LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE RUPEBT GODWIN ^ Mobil BY THE AtTTHOR OF "LADY AUDLEY'S SECRET," "AURORA FLOYO' " VIXEN," '< ISHMAEL," " WYLLARD'S WEIRD " ETC. ETC. SteKotgp«b dbhtoji LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO., LIMITED, STATIONERS' HALL COURT 1890. \Ml rights reserved.} MISS BRADDON'S NOVELS. Now Ready at all Booksellers' and Bookstalls, Peioe 2«. 6d. JtACH, Cloth gilt. THE AUTHOE'S AUTOGEAPH EDITION OF MISS BEADDON'S NOVELS. " No one can be dull who has a novel by Mies Braddon In hand, ■ffhe must tiresome journey is b» is brightened, by any one of her books." "Miss Uroddon Is the Queen of the circulating libraries." Tilt World. T.ONnnN! STMPKTN <^ CO., T,TMiTFT), Ptattovfrp' ITai.i, OorriT. And at all Railwuy B(X>ltstnlls, Boohscllcrs\ and Libraries. PUBLISHERS' ANNOUNCEMENT. Rupert Godtoin was written for, and first appeared in, a cheap Weekly Journal. From this source the Tale was translated into the French language, and ran as the leading story in the Journal four Tous. It was there discovered by an American, who re-translated the matter back into English, and who obtamea an outlet for the new translation in the columns of the New-York Mercury. These and other versions have been made without the slightest advantage to the Author; or, indeed, without the faintest approach to any direct communica- tion to her on the subject. Influenced by the facts as here stated, the Author has revised the original, and now ofiers the result for what it is, namely, a Tale of Incident written to amuse the short intervals of leisure which the readers of popular periodicals can snatch from their daily avocationa CONTEXTS, OBAT. L A SiD Farewell . II. Rupert Godwin the Bakkeb III. An Importunate Creditor . IV. A NEW Way to pat old Debts V. Love's Yotjno Dreau . VI. The Story or the Past VII. The Stolen Letter VIH. TiiE Day of Desolation IX. A Pitiless Claimant . X. Hidden in the Yew-tree . XI. Homeless and FniENDLEaa . XII. Mati-.rnal Manceuvres XIII. A Daughter's Trial . XIV. Love at Sight XV. Violet Resolves trpoN Entering a New Si'berb XVI. Behind the Scenes XVII. Cruel Kindness . XVIII. WlLMINOUON UaLL XIX. A Recognition and a Disappointment XX. The Marquis ok Roxleydale XXI. Bent, but not Broken XXII. Julia's Protege . XXIII. On the TiiREHiioLD XXIV. Miss Vanueuo is MAUCiot/fc XXV. Falcon ani. Dovk. XXVI. In the Laryiunth XXVII. A Dark Journey. XXVIII. The IIorsEKKEPER'a Story. XXI.K. "She Weit, delivered kuo.« iiek Danoeb' XX.X. Undeuoround XXXI. On the Track XXXII. Esther Vanuero has her way XXXIII. The Evidence of the Miniatur XX XIV. Fever-btuickkn . XX.W. An ai.aumiso DmcovrRV . XXXVI. DiscoMFirEi) .... XXXVII. Put to the Tij.1)H . n XXX I. K. The Hiiahow ok Dkatw XL. A Fatal Lkbhon . XLI. Silenced .... XLII. Oiut with mre . XI. III. The Ci.f.rk'h Stoiiv XI. IV. The Duke ok IIarmnokokd makes a Discovert XLV. The Vack or the Lost XI. VI. SUHPKNBE .... XLVll. Ur.HiitoAM .... JCi.VIII " Venoean" E iH Vine RUPEET GODWIN. CHAPTER I. A SAD FAEEWELL. In a charming residence, half cottage, half manor-house, em- bosomed in the woodland scenery of Hampshire, lived a family who might have formed the model for a poet's ideal of domestic happiness. The home-circle was not a large one. It consisted of only four persons — Captain Harley Westford, of the mercha^^t service, his wife, son, and daughter. The Captain and his wiiia were both in the fairest jjrime of middle age. Life for them seemed at its brightest and best. Clara Westford's girhsh beauty might, indeed, have vanished vnth the snows of departed winters, the blossoms of bygone spring-times ; but another kind of beauty had succeeded — the calm loveliness of the matron, whose hfe has been cloudless as one long summer's day, pure as the untrodden snows of some far Alpine region. Yes ; she was very lovely still. Beauty has its Indian sum- mer, and the glory of that later splendour is scarcely less than the early freshness of spring-time. Mrs. Westford possessed even a rarer chann than mere perfection of face or figure. Every look, every movement, was instinct with that indefinable grace for which we can find no better name than good breeding. She had that winning manner the French call graciousness. Those who were intimate with the Cajjtain and his wife whis- pered that Clara Westford came of a nobler race than that of hei husband. It was said that she had left the house of a wealthy father, to begin the battle of life with the frank, genial, handsome merchant sailor, and that she had thus made herself for ever an outcast from the family to which she belonged. No one knew the real story of that runaway man-iage. The Captain and his wife kept the secrets of the past locked in their own breasts. Mrs. Westford could very seldom be induced to speak of her marriage ; but when she did speak, it was always in words that expressed the pride she felt in her husband. " I know that his family has no place amongst Burke's landed gentry, and that his grandfather was a trader on the high seas, like liimself," she would say; " but I also know that his n:ur^ 2 Eupert Godwin. is honoured by tlie few to whom it is familiar, and that in hii native to\Yn, Westford and honesty are synonymous terms." Only one shadow ever darkened that rustic dwelling among the verdant woods and fair spreading pastures of Hampshire ; and that shadow was a very terrible one. It came when the husband and father was obliged to leave the dear ones who made his home a kind of paradise for hira. Partino-s were very frequent in that simple household. The Captain's professional duties called him often away to scenes of peril and tempest, far from that happy nook m peacetul England. To-day the June sunshine is bright on the lawn and tlower- beds in the Cai^tain's garden ; but the shadow comes with the sunshine, and the bright midsummer noontide ia an hour of Badness for the seaman's household. The Captain and his wife are walking slowly, arm in arm, rnder the shelter of a long alley of hazel and filbert trees. It is a lovely day at the close of June; the roses are m their fullest si)lendour; the deep bine sky is unshadowed by a cloud; the hum of bees and carolling music of birds make all the air melodious with nature's simple harmonies ; a thousand Itntter- llies are Unttoring above the flower-beds on the smooth lawn before the windows of the old fJrange. Everj' c^uaint dianiond- paned casement and broad mullioned window winks and bhnka in the warm sunlight, till tbu old liouse seems full of eyes. The yellow stone-cr..t) on the gabled roof, the deep crimson of the brick-work, are sharply iletiu.Ml iigainst an uHnimarine sky, and make a picture that wouM gladden the eyrs of a pre-Kaphaohte. The sunshine steeps every leaf and every flower in its wana radiance— it floods the trees with silvery light, it transiorma an. I glorilifs the conimunest objects, until the earth seenis un- familiar and UMiitifwl as fairyland. On Huch a day as this, it seeiiis almost iiiijxtssiblc to believe that sorrow or heartache can have any existcnco uiwu this f'lorified earth ; we almost forget that hearts can break araiJ beauty ami sun.Mhine. Clara Wcstford'.s noblo face is pale and wan this sunny morn i- - Dark circles surround her eyes— earnest eyes, from whoso .1 ir (Icpths i\u\ very sonl of truth looks out. AH through the TiXiHt night this tnn-heartcd wfe has watched and wept on her tncen bilbn- Iliin who can alone iirotcct the wanderer. " Oh. TIarlry," Hho o\c!:iimed, in a low, trcmulons voice, while her slcn-lrr fiii-'TH tightmid their grasp upon the Cnptnin's arm, "it is ho hittrr ho l.iUer; nliMost too ])iticr t/) benr. We have parted oft«'n before to-day; and yet to-day, for the that time, the an^ nJKh of parting Hcems more than I can endure." 'I'h.'Te v.'.".' a If'k of agony in the wilV-'s palo face, us sha A Sad Farewell. 3 turned it towards her hnsband, that expressed even more than her passionate words. There were no tears in the large violet* hued eyes ; but there was a quivering motion about the com- pressed Hps that betrayed a world of suflering. At sea, or in any hour of peril and contest, Harley "Westford possessed the courage of a lion; but the aspect of his wife''^ grief transformed him into the veriest coward. He strove man- fully, however, to conceal his emotion, and it was in a tone of affected gaiety that he rephed to Mrs. Westford. "My darhng," he exclaimed, "this is really foolish, and quite unworthy of a seaman's wife, who should have a soul above fear. This parting ought not to be a hard one ; for is not this to be my last voyage ? After this one trip to China, by which I hope to make a sackful of golden guineas for you and the dear ones, I mean to settle down for the rest of my Hfe in this dear old Grange, a regidar landsman, a gentleman farmer, if you like ; going in for pigs, and prize cattle, and monster tur- nips, and all that kind of thing, Hke a country squire to tho manner bom. Why, Clara, you ought not to shed a tear, this time!" " There are no tears in my eyes, Harley," his wife answered, in the same low, faltering voice, so terribly erpressive of mental anguish ; " there is something in my sorrow too deep for tears. I have shed tears always on the day of our iiarting, and I know that my cowardly weakness has often unmanned you, Harley; but I can shed no tears to-day. There is an awful terror in my heart. My di-eams for the last week have been full of trouble and foreboding. My prayers last night brought no consolation. It seemed to me as if Heaven was deaf to my cries. I feel like some unhappy wretch who wanders blindfold upon the brink of a precipice — every stejD may plunge me into an abyss of dark- ness and hoiTor. 0, Harley, Harley, have pity upon me ! I know there is danger in this voyage — deadly, unseen peril. Do not go ! Have mercy upon my anguish, Harley, and do not go!" Again the slender hands tightened convulsively upon the Bailor's arm. It seemed as if the agonized wife would have h(dd her hnsband despite himself in that passionate grasp. Captain Westford smded sadly. " My darling," he said, " foolish as I know your fears to be, I might perhaps indulge them if my word were not pledged to this voyage ; but my woi'd is pledged. And when did Harley Westford ever break liis promise ? There is not a sailor anion, ^u my crew who does not look forward to this trip as a means of taking home comfort to his wife and little ones. They all confide in me as if I were the'r brother as well as their captain; and I know ♦heir plans, pf)or .sllows, and the disappointmen*^ tlieywo ildfopJ 4 Mupert Godwin. if anytbing prevented the voyage. No, darling, you must be bold and brave, like a true-hearted sailor's wife as you are. The lAhi Queen— jovj: ship, Clara; christened after you, the queen of all earthly lilies— the lAly Queen sails from London Docks at daybreak to-morrow, and, if he lives, Harley Westford sails with her ! " The wife knew that all further remonstrance was useless. She knew that her husband valued his word and honour more than his hfe— more even than her happiness. She only breathed one long sigh, which sounded like the last murmur of a despair- ing heart. " And now listen to me, my dearest one," said Harley West- ford, in tones which he strove to render cheerful. " Listen to me, my own brave, true-hearted wife ; for I must talk to you of serious business before the Winchester coach turns the sharp corner yonder by the village pond." He looked at his watch as he spoke. "Only one more half-hour, Clara, and then good-bye!" he exclaimed. " Now, darling, listen. You know that, thanks to Providence, I have been enabled to save a very decent little fortune for you and yours. Close against my breast I carry a pocket-book containing bank-notes to the amount of twenty thousand pounds, the entire bulk of my fortune, withdrawn from different foreign investments, by the advice of friends, who have givfan me warning of an approaching crisis in the money-market. There seems to be always something or other wrong^in the money-market, by the way. Directl;yr I return from China 1 shall invest this money, with the earnmgs of my present enter- frise, in the best and safest manner I can. In the mean time, shall place the money in the hands of the present head_ of the banking finn in which my father had the highest couHdcnce and in whose house he kept an account for thirty years of his life. In such hands the money will be safe until my return And, to gujird against any cliance of accident, I shall send you the hiiiiker's receipt for the twenty thousand pounds, and for the title-deeds of this house and laud, which I shall also lodge in his hands. You will receive these from me Ijefore I set sail ; and then, as my will is in the IuukIh of my lawyer, you and the children will be safe, come whiit may." "(), Harley," murmured (Jlara Westford, "every word you Hay makes nic more and more wretched. You talk as it you were K"'")^ to rertiiiu death." "No, diuling, I (jiily talk like a prudent man, who knows the uncertainty of life. But I will say no more, Clara. With twenty thousand t>oundH, and the freehold of this old Grange, with fifty acres of the best land in Hampshire spreading round it, you and tlie dtar ones cannot ]>e ill provided for. And now. A Sad Farewell. 6 dearest, nearly half my time lias gone, and 1 must go and say good-bye to my children.' The Captain stepped from the shady alley to the broad sun- shine of the lawn. Opposite him were the windows of a pretty morning-room, sheltered by a long verandah, half hidden under honeysuckle and roses. The cages of the pet birds hung nnder this verandah, and a Skye terrier was lying on the silky white mat stretched before one of the long French windows, blinking his lazy eyehds in the meridian sun. A girl of about seventeen apj^eared in this window. As the Captain stepjied oiit upon the la%vn she came running towards him. Never, perhaps, had the June sunHght shone upon a lovelier ereature than this white-robed girl who came to meet the Captain. Her beauty had a sunny freshness which seemed in harmony with the summer morning. Her features were small and delicately-formed ; the nose, forehead, and chin of the purest Grecian type. Her eyes, like her mother's, were of the deepest violet hue, large, lustrous, and earnest, fringed by long auburn lashes. Her hair was of that golden tint, so rare in nature, and which art has been wont to simulate, from the age of Roman Lydias and Juhus down to our own enHghtened era. This was Yiolet Westford. They had called her Violet because of those deep-blue eyes, which were only to be matched by the hne of the modest hedgerow flower that hides its beauty under sheltering leaves. They had called her Yiolet ; and well did the sweet romantic name harmonize with the nature of Clara "West- ford's daughter, for the girl was almost as unconscious of her exquisite loveliness as the timid blossom after wliich she had been christened. " Dearest father," she exclaimed, passing her httle hand through the Captain's arm, while Mrs. Westford sank faint and exhausted upon a garden-seat on the lawn, " mamma has been very cruel to detain you so long, while your poor Yiolet has been longing for a chance of saying good-b3'^e. I have been counting the minutes, papa, and the coach will be at the gate almost immediately. 0, papa, papa, it seems so hard to lose you!" The beautiful blue eyes filled with tears as the girl clung to her father ; but in Yiolet We.stford"s face there was no trace of that awful shadow which blanched the cheeks and lips of her mother to a death-like whiteness. Yiolet only felt a natural grief at this parting wth a father whom she idolized. There was no presentiment of impending peril weighing down her heart. " Lionel has gone to get Warrior saddled," she said ; " he is going to ride by the cross-road to "Winchester. He an^II be there S Rupert Godwin. lo meet you when the coach arrives, and will only part from you when the train leaves the station How I envy him that halt- hour at the station ! Men are always better off than women," ■aurmured the petted beauty of seventeen, with the most bewitching move. " My darUng, hark ! There is the coach." The guard's horn playing a joyous polka made itself hoard among the trees as the Captain spoke. At the same moment Lionel Westford rode out of an old-fashioned ivy-covered arch- way which formed the entrance to the stables. The coach stopped at the low ^\^de gate openmg into the Grange gardens, and the guard's horn had an impatient sound in the ears of Violet Westford. ^ n x i ISIrs. Westford rose from the rustic bench, calm and tearless, but deadly pale. She advanced to her husband, and put her icy hands in his. " .My beloved," she murmured, "my all m all, I can only i^ray for voii. I must ask you one question, Hurley. You spokojust now of a banker ; tell me his name, dearest. I have a particular reason for making this inquiry." " My father's bankers were Godwin and Rclljy, answered the Captain; " the present head of the tirm is En]>crt Godwin. My own darling, good-bye." The horn I'laying that cheerful danee-mns:c sonnded louder and more clamorons than ever, as Harloy AV^estf(jrd pressed one knis upon his wife's white lips and tore himstlt away. So hurrifd, so ngitated, had the Captain be-n in that snd parting, that he liad been utterly unconscious of the one low agonized cry which broke from his wife's lips at the sound ot Rupert Godwin's name. i i i i i But as the coach drove away, bearing with it the husband and father. Clara Westford tottered forward a few paces, and then fell back swooning on the grass. Violet returned from the garden-gate to see her mother lying nj-on the ground, white and motionless as a corpse. The gu-rs t<;rror-stri(;lassionate, and self-willed. She preferred the British trader to the descendants of the Cid, and left the hhadowy glories of her native land for the comfort and splendour of her hii.shand'H noble old mansion, where she ruled him with desjKjtic power till the day of her death. Two sons and three daughters were born to the proud Castilian Ix'auty; but those children (»f the South languished under the \'ife. the only JRupert Godwin the l^anJcer. 9 daugliter of a city milHonnaire, an amiable but not over-wise damsel, who had worshipped her husband as a kind of demigod, and who had faded quietly out of existence soon after the birth of her second chUd, not by any means passionately lamented by Eupert Godwin. He was a man who had begun the world very early, and had exhausted the common round of Hfe's pleasures and dissipations at an age when other men are still enjoying the freshness of youth's morning. He had been his own master from the age of sixteen, for the simple reason that neither his father nor his tutors had ever been able to conquer his indomitable spirit, or restrain his determined will. His father had been much shaken by the early deaths of hig children and the loss of his wife, who died when Eupert was fifteen. He allowed this last surviving son to do as he pleased, and dawdled through his lonely existence at his country house, in the company of his medical attendant and a valet who had grown grey in his f;ervice. While the father's placid days glided by at the country seat in Hertfordshire, the son travelled from one place to another, some- times abroad, sometimes at home, spending money lavishly, and seeing a great deal of life, more or less to hia own satisfaction, but not very much to his moral improvement. At three-and-twenty he married; but those who knew him best augured little happiness from this marriage. He accepted his wife's devotion as a matter of course, allowed her to Hve her own life at the noble old house in Hertfordshire, while he followed the bent of his inclinations elsewhere, honouring his household by his presence during all seasons of gaiety and festivity, but studiously avoiding the delights of domestic retirement. The business of the bank always afforded Mr. Godwin an excellent excuse for absence. There were branch-houses in Spain and iu Spanish America, and these branch-houses were under the personal supei-vision of the banker. For many years the name of Rupert Godwin had been in the minds of City men a tower of strength. But within the last few weeks there had come a crisis in the fortunes of great com- mercial firms, and all at once there were strange whispera passing from hp to lip amongst the wise men of the Stock Exchange. It was well known that for some years Rupert God- win had been a great speculator. It was now whispered abroad tliat he had not been always a fortunate speculator. He had been bitten with the mania of speculation, men said, and had plunged wildly into all manner of schemes, many of which had ended in ruin. Such whispers as these are fatal in their influence upon the credit of a commercial man. But as yet these dark rumour* 10 Hupert Godioin. had not gone beyond the narrow circle of wiseacres ; as yet no hint of Ptupert Godwin's losses had reached those whose money was lodged in his keeping ; as yet, therefore, there had been no run npon the bank. The banker sat in his private room, %vith his books spread open before him, while with a white face and a heavily -beating heart he examined the state of his affairs. Daily, almost hourly, he expected a desperate crisis, and he tried in vain to devise some means of meeting it. There was only one hnman being who was admitted to Kupert Godwin's confidence, and that was his head clerk, Jacob Danielson. Ever since Eupert's earliest manhood this Danielson had been in his employment, and Httle by Uttle there had grown up a strange bond of union between the two men. It could not be called friendship, for the banker was of too reserved a nature to form a close friendship with any one— least of all with an inferior; and whatever the confidences between him and his clerk, he was always haughty and commanding in his tone and manner towards his dependent. But Jacob Daniel'son was the depository of many of hia employer's secrets, and seemed to possess an almost superhuman power of reading every thought that entered the brain of Rupert Godwin, It may be that the banker knew this, and that there wero times when he felt a kind of terror of his shabby, queer-looking dependent. Notliiug could be wider than the contrast between the outward appearance of the two men. Kupert Godwin had one of those darkly splendid faces which we rarely see out of an old Italian picture— such a face as Leonardo or Guido might have chosen fur a Herod or a Saul. He was tall and bruiid-chcsted, his head nobly poised upon his shoulders. His dark flashing eyes had something of the falcon in their proud and eager glance ; but beneath the calm steady gjize of more honest eyes those falcon glances grew shilling and n-.stless. 1. • 1 Jacob Danielson was strangely deficient in those physical per- il Ctions which had so furthtrcd his master's fortunes. The clerk was a wizen little man, with high shoulders, and a queer, limping walk. His small but ],iercing gray eyes looked out from under tlie .shelter of a protruding forehead, fnnged by Vwo shaggy eyebrows. IJis thin lipa were apt to be disturbed iy a twitciiug motion, which at times was almost painful to /itn. SB. Jacob Danielson was one of those walking mystenes whose thoughts, deeds, and words are alike beyond the comprehension Hupert Godwin fJie JBanJcer. 11 of other men. No one nnder stood him; no one was able to fathom the secrets hidden in his breast. He Uved in a dingy little lodging on the Surrey side of the Thames, a lodging which he had occupied for years, and where he had never been known to receive the visit of any human being. It was known that he drank deeply, but he had never been fieen in a state of intoxication. There were those amongst his fellow-clerks who had tried to make him dmnk, and who declare