“Well, you see, sir, even if one is a widow and growing old, one can’t help feeling interested in weddings. I suppose it’s being a woman. Everybody’s dreadfully disappointed.”

“Indeed,” said Chris coldly.

“And, yes, indeed, sir. No big party; no wedding breakfast and cake; no going away in chaises and fours. If poor Mr Gartram had been alive, it wouldn’t have been like this. Why, do you know, sir, the quarry folk were getting ready powder and going to fire guns, and make a big bonfire on the cliffs; but Mr Trevithick, the lawyer, went to them with a message from Miss Claude, sir, asking for them to do nothing; and they’re just going to the church and back to the big house, and not even going away.”

“Indeed!”

“Oh, yes, sir, and I did hear that Miss Claude actually wanted to be married in black, but Miss Mary Dillon persuaded her not. I heard it on the best of authority, sir.”

Chris made no reply, and, finding no encouragement, Mrs Sarson cleared her lodger’s breakfast things away, and left the room.

The moment he was alone, Chris started from his chair to stand with his back to the light; his teeth set hard and fists clenched as a spasm of mental agony for the moment mastered him.

“No,” he said, after a few moments, with a bitter laugh, “this won’t do. What is it to me? I can bear it now like a man. She shall see how indifferent I am.”

For it was the morning of the ill-starred wedding – a morning in which Nature seemed to be in the mood to make everything depressing, for the wind blew hard, bringing from the Atlantic a drenching shower, through which, with Gellow for his best man, Glyddyr would have to drive to the little church. Meanwhile, he was having so severe a shivering fit at the hotel where he had been staying, that his companion had become alarmed, and suggested calling in the doctor.

“Bah! nonsense! Ring for some brandy.”

“And I’ll take a flask to the church,” said Gellow to himself, “or the brute will breakdown. We’re going to have a jolly wedding seemingly. Only wants that confounded Frenchwoman to get scent of it, and come down, and then we should be perfect.”

“That’s better,” said Gellow, after the brandy had been brought. “But what a day! What a cheerful lookout! I say, Glyddyr, am I dreaming? Is it a wedding this morning or a funeral?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it looks more like the latter. I say: Young Lisle won’t come and have a pop at you in the church?”

Glyddyr turned ghastly.

“You – you don’t think – ”

“Bah! My chaff. You are out of sorts; on your wedding-day, too. Hold hard with that brandy, or it will pop you off, and not Lisle. Steady, man, steady.”

“Gellow, it’s all over,” gasped the miserable man. “I shall never be able to go through with it.”

“Oh, if I can only get this morning over,” said Gellow to himself; and then aloud —

“Nonsense, my dear boy, you’re a bit nervous, that’s all. I suppose a man is when he’s going to be married. You’re all right. Come, have a devilled kidney or a snack of something. You don’t eat enough.”

“Eat?” said Glyddyr, with a shudder. “No; I seem to have no appetite now.”

“Come on, and let’s get it over. Here’s the carriage waiting. Steady, man, steady. No; not a drop more.”

“The carriage is at the door, sir,” said the waiter; and striving hard to be firm, and to master a tremulous sensation about his knees, Glyddyr walked out into the hall, where a buzzing sound that was heard suddenly ceased till the pair were in the carriage, from whose roof the rain was streaming. Then, after banging too the door, the waiter dashed back under shelter, the dripping horses started off, and the carriage disappeared in the misty rain.

“Looks as if he was going to execution,” said the man, with a laugh, as he dabbed the top of his head with his napkin. “Well, it do rain to-day.”

At the Fort everything had gone on that morning in a calm, subdued way that seemed to betoken no change. Claude came down to breakfast as usual, and sat looking dreamily before her, while Mary, red-eyed and sorrowful, had not the heart to speak.

Trevithick had slept there the previous night, and was the only guest, for Doctor Asher had declined to be present, on the score of professional calls.

“I’m afraid there is very little chance of its holding up,” said Trevithick, when they rose from the scarcely-touched breakfast.

“No, Mr Trevithick,” said Claude quietly. “I think we shall have a very wet day. Mary, dear, we must take our waterproofs. It is fifty yards from the lych-gate to the church door. Isn’t it time we went up to dress?”

She moved towards the door, but came back, and held out her hand to the lawyer.

“Forgive me for being so absent and strange with you,” she said, with a faint smile. “You have been very good and kind to me, but I dare say you think all this odd and unnatural.”

“Oh, no; not at all,” said Trevithick, colouring like a girl.

“It was the only thing in which I asked to have my way – to let the wedding be perfectly quiet. Don’t be long, Mary.”

Trevithick looked at his little betrothed as the door closed, and she looked up at him.

“I say, Mary, dear,” he said, “is she quite – you know what I mean. I feel almost as if I ought to interfere.”

“Oh, John, John,” cried the little thing, bursting into a passionate fit of weeping; “if we could only stop it even now!”

She sobbed on his breast for a few seconds, and then hastily wiped her eyes.

“There, I’m better now,” she said. “I’ve talked to her till I’m tired, but it’s of no use. ‘It’s my

duty

’ is all she will say. Oh! why did people ever invent the horrid word. Don’t say anything, John, dear. Let’s get it over, and hope for the best; but if there’s any chance of our wedding being like this, let’s shake hands like Christians, forgive one another, and say good-bye.”

She ran out of the room, and Trevithick sat watching the rain trickle down the window-panes, and tried to follow the course of a big ship struggling up Channel, its storm topsails dimly seen through the mist of rain.

“I wouldn’t be on that ship for all I’ve saved,” he said, shaking his head. “Looks as if there was going to be a wreck.

“So there is,” he said, after a pause, “a social wreck, and I’m going to assist. No, I’m not. I’m looking after the salvage. Poor girl! Gartram must have been mad.”

His meditations were broken in upon by the sound of wheels. Half-an-hour later the door was thrown open.

“Now, Mr Trevithick, please,” said Mary; and he hurried into the hall to find Claude ready and looking very calm and composed.

“Good-bye,” she was saying to first one and then another of the maids, who, catching the contagion, burst into tears.

“As if it wasn’t wet enough already,” said Reuben Brime, who stood with the footman by the carriage-door.

“Good-bye, Woodham, dear,” said Claude, holding out her hand, but snatching it back directly as she yielded to a sudden impulse, and threw her arms around the stern-looking woman’s neck. “Thank you for all that you have done.”

“Good-bye! Why did she say good-bye?” thought Woodham, as Trevithick handed the bride into the carriage, the drops from the edge of the portico falling like great tears upon her hair. “Yes: good-bye to youth and happiness and your sweet young life.”

The carriage-door was banged, and banged again, for the wet had made it hard to shut. Then, as the footman mounted to his place on the box, the gardener hurried round in front of the horses, and ran for the short cut over the cliffs to the church.

“Shouldn’t you go, Mrs Woodham?” said one of the maids.

Sarah Woodham shook her head.

“They will soon be back,” she said. “I’m going to stay to meet the new master.”

“Why does not something happen to stop this hateful match?” she muttered to herself. “My poor girl. My poor, dear girl.”

The carriage sped on through the driving rain, and the little party descended at the church gate, where a few fishermen were gathered in their yellow and black oilskins to follow them, dripping, into the little church, while it seemed to Claude that it was only the other day that her father was borne to his resting-place. And there they were, standing face to face before God’s altar, she pale, sad and composed, having to give her whole love and life to the pale trembling man who faced her, and who, though she knew it not, exhaled a strong odour of the spirits he had taken to enable him to go through the task.

But Claude saw nothing, realised nothing but the words of the clergyman, repeating every response in a low, earnest tone right on to the end, when, as the last words of the service was uttered, there was the sound of some one drawing a long, deep breath.

It was only Gellow’s way of congratulating himself on the fact that his money and much more were safe at last.

“Now!” he muttered, as he hugged himself. “Now you may have

, or anything you like.”

The book was signed, and the few fishermen and women who had braved the storm began to go clattering out of the church as Glyddyr, making an effort to look happy and content, held his arm to his newly-made bride to lead her down the little nave.

“Father, dear, it was your wish,” said Claude softly, and, with a sigh, she raised her eyes towards the faint light which came through the west window.

Then she stopped short, gazing wildly at where Chris Lisle stood like a black silhouette against the dim lattice panes, as he had stood with folded arms right through the service.

He made no sign; he uttered no sound, his features hardly visible from the position against the light; but the sight of that figure was enough to bring like a flood the recollections of the past, and of what might have been, but for her irrevocable step; and, snatching her hand from her husband’s arm, Claude clasped her forehead as she uttered a low, faint cry, and fell heavily upon the floor.

“Keep back, all of you!” cried Glyddyr excitedly. “Do you hear, keep back. The carriage, there. Do you hear me? Keep back!”

He lifted Claude from where she lay, and bore her out, holding her tightly in his arms, as if he feared that she might be snatched away by him who had caused this shock.

“Curse him!” he muttered, as the carriage was driven back to the Fort at a canter; “but he’s too late. The dark horse has won, Chris Lisle, and the stakes are mine.”

Claude was still insensible when the carriage stopped, and Glyddyr resigned her to Sarah Woodham’s arms.

“A bit faint, that’s all,” he said, with a half laugh. “She’ll be better soon.”

“You – you are married, sir?” faltered the woman, looking at him wildly.

“You bet!” he snarled, as he turned away, and strode into the library, but came back looking ghastly and slamming the door. “Here, some one bring the spirits into the dining-room; not in there. Quick! don’t you see your mistress is taken ill?”

“Open the door,” whispered Woodham; “we’ll take her in there.”

“No; in the dining-room – anywhere,” cried Glyddyr. “Don’t take her there.

“And this is being married!” he muttered, as soon as he was alone. “The cad! The coward! But I’ve bested him, and I’m a free man once again, and master here.”

They had carried Claude into the dining-room; and, hardly caring where he went, Glyddyr had entered the drawing-room, thrown to the door, and was walking hurriedly up and down, till, as he uttered the last words, his eyes fell upon the large photograph of Gartram.

He stopped short, with his eyes showing a ring of white about the iris, and the cold sweat glistening upon his forehead till the spasm of dread passed away. Then dashing forward, he was about to tear the likeness from its easel and frame, but the door was suddenly opened, and he recovered himself, and turned to face Trevithick and his best man, for he had not heard the wheels as the second carriage stopped.

Volume Three – Chapter Fifteen.

“Only Wait.”

The occupants of the Fort were broken up into little parties on that eventful day. Claude seemed to go from one fit into another, and her cousin and Sarah Woodham did not leave her side.

Brime had been despatched for Doctor Asher, but had come back with a message that the doctor had been taken ill, and could not leave his home, but they were not to be alarmed. It was only hysteria, he wrote, and all needed was quiet and rest.

Trevithick had betaken himself to the library, where he sat alone, waiting for tidings, and had at last taken his note-book from his pocket, as if inspired by the place, and began to run over the numbers of the missing notes.

“I can’t go away till afternoon,” he had said to himself; “and till I have had a quiet few minutes with Mary.”

In the dining-room Glyddyr was now alone with Gellow, and there had been a scene.

“Look here,” said the latter, after partaking heartily of the breakfast, “I’m not a man who boasts, and I suppose my principles, as people call ’em, are not of the best, but, ’pon my soul, Glyddyr, if I couldn’t show up better after marrying a girl like that, I’d go and hang myself.”

“Bah!”

“No, you don’t; not a drop more,” continued Gellow, laying his hand upon a bottle of champagne that Glyddyr was about to take. “You’ve had too much now. When I’m gone, you can do as you like. You’re master here, but I won’t sit and see you go on like this.”

“It don’t hurt me. I’m as sober as you are.”

“P’r’aps so, now; but what will you be by-and-by? Hang it all, Glyd, you’ve got the girl, and the money, and you can pay me off. She’s a little darling, that’s what she is, and I’d turn over a fresh leaf – clean the slate and begin square now, I would, ’pon my soul. Do you hear?”

“Yes, I hear.”

“And now I think I’ll go back to the hotel; you don’t want me.”

“Eh! What? No, no; don’t go,” said Glyddyr excitedly.

“Not go?”

“No, man, no; don’t go and leave me here alone.”

“Well, upon my soul, Glyddyr, you are a one.”

“That fellow, Lisle. You saw him in the corner. He means mischief. I’m sure he does.”

“Let him. You’re King of the Castle now. Keep him out. Don’t be such a cur.”

“He’s half mad. I know he is. I don’t want a scene. I should kill him if he came.”

“Yes, you look as if you would.”

“And I haven’t done much for you yet. We shall want to talk business.”

“What, on your wedding-day! Nonsense. I’ll go back to the hotel.”

“No, no. There is plenty of room in the place – for a friend. You must stop here for a few days.”

“Oh, very well. Play policeman, eh, and keep t’other fellow off. I see your little game. Cheerful for me, though, all the same.”

“Help me to get rid of that lawyer; I don’t want him hanging about. – Gellow.”

“Well?”

“Why didn’t I insist upon going over to Paris or Baden as soon as we were married?”

“How should I know? I suppose I may light a cigar now. Your wife won’t object?”

“It was her doing,” said Glyddyr thoughtfully. “She insisted on staying.”

“No, you don’t. If I’m to play policeman, no more drink, or very little, do you have to-day.”

Gellow drew the bottle farther away again, and Glyddyr threw himself back in his chair and began gnawing his nails.

“Ugh!”

“What’s the matter now?” said Gellow, as Glyddyr shuddered.

“I don’t know. Somehow I don’t like this place.”

“Buy it off you, if you like. But, I say, hadn’t you better ring and ask after your wife?”

About this time, as John Trevithick sat cogitating over his memoranda, seeking for the light where all was dark, the door opened, and Mary came in.

“Ah! How is she now?”

“Very ill. I have left her for a few minutes in the drawing-room with Sarah Woodham,” said Mary, with a catching of the breath. “Oh, John, how cruel of Chris Lisle to come and do that.”

“I don’t know,” said Trevithick thoughtfully. “I’m afraid I should have acted the same. But there: the mischief is done. I’m glad you’ve come. I wanted to see you before I went.”

“Before you went? Oh!” exclaimed Mary, catching at his hand, “you must not go.”

“Not go? Oh, I’m not wanted here.”

“You don’t know,” cried Mary excitedly. “Don’t leave us, John. I’m frightened. It all seems so horrible. Suppose Chris Lisle were to come?”

“Chris Lisle would not be so mad.”

“I don’t know. I saw his face, poor fellow, and it looked dreadful, and I have just seen Mr Glyddyr. I went to the dining-room to see if you were there. He looks ghastly, and he has been drinking. For Claude’s sake, pray stay.”

“You do not know what you are saying, my dear,” said the big lawyer gently. “Mr Glyddyr is master here now. But I’m afraid you are right. He had been drinking before he came. I cannot interfere.”

“Not to protect her?”

“No, I have no right.”

“Then stop to protect me, John, dear,” she whispered.

“The law gives me no right,” he said slowly, “but if you put it in that way, why, hang the law!”

“And you will stay?”

“Yes, my dear, if I have to wring Parry Glyddyr’s neck.”

“Ah, now you are speaking like yourself,” cried Mary, drawing a breath full of relief. “I’m not a bit afraid now.”

Just then a bell rang, and Mary ran out of the room, to find Sarah Woodham anxiously awaiting her, for Claude was pacing the floor wildly, her face flushed, and the excitement from which she suffered finding vent in rapid, almost incoherent words.

She ran to Mary and clung to her, sobbing out —

“Don’t – don’t leave me again, dear. Stay with me. I cannot bear it. Oh, Mary, Mary, I must have been mad – I must have been mad.”

“Hush, darling! Be calm; try and be calm.”

“Calm! You do not know – you do not know. Stop!” she cried wildly, as she saw Woodham cross gently towards the drawing-room door. “Don’t leave me. If you care for me now, pray stay.”

“Claude, dear, this is terrible,” said Mary firmly. “You are acting like a child.”

Claude sank upon her knees and buried her face in her cousin’s dress.

“Don’t think me cruel or unfeeling to you, but what can we do or say? You are Mr Glyddyr’s wife.”

“Yes, I know,” wailed Claude. Then, looking excitedly in her cousin’s face, “I did not know then. I was blind to it all. Mary, what have I done? Tell me – that man – he has married me – for the fortune – tell him to take all and set me free.”

“My own darling cousin,” whispered Mary, sinking upon her knees, to draw Claude’s face to her breast. “No, no, no; all that is impossible. This fit will pass off, and you must be brave and strong. Try and think, dear, of what you said. It was poor uncle’s wish.”

“Yes, yes, yes,” said Claude wearily; and she struggled to her feet, to throw herself into one of the lounges and sit wringing her hands involuntarily, dragging at one finger until the little golden circle, lately placed there, passed over the joint, and at last flew off, to fall trinkling in the fender.

Claude uttered a faint cry, and covered her face with her hands, while Woodham and Mary stood gazing at each other till the former crossed softly and picked up the ring from where it lay.

“Claude, darling,” said Mary, as, after a little hesitation, she took the ring from Woodham, and gently drawing her cousins hand from her face, began to slip the little token back into its place.

There was no resistance, only a helpless, dazed expression in Claude’s face, as she dropped her hand into her lap, and sat back gazing down at her cousin’s act, shuddering slightly, and then closing her eyes.

They drew back, watching her for some time, and at last Woodham crept cautiously forward, peering anxiously into her mistress’s face, watching the regular rise and fall of her breast, and then gave Mary a satisfied nod, as they stole very softly away to the far end of the room, and sat down to watch.

“Exhausted, Miss Mary, asleep,” whispered Woodham. “Oh, my dear, what can we do?”

“Nothing,” whispered back Mary bitterly; “only wait.”

The wind increased, setting in more and more for one of the western gales. The rain beat at the windows and the storm came in fierce squalls, as if to tear down the unhappy house; but hours went by, and Claude had not moved, remaining plunged in a kind of stupor more than sleep.

And so the weary hours went on, broken only by the sound of an opening or closing-door, and faintly heard voices which made the watchers start and glance anxiously towards the door in anticipation of Glyddyr’s coming; but he did not leave the dining-room, and Trevithick remained still in the library, where, through Woodham’s forethought, refreshments had been taken to him twice.

As the night closed in, a lamp was lit, and a screen drawn before the table where it stood so as to leave the spot where Claude lay back in darkness, and once more the watchers sat waiting.

It was about eight o’clock, when, after for the twentieth time stealing across to her cousin’s side, and returning, Mary placed her lips to Woodham’s ear.

“I am getting frightened at her state,” she whispered; “surely we ought to send over for the doctor.”

“No, my dear,” said Woodham sadly. “Let her rest. It will be better than anything the doctor can do.”

“Woodham,” whispered Mary again, “it seems horrible to say, but I feel as if I could poison that man and set her free.”

Sarah Woodham’s jaw dropped, and as she sank back, Mary could see that her eyes were wide and staring.

“Sarah, you foolish woman, don’t take what I say like that.”

The woman struggled to recover herself, and she gasped —

“It was so horrible, Miss Mary; for thoughts like that came to me.”

“But, Sarah,” whispered Mary, “I did not think of it before; when she wakes, if she is wild like that again, there is some of poor uncle’s medicine in the library – there is a bottle of that chloral that had not been opened. Would it be wise to give her some of it to make her calm?”

“Miss Mary!” gasped Woodham, as she pressed her hand to her side. “Hush! Don’t! You – oh, pray, pray, don’t talk of that!”

Mary looked at her wonderingly, the woman’s excitement seemed so wild and strange.

“No, it would not be wise,” she said.

At that moment there was the sound of the dining-room door being opened, and Claude sprang to her feet.

“Mary! Woodham!” she panted. “He is coming.”

“Claude! Claude, darling!” cried Mary, with a sob, as she flew to her cousin’s arms.

“Keep Woodham here too. He’s coming! Do you hear?”

“But, Claude, dearest, he is master here. You made him so. You are his wife.”

“Yes, Mary. I was blind and mad. I forced myself to it, thinking it must be my father’s will – my duty to the dead. But it is too horrible. Chris could not have done this thing.”

“No, no, my poor darling; he could not have been so vile.”

And as the cousins clung together, Mary felt the heart that beat against hers fluttering like that of some prisoner bird. There was the sound of an angry voice in the hall, and then a door was opened.

“Oh, you’re there, are you?”

“Yes, Mr Glyddyr, I am here.”

“Then why didn’t you come into the dining-room like a man, not stop hiding there. What the hell do you mean?”

“Don’t go on like that, old fellow,” said another voice. “Here, come back into the dining-room. Mr Trevithick will join us, perhaps.”

“Hold your tongue, curse you! Here, you – you can go back into your hole; and as to you, Gellow, I know what I’m about. Come along.”

The voices died away, as if the speakers had gone back into the dining-room, and the door swung to.

“Ah!” ejaculated Claude, with a piteous sigh.

“I know what I’m about,” came loudly again, followed by the banging of a door and a step in the hall.

“Mary!”

“Claude, dear, you must. He is your husband.”

“And I love Chris still with all my heart.”

“Claude!” whispered Mary, as the door was thrown open, and Glyddyr strode in.

“Here, Claude, where are you? Why don’t you have more lights? Oh, there you are, and our little cousin, eh? Now, woman, you can go.”

Sarah Woodham gave her mistress one wild, pitying look, and then left the room.

“Ah, that’s better,” said Glyddyr, whose face was flushed, but his gait was steady, and there was an insolent smile upon his lips. “Only been obliged to entertain my best man,” he said, with a laugh; and he gave his head a shake, and suddenly stretched out a hand to steady himself. “But kept myself all right.”

It was plain to Mary that the man had been drinking heavily, and her spirit rose with indignation and horror, mingled with excitement at her cousin’s avowal.

“Mary, don’t leave me,” whispered Claude.

“Now, then, little one, you go and talk to the other fellows; I want to have a chat with my wife.”

He laughed in a low, chuckling way, for he had long ago mastered Gellow’s opposition, and been told to drink himself blind if he liked. And he had drunk till his miserable feeling of abject dread had been conquered for the moment, while, inured as he was to the use of brandy, he only seemed to be unsteady at times.

“Do you hear?” he said sharply. “Why don’t you go?”

“Claude, dearest, what shall I do?” whispered Mary.

“Stay with me, Mary, pray,” panted Claude. And she looked wildly round for a way of escape, her eyes resting last upon the window, which opened over a steep portion of the cliff.

“Oh! what are you thinking?” said Mary wildly.

“Ah!” exclaimed Glyddyr, with a savage expression crossing his face, “the window? No; he’s not there. Curse him! I could shoot him like a dog.”

Claude, covered her quivering face with her hands.

“Yes, madam, it’s time we came to a little explanation about that, and then we can go on happily. No trifling with me. – Now then,” he cried fiercely, “will you go?”

“No,” cried Mary, turning upon him so sharply that he dropped the hand he had raised to seize her by the shoulder. “How dare you come into my cousin’s presence like this? Shame upon you! She is ill – agitated – not fit to meet you now, and you dare to force your way to her like this – drunken as one of the quarrymen at his worst.”<