"She was very proud of the name, poor Catalina, and she made me promise in case anything happened to her while we were abroad that she should be laid in the ancient grave of her race--in the churchyard of Drim.She had a weak heart, and she knew that she might die suddenly.I promised.And it was on our way to the spot she was so anxious to visit that death claimed her, only a few miles from the place where her ancestors had lived in the old days, and where all that remains of them has long mouldered to dust.So you see, Mr.Ffrench, that I had no choice but to lay her there.""That is not the point," said Gerald; "why this secrecy? Why this flight? Dr.Lynn, I am sure, would have enabled you to obey your sister's request in the full light of day; you need not have thrown her coffin on the ground and left to strangers the task of doing for the poor girl the last duties of civilization." Gerald spoke with indignant heat, for this looked to him like the cruellest desertion.
"I know how it must seem to you," said Vincenza, "and I have no excuse to offer for my conduct but this.My sister's death would have given all she possessed to people whom she disliked.It would have thrown me, whom she loved, penniless on the world.I acted as if she were still living, and as I am sure she would have wished me to act; no defence, I know, in your eyes, but consider the temptation.""And did you not realize that all this must come out some day?"asked Ffrench.
"Yes, but not for several years.Indeed, I cannot imagine how it is that you have stumbled on the truth."And Gerald, remembering the extraordinary chain of circumstances which had led him to the root of the mystery, could not but acknowledge that, humanly speaking, Vincenza's confidence was justified.
"And now you have found this out, what use do you intend to make of it?" asked the Spaniard after a pause.
"I shall publish the whole story as soon as I return to San Francisco," answered Gerald promptly.
"So for a few hundred dollars, which is all that you can possibly get out of it, you will make a beggar of me.""Right is right," said the young Irishman."This property does not belong to you.""Will you hold your tongue--or your pen--for fifty thousand dollars?" asked the Spaniard eagerly.
"No, nor for every dollar you have in the world.I don't approve your practice and I won't share your plunder.I am sorry for you personally, but I can't help that.I won't oust you.I will make such use of the story as any newspaper man would make, and so Igive you fair warning.You may save yourself if you can.""Then you do not intend to communicate with the heirs?" began Vincenza eagerly.
"I neither know nor care who they are," interrupted Gerald."I am not a detective, save in the way of my profession, and I shall certainly not tell what I have discovered to any individual till Igive it to the press."
"And that will be?" asked the Spaniard.
"As soon as I return to San Francisco," answered Ffrench."It may appear in a week or ten days.""Thank you, senor; good morning," said Vincenza, rising and leaving the room.
Three days later Senor Miguel Vincenza sailed on the outgoing Pacific mail steamer bound for Japan and China.He probably took a considerable sum of money with him, for the heirs of Catalina Costello y Ugarte found the affairs of the deceased in a very tangled state, and the ranch was mortgaged for nearly half its value.
Gerald Ffrench's story occupied four pages of the next issue of the Golden Fleece, and was widely copied and commented on over two continents.Larry, the groom at Ballyvire, read the account in his favorite Westmeath Sentinel, and as he laid the paper down exclaimed in wonder--"Begob, he found her!"
Lady Betty's Indiscretion "Horry! I am sick to death of it!"There was a servant in the room gathering the tea-cups; but Lady Betty Stafford, having been brought up in the purple, was not to be deterred from speaking her mind by a servant.Her cousin was either more prudent or less vivacious; he did not answer on the instant, but stood looking through one of the windows at the leafless trees and slow-dropping rain in the Mall, and only turned when Lady Betty pettishly repeated her statement.
"Had a bad time?" he then vouchsafed, dropping into a chair near her, and looking first at her, in a good-natured way, and then at his boots, which he seemed to approve.
"Horrid!" she replied.
"Many people here?"
"Hordes of them! Whole tribes!" she exclaimed.She was a little lady, plump and pretty, with a pale, clear complexion, and bright eyes."I am bored beyond belief.And--and I have not seen Stafford since morning," she added.
"Cabinet council?"
"Yes!" she answered viciously."A cabinet council, and a privy council, and a board of trade, and a board of green cloth, and all the other boards! Horry, I am sick to death of it! What is the use of it all?""Country go to the dogs!" he said oracularly, still admiring his boots.
"Let it!" she retorted, not relenting a whit." I wish it would; Iwish the dogs joy of it!"
He made an extraordinary effort at diffuseness."I thought," he said, "that you were becoming political, Betty.Going to write something, and all that.""Rubbish! But here is Mr.Atley.Mr.Atley, will you have a cup of tea," she continued, speaking to the newcomer."There will be some here presently.Where is Mr.Stafford?""Mr.Stafford will take a cup of tea in the library, Lady Betty,"replied the secretary."He asked me to bring it to him.He is copying an important paper."Sir Horace forsook his boots, and in a fit of momentary interest asked, "They have come to terms?"The secretary nodded.Lady Betty said "Pshaw!" A man brought in the fresh teapot.The next moment Mr.Stafford himself came quickly into the room, an open telegram in his hand.
