Benjamin Farjeon - The Betrayal of John Fordham

She ran into the bedroom to tell Annette the joke, and there was much giggling between them.

"How provoking!" she cried, darting in for the twentieth time. "I have mislaid the key of my small trunk. Lend me your keys; perhaps one of them will fit."

I gave her my bunch of keys, and she was a long time trying them. I took no notice of this, being engrossed in a feuilleton, and taking from the style in which the exciting incidents were described a lesson for the novel I contemplated writing.

"Not one of them will fit," said Barbara, throwing the keys into my lap. Shortly afterwards she called out, "Congratulate me, John, I have found my key. It was in my pocket all the time. See what a simple little woman you have married; and you thought me clever, you foolish boy!"

So far as I can recall my impressions I am endeavoring to describe them faithfully. I went through many transitions of feeling in those days, now hoping, now despairing, now accusing myself of doing my wife an injustice, now sternly convinced that I was right. On this day I was comforted, Barbara was so bright, so ingenuous, and I firmly believed she would keep the promise she had given me. She brought into play all the arts and fascinations by which she had beguiled me in our courting days. She ordered me to take her for a drive, to buy her violets, to drive to the Magazin de Louvre to make purchases (where she selected a number of things she did not need), to take her to a famous restaurant to dine – "it is so dull," she said, "to dine in a stuffy little room all by ourselves" – and, dinner over, she invited me to accompany her to a theatre where a comedy was being played which Annette had told her was very amusing.

"I can't live without excitement," she said. "I love theatres, I love bright weather, I love flowers, I love handsome men – why do you look so grave, sir? Do you not love handsome women? You are a ninny if you don't, and if you don't, sir, why did you marry me?"

"Barbara," I said gravely, "it is a strange question, I know, but do you think we are suited to one another?"

"It is a strange question," she replied, laughing. "My dear, we were made for one another. Fie, love! Do you forget that marriages are made in Heaven?"

"Ours, Barbara?"

"Certainly, ours."

Wonderful were the inconsistencies of her utterances; one moment questioning whether she had not made a mistake in marrying me, the next declaring that our marriage was made in heaven.

"I have not a secret from you," I said.

"Nor I from you," she returned. "I hope you agree with me, John, that there should be perfect confidence between man and wife, that they should hide nothing from one another."

"I do agree with you; not even the smallest matter should be hidden."

"Yes, John, love, not even the smallest matter. Little things are often very important, and it is so awkward to be found out. I am so glad we are of one mind about this. When we first engaged I said to Maxwell, 'John shall know everything about me – everything. All my faults and failings – nothing shall be hidden from him. Then he can't reproach me afterwards. I will be perfectly frank with him.' Maxwell called me a fool, and said there were lots of things people ought to keep to themselves, and that I should be horrified if I were told all the dreadful things you had done. He spoke of wild oats, and bachelors living alone, and the late suppers they had in their chambers with girls and all sorts of queer company. But I was determined. You might deceive me, but I would not deceive you. I would not have that upon my conscience."

"You really kept nothing from me, Barbara?"

"Nothing, love."

"And you are keeping nothing from me now?"

"Nothing, love."

I did not press her farther. Her smiling eyes looked into mine, and I had received incontestible proof that she was lying to my face.

I was an inveterate smoker, and at this period my favorite habit was a consolation to me. I smoked at all hours of the day, and Barbara had encouraged me, saying that she loved the smell of a cigar. But on the morning following the conversation I have just recorded she complained that my cigar made her ill, and I went into the boulevard to smoke it. When I had thrown away the stump I returned to the hotel to attend to my trunks, which were not yet unpacked. These trunks were in a small ante-room, the key of which I had put in my pocket. I had adopted this precaution in order that they should not be in Barbara's sight, that she should not be left alone with them, and that when I unpacked them she should not see what they contained. Upon my return to the hotel Barbara was in her bed-room, attending to her toilet, and Annette was with her. It was Barbara's first visit to Paris, and we had arranged to make the round of its principal attractions.

The first trunk I opened was that in which I had deposited the five bottles of brandy I had found among Barbara's dresses. To my astonishment they were gone.

I was positive I had placed them there, but to make sure I searched my second trunk, with the same result. The bottles had been abstracted. By whom, and by what means?

The cunning hand was Barbara's.

What kind of a woman was I wedded to who spoke so fair and acted so treacherously, who could smile in my face with secret designs in her heart against my peace and happiness? I could go even farther than that, and say against my honor. Fearful lest my indignation might cause me to lose control over myself and lead to a scandalous scene, I locked the trunk and left the hotel. In the open air I could more calmly review the deplorable position into which I had been betrayed.

It is the correct word to use. Treacherously, basely, had I been betrayed.

It was long before I was sufficiently composed to apply myself to the consideration of the plan by means of which Barbara obtained the bottles of brandy. The lock of the trunk had not been tampered with, and no force had been used in opening it. She must have had a duplicate key. How did she become possessed of it?

I examined my keys, and I fancied I discerned traces of wax upon them. I inquired my way to the nearest locksmith, and giving him the bunch asked whether an impression in wax had been taken of any of them.

"Of a certainty, monsieur," he said, "else I could not have made them."

"It is you, then, who made the duplicates?"

"Assuredly, it is I, monsieur."

"Of how many?"

"Of two, monsieur."

"Of these two?" indicating the keys of my two trunks.

"Exactly, monsieur."

"From impressions in wax which you received."

"Yes, yes, monsieur," he said, redundantly affirmative. "Have you come to ask for them? But they were delivered and paid for last night."

"By a thin-faced, middle-aged woman, with gray eyes and a white face?"

"The description is perfect. I trust the keys are to your satisfaction, and that they fit the locks."

"They fit admirably," I said, and I gave him good morning.

Annette! She was in my wife's pay; together they had conspired against me. The first practical step towards obtaining access to my boxes was taken when Barbara informed me that she had mislaid one of her keys, and borrowed my bunch; then the impressions in wax, and Annette going to the locksmith to give the order; then the packet containing the keys which Annette had secretly conveyed to my wife while my back was turned; then Barbara's complaint this morning that my cigar made her ill, and my going out to smoke. During my absence my trunk was opened and rifled. The petty little mystery was solved.

It was late when I returned to the hotel. I expected a stormy scene, it being now two hours after the time I had appointed to take Barbara to see the sights of Paris; but she was not in our rooms to reproach me. In the bedroom I noticed that two padlocks had been newly fixed to each of her trunks. I went into the office to make inquiries.