Kent-Lauriston fully realised that the strong hold which he possessed over the Secretary rested, more than anything else, on the fact that his opinions were entirely reliable; and it was most important that Stanley’s confidence in his friend’s dicta should remain unimpaired, if that friend hoped to be able to guide him. Therefore, much as the Englishman would have liked to voice his suspicions for the Secretary’s benefit, he determined to keep silence till he had full verification of his conjectures, and for this purpose he sought out Madame Darcy.

He found her at home, and she welcomed him courteously.

“Will you think me very presuming,” he said, “to have called on you in the interests of a mutual friend of ours, Mr. Stanley?”

“Any friend of Mr. Stanley’s can claim and receive friendship of me,” she replied, a beautiful light coming over her expressive face, “for he has done me kindnesses that I can never forget or repay.”

“It is in virtue of that, that I’ve ventured to intrude myself upon you this afternoon. You have, like myself, a great interest in his welfare, I’m sure, and I am come to make common cause with you for his good.”

“You could have come to no one more willing but will you do me the honour to accept a seat in the garden, where we can chat more at leisure.”

“I shall be charmed,” he said, and she led the way to a rustic bench, under the spreading branches of a gnarled, old apple-tree.

“Our friend makes no secrets of his own affairs from me, you must understand,” Kent-Lauriston began, after assuring himself that they were alone, “and I imagine, from what he’s said, that he’s given you some inkling of his heart troubles.”

“Yes,” she said, “he hinted to me in London that he had some affair under consideration; but I do not think he felt deeply as he should have felt. I trust it’s not turned out seriously.”

“Not as yet, I’m glad to say but he’s in some danger; and, believe me, you could not be doing him a greater service, than in helping to ward off this peril, which would be the ruin of his life.”

“Indeed, yes, but what means have I?”

“I believe you have it in your power to prove that the woman who has bewitched him, is unworthy of his love. Let him realise this and he is saved.”

“But, surely, you’re not alluding to the lady who formed our topic of conversation this morning?”

“I fear I am.”

“But Mr. Stanley assured me that she was nothing to him.”

“You were talking at cross purposes, and unintentionally deceiving each other.”

“How so?”

“Why, there are two versions of the story of that marriage. The version Mr. Stanley had been told runs to this effect: that Lieutenant Kingsland married Lady Isabelle McLane.”

But the register

“Says she didn’t. I know, I’ve seen it; but our young friend has not, or had not when he last saw you.”

“Then he thought I was referring to Lady Isabelle?”

“Exactly. No names were mentioned, he told me.”

“True but this is most unfortunate! Do you see my position?”

“Believe me, I’m fully informed on the matter, so that I’ll not put you to the pain of relating it.”

She bowed her silent thanks, and then continued:

The fact of this ladys marriage ties my hands. Deeply as she has wronged me, have I any right to ruin her husbands life by her exposure? If she has reformed

“My dear Madame Darcy, pray disabuse your mind of two misconceptions: the lady in question, Miss Fitzgerald, has not reformed, and I doubt if the marriage is legal. There’s some trick about it.”

“What you’ve told me leaves me free to act where my own honour is concerned; but I naturally feel a delicacy about interfering in Mr. Stanley’s private affairs.”

“Believe me, I fully appreciate your hesitation; but that there may be no misunderstanding between us regarding this important matter, let me tell you something of my friend’s present position. I ask you to accept my word for it, that he’s not as yet bound himself to Miss Fitzgerald; but his high sense of honour may lead him to do so, if he knows nothing definite against her.”

“I see, and you want me to show him these letters?” and she took a little packet from her bosom.

“No, I wouldn’t subject you to such a trying ordeal. I ask you to let me show the letters to him. Remember that you’ve told him that you have them.”

“Yes,” she said, after a moment’s hesitation. “I think you’re right. You assure me that he does not love her, and that there’s positive danger that he may marry her from a sense of duty.”

“I assure you that such is the case.”

“Then take them,” she said, giving him the letters; “but promise me that no one besides yourselves shall see them, and that they shall be safely returned to me by to-morrow.”

“I promise,” he replied, “and take my assurance that in doing this you’ve more than repaid him for any services he may have done you.”

“You cannot persuade me to believe that; but I’m thankful to help where I’m able, though it be only a little, and I am even more thankful that he has such a strong champion in you.”

Kent-Lauriston took her extended hand.

“Thank you,” he said heartily. “Stanley’s a good fellow; too good and too unsophisticated for the people he’s thrown with, and I’m going to save him from himself if I can, both now and in the future.”

She looked up at him with a wistful light in her eyes, saying:

“Perhaps you’ll be wishing to save him from me who’ve already one husband too many.”

“I don’t know,” replied Kent-Lauriston, with an English bluntness, of which he was not often culpable.

She laughed merrily, answering:

“I hope you’ll do so, if ever I give you cause.”

“Madame,” he returned, “what can I do? You’ve disarmed me, even before the first skirmish.”

The feelings of Stanley on looking at the marriage register were difficult to describe. In the first shock of the discovery his brain whirled. The mystery had become a maze, and he felt the imperative need of a solution of the subject to steady his mind. Accordingly, he had that evening a fixed purpose in view, which dominated all matters of the moment; and though at dinner he talked about something, he knew not what, during the greater part of the meal his eyes and thoughts were almost continually on the amiable blundering, little old pastor, whom he had marked out as his prey. When the ladies left the table, and the men adjourned to the smoking-room, he never lost sight of him; but the dominie, as if warned by some instinct, contrived to slip out of the Secretary’s grasp, to elude him in corners, and, smiling, vanquish him in every attempt at an interview. At last, however, the opportunity came a move was made to the drawing-room. In a fatal moment, the parson lingered for one last whiff of his half-smoked and regretfully relinquished cigar, and the Secretary saw, with a sigh of relief, the last coat-tail vanish through the door, which he softly closed.

The click of the latch brought the Reverend Reginald back to the present with an uncomfortable start.

“Oh,” he cried, tumbling out of his chair, “I didn’t see the others had got away so quickly. Very kind of you to wait for me, I’m sure very we must lose no time in joining the ladies, must we, eh?”

“Only a little, a very little time, Mr. Lambert,” replied the Secretary, leaning squarely against the closed door, which formed the sole exit from the room. “Just long enough to ask you one question.”

“Really, I’m sure,” said the little man, becoming flustered. “Another time perhaps I should have the greatest pleasure

“You have, I know, performed the marriage ceremony in the last few days,” began Stanley calmly.

“To be sure yes, certainly but this permit me to suggest, is hardly the place to discuss my parochial duties.”

“Of course anyone married from this house would have to be married by you.”

“I’m in charge of this living, Mr. Stanley, there is no one else.”

“I know that, and also that your nearest colleague excuse me if I use a professional term is some distance off.”

“Fifteen miles. And now that I’ve answered all of your questions, let us waste no more time before joining the ladies.”

“Excuse me, Mr. Lambert, but I’ve not as yet asked you a question. I’ve made a number of statements, and you’ve furnished me with a good deal of gratuitous information, for which I’m deeply obliged. We now come to the pith of the whole matter, which is simply this. Did you, or did you not, marry Lady Isabelle McLane to Lieutenant Kingsland?”

“What! The lady to whom you’re engaged?”

“Could I be engaged to a married woman, Mr. Lambert?”

“My dear sir, you may take my word for it, I did not. I shouldn’t think of such a thing. Let me assure you on the honour of my sacred office, that Lady Isabelle is not, and cannot be married to Lieutenant Kingsland.”

“Ah, then Kingsland is married.”

The parson caught his breath in his relief at the escape from the dreaded question, which he had supposed was inevitable. He had been too confidential.

“I did not say so, sir,” he replied with dignity.

“Quite true, Mr. Lambert, you did not say so,” persisted his tormentor, opening the door, “and so I suppose you’d prefer not to have me ask if you married Miss Fitzgerald to Lieutenant Kingsland?”

“I would certainly prefer not to answer that question, and now I must really go upstairs;” and without waiting for further parley, the little man scuttled out of the room.

Stanley was preparing to follow him at his leisure, when the door opened, and Kent-Lauriston entered.

“Kent-Lauriston!” he exclaimed. “You’re the very man I want! I must speak with you!”

“I know it,” replied his friend, “but not before I’ve had my smoke.”

“But this matter admits of no delay.”

“Oh yes, it does. That’s one of the fallacies of modern civilisation. Every important question admits of delay, and most matters are all the better for it.”

“But I’ve seen the register!”

“Of course you have, but you haven’t seen a deduction that is as plain as the nose on your face, or you wouldn’t now be trying to ruin my digestion. I’ll meet you here at ten o’clock this evening and then, and not an instant sooner, will I discuss your private affairs.”

“You English are so irritatingly slow!”

“My dear fellow, we’ve made our history you’re making yours. You can’t afford to miss a few days; we can easily spare a few centuries. Now be a good boy, and leave me to peace and tobacco. Join the ladies, and pay a little attention to one of your fiancees.”

So it was that Stanley found himself relegated to the drawing-room, and feeling decidedly upset, he good-naturedly determined to see what he could do towards upsetting the equanimity of the rest of the party. In this, however, he was partially forestalled by the good parson, who had not been wasting the few minutes of grace, which the Secretary’s conversation with Kent-Lauriston had allotted to him.

No sooner had Mr. Lambert entered the drawing-room, than he sought out Miss Fitzgerald, and confided to her an astonishing discovery he had made in the church register.

“Most careless of me, I assure you,” he apologised. “I should have noticed of course people often make nervous mistakes at times like those; but it was not till this morning that I discovered that Lady Isabelle had written her name in the space reserved for the bride, and you in the space reserved for the witness.”

“Well?” asked Miss Fitzgerald, her voice ringing hard and cold as steel.

“Oh, it’s all right, my dear,” the old man quavered on. “Quite all right, I corrected it myself. I can do a neat bit of work still, even if my hands do tremble a little. I cut out the names, reversed them, and put them back in their proper places, and I’d defy any but an expert to see that they’d been tampered with. I’m sure that none of the people who’ve seen the book since suspected the change.”

“Who has seen the book?” she asked, frozen with horror.

“After I corrected the register?”

“Yes! Yes! Who?”

“Dear me let me see! That was this morning. Now who was there? Ah! I remember. A strange lady in black, very beautiful, and Mr. Kent-Lauriston.”

Miss Fitzgerald shuddered.

“Dear, dear!” cried the parson. “You’re cold the draught from the window let me get you a wrap.”

“No, no, I’m quite warm, thank you. You’re sure that no one else saw the register?”

“No one except Mr. Stanley.”

“You must excuse me, Mr. Lambert,” she said. “I’m not feeling very well.”

“You are faint? Is there nothing I can do for you?”

“Nothing more, thank you,” and she swept past him across the room, to where Lady Isabelle was seated on a sofa.

“Nothing more,” murmured the little man, after she had left him; “but I hadn’t begun to do anything; and she seemed quite faint. Dear, dear, she looks strong, but to be so easily upset, I fear something must be wrong my daughter was never like that,” and, shaking his head, he went to join the Dowager, who had a penchant for the clergy.

“You’ve heard nothing from your husband?” asked Miss Fitzgerald of Lady Isabelle, as she seated herself beside her.

“Nothing beyond a telegram telling me of his safe arrival in London.”

“But surely his uncle was in extremis. He cannot live long.”

“I do not know,” she replied, “but it’s very awkward. Oh, why won’t you let me tell Mr. Stanley the truth?”

“Sh! He’s coming,” murmured Miss Fitzgerald, and, indeed, the Secretary was advancing deliberately towards them; a thing suggestive in itself, considering how he had striven to avoid them all day long.

“Miss Fitzgerald,” he said very quietly, as he stood before them, “will you permit me to ask you a question?”

“If it’s a proper question to ask, Mr. Stanley.”

“It is eminently proper and fitting,” he replied, coldly.

“Would you rather that I went?” suggested Lady Isabelle, half rising.

“I would rather you stayed.”

“Don’t be so dreadfully mysterious, Jimsy!” cried Miss Fitzgerald, with a forced laugh that grated on the ears of both her hearers. “Out with your dreadful question. What is it?”

“It is this,” he replied. “Are you Jack Kingsland’s wife?”

For a moment there was absolute silence. The Secretary stood looking straight in the face of the Irish girl, without moving a muscle. Lady Isabelle gave a smothered exclamation, and gripped her companion’s wrist with all her force, flushing red as she did so. Miss Fitzgerald bit her lip, and stared hard at Stanley for the fraction of a minute; then, breaking into her hard metallic laugh, she cried:

“Why, you foolish boy! What can you be thinking of?”

“You’ve not answered my question,” he replied.

“Why, what is there to answer?”

“I ask you Are you Lieutenant Kingsland’s wife?” he repeated harshly betraying the first sign of temper he had so far evinced, which Miss Fitzgerald saw and was quick to profit by. Whatever was coming there was, in Lady Isabelle’s presence, but one course open to her she looked her accuser boldly in the face and said:

“No, I’m not Lieutenant Kingsland’s wife.”

“You are quite sure of what you are saying?”

“I repeat, I am not his wife. I have not married him, put it how you please. Do you doubt my word? If you’re so anxious to know whom Lieutenant Kingsland married, ask your fiancee, Lady Isabelle; perhaps she can tell you.”

“It’s not necessary to ask Lady Isabelle if she is Lieutenant Kingsland’s wife because

“Because she has already told you so,” broke in Miss Fitzgerald.

Because, continued Stanley, in the same colourless, dogged tone, because Mr. Lambert, the one person who could have made Kingsland and Lady Isabelle man and wife, has solemnly assured me that he did not perform the marriage ceremony between them ” and he turned on his heel and left the room.