Great Porter Square: A Mystery. v. 2

by B. L. Farjeon

“Lydia is charmed with you, Frederick. She says no one in the world has ever been more attentive to her. She loves you with a sister’s love. So all things have turned out happily.”

In this miserable way three weeks passed, without anything further being said, either by her or myself, upon what was uppermost in our minds. Convinced that she was thoroughly on her guard against me, and convinced also of the necessity of my obtaining some kind of evidence before I could broach the subject to my father, I employed a private detective, who, at the end of these three weeks had something to report. The woman, it appears, went out shopping, and as nearly as I can remember I will write the detective’s words:

“The lady did not go in her carriage. She took a hansom, and drove from one shop to another, first to Regent Street, then to Bayswater, then to the Elephant and Castle. A round-about drive, but I did not lose sight of her. At the Elephant and Castle she went into Tarn’s, paying the cabman, who drove off. I have his number and the number of every cab the lady engaged. When she came out of Tarn’s, she looked about her, and went into a confectioner’s shop near at hand, where there were tables for ladies to sit at. There was nothing in that—she must have been pretty tired by that time. Lemonade and cakes were brought to her, and she made short work of them. There was nothing in that—the lady has a sweet tooth; most ladies have; but I fancied that she looked up at the clock once or twice, a little impatiently. She finished her cakes, and called for more, and before she had time to get through the second plateful, a man entered the shop, and in a careless way took his seat at the same table. As I walked up and down past the window—for it wouldn’t have done for me to have stood still staring through it all the time—I saw them talking together, friendly like. There was nothing out-of-the-way in their manner; they were talking quietly, as friends talk. After about a quarter-of-an-hour of this, the man shook hands with her, and came out of the shop. Then, a minute or two afterwards, the lady came out of the shop. She walked about a hundred yards, called a cab, drove to a jeweller’s shop in Piccadilly, discharged the cab, came out of the jeweller’s shop, took another cab, and drove home. Perhaps you can make something out of it. I can’t.”

“Is there nothing strange,” I asked, “in a lady going into a confectioner’s shop at such a distance from home, and there meeting a gentleman, with whom she remains conversing for a quarter of an hour?”

“There’s nothing strange in it to me,” replied the detective. “You don’t know the goings-on of women, sir, nor the artfulness of them. Many a lady will do more than that, just for the purpose of a harmless bit of flirtation; and they like it all the better because of the secresy and the spice of danger. No, sir, I don’t see anything in it.”

“Describe the man to me,” I said.

He did so, and in the description he gave I recognised the scoundrel, Mr. Pelham. Even now this shameful woman, married to my father, was carrying on an intrigue with her infamous lover. There was no time to lose. I must strike at once.

My first business was with the woman. If I could prevail upon her to take the initiative, and leave my father quietly without an open scandal—if I could induce her to set a price upon her absence from the country, I had no doubt that I could secure to her a sufficient sum to enable her to live in comfort, even in affluence, out of England. Then I would trust to time to heal my father’s wounds. It was a cruel blow for a son to inflict upon his father, but it was not to be borne that the matter should be allowed to continue in its present shape. Not only shame and dishonour, but other evils might spring from it.

Within a few hours I struck the first blow. I asked her for an interview. She called me into her boudoir. I should have preferred a more open room, but she sent word by a maid as treacherous as herself, whom she doubtless paid well, that if I wished to speak to her on that day it must be where she wished. I presented myself, and closed the door behind me.