"I have said too much," she said, panting and moistening her parched lips. "I did not mean to tell you--no, I will not say another word. I don't know why I am so unnerved, why I take it so much to heart I think--Nell, I am fond of you; you know it?"

Nell made a gesture of a.s.sent, and touched the countess' clasped hands lovingly, tenderly.

"I--I think it is your presence here that--that has made me hesitate--has made me realize the gravity of what I am going to do. I--I never look at you, hear you speak, but I am reminded that I was once, and not so long ago, as innocent as you. But I can hesitate no longer. I have to decide, and I have decided!"

She rose and stood with her hands before her face for the moment; then she let them fall with a sigh, and forced a smile.

"Go now, dear!" she said. "I--I wish I had not spoken so freely; but that tender, loving heart of yours is hard to resist."

"What is it you have decided to do?" Nell asked, scarcely above her breath.

A deep red rose slowly to the countess' face, then slowly faded, leaving it pale and wan, and set with determination.

"I cannot tell you, Nell," she said. "You--you will know soon enough.

And when you know, I want you--I want you to think not too badly of me, to remember how much I have suffered, how hard and cruel my life has been--how I have hungered and thirsted for one word, one look of love; that I have struggled and striven against my fate, and have yielded only when I could endure no longer. Oh, go now, dear!"

"Let me stay with you to-night! I can sleep on this couch--on this chair--beside you, if you like," pleaded Nell, confused and frightened, but aching with pity and sympathy. "I know that it is all wrong, that you are mistaken. If I could only convince you! If I could only tell you what I saw in Lord Wolfer's eyes as he looked at you to-night!"

The countess shook her head.

"It is you who are mistaken," she said, "and it is too late. No, you shall not stay. I have done wrong to say so much. Try--try and forget it. But yet--no, don't forget it, Nell. Remember me and my wretchedness, and let it be a warning to you, if ever you are tempted to marry a man who does not love you, whom you do not love. Ah, but you must go, Nell!

I am worn out!"

Nell went to her and put her arm round her neck, and drew her face down that she might kiss her, but the countess gently put Nell's arm from her, and drew back from the proffered kiss.

"No; you shall not kiss me!" she said, in a low voice. "You will be glad that you did not--presently! Stay--give me that flower!" she said, holding out her hand, but looking away.

Nell started, and drew the flower from her bosom as if it had been something poisonous, and flung it in the fire.

The countess shrugged her shoulders with an air of indifference, and turned to watch the flower withering and consuming in the fire, and Nell, with something like a sob, left her.

What should she do? She understood that her friend stood on the verge of a precipice; but how could she--Nell--with all her desire to save her, drag her back?

As she was going to her room she heard a step in the hall, and, looking over the bal.u.s.trade, saw the earl pa.s.s from the library to the drawing-room. For an instant she was half resolved to go down to him, to--what? How could she tell him? She dared not!

Lord Wolfer wandered into the drawing-room and stood before the fire, looking into it moodily, as he leaned against the great mantelpiece of carved marble.

He was thinking of the flower which he had seen first in his wife's possession, then in Sir Archie's, and lastly in Nell's; and of her blush and confusion when he had asked her how she came by it. He knew Sir Archie, knew him better and more of his life than Sir Archie suspected.

The man was a perfect type of the modern lover; incapable of a fixed pa.s.sion, as fickle as the wind. Could it be that he had transferred, what he would have called his "devotion," from the countess to Nell? It seemed at first sight too improbable; but Wolfer knew his world and the ethics of the smart set of which Sir Archie Walbrooke was a conspicuous member too well to scout the idea as impossible. The fact that Sir Archie had spent the last three months flirting with one woman would be no hindrance to his transferring his attentions to a younger and prettier one.

The hara.s.sed man turned away with a weary sigh, wandered purposelessly into the anteroom, and, in a mechanical fashion, fingered the various articles on the writing table. His eye fell on the book on the pedestal, and he took up the volume absently, intending to restore it to its place in the bookcase. On his way he opened the book, and a half sheet of note paper fell from it and fluttered to his feet. He picked it up, read what was written on it, and stood for a moment motionless, his eyes fixed on the carpet, his lips writhing.

How long he stood there he did not know, but presently he was aroused by the sound of footsteps. He listened. Some one--the rustling of a dress--was approaching the room. He slipped the note into the book and replaced the volume on the pedestal, and quickly stepped behind the portiere curtains.

He expected his wife. Should he come forward and confront her? His stern face grew red with shame--for her, for himself. Then, with a sudden leap of the heart, with a sensation of relief which was absolutely painful in its intensity, he saw Nell enter the room and go straight to the pedestal. Her face was pale and troubled, and she looked round with what seemed to him a guilty expression in the gray eyes. Then she opened the book as he had done, but, as if she expected to find something, took out the note, and after a moment of hesitation read it. He saw her face flush hotly, then grow white, and her hand go out to the pedestal as if for support. For a moment she stood as motionless as he had done, then she thrust the note into her pocket, dropped the book from her hand--it fell on the floor unregarded by her--and slowly left the room.

Wolfer pa.s.sed his hand over his brow with a bewildered air, then, as if obeying an irresistible impulse, he followed her up the stairs.

Quietly but slowly. He knew that she had not seen him, did not know that he was following her, and he waited at the end of the corridor, watching her with a heart throbbing with an agony of anxiety. Was she going to carry the note to his wife? But she did not even hesitate at the door of Lady Wolfer's room, but went straight to her own, and he heard the key turn as she locked it.

The sweat was standing in great drops upon his forehead, and he put up a trembling hand and wiped them away as he looked toward his wife's door.

Should he go in and question her? Should he ask her straightly whether the note was intended for her or Nell? It seemed too horrible to suspect the girl who had seemed innocence and purity itself, and yet had he not seen her go straight for the book, as if she had known that it was there waiting for her?

Like a man in a dream he went down to the library, and, locking the door, flung himself into a chair, and buried his face in his hands. What was he to think?

CHAPTER XXIII.

Nell stood in the middle of the room with the note which she had found in the book in her hand. She had read it half mechanically and unsuspectingly, as one reads a sc.r.a.p of paper found in a volume, or in some unexpected place; and, trembling a little, she went to the electric light and read the note again. It ran thus--and with every word Nell's face grew pale:

"I can wait no longer. You cannot say I have been impatient--that I haven't endured the suspense as well as a man could. If you love me, if you are really willing to trust yourself to me, come away with me to-morrow. G.o.d knows I will try and make you happy, and that you can never be under this roof with a man who doesn't care for you. I will come for you at seven to-morrow morning--we can cross by the morning boat. Don't trouble about luggage; everything we want we can get on the other side. For Heaven's sake, don't hesitate! Be ready and waiting for me as the clock strikes. Don't hesitate! The happiness of both our lives lies in your hands. ARCHIE."

Nell sank into a chair and stared at the wall, trying to think; but for a moment or two the horror and shame of the thing overwhelmed her. She had read of such incidents as these, for now and again one of the new school of novels reached The Cottage; but there is a lot of difference between reading, say, of a murder, and watching the committal of one.

She was almost as much ashamed and shocked as if the note had been intended for herself.

She was not ashamed of having read it--though the mere touch of the paper was hateful to her--for she felt that Providence had ordained it that she should stand between Lady Wolfer and the ruin to which Sir Archie was beckoning her.

But what should she do? Should she take the letter to Lady Wolfer and implore her to send Sir Archie a refusal? This was, of course, Nell's first impulse, but she dared not follow it; dared not run the risk of letting Lady Wolfer see the note. The unhappy woman's face haunted Nell, and her reckless words, and her tone of desperation, still rang in Nell's ears. No; she dared not let Lady Wolfer know that this man would be waiting for her. Few women in the position of the countess could resist such a note as this, such an appeal from the man who, she thought, loved her. But if she did not take the note to the countess, what was she to do?

Sir Archie would be, then, in the library at seven o'clock; he would ask for the countess; she would go to him, and--Nell shuddered, and walked up and down. If there were any one to whom she could go for advice! But there was no one. At all costs, the truth must be kept from the earl; his wife must be saved.

It was a terrible position for a young and inexperienced girl; but, despite her youth and inexperience, the note could scarcely have fallen into better hands than Nell's; for she possessed courage, and was not afraid for herself. Most girls, keenly though they might desire to save their friend, would have destroyed the note and left the rest to Providence; but Nell's spirit had been trained in the bracing air of Shorne Mills, and her views tempered by many a tussle with tide and wind in the _Annie Laurie_; and the pluck which lay dormant in the slight figure rose now to the struggle for her friend's safety. She had grown to love the woman who had confided her heart's sorrow to her that night, and she meant to save her. But how? Sir Archie would be there at seven, and Lady Wolfer must be kept in ignorance of his presence; and he must be sent away convinced of the hopelessness of his pa.s.sion.

Nell walked up and down, unconscious of weariness, ignorant that in his own room the earl was listening to her footsteps, and putting his own construction upon her agitation. Now and again she thought of Drake and her own love affair. Were all men alike? Were there no good men in the world? Were they all selfish and unscrupulous in the quest of their own interest and amus.e.m.e.nts? Love! The word sounded like a mockery, a delusion, a snare. Drake had loved, or thought he loved her, until Lady Luce had beckoned him back to her; and this other man, Sir Archie--how long would he continue to love the unhappy woman if she yielded to him?

The silver clock on the mantelshelf struck five, and Nell, worn out at last, and still apparently far away from any solution of the problem which she had set herself, flung herself on the bed. She had scarcely closed her eyes before a way of helping Lady Wolfer presented itself to her.

Her face crimsoned, and she winced and closed her eyes with a slight shudder; but though she shrank from the ordeal, she resolved to make it.

Lady Wolfer had been kind to her, had won her love, and, more than all else, had confided in her, and she--Nell--would save her at any cost.

A little before seven she rose, and changed her dinner dress for a plain traveling one, and, putting on her hat and jacket, went down to the library slowly and almost stealthily. A maidservant was sweeping the hall, and she looked up at Nell, clad in her outdoor things, with some surprise.

"I expect Sir Archie Walbrooke at seven o'clock," said Nell. "I am in the library, please."

She spoke quite calmly and casually, b.u.t.toning her glove in a leisurely fashion as she pa.s.sed on her way; and the maid responded unsuspiciously, for the coming and going at Wolfer House were always somewhat erratic.

Nell went into the library, and, closing the door, turned up the electric light a little--for the maids had not yet been to the room, and the shutters were still closed. The morning was a wet and chilly one, and Nell shuddered slightly as she sat and watched the second hand of the clock, which at one moment seemed to move slowly and at the next appeared to fly. She had not decided upon the words she would use; she would be guided by those which Sir Archie might speak; but she was resolved to fight as long as possible, to hide every tremor which, at these moments of waiting and suspense, quivered through her.

Then she heard his voice, his slow step--no quicker than usual this morning--crossing the hall; the door opened, and he was in the room.

Nell rose, and stood with her back to the light; and, closing the door, he came toward her with a faint cry of satisfaction and relief.

"Ada!" he said. "You have come----"

Nell raised her veil, but, before she had done so, he had seen that she was not the countess; and he stopped short and stared at her.