"I wonder—oh, I wonder if she came across Percivale," said Claud, eyeing her intently. "I would give my best hat to see them meet! How she does hate him! I never saw a woman in a rage in my life really, until I saw Mrs. Frederick Orton at the inquest."
"Ah, you were there! I wish," said Wyn, "that you would tell me all about it. I have heard so few details. All that I have heard was from Mr. Fowler. He is very kind, but not a clever writer of letters. I think he is unaccustomed to it."
"Very probably. So he writes to you! I think," he looked keenly at her, "I never saw a more thoroughly first-rate fellow."
"I go every length with you, as Jac would say. He is good. I think I rejoiced over Elsa's innocence as much for his sake as for anything."
"Yes. He was splendid at the inquest. He and Percivale are a pair for never losing their tempers under any provocation. That woman contradicted him, insulted him, abused him, but he never let her get the better of him for a moment. What a curious thing human nature is! She had so nursed some sort of grudge against Miss Brabourne that it has grown into a blazing hatred, which is the ruling passion of her life. I honestly believe that to have proved the girl guilty of murder would have afforded her the keenest satisfaction. She was furious at being baulked of her revenge."
"Oh! Such a thing is inhuman—incredible! If I put such a character into one of my books, people would call it unpardonably overdrawn," said Wyn, in horror.
"I daresay; but it is true. Remember she was in a desperate frame of mind altogether. They were literally without money, and they came down there to find that the boy, from whom came their sole chance of funds, was dead. It seemed only fair that somebody should be made to suffer for Mrs. Orton's exceeding discomfort. That was all. But I believe she would do Percivale a bad turn, if she could."
"Who is Mr. Percivale?" asked Wyn.
"That's just what nobody quite knows," said Claud, with a puzzled laugh. "All I know about him is that he is a gentleman in the word's truest sense. He is very reserved; never speaks of himself, and one can't exactly ask a man straight out who his father was. He is a good deal talked about in society, as you may guess, and the society journals manufacture a fresh lie about him, on an average, once a month. He evidently dislikes publicity, for he never races that beautiful yacht of his, or gives large donations to public institutions, or opens bazaars, or lays foundation-stones, or in any other way attracts attention to himself. That made it all the more generous of him to espouse Miss Brabourne's cause so frankly. He knew what it would bring upon him. You can't think how much he had to suffer from the idiots sent down to interview him, the letters imploring him for his photograph, the journalists trying to bribe his crew to tell what their captain withheld. He could not prevent surreptitious newspaper artists from making sketches of the Swan as she lay at anchor; but his full anger blazed up when the Pen and Pencil produced a page of heads—you saw it, of course—including portraits of him, Fowler, myself, the idiot Saul, poor Godfrey, and Miss Brabourne. Where they got them from is to this day a mystery. We suppose most of them must have been done at the inquest. Ah! that was an exciting day. I can feel the enthusiasm of it now. It was splendid to see that fine fellow held up in the arms of the fisher-lads, with the sunshine blazing on him, and the bells clashing out from the tower!—the sort of thing one sees only once in a lifetime. It sounded like a bit of an old romance. I often tell Percivale he is an anachronism."
"He has a wonderful face; but it does strike one as strange that he should be so mysterious," said Wynifred. "Has he no family—no relations—no home?"