The Lion's Mouse Part 37

"You have had those pearls copied!" he flung at her.

Beverley blushed bright crimson. She understood instantly what he meant and thought, but she had not gone through tortures and been relieved at the last moment to be beaten down now.

"What do you mean?" she asked, her eyes steady, her head up.

"You thought I didn't know. But I have known from the first. I found out by accident. I always hoped you'd some day tell me the truth. This is a cowardly thing you've done."

Beverley was again ivory pale. "Are you a judge of pearls, Roger?" she coldly inquired.

"Yes," he said.

She lifted the rope over her head and thrust it, against his will, into his hands. "Make any test you wish, and decide whether these are the pearls you gave me or an imitation."

Hardly knowing what he did, he walked to a table, on which stood a tall lamp that gave a brilliant light. Beverley watched him. There was no emotion whatever on her face. After a moment he spoke: "These are genuine pearls," he admitted, after a heavy silence. "And I have reason to believe from certain marks that they are the pearls I bought for you, the queen's pearls. If you give me your word, that since I put them into your hands you did not part with them to Justin O'Reilly, as I have believed, I will beg your forgiveness on the knees of my soul. I will confess to you--as I once expected you to confess to me."

"Hus.h.!.+ There's someone at the door!" Beverley cut him short.

It was Leontine who knocked, and paused on the threshold. "Will Madame have the kindness to step into the hall," she asked. As her mistress moved toward her, she retired, and it was not until they both stood at some distance from the door that the Frenchwoman spoke.

"I beg Madame's pardon for disturbing her," she apologized, "but I dare not delay. The lady, Mees Blackburne, if that is her name, was about to start back to town, but remembered a commission she had been given at the apartment; to bring a telegram for me. I opened it, to find that for me there is no sense. I know no Stephen; but----"

"Stephen!" Beverley gasped the name, and s.n.a.t.c.hed from the woman's hand an open telegram she held. She read it, and then without a word or cry, collapsed in a dead faint. With a shriek of fear Leontine tried to catch the swaying figure; but the best she could do was to break the fall.

When Roger reached the door it was to find Beverley in a white heap on the floor with the Frenchwoman kneeling by her side. He caught his wife up, and, carrying her back into his room, laid her on the bed.

"Let everybody be told that dinner will be delayed half an hour," he said, and shut the door in Leontine's face. She s.n.a.t.c.hed the dropped telegram and whisked off to obey the master's command.

x.x.xVIII

WHO IS STEPHEN?

As Roger stood looking down at Beverley she opened her eyes.

"Stephen is dead!" she muttered. "Stephen--is dead."

"Who is Stephen?" Roger asked shortly.

"Oh, Roger!" she appealed to him, breaking into sobs. "My poor Stephen!

I shall never see him again. All my sacrifices--in vain!"

"Who is Stephen?" Roger repeated.

She held up her arms, without answering his questions. "Roger--comfort me!" she wept.

And for all his life, no matter how many years he may live, Roger Sands will be glad that he did not hold back from Beverley then. Without another word he clasped her tightly, while she cried against his cheek.

Both had forgotten that there were guests, that this was the "big night"

which all the newspapers were talking about; that already dinner was late, and people wondering; that the "ball" was to begin at ten-thirty, and that the Russian dancers who were to open it, as the great "surprise," would soon be in the house.

When Beverley had sobbed until exhaustion came, she spoke, in a tiny voice, like that of a tired little girl: "Because Stephen is--safe, I can tell you everything now. Will you listen, Roger, until the end, whether you can forgive me or no?"

"Yes," Roger answered. "But just this before you begin! I love you so much, Beverley, that if there's something to forgive it's forgiven already."

"Stephen was my brother," she said, "the one person who belonged to me after father died. Mother I don't remember. She came of a high Russian family who were sent to Siberia as political prisoners. She was only sixteen, and father saved her by making her his wife. I was named 'Olga'

after her. But for that dreadful journey from Albuquerque I had to have some name that wouldn't give me away when my ticket was bought. Stephen and I were called Bevan, because father used that name for his business in Russia, but his own name was Beverley. For travelling that day I was 'Miss B. White.' Once I'd told you I was Beverley, I had always to be Beverley for you.

"Stephen--or Stephan, his Russian name--and I, were born in Russia, where father superintended an immense tract of oil wells for Mr. Heron.

When my father was killed in an explosion (I was fourteen and Stephen twelve) Mr. Heron felt it his duty to look after our future. He had just married at that time. You must know Mrs. Heron well enough to understand that she wouldn't like to have two half-grown-up children thrust upon her. Why, she used to be jealous even of her husband's first wife, an Irish girl, who died years and years ago, in Ireland! It seems Mr. Heron hadn't told her about his old love story. She came across a picture of him taken with the girl, and some letters from people Mr. Heron had employed to search for his wife, whom he had quarrelled with and left. I was staying at their house when Dolores discovered the photograph and letters. She rushed into the room where I was with Mr. Heron. He had to seize her hands to keep her from tearing the picture in pieces; and he held them while he told her his sad story. He'd been visiting Ireland, it seemed, years before, and met a girl, very poor but very lovely, and married her when they'd known each other a few weeks. It seemed the girl had been engaged to someone else; and that someone took a cruel revenge on Heron. By a plot which he confessed afterward when it was too late, he made it appear that the girl had been his mistress. The evidence was so strong Heron could hardly help believing, so he came back to America and tried to forget. Years after the other man, dying of typhoid, confessed to a priest that he had lied, and forged letters. The priest wrote to Heron. But the poor, deserted girl was dead, and all that Heron could learn when he dashed back to Ireland to find her was that a baby girl had been born a few months after he left his wife. He tried for years to trace the child, but could not. And it was only after he'd given up all hope that he married Dolores Moreno. I think Mr. Heron felt tender over us children because of his lost little one. After leaving us in Russia at school for a while, and a year in England, to learn the language better than we knew it, another year in France and another in Italy (in families whom he paid to educate and take care of us) he must have had a longing to see what we were like. He and Dolores, his wife, came abroad, and brought us back to America with them, much against Dolores' will, I know. I was nearly eighteen, and I realized the first minute we met that Dolores was going to hate me. We went straight to a house near Albuquerque, which belongs to Mrs. Heron. Her brother Louis always lived there. He was an invalid, you know; about a year younger than Dolores; something wrong with his heart, and almost a hunchback--but oh, what a handsome face! When he took a violent fancy to me her one thought was to get me out of his way. Louis had money of his own. He was rich, and I suppose Dolores was afraid I might try to marry him, as I hadn't a penny. It was bad enough for her that Mr. Heron should have a tenderness for me, because of his lost child; but that Louis should love me was more than she could stand. I was sent to a boarding-school, and when I was twenty I began to teach. Dolores didn't like Stephen, either. She grudged every penny her husband spent for us.

"Mr. Heron used his influence, and got Stephen work in Los Angeles as a reporter on a newspaper, when he was only eighteen. He was tall and handsome, and could pa.s.s for two years older at least. I was very unhappy at this time, for I'd begun to worry about Stephen. I was sure he was keeping some secret from me. But I found out nothing till the crash came. Oh, Roger, it was horrible. He'd fallen under the influence of those anarchists--those dynamiters, who had been terrorizing all America for years. They'd persuaded him that they were n.o.ble reformers.

Poor Stephen was a useful tool. He never did any of the dynamiting with his own hands, but he used to make bombs, and carry them from place to place, and take letters it wasn't thought safe to send through the post.

It was the blowing-up of the _Times_ buildings in Los Angeles and all those innocent men being killed that sickened him, he confessed afterward, when at last he opened his heart to me. But he was too deep in to free himself. It's now two years ago that the break happened, and all our life collapsed--Stephen's and mine.

"Some of the old lot he'd worked with were left--men who had managed to keep clear and never be suspected when William Burns, the detective, was fighting the Macnamaras and their gang. Only one or two who'd been under suspicion wriggled out from Burns' clutches. A man named Carl Schmelzer was the cleverest. He went abroad, and was supposed to die in Germany.

But he didn't die. By that time they were engaged in new enterprises, as the old ones were too risky; but they always pretended to be working for Labour against Capital. John Heron was their target two years ago. The war cry was that he was the master, a tyrant, a plutocrat, ruthlessly crus.h.i.+ng the weak. The Comrades knew our history--Stephen's and mine--and they tried to inflame Stephen against Mr. Heron because he'd failed to do for us what our father's services and death merited. But they made a big mistake when they ordered my brother to dynamite a railway bridge, just as a train with Heron's private car was due to pa.s.s over it. He refused, and threatened to warn Heron unless they abandoned all their schemes against him. That gave the gang a fearful fright. They thought their one chance of safety was to suppress Stephen. A friend of his who lived at Home Colony warned him that there was a plot to kill him. He came straight to me and told me the whole story. Neither of us had much hope. We thought the Comrades were sure to get him in the end.

Then a wonderful thing happened. The train Stephen took, after his visit to me, was wrecked. Everybody in the car with Stephen was killed except himself. An idea came to Stephen. He put a silver cigarette-case with his name on it into the pocket of a man burnt past recognition--a man of about his own size. Then he crept away and hid for many days. When he hoped it might be fairly safe, he wrote to me, knowing I mourned for him as dead. He asked if I'd risk going with him to Russia to begin a new life there under another name. Of course I said 'Yes.'

"I left the school, and some jewellery I had kept us going for a while till there was a s.h.i.+p we could take for j.a.pan, and so get back to Russia. We'd have to sail from San Francisco, so presently we went to Oakland, travelling at night by local trains. We hoped in that way we should not be seen by any one we knew.

"Whether someone did see us or not, I can't tell. Anyhow, from the day Stephen left me to buy our cabins on the s.h.i.+p I've never seen him again.

He was kidnapped by the gang; and then began my martyrdom. They gave me a week of suspense. Then I got a letter. It told me that Stephen had been caught and would be punished by death for his treachery unless I'd agree to buy his life. I was warned that if I went to the police, it would be known to them, and Stephen instantly killed. If I consented to bargain I must put a 'personal' in a San Francisco paper, saying 'Steve's sister says yes'; in that case an appointment would be made with a man who would tell me what to do to save Stephen.

"Of course, I obeyed. Next day the same paper told 'Steve's Sister'

where to go for instructions, and at what time. I think the man who met me must have been Schmelzer himself, just back from Europe. He had the authoritative manner Stephen had spoken of, and a great deal of gesture.

He didn't give himself any name then, but afterward I knew him as Cheffinsky. To save my brother I had only to get a bundle of papers which were in the possession of John Heron. They were at Albuquerque in Mrs. Heron's house. Heron kept them there because he believed no one would suspect; but a spy the 'Comrades' had hired to act as a gardener there overheard a conversation, and knew the hiding-place. Unfortunately he couldn't put his hand on the papers without killing a man to get at them. For me, it would be simple, because Louis Moreno was in love with me. Louis had charge of the papers, and would let me see them if I treated him the right way. How Cheffinsky found out about Louis and me I never heard; perhaps from Stephen. I was given a day to think the matter over. Then there was to be another meeting in the same place. When I went to the rendezvous for the second time--it was in a park--I hadn't made up my mind. But, oh, Roger, the wretch showed me a snapshot of Stephen in a room, with a rope round his neck, standing on tiptoe. The rope was fastened to a ring in the ceiling, where a chandelier had been.

If Stephen had dropped from fatigue he would have choked to death. 'Six hours a day of this medicine,' Cheffinsky said, 'till you've handed us the papers we want.'

"I promised to go to Albuquerque and get them. What the papers were I wasn't told. Afterward I heard more about them--from Louis himself. The day of the second meeting in the park I was given directions what to do, but they were changed in a hurry. The Comrades got warning to 'clear out' and go East as quick as they could. A telegram reached me only a few hours before I was to start for Albuquerque. It said, 'Delay journey. Writing,' and a letter came the same night to the quiet little boarding-house where I stayed. My brother had been taken East, where I should meet him when I handed over the papers. I was told what train to take to Albuquerque, and what train to leave in: the Santa Fe Limited. I was to find reservations on board for 'Miss B. White.' At Chicago I was to get out of the train and find a man waiting for me. You know all about that, and what happened. There was money in the letter of instructions, enough to see me through to Chicago, otherwise I couldn't have started. What I had was almost all gone. Oh, I can hardly bear to think of that day, and what I went through--before I met _you_."

"Don't think of it--don't go on if you'd rather not," Roger begged.

But Beverley wished to go on.

"There was one thing the Comrades hadn't calculated upon," she said, "and that was that the Herons would be at Albuquerque. When the plan was made the Herons were at Los Angeles, and expecting to stay there. You must have been with them--just after the great case was decided in John Heron's favour--thanks to you! But Louis had been seized with one of his heart attacks--he had angina pectoris--and had wired for his sister.

Dolores didn't wish to travel without her husband, so both decided to go. As for Justin O'Reilly, it was at Albuquerque I first saw him. It came out that he was taking a short holiday in California, and I heard talk about his visiting some place where he and his father had lived. I had the impression of his being a California man. Mr. Heron had helped O'Reilly to get into Congress. They weren't intimate, though I believe they're distantly related, but Mr. Heron wanted to see him before he went East, and wired for O'Reilly to meet them at Albuquerque. When I arrived, expecting to find only Louis in the house, they were all there.

"It was a shock and a blow to me to see the Herons. I'd meant to lie, and tell Louis I'd come to him because I'd changed my mind, and liked him better than I thought. But to account for my sudden appearance, uninvited, to Dolores, who hated me, was another matter.

"She and her husband supposed I was living quietly at school, mourning for my dead brother. I had to make up a story quickly. I said that I'd lost my position, and hoped they would put me up at Albuquerque until I could get another. They couldn't turn me out that night. And Louis was fairly well again by that time. He was very glad to see me. I made the most of his welcome--for Stephen's sake. You see, I _had_ to succeed! I wrote a note, and slipped it into Louis' hand. In it I hinted that I had something very particular to say to him. He must go to his own rooms as soon as he could--he had a whole suite to himself which he could shut off from the rest of the house. It was on the ground floor. I said I would go to him there.

"Now comes the most terrible part of my story. Roger, you may hate me when you've heard the rest! I went to Louis' room. He let me in. I told him that I had changed my mind. I would marry him if he wanted me to, but only on one condition. I said I'd heard from friends of Stephen's that Mr. Heron was keeping doc.u.ments which concerned our dead father; that they were with other private papers, in the Albuquerque house, and in Louis' charge. If he would give the whole bundle to me to look over, and choose what I wished to take away, I'd be his wife whenever he wanted me.

"He tried to seize me in his arms, but I threatened to go away at once unless he kept quiet, and did as I told him. There was a packet of papers, he admitted, but he vowed to me that they were only business papers. They were compromising to John Heron, and would do him immense harm--worse than ever, now that he'd just come successfully through the courts--if they pa.s.sed into enemy hands. I insisted that there must be something about my father. There could be no mistake, and unless Louis would let me look, I'd never marry him. He still objected, arguing that all the things were in one envelope, sealed with three seals, which must not be broken, or his sister and her husband would never forgive him.

"He went to his desk--we were in his sitting-room--and showed me a secret drawer between two other drawers. He took out an envelope--you've seen it. 'I'll try to cut off the seals with a sharp knife,' he said, 'and I can stick them on again. While he spoke, he began looking for the knife he wanted, and I s.n.a.t.c.hed at the envelope. But his fingers closed down on it. He laughed in my face. 'So that's your game!' he said. 'I'm not so soft as you thought!' But I struggled with him. I was strong; he was an invalid. He'd just been ill. When he realized that I was more than his match, his face looked like a devil's. I shall never forget it.

'You'll pay for this!' he screamed at the top of his voice--an awful scream--'Help! murder!'