Whoso Findeth a Wife

Chapter One

A State Secret

“Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the Lord.” – Proverbs xviii, 22.

“Have those urgent dispatches come in from Berlin, Deedes?”

“Captain Hammerton has not yet arrived,” I answered.

“Eleven o’clock! Tut, tut! Every moment’s delay means greater risk,” and the Earl of Warnham, Her Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, strode up and down his private room, with his hat still on, impatiently snapping his bony fingers in agitation quite unusual to him.

“Hammerton wired from Berlin yesterday, when on the point of leaving,” I observed, taking a telegram from the table before me.

“In cipher?”

“Yes.”

“No accident is reported in the papers, I suppose?”

“Nothing in the Times,” I replied.

“Strange, very strange, that he should be so long overdue,” the Earl said, at last casting himself into his padded chair, and lounging back, his hands thrust deep into his pockets as he stared thoughtfully into space.

I resumed my writing, puzzled at the cause of the chief’s excited demeanour, but a few moments later sharp footsteps sounded outside in the corridor, followed by a loud rapping, and there entered the messenger, clad in his heavy fur-lined travelling coat, although a July morning, and carrying a well-worn leather dispatch-box, which he placed upon my table.

“Late, Hammerton. Very late,” snapped the Earl, glancing at his watch.

“There’s a dense fog in the Channel, your Lordship, and we were compelled to come across dead slow the whole distance. I’ve driven straight from the station,” the Captain answered good-humouredly, looking so spruce and well-groomed that few would credit he had been travelling for nearly twenty-four hours.

“Go and rest. You must return to-night,” his Lordship said testily.

“At seven-thirty?”

“Yes, at my house in Berkeley Square.”

Then, taking up the receipt I had signed for the dispatch-box, the messenger, to whom a journey to Constantinople or St Petersburg was about as fatiguing as a ride on the Underground Railway is to ordinary persons, walked jauntily out, wishing us both good-day.

When the door had closed, Lord Warnham quickly opened the outer case with his key, and drew forth a second box, covered with red morocco, and securely sealed. This he also opened, and, after rummaging for some moments among a quantity of papers, exclaimed, in a tone of satisfaction, —

“Ah! Here it is. Good! Seals not tampered with.”

Withdrawing from the box a large official envelope, doubly secured with the seal of the British Embassy at Berlin, and endorsed by Sir Philip Emden, our Ambassador, he walked hastily to one of the long windows overlooking the paved courtyard of the Foreign Office, and for some moments closely scrutinised both seals and signature.

“Did you fear that the papers might have been examined in transit?” I inquired of my grave-faced chief in surprise.

“No, Deedes, no. Not at all,” he answered, returning to his table, cutting open the envelope, and giving a rapid glance at its contents to assure himself that it was the same document he had sent to the German capital a week before. “Hammerton is trustworthy, and while dispatches are in his care I have no fear. The only apprehension I had was that an attempt might possibly have been made to ascertain the nature of this treaty,” the great statesman added, indicating the document beneath his hand.

“The result would be detrimental?” I hazarded.

“Detrimental!” he cried. “If the clauses of this secret defensive alliance became known to our enemies war would be inevitable. Russia and France would combine, and the whole of the Powers would become embroiled within a week. Exposure of these secret negotiations would be absolutely disastrous. It would, I verily believe, mean irretrievable ruin to England’s prestige and perhaps to her power.”

He uttered the ominous words slowly and distinctly, then carefully refolding the precious document, with its string of sprawly signatures, he placed it in another envelope, sealing it with his own private seal.

The great statesman, the greatest Foreign Minister of his time, upon whose tact, judgment and forethought the peace and prosperity of England mainly depended, was tall and thin, with scanty, white hair, a pale, refined face, slightly wizened by age, deep-sunken, steely eyes, shaggy brows, a sharp, straight nose, and a breadth of forehead indicating indomitable perseverance and an iron will. His reputation as brilliant orator and shrewd and skilful diplomat was a household word throughout the civilised world, whilst in our own land confidence always increased when he was at the head of Foreign Affairs. As his confidential private secretary, I, Geoffrey Deedes, had daily opportunities of observing how conscientiously he served his Sovereign and his country, and how amazing was his capacity for work. With him, duty was always of paramount consideration; he worked night and day to sustain England’s honour and welfare, for times without number I had gone to his great gloomy house in Berkeley Square in the middle of the night and roused him from his bed to attend to urgent dispatches.

Although a perfect martinet towards many in the various departments of the Foreign Office, he was to me always kind and generous. My father, Sir Reginald Deedes, had, as many will doubtless remember, represented Her Majesty at the Netherlands Court for fifteen years until his death. He was thus an old friend of the Earl, and it was this friendship that caused him to appoint me five years ago his private secretary, and, much to the chagrin of young Lord Gaysford, the Under Secretary, repose such implicit confidence in me that very frequently he entrusted to my care the keys of the ponderous safe wherein were deposited the State secrets of the nation.

“You’d better register this, and we’ll lock it away from prying eyes at once,” Lord Warnham said a few moments later, handing me the envelope after he had sealed it. Taking it, I went straight to my own room across the corridor at the head of the fine central staircase. It was part of my duty to receive the more important dispatches, number those which were sealed, and prior to depositing them in the safe, register the number in my book, stating the source whence they came, the date received, and the name of the messenger who brought them.

Alone in my room, I closed the door, took the register from my own small safe, numbered the precious envelope with the designation “B27,893,” and carefully made an entry in the book. Having finished, a clerk brought me two letters from other Departments, both of which needed immediate replies, therefore I sat down and scribbled them while he waited. Then, having been absent from the Chief’s room nearly a quarter of an hour, I went back with the dispatch in my hand. In the room I found Lord Gaysford, who, in reply to my question, stated that the Earl had been compelled to leave in order to attend a meeting of the Cabinet, which he believed would be a protracted one.

To me this was provoking, for the great statesman had taken with him the key of the safe; thus was I left with this important document in my possession. But I said nothing of the matter to the Under Secretary, and returning to my room placed the dispatch in my inner pocket for greater security, determined to keep it there until his Lordship returned. I feared to lock it away in my own safe lest anyone else might possess a key, and felt that in the circumstances my own pocket was the safest place.

For nearly two hours I continued my work, it being Friday, an unusually busy day, until, just as the clock at the Horse Guards chimed one o’clock, a clerk entered with the card of Dudley Ogle, my college chum, with whom I was now sharing, during the summer months, a cottage close to the Thames at Shepperton. On the card was the pencilled query, “Can you come and lunch with me?”

For a few moments I hesitated. I was busy, and I was compelled to deliver the dispatch in my pocket to Lord Warnham before he left for home. I knew, however, that the meeting of the Cabinet must be a long one, and recognising the fact that I must lunch somewhere, I gave the clerk a message that I would join Mr Ogle in the waiting-room in a few moments. Then, locking my safe, I assured myself that the dispatch was still in my pocket, brushed my hat, and joined my friend.

Dudley Ogle was the best of good fellows. After a rather wild college career, it had been his fancy to roam for about two years on the Continent, and on his return, his father, with whom he was not on the best of terms, conveniently died, leaving him possessor of about twenty thousand pounds. By this time he had, however, sown his wild oats, and instead of spending his money as most young men of his age would have done, he invested it, and now lived a careless, indolent existence, travelling where he pleased, and getting as much enjoyment out of life as was possible. He was about my own age – twenty-eight, well set-up, smart-looking, with rather aquiline features, dark hair, and a pair of merry eyes that were an index to a contented mind.

“Didn’t expect me, I suppose, old fellow?” he exclaimed breezily, when we met. “I found after you’d left this morning that I was compelled to come up to town, and having nothing to do for an hour or so, it occurred to me that we might lunch together.”

“I thought you intended to pull up as far as ‘The Nook,’” I said, laughing.

“So I did, but I received a wire calling me to town on some rather urgent business. Where shall we lunch?”

In descending the stairs and turning into Downing Street we discussed the merits of various restaurants, and finally decided upon a small, old-fashioned, unpretentious, but well-known place a few doors from Charing Cross, in the direction of Whitehall, known as “The Ship.” Here we ate our meal, spent an hour together, and then parted, he leaving to return to Shepperton, I to finish my work and rejoin him later at our riparian cottage.

On my return to the Foreign Office the Earl had, I found, just come in, and I handed him the secret document which some day, sooner or later, would control the destiny of an empire.

“This has, of course, not been out of your possession, Deedes?” inquired his Lordship, looking keenly at me with his grey eyes, as he stood before the open door of the great safe.

“Not for a single instant,” I replied.

“Good. I trust you,” he said, carefully placing the sealed envelope in a pigeon-hole to itself, and closing the door with a loud clang, locked it.

“I think,” he said, his ascetic features relaxing into a self-satisfied smile, “I think we have once again checkmated our enemies, and swiftly too. The whole thing has been arranged and concluded within a week, thanks to the clever diplomacy of Emden at Berlin.”

“And to your own forethought,” I added, laughing.

“No, no. To Emden all credit is due, none to me, none,” he answered modestly; then, turning, he gave me some instructions, and a few minutes later put on his hat and left for home. At four o’clock I also left, and driving to Waterloo, caught my train to Shepperton, where I found Dudley Ogle awaiting me. Ours was a pretty cottage. Facing the river, it was covered with creepers, sweet-smelling jasmine and roses, with a rustic porch in front, and a large old-world garden around. Life was delightful there after the stuffiness of London chambers, and as we both had with us our men, in addition to Mrs Franks, my trusty housekeeper, we were prevented from being troubled by the minor worries of life.

“Hulloa, old chap!” cried Dudley, hastily rousing himself from a lazy attitude on the couch in our sitting-room as I entered. “Stifling hot, isn’t it? There’s a wire from the Laings. They want us to dine with them to-night. Going?”

I hesitated, and my reluctance did not escape him.

“Isn’t Ella’s company sufficient inducement?” he asked chaffingly.

“Going? Of course I am,” I answered quickly, glancing at my watch. “We have a full hour before dressing. Let’s go for a row. It’ll improve our appetites.”

Within a few minutes I had exchanged the frock coat of officialdom for flannels, and very soon we were pulling upstream towards a delightful backwater that was our goal. As we rowed, the silence being broken only by the sound of the oars in the row-locks, I calmly reviewed the situation. Why the Laings invited me that night puzzled me. Truth to tell, I loved Ella Laing with all the strength of my being, and had foolishly believed she reciprocated my affection until two nights ago, when I had called at the house near Staines, where she lived with her mother during the summer months. I had discovered her in the garden walking in lover-like attitude with Andrew Beck, a retired silk manufacturer, who had lived in France so long that he had become something of a cosmopolitan, and who had lately entered Parliament at a bye-election as representative of West Rutlandshire. I confess to having conceived an instinctive dislike to this man from the very first moment we had been introduced by a mutual friend in the Lobby of the House of Commons, for he was a parvenu of the most pronounced type, while his grey, beetling brows and flat, broad nose gave his face an expression anything but pleasing.

Nevertheless he walked jauntily, spoke loudly in bluff good-natured tones, gave excellent dinners, and, strangely enough, was voted a good fellow wherever he went. Yet there was an ostentatiousness about his actions that was sickening; his arrogant, self-assertive manner was, to me, extremely distasteful. The discovery that he was endeavouring to supplant me in Ella’s affections filled my cup of indignation to the full.

I had left the garden unobserved on that fateful night, returned at once to our riverside cottage, and written her an angry letter, charging her in plain terms with having played me false. In reply, next morning she sent by the gardener a long letter full of mild reproach, in which she asserted that she had no thought of love for anyone beside myself, and that I had entirely misconstrued her relations with Mr Beck. “Strange, indeed, it is that you, of all men, should declare that I love him,” she wrote. “Love! If you knew all, you would neither write nor utter that sacred word to me; and even though you are the only man for whom I have a thought, it may, after all, be best if we never again meet. You say you cannot trust me further. Well, I can only reply that my future happiness is in your hands. I am yours.”

Deeply had I pondered over this curious, half-hysterical, half-reproachful letter, re-reading it many many times, and becoming more and more puzzled over its vague, mysterious meaning. On several occasions I had been upon the point of calling and questioning her, but had refrained. Now, however, this formal invitation to dine had come no doubt through Ella, and I saw in it her desire to personally explain away my jealousy. So I accepted.

Chapter Two

“The Nook.”

When, a couple of hours later, we entered Mrs Laing’s garden, the first person we encountered was the man I hated, Andrew Beck, in his ill-fitting dress clothes and broad, crumpled shirt-front, with its great diamond solitaire, lounging in a wicker chair at the river’s brink, smoking, and in solitude enjoying the glorious sunset that, reflecting upon the water, transformed it into a stream of rippling gold. “The Nook,” as Mrs Laing’s house was called, was a charming old place facing the river at a little distance above Staines Bridge – long, low, completely covered with ivy and surrounded by a wide sweep of lawn that sloped down to the water’s edge, and a belt of old elms beneath the cool shade of which I had spent many delightfully lazy afternoons by the side of my well-beloved.

“Ah! Deedes,” exclaimed Beck, gaily, rising as we approached, “I was waiting for somebody to come. The ladies haven’t come down yet.”

“Have you seen them?” I asked.

“Not yet,” he replied; then turning to my friend Dudley, he began chaffing him about a young and wealthy widow he had rowed up to Windsor in our boat a few days before.

“We saw you, my boy. We saw you?” he laughed. “You were talking so confidentially as you passed, that Ella remarked that you were contemplating stepping into the dead man’s shoes.”

“No, no,” Dudley retorted good-humouredly. “No widows for me. She was merely left under my care for an hour or so, and I had to do the amicable. It’s really too bad of you all to jump to such rash conclusions.”

At that instant a soft, musical voice behind me uttered my name, and, turning, I met Ella, with a light wrap thrown about her shoulders, coming forward to me with outstretched hand. “Ah! Geoffrey, how are you?” she cried gaily, with joy in her brilliant, sparkling eyes. Then, as our hands clasped, she added in an undertone, “I knew you would come; I knew you would forgive.”

“I have not forgiven,” I answered, rather coldly, bending over her slim white hand.

“But I have committed no fault,” she said, pouting prettily.

“You have given me no satisfactory explanation.”

“Wait until after dinner. We will come out here together, where we can talk without being overheard,” she whispered hurriedly, then left me abruptly to greet Dudley and Andrew Beck. There was something significant in the swift, inquisitive glance she exchanged with the last-named man, and turning away I strode across the lawn annoyed. A moment later I met Mrs Laing herself. She was elderly and effusive; tall, and of stately bearing. Her hair was perfectly white but by no means scanty, her face was clever and refined without that grossness that too often disfigures a well-preserved woman of fifty, and in her dark eyes, undimmed by time, there was always an expression of calm contentment. Her husband had been a great traveller until his death ten years ago, and she, accompanying him on his journeys in the East, had become a clever linguist, an accomplishment which her only daughter, Ella, shared.

As we stood together chatting, and watching the boats full of happy youths and maidens gliding past in the brilliant afterglow, I thought that never had I seen Ella looking so handsome, as, standing with Dudley, she had taken up Beck’s theme, and was congratulating him upon his trip with the skittish widow.

Hers was an oval face, perfect in its symmetry, clear cut and refined, a trifle pale perhaps, but from her eyes of that darkest blue that sometimes sparkled into the brightness of a sapphire, sometimes deepened into softest grey like the sky on a summer night, there shone an inner beauty, indicative of a purity of soul. The mouth was mobile, short and full, with an exquisite finish about the curve of the lips, the nose short and straight, and the hair of darkest gold – the gold that cannot be produced artificially, but has a slight dash of red in it, just sufficient to enrich the brown of the shadows and give a burnish to the ripples in the high lights. Her eyebrows were set rather high up from the eye itself, and were slightly drooped at the corner nearest the ear, imparting to her face a kind of plaintive, questioning look that was exceedingly becoming to her. Her gown was of soft clinging silk of palest heliotrope, that bore the unmistakable stamp of Paris, while on her slim wrist I noticed she wore the diamond bangle I had given her six months before. As she chatted with Dudley, she turned and laughed at me gaily over her shoulder from time to time, and when we entered the house a few minutes later, it was with satisfaction that I found myself placed beside her at table.

Dinner was always a pleasant, if slightly stately, meal at Mrs Laing’s. She was a brilliant and accomplished hostess, whose entertainments at her house in Pont Street were always popular, and who surrounded herself with interesting and intellectual people. Bohemia was generally well represented at her receptions, for the lions of the season, whether literary, artistic, or musical, were always to be met there – a fact which induced many of the more exclusive set to honour the merry widow by their presence. Wearied, however, of the eternal small talk about new books, new plays, new pictures, and the newest fads, I was glad when, after smoking, we were free to rejoin the ladies in the quaint, oak-panelled drawing-room.

The moon had risen, and ere long I strolled with Ella through the French windows, and out upon the lawn, eager to talk alone with her.

“Well,” she said at length, when we were seated in the shadow beneath one of the high rustling elms, “so you want an explanation. What can I give?”

“Your letter conveys the suspicion that there exists some secret between Beck and yourself,” I said, as calmly as I could.

“My letter!” she exclaimed, in a voice that seemed a little harsh and strained. “What did I say? I really forget.”

“It’s useless to prevaricate, Ella,” I said, rather impatiently. “You say that if I knew all I would never utter words of love to you. What do you mean?”

“Exactly what I wrote,” she answered huskily, in a low voice.

“You mean to imply that you are unworthy of the love of an honest man?” I observed in astonishment.

“Yes,” she gasped hoarsely. “I do not – I – cannot deceive you, Geoffrey, because I love you.” The last sentence she uttered passionately, with a fierce fire burning in her eyes. “You are jealous of Andrew Beck, a man old enough to be my father. Well, I confess I was foolish to allow him to walk with me here with his arm around my waist; yet at that moment the indiscretion did not occur to me.”

“But he was speaking to you – whispering into your ready ears words of love and tenderness. He spoke in persuasive tones, as if begging you to become his wife,” I said angrily, the very thought of the scene I had witnessed filling me with indignation and bitter hatred.

“No, you are entirely mistaken, Geoffrey. No word of love passed between us,” she said quietly, looking into my eyes with unwavering glance.

I smiled incredulously.

“You will perhaps deny that here, within six yards of this very spot, you stopped and burst forth into tears?” I exclaimed, with cold cynicism.

“I admit that. The words he uttered were of sufficient significance to bring tears to my eyes,” she replied vaguely.

“He must have spoken words of love to you,” I argued. “I watched you both.”

“I deny that he did, Geoffrey,” she cried fiercely, starting up. “To satisfy you, I am even ready to take an oath before my Creator that the subject of our conversation was not love.”

“What was Beck persuading you to do?” I demanded.

“No, no,” she cried, as if the very thought was repulsive to her. “No, do not ask me. I can never tell you, never!”

“Then there is a secret between you that you decline to reveal,” I said reproachfully.

She laughed a harsh metallic laugh, answering in a tone of feigned flippancy, —

“Really, Geoffrey, you are absurdly and unreasonably suspicious. I tell you I love no other man but yourself, yet merely because it pleases you to misconstrue what you have witnessed you brand me as base and faithless. It is unjust.”

“But your letter!” I cried.

“I had no intention of conveying the idea that any secret existed between Mr Beck and myself. He was, as you well know, an old friend of my father’s, and has known me since a child. Towards me he is always friendly and good-natured, but I swear he has never spoken to me of love.”

“But you cannot deny, Ella, that a secret – some fact that you are determined to keep from me – exists, and that if not of love, it was of that secret Beck spoke to you so earnestly in the garden here!”

Her dry lips moved, but no sound escaped them. She shivered. I saw my question had entirely nonplussed her, and I felt instinctively that I had uttered the truth.

At that instant, however, a servant crossed the lawn in the moonlight, and approaching, handed me a telegram, stating that Juckes, my man, had brought it over from Shepperton, fearing that it might be of importance.

Hastily I thrust it into my pocket unopened, and when the servant was out of hearing I repeated the plain question I had put to my well-beloved.

In the bright moonlight I watched how pale and agitated was her face, while involuntarily she shuddered, as if the thought that I might ascertain the truth terrified her.