Chapter XXXVIII: My Love's Confession

The big dress-basket had been placed upon the hired brougham, and we were within the vehicle going at a jog-trot past the West London Hospital in the direction of Kensington.

She had repeated her question why I was not myself that evening, but I had evaded it. Then we sat silent for a long time. I was holding her soft, ungloved hand in mine, for even though I was distracted by the enigma that had, through all those weeks, become more and more complicated, yet it surely gave me happiness to be once more beside the woman I so dearly loved.

You all of you, do love, or have once loved. Therefore you know the sweet and silent ecstasy of the first moments of being alone together after a long and bitter parting.

I did not know what to say, so full was my heart. Whitlock, the famous police agent, had failed utterly to unravel the mystery which grew daily more inscrutable and more impossible of solution. Only the sweet-faced, soft-voiced woman at my side knew the truth.

"Dearest," I said at last, drawing her closer to me until her face was near my own, "I have come to ask you what you meant the other night in Paris when you made that strange assertion that--that you were unworthy of my love--you, who are all the world to me!"

She tried to release herself quickly, and I felt her trembling.

"No! Victor, you are cruel! Why refer to it? Why have you come to me like this to-night? Ah! my God! you do not know--you don't know how I suffer!"

"For what?" I asked in a low whisper. "Why not, dearest, confide in me?" I urged persuasively.

She was silent for a few moments.

"Did I not tell you in Paris? We are best apart in future."

"Because you doubt me--eh?"

"And because I have no right longer to your love," she said in a voice of mystery.

"I can't make it out," I declared, still holding her hand. "Why have you so suddenly taken up this extraordinary attitude, Daisy?"

She only sighed. By the ray of light from a shop-window I saw that her countenance was now deathly pale. The sudden change it had undergone was remarkable and startling.

I repeated my question clearly, perhaps even a trifle harshly. The existence of Drayton flashed across my mind. Had he actually supplanted me in my well-beloved's affection?

"I have already confessed to you, Victor," she faltered at last in a low voice. "I told you the truth in Paris."

"But why--why do you tell me this? Why are you unworthy of my love?"

"One day you will, perhaps, discover for yourself," she responded hoarsely, sitting bolt upright, her face turned from me.

"I confess I cannot understand this self-condemnation of yours. Surely you should give me some reason!" I cried, dismayed. "You know full well how dearly and sincerely I love you, darling."

"Yes," she answered in a mechanical voice. "Unfortunately, I do. But----"

"But what?" I asked, pressing her hand and trying to draw her nearer to me.

"But love and happiness can never come to us again, Victor," she said in a sad voice full of emotion. "Our dream has ended."

"No, it has not!" I cried decisively. "I love you, and you are mine, even--even if, as you tell me, you are unworthy. Daisy--you shall be mine," I said in a hard, fierce tone. "I will not allow you to pass from me like this. I care nothing for your self-condemnations, nothing for your declarations of unworthiness. You have been my love, and you still are, and still shall be."

She started at my words, and, turning, peered into my face.

"And if I refuse?" she asked in an unusual tone. "What then?"

"It makes no difference. You have told me, long ago, that you loved no other man but myself, and I believe your words."

"Ah! that was long ago," she answered. "A woman changes her mind sometimes, you know."

"And you have changed yours!" I gasped, staring at her. "Do you mean to tell me that you have discarded me, the man who loves you better than his life, in favour of that fellow?"

"Of what fellow?" she asked quickly.

"Of Drayton," I said, boldly. "I do not forget your attitude in Kensington Gardens."

"Of him!" she gasped, staring at me, as though she suddenly realised a truth that she had not dreamed before. "Ah! I see. You believe that--that I have deceived you, Victor!" she exclaimed quickly.

"I only believe what I have seen with my own eyes," I said vaguely, for I had no intention of explaining to her how with Whitlock I had watched her movements. She, of course, believed that I referred to Drayton's visit to Paris.

"My confession of unworthiness had no connection with that man," she said in a low, intense voice.

"Come," I said, after a long pause, "let us end all this, Daisy. I love you, and I refuse to accept your self-condemnation. You have assured me that the fellow Drayton is not your lover."

"I swear he is not, Victor," she cried hastily. "I--I love no one else but you."

I drew her closely to me, as, with a sigh, her head fell upon my shoulder, and I kissed the cold lips again and again, while at the same moment a slight shudder ran through her frame.

"No, no!" she cried, putting me away from her a moment later. "Why have you come--to torture me--to recall all the past? My life is--God knows--bitter enough."

"Why should it be?" I asked in surprise. "Why are you not frank with me? You have taken a great burden from my mind, dearest, in telling me that I have misconstrued your regard for Drayton; and you have gone farther--you have admitted that you still love me. Ah! you cannot tell what peace your words have brought to me, or how deeply and devotedly I love you!"

"And yet," she said in a strange voice, turning to look me full in the face as a gleam of light illuminated the interior of the brougham--"and yet you still refuse to tell me the truth regarding Julian Little!"

"The truth regarding Julian!" I echoed. "What do you mean?"

"You surely know," she said.

"Ah! you mean the motive which took him to Servia," I remarked.

"I mean the real reason why he has been so long in hiding."

"That, dearest, is as great a mystery to me as it is to you," I declared. "He has not entered our chambers in Gray's Inn since the strange affair down at Barnes. But, tell me, why are you so greatly interested in that occurrence?"

"I have a very strong reason to be, Victor," was all the reply she would vouchsafe. "You have made many inquiries, I know. Have you yet established the identity of the assassin?"

"No. Unfortunately I have not," I replied. "But, truth to tell, I have always had a suspicion that you know more of the secret history of the affair than anyone else."

She started visibly.

"I? Why, whatever makes you think that?" she laughed, uneasily.

"Because your actions somehow convinced me that you knew more than either Scotland Yard or myself," I responded quite frankly. "I began to investigate the affair in order to obtain sensational 'copy' for the _Evening Herald_, but my connection with the affair has apparently caused you to suspect me of complicity. Why, is a complete mystery."

"You have refused to answer my questions, remember, Victor," she said in a rather hard tone. "I have been investigating, just as you have been."

"And you apparently suspect Julian?"

"I have made no allegation," she answered. "I have merely asked you to tell me what you knew, and you refused."

"As I have before told you, dearest," I said, "I have no knowledge of Julian's connection with the affair, save that Whitlock held suspicion of him from the very first."

"Exactly. Who, I ask, could have sent those bogus Press messages, except a man who had intimate knowledge of the ways of correspondents? Why did he escape to Servia, and then return to Cromer and live in hiding?"

"You knew he was at Cromer, then?"

"Yes; and he is now here, in London, in secret. I caught sight of him last night."

"Then you have not yet given up your inquiries?"

"No, I shall never give them up until I have fully established his guilt," she cried furiously, and I saw, in the faint glimmer from a street lamp, that upon her white countenance was a look of desperate vengeance. Why, I wondered, was she so bent upon bringing the assassin to justice? Was it possible that the two unfortunate women were her friends? Why, indeed, had she gone to Paris to see the mysterious Monsieur Smith?

Suddenly she said--

"You repeat, then, that you are entirely in ignorance of Little's motives?"

"Entirely. I have heard nothing from him since the day following the tragedy."

She gave vent to a long-drawn sigh, and sat back in the carriage without uttering a word. Her self-condemnation puzzled me. Why did she declare her unworthiness? Was it merely because she had doubted me, and now saw that I had spoken the truth?

My love for her was boundless. True, I had more than once found myself doubting her, and had suspected her of double-dealing. But now that she had denied it I had become reassured, and found myself more than ever filled with affection for her sweet self.

"Why should this mysterious affair be allowed to interfere with the love we bear each other, darling?" I asked, placing my hand upon her shoulder and kissing her soft cheek. She made no protest, but merely sighed again.

"Will you allow it?" I asked. "Surely your interest is also my own! And have you not only a few minutes ago admitted that you are still mine as completely as you ever were?"

"I know! I know!" she exclaimed, hoarsely. "But--Victor--you do not know----"

"Know what?"

"Know all that this means to me," she cried, bursting suddenly into tears. "You say that you love me; but--but when you know the truth you will hate me!"

And she sobbed aloud, giving way to a fit of deep remorse.

I sat beside her entirely mystified, and unable to utter a single sentence.

She seemed as though she was condemning herself for the actual crime!

"Hate you!" I exclaimed at last. "Why, Daisy--why should I hate the woman I love?"

"Because--because--ah! no, I can't tell you. I can't! You love me, and I cannot in one moment turn all your love to hatred. Ah! no--no"--and throwing her arms wildly about my neck, she clung to me, sobbing bitterly and saying: "let me drink the cup of my happiness to the dregs. And--and," she sobbed, "you will think of me sometimes, Victor; think of me as a woman who loved you fondly--who dared to love you, notwithstanding her guilt----"

"Guilt!" I gasped, taking both her soft hands and looking straight into her haggard face. "Guilt! Speak! What do you mean?"

"What--I--say," she answered in a hollow voice of despair.

What could I answer? I sat dumbfounded, in silence, listening to her broken breathing and her low sobs.

Of what was she guilty? Of one thing only--of a crime I dare not recall. Why was she so antagonistic towards Julian Little? Was it because he alone knew her secret and, perhaps, had actually been one of the conspirators who caused the tragic death of Louise Lorimer and her unidentified friend?

While I sat there pondering, with my well-beloved at my side, the brougham suddenly pulled up. I had not heard Daisy give any order to the coachman, so I presume he drove to the address where he had been in the habit of taking her each evening after the show.

She suddenly realised where we were, and gave vent to a low scream.

"No, no!" she cried wildly to the coachman. "Not here! I--I forgot--I----"

"Yes, Daisy," I said in as quiet a tone as I could command, "let us alight here. You evidently know this house. Come."

I got out and helped her to descend. And like one in a dream I followed her up the short flight of steps, where the front door fell back to receive her.

We were entering together the dark, silent house in Woburn Square--the grim house of doom.