The Bride of the Tomb and Queenie's Part 88

"Why does she not instruct her lawyer to manage the case without her if she is unable to be present herself? This suspense is unendurable. If this delay is continued much longer, I shall endeavor to push the matter without her. I am tired of this dilly-dallying!"

They looked at each other a moment in silence. Then the elder man said, with a repressed sigh:

"That is one thing I came to ask you, Lawrence. Grant us this much grace, my poor, unfortunate Queenie, and her fond, old uncle. Do not push the matter for a little while. Wait until she can come into court and tell her own story before her fiendish accusers."

"But, Mr. Lyle, I am growing too impatient to wait longer. I chafe at the bonds that bind me to that beautiful deceiver."

"They will not bind you much longer," Mr. Lyle answered, sadly. "Either death or the law will soon sever your hated fetters."

Captain Ernscliffe started and looked at the speaker wildly.

"Death," he said, with an uncontrollable shudder. "Why do you talk of death? What is this mysterious illness that has held her in its chains so long? She used to be strong and well. She never talked of weakness."

"I cannot tell what ails her, Lawrence," said Mr. Lyle, rising as if the conference were ended, "but I have the word of her physician to tell you that within a month she will either be able to appear in court, and do what is necessary to defend her rights, or she will be in her grave. In either case you will be free."

The words fell coldly on Lawrence Ernscliffe's hearing, chilling the hot and pa.s.sionate tide of resentment that hurried through his heart.

He thought with an uncontrollable pang of all that bright, fair beauty he had loved so long and so fondly lying cold in the grave--those lips that had kissed him so tenderly sealed in death, the white lids shut forever over the heaven of love in those soft blue eyes.

"Will that content you, Lawrence?" asked the old man, wistfully, pausing with his hat in his hand. "A month is not so very long."

"That depends on the mood one is in," was the unsatisfactory reply.

"But you will wait?" Mr. Lyle said, almost pleadingly.

There was a minute's pause, and then the answer came, coldly:

"I will wait."

"Thanks--and farewell," said Mr. Lyle, pa.s.sing silently out of the room.

The outraged husband was alone once more, the red glow of the sunset s.h.i.+ning into the room and touching with its tender warmth his pallid, marble-like features.

He could not rest. Mr. Lyle's words re-echoed in his ears, turning his warm blood to an icy current that flowed sluggishly through his benumbed veins.

"In a month she may be in her grave--oh! the horror of that thought," he said, aloud.

Yes, it was horror. He thought he hated her--she had deceived him so bitterly--he thought he was anxious to sever the tie that bound them together; he thought he never wished to look upon her beautiful, false face again.

And yet, and yet those words of Mr. Lyle's staggered him. He reeled beneath the suddenness of the blow. He asked himself again as he had asked Mr. Lyle:

"What is this mysterious illness that holds her in its chains?"

He did not know, he did not dream of the truth. If he had known it, he must surely have forgiven her and taken her back. He could not have hated her longer, even though she had sinned and deceived him. For he had loved her very dearly, and she was his wife.

But he said to himself:

"Why should I care if she dies? She deceived me shamefully. She can never be anything to me again. In either case, as that old man said, I shall be free. What will it matter to me, then, if she be dead or alive; I shall never see her again!"

And then when he began to understand that she might die before her testimony was given before the court in her own defense, he became conscious of a vague feeling of disappointment. He knew now that he had been very anxious all along to hear what his wife would say when she stood face to face with her accuser. Perhaps, after all, she could vindicate herself. If not, why was she so anxious to make the attempt?

"Have I wronged her?" he asked himself, suddenly. "Should I have condemned her without hearing her version of that villain's story? Ah!

he would not have dared deceive me!"

CHAPTER XL.

Suddenly a serving-man entered with a card in his hand.

"A gentleman to see you, sir," he said.

Captain Ernscliffe took the bit of pasteboard in his hand and looked at it.

He started with surprise as he did so.

"C. M. Kidder," was the name he read.

It was the famous London detective whom he had employed to hunt down Sydney's dastardly murderer.

"What is he doing here in America--in this city?" thought Captain Ernscliffe, in surprise.

"Show the gentleman into this room," he said to the man.

Mr. Kidder came briskly in a moment after.

He was a shrewd-looking little man, well-dressed and gentlemanly.

"You are surprised to see me here," he said, after they had exchanged the usual greetings.

"Yes," admitted the host. "Do you bring news?"

The little man's black eyes sparkled.

"The best of news," he answered, blithely. "I have run the game down."

"That is indeed the best of news," said his employer, his face lighting up. "But I don't quite understand why you are here, in the United States."

"You don't?" said Mr. Kidder, with a good-natured laugh. "Well, I am here because my man is here. I have followed him across the seas."

"Is it possible?" exclaimed the listener, with a start.

"Yes, it is true. I have had a weary hunt for him, but I have unearthed him at last, thanks to Elsie Gray."

"Elsie Gray! Ah, yes, I remember, she was my wife's maid who disappeared so strangely the night of the murder. You say she helped you. Where is she now?"

"She crossed the ocean with me. She is here in this city, and will be the chief witness in the prosecution. She witnessed the murder, and recognized the criminal at that moment as a former lover of your present wife. She pursued him, and was on his track when I found her."