"What a pity you should have come too late for the catastrophe, when you
had seen all the preface! Five days ago Bella and Charley made their
great _coup_, and were married in Paris."
"And Bruce?" I said, recovering from the intelligence, which was not so
unexpected, after all.
"Ah! Bruce"--Guy replied; "I should be very glad if I knew what he _was_
doing at this moment. I have been expecting him every day; but nothing
has been heard of him since he left my mother's presence in a rabid
state of fury. Did I tell you it was from Kerton they fled? I thought
he must have come to me for an explanation, knowing that I was an
accessory before the fact. Indeed, I lent Charley the sinews of war in
the shape of a blank check, which I see this morning he has filled up
for a thousand--just like his modesty. Well, I hope they'll amuse
themselves! Bruce has never been near me. Suicide is the most charitable
suggestion I've heard yet; but coroners are silent, and the Thames, if
it is conscious of that unlucky though disagreeable man, keeps his
secret so far!"
Then he went on to give me more particulars of the _escapade_. It seems
that Miss Raymond had gone out to walk alone, after luncheon, and that
nothing more was heard of her till dinner-time, when a note was found on
her dressing-table, addressed to her aunt, containing the intelligence
of her flight with Forrester, and a little piece of ready-made
penitence--the first for all whom it might concern, the second for her
father.
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