Chapter XXI: Towards the Truth

Several days had passed—pleasant May days in London.

Yes; Miss Berentsen was at home—for Thyra had again retaken her maiden name soon after the tragic affair—and Richard Jervoise followed the rather saucy maidservant up to the drawing-room in Talbot Road.

The grey-eyed girl, seated near the window, reading, rose as he entered, but her greeting was cold and strained. He was dressed in frock coat, and carried his silk hat in his hand, for his visit there was a formal one, and he had therefore dressed for formality.

“I’ve called, Miss Berentsen, to offer you my—my congratulations,” he stammered. “I have just heard of your return to London.”

“Thank you very much,” she replied in a low voice. “Won’t you sit down?”

He took the straight-backed chair she indicated, and began to inquire how she had enjoyed herself on the Dalmatian coast.

“I know Ragusa quite well,” he remarked. “I’ve stayed there twice on my way down to Cattaro for Montenegro. It’s quite charming. I think I know the Villa Sergio, too—a big white place on the hill. And so you are very soon to be its mistress! Where does the wedding take place?”

“In Christiania. Mr. Sundt leaves London to-morrow in order to make the arrangements. Meanwhile”—she laughed uneasily—“look at all these things that are continually arriving!” and she pointed to a pile of dressmakers’ and milliners’ boxes at the further end of the room.

“Well,” he sighed sadly, “I hope, Thyra, that you will be very, very happy. I hesitated before I came to call upon you, but I felt that I must at least bid farewell to you once again.”

“Once again!” she echoed bitterly. “Do you recollect our farewell that fatal afternoon in Christiania—and what occurred afterwards?”

“Why recall it?” he faltered, raising his hand. “Why remember the past, now that the future is so bright for you?”

“Can I ever forget it?” she asked. “Can you ever forget it?”

He shook his head in silence, his overburdened heart too full for words. He loved her as he loved his own life.

“Richard,” she said at length in a changed voice, “I think you really ought not to have come here. You might at least have spared me this!”

“I had no desire to offend you,” he assured her quickly. “I recollect all that you wrote in your letter, and I thought——”

“You thought that I was ignorant,” she exclaimed in sudden indignation, interrupting him. “Since I wrote that letter, however, I have heard of your intimate friendship with a woman—a certain Frenchwoman of bad character, named Alza Dresler.”

“Well?”

“I hear that this woman who is such an intimate friend of yours is an adventuress of the very worst type?”

“She is undoubtedly judged by the world as such,” he said.

“Then you defend the woman?”

“She is my friend.”

“You admit it—even—even while you have pretended to love me!”

“Friendship and love are entirely different feelings,” he declared. “The woman, though she may be what you allege, is nevertheless my friend.”

Thyra rose impatiently. Her heart was full of indignation that he should admit friendship with a mere adventuress.

She turned upon him quickly, and in a few forcible words expressed surprise that he should have dared to declare his love for her on that day prior to her departure for Ragusa.

“I told you my heart’s secret, Thyra,” he answered in a low, hoarse whisper, “because—because I could restrain the truth no longer.”

“The truth!” she cried indignantly, her jealousy overcoming her. “Why, at the same time you told me that, you were actually meeting this Frenchwoman in secret!”

“With an object,” he exclaimed. “With one distinct object, Thyra. If you were aware of the whole of the facts you surely would never speak thus to me.”

“Then tell me the facts,” she urged. “Tell me the truth.”

“Not from my lips shall you hear it—but from hers.”

“From hers? What do you mean?”

“I anticipated your misjudgment of my actions, therefore I have asked the woman herself to call upon you.”

“To call here—a person of her character? You must be mad!”

“Whatever may be her character, Alza Dresler has a good heart. And, further, let me tell you that though she has never met you, she is nevertheless your friend.”

“My friend? Why?”

“Be patient, and you will see.”

At that moment Captain Berentsen entered the room, surprised to find Thyra’s visitor, yet eager to leave the pair alone. Too well he knew the heart’s secret of his daughter, who had, alas! now sacrificed herself. And yet did not that sacrifice mean his own salvation?

Ah! the bitterness of it all. Many a night had that sturdy old whaler spent in secret tears. He foresaw his daughter’s doom. What could be expected of a loveless marriage between such a pair—the girl cultured and refined, with artistic taste and artistic temperament; the man a rough boor, bloated with the egotism begotten of great wealth.

The suspicions sown in his mind by Peter Sundt regarding the tall Englishman had caused him much reflection. Certain it was that his daughter and Richard Jervoise were in secret accord. Was it not proved by his visit there at that moment?

As he had entered he saw that something had passed between them in the nature of a secret.

“Mr. Jervoise had called to congratulate me, dad,” the girl explained rather lamely.

“I heard you were abroad,” the captain exclaimed, addressing the Englishman, who in his well-cut frock coat looked taller. “We have not long been back from the Adriatic.”

“So Thyra has just told me,” Dick replied. “But, captain, I called here for a second purpose,” he added. “I called in order to introduce to you and to your daughter a friend of mine—a lady.”

“Oh! Who’s she?” inquired Jorgen quickly. Old salt that he was, he rather prided himself upon his engaging ways with the fair sex.

As he uttered the words the maid opened the door, announcing:

“There’s a lady called to see you, Miss. Her name is Dresler.”

Thyra held her breath. She had no desire to meet the woman, yet of sheer necessity she gave orders for her to be shown up.

A moment later Alza, neat in black, with a large feather boa about her neck, entered, while behind her stood a man, a perfect stranger to them all.

“Ah, M’sieur Dick!” cried the pretty Frenchwoman. “I only arrived in London this morning at five o’clock, and received your note. I went at once to Barnes, but you were out, so I came on here as you desired.”

“This is Miss Berentsen,” Dick said. “Allow me to introduce her, and also Captain Berentsen.”

Thyra bowed coldly. The woman was, she had been told, one of the most clever and unscrupulous adventuresses in Europe.

“This gentleman,” Alza explained in turn, indicating the rather well-dressed man about thirty, tall, with a fair, somewhat bristly moustache, “is a person of whom you have no doubt all heard in connection with the unfortunate death of mademoiselle’s husband—Mr. Oscar Nystrom.”

“Nystrom!” echoed Dick. “Then, sir, you are the mysterious correspondent of Paul Grinevitch?”

“I am,” he answered in rather indifferent English, bowing courteously. Alza explained that he was a Dane, and until that moment, because he was wanted by the police, he had not dared to come forward. Indeed, he had been in hiding in Seville, until she had, after long inquiry, found him and induced him to risk a journey to London in order to explain certain matters.

“I told M’sieur Nystrom of your estrangement from Mr. Jervoise, mademoiselle,” she explained, turning to Thyra, “and it was that which induced him to place himself in his present peril.”

“It is really extremely kind of him,” remarked Thyra rather coldly.

“Ah, mademoiselle!” cried Alza, “you do not understand—you cannot understand. You doubt my good intentions, because you have perhaps heard what I am. But I tell you at once that M’sieur Dick is my good friend. He was once very kind to me, and in consequence I owe him a service, one which to-day I hope to repay.”

“In what way, Alza?” he asked, for it was apparent that he had no idea that the man Nystrom would accompany her on that visit.

“Listen, and I will tell you,” she said. “You love mademoiselle—you told me so,” she went on. “You sought my assistance, the assistance of a bad woman. Oh, yes,” she laughed, turning towards Thyra, her dark eyes dancing, “I know I am an adventuress—a woman of no character! But in consequence I am enabled to move in quite a different circle from yours, I can seek and obtain information in the undercurrents of life that are unsuspected by respectable folk like yourselves. But I—I was respectable once, as respectable as you yourself, mademoiselle,” she faltered; “M’sieur Dick knows. Some day he may tell you my true history—the history of an unfortunate woman!”

“Mademoiselle!” cried Thyra, advancing towards her with sudden emotion and taking her hand, “are you really my friend? Are you speaking the truth?”

“I am,” was the Frenchwoman’s reply. “Your friend—and his.”

“Then forgive me, please forgive me,” pleaded the grey-eyed girl. “Only a moment ago I uttered hard words concerning you, because—because—well, perhaps I was jealous of you.”

“Ah! then you do love M’sieur Dick still?” she inquired quickly. “You have no love for Peter Sundt?”

There was no reply. The girl’s chin had sunk upon her breast. Her silence, however, was sufficiently indicative of the true state of her mind. Her father had placed his hand tenderly on her shoulder.

“Good!” Alza cried, her black-gloved hands held behind her back. “Then I will tell you something which will probably surprise you all. M’sieur Dick telegraphed to me in Paris long ago, and asked me to redeem the promise I once made to him under rather strange circumstances. Well, I have redeemed it. I have had more than one narrow escape of detection and arrest, for, as you may probably guess, the police are anxious for closer acquaintance with me. Nevertheless, though I may probably be convicted and spend some years in prison, I have nevertheless the satisfaction of knowing that I have at least done one good action in my life in ascertaining the truth concerning the death of Paul Grinevitch, the man who belonged to the same set as myself. The man who, like myself, unfortunately, was a thief and a swindler.”

“My husband—a thief!” gasped the unfortunate girl. “What are you saying? What proof have you of this?”

“My poor mademoiselle,” Alza exclaimed, “that man deceived you, as he had deceived M’sieur Dick long ago. He told you a picturesque story as to his antecedents and his high family connections, but I tell you he was one of us. He was an adventurer, it seems, and, soon after poor Helene’s death, became actively associated with us. The reason he went north to Vardo was in order to be out of the way. Inquiries were being made concerning certain forged French bonds, which had been printed in London and had been placed in circulation in Cologne, as well as the theft of the Countess de Magnan’s jewelry from the Gare de Lyon in Paris. The fact was that he had been betrayed, together with my lover and Oscar Nystrom here, by a man who was a member of our gang, but who had turned police informant. My lover was arrested and sent to Cayenne, but Paul managed to escape to the Arctic and get off scot-free, while Oscar went to Russia. The man who denounced them both was a compatriot of Paul’s, a man named Nicholas Bourtzeff.”

“Quite true,” remarked the fair-moustached Dane, interrupting, “quite true! Mademoiselle’s lover was sent to Cayenne by information furnished by that accursed police-spy,” a statement which seemed to cause Thyra to regard Alza with greater cordiality.

“But what is the truth concerning my unfortunate husband’s death?” asked the young widow, pale-faced and anxious, still half expecting that this good-looking Frenchwoman was endeavouring to remove the suspicion from Dick Jervoise. They were friends, old Jorgen also reflected, and therefore the woman was not likely to implicate him.

“Mademoiselle, the facts are extremely curious—amazing,” she answered. “Only yesterday, very far from here—in the town of Orleans—did I learn the one fact which gave me a clue to the remarkable truth. And I hastened to London at once, to find M’sieur Dick, and to place before you both the true and remarkable story. I have said that I am your friend, as well as M’sieur Dick’s. Listen, and I will prove to you the truth of my assertion. I do not ask you to believe me without absolute proof, but I do ask you not to allow yourself to be prejudiced against me merely because of the unfortunate fact that I am, alas!—what I am.”

Dick and old Jorgen stood aside in silence and wonder. Both watched that woman whom the world denounced as an adventuress—the woman who for months had been ever active in the interests of the man to whom she owed her liberty.

“Speak, Alza,” Dick said in a quiet, intense tone, looking from her to the man at her side. “Do not keep us in suspense longer. What discovery have you made?”

For answer she handed him a small, folded, yellow paper.

He opened it, glanced at it for a few seconds, as though unable to believe his eyes.

Then he stood staring at her, speechless and rigid.