Horace started. "Serious reasons?" he repeated. "You surprise me."
"I shall surprise you still more before I have done."
Their eyes met as Lady Janet answered in those terms. Horace observed signs of agitation in her, which he now noticed for the first time. His face darkened with an expression of sullen distrust--and he took the chair in silence.
CHAPTER XXIV. LADY JANET"S LETTER.
THE narrative leaves Lady Janet and Horace Holmcroft together, and returns to Julian and Mercy in the library.
An interval pa.s.sed--a long interval, measured by the impatient reckoning of suspense--after the cab which had taken Grace Roseberry away had left the house. The minutes followed each other; and still the warning sound of Horace"s footsteps was not heard on the marble pavement of the hall. By common (though unexpressed) consent, Julian and Mercy avoided touching upon the one subject on which they were now both interested alike. With their thoughts fixed secretly in vain speculation on the nature of the interview which was then taking place in Lady Janet"s room, they tried to speak on topics indifferent to both of them--tried, and failed, and tried again. In a last and longest pause of silence between them, the next event happened. The door from the hall was softly and suddenly opened.
Was it Horace? No--not even yet. The person who had opened the door was only Mercy"s maid.
"My lady"s love, miss; and will you please to read this directly?"
Giving her message in those terms, the woman produced from the pocket of her ap.r.o.n Lady Janet"s second letter to Mercy, with a strip of paper oddly pinned round the envelope. Mercy detached the paper, and found on the inner side some lines in pencil, hurriedly written in Lady Janet"s hand. They ran thus.
"Don"t lose a moment in reading my letter. And mind this, when H.
returns to you--meet him firmly: say nothing."
Enlightened by the warning words which Julian had spoken to her, Mercy was at no loss to place the right interpretation on those strange lines.
Instead of immediately opening the letter, she stopped the maid at the library door. Julian"s suspicion of the most trifling events that were taking place in the house had found its way from his mind to hers.
"Wait!" she said. "I don"t understand what is going on upstairs; I want to ask you something."
The woman came back--not very willingly.
"How did you know I was here?" Mercy inquired.
"If you please, miss, her ladyship ordered me to take the letter to you some little time since. You were not in your room, and I left it on your table."
"I understand that. But how came you to bring the letter here?"
"My lady rang for me, miss. Before I could knock at her door she came out into the corridor with that morsel of paper in her hand--"
"So as to keep you from entering her room?"
"Yes, miss. Her ladyship wrote on the paper in a great hurry, and told me to pin it round the letter that I had left in your room. I was to take them both together to you, and to let n.o.body see me. "You will find Miss Roseberry in the library" (her ladyship says), "and run, run, run!
there isn"t a moment to lose!" Those were her own words, miss."
"Did you hear anything in the room before Lady Janet came out and met you?"
The woman hesitated, and looked at Julian.
"I hardly know whether I ought to tell you, miss."
Julian turned away to leave the library. Mercy stopped him by a motion of her hand.
"You know that I shall not get you into any trouble," she said to the maid. "And you may speak quite safely before Mr. Julian Gray."
Thus re-a.s.sured, the maid spoke.
"To own the truth, miss, I heard Mr. Holmcroft in my lady"s room. His voice sounded as if he was angry. I may say they were both angry--Mr.
Holmcroft and my lady." (She turned to Julian.) "And just before her ladyship came out, sir, I heard your name, as if it was you they were having words about. I can"t say exactly what it was; I hadn"t time to hear. And I didn"t listen, miss; the door was ajar; and the voices were so loud n.o.body could help hearing them."
It was useless to detain the woman any longer. Having given her leave to withdraw, Mercy turned to Julian.
"Why were they quarreling about you?" she asked.
Julian pointed to the unopened letter in her hand.
"The answer to your question may be there," he said. "Read the letter while you have the chance. And if I can advise you, say so at once."
With a strange reluctance she opened the envelope. With a sinking heart she read the lines in which Lady Janet, as "mother and friend,"
commanded her absolutely to suppress the confession which she had pledged herself to make in the sacred interests of justice and truth.
A low cry of despair escaped her, as the cruel complication in her position revealed itself in all its unmerited hardship. "Oh, Lady Janet, Lady Janet!" she thought, "there was but one trial more left in my hard lot--and it comes to me from _you!_"
She handed the letter to Julian. He took it from her in silence. His pale complexion turned paler still as he read it. His eyes rested on her compa.s.sionately as he handed it back.
"To my mind," he said, "Lady Janet herself sets all further doubt at rest. Her letter tells me what she wanted when she sent for Horace, and why my name was mentioned between them."
"Tell me!" cried Mercy, eagerly.
He did not immediately answer her. He sat down again in the chair by her side, and pointed to the letter.
"Has Lady Janet shaken your resolution?" he asked.
"She has strengthened my resolution," Mercy answered. "She has added a new bitterness to my remorse."
She did not mean it harshly, but the reply sounded harshly in Julian"s ears. It stirred the generous impulses, which were the strongest impulses in his nature. He who had once pleaded with Mercy for compa.s.sionate consideration for herself now pleaded with her for compa.s.sionate consideration for Lady Janet. With persuasive gentleness he drew a little nearer, and laid his hand on her arm.
"Don"t judge her harshly," he said. "She is wrong, miserably wrong. She has recklessly degraded herself; she has recklessly tempted you. Still, is it generous--is it even just--to hold her responsible for deliberate sin? She is at the close of her days; she can feel no new affection; she can never replace you. View her position in that light, and you will see (as I see) that it is no base motive which has led her astray. Think of her wounded heart and her wasted life--and say to yourself forgivingly, She loves me!"
Mercy"s eyes filled with tears.
"I do say it!" she answered. "Not forgivingly--it is _I_ who have need of forgiveness. I say it gratefully when I think of her--I say it with shame and sorrow when I think of myself."
He took her hand for the first time. He looked, guiltlessly looked, at her downcast face. He spoke as he had spoken at the memorable interview between them which had made a new woman of her.
"I can imagine no crueler trial," he said, "than the trial that is now before you. The benefactress to whom you owe everything asks nothing from you but your silence. The person whom you have wronged is no longer present to stimulate your resolution to speak. Horace himself (unless I am entirely mistaken) will not hold you to the explanation that you have promised. The temptation to keep your false position in this house is, I do not scruple to say, all but irresistible. Sister and friend! can you still justify my faith in you? Will you still own the truth, without the base fear of discovery to drive you to it?"
She lifted her head, with the steady light of resolution shining again in her grand, gray eyes. Her low, sweet voice answered him, without a faltering note in it,
"I will!"
"You will do justice to the woman whom you have wronged--unworthy as she is; powerless as she is to expose you?"