said Urquhart, contemptuously, “and I am quite ready to believe that you are what you say. Now, what are your proofs against this unhappy woman?”
“What use do you intend to make of them?”
“That is my affair.”
“True; but it is mine to know what you will do.”
“Suppose I say that there is but one use to which an honourable man can put the knowledge that his friend is wronged. Can you understand that?”
“Again I counsel you, Mr. Urquhart, to abstain from insult. Do I rightly interpret you to mean that you will apprise Mr. Lygon of what you may learn?”
“If the proofs hold, man, what else, in the devil’s name, do you suppose I should do?”
“Suppress them, for the sake of Mrs. Urquhart, and bribe me to silence.”
“Is that what you are going to propose to me?” said Urquhart, looking at him with an evil eye.
“No; that is not my plan. I will not be silenced on any terms that you can offer; but it is natural to suppose that you might wish to avoid a painful exposure.”
“Whether it is natural or not, sir, I am not going to debate with you. But if you have any fears that make you keep back your evidence, you may take my word for this, that if I cannot resist the proof, it shall be before Mr. Lygon in twenty-four hours thereafter.”
“That is as much as concerns me. I care for none of you all; but I have a duty to do, and I am in Versailles to do it. You have been wondering, I doubt not—nay, I know it—why Mrs. Lygon has been here. She has probably deceived you with an admirably-told story, for she is one of the cleverest women in the world; it is no news to you, and I need not apologise for saying that Mrs. Urquhart is a child in her hands. But you will discover the real reason for her presence when you have read some documents which are in my possession.”
“Give them to me.”
“Unfortunately they are not here. I was betrayed into a blunder last night, and in spite of my influence, whatever that may be, with certain quarters, I was brought here, and, until discharged, I can do nothing.
“That seems a shuffle. You can say where the documents are, if you please to do so.”
“I do not please to do so. It is my pleasure to be discharged.”
“What have I to do with that? What did you say you had done?”
“I told you that I was gambling, and my antagonist assaulted me, on which I struck him in the arm with a dagger. I had, it is true, taken too much brandy.”
“I suppose your spy-friends can get you out by a word to the police?”
“I do not choose to employ them. But if I am not released through your agency, and have to release myself in my own way, I shall disappear without further troubling myself in your affairs, and leave you to extract the truth from my hints to Mrs. Urquhart, and the confessions of Mrs. Lygon.”
“I will not have Mrs. Urquhart’s name dragged into question,” said Urquhart, “and I will see your proofs. Else you might lie here till doomsday, my man, for me.”
“I am well aware of that,” said Adair, “nor do I complain. I have no claim on you or Mrs. Urquhart.”
“I will send a lawyer to you. I suppose he will know what to do.”
“Send the lawyer who managed the affair for you when you were cheated in a horse, and threw the seller into the pond behind M. Daubiac’s stables.”
“Five years ago,” said Urquhart.
“Nothing is overlooked—nothing forgotten,” replied Adair, in answer to his tone rather than his words.
“You will come to my house, on being let out of this place,” said Urquhart, “and bring these papers. I have only your word for that.”
“Which you don’t value.”
“Not a jot, and that’s truth.”
“I will be more just to you, sir. I will take your word for something which, unless you promise, I will not produce a single line.”
“What am I to promise?”
“That the papers I place in your hands you will read, and then immediately return them to me.”
“I will not give the promise. I may desire to send them to Mr. Lygon.”
“Mr. Lygon will not need them. Mr. Lygon will be in no state to read papers. Let him receive the assurance that his brother-in-law and counsellor has examined them, and he will ask no more. Be this as it may, I must have them returned.”
“Why?”
“When they have done their work, I have sworn to burn them on the tomb of him who is gone.”
“What accursed play-book folly is that?” said Urquhart, with contempt.
“What? The keeping an oath?”
“You are no doubt exactly the man to indulge in fits of sentimentality,” said the Scot. “And you have never broken an oath?”
“I may have broken oaths, and induced others to break them,” said Ernest Adair, calmly; “but I intend to keep this oath. Give me your word.”
“I have no choice, I suppose?”
“None, as might have occurred to you before.”
“You have my word,” said Urquhart. “I will send the lawyer.”
“Bertha,” said her husband, when he joined her in the walk below, “listen to me, and do not make any answer. In yon room there lies one of the greatest scoundrels that God ever permitted to draw breath. I saw at the first glance that he was so, and that he was a man I am called on to hate, and some day, I hope, to punish. But he states that he holds proofs which I must see before I sleep. He is coming to my house with them as soon as he is set at liberty. At present my house is yours, and all that is in it. You know best