Chapter XXXI: Benjamin Levy Writes Home

"_June 10th_.

"MY DEAR DAD:--

"I wired you yesterday afternoon, immediately on our arrival at
this outlandish little place, to write to me at the hotel Leon
d'Or, for it seems that we have reached our destination--by we, of
course, I mean Mr. Maddison and myself, though he has not the least
idea of my presence here. Well, this is a queer old crib, I can
tell you, and the sooner we are on the move again the better I
shall be pleased. The fodder is odious, not fit for a pig, and the
wine is ditto. What wouldn't I give for a pint of Bass like they
draw at the Blue Boar? Old England for me is my motto!

"And now to biz! So far all's well. I'm on the right tack and no
mistake. We got here middle day, yesterday--came over the hills
from the railway in a regular old bone-shaker of a coach. My
tourist get-up is quite the fig, and though I caught Mr. M----
eyeing me over a bit supercilious like once, he didn't recognize me
if ever he did see me down at Thurwell Court, which I don't think
he did. Well, directly we got here, off started Mr. M---- through
the town, and after a bit I followed. Lord! it was hot and no
mistake, but he didn't seem to notice it, though the perspiration
was streaming down my back like anything. About a mile out of town
we came to a great high wall with a door in it, and before I could
say 'Jack Robinson' or get anywhere near him, in he went. Well, I
hung round a bit, and soon I found a sort of opening in the wall
where I could just see in, and there he was sitting down on a seat
in a regular howling wilderness of a garden, as though the whole
place belonged to him, if you please. All right! I thought, I'm
agreeable to a rest, and I sat down too, little thinking what was
in store for me. Four mortal hours passed before he stirred, and
jolly stiff and tired I was, I can tell you. But it was a lucky
thing for me all the same, for when he got up and made for the
house it was almost dark, so without more ado I just opened the
door and walked in myself. There was no end of shrubs and trees
about the place, and though I followed him on another path only a
few yards away, he couldn't see me, and there was no chance of his
hearing, for the moss had grown over the gravel like a blooming
carpet, which was all lucky for me again.

"Well, we were just close to the house, when we both of us got a
start, and I nearly yelled out. Round the corner of his path, thank
goodness! came a tall, white-haired old lady, in a long black
dress, with an ivory cross hanging down, and looking as dignified
as possible. She no sooner saw him than she stopped and cried out,
'Bernard! Bernard!' and seemed as though she were going to faint.
She pulled herself together, however, and things became very
interesting for me, I can tell you.

"Mr. M---- he was going to take her hands and kiss her, but she
drew them away and stood back. Lord! how awful her face did look!
It gave me a regular turn just to look at her.

"'Bernard!' she cried out in a low, shaking voice, 'I know
all--all!'

"'What do you mean, mother?' he asked.

"Then she stretched her arms up, and it was dreadful to look at
her.

"'I had a dream!' she cried, 'a dream which kept me shuddering
and sleepless from midnight to daybreak. I dreamed I saw
him--dead--cold and dead!'

"He said nothing, but he seemed fearfully upset. I kept crouched
down behind a shrub and listened.

"'In the morning I sent for a file of English newspapers,' she went
on. 'One by one I searched them through till I came to August last
year. There I found it. Bernard, it was at Thurwell Court. I had a
letter in my pocket from you with the postmark Thurwell. Don't come
near me, but speak! Is there blood upon your hands?'

"And now, dad, the most provoking things happened. It seemed just
as though it were done to spite me. He had his mouth open to
answer, and I had my ears open, as you may guess, to listen, and
see what happens, and tell me if it wasn't a rare sell! Off the old
woman goes into a faint all of a sudden. He catches hold of her and
sings out for help. Down I ran to the door as hard as I could,
slammed it as though I had just come in, and came running up the
path. 'Anything the matter?' I called out, as though I didn't know
my way. 'A lady fainted,' he shouts; 'come and help me carry her
into the house;' so up I went, and together we carried her inside
and laid her on a couch in one of the queerest-furnished rooms I
ever saw. There was servants with lighted lamps running about, and
another woman who seemed to be a relation, and such a fuss they all
made, and no mistake. However, Mr. M---- cooled them all down
again pretty soon, for he could see that it was only an ordinary
faint, and then he began to look at me curiously. I had made up my
mind to stay until the old woman came round, but he was too many
for me, for he got up and took me to the door himself. Of course,
he was awfully polite and all that, and was very much obliged for
my help, but I twigged it in a moment. He wanted me gone, so off I
skedaddled.

"Well, back I went to the inn, and began to make a few cautious
inquiries about the lady of the Villa Fiorlessa, for that was the
name of the house where I had left Mr. M----. I could not get on at
all at first, not understanding a word of the blessed lingo, but by
good luck I tumbled across an artist chap who turned out a good
sort, and offered to interpret for me. So we had the landlord in,
and I ordered a bottle of his best wine--nasty greasy stuff it
was--and we went at it hammer and tongs. Pretty soon I had found
out everything I wanted to.

"Nearly twenty years ago the lady--Mrs. Martival she was
called--had come to the Villa Fiorlessa with her husband and one
little boy. They were, it seems, one of the worst-matched couples
that could be imagined. Mr. Martival was a gloomy, severe man, who
hated going out, and worked at some sort of writing day and night.
His wife, on the other hand, who was a Frenchwoman, was
passionately fond of travel, and change, and gaiety. Her life was
consequently very like a prison, and it is stated, too, that
besides denying her every whim and forcing her to live in a manner
she utterly disliked, her husband ill-treated her shamefully. Well,
she made a few friends here and went to see them pretty often, and
just at that time an English milord--you can guess who he was--came
here to see the statue, and met Mrs. Martival, whom he seems to
have known before her marriage. The exact particulars are not
known, but it is supposed that Mrs. Martival would have been
married to this young Englishman, Sir Geoffrey Kynaston, but for
some deep scheming on the part of Mr. Martival. Anyhow, there was a
desperate quarrel between Mr. and Mrs. Martival, when she charged
him with duplicity before this marriage, and he forbade her to meet
Sir Geoffrey Kynaston again. Quite properly she refused to obey
him, and they met often, although every one seems quite sure that
at that time they met only as friends. Mr. Martival, however,
appears to have thought otherwise, for one night, after what they
call their carnival dance here, which every one in the neighborhood
had attended, Mr. Martival had the brutality to close his doors
against her, and refuse to let her enter the house. It was the
crowning piece of barbarism to a long course of jealous cruelties.
Mrs. Martival spent that night with some friends, and seems even
then to have hesitated for a long time. Her married life had been
one long disappointment, and this brutal action of her husband had
ended it. Sir Geoffrey Kynaston was madly in love with her, and she
was one of those women who must be loved. In the end she ran away
with him, which seemed a very natural thing for her to do.

"The queerest part of it is to come, though. Sir Geoffrey was
devoted to her, and would have married her at once if Mr. Martival
would have sued for a divorce. He showed her every kindness, and he
lavished his money and his love upon her. But it seems that she
was a devout Roman Catholic, and the horror of what she had done
preyed upon her so, that in less than a month she left Sir
Geoffrey, and entered one of the lower sort of nunneries as a
menial. From there she went to the wars as a nurse, and did a great
deal of good. When she returned, of all places in the world she
came back to the Villa Fiorlessa, partly from a curious notion of
penance, that she might be continually reminded of her sin. The
queerest part of it is, however, that the people round here behaved
like real Christians, and jolly different to what they would have
done at home. They knew all her history, and they welcomed her back
as though that month in her life had never been. That's what I call
charity, real charity, dad! Don't know what you think about it.
Well, there she's lived ever since with her sister, who had lots of
money (she died last year), and the poor people all around just
worshipped them.

"Now, to go back a bit. Mr. Martival, although he had been such
a brute to his wife, no sooner found out that she was with Sir
Geoffrey Kynaston than he swore the most horrible oaths of
vengeance, and went off after them. He was brought back in a fever,
with a pistol shot in his leg, which served him d----d well right,
I think. No sooner was he better than he started off again in
pursuit, but Sir Geoffrey dodged him, and they never met. Meanwhile
the young cub, whom you will recognize as Mr. M----, had grown up,
and what must his father do when he returned but tell him as much
of the story as suited him, with the result that he too swore an
oath of vengeance against Sir Geoffrey Kynaston. Time goes on, and
Mr. Martival and his son both leave here. Mr. Martival is reported
to have died in Paris, his son goes to England, and is lost sight
of. We can, however, follow the story a little further. We can
follow it down to its last scene, and discover in the Mr. Brown who
had taken a small cottage near Sir Geoffrey's seat, within a week
of his return home, and whom soon afterwards we discover bending
over Sir Geoffrey's murdered body, the boy who, fired with what his
father had thundered into his ears as his mother's ruin, had sworn
that oath of vengeance against Sir Geoffrey.

"All this looks very simple, doesn't it? and I dare say, my dear
dad, you're wondering why I don't come straight away home, and
cause a sensation at Scotland Yard by clearing up the Kynaston
murder. Simply because that isn't quite my game. I didn't come over
here to collect evidence against Mr. M----, for I could have laid
my hand on plenty of that at home. There is something else at the
back of it all, which I can only see very dimly yet, but which will
come as a crasher, I can tell you, when it does come. At present I
won't say anything about this, only keep your eyes open and be
prepared. Ta-ta!

"Your obedient son,
"BEN.

"P.S. Don't worry about Xs. They won't come out of your pocket in
the long run, I can tell you.

"P.S. 2. Wednesday evening. Here's a pretty pickle! You remember
the artist I told you about. I'm d----d if he isn't a regular from
S.Y., and he's got his pocket-book pretty full, too. The game is
serious now and no mistake. Mind you, I think we stand to win
still, but I can't be quite sure while this chap's on the lay. Look
out for telegrams, and don't be surprised if I turn up at any
moment. It may come to a race between us. D----n, I wonder how he
got on the scent!"