The Heart of a Woman

"I mean that if we are going to admit this Quixotic motive in de Mountford's attitude now, there can only be one mainspring for it."

"What is that?"

"It is perhaps a little difficult – " he said somewhat hesitatingly.

"You mean," she interposed quietly, "that if Luke is taking this awful crime upon himself for the sake of another, that other can only be a woman whom he loves."

"Well," retorted Sir Thomas, "it is not you, my dear, I presume, who killed this bricklayer from Clapham."

She did not reply immediately: but her lips almost framed themselves into a smile. Luke and another woman! To Sir Thomas Ryder that seemed indeed a very simple explanation. Men have been known to do strange things, to endure much and to sacrifice everything for the sake of woman! But then Sir Thomas knew nothing of Luke, nothing more than what the latter chose to show of his inward self to the world. The memory of those few moments in the room in Fairfax Mansions laughed the other man's suggestion to scorn. Louisa shook her head and said simply:

"No, Uncle Ryder, I did not kill the Clapham bricklayer in the cab."

"And you won't admit that Luke may be shielding another woman?" said Sir Thomas, with just the faintest semblance of a sneer.

"I won't say that," she replied gravely. "You see, I don't really know. I would take a dying oath at this moment – if I were on the point of death – that Luke never committed that abominable crime. I won't even say that he is incapable of it. I'll only swear that he did not do it. And yet he is silent when he is accused. Then, to me, the only possible, the only logical conclusion is that he is shielding some one else."

"Have you questioned him?"

"Yes."

"Put the question directly to him, I mean?"

"Yes."

"And what did he say?"

"That his own stick condemns him, and that he would plead guilty at his trial."

"He never told you directly or indirectly that he killed the man?"

For the space of one second only did Louisa hesitate. She had asked Luke the direct question: "Was it you who killed that man?" and he had replied: "It was I." She had asked it then, determined to know the truth, convinced that she would know the truth when he gave reply. And she did learn the truth then and there, not as Luke hoped that she would interpret it, but as it really was. He had never really lied to her, for she had never been deceived. Now, she did not wish to hide anything from Sir Thomas Ryder, the only man in the whole world who could help her to prove Luke's innocence in spite of himself: therefore, when her uncle reiterated his question somewhat sharply, she replied quite frankly, looking straight up at him:

"He told me directly that it was he who had killed the man."

"And even then you did not believe him?"

"I knew that he tried to lie."

"You firmly believe that de Mountford knows who killed that Paul Baker – or whoever he was?"

"I do."

"And that he means to go through his trial, and to plead guilty to a charge of murder, so that the real criminal should escape."

"Yes!"

"And that he is prepared to hang – to hang, mind you!" reiterated Sir Thomas with almost cruel bluntness, "if he is condemned in order to allow the real criminal to escape?"

"Yes."

"And you yourself have no notion as to who this person maybe?"

"No."

"Is there anybody, do you think, who is likely to know more about Luke de Mountford's past and present life than you do yourself?"

"Yes," she said, "Lord Radclyffe."

"Old Radclyffe?" he ejaculated.

"Why, yes. Lord Radclyffe adored Luke before this awful man came between them. He had him with him ever since Luke was a tiny boy. There's no one in the world for whom he cared as he cared for Luke, and the affection was fully reciprocated. My belief is that Lord Radclyffe knows more about Luke than any one else in the world."

"But old Rad is very ill just now, unfortunately."

"It would kill him," she retorted, "if anything happened to Luke, whilst he was being coddled up as an invalid, almost as a prisoner, and no news allowed to reach him."

Sir Thomas was silent for a moment, obviously buried in thought. That he was still incredulous was certainly apparent to Louisa's super-sensitive perceptions, but that he meant to be of help to her, in spite of this incredulity was equally certain. Therefore she waited patiently until he had collected his thoughts.

"Well, my dear," he said at last, "I'll tell you what I will do. To-morrow morning I'll go and see if I can have a talk with old Rad – "

"To-morrow morning," she broke in gravely, "Luke will be dragged before the magistrate – the first stage of that awful series of humiliations which you yourself say, Uncle Ryder, that no man who is innocent can possibly endure!"

"I know, my dear," he said almost apologetically, "but I don't see now how that can be avoided."

"We could see Lord Radclyffe to-night!"

"To-night?" he exclaimed. "Why, it's nearly ten o'clock."

"In matters of this sort, time does not count."

"But old Rad is an invalid!"

"He may be a dead man to-morrow, if he hears that Luke – Luke, who was the apple of his eye, who is the heir to his name and title, is being dragged in open court before a police-magistrate, charged with an abominable crime."

"But the doctor, I understand, has forbidden him to see any one."

"I think that the matter has passed the bounds of a doctor's orders. I would go and force my way into his presence without the slightest scruple. I know that any news that he may glean about Luke, within the next few days, will be far more fatal to him, than the few questions which I want to ask him to-night."

"That may be, my dear," rejoined Sir Thomas dryly, "but this does not apply to me. Old Rad is a very old friend of mine, but if I went with you on this errand to-night, I should be going not as a friend, but in an official capacity, and as such I cannot do it without the doctor's permission."

"Very well then," she said quietly, "we'll ask Doctor Newington's permission."

For a little while yet Sir Thomas Ryder seemed to hesitate. Clearly the girl's arguments, her simple conviction, and her latent energy had made a marked impression upon him. He was no longer the sceptical hide-bound official: the man, the gentleman, was tearing away at the fetters of red tape. All the old instincts of chivalry, which at times might be dormant in the heart of an English gentleman – but which are always there nevertheless, hidden away by the mantle of convention – had been aroused by Louisa's attitude toward the man she loved, and also by the remembrance of Luke's bearing throughout this miserable business.

After all what the girl asked was not so very difficult of execution. There are undoubtedly cases where the usual conventional formulas of etiquette must give way to serious exigencies. And there was unanswerable logic in Louisa's arguments: at any time in the near future that old Rad – either through his own obstinacy, or the stupidity or ill-will of a servant – got hold of a newspaper, the suddenness of the blow which he would receive by learning the terrible news without due preparation, would inevitably prove fatal to him. Sir Thomas Ryder prided himself on being a diplomatist of the first water: he did believe that he could so put the necessary questions to Lord Radclyffe, with regard to Luke, that the old man would not suspect the truth for a moment. The latter had, of course, known of the murder before he had been stricken with illness; he had at the time answered the questions put to him by the police officer, without seeming to be greatly shocked at the awful occurrence; and it was not likely that he would be greatly upset at a professional visit from an old friend, who at the same time had the unravelling of the murder mystery at heart.

All these thoughts mirrored themselves on Sir Thomas's wrinkled face. He was taking no trouble to conceal them from Louisa. Soon she saw that she had won her first victory, for her uncle now said with sudden determination:

"Well, my dear! you have certainly got on the right side of me. Your aunt always said you had a very persuasive way with you. I'll tell you what we will do. It is now a quarter to ten – late enough, by Jingo! We'll get into one of those confounded taxis, and drive to Doctor Newington's. I'll see him. You shall stay in the cab; and if I can get his permission, we'll go and have a talk with old Rad – or rather I'll talk first and you shall pretend that our joint visit is only a coincidence. As a matter of fact he knew all about the murder before he got ill, and he won't think it at all unnatural that I have obtained special medical permission to question him myself on the subject. Then you must work in your questions about Luke as best you can afterward. Is that agreed now?"

"Indeed it is, Uncle Ryder," said Louisa, as she rose from her chair, with a deep sigh of infinite contentment. "Thank you," she added gently, and placed her neatly gloved hand upon his arm.

With a kind, fatherly gesture, he gave that little hand an encouraging pat. Then he rang the bell.

"A taxi – quickly!" he said to his man. "My fur coat and my hat. I am going out."

Louisa had gained her first victory. She had put forward neither violence nor passion in support of her arguments. Yet she had conquered because she believed.

A few moments later she and Sir Thomas Ryder were on their way to Doctor Newington's in Hertford Street.

CHAPTER XXXVII

IT IS ONE HUMAN LIFE AGAINST THE OTHER

Once more Louisa was sitting in the dark corner of a cab, seeing London by night, as the motor flew past lighted thoroughfares, dark, narrow streets, stately mansions and mean houses. The same endless monotony of bricks and mortar, of pillars and railings; the same endless monotony of every-day life whilst some hearts were breaking and others suffered misery to which cruel, elusive death refused its supreme solace.

She waited in the cab whilst Sir Thomas Ryder went in to see the doctor. Fortunately the latter was at home, and able to see Sir Thomas.

At first he was obdurate. Nothing that the high officer of police could say would move his medical dictum. Lord Radclyffe was too ill to see any one. He was hardly conscious. His brain was working very feebly. He had not spoken for two days, for speech was difficult.

"If," said Doctor Newington in his habitual pompous manner, "he had the least inkling now, that that favourite nephew of his was guilty of this awful murder, why, my dear sir, I wouldn't answer for the consequences. I believe the feeble bit of life in him would go out like a candle that's been blown upon."

"Who talks," retorted Sir Thomas somewhat impatiently, and assuming a manner at least as pompous as that of the fashionable physician, "of letting Lord Radclyffe know anything about his nephew's position. I don't. I have no such intention. But de Mountford's plight is a very serious one. There are one or two points about his former life that Lord Radclyffe could elucidate if he will. I want your permission to ask him two or three questions. Hang it all, man, de Mountford's life is in danger! I don't think you have the right to oppose me in this. You take a most awful responsibility upon your shoulders."

"A medical man," said Doctor Newington vaguely, "has to take upon himself certain grave responsibilities sometimes."

"Yes; but not such a grave one as this. You must at least give me the chance of interrogating Lord Radclyffe. Supposing he knows something that may throw light on this awful affair, something that may go to prove de Mountford's innocence or guilt – either way – and suppose that owing to your prohibitions, all knowledge of his nephew's fate is kept from him until it is too late, until de Mountford is hanged – for he risks hanging, doctor, let me tell you that! – suppose that you have stood in the way, when some simple explanation from your patient might have saved him! What then?"

"But the patient is too ill, I tell you. He wouldn't understand you, probably. I am sure he couldn't answer your questions."

The doctor's original pompous manner had left him somewhat. He was now more like an obstinate man, arguing, than like a medical man whose pronouncements must be final. Sir Thomas Ryder – one of the keenest men to note such subtle changes in another – saw that he had gained an advantage. He was quick enough to press it home.

"Let me try at all events," he said. "The whole matter is of such enormous importance! After all, doctor, it is a question of one human life against the other. With regard to de Mountford, let me tell you that unless we can get some very definite proof as to his innocence, it is bound to go hard with him. Say that a few weeks hence Lord Radclyffe, recovering from this severe illness, is confronted with the news that his nephew is being tried for murder, or that he has been condemned – I won't even mention the final awful possibility – do you think that you or any one will save the old man's life then, or his reason perhaps?"

Doctor Newington was silent for awhile. Clearly he was ready to give way. Like most men who outwardly are very pompous and dictatorial, his blustering was only veneer. The strong will power of a more determined intellect very soon reduced him to compliance. And all that Sir Thomas Ryder said was logical. It carried a great deal of conviction.

"Very well," said the doctor at last, "I'll give you permission to interview my patient. But on two conditions."

"What are they?"

"That the interview takes place in my presence, and that at the first word from me, you cease questioning my patient, and leave his room."

"Very well," assented Sir Thomas, without any hesitation, content that he had gained his point, and quite satisfied that the two conditions were perfectly reasonable and such that the doctor was really compelled to impose. "I must tell you that I came to see you to-night at the instance of my niece, Louisa Harris, who was fiancée to de Mountford before this unfortunate business. It was she who adduced certain arguments which she placed before me, and which led to my strong desire to question Lord Radclyffe to-night, before de Mountford is brought up before the magistrate to-morrow. She is down below in the cab, waiting for me."

"I cannot allow her to see my patient also," protested the doctor quickly.

"No, no. She shall not see him, unless you give permission."

"Why don't you send her home right away then?"

"Because," retorted Sir Thomas tartly, "you might give that permission, you see."

The argument between the two men had lasted close on half an hour. It was long past ten o'clock when at last Louisa saw them emerging through the lighted door-way. The next moment they were seated in the cab with her, Sir Thomas having given the chauffeur the address of Lord Radclyffe's house in Grosvenor Square.

The doctor tried to be bland and polite, but he was not over successful in this. He did not like being opposed, nor hearing his pronouncements combated. In this case he had been forced to give way, somewhat against his better judgment, and all the way in the cab he was comforting himself with the thought that at any rate he would keep women away from his patient, and that he would in any case cut the interview very short, and demand its abrupt cessation very peremptorily. He would then be backed up by two nurses, and we must do him the justice to say that he was honestly anxious about his patient.

Louisa took no notice of the fashionable doctor's efforts at conversation. She preferred to remain quite silent for those few minutes which elapsed between the departure from Hertford Street and the arrival at the east side of Grosvenor Square. When she saw her uncle coming down the steps of the doctor's house in company with the doctor himself, she knew that the second victory had been won to-night: that Sir Thomas Ryder would be allowed to interview Lord Radclyffe. She had, of course, no suspicion of Doctor Newington's conditions to the interview, but the victory gained was an important one, and for the moment she was content.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

THE HAND OF DEATH WAS ON HIM TOO

A respectable looking butler opened the door in answer to Doctor Newington's pull at the bell.

Luke had had time – on the day preceding the inquest – to put some semblance of order in his uncle's household. The doctor had sent in the nurses, and he had seen to a nice capable housekeeper being installed in the house. She took the further management at once in her own hands. She dismissed the drunken couple summarily and engaged a couple of decent servants – a butler and a cook.

The house, though no less gloomy, looked certainly less lonely and neglected.

Mr. Warren, who had been Lord Radclyffe's secretary for years, but who had been speedily given his congé when the imposter took up his permanent abode in the house, was installed once more in the library, replying to the innumerable letters and telegrams of inquiry which poured in with every post.

Louisa and Sir Thomas were shown into the room where the young man was sitting. He rose at once, offering chairs and pushing his own work aside. In the meanwhile the doctor had gone up stairs.

Several minutes elapsed. No one spoke. Mr. Warren, who had always been deeply attached to Luke de Mountford, was longing to ask questions, which, however, he was too shy to formulate. At last there was a knock at the door and one of the nurses came in to say that Lord Radclyffe would be pleased to see Sir Thomas Ryder up stairs.

Louisa rose at the same time as her uncle, but the latter detained her with a gesture full of kind sympathy.

"Not just yet, my dear," he said. "I'll call you as soon as possible."

"But," she asked anxiously, "I shall be allowed to see him, shan't I?"

"I think so," he replied evasively. "But even if you do not see him, you can trust to me. Oh, yes! you can," he added insistently, seeing the deeply troubled look that had crept into her face at his words. "I am going to do to-night what I often have to do in the course of my work. I am going to borrow your soul and your mind and allow them to speak through my lips. When I go up stairs, I shall only outwardly be the police officer searching for proofs of a crime: inwardly I shall be a noble-hearted woman trying to discover proofs of her fiancée's innocence. That will be right, dear, won't it?"

She nodded acquiescence, trying to appear content. Then she pleaded once again, dry-eyed and broken-voiced: "You will try and get permission for me to see Lord Radclyffe, won't you?"

"I give you my word," he said solemnly.

Then he went up stairs.

Mr. Warren, quiet and sympathetic, persuaded Louisa to sit down again by the hearth. He took her muff and fur stole from her, and threw a log on the fire. The flames spurted off, giving a cheerful crackle. But Louisa saw no pictures in this fire, her mind was up stairs in Lord Radclyffe's room, wondering what was happening.

Mr. Warren spoke of the murdered man. He had not been present at the inquest, and the news that the tyrant who had ruled over Lord Radclyffe for so long was nothing but an impostor came as a fearful shock to him.

There was the pitifulness of the whole thing! The utter purposelessness of a hideous crime. So many lives wrecked, such awful calamity, such appalling humiliation, such ignominy, and all just for nothing! A very little trouble, almost superficial inquiry, would have revealed the imposture, and saved all that sorrow, all the dire humiliation, and prevented the crime for which the law of men decrees that there shall be no pardon.

The man who lay ill up stairs – and he who was lying in the public mortuary, surrounded by all the pomp and luxury which he had filched by his lies – alone could tell the secret of the extraordinary success of the imposture. Lord Radclyffe had accepted the bricklayer's son almost as his own, with that same obstinate reserve with which he had at first flouted the very thought of the man's pretensions. Who could tell what persuasion was used? what arguments? what threats?

And the man was an impostor after all! And he had been murdered, when one word perhaps would have effaced him from the world as completely and less majestically than had been done by death.

Mr. Warren talked of it all, and Louisa listened with half an ear even whilst every sense of hearing in her was concentrated on the floor above, in a vain endeavour to get a faint inkling of what went on in Lord Radclyffe's room. She had heard her uncle's step on the landing, the few hurried sentences exchanged with the doctor before entering the sick chamber, the opening and shutting of a door. Then again the lighter footsteps of the nurses, who had evidently been sent out of the room, when Sir Thomas went in. Louisa heard the faint hum of their voices as they descended the stairs, even a suppressed giggle now and then: they were happy no doubt at the few moments of respite from constant watching, which had apparently been accorded them.

They ran quickly down the last flight of stairs, and across the hall toward the servants' quarters. Their chattering was heard faintly echoing through the baize doors. Then nothing more.

Less than a quarter of an hour went by, and again she heard the opening and shutting of a door, and men's footsteps on the landing.

Louisa could not believe either her eyes which were gazing on the clock, or her ears, which heard now quite distinctly the voice of Sir Thomas descending the stairs, and Doctor Newington's more pompous tones in reply.

"The interview," remarked Mr. Warren, "did not last very long."

But already she had risen from her chair, desperately anxious, wondering what the meaning could be of the shortness of the interview. She was not kept long in suspense, for a moment or two later Sir Thomas Ryder came in followed by Doctor Newington. One glance at her uncle's face told her the whole disappointing truth, even before he spoke.

"It was useless, my dear," he said, "and Doctor Newington was quite right. Lord Radclyffe, I am sorry to say, is hardly conscious. He is, evidently, unable to understand what is said, and certainly quite incapable of making any effort to reply."

"I was afraid so," added Doctor Newington in his usual conventional tones, "the patient, you see, is hardly conscious. His mind is dormant. He just knows me and his nurses, but he did not recognize Sir Thomas."

Louisa said nothing: the blank, hopeless disappointment following on the excitement of the past two hours was exceedingly difficult to bear. The ruling passion – strong even in the midst of despair – the pride that was in her, alone kept her from an utter breakdown. She was grateful to her uncle, who very tactfully interposed his tall figure between her and the indifferent eyes of the doctor. Mr. Warren looked more sympathetic than ever, and that was just as trying to bear as the pompousness of Doctor Newington.

As a matter of fact, Louisa had absolutely ceased to think. The whole future from this moment appeared as an absolute blank. She had not begun to envisage the possibility of going back to the hotel, having utterly failed in accomplishing that which she had set mind and heart to do: the throwing of the first feeble ray of light on the impenetrable darkness of Luke's supposed guilt. She certainly had not envisaged the going to bed to-night, the getting up to-morrow, the beginning of another day with its thousand and one trivial tasks and incidents, all the while that she had failed in doing that which alone could prevent the awful catastrophe of to-morrow!

Luke standing in the dock, like a common criminal!

"I'll just see about getting a cab, dear," said her uncle kindly.

The first of those thousand and one trivialities which would go on and on from now onward in endless monotony, whilst Luke prepared for his trial, for his condemnation, perhaps for death.

It was indeed unthinkable. No wonder that her mind rebelled at the task, refusing all thoughts, remaining like a gray, blank slate from which every impression of past and future has been wiped out.

Sir Thomas Ryder went out of the room, and Mr. Warren went with him. They left the door ajar, so she could hear them talking in the hall. Mr. Warren said:

"Don't go out, Sir Thomas. It's a horrid night. Fletcher will get you a cab."