whether there is anything which he can say to me, or show me, that should make us two. Do not tremble in that way, wife; I am making no charge, I am speaking in all kindness. I shall not return home for an hour. If I find you there, I shall know in one second—it will be a glad one, Bertha—that you were blameless of all knowledge of Laura’s sin until you learned it from this man. If this were so, Bertha,—but say that it was so, wife, whom I have loved so well, so dearly,—say that you knew nothing of Laura’s sin.”
And the strong man’s voice grew thick, and his stalwart form trembled beside that fragile woman.
“As I shall be judged at the last, Robert, and as I hope for mercy,” said Bertha, in a low voice, but with unusual firmness, “I never knew that Laura had sinned, nor, Robert, do I know it now.”
“God bless you, child!” said Urquhart, suppressing his emotion. “There, go to your home, and wait for me. I fear we have sad work to do. Go home, dear woman.”
And his eyes rested lovingly on her figure, as, after touching his hand as if thanking him for his kind words, she went homewards.
CHAPTER XLII.
The mode in which the lawyer, employed by Robert Urquhart, achieved the liberation of Ernest Adair, does not connect itself with our narrative, and it is only necessary to say that in the course of the day Adair was set at liberty.
The condition of mind in which Bertha returned to the house of her husband, and still, as he had said, her own, was indeed pitiable.
What had passed in her presence in the prison apartment had, of course, conveyed to her the conviction that Ernest intended to save her at the expense of her sister, and it was in Bertha’s weak nature to derive comfort and re-assurance from the idea of her present safety. But independently of her agitation at the prospect of any inquiry into past histories, and without taking into consideration what her feeble and half hearted affection for her sister might cause her to feel, when informed that the latter was to be formally accused, Bertha had an undefined dread of some act of new treachery or cruelty on the part of Adair, and a terror lest the stern eye of her husband might detect in any tale that Ernest might frame, the vitiating flaw that would ruin the whole. Then the knowledge, derived from Henderson, that Laura had not left Versailles, was a new element of fear, for if Laura should claim to be confronted with Adair, the scene would end very differently from that in which Mrs. Lygon submitted to the insult of Urquhart, and departed silently from the room where she had been wronged. And if any thoughts of a deeper and nobler kind came to the mind of the feeble Bertha in her hour of trial,—if womanly pride, or womanly love had voices that made themselves heard amid the vulgar strife of shallow hopes and fears, those voices were soon stilled in the presence of the immediate danger.
It was no ordinary consolation to her when, a couple of hours after parting from her husband, Bertha received from the hand of Angelique an envelope in which were written, in the well-known hand of Adair, the words—
“Be quite calm, and fear nothing.”
“If Laura had only gone home,” thought Bertha, “it would not so much matter, for I am certain that Arthur will never forgive her for what she has done already, so that, let him think what he may, things would not be a great deal worse. And why did she come at all?”
It was in this state of feeling—if feeling it may be called—that Bertha Urquhart prepared herself for the dreaded interview.
M. Ernest Adair was announced to Robert Urquhart, who was in the drawing-room with his wife. Up to the time of Adair’s arrival Urquhart had scarcely exchanged twenty words with her, but his manner, though sad, was kind. He also paid her several of those small attentions which are habitual with some husbands, and which others as habitually neglect. Urquhart himself was somewhat careless in such matters, and this, of course, made Bertha notice the circumstance, although she misconstrued it, and supposed that Robert desired to atone to her for having been harsh in the earlier part of the day. “There was no such stuff in his thoughts.”
Adair entered, bowed gravely to Bertha, something less ceremoniously to her husband, and said:
“I have to thank you, Mr. Urquhart, for the assistance which you have been good enough to afford me. I have offered my thanks to your legal adviser, who has enabled me to keep my appointment with you.”
“You have come prepared to substantiate what you stated this morning?” asked Urquhart.
“I stated nothing—I mean nothing for substantiation,” replied Adair. “I spoke very guardedly, but your own inferences went in the right direction, and those it is my painful duty to support by proofs.”
“Give them to me.”
“I need not recal your engagement?”
“I will return them when I have satisfied myself.”
“Then, before producing them, I will say a few words, and very few. The position in which 1 am placing myself would be under ordinary circumstances a humiliating one.”
“Most humiliating,” said Urquhart, bluntly. “A woman may be evil, but I do not envy the man who hunts her down.”
“Pardon me if I reply that here we are upon even terms, Mr. Urquhart, as I understood from you that this was the very course you proposed to take.”
“I am not inclined to bandy words with you, sir. In my case, however, the friend whom I value most in this world has either been deeply injured, or you are—what I need not say. It is my business to know which is the truth.”
“The friend whom I did value most in this world was deeply injured, Mr. Urquhart, and there is no alternative in my case.”
“Do not let us talk,” said the Scot. “The proofs you promised.”
“These proofs, Mr. Urquhart, consist of a series of letters addressed by a lady to her lover. They were placed in my charge for the purpose with