Whoso Findeth a Wife

The suddenness with which I had produced it startled and nonplussed her. As I transfixed her blue eyes with my keen, suspicious gaze, her white lips moved, but no sound fell from them. Embarrassment held her dumb.

Chapter Nine

The Bond of Secrecy

I held the small brass stamp towards her, inviting her to examine it, but she shrank back with an expression of terror and repulsion, refusing to touch it.

“Have you ever seen Dudley with this in his hand?” I asked, repeating my question seriously, determined upon learning the truth.

“Where did you find it?” she inquired, a look of bewilderment upon her haggard face.

“You have not answered my question, Ella,” I said sternly.

“Your question? Ah!” she cried, as if in sudden remembrance of my words. “I – I have never seen Dudley with it. I – I swear I haven’t.”

“Is that the absolute truth?” I asked in doubt.

“The truth!” she echoed. “Did I not, a moment ago, promise you I would never again deceive you by word or action? Can you never have confidence in me?” she asked, in a tone of mingled regret and reproach.

“But this was found in Dudley’s possession,” I said, holding it nearer my gaze, and detecting in the bright sunlight streaming through the window small portions of black wax still adhering to the cleverly-cut coat of arms. Black wax, I remembered, had been used to secure the dummy envelope.

“And even if that were so, is it such a very remarkable fact that a man should carry a seal?” she asked suddenly, raising her brows and assuming a well-feigned air of surprise. At that instant it occurred to me that she was an adept in preserving a mystery; she could practice deception with a verisimilitude little short of marvellous.

“But this,” I observed, “is no ordinary seal.”

“It looks ordinary enough,” she answered, smiling. “It’s only brass.”

“But its discovery forms a clue to a most serious and startling crime,” I said.

“A crime!” she gasped. “What do you mean? Dudley’s murder?”

I did not fail to notice that she used the word “murder” as if she had absolute proof that death had not been due to natural causes. Yet the effect of my announcement had been to fill her with sudden apprehension. She strove to appear amazed, but I thought I could detect in her attitude and bearing a fear that I had knowledge of her secret.

“It is most probably connected with that tragic event,” I answered meaningly, looking her straight in the face. “The police will no doubt pursue their investigations and clear up the matter.”

“The police!” she whispered hoarsely, just as Mrs Laing had done when the officers had entered her house. “Do you think they will discover the cause of poor Dudley’s death?”

“I cannot say,” I answered calmly. “They will, however, discover the reason he had this seal in his possession.”

“I tell you it was not his – I mean I never saw him with it,” she protested.

“But he may have had it in his pocket and not shown it to you. Indeed, there were reasons that he should not do so because it was used for a nefarious purpose.”

“For what?” she asked, suddenly evincing an interest in the stamp, taking it from my hand and examining it closely.

It was on my tongue to relate to her the whole circumstances, but suddenly remembering that for the present the secret of England’s peril must be preserved if the identity of the spy were to be discovered, I refrained, and answered, —

“The man who used that seal committed one of the worst crimes of which a man can be guilty.”

“What was it; tell me?” she asked quickly. “Surely Dudley never committed any offence!”

“I am not certain,” I answered gloomily. “An enemy who would pose as a friend, as he has done, might be capable of any deceit.”

“Have I not already told you that he was not your enemy, Geoffrey?” she observed calmly.

“Ah, Ella,” I cried in disgust, “all these falsehoods only render your conduct the more despicable. You will deny next that you went down to Warnham to meet him surreptitiously.”

“To Warnham?” she cried, white to the lips.

“Yes. Do you deny it?”

“No. I – it is quite true that I met him there,” she faltered.

“You spent the day with my rival, unknown to me,” I went on bitterly. “Yet you declare that you never loved him?”

Her breath came and went in short, quick gasps, her haggard eyes were fixed; she stood silent, unable to make reply.

“It is useless to further prolong this painful interview,” I exclaimed at last, turning from her.

“I swear I never loved him,” she cried suddenly. “Some day, when you know the truth, you will bitterly regret how you have misjudged me, how, while striving to serve you, I have fallen under suspicion.”

“But your visit to Warnham!” I said. “Is that an act such as can be overlooked without explanation?”

“I only ask you to place trust in me, and I will prove ere long that I acted under compulsion.”

“You want me to believe that he held you irrevocably in his power, I suppose?” I said with biting sarcasm.

She nodded, and held her head in downcast, dejected attitude.

“It is easy enough to allege all this, now that he is dead,” I observed doubtingly.

“I have told you the truth. I feared him, and was compelled to obey,” she exclaimed hoarsely.

“What was the object of your visit? Surely you can explain that?”

“No. I cannot.”

“You absolutely refuse?”

“Absolutely,” she answered, in a low, strained voice, looking straight at me with an expression of determination.

“Then we must part,” I said, slowly but firmly disengaging myself from her embrace.

“No, no,” she wailed, sobbing bitterly and clinging more closely to me. “Do not be so cruel, Geoffrey. You would never utter these words could you know all.”

“But you will not tell me,” I cried.

“At present I dare not. Wait; be patient, and you shall know everything.”