Helen's Vow, or a Freak of fate

Front matter

NOVELS BY THE EARL OF DESART. Picture boards, 2s. ; Cloth, y. 6d. i. LORD AND LADY PICCADILLY. 1887. " Lord and Lady Piccadilly is full of incident, and but for the forced eccentricity which makes them unnatural, the characters portrayed are clever and amusing."— Saturday Review. "The writer's keen discrimination and nice knowledge of his subject have pro duced a book in merit not far behind some of our greatest works of fiction." — Glasgow Herald. "This is a first-rate novel, unusually vigorous in style, full of fresh characters, and thoroughly amusing, perhaps, in these days, when every possible collection of cir cumstances seem to have been used by novelists over and over again. The plot is, so far as we know, absolutely fresh." — Vanity Fair. " Concentrated epigrams, and the smartest, albeit somewhat cynical, turns of thought are nowhere wanting, and congratulations are due to the author for having produced an extremely interesting and veiy powerful picture of London society." — IVhiteJiall Review.

" That it is clever may be accepted at once ; that it is moral in its purpose is also evident. "—Pall Mall. "There is some very smart writing in this novel, and together with a powerful plot we have altogether a capital story, one that must become a favourite." — Court Journal. 2. HERNE LODGE. 1888. "The invention of the ordinary method of narrative-writing does not, however, affect our enjoyment ofthe perusal of ' Herne Lodge,* which is an ably and cleverly written story of the sensational type, and marked throughout by graphic descrip tions of persons and places, free but judicious handling of social subjects, and that airy and harmless vein of persiflage with which readers of the author's previous works are familiar." — Pall Mall. "Lord Desart seems to have been studying Mrs. Radcliffe's blood-curdling romances ; at all events, he shows himself, consciously or unconsciously, an apt pupil of a novelist who used to make, when George the Third was king, the fair readers of her highly-wrought scenes of horror positively afraid to take their bed room candles and climb the shadow-haunted staircase." — Standard.

" There is a refreshing originality about this novel which will only be less appre ciated by the public than it is by the jaded reviewer. A clever story told in the pointed, rather cynical, but often pathetic style, which Lord Desart has made his own." — Vanity Fair. "Nothing can be more skilful than the development ofthe mystery." — Guardian. " All who enjoy a thoroughly mysterious and sensational romance, mitigated with ■mild humour, will revel in the Earl's two latest volumes." — Court Journal. " There is more careful writing in ' Herne Lodge ' than in anything Lord Desart has yet produced." — Academy, 3. THE LITTLE CHATELAINE. 1889. " Lord Desart is full of devices for evoking incident and strong situations out of the apparently uncongenial elements of London life. His characters are alive, as the Americans say." — Athenæum.

Chapter I. The Effect

" There is no hope ? " "No, I fear, none. The shock of her brother's dreadful death, coming at such a moment, was too much for her, poor child ! " and the case hardened Paris doctor looked tenderly at the pale, drawn face upon the bed. " And the child ? " "It never lived, to speak of," answered a voice behind ; and a gaunt bonne, her eyes red with weeping, came forward to the bedside. " Poor little thing! It went straight home to the heaven it, at any rate, has done nothing to forfeit." Then she suddenly turned fiercely on the man who had asked the question and raised her voice, — " And you are the monster! the •" " Hush ! " said the doctor, touching her arm ; " no noise here. Are you a relation, Monsieur?" B " No," answered the young Englishman, with his eyes fixed on the girl's closed ones.

" No. I only heard of this to-day," he went on irrele vantly, " or I should have come before. Good God ! It is too cruel. First Claud, and now Jenny — bright little Jenny — and all my fault — all my fault ! " Then he broke down and sobbed aloud. The doctor looked sternly at him for a moment, and then turned to the bonne, — " Give her the draught when she wakes, and watch her carefully. At what hour does the hospital nurse return ? " " At six o'clock." " Good. I will look in again the last thing. But" — here he lowered his voice — "nothing can save her. It will be all over before morno He took up his cane and hat, as if to go, when the Englishman addressed him. " Whatever there is to pay, Monsieur " The doctor checked him with a gesture which had something of contempt in it. " I do not ask, sir," he said, in the same low tone, " what your position here is, though I may guess.

Suffice it that — although a poor man — I would rather die than touch a penny of your money for what I have done for that poor murdered child." " Murdered ! " echoed the other hoarsely. " I have said so. Now, Monsieur, I must beg that you leave the room with me. Abso lute quiet may give her a painless ending." THE EFFECT. 3 They went together down the narrow stairs, and into the street, noisy and stirring with Parisian life and movement. Then the Englishman spoke again. " Will you come somewhere where we can talk, Monsieur — to your house or mine ?" " I will not. I will have nothing to do with you. You are a rich Milor, no doubt — what you call a 'gentleman,' in your tongue: and I am only a poor doctor : but I would not change places with you for all that. Bonjour!' " Stay, sir," said the other almost humbly, though his habitual expression did not denote much humility of disposition.

" You do not know all." " I know enough," cried the other, shaking off the hand that had been placed on his arm. " I know that such men as you are worse than the criminals we send to gaol. You only break the law of God, and so you go free ; you " His excited tone had roused the curiosity of the passers-by, and he stopped suddenly as he saw a little crowd collecting, then bowed stiffly to the other and walked hurriedly away. The Englishman swung through the crowd haughtily, brushing the inquisitive citizens aside like so many flies : and, hailing a passingy?^?-^, drove out of earshot of their uncomplimentary expressions as to ihe gros Anglais manners. John, or rather Jack — no one ever called him anything else — Dallas was at that moment, per haps, the most miserable man in all the gay city of contrasts.

Who could have predicted, thought he, as his cab crawled along in the direction of the Boulevards, that such an end would have come to the bright litlle romance that had entered into his life only a short twelvemonth ago ? He recalled all its incidents as he was driven along, his face white, his teeth tight clenched, and his eyes staring into vacancy. He recalled how, tired of his life of endless racket — of gambling for his daily bread, of smiling when the turn of a card might mean loss of honour — he had walked one spring day into the gardens of the Luxembourg, and had seen a dainty maiden tripping along beside a youth — evidently her brother —so sweetly tender, so innocently gay, that it did his eyes good to rest upon her. Idly he had followed them, listening to their merry childish prattle, which brought back to him unconsciously memories of his own home — his own happy childhood in the old manor house in Kent.

Insensibly he put aside the sordid cares, the ignoble pleasures of his pre sent existence, and went back in thought to the days when he too was free from stain, when the world seemed a garden of delight before him, and the word shame had not yet been written in letters of fire upon his conscience. They were English ; and they seemed to him, as he watched and listened, like two fair exiles, safe, although far away from their homes, guarded as they were by an innocence that precluded fear. The boy was about nineteen, with a fair skin, and large blue eyes that HE EFFECT. 5 laughed in the sun ; and the girl was her brother ethereal ized. Sighing, Dallas was about to turn away, when a gust of wind took the boy's hat off, and blew it against Dallas's feet. He picked it up and restored it to the laughing youth, bowing slightly as the girl, who had joined in the chase, came up to him.

That was all that had happened then. Some weeks afterwards he found himself seated out side a Boulevard ca fid next to the owner of the recovered hat, and entered into conversation with him. Claud Moore was flattered by the attention of this well-dressed, handsome man, and in but -a short time Dallas knew all about him there was to know. The story was not particularly interesting, and had not Dallas vividly remembered that miguon face with the dancing, saucy eyes and mutinous little mouth, and been, moreover, rather taken by the ingenuousness ofthe young man, he would not have listened for more than the time required to finish his glass of absinthe. Old Mr. Moore had earned a somewhat pre carious existence as an occasional correspondent of certain London papers : and, it was easy for Dallas to see — although the filial love of the boy cast a fog around the fact — was evidently one of the great body of men who write with ease and fluency on many subjects, but not excellently well on any.

When the father had died, he left his little household slenderly pro vided for : and but for his eldest sister, said Claud, they would have starved. She, the elder sister — a prodigy of love, and prudence, and industry — was now twenty one, and away earning bread for them all in England. Mr. Moore had confided Jane especially to her care on his death-bed : and, said Claud ingenuously, " me too, I think ; for, yOu see, I was only a boy then. And she has been a mother to Jenny : worked her brains out almost for us both, until I was able to earn a little for myself; and then she took a good post offered her in England, and left us till she could arrange a home over there. I am taking her place with Jenny now, sir — that is, when I get away from Messrs. Diderot & Cie., where I am clerk ; and while I am at work old Madame Dufaure looks after her."

It was not true, it was hideously false, that he had made friends with the young man for any motive except a sudden stir of kindliness towards these two expatriated children. It was not true — so said the man to himself as he drove along — that he had planned or fore seen anything. The. boy amused him ; what more natural than that his innocent chatter should come in as a relief to the cynical worldly talk he heard and helped to swell ? And what more natural than that he should be taken to their modest apparlement in the Rue Notre Dame des Champs, near the Rue de Rennes, and should stay to drink coffee with Madame Dufaure and Jenny ? Jenny ! Ah ! how shy she was that first THE EFFECT. 7 evening ; and how gradually there mingled with the shyness a wish to express to him her gratitude for his recognition of her brother's good qualities.

Plow gradual, yet how easy, the intimacy which grew from their converse anent Claud ; the little ruses by which they eluded Madame Dufaure's watchful, yet somno lent, eyes; the halfaccidental meetings abroad; the short walks ; the half-hours on a bench in the Luxembourg Gardens ; the Sunday trips (these with brother and sister) to St. Cloud and Versailles. And what more natural than that he should take Claud, that ambitious, silly, lovable boy. to where he could see a little life ; should initi ate him into the outside fringe of the world in which he, Dallas, lived ; should lend him small sums to play with, and laugh to see his eager ness, his joy at gains, and outspoken dismay at loss ? Why should this have led to such an end ? He had meant well ; by all his gods, he swore to himself, he had meant well by both.

Why had Claud been so weak — Jenny so tempting ? Oh, the pity of it ! For once he had lived awhile out of the tur moil of sordid passions into which Fate and his worst nature had led him : and yet eventually he had trodden the paths of sin, and dragged down two fresh young souls with him. And they had fallen ; he knew the dark path from the height. How could he know that the boy would absorb a passion for play ? would, in his madness, embezzle his employers' money, and kill himself when discovery was certain ? How could he No. The man could not deceive himself here. Had he not, day by day, watched with diabolical delight the signs in Jenny's face as he approached, the coming and going colour, the young breast heaving, the trembling hands, the quivering lips when he spoke of leaving Paris ?

Love ! Yes, he had loved her for awhile, and he had meant no harm. When he went, with her kisses on his lips, her tears on his cheek, away to Monaco to pursue his profes sion, was he not determined to return, and, if the worst came, to make all right ? Was it his fault that he had been dogged by bad luck ; that he could not return until yesterday, only to hear the horrible news — Claud a suicide, and Jenny " Then the fiacre was pulled up with a jerk, and he was at the door of the house in which he lived.

Chapter II. The Cause

: AND A GAME OF CARDS. " You are late," said a tall thin man with a carefully waxed black moustache, rising from an easy chair and flicking the ash from his cigarette on to the carpet with an air of sup pressed impatience. " To what lady's beaux yeux do I owe the fact that I have been waiting here these two hours ? " "Oh, Jim," said Dallas, sinking into the chair the other had vacated, " 1 am the most wretched hound in all Christendom." " What — after winning 20,000 francs the last day at Monte Carlo ? when you have that prize pig, Sir John Finchley, Bart., of Sheffield, com ing this very night to play dcartd at a hundred the game ? Nonsense! But what is the matter, my dear Jack ? " "I told you the story of the Moores." " Your spring-tide idyll — the lovely girl and the sweet clerk — oh, yes."

" Well, they — I have murdered both ! " "What the devil!" cried Mr. James Marnard, startled. " Murdered ? " " Yes ; not with my hands, man ; but just as much as if I had throttled them. The poor boy got into trouble about his firm's money " "Ah!" said Mr. Marnard, lighting a fresh cigarette, " that was very probable from what you told me " "And has killed himself." " Caramba ! but the little man was deter mined. And she ?" "She — oh, Jim! when I think of her as I first knew her, so fresh, so innocent, and " " Let us take all that for granted, my dear Jack. They are all innocent at first. I suppose it's the old story — not wisely, but too well, eh ? " " Jim Marnard," said Dallas, sitting up in FA TE. 10 the chair and giving the other a look that made his grin subside like maoic, " I believe you are a greater scoundrel than I am, if it be possible.

"Thank you, Jack; thank you. But I have often noticed that when conscience pricks a weak man he imagines that it ought to be pricking his friends. Let me hear it all." " I must tell some one. Well, she's dying." "Of love?" " Yes ; if you like to call it so. Oh, my God ! what a ruffian I am ! — I, who call myself a gentleman ! " " And who look upon your friends as cads," put in Mr. Marnard gently. " Perhaps you are wrong in both cases." " To think that these two were happy until that cursed day when I met them, and broke up their Eden, like another Satan! It was all drifting with me. Had any one told me what might come of my idle amusement, I swear I would never have crossed their threshold again. You believe me, Jim ?" " I believe you think so now. When the devil was sick — you know the rest."

"No! no!" went on the wretched conscience stricken man, more to himself than to his com panion, " I am not so bad as that ; and when the havoc was done, where was the remedy ? The silly boy had his head turned by his initial success, and by the flattery of all those devils who got round him — devils of both sexes — to trick him out of his little money. He broke away from me, and I could not save him. You can bear witness, Marnard, that at least / never won a sou of him, that " " You forget I was away during the progress ofthe idyll," said Marnard drily. " I am afraid I am not competent to stand between you and that somewhat feminine conscience of yours, that always lets you do the thing, and then goes on nagging at you with ' I told you so,' in its still small voice. Thank the Lord I am not troubled with the article.

But tell me about the sister — the sister whose character, from what you told me, seemed far more interesting than that of your little Dresden shepherdess." " The sister ? To think of her return to the home she left so happy! If I met her, Jim ! if I met her ! " " Yes, that would be unpleasant, certainly. She seems a determined young party, and might make it warm for you. I should avoid the Rue Notre Dame des Champs scrupu lously, if I were you." Dallas started up suddenly at the mention of the street where his victim lay dying. " I must go back. Perhaps she will forgive me before she dies." Marnard rose with an oath. " Look here, Jack, we've had fooling enough about this little unpleasantness. You men who go in for bonnes fortunes ought to be accustomed to such incidents. I want to come to business.

We have this Yorkshire calf coming here this evening, and hope to transfer some of the golden images from his pocket to ours ; and, besides, de Laure is coming, and Brabazon Grey. You must be back in time." Dallas muttered something inaudible, and dashed away. " Featherheaded ass ! " said Marnard to him self, with a scowl that gave a peculiarly sinister expression to his face. " If it wasn't that his remnant of position is of use to me I would chuck him up. But he is a beautiful dearie player — for a man who doesn't cheat — and the coolest gambler I ever came across. Has a rare vein of luck sometimes too. No; the partnership must continue a little longer ; at least, till I can see my way to arranging my affairs and recrossing the silver streak. In Paris one has no chance. There are a dozen kites to every pigeon, and it is not always easy to tell which is which."

In the meanwhile Dallas was beingdriven back through the same streets he had so re cently traversed, and soon arrived at the door of the house in the Rue Notre Dame de Champs. The news he sought was soon obtained from the concierge. The poor young lady was dead; had been dead some half-hour; died almost immediately after he had left, in short. Dallas cursed himself for the insane journey he had taken, scarcely knowing what he did when the first shock was upon him, and only blindly obeying the impulse that bade him escape home from the stinging truths of the nurse and the doctor. " There was an arrival just before she breathed her last," said the concierge kindly, pitying the dumb misery upon the young man's face — "a sister, the bonne said, from England. Perhaps you would see her." He stood aside to make way for Dallas to pass, but he shrank back with a gesture of re pugnance.

" You would not intrude upon her grief ? It is better, perhaps, for I hear she is in veritable despair. But you were a friend of the poor young lady's. Perhaps you are also a friend of the sister, and your sympathy " " No — no," said Dallas hastily, " not yet. But," my friend, do you know how — I mean was she sent for ? " " Yes. Madame Dufaure, so Elise told me, telegraphed three days ago, when that terrible thing happened to M. Claud, but it appears she was away from her address, and the message only reached her yesterday. She knew nothing of her sister's illness. Ah, Monsieur!" and the kind-hearted old man threw up his arms. with a tragic gesture — " but it is a veritable catas trophe. Both of them gone in three days, and both so young and so handsome! The prettiest couple in all Paris I always called them, although they were English.

If Monsieur could only find the scoundrel who " " Hush ! What is that?" cried Dallas, turning paler still, as a scream from above come to their ears. " It is Madame Dufaure, poor lady ! She has the nerves always, and now she laughs, and cries, and screams, by turns. It will almost kill her, and doubtless the arrival of the poor sister has set her off again." Dallas tore himself away. He could bear no more. The picture of all that his reckless villainy had done was burnt into his heart. It is not too much to say that if the forfeit of his life could have retrieved the past he would gladly have given it. The turning-point in his career had been reached, and this awful tragedy had changed him in one moment into a different being — so different as to look with loathing' and almost surprise upon the man he had been yesterday.

It has been said that we change altogether every seven years ; but one hour of such agony of remorse as Jack Dallas felt now could do the work of a lifetime of ordinary experience. He slunk back towards the street in which he lived, feeling as if every passer-by must see the brand of Cain upon his brow ; almost wondering how those against whom he jostled on the crowded trottoir did not shrink back from contact with such as he. As he passed by a chemist's shop he paused. Would it not be as well to end it all and go — as he surely must go if there were any truth in the religious belief he had been taught, and which he had never wholly repudiated in his heart — straight to everlasting punishment? What punishment could be sufficient for his crime ? But it would be almost justice — all he could do now to expiate and atone He entered the shop, and emerged in a few minutes with a small bottle tightly clutched in his hand.

Then he made a ddtour which took him by several other chemists' establishments, and at each he repeated the purchase. " Well, Jenny — sweet little loving Jenny," he muttered to himself as he almost ran along the streets towards his home, " I have murdered you, and you have gone to heaven ; you are an angel, my sweet one, and you shall be well avenged, for I will go this night to burn for ever in the fire that is not quenched ! " Many looked after him, and nudged each other as he passed, half fearing, half pitying the madman : and one eminent senator, whose mission it was to extirpate the drinking of spirits from his country, exclaimed aloud, as he saw his wild look and staggering gait, — " Another victim to the demon Absinthe ! " Truly he was half mad for the moment ; but arrival at his apparlement, and the necessity to secrete his prizes — those little bottles, the con tents of which together would send him to sleep for ever — sobered him, and Marnard noticed nothing, except that he had not yet quite got over the " little unpleasantness that his Don Juan escapade had led to.' They went out together and dined at a favourite restaurant.

Dallas being now apparently in the highest spirits, drinking deeply of the Burgundy for which the house was cele brated, and astounding Marnard by his witty sallies and wonderful knowledge of the world, and the motives of those who dwell upon it. Never before had he quite understood why it was that Dallas had enjoyed such popularity in the best circles in England before his pecuniary smash had come, and he had been obliged to disappear and join the ever-increasing ranks of the ddclassds English gentlemen who pick up a precarious existence in continental cities and gaming towns. Never before, perhaps, had Dallas taken the trouble to shine before the friend whose coarse nature he saw through and despised, while too lazy to shake him off. To wards the close of dinner several French friends joined them, and roared loud and long at Dallas' witty repartees, sparkling satire, and curious anecdotes of adventure ; not reproducible, per haps, even in a Zolaesque novel.

" He is almost Parisian," said one, when the two Englishmen had taken their departure. " He gambles like a Frenchman," remarked another. "And he has the luck! You heard of his breaking the bank twice at Monte Carlo ? " " Ah ! but he has given it all back. That demon, de Laure, took an enormous sum from him at dcartd the other night, I hear." " Well, he is bon diable. He does not de serve to have been born on the wrongr side of o the channel." * * * * * The party that assembled in Dallas's rooms that night consisted of " Count" Raymond de Laure, a Bohemian Frenchman of doubtful antecedents, who, having long ago run through whatever patrimony he may have had, devoted himself principally to personally conducting young men anxious to do the same, taking ample toll on the way ; Mr. Brabazon Grey, an old friend of Dallas's, who belonged to the em bassy at Vienna, but who spent most of his leave of absence in the Paris that he loved ; and Sir John Finchley, a young Yorkshire millionaire, who was seeing the world ; one of those travellers who gain as much from their travels as do their portmanteaux — a few views of the hotels they stop at ; and who, unfortunately for his pockets, had made the acquaintance of Mr. Marnard, and had been taken by this gentle man's geniality, knowledge of life in Paris, and readiness to show him what, said Marnard, a young man of spirit should see, and so few did, because they knew not the way behind the scenes.

The primary object of the party was to re lieve Sir John of some of his superfluous wealth by fair means — that is, if good play pitted against bad be fair means. Dallas himself was a con summate player, but had never fallen so low as to cheat, and both de Laure and Marnard knew well that they must produce their kings with much tact if they were to remain on good terms with their host. " That is the worst of playing at Dallas's rooms," said the Count to Marnard on one occasion. " It is so slow ; and, while it's easy enough to avoid detection by one's adversary, c it is the very devil to have a player like Dallas perhaps behind one's chair, who also has to be deceived." To-night the play was high, for Sir John Finchley had won largely the last time he had played there, and was convinced that he was a born dcartd player.

Dallas humoured him in the matter of stakes, and soon a very big hole was made in the winnings from Monte Carlo. Then there was a change of luck, and things became about equal between the two. At the end of the third rubber Dallas rose, saying he would play no more that night. " Take de Laure in hand, Finchley. He is sick of playing for louis with Grey. You don't mind, Grey ? " " Not a bit. I am not a good gambler ; be cause if I win a large stake I want to bolt and keep it, and if I lose one I want to bolt and cry." " Well, what shall it be ? " asked de Laure, shuffling the cards. " A hundred a game, and five hundred on the rub," cried the flushed youth, plumping his squat person down on the chair vacated by Grey. Count Raymond slightly raised his eyebrows and glanced at Marnard. Marnard just moved his eyes in the direction of Dallas, who was seated at the other side of the room, leaning his face on his hands.