'I believe, Hilda, you will drive me mad.'

'My dear, one must look ahead. And remember that I look ahead for you.

As for the young man, I dissociate him henceforth from you. What he does and where he goes I do not inquire or care about, any more than I trouble myself about a disgraceful brother. Some acts cut a man off from his mistress--from his sisters--from the world.'

'Do not talk any more,' said Elsie. 'Let the blow, as you call it, fall when it pleases. But as for me, I shall not warn George that he is to be charged with dishonesty, any more than I will believe him capable of dishonesty.'

'Well, my dear, there is one comfort for us. You may resolve on marrying him. But a man charged with a crime--out on bail--cannot marry any girl.

And he will be charged, and the evidence is very strong.'

'No doubt. As good as proved--as good as proved. Poor George! Who never had ten pounds in the world until he was made a partner----'

'True. And there we have the real motive. Seek the motive, Sir Samuel says, and we shall find the criminal. Here you have the reason of the secret partnership with Athelstan. Poverty is the tempter--Athelstan is the suggested.'

Elsie shook her head impatiently.

'Mr. Dering was to give you away. Who will now? Athelstan? How can we--Sir Samuel and I--a.s.sist at a wedding where the bridegroom lies under such a charge?--by one so near to us as Mr. Dering? How can your mother be present? Oh, Elsie, think!'

Elsie shook her head again, with greater impatience.

'Think what a fate you may be dragging upon yourself! Think of possible children with such a brand upon them!'

'I think only of an honourable and an innocent man.'

'I have just come from my mother, Elsie. She says positively that if the charge is brought, the wedding must be put off until the man is cleared.

And for the moment she does not feel strong enough to meet him. You can receive him here if you please. And she desires that there may be no disputes or arguments about it.'

'It is truly wonderful!' Elsie walked to the open window and gasped as if choking. 'Wonderful!' she repeated. 'The same fate--in the same manner--threatens George that fell upon Athelstan. And it finds us as ready to believe in the charge and to cast him out. Now, Hilda, go to my mother and tell her that though the whole world should call George--my George--a villain, I will marry him. Tell her that though I should have to take him from the prison door, I will marry him. Because, you see, all things are not possible. This thing is impossible.'

'We shall have trouble with Elsie,' Lady Dering told her mother. 'Call her soft and yielding? My dear, no mule was ever more stubborn. She will marry her convict, she says, even at the prison door.'

CHAPTER XVII

WAS HE IN RAGS?

Stubborn as a mule. Yes--it is the way with some girls: man is soft as wax compared with woman: man concedes, compromises, gives way, submits: woman has her own way--when that way is the right way she becomes a pearl above price.

Elsie, when the door was shut and her sister gone, stood silent, immovable. A red spot burned in her cheeks: her eyes were unnaturally bright: her lips parted: she was possessed by a mighty wrath and great determination: she was the tigress who fights for her beloved. Meantime, everything was changed: the sunshine had gone out of the day: the warmth out of the air: her work, that had pleased her so much an hour ago, seemed a poor weak thing not worth thinking about. Everything was a trifle not worth thinking about--the details of her wedding: her presents: her honeymoon: her pretty flat--all became insignificant compared with this threatened charge against her lover. How was it to be met? If it was only a suspicion put into shape by Sir Samuel and old Checkley it would be best to say nothing. If it was really going to be brought against him, would it not be best to warn him beforehand? And about her brother----

She sat down and wrote out the facts. To be doing this cleared her brain, and seemed like working for her lover. In March 1882 a cheque for 720_l_. to the order of one Edmund Gray was cashed in ten-pound notes by a commissionaire sent from an hotel in Arundel Street, Strand. No one ever found out this Edmund Gray. Athelstan was suspected. The notes themselves were never presented, and were found the other day in Mr.

Dering's safe, covered with dust, at the back of some books.

In February, March, and April, by means of forged letters, a great quant.i.ty of shares were transferred from the name of Edward Dering to that of Edmund Gray. The writing of the letters was the same as that of the forged cheque.

These were the only facts. The rest was all inference and presumption.

Athelstan had been seen in London: Athelstan had been living all the time in London: Athelstan had been seen going into the house which was given as the residence of Edmund Gray. Well--Athelstan must be seen the very first thing. Further than this point she could not get. She rang the bell, ordered tea to be brought to her own room, and then put on her hat and went out to the Gardens, where she walked about under the trees, disquieted and unhappy. If a charge is going to be brought against him, the most innocent man in the world must be disquieted until he knows the nature of the evidence against him. Once satisfied as to that, he may be happy again. What evidence could they bring against George?

She went home about eight, going without dinner rather than sit down with her mother. It is a miserable thing for a girl to be full of hardness against her mother. Elsie already had experience, as you have seen. For the present better not to meet at all. Therefore she did not go home for dinner, but took a bun and a cup of coffee--woman's subst.i.tute for dinner--at a confectioner's.

When George called about nine o'clock, he was taken into the studio, where he found Elsie with the traces of tears in her eyes.

'Why, Elsie,' he cried, 'what is the matter? Why are you crying, my dear? and why are you alone in this room?'

'I choke in this house, George. Take me out of it--take me away. Let us walk about the Squares and talk. I have a good deal to say.'

'Now, dear, what is it?'--when they were outside. 'What happened? You are trembling--you have been shaken. Tell me, dear.'

'I don't think I can tell you just at present--not all.'

'Something then--the rest afterwards. Tell me by instalments.'

'You are quite happy, George? n.o.body has said anything to make you angry, at the office, or anywhere else?'

'n.o.body. We are going on just the same. Mr. Dering thinks and talks about nothing but the robbery. So do I. So does everybody else. I suppose Checkley has told, for every clerk in the place knows about it, and is talking about it. Why do you ask if anybody has made me angry?'

'My dear George, Hilda has been here this afternoon. You know that--sometimes--Hilda does not always say the kindest things about people.'

'Not always. I remember when she wrote me a letter asking whether I thought that a lawyer's clerk was a fit aspirant for the hand of her sister. Not always just the kindest things. But I thought we were all on the most affectionate terms, and that everything had been sponged out.

Has she been saying more kind, sisterly, things about me? What have I done now? Isn't the money difficulty solved?'

'I will tell you some other time--not now--what she said. At the present moment I want to ask you a question. If you have reasons for not answering, say so, and I shall be quite satisfied; but answer me if you can. This is the question. Hilda says that Athelstan is secretly in London, and that you know it, and that you have been seen with him. Is that true?'

'Well--Elsie--the only reason for not telling you that Athelstan is here is that he himself made me promise not to tell you. Athelstan is in London. I see him often. I shall see him this evening after leaving you.

He is in London, walking about openly. Why not? I know no reason for any concealment. But he cannot go to see his mother, or enter his mother's house, until this charge against him has been acknowledged to be baseless. As for you, he will be the first person to visit you--and will be your most frequent visitor--when we are married. He is always talking about you. He is longing for the time when he can see you openly. But nothing will persuade him to come here. He is still bitter against his mother and against Hilda.'

Elsie sighed. 'It is very terrible--and now---- But go on.'

'I have answered your question, Elsie.'

'Oh, no. I have only just begun. You say that Athelstan is in London; but you do not tell me what he is doing and how he fares.'

'He fares very well, and he is prosperous.'

'Hilda says that he has been living in some wretched quarter of London all these years; that he has been frequenting low company; and that he has been, until the last few weeks, in rags and penniless.'

George laughed aloud. 'Where on earth did Hilda get this precious information? Athelstan in a low quarter? Athelstan a Prodigal? Athelstan in rags? My dearest Elsie, if Lady Dering were not your sister, I should say that she had gone mad with venomous hatred of the brother whom she made so much haste to believe guilty.'

'Oh! Tell me quick, George. Don't say anything against Hilda, please. I am already---- Tell me quick the whole truth.'

'Well, dear, the whole truth is this. Athelstan is doing very well. I suppose you might call him prosperous. When he went away, he had ten pounds to begin with. People kindly credited him with the nice little sum of 720_l_. obtained by a forgery. We now know that this money has been lying in the safe all the time--how it got there, the Lord knows--perhaps Checkley could tell. He went to America by the cheapest way possible. He had many adventures and many ups and downs, all of which he will tell you before long. Once he had great good fortune on a silver mine or something: he made thousands of pounds over it. Then he lost all his money--dropped it down a sink or into an open drain--you know, in America, these traps are plentiful, and started again on his ten pounds. He was a journalist all the time, and he is a journalist still. He is now over here as the London correspondent of a great paper of San Francisco.--That, my dear Elsie, is, briefly, the record of your brother since he went away.'

'Oh! But are you quite sure, George?--quite--quite sure? Because, if this can be proved----'

'Nothing is more easy to prove. He brought letters to a London Bank introducing him as the correspondent, and empowering him to draw certain moneys.'

'How long has Athelstan been at home?' She remembered the dates of the recent forgeries, and the alleged fact that all were in the same handwriting.