The House of Strange Secrets Part 20

"To commence at the very beginning, my dear boy, and in orthodox fas.h.i.+on, I will state that my name is that by which you have always known me--Harold Lester Carrington, only son of a worthy naval officer and his wife, who was a younger daughter of the late Sir John Collyer. I was born nine-and-fifty years ago at Manchester, received but a moderate education, and entered the army at an early age.

"I was unfortunate enough to lose both my parents while I was quite a child, and, getting into bad company, led what my few relatives--they are all dead now--considered a wild life. I can safely say, though, that I never forgot I was the son of gentlefolk, for to both my parents I had been greatly attached.

"I must have been either twenty-one or twenty-two years of age when I first met Edith Rawson, the charming daughter of my old Colonel. It was at a garden party, and was a case of love at first sight on both sides.

Of course it was foolish in the extreme for me, a penniless lieutenant, to aspire to the hand of wealthy Colonel Rawson's eldest daughter, but the folly was inevitable. Miss Rawson was the most lovely girl I ever cast eyes upon. Mutual love in such cases as ours is hard to conceal--particularly from a woman--and Mrs. Rawson quickly perceived things after I had visited the house a few times. She communicated her suspicions to her husband, and a tremendous row was the result--the upshot of which was that I changed my regiment for one embarking for India, bade my loved one a pitiful farewell, re-echoed my vows of constancy, promising to return when, judging by Rawson's standard, I was in a position to claim Edith as my bride, and left England for the great Eastern Empire.

"I had been forbidden to write, even once a year, to my loved one, and it was with a faint heart that I started life again in Madras. But I knew that if I wished to succeed I must throw all my energy into the work, and strive my hardest to render myself fit to become Edith's husband in what seemed a very distant future.

"Years rolled by, and by degrees, thanks to sundry small skirmishes with discontented tribes, I gained the promotion which meant so much. But it was a sad time for me. Folks may say that 'out of sight' is equivalent to 'out of mind,' but I speak truly when I say that never for a single day did anyone--any woman--figure in my thoughts except the loved one in the far-off old country.

"Periodically I got hold of old society newspapers, sent to us from London, and in these I occasionally came across the name of Colonel Rawson's fair daughter. Each time I was thrilled with pleasure to find that her maiden name still remained to her. Was she true to the devoted young officer in India? Of course she was!

"I was Major Carrington by this time, and young for that, still I knew a beautiful girl like Edith would never want for offers of marriage. Three or four years had pa.s.sed since I had discovered the dear name in print.

Two or three were likely to drag before there was any chance of my further promotion, after which Colonel Rawson had given me permission to return home, and, if the mutual affection still existed, marry his daughter.

"Then one day a copy of the _Times_ chanced to reach me, and I casually commenced reading by a perusal of the births, marriages, and deaths column in that paper. Suddenly I caught sight of an announcement that caused me to cry aloud with dismay, with horror, with disappointment.

It was painfully brief, but, oh! so plain.

"'SANDLYNG-RAWSON.--On the 28th ult., at St. Jude's, Aynswell-street, W., George Arthur Sandlyng, of the Priory, Parkham, Bucks, to Edith, daughter of Colonel Rawson, V.C.'

"Had I considered this paragraph in the light of common sense I would not have acted as I did.

"In the first place, I should have recollected that Rawson was no rare name, and that the combination of names, Edith Rawson, might occur in any other branch of the Rawson family than the one in which were centred all my hopes.

"I might, too, have made the following deduction: When I left England, ten years before, the Colonel had not the letters V.C. after his name.

As far as I was aware he had not been engaged in active warfare since.

Suppose, though, he had, and had won the Victoria Cross, would it not have been reasonable to suppose that ten years would have seen his promotion to a generals.h.i.+p, particularly if his conduct had been so conspicuous as to merit the award of the coveted V.C.?

"But I did not stop to take a rational view of the matter. To me, then, there was no doubt but that Edith--my Edith--had broken her vows to me, and had married. I was filled with murderous thoughts. For the time I was mad."

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE SQUIRE'S STORY (CONTINUED)

"I left the barracks and made my way into the lowest and commonest quarter of the city. My own idea was to drown my thoughts, to forget myself, Edith, and the world, even if only for an hour or so. The sight of the familiar sign of the opium den over a low door stopped me in my mad ramble. Here was the chance of banis.h.i.+ng my thoughts and misery. I entered. A hideous old Chinaman barred my way, but satisfying himself that I was not an objectionable person, he turned and led me down into the dark den itself. An unoccupied ottoman in a corner took my fancy. I flung myself down. Simultaneously a soft voice asked me in English what I required. At first I fancied I was a prey to my imagination. The voice was so soft, so gentle, that I thought it was hers--Edith's.

"Then I looked round full into the face of a maiden who leaned over me, so close that I felt her warm breath on my cheek as she repeated the words that had roused me from my drowsiness. She was in all respects the loveliest native girl I ever saw--so slim, so bright-eyed, and so charmingly clad, that for the moment I forgot my misery in contemplation of her exceptional beauty.

"'You speak English?' I remarked.

"'Yes, indeed,' she murmured, seating herself gracefully on the arm of the couch; 'it is so much prettier than my own language.'

"'And what are you doing in this--er--h.e.l.l?' I could not refrain from asking. She formed such a striking contrast to her surroundings.

"'Hus.h.!.+' she responded quietly, and raised her finger in warning, placing it almost upon my lips. 'Hush, they may not all be asleep.' And she waved her arm, bare to the elbow, in the direction of the motionless forms rec.u.mbent on the other couches in the cellar.

"'What is your name?' I whispered, as I perceived that she was not averse to conversation.

"'Lilla,' she replied, blus.h.i.+ng under her dark skin. I noticed that she had a little pipe in her hand. 'Half?' she asked.

"'No,' I said, 'not yet. I want a talk. That is, if you don't mind.'

"Again she blushed, and settled herself down at the foot of the ottoman.

'You know you're in danger here?' she muttered interrogatively.

"'Why?' I asked, in no way alarmed, though.

"'Well,' she replied, gazing into my eyes, 'queer things happen here occasionally which would cause some talk were they to become known.' She shrugged her little shoulders suggestively. She was certainly a bewitching girl.

"'You are an officer?' she asked.

"'Yes,' I replied, foolishly betraying the fact, when, dressed as I was in civilian attire, I might have pa.s.sed as a merchant or some other English resident of the city.

"For the moment I confess I was bewitched--powerless in the hands of the dark-eyed girl whose life was spent in such strange surroundings.

"For many an hour we sat there--she at the foot, I at the head of the couch, and our conversation disturbed a silence only broken occasionally by the heavy breathing or moans of one or other of the motionless figures stretched round us.

"'Lilla' told me much about herself and about those that kept the den.

The latter were a native and his Chinese wife, the parents of 'Lilla,'

which was an abbreviation of some eight-syllabled name by which she was known in her peculiar family circle.

"Yes, she had always lived in the den, she told me, and had waited upon the customers since a mere child. She was now only seventeen, and confessed she was unmarried. She further told me that she intended doing what the English call marrying money, even questioning me, to my embarra.s.sment, on my financial position.

"As the serpent bewitches, hypnotises, and eventually snares the rabbit, so I began to feel that this maiden of the opium den was beginning to bewitch me. Not that I was, or have been, an impressionable man, unusually susceptible to feminine attack, though I have, as you, my son, may have discovered, always been of a weak disposition. I do not know, either, whether, by permitting myself to fall a victim to 'Lilla's'

charms, I was, in the words of a common expression, 'cutting off my nose to spite my face'--impotently avenging Edith's treatment of me by falling in love--no other words express my behaviour--with the first female I met after learning of what I believed to be her fickle inconstancy.

"I am more than inclined to think that the native girl was imbued with those powers that so many of even the humblest Indian folks possess--a power that, unfortunately, is getting a firm rooting in this country--that of mesmeric influence over a weaker mind!

"It will be sufficient for me to say that I found myself quite powerless in the girl's hands. I told her the story of my life and love when she requested me to do so. I seemed unable to hide anything from her. I went so far as to mention that a severe punishment would result were it discovered that I had visited the den, the cholera then ravis.h.i.+ng the country, and the troops, including the officers, being under special orders not to visit the particularly afflicted quarters of the town.

"And this remark of mine must have been the cause of all my future trouble and misery--and, probably, of my death!

"The first day I remained in ignorance of the secrets of the opium den, and of that of opium smoking. But when I left, long after nightfall, it was with a promise on my lips that I would return next day, and I did.

Strive as I might I could not battle against the invisible power that drew me, on the following afternoon, to the low opium den.

"This time I was horrified on entering the dim cellar to see Lilla curled up on a sofa with the stem of an opium pipe between her pearly teeth. Otherwise the room was empty. Not until afterwards did I discover the reason, which was that one of the visitors of the previous day had been seized with the terrible disease, and that either he had communicated the scourge to the other smokers who haunted the den, or the habitues had been too frightened by what they saw to return!

"On closer investigation I discovered that a gla.s.s of neat spirit stood on the table at the girl's right hand! That the lovely young girl was an opium smoker and a drinker of undiluted spirit seemed too horrible.

Instinctively I recoiled from her, and as she seemed half asleep, commenced to make my way from the room.

"The sounds I made caused her to awake.

"'Ah! it is the Sahib,' she murmured; 'come, come, and kiss Lilla.'