I find it difficult to write, in my halting fashion, of what my sensations were at that time. God knows what good was in me, and only God and time could bring that good out of me; for I had had no childhood, and my manhood had been a thing thwarted and blighted.
You have to understand that in a matter of a few days I had lived years of an ordinary life; had been in prison, and had escaped; had come near to death; had found myself buried and done with, and yet enlisted on life under a new name; and, to crown it all, now come face to face with someone who believed in me and trusted me—broken reed though I was to lean upon.
I stood in the dark grounds, holding the girl's hands and looking into her eyes: and that was a new experience for me. I remembered how someone else—dead, and shamefully buried in the precincts of a prison—had held her hands but a little time before, and had begged that he might help her. Well, he was past all that now; and I, with my poor record behind me, stood, miraculously enough, in his place. Yet there were things I must understand, if I would help her at all: I wanted to know why she had fled from her guardian, and why, in his turn, he had chased her through the grounds.
"What were you afraid of?" I asked her gently; and it was pleasant to me that she should forget to take her hands out of mine.
"Of him," she said, with a glance towards the house; and I thought she shivered. "I wonder if you can understand what I feel, and of what I am afraid?" she went on, looking at me curiously. "I do not even know your name."
I laughed a little bitterly. "You must indeed be in need of friends if you come to me," I answered.
"But my name is John New, and I am a—a friend of Dr. Just."
"Oh!" She shrank away from me with a startled look. "I did not understand that."
"I am a friend of Dr. Just," I repeated, "because it happens that I am very much in his power, and I must be his friend if I would live at all. If that is your case, too, surely we might form some small conspiracy together against him. You're not fond of the man?" I hazarded.
She shook her head. "I hate him—and I'm afraid of him," she said vehemently. "And yet I have to look to him for everything in the world."
"Sit down, and tell me about it," I said; and I drew her into the summer-house, and sat by her side while she talked to me. She was like a child in the ease with which she gave me her confidence; and as I listened to her, years seemed to separate me from my prison and from the life I had led. For this was the first gentle soul with whom I had yet come in contact.
"You must first tell me," she urged, "why you are in the doctor's power. Who are you? and what have you done, that he should be able to hold you in his hands? You are a man; you're not a weak girl."
It was difficult to answer her. "Well," I began, after a pause, "I did something, a long time ago, of which the doctor knows; and he holds that knowledge over me. That's all I can tell you."
She looked straight into my eyes, and I found, to my relief, that I was able to look at her with some frankness in return. "I don't believe it was anything very wrong," she said at last.
"Thank you," I answered, and I prayed that she might never know what my sin had been.
"You see," she went on confidentially, while the shadows grew about us; "I am really all alone in the world, except for Dr. Just, who is my guardian. He was made my guardian by my poor, dear father, who died some two years ago; my father believed in the doctor very much. They had written a scientific treatise together—because the doctor is very clever, and father quite looked up to him. So when he died he left directions that I was to be taken care of by the doctor. That was two years ago, and I have lived in this house ever since, with one short interval."
"And the interval?" I asked.
"We went down to a country house belonging to the doctor—a place in Essex, called Green Barn. It's a gloomy old house—worse than this one; the doctor goes there to shoot."
"But you haven't told me yet why you were running away from him," I reminded her.
She bent her head, so that I could not see her face. "Lately," she said in a low voice, "his manner to me has changed. At first he was courteous and kind—he treated me as though I had been his daughter. But now it's all different; he looks at me in a fashion I understand—and yet don't understand. To-day he tried to put his arm round me, and to kiss me; then when I ran away he ran after me."
I felt that I hated the doctor very cordially; I had an insane desire to be present if by any chance he should repeat his conduct. I felt my muscles stiffen as I looked at the girl; in my thoughts I was like some knight of old, ready to do doughty deeds for this fair, pretty girl, who was so ready to confide in me. I forgot all about who I was, or what had happened to me; I had only strangely come out into the world again—into a world of love.
But the fact that it was a world of love reminded me that I had had a rival—another man who had held her hands and looked into her eyes, and pleaded that he might help her. I could not, of course, ask about him, because I held the key to his fate, and that fate intimately concerned my own safety; but I was consumed with curiosity, nevertheless. Strangely enough, she voiced my thoughts by beginning to speak of him.
"There is something else that troubles me," she said earnestly. "I have one friend—a dear, good, loyal fellow; but he has unaccountably gone away, and I can hear nothing of him."
I felt myself turning hot and cold; I blessed the darkness of the summer-house. "What was his name?" I asked.
"Gregory Pennington," she answered softly.
"He was my friend before my father died; he followed me here when the doctor took charge of me. He was afraid of the doctor—not for himself, but on my account; he had a strange idea, and one that I have tried to laugh at, that the doctor wanted to kill me."
She looked at me with smiling eyes, laughing at such a suggestion; but I, remembering the earnestness of Gregory Pennington's words to the girl on that first occasion of my coming to the house, seemed now to hear that warning as though it came indeed from the dead. And I could not answer her.
"That was foolish, wasn't it?" she said, with a little laugh. "But then, I think poor Gregory loves me, and that made him afraid for me. You have been in the house here for some days; have you seen nothing of him?"
I was obliged to lie; there was nothing else for it. I shook my head, and lied stoutly. "No," I replied, "I have never seen him."
"It's all so strange," she said, as she got to her feet. "The doctor did not like him, and had forbidden him the house, in spite of my remonstrances. As he was my friend, Gregory and I used to meet secretly in these grounds in the evening."
I remembered how I had seen them together; I remembered, with a shudder, all that had happened afterwards. But still I said nothing; for what could I say?
"It was all so strange," she went on; and her voice sounded ghostly in the darkness. I had risen, and was standing opposite to her; I seemed to feel that the air had grown suddenly very chill. "The last time I saw him he told me that he would go to the house, and would see my guardian. I did all I could," she proceeded helplessly, "to dissuade him, but he would not listen. He said he must have an understanding with Dr. Just, and must take me away; although I think I should never have consented to that, in any case—because, you see, I did not really love him. He had always been like a good, kind brother to me, but nothing more."
"And did he go to the house?" I asked, for the want of something better to say.
She nodded. "I would not go in with him," she replied, "but I saw him go towards the doctor's study. I went off to my own room."
"And you heard nothing, and saw nothing after that?" I asked breathlessly.
"Nothing at all," she whispered. "Early the next morning the doctor sent me off to Green Barn, with a woman who is his housekeeper; I only came back to-day. I expected a letter from Gregory—even expected to see him. It's all so funny; it is just as though he had walked into that study—and had disappeared from that time."
"You mustn't think such things as that," I exclaimed hurriedly. "A dozen things may have happened; he may have been repulsed by the doctor, and so have decided to go away. If he knew you did not love him, he would feel pretty hopeless about the matter."
"That is possible, perhaps," she said. Then, suddenly, she held out her hand to me. "I have one friend at least," she said, "and his name is Mr. John New. It's a curious name, and I shan't forget it. You tell me that you are in trouble, too: so that is a bond between us. Good-night!"
I watched her as she flitted away through the garden. Even in my relief at the thought that she did not love Gregory Pennington, there was the dismal feeling that some day she must learn the truth—the ghastly thought that I stood there, actually in the clothes of the dead man. The whole business was a nightmare from beginning to end, in which alone she stood out as something bright, and fair, and unsullied.
We were a curious household. There were one or two rather scared-looking servants, presided over by a woman to whom the doctor referred always as "Leach"; in fact, he called her by that name when speaking to her. As she was destined to play rather an important part in that strange business upon which we were all entering, she deserves a word or two of description.
She must have been about forty years of age, and had once been, and still was, in a way, astonishingly handsome. She was tall and very dark; she had hair of that blue-black quality that is so rarely seen. Her eyes were as brilliant as those of Dr. Bardolph Just himself, save that there was in hers a curious slumbrous quality, quite unlike the sparkle in the man's. I may best describe her by saying that she suggested to me that in the very soul of her was something lurking and waiting for expression—some smouldering fire that a touch or a word might start into flame.
So far as I could gather, Dr. Just was exceedingly contemptible of her, and treated her with a sort of bitter playfulness. He seemed to take a delight in making her perform the most menial offices; and to me it was rather pitiful to see the eagerness with which she anticipated his every wish or command. I did not know at that time what bond there was between them; only, whenever I think of them in this later time one scene always rises before my memory.
It was on a morning soon after I had arrived at the house, and the doctor was in a ferocious mood. Everything had gone wrong, and I had seen the woman Leach, who ordinarily waited behind his chair, and by quick signs directed the servants what to do, cower under the lash of his words more than once. It happened to be at the breakfast table, and I was seated at one end, facing the doctor. It was the morning after that memorable night when I had talked with the girl Debora in the grounds; and now she sat on my right hand, at one side of the table, between the doctor and myself.
Absurd as the suggestion is, it almost seemed to me that the doctor was striking a balance between the two women for the mortification of them both. He pressed dishes upon the girl, with suave compliments at one moment, and in the next turned to Leach behind him with what was almost a coarse threat.
"Why the devil don't you wait on your young mistress?" he snapped. "What do you think I keep you here for? What do I pay you for?"
He turned to the table again, and, looking down the length of it, I saw the woman swiftly clench and unclench her hands behind him, as though she would have struck him. And if ever I saw murder in a face I saw it then; yet she looked not at the doctor, but at the bowed head of the girl beside me.
"Come—move—stir yourself!" cried the man, bringing down his fist with a bang on the table beside him. "Don't wait for the servants to carry things; carry them yourself. Take this dish to your mistress—Miss Debora Matchwick."
It was the first time I had heard the girl's name in full; but I took but little notice of it then, so interested was I in watching the little scene that was going forward. While the doctor sat looking at the girl, I saw the woman behind him draw herself up, and I saw her nostrils dilate; then she seemed to swoop to the table, and to catch up the dish he had indicated. She moved round slowly to where the girl sat, and purposely handed the dish from the wrong side. And down came Bardolph Just's fist again on the table.
"The other side, you jade!" he roared; and with a glance at him she moved round, and presented it to the girl in the proper fashion. And the face that bent above the fair hair of the girl was the face of a devil—of a soul in torment.
"I want nothing, thank you," said Debora in a low voice.
"Come, my dear child, we shall have you pining away to a shadow if you don't eat," broke in the doctor, with a mocking smile. "Is it possible that you are fretting over something—hungering for someone? We must have a private talk about this after breakfast; you must confide your troubles to me. And may I ask," he went on, with bitter politeness, as he turned to the other woman, "may I ask why you are standing in that absurd attitude, when your mistress tells you she wants nothing?"
The woman Leach turned away abruptly, and set down the dish. Debora had risen from the table, as if to make her escape, and the other woman, after a quick glance at her, was preparing to go from the room also. But her humiliation was not yet completed; the doctor called her back.
"Wait, Leach," he said, and she stopped on the instant. "You are in a tempestuous humour this morning, and that sort of humour must be quelled. Ring the bell."
She gave a quick, nervous glance at him, and then walked across the room and rang the bell. She waited, with her eyes cast on the ground, until a servant came in, carrying in his hand a pair of shoes. The doctor turned round in his chair, and the man carrying the shoes dropped on one knee, as if to put them on. But Bardolph Just waved him aside.
"You needn't trouble; get up," he said; and the man rose from his knees, looking a little bewildered. "Leach, come here!"
The woman stood still for a moment, and then walked slowly across the floor, till she stood in front of him. He pointed to the shoes at his feet, and smiled; and I, who had risen in my place, stood helplessly, waiting to see what would happen.
It took her quite a long time to get to her knees, but she did it at last, and began to put on the shoes. All this time the man-servant stood gaping, not knowing whether to go or stay. Debora, too, had paused at the door, in amazement at the scene. And in that oppressive silence the woman Leach fastened the shoes with fingers that seemed clumsy enough for that work. Nor were the doctor's words likely to mend her confusion.
"You're precious slow, I must say! What's the matter with you? are you getting past your work? You know what happens to people who are no longer fit to work, don't you? We have to cast them out into the street, to make a living as best they can—or to die. There—that'll do; you've been long enough to fasten a dozen pairs of shoes."
I think he struck her with his foot as she was rising from her knees, but of that I cannot be sure. I know that she turned away abruptly, but not before I had had time to see that those great eyes of hers were blinded with tears. Yet her gait, as she went from the room, was as stately as ever.
But perhaps the strangest being in that strange house at that time was William Capper. He wandered like a lost spirit, and one never knew quite where he would appear. Knowing what I did as to what had become of the dead man, this man who looked for him and waited for him was as a ghost that would not be laid. More than that, he was a ghost who might suddenly spring into live flesh and blood, and tell what he knew.
The doctor seemed as disconcerted by his presence as I was, and yet he made no effort to get rid of the man. Capper wandered about the house and about the grounds just as he pleased, while those peering eyes of his seemed always to be searching for his master. But it happened that, as Debora had been sent away on the very morning following the death of poor Gregory Pennington, and had only returned now, she had not yet come in contact with the man Capper. I found myself wondering what would happen when she did.
She was destined to meet him under curious circumstances. On that morning which had seen the degradation of the woman Leach before us all, Dr. Bardolph Just called me into that room that was half study and half surgery, and told me quite abruptly that he wanted me to go down into London for him. I suppose my startled face told its own tale, for he laughed a little contemptuously.
"Do you imagine anyone will be seeking you, or even expecting to find you above ground?" he asked. "Can't you get into your mind the idea that Norton Hyde is dead and buried in his own prison, and that another man—John New—has come alive in his place? People only look for what they expect to find, my dear John New; you are as safe as though by a miracle you had changed your features. I merely want you to go down into Holborn, to inquire about a certain scientific book which was promised to be sent to me and has not arrived. If it has not already been sent, you can bring it back with you."
He gave me the address, and money wherewith to travel; and I felt my heart sink at the prospect of going down, in this bare-faced fashion, into the great world. In my heart of hearts I determined that I would not go; the book might arrive in my absence, and the doctor might forget that he had sent me at all. So I made a feint of going, but in reality did not pass beyond the grounds.
It was a slumbrous day in early summer, and the grounds being very wide and extensive, I had rather an enjoyable forenoon of it. I determined that I would calculate to a nicety how long it should have taken me to get down to Holborn and back again, allowing a margin for accidental delays. Then I would put in an appearance at the house, and tell the doctor that I had reached the shop, only to find that the book had been sent off.
It may have been some sentimental feeling that carried my feet in the direction of that dark and half-ruined summer-house; or, as I think now, some direct Providence guiding me. Believing that it would be deserted, and that I might kill time there with some comfort, I was making straight for it among the tangled grasses and dead leaves of the garden, when I stopped, and drew away from it. For I had heard voices.
I make no attempt to excuse my conduct; I only urge that at that time I was surrounded by mysteries, and by trickery of every sort, and that I was, moreover, in hiding, in peril of my liberty. All the world might be conspiring against me—above all, those in this house, with one exception, might be only too glad to give me up to justice. I was fighting for myself; I make no excuse that I crept near to the summer-house, and listened. More than that, I looked in, for through a chink of the ruined boarding at the back of it I could see clearly all that happened.
Debora Matchwick was seated in a corner, drawn up tense and still, with her hands gripping the seat on either side of her; and in the doorway, with his arms folded, completely blocking her way of escape, stood the doctor.
It would seem that I had arrived at the very moment the man had discovered her, for his first words referred to the previous day. Whatever other words I had heard had been but a mere skirmishing before the actual battle began.
"I lost you in this direction yesterday, Debora," said the man; "you managed to elude me rather cleverly. What makes you afraid of me?"
"I—I'm not afraid of you," she said, with more bravery than she seemed to feel.
He laughed at her, showing his white teeth. "You're very much afraid of me," he corrected her. "And yet you have no reason to be; we should never be afraid of those who love us."
"You are my guardian, and you were my father's friend," she said quietly. "Beyond that guardianship you have nothing to do with me, and I will not——"
"You talk like a child, and you have a child's knowledge of the world," he broke in roughly. "I that am a man can teach you, as only a man can teach a woman, what life and the world hold for her. Prudishly you step aside; with false modesty you refuse to look at facts as they are. You are a child no longer, in the ordinary sense of things; and I am a man that loves you. Your father liked me——"
"To my everlasting sorrow, he did!" she exclaimed passionately.
"And he would have approved of the arrangement. Above all things, the management of your extremely troublesome affairs are in my hands, and if you belonged to me the whole thing would be solidified. I have great power in regard to your fortune now; I should have greater powers then."
"It's the fortune that tempts you!" she exclaimed, starting to her feet. "God forgive me for saying it, but my father must have been mad when he made up his mind to place me in your care. I hate you—but I'm not afraid of you. I hate you!"
Bardolph Just stepped forward quickly, and took her prisoner in his arms. I had made a sudden movement, recklessly enough, to run round the summer-house and spring upon the man, as I heard her give a little gasping cry, when there came a strange interruption; and it came from outside and from inside the summer-house almost at the same moment.
I had heard the doctor say, over and over again, with a sort of savage triumph, as he held her, "You shall love me! You shall love me! You shall love me!" and I had made that movement of which I speak, when there broke in the sound of someone singing, in a high querulous voice, and that someone was moving towards the summer-house. The girl heard the sound, and she broke away from the man who held her; she seemed literally to shriek out a name—
"Capper!"
All the rest happened in a flash. Scarcely knowing what I did, I ran round and confronted them all—and that, too, at the moment that the girl, breaking from the summer-house, ran swiftly to where the little grey-headed old man was emerging from the trees. In her agitation she flung herself at his feet, and caught at his hands, and cried out her question:
"Capper, dear, good Capper!—where's your master?"
We stood there in silence, waiting to see what would happen. For both Bardolph Just and myself could have answered the question, but what was the man Capper about to say? This was just such a crisis as I had been expecting and fearing; it seemed hours before the little grey-haired man, who had been looking down at her in a bewildered fashion, made any reply.
"I don't—don't know," he said, and he smiled round upon us rather foolishly, I thought.
"But, Capper—you remember me, Capper; I was your master's friend," went on the girl despairingly. "You remember that Mr. Pennington came to this house—oh!—oh, a week ago!"
She had risen to her feet, and was staring into his eyes. He put a hand over those eyes for a moment, and seemed to ponder something; then he looked up, and slowly shook his head. "I can't—I can't remember," he said. "Something has gone from me—here"—he laid the hand upon his forehead—"and I can't remember."
The doctor drew a deep breath, and took a step towards the girl; of me he seemed to take but little notice. "Don't worry the man, Debora," he said in a gentle tone; "I can't make him out myself, sometimes. Why he should remain here, where his master is not, I cannot understand."
Both Just and the girl spoke of the old man in hushed tones, as they might have spoken of someone who was ill. But Capper himself stood looking smilingly from one face to the other, as if his eyes would question them concerning this mystery in which he was involved.
"Has he been here ever since—since Mr. Pennington disappeared?" asked the girl.
"I don't know what you're talking about," retorted the doctor, with a perplexed frown. "Disappeared? How could Gregory Pennington disappear? I refused to allow him to come here; I have seen nothing of him for some time."
I knew, of course, that the doctor was keeping from her the knowledge of the unfortunate young man's suicide—I realised that that knowledge must be kept from her, for my sake as well, unless disaster was to fall upon me. But the girl was looking at Bardolph Just keenly, and I wondered how he could meet her eyes as calmly as he did.
"The night before I went to Green Barn with Leach," she said slowly, "I was in these grounds with Gregory. And that night he went into the house to see you."
"To see me?" The doctor twisted about from one to the other of us in apparent perplexity. "To see me? I haven't seen the young man for months."
"Then what, in the name of all that's wonderful, is Capper doing here?" demanded Debora, pointing to that strange, smiling creature, who seemed the least interested of any of us.
For a moment even the doctor was nonplussed, for that was a question to which there seemed to be no possible answer—or, at least, no answer that should prove satisfactory. It was, indeed, the strangest scene, to us, at least, who understood the true inwardness of it: that little grey-haired man, who might carry locked up in his numbed brain something that presently should leak out; the girl demanding to know the reason of his presence there; and the doctor and myself with the full knowledge of what had really happened, and of where Gregory Pennington lay hidden.
Bardolph Just, however, was the last man to be placed at a disadvantage for any length of time. In a moment or two he laughed easily, and shrugged his shoulders. "'Pon my word, I don't know!" he replied, in reference to the girl's question. "I can make neither head nor tail of him; but as his master is not here, I scarcely care to turn him out into the world in his present condition."
"What's the matter with him?" asked Debora. "I never saw him like this before."
"Can't say," retorted the doctor quickly. "But I should judge him to have had a stroke of some kind. At all events, Debora, I don't want you to think that I'm a brute; and as Gregory Pennington was a friend of yours—I should say, is a friend of yours—the old man shall stay here until—until his master returns."
I noticed that Capper kept close beside the girl as she moved away towards the house; he looked up at her trustingly, as a child might have done who wanted a guide. As they walked away together, Bardolph Just stepped forward and laid a hand on the girl's arm. I heard what he said distinctly.
"I have not said my last word, by any means," he said in his smooth voice; "nor is this the end."
"It is the end so far as I am concerned," she retorted, without slackening her pace. "You shall be my guardian no longer; I'll arrange something, so that I can get out into the world and live for myself and in my own fashion."
"We'll see about that," he retorted, between his teeth. "Go to your room, and remain there."
She gave him a glance of contempt, that had yet in it some spice of fear, as she turned away and made for the house, with old Capper trotting dog-like beside her. Then the doctor turned to me, and although I saw that there were certain white spots coming and going at the edges of his nostrils and on his cheek bones, he yet spoke calmly enough—indeed, a little amusedly.
"What do you think of that for pretty defiance?" he asked; then, sinking his voice to a lower tone, and taking a step nearer to me, he went on—"She's getting suspicious about that boy; and the madman who's gone off with her now is likely to cause trouble. I don't know what to do with him, but I shall have to devise something. Don't forget, my friend, that if the worst comes to the worst you're in the same boat with me—or in a worse boat. I've only cheated the authorities for your sake; I can plead human sympathy and kindliness, and all sorts of things—which you can't."
"Is that a threat?" I demanded, for now my gratitude was being fast swallowed up in a growing dislike of the man.
"Yes, and no," he replied, with a faint smile. "I'm only suggesting that you will find it wise, whatever happens, to fight on my side, and on mine only. I think you understand?"
I answered nothing; I followed him, sullenly enough, to the house. By that time I had quite forgotten the errand on which I had been sent, and which I had made no effort to accomplish; only when we were near to the house he turned quickly, and startled me by referring to it.
"By the way, you had your journey for nothing," he said. "The book arrived while you were gone. Did you meet with any adventures?"
"None at all," I answered curtly.
I was destined for another adventure, and a more alarming one, that night. There was no ceremony used in the doctor's house, and he made no attempt to dress for dinner. For that matter, I had not as yet seen any guests, and the doctor, on one or two occasions at least, had had his meals carried up to his study. So far as dinner was concerned, it usually happened that in the recesses of the house someone clanged a dismal bell at the time the food was actually put upon the table, and I would go down, either to sit alone, or to find the doctor awaiting me. You will remember that the girl Debora had been away for the whole of that eventful week.
The dining-room was dimly lighted by a big, shaded lamp, standing on the centre of the table; so that when I went in on this night, and looked about me, I could see figures seated, but could not clearly distinguish faces. The doctor I saw in his usual place, stooping forward into the light of the lamp to sup at his soup; I saw the bent head of the girl at one side of the table. I moved round the table to reach my place, and as I did so saw that another man was seated opposite the girl, so making a fourth. I could not see his face, as it was in shadow. I wondered who he might be.
The doctor bent forward, so as to look round the lamp at me, called me (God be praised for it!) by that new name he had given me—
"John New, let me introduce you to my friend, Mr. Harvey Scoffold."
I sat frozen in my chair, keeping my face in shadow, and wondering what I should do. For I knew the man—had known him intimately on those occasions when I had broken out of my uncle's house at night, and had gone on wild excursions. I saw him glance towards me; I knew that he knew my history, and what had become of me; and I wondered how soon he was to start up in his place, and cry out who I was, and demand to know who lay buried in my place. I left my soup untasted, and sat upright, keeping my face above the light cast by the lamp.
"Mr. Harvey Scoffold is an old friend of mine," said Bardolph Just, "although we have not met for some time. A worthy fellow—though he does not take quite so deep an interest in the serious things of life as I do."
"Not I," exclaimed the other man, squaring his shoulders, and giving vent to a hearty laugh that rang through the room. "I'm a very butterfly, if a large one; and life's the biggest joke that ever I tasted. I hope our new friend is of the same order?"
I mumbled something unintelligible, and, after looking at me intently for a moment, he turned and began to speak to his host. I think I had just decided that I had better feign illness, and get up and make a run for dear life, when he staggered us all by a question, put in his hearty, careless fashion.
"By the way," he said, looking from the doctor to the girl, and back again, "what's become of that youngster I used to see here—Gregory Pennington? I took quite a fancy to the boy. Does anyone know where he is?"
With the putting of that most awkward question as to what had become of Gregory Pennington, it may be said that a sort of bombshell fell into our midst. I leaned further back, determined to gain what respite I could in the shadows of the room before the inevitable discovery should fall upon me; and of the four of us only the girl, Debora Matchwick, leaned forward eagerly, peering round the lamp at the man who had asked the question.
"That's what we want to know," she said, in a quick, nervous voice. "Gregory has disappeared."
"Nonsense!" It was the doctor who broke in testily, still keeping his face in shadow. "You mustn't get such ideas into your head, child. Young men, strong, and well, and healthy, don't disappear in that fashion. I ordered him away from the house, and he has respected my wishes. Don't let me hear such nonsensical talk again."
The girl drew back, with a little quick sigh, and for a moment or two there was an abashed silence on the part of Scoffold and myself. But Scoffold was never the man to be abashed long by anything; in a moment or two he leaned his big body forward over the table, so that I saw his face fully in the light of the shaded lamp, and glanced quickly from one to the other of us, and began to put questions. And with each question it seemed that he probed the matter more deeply.
"But tell me, what had my young friend done to be forbidden the house?" he asked. Then, answered in a fashion by the silence about him, he shrugged his shoulders, and spread out his great hands deprecatingly.
"Oh, I'm sorry!" he went on. "I see that I'm prying into secrets, and that was never my way at all. Only I was interested in Gregory—a fine fellow, with a future before him. A little reckless, perhaps—a little given to the spending of money; but then, that is ever a fault of the young. If I did not wish to pry into secrets," he added a little maliciously, as he peered round the lamp at the girl, "I might suggest that perhaps his disappearance may have had something to do with Miss Debora here—eh? There are so many hearts to be broken in this world of pretty faces, Miss Debora."
The girl sat rigid and silent; presently the man leaned back in his chair again, with a little laugh, as the servants entered with the next course. I saw the woman Leach hovering about near the doorway; I wondered if we were to have another such scene as we had had that morning. But nothing happened until the servants had gone, with Leach following last. Then this unlucky guest had another word to say.
"I see you still keep your faithful retainer," said Harvey Scoffold, with a jerk of his great head towards the door. "Remarkable woman, that—and quite devoted to you, doctor."
"Servants are servants, and are kept in their places," retorted Bardolph Just coldly.
"But, my dear Just," broke in the irrepressible one again, "Leach is surely more than a servant. How many years has she been with you?"
"I haven't taken the trouble to count," replied the doctor. "Shall we change the conversation?"
Mr. Scoffold abruptly complied, by turning his attention to me, somewhat to my dismay. "Do you belong to these parts, Mr.—Mr. John New?" he asked.
I murmured in a low tone that I belonged to London, and as I spoke I saw him lean forward quickly, as if to get a better glimpse of me; but I obstinately kept my face in shadow.
"Ah!" he went on. "London's a fine place, but with temptations. I often think that it would be well if we could prevent young men from ever going to London at all—let 'em wait until they have reached years of discretion, and know what the world is like. I've seen so much in that direction—so many lives that have gone down into the shadows, and never emerged again. I could give you a case in point—rather an interesting story, if you would not be bored by it." He glanced round the table amid silence.
Now, I knew instinctively what story he was going to tell, before ever he said a word of it; I knew the story was my own. I sat there, spellbound; I strove to get a glimpse of Bardolph Just at the further end of the table, but he did not move, and the only face of the four of us that could be seen was the face, animated and smiling, of Harvey Scoffold.
"The story is a little sad—and I detest sad things," the man began, "but it has the merit of a moral. You are to imagine a young man, of good education, and with a credulous and doting old man—an uncle, in fact—as his sole guardian. He rewards the credulous old man by robbing him right and left, and he spends the proceeds of his robberies in vicious haunts in London."
I may here interpolate that the only vicious haunt I had known in London had been the house of Mr. Harvey Scoffold, and that most of the money I had stolen had gone, in one way and another, into his pockets—but this by the way.
"His name was Norton Hyde," went on Scoffold. "I beg your pardon—did you speak?" This last was to the doctor, who had leaned forward, so that I saw his face clearly, and had uttered an exclamation.
"No," he replied. "Pray proceed with your story." He leaned sideways, under pretence of filling his glass, and gave me a warning glance down the length of the table.
"Well, this Norton Hyde paid the penalty, in due course, of his crime," went on Scoffold, leaning back in his chair again. "He was sentenced to a certain term of penal servitude, served part of it, escaped from his prison——"
"The story is well known, and we need hear no more, my dear Scoffold," broke in the doctor. "I don't want to shock Miss Debora, nor to have her shocked."
"But I am interested," said the girl, leaning forward. "Please go on, Mr. Scoffold."
"You hear—she's interested," said the man with a smile, as he leaned forward again, and looked round the lamp at the girl. "It's very dreadful, but very fascinating. You must know, then, Miss Debora, that the fellow broke prison, and made a desperate attempt to get back to London; reached a house somewhere on its outskirts; and then, being evidently hard pressed, gave up the game in despair, and committed suicide."
"Poor, poor fellow!" commented the girl, in a low tone; and I felt my heart go out to her in gratitude.
"And that was the end of him," went on Mr. Scoffold, with a snap of the fingers. "They carried him back—dead—to his prison; and they buried him within its walls. So much for Buckingham!"
"Now, perhaps, you can contrive to talk of something a little more pleasant," said the doctor testily. "You've given us all the horrors, with your talk of imprisonments, and suicides, and what not. You used to be pleasant company at one time, Harvey."
"And can be so still," exclaimed the other lightly. "But I'm afraid it's this dark room of yours that gave that turn to the conversation: one sits in shadow among shadows. May I move this lamp, or may I at least take the shade off?" He put a hand to it as he spoke.
If ever I had trembled in my life, I trembled then; but I sat rigid, and waited, trusting in that stronger man at the further end of the table. Nor was my trust in him betrayed.
"Leave the lamp alone," he said sharply. "It's not safe to be moved; it's rather an old one, and shaky. Besides, I prefer this light."
"You always were a queer fellow," said Scoffold, dropping back into his seat again. "And to-night you're a dull one. I swear I couldn't endure your company," he proceeded with a laugh, "if it were not for the charming lady who faces me, and who is mostly hidden by your beast of a lamp. Even our friend, Mr. New here, hasn't a word to say for himself; but perhaps he'll come out stronger under the influence of one of your cigars presently."
I vowed in my heart that there should be no cigars for me that night in his company; my brain was active with the thought of how best I could escape. I was perplexed to know how it was that he had not remembered that it was in this very house, according to the tale, that Norton Hyde had committed suicide; but for that point, he had the whole thing in chapter and verse. I was comforted, however, by the thought that it was to the interests of Bardolph Just to help me out of the scrape; I saw that he was as much astonished to learn that Harvey Scoffold knew me as I was to find the man in that house.
But for my desperate strait, I must have been amused at the doctor's perplexity. I saw, just as surely as though he had stated it in words, that he was working hard at that puzzle: how to get Norton Hyde out of that room unobserved. Fortunately for the solution of that problem, he must have known how eager I was to get away; and presently he contrived the business in the simplest fashion.
We had come near to the end of the dinner, and it was about time for Debora to leave us. I knew that he dreaded that if she got up it would mean a breaking-up of our relative positions at the table, and I must be discovered. I was dreading that, too, when relief came.
"I say, New," he called to me down the length of the table, "I know you have that business of which you spoke to clear up to-night. We're all friends here, and we'll excuse you."
I murmured my thanks, and got up, designing to pass behind Harvey Scoffold, and so escape observation. But, as ill luck would have it, Debora saw in the movement an opportunity for her own escape; she rose quickly, and the inevitable happened. Harvey Scoffold blundered to his feet to open the door.
And there we were in a moment, above the light of the lamp, and all making for the door together; for the doctor, in his consternation, had risen also. Scoffold got to the door before me, and held it open for the girl; and for one disastrous moment I hesitated. For there was a light outside in the hall, and I dared not face it. Properly, of course, I should have followed the girl with my face averted; but even in that I blundered, and so found myself suddenly looking into the eyes of Harvey Scoffold, as he stood there holding the door.
It was as though he had seen a ghost. He gasped, and took a step back; and the next moment I was out of the room, and had pulled the door close after me. Even as I did so, I heard his voice raised loudly and excitedly in the room, and heard the deeper tones of Bardolph Just.
There was no time to be lost, and I looked about me for the quickest way of escape. I was groping in the dark, as it were, because I did not even know whether the man was a chance visitor, and I might safely hide in some other room of the house, or whether he was staying there, and so could leave me no choice but to get away altogether. And while I hesitated, my mind was made up for me, as it has been so often in my life, in the most curious fashion.
I saw that Debora had stopped at the foot of the stairs, and was looking back at me; and in a moment, in the thought of her, I forgot my own peril. I took a step towards her, and she bent her head towards mine, as she stood a step or two above me on the stairs, and whispered—
"For the love of God, don't leave me alone in this house to-night!"
Then she was gone, before I could make reply, and I was left there, standing helplessly looking after her.
In that moment I lost my chance. The dining-room door was opened, and the two men came out quickly; it seemed to me that Harvey Scoffold was speaking excitedly, and that the doctor, who had a hand on his arm, was striving to soothe him. I made a dart for the stairs—too late, for the voice of Scoffold called me back.
"Here, don't run away; I want to talk to you!" he cried. "There's a mystery here——"
"Not so loud!" exclaimed the doctor sternly, in a low tone. "If you've anything to say, don't shout it in the hall in that fashion. I trust we're gentlemen; let us go and talk quietly in my study. John, you know the way—lead on."
So, knowing well what was to follow, I went on up the stairs, until I came to the door of that room that was half study and half surgery; I opened the door and went in. To gain time, I went to the further end of it, and stood looking out of the window into the darkness. I calculated that it might be a drop of twelve or fourteen feet, if he drove me too far and I had to take flight. I was prepared for everything, and had for the moment—God forgive me!—clean forgotten what the girl had said to me. The two other men came into the room, and the door was closed. I heard the doctor speak in his most genial tones.
"Now, my dear Harvey, let's understand what bee you have in your bonnet. What's this about an escaped convict—and in my house? If I didn't know you better, I should suggest that my wine had been too much for you."
"Don't bluff, doctor: it would be far better to ask our friend there to show us his face clearly. If a man's honest he doesn't turn his back on his friends."
At that I threw discretion to the winds; I faced round upon him savagely. "Friends!" I exclaimed bitterly. "When were you ever a friend to me, Harvey Scoffold?"
The man laughed, and shrugged his shoulders. "Truly you are indiscreet," he said, with a triumphant glance at the doctor. "But youth is ever impatient, and one cannot expect that you, of all men, should be cautious. You never were. Come—can't we sit down and talk quietly, and see what is to be done?"
"There is nothing to be done—at least nothing that concerns you," said Bardolph Just quickly, as he stopped in the act of pulling open that drawer in his desk which held the cigars. "What in the world is it to do with you?"
"Oh-o! soyouare in the swim, too, eh?" exclaimed Scoffold, turning upon him with raised eyebrows. "I thought it possible that you might have been deceived—that our friend here might have come upon you suddenly, and induced you to help him, without your knowing who he was."
The doctor shrugged his shoulders, and took out a cigar. In the act of biting the end of it with his sharp white teeth he looked at the other man with a smile that was deadly—it was as though he snarled over the cigar. "I knew all about our friend here from the beginning," he said. "Be careful, Harvey; you know me by this time, and you know it's better to have me for a friend than an enemy. Once more I warn you not to ask questions, and not to interfere in what does not concern you. Take a cigar, and sit down and smoke."
Scoffold took the cigar, and stood for a moment or two, while he lighted it, looking from one to the other of us, as though weighing the matter carefully in his mind. He voiced his feelings as he put the match to the cigar, and puffed at it.
"Norton Hyde escaped from prison"—puff—"Norton Hyde hangs himself"—puff—"Norton Hyde is duly sat upon by a coroner and a jury"—puff—"Norton Hyde is buried in a prison grave." He looked at the lighted end of his cigar carefully, and tossed the match from him. "And yet my dear friend, Norton Hyde, stands before me. Any answer to that puzzle?" He looked at me and at the doctor, and laughed quietly.
Truly the game appeared to be in his hands, and I knew enough of him to know that he was a man to be feared. It was, of course, a mere coincidence that the man who had helped me to my ruin was a friend of this man upon whose hospitality I had so unceremoniously flung myself; nor did it mend matters to know that he was a friend of the dead boy. I think we both waited for his next remark, knowing pretty well what it would be.
"A natural answer springs up at once to the puzzle," he went on, seeming literally to swell his great bulk at us in his triumph. "Some man was buried as Norton Hyde—some man who must have been able to pass muster for him. What man could that have been?"
"You're getting on dangerous ground: I tell you you'd better let it alone," broke in the doctor warningly.
But the other man went on as though the doctor had not spoken. "Some man lies in that grave, who has disappeared, and for whom no enquiry has been made. Now, who can that man be? What man is there that hasn't been seen for some days—what man is there that is being looked for now?"
In the tense silence of the room, while the man looked from one to the other of us, absolutely dominating the situation, there came an interruption that was so terrible, and so much an answer to what the man was asking, that I could have shrieked out like a frightened woman. Behind him, where he stood, I saw the door of the study slowly opening, and then the smiling face of the little grey-haired man looked round it. Scoffold did not see him; only the doctor and I turned our startled faces to the smiling face of Capper. And Capper spoke—
"Forgive me, gentlemen"—and Scoffold swung round on the words and faced him—"I'm looking for my master, Mr. Pennington."
"Gregory Pennington, by the Lord!" shouted Harvey Scoffold, with a great clap of his hands together.
The doctor turned quickly to the door. I saw him thrust Capper outside, and close the door, and turn the key in it. He put the key in his pocket, and his eyes looked dangerous; he was as a man driven at bay.
"Well, you think you've made some great and wonderful discovery," he snapped. "Perhaps you have—at all events, you shall know the truth of the matter from beginning to end. I'll keep nothing back."
"You can't, you know," sneered the other, dropping his great bulk into an arm-chair, and puffing luxuriously at his cigar.
I stood with my back to the window while the doctor told the story. He told it from beginning to end, and quite clearly. Of the coming of the disappointed Gregory Pennington to the house, after an interview with the girl; of that mad, rash act of the unsuccessful lover; of the finding of him hanging dead. He told of my coming, and painted a little luridly my desperate threats and pleadings; told of how he had given way, and had dressed poor Gregory Pennington in my shameful clothes. When he had finished the narrative Harvey Scoffold nodded, as if satisfied with that part of it, and sat for a time smoking, while we awaited what he had to say.
"It never struck me that it was in this house the convict (as the newspapers called him) hanged himself," he said at last. "Upon my word, the puzzle fits together very neatly. But what happens, my friends, when someone enquires for young Pennington? For instance, myself."
"You've no purpose to serve," I broke in quickly.
He laughed, and shook his head gaily. "Not so fast, my young friend, not so fast!" he answered me. "I may have an axe to grind—I have ground many in my time. Besides—putting me right out of the question—what of the girl? How do you silence her?"
"I can find a way even to do that," replied the doctor in a low voice. "Only let me warn you again, Harvey Scoffold, we are desperate men here—or at least one of us—fighting for something more even than liberty. I am fighting to keep this innocent girl's name out of the business, and to keep scandal away from this house. Let Norton Hyde rest in his grave; Gregory Pennington is not likely to be enquired for. He was young and restless; he may have gone abroad—enlisted—anything. That's our tale for the world, if questions are asked."
"It only occurs to me that the virtuous uncle of our young friend here—the man who was robbed so audaciously—would give a great deal to know that the nephew who robbed him was at large," suggested Harvey Scoffold musingly over his cigar.
I took a quick step towards him. "You wouldn't dare!" I exclaimed threateningly.
He held up a large protesting hand. "My dear boy, I am your friend; I was always your friend. You are quite safe with me," he said. Yet I knew that he lied.
He made one other comment on the matter before wisely leaving the subject alone. "It seems to me strange," he observed, with a furtive look at the doctor, "that you should be so willing to help our young friend here—a man you have never seen."
"I do that," replied the other quickly, "because in that way I can cover up the miserable business of young Pennington. Unless you speak, it is scarcely likely that anyone else will ever drag that business into the light of day. Both Gregory Pennington and our friend here happen to have been particularly alone in the world: in neither case is there anyone who is likely to make awkward inquiries."
"Always excepting the girl," Harvey Scoffold reminded him. "So far as I am concerned, you have nothing to fear from me; I shall merely be an amused spectator of the little comedy; I don't know yet exactly how it's going to end."
He was tactful enough to say nothing more then, and we presently drifted, almost with cheerfulness, into some more ordinary conversation. Yet I saw that the man watched us both from between half-closed eyelids while he smoked and lounged in his chair; and I was far from comfortable. It was late when the doctor rose, and with a glance at the clock said that he had still much work to do before he could sleep. He unlocked the door; at which hint Harvey Scoffold and I left him for the night.
The excitement of the meeting had quite thrust out of my mind the question whether the man was stopping in the house or had merely come there as a chance visitor; but the question was answered now, when Harvey Scoffold told me that he had a long walk before him, and was glad that the night was fine. I felt some sudden uplifting of the heart at the thought that at least I should be relieved of his presence, only to feel that heart sinking the next moment, at the remembrance that he would be free to spread his news in the outer world, if he cared to do so. For it must be understood that my public trial, and all the disclosures thereat, had given to the world the address of my uncle, and my own movements on those secret expeditions of mine; it was possible for Harvey Scoffold to put that veiled threat of his into instant execution.
I knew, moreover, that he was a dangerous man, by reason of the fact that he was chronically in want of money, and had never hesitated as to the methods employed to obtain it. However, there was no help for it now; the murder was out, and I could only trust to that extraordinary luck that had befriended me up to the present.
I walked with him out into the grounds, and he shook hands with me at parting, with some cordiality. "You have had a miraculous escape, dear boy," he said, in his jovial fashion, "and you are quite a little romance in yourself. I shall watch your career with interest. And you have nothing to fear—I shall be as silent as the grave in which you ought to be lying."
He laughed noisily at that grim jest, and took his way down the road in the direction of London. I went back into the house and went to my room, and slept heavily until late the next morning.
The doctor had left the house when I went down to breakfast, and I had a dim hope that I might see the girl alone. But she did not put in an appearance, nor did I see anything of her until the evening, when the doctor had returned, and the three of us sat down to dinner. I had been roaming desolately about the grounds, smoking the doctor's cigars, and inwardly wondering what I was going to do with the rest of the life that had been miraculously given back to me; and I did not know at what hour Bardolph Just had returned. Yet I had a feeling that there had been some strange interview between the doctor and the girl before I had come upon the scene—and a stormy interview at that. Bardolph Just sat at his end of the table, grim and silent, with his brows contracted, and with his habitual smile gone from his lips; the girl sat white and silent, sipping a little wine, but touching no food. During the course of a melancholy meal no single word was heard in the room, for the doctor did not even address the servants.
At the end of the meal, however, when the girl rose to quit the room, the doctor rose also, and barred her way. "Stop!" he said quickly. "I've got to speak to you. We'll have this matter cleared up—once and for all."
"I have nothing more to say," she replied, looking at him steadily. "My answer is what it has always been—No!"
"You can go, John New," said the man harshly, turning towards me. "I want to talk to Miss Matchwick alone."
"No, no!" exclaimed the girl, stretching out her hands towards me; and on the instant I stopped on my way to the door, and faced about.
But the doctor took a quick step towards me, and opened the door, and jerked his head towards the hall. "I am master here," he said. "Go!"
I saw that I should not mend matters by remaining, but I determined to be within call. I passed quickly along the hall after the door was closed; I knew that just within the great hall door itself was another smaller door, opening to a verandah which ran round the front of the dining-room windows, on the old-fashioned early Victorian model. I knew that the windows were open, and I thought that I might by good fortune both see and hear what went on in the room.
And so it turned out. I slipped through that smaller door, and came on to the verandah; and so stood drawn up in the shadows against the side of the window, looking in and listening.
"I have given you the last chance," the doctor was saying, "and now I shall trouble you no more. There is another way, and perhaps a better one. I have treated you well. I have offered to make you my wife—to place you in the position your father would have been glad to see you occupy. Now I have done with you, and we must try the other way. Look into my eyes!"
Then I saw a curious thing happen. At first, while the man looked intently at her with those extraordinarily bright eyes of his, she covered her own with her hands, and strove to look away; but after a moment or two she dropped her hands helplessly, and shivered, and looked intently at him full. It was like the fascination of some helpless bird by a snake. I saw her sink slowly into a chair behind her; and still she never took her eyes from those of the doctor, until at last her lids fell, and she seemed to lie there asleep. Then I heard the man's voice saying words that had no meaning for my ears at that time.
"You will not sleep well to-night, little one," he said, in a curious crooning voice. "You will rise from your bed, and you will come out in search of something. Is it not so?"
Very softly she answered him: "Yes, I understand."
"You will be restless, and you will seek to get out into the air. But all the doors will be bolted, and the windows fastened. So you will turn to the eastern corridor and will pass along there to the end wall. Do you understand?"
And again she murmured: "Yes, I understand."
"And then you will walk on—into the air. You will do this at midnight."
She murmured, "At midnight"; and on a sudden he snapped his fingers violently three times before her eyes, and she sprang up, wide awake, and stared at him, looking at him in perplexity.
"You've been asleep for ever so long," he said, with a smile. "You must be tired; go to your room."
She looked at him in a dazed fashion, and passed her hand across her forehead. "What were we speaking of?" she asked him, as though referring to the conversation they had had before he had sent her into that species of trance.
"Nothing—nothing that matters now," he said, moving towards the door.
Fearing that he might come in my direction after he had sent her from the room, I vaulted over the railing of the verandah, which was only raised a few feet above the level of the ground. And so presently came round by the side entrance into the house, and, as was my custom, went up to the doctor's study to smoke with him.
I found him pacing up and down, chewing the butt of a cigar that had long gone out. He glanced up quickly when I entered, and jerked his head towards the open drawer in the desk where the cigars were.
"I must ask you to take your cigar and smoke it elsewhere to-night," he said. "I have work to do, and I am very busy. Good-night."
I longed to stop and talk with him—cursed my own impotent position, which gave me no chance of trying conclusions with him and befriending the girl. I remembered bitterly the words she had said to me at the foot of the staircase on the previous night, when she had begged me not to leave her alone in that house. So I went away, reluctantly enough, to smoke my cigar elsewhere.
I wandered down into the dining-room, and dropped into a chair, and closed my eyes. Suddenly I remembered that it was that chair into which the girl had dropped when the doctor had said those words I did not understand. I sat up, very wide awake, remembering.
She was to walk along the eastern corridor, and was to come to a wall at the end. And yet she was to walk out into the air! What did it all mean? What trick was the man about to play upon her? What devilry was afoot?
I got up at once, and threw away my cigar, and set off to explore the house. I wanted to know where this eastern corridor was, if such a place existed, and what was meant by the doctor's words. I went up to my own room first, and made out, as well as I could, by remembering which way the sun rose, and other matters, in what direction the house was situated; and so came to the conclusion that the room to which I had been assigned was at the end of the eastern corridor, nearest to the great bulk of the house. Which is to say, that if I stood in the doorway of my room, and faced the corridor, the other rooms of the house would be on my right hand, while on my left the corridor stretched away into darkness, past rooms that, so far as I knew, were unoccupied.
Lest by any chance my windows should be watched, I lit the lamp in my room and left it; then I came out into the corridor, and closed the door. I looked over the head of the great staircase; the house was in complete silence, though not yet in darkness. Listening carefully, I moved away swiftly into the gathering darkness to the left, until at last, at the end of the corridor, my outstretched hand touched the wall. This was exactly as it should be, according to the doctor's words. I now turned my attention to the wall itself, and found that it was recessed—much as though at some time or other it had been a window that had been bricked up. I could make nothing of it, and I went back to my room, sorely puzzled.
I must have a torpid brain, for I was ever given to much sleeping. On this occasion I sank down into a chair, intending to sit there for a few minutes and think the matter out. In less than five, I was asleep. When I awoke I felt chilled and stiff, and I blamed myself heartily for not having gone to bed. While I yawned and stretched my arms, I became aware of a curious noise going on in the house. With my arms still raised above my head, I stopped to listen.
Whatever noise it was came from the end of the corridor where I had found that blank wall. Some instinct made me put out the light; then in the darkness I stole towards the door, and cautiously opened it. Outside the corridor was dark, or seemed to be at my first glance; I dropped to my knees, and peered round the edge of the door, looking to right and left.
To the right all was in darkness; the servants had gone to bed, after extinguishing the lights and locking up. To the left, strangely enough, a faint light shone; and as I turned my eyes in that direction I saw that a small hand-lamp was standing on the floor, and that above it loomed the figure of a man, casting a grotesque shadow on the walls and ceiling above him. I made enough of the figure to know that it was the doctor, and that he was working hard at that end wall.
I was puzzling my brains to know what he was doing, and was striving hard to connect his presence there with what he had said to the girl, when I heard a grinding and a creaking, and suddenly the lamp that stood beside him was blown out in a gust of wind that came down the corridor and touched my face softly as I knelt there. Then, to my utter amazement, I saw the night sky and the stars out beyond where that end wall had been.
I had just time to get back into my room and to close the door, when the doctor came tiptoeing back along the corridor, and vanished like a shadow into the shadows of the house. I waited for a time, and then struck a match, and looked at the little clock on the mantelpiece. It wanted four minutes of midnight.
I opened the door again, and looked out into the corridor; then, on an impulse, I stole along towards that newly-opened door, or whatever it was, and, coming to it, looked out into the night. It was at a greater height from the ground than I had thought possible, because on that side of the house the ground shelved away sharply, and there was in addition a deep, moat-like trough, into which the basement windows looked. More than ever puzzled, I was retracing my steps, when I heard a slight sound at the further end, like the light rustle of a garment mingled with the swift patter of feet.
I will confess that my nerves were unstrung, and they were therefore scarcely prepared for the shock they had now to endure. For coming down the corridor, straight towards where I stood drawn up against the wall, was a little figure in a white garment, and with fair flowing hair over its shoulders; and that figure came swiftly straight towards that new door which opened to the floor. While I stood there, paralysed by the sight, certain words floated back to my mind.
"You will be restless, and you will seek to get out into the air. But all the doors will be bolted, and the windows fastened. So you will turn to the eastern corridor, and will pass along there to the end wall ... and then you will walk on into the air.... You will do this at midnight!"
With a great horror upon me, I leapt in a moment, though dimly, to what was meant. The girl was walking to her death, and walking in her sleep. In what devilish fashion Bardolph Just had contrived the thing, or what ascendency he had gained over her that he could suggest the very hour at which she should rise from her bed and do it, I did not understand; but here was the thing nearly accomplished. She was within a couple of feet of the opening, and was walking straight out into the air at that giddy height, when I sprang forward and caught her in my arms.
She shrieked once—a shriek that seemed to echo through the night; then, with a long sobbing cry, she sank into my arms, and hid her face on my shoulder. And at the same moment I heard a door open down below in the house, and heard running footsteps coming towards me. I knew it was the doctor, and I knew for what he had waited.