Julian Wyllard

“ Dora Wyllard had not been able altogether to overcome her offended feeling at that unwarrantable burst of passion upon her husband's part, which had followed Edward Heathcote's visit. That he should upbraid and insult her, that he should be jealous—he for whose sake she had jilted an upright and honourable man, he to whom she had given all the devotion of her life! It seemed to her an almost unpardonable weakness and littleness on Julian Wyllard's part. And she had thought his character above all pettinesses common to meaner men. She had loved him because he was noble-hearted and large-minded. ”

“ He rode up to the carriage and shook hands with Mrs. Wyllard. He was her neighbour, and had visited Penmorval during the last year. There had never been the faintest indication in his manner or his speech that Julian Wyllard's wife was any more to him than a friend. He was pleased to visit her, anxious that she should be interested in his motherless children, pleased to confide his plans and his thoughts to her. Time had sobered his enthusiasm about all things, and had softened all bitter memories. He took life now as a gentle legato movement. ”

“ The rooms in which Julian Wyllard had worked were used as offices by Messrs. Blümenlein Brothers, while one of the brothers had made his nest in Julian's old rooms at the back of the offices.
"Upon my word, Dora," said Wyllard, pausing on the threshold of his old abode, "I feel that we are going into this house on a fool's errand. I don't know what excuse to make."
"Why make any excuse at all?" replied his wife. "Leave the whole business to me, Julian. I want to see your old home, and I am determined I will see it. I am not at all afraid of Messrs. Blümenlein." ”

“ It would have been impossible to associate such loveliness with an evil life, a dissolute mind.
The colour of this larger photograph was almost as good as if it had been taken yesterday: the portrait had a living look, which struck Heathcote painfully. It was sad to think that lovely face had been lying in the dust for years—that the sweet smile in those eyes was nothing more than a memory.
He was to dine at the Windsor that evening—a farewell dinner, since Julian Wyllard talked of leaving Paris next morning. He wanted to take his wife to Switzerland, perhaps to the Italian lakes. ”

“ Julian Wyllard's life, judged as Heathcote judged it, was that of a man who had lived exclusively for himself and his own happiness. An excellent husband to a wife whom he adored, a good master, a liberal landlord; yet a man with whom self had ever been paramount. ”

“ Yet there was a subtle change in her manner and bearing which was perceptible to Julian Wyllard, and which he felt keenly.
Neither husband nor wife had recurred by so much as one word or hint to that scene in the yew-tree arbour. Life had glided by for these last few days in just the same manner as of old; but the shadow was there all the same. The mild genius of domestic love had veiled his face.
Dora was sitting in the library with her husband at post-time on the day of Bothwell's ride to Trevena. ”

“ But although I am content to be silent, it would be well for Julian Wyllard, when he shall feel the hand of death upon him, to write the admission of his guilt; since that alone can thoroughly clear your cousin Bothwell before his fellow-men. So dark a suspicion once engendered may hang over a man for a lifetime. ”

“ She had not, even to this day, left off blushing at any sudden mention of Edward Heathcote's name; and yet it was seven years since she had jilted him in order to marry Julian Wyllard.
A sad story, all forgiven now, if not forgotten. A deep wrong done by a noble-hearted woman to a noble-hearted man. It was the one act of Theodora Wyllard's life which she could not look back upon without remorse. In all other relations of life she had been perfect—devoted daughter, devoted wife. ”

“ There were some whose husbands could not sit by the domestic hearth ten minutes without dismal yawnings, men who depended upon newspapers for all their delight, men whose minds were always in the stable. Julian Wyllard was an ideal husband, who never yawned in a tête-à-tête with his wife, who shared every joy and every thought with the woman of his choice. ”

“ He had schooled himself long ago to generous thoughts about his rival. It pleased him to know that Dora had been lucky in her choice, that she had not taken a scorpion into her bosom when she preferred another man to himself. He had wondered sometimes—in a mere idle wonder, when he saw her in her beautiful home at Penmorval—whether it would have been possible for him to make her life happier than Julian Wyllard had made it; whether in his uttermost adoration he could ever have been a better husband to her than Julian Wyllard had been. ”

“ It means a nature in which the heart must have fair play. Whatever Julian Wyllard's life may have appeared in the eyes of the men with whom he had business relations—however he may have contrived to pass for the serious genius of finance, old before his time, the embodiment of abstruse calculations and far-seeing policy—be sure that the life was not a barren life, and that fiery passions were factors in the sum of that existence. ”

“ It means, Julian Wyllard, that I have solved the mystery of your life—that double life which showed to the world the character of a hard-headed financier, passionless, mechanical, while the real nature of the man, passionate, jealous, vindictive, the lover and the slave of a beautiful woman, was known to but a few chosen friends. ”

“ By the inevitable sequence of small facts, by the agreement of dates, by a pencil sketch of the murderer's face, made from memory, yet vivid as flesh and blood, I have been able to identify you, Julian Wyllard, with the man who called himself Georges, who was known to a few privileged Bohemians as the lover of Marie Prévol, and who disappeared from Paris immediately after the murder, so completely as to baffle the police. The murderer vanished utterly, before the crime was twelve hours old ”

“ He could put forward no claim for past constancy. No, were she once again free, it would be by the devotion of the future that he must win her.
And then he recalled what the physician had said about Julian Wyllard's malady. It would be a slow and lingering disease—a decay of years, perhaps. He saw the dark possibility of such a martyrdom. Dora's life would be worn and wasted in the attendance upon that decaying frame, that sorely tried mind and temper. She would sacrifice health, spirits, life itself, perhaps, in her devotion to her afflicted husband. ”

“ No, such a man could not have habitually lived the Boulevard life, could not have been the associate of fools and light women. He could not so have lived without the fact of his folly being known to everybody in Paris. And Edward Heathcote had heard his rival praised for the sobriety and steadiness of his life, wondered at as a miracle of industry and good conduct, a man of one idea and one ambition. He had heard Julian Wyllard so spoken of by men who knew their Paris. ”

“ And then, in a fatal hour, another face flashed across the foreground of her life—a new voice thrilled her ear—an influence was exercised over her which she had never felt before, a power too potent for resistance—and, in a moment of passionate self-abandonment, she knelt at Edward Heathcote's feet, and confessed her love for another. Julian Wyllard had broken down all barriers, had asked her to be his wife, knowing her to be engaged to another man. But there are those who think that a great irresistible love outweighs all scruples of honour or conscience. ”

“ They seemed far away in a dim past, those days of early married life, when all the world was decked in the vivid hues of hope and gladness. Her union with Julian Wyllard had been a happy one, but there had been something wanting. ”

“ A dozen men of different ages and qualities leaped out of the train and clambered down the embankment; among others Julian Wyllard, the Lord of the Manor of Penmorval—a man of middle age, soberly attired, a tall stately figure, a man of mark in this part of the country—before whom all gave way; except little Dr. Menheniot, who hurried on ahead, intent upon affording professional help, if such help could avail.
Julian Wyllard had been an athlete in his boyhood and youth. He walked down the steep, rugged hillside more easily than many men walk down Regent Street. ”

“ It might be that the disappointment of a childless union was preying upon his mind—that he felt the burden of a great fortune for which he had toiled over-much in his youth, renouncing every social pleasure, friendship, love, all things, only to heap up wealth for which there should be no heir.
The dinner at the Windsor was bright and pleasant, albeit Heathcote was the only guest. Julian Wyllard was in excellent spirits, full of plans for making the most of the bright weather in Switzerland. Dora was pleased at his gaiety. ”

“ Thus, albeit he was by no means a rich man as compared with Julian Wyllard, he stood higher than the wealthy financier in the esteem of those good old conservatives who held that money is not everything. Mr. Wyllard was a new-comer, had bought Penmorval just before his marriage—choosing this part of the world for his residence because Theodora Dalmaine loved it, rather than for any leaning of his own. He was known to have made the greater part of his money himself—a low thing for a man to have done. ”

“ So, after dressing and breakfasting, she accompanied her husband to the great Parisian auction rooms to look at the Rochejaquelin collection.
The inspection of the pictures lasted over two hours. Julian Wyllard was an ardent connoisseur, and his wife sympathised with him in his love of art. Together they criticised the gems of the collection, and stood in silent admiration before the famous Raffaelle.
"It will fetch thousands," said Wyllard.
"Why not buy it, if you really wish to possess it?" said Dora. "Why should we hoard our money? There is no one to come after us. ”

“ It means that in you, the man who came between me and the happiness of my life, who stole my betrothed—in you, the successful speculator, the honoured of all men, I have found the murderer of Léonie Lemarque and of her aunt Marie Prévol, and of her aunt's admirer, Maxime de Maucroix. A man must have a mind and heart of iron who could carry the consciousness of three such murders with a calm front; who could clasp his innocent wife to his breast, accept her caresses, her devotion, her revering love—knowing himself the relentless devil that he is! Julian Wyllard, thou art the man! ”

“ After that speech of his, Edward Heathcote had no longer the power to withhold any details of his investigation from Julian Wyllard and his wife. He told them in fewest words all that he had discovered since he crossed the Channel.
Dora was intensely interested in the story. The passionate love and passionate jealousy were very human feelings that appealed to her womanly tenderness. She could not withhold her pity from the murderer.
"Strange that, in all your Parisian experience, you never met this Monsieur Georges," she said to her husband. ”

“ The Cornish tors, those wild brown hills upon whose dark foreheads time writes no wrinkles, were just one year older since Julian Wyllard's death, and Bothwell Grahame was established in his house at Trevena as an instructor of the embryo Engineer. Already two lads had gone forth from Bothwell's house, after six months' training, and had done well at Woolwich. Other lads were coming to him—sons of men he had known in Bengal. ”

“ Even commercial fortunes become hallowed after they have filtered from father to son for three or four generations. Thus, although he was altogether the most important personage in the neighbourhood, and belonged to the landed gentry by right of recent purchase, there were people who looked upon Julian Wyllard as a parvenu, and who were somewhat disposed to resent the weight which his wealth gave him in local affairs.
Squire Heathcote was said to be the best coroner who had filled that office at Bodmin within the memory of the oldest inhabitant. ”

“ Ten minutes later the physician was being driven back to the station, and Julian Wyllard was alone.
"'And Swift expires a driveller and a show,'" he repeated, in a tone of suppressed agony. "Yes, that is the horror. To become a spectacle—a loathsome object from which even love would shrink away with averted eyes. That is the sting. Facial anæsthesia—every muscle paralysed, every feature distorted. O, for the doomsman to make a shorter end of it all! The face has been spared so far—speech has hardly begun to falter. ”

“ Julian Wyllard spoke of Bothwell and his love affairs with the irritability of a chronic sufferer, and Dora listened and sympathised, and soothed the sufferer as best she might. Her burden was very heavy in these days. To see her beloved suffer and to be unable to lessen his pain, that was indeed bitter. And in his case the palliating drugs which deadened his agony seemed almost a worse evil than the pain itself. The constant use of morphia and chloral was working its pernicious effect, and there were times, when the sufferer's mind wandered. ”

“ Every traveller in that train should be ready to answer any question which those who are charged with the elucidation of this mystery may ask."
"I have answered your questions as to what occurred to me in the train, and at the station; but I decline to be catechised about my business in Plymouth," answered Bothwell doggedly.
"That will do," said Distin; and Bothwell went to his seat next Julian Wyllard, whose handsome presence appeared in the front rank of spectators, amongst those of the élite who were favoured with chairs, while the commonalty stood in a mob at the back of the room. ”