CHAPTER LVII
HAND AND FOOT
What did it mean? Why was there all this commotion in the house? And why did everybody leave her so severely alone? These were the questions that Princess Zara, otherwise Mrs. May, otherwise Mrs. Jasper Ravenspur, asked herself. And why had Marion not returned?
Oh, it was bitter to lie there fettered hand and foot at the very moment when activity and cunning and action were most imperatively needed. And Tchigorsky was not dead. How she had been tricked and fooled!
Fate had played against her. Who could have anticipated that Voski would have come to Ravenspur and met his death there! By this time the sham Ben Heer had all necessary proofs in his hands.
The door opened and a resolute-looking woman came in. Her garb was something of the hospital type, yet more severe and plainer. She came in and took her place with the air of one who watches a prisoner.
"I do not require your services," the adventuress said coldly.
"It is immaterial, madame," was the equally cold reply. "I am sent here to do my duty whether you require my services or not."
"Indeed! Am I to regard myself as a prisoner, then?"
The other bowed. The bolt had fallen. There was nothing for it but to submit quietly. By this time Tchigorsky's proofs were in possession of the police. The prisoner smiled grimly as she thought how she could escape her foes yet.
"What is the confusion in the house?" she asked. "What is your name?"
"My name is Symonds. I was fetched here by the inspector of police. The bodies of two Asiatics have been found drowned in the vaults, and they are getting ready for the inquest to-morrow."
Once again the defeated murderess smiled. Fate was all against her. Those men had come to do her bidding and had perished. Doubtless the note sent by Vera Ravenspur would be found on one of them, and this would be no more than another link in the long chain.
She tried to rise but she could not. She lay on the bed fully dressed, her brain was as quick and as clear as ever, but the paralysis in the lower limbs fettered her. A blind fury shook her for the moment.
If she had only been free to move she would have triumphed even yet. Tchigorsky might have been a clever man, but she would have shown him that he was no match for her. And now she had walked into the trap he had laid for her. Doubtless she had been watched into the castle; doubtless the enemy had seen her lay those wires, and had arranged to give her a taste of that deadly stuff she had prepared for others. Then Marion had been spirited away, and the key of the safe taken from her. Subsequently Tchigorsky had ransacked the box. Oh, she saw it all.
The family of Ravenspur saw it all by this time, too. She was no longer a guest in the house of Ravenspur, but a prisoner in charge of a female warder. In a day or two she would be cast into prison. In due course she would undergo her trial and finally be hanged by the neck until she were dead.
It was this last thought that caused her to smile. She was too clever a woman not to accept the inevitable. A great many people in her position would have protested and lied and blustered. She saw the folly of it.
"I should like to see Mr. Ravenspur," she said. "Will you tell him so? You need not fear. I am helpless. I could not move."
Mrs. Symonds stepped into the corridor and gave the message to a passing servant. After a time a slow step came shuffling along up the stairs. It was Ralph, who presently came into the room.
"You can leave us for a little time," he said.
Symonds discreetly disappeared. She passed into the corridor. The woman in the bed opened her mouth to speak, but stopped in astonishment. Ralph's glasses were gone, and the smooth unguents had disappeared from his face. Those cruel criss-cross lines stood out with startling distinctness.
"You wanted to see my father?" he said. "My father declines to see you in any circumstances. Perhaps I shall do as well."
"You, you are one of the men I saw at Lassa." The words came from the woman's lips with a gasp. She had never been so astonished in all her life.
"Yes, I was the other one," Ralph said coolly. "I had to disguise myself when I found out you were in England. There is no longer any need for disguise. I hope you are delighted to see me, my dear sister-in-law."
"Oh, so you know that also?"
"You may take it for granted that I knew everything."
There was a long pause before the woman spoke again.
"I need not ask what opinion you have formed of me?"
"You are perhaps the most depraved wretch who ever drew the breath of life," said Ralph, slowly and without emotion. "To your ambition and what you call your religion you are prepared to sacrifice everything. You deliberately murdered the man who loved you."
"Your brother, Jasper. I admit it. Perhaps you will find it impossible to believe that I loved him. But I did with my whole heart and soul. I loved him and I killed him. Does it not sound strange? But this is the fact. I had to do it – for the sake of my people and my religion I had to do it. When I recovered those papers I slew him as he knew I would. He was the only thing on earth that I had to care for."
"Oh! Had you not a daughter?"
The woman made a gesture of contempt.
"A poor creature," she said. "But I brought her up in the strong faith I follow, and so she has not been without her uses. Not that she knows anything of the Holy Temple and the ceremonial there. I never told her about the two men who escaped along the Black Valley. If I had I should have known you to be a worthy antagonist instead of a half-witted fool, and then you would never have brought me to this pass. Oh, if I had only told her that!"
There was a passionate ring in the woman's voice. It was the first time during the interview that she had displayed any humanity.
"You didn't and there is an end of it," Ralph said. "Go on."
"Is there any need to go on? I have failed and there is an end of the matter. When my husband died my feelings were turned to rage and hatred of you all."
"Why should you all live and prosper while he was dead?" said Mrs. May. "With your money I could do anything among my own people. I could found a new dynasty. Did I not possess the occult knowledge of the East with a thorough knowledge of what you are pleased to call Western civilization? I could do it. A little longer and your wealth would have come to my child; in other words, it would have come to me. Do you understand what I mean?"
"Perfectly. I have understood for some time. Before I returned to England I had an idea of what was at the bottom of the vendetta. But you would not have succeeded. Tchigorsky and myself made up our minds that if we could not bring the crimes home to you we would shoot you."
Ralph spoke with a grim coldness that was not without its effect upon the listener. Hard as she was, the sentiment was after her own heart.
"That would have been murder," she said.
"Perhaps so. In the cold, prosaic eyes of the law we might have been regarded as criminals of the type you mention; but we did not propose to pay any deference to the law. Nor would our deed have been discovered. You would simply have disappeared; we should have shot you and thrown your body into the sea. And I don't fancy that the deed would have weighed very heavily on the conscience of either of us."
The woman smiled. Nothing seemed to disturb her. She was full of passionate fury against the decrees of fate, but she did not show it.
"I suppose you planned everything out?" she asked.
"Everything; Tchigorsky and myself between us. It was Tchigorsky who rescued my nephew after your familiar in the blue dress and red hat had cut the mast and sculls. We guessed that the search for Geoffrey would empty the house, and that you would take advantage of the fact.
"Geoffrey and I watched you laying those wires. It was I who saw that you had a taste of the poison. I wanted to lay you by the heels here while Tchigorsky overhauled your possessions. Your messenger was waylaid and robbed of your key. Also I opened the letter you sent by my niece so that your confederates might be summoned to your assistance."
"Marion has come back again?"
"Within the last hour, yes. You will see her presently."
The woman smiled curiously.
"Not to-night," she said. "Not to-night. I am tired and fancy I shall sleep well. I shall be glad of a long, long rest. Shall I see your father?"
"No," Ralph said sternly. "You certainly shall not."
"Then good-night. Do not be surprised if I beat you yet."
It was late, and the family were retiring. Marion had already gone. In the drawing-room a group had gathered round the fire. They were silent and sad, for they had heard many things that had moved them strangely. There was a knock at the door and Symonds looked in.
"My prisoner is dead," she said coldly and unmoved. "I supposed she managed to secret some poison and take it. But she is dead."
"It is well," Ravenspur replied. "It might have been worse. It was the best she could do to lift the shadow of disgrace from this unhappy house."
L'ENVOI
Marion had bowed her head before the coming storm. She asked no mercy and expected none. Yet she looked the same pure, unaffected saint she had ever appeared. Ravenspur would have taken her hand, but she drew it away.
"It is true," she said, "I am a fallen angel. I have never been anything else. Put it down to my mother's training if you like, but I came here as her friend, not yours. My religion is hers, my feelings are hers; I am of her people. With all the wicked knowledge of the East I came here to cut you off root and branch."
"Why?" Ravenspur said brokenly. "In the name of Heaven, why?"
"Because for years I have been taught to hate you; because I am at heart an Asiatic. It would be grand to have all your money, so that I might be a great person in my own country some day. Then I came and brought the curse with me. It never seemed to strike any of you that the curse and I came together. Three deaths followed. In every one of these I played a part; I was responsible for them all. Shall I tell you how?"
"No, no," said Ravenspur. "Heavens, this is too horrible. To think of you looking so sweet and so fair and good; to think that you should have crept into our hearts only to betray us like this. We want to hear nothing beyond your confession. Have you a heart at all, or are you a beautiful fiend?"
"I did not imagine that I had a heart at all until I came here," Marion replied. She had not abated a jot of her sweetness of expression or angelic manner. "Then gradually I began to love you all. When I met my cousin Geoffrey I recognized the fact that I was a woman.
"More than once I have been on the point of betraying myself to him. But the more passion for him filled my heart the worse I felt. I was going to kill you all off and keep Geoffrey for myself. If Vera had died he would have come to care for me in time. I know he would.
"Then my mother came. I was not getting along fast enough for her. Her keen eyes saw into my breast and discovered my secret at once. For that reason she marked Geoffrey down for her next victim. I tried to warn him; I wrote him a letter. And I had to do him to death myself. It was I who cut the mast away; it was I who sawed the sculls. I was the girl in the blue dress."
"Amazing," Geoffrey murmured. "To think of it! Marion, Marion!"
There were tears in his eyes; he could not be angry with her. There were tears in the eyes of everybody. Vera was crying softly. And all the grief was as so many daggers in the heart of the unhappy girl.
"Go on," she said. "Cry for me. Every look of pity and every sign of grief stings me to the quick. Perhaps I am mad; perhaps I am not responsible for my actions. But I swear that all the time I have been plotting against your lives I have cared for you. Only my training and my religion forced me on. Call me insane if you please, as you say of the fakir who sleeps upon a bed of sharp nails. I could explain all the mysteries – "
"You need not," Ralph said. "I can do that in good time. From the first I knew you, from the first I have dogged you from room to room at night and frustrated your designs. Then came Tchigorsky, who finished the task for me. Need I say more?"
Marion moved towards the door. The imploring look had gone from her face; her eyes had grown sad and hopeless. And yet in the face of her confession, in face of the knowledge of her crimes, not one of them had the slightest anger for her.
"I am going," she said. "In the event of this happening, I had made my plans. It may be that I shall have to take my trial; it may be that I shall be spared. One thing you may be certain of – my mother will never stand in the dock."
Ralph rose and slipped quietly from the room.
"If she dies, if anything happens to her," Marion went on, "it may be possible to spare me. Nobody knows anything to my dishonor outside the family but Dr. Tchigorsky, and you can rely upon his silence. If my mother is no more there need be no scandal. Farewell, farewell to you all! Oh, if Heaven had been good to me, and sent me here as a little child, then what a happy life might have been mine!"
She passed out of the room and nobody made any attempt to detain her. It was a long, long time before anybody spoke and no voice was raised above a whisper. The shock was stupendous. In none of their past sorrows and troubles had their feelings been more outraged.
The cloud lay heavy upon them all; it would be a long while before it passed away. Ravenspur rose at length, his face white and worn.
"We can do no good here," he said. "Perhaps sleep will bring us merciful relief."
It was at this moment that Symonds looked in with her information. It was no shock, because all were past being shocked. Vera cried on Geoffrey's shoulder.
"I am glad of it," she whispered; "it's an awful thing to say, but I am glad. It saves Marion. We shall never see her again; but I am glad she is saved."
* * * * *
A young couple were looking down on the Mediterranean from the terrace of an old garden filled with the choicest flowers. The man looked bronzed and well, the girl radiantly happy. For grief has no abiding place in the eyes of youth.
"Doesn't it seem wonderful, Geoffrey?" the girl said. "Positively I cannot realize that we have been married three weeks. I shall wake up presently and find myself back at Ravenspur again wondering what dreadful thing is going to happen next."
Geoffrey touched a letter that lay in Vera's lap.
"Here is the evidence of our freedom," he said. "Read it to me, please."
Vera picked up the letter. There was no heading. Then she read:
"I am near you and yet far off. I hear little things from the world from time to time, and I know that you are married to Geoffrey. I felt that I must write you a few lines.
"I am in a convent here, in a convent from whence I can never emerge again. Heaven knows how many human tragedies are bound up in these gray old walls. But of all the miserable wretches here there is none more miserable than myself. Still, in my new faith I have found consolation. I know that there is hope even for sinners as black as myself.
"Will it sound strange to you to hear that I long and yearn for you always; that I still love those whom I would have destroyed? I meant to write you a long letter, but my heart is too full. Do not reply, because we are not allowed to have letters here.
"Heaven bless you both and give you the happiness you deserve!
"Marion."
Geoffrey took up the letter and tore it into minute fragments. The gentle breeze carried it over the oleanders and lemon trees like snow.
Down below the blue sea sparkled and the world seemed full of the pure delight of life.
"Geoffrey," Vera said after a long pause, "are we too happy?"
"Is it possible to be too happy?" Geoffrey replied.
"Well, too selfishly happy I mean. It seems awful to be so blissful when Marion is full of misery. I shall never feel anything but affection for her. It seems a strange thing to say, but I mean it. Poor Marion."
Geoffrey stooped and kissed the quivering lips.
"Poor Marion, indeed!" he said. "Marion was two distinct persons. Of all the shocks we ever had, her confession hurt me most of all. A creature so sweet and pure and good, a veritable angel! It is sufficient to utterly destroy one's faith in human nature. It would if I hadn't got you."