The Master of the Ceremonies

No! Would it? The complication was too dreadful.

Claire knelt there with her brain swimming, and the confusion in her mind growing moment by moment worse.

She wanted to think clearly – to plan out some way of averting a horrible exposure from their family; and, as she strove, the thought came upon her with crushing force that she was sinking into a miserable schemer – one who was growing lower in the sight of all she knew.

She pressed her hands over her eyes, but she could not shut out Richard Linnell’s face, and his stern, grave looks, that seemed to read her through and through, keeping her back from acting some fresh deceit, when something was spurring her on to try and save poor weak May.

The horror of Lady Teigne’s death: the suspicion of her having made an assignation with Sir Harry Payne; the supposed elopement with Major Rockley – all these clinging to her and lowering her in the sight of the world. There were those, too, who had noted her visits to the fisherman’s cottage.

It was terrible – one hideous confusion, to which this fresh trouble had come; and she asked herself, in the agony of her spirit, whether it would not be better to wait till the dark, soft night had fallen, and the tide was flowing, lapping, and whispering amongst the piles at the end of the pier. She had but to walk quietly down unseen – to descend those steps, and let the cool, soft wave take her to its breast and bear her away, lulling her to the easy, sweet rest of oblivion.

And May?

She started to her feet at the thought.

And Richard Linnell?

He would go on believing ill of her, and she would never stand up before him, listening as he asked her forgiveness for every doubt, never to be her husband, but ready then to look up to her as all that was pure and true.

May! She must save May. How, she knew not, but she must go to her. Something must be done.

Hurriedly dressing, she went out, and walked swiftly to her brother-in-law’s house, where the servant admitted her with no great show of respect, and she was shown into the drawing-room.

“I’ll tell my mistress you are here,” said the footman; and he went out, closing the door behind him rather loudly.

The effect was to make a little man jump up from the couch where he had been sleeping, with a loud exclamation.

“What is it? Who the – . Oh, it’s you, is it? Well, what do you want?”

“I came – I called to see May, Frank dear,” said Claire, trembling.

“Well, then, I just wish you wouldn’t,” he said testily. “It’s bad enough to have to bear the relationship, without having you come here.”

“Frank! – dear Frank!”

“There, don’t ‘dear Frank’ me. I should have thought, after what had occurred, you would have been ashamed to show your face here again.”

“Frank dear, we are brother and sister; for pity’s sake, spare me. Is it the duty of a gentleman to speak to me like this?”

She looked at him with a pitying dread in her eyes, as she thought of the horror hanging over his house. His allusions were keen enough, but they were blunt arrows compared to the bolts that threatened to fall upon his home; and, in her desire to shield him and his wife, if possible, from some of the suffering that must come, she scarcely felt their points.

“Gentleman, eh? You behave like a lady, don’t you? Nice position we hold in society through you and the old man, don’t we? I’ll be off abroad, that’s what I’ll do, and take May away from the old connection.”

“Yes, do!” cried Claire excitedly. “Do, Frank, at once. No, no; you must not do that. – Heaven help me! What am I saying?” she sighed to herself.

“Best thing to do,” said Burnett. “Shouldn’t have you always coming in then.”

“Frank dear,” said Claire deprecatingly, “I have not been to see May since – ”

“You disgraced yourself on the night of the party,” he said brutally.

“Frank!”

“Oh, come: it’s of no use to ride the high horse with me, my lady. I’m not a fool. I repeat it: you haven’t been since the night you disgraced us by inviting that little blackguard, Harry Payne, to see you; and it would have been better if you had not come now.”

Claire winced as if she were being lashed, but she uttered no word of complaint. It was her fate, she told herself, to suffer for others, and she was ready to play the social martyr’s part, and save May and Burnett if she could.

As she debated in her mind whether Burnett had not proposed the solution of the difficulty in taking her sister away, the thought was crushed by the recollection that May was Gravani’s wife, and that she would be saved and made happier could she leave with him.

Then the feeling came that all this was madness, and the position hopeless, and she said imploringly:

“Let me see May, Frank.”

“What do you want with her? To beg for more money? You’ve kept her short enough lately.”

“Frank! indeed – ”

“No lies, please,” he cried. “I know you’ve had at least a guinea a week from her for long enough past.”

It was true, but the money was for Gravani’s child; and Claire’s face grew hollow and old-looking as she felt that she dared not defend herself.

“I suppose you have come for more money, haven’t you?” said Burnett spitefully.

“No – indeed no!” cried Claire.

“I do not believe you,” he said brutally; “and – ”

“Ah, Claire, you here!” said May, rustling into the room, all silk, and scent, and flowers.

“Yes, she’s here,” said Burnett; “and the sooner she’s gone the better. I’m going out.”

“Very well, dear,” said May. “But don’t pout and frown like that at his little frightened wife.”

“Get out!” said Burnett, “and don’t be a fool before people.”

He shook her off as he said this, and strutted towards the door, where he turned with a sneering grin upon his face.

“I say,” he cried, “I didn’t give you any money when you asked me this morning.”

“No, dear, you didn’t. Give me some now, before you go. Don’t go out and leave me without.”

“Not a shilling!” he cried, with an unpleasant cackling laugh.

May stood with the pretty smile upon her face, a strange contrast to the pained classic sorrow upon her sister’s better-formed features, amid perfect silence, till the front door closed, and Frank Burnett’s strutting step was heard on the shingle walk leading to the gate, when a change came over the bright, flower-like countenance, which was convulsed with anger in miniature.

“Ugh! Little contemptible wretch!” she exclaimed. “How I do hate you! Claire, I shall end by running away from the little miserable ape, if I don’t make up my mind to kill him. Ah!”

She ended with an ejaculation full of pain, and turned a wondering, childish look of reproach on her sister, for Claire had crossed to her, and suddenly grasped her wrist.