CHAPTER XX.

LORD CARTHEW FINDS HIS WIFE.

Hilary stared at Stella in undisguised amazement as she made the astonishing confession that, from the time of leaving the Chase until her arrival in London, she could remember nothing of what had happened to her.

Her statement seemed to fit in only too well with Lord Carthew’s belief that she was not in her right mind on her wedding-day.

It was necessary to learn fuller details, and Hilary led her to a bench in the Park, and seated himself beside her.

“Now, tell me,” he said, kindly but firmly, “all that has happened since you and I were parted by your father at the Cranstoun Arms.”

Willingly enough she obeyed, beginning with Lady Cranstoun’s death, and her own subsequent close imprisonment and supervision, and the pressure which was brought to bear upon her to induce her to marry Lord Carthew. She left out nothing, and dwelt particularly over the gypsy Sarah Carewe’s offer of help “on her wedding-eve,” in the note conveyed to her by means of Stephen Lee.

Hilary’s brows darkened as she uttered the gamekeeper’s name, and he recalled what Lord Carthew had said of Stella’s extraordinary conduct toward him on her wedding journey.

“Are you on such close and confidential terms with this Lee, then, may I ask, that you entrust letters and messages to him?”

Stella’s dark-blue eyes opened wide in what looked like innocent surprise.

“Close and confidential terms?” she repeated. “Why, he is the gamekeeper! I hardly ever see him, and I shall never forgive him for hurting you. Surely, Hilary, you are not going to be jealous of the servants?”

He noticed that she dwelt affectionately upon his name, not in the least as if she realized that she was now another man’s wife.

“Go on,” he said. “When did you see this man Lee last?”

“Not since I dropped him the signal from the window,” she answered, promptly. “Old Sarah told me to employ him, so I suppose he must be a gypsy, too. But let me get on with my story. I can’t tell you how ill I got by being kept shut in my room all those days, and half-starved; but that was my fault, since I was too unhappy to eat. By the wedding-eve, the date on which I was promised help from the gypsies, I was half-desperate, and the strangest fancies began to crowd into my head. I wanted to tear down the bars in my room and jump from the window. I had an idea that if once I could get away to the forest, I might join the gypsies and escape. That afternoon and evening I was not so closely watched; for the first time for weeks I was able to creep out of my room, and down the stairs to the front door. When once I stood in the open air again, I felt intoxicated with joy, and I ran as fast as my feet could carry me into the wood. An idea came into my mind that if the gypsies could not help me, rather than marry any one but you I would drown myself in a tarn I know of, where no one would think of looking for me for weeks, perhaps for months. But before I had run more than a few yards, the old gypsy, Sarah Carewe, who is really, I believe, my great-grandmother, suddenly appeared before me among the trees, like some witch in a fairy-tale. She took my hand, and made me walk very fast beside her into the woods; then she suddenly stopped, and drawing down my face to hers in the gathering darkness, she peered into my eyes with her wonderful bright stare, and stroked my face down with both hands, murmuring soothing words in some language I did not understand. Just as I felt myself growing strangely weak and sleepy, she took a small bottle from her pocket, drew the cork out, and commanded me to drink out of it. I obeyed her without hesitation. I seemed to have no power of resistance. From that moment I can remember nothing at all until two days ago, when I found myself in small, shabby rooms which I had never seen before, with an elderly woman, who slept in another bed in the same room with me. She told me that she was a nurse, that her name was Julia Tait; that she had held me in her arm as a tiny baby, and had seen my mother die. Further, that I had been put in her care for a few days by friends, and that I must not ask questions, or leave the house except in her company. She got me these clothes, and treated me kindly enough, taking me out twice. But she would not talk, and this morning, while she was still asleep, I dressed and slipped out. I was mad to be in the open air after living so long shut up at the Chase. Then, too, I knew you had come to London, and you had told me you always stayed somewhere near Charing Cross and the Strand. So I made my way here, and just as though you had dropped from the clouds, I found you. Why, Hilary, you haven’t yet said you are glad to see me.”

She had evidently again forgotten the tie which bound her to his friend. With an effort, he resolved to recall it to her.

“What is the address where you are now staying?” he asked.

“Duchess Street, Oxford Street. Mrs. Tait thinks I haven’t noticed it painted up, but I have.”

“Stella,” he said, gravely and impressively, “your husband, Lord Carthew, is at Duchess Street at this very moment searching for you. Some detectives whom he employed to find you, after you had jumped out of the train on your wedding journey, set him on your track. When he comes back to my hotel, what can I say to him?”

She sprang from her seat, white and trembling.

“Hilary!” she said, “I can see you believe I am mad. But do I look or speak like a mad woman? Is it possible that I could do all these things of which you tell me and yet remember nothing?”

“I cannot say,” he answered. “On my soul, I understand nothing of the business. But, my dear child, you must see plainly what my duty is. Carthew confided in me; I cannot act against him in this.”

“Hilary!” she exclaimed again, while a hunted, terrified look came into her eyes, “you could not be so cruel as to give me up to him, after all I have suffered for your sake! If--if Lord Carthew’s tale and that notice in the paper are true, then I am mad, quite, quite mad. And if I am sane, I would rather die than be Lord Carthew’s wife. I have no friend in the world but you; for after what you have told me, I cannot tell whether Sarah Carewe is my friend or--my worst enemy. I have told you that I meant to kill myself rather than be married to any one but you; and yet you would give me up to this man, whose wife I will never be. I would rather die!”

She spoke in low tones of passionate intensity, standing before him with clasped hands and tears shining in her eyes. Very pale, very slender and fragile she looked, in her shabby and ill-fitting clothes, which yet could not wholly conceal the graceful outlines of her tall, slim figure. The flush of pleasure which had tinged her cheeks at first sight of him had died away and given place to a look of absolute despair. As he looked at her, Hilary’s resolution was taken. Rising from the bench, he drew her hand through his arm.

“Listen, dear,” he said. “I can no more explain this wretched business than you can. But until it becomes clear, you must trust me and look upon me as a brother, and I, so Heaven help me, will treat you and think of you as a dear sister. I have an aunt, Mrs. Sinclair, who lives in Bayswater. She is a rich woman, a childless widow, and very kindly. I will place you in her care for the present, while I thoroughly investigate this business. Meantime I will pledge myself on my honor to say no word to any one which shall reveal your whereabouts. Will that suit you?”

“Yes, Hilary. I will do everything you tell me.”

While they were driving together in a hansom in the direction of Mrs. Sinclair’s residence, Lord Carthew, in his search after his wife, was undergoing a very strange experience. At the Duchess Street lodgings he gathered little but that an elderly woman named Tait, a professional nurse, lived there, and that three days ago a very old woman had driven up in a four-wheeled cab, and had placed a pretty young invalid lady, who appeared to be in a fainting condition, in Mrs. Tait’s care. On this particular morning the young lady had gone out alone at about seven o’clock, and shortly afterward Mrs. Tait, who appeared distressed at the girl’s absence, had left, presumably in search of her.

Puzzled and anxious, Lord Carthew left, deciding that he would call again, and he was proceeding down Regent Street when, to his astonishment, from the doors of a well-known fashionable millinery establishment he saw, as he believed, his newly made bride emerge, followed by a bowing shopman, laden with parcels.

She was dressed in the identical gray crape costume she had worn on her wedding journey, and she walked leisurely, with her proud head held erect and the sunshine lighting up her lovely face, to a smart victoria which waited for her by the pavement.

A man-servant in dark livery opened her carriage-door, a tall, finely-built man in whom, in spite of the absence of beard about his chin, Lord Carthew traced a marked resemblance to the gamekeeper, Stephen Lee.

Neither the lady nor the man perceived Lord Carthew, who, as the victoria drove away, sprang into a hansom which he directed to follow on the track of the carriage. Down Regent Street, the Haymarket, and across Trafalgar Square, went pursuer and pursued, until, passing down Northumberland Avenue, the victoria drew up with a flourish before the doors of a fashionable hotel greatly patronized by Americans and wealthy travellers passing through London.

The swarthy groom assisted his mistress to alight, and she then, conscious of the admiring ogle of several smart young men who were lounging about the hotel entrance, stopped to give a prolonged order to the coachman before leisurely walking up the hotel steps, throwing, as she did so, many glances of bold coquetry to right and left of her.

Lord Carthew waited for her to have time to proceed to her room before entering himself, and after asking at the office for an imaginary friend, inquired the name of the lady who had just entered.

“That, sir, is Viscountess Carthew. She was only married three or four days ago, and she is waiting here until her husband, who is detained in the country on urgent private affairs, joins her.”

There was something embarrassed about the clerk’s manner. Evidently he was of opinion that the new Viscountess Carthew was a lady whose exact position needed explaining.

“I am Lord Carthew,” said Claud, quietly. “Lady Carthew is suffering from the effects of recent brain fever.”

“Indeed, sir!”

The man looked polite but incredulous.

“We understood, my lord,” he went on, “that the lady was the daughter of Sir Philip Cranstoun, who has visited this hotel several times. We therefore communicated with him last night on the subject of Lady Carthew. We thought ourselves that she seemed--ill.”

From the curious emphasis which the man laid on the words, Lord Carthew guessed that his wife had already gained an unenviable notoriety by her behavior in the establishment. There was a look of evident relief on the face of the manager of the hotel, to whom the clerk communicated the news that Lord Carthew had arrived to join his bride. Claud noted this, being hypersensitive on the subject, and he smarted with an indignant sense of injury as he followed an attendant up the wide marble stairs to Lady Carthew’s rooms on the first floor.

The apartment into which the unhappy bridegroom was shown was a palatially furnished drawing room. On a side-table several bottles of champagne were standing, and at the moment when Lord Carthew entered, a vapid and vicious-looking youth, of the ordinary “stage-door loafer” type, was drinking the health of the lady, whose name he mentioned in loud, drawling tones as he drained his glass.

“Here’s Lady Carthew’s health, and my love to her! Lady Carthew,” he repeated, raising his voice louder, so as to be heard by the occupant of the adjoining room, “do hurry up, there’s a good soul. We’re boring ourselves dreadfully without you.”

“We” consisted of another youth of much the same calibre, and of a stout, florid, dark man of foreign appearance, whom his companions addressed as “Count.” By the table stood Stephen Lee, opening another bottle of champagne, his face set in a sullen frown of disapproval.

“I say, Count,” drawled the youth who sprawled on the sofa, “hope you travel with your stiletto up your sleeve. Lady Carthew’s man here has such a confoundedly cut-throat look that he makes me quite nervous.”

The noise of the door closing made the youth turn his head. At sight of Lord Carthew he stared superciliously.

“Hullo! Here’s another chap to luncheon! Quite a party we shall be. Ah, here she is at last, lookin’ rippin’, positively rippin’!”

Was it, could it be, his Stella, his modest and refined lady-love, this bold-eyed woman with the coarse laugh, who, in a gorgeous tea-gown of red brocade, far too elaborate and vivid in color for morning wear, swept into the room, returning the vulgar and silly banter of her chosen acquaintances in the style of a fourth-rate barmaid?

She did not at first notice Lord Carthew as he stood, pale and motionless, by the door. But even when she perceived him, she was in no way abashed.

“Why, I declare,” she cried, with a loud laugh, “there’s my husband. Where did you boys pick him up? Glad to see you, Carthew. Have a drop of fizz? Stephen, open another bottle for his lordship.”

The three men had risen in surprise at the mention of Lord Carthew’s name, and now glanced undecidedly from their hostess, whom they had met for the first time in the hotel entrance a few hours ago, to the small, plain man whom she claimed as her husband. Lady Carthew had flung herself easily into a deep arm-chair, and was to all appearance heartily enjoying their embarrassment, when another tap at the drawing-room door heralded the entrance of a short, pale man of about fifty, with a handsome, sinister face, which displayed a marked resemblance to that of the black-haired, blue-eyed woman in scarlet who lounged and laughed before him.

For the second time Lady Carthew showed neither confusion nor surprise.

“Well, I’m blest if it isn’t my dad!” she cried in a hoarse voice, which did much to counteract the effect of her remarkable beauty. “A jolly old family party we’ll make, though I can’t say I’m as fond of my papa as I ought to be, seeing what a nice, affectionate old gentleman he is. Don’t go, boys! The fun is just going to begin!”

“Is she mad?” Sir Philip asked aloud of his son-in-law.

“I suppose so.”

“Mad! Not a bit of it,” laughed the lady. “As sane as you are, and a lot saner. _I_ should never have made the mistake _you_ did,” she continued, addressing her father, “of marrying a gypsy out of a caravan, and then thinking you could bring her daughter up and palm her off as a Duchess’ grandchild merely by stuffing her head full of book-learning. You and Carthew there are both a couple of fools. But I mean to lead you a pretty dance, and thoroughly enjoy myself. I’m not mad enough to be shut up, and not bad enough to be divorced; and I shall remain Sir Philip Cranstoun’s daughter and Lord Carthew’s wife for years to come. I know a good thing when I see it!”

The three men had taken their hats, and now clumsily excused themselves; they did not care for the expression on Sir Philip Cranstoun’s face. As the door closed upon them, Lord Carthew turned to his father-in-law.

“Is what she says true?” he asked, sternly. “That you deceived me, and that she is really the daughter of a gypsy?”

“It is quite true,” said the woman, laughing again. “My mother’s name was Clare Carewe, and that fellow who was waiting at table--don’t go, Stephen--is a relative of mine, a second cousin. _He’d_ have been my fancy, not a little, ugly whipper-snapper like you,” she added, candidly, addressing her husband; “only the title was a temptation, you see. I _do_ like having a handle to my name!”

“Sir Philip,” said Claud, turning sharply toward the Baronet, “this is _not_ Stella. Who is it?”

“Your wife and Sir Philip Cranstoun’s daughter,” she cried, rising to her full height, and filling herself a brimming glass of champagne. “And I’ve let most people know all about me and my relations since I came here, I can tell you. Luncheon-parties, tea-parties, supper-parties, every day--rare old time; not a man but envied you your luck for having such a daughter, Sir Philip Cranstoun, and such a wife, my Lord Carthew!”

She made each of them a mock curtsey as she spoke, and then tossed off the wine.

“Here’s to our happy married life!” she cried. “You’ll both of you be pleased to hear that a newspaper man called upon me yesterday afternoon, and took down all about me--an interview, they call it, don’t they? All about my esteemed daddy marrying a gypsy, and me bolting on my wedding journey. He _did_ laugh at _that_, I can tell you! And it’ll all be in the papers to-morrow morning!”