The Under-Secretary

“Then I am unwelcome here?”

“While you continue to follow the absurd course you have of late chosen, you are.”

“Thank you,” she replied. “You are at least candid.”

“We have been friends, and you have, I think, always found me honest and outspoken, Claudia.”

“Yes, but I have never before known you to treat me in this manner,” she answered with sudden hauteur. “The other day you declared your intention of severing our friendship, but I did not believe you.”

“Why?”

“Because I knew that we loved each other.”

“No,” he said in a hard tone, “do not let us speak of love. Speak of it to those men who dance attendance upon you everywhere, but with me, Claudia, be as frank as I am with you.”

“Dudley! It is cruel of you to speak like this!” she cried with a sudden outburst of emotion, for she now saw quite plainly that the power she once exerted over him had disappeared.

Chisholm had been sadly disillusioned. During the past few weeks the bitter truth had gradually been forced upon him. Instead of remaining a real, dignified, high-minded woman of unblemished integrity, Claudia Nevill had grown callous and artificial, and in other ways hostile to true womanhood. But Dudley had always admired her, and once she had been his ideal.

He had admired her simplicity of heart. Unquestionably that is a great charm in a woman, though not a charm so illuminating as integrity, because it consists more in the ignorance of evil, and, consequently, of temptation, than in the possession of principle strong enough to withstand both. In the days before her marriage her simplicity of heart was the child of that unruffled serenity of soul which suspects no mischief to be lurking beneath the fair surface of things – which trusts, confides and is happy in this confidence, because it has never been deceived, and because it has never learned that most fatal of all arts, the mystery of deceiving others.

But all was now changed. She was no longer the Claudia of old. She had degenerated into a smart, brilliant woman, full of arts and subterfuges, with no thoughts beyond her engagements, her toilettes, and her vainglorious triumphs.

“I have only spoken what I feel, Claudia!” exclaimed the man still standing before her. “I have no power to compel you to heed my warning.”

“Oh, do let us drop the subject, my dear Dudley!” she cried impatiently. “This lecture of yours upon my duty towards society may surely be continued on another occasion. Let us go along to the Duchess’s. As I’ve already said, the House has entirely spoilt you.”

“I don’t wish to continue the discussion. Indeed, I’ve said all that I intend saying. My only regret is that you are heedless of my words – that you are blind to the truth, and have closed your ears to all this gossip.”

“Let them gossip. What does it matter to me? Now to you, of course, it matters considerably. You can’t afford to imperil your official position by allowing all this chatter to go on. I quite understand that.”

“And yet you come here to-night and ask me to take you to the Duchess’s?” he said.

“For the last time, Dudley,” she answered, looking up at him with that sweet, sympathetic look of old. “This is the last of our engagements, and it is an odd fancy of mine that you should take me to the ball – for the last time.”

“Yes,” he repeated hoarsely, in a deep voice full of meaning; “for the last time, Claudia.”

“You speak as though you were doomed to some awful fate,” she remarked, looking up at him with a puzzled expression on her face. Little did the giddy woman think that her words, like the sword of the angel at the entrance to Paradise, were double-edged.

“Oh,” he said, rousing himself and endeavouring to smile, “I didn’t know. Forgive me.”

“You’ve changed somehow, Dudley,” she said, rising. She went near to him and took his hand tenderly. “Why don’t you tell me what is the matter? Something is troubling you. What is it?”

“You are, for one thing,” he answered promptly, looking straight into her splendid eyes. As she stood there in that beautiful gown, with the historic pearls of the Nevills upon her white neck, Dudley thought he had never seen her look so magnificent. Well might she be called the Empress of Mayfair.

“But why trouble your head about me?” she asked in a low, musical voice, pressing his hand tenderly. “You have worries enough, no doubt.”

“The stories I hear on every hand vex me horribly.”

“You are jealous of that man who was at the Meldrums’ house-party. It’s useless to deny it. Well, perhaps I was foolish, but if I promise never to see him again, will you forgive me?”

“It is not for me to forgive,” he said in an earnest voice. “I have, I suppose, no right to criticise your actions, or to exact any promises.”

“Yes, Dudley, you, of all men, have that right,” she answered, her beautiful breast, stirred by emotion, rising and falling quickly. “All that you have just said is, I know, just and honest; and it comes straight from your heart. You have spoken to me as you would to your own sister – and, well, I thank you for your good advice.”

“And will you not promise to follow it?” he asked, taking her other hand. “Will you not promise me, your oldest man friend, to cut all these people and return to the simple, dignified life you led when Dick was still alive? Promise me.”

“And if I promise, what do you promise me in exchange?” she asked. “Will you make me your wife?”

The look of eagerness died out of his face; he stood as rigid as one turned to stone. What was she suggesting? Only a course that they had discussed, times without number, in happier days. And yet, what could he answer, knowing well that before a few hours passed he might be compelled to take his own life, so as to escape from the public scorn which would of necessity follow upon his exposure.

“I – I can’t promise that,” he faltered, uttering his refusal with difficulty.

She shrank from him, as if he had struck her a blow.

“Then the truth is as I suspected. Some other woman has attracted you!”

“No,” he answered in a hard voice, his dark brow clouded, “no other woman has attracted me.”

“Then – well, to put it plainly – you believe all these scandalous tales that have been circulated about me of late? Because of these you’ve turned from me, and now abandon me like this!”

“It is not that,” he protested.

“Then why do you refuse to repeat your promise, when you know, Dudley, that I love you?”

“For a reason which I cannot tell you.”

She looked at him puzzled by his reticence. He was certainly not himself. His face was bloodless, and for the first time she noticed round his eyes the dark rings caused by the insomnia of the past two nights.

“Tell me, Dudley,” she implored, clinging to him in dismay. “Can’t you see this coldness of yours is driving me to despair – killing me? Tell me the truth. What is it that troubles you?”

“I regret, Claudia, that I cannot tell you.”

“But you always used to trust me. You have never had secrets from me.”

“No, only this one,” he answered in a dull, monotonous manner.

“And is it this secret which prevents you from making the compact I have just suggested?”

“Yes.”

“It has nothing to do with any woman who has come into your life?” she demanded eagerly.

“No.”

“Will you swear that?”

“I swear it.”