Chapter 26

THE PENANCE OF INEZ.

Sebastian's abrupt interruption of his sister's enthusiastic confession was as a douche of cold water on glowing iron. The iron forthwith cooled; that is to say, Mrs. Marshall, from flesh and blood, became stone again.

"Of course I will tell you all you wish to know," she said, in even tones, with about as much feeling as might have been expected from a cuckoo. "But since you will not let me tell my story in my own way, I think it is best that you should put your own questions, then I shall know precisely what you do want."

"Don't be angry!" entreated her brother; "but tell me all for the sake of the family. Where did you learn that Frank had committed forgery?"

"At the Waggoner's Pond."

Mr. Cass started from his seat and stared down at his sister in surprise. He remembered what Marshall had told him about that appointment at the Waggoner's Pond. "What!" he cried. "Were you out on the night of the murder? Did you overhear the conversation between Marshall and Jenner?"

"Oh, it was Jenner, was it?" she said, quite composedly. "Well, I guessed as much, though I could never be quite sure."

"Didn't your husband tell you that he had met him by the Waggoner's Pond?"

She looked up with scorn and contempt.

"Frank never told me anything but what was wrung out of him by fear. Besides, we did not speak of these things. Like him, I preferred to let sleeping dogs lie."

Her brother had taken his seat again, and, deep in thought, paid little attention to what she was saying. "I thought you were in bed on that night with a headache?"

"A woman's excuse," she said, coolly. "I had no headache; but I had a very keen desire to find out why Frank had an appointment on that night, and with whom. I suspected another woman--you can guess her name."

"Mrs. Jenner? Ah, but he did not go out to meet her!" cried Mr. Cass, impatiently. "He had an appointment with her husband."

"I found that out later. But I heard him asking one of the servants where the Waggoner's Pond was, and if he could find it in the dark. I knew then that he intended to go there that night for some purpose. The name of Mrs. Jenner was not mentioned; but as she was in the neighbourhood--well, you know what a woman's feelings are!"

"You jumped to conclusions?"

"Yes; they were wrong, but that did not matter. At all events, I was satisfied that he did not meet the woman. I slipped out of a side door unknown to everyone; my headache was a pretext that I might be at the meeting-place. Had he done so, I would have broken off the engagement--yes, much as I loved him, or rather, much as I was infatuated--I would have broken it off at the eleventh hour had he put such an insult on me!"

"And yet you married him?"

"Oh, what is the use of that parrot-cry?" she said, impatiently. "You have already said that five or six times."

"Because I am so amazed that your pride did not come to your aid when you knew the use to which he intended to put your money. To him you were not the woman he loved--but the banker upon whom he intended to draw."

"And yet I married him," she said, with a cold smile. "Women are strange creatures, I confess. Yet you always considered me proud. See how mistaken you were! I had more weakness than you thought me capable of possessing. I was wildly--madly in love with him. At all events, I intended to marry him, and what is more, I intended to get back that incriminating bill from Jenner without the expenditure of a penny. I saw that he had replaced it in his red pocket-book; well, I made up my mind that I would get that pocket-book."

"Yet you never guessed the man was Jenner!" remarked her brother, ironically.

"I was suspicious, but not certain. However, I did not go after Jenner at once, for I knew where to find him. I wanted Frank to be out of the way before I left my hiding-place--I was behind a hedge--and not alone."

"What do you mean by that?" asked Mr. Cass, startled.

"I mean what I say. Several times, while I was crouching in the wet grass, I heard the breathing of someone no great distance off. Well, I found that other person."

"When--some time afterwards?"

"On the contrary, the person threw himself in my way within half-an-hour after I was on my way to the Turnpike House."

"Wait a moment!" cried Mr. Cass, with suppressed excitement. "I know who it was--the gypsy, Job."

"Ah!" replied Mrs. Marshall, without betraying much surprise. "Ruth told you something!"

"Geoffrey did: Ruth had told him."

Mrs. Marshall rose with a bound. "And pray what has Mr. Heron to do with this matter?"

"A good deal," rejoined her brother, drily. "You may as well sit down, Inez. Geoffrey is perfectly discreet. He is going to marry Ruth, you know: it will be as much to his interest as mine to keep this affair secret. Well, so you met this gypsy blackguard?"

"Yes, half-way on the road to the Turnpike House. In spite of the darkness and the mist, he knew me in a moment--instinct, I suppose."

"How could he have met you? Had you met him before?"

"Lots of times. I knew the Romany dialect, and used to talk to Job."

"I realty wonder at you, Inez, taking up with such scum! As for Ruth, I'll talk to her! She shall have nothing more to do with him."

"Oh, as to that," remarked his sister, shrugging her shoulders, "the creature is dying; he is consumptive, and is drinking himself to death. I have placed him in the Turnpike House--without Mr. Heron's permission, by the way--and I allow him a small sum a week so that he may die in peace."

"So that you may keep your secret, you mean."

"It will soon be a secret no longer. Job, as I say, knew me. He told me that he had been sleeping behind the hedge--near me, I suppose--and had been aroused by the sound of voices. He recognised Frank's voice, for he had often spoken to him; but Jenner he did not know, any more than I did."

"Naturally. Jenner was a comparative stranger in these parts. Go on."

"Well, Job had heard all about, the red pocket-book and the bill. I saw in a twinkling that here was the instrument I required; I promised him twenty pounds if he would get me that red pocket-book."

"Inez! Did you send the man to murder Jenner?"

"No, I did not. I never thought he would goo so far as that. And, as a matter of fact. Job has always denied to me that he struck the blow."

"He certainly would tell you that to save his neck!"

"Well, after I had made this arrangement with him and had told him that Jenner was at the Turnpike House, I returned home. I entered by the side door and slipped up to my room without anyone being the wiser."

"I certainly was not," said her brother. "You are quite a diplomatist, Inez. What about Job's murdering mission?"

"He did not commit the murder," insisted Mrs. Marshall. "He came next day and brought me the pocket-book. I opened it, but could not find the bill; then I accused Job of having taken it. He grinned, but would say nothing. You understand, Sebastian, he had not got the bill; but he wanted to have me in his power."

"I see; but you could have turned the tables on him by having him arrested for the crime."

"No, he knew of the bill--of Frank's disgrace. I thought, if he were arrested, he would tell all, which he certainly would have done; then Frank would have been prosecuted. Remember, I thought Job had the bill! All these years I have believed he had it in his possession; you do not know the blackmail I have paid that man! He was always worrying me for money. At last, seeing he was ill, I put him into the Turnpike House, and--well, I have told you all that. But now you know why I assisted him."

"Assisted a murderer?"

"Job denied that he had killed the man."

"Then how did he get the pocket-book?"

"He said that he had met Jenner before he got to the Turnpike House, and robbed him of the book."

"That is a lie!" cried Mr. Cass; "and a feeble lie to boot. Jenner had the book when he was in that room--before he was killed Mrs. Jenner said that the book was on the table near the window; and my own opinion is that the blow must have been struck through the window and the book stolen."

"But why believe Mrs. Jenner more than Job?"

"I will tell you all. The bill was in the pocket-book; you yourself saw Jenner put it there. Well, he thought Marshall might steal that bill, so he sewed it up in the body of a toy horse with which his child was playing. Neil kept the horse, and a short time ago he sent it to George, who cut the animal open. The bill was found, and is now in my possession. So, you see, Job could not have taken the pocket-book which contained the bill before Jenner got to the house. He must have murdered the man and stolen the book after the bill had been placed inside the horse.

"But nothing of all this came out at the trial."

"No one knew anything about it--least of all Mrs. Jenner. But now you are satisfied that Job committed that murder?"

"I suppose so; it looks like it. Oh, the wretch, to let me think all these years that he had the bill, and that he was innocent of killing the man!"

"Had you no suspicion of his guilt?"

She thought for a moment. "I confess I had," she said, after a pause, "but, you see, I had to put all such suspicions behind my back. If I had denounced Job, I thought he would have produced the bill and ruined Frank."

"I see. Well, here is the bill. No one knows of it but Heron, and he will say nothing. I thought of keeping it as a useful whip for your husband, should he treat you cruelly. But now that I find you do not care for him, I think it had better be destroyed."

"No," she said, putting it into her pocket, "I will keep it, to hold over Frank myself. I hate him, and would gladly divorce him--which I could easily do. But I am as proud of the family name as you are, and I do not want a scandal. So I shall not separate from him; but now I shall know how to make him behave himself." She tapped her pocket with a grim smile.

"Did you ever speak to him about the red pocket-book?"

"No, he never knew I had it. I put it away, and afterwards sent it up to the garret, where I thought it would be safe. Hardly anyone ever goes there but myself. Besides, if I had told Frank, he would have worried Job about giving him the bill, and Heaven only knows what would have happened then. No, I was wrong, I suppose, but I acted for the best. When Frank told me that he had seen you, and that the bill was in your possession, I went up to the garret, intending to find the pocket-book and destroy it. Then I was foolish enough to ask Ruth; she found it by chance--and--well, you know the rest."

"Yes, I know the rest," said Mr. Cass, grimly; "and, among other things. I know that Job Lovell killed Jenner, and that the dead man's unhappy wife has been punished all these years. Inez, I know you always hated her, but would you have let her lose her life?"

"No; if she had been in danger of that, I would have come forward and told all I knew, even at the cost of disgrace; I would not have had the blood of a fellow-creature on my soul. But, to tell you the truth, Sebastian, as Mrs. Jenner did not defend herself, I really believed she was guilty, and Job innocent. He confessed to having robbed Jenner; she would say nothing; so of the two, I thought Job the innocent one. Can you blame me?"

"Partly. I blame you for not having told me this long ago. I always suspected your husband. Now I know that he is innocent; and I should have known it all along, seeing that he was in the house--in my house--when the crime was committed. If you had spoken out, I would have managed to get Mrs. Jenner off in some way without exposing the whole of this dreadful story. Job should be punished."

"Think what that would mean to us all," said his sister, warningly.

"I will contrive to evade the worst. But I must have that poor woman released!"