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CHAPTER III
THE REVELATION OF FRANCIS HILLISTON

Once upon a time popular imagination pictured a lawyer as a cadaverous creature, arrayed in rusty black, with bulging blue-bag, and dry forensic lore on his tongue. So was the child of Themis represented in endless Adelphia farces; and his moral nature, as conceived by the ingenious playwright, was even less inviting than his exterior. He was a scamp, a rogue, a compiler of interminable bills, an exactor of the last shilling, a legal Shylock, hard-fisted and avaricious. To a great extent this type is a thing of the past, for your latter-day lawyer is an alert, well-dressed personage, social and amiable. Still he is looked on with awe as a dispenser of justice, – very often of injustice, – and not all the fine raiment in the world can rob him of his ancient reputation: when he was a dread being to the dwellers of Grub Street, who mostly had the task of limning his portrait, and so impartial revenge pictured him as above.

All of which preamble leads up to the fact that Francis Hilliston was a lawyer of the new school, despite his sixty and more years. In appearance he was not unlike a farmer, and indeed owned a few arable acres in Kent, where he played the rôle of a modern Cincinnatus. There he affected rough clothing and an interest in agricultural subjects, but in town in his Lincoln's Inn Fields' office he was solemnly arrayed in a frock coat with other garments to match, and conveyed into his twinkling eyes an expression of dignified learning. He was a different man in London to what he was in Kent, and was a kind of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde for moral transformations. On this special occasion frock-coated legality was uppermost.

Yet he unbent for a moment or so when receiving Claude Larcher, for childless himself, the young man was to him a very Absalom; and he loved him with an affection truly paternal. No one can have the conduct of a child up to the age of twenty – at which period Claude made his début in the engineering world, without feeling a tugging at the heart strings. Had Larcher been indeed his son, and he a father in place of a guardian, he could have scarcely received the young man more warmly, or have welcomed him with more heartfelt affection.

But the first outburst over, and Claude duly greeted and seated in a convenient chair, Mr. Hilliston recurred to his legal stiffness, and, with no smile on his lips, sat eyeing his visitor. He had an awkward conversation before him, and was mentally wondering as to the best way of breaking the ice. Claude spared him the trouble by at once plunging headlong into the subject of Margaret Bezel and her mysterious letter.

"Here you are, sir," said he, handing it to his guardian. "I have brought the letter of this woman with me as you wished, and I have also abstained from seeing her in accordance with your desire."

"Humph!" muttered Hilliston, skimming the letter with a legal eye, "I thought she would write."

"Do you know her, sir?"

"Oh, yes!" said the other dryly. "I know her. But," he added after a thoughtful pause, "I have not set eyes on her for at least five-and-twenty years."

"Twenty-five years," repeated Claude, thoughtful in his turn. "It was about that time I came into your house."

Hilliston looked up sharply, as though conceiving that the remark was made with intention, but satisfied that it was not from the absent expression in Larcher's face, he resumed his perusal of the letter and commented thereon.

"What do you think of this communication, Claude?"

"I don't know what to think," replied the young man promptly. "I confess I am curious to know why this woman wishes to see me. Who is she?"

"A widow lady with a small income."

"Does she know anything of my family?"

"Why do you ask that?" demanded Hilliston sharply, and, as it seemed to Claude, a trifle uneasily.

"Well, as I am a stranger to her, she cannot wish to see me on any personal matter, sir. And as you mention that you have not seen her for five-and-twenty years, about which time my parents died, I naturally thought – "

"That I had some object in asking you not to see her?"

"Well, yes."

"You are a man of experience now, Claude," said Hilliston, with apparent irrelevance, "and have been all over the world. Consequently you know that life is full of – trouble."

"I believe so; but hitherto no trouble has come my way."

"You might expect that it would come sooner or later, Claude. It has come now."

"Indeed!" said Larcher, in a joking tone. "Am I about to lose my small income of five hundred a year?"

"No, that is safe enough!" answered Hilliston abruptly, rising to his feet. "The trouble of which I speak will not affect your material welfare. Indeed, if you are a hardened man of the world, as you might be, it need affect you very little in any case. You are not responsible for the sins of a former generation, and as you hardly remember your parents, cannot have any sympathy with their worries."

"I certainly remember very little of my parents, sir," said Larcher, moved by the significance of this speech. "Yet I have a faint memory of two faces. One a dark, handsome face, with kind eyes, the other a beautiful, fair countenance."

"Your father and mother, Claude."

"Yes. So much I remember of them. But what have they to do with Margaret Bezel – or Mrs. Bezel, as I suppose she is called? Why does she want to see me?"

"To tell you a story which I prefer to relate myself."

"About whom?"

"About your parents."

"But they are dead!"

"Yes," said Hilliston, "they are dead."

He walked about the room, opened a box, and took out a roll of papers, yellow with age. These were neatly tied up with red tape and inscribed "The Larcher Affair." Placing them on the table before him, Hilliston resumed his seat, and looked steadfastly at his ward. Claude, vaguely aware that some unpleasant communication was about to be made to him, sat silently waiting the words of ill omen, and his naturally fresh color faded to a dull white with apprehension.

"I have always loved you like a son, Claude," said Hilliston solemnly, "ever since you came to my house, a tiny boy of five. It has been my aim to educate you well, to advance your interests, to make you happy, and above all," added the lawyer, lowering his voice, "to keep the contents of these papers secret from you."

Claude said nothing, though Hilliston paused to enable him to speak, but sat waiting further explanation.

"I thought the past was dead and buried," resumed his guardian, in a low voice. "So far as I can see it is foolish to rake up old scandals – old crimes."

"Crimes!" said Claude, rising involuntarily to his feet.

"Crimes," repeated Hilliston sadly. "The time has come when you must know the truth about your parents. The woman who wrote this letter has been silent for five-and-twenty years. Now, for some reason with which I am unacquainted, she is determined to see you and reveal all. A few months ago she called here to tell me so. I implored her to keep silent, pointing out that no good could come of acquainting you with bygone evils; but she refused to listen to me, and left this office with the full intention of finding you out, and making her revelation."

"But I have been in New Zealand."

"She did not know that, nor did I tell her," said Hilliston grimly; "in fact, I refused to give her your address, but she is not the woman to be easily beaten, as I well know. I guessed she would find out the name of your club and write to you there, therefore I sent that letter to you so as to counter-plot the creature. I expected that you would find a letter from her at your club on your arrival. I was right. Here is the letter. She has succeeded so far, but I have managed to checkmate her by obtaining the first interview with you. Should you call on her, – and after reading these papers I have little doubt but that you will do so, – she will be able to tell you nothing new. I cannot crush the viper, but at least I can draw its fangs."

"You speak hardly of this woman, sir."

"I have reason to," said Hilliston quietly. "But for this woman your father would still be alive."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that your father, George Larcher, was murdered!"

"Murdered!"

"Yes! Murdered at Horriston, in Kent, in the year 1866."

Stunned by this information, which he was far from expecting, Claude sank down in his chair with a look of horror on his face, while Hilliston spoke rapidly.

"I have kept this secret all these years because I did not want your young life to be shadowed by the knowledge of your father's fate. But now Mrs. Bezel intends to tell you the truth, and will give you a garbled version of the same, making herself out a martyr. I must be beforehand with her, and I wish you to take those papers, and read the account of the case which ended in the acquittal of your mother."

"My mother! Acquitted! Do you mean – "

"I mean that Mrs. Larcher was accused of the murder of her husband, and was tried and acquitted."

"Great Heavens! But she is now dead?"

"I say no more," said Hilliston, evading a direct reply. "You will know the truth when you read these papers."

Larcher mechanically took the packet held out to him, and placed it in his pocket. Then he rose to go. A thousand questions were on the tip of his tongue, but he dare not ask one. It would be better, he thought, to learn the truth from the papers, in place of hearing it from the lips of Francis Hilliston, who might, for all he knew, give as garbled a version of the affair as Mrs. Bezel. Hilliston guessed his thoughts, and approved of the unspoken decision.

"I think you are right," he said, with deliberation; "it is best that you should learn the truth in that way. When you have read those papers come and see me about them."

"One moment, sir! Who killed my father?"

"I cannot say! Your mother was suspected and proved innocent. A friend of your father was also suspected and – "

"And proved innocent?"

"No! He was never arrested – he was never tried. He vanished on the night of the murder and has not been heard of since. Now, I can tell you no more. Go and read the papers, Claude."

Larcher took up his hat and hurried toward the door in a mechanical manner. There he paused.

"Does Mrs. Bezel know the truth?"

Hilliston, arranging the papers on the table, looked up with a face which had unexpectedly grown gray and old.

"Yes!" he said quickly. "I think Mrs. Bezel knows the 'truth.'"

CHAPTER IV
WHAT OCCURRED AT HORRISTON

After that fatal interview Claude went neither to the house at Kensington Gore nor to the chambers of his friend Tait. With the papers given to him by Hilliston in his pocket, he repaired to a quiet hotel in Jermyn Street, where he was well-known, and there secured a bedroom for the night. A wire speedily brought his luggage from the railway station, and thus being settled for the moment, he proceeded to acquaint himself with the tragedy of his parents' lives.

It was some time before he could make up his mind to read the papers, and, dreading the disagreeable relation, he put off the perusal till such time as he retired to bed. A note dispatched to the Club intimated to Tait that the second seat at the Curtain Theater would be unoccupied, and then Claude tried to rid himself of distracting thoughts by a rapid walk in the Park. So do men dally with the inevitable, and vainly attempt to stay the march of Fate.

Dinner was a mere farce with the young man, for he could neither eat nor drink, and afterward he dawdled about the smoke room, putting off the reading of the papers as long as he could. A superstitious feeling of coming evil withheld him from immediately learning the truth; and it was not until the clock struck ten that he summoned up sufficient courage to repair to his bedroom.

With the papers spread out on a small table, he sat down at half-past ten, reading by the light of a single candle. A second and a third were needed before he arose from his chair, and the gray dawn was glimmering through the window blinds as he laid down the last sheet. Then his face was as gray as the light spreading over street and house, for he knew that his dead father had been foully murdered, and that his dead mother had been morally, if not legally, guilty of the crime. The tragedy – a strange mixture of the sordid and the romantic – took place at Horriston, in Kent, in the year 1866, and the following are the main facts, as exhibited by the provincial press:

In the year 1860 George Larcher and his wife came to settle at Horriston, attracted thereto by the romantic beauty of the scenery and the cheerful society of that rising watering-place. Since that time Horriston, after a feeble struggle for supremacy, has succumbed to powerful rivals, and is once more a sleepy little provincial town, unknown to invalid or doctor. But when Mr. and Mrs. Larcher settled there it was a popular resort for visitors from all quarters of the three kingdoms, and the young couple were extremely liked by the gay society which filled the town. For five years they lived there, but during the sixth occurred the tragedy which slew the husband, and placed the wife in the dock.

The antecedents of the pair were irreproachable in every respect. He was a fairly rich man of thirty-five, who, holding a commission in the army, had met with his wife – then Miss Barker – at Cheltenham. She was a beautiful girl, fond of dress and gayety, the belle of her native town, and the greatest flirt of the country side. Handsome George Larcher, in all the bravery of martial trappings, came like the young prince of the fairy tale, and carried off the beauty from all rivals. She, knowing him to be rich, seeing him to be handsome, and aware that he was well-connected, accepted his hand, and so they were married, to the great discomfiture of many sighing swains. There was love on his side at least, but whether Julia Barker returned that passion in any great degree it is hard to say. The provincial reporter hinted that a prior attachment had engaged her heart, and though she married Larcher for his money, and looks, and position, yet she only truly loved one man – one Mark Jeringham, who afterward figured in the tragedy at Horriston.

To all outward appearance Captain and Mrs. Larcher were a pattern couple, and popular with military and civil society. Then, in obedience to the wish of his wife, George Larcher sold out, and within a few months of their marriage they came to live at Horriston. Here they took a house known as The Laurels, which was perched on a cliff of moderate height, overlooking the river Sarway; and proceeded to entertain the gay society of the neighborhood. One son was born to them a year after they took up their abode at The Laurels, and he was five years of age when the tragedy took place which caused the death of his parent. Claude had no difficulty in recognizing himself as the orphan so pathetically alluded to by the flowery provincial reporter.

The household of George Larcher consisted of six servants, among whom two were particularly interesting. The one was the captain's valet, Denis Bantry, an Irish soldier in the same regiment as his master, who had been bought out by Larcher when he took leave of military glory. Attached to the captain by many acts of kindness, Denis was absolutely devoted to him, and was no unimportant personage in the new home. The other servant was Mona Bantry, the sister of Denis, a handsome, bright-eyed lass from County Kerry, who acted as maid to Mrs. Larcher. The remaining servants call for no special mention, but this Irish couple must be particularly noted as having been mixed up with the tragedy.

For some months all went well at The Laurels, and it seemed as though the Larchers were devoted to one another. But this was only outwardly, for the character of Julia developed rapidly after marriage into that of a vain, frivolous woman, eager of admiration, extravagant as regards dress, and neglectful of the infant son. Larcher, a thoroughly domesticated man, greatly resented the attitude taken up by his wife, and the resentment led to frequent quarrels. He was annoyed by her frivolity and continuous absence from home; while she began to dislike her grave husband, who would have made her – as she expressed it – a mere domestic drudge. But the pair managed to hoodwink the world as to their real feelings to one another, and it was only when the trial of Mrs. Larcher came on that the truth was revealed. In all Kent there was no more unhappy home than that at The Laurels.

To make matters worse, Mark Jeringham paid a visit to Horriston, and having known Mrs. Larcher from childhood, naturally enough became a frequent visitor. He was everywhere at the heels of the former belle of Cheltenham, who encouraged him in his attentions. Larcher remonstrated with his wife on her folly, but she saucily refused to alter her line of conduct. But for the scandal of the thing Larcher would have forbidden Jeringham the house; and, to mark his disapprobation, gave him the cold shoulder on every occasion. Nevertheless, this inconvenient person persisted in thrusting himself between husband and wife, to the anger of the former and the delight of the latter. The introduction of this third element only made matters worse.

The house was divided into camps, for Mona supported her mistress in her frivolity, and, indeed, seemed herself to have an admiration for handsome Mark Jeringham, who was very generous in money matters. Denis, in whose eyes his master was perfect, hated the interloper as much as Larcher, and loudly protested against the attention of Mona and his mistress. Another friend who supported Larcher was Francis Hilliston, then a gay young lawyer of thirty-five, who often paid a visit to Horriston. He also frequented The Laurels, but was much disliked by Mrs. Larcher, who greatly resented his loyal friendship for her husband. Things were in this position on the 23d of June, 1866, when events occurred which resulted in the murder of Captain Larcher, the disappearance of Jeringham, and the arrest of Mrs. Larcher on a charge of murder.

A masked ball in fancy dress was to be given at the Town Hall on that night, and hither Mrs. Larcher was going as Mary, Queen of Scots, accompanied by Jeringham in the character of Darnley. George Larcher refused to be present, and went up to London on the night in question, leaving his faithful friend Hilliston to look after his matrimonial interests at the ball. Before he left a terrible scene took place between himself and his wife, in which he forbade her to go to the dance, but she defied him, and said she would go without his permission. Whereupon Larcher left the house and went up to London, swearing that he would never return until his wife asked his pardon and renounced the friendship of Jeringham.

Now, here began the mystery which no one was able to fathom. Mrs. Larcher went to the ball with Jeringham, and having, as she said to Hilliston, who was also at the ball, enjoyed herself greatly, returned home at three in the morning. The next day she was ill in bed, although she had left the Town Hall in perfect health, and Mark Jeringham had disappeared. Larcher was not seen in the neighborhood for five days, and presumably was still in London; so during his absence Mrs. Larcher kept her bed. Then his body, considerably disfigured, was found at the mouth of the river Sarway, some four miles down. Curious to state it was clothed in a fancy dress similar to that worn by Jeringham on the night of the ball.

On the discovery of the body public curiosity was greatly excited, and a thousand rumors flew from mouth to mouth. That a crime had been committed no one doubted for a moment, as an examination proved that George Larcher had been stabbed to the heart by some slender, sharp instrument. The matter passed into the hands of the police, and they paid a visit to The Laurels for the purpose of seeing what light Mrs. Larcher could throw on the matter. At this awful period of her frivolous life Francis Hilliston stood her friend, and it was he who interviewed the officers of the law when they called.

Mrs. Larcher was still in bed, and, under the doctor's orders, refused to rise therefrom, or to receive her visitors. She protested to Hilliston, who in his turn reported her sayings to the police, that she knew nothing about the matter. She had not seen her husband since he left her on the 23d of June, and no one was more astonished or horror-struck than she at the news of his death. According to her story she had left the ball at three o'clock, and had driven to The Laurels with Jeringham. He had parted from her at the door of the house, and had walked back to Horriston. His reason for not entering, and for not using the carriage to return, was that he did not wish to give color to the scandal as to the relations which existed between them, which Mrs. Larcher vowed and protested were purely platonic.

Furthermore, she asserted that her illness was caused by a discovery which she had made on the night of the ball: that Mona Bantry was about to become a mother, and to all appearance she believed that the father of the coming child was none other than her husband. Far from thinking that he had been murdered, she had been waiting for his return in order to upbraid him for his profligacy, and to demand a divorce. Mona Bantry had disappeared immediately after the discovery of her ruin, and Mrs. Larcher professed that she did not know where she was.

This story, which was feasible enough, satisfied the police authorities for the moment, and they retired, only to return three days later with a warrant for the arrest of Mrs. Larcher. In the interval a dagger had been found in the grounds of The Laurels, on the banks of the river, and, as it was stained with blood and exactly fitted the wound, it was concluded that with this weapon the crime had been committed. Inquiry resulted in the information being obtained that Mrs. Larcher, in her character of Mary, Queen of Scots, had worn this dagger on the night of the ball. Hence it was evident, so said the police, that she had killed her husband.

The theory of the police was that Captain Larcher had returned from London on the night of the ball, and had witnessed the parting of his wife and Jeringham at the door. Filled with jealous rage he had upbraided his wife in the sitting room, the window of which looked out on the cliff overhanging the river. In a moment of fury she had doubtless snatched the dagger from her girdle and stabbed him to the heart, then, terrified at what she had done, had thrown the body out of the window, trusting that the stream would carry it away, and so conceal her crime. This the river had done, for the body had been discovered four miles down, where it had been carried by the current. As to the dagger being in the grounds in place of the room, the police, never at a loss for a theory, suggested that Mrs. Larcher had stolen out of the house, and had thrown the dagger over the bank where it was subsequently discovered.

Mrs. Larcher asserted her innocence, and reiterated her statement that she had not seen her husband since the day of the ball. He had not returned on that night, as the servants could testify. The only domestics who had not retired to bed when she returned at three o'clock were Mona and Denis. Of these the first had gone away to hide her shame, and all inquiries and advertisements failed to find her. But at the trial Denis – much broken down at the ruin of his sister – swore that Captain Larcher had not returned from London on that evening, and that Mrs. Larcher had gone straight to the sitting room, where she first made the discovery of Mona's iniquity, and then had afterward retired to bed. Mrs. Larcher asserted that the dagger had been lost by her at the ball, and she knew not into whose hands it had fallen.

The trial, which took place at Canterbury, was a nine days' wonder, and opinions were divided as to the guilt of the erring wife. One party held that she had committed the crime in the manner stated by the police, while the others asserted that Jeringham was the criminal, and had disappeared in order to escape the consequences of his guilt. "Doubtless," said they, "he had been met by Larcher after leaving the house, and had killed him during a quarrel." The use of the dagger was accounted for by these wiseacres by a belief that Mrs. Larcher had given it to Jeringham as a love token when she parted from him at the door of The Laurels.

The evidence of Denis, that he had been with or near Mrs. Larcher till she retired to bed, and that the captain had not set foot in the house on that evening, turned the tide of evidence in favor of the unfortunate woman. She was acquitted of the crime, and went to London, but there died – as appeared from the newspapers – a few weeks afterward, killed by anxiety and shame.

The child Claude was taken charge of by Mr. Hilliston, who had been a good friend to Mrs. Larcher during her troubles, and so the matter faded from the public mind.

What became of Jeringham no one ever knew. His victim – as some supposed Larcher to be – was duly buried in the Horriston Cemetery, but all the efforts of the police failed to find the man who was morally, if not legally, guilty of the crime. Denis also was lost in the London crowd, and all those who had been present at the tragedy at The Laurels were scattered far and wide. New matters attracted the attention of the fickle public, and the Larcher affair was forgotten in due course.

The mystery was never solved. Who was guilty of the crime? That question was never answered. Some accused Mrs. Larcher despite her acquittal and death. Others insisted that Jeringham was the criminal; but no one could be certain of the truth. Hilliston, seeing that Mr. and Mrs. Larcher were dead, that Mona, Denis, and Jeringham had disappeared, wisely kept the matter secret from Claude, deeming that it would be folly to disturb the mind of the lad with an insoluble riddle of so terrible a nature. So for five-and-twenty years the matter had remained in abeyance. Now it seemed as though it were about to be reopened by Mrs. Bezel.

"And who – " asked Claude of himself, as he finished this history in the gray dawn of the morning, "who is Mrs. Bezel?"

To say the least, he had a right to ask himself this question, for it was curious that the name of Mrs. Bezel was not even mentioned in connection with that undiscovered crime of five-and-twenty years before.