Chapter I: A Startling Rencontre

Two travelers on board the ocean steamer _Scorpio_, bound from New York to Liverpool, were Gentleman Geff and his queenly bride.

He was in blissful ignorance that his forsaken wife and her infant were on the same ship.

The wife whom he believed to be in her pauper grave in potter’s field, and the child of whose birth he had never heard!

Gentleman Geff was riding on the topmost wave of success and popularity. He had paid a high price for his fortune, but he told himself continually that the fortune was worth all he had given for it.

Certainly there were two awful pictures that would present themselves to his mental vision with terrible distinctness and persistent regularity.

The first was of a deep wood, in the dead of night, and a young man’s ghastly face turned up to the starlight.

The other was of a silent city street, in the dark hours before day, and a girl’s form prone upon the pavement, with a dark stream creeping from a wound in her side.

There were moments when the murderer would have given all that he had gained by his crimes to wake up and find that they had all been “the phantasmagoria of a midnight dream”; that he was not the counterfeit Randolph Hay, Esquire, of Haymore, with a rent roll of twenty thousand pounds sterling a year, and an income from invested funds of twice as much, and with two atrocious murders on his soul, but simply the poor devil of an adventurer who lived by his wits, and was known to the miners as Gentleman Geff.

At such times he would drink deeply of brandy, and under its influence find all his views change. He would philosophize about life, fortune, destiny, necessity, and try to persuade himself that he had been more sinned against than sinning. He then felt sure that, if he had been born to wealth, he would have been a philanthropist of the highest order, a benefactor to the whole human race; would have founded churches, and sent out missionaries; would have established hospitals and asylums, and erected model tenement houses for the poor.

Ah! how good and great a man he would have proved himself if he had only been born to vast wealth! But he had been born to genteel poverty. Fate had been unkind. It was all the fault of fate, he argued.

In this exaltation he would go into the gentlemen’s saloon, sit down at one of the gaming tables, and stake, and win or lose, large sums of money; and so, in the feverish mental and physical excitement of drinking and gambling, he would seek to drive away remorse.

Often he would drink himself into a state of maudlin sentimentality, and in that state reel into the stateroom occupied by himself and his bride. He was really more “in love” with Lamia Leegh than he had ever been with any woman in his long career of “lady-killing.” He had married her for love, although it was the Turk’s love.

But Lamia did not love him in the least. She had married him for rank, money and position. She had begun by liking him, then enduring him, and now she ended by detesting him.

“Some poor girls marry old men for money; some marry ugly men or withered men for the same cause; but to marry a drunkard for that, or for any cause; to be obliged to live with the beast; to be unable to escape from him; to see him day and night; to smell his nauseous breath—it is horrible, abhorrent, abominable!” she said to herself.

Yet she never dared to let her disgust and abhorrence appear to its object. She was too politic to offend him, for—he held the purse strings. There had been no settlements—nothing of the sort—notwithstanding all the talk about them with Will Walling. For every dollar she would receive she must depend on her husband.

The Cashmere shawls and sable furs and solitaire diamonds that she longed for, if she should get them at all, must be got from him, and she knew she would get them, and everything else she might want, so long as he should possess his fortune and she retain his favor. So she veiled her dislike under a show of affection, and she even made for herself a rule and set for herself a task, so that he might never find out her real feelings toward him.

The more disgusted she might really be, the more enamored she would pretend to be.

This was surely a very hard way of earning diamonds and the rest, but, like Gentleman Geff, she told herself that they were worth it; and she thought so.

Their fellow passengers all knew them to be a newly married pair; for there happened to be a few New York “society” people on the ship, who had heard all about the grand wedding at Peter Vansitart’s, and they had spread the news in the first cabin.

Their fellow voyagers also believed them to be a very happy couple; though ladies sometimes whispered together that he certainly did look rather dissipated; and gentlemen remarked to each other that it was a pity he drank so hard and played so high. It was a bad beginning at his age, and if it should continue Haymore fortunes could scarcely “stand the racket.”

But notwithstanding these drawbacks, Mr. and Mrs. Randolph Hay were very popular among their fellow voyagers.

The weather continued good for the first week.

The bride and groom were daily to be seen on deck—well wrapped up, for the fine October days were cold on midocean.

Yet though they were every day on deck, they had never yet encountered Jennie.

How was that? And where was Jennie?

Jennie Montgomery was in her stateroom, so prostrated by seasickness that she was scarcely able to take care of her child. She had never once left her room even to go into the ladies’ saloon, but passed her time between her lower berth and her broad sofa.

Stewardess Hopkins became interested in poor little Jennie and her baby—“one as much of a baby as t’other,” she had said to one of the stateroom stewards—and so she showed them kindness from a heartfelt sympathy, such as no fee could have purchased.

On the eighth day out, Mrs. Hopkins was in the room with the young mother and child, when Jennie, looking gratefully at the stewardess, said, with tears in her eyes:

“Oh, Mrs. Hopkins, I do thank you with all my heart, but feel so deeply that that is not enough. I shall never, never be able to repay you for all your goodness to me.”

“Don’t talk in that way, my dear,” replied the stewardess, in self-depreciation.

“If it were not for you, I believe that I and baby should both die on the sea.”

“Oh, no, dear. ‘The Lord tempers the wind to the shorn lamb,’ and if I hadn’t been here He would have provided some one else for you. But now, dear, I do really think you ought to try and exert yourself to go up on deck. Here we are a week at sea, and you have had no enjoyment of the voyage at all. Don’t you think, now that the baby has gone to sleep, and is safe to be quiet for two or three hours, you could let me wrap you up warm and help you up on deck?”

“I should like to do so, but I am not able; indeed I am not. I am as weak as a rat.”

“Rats are remarkably strong for their size, my dear, for they’re all muscle. And as for you being weak, it is only a nervous fancy, caused by your seasickness. But you’re over that now. And if you will only let me help you up on deck, why, every step you take and every breath you breathe will give you new life and strength,” persisted the stewardess.

“Well, I will go.”

Jennie stood up, holding by the edge of the upper berth for support, while the stewardess prepared her to go up on deck.

And when last of all Jennie was well wrapped up in her fur-lined cloak, Mrs. Hopkins led and supported her to the stairs, and took her carefully up to the deck, and found her a sheltered seat on the lee side.

“Sit here,” she said, “and every breath of this fresh air you breathe will give you new life.”

And having tucked a rug well around the feet of her charge, the stewardess left Jennie to herself.

Jennie looked around her. There were very few people within the range of her vision, only the man at the wheel and two or three deck hands.

It was the luncheon hour, and nearly all the passengers who were not in their staterooms had gone to the dining saloon.

Then Jennie looked abroad over the boundless expanse of dazzling blue sea, leaping and sparkling under the light of a radiant blue sky. It was splendid, glorious, but blinding to vision just out of the shadows of the stateroom and cabin, and so Jennie closed her eyes to recover them, and sat with them closed for some moments. At this hour it was very quiet on deck. Only the sounds of the ship’s movements were heard. Jennie, with her tired eyes shut, sat there in calm content.

“Oh! I am going mad! I am going mad! It has taken shape at last—or is this—delirium tremens? I—must not—drink so much!”

It was a low, husky, shuddering voice that uttered these strange words in Jennie’s hearing.

She opened her eyes at the sound, looked up and saw——

Kightly Montgomery, her husband, within a few feet of her, staring in horror upon her, while he supported himself in a collapsed state against the bulwarks of the ship. The face that confronted her was ashen, ghastly, awe-stricken, yet defiant, as with the impotent revolt of a demon.

Jennie returned his glare with a gaze of amazement and perplexity.

And so they remained spellbound, staring at each other, without moving or speaking, for perhaps a full minute.

Jennie was the first to recover herself. A moment’s reflection enabled her to understand the situation—that Kightly Montgomery, under his new name and with his new wife, was her fellow passenger on the _Scorpio_. This was clear enough to her now.

She was also the first to break the spell of silence, though it cost her an effort to do so, and her voice quivered, and she lowered her eyes as she said:

“You seem to take me for an optical illusion.”

He still glared at her without answering.

“I am no ‘illusion,’” she continued, more steadily, gaining more self-control every moment.

“If not—what—in the devil—are you?” he gasped at length, terrified, yet aggressive.

“I am your wife; but shall never claim, or wish to claim, the position,” she replied, still keeping her eyes down to avoid the pain of seeing his face.

“You are—I do not—I thought——How——” he began, in utter confusion of mind, and with his eyes starting from the intensity of his stare.

“Go away, please, and collect yourself. Do not fear me. I shall not trouble you. But pray, go now, and do not come near me or speak to me again,” said Jennie.

“But I thought—you were dead!” he blurted out, with brutal bluntness.

Jennie reflected for a moment. Why should he have thought that she was dead, even though he had tried to kill her, and had indeed left her for dead? Then she concluded that he must have fled from the city immediately after having committed the crime by which he had intended to rid himself of her forever; but she made no reply to his remark.

“Why have you followed me here?” he demanded, trying to cover his intense anxiety with an air of bravado.

“I did not follow you. I did not know that you were to be on this boat. How should I have known it? And why should I have followed you?” she calmly inquired.

“How is it—that you are here, then?” he questioned, his voice still shaking, his eyes staring, his form supported against the bulwarks of the ship.

“I am going home to my father’s house. When I got well in the Samaritan Hospital a few good women of means clubbed together and raised the funds to give me an outfit and pay my passage to England. They engaged for me one of the best staterooms in the ladies’ cabin.”

“How is it—that I have never seen you—or suspected your presence on the ship before? Have you been hiding from me?”

“No; I have already told you that I did not know you were on board. You have not seen me because I have been seasick in my stateroom. This is my first day on deck. And now will you please to go away and leave me?”

“Presently. By Jove, Jennie, you take things very coolly!” he exclaimed, drawing a handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiping his forehead, on which beads of perspiration stood out. “What do you intend to do?” he suddenly demanded.

“Nothing to trouble you while you are on this ship. I do not wish to see, or speak to, or even to know you here again, and I will not.”

“I—well—I thank you for so much grace. But what will you do after you shall have reached England?”

“I shall tell my father the whole story—of which he has no suspicion now—and I shall place myself in his hands for direction, and do whatever he counsels me to do. He was my guard and guide all my life until I threw off his safe authority and followed you.”

“Pity!” muttered Gentleman Geff to himself.

“And now,” said Jennie, “once more, and for the third time, I beg you to leave me. Let this distressing and most improper interview come to an end at once. I think it is both sinful and shameful, in view of the past and the present, for you to speak to me, or even to look at me. Perhaps I am doing wrong in keeping quiet. Perhaps I ought to denounce you to the captain and officers of this ship.”

“That would be quite useless, my girl,” exclaimed Gentleman Geff, daring to speak contemptuously for the first time during the interview, yet still quaking between the conflicting passions of terror and defiance; “you could not prove anything against me here.”

“Probably not; and my interference would not only be useless, but worse than useless; it would make an ugly scandal, and create a great disturbance. No, I will do nothing until I take counsel with my father. But let me give you this warning: My father is to meet me at Liverpool. Do not let him see you then! And now, Capt. Montgomery, if you do not leave me, I shall be obliged to go to my room,” Jennie concluded.

Gentleman Geff turned away. It was time, for people were leaving the dining saloon and coming up on deck.

Several people—men, women and children—passed Jennie on their way forward; nearly every one of these glanced at Jennie with more or less interest; for hers was a new face. Now, in the beginning of a sea voyage nearly all the passengers are strangers to each other. But after eight days, when every one on board is known to the other by sight, a new face is an event. And this face was fair, pensive and interesting, and it belonged to a young woman who seemed to be quite alone on board.

Among those who passed was a superbly beautiful woman, whose Juno-like form was wrapped in a rich fur-lined cloak, the hood of which was drawn over her lovely head, partly concealing the glory of her red, gold-hued hair, and half shading the radiance of her blond and blooming complexion.

This goddess did something more than glance at the pretty, pale, childlike form reclining there. She stopped and gazed at her for a moment, and then, when Jennie lowered her eyes, the goddess passed on.

When the stream of passengers had all gone forward Jennie drew a sigh of relief and composed herself to rest and to think over the sudden, overwhelming interview which had just passed between herself and her husband.

Jennie was troubled, not in her affections—for if Kightly Montgomery had not succeeded in slaying her, he had certainly managed to kill her love for him—but in her conscience. Was she right in letting him go on in his course of evil? Ought she not to stop it? But could she, even if she tried? And she shrank from trying. For if she should succeed in exposing him, what a terrible mortification it would be to that unfortunate young lady whom he had feloniously married; who was reported to be as religious and charitable as she was beautiful and accomplished; who, even in the busy week before her wedding day, had given time to go out shopping for her—Jennie’s—outfit; and whom it was now too late to save, since she had been living with her supposed husband for a week.

To expose him now, and here, would be to degrade her before all the ship’s passengers, so that all who now admired, honored or envied her, would soon pity and avoid her.

Jennie could not bring an “unoffending” fellow creature to that pass; and if her forbearance was a sin, she hoped the Lord would pardon her for His sake who pitied the sinful woman.

While Jennie was “wrestling” so in the spirit, the stewardess came up and put her baby in her arms, smiling, and saying:

“As I was passing by your stateroom I just looked in to see if all was right, and then I saw this little thing lying wide awake and crowing to herself as good as pie. And I thought I would wrap her up and bring her to you for a breath of this good, fresh air, which, if it was doing you good, wouldn’t do her harm. Was I right?”

“Oh, yes, Mrs. Hopkins. And I thank you so much,” said Jennie, as she stooped and kissed the babe that lay upon her lap; but Mrs. Hopkins had already gone about her business.

Jennie smiled and cooed to the little one, enjoying its presence, and rejoicing that Kightly Montgomery was gone from her side and was not likely to return. She had purposely avoided speaking of the child to him. She was glad that he had not once inquired about it. She had almost a superstitious dread of his seeing, touching or even knowing of the babe, for fear that his evil nature might, in some moral, physical or, perhaps, occult way, bring harm to the little innocent.

She was still bending over the babe, when a soft, sweet, melodious voice addressed her.

“Pardon me, you are Mrs. Montgomery, are you not?”

Jennie looked up. The goddess had come back. Jennie did not know her, but she answered quietly:

“Yes, madam.”

“I am Mrs. Randolph Hay; and that I had heard of you and become interested in you must be my excuse for intruding my acquaintance on you,” added the beauty, with a bewitching smile.

Jennie flushed, paled, trembled and cast down her eyes.

This, then, was Lamia Leegh, the unfortunate young lady whom Kightly Montgomery had married!

Jennie felt sorry for her, standing there in all the pride and pomp of her beauty and wealth.

“You are very kind, madam,” was all that she could find to say, in a low tone, with downcast eyes and flushed cheeks.

The goddess thought the little woman overpowered by her own grandeur, smiled condescendingly, and said complacently:

“What a pretty baby you have! Girl or a boy?”

“Girl, madam.”

“That is right. I love girl babies. What is her name?”

“She is not christened yet.”

“How old is she?”

“Two months on the third of this month, madam.”

“Ah! She is well grown for that age. I need not ask if she has good health. She looks so well.”

“Oh, yes, madam. Thank Heaven!”

“This is the first time you have been on deck, I think?”

“Yes, madam.”

“Suffered from seasickness, I fear.”

“Yes, madam, until this morning.”

“Ah! very sad to have missed all this beautiful voyage. An exceptionally fine voyage. I have crossed many times, but have never experienced so fine a voyage.”

Jennie did not reply.

“But, then, seasickness is a great benefit to some constitutions. I hope that it will have been so in your case.”

Still Jennie did not answer, except by a bow.

“Have you quite recovered?”

“Quite, ma’am, thank you.”

“Yet you feel weak?”

“Yes, madam.”

“That will pass away. You are traveling quite alone, I believe.”

“Yes, madam.”

“Then, if I or Mr. Randolph Hay can be of any service to you, I hope you will call on us. I, and I am sure Mr. Hay also, would be very much pleased to serve you.”

“I thank you, madam, very much, but my dear father will meet me at Liverpool, so that I shall not need assistance. But equally I thank you.”

Jennie would have said more had she been able. She would have acknowledged the services or the supposed services the lady had performed for her before they had ever met; but her tongue “clove to the roof of her mouth,” so to speak. It was all she could do to utter the perfunctory words she had spoken, and these without raising her eyes to the face of the goddess.

Mrs. Randolph Hay bowed graciously, and passed on toward the cabin.

“Poor thing!” breathed Jennie, with deep pity; “poor, poor thing! She, so proud, so stately, so beautiful, to be cast down to the dust! Oh, no! Heaven pardon me, but I must spare him for her sake! I will do nothing until I see my father, and then I must tell him all, and be guided by his counsels.”

So then Jennie stooped and kissed her baby and felt at peace with all the world.

Lamia Leegh was not one to hide her “light under a bushel.”

Before many hours had passed every one had heard the pathetic story of the English curate’s young daughter, who had been married, deserted and months afterward half murdered by her husband; how she had been taken to the Samaritan Hospital, where she became a mother; how certain charitable ladies had become so interested in her case that they had made up a fund to give her and her child an outfit and send them home to her father, and how she was on this very ship.

Without claiming all the credit in so many words, Lamia Leegh had left the impression on the minds of her hearers that she herself had been the principal, if not the only, benefactress of Jennie Montgomery, and she won applause for her benevolence.

When Kightly Montgomery left his wife seated on the deck it was with a feeling of relief to get out of her presence. He hurried to his stateroom, looked around, and felt more relief to find that his deceived bride was absent.

He kept a private stock of strong old brandy in a case. He opened a bottle, poured out half a goblet full, and drank it at a draught.

Then he felt better still.

“She will keep her word,” he said to himself. “If she had intended to give me away, she would have done so before this. Any man would have denounced another under such circumstances. But these women are inexplicable. I wonder if her child was born alive? I wonder if it is living, and if she has it with her, or if she has placed it in some asylum? Impossible to say. She volunteers no information on the subject, and I certainly cannot question her about it. She wishes me to avoid her. I am quite willing to oblige her in that particular. I very much do not wish to see her again. No, nor her father! I must not meet the dominie, under present complications. It would be awkward. I shall shirk that _rencontre_ by getting off the steamer at Queenstown and taking the mail route to London via Kingstown and Holyhead. That will do!”

He filled and drank another half goblet of brandy, and then sat staring at his boots.

Presently Lamia Leegh entered the stateroom. He looked up at her stupidly. His face was flushed, his eyes were fishy. The air was full of the smell of brandy. She knew that he had been drinking to intoxication; but she cared too little for him and too much for herself to notice this. He might drink himself to death, if he pleased, without any interference from her, so that he supplied her with plenty of money while he lived and left her a rich dower when he should die.

So, without seeming to notice his state, she sat down on the sofa by him and said, very pleasantly:

“You remember hearing me speak of that interesting young woman from the Samaritan Hospital for whom we furnished an outfit and engaged a stateroom in this cabin to send her home to her people?”

“What young woman? Ah! yes, I believe I do. What of her?” he drawled, with assumed indifference.

“I have just seen her and her child——”

“Child?” he echoed involuntarily.

“Yes; I told you she had a child, you remember.”

“Aw—no—I didn’t.”

“Oh, yes. Such a pretty little girl baby! They have been shut up in their stateroom for a week on account of the mother’s seasickness. She is out on deck to-day for the first time. When I saw a new face there I thought it was hers, but was not certain, so I passed her by. But a little later, when I saw the stewardess place a young infant in her arms, then I felt almost certain, and I went up and spoke to her. A prodigal daughter, I fear she is, but a most interesting one, and her father is to meet her at Liverpool and——”

“Lamia,” interrupted the man, “suppose we drop the subject. I am not at all interested in your charity girl.” He yawned with a bored air.

“Oh, very well; what shall we talk about? The end of the voyage? Well, I heard the captain say that we shall be at Queenstown to-morrow morning.”

“And we shall get off at Queenstown; do you hear?”

“At Queenstown? But why, when our tickets are for Liverpool?”

“Because I will it to be so!” said the man, in the sullen wilfulness of intoxication.

“Oh, very well! Quite right! So be it!” replied Lamia, with contemptuous submission.

And the discussion ended.

She loosened her dress and laid herself down on the lower berth to take an afternoon nap.

He sat on the sofa, with the brandy bottle before him, and drank and drank and drank.

That evening Gentleman Geff was much too drunk to go into the dining saloon, yet with the fatuity of drunkenness he insisted on doing so, and he reeled out of his stateroom and through the cabin and up the stairs. But had it not been for Lamia’s strong support he could never have reached his seat at their table. Lamia was like Burns’ Nanny:

“A handsome jaud and strang,”

and she succeeded in setting him safe in his seat, where he sat bloated, blear-eyed, and luckily stupid, instead of hilarious or quarrelsome. Every one at table noticed his condition, and—

“What a pity! What a pity!” was thought or whispered by one or another.

It was a severe ordeal for Lamia, yet the trial was softened by the thought that all the sympathies of the company were with her, all the condemnation for him.

She was glad at last when she succeeded in drawing him away from the table to the privacy of their stateroom, where he fell upon the sofa and sank into the heavy sleep of intoxication.

Lamia felt too bitterly humiliated to return to the saloon or go on deck, so she remained in the stateroom, reading a French book until it was time to retire.

Then she turned into her berth, leaving the stupefied inebriate to sleep off the fumes of his brandy, lying on the sofa dressed as he was.

Jennie Montgomery sat on deck with her baby on her knees until the fading day and the freshening breeze warned her to seek shelter in the cabin.

Then she took her child to her stateroom, where soon after both were rocked to sleep by the rolling of the ship.

It was a dark night, partly overclouded, and with but few stars shining.

A few passengers, all men, remained on deck to catch the first glimpse of land. Before midnight the man on the lookout made Cape Clear Lighthouse, and the ship ran along the coast of Ireland.