Only a girl's love
Jasper went and closed it; then he laughed in his quiet, noiseless way.
"I'm afraid you'll think me a soft kind of lawyer, Halliday, but this
story of yours has touched me; it has, indeed!"
The captain nodded, and dropped into a chair.
"I thought it had," he said, simply. "Touch anybody, wouldn't it?"
"Yes, yes!" said Jasper, with a sigh. "It's very wrong, you
know--altogether out of the line, but I suppose you've set your heart
on hushing it up, eh?"
"I have, indeed," said the captain, eagerly. "And if you knew all you'd
say the same."
"Haven't you told me all?" said Jasper, quietly. "I don't mean the
boy's name; you can keep that if you like."
"No, I don't mean to conceal anything, if you'll help me," said the
captain ingenuously. "Of course if you had decided not to, I should
have kept dark about his name."
"Of course," said Jasper, with a smile; and he glanced at the slip of
paper. "Well, perhaps you'd better tell me all, hadn't you?"
"I think I had," assented the captain. "Well, the youngster's name
is--Etheridge?"
"Ether--how do you spell it?" asked Jasper, carelessly.
The captain spelt it.
"Not a common name, and he's anything but a common boy; he's a handsome
youngster, and I couldn't help pitying him, because he has been left to
himself so much--no friends, and all that sort of thing."
"How's that?" asked Jasper, with his eyes cast down, a hungry eagerness
eating at his heart. There was some mystery after all, then, about the
old man!
"Well, it is this way. It seems he's the son of an old man--a painter,
or a writer, or something, who lives away in the country, and who can't
bear this boy near him."
"Why?" asked Jasper, examining his nails.
"Because he's like his mother," said the captain, simply.
"And she----?" said Jasper, softly.
"She ran away with another man, and left her boy behind----"
"I understand."
"Yes," resumed the captain. "Usual thing, the husband, this boy's
father, was awfully cut up; left the world and buried himself and sent
the boy away, treated him very well, though, all the same; sent him to
Eton, and to Cambridge, under the care of a tutor, and that sort of
thing, but couldn't bear to see him. He's up now for the holidays--the
boy, I mean!"
"I understand," said Jasper, in a low voice. "Quite a story, isn't it?
And"--he paused to throw the piece of paper on the fire--"do you think
the boy has communicated with the father ever since?"
"Heaven knows--not unlikely. He said something about telegraphing."
"Oh, yes; just so," said Jasper, carelessly. "Well, it will be
inconvenient, but I suppose I must do what you want. The sooner we get
this over the better," and he sat down and drew out his check book.
"Thanks, thanks!" muttered the captain. "I didn't think a good fellow
like you would stand back; I didn't, indeed!"
"I ought not to do it," murmured Jasper, with a shake of the head, as
he rang the bell.
"Take this letter to Murphy, and wait, Scrivell," he said.
Scrivell disappeared noiselessly.
"By the way," said Jasper, "have you mentioned this to any one
excepting me?"
"Not to a soul," replied the captain; "and you bet, I shall not of
course."
"Of course," said Jasper, with a smile; "it wouldn't be worth spending
a hundred and fifty to hush it up if you did. Mention such a thing to
one person--excepting me, of course,"--and he smiled--"and you let the
whole world know. Where did you get all this information?"
"From Bellamy, the boy's chum," said the captain. "He asked me to look
him up occasionally."
"I see," said Jasper. "You won't mind my writing a letter or two, will
you?"
"Go on," said the captain, lighting the fifth cigarette.
Jasper went to a cupboard and brought out a small bottle of champagne
and a couple of glasses.
"The generous glow of so virtuous an action--which by-the-way is
strictly illegal--suggests something to drink," he said, with a smile.
The captain nodded.
"I didn't know you did this sort of thing here," he said, looking round.
"I don't as a rule," said Jasper, with a dry smile. "Will you slip that
bolt into the door?"
The captain, greatly enjoying anything in the shape of an irregularity,
did as he was bidden, and the two sat and sipped their wine, and Jasper
threw off his dry business air and chatted about things in general
until Scrivell knocked. Jasper opened the door for him and took an
envelope from his hand and carried it to the desk.
"Well?" said the captain, eagerly.
"All right," said Jasper, holding up the bill.
The captain drew a long breath of relief.
"I feel as if I had done it myself," he said, with a laugh. "Poor young
beggar, he'll be glad to know he's to get off scot free."
"Ah!" said Jasper. "By-the-way, hadn't you better drop him a line?"
"Right," exclaimed the captain, eagerly; "that's a good idea. May I
write it here?"
Jasper pushed a sheet of plain paper before him and an envelope.
"Don't date it from here," he said; "date it from your lodgings. You
don't want him to know that anybody else knows anything about it, of
course."
"Of course not! How thoughtful you are. That's the best of a
lawyer--always keeps his head cool," and he drew up a chair, and wrote
not in the best of hands or the best of spelling:
"Dear Mr. Etheridge--I've got--you know what. It is all right. Nothing
more need be said. Be a good boy for the future."
"Yours truly,
"HARRY HALLIDAY."
"How's that?" he asked, handing the note to Jasper.
Jasper looked up; he was bending over his desk, apparently writing a
letter, and looked up with an absent expression.
"Eh?" he said. "Oh, yes; that will do. Stop though, to set his mind
quite at rest, better say that you have destroyed it--as you have,
see!" and he took the envelope and held it over the taper until it
burnt down nearly to his finger, dropping the remaining fragment on the
desk and allowing it to turn and smolder away.
The captain added the line to that effect.
"Now your man can run with it, if you'll be so good."
Jasper smiled.
"No," he said. "I think not. I'll send a commissionaire."
He rang the bell and took up the letter.
"Send this by the commissionaire," he said. "There is no answer. Tell
him to give it in and come away."
"And now I'm off," said the captain. "I'll let you have a check in a
day or two, Adelstone, and I'm very much obliged to you."
"All right," said Jasper, with a slightly absent air as if his mind
was already engaged with other matters. "No hurry; whenever it's
convenient. Good-bye!"
He went back to his desk before the captain had left the room, and
bent over his letter, but as the departing footsteps died away, he
sprang up, locked the door, and drawing a slip of paper from under his
blotting pad, held it before him with both hands and looked down at it
with a smile of eager triumph.
It was the forged bill. Without a word or gesture he looked at it for a
full minute, gloating over it as if it were some live, sentient thing
lying in his path and utterly at his mercy; then at last he raised his
head, and his lips parted with a smile of conscious power.
"So soon!" he muttered; "so soon! Fate is with me! She is mine! My
beautiful Stella! Yes, she is mine, though a hundred Lord Leycesters
stood between us!"
CHAPTER XVIII.
When Stella awoke in the morning it was with a start that she
remembered the scene of last night, and that she was, with the
exception of Mrs. Penfold, alone in the cottage.
While she was dressing she recalled the incidents of the eventful
evening--the party at the Hall, the telegram, and, not least, the
finding of the mysterious miniature. But, above all, there shone out
clear and distinct the all-important fact that Lord Leycester loved
her, and that she had promised to meet him this evening.
But for the present there was much on her mind. She had to meet Mrs.
Penfold, and communicate the information that Mr. Etheridge had
suddenly been called to London on important business.
She could not suppress a smile as she pictured Mrs. Penfold's
astonishment and curiosity, and wondered how she should satisfy the
latter without betraying the small amount of confidence which her uncle
had placed in her.
She went down-stairs to find the breakfast laid, and Mrs. Penfold
hovering about with unconcealed impatience.
"Where's your uncle, Miss Stella?" she asked. "I do hope he hasn't gone
sketching before breakfast, for he is sure to forget all about it, and
won't come back till dinner-time, if he does then."
"Uncle has gone to London," said Stella.
"To--where?" demanded Mrs. Penfold.
Then Stella explained.
"Gone to London last night; hasn't slept in his bed! Why, miss, how
could you let him?"
"But he was obliged to go," said Stella, with a little sigh and a
rueful glance at the empty chair opposite her own.
"Obliged!" exclaimed Mrs. Penfold. "Whatever was the matter? Your uncle
isn't obliged to go anywhere, Miss Stella!" she added with a touch of
pride.
Stella shook her head.
"There was a telegram," she said. "I don't know what the business was,
but he was obliged to go."
Mrs. Penfold stood stock-still in dismay and astonishment.
"It will be the death of him!" she breathed, awe-struck. "He never goes
anywhere any distance, and starting off like that, Miss Stella, in the
dead of night, and after being out at the Hall--why it's enough to kill
a gentleman like him who can't bear any noise or anything sudden like."
"I'm very sorry," said Stella. "He said that he was obliged to go."
"And when is he coming back?" asked Mrs. Penfold.
Stella shook her head.
"I don't know. I hope to-day--I do hope to-day! It all seems so quiet
and lonely without him." And she looked round the room, and sighed.
Mrs. Penfold stood, with the waiter in her hand, staring at the
beautiful face.
"You--you don't know what it is, Miss Stella?" she asked, in a low
voice, and with a certain significance in her tone.
Stella looked up at her.
"No, I don't know--uncle did not tell me," she replied.
Mrs. Penfold looked at her curiously, and seemed lost in thought.
"And you don't know where he's gone, Miss Stella? I don't ask out of
curiosity."
"I'm sure of that," said Stella, warmly. "No, I don't know."
"And you don't guess?"
Stella looked up at her with wide open eyes, and shook her head.
Mrs. Penfold turned the waiter in her hand, then she said suddenly:
"I wish Mr. Adelstone was here."
Stella started.
"Mr. Adelstone!"
Mrs. Penfold nodded.
"Yes, Miss Stella. He is such a clever young gentleman, and he's so
friendly, he'd do anything for your uncle. He always was friendly, but
he's more so than ever now."
"Is he?" said Stella. "Why?"
Mrs. Penfold looked at her with a smile, which died away before
Stella's look of unconsciousness.
"I don't know, Miss Stella; but he is. He is always about the cottage.
Oh, I forgot! he called yesterday, and left something for you."
And she went out, returning presently with a bouquet of flowers.
"I took them in the pantry, to keep cool and fresh. Aren't they
beautiful, miss?"
"Very," said Stella, smelling them and holding them a little way from
her, after the manner of her sex. "Very beautiful. It is very kind of
him. Are they for uncle, or for me?"
Mrs. Penfold smiled.
"For you, Miss Stella. Is it likely he'd leave them for your uncle?"
"I don't know," said Stella; "he is uncle's friend, not mine. Will you
put them in water, please?"
Mrs. Penfold took them with a little air of disappointment. It was not
in this cool manner that she expected Stella to receive the flowers.
"Yes, miss; and there's nothing to be done?"
"No," said Stella; "except to wait for my uncle's return."