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The Great Secret, a fiction by E. Phillips Oppenheim |
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CHAPTER XVI. I TAKE UP MY LEGACY |
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_ Towards dawn I lit another lamp in my study and chanced to catch a glimpse of my face in a small mirror which stood upon my writing-table. Almost involuntarily I glanced over my shoulder, expecting to find another man there. It was a moment's madness, but as a matter of fact I did not recognize myself. It seemed to me that the change in the man upstairs, who had passed from the world of living things with breath in his body and life in his brain to the cold negation of death, was a change no greater than had come to me. For I was passing, as I knew very well, from behind the fences of my somewhat narrow but well-contained life into the great world of tragical happenings, where life and death are but small things, and one's self but a pawn in the great game. This, because I believed, because I had accepted the trust of the man who, a few hours ago, had closed his eyes with his hand in mine, and the faint welcoming smile upon his lips of a brave but weary man, who finds nothing terrible in death. There was something almost fearful in a change so absolute and vital as that which had come over my life. I realized this as I allowed myself a few moments' rest, and threw myself upon the sofa. The old outlook, the old ideas had been torn up by the root. The things which had seemed to be of life itself only a few hours ago seemed now to have lapsed into the insignificance of trifles. I thought of myself and my old life with the tolerance of one who watches a child at play. Sport and all its kindred delights--the whole glorification of the physical life--I viewed as a Stock Exchange man might view the gambling for marbles of his youth. It was incredible that I had ever even fancied myself content. My brain was still in a whirl, but it seemed to me that I was already conscious of new powers. My thoughts travelled more quickly, I felt a greater alertness of brain, a swifter rush of ideas. But it seemed to me, also, that something had gone, that never again would I find my way lie through the rose gardens of life. I must have dozed for a time upon the sofa, and was awakened by a soft tapping upon the low, old-fashioned windows, which opened upon the terrace. I sprang up, and, for a moment, it seemed to me that I must be dreaming. It was Adele who stood there, all in white, with sunlight around her.... I gasped for a moment, and then recovered myself. It was Adele sure enough, in a white linen riding habit, and morning had come while I slept. But I knew then that one link at least remained with the old life. She tapped upon the window-pane a little imperiously, and I threw open the sash. Her eyes were fixed upon my face. I think that she, too, saw the change. With the opening of the window came a rush of sweet fresh air. She stepped into the room. "Don't look at me as though I were something unreal!" she exclaimed. "I told them that I was fond of early morning rides, and I saw your light burning here from the park. Tell me--is he worse?" I was suddenly calm. I realized that this was the beginning. "He is dead," I answered. "He died about midnight." There was a momentary horror in her face, for which I was grateful--I scarcely knew why. "Dead," she repeated softly, "so soon!" She looked around the room and back at me. "Turn out the lamps," she said. "This light is ghastly." There was little more color in her face than mine. Even the sunlight seemed cold and cheerless. She came a little nearer to me. "He was conscious--at the end?" "Yes!" I answered. Her breath seemed to be coming a little faster. Her eyes were full of eager questioning. "You were with him?" "Yes!" Again there was a pause. I was steadfastly silent. "Don't keep me in suspense," she muttered. "He told you?" "Yes!" I answered, "he told me--certain things." She drew a long breath of relief. I could see that she was trembling all over. She sank into a chair. "I felt that he would," she declared. "I knew that he could not carry his secret to the grave. Is the door locked?" "Yes!" I answered. "The door is locked." She was still pale, but her eyes were burning. "Go on!" she said; "don't lose a moment. I am waiting." "For what?" I asked calmly. "To hear everything," she answered quickly. "I have nothing to tell you," I said. She stamped her foot with the petulance of a spoilt child. "Oh! how dense you are!" she exclaimed. "Repeat to me exactly what he said to you--now, before you forget a single word!" "I cannot do that," I said. She leaned a little forward in her chair. Even then she did not understand. "What do you mean?" she asked. "I mean that the things which he told me with his last breath were for my own ear and my own knowledge alone," I answered. "I cannot share that knowledge even with you." It seemed to me that there was something unreal, almost hideous, about the silence which followed. Through the open window there drifted into the room the early morning sounds of an awakening world--the whistling of birds in the shrubberies and upon the lawn, the more distant whir of a reaping machine at work in the cornfields. But between us--silence. I could not move my eyes from her face. There was no anger there, only a slowly dawning horror. She seemed to be looking upon me as a man doomed. I lit a match, and, taking some papers from my pocket, I slowly destroyed them. "There go the last records," I said, blowing the ashes away, "I have learnt them by heart." "I never thought of this," she murmured. "I never thought that you might be--oh! you cannot understand," she broke off. "You cannot know what you are doing." "I have an idea," I answered grimly. "He warned me." "Yet you cannot understand," she persisted. "Do you know that, even in saying this much to me, you are signing your death-warrant--that from this moment your life will not be safe for a single moment?" "I know that there is danger," I answered; "but I am not an easy person to kill. I have had narrow escapes before, and escaped without a scratch." She rose to her feet. "If only I could make you understand," she muttered. "Leslie Guest did his best," I answered. "He told me what the last few years of his life had been. I know that I have to face great odds. I can but do my best. We only die once." Then she came swiftly over to me and laid her hands upon my shoulders. There was now something more human in her face. Her eyes seemed to plead with mine, and the joy of her near presence was a very real and subtle thing. I felt my eyes kindle and my heart beat fast. There was no other danger to be compared with this. "I did not dream that this might happen," she said softly. "I meant to use you as a tool, I even thought that you had consented. Oh! I am sorry. I shall be sorry all my life that I asked you to bring him here. Will you listen to me for a moment?" "I am listening all the time," I answered, taking one of her hands in mine. "Have you realized what all this means?" she continued. "Are you prepared to give up your life here, your sports, your beautiful home, to feel that you have spies and enemies on every side, working always in the dark against you? The man who lies dead upstairs knew every move of the game--yet you see what has happened to him. How can you hope to succeed when he failed? Forget last night, my friend! I Believe that it was a nightmare, and I, too, will forget what you have told me. Come, it is not too late. We will say that he died suddenly in a stupor, and that, whatever his secrets were, he carried them with him. Is it agreed?" I shook my head. "One cannot break faith with the dead," I answered. "That is amongst the impossible things. Let us speak no more of it." She leaned towards me. Her breath was upon my cheek, and her eyes shone into mine. "Men have done more than this," she murmured, "when a woman has pleaded--and--it is for your own sake. Think! Must I count you amongst my enemies?" "God only knows why you should," I answered. "I am no judge of others; but if I betrayed the trust of a dead man, even for the sake of the woman I loved, I should put a bullet in my brain sooner or later. What I cannot understand, dear, is why you are not on my side. You are practically an Englishwoman. What have you to do with Leslie Guest's enemies?" She turned away sadly. "There are some things," she said, "which cannot be altered. You and I are on opposite sides. We may as well say good-bye. We shall never meet again like this." "I cannot believe it," I answered. "There are many things which seem dark enough in the future to me, but I shall never believe that this is our good-bye." It seemed to me strange afterwards, that of the immediate future neither of us spoke. I did not even ask her how long she was going to stay with Lady Dennisford; she did not speak to me of my plans. As she had come, so she went, silently and unexpectedly. She would not even let me follow her out onto the terrace; from the window I watched her mount her horse and ride away. Only just before she went she had looked back. "I must see you again," she said. "You, too, must have time to think. I am going to forget this morning, I am going to forget that I have seen you. You, too, must do the same!" Forget! She asked a hard thing. _ |
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