CHAPTER X

THE ADVENTURES OF A VISCOUNT’S DAUGHTER

When the Hon. Mary King first opened her eyes in Cork County late in the eighteenth century, her parents, who already had a “quiverful” of offspring, could little have foreseen the tragic chapter in the family annals in which this infant was to play the leading part.  Had they done so, they might almost have been pardoned for wishing that she might die in her cradle, a blossom of innocence, before the blighting hand of Fate could sully her.

Her father, Robert, Viscount Kingsborough, was heir to the Earldom of Kingston, and member of a family which had held its head high, and preserved an untarnished ’scutcheon since its founder, Sir John King, won Queen Elizabeth’s favour by his zeal in suppressing the Irish rebellion.  All its men had been honourable, all its women pure; and it was not until Mary King came on the scene that this fair repute was ever in danger.

Not that there was anything vicious in Lord Kingsborough’s young daughter.  She was the victim of a weak nature and a lover as unscrupulous as he was handsome and clever.  She grew up in the Mitchelstown nursery—­one of a dozen brothers and sisters—­a wholesome, merry, mischievous girl, with no great pretensions to beauty, but with the fresh charms, the dancing grey eyes, and brown hair (which, in its luxuriant abundance, was her chief glory) of a daughter of Ireland.

Among those whom her bright nature and winsome ways captivated was one Henry Gerald Fitzgerald, the natural son of her mother’s brother, and thus her cousin by blood, if not by law.  Fitzgerald, who was many years Mary’s senior—­indeed, at the time this story really opens, he was a married man—­had been brought up by Lady Kingsborough as one of her children.  He had been the companion of Mary’s elder brothers, and Mary’s “big playfellow” when she was still nursing her dolls.  He was, moreover, a young man of remarkable physical gifts—­tall, of splendid figure, and strikingly handsome.  It is thus small wonder that the child made a hero of him long before she had emerged from short frocks.  When she grew into young womanhood Fitzgerald’s attentions to her grew still more marked.  He was her constant companion on walks and rides, her partner at dances—­in fact, her shadow everywhere, until even her unsuspecting parents began to grow alarmed.

One summer day in 1797, when the Kingsborough family were spending a few weeks by the Thames-side, near Fitzgerald’s home at Bishopsgate, the blow fell.  Miss King disappeared, leaving behind her a note to the effect that she intended to drown herself in the Thames.  Her family and friends were distracted.  The river was dragged, but no trace of the missing girl was found.  On the river bank, however, were discovered her bonnet and shawl, mute witnesses to the fate that seemed to have overtaken her.  Her father alone refused to believe that his daughter had ended her life tragically.  He persisted in his search for her, and was soon rewarded by a clue which threw a different and more ominous light on her fate.