And now the scene changes from Gloucester Cathedral, to St. George's, Hanover Square.

It was the smartest wedding of the year, and, apart from all its social brilliance, even the most rigid critics admitted that London had not seen a lovelier bride or a handsomer bridegroom than Enid Raleigh and Reginald Garthorne. The church was thronged by an audience made up of the friendly, the sympathetic, the sentimental, and the merely curious, as is usual on such occasions.

Carol Vane and Dora Russel, who had come provided with tickets indirectly supplied by the bridegroom himself, occupied seats in the left-hand gallery at the front. In consequence of the crowd, they only got into their places just as the bridal procession was moving up the central aisle. There was the bride with her attendant bridesmaids, six little maidens dressed in pure white, the bridegroom with his pages, six counterparts dressed in the style of Charles I. Then Sir G.o.dfrey and Lady Raleigh, and then a tall, grizzled, soldierly-looking man, and beside him a white-haired old lady, who might have stepped straight out of one of Gainsborough's pictures.

As Carol caught sight of the man beside her, she leant half her body over the front of the gallery, and stared with straining eyes down at the slowly moving procession. Dora caught her by the arm and pulled her back, saying, in a whisper:

"Don't do that; you might fall over."

Carol turned a white face and a pair of blankly staring eyes upon her, caught her by the arm with one hand and pointing downwards with the other, said in a whisper that seemed to rattle in her throat:

"See that man, there--that tall one with the old lady on his arm? That's the man who did all the ruin! That's my father--and my mother was Vane's mother, and that's his son, going to marry Vane's sweetheart. No, by G.o.d, he shan't! I'll tell the whole church full, first."

She tore herself free from Dora's hold and struggled to her feet, her lips were opened to utter words which would have instantly turned the wedding into a tragedy; but the rush of thoughts which came surging into her brain was too much for her. The swift revelation of an almost unbelievable life-tragedy struck her like a lightning-stroke; she uttered a few incoherent sounds, and then dropped back fainting into Dora's arms.

"Another of life's little tragedies, I suppose," whispered a well-dressed matron just behind her, to a companion at her side, "a _pet.i.te maitresse_, no doubt. It's a curious thing; they always come to see their lovers married."

CHAPTER XI.

The fainting of Carol in the gallery of the church and her being carried out just before the commencement of the ceremony, was looked upon by some of the more superst.i.tious of the immediate spectators as a sign of evil omen to the happiness of those who, in the phrase which is so often only the echo of devils' laughter, were about "to be joined together in holy matrimony."

Still, only a few had heard the broken words which the horror-stricken girl had uttered before she fell down insensible, and those only thought what the good lady behind her had said. To the rest of the congregation it was merely an incident, due to the crowd and the heat. The little flutter of excitement which it caused soon pa.s.sed away, and the ceremony began and went on without any of the bridal party even knowing what had happened.

She was carried to the gallery stairs, and there Dora sat her down, supporting her with her arm, while one sympathetic young lady held a bottle of salts to her nostrils, and an older lady emptied a scent-bottle on to her handkerchief and held it to her forehead.

In a very few minutes she came round. She looked about her, and, recognising Dora, said:

"Oh, dear, what's happened? Where am I? Yes, I remember--at a wedding--and he----"

Then she checked herself, and Dora said:

"Do you think you're well enough to come down and get into a cab, and then we'll get home? It was the heat and the crush that did it, I suppose."

"Yes, I think I can," said Carol. "I'm all right now. Thank you very much for being so kind," she went on to the other two with a faint smile of grat.i.tude.

"Oh, don't mention it," they said almost together, and then the younger one put her hand under her arm and helped her up. "Let me help you down," she said. "I daresay you'll be all right when you get into the open air."

Carol looked round at her and saw that, without being exactly pretty, she had a very sweet and sympathetic expression, and big, soft brown eyes which looked out very kindly under dark level brows. It was a face which women perhaps admire more than men; but her voice was one which would have gone just as quickly to a man's heart as to a woman's. At any rate, it went straight to Carol's, and when they had got into the cab and she leant back against the cushions she said to Dora:

"I wonder who that girl was? Did you notice what a sweet face and what a lovely voice she had? I'm not very loving towards my own s.e.x, but as soon as I got round I felt that I wanted to hug her--and I suppose if she knew the sort of person I am she wouldn't have touched me. What a difference clothes make, don't they? Now, if I'd been dressed as some of the girls are----"

"I think you're quite wrong there, Carol," said Dora, interrupting her.

"I don't believe she's that sort at all, she was much too nice, I'm certain. She had the face of a really good woman, and you know good women don't think that of us. It's only the goody-goody ones who do that, and there's a lot of difference between good and goody-goody."

"Well, yes," said Miss Carol, "I daresay you're right, after all. She had a sweet face, hadn't she? But look here, Dora," she went on with a sudden change of tone, "did you ever know anything so awful? No--I can't talk about it yet. Tell him to pull up at the Monico, and we'll have a brandy and soda. I never wanted a drink so badly in my life."

The cab had meanwhile been rolling down Regent Street, and had almost reached the Circus. Dora put her hand up through the trap and told the cabman--whose opinion of his fares underwent an instantaneous change. He nodded and said, "Yes, miss," and the next minute pulled up in front of the square entrance to the cafe. Dora got out first and helped Carol out; then she gave the cabman a shilling and they went in.

"Goes to a wedding, does a faint, comes out, and stops 'ere when they ought to have been driven 'ome. Not much cla.s.s there!" the cabman soliloquised as he flicked his whip over his horse's ears and turned across towards Piccadilly. He was, perhaps, naturally disgusted at the meagre results of a job for which he had expected three or four shillings at the very least.

The big cafe was almost deserted, as it usually is in the morning, and the two girls found a secluded seat at one of the corner tables.

"Dora, you must pay for these," said Carol when they had given their order, "and what's more you'll have to lend me some money to go on with, for if I was starving I wouldn't spend another shilling of that man's money."

"But, my dear child, I don't suppose he knew it," said Dora. "Of course you can have anything I've got if you want it, and I quite understand how you feel. It's very dreadful, horrible, in fact, but you couldn't help it. You're not to blame, and I don't see that he is, after all's said and done."

"No, I don't say that he is," said Carol, "and of course I couldn't know, for he isn't a bit like his father. He was dark once, so I suppose the--the other one takes after his mother. At least, he would do if she was a fair woman. But just fancy me having that feeling about Vane that night--feeling that I couldn't--and yet this one is just as near. G.o.d forgive me, Dora, isn't it awful?"

"Well, never mind, dear," said Dora, as the waiter brought the drinks.

"I don't see that that matters one way or the other now. What's done _is_ done, and there's an end of it. Well, here's fun, and better luck next time!"

"Hope so!" said Carol somewhat bitterly, as she took a rather long pull at her brandy and soda. "Ah, that's better," she went on, as she put her gla.s.s down. "At any rate, it couldn't be much worse luck, could it?"

"But are you perfectly certain," said Dora, "that he really was the man?

You know, after all, you only saw him for quite a moment or so."

"I'm as certain as I am that I'm sitting here," said Carol, "that that was the man who lived with my mother in Paris and Vienna and Nice and a lot of other places ever since I can remember. It isn't likely that I'm going to forget when I have such good reason as I have for remembering.

He's the man, right enough, and if I was face to face with him for five minutes I'd prove it. The question is whether I ought to prove it or not."

"That's a thing that wants thinking about," said Dora. "But how can you prove it?"

"Easy enough," replied Carol, "if he'd just take his coat off and turn his shirt-sleeve up. He's got two marks just above his right elbow, two white marks, and the one on the front is bigger than the one behind.

I've seen them many a time when he's been sculling or playing tennis. He told me he got them from a spear thrust when he was fighting in the Zulu war. The spear went right in in front and the point came out behind, and if I had a thousand pounds I'd bet it that that man has got those marks on his arm.

"Besides, I know lots of other things about him. You know I'm not a bad mimic, for one thing, and I could imitate his voice and his way of talking before I heard him speak, and I know a photographer in Paris where I could get his photograph--one taken while he was with us. We went with him to have it taken; and, besides, I don't care whether that unfortunate mother of mine's mad or not, she'd recognise him. I'd bet any money he daren't go to the place where she is and face her. Well, now I'm better. Let's go home to lunch and think it over. It certainly isn't a thing to do anything hastily about."

"That's just what I think, dear," said Dora, finishing her brandy and soda.

"All right; we won't take another cab just yet. Let's walk along the 'Dilly for a bit; it'll do me good, I think; and besides, I may as well get familiar with the old place again," said Carol, rising from her seat.

"What nonsense!" said Dora. "The very idea of _you_ having to go in for that sort of thing, when there are half a dozen fellows a good deal more than ready to take this man Garthorne's place."

"Well, well," said Carol, with a light laugh and a toss of her pretty head, "I don't suppose the change would be for the worse. But there's one thing certain, I shall have to snare the oof bird very shortly, for the first thing I'm going to do when we get to the flat is to send back every penny of the money that Reginald gave me when we said good-bye. Of course I didn't know anything about it, but it seems worse a good deal than if I had stolen it. Then to-night we'll go to the Empire, and you, being rather more married than I am, can chaperone me."

"All right," said Dora. "I'll send a wire to Bernard, and perhaps he'll come too and escort us."

Reginald Garthorne had behaved, as both the world and the half-world would have said, very honourably to Carol when they had said the usual good-bye before his marriage. He had paid his share of the rent of the flat for her for six months ahead, and had given her a couple of hundred pounds to go on with. Of this considerably over a hundred pounds remained. She changed the gold into notes, and even the silver into postal orders, and put the whole sum into a packet, which she registered and posted to his town address.

She gave no explanation or reason for what she was doing. In the first place she could not bring herself to tell him the dreadful truth that she had discovered; and then, again, it would only after all be a piece of needless cruelty. During her connection with him he had always treated her with kindness and courtesy, and often with generosity. She had nothing whatever against him, so why should she wreck the happiness of his honeymoon, and perhaps of his whole married life, by disclosing the secret that had been so strangely revealed to her? So she simply wrote:

"DEAR MR. GARTHORNE,

"You have been very kind to me, and I thoroughly appreciate your kindness. But something has happened to-day--I daresay you can guess what it is--which makes it unnecessary to me, and, as you know I have rather curious ideas about money matters, I hope you will understand my reasons, and not be offended by my returning it to you with many thanks.

"Yours very sincerely, "CAROL VANE."