The Temptress

Flinging himself upon his knees before her, he pleaded for mercy, declaring that the injury he had done her was under sheer compulsion. He admitted he was a base, heartless villain, undeserving of pity or leniency; still he implored forgiveness on the ground that he had been sufficiently punished by a remorseful conscience.

But Dolly was inexorable to his appeals, and turned a deaf ear to his expressions of regret. She had come there for a fixed purpose, which she meant to accomplish at all hazards. It was evident he had some connection with the crime which she had heard discussed by the man and woman who had kept her prisoner, and it was likewise apparent that he was in deadly fear of the police. The effect of her remark about the murder had been almost magical, and she was at a loss how to account for it.

“Your entreaty is useless,” she said coldly, after a few moments’ reflection, stretching forth her hand and assisting him to his feet. She despised the cringing coward. “Before you need hope for leniency, I desire to know where Hugh Trethowen is to be found.”

“I don’t know him. How should I know?” he stammered confusedly.

By his agitation she was convinced he was not telling the truth.

“Oh, perhaps you will tell me next that you are unacquainted with Mr Egerton, the artist,” she observed, with a curious smile.

“I’ve met him once, I think,” replied the curate, with feigned reflection.

“And you declare solemnly that you know nothing of Hugh Trethowen?” she asked incredulously.

He shook his head.

“Then you are speaking falsely,” she said angrily; “and the sooner we understand each other the better. You believe me to be a weak girl, easily cajoled, but you’ll discover your mistake, sir, when it’s too late – when you have fallen into the clutches of the police and your crime has been exposed.”

“Do you think I’m going to allow you to give information!” he cried fiercely, shaking his fist threateningly before her face.

This outburst of passion did not intimidate her. Laughing, she said —

“I’m well aware that we are alone, and I’m completely in your power. If you are so anxious to murder me, you’d better set about it at once.”

“Bah!” he exclaimed, turning from her with chagrin. “Why do you taunt me like this? Why did you come here and incite me to lay murderous hands upon you?”

“Merely because I desire some information – nothing more.”

“Why do you seek it of me?”

“Because I know that with your assistance I can discover Hugh Trethowen. But we have parleyed long enough. I ask you now, for the last time, whether you wish me to show you mercy – whether you will answer my questions in confidence?”

He drew a deep breath, and stood motionless, perplexed and hesitating. They had emerged from the vestry, and were standing close to the altar. About her fair face shone a stream of richest life. This came from the painted window above – three bars of coloured sunlight, that bathed the hair in fire and left the dark body in deepest shadow.

“By betraying the secret I should run a great risk – how great you have little idea.”

“Will not the risk be greater if you refuse to answer me?” she asked, looking at him steadily.

Her argument was conclusive. A few minutes, and he had apparently decided.

“Well, if you compel me, I suppose I must tell you,” said he, dropping into a hoarse whisper. “If I do, you’ll promise never to repeat it?”

“Yes,” she replied eagerly.

“Swear to keep the secret. Indeed, it was through my efforts that your life was saved.”

“I’ll preserve silence,” she promised. “Then, the truth is that you were the dangerous rival of a woman in the affections of a man whom she desired should marry her. The man merely admired her, but loved you. Having set her mind upon marrying him, she deliberately planned that you, the only obstacle, should be removed. The woman – ”

“Whose name is Valérie Dedieu,” interposed Dolly calmly.

“Why, how did you know?” he asked in surprise.

“I know more than you anticipate,” replied she meaningly.

“Ah, it was a diabolical plot! The woman – I mean Valérie – planned it with Victor.”

“Victor? Who is Victor?”

“Bérard – the man who attempted to take your life. But I was about to tell you how it was that I became complicated in the affair. The truth is, they compelled me. The Frenchwoman holds a certain power over me which causes me to be absolutely ruled by her caprices. In her hands I am helpless, for she can order me to perform any menial service, any crime, being fully aware that I could not – that I dare not – disobey her.”

He spoke with heartfelt bitterness, as if the whole of the transactions were repugnant to him.

“And you – a clergyman!” Dolly incredulously observed.

“Yes. Unfortunately, our evil deeds pursue us. At times, when we least anticipate, the closed pages of one’s life are reopened and revealed in all their hideousness.”

“Yours is a bitter past, then?” she said in a tone of reproach. “Ah! now I understand. You are bound to mademoiselle with the same bond of guilt as Jack Egerton?”

“Who – who told you it was guilt?” he stammered.

“You and Mr Egerton are bound to Valérie Dedieu by a secret,” she said.

An astounding thought had just crossed her mind. The Christian name Victor occurred frequently in the report in the Gaulois, which she had had translated, and which she had since treasured carefully, determined to use it as a final and unimpeachable document to bring Nemesis upon her enemy when occasion offered.

“I understand. Much is now plain to me,” she continued in a firm, harsh voice. “Yet you have not answered my first question. Mademoiselle’s husband left England some months ago, and has not since been heard of. Tell me, where is he?”

“I’m quite as ignorant of his whereabouts as yourself.”

“Then, I’ll put the question in another form. Why has Hugh Trethowen disappeared?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’m convinced that you know where he is.”

“I do not. How should I?” he asked impatiently. “It is futile to prevaricate. If you are one of mademoiselle’s myrmidons, as you admit, you surely can form some idea why he has disappeared so mysteriously. Are you not aware that he is no longer living with her, and that all efforts to discover him have been in vain?”

“I – I really know nothing, and care less, about your lover,” he answered disdainfully. “Besides, why should you renew your friendship with him now he is married?”

His words maddened her. She had attacked her adversary with circumspection, but in her sudden ebullition of passionate indignation she gave vent to a flood of words, which, as soon as they were uttered, she regretted.

“I did not ask you to assist Hugh,” she cried. “I know he – like myself – has fallen a victim to the machinations of your hired assassins. But you refuse to tell me where I can find him, and speak of him as my lover. Even if we do love one another, what does it concern you? Would you preach to me of morals?” This last remark caused him to start, and he scowled at her ominously. “I warn you,” she said. “The day is not far distant when the whole mystery will be cleared up, and your villainy exposed.”

“Perhaps so,” he replied, with a forced laugh. “I’m sure I don’t care.”

“But you will, I fancy. You’ll be glad enough, when the time arrives, to fall upon your knees, as you did just now, and beg for mercy.”

“You’re mad,” he said in a tone of disgust.

She did not heed his remark, but continued —

“Perhaps,” she cried, “you will deny that a celebrated case was recently investigated by the Assize Court of the Seine, and was popularly known as the Mystery of the Boulevard Haussmann. Perhaps you will deny that Valérie Dardignac and Mrs Trethowen are the same person; that she – ”

“What are you saying?”

“The truth. Moreover, I tell you I intend having satisfaction from you who lured me almost to my death.”

“Oh! How?” he asked defiantly.

“By a very simple process. I have merely to place the police in possession of the true facts regarding the crime which startled Paris not long ago. You shall not escape me now.”

He stood erect, glaring at her, his mouth twitching, his face pale, with a murderous expression upon it.

“So those are your tactics, miss?” he cried, with rage, springing upon her, and clutching with both hands at her throat. “You are the only person who knows our secret.”

“Help! police!” she shouted in alarm, noticing his determined manner.

Her cries echoed through the great empty church, but no assistance came.

His fingers tightened their hold upon her throat. He was strangling her.

The light had died away from above, and the shadows mingled in a shapeless mass.

“Help! help!” she screamed again; but her voice was fainter, for she was choking.

“Silence!” he hissed. “It’s you – you who would brand me as a murderer, and send me to the gallows! Do you think I’m going to allow you to do that! By heaven, you shan’t do it!”

She attempted to scream, but he placed his hand over her mouth.

His face was blanched, and his eyes gleamed with murderous hate as he glanced quickly around. His gaze fell upon the altar. Releasing her, he bounded towards it, and snatched up a heavy brass vase.

She saw his intention, but was powerless to recede.

“Help!” she shrieked.

Upon her throat she felt a hot hand; she saw the heavy vase uplifted above her.

“Take that!” he cried, as he brought it down upon her head with a crushing blow, and she fell senseless upon the stone pavement.

For a second or two he looked at her, wondering if she were dead. Then tearing off his surplice, he rushed into the vestry, and, putting on his coat and hat, fled from the church, locking the door after him.

The upturned face of the prostrate girl was calm and deathlike. She lay motionless upon the cold grey flags. The sun shone out again, and the coloured light, streaming from the stained-glass window, fell full upon her handsome features. But its warmth did not rouse her; she gave no sign of life.

Late in the afternoon, however, she struggled back to consciousness, and sat for a long time on the pulpit steps trying to calm herself and decide how to act.

The excruciating pain in her head would not allow her thoughts to shape sufficiently, so she made a tour of the building to discover some mode of egress. It was not long before she found that in one of the main doors the key had been left, and, unlocking it, she stepped out into the bright, warm afternoon with a feeling that a strange, oppressive weight had suddenly clouded her brain.

That evening the city clerks, small shopkeepers, with their wives and relations, who comprise the majority of the congregation of St. Barnabas, Camberwell, were agog when it transpired that their popular spiritual guide, the Rev. Hubert Holt, had suddenly thrown up his curacy. The vicar took the service, and at the conclusion announced with regret that his assistant had written to him that afternoon resigning his appointment, stating that a pressing engagement made it imperative that he should leave England at once. He gave no reason, but when the vicar sent round to his lodgings to request him to call and wish him adieu, it was discovered that he had packed a few things hurriedly, and already departed.

Then a local sensation was produced in the district between Denmark Hill and Camberwell Gate, and the devout parishioners prayed for the preservation and well-being of their popular but absent curate.

Chapter Twenty Seven

Silken Sackcloth

The certificate of death is all we require.

“I have it here.”

“Why, how did you obtain it?”

“By a most fortunate circumstance. We saw one day, in the Indépendance Belge, that an unknown Englishman, apparently a gentleman, had died at the Hôtel du Nord at Antwerp. Pierre at once suggested that he might identify him as Hugh Trethowen. He went to Antwerp and did so. The man was buried as my husband, and here is the certificate.”

“A very smart stroke of business – very smart. But – er – don’t talk quite so plainly; you – ”

“What do you mean? Surely you have no qualm of conscience? The payment we agreed upon ought to counteract all that.”

“Of course. Nevertheless, it is unnecessary to refer to the strategy too frequently. As long as we have an indisputable death certificate in the name of Hugh Trethowen, and you have your marriage certificate as his wife, there will not be the slightest difficulty.”

“I know that. To me you appear afraid lest we should be exposed.”

“You need not upbraid me for exercising due caution. The success of the plan you have been so long maturing depends upon it. Supposing we were unable to prove the will, in what position should we be?”

“In an awkward one – decidedly awkward. But why speak of failure when we are bound to succeed?”

“Are you quite sure the – er – dead man will never trouble us?”

“Positive. A sentence of fifteen years in New Caledonia means certain death. He might just as well have been buried at once, poor devil!”

This confidential conversation took place in Mr Bernard Graham’s gloomy private office in Devereux Court. The old solicitor, with a serious, intense expression upon his countenance, was sitting at his littered writing-table with a short legal document, covering only half of the sheet of foolscap, spread out upon his blotting-pad. Its purport was that the testator, Hugh Trethowen, left all he possessed to his “dear wife, Valérie,” and the date of the signatures showed that it had been completed only a few days before they left Coombe for Paris.

In the client’s chair, opposite her legal adviser, sat Valérie. Attired in deep mourning, that became her well, her thin black veil scarcely hid the anxious expression upon her face. Assuming her part with an actress’s regard to detail, she did not overlook the fact that pallor was becoming to a widow; therefore, since she had put on the garments of sorrow, she had refrained from adding those little touches of carmine to her cheeks which she knew always enhanced her beauty. Neither her face nor voice betrayed signs of nervousness. With the steady, dogged perseverance of the inveterate gambler she had been playing for heavy stakes, and now, at the last throw of the dice, she had determined to win.

Their interview had been by appointment in order to arrange the final details. Now that Graham was in possession of the death certificate, he was to proceed at once to obtain probate on the will, after which the estate would pass to her. For his services in this matter, and in various other little affairs to which she was indebted to him, he was to receive twelve thousand pounds. A munificent fee, indeed, for proving a will!

There was a silence while the old solicitor took up the certificate she had handed him, and carefully scrutinised it. The declaration was quite plain and straightforward. It stated that Hugh Trethowen, English subject, had died from syncope at the Hôtel du Nord, and had been buried at the cemetery of Stuivenberg.

“If he lived to complete his sentence?” hazarded Mr Graham in a low voice, putting down the slip of paper, and removing his pince-nez to polish them. “Imprisoned persons, you know, have an awkward knack of turning up at an inopportune moment.”

“And supposing he did, what could he prove?” she asked. “Has he not left a will bequeathing everything to me? – am I not mourning for him as his widow? Besides, he knows nothing – he can never know.”

“I admit your cleverness,” he said. “Notwithstanding that, however, we cannot be too circumspect.”

“We’ve absolutely nothing to fear, I tell you,” she exclaimed impatiently. “Hugh is as safely out of the way as if he were in his grave.”

“And what of the others – Egerton, for instance?”

“He dare not breathe a word. As a matter of fact, he is ignorant of the whereabouts of his friend.”

“Is Holt to be relied upon?”

“Absolutely. He has left the country.”

“Oh! Where is he?”

“In America Through some unexplained cause he took a passage to New York. I expect he is in disgrace.”

“Does he share?”

“Of course. He has written me a long letter announcing his intention not to return to England at present, and giving an address in Chicago where I am to send the money.”

“Very good,” Graham said approvingly. “As long as we can safely rely upon the secret being preserved, we need apprehend nothing.”

“It will be preserved, never fear,” declared Valérie flippantly. “They know how essential is secrecy for the safety of their own necks.”

“Don’t be so unsentimental,” urged the old man smiling. “You talk a little too plainly.”

“Merely the truth,” declared she laughing. “But never mind – you prove the will, and the twelve thousand pounds are yours.”

“Agreed. I shall take preliminary steps to-morrow.”

“The sooner the better, you know.”

“Shan’t you live at Coombe?”

“Oh, what an idea!” she exclaimed in ridicule. “How could I live there among all those country busy-bodies and old fogies? I should cut a nice figure as a widow, shouldn’t I? No. When I get the money I shall set up a good house here in London, mourn for a little time, then cast off my sackcloth and ashes.”

“Remember,” he said, “I am to receive twelve thousand pounds. But, really, you make a most charming widow.”

“And you bestow a little flattery upon me as a sort of recognition,” she observed, a trifle piqued at the point of his remark. Then, laughing again, she said lightly, “Well, if I really am so charming as some people tell me, I suppose I ought to be able to keep my head above water in the social vortex. At all events I mean to try.”

“You cannot fail. Your beauty is always fatal to those who oppose you,” he remarked pleasantly.

“We shall see!” she exclaimed, with a merry little peal of laughter. Rising and stretching forth her hand, she added, “I must be going. I consign the certificate to your care, and if you want me you know my address. I shall remain in London till the matter is settled.”

The old man rose, and grasped the hand offered to him. Bidding her adieu, he again assured her that he would give his prompt attention to the business on hand, and, as his clerk entered at that moment, he ceremoniously bowed her out.

During the time Valérie had been in conversation with Mr Graham, a woman had been standing on the opposite side of the Strand, against the railings of the Law Courts, intently watching the persons emerging from Devereux Court. She was young and not bad-looking, but her wan face betrayed the pinch of poverty, and her dress, although rather shabby, was nevertheless fashionable. Her dark features were refined, and her bright eyes had an earnest, intense look in them as she stood in watchful expectancy.

After she had kept the narrow passage under observation for nearly an hour, the object of her diligent investigation suddenly came into view. It was Valérie, who, when she gained the thoroughfare, hesitated for a moment whether she should walk or take a cab to the Prince of Wales’ Club. Deciding upon the former course, as she wanted to call at a shop on the way, she turned and walked along the Strand in the direction of Charing Cross.

When the woman who had been waiting caught sight of her she gave vent to an imprecation, the fingers of her gloveless hands twitched nervously, and her sharp nails buried themselves in the flesh of her palms.

As she started to walk in the same direction she muttered aloud to herself, in mixed French and English —

“Then I was not mistaken. To think I have waited for so long, and I find you here! You little dream that I am here! Ah, you fancy you have been clever; that your secret is safe; that the police here in London will not know Valérie Dedieu! You have yet to discover your mistake. Ha, ha! what a tableau that will be when you and I are quits! Bien, for the present I will wait and ascertain what is going on.”

Throughout the whole length of the Strand the strange woman walked on the opposite pavement, always keeping Valérie in sight – a difficult task sometimes, owing to the crowded state of the thoroughfare. At a jeweller’s near Charing Cross, Mrs Trethowen stopped for a few minutes, then, resuming her walk, crossed Trafalgar Square, and went up the Haymarket to the Prince of Wales’ Club, calmly unconscious of the woman who was following and taking such intense interest in her movements.

Muttering to herself sentences in French, interspersed by many epithets and imprecations, she waited for Valérie’s reappearance, and then continued to follow her down the Haymarket and through St. James’s Park to her flat in Victoria Street.

She saw her enter the building, and, after allowing her a few moments to ascend the stairs, returned and ascertained the number of the suite.

Then she turned away and walked in the direction of Westminster Bridge, smiling and evidently on very good terms with herself. Indeed, she had made a discovery which meant almost more to her than she could realise.

Chapter Twenty Eight

At La Nouvelle

A wide, vast expanse of glassy sapphire sea.

The giant mountains rose in the west, sheer and steep – purple barriers between the land and the setting sun. A golden fire edging their white crests, that grew from their own dense, sombre shadows to the crimson light which flooded their heads, solemn and silent. And the calm Pacific Ocean lay unruffled in the brilliant blood-red afterglow.

Seated upon a great lichen-covered boulder on the outskirts of a dense forest, a solitary man gazed blankly and with unutterable sadness upon the magnificent scene. Above him the trees were hung with a drapery of vines and tropical creepers bearing red and purple flowers, and forming natural arches and bowers more beautiful than ever fashioned by man. Parrots and other birds of bright plumage were flying about among the trees – among them guacamayas, or great macaws, large, clothed in red, yellow, and green, and when on the wing displaying a splendid plumage. But there were also vultures and scorpions, and, running across the road to the beach and up the trees, innumerable iguanas. Great cocoanut and plantain trees jutted out and massed themselves to the right and to the left. A mountain torrent, sweeping swiftly over a moss-grown rocky ledge, seethed for a few moments in white foam, and then gurgled away down the bright shingles into the sea.

The man sat there stonily, voiceless, motionless, his chin fallen upon his chest, his hands clasped in front of him. Dressed in grey shirt and trousers that were ragged and covered with dust and dried clay, his appearance was scarcely prepossessing. On the back of his shirt was painted in large black numerals “3098,” and his ankles were fettered by two oblong iron links. He was a convict.

Under the broad-brimmed, battered straw hat that protected his head from the tropical glare was a ruddy, auburn-bearded face, with sad blue eyes which at times turned anxiously up and down the beach path – the sun-tanned face of Hugh Trethowen.

His pickaxe lay on the ground before him, for he was resting after his long day’s toil in the mine.

Toil! He shuddered when he thought of the weary monotony of his life. Down in the dark, dismal working he was compelled to hew and delve for twelve hours each day, and to satisfactorily perform the task set him by his warder before he was allowed his ration of food. Half an hour’s relaxation when leaving the mine was all that the discipline allowed, after which the convicts were compelled to return to the prison to their evening meal, and afterwards to work at various trades for two hours longer before they were sent to their cells. The French Republic shows no leniency towards prisoners condemned to travaux forces, and transported to the penal settlement in New Caledonia, consequently the latter live under a régime that is terribly harsh and oft-times absolutely inhuman.

Instead of chattering with the forcats, assassins, robbers, and scoundrels of all denominations and varieties of crime who were his fellow-prisoners, Hugh, in the brief half-hour’s respite, usually came daily to the same spot, to reflect upon his position, and try to devise some means of escape.

His conviction and transportation had been so rapid that only a confused recollection of it existed in his memory. He remembered the Assize Court – how the sun insolently, ironically, cast his joyous, sparkling beams into the gloomy, densely packed apartment. The hall, dismal and smoke-begrimed, is anything but imposing at best, but it was filled with the foetid exhalations from the crowd that had long taken up every vacant space. The gendarmes at his side looked at one another and smiled. The evidence was given – what it was he did not thoroughly understand – yet he, an upright man, resolute, honest to the very soul, and good-natured to simplicity, found himself accused of complicity in the murder of a man he had never heard of. Despondent at Valérie’s desertion, he took no steps to defend himself; he was heedless of everything.