Chapter Nineteen.
The Miniature.
Zertho gave her a single glance full of hatred, then, with a gesture of impatience after a few quick words, turned to make his exit. As he did so, however, he found himself face to face with a man who, standing in the doorway, resolutely barred his passage.
He stood glaring at him as one stupefied. The man was Max Richards.
“No,” the latter said. “Now that you have chosen to call here uninvited it is at least polite to remain at the invitation of your hostess.”
“Let me pass!” he cried threateningly.
“I shall not!” Richards answered with firmness, his back to the half-closed door, while Brooker stood watching the scene, himself full of fear and dismay.
“This is a conspiracy!” Zertho exclaimed, his trembling hands clenched, his face livid.
“Listen!” Mariette cried, her cheeks flushed with excitement as she stepped boldly forward and faced him. “This is a counterplot only to combat your dastardly intrigue. The innocent shall no longer suffer for the sins of the guilty.”
“The guilty!” he echoed, with an insolent laugh. “You mean yourself!”
“I am not without blame, I admit,” she answered quickly, her flashing eyes darting him an angry look. “Nevertheless, I have to-day determined to make atonement; to end for ever this conspiracy of silence.” Then, turning to Liane, who was standing whitefaced and aghast, she said, “First, before I speak, it will be necessary for you to make confession. Explain to George of what nature is this bond which holds you to yonder man.”
“No, I—I cannot,” she protested, covering her face with her hands.
“But it is necessary,” she urged. “Speak! Fear nothing. Then the truth shall be made known.”
The slim, fair-faced girl stood with bent head, panting and irresolute, while all waited for the words to fall from her dry, white lips. At last, with eyes downcast, she summoned courage, and in a low, hoarse voice said,—
“Zertho compelled me to accept him because—because he can prove that my father murdered Charles Holroyde.”
“Your father a murderer!” her lover echoed. “Impossible.”
“Let me speak,” Mariette interrupted, hastily. “Two winters ago I met in Nice a wealthy young Englishman named Holroyde. We saw one another often at Monte Carlo, and our acquaintance ripened into love. He offered me marriage, and I accepted; but one night, after winning a considerable sum, he returned to Nice about eleven o’clock, was waylaid in a narrow lane running from the Promenade des Anglais into the Rue de France, robbed and murdered. Thus was the man I loved cruelly snatched from me just at the moment when happiness was in my reach; just within a few weeks of making me his wife. This villa, which I have since bought, he designated as our home, and this ring upon my finger is the one he gave me. The crime, enshrouded in mystery, has not yet been forgotten either by the police or the people of Nice. It seemed amazing that such a dastardly assassination could take place so swiftly without a single person hearing any cry, yet the police had no clue. The murderer, who had no doubt accompanied or followed his victim from Monte Carlo, must have struck him down with unerring blow and escaped, leaving no trace behind. Yet there was nevertheless a witness of the deed—a witness who is present.”
“A witness!” gasped Liane.
“Yes,” Mariette said. “Max Richards will tell you what he saw.”
The man indicated, still standing with his back to the door, smiled triumphantly at Zertho, then said,—
“Yes, it is true. I witnessed the murder of Charles Holroyde. On that night I had left the Café de la Régence, and crossing the road overtook, in the Avenue de la Gare, Nelly Bridson, Captain Brooker’s adopted daughter. We had met before on several occasions, and after she had told me that she had been to a chemist’s to obtain something for Liane, who was not well, I offered, as it was late, to accompany her as far as her house in the Rue Dalpozzo. To this she made no objection, and we walked together along the Rue de France as far as the corner of the street wherein she lived. The moon, however, was bright upon the sea, and at my suggestion she consented to accompany me for a stroll along the Promenade. To reach the latter we had to pass through a narrow lane, which we had just entered, when we saw straight before us figures of men struggling together. Instantly I dragged Nelly back into the deep shadow where we could see without being observed. Suddenly I heard one of the men cry in English ‘My God! I’m stabbed!’ and he staggered back and fell. Then, discerning for the first time that the man had been attacked by two assailants, I rushed forward, but already they had bent and secured the contents of their victim’s pocket, and as I approached one of them threw the knife away. That man I recognised in the moonlight as Captain Brooker!”
A low groan escaped the lips of the pale-faced, agitated man who had been thus denounced, and he stood paralysed by fear, clutching the back of a chair for support.
“The man, however, who threw away the knife he had snatched up, was not the murderer,” Richards continued, in a clear, calm voice. “Both Nelly and myself were afterwards in complete accord that it was his companion who had, in the mêlée, struck the fatal blow. The murderer was the man there—Zertho d’Auzac.”
“It’s a lie!” cried the man indicated, “a foul, abominable falsehood! Brooker crept up behind him and tried to gag him with a scarf, when, finding that he was too powerful for him, he struck him full in the breast. In an instant he was dead.”
“Your story is an entire fabrication,” Richards answered, in a deprecatory tone. “We were both quite close to you, and saw your murderous face in the moonlight at the moment when you killed your victim. To us it seemed as though you alone had acted with premeditation, and that instead of assisting you, Brooker was endeavouring to release Holroyde, for I heard him cry in dismay, ‘Good God! Zertho, what are you doing?’ It was you who bent and secured the notes, while Brooker snatched up the knife, held it for an instant in hesitation, then seeing me approach in the darkness, flung it away and fled after you. I sped along the Promenade for some distance, leaving Nellie beside the prostrate man, but you both escaped, and when I returned she had gone. She had, I suppose, rushed home, fearing to be discovered there. But the young Englishman was already lifeless, therefore I left the spot hurriedly. Next morning, when the town was in a state of great excitement over the murdered Englishman, Nelly called at my rooms and begged me to say nothing to the police, because she felt certain the Captain would be arrested and convicted as an accessory. Therefore, in obedience to her wish, I have kept my knowledge secret until such time as I should choose to make the truth known.”
“Is that the actual truth?” Brooker asked, agape in wonderment.
“It is the entire truth of what I saw with my own eyes—of what I am prepared to swear in any court of justice.”
“So confused were the memories of that terrible incident that I have all along believed that I myself was the actual murderer,” said the Captain. “That night I had drunk more wine than usual, and remember very little of the occurrence save that I held the knife in my hand, and that on the following morning when I awoke I found my hands stained with blood, while in my pocket were some of the stolen notes. Zertho told me, when we met next day, that, in a frenzy of madness at having lost almost every sou I possessed, I had attacked Holroyde suddenly, murdered him, and filched his winnings from his pocket. He said, however, he would preserve my secret, and did so until a few weeks ago, when Liane refused to become his wife. Then he declared that if I did not compel her to marry him he would denounce me. I begged him to at least spare Liane, but he was inexorable. Therefore I was compelled to make confession to her, and she, rather than I should pay the terrible penalty, sacrificed all her love and happiness for my sake.”
His voice was broken with emotion, and although his lips moved, he could utter no further words.
George, standing beside his well-beloved, grasped her tiny hand and pressed it tenderly. At last he knew the secret of her acceptance of Zertho’s offer, and recognised all the tortures she must have suffered in order to save her father from degradation and shame.
“He lies!” Zertho cried, his sallow face bloodless. He saw how ingeniously he had been entrapped. “It was he himself who killed Holroyde.”
“If so,” exclaimed Max Richards, “why have you paid me so well for my silence?”
He did not reply.
“You are silent,” he went on. “Then I will tell you. You were shrewd enough to see that while I held my tongue you would still hold Captain Brooker in your power, and through the pressure you could place upon him, secure Liane as your wife. I knew this all along, although you believed me to be entirely ignorant of it. Still I allowed you to pay me, and I can assure you that the money you gave me with such bad grace often came in very useful,” he laughed. “I am not a Prince, and although I may be an adventurer, I thank Heaven I’m not an assassin.”
“I paid you all you demanded, every penny, yet now you turn upon me. It is the way of all blackmailers,” Zertho cried, still livid with anger.
“I speak the truth in order to save from your merciless clutches one woman whose fair name has never been besmirched. I speak for Liane’s sake.”
Zertho turned from him with a fierce imprecation on his lips, declaring that the whole story was a tissue of falsehoods, and denouncing his companion Brooker as the actual assassin.
“You forget,” said Richards, “that in addition to myself there was a second witness, Nelly Bridson, the girl with whom your victim had carried on a mild and harmless flirtation prior to meeting Mariette. You forget that she was with me, and actually saw you commit the deed.”
This truth rendered him voiceless.
“May I, in future, enjoy an absolutely clear conscience that I had no hand in the actual crime?” the Captain asked earnestly, turning to Richards.
“Certainly,” he answered, quickly. “Both Nelly and myself saw every movement clearly, for the moon was shining bright as day. We heard you shout in horror and dismay to the assassin; we saw the blow struck; we saw the theft committed, and watched you pick up the knife, which you threw down again instantly at the moment when I rushed forward.”
“I was, alas, only half-conscious of my actions,” he answered. “But the enormity of the crime must have sobered me instantly, for I remember a man approaching—who it was I was not aware until this moment—and knowing that we had been discovered and were in peril, flew for my life back to the Promenade, reaching home by a circuitous route about midnight.”
“You need have no further fear of this man,” Richards assured him. “His plan was ingenious, to shift the crime from his own shoulders to yours, and at the same time to marry Liane, but fortunately his own actions convict him. Liane has shown bravery and self-denial, which should further endear her to the heart of the man who loves her, and if the truth I have told brings back her happiness and peace of mind I shall not have spoken in vain.”
“I have much to thank you for,” Liane faltered, her face bright with a new-born happiness. “You have indeed revived within me hope, life and love. I knew this man was crafty and cruel, but I never dreamed that he himself had committed the crime with which he charged my father. I saw that he was inexorable and relentless, and was compelled to wrench myself from George, whom I loved, and promise to become the wife of—of this assassin.”
“Assassin!” cried Zertho. “No, the prospect of becoming Princess d’Auzac proved too attractive for you! It was because both you and your father wanted money and position, that you were ready to become my wife.”
“We desired nothing from you,” she answered proudly. “Both of us detested you when you found us in England, and thrust yourself upon us. Upon the gold of the guilty there always lies a curse.”
But shrugging his shoulders contemptuously, he said nothing. He fidgetted, anxious to escape, for although he preserved a calm, insolent, almost indifferent manner, he nevertheless knew that concealment of the truth was now no longer possible. At the very instant when he had felt his position the most secure, his perfidy, his cunning, and his crime had been laid bare before them all.
He clenched his hands, muttering an oath behind his set teeth, while his dark eyes, with a glance of hatred in them, flashed with an unnatural brilliance.
For a few moments no one spoke. The silence was complete save for the roar of the waves on the rocks outside and the sobs that now and then escaped Liane. She clung to George, burying her beautiful head upon his shoulder.
At last Mariette spoke, saying,—
“There is yet another fact which is, in itself, sufficient proof of this man’s unscrupulousness. One witness of his crime still lives; the other, Nelly Bridson, is dead. Nelly was once my friend. Unknown to Captain Brooker I knew her intimately as a bright girl months before Charles Holroyde met and admired her. Indeed, it was by her that I was introduced to the man who afterwards loved me, and was so brutally done to death. When at last she became aware that her lover had forsaken her some ill-feeling arose between us. I knew that she must hate me, but I treated her jealousy with unconcern, and remained towards her the same as before. In my heart, however, I envied her her youth and good looks, and feared that Charles Holroyde might return to his first love. But, alas! he was murdered mysteriously—by whom I knew not, until three days ago, when Max Richards divulged to me the truth. Then I resolved that punishment should fall upon the guilty. Well, I hated Nelly because I knew that Holroyde had admired her, and I likewise hated Liane, entertaining a suspicion that because she always avoided me she had spoken of me detrimentally to the man whom I loved. After Holroyde’s death I left the Riviera and went to Paris, to Wiesbaden, to Vienna, caring little whither I went, until at last, about a year afterwards, I returned to Monte Carlo, and heard from one of Captain Brooker’s friends that he and the girls had left long ago for England, where they had resolved to live in the future. Immediately after my lover’s death luck had forsaken me entirely, and I passed a spurious bank-note for a large amount at Marseilles. The police were endeavouring to find me, and it was to avoid arrest that I was travelling. I wrote several times to Nelly and received replies, stating how happy they were in their country home in England, and how much more peaceful and enjoyable it was than at Nice. Still there was one matter upon which I desired to see her, a matter connected with the family of the man who was dead. He had, I believed, told her of his relations in England, but he had spoken no word of them to me. I had in my possession a Cosway miniature he had one day left at my house, an antique portrait of an elderly lady, beautifully painted on ivory and set round with brilliants. He had mentioned to me that it was an heirloom, and I desired to return it to the family if I could find them. With that object I went to England, and one summer’s evening met Nelly by appointment in a country lane a short distance from Stratfield Mortimer.”
“You met her?” Captain Brooker exclaimed. “She never told me so.”
“She had, alas, no opportunity,” Mariette answered. “For it was on that evening she met with her death. She had ridden her cycle, and I found her resting in the gateway she had indicated in her letter. She seemed unusually nervous, I noticed, nevertheless I attributed it to the fact that she regarded me as her rival, even though the man we both loved was dead. For nearly an hour we remained together chatting, until the sunset faded and dusk crept on. I asked her what the man had told her regarding his family, and showed her the antique miniature. Then she told me a fact which held me speechless in amazement. Charles Holroyde was no other than the son of a man living close by that spot, Sir John Stratfield.”
“My brother!” cried George. “Impossible!”
“It was the truth. He had told her everything. The father of Charles Holroyde was actually living within a mile of that spot, and the portrait was one of Lady Anne Stratfield, a noted beauty, which was painted by the fashionable miniaturist, Cosway, shortly before his death. At first I could not credit that he was actually Sir John’s son, but she brought proof positive to show that what she said was correct, and at her request I gave her the miniature to return to Sir John. She promised to call next day and give it into his hands, saying that it came from a person who desired to remain anonymous.”
“Why did you not come to the Court yourself?” George asked quickly.
“I had no desire to meet the father of my dead lover,” she replied.
“But he must have been acquainted with you, because he mentioned you in his will.”
“Yes,” she answered reflectively, “he must, I suppose, have known of me.”
“Then what occurred afterwards?” Brooker eagerly inquired. “Tell us the events of that night in their proper sequence.”
“After we had talked for some time, she telling me how happy both she and Liane were, and how the latter had become engaged clandestinely to the Baronet’s son, George, she rode beside me as far as the lodge gates of the Court, where we parted. Then she remounted and rode back in the direction of the spot where she was afterwards discovered, while I strolled slowly on to the station, whence I returned to London. It was dusk before I left Stratfield Mortimer, but as I changed at Reading to enter the train for Paddington, I caught a glimpse of a face I thought I knew. It was only for a single instant, but the face was one that once seen is never forgotten. It was the face of Zertho.”
“You saw me!” he gasped.
“Yes. You were in a crowd on Reading platform, and were about to enter the same train as myself, but changing your mind, suddenly left the station hurriedly,” she said. “At that time, remember, I had no idea that you were in England, for Nelly had not mentioned your visit. Two days later, however, I was appalled by reading in the papers that poor Nelly had been murdered almost immediately after I had left her, and quite close to the spot where we had at first stood. Afterwards in the report of the inquest, I saw that you were present and had given evidence. Then there was silence. The affair was an enigma, and the police possessed no clue. The papers mentioned a broad mark a foot wide upon the dust, which they regarded as mysterious. It was made by my skirt which swept the road. I alone held the key to the enigma. In order to assure myself that my suspicions were not unfounded, I returned to Reading, made careful inquiries there, and when I had satisfied myself, left England with the knowledge I had obtained still in my possession.”
“What did you discover?” inquired George, quickly, while Liane still clung to him tremblingly.
“I discovered absolute proof of the identity of Nolly’s assassin. It was Zertho d’Auzac!”
Chapter Twenty.
At Cross Lane.
“You lie!” the Prince cried indignantly. “There is no proof.”
“Listen!” Mariette retorted in a firm, harsh tone, gazing at him steadily. “Listen while I recall to your memory the events of that fateful night. In my inquiries I traced your progress step by step, and every movement is entirely plain to me. You went to England with solely one object in view, namely, to get rid of Nelly Bridson, the woman who could convict you of murder.”
“I deny that I had any hand whatever in the affair,” he protested. “Why, she went with me to the station and saw me off to Reading! It was given in evidence that the police inquired of the station officials at Stratfield Mortimer, and also at Reading, and were entirely satisfied that there was no suspicion upon me. Therefore, whatever you say is utterly worthless,” he added, turning from her contemptuously.
“We shall see,” she replied. “If you have so conveniently forgotten what your movements were, I will describe them. It is quite true that Nelly saw you off to Reading. But prior to this, while alone in the dining-room of Captain Brooker’s cottage, you found lying about the letter I had written her making the appointment. Curiosity prompted you to read its contents, and you therefore knew that at seven o’clock she would be in Cross Lane. You bade her farewell at eight minutes past six, and your train arrived at Reading at twenty minutes past. You immediately took a fly back towards Stratfield, but dismissed the man at Threemile Cross, and after watching the conveyance out of sight, took a cut across the fields for about a mile and a half to Cross Lane, thus completely doubling. It was growing dark when you reached the railway bridge, but you saw your victim coming from the opposite direction, and drew back half-way up the steep ascent, where you knew she must pass slowly. Suspecting no danger, the light-hearted girl allowed her machine to run swiftly down the incline, then pedalled hard for the ascent, when suddenly you raised your weapon, took deliberate aim and fired. With a cry she dropped sideways on her feet, the machine falling with her. Then she blindly staggered forward two or three paces, and sank to earth, dying. For an instant you waited, but even while you looked the poor girl sighed heavily and passed away. Then, fearing detection, you turned and fled back across the fields to Reading station, where I saw you an hour later.”
“It’s an absolute falsehood!” he cried. “I went direct to London after leaving the girl.”
“You did not, for I found the man who drove you to Threemile Cross, and who will give evidence against you on your trial.”
“You have!” he gasped. “You will hand me over to the police?” he added hoarsely.
“Certainly,” she answered, firmly. “The police of Reading and the police of Nice will alike be anxious to give you free lodgings in a chamber scarcely as comfortable as any in the Villa Chevrier. For a good many months the mystery of Charles Holroyde’s death has puzzled them, but it will remain an enigma no longer.”
“Then Brooker will suffer also,” he cried.
“No, he will not,” replied the inventor of “The Agony of Monte Carlo,” quickly. “My evidence will prevent that. I saw you commit the murder, and likewise witnessed how Brooker endeavoured to prevent you.”
“Again,” cried Mariette, “there is yet another fact. From inquiries I have made it is plain that some months prior to Nelly’s death she, by word or action, had betrayed her knowledge of your crime committed in Nice.”
“I recollect now,” cried Liane, suddenly. “She always loathed Zertho, a fact which often caused me some surprise, he having made her several handsome presents after his sudden change of fortune. Once, too, I chanced to remark in jest that I might possibly become Princess d’Auzac, whereupon she answered, ‘No, never. I could prevent that.’”
“This exactly proves my contention,” exclaimed Mariette, excitedly turning to the others. “Nelly had betrayed her knowledge of his secret, and he was in deadly fear of her. He committed the second crime so that the first should remain concealed. It was not until months afterwards, when Richards disclosed his identity, and, having had a run of ill-luck at the tables, offered to preserve silence for a momentary consideration, that he knew there was a second witness. Nelly had never told him that she had a companion on that fateful night, and he felt assured that the man who had so suddenly sprung upon them could not again identify him. Only when Richards came forward did he realise the truth that in taking Nelly Bridson’s life he had failed to efface his first crime, and had placed himself in deadlier peril.”
A deep silence fell. The man accused stood motionless, his dark, sallow face livid, his eyes, with a haunting look of abject terror in them, fixed upon the carpet. His hands were clenched, his head bent, his body rigid. This sudden and unexpected exposure held him dumb.
At last Liane spoke in a low musical voice, a little strained perhaps, but her tone showed that at last the crushing weight of Zertho’s accusation of her father had been lifted from her mind, and she already felt her freedom to love George Stratfield.
“There is yet one thing unexplained,” she said. “I have a confession to make.”
“A confession!” gasped her lover. “What?”
“On that fatal evening when poor Nelly was so brutally killed I had an appointment to meet you at the spot,” she answered. “And I kept it.”
“You did? Why, I thought you were prevented.”
“I was, but I arrived there late. Unconscious of the fearful tragedy, I walked there, and in the twilight waited in the gateway leading to the meadow, the very spot where Mariette and Nelly had been standing an hour before. While there the high wind blew my hair about and several of the pins fell out. I picked them up, all save one—the one you discovered.”
“It was yours!” he cried dismayed.
“Yes, mine,” she replied. “I waited there alone about ten minutes, then passed beneath the railway bridge and there saw straight before me, a little way beyond, Nelly lying beside her machine. We had quarrelled earlier in the day over a trifling matter and she had uttered some rather insulting words: therefore, believing that she had merely had a fall and would recover in a few minutes, I left her lying where she was. I saw no blood, and never dreamt that she was dead. At her throat was the brooch Charles Holroyde had given her, an ornament upon which she set great store. Suddenly the temptation to annoy her came over me, and I bent and snatched it off. At that moment you had already discovered the crime, and gone for assistance. It was my intention to keep the brooch, so that she might believe it had been stolen. Judge my horror when a few hours later I knew the ghastly truth, while in my possession there remained the missing brooch about which the papers afterwards made so many comments. Again, the hairpin you discovered being one of mine was still another fact which caused me the greatest terror, lest the police should ascertain from whose hair the pin had fallen. In order to make it appear that I had not been to Cross Lane I that night wrote a letter to you regretting that I was prevented from meeting you, and early next morning tore it into fragments and cast it at the roadside, where it was subsequently discovered by the detectives. Yet the fear that the brooch might be discovered in my possession was ever upon me, so one night I took all my remaining pins, together with the brooch, and buried them in the garden, where, I suppose, they still remain. Ever since that day until now I have feared lest my theft should be discovered and my presence at the scene of the tragedy proved, for I saw how suspicious were the circumstances, especially as we had had a slight difference earlier that day and someone might have overheard our high words. For months my life has been overshadowed by a terrible dread, but now that I know the truth I hesitate no longer to speak.”
“And the miniature we discovered by Nelly’s side was the one you gave her to return to my family?” George exclaimed, turning quickly to Mariette, astounded at the remarkable explanation.
“Yes. She said she knew you, and that you loved Liane. Therefore she would return it to your father without stating whence it had come.”
“But you say that Charles Holroyde was my brother,” he exclaimed, puzzled. “I do not understand.”
“Think for a moment, and you will see that all I have spoken is the truth,” she answered. “Before his death he told me the whole of the circumstances; how your mother, Lady Stratfield, died a few months after your birth, and how your father, a year afterwards, married another lady, whom he subsequently divorced. The latter, a lady of means, came and lived in France, where Charles was educated, but when he knew how unjustly your father had treated his mother he declined to take the name of Stratfield, and preferred his mother’s maiden name. He—”
“Ah, yes, I remember?” cried George, amazed. “It was my father’s unhappy second marriage that had caused him to become gloomy, misanthropic, and a hater of womankind. The subject was scarcely ever mentioned between us, but now I distinctly remember that the lady’s name was Holroyde. I knew that she had a son, but have always been led to suppose that he died when only a few months old.”
“No,” Mariette replied. “He was foully murdered for the money he had won at roulette by that man standing there,” and she pointed towards Zertho, who stood trembling, crushed by her terrible denunciation.
“Fancy poor Charlie Holroyde actually being your brother!” Liane exclaimed, looking up tenderly into the face of the man she so fondly loved. “Yet it is not surprising, for, strangely enough, I have many times thought that your face strongly resembled his. But my father is cleared of the terrible stigma, and no suspicion can now be cast upon me, therefore we have nothing to fear.”
“True, darling,” he answered. “We have nothing to fear, save one thing.”
“What is that?” she inquired eagerly.
He hesitated. His words were overheard by all in the room, and every eye was upon him. The man accused moved across to the table and stood leaning against it, swaying unsteadily. His passage was still barred resolutely.
“You forget the offer of marriage which, under my father’s will, I am compelled to make to Mariette, if I am not to remain a pauper all my days.”
As he spoke there was a quick movement behind him, a flood of golden sunlight suddenly lit up the room as the jalousies of one of the windows were dashed open, and as he turned he saw the figure of Zertho disappearing through the window.
With a cry, the fugitive leaped down upon the flower-bed outside, hat in hand, and an instant later had gained the road and was flying down through the fortifications towards La Condamine.
For scarcely a second Max Richards hesitated, then rushed after him to give him into the hands of the police. Zertho had long been watching his opportunity, and, being strong and athletic, had reached the window at a single bound, and had escaped almost before they could realise what had occurred.
For a few moments all were dismayed, but were quickly reassured by Mariette, who declared that the police must sooner or later arrest him.
Then, turning to George, she added,—
“You have spoken of your father’s will. Well, your solicitors may make the offer, but I shall refuse.”
“You will refuse!” cried Liane, joyously.
“Yes,” she answered, smiling in contentment. “I shall refuse because I am already engaged to marry Max, the man whose words have cleared your father, and whose evidence will convict the man who has held you so long beneath the thrall of terror.”
“You are to marry Max!” Liane exclaimed, surprised.
“Yes. We have known each other some years now, and as I have recently won sufficient money which, invested, will bring us in a modest income, we have agreed to marry and relinquish gambling. One of our promises to each other is that after marriage neither of us shall enter the Casino on any pretext whatsoever. I shall certainly keep it, and I feel assured that Max will.”
“I’m sure you have our heartiest congratulations,” Captain Brooker said, smiling. “I’ve known Max a long time, and although once he has been one of us and an outsider, he is, nevertheless, at heart a gentleman.”
Mariette, known as “The Golden Hand,” and believed by habitués of Monte Carlo to be thoroughly unscrupulous, and an adventuress of the very worst type, was now an entirely different person to the woman who flung down her gold so recklessly upon the tables. Her life had not been altogether blameless, nevertheless there was still sufficient generosity, tenderness, and love within her heart to render her a devoted wife with a man who would love and cherish her.
“Make your offer to marry me as soon as you wish,” she laughed. “You know what my reply will be.”
“A reply,” he said, “that will bring me fifty thousand pounds.”
“You are indeed my friend, Mariette,” Liane said, stretching forth her hand. “Forgive me for believing that you were my enemy.”
The other grasped it warmly, answering,—
“I have forgiven all—everything save the terrible offences of the man who has fled, offences before God and man that are beyond atonement.”
Chapter Twenty One.
Red and Black.
The fugitive was already out of sight when his pursuer gained the road. In the crooked streets of Monaco, with their dark arches, narrow passages and steep inclines, it is easy to evade pursuit, and Zertho, to whom the place was well-known, was fully aware that if he could gain the foot of the rock he could get clean away. He crushed his hat on his head and ran swiftly as a deer.
Max knew the road the accused man must take, and dashed after him, hatless, as fast as his legs would carry him. Suddenly, however, he entered a crooked lane, only to find himself in a cul-de-sac. He quickly retraced his steps and gained the square in front of the Palace, but by this time the man he was pursuing was already at the foot of the rock. Rushing up to the wall of the fortifications he peered over, and saw far below the fugitive spring into a open cab and drive rapidly towards La Condamine. To overtake him now was impossible. The police must take up the chase.
He ran back to the Villa Fortunée to tell Mariette and the others of his failure and obtain her sanction to invoke the aid of police, while the other sat bolt upright in the cab, staring straight before him, not daring to glance behind. Yet all seemed peaceful in that calm sunset hour. Along the boulevard around the bay he drove at a spanking pace, but in front the road to Monte Carlo rose steeply, and soon they were only travelling at walking pace.
“Quicker!” he cried, impatiently to the driver; and with an oath added: “Whip your horses! Quicker!”
“Impossible, m’sieur,” the man answered without turning towards him.
The moments that went by during that slow ascent seemed hours. Each instant he expected to hear loud cries and demands as the police bore down upon him. He knew that his face must betray the deadly terror that held him paralysed. Like a fox going to cover he had headed instinctively for Monte Carlo, but knew not how he was about to act, or whither he was going. He knew that he must fly to save his liberty and life, and had a vague idea that if he crossed into Italy the pursuit would thereby be delayed.
“Where to, m’sieur?” inquired the driver, when at last they gained the brow of the hill.
“The Casino! Quick!” he answered, after an instant’s reflection. Then to himself, he muttered behind his set teeth: “One throw. My last chance. Life or death!”
He sprang from the cab, tossed the man a ten-franc piece, and ran up the red-carpeted steps to the atrium, showed his white ticket to the two doorkeepers, and entered the hot, garish gaming-rooms.
The atmosphere was troubled, faint with the thousand perfumes exhaled from the tightly-laced corsets of the women. Charming and pretty as many of the latter are, they are, nevertheless, designedly or unconsciously, the most active and dangerous companions at the tables. Their influence upon their fellow-players is always on the side of the bank.
Queen Roulette is the most absorbing and most imperious of all mistresses. The most determined, young or old, audacious or timid, find themselves powerless to resist her, for when the fatal fascination creeps upon them she engages their brain, saps their spirit, holds captive their senses, breaks asunder their resolutions, and lures them to their ruin. She is indeed an enchantress infernal.
The jingle and chatter jarred upon his unstrung nerves. For a moment he stood nauseated, half-dazed by the thousand memories, hideous spectres of a guilty past, that crowded upon him.
But again he walked forward blindly, on past several of the tables encircled by their hot, eager crowds, until he came to the Moorish room. As he was passing a man rose wearily from the roulette-table with a roll of notes in his hand, and instantly he took his chair. He cast a furtive glance around the circle of faces, pale beneath the green-shaded oil lamps suspended from the long brass chains. The emotions of hope, disgust, anxiety, or greed were displayed on each of the perspiring countenances ranged around that table. Next him was a beautiful woman well-known in Riviera society, winning, and therefore a little excited, her cheeks burning with two bright spots, her eyes shining like lamps; and she looked like a girl as she now and then heaved a deep sigh. Next her a blotchy-faced man, smelling strongly of rank cigars, was playing and losing heavily, his countenance betraying nothing more than a half-hearted smile, while opposite a staid matron made room for her daughter, and handed her money to put on, believing, as so many believe, that innocence is a kind of “mascot.”
He lowered his gaze. The deathly pallor of his own cheeks had attracted notice. It seemed as though these people, many of them personally known to him, held him in suspicion.
He paused in hesitation, holding his breath the while, trying to calm the wild tumultuous throbbing of his heart.
“Messieurs, faites vos jeux!”
The red and black disc in the centre of the table was revolving, the money was already placed within the squares, and the little ivory ball had already been launched when, with sudden resolve, he drew from his pocket a louis and tossed it carelessly upon the scarlet diamond.
“Gain, I fly!” he murmured to himself. “Lose, I remain.”
In flinging the coin his hand had lost its deftness, for instead of falling flat, it fell upon its edge and rolled from the “red” over the line into the “impair.”
At that instant sounded the monotonous wearying cry,—
“Rien ne va plus!”
Then there was a moment’s hush, the ball fell with a click into its socket, and the croupier’s rake came swiftly before his fevered eyes and swept away the coin he had staked.
He had lost, and would remain.
Glancing round, his lips curled in a bitter smile; at the same moment, however, he placed his trembling hand to his mouth, as if to stifle an imprecation.
Glaring, rigid and desperate he sat, his dark eyes, the eyes that had been so admired by the women, fixed upon the ever-revolving disc of black and red now holding him in fascination. Suddenly, as another game was being played, a spasm of excruciating pain caused him to clap both hands to his brow and utter a low groan. It was the gasp of a dying man, but amid the terrible excitement of play it passed unnoticed, and none dreamed the truth until a moment or two later when, with a wild, despairing shriek which rang through the hot gilded rooms and caused an instant’s hush, he half-rose from his chair and fell forward upon the table lifeless, scattering the gold, silver and notes staked by the players, and causing a terrible scene of alarm and confusion.
His heart had always been weak, and the sudden excitement of play had caused a rupture which had proved fatal.
Such was the official account of the affair given in the papers, for the administration of the Casino were careful not to let the public know that in the dead man’s pocket was found a tiny bottle labelled “Quinine,” containing several white tabloids which, on analysis, were found to be of strychnine.
Nevertheless, it is not surprising that the public remained in ignorance of this last-mentioned fact, when it is remembered that the Administration of the Cercle des Etrangers spends some hundreds of thousands of francs annually among the journals and journalists in order to conceal the many suicides which take place in their world-famous combination of paradise and hell.
Chapter Twenty Two.
Conclusion.
George and Liane, fervent in their newly-found happiness, were married shortly afterwards in the village church of Stratfield Mortimer, the old time-worn place where for generations his family had been christened, married, and placed to rest, each latter event being recorded upon the tarnished monumental brasses. By Mariette’s refusal he received the sum stipulated by his father’s will, and for a year they lived high up on Sydenham Hill, in a house which set its face towards the deep valley wherein murky London lies ever beneath its smoke-pall, George journeying each day to his gloomy chambers into which no ray of sunlight had ever been known to penetrate.
By the death of his elder brother, the result of an accident while hunting last winter, he, however, suddenly found himself the possessor of Stratfield with its handsome income, and to-day both he and Liane live at the Court, and are prominent figures in the county. Liane’s sweet, beautiful face, graceful bearing and vivacious chic, cause her to be admired everywhere, and among the many charming young hostesses of Berkshire no one is so popular.
Mariette, no longer known as “The Golden Hand,” has married Max Richards, and still lives in her pretty villa where the salon windows open upon the blue Mediterranean. Each spring Liane and George spend a few weeks with them, while they, in return, come to England in summer, and are welcome guests at Stratfield.
Through many months it was a profound mystery how old Sir John became aware of Mariette’s existence, but this was cleared up quite unexpectedly one day by George, who, in turning over some of his father’s papers, discovered a letter written by his unknown brother Charles, who informed the old Baronet that he had lost a considerable sum at cards to a certain Captain Brooker, and also stated that he was about to marry, and gave Mariette’s name and some facts concerning her. From this letter the old gentleman would no doubt suspect her to be an adventuress, and therefore, in his paroxysm of anger at George’s refusal to renounce Liane, he made a provision in his will that this unknown woman should marry him, instead of the son he had discarded, and of whose death he was unaware.
In the great oak-panelled drawing-room at Stratfield, with its quaint diamond panes, deep-set mullioned windows and polished floor, there now hangs Cosway’s beautiful miniature of Lady Anne, and each time husband and wife glance at it they remember how very near they once were to eternal separation and blank despair. But devoted to one another, their life is now one of unalloyed happiness. The clouds have lifted, and their days are as bright and joyous as they once long ago imagined in their day-dreams. The Captain is back in his old-fashioned ivied cottage in the village, but dines each evening at the Court, where the cigars are choice and the wines well-matured. Only once have George and Liane walked together to that fateful spot beyond the railway bridge in Cross Lane. But for both of them its sight brought back memories so bitter that by mutual agreement they now always avoid passing that unfrequented way.
To that estimable body of men, the Berkshire Constabulary, the motive of the assassination of Nelly Bridson and the identity of her assassin remain still a mystery, as they will for ever.
The End.