She fell upon the couch and buried her face in her hands. Captain Ferrers looked at her quizzically for a moment, but the smile at his lips was not a pleasant one. Then he tossed his chin and walked towards the door.
“Very well, then! Until to-morrow.” He took his hat and was gone.
For some moments Mistress Barbara lay there as one stricken and unable to move. But at last, with a struggle, she broke the seal of the packet which she had held tightly clutched in her hand. Then, while the sun gilded again the chimney-pots opposite her, one by one she read over the papers before her—the attestation of the nurse, Marie Graillot, and the witnesses, Anton Gratz and Pierre Dauvet; the last testament of Eloise de Bresac, and her confession; the statement of the priest who had confessed her, and the description of the child; all sworn and properly subscribed to before an official of the parish of Saint-Jacques. Then there were some letters from Juan d’Añasco, clear proof of Henry Heywood and Wilfred Clerke’s complicity in the plot. The tears came to her eyes and made even dimmer the blur of the ink in the faded documents. At last the letters became indistinct, and she could read no more.
Far into the night she lay there. Her duenna would have entered, but she sent her away. Servants came with food, but she refused to eat. At last, when the reflection from the passing links no longer flashed in fiery red across her ceiling, and the sounds of the street were no longer loud or frequent, she arose, and, putting her head out of the window, looked up at the quiet stars. The cool air bathed her brow, and the tranquillity and all-pervading equality of peace helped her to her resolution.
The next day, as Captain Stephen Ferrers presented himself at Mistress Clerke’s lodgings, he was given a letter.
This is the cry of a soul that suffers [it ran]. I have read one by one the papers you have given me, and from them an iron resolution has been forged—forged with the warmth of passion and tempered with the wet of tears. Yesterday I was your promised wife. Unless you wish to be released, I am the same to-day. But this morning every estate that I possess, every revenue—all my fortune, in fact, down to the last penny—has been placed under the Crown, where it will remain until the rightful heir of the estates of De Bresac is found. Believe me, this decision of mine is irrevocable. If you would claim me for yourself under these new conditions, I shall still be the same to you.
Barbara.
Captain Ferrers left the house in some haste. A week later he went to France upon a commission to purchase guns for the Royal Artillery. And Mistress Barbara Clerke sailed as duenna to Señorita de Batteville, the daughter of the Spanish Ambassador, to visit the señorita’s uncle, who was governor of a castle at Porto Bello, upon the Spanish Main.