"On the steamer I met--HIM. His deck chair was next to mine. I noticed that his name was Wrandall--"C. Wrandall" the card on the chair informed me. I--"
"You crossed on the steamer with him?" interrupted Mrs. Wrandall quickly.
"Yes."
"Had--had you seen him before? In London?"
"Never. Well, we became acquainted, as people do. He--he was very handsome and agreeable." She paused for a moment to collect herself.
"Very handsome and agreeable," said the other slowly.
"We got to be very good friends. There were not many people on board, and apparently he knew none of them. It was too cold to stay on deck much of the time, and it was very rough. He had one of the splendid suites on the--"
"Pray omit unnecessary details. You landed and went--where?"
"He advised me to go to an hotel--I can"t recall the name. It was rather an unpleasant place. Then I went to the bank, as I have stated.
After that I did not know what to do. I was stunned, bewildered.
I called him up on the telephone and--he asked me to meet him for dinner at a queer little cafe, far down town. We--"
"And you had no friends, no acquaintances here?"
"No. He suggested that I go into one of the musical shows, saying he thought he could arrange it with a manager who was a friend.
Anything to tide me over, he said. But I would not consider it, not for an instant. I had had enough of the stage. I--I am really not fitted for it. Besides, I AM qualified--well qualified--to be governess--but that is neither here nor there. I had some money--perhaps forty pounds. I found lodgings with some people in Nineteenth street. He never came there to see me. I can see plainly now why he argued it would not be--well, he used the word "wise."
But we went occasionally to dine together. We went about in a motor--a little red one. He--he told me he loved me. That was one night about a week ago. I--"
"I don"t care to hear about it," cried the other. "No need of that.
Spare me the silly side of the story."
"Silly, madam? In G.o.d"s name, do you think it was silly to me?
Why--why, I believed him! And, what is more, I believe that he DID love me--even now I believe it."
"I have no doubt of it," said Mrs. Wrandall calmly. "You are very pretty--and charming."
"I--I did not know that he had a wife until--well, until--" She could not go on.
"Night before last?"
The girl shuddered. Mrs. Wrandall turned her face away and waited.
"There is nothing more I can tell you, unless you permit me to tell ALL," the girl resumed after a moment of hesitation.
Mrs. Wrandall arose.
"I have heard enough. This afternoon I will send my butler with you to the lodging house in Nineteenth street. He will attend to the removal of your personal effects to my home, and you will return with him. It will be testing fate, Miss Castleton, this visit to your former abiding place, but I have decided to give the law its chance. If you are suspected, a watch will be set over the house in which you lived. If you are not suspected, if your a.s.sociation with--with Wrandall is quite unknown, you will run no risk in going there openly, nor will I be taking so great a chance as may appear in offering you a home, for the time being at least, as companion--or secretary or whatever we may elect to call it for the benefit of all enquirers. Are you willing to run the risk--this single risk?"
"Perfectly willing," announced the other without hesitation. Indeed, her face brightened. "If they are waiting there for me, I shall go with them without a word. I have no means of expressing my grat.i.tude to you for--"
"There is time enough for that," said Mrs. Wrandall quickly. "And if they are not there, you will return to me? You will not desert me now?"
The girl"s eyes grew wide with wonder. "Desert you? Why do you put it in that way? I don"t understand."
"You will come back to me?" insisted the other.
"Yes. Why,--why, it means everything to me. It means life,--more than that, most wonderful friend. Life isn"t very sweet to me. But the joy of giving it to you for ever is the dearest boon I crave.
I DO give it to you. It belongs to you. I--I could die for you."
She dropped to her knees and pressed her lips to Sara Wrandall"s hand; hot tears fell upon it.
Mrs. Wrandall laid her free hand on the dark, glossy hair and smiled; smiled warmly for the first time in--well, in years she might have said to herself if she had stopped to consider.
"Get up, my dear," she said gently. "I shall not ask you to die for me--if you DO come back. I may be sending you to your death, as it is, but it is the chance we must take. A few hours will tell the tale. Now listen to what I am about to say,--to propose. I offer you a home, I offer you friendship and I trust security from the peril that confronts you. I ask nothing in return, not even a word of grat.i.tude. You may tell the people at your lodgings that I have engaged you as companion and that we are to sail for Europe in a week"s time if possible. Now we must prepare to go to my own home.
You will see to packing my--that is, our trunks--"
"Oh, it--it must be a dream!" cried Hetty Castleton, her eyes swimming.
"I can"t believe--" Suddenly she caught herself up, and tried to smile. "I don"t see why you do this for me. I do not deserve--"
"You have done me a service," said Mrs. Wrandall, her manner so peculiar that the girl again a.s.sumed the stare of perplexity and wonder that had been paramount since their meeting: as if she were on the verge of grasping a great truth.
"What CAN you mean?"
Sara laid her hands on the girl"s shoulders and looked steadily into the puzzled eyes for a moment before speaking.
"My girl," she said, ever so gently, "I shall not ask what your life has been; I do not care. I shall not ask for references. You are alone in the world and you need a friend. I too am alone. If you will come to me I will do everything in my power to make you comfortable and--contented. Perhaps it will be impossible to make you happy. I promise faithfully to help you, to shield you, to repay you for the thing you have done for me. You could not have fallen into gentler hands than mine will prove to be. That much I swear to you on my soul, which is sacred. I bear you no ill-will. I have nothing to avenge."
Hetty drew back, completely mystified.
"Who are you?" she murmured, still staring.
"I am Challis Wrandall"s wife."
CHAPTER IV
WHILE THE MOB WAITED
The next day but one, in the huge old-fashioned mansion of the Wrandalls in lower Fifth Avenue, in the drawing-room directly beneath the chamber in which Challis was born, the impressive but grimly conventional funeral services were held.
Contrasting sharply with the sombre, absolutely correct atmosphere of the gloomy interior was the exterior display of joyous curiosity that must have jarred severely on the high-bred sensibilities of the chief mourners, not to speak of the invited guests who had been obliged to pa.s.s between rows of gaping bystanders in order to reach the portals of the house of grief, and who must have reckoned with extreme distaste the cost of subsequent departure. A dozen raucous-voiced policemen were employed to keep back the hundreds that thronged the sidewalk and blocked the street. Curiosity was rampant. Ever since the moment that the body of Challis Wrandall was carried into the house of his father, a motley, varying crowd of people shifted restlessly in front of the mansion, filled with gruesome interest in the absolutely unseen, animated by the sly hope that something sensational might happen if they waited long enough.
Men, women, children struggled for places nearest the tall iron fence surrounding the spare yard, and gazed with awed but wistful eyes at the curtained windows and at the huge bow of crepe on the ma.s.sive portals. In hushed voices they spoke of the murder and expressed a single opinion among them all: the law ought to make short work of her! If this thing had happened in England, said they who scoff at our own laws, there wouldn"t be any foolishness about the business: the woman would be buried in quick-lime before you could know what you were talking about. The law in this country is a joke, said they, with great irritability. Why can"t we do the business up, sharp and quick, as they do in England? Get it over with, that"s the ticket. What"s the sense of dragging it out for a year? Send "em to the chair or hang "em while everybody"s interested, not when the thing"s half forgotten. Who wants to see a person hanged after the crime"s been forgotten? And then, think of the saving to the State? Hang "em, men or women, and in a couple of years" time there wouldn"t be a tenth part of the murders we have now. Statistics prove, went on the wise ones, that only one out of every hundred is hanged. What"s that? The jury system is rotten!
No sirree, we are "way behind England in that respect. Just look at that big murder case in London last month! Remember it? Murderer was hanged inside of three weeks after he was caught. That"s the way to do it! And the London police catch "em too. Our police stand around doing nothing until the criminal has got a week"s start, and then--oh, well, what can you expect? "Now if I was at the head of the New York department I"d have that woman behind the bars before night, that"s what I"d do. You bet your life, I would," said more than one. And no one questioned his ability to do so.
And then all of them would growl at the policemen who pushed them back from the gates, and call them "scabs" and "mutts" in repressed tones, and snarl under their breath that they wouldn"t be pushing people around like that if they didn"t have stars and clubs and a great idea of their own importance. "If it wasn"t for the family at home dependin" on me for support, I"d take a punch at that stiff, so help me G.o.d, even if I went to the Island for it!"
And so it WAS and ever shall be, world without end.