Yes, Mrs. Vane would send. And then the doctor went to look once more at Hubert, of whose condition he again seemed somewhat doubtful; and afterwards he took his leave. When he had gone, Mrs. Vane also departed, taking her docile husband back with her to the Grosvenor Hotel. She had gained her point and was secretly triumphant; for she had secured the presence of a spy upon Cynthia, and could depend upon Sabina Meldreth to give a full account of Miss West's habits and visitors.
Flossy had great faith in her system of espionage. She sent Parker at once with a note summoning Sabina to the hotel, and there she laid her plans. Sabina was to go that very night to Mr. Lepel's rooms, and was to make herself as useful as she could. It was presumed that Cynthia had not seen with sufficient clearness for the encounter to be a source of danger the woman in black who had followed Westwood to Kensington Gardens. Sabina was told to keep herself in the background as much as possible—to be silent and serviceable, but, above all, to be observant; for it was likely that Westwood would try to communicate with his daughter, and, if he did so, Sabina would perhaps be able to track him down.
Flossy had completely lost all fear for herself in the excitement of her discoveries. It seemed to her that she and her secret were entirely safe. Nobody, she thought, had ever known of her understanding with Sydney Vane in days gone by; nobody had any clue to the secret of his death; so long as Hubert was silent, she had nothing at all to fear; and Hubert had succumbed to her for so long that she did not dread him now. Nothing seemed to her more unlikely than that after so many years he should deliberately divest himself of name and fame, clear Westwood's reputation at the cost of his own, and sacrifice his freedom for the sake of a scruple of conscience. Flossy did not believe him foolish enough or self-denying enough to do all that—and in her estimate of her brother's character perhaps, after all, Flossy was very nearly right.
Sabina Meldreth presented herself to Cynthia and Mrs. Jenkins that evening, and was not very graciously received. However, she proved herself both capable and willing, and was speedily acknowledged—by Mrs. Jenkins, at least—to be "a great help in the house." Cynthia said nothing; she hardly seemed to know that a stranger was present. Her whole soul was absorbed in the task of nursing Hubert. When he slept, she did not leave the house; she lay on a sofa in another room. She could not bear to be far away from Hubert; and more and more, as the days went on and the delirium was not subdued, did she shrink from the knowledge that any other ears beside her own should hear the ravings of the patient—should marvel at the extraordinary things he said, and wonder whether or no there was any truth in them.
"He talked in this way because he has brooded over my poor father's fate!" Cynthia said to herself, with piteous insistence. "He must have been so much distressed at finding that I was the daughter of Andrew Westwood that his mind dwelt on all the details of the trial; and now he fancies almost that he did the deed himself. I have read of such strange delusions in books. When he is better, no doubt the delusion will die away. It shows how powerfully his mind was affected by what I told him—the constant cry that he sees no way out of it shows how he must have brooded over the matter. No way out of it indeed, my darling, until the person who murdered Mr. Vane is discovered and brought to justice! And I almost believe that my father is right, and that the murderer, directly or indirectly, was Mrs. Vane."
To Cynthia, Hubert's ravings were the more painful, because they bore almost entirely upon what had been the great grief—the tragedy—of her life. He spoke much of Sydney Vane, of Florence, and of Cynthia herself, but in such strange connection that at times she hardly knew what was his meaning, or whether he had any definite meaning. Presently, however, it appeared to her as if one or two ideas ran through the whole warp and woof of his imaginings. One was the conviction that in some way or another he must take Westwood's place—give himself up to justice and set Westwood free. Another was the belief that it was utterly impossible for Cynthia ever to forgive him for what he had done, and that the person chiefly responsible for all the misery and shame and disgrace, which had fallen so unequally on the heads of those concerned in "the Beechfield tragedy," was no other than Florence Vane.
Farther than these vague statements he did not go. He never said in so many words that he was guilty of Sydney Vane's death, and that he, and not Westwood, ought to have borne the punishment. Yet he said enough to give Cynthia cause for great unhappiness. She tried not to believe that there was any foundation of truth for his words; but she could not succeed. The ideas were too persistent, too logical, to be altogether the fruit of imagination. More and more she clung to the belief that Flossy was responsible for Mr. Vane's sudden death, that Hubert knew it, and that for his sister's sake he had concealed the truth. If this were so, it would be terrible indeed; and yet Cynthia had a soft corner in her heart for the man who had sacrificed his own honor to conceal his sister's sin.
Cynthia did not go back to Madame della Scala's house. Flossy had done her work with the singing-mistress as she had done it elsewhere. She blackened Cynthia's name wherever she went. So, two days after the girl's departure from Norton Square, her boxes and all her belongings were sent to her from her former home without a word of apology or explanation. She felt that she was simply turned out of Madame's house—that she could never hope to go back to it again. She was now absolutely homeless; and she was also without employment; for she had withdrawn from several engagements to sing at concerts, and at more than one private house she had received an intimation that her services could be dispensed with. No reason in these cases was given; but it was plain that the world did not think Miss West a very reputable person, and that society had turned its back upon her. Cynthia had not leisure to think what this would mean for her in the future; at present she cared for nothing but her duties in Hubert Lepel's sick-room.
Her boxes were deposited at last in Mrs. Jenkins' little house at the back; and there a small room was appropriated to Cynthia's use. She was "supposed to be lodging at Mrs. Jenkins'," as Sabina told her mistress; but she practically lived in Hubert's rooms. Still it was a comfort to her to think that she had that little room to retire to when Hubert should recover consciousness; and till then she did not care where or how she lived.
Sabina found little to report to Mrs. Vane, who had now returned to Beechfield. Cynthia went nowhere, and received neither visitors nor letters. She had been interviewed by the police-officials; but they had not been able to get any information from her. As for Andrew Westwood, he seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth; and some of the authorities at Scotland Yard went so far as to say that the report made to them of his discovery must have been either an illusion of the fancy or pure invention on the part of Sabina Meldreth and Mrs. Vane.