leaving giovanna and luigi to establish themselves in their new home and accustom themselves, so far as they may be able, to that changed condition of life to which the success of captain verinder's nefarious scheme has elevated them, we will hie back awhile to st. oswyth's and ascertain how fortune has been dealing with our friends in that pleasant little town since we parted from them last.
when mrs. lisle, in one of her letters, informed her son that, owing to the loss of the greater part of their fortune the miss thursbys had been compelled to give up vale view house and remove to an inexpensive cottage in the suburbs, she stated no more than the simple fact. through the rascality of their agent, whose misdeeds had not been brought to light till he was beyond the reach of earthly reckoning, the sisters had lost the greater part of their property past all hope of recovery. all they had left was a somewhat fluctuating income, derivable from railway stock, which brought them in about two hundred a year. to this would be added the rental derivable from vale view, which was their own property, as soon as a tenant should be found for it; for the present, however, it was standing empty. a matter of something over a hundred pounds had accrued to them from the sale of their surplus furniture and such other things as they no longer had a use for. more than all, they had felt the parting from flossie, their gentle, steady-going old pony, but they had the consolation of knowing that in mrs. rudd it had found a mistress who would treat it with no less kindness than they had done.
it had been generally supposed among their friends and acquaintances, in view of their simple and unostentatious mode of life, that the sisters must have a few snug thousands--the result of their savings through a long course of years--put away somewhere: but such a supposition was wholly at variance with fact. in the belief that their income was as safe as the bank of england, the sisters had never deemed it necessary to put by any portion of it, but had disbursed every shilling of whatever surplus was left in secret charity.
it was a matter of course that tamsin should cling to them in their fallen fortunes, and accompany them to their new home. for the future she, and a young maid-servant, would be the only domestics whom they would be able to keep. but tamsin, although heretofore her position had merely been that of maid to the sisters, had had the advantage of a sound bringing-up at home, and in days gone by had often lamented that sundry of her domestic acquirements had no scope for their exercise. now, however, she would be able to prove both her skill as a cook and her deftness as parlourmaid, and all the housewifely gifts on which she secretly prided herself would have an opportunity of being brought into play. at length she felt that she was in her proper element.
as for the sisters, their sudden reverse of fortune was powerless to sour them or change them in any way. they remained just the same sweet and gracious ladies they had always been; and if such a thing were possible, they were beloved and respected more than ever by all who had the happiness of counting them among their friends. their chief regret arose from the fact that they were no longer in a position to dispense their charities on the same scale as before.
the cottage to which they had removed--known as rose mount--made a pleasant little home, and its seven or eight rooms were amply sufficient for their changed needs. it stood on a sunny slope fronting the south, where flowers of a score different kinds--especially the one from which the cottage took its name--grew and blossomed to perfection. the thick hedge of evergreens which divided it from the highroad imparted to it that air of privacy and seclusion which the sisters loved.
with ethel, meanwhile, affairs had by no means been at a standstill.
day succeeded day till they had merged into weeks after launce keymer's sudden departure from st. oswyth's, and still ethel looked in vain for a letter or a message of some kind from him. she had no knowledge of his whereabouts, and however extreme her desire might be to communicate with him, she felt that only as a last resource could she prevail upon herself to ask for information from her lover's father. for one thing, she was by no means sure that launce had broken the news of their engagement to mr. keymer senior. there had certainly been nothing in the note which the brewer wrote to miss thursby to indicate that such was the case. she was powerless to move.
her aunts, even while in the midst of their own more personal anxieties, did not fail to sympathise with her over a state of affairs which was as much a puzzle to them as it was to her. equally with ethel, they felt that it was out of the question that they should ask the elder mr. keymer for an explanation of his son's silence, more especially now that their drop from affluence to comparative penury was a fact known to everybody. could it be possible, they asked each other, that the fact in question had any bearing on launce keymer's mysterious silence? had he merely engaged himself to ethel in the expectation that, as her aunts' heiress, he would secure a rich wife for himself? and now, when he found his expectations dashed to the ground, was he so incredibly base as to want to break faith with her? these were questions which, although the sisters could not help putting, they shrank from any endeavour to find an answer to them. it was a hard matter at all times for them to think ill of anyone, and they recoiled especially from doing so in the present case. not for the world would they have whispered a word to ethel which would have seemed to cast the faintest shadow of suspicion on her lover's truth and constancy.
as the reader will have already surmised, the news that the ladies of vale view had undoubtedly lost the greater part of their money was not long in being conveyed to the elder keymer by his cousin, mr. tuttle, clerk to mr. linaway the lawyer, the latter, as it may be remembered, having been employed by the sisters to draw up their wills and look after their business matters generally. to mr. linaway they had gone the day following the receipt of the letter which launce keymer had been allowed to read on that memorable evening when he was received at vale view as ethel's acknowledged lover.
keymer senior had at once communicated with his son, and as they were both agreed that the affair, as between the latter and ethel, must at once be nipped in the bud, it had been deemed advisable that launce should stay where he was for the present. as far as was known, the sisters had not spoken of the engagement to anyone, and by-and-by he would be able to come back and brazen out the affair with impunity.
but there was one person who had by no means forgiven launce keymer's treachery towards her, and had made up her mind to be revenged upon him in one way or another. the person in question was miss hetty blair, the pretty governess at dulminster, whose workbox keymer had rifled of the letters he himself had written her.
on discovering her loss hetty had at once leaped to the very natural conclusion that her whilom lover had deserted her, and repossessed himself of his letters in consequence of his having forsaken her for someone else. the question that at once put itself to her was, as to the means by which it would be possible to find out who that someone was. jealousy, and a determination to be revenged on her perfidious lover, worked very powerfully within her. she was by no means the kind of young woman to sit down helplessly under so foul a wrong and content herself with bemoaning her fate and shedding an infinitude of tears. she had really loved keymer, and the blow he had aimed at her was such as she could neither forgive nor forget, and not till she should have succeeded in returning it with interest would she rest satisfied.
her first step, despite her mother's protests, was to quit dulminster and take lodgings in st. oswyth's in a back street within a stone's throw of keymer's home. she was not long ascertaining that launce had left the town only a couple of days after his theft of the letters, but that no one, unless it were his father, knew either where he had gone, or the business which had taken him away. neither did all hetty's inquiries, perseveringly as she conducted them, tend to enlighten her on the one point about which she was more anxious than any other. if launce were engaged to any young lady at st. oswyth's, no one there seemed to know of it. that at various times he had flirted more or less desperately with half a score of damsels was not open to dispute; but there matters had ended, and not even the whisper of an engagement reached hetty from anywhere.
in such a state of affairs it was only natural that she should ask herself whether keymer, unknown to his friends and acquaintances, might not have left home on purpose to marry someone at a distance, and might not, at that very time, be on his bridal tour. it was a tormenting thought, and one of which hetty could by no means disabuse her mind.
anyone less persevering or less determined to leave no stone unturned in the task she had set herself would have gone back home disheartened, and have done her utmost to forget that anyone so unspeakably mean as launce keymer had proved himself to be should ever have beguiled her into loving him. but miss hetty was made of different stuff. she knew that keymer could not stay away for ever. it might be months, perhaps even a year, before he returned. but that he would return she felt little doubt, and should he then bring with him a wife--well, in that case, let him look to himself! meanwhile she would stay on where she was.
it was as well for the success of her purpose that she decided to do so. among others whose acquaintance she had succeeded in making since her arrival at st. oswyth's was the nursery governess at mr. keymer's (for the brewer's youngest child by his second marriage was as yet but seven years old), who, like herself, belonged to dulminster, a fact which hetty put forward as a sort of bond to draw them together. the result was that they met frequently when miss doris lane was out with her youthful charge, and had many confidential gossips together in which, however, hetty's part was more that of listener than talker. thus by degrees she learnt more about launce and his "carryings on" than she had ever known before, and it was by no means a flattering portrait which the governess sketched for her. still, all this in no way served to advance the object hetty had in view, seeing that doris, no more than others, was in a position to point to any young lady as being launce keymer's fiancée, although in their talks together hetty recurred again and again to that particular topic.
at length doris said one day with a touch of impatience:
"why are you for ever asking me whether i am sure mr. launce is not engaged to somebody? it's enough to make one fancy that you are fishing for him yourself."
then hetty took a sudden resolution. from what she had seen of doris she thought she might be trusted, and in any case the time had come when it seemed better to risk telling her secret, if by so doing anything could be gained, rather than go on from day to day in utter ignorance of that which she was burning to discover.
"it is not because i am fishing for launce keymer," she said, "but because till a few weeks ago he was my promised husband, and because it ended in his treating me like the scoundrel he is, that i want to know whether he has flung me aside in order that he may engage himself to someone else."
doris gasped and opened her eyes to their widest extent, and for a few moments could find nothing to say.
then presently hetty went on to tell of the loss of her letters and the means by which it had been accomplished. this sent doris's indignation up to boiling-point, which thereupon proceeded to vent itself in certain expressions which, as referring to himself, launce keymer would scarcely have cared to listen to.
miss lane's sympathy and outspoken indignation were sweet to hetty, who had often longed for a confidant to whom she could open her mind. "and yet now i've told her, she can help me no more than she could before," she said to herself with a sigh. but in so saying she was mistaken, as was presently to be proved.
a sudden thought seemed to strike doris.
"how stupid i must be," she said, "not to have recollected before (though, mind you, even now i don't know that it's a matter of any consequence), that mary deane, the housemaid, when she was brushing and arranging some clothes which mr. launce had left behind him, found the photo of a young lady in one of the pockets of his overcoat. mary dropped it in my room as she was dusting, and then told me all about it, and went and put it back where she had found it. now do you think----"
here doris stopped and looked inquiringly at hetty.
"it does not matter what i think," replied the latter, "but you will be doing me a very great service indeed if you can obtain possession of the likeness and entrust it to me for one day. the next it shall be given back to you safe and sound. will you do this for me?"
doris would have done more than that had more been required of her, so worked upon had her feelings been by the tale told her by the other. at their next meeting the likeness was produced and handed over to hetty.
"it's a sweet face, don't you think?" asked doris, as hetty stood gazing at the photograph with bent brows.
"it's a beautiful face," she replied, "and if launce keymer gave me up because he had the chance of winning this girl for his wife, i can hardly wonder at it. but he need not have robbed me of my letters."
she bit her lip in an effort to keep back the tears which had sprung to her eyes.
on turning the portrait over she saw that it bore the name of a local photographer. this was so far fortunate for the purpose she had in view, although had it borne a london or even a paris address she would have carried out her scheme in exactly the same way.
turning to doris she said:
"i will leave you now and meet you again in half an hour, when i will give you back the likeness."
in the course of the afternoon of next day miss blair knocked at the door of rose mount and asked to see miss ethel thursby. she had experienced no difficulty in obtaining the latter's name and address from the photographer who had taken the likeness. hetty having been shown into the tiny drawing-room by tamsin, was presently joined by ethel, who could not help wondering as to the nature of the business which had caused her to be sought out by a perfect stranger.
her visitor did not leave her long in doubt.
"my name is hetty blair," she began, "my home is at dulminster, and i earn my living as a daily governess. and now, miss thursby, will you please to pardon the question i am about to ask you, which is: do you happen to be acquainted with a person of the name of mr. launce keymer?"
on the instant a lovely flush suffused ethel's cheeks, which was not mitigated by the fact that miss blair was looking at her with parted lips and eagerly anxious eyes. she felt indignant with herself at having been surprised into a display of so much emotion and perhaps a little indignant with her questioner. she had not failed to notice that miss blair employed the word "person" in her mention of keymer.
"the gentleman you speak of is my friend," she replied with a touch of hauteur, "although i am at a loss to know in what way that fact concerns you, or why----"
"i have presumed to come here and question you about him. that you will learn presently. mr. launce keymer being, as you say, your friend, did he ever take you so far into his confidence as to tell you that he had engaged himself by a solemn promise to marry someone else?"
the colour vanished from ethel's face, leaving it of a deathlike pallor. there was a little space of silence which to both the girls was fraught with pain. then ethel said faintly:
"no, mr. keymer never told me that."
"i thought not," answered hetty, quietly. "miss thursby, i am the someone--i, humble hetty blair, nursery governess, whom launce keymer promised to make his wife."
"i cannot believe it," came from ethel, but her words lacked the accent of conviction.
"it is hard to believe, is it not, that any man should be such a villain? but, for all that, it's the simple truth, as i can prove in a way which even you will find it impossible to dispute. if you will allow me, i will sit down, for the truth is i shake like an aspen."
"pray pardon my forgetfulness," said ethel, and with that she seated herself on a sofa a little distance away.
"i think he must have been fond of me at one time, or he would never have written me the letters he did," resumed hetty presently. ethel's eyes were fixed intently on her. she sat leaning a little forward, her hands with tightly interlocked fingers resting on her lap. at the word "letters" she could not repress a start.
"though i began to suspect latterly," continued hetty, "that he was no longer quite as fond of me as he used to be, i did not doubt his love, and, least of all, did i think he would behave to me as only a scoundrel could behave. i had a number of letters from him at different times--eight in all. he used to go over to dulminster twice a week to see me. he knew where i kept the letters--in a little workbox which stood on the sideboard in my mother's parlour where we used to sit together. well, one afternoon, when he knew i was from home, he came to the house, and having sent my mother out on an errand, while she was gone, he broke open my workbox and stole my letters--that is to say, his letters to me; and from that day to this i have never set eyes on him, nor heard from him in any way. and the man who did that was mr. launce keymer."
ethel sat as one bereft of speech. it was as if the tides of her physical life had been arrested in full flow and sent surging back to overwhelm heart and brain alike, only to be released a few moments later and let go madly on their way. as yet but one coherent thought could frame itself in her mind: "and this is the man whose promised wife i am!"
then she became conscious that hetty was speaking again.
"i told you just now, miss thursby, that i had eight letters in all from him, but there were only six in the workbox when he rifled it. the remaining two were in a drawer in my bedroom. i have brought them with me to-day for you to read if you would like to do so."
"not for worlds!" gasped ethel.
"you are quite welcome to do so. you would then see for yourself how he used to write of me as his 'darling hetty,' and his 'sweet little wife that is to be.' what wretches some men are, to be sure!"
ethel found herself automatically counting her heart beats--"one, two--one, two--one, two." she was faint and dizzy.
hetty was regarding her with eyes that were blurred with tears.
after a little, ethel's dizziness passed. bending her gaze on hetty, she said:
"but what induced you to seek me out--that is to say, me rather than anyone else--and tell me all this about mr. keymer?"
"it was because i found out by accident that he was in the habit of carrying your likeness about with him, and i knew he was not the kind of man to do that unless----"
ethel held up her hand. "that is enough," she said softly.
