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Title: The de Bercy Affair
Author: Tracy, Louis
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The de Bercy Affair" ***
The de Bercy Affair
_By_ GORDON HOLMES
A
MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE
THE ARNCLIFFE PUZZLE
THE LATE TENANT
BY FORCE OF CIRCUMSTANCES
THE DE BERCY AFFAIR
THE HOUSE OF SILENCE
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Osborne came whispering
_Frontispiece_]
The
de Bercy Affair
BY
GORDON HOLMES
AUTHOR OF
A MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE,
BY FORCE OF CIRCUMSTANCES, ETC., ETC.
ILLUSTRATIONS BY
HOWARD CHANDLER CHRISTY
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1910
BY EDWARD J. CLODE
_Entered at Stationers' Hall_
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. SOME PHASES OF THE PROBLEM 1
II. DARKNESS 16
III. A CHANGE OF ADDRESS 31
IV. THE NEW LIFE 51
V. THE MISSING BLADE 66
VI. TO TORMOUTH 88
VII. AT TORMOUTH 107
VIII. AT THE SUN-DIAL 126
IX. THE LETTER 148
X. THE DIARY, AND ROSALIND 169
XI. ENTRAPPED! 188
XII. THE SARACEN DAGGER 206
XIII. OSBORNE MAKES A VOW 224
XIV. THE ARRESTS 246
XV. CLEARING THE AIR 265
XVI. WHEREIN TWO WOMEN TAKE THE FIELD 285
XVII. THE CLOSING SCENE 304
THE DE BERCY AFFAIR
CHAPTER I
SOME PHASES OF THE PROBLEM
Chief Inspector Winter sat in his private office at New Scotland Yard,
while a constable in uniform, bare-headed, stood near the door in the
alert attitude of one who awaits the nod of a superior. Nevertheless,
Mr. Winter, half-turning from a desk littered with documents, eyed the
man as though he had just said something outrageous, something so
opposed to the tenets of the Police Manual that the Chief Commissioner
alone could deal with the offense.
"Have you been to Mr. Furneaux's residence?" he snapped, nibbling one
end of a mustache already clipped or chewed so short that his strong
white teeth could barely seize one refractory bristle.
"Yes, sir."
"Have you telephoned to any of the district stations?"
"Oh, yes, sir--to Vine Street, Marlborough Street, Cannon Row, Tottenham
Court Road, and half-a-dozen others."
"No news of Mr. Furneaux anywhere? The earth must have opened and
swallowed him!"
"The station-sergeant at Finchley Road thought he saw Mr. Furneaux jump
on to a 'bus at St. John's Wood about six o'clock yesterday evening,
sir; but he could not be sure."
"No, he wouldn't. I know that station-sergeant. He is a fat-head....
When did you telegraph to Kenterstone?"
"At 6.30, sir."
Mr. Winter whisked a pink telegraphic slip from off the blotting-pad,
and read:
Inspector Furneaux not here to my knowledge.
_Police Superintendent_, KENTERSTONE.
"Another legal quibbler--fat, too, I'll be bound," he growled. Then he
laughed a little in a vein of irritated perplexity, and said:
"Thank you, Johnson. You, at least, seem to have done everything
possible. Try again in the morning. I _must_ see Mr. Furneaux at the
earliest moment! Kindly bring me the latest editions of the evening
papers, and, by the way, help yourself to a cigar."
The gift of a cigar was a sign of the great man's favor, and it was
always an extraordinarily good one, of which none but himself knew the
exact brand. Left alone for a few minutes, he glanced through a written
telephone message which he had thrust under the blotting-pad when Police
Constable Johnson had entered. It was from Paris, and announced that two
notorious Anarchists were en route to England by the afternoon train,
due at Charing Cross at 9.15 p.m.
"Anarchists!" growled the Chief Inspector--"Pooh! Antoine Descartes and
Émile Janoc--Soho for them--absinthe and French cigarettes--green and
black poison. Poor devils! they will do themselves more harm than his
Imperial Majesty. Now, where the deuce _is_ Furneaux? This Feldisham
Mansions affair is just in his line--Clarke will ruin it."
Johnson came back with a batch of evening papers. Understanding his
duties--above all, understanding Mr. Winter--he placed them on the
table, saluted, and withdrew without a word. Soon the floor was littered
with discarded news-sheets, those quick-moving eyes ever seeking one
definite item--"The Murder in the West End--Latest"--or some such
headline, and once only was his attention held by a double-leaded
paragraph at the top of a column:
A correspondent writes:--"I saw the deceased lady in company
with a certain popular American millionaire at the International
Horse Show in June, and was struck by her remarkable resemblance
to a girl of great beauty resident in Jersey some eight years
ago. The then village maid was elected Rose Queen at a rural
fête, I photographed her, and comparison of the photograph with
the portrait of Mademoiselle de Bercy exhibited in this year's
Academy served to confirm me in my opinion that she and the
Jersey Rose Queen were one and the same person. I may add that
my accidental discovery was made long before the commission of
the shocking crime of yesterday."
Under present circumstances, of course, we withhold from
publication the name of the Jersey Rose Queen, but the line of
inquiry thus indicated may prove illuminative should there be
any doubt as to the earlier history of the hapless lady whose
lively wit and personal charm have brought London society to her
feet since she left the Paris stage last year.
Winter did not hurry. Tucking the cigar comfortably into a corner of his
mouth, he read each sentence with a quiet deliberation; then he sought a
telephone number among the editorial announcements, and soon was
speaking into a transmitter.
"Is that the _Daily Gazette_?... Put me on to the editorial department,
please.... That you, Arbuthnot? Well, I'm Winter, of Scotland Yard. Your
evening edition, referring to the Feldisham Mansions tragedy, contains
an item.... Oh, you expected to hear from me, did you? Well, what is the
lady's name, and who is your correspondent?... What? Spell it.
A-r-m-a-u-d. All right; if you feel you _must_ write to the man first,
save time by asking him to send me the photograph. I will pass it on to
you exclusively, of course. Thanks. Good-by."
Before the receiver was on its hook, the Chief Inspector was taking a
notebook from his breast pocket, and he made the following entry:
Mirabel Armaud, Rose Queen, village near St. Heliers,
summer of 1900.
A knock sounded on the door.
"Oh, if this could only be Furneaux!" groaned Winter. "Come in! Ah! Glad
to see you, Mr. Clarke. I was hoping you would turn up. Any news?"
"Nothing much, sir--that is to say, nothing really definite. The
maid-servant is still delirious, and keeps on screaming out that Mr.
Osborne killed her mistress. I am beginning to believe there is
something in it----"
Winter's prominent steel blue eyes dwelt on Clarke musingly.
"But haven't we the clearest testimony as to Osborne's movements?" he
asked. "He quitted Miss de Bercy's flat at 6.25, drove in his motor to
the Ritz, attended a committee meeting of the International Polo Club at
6.30, occupied the chair, dined with the committee, and they all went to
the Empire at nine o'clock. Unless a chauffeur, a hall-porter, a
head-waiter, two under-waiters, five polo celebrities, a box-office
clerk, and several other persons, are mixed up in an amazing conspiracy
to shield Mr. Rupert Osborne, he certainly could not have murdered a
woman who was alive in Feldisham Mansions at half-past seven."
Clarke pursed his lips sagely. As a study in opposites, no two men could
manifest more contrasts. Clarke might have had the words "Detective
Inspector" branded on his forehead: his features sharp, cadaverous, eyes
deep-set and suspicious, his nose and chin inquisitive, his lips fixed
as a rat-trap. Wide cheek-bones, low-placed ears, and narrow brows gave
him a sinister aspect. In his own special department, the hunting out of
"confidence men," card-sharpers, and similar hawklike pluckers of the
provincial pigeon fluttering through London's streets, he was unrivaled.
But Winter more resembled an intellectual prizefighter than the typical
detective of fiction. His round head, cropped hair, wide-open eyes,
joined to a powerful physique and singular alertness of glance and
movement, suggested that he varied the healthy monotony of a gentleman
farmer's life by attendance at the National Sporting Club and other
haunts of pugilism. A terror to wrongdoers, he was never disliked by
them, whereas Clarke was hated. In a word, Winter was a sharp brain,
Clarke a sharp nose, and that is why Winter groaned inwardly at being
compelled to intrust the Feldisham Mansions crime to Clarke.
"What is your theory of this affair?" he said, rather by way of making
conversation than from any hope of being enlightened.
"It is simple enough," said Clarke, his solemn glance resting for a
moment on the box of cigars. Winter nodded in the same direction. His
cigars were sometimes burnt offerings as well as rewards.
"Light up," he said, "and tell me what you think."
"Mademoiselle de Bercy was killed by either a disappointed lover or a
discarded husband. All these foreign actresses marry early, but grow
tired of matrimony within a year. If, then, there is no chance of
upsetting Mr. Osborne's alibi, we must get the Paris police to look into
Miss de Bercy's history. Her husband will probably turn out to be some
third-rate actor or broken-down manager. Let us find _him_, and see if
_he_ is as sure of his whereabouts last evening as Mr. Rupert Osborne
professes to be."
"You seem to harp on Osborne's connection with the affair?"
"And why not, sir? A man like him, with all his money, ought to know
better than to go gadding about with actresses."
"But he is interested in the theater--he is quite an authority on French
comedy."
"He can tackle French tragedy now--he is up to the neck in this one."
"You still cling to the shrieking housemaid--to her ravings, I mean?"
"Perhaps I should have mentioned it sooner, sir, but I have come across
a taxicab driver who picked up a gentleman uncommonly like Mr. Osborne
at 7.20 p.m. on Tuesday, and drove him from the corner of Berkeley
Street to Knightsbridge, waited there nearly fifteen minutes, and
brought him back again to Berkeley Street."
The Chief Inspector came as near being startled as is permissible in
Scotland Yard.
"That is a very serious statement," he said quietly, wheeling round in
his chair and scrutinizing his subordinate's lean face with eyes more
wide-open than ever, if that were possible. "It is tantamount to saying
that some person resembling Mr. Osborne hired a cab outside the Ritz
Hotel, was taken to Feldisham Mansions at the very hour Miss de Bercy
was murdered, and returned to the Ritz in the same vehicle."
"Exactly so," and Clarke pursed his thin lips meaningly.
"So, then, you _have_ discovered something?"
Mr. Winter's tone had suddenly become dryly official, and the other man,
fearing a reprimand, added:
"I admit, sir, I ought to have told you sooner, but I don't want to make
too much of the incident. The taxicab chauffeur does not know Mr. Rupert
Osborne by sight, and I took good care not to mention the name. The
unknown was dressed like Mr. Osborne, and looked like him--that is all."
"Who is the driver?"
"William Campbell--cab number X L 4001. I have hired him to-morrow
morning from ten o'clock, and then he will have an opportunity of seeing
Mr. Osborne----"
"Meet me here at 9.30, and I will keep the appointment for you.
Until--until I make other arrangements, I intend to take this Feldisham
Mansions affair into my own hands. Of course, I should have been
delighted to leave it in your charge, but during the past hour something
of vastly greater importance has turned up, and I want you to tackle it
immediately."
"Something more important than a society murder?" Clarke could not help
saying.
"Yes. You know that the Tsar comes to London from Windsor to-morrow?
Well, read this," and Winter, with the impressive air of one who
communicates a state secret, handed the Paris message.
"Ah!" muttered Clarke, gloating over the word "Anarchists."
"Now you understand," murmured Winter darkly. "Unfortunately these men
are far too well acquainted with me to render it advisable that I should
shadow them. So I shall accompany you to Charing Cross, point them out,
and leave them to you. A live monarch is of more account than a dead
actress, so you see now what confidence I have in you, Mr. Clarke."
Clarke's sallow cheeks flushed a little. Winter might be a genial chief,
but he seldom praised so openly.
"I quite recognize that, sir," he said. "Of course, I am sorry to drop
out of this murder case. It has points, first-rate points. I haven't
told you yet about the stone."
"Why--what stone?"
"The stone that did for Miss de Bercy. The flat was not thoroughly
searched last night, but this morning I examined every inch of it, and
under the piano I found--this."
He produced from a pocket something wrapped in a handkerchief. Unfolding
the linen, he rose and placed on the blotting-pad, under the strong
light of a shaded lamp, one of those flat stones which the archeologist
calls "celts," or "flint ax-heads." Indeed, no expert eye was needed to
determine its character. The cutting edge formed a perfect curve; two
deep indentations showed how it had been bound on to a handle of bone or
wood. At the broadest part it measured fully four inches, its length the
same, thickness about three-quarters of an inch. That it was a genuine
neolithic flint could not be questioned. A modern lapidary might
contrive to chip a flint into the same shape, but could not impart that
curious bloom which apparently exudes from the heart of the stone during
its thousands of centuries of rest in prehistoric cave or village mound.
This specimen showed the gloss of antiquity on each smooth facet.
But it showed more. When used in war or the chase by the fearsome being
who first fashioned it to serve his savage needs, it must often have
borne a grisly tint, and now _again_ each side of the strangely sharp
edge was smeared with grewsome daubs, while some black hairs clung to
the dried clots which clustered on the irregular surfaces.
Sentiment finds little room in the retreat of a Chief Inspector, so
Winter whistled softly when he set eyes on this weird token of a crime.
"By gad!" he cried, "in my time at the Yard I've seen many queer
instruments of butchery--ranging from a crusader's mace to the strings
of a bass fiddle--but this beats the lot."
"It must have come out of some museum," said the other.
"It suggests a tragedy of the British Association," mused Winter aloud.
"It ought to supply a first-rate clew, anyhow," said Clarke.
"Oh, it does; it must. If only----"
Winter checked himself on the very lip of indiscretion, for Clarke
detested Furneaux. He consulted his watch.
"We must be off now," he said briskly. "Leave the stone with me, and
while we are walking to Charing Cross I can give you a few pointers
about these Anarchist pests. Once they are comfortably boxed up in some
café in Old Compton Street you can come away safely for the night, and
pick them up again about midday to-morrow. They are absolutely harm--I
mean they cannot do any harm until the Tsar arrives. From that moment
you must stick to them like a limpet to a rock; I will arrange for a man
to relieve you in the evening, nor shall I forget to give your name to
the Embassy people when they begin to scatter diamond pins around."
When he meant to act a part, Winter was an excellent comedian, and soon
Clarke was prowling at the heels of those redoubtables, Antoine
Descartes and Émile Janoc.
Once Clarke was safely shelved, Winter called the first taxicab he met
and was driven to Feldisham Mansions. An unerring instinct had warned
him at once that the murder of the actress was no ordinary crime; but
Clarke had happened to be on duty when the report of it reached the Yard
a few minutes after eight o'clock the previous evening, and Winter had
bewailed the mischance which deprived him of the services of Furneaux,
the one man to whom he could have left the inquiry with confidence.
The very simplicity of the affair was baffling. Mademoiselle Rose de
Bercy was the leading lady in a company of artistes, largely recruited
from the Comédie Française, which had played a short season in London
during September of the past year. She did not accompany the others when
they returned to Paris, but remained, to become a popular figure in
London society, and was soon in great demand for her _contes drôles_ at
private parties. She was now often to be seen in the company of Mr.
Rupert Osborne, a young American millionaire, whose tastes ordinarily
followed a less frivolous bent than he showed in seeking the society of
an undeniably chic and sprightly Frenchwoman. It had been rumored that
the two would be married before the close of the summer, and color was
lent to the statement by the lady's withdrawal from professional
engagements.
So far as Winter's information went, this was the position of affairs
until a quarter to eight on the night of the first Tuesday in July. At
that hour, Mademoiselle de Bercy's housemaid either entered or peered
into her mistress's drawing-room, and saw her lifeless body stretched on
the floor. Shrieking, the girl fled out into the lobby and down a flight
of stairs to the hall-porter's little office, which adjoined the
elevator. By chance, the man had just collected the letters from the
boxes on each of the six floors of the block of flats, and had gone to
the post; Mademoiselle de Bercy's personal maid and her cook, having
obtained permission to visit an open-air exhibition, had, it seemed,
been absent since six o'clock; the opposite flat on the same story was
closed, the tenants being at the seaside; and the distraught housemaid,
pursued by phantoms, forthwith yielded to the strain, so that the
hall-porter, on his return, found her lying across the threshold of his
den.
He summoned his wife from the basement, and the frenzied girl soon
regained a partial consciousness. It was difficult to understand her
broken words, but, such as they were, they sent the man in hot haste to
the flat on the first floor. The outer and inner doors were wide open,
as was the door of the drawing-room, and sufficient daylight streamed in
through two lofty windows to reveal something of the horror that had
robbed the housemaid of her wits.
The unfortunate Frenchwoman was lying on her back in the center of the
room, and the hall-porter's hurried scrutiny found that she had been
done to death with a brutal ferocity, her face almost unrecognizable.
Not until the return of the French maid, Pauline, from the exhibition,
could it be determined beyond doubt that robbery was not the motive of
the crime, for she was able to assure the police that her mistress's
jewels were untouched. A gold purse was found on a table close to the
body, a bracelet sparkled on a wrist cruelly bruised, and a brooch
fastened at the neck the loose wrap worn as a preliminary to dressing
for the evening.
Owing to the breakdown of the only servant actually present in the flat
at the time of the murder, it was impossible to learn anything
intelligible beyond the girl's raving cry that "Mr. Osborne did it."
Still, there was apparently little difficulty in realizing what had
happened. The housemaid had been startled while at supper, either by a
shriek or some noise of moving furniture, had gone to the drawing-room,
given one glance at the terrifying spectacle that met her eyes, and was
straightway bereft of her wits.
The Chief Inspector was turning over in his mind the puzzling features
of the affair when his automobile swept swiftly out of the traffic and
glare of Knightsbridge into the quiet street in which stood Feldisham
Mansions. A policeman had just strolled along the pavement to disperse a
group of curious people gathered near the entrance, so Winter stopped
his cab at a little distance and alighted unobserved.
He walked rapidly inside and found the hall-porter at his post. When the
man learnt the visitor's identity he seemed surprised.
"Mr. Clarke has bin here all day, sir," he said, "and, as soon as he
left, another gentleman kem, though I must say he hasn't bothered _me_
much----" this with a touch of resentment, for the hall-porter's
self-importance was enhanced by his connection with the tragedy.
"Another gentleman!"--this was incomprehensible, since Clarke would
surely place a constable in charge of the flat. "What name did he give?"
"He's up there at this minnit, sir, an' here's his card."
Winter read: "Mr. Charles Furneaux, Criminal Investigation Department,
Scotland Yard."
"Well, I'm jiggered!" he muttered, and he added fuel to the fire of the
hall-porter's annoyance by disregarding the elevator and rushing up the
stairs, three steps at a time.
CHAPTER II
DARKNESS
Winter felt at once relieved and displeased. Twice during the hour had
his authority been disregarded. He was willing to ignore Clarke's method
of doling out important facts because such was the man's secretive
nature. But Furneaux! The urgent messages sent to every place where they
might reach him, each and all summoned him to Scotland Yard without the
slightest reference to the Feldisham Mansions crime. It was with a stiff
upper lip, therefore, that the Chief Inspector acknowledged the salute
of the constable who admitted him to the ill-fated Frenchwoman's abode.
Furneaux was his friend, Furneaux might be admirable, Furneaux was the
right man in the right place, but Furneaux must first receive an
official reminder of the claims of discipline.
The subdued electric lights in the hall revealed within a vista of
Oriental color blended with Western ideals of comfort. Two exquisitely
fashioned lamps of hammered iron, rifled from a Pekin temple, softened
by their dragons and lotus leaves the glare of the high-powered globes
within them. Praying carpets, frayed by the deserts of Araby, covered
the geometric design of a parquet floor, and bright-hued draperies of
Mirzapur hid the rigid outlines of British carpentry. A perfume of
joss-sticks still clung to the air: it suggested the apartments of a
Sultana rather than the bower of a fashionable lady in the West End of
London.
First impressions are powerful, and Winter acknowledged the spell of the
unusual here, but his impassive face showed no sign of this when he
asked the constable the whereabouts of Mr. Furneaux.
"In there, sir," said the man, pointing to a door.
Winter noted instantly that the floor creaked beneath his light tread.
The rugs deadened his footsteps, but the parquetry complained of his
weight. It was, he perceived, almost impossible for anyone to traverse
an old flooring of that type without revealing the fact to ordinarily
acute ears. Once when his heel fell on the bare wood, it rang with a
sharp yet hollow note. It seemed, somehow, that the place was
empty--that it missed its presiding spirit.
Oddly enough, as he remembered afterwards, he hesitated with
outstretched hand in front of the closed door. He was doubtful whether
or not to knock. As a matter of fact, he did tap slightly on a panel
before turning the handle. Then he received his second vague impression
of a new and strange element in the history of a crime. The room was in
complete darkness.
Though Winter never admitted the existence of nerves, he did not even
try to conceal from his own consciousness that he started distinctly
when he looked into a blackness rendered all the more striking by the
glimpse of a few feet of floor revealed by the off-shine from the
hall-light.
"Are you here, Furneaux?" he forced himself to say quickly.
"Ah, that you, Winter!" came a voice from the interior. "Yes, I was
dreaming in the dusk, I think. Let me give you a light."
"Dusk, you call it? Gad, it's like a vault!"
Winter's right hand had found the electric switches, and two clusters of
lamps on wall-brackets leaped alight. Furneaux was standing, his hands
behind his back, almost in the center, but the Chief Inspector gathered
that the room's silent occupant had been seated in a corner farthest
removed from the windows, and that his head had been propped on his
clenched hands, for the dull red marks of his knuckles were still
visible on both cheeks.
Each was aware of a whiff of surprise.
"Queer trick, sitting in the dark," Furneaux remarked, his eyes on the
floor. "I--find I collect my wits better that way--sometimes. Sometimes,
one cannot have light enough: for instance, the moment I saw fear in
Lady Holt's face I knew that her diamonds had been stolen by
herself----"
Winter reflected that light was equally unkind to Furneaux as to "Lady
Holt," for the dapper little man looked pallid and ill at ease in this
flood of electric brilliancy.
There was a silence. Then Furneaux volunteered the remark: "In this
instance, thought is needed, not observation. One might gaze at that for
twenty years, but it would not reveal the cause of Mademoiselle de
Bercy's murder."
"_That_" was a dark stain near the center of the golden-brown carpet.
Winter bent a professional eye on it, but his mind was assimilating two
new ideas. In the first place, Furneaux was not the cheery colleague
whose perky chatterings were his most deadly weapons when lulling a
rogue into fancied security. In the second, he himself had not been
prepared for the transit from a hall of Eastern gorgeousness to a room
fastidiously correct in its reproduction of the period labeled by
connoisseurs "after Louis XV."
The moment was not ripe for an inquiry anent Furneaux's object in
hastening to Feldisham Mansions without first reporting himself. Winter
somehow felt that the question would jar just then and there, and though
not forgotten, it was waived; still, there was a hint of it in his next
comment.
"I must confess I am glad to find you here," he said. "Clarke has
cleared the ground somewhat, but--er--he has a heavy hand, and I have
turned him on to a new job--Anarchists."
He half expected an answering gleam of fun in the dark eyes lifted to
his, for these two were close friends at all seasons; but Furneaux
seemed not even to hear! His lips muttered:
"I--wonder."
"Wonder what?"
"What purpose could be served by this girl's death. Who bore her such a
bitter grudge that not even her death would sate their hatred, but they
must try also to destroy her beauty?"
Now, the Chief Inspector had learnt that everyone who had seen the dead
woman expressed this same sentiment, yet it came unexpectedly from
Furneaux's lips; because Furneaux never said the obvious thing.
"Clarke believes,"--Winter loathed the necessity for this constant
reference to Clarke--"Clarke believes that she was killed by one of two
people, either a jealous husband or a dissatisfied lover."
"As usual, Clarke is wrong."
"He may be."
"He is."
In spite of his prior agreement with Furneaux's estimate of their
colleague's intelligence, Winter felt nettled at this omniscience. From
the outset, his clear brain had been puzzled by this crime, and
Furneaux's extraordinary pose was not the least bewildering feature
about it.
"Oh, come now," he said, "you cannot have been here many minutes, and it
is early days to speak so positively. I have been hunting you the whole
afternoon--in fact, ever since I saw what a ticklish business this was
likely to prove--and I don't suppose you have managed to gather all the
threads of it into your fingers so rapidly."
"There are so few," muttered Furneaux, looking down on the carpet with
the morbid eyes of one who saw a terrible vision there.
"Well, it is a good deal to have discovered the instrument with which
the crime was committed."
Furneaux's mobile face instantly became alive with excitement.
"It was a long, thin dagger," he cried. "Something in the surgical line,
I imagine. Who found it, and where?"
Some men in Winter's shoes might have smiled in a superior way. He did
not. He knew Furneaux, profoundly distrusted Clarke.
"There is some mistake," he contented himself with saying. "Miss de
Bercy was killed by a piece of flint, shaped like an ax-head--one of
those queer objects of the stone age which is ticketed carefully after
it is found in an ancient cave, and then put away in a glass case.
Clarke searched the room this morning, and found it there--tucked away
underneath," and he turned round to point to the foot of the boudoir
grand piano, embellished with Watteaux panels on its rosewood, that
stood in the angle between the door and the nearest window.
The animation died out of Furneaux's features as quickly as it had
appeared there.
"Useful, of course" he murmured. "Did you bring it?"
"No; it is in my office."
"But Mi--Mademoiselle de Bercy was not killed in that way. She was
supple, active, lithe. She would have struggled, screamed, probably
overpowered her adversary. No; the doctor admits that after a hasty
examination he jumped to conclusions, for not one of the external cuts
and bruises could have produced unconsciousness--not all of them death.
Miss de Bercy was stabbed through the right eye by something strong and
pointed--something with a thin, blunt-edged blade. I urged a thorough
examination of the head, and the post mortem proved the correctness of
my theory."
Winter, one of the shrewdest officials who had ever won distinction in
Scotland Yard, did not fail to notice that curious slip of a syllable
before "Mademoiselle," but it was explained a moment later when Furneaux
used the English prefix "Miss" before the name. It was more natural for
Furneaux to use the French word, however. Winter spoke French
fluently--like an educated Englishman--but Furneaux spoke it like a
native of Paris. The difference between the two was clearly shown by
their pronunciation of "de Bercy." Winter sounded three distinct
syllables--Furneaux practically two, with a slurred "r" that Winter
could not have uttered to save his life.
Moreover, he was considerably taken aback by the discovery that Furneaux
had evidently been working on the case during several hours.
"You have gone into the affair thoroughly, then," he blurted out.
"Oh, yes. I read of the murder this morning, just as I was leaving
Kenterstone on my way to report at the Yard."
"Kenterstone!"
He was almost minded to inquire if the local superintendent was a fat
man.
"Sir Peter and Lady Holt left town early in the day, so I went to
Kenterstone from Brighton late last night.... The pawnbroker who held
Lady Holt's diamonds was treating himself to a long weekend by the sea,
and I thought it advisable to see him in person and explain matters."
A memory of the Finchley Road station-sergeant who thought that he had
seen Furneaux get on a 'bus at 6 p.m. in North London the previous
evening shot through Winter's mind; but he kept to the main line of
their talk.
"Do you know who this Rose de Bercy really is?" he suddenly demanded.
For a second Furneaux seemed to hesitate, but the reply came in an even
tone.
"I have reason to believe that she was born in Jersey, and that her
maiden name was Mirabel Armaud," he said.
"The Rose Queen of a village fête eight years ago?"
Perhaps it was Furneaux's turn to be surprised, but he showed no sign.
"May I ask how you ascertained that fact?" he asked quietly.
"It is published in one of the evening papers. A man who happened to
photograph her in Jersey recognized the likeness when he saw the Academy
portrait of Rose de Bercy. But if you have not seen his statement
already, how did _you_ come to know that Miss de Bercy was Mirabel
Armaud?"
"I am a Jersey man by birth, and, although I quitted the island early in
life, I often go back there. Indeed, I was present at the very fête you
mention."
"I suppose the young lady was in a carriage and surrounded by a crowd?
It would be an odd thing if you figured in the photograph," laughed
Winter.
"There have been more unlikely coincidences, but my early sight of the
remarkable woman who was killed in this room last night explains my
intense desire to track her murderer before Clarke had time to baffle my
efforts. It forms, too, a sort of excuse for my departure from official
routine. Of course, I would have reported myself this evening, but, up
to the present, I have been working hard to try and dispel the fog of
motive that blocks the way."
"You have heard of Rupert Osborne, then?"
Furneaux was certainly not the man whom Winter was accustomed to meet at
other times. Usually quick as lightning to grasp or discard a point,
to-night he appeared to experience no little difficulty in focusing his
attention on the topic of the moment. The mention of Rupert Osborne's
name did not evoke the characteristically vigorous repudiation that
Winter looked for. Instead, there was a marked pause, and, when the
reply came, it was with an effort.
"Yes. I suppose Clarke wants to arrest him?"
"He has thought of it!"
"But Osborne's movements last night are so clearly defined?"
"So one would imagine, but Clarke still doubts."
"Why?"
Winter told of the taxicab driver, and the significant journey taken by
his fare. Furneaux shook his head.
"Strange, if true," he said; "why should Osborne kill the woman he meant
to marry?"
"She may have jilted him."
"No, oh, no. It was--it must have been--the aim of her life to secure a
rich husband. She was beautiful, but cold--she had the eye that weighs
and measures. Have you ever seen the Monna Lisa in the Louvre?"
Winter did not answer, conscious of a subtle suspicion that Furneaux
really knew far more of the inner history of this tragedy than had
appeared hitherto. Clarke, in his own peculiar way, was absurdly
secretive, but that Furneaux should want to remain silent was certainly
baffling.
"By the way," said Winter with seeming irrelevance, "if you were in
Brighton and Kenterstone yesterday afternoon and evening, you had not
much time to spare in London?"
"No."
"Then the station-sergeant at Finchley Road was mistaken in thinking
that he saw you in that locality about six o'clock--'jumping on to a
'bus' was his precise description of your movements."
"I was there at that time."
"How did you manage it? St. John's Wood is far away from either Victoria
or Charing Cross, and I suppose you reached Kenterstone by way of
Charing Cross?"
"I returned from Brighton at three o'clock, and did not visit Sir Peter
Holt until half-past nine at Kenterstone. Had I disturbed him before
dinner the consequence might have been serious for her ladyship.
Besides, I wished to avoid the local police at Kenterstone."
Both men smiled constrainedly. There was a barrier between them, and
Furneaux, apparently, was not inclined to remove it; as for Winter, he
could not conquer the impression that, thus far, their conversation was
of a nature that might be looked for between a police official and a
reluctant witness--assuredly not between colleagues who were also on the
best of terms as comrades. Furneaux was obviously on guard, controlling
his face, his words, his very gestures. That so outspoken a man should
deem it necessary to adopt such a rôle with his close friend was
annoying, but long years of forced self-repression had taught Winter the
wisdom of throttling back utterances which might be regretted
afterwards. Indeed, he tried valiantly to repair the fast-widening
breach.
"Have a cigar," he said, proffering a well-filled case. "Suppose we just
sit down and go through the affair from A to Z. Much of our alphabet is
missing, but we may be able to guess a few additional letters."
Furneaux smiled again. This time there was the faintest ripple of
amusement in his eyes.
"Now, you know how you hate to see me maltreat a good Havana," he
protested.
"This time I forgive you before the offense--anything to jolt you into
your usual rut. Why, man alive, here have I been hunting you all day,
yet no sooner are you engaged on the very job for which I wanted you,
than I find myself cross-examining you as though--as though you had
committed some flagrant error."
The Chief Inspector did not often flounder in his speech as he had done
twice that night. He was about to say "as though I suspected you of
killing Rose de Bercy yourself"; but his brain generally worked in front
of his voice, and he realized that the hypothesis would have sounded
absurd, almost insane.
Furneaux took the cigar. He did not light it, but deliberately crushed
the wrapper between thumb and forefinger, and then smelled it with the
air of one who dallies with a full-scented rose, passing it to and fro
under his nostrils. Winter, meantime, was darting several small rings of
smoke through one wide and slowly dissipating circle, both being now
seated, Winter's bulk, genially aggressive, well thrust forward--but
Furneaux, small, compact, a bundle of nerves under rigid control, was
sunk back into the depths of a large and deep-seated chair, and seemed
to shirk the new task imposed on his powers of endurance. Winter was so
conscious of this singularly unexpected behavior on his friend's part
that his conscience smote him.
"I say, old man," he said, "you look thoroughly done up. I hardly
realized that you had been hard at work all day. Have you eaten
anything?"
"Had all I wanted," said Furneaux, thawing a little under this
solicitude.
"Perhaps you didn't want enough. Come, own up. Have you dined?"
"No--I was not hungry."
"Where did you lunch?"
"I ate a good breakfast."
Winter sprang to his feet again.
"By Jove!" he cried, "this affair seems to have taken hold of you--I
meant to send for the hall-porter and the French maid--Pauline is her
name, I think; she ought to be able to throw some light on her
mistress's earlier life--but we can leave all that till to-morrow. Come
to my club. A cutlet and a glass of wine will make a new man of you."
Furneaux rose at once. Anyone might have believed that he was glad to
postpone the proposed examination of the servants.
"That will be splendid," he said with an air of relief that compared
markedly with his reticent mood of the past few minutes. "The mere
mention of food has given me an appetite. I suppose I am fagged out, or
as near it as I have ever been. Moreover, I can tell you everything that
any person in these Mansions knows of what took place here between six
and eight o'clock last night--a good deal more, by the way, than Clarke
has found out, though he scored a point over that stone. Where is
it?--in the office, you said. I should like to see it--in the morning."
"You will see more than that. Clarke has arranged to meet the taxicab
driver at ten o'clock. He meant to confront him with Rupert Osborne, but
we must manage things differently. Of course the man's testimony may be
important. Alibi or no alibi, it will be awkward for Osborne if a
credible witness swears that he was in this locality for nearly a
quarter of an hour about the very time that this poor young lady was
killed."
Furneaux, holding the broken cigar under his nose, offered no comment,
but, as they entered the hall, he said, glancing at its quaint
decoration:
"If opportunity makes the thief, so, I imagine, does it sometimes
inspire the murderer. Given the clear moment, the wish, the fury, can't
you picture the effect these bizarre surroundings would exercise on a
mind already strung to the madness of crime? For every willful slayer of
a fellow human being is mad--mad.... Ah, there was the genius of a
maniac in the choice of that flint ax to rend Mirabel Armaud's smooth
skin--yet she had the right to live--perhaps----"
He stopped; and Winter anew felt that this musing Furneaux of to-day was
a different personality from the Furneaux of his intimate knowledge.
And how compellingly strange it was that he should choose to describe
Rose de Bercy by the name which she had ceased to bear during many
years! Winter dispelled the scent of the joss-sticks by a mighty puff of
honest tobacco smoke.
"Oh, come along," he growled, "let us eat--we are both in need of it.
The flat is untenanted, of course. Very well, lock the door," he added,
addressing the policeman. "Leave the key with the hall-porter, and tell
him not to admit anybody, on any pretext whatsoever, until Mr. Furneaux
and I come here in the morning."
CHAPTER III
A CHANGE OF ADDRESS
On the morning after the inquest on Rose de Bercy, the most miserable
young man in London, in his own estimation, was Mr. Rupert Glendinning
Osborne. Though utterly downcast and disconsolate, he was in excellent
health, and might have eaten well of the good things on his breakfast
table had he not thoughtlessly opened a newspaper while stirring his
coffee.
Under other circumstances, he might have laughed at the atrocious
photograph which depicted "Mr. Rupert Osborne arriving at the coroner's
court." The camera had foreshortened an arm, deprived him of his right
leg below the knee, discredited his tailor, and given him the hang-dog
aspect of a convicted pickpocket, for he had been "snapped" at the
moment of descent from his automobile, when a strong wind was blowing,
and he had been annoyed by the presence of a gaping crowd.
The camera had lied, of course. In reality, he was a good-looking man of
thirty, not tall or muscular, but of well-knit figure, elegant though by
no means effeminate. For a millionaire, and a young one, he was by way
of being a phenomenon. He cared little for society; drove his own
horses, but was hardly ever seen in the Park; rode boldly to hounds, yet
refused to patronize a racing stable. He seldom visited a theater,
though he wrote well-informed articles on the modern French stage for
the _New Review_; he preferred a pleasant dinner with a couple of
friends to a banquet with hundreds of acquaintances; in a word, he
conducted himself as a staid citizen whether in New York, or London, or
Paris. Never had a breath of scandal or notoriety attached itself to his
name until he was dragged into lurid prominence by the stupefying event
of that fatal Tuesday evening.
Those who knew him best had expressed sheer incredulity when they first
heard of his contemplated marriage with the French actress. But a man's
friends, as a rule, are the worst judges of his probable choice of a
partner for life: and Rupert Osborne was drawn to Rose de Bercy because
she possessed in superabundance those lively qualities and volatile
charms in which he was himself deficient.
There could be no manner of doubt, however, that some part of his
quivering nervous system had been seared by statements made about her
during the inquest. It was not soothing for a distraught lover to learn
that Mademoiselle de Bercy's reminiscences of her youth were singularly
inaccurate. She could not well have been born in a patrician château on
the Loire, and yet be the daughter of a Jersey potato-grower. Her
father, Jean Armaud, was stated to be still living on a small farm near
St. Heliers, whereas her own version of the family history was that
Monsieur le Comte de Bercy did not survive the crash of the family
fortunes in the Panama swindle. Other discrepancies were not lacking
between official fact and romantic narrative. They gave Osborne the
first glimpse of the abyss into which he had almost plunged. A
loyal-hearted fellow, he shrank from the hateful consciousness that the
hapless girl's tragic end had rescued him in all likelihood from another
tragedy, bitter and long drawn out. But because he had been so foolish
as to fall in love with a beautiful adventuress there was no reason why
he should be blind and deaf when tardy common sense began to assert
itself.
To a man who habitually shrank from the public eye, it was bad enough to
be dragged into the fierce light that beats on the witness-box in an
inquiry such as this, but it was far worse to feel in his inmost heart
that he was now looked upon with suspicion by millions of people in
England and America.
He could not shirk the meaning of the recorded evidence. The newspapers,
it is true, had carefully avoided the ugly word alibi; but ninety per
cent. of their readers could not fail to see that Rupert Osborne had
escaped arrest solely by reason of the solid phalanx of testimony as to
his movements on the Tuesday evening before and after the hour of the
murder; the remaining ten per cent. reviled the police, and protested,
with more or less forceful adjectives, that "there was one law for the
rich and another for the poor."
At the inquest itself, Osborne was too sorrow-laden and stunned to
realize the significance of certain questions which now seemed to leap
at him viciously from out the printed page.
"How were you dressed when you visited Miss de Bercy that afternoon?"
the coroner had asked him.
"I wore a dark gray morning suit and black silk hat," he had answered.
"You did not change your clothing before going to the Ritz Hotel?"
"No. I drove straight there from Feldisham Mansions."
"Did you dress for dinner?"
"No. My friends and I discussed certain new regulations as to the
proposed international polo tournament, and it was nearly eight o'clock
before we concluded the business of the meeting, so we arranged to dine
in the grill-room and go to a Vaudeville entertainment afterwards."
That statement had puzzled the coroner. He referred to his notes.
"To the Vaudeville?" he queried. "I thought you went to the Empire
Theater?" and Osborne explained that Americans spoke of "vaudeville" in
the same sense as Englishmen use the word "music-hall" or "variety."
"You were with your friends during the whole time between 6.30 p.m. and
midnight?"
"Practically. I left them for a few minutes before dinner, but only to
go to the writing-room, where I wrote two short letters."
"At what hour, as nearly as you can recollect?"
"About ten minutes to eight. I glanced at the clock when the letters
were posted, as I wished to be sure of catching the American mail."
"Were both letters addressed to correspondents in America?"
"No, one only. The other was to a man about a dog."
A slight titter relieved the gray monotony of the court at this
explanation, but the coroner frowned it down, and Rupert added that he
was buying a retriever in readiness for the shooting season.
But the coroner's questions suddenly assumed a sinister import when
William Campbell, driver of taxicab number X L 4001, stated that on the
Tuesday evening, at 7.20, he had taken a gentleman dressed in a dark
gray suit and a tall hat from the corner of Berkeley Street (opposite
the Ritz Hotel) to the end of the street in Knightsbridge in which
Feldisham Mansions were situated, had waited there for him for about
fifteen minutes, and had brought him back to Berkeley Street.
"I thought I might know him again, sir, an', as I said yesterday----"
the man continued, glancing at Rupert, but he was stopped peremptorily.
"Never mind what you said yesterday," broke in the coroner. "You will
have another opportunity of telling the jury what happened subsequently.
At present I want you to answer my questions only."
An ominous hush in the court betrayed the public appreciation of the
issues that might lurk behind this deferred evidence. Rupert remembered
looking at the driver with a certain vague astonishment, and feeling
that countless eyes were piercing him without cause.
The hall-porter, too, Simmonds by name, introduced a further element of
mystery by saying that at least two gentlemen had gone up the stairs
after Mr. Osborne's departure in his automobile, and that one of them
bore some resemblance to the young millionaire.
"Are you sure it was not Mr. Osborne?" said the coroner.
"Yes, sir--leastways, I'm nearly positive."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because Mr. Osborne, like all American gentlemen, uses the lift, sir."
"Can any stranger enter the Mansions without telling you their
business?"
"Not as a rule, sir. But it does so happen that between seven an' eight
o'clock I have a lot of things to attend to, and I often have to run
round the corner to get a taxi for ladies and gentlemen goin' out to
dinner or the theater."
So, there was a doubt, and Rupert Osborne had not realized its deadly
application to himself until he read question and answer in cold type
while he toyed with his breakfast on the day after the inquest, which,
by request of Mr. Winter, had been adjourned for a fortnight.
It was well for such shreds of stoicism as remained in his tortured
brain that the housemaid was still unable to give evidence, and that no
mention was made of the stone ax-head found in Rose de Bercy's
drawing-room. The only official witnesses called were the constable
first summoned by the hall-porter, and the doctor who made the autopsy.
The latter--who was positive that Mademoiselle de Bercy had not been
dead many minutes when he was brought to her flat at ten minutes to
eight--ascribed the cause of death to "injuries inflicted with a sharp
instrument," and the coroner, who knew the trend of the inquiry, would
not sate public curiosity by putting, or permitting the jury to put, any
additional questions until the adjourned inquest. Neither Clarke nor
Furneaux was present in court. To all seeming, Chief Inspector Winter
was in charge of the proceedings on behalf of the police.
Rupert ultimately abandoned the effort to eat, shoved his chair away
from the table, and determined to reperuse with some show of calmness
and criticism, the practically verbatim report of the coroner's inquiry.
Then he saw clearly two things--Rose de Bercy had willfully misled him
as to her past life, and he was now regarded by the public as her
probable betrayer and certain murderer. There was no blinking the facts.
He had almost committed the imprudence of marrying a woman unworthy of
an honorable man's love, and, as if such folly called for condign
punishment, he must rest under the gravest suspicion until her slayer
was discovered and brought to justice.
Rupert Osborne's lot had hitherto been cast in pleasant places, but now
he was face to face with a crisis, and it remained to be seen if the
force that had kept three generations of ancestors in the forefront of
the strenuous commercial warfare of Wall Street had weakened or wholly
vanished in the person of their dilettante descendant.
At any rate, he did not flinch from the drab reality of fact. He read
on, striving to be candid as to meanings and impartial in weighing them.
At the end of the evidence were two paragraphs setting forth the
newspaper's own researches. The first of these ran:
Our correspondent at St. Heliers has ascertained that the father
and sister of the deceased will leave the island by to-day's
mail steamer for the double purpose of identifying their
relative and attending the funeral. There can be no question
that their first sad task will be in the nature of a formality.
They both admit that Rose de Bercy was none other than Mirabel
Armaud. Mademoiselle Marguerite Armaud, indeed, bears a striking
resemblance to her wayward sister, while Monsieur Armaud, though
crippled with toil and rheumatism, shows the same facial
characteristics that are so marked in his two daughters. The
family never revealed to their neighbors in the village any
knowledge of Mirabel's whereabouts. After her disappearance
eight years ago her name was seldom, if ever, mentioned to any
of their friends, and their obvious wishes in the matter soon
came to be respected by would-be sympathizers. It is certain,
however, that Marguerite, on one occasion, dared her father's
anger and went to Paris to plead with her sister and endeavor to
bring her home. She failed, as might be expected, since Rose de
Bercy was then attaining the summit of her ambition by playing a
small part in a play at the Gymnase, though at that period no
one in Paris was able to foresee the remarkable success she was
destined to achieve on the stage.
Each word cut like a knife. The printed statements were cruel, but the
inferences were far worse. Rupert felt sick at heart; nevertheless he
compelled himself to gather the sense of the next item:
It was a favorite pose of Mademoiselle de Bercy--using the name
by which the dead actress was best known--to describe herself as
an Anarchist. It is certain that she attended several Anarchist
meetings in Paris, probably for amusement or for professional
study of an interesting type, and in this connection it is a
somewhat singular coincidence that Detective-Inspector Clarke,
who was mentioned on Wednesday as being in charge of the police
investigations into the murder, should have arrested two
notorious Anarchists on the Thames Embankment yesterday shortly
before the Tsar passed that way _en route_ to the Guildhall. The
two men, who refused to give any information as to their
identity, were said to be none other than Emile Janoc and
Antoine Descartes, both well-known French revolutionaries. They
were brought before the Extradition Court, and ordered to be
deported, the specific charge against them being the carrying of
fire-arms without a license. It was stated that on each man was
found an unloaded revolver.
So far as Rupert could judge, the newspaper was merely pandering to the
craze for sensationalism in bracketing Rose de Bercy with a couple of
unwashed scoundrels from Montmartre. On one occasion, indeed, she had
mentioned to him her visits to an Anarchist club; but their object was
patent when she exhibited a collection of photographs and laudatory
press notices of herself in the stage part of a Russian lady of high
rank who masqueraded as a Terrorist in order to save her lover from
assassination.
"It would have been only fair," he growled savagely, "if the fellow who
is raking up her past so assiduously had placed on record her appearance
on the stage as _Marie Dukarovna_. And who is this detective who made
the arrests? Clarke was not the name of the man I met yesterday."
Then he groaned. His glance had just caught a detailed description of
himself, his tastes, his family history, and his wealth. It was
reasonably accurate, and not unkindly in tone, but it grated terribly at
the moment, and in sheer desperation of spirit he crushed the newspaper
in his clenched hands.
At that instant his man entered. Even the quiet-voiced and
impenetrable-faced Jenkins spoke in an awed tone when he announced:
"Chief Inspector Winter, of Scotland Yard, wishes to see you, sir."
"Very well, show him in; and don't be scared, Jenkins. He will not
arrest _you_."
Rupert must have been stung beyond endurance before he would fling such
a taunt at his faithful servitor. Jenkins, at a loss for a disclaimer,
glanced reproachfully at the table.
"You have hardly eaten a morsel, sir," he said. "Shall I bring some
fresh coffee and an egg?"
Then Rupert laughed grimly.
"Wait till I have seen Mr. Winter," he said. "Perhaps he may join me. If
he refuses, Jenkins, be prepared for the worst."
But the Chief Inspector did not refuse. He admitted that coffee-drinking
and smoking were his pet vices, and his breezy cheerfulness at once
established him on good terms with his host.
"I want you to understand, Mr. Osborne, that my presence here this
morning is entirely in your interests," he said when they were seated,
and Rupert was tackling a belated meal. "The more fully we clear up any
doubtful points as to your proceedings on Tuesday the more easy it will
be for the police to drop you practically out of the inquiry except as
an unimportant witness."
Rupert's heart warmed to this genial-mannered official.
"It is very kind of you to put things in that light when every newspaper
in the country is prepared to announce my arrest at any moment," he
replied.
Winter was astonished. His face showed it; his big blue eyes positively
bulged with surprise.
"Arrest!" he cried. "Why should I arrest you, sir?"
"Well, after the chauffeur's evidence----"
"That is exactly what brings me here. Personally, I have no doubt
whatsoever that you did not leave the Ritz Hotel between half-past six
and nine o'clock on the evening of the murder. Two of your friends on
the committee saw you writing those letters, and the clerk at the
inquiry desk remembers supplying you with stamps. Just as a matter of
form, you might give me the names of your correspondents?"
Rupert supplied the desired information, which Winter duly scribbled in
a notebook, but it did not escape the American's usually quick
perception that his visitor had already verified the statement made
before the coroner. That being so, some other motive lay behind this
visit. What was it?
Winter, at the moment, seemed to be fascinated by the leaf-color and
aroma of the cigar which Jenkins had brought with the coffee. He puffed,
smelled, pinched, and scrutinized--was completely absorbed, in fact.
"Don't you like it?" asked Osborne, smiling. The suggestion was almost
staggering to the Chief Inspector.
"Why, of course I do," he cried. "This is a prize cigar. You young
gentlemen who are lucky enough to command practically unlimited money
can generally obtain anything you want, but I am bound to say, Mr.
Osborne, that you could not buy a thousand cigars like this in London
to-day, no matter what price you paid."
"I imagine you are right," said Rupert. "The estate on which that
tobacco was grown is one of the smallest in Cuba, but it is on the old
rich belt. My manager is a scientist. He knows to half an ounce per acre
how much sulphate of potash to add each year."
"Sulphate of potash?" questioned Winter, ever ready to assimilate fresh
lore on the subject of the weed.
"Yes, that is the secret of the flavor, plus the requisite conditions of
soil and climate, of course. The tobacco plant is a great consumer of
mineral constituents. A rusty nail, a pinch of salt, and a small lump of
lime, placed respectively near the roots of three plants in the same
row, will produce three absolutely different varieties of tobacco, but
all three will be inferior to the plants removed from such influences."
"Dear me!" said Winter, "how very interesting!"
But to his own mind he was saying: "Why in the world did Furneaux refuse
to meet this nice young fellow? Really, this affair grows more complex
every hour."
Osborne momentarily forgot his troubles in the company of this affable
official. It was comforting, too, that his hospitality should be
accepted. Somehow, he felt certain that Winter would have declined it if
any particle of suspicion had been attached to the giver, and therein
his knowledge of men did not deceive him. With a lighter heart,
therefore, than he would have thought possible a few minutes earlier,
he, too, lit a cigar.
Winter saw that Rupert was waiting for him to resume the conversation
momentarily broken. He began with a straightforward question.
"Now, Mr. Osborne," he said, "will you kindly tell me if it is true that
you were about to marry Mademoiselle de Bercy?"
"It is quite true."
"How long have you known her?"
"Since she came to London last fall."
"I suppose you made no inquiries as to her past life?"
"No, none. I never gave a thought to such a thing."
"I suppose you see now that it would have been wiser had you done
something of the kind?"
"Wisdom and love seldom go hand in hand."
The Chief Inspector nodded agreement. His profession had failed utterly
to oust sentiment from his nature.
"At any rate," he said, "her life during the past nine months has been
an open book to you?"
"We soon became friends. Since early in the spring I think I could tell
you of every engagement Mademoiselle de Bercy fulfilled, and name almost
every person she met, barring such trivialities as shopping fixtures and
the rest."
"Ah; then you would know if she had an enemy?"
"I--think so. I have never heard of one. She had hosts of friends--all
sympathetic."
"What was the precise object of your visit on Tuesday?"
"I took her a book on Sicily. We--we had practically decided on Taormina
for our honeymoon. As I would be occupied until a late hour, she
arranged to dine with Lady Knox-Florestan and go to the opera to hear
_Pagliacci_. It was played after _Philémon et Baucis_, so the dinner was
fixed for half-past eight."
"Would anyone except yourself and Lady Knox-Florestan be aware of that
arrangement?"
"I think not."
"Why did she telephone to Lady Knox-Florestan at 7.30 and plead illness
as an excuse for not coming to the dinner?"
Rupert looked thoroughly astounded. "That is the first I have heard of
it," he cried.
"Could she have had any powerful reason for changing her plans?"
"I cannot say. Not to _my_ knowledge, most certainly."
"Did she expect any visitor after your departure?"
"No. Two of her servants were out for the evening, and the housemaid
would help her to dress."
Winter looked at the American with a gleam of curiosity when the
housemaid was mentioned.
"Did this girl, the housemaid, open the door when you left?" he asked.
"No. I just rushed away. She admitted me, but I did not see her
afterwards."
"Then she may have fancied that you took your departure much later?"
"Possibly, though hardly likely, since her room adjoins the entrance,
and, as it happened, I banged the door accidentally in closing it."
Winter was glad that a man whom he firmly believed to be innocent of any
share in the crime had made an admission that might have told against
him under hostile examination.
"Suppose--just suppose--" he said, "that the housemaid, being hysterical
with fright, gave evidence that you were in Feldisham Mansions at
half-past seven--how would you explain it?"
"Your own words 'hysterical with fright' might serve as her excuse. At
half-past seven I was arguing against the ever-increasing height of polo
ponies, with the rest of the committee against me. Does the girl say any
such thing?"
"Girls are queer sometimes," commented Winter airily. "But let that
pass. I understand, Mr. Osborne, that you have given instructions to the
undertaker?"
Rupert flinched a little.
"What choice had I in the matter?" he demanded. "I thought that
Mademoiselle de Bercy was an orphan--that all her relatives were dead."
"Ah, yes. Even now, I fancy, you mean to attend the funeral to-morrow?"
"Of course. Do you imagine I would desert my promised wife at such an
hour--no matter what was revealed----"
"No, Mr. Osborne, I did not think it for one instant. And that brings me
to the main object of my visit. Please be advised by me--don't go to the
funeral. Better still, leave London for a few days. Lose yourself till
the day before the adjourned inquest."
"But why--in Heaven's name?"
"Because appearances are against you. The public mind--I had better be
quite candid. The man in the street is a marvelous detective, in his own
opinion. Being an idler, he will turn up in his thousands at Feldisham
Mansions and Kensal Green Cemetery to-morrow afternoon, and, if you are
present, there may be a regrettable scene. Moreover, you will meet a
warped old peasant named Jean Armaud and a narrow-souled village girl in
his daughter Marguerite. Take my advice--pack a kit-bag, jump into a
cab, and bury yourself in some seaside town. Let me know where you
are--as I may want to communicate with you--and--er--when you send your
address, don't forget to sign your letter in the same way as you sign
the hotel register."
Rupert rose and looked out of the window. He could not endure that
another man should see the agony in his face.
"Are you in earnest?" he said, when he felt that his voice might be
trusted.
"Dead in earnest, Mr. Osborne," came the quiet answer.
"You even advise me to adopt an alias?"
"Call it a _nom de voyage_," said Winter.
"I shall be horribly lonely. May I not take my valet?"
"Take no one. I suppose you can leave some person in charge of your
affairs?"
"I have a secretary. But she and my servants will think my conduct very
strange."
"I shall call here to-morrow and tell your secretary you have left
London for a few days at my request. What is her name?"
"Prout--Miss Hylda Prout. She comes here at 11 a.m. and again at 3 p.m."
"I see. Then I may regard that matter as settled?"
Again there was silence for a time. Oddly enough, Rupert was conscious
of a distinct feeling of relief.
"Very well," he said at last. "I shall obey you to the letter."
"Thank you. I am sure you are acting for the best."
Winter, whose eyes had noted every detail of the room while Rupert's
back was turned, rose as if his mission were accomplished.
"Won't you have another cigar?" said Rupert.
"Well, yes. It is a sin to smoke these cigars so early in the day----"
"Let me send you a hundred."
"Oh, no. I am very much obliged, but----"
"Please allow me to do this. Don't you see?--if I tell Jenkins, in your
presence, to pack and forward them, it will stifle a good deal of the
gossip which must be going on even in my own household."
"Well--from that point of view, Mr. Osborne----"
"Ah, I cannot express my gratitude, but, when all this wretched business
is ended, we must meet under happier conditions."
He touched a bell, and Jenkins appeared.
"Send a box of cigars to Chief Inspector Winter, at Scotland Yard, by
special messenger," said Rupert, with as careless an air as he could
assume.
Jenkins gurgled something that sounded like "Yes, sir," and went out
hastily. Rupert spread his hands with a gesture of utmost weariness.
"You are right about the man in the street," he sighed. "Even my own
valet feared that you had come to arrest me."
"Ha, ha!" laughed Winter.
But when Jenkins, discreetly cheerful, murmured "Good-day, sir," and the
outer door was closed behind him, Winter's strong face wore its
prizefighter aspect.
"Clarke _would_ have arrested him," he said to himself. "But that man
did not kill Mirabel Armaud. Then who did kill her? _I_ don't know, yet
I believe that Furneaux guesses. _Who_ did it? Damme, it beats me, and
the greatest puzzle of all is to read the riddle of Furneaux."
CHAPTER IV
THE NEW LIFE
No sooner did Rupert begin to consider ways and means of adopting
Winter's suggestion than he encountered difficulties. "Pack a kit-bag,
jump into a cab, and bury yourself in some seaside town" might be the
best of counsel; but it was administered in tabloid form; when analyzed,
the ingredients became formidable. For instance, the Chief Inspector had
apparently not allowed for the fact that a man in Osborne's station
would certainly carry his name or initials on his clothing, linen, and
portmanteaux, and on every article in his dressing-case.
Despite his other troubles--which were real enough to a man who loathed
publicity--Rupert found himself smiling in perplexity when he endeavored
to plan some means of hoodwinking Jenkins. Moreover, he could not help
feeling that his identity would be proclaimed instantly when a
sharp-eyed hotel valet or inquisitive chambermaid examined his
belongings. He was sure that some of the newspapers would unearth a
better portrait of himself than the libelous snapshot reproduced that
day, in which event no very acute intelligence would be needed to
connect "Osborne" or "R. G. O." with the half-tone picture. Of course,
he could buy ready-made apparel, but the notion was displeasing;
ultimately, he abandoned the task and summoned Jenkins.
Jenkins was one of those admirable servants--bred to perfection in
London only--worthy of a coat of arms with the blazoned motto: "Leave it
to me." His sallow, almost ascetic, face brightened under the trust
reposed in him.
"It is now half-past ten, sir," he said. "Will it meet your convenience
if I have everything ready by two o'clock?"
"I suppose so," said his master ruefully.
"What station shall I bring your luggage to, sir?"
"Oh, any station. Let me see--say Waterloo, main line."
"And you will be absent ten days or thereabouts, sir."
"That is the proposition as it stands now."
"Very well, sir. I shall want some money--not more than twenty
pounds----"
Rupert opened a door leading to the library. He rented a two-story
maisonette in Mayfair, with the drawing-room, dining-room, library,
billiard-room and domestic offices grouped round the hall, while the
upper floor was given over to bedrooms and dressing-rooms. His secretary
was not arrived as yet; but he had already glanced through a pile of
letters with the practiced eye of one who receives daily a large and
varied correspondence.
He wrote a check for a hundred pounds, and stuffed the book into a
breast pocket.
"There," he said to Jenkins, "cash that, buy what you want, and bring me
the balance in five-pound notes."
"Yes, sir, but will you please remember to pack the clothes you are now
wearing into a parcel, and post them to me this evening?"
"By gad, Jenkins, I should have forgotten that my name is stitched on to
the back of the coat I am wearing. How will you manage about my other
things?"
"Rip off the tabs, sir, and get you some new linen, unmarked."
"Good. But I may as well leave my checkbook here."
"No, sir, take it with you. You may want it. If you do, the money will
be of more importance than the name."
"Right again, Socrates. I wish I might take you along, too, but our
Scotland Yard friend said 'No,' so you must remain and answer callers."
"I have sent away more than a dozen this morning, sir."
"Oh? Who were they?"
"Newspaper gentlemen, sir, every one of 'em, though they tried various
dodges to get in and have a word with you. If I were you, sir, I would
drive openly in the motor to some big hotel, and let your car remain
outside while you slip out by another door."
"Jenkins, you seem to be up to snuff in these matters."
"Well, sir, I had a good training with Lord Dunningham. His lordship was
a very free and easy sort of gentleman, and I never did meet his equal
at slipping a writter. They gave it up at last, and went in for what
they call substitooted service."
A bell rang, and they heard a servant crossing the hall.
"That will be Miss Prout, sir," said Jenkins. "What shall I tell her?"
"Nothing. Mr. Winter will see her in the morning. Now, let us be off out
of this before she comes in."
Rupert was most unwilling to frame any subterfuge that might help to
explain his absence to his secretary. She had been so manifestly
distressed in his behalf the previous day, that he decided to avoid her
now, being anxious not to hurt her feelings by any display of reticence
as to his movements. As soon as the library door closed behind the
newcomer, he went to his dressing-room and remained there until his
automobile was in readiness. He was spoken to twice and snapshotted
three times while he ran down the steps and crossed the pavement; but he
gave no heed to his tormentors, and his chauffeur, quick to appreciate
the fact that a couple of taxicabs were following, ran into Hyde Park by
the nearest gate, thus shaking off pursuit, since vehicles licensed to
ply for hire are not allowed to enter London's chief pleasure-ground.
"Yes," said Rupert to himself, "Winter is right. The solitary cliff and
the deserted village for me during the next fortnight. But where are
they to be found? England, with August approaching, is full to the
brim."
He decided to trust to chance, and therein lay the germ of complications
which might well have given him pause, could he have peered into the
future.
Having successfully performed the trick of the cab "bilker" by leaving
his motor outside a hotel, Rupert hurried away from the main stream of
fashion along several narrow streets until his attention was caught by a
tiny restaurant on which the day's eatables were scrawled in French. It
was in Soho; an open-air market promised diversion; and he was wondering
how winkles tasted, extracted from their shells with a pin, when some
commotion arose at the end of an alley. A four-wheeled cab had wormed
its way through a swarm of picturesque loafers, and was drawn up close
to the kerb. Pavement and street were pullulating with child life, and
the appearance from the interior of the cab of a couple of
strongly-built, square-shouldered men seemed to send an electric wave
through adults and children alike.
Instantly there was a rush, and Rupert was pinned in the crowd between a
stout Frenchwoman and a young Italian who reeked of the kitchen.
"What is it, then?" he asked, addressing madame in her own language.
"They are police agents, those men there," she answered.
"Have they come to make an arrest?"
"But no, monsieur. Two miserables who call themselves Anarchists have
been sent back to France, and the police are taking their luggage. A
nice thing, chasing such scarecrows and letting that bad American who
killed Mademoiselle de Bercy go free. Poor lady! I saw her many times.
Ah, _mon Dieu_, how I wept when I read of her terrible end!"
Rupert caught his breath. So he was judged and found guilty even in the
gutter!
"Perhaps the police know that Monsieur Osborne did not kill her," he
managed to say in a muffled tone.
"Oh, là, là!" cried the woman. "He has money, _ce vilain_ Osborne!"
The ironic phrase was pitiless. It denounced, condemned, explained.
Rupert forced a laugh.
"Truly, money can do almost anything," he said.
A detective came out of the passage, laden with dilapidated packages.
The woman smiled broadly, saying:
"My faith, they do not prosper, those Anarchists."
Rupert edged his way through the crowd. On the opposite side of the
street the contents bills of the early editions of the evening
newspapers glared at him: "West End murder--Relatives sail from Jersey."
"Portrait sketch of Osborne"; "Paris Life of Rose de Bercy"; the horror
of it all suddenly stifled his finer impulses: from that hour Rupert
squared his shoulders and meant to scowl at the jeering multitude.
Probably because he was very rich, he cultivated simple tastes in the
matter of food. At one o'clock he ate some fruit and a cake or two,
drank a glass of milk, and noticed that the girl in the cashier's desk
was actually looking at his own "portrait sketch" when he tendered her a
shilling. About half-past one he took a hansom to Waterloo Station,
where he bought a map and railway guide at the bookstall, and soon
decided that Tormouth on the coast of Dorset offered some prospect of a
quiet anchorage.
So, when Jenkins came with a couple of new leather bags, Rupert bought a
third-class ticket. Traveling in a corridor compartment, he heard the
Feldisham Mansions crime discussed twice during the afternoon. Once he
was described as a "reel bad lot--one of them fellers 'oo 'ad too little
to do an' too much to do it on." When, at Winchester, these critics
alighted, their places were taken by a couple of young women; and the
train had hardly started again before the prettier of the two called her
companion's attention to a page in an illustrated paper.
"Poor thing! Wasn't she a beauty?" she asked, pointing to a print of the
Academy portrait of Mademoiselle de Bercy.
"You can never tell--them photographs are so touched up," was the reply.
"There's no touching up of Osborne, is there?" giggled the other,
looking at the motor-car photograph.
"No, indeed. He looks as if he had just done it," said the friend.
A lumbering omnibus took him to Tormouth. At the Swan Hotel he haggled
about the terms, and chose a room at ten shillings per diem instead of
the plutocratic apartment first offered at twelve and six. In the
register he signed "R. Glyn, London," and at once wrote to Winter. He
almost laughed when he found that Jenkins's address on the label was
some street in North London, where that excellent man's sister dwelt.
He found that Tormouth possessed one great merit--an abundance of sea
air. It was a quiet old place, a town of another century, cut off from
the rush of modern life by the frenzied opposition to railways displayed
by its local magnates fifty years earlier. Rupert could not have
selected a better retreat. He dined, slept, ate three hearty meals next
day, and slept again with a soundness that argued him free from care.
But newspapers reached even Tormouth, and, on the second morning after
his arrival, Osborne's bitter mood returned when he read an account of
Rose de Bercy's funeral. The crowds anticipated by Winter were there,
the reporters duly chronicled Rupert's absence, and there could be no
gainsaying the eagerness of the press to drag in his name on the
slightest pretext.
But the arrows of outrageous fortune seemed to be less barbed when he
found himself on a lonely path that led westward along the cliffs, and
his eyes dwelt on the far-flung loveliness of a sapphire sea reflecting
the tint of a turquoise sky. A pleasant breeze that just sufficed to
chisel the surface of the water into tiny facets flowed lazily from the
south. From the beach, some twenty feet or less beneath the low cliff,
came the murmur of a listless tide. On the swelling uplands of Dorset
shone glorious patches of gold and green, with here and there a hamlet
or many-ricked farm, while in front, a mile away, the cliff climbed with
a gentle curve to a fine headland that jutted out from the shore-line
like some great pier built by a genie for the caravels of giants. It was
a morning to dispel shadows, and the cloud lifted from Rupert's heart
under its cheery influence. He stopped to light a cigar, and from that
moment Rupert's regeneration was complete.
"It is a shame to defile this wonderful atmosphere with tobacco smoke,"
he mused, "so I must salve my conscience by burning incense to the
spirit of the place. That sort of spirit is invariably of the female
gender. Where is the lady? Invisible, of course."
Without the least expectation of discovering either fay or mortal on the
yellow sands that spread their broad highway between sea and cliff,
Rupert stepped off the path on to the narrow strip of turf that
separated it from the edge and looked down at the beach. Greatly to his
surprise, a girl sat there, painting. She had rigged a big Japanese
umbrella to shield herself and her easel from the sun. Its green-hued
paper cover, gay with pink dragons and blue butterflies, brought a
startling note of color into the placid foreground. The girl, or young
woman, wore a very smart hat, but her dress was a grayish brown costume,
sufficiently indeterminate in tint to conceal the stains of rough usage
in climbing over rocks, or forcing a way through rank vegetation.
Indeed, it was chosen, in the first instance, so that a dropped brush or
a blob of paint would not show too vivid traces; and this was well, for
some telepathic action caused the wearer to lift her eyes to the cliff
the very instant after Rupert's figure broke the sky-line above the long
grasses nodding on the verge. The result was lamentable. She squeezed
half a tube of crimson lake over her skirt in a movement of surprise at
the apparition.
She was annoyed, and, of course, blamed the man.
"What do you want?" she demanded. "Why creep up in that stealthy
fashion?"
"I didn't," said Rupert.
"But you did." This with a pout, while she scraped the paint off her
dress with a palette knife.
"I am very sorry that you should have cause to think so," he said. "Will
you allow me to explain----"
As he stepped forward, lifting his hat, the girl cried a warning, but
too late; a square yard of dry earth crumbled into dust beneath him, and
he fell headlong. Luckily, the strata of shale and marl which formed the
coast-line at that point had been scooped by the sea into a concavity,
with a ledge, which Rupert reached before he had dropped half-way. Some
experience of Alpine climbing had made him quick to decide how best to
rectify a slip, and he endeavored now to spring rather than roll
downward to the beach, since he had a fleeting vision of a row of black
rocks that guarded the foot of the treacherous cliff. He just managed to
clear an ugly boulder that would have taken cruel toll of bruised skin,
if no worse, had he struck it, but he landed on a smooth rock coated
with seaweed. Exactly what next befell neither he nor the girl ever
knew. He performed some wild gyration, and was brought up forcibly by
the bamboo shaft of the umbrella, to which he found himself clinging in
a sitting posture. His trousers were split across both knees, his coat
was ripped open under the left arm, and he felt badly bruised;
nevertheless, he looked up into the girl's frightened face, and laughed,
on which the fright vanished from her eyes, and she, too, laughed, with
such ready merriment and display of white teeth, that Rupert laughed
again. He picked himself up and stretched his arms slowly, for something
had given him a tremendous thump in the ribs.
[Illustration: He found himself clinging to the bamboo shaft
_Page 61_]
"Are you hurt?" cried the girl, anxiety again chasing the mirth from her
expressive features.
"No," he said, after a deep breath had convinced him that no bones were
broken. "I only wished to explain that your word 'stealthy' was
undeserved."
"I withdraw it, then.... I saw you were a stranger, so it is my fault
that you fell. I ought to have told you about that dangerous cliff
instead of pitching into you because you startled me."
"I can't agree with you there," smiled Rupert. "We were both taken by
surprise, but I might have known better than to stand so near the edge.
Good job I was not a mile farther west," and he nodded in the direction
of the distant headland.
"Oh, please don't think of it, or I shall dream to-night of somebody
falling over the Tor."
"Is that the Tor?" he asked.
"Yes; don't you know? You are visiting Tormouth, I suppose?"
"I have been here since the day before yesterday, but my local knowledge
is nil."
"Well, if I were you, I should go home and change my clothes. How did
your coat get torn? Are you sure you are not injured?"
He turned to survey the rock on which his feet had slipped. Between it
and the umbrella the top of a buried boulder showed through the deep
sand, ever white and soft at highwater mark.
"I am inclined to believe that I butted into that fellow during the
hurricane," he said. Then, feeling that an excuse must be forthcoming,
if he wished to hear more of this girl's voice, and look for a little
while longer into her face, he threw a plaintive note into a request.
"Would you mind if I sat down for a minute or so?" he asked. "I feel a
bit shaken. After the briefest sort of rest I shall be off to the Swan."
"Sit down at once," she said with ready sympathy. "Here, take this," and
she made to give him the canvas chair from which she had risen at the
first alarm.
He dropped to the sand with suspicious ease.
"I shall be quite comfortable here," he said. "Please go on with your
painting. I always find it soothing to watch an artist at work."
"I must be going home now," she answered. "I obtain this effect only at
a certain stage of tide, and early in the day. You see, the Tor changes
his appearance so rapidly when the sun travels round to the south."
"Do you live at Tormouth?" he ventured to ask.
"Half a mile out."
"Will you allow me to carry something for you? I find that I have broken
two ribs--of your umbrella," he added instantly, seeing that those
radiant eyes of hers had turned on him with quick solicitude.
"Pity," she murmured, "bamboo is so much harder to mend than bone.
No--you will not carry anything. I think, if you are staying at the
Swan, you will find a path up a little hollow in the cliff about a
hundred yards from here."
"Yes, and if you, too, are going----"
"In the opposite direction."
"Ah, well," he said, "I am a useless person, it seems. Good-by. May I
fall at your feet again to-morrow?"
The absurd question brought half a smile to her lips. She began to
reply: "Worship so headlong----"
Then she saw that which caused her face to blanch.
"Why, your right hand is smothered in blood--something has happened----"
He glanced at his hand, which a pebble had cut on one of the knuckles;
and he valiantly resisted the temptation that presented itself, and
stood upright.
"It is a mere scratch," he assured her. "If I wash it in salt water it
will be healed before I reach Tormouth. Good-by--mermaid. I believe you
live in a cavern--out there--beneath the Tor. Some day soon I shall swim
out among the rocks and look for you."
With that he stooped to recover his hat, walked seaward to find a pool,
and held his hand in the water until the wound was cauterized. Then he
lit another cigar, and saw out of the tail of his eye that the girl was
now on the top of the cliff at some distance to the west.
"I wonder who she is," he murmured. "A lady, at any rate, and a very
charming one."
And the girl was saying:
"Who is he?--A gentleman, I see. American? Something in the accent,
perhaps. Or perhaps not. Americans don't come to torpid old Tormouth."
CHAPTER V
THE MISSING BLADE
On that same morning of the meeting on the sands at Tormouth, Inspector
Clarke, walking southward down St. Martin's Lane toward Scotland Yard,
had a shock. Clarke was hardly at the moment in his best mood, for to
the natural vinegar of his temperament a drop of lemon, or of gall, had
been added within the last few days. That morning at breakfast he had
explained matters with a sour mouth to Mrs. Clarke.
"Oh, it was all a made-up job between Winter and Furneaux, and I was
only put on to the Anarchists to make room for Furneaux--that was it.
The two Anarchists weren't up to any mischief--'Anarchists' was all a
blind, that's what '_Anarchists_' was. But that's the way things are run
now in the Yard, and there's no fair play going any more. Furneaux must
have Feldisham Mansions, of course; Furneaux this, and Furneaux that--of
course. But wait: he hasn't solved it yet! and he isn't going to; no,
and I haven't done with it yet, not by a long way.... Now, where do you
buy these eggs? Just look at this one."
The fact was, now that the two Anarchists, Descartes and Janoc, had been
deported by the Court, and were gone, Clarke suddenly woke to find
himself disillusioned, dull, excluded from the fun of the chase. But, as
he passed down St. Martin's Lane that morning, his underlooking eyes,
ever on the prowl for the "confidence men" who haunt the West End, saw a
sight that made him doubt if he was awake. There, in a little by-street
to the east, under the three balls of a pawnbroker's, he saw, or dreamt
that he saw--Émile Janoc!--Janoc, whom he _knew_ to be in Holland, and
Janoc was so deep, so lost, in talk with a girl, that he could not see
Clarke standing there, looking at him.
And Clarke knew the girl, too! It was Bertha Seward, the late cook of
the murdered actress, Rose de Bercy.
Could he be mistaken as to Janoc? he asked himself. Could _two_ men be
so striking to the eye, and so alike--the lank figure, stooping; the
long wavering legs, the clothes hanging loose on him; the scraggy throat
with the bone in it; the hair, black and plenteous as the raven's
breast, draping the sallow-dark face; the eyes so haggard, hungry,
unresting. Few men were so picturesque: few so greasy, repellent. And
there could be no mistake as to Bertha Seward--a small, thin creature,
with whitish hair, and little Chinese eyes that seemed to twinkle with
fun--it was she!
And how earnest was the talk!
Clarke saw Janoc clasp his two long hands together, and turn up his eyes
to the sky, seeming to beseech the girl or, through her, the heavens.
Then he offered her money, which she refused; but, when he cajoled and
insisted, she took it, smiling. Shaking hands, they parted, and Janoc
looked after Bertha Seward as she hurried, with a sort of stealthy
haste, towards the Strand. Then he turned, and found himself face to
face with Clarke.
For a full half-minute they looked contemplatively, eye to eye, at one
another.
"Janoc?" said Clarke.
"That is my name for one moment, sare," said Janoc politely in a very
peculiar though fluent English: "and the yours, sare?"
"Unless you have a very bad memory you know mine! How on earth come you
to be here, Émile Janoc?"
"England is free country, sare," said Janoc with a shrug; "I see not the
why I must render you account of movement. Only I tell you this time,
because you are so singular familiarly with my name of family, you
deceive yourself as to my little name. I have, it is true, a brother
named Émile----"
Clarke looked with a hard eye at him. The resemblance, if they were two,
was certainly very strong. Since it seemed all but impossible that Émile
Janoc should be in England, he accepted the statement grudgingly.
"Perhaps you wouldn't mind letting me see your papers?" he asked.
Janoc bowed.
"That I will do with big pleasure, sare," he said, and produced a
passport recently viséd in Holland, by which it appeared that his name
was not Émile, but Gaston.
They parted with a bow on Janoc's side and a nod on Clarke's; but Clarke
was puzzled.
"Something queer about this," he thought. "I'll keep my eye on _him_....
What was he doing talking like that--_so earnest_--to the actress's
cook? Suppose she was murdered by Anarchists? It is certain that she was
more or less mixed up with them--more, perhaps, than is known. Why did
those two come over the night after her murder?--for it's clear that
they had no design against the Tsar. I'll look into it on my own. Easy,
now, Clarke, my boy, and may be you'll come out ahead of Furneaux,
Winter, and all the lot in the end."
When he arrived at his Chief's office in the Yard, he mentioned to
Winter his curious encounter with the other Janoc, but said not a word
of Bertha Seward, since the affair of the murder was no longer his
business, officially.
Winter paid little heed to Janoc, whether Émile or Gaston, for Furneaux
was there with him, and the two were head to head, discussing the
murder, and the second sitting of the inquest was soon to come. Indeed,
Clarke heard Winter say to Furneaux:
"I promised Mr. Osborne to give some sort of excuse to his servants for
his flight from home. I was so busy that I forgot it. Perhaps you will
see to that, too, for me."
"Glad you mentioned it. I intended going there at once," Furneaux said
in that subdued tone which seemed to have all at once come upon him
since Rose de Bercy was found lying dead in Feldisham Mansions.
"Well, then, from henceforth everything is in your hands," said Winter.
"Here I hand you over our dumb witness"--and he held out to Furneaux the
blood-soiled ax-head of flint that had battered Rose de Bercy's face.
He was not sure--he wondered afterwards whether it was positively a
fact--but he fancied that for the tenth part of a second Furneaux shrank
from taking, from touching, that object of horror--a notion so odd and
fantastic that it affected Winter as if he had fancied that the poker
had lifted its head for the tenth part of a second. But almost before
the conceit took form, Furneaux was coolly placing the celt in his
breast-pocket, and standing up to go.
Furneaux drove straight, as he had said, to Mayfair, and soon was being
ushered into Osborne's library, where he found Miss Prout, the
secretary, with her hat on, busy opening and sorting the morning's
correspondence.
He introduced himself, sat beside her, and, while she continued with her
work, told her what had happened--how Osborne had been advised to
disappear till the popular gale of ill-will got stilled a little.
"Ah, that's how it was," the girl said, lifting interested eyes to his.
"I was wondering," and she pinned two letters together with the neatness
of method and order.
Furneaux sat lingeringly with her, listening to an aviary of linnets
that prattled to the bright sunlight that flooded the library, and
asking himself whether he had ever seen hair so glaringly red as the
lady secretary's--a great mass of it that wrapped her head like a flame.
"And where has Mr. Osborne gone to?" she murmured, making a note in
shorthand on the back of one little bundle of correspondence.
"Somewhere by the coast--I think," said Furneaux.
"West coast? East coast?"
"He didn't write to me: he wrote to my Chief"--for, though Furneaux well
knew where Osborne was, his retreat was a secret.
The girl went on with her work, plying the paper-knife, now jotting down
a memorandum, now placing two or more kindred letters together: for
every hospital and institution wrote to Osborne, everyone who wanted
money for a new flying machine, or had a dog or a hunter to sell, or
intended to dine and speechify, and send round the hat.
"It's quite a large batch of correspondence," Furneaux remarked.
"Half of these," the girl said, "are letters of abuse from people who
never heard Mr. Osborne's name till the day after that poor woman was
killed. All England has convicted him before he is tried. It seems
unfair."
"Yes, no doubt. But 'to understand is to pardon,' as the proverb says.
They have to think something, and when there is only one thing for them
to think, they think it--meaning well. It will blow over in time. Don't
you worry."
"Oh, I!--What do I care what forty millions of vermin choose to say or
think?"
She pouted her pretty lips saucily.
"Forty--millions--of vermin," cried Furneaux; "that's worse than
Carlyle."
Hylda Prout's swift hands plied among her papers. She made no answer;
and Furneaux suddenly stood up.
"Well, you will mention to the valet and the others how the matter
stands as to Mr. Osborne. He is simply avoiding the crowd--that is all.
Good-day."
Hylda Prout rose, too, and Furneaux saw now how tall she was,
well-formed and lithe, with a somewhat small face framed in that nest of
red hair. Her complexion was spoiled and splashed with freckles, but
otherwise she was dainty-featured and pretty--mouth, nose, chin, tiny,
all except the wide-open eyes.
"So," she said to Furneaux as she put out her hand, "you won't let me
know where Mr. Osborne is? I may want to write to him on business."
"Why, didn't I tell you that he didn't write to me?"
"That was only a blind."
"Dear me! A blind.... It is the truth, Miss Prout."
"Tell that to someone else."
"What, don't you like the truth?"
"All right, keep the information to yourself, then."
"Good-by--I mustn't allow myself to dally in this charming room with the
linnets, the sunlight, and the lady."
For a few seconds she seemed to hesitate. Then she said suddenly: "Yes,
it's very nice in here. That door there leads into the morning room, and
that one yonder, at the side----"
Her voice dropped and stopped; Furneaux appeared hardly to have heard,
or, if hearing, to be merely making conversation.
"Yes, it leads where?" he asked, looking at her. Now, her eyes, too,
dropped, and she murmured:
"Into the museum."
"The--! Well, naturally, Mr. Osborne is a connoisseur--quite so, only I
rather expected you to say 'a picture gallery.' Is it--open to
inspection? Can one----?"
"It is open, certainly: the door is not locked, But there's nothing
much----"
"Oh, do let me have a look around, and come with me, if it will not take
long. No one is more interested in curios than I."
"I--will, if you like," said the girl with a strange note of confidence
in her voice, and led the way into the museum.
Furneaux found himself in a room, small, but full of riches. On a
central table were several illuminated missals and old Hoch-Deutsch
MSS., some ancient timepieces, and a collection of enameled watches of
Limoges. Around the walls, open or in cabinets, were arms, blades of
Toledo, minerals arranged on narrow shelves, an embalmed chieftain's
head from Mexico, and many other bizarre objects.
Hylda Prout knew the name and history of every one, and murmured an
explanation as Furneaux bent in scrutiny.
"Those are what are called 'celts,'" she said; "they are not very
uncommon, and are found in every country--made of flint, mostly, and
used as ax-heads by the ancients. These rough ones on this side are
called Palæolithic--five hundred thousand years old, some of them; and
these finer ones on this side are Neolithic, not quite so old--though
there isn't much to choose in antiquity when it comes to hundreds of
thousands! Strange to say, one of the Neolithic ones has been missing
for some days--I don't know whether Mr. Osborne has given it away or
not?"
The fact that one _was_ missing was, indeed, quite obvious, for the
celts stood in a row, stuck in holes drilled in the shelf; and right in
the midst of the rank gaped one empty hole, a dumb little mouth that yet
spoke.
"Yes, curious things," said Furneaux, bending meditatively over them. "I
remember seeing pictures of them in books. Every one of these stones is
stained with blood."
"Blood!" cried the girl in a startled way.
"Well, they were used in war and the chase, weren't they? Every one of
them has given agony, every one would be red, if we saw it in its true
color."
Red was also the color of Furneaux's cheek-bones at the moment--red as
hectic; and he was conscious of it, as he was conscious also that his
eyes were wildly alight. Hence, he continued a long time bending over
the "celts" so that Miss Prout might not see his face. His voice,
however, was calm, since he habitually spoke in jerky, clipped syllables
that betrayed either no emotion or too much.
When he turned round, it was to move straight to a little rack on the
left, in which glittered a fine array of daggers--Japanese kokatanas,
punals of Salamanca, cangiars of Morocco, bowie-knives of old
California, some with squat blades, coming quickly to a point, some long
and thin to transfix the body, others meant to cut and gash, each with
its label of minute writing.
Furneaux's eye had duly noted them before, but he had passed them
without stopping. Now, after seeing the celts, he went back to them.
To his surprise, Miss Prout did not come with him. She stood looking on
the ground, her lower lip somewhat protruded, silent, obviously
distrait.
"And these, Miss Prout?" chirped he, "are they of high value?"
She neither answered nor moved.
"Perhaps you haven't studied their history?" ventured Furneaux again.
Now, all at once, she moved to the rack of daggers, and without saying a
word, tapped with the fore-finger of her right hand, and kept on
tapping, a vacant hole in the rack, though her eyes peered deeply into
Furneaux's face. And for the first time Furneaux made acquaintance with
the real splendor of her eyes--eyes that lived in sleep, torpid like the
dormouse; but when they woke, woke to such a lambency of passion that
they fascinated and commanded like the basilisk's.
With eyes so alight she now kept peering at Furneaux, standing tall
above him, tapping at the empty hole.
"Oh, I see," muttered Furneaux, _his_ eyes, too, alight like live coals,
"there's an article missing here, also--one from the celts, one from the
daggers."
"He is innocent!" suddenly cried Hylda Prout, in a tempest of passionate
reproach.
"She loves him," thought Furneaux.
And the girl thought: "He knew before now that these things were
missing. His acting would deceive every man, but not every woman. How
glad I am that I drew him on!"
Now, though the fact of the discovery of the celt by Inspector Clarke
under the dead actress's piano had not been published in the papers, the
fact that she had been stabbed through the eye by a long blade with
blunt edges was known to all the world. There was nothing strange in
this fierce outburst of Osborne's trusted secretary, nor that tears
should spring to her eyes.
"Mr. Furneaux, he is innocent," she wailed in a frenzy. "Oh, he is! You
noticed me hesitate just now to bring you in here: well, _this_ was the
reason--this, this, this----" she tapped with her forefinger on the
empty hole--"for I knew that you would see this, and I knew that you
would be jumping to some terrible conclusion as to Mr. Osborne."
"Conclusion, no," murmured Furneaux comfortingly--"I avoid conclusions
as traps for the unwary. Interesting, of course, that's all. Tell me
what you know, and fear nothing. Conclusion, you say! I don't jump to
conclusions. Tell me what was the shape of the dagger that has
disappeared."
She was silent again for many seconds. She was wrung with doubt, whether
to speak or not to speak.
At last she voiced her agony.
"Either I must refuse to say, or I must tell the truth--and if I tell
the truth, you will think----"
She stopped again, all her repose of manner fled.
"You don't know what I will think," put in Furneaux. "Sometimes I think
the most unexpected things. The best way is to give me the plain facts.
The question is, whether the blade that has gone from there was shaped
like the one supposed to have committed the crime in the flat?"
"It was labeled 'Saracen Stiletto: about 1150,'" muttered the girl
brokenly, looking Furneaux straight in the face, though the fire was now
dead in her eyes. "It had a square bone handle, with a crescent carved
on one of the four faces--a longish, thin blade, like a skewer, only not
round--with blunt-edged corners to it."
Furneaux took up a little tube containing radium from a table at his
hand, looked at it, and put it down again.
Hylda Prout was too distraught to see that his hand shook a little. It
was half a minute before he spoke.
"Well, all that proves nothing, though it is of interest, of course," he
said nonchalantly. "How long has that stiletto been lying there?"
"Since--since I entered Mr. Osborne's employment, twelve months ago."
"And you first noticed that it was gone--when?"
"On the second afternoon after the murder, when I noticed that the celt,
too, was gone."
"The second--I see."
"I wondered what had become of them! I could imagine that Mr. Osborne
might have given the celt to some friend. But the stiletto was so rare a
thing--I couldn't think that he would give that. I assumed--I
assume--that they were stolen. But, then, by whom?"
"That's the question," said Furneaux.
"Was it this same stiletto that I have described to you that the murder
was done with?" asked Hylda.
"Now, how can I tell that?" said Furneaux. "_I_ wasn't there, you know."
"Was not the weapon, then, found in the unfortunate woman's flat?"
"No--no weapon."
"Well, but that is excessively odd," she said in a low voice.
"Why so excessively odd?" demanded Furneaux.
"Why? Because--don't you see?--the weapon would be blood-stained--of
course; and I should expect that after committing his horrid deed, the
murderer would be only too glad to get rid of it, and would leave
it----"
"Oh, come, that is hardly a good guess, Miss Prout. I shall never make a
lady detective of you. Murderers don't leave their weapons about behind
them, for weapons are clews, you see."
He was well aware that if the fact of the discovery of the celt had been
published in the papers, Hylda might justly have answered: "But _this_
murderer did leave _one_ of his weapons behind, namely the celt; and it
is excessively odd that, since he left one, the smaller one, he did not
leave the other, the larger one."
As it was, the girl took thought, and her comment was shrewd enough:
"All murderers do not act in the same way, for some are a world more
cunning and alert than others. I say that it _is_ odd that the murderer
did not leave behind the weapon that pierced the woman's eye, and I will
prove it to you. If the stiletto was stolen from Mr. Osborne--and it
really must have been stolen--and if that was the same stiletto that the
deed was done with, then, the motive of the thief in stealing it was to
kill Mademoiselle de Bercy with it. But why should one steal a weapon to
commit a murder? And why should the murderer have chosen _Mr. Osborne_
to steal his weapon from? Obviously, because he wanted to throw the
suspicion upon him--in which case he would _naturally_ leave the weapon
behind as proof of Mr. Osborne's guilt. Now, then, have I proved my
point?"
Though she spoke almost in italics, and was pale and flurried, she
looked jauntily at Furneaux, with her head tossed back; and he, with
half a smile, answered:
"I withdraw my remark as to your detective qualifications, Miss Prout.
Yes, I think you reason well. If there was a thief, and the thief was
the murderer, he would very likely have acted as you say."
"Then, why was the stiletto not found in the flat?" she asked.
"The fact that it was not found would seem to show that there was _not_
a thief," he said; and he added quickly: "Perhaps Mr. Osborne gave it,
as well as the celt, to someone. I suppose you asked him?"
"He was gone away an hour before I missed them," Hylda answered. She
hesitated again. When next she spoke it was with a smile that would have
won a stone.
"Tell me where he is," she pleaded, "and I will write to him about it.
You may safely tell _me_, you know, for Mr. Osborne has no secrets from
_me_."
"I wish I could tell you.... Oh, but he will soon be back again, and
then you will see him and speak to him once more."
Some tone of badinage in these jerky sentences brought a flush to her
face, but she tried to ward off his scrutiny with a commonplace remark.
"Well, that's some consolation. I must wait in patience till the mob
finds a new sensation."
Furneaux took a turn through the room, silently meditating.
"Thanks so much for your courtesy, Miss Prout," he said at last. "Our
conversation has been--fruitful."
"Yes, fruitful in throwing still more suspicion upon an innocent man, if
that is what you mean. Are not the police _quite_ convinced yet of Mr.
Osborne's innocence, Inspector Furneaux?"
"Oh, quite, quite," said he hastily, somewhat taken aback by her candor.
"Two 'quites' make a 'not quite,' as two negatives make an affirmative,"
said she coldly, fingering and looking down at some wistaria in her
bosom.
She added with sudden warmth: "Oh, but you should, Inspector Furneaux!
You should. He has suffered; his honest and true heart has been wounded.
And he has his alibi, which, though in reality it may not be so good as
you think, is yet quite good enough. But I know what it is that poisons
your mind against him."
"You are full of statements, Miss Prout," said Furneaux with an
inclination of the head; "what is it, now, that poisons my mind against
that gentleman?"
"It is that taxicabman's delusion that he took him from the Ritz Hotel
to Feldisham Mansions and back, added to the housekeeper's delusion that
she saw him here----"
Furneaux nearly gasped. Up to that moment he had heard no word about a
housekeeper's delusion, or of a housekeeper's existence even. A long
second passed before he could answer.
"Well, she was no doubt mistaken. I have not yet examined her
personally, but I have every reason to believe that she is in error. At
what hour, by the way, does she say that she thought she saw him here?"
"_She_ says she thinks it was about five minutes to eight. But at that
time, I take it from the evidence, he must have been writing those two
letters at the Ritz. If she were right, that would make out that after
doing the deed at about 7.40 or so, he would just have time to come back
here by five to eight, and change his clothes. But he was at the
Ritz--he was at the Ritz! And Mrs. Bates only saw his back an instant
going up the stairs--his ghost's back, she means, his double's back, not
his own. He was at the Ritz, Inspector Furneaux."
"Precisely," said Furneaux, with a voice that at last had a quiver in
it. "If any fact is clear in a maze of doubt, that, at least, is
established beyond cavil. And Mrs. Bates's other name--I--forget it?"
"Hester."
"That's it. Is she here now?"
"She is taking a holiday to-day. She was dreadfully upset."
"Thanks. Good-by."
He held out his hand a second time, quite affably. Hylda Prout followed
him out to the library and, when the street door had closed behind him,
peeped through the curtains at his alert, natty figure as he hastened
away.
Furneaux took a motor-bus to Whitehall, and, what was very odd, the 'bus
carried him beyond his destination, over Westminster Bridge, indeed, he
was so lost in meditation.
His object now was to see Winter and fling at his chief's head some of
the amazing things he had just learned.
But when he arrived at Scotland Yard, Winter was not there. At that
moment, in fact, Winter was at Osborne's house in Mayfair, whither he
had rushed to meet Furneaux in order to whisper to Furneaux without a
moment's delay some news just gleaned by the merest chance--the news
that Pauline Dessaulx, Rose de Bercy's maid, had quarreled with her
mistress on the morning of the murder, and had been given notice to quit
Miss de Bercy's service.
When Winter arrived at Osborne's house Furneaux, of course, was gone. To
his question at the door, "Is Mr. Furneaux here?" the parlor-maid
answered: "I am not sure, sir--I'll see."
"Perhaps you don't know Mr. Furneaux," said Winter, "a small-built
gentleman----"
"Oh, yes, sir, I know him," the girl answered. "I let him in this
morning, as well as when he called some days ago."
No words in the English tongue could have more astonished Winter, for
Furneaux had not mentioned to him that he had even been to Osborne's.
What Furneaux could have been doing there "some days ago" was beyond his
guessing. Before his wonderment could get out another question, the girl
was leading the way towards the library.
In the library were Miss Prout, writing, and Jenkins handing her a
letter.
"I came to see if Inspector Furneaux was here," Winter said; "but
evidently he has gone."
"Only about three minutes," said Hylda Prout, throwing a quick look
round at him.
"Thanks--I am sorry to have troubled you," he said. Then he added, to
Jenkins: "Much obliged for the cigars!"
"Do not mention it, sir," said Jenkins.
Winter had reached the library door, when he stopped short.
"By the way, Jenkins, is this Mr. Furneaux's first visit here?--or don't
you remember?"
"Mr. Furneaux came here once before, sir," said Jenkins in his staid
official way.
"Ah, I thought perhaps--when was that?"
"Let me see, sir. It was--yes--on the third, the afternoon of the
murder, I remember."
The third--the afternoon of the murder. Those words ate their way into
Winter's very brain. They might have been fired from a pistol rather
than uttered by the placid Jenkins.
"The afternoon, you say," repeated Winter. "Yes--quite so; he wished to
see Mr. Osborne. At what exact _hour_ about would that be?"
Jenkins again meditated. Then he said: "Mr. Furneaux called, sir, about
5.45, as far as I can recollect. He wished to see my master, who was
out, but was expected to return. So Mr. Furneaux was shown in here to
await him, and he waited a quarter of an hour, if I am right in saying
that he came at 5.45, because Mr. Osborne telephoned me from Feldisham
Mansions that he would not be returning, and as I entered the museum
there, where Mr. Furneaux then was, to tell him, I heard the clock
strike six, I remember."
At this Hylda Prout whirled round in her chair.
"The museum!" she cried. "How odd, how exceedingly odd! Just now Mr.
Furneaux seemed to be rather surprised when I told him that there was a
museum!"
"He doubtless forgot, miss," said Jenkins, "for he had certainly gone in
there when I entered the library."
"Thanks, thanks," said Winter lightly, "that's how it was--good-day";
and he went out with the vacant air of a man who has lost something, but
knows not what.
He drove straight to Scotland Yard. There in the office sat Furneaux.
For a long time they conferred--Winter with hardly a word, one hand on
his thigh, the other at his mustache, looking at Furneaux with a frown,
with curious musing eyes, meditating, silent. And Furneaux told how the
celt and the stiletto were missing from Osborne's museum.
"And the inference?" said Winter, speaking at last, his round eyes
staring widely at Furneaux.
"The inference, on the face of it, is that Osborne is guilty," said
Furneaux quietly.
"An innocent man, Furneaux?" said Winter almost with a groan of
reproach--"an innocent man?"
Furneaux's eyes flashed angrily an instant, and some word leapt to his
lips, but it was not uttered. He stood up.
"Well, that's how it stands for the moment. Time will show--I must be
away," he said.
And when he had gone out, Winter rose wearily, and paced with slow steps
a long time through the room, his head bent quite down, staring.
Presently he came upon a broken cigar, such as Furneaux delighted in
smelling. Then a fierce cry broke from him.
"Furneaux, my friend! Why, this is madness! Oh, d--n everything!"
CHAPTER VI
TO TORMOUTH
"An absinthe!"
"A packet of Caporal!"
"Un bock pour vous, m'sieur?"
"A vodka!"
A frowsy waiter was hurrying through some such jangle of loud voices
from the "comrades" scattered among the tables set in a back room in a
very back street of Soho. The hour was two in the morning, and the light
in that Anarchist Club was murky and blurred. Only one gas-jet on the
wall lit the room, and that struggled but feebly through the cigarette
smoke that choked the air like a fog--air that was foul and close as
well as dim, for some thirty persons, mostly men but some few women,
were crowded in there as if there was no place else on earth for them.
One heard the rattle of dice, the whirr of cards being shuffled against
the thumbs, the grating of glass tumblers against imitation granite. Two
poor girls, cramped in a corner, were attempting to dance to the rhythm
of an Italian song. They were laughing with wide mouths, their heads
thrown back, weary unto death, yet alive with make-believe mirth.
At one of the tables sat Gaston Janoc, the man who had been seen by
Inspector Clarke talking in St. Martin's Lane to Bertha Seward, one-time
cook in the Feldisham Mansions flat. Playing vingt-et-un with him was a
burly Russian-looking man, all red beard and eyebrows; also a small
Frenchman with an imperial and a crooked nose; while a colored man of
Martinique made the fourth of a queer quartette. But somehow Janoc and
the rough, red Russian seemed not to be able to agree in the game. They
were antagonistic as cat and dog, and three times one or other threw
down his cards and looked at his adversary, as who should say:
"A little more of you, and my knife talks!"
"Who are you, then, Ruski?" cried Janoc at last, speaking French, since
the Russian only glared at him when he swore in his quaint English.
Yet the Russian grumbled in English in his beard: "No French."
"And no Italian, and no Spanish, and no German, and very, very small
English," growled Janoc in English, frowning at him; "Well, then, shall
we converse, sare?"
"What is that--'_converse_'?" asked the Russian.
Janoc shrugged disgustedly, while the little Frenchman, whose eyes
twinkled at every tiff between the pair, said politely in French:
"We await your play, m'sieurs."
Twice, on the very edge of the precipice of open hostilities, Janoc and
the Russian stopped short; but a little after two o'clock, when much
absinthe and vodka had been drunk, an outbreak took place: for the
Russian then cried out loudly above the hubbub of tongues:
"Oh, you--how you call it?--_tcheeeet_!"
"Who? I--me?" cried Janoc sharply, pale, half-standing--"cheat?"
"Yes--_tcheeet_, you _tcheeet_!" insisted the bearded Slav. And now the
little Frenchman with the crooked nose, who foreknew that the table was
about to be upset, stood up quickly, picked up his thimbleful of
anisette, and holding it in hand, awaited with merry eyes the outcome.
Instantly Janoc, who was dealing, sent the pack of cards like an assault
of birds into the Russian's face, the Russian closed with Janoc, and
forthwith the room reeled into chaos. The struggle need not be
described. Suffice it to say, that it lasted longer than the Russian had
probably expected, for Janoc proved to have sinews of steel, though thin
steel. His lank arms embraced the Russian, squeezing like a cable that
is being tighter and tighter wound. However, he was overcome by mere
weight, thumping to the floor among a tumbled dance of tables, chairs,
and foreign drinks, while the women shrieked, the men bellowed, and the
scared manager of the den added to the uproar by yelling:
"M'sieurs! M'sieurs! Je vous prie! The police will come!"
Only one soul in the room remained calm, and that was the diminutive
Frenchman, who kept dodging through the legs and arms of the flood of
humanity that surged around the two on the floor.
He alone of them all saw that the Russian, in the thick of the struggle,
was slipping his hand into pocket after pocket of Janoc under him, and
was very deftly drawing out any papers that he might find there.
In two minutes the row was ended, and the gaming and drinking
recommenced as if nothing had happened. The Russian had been half led,
half hustled to the front door, and was gone. Immediately after him had
slipped out the bright-eyed Frenchman.
The Russian, after pacing down an alley, turned into Old Compton Street,
twice peering about and behind him, as if disturbed by some instinct
that he was being shadowed. And this was so--but with a skill so nimble,
so expert, so inbred, did the Frenchman follow, that in this pursuit the
true meaning of the word "shadowing" was realized. The Russian did not
see his follower for the excellent reason that the Frenchman made
himself an invisibility. He might have put on those magic shoes that
shadows shoot and dash and slink in, so airily did he glide on the
trail. Nor could mere genius have accomplished such a feat, and with
such ease--were it not for the expertness that was wedded to genius.
When the Russian emerged into the wide thoroughfare close to the Palace
Theater, he stood under a lamp to look at one of the papers picked from
Janoc's pockets; and only then did he become aware of the Frenchman, who
rose up out of the ground under his elbow with that pert ease with which
a cork bobs to the surface of water.
"Got anything of importance?" asked the Frenchman, his twinkling eyes
radiant with the humor of the chase.
The Russian stared at him half a minute with the hung jaw of
astonishment. Then, all at once remembering his rôle, he cried hoarsely:
"No English!"
"Oh, chuck it!" remarked the other.
Again the Russian gazed at the unexpected little phenomenon, and his
voice rumbled:
"What is that--'chuck it'?"
Suddenly the Frenchman snatched Janoc's paper neatly with thumb and
finger out of the Russian's hand, and ran chuckling across Charing Cross
Road eastward. The Russian, with a grunt of rage, made after him with
his long legs. But, from the first, he saw that he was being left behind
by the nimble pace set up by a good runner. He seemed to understand that
a miracle was needed, and lo, it occurred, for, as the two crossed the
road in front of the Palace Theater, the Russian lifted his voice into:
"Stop him! Stop thief! Police! Police!"
Not only did he yell in most lucid English, but he also plucked a police
whistle from his coat and blew it loudly.
No policeman happened to be near, however, and the deep sleep of London
echoed their pelting steps eastward, until the Russian saw the
paper-snatcher vanish from sight in the congeries of streets that
converge on the top of St. Martin's Lane.
He lost hope then, and slackened a little, panting but swearing in a
language that would be appreciated by any London cabman. Nevertheless,
when he, too, ran into St. Martin's Lane, there was the small Frenchman,
standing, wiping his forehead, awaiting him.
The Russian sprang at him.
"You little whelp!" he roared. "I arrest you----"
"Oh, what's the good, Clarke? You are slow this evening. I just thought
I'd wake you up."
"Furneaux!"
"Fancy not knowing me!"
"It was _you_!"
"Who else? Here's your Janocy document. You might let me have a look at
it. Share and share alike."
Clarke tried to retrieve lost prestige, though his hand shook as he took
the paper.
"Well--I--could have sworn it was you!" he said.
"Of course you could--and did, no doubt. Let's have a glimpse at those
documents."
"But what were _you_ doing in the Fraternal Club, anyhow? Something on
in that line?"
"No. An idle hour. Chance of picking up a stray clew. I sometimes do
dive into those depths without special object. You managed that to a T
with Janoc. Where are the other papers? Hand them over."
"With pleasure," said Clarke, but there was no pleasure in his surly
Russian face, in which rage shone notwithstanding a marvelous make-up.
Still, he opened the paper under the lamp--a sheet of notepaper with
some lines of writing on the first page; and on the top of it, printed,
the name of a hotel, "The Swan, Tormouth."
The two detectives peered over it. To the illimitable surprise of both,
this letter, stolen by Clarke from Janoc's pocket, was addressed to
Clarke himself--a letter from Rupert Osborne, the millionaire.
And Osborne said in it:
DEAR INSPECTOR CLARKE:--Yours of the 7th duly to hand. In reply
to your inquiry, I am not aware that the late Mlle. Rose de
Bercy had any relations with Anarchists, either in London or in
Paris, other than those which have been mentioned in the
papers--_i.e._, a purely professional interest for stage
purposes. I think it unlikely that her connection with them
extended further.
I am,
Sincerely yours,
RUPERT OSBORNE.
Furneaux and Clarke looked at each other in a blank bewilderment that
was not assumed by either man.
"_Did_ you write to Mr. Osborne, asking that question?" asked Furneaux.
"No," said Clarke--"never. I didn't even know where Osborne was."
"So Janoc must have written to him in your name?" said Furneaux. "Janoc,
then, wishes to know how much information Osborne can give you as to
Mademoiselle de Bercy's association with Anarchists. That seems clear.
But why should Janoc think that _you_ particularly are interested in
knowing?
Clarke flushed hotly under the paint, being conscious that he was
investigating the case on his own private account and in a secret way.
As a matter of fact, he was by this time fully convinced that Rose de
Bercy's murder was the work of Anarchist hands, but he was so vexed with
Furneaux's tricking him, and so fearful of official reprimand from
Winter that he only answered:
"Why Janoc should think that I am interested, I can't imagine. It beats
me."
"And how can Janoc know where Osborne is, or his assumed name, to write
to him?" muttered Furneaux. "I thought that that was a secret between
Osborne, Winter, and myself."
Clarke, equally puzzled, scratched his head under his wig, which had
been insufferably hot in that stifling room.
"Janoc and his crew must be keeping an eye on Osborne, it seems--for
some reason," he exclaimed. "Heaven knows why--I don't. I am out of the
de Bercy case, of course. My interest in the Janoc crowd is--political."
"Let me see the letter again," said Furneaux; and he read it carefully
once more. Then he opened the sheet, as if seeking additional
information from the blank pages, turned it over, looked at the
back--and there at the back he saw something else that was astounding,
for, written backwards, near the bottom of the page, in Osborne's
handwriting, was the word "Rosalind."
"Who is 'Rosalind'?" asked Furneaux--"see here, an impression from some
other letter written at the same time."
"Don't know, I'm sure," said Clarke. "A sister, perhaps."
"A sister. Why, though, should his sister's name appear at the back of a
note written to Janoc, or to Inspector Clarke, as he thought?" said
Furneaux to himself, deep in meditation. He suddenly added brightly:
"Now, Clarke, there's a puzzle for you!"
"I don't see it, see any puzzle, I mean. It might have appeared on any
other letter, say to his bankers, or to a friend. It was a mere
accident. There is nothing in that."
"Quite right," grinned Furneaux. "And it was a sister's name, of course.
'Rosalind.' A pretty name. Poor girl, she will be anxious about her fond
and doting brother."
"It may be another woman's name," said Clarke sagely--"though, for that
matter, he'd hardly be on with a new love before the other one is cold
in her grave, as the saying is."
Furneaux laughed a low, mysterious laugh in his throat. It had a
peculiar sound, and rang hard and bitter in the ears of the other.
"I'll keep this, if you don't mind," he said, lapsing into the detective
again.
Meantime, Furneaux knew that there were other papers of Janoc's in
Clarke's pocket, and he lingered a little to give his colleague a chance
of exhibiting them. Clarke made no move, however, so he put out his
hand, saying, "Well, good luck," and disappeared southward, while Clarke
walked northward toward his residence, Hampstead way. But in Southampton
Row an overwhelming impatience to see the other Janoc papers overcame
him, and he commenced to examine them as he went.
Two were bills. A third was a newspaper cutting from the _Matin_
commenting on the murder in Feldisham Mansions. The fourth had power to
arrest Clarke's steps. It was a letter of three closely-written
pages--in French; and though Clarke's French, self-taught, was not
fluent, it could walk, if it could not fly. In ten minutes he had read
and understood....
St. Petersburg says that since the secret meeting, a steady
growth of courage in the rank-and-file is observable. As for the
Nevski funds, an individual highly placed, whose name is in
three syllables, is said to be willing to come to the rescue.
Lastly, as to the traitress, you will see to it that she to
whose hands vengeance has been intrusted shall fail on the 3rd.
This was in the letter; and as Inspector Clarke's eyes fell on the date,
"the 3d," his clenched hand rose triumphantly in air. It was on July
_the 3d_ that Rose de Bercy had been done to death!
When Clarke again walked onward his eyes were alight with a wild
exultation. He was thinking:
"Now, Allah be praised, that I didn't show Furneaux this thing, as I
nearly was doing!"
He reached his house with a sense of surprise--he had covered so much
ground unconsciously, and the dominant thought in his mind was that the
race was not always to the swift.
"Luck is the thing in a man's career," he said to himself, "not wit, or
mere sharpness to grasp a point. Slow, and steady, and lucky--that's the
combination. The British are a race slower of thought than some of the
others, just as _I_ may be a slower man than Furneaux, but we Britons
rule the world by luck, as we won the battle of Waterloo by luck. Luck
and prime beef, they go together somehow, I do believe. And what I am
to-day I owe to luck, for it's happened to me too often to doubt that
I've got the gift of it in my marrow."
He put his latch-key into the door with something of a smile; and the
next morning Mrs. Clarke cried delightedly to him:
"Well, something must have happened to put you in this good temper!"
At that same hour of the morning Furneaux, for his part, was at
Osborne's house in Mayfair, where he had an appointment with Mrs. Hester
Bates, Osborne's housekeeper. He was just being admitted into the house
when the secretary, Miss Prout, walked up to the door--rather to his
surprise, for it was somewhat before the hour of a secretary's
attendance. They entered together and passed into the library, where
Hylda Prout invited him to sit down for a minute.
"I am only here just to collect and answer the morning's letters," she
explained pleasantly. "There's a tree which I know in Epping Forest--an
old beech--where I'm taking a book to read. See my picnic
basket?--tomato and cress sandwiches, half a bottle of Chianti, an
aluminum folding cup to drink from. I'll send for Mrs. Bates in a
moment, and leave her to your tender inquiries. But wouldn't you prefer
Epping Forest on a day like this? Do you like solitude, Inspector
Furneaux? Dreams?"
"Yes, I like solitude, as boys like piracy, because unattainable. I can
only just find time to sleep, but not time enough to dream."
Hylda lifted her face beatifically.
"I _love_ to dream!--to be with myself--alone: the world in one
compartment, I in another, with myself; with silence to hear my heart
beat in, and time to fathom a little what its beating is madly trying to
say; an old tree overhead, and breezes breathing through it. Oh, _they_
know how to soothe; _they_ alone understand, Inspector Furneaux, and
_they_ forgive."
Furneaux said within himself: "Well, I seem to be in for some charming
confidences"; and he added aloud: "Quite so; _they_ understand--if it's
a lady: for Nature is feminine; and only a lady can fathom a lady."
"Oh, women!" Hylda said, with her pretty pout of disdain,--"they are
nothing, mostly shallow shoppers. Give me a man--if he is a man. And
there have been a few women, too--in history. But, man or woman, what I
believe is that for the greater part, we remain foreigners to ourselves
through life--we never reach that depth in ourselves, 'deeper than ever
plummet sounded,' where the real _I_ within us lives, the real,
bare-faced, rabid, savage, divine _I_, naked as an ape, contorted,
sobbing, bawling what it cannot speak."
Furneaux, who had certainly not suspected this blend of philosopher and
poet beneath that mass of red hair, listened in silence. For the second
time he saw this strange girl's eyes take fire, glow, rage a moment like
a building sweltering in conflagration, and then die down to utter
dullness.
Though he knew just when to speak, his reply was rather tame.
"There's something in that, too--you are right."
She suddenly smiled, with a pretty air of confusion.
"Surely," she said. "And now to business: first, Mrs. Bates----"
"One moment," broke in Furneaux. "Something has caused me to wish to ask
you--do you know Mr. Osborne's relatives?"
"I know _of_ them. He has only a younger brother, Ralph, who is at
Harvard University--and an aunt."
"Aunt's name Rosalind?"
"No--Priscilla--Priscilla Emptage."
"Who, then, may 'Rosalind' be?"
"No connection of _his_. You must have made some mistake."
Furneaux held out the note of Rupert Osborne to Janoc intended for
Clarke, holding it so folded that the name of the hotel was not
visible--only the transferred word "Rosalind."
And as Hylda Prout bent over it, perplexed at first by the seeming
scrawl, Furneaux's eye was on her face. He was aware of the instant when
she recognized the handwriting, the instant when reasoning and the
putting of two-and-two together began to work in her mind, the instant
when her stare began to widen, and her tight-pressed lips to relax, the
rush of color to fade from her face, and the mask of freckles to stand
out darkly in strong contrast with her ivory white flesh. When she had
stared for a long minute, and had had enough, she did not say anything,
but turned away silently to stand at a window, her back to Furneaux.
He looked at her, thinking: "She guesses, and suffers."
Suddenly she whirled round. "May I--see that letter?" she asked in a low
voice.
"The whole note?" he said; "I'm afraid that it's private--not _my_
secret--I regret it--an official document, you know."
"All right," she said quietly. "You may come to me for help yet"--and
turned to the pile of letters on the desk.
"Anyway, Rosalind is not a relative, to your knowledge?" he persisted.
"No."
She stuffed the letters into a drawer, bowed, and was gone, leaving him
sorry for her, for he saw a lump working in her throat.
Some minutes after her disappearance, a plump little woman came in--Mrs.
Hester Bates, housekeeper in the Osborne _ménage_. Her hair lay in
smooth curves on her brow as on the upturned bulge of a china bowl.
There was an apprehensive look in her upward-looking eyes, so Furneaux
spoke comfortingly to her, after seating her near the window.
"Don't be afraid to speak," he said reassuringly. "What you have to say
is not necessarily against Mr. Osborne's interests. Just state the facts
simply--you did see him here on the murder night, didn't you?"
She muttered something, as a tear dropped on the ample bosom of her
black dress.
"Just a little louder," Furneaux said.
"Yes," she sobbed, "I saw his back."
"You were--where?"
"Coming up the kitchen stairs to talk to Mr. Jenkins."
"Don't cry. And when you reached the top of the kitchen stairs you saw
his back on the house stairs--at the bottom? at the top?"
"He was nearer the top. I only saw him a minute."
"A moment, you mean, I think. And in that one moment you became quite
sure that it was Mr. Osborne? Though it was only his back you saw?"
"Yes, sir...."
"No, don't cry. It's nothing. Only are you certain sure--that's the
point?"
"Yes, I am sure enough, but----"
"But what?"
"I thought he was the worse for drink, which was a mad thing."
"Oh, you thought that. Why so?"
"His feet seemed to reel from side to side--almost from under him."
"His feet--I see. From side to side.... Ever saw him the worse for drink
before?"
"Never in all my life! I was amazed. Afterwards I had a feeling that it
wasn't Mr. Osborne himself, but his spirit that I had seen. And it may
have been his spirit! For my Aunt Pruie saw the spirit of her boy one
Sunday afternoon when he was alive and well in his ship on the sea."
"But a spirit the worse for drink?" murmured Furneaux; "a spirit whose
feet seemed to reel?"
She dropped her eyes, and presently wept a theory.
"A spirit walks lighter-like than a Christian, sir."
"Did you, though," asked Furneaux, making shorthand signs in his
notebook, "did you have the impression that it might be a spirit at the
time, or was it only afterwards?"
"It was only afterwards when I thought matters over," said Mrs. Bates.
"Even at the time it crossed my mind that there was something in it I
didn't rightly understand."
"Now, what sort of something?--can't you say?"
"No, sir. I don't know."
"And when you saw Mr. Jenkins immediately afterwards, did you mention to
him that you had seen Mr. Osborne?"
"No, I didn't say anything to him, nor him to me."
"Pity.... But the hour. You have said, I hear, that it was five minutes
to eight. Now, the murder was committed between 7.30 and 7.45; and at
five to eight Mr. Osborne is said by more than one person to have been
at the Ritz Hotel. If he was there, he couldn't have been here. If he
was here, he couldn't have been there. Are you sure of the hour--five to
eight?"
As to that Mrs. Bates was positive. She had reason to remember, having
looked at the clock _à propos_ of the servants' supper. And Furneaux
went away from her with eyes in which sparkled a light that some might
have called wicked, and all would have called cruel, as when the cat
hears a stirring, and crouches at the hole's rim with her soul crowded
into an unblinking stare of expectation.
He looked at his watch, took a cab to Waterloo, and while in the vehicle
again studied that scrawled "Rosalind" on Osborne's letter to Janoc.
"A trip to Tormouth should throw some light on it," he thought. "If it
can be shown that he is actually in love--again--already----" and as he
so thought, the cab ran out of St. James's Street into Pall Mall.
"Look! quick! There--in that cab!" hissed a man at that moment to a girl
with whom he was lurking in a doorway deep under the shadow of an awning
near the corner. "Look!"
"That's him!"
"Sure? Look well!"
"The very man!"
"Well, of all the fatalities!"
The cab dashed out of sight, and the man--Chief Inspector
Winter--clapped his hand to his forehead in a spasm of sheer distraction
and dismay. The woman with him was the murdered actress's cook, Bertha
Seward, the same whom Inspector Clarke had one morning seen in earnest
talk with Janoc under the pawnbroker's sign in St. Martin's Lane.
Winter walked away from her, looking on the ground, seeking his lost
wits there. Then suddenly he turned and overtook her again.
"And you swear to me, Miss Seward," he said gravely, "that that very man
was with your mistress in her flat on the evening of the murder?"
"I would know him anywhere," answered the slight girl, looking up into
his face with her oblique Chinese eyes that were always half shut as if
shy of light. "I thought to myself at the time what a queer, perky
person he was, and what working eyes the little man had, and I wondered
who he could be. That's the very man in that cab, I'm positive."
"And when you and Pauline went out to the Exhibition you left him with
your mistress, you say?"
"Yes, sir. They were in the drawing-room together; and quarreling, too,
for her voice was raised, and she laughed twice in an angry way."
"Quarreling--in French? You didn't catch--?"
"No, it was in French."
Inspector Winter leant his shoulder against the house-wall, and his head
slowly sank, and then all at once dropped down with an air of utter
abandonment, for Furneaux was his friend--he had looked on Furneaux as a
brother.
Furneaux, meantime, at Waterloo was taking train to Tormouth, and his
fixed stare boded no good will to Rupert Osborne.
CHAPTER VII
AT TORMOUTH
Furneaux reached Tormouth about three in the afternoon, and went boldly
to the Swan Hotel, since he was unknown by sight to Osborne. It was an
old-fashioned place, with a bar opening out of the vestibule, and the
first person that met his eye was of interest to him--a man sitting in
the bar-parlor, who had "Neapolitan" written all over him--a face that
Furneaux had already marked in Soho. He did not know the stranger's
name, but he would have wagered a large sum that this queer visitor to
Tormouth was a bird of the Janoc flock.
"What is he doing here?" Furneaux asked himself; and the only answer
that suggested itself was: "Keeping an eye on Osborne. Perhaps that
explains how Janoc got hold of the name 'Glyn.'"
When he was left alone in the bedroom which he took, he sat with his two
hands between his knees, his head bent low, giving ten minutes' thought
by the clock to the subject of Anarchists. Presently his lips muttered:
"Clarke is investigating the murder on his own account; he suspects that
Anarchists were at the bottom of it; he has let them see that he
suspects; and they have taken alarm, knowing that their ill repute can't
bear any added load of suspicion. Probably she was more mixed up with
them than is known; probably there was some quarrel between them and
her; and so, seeing themselves suspected, they are uneasy. Hence Janoc
wrote to Osborne in Clarke's name, asking how much Osborne knew of her
connection with Anarchists. He must have managed somehow to have Osborne
shadowed down here--must be eager to have Osborne proved guilty. Hence,
perhaps, for some reason, the presence of that fellow below there in the
parlor. But I, for my part, mustn't allow myself to be drawn off into
proving _them_ guilty. Another, another, is my prey!"
He stood up sharply, crept to his door, and listened. All the upper part
of the house was as still as the tomb at that hour. Mr. Glyn--Osborne's
name on the hotel register--was, Furneaux had been told, out of doors.
He passed out into a corridor, and, though he did not know which was
Osborne's room, after peering through two doorways discovered it at the
third, seeing in it a cane with a stag's head which Osborne often
carried. He slipped within, and in a moment was everywhere at once in
the room, filling it with his presence, ransacking it with a hundred
eyes.
In one corner was an antiquated round table in mahogany, with a few
books on it, and under the books a copper-covered writing-pad. In the
writing-pad he found a letter--a long one, not yet finished, in
Osborne's hand, written to "My dear Isadore."
The first words on which Furneaux's eyes fell were "her unstudied
grace...."
... her walk has the undulating smoothness that one looks for in
some untamed creature of the wild.... You are a painter, and a
poet, and a student of the laws of Beauty. Well, knowing all
that, I still feel sure that you would be conscious of a certain
astonishment on seeing her move, she moves so well. I confess I
did not _know_, till I knew her, that our human flesh could
express such music. Her waist is small, yet so willowy and
sinuous that it cannot be trammeled in those unyielding ribs of
steel and bone in which women love to girdle themselves. For her
slimness she is tall, perhaps, what you might think a little too
tall until you stood by her side and saw that her freedom of
movement had deceived you. Nor is she what you would call _a
girl_: her age can't be a day under twenty-three. But she does
not make a motion of the foot that her waist does not answer to
it in as exact a proportion as though the Angel of Grace was
there with measuring-tape and rod. If her left foot moves, her
waist sways by so much to the left; if her right, she sways to
the right, as surely as a lily on a long stalk swings to the
will of every wanton wind. But, after all, words cannot express
the poetry of her being. With her every step, I am confident her
toe in gliding forward touches the ground steadily, but so
zephyr-lightly, that only a megaphone could report it to the
ear. And not only is there a distinct forward bend of the body
in walking, but with every step her whole being and soul
walks--the mere physical movements are the least of it! And her
walk, I repeat, has the security, the lissome elegance of a
leopard's--her eyes, her mouth, her hair, her neck, those of a
Naiad balanced on the crest of a curling wave....
"Ah-h-h!..." murmured Furneaux on a long-drawn breath, "'A Naiad'!
Something more fairy-like than Rose de Bercy!"
He read on.
Soon I shall see her dance--dance _with_ her! and then you shall
hear. There's a certain Lord Spelding a little way from here
whom I know through a local doctor, and he is giving a dance at
his Abbey two evenings hence--she and her mother are to be
there. She has promised me that she will dance, and I shall tell
you how. But I expect nothing one whit more consummate in the
way of charm from her dancing than from her ordinary motions. I
know beforehand that her dancing will be to her walking what the
singing of a lovely voice is to its talking--beauty moved to
enthusiasm, but no increase of beauty; the moon in a halo, but
still the moon. What, though, do you think of me in all this, my
dear Isadore? I have asked myself whether words like "fickle,"
"flighty," "forgetful," will not be in your mind as you read.
And if you are not tolerant, who will be? She, _the other_, is
hardly cold yet in her untimely tomb, and here am I ... shall I
say in love? say, at any rate, enraptured, down, down, on my two
bended knees. Certainly, the other was bitter to me--she
deceived, she pitilessly deceived; and I see now with the
clearest eyes that love was never the name of what I felt for
her, even if she had not deceived. But, oh, such a fountain of
pity is in me for her--untimely gone, cut off, the cup of life
in her hand, her lips purple with its wine--that I cannot help
reproaching this wandering of my eye from her. It is rather
shocking, rather horrible. And yet--I appeal to your sympathy--I
am no more master of myself in this than of something that is
now happening to the Emperor of China, or that once happened to
his grandfather.
The corners of Furneaux's lips turned downward, and a lambent fire
flamed in his eyes. He clutched the paper in his hand as if he would
strangle its dumb eloquence. Still he glowered at the letter, and read.
But imagine, meanwhile, my false position here! I am known to
her and to her mother as Mr. Glyn; and _thrice_ has Osborne, the
millionaire, the probable murderer of Rose de Bercy, been
discussed between us. Think of it!--the misery, the falseness of
it. If something were once to whisper to Mrs. Marsh, "this Mr.
Glyn, to whom you are speaking in a tone of chilly censure of
such men as Osborne, is _Osborne himself_; that translucent
porcelain of your teacup has been made impure by his lips; you
should smash your Venetian vases and Satsuma bowl of hollyhocks,
since his not-too-immaculate hands have touched them: beware! a
snake has stolen into your dainty and Puritan nest"--if some imp
of unhappiness whispered that, what would she do? I can't
exactly imagine those still lips uttering a scream, but I can
see her lily fingers--like lilies just getting withered--lifted
an instant in mild horror of the sacrilege! As it is, her
admittance of me into the nest has been an unbending on her
part, an unbending touched with informality, for it was only
brought about through Richards, the doctor here, to whom I got
Smythe, one of my bankers, who is likewise Richards' banker, to
speak of a "Mr. Glyn." And if she now finds that being gracious
to the stranger smirches her, compromises her in the slightest,
she will put her thin dry lips together a little, and say "I am
punished for my laxity in circumspection." And then, ah! no more
Rosalind for Osborne forever, if he were ten times ten
millionaires....
"'Rosalind,'" murmured Furneaux, "Rosalind Marsh. That explains the
scribble on the back of the Janoc letter. He calls her
Rosalind--breathes her name to the moon--writes it! We shall see,
though."
At that moment he heard a step outside, and stood alert, ready to hide
behind a curtain; but it was only some hurrying housemaid who passed
away. He then put back the letter where he had found it; and instantly
tackled Osborne's portmanteaux. The larger he found locked, the smaller,
lying half under the bed, was fastened with straps, but unlocked. He
quickly ransacked the knicknacks that it contained; and was soon holding
up to the light between thumb and finger a singular object taken from
the bottom of the bag--a scrap of lace about six inches long, half of it
stained with a brown smear that was obviously the smear of--blood.
It was a peculiar lace, Spanish hand-made, and Furneaux knew well, none
better than he, that the dressing-gown in which Rose de Bercy had been
murdered, which she had thrown on preparatory to dressing that night,
was trimmed with Spanish hand-made lace. He looked at this amazing bit
of evidence with a long interest there in the light from the window,
holding it away from him, frowning, thinking his own thoughts behind his
brow, as shadow chases shadow. And presently he muttered the peculiar
words:
"Now, any detective would swear that this was a clew against him."
He put it back into the bag, went out softly, walked downstairs, and
passed out into the little town. A policeman told him where the house of
Mrs. Marsh was to be found, and he hastened half a mile out of Tormouth
to it.
The house, "St. Briavels," stood on a hillside behind walls and
wrought-iron gates and leafage, through which peeped several gables rich
in creepers and ivy. Of Osborne, so far, there was no sign.
Furneaux retraced his steps, came back to Tormouth, sauntered beyond the
town over the cliffs, with the sea spread out in the sunlight, all
sparkling with far-flung sprightliness. And all at once he was aware of
a murmur of voices sounding out of Nowhere, like the hum of bumble-bees
on a slumbrous afternoon. The ear could not catch if they were right or
left, above or below. But they became louder; and suddenly there was a
laugh, a delicious low cadence of a woman's contralto that seemed to
roll up through an oboe in her throat. And now he realized that the
speakers were just below him on the sands. He stepped nearer the edge of
the cliff, and, craning and peering stealthily through its fringe of
grasses, saw Osborne and a lady walking westward over the sands.
Osborne was carrying an easel and a Japanese umbrella. He was not
looking where he was going, not seeing the sea, or the sands, or the
sun, but seeing all things in the lady's face.
Furneaux watched them till they were out of sight behind a bend of the
coast-line; he saw Osborne once stumble a little over a stone, and right
himself without glancing at what he had stumbled on, without taking his
gaze from the woman by his side.
A bitter groan hissed from Furneaux's lips.
"But how about this fair Rosalind?" he muttered half aloud. "Is this
well for _her_? She should at least be told who her suitor is--his
name--his true colors--the length and depth of his loves. There is a way
of stopping this...."
He walked straight back to the hotel, and at once took pen and paper to
write:
DEAR MISS PROUT:--It has occurred to me that possibly you may be
putting yourself to the pains of discovering for me the identity
of the friend of Mr. Osborne, the "Rosalind," as to whom I asked
you--in which case, to save you any trouble, I am writing to
tell you that I have now discovered who that lady is. I am, you
see, at present here in Tormouth, a very agreeable little place.
Yours truly,
C. E. FURNEAUX.
And, as he directed the envelope, he said to himself with a curious
crowing of triumph that Winter would have said was not to be expected
from his friend:
"This should bring her here; and if it does----!"
Whereupon a singular glitter appeared an instant in his eyes.
Having posted the letter, he told the young woman in the bar, who also
acted as bookkeeper, that, after all, he would not be able to stay the
night. He paid, nevertheless, for the room, and walked away with his
bag, no one knew whither, out of Tormouth. Two hours later he returned
to the hotel, and for the second time that day took the same room, but
not a soul suspected for a moment that it was the same Furneaux, since
at present he had the look of a meek old civil servant living on a mite
of pension, the color all washed out of his flabby cheeks and hanging
wrinkles.
His very suit-case now had a different physiognomy. He bargained
stingily for cheap terms, and then ensconced himself in his apartment
with a senile chuckle, rubbing his palms together with satisfaction at
having obtained such good quarters so cheaply.
The chambermaid, whom he had tipped well on leaving, sniffed at this new
visitor. "Not much to be got out of him," she said to her friend, the
boots.
The next afternoon at three o'clock an elderly lady arrived by the
London train at Tormouth, and she, too, came to put up at the Swan.
Furneaux, at the moment of her arrival, was strolling to and fro on the
pavement in front of the hotel, very shaky and old, a man with feeble
knees, threadbare coat, and shabby hat--so much so that the manager had
told the young person in the bar to be sure and send in an account on
Saturday.
Giving one near, clear, piercing glance into the newcomer's face, round
which trembled a colonnade of iron-gray ringlets, Furneaux was
satisfied.
"Marvelously well done!" he thought. "She has been on the stage in her
time, and to some purpose, too."
The lady, without a glance at him, all a rustle of brown silk, passed
into the hotel.
The same night the old skinflint and the lady of the iron-gray ringlets
found themselves alone at a table, eating of the same dishes. It was
impossible not to enter into conversation.
"Your first visit to Tormouth, I think?" began Furneaux.
The lady inclined her head.
"My name is Pugh, William Pugh," he told her. "I was in Tormouth some
years ago, and know the place rather well. Charming little spot! I shall
be most happy--if I may--if you will deign----"
"How long have you been here now?" she asked him in a rather mellow and
subdued voice.
"I only came yesterday," he answered.
"Did you by chance meet here a certain Mr. Furneaux?" she asked.
"Let me see," said he--"Furneaux. I--stay--I believe I did! He was just
departing at the time of my arrival--little man--sharp, unpleasant
face--I--I--hope I do not speak of a friend or relative!--but I believe
I did hear someone say 'Mr. Furneaux.'"
"At any rate, he is not here now?" she demanded, with an air of
decision.
"No, he is gone."
"Ah!" she murmured, and something in the tone of that "Ah!" made
Furneaux's eye linger doubtfully upon her an instant.
Then the elderly lady wished to know who else was in the hotel, if there
was anyone of any interest, and "Mr. Pugh" was apparently eager to
gossip.
"There is first of all a Mr. Glyn--a young man, an American, I think, of
whom I have heard a whisper that he is enormously wealthy."
"Is he in the room?"
"No."
"Why is he--invisible?"
"I am told that he has made friends in Tormouth with a lady--a Mrs.
Marsh--who resides at 'St. Briavels' some way out of town--not to
mention _Miss_ Marsh--Rosalind is her name--upon whom I hear he is more
than a little sweet."
He bent forward, shading his lips with his palm to conceal the secret as
it came out, and it was a strange thing that the newly-arrived visitor
could not keep her ringlets from shaking with agitation.
"Well," she managed to say, "when young people meet--it is the old
story. So he is probably at 'St. Briavels' now?"
"Highly probable--if all I hear be true."
The ringleted dame put her knife and fork together, rose, bowed with a
gracious smile, and walked away. Five minutes later Furneaux followed
her, went upstairs with soundless steps to his room, and within it stood
some time listening at a crevice he had left between the door and the
door-post.
Then he crept out, and spurting with swift suddenness, silent as a cat,
to Osborne's room, sent the door open with a rush, and instantly was
bowing profoundly, saying: "My dear madam! how _can_ you pardon me?"
For the lady was also in Osborne's room, as Furneaux had known; and
though there was no artificial light, enough moonlight flooded the room
to show that even through her elaborate make-up a pallor was suggested
in her face, as she stood there suspended, dumb.
Mr. Pugh seemed to be in a very pain of regret.
"I had no idea that it was your room!" he pleaded. "I--do forgive
me--but I took it for my own!"
Oddly enough, the lady tittered, almost hysterically, though she was
evidently much relieved to find who it was that had burst in so
unceremoniously.
"The same accident has happened to me!" she cried. "I took it to be my
room, but it doesn't seem----"
"Ah, then, we both.... By the way," he added, with a magnificent effort
to escape an embarrassing situation, "what beautiful moonlight! And the
Tormouth country under it is like a fairy place. It is a sin to be
indoors. I am going for a stroll. May I hope to have the pleasure----?"
He wrung his palms wheedlingly together, and his attitude showed that he
was hanging on her answer.
"Yes, I should like to take a walk--thank you," she answered. Together
they made for the door; he fluttered to his room, she to hers, to
prepare. Soon they were outside the hotel, walking slowly under the
moon. Apparently without definite directive, they turned up the hill in
the direction of "St. Briavels," nor was it many minutes before Mr. Pugh
began to prove himself somewhat of a gallant, and gifted in the saying
of those airy nothings which are supposed to be agreeable to the
feminine ear. The lady, for her part, was not so thorny and hard of
heart as one might have thought from the staidness of her air, and a
good understanding was quickly established between the oddly-assorted
pair.
"Rather an adventure, this, for people of our age...." she tittered, as
they began to climb the winding road.
"But, madam, we are not old!" exclaimed the lively Mr. Pugh, who might
be seventy from his decrepit semblance. "Look at that moon--are not our
hearts still sensible to its seductive influences? You, for your part,
may possibly be nearing that charming age of forty----"
"Oh, sir! you flatter me...."
"Madam, no, on my word!--not a day over forty would be given you by
anyone! And if you have the heart of twenty, as I am sure that you have,
what matters it if----"
"Hush!" she whispered, as a soft sound of the piano from "St. Briavels"
reached them.
Before them on the roadway they saw several carriages drawn up near the
great gates. The tinkle of the piano grew as they approached. Then they
saw a few lantern lights in the grounds glimmering under the trees. Such
signs spoke of a party in progress. For once, the English climate was
gracious to its dupes.
The lady, without saying anything to her companion, stepped into the
shadow of a yew-tree opposite the manor-close, and stood there, looking
into the grounds over the bars of a small gate, beyond which a path ran
through a shrubbery. On the path were three couples, ladies with light
scarves draped over their décolleté dresses, men, bare-headed and
smoking cigarettes. They were very dim to her vision, which must have
been well preserved for one of her age, despite Mr. Pugh's gallantry.
The overhanging foliage was dense, and only enough moonlight oozed
through the canopy of leaves to toss moving patterns on the lawn and
paths.
But the strange lady's eyes were now like gimlets, with the very fire of
youth burning in them, and it was with the sure fleetness of youth that
she suddenly ran in a moment of opportunity from the yew to the gate,
pushed it a little open, and slipped aside into a footpath that ran
parallel with the lawn on which the "St. Briavels" diners were now
strolling.
With equal suddenness, or equal disregard of appearance, Mr. Pugh, too,
became young again, as if both, like Philemon and Baucis, had all at
once quaffed the elixir of youth; and he was soon by the young-old
lady's side on the footpath. But her eyes, her ears, were so strained
toward the lawn before her, that she seemed not to be aware of his
presence.
"I did not guess that you were interested in the people here," he
whispered. "That man now coming nearer is Mr. Glyn himself, and with him
is Miss Rosalind Marsh."
"_Sh-h-h_," came from her lips, a murmur long-drawn, absent-minded, her
eyes peering keenly forward.
He nudged her.
"Is it fitting that we should be here? We place ourselves in a difficult
position, if seen."
"Sh-h-h-h-h...."
Still he pestered her.
"Really it is a blunder.... We--we become--eavesdroppers--! Let us--I
suggest to you----"
"Oh, _do_ keep quiet," she whispered irritably; and in that instant the
talk of Osborne and Rosalind became audible to her. She heard him say:
"Yes, I confess I have known Osborne, and I believe the man perfectly
incapable of the act attributed to him by a hasty public opinion."
"Intimately known him?"
Rosalind turned her eyebrows upward in the moonlight. Seen thus, she was
amazingly beautiful.
"Do we intimately know anyone? Do we intimately know ourselves?" asked
Osborne as he passed within five yards of the two on the path. "I think
I may say that I know Osborne about as well as I know anyone, and I am
confident that he is horribly misjudged. He is a young man of--yes, I
will say that for him--of good intentions; and he is found guilty,
without trial, of a wrong which he never could have committed--and the
wrong which he _has_ committed he is not found guilty of."
"What wrong?" asked Rosalind.
"I have heard--I know, in fact--that in the short time that has passed
since the murder of Miss de Bercy, Osborne, her acknowledged lover, has
allowed himself to love another."
Rosalind laughed, with the quiet amusement of well-bred indifference.
"What a weird person!" she said.
And as their words passed beyond hearing, a hiss, like a snake's in the
grass, rose from the shrubbery behind them, a hiss of venom intensely
low, and yet loud enough to be heard by Furneaux, who, standing a little
behind the lady of the ringlets, rubbed his hands together in silent and
almost mischievous self-congratulation.
The house end of the lawn was not far, the words of the returning pair
were soon again within earshot. The fiery glance of the watching woman,
ferreting, peering, dwelt on them--or rather on one of them, for she
gave no heed to Osborne at all. Her very soul was centered on Rosalind,
whose walk, whose lips, whose eyes, whose hair, whose voice, she ran
over and estimated as an expert accountant reckons up a column of
figures to ascertain their significance. She missed no item in that
calculation. She noted the over-skirt of Chantilly, the wrap of Venetian
lace on the girl's head, the white slippers, the roses disposed on her
corsage with the harmless vanity of the artist's skill, all these that
fixed stare ravenously devoured and digested while Rosalind took half a
dozen slow steps.
"But seriously," she heard Osborne say, "what is your opinion of a love
so apparently fickle and flighty as this of Osborne's?"
"Let me alone with your Osborne," Rosalind retorted with another little
laugh. "A person of such a mood is merely uninteresting, and below being
a topic. Let the dead lady's father or somebody horsewhip him--I cannot
care, I'm afraid. Let us talk about----"
"_Ourselves?_"
"'Ourselves and our king.'"
"I have so much to say about ourselves! Where should I begin? And now
that I have a few minutes, I am throwing them away. Do you know, I never
seem to secure you free from interruption. Either yourself or someone
else intervenes every time, and reduces me to silence and despair----"
Their words passed beyond earshot again in the other direction; and, as
the lawn was wide between house and screen of shrubbery on the road
front, it was some time before they were again heard. At last, though,
they came, and then Rosalind's low tone of earnestness showed that this
time, at least, Osborne had been listened to.
"I will, since you ask, since you wish"--her voice faltered--"to please
you. You will be at the Abbey to-morrow evening. And, since you say that
you so--desire it, I may then hear what you have to say. Now I'll go."
"But when--where----?"
"If the night is fine, I will stroll into the gardens during the
evening. You will see me when I go. On the south terrace of the Abbey
there is a sun-dial in the middle of a paved Italian garden. I'll pass
that way, and give you half an hour."
"Rosalind!"
"Ah, no--not yet."
Her lips sighed. She looked at him with a lingering tenderness
languishing in her eyes.
"Can I help it?" he murmured, and his voice quivered with passion.
"Are you glad now?"
"Glad!"
"Good-by."
She left him hurriedly and sped with inimitable grace of motion across
the lawn toward the house, and, while he looked after her, with the rapt
vision of a man who has communed with a spirit, the two listeners crept
to the little gate, slipped out when a laughing couple turned their
heads, and walked back to the hotel.
The lady said never a word. Mr. Pugh was full of chat and merriment, but
no syllable fell from her tight-pressed lips.
The next day the lady was reported to have a headache--at any rate she
kept to her room, and saw no one save the "boots" of the establishment,
with whom during the afternoon she had a lengthy interview upstairs. At
about seven in the evening she was writing these words:
MISS MARSH:--Are you aware that the "Mr. Glyn" whom you know
here is no other than Mr. Rupert Osborne, who is in everyone's
mouth in connection with the Feldisham Mansions Murder? You may
take this as a positive fact from
"ONE WHO KNOWS."
She wrote it in a handwriting that was very different from her own,
inclosed and directed it, and then, about half-past seven, sent for
"boots" again.
Her instructions were quite explicit:
"Wait in the paved rose garden at the Abbey, the square sunken place
with a sun-dial in the center," she said. "It is on the south terrace,
and the lady I have described will surely come. The moment she appears
hand the note to her, and be off--above all else, answer no questions."
So the youth, with a sovereign in his pocket, hurried away to do Hylda
Prout's will--or was it Furneaux's? Who might tell?
CHAPTER VIII
AT THE SUN-DIAL
The messenger of evil had waited twenty minutes by the side of the
sun-dial, when he saw a lady come round the corner from the front of the
house, and saunter towards him. Moonlight lay weltering on the white
walks of the terrace, on the whiter slabs of stone, on the water of the
basin, on the surface of the lake eastward where the lowest of the
terraces curved into the parkland that the wavelets lapped on. It
weltered, too, on the lady's hair, deftly coiled and twisted into the
coiffure of a Greek statue. It shimmered on the powdered blue of her
gown that made her coming a little ghostly in that light, on the rows of
pearls around her throat, and on the satin gloss of her shoes. She made
straight for the dial; and then, all at once, finding some unknown man
keeping the tryst, half halted.
He ran out to her, touched his cap, saying "Miss Marsh," handed her the
note, touched his cap again, and was going.
"From whom?" she called after him in some astonishment.
"Lady at the Swan, miss"--and he hurried off even more swiftly, for this
was a question which he had answered against orders.
She stood a little, looking at the envelope, her breathing labored, an
apprehension in her heart. Then, hearing the coming of footsteps which
she knew, she broke it open, and ran her eye over the few words.
Bending slightly, with the flood of the moon on the paper, she could
easily read the plainly written, message.
... The Mr. Glyn whom you know is no other than the Mr. Rupert
Osborne who is in everyone's mouth in connection with the
Feldisham Mansions Murder....
Now she laughed with a sudden catch of the breath, gasping "Oh!" with a
sharp impatience of all anonymous scandalizers. But as her head rather
swam and span, she walked on quickly to the basin, and there found it
necessary to sit down on the marble. The stab of pain passed in a few
seconds, and again she sprang up and laughed as lightly as one of the
little fountains in the basin that tossed its tinted drops to the
moonbeams.
Not twenty yards away was Osborne coming to her.
She looked at him steadily--her marvelous eyes self-searching for sure
remembrance of the earnestness with which he had pleaded in favor of the
lover of Rose de Bercy--how he had said that Osborne had already loved
again; and how she, Rosalind--oh, how blind and deaf!--heedlessly had
brushed aside his words, saying that a man of that mood was below being
a topic....
"Is it half an hour?" Osborne came whispering, with a bending of the
body that was like an act of worship.
She smiled. In the moonlight he could not perceive how ethereally white
was her face.
"It is one half-minute!... It was rather quixotic of you to have
proposed, and of me to have accepted, such a meeting. But I felt sure
that by this hour others would be strolling about the terraces. As it
is, you see, we are pioneers without followers. So, till we meet
again----"
She seemed to be about to hurry away without another word; he stood
aghast.
"But, Rosalind----"
"What? How dare you call me Rosalind?"
Now her eyes flashed upon him like sudden lightning from a dark blue
sky, and the scorn in her voice blighted him.
"I--I--don't understand," he stammered, trying to come nearer. She drew
her skirts aside with a disdain that was terrifying.
Then she laughed softly again; and was gone.
He looked after her as after treasure that one sees sinking into the
sea, flashing in its descent to the depths. For one mad instant he had
an impulse to run in vain pursuit, but instead he gave way, sank down
upon the edge of the marble basin, just where she had dropped a few
brief seconds earlier, covered his face, and a groan that was half a sob
broke so loudly from his throat that she heard it. She hesitated, nearly
stopped, did not look round, scourged herself into resolution, and in
another moment had turned the corner of the house and was lost to sight.
What had happened to change his Rosalind into this unapproachable
empress Osborne was too stunned to ask himself explicitly. He knew he
was banned, and that was enough. Deep in his subconsciousness he
understood that somehow she had found out his wretched secret--found out
that he was not the happy Glyn reeling through an insecure dream in
fairyland, but the unhappy Osborne, heavily tangled in the sordid and
the commonplace.
And, because he was unhappy and troubled, she left him without pity,
turned her back eternally upon him. That hurt. As he stood up to walk
away toward Tormouth, a fierce anger and a gush of self-pity battled in
his eyes.
He had no more hope. He wandered on through the night, unseeing,
stricken as never before. At last he reached the hotel, and, as soon as
he could summon the energy, began to pack his portmanteau to go back to
London. The day of the postponed inquest now loomed near, and he cared
not a jot what became of him, only asking dumbly to be taken far from
Tormouth.
As he was packing the smaller of the bags, he saw the scrap of
blood-stained lace that Furneaux had already seen, had taken out, and
had replaced. Osborne, with that same feeling of repulsion with which
Furneaux had thrust it away from him, held it up to the light. What was
it? How could it have got into his bag? he asked himself--a bit of lace
stained with blood! His amazement knew no bounds--and would have been
still more profound, if possible, had he seen Furneaux's singular act in
replacing it in the bag after finding it.
He threw the horrible thing from him out of the window, and his very
fingers tingled with disgust of it. But then came the disturbing
thought--suppose it had been put into his bag as a trap? by the police,
perhaps? And suppose any apparent eagerness of his to rid himself of it
should be regarded as compromising? He was beginning to be circumspect
now, timorous, ostentatious of that innocence in which a whole world
disbelieved.
So he glanced out of the window, saw where the lace had dropped upon a
sloping spread of turf in the hotel grounds, and ran down to get it.
When he arrived at the spot where he had just seen it, the lace had
disappeared.
He stood utterly mystified, looking down at the spot where the lace
should be and was not; then looked around in a maze, to discover on a
rustic seat that surrounded an oak tree an elderly lady and a bent old
man sitting there in the shadow. Some distance off, lounging among the
flower beds in the moonlight, was the figure of a tall man. Osborne was
about to inquire of the two nearest him if they had seen the lace, when
the old gentleman hurried nimbly forward out of the tree's shadow and
asked if he was seeking a piece of something that had dropped from
above.
"Yes," answered Osborne, "have you seen it?"
"That gentleman walking yonder was just under your window when it
dropped, and I saw him stoop to pick it up," said the other.
Osborne thanked him, and made for "the gentleman," who turned out to be
a jauntily-dressed Italian, bony-faced, square in the jaw, his hair
clipped convict-short, but dandily brushed up at the corner of the
forehead.
To the question: "Did you by chance pick up a bit of lace just now?" he
at once bowed, and showing his teeth in a grin, said:
"He dropped right to my feet from the sky; here he is"--and he presented
the lace with much ceremony.
"I am obliged," said Osborne.
"Do not say it," answered the other politely, and they parted, Osborne
hurrying back to his room, with the intent to catch a midnight train
from Tormouth.
As he entered the house again, the older man, incredibly quick on his
uncertain feet, overtook him, and, touching him on the arm, asked if he
intended to catch the train that night.
"That is my desire," answered Osborne.
"It is mine, too," said the other; "now, could you give me a seat in
your conveyance?"
Osborne said, "With pleasure," and they entered the hotel to prepare to
go.
At the same moment the Italian sauntered up to the oak tree beneath
which sat Hylda Prout in her Tormouth make-up. Seating himself without
seeking her permission, he lit a cigarette.
"Good-evening," he said, after enveloping himself in a cloud of smoke.
She did not answer, but evidently he was not one to be rebuffed.
"Your friend, Mistare Pooh, he is sharp! My! he see all," he said
affably.
This drew a reply.
"You are quite right," she said. "He sees all, or nearly all. Do you
mean because he saw you pick up the lace?"
"Now--how _you_ know it was _lace_?" asked the Italian, turning full
upon her. "You sitting here, you couldn't see it was lace so far--no
eyes could see that."
This frankness confused the lady a moment; then she laughed a little,
for he had supplied her with a retort.
"Perhaps I see all, too, like my friend."
There was a silence, but the Italian was apparently waiting only to
rehearse his English.
"You know Mr. Glyn--yes?" he said.
"No."
"Oh, don't say 'no'!" Reproach was in his ogle, his voice. His tone was
almost wheedling.
"Why not?"
"The way I find you spying after him this morning tell me that you know
him. And I know that you know him before that."
"What concern is it of _yours_?" she asked, looking at him with a
lowering of the lids in a quick scrutiny that was almost startled. "What
is _your_ interest in Mr. Glyn?"
"Say 'Osborne' and be done," he said.
"Well, say 'Osborne,'" she responded.
"Good. We are going to understand the one the other, I can see. But if
you want to know what is 'my interest' in the man, you on your part will
tell me first if you are friend or enemy of Osborne."
In one second she had reflected, and said: "Enemy."
His hand shot out in silence to her, and she shook it. The mere action
drew them closer on the seat.
"I believe you," he whispered, "and I knew it, too, for if you had been
a friend you would not be in a disguise from him."
"How do you know that I am in a disguise?"
"Since yesterday morning I know," he answered, "when I see you raise
your blind yonder, not an old woman, but a young and charming lady not
yet fully dressed, for I was here in the garden, looking out for what I
could see, and my poor heart was pierced by the vision at the window."
He pressed his palm dramatically on his breast.
"Yes, of course, it is on the left, as usual," said Hylda Prout saucily.
"But let us confine ourselves to business for the moment. I don't quite
understand your object. As to the bit of lace----"
"How you _know_ it was lace?"
She looked cautiously all round before answering. "I know because I
searched Mr. Osborne's room, and saw it."
"Good! Before long we understand the one the other. You be frank, I be
frank. You spied into the bag, and _I_ put it in the bag."
"I know you did."
"Now, how you know?"
"There was no one else to do it!"
"No? Might not Osborne put it there himself? You know where that bit of
lace come from?"
"I guess."
"What you guess?"
"I guess that it is from the dress of the dead actress, for it has blood
on it."
"You guess good--very good. And Osborne killed her--yes?"
She pondered a little. This attack had come on her from a moonlit sky.
"That I don't know. He may have, and he may not," she murmured.
"Which is more likely? That _he_ killed her, or that _I_ killed her?"
"I don't know. I should say it is more likely that you killed her."
"What! You pay me that compliment? Why so?"
"Well, you are in possession of a portion of the dress she wore when she
was killed, and you put it into someone's belongings to make it seem
that he killed her, an act which looks a little black against you."
"Ah, ma bella, now you jest," said the Italian, laughing. "The fact that
I am so frank with you as to say you all this is proof that I not kill
her."
"Yes, I see that," she agreed. "I was only joking. But since you did not
kill her, how on earth did you get hold of that piece of her dress?"
"That you are going to know when I have received better proof that you
are as much as I the enemy of Osborne. Did I not guess good, on seeing
you yesterday morning at the window, that you are the same young lady
who is Osborne's secretary in London, where I see you before?"
Hylda Prout admitted that she was the secretary.
"Good, then," said the Italian; "you staying in the house with him have
every opportunity to find proof of his guilt of the murder; until which
is proved, the necks of those I am working for are in danger."
With the impulsive gesture of his race he drew his forefinger in ghastly
mimicry across his throat.
"So bad as that?" asked the woman coolly. "Unfortunately, I don't know
who 'those' are you are working for. The----?"
"Yes."
"The Anarchists?"
"If you call them so."
"Did _they_ kill her?"
"Not they!"
"Did they intend to?"
"Not they!"
"Then, where did you get that bit of lace? And where is the dagger?"
"Dagger! What about dagger now?"
He asked it with a guilty start. At last the talk was taking a turn
which left Hylda Prout in command.
"If you have that lace, you have the dagger, too. And if you have the
dagger, what help do you want from me? Produce that, and Osborne is done
for."
Her voice sank to a whisper. If Furneaux could have been present he must
have felt proud of her.
"Dagger!" muttered the Italian again in a hushed tone. "You seem to know
much more----"
"Stay, let us get up and walk. It is not quite safe here.... There are
too many trees."
The man, who had lost his air of self-confidence, seemed to be unable to
decide what to do for the best. But Hylda Prout had risen, and he, too,
stood up. He was compelled to follow her. Together they passed through
the grounds toward the cliffs.
The same moonlight that saw them strolling there, saw at the same time
Furneaux and Osborne racing in a trap along the road to Sedgecombe
Junction to catch the late train on the main line. Furneaux was inclined
to be chatty, but Osborne answered only in monosyllables, till his
companion's talk turned upon the murder of the actress, when Osborne,
with a sudden access of fury, assured him in very emphatic language that
his ears were weary of that dreadful business, and prayed to be spared
it. The old gentleman seemed to be shocked, but Osborne only glanced at
his watch, muttering that they would have to be smart to catch the
train; and as he put back the watch in its pocket, the other dropped his
bag over the side of the vehicle.
There was nothing to be done but to stop, and the delinquent, with the
stiffness and slowness of age, descended to pick it up. Thus some
precious minutes were wasted. Furneaux, in fact, did not wish Osborne to
start for London that night at that late hour, since he wanted to
apprise Winter of Osborne's departure. Hence he had begged a seat in the
conveyance, and had already lost time at the hotel. A little later, when
Osborne again glanced at his watch, it was to say: "Oh, well, there is
no use in going on," and he called to the driver to turn back. Indeed,
the whistle of the departing train was heard at the station half a mile
away.
"Well, yes," said Furneaux, curiously pertinacious, when the dog-cart
was on the homeward road, "one is weary of hearing this murder
discussed. I only spoke of it to express to you my feeling of
disapproval of the lover--of the man Osborne. Is it credible to you that
he was not even at her funeral? No doubt he was advised not to be--no
doubt it was wise from a certain point of view. But _nothing_ should
have prevented him, if he had had any affection for her. But he had
none--he was a liar. Talk of her deceiving him! It was he--it was
_he_--who deceived her, I say!"
"Have a cigar," said Osborne, presenting his case; "these are rather
good ones; you will find them soothing."
His hospitality was declined, but there was no more talk, and the trap
trotted back into Tormouth.
Up at "St. Briavels" that same moment the same moonlight, shining on a
balcony, illumined yet another scene in the network of events. Rosalind
Marsh was sitting there alone, her head bent between her clenched hands.
She had returned home early from the Abbey, and Mrs. Marsh, who had
silently wondered, presently came out with the softness of a shadow upon
her, and touched her shoulder.
"What is the matter?" she asked in a murmur of sympathy.
"My head aches a little, mother dear."
"I am sorry. You look tired."
"Well, yes, dear. There are moments of infinite weariness in life. One
cannot avoid them."
"Did you dance?"
"Only a little."
"Weary of emotions, then?"
The old lady smiled faintly.
"Mother!" whispered Rosalind, and pressed her mother's hand to her
forehead.
There was silence for a while. When Mrs. Marsh spoke again it was to
change the subject.
"You have been too long at Tormouth this time. I think you need a
change. Suppose we took a little of London now? Society might brighten
you."
"Oh, yes! Let us go from this place!" said Rosalind under her breath,
her fingers tightly clenched together.
"Well, then, the sooner the better," said Mrs. Marsh. "Let it be
to-morrow."
Rosalind looked up with gratitude and the moonlight in her eyes.
"Thank you, dear one," she said. "You are always skilled in divining,
and never fail in being right."
And so it was done. The next forenoon saw the mother and daughter
driving in an open landau past the Swan to Tormouth station, and, as
they rolled by in state, Hylda Prout, who was peeping from a window
after the figure of Osborne on _his_ way to the station, saw them.
A glitter came into her eyes, and the unspoken thought was voiced in
eloquent gesture: "What, following him so soon?"--for she knew that they
could only be going by the London train, which had but one
stopping-place after Tormouth. At once she rushed in a frenzy of haste
to prepare to travel by that very train.
Some wild ringing of bells and promise of reward brought chambermaid and
"boots" to her aid.
In her descent to the office to pay her bill she was encountered by her
new friend, the Italian, who, surprised at her haste, said to her,
"What, you go?"--to which she, hardly stopping, answered: "Yes--we will
meet when we said--in two days' time."
"But me, too, I go," he cried, and ran to get ready, the antics of the
pair creating some stir of interest in the bar parlor.
At this time Furneaux was already at the station, awaiting the train,
having already wired to Winter in London to meet him at Waterloo. And so
the same train carried all their various thoughts and purposes and
secrets in its different compartments on the Londonward journey.
Furneaux, who chose to sit in the compartment with Rosalind and Mrs.
Marsh, listened to every sigh and syllable of Rosalind, and, with the
privilege of the aged, addressed some remarks to his fellow-travelers.
Hylda Prout and the Italian were together--a singular bond of intimacy
having suddenly forged itself between these two. They were alone, and
Hylda, who left Tormouth old and iron-gray, arrived at London red-headed
and young, freckle-splashed and pretty. But as for Osborne, he traveled
in the dull company of his black thoughts.
The first to alight at Waterloo, before the train stopped, was Furneaux.
His searching eyes at once discovered Winter waiting on the platform. In
a moment the Chief Inspector had a wizened old man at his ear, saying:
"Winter--I'm here. Came with the crowd."
"Hallo," said Winter, and from old-time habit of friendship his hand
half went out. Furneaux, however, seemed not to notice the action, and
Winter's hand drew back.
"Osborne is in the train," whispered Furneaux. "I telegraphed because
there is an object in his smaller bag that I want you to see--as a
witness, instantly. There he comes; ask him into the first-class
waiting-room. It is usually empty."
Furneaux himself went straight into the waiting-room and sat in a corner
behind a newspaper. Soon in came Winter, talking to Osborne with a
marked deference:
"You will forgive me, I am sure, for this apparent lack of confidence,
but in an affair of this sort one leaves no stone unturned."
"Do not mention it," said Osborne, who was rather pale. "I think I can
guess what it is that you wish to see...."
A porter, who had followed them, put the two portmanteaux on a table,
and went out. Osborne opened the smaller one, and Winter promptly had
the blood-stained bit of lace in his hand.
"What is it, sir?" asked Winter.
"Heaven knows," came the weary answer. "It was not in my possession when
I left London, and was put into one of my bags by someone at Tormouth.
When I found it, I threw it out of the window, as that gentleman there
can prove," for he had seen Furneaux, but was too jaded to give the
least thought to his unaccountable presence. "Afterwards I ran down and
recovered it. _He_ was in the garden...."
The unhappy young man's glance wandered out of the door to see Rosalind
and her mother go past towards a waiting cab. He cared not a jot if all
Scotland Yard were dogging his footsteps now.
"Is that so, sir?" asked Winter of Furneaux.
"Exactly as Mr. Glyn says," answered Furneaux, looking at them
furtively, and darting one very curious glance at Winter's face.
"And who, Mr.--Glyn, was about the place whom you could possibly suspect
of having placed this object in your bag--someone with a wicked motive
for throwing suspicion upon you?"
Winter's lips whitened and dwelt with venom upon the word "wicked."
"There was absolutely no one," answered Osborne. "The hotel was rather
empty. Of course, there was this gentleman----"
"Yes," said Winter after him, "this gentleman."
"An elderly lady, a Mrs. Forbes, I believe, as I happened to read her
name, a foreigner who probably never saw me before, an invalid girl and
her sister--all absolutely unconnected with me."
Furneaux's eyes were now glued on Winter's face. They seemed to have a
queer meaning in them, a meaning not wholly devoid of spite and malice.
"Well, Mr.--Glyn," said Winter, "let me tell you, if you do not know,
that this bit of lace was certainly part of the dress in which Miss de
Bercy was murdered. Therefore the man--or woman--who put it into your
bag was there--on the spot--when the deed was done."
Osborne did then exhibit some perplexed interest in a strange discovery.
"How can you be certain that it was part of her dress?" he asked.
"Because a fragment of lace of this size was torn from the wrap she was
wearing at the time of the murder--I noticed it at my first sight of the
body. This piece would just fit into it. So, whoever put it into your
bag----"
"In that case I may have put it in myself!" said Osborne with a nervous
laugh, "since I may be the murderer."
Apparently the careless comment annoyed Winter.
"I don't think I need detain you any longer, sir," he said coldly. "As
for the lace, I'll keep it. I feel very confident that this part of the
mystery will not baffle me for more than a day or two."
And ever the eyes of Furneaux dwelt upon Winter's face with that queer
meaning reveling in their underlook.
Osborne turned to go. He did not trouble to call another porter, but
carried his own luggage. He was about to enter a cab when he caught
sight of the back of a woman's head among the crowd hurrying to an exit,
a head which seemed singularly familiar to him. The next moment it was
gone from his sight, which was a pity, since the head belonged to Hylda
Prout, who had not anticipated that Osborne would be delayed on the
platform, and had had to steal past the waiting-room door at a rush,
since she was no longer an old lady, but herself. She could not wait in
the train till he was well away, for she thought it well to ascertain
the whereabouts of Rosalind Marsh in London, and wished to shadow her.
Mrs. Marsh and her daughter carried the usual mountain of ladies'
luggage, which demanded time and care in stowing safely on the roof of a
four-wheeler, so Hylda Prout was in time to call a hansom and follow
them. After her went the Italian, who made off hastily when the train
arrived, but lurked about until he could follow the girl unseen, for she
had frightened him.
Now, at the station that day, keeping well in the background, was a
third detective beside Winter and Furneaux.
Clarke, with his interest in Anarchists, knew that this particular
Italian was coming from Tormouth either that day or the day after. Two
nights before, while on a visit to the Fraternal Club in Soho, he had
overheard the whispered word that "Antonio" would "be back" on the
Wednesday or the Thursday.
Clarke did not know Antonio's particular retreat in London, and had
strong reasons for wishing to know it. He, therefore, followed in a cab
the cab that followed Rosalind's cab. In any other city in the world
than London such a procession would excite comment--if it passed through
street after street, that is. But not so in cab-using London, where a
string of a hundred taxis, hansoms, and four-wheelers may all be going
in the same direction simultaneously.
As Clarke went westward down the Strand and across Trafalgar Square, he
was full of meditations.
"What is Antonio doing with Osborne's lady secretary?" he asked himself.
"For that is the young woman he is after, I'll swear. By Jove, there's
more in this tangle than meets the eye. It's a case for keeping both
eyes, and a third, if I had it, wide, wide open!"
Rosalind's and Mrs. Marsh's cab drew up before a house in Porchester
Gardens. As they got out and went up the steps, the cabs containing
Antonio and Hylda Prout almost stopped, but each went on again.
"Now, what in the world is the matter?" mused Clarke. "Why are those two
shadowing a couple of ladies, and sneaking on each other as well?"
He told his own driver to pass the house slowly, as he wished to note
its number, and the vehicle was exactly opposite the front door when it
was opened by a girl with a cap on her head to let in Mrs. Marsh and
Rosalind; Clarke's eye rested on her, and lit with a strange fire. A cry
of discovery leapt to his lips, but was not uttered. A moment after the
door had closed upon the two travelers, Clarke's hand was at the
trap-door in the roof of the hansom, and, careless whether or not he was
seen, he leaped out, ran up the steps, and rang.
A moment more and the door was opened to him by the same girl, whom he
had recognized instantly as Pauline Dessaulx, the late lady's-maid of
Rose de Bercy--a girl for whom he had ransacked London in vain. And not
he alone, for Pauline had very effectively buried herself from the
afternoon after the murder, when Clarke had seen her once, and she him,
to this moment. And there now they stood, Clarke and Pauline, face to
face.
He, for his part, never saw such a change in a human countenance as now
took place in this girl's. Her pretty brown cheeks at once, as her eyes
fell on him, assumed the whiteness of death itself. Her lips, the very
rims of her eyelids even, looked ghastly. She seemed to be on the verge
of collapse, and her whole frame trembled in an agony of fear. Why? What
caused these deadly tremors? Instantly Clarke saw guilt in this excess
of emotion, and by one of those inspirations vouchsafed sometimes even
to men of his coarse fiber he did the cleverest act of his life.
Putting out his hand, he said quietly, but roughly:
"Come now, no nonsense! Give it to me!"
What "it" meant he himself had no more notion than the man in the moon.
His real motive was to set the terrified girl speaking, and thus lead
her on to yield some chance clew on which his wits might work. But at
once, like one hypnotized, Pauline Dessaulx, still keeping her eyes
fixed on his face, slowly moved her right hand to a pocket, slowly drew
out a little book, and slowly handed it to him.
"All right--you are wise," he said. "I'll see you again." The door
slammed, and he ran down the steps, his blood tingling with the sense
that he had blundered upon some tremendous discovery.
Nor was he far wrong. When in the cab he opened the book, he saw it was
Rose de Bercy's diary. He did not know her handwriting, but he happened
to open the book at the last written page, and the very first words his
staring eyes devoured were these:
If I am killed this night, it will be by ---- or by C. E. F.
Where the blank occurred it was evident that some name had been written,
and heavily scratched through with pen and ink.
But the alternative suggested by the initials! C. E. F.! How grotesque,
how exquisitely ludicrous! Clarke, gazing at the enigma, was suddenly
shaken with a spasm of hysterical laughter.
CHAPTER IX
THE LETTER
Two days later, not Britain alone, but no small part of the two
hemispheres, was stirred to the depths by the adjourned inquest on the
Feldisham Mansions crime. Nevertheless, though there were sensations in
plenty, the public felt vaguely a sense of incompleteness in the
process, and of dissatisfaction with the result. The police seemed to be
both unready and unconvinced; no one was quite sincere in anything that
was said; the authorities were swayed by some afterthought; in popular
phrase, they appeared "to have something up their sleeve."
Furneaux, this time, figured for the police; but Winter, too, was there
unobtrusively; and, behind, hidden away as a mere spectator, was Clarke,
smiling the smile that knows more than all the world, his hard mouth set
in fixed lines like carved wood.
As against Osborne the inquiry went hard. More and more the hearts of
the witnesses and jury grew hot against him, and, by a kind of electric
sympathy, the blood of the crowd which gathered outside the court caught
the fever and became inflamed with its own rage, lashing itself to a
fury with coarse jibes and bitter revilings.
Furneaux, bringing forth and marshaling evidence on evidence against
Osborne, let his eye light often on Winter; then he would look away
hastily as though he feared his face might betray his thoughts.
In that small head of his were working more, by far more, secret things,
dark intents, unspoken mazy purposes, than in all the heads put together
in the busy court. He was pale, too, but his pallor was nothing compared
with the marble forehead of Winter, whose eyes were nailed to the
ground, and whose forehead was knit in a frown grim and hard as rock.
It was rarely that he so much as glanced up from the reverie of
pitch-black doubts weltering through his brain like some maelstrom
drowned in midnight. Once he glanced keenly upon William Campbell, the
taxicab driver, who kept twirling his motor-cap round and round on his
finger until an irritated coroner protested; once again did he glance at
Mrs. Bates, housekeeper, and at the fountain of tears that flowed from
her eyes.
Campbell was asked to pick out the man whom he had driven from Berkeley
Street to Feldisham Mansions, if he saw him in court. He pointed
straight at Osborne.
"You will swear that that is the man?" he was asked.
"No, not swear," he said, and looked round defiantly, as if he knew that
most of those present were almost disappointed with his non-committal
answer.
"Just think--look at him well," said the Treasury representative, as
Osborne stood up to confront the driver with his pale face.
"That gentleman is like him--very like him--that's all I'll swear to.
His manner of dress, his stand, his height, yes, and his face, his
mustache, the chin, the few hairs there between the eyebrows--remarkably
like, sir--for I recollect the man well enough. It may have been his
double, but I'm not here to swear positively it was Mr. Osborne, because
I'm not sure."
"We will take it, then, that, assuming there were two men, the one was
so much like the other that you swear it was either Mr. Osborne or his
double?" the coroner said.
"Well, I'll go so far as that, sir," agreed Campbell, and, at this
admission, Furneaux glanced at a veiled figure that sat among the
witnesses at the back of the court.
He knew that Rosalind Marsh was present, and his expression softened a
little. Then he looked at another veiled woman--Hylda Prout--and saw
that her eyes were fastened, not on the witness, but ever on Rosalind
Marsh, as though there was no object, no interest, in the room but that
one black-clothed figure of Rosalind.
Campbell's memory of the drive was ransacked, and turned inside out, and
thrashed and tormented by one and another to weariness; and then it was
the turn of Hester Bates, all tears, to tell how she had seen someone
like unto Osborne on the stairs at five to eight, whose feet seemed to
reel like a drunken man's, and who afterwards impressed her, when she
thought of it, as a shape rather of limbo and spirit-land than of
Mayfair and everyday life.
Then the flint ax-head, or celt, was presented to the court, and Hylda
Prout was called to give evidence against her employer. She told how she
had missed an ax-head from the museum, and also a Saracen dagger, but
whether this was the very ax-head that was missing she could not say. It
was very like it--that was all--and even Osborne showed his amaze at her
collectedness, her calm indifference to many eyes.
"May I not be allowed to examine it?" he asked his solicitor.
"Why not?" said the coroner, and there was a tense moment when the celt
was handed him.
He bent over it two seconds, and then said quietly: "This is certainly
one of my collection of flints!"
His solicitor, taken quite aback, muttered an angry protest, and a queer
murmur made itself felt. Osborne heard both the lawyer's words and the
subdued "Ah!" of the others echoing in his aching heart. By this time he
was as inwardly sensitive to the opinion of the mob as a wretch in the
hands of inquisitors to the whim and humors of his torturers.
"That evidence will be taken on oath in due course," said the coroner,
dryly official, and the examination of Miss Prout went on after the
incident.
"And now as to the dagger," resumed the Treasury solicitor, "tell us of
that."
She described it, its shape, the blunt edges of the long and pointed
blade, the handle, the label on it with the date. It was Saracen, and
it, too, like the celt, had once been used, in all probability, in the
hands of wild men in shedding blood.
"And you are sure of the date when you first missed it from its place in
the museum?"
"It was on the third day after the murder"--and Hylda Prout's glance
traveled for an instant to the veiled, bent head of Rosalind, as it
seemed to droop lower after every answer that she gave.
"And you are unable to conceive how both the dagger and the celt could
have vanished from their places about that time?"
"Yes, I conceive that they were stolen," she said--"unless Mr. Osborne
made them a present to some friend, for I have known him to do that."
"'Stolen,' you say," the Treasury man remarked. "But you have no grounds
for such a belief? You suggest no motive for a thief to steal these two
objects and no other from the museum? You know of no one who entered the
room during those days?"
"No, I know of no one--except Inspector Furneaux, who seems to have
entered it about six o'clock on the evening of the murder."
The coroner looked up sharply from his notes. This was news to the
court.
"Oh?" said the examiner. "Let us hear how that came about."
She explained that Furneaux had called to see Mr. Osborne, and, while
awaiting his coming in the library, had apparently strolled into the
museum. Jenkins, Mr. Osborne's valet, was her informant. It was not
evidence, but the statement was out before the court well knew where it
was leading. Winter's lip quivered with suppressed agitation, and over
Clarke's face came a strange expression of amazement, a stare of utter
wonderment widening his eyes, as when one has been violently struck, and
knows not by what or whom.
When Hylda Prout stepped down, the coroner invited the officer in charge
of the case to explain the curious bit of intelligence given by the last
witness.
Furneaux, not one whit disturbed in manner, rose to give his evidence of
the incident. Oddly enough, his eyes dwelt all the time, with a dull
deadness of expression in them, upon the lowered face of Winter.
It was true, he told the court, that he had called upon Mr. Osborne that
evening; it was true that he was asked to wait; and he seemed to
remember now that he _had_ wandered through a doorway into a room full
of curios to have a look at them in those idle moments.
"So you knew Mr. Osborne _before_ the murder?" inquired the court.
"Yes. I knew him very well by sight and repute, as a man about town,
though not to speak to."
"And what was the nature of the business on which you called to see
him?"
"It was a purely personal matter."
The coroner paused, with the air of a man who suddenly discovers a
morass where he imagined there was a clear road.
"And did you see Mr. Osborne that evening?" he asked at length.
"No, sir. After I had waited some time the valet entered and told me
that Mr. Osborne had just telephoned to say that he would not be home
before dinner. So I came away."
"Have you spoken to Mr. Osborne _since_ then about the matter on which
you called to see him that evening?"
"No, sir."
"Why not?"
"Because after that evening there was no longer any need!"
Well, to the more experienced officials in court this explanation had an
unusual sound, but to Winter, who slowly but surely was gathering the
threads of the murder in the flat into his hands, it sounded like a
sentence of death; and to Clarke, too, who had in his possession Rose de
Bercy's diary taken from Pauline Dessaulx, it sounded so amazing, that
he could scarce believe his ears.
However, the coroner nodded to Furneaux, and Furneaux turned to
Osborne's solicitor, who suddenly resolved to ask no questions, so the
dapper little man seated himself again at the table--much to the relief
of the jury, who were impatient of any red herring drawn across the
trail of evidence that led unmistakably to the millionaire.
Then, at last, appeared six witnesses who spoke, no longer against, but
for Osborne. Four were International polo-players, and two were waiters
at the Ritz Hotel, and all were positive that at the hour when Mrs.
Bates saw her employer at home, _they_ saw him elsewhere--or some among
them saw him, and the others, without seeing him, knew that he was
elsewhere.
Against this unassailable testimony was the obviously honest cabman, and
Osborne's own housekeeper: and the jury, level-headed men, fully
inclined to be just, though perhaps, in this instance, passionate and
prejudiced, weighed it in their hearts.
But Furneaux, to suit his own purposes, had contrived that the tag of
lace should come last; and with its mute appeal for vengeance everything
in favor of Osborne was swept out of the bosom of His Majesty's lieges,
and only wrath and abhorrence raged there.
Why, if he had actually killed Rose de Bercy, Osborne should carry about
that incriminating bit of lace in his bag, no one seemed to stop to ask;
but when the dreadful thing was held up before his eyes, the twelve good
men and true looked at it and at each other, and a sort of shuddering
abhorrence pervaded the court.
Even the Italian Antonio, who had contrived to be present as
representing some obscure paper in Paris--the very man who had put the
lace into the bag--shook his head over Osborne's guilt, being, as it
were, carried out of himself by the vigor and rush of the mental
hurricane which swept around him!
When Osborne, put into the box, repeated that the "celt" was really his,
this candor now won no sympathy. When he said solemnly that the bit of
lace had been secreted among his belongings by some unknown hand, the
small company of men present in court despised him for so childish a
lie.
His spirit, as he stood in that box, exposed to the animus of so many
spirits, felt as if it was being hurried by a kind of magnetic gale to
destruction; his fingers, his knees shivered, his voice cracked in his
throat; he could not keep his eyes from being wild, his skin from being
white, and in his heart his own stupefied conscience accused him of the
sin that his brothers charged him with.
Though the jury soon ascertained from the coroner's injunctions what
their verdict had to be, they still took twenty minutes to think of it.
However, they knew well that the coroner had spoken to them under the
suggestion of the police, who, no doubt, would conduct their own
business best; so in the end they came in with the verdict of "willful
murder committed by some person or persons unknown."
And now it was the turn of the mob to have their say. The vast crowd was
kept in leash until they were vouchsafed just a glimpse of Osborne, in
the midst of a mass of police guarding him, as he emerged from the court
to his automobile. Then suddenly, as it were, the hoarse bellow of the
storm opened to roar him out of the universe--an overpowering load of
sound for one frail heart to bear without quailing.
But if Osborne's heart quailed, there was one heart there that did not
quail, one smooth forehead that suddenly flushed and frowned in
opposition to a world's current, and dared to think and feel alone.
As the mob yelped its execration, Rosalind Marsh cried a protest of
"Shame, oh, shame!"
For now her woman's bosom smote her with ruth, and her compassion
championed him, believed in him, refused to admit that he could have
been so base. If she had been near him she would have raised her veil,
and gazed into his face with a steady smile!
As she was about to enter the carriage that awaited her, someone said
close behind her:
"Miss Marsh."
She looked round and saw a small man.
"You know me," he said--"Inspector Furneaux. We have even met and spoken
together before--you remember the old man who traveled with you in the
train from Tormouth? That was myself in another aspect."
His eyes smiled, though his voice was respectful, but Rosalind gave him
the barest inch of condescension in a nod.
"Now, I wish to speak to you," he muttered hurriedly. "I cannot say when
exactly--I am very occupied just now--but soon.... To speak to you, I
think, in your own interests--if I may. But I do not know your address."
Very coldly, hardly caring to try and understand his motive, she
mentioned the house in Porchester Gardens. In another moment she was in
her carriage.
When she reached home she saw in her mother's face just a shadow of
inquiry as to where she had been driving during the forenoon; but
Rosalind said not a word of the inquest. She was, indeed, very silent
during the whole of that day and the next. She was restless and woefully
uneasy. Through the night her head was full of strange thoughts, and she
slept but little, in fitful moments of weariness. Her mother observed
her with a quiet eye, pondering this unwonted distress in her heart, but
said nothing.
On the third morning Rosalind was sitting in a rocking-chair, her head
laid on the back, her eyes closed; and with a motion corresponding with
the gentle to-and-fro motion of the chair her head moved wearily from
side to side. This went on for some time; till suddenly she brought her
hand to her forehead in a rather excited gesture, her eyes opened with
the weak look of eyes dazzled with light, and she said aloud:
"Oh, I _must_!..."
Now she sprang up in a hurry, hastened to an escritoire, and dashed off
a letter in a very scamper of haste.
At last, then, the floods had broken their gates, for this is what she
wrote:
My dear, my dear, I was brutal to you that night at the
sun-dial. But it was necessary, if I was to maintain the
severity which I felt that your lack of frankness to me
deserved. Inwardly there was a terribly weak spot, of which I
was afraid; and if you had come after me when I left you, and
had commanded me, or prayed me, or touched me, no doubt it would
have been all up with me. Forgive me, then, if I seemed over
harsh where, I'm afraid, I am disposed to be rather too
infinitely lenient. At present, you see, I quite lack the
self-restraint to keep from telling you that I am sorry for
you.... I was present at the inquest.... Pity is like lightning;
it fills, it burns up, it enlightens ... see me here struck with
it!... You are not without a friend, one who knows you, judges
you, and acquits you.... If you want to come to me, come!... I
once thought well of a Mr. Glyn, but, like a flirt, will forget
him, if Osborne is of the same manner, speaks with the same
voice.... My mother is usually good to me....
She enclosed it in a flurry of excitement, ran to the bell-rope, rang,
and while waiting for a servant held the envelope in the manner of one
who is on the very point of tearing a paper in two, but halts to see on
which cheek the wind will hit. In the midst of this suspense of
indecision the door opened; and now, straightway, she hastened to it,
and got rid of the letter, saying rapidly in a dropped voice,
confidentially:
"Pauline, put that in the pillar-box at once for me, will you?"
Another moment and she stood alone there, with a shocked and beating
heart, the deed done, past recall now.
As for Pauline Dessaulx, she was half-way down the stairs when she
chanced to look at the envelope. "Rupert Osborne, Esq." She started!
Everything connected with that name was of infinite interest to her! But
she had not dreamt that Miss Marsh knew it, save as everyone else knew
it now, from public gossip and the papers.
She had never seen Rosalind Marsh, or her mother, till the day of their
arrival from the country. It was but ten days earlier that she had
become the servant of a Mrs. Prawser, a friend of Mrs. Marsh's, who kept
a private boarding-house, being in reduced circumstances. Then, after
but an interval of peace and security, the Marshes had come, and as she
let them in, and they were being embraced by Mrs. Prawser, Inspector
Clarke had appeared at the door, nearly striking her dead with
agitation, and demanding of her the diary, which she had handed him.
Luckily, luckily, she had been wise enough before that to scratch out
with many thick scratches of the pen the name that had been written by
the actress before the initials C. E. F. in that passage where the words
appeared: "If I am killed this night it will be by ---- or by C. E. F."
But suppose she had not shown such sense and daring, what then? She
shivered at the thought.
And a new problem now tortured her. Was it somehow owing to the fact
that Miss Marsh knew Osborne that Inspector Clarke had come upon her at
the moment of the two ladies' arrival? What was the relation between
Miss Marsh and Osborne? What was in this letter? It might be well to
see....
Undecided, Pauline stood on the stairs some seconds, letter in hand, all
the high color fled from lips and cheeks, her breast rising and falling,
no mere housemaid now, but a figure of anguish fit for an artist to
sketch there in her suspense, a well-molded girl of perfect curves and
graceful poise.
Then it struck her that Miss Marsh might be looking out of the window to
watch her hurrying with the letter to the pillar-box a little way down
the street, and at this thought she ran downstairs and out, hurried to
the pillar-box, raised her arm with the letter, inserted it in the slot,
drew it out swiftly and hiddenly again, slipped it into her pocket, and
sped back to the house.
In her rooms half an hour later she steamed the envelope open, and read
the avowal of another woman's passion and sympathy. It appeared, then,
that Miss Marsh was now in love with Osborne? Well, that did not
specially interest or concern her, Pauline. It was a good thing that
Osborne had so soon forgotten _cette salope_, Rose de Bercy. She,
Pauline, had conceived a fondness for Miss Marsh; she had detested her
mistress, the dead actress. At the first chance she crept afresh into
the street, and posted the letter in grim earnest. But an hour had been
lost, an hour that meant a great deal in the workings of this tragedy of
real life and, as a minor happening, some of the gum was dissolved off
the flap of the envelope.
Inspector Furneaux, as he had promised after the inquest, called upon
Rosalind during the afternoon. They had an interview of some length in
Mrs. Prawser's drawing-room, which was otherwise untenanted. Furneaux
spoke of the picturesqueness of Tormouth, but Rosalind's downright
questioning forced him to speak of himself in the part of the decrepit
Mr. Pugh, and why he had been there as such. He had gone to have a look
at Osborne.
"Is his every step, then, spied on in this fashion?" asked Rosalind.
"No," answered Furneaux. "The truth is that I had had reason to think
that the man was again playing the lover in that quarter----"
"Ah, playing," said Rosalind with quick sarcasm. "It is an insipid
phrase for so serious an occupation. But what reason had you for
thinking that he was playing in that particular mood?"
"The reason is immaterial.... In fact, he had impressed on the back of a
letter a name--I may tell you it was 'Rosalind'--and sent it off
inadvertently----"
"Oh, poor fellow! Not so skilled a villain then, after all," she
murmured.
"But the point was that, if this was so, it was clear to me that he
could not be much good--I speak frankly----"
"Very, sir."
"And with a good meaning to _you_."
"Let us take it at that. It makes matters easier."
"Well, as I suspected, so I found. And--I was disgusted. I give you my
assurance that he had professed to Mademoiselle de Bercy that he--loved
her. He had, he had! And she, so pitifully handled, so butchered, was
hardly yet cold in her grave. Even assuming his perfect innocence in
that horrible drama, still, I must confess, I--I--was disgusted; I was
put against the man forever. And I was more than disgusted with him, I
was concerned for the lady whose inclinations such a weather-vane might
win. I was concerned before I saw you; I was ten times more concerned
afterwards. I travelled to town in the same compartment as you--I heard
your voice--I enjoyed the privilege of breathing the same air as you and
your charming mother. Hence--I am here."
Rosalind smiled. She found the detective's compliments almost
nauseating, but she must ascertain his object.
"Why, precisely?" she asked.
"I want to warn you. I had warned you before: for I had given a certain
girl whose love Mr. Osborne has inspired a hint of what was going on,
and I felt sure that she would not fail to tell you who 'Mr. Glyn' was.
Was I not right?"
Rosalind bent her head a little under this unexpected thrust.
"I received a note," she said. "Who, then, is this 'certain girl, whose
love Mr. Osborne has inspired,' if one may ask?"
"I may tell you--in confidence. Her name is Prout. She is his
secretary."
"He is--successful in that way," observed Rosalind coldly, looking down
at a spray of flowers pinned to her breast.
"Too much so, Miss Marsh. Now, I felt confident that the warning given
by Miss Prout would effectually quash any friendship between a lady of
your pride and quality and Mr. Glyn--Osborne. But then, through your
thick veil I noticed you at the inquest: and I said to myself, 'I am
older than she is--I'll speak to her in the tone of an old and
experienced man, if she will let me.'"
"You see, I let you. I even thank you. But then you notice that Mr.
Osborne is just now vilified and friendless."
"Oh, there is his Miss Prout."
Rosalind's neck stiffened a little.
"That is indefinite," she said. "I know nothing of this lady, except
that, as you tell me, she is ready to betray her employer to serve her
own ends. Mr. Osborne is my friend: it is my duty to refuse to credit
vague statements made against him. It is not possible--it cannot be----"
She stopped, rather in confusion. Furneaux believed he could guess what
she meant to say.
"It _is_ possible, believe me," he broke in earnestly. "Since it was
possible, as you know, for him to turn his mind so easily from the dead,
it is also possible----"
"Oh, the dead deceived him!" she protested with a lively flush. "The
dead was unworthy of him. He never loved her."
"_He_ deceived _her_," cried Furneaux also in an unaccountable heat--"he
deceived her. No doubt she was as fully worthy of him as he of her--it
was a pair of them. And he loved her as much as he can love anyone."
"Women are said to be the best judges in such matters, Inspector
Furneaux."
"So, then, you will not be guided by me in this?" Furneaux said,
standing up.
"No. Nevertheless, I thank you for your apparent good intent," answered
Rosalind.
He was silent a little while, looking down at her. On her part, she did
not move, and kept her eyes studiously averted.
"Then, for your sake, and to spite him, I accuse him to you of the
murder!" he almost hissed.
She smiled.
"That is very wrong of you, very unlike an officer of the law. You know
that he is quite innocent of it."
"Great, indeed, is your faith!" came the taunt. "Well, then," he added
suddenly, "again for your sake, and again to spite him, I will even let
you into a police secret. Hear it--listen to it--yesterday, with a
search-warrant, I raided Mr. Osborne's private apartments. And this is
what I found--at the bottom of a trunk a suit of clothes, the very
clothes which the driver of the taxicab described as those of the man
whom he took from Berkeley Street to Feldisham Mansions on the night of
the murder. And those clothes, now in the possession of the police, are
all speckled and spotted with blood. Come, Miss Marsh--what do you say
now? Is your trust weakened?"
Furneaux's eyes sparkled with a glint of real hatred of Osborne, but
Rosalind saw nothing of that. She rose, took an unsteady step or two,
and stared through the window out into the street. Then she heard the
door of the room being opened. She turned at once. Before a word could
escape her lips, Furneaux was gone.
One minute later, she was scribbling with furious speed:
Do not read my letter. I will call for it--unopened--in person.
ROSALIND MARSH.
She tugged at the bell-rope. When Pauline appeared, she whispered:
"Quickly, Pauline, for my sake--this telegram." And as Pauline ran with
it, she sank into a chair, and sat there with closed eyelids and
trembling lips, sorely stricken in her pride, yet even more sorely in
her heart.
Now, if her letter had gone by the post by which she had sent it,
Osborne would have read it two hours or more before the telegram
arrived. But it had been kept back by Pauline: and, as it was, the
letter only arrived five minutes before the telegram.
At that moment Osborne was upstairs in his house. The letter was handed
to Hylda Prout in the library. She looked at it, and knew the writing,
for she had found in Osborne's room at Tormouth a note of invitation to
luncheon from Rosalind to Osborne, and did not scruple to steal it. A
flood of jealousy now stabbed her heart and inflamed her eyes. It was
then near five in the afternoon, and she had on a silver tripod a kettle
simmering for tea, for she was a woman of fads, and held that the
servants of the establishment brewed poison. She quickly steamed open
the letter--which had been already steamed open by Pauline--and, every
second expecting Osborne to enter, ran her eye through it. Then she
pressed down the flap of the envelope anew.
Two minutes afterwards Rupert made his appearance, and she handed him
the letter.
He started! He stared at it, his face at one instant pale, at the next
crimson. And as he so stood, flurried, glad, agitated, there entered
Jenkins with a telegram on a salver.
"What is it?" muttered Osborne with a gesture of irritation, for he was
not quite master of himself in these days. Nevertheless, to get the
telegram off his mind at once before rushing upstairs to read the letter
in solitude, he snatched at it, tore it open, and ran his eye over it.
"Do not read my letter. I will call for it _unopened_...."
He let his two hands drop in a palsy of anger, the letter in one, the
telegram in the other--bitter disappointment in his heart, a wild
longing, a mad temptation....
He lifted the letter to allow his gaze to linger futilely upon it, like
Tantalus.... In spite of his agitation he could not fail to see that the
envelope was actually open, for, as a matter of fact, the gum had nearly
all been steamed away....
It was open! He had but to put in his finger and draw it out, and read,
and revel, like the parched traveler at the solitary well in the desert.
Would that be dishonest? Who could blame him for that? He had not opened
the envelope....
"Miss Prout, just give me the gum-pot," he said, for he could see that
the gum on the flap was too thin to be of any service.
Hylda Prout handed him a brush, and he pasted down the flap, but with
fingers so agitated that he made daubs with the gum on the envelope,
daubs which anyone must notice on examination.
Meantime, he had dropped the telegram upon the table, and Hylda Prout
read it.
CHAPTER X
THE DIARY, AND ROSALIND
Strange as a process of nature is the way in which events, themselves
unimportant, work into one another to produce some foredestined result
that shall astonish the world.
The sudden appearance of Inspector Clarke before Pauline Dessaulx at the
front door of Mrs. Marsh's lodgings produced by its shock a thorough
upset in the girl's moral and physical being. And in Clarke himself that
diary of Rose de Bercy which Pauline handed him produced a hilarity, an
almost drunken levity of mind, the results of which levity and of
Pauline's upset dovetailed one with the other to bring about an effect
which lost none of its singularity because it was preordained.
To Clarke the diary was a revelation! Moreover, it was one of those
sweet revelations which placed the fact of his own wit and wisdom in a
clearer light than he had seen those admitted qualities before, for it
showed that, though working in the dark, he had been guided aright by
that special candle of understanding that must have been lit within him
before his birth.
"Well, fancy that," cried he again and again in a kind of surprise. "I
was right all the time!"
He sat late at night, coatless and collarless, at a table over the
diary, Mrs. Clarke in the next room long since asleep, London asleep,
the very night asleep from earth right up to heaven. Four days before a
black cat had been adopted into the household. Surely it was _that_
which had brought him the luck to get hold of the diary!--so easily, so
unexpectedly. Pussie was now perched on the table, her purr the sole
sound in the quietude, and Clarke, who would have scoffed at a hint of
superstition, was stroking her, as he read for the third time those last
pages written on the day of her death by the unhappy Frenchwoman.
... I so seldom dream, that it has become the subject of remark,
and Dr. Naurocki of the Institute said once that it is because I
am such a "perfect animal." It is well to be a perfect
_some_thing: but that much I owe only to my father and mother. I
am afraid I am not a perfect anything else. A perfect liar,
perhaps; a perfect adventuress; using as stepping-stones those
whose fond hearts love me; shallow, thin within; made of
hollow-ringing tin from my skin to the tissue of my liver. Oh,
perhaps I might have done better for myself! Suppose I had
stayed with Marguerite and _le père_ Armaud on the farm, and
helped to milk the two cows, and met some rustic lover at the
stile at dusk, and married him in muslin? It might have been as
well! There is something in me that is famished and starved, and
decayed, something that pines and sighs because of its utter
thinness--I suppose it is what they call "the soul." I have lied
until I am become a lie, an unreality, a Nothing. I seem to see
myself clearly to-day; and if I could repent now, I'd say "I
will arise and go to my father, and will say to him 'Father.'"
Too late now, I suppose. Marguerite would draw her skirts away
from touching me, though the cut of the skirt would set me
smiling; and, if the fatted calf was set before me on a soiled
table-cloth, I should be ill.
Too late! You can't turn back the clock's hands: the clock
stops. God help me, I feel horribly remorseful. Why should I
have dreamt it? I so seldom dream! and I have _never_, I think,
dreamt with such living vividness. I thought I saw my father and
Marguerite standing over my dead body, staring at me. I saw
them, and I saw myself, and my face was all bruised and wounded;
and Marguerite said: "Well, she sought for it," and my father's
face twitched, and suddenly he sobbed out: "I wish to Heaven I
had died for her!" and my dead ears on the bed heard, and my
dead heart throbbed just once again at him, and then was dead
for ever.
Clarke did not know that he was reading literature,
but he did know that this was more exciting than
any story he had ever set eyes on. He stopped,
lit a pipe, and resumed.
I saw it, I heard it, though it was in a black world that it
happened, a world all draped in crape; black, black. But what is
the matter with me to-day? Is there any other woman so sad in
this great city, I wonder? I have opened one of the bottles of
Old Veuve, so there are only seven left now; and I have drunk
two full glasses of it. But it has made no difference; and I
have to dine with Lady Knox-Florestan, and go with her to the
opera; and Osborne may be coming. They will think me a
death's-head, and catch melancholy from me like a fever. I do
not know why I dreamt it, and why I cannot forget. It seems
rather strange. Is anything going to happen to me, really? Oh,
inside this breast of mine there is a bell tolling, and a
funeral moving to the tomb this afternoon. It is as if I had
drunk of some lugubrious drug that turns the human bosom to
wormwood. Is it my destiny to die suddenly, and lie in an early
grave? No, not that! Let me be in rags, and shrunken, with old,
old eyes and toothless gums, but give me life! Let me say I am
still alive!
"By Jove!" growled Clarke, chewing his pipe, "that rings in my ears!"
Yet I have had curious tokens, hints, fancies, of late. Four
nights ago, as I was driving down Pall Mall from Lady Sinclair's
_diner dansant_--it was about eleven-thirty--I saw a man in the
shadow at a corner who I could have sworn for a moment was F. I
didn't see his face, for as the carriage approached him, he
turned his back, and it was that turning of the back, I think,
that made me observe him. Suppose all the time F. knows of
me?--knows _who_ Rose de Bercy _is_! I never wanted to have that
Academy portrait painted, and I must have been mad to consent in
the end. If F. saw it? If he _knows_? What would he do? His
nature is capable of ravaging flames of passion! Suppose he
killed me? But could a poor woman be so unlucky? No, he doesn't
know, he can't, fate is not so hard. Then there is that wretched
Pauline--she shan't be in this house another week. My quarrel
with her this morning was the third, and the most bitter of all.
Really, that girl knows too much of me to permit of our living
any longer under one roof; and, what is more, she has twice
dropped hints lately which certainly seem to bear the
interpretation that she knows of my work in Berlin for the
Russian Government. Oh, but that must only be the madness of my
fancy! Two persons, and two only, in the whole world know of
it--how could _she_, possibly? Yet she said in her Friday
passion: "You will not be a long liver, Madame, you have been
too untrue to your dupes." _Untrue to my dupes!_ Which dupes? My
God, if she meant the Anarchists!
Clarke's face was a study when he came to that word. It wore the
beatific expression of the man who is justified in his own judgment.
Just suppose that she knows! For that she is mixed up with some
of them to some uncertain extent I have guessed for two years.
And if they knew that I have actually been a Government agent;
they would do for me, oh, they would, I know, it would be all up
with me. Three months ago Sauriac Paulus in the _promenoire_ at
Covent Garden, said to me: "By the way, do you know that you
have been condemned to death?" I forget _à propos_ of what he
said it, and have never given it a thought from that day. He was
bantering me, laughing in the lightest vein, but--God! it never
struck me like this before!--Suppose there was earnest under the
jest, deep-hidden under? He is a deep, deep, evil beast, that
man. Those were his words--I remember distinctly. "By the way,
do you know that you have been condemned to death?" "By the
way:" his heavy face shook with chuckling. And it never once
till now entered my head!--Oh, but, after all, I must be
horribly ill to be having such thoughts this day! The beast, of
course, didn't mean anything. Think, though, of saying, "by the
way?"--the terrible, evil beast. Oh, yes, I am ill. I have begun
to die. This night, may be, my soul shall be required of me. I
hear Marguerite saying again, "Well, she sought for it," and my
father's bitter sobbing, "I wish to Heaven I had died for her!"
But, if I am killed this day, it will be by ... or by C. E. F....
That last dash after the "F." was not, Clarke saw, meant as a dash, for
it was a long curved line, as if her elbow had been struck, or she
herself violently startled. She had probably intended, this time, to
write the name in full, but the interruption stopped her.
At the spot of the first dash lay thick ink-marks--really made by
Pauline Dessaulx--and Clarke, cute enough to see this, now commenced to
scratch out the ink blot with a penknife, and after the black dust was
scraped away, he used a damp sponge.
It was a delicate, slow operation, his idea being that, since under
those layers of ink lay a written name, if he removed the layers with
dainty care, then he would see the name beneath. And this was no doubt
true in theory, but in practice no care was dainty enough to do the
trick with much success. He did, however, manage to see the shape of
some letters, and, partly with the aid of his magnifying glass, partly
with the aid of his imagination, he seemed to make out the word
"_Janoc_."
The murder, then, was committed either by Janoc, or by C. E. F.--this,
as the mantle of the night wore threadbare, and some gray was showing
through it in the east, Clarke became certain of.
_Who_ was C. E. F.? There was Furneaux, of course. Those were his
initials, and as the name of Furneaux arose in his mind, Clarke's head
dropped back over his chair-back, and a long, delicious spasm of
laughter shook him. For the idea that it _might_, in very truth, be
Furneaux who was meant never for one instant occurred to him. He assumed
that it must needs be some French or Russian C. E. F., but the joke of
the coincidence of the initials with Furneaux's, who had charge of the
case, into whose hands the case had been given by Winter over his
(Clarke's) head, was so rich, that he resolved to show the diary to
Winter, and to try and keep from bursting out laughing, while he said:
"Look here, sir--this is your Furneaux!"
Clarke, indeed, had heard at the inquest how Furneaux had been seen on
the evening of the murder in Osborne's museum, from which the "celt" and
the dagger had vanished. Hearing this, his mind had instantly remembered
the "C. E. F." of the diary, and had been amazed at such a coincidence.
But his brain never sprang to grapple with the possibility that Rose de
Bercy might, in truth, be afraid of Furneaux. So, whoever "C. E. F."
might be, Clarke had no interest in him, never suspected him: his
thoughts had too long been preoccupied with one idea--Anarchists, Janoc,
Anarchists--to receive a new bent with real perspicacity and interest.
And the diary confirmed him in this opinion: for she had actually been
condemned to death as an agent of the Russian Government months before.
At last he stood up, stretching his arms in weariness before tumbling
into bed.
"Well! to think that I was right!" he said again, and again he laughed.
When he was going out in the morning, he put some more ink-marks over
the "Janoc" in the diary--for he did not mean that any other than
himself should lay his hand on the murderer of Rose de Bercy--and when
he arrived at Scotland Yard, he showed the diary to the Chief Inspector.
Winter laid it on the desk before him, and as he read where Clarke's
finger pointed, his face went as colorless as the paper he was looking
at.
A laugh broke out behind him.
"Furneaux!"
And Winter, glancing round, saw Clarke's face merry, like carved ivory
in a state of gayety, showing a tooth or two lacking, and browned fangs.
For a moment he stared at Clarke, without comprehension, till the absurd
truth rushed in upon him that Clarke was really taking it in jest. Then
he, too, laughed even more loudly.
"Ha! ha!--yes, Furneaux! 'Pon my honor, the funniest thing! Furneaux it
is for sure!"
"Officer in charge of the case!"
"Ripping! By gad, I shall have to apply for a warrant!"
Finding his chief in this rare good humor, Clarke thought to obtain a
little useful information.
"Do you know any of the Anarchist crowd with those initials, sir?" he
asked.
"I think I do; yes, a Frenchman. Or it may be a German. There is no
telling whom she means--no telling. But where on earth did you come
across this diary?"
"You remember the lady's-maid, Pauline, the girl who couldn't be found
to give evidence at the inquest? I was following the Anarchist Antonio,
who seemed to be prowling after some ladies in a cab a day or two ago,
and the door that was opened to the ladies when their cab stopped was
opened by--Pauline."
Then he told how he had obtained the diary, and volunteered a theory as
to the girl's possession of it.
"She must have picked it up in the flat on coming home from the
Exhibition on the night of the murder, and kept it."
They discussed the circumstances fully, and Clarke went away, his
conscience clear of having kept the matter dark from headquarters, yet
confident that he had not put Winter on the track of his own special
prey, Janoc. And as his footsteps became faint and fainter behind the
closed door, Winter let his head fall low, almost upon the desk, and so
he remained, hidden, as it were, from himself, a long while, until
suddenly springing up with a face all fiery, he cried aloud in a rage:
"Oh, no more sentiment! By the Lord, I'm done with it. From this hour
Inspector Furneaux is under the eye of the police."
Furneaux himself was then, for the second time that week, at Mrs.
Marsh's lodgings in Porchester Gardens in secret and urgent talk with
Rosalind.
"You will think that I am always hunting you down, Miss Marsh," he said
genially on entering the room.
"You know best how to describe your profession," she murmured a little
bitterly, for his parting shot at their last meeting had struck deep.
"But this time I come more definitely on business," he said, seating
himself uninvited, which was a strange thing for Furneaux to do, since
he was a gentleman by birth and in manners, "and as I am in a whirl of
occupation just now, I will come at once to the point."
"To say 'I will come at once to the point' is to put off coming to
it--for while you are saying it----"
"True. The world uses too many words----"
"It is a round world--hence its slowness in coming to a point."
"I take the hint. Yet you leave me rather breathless."
"Pray tell me why, Inspector Furneaux."
"For admiration of so quick and witty a lady. But I shall make you dumb
by what I am going to suggest to-day. I want to turn you into a
detective----"
"It _is_ a point, then. You want me to be sharp?"
"You are already that. The question is, what effect did what I last said
have upon your mind?"
"About your finding the blood-spotted clothes in Mr. Osborne's trunk?"
she asked, looking down at his tired and worn face from her superior
height, and suddenly moved to listen to him attentively. "Well, it was
somewhat astounding at first. In fact, it sounded almost convincing. But
then, I had already believed in Mr. Osborne's innocence in this matter.
Nor am I over-easily shaken, I think, in my convictions. If he confessed
his guilt to me, then I would believe--but not otherwise."
"Good," said Furneaux, "you have said that well, though I am sure he
does not deserve it. Anyhow, since you persist in believing in his
innocence, you must also believe that every new truth must be in his
favor, and so may be willing to turn yourself into the detective I
suggested.... You have, I think, a servant here named Pauline Dessaulx?"
This girl he had been seeking for some time, and had been gladly
surprised to have her open the door to him on the day of his first visit
to Rosalind. "She did not know me," he explained, "but _I_ have twice
seen her in the streets with her former mistress. Do you know who that
mistress was? Rose de Bercy!"
Rosalind started as though a whip had cracked across her shoulders. She
even turned round, looked at the door, tested it by the handle to see if
it was closed, and stood with her back to it. Furneaux seemingly ignored
her agitation.
"Now, you were at the inquest, Miss Marsh," he said. "You heard the
description given by Miss Prout of the Saracen dagger missing from Mr
Osborne's museum--the dagger with which the crime was probably
committed. Well, I want to get that into my hands. It is lying in
Pauline Dessaulx's trunk, and I ask you to secure it for me."
"In Pauline's trunk," Rosalind repeated after him, quite too dazed in
her astonishment to realize the marvels that this queer little man was
telling her.
"To be quite accurate," he continued, "I am not altogether sure of what
I say. But that is where it _should_ be, in her trunk, and with it you
should find a second dagger, or knife, which I am also anxious to
obtain, and if you happen to come across a little book, a diary, with a
blue morocco cover, I shall be extremely pleased to lay my hand on it."
"How can you possibly know all this?" Rosalind asked, her eyes wide open
with wonder now, and forgetful, for the moment, of the pain he had
caused her.
"Going up and down in the earth, like Satan, and then sitting and
thinking of it," he said, with a quick turn of mordant humor. "But is it
a bargain, now? Of course, I could easily pounce upon the girl's trunk
myself: but I want the objects to be _stolen_ from her, since I don't
wish to have her frightened--not quite yet."
"Do you, then, suspect this girl of having--of being--the guilty hand,
Inspector Furneaux?" asked Rosalind, her very soul aghast at the notion.
"I have already intimated to you the person who is open to suspicion,"
answered Furneaux promptly, "a man, not a woman--though, if you find
these objects in the girl's trunk, that _may_ lighten the suspicion
against the man."
A gleam appeared one instant in his eyes, and died out as quickly, but
this time Rosalind saw it. She pulled a chair close to him and sat down,
her fingers clasped tightly over her right knee--eager to serve, to
help. But, then, to steal, to pry into a servant's boxes, that was not a
nice action. And this Pauline Dessaulx was a girl who had interested
her, had shown a singular liking for her.
She mentioned her qualms.
"At the bidding of the police," urged Furneaux--"in the interests of
justice--to serve a possibly innocent man, who is also a friend--surely
that is something."
"I might have been able to do it yesterday," murmured Rosalind,
distraught, "but she is better to-day. I will tell you. For two days the
girl has been ill--in a kind of hysteria or nervous collapse--a species
of neurosis, I think--altogether abnormal and strange. I--you may as
well know--wrote a letter to Mr. Osborne on the day you first came, a
little before you came. I gave it her to post--she may have seen the
address. Then you appeared. After you were gone, I sent him a telegram,
also by Pauline's hand, telling him not to read my letter----"
"Ah, you see you did believe that what I told you proved his guilt----"
"Hear me.... No, I did not believe that. But--you had impressed me with
the fact that Mr. Osborne has been, may have been, already sufficiently
successful in attracting the sympathies of young ladies. I had been at
the inquest--I had seen there in the box his exquisite secretary, of
whose perfect ways of acting you gave me some knowledge that day, and I
thought it might be rash of me to seem to be in rivalry with so charming
a lady. Now you see my motive--I am often frank. So, when you were gone,
I sent the telegram forbidding the reading of my letter; and the next
morning I received a very brief note from Mr. Osborne saying that the
letter was awaiting my wishes unopened."
"How did he know your address, if he did not open the letter?" asked
Furneaux.
Rosalind started like a child caught in a fault. She was so agitated
that she had not asked herself that question. As a matter of fact, it
was Hylda Prout, having tracked Rosalind from Waterloo, who had given
Osborne the address for her own reasons: Hylda had told Osborne, on
hearing his fretful exclamation of annoyance, that she knew the address
of a Miss Marsh from an old gentleman who had apparently come up from
Tormouth with him and her, and had called to see Osborne when Osborne
was out.
"He got the address from some source, I don't know what," Rosalind said,
with a rather wondering gaze at Furneaux's face; "but the point is, that
the girl, Pauline, saw my letter to him, and the telegram; and last
night, coming home from an outing in quite a broken-down and enfeebled
state, she said to me with tears in her eyes: 'Oh, he is innocent! Oh,
do not judge him harshly, Miss Marsh! Oh, it was not he who did it!' and
much more of that sort. Then she collapsed and began to scream and kick,
was got to bed, and a doctor sent for, who said that she had an attack
of neurasthenia due to mental strain. And I was sitting by her bedside
quite a long while, so that I might then--if I had known--But I think
she is better to-day."
"It is not too late, if she is still in bed," said Furneaux. "Sit with
her again till she is asleep, and then see if the trunk is unlocked, or
if you can find the key----"
"Only it doesn't seem quite fair to----"
"Oh, quite, in this case, I assure you," said Furneaux. "Whether this
girl committed that murder with her own hand or not----"
"But how _could_ she? She was at an Exhibition----!"
"Was she? Are you sure? I was saying that whether the girl committed the
murder with her own hand or not----"
"If _she_ did, it could not have been done by the person you said that
you suspect!"
"No? Why speak so confidently? Have you not heard of such things as
accomplices? She might have helped Osborne! _He_ might have helped
_her_! But I was saying--for the third time--that whether the girl
committed the murder with her own hand or not, I am in a position to
give you my assurance that she is not a lawful citizen, and that you
needn't have the least compunction in doing anything whatever to her
trunk or her--in the cause of truth."
"Well, if you say so----" Rosalind said, and Furneaux stood up to go.
It was then two o'clock in the afternoon. By five o'clock Rosalind had
in her hand the Saracen dagger, and another dagger--though not, of
course, the diary, which Clarke had carried off long ago.
At about three she had gone to sit by Pauline's bedside, and here, with
the leather trunk strapped down, not two feet from her right hand, had
remained over an hour. Pauline lay quiet, with a stare in her wide-open
eyes, gazing up at the ceiling. Every now and again her body would twist
into a gawky and awkward kind of position, a stupid expression would
overspread her face, a vacant smile play on her lips; then, after some
minutes, she would lie naturally again, staring at the ceiling.
Suddenly, about half-past four, she had had a kind of seizure; her body
stiffened and curved, she uttered shrieks which chilled Rosalind's
blood, and then her whole frame settled into a steady, strong agitation,
which set the chamber all in a tremble, and could not be stilled by the
two servants who had her wrists in their grip. When this was over, she
dropped off into a deep sleep.
And now, as soon as Rosalind was again left alone with the invalid, she
went to the trunk, unstrapped it, found it locked. But she was not long
in discovering the key in the pocket of the gown which Pauline had had
on when she fell ill. She opened the trunk, looking behind her at the
closed eyes of the exhausted girl, and then, in feverish haste, she
ransacked its contents. No daggers, however, and no diary were there.
She then searched methodically through the room--an improvised
wardrobe--a painted chest of drawers--kneaded and felt the bed, searched
underneath--no daggers. She now stood in the middle of the room, her
forehead knit, her eyes wandering round, all her woman's cunning at work
in them. Then she walked straight, with decision, to a small shelf on
the wall, full of cheap books; began to draw out each volume, and on
drawing out the third, she saw that the daggers were lying there behind
the row.
Her hand hovered during some seconds of hesitancy over the horrible
blades, one of which had so lately been stained so vilely. Then she took
them, and replaced the books. One of the daggers was evidently the
Saracen weapon that she had heard described. The label was still on it;
the other was thick-bladed, of an Italian type. She ran out with them,
put them in a glove box, and, rather flurriedly, almost by stealth, got
out of the house to take her trophies to Furneaux.
She drove to the address that he had given her, an eagerness in her, a
gladness that the truth would now appear, and through _her_--most
unexpectedly! Quite apart from her friendship for Osborne, she had an
abstract interest in this matter of the murder, since from the first,
before seeing Osborne, she had said that he was innocent, but her mother
had seemed to lean to the opposite belief, and they were in hostile
camps on the subject, like two good-natured people of different
political convictions dwelling in the same house.
She bade her driver make haste to Furneaux's; but midway, seeing herself
passing close to Mayfair, gave the man Osborne's address, thinking that
she would go and get her unopened letter, and, if she saw Osborne
himself, offer him a word of cheer--an "all will be well."
Her driver rapped for her at the house door, she sitting still in the
cab, a hope in her that Osborne would come out. It seemed long since she
had last seen his face, since she had heard that sob of his at the
sun-dial at the Abbey. The message went inwards that Miss Marsh had
called for a letter directed to Mr. Osborne by her; and her high spirits
were damped when Jenkins reappeared at the door to say that the letter
would be brought her, Mr. Osborne himself having just gone out.
In sober fact, Osborne had not stirred out of the house for days, lest
her promised call "in person" should occur when he was absent, but at
last, unable to bear it any longer, he had made a dash to see her, and
was at that moment venturing to knock at her door.
However, though the news was damping, she had a store of high spirits
that afternoon, which pushed her to leave a note scribbled with her gold
pencil on the back of a letter--an act fraught with terrible sufferings
for her in the sequel. This was her message:
I will write again. Meantime, do not lose hope! I have
discovered that your purloined dagger has been in the possession
of the late lady's-maid, Pauline. "A small thing, but mine own!"
I am now taking it to Inspector Furneaux's.
R. M.
"What _will_ he think of '_I_ have discovered'?" she asked herself,
smiling, pleased; "he will say 'a witch'!"
She folded it crossways with a double bend so that it would not open,
and leaning out of the cab, handed it to Jenkins.
As he disappeared with it, Hylda Prout stood in the doorway with
Rosalind's letter to Osborne--Hylda's freckles showing strong against
her rather pale face. She held the flap-side of the envelope forward
from the first, to show the stains of gum on it.
As she approached the cab, Rosalind's neck stiffened a little. Their
eyes met malignly, and dwelt together several seconds, in a stillness
like that of somber skies before lightnings fly out. Truly, Rupert
Osborne's millions were unable to buy him either happiness or luck, for
it was the worst of ill-luck that he should not have been at home just
then.
CHAPTER XI
ENTRAPPED!
When Rosalind's contemptuous eyes abandoned that silent interchange of
looks, they fell upon the envelope in Hylda Prout's hand, nor could she
help noticing that round the flap it was clumsily stained with gum. Yet
Osborne had written her saying that it had been unopened....
The other woman stepped to the door of the cab.
"Miss Marsh?" she inquired, with an assumed lack of knowledge that was
insolent in itself.
"Yes."
"Mr. Osborne left this for you, if you called."
"Thank you."
The business was ended, yet the lady-secretary still stood there,
staring brazenly at Rosalind's face.
"Drive on----"
Rosalind raised her gloved hand to attract the driver's attention.
"One moment, Miss Marsh," said Hylda, also raising a hand to forbid him
to move; "I want to tell you something--You are very anxious on poor Mr.
Osborne's behalf, are you not?"
"I thought he was rich? You are not to say 'poor Mr. Osborne.'"
"Is that why you are so anxious, because he is rich?" and those
golden-brown eyes suddenly blazed out outrageously.
"Driver, go on, please!" cried Rosalind again.
"Wait, cabman!" cried Hylda imperiously.... "Stay a little--Miss
Marsh--one word--I cannot let you waste your sympathies as you do. You
believe that Mr. Osborne is friendless; and you offer him your
friendship----"
"_I!_"
Rosalind laughed a little, a laugh with a dangerous chuckle in it that
might have carried a warning to one who knew her.
"Do you not say so in that letter? In it you tell him that since the
night at the sun-dial, when you were '_brutal_' to him----"
"You know, then, my letter--by heart?" said Rosalind, her eyes sparkling
and cheeks aflame. "That is quite charming of you! You have been at the
pains to read it?"
"No, of course, Mr. Osborne wouldn't exactly _show_ it to me, nor did I
ask him. But I think you guess that I am in Mr. Osborne's confidence."
"Mr. Osborne, it would seem, has--read it? He even thought the contents
of sufficient importance to repeat them to his typist? Is that so?"
"Mr. Osborne repeats many things to me, Miss Marsh--by habit. You being
a stranger to him, do not know him well yet, but I have been with him
some time, you see. As to his reading it, I know that you telegraphed
him not to, and he received the telegram before the letter, I admit;
but, the letter once in his hand, it became his private property, of
course. He had a right to read it."
A stone in Rosalind's bosom where her heart had been ached like a wound;
yet her lips smiled--a hard smile.
"But then, having read, to be at the pains to seal it down again!" she
said. "It seems superfluous, a contemptible subterfuge."
"Oh, well," sneered Hylda, with a pouting laugh, "he is not George
Washington--a little harmless deception."
"But you cry out all his secrets!"
"To you."
"Why to me?"
"I save you from troubling your head about him. He is not so friendless
as you have imagined."
"Happy man! And was it you who wrote me the anonymous information that
he was not Glyn but Osborne?"
"No, that was someone else."
And now Rosalind, blighting her with her icy smile, which no inward
fires could melt, said contemplatively:
"I am afraid you are not speaking the truth. I shall tell Mr. Osborne to
get rid of you."
The dart was well planted. The paid secretary's lips twitched and
quivered.
"Try it! He'll laugh at you!" she retorted.
"No, I think he will do it--to please me!"
Sad to relate, our gracious Rosalind was deliberately adding oil to the
fires of hate and rage that she saw devouring Hylda Prout; and when
Hylda again spoke it was from a fiery soul that peered out of a ghost's
face.
"Will he?--to please you?" she said low, hissingly, leaning forward. "He
has a record in a diary of the girls he has kissed, and the number of
days from the first sight to the first kiss. He only wanted to see in
how few days he could secure you."
This vulgarity astonished its hearer. Rosalind shrank a little; her
smile became forced and strained; she could only murmur:
"Oh, you needn't be so bourgeoise."
Hylda chuckled again maliciously.
"It's the mere truth."
"Still, I think I shall warn him against you, and have you
dismissed,"--this with that feminine instinct of the dagger that plunged
deepest, the lash that cut most bitterly.
"You try!" hissed Hylda sharply, as it were secretly, with a nod of
menace. "I am not anybody! I am not some defenseless housemaid, the only
rival you have experienced hitherto, perhaps. I am--at any rate, you
try! You dare! Touch me, and I'll wither your arm----"
"Drive on!" cried Rosalind almost in a scream.
"Wait!" shrilled Hylda--"you _shall_ hear me!"
"Cabman, please----!" wailed Rosalind despairingly.
And now at last the cab was off, Hylda Prout running with it to pant
into it some final rancor; and when it left her, she remained there on
the pavement a minute, unable to move, trembling from head to foot,
watching the vehicle as it sped away from her.
When she re-entered the library the first thing that she saw was
Rosalind's cross-folded note to Osborne, and, still burning inwardly,
she snatched it up, tore it open, and read:
I will write again. Meantime, high hope! _I_ have discovered
that your purloined dagger has been in the possession of the
late lady's-maid, Pauline. "A small thing but mine own." I am
now taking it to Inspector Furneaux's.
R. M.
Hylda dashed the paper to the ground, put her foot on it, then catching
it up, worried it in her hands to atoms which she threw into a
waste-paper basket. Then she collapsed into a chair at her desk, her
arms thrown heedlessly over some documents, and her face buried between
them.
"I have gone too far, too far, too far----"
Now that her passion had burnt to ashes this was her thought. A crisis,
it was clear, had come, and something had to be done, to be decided,
now--that very day. Rosalind would surely tell Osborne what she, Hylda,
had said, how she had acted, and then all would be up with Hylda, no
hope left, her whole house in ruins about her, not one stone left
standing on another. Either she must bind Osborne irrevocably to her at
once, or her brain must devise some means of keeping Osborne and
Rosalind from meeting--or both. But how achieve the apparently
impossible? Osborne, she knew, was at that moment at Rosalind's
residence, and if Rosalind was now going home ... they would meet! Hylda
moved her buried head from side to side, woe-ridden, in the grip of a
hundred fangs and agonies. She had boasted to Rosalind that she was not
a whimpering housemaid, but of a better texture: and if that was an
actual truth, the present moment must prove it. Yet she sat there with a
buried head, weakly weeping....
Suddenly she thought of the words in Rosalind's note to Osborne, which
she had thrown into the basket: "I have discovered that your purloined
dagger has been in the possession of the late lady's-maid, Pauline.... I
am now taking it to Inspector Furneaux's...."
That, then, was the person who had the dagger which had been so sought
and speculated about--Pauline Dessaulx!
And at the recollection of the name, Hylda's racked brain, driven to
invent, invented like lightning. Up she sprang, caught at her hat, and
rushed away, pinning it on to her magnificent red hair in her flight,
her eyes staring with haste. In the street she leapt into a
motor-cab--to Soho.
She was soon there. As if pursued by furies she pelted up two foul
staircases, and at a top back room, rapped pressingly, fiercely, with
the clenched knuckles of both hands upon the panels. As a man in his
shirt-sleeves, his braces dropped, smoking a cigarette, opened the door
to her, she almost fell in on him, and the burning words burst from her
tongue's tip:
"Antonio!--it's all up with Pauline--the dagger she did it with--has
been found--by a woman--the same woman from Tormouth whom you and I
tracked to Porchester Gardens--Pauline is in her employ probably--tell
Janoc--he has wits--he may do something before it is too late--the woman
has the dagger--in a motor-cab--in a long, narrow box--she is this
instant taking it to Inspector Furneaux's house--if _she_ lives, Pauline
hangs--tell Janoc that, Antonio--don't stare--tell Janoc--it is _she_ or
Pauline--let him choose----"
"_Grand Dieu!_"
"Don't stare--don't stand--I'm gone."
She ran out; and almost as she was down the stair Antonio had thrown on
a coat and was flying down behind her.
He ran down three narrow streets to Poland Street, darted up a stair,
broke into a room; and there on the floor, stretched face downwards, lay
the lank length of Janoc's body, a map of Europe spread before him, on
which with an ivory pointer he was marking lines from town to town. He
glanced at the intruder with a frowning brow, yet he was up like an
acrobat, as the tidings leapt off Antonio's tongue.
"Found!" he whispered hoarsely, "Pauline found!"
"Yes, and the dagger found, too!"
"Found! dearest of my heart! my sweet sister!"
Janoc clasped to his bosom a phantom form, and kissed thrice at the air.
"Yes, and the dagger found that she did it with----"
"The dagger?"
"Yes, and the lady is this minute taking it to Inspector Furneaux----"
"Lady?--Oh, found! found! dear, sweet sister, why didst thou hide
thyself from me?"
Janoc spread his arms with a face of rapture. He could only assimilate
the one great fact in his joy.
"But Janoc--listen--the lady----"
"Lady?"
"The lady who has the dagger! Listen, my friend--she is on the way to
Inspector Furneaux with Pauline's dagger----"
"_Mille diables!_"
"Janoc, what is to be done? O, arouse yourself, _pour l'amour de
Dieu_--Pauline will be hanged----"
"Hanged? Yes! They hang women, I know, in England--the only country in
Europe--this ugly nest of savages. Yes! they hang them by the neck on
the gallows here--the gallant gentlemen! But they won't hang _her_,
Antonio! Let them touch her, and _I_, I set all England dancing like a
sandstorm of the Sahara! Furneaux's house No. 12?"
"Yes."
"And the lady's address?"
"Porchester Gardens--unfortunately I did not notice the number of the
house."
"Pity: weak. What is she like, this lady?"
"Middle-size--plentiful brown hair--eyes blue--beautiful in the cold
English way, elegant, too--yes, a pretty woman--I saw her in
Tormouth----"
"Come with me"--and Janoc was in action, with a suddenness, a fury, a
contrast with his previous stillness of listening that was very
remarkable--as if he had waited for the instant of action to sound, and
then said: "Here it is! I am ready!"
Out stretched his long leg, as he bent forward into running, catching at
his cap and revolver with one sweep of his right arm, and at Antonio
with a snatch of the left; and from that moment his motions were in the
tone of the forced marches of Napoleon--not an instant lost in the
business he was at.
He took Antonio in a cab to Furneaux's house in Sinclair Street. There
he was nudged by Antonio, as they drove up, with a hysterical sob of
"See! There she is!"
Rosalind was driving away at the moment. She had, then, seen Furneaux?
told Furneaux? given Furneaux the dagger? In that case, the battle would
lie between Furneaux and Janoc that day. Janoc's flesh was pale, but it
was the paleness of iron, his eyes were full of fire. In his heart he
was a hero, in brain and head an assassin!
He alighted at the detective's house, letting Rosalind go. But the
landlady of the flat told him that Furneaux had not been at home for two
hours, and was not expected for another hour. Rosalind, then, had not
seen him; and the battle swung back to its first ground as between
Rosalind and Janoc. Had the lady who had just called left any parcel, or
any weapon for Mr. Furneaux? The answer was "No." He hurried down into
his cab, to make for Rosalind's boarding-house.
But Antonio had not noted the number, and, to discover it, Janoc started
off to Osborne's house, to ask it of Miss Prout.
Now, Rosalind was herself driving to the same place. On learning that
Furneaux was not at home, she had paced his sitting-room a little while,
undecided whether to wait, or to leave a message and go home. Then the
new impulse had occurred in her to go to Osborne's in the meantime, and
then return to Furneaux. Hylda Prout had contrived to put a lump in her
throat and a firebrand in her bosom, an arrogance, a hot rancor. How
much of what the hussy had said against Osborne might contain some truth
she did not know; it had so scorched her, and inflamed her gorge, and
kindled her eyes, that she had not had time to question its probability
in her preoccupation with the gall and smart of it. But that Osborne
should have opened the letter, and then written to say he had not--this
was a vileness that the slightest reflection found to be incredible. The
creature with the red hair certainly knew what was in the letter,
but--might she not have opened it herself? And if any part of her
statements were false, _all_ might be false. An impatience to see
Osborne instantly seized and transported Rosalind. He had honest
eyes--had she not whispered it many a time to her heart? She hurried off
to him.... And by accident Janoc went after her.
Osborne himself had arrived home some ten minutes before this, after a
very cold reception from Mrs. Marsh at Porchester Gardens.
As he entered the library, he saw Hylda Prout standing in the middle of
the room with a face of ecstasy which astonished him. She, lately
arrived back from her visit to the Italian, had heard him come, and had
leapt up to confront him, her heart galloping in her throat.
"Anything wrong?" he asked with a quick glance at her.
"Miss Marsh has been here."
"Ah?... Miss Marsh?"
She made a mad step toward him. The words that she uttered rasped
harshly. She did not recognize her own voice.
"I told her straight out that it is not the slightest good her running
after you."
"You told her _what_?"
Amazement struggled with indignation in his face. All the world seemed
to have gone mad when the pale, studiously sedate secretary used such
words of frenzy.
"I meant to stop--her pursuit of you.... Mr. Osborne--hear me--I--I...."
Excessive emotion overpowered her. In attempting to say more she panted
with distress.
"What is it all about, Miss Prout? Calm yourself, please--be quiet"--he
said it with some effort to express both his resentment and his
authority.
"Mr. Osborne--I warn you--I cannot endure--any rival----"
"Who can't? you speak of a _rival_!"
"Oh, Heaven, give me strength--words to explain. Ah!..."
She had been standing with her left hand resting on a table, shivering
like a sail in the wind, and now the hand suddenly gave way under her,
and she sank after it, falling to the ground in a faint, while her head
struck the edge of the table in her descent.
"Well, if this isn't the limit," muttered Osborne, as he ran to her,
calling loudly for Jenkins. He lifted her to a sofa, and, in his flurry,
not knowing what else to do, wet her forehead with a little water from a
carafe. Jenkins had not heard his call, and by the time he looked round
for a bell to summon help, her eyes unclosed themselves, and she smiled
at him.
"You are there...."
"You feel better now?" He sat on a chair at her head, looking down on
her, wondering what inane words he should use to extricate both himself
and her from an absurd position.
"It is all right.... I must have fainted. I have undergone a great
strain, a dreadful strain. You should be sorry for me. Oh, I have
loved--much."
"Miss Prout----"
"No, don't call me that, or you kill me. You should be sorry for me, if
you have any pity, any shred of humanity in your heart. I have--passed
through flames, and drunk of a cup of fire. Ten women, yes, ten--have
hungered and wailed in me. I tell _you_--yet to whom should I tell it
but to you?"
She smiled a ravished smile of pain; her hand fell upon his heavily; her
restless head swung from side to side.
"Well, I am very sorry," said Osborne, forced to gentleness in spite of
the anger that had consumed him earlier. "It is impossible not to
believe you sincere. But, you will admit, all this is very singular and
unexpected. I am afraid now that I shall have to send you on a trip
to--Switzerland; or else go myself. Better you--it is chilling there, on
the glaciers."
Yet the attempt at humor died when he looked at her face with its
languishing, sick eyes, its expression of swooning luxury. She sighed
deeply.
"No, you cannot escape me now, I think, or I you," she murmured. "There
are powers too profound to be run from when once at work, like the
suction of whirlpools. If you don't love me, my love is a force enough
for two, for a thousand. It will draw and compel you. Yes, I think so.
It will either warm you, or burn you to ashes--and myself, too. Oh, I
swear to Heaven! It will, it shall! You shouldn't have pressed my hand
that night."
"Pressed your hand! on which night?" asked Osborne, who had now turned
quite pale, and wanted to run quickly out of the house but could not.
"What, have you _forgotten_?" she asked with tender reproach, gazing
into his eyes; "the night I was going to see my brother nine months ago,
and you went with me to Euston, and in saying good-by you----"
She suddenly covered her eyes with her fingers in a rapture at the
memory.
Osborne stared blankly at her. He recalled the farewell at Euston, which
was accidental, but he certainly had no memory of having pressed her
hand.
"I loved you before," her lips just whispered in a pitiful assumption of
confidence, "but timidly, not admitting it to myself. With that pressure
of your hand, I was done with maidenhood, my soul rushed to you. After
that, you were mine, and I was yours."
The words almost fainted on her bitten under lip, and in Osborne, too, a
rush of soul, or of blood, took place, a little flush of his forehead.
It was a bewitching woman who lay there before him, with that fair
freckle-splashed face couched in its cloud of red hair.
"Come, now," he said, valiantly striving after the commonplace, "you are
ill--you hardly know yet what you are saying."
She half sat up suddenly, bending eagerly toward him.
"Is it pity? Is it 'yes'?"
"Please, please, let us forget that this has ever----"
"It _would_ be 'yes' instantly but for that Tormouth girl! Oh, drive her
out of your mind! That cannot be--I could never, never permit it! For
that reason alone--and besides, you are about to be arrested----"
"I!"
"Yes: listen--I know more of what is going on than you know. The man
Furneaux, who, for his own reasons, hates you, and is eager to injure
you, has even more proofs against you than you are aware of. _I_ happen
to know that in his search of your trunks he has discovered something or
other which he considers conclusive against you. And there is that
housemaid at Feldisham Mansions, who screamed out 'Mr. Osborne did
it!'--Furneaux only pretended at the inquest that she was too ill to be
present, because he did not want to produce the whole weight of his
evidence just then. But he has her, too, safe up his sleeve, and _she_
is willing to swear against you. And now he has got hold of your Saracen
dagger. But don't you fear _him_: I shall know how to foil him at the
last; I alone have knowledge that will surely make him look a fool.
Trust in me! I tell you so. But I can't help your being arrested--that
must happen. Believe me, for I know. And let that once take place, and
that Tormouth girl will never look at you again. I understand her class,
with its prides and prejudices--she will never marry you--innocent or
guilty--if you have once stood in the dock at an assize court. Such as
she does not know what love is. _I_ would take you if you were a
thousand times guilty--and I only can prove you innocent--even if you
were guilty--because I am yours--your preordained wife--oh, I shall die
of my love--yes, kiss me--yes--now----"
The torrent of words ended in a fierce fight for breath. Her eyes were
glaring like two lakes of conflagration, her cheeks crimson, her
forehead pale. Unexpectedly, eagerly, she caught him round the neck in
an embrace from which there was no escape. She drew him almost to his
knees, and pressed his lips to hers with a passion that frightened and
repelled him.
And he was in the thick of this unhappy and ridiculous experience when
he heard behind him an astonished "Oh!" from someone, while some other
person seemed to laugh in angry embarrassment.
It was Jenkins who had uttered the "Oh!" and when the horrified Osborne
glanced round he saw Rosalind's eyes peering over Jenkins's shoulder.
She it was who had so lightly, so perplexedly, laughed.
Before he could free himself and spring up she was gone. She had
murmured to Jenkins: "Some other time," and fled.
As she ran out blindly, and was springing into the cab, Janoc, in
pursuit of her, drove up. In an instant he was looking in through the
door of the cab.
"Miss Marsh?" he inquired.
"Yes."
His hands met, wringing in distress.
"You are the lady I am searching for, the mistress of the young girl
Pauline Dessaulx, is it not? I am her brother. You see--you can see--the
resemblance in our faces. She threatens this instant to commit the
suicide----"
Rosalind was forced to forget her own sufferings in this new terror.
"Pauline!" she cried, "I am not her employer. Moreover, she is ill--in
bed----"
"She has escaped to my lodging during your absence from home! Something
dreadful has happened to her--she speaks of the loss of some weapon--one
cannot understand her ravings! And unless she sees you--her hands cannot
be kept from destroying herself--Oh, lady! lady! Come to my sweet
sister----"
Rosalind looked at him with the scared eyes of one who hears, yet not
understands. There was a mad probability in all this, since Pauline
_might_ have discovered the loss of the daggers; and, in her present
anguish of spirit, the thought that the man's story might only be a
device to lure her into some trap never entered Rosalind's head. Indeed,
in her weariness of everything, she regarded the mission of succor as a
relief.
"Where do you live? I will go with you," she said.
"Lady! Lady! Thank God!" he exclaimed. "It is not far from here, in
Soho."
"You must come in my cab," said Rosalind.
Janoc ran to pay his own cabman, came back instantly, and they started
eastward, just as Osborne, with the wild face of a man falling down a
precipice, rushed to his door, calling after them frantically: "Hi,
there! Stop! Stop! For Heaven's sake----"
But the cab went on its way.
CHAPTER XII
THE SARACEN DAGGER
Next morning, just as the clock was striking eight, Osborne was rising
from his bed after a night of unrest when Jenkins rapped at the door and
came in, deferential and calm.
"Mrs. Marsh below to see you, sir," he announced.
Osborne blinked and stared with the air of a man not thoroughly awake,
though it was his mind, not his body, that was torpid.
"Mrs.," he said, "not Miss?"
"No, sir, Mrs."
"I'll be there in five minutes," he hissed with a fierce arousing of his
faculties, and never before had he flung on his clothes in such a flurry
of haste; in less than five minutes he was flying down the stairs.
"Forgive me!" broke from his lips, as he entered the drawing-room, and
"Forgive me!" his visitor was saying to him in the same instant.
It was pitiful to see her--she, ever so enthroned in serenity, from whom
such a thing as agitation had seemed so remote, was wildly agitated now.
That pathetic pallor of the aged when their heart is in labor now
underlay her skin. Her lips, her fingers, trembled; the tip of her nose,
showing under her half-raised veil, was pinched.
"The early hour--it is so distressing--I beg your forgiveness--I am in
most dreadful trouble----"
"Please sit down," he said, touching her hand, "and let me get you some
breakfast."
"No, nothing--I couldn't eat--it is Rosalind----"
Now he, too, went a shade paler.
"What of Rosalind?"
"Do you by chance know anything of her whereabouts?"
"No!"
"She has disappeared."
Her head bowed, and a sob broke from her bosom.
"Disappeared"--his lips breathed the word foolishly after her, while he
looked at her almost stupidly.
Mrs. Marsh's hand dropped with a little nervous fling.
"She has not been at home all night. She left the house apparently
between four and five yesterday--I was out; then I came in; then you
called.... She has not come home--it is impossible to conceive...."
"Oh, she has slept with some friend," he said, feeling that the world
reeled around him.
"No, she has never done that without letting me know.... She would
surely have telegraphed me.... It is quite impossible even to imagine
what dispensation of God----"
She stopped, her lips working; suddenly covering her eyes with her hand,
as another sob gushed from her, she humbly muttered:
"Forgive me. I am nearly out of my senses."
He sprang up, touched a bell, and whispered to Jenkins, who instantly
was with him: "Brandy--_quick_." Then, running to kneel at the old
lady's chair, he touched her left hand, saying: "Take heart--trust in
God's Providence--rely upon _me_."
"You believe, then, that you may find her----?"
"Surely: whatever else I may fail in, I could not fail now.... Just one
sip of this to oblige me." Jenkins had stolen in, and she drank a little
out of the glass that Osborne offered.
"You must think it odd," she said, "that I come to you. I could not give
a reason--but I was so distracted and benumbed. I thought of you, and
felt impelled----"
"You were right," he said. "I am the proper person to appeal to in this
case. Besides, she was here yesterday----"
"Rosalind?"
"The fact is----"
"Oh, she was here? Well, that is something discovered! I did well to
come. Yes--you were saying----"
"I will tell you everything. Three days ago she wrote me a letter----"
"Rosalind?"
"Are you astonished?"
"I understood--I thought--that your friendship with her had suffered
some--check."
"That is so," said Osborne with a bent head. "You may remember the night
of the dance at the Abbey down at Tormouth. That night, when I was full
of hopes of her favor, she suddenly cast me off like a burr from her
robe--I am not even now sure why--unless she had discovered that my name
was not Glyn."
"If so, she no doubt considered that a sufficient reason, Mr. Osborne,"
said Mrs. Marsh, a chill in her tone. "One does not like the names of
one's friends to be detachable labels."
"Don't think that I blame her one bit!" cried Osborne--"no more than I
blame myself. I was ordered by--the police to take a name. There seemed
to be good reason for it. I only blame my baleful fate. Anyway, so it
was. She dropped me--into the Pit. But she was at the inquest----"
"Indeed? At the inquest. She was there. Singular."
"Deeply veiled. She didn't think, I suppose, that I should know. But I
should feel her presence in the blackest----"
"Mr. Osborne--I must beg--do not make your declarations to _me_----"
"May I not? Be good--be pitiful. Here am I, charged with guilt,
conscious of innocence----"
"Let us suppose all that, but are you a man free to make declarations of
love? One would say that you are, as it were, married for some time to
come to the lady who has lately been buried."
"True," said Osborne--"in the eyes of the world, in a formal way: but in
the eyes of those near to me? Oh, I appeal to your indulgence, your
friendship, your heart. Tell me that you forgive, that you understand
me! and then I shall be so exuberantly gladsome that in the sweep of my
exhilaration I shall go straight and find her, wherever she lies
hidden.... Will you not say 'yes' on those terms?" He smiled wanly, with
a hungry cajolery, looking into her face.
But she did not unbend.
"Let us first find her! and then other things may be discussed. But to
find her! it is past all knowing--Oh, deep is the trouble of my soul
to-day, Mr. Osborne!"
"Wait--hope----"
"But you were speaking of yesterday."
"Yes. She was at the inquest: and when I saw her--think how I felt! I
said: 'She believes in me.' And three days after that she wrote to
me----"
"My poor Rosalind!" murmured Mrs. Marsh. "She suffered more than I
imagined. Her nature is more recondite than the well in which Truth
dwells. What _could_ she have written to you?"
"That I don't know."
"How----?"
"As I was about to open the letter, a telegram came from her. 'Don't
read my letter: I will call for it unopened in person,' it said. Picture
my agony then! And now I am going to tell you something that will move
you to compassion for me, if you never had it before. Yesterday she
called for the letter. I was with you at Porchester Gardens at that very
hour. When I came home, an extraordinary scene awaited me with my
secretary, a Miss Prout.... I tell you this as to a friend, a Mother,
who will believe even the incredible. An extraordinary scene.... Without
the least warning, the least encouragement that I know of, Miss Prout
declared herself in love with me. While I stood astonished, she fainted.
I bore her to a sofa. Soon after she opened her eyes, she--drew--me to
her--no, I will say that I was _not_ to blame; and I was in that
situation, when the library door opened, and who should be there looking
at me but--yes--_she_."
Mrs. Marsh's eyes fell. There was a little pressure of the lips that
revealed scant sympathy with compromising situations. And suddenly a
thought turned her skin to a ghastlier white. What if the sight of that
scene accounted for Rosalind's disappearance? If Rosalind was dead--by
her own act? The old lady had often to admit that she did not know the
deepest deeps of her daughter's character. But she banished the
half-thought hurriedly, contenting herself with saying aloud:
"That made the second time she came to you yesterday. Why a second
time?"
"I have no idea!" was the dismayed reply. "She uttered not one
word--just turned away, and hurried out to her waiting cab--and by the
time I could wring myself free, and run after her, the cab was going
off. I shouted--I ran at top speed--she would not stop. I think a man
was in the cab with her----"
"A man, you say?"
"I think so. I just caught a glimpse of a face that looked out
sideways--a dark man he seemed to me--I'm not sure."
"It becomes more and more mysterious!"
"Well, we must be making a move to do something--first, have you
breakfasted?"
She had eaten nothing! Osborne persuaded her to join him in a hurried
meal, during which his motor-car arrived, and soon they set off
together. He was for going straight to the police, but she shrank from
the notoriety of that final exposure until she had the clear assurance
that it was absolutely necessary. So they drove from friend to friend of
the Marshes who might possibly have some information; then drove home to
Mrs. Prawser's to see if there was news. Osborne had luncheon there--a
polite pretense at eating, since they were too full of wonder and woe to
care for food. By this time Mrs. Marsh had unbent somewhat to Osborne,
and humbly enough had said to him, "Oh, find her, and if she is alive,
every other consideration shall weigh less than my boundless gratitude
to you!"
After the luncheon they again drove about London, making inquiries
without hope wherever the least chance of a clew lay; and finally, near
six, they went to Scotland Yard.
To Inspector Winter in his office the whole tale was told; and, after
sitting at his desk in a long silence, frowning upon the story, he said
at last:
"Well, there is, of course, a great deal more in this than meets the
eye." He spun round to Mrs. Marsh: "Has your daughter undergone anything
to upset her at home lately?"
"Nothing," was the answer. "One of the servants in the house has had a
sort of hysteria: but that did not trouble Rosalind beyond the mere
exercise of womanly sympathy."
"Any visitors? Any odd circumstance in that way?"
"No unusual visitors--except an Inspector Furneaux, who--twice, I
think--had interviews with her. She was not very explicit in telling me
the subject of them."
"Inspector Furneaux," muttered Winter. To himself he said: "I thought
somehow that this thing was connected with Feldisham Mansions." And at
once now, with a little start, he asked: "What, by the way, is the name
of the servant who has had the hysteria?"
"Her name is Pauline," answered Mrs. Marsh--"a French girl."
"Ah, Pauline!" said Winter--"just so."
The fewness of his words gave proof of the activity of his brain. He
knew how Clarke had obtained the diary of Rose de Bercy from Pauline,
and he felt that Pauline was in some undetermined way connected with the
murder. He knew, too, that she was now to be found somewhere in
Porchester Gardens, and had intended looking her up for general
inquiries before two days had passed. That Pauline might actually have
had a hand in the crime had never entered into his speculations--he was
far too hot in these days on the trail of Furneaux, who was being
constantly watched by his instructions.
"I think I will see this Pauline to-night," he said. "Meantime, I can
only recommend you to hope, Mrs. Marsh. These things generally have some
simple explanation in the end, and turn out less black than they look.
Expect me, then, at your residence within an hour."
But when Mrs. Marsh and Osborne were gone he was perplexed, remembering
that this was Thursday evening, for he had promised himself on this very
evening to be at a spot which he had been told by one of his men that
Furneaux had visited on two previous Thursday evenings, a spot where he
would see a sight that would interest him.
While he was on the horns of the dilemma as to going there, or going to
Pauline, Inspector Clarke entered: and at once Winter shelved upon
Clarke the business of sounding Pauline.
"You seem to have a lot of power over her--to make her give up the diary
so promptly," he said to Clarke. "Go to her, then, get at the bottom of
this business, and see if you cannot hit upon some connection between
the disappearance of Miss Marsh and the murder of the actress."
Clarke stood up with alacrity, and started off. Presently Winter himself
was in a cab, making for the Brompton Cemetery.
As for Clarke, the instant he was within sight of Porchester Gardens,
his whole interest turned from Pauline Dessaulx and the vanished
Rosalind to two men whom he saw in the street almost opposite the house
in which Pauline lay. They were Janoc and the Italian, Antonio, and
Antonio seemed to be reasoning and pleading with Janoc, who had the
gestures of a man distracted.
Hanging about near them was a third man, whom Clarke hardly noticed--a
loafer in a long coat of rags, a hat without any crown, and visible
toes--a diminutive loafer--Furneaux, in fact, who, for his own reasons,
was also interested in Janoc in these days.
Every now and again Janoc looked up at the windows of Mrs. Marsh's
residence with frantic gestures, and a crying face--a thing which
greatly struck Clarke; and anon the loafer passed by Janoc and Antonio,
unobserved, peering into the gutter for the cast-aside ends of cigars
and cigarettes.
Instantly Clarke stole down the opposite side of the square into which
the house faced, looked about him, saw no one, climbed some railings,
and then through the bushes stole near to the pavement where the
foreigners stood. There, concealed in the shrubbery, he could clearly
hear Janoc say:
"Am I never to see her? My little one! But I am about to see her! I will
knock at that door, and clasp her in my arms."
"My friend, be reasonable!" pleaded Antonio, holding the arm of Janoc,
who made more show of tearing himself free than he made real
effort--with that melodramatic excess of gesture to which the Latin
races are prone. "Be reasonable! Oh, she is wiser than you! She has
hidden herself from you because she realizes the danger of being seen
near you even in the dark. Be sure that she has longed to see you as
keenly as you hunger to see her; but she feels that there must be no
meeting with so many spying eyes in the world----"
"Let them spy! but they shall not keep me from the embrace of one whom I
love, of one who has suffered," said Janoc, covering his face. "Oh, when
I think of your cruelty--you who all the time knew where she was and did
not tell me!"
"I confess it, but I acted for the best," said Antonio. "She wrote to me
three days after the murder, so that she might have news of you. I met
her, and received from her that bit of lace from the actress's dress
which I put into Osborne's bag at Tormouth, to throw still more doubt
upon him. But she implored me not to reveal to you where she was, lest,
if you should be seen with her, suspicion of the murder should fall upon
you----"
"Her heart's goodness! My sister! My little one!" exclaimed Janoc.
"Only be patient!" wooed Antonio--"do not go to her. Soon she will make
her escape to France, and you also, and then you will embrace the one
the other. And now you have no longer cause for much anxiety as to her
capture, for the dagger cannot be found with her, since it lies safe in
your room in your own keeping, and to-night you will drop it into the
river, where it will be buried forever. Do not go to her----"
These were the last words of the dialogue that Clarke heard, for the
tidings that "the dagger" was in Janoc's room sent him creeping away
through the bushes. He was soon over the railings and in a cab, making
for Soho; and behind him in another cab went Furneaux, whose driver,
looking at his fare's attire, had said, "Pay first, and then I'll take
you."
Clarke, for his part, had no difficulty in entering Janoc's room with
his skeleton-keys--indeed, he had been there before! Nor was there any
difficulty in finding the dagger. There it lay, with another, in the
narrow cardboard box into which Rosalind had put both weapons on finding
them behind the shelf of books in Pauline's room.
Clarke's eyes, as they fell at last upon that Saracen blade which he
knew so well without ever having seen it, pored, gloated over it, with a
glitter in them.
He relocked the trunk, relocked the door, and with the box held fast,
ran down the three stairs to his cab--feeling himself a made man, a head
taller than all Scotland Yard that night. He put his precious find on
the interior front seat of the cab--a four-wheeler; for in his eagerness
he had jumped into the first wheeled thing that he had seen, and, having
lodged the box inside, being anxious to hide it, he made a step forward
toward the driver, to tell him whither he had now to drive. Then he
entered, shut the door, and, as the vehicle drove off, put out his hand
to the box to feast his eyes on its contents again. But the box was
gone--no daggers were there!
"Stop!" howled Clarke.
The cab stopped, but it was all in vain. The loafer, who had opened the
other door of the cab with swift deftness while Clarke spoke to the
driver, had long since turned a near corner with box and daggers, and
was well away. Clarke, standing in the street, glanced up at the sky,
down at the ground, and stared round about, like a man who does not know
in which world he finds himself.
Meantime, Furneaux hailed another cab, again having to pay in advance,
and started off on the drive to Brompton Cemetery--where Winter was
already in hiding, awaiting his arrival.
Something like a storm of wind was tearing the night to pieces, and the
trees of the place of graves gesticulated as if they were wrangling. The
moon had moved up, all involved in heavy clouds whose grotesque shapes
her glare struck into garish contrasts of black against silver. Furneaux
bent his way against the gale, holding on his dilapidated hat, his rags
fluttering fantastically behind him, till he came to the one grave he
sought--the cheerless resting-place of Rose de Bercy. The very spirit of
gloom and loneliness brooded here, in a nook almost inclosed with
foliage. As yet no stone had been erected. The grave was just a narrow
oblong of red marl and turf, which the driven rain now made soft and
yielding. On it lay two withered wreaths.
Furneaux, standing by it, took off his hat, and the rain flecked his
hair. Then from a breast-pocket of his rags he took out a little funnel
of paper, out of which he cast some Parma violets upon the mound. This
was Thursday--and Rose de Bercy had been murdered on a Thursday.
[Illustration: Then from a breast-pocket he took a little funnel of
paper
_Page 219_]
After that he stood there perhaps twenty minutes, his head bent in
meditation.
Then he peered cautiously into the dark about him, took a penknife with
a good-sized blade from a pocket, and with it set to work to make a
grave within the grave--a grave just big and deep enough to contain the
box with the daggers. He buried his singular tribute and covered it
over.
After this he waited silently, apparently lost in thought, for some ten
minutes more.
Then, with that curious omniscience which sometimes seemed to belong to
the man, he sent a strange cry into the gloom.
"Are you anywhere about, Winter?"
Nor was there anything aggressive in the call. It was subdued, sad,
touched with solemnity, like the voice of a man who had wept, and dried
his eyes.
There was little delay before Winter appeared out of the shadow of his
ambush.
"I am!" he said; he was amazed beyond expression, yet his colleague had
ever been incomprehensible in some things.
"Windy night," said Furneaux, in an absurd affectation of ease.
"And wet," said Winter, utterly at a loss how to take the other.
"Odd that we should both come to visit the poor thing's grave at the
same hour," remarked Furneaux.
"It _may_ be odd," agreed Winter.
There was a bitter silence.
Then Furneaux's cold voice was heard again.
"I dare say, now, it seems to you a suspicious thing that I should come
to this grave at all."
"Why should it, Furneaux?" asked his chief bluntly.
"Yes, why?" said Furneaux. "I once knew her. I told you from the first
that I knew her."
"I remember: you did."
"You asked no questions as to how I came to know her, or how long, or
under what circumstances. Why did you not ask? Such questions occur
among friends: and I--might have told you. But you did not ask."
"Tell me now."
"Winter, I'd see you hanged first!"
The words came in a sharp rasp--his first sign of anger.
"Hanged?" repeated Winter, flushing. "You'll see _me_ hanged? _I_
usually see the hanging, Furneaux!"
"Sometimes you do: sometimes you are not half smart enough!"
Furneaux barked the taunt like a dog at him.
Of the two, the big bluff man of Anglo-Saxon breed, mystified and
saddened though he was, showed more self-control than the excitable
little man more French than English.
"This is an occasion when I leave the smartness to you, Furneaux," he
said bitterly, "though there is a sort of clever duplicity which ought
to be drained out of the blood, even if it cost a limb, or a life."
"Ah, you prove yourself a trusty friend--loyal to the backbone!"
"For Heaven's sake, make no appeal to our friendship!"
"What! Appeal? I? Oh, this is too much!"
"You are trying me beyond endurance. Can't you understand? Why keep up
this farce of pretense?"
There was genuine emotion in Winter's voice, but Furneaux's harsh laugh
mingled with the soughing of the laden branches that tossed in the wind.
"Farce, indeed!" he cried. "I refuse to continue it. Go, then, and be
punished--you deserve it--you, whom I trusted more than a brother."
He turned on his heel, and made off, a weird figure in those wind-blown
tatters, and Winter watched him with eyes that had in them some element
of fear, almost of hope, for in that hour he could have forgiven
Furneaux were he standing by his corpse.
But the instinct of duty soon came uppermost. He had seen his colleague
bury something in the grave, and the briefest search brought to light
the daggers in their cardboard coffin. Even in that overwhelming gloom
of night and shivering yews he recognized one of the weapons. A groan
broke from him, as it were, in protest.
"Mad!" he sighed, "stark, staring mad--to leave this here, where he knew
I must find it. My poor Furneaux! Perhaps that is best. I must defer
action for a few hours, if only to give him a last chance."
While the Chief Inspector was stumbling to the gate of the
Cemetery--which was long since closed to all except those who could show
an official permit--one of his subordinates was viewing the Feldisham
Mansions crime in a far different light. Inspector Clarke, in whom
elation at his discovery was chastened by chagrin at his loss, was
walking towards Scotland Yard and saying to himself:
"I can prove, anyhow, that I took the rotten things from his trunk. So
now, Monsieur Janoc, the next and main item is to arrest you!"
CHAPTER XIII
OSBORNE MAKES A VOW
When Inspector Winter returned to his office from the cemetery he sat at
his desk, gazing at the two daggers before him, and awaiting the coming
of Clarke, from whom he expected to receive a full report of an
interview with Pauline Dessaulx in connection with the disappearance of
Rosalind.
There lay that long sought-for Saracen dagger at last: and Furneaux had
it, had been caught burying it in the grave of her who had been killed
by it. Was not this fact, added to the fact that Furneaux was seen in
Osborne's museum before the murder--was it not enough to
justify--indeed, enough to demand--Furneaux's arrest straight away? And
Furneaux had visited Rose de Bercy that night--had been seen by Bertha
Seward, the actress's cook! And yet Winter hesitated.... What had been
Furneaux's motive? There was as yet no ray of light as to that, though
Winter had caused elaborate inquiries to be made in Jersey as to
Furneaux's earlier career there. And there were _two_ daggers buried,
not one....
"Where does _this_ come in, this _second_ dagger...?" wondered Winter, a
maze of doubt and horror clouding his brain.
Just then Clarke arrived, rather breathless, jubilant, excited, but
Winter had already hidden the daggers instinctively--throwing them into
a drawer of his writing-desk.
"Well, what news of Miss Marsh?" he asked, with a semblance of official
calm he was far from feeling.
"The fact is, sir, I haven't been to Pauline Des----"
"What!"
"I was nearly at her door when I came across Gaston Janoc----"
"Oh, Heavens!" muttered Winter in despair. "You and your eternal
Janocs----"
The smiling Clarke looked at his chief in full confidence that he would
not be reprimanded for having disobeyed orders. Suddenly making three
steps on tiptoe, he said in Winter's ear:
"Don't be too startled--here's an amazing piece of information for you,
sir--_it was Gaston Janoc_ who committed the Feldisham Mansions murder!"
Winter stared at him without real comprehension. "Gaston Janoc!" his
lips repeated.
"I want to apply to-morrow for a warrant for his arrest," crowed Clarke.
"But, man alive!--don't drive me distracted," cried out Winter; "what
are you talking about?"
"Oh, I am not acting on any impulse," said Clarke, placidly satisfied,
enthroned on facts; "I may tell you now that I have been working on the
Feldisham Mansions affair from the first on my own account. I couldn't
help it. I was drawn to it as a needle by a magnet, and I now have all
the threads--ten distinct proofs--in my hands. It was Gaston Janoc did
it! Just listen to this, sir----"
"Oh, do as you like about your wretched Anarchist, Clarke," said Winter
pestered, waving him away; "I can't stop now. I sent you to do
something, and you should have done it. Miss Marsh's mother is half dead
with fright and grief; the thing is pressing, and I'll go myself."
With a snatch at his hat, he rushed out, Clarke following sullenly to go
home, though on his way northward, by sheer force of habit, he strolled
through Soho, looked up at Janoc's windows, and presently, catching
sight of Janoc himself coming out of the restaurant on the ground floor,
nodded after him, muttering to himself: "Soon now----" and went off.
But had he shadowed his Janoc just then, it might have been well! The
Frenchman first went into a French shop labeled "Vins et Comestibles,"
where he bought slices of sausage and a bottle of cheap wine, from which
he got the cork drawn--he already carried half a loaf of bread wrapped
in paper, and with bread, sausage, and wine, bent his way through
spitting rain and high wind, his coat collar turned up round his neck,
to a house in Poland Street.
An unoccupied house: its window-glass thicker than itself with grime,
broken in some of the panes, while in others were roughly daubed the
words: "To Let." But he possessed a key, went in, picked up a
candlestick in the passage, and lit the candle-end it contained.
At the end of the passage he went down a narrow staircase of wood, then
down some stone steps, to the door of a back cellar: and this, too, he
opened with a key.
Rosalind was crouching on the floor in the corner farthest from the
door, her head bent down, her feet tucked under her skirt. She had been
asleep: for the air in there was very heavy, the cellar hardly twelve
feet square, no windows, and the slightest movement roused a cloud of
dust. The walls were of rough stone, without break or feature, save
three little vaulted caves like ovens in the wall facing the door, made
to contain wine bottles and small barrels: in fact, one barrel and
several empty bottles now lay about in the dust. Besides, there were
sardine tins and a tin of mortadel, and relics of sausage and bread,
with which Janoc had lately supplied his prisoner, with a bottle half
full of wine, and one of water: all showing very dimly in the feeble
rays of the candle.
She looked at him, without moving, just raising her scornful eyes and no
more, and he, holding up the light, looked at her a good time.
"Lady," he said at last, "I have brought you some meat, wine, and
bread."
She made no answer. He stepped forward, and laid them by her side; then
walked back to the door, as if to go out, coughing at the dust; but
stopped and leant his back on the wall near the door, his legs crossed,
looking down at her.
"Lady," he said presently, "you still remain fixed in your obstinacy?"
No answer: only her wide-open reproving eyes dwelt on him with their
steady accusation like a conscience, and her hand stuck and stuck many
times with a hat-pin her hat which lay on her lap. Her gown appeared to
be very frowsy and unkempt now; her hair was untidy, and quite gray with
dust on one side, her face was begrimed and stained with the tracks of
tears; but her lips were firm, and the wonderful eyes, chiding,
disdainful, gave no sign of a drooping spirit.
"You will say nothing to me?" asked Janoc.
No answer.
"Is it that you think I may relent and let you free, lady, because my
heart weakens at your suffering? Do not imagine such a thing of me! The
more you are beautiful, the more you are sublime in your torture, the
more I adore you, the more my heart pours out tears of blood for you,
the more I am inflexible in my will. You do not know me--I am a man, I
am not a wind; a mind, not an emotion. Oh, pity is strong in me, love is
strong; but what is strongest of all is self-admiration, my worship of
intelligence. And have I not made it impossible that you should be let
free without conditions by my confession to you that it was my sister
Pauline who killed the actress? I tell you again it was Pauline who
killed her. It was not a murder! It was an assassination--a political
assassination. Mademoiselle de Bercy had proved a traitress to the group
of Internationals to which she belonged: she was condemned to death; the
lot fell upon Pauline to execute the sentence; and on the day appointed
she executed it, having first stolen from Mr. Osborne the 'celt' and the
dagger, so as to cast the suspicion upon him. I tell you this of my
sister--of one who to me is dearest on earth; and, having told you all
this, is it any longer possible that I should set you free without
conditions? You see, do you not, that it is impossible?"
No answer.
"I only ask you to promise--to give your simple word--not to say, or
hint, to anyone that Pauline had the daggers. What a risk I take! What
trust in you! I do not know you--I but trust blindly in the
highly-evolved, that divine countenance which is yours; and since it was
with the object of saving my sister that you came here with me, my
gratitude to you deepens my trust. Give me, then, this promise, Miss
Marsh!"
Now her lips opened a little to form the word "No," which he could just
catch.
"Sublime!" he cried--"and I am no less sublime. If I was rich, if I had
a fair name, and if I could dare to hope to win the love of a lady such
as you, how favored of the gods I should be! But that is--a dream. Here,
then, you will remain, until the day that Pauline is safely hidden in
France: and on that day--since for myself I care little--I will open
this door to you: never before. Meanwhile, tell me if you think of
anything more that I can do for your comfort."
No answer.
"Good-night." He turned to go.
"You made me a promise," she said at the last moment.
"I have kept it," he said. "This afternoon, at great risk to myself, I
wrote to your mother the words: 'Your daughter is alive and safe.' Are
you satisfied?"
"Thank you," she said.
"Good-night," he murmured again.
Having locked the door, he waited five minutes outside silently, to hear
if she sobbed or wailed in there in the utter dark: but no sound came to
him. He went upstairs, put out the light, put down the candlestick in
the passage, and was just drawing back the door latch, when he was aware
of a strong step marching quickly along an almost deserted pavement.
After a little he peeped out and recognized the heavy figure of
Inspector Winter. Even Janoc, the dreamer, whose dreams took such tragic
shape, was surprised for an instant.
"How limited is the consciousness of men!" he muttered. "That so-called
clever detective little guesses what he has just passed by."
But Winter, too, might have indulged in the same reflection: "How
limited the consciousness of Janoc! He doesn't know where I am passing
to--to visit and question his sister Pauline!"
Winter, a little further on, took a taxicab to Porchester Gardens, got
out at the bottom of the street, and was walking on to Mrs. Marsh's
temporary residence, when he saw Furneaux coming the opposite way.
Winter wished to pretend not to see him, but Furneaux spoke.
"Well, Providence throws us together somehow!"
"Ah! Why blame Providence?" said Winter, with rather a snarl.
"Not two hours ago there was our chance meeting by that graveside----"
The "chance" irritated Winter to the quick.
"You have all the faults of the French nature," he said bitterly,
"without any of its merits: its levity without its industry, its
pettiness without its minuteness----"
"And you the English frankness without its honesty. The chief thing
about a Frenchman is his intelligence. At least you do not deny that I
am intelligent?"
"I have thought you intelligent. I am damned if I think you so any
longer."
"Oh, you will again--soon--when I wish it. We met just now at a grave,
and there was more buried in that grave than the grave-diggers know: and
we both stood looking at it: but I fancy there were more X-rays in my
eye to see what was buried there than in yours!"
Driven beyond the bounds of patience, Winter threw out an arm in angry
protest.
"Ha! ha! ha!" tittered Furneaux.
An important official at Scotland Yard must learn early the value of
self-control. Consumed with a certain sense of the monstrous in this
display of untimely mirth, Winter only gnawed a bristle or two of his
mustache. He looked strangely at Furneaux, and they lingered together,
loath to part, having still something bitter and rankling to say, but
not knowing quite what, since men who have been all in all to each other
cannot quarrel without some childish tone of schoolboy spite mingling in
the wrangle.
"I believe I know where you are going now!" jeered Furneaux.
"Ah, you were always good at guessing."
"Going to pump the Pauline girl about Miss Marsh."
"True, of course, but not a very profound analysis considering that I am
just ten yards from the house."
"Don't you even know where Miss Rosalind Marsh is?" asked Furneaux,
producing a broken cigar from a pocket and sniffing it, simply because
he was well aware that the trick displeased his superior.
"No. Do you?" Winter jeered back at him.
"I do."
"Oh, the sheerest bluff!"
"No, no bluff. I know."
"Well, let me imagine that it is bluff, anyway: for brute as a man might
be, I won't give you credit for being _such_ a brute as to keep that
poor old lady undergoing the torments of hell through a deliberate
silence of yours."
"Didn't you say that I have all the bad qualities of the Latin
temperament?" answered Furneaux. "Now, there is something cat-like in
the Latin; a Spaniard, for example, can be infernally cruel at a
bullfight; and I'll admit that _I_ can, too. But 'torments of hell' is
rather an exaggeration, nor will the 'torments' last mortally long, for
to-morrow afternoon at about four--at the hour that I choose--in the
hour that I am ready--Miss Marsh will drive up to that door there."
"Evidently you were not born in Jersey, but in Gascony," Winter said
sourly.
"Wrong again! A Jersey man will bounce any Gascon off his feet," said
Furneaux. "And, just to pile up the agony, here is another sample for
you, since you accuse me of bluffing. To-morrow afternoon, at that same
hour--about four--I shall have that scoundrel Osborne in custody charged
with the murder in Feldisham Mansions."
"Mr. Osborne?" whispered Winter, towering and frowning above his
diminutive adversary. "Oh, Furneaux, you drive me to despair by your
folly. If you are mad, which I hope you are, that explains, I suppose,
your delusion that others are mad, too."
"Genius is closely allied with insanity," said Furneaux carelessly;
"yet, you observe that I have never hinted any doubt as to your
saneness. Wait, you'll see: my case against Osborne is now complete. A
warrant can't be refused, not even by you, and to-morrow, as sure as you
stand there, I lay my hand on your protégé's shoulder."
Winter nearly choked in his rage.
"All right! We'll see about that!" he said with a furious nod of menace.
Furneaux chuckled; and now by a simultaneous impulse they walked apart,
Furneaux whistling, in Winter a whirlwind of passion blowing the last
shreds of pity from his soul.
He was soon sitting at the bedside of Pauline Dessaulx, now
convalescent, though the coming of this strange man threw her afresh
into a tumult of agitation. But Winter comforted her, smoothed her hand,
assured her that there was no cause for alarm.
"I know that you took Mademoiselle de Bercy's diary," he said to her,
"and it was very wrong of you not to give it up to the police, and to
hide yourself as you did when your evidence was wanted. But, don't be
frightened--I am here to-night to see if you can throw any light on the
sad disappearance of Miss Marsh. The suspense is killing her mother, and
I feel sure that it has some connection with the Feldisham Mansions
affair. Now, can you help me? Think--tell me."
"Oh, I cannot!" She wrung her hands in a paroxysm of distress--"If I
could, I would. I cannot imagine----!"
"Well, then, that part of my inquiry is ended. Only, listen to this
attentively. I want to ask you one other question: Why did you leave the
Exhibition early on the night of the murder, and where did you go to?"
"_I--I--I_, sir!" she said, pointing to her guiltless breast with a
gaping mouth; "I, poor me, I _left_----?"
"Oh, come now, don't delude yourself that the police are fools. You went
to the Exhibition with the cook, Hester Se----"
"And she has said such a thing of me? She has declared that _I_
left----?"
"Yes, she has. Why trouble to deny it? You did leave--By the way, have
you a brother or any other relative in London----?"
"_I--I_, sir! A brother? Ah, mon Dieu! Oh, but, sir----!"
"Really you must calm yourself. You went away from the Exhibition at an
early hour. There is no doubt about it, and you must have a brother or
some person deeply interested in you, for some man afterwards got hold
of the cook, Bertha Seward, and begged her for Heaven's sake not to
mention your departure from the Exhibition that night. He gave her
money--she told me so. And Inspector Clarke knows it, as well as I, for
Hester Seward has told me that he went to question her----"
"M'sieur _Clarke_!"--at the name of "Clarke," which she whispered after
him, the girl's face turned a more ghastly gray, for Clarke was the
ogre, the griffon, the dragon of her recent life, at the mere mention of
whom her heart leaped guiltily. Suddenly, abandoning the struggle, she
fell back from her sitting posture, tried to hide her face in the
bedclothes, and sobbed wildly:
"I didn't do it! I didn't do it!"
"Do what? Who said you had done anything?" asked Winter. "It isn't _you_
that Mr. Clarke suspects, you silly child, it is a man named----"
She looked up with frenzied eyes to hear the name--but Winter stopped.
In his hands the unhappy Pauline was a little hedge-bird in the talons
of a hawk.
"Named?" she repeated.
"Never mind his name."
She buried her head afresh, giving out another heart-rending sob, and
from her smothered lips came the words:
"It wasn't I--it was--it was----"
"It was who?" asked Winter.
She shivered through the whole of her delicate frame, and a low murmur
came from her throat:
"You have seen the diary--it was Monsieur Furneaux."
Oddly enough, despite his own black conviction, this was not what Winter
expected to hear.
He started, and said sharply:
"Oh, you are stupid. Why are you saying things that you know nothing
of?"
"May Heaven forgive me for accusing anyone," she sobbed hoarsely. "But
it was not anybody else. It could not be. You have seen the diary--it
was Mr. Furneaux, or it was Mr. Osborne."
"Ah, two accusations now," cried Winter. "Furneaux or Osborne! You are
trying to shield someone? What motive could Mr. Furneaux, or Mr.
Osborne, have for such an act?"
"Was not Mr. Osborne her lover? And was not Mr. Furneaux her--husband?"
"Her----!"
In that awesome moment Winter hardly realized what he said. Half
starting out of his chair, he glared in stupor at the shrinking figure
on the bed, while every drop of blood fled away from his own face.
There was a long silence. Then Winter, bending over her, spoke almost in
the whisper of those who share a shameful secret.
"You say that Mr. Furneaux was her husband? You know it?"
She trembled violently, but nerved herself to answer:
"Yes, I know it."
"Tell me everything. You must! Do you understand? I order you."
"She told me herself when we were friends. She was married to him in the
church of St. Germain l'Auxerrois in Paris on the 7th of November in the
year '98. But she soon left him, since he had not the means to support
her. I have her marriage certificate in my trunk."
Winter sat some minutes spellbound, his big round eyes staring at the
girl, but not seeing her, his forehead glistening. This, then, supplied
the long-sought motive. The unfaithful wife was about to marry another.
This was the key. An affrighting callousness possessed him. He became
the cold, unbending official again.
"You must get up at once, and give me that certificate," he said in the
tone of authority, and went out of the room. In a little while she
placed the paper in his hands, and he went away with it. Were she not so
distraught she might have seen that it shook in his fingers.
Now he, like Clarke, held all the threads of an amazing case.
The next afternoon Furneaux was to arrest Osborne--it was for him,
Winter, then, to anticipate such an outrage by the swift arrest of
Furneaux. But was he quite ready? He wished he could secure another
day's grace to collate and systematize each link of his evidence, and he
hurried to Osborne's house in order to give Osborne a hint to vanish
again for a day or two. Nevertheless, when at the very door, he paused,
refrained, thought that he would manage things differently, and went
away.
On one of the blinds of the library as he passed he saw the shadow of a
head--of Osborne's head in fact, who in that hour of despair was sitting
there, bowed down, hopeless now of finding Rosalind, whom he believed to
be dead.
Though Mrs. Marsh had that evening received a note from Janoc: "Your
daughter is alive," as yet Osborne knew nothing of it. He was mourning
his loss in solitude when a letter was brought to him by Jenkins. He
tore it open. After an uncomprehending glare at the written words he
suddenly grasped their meaning.
The writer believes that your ex-secretary, Miss Hylda Prout,
could tell you where Miss Rosalind Marsh is imprisoned.
"Imprisoned!" That was the word that pierced the gloom and struck
deepest. She was alive, then--that was joy. But a prisoner--in what hole
of blackness? Subject to what risks? In whose power? In ten seconds he
was rushing out of the house, and was gone.
During the enforced respite of a journey in a cab he looked again at the
mysterious note. It was a man's hand; small, neat writing; no signature.
Who could have written it? But his brain had no room for guessing. He
looked out to cry to the driver: "A sovereign for a quick run."
To his woe, Hylda Prout was not in her lodgings when he arrived there.
During the last few days he had known nothing of her movements. After
that flare-up of passion in the library, the relation of master and
servant had, of course, come to an end between them; and the lady of the
house in Holland Park where Hylda rented two rooms told him that Miss
Prout had gone to see her brother for the weekend, and was not expected
back till noon on the following day.
And Osborne did not know where her brother lived! His night was dismal
with a horror of sleeplessness.
Long before midday he was in Hylda's sitting-room, only to pace it to
and fro in an agony of impatience till two o'clock--and then she came.
"Oh, I have waited hours--weary hours!" he cried with a reproach that
seemed to sweep aside the need for explanations.
"I am so sorry!--sit here with me."
She touched his hand, leading him to a couch and sitting near him, her
hat still on, a flush on her pale face.
"Hylda"--her heart leapt: he called her "Hylda"!--"you know where Miss
Marsh is."
She sprang to her feet in a passion.
"So it is to talk to me about another woman that you have come? I who
have humbled myself, lost my self-respect----"
Osborne, too, stood up, stung to the quick by this mood of hers, so
foreign to the disease of impatience and care in which he was being
consumed.
"My good girl," he said, "are you going to be reasonable?"
"Come, then," she retorted, "let us be reasonable." She sat down again,
her hands crossed on her lap, a passionate vindictiveness in her pursed
lips, but a mock humility in her attitude.
"Tell me! tell me! Where shall I find her?" and he bent in eager
pleading.
"No. How is it possible that I should tell you?"
"But you do know! Somehow you do! I see and feel it. Tell it me, Hylda!
Where is she?"
She looked up at him with a smiling face which gave no hint of the asp's
nest of jealousy which the sight of his agony and longing created in her
bosom. And from those calm lips furious words came out:
"Why, I horribly hate the woman--and since I happen to know that she is
suffering most vilely, do you think it likely that I would tell you
where she is?"
He groaned, as his heart sank, his head dropped, his hope died. He moved
slowly away to a window; then, with a frantic rush was back to her, on
his knees, telling her of his wealth--it was more than she could
measure!--and he had a checkbook in his pocket--all, one might say, was
hers--she had only to name a sum--a hundred thousand, two
hundred--anything--luxury for life, mansions, position--just for one
little word, one little act of womanly kindliness.
When he stopped for lack of breath, she covered her eyes with the back
of her hand, and began to cry; he saw her lips stretched in the tension
of her emotion.
"Why do you cry?--that achieves nothing--listen----" he panted.
"To be offered money--to be so wounded--I who----" She could not go on.
"My God! Then I offer you--what you will--my friendship--my
gratitude--my affection--only speak----"
"For another woman! Slave that you are to her! she is sweet to you, is
she, in your heart? But she shall never have you--be sure of that--not
while I draw the breath of life! If you want her free, I will sell
myself for nothing less than yourself--you must marry me!"
Her astounding demand struck him dumb. He picked himself slowly up from
her feet, walked again to the window, and stood with his back to her--a
long time. Once she saw his head drop, heard him sob, heard the words:
"Oh, no, not that"; and she sat, white and silent, watching him.
When he returned to her his eyes were calm, his face of a grim and stern
pallor. He sat by her, took her hand, laid his lips on it.
"You speak of marriage," he said gently, "but just think what kind of a
marriage that would be--forced, on one side--I full of resentment
against you for the rest of my life----"
Thus did he try to reason with her, tried to show her a better way,
offering to vow not to marry anyone for two years, during which he
promised to see whether he could not acquire for her those feelings
which a husband----
But she cut him short coldly. In two years she would be dead without
him. She would kill herself. Life lived in pain was a thing of no
value--a human life of no more value than a fly's. If he would marry
her, she would tell him where Miss Marsh was: and, after the marriage,
if he did not love her, she knew a way of setting him free--though, even
in that case, Rosalind Marsh should never have him--she, Hylda, would
see to that.
For the first time in his life Osborne knew what it was to hate. He, the
man accused of murder, felt like a murderer, but he had grown strangely
wise, and realized that this woman would die cheerfully rather than
reveal her secret. He left her once more, stood ten minutes at the
window--then laughed harshly.
"I agree," he said quite coolly, turning to her.
She, too, was outwardly cool, though heaven and hell fought together in
her bosom. She held out to him a Bible. He kissed it.
"When?" she asked.
"This day week," he said.
She wrote on a piece of paper the address of a house in Poland Street;
and handed it to him.
"Miss Marsh is there," she said, as though she were his secretary of
former days, in the most business-like way.
He walked straight out without another word, without a bow to her.
When he was well out of the house he began to run madly, for there was
no cab in sight. But he had not run far when he collided with Inspector
Furneaux.
"Mr. Osborne," said Furneaux--"one word. I think you are interested in
the disappearance of Miss Marsh? Well, I am happy to say that I am in a
position to tell you where that lady is."
He looked with a glitter of really fiendish malice in his eyes at the
unhappy man who leant against a friendly wall, his face white as death.
"Are you ill, sir?" asked Furneaux, with mock solicitude.
"Why, man, your information is a minute late," muttered Osborne; "I have
it already--I have bought it." He held out the paper with the address in
Poland Street.
Furneaux gazed at him steadily as he leant there, looking ready to drop;
then suddenly, eagerly, he said:
"You say '_bought_': do you mean with money?"
"No, not with money--with my youth, with my life!"
Furneaux seemed to murmur to himself: "As I hoped!" And now the glitter
of malice passed away from his softened eyes, his forehead flushed a
little, out went his hand to Osborne, who, in a daze of misery, without
in the least understanding why, mechanically shook it.
"Surely, Mr. Osborne," said Furneaux, "Miss Marsh would consider that a
noble deed of you, if she knew it."
"She will never know it."
"Oh, never is a long time. One must be more or less hopeful.
Unfortunately, I am compelled to inform you that I am here to arrest
you----"
"Me? At last! For the murder?"
"It was to be, Mr. Osborne. But, come, you shall first have the joy of
setting free Miss Marsh, to whom you have given so much--there's a
cab----"
Osborne followed him into the cab with a reeling brain. Yet he smiled
vacantly.
"I hope I shall be hanged," he said, in a sort of self-communing. "That
will be better than marriage--better, too, than deserving to be hanged,
which might have been true of me a few minutes ago. Why, I killed a
woman in thought just now--killed her, with my hands. Yes, this is
better. I should hate to have done that wretched thing, but now I am
safe--safe from--myself."
CHAPTER XIV
THE ARRESTS
As Furneaux and Osborne were being driven rapidly to Poland Street, bent
on the speedy release of Rosalind, Inspector Winter, for his part, was
seeking for Furneaux in a fury of haste, eager to arrest his colleague
before the latter could arrest Osborne. At the same time Clarke,
determined to bring matters to a climax by arresting Janoc, was lurking
about a corner of Old Compton Street, every moment expecting the passing
of his quarry. Each man was acting without a warrant. The police are
empowered to arrest "on suspicion," and each of the three could produce
proof in plenty to convict his man.
As for Winter, he knew that where Osborne was Furneaux would not be far
that day. Hence, when in the forenoon he received notice from one of his
watchers that Furneaux had that morning deliberately fled from
observation, he bade his man watch Osborne's steps with one eye, while
the other searched the offing for the shadow of Furneaux, on the sound
principle that "wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be
gathered together."
Thus Osborne's ride to Holland Park to see Hylda Prout had been
followed; and, two hours afterwards, while he was still waiting for
Hylda's arrival, Winter's spy from behind the frosted glass of a
public-house bar had watched Furneaux's arrival and long wait on the
pavement. He promptly telephoned the fact to Winter, and Winter was
about to set out westward from Scotland Yard when the detective
telephoned afresh to say that Mr. Osborne had appeared out of the house,
and had been accosted by Furneaux. The watcher, quite a smart youngster
from a suburban station, hastened from his hiding-place. Evidently,
Furneaux was careless of espionage at that moment. He hailed a cab
without so much as a glance at the man passing close to Osborne and
himself on the pavement, and it was easy to overhear the address given
to the driver--a house in Poland Street.
Why to Poland Street Winter could not conceive. At all events, the fact
that the drive was not to a police-station inspired him with the hope
that Osborne's arrest was for some reason not yet an accomplished fact,
and he, too, set off for Poland Street, which happily lay much nearer
Scotland Yard than Holland Park.
Meantime, Osborne and Furneaux were hastening eastward in silence,
Osborne with his head bent between his clenched hands, and an expression
of face as wrenched with pain as that of a man racked with neuralgia. It
was now that he began to feel in reality the tremendousness of the vow
he had just made to marry Hylda Prout, in order to set Rosalind free.
Compared to that his impending arrest was too little a thing for him to
care about. But as they were spinning along by Kensington Gardens, a
twinge of curiosity prompted him to ask why he was to be arrested now,
after being assured repeatedly that the police would not formulate any
charge against him.
Furneaux looked straight in front of him, and when he answered, his
voice was metallic.
"There was no escaping it, Mr. Osborne," he said. "But be thankful for
small mercies. I was waiting there in the street for you, intending to
pounce on you at once, but when I knew that you had sacrificed yourself
for Miss Marsh, I thought, 'He deserves to be permitted to release her':
for, to promise to marry Miss Prout----"
"What are you saying? How could you possibly know that I promised to
marry Miss Prout?"
Osborne's brain was still seething, but some glimmer of his wonted clear
judgment warned him of the exceeding oddity of the detective's remark.
"Well, you told me that you had 'bought' the knowledge of her
whereabouts with 'your youth and your life'--so I assumed that there
could be no other explanation."
"Still, that is singularly deep guessing----!"
"Well, if you demand greater accuracy, I foresaw exactly what would be
the result of your interview with your late secretary, in case you
really did care for Miss Marsh. Therefore, I brought about the interview
because----"
"_You_ brought it about?" cried Osborne in a crescendo of astonishment.
"Yes. You see I am candid. You are aware that I knew where Miss Marsh
could be found, and I might have given you the information direct. But I
preferred to write a note telling you that you must depend on Miss Prout
for tidings."
"Ah! it was you, then, who sent that note! But how cruel, how savagely
cruel! Could you not have told me yourself? Don't you realize that your
detestable action has bound me for life to a woman whom--Oh, I hope,
since you are about to arrest me, that you will prove me guilty, for if
I live, life henceforth will hold nothing for me save Dead Sea fruit!"
He covered his eyes, but Furneaux, whose face was twitching curiously,
laid a hand on his knee, and said in a low voice:
"Do not despair. You are not the only man in the world who suffers. I
had reasons--and strong reasons--for acting in this manner. One reason
was that I was uncertain of the depth of your affection for Miss Marsh,
and I wished to be as certain as you have now made me."
"But how on earth could that concern you, the depth or shallowness of my
affection for Miss Marsh?" asked Osborne in a white heat of anger and
indignation.
"Nevertheless, it did concern me," answered Furneaux dryly; "I cannot,
at present, explain everything to you. I had a suspicion that your
affection for Miss Marsh was trivial: if it had been, you would then
have shown a criminal forgetfulness of the dead woman whom so recently
you said you loved. In that event, you would have found me continuing
the part I have played in regard to you--anything but a friend. As
matters stand, I say I may yet earn your gratitude for what to-day you
call my cruelty."
Osborne passed his hands across his eyes wearily.
"I fear I can neither talk myself, nor quite understand what you mean by
your words," he murmured. "My poor head is rather in a whirl. You see, I
have given my promise--I have sworn on the Bible to that woman--nothing
can ever alter that, or release me now. I am--done for----"
His chin dropped on his breast. He had the semblance of a man who had
lost all--for whom death had no terrors.
"Nevertheless, I tell you that I forecasted the result of your interview
with Hylda Prout," persisted Furneaux. "Even now I do not see your
reason for despair. I knew that Miss Prout had an ardent attachment to
you; I said to myself: 'She will surely seek to sell the information in
her possession for what she most longs for, and the possibility is that
Osborne may yield to her terms--always provided that his attachment to
the other lady is profound. If it is not profound, I find out by this
device; if it is profound, he becomes engaged to Miss Prout, which is a
result that I greatly wish to bring about before his arrest.'"
"My God! why?" asked Osborne, looking up in a tense agony that might
have moved a less sardonic spirit.
"For certain police reasons," said Furneaux, smiling with the smug air
of one who has given an irrefutable answer.
"But what a price _I_ pay for these police reasons! Is this fair,
Inspector Furneaux? Now, in Heaven's name, is this fair? Life-long
misery on the one hand, and some trick of officialism on the other!"
The detective seemed to think the conversation at an end, since he sat
in silence and stared blankly out of the window.
Osborne shrank into his corner, quite drooping and pinched with misery,
and brooded over his misfortunes. Presently he started, and asked
furiously:
"In what possible way did Hylda Prout come to know where Miss Marsh was
hidden, to use your own ridiculous word?"
"Miss Prout happens to be a really clever woman," answered Furneaux. "In
the times of Richelieu she would have governed France from an _alcôve_.
You had better ask her herself how she obtained her knowledge. Still, I
don't mind telling you that Miss Marsh has been imprisoned in a
wine-cellar by a certain Anarchist, a great man in his way, and that
your former secretary has of late days developed quite an intimate
acquaintance with Anarchist circles----"
"Anarchist?" gasped Osborne. "My Rosalind--imprisoned in a wine-cellar?"
"It is a tangled skein," purred Furneaux with a self-satisfied smirk; "I
am afraid we haven't time now to go into it."
The cab crossed Oxford Circus--two minutes more and they were in Soho.
Winter at that moment was on the lookout for Furneaux at the corner of a
shabby street which traverses Poland Street. As for Clarke, he had
vanished from the nook in Compton Street where he was loitering in the
belief that Janoc would soon pass. In order to understand exactly the
amazing events that were now reaching their crisis it is necessary to go
back half an hour and see how matters had fared with Clarke....
During his long vigil, he, in turn, had been watched most intently by
the Italian, Antonio, who, quickly becoming suspicious, hastened to a
barber's shop, kept by a compatriot, where Janoc was in hiding. Into
this shop he pitched to pant a frenzied warning.
"Sauriac says that Inspector Clarke has been up your stairs--may have
entered your rooms--and I myself have just seen him prowling round Old
Compton Street!"
Agitation mastered Janoc; he, who so despised those bunglers, the
police, now began to fear them. Out he pelted, careless of consequences,
and Antonio after him.
He made straight for his third-floor back, and, losing a few seconds in
his eagerness to unlock the door, rushed to the trunk in which he had
left the two daggers, meaning to do away with them once and for all.
And now he knew how he had blundered in keeping them. He looked in the
trunk and saw, not the daggers, but the gallows!
For the first time in his life he nearly fainted. Political desperadoes
of his type are often neurotic--weak as women when the hour of trial is
at hand, but strong as women when the spirit has subdued the flesh.
During some moments of sheer despair he knelt there, broken, swaying,
with clasped hands and livid face. Then he stood up slowly, with some
degree of calmness, with no little dignity.
"They are gone," he said to Antonio, pointing tragically.
Antonio's hands tore at his hair, his black eyes glared out of their red
rims with the look of a hunted animal that hears the hounds baying in
close pursuit.
"This means the sure conviction either of her or me," went on Janoc. "My
efforts have failed--I must confess to the murder."
"My friend!" cried Antonio.
"Set free Miss Marsh for me," said Janoc, and he walked down the stairs,
without haste, yet briskly--Antonio following him at some distance
behind, with awe, with reverence, as one follows a conqueror.
Janoc went unfalteringly to his doom. Clarke, seeing him come, chuckled
and lounged toward him.
"It is for me you wait--yes?" said Janoc, pale, but strong.
"There may be something in _that_," said Clarke, though he was slightly
taken aback by the question.
"You have the daggers--yes?"
This staggered him even more, but he managed to growl:
"You may be sure of that."
"Well, I confess! I did it!"
At last! The garish street suddenly assumed roseate tints in the
detective's eyes.
"Oh, you do?" he cried thickly. "You confess that you killed Rose de
Bercy on the night of the 3d of July at Feldisham Mansions?"
"Yes, I confess it."
Clarke laid a hand on Janoc's sleeve, and the two walked away.
As for Antonio, in an ecstasy of excitement he cast his eyes and his
arms on high together, crying out, "_O Dio mio!_" and the next moment
was rushing to find a cab to take him to Porchester Gardens. Arrived
there, he rang, and the instant Pauline appeared, she being now
sufficiently recovered to attend to her duties, his right hand went out
in a warning clutch at her shoulder.
"Your brother is arrested!" he cried.
With her clenched fists drawn back, she glared crazily at him, and her
face reddened for a little while, as if she were furious at the outrage
and suddenness of his news. Then her cheeks whitened, she went faint,
sank back into the shelter of the hall, and leant against an inner
doorway, her eyes closed, her lips parted.
"Oh, Pauline, be brave!" said Antonio, and tears choked his voice.
After a time, without opening her eyes, she asked:
"What proofs have they?"
"They have found the daggers in his trunk."
"But _I_ have the daggers!"
"No, that woman who lived here, your supposed friend, Miss Marsh, stole
the daggers from you, and Janoc secured them from her."
She moaned, but did not weep. She, who had been timid as a mouse at
sight of Clarke, was now braver than the man. Presently she whispered:
"Where have they taken him to?"
"He will have been taken to the Marlborough Street police-station."
After another silence she said:
"Thank you, Antonio; leave me."
Passionately he kissed her hand in silence, and went.
She was no sooner alone than she walked up to her room, dressed herself
in clothes suited for an out-of-door mission, and went out, heedless and
dumb when a wondering fellow-servant protested. She called a cab--for
Marlborough Street; and now she was as calm and strong as had been her
brother when he gave himself up to Clarke.
Her cab crossed Oxford Circus about ten minutes ahead of the vehicle
which carried Furneaux and Osborne; and as she turned south to enter
Marlborough Street, she saw Winter, who had lately visited her, standing
at a corner awaiting the arrival of Furneaux.
"Stop!" Pauline cried to her driver: and she alighted.
"Well, you are better, I see," said Winter, who did not wish to be
bothered by her at that moment.
"Sir," said Pauline solemnly in her stilted English, "I regret having
been so unjust as to tell you that it was either Mr. Furneaux or Mr.
Osborne who committed that murder, since it was I myself who did it."
"What!" roared Winter, stepping backward, and startled most effectually
out of his official phlegm.
"Sir," said Pauline again, gravely, calmly, "it was not a murder, it was
an assassination, done for political reasons. As I have no mercy to
expect, so I have no pardon to ask, and no act to blush at. It was
political. I give myself into your custody."
Winter stood aghast. His brain seemed suddenly to have curdled;
everything in the world was topsy-turvy.
"So that was why you left the Exhibition--to kill that poor woman,
Pauline Dessaulx?" he contrived to say.
"That is the truth, sir. I could bear to keep it secret no longer, and
was going now to the police-station to give myself up, when I saw you."
Still Winter made no move. He stood there, frowning in thought, staring
at nothing.
"And all the proofs I have gathered against--against someone else--all
these are false?" he muttered.
"I am afraid so, sir," said Pauline, "since it was I who did it with my
own hands."
"And Mr. Osborne's dagger and flint--where do they come in?"
"It was I who stole them from Mr. Osborne's museum, sir, to throw
suspicion upon him."
"Oh, come along," growled Winter. "I believe, I know, you are lying, but
this must be inquired into."
Not unkindly, acting more like a man in a dream than an officer of the
law, he took her arm, led her to the cab from which she had just
descended, and the two drove away together to the police-station higher
up the street.
Thus, and thus only, was Inspector Furneaux saved from arrest that day.
Two minutes later he and Osborne passed the very spot where Pauline
found Winter, and reached Poland Street without interference.
Furneaux produced a bunch of keys when he ran up the steps of the house.
He unlocked the door at once, and the two men entered. Evidently
Furneaux had been there before, for he hurried without hesitation down
the kitchen stairs, put a key into the cellar door, flung it open, and
Osborne, peering wildly over his shoulder, caught a glimpse of Rosalind
sitting on the ground in a corner.
She did not look up when they entered--apparently she thought it was
Janoc who had come, and with fixed, mournful eyes, like one gazing into
profundities of vacancy, she continued to stare at the floor. Her face
and air were so pitiable that the hearts of the men smote them into
dumbness.
[Illustration: She did not look up when they entered
_Page 258_]
Then, half conscious of some new thing, she must have caught sight of
two men instead of the usual one, for she looked up sharply; and in
another moment was staggering to her feet, all hysterical laughter and
sobbings, like a dying light that flickers wildly up and burns low
alternately, trying at one instant to be herself and calm, when she
laughed, and the next yielding to her distress, when she sobbed. She put
out her hand to Osborne in a last effort to be graceful and usual; then
she yielded the struggle, and fainted in his arms.
Furneaux produced a scent-bottle and a crushed cigar, such as it was his
habit to smell, to present them to her nose....
But she did not revive, so Osborne took her in his arms, and carried
her, as though she were a child, up the stone steps, and up the wooden,
and out to the cab. Furneaux allowed him to drive alone with her,
himself following behind in another cab, which was a most singular
proceeding on the part of a detective who had arrested a man accused of
an atrocious murder.
Half-way to Porchester Gardens Rosalind opened her eyes, and a wild,
heartrending cry came from her parched lips.
"I will have no more wine nor water--let me die!"
"Try and keep still, just a few moments, my dear one!" he murmured,
smiling a fond smile of pain, and clasping her more tightly in a
protecting arm. "You are going home, to your mother. You will soon be
there, safe, with her."
"Oh!"--Then she recognized him, though there was still an uncanny
wildness in her eyes. "I am free--it is you."
She seemed to falter for words, but raised her hands instinctively to
her hair, knowing it to be all rumpled and dusty. Instinctively, too,
she caught her hat from her knee, and put it on hurriedly. She could not
know what stabs of pain these little feminine anxieties caused her
lover. No spoken words could have portrayed the sufferings she had
endured like unto her pitiful efforts to conceal their ravages. At last
she recovered sufficiently to ask if her mother expected her.
"I am not sure," said Osborne. "I am not your deliverer; Inspector
Furneaux discovered where you were, and went to your rescue."
"But you are with him?" and an appealing note of love, of complete
confidence, crept into her voice.
"I merely happen to be with him, because he is now taking me to a
felon's cell. But he lets me come in the cab with you, because he trusts
me not to run away."
His smile was very sad and humble, and he laid his disengaged hand on
hers, yielding to a craving for sympathy in his forlornness. But
memories were now thronging fast on her mind, and she drew herself away
from both hand and arm. She recalled that her last sight of him was when
in the embrace of Hylda Prout in his library; and, mixed with that
vision of infamy, was a memory of her letter that had been opened, whose
opening he had denied to her.
And that snatch of her hand as from a toad's touch, that shrinking from
the pressure of his arm, froze him back into his loneliness of misery.
They remained silent, each in a corner, a world between them, till the
cab was nearly at the door in Porchester Gardens. Then he could not help
saying from the depths of a heavy heart:
"Probably I shall never see you again! It is good-by now; and no more
Rosalind."
The words were uttered in a tone of such heart-rending sadness that they
touched some nerve of pity in her. But she could find nothing to say,
other than a quite irrelevant comment.
"I will tell my mother of your consideration for me. At least, we shall
thank you."
"If ever you hear anything--of me--that looks black----" he tried to
tell her, thinking of his coming marriage with Hylda Prout, but the
explanation choked in his throat; he only managed to gasp in a quick
appeal of sorrow: "Oh, remember me a little!"
The cab was at the door. She put out her hand, and he shook it; but did
not offer to escort her inside the house. It was Furneaux who led her up
the steps, and Osborne heard from within a shrill outcry from Mrs.
Marsh. Furneaux waited until the door was closed. Then he rejoined
Osborne. They went, without exchanging a syllable of talk, to
Marlborough Street police-station, where Janoc and his sister were
already lodged. Arrived there, Furneaux formally arrested him, "on
suspicion," charged with the murder of Rose de Bercy.
"But why _now_?" asked Osborne again. "What has happened to implicate me
now more than before?"
"Oh, many things have happened, and will happen, that as yet you know
nothing of," said Furneaux, smiling at the stolid station inspector, a
man incapable of any emotion, even of surprise, and Osborne was led away
to be searched for concealed weapons, or poison, before being placed in
a cell.
Half an hour afterwards Furneaux walked into Winter's quarters. His
chief, writing hard, hardly glanced up, and for some time Furneaux stood
looking at his one-time friend with the eyes of a scientist who
contemplates a new fossil.
"Well, I have Osborne safe," he said at last.
"You have, have you?" muttered Winter, scribbling rapidly; but a flush
of anger rose on his forehead, and he added: "It will cost you your
reputation, my good fellow!"
"Is that all?" cried Furneaux mockingly. "Why, I was looking out for
worse things than that!"
Winter threw down his pen.
"You informed me last night," he snarled, "that by this hour Miss Marsh
would have returned to her home. I need not ask----"
"I have just taken her there," remarked the other coolly.
Winter was thoroughly nonplused. Everybody, everything, seemed to be
mad. He was staring at Furneaux when Clarke entered. The newcomer's hat
was tilted a little backward, and there was an air of business-like
haste in him from the creak of his boot soles to the drops of
perspiration shining on his brow. He contrived to hold himself back just
long enough to say, "Hello, Furneaux!" and then his burden of news broke
from him:
"Well, I've got Janoc under lock and key all right."
"Oh, _you've_ got somebody, too, have you?" groaned Winter. "And on what
charge, pray, have you collared Janoc?"
"Why, what a question!" cried Clarke. "Didn't I tell you, sir----?"
"So true," said Winter; "I had almost forgotten. _You_'ve grabbed Janoc,
and the genius of Mr. Furneaux is sated by arresting Mr. Osborne----"
Clarke slapped his thigh vigorously, doubling up in a paroxysm of
laughter.
"Osborne! Oh, not Osborne at this time of day!" He leered at Furneaux in
comic wonder--he, who had never dared question aught done by the little
man, save in the safe privacy of his thoughts.
"And I have arrested Pauline," said Winter in grim irony.
"Who has?" asked Clarke, suddenly agape.
"I, I say. Pauline is _my_ prize. _I_ wouldn't be left out in the cold."
And he added bitterly: "We've all got one!--_all_ guilty!--a lovely
story it will make for the newspapers. I suppose, to keep up the
screaming farce, that we each ought to contrive to have our prisoner
tried in a different court!"
Clarke's hands went akimbo. He swelled visibly, grew larger, taller, and
looked down from his Olympus at the others.
"But _I_ never dream at night," he cried. "When _I_ arrest a man for
murder he is going to be hanged. You see, _Janoc has confessed_--that's
all: he has confessed!"
Winter leaped up.
"Confessed!" he hissed, unable to believe his ears.
"That's just it," said Clarke--"confessed!"
"But Pauline has confessed, too!" Winter almost screamed, confronting
his subordinate like an adversary.
And while Clarke shrank, and gaped in dumb wonder, Furneaux, looking
from one to the other, burst out laughing. Never a word he said, but
turned in his quick way to leave the room. He was already in the
corridor when Winter shouted:
"Come back, Furneaux!"
"Not I," was the defiant retort.
"Come back, or I shall have you brought back!"
Winter was in a white rage, but Furneaux pressed on daringly, whistling
a tune, and never looking round. Clarke, momentarily expecting the roof
of Scotland Yard to fall in, gazed from Furneaux to Winter and from
Winter to Furneaux until the diminutive Jersey man had vanished round an
angle of a long passage.
But nothing happened. Winter was beaten to his knees, and he knew it.
CHAPTER XV
CLEARING THE AIR
Winter was far too strong a man to remain long buried in the pit of
humiliation into which Furneaux, aided unwittingly by Clarke, had cast
him. The sounds of Furneaux's jaunty footsteps had barely died away
before he shoved aside the papers on which he had been engaged
previously, and reached across the table for a box of cigars.
He took one, and shoved the box towards Clarke, whose face was still
glistening in evidence of his rush from Marlborough Street
police-station.
"Here, you crack-pate!" he said, "smoke; it may clear your silly head."
"But I can't repeat too often that Janoc has confessed--_confessed_!"
and Clarke's voice rose almost to a squeal on that final word.
"So has his sister confessed. In an hour or two, when the silence and
horror of a cell have done their work, we shall have Osborne confessing,
too. Oh, man, man, can't you see that Furneaux has twisted each of us
round his little finger?"
"But--sir----"
"Yes, I know," cried Winter, in a fume of wrath and smoke. "Believe
these foreign idiots and we shall be hearing of a masked tribunal,
glistening with daggers, a brace of revolvers in every belt--a dozen or
more infuriated conspirators, cloaked in gaberdines, gathered in a West
End flat, while a red-headed woman harangues them. Furneaux has fooled
us, I tell you--deliberately brought the Yard into discredit--made us
the laughing-stock of the public. Oh, I shall never----"
He pulled himself up, for Clarke was listening with the ears of a
rabbit. Luckily, the detective's ideas were too self-concentrated to
extract much food for thought from these disjointed outpourings.
"I don't wish to seem wanting in respect, sir," he said doggedly, "but
have you forgotten the diary? Why, Rose de Bercy herself wrote that she
would be killed either by C. E. F. or Janoc. Now----"
"Did she mention Janoc?" interrupted Winter sharply. "In what passage? I
certainly _have_ forgotten that."
Clarke, stubborn as a mule, stuck to his point, though he felt that he
had committed himself.
"Perhaps I did wrong," he growled savagely, "but I couldn't help myself.
You were against me all along, sir--now, weren't you?"
No answer. Winter waited, and did not even look at him.
"What was I to do?" he went on in desperation. "You took me off the job
just as I was getting keen in it. Then I happened upon Janoc, and found
his sister, and when I came across that blacked-out name in the diary I
scraped it and sponged it until I could read what was written beneath.
The name was Janoc!"
"Was it?" said Winter, gazing at him at last with a species of contempt.
"And to throw dust in my eyes--in the eyes of your superior officer--you
inked it out again?"
"You wouldn't believe," muttered Clarke. "Why, you don't know half this
story. I haven't told you yet how I found the daggers----"
"You don't say," mocked Winter.
"But I do, I did," cried Clarke, beside himself with excitement. "I took
them out of Janoc's lodgings, and put them in a cab. I would have them
in my hands this minute if some d--d thing hadn't occurred, some trick
of fate----"
Winter stooped and unlocked a drawer in his writing-desk.
"Are these your daggers?" he demanded, though Clarke was shrewd enough,
if in possession of his usual senses, to have caught the note of
suppressed astonishment in the Chief Inspector's voice, since this was
the first he had heard of Furneaux's deliberate pilfering of the weapons
from his colleague.
But something was singing in Clarke's ears, and his eyes were glued on
the blades resting there in the drawer. Denial was impossible. He
recognized them instantly, and all his assurance fled from that moment.
"Well, there!" he murmured, in a curiously broken voice. "I give in! I'm
done! I'm a baby at this game. Next thing, I suppose, I'll be asked to
resign--me, who found 'em, and the diary, and the letter telling Janoc
not to kill her--yet."
He was looking so fixedly at the two daggers that he failed to see the
smile of relief that flitted over Winter's face. Now, more than ever,
the Chief Inspector realized that he was dealing with one of the most
complex and subtle crimes which had come within his twenty years of
experience. He was well versed in Furneaux's sardonic humor, and the
close friendship that had existed between them ever since the little
Jersey man joined the Criminal Investigation Department had alone
stopped him from resenting it. It was clear now to his quick
intelligence that Furneaux had actually planned nearly every discovery
which either he himself or Clarke had made. Why? He could not answer. He
was moving through a fog, blind-folded, with hands tied behind his back.
Search where he would, he could not find a motive, unless, indeed,
Furneaux was impelled by that strangest of all motives, a desire to
convict himself. At any rate, he did not want Clarke to tread on the
delicate ground that must now be covered before Furneaux was arrested,
and the happy accident which had unlocked Clarke's tongue with regard to
the diary would serve admirably to keep him well under control.
"Now, look here, Inspector Clarke," said Winter severely, after a pause
that left the other in wretched suspense, "you have erred badly in this
matter. For once, I am willing to overlook it--because--because you
fancied you had a grievance. But, remember this--never again! Lack of
candor is fatal to the best interests of the service. It is for me to
decide which cases you shall take up and which you shall leave alone.
You know perfectly well that if, by chance, information reaches you with
regard to any inquiry which may prove useful to the man in charge of it,
it is your duty to tell him everything. I say no more now. You
understand me fully, I have no doubt. You must take it from me, without
question or protest, that neither Janoc nor his sister was responsible
for that crime. They may have been mixed up in it--in some manner now
hidden from me--but they had no share in it personally. Still, seeing
that you have worked so hard, I don't object to your presence while I
prove that I am right. Come with me now to Marlborough Street. Mr.
Osborne must be set at liberty, of course, but I shall confront your
Anarchist friends with one another, and then you will see for yourself
my grounds for being so positive as to their innocence."
"But you yourself arrested Pauline, sir," Clarke ventured to say.
"Don't be an ass!" was the cool rejoinder. "Could I refuse to arrest
her? Suppose you told me now that you had killed the Frenchwoman,
wouldn't I be compelled to arrest _you_?"
"Ha!" laughed Clarke, in solemn mirth, "what about C. E. F.? Wouldn't it
be funny if he owned up to it?"
Winter answered not a word. He was busy locking the drawer and rolling
down the front of the desk. But Clarke did not really mean what he had
said. His mind was dwelling on the inscrutable mystery of the daggers
which he had last held in his hands in Soho and now knew to be reposing
in a locked desk in Scotland Yard.
"Would you mind telling me, sir, how you managed to get hold of 'em?" he
asked.
Winter did not pretend ignorance.
"You will be surprised to hear that I myself took them, disinterred
them, from the poor creature's grave in Kensal Green Cemetery," he said.
Clarke's jaw dropped in the most abject amazement. The thing had a
supernatural sound. He felt himself bewitched.
"From her grave?" he repeated.
"Yes."
"But who put 'em there?"
"Ah," said the other with a new note of sternness in his voice, "who but
the murderer? But come, we are wasting time--that unfortunate Osborne
must be half-demented. I suppose the Marlborough Street people will let
him out on my authority. If not, I must get an order from the
Commissioner. By gad, there will be a fiendish rumpus about this
business before it is all settled!"
Clarke shivered. He saw a certain well-belovèd detective inspector
figuring prominently in that "rumpus," and he was in no mind to seek a
new career after passing the best part of his life in the C. I. D.
But at Marlborough Street another shock awaited the Chief. He and Clarke
were entering the street in a taxi when Furneaux crooked a finger at him
from the pavement. Winter could not, nay, he dared not, ignore that
demand for an interview.
"Stop here!" he said to Clarke. Then he sprang out, and approached
Furneaux.
"Well?" he snapped, "have you made up your mind to end this tragic
farce?"
"I am not its chief buffoon," sneered Furneaux. "In fact, I am mainly a
looker-on, but I do appreciate its good points to the full."
Winter waved aside these absurdities.
"I have come to free Mr. Osborne," he said. "I was rather hoping that
your own sense of fair dealing, if you have any left----"
"Exactly what I thought," broke in the other. "That is why _I_ am here.
I hate correcting your mistakes, because I fancy it does you good to
discover them for yourself. Still, it is a pity to spoil a good cause.
Mere professional pride forces me to warn you against liberating
Osborne."
"Man alive, you try me beyond endurance. Do you believe I don't know the
truth--that Rose de Bercy was your wife--that _you_ were in that museum
before the murder--that _you_.... Oh, Furneaux, you wring it from me.
Get a pistol, man, before it is too late."
"You mean that?" cried Furneaux, his eyes gleaming with a new fire.
"Heaven knows I do!"
"You want to be my friend, then, after all?"
"Friend! If you realized half the torture----"
"Pity!" mused Furneaux aloud. "Why didn't you speak sooner? So you would
rather I committed suicide than be in your hands a prisoner?"
Winter then awoke to the consciousness that this extraordinary
conversation was taking place in a crowded thoroughfare, within a
stone's throw of a police-station in which lay three people charged with
having committed the very crime he was tacitly accusing Furneaux of,
while Clarke's ferret eyes must be resting on them with a suspicion
already half-formed.
"I can say no more," he muttered gruffly. "One must forego friendship
when duty bars the way. But if you have a grain of humanity left in your
soul, come with me and release that unhappy young man----"
Some gush of emotion wrung Furneaux's face as if with a spasm of
physical pain. He held out his right hand.
"Winter, forgive me, I have misjudged you," he said.
"Is it good-by?" came the passionate question.
"No, not good-by. It is an alliance, Winter, a wiping of the slate. You
don't understand, perhaps, that we are both to blame. But you can take
my hand, old man. There is no stain of blood on it. I did not murder my
wife. I am her avenger, her pitiless, implacable avenger--so pitiless,
so implacable, that I may have erred in my harshness. For Heaven's sake,
Winter, believe me, and take my hand!"
The man's magnetism was irresistible. Despite the crushing weight of
proof accumulated against him, the claims of old friendship were not to
be ignored. Winter took the proffered hand and squeezed it with a
vehemence that not only showed the tension of his feelings but also
brought tears of real anguish to Furneaux's eyes.
"I only asked you for a friendly grip, Winter," he complained. "You have
been more than kind. No matter what happens, don't offer to shake hands
with me again for twelve months at least."
There was no comprehending him, and Winter abandoned the effort.
Moreover, Clarke's puzzled brows were bent on them.
"An alliance implies confidence," he said, and the official mask fell on
his bluff features. "If you can honestly----"
Furneaux laughed, with just a faint touch of that impish humor that the
other knew so well.
"Not Winter, but Didymus!" he cried. "Well, then, let us proceed to the
confounding of poor Clarke. _Peste!_ he deserves a better fate, for he
has worked like a Trojan. But leave Osborne to me. Have no fear--I shall
explain, a little to him, all to you."
Clarke writhed with jealousy when Winter beckoned to him. While his
chief was paying the cabman, he jeered at Furneaux.
"I had a notion----" he began, but the other caught his arm
confidentially.
"I was just telling the guv'nor how much we owe to you in this Feldisham
Mansions affair," he said. "You were on the right track all the time.
You've the keenest nose in the Yard, Clarke. You can smell an Anarchist
through the stoutest wall ever built. Now, not a word! You'll soon see
how important your investigations have been."
Clarke was overwhelmed by a new flood. Never before had Furneaux praised
him, unless in some ironic phrase that galled the more because he did
not always extract its hidden meaning. He blinked with astonishment.
With a newborn trust, which he would have failed ignominiously to
explain in words, Winter led his colleagues to Marlborough Street
police-station. There, after a brief but earnest colloquy with the
station inspector, he asked that Janoc and his sister should be brought
to the inspector's office.
Janoc came first, pale, languid, high-strung, but evidently prepared to
be led to his death that instant.
He looked at the four men, three in plain clothes and one in uniform,
with a superb air of dignity, almost of superiority; in silence he
awaited the inquisition which he supposed he would be compelled to
undergo, but when no word was spoken--when even that phantom of evil,
Clarke, paid no heed to him, he grew manifestly uneasy.
At last steps were heard, the door opened, and Pauline Dessaulx entered.
Of course, this brother and sister were Gauls to the finger-tips. Each
screamed, each flew to the other's arms; they raved; they wept, and
laughed, and uttered incoherent words of utmost affection.
Winter indulged them a few seconds. Then he broke in on their
transports.
"Now, Janoc," he said brusquely, "have done with this acting! Why have
you given the police so much trouble?"
"Monsieur, I swear----"
"Oh, have done with your swearing! Your sister didn't kill Mademoiselle
de Bercy. She wouldn't kill a fly. Come, Pauline, own up!"
"Monsieur," faltered the girl, "I--I----"
"You took the guilt on your shoulders in order to shield your brother?"
Wild-eyed, distraught, she looked from the face of the man who seemed to
peer into her very soul to that other face so dear to her. She knew not
what to say. Was this stern-visaged representative of the law merely
torturing her with a false hope? Dared she say "Yes," or must she
persist in self-accusation?
"Janoc," thundered Winter, "you ought to be ashamed of yourself. Don't
you see how she is suffering for your sake? Tell her, then, that you are
as innocent as she of this murder?"
The dreamer, the man who would reform an evil world by force, had the
one great quality demanded of a leader--he knew a man when he met him.
He turned now to Pauline.
"My sister," he said in French, "this gentleman can be trusted. He is no
trickster. I had no hand in the slaying of the traitress, just though
her death might be."
"Ah, _Dieu merci_!" she breathed, and fainted.
The police matron was summoned, and the Frenchwoman soon regained
consciousness. Meanwhile, Janoc admitted readily enough that he did
really believe in his sister's acceptance of the dread mission imposed
on her by the revolutionary party in Russia.
"Rose de Bercy was condemned, and my sweet Pauline, alas! was deputed to
be her executioner," he said. "We had waited long for the hour, and the
dagger was ready, though I, too, distrusted my sister's courage. Then
came an urgent letter from St. Petersburg that the traitress was
respited until a certain list found among her papers was checked----"
"Found?" questioned Winter.
"By Pauline," said Janoc.
"Ah, stolen?"
Janoc brushed aside the substituted word as a quibble.
"Conceive my horror when I heard of the murder!" he cried with hands
flung wide and eyes that rolled. "I was sure that Pauline had mistaken
the instructions----"
"Where is the St. Petersburg letter?" broke in Furneaux.
"Sapristi! You will scarce credit. It was taken from me by a man--a
Russian agent he must have been--one night in the Fraternal Club,
Soho----"
"Clarke, produce it," said Furneaux, grinning.
Clarke flushed, grew white, nervously thumbed some papers in a
pocketbook, and handed to Winter the letter which commenced: "St.
Petersburg says ..." and ended: "You will see to it that she to whose
hands vengeance has been intrusted shall fail on the 3d."
Winter read, and frowned. Furneaux, too, read.
"The 3d!" he muttered. "Just Heaven, what a fatal date to her!"
"What was I to think?" continued Janoc. "Antonio shared my view. He met
Pauline at the Exhibition, and was ready, if necessary, to vouch for her
presence there at the time Rose de Bercy went to her reckoning; but he
is not in the inner--he had not heard of the Petersburg order."
"Yet he, and the rest of your gang, were prepared to let Mr. Osborne
hang for this crime," said Winter, surveying the conspirator with a
condemning eye. But his menace or scorn was alike to Janoc, who threw
out his arms again.
"Cré nom!" he cried, "why not? Is he not a rich bourgeois like the rest?
He and his class have crushed us without mercy for many a century. What
matter if he were hanged by mistake? He could be spared--my Pauline
could not. He is merely a rich one, my Pauline is a martyr to the
cause!"
"Listen to me, Janoc," said Winter fiercely. "Spout what rubbish you
please in your rotten club, but if ever you dare again to plot--even to
plot, mind you--any sort of crime against life or property in this free
country, I shall crush you like a beetle--like a beetle, do you hear,
you wretched--insect! Now, get out!"
"Monsieur, my sister?"
"Wait outside there till she comes. Then leave England, the pair of you,
or you will try what hard labor in a British prison can do for your
theories."
Janoc bowed.
"Monsieur," he said, "a prison has made me what I am."
Pauline was candid as her brother. She had, in truth, misunderstood the
respite given to her mistress, and meant to kill her on the night of the
3d. The visit to the Exhibition was of her own contriving. She had got
rid of her English acquaintance, the cook, very easily after meeting
Antonio by appointment. Then she left him, without giving a reason, and
hurried back to the mansions, where, owing to her intimate knowledge of
the internal arrangements, she counted on entering and leaving the flat
unseen. She did actually succeed in her mission, but found Rose de Bercy
lying dead.
On the floor, close to the body, was a dagger, and she had no doubt
whatever that her brother had acted in her stead, so she picked up the
weapon, secreted it with the dagger given her in readiness for the
crime, and took the first opportunity of hiding herself, lest the mere
fact that Janoc was seen in her company should draw suspicion towards
him.
"Ah, but the lace? What of the piece of blood-stained lace?" demanded
Furneaux.
"I wished to make sure, monsieur," was the astounding reply. "Had she
not been dead, but merely wounded, I--_Eh, bien!_ I tore her dress open,
in order to feel if her heart was beating, and the bit of lace remained
in my hand. I was so excited that I hardly knew what I was doing. I took
it away. Afterwards, when Antonio said that the police were cooling in
their chase of Osborne, I gave it to him; he told me he could use it to
good effect."
"Phew!" breathed Winter, "you're a pretty lot of cutthroats, I must say.
Why did you keep the daggers and the diary, sweet maid?"
"The knife that rid us of a traitress was sacred. I thought the diary
might be useful to the--to our friends."
"Yet you gave it to Mr. Clarke without any demur?"
The girl shot a look at Clarke in which fright was mingled with hatred.
"He--he--I was afraid of him," she stammered.
Winter opened the door.
"There is your brother," he said. "Be off, both of you. Take my advice
and leave England to-night."
They went forth, hand in hand, in no wise cast down by the loathing they
had inspired. Clarke looked far more miserable than they, for by their
going he had lost the prize of his life.
"Now for Osborne," whispered Furneaux. "Leave him to me, Winter. Trust
me implicitly for five minutes--that is all."
Osborne was brought in by the station inspector, that human ledger who
would record without an unnecessary word the name of the Prime Minister
or the Archbishop of Canterbury on any charge preferred against either
by a responsible member of the force. The young American was calm now,
completely self-possessed, disdainful of any ignominy that might be
inflicted on him. He did not even glance at Furneaux, but nodded to
Winter.
"Your assurances are seemingly of little value," he said coldly.
"Mr. Winter is quite blameless," snapped Furneaux, obviously nettled by
the implied reproof. "Please attend to me, Mr. Osborne--this affair
rests wholly between you and me. Learn now, for the first time, I
imagine, that Rose de Bercy was my wife."
Osborne did truly start at hearing that remarkable statement. Clarke's
mouth literally fell open; even the uniformed inspector was stirred, and
began to pare a quill pen with a phenomenally sharp knife, this being
the only sign of excitement he had ever been known to exhibit.
"Yes, unhappily for her and me, we were married in Paris soon after she
ran away from home," said Furneaux. "I--I thought--we should be happy.
She had rare qualities, Mr. Osborne; perhaps you discovered some of
them, and they fascinated you as they fascinated me. But--she had
others, which _I_ learnt to my sorrow, while _you_ were spared. I cannot
explain further at this moment. I have only to say that you are as free
from the guilt of her death--as _I_ am!"
Winter alone was conscious of a queer note in the little man's voice as
he dwelt on the comparison. He seemed to be searching for some simile of
wildest improbability, and to have hit upon himself as supplying it. But
Osborne was in no mood for bewilderment. He cared absolutely nothing
about present or future while the horrible past still held the pall it
had thrown on his prospects of bliss with Rosalind.
"In that event, one might ask why I am here," he said quietly. "Not that
I am concerned in the solving of the riddle. You have done your worst,
Mr. Furneaux. You can inflict no deeper injury on me. If you have any
other vile purpose to serve by telling me these things, by all means go
right ahead."
Furneaux's eyes glinted, and his wizened cheeks showed some token of
color, but he kept his voice marvelously under control.
"In time you will come to thank me, Mr. Osborne," he said. "To-day you
are bitter, and I am not surprised at it, but you could never have been
happy in your marriage with Miss Rosalind Marsh while the shadow of
suspicion clung to you. Please do not forget that the world believes you
killed Rose de Bercy. If you walked forth now into Regent Street, and
the word went around that you were there, a thousand people would mob
you in a minute, while ten thousand would be prepared to lynch you
within ten minutes. I have played with you, I admit--with others, too,
and now I am sorry--to a certain extent. But in this case, I was at once
detective, and judge, and executioner. If you wantonly transferred your
love from the dead woman to the living one, I cared not a straw what you
suffered or how heavily you were punished. That phase has passed. To-day
you have justified yourself. Within twenty-four hours you will be free
to marry Rosalind Marsh, because your name will have lost the smirch now
placed on it, while your promise to Hylda Prout will be dissolved. But
for twenty-four hours you must remain here, apparently a prisoner, in
reality as much at liberty as any man in London. Yes, I vouch for my
words----" for at last wonder and hope were dawning in Osborne's
eyes--"my chief, Mr. Winter, will tell you that I have never spoken in
this manner without making good what I have said--never, I repeat. If I
could spare you the necessity of passing a night in a cell I would do
so; but I cannot. You are the decoy duck for the wild creature that I
mean to lay hands on before another day has closed. Make yourself as
comfortable as possible--the inspector will see to that--but I _must_
keep you here, a prisoner in all outward semblance. Are you willing?"
"For Heaven's sake----" began Osborne.
"For Rosalind's sake, too," said Furneaux gravely. "No, I can answer no
questions. She has more to bear than you. She does not know what to
believe, whom to trust, whereas you have my solemn assurance that all
will soon be well with both you and her. You see, I am not craving your
forgiveness--yet. It suffices that I have forgiven _you_, since your
tribulation will end quickly, whereas mine remains for the rest of my
days. I _did_ love Rose de Bercy: you did not.... Ah, bah! I am growing
sentimental. Winter, have you ever seen me weep? No; then gag me if you
hear me talking in this strain again. Come, I have much to tell you.
Good-day, Mr. Osborne. The hours will soon fly; by this time to-morrow
you will be gay, light-hearted, ready to shout your joy from the
housetops--ready even to admit that a detective may be bothered with
that useless incubus--a heart."
Osborne took a step towards him, but Furneaux sprang out and banged the
door. Winter caught the millionaire by the shoulder.
"I am as thoroughly in the dark as you," he said. "Perhaps not, though.
I have a glimmer of light; you, too, will begin to see dimly when you
have collected your thoughts. But you must let Furneaux have his way. It
may not be your way--it certainly is not mine--but he never fails when
he promises, and, at any rate, you must now be sure that no manner of
doubt rests in the minds of the police where you are concerned. It is
possible, after Furneaux and I have gone into this thing fully, that you
may be released to-night----"
"Mr. Winter," cried Osborne, in whose veins the blood was coursing
tumultuously, "let that strange man justify his words concerning Miss
Marsh, and I shall remain here a month if that will help."
CHAPTER XVI
WHEREIN TWO WOMEN TAKE THE FIELD
Some tears, some tea, a bath, a change of clothing--where is the woman
who will not vie with the Phoenix under such conditions, especially if
she be sound in mind and limb? An hour after her arrival at Porchester
Gardens, Rosalind was herself again, a somewhat pale and thin Rosalind,
to be sure, but each moment regaining vigor, each moment taking huge
strides back to the normal.
Of course, her ordered thoughts dwelt more and more with Osborne, but
with clear thinking came a species of confusion that threatened to
overwhelm her anew in a mass of contradictions. If ever a man loved a
woman then Osborne loved her, yet she had seen him in the arms of that
dreadful creature, Hylda Prout. If ever a man had shown devotion by word
and look, then Osborne was devoted to her, yet he had taken leave of her
with the manner of one who was going to his doom. Ah, he spoke of "a
felon's cell." Was that it? Was it true what the world was saying--that
he had really killed Rose de Bercy? No, that infamy she would never
believe. Yet Furneaux had arrested him--Furneaux, the strange little man
who seemed ever to say with his lip what his heart did not credit.
During those weary hours in Poland Street, when she was not dozing or
faint with anxiety, she had often recalled Furneaux's queer way of
conducting an inquiry. She knew little or nothing of police methods, yet
she was sure that British detectives did not badger witnesses with
denunciations of the suspected person. In newspaper reports, too, she
had read of clever lawyers who defended those charged with the
commission of a crime; why, then, was Osborne undefended; what had
become of the solicitor who appeared in his behalf at the inquest?
Unfortunately, she had no friend of ripe experience to whom she could
appeal in London, but she determined, before that day closed, to seek
those two, the solicitor and Furneaux, bidding the one protect Osborne's
interests, and demanding of the other an explanation of his gross
failure to safeguard her when she was actually carrying out his behests.
Mrs. Marsh, far more feeble and unstrung than her daughter, was greatly
alarmed when Rosalind announced her intention.
"My dear one," she sobbed, "I shall lose you again. How can you dream of
running fresh risk of meeting those terrible beings who have already
wreaked their vengeance on you?"
"But, mother darling, you shall come with me--there are lives at
stake----"
"Of what avail are two women against creatures like these Anarchists?"
"We shall go to Scotland Yard and obtain police protection. Failing
that, we shall hire men armed with guns to act as our escort. Mother, I
did not die in that den of misery, but I shall die now of impotent wrath
if I remain here inactive and let Mr. Osborne lie in prison for my
sake."
"For your sake? Rosalind? After what you have told me?"
"Oh, it is true, true! I feel it here," and an eager hand pressed close
to her heart. "My brain says, 'You are foolish--why not believe your
eyes, your ears?' but my heart bids me be up and doing, for the night
cometh when no man can work, and I shall dream of death and the grave if
I sleep this day without striking one blow for the man that loves me."
"Yet he said----"
"Bear with me, mother dear! I cannot explain, I can only feel. A woman's
intuition may sometimes be trusted when logic points inexorably to the
exact opposite of her beliefs. And this is a matter that calls for a
woman's wit. See how inextricably women are tangled in the net which has
caught Osborne in its meshes. A woman was killed, a woman found the poor
thing's body, a woman gave the worst evidence against Osborne, a woman
has sacrificed all womanliness to snatch him from me. Ah, where is
Pauline Dessaulx? She, too, is mixed up in it. Has she discovered the
loss of the daggers? Has she fled?"
Rosalind rose to her feet like one inspired, and Mrs. Marsh, fearing for
her reason, stammered brokenly her willingness to go anywhere and do
anything that might relieve the strain. When her daughter began to talk
of "daggers" she was really alarmed. The girl had alluded to them more
than once, but poor Mrs. Marsh's troubled brain associated "daggers"
with Anarchists. That any such murderous-sounding weapons should be
secreted in a servant's bedroom at Porchester Gardens, be found there by
Rosalind, and carried by her all over London in a cab, never entered her
mind. Perhaps the sight of Pauline would in itself have a soothing
effect, since one could not persist in such delusions when the demure
Frenchwoman, in the cap and apron of respectable domestic service, came
in answer to the bell. So Mrs. Marsh rang: and another housemaid
appeared.
"Please send Pauline here," said the white-faced mother.
"Pauline is out, ma'm," came the answer.
"Will she return soon?"
"I don't know, ma'm--I--I think she has run away."
"Run away!"
Two voices repeated those sinister words. To Rosalind they brought a dim
memory of something said by Janoc, to Mrs. Marsh dismay. The three were
gazing blankly at each other when the clang of a distant bell was heard.
"That's the front door," exclaimed the maid. "Perhaps Pauline has come
back."
She hurried away, and returned, breathless.
"It isn't Pauline, ma'm, but a lady to see Miss Rosalind."
"What lady?"
"She wouldn't give a name, miss; she says she wants to see you
perticular."
"Send her here.... Now, mother, don't be alarmed. This is not Soho. If
you wish it, I shall get someone to wait in the hall until we learn our
mysterious visitor's business."
Most certainly, the well-dressed and elegant woman whom the servant
ushered into the room was not of a type calculated to cause a pang of
distrust in any household in Porchester Gardens. She was dressed quietly
but expensively, and, notwithstanding the heat of summer, so heavily
veiled that her features were not recognizable until she raised her
veil. Then a pair of golden-brown eyes flashed triumphantly at the
startled Rosalind, and Hylda Prout said:
"May I have a few words in private with you, Miss Marsh?"
"You can have nothing to say to me that my mother may not hear," said
Rosalind curtly.
The visitor smiled, and looked graciously at Mrs. Marsh.
"Ah, I am pleased to have this opportunity of meeting you," she said.
"You may have heard of me. I am Hylda Prout." ... Then, seeing the older
woman's perplexity, she added: "Since you do not seem to know me by
name, let me explain that Mr. Rupert Osborne, of whom you must have
heard a good deal, is my promised husband."
Mrs. Marsh might be ill and worried; but she was a well-bred lady to the
marrow, and she realized instantly that the stranger's politeness
covered a studied insult to her daughter.
"Has Mr. Osborne sent you as his ambassador?" she asked.
"No, he could not: he is in prison. But your daughter and I have met
under conditions that compel me to ask her now not to interfere in the
efforts I shall make to secure his release."
"Please go!" broke in Rosalind, and she moved as if to summon a servant.
"I am not here from choice," sneered Hylda. "I have really come to plead
for Mr. Osborne. If you care for him as you say you do I want you to
understand two things: first, that your pursuit is in vain, since he has
given his word to marry me within a week, and, secondly, that any
further interference in his affairs on your part may prove disastrous to
him. You cannot pretend that I have not warned you. Had you taken my
advice the other day, Rupert would not now be under arrest."
Mrs. Marsh was sallow with indignation, but Rosalind, though tingling in
every fiber, controlled herself sufficiently to utter a dignified
protest.
"You had something else in your mind than Mr. Osborne's safety in coming
here today: I do not believe one word you have said," she cried.
"Oh, but you shall believe. Wait one short week----"
"I shall not wait one short hour. Mr. Osborne's arrest is a monstrous
blunder, and I am going this instant to demand his release."
"He has not taken you into his confidence, it would seem. Were it not
for his promise to me you would still be locked in your den at Poland
Street."
"Some things may be purchased at a price so degrading that a man pays
and remains silent. If Mr. Osborne won my liberty by the loss of his
self-respect I am truly sorry for him, but the fact, if it is a fact,
only strengthens my resolution to appeal to the authorities in his
behalf."
"You can achieve nothing, absolutely nothing," shrilled Hylda
vindictively.
"I shall try to do much, and accomplish far more, perhaps, than you
imagine."
"You will only succeed in injuring him."
"At any rate, I shall have obeyed the dictates of my conscience, whereas
your vile purposes have ever been directed by malice. How dare you talk
of serving him! Since that poor woman was struck dead by some unknown
hand you have been his worst enemy. In the guise of innocent friendship
you supplied the police with the only real evidence they possess against
him. Probably you are responsible now for his arrest, which could not
have happened had I been at liberty during the past two days. Go, and
vent your spite as you will--no word of yours can deter me from raising
such a storm as shall compel Mr. Osborne's release!"
For a second or two those golden-brown eyes blazed with a fire that
might well have appalled Rosalind could she have read its hidden
significance. During a tick of the clock she was in mortal peril of her
life, but Hylda Prout, though partially insane, was not yet in that
trance of the wounded tiger which recks not of consequences so that it
gluts its rage.
Mrs. Marsh, really frightened, rushed to the electric bell, and the jar
of its summons, faintly audible, seemed to banish the grim specter that
had entered the room, though unseen by other eyes than those of the
woman who dreamed of death even while she glowered at her rival. Her
bitter tongue managed to outstrip her murderous thoughts in the race
back to ordered thought.
"You are powerless," she taunted Rosalind, "but, like every other
discarded lover, you cling to delusions. Now I shall prove to you how my
strength compares with your weakness. You speak of appealing to the
authorities. That means Scotland Yard, I suppose. Very well. I, too,
shall go there, in your very company, if you choose, and it will then be
seen which of us two can best help Mr. Osborne."
The housemaid appeared.
"Please show this person out," said Rosalind.
"My carriage is waiting--Rupert's carriage," said Hylda.
"After she has gone, Lizzie," said Rosalind to the maid, "kindly get me
a taxicab."
Porchester Gardens is well out to the west, so the taxicab, entered in a
fever of haste by Rosalind and her mother, raced ahead of Osborne's bays
in the flight to Westminster. Hylda Prout had experienced no difficulty
in securing the use of the millionaire's carriage. She went to his
Mayfair flat, paralyzed Jenkins by telling him of his master's arrest,
assured him, in the same breath, that she alone could prove Osborne's
innocence, and asked that all the resources of the household should be
placed at her disposal, since Mr. Osborne meant to marry her within a
few days. Now, Jenkins had seen things that brought this concluding
statement inside the bounds of credibility, so he became her willing
slave in all that concerned Osborne.
Winter was sitting in his office, with Furneaux straddled across a chair
in one corner, when Johnson, the young policeman who was always at the
Chief Inspector's beck and call, entered.
"Two ladies to see you, sir," he said.
Furneaux's eyes sparkled, but Winter took the two cards and read: "Mrs.
Marsh; Miss Rosalind Marsh."
"Bring them here," he said.
"I rather expected the other one first," grinned Furneaux, who was now
evidently on the best of terms with his Chief.
"Perhaps she won't show up. She must be deep, crafty as a fox, or she
could never have humbugged me in the way you describe."
"My dear Winter, coincidence is the best dramatist yet evolved. You were
beaten by coincidence."
"But you were not," and the complaint fell querulously from the lips of
one who was almost unrivaled in the detection of crime.
"You forget that _I_ supplied the coincidence. Clarke, too, blundered
with positive genius. I assure you that, in your shoes, I must have
acted with--with inconceivable folly."
"Thank you," said Winter grimly.
Rosalind and her mother came in. Both ladies had been weeping, but the
girl's eyes shone with another light than that of tears when she cried
vehemently:
"You are the responsible official here, I understand. I have no word for
_that_ man," and she transfixed Furneaux with a tragic finger, "but I do
appeal to someone who may have a sense of decency----"
"You have come to see me about Mr. Osborne?" broke in Winter, for
Rosalind's utterance was choked by a sob.
"Yes, of course. Are you aware----"
"I am aware of everything, Miss Marsh. Please be seated; and you, too,
Mrs. Marsh. Mr. Osborne is in no danger whatsoever. I cannot explain,
but you must trust the police in this matter."
"Ah, so _he_ said," and Rosalind shot a fiery glance at the unabashed
Furneaux.
"Seen anybody?" he asked, with an amiable smirk.
"What do you mean?"
"Has anybody been gloating over Mr. Osborne's arrest?"
For the life of her, Rosalind could not conceal the surprise caused by
this question. She even smothered her resentment in her eagerness.
"Mr. Osborne's typist, a woman named Hylda Prout, has been to see me,"
she cried.
"Excellent! What did she say?"
"Everything that a mean heart could suggest. But you will soon hear her
statements. She is coming here herself, or, at least, so she said."
"Great Scott!"
Furneaux sprang up, and ran to the bell. For some reason which neither
Mrs. Marsh nor her daughter could fathom, the mercurial little Jersey
man was wild with excitement; even Winter seemed to be disturbed beyond
expression. Johnson came, and Furneaux literally leaped at him.
"Ring up that number, quick! You know exactly what to say--and do!"
Johnson saluted and vanished again; Winter had chosen him for his
special duties because he never uttered a needless word. Still, these
tokens of activity in the police headquarters did not long repress the
tumult in Rosalind's breast.
"If, as you tell me, Mr. Osborne is in no danger----" she began; but
Winter held up an impressive hand.
"You are here in order to help him," he said gravely. "Pray believe that
we appreciate your feelings most fully. If this girl, Hylda Prout, is
really on her way here we have not a moment to lose. No more appeals, I
beg of you, Miss Marsh. Tell us every word that passed between you and
her. You can speak all the more frankly if I assure you that Mr.
Furneaux, my colleague, has acted throughout in Mr. Osborne's interests.
Were it not for him this young gentleman, who, I understand, will soon
become your husband, would never have been cleared of the stigma of a
dreadful crime.... No, pardon me, not a syllable on that subject....
What did Hylda Prout say? Why is she coming to Scotland Yard?"
Impressed in spite of herself, Rosalind gave a literal account of the
interview at Porchester Gardens. She was burning to deliver her soul on
matters that appeared to be so much more important, such as the finding
and loss of the daggers, the strange behavior of Pauline Dessaulx, the
statement, now fiery bright in her mind, made by Janoc when he spoke of
his sister's guilt--but, somehow, the tense interest displayed by the
two detectives in Hylda Prout's assertions overbore all else, and
Rosalind proved herself a splendid witness, one able to interpret moods
and glances as well as to record the spoken word.
Even while she spoke a lurid fancy flashed through her brain.
"Oh, gracious Heaven!" she cried. "Can it be----"
Winter rose and placed a hand on her shoulder.
"You have endured much, Miss Marsh," he said in a voice of grave
sympathy. "Now, I trust to your intelligence and power of self-command.
No matter what suspicions you may have formed, you must hide them.
Possibly, Mr. Furneaux or I may speak or act within the next half-hour
in a manner that you deem prejudicial to Mr. Osborne. I want you to
express your resentment in any way you may determine, short of leaving
us. Do you understand? We shall act as on the stage; you must do the
same. You need no cue from us. Defend Mr. Osborne; urge his innocence;
threaten us with pains and penalties; do anything, in short, that will
goad Hylda Prout into action in his behalf for fear lest you may prevail
where she has failed."
A knock was heard at the door. He sank back into his seat.
"Do you promise?" he muttered.
"Yes," she breathed.
"Come in!" cried Winter, and the imperturbable Johnson ushered in Hylda
Prout. Even in the storm and stress of contending emotions Rosalind knew
that there was a vital difference between the reception accorded to the
newcomer and that given to her mother and herself. They had been
announced, their names scrutinized in advance, as it were, whereas Hylda
Prout's arrival was expected, provided for; in a word, the policeman on
guard had his orders and was obeying them.
"Well, this _is_ a surprise, Miss Prout," exclaimed Furneaux before
anyone else could utter a word.
"Is it?" she asked, smiling scornfully at Rosalind.
"Quite. Miss Marsh told us, of course, of your visit, and I suppose that
your appearance here is inspired by the same motive as hers. My chief,
Mr. Winter, has just been telling her that the law brooks no
interference, yet she persists in demanding Mr. Osborne's release. She
cannot succeed in obtaining it, unless she brings a positive order from
the Home Secretary----"
"I shall get it," vowed Rosalind, to whom it seemed that Furneaux's
dropped voice carried a subtle hint.
"Try, by all means," said Furneaux blandly. "Nevertheless, I strongly
advise you ladies, all three, to go home and let matters take their
course."
"Never!" cried Rosalind valiantly. "You must either free Mr. Osborne
to-night or I drive straight from this office to the House of Commons. I
have friends there who will secure me a hearing by the Home Secretary."
Furneaux glanced inquiringly at Winter, whose hand was stroking his chin
as if in doubt. Hylda Prout took a step nearer the Chief Inspector. Her
dress brushed against the drawer which contained the daggers, and one of
those grewsome blades had pierced Rose de Bercy's brain through the eye.
"The Home Secretary is merely an official like the rest of you," she
said bitingly. "Miss Marsh may appeal to whom she thinks fit, but the
charge against Mr. Osborne will keep him in custody until it is heard by
a magistrate. Nothing can prevent that--nothing--unless----" and her
gaze dwelt warily on Furneaux for a fraction of an instant--"unless the
police themselves are convinced that the evidence on which they rely is
so flimsy that they run the risk of public ridicule by bringing it
forward."
"Ha! ha!" laughed Furneaux knowingly.
"I think I am wasting time here," cried Rosalind, half rising.
"One moment, I pray you," put in Winter. "There is some force in Miss
Prout's remarks, but I am betraying no secret in saying that Mr.
Osborne's apparently unshakable alibi can be upset, while we have the
positive identification of at least three people who saw him on the
night of the crime."
"Meaning the housekeeper, the driver of the taxicab, and the housemaid
at Feldisham Mansions?" said Hylda coolly, and quite ignoring Rosalind's
outburst.
"At least those," admitted Winter.
"Are there others, then?"
"Really, Miss Prout, this is most irregular. We are not trying Mr.
Osborne in this room."
"I see there is nothing for it but to carry my plea for justice to the
Home Secretary," cried Rosalind, acting as she thought best in obedience
to a lightning glance from Furneaux. "Come, mother, we shall soon prove
to these legal-minded persons that they cannot juggle away a man's
liberty to gratify their pride--and spite."
Hylda's eyes took fire at that last word.
"Go to your Home Secretary," she said with measured venom. "Much good
may it do you! While _you_ are being dismissed with platitudes _I_ shall
have rescued my affianced husband from jail."
"Dear me! this is most embarrassing. Your affianced husband?"
Furneaux cackled out each sentence, and looked alternately at Hylda and
Rosalind. There was no mistaking his meaning. He implied that the one
woman was callously appropriating a man who was the acknowledged suitor
of the other.
Hylda laughed shrilly.
"That is news to you, Mr. Furneaux," she cried. "Yet I thought you were
so clever as to be almost omniscient. Come now with me, and I shall
prove to you that the so-called identification of Mr. Osborne by Hester
Bates and Campbell, the chauffeur, is a myth. The hysterical housemaid I
leave to you."
Winter leaned back in his chair and waved an expostulating hand.
"'Pon my honor, this would be amusing if it were not so terribly serious
for Osborne," he vowed.
"If that is all, I prefer to depend on the Home Secretary," said
Rosalind.
"Let her go," purred Hylda contemptuously. "I can make good my boast,
but she cannot."
"Boasting is of no avail in defeating a charge of murder," said
Furneaux. "Before we even begin to take you seriously, Miss Prout, we
must know what you actually mean by your words."
"I mean this--that I, myself, will appear before Hester Bates in such
guise that she will swear it was me, and not Mr. Osborne, whom she saw
on the stairs that night. If that does not suffice, I shall meet
Campbell at the corner of Berkeley Street, if you can arrange for his
presence there, and tell him to drive me to Feldisham Mansions, and he
will swear that it was I, and not Mr. Osborne, who gave him that same
order on the night of the third of July. Surely, if I accomplish so
much, you will set Rupert at liberty. Believe me, I am not afraid that
you will commit the crowning blunder of arresting _me_ for the murder,
after having arrested Janoc, and his sister, _and_ Rupert."
Winter positively started. So did Furneaux. Evidently they were
perturbed by the extent of her information. Hylda saw the concern
depicted on their faces; she laughed low, musically, full-throated.
"Well, is it a bargain?" she taunted them.
"Of course----" began Winter, and stopped.
"There is no denying the weakness of our position if you can do all
that," said Furneaux suavely.
"Pray do not let me detain you from visiting the House of Commons,"
murmured Hylda to Rosalind.
"Perhaps, in the circumstances, you had better wait till to-morrow,"
said Winter, rising and looking hard at Rosalind.
This man had won her confidence, and she felt that she was in the
presence of a tragedy, yet it was hard to yield in the presence of her
rival. Tears filled her eyes, and she bowed her head to conceal them.
"Come, mother," she said brokenly. "We are powerless here, it would
seem."
"Allow me to show you the way out," said Winter, and he bustled forward.
In the corridor, when the door was closed, he caught an arm of each and
bent in a whisper.
"Furneaux was sure she would try some desperate move," he breathed.
"Rest content now, Miss Marsh. If all goes well, your ill-used friend
will be with you to-night. Treat him well. He deserves it. He did not
open your letter. He sacrificed himself in every way for your sake. He
even promised to marry that woman, that arch-fiend, in order to rescue
you from Janoc. So, believe him, for he is a true man, the soul of
honor, and tell him from me that he owes some share of the restitution
of his good name in the eyes of the public to your splendid devotion
during the past few minutes."
Not often did the Chief Inspector unbend in this fashion. There was no
ambiguity in his advice. He meant what he said, and said it so
convincingly that Rosalind was radiantly hopeful when she drove away
with her mother.
CHAPTER XVII
THE CLOSING SCENE
It was a scared and worried-looking Jenkins who admitted Hylda Prout and
the two detectives to Osborne's flat in Clarges Street, Mayfair. These
comings and goings of police officers were disconcerting, to put it
mildly, and an event had happened but a few minutes earlier which had
sorely ruffled his usually placid acceptance of life as it presented
itself. Still, the one dominant thought in his mind was anxiety in his
master's behalf, and, faithful to its promptings, he behaved like an
automaton.
Hylda carried herself with the regal air of one who was virtual mistress
of the house. She had invited the two men to share her carriage, and
there was an assured authority in her voice when she now directed the
gray-headed butler to show them into the library while she went upstairs
to Mr. Osborne's dressing-room.
"And, by the way, Jenkins," she added, "tell Mrs. Bates to come to these
gentlemen. They wish to ask her a few questions."
"Yes, bring Mrs. Bates," said Furneaux softly. "Don't let her come
alone. She might be frightened, and snivel, being a believer in ghosts,
whereas we wish her to remain calm."
Jenkins thought he understood, but said nothing. Hylda Prout sped
lightly up the stairs, and when Jenkins came with the housekeeper,
Furneaux crept close to him, pointed to a screened doorway leading to
the kitchen quarters, and murmured the one word:
"There!"
At once he turned to Mrs. Bates and engaged her in animated chatter,
going so far as to warn her that the police were trying an experiment
which might definitely set at rest all doubts as to Mr. Osborne's
innocence, so she must be prepared to see someone descend the stairs who
might greatly resemble the person she saw ascending them on the night of
the murder.
The maisonette rented by the young millionaire was not constructed on
the lines associated with the modern self-contained flat. It consisted
of the ground floor, and first story of a mid-Victorian mansion, while
the kitchen was in a basement. As it happened to be the property of a
peer who lived next door--a sociable person who entertained
largely--these lower stories were completely shut off from the three
upper ones, which were thrown into the neighboring house, thus supplying
the landlord with several bedrooms and bathrooms that Osborne did not
need. As a consequence, the entrance hall and main staircase were
spacious, and the staircase in particular was elaborate, climbing to a
transverse corridor in two fine flights, of which the lower one sprang
from the center of the hall and the upper led at a right angle from a
broad half-landing.
Anyone coming down this upper half of the stairs could be seen full face
from the screened door used by the servants: but when descending the
lower half, the view from the same point would be in profile.
At present, however, the curtains were drawn tightly across the passage,
and the only occupants of the hall and library were the two detectives,
Jenkins, and Mrs. Bates.
Hylda Prout did not hurry. If she were engaged in a masquerade which
should achieve its object she evidently meant to leave nothing to
chance, and a woman cannot exchange her costume for a man's without
experiencing difficulty with her hair, especially when she is endowed by
nature with a magnificent chevelure.
Jenkins returned from the mission imposed by Furneaux's
monosyllable,--insensibly the four deserted the brilliantly lighted
library and gathered in the somewhat somber hall, whose old oak
wainscoting and Grinling Gibbons fireplace forbade the use of garish
lamps. Insensibly, too, their voices lowered. The butler and housekeeper
hardly knew what to expect, and were creepy and ill at ease, but the two
police officers realized that they were about to witness a scene of
unparalleled effrontery, which, in its outcome, might have results
vastly different from those anticipated.
They were sure now that Hylda Prout had killed Rose de Bercy. Furneaux
had known that terrible fact since his first meeting with Osborne's
secretary, whereas Winter had only begun to surmise it when he and
Furneaux were reconciled on the very threshold of Marlborough Street
police-station. Now he was as certain of it as Furneaux. Page by page,
chapter by chapter, his colleague had unfolded a most convincing theory
of the crime. But theories will not suffice for a judge and jury--there
must be circumstantial evidence as well--and not only was such evidence
scanty as against Hylda Prout, but it existed in piles against Osborne,
against Pauline Dessaulx, and against Furneaux himself. Indeed, Winter
had been compelled to recall his permission to Janoc and his sister to
leave England that day. He foresaw that Hylda Prout, if brought to
trial, would use her knowledge of Rose de Bercy's dealings with the
Anarchist movement to throw the gravest suspicion on its votaries in
London, and it would require no great expert in criminal law to break up
the theoretical case put forward by the police by demonstrating the
circumstantial one that existed in regard to Pauline Dessaulx.
This line of defense, already strong, would become impregnable if
neither Janoc nor Pauline were forthcoming as witnesses. So Clarke,
greatly to his delight, was told off again to supervise their movements,
after they had been warned not to quit Soho until Winter gave them his
written permission.
Some of the difficulties ahead, a whole troupe of fantastic imageries
from the past, crowded in on Winter's mind as he stood there in the hall
with Furneaux. What a story it would make if published as he could tell
it! What a romance! It began eight years ago at a _fête champêtre_ in
Jersey. Then came a brief delirium of wedded life for Furneaux, followed
by his wife's flight and reappearance as a notable actress. Osborne came
on the scene, and quickly fell a victim to her beauty and charm of
manner. It was only when marriage was spoken of that Furneaux decided to
interfere, and he had actually gone to Osborne's residence in order to
tell him the truth as to his promised wife on the very day she was
killed. Failing to meet him, after a long wait in the library and
museum, during which he had noted the absence of both the Saracen dagger
and the celt, already purloined for their dread purposes, he had gone to
Feldisham Mansions.
During a heart-breaking scene with his wife he had forced from her a
solemn promise to tell Osborne why she could not marry him, and then to
leave England. The unhappy woman was writing the last word in her diary
when Furneaux was announced! No wonder she canceled an engagement for
dinner and the theater. She was sick at heart. A vain creature, the
wealth and position she craved for had been snatched from her grasp on
the very moment they seemed most sure.
The murder followed his departure within half an hour. Planned and
executed by a woman whom none would dream of, it was almost worthy to
figure as the crime of the century. Hylda Prout had counted on no other
suspect than the man she loved. She knew he was safe--she assured
herself, in the first place, that he could offer the most positive proof
of his innocence--but she reckoned on popular indignation alleging his
guilt, while she alone would stand by him through every pang of obloquy
and despair. She was well prepared, guarded from every risk. Her
open-hearted employer had no secrets from her. She meant to imperil him,
to cast him into the furnace, and pluck him forth to her own arms.
But fate could plot more deviously and strangely than Hylda Prout. It
could bring about the meeting of Osborne and Rosalind, the mutual
despair and self-sacrifice of Janoc and Pauline, the insensate quarrel
between Winter and Furneaux, and the jealous prying of Clarke, while
scene after scene of tragic force unfolded itself at Tormouth, in the
Fraternal Club, in the dismal cemetery, in Porchester Gardens, and in
the dens of Soho.
Winter sighed deeply at the marvel of it all, and Furneaux heard him.
"She will be here soon," he said coolly. "She is just putting on
Osborne's boots."
Winter started at the apparent callousness of the man.
"This is rather Frenchified," he whispered. "Reminds one of the
'reconstructed crime' method of the _juge d'instruction_. I wish we had
more good, sound, British evidence."
"There is nothing good, or sound, or British about this affair," said
Furneaux. "It is French from beginning to end--a passionate crime as
they say--but I shall be glad when it is ended, and I am free."
"Free?"
"Yes. When she is safely dealt with," and he nodded in the direction of
the dressing-room, "I shall resign, clear off, betake my whims and my
weaknesses to some other clime."
"Don't be an ass, Furneaux!"
"Can't help it, dear boy. I'm a bit French, too, you know. No Englishman
could have hounded down Osborne as I have done, merely to gratify my own
notions of what was due to the memory of my dead wife. And I have played
with this maniac upstairs as a cat plays with a mouse. I wouldn't have
done that, though, if she hadn't smashed Mirabel's face. She ought to
have spared that. Therein she was a tiger rather than a woman. Poor
Mirabel!"
Not Rose, but Mirabel! His thoughts had bridged the years. He murmured
the words in a curiously unemotional tone, but Winter was no longer
deceived. It would be many a day, if ever, before Furneaux became his
cheery, impish, mercurial self again.
And now there was an opening of a door, and Winter shot one warning
glance at the curtains which shrouded the passage to the kitchen. A
man's figure appeared beyond the rails of the upper landing, a man
attired in a gray frock-coat suit and wearing a silk hat. Mrs. Bates
uttered a slight scream.
"Well, I never!" she squeaked.
"But you did, once," urged Furneaux, instantly alert. "You see now that
you might be mistaken when you said you saw Mr. Osborne on that
evening?"
"Oh, yes, sir; if that is Miss Prout she's the very image----Now, who
would have believed it?"
"You did," prompted Furneaux again. "But this time you must be more
careful. Tell us now who it was you saw on the stair, your master, or
his secretary made up to represent him?"
Mrs. Bates began to cry.
"I wouldn't have said such a thing for a mint of money, sir. It was
cruel to deceive a poor woman so, real cruel I call it. Of course, it
was Miss Prout I saw. Well, there! What a horrid creature to behave in
that way----"
"No comments, please," said Furneaux sternly.
Throughout he was gazing at Hylda Prout with eyes that scintillated. She
was standing now on the half-landing, and her face had lost some of its
striking semblance to Osborne's because of the expression of mocking
triumph that gleamed through its make-up.
"That will do, thank you, Miss Prout," he said. "Now, will you kindly
walk slowly up again, reeling somewhat, as if you were on the verge of
collapse after undergoing a tremendous strain?"
A choked cry, or groan, followed by a scuffle, came from the curtained
doorway, and Hylda turned sharply.
"Who is there?" she demanded, in a sort of quick alarm that contrasted
oddly with her previous air of complete self-assurance.
"Jenkins," growled Winter, "just go there and see that none of the
servants are peeping. That door should have been closed. Slam it now!"
The butler hurried with steps that creaked on the parquet floor. Hylda
leaned over the balusters and watched him. He fumbled with the curtains.
"It is all right, sir," he said thickly.
"Some one is there," she cried. "Who is it? I am not here to be made a
show of, even to please some stupid policemen."
Winter strode noisily across the hall, talking the while, vowing
official vengeance on eavesdroppers. He, too, reached the doorway,
glanced within, and drew back the curtains.
"Some kitchen-maid, I suppose," he said off-handedly. "Anyhow, she has
run away. You need not wait any longer, Miss Prout. Kindly change your
clothing as quickly as possible and come with us. You have beaten us.
Mr. Osborne must be released forthwith."
"Ah!"
Her sudden spasm of fear was dispelled by hearing that promise. She
forgot to "reel" as she ran upstairs, but Furneaux did not remind her.
He exchanged glances with Winter, and the latter motioned Jenkins to
take Mrs. Bates to her own part of the establishment.
"At Vine Street, I think," muttered Winter in Furneaux's ear.
"No, here, I insist; we must strike now. She must realize that we have a
case. Give her time to gather her energies and we shall never secure a
conviction."
Winter loathed the necessity of terrifying a woman, but he yielded,
since he saw no help for it. This time they had not long to wait. Soon
they heard a rapid, confident tread on the stairs, and Hylda Prout was
with them in the library. Both men, who had been seated, rose when she
entered.
"Well," she said jauntily, "are you convinced?"
"Fully," said Winter.
She turned to Furneaux.
"But you, little man, what do _you_ say?"
"I have never needed to be convinced," he answered. "I have known the
truth since the day when we first met."
Something in his manner seemed to trouble her, but those golden brown
eyes dwelt on him in a species of scornful surprise.
"Why, then, have you liberated Janoc and his sister?" she demanded.
"Because they are innocent."
She laughed, a nervous, unmirthful laugh.
"But there only remains Mr. Osborne," she protested.
"There is one other, the murderess," he said. Even while she gazed at
him in wonder he had come quite near. His right hand shot out and
grasped her arm.
"I arrest you, Hylda Prout," he said. "I charge you with the murder of
Mirabel Furneaux, otherwise known as Rose de Bercy, at Feldisham
Mansions, on the night of July 3d."
She looked at him in a panic to which she tried vainly to give a
semblance of incredulity. Even in that moment of terror a new thought
throbbed in her dazed brain.
"Mirabel Furneaux!" she managed to gasp.
"Yes, my wife. You committed a needless crime, Hylda Prout. She had
never done, nor ever could have done, you any injury. But it is my duty
to warn you that everything you now say will be taken down in writing,
and may be used in evidence against you."
She tried to wrest herself free, but his fingers clung to her like a
steel trap. Winter, too, approached, as if to show the folly of
resistance.
"Let go my arm!" she shrieked, and her eyes blazed redly though the
color had fled from her cheeks.
"I cannot. I dare not," said Furneaux. "I have reason to believe that
you carry a weapon, perhaps poison, concealed in your clothing."
"Idiot!" she screamed, now beside herself with rage, "what evidence can
you produce against me? You will be the laughing stock of London, you
and your arrests."
"Mrs. Bates knows now who it was she saw on the stairs," said Furneaux
patiently. "Campbell, the driver of the taxicab, has recognized you as
the person he drove to and from Feldisham Mansions. Mary Dean, the
housemaid there, can say at last why she fancied that Mr. Osborne killed
her mistress. But you'll hear these things in due course. At present you
must come with me."
"Where to?"
"To Vine Street police-station."
"Shall I not be permitted to see Rupert?"
"No."
A tremor convulsed her lithe body. Then, and not till then, did she
really understand that the apparently impossible had happened. Still,
her extraordinary power of self-reliance came to her aid. She ceased to
struggle, and appealed to Winter.
"This man is acting like a lunatic," she cried. "He says his wife was
killed, and if that be true he is no fit person to conduct an inquiry
into the innocence or guilt of those on whom he wreaks his vengeance.
You know why I came here to-night--merely to prove how you had blundered
in the past--yet you dare to turn my harmless acting into a
justification of my arrest. Where are these people, Campbell and the
woman, whose testimony you bring against me?"
Now, in putting that impassioned question, she was wiser than she knew.
Furneaux was ever ready to take risks in applying criminal procedure
that Winter fought shy of. He had seen more than one human vampire slip
from his grasp because of some alleged unfairness on the part of the
police, of which a clever counsel had made ingenious use during the
defense. If Hylda Prout had been identified by others than Mrs. Bates,
of whose presence alone she was aware, she had every right to be
confronted with them. He turned aside and told the horrified Jenkins to
bring the witnesses from the room in which they had taken refuge. As a
matter of fact, Campbell and Mary Dean, in charge of Police Constable
Johnson, had been concealed behind the curtains that draped the
servants' passage, and Johnson had scarce been able to stifle the scream
that rose to the housemaid's lips when she saw on the stairs the living
embodiment of her mistress's murderer.
But Furneaux did not mean to allow Hylda Prout to regain the marvelous
self-possession which had been imperiled by the events of the past
minute.
"While we are waiting for Campbell and the girl you may as well learn
the really material thing that condemns you," he said, whispering in her
ear with quiet menace. "You ought to have destroyed that gray suit which
you purchased from a second-hand clothes dealer. It was a deadly mistake
to keep those blood-stained garments. The clothes Osborne wore have been
produced long since. They were soiled by you two days after the murder,
a fact which I can prove by half a dozen witnesses. Those which you wore
to-night, _which you are wearing now_, are spotted with your victim's
blood. I know, because I have seen them in your lodgings, and they can
be identified beyond dispute by the man who sold them to you."
Suddenly he raised his voice.
"Winter! Quick! She has the strength of ten women!"
For Hylda Prout, hearing those fateful words, was seized with a fury of
despair. She had peered into Furneaux's eyes and seen there the pitiless
purpose which had filled his every waking moment since his wife's
untimely death. Love and hate had conspired to wreck her life. They had
mastered her at last. From being their votary she had become their
victim. An agonizing sigh came from her straining breast. She was
fighting like a catamount, while Winter held her shoulders and Furneaux
her wrists; then she collapsed between them, and a thin red stream
issued from her lips.
They carried her to the sofa on which she had lain when for the first
and only time in her life those same red lips had met Rupert Osborne's.
Winter hurried to the door, and sent Campbell, coming on tiptoe across
the hall, flying in his taxi for a doctor. But Furneaux did not move
from her side. He gazed down at her with something of the judge,
something of the executioner, in his waxen features.
"All heart!" he muttered, "all heart, controlled by a warped brain!"
"She has broken a blood vessel," said Winter.
"No; she has broken her heart," said Furneaux, hearing, though
apparently not heeding him.
"A physical impossibility," growled the Chief Inspector, to whom the
sight of a woman's suffering was peculiarly distressing.
"Her heart has dilated beyond belief. It is twice the normal size. This
is the end, Winter! She is dying!"
The flow of blood stopped abruptly. She opened her eyes, those
magnificent eyes which were no longer golden brown but a pathetic
yellow.
"Oh, forgive!" she muttered. "I--I--loved you, Rupert--with all my
soul!"
She seemed to sink a little, to shrink, to pass from a struggle to
peace. The lines of despair fled from her face. She lay there in white
beauty, a lily whiteness but little marred by traces of the make-up
hurriedly wiped off her cheeks and forehead.
"May the Lord be merciful to her!" said Furneaux, and without another
word, he hurried from the room and out of the house.
Winter, having secured some degree of order in a distracted household,
raced off to Marlborough Street; but Furneaux had been there before him,
and Osborne, knowing nothing of Hylda Prout's death, had flown to
Porchester Gardens and Rosalind.
The hour was not so late that the thousand eyes of Scotland Yard could
not search every nook in which Furneaux might have taken refuge, but in
vain. Winter, grieving for his friend, fearing the worst, remained all
night in his office, receiving reports of failure by telephone and
messenger. At last, when the sun rose, he went wearily to his home, and
was lying, fully dressed, on his bed, in the state of half-sleep,
half-exhaustion, which is nature's way of healing the bruised spirit,
when he seemed to hear Furneaux's voice sobbing:
"My Mirabel, why did you leave me, you whom I loved!"
Instantly he sprang up in a frenzy of action, and ran out into the
street. At that early hour, soon after six o'clock, there was no vehicle
to be found except a battered cab which had prowled London during the
night, but he woke the heavy-witted driver with a promise of double
fare, and the horse ambled over the slow miles to the yews and laurels
of Kensal Green Cemetery.
There he found him, kneeling by the side of that one little mound of
earth, after having walked in solitude through the long hours till the
gates were opened for the day's digging of graves. Winter said nothing.
He led his friend away, and had him cared for.
Slowly the cloud lifted. At last, when a heedless public had forgotten
the crime and its dramatic sequel, there came a day when Furneaux
appeared at Scotland Yard.
"Hello, Winter," he said, coming in as though the world had grown young
again.
"Hello, Furneaux, glad to see you," said Winter, pushing the cigar-box
across the table.
"Had my letter?"
"Yes."
"Who has taken my place--Clarke?"
"No, not Clarke."
"Who, then?"
"Nobody, yet. The fact is, Furneaux----"
"I've resigned--that is the material fact."
"Yes, I know. But you don't mind giving me your advice."
"No, of course not--just for the sake of old times."
"Well, there is this affair of Lady Harringay's disappearance. It is a
ticklish business. Seen anything about it in the paper?"
"A line or two."
"I'm at my wits' end to find time myself to deal with it. And I've not a
man I can give it to----"
"Look here, Winter, I'm out of the force."
"But, to oblige me."
"I would do a great deal on that score."
"Get after her, then, without a moment's delay."
"But there's my resignation."
Winter picked a letter from a bundle, struck a match, set fire to the
paper, and lighted a cigar with it.
"There goes your resignation!" he said.
* * * * *
During the following summer Rosalind Marsh and Rupert Osborne were
married at Tormouth. It was a quiet wedding, and since that day they
have led quiet lives, so it is to be presumed that they have settled
satisfactorily the problem of how to be happy though rich.
THE END
Transcriber Notes:
Passages in italics were indicated by _underscores_.
Small caps were replaced with ALL CAPS.
Throughout the document, the oe ligature was replaced with "oe".
Throughout the dialogues, there were words used to mimic accents of the
speakers. Those words were retained as-is.
The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up
paragraphs and so that they are next to the text they illustrate.
Errors in punctuations and inconsistent hyphenation were not corrected
unless otherwise noted.
On the title page, "DISSAPEARANCE" was replaced with "DISAPPEARANCE".
On page 69, "Emile" was replaced with "Émile".
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The de Bercy Affair" ***
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