The cloven foot

by M. E. Braddon

‘My father,’ cried Laura, when Mr. Leopold had taken his departure, and she and her husband were left alone, ‘my father guilty of this cruel murder! A crime of the vilest kind, without a shadow of excuse. And to think that this man’s blood flows in my veins, that your wife is the daughter of a murderer. Oh, John, it is too terrible! You must hate me. You must shrink from me with loathing.’

‘Dear love, if you had descended from a long line of criminals, you would still be to me what you have been from the first hour I knew you, the purest, the dearest, the loveliest, the best of women. But as to this scoundrel Desrolles, who imposed on your youth and inexperience—who stole into your benefactor’s gardens like a thief, seeking only gain—who extorted from your generous young heart a pity he did not deserve, and robbed you of your money,—I no more believe that he is your father than that he is mine. While his claim upon you meant no more than an annuity which it cost us no sacrifice to give, I was too careless to trouble myself about his credentials. But now that he stands revealed as the murderer of that unfortunate woman, it is our business to explode his specious tale. Will you help to do this, Laura? I can do nothing but advise, while I am tied hand and foot in this wretched place.’

‘I will do anything, dearest, anything to prove that this hateful man is not the father I lived with when I was a little child. Only tell me what I ought to do.’

‘The first thing to be done is to go down to Chiswick, and make inquiries there. Do you think you could find the house in which you lived, supposing that it is still standing?’

‘I think I could. It was in a very dull, out-of-the-way place. I can just remember that. It was called Ivy Cottage, and it was in a lane where there was never anything to be seen from the windows.’

‘Very well, darling, what you have to do is to go down to Chiswick with Sampson—we can afford to trust him with all our secrets, for he’s as true as steel—see if you can find the particular Ivy Cottage we want,—I dare say there are half-a-dozen Ivy Cottages in Chiswick, all looking out upon nothing particular,—and then discover all you can about your father’s residence in that house, and how and when he quitted it.’

‘I will go to-day, John. Why should Mr. Sampson go with me? I am not afraid of going alone.’

‘No, dear, I could not bear that. You must have our good Sampson to take care of you. He is as sharp as a needle, and, in a country where he is not tongue-tied, will be very useful. He will be here in a few minutes, and then you and he can start for Chiswick as soon as you like.’

Half-an-hour later, Laura and Mr. Sampson were seated in a railway carriage on their way to Chiswick; and in less than an hour from the time she left Clerkenwell, Laura was looking wonderingly at the lanes with which her infancy had been familiar.

There had been great changes, and she wandered about for a long time, unable to recognise a single feature in the scene, except always the river, which looked at her through the gray mistiness of a winter afternoon, like an old friend. Terraces had been built; villas of startling newness stared her in the face in every direction. Where erst had been a rustic lane there was all the teeming life of a factory.