The Mystery of the Four Fingers | Page 7

further. It would be madness for him to know that we are together."
"He will not come just yet," Venner replied. "My friend knows something of my story, and he will do his best to get us five minutes together. You have heard me speak of Jim Gurdon before."
"But it is madness," the girl whispered. "You know how dangerous it is. Oh, Gerald, what must you think of me when--"
"I swear to you that I think nothing of you that is unkind or ungenerous," Venner protested. "By a cruel stroke of fate we were parted at the very moment when our happiness seemed most complete. Why you left me in the strange way you did, I have never yet learned. In your letter to me you told me you were bound to act as you did, and I believed you implicitly. How many men in similar circumstances would have behaved as I did? How many men would have gone on honoring a wife who betrayed her husband as you betrayed me? And yet, as I stand here at this moment, looking into your eyes, I feel certain that you are the same sweet and innocent girl who did me the happiness to become my wife."
The beautiful face quivered, and the blue eyes filled with tears. Her trembling hand lay on Venner's arm for a moment; then he caught the girl to his side and kissed her passionately.
"I thank you for those words," she whispered. "From the bottom of my heart I thank you. If you only knew what I have suffered, if you only knew the terrible pressure that is put upon me;--and it seemed to me that I was acting for the best. I hoped, too, that you would go away and forget me; that in the course of time I should be nothing more than a memory to you. And yet, in my heart, I always felt that we should meet again. Is it not strange that we should come together like this?"
"I do not see that it is in the least strange," Venner replied, "considering that I have been looking for you for the last three years. When I found you to-night, it was with the greatest difficulty that I restrained myself from laying my hands on the man who is the cause of all your misery and suffering. How long has he been passing for an Englishman? Since when has he been a millionaire? If he be a millionaire at all."
"I cannot tell you," the girl whispered. "Really, I do not know. A little time ago we were poor enough; then suddenly, money seemed to come in from all sides. I asked no questions; they would not have been answered if I had. At least, not truthfully. And now you really must go. When shall I see you again? Ah, I cannot tell you. For the present you must go on trusting me as implicitly as you have done in the past. Oh, if you only knew how it wrings my heart to have to speak to you like this, when all the time my whole love is for you and you alone. Gerald--ah, go now; go at once. Don't you see that he is coming up the stairs?"
Venner turned away, and slipped down a side corridor, till Fenwick had entered his own room. Then he walked down the stairs again into the dining-room, where a heated discussion was still going on as to the identity of the missing waiter.
"They'll never find him," Gurdon muttered, "for the simple reason that the fellow was imported for the occasion, and, in my opinion, was no waiter at all. You will notice also that our crippled friend has vanished. I would give a great deal to know what was in the box that pretty nearly scared the yellow man to death. I never saw a fellow so frightened in my life. He had to fortify himself with two brandies before he could get up to his own room. Gerald, I really must find out what was in that box!"
"I think I could tell you," Venner said, with a smile. "Didn't you tell me that the mysterious waiter fetched it from the table where it had been placed by the handsome cripple?"
"Certainly, he did. I saw the signal pass directly Fenwick asked for a wooden match; that funny little waiter was palpably waiting for the silver box, and as soon as he placed it on Fenwick's table, he discreetly vanished. But, as I said before, I would give considerable to know what was in that box."
"Well, go and see," Venner said grimly. "Unless my eyes deceive me, the box is still lying on Fenwick's table. In his fright, he forgot all about it, and there isn't a waiter among the whole