CHAPTER IX.
After a wretched night spent in tossing about his bed, in dreaming of the murdered man, and in lying awake wondering how he should break the news to Ida, Lord Penlyn rose with the determination of going down to Belmont. But when the valet brought him his bath he told him that Mr. Smerdon had arrived from Occleve Chase at six o'clock, and would meet him at breakfast. So, when he heard this, he dressed quickly and went to his friend.
"Good Heavens!" Philip said, when he saw him. "How ill you look! What is the matter?"
"Matter!" the other answered, "is there not matter enough to make me look ill? I have told you that Cundall is dead, and you know how he died."
"Yes, I know. But surely you must be aware of what it has freed you from."
"It has freed me from nothing. Read this; would that not have freed me equally as well?" and he handed him the letter that his brother had written a few hours before his death.
The other's face darkened as he read, and then he said:
"He was a man of noble impulses, but they were only impulses! Would you have ever felt sure while he lived that he might not alter his mind again at any moment?"
"Yes! He loved Ida, and I do not believe he was a man who would have ever loved another woman. I should have been safe in his hands."
Then they began to talk about the murder itself, and Smerdon asked who was suspected, or if any one was?
"No," Penlyn said, "no one is suspected--as yet. A labourer was seen following him on that night, and suspicion naturally falls on him, because, if he did not do it himself, he must have been close at hand, and would have helped him or given an alarm. There is only one road through the Park, which they must both have taken."
"Is there any trace of this man?"
"None whatever, up to last night. Meanwhile, his friend and secretary, Mr. Stuart, says that he is confident that the murder was committed by some one who had reason to wish him out of the way, and he is going through his papers to-day to see if any of them can throw any light on such an enemy."
"He cannot, I suppose, find anything that can do you any harm?"
"Supposing he finds those certificates he showed us?"
"Supposing he does! You are Lord Penlyn now, at any rate. And it would give you an opportunity of putting in a claim to his property. You are his heir, if he has left no will."
"His heir! To all his immense wealth?"
"Certainly."
"I shall never claim it, and I hope to God he has destroyed every proof of our relationship."
"Why?"
"Why! Because will not the fact that I held a position which belonged to him, and was the heir to all his money--of which I never thought till this moment--give the world cause for suspecting----?"
"What?"
"That I am his murderer."
"Nonsense! I suppose you could prove where you were at the time of his death?"
"No, I could not. I entered the hotel at two, but there was not a creature in the house awake. I could hear the porter's snores on the floor above, and there is not a living soul to prove whether I was in at three or not."
"Nor whether you were out! If they were all asleep, what evidence could they give on either side?"
"Even though there should be no evidence, how could I go through life with the knowledge that every one regarded me as his unproved murderer?"
"You look at the matter too seriously. To begin with, after that letter he wrote you, he would very likely destroy all proofs of his identity----"
"He had no chance. He was murdered, in all probability--indeed must have been--a quarter of an hour after he posted it in Pall Mall."
"He might have destroyed them before--when he made up his mind to write the letter."
"Certainly, he might have done so. But I am not going to depend upon his having destroyed them. This secret must be told by me, and I am going to Belmont to-day to tell it to Ida."
"You must be mad, I think!" Smerdon said, speaking almost angrily to him. "This secret, which only came to light a week ago, is now buried for ever, and, since he is dead, can never be brought up again. For what earthly reason should you tell Miss Raughton anything about it?"
"Because she ought to know," the other answered weakly. "It is only right that she should know."
"That you were not Lord Penlyn when you became engaged to her, but that you are now. And that Cundall being your brother, you must mourn him as a brother, and consequently your marriage must be postponed for at least a year. Is that what you mean?"
Lord Penlyn started. This had never entered into his head, and was certainly not what he would have meant or desired. Postponed for a year! when he was dying to make her his wife, when the very thought that his brother might step in and interrupt his marriage had been the cause of his brutality of speech to him. It had not been the impending loss of lands and position that had made him speak as he had done, he had told himself many times of late; it had been the fear of losing his beloved Ida. And, now that there was nothing to stand between them, he was himself about to place an obstacle in the way, an obstacle that should endure for at least a year. Smerdon was right, his quick mind had grasped what he would never have thought of--quite right! he would do well to say nothing about his relationship to the dead man. It is remarkable how easily we agree with those who show us the way to further our own ends!
"I never thought of that," he said, "and I could not bear it. After all," he went on weakly, "you are right! I do not see any necessity to say anything about it, and he himself forbade me to do so."
"There is only one thing, though," Smerdon said, "which is that, if you do not proclaim yourself his brother, I cannot see how you are to become possessed of his money."
"Don't think about it--I will never become possessed of it. It may go to any one but me, to some distant relative, if any can be found, or to the Crown, or whatever it is that takes a man's money when he is without kinsmen; but never to me. He was right when he said that I had been Jacob to his Esau all my life, but I will take no more from him, even though he is dead."
"Quixotic and ridiculous ideas!" Smerdon said. "In fact you and he had remarkably similar traits of character. Extremely quixotic, unless you have some strong reason for not claiming his millions. For instance, if you had really murdered him I could understand such a determination! But I suppose you did not do that!"
Lord Penlyn looked up and saw his friend's eyes fixed on him, with almost an air of mockery in them. Then he said:
"I want you to understand one thing, Philip. There must be no banter nor joking on this subject. Even though I must hold my peace for ever, I still regard it as an awful calamity that has fallen upon me. If I could do so, I would set every detective in London to work to try and find the man who killed him; indeed, if it were not for Ida's sake, I should proclaim myself his brother to-morrow."
"But for Ida's sake you will not do so?"
"For Ida's sake, and for the reason that I do not wish his money, I shall not; and more especially for the reason that you have shown me our marriage would be postponed if I did so. But never make such a remark again to me. You know me well enough to know that I am not of the stuff that murderers and fratricides are made of."
"I beg your pardon," Philip said; "of course I did not speak in earnest."
"On this subject we will, if you please, speak in nothing else but earnest. And, if you will help me with your advice, I shall be glad to have it."
"Let us go over the ground then," his friend said, "and consider carefully what you have to do. In the first place you have to look at the matter from two different points of view. One point is that you lose all claim to his money--yes, yes, I know," as Lord Penlyn made a gesture of contempt at the mention of the money--"all claim by keeping your secret. It is better, however, that you should so keep it. But, on the other hand, there is, of course, the chance--a remote one, a thousand to one chance, but still a chance--that he may have left some paper behind him which would prove your relationship to each other. In that case you would, of course, have no alternative but to acknowledge that you were brothers."
"And what would the world think of me then?"
"That you had simply done as he bade you, and kept the secret."
"It would think that I murdered him. It would be natural that the world should think so. He stood between me and everything, except Ida's love, and people might imagine that he possessed that too. And his murder, coming so soon after he disclosed himself to me, would make appearances against me doubly black."
"Who is to know when he disclosed himself to you? For aught the world knows, you might have been aware of your relationship for years."
"Then I was living a lie for years!"
"Do not wind round the subject so! And remember that, in very fact, you have done no harm. A week ago you did not know this secret."
"Well," Penlyn said, springing up from his chair, "things must take their course. If it comes out it must; if not, I shall never breathe a word to any one. Fate has cursed me with this trouble, I must bear it as best I can. The only thing I wish is that I had never gone to that hotel. That would also tell against me if anything was known."
"It was a pity, but it can't be helped. Now, go to Belmont, but be careful to hold your tongue."
Lord Penlyn did go to Belmont, having previously sent a telegram saying he was coming, and he travelled down in one of the special trains that was conveying a contingent of fashionable racing people to the second day at Ascot. But their joyousness, and the interest that they all took in the one absorbing subject, "What would win the Cup?" only made him feel doubly miserable. Why, he pondered, should these persons be so happy, when he was so wretched? And then, when they were tired of discussing the racing, they turned to the other great subject that was now agitating people's minds, the murder in St. James's Park. He listened with interest to all they had to say on that matter, and he found that, whatever the different opinions of the travellers in the carriage might be as to who the murderer was, they were all agreed as to the fact that it was no common murder committed for robbery, but one done for some more powerful reason.
"He stood in some one's light," one gentleman said, whom, from his appearance, Lord Penlyn took to be a barrister, "and that person has either removed him from this earth, or caused him to be removed. I should not like to be his heir, for on that man suspicion will undoubtedly fall, unless he can prove very clearly that he was miles away from London on Monday night."
Penlyn started as he heard these words. His heir! Then it would be on him that suspicion would fall if it was ever known that he was the heir; and, as he thought that, among his brother's papers, there might be something to prove that he was in such a position, a cold sweat broke out upon his forehead. How could he prove himself "miles away from London" on that night? Even the sleepy porter could not say at what time he returned to the hotel! Nothing, he reflected, could save him, if there was any document among the papers (that Stuart was probably ransacking by now) that would prove that he and Cundall were brothers.
He thought that, after all, it would be better he should tell Ida, and he made up his mind by the time he had arrived at the nearest station to Belmont, that he would do so. It would be far better that the information, startling as it might be, should come from him than from any other source. And while he was being driven swiftly over to Sir Paul's villa, he again told himself that it would be the best thing to do. Only, when he got to Belmont, he found his strength of mind begin to waver. The news of Cundall's dreadful death had had the effect of entirely breaking up the baronet's Ascot party. Every one there knew on what friendly terms the dead man had been both with father and daughter, and had been witness to the distress that both had felt at hearing the fatal tidings--Ida, indeed, had retired to her room, which she kept altogether; and consequently all the guests, with the exception of Miss Norris, had taken their departure. That young lady, whose heart was an extremely kind one, had announced that nothing should induce her to leave her dear friend until she had entirely recovered from the shock, and she had willingly abandoned the wearing of her pretty new frocks and had donned those more suited to a house of mourning; and she resigned herself to seeing no more racing, and to the loss of Mr. Fulke's agreeable conversation, and had devoted herself to administering to Ida. But, as Mr. Fulke and young Montagu had betaken themselves to an hotel not far off and had promised that they would look round before quitting the neighbourhood, she probably derived some consolation from knowing that she would see the former again.
"This is a dreadful affair, Penlyn!" the baronet said, when he received his future son-in-law in the pretty morning-room that Ida's own taste had decorated. "The shock has been bad enough to me, who looked upon Cundall as a dear friend, but it has perfectly crushed my poor girl. You know how much she liked him."
"Yes, I know," Penlyn answered, finding any reply difficult.
"Has she told you anything of what passed between them recently?" Sir Paul asked.
"No," Penlyn said, "nothing." But the question told him that Ida had informed her father of the dead man's proposal to her.
"She will tell you, perhaps, when you see her. She intends coming down to you shortly." Then changing the subject, Sir Paul said: "She tells me you met the poor fellow at Lady Chesterton's ball. I suppose you did not see him after that, until--before his death?"
Lord Penlyn hesitated. He did not know what answer to give, for, though he had no desire to tell an untruth, how could he tell his questioner of the dreadful scenes that had occurred between them after that meeting at the ball?
Then he said, weakly: "Yes; I did see him again, at 'Black's.'"
"At 'Black's!'" Sir Paul exclaimed. "I did not know he was a member."
"Nor was he. Only, one night--Friday night--he was passing and I was there, and he dropped in."
"Oh!" Sir Paul said, "I thought you were the merest acquaintances."
And then he went on to discuss the murder, and to ask if anything further was known than what had appeared in the papers? And Penlyn told him that he knew of nothing further.
"I cannot understand the object of it," the baronet said. He had had but little opportunity of talking over the miserable end that had befallen his dead friend, and he was not averse now to discuss it with one who had also known him.
"I cannot understand," he went on, "how any creature, however destitute or vile, would have murdered him for his watch and the money he might chance to have about him. There must have been some powerful motive for the crime--some hidden enemy in the background of whom no one--perhaps, not even he himself--ever knew. I wonder who will inherit his enormous wealth?"
"Why?" Penlyn asked, and as he did so it seemed as though, once again, his heart would stop beating.
"Because I should think that that man would be in a difficult position--unless he can prove his utter absence from London at the time."
To Penlyn it appeared that everything pointed in men's minds to the same conclusion, that the heir of Walter Cundall was the guilty man. Every one was of the same opinion, Sir Paul, and the man going to Ascot who seemed like a lawyer; and, as he remembered, he had himself said the same thing to Smerdon. "What would the world think of him," he had asked, "if it should come to know that they were brothers, and that, being brothers, he was the inheritor of that vast fortune?" Yes, all thought alike, even to himself.
As these reflections passed through his mind it occurred to him that, after all, it would not be well for him to disclose to Ida the fact that he and Cundall were brothers--would she not know then that he was the heir, and might she not also then look upon him as the murderer? If that idea should ever come to her mind, she was lost to him for ever. No! Philip Smerdon was right; she must never learn of the fatal relationship between them.
"By-the-way," Sir Paul said, after a pause, "what on earth ever made you go to that hotel in town? Occleve House is comfortable enough, surely!"
Again Penlyn had to hesitate before answering, and again he had to equivocate. He had gone out of the house--that he thought was no longer his--with rage in his heart against the man who had come forward, as he supposed, to deprive him of everything he possessed; and never meaning to return to it, but to openly give to those whom it concerned his reasons for not doing so. But Cundall's murder had opened the way for him to return; the letter written on the night of his death had bidden Penlyn be everything he had hitherto been; and so he had gone back, with as honest a desire in his heart to obey his brother's behest as to reinstate himself.
But those two or three days at the hotel had surprised everybody, even to his valet and the house servants; and now Sir Paul was also asking for an explanation. What a web of falsehood and deceit he was weaving around him!
"There were some slight repairs to be done," he said, "and some alterations afterwards, so I had to go out."
"Then I wonder you did not come down here. The business you had to do might have been postponed."
He could make no answer to this, and it came as a relief to him when a servant announced that Miss Raughton would see him in the drawing-room. Only, he reflected as he went to her, if she, too, should question him as her father had done, he must go mad!