Then, a few moments later, a thin, grey-faced, rather ascetic-looking clergyman, the Reverend Edmund Shuttleworth, rector of Middleton, came across the gra.s.s and grasped his host"s hand in warmest greeting.
When he had seated himself in the low chair which Poland pulled forward, and Felix had handed the cigars, the two men commenced to gossip, as was their habit.
Phil Poland liked the rector, because he had discovered that, notwithstanding his rather prim exterior and most approved clerical drawl, he was nevertheless a man of the world. In the pulpit he preached forgiveness, and, unlike many country rectors and their wives, was broad-minded enough to admit the impossibility of a sinless life. Both he and Mrs. Shuttleworth treated both chapel and church-going folk with equal kindliness, and the deserving poor never went empty away.
Both in the pulpit and out of it the rector of Middleton called a spade a spade with purely British bluntness, and though his parish was only a small one he was the most popular man in it--a fact which surely spoke volumes for a parson.
"I was much afraid I shouldn"t be able to come to-night," he said presently. "Old Mrs. Dixon, over at Forest Farm, is very ill, and I"ve been with her all the afternoon."
"Then you didn"t go to Lady Medland"s garden-party?"
"No. I wanted to go very much, but was unable. I fear poor old Mrs.
Dixon may not last the night. She asked after Miss Sonia, and expressed a great wish to see her. You have no idea how popular your daughter is among the poor of Middleton, Mr. Poland."
"Sonia returns from London to-morrow afternoon," her father said. "She shall go over and see Mrs. Dixon."
"If the old lady is still here," said the rector. "I fear her life is fast ebbing, but it is rea.s.suring to know she has made peace with her Maker, and will pa.s.s happily away into the unknown beyond."
His host was silent. The bent old woman, the wife of a farm-labourer, had made repentance. If there was repentance for her, was there not repentance for him? He held his breath at the thought.
Little did Shuttleworth dream that the merry, easy-going man who sat before him was doomed--a man whose tortured soul was crying aloud for help and guidance; a man with a dread and terrible secret upon his conscience; a man threatened by an exposure which he could never live to face.
Poland allowed his visitor to chatter on--to gossip about the work in his parish. He was reviewing his present position. He desired some one in whom he could confide; some one of whom he might seek advice and counsel. Could he expose his real self in all his naked shame; dare he speak in confidence to Edmund Shuttleworth? Dare he reveal the ghastly truth, and place the seal of the confessional upon his lips?
Twilight deepened into night, and the crescent moon rose slowly. Yet the two men still sat smoking and chatting, Shuttleworth somewhat surprised to notice how unusually preoccupied his host appeared.
At last, when the night wind blew chill, they rose and pa.s.sed into the study, where Poland closed the French windows, and then, with sudden resolve and a word of apology to his visitor, he crossed the room and turned the key in the lock, saying in a hard, strained tone--
"Shuttleworth, I--I want to speak to you in--in strictest confidence--to ask your advice. Yet--yet it is upon such a serious matter that I hesitate--fearing----"
"Fearing what?" asked the rector, somewhat surprised at his tone.
"Because, in order to speak, I must reveal to you a truth--a shameful truth concerning myself. May I rely upon your secrecy?"
"Any fact you may reveal to me I shall regard as sacred. That is my duty as a minister of religion, Poland," was the other"s quiet reply.
"You swear to say nothing?" cried his host eagerly, standing before him.
"Yes. I swear to regard your confidence," replied his visitor.
And then the Honourable Philip Poland slowly sank into the chair on the opposite side of the fireplace, and in brief, hesitating sentences related one of the strangest stories that ever fell from any sane man"s lips--a story which held its hearer aghast, transfixed, speechless in amazement.
"There is repentance for me, Shuttleworth--tell me that there is!"
cried the man who had confessed, his eyes staring and haggard in his agony. "I have told you the truth because--because when I am gone I want you, if you will, to ask your wife to take care of my darling Sonia. Financially, she is well provided for. I have seen to all that, but--ah!" he cried wildly, "she must never know that her father was----"
"Hush, Poland!" urged the rector, placing his hand tenderly upon his host"s arm. "Though I wear these clothes, I am still a man of the world like yourself. I haven"t been sinless. You wish to repent--to atone for the past. It is my duty to a.s.sist you." And he put out his strong hand frankly.
His host drew back. But next instant he grasped it, and in doing so burst into tears.
"I make no excuse for myself," he faltered. "I am a blackguard, and unworthy the friendship of a true honest man like yourself, Shuttleworth. But I love my darling child. She is all that has remained to me, and I want to leave her in the care of a good woman.
She must forget me--forget what her father was----"
"Enough!" cried the other, holding up his hand; and then, until far into the night, the two men sat talking in low, solemn tones, discussing the future, while the att.i.tude of Philip Poland, as he sat pale and motionless, his hands clasped upon his knees, was one of deep repentance.
That same night, if the repentant transgressor could but have seen Edmund Shuttleworth, an hour later, pacing the rectory study; if he could have witnessed the expression of fierce, murderous hatred upon that usually calm and kindly countenance; if he could have overheard the strangely bitter words which escaped the dry lips of the man in whom he had confided his secret, he would have been held aghast--aghast at the amazing truth, a truth of which he had never dreamed.
His confession had produced a complication unheard of, undreamed of, so cleverly had the rector kept his countenance and controlled his voice. But when alone he gave full vent to his anger, and laughed aloud in the contemplation of a terrible vengeance which, he declared aloud to himself, should be his.
"That voice!" he cried in triumph. "Why did I not recognize it before?
But I know the truth now--I know the amazing truth!"
And he laughed harshly to himself as he paced his room.
Next day Philip Poland spent in his garden, reading beneath the big yew, as was his wont. But his thoughts ever wandered from his book, as he grew apprehensive of the evil his enemy was about to hurl upon him.
His defiance, he knew, must cost him his liberty--his life. Yet he was determined. For Sonia"s sake he had become a changed man.
At noon Shuttleworth, calm and pleasant, came across the lawn with outstretched hand. He uttered low words of encouragement and comfort.
He said that poor Mrs. Dixon had pa.s.sed away, and later on he left to attend to his work in the parish. After luncheon, served by the silent Felix, Poland retired to his study with the newspaper, and sat for two hours, staring straight before him, until, just after four o"clock, the door was suddenly flung open, and a slim, athletic young girl, with a wealth of soft fair hair, a perfect countenance, a sweet, lovable expression, and a pair of merry blue eyes, burst into the room, crying--
"Hallo, dad! Here I am--so glad to be back again with you!" And, bending over him, she gave him a sounding kiss upon the cheek.
She was verily a picture of youthful beauty, in her cool, pale grey gown, her hair dressed low, and secured by a bow of black velvet, while her big black hat suited her to perfection, her blue eyes adoring in their gaze and her lovely face flushed with pleasure at her home-coming.
Her father took her hand, and, gazing lovingly into her eyes, said in a slow voice--
"And I, too, darling, am glad to have you at home. Life here is very dull indeed without you."
That night, when seated together in the pretty old-fashioned drawing-room before retiring to bed--a room of bright chintzes, costly knick-knacks, and big blue bowls of sweet-smelling pot-pourri--Sonia looked delightful in her black net dinner-gown, cut slightly _decollete_, and wearing around her slim white throat a simple necklace of pale pink coral.
"My dear," exclaimed her father in a slow, hesitating way, after her fingers had been running idly over the keys of the piano, "I want to speak very seriously to you for a few moments."
She rose in surprise, and came beside his chair. He grasped her soft hand, and she sank upon her knees, as she so often did when they spoke in confidence.
"Well--I"ve been wondering, child, what--what you will do in future,"
he said, with a catch in his voice. "Perhaps--perhaps I may have to go away for a very, very long time--years perhaps--on a long journey, and I shall, I fear, be compelled to leave you, to----"
"To leave me, dad!" gasped the girl, dismayed. "No--surely--you won"t do that? What could I do without you--without my dear, devoted dad--my only friend!"
"You will have to--to do without me, dearest--to--to forget your father," said the white-faced man in a low, broken voice. "I couldn"t take you with me. It would be impossible."
The girl was silent; her slim hand was clutching his convulsively; her eyes filled with the light of unshed tears.
"But what should I do, dad, without you?" she cried. "Why do you speak so strangely? Why do you hide so many things from me still--about our past? I"m eighteen now, remember, dad, and you really ought to speak to me as a woman--not as a child. Why all this mystery?"
"Because--because it is imperative, Sonia," he replied in a tone quite unusual. "I--I would tell you all, only--only you would think ill of me. So I prefer that you, my daughter, should remain in ignorance, and still love me--still----"
His words were interrupted by Felix, who opened the door, and, advancing with silent tread, said--