Chapter 65
gwen wynne a romance of the why by main read volume three chapter eighteen almost avert major mahon is standing at one of the front windows of his house waiting for his dinner to be served when he sees a fiac driven up to the door and inside it the face of a friend he does not stay for the bell to be rung but with genuine irish impulsiveness rushes forth himself opening the door captain raycroft he exclaims grasping the new arrival by the hand and hauling him out of the hackney glad to see you back in boulogne then adding as he observes a young man leap down from the box where he has had seat beside the driver part of your belongings isn't he yes major my old white waterman jack wingate of whom i spoke to you and if it be convenient to you to quarter both of us for a day or two don't talk about convenience and bar all mention of time the longer you stay with me you'll be conferring the greater favour your old room is gaping to receive you
and murtagh will rig up a berth for your boatman murt to the ex-royal irish who hearing the fracas has also come forth take charge of captain ryecroft's traps along with mr wingate here and see all safety bestowed now old fellows step inside they look after the things you're just in time to do dinner with me i was about sitting down to its sulu awfully lamenting my loneliness well one never knows what luck's in the wind rather hard lines for you however if i mistake not my pot's off the poorest this blessed day but i know you're neither gourmand nor gourmi and that's some consolation in go they leaving the old soldier to settle the fiat fare look after the luggage and extend the hospitalities of the kitchen to jack wingate soon as captain ryecroft has performed some slight ablutions necessary after a sea voyage however short his host hurries him down to the dining-room when seated at the table the major asks
what on earth has delayed you vivian you promised to be back in a week at most it's months now despairing of your return i had some thought of advertising the lugs you left with me if not claimed within a certain time to be sold for the payment of expenses echoes the laugh but so faintly his friend can see the cloud has not yet lifted instead lies heavy and dark as ever in hopes of doing something to dissipate it the major rolls on in his rich hibernian brogue you've just come in time to save your chattels from the hammer and now i have you here i mean to keep you so old boy make up your mind to an unli minute sojourn in boulogne-sur-mer you will won't you it's very kind of you mahon but that must depend on-on what how i prosper in my errand oh this time you have an errand some business i have well as you had none before it gives reason to hope that other matters may be also reversed and instead of shooting off like a comet you'll play the part of a fixed star
neither to shoot nor to be shot at as looked likely on the last occasion but speaking seriously ryecroft as you say you're on business may i know its nature not only may but it's meant you should nay more mahon i want your help in it that you can count upon whatever it be from pitch and toss-up to manslaughter only say how i can serve you well major in the first place i would seek your assistance in some inquiries i am about to make inquiries have they regard to that young lady you said was lost missing from her home surely she has been found she has found round found round god bless me yes ma'en the home from which she was missing knows her no more gwendoline wynne is now in her long home in heaven the solemn tone of voice with a woe-begone expression on the speaker's face drives all thoughts of hilarity out of the listener's mind it is a moment too sacred for mirth and between the two friends old comrades in arms for an interval even speech is suspended
only a word of courtesy as the host presses his guests to partake of the viands before them the major does not question further leaving the other to take up the broken thread of the conversation which he at length does holding it in hand till he has told all that happened since they last sat at that table together he gives only the facts reserving his own deductions from them but mahon drawing them for himself says searchingly then you have a suspicion there's been what's commonly called foul play more than a suspicion i'm sure of it the devil but who do you suspect who should i but he now in possession of the property her cousin mr levin murdock though i've reason to believe there are others mixed up in it one of them a frenchman indeed it's chiefly to make inquiry about him i've come over to boulogne a frenchman you know his name i do at least that he goes by on the other side of the channel you remember that night as we were passing the back entrance of the convent where your sisters at school are seeing a carriage there a hackney or whatever it was certainly i do
and my saying that the man who had just got out of it and gone inside resembled a priest i'd seen but a day or two before of course i remember all that and my joking you at the time as to the idleness of you fancying a likeness among sheep where all are so nearly of the same hue that black something of the sort i said what was your argument no argument at all but a conviction that the man we saw that night was my herr fordshire priest i've seen him several times since had a good square look at him and feel sure twas he you haven't told me his name rogier father rogier so is called upon the why and supposing him he identified what follows a great deal follows or rather depends on his identification explain ryecroft i shall listen with patience ryecroft does explain continuing his narrative into a second chapter which includes the doings of the jesuit on wise side so far as known to him the story jack wingate's love and loss the last so strangely resembling his own
the steps afterwards taken by the waterman in short everything he can think of that will throw light upon the subject a strange tale truly observes the major after hearing it to the end but does your boatman really believe the priest has resuscitated his dead sweetheart and brought her over here with the intention of shutting her up in a nunnery he does all that and certainly not without show of reason dead or alive the priest or some one else has taken the girl out of her coffin and her grave would be a wonderful story if true i mean the resuscitation or resurrection not the mere disinterment of a body that's possible and probable where priests of the jesuitical school are concerned and so should the other be when one considers that they can make statues wink and pictures shed tears oh yes ultramontane magicians can do anything but why asks ryecroft should they have taken all this trouble about a poor girl the daughter of a small herofortshire farmer with possibly at the most a hundred pounds or so for her dowry that's what mystifies me
it needn't laconically observes the major these jesuit gentry have often other motives than money for caging such birds in their convents was the girl good-looking he asks after musing a moment well of myself i never saw her by jack's description she must have been a superb creature on a par with the angels true a lover's judgment is not much to be relied on but i've heard from others that miss morgan was really a rustic belle something beyond the common faith and that may account for the whole thing i know they like their nuns to be nice-looking refer that stripe i suppose for purposes of proselytising if nothing more they'd give a good deal to receive the services of my own sister in that way have been already bidding for her by heavens i'd rather see her laid in her grave the major's strong declaration is followed by a spell of silence after which cooling down a little he continues you come then to inquire into this convent matter about whats the girl's name er morgan
more than the convent matter though it's in the same connection i've come to learn what can be learnt about this priest get his character with his antecedents and if possible obtain some information respecting the past lives of mr levin murdock and his french wife for which i may probably go on to paris if not further to sum up everything i've determined to sift this mystery to the bottom and unravel it to its last thread i've already commenced unwinding the clue and made some little progress but i want one to assist me like a lone hunter on a lost trail i need counsel from a companion and help too you'll stand by me ma to the death my dear boy i was going to say the last shilling in my purse as you don't need that i say instead to the last breath in my body you shall be thanked with the last in mine i'm sure of that and now for a drop of that crather to warm us to our work ho there murt bring in the materials
which murtagh does the dinner dishes having been already removed soon as punches have been mixed the major returns to the subject saying now then to enter upon particulars what step do you wish me to take first first to find out who father rochier is and what that is on this side i know what he is on the other if we can but learn his relations with the convent it might give us a key capable of opening more than one lock there won't be much difficulty in doing that i take it all the less from my little sister kate being a great pet of the lady superior who has hopes of making a nun of her not if i know it soon as her schooling is completed she walks out of that seminary and goes to a place where the moral atmosphere is a trifle purer you see old fellow i'm not very begotten about our holy faith and in some danger of a becoming a as for my sister were it not for a bit of a legacy left on condition of her being educated in a convent she'd never have seen the inside of one with my consent and never will again when out of this one
but money's money and though the legacy isn't a large one for her sake i couldn't afford to forfeit it you comprehend quite and you think she will be able to obtain the information without in any way compromising herself pretty sure of it kate's no simpleton though she be but a child in years she'll manage it for me with the instructions i mean giving her after all it may not be so much trouble in these nunneries things which are secrets to the world without are known to every mother's child of them nuns and novices alike gossips the chief occupation of their lives if there's been an occurrence such as you speak of a new bird caged there above all an english one it's sure to have got wind that is inside the walls and i can trust kate to catch the breath and blow it outside so vivian old boy drink your toddy and take things coolly i think i can promise you that before many days or it may be only hours you shall know whether such a priest as you speak of be in the habit of coming to that convent and if so what for when he was there last and everything about the reverend gentleman worth knowing
kate mahon proves equal to the occasion showing herself quick-witted as her brother boasted her to be on the third day after she is able to report to him that some time previously how long not exactly known a young english girl came to the convent brought thither by a priest named rogier the girl is a candidate for the holy sisterhood voluntary of course to take the veil soon as her probation be completed miss mahon has not seen the new novice only heard of her as being a great beauty for personal charms make noise even in a nunnery nor have any of the other pensionnaires been permitted to see or speak with her all they as yet know is that she is blonde with yellow hair a grand wealth of it and goes by the name of sir marie sister mary exclaims jack wingate as ryecroft at second hand communicates the intelligence at the same time translating the sir marie
it's mary morgan my mary and by the heavens of mercy he adds his arms angrily thrashing the air she shall come out of that convent or i'll lay my life down at its door end of chapter eighteen read by lars rolander
