CHAPTER II.

GEORGE STRICKLAND'S QUEST.

The strange story told by Sister Agnes in her confession, when combined with her hinted suspicion that the account of Mr. Fairfax's death had no foundation in fact, opened up a series of questions which, under any circumstances, Janet would have felt herself incompetent to deal with alone. Major Strickland was the person of all others to whom she would have gone for counsel and assistance, even had no injunction been laid on her to that effect. That with him should be associated Father Spiridion, could only be another source of gratulation to Janet. She had learned to love and reverence the kindly old man before, but now that she knew him to have been her mother's constant friend and adviser through many years of trouble, he seemed to have a thousand more claims on her affection. Into his hands and those of Major Strickland she committed her cause without reservation, feeling and knowing that they would do the same by her as if she were a child of their own.

It was in her relations towards Lady Pollexfen that Janet felt most the burden of the secret that had been laid upon her. To know that she was the granddaughter of that imperious old woman, and yet to be supposed not to be aware of the fact; to be able to walk down the long, dim picture gallery at Dupley-Walls, and say with a proud swelling of the heart, "These were my ancestors;" to look up from the garden at the gray old pile, and then away across the wide-stretching park, and hear the unbidden whisper at her heart, "This is my rightful home:"--in all this there was for Janet a strange sort of fascination which she could not overcome. But even had she not been bound by her promise to Sister Agnes not to reveal to Lady Pollexfen what had been told her, there was a sufficiency of stubborn pride in her composition to keep her from ever acquainting the mistress of Dupley Walls with her knowledge of a fact which that lady had persistently ignored for so many years. As simple Janet Holme she would go on till the end of the chapter, unless Lady Pollexfen should herself break the seal of silence and acknowledge her as the daughter of the woman she had so cruelly wronged.

One of Major Strickland's first acts in his capacity of adviser to Miss Holme, was to ask permission to make a confidant of his nephew, Captain George, in all that related to his young ward's affairs. The request was granted as a matter of course. Had it been made in behalf of any other than George Strickland, it would have been at once acceded to, but with how much greater pleasure in his case, Janet herself could alone have told. Between Janet and Captain Strickland there had not been the remotest attempt at love-making in the common acceptation of the phrase; and yet, by one of Love's subtle intuitions, each read the other's heart, and knew of the sweet secret that lay hidden there. Any intentions that Captain George might have formed in his own mind as to the propriety, or necessity, of making mention of his love to her whom it most concerned, were put aside for the time being in consequence of the death of Sister Agnes. He only laid them aside for a little while, because, as far as he then knew, there was no relationship between Sister Agnes and Janet. But when he came to learn from his uncle, as he was not long in doing, that Miss Holme was the daughter of Sister Agnes and the granddaughter of Lady Pollexfen, he was obliged to thrust his intentions very far into the background, and it seemed doubtful to him whether they would not have to remain there for ever. The granddaughter of Lady Pollexfen was a very different person from Miss Janet Holme, with no prospects to speak of, and not a penny, beyond her quarter's salary, to call her own. To have wedded the Miss Holme he had supposed Janet to be, would have made the happiness of his life; but to propose to Miss Holme as he now knew her was a very different affair. Captain Strickland was a poor man, but his pride was equal to his poverty; and to marry Lady Pollexfen's granddaughter without Lady Pollexfen's consent was more than that pride would allow him to do. Happily, the future might reveal to him some plan, by means of which his love and his pride might be reconciled, and walk together hand in hand. Till that time should come, if come it ever did, his love should remain hidden and dumb.

It was not till nearly a fortnight after the reading of Sister Agnes's Confession that any decision was arrived at by Major Strickland and Father Spiridion as to what steps, if any, should be taken with the view of unravelling the mystery in which the antecedents and fate of Mr. Fairfax were involved. The old soldier and the older priest, with Captain George to strengthen their consultations, met again and again, and discussed the question, as far as the data they had to go upon would allow of it, from every possible point of view. They all felt that underneath the veil which they longed and yet were half afraid to lift, might be hidden some disgraceful story, some dark mystery, which it were better that neither they nor any one should become acquainted with. For Janet never to know who her father really was, and to remain in doubt as to whether he were alive or dead, might be painful to her feelings as a daughter, but for her to learn the truth might be more painful still. From Janet no positive expression of opinion could be elicited. She would be guided, she said, entirely by the wishes of those to whom the affair had been submitted. If they decided that no action whatever had better be taken in the matter, she was quite content to let it rest where it did. If, on the other hand, an investigation were decided upon, she would not shrink from an exposition of the truth, however painful it might be.

At length a definite course of action was resolved upon by the three gentlemen, and Major Strickland wrote to Janet by post:--

"Meet me at the King's Oak to-morrow afternoon at three.

"Bring with you the certificate and the miniature."

Janet was there at the time appointed, and there she found the major and Captain George.

"I have asked you to meet me here," said the major after the usual greetings were over, "to inform you that Father Spiridion and myself have decided that, with your permission, an investigation ought to be made into the circumstances connected with your mother's marriage, and the supposed death of your father. We think that it would be in accordance with your mother's secret wishes that such an investigation should be entered upon after her death, and we think that, in justice to yourself, the mystery, if mystery there be, should be cleared up and set at rest for ever."

"You have my full and entire sanction to whatever plan of proceeding you may think most advisable," said Janet.

"In that case," resumed the major, "George here shall start for Cumberland to-morrow morning, for it is there that our investigation must begin. Father Spiridion and I are both old men. George is young, active, and energetic, and imbued with a thorough zeal for the furtherance of your interests. Have you sufficient confidence in him to entrust your cause into his hands?"

"My cause could not be in safer keeping," said Janet with a blush and a smile. "I already owe my life to Captain Strickland. To that obligation he is now about to add another. How shall I ever be able to repay him, and you, and dear Father Spiridion, the thousand kindnesses I have received at your hands? Indeed, and indeed, I never can repay you!"

Janet's eyes as she ceased speaking went up shyly to those of Captain George. In the deep, earnest gaze of the young soldier she read something that caused her to tremble and blush for the second time, something that seemed to say, "There is one way, and one only, by which you can repay me."

"Tut! tut! poverina mia," said the major, with a flourish of his malacca, "we are all three your bounden slaves, and never so happy as when we are fulfilling your behests. We will go back a part of the way with you, only we must not let her ladyship's lynx eyes see us together, or she will suspect that we are hatching some conspiracy. Last time you were at my house I had some difficulty in gaining her permission to allow you to come."

Captain George offered Janet his arm. The major walked beside them, flourishing his cane, and talking on a score of different topics. So they went slowly through the sunlit park, back towards gray old Dupley Walls. George and Janet were mostly silent. What little they did say was nearly all addressed to the major: they scarcely spoke a word directly to each other. Still, strange to relate, they both afterwards declared to themselves that they had never had a more delightful walk in their lives.

Early next morning Captain Strickland started for Cumberland. There was an unwonted feeling of sadness at his heart which he could not overcome. He knew that if his quest were successful in the way his uncle and Father Spiridion hoped it would be, he and Janet would in all probability be farther divided than they were now. That is to say, if Miss Holme's father should prove to have been a man of family, or simply a very rich man, it was not improbable that his relatives might wish to claim her, in which case she would be lost to him for ever; and even the consolation of seeing her occasionally, on which he could count so long as she remained at Dupley Walls, would be his no longer. Such thoughts as these, however, would have no deterrent effect on his actions. He was fully determined to do all that lay in his power to bring the task that had been laid upon him to a successful issue. It had been decided that should Captain Strickland's investigation bring to light any facts in connexion with her father, which it would be better for Janet's happiness and peace of mind that she should never know, such facts should be carefully withheld from her. Major Strickland and Father Spiridion reserved to themselves a certain discretionary power as to what should be told her, and what had better remain unsaid.

Before Captain Strickland had been two hours in Whitehaven he had hunted out the little church where the marriage of Edmund Fairfax and Helena Holme Pollexfen had been solemnized twenty years before. He compared the certificate he had brought with him with the original entry in the register, and he found them to tally in every particular. He inquired here and there till he had ferreted out the daughter of the woman who had been pew-opener at the church a quarter of a century before, and had been one of the witnesses to the marriage; but the woman herself had been dead a dozen years.

When he had got so far, Captain Strickland went back to his hotel and ordered a bed for the night. Whitehaven could furnish him with no further information. On the morrow he must go to Beckley. One important point had been proved: that the certificate in his possession was a bona fide copy of the register.

As soon as breakfast was over next morning he took a post-chaise and was driven to Beckley. It was eleven miles away, but there was no difficulty in finding the place. Since the date of Miss Pollexfen's residence there, quite a little hamlet had sprung up close by in connexion with some extensive iron-ore works which had now been in operation for several years. Beckley Grange was now tenanted by the manager of these works. Miss Bellenden, the aunt with whom Miss Pollexfen had lived for so long a time, and from whose house she had run away to get married, had been dead these eighteen years. Captain Strickland was shown her tombstone in the village church.

He had not expected to pick up much information that would be of use to him at Beckley; it can hardly therefore be said that he was disappointed at finding every trace, except the epitaph, of a past state of things so entirely swept away. There was not even an old servant to be found, with a memory that would stretch back for a quarter of a century, from whom he might have gathered some reminiscences of Miss Pollexfen's life at Beckley, such as would have had a special interest for Janet, although they might have had no bearing whatever on the case he, Captain George, had in hand.

Sister Agnes, in her Confession, had made no mention by name of the particular village or place at which Mr. Fairfax was staying at the time he made her acquaintance. Consequently for Captain Strickland to have gone inquiring among all the villages in the district respecting a certain Mr. Fairfax who might or who might not have lived there for a few weeks some twenty years ago, would have been an almost hopeless task, and one that need not be resorted to till every other chance should have failed. The person called Captain Laut in the Confession, and he alone, if he were still alive, could clear up the mystery in a few words.

The first point was, where to find Captain Laut. The second, whether, when found, he would tell all that he was wanted to tell.

Captain Strickland left Whitehaven next day by express train for Loudon. The first thing he did after reaching town was to deposit his portmanteau at the station hotel and then take a Hansom to his old club, the Janus, where he was sure to meet several brothers in the profession of arms to whom he was well known. After dining he went to consult some files of Army Lists. In a List twenty years old he found the name of a Captain Laut as belonging to the two-hundred-and-fourth regiment, at that time in garrison at Portsmouth.

Captain Strickland belonged to a younger generation of military men than that which had been in vogue at the Janus twenty years previously. But the father of one of his most particular friends was not only an old military man, but an old club man and bon vivant into the bargain--a man who knew something good or bad--generally the latter--about everybody of note for the last quarter of a century. To this gentleman went Captain George. After explaining that he wanted to find out whether Captain Laut, who, twenty years previously, had belonged to the two-hundred-and-fourth Foot, were still alive, and if so where he could be found--he asked the favour of the old soldier's advice and assistance.

After turning the matter over in his mind for two or three minutes, the old gentleman said: "Put down on a slip of paper the particulars of what you want to know, and leave the case in my hands. You shall hear from me, one way or another, in the course of a few days."

Three days passed away without bringing any news, but on the morning of the fourth Captain George found the following note at his club:

"Major Gregson presents his compliments to Captain Strickland, and begs to inform him that Captain (afterwards Colonel) Lant, formerly of the two-hundred-and-fourth Foot, is still living. Colonel Lant's present residence is Higham Lodge, near Richmond, Surrey."

Captain George suffered no grass to grow under his feet. That very afternoon he set out in quest of Higham Lodge. It was about two miles from Richmond, and he found it without difficulty. The footman who answered his ring told him that Colonel Lant was at home, but was only just recovering from a dangerous attack of gastric fever, and would hardly see any stranger at present. All the same, he would take Captain Strickland's card to his master.

Presently he returned. Colonel Lant would see Captain Strickland. So George followed the footman across the hall and up the wide shallow staircase, and was ushered into the sick man's room.

"Good morning, sir," said Colonel Lant--a white-haired sharp-featured man, with a brick-dust complexion that was somewhat toned down at present by illness--"a brother in arms is always welcome. Had you belonged to any other profession I had not seen you."

"I must apologize for my intrusion," said Captain Strickland. "Had I been aware that you were ill I would have put off my visit till a future date. My errand, in fact, is entirely of a private nature, and is not so pressing but that it will stand over till another time. With your permission, I will call upon you again this day week or fortnight."

"Not a bit of it, my boy, not a bit of it," said the colonel. "Now that you are here, we may as well cook your goose and have done with you. May I inquire as to the particular object which has brought you so far from town?"

"My object was to ask you whether, once upon a time--say twenty years ago--you were acquainted with a gentleman of the name of Fairfax--Mr. Edmund Fairfax, to be precise?"

The sick man coughed uneasily, raised himself on one elbow, and stared fixedly at his visitor. "And pray, sir, what may be your object in asking such a question?" he said at length.

"That I will tell you presently," answered Captain George. "May I assume that you were acquainted with Mr. Edmund Fairfax?"

"You may assume what the deuce you like, sir," answered the peppery colonel. "It seems to me that there is a great deal too much assumption about you. But go on. What are you driving at next?"

"The Mr. Edmund Fairfax to whom I allude, was married at Whitehaven to a certain young lady, Miss Pollexfen by name. If I am rightly informed, you were a witness to that marriage. Mr. Fairfax and his wife went abroad. A year later, Mr. Fairfax was unfortunately drowned in one of the Swiss lakes. You were the bearer of the news of his death to his widow, who shortly after that event returned to England. I hope, sir, that you follow me thus far?"

"Oh, I follow you easily enough, never fear!" replied the irascible old soldier. "You tell your tale as glibly as if you had learnt it by heart beforehand. But you have not done yet. When you have come to an end, I may, perhaps, question the truth of your statements in toto."

"From the date of her arrival in England up to the time of her death, which event happened a few weeks ago, Mrs. Fairfax lived in the utmost seclusion--in fact, she lived under an assumed name. But, sir, she had a daughter. That daughter is now grown up, and is acquainted with her mother's story. It is as her advocate that I am here to-day."

"A youthful Daniel come to judgment!" sneered the colonel. "Well, sir, granting for the sake of argument that there may be some slight residuum of truth in what you have just told me--what then? You have something still in the background."

"Simply this, Colonel Lant. Mrs. Fairfax never knew, nor beyond a few questions put to you on a certain occasion did she ever seek to know, anything concerning the antecedents and social position of her husband. When once her husband was lost to her, all minor considerations were regarded with perfect indifference. But as respects Miss Fairfax, the case is very different. Those who have her interests most at heart--that is to say, my uncle, Major Strickland, and another old friend of Mrs. Fairfax, who is associated with him in this matter--are naturally anxious that Miss Fairfax should no longer be left in doubt as to her parentage and proper position in the world. I am their envoy to you. You alone can tell them where and how to look for that which they want to find."

"And so pretty Mrs. Fairfax is dead," said the colonel after a pause. "Ay! ay! each of us must go in turn. I had a narrow squeak myself a few days ago, I can tell you. Sweet Mrs. Fairfax! and dead, you say? Twenty years have gone by since I saw her last; but I have often thought about her, and always as being young and pretty. I never could think of her as touched by Time's finger: as having grey hair, and wrinkles, and all that, you know. For ever sweet and young. I was half in love with her myself, and should have been wholly so had not Fairfax been beforehand with me. But she was far away too good for him, and for me too, for that matter. And now, dead!"

Colonel Lant had wandered so far back into the past that he was near forgetting the presence of Captain Strickland. The latter sat without speaking. The sick man's half-conscious revelations were sufficient to prove that he was on the right track. At length the colonel came back with a sigh and a start to the practical present.

"A daughter, did you not say--a grown-up daughter? Dear me! And in the interests of this daughter you want to know something about the antecedents and history of Ned Fairfax. Well! well! it was a bad piece of business, and some reparation is certainly due."

"I tell you, sir, that some reparation is certainly due," re-asserted the colonel, in his most peppery style. "And I'll e'en make a clean breast of it while I've a chance of doing so--though, mind you, whether Ned Fairfax would approve of such a step on my part, is more than I can say. Probably he wouldn't. But that don't matter. If he knew I lay dying, he would not trouble himself to come twenty miles to see me. Then why should I study his interests so particularly? I may tell you, Captain What's-your-name, in confidence, mind, that when I lay here a few days ago, so ill that I was doubtful whether I should ever get round again, this very business of which we have been talking, and of which as yet you don't know all the particulars, stood out very black in my memory, and troubled my mind not a little. Now, I'm not going to die this time, but while I've the chance I'll rub out that little score, so that when my Black Monday really does come, it may not crop up against me for the second time, and stare me in the face with the ugly look of an unrepented wrong."

Captain George sat without speaking. It was quite evident to him that Colonel Lant was one of those people who love to hear themselves talk, but who pay small regard to the wishes or opinions of others. Left to himself, the colonel would probably let fall more valuable information of his own accord than could be elicited from him by the keenest cross-examination.

"An ugly piece of business!" resumed the colonel. "Many a time since then have I felt sorry that I allowed myself to be talked into doing what I did by Ned Fairfax's plausible tongue. For one thing, I owed him money at that time, and he might have made it hot for me had I refused to comply with his wishes. The marriage itself was all right and proper, but the story of the drowning in one of the Swiss lakes was a pure forgery. You may well look surprised. Ned Fairfax was no more drowned than I was: in fact, to my certain knowledge he was alive only three months ago."

The colonel paused to refresh himself with a pinch of snuff, and then went on again. "When Edmund Fairfax married Miss Pollexfen, the fact of such a ceremony having taken place was most jealously guarded from all his people. His expectations at that juncture might be said to depend upon his remaining a bachelor. But he saw Miss Pollexfen and fell in love with her, and he was not a man to let anything thwart him in the gratification of his likes or dislikes. He married Miss Pollexfen and risked the future. All went well with the young couple for a year or more. They lived a quiet, secluded life, and were tolerably happy: not that Fairfax was a man who would have been happy for any length of time in the quiet trammels of domestic life. But he had not had time to get thoroughly tired before the thunder-cloud burst. He was summoned back to England by his uncle, to marry the young lady, a great heiress, who had been set down for him in the family programme. The predicament was an awkward one, but Fairfax was equal to the occasion. At that time he was close upon five-and-twenty years of age. He had spent one fortune already, and he was booked to come into another on his twenty-fifth birthday. He would come into another, that is, provided he were willing to change his name from Fairfax to that of the old lady, a distant relation, by whom the fortune was bequeathed. Fairfax had no foolish predilection for one name over another when there was money to be got by the change. His plan was to come to England, leaving his first wife abroad; to wait for the birthday which would at once give him a fortune and allow him to change his name; after that to marry the heiress with all convenient speed. The story of his death was cleverly concocted, and, with my assistance, as cleverly carried out. Mrs. Fairfax believed the story, and Ned knew her gentle nature too well to fear that she would ever make any inquiry as to his history or family, they being topics on which he had declined to enlighten her when he was supposed to be alive. The result of the plot as regards Mrs. Fairfax, you probably know better than I do. She accepted her fate, and disappeared from her husband's path, which was precisely what he wanted. The result as regarded Fairfax himself was something different from his expectations. He changed his name, and he came into his fortune, but his bride that was to have been, died two months before the day fixed for the wedding. Fairfax bore his loss with great equanimity. He smoked more cigars than before, and bought a commission in a marching regiment. A few months later he was ordered out to India. Before leaving Europe he set on foot a private inquiry, having for its object the discovery of the whereabouts of Mrs. Fairfax. But the inquiry elicited nothing beyond its own heavy expenses, and it is possible that Fairfax was quite as well pleased that it did not.

"Well, sir, my friend Edmund proceeded to India, and there he remained for several years. He worked himself up to a captaincy, and he might have done exceedingly well had not the cursed spirit of gambling eaten into his very soul. But he was and is a born gambler, and will be so till the end of the chapter. He would gamble for the nails in his own coffin if he had nothing else to play for. His second fortune went as his first had gone. Just as he was on the verge of ruin some unpleasantness in connexion with a gambling transaction induced him to sell out and return to England. Since that time how he has contrived to live and appear like a gentleman is a problem best known to himself. And now, sir, I think I have told you all that it concerns you to know respecting my friend Mr. Edmund Fairfax."

"All but one thing, Colonel Lant, and that a most essential one."

"What is it?"

"You state that Mr. Fairfax changed his name some time after his marriage with Miss Pollexfen. By what name is he now known?"

"He is known as Captain Edmund Ducie, and his London address when I last heard from him was 2A, Tremaine-street, Piccadilly."

These particulars were duly taken down by Captain Strickland in his pocket-book. It must be borne in mind that the name of Ducie sounded quite strange in his ears. He had never heard mention of the Great Mogul Diamond.

"As I said before, I don't know whether my friend Fairfax, or rather Ducie, would altogether approve of my telling you so much of his history and private affairs," said the colonel; "but I don't care greatly whether he approves or does the other thing. I've eased my mind of a burden, the weight of which I have felt several times of late; and since there is a child, it is only right that she should know her father."

After some further conversation, in the course of which he elicited from the old soldier sundry minor particulars having reference to his errand, Captain Strickland took his leave and returned to town.

The day was still early, and George drove direct from the terminus to 2A, Tremaine-street, Piccadilly. But Captain Ducie had removed from Tremaine-street nearly two years ago, and George was directed to a much humbler locality but no great distance away. Here the rooms were still held in Captain Ducie's name, so George was told, but the captain himself had not been seen there for nearly six months. The gentleman had better go down to the Piebalds, which used to be Captain Ducie's club, and there he might perhaps learn where the latter was now living. So spake the janitress, and to the Piebalds Captain Strickland repaired.

Here Here he got what he wanted when the porter had "taken stock" of him, and had satisfied himself that he could not possibly be a dun. Captain Ducie's present address, he was told, was the Royal George Hotel, St. Helier, Jersey.

That night's post took a long letter addressed to Major Strickland. George waited in London for an answer to it. One came sooner than he expected. It was in the shape of a telegram:--

"Start for Jersey at once. I will write to you there by next post."