"Yes, sir," said Miss Riordan, timidly. "But, please, before I speak, could you help me to a new situation? Mr. Jefferies dismissed me because I walked out with Bernard and received him in the kitchen."
"Hum," said Durham, reflectively. He did not know very well what to say at the outset as he was by no means prepared to promise to a.s.sist her off-hand. But on consideration he saw the necessity of keeping so valuable a witness under his own eye and away from Beryl, always supposing Beryl to be mixed up in the matter. He therefore made up his mind swiftly, and in his answer gained Jane"s goodwill. "Yes, I can help you," he said; "my housekeeper wants a housemaid. I will give you my address and a letter to her. Go to Camden Hill and if your character is satisfactory she will engage you."
"Oh, thank you, sir," said Jane, effusively. "I"m sure my character is all that can be desired, save in this last trouble. But Bernard was such an agreeable----"
"There! there!" interrupted Durham, cutting her short, "we won"t talk of that just now. This last episode of your career will not stand in the way of my housekeeper engaging you. I"ll make that clear to her in my letter. Come now, will you answer my questions?"
"Yes, sir. Any you like to ask," said Jane, delighted at the granting of her pet.i.tion, and privately thinking Durham a sweet gentleman.
"Good!" said the lawyer in an official manner. "What is your name?"
"Jane Riordan."
Durham noted this and her other answers down.
"You were how long at Mr. Jefferies?"
"Six months, sir."
"When did you first see this soldier?"
"Bernard, sir. In the Park, about a month before Sir Simon came."
"How did he become acquainted with you?"
Jane giggled and looked down. "Well, sir," she said, blushing, "I am not bad-looking and Bernard--"
"He called himself Bernard?"
"Yes, sir. He said he was a corporal in the Imperial Yeomanry. He had seen me in Crimea Square."
"In this house?"
"No, sir. Leaving the house. He said he had come several times, being taken with my looks, and that he always wanted to know me. As he was so handsome, sir, and spoke so civil, we walked out. He treated me to tea in the Park, and then I asked him to meet cook. He accepted at once, sir, and most willingly."
"I daresay," muttered Durham, seeing in this meeting how the scamp had forced his company on the girl so as to enter the house likely to be occupied by Sir Simon. "And he came?"
"Many times, sir--oh! many times, and made himself so agreeable that cook was quite jealous."
"Who did he say he was?"
"Well, sir, he did nothing but hint, saying he was a gentleman of high rank, as could be seen from his manners, and that he had enlisted because of a quarrel he had with his grandfather. But I never knew he was Sir Simon"s grandson until I lost him," sobbed Jane. "Oh, dear me, and to think I would have been Lady Gore, with diamonds and fine clothes, had he lived."
"Hum!" said Durham, digging the point of his pencil into the blotting paper, "so he practically told you the story of Sir Bernard."
"Yes, sir, as I afterwards learned it. And wasn"t that natural, sir, seeing he was Sir Bernard?"
"Are you sure he was?"
Jane stared. "Why, sir, he was always frightened when Mrs. Gilroy came down to the kitchen and said she was his enemy, and that if she saw him he could never marry me. I didn"t know what he meant at that time, but I see now. She would have said who he was. I used to hide him in cupboards, and once in the coal cellar. Cook and William never told, being sympathetic like!"
"Did he speak in educated manner?"
"Like the gentleman he was, sir, having been educated at Eton."
"When you saw him in the grasp of the policeman did you recognize him?
Was he the same man who courted you?"
Jane stared again and looked puzzled. "There isn"t two, sir, that I know of," she said; "and now," with a fresh burst of tears, "there isn"t one, seeing he is drowned. Oh dear, dear me. Yes, sir, I knew him at once, although the light was bad. And when I would have seen him plainer, Mrs.
Gilroy would not let him be brought under the lamp."
"Oh, indeed," said Durham, making a note of this. "Look here," and he held out a large portrait of Bernard, different to that shown at the inquest. "You recognize this, I suppose?"
"That"s my Bernard, sir."
"Is it a good likeness?"
Jane examined the photograph closely. "Not what I"d call a very good one, sir, neither was the other. There"s a look wanting."
"What sort of a look?"
"Well, sir, you might call it a roguish look, of a gentleman who had seen life and had been gay. This portrait is sad and horrid looking. I should have been afraid to be courted by Bernard if he had looked like this. But he was always bright and full of larks. Then he has not got a spot on his chin as he has here. I suppose he cut himself shaving when he had this done."
Durham started. Here was a means of identification. Bernard had a rather large mole on the left of his chin. "Didn"t the man who walked out with you have this spot?" he said, purposely adopting the word she had used.
"No, sir. He had a chin like a new-born infant, smooth and white."
"Did he ever write you a letter?"
Jane blushed again. "Just a short note making an appointment, sir," she said, feeling in her breast, "it being early for love letters, and me being a most respectable young lady. I carry it next my heart."
Durham took the note she handed him without hesitation, and glanced through it. The writing was not unlike that of Bernard"s, yet he saw very plainly that it lacked several characteristics which distinguished that of Gore. The note simply asked Jane to meet the writer on Sunday at the Marble Arch, and was signed "Bernard."
"I"ll give you a sovereign for this," said Durham, quietly.
"Thank you, sir," said Jane, accepting without a moment"s hesitation.
"Of course, Bernard"s dead now, so there"s no use keeping his letters, but if he"d been alive I"d have kept them on the chance of his not making me Lady Gore!"
"Did he wear any rings?" asked Durham, paying the money and putting the letter away.
"Three, sir. Two gold and one silver."
This was another point of difference. Bernard hated rings and never by any chance wore any, not even a signet ring. But by this time Jane"s information was exhausted, and Durham concluded her examination for the moment. He would be able to resume it later when necessary, and congratulated himself on the fact that he had secured Jane as his housemaid. When brought face to face with the real Bernard she would be able to see the difference between him and his double. And then she might also be able to recognize the double should he be found. Just as he was dismissing Jane with a letter to his housekeeper a clerk brought in a name written on a piece of paper. "Mrs. Gilroy," said Durham to himself, wondering greatly. "Tell her to come in," he said aloud, and ushered Jane out quickly by another door. It would never have done to have let Mrs. Gilroy meet her, seeing that the Hall housekeeper was hostile to Bernard. So Jane departed rejoicing, and Durham went back to his desk well satisfied.
"Bernard never wrote this note, as it is different in many ways to his writing," he murmured. "Bernard never wears rings, and he has a mole on his chin which this double apparently lacks. Without doubt the impersonation has been very clever. But I wonder how I am to find the double."
Before he could reply to this perplexing question, the clerk showed in Mrs. Gilroy, as demure and sly-looking as ever. She was richly dressed in black silk, much better dressed in fact than she had ever been during the life of her master. Also Durham noted that there was an aggressive air about her which he had not noticed before. Perhaps this was due to her receipt of an annuity. She was not a lady, and yet she could not be called common. Durham had never examined her carefully before, but now that she was dangerous to Gore"s interest he looked at her carefully. A strange woman and a dangerous was his verdict. He proceeded to feel his way cautiously, wondering what she had come about.
"It"s to see me about your annuity?" he said, tentatively.