He looked at me queerly for a moment, and then brought his hand down with a whack upon my shoulder.
"By Jove! Do you know, I believe you have been in love with her yourself," he said. "Now own up!"
"It is very possible," I answered, feeling that my only safety lay in answering as I did. "I have been in love with her ever since I have known her, and with all due respect to you, I shall remain so after she has become Her Grace the Duchess of Rotherhithe. If you are jealous, you will have to forbid me the house."
He laughed uproariously, his confidence quite restored by my candour. Then, with an assurance that I had better not let him catch me flirting with her, he informed me that it was time for him to be off, as he had promised to call at Wiltshire House that afternoon.
"One last question," I said, as we walked towards the door, "and I mean it seriously. What does cousin Conrad say to the arrangement?"
"I don't know what he says in the least, and what is more I don't care," he replied, an angry look coming into his face. "Between ourselves, George, I don't like that young fellow. I shall take care, once I am married, that he doesn't enter my doors."
"I think you would be wise," I said, and there the matter dropped.
When he had gone, I sat myself down to consider the situation. It displeased me for more reasons than one. Rotherhithe was my old friend. I was exceedingly fond of him, and I had no desire that his married life should prove a failure. Yet what reason had I for supposing that it would? It is true I had seen a good deal of the Countess lately, but not sufficient to be able to declare that I knew her intimately. She was a beautiful woman, an excellent hostess, the possessor of great wealth, and—though beyond her father I knew nothing of her family—evidently of gentle blood. This much was in her favour, yet there were other things which rankled in my memory, and which, had I aspired to the honour of her hand, I should have wanted explained to me. How was it that no one had ever heard of her before she appeared to dazzle all London? Was Count Reiffenburg really her cousin? Who was that mysterious foreigner who had plainly been threatening her on the morning that I had met her in the Park? And last, but not least, what was the real story of that old tramp's entrance into Wiltshire House on the night of the supposed burglary?
The most alarming question, and the most difficult of all to decide, was whether it was my duty to say anything to Rotherhithe upon the subject. He was, in the main, an easy-going, happy-go-lucky fellow, not overburdened with brains, but in every other respect a high-minded English gentleman. Yet I knew him well enough to feel sure that in a case like this he would have been the first to resent—and, looked at from his own light, quite rightly too—any aspersion that might be thrown upon the character of the woman he loved. That he was in love with her there could be no sort of doubt. One had only to look into his face to see it. But I was also fond of him, and if I knew there were anything hidden from him which he ought to know, was it not my duty, as his friend, to risk his anger, and the possible rupture of our friendship, in order to make him acquainted with it?
For the remainder of the day I debated this question seriously with myself, but try how I would I was quite unable to arrive at a satisfactory decision regarding it. This much, however, I did do—common politeness demanded it of me: I sat down and wrote a note of congratulation to the Countess. Though I knew in my heart it was a somewhat traitorous proceeding, yet, when the note had been despatched, I must confess I felt easier in my mind. A twinge of conscience, however, still remained to plague me. If only I had not taken the walk that night, or if only I had been too late to see the old man enter the house, I should have been able to regard the whole affair, if not with pleasure, at least with a measure of equanimity. Now, however, it was otherwise.