CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

IN FULL CRY

The amazing letter which I held in my nerveless fingers had been hurriedly scribbled on a piece of my wife's own notepaper, and read--

"DEAR OWEN--I feel that our marriage was an entire mistake.

I have grossly deceived you, and I dare not hope ever for your forgiveness, nor dare I face you to answer your questions. I know that you love me dearly, as I, too, have loved you; yet, for your own sake--and perhaps for mine also--it is far best that we should keep apart.

"I deeply regret that I have been the means of bringing misfortune and unhappiness and sorrow upon you, but I have been the tool of another. In shame and deepest humiliation I leave you, and if you will grant one favour to an unhappy and penitent woman, you will never seek to discover my whereabouts. It would be quite useless. To-night I leave you in secret, never to meet you again. Accept my deepest regret, and do not let my action trouble you. I am not worthy of your love. Good-bye. Your unhappy--SYLVIA."

I stood staring at the uneven scribbled lines, blurred as they were by the tears of the writer.

What had happened? Why had she so purposely left me? Why had she made that signal from the theatre-box to her accomplice?

She admitted having grossly deceived me, and that she was unworthy.

What did she mean? In what manner had she deceived me?

Had she a secret lover?

That idea struck me suddenly, and staggered me. In some of her recent actions I read secrecy and suspicion. On several occasions lately she had been out shopping alone, and one afternoon, about a week before, she had not returned to dress for dinner until nearly eight o'clock.

Her excuse had been a thin one, but, unsuspicious, I had pa.s.sed it by.

Had I really been a fool to marry her, after all? I knew Marlowe's opinion of our marriage, though he had never expressed it. That she had been a.s.sociated with a shady lot had all along been apparent. The terrors of that silent house in Porchester Terrace remained only too fresh within my memory.

That night I spent in a wild fever of excitement. No sleep came to my eyes, and I think Browning--to whom I said nothing--believed that I had taken leave of my senses. The faithful old servant did not retire, for at five in the morning I found him seated dozing in a chair outside in the hall, tired out by the watchful vigil he had kept over me.

I tried in vain to decide what to do. I wanted to find Sylvia, to induce her to reveal the truth to me, and to allay her fear of my reproaches.

I loved her; aye, no man in all the world ever loved a woman better.

Yet she had, of her own accord, because of her own shame at her deception, bade farewell, and slipped away into the great ocean of London life.

Morning dawned at last, cold, grey and foggy, one of those dispiriting mornings of late autumn which the Londoner knows so well. Still I knew not how to act. I wanted to discover her, to bring her back, and to demand of her finally the actual truth. All the mystery of those past months had sent my brain awhirl.

I had an impulse to go to the police and reveal the secret of that closed house in Porchester Terrace. Yet had she not implored me not to do so? Why? There was only one reason. She feared exposure herself.

No. Ten thousand times no. I would not believe ill of her. Can any man who really loves a woman believe ill of her? Love is blind, it is true, and the scales never fall from the eyes while true affection lasts. And so I put suspicion from my mind, and swallowed the cup of coffee Browning put before me.

The old man, the friend of my youth, knew that his mistress had not returned, and saw how greatly I was distressed. Yet he was far too discreet a servant to refer to it.

I entered the drawing-room, and there, in the grey light, facing me, stood the fine portrait of my well-beloved in a silver frame, the one she had had taken at Scarborough a week after our marriage.

I drew it from its frame and gazed for a long time upon it. Then I put it into an envelope, and placed it in my pocket.

Soon after ten o'clock I returned to the Coliseum, and showed the portrait to a number of the attendants as that of a lady who was missing. All of them, both male and female, gazed upon the picture, but n.o.body recognized her as having been seen before.

The manager, whom I had seen on the previous night, sympathized with me, and lent me every a.s.sistance. One after another of the staff he called into his big office on the first floor, but the reply was always the same.

At length a smart page-boy entered, and, on being shown the portrait, at once said to the manager--

"Why, sir, that's the lady who went away with the gentleman who spoke to me!"

"Who was he?" I demanded eagerly. "What did he say? What was he like?"

"Well, sir, it was like this," replied the boy. "About a quarter of an hour before the curtain fell last night I was out in the vestibule, when a tall dark gentleman, with his hair slightly grey and no moustache, came up to me with a lady's cloak in his hand--a dark blue one. He told me that when the audience came out a fair young lady would come up to me for the cloak, as she wanted to get away very quickly, and did not want to wait her turn at the cloak-room. There was a car--a big grey car--waiting for her outside."

"Then her flight was all prepared!" I exclaimed. "What was the man like?"

"He struck me as being a gentleman, yet his clothes seemed shabby and ill-fitting. Indeed, he had a shabby-genteel look, as though he were a bit down on his luck."

"He was in evening clothes?"

"No, sir. In a suit of brown tweeds."

"Well, what happened then?"

"I waited till the curtain fell, and then I stood close to the box-office with the cloak over my arm. There was a big crush, as it was then raining hard. Suddenly a young lady wearing a cream theatre-wrap came up to me hastily, and asked me to help her on with the cloak. This I did, and next moment the man in tweeds joined her. I heard him say, 'Come along, dear, we haven't a moment to lose,' and then they went out to the car. That's all I know, sir."

I was silent for a few moments. Who was this secret lover, I wondered?

The lad's statement had come as an amazing revelation to me.

"What kind of car was it?" I asked.

"A hired car, sir," replied the intelligent boy. "I've seen it here before. It comes, I think, from a garage in Wardour Street."

"You would know the driver?"

"I think so, sir."

It was therefore instantly arranged that the lad should go with me round to the garage, and there try to find the man who drove the grey car on the previous night.

In this we were quickly successful. On entering the garage there stood, muddy and dirty, a big grey landaulette, which the boy at once identified as the one in which Sylvia had escaped. The driver was soon found, and he explained that it was true he had been engaged on the previous night by a tall, clean-shaven gentleman to pick up at the Coliseum. He did so, and the gentleman entered with a lady.

"Where did you drive them?" I asked quickly.

"Up the Great North Road--to the George Hotel at Stamford, about a hundred miles from London. I've only been back about a couple of hours, sir."

"The George at Stamford!" I echoed, for I knew the hotel, a quiet, old-fashioned, comfortable place much patronized by motorists to and fro on the north road.

"You didn't stay there?"

"Only just to get a drink and fill up with petrol. I wanted to get back. The lady and gentleman were evidently expected, and seemed in a great hurry."

"Why?"

"Well, near Alconbury the engine was misfiring a little, and I stopped to open the bonnet. When I did so, the lady put her head out of the window, highly excited, and asked how long we were likely to be delayed. I told her; then I heard her say to the gentleman, 'If they are away before we reach there, what shall we do?'"