"My boy--my poor boy."

Venetia had said nothing.

Jones had expected a scene, outcries, questions, but there was something in all this that was quite beyond him. They had asked no questions, seemed to take the whole thing for granted, Venetia especially.

The Duke of Melford shut the door.

"Your mother--I mean Lady Rochester's heart is not strong," said he, going to the bell and touching it. "I must send for the doctor to see her."

Jones, more than ever astonished by the coolness of the other, sat down again.

"Look here," said he, "I can't make you all out--you've called me no names--you haven't let me fully explain, the old lady is the only one that seems to have taken the news in. Can't you understand what I have told you?"

"Perfectly," said the old gentleman, "and it's the most extraordinary thing I have ever heard--and the most interesting--I want to have a long talk about it.--James," to the servant who had answered the bell, "telephone for Dr. Cavendish. Her ladyship has had another attack."

"Dr. Cavendish has just been telephoned for, your grace, and Dr.

Simms."

"That will do," said his grace.

"Yes, 'pon my soul, it's quite extraordinary," he took a cigar case from his pocket, proffered a cigar which Jones took, and then lit one himself.

"Look here," said Jones suddenly alarmed by a new idea, "you aren't guying me, are you?--you haven't taken it into your heads that I've gone dotty--mad?"

"Mad!" cried the old gentleman with a start. "Never--such an idea never entered my mind. Why--why should it?"

"Only you take this thing so quietly."

"Quietly--well, what would you have? My dear fellow, what is the good of shouting--ever? Not a bit. It's bad form. I take everything as it comes."

"Well, then, listen whilst I tell you how all this happened. I came over here some time ago to rope in a contract with the British Government over some steel fixtures. I was partner with a man named Aaron Stringer.

Well, I failed on the contract and found myself broke with less than ten pounds in my pocket. I was sitting in the Savoy lounge when in came a man whom I knew at once by sight, but I couldn't place his name on him.

We had drinks together in the American bar, then we went upstairs to the lounge. He would not tell me who he was. 'Look in the looking-gla.s.s behind you,' said he, 'and you will see who I am.' I looked and I saw him. I was his twin image. I must tell you first that I had been having some champagne c.o.c.ktails and a whisky and soda. I'm not used to drink.

We had a jamboree together and dinner at some place, and then he sent me home as himself--I was blind.

"When I woke up next morning I said nothing but lay low, thinking it was all a joke. I ought to have spoken at once, but didn't, one makes mistakes in life--"

"We all do that," said the other; "yes--go on."

"And later that day I opened a newspaper and saw my name and that I had committed suicide. It was Rochester, of course, that had committed suicide; did it on the underground.--Then I was in a nice fix. There I was in Rochester's clothes, with not a penny in my pockets; couldn't go to the hotel, couldn't go anywhere--so I determined to be Rochester, for a while, at least.

"I found his affairs in an awful muddle. You know that business about the coal mine. Well, I've managed to right his affairs. I wasn't thinking of any profit to myself over the business, I just did it because it was the right thing to do.

"Now I want to be perfectly plain with you. I might have carried on this game always and lived in Rochester's shoes only for two things, one is his wife, the other is a feeling that has been coming on me that if I carried on any longer I might go dotty. Times I've had attacks of a feeling that I did not know who I was. It's leading this double life, you know. Now I want to get right back and be myself and cut clear of all this. You can't think what it has been, carrying on this double life, hearing the servants calling me 'your lordship.' I couldn't have imagined it would have acted on the brain so. I've been simply crazy to hear someone calling me by my right name--well, that's the end of the matter, I want to settle up and get back to the States--"

The door opened and a servant appeared.

"Dr. Simms has arrived, your grace."

The Duke of Melford rose from his chair.

"One moment," said he to Jones. He left the room closing the door.

Jones tipped the ash of his cigar into a jardiniere near by.

He was astonished and a bit disturbed by the cool manner in which his wonderful confession had been received. "Can it be they are laying low and sending for the police?" thought he.

He was debating this question when the door opened and the Duke walked in, followed by a bald, elderly, pleasant-looking man; after this latter came a cadaverous gentleman, wearing gla.s.ses.

The bald man was Dr. Simms, the cadaverous, Dr. Cavendish.

Simms nodded at Jones as though he knew him.

"I have asked these gentlemen as friends of the family to step in and talk about this matter before seeing Lady Rochester," said the Duke.

"She has been taken to her room, and is not yet prepared for visitors."

"I shall be delighted to help in any way," said Simms; "my services, professional or private, are always at your disposal, your grace." He sat down and turned to Jones. "Now tell us all about it," said he.

Cavendish took another chair and the Duke remained standing.

Jones felt irritated, felt somewhat as a maestro would feel who, having finished that musical obstacle race The Grand Polonnaise, finds himself requested to play it again.

"I've told the whole thing once," said he, "I can't go over it again--the Duke knows."

Suddenly Cavendish spoke:

"I understand from what his grace said on the stairs, that there is some trouble about ident.i.ty?"

"Some trouble," said Jones; "I reckon you are right in calling it some trouble."

"You are Mr. Jones, I think," said Simms.

"Victor Jones was the name I was christened by," answered Jones.

"Quite so, American?"

"American."

"Now, Mr. Jones, as a matter of formality, may I ask where you live in America?"

"Philadelphia."

"And in Philadelphia what might be your address?"

"Number one thousand, one hundred and one, Walnut Street," replied Jones.

Cavendish averted his head for a moment and the Duke shifted his position on the hearthrug, leaving his elbow on the mantel and caressing for a moment his chin.

Simms alone remained unmoved.