The Small House at Allington by Anthony Trollope (the kiss of deception read online txt) 📕

honour upon his own purity as regarded Mrs. Lupex. Lupex still held to his enemy’s cravat, though Eames had now got him by the arm, and so far impeded his movements as to hinder him from proceeding to any graver attack.

“Jemima, Jemima, Jemima!” shouted Mrs. Roper. “Run for the police; run for the police!” But Amelia, who had more presence of mind than her mother, stopped Jemima as she was making to one of the front windows. “Keep where you are,” said Amelia. “They’ll come quiet in a minute or two.” And Amelia no doubt was right. Calling for the police when there is a row in the house is like summoning the water-engines when the soot is on fire in the kitchen chimney. In such cases good management will allow the soot to burn itself out, without aid from the water-engines. In the present instance the police were not called in, and I am inclined to think that their presence would not have been advantageous to any of the party.

“Upon-my-honour⁠—I know nothing about her,” were the first words which Cradell was able to articulate, when Lupex, under Eames’s persuasion, at last relaxed his hold.

Lupex turned round to Miss Spruce with a sardonic grin. “You hear his words⁠—this enemy to domestic bliss⁠—Ha, ha! man, tell me whither you have conveyed my wife!”

“If you were to give me the Bank of England I don’t know,” said Cradell.

“And I’m sure he does not know,” said Mrs. Roper, whose suspicions against Cradell were beginning to subside. But as her suspicions subsided, her respect for him decreased. Such was the case also with Miss Spruce, and with Amelia, and with Jemima. They had all thought him to be a great fool for running away with Mrs. Lupex, but now they were beginning to think him a poor creature because he had not done so. Had he committed that active folly he would have been an interesting fool. But now, if, as they all suspected, he knew no more about Mrs. Lupex than they did, he would be a fool without any special interest whatever.

“Of course he doesn’t,” said Eames.

“No more than I do,” said Amelia.

“His very looks show him innocent,” said Mrs. Roper.

“Indeed they do,” said Miss Spruce.

Lupex turned from one to the other as they thus defended the man whom he suspected, and shook his head at each assertion that was made. “And if he doesn’t know who does?” he asked. “Haven’t I seen it all for the last three months? Is it reasonable to suppose that a creature such as she, used to domestic comforts all her life, should have gone off in this way, at dinnertime, taking with her my property and all her jewels, and that nobody should have instigated her; nobody assisted her! Is that a story to tell to such a man as me! You may tell it to the marines!” Mr. Lupex, as he made this speech, was walking about the room, and as he finished it he threw his pocket-handkerchief with violence on to the floor. “I know what to do, Mrs. Roper,” he said. “I know what steps to take. I shall put the affair into the hands of my lawyer tomorrow morning.” Then he picked up his handkerchief and walked down into the dining-room.

“Of course you know nothing about it?” said Eames to his friend, having run upstairs for the purpose of saying a word to him while he washed his hands.

“What⁠—about Maria? I don’t know where she is, if you mean that.”

“Of course I mean that. What else should I mean? And what makes you call her Maria?”

“It is wrong. I admit it’s wrong. The word will come out, you know.”

“Will come out! I’ll tell you what it is, old fellow, you’ll get yourself into a mess, and all for nothing. That fellow will have you up before the police for stealing his things⁠—”

“But, Johnny⁠—”

“I know all about it. Of course you have not stolen them, and of course there was nothing to steal. But if you go on calling her Maria you’ll find that he’ll have a pull on you. Men don’t call other men’s wives names for nothing.”

“Of course we’ve been friends,” said Cradell, who rather liked this view of the matter.

“Yes⁠—you have been friends! She’s diddled you out of your money, and that’s the beginning and the end of it. And now, if you go on showing off your friendship, you’ll be done out of more money. You’re making an ass of yourself. That’s the long and the short of it.”

“And what have you made of yourself with that girl? There are worse asses than I am yet, Master Johnny.” Eames, as he had no answer ready to this counter attack, left the room and went downstairs. Cradell soon followed him, and in a few minutes they were all eating their dinner together at Mrs. Roper’s hospitable table.

Immediately after dinner Lupex took himself away, and the conversation upstairs became general on the subject of the lady’s departure.

“If I was him I’d never ask a question about her, but let her go,” said Amelia.

“Yes; and then have all her bills following you, wherever you went,” said Amelia’s brother.

“I’d sooner have her bills than herself,” said Eames.

“My belief is, that she’s been an ill-used woman,” said Cradell. “If she had a husband that she could respect and have loved, and all that sort of thing, she would have been a charming woman.”

“She’s every bit as bad as he is,” said Mrs. Roper.

“I can’t agree with you, Mrs. Roper,” continued the lady’s champion. “Perhaps I ought to understand her position better than anyone here, and⁠—”

“Then that’s just what you ought not to do, Mr. Cradell,” said Mrs. Roper. And now the lady of the house spoke out her mind with much maternal dignity and with some feminine severity. “That’s just what a young man like you has no business to know. What’s a married woman like that to you, or you to her; or what have you to do with understanding her position? When you’ve a