She handed him the letter, in which the Irishman had declared his resolution to destroy himself. Hugh read it with contempt. "Did my lord"s heart fail him?" he asked scornfully.
"He would have died by his own hand, Mr. Mountjoy----"
"Oh, Iris--_"Mr.!""_
"I will say "Hugh," if you prefer it--but the days of our familiar friendship are none the less at an end. I found Lord Harry bleeding to death from a wound in his throat. It was in a lonely place on Hampstead Heath; I was the one person who happened to pa.s.s by it. For the third time, you see, it has been my destiny to save him. How can I forget that? My mind will dwell on it. I try to find happiness--oh, only happiness enough for me--in cheering my poor Irishman, on his way back to the life that I have preserved. There is my motive, if I have a motive. Day after day I have helped to nurse him. Day after day I have heard him say things to me--what is the use of repeating them? After years of resistance I have given way; let that be enough. My one act of discretion has been to prevent a quarrel between my father and Harry. I beg your pardon, I ought to have said Lord Harry. When my father came to the house, I insisted on speaking with him alone. I told him what I have just told you. He said: "Think again before you make your choice between that man and me. If you decide to marry him, you will live and die without one farthing of my money to help you." He put his watch on the table between us, and gave me five minutes to make up my mind. It was a long five minutes, but it ended at last. He asked me which he was to do--leave his will as it was, or go to his lawyer and make another.
I said, "You will do as you please, sir." No; it was not a hasty reply--you can"t make that excuse for me. I knew what I was saying; and I saw the future I was preparing for myself, as plainly as you see it--"
Hugh could endure no longer the reckless expression of her despair.
"No!" he cried, "you don"t see your future as I see it. Will you hear what I have to say, before it is too late?"
"It is too late already. But I will listen to you if you wish it."
"And, while you listen," Mountjoy added, "you will acquit me of being influenced by a selfish motive. I have loved you dearly. Perhaps, in secret, I love you still. But, this I know: if you were to remain a single woman for the rest of your life, there would be no hope for Me.
Do you believe that I am speaking the truth?"
"You always speak the truth."
"I speak in your interest, at least. You think you see your future life plainly--you are blind to your future life. You talk as if you were resigned to suffer. Are you resigned to lose your sense of right and wrong? Are you resigned to lead the life of an outlaw, and--worse still--not to feel the disgrace of it?"
"Go on, Hugh."
"You won"t answer me?"
"I won"t shock you."
"You don"t discourage me, my dear; I am still obstinate in the hope of restoring you to your calmer and truer self. Let me do every justice to Lord Harry. I believe, sincerely believe, that his miserable life has not utterly destroyed in him the virtues which distinguish an honourable man. But he has one terrible defect. In his nature, there is the fatal pliability which finds companionable qualities in bad friends. In this aspect of his character, he is a dangerous man--and he may be (forgive me!) a bad husband. It is a thankless task to warn you to any good purpose. A wife--and a loving wife more than another--feels the deteriorating influence of a husband who is not worthy of her. His ways of thinking are apt to become, little by little, her ways of thinking. She makes allowances for him, which he does not deserve; her sense of right and wrong becomes confused; and before she is aware of it herself, she has sunk to his level. Are you angry with me?"
"How can I be angry with you? Perhaps you are right."
"Do you really mean that?"
"Oh, yes."
"Then, for G.o.d"s sake, reconsider your decision! Let me go to your father."
"Mere waste of time," Iris answered. "Nothing that you can say will have the least effect on him."
"At any rate," Mountjoy persisted, "I mean to try."
Had he touched her? She smiled--how bitterly Hugh failed to perceive.
"Shall I tell you what happened to me when I went home to-day?" she said. "I found my maid waiting in the hall--with everything that belongs to me, packed up for my departure. The girl explained that she had been forced to obey my father"s positive orders. I knew what that meant--I had to leave the house, and find a place to live in."
"Not by yourself, Iris?"
"No--with my maid. She is a strange creature; if she feels sympathy, she never expresses it. "I am your grateful servant, Miss. Where you go, I go." That was all she said; I was not disappointed--I am getting used to f.a.n.n.y Mere already. Mine is a lonely lot--isn"t it? I have acquaintances among the few ladies who sometimes visit at my father"s house, but no friends. My mother"s family, as I have always been told, cast her off when she married a man in trade, with a doubtful reputation. I don"t even know where my relations live. Isn"t Lord Harry good enough for me, as I am now? When I look at my prospects, is it wonderful if I talk like a desperate woman? There is but one encouraging circ.u.mstance that I can see. This misplaced love of mine that everybody condemns has, oddly enough, a virtue that everybody must admire. It offers a refuge to a woman who is alone in the world."
Mountjoy denied indignantly that she was alone in the world.
"Is there any protection that a man can offer to a woman," he asked, "which I am not ready and eager to offer to You? Oh, Iris, what have I done to deserve that you should speak of yourself as friendless in my hearing!"
He had touched her at last. Their tender charm showed itself once more in her eyes and in her smile. She rose and approached him.
"What exquisite kindness it must be," she said, "that blinds a clever man like you to obstacles which anyone else can see! Remember, dear Hugh, what the world would say to that protection which your true heart offers to me. Are you my near relation? are you my guardian? are you even an old man? Ah me! you are only an angel of goodness whom I must submit to lose. I shall still count on your kindness when we see each other no more. You will pity me, when you hear that I have fallen lower and lower; you will be sorry for me, when I end in disgracing myself."
"Even then, Iris, we shall not be separated. The loving friend who is near you now, will be your loving friend still."
For the first time in her life, she threw her arms round him. In the agony of that farewell, she held him to her bosom. "Goodbye, dear," she said faintly--and kissed him.
The next moment, a deadly pallor overspread her face. She staggered as she drew back, and dropped into the chair that she had just left. In the fear that she might faint, Mountjoy hurried out in search of a restorative. His bed-chamber was close by, at the end of the corridor; and there were smelling-salts in his dressing-case. As he raised the lid, he heard the door behind him, the one door in the room, locked from the outer side.
He rushed to the door, and called to her. From the farther end of the corridor, her voice reached him for the last time, repeating the last melancholy word: "Good-bye." No renewal of the miserable parting scene: no more of the heartache--Iris had ended it!
CHAPTER XXII
THE FATAL WORDS
WHEN Mountjoy had rung for the servant, and the bedroom door had been unlocked, it was too late to follow the fugitive. Her cab was waiting for her outside; and the attention of the porter had been distracted, at the same time, by a new arrival of travellers at the hotel.
It is more or less in the nature of all men who are worthy of the name, to take refuge from distress in action. Hugh decided on writing to Iris, and on making his appeal to her father, that evening. He abstained from alluding, in his letter, to the manner in which she had left him; it was her right, it was even her duty to spare herself. All that he asked was to be informed of her present place of residence, so that he might communicate the result--in writing only if she preferred it--of his contemplated interview with her father. He addressed his letter to the care of Mr. Vimpany, to be forwarded, and posted it himself.
This done, he went on at once to Mr. Henley"s house.
The servant who opened the door had evidently received his orders. Mr.
Henley was "not at home." Mountjoy was in no humour to be trifled with.
He pushed the man out of his way, and made straight for the dining-room. There, as his previous experience of the habits of the household had led him to antic.i.p.ate, was the man whom he was determined to see. The table was laid for Mr. Henley"s late dinner.
Hugh"s well-meant attempt to plead the daughter"s cause with the father ended as Iris had said it would end.
After hotly resenting the intrusion on him that had been committed, Mr.
Henley declared that a codicil to his will, depriving his daughter absolutely of all interest in his property, had been legally executed that day. For a time, Mountjoy"s self-control had resisted the most merciless provocation. All that it was possible to effect, by patient entreaty and respectful remonstrance, he had tried again and again, and invariably in vain. At last, Mr. Henley"s unbridled insolence triumphed. Hugh lost his temper--and, in leaving the heartless old man, used language which he afterwards remembered with regret.
To feel that he had attempted to a.s.sert the interests of Iris, and that he had failed, was, in Hugh"s heated state of mind, an irresistible stimulant to further exertion. It was perhaps not too late yet to make another attempt to delay (if not to prevent) the marriage.
In sheer desperation, Mountjoy resolved to inform Lord Harry that his union with Miss Henley would be followed by the utter ruin of her expectations from her father. Whether the wild lord only considered his own interests, or whether he was loyally devoted to the interests of the woman whom he loved, in either case the penalty to be paid for the marriage was formidable enough to make him hesitate.
The lights in the lower window, and in the pa.s.sage, told Hugh that he had arrived in good time at Redburn Road.
He found Mr. Vimpany and the young Irishman sitting together, in the friendliest manner, under the composing influence of tobacco. Primed, as he would have said himself, with only a third gla.s.s of grog, the hospitable side of the doctor"s character was displayed to view. He at once accepted Mountjoy"s visit as offering a renewal of friendly relations between them.
"Forgive and forget," he said, "there"s the way to settle that little misunderstanding, after our dinner at the inn. You know Mr. Mountjoy, my lord? That"s right. Draw in your chair, Mountjoy. My professional prospects threaten me with ruin--but while I have a roof over my head, there"s always a welcome for a friend. My dear fellow, I have every reason to believe that the doctor who sold me this practice was a swindler. The money is gone, and the patients don"t come. Well! I am not quite bankrupt yet; I can offer you a gla.s.s of grog. Mix for yourself--we"ll make a night of it."
Hugh explained (with the necessary excuses) that his object was to say a few words to Lord Harry in private. The change visible in the doctor"s manner, when he had been made acquainted with this circ.u.mstance, was not amiably expressed; he had the air of a man who suspected that an unfair advantage had been taken of him. Lord Harry, on his side, appeared to feel some hesitation in granting a private interview to Mr. Mountjoy.
"Is it about Miss Henley?" he asked.