Chapter Forty One
A Woman’s Freedom
Within a month of the abandoned wedding at Orton, Mary Morini and George Macbean were married quietly at St. James’s Church, in Piccadilly, the Rev. Basil Sinclair assisting, and Billy Grenfell, as full of his bluff humour as ever, acting as best man, while among the various handsome presents the happy pair received was an acceptable cheque from Mr Morgan-Mason for ten thousand pounds – the sum he had offered to George for information as to the actual means by which his brother-in-law met with his death.
The millionaire was determined to place the assassins on their trial, and notwithstanding Morini’s efforts to preserve secrecy regarding the affair, he actually gave information to the Chief of Police in Mentone. By some secret means, Angelo Borselli obtained knowledge of this fact, and on the very morning of George’s wedding day he was found in a room in an obscure hotel in Brussels, quite dead, having committed suicide by swallowing some arsenical poison, probably the same as that used in the cognac which caused the unfortunate general’s tragic end.
Felice Solaro was soon gazetted major, and is now transferred to the gaiety of Naples. As for Dubard, he did not long enjoy his freedom, for he was arrested as a traitor by the French police while passing through Bordeaux, and is now spending the remainder of his days on the penal island of New Caledonia.
George Macbean and his charming wife still live in Rome, and all in the Eternal City know them well by sight. The Cavaliere Macbean has been promoted to a very high and responsible position in the Ministry of War, but last year Camillo Morini, owing to failing health, resigned office, greatly to the regret of his new sovereign, King Victor Emmanuel, and of the gallant Italian people at large.
But before resigning he endeavoured by every means in his power to atone for the peculations of his earlier career, and by selling his palace and other properties, he paid back the whole of the money he had appropriated.
San Donato, the old-world estate above Florence, is, however, still his, and there, enjoying the greatest fame perhaps of any living Italian, he is spending with his wife the evening of his days.
Orton Court is still rented by him, and each summer they go there with Mary and her husband. But the village is still mystified why Miss Mary did not marry the Frenchman, and whether, after all, there was not a scene on that memorable day when the wedding was so abruptly postponed.
But in her fine dark eyes they now see the light of perfect love and sweet contentment, and they know too well the sterling worth and kindly heart of the man who is her husband.
In Orton village in summer, however, perhaps the most popular and important personage of any is the little round-faced, chubby boy, who so often sits between the happy pair when on bright afternoons they drive out in the smart victoria.
Much as she prefers England, Madame Macbean is compelled, on account of her husband’s official position, to still move in Roman society, where, for her great personal beauty and the sweetness of her character, she is the most admired of women in the Quirinale set, that bright and brilliant circle of Italy’s bluest blood – “The World behind the Throne.”