“Murdered woman not my aunt Mrs. Vanderstein or anyone known to me there is no clue to her identity.“Sidney.”
“Murdered woman not my aunt Mrs. Vanderstein or anyone known to me there is no clue to her identity.
“Sidney.”
Gimblet crumpled it up and flung it into a waste-paper basket.
“A pity to squander five shillings,” he murmured, “in telling me what I already knew.”
Then he hastened hungrily to the dining-room.
After a hearty meal he felt considerably better, and when he presently pushed back his chair and strolled over to the open window he was ready and eager for more work. His mind, which had been busy during the meal with attempts to devise a plan that should bring him to closer quarters with the person he most desired to meet, that should cause the phantom figure of Mr. West of the black beard to materialise and become a solid form discernible to the naked eye and capable of wearing handcuffs, had not yet furnished him with a method by which this desirable object might be attained.
“Surely,” he said to himself, “I must be able to trace Madame Querterot’s meetings with this man. It is impossible that she can have been on such terms of intimacy with him without some one knowing it.”
He looked at his watch, helped himself to a sweet from a box which stood on the shelf, and decided to go down to Pimlico and see if he could not find out something more from Julie. It was half-past nine, but she was not likely to have gone to bed yet, and he wanted a specimen of her mother’s handwriting.
He went out and took a taxi to Warwick Square, where he dismissed it, and pursued his way on foot.
It was quite dark by now, with the soft blue darkness of summer, for the weather had turned warm again and the sun had gone down in a clear sky. There were plenty of people about, as it was Saturday night; many a small coin was being carried snug in its earner’s pocket that would no longer be lying there in a couple of hours’ time, and the tills of the publicans were already flooded with the rise of the weekly tide.
As he drew near the little shop in the gloomy, sordid little street, the door of it opened suddenly and a man came out and walked rapidly away. After a few steps he paused; and, turning, gazed for a moment longingly back at the window—from which a pale light shone forth, so that the pavement beneath it was bathed in a gentle radiance—before he swung round once more and made off up the street. It happened that, as he stood for that instant, hesitating perhaps whether or no to return and make a final appeal to the girl he worshipped, the light of the street lamp fell full upon his white, haggard face; and Gimblet, with a start, experienced the surprise of his life, as he realised that he and Bert had met before.
Everything was clear to him now, and, with a sigh of something between relief and regret, he abandoned his proposed visit to Julie and went about the ordering of more important business.
. . . . .
An hour later, Albert Tremmels, clerk to Messrs. Ennidge and Pring, house agents, was arrested in his lodgings for the murders of Mrs. Vanderstein and Madame Querterot, and for the attempted murder of Miss Turner.
Bertoffered no resistance to the officers of the law. Indeed, after the first moment, he showed a kind of relief at his arrest, and went with his captors almost gladly.
“I knew you’d get me sooner or later,” he said, although warned that his words would be used against him, “and it’s best to get it over. Julie won’t ever forgive me, let alone have anything to do with me, so what have I got to live for? I can’t go on like this; no one could. Still, mind you, I’m not so much to blame as you think, and it’s my belief any one of you chaps would have done the same as I did, in my place.”
Bert had always been ready to justify himself.
He was willing enough to confess, to the police, to the prison chaplain, to anyone. He showed, indeed, considerable satisfaction, not to say pride, in the interest his story excited, and was not a little annoyed with Gimblet when he found there was practically nothing he could tell the detective of which he was not already aware. Bert did not dilate so much on his love for Julie, the one real thing about him and the innocent incentive of all his crimes.
It is perhaps best not to give the exact words in which he poured forth the history of the dark deeds in which he had been concerned, but to offer to the reader arésuméof his tale in so far as it was corroborated by the evidence.
Albert Tremmel’s father was a West End dairymanwho had the misfortune to marry above him, as the saying is. He had a small shop in Hanover Street and carried on a profitable business, but his wife despised it from the first, and refused to allow their only child to assist her husband when he became old enough to do so. She wished him to be a clerk, and, as she had a way of getting what she wanted, young Bert at the age of eighteen had entered, in that capacity, the office of Messrs. Ennidge and Pring, house and estate agents. He was then, as later, a cadaverous, unpleasant-looking youth, with a surly, combative temper and a strongly marked tendency to look on most people as his natural enemies. This in itself did not bring him friends, and he made matters worse as often as he could by adopting a dictatorial manner of speech and the habit of pointing out to comparative strangers his opinion that they erred in thinking they knew their own business. He would also mention their duty as another thing they were ignorant of. This line of conversation he varied by assuring them that if it were true, as they would have him believe, that they knew both better in any case than he did, it was still more to be regretted that they should mismanage the one and fail to do the other.
Boys of his own age frankly refused to have anything to do with him, and he found his most congenial surroundings at a Socialistic Club, where all the members shared his disapproval of the world in general, and descanted as much as they pleased on the shameful conduct and character of those who were not of their own way of thinking. Here all ranks and parts of the community were equally denounced, and if one could hardly find words strong enough to censure the attitude of the rich who wished to retain control of their own wealth, neither could one sufficiently display one’s anger and disgust at the behaviour of the poor who showed themselves so regardless of the socialisticmovement as to take benefits from the capitalist classes. Fond as these young men were of employing the words “give” and “take,” the meaning generally conveyed by their joint use was peculiarly repugnant to them. Take, in their view, should always come first in any case, and a thing taken lost half its value in their eyes if it came as a gift. They would have abolished both generosity and gratitude from a world that can ill afford the loss of those virtues.
Bert drank in every tenet of this creed, and revelled in the discussions and execrations as much as he delighted in the wishy-washy sentimentalism. He was an unhealthy, discontented, miserable boy, his hand against every one; and his club was the only place where he felt himself more or less at his ease.
There was, however, one spot which he liked better to be in, and that was the household of the Querterots.
He had gone to school with Julie Querterot, for it so happened that Bert’s father was a Lancashire man and a Roman Catholic. It is true that when he died, as he did when Bert was only thirteen, the boy’s mother immediately removed him to another school and saw to it that he imbibed her hatred of Rome; but he did not take any more kindly to her own church, and when she herself died five or six years later he was going pretty much his own way, which was a way devoid of religious belief of any kind. In spite of this, he never lost touch with his little schoolfellow; and, as the Querterots dealt at Tremmels’ shop and the children were always together, the two families became acquainted, and a certain friendship even sprang up between Madame Querterot and Mrs. Tremmels. These ladies drank tea together, and smiled over the devotion of Bert for little Julie. This was in the days when prosperity reigned in both houses.
It was different after Mrs. Tremmels’ death, whenBert discovered that the business, of which he had never been allowed to learn the details, was on the verge of bankruptcy, Mrs. Tremmels having conducted it since her husband’s death with an eye more to her own aggrandisement than to profit. She had opened two large branches and started milk carts drawn by Shetland ponies; and, having no capital, had borrowed money to do it. Custom under her management had fallen off; the branches had had to be closed; the smart ponies sold; and, at the time of her death, she could no longer find the interest on the borrowed money and the mortgagees were at the point of foreclosing.
Bert, who spent half his evenings in advocating the redistribution of wealth, did not at all enter into the spirit of the thing when he found himself quietly set on one side while his own wealth, that is to say, the competency to which he had always believed himself heir, was redistributed without anyone consulting him. He took it very ill indeed, and said things about his dead mother which would have brought him his dismissal from the office if they had come to the ears of either Mr. Ennidge or Mr. Pring. He had been in their employment about a year when she died, and had done fairly well in it, for he was not a bad worker, nor even without intelligence of a kind. Still, he only kept his post by the skin of his teeth, for he had been in the office more than long enough for Mr. Pring to take a violent dislike to him, and if it had not been for the extremely kind heart of Mr. Ennidge, who argued that he could not dismiss the youth to whom Fortune had already dealt so severe a blow, Bert would have been sacked a dozen times a week. He had, however, no idea of this, and considered himself indispensable and miserably underpaid.
He certainly was not paid a great deal, though more than he was worth to Mr. Pring, at all events, andMadame Querterot ceased abruptly to invite him to her house. He continued, however, to visit it from time to time, and a couple more years went by without further event. Then came the sudden and tragic failure of the Querterots. Eugène Querterot shot himself; and in the fallen state of their fortunes the two impoverished women he left behind him were glad of any friend who stood by them. The sudden dropping off of their old acquaintances created a new bond of sympathy between them and the young man, and when they moved to Pimlico and he was the only person who ever went to see them, he received a much warmer welcome, at all events from the mother, than he had lately grown to expect.
Gradually he went more and more often, until he formed the habit of dropping in at least every other evening. He had always been fond of Julie, and perhaps of no one else in the world, since he had shown little affection for his parents; now, as he saw her with increasing frequency, his feelings for her became more intense, till every day he seemed to see in her new and more entrancing perfections, and even his enthusiasms for Socialism faded under the continual protest of her aversion to it. He admitted to himself with a kind of thrill of self-defiance that Julie was so clever, so sensible, so wonderfully reasonable and clear-sighted, that her opinion on any subject could not be despised, and it became more and more plain to him that if she thought badly of Socialism that doctrine would find difficulty in retaining his complete loyalty. To be short, by the time she reached her eighteenth birthday Bert was head over ears in love with the girl, and had scarcely a thought in which she did not predominate. Madame Querterot watched it all from beneath her heavy eyelids. She said nothing, but the idea that here was one who in time might be useful to hercrept into her brain and took deep root there as the weeks went by.
Julie was pious and devout. It was about this time that she began to speak about entering a religious sisterhood, but the storm of reproach and upbraiding that this desire provoked in her mother caused her to relinquish the idea for the time being, and, more particularly, not to talk of it any more. The only visible effect of the suggestion was that Madame Querterot welcomed Bert more effusively than usual, and now often invited him to stay to supper.
It may be judged how readily he accepted, and these evenings were certainly the happiest hours in his life. He used to come early and help Julie to lay the table, and sometimes even to prepare the meal; and if her sleeve chanced to brush against his shoulder as she stooped over the fire or reached up to a shelf he would be reduced to a state of speechless ecstasy, which Madame Querterot found a pleasant change from the usual aggressive torrent of his talk.
In spite of her quiet and demure ways, Julie had a girlish fondness for dress and finery, and the offerings that from time to time Bert laid at her feet, of gloves and trinkets, were a great source of innocent pleasure to her. There was a time when he sallied forth from his lodgings armed with the savings of months, and the intention of buying a ring, which he should present to her accompanied by a speech he prepared for the occasion, in which the secret of his heart was to be imparted, together with the request that the ring should be a token of their engagement. But his courage failed him at the jeweller’s counter; he felt suddenly a conviction, amounting to a certainty, that Julie would refuse; and, rather than risk knowing the worst, he abandoned his project and spent his hoardings on a brooch which he himself did not really admire, andwhich Julie, when she received it, thought hideous. The only person who was pleased was the jeweller, who had had the thing in his shop two years and simply loathed the sight of it.
It was soon after this that the great plan, of which Madame Querterot had had the elements incubating in her mind for a long while, was hatched, and presented itself to her in a complete and material form. She knew from the first that she could not carry it out alone; and, casting over in her thoughts for the help she required, saw in Bert a tool made ready to her hand. When she broached her idea to him she had her design prepared, down to every detail.
It was on the night when he had treated the two women to the theatre, as has been related in an early page of this narrative. Madame Querterot began by telling the young man that she would never allow her daughter to marry one so poor as himself, and added quickly that she knew of a way by which he could attain both money and the assistance of her influence exerted on his behalf with Julie. Having excited his curiosity and his hopes she bound him to secrecy and disclosed her purpose to him.
“It is yourself who gave me the good idea,” she assured him. “It is your socialistic teaching, is it not, to take from the rich? they have more than is reasonable, those others!”
They were walking up and down before the little house in Pimlico where the Querterots lived in these days of poverty; Julie had left them and gone to bed; the glimmer of a candle came from behind a blind in the room upstairs.
“Of course they have,” Bert grunted. “But it’s no use your thinking you can take their money from them without further legislation. What price the police?”
“Ah, the police,” sighed Madame Querterot, “if only they would not meddle in what is not their affair! But, look you, there are cases which are exceptional. There are cases which ought to receive immediate attention, which cry out for treatment of the most drastic. If the law is slow—and I grant you that the law has great need of alteration—when a matter is exceptionally urgent, I say, the good citizen must take it in his own hands to see justice done. And if while we render a service to humanity we do so with profit to ourselves, it is clear that the ends of justice are doubly served.”
Bert could not help agreeing with these excellent precepts. Indeed, Madame Querterot’s air of supernatural wisdom would have impressed the most sceptical.
“It is not enough to talk, one must demonstrate one’s faith in a theory. By the means I shall propose you can prove how well Socialism will work in practice; for here will the poor, as represented by us, be made richer, and yet the rich person who will have changed our fortunes need scarcely feel any deprivation. You remember my talking to you at supper-time about a lady, a very wealthy lady, one of my clientele?”
“Yes,” said Bert. “A Jewess, wasn’t it?”
“It is true. A Jewess! And have not the Jews for centuries ground the bones of the poor? Who more fitted to be the first to contribute some of their ill-gotten gains in return? Should they not be obliged to restore some of that money which they never earned?”
“I daresay,” assented Bert; “but I wish you’d hurry up and let’s see what you’re getting at, that’s all.”
“Eh bien! This woman, this Jewess, is enormously rich, as I tell you. And what does she do with her money? My friend, she covers herself with diamonds!It is those diamonds which I propose to myself to deprive her of.”
“What, steal them?” Bert’s tone was troubled, although in his heart he had known from the first whither her talk drifted.
“Steal! What a word.” Impossible to convey the contempt of Madame Querterot’s tone. “Is it right then, that she should be permitted to have so much when others starve? Is it right that she should flaunt her jewels in the face of the hungry poor?”
Madame Querterot, who had a good memory, went on to quote phrase after phrase she had at various times heard fall from Bert’s own lips. She poured his favourite catchwords into his ears, and strengthened them with arguments of her own. She painted the robbery she designed in such glowing colours that you would have thought, to hear her, that it was a sacrifice she was going to make for the good of humanity. She passed imperceptibly to picturing the delight of Julie when she should be presented with one of the less easily identified jewels, to the readiness with which, at the advice and with the glad consent of her mother, she would accept the heart and hand of the prosperous and enriched Albert, to the happiness of the young couple ensconced in their charming house, surrounded by motors, gramophones, champagne; in fine, all the luxuries due to a girl of Julie’s perfections. Madame Querterot did not stop till she came to her own prospective joys, her grandchildren climbing on her knee. It was enough for the blushing and intoxicated Bert. He surrendered, agreed to all she proposed, put himself entirely under her directions, and these his prospective mother-in-law willingly proceeded to give him.
She explained to him first at some length the character of Mrs. Vanderstein, and the means by which she hoped to play upon her weakness.
“There is,” said she, “a young Prince—the Prince Felipe of Targona—now in London and staying at Fianti’s Hotel in Grosvenor Street, which is situated just opposite to the house of this Jewess. It so happened to-day, as I was in the midst of my massaging, that she jumped up and ran to the window to see this young man pass, and I also looked out. Now by some chance the Prince, as he drove by, happened to lift his head and look straight into Mrs. Vanderstein’s face. It was a most lucky occurrence, and I could not have hoped for anything so providential to arrive. One would say, indeed, that it is an omen for me, a mandate to carry out my plan. Mrs. Vanderstein was delighted at this encounter of the eyes, and did not disguise her pleasure. Well, see how simple is now my part. I have in the shop some tortoise-shell combs, purchased at a ridiculous price by that poor Eugène when we first started in business here in London. They are very beautiful, of the finest workmanship, exquisitely and intricately carved, but of a pattern antiquated anddémodé. We have never been able to sell them.
“Now see, I shall take those combs, and present myself at Fianti’s with a petition that I may see the Princess of Targona, mother of Prince Felipe. For her I have a story that my husband was of Targona, and that the combs also come from that country. I shall offer them to Her Highness as a present from a humble and expatriated subject, and say that my late husband refused to part with them out of patriotism, and, when everything else he possessed had to be sold, clung always to the only objects he had left to remind him of his beloved Targona. It is quite probable that the Princess will be affected by this touching history. She may even make me a present; but that is by the way. What is really of importance is that I should be left alone in one of the apartments occupied by theRoyal party for a few minutes. If I can manage that—and I think you may have confidence that I will do so—I shall obtain some pieces of the Prince’s notepaper on which his royal device or monogram is certainly engraved; at all events it will bear some distinguishing mark, and it will go hard if a few sheets of it do not find their way into my bag.
“The next step will be easy. I shall issue from the hotel at a moment when I have ascertained, by peeping from a window, that Mrs. Vanderstein is on her balcony, where at a certain hour she very often goes to water some flowers she has there. She will see me pass; and, as she is very curious about all that goes on at Fianti’s, she will remark on the incident. I shall tell her that I have been called by the Prince of Targona, who has fallen madly in love with her at first sight. You may think she will not believe this, but trust me to make it plausible; and she will be readier to credit such an idea than you imagine, for in the first place all beautiful women are ready to believe that their attractions are irresistible—and she is beautiful, this Jewess, not unlike what I was myself when I was younger—and in the second place, Mrs. Vanderstein is of a nature romantic to the point of ridicule, and is always, I am convinced, fabricating for herself stories of heroes and princes, with herself for the heroine of these fables.
“How do I know, you ask me? I tell you I know. I am a judge of character; I have an aptitude for that. Eh bien! I shall convince the Jewess that she is adored by a reigning Prince, with frenzy, with devotion, with passion; that he thinks of nothing but her; that he would put his hand in the fire for her sake, that he is ready to abdicate his throne, to give up the government of his country. In short, that he wishes to marry her, and that if she will not listen to hisaddresses he has nothing further to live for in this world. What is perhaps the weak point in my tale is the idea that Prince Felipe should have chosen to make a confidante of myself, but, believe me, my dear Bert, I shall make even that appear not unnatural, and, as a matter of fact, stranger things are done every day. All this will take time, I do not know how long—days, perhaps weeks. I must find out how long the Prince stays in London,” added Madame Querterot, more to herself than to her companion.
It was the one thing she had forgotten.
“I shall write her letters on the Royal notepaper, and as she will send the answers by my hand, I shall know their contents and be able to reply to them without arousing any suspicions on her part. In his impassioned epistles the Prince will beg for an interview; he will lament the obstacles that prevent his seeing her either at the hotel or in her own residence, and he will finally, I am sure, persuade her to meet him for the purpose of making his acquaintance, in a house which he will indicate.
“She will consent to all he proposes, or I am much mistaken. It is at this point, my dear Bert, that your assistance becomes so indispensable. You are a house agent’s clerk. I shall require a house; and it is you who must take it for me, in an assumed name, of course, and without the knowledge of your employers.”
“I don’t see how that can ever be done,” Bert objected.
They were still pacing slowly up and down the dingy street. A policeman at the corner of the road looked at them once or twice, decided they were harmless, and ceased his attentions. The light in Julie’s bedroom was long since extinguished.
Madame Querterot cleared her throat and began again.
“There will be a gentleman from India, let us say,” she resumed, “who will call at the office at an hour when the two partners are out. No one will regret this more than yourself, but in their absence you will do your best to attend to the requirements of the gentleman from India. He will want a house, and he will want it immediately. He will desire to take it by the week and he will be ready to pay a large rent. He is somewhat eccentric, this gentleman, and dislikes meeting strangers. He will tell you to see about getting a charwoman to make the house ready for him, and he will settle then and there on the terms, on the day he is to take possession, and upon every necessary detail. Then, having signed the agreement, he will pay you the first week’s rent in advance—for which I will provide the money—and he will walk out of the office. You will tell Mr. Ennidge and Mr. Pring, when they return, about the eccentric gentleman from India, and they will not be suspicious about him since there will be the money for the rent.”
“Are you going to act being this gentleman you’re talking about?” asked Bert.
“No,” replied Madame Querterot. “He will not exist at all; it is not necessary that he should ever appear. But it may be very useful that he should be thought to exist.”
“Then who is to sign the lease?”
“You will do that,” said the Frenchwoman, “you must begin at once to practise writing with your left hand. Choose a short name—we will call him Mr. West—and write it over and over again many times on a sheet of foolscap, which you will always burn when you have covered it. Never forget to burn it, Bert. You will find it quite easy in a few days, and it will not in the least resemble your own hand.”
“I don’t half like it,” Bert commented.
“I promise you it will be all that is most simple. The Indian gentleman will ask you personally to meet him at the house on the day he takes possession, and he will tell you to be sure to come yourself, as he dislikes strangers and prefers not to do business with more than one person. So you will get the house ready for him and hand him the key and leave him in it. That is all the trouble there will be about the house. Not much to take, for the sake of gaining a fortune and a charming wife, you must admit? The Vanderstein will come to the house to meet Prince Felipe. She will find us there, masked and unknown to her. We shall relieve her of her jewels, which I shall have arranged that she will wear; Prince Felipe is so fond of jewellery, it is a perfect passion with him to see women so adorned! So I shall tell her, and she will not fail to bedeck herself with them. When all is done she may return home; disappointed, I fear; but life is full of disillusions, and the blame will rest on the eccentric Mr. West from India.”
It was all very plausible. Bert could pick no holes in the plan. He tried to offer one or two objections, but was quickly overruled, and finally said good night and went home to bed committed to aid and abet Madame Querterot in her purpose to the best of his power.
All went well. Madame Querterot succeeded even beyond her expectations. The Vanderstein, as she called her, was all a flutter of excitement and delight, and Madame Querterot related to Bert at great length and with huge enjoyment the scene in which she had embarked upon the hoax, and the easy gullibility of “la Juive.”
“‘Figure to yourself,’ I said to her, ‘that this morning I receive a summons to Fianti’s from a lady in waiting on the Princess of Targona! What anhonour! You can imagine my excitement! This lady used formerly to stay much at her country’s legation here, in London, and she was in the habit of making herselfcoifféeby that poor Eugène. So it appears that yesterday she sent for him; but, when they told her that the poor dear was no longer on this earth, she had the amiability to seek me out, having heard of all our cruel misfortune, and asked that I should present myself in his place. To-day, therefore, I attended at the hotel, and had the pleasure of making thecoiffureof a charming lady. Mais elle est charmante, cette dame-là! But—and here follows the affair that is of interest to you, madame—as I left the apartment of the lady in waiting and was about to descend the staircase, a voice called me back, and, looking round, what was my surprise to perceive no less a person than His Highness, Prince Felipe, who appeared to be beckoning to me to join him in a dark part of the passage.’
“Mrs. Vanderstein interrupted me with sparkling eyes. ‘Do tell me,’ she cried, ‘the words that His Highness spoke to you! Sit down, Madame Justine, and tell me every single thing you can remember about it.’ I drew a chair close to the sofa where Mrs. Vanderstein was seated, and I continued my narrative in a confidential undertone. ‘I could not imagine what it was that Prince Felipe had to say to me, but I thought for a moment that possibly his mother required my services, and I was enchanted at the idea that perhaps I was this day to dress the hair of a Royal personage. But as soon as I drew near, the Prince began to ask me questions of which at first I could not understand the purport. Soon, however, I comprehended. “You live in this street?” he asked. “No, monsieur,” I replied; “I live far from here.” “But I saw you,” he cried, “I am convinced that it was you I saw!”“When did Your Highness see me?” I inquired. I was indeed flattered that he should condescend to recognise me. “I saw you yesterday. You were looking out of the window of a house opposite this hotel,” said he positively. “Ah yes, monsieur, it is true. I was in the house of Mrs. Vanderstein, one of my clients, and we had the good fortune to see you drive past.”
“‘I began now to see why I was receiving the honour of this interview. “Mrs. Vanderstein!” he exclaimed. “Is that then her name? But,” he added, “there were two ladies. Which was Mrs. Vanderstein?” “The elder of the two, monsieur, the one whose hair is dark.” “It is she,” he said. “Ah, how beautiful she is! In all my life I have never seen a face that so haunts my memory. It is the face I have dreamed of all these years. But stay,” cried he in a different tone and with a look of despair. “You call her Mrs. Vanderstein! Am I to understand then that she is married? No matter, her husband must perish! One of my gentlemen may engage him in a duel. These things can arrange themselves.” Such were his words. Ah, madame! one sees that His Highness is not used to opposition.’
“The Vanderstein was transformed. Her eyes flashed with unaccustomed fires. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips parted, her breath came a little quickly. I was astonished at the change. ‘She looks ten years younger,’ I said to myself. ‘Is it the massage that has had an effect after all?’ Aloud I continued my tale. ‘I explained to the Prince that Mr. Vanderstein had saved him the trouble of arranging a duel. “Then,” cried he, “there is no obstacle! Except,” he added in a different and depressed tone, “the wishes of my mother, and of the government of Targona. They are very decided that I must marry for reasons of state, but I have told them again and again that Iwill not do it. I will abdicate if they like, but I will never marry except in accordance with the dictates of my heart. And my heart has never before been touched; so that I am sure now that there is but one woman in the world for me. But how am I to meet her? If anyone suspects my feelings, unimaginable difficulties will be thrown in the way. And how can I ever win the affections of the beautiful and adorable Mrs. Vanderstein, if I cannot even imagine a means by which I may make her acquaintance? One thing, however, is sure. Without her I cannot live.”
“‘Ah, madame,’ I said, ‘if you could have seen the poor gentleman your heart would have ached for him. On his face so sad an expression! He had an air so miserable and disconsolate. One can see that he has a tender nature! In his despair he strode up and down the corridor, gesticulating with his hands, and rumpling his hair—which is fine like silk—by tearing at it with his fingers! Again and again he would clap his hand to his forehead, or smite himself upon the breast, and, if he abstained from bursting into actual tears, you may be sure it was because the rigorous code, which forbids any public display of feeling in persons of Royal blood, would not allow him to show his emotion even in the presence of so insignificant a person as myself. Ah, the poor young man. I, madame, I, whom he noticed as he would observe your looking-glass or your boot-lace, felt myself ready to take him in my arms and to embrace and comfort him like a mother.’
“I paused for breath, and Mrs. Vanderstein cried: ‘Oh, Madame Justine, is it really possible that he should feel like that after only seeing me once, and that at a distance?’ ‘Love at first sight,’ I replied, ‘is not a thing of which one has never heard; and assuredly he is in love, this poor Prince Felipe, or I do not know what love is. Several times again hestopped in front of me, and cried out: “How, how am I to arouse her interest, gain her respect, above all how can I win her heart, when I have no chance of making myself known to her? I cannot hope that she will be attracted by my personal appearance. With one of her mental and spiritual superiority—as I can see at a glance—my rank and position will scarcely avail; it is, then, only by learning the depth and sincerity of my passion, only by realising the fond and tender quality of my love for her, that she may in time be prevailed on to look not altogether unfavourably upon my suit.” And much more he said of the same kind. As for me, madame, I assured him I would, in a tactful way, convey to you some hints as to the state of his feelings. He insisted that they should be no more than hints, fearing that you would be offended at his making of me a messenger; so if I have, in my sympathy, overstepped the bounds of discretion, you must judge the fault entirely my own and not attribute it to any lack of manners on the part of the Prince. His intentions are of the most perfect correctness.
“‘He questioned me closely as to your way of life, your opinions and habits. “Ah,” he cried, “I see we are made for one another, she and I. You say that she likes to surround herself with pictures, flowers, jewels, and the luxurious things of life. She is fond of music and of the arts. Now remark this! I am a collector of paintings andobjets d’art. I, too, adore music and roses. I, also, have a passion for precious stones and personal adornment. Wherein do we differ?Hein!It is plain that we have the same tastes, that I shall besympathiqueto her. Oh, we must meet! Somehow, somewhere I will arrange, if she consents, that we should meet. Not here. Impossible! Not at her house. I should feel my mother’s eye on me.I could not escape observation if I merely crossed the road. No, neither here nor there, but in some other place of which I will consider. In the meanwhile do you, with the utmost delicacy, sound her feelings as regards myself, and prepare her for a further expression of my own.” I think, madame, that that is all that passed between us, but I am to return to Fianti’s to-morrow and report to him whether you appeared displeased.’ It seemed that Mrs. Vanderstein was not displeased. She spoke very little more, but I could see, by the happy, excited air she wore under her assumed calm, that my words were having all the effect I could wish.”
All this Madame Querterot retailed with many details to the interested and amazed Bert, and each succeeding day she had new accounts of her cleverness and success to relate. She wrote impassioned, but eminently “correct” letters on the royal notepaper she had filched in accordance with her plan, and carried them to Mrs. Vanderstein with a hidden, jeering smile at that lady’s glad and confiding acceptance of their authenticity.
The night of the gala performance at the opera was fixed on for the deed, and at their every meeting Madame Querterot repeated to Bert her instructions as to the part played by the gentleman from India. She elaborated and filled in her first sketch of his character and behaviour, till at last the young man almost believed in the real existence of Mr. West, and certainly knew far more about him than about most of the people with whom he was actually in daily contact, for, as a rule, he was unobservant to the last degree. She saw also to his learning to write with his left hand, and he was able in a couple of days to do this to her satisfaction. By now Bert was as keen about the project as she could have wished. Anevening spent at his club had strengthened and confirmed his conviction that no one woman had a right to the exclusive enjoyment of so much wealth; and he was now well assured that he would deserve nothing but commendation for trying to readjust the scales. There were moments when, for the fraction of an otherwise optimistical second, he beheld a vision of Julie as she would look at him if she ever heard of what was contemplated; and it was a vision that caused in him a catching of the breath. But the idea for the most part only hovered in the background of his thoughts, so that, while he was always conscious of its neighbourhood, so to speak, he was able with an effort to turn away his mental eyes, and to avoid looking it in the face; and it was then that he would seem to Madame Querterot most eager, most impatient for the night to arrive.
The house in Scholefield Avenue was taken, and Messrs. Ennidge and Pring showed themselves only mildly interested in the mythical Mr. West, and that chiefly on account of his readiness to pay a high rent. Then a difficulty arose; and it was Bert, to his satisfaction and pride, who suggested a way out of it.
Madame Querterot met him one evening with an expression of dismay she made no attempt to conceal.
“There is after all something I have forgotten,” she cried. “Nom d’un nom!that I can have been so stupid, so idiot! Listen, it is this. The Jewess must drive from the opera to Scholefield Avenue. But in what? It is impossible that she should go in her own automobile, and if she takes a taxi we are equally betrayed.Aïe, aïe!what to do?”
Itwas then that Bert had his brilliant idea.
To explain it, reference must be made again to his family history. His father’s sister had married a grocer at Richmond, named Stodder, she having been cook in a family at Hampton Court previous to this event.
The pair had five children, and Bert, when a child, was often taken down to visit his relations; in the hot weather holidays the Stodders had him to stay with them for most of the summer. The children hated him, for he was a spoilt, ill-tempered little boy from the start, but they had to put up with him, and he grew up on familiar if rather quarrelsome terms with the whole family.
The eldest boy, Ned, after he left school, was employed in driving his father’s cart about the neighbourhood every day, in order to deliver orders received and to collect fresh ones. It was Bert’s favourite occupation to sit in the back of the van, his legs dangling, or kicking against the backboard, while he watched the white roads slip under him and the grocer’s dog trotting with extended tongue beneath his drumming heels. Ned was quite aware of the pleasure his cousin took in this not very arduous form of exercise, and he soon devised a way of turning it to his own profit. He pointed out to Bert that he could not expect anyone to put up with his company unless he did something to make it worth their while, and that he for one wouldnot suffer Bert’s company in the van unless he justified his presence by cleaning it when they came home, and by helping to look after the harness and the horse. Bert disliked work, but he hated to be cut off from his drives, and, as Ned was quite firm besides being older and stronger than he was, he told himself that needs must—and Ned that he was the devil—and took up the duties of stable boy.
Under his critical and unsparing master and to the accompaniment of more than a few cuffs and kicks when he tried to shirk his work, Bert became more proficient in the care of the grocer’s steed than any less well-adjusted mixture of pain and pleasure would have been likely to result in.
As a further reward, too, the stern Ned so far relented as to allow him occasionally to take the reins. The combination of discipline and fresh air did the Tremmels’ boy a world of good, and that was a happy summer for him. Unfortunately, when he returned to Hanover Street his mother soon undid the good effects of Ned’s cuffings; and the following summer when he found himself again under his uncle’s hospitable roof Ned had left it to enter private service in the stables, and his next cousin had come out of school and succeeded to the job of driving the van. Geoffrey was of a less good-humoured, easy-going disposition than his brother Ned, and Bert was at this age becoming more and more objectionable; it was seldom that Geoffrey could be induced to let him go with him on his rounds, but he followed his brother’s example in forcing his cousin to assist him with the horse and cart when he returned with them. This only enraged and embittered Bert, and of the good done the year before the last remnant was now utterly destroyed.
In the meantime, as the years went on, Ned grew up a credit to his family, and a good and favoured servant.So rapid was his progress, and so astounding—as the Tremmels said—his luck, that by the time he was three-and-twenty he had risen to the situation of coachman to an old lady named Mrs. Wilkinson, the aunt of his former master. This lady kept only one horse and a brougham, and with them drove out every afternoon, in winter from three to five, in summer from four to six. It was impossible to imagine an easier or more comfortable place, and Bert often envied his cousin the soft thing he had stepped into.
Ned was the only one of his relations whom he ever went near nowadays, but he used often to go round to his stable during the luncheon hour and explain to the young coachman how little he deserved his good fortune.
It was not till, for the first time, he beheld Madame Querterot at a loss, not till he heard what in their great plan she had forgotten to provide for, that he suddenly realised that Ned’s good fortune was possibly his own as well.
“See here,” he said to the agitated Frenchwoman, “I can manage that part.” And he told her of his cousin the coachman.
“Mrs. Wilkinson, the lady he works for, has by the rarest luck a house in the same street as the one I have taken. She lives at No. 1 Scholefield Avenue, only a few doors away from No. 13. More than that, it happens that she has a large garden at the back of the house, and the stable is situated at the end of it, quite away from any other buildings. There’s luck for you!”
“How is that?” cried Madame Querterot, “explain yourself quick.” She was very nervous and excited, and for the only time during the whole business her calm confidence deserted her. It was so near the hour! She had already smoothed away so many difficulties, done the impossible; and if all her hopes were to beshattered now, and by so small an obstacle, it would be, she told herself, thecomble.
“Why, this way,” Bert reassured her. “Ned is always wanting to go home to Richmond, because the young lady he’s keeping company with lives down there, though he makes out to me that it’s his family he wants to see. As if anyone wanted to see their family! But his old lady drives out till six every day, and by the time Ned has cleaned up and rubbed down the horse, and fed him, and washed the brougham and the rest of it, it’s too late to get a decent train down to Richmond, for it’s a tidy way from Scholefield Avenue to Gloucester Road, where the trains connect.
“Now suppose I go to Ned, and tell him I know he wants an evening off, and that if he likes I don’t mind doing his job for once, so as he can have it. I’ll offer to be about on Monday, when he comes in from taking old Mrs. Wilkinson out for her drive, and to look after the horse and to put it to bye-bye. I’ve often done it for him when I was a lad, so he knows I can manage, though I don’t say he won’t be a bit surprised at my offering, so to speak. I think perhaps I’d best say I’ll do it for a consideration; he’ll be good for a bob where his young lady’s concerned, I’ll bet. What’s more, I’ll say I’ll feed the horse in the morning, so he won’t have to catch the last train back, but can stay down home for the night. After I’ve seen him off the premises I’ll get inside his livery—he’s a bigger man than me, though not so long in the leg—and I’ll put the horse in again and drive down to Covent Garden and fetch the lady up. We can say the Prince is sending his own carriage for her.”
Madame Querterot nearly wept on Bert’s neck in her joy and emotion.
“You will save us, my dear friend!” she exclaimed,pressing his hand, a demonstration that he resented by snatching it savagely away. “What a mind, what a genius, to think of so splendid, so heaven-given a device! Let it be as you say. I am well assured now that all will go well.”
These last days were a busy time for Madame Querterot, for there were certain personal details, essential to the success of her plan, to be attended to: there were bills to collect, sales to arrange, and purchases to be made. At last all was done, everything ready, and she stood in the hall of No. 13 Scholefield Avenue awaiting, with only the least flicker of the nerves, the sound of wheels before the door.
Earlyas it was in the adventure, Bert was already realising the difficulties of the part he had to play. He had induced the gratified—though suspicious and thankless—Ned to accept his services in the matter of the horse; and, having seen him depart with a small brown paper parcel—which furnished the outward evidence of his intention to stay the night with his people—had harnessed the animal again in good time, arrayed himself in the livery belonging to Ned, and adorned his chin with the false beard provided by Madame Querterot, so that no time should be wasted on his return. “I do look a guy,” he said to himself, as he contemplated his reflection in the strip of looking-glass in the harness-room.
Nothing remained but to drive down to Covent Garden, and take his place on the rank of waiting vehicles. This, he was surprised to find, was not so easy as he had expected. He discovered that attempting to control Mrs. Wilkinson’s dun horse, which had a willing spirit and a hard mouth, was a very different affair from driving the old and sluggish beast that used to meander between the shafts of his uncle’s van. Their progress was erratic in the extreme, and he several times narrowly avoided an accident. The Providence which looks after bad drivers did not fail him, however, and at length he found himself, a good deal to his surprise—for at one period of the journey hope had altogether deserted him—forming one ofthe long string of motors and carriages that had already drawn into line in the vicinity of the opera house.
Now began a time during which the fear that the expected summons would never reach him alternated with something very like hope that it would not. As he sat on the box, while minute after minute passed, and still no voice cried for Mr. Targon’s carriage, he was beset with ever growing misgivings as to the appearance he presented, and felt that his ill-fitting livery and the false beard, which the scarf he had wrapped round his neck and chin only partially concealed, must be riveting upon him the eyes of every beholder; so that not a look was cast in his direction but he read in it distrust and suspicion.
Even the most seemingly interminable suspense comes to an end at last, and he had not endured these torments more than a short half-hour before the words for which he had been waiting fell upon his ear, and making his way out of the line he succeeded in guiding the dun horse beneath the portico of the theatre.
The safe accomplishment of this manœuvre, however, fully occupied his every faculty, and it was only when the carriage had come to a standstill before the doors that he had time to glance in the direction of the lady he was to carry off. With a shock of surprise and dismay he saw that not one but two elegantly attired women were about to enter the carriage.
He had not the courage for more than a feeble remonstrance; indeed, it needed all the courage he could muster to lift up his voice at all in the presence of the waiting attendants, and in the brilliant glare of the lamps. After he had driven some way in increasing perplexity and irresolution, he stopped, and tried again to induce Barbara to get out; but theattention the ensuing discussion aroused from the passers-by and the sight of an approaching policeman were too much for his nerves, and he decided hastily to drive on and allow Madame Querterot to deal with this unexpected complication. A glimpse of her face when they arrived in Scholefield Avenue, and she saw what had happened, did not add to his peace of mind. He drove round to Mrs. Wilkinson’s stables, extinguished the carriage lamps, and unharnessed the dun horse by the light of his pocket electric torch as quietly and quickly as he might, his heart sinking at the prospect of what she would say to him when he returned. It was lucky that the stable gate opened on to such a lonely street as the one which ran at the back of the gardens of the houses in Scholefield Avenue.
A blank wall faced it across the road, studded at intervals with the doors to the gardens at the back of the houses in Westford Avenue, which lay beyond. There was another stable some hundred yards further down; but, unless some one were awake and about in that direction, Bert knew that there was little chance of his presence and movements being discovered. Still he could not feel secure for a moment, and it was not till he had put everything in some kind of order and shut the door of the loose box behind him that he breathed again. He hurried round to No. 13, seeing the fancied forms of lurking policemen behind every tree and in every shadow, and it was with a hand already shaking with agitation that he gave the three taps on the door, with which it had been agreed that he should signal his return to Madame Querterot.
She greeted him, as he had feared she would, with a storm of whispered reproaches. What had he been thinking of to bring that girl to the house? Was he mad? As she looked at him, however, in the light of the gas jet which burned at the foot of the stairs,she saw plainly enough that he was in a state of nervousness which she had not expected; and that, if he was to be of any use to her in the crisis that was upon them, she had better employ herself in soothing rather than adding to his distress of mind.
“Well, well,” she interrupted her own words, “it is perhaps of no such great consequence. A little more trouble, possibly, for you; but of that we will talk later. For the moment we must get to business. These summer nights are short and we have much to do before morning. Go into the dining-room, while I prevail upon Miss Turner to leave her friend. I will put her in the library, where she will be out of the way for the present.”
After a few minutes, during which Bert waited, breathless, in the darkness of the dining-room, she was back again, and announced in a whisper that all was well. Barbara had been shown into the back room; and upstairs Mrs. Vanderstein, alone and expectant, awaited the coming of the Prince.
“She has got on all her jewels,” sniggered the Frenchwoman, drawing on her gloves. “And she little thinks that there are here two people who appreciate them as her Prince never could. Ah! Bah! Are there imbeciles in the world? Now then, my friend, you know what you have to do. We rush into the room, you seize this fair creature and hold her fast, while I administer a little whiff of chloroform that shall keep her quiet and prevent any outcry, so that we can remove from her the gems at our ease. See, I have the bottle ready. Allons donc; à la besogne!”
They went softly and quickly up the stairs. Now that the moment for action had arrived, Bert’s confidence was in some measure restored. The sight of the diamonds glittering in the light of the broughamlamp, when Mrs. Vanderstein had stood upbraiding him for his bad driving, had sharpened his appetite for them, and the prospect of fingering the shining things was a pleasant one. Inside the four walls of the house, with the door bolted between them and the interfering outside world, it seemed again safe and desirable enough to take her jewels from this pampered member of the idle rich, and afterwards to lead her blindfolded to some sequestered place, as they had planned, and there release her to find her own way home. Even if she knew where the house was to which she had been decoyed, it would be empty and discreetly silent by the time she could bring to it the avenging hosts of the police. He himself was so well disguised that she never could recognise him again; besides, she would only see him for one moment. True, Madame Querterot was well known to her, but Madame Querterot had her own plans for avoiding any unpleasant consequences of their deed; so she had informed him, and knowing her as he did, he never doubted her intention and capacity of taking care of herself. A medley of these thoughts was in his mind as they mounted the stairs, and paused for an instant at the drawing-room door. No sound came from behind it, and with an encouraging whisper to her companion Madame Querterot turned the handle and went in.
From the end of the room Mrs. Vanderstein rose to greet them, with a radiant, blushing countenance. Always a beautiful woman, she had never been more lovely than at this moment. The smile faded from her lips as she realised that here was not the lover she looked to see; but before she had time to speak Bert was beside her, clutching her round the waist and dragging her back towards the sofa, while over the mouth she opened with a remonstrating cry were clapped the plump hands of Madame Querterot,holding between them something that choked her with its sickly, overwhelming odour.
“See,” said Madame Querterot, after a short interval, “see, she sleeps!” But still she continued to hold the mouth of the bottle over Mrs. Vanderstein’s mouth and nose.
It was at this moment that the door was flung open, and Barbara rushed into the room.
Bert sprang to meet her, fully alive to the undesirability of her presence. It hardly needed Madame Querterot’s cry of “Take her away,” to make him grasp her by the arms, and half push, half carry her out on to the landing and down the narrow stairs to the library, where he left her after a minute or two safely locked in. He listened for a little while outside the door, for he fancied the girl might raise the alarm or do some unimagined, desperate thing which should imperil their safety. She had already threatened to set fire to the house, and he racked his brains to guess what might be her next move. He was in no hurry to return to the drawing-room, moreover, for his heart was beating unpleasantly fast, and the sight of the helpless lady they had so violently treated, sinking quiet and motionless on to the sofa, had filled him with vague discomfort.
After all—the thought would not be kept away any longer—what would Julie think of all this? Could she ever be brought to care for a robber? Yes, that was what he was—a robber. His fortifying socialistic claptrap refused, somehow, to come to his aid in this hour of need. What would Julie say? Already misgivings undermined his unstable resolves. He sat down half-way up the stairs and buried his face in his hands.
It was ten minutes before he could make up his mind to go back to the drawing-room.
Madame Querterot looked up quickly as he entered; she was on her knees beside the unconscious form of Mrs. Vanderstein, engaged in unfastening the clasp of a bracelet. A bright silk-covered cushion lay on the floor beside her.
“Where have you been?” she said. “Come and help me to get these things off.”
Bert went over and stood opposite her. As his eyes rested on the figure that lay so still upon the sofa, a horrible doubt leapt into his mind. How white, how dreadful Mrs. Vanderstein looked! How quiet, how motionless she was. Could she indeed be sleeping? There was no movement to show that she breathed.
Bert looked at Madame Querterot.
“Madame Querterot!” was all he could find to say. But there was a world of accusation in his hoarse tones, and the Frenchwoman, looking up in reply to his words, was unable to stand the fixed stare with which he glared into her face, as if expecting to read the terrible truth upon it. Poor innocent, to look for the truth upon that face!
Still, for once, she could not meet his eyes, and her glance shifted furtively to one side.
He knew now; and in the horror and rage which fell upon him he would have struck her, if the sofa on which Mrs. Vanderstein was stretched had not been between them.
With dropping jaw and eyes starting from his head he thrust his face forward towards her.
“You have killed her!” he whispered.
Madame Querterot laughed a little nervously “It was an accident. I gave her a little more chloroform than I had the intention.”
“That is a lie. You meant to kill her all along. That cushion! You have suffocated her! I see it now. Oh! I see it in your face; murderess!”
“Bert, don’t be a fool!”
“Well, we’ll see who’s a fool,” said he. “I am going for the police!”
“My good Bert, you are, as I say, a fool,” said Madame Querterot, resuming with an effort her usual assurance. “For what will you fetch the police? What will you tell them, eh? That you brought this woman here in some one else’s carriage, which you stole for the purpose; and that I killed her, I suppose? A likely story! When you are gone I shall scream and run to Miss Turner, who knows me well; and her I shall tell that you have done this thing, and that now you would murder me, and her also. Do you think the police would believe that I have done it? Why, I am not stronger than Mrs. Vanderstein; it is impossible that I could have done it alone, and they will see that easily. But it is very possible that you could have done it, and believe me, Bert, if you are not sensible and do all that I tell you, it is you, and you alone, who will dangle in the air as a sequel to this accident.”
At this forecast, which he saw too plainly had a smack of probability about it, Bert’s resolution, never a dependable feature in his composition, wavered and failed him. He flung himself down in a corner of the room, bewailing his fate and cursing his companion with impartial heartiness.
Madame Querterot waited till he had exhausted his powers of recrimination, and busied herself in transferring the jewels from the body of Mrs. Vanderstein to the bag she had provided for the purpose.
Then she had her turn.
“What,” she cried, “did you actually suppose I was sufficiently imbecile to contemplate allowing this woman to live, when her first act would have been to have me arrested? How do you suppose either of us could have escaped, when it was I who made all thearrangements with her that she should come to this house, and when she knew as well as you do that it was I that chloroformed her? I could not have done it without your help, so that you are as responsible as I; and more, for it was you who brought her to the house. You brought the other girl too, you great, stupid, whimpering baby, and she will have to die as well before either you or I are safe. And that will be entirely your doing, for if she had not come she could have lived till Doomsday for all I cared. Now, what you have to do is to get the spade which I brought this afternoon from the tool house in the garden, and dig a grave under the trees at the back of the house, where you can hide this.” She patted the arm of Mrs. Vanderstein with gruesome familiarity.
But Bert, sick and faint with horror, absolutely refused to do as he was told in this matter. To go down into the starlit garden, to dig for interminable hours in the open, with every shadow full of unknown terrors, which would leap on him from out of the darkness, pounce on him from behind, come creeping and gibbering at him with every leaf that stirred or every chance footfall in a distant street! No. Again, it was a long job to dig a grave; he knew that. The ground would be hard; he would want a pickaxe. In any case he would not do it.
Nothing Madame Querterot could say shook him in this determination. She was growing really anxious, for it wanted only two or three hours to dawn, and it began to look as if the body must be left where it lay, when, by a lucky inspiration, she thought of the flower stand on the balcony. Would Bert help her there? It would be quicker done and less dangerous if he would, but if needs must, she said, she could manage that alone.
With a furious, shuddering sulkiness, Bert consented to help.
He opened a window and undid the fastening of the shutters. Then, after putting out the gas, they stepped cautiously out on to the balcony, Madame Querterot carrying the spade, and, stooping behind the balustrade, peered anxiously up and down the deserted street. There was no one to be seen or heard, and with frenzied haste they began to pull up the plants which adorned the flower box. At Madame Querterot’s direction Bert ladled out shovelfuls of loose soil, till the box was more than half empty and the balcony was heaped high with black mould.
They stole back to the drawing-room and Madame Querterot took from a parcel that she had stored away in a corner of the room a bundle of clothing, which she told Bert to carry downstairs and give to Miss Turner to put on.
“It would never do,” she said, “for either of them to be found with clothes on them that could be identified as their own. It would be best that never should they be found at all, but it is well to be prepared for everything, and though I fear Mrs. Vanderstein is sure to come to light sooner or later, I prefer to take even more precautions with regard to Miss Turner, as I shall be obliged to leave the disposal of her to your scanty wits. Tell the girl, therefore, some cock and bull story about intending to help her to escape, so that she may readily attire herself in these clothes, which I had intended for the Vanderstein. They are all bought in different rag shops, and there is nothing on any of them to identify them by. Tell her also to undo her hair and to screw it up plainly so as to hide it as much as possible. Now go and do as I say.”
“But it is impossible,” cried Bert, “that that girl should be killed too. I cannot, I will not let you do it!”
“So far from letting me do it, my dear Bert,” repliedMadame Querterot placidly, “it is probable that you will have to do it yourself. But we will speak of that again.”
Bert went reluctantly on his mission, and by the time he returned Madame Querterot had undressed and decently enveloped the body in the chintz cover of one of the sofas. Mrs. Vanderstein’s clothes lay in a heap on a chair near by, and the Frenchwoman was vainly trying, with a silken petticoat, to rub away some large stains which appeared on the carpet, beside the couch. As Bert came in she got up quickly, abandoning her efforts.
“What is it?” he asked, “what is that on the floor?”
“Nothing. Only something I spilt. Some of the chloroform. It can easily be hidden.” And she pushed the sofa over the place.
She said nothing to Bert about the vitriol she had used, nor did he suspect it till the following Thursday night, when he was obliged to undergo the ghastly ordeal of seeing the body unearthed by Mr. Gimblet.
With a preliminary reconnaissance of the balcony to make sure that no policeman was patrolling the street below, the young man and the woman carried out the body of their victim, laid it in the grave they had made ready, and then fell in silence to the task of restoring to the box the mound of earth that was heaped upon the floor. When all was finished and the flowers planted and blooming once more in their former places, there still remained a quantity of soil for which there was no room in the stand.
Madame Querterot fetched a couple of housemaid’s pails and they carried the superfluous mould out by the back door to the garden, where they scattered it widely upon the flower beds. It was a slow business and necessitated many journeys, but bynow Bert, in a paroxysm of fear, which was in part for his own neck and almost as much at the certainty that he would irretrievably lose Julie if any trace should ever be discovered of that night’s work, showed himself more tractable, and by the time they had made the place shipshape was ready to lend a receptive ear to the proposals of his resourceful leader as to their future conduct. At her suggestion they sat down opposite to one another in the back of the drawing-room, to talk over the best means of averting even a shadow of suspicion.
“We are safe enough,” Madame Querterot asserted positively; “how is it you say? safe as a church! Once the girl is disposed of, that is. Ah, my friend, you made a mistake when you permitted the inclusion of Miss Turner in thepartie, but it is not impossible to remedy that error. Here is the chloroform. What do you say? Shall we repeat the comedy which we have just performed? For me, I am ready, for your sake, to do my share.”
“No, no,” cried Bert with a shiver, “not that, not that! Besides,” he added weakly, “there is only one flower box on the balcony.”
“It is true,” mused the Frenchwoman, “that there is no room there for another burial. And you still refuse to dig a grave? Perhaps to-morrow night you will have more courage?” she suggested hopefully.
But of this Bert held out no hope. “It would take too long,” he said. “I might screw myself up to commence the job, but I simply couldn’t stick to it for an hour, no more than I could fly. I’ll do what I can, Madame Querterot; I don’t want to be hung for your beastly murders, and if I can’t keep my neck out of a noose any other way I suppose I’ve got to do what you say—within reason, that is. It’s the girl’s life or mine right enough, I believe, and I can’t be blamed forthinking of myself first in such a case,” said Bert, nearly crying; “though as a matter of fact it’s not so much myself I’m thinking of, in a manner of speaking, as it’s Joolie. A nice thing for her it would be, to have it said that her mother was hung! A fair treat, that ’ud be!”
“It’s very considerate of you, I’m sure, Bert, to take that view,” said Madame Querterot, with bitter sarcasm, “but it’s no good talking like that if you refuse to do anything to prevent such a scandal, which I agree with you in thinking is one to be avoided if possible. Here is another idea, though I think I am too patient with you, and shall not waste much more time in trying to assist you out of a danger you have yourself brought upon us. Suppose you take the girl out to a place where there is some deep water—there is a canal near the Zoological Gardens, is there not?—and push her in when she is walking beside it. She will go with you willingly, if you let her think you are helping her to escape, and you can find a pretext for attaching something heavy to her first, so that she will not trouble us by rising again to the surface. It should be easy to do on a dark night, and there is no moon now, as you know.”
Bert had plenty of objections to raise to this plan, and they discussed others with no better result. In the end he was obliged to admit that drowning offered the best and easiest solution to the difficulty, and she wrung from him a promise that he would get rid of the unfortunate young lady by this means on the following night.
In vain Madame Querterot urged the danger of delay, and the perils which would attend on their keeping Barbara in the house for the next twenty-four hours. Bert was obstinately determined not to venture forth with her at this hour, for it wanted but a short time tosunrise and any delay would mean that the culminating act must be performed after the full darkness of the night had been diluted by the coming dawn. Even Madame Querterot was obliged to admit that there was something in his argument, and it was finally decided that he should wait till another day had passed.