CHAPTER XXVII.INVISIBLE INK.
Nance left the room. The moment she closed the door behind her the master of the Heights went straight to his desk. His brow was like thunder; his face was white with an awful grey shadow over it.
“Long John has gone one step too far,” he muttered. “The robbery was planned and carried out to perfection. It was done as a blind, and as a blind it will succeed admirably; but this—this blow was aimed at me. I have threatened to throw up the sponge. If I do, it will mean so much that all will be up with the Silver School. Now, hear me, Heaven,” continued the man, clenching his hand and looking up as he spoke, “I swear, I swear that, as I live, if that boy is not back at the Heights within twenty-four hours, I carry out my threat.”
Trembling violently, Rowton sat down before his desk and opened it. He took out some paper of a peculiar make and quality, dipped his pen into a small bottlewhich contained a preparation not in the least like ordinary ink, and wrote a short sentence. At the end of this sentence he appended a hieroglyphic. The paper was then folded up, put into an envelope and directed. Having done so, Rowton put on his hat and went out.
As he was walking up the avenue, Jacob, the footman, who had been unremitting in his active services and presence of mind during the terrible scare of the morning, also put on his hat, and followed his master at a respectful distance.
With quick strides, Rowton approached the little post office of the small adjacent village. The post-mistress, who had evidently not yet heard anything of the burglary, looked at him with some slight surprise when he entered her shop.
“Am I in time to catch the post, Mrs. Higgins?” he asked.
“Yes, sir, just; Polly and me, we are packing the bags now.”
“Then here is a letter; hold out the bag and I’ll drop it in.”
The woman did so.
“Thank you, sir,” she said.
“Now I want to send off a telegram.”
“Here are the forms, sir, and a new pen.”
Rowton scribbled two words on a telegraph form, added a brief address, and handed it in.
“I want this to go at once,” he said.
“I’ll send it off this moment, sir; it is early, and the wires are sure to be clear.”
“Very well, I’ll wait and see it off; it is of the utmost importance.”
The woman turned to where the little telegraphic apparatus stood, and immediately worked off the message while Rowton stood silently by.
“Thank you,” he answered. He left the post-office as he spoke.
Just outside he ran almost into Jacob’s arms.
“What are you doing here?” cried his master with a scowl.
“I beg your pardon, sir; I saw you go out, and I thought I’d run after you, sir, to suggest that the police should be telegraphed for from Pitstow.”
“Aye, a good thought,” answered Rowton; “go into the office and send a wire off immediately.”
Jacob lingered outside the post-office until his master’s figure had vanished from view. Rowton did not once look round. When Jacob could see him no longer, he too, went into the post-office.
“I want to send a telegram,” he said to the post-mistress; “please give me a form.”
“Dear, dear, you must be all gone mad on the subject of telegrams,” she answered; “there’s Mr. Rowton sending off the queerest words, enough to frighten a body. Oh, I am not going to tell, so don’t you think it, Jacob Short.”
She showed him with a motion of her hand where the telegraph forms were lying. As she did so, his eyes met hers with a fixed and peculiar glance. She faintly nodded to him, and then her face turned pale.
“Run, Polly,” she said to a rosy-cheeked girl whowas helping her, “and tell Hudson to be quick; tell him it’s time the post was off, or he will miss the train at Pitstow.”
The girl immediately left the room.
“That was well done,” said Jacob; “now we have not a minute to lose. He brought a letter here, did he not?”
“He did that, Mr. Short; he brought it and dropped it into the mail-bag himself. I can’t find it, so there’s no use in your trying to meddle. It is as much as my place is worth, even talking to you on the subject, and if I was to do more, it’s penal servitude might hang over my head.”
“It might, or it might not,” said Jacob; “we have talked over these matters a few times, haven’t we, Mrs. Higgins? It is rather late in the day for you to take up this tone. I thought the matter was all arranged. You want thirty pounds, don’t you now? You shall have it if you give me one look at the letter which Mr. Rowton has just dropped into the bag.”
The woman hesitated again; she had a weak and somewhat cowardly type of face—her mouth expressed greed. When Jacob spoke of the thirty pounds which might so easily become hers, her eyes glittered with an ugly light.
“Heaven knows I do want that money,” she said, “and I don’t suppose any harm will come of it; be quick, then, or Polly will be back.”
The woman shivered as she spoke. She lifted the flap of the counter.
“I was just about to seal the bag,” she said; “I won’t look—you do.”
Jacob slipped inside the counter. The post-mistress held the bag, half-full of letters, for him to peep in. His eyes which were keen as an eagle’s, quickly discovered the despatch he wanted.
He lifted it out of the bag and coolly deposited it in his pocket.
“He lifted the dispatch out of the bag and coolly deposited it in his pocket.”—Page 229.
“He lifted the dispatch out of the bag and coolly deposited it in his pocket.”—Page 229.
“No, no; that’s not fair,” she cried in terror.
“Perfectly fair,” he replied; “I’ll post it myself at Pitstow in time to catch the same mail.”
“You cannot; it is impossible.”
“It is quite possible. Don’t keep me now, woman; here’s your thirty pounds.” He laid an envelope on the counter, and vanished before she could utter a word.
Going as quickly as ever his feet could carry him, Jacob approached the nearest inn, ordered a trap and the fleetest horse in the livery stables. He made a very plausible explanation for his hurry.
“You know all about the burglary up at the Heights,” he said—“well, I’m off to see the police at Pitstow; my master told me to telegraph, but it occurred to me it would be best to drive over and bring one or two of them back with me. Now, do be quick. Half a crown to the man who brings round the trap first.”
“It shall be at your service in three minutes at the farthest,” said the burly host of the little village inn. He ran off to the stables, and several men began to loaf round and eagerly question Jacob Short.
“I think I’ll go and lend a hand in putting the harness on the horse,” said Jacob, who did not want to communicateany of his tidings to the excited bystanders. He had reason for his hurry, for at that moment the cart containing Her Majesty’s mail rattled up the street. Two minutes afterwards Jacob himself was driving as fast as he could in the same direction. He soon overtook the mail cart, nodded to the driver, whom he happened to know slightly, and promising his own driver five shillings if he got to Pitstow ten minutes before the mail, settled down comfortably to consider the present position of affairs.
Pitstow was quite five miles away, and part of the road was very lonely. When Jacob got to the lonely part, the mail-cart was so far behind that it was not even visible. Short’s driver was smoking a cigar supplied to him by that worthy, and happy in his own reflections, was looking the other way. With a hasty movement, Short now took the letter which he had abstracted from the mail-bag out of his pocket. It was addressed in an upright and somewhat cramped hand.
“The sort of hand that ain’t natural to the writer,” muttered Short, a gratified smile spreading over his countenance. “I’ve seen Mr. Rowton’s own hand scores of times—big and flowing and easy, with a sort of dash about it; now, this is as stiff and crabbed as if the writer had got the rheumatics very bad. Let me see, to whom is it addressed?
“‘George Morton, Esq., ⸺, Redcliffe Square, London S.W.’ Well, there’s certainly nothing remarkable in the address. George Morton—the name is respectable, the locality good.”
Jacob held the letter close to his eyes; once again heperused the upright, stiff hand with minute and careful attention. He presently took a pocket-book out of his breast pocket and carefully compared the handwriting on the envelope of the purloined letter with some handwriting which he had in his pocket-book.
“Done, by Jove! Caught at last!” he muttered.
He slipped the pocket-book into its place, put the letter once again into his breast pocket, and began to talk in a cheerful and lively manner to the man who was driving him.
The subject of the burglary was, of course, the only one of the least interest at the present moment.
“It’s the queerest thing going,” said Jacob Short’s driver; “why, that’s the third big robbery that’s taken place in the last month or six weeks—and the police ain’t nabbed one of the fellows yet. I can’t understand it, can you, guv’nor?”
“Oh, the burglars will be nabbed all in good time,” said Jacob; “I should not be a bit surprised if this robbery at the Heights last night did not do for them. Then there’s the child, you know.”
“What child?” asked the man.
“Why, that game little chap, Master Murray Cameron, he was kidnapped, too, last night, as well as the plate and jewels.”
The driver, a stolid-looking fellow, dropped his mouth wide open on hearing this startling intelligence.
“Heaven preserve us!” he cried; “It is enough to terrify a body. There seems a sort of judgment on the place. Don’t it strike you so, guv’nor?”
“It does and it doesn’t,” said Jacob; “you whip upyour horse, my man. Ah, here we are, at Pitstow, at last.”
“Shall I drive you straight to the police station?” asked the man.
“No; you put up here at the sign of the Boar; I shall want you to drive me back before long.”
Jacob jumped off the cart and entered the inn.
“A private room, quick,” he said; “a room with a fire in it.”
Jacob was conducted into a small parlour at the back of the inn.
“You can have this room to yourself, sir,” said the landlady. “It so happens that there’s no one using it just now, and the fire is lit all handy.”
“That’s right,” answered Jacob; “now bring me pen, ink, and paper. I am in a desperate hurry—I want to write an important letter to catch the next post to London.”
“You’ll have to be quick, then,” said the landlady, glancing at the clock over the mantelpiece as she spoke, “for the post will be cleared in ten minutes.” She hurried out of the room to procure writing materials, returning with them almost immediately.
“Thank you, ma’am,” answered Jacob; “and now I’ll be all the quicker if I am left alone.”
The landlady took the hint and closed the parlour door behind her.
The moment she did so, Jacob took Rowton’s letter again out of his pocket. He breathed on the flap, which was securely fastened down, holding it to his mouth with one hand, while he wrote a communication of his own,as if for life or death, with the other. At last he took the moist letter from his mouth. With very little difficulty and with consummate skill he unfastened the flap of the envelope and took the letter from beneath. He opened it, to survey nothing whatever except a perfectly blank sheet of paper.
“Ha! invisible ink,” he muttered. “Now, will it make its appearance under the influence of fire or of water? I hope to goodness heat will do it, for I never thought of ordering water, and the mail will be off in a few minutes.”
He rushed to the fire as he spoke, and held the blank sheet of paper at a little distance from the bars. After doing so for a few seconds, a satisfied exclamation fell from his lips. Some writing of a bright blue colour was now perfectly visible on the hitherto blank sheet of paper. Jacob read the words, which, to an unobservant eye, meant very little:
“Illness has increased; will call to-morrow for ultimatum.”
“Illness has increased; will call to-morrow for ultimatum.”
At the foot of this apparently unintelligible sentence was a certain hieroglyphic of a peculiar shape and size.
After once again consulting some memoranda in his pocket-book, Jacob re-enclosed the letter in its envelope. As he did so he observed with satisfaction that the writing had completely disappeared. Slipping this letter with another of his own into his pocket, he now rushed almost on the wings of the wind to the nearest post-office. He opened the door and went in—the mail was just being packed.
“Am I in time to post two letters?”
“Just in time, master, if you look sharp,” said the postmaster. “Here, give ’em to me and I’ll drop ’em into the bag myself.”
Jacob did so; the letters were thrown on the top of a heap of others, and the postmaster began to tie up the bag. Jacob went out of the post-office with a perfectly radiant face.
“Well, Jacob Short, you’ve done a nice stroke of business to-day,” he muttered to himself; “and now I fancy your residence at Rowton Heights has very nearly come to an end.”
His mind was completely relieved with regard to the letter which he had abstracted from Her Majesty’s mail in the little village near Rowton Heights. After all, it would go by exactly the same post to town.
He now went to the police station, gave a circumstantial account of the events of the last night, and, as he expected, was soon accompanied by two or three of her Majesty’s constabulary back to Rowton Heights.
The rest of the day was passed, as might be imagined, in hopeless confusion and excitement. Jacob saw very little of his master and mistress. He was not required to wait at lunch, but was busily occupied taking notes with the police, who required someone to help them.
Most of the guests had left or were leaving the Heights, the ladies being, many of them, in a state of panic, and everyone earnestly wishing to get away from a place over which a tragedy seemed now to hang. The news of the mad lady being confined in the Queen Anne wing had got abroad; that fact, the abstraction of the jewels, and the loss of the child, seemed quite tochange the aspect of the place. Rowton Heights was no longer gay, cheerful, the home of brightness and frivolity. Detectives and superintendents of police kept coming and going; the entire house was searched from cellar to attic, the Queen Anne wing not being excepted. Nothing of the least importance was, however discovered, and not the faintest clue to the lost child was obtained.
Rowton, who had busied himself all day seeing to his guests and hastening their departure, came into the room where his wife and Lady Georgina were seated, about six o’clock in the evening.
“I cannot stand this inaction any longer,” he said. “I mean to go up to town to-night myself.”
“Oh, take me with you,” said Nance, springing to her feet; “the fact is, I am quite afraid to stay here alone.”
He fixed his eyes gloomily upon her—they were slightly bloodshot; his face was more or less flushed. He looked so agitated and upset that Lady Georgina seemed scarcely to know him.
“Will you have the goodness to stay with my wife?” he asked suddenly, giving her a keen intelligent glance, which also seemed to her to convey to her a certain warning.
“With pleasure,” she replied.
“But don’t leave me behind, Adrian,” cried Nance. “I know Lady Georgina is kind, but I am terrified to be left without you. Please take me with you to town.”
“I’ll send for you if necessary, Nancy,” he replied after a brief pause.
“You are surely not going to stay away long?” she asked with a gasp of terror.
He did not answer her, neither did he kiss her; there was an expression about his face which she could not fathom. Half an hour later he went away.