Who could deny that her adopted daughter was a charming creature? Who could wonder if a man of refined tastes admired her? Upon the whole, her ladyship humanely decided that her nephew was rather to be pitied than blamed. What daughter of Eve (no matter whether she was seventeen or seventy) could have honestly arrived at any other conclusion? Do what a man may--let him commit anything he likes, from an error to a crime--so long as there is a woman at the bottom of it, there is an inexhaustible fund of pardon for him in every other woman's heart. "Sit down," said Lady Janet, smiling in spite of herself; "and don't talk in that horrible way again. A man, Julian--especially a famous man like you--ought to know how to control himself."
Julian burst out laughing bitterly.
"Send upstairs for my self-control," he said. "It's in her possession--not in mine. Good morning, aunt."
He rose from his chair. Lady Janet instantly pushed him back into it.
"I insist on your staying here," she said, "if it is only for a few minutes longer. I have something to say to you."
"Does it refer to Miss Roseberry?"
"It refers to the hateful woman who frightened Miss Roseberry. Now are you satisfied?"
Julian bowed, and settled himself in his chair.
"I don't much like to acknowledge it," his aunt went on. "But I want you to understand that I have something really serious to speak about, for once in a way. Julian! that wretch not only frightens Grace--she actually frightens me."
"Frightens you? She is quite harmless, poor thing."
"'Poor thing'!" repeated Lady Janet. "Did you say 'poor thing'?"
"Yes."
"Is it possible that you pity her?"
"From the bottom of my heart."
The old lady's temper gave way again at that reply. "I hate a man who can't hate anybody!" she burst out. "If you had been an ancient Roman, Julian, I believe you would have pitied Nero himself."
Julian cordially agreed with her. "I believe I should," he said, quietly. "All sinners, my dear aunt, are more or less miserable sinners. Nero must have been one of the wretchedest of mankind."
"Wretched!" exclaimed Lady Janet. "Nero wretched! A man who committed robbery, arson and murder to his own violin accompaniment--only wretched! What next, I wonder? When modern philanthropy begins to apologize for Nero, modern philanthropy has arrived at a pretty pass indeed! We shall hear next that Bloody Queen Mary was as playful as a kitten; and if poor dear Henry the Eighth carried anything to an extreme, it was the practice of the domestic virtues. Ah, how I hate cant! What were we talking about just now? You wander from the subject, Julian; you are what I call bird-witted. I protest I forget what I wanted to say to you. No, I won't be reminded of it. I may be an old woman, but I am not in my dotage yet! Why do you sit there staring? Have you nothing to say for yourself? Of all the people in the world, have you lost the use of your tongue?"
Julian's excellent temper and accurate knowledge of his aunt's character exactly fitted him to calm the rising storm. He contrived to lead Lady Janet insensibly back to the lost subject by dexterous reference to a narrative which he had thus far left untold--the narrative of his adventures on the Continent.
"I have a great deal to say, aunt," he replied. "I have not yet told you of my discoveries abroad."
Lady Janet instantly took the bait.
"I knew there was something forgotten," she said. "You have been all this time in the house, and you have told me nothing. Begin directly."
Patient Julian began.
CHAPTER XIV.
COMING EVENTS CAST THEIR SHADOWS BEFORE.
"I WENT first to Mannheim, Lady Janet, as I told you I should in my letter, and I heard all that the consul and the hospital doctors could tell me. No new fact of the slightest importance turned up. I got my directions for finding the German surgeon, and I set forth to try what I could make next of the man who performed the operation. On the question of his patient's identity he had (as a perfect stranger to her) nothing to tell me. On the question of her mental condition, however, he made a very important statement. He owned to me that he had operated on another person injured by a shell-wound on the head at the battle of Solferino, and that the patient (recovering also in this case) recovered--mad. That is a remarkable admission; don't you think so?"
Lady Janet's temper had hardly been allowed time enough to subside to its customary level.
"Very remarkable, I dare say," she answered, "to people who feel any doubt of this pitiable lady of yours being mad. I feel no doubt--and, thus far, I find your account of yourself, Julian, tiresome in the extreme. Go on to the end. Did you lay your hand on Mercy Merrick?"
"No."
"Did you hear anything of her?"
"Nothing. Difficulties beset me on every side. The French ambulance had shared in the disasters of France--it was broken up. The wounded Frenchmen were prisoners somewhere in Germany, nobody knew where. The French surgeon had been killed in action. His assistants were scattered--most likely in hiding. I began to despair of making any discovery, when accident threw in my way two Prussian soldiers who had been in the French cottage. They confirmed what the German surgeon told the consul, and what Horace himself told me--namely, that no nurse in a black dress was to be seen in the place. If there had been such a person, she would certainly (the Prussians inform me) have been found in attendance on the injured Frenchmen. The cross of the Geneva Convention would have been amply sufficient to protect her: no woman wearing that badge of honor would have disgraced herself by abandoning the wounded men before the Germans entered the place."
"In short, "interposed Lady Janet, "there is no such person as Mercy Merrick."
"I can draw no other conclusion, "said Julian, "unless the English doctor's idea is the right one. After hearing what I have just told you, he thinks the woman herself is Mercy Merrick."
Lady Janet held up her hand as a sign that she had an objection to make here.
"You and the doctor seem to have settled everything to your entire satisfaction on both sides," she said. "But there is one difficulty that you have neither of you accounted for yet."
"What is it, aunt?"
"You talk glibly enough, Julian, about this woman's mad assertion that Grace is the missing nurse, and that she is Grace. But you have not explained yet how the idea first got into her head; and, more than that, how it is that she is acquainted with my name and address, and perfectly familiar with Grace's papers and Grace's affairs. These things are a puzzle to a person of my average intelligence. Can your clever friend, the doctor, account for them?"
"Shall I tell you what he said when I saw him this morning?"
"Will it take long?"
"It will take about a minute."
"You agreeably surprise me. Go on."
"You want to know how she gained her knowledge of your name and of Miss Roseberry's affairs," Julian resumed. "The doctor says in one of two ways.