Mr. Witt's Widow: A Frivolous Tale

“True. So are a good many other people.”

“I should have to consider my father and – and the family.”

“Should you? I should see the family damned. However, it comes to this – if it were true, you wouldn’t marry her.”

“How could I?” groaned Gerald. “We should be cut.”

Mr. Blodwell smiled.

“Well, my ardent lover,” he said, “that being so, you’d better do nothing till you see whether it’s true.”

“Not at all. I only took the hypothesis; but I haven’t the least doubt that it’s a lie.”

“A mistake – yes. But it’s in the Bull’s-eye, and a mistake in the newspapers needs to be reckoned with.”

“What shall I do?”

“Wait till George comes back. Meanwhile, hold your tongue.”

“I shall contradict that lie.”

“Much better not. Don’t write to them, or see them, or let anybody else till George comes back. And, Gerald, if I were you, I shouldn’t quarrel with George.”

“He shall withdraw it, or prove it.”

Mr. Blodwell shrugged his shoulders and became ostentatiously busy with the case of Pigg v. the Local Board of Slushton-under-Mudd. “A very queer point this,” he remarked. “The drainage system of Slushton is – ” And he stopped with a chuckle at the sight of Gerald’s vanishing back. He called after him —

“Are you going to Mrs. Witt’s this afternoon?”

“No,” answered Gerald. “This evening.”

Mr. Blodwell sat at work for ten minutes more. Then he rang the bell.

“Mr. Neston gone, Timms?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then get a four-wheeler.” And he added to himself, “I should like to see her again, under this new light. I wonder if she’ll let me in.”

Neaera did let him in. In fact, she seemed very glad to see him, and accepted with meekness her share of his general censure on the “babbling” that had gone on.

“You see,” she said, handing him a cup of tea, “it scarcely seemed a serious matter to me. I was angry, of course, but almost more amused than angry.”

“Naturally,” answered Mr. Blodwell. “But, my dear young lady, everything which is public is serious. And this thing is now public, for no doubt to-morrow’s Bull’s-eye will give all your names and addresses.”

“I don’t care,” said Neaera.

Mr. Blodwell shook his head. “You must consider Gerald and his people.”

“Gerald doesn’t doubt me. If he did – ” Neaera left her recreant lover’s fate to the imagination.

“But Lord Tottlebury and the world at large? The world at large always doubts one.”

“I suppose so,” said Neaera, sadly. “Fortunately, I have conclusive proof.”

“My dear Mrs. Witt, why didn’t you say so before?”

“Before there was anything to meet? Is that your way, Mr. Blodwell?”

“George may bring back something to meet.”

Neaera rose and went to her writing-table. “I don’t know why I shouldn’t show it to you,” she said. “I was just going to send it to Lord Tottlebury. It will be a pleasant surprise for Mr. George Neston when he comes back from Peckton with his proofs!” She handed Mr. Blodwell a sheet of note-paper.

He took it, throwing one quick glance at Neaera. “You wish me to read this?”

“It’s letting you into the secrets of my early days,” she said. “You see, I wasn’t always as well off as I am now.”

Mr. Blodwell adjusted his eye-glass and perused the document, which set forth that Miss N. Gale entered the service of Mrs. Philip Horne, of Balmoral Villa, Bournemouth, as companion to that lady, in March, 1883, and remained in such service until the month of July, 1883; that, during the whole of such period, she conducted herself with propriety; that she read aloud with skill, ordered a household with discretion, and humoured a fussy old lady with tact (this is a paraphrase of the words of the writer); finally, that she left, by her own desire, to the regret of the above-mentioned Susan Horne.

Neaera watched Mr. Blodwell as he read.

“Eighteen eighty-three?” said he; “that’s the year in question?”

“Yes, and April is the month in question – the month I am supposed to have spent in prison!”

“You didn’t show this to George?”

“No. Why should I? Besides, I didn’t know then when he dated my crime.”

Mr. Blodwell thought it a little queer that she had not asked him. “He should certainly see it at once. Have you seen anything of Mrs. Horne lately?”

“Oh no; I should be afraid she must be dead. She was an old lady, and very feeble.”

“It is – it may be – very lucky – your having this.”

“Yes, isn’t it? I should never have remembered the exact time I went to Mrs. Horne’s.”

Mr. Blodwell took his departure in a state of mind that he felt was unreasonable. Neaera had been, he told himself, most frank, most charming, most satisfactory. Yet he was possessed with an overpowering desire to cross-examine Neaera.

“Perhaps it’s only habit,” he said to himself. “A protestation of innocence raises all my fighting instincts.”

The next day witnessed the publication of the “Second Paragraph,” and the second paragraph made it plain to everybody that somebody must vindicate his or her character. The public did not care who did it, but it felt itself entitled to an action, wherein the whole matter should be threshed out for the furtherance of public justice and entertainment. The Bull’s-eye itself took this view. It implored Neaera, or George, or somebody to sue it, if they would not sue one another. It had given names, addresses, dates, and details. Could the most exacting plaintiff ask more? If no action were brought, it was clear that Neaera had stolen the shoes, and that George had slandered her, and that the Nestons in general shrank from investigation into the family history; all this was still clearer, if they pursued their extraordinary conduct in not forwarding personal narratives for the information of the public and the accommodation of the Bull’s-eye.

Into this turmoil George was plunged on his return from Peckton. He had been detained there two days, and did not reach his rooms till late on Friday evening. He was greeted by two numbers of the Bull’s-eye, neatly displayed on his table; by a fiery epistle from Gerald, demanding blood or apologies; by two penitential dirges from Isabel Bourne and Tommy Myles; and, lastly, by a frigid note from Lord Tottlebury, enclosing the testimony of Mrs. Philip Horne to the character and accomplishments of Miss N. Gale. In Lord Tottlebury’s opinion, only one course was, under the circumstances, open to a gentleman.

Philanthropists often remark, à propos of other philanthropists, that it is easier to do harm than good, even when you are, as it were, an expert in doing good. George began to think that his amateur effort at preserving the family reputation and punishing a wrongdoer looked like vindicating the truth of this general principle. Here was a hornets’-nest about his ears! And would what he brought back with him make the buzzing less furious or the stings less active? He thought not.

“Can a girl be in two places at once,” he asked, – “in one of her Majesty’s prisons, and also at – where is it? – Balmoral Villa, Bournemouth?” And he laid side by side Mrs. Horne’s letter and a certain photograph which was among the spoils of his expedition.