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CHAPTER XX
The autumn sunlight fell goldenly on the handsome face and form of Lancelot Darling as he stood on the broad marble steps of the grand hotel where he boarded, his glance roving carelessly up and down the crowded street.
Our hero was that rara avis whose species is almost extinct at the present day—a young man of wealth and fashion, yet totally unspoiled by the flattery and adulation of the world.
Carefully raised by judicious parents, whom he had unhappily lost by death in the dawn of manhood, he had been shielded from many temptations that would have assailed one less carefully guarded than this only and beloved child of fond and doting parental care.
Enjoying the possession of an almost princely fortune, which precluded the need of work, one would have thought him liable to be whirled into the maelstrom of vice and dissipation, and engulfed in its fatal whirlpool forever.
But such was not the case. He was only twenty-three when he met and loved the beautiful Lily Lawrence, and her love had been to him a talisman and safeguard against evil.
Even now, amid the total wreck of all his hopes, and the despair that filled his own being, he was no less the pure-hearted man and perfect gentleman than when the happiness of Lily's love had crowned his life with bliss.
As he stood there on the marble steps he did not note the many admiring glances that fell on him from passers-by—the appreciative looks of women whose gaze lingered on the tall, elegant figure and handsome face, nor the approving nod of men who, while they made no endeavor to reach his lofty standard, could yet admire him as a gentleman "sans peur et sans reproche."
While he stood thus abstracted a boy approached, and placing in his hand a delicate envelope, scented with heliotrope, turned away.
Lancelot turned the envelope in his hand for a moment in some surprise, for the writing was unfamiliar. In a moment he tore it open, however, and read these few lines on the perfumed sheet:
"My Dear Friend:—I enclose a list of some new songs which I wish to try. Will you do me the favor to select them for me, and bring them up this afternoon?
"Yours faithfully,"Ethel Vance."
This was a bold move on the part of the fascinating widow. She knew perfectly well that she could have sent the boy to a music store and secured the songs at less trouble than by entrusting the commission to Lancelot Darling.
The young man was aware of the fact also; but in the integrity of his own heart he suspected no art in her, and made an excuse for her in his mind.
"How tender-hearted she is," he thought. "She knows how wretched and forlorn I am, and charitably devises schemes for drawing me away from my gloomy retrospections, and cheering me with her gentle society."
Thus thinking Lancelot turned away and proceeded to execute the widow's commission. And punctually he appeared at Mr. Lawrence's drawing-room that afternoon.
The artful woman was alone, and rose to greet him with a beaming smile of welcome.
She had laid aside her usual dress of half mourning, and appeared in a becoming costume of costly black velvet and cream-colored brocade, profusely trimmed with rich lace. Diamonds twinkled in her ears and on her breast, and a bunch of vivid scarlet roses was fastened in the jetty braids of her beautiful hair.
"It is so kind of you to come," she said, pressing his hand in her soft, pink palm as he bowed before her. "Ada has gone riding with her father, and I am very lonely."
"It is not much kindness on my part," said he, bluntly: "for I am aware that I am not very cheerful company for anyone these days. I only came because you asked me."
"And not at all that you wished to see me," said she, with a very becoming pout of her rich, red lip.
"Oh, pardon my rudeness," said Lance, contritely. "You know I did not mean that. Of course I like to see you. You are very kind to me always. I meant that I would not presume to inflict my sad countenance and heavy heart upon you unless you insisted I should do so."
"You are very sad, certainly," answered she, with a pensive air. "Indeed, I sometimes wonder, Lance, that the natural light-heartedness of youth does not begin to assert itself within you. It is almost five months since your bereavement, and we do not grieve forever for the dead."
"Do we not?" he asked, with a heavy sigh. "Ah, Mrs. Vance, my grief does not lessen with time. My love was deeper than a common love, and my regret will be eternal!"
"That is all romantic nonsense," she answered, impatiently. "It is not the nature of any human creature to cherish the memory of one dead forever. 'Men's hearts crave tangible, close tenderness; love's presence warm and near.' You will be happy again, Lance, and you will love again."
"You judge me wrongly, Mrs. Vance, and under-rate the constancy of a heart like mine. You used a quotation just now, Permit me to reply with another one."
In a voice like saddest music he repeated those exquisite lines from Leigh Hunt:
"The world buds every year,
But the heart, just once, and when
The blossom falls off sere,
No new blossom comes again.
Ah! the rose goes with the wind
But the thorns remain behind!"
"Your poetry reminds me of the new songs," said she, dropping the argument. "It was very kind of you to bring them. Will you come to the piano and turn the leaves while I try them?"
"Certainly," he answered, rising and attending her.
It was the hardest thing she could have asked of him, but Lance was very unselfish. He put down the throb of pain that rose at the remembrance of the new songs he and Lily had been wont to practice at the same piano, and turned the leaves with a steady hand while her fingers flew over the keys. But one thing she had asked more than once. It was that he should sing with her. This he always quietly declined to do.
"That is rude of you," she would say, in a voice of chagrin. "Your tenor is so perfectly splendid, why should you refuse?"
"I shall never sing again," he would answer, quietly but firmly, and no persuasion on her part could induce him to change his mind.
It was agony for him to stand there and turn the leaves, looking down upon that dark head instead of the golden one he had been wont to gaze upon so fondly. When the face was lifted with a smile to his, and instead of Lily's soft, blue eyes he met the gaze of the black ones, his heart thrilled with pain. Perhaps she guessed it, but she kept him there all the same, thinking that time would blunt the keenness of his remembrance and teach him to adore the brunette as fondly as he had loved the blonde.
She played at him, she sung at him, lifting her passionate glance to his whenever some appropriate sentiment in the song seemed to warrant such expressiveness. Lance never dreamed of the reason for her pantomime. He had seen the same thing practiced by ladies in society. He deemed it a harmless kind of flirting, but never thought of responding to it.
She kept him there perhaps an hour patiently waiting on her pleasure, and passing his opinion only as it was called for on the various pieces she was practicing. At last, to his great relief, she grew weary of her amusement, and left the piano.
"Come and read to me, Lance," said she, with a pretty tone of proprietorship in him; "I am tired of the music, I do not like the songs. There is not a passable one in the whole selection."
She threw herself down half-reclining on a rich divan and settled herself to listen. Lance selected a volume of Tennyson, and seating himself near her, began to read quite at random the celebrated poem of Lady Clara Vere De Vere.
"Lady Clara Vere De Vere,
Of me you shall not win renown;
You thought to break a country heart
For pastime ere you went to town.
At me you smiled, but unbeguiled
I saw the snare, and I retired;
The daughter of a hundred Earls,
You are not one to be desired."
"Oh! no more of that," she cried, as he paused after the first verse. "I have never fancied that poem—try something else."
Patiently he turned the leaves and came upon the exquisite little poem of "Edward Gray"—a dainty bit of versification admired by all women.
"This will please her fancy," he thought, and began again:
"Sweet Emma Moreland of yonder town
Met me walking on yonder way,
'And have you lost your heart?' she said;
'And are you married yet, Edward Gray?'
Sweet Emma Moreland spoke to me;
Bitterly weeping I turned away:
'Sweet Emma Moreland, love no more
Can touch the heart of Edward Gray.'"
"You need not finish that one," said she, impatiently. "Pray excuse me, Lance, but I do not think you make very pretty selections, or perhaps I am not in the humor for listening. Put the book aside—let us talk instead."
"As you will, fair lady," said he, gallantly. "I shall listen to you with pleasure; but I must warn you that my conversational powers are not great."
"Perhaps the will is wanting," said she, trying hard to repress all signs of vexation. It was terribly hard to lead him on, this frank-spoken young ideal of hers.
"Oh, no," said he, smiling slightly. "It is a real inability for which I ought to be excusable."
"And so you are excusable," said she, with a tender glance. "There are but few things I would not excuse in you, Lance."
"You are very good to say so," he answered, quite gravely. "I am very faulty, I know, and it needs the eyes of a true friend indeed to overlook my manifold imperfections."
"A true friend," she sighed, softly. "Ah! would that I might find such an one."
Lance was about to make some commonplace reply to this aspiration when he suddenly observed that her face had dropped into her hands, and she was crying softly, her graceful form heaving with deep emotion.
"Mrs. Vance," said he in alarm, "what is the cause of your distress? Have I said or done anything to wound you? If I have, pray forgive me. It was unintentional, I assure you."
There was no reply. She continued to sob violently for a few minutes while Lancelot sat silent and perplexed at her unusual emotion. At length the storm of grief ceased in low sighs, and she lifted her head and carefully wiped off a few genuine tears that hung pendent on her silky lashes and threatened to fall upon her cheek and wash off the delicate rose-tint so carefully put on. Lance at once renewed his apologies and regrets.
"It is I who should beg your pardon, Lance, for this childish and undignified outburst of mine," said she, with quivering lips, "But indeed I could not help it. Our chance words struck a chord so tender that it vibrated painfully. Oh! Lance, I am very unhappy!"
"I should not have thought it," said he, quite surprised at her admission.
"No; because I mask my aching heart in deceitful smiles," was the mournful answer.
"But you have no present cause for unhappiness," said Lancelot, quite perplexed as to the means of comforting her. "Your home is pleasant, your friends are kind and loving."
"Ah! you think so," said she, with a bitter smile, "but you do not know what I have to endure. You could scarcely believe how bitterly Ada Lawrence taunts me with my poverty and dependence. Were it not for Mr. Lawrence, whom I will admit is kind in his way, I believe she would drive me forth homeless and shelterless."
"Surely you misjudge Ada," said he, warmly, "I am sure she has a tender heart."
"Ah! her sweet face is no index of her mind," answered Mrs. Vance, with a gloomy shake of her head. "God knows what insolence I daily endure from that ill-natured girl! Ah! Lance, this life of dependence is a bitter one. I would leave here to-morrow and seek to earn my own bread with my own weak hands were it not for one dear tie which holds me with a power stronger than my woman's will."
"And that tie?" asked the unconscious young man, in a voice of gentle interest.
"Is my passionate, uncontrollable, hopeless love for one whom I will not name," she answered, in a broken voice, and drooping her eyes from his earnest gaze.
"You mean Mr. Lawrence?" Lance queried, in surprise.
"Can you think so?" inquired the lady, in a low and meaning tone, lifting her eyes with one swift glance to his face, then quickly letting them droop again beneath their sweeping lashes.
"It seems incredible," pursued Lancelot, quite oblivious of the meaning she had so delicately conveyed. "Mr. Lawrence, though a very fine looking man, is at least double your age, and is not at all the kind of a man I should have supposed as likely to win your love, Mrs. Vance."
"Heavens, what obtuseness!" thought the almost distracted woman. "He will not understand. I shall have to tell him plainly, and then see what will become of his sublime unconsciousness!"
"Oh! Lance," she cried, shading her burning cheek with her hand, "why will you misunderstand my meaning? I did not mean to tell you the truth, but your assumption of my love for that old dotard forces me to vindicate the choice of my heart! Oh! Lance, do you not know, can you not see what I am ashamed to put in these plain words, that it is you whom I love and no other?"
If a bombshell had exploded at Lancelot Darling's feet he could not have been more surprised and actually alarmed than he was at this avowal of love from the woman whom he had honestly admired and reverenced as one among the gentlest and loveliest of her sex. He sprang up and stood looking down at her while a blush of honest shame for her burnt on his cheek.
"Oh, no," he stammered, finding breath after a long, embarrassed pause. "You cannot mean what you say!"
She arose at his words, and drawing near him laid a fluttering hand on his coat-sleeve. Her dark eyes still drooped before his, and her shamed yet imploring posture was the embodiment of grace.
"Do not be angry," she pleaded. "I do mean it; how could I help it when you are the only living creature that is kind to me? Oh, forgive me, Lance, for my wild words, and let me love you a little."
"Mrs. Vance, it is a shame for a woman to love unsought," said he, in a low, rebuking tone.
"Oh, do not say so!" she answered, wildly. "You men are too hard upon us women. You tie us down and restrict us in everything, and if we let our poor, clinging hearts go out to you ever so little before you give us leave, then you cry out shame upon us. Oh, Lance, is it so strange that I should love you? You have been kind to me, you are dangerously handsome and winning, and a woman's heart must cling to something. I have not a true friend on earth, Lance; I have no one to love and no one to love me. I am lonely and wretched beyond expression. Let me love you and say that you will love me in return."
Her forlornness moved his generous heart to pity and sorrow for her. He stood still as if rooted to the spot, listening to the wild torrent of words she poured forth so eagerly.
"Why should you be angry because a woman's heart lies at your feet, Lance, to trample on or to cherish as you please? Am I not young, beautiful, accomplished? If you chose me for your own before the world what could any one say against me, save that I could bring you no wealth but myself?"
Still no word from the appalled listener.
She raised her eyes beseechingly to him and drew a step nearer.
"Lance, do speak to me—do tell me that I am not wasting the wealth of my woman's heart in vain!"
He gently removed her clinging hands and seated her in a low arm-chair, standing beside her and looking down with visible embarrassment, yet with a steady purpose.
"Mrs. Vance," he said, gently, "words would fail me if I tried to express the unutterable regret I feel for the revelation you have made. You must know how hopeless your affection is, remembering all that I have said on that subject this afternoon. There is no woman living, no matter what her attractions may be, who could take the place of Lily Lawrence in my heart."
"But she did not love you—she died by her own hand rather than wed you."
"Perhaps so—we cannot tell. Be that as it may, I shall keep her image in my heart forever, and no other woman shall come between us," earnestly answered Lily's loyal lover.
"Then there is no hope for me," she moaned, faintly.
"None, Mrs. Vance—absolutely none. Pardon me that I have been forced to wound you thus, and forget this madness if you can. No one shall ever know of it from me," said he, gently, as he turned to go.
"Are you going?" she asked, rising.
"Yes," he asked, pausing reluctantly.
"One word, Lance. I have been mad and blind in allowing my feelings to find vent as I have done. I beg your pardon, and ask you as a priceless boon to forgive and forget my madness. Will you try and do it?"
"Gladly," he answered, with a sigh of relief.
"And one thing more. You will not suffer this act of mine to alter your pleasant relations with the household here. You will come and go as usual that they may not suspect anything has occurred. I promise you that I will not obtrude my company upon you," said she, humbly.
"It were better that I should remain away," he said, hesitatingly.
"But you will come sometimes," she said, and he did not answer nay, but only said: "Good-bye."
CHAPTER XXI
Mr. Shelton, the famous detective, was slowly but surely gaining ground in his mysterious and interesting case.
For a long time it had puzzled him and baffled his investigations, but having at last obtained a single clew, he began to push on, slowly, to be sure, but certainly, to eventual success.
He had discovered, after patient and almost incredible labors, that Doctor Pratt was the man who had bribed the sexton and obtained the key of the Lawrence vault the night of Lily's interment there. He had also learned that Harold Colville wore the missing half of the broken locket found in Mr. Lawrence's hall the night on which the specter of the banker's daughter had appeared to the assembled family. As yet he had not thought of linking these separate facts together, but the day was not far away when he would do so.
He adopted quite a bold method of obtaining the desired knowledge regarding Mr. Colville.
He called upon that gentleman attired in a very plain business suit, and still further disguised by a rather long wig of reddish hair, set off by beard and eyebrows of the same ruddy hue. He sent up a card to the gentleman of pleasure, simply engraved: "J. Styles."
After some delay he was ushered into Mr. Colville's parlor. That gentleman, attired in the extreme of fashion, merely nodded at his visitor's entrance. He did not think it necessary to rise for such a plain-looking personage.
"I have not the honor of knowing you, sir," said he, stiffly.
"J. Styles, under-clerk to the bankers, Lawrence and Co.," explained the visitor, briskly.
"Indeed!" said Mr. Colville, affecting nonchalance, but he started violently and the keen eyes of "J. Styles" saw that he turned a trifle paler.
"You have met with a loss, I see," said the under clerk, abruptly bending forward and taking hold of the broken locket that dangled among the charms of the gentleman's watch-chain.
"A personal affair that does not concern strangers," answered Mr. Colville, haughtily, as he drew back.
"I beg your pardon—it is the very business on which I called," replied the visitor, imperturbably. As he spoke he slipped his fingers into his breast pocket, produced the missing half of the locket, and deftly fitted it to the broken part that dangled from the chain. "I have the honor to return this to you, sir," said he, slipping the jewel into Mr. Colville's hand.
The gentleman's fingers closed over it mechanically.
"Why, what—the devil—where did you find it?" asked he, thrown off his guard by the unconcerned and business air of the under-clerk.
"I did not find it at all," answered "J. Styles," calmly. "I was commissioned to return it to you by Mr. Lawrence. It was found in the hallway of his residence on the evening of the twenty-first instant."
Mr. Colville started as if a bullet had struck him. He grew deathly white even to the lips, and stared at the visitor a moment in silence. At length he recovered himself with a powerful effort, and asked, curtly:
"Well, why did Lawrence think of sending it to me? I did not lose it there. Lawrence is a friend of mine, certainly, but I have not called on him for several months."
"He recognized it as your property, and supposed that you might have called on the ladies that day in his absence," returned the visitor, fabricating this lie with bare-faced effrontery.
"Yes, that seemed plausible," answered Colville, with evident relief.
"I suppose now that you have no idea where you actually lost it?" inquired the clerk, respectfully.
"Not the slightest—indeed, it was but yesterday that I discovered the loss. That must have been several days afterwards if, as you said, it was found on the twenty-first," replied Colville, more affably than he had yet spoken. "You will return my thanks to Mr. Lawrence for its prompt return."
"It appears strange that it should be found in the hallway of a house which you have not entered for months—does it not, sir?" remarked the clerk with a musing air.
"Exceedingly strange," returned Colville, uneasily. "But perhaps it had been found on the street by some person who might have lost it in Mr. Lawrence's hall that day. That is the only explanation of the mystery I can think of, for I assure you I have not been to the house for months. Not since long before the—the tragic death of his daughter," said he, growing pale as the words left his lips.
"By the way, a most startling event occurred at the home of Mr. Lawrence the same night on which your locket was found," said the clerk, who seemed in no haste to leave. "Your mention of Miss Lily recalls it to my mind."
"Indeed, and what was that?" inquired Colville, with an affectation of carelessness.
"Why, the spirit of the deceased young lady actually appeared to the family, who were all assembled in the drawing-room in company with the gentleman to whom she was to have been married," replied the visitor in a voice of awe.
"Can it be possible?" inquired Mr. Colville in a tone of surprise and interest. "In what manner did the apparition appear?"
"She appeared in the doorway, sir, with her arms extended towards her lover. She was heard to utter her father's name twice, then the whole illusion faded out in the thick darkness."
"Dear me, how very interesting," said Colville, shifting uneasily on his chair as though it were set round with thorns. "I have heard of such things, but never witnessed any manifestations myself. Miss Lawrence was a charming girl. A pity she should have destroyed herself."
"Yes, sir—a most lamentable affair—well, I must be going," said "J. Styles," rising.
"You will let me offer you a reward for your trouble in returning my property?" inquired Mr. Colville.
"Oh! no, I thank you, sir—but perhaps the housemaid who found it would be glad of a trifle, sir!"
Mr. Colville placed a bill in his hand, and the pair separated courteously, the fine gentleman returning to his seat in a tremor of anxiety and trepidation, while the detective took himself to the office of Mr. Lawrence, and after revealing his identity (for his disguise completely deceived that gentleman) he proceeded to detail the interview with Mr. Colville and its result as we have already described it.
"I took the liberty of borrowing the name of one of your under-clerks," said he. "I suppose there is no harm done."
"None at all, I should say," returned the banker, with a smile.
"And here is the reward the gentleman gave me for the housemaid who found the locket," continued the detective, producing the money.
"Ah! he was generous," commented the banker, tucking the five-dollar bill into his vest pocket. "Well, and what do you make of all this, Shelton?"
"Much, if I could guess at the meaning of it," returned the detective, frankly. "At present I am all at sea, but from this day forward until I get at the truth, Colville will be a shadowed man. I shall be on his track like a bloodhound. His agitation and alarm at learning where his locket had been found meant much, and his lying assertion that he had not been at your house that night meant more. I assure you that Harold Colville was in your house that night and with no good purpose. I will yet give you proofs of my assertion."
"You have done well so far," said Mr. Lawrence, approvingly; "I believe you will succeed in ferreting out that mystery, and I will try and bide the time patiently. And now about the man who had the key of my vault the night of my daughter's interment. Have you tracked him yet?"
"I have," answered Mr. Shelton, triumphantly.
"You have?" cried the banker, eagerly. "His name?"
"You remember the physician who was called in to examine your daughter's body the morning she was found dead—the same man who testified at the inquest? The man is one Doctor Pratt, a physician of fair repute in this city and of some skill in his profession."
"A physician, Shelton? My God! Then poor Lily's body was stolen for purposes of dissection!"
"I do not think so. They would not have run so great a risk to gain so little. No, Mr. Lawrence, I still firmly believe that it was done for the sake of a large ransom."
"Then why do the thieves not return the body, since I have long ago offered a ransom for it and no questions asked?" said the banker, impatiently.
"Perhaps you have not offered as much as they expected," answered Shelton.
"Would you advise me to increase the amount? I would willingly double and treble it if necessary," said Mr. Lawrence, earnestly.
"Do not do so at present, sir. I hope that we shall succeed in finding the body and punishing the knaves for their unholy sacrilege. I am loth to reward their treachery and suffer them to go scot-free," answered Shelton, earnestly.
"Well, you know best, Shelton. I will wait yet a little longer, then—but, oh, Heavens, this suspense is very dreadful. I feel myself growing old before my time with the pressure of my troubles," said Mr. Lawrence, passing his hand wearily through his fast whitening hair.
"Have patience yet a little longer. Indeed, Mr. Lawrence, I feel deeply for your distress, and will do all I can to alleviate it," said the detective, in a tone of respectful sympathy.
"Thank you, Shelton. I believe that you will," said the banker, gratefully. "And now about this rascally physician. You were very clever in finding him out. How did you manage it?"
"It would weary you if I went into details, Mr. Lawrence. I arrived at my knowledge after much time and labor. But I will briefly explain that I furnished the old sexton who helped on this trouble a deputy in his business, and disguising the old fellow thoroughly, I took him about with me night and day until he recognized his man and pointed him out to me."
"It seems incredible that a man with a good profession and of fair repute should be found engaging in such a nefarious scheme," said Mr. Lawrence, in amazement.
Mr. Shelton smiled knowingly.
"My dear sir," he said, "there is nothing incredible, nor even uncommon about it. My experience in the detective line has made me familiar with a hundred such cases. Men steeped in every iniquity are found concealed under the guise of respectable professions or genteel business. Wolves in lamb's clothing, you know."
"It is shocking to think of," said the banker. "Well, can anything be done with this Pratt? Should not he be arrested at once on the charge of bribery?"
"And thereby lose the chance of tracking him to the hiding-place where he has the body concealed?" said Mr. Shelton. "Oh! no, Mr. Lawrence, we will not molest him yet. I have my eye upon him. Like Mr. Colville, he is a shadowed man; I have a colleague in this business, and we each have our marked man to watch. Dr. Pratt's profession takes him abroad so much and into so many houses that it will be difficult to track him, but depend upon it we shall run him to earth at last."
"I truly hope so; your recent discoveries have put new heart into me, Shelton; may God prosper you in your undertaking," said the banker, supplementing this aspiration with a very large roll of bank-bills which he slipped into the detective's hand.
"Thank you, sir," smiled Shelton. "That material way you have of supplementing a prayer is not a bad thought. I may count upon your silence about what I have disclosed—may I?"
Mr. Lawrence placed his fingers on his lips with a nod and smile.
"All right, I'll rely upon you," said the disguised detective, and with a brief "good-day, sir," he went buoyantly away on the secret mission that meant detection and ruin to Messrs. Pratt and Colville.
The banker returned to his counting-room with renewed hope and vigor. The impenetrable darkness that had hovered over Lily's disappearance so long seemed to be lifting at last and a gleam of light shone through the little rift in the clouds.
