Читать книгу The Case for the Crown - Fred M. White - Страница 5

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Cecil drew a long breath of relief. She was feeling like a swimmer who has taken his life in his hands and has plunged into an unknown sea of difficulties and dangers; anything to get away from the peril behind. Outside it was so sweet and wholesome after the trying atmosphere of the house and the horror that faced her day and night that, for the moment, she could think of nothing else. From a puritanical point of view she was doing a wrong thing, and yet her heart did not reproach her or conscience whisper, for there was no guile in her, and, after all, she was doing no more than seeing the man she loved for the last time.

She had never disguised from her husband the fact that as long as she could recollect she had loved Godfrey Coventry. They had been brought up together, they had lived almost side by side until Robert Molyneux had come along with that masterful way of his and swept all opposition aside and robbed Coventry of his promised wife. Coventry was a poor man, and his prospects none of the best, and Cecil's dead father had been in needy, not to say desperate, circumstances. It was the pressure at home that had finally forced Cecil to defy the dictates of her own heart, and embark on a sea of trouble and misery with her eyes wide open. True, her father's good name had been saved, true he had died honoured and respected, but this had only added to Cecil's humiliation.

Then a distant relative had died, and Godfrey Coventry was no longer poor. But the fortune had come too late to save Cecil, and she knew she would have to 'dree yer ain weird' so long as it pleased Providence, and that she must cling to her own misery until the end, whenever that might come. And Coventry had understood; no one appreciated better than himself the sacrifice that Cecil had made and why. He had never reproached her, he never said one word in anger to her, for he fully appreciated the nobility of that sacrifice. Cecil understood his feelings, and she knew that Godfrey was going to Canada on the morrow entirely for her sake. She knew that in meeting him this evening she was going to say good-bye to him, perhaps for ever. There would be no attempt on his part to influence her in any way, and she would be as safe in his hands as she would be in the hands of her own mother. And no one knew this better than Robert Molyneux, though he had taunted her with her love for Coventry, and had outraged her finest feelings before her own servants. But this much it seemed to her she owed to her lover, and not for a moment was she going to hesitate or draw back.

He came presently across the lawn from under the shadow of the elms and stood there before her in the moonlight, a fine figure of a man, and a striking contrast to the physical and mental wreck upon which Cecil had turned her back only a few minutes before. He came forward with a smile upon his lips and held out his hand.

"It's very good of you to see me like this," he said. "Though of course I should have much preferred to have called at the house, and said good-bye to you in the ordinary way."

"Ah, well, there is very little of the ordinary way in my mode of life," Cecil said bitterly. "Robert would only have been rude to you, to put it mildly, and I have had quite enough humiliation in the presence of the servants already. It is an insult to you, Godfrey, to be here like this at all, and I know you must feel it so; but what can I do?"

"Don't you think about me at all," Coventry said. "In any case, what does it matter? This is entirely between you and me; we have nothing to reproach ourselves with. It has been a hideous blunder altogether, dear. There are times when I feel hard and bitter against Providence that you should have been made to suffer like this from no fault of your own. And heaven knows, I love and respect you all the more because you have suffered so terribly, and because you have sacrificed yourself on the altar of a mistaken duty. And it was a mistake, Cecil; no girl is called upon to sell herself as you did, even to save the honour of a parent. But we have had all this over before. You know why I am going away."

"Of course," Cecil said gently. "You are turning your back on this fine property of yours, you are leaving all your friends and all you value in life to make things easy for me. You are going away because you think that Robert may be kinder and more considerate. It is very noble of you, and, if possible, I love you all the more for it. Because I understand; it is only one in my unhappy position who can understand. But it will make no difference, nothing could make any difference to a man who has gone so far down as Robert Molyneux has fallen."

Godfrey Coventry's jaw stiffened.

"He has been ill-treating you again," he said.

"Does it matter?" Cecil asked wearily. "In a degradation as deep as mine there are hurts worse than blows. Even my position has consolations. I might once have loved that man, and, if I had, how much worse it would have been. But I never did, there were no deceptions between us, and I think he hates me all the more for it. You see, all this life he has been accustomed to have what he wants, and opposition was to him a sheer delight. If I could have deceived him, if I had angled for him like some women did, he would never have glanced at me again. But why speak of the things that might have been? I must go back, I must say goodbye to you here and now."

And yet they lingered on there in the moonlight till an hour or more had elapsed before they finally parted. How Godfrey was fighting with his feelings perhaps Cecil only knew. He was holding himself well enough in hand, but he could not disguise the passionate love in his eyes, though when the moment came to part he did no more than take her hand in his and lift it gently to his lips. A moment later he was gone, half an hour later and he would have turned his back on the place for ever, and Cecil slowly retraced her steps to the house.

She crossed the hall. Barton, white, agitated, came out of the smoking-room.

"I have been looking everywhere for you, madam," he exclaimed. "Something is the matter with Mr. Molyneux. I cannot rouse him anyway, madam."

More or less mechanically Cecil turned her gaze in the direction of the hall clock. She was alarmed and uneasy to see that it was long past eleven. She had been in the garden for at least an hour and a half. And she was prepared to swear that not more than half an hour had elapsed since she left the house. But there was the evidence of the long clock in its beautiful Chippendale case, and there was no gainsaying it.

"Where is Mr. Molyneux?" she asked.

"In the smoking-room. He had a cigar after you went out, and the evening paper, and I took in the spirit stand and the syphons as usual. He told me to go in at a quarter-past eleven, as he wanted to go to bed early. I went in a little time ago, and he seemed to be asleep. I couldn't wake him any way, madam. He seemed to be quite insensible."

"I had better go in and see," Cecil said. "Is Carr anywhere about. Oh, gone to bed, has she? Yes, I recollect telling her that I shouldn't want her again."

Cecil moved across the hall into the smoking-room and stood by the side of the couch where her husband was lying. She laid her hand upon his head and started back.

"He is dead," she cried. "Send for Dr. Barclay."