Then go as soon as you like, and God be with you,’ said the Vicar, heartily. ‘But I’m afraid you will have some trouble to find the runaway heiress.’
‘I will find her,’ said Cyril, ‘if I have to wander over all the earth in search of her.’
‘And you will marry her, and she will be Lady Culverhouse after all, for of course if you married you would have to take up your title,’ said Mrs. Dulcimer. ‘It may be weak-minded on my part, but I should like Beatrix to have the title. I always used to think of her as Lady Culverhouse. Poor Kenrick!’
‘I will take her that letter, her father’s last letter—a letter which I cannot doubt contains a statement of his fatal intention—the indisputable proof of her innocence. I will put that letter in her hand, and then she shall deal with me as she likes. It must be for her to decide my fate.’
‘Why not put an advertisement in the Times,’ suggested the Vicar, ‘a carefully worded advertisement, telling her that a letter written by her father on the night before his death has come to hand, and begging her to come home, where it awaits her?’
‘If she is abroad she is not likely to see the Times,’ answered Cyril. ‘Besides, I would not vulgarize her family secrets by putting them in an advertisement, however enigmatically worded. No, it shall be my business to find her. It is a small thing for me to do—a small sacrifice, even if I were to spend seven years of my life upon the task—a small atonement for the cruel wrong I have done her.’
‘If you think that, you may as well set out,’ said the Vicar. ‘But I don’t believe your quest will take seven years of your life. Our modern civilization has set its heel on knightly enterprise. Now-a-days a man could not be chivalrous if he tried ever so hard. Railways, post-offices, electric telegraphs, have made all things easy. Romance is dead. Yes, Cyril, you must be content to be a common-place lover. You remember what old Aubrey says, “The divine arts of printing and gunpowder have frightened away Robin Goodfellow and the fairies.”’
‘You had a letter from Beatrix after she left us, Clement,’ said Mrs. Dulcimer. ‘That might be some use.’
‘Not much, I fear,’ answered the Vicar. ‘She wrote to me from Paris within a week of her leaving us, asking my forgiveness for all the trouble she had caused me. My forgiveness, poor child! As if it were not her own life she had to dispose of, and her own soul to which she was responsible for her deeds. It was a sad sweet letter, full of affection and good feeling, but it told me very little of her plans for the future, except that she meant to wander about the Continent with Madame Leonard, and that in the course of her travels she intended to visit Italy, the scene of her mother’s youth and of her mother’s death.’
‘That would be a natural desire,’ said Cyril.