The Greek E. A novel

Front matter

THE GREEK E a THE GREEK E A NOVEL BY THE PRINCESS LAURA BONAPARTE LONDON H. S. NICHOLS 3 SOHO SQUARE and 62A PICCADILLY W MDCCCXCVI All rights reserved) Printed and Published by H. S. NICHOLS 3 SOHO SQUARE LONDON W. CONTENTS PAGE The Husband's Death i The Mysterious Letter n Philip is taken into Consultation 22 Departure 32 Peace ... 41 How Frances meets an Old Friend ... 52 Up in the Morning Early .66 A Picnic and Platonism 82 Friends once more 99 Philip Pays his Sister a Visit 107 The Gate of Death 121 Caught back to Life 141 Cupid Shoots his Arrow Home 145 The Greek E 163 Damning Evidence !79 Flight l87 A Treasure Lost 201 Philip is Sadly Perplexed .... . 214 Old Friends in the North .... .226 VI CONTENTS PAGE Doubts 243 Frank Winthrop Wins his Prize .... 248 Frances Returns to her Brother 262 The Greek E Again 273 A Great Mistake 285 " I Will Avenge !

" ........ 293 Meeting Again 304 The Gate of Death Wide Open once again . . 317 A Near Shave 322 Victor and the Crimson Stream 333 Victor goes over the Dark Water .... 346 Hunted Down ■ 360 Life's Living Death LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE "Kiss me, my dear ! Good-bye, my darling love! " . 9 "Here I swear that I consecrate my life to the pursuit of the villain". 20 "What are you doing up here at this time?" . 104 A huge wave curled over the canoe .... 140 "If you go away," he said, "leave me, Frances, a word OF HOPE BEFORE YOU GO " 254 "What do you mean, Fan, by a mistake?" . 286 He lowered her carefully until she reached the FLOOR 325 The swamp had seized him fast ...... I THE GREEK E

Chapter I The Husband's Death

"He is sinking rapidly," said the doctor, as he came out of the sick-room and met the young wife returning from an errand downstairs. At his words she caught her breath sharply, the pallor of her face intensified, while her head drooped and her eyes half closed, betokening a habit of concealing all feeling from those around her as much as possible. "Can nothing be done?" she asked in a low voice, while her white fingers pressed tightly against her sinking heart. "Nothing," he replied in grave tones, with a pitying look at the beautiful girl before him. "All that could be done has been done, and nothing but a miracle can now save him." The dim light of the lamp shone on the face of Frances Harrold. She was only twenty-four, but the first glance told of much grief and suffering, for in the soft brown eyes there was a saddened ex pression unusual in one so young.

Yet the marked composure with which she heard the doctor's fatal words bespoke a nature that was capable of bearing great pain without a murmur, and with scarce an outward sign that she felt at all. She was tall and graceful above the average, her figure being lithe and supple, her complexion, in spite of its momentary paleness, healthy. Her nose was somewhat small but shapely, her lips full and pleasure-loving, while the light that beamed in the beautiful, large brown eyes revealed an intelligence of no ordinary character. But the chief characteristic that would strike an outsider on gazing for the first time upon her was an expression of impassive ness that heralded an extraordinary degree of self control. The doctor was a kindly, delicate - looking man, grey-headed, with a soft, low voice that was now full of pity and compassion.

He was not surprised at the quietude she evinced at his words, for he had known her since her marriage and fully understood her nature. He had seen her suffer a life's martyrdom during the last two years ; and, while marvelling at her en durance, he was lost in astonishment at the uncom plaining silence with which she bore the tedium and horror of nursing her unfortunate husband, who was stricken with general paralysis, which affected his brain. He looked at her rather curiously, wondering, now the end was at hand, whether her composure and calm would at last break down. " It has been a long and distressing time for you," he said gently, as he failed to gather any intelligence from her expression. " You have had a long, dis tressing nursing to go through. This is a most THE HUSBAND'S DEATH 3 blessed release for him, poor fellow, and for you.

There has been no hope of his recovery for a long time." Her pale lips quivered for a moment, and her voice sounded dry and hoarse as she replied : " It may be a happy release for him ; but to nurse and to be always watching him has become second nature to me." " It would have killed you soon," he said. " It was becoming a question who should last the longer." " He has a gentle nature," she returned. " He has never been any trouble ; he was always amenable. I am very fond of him." This was Mrs. Harrold's way of saying she had loved the dying man with passionate ardour through out their married life, and especially during those last two fateful years. With him she felt would depart her last shred of earthly happiness. It had become a chastened pleasure to her to act as the ceaseless nurse of the poor stricken soul.

"Is my brother in there?" she asked, motioning towards the bedroom door. "Yes, Mr. Armstrong is watching your husband. But have you no friend for whom you can send? No woman ? " "No. As you know, all my relatives are abroad, and he has no one belonging to him but me." "It will be very dreadful for you to be here alone, with only your brother, during the next few days." "I want no one else, doctor. Phil and I have nursed him, and we shall continue to do so until God takes him from me. Besides, there are the servants." I — "Servants are not much good in these straits," retorted Dr. Shannon, fretfully pulling at his moustache. "I really wish you would let me send you someone." Mechanically she replied, "No, thank you," for her mind was in the sick-room. She was straining her hearing to catch the slightest sound.

Only a low monotonous singing reached her ears, the crooning of the dying man, which lent a horror to a death scene otherwise peaceful. The painful sound fell weirdly upon the stillness of the night ; even the doctor shuddered slightly as he heard the ghastly murmur. Frances Harrold involuntarily raised her eyes for a moment to the doctor's face, and he saw how awful was the suffering she underwent. There were no tears to dim their brightness and bring relief to her strained mind, but in the depths of their beauty the depressing agony that reigned in her heart gleamed with a pitiful light for that second. "How long will this last?" she anxiously inquired, again motioning to the sick-room. "It may still last some time," he answered sadly, "until he gets more exhausted. He has fought hard for his life, poor fellow !

" "Oh, God! yes," she ejaculated, her voice for once quivering with pain. She had witnessed in the horrors of that struggle scenes which would for ever remain stamped in her memory. When she had witnessed the terrible conflict the strong man had made against the attacks of death, she had prayed in her heart to God to release him ; now that he was sinking into the exhaustion following that THE HUSBAND'S DEATH 5 fight, she rebelled against the speedy answer to her prayer. "Doctor," she pleaded in her anguish, holding out to him her poor groping hands, "Doctor! don't let him die. I want him back again!" He took her hands in his, with wondrous pity in his gentle eyes, as he saw the composure some would have deemed hard and unfeeling had vanished completely from the young, sorrow-worn face, in which now all the woman was pleading and imploring.

"If I could make him live, my dear," he answered kindly, " I would do it for your sake. But, oh ! cannot you see how wrong it is to wish him to live? Recall his sufferings ! Can you wish him to undergo the horrors of the last two years over again ? He can never be other than he then was. Try and see it in that light. It is best as it is, my dear ; and when the immediate grief of parting is deadened by Time's kind hand, you will then say with me, 'It was better for him to die.' " She drew her hands away and put them to her damp forehead, pushing back the tendrils of brown hair that in disorder struggled to kiss the fair, white flesh, as she sighed, meekly submissive, "I know you are right, doctor. But, though much younger, I have felt like his mother as well as his wife. The loss is therefore doubly great.

You do not know what it is to have a great strong man dependent on you for every little act. Weak and helpless he was more like my child than my husband, and now I feel as though I were losing both." "You have taken good care of your child, then," said the doctor, with a slight quiver of the lips ; "not many children have so devoted and patient a mother !" " Perhaps I might have been more patient ! " she humbly murmured, with that vague distrust which comes when all is over and it is too late to recall the past. " No one, Mrs. Harrold, could have been more patient or more gentle than you have been," the doctor replied. " You have sacrificed your life and health to him. You have endured a martyrdom of mental torture these last two years ; you have en dured it without a murmur or a sigh. No wife, no mother could have been more self-sacrificing."

The suffering eyes once more sought his with a look of gratitude for his kind words, as she answered, "Doctor, I loved him! Any woman who loved would have done the same." It was useless for him to say more. He had soothed her somewhat, and knew it was idle work to convince her that her conduct had been heroic. Woman, he well knew, will never think she has done enough for the man she loves ; but will even upbraid herself with neglect of him, when every thought, moment, and deed have been spent in his service. At this moment the monotonous crooning in the sick-room suddenly ceased ; the doctor hastened to the door, while a sickness of the heart seized the young wife, and her face turned to an ashy white ness. " Oh, God ! " she whispered, " why has it stopped ? Is this the end ? " She hid her face in her hands, and was trembling violently in every limb.

A young man of about twenty-eight came out of the room as the doctor entered it, his face betraying his THE HUSBAND'S DEATH 7 anxiety and grief as he laid his hand lovingly on her shoulder, saying, " Fan, dearest, I think you had better come in." At the words Mrs. Harrold with drew her hands from her face, which was once more composed and calm. She knew the fatal hour had arrived, and was determined her husband should not have his last moments embittered by seeing her grief, should the approach of death have for a brief space cleared his intellect. Leaning on her brother's arm she followed the doctor into the room. Her calm demeanour gave no clue to the thoughts that were whirling through her brain. "Oh, love," she was saying to herself, "is this the cruel end to our married happiness ? Are all our dreams to have this sudden awakening ?

Must I lose you, my own, my beloved ? " The room she entered was large and lofty. The furniture was upholstered in dark warm velvet ; the sofa and armchairs, though old-fashioned, were roomy and comfortable. A small fire burnt in the grate, keeping up a fairly warm temperature such as a sick man needs. The bed was larger and wider than those generally seen, and upon it the sick man lay in a slanting position, having in his restlessness brought his body to lie rather across than along it. His face was grandly beautiful, its normal beauty being perhaps somewhat intensified by the change that was gradually coming over it. The nose was long and finely chiselled, with delicately arched nostrils ; the lips were full and bow-shaped, now slightly parted as the long-drawn gasps heaved from the panting lungs ; the well - marked eyebrows lay black upon the pallid brow, already grey -tinted by the approach of death.

Only the whites of his beautiful dark eyes were to be seen, for they were turned upwards underneath the drooping lids. The deathly pallor of his countenance was enhanced by his rather long hair, which was intensely black, with just a wave, suggestive of a curl, in it. The heave of the bed-clothes bore witness to the magnificent physique of the man who lay beneath them, with the damp dew of death already on his brow. His wife bent over him till her lips touched his ; her hands crept beneath the heavy head, and she whispered in his dull ear, " Dear heart, will you not look up and see your httle girl ? Shall I never hear one kind word more from those tender lips that were never so pleased as when saying sweet words to me ? Are you going to leave me alone in the world without one fond glance of farewell from those loving eyes ?

Look once, speak once to me, my love, my love ! " But the dying ears were deaf; the loving eyes were blind; the quickly numbing flesh never felt the soft caress of her hand ; the paling lips formed no word of comfort for her soul. The only reply was the awful sound of the dragging gasps that heaved from the unconscious form still struggling with the throttling hand of death. At the foot of the bed Dr. Shannon stood watch ing the heart-breaking scene with pitying eyes. He knew his skill was now of no avail ; he was but a spectator, and felt his helplessness to such an extent that he was muttering to himself, " Doctor ! what a misnomer in the face of death ! Where is the learning that can now be of use ? " Pa-yc 9 KISS HE, MY DEAR ! GOOD-BYE, MY DARLING LOVE ! " THE HUSBAND'S DEATH 9 Poor loving Philip sat on the bed holding the sufferer's hand, which he tenderly rubbed, hoping the warmth he created would keep off the icy cold ness that was slowly seizing its victim.

Philip, on his sister's account, had dearly loved his brother in-law. They were personally as unlike as two men could be, for Philip was fair, with a delicately tinged complexion any beautiful girl might have envied, while the dying man was dark to a degree. But the disposition of each had been the same ; loving, trusting, warm-hearted and true. The sick man's face, on which the dim lamp light fell, suddenly changed, and his wife, seeing the end was near, tightening her embrace, exclaimed, " Kiss me, my dear ! Good-bye, my darling love ! " A flicker of happiness illumined for a brief second the handsome features ; the lips broke into a half smile ; but nothing was heard except a long, quivering gasp ; his eyes opened wide and gazed unseeing into space ; he was dead. For him all trouble and turmoil had ceased; others might suffer, suffer even on his account, but with him it was peace.

His wife knelt down beside him, her arms still round his stiffening body, her head resting on his breast. After a pause, she calmly lifted her head, and, as she impressed her kisses on his now cold face, she said, " Do you remember, dear, I love you ? " Doubtless at last he remembered. Now that he had reached the heavenly shore his restored memory could recall the love she had borne him through two long years of martyrdom. Doubtless he understood at last the courage and endurance she had shown for him ; understood what she had suffered in seeing the pain endured by one beloved ! The doctor, with a commanding touch, drew her away. " Come, Mrs. Harrold ; your brother and I will see to everything. You must lie down and rest." She looked at him with wondering, vacant eyes, while her little fingers firmly clasped the still form before her.

Apparently she did not hear. Her brother tenderly tried to remove her hold, saying, " Dear, come away." She rose hastily, and still gazing at the dead face, said, " He is not dead. I felt his pulse beating." " It was your own, Mrs. Harrold," the doctor answered. She looked at him like a puzzled child for a moment ; then, putting her hand to her head, said, " What time is it ? " " Half-past six," he replied, consulting his watch. " In the morning ? " she queried. " Yes, in the morning," he replied. She raised her eyes to the doctor's face for a moment in puzzled pain; then, turning to her brother, a strange smile creeping to her lips, she said, " Phil, he is dead ! " She shook her head in a hopeless way, tried to walk, but suddenly staggered and fell forward over the corpse in a swoon as deathlike as itself.

Chapter II The Mysterious Letter

Edgar Harrold had been a fairly successful artist during his short career. An early painting of his, having had the good fortune to be hung on the line, was purchased, the price being a modest one, by a royal personage, consequently his name was made, and commissions flowed in with the result that his income became a good one. For seven years he steadily improved in his art — and his prices ; and, although royalty no longer selected his canvases, good judges were now glad to pay handsomely for workmanship which had ceased to require other patronage than its own merit. Then he had married Frances Armstrong, with whom he had a year of uninterrupted bliss, followed by two years of such misery arising from his clouded brain that it were pity to raise the veil upon it. While a bachelor Edgar's life had not been wholly blameless ; it would be untrue to say that it had been entirely moral and virtuous ; but after all, it had been no worse than that of ninety-nine men out of a hundred.

If anything, it had been rather better. At any rate, after marriage he had settled down into the sober routine of domesticity, his whole soul centred in his beautiful, talented and attractive wife. With the exception of Phil, her people had neither approved nor disapproved of the marriage. They thought indeed that Frances, with her gifts, might easily have done better for herself, but, as she was not the favourite daughter, no objection was raised to the match, which had accordingly come off with all the outward appearances of love and affection usual on such occasions. Within a month or two all her family, except Phil, had gone to the Cape, where her father had just received a very lucrative appointment. Edgar Harrold had no relatives in the world ; his parents had died when he was still a boy, leaving him to fight life's battle single-handed.

He had a gentle nature, incapable of doing wilful harm ; his main fault being that he was rather weak and vacillating. This gentleness even manifested itself during his illness, for, when the paralysis crept on him and obscured his once fine intellect, he was generally very easy to manage. The full horror of that awful time was never known to anyone except his wife ; for she had used every effort in her power to hide the extent of his mental aberration, the piteous fancies of his imagina tion. Now, poor soul, three days after his death she sat alone in the silent house, still brooding over her loss. Her brother had been forced to leave her for a time, as he was only a clerk in a City firm, and City firms care little for sorrowing widows and sisters when work has to be done. All the blinds were drawn, adding to the gloom that pervaded the house of death ; and as the pale-faced widow, in her restlessness, went from room to room, she realised the awful void that had been made in her life.

Everywhere the spirit of death was triumphant. When she reached the bed-chamber in which he lay in his unclosed coffin, she seemed less alone than elsewhere. He still looked as if he only slept, his features refined, and their innate beauties even more apparent than they had been in life. As she gazed upon his face, mechanically rearranging the flowers in which he was embowered, she felt he was sleeping with the just, and would arise pure and undefiled on the glorious Morrow. Impressing her warm lips against his cold brow, she knelt beside him in silent prayer, her feeling of loneliness gone, her spirits calmed, her heart at rest. An hour later the maid, not finding her in the library, thus discovered her still praying, her limbs stiffened, her hands almost as cold as those of the corpse. " Madam," the girl said, " I have taken up your tea.

Please come down. You look perished with cold." " I will come, Emily," she answered. Slowly rising, she leant once more over the coffin and kissed the still, white, unresponsive face, then followed the maid downstairs. The physical chill she had suffered while praying beside her dead rendered the warmth of the library more agreeable and pleasant to her numbed senses. There seemed — so soft a peace had fallen on her soul — no sacrilege now in enjoying the comforts of the cosy room. She sat in the luxurious chair he had loved in life, and, placing her chilled feet on the fender, warmed her hands at the cheerful blaze as she sipped her tea. Soon her blood flowed in ardent current through her body, and a pleasing languor possessed her soul. She lay back in her chair as her eyes filled with welcome tears, too long held back.

Every trial she had suffered through her dead husband was now forgotten, and memory brought back but his good deeds. Each tender word his lips had uttered, each kind act his hand had done, now rose before her mind to soothe and comfort her. "He had no enemies," she said to herself; "he was no one's foe. He always had a kind word for everyone, and an excuse for all. He may have had his faults, but I never knew them, or they were so slight that I even loved them, let alone his virtues." Thus the true-hearted woman will ever reason about the man she has loved. His failings sink into forgetfulness, his virtues alone are remembered. Once more she held out her hands to warm them at the blazing fire, and as she did so she smiled scorn fully to herself as she noted her long, supple fingers. " How strong you are !

" she murmured ; " there is no chance of an early death for me. My love, I fear it will be long before I join you in the tomb." A true wife's first thought on seeing her husband dead is naturally to follow him. She leant back once more in the chair, a feeling of fatigue coming over her ; she closed her eyes, sleepless for many nights, and would soon have fallen into a slumber but that she was suddenly roused by the postman's loud knock. The noiseless maid, with a gentle, sympathetic look on her pretty face, soon brought in the only letter that had come by that post. Handing it to her mistress, her eyes full of pity, she said in a soft voice, " Madam, here is a letter. Can I do anything for you ? " " Yes. Please light the lamp. It is too dark to read without it." The maid, with kindly haste, lighted the lamp, regretting that her mistress had been left without it ; then, mending the fire, she withdrew.

Frances Harrold looked at the envelope with a careless glance. It was dirty, and the superscription badly written, as if from some uneducated person. She threw it down, unopened, upon the small table beside her, and fell once more to thinking. Her eyes wandered round the room with mournful gaze. She noted the handsomely bound books poor Edgar had seldom opened in the brief year of their married bliss before his fatal illness overtook him. She glanced at the gems that adorned the walls — exquisite little landscapes and seascapes, some from his own brush — souvenirs of happy hours spent at those sweet spots. The furniture of the room she sat in was typical of the good taste throughout the house. Edgar had spared neither judgment nor money in preparing a fitting home for his bride. Now she knew it would have to be broken up.

During the last two years of his life his illness had entailed heavy expenses, while it had prevented his earning anything. Consequently they had been living on their capital, which had been sadly diminished. Latterly, indeed, her mind had been somewhat per plexed as to what they should do for money ; but his death had solved that question. A woman can live on very little when alone, but she cannot see one whom she loves want for anything. Now she would have plenty for herself, for he had prudently insured his life in her favour, and the house and furniture when sold would add sufficient to that sum to enable her to live in comfort, and she did not aspire to luxury. Such were the thoughts and fancies that floated through her brain, as she reclined in pleasant ease in the comfortable armchair.

Her eye lighted on the lately arrived letter again, and this time she determined to open it. " Some begging letter, I suppose," she said to herself. " Well, for his sake, you shall receive your request." She broke open the envelope, and drew out a very dirty piece of paper. " What a funny letter ! " she ejaculated. " The writer must indeed be poor, not to be able to afford a sheet of notepaper ! " Listlessly she opened out the paper, and her careless gaze caught sight of a cutting from some news paper pasted in the centre. "Curious!" she thought. "Who can have sent me a newspaper cutting, and what can it be about ? " She held it to the lamp, and looked more carefully than she had yet done at the document. This is what she saw and read : DEATH OF AN ARTIST. Mr. Edgar Harrold, who diedAon Monday last, at 50 Stilholm Grove, St!\ John's Wood, was one of our most4 promising rising painters, his work giving j evidence of _ great talent.

He was only 35./ With a bitter cry of pain, Frances fell back in her chair, while the cruel paper fluttered from her fingers to the floor. "My God!" she murmured to herself, "who could be so cruel as to send me this ? What brute in human form can have imagined so dastardly a blow at a dead man ? And to send it to me — his wife ! What an outrage ! What a villainy ! " Her loving memory conjured up all the kind acts, all the sweet words, of the insulted man who now lay stiff and stark in his coffin upstairs. She knew him to be incapable of hurting even an enemy in life ; his gentleness and amiability were his most distinctive characteristics ; and now he was assailed in this most loathsome manner. She did not grasp that the worst feature of this cowardly blow was struck at her, for her soul had gone out in defence of him.

She realised only that the attack was on him — not on her. Stooping she picked up the paper and forced herself to read it once more. As she did so her eyes flamed with passion, and a merciless anger and desire for revenge awoke in her wounded heart. Her nature was patient and enduring to the last degree, but now a whirlwind of passionate rage swept over her, and a fury of justifiable wrath seized upon her. Her form straightened, the mouth grew hard, and her delicate fingers clenched themselves in agony. " O God, grant that I may find you out and wreak my vengeance on you, ruffian, whoever you are ! " she cried. " My poor dead love, I consecrate my life to avenge you for this foul insult ! Whoso ever you may be, I shall find you out, and then — if God grant me strength— I'll take such vengeance as only an outraged woman can !

" All the latent passion of her nature was roused. It was fearful to see how anger had changed her usually sweet face. " By sea and by land," she went on, "by day and by night, I'll track you, follow you till I find you. I shall know no peace till I am face to face with you, you dastardly coward ; then may God spare you, for I shall not ! " She sank back into her chair exhausted by the intensity of her anguish and passion, and for a moment closed her eyes. But she could not rest where she was. There was but one spot where she could find any comfort. Springing up, she hastily put the letter in her pocket and hurried to his room. She gazed, rapture-bound, at the calm saintliness of the marble face resting upon its pillow, and bending over the coffin she impressed a loving kiss on the icy brow with her quivering lips.