“Your lordship is indeed to be congratulated,” Mr. Templeton agreed. “You are thus in a position to clear yourself of even a shadow of suspicion.”
“You fool!” cried she who until that hour had been Countess of Ostermore, turning fiercely upon Mr. Templeton. “You fool!”
“Madam, this is not seemly,” cried the second secretary, with awkward dignity.
“Seemly, idiot?” she stormed at him. “I swear, as I've a soul to be saved, that in spite of all this, I know that man to be a traitor and a Jacobite--that it was the letter from the king he sought, whatever he may pretend to have found.”
Mr. Templeton looked at her in sorrow, for all that in her overwrought condition she insulted him. “Madam, you might swear and swear, and yet no one would believe you in the face of the facts that have come to light.”
“Do you believe me?” she demanded angrily.
“My beliefs can matter nothing,” he compromised, and made her a valedictory bow. “Your servant, ma'am,” said he, from force of habit. He nodded to Rotherby, took up his hat and cane, and strode to the door, which Mr. Green had made haste to open for him. From the threshold he bowed to Mr. Caryll. “My lord,” said he, “I shall go straight to Lord Carteret. He will stay for you till you come.”
“I shall not keep his lordship waiting,” answered Caryll, and bowed in his turn.
The second secretary went out. Mr. Green hesitated a moment, then abruptly followed him. The game was ended here; it was played and lost, he saw, and what should such as Mr. Green be doing on the losing side?
The game was played and lost. All realized it, and none so keenly as Hortensia, who found it in her gentle heart to pity the woman who had never shown her a kindness.
She set a hand upon her lover's arm. “What will you do, Justin?” she inquired in tones that seemed to plead for mercy for those others; for she had not paused to think--as another might have thought--that there was no mercy he could show them.
Rotherby and his mother stood hand in hand; it was the woman who had clutched at her son for comfort and support in this bitter hour of retribution, this hour of the recoil upon themselves of all the evil they had plotted.
Mr. Caryll considered them a moment, his face a mask, his mind entirely detached. They interested him profoundly. This subjugation of two natures that in themselves were arrogant and cruel was a process very engrossing to observe. He tried to conjecture what they felt, what thoughts they might be harboring. And it seemed to him that a sort of paralysis had fallen on their wits. They were stunned under the shock of the blow he had dealt them. Anon there would be railings and to spare--against him, against themselves, against the dead man above stairs, against Fate, and more besides. For the present there was this horrid, almost vacuous calm.