"As you like," I said, smiling. "You don"t, of course, care to trust your secrets in my keeping--eh?"
She looked at me seriously for a moment, her lips quivered, and she drew a long breath.
"You"ve always been extremely kind," she said in a low voice, half-choked with emotion. "And now that I find you alone, I feel impelled to confide in you and seek your advice."
"I"m quite ready to offer any advice I can," I answered, quickly interested. "If I can render you any a.s.sistance I will certainly do so with pleasure."
"Ah!" she exclaimed, sighing again, "I knew you would. I am in trouble--in such terrible trouble."
"What has happened?" I inquired quickly, for I saw how white and wan she was, and of course attributed it to d.i.c.k"s action in renouncing his pledge.
"You, of course, know that Mr. Cleugh and I have parted," she said, looking up at me quickly.
"He has told me so," I responded gravely. "I regret very much to hear it. What is the reason?"
"Has he not told you?" she asked, her eyes filled with tears.
"No," I answered. "He gave no reason."
"Well," she explained, "he has judged me wrongly. I am entirely innocent, I a.s.sure you. In a place of business like ours we are compelled to be on friendly terms with the male a.s.sistants, and the other evening, as I was leaving the shop to go to the house where we girls live, at the other end of Rye Lane, one of the men--an insufferable young fellow in the hosiery department--chanced to be going the same way and walked with me.
"On the way, d.i.c.k--Mr. Cleugh, I mean--pa.s.sed us, and now he declares that I"ve been in the habit of flirting with these men. It is not pleasant for any girl to walk alone along Rye Lane at ten o"clock at night, therefore this young fellow was only escorting me out of politeness. Yet I cannot make d.i.c.k believe otherwise than that he is my lover."
"He"s jealous of you," I said. "Is not jealousy an index of true love?"
"But if he loved me truly," she protested, bursting into tears, "he surely would not treat me so cruelly as this. I"ve done nothing to warrant this denunciation as a worthless flirt--indeed, I haven"t."
"And you love him?" I asked with deep sympathy, for I saw how intense was her suffering.
"He knows that I do," she answered. "He could see but little of me because his work prevented him, yet I was supremely happy in the knowledge of his love. Yet now he has forsaken me," she added, sobbing.
"I"m but a poor girl, and I suppose if the truth were known he admires some one else better educated and more attractive than I am."
"No, I think not," I said, although at heart I felt that she spoke the truth. "This is merely a lover"s quarrel, and you"ll quickly make it up again. Look at the brighter side of things--come."
But she shook her head gloomily, saying--
"Never. I feel confident that d.i.c.k will never come back to me, although--although I shall love him always," and she raised her veil to wipe the hot tears from her cheeks.
"No, no," I exclaimed, endeavouring to comfort her, "don"t meet trouble half-way. That"s one of the secrets of happiness. We all of us have our little spasms of grief and despair sometimes, you know."
"Ah! yes, of course," she cried quickly. "But this sorrow has, alas!
not come alone. Still another misfortune has fallen upon me."
"What"s that?" I inquired, surprised.
"My father!" she exclaimed huskily.
"And what of him?" I asked. "I called upon him a short time ago.
Surely nothing has happened to him?"
"Well," she replied, "it occurred like this. I got permission this day week to leave business at five o"clock, and, as usual, went home. When, however, I arrived at the shop I found it shut, and to my amazement a bailiff was in possession."
"For debt?" I inquired.
"Yes. He showed me some papers, and said it would cost about four hundred pounds to settle both bill and costs of the court."
"And your father? What was his explanation?" I asked, greatly interested and surprised.
"He wasn"t there," she responded. "That"s the curious part about the whole affair. I made inquiries, and discovered that he had suddenly shut up the shop about noon three days before, and had gone off with a heavy trunk placed on a four-wheeled cab."
"Does no one know where he"s gone?"
"n.o.body," she answered excitedly. "It"s so strange that he has not written me a single line in explanation. I can"t understand it."
I paused for a few moments, deeply puzzled.
"From the fact that the bailiff was in possession it would appear that he had preferred flight to facing his creditors," I said slowly. "Were you aware that he was in debt?"
"Not in the least," she answered. "He has some property abroad, you know."
"Where?"
"In France, I think. He never spoke of it to any one, although I knew that the rent was remitted regularly by a draft on the Credit Lyonnais in Pall Mall. I used to go there with him to receive the money. It was quite a pile of banknotes each quarter."
"Then he could not really have been so badly off as he appeared?" I observed.
"No. He was eccentric, and very miserly, and although he always had enough and to spare he used constantly to deplore our poverty. I took a situation merely to satisfy him, as he had so often expressed regret that I should be idling at home. There was, however, absolutely no real necessity."
"But surely," I said, "he has not intentionally left you alone in the world? He will write very soon. Perhaps just now he does not write for fear his whereabouts should become known. He"s evidently escaped his creditors. Has he been speculating, do you think?"
"Not that I am aware of."
"Can"t you think of any reason why he should have fled so precipitately?" I asked, at the same time reflecting that it might be due to the fact that he had aroused the suspicions of the police by the illegal sale of drugs.
"No," she answered. "None whatever, beyond what I"ve already explained.
His flight is an entire mystery, and it was to seek the advice of d.i.c.k, as my closest friend, that I called here. How had I best act, do you think?"
"I really don"t know," I replied, after some reflection. "His disappearance is certainly remarkable, but if he is in hiding, it is not at all strange that he should omit to write to you. He knows your address, therefore, when he deems it safe in his own interests to communicate with you and explain, he will do so, no doubt."
"Then I"m to wait in patience and see our home sold up?" she asked, tears again welling in her dark, luminous eyes.
"You can do nothing else," I said. "He evidently means that it should be sold, for he has made no attempt to rescue it."
"There are so many of my poor mother"s things there. I should so like to keep them--her little trinkets and such trifles. It seems very hard that they should be sold to a second-hand dealer."
"That"s so, but you have no means of rescuing them," I pointed out. "It is certainly very hard indeed for you to be left alone and friendless like this, but without doubt your father has some reason in acting thus."
"He"s fled like some common thief," she cried, with a choking sob. "And now I haven"t a single friend."