that may seem harsh, and I can bear to be trifled with no longer. Tell me the business which brought my wife to France.”
“I do not know, I do not know,” repeated Mrs. Urquhart.
“That must be false. You have no secrets between you.”
“This is one, Arthur. If I made a guess I might deceive you, which I have no wish to do”
“Well,” said he, thinking a gleam of light might be afforded him.
“It may be—I almost suppose it is—something about my father.”
“About Mr. Vernon?”
“Yes. When he came over to France during his troubles, he was engaged in a dark plot against the Government. I never understood it, but there were oaths and secrets, and the police knew all about it. From what Laura has said, and it was very little, I think that she has been summoned on a matter of life and death, but more I know not. I do know that she has accomplished her business, and is returning.”
“I have no means of knowing whether you speak truthfully or not; but remember, your story will be tested in a few days.”
“Do not threaten me until you find I deserve it.”
“It will then be too late for threats,” said Arthur Lygon. “Remember that; and if you are withholding the truth from me, you have still an opportunity of setting yourself right.”
“I have told you all I know,” said Bertha, “except Laura’s address in Paris, and that would be of no use to you, because she will have left before you could reach it.”
“That is true,” said Arthur. “Still give it me, as proof that the rest of the story is true.”
Bertha took a card from among several that lay in a China basket, and gave it to Lygon. He saw that it was a woman’s card, with an address, and placed it in his pocket.
“There are no more trains,” Bertha repeated. “You will stay here to-night, though it will be sad for you, Robert being away, and my being so ill. But we will make you as comfortable as we can.”
“I thank you, Bertha, but no. I shall be off by the earliest train, and it would disturb your household. I will sleep in the town here, and trouble no one. Farewell. If you are behaving loyally to me now, I shall have an opportunity of saying to you—or, better, of showing you that you retain a friend, although”
“Although Laura will be ordered never to see or correspond with me again.”
“I am too much in the dark to speak of the future, but no one as yet has had a right to call me a harsh judge. What I may be under disloyal treatment, I know not.”
“If you knew all, Arthur, you would indeed pity me.”
“Indeed I do, and should, if I only knew that you were a wife who dares not tell her husband every thought of her heart. I do indeed pity you, Bertha.”
“Laura tells you every thought of hers,” said Bertha, holding his hand.
“I believed so. I believe that she will do so. When I believe that she ceases to do so I shall have no wife. Farewell, Bertha.”
He pressed her hand, and went out into the now lovely summer night.
CHAPTER XXIII.
When Mrs. Hawkesley had departed on her visit to her father at Canonbury, her husband, after making short work with the end of an article in which the House of Hapsburg was strongly, yet affectionately, recommended by him to set itself in order at the earliest opportunity, started for his walk to Brompton, to visit Laura’s children. But a man must mind his own business, more or less, whatever may be happening to his friends, and in the Park Hawkesley encountered the manager of one of the pleasantest of the London theatres.
“Stand and deliver!” said Mr. Aventayle. “I see a manuscript in your pocket, and of course it is the piece you have promised me so long. This is not exactly in your way from Maida Hill to the theatre; but perhaps you were going to read out to yourself sub tegmine fagi?”
“This is not a manuscript,” said the author, laughing. “Do you think I would trust myself with valuables in solitary places where managers and such like walk about? This is a kaleidoscope, which affords you a good opportunity for introducing an appropriate quotation—
‘Each change of many-coloured life he drew.’”
“But he—meaning you—did nothing of the sort. There’s no getting anything out of you. I suppose you do not care about money.”
“Not the least. If I take it, that is only for form’s sake. I write purely to do my fellow-creatures good.”
“Do me some, and give me a good piece,” said Mr. Aventayle. “We want it particularly, just now.”
“Just now I am particularly busy, my dear Aventayle.”
“Of course you are. But, come, promise, and then I shall get it.”
“I cannot say, to a week, when I can take it up.”
“I don’t want you to say to a week—say it to me. Laughs,” added Mr. Aventayle, mockingly quoting a stage direction.
“If you can make such epigrams as that, you might write your own pieces,” said Hawkesley, “and not try to demoralise me by giving me such work. But walk with me this way, that’s a good fellow, for I have a call over yonder to make.”
“What, at the French Embassy? Going to ask the Ambassador for the loan of a few French plays,” laughed Aventayle, a gentlemanly and accomplished man, out of whom not even the troubled politics of management had been able to make what the necessity of self-defence makes of a good many of us, both in and out of management. They walked on in companionship.
“Nonsense apart, Hawkesley, I should be very glad of a piece from you just now. We are getting capital houses to the Bright Poker, and long may they last; but I want to be ready with something else the moment that flags.”
