Chapter II

“All seems to have gone on happily and smoothly for a time in Mrs. Brackenbury’s pretty house in Kensington,” continued the man in the corner. “Hubert Turnour was a constant visitor there, and the two young people seem to have had all the freedom of an engaged couple.

“Alice Checkfield was in no sense of the word an attractive girl; she was not good-looking, and no effort on Mrs. Brackenbury’s part could succeed in making her look stylish. Still, Hubert Turnour seemed quite satisfied, and the girl herself ready enough at first to continue the boy and girl flirtation as of old.

“Soon, however, as time went on, things began to change. Now that Alice had become mistress of a comfortable fortune, there were plenty of people ready to persuade her that a ‘commission agent,’ with but vague business prospects, was not half good enough for her, and that her £80,000 entitled her to more ambitious matrimonial hopes. Needless to say that in these counsels Mrs. Brackenbury was very much to the fore.

“She lived in Kensington, and had social ambitions, foremost among which was to see her daughter’s bosom friend married to, at least, a baronet, if not a peer.

“A young girl’s head is quickly turned. Within six months of her stay in London, Alice was giving Hubert Turnour the cold shoulder, and the young man had soon realised that she was trying to get out of her engagement.

“Scarcely had Alice reached her twentieth birthday, than she gave her erstwhile _fiancé_ his formal _congé_.

“At first Hubert seems to have taken his discomfiture very much to heart. £80,000 were not likely to come his way again in a hurry. According to Mrs. Brackenbury’s servants, there were one or two violent scenes between him and Alice, until finally Mrs. Brackenbury herself was forced to ask the young man to discontinue his visits.

“It was soon after that that Alice Checkfield first met Count Collini at one of the brilliant subscription dances given by the Italian colony in London, the winter before last. Mrs. Brackenbury was charmed with him, Alice Checkfield was enchanted! The Count, having danced with Alice half the evening, was allowed to pay his respects at the house in Kensington.

“He seemed to be extremely well off, for he was staying at the Carlton, and, after one or two calls on Mrs. Brackenbury, he began taking the ladies to theatres and concerts, always presenting them with the choicest and most expensive flowers, and paying them various other equally costly attentions.

“Mrs. and Miss Brackenbury welcomed the Count with open arms (figuratively speaking). Alice was shy, but apparently over head and ears in love at first sight.

“At first Mrs. Brackenbury did her best to keep this new acquaintanceship a secret from Hubert Turnour. I suppose that the old matchmaker feared another unpleasant scene. But the inevitable soon happened. Hubert, contrite, perhaps still hopeful, called at the house one day, when the Count was there, and, according to the story subsequently told by Miss Brackenbury herself, there was a violent scene between him and Alice. As soon as the fascinating foreigner had gone, Hubert reproached his _fiancée_ for her fickleness in no measured language, and there was a good deal of evidence to prove that he then and there swore to be even with the man who had supplanted him in her affections. There was nothing to do then but for Mrs. Brackenbury to ‘burn her boats.’ She peremptorily ordered Hubert out of her house, and admitted that Count Collini was a suitor, favoured by herself, for the hand of Alice Checkfield.

“You see, I am bound to give you all these details of the situation,” continued the man in the corner, with his bland smile, “so that you may better form a judgment as to the subsequent fate of Count Collini. From the description which Mrs. Brackenbury herself subsequently gave to the police, the Count was then in the prime of life; of a dark olive complexion, dark eyes, extremely black hair and moustache. He had a very slight limp, owing to an accident he had had in early youth, which made his walk and general carriage unusual and distinctly noticeable. His was certainly not a personality that could pass unperceived in a crowd.

“Hubert Turnour, furious and heartsick, wrote letter after letter to his brother, to ask him to interfere on his behalf; this Mr. Turnour did, to the best of his ability, but he had to deal with an ambitious matchmaker and with a girl in love, and it is small wonder that he signally failed. Alice Checkfield by now had become deeply enamoured of her Count, his gallantries flattered her vanity, his title and the accounts he gave of his riches and his estates in Italy fascinated her, and she declared that she would marry him, either with or without her guardian’s consent, either at once, or as soon as she had attained her majority, and was mistress of herself and of her fortune.

“Mr. Turnour did all he could to prevent this absurd marriage. Being a sensible, middle-class Britisher, he had no respect for foreign titles, and little belief in foreign wealth. He wrote the most urgent letters to Alice, warning her against a man whom he firmly believed to be an impostor; finally, he flatly refused to give his consent to the marriage.

“Thus a few months went by. The Count had been away in Italy all through the winter and spring, and returned to London for the season, apparently more enamoured with the Reading biscuit baker’s daughter than ever. Alice Checkfield was then within nine months of her twenty-first birthday, and determined to marry the Count. She openly defied her guardian.

“‘Nothing,’ she wrote to him, ‘would ever induce me to marry Hubert.’

“I suppose it was this which finally induced Mr. Turnour to give up all opposition to the marriage. Seeing that his brother’s chances were absolutely _nil_, and that Alice was within nine months of her majority, he no doubt thought all further argument useless, and with great reluctance finally gave his consent.

“The marriage, owing to the difference of religion, was to be performed before a registrar, and was finally fixed to take place on 22nd October, 1903, which was just a week after Alice’s twenty-first birthday.

“Of course the question of Alice’s fortune immediately cropped up: she desired her money in cash, as her husband was taking her over to live in Italy, where she desired to make all further investments. She, therefore, asked Mr. Turnour to dispose of her freehold property for her. There again Mr. Turnour hesitated, and argued, but once he had given his consent to the marriage, all opposition was useless, more especially as Mrs. Brackenbury’s solicitors had drawn up a very satisfactory marriage settlement, which the Count himself had suggested, by which Alice was to retain sole use and control of her own private fortune.

“The marriage was then duly performed before a registrar on that 22nd of October, and Alice Checkfield could henceforth style herself Countess Collini. The young couple were to start for Italy almost directly, but meant to spend a day or two at Dover quietly together. There were, however, one or two tiresome legal formalities to go through. Mr. Turnour had, by Alice’s desire, handed over the sum of £80,000 in notes to her solicitor, Mr. R. W. Stanford. Mr. Stanford had gone down to Reading two days before the marriage, had received the money from Mr. Turnour, and then called upon the new Countess, and formally handed her over her fortune in Bank of England notes.

“Then it was necessary, in view of immediate and future arrangements, to change the English money into foreign, which the Count and his young wife did themselves that afternoon.

“At 5 o’clock p.m. they started for Dover, accompanied by Mrs. Brackenbury, who desired to see the last of her young friend, prior to the latter’s departure for abroad. The Count had engaged a magnificent suite of rooms at the Lord Warden Hotel, and thither the party proceeded.

“So far, you see,” added the man in the corner, “the story is of the utmost simplicity. You might even call it commonplace. A foreign Count, an ambitious matchmaker, and a credulous girl; these form the ingredients of many a domestic drama, that culminates at the police courts. But at this point this particular drama becomes more complicated, and, if you remember, ends in one of the strangest mysteries that has ever baffled the detective forces on both sides of the Channel.”