Elizabeth smiled.
“I did,” she answered, “naturally.”
“Tell me about last night,” Tavernake said. “I suppose I am stupid but I don't quite understand.”
“How should you?” she answered. “Listen, then. Wenham, I suppose got tired of being shut up with Mathers, although I am sure I don't see what else was possible. So he waited for his opportunity, and when the man wasn't looking—well, you know what happened,” she added, with a shiver. “He got up to London somehow and made his way to Dover Street.”
“Why Dover Street?”
“I suppose you know,” Elizabeth explained, “that Wenham has a brother—Jerry—who is exactly like him. These two had rooms in Dover Street always, where they kept some English clothes and a servant. Jerry Gardner was over in London. I knew that, and was expecting to see him every day. Wenham found his way to the rooms, dressed himself in his brother's clothes, even wore his ring and some of his jewelry, which he knew I should recognize, and came here. I believed—yes, I believed all the time,” she went on, her voice trembling, “that it was Jerry who was sitting with me. Once or twice I had a sort of terrible shiver. Then I remembered how much they were alike and it seemed to me ridiculous to be afraid. It was not till we got upstairs, till the door was closed behind me, that he turned round and I knew!”
Her head fell suddenly into her hands. It was almost the first sign of emotion. Tavernake analyzed it mercilessly. He knew very well that it was fear, the coward's fear of that terrible moment.
“And now?”
“Now,” she went on, more cheerfully, “no one will venture to deny that Wenham is mad. He will be placed under restraint, of course, and the courts will make me an allowance. One thing is absolutely certain, and that is that he will not live a year.”
Tavernake half closed his eyes. Was there no sign of his suffering, no warning note of the things which were passing out of his life! The woman who smiled upon him seemed to see nothing. The twitching of his fingers, the slight quivering of his face, she thought was because of his fear for her.