"Name your price, then, sir. Though it were half my kingdom, you shall be paid."
"And don"t mind me, sir," suggested Mrs. Sharpe, demurely.
"Ah! but I do mind you," said Mr. Ingelow; "and besides, the time for payment has not yet come. Doctor Oleander"s little bill must be settled first. What do you mean to do about it, Miss Dane?"
"Punish him to the utmost of my power."
"And that will be pretty severe punishment, if you appeal to the laws of our beloved country. Abductions, and forcible marriages, and illegal imprisonment don"t go for nothing, I fancy. Only, unfortunately, the whole land will ring with your story, and your notoriety will be more extensive than gratifying."
Mollie made a gesture of horror.
"Oh, stop! Not that! I should die if it were known I was Guy Oleander"s wife! I mean it, Hugh Ingelow. I should die of shame!"
She rose impetuously from the table and walked away to one of the windows.
"You don"t know how I abhor that man--abhor, detest, hate, loathe him!
There is no word in all the language strong enough to express my feeling for him. Think of it, Mr. Ingelow!"--she faced around, her eyes flashing fire--"think of tearing a bride from the very altar on her wedding-night, and compelling her to marry a man she abhorred! You, who are a brave man and an honorable gentleman, tell me what language is strong enough for so dastardly a deed."
Hugh Ingelow left his seat and faced her, very pale. Mrs. Sharpe slipped out of the room.
"Do you regret your broken marriage with Sir Roger Trajenna, Mollie?"
"No--yes--no. I don"t know--I don"t think I do. It isn"t that. I didn"t care for Sir Roger. I was mean enough and shabby enough to consent to marry him for his wealth and t.i.tle. But I was such a little fool! Sir Roger was a thousand times too good for me, and he and I are both well out of that matter. But that is no excuse for such a villainous deed."
"True. Nothing can excuse it. But you must be merciful. The man loved you pa.s.sionately."
"Mr. Ingelow," opening her eyes wild and wide, "are you pleading Doctor Oleander"s case?"
"No, Mollie--the case of the man who loved you so madly, so recklessly, that the thought of your being another"s--another"s whom you did not love--drove him to insanity, and to the commission of an insane deed."
"And that man was Doctor Oleander."
"It was not!"
"Mr. Ingelow!"
"No, Mollie; never Guy Oleander. He hadn"t the pluck. He never cared for you enough."
"But he did it twice."
"Once only--this last time--stung, goaded into it by the lash of Mrs.
Walraven"s waspish tongue. But he is not the man who married you, whoever that man may be. At least," cooling down suddenly, as he saw the full blue eyes fixed upon him with piercing intentness, "I don"t believe it."
"What do you believe, then, Mr. Ingelow?" Mollie said, slowly and suspiciously.
"That when you made Miriam the confidante of your story, on a certain night in your bedroom, Mrs. Carl Walraven overheard you."
"Impossible!"
"Perhaps so; but you"ll find that"s the way of it. She listened and heard, and patched it up with Mr. Rashleigh"s dinner-table tale, and confabulated with her cousin, and put him up to this last dodge. She saw your advertis.e.m.e.nt in the paper, and understood it as well as you did, and Doctor Oleander was there in waiting. You committed one unaccountable blunder. You appointed ten for the nocturnal interview, and were at the place of the tryst at half past nine. How do you explain that little circ.u.mstance?"
"It seems to me, Mr. Ingelow," said Mollie, "that you must be a sorcerer. How do you know all this?"
"Partly from Miriam, partly from my own inborn ingenuity, as a Yankee, in guessing. Please answer my question."
"I didn"t know I was before time. It was later than half past nine by my watch when I quitted the house. I remember listening for the clocks to strike ten as I reached Fourteenth Street."
"You didn"t hear them?"
"No."
"Of course not. Your watch was tampered with, and that confirms my suspicion of Mrs. Walraven. Believe me, Mollie, a trap was laid for you, and you were caught in it. You never met "Black Mask" that night."
"If I thought so!" Mollie cried, clasping her hands.
"You will find it so," Hugh Ingelow said, very quietly. "Let that be Doctor Oleander"s punishment. Make him confess his fraud--make him confess Mrs. Walraven aided and abetted him--to-night."
"How can I?"
"Simply enough. Accuse him and her before us all. There will be no one present you can not trust. Your guardian, Sir Roger, and myself know already. Sardonyx is Mr. Walraven"s lawyer, and silence is a lawyer"s forte."
"Well?" breathlessly.
"Accuse him--threaten him. Tell him you know his whole fraud from first to last. Accuse her! Tell him if he does not prove to your satisfaction he is the man who carried you off and married you, or if he refuses to own he is not the man, that he will go straight from the house to prison. He knows you can fulfill the threat. I think it will succeed."
"And if he confesses he is not the man who married me--if he acknowledges the fraud--what then?"
"Ah! what then? Doctor Oleander will not be your husband."
"And I will be as much in the dark as ever."
"A moment ago you were in despair because you thought he, of all men, was the man," said Hugh Ingelow. "It seems to me you are hard to satisfy."
"No," said Mollie; "if it be as you suspect, I shall be unspeakably thankful. No fate earth can have in store for me can be half so horrible as to know myself the wife of Guy Oleander."
"And if I thought you were his wife, Mollie, rest a.s.sured I should never have taken you from him," said Mr. Ingelow, decidedly. "You are no more Guy Oleander"s wife than I am."
"Heaven be praised for that!" Mollie cried. "But then, I am entirely in the dark. Whose wife am I?"
Mr. Ingelow smiled.
"That question has an extraordinary sound. One doesn"t hear it often in a life-time. If I were a sorcerer, as you accuse me of being, I might perhaps answer it. As it is, I leave it to your own woman"s wit to discover."
"My woman"s wit is completely at a loss," said Mollie, despairingly. "If ever I do find out, and I think it likely I shall, the divorce law will set me free. I must tell guardy all, and get him to help me."
"Is there no one you suspect?"
"Not one--now," Mollie replied, turning away from him.