So I led her back to the Crown and that same day she took her departure and I have never seen her since. One letter, it is true, I had from her of which I will tell you in due course.
Then I returned to Mr. Redman.
"Jack," he said, "I am going without further discussion to warn the manager not to send any more money to these attorneys and to disregard their orders. I shall write at once warning them that we have now in our hands clear proof that my client is not married to Lord Fylingdale, and that we are considering in what manner we should proceed with regard to the large sums that have been remitted to his orders. This, Jack, is the way of lawyers. We write such a letter knowing that we shall not proceed further in this direction, for the scandal would be very great and the profit would be very small. Besides, there is the awkward fact that we made no protest, but submitted. Yet sure and certain I am that the other side will not dare to go into court, being conscious of guilt, yet not knowing how much we have learned."
"It seems a tame ending that villainy should get off unpunished."
"Not unpunished, Jack. You young men look to see the lightning strike the wicked man. That is not the way, believe me. He never goes unpunished, though he may be forgiven. I look not for the flash of lightning to strike this man dead, but I look for the vengeance of the Lord—perhaps to-day, perhaps to-morrow."
He read over again the paper signed by Lady Anastasia. "It is a strange confession," he said. "There is the wrath of a jealous woman in it. He might have beaten her and cuffed her; he might have robbed her; and she would have forgiven him. But he has followed after strange goddesses. She spoke about the jewels. I suppose that he has long since given them to these strange goddesses. Hence her repentance. Hence her revenge. Jack, I think we ought to have the other confederate's confession—that of the man Purdon. He wanted £12,000 for it at first. He then came down to £6,000; he now offers it for relief of his present necessities. I will send my attorney to see him. The vicar refuses to have any dealings with scoundrels. In this case, however, it might be politic to traffic with him. We will offer him £100 for a full confession. I will instruct my attorney what particulars to expect."
My story is nearly finished. Molly recovered her freedom with the loss of by far the greater part of her fortune. She had, indeed, nothing left except her fleet and the trade carried on by the firm in which she was sole partner. Still she remained the richest woman in the town.
There was no difficulty in procuring from the Reverend Mr. Purdon a full statement of the conspiracy. It was, of course, to be expected that he should represent Lord Fylingdale as the contriver and the proposer of the abominable design. However, he gave under safeguards of witness and signature a plain recital of what had happened, in which he was borne out by the other confession in our hands.
And here follows the letter from the Lady Anastasia.
"My dear Jack," she said, "news reaches Lynn slowly if it gets there at all. Therefore I hasten to inform you that an end has come—perhaps the end that you would desire. My lord is no more. I am a widow. Yet I mourn not. My husband in name during the last twelve months has acted as one no longer in command of himself. I cannot think, indeed, that he has been in his right mind since he entered upon that great crime of which you know. He would have gone from bad to worse, and I should have suffered more and still more. He killed himself. He placed the muzzle of a pistol within his mouth and so killed himself.