Читать книгу Ambition's Slave - Fred M. White - Страница 7

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BEING a bachelor, Clifford Desborough's ménage was not an expensive one. He had three rooms in the Temple, and where he had his consultations was at once his living and smoking room after office hours.

To do the man justice, he was no sybarite. He had been busy all the afternoon and evening; he had swallowed an indifferently-cooked chop and some dubious claret, and now over a pipe he had turned to a mass of papers again. A big pile of invitations he had contemptuously swept upon the floor.

The clerk came in with two or three leather-bound volumes under his arm.

"Here are what you want, sir," he said. "They are the diaries of the late Mr. James Beaumont, the gentleman who originally obtained the concessions that more or less formed the base of the Mackness-Minter litigation."

Desborough looked up with an interested face.

"I'm glad you got those," he said. "A lucky find, Mellor."

"Well, yes, sir. Mr. Mackness found them after he bought Mr. Beaumont's practice. I have not ventured to investigate, but there are some private matters there that might as well be relegated to obscurity. In fact, Mr. Mackness' solicitor asked in the present action that they should be destroyed after you had made what use you like of them."

Desborough nodded a dismissal and the discreet clerk disappeared. It was some little time before the barrister had occasion to refer to the diaries. He picked up the first volume and skimmed it over. There were points likely to be of use to him in the case, and these he duly noted. But there were other matters also that few men confide to a diary. It seemed odd to Desborough that he should be looking at the life of the man whose daughter he had hoped to marry.

He read on, riveted by what was before his eyes. For the minute he had forgotten all about the case that these books led up to. He was reading sacred family secrets. Not that there was anything strange in this, seeing that lawyers and barristers lived in an atmosphere of this kind.

He should have put the book down, he should have destroyed it. But he did nothing of the kind. He read on and on until the clock struck ten. Then he lighted a cigarette and lay back in a chair.

His face was hard and set, there was a strange gleam in his eyes.

"Here is a chance," he muttered, "the chance of a lifetime. Only to a member of the law could such a thing happen. Fate places Maude Beaumont's future in my hands. I have discovered a shameful family secret. If I could go to her and—"

He paused, his mind working fast.

"I can save myself by doing what Minter asks me," he went on, "but by so doing I place myself entirely in the fellow's power. Sooner or later he will give me another disgraceful task to do, sooner or later, he will drag me down. And in a few weeks I shall be a Cabinet Minister. If only I could have won Maude's consent to marry me, I could have defied him. With my prospects and the knowledge that I was engaged to a wealthy girl I could have raised a loan to clear me. As it is, Fortune has stepped in and saved me from dishonour—as yet. I have a few days now to wriggle out of Minter's net. Maude has promised to marry Clive, but I could break off that match."

Desborough's face grew white and the gleam in his eyes deepened. He was contemplating a dastardly and dishonourable deed. Fate had placed a tremendous weapon in his hands. Should he throw it aside or should he use it? Anything to get out of Minter's clutches. He would have to proclaim himself a scoundrel to a girl he respected, who believed in him, but that did not matter.

It was a horrible position to be placed in altogether. But to remain under the thumb of Minter was intolerable. Sooner or later that was bound to spell absolute ruin. He sat up and glanced at the clock.

Only a little past ten, and social London was just beginning to enjoy itself. Most of the dinners were over by this time and the receptions beginning. Where was Maude Beaumont most likely to be to-night? Lady Mary Minter had said that she was dining at Park Lane to-night and that she was going on to Mrs. Hackett-Smith's party afterwards. It was pretty certain that Miss Beaumont would be there also. And Mrs. Hackett-Smith had sent Desborough a card. Whether he had accepted or not made no difference, Mrs. Hackett-Smith was always ready to smile on successful men, and next week he might be Home Secretary.

"I'll go and take the chance!" Desborough muttered.

He passed into his bedroom and dressed quickly. The barrister was put aside for the moment. Half an hour later the polished, easy man of Society was bending over the hand of his hostess and talking smoothly of nothing in particular.

He had to wait some little time. The rooms and the stairs were crowded. Desborough was preparing to get upon the track of his quarry by skilful questioning, when he caught the flash of Maude Beaumont's dress. She fluttered into a little alcove accompanied by Lady Mary Minter. A well-known Society journalist accompanied them.

Desborough pushed his way into the alcove with a vague air of expecting to find nobody there. There was just room for four.

"Here is a pleasant surprise," he said. "I was feeling like Robinson Crusoe. And four really is company. I'll take this seat, Lady Mary."

"You look worked to death," Denton the journalist suggested. "Anything sensational? I envy you barristers. I have to depend for my copy a great deal on imagination, whereas you have always something real to go upon."

"A barrister meets strange coincidences," Desborough said. "I met one to-night."

"Scandal!" Lady Mary cried. "Please, please go on. I'm bored to death!"

"I'd far rather it was fiction," Maude observed. "Is it very interesting?"

"I fancy you will find it so," Desborough replied. He had his voice perfectly under control, he spoke slowly and distinctly. "Probably I should not have mentioned it had Denton not been present. Anyway, here is a plot for a novel. We will say that I am a successful barrister with a great prize well within my grasp. I am young and ambitious, but, like most young and ambitious men, I am very poor. Not only am I very poor, but I am disgracefully in debt at the same time. My Oxford creditors nearly drove me mad. To try to pay them I speculated till I was in a worse plight than ever. There is a synopsis of the first act in a nutshell."

"And a very good one, too," Denton murmured approvingly. "I am deeply interested."

Maude looked curiously into the story-teller's face, but she could make nothing of it. All around her the chatter of the frivolous was going on, the outward seeming of absolute happiness rich Society always has, and yet she felt cold and uneasy. There seemed to be some meaning behind it all.

"Act II," Desborough went on. "The man I speak of must be saved in some way. As I speak in a Society atmosphere let me give you a Society flavour to the story. The man seeks a rich wife. A prosaic way out of the difficulty, but a safe one. He finds his ideal, who is lovely and good and clever and very rich. But she has the bad taste to care for another—she is engaged to another, in fact. Most men would look further, but not my barrister, because he is in a position to find things out. In this case he does find things out. He is engaged in a certain case, and in his researches into that case he consults some diaries written by the late father of the girl he wants to make his wife. There fortune comes to the aid of the ambitious young man. In that diary is the story of a family secret. The young lady has a sister. Years ago that sister made a secret match with a man of dubious reputation. All this is told in the diary which was consulted merely for dry business purposes. The newly-married couple were in a shipwreck and their names were given amongst the missing. As a matter of fact they were not drowned. Moreover, they were not married, for the scoundrel of a man had a wife alive all the time. The mother of the poor girl was not told, she does not know to this day. If she did, it would kill her."

Desborough paused as if for breath. He glanced at Maude, whose face was partly hidden by her fan. He could see that the face was white as marble, the fan rustled as if shaken by the wind. Desborough had learnt all he required. Maude had not heard this story for the first time.

"Now we come to Act III," he went on quite gaily. "The other daughter knows the story. My pushing young barrister is going to make her his wife. He tells her that she must give up the other man and marry him. For the honour of the family she is compelled to sacrifice her own feelings. The scandal still remains secretly buried, and that man and that girl save one another. End of Act III."

"Capital!" Denton cried. "So far, a really gripping story. But what about the end of the play—the last act?"