The House of Whispers by William Le Queux

Author:William Le Queux [Queux, William Le]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aeterna Classics
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER XXI

THROUGH THE MISTS

Sir Henry refused to speak with his daughter when, on the following morning, she stole in and laid her hand softly upon his arm. He ordered her, in a tone quite unusual, to leave the library. Through the morning hours she had lain awake trying to make a resolve. But, alas! she dared not tell the truth; she was in deadly fear of Flockart's reprisals.

That morning, at nine o'clock, Lady Heyburn and Flockart had held hurried consultation in secret, at which he had explained to her what had occurred.

"Excellent!" she had remarked briefly. "But we must now have a care, my dear friend. Mind the girl does not throw all prudence to the winds and turn upon us."

"Bah!" he laughed, "I don't fear that for a single second." And he left the room again, to salute her in the breakfast-room a quarter of an hour later as though they had not met before that day.

Gabrielle, on leaving her father, went out for a long walk alone, away over the heather-clad hills. For hours she went on—Jock, her Aberdeen terrier, toddling at her side, in her hand a stout ash-stick—regardless of the muddy roads or the wet weather. It was grey, damp, and dismal, one of those days which in the Highlands are often so very cheerless and dispiriting. Yet on, and still on, she went, her mind full of the events of the previous night; full, also, of the dread secret which prevented her from exposing her father's false friend. In order to save her father, should she sacrifice herself—sacrifice her own life? That was the one problem before her.

She saw nothing; she heeded nothing. Hunger or fatigue troubled her not. Indeed, she took no notice of where her footsteps led her. Beyond Crieff she wandered, along the river-bank a short distance, ascending a hill, where a wild and wonderful view spread before her. There she sat down upon a big boulder to rest.

Her hair blown by the chill wind, she sat staring straight before her, thinking—ever thinking. She had not seen Lady Heyburn that day. She had seen no one.

At six o'clock that morning she had written a long letter to Walter Murie. She had not mentioned the midnight incident, but she had, with many expressions of regret, pointed out the futility of any further affection between them. She had not attempted to excuse herself. She merely told him that she considered herself unworthy of his love, and because of that, and that alone, she had decided to break off their engagement.

A dozen times she had reread the letter after she had completed it. Surely it was the letter of a heart-broken and desperate woman. Would he take it in the spirit in which it was meant, she wondered. She loved him—ah, loved him better than any one else in all the world! But she now saw that it was useless to masquerade any longer. The blow had fallen, and it had crushed her.

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