"The moment to speak is past," he said to himself.
Had it ever been present?
CHAPTER XLV
Dieu n'oublíe personne. Il visite tout le monde.—VINET.
Hugh did not sleep that night.
His escape had been too narrow. He shivered at the mere thought of it. It had never struck him as possible that Rachel and Lady Newhaven had known of the drawing of lots. Now that he found they knew, sundry small incidents, unnoticed at the time, came crowding back to his memory. That was why Lady Newhaven had written so continually those letters which he had burned unread. That was why she had made that desperate attempt to see him in the smoking-room at Wilderleigh after the boating accident. She wanted to know which had drawn the short lighter. That explained the mysterious tension which Hugh had noticed in Rachel during the last days in London before—before the time was up. He saw it all now. And, of course, they naturally supposed that Lord Newhaven had committed suicide. They could not think otherwise. They were waiting for one of the two men to do it.
"If Lord Newhaven had not turned giddy and stumbled on to the line, if he had not died by accident when he did," said Hugh to himself, "where should I be now?"
There was no answer to that question.
What was the use of asking it? He was dead. And, fortunately, the two women firmly believed he had died by his own hand. Hugh as firmly believed that the death was accidental.