hardly exchanged two words together.”

Blanche put down the tea-pot. She began to laugh–she really couldn’t help it. “You must have been deaf as well as blind!” she exclaimed. “They’ve been together perpetually! I admit that that’s been his doing–not hers. For days past I’ve seen right into his mind–seen, I mean, the struggle that has been taking place between his pride and–yes, the extraordinary attraction that girl seems to have for him. He’s no fortune-hunter, you know; also, he wants so little, the lucky man, that I think her money would be a positive bother to him.”

Lionel Varick stared at Blanche Farrow. She had a way of being right about worldly matters–the triumph of experience over hope, as she had once observed cynically. But this time he felt sure she was wrong.

The feminine interest in a possible, probable, or even improbable love-affair always surprises the average man–surprises, and sometimes annoys him very much.

“Do you go so far as to say she returns this–this feeling you attribute to him?” he asked abruptly. He was relieved to see Blanche shake her head.

“No; I can’t say that I’ve detected any response on her part,” she said lightly. “But she’s very old-fashioned and reserved. She certainly enjoys Sir Lyon’s rather dull conversation, and she likes cross-examining him about the life of the poor. She’s a very good girl,” went on Blanche musingly. “She’s a tremendous sense of duty. One can never tell–but no, I don’t think the idea that Sir Lyon’s in love with her has yet crossed her mind! And I should say that she really prefers you to him. She has a tremendous opinion of you, Lionel. I wonder why?”

He laughed aloud, for the first time since Bubbles’ accident. He knew that what Blanche said was true, and it was a very pleasant, reassuring bit of knowledge.

“Old Burnaby would not think of allowing her to marry a penniless baronet,” he said smiling.

Blanche looked across at him quickly. “Good and obedient as she is to both those old things, I don’t think they’d be able to influence Helen Brabazon in such a thing as marriage.”

“Well, you may be right,” said Varick, doubtfully.

He felt strongly tempted to take Blanche into his confidence; to tell her, frankly, that he wished to marry Helen. Yet some obscure instinct held him back. Women, even the most sensible women, are so damned sentimental! So he told himself. Lately he had had the unpleasant, disconcerting feeling that whenever Helen looked at him she thought of “poor Milly.”

“Still, I don’t envy Sir Lyon his wooing,” went on Blanche. “Helen is a girl who’ll take a long time to make up her mind, and who will weigh all the pros and cons.”

“Then you don’t think,” said Varick in a low tone, “that she would ever be swept off her feet?”

At one time he had felt sure she would be.

“By a grand passion? My dear Lionel, what an absurd idea! But hush–“

The door opened, and the object of their discussion came in. Helen Brabazon always looked especially well as breakfast. It was her hour.

“How’s Bubbles this morning?” she asked.

And Blanche felt rather guilty. She hadn’t been into Bubbles’ room; her mind had been too full of other things. “She’s going on very well,” she answered composedly. “I think she might get up to-morrow, in spite of Dr. Panton.” And then, for she felt Varick was “willing” her to say it: “I do hope that you are going to stay on till Saturday, even if your aunt has to go away this afternoon.”

“Yes,” said Helen, and the colour deepened a little in her cheeks. “Yes, I’ve persuaded Auntie to let me stay on till you and Bubbles come up to London. It’s only two days, after all.”

“I _am_ glad.” There was a genuine thrill of satisfaction in Varick’s voice. This meant that he and the girl would be practically alone together all to-morrow and Friday.

“I think Sir Lyon could manage to stay on too, if you ask him.” Helen smiled guilelessly at her host. “I saw him just now. He and Dr. Panton were taking Span round to the kitchen, and when I said I was staying on, Sir Lyon said he thought he could stay on too, just till Saturday morning.”

Blanche could not forbear giving a covert glance of triumph at Varick’s surprised and annoyed face. “Of course,” she said quickly, “we shall be delighted to have Sir Lyon a little longer. I thought by what he said that he was absolutely obliged to go away to-day, by the same train as you and Miss Burnaby.”

“He certainly said so,” observed Varick coldly.

And then, for Blanche Farrow was above all things a woman of the world, when the other two men came in she made everything quite easy for Sir Lyon, pressing him to stay on, as if she had only just thought of it. But she noticed, with covert amusement, that he was very unlike his usual cool, collected self. He actually looked sheepish–yes, that was the only word for it! Also, he made rather a favour of staying. “I shall have to telegraph,” he said; “for I’d made all my arrangements to go back this afternoon.”

“As for me,” said Dr. Panton, “I must leave this afternoon, worse luck! But there it is.” He turned to Varick. “I’ve got an appointment in London to-morrow morning–one I can’t put off.”

Donnington came in at last. He looked radiant–indeed, his look of happiness was in curious contrast to the lowering expression which now clouded Varick’s face.

“Bubbles is nearly well again!” he cried joyfully. “She says she’ll get up to-morrow, doctor or no doctor!” He looked at Panton; then, turning to Blanche, in a lower tone: “Also, she’s shown me the most wonderful letter from her father, written to her before Christmas. I always thought he disliked me: but he liked me from the very first time we met–isn’t that strange?”

“Very strange,” said Blanche, smiling.

They all scattered after breakfast, but Miss Farrow noticed that Varick made a determined and successful attempt to carry off Helen Brabazon from Sir Lyon, who had obviously been lying in wait for her.

“What dogs in the manger men are!” she said to herself. And then she remembered, with a little gasp of dismay, her mysterious appointment with Mark Gifford. She knew him well enough to be sure that he would be in good time; but, even so, there was more than an hour to be got through somehow before she could start for Darnaston.

She went up to Bubbles’ room. Yes, the girl looked marvellously better–younger too, quite different!

There came a knock at the door while she was there, and Donnington came in.

“If you’d been wise,” said Bubbles, looking up at him, “you’d have made up to Helen Brabazon, Bill. She’s like an apple, just ready to fall off the tree.”

“What _do_ you mean?” asked Blanche.

“Just what I say. She’s tremendously in love with love!”

“D’you really think so?”

(If so, Sir Lyon’s task would be an easy one.)

“I know it,” said Bubbles positively. “I’ve made a close study of that girl. I confess I didn’t like her at first, and I will tell you why, though I know it will shock Bill.”

“I’ve always liked Miss Brabazon,” he said stoutly, “why didn’t you like her, Bubbles?”

“Because when she arrived here I saw that she was in love with Lionel Varick.”

“Don’t talk nonsense,” said her aunt reprovingly. “You know I don’t like that sort of joking.”

And as for Bill, he turned and walked towards the door. “I’ve got some letters to write,” he said crossly.

“Don’t go away, Bill. It isn’t a joke, Blanche–and I’m going really to shock _you_ now–unless, of course, you’re only pretending to be shocked?”

“What d’you mean?” said Blanche.

“I think Helen fell in love with Lionel Varick before his wife died.”

Bill said sharply: “I won’t have you say such disgusting things, Bubbles!” And he did indeed look disgusted.

“What a queer mind you’ve got,” said Bubbles reprovingly. “I mean, of course, in quite a proper way; that is, without the poor girl knowing anything about it. But I thing _he_ knew it right enough.”

Blanche remained silent. Bubbles’ words were making her feel curiously uneasy. They threw a light on certain things which had puzzled her.

“Lionel Varick marked her down long ago,” went on Bubbles slowly. “On the evening that she arrived I saw that he had quite made up his mind to marry her. But as the days went on I began to hope that he wouldn’t succeed.” She uttered these last words very, very seriously.

Her aunt looked at her, surprised at the feeling she threw into her voice. As for Donnington, he was staring at her dumbly and, yes, angrily. At last he said: “And why shouldn’t Varick marry her, if they both like one another?”

“You wouldn’t understand if I were to tell you. You’re too stupid and too good to understand.”

Donnington felt very much put out. He did not mind being called stupid, but what on earth did Bubbles mean by saying he was too good?

“I’m sure Lionel’s dead wife has been haunting Helen,” went on Bubbles rapidly, “quite, quite sure of it. And I’m glad she has! I should be sorry for any nice girl–for any woman, even a horrid woman–to marry Lionel Varick. There! I’ve said my say, and now I shall for ever hold my peace.”

They both stared at her, astonished by the passion and energy with which she uttered the curious words.

Bill looked down at the girl, and, though he felt hurt and angry with her, his heart suddenly softened. Bubbles looked very frail and tired lying there.

“Bill,” she said, “come here,” and he came, though not very willingly, closer to her.

She pulled him down. “I only want to tell you that I love you,” she whispered, and his anger, his irritation, vanished like snow in the sun.

Blanche was already at the door. She turned round. “Well, I must be off now to see the _chef_, and to make all sorts of arrangements. Sir Lyon is staying on–rather unlike him to change his mind, but he’s done so–at the last moment.”

“I wish _I_ could get a few more days’ holiday,” said Bill ruefully. “My number’s up this afternoon.”

The letters he had to write could go to blazes–of course he meant to spend each of the precious minutes that remained in the next few hours with Bubbles!

“You’ll be able to escort old Miss Burnaby to town, for Helen’s staying on,” went on Blanche.

“Helen staying on?” exclaimed Bubbles. “I’m glad of that! Oh, and Sir Lyon’s staying on, too?”

She suddenly gave one of her funny, eerie little chuckles; but she made no other comment.

“Yes,” called out Blanche. “And Dr. Panton’s going–so I’ve a good many little things to see to.”

Bill sprang to the door, and opened it for her.

As it shut she heard Bubbles’ voice, and it was a voice Blanche Farrow hardly knew. “Are you really sorry you’re going away from your little kid, Bill?”

Blanche sighed sharply. After all, so she told herself, there is something to be said for love’s young dream.

CHAPTER XXI

It marked ten minutes to twelve on the tower of the ancient chantry church of Darnaston as Blanche Farrow walked across the village green and past the group of thatched cottages composing the pretty hamlet which looks so small compared with its noble house of God. But, though she was early, the man she was to meet was evidently already there, for a big, mud-stained motor-car was drawn up in the lane which runs to the left of the church.

Feeling more and more apprehensive, she knew not of what, she walked up the path between the graves, and then suddenly she saw Mark Gifford–his spare, still active-looking figure framed in the stone porch, his plain, but pleasant, intelligent-looking face full of a grave welcome.

He stepped out of the porch and gripped her hand in silence.

She felt that he was deeply stirred, stirred as she had never known him to be–excepting, perhaps, on that occasion, years and years ago, when he had first asked her to be his wife.

Still holding her hand in that strong grasp, he drew her within the porch. “I’m so grateful to you for having come,” he said. “I hope you didn’t think what I did very odd?”

“I did think it just a little odd.”

She was trying to smile–to be her usual composed self.

“I couldn’t come to Wyndfell Hall,” he said abruptly, “for a reason which you will soon know. But I had to see you, and, by a bit of luck, I suddenly remembered this splendid old church. I passed by here once on a walking tour, years and years ago. It’s the sort of place people come a long way to see; so, if we are found here together–well, we might have met by accident.”

“As it is, we have met by appointment,” she said quietly.

She was feeling more and more frightened. Mark now looked so set, so grim.

“Would you rather stay out here,” he asked, “or shall we go into the church?”

“I’d rather stay out here. What is it, Mark? Don’t keep me in suspense.”

They were standing, facing one another; he had let go her hand at last.

“What I’ve come to tell you will give you, I fear, a great shock,” he began slowly, “for it concerns someone to whom I believe you to be deeply attached.”

He looked away from her for the first time.

“Then it _is_ Bubbles!” she cried, dismayed. “What on earth has the child done?”

He turned and again looked into her face, now full of a deeply troubled, questioning anxiety. “Bubbles Dunster?” he exclaimed. “Good heavens, no! It’s nothing to do with Bubbles.”

A look of uncontrollable relief came over her eyes and mouth.

“Who is it, Mark? You credit me with a warmer heart than I possess–“

But he remained silent, and she said quickly: “Come! Who is it, Mark?”

“Can’t you guess?” he asked harshly. And, as she shook her head, he added, in a slow, reluctant tone: “I’ve always supposed you to be really attached to Lionel Varick.”

Lionel? That was the last name she expected to hear!

“I don’t know exactly what you mean by ‘attached,’ Mark,” she said coldly. “But yes, I’ve always been fond of him–in a way I suppose you might call it ‘attached’–since that horrid affair, years ago, when you were so kind both to him and to me.”

“Don’t couple yourself with him,” he said sternly, “if, as I gather, you don’t really care for him, Blanche.” And then, almost inaudibly, he added: “You don’t know the tortures of jealousy I’ve suffered at the thought of you and that man.”

“Tortures of jealousy?” she repeated, astonished, and rather touched. “Oh, Mark–poor Mark! Why didn’t you ask me? I’ve never, never cared for him in–in that sort of way. How could you think I did?”

“Yet you’re here, in his house,” he said, “acting (so you said in your letter) as hostess to his guests? And surely you’ve always been on terms of what most people would call close friendship with him?”

“Yes, I suppose I have”–she hesitated–“in a way. I’ve always felt that, like me, he hadn’t many real friends. And, of course, in old days, ages ago, he was very fond of me,” she smiled. “That always pleases a woman, Mark.”

“Does it?” he asked, probingly; and as only answer she reddened slightly.

There came a little pause, and then Blanche exclaimed:

“I’m sorry, very sorry, if he’s got into a new scrape, Mark; and I’m surprised too. Some two years ago he married a rich woman; she died not long after their marriage, but she was devoted to him, and he’s quite well off now.”

“Did you know her?” asked Mark Gifford, in a singular tone.

“No, I never came across her. I was away–in Portugal, I think. He wrote and told me about his marriage, and then, later, when his wife fell ill, he wrote again. He was extremely good to her, Mark.”

“D’you know much about Varick’s early life?” he asked.

“I think I know all there is to know,” she answered.

What was Mark getting at? What had Lionel Varick done? Her mind was already busily intent on the thought of how disagreeable it would be to have to warn him of impending unpleasantness.

It was good of Mark to have taken all this trouble! Of course, he had taken it for her sake, and she felt very grateful–and still a little frightened; he looked so unusually grave.

“What _do_ you know of Varick’s early life?” he persisted.

“I don’t think there’s very much to know,” she answered uneasily. “His father had a place in Yorkshire, and got involved in some foolish, wild speculations. In the end the man went bankrupt, everything was sold up, and they were very poor for a while–horribly poor, I believe. Then the elder Varick died, and his widow and Lionel went and lived at Bedford. I gather Lionel’s mother was clever, proud, and quarrelsome. At any rate, she quarrelled with her people, and he had a very lonely boyhood and youth.”

“Then you know very little of how Varick lived before you yourself met him? How old would he have been then, Blanche?”

“I should think four or five-and-twenty,” she said hesitatingly.

“I suppose,” and then Mark Gifford looked at her with a troubled, hesitating look, “I suppose, Blanche–I fear I’m going to surprise you–that you were not aware that he’d been married before?”

“Yes,” she said eagerly, “I did know that, Mark.”

What on earth was he driving at? That woman, Lionel Varick’s first wife, was surely dead? She, Blanche, had had, by a curious accident, someone else’s word for that. And then–there rose before her the vision of a ghastly-looking, wild, handsome face; quickly she put it from her, and went on: “He married, when he was only nineteen, a girl out of his own class. They separated for a while; then they seem to have come together again, and, fortunately for Lionel, she died.”

“She died murdered–poisoned.”

Mark Gifford uttered the dread words very quietly. “Almost certainly poisoned by her husband, Lionel Varick.”

A mist came over Blanche Farrow’s eyes. She turned suddenly sick and faint.

She put out her hand blindly. Gifford took it, and made her sit down on a stone bench.

“I’m sorry,” he said feelingly, “very, very sorry to have had to tell you this dreadful thing, Blanche.”

“Never mind,” she muttered. “Go on, Mark, if there’s anything else to say–go on.”

As he remained silent for a moment, she asked, in a dull, tired tone: “But if this awful thing is true, how was it found out, after so many years?”

“It’s a peculiar story,” he answered reluctantly. “The late–I might say the last–Mrs. Varick, whose name, as you of course know, was Millicent Fauncey, had first as governess, and then as companion, an elderly woman called by the extraordinary name of Pigchalke. This Julia Pigchalke seemed to have hated Varick from the first. She violently disapproved of the engagement, quarrelled with Miss Fauncey about it, and the two women never met after the marriage. But Miss Pigchalke evidently cared deeply for poor Mrs. Varick; I’ve seen her, and convinced myself of that.”

“What is she like?” asked Blanche suddenly.

“Well, she’s not attractive! A stout, stumpy, grey-haired woman, with a very red face.”

Blanche covered her eyes with her hands. “Go on,” she said again, “go on, Mark, with what you were saying.”

“Where was I? Oh, I know now! When Mrs. Varick died, within less than a year of her marriage, Miss Pigchalke suspected foul play, and she deliberately set herself to track Lionel Varick down. She made it her business to find out everything about him, and but for her I think we may take it that he would have gone on to the end of the chapter a respectable, and in time highly respected, member of society.”

There was a pause. Blanche was staring before her, listening.

“About five weeks ago,” went on Mark Gifford quietly, “Miss Pigchalke got into touch with the head of our Criminal Investigation Department. She put before him certain–one can hardly call them facts–but certain discoveries she had made, which led to the body of the first Mrs. Varick being exhumed.” Blanche Farrow uttered a stifled exclamation of surprise, and Gifford went on: “I may add that Miss Pigchalke behaved with remarkable cunning and intelligence. She found out that the doctor at Redsands–the place where her poor friend died–was a firm friend of Varick’s. She thinks him an accomplice, but of course we regard that as nonsense, for we’ve found out all about the man, and he is coming to see our toxological expert to-morrow.”

(Then that was Dr. Panton’s urgent appointment in town.)

“And now, Blanche, comes the curious part of the story! The doctor who had attended the first Mrs. Varick years and years ago _had_ suspected foul play. He’s a very old man now, and he retired many years ago, but he happened to come across an advertisement which Miss Pigchalke put into one of the Sunday papers asking for information concerning Lionel Varick’s past life. _He answered the advertisement_, with the result that his one-time patient was exhumed. It was then found beyond doubt that the woman had been poisoned; and a few days ago the second Mrs. Varick’s body was exhumed.”

Blanche looked up, and in answer to her haggard look, he said: “Though perhaps I oughtn’t to tell you so, there isn’t a shadow of doubt that she also was foully done to death, and rather more intelligently than the other poor soul, for in _her_ case the process was allowed to take longer, and the doctor attending her was quite taken in.”

“How horrible!” muttered Blanche. “How very, very horrible!”

“Yes, horrible indeed! But why I’ve come here to-day, Blanche, is to tell you that to-morrow Lionel Varick will be arrested on the charge of murder. I have come to say that you and Bubbles must leave Wyndfell Hall this afternoon.”

Blanche hardly heard what he was saying. She was absorbed in the horror and in the amazement of the story he had just told her, and in what was going to happen to-morrow to the man who had been for so long her familiar friend.

“It is an immense relief to me to hear that you never even saw the late Mrs. Varick.” Mark Gifford went on: “I was afraid that you might have been mixed up with this dreadful business; that he might have used you in some way.”

Blanche shook her head, and he went on, musingly: “There were two ladies living next door to the house at Redsands where the poor woman was done to death. They, I expect, will have to give evidence, at least I know that one of them will, a certain Miss–Miss–?”

“Brabazon?” supplied Blanche quickly.

“Yes, that’s the name! A certain Miss Brabazon was a great deal with Mrs. Varick. She seems to have been an intimate friend of both the husband and wife. She used to go out with Varick for motor drives. Has he ever spoken to you of her?”

“Miss Brabazon is here, now, at Wyndfell Hall,” exclaimed Blanche. “You must have heard of her, Mark? She’s the owner of some tremendously big city business.”

“Oh, I don’t think it can be that girl!”

Mark Gifford looked surprised and perturbed.

“But I know it’s that girl. She’s become quite a friend of mine, and of Bubbles. Oh, Mark, I do _hope_ Helen Brabazon won’t be brought into this dreadful business–d’you think that will be really necessary?”

“I don’t know,” he said slowly. “But some of our people think that Varick may put up a fight. British criminal law is much too kind to murderers. Even if there’s evidence enough to hang a man ten times over, there’s always a sporting chance he may get off! There is in this case.”

Blanche turned suddenly very pale. The full realization of what those words meant rushed upon her. He feared she was going to faint.

“Forgive me,” she muttered. “It’s stupid, I know; but you must remember that–that I’ve known Lionel Varick a long time.”

“I’m not a bit surprised that you are so distressed,” he said soothingly.

And then something happened which did surprise Mark Gifford! He was supposed to be a clever, intelligent man, and there were many people who went in awe of him; but he knew very little about women. This, perhaps, was why he felt utterly astounded when Blanche suddenly burst into tears, and began rocking herself backwards and forwards. “Oh, Mark!” she sobbed. “Oh, Mark, I’m so unhappy,–I’m so miserable–I’m so frightened. Do–do help me!”

“That’s just what I came to do,” he said simply. But he was very much troubled. Her face was full of a kind of agonized appeal….

Greatly daring, he bent down over her, and gathered her into his arms.

She clung to him convulsively; and, all at once, there came insistently to Mark Gifford, George Herbert’s beautiful saying: “There is an hour in which a man may be happy all his life, can he but find it.” Perhaps that hour, that moment, had come to him now.

“Blanche,” he whispered, “Blanche–darling! You didn’t really mean what you wrote yesterday? Don’t you think the time has come when two such old friends as you and I might–“

“–make fools of themselves?”

She looked up at him, and there came a quivering smile over her disfigured face. “Yes, if you really wish it, Mark. I’ll do just as you like.”

“D’you really mean that?” he asked.

And she said firmly: “Yes, Mark–I really do mean it.” And he felt her yielding–yielding in spirit as well as in body–in body as well as in spirit.

“I suppose you couldn’t come back with me to London, now?” he asked a little shyly. “We could get the woman at the post office down there to send up a letter to Bubbles, explaining that you had to go away unexpectedly, and telling her to follow you to town to-day.”

It was rather a wild proposal, and he was not surprised when he saw her shake her head. “I can’t do that,” she said. “But oh, Mark, I wish I could! Bubbles is in bed. There was an accident–it’s too long to tell you about it now. But, of course, I’ll manage to get her away to-day.”

And then the oppressive horror of it all suddenly came back to her. “When did you say they were going to arrest Lionel?”

She uttered the words slowly, and with difficulty.

“They’re going to arrest him to-morrow, Friday, in the early afternoon,” he said in a low voice. “By God’s mercy,” he spoke simply, reverently, “I got your letter in time, Blanche.”

He looked at her anxiously. “I’m afraid even now you will have some difficult hours to live through,” and, as he saw her face change, “I trust absolutely to your discretion,” he said hesitatingly.

“Of course,” she gave the assurance hurriedly. “Of course you can do that, Mark.”

Without looking at her, he went on:

“As a matter of fact, the house has been watched for some days. If he tries to get away he will destroy the–the sporting chance I mentioned just now.”

“I must be going back,” she said, getting up. “Several of the party were, in any case, leaving this afternoon, and I must manage to get everybody else away as well.”

Her mind was in a whirl of conflicting feelings and emotions. And then, all at once, she was moved, taken away from the dreadful problem of the moment, by what she saw in Mark Gifford’s face. It was filled with a kind of sober gladness. “Mark,” she exclaimed, “what a selfish brute I’ve always been to you–never giving–always taking! I’ll try to be different now.”

She held out her hand; he took it and held it closely. “When shall I see you again?” he asked. “May I come and meet you and Bubbles at Liverpool Street to-morrow?”

“Yes–do. That will be a great comfort!” And then, acting as she very seldom did, on impulse, Blanche rather shamefacedly held up her face to his….

CHAPTER XXII

Again and again, as Blanche Farrow walked slowly back to Wyndfell Hall, she went over the meagre details of the strange story she had just been told. Again and again she tried to fill in the bare outlines of the tale.

Lionel Varick a murderer? Her mind, her heart, refused to accept the possibility.

Suddenly there came back to her a recollection of the curious, now many years old, circumstances which had attended her knowledge of Varick’s first marriage.

Someone, she could not now remember who, had taken her to one of the cheap foreign restaurants in Soho, which were not then so much frequented by English people as they are now. She had been surprised, and rather amused, to see Lionel Varick at a neighbouring table, apparently entertaining a middle-aged, rather prim-looking lady, whom he had introduced to her, Blanche, rather unwillingly, as “my friend, Miss Weatherfield.”

Then had come the strange part of the story!

When on her way to stay with some friends in Sussex a few days later, she found herself in the same railway carriage as Miss Weatherfield; and, during the course of some desultory talk, the latter had mentioned that she was daughter to the Chichester doctor who had attended Lionel Varick’s wife in her last illness.

_Lionel Varick’s wife_? For a moment Blanche had thought that there must be some mistake, or that her ears had betrayed her. But she very soon realized that there was no mistake, and that she had heard aright.

Successfully concealing her ignorance of the fact that their mutual friend was a widower, she had ventured a few discreet questions, to which had come willing answers. These made it clear why Varick had chosen to remain silent concerning what had evidently been a sordid and melancholy episode of his past life.

Miss Weatherfield told her pleasant new acquaintance that the Varicks, when they had first come to Chichester, had been very poor, the wife of an obviously lower class than the husband. But that Varick, being the gentleman he was, had not minded what he did to earn an honest living, and that through Dr. Weatherfield he had obtained for a while employment with a chemist, his work being that of taking round the medicines, as he was not of course qualified to make up prescriptions.

While Miss Weatherfield had babbled on, Blanche had been able to piece together what had evidently been a singularly painful story. Mrs. Varick had been a violent, disagreeable woman, and the kindly spinster had felt deeply sorry for the husband, himself little more than a boy. But she admitted that her father, while attending Mrs. Varick, had acquired a prejudice against the husband of his patient, and she added, smilingly, that it was without her father’s knowledge or consent that she had given the young man, after the death of his wife, a valuable business introduction.

Miss Weatherfield evidently flattered herself that this introduction had been a turning-point in Varick’s life, and that what appeared to her his present prosperity was owing to what she had done. In any case, he had shown his gratitude by keeping in touch with her, and on the rare occasions when she came to London, they generally met.

Blanche Farrow, even in those early days, was too much a woman of the world to feel as surprised as some people would have been. All the same, she had felt disconcerted and a little pained, that the man who was fond of telling her that she was his only real friend in the world had concealed from her so important a fact as that of his marriage.

After some hesitation she had made up her mind to tell him of her new-found knowledge, and at once he had filled in and coloured the sketchy outlines of the picture drawn by the rather foolish if kindly natured Miss Weatherfield. Yes, it was true that he had been a fool, though a quixotic fool–so Blanche had felt on hearing his version of the story. At the time of the marriage Varick had been nineteen, his wife five years older. The two had soon parted, but they had made up their differences after a separation which lasted four years. Varick’s fortunes had then been at their lowest ebb, and the two had drifted to Chichester, where Mrs. Varick had humble, respectable relations. After a while the woman had fallen ill, and finally died. Blanche had seen how it had pained and disturbed Varick to rake out the embers of the past, and neither had ever referred to the sad story again.

* * * * *

And now, from considering the past, Blanche Farrow turned shrinkingly to the present.

In common with the rest of the world, she had at times followed the course of some great murder trial; and she had been interested, as most intelligent people are occasionally interested, in the ins and outs of more than one so-called “poisoning mystery.”

But such happenings had seemed utterly remote from herself; and to her imagination the word “murderer” had connoted an eccentric, cunning, mentally misshapen monster, lacking all resemblance to the vast bulk of human kind. She tried to realize that, if Mark Gifford’s tale were true, a man with whom she herself had long been in close sympathy, and whose peculiar character she had rather prided herself on understanding, had been–nay, was–such a monster.

Blanche felt a touch of shuddering repulsion from herself, as well as from Varick, as she now remembered how sincerely she had rejoiced when, reading between the lines of his letter, she had guessed that he was marrying an unattractive woman for her money. It was now a comfort to feel that, even so, she had certainly felt a sensation of disgust when it had come to her knowledge that Varick had assumed, with regard to that same unattractive woman, an extravagant devotion she felt convinced he did not–could not–feel. It had shocked her, made her feel uncomfortable, to hear Helen Brabazon’s artless allusions to the tenderness and devotion he had lavished on “poor Milly.”

Helen Brabazon? A sensation of pain, almost of shame, swept over Blanche Farrow. Were Helen to appear as witness in a _cause celebre_ the girl’s life would henceforth be shadowed and smirched by an awful memory. And then there rose before her mind another dread possibility. Was it not possible–nay, probable–that she, Blanche Farrow, would be sucked into the vortex?

She remembered a case in which the prisoner had been charged with the murder of a relation through whose death he had received considerable benefit, and how four or five men and women of repute had been called to testify to his high character, and to the kindness of his heart. But their evidence had availed him nothing, for he had been hanged.

Blanche quickened her footsteps as, in imagination, she saw herself in the witness-box speaking on behalf of Lionel Varick.

She argued with herself that, after all, it was just possible that he might be innocent! If so, she would fight for him to the death, and that, however much it distressed and angered Mark Gifford that she should do so.

Absorbed in the dread and terrible thing he had come to tell her, she had not given him, the man who loved her, and whose wife she was to be, one thought since their solemn, rather shamefaced, embrace. Yet now the knowledge that, however, much he disapproved, Mark would stand by her, gave her a wonderful feeling of security, of having left the open sea of life for a safe harbour–and that in spite of the terrible hours, perhaps the terrible weeks and months, which now lay before her.

* * * * *

Turning the sharp angle which led to the gate giving admittance to the gardens of Wyndfell Hall, she suddenly met Helen Brabazon face to face, and for one wild moment Blanche thought that Helen _knew_. The girl’s usually placid, comely face was disfigured. It was plain that she had been crying bitterly.

“I’m going to the village,” she exclaimed; “I’ve got to go home to-day, and I must telegraph to my uncle.”

“I hope you haven’t had bad news?” said Blanche mechanically.

She was telling herself that it was quite, quite impossible that Helen knew anything–but as Helen, who had begun crying again, shook her head, Blanche asked: “Does Lionel know that you want to leave to-day?”

“Yes; I have told Mr. Varick,” and then all at once she exclaimed: “Oh, Miss Farrow, I feel so utterly miserable! Mr. Varick has just asked me to be his wife, and it has made me feel as if I had been so treacherous to Milly. Yet I don’t think I did anything to make him like me? Do you think I did?”

She looked appealingly at Blanche.

It was plain that what had happened had given her an extraordinary shock. “I am sure, now,” she went on falteringly, “that Milly–poor, poor Milly–haunts this house. I have felt, again and again, as if she were hovering about me. I believe that what I saw in the hall, on that awful afternoon, was really _her_. Yet Mr. Varick says that Milly would be very pleased if he and I were to marry each other. Surely he is mistaken?”

“Yes,” said Blanche slowly, “I think he is.”

“I feel so miserable,” went on the girl, still speaking with a touch of excitement which in her was so very unusual. “What happened this morning has spoiled what I thought was such a beautiful friendship! And then I feel frightened–horribly frightened”–she went on in a low voice.

“What is it that frightens you, Helen?” asked Blanche.

These confidences seemed at once so futile, and yet also so sinister, knowing what she now knew.

“I’m afraid that Mr. Varick will ‘will’ me into thinking I care for him,” the girl confessed in a low voice. “He says that he will never give up hope, and that, although he knows he isn’t worthy of me, he thinks that in time I shall care for him. But I don’t want to care for him, Miss Farrow–I’m sure that Milly is jealous of me; yet at Redsands, when she was dying, it made her happy that we were friends.”

“I don’t think you need be afraid that Lionel will ever ask you to marry him again,” said Blanche firmly. “And, Helen? Let me give you a word of