CHAPTER XXV.A MYSTERY.
The girl saw him, and he observed that her face paled and then flushed. He did not doubt but she recognized him, but she turned coldly away. The over-dressed youth gave Frank a look that seemed to say he longed to crack the American lad over the head with the cane he carried, and they passed on.
Frank felt as if he had received a blow in the face. He stood there, dazed, and watched them melt into the moving throng and disappear. Then, when it was too late, he started forward to make sure it was Inza.
He did not find them; they had vanished.
It is utterly impossible to describe the emotions which filled the boy’s heart as he once more turned to seek his coach. Never in his life had he been so confused as by the events of the last few minutes.
“I may have been deceived,” he muttered. “It could not have been my old chum, Inza; and yet my last letter from Fardale said Bernard Burrage contemplated taking a trip abroad for his health. It may have been; but why did she cut me?”
He seemed to think in a confused manner, and he paid little heed to his surroundings. He was quite unaware that the races were being run, and that the crowd was yelling and cheering like a lot of lunatics.
“It must be that she did not recognize me,” he said, speaking to himself. “She did not expect to see me here, and I have changed some since we last met in New Orleans. That’s it—that’s the explanation.”
But it did not satisfy him. She had looked him squarely in the face, and she had heard him speak her name, as he started forward, with hat raised and hand outstretched. Over and over came the thought that it was surely Inza, and she had given him the cut direct.
Who was the flashy youth with her? The question struck him like a blow.
“He looked English,” thought the wondering boy. “It seems that I have heard her speak of her English relations. Now I know I have. That must have been a cousin. He gave me an insolent stare, confound him! I’d like to crack his head!”
Frank’s jealousy was beginning to stir his blood. He longed to see Inza and her companion again, but knew there was not one chance in a thousand of finding them in that great throng.
When he reached his coach he found the little professor standing on the highest seat and cheering like mad over a very close race. Frank climbed up and sat down, continuing to meditate on the events of the last half-hour, and paying very little heed to the hot heat that was being run on the track.
The professor was surprised to find Frank there, and he was still more surprised to find the boy did not enthuse in the least over the races.
“What’s the matter with you?” demanded the little man, in his big, hoarse voice. “You must be seriously ill!”
“Don’t bother me,” said Frank.
But the professor did bother him. He would not let the boy alone, but continued to ply him with questions.
Frank did not think it best to tell of the remarkable warning he had received and of the grip of the icy hand, but he did tell how he had seen Inza Burrage and she had failed to recognize him.
“Miss Burrage?” exclaimed Scotch, who had known the girl at Fardale. “In England? You must be mistaken!”
“I am not,” declared the boy, positively. “I have tried to think that I was, but I have given that up. It was Inza, and she gave me the cut. I will find her, and demand an explanation.”
“Find her! Well, if you couldn’t find her after losing sight of her in this crowd, it is not likely you will be able to find her in London. There is little show for that.”
Frank was forced to confess to himself that this was true, but still he felt that something would bring them together again.
Instead of watching the races, Frank watched the faces in the shifting throng, longing and hoping to catch a glimpse of Inza once more.
He was disappointed. The last race was run, and then came the desperate hurrying of departure. Frightened horses were harnessed in great haste, the different members of coaching parties were collected, horns began to blow and whips to crack, and the vast multitude that had been gathering for many hours strove to get away all at once.
At last, the track was left behind, the downs were cleared, and the Clapham Road was reached, where the procession of the forenoon was found moving toward London.
And now the crowd seemed almost riotous. Those who had won on the races were hilarious over their success, and those who had lost shouted and sang, that they might forget their misfortune.
Everybody seemed to have wooden doll-babies stuck in their hatbands, which Frank discovered was a time-honored custom at the Derby. Some had bought hollow tubes and dried peas to blow through the tubes, and they were shooting away at everybody and anybody in a most reckless fashion. Some of the costers had obtained paper caps and false noses, and were playing the part of clowns on their way home. Not a few of them were provided with accordions, from which they pumped all sorts of wheezy tunes. And all along the line the horns were sounding and the whips cracking.
At the public houses the carts were gathered again, but there was very little dancing on the greens. Under the hedges some of the weary and overloaded merrymakers had stowed themselves to rest, and were sleeping soundly, for all of the noise of the passing procession.
It was quite dark when the London asphalt was reached. The street was brightly lighted, and either side was thronged with spectators. Again the beggars were entreating every one to throw out a few “moldy coppers,” and hoping every one had a successful day.
When Frank and the professor reached their lodgings, after taking supper, both were well satisfied to sit down and rest after the events of the day.
“I wouldn’t go through it again for a fortune,” declared the professor, grimly.
“I wouldn’t have missed it for anything,” asserted Frank, decidedly.
The landlady came up with their mail. She handed Frank a sealed envelope, which she said had been left at the door by a muffled man less than a minute after the boy entered the house.
“I see as ’ow hit is a mourning henvelope, young sir,” she said. “I ’opes as ’ow none hof your friends or relatives hare dead.”
A mourning envelope! The sight of it gave the boy a start, but what astounded him most was his name written on the envelope. It was in a peculiar black hand, and the boy immediately decided that the writer had made an effort to disguise his chirography.
But what startled him the most was that on this black-edged envelope his name was written in blood-red ink!
The landlady stood around, waiting for Frank to open the envelope, casting a crooked eye at him in an inquisitive and suspicious manner.
“Very good, Mrs. Bumley,” said the boy, regaining his composure. “Thank you.”
She did not take the hint, but lingered about, saying:
“I ’opes it ain’t nothink serious, young sir. It was a strange-looking gent wot ’anded the letter to me. He were all muffled and bundled, and his ’at were lopped hover his eye in a manner wot said as ’ow he didn’t care for to have his fetoores hobserved. I wondered were he an hintimate friend hof yours, young sir.”
“Then you did not obtain a fair look at his face, so you would know him again if you saw him?”
“Hit’s not my fault that I didn’t, but hit were dark, and I didn’t ’ave a fair show. I must hadmit that I would not know him if I were to meet him face to face to-morrow.”
“Thank you again, Mrs. Bumley. That is all.”
Still she refused to take the hint.
“Singular ’ow hanybody can write on a mourning henvelope with red hink,” she said, insinuatingly. “You don’t seem in any ’urry to hopen it.”
“I sometimes do not read my letters before retiring at night, as they are liable to make me wakeful. Good-night, Mrs. Bumley.”
“Good-night, gentlemen,” came reluctantly from her lips. “I ’opes you sleep well. Good-night.”
She went out, closing the door in a soft, stealthy way, which was natural with her.
“What a prying old hen she is!” exclaimed Frank, angrily.
The door opened quickly and silently, and Mrs. Bumley thrust her head in, cocking her crooked eye toward the boy.
“Did I ’ear you speak to me, sir?” she asked.
“No, madam! Good-night.”
“Good-night. Pleasant dreams.”
The door closed again, whereupon Frank promptly arose and locked it.
“There!” he muttered; “that will keep her out. Just take a look at this thing, professor. It is a curiosity.”
“Good gracious!” exclaimed the little man, having adjusted his spectacles and peered at the envelope. “How remarkable!”
“It is a trifle bizarre. We will see what it contains.”
He tore open the envelope and extracted the single sheet of paper which it contained. On that sheet, written in the same scrawling backhand, the ink being red, were these words:
“You have felt the grip! When it closes on you again it will crush out your life! There is no escape.”
“Cæsar’s ghost!” gurgled the professor, when he had made out what was written there. “What is the meaning of that, Frank?”
“It is a threat, but why I am threatened is more than I can understand. Let’s make a comparison.”
Then he took from his pocket the note which he had received at the racetrack that day, unfolded it, and placed it on the little center table beside the one just received.
“See if you can discover a likeness in the handwriting, professor,” he invited.
“Eh? What’s this? Where did you get this?”
Then Frank told the professor of his adventure at the Derby, much to the little man’s astonishment and dismay.
“Dreadful!” exclaimed Scotch. “It seems to have been an attempt on your life.”
“That’s the way it looks,” admitted the boy.
“Are you to be followed by it here? I did hope we might escape trouble here in London! It seems that you are fated to be continually in deadly peril!”
“Well, I must confess that I am not given time for my blood to grow stagnant. As soon as one thing passes, another comes on.”
“It is an outrage! Why it is I am unable to say. What have you done now, that an attempt should be made on your life?”
“That is what I would like to have you tell me.”
“It must be because you discovered the infernal machine in the House. I can see no other explanation.”
“And that is not a satisfactory explanation, for it does not seem that any one but a maniac or set of maniacs would hound me and attempt to take my life because of that.”
“True, true.”
“I believe it is something more—something deeper. Look how I have been watched by the police. And then there was that fellow at the Derby, who gave his name as ’Arry ’Awkins. Who and what was he?”
“It is impossible to say.”
“I was intensely angry with him until he plunged into the mob and got me out of what seemed to be a bad scrape. I could not be angry with the fellow after that. But he did not give me an opportunity to question him. He skipped.”
“Frank,” cried the little man, who was becoming greatly agitated, “I believe there is but one thing for us to do.”
“What is that?”
“We should return to the United States without delay. Wherever you go, you get into serious trouble and danger. The conditions could not have been favorable when you started on your travels abroad.”
“Nonsense! I hope you are not as superstitious as that, professor! That is childish, and you must know it.”
The professor stiffened up.
“Oh, very well!” he growled. “Go on to your destruction! I see you are determined to do so. Don’t mind me. Don’t heed my advice. I am of no consequence. I am simply your guardian, and so I do not cut any ice!”
“Easy, professor! You are getting slangy. I am inclined to be somewhat curious, and I will admit that my curiosity is aroused. I want to solve this mystery; I want to know just what this business means. Besides that, Inza Burrage is somewhere in London.”
“And you might as well look for a needle in a haystack as to search for her. You will waste your time, Frank.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I shall write home, to know if she is here, and to obtain her address. I shall not leave London till I receive an answer to the letter.”
Scotch flung up both hands in despair.
“Have your own way!” he groaned. “It looks as if I might take you back to America in a coffin—if I am lucky enough to take you back at all.”
Frank laughed, seeming quite at ease, but fully settled in his mind and determined. He fell to studying the handwriting on the two sheets of paper before him. After a few minutes, he said:
“There is no resemblance. They were written by entirely different persons. The first is a warning of a friendly sort; but the second came from an enemy.”
The professor once more adjusted his spectacles and surveyed the writing. He spent at least fifteen minutes over the two notes, and then he straightened up, agreeing with Frank.
“You are quite right, quite right. The two notes were not written by the same person. The first is written in an undisguised hand, but it is plain that the writer of the second made an effort to disguise his writing.”
“I don’t know but the police would be interested in these,” said the boy. “I may take a notion to carry them to the police.”
“I shall not sleep a wink to-night,” declared the little man. “We must make sure the door is secure and the windows are fastened. Even then, it is possible we may not awaken in the morning.”
“Or if we do wake up, we may find ourselves dead, as Barney Mulloy would say.”
“It is a very cheerful prospect—very!” groaned the little man, tramping nervously about the room.
“Oh, don’t get excited, professor. This is nothing compared to Madam Tussaud’s Wax Works, and you know you took me to see them, Chamber of Horrors and all. You did not sleep well for three nights after that.”
“Boo!” cried Scotch, as he made haste to examine the window-fastenings. “Why do you speak of such things?”
Before Scotch retired for the night, he carefully piled every chair in the room, and the center table, against the door.
“There,” he said, with some satisfaction, “if they come in that way, they’ll be pretty sure to awaken us.”
But they were not troubled. The night passed peacefully, and they were aroused at the usual hour by Mrs. Bumley’s knock on the door, and her voice informed them that it was “time to be hup.”
After breakfast, Frank decided to take a spin on his bicycle, which he had hired for the purpose of morning exercise while in London. He got out the polished wheel, and waved a farewell to the professor, who was looking from the window.
It was between nine and ten when he reached one of the riding stables near Rotten Row, and he was seized by a sudden desire to take a dash through Hyde Park and up past Kensington Gardens, so he left his bicycle at the stable, and obtained a horse. As he had an eye for horseflesh, the ’ostler was not able to thrust a worthless animal upon him. He obtained one with dash, vim and spirit, and with a mouth of iron.
The show of Rotten Row lasts from nine in the morning to eleven. Once on a time it took place in the afternoon, but fashion has changed that. At ten in the morning there are between six hundred and seven hundred horses on the Row, providing the day is favorable and it is in “the season.”
The Row is set aside for the better class. It is one of the great show places of London.
Frank let his horse take him along at a smart canter. Fashion and wealth were on every hand. He knew he was among the bloods of the great English metropolis.
Suddenly he drew hard on the bit, for coming toward him were two riders whom he recognized.
They were Inza Burrage and her companion, the flashily-dressed youth of the day before.