He seemed satisfied, and taking out a note-case laid on the table a little pile of notes. “There is your money,” he said, counting them over with reluctant fingers. “Be good enough to put the will and envelope back into the cupboard. To-morrow you will oblige me by rediscovering it — you can manage that, no doubt — and giving information at once to Messrs. Duggan and Poole, or to Mrs. Wigram, as you please. Now,” he continued, when I had obeyed him, “will you be good enough to ask the servants to tell Mrs. Wigram that I am waiting?”
There was a slight noise behind us. “I am here,” some one said. I am sure that we both jumped at the sound, for though I did not look that way, I knew that the voice was Mrs. Wigram’s, and that she was in the room. “I have come to tell you, Lord Wetherby,” she went on, “that I have an engagement at twelve. Do I understand that you are ready? If so, I will summon Mrs. Williams.”
“The papers are ready for signature,” the peer answered, betraying some confusion, “and I am ready to sign. I shall be glad to have the matter settled as agreed.” Then he turned to me, where I had fallen back to the end of the room. “Be good enough to ring the bell if Mrs. Wigram permit it,” he said.
As I moved to the fireplace to do so, I was conscious that the lady was regarding me with surprise. But when I had regained my position and looked towards her, she was standing near the window gazing steadily into the square, an expression of disdain rendered by face and figure. Shall I confess that it was a joy to me to see her head so high, and to read even in the outline of her form a contempt which I, and I only, knew to be so justly based? For myself, I leant against the edge of the screen by the door, and perhaps my hundred pounds lay heavily on my heart. As for him, he fidgeted with his papers, although they were all in order. He was visibly impatient to get his bit of knavery accomplished. Oh! he was a worthy man! And Welshman!
“Perhaps,” he presently suggested, for the sake of saying something, “while your servant is coming, you will read the agreement, Mrs. Wigram. It is very short, and, as you know, your solicitors have seen it in the draft.”
She bowed, and took the paper negligently. She read some way down the first sheet with a smile, half careless, half contemptuous. Then I saw her stop — she had turned her back to the window to obtain more light — and dwell on a particular sentence. I saw — God! I had forgotten the handwriting! I saw her eyes grow large, and fear leap into them, as she grasped the paper with her other hand, and stepped nearer to the peer’s side. “Who?” she cried. “Who wrote this? Tell me! Do you hear? Tell me quickly! Who wrote this?”
He was nervous on his own account, wrapt in his own piece of scheming, and obtuse.
“I wrote it,” he said, with maddening complacency. He put up his glasses and glanced at the top of the page she held out to him. “I wrote it myself, and I can assure you that it is quite right, and a faithful copy. You do not think — —”
“Think! Think! no! no. This, I mean! Who wrote this?” she repeated, her voice hysterical with excitement. “This? This?”
He was confounded by her vehemence, as well as hampered by his evil conscience.
“The clerk, Mrs. Wigram, the clerk,” he said petulantly, still in his fog of selfishness. “The clerk from Messrs. Duggan and Poole’s.”
“Where is he?” she cried breathlessly. I think she did not believe him.
“Where is he?” he repeated in querulous surprise. “Why, here, of course; where should he be, madam? He will witness my signature.”
It was little of signatures I recked at that moment. I was praying to Heaven that my folly might be forgiven me; and that my lightly planned vengeance might not fall on my own head. “Joy does not kill,” I said to myself, repeating it over and over again, and clinging to it desperately. “Joy does not kill!” But oh! was it true? in face of that white-lipped woman!
“Here!” She did not say more, but she gazed at me with dazed eyes, she raised her hand and beckoned to me. And I had no choice but to obey; to go nearer to her, out into the light.
“Mrs. Wigram,” I said hoarsely, my voice sounding to me as a whisper, “I have news of your late — of your husband. It is good news.”
“Good news?” Did she faintly echo my words? or, as her face from which all colour had passed peered into mine, and searched it in infinite hope and infinite fear, did our two minds speak without need of physical lips? “Good news?”
“Yes,” I whispered. “He is alive. The Indians did not — —”
“Alfred!” Her cry rang through the room, and with it I caught her in my arms as she fell. Beard and long hair, and scar and sunburn, and strange dress — these which had deceived others were no disguise to her — my wife. I bore her gently to the couch, and hung over her in a new paroxysm of fear. “A doctor! Quick! A doctor!” I cried to Mrs. Williams, who was already kneeling beside her. “Do not tell me,” I added piteously, “that I have killed her?”
“No! no! no!” the good woman answered, the tears running down her face. “Joy does not kill!”
An hour later this fear had been lifted from me, and I was walking up and down the library alone with my thankfulness; glad to be alone, yet more glad, more thankful still, when John came in with a beaming face. “You have come to tell me — —” I cried, pleased that the tidings had come by his lips— “to go to her? That she will see me?”
“Her ladyship is sitting up,” he replied.
“And Lord Wetherby?” I asked, pausing at the door to put the question. “He left the house at once?’
“Yes, my lord, Mr. Wigram has been gone some time.”
THE END
The Short Stories
Weyman’s home, Plas Llanrhydd, in Ruthin, where he lived for 33 years, until his death in 1928
LIST OF SHORT STORIES IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER
THE KING’S STRATAGEM.
THE BODY-BIRDS OF COURT.
IN CUPID’S TOILS.
HER STORY.
HIS STORY.
THE DRIFT OF FATE.
A BLORE MANOR EPISODE.
THE FATAL LETTER.
THE SNOWBALL.
FLORE
CRILLON’S STAKE.
FOR THE CAUSE
THE KING’S STRATAGEM
THE HOUSE ON THE WALL
HUNT, THE OWLER
THE TWO PAGES
THE DIARY OF A STATESMAN
KING TERROR. A DAUGHTER OF THE GIRONDE
IN THE NAME OF THE LAW!
LADY BETTY’S INDISCRETION
THE SURGEON’S GUEST
THE COLONEL’S BOY
A GOOD MAN’S DILEMMA
BAB
JOANNA’S BRACELET
THE BODY-BIRDS OF COURT
THE VICAR’S SECRET
THE OTHER ENGLISHMAN
KING PEPIN AND SWEET CLIVE.
FAMILY PORTRAITS.
LIST OF SHORT STORIES IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
A BLORE MANOR EPISODE.
A GOOD MAN’S DILEMMA
BAB
CRILLON’S STAKE.
FAMILY PORTRAITS.
FLORE
FOR THE CAUSE
HER STORY.
HIS STORY.
HUNT, THE OWLER
IN CUPID’S TOILS.
IN THE NAME OF THE LAW!
JOANNA’S BRACELET
KING PEPIN AND SWEET CLIVE.
KING TERROR. A DAUGHTER OF THE GIRONDE
LADY BETTY’S INDISCRETION
THE BODY-BIRDS OF COURT
THE BODY-BIRDS OF COURT.
THE COLONEL’S BOY
THE DIARY OF A STATESMAN
THE DRIFT OF FATE.
THE FATAL LETTER.
THE HOUSE ON THE WALL
THE KING’S STRATAGEM.
THE KING’S STRATAGEM
THE OTHER ENGLISHMAN
THE SNOWBALL.
THE SURGEON’S GUEST
THE TWO PAGES
THE VICAR’S SECRET
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St. Meugans’ Cemetery, Ruthin — Weyman’s final resting place
Weyman’s grave
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 840