CHAPTER XX.
AN UNTIMELY ARRIVAL.
In the early dawn of a gray wild morning, Sir Harold Wynde, Lord Towyn, and Mr. Atkins arrived at Inverness. They proceeded directly to the Railway Hotel, and secured bedrooms and sitting-room, and ordered breakfast. Some attention to their toilet was necessary, and after baths and vigorous brushing, they met in their sitting-room, and here a very tempting Scottish breakfast was served to them.
They were still lingering at the table, discussing their future movements, when a knock was heard at the door, and the detective who had been set to watch Rufus Black entered the room.
He was a thin, small man, with a sharp business face, and looked the very ideal of a keen commercial traveler, and Sir Harold for the moment supposed that such was his vocation, and that the man had strayed into the wrong room. This impression was speedily corrected.
“Good-morning, my lord,” said the officer, addressing himself to the young earl. “Expected your lordship up yesterday. Good-morning, Mr. Atkins. Fine morning, sir—for Scotland. My lord, can I see you alone for a few minutes?”
“Say what you have to say here, Ryan,” said the young earl. “Mr. Atkins is a fellow-guardian of the young lady of whom we are in search, and this gentleman, Mr. Hunlow, is also a friend of Miss Wynde. Speak out, therefore. Have you any news?”
The detective glanced half uneasily at the baronet, whose striking face announced that he was no common personage. The gray hair and gray military beard had not greatly changed Sir Harold’s looks, but Ryan had never seen the baronet before, and of course conceived no suspicion of his identity.
The baronet arose and went to the hearth, sitting down before the fire, his face half turned away from the detective, who again addressed himself to Lord Towyn.
“There is news, my lord,” he announced. “I succeeded in tracing Rufus Black up to this place. He stopped at the Caledonian. In fact, he is stopping there now.”
The young earl’s face kindled with excitement.
“Then we cannot be far from Miss Wynde!” he exclaimed. “He has stopped two or three days at Inverness, and that proves that he has not much further to go. Has he been out of Inverness since he came?”
The detective’s face clouded a little.
“Rufus Black arrived at Inverness the day before yesterday,” he said. “Upon the afternoon of the very day on which he arrived, while I was at dinner, he went off in a cab, and did not return till late in the evening. I was lounging about the door when he came back, and he looked the very picture of despair, and came in recklessly and went to his room.”
“That proves that Miss Wynde is not many miles from here,” said Lord Towyn. “His despair may be readily accounted for, if he had just come from an interview with her.”
“Yesterday,” continued the officer, “he strolled about the town all the forenoon, and went down to the river, and visited the wharves on the Canal, and seemed to be making up his mind to something that required courage. After luncheon at the Caledonian, he took a cab and went off again, not returning till midnight last night.”
“And you followed him?” cried Atkins.
“What, and put that sharp old ferret Craven Black on his guard!” ejaculated Ryan, in astonishment. “No, sir. We’ve got an uncommon pair to deal with. Mr. Black and his lady are as shrewd and keen as any old stagers I ever knew. It wouldn’t do to let them suspect that we are on their track, or they would outwit us yet, and perhaps put this young lady in peril. People do a many things when they get desperate that will do them no good, and is sure to harm them if found out.”
A stifled groan came from Sir Harold. Ryan shot a quick, suspicious glance at him.
“Then you are at a stand-still, Ryan,” said Mr. Atkins impatiently. “You have treed the game and sat down to wait for us?”
“By no means, sir,” answered Ryan deliberately. “I saw the cabby after Rufus Black had gone to bed, and arf-a-crown drew out of the fellow all that he knew. Mind you my lord, that gold and silver make the best cork-screws in existence. The cabby owned up all he knew, as I said, and a pity it wasn’t more. He drove out with his fare to an estate called Heather Hills, between this and Nairn, on the coast, and a wild, bleak spot it is, according to cabby. They went up a long drive and stopped in a carriage porch, and Rufus Black he knocked and rung, and a house-maid came to the door, and he asked her something, and she pointed down the coast. And, telling cabby to wait, young Black went down the bluffs and struck across the fields. Cabby put an oil-cloth on his horse, for the wind was blowing free and strong from the sea, and sat there on his box, and sat there till it began to grow dark and he began to swear a blue streak; and then, at last, young Black came back with a young lady dressed in black upon his arm, a hanging on to him so very fond, and a looking up at him so very tender, that cabby saw that they were lovers.”
“Impossible!” cried Lord Towyn, turning pale. “I will stake my very soul on Miss Wynde’s courage, and her fidelity to me. No personal fears, no cruelty even, could drive her into accepting Rufus Black. I know her brave and glorious nature; I know that she could never know a moment of weakness or yielding. The cabman has deceived you, Ryan.”
“No, my lord,” said the detective doggedly. “I’ll stake anything your lordship likes on his good faith. Rufus Black hung over the lady as if the ground wasn’t good enough for her to walk on, and she smiled up at him as loving as—as a basket of chips,” said Ryan, at fault for a simile, and concluding his comparison rather ignominiously. “The lady saw cabby, and says she, blushing and smiling, ‘The gentleman will stay to dinner, and you can put up your horses in the stable,’ says she, ‘and go into the servants’ hall and get a glass of ale and your dinner.’ And cabby put up his horses, and went into the kitchen.”
“A queer story,” muttered Atkins. “Perhaps Miss Wynde was playing a part—pretending to love Rufus Black in order to throw her jailers off their guard, and so obtain a chance of escape?”
The young earl’s face now flushed.
“I can’t understand it,” he said. “It is not like Miss Wynde to play such a part, even to effect her escape from her enemies. She is truth incarnate. She could never summon to her lips those false smiles; she could never for one moment allow Rufus Black to consider himself her favored lover.”
“The earl is right,” said Sir Harold. “Neva could never play such a part. She is too truthful and straightforward.”
The detective bent another quick glance at the baronet.
“Did the cabman make any further discoveries?” inquired Atkins.
“One or two, of some importance,” said Ryan. “In the first place, there were too few servants for so grand a house. In the second place, the young lady, with an older woman, had come up here within a week. In the third place, the house-maid said that her young mistress was called Miss Wroat, but that that was not her real name, for the young gentleman had asked for her by another name. And altogether, an air of mystery seems to hang about the young lady. But the fact of the most importance of all is, that on the way home from Heather Hills last night, young Black got up on the box with the cabby, and asked him no end of questions about the Scotch laws concerning marriage—if licenses were necessary, if publication of banns was usual, and so on. And the young man asked him which was the best church to step into for a quiet, informal marriage, without license or publication of banns, but the marriage to be perfectly legal and binding.”
“Ah!” said Atkins. “That begins to look as if he meant business.”
“Young Black seemed to be in gay humor all the way home,” said Ryan. “He sung to himself, and talked and laughed, and acted as if he had had a fortune left to him. And as they drove into Inverness, he told the cabby that he wanted him to take him to church this morning at a quarter to ten o’clock, and he told him that he was going to be married to a great heiress whom he adored.”
“Is there not some mistake?” asked Lord Towyn excitedly. “Can he be in love with some other lady?”
“I should say not,” said Atkins dryly. “Heiresses are not as plenty as oat cakes in Scotland. He’s been courting Miss Wynde since last July, and was dead in love with her, as any one could see. He could not shift his affections so soon, and fix them upon another heiress. The young lady is Miss Wynde, fast enough. And she is either deluding him, meaning to denounce him to the minister at the altar, or to escape from him in Inverness, or else her courage is weakened, and she believes herself helpless, and has yielded to her enemies in a fit of despair.”
“If she were alone upon the cliffs, she might then have attempted an escape,” said Lord Towyn, thoroughly puzzled. “I cannot feel that this smiling, loving bride is Neva. I know she is not. But we will present ourselves at the marriage, and if the bride be Neva, we will save her!”
“I cannot think that she is Neva,” said Sir Harold thoughtfully. “And yet, as Atkins says, where could he have found another heiress so soon? And how, if he loved Neva so devotedly, could he be so deeply in love with this young lady who has just come up to Inverness?”
“She comes from Kent,” said Ryan. “The housemaid has heard her speak of being at Canterbury within the month.”
“That settles it!” cried Atkins. “It is Miss Wynde!”
“Ryan,” exclaimed Lord Towyn, “you must go now and discover to what church Rufus Black is going. We will wait here for you to guide us.”
Ryan bowed and departed.
He was gone until nearly ten o’clock, and the time dragged heavily to Neva’s friends, who remained in their closed sitting-room, exchanging surmises and doubts, and preparing themselves for an encounter with Craven Black and Octavia.
Sir Harold put on his greatcoat and turned up his collar, and wound a gray woolen muffler about the lower part of his face. He was standing thus disguised, hat in hand, when Ryan came back and quietly slipped into the room.
“The cab is waiting,” announced the detective. “I have been at Rufus Black’s heels ever since I left you. When I got back to the Caledonian, he was just going out in his cab. I rode on top as a friend of the driver, who was won over to make a friend of me by a gift of a crown. We drove to the minister’s, and to the sexton’s, and finally to a jeweller’s, where Black bought a ring. We then went back to the hotel. And a few minutes ago young Black entered his cab again, and gave the order ‘to the church.’ I know the church, and we must get on our way to reach it, if we expect to get there in time to stop the ceremony.”
Sir Harold and Lord Towyn hurried impetuously out of the room and down the stairs, and were seated in the cab when Atkins and the detective reached the street. These two also entered the vehicle, which rolled swiftly down the street.
A few minutes’ drive brought them to the plain, substantial kirk which had been chosen by Rufus Black as the scene of his second marriage to Lally.
The four pursuers leaped from the cab, and hastily entered the edifice by its half-opened door.
Passing through the dim and chilly vestibule, they pushed open one of the baize-covered inner doors, which swung noiselessly upon its well-oiled hinges, and stood within the kirk.
It was a plain church interior, without stained glass or lofty arched window, with bare walls and ceilings, and with the plainest of gasoliers; the reading desk of solid oak, beautifully carved, was yet in keeping with the rugged simplicity of this house of worship. Here the old Covenanters might have worshiped; and here their descendants did worship, in all the stern simplicity of the faith in which they had been trained.
There was no one save the pew-opener in the church at the moment of the intrusion of Sir Harold Wynde and his companions. The four passed silently down the long dim aisle, and entered a tall-backed pew, in which they were nearly hidden from view. Lord Towyn gave the pew-opener a shilling, and they were left to themselves.
“It doesn’t look like a wedding,” said Sir Harold, shivering in his greatcoat. “If the bridegroom came on before us, where is he?”
The question was answered by the appearance of Rufus Black and the minister from the little vestry, in which they had gone to warm themselves. Rufus wore his ordinary garments, but had bought a white waistcoat and neck-tie, which gave him a clerical air. He kept his eyes upon the door with an anxious, uneasy glance.
“He’s afraid she’ll give him the slip, after all,” muttered Ryan.
The green baize-covered door swung open and closed again. Rufus Black and the occupants of the high-back pew in the corner near the reading desk alike started, but the arrival was only that of a few persons who had seen the open church door, and surmised that a wedding was in progress. They questioned the pew-opener, and subsided into pews.
Presently a few more curious persons appeared, and took their seats also.
The occupants of the high-backed pew grew impatient. It was after ten o’clock, an early hour for a wedding, but the hour Rufus had himself appointed, in his eager impatience to claim his young wife. A cold sweat started to the young bridegroom’s face. He began to think that Lally had thought better of her promise to remarry him, and had decided to give him up for the worthless, weak, irresolute being he knew himself to be.
“There’s a hitch somewhere,” said Ryan.
Again the baize-covered door swung open, and four persons came slowly up the aisle.
It was the bridal party at last.
Rufus Black started forward with an irrepressible eagerness, joy and relief. Sir Harold Wynde and Lord Towyn, alike pale and agitated, regarded the approaching party with burning eyes.
First of all came the steward of Heather Hills, with a girlish figure clinging to his arm. Behind these two came the steward’s wife in gray silk, and Peters in black silk and crape, but with white ribbons at her throat, and white lace collar and sleeves.
Sir Harold and the young earl looked at the three strange figures in a sort of bewilderment. They had expected to see Craven Black and Octavia. Not seeing them, they fixed their glances upon Lally.
The young wife had laid aside her mourning for her great-aunt upon this occasion, and wore a dress that Mrs. Wroat had bought for her upon their memorable shopping expedition immediately after Lally’s arrival in London.
It was a delicate mauve moire, made with a long train. Over it was worn an upper dress of filmy tulle, arranged in foam-like puffs over all its surface. This too formed a trail. The corsage was of puffs of tulle over the moire, and was made low in the neck and short in the sleeves. The bride wore a tulle vail, which fell over her face in soft folds, and was confined to her head by an aigrette of diamonds. Through the filmy folds of her vail the spectators caught the gleam of diamonds on her arms and neck and bosom.
The steward conducted his beautiful young charge to the altar, and bride and bridegroom stood side by side and the minister slowly took his place.
Lord Towyn made a movement to dash from his seat, but Sir Harold caught his arm in a stern grip, and compelled him to remain.
At the moment of beholding the bride, a mist had swept over the young earl’s vision. His brain had seemed to swim. For the instant he had scarcely doubted, in his excitement, that it was Neva who stood before him; but as his vision cleared, he knew that this young bride was not his betrothed wife. He knew it, although he could not see Lally’s face. He missed the haughty carriage of Neva’s slender figure, the proud poise of her small, noble head, the swaying grace of her movements. This young bride was not so tall as Neva, and had not Neva’s dainty imperial grace.
“It’s not Neva!” he whispered excitedly. “That is Rufus Black, sure enough, but the lady is not Neva.”
“You can’t see her face,” said Atkins. “I think it is Miss Wynde.”
At this moment the bride with a sweep of her hand, threw back her vail. As her bright, dark face, so like a gipsy’s and with a glow of happiness upon it, met the gaze of the spectators, Sir Harold stifled a groan.
Lord Towyn stared at the pretty brown face, with its fluctuating color, and the softly melting black eyes, and a dead pallor covered his face.
If this young girl was the chosen bride of Rufus Black, where was Neva? Why had Rufus given her up? The wildest fears for her life and safety possessed him.
The marriage went on. The four pursuers who had come to interrupt the proceedings sat in their high-backed pew as if utterly stupefied. What objection could they raise to the marriage of Rufus Black to a stranger who came to the church escorted by her friends? Why should they object to such a marriage? They heard the questions and answers as in a trance. The name of Lalla Bird sounded strangely upon their ears. And when the minister said, “I now pronounce you man and wife, and whom God has joined together let not man put asunder,” Sir Harold Wynde and the young earl looked at each other with terrified, inquiring eyes, that asked the question that filled their souls alike: Where was Neva?
After the prayer that followed the ceremony, the minister went into the vestry, followed by the newly married pair, the steward and his wife, and good Mrs. Peters.
The casual spectators of the wedding stole silently out of the church.
“Well, I’ve come up here on a fool’s errand,” muttered Ryan, in a tone of chagrin.
“Perhaps not,” said Lord Towyn. “Rufus may be able to give us some clue to his father’s whereabouts, if we approach him judiciously. I am going into the vestry to see him.”
“And I too,” said the baronet, rising.
The young earl led the way from their pew to the vestry, Sir Harold at his side, and Mr. Atkins and Ryan behind them.
The bride, all blushes and smiles, was writing her name in the marriage register, when the young earl and his companions entered the small room. Rufus Black had just signed it, and was putting on his gloves. He gave a great start as he recognized Lord Towyn and Atkins, and stared beyond them with an unmistakable terror, as if he expected to behold the cynical sneering face and angry eyes of his father looming up behind the intruders.
“You here, my lord?” he faltered.
“Yes, Rufus,” said the young earl, holding out his hand. “We happened to be at Inverness and have been witnesses to your marriage. Permit us to congratulate you.”
Rufus drew a long breath of relief and shook the earl’s hand heartily.
“I thought—I thought—” he began, confused and hesitating—“I was afraid— But never mind. It’s odd your being up here, my lord. How do you do, Atkins? Lally,” and Rufus turned to his young wife, who was looking curiously at the new-comers, “here are some friends of mine, up from Kent. Lord Towyn, Lally, and Mr. Atkins of Canterbury.”
Lally blushed and acknowledged the introduction gracefully.
“Can we see you in the church a moment, Mr. Black?” asked Lord Towyn.
Rufus consented, with that look of fear again in his eyes. He apologized for a moment’s absence to his bride and her friends, who were now signing their names to the register, and accompanied his pursuers back into the church. His face brightened when he found that his father was not in waiting for him in the church.
“You have a pretty young bride, Rufus,” said the young earl pleasantly. “We have followed you up from Kent, with the idea that you were on your way to Miss Wynde. It was in this way we happened to be at your wedding. Is Mrs. Rufus Black a recent acquaintance?”
Rufus hesitated, with a quick glance at Sir Harold’s muffled face and figure. Then he said bravely, resolving to act upon his new principles of straightforwardness and courage:
“It is an odd story, Lord Towyn. I have been married before to my wife to whom I was married this morning. My father separated me from her and I read in a London paper that she was dead. I discovered my mistake the other day in London. I met her in a picture-shop. She came off to Scotland that night, and I found her yesterday. She is an heiress now, my lord, but the same true and loving wife she used to be. I was desperate at her loss; I was half mad, I think, when I asked Miss Wynde to marry me. I never loved any one but my own wife, and I beg you to say to Miss Wynde for me, that I send my best wishes for her happiness, and I should be glad to witness her marriage with you, my lord.”
“Thank you, Rufus. But where is Miss Wynde?”
A look of genuine surprise appeared in Rufus Black’s eyes.
“Why, she is at Wynde Heights, with my father and her step-mother,” he answered.
“She is not there. They have not been there. They have conveyed her to some lonely place, where they hope to subdue her into consenting to marry you,” said Lord Towyn. “Can you give us no clue to their whereabouts?”
“None whatever, my lord. My father said they were going to Wynde Heights, and ordered me to hold myself in readiness to come to him at a moment’s warning. I have not heard from him since he left Hawkhurst. I am now of age, and have flung off my father’s authority forever. I know no more than you do, my lord, where my father can have gone. But one thing is sure. When he sees the announcement of my marriage in the Times, he’ll give up the game, and bring Miss Wynde back to her home.”
“He may not dare to do that,” said Atkins. “He has carried matters with too high a hand, and has gone too far to make an easy retreat. Has your father any property, Mr. Black?”
“About three hundred a year,” said Rufus. “His wife is rich.”
“I mean, does he own any real estate?”
Rufus smiled, shook his head, and hesitated.
“I don’t know,” he said doubtfully. “I believe he does own a small estate somewhere, but it never brought him in a penny. It is barren, unproductive, and out of the world.”
“The very place to which he would have gone!” cried Atkins. “Where is it?”
“I don’t know,” confessed Rufus. “You see my father never talked of his affairs to me. In fact, I never lived with him. I was always at school, and we were more like strangers, or master and serf, than like father and son. His property may be in Wales, and it may be elsewhere. I believe there are mountains near it or around it, but I am not sure. Indeed, my lord, almost any one who ever knew my father can tell you more about his affairs than I can.”
Rufus spoke with a plain sincerity that convinced his hearers of his truthfulness.
“We have had our journey to Scotland for nothing,” said Atkins.
Ryan looked crestfallen.
“We will detain you no longer, Rufus,” said Lord Towyn, a shadow darkening his fair and noble face. “Make our excuses to your bride for taking you from her so soon after your marriage, and accept our best wishes for your future prosperity and happiness. And now good-morning.”
With an exchange of courtesies and friendly greetings the party broke up, Rufus Black returning to his young wife and her wondering friends, to make all necessary apologies for his absence from them, and Lord Towyn and his companions making their way into the street.
“What are we to do now?” demanded the young earl, as they paused at the open door of the cab.
Sir Harold looked at his daughter’s lover with haggard eyes.
“I am worn out with excitement and fatigue,” said the baronet, in a low, weary voice. “I will go back to the hotel and lie down. I must not become worn out. Heaven knows I shall need all my strength.”
“And you, Atkins?” said Lord Towyn.
“I shall try to catch a nap also,” said the solicitor gloomily. “I’m tired too. I can’t stand it to go banging back to Kent by the first south-bound train.”
“And you, Ryan?” asked the earl.
“I don’t know,” said the detective. “I want to think over what has happened, and see if I can get any new ideas.”
He raised his hat, and walked away.
“I’ll take a stroll about the town, Sir Harold,” said the earl. “I feel strangely restless, and not at all sleepy. I slept very well last night on the train—as well as I have slept since Neva disappeared. I’ll meet you and Atkins in our sitting-room at the Railway Hotel by four o’clock.”
Sir Harold and Atkins entered the cab, and were driven to their hotel. The young earl watched the cab until it disappeared from sight, and then he walked down the street, idly taking his way toward the river.
The wind blew strong and fiercely—a very winter wind, as cold and keen as if it blew directly from the North pole, and having suggestions of icebergs in it. The young earl shivered, and drew up his coat collar.
“Pretty weather for this season,” he muttered. “The gale of night before last has not quite blown itself out, and is giving us a few parting puffs.”
He walked down to the wharves and stood by the water’s edge, his hat pulled over his fair brows to keep it on, his hands in his pockets, the very picture of a careless saunterer, but a great wave of despair was surging in his heart.
“My poor Neva!” he said to himself. “Where is she this wild day? Does she begin to think I am never coming to rescue her?”
His wild glances, straying over the boats in the river, settled at that instant upon a graceful yacht just coming to anchor. He could read on her stern her name—The Arrow. He watched her idly for a long time. He saw a boat lowered from her deck, and two sailors descend into it. A gentleman in greatcoat and tall silk hat followed them, and was rowed toward the shore.
The young earl started, his blue eyes flaming. Something in the attitude and carriage of the gentleman excited his keenest scrutiny. As the boat came nearer, and the faces of its occupants were revealed more plainly, a strange cry sprang to Lord Towyn’s lips. He had recognized in the tall stranger gentleman his own and Neva’s enemy—Craven Black!