cannot forget what my father suffered, I cannot be merciful to this man.”
Eleanor’s task was a very hard one. Laura would not believe, or she would not acknowledge that she believed; though she had none of the calm assurance which a perfect and entire faith in her lover should have given her. It was useless to reason with her. All Eleanor’s logic was powerless against the passionate force of this girl’s perpetual cry, the gist of which was “I will believe no harm of him! I love him, and I will not cease to love him!”
She would not argue, or listen to Eleanor’s calm reasoning; for Mrs. Monckton was very calm in the knowledge of her own defeat, almost despairingly resigned, in the idea that all struggle against Launcelot Darrell was hopeless. Laura would not listen, would not be convinced. The man whom Eleanor had seen in Paris was not Launcelot. He was in India at that very time. He had written letters from India, and posted them thence, with foreign postage stamps. The shipbroker’s books were all wrong; what was more likely than that stupid shipbrokers’ clerks should make wrong entries in their horrid books? In short, according to poor Laura’s reasoning, Launcelot Darrell was the victim of a series of coincidences. There had happened to be a person who resembled him in Paris at the time of George Vane’s death. There had happened to be a mistake in the shipbroker’s books. The figure in the water-coloured sketch that Eleanor had stolen happened to be like the old man. Miss Mason rejected circumstantial evidence in toto. As for the story of the forgery, she delared that it was all a fabrication of Eleanor’s, invented in order that the marriage should be postponed.
“You’re very cruel, Eleanor,” she cried, “and you’ve acted very treacherously, and I shouldn’t have thought it of you. First you fall in love with Launcelot Darrell; and then you go and marry my guardian; and then, when you find that you don’t like my guardian, you begrudge me my happiness; and you now want to set me against Launcelot; but I will not be set against him. There!”
This last decisive monosyllable was uttered amidst a torrent of sobs, and then, for a long time, the two girls sat in silence upon the sofa before the expiring fire. By and by, Laura nestled her head a little closer upon Eleanor’s shoulder; then a little hand, very cold, by reason of its owner’s agitation, stole into the open palm lying idle upon Mrs. Monckton’s lap; and at last, in a low voice, almost stifled by tears, she murmured:
“Do you think that he is wicked? Oh! Eleanor, do you really think that it was he who cheated your poor old father?”
“I know that it was he, Laura.”
“And do you believe that he has made a false will, for the sake of that dreadful money? Oh, how could he care for the money, when we might have been so happy together poor! Do you really believe that he has committed—forgery?”
She dropped her voice to a whisper as she spoke the word that was so awful to her when uttered in relation to Launcelot Darrell.
“I believe it, and I know it, Laura,” Eleanor answered, gravely.
“But what will they do to him? What will become of him? They won’t hang him—will they, Eleanor? They don’t hang people for forgery now. Oh, Eleanor, what will become of him? I love him so dearly, I don’t care what he is, or what he has done. I love him still, and would die to save him.”
“You need not be afraid, Laura,” Mrs. Monckton answered, rather bitterly. “Launcelot Darrell will escape all evil consequences of what he has done. You may be sure of that. He will hold his head higher than he ever held it yet, Laura. He will be master of Woodlands before next week is over.”
“But his conscience, Eleanor, his conscience! He will be so unhappy—he will be so miserable.”
Laura disengaged herself from the loving arm that had supported her, and started to her feet.
“Eleanor!” she cried, “where is he? Let me go to him! It is not too late to undo all this, perhaps. He can put back the real will, can’t he?”
“No, the real will is lost.”
“He can destroy the false one, then.”
“I don’t think he will have the chance of doing that, Laura. If his heart is not hardened against remorse, he will have plenty of time for repentance between this and the time when the will is read. If he wishes to undo what he has done, he may make a confession to his aunts, and throw himself upon their mercy. They are the only persons likely to be injured by what he has done. The money was left to them in the original will, no doubt.”
“He shall confess, Eleanor!” cried Laura. “I will throw myself upon my knees at his feet, and I won’t leave him till he promises me to undo what he has done. His aunts will keep the secret, for their own sakes. They wouldn’t like the world to know that their nephew could do such a wicked thing. He shall confess to them, and let them have the fortune, and then we can be married, and then we shall be as happy together as if he had never done wrong. Let me go to him.”
“Not to-night, Laura. Look at the clock.”
Eleanor pointed to the dial of the timepiece opposite them. It was half-past two o’clock.
“I will see him to-morrow morning, then, Eleanor. I will see him.”
“You shall, my dear; if you think it wise or right to do so.”
But Laura Mason did not see her lover the next morning; for when the morning came, she was in a burning fever, brought on by the agitation and excitement of the previous night. A medical man was summoned from Windsor to attend upon her, and Eleanor sat by her bed-side, watching her as tenderly as a mother watches her sick child.
Gilbert Monckton too was very anxious about his ward, and came up to the door of Laura’s room to make inquiries many times in the course of that day.
