CHAPTER XVII LORD DERRINGTON EXPLAINS

George was rather puzzled to reconcile the apparent contradiction in Derrington's speech. The old gentleman saw his bewilderment, and before the young man could speak he anticipated his question.

"You are perplexed," he said quietly. "I thought you would be. To explain myself clearly it will be better to tell you the whole story from the beginning."

"What story?"

"The story of your mother's marriage and of my quarrel with your father. Do not be afraid, I shall say nothing to hurt your pride."

George nodded. "I am sure of that. We are friends now."

Derrington was much gratified by this speech. But he merely acknowledged it with a grunt and began his family history at once.

"Your father and I never got on well," he said frankly, "and I fear it was my fault. I wanted Percy to obey me implicitly, and as he was of an age to judge for himself he objected. You would have done the like in his case."

"I certainly should, sir. Every man should judge for himself."

"H he has brains to do so. But I fear Percy was not overburdened with brains. He was gay and thoughtless and thriftless. Your talents, George, come from your mother. She must have been a remarkable woman."

"So Mr. Ireland says."

"Pooh! he was in love with her, and a man in love is incapable of giving an opinion. However, I saw your mother several times when she sang, although I never met her to speak to. She was very beautiful and had an intellectual face. Yes, George, it is from her that you inherit your brain. From my side of the family you inherit a strong will and a propensity to fight. There is Irish blood in our veins," said Derrington, grimly.

"Was my father a fighter?"

"In a way, yes. But he had not a strong will, save in resisting me."

George smiled and said nothing, but he privately thought that if Mr. Percy Vane could hold his own against Derrington he must have had a stronger will than the old gentleman gave him credit for.

"However, to continue," pursued Derrington, pushing away his empty cup. "Percy saw Miss Lockwood, he fell in love with her, and finally he eloped. I wrote him a letter saying he was to return or I would never see him again. He declined to return, and remained on the Continent with his wife. I never did see him again," added Derrington, quietly, "for three years later he was murdered at San Remo."

"In his letter to you did my father say he was married?"

"He did; but at the time, as he did not say where the marriage was celebrated, I thought he mentioned it out of obstinacy."

George colored. "I don't see why you should have so misjudged my mother," he said hotly. "Admitting that she was not born in the purple, she was in a good position and had no reason to run away with my father."

"She was in love with him, I believe."

"Even then she would not have eloped, unless it was to be married."

Derrington nodded. "You are perfectly right," he said; "I tried to disbelieve in the marriage, but in my own heart I knew there was one. I have behaved very badly, George."

"You have, sir. But as we are now reconciled the less said about the thing the better. You are quite sure you do not know where the marriage was celebrated?"

"No, George, I do not. After the death of your father I tried to find out, but it was impossible. Had I really seen the register of the marriage I should have acknowledged you as my heir. As a matter of fact," added Derrington, with a burst of candor, "I did not trouble much to search, as I feared lest the marriage should be verified."

George wriggled in his seat. "Let us say no more," he said.

"Very good. I have confessed my sins and I have received absolution from you. At the present moment we will leave the murder of your father at San Remo alone, and come to the appearance of Mrs. Jersey in my life. You were with your grandfather Lockwood in Amelia Square. I had constituted my second son my heir, and I had relegated to obscurity the escapade of my son Percy. All was nicely settled, in my humble opinion, when Mrs. Jersey appeared to make trouble. That was eight years after your father's death."

"Where was she in the mean time?"

"I cannot say. She told me nothing of her history, but from a word or two which she let slip I believe she must have been in the United States. Why she went there from San Remo, or for what reason, I cannot say. She came here to see me--we had an interview in this very room--to demand money."

"What threat did she make?"

"That she would tell where the marriage took place,"

"And you bribed her to keep silence?"

Derrington winced at the scorn in his grandson's voice and took a turn up and down the room. "I am no saint, I admit," he said, "and at the time, George, I did not know that you would turn out such a fine fellow. I dreaded a scandal, and there was your uncle to be considered. I had made him my heir."

"And what about me, sir? Were the sins of my father to be placed on my shoulders?"

"I have admitted that I was in the wrong," said Derrington, impatiently, "spare me further sermons."

"I beg your pardon," said George, quietly. "But please touch as lightly as possible on these matters. We will admit that you acted according to your lights."

"False lights," said his grandfather, sadly. "However, we need speak no more on that particular point. Mrs. Jersey said that she knew where the marriage was celebrated, adding that if I did not give her an annuity she would go to Lockwood and help him to prove that you were my legitimate grandson and heir."

"Did she say if the marriage was celebrated in England or abroad?"

"No, sir; Mrs. Jersey was a remarkably clever woman, and if my son Percy had married her she would have made a man of him."

"Then she really was in love with my father?"

"Very deeply in love--as she told me herself. But she did not regard his memory with such veneration as to desire to aid his son. She was content that you should lose your rights, provided that I paid her an annuity. I tried in vain to learn from her where the marriage had been celebrated. She refused to open her mouth, so I allowed her an annuity of five hundred a year----"

"That was a large sum," interposed George.

Derrington shrugged his shoulders. "Much larger than I could afford, my good sir," he said, "but Mrs. Jersey dictated her own terms. I arranged that the money should be paid through my lawyers, and she vanished."

"Where to?"

"I can't say. She might have gone to rejoin Mr. Jersey if there ever was such a person. She sent a messenger regularly to the office of my lawyers for the money, but did not trouble me in any way. Her next appearance was shortly after the death of your grandfather."

"What did she want this time?"

"To set up a boarding-house in Amelia Square. She said that her life was lonely--a remark which made me think Mr. Jersey was a myth--and that she wanted company. I expect she learned in some way that I was buying old Lockwood's house."

"Why did you buy it?"

"I have a lot of property in that district, and I wanted to round it off with this house. Ireland, in his rage at me for my treatment of your mother, would not have sold it to me. I bought the house through an agent; Mrs. Jersey must have heard of the purchase, for it was then that she came to me and asked me to set her up in the house as a landlady."

"I wonder why she did that," said George, thoughtfully.

"She was lonely, I understand."

George looked at his shoes. "As Eliza Stokes she lived in that house along with my mother previous to the elopement. I expect she had a kind a affection for it."

"Well, whatever her reason was, I did what she asked. She agreed to pay me a rent, and her money was as good as any one else's. Besides, I felt that as my tenant I could keep her under my own eye. When she was away I never knew but what she might die and part with the secret to some one else, who might come on me for blackmail, also. I thought it best Mrs. Jersey should have the house so she went into it and used the old furniture. I don't deny but what she was a good business woman and made the house pay. At all events she was never behindhand with her rent."

"I wonder she paid you any at all."

"Oh, she had her annuity and was afraid of pressing me too hard. I refused to let her the house on a seven years' lease. She only had it from year to year, and in that way I kept a check on her. She knew if I once lost my temper that I would throw her over and acknowledge you as my heir."

"I wish you had done so," said Brendon, moodily; "it would have saved a lot of trouble."

"I do so now," replied Derrington, testily; "better late than never. Well, Mrs. Jersey lived and flourished for fifteen years. I tried to find you out, George, lest she should get at you----"

"Oh, was that why you offered to make me an allowance?"

"It was. I intended to give you a yearly income on condition that you went to Australia; then I could be sure that Mrs. Jersey would not seek you out. But you refused my offer and disappeared."

"I went to college under the name of Brendon," observed George.

"And that is why Mrs. Jersey never found you, and why I could not come across you until you put those advertisements about the marriage into the papers. It was that which----"

"Yes, so Bawdsey told me. You had me watched."

"I did," said Derrington, "and in that way I found out that you were going to stop in Mrs. Jersey's house."

"How did you learn that, sir?" asked George in surprise. "I never told any one."

"Oh, yes, you told Lola."

"So I did," said Brendon, quickly; "she bothered me to come and see her, and I said that I was going to stop in the neighborhood of Amelia Square with a friend and would call on her the next day. I expect she told this to Bawdsey.

"Exactly, and Bawdsey told me. I was afraid lest you should make Mrs. Jersey confess. I wrote to her and asked her to see me. She refused to come to my house, so I made up my mind to seek her out in Amelia Square. I arranged by letter with her to call about eleven o'clock at her place and see her secretly."

"Why secretly, and why at night?"

"Can't you see, George? My height and figure make me so conspicuous that I knew I would be recognized if I went in the daytime, and then people would ask themselves why Lord Derrington went to see a lodging-house keeper."

"You could have put it down to her being a tenant."

"Ah," said Derrington, grimly, "I never thought of that. I received a note from Mrs. Jersey saying she would wait for me on Friday evening at eleven o'clock in her sitting-room; it was a foggy night, if you remember."

"Very foggy. I suppose you traced the house by means of the red light over the door."

"I did not trace the house at all," said Derrington, quietly. "I did not go near the house."

"But I saw you," insisted George.

"You saw my coat and a man with my tall figure, and having my association with yourself in your head you jumped to the conclusion that the figure was me."

"Then if not you, who was the man?"

"Bawdsey!" said Derrington, curtly.

George stared. "In your coat?" he said incredulously.

"It seems strange," said Derrington, "but the fact is that Bawdsey is one of the few who have got the better of me in my life. It was in this way that he prevented me from seeing Mrs. Jersey. On that night I visited him at his rooms, which then were in Bloomsbury. I desired to tell him that I intended to see Mrs. Jersey and to warn her against revealing anything. I don't suppose the warning was needed, as she knew when she was well off. But the fact is, Mrs. Jersey was not in good health and was feeling compunction about keeping you out of your rights. I learned from Bawdsey that Mrs. Jersey had written out a confession of the whole matter and that she intended to leave this to her niece, Margery Watson, so that I might be forced to continue the lease of the house."

George uttered an ejaculation. "I thought from what Margery said that there was some such confession," he remarked, "but it is missing; it was not found among her papers after her death. Unless Miss Bull took it and forced you to----"

"No," interrupted Derrington, vigorously, "she came here quietly and put the case of the poor girl to me. She also undertook that the rent would be paid regularly, and that through Miss Watson she would manage the house. I was quite satisfied with the existing arrangements, and, moreover, thought that, if such a confession were found, out of gratitude Miss Watson might bring it to me."

"If Miss Bull had told her to she would have done so but not otherwise," said George; "she is under Miss Bull's thumb."

"The best place she could be, George. The girl Is a born idiot from what I saw of her. However, you know why I renewed the year-by-year lease. Where the confession is I have no idea; but the person who holds it will certainly make use of it some day to extort money, and then we will learn who killed Mrs. Jersey."

"I dare say. The assassin must have taken the papers. Well?"

Derrington proceeded with his account of his doings on that night. "As I said, I went to see Bawdsey at his rooms. I took a cab, and as the fog was thick I had considerable difficulty in finding the place. The rain and fog chilled me, for I am not so young as I was, and when I arrived I was shivering. But I was too anxious to tell Bawdsey about Mrs. Jersey, to trouble. He heated some water to give me a glass of hot whisky. While the water was boiling I told him, I was going to see Mrs. Jersey. He asked me how I could get into the house without being admitted by one of the servants and thus run a chance of my visit being known."

"Did it never strike him that Mrs. Jersey expected you and would admit you when you rang?"

"Yes, it did strike him; but he knew that I didn't want any one to know that she had a visitor so late at night."

"I don't know why you took all these precautions, sir."

Derrington smiled dryly. "Perhaps they were rather unnecessary, but I thought it best to be on the safe side. As a matter of fact, I had a latch-key."

"I thought that Mrs. Jersey never allowed latch-keys."

"This one came to me when I bought the house, and was given to me by the agent. I told Mrs. Jersey I had it and that I would let myself in. She expected me at eleven."

"I know she did," said George, "for on that night she asked the boarders to be in bed by eleven, and broke up her party at ten. I wondered if she was having any one to meet her then."

"She was expecting me. It was after ten when I told Bawdsey, and I explained to him that I had a latch-key. He gave me the whisky, and, being chilled, I drank it. Then I fell asleep."

George looked up suddenly. "The whisky was drugged," he guessed.

"It was," assented Derrington, "and while I was insensible Bawdsey took the latch-key out of my pocket and put on my coat. He is rather my height, so with that and the fur coat I expect he passed himself off as me to Mrs. Jersey until she saw his face."

"When she did, she would have nothing to do with him. Although," added George, "he was an old boarder in the house."

"Wait till I tell you the rest," said Derrington, "and then you can give an opinion. When I woke it was after twelve. I never suspected that the whisky had been drugged, and thought that it was some sort of illness. Bawdsey was in the room when I awoke. He did not tell me that he had been to Mrs. Jersey, and I now saw that it was too late to go. He advised me to see her on the morrow, saying that it was doubtful if you would speak to her on that night."

"I intended to wait till the next day, but, as a matter of fact, I became anxious to see if any one was with her, and I went down the stairs."

"By means of that secret door. Bawdsey told me."

"Well, I crept downstairs, and saw--as I thought--you. It was, of course, Bawdsey. He was standing at the door of the sitting-room. I was afraid lest you--as I thought it was--should see me, so I went upstairs again."

"And Bawdsey left the house. However, I never suspected him. I went home and found Mrs. Ward waiting for me. She came to tell me that she had heard from Dorothy that you purposed to stop with Train at Mrs. Jersey's house, and came to warn me."

"How good of Mrs. Ward!"

"She is a dangerous woman, George. I threw my coat on yonder sofa, and she sat near it. Feeling something in the pocket, her curiosity led her to take out the something when I was absent from the room. It was a stiletto."

George started from his seat. "A stiletto?"

"Yes." Derrington opened the drawer in his desk and took out the weapon which Mrs. Ward had brought. "This was between the fur and the lining of the coat. What with the weight of the coat and the position of this weapon lying along the bottom of the coat, I never suspected it. I brought it home quite unconsciously. Mrs. Ward found it, took it away with her, and came the other day to accuse me of having murdered Mrs. Jersey."

"How dare she do such a thing?"

"Oh, Mrs. Ward is capable of all things! However you can see from what I tell you what happened. Bawdsey put the stiletto in my coat and either forgot to take it out or left it there so that I might be incriminated."

"Did he tell you this?"

"He told me, when I rebuked him too sharply, that he could get me into trouble, and explained how he had been in the house. He also referred to the stiletto. I denied that I had seen it, and it was only when Mrs. Ward brought it the other day that I saw that this part of Bawdsey's story was true."

"What did you do?"

"I accused him of having killed the woman."

"What did he say?"

"He denied that he had done so. He declared that he went to Mrs. Jersey's sitting-room door close upon twelve, having let himself in noiselessly by the front door. He discovered Mrs. Jersey lying dead, as she was found in the morning. On the floor was the stiletto. Fearing lest he should be accused of the crime, Bawdsey left the house quickly, but took the stiletto with him so that he might find out who had done the deed. He changed his mind or left it by mistake in my fur coat."

"Did he ask money?"

"No. He has not done so yet. But he told me very plainly that no one could prove that he had been in the house on that night, and that if he had been seen, the coat would make people think it was I."

"Exactly what I did think," said George.

"Well, I had to hold my tongue for you see I was in a most awkward position and I could prove nothing. I bluffed Mrs. Ward, but if the matter came into court things would look extremely unpleasant for me."

"I can see that," said Brendon, "but Bawdsey----"

"He has made himself secure, as no one can prove that he was in the house on that night. Even you thought it was I. I can't say for certain if Bawdsey committed the murder, or if he really did find the woman dead as he said, but he swears to his innocence. As yet he has not made any use of his power, but I am quite sure that he will try and get money out of me, so I have asked you here to advise me about the matter."

"Do you think Bawdsey has the confession?"

"He may have. If so, he knows where the marriage was celebrated!"

Brendon mused for a time. "I think it best to do nothing at the present moment," he said. "Bawdsey is friendly to me, as I saved him from being run over. If he thought I knew this he might turn crusty and make trouble. Better wait."

"For what?" asked Derrington, restlessly.

"To see what he will do. If he does blackmail you, call me in."

Derrington drew a long breath. "Yes. I think you are right," he said. "We will wait. But I don't trust that man."

"He's a scoundrel," said George, "but I know how to conquer him."