The Profligate 9
HUGH MURRAY.
Yes--yes.
WILFRID BRUDENELL.
It’s of no consequence, you know.
[_WILFRID runs out after the wedding party._]
HUGH MURRAY.
She is going. [_He goes to the window and looks out._] Ah! They have
taken her away. The Inn is empty.
[_EPHGRAVES enters._]
EPHGRAVES.
H’m! Mr. Murray.
HUGH MURRAY.
They have gone, Ephgraves.
EPHGRAVES.
Yes. [_Handing him a slip of paper._] Will you see the young lady now?
HUGH MURRAY.
Certainly. [_EPHGRAVES goes out._]
HUGH MURRAY.
[_Reading._] “Miss Janet Preece, introduced by Mr. Wilfrid Brudenell.”
[_EPHGRAVES ushers in JANET PREECE, a pretty, simply-dressed girl of
about eighteen, with a timid air, and a troubled look._]
JANET PREECE.
Are you Mr. Murray, sir?
HUGH MURRAY.
Yes. Sit down there. You wish to see a solicitor, I understand?
JANET PREECE.
A lawyer, sir.
HUGH MURRAY.
That’s the same thing--sometimes. In what way can I serve you?
JANET PREECE.
I--I thought you would be older.
HUGH MURRAY.
Mr. Cheal, my partner, is older than I, but he is out. Can’t you
believe in me?
JANET PREECE.
It isn’t that I think you’re not clever.
HUGH MURRAY.
Come, come, that’s something.
JANET PREECE.
But you don’t know why I--what I have to--Heaven help me!
HUGH MURRAY.
You know, people bring their troubles to men like me quite as an
ordinary matter----
JANET PREECE.
Yes, sir--ordinary troubles. I could tell a woman: I could tell your
wife if she was as kind as you seem to be.
HUGH MURRAY.
My dear young lady, I have no wife. Come now, don’t think of me as
anything but a mere machine.
[_He listens without looking at her._]
JANET PREECE.
I--want--to--find somebody who has disappeared.
HUGH MURRAY.
Yes? A man or a woman?
JANET PREECE.
A man.
HUGH MURRAY.
The task may be very easy or very difficult. Is he a London man?
JANET PREECE.
Yes, a town gentleman who does ill in the country.
HUGH MURRAY.
Shall I begin by writing down his name?
JANET PREECE.
I don’t know his name--I only know the name he called himself by away
down home. Mr.--Lawrence--Kenward. Lawrence--Kenward--Esquire.
HUGH MURRAY.
How do you know the name is assumed?
JANET PREECE.
Because I once came softly into the room while he was signing a letter;
he wrote only his initials, but I saw that they didn’t belong to the
name of Lawrence Kenward.
HUGH MURRAY.
What were the initials?
JANET PREECE.
D. R.
HUGH MURRAY.
[_Scribbling upon a sheet of paper._] Ah, you may have been mistaken.
The letters “D. R.” and “L. K.” have some resemblance at a distance.
JANET PREECE.
No--no, no--no!
HUGH MURRAY.
[_Scribbling again._] Now, making the “D. R.” in this
way--[_thoughtfully_] D. R.
JANET PREECE.
I’m not mistaken, for when I charged him with deceiving me he told me a
falsehood with his lips and the truth with his eyes. And that night he
broke with me.
HUGH MURRAY.
[_To himself, looking at his watch._] It is _her_ name now. Why do I
let everything remind me of it? D. R. [_To JANET._] Have you any letter
from this man?
JANET PREECE.
No. He was always too near me for the need of writing, the more’s the
shame.
HUGH MURRAY.
Have you his portrait--a photograph?
JANET PREECE.
He always meant me too much ill to give me a portrait.
HUGH MURRAY.
Describe him.
JANET PREECE.
A man about your age, sir, I should guess, but with a boy’s voice when
he speaks to women. I--I--I can’t describe him.
HUGH MURRAY.
[_To himself._] Great Heavens! If by any awful freak of fate this poor
creature is a victim of Renshaw’s--and _she_ at this moment standing
beside him----! What a fool I am to think of no man but Renshaw!
JANET PREECE.
댓글 없음:
댓글 쓰기