have him. Whether I do so shall depend upon your own decision, and that I will not ask you to give hastily. In the meantime, beyond a certain cordon, Ernest Adair shall not pass. If you, on consideration, call for his arrest, it shall be made. But I am prepared to give you a stronger proof of my regard for the memory of him who is gone than you perhaps can appreciate. If you decide that it will be better for Ernest Adair to escape, that escape shall not be impossible.”
“The assassin!”
“I will not try to enforce my own view by any o:the lesser arguments which have occurred to me. I will not urge on you that we have no proof of the origin of the final quarrel that ended so miserably—that the probabilities are all against its having been provoked by the weaker man, and not by the stronger—that French juries have sometimes a strange tenderness for a scoundrel whose history can be mixed up with a sentimental story like that of Adair’s. I will suppose that he has committed wilful murder, and that he will be found guilty of it, and executed. What is now a mystery, save among a few relatives, and among some officials who are as mute as the tomb, will then become common scandal in Paris and London. It is not my duty—on the contrary, it is far away from my duty—to place this consideration before you; but I loved your friend, and I take all the consequences of setting all this before you.”
“It does not weigh with me, M. ,” said Hawkesley. “Justice demands that the miscreant who betrayed my dear friend’s honour, and who has taken his life, should come out on a French scaffold, and die.”
“You speak of justice, but you mean vengeance. But that is a common confusion of thought.”
“Let it be so,” said Hawkesley, sternly. “I would myself stand by and see the wretch’s head fall.”
“Do you think that I do not share your indignation? But is there not a higher duty than the gratification of a just revenge? Will you resolve on proclaiming to the world that the noble-minded Urquhart was a dishonoured man?”
“He was not dishonoured,” returned Hawkesley. “An honourable man is robbed, but the deed of the scoundrel who pillages him does him no dishonour, and the crime of a bad man and a bad woman inflicts no shame upon the memory of Robert Urquhart. He suffered a great misfortune, and we will punish the villain who inflicted it.”
“Come and say this to me in six hours, and I will act upon what you say. But there will be one thing more for you to consider. Were the name and fame of Urquhart alone involved, and as he has happily left no children to bear the brand of disgrace, specially no daughter whose husband the world will call a bold man, there might be nothing more to say, and I would telegraph that Adair should be at once arrested. But the subject of our interviews in this room, Mr. Hawkesley, has not been the misfortune of Adair, but of another equally honourable man, whose reputation you were still more eager to protect.”
“Lygon. I have thought of that,” said Hawkesley.
“You could not fail to think of it. But have you considered well what must inevitably happen if this criminal procedure continues? Do you think that Adair on his trial will be more reserved than Adair in this room? Will he, in view of the guillotine, respect the name of your sister?”
“Do you not know that we have seized the letters, M. , the villain’s proofs, as he calls them?”
M. ’s well-trained features gave no sign that he was hearing news. But he said:
“I learn this for the first time, Mr. Hawkesley, and I own it to you with perfect frankness. Others will have to explain how it is that I hear it first from you. But accept my admission as another proof that I am acting loyally by you. Who has the letters?”
“Mrs. Arthur Lygon.”
“That, then, was the packet which you carried when she left the terminus with you, and you drove away to the lodging. They should have known better than to describe it as—as a dressing-case,” said M. , taking up a scrap of paper that lay beside him. “It is in Mrs. Lygon’s possession, of course?”
“Yes, and he will be a shrewd man who gets it from her keeping.”
“We are on grave business, and it is not worth while for me to invite you to come in three hours and see it on this table,” said M. . “Let it remain in the poor lady’s keeping—she clings to it doubtless as a sheet anchor. Yet will your possession of it prevent scandal? Will not Adair rejoice in describing its contents, and in challenging you to produce the letters?”
“Who will believe a miscreant and assassin?”
“The world, which always believes the worst. And, besides, the letters are inextricably mixed up with the case. It is impossible that the treacherous revelations of Adair can be checked, if he is once arrested, unless, of course,” added M. , with no affectation of coolness, but in the tone of remonstrance which he had hitherto employed, “unless he should be permitted to evade a trial by placing himself beyond the reach of this world’s justice. Of this I fear there is no chance. He will have leisure in confinement to calculate the odds too well. He would be a fool to destroy himself. If he lives, he will reveal the double mystery which has come into his keeping.”
“How was it,” said Hawkesley, with a passionate oath, “that Urquhart failed to crush the very life out of him!”
“Aye,” repeated the other. “It was strange. So strange that those may be pardoned who believed that the issue which has happened would be impossible, and therefore left events to take their course.”
“What do you mean?”
“No matter. I will tell you another time. Now, will you leave me? You have a melancholy occupation before you, and that claims your first attention. I will send to you, as I have said, a man whom you can trust. Afterwards, Mr. Hawkesley, give your best consideration to all that I have said. Remember, I am counselling you neither way, but I am setting the whole case before you, and I am ready to act as your calm