"If I could see the young woman and speak to her," Iris said, "I should like to decide the question of engaging her, for myself."
The lady knew the address of her discharged servant, and--with some appearance of wonder--communicated it. Miss Henley wrote at once, telling f.a.n.n.y Mere to come to her on the following day.
When she woke on the next morning, later than usual, an event occurred which Iris had been impatiently expecting for some time past. She found a letter waiting on her bedside table, side by side with her cup of tea. Lord Harry had written to her at last.
Whether he used his pen or his tongue, the Irish lord"s conduct was always more or less in need of an apology. Here were the guilty one"s new excuses, expressed in his customary medley of frank confession and flowery language:
"I am fearing, my angel, that I have offended you. You have too surely said to yourself, This miserable Harry might have made me happy by writing two lines--and what does he do? He sends a message in words which tell me nothing.
"My sweet girl, the reason why is that I was in two minds when your man stopped me on my way to the ship.
"Whether it was best for you--I was not thinking of myself--to confess the plain truth, or to take refuge in affectionate equivocation, was more than I could decide at the time. When minutes are enough for your intelligence, my stupidity wants days. Well! I saw it at last. A man owes the truth to a true woman; and you are a true woman. There you find a process of reasoning--I have been five days getting hold of it.
"But tell me one thing first. Brutus killed a man; Charlotte Corday killed a man. One of the two victims was a fine tyrant, and the other a mean tyrant. n.o.body blames those two historical a.s.sa.s.sins. Why then blame me for wishing to make a third? Is a mere modern murderer beneath my vengeance, by comparison with two cla.s.sical tyrants who did _their_ murders by deputy? The man who killed Arthur Mountjoy is (next to Cain alone) the most atrocious homicide that ever trod the miry ways of this earth. There is my reply! I call it a crusher.
"So now my mind is easy. Darling, let me make your mind easy next.
"When I left you at the window of Vimpany"s house, I was off to the other railroad to find the murderer in his hiding-place by the seaside.
He had left it; but I got a trace, and went back to London--to the Docks. Some villain in Ireland, who knows my purpose, must have turned traitor. Anyhow, the wretch has escaped me.
"Yes; I searched the ship in every corner. He was not on board. Has he gone on before me, by an earlier vessel? Or has he directed his flight to some other part of the world? I shall find out in time. His day of reckoning will come, and he, too, shall know a violent death! Amen. So be it. Amen.
"Have I done now? Bear with me, gentle Iris--there is a word more to come.
"You will wonder why I went on by the steamship--all the way to South Africa--when I had failed to find the man I wanted, on board. What was my motive? You, you alone, are always my motive. Lucky men have found gold, lucky men have found diamonds. Why should I not be one of them?
My sweet, let us suppose two possible things; my own elastic convictions would call them two likely things, but never mind that.
Say, I come back a reformed character; there is your only objection to me, at once removed! And take it for granted that I return with a fortune of my own finding. In that case, what becomes of Mr. Henley"s objection to me? It melts (as Shakespeare says somewhere) into thin air. Now do take my advice, for once. Show this part of my letter to your excellent father, with my love. I answer beforehand for the consequences. Be happy, my Lady Harry--as happy as I am--and look for my return on an earlier day than you may antic.i.p.ate. Yours till death, and after.
"HARRY."
Like the Irish lord, Miss Henley was "in two minds," while she rose, and dressed herself. There were parts of the letter for which she loved the writer, and parts of it for which she hated him.
What a prospect was before that reckless man--what misery, what horror, might not be lying in wait in the dreadful future! If he failed in the act of vengeance, that violent death of which he had written so heedlessly might overtake him from another hand. If he succeeded, the law might discover his crime, and the infamy of expiation on the scaffold might be his dreadful end. She turned, shuddering, from the contemplation of those hideous possibilities, and took refuge in the hope of his safe, his guiltless return. Even if his visions of success, even if his purposes of reform (how hopeless at his age!) were actually realised, could she consent to marry the man who had led his life, had written this letter, had contemplated (and still cherished) his merciless resolution of revenge? No woman in her senses could let the bare idea of being his wife enter her mind. Iris opened her writing-desk, to hide the letter from all eyes but her own. As she secured it with the key, her heart sank under the return of a terror remembered but too well. Once more, the superst.i.tious belief in a destiny that was urging Lord Harry and herself nearer and nearer to each other, even when they seemed to be most widely and most surely separated, thrilled her under the chilling mystery of its presence. She dropped helplessly into a chair. Oh, for a friend who could feel for her, who could strengthen her, whose wise words could restore her to her better and calmer self! Hugh was far away; and Iris was left to suffer and to struggle alone.
Heartfelt aspirations for help and sympathy! Oh, irony of circ.u.mstances, how were they answered? The housemaid entered the room, to announce the arrival of a discharged servant, with a lost character.
"Let the young woman come in," Iris said. Was f.a.n.n.y Mere the friend whom she had been longing for? She looked at her troubled face in the gla.s.s--and laughed bitterly.
CHAPTER XIV
THE LADY"S MAID
IT was not easy to form a positive opinion of the young woman who now presented herself in Miss Henley"s room.
If the Turkish taste is truly reported as valuing beauty in the female figure more than beauty in the female face, f.a.n.n.y Mere"s personal appearance might have found, in Constantinople, the approval which she failed to receive in London. Slim and well balanced, firmly and neatly made, she interested men who met her by accident (and sometimes even women), if they happened to be walking behind her. When they quickened their steps, and, pa.s.sing on, looked back at her face, they lost all interest in f.a.n.n.y from that moment. Painters would have described the defect in her face as "want of colour." She was one of the whitest of fair female human beings. Light flaxen hair, faint blue eyes with no expression in them, and a complexion which looked as if it had never been stirred by a circulation of blood, produced an effect on her fellow-creatures in general which made them insensible to the beauty of her figure, and the grace of her movements. There was no betrayal of bad health in her strange pallor: on the contrary, she suggested the idea of rare physical strength. Her quietly respectful manner was, so to say, emphasised by an underlying self-possession, which looked capable of acting promptly and fearlessly in the critical emergencies of life. Otherwise, the expression of character in her face was essentially pa.s.sive. Here was a steady, resolute young woman, possessed of qualities which failed to show themselves on the surface--whether good qualities or bad qualities experience alone could determine.
Finding it impossible, judging by a first impression, to arrive at any immediate decision favourable or adverse to the stranger, Iris opened the interview with her customary frankness; leaving the consequences to follow as they might.
"Take a seat, f.a.n.n.y," she said, "and let us try if we can understand each other. I think you will agree with me that there must be no concealments between us. You ought to know that your mistress has told me why she parted with you. It was her duty to tell me the truth, and it is my duty not to be unjustly prejudiced against you after what I have heard. Pray believe me when I say that I don"t know, and don"t wish to know, what your temptation may have been--"
"I beg your pardon, Miss, for interrupting you. My temptation was vanity."
Whether she did or did not suffer in making that confession, it was impossible to discover. Her tones were quiet; her manner was un.o.btrusively respectful; the pallor of her face was not disturbed by the slightest change of colour. Was the new maid an insensible person?
Iris began to fear already that she might have made a mistake.
"I don"t expect you to enter into particulars," she said; "I don"t ask you here to humiliate yourself."
"When I got your letter, Miss, I tried to consider how I might show myself worthy of your kindness," f.a.n.n.y answered. "The one way I could see was not to let you think better of me than I deserve. When a person, like me, is told, for the first time, that her figure makes amends for her face, she is flattered by the only compliment that has been paid to her in all her life. My excuse, Miss (if I have an excuse) is a mean one---I couldn"t resist a compliment. That is all I have to say."
Iris began to alter her opinion. This was not a young woman of the ordinary type. It began to look possible, and more than possible, that she was worthy of a helping hand. The truth seemed to be in her.
"I understand you, and feel for you." Having replied in those words, Iris wisely and delicately changed the subject. "Let me hear how you are situated at the present time," she continued. "Are your parents living?"
"My father and mother are dead, Miss."
"Have you any other relatives?"
"They are too poor to be able to do anything for me. I have lost my character--and I am left to help myself."
"Suppose you fail to find another situation?" Iris suggested.
"Yes, Miss?"
"How can you help yourself?"
"I can do what other girls have done."
"What do you mean?"
"Some of us starve on needlework. Some take to the streets. Some end it in the river. If there is no other chance for me, I think I shall try that way," said the poor creature, as quietly as if she was speaking of some customary prospect that was open to her. "There will be n.o.body to be sorry for me--and, as I have read, drowning is not a very painful death."
"You shock me, f.a.n.n.y! I, for one, should be sorry for you."
"Thank you, Miss."
"And try to remember," Iris continued, "that there may be chances in the future which you don"t see yet. You speak of what you have read, and I have already noticed how clearly and correctly you express yourself. You must have been educated. Was it at home? or at school?
"I was once sent to school," f.a.n.n.y replied, not quite willingly.
"Was it a private school?"
"Yes."
That short answer warned Iris to be careful.