CHAPTER XVII
"Ernestine," he said gravely, "I am going to speak to you about yourfather!"
She looked up at him in swift surprise.
"Is it necessary?"
"I think so," he answered. "You won't like what I'm going to tell you!You'll think you've been badly treated. So you have! I pledged my word,in a weak hour, with the others. To-day I'm going to break it. I thinkit best."
"Well?"
"You've been deceived! You were told always that your father had died inprison. He didn't."
"What!"
Her sharp cry rang out strangely into the little room. Already he couldsee signs of the coming storm, and the task which lay before him seemedmore hateful than ever.
"Listen," he said. "I must tell you some things which you know in orderto explain others which you do not know. Your father was a younger sonborn of extravagant parents, virtually penniless and without the leastcapacity for earning money. I don't blame him--who could? I couldn'tearn money myself. If I hadn't got it I daresay that I should go to thebad as he did."
The girl's lips tightened, and she drew a little breath through herteeth. Davenant hesitated.
"You know all about that company affair. Of course they made your fatherthe butt of the whole thing, although he was little more than a tool. Hewas sent to prison for seven years. You were only a child then and yourmother was dead. Well, when the seven years were up, your relationsand mine too, Ernestine, concocted what I have always considered anill-begotten and a miserably selfish plot. Your father, unfortunately,yielded to them, for your sake. You were told that he had died inprison. He did not. He lived through his seven years there, and when hecame out did so in another name and went abroad on the morning of theday of his liberation."
"Good God!" she cried. "And now!"
"He is dead," Davenant answered hastily, "but only just lately. Waita minute. You are going to be furiously angry. I know it, and I don'tblame you. Only listen for a moment. The scheme was hatched up betweenmy father and your two uncles. I have always hated it and alwaysprotested against it. Remember that and be fair to me. This is how theyreasoned. Your father's health, they said, was ruined, and if he livesthe seven years what is there left for him when he comes out? He was aman, as you know, of aristocratic and fastidious tastes. He would havethe best of everything--society, clubs, sport. Now all these were barredagainst him. If he had reappeared he could not have shown his face inPall Mall, or on the racecourses, and every moment of his life would befull of humiliations and bitterness. Virtually then, for such a man ashe was, life in England was over. Then there was you. You were a prettychild and the Earl had no children. If your father was dead the storywould be forgotten, you would marry brilliantly and an ugly page in thefamily history would be blotted out. That was how they looked at it--itwas how they put it to your father."
"He consented?"
"Yes, he consented! He saw the wisdom of it for your sake, for the sakeof the family, even for his own sake. The Earl settled an income uponhim and he left England secretly on the morning of his release. We hadthe news of his death only a week or two ago."
She stood up, her eyes blazing, her hands clenched together.
"I thank God," she said "that I have found the courage to break awayfrom those people and take a little of my life into my own hands. Youcan tell them this if you will, Cecil,--my uncle Lord Davenant, yourmother, and whoever had a say in this miserable affair. Tell them fromme that I know the truth and that they are a pack of cowardly, unnaturalold women. Tell them that so long as I live I will never willinglyspeak to one of them again.
"I was afraid you'd take it like that," he remarked dolefully.
"Take it like that!" she repeated in fierce scorn. "How else could awoman hear such news? How else do you suppose she could feel to be toldthat she had been hoodwinked, and kept from her duty and a man's heartvery likely broken, to save the respectability of a worn-out old family.Oh, how could they have dared to do it? How could they have dared to doit?"
"It was a beastly mistake," he admitted.
A whirlwind of scorn seemed to sweep over her. She could keep still nolonger. She walked up and down the little room. Her hands were clenched,her eyes flashing.
"To tell me that he was dead--to let him live out the rest of his poorlife in exile and alone! Did they think that I didn't care? Cecil," sheexclaimed, suddenly turning and facing him, "I always loved my father!You may think that I was too young to remember him--I wasn't, I lovedhim always. When I grew up and they told me of his disgrace I wasbitterly sorry, for I loved his memory--but it made no difference.And all the time it was a weak, silly lie! They let him come out, poorfather, without a friend to speak to him and they hustled him out of thecountry. And I, whose place was there with him, never knew!"
"You were only a child, Ernestine. It was twelve years ago."
"Child! I may have been only a child, but I should have been old enoughto know where my place was. Thank God I have done with these people andtheir disgusting shibboleth of respectability."
"You are a little violent," he remarked.
"Pshaw!" She flashed a look of scorn upon him. "You don't understand!How should you, you are of their kidney--you're only half a man.Thank God that my mother was of the people! I'd have died to have gonesmirking through life with a brick for a heart and milk and water in myveins! Of all the stupid pieces of brutality I ever heard of, this isthe most callous and the most heartbreaking."
"It was a great mistake," he said, "but I believe they did it for thebest."
She sat down with a little gesture of despair.
"I really think you'd better go away, Cecil," she said. "You exasperateme too horribly. I shall strike you or throw something at you soon. Didit for the best! What a miserable whine! Poor dear old dad, to thinkthat they should have done this thing."
She buried her face in her handkerchief and sobbed for the second timesince her childhood. Davenant was wise enough to attempt no sort ofconsolation. He leaned a little forward and hid his own face with thepalm of his hand. When at last she looked up her face had cleared andher tone was less bitter. It would have gone very hard with the Earl ofEastchester, however, if he had called to see his niece just then.
"Well," she said, "I want to know now why, after keeping silent all thistime, you thought it best to tell me the truth this afternoon?"
"Because," he answered, "you told me that you had just been to seeScarlett Trent!"
"And what on earth had that to do with it?"
"Because Scarlett Trent was with your father when he died. They were onan excursion somewhere up in the bush--the very excursion that laid thefoundation of Trent's fortune."
"Go on," she cried. "Tell me all that you know! this is wonderful!"
"Well, I am glad to tell you this at any rate," he said. "I always likedyour father and I saw him off when he left England, and have written tohim often since. I believe I was his only correspondent in this country,except his solicitors. He had a very adventurous and, I am afraid, not avery happy time. He never wrote cheerfully, and he mortgaged the greaterpart of his income. I don't blame him for anything he did. A man needssome responsibility, or some one dependent upon him to keep straight. Tobe frank with you, I don't think he did."
"Poor dad," she murmured, "of course he didn't! I know I'd have gone tothe devil as fast as I could if I'd been treated like it!"
"Well, he drifted about from place to place and at last he got to theGold Coast. Here I half lost sight of him, and his few letters were morebitter and despairing than ever. The last I had told me that he was justoff on an expedition into the interior with another Englishman.They were to visit a native King and try to obtain from him certainconcessions, including the right to work a wonderful gold-mine somewherenear the village of Bekwando."
"Why, the great Bekwando Land Company!" she cried. "It is the oneScarlett Trent has just formed a syndicate to work."
Davenant nodded.
"Yes. It was a terrible r
isk they were running," he said, "for thepeople were savage and the climate deadly. He wrote cheerfully for him,though. He had a partner, he said, who was strong and determined, andthey had presents, to get which he had mortgaged the last penny of hisincome. It was a desperate enterprise perhaps, but it suited him, andhe went on to tell me this, Ernestine. If he succeeded and he becamewealthy, he was returning to England just for a sight of you. He wasso changed, he said, that no one in the world would recognise him. Poorfellow! It was the last line I had from him."
"And you are sure," Ernestine said slowly, "that Scarlett Trent was hispartner?"
"Absolutely. Trent's own story clinches the matter. The prospectus ofthe mine quotes the concession as having been granted to him by the Kingof Bekwando in the same month as your father wrote to me."
"And what news," she asked, "have you had since?"
"Only this letter--I will read it to you--from one of the missionariesof the Basle Society. I heard nothing for so long that I made inquiries,and this is the result."
Ernestine took it and read it out steadily.
"FORTNRENIG.
"DEAR Sir,--In reply to your letter and inquiry, respecting thewhereabouts of a Mr. Richard Grey, the matter was placed in my hands bythe agent of Messrs. Castle, and I have personally visited Buckomari, thevillage at which he was last heard of. It seems that in February, 18--hestarted on an expedition to Bekwando in the interior with an Englishmanby the name of Trent, with a view to buying land from a native King,or obtaining the concession to work the valuable gold-mines of thatcountry. The expedition seems to have been successful, but Trentreturned alone and reported that his companion had been attacked bybush-fever on the way back and had died in a few hours.
"I regret very much having to send you such sad and scanty news inreturn for your handsome donation to our funds. I have made everyinquiry, but cannot trace any personal effects or letter. Mr. Grey, Ifind, was known out here altogether by the nickname of Monty.
"I deeply regret the pain which this letter will doubtless cause you, andtrusting that you may seek and receive consolation where alone it may befound,
"I am,
"Yours most sincerely,
"Chas. ADDISON."
Ernestine read the letter carefully through, and instead of handing itback to Davenant, put it into her pocket when she rose up. "Cecil," shesaid, "I want you to leave me at once! You may come back to-morrow atthe same time. I am going to think this out quietly."
He took up his hat. "There is one thing more, Ernestine," he saidslowly. "Enclosed in the letter from the missionary at Attra was anotherand a shorter note, which, in accordance with his request, I burnt assoon as I read it. I believe the man was honest when he told me thatfor hours he had hesitated whether to send me those few lines or not.Eventually he decided to do so, but he appealed to my honour to destroythe note as soon as I had read it."
"Well!"
"He thought it his duty to let me know that there had been rumours asto how your father met his death. Trent, it seems, had the reputation ofbeing a reckless and daring man, and, according to some agreement whichthey had, he profited enormously by your father's death. There seems tohave been no really definite ground for the rumour except that the bodywas not found where Trent said that he had died. Apart from that,life is held cheap out there, and although your father was in delicatehealth, his death under such conditions could not fail to be suspicious.I hope I haven't said too much. I've tried to put it to you exactly asit was put to me!"
"Thank you," Ernestine said, "I think I understand."