‘It was a representation, produced by what process I cannot say, which was so wonderfully, so diabolically, like the original, that for a moment I thought the thing itself was on my table.’
‘Who put it there?’
‘That is precisely what I wish you to find out,—what I wish you to make it your instant business to ascertain. I have found the thing, under similar circumstances, on three separate occasions, on my study table,—and each time it has had on me the same hideous effect.’
‘Each time after you have returned from a late sitting in the House of Commons?’
‘Exactly.’
‘Where are these—what shall I call them—delineations?’
‘That, again, I cannot tell you.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What I say. Each time, when I recovered, the thing had vanished.’
‘Sheet of paper and all?’
‘Apparently,—though on that point I could not be positive. You will understand that my study table is apt to be littered with sheets of paper, and I could not absolutely determine that the thing had not stared at me from one of those. The delineation itself, to use your word, certainly had vanished.’
I began to suspect that this was a case rather for a doctor than for a man of my profession. And hinted as much.
‘Don’t you think it is possible, Mr Lessingham, that you have been overworking yourself—that you have been driving your brain too hard, and that you have been the victim of an optical delusion?’
‘I thought so myself; I may say that I almost hoped so. But wait till I have finished. You will find that there is no loophole in that direction.’
He appeared to be recalling events in their due order. His manner was studiously cold,—as if he were endeavouring, despite the strangeness of his story, to impress me with the literal accuracy of each syllable he uttered.
‘The night before last, on returning home, I found in my study a stranger.’
‘A stranger?’
‘Yes.—In other words, a burglar.’
‘A burglar?—I see.—Go on.’
He had paused. His demeanour was becoming odder and odder.
‘On my entry he was engaged in forcing an entry into my bureau. I need hardly say that I advanced to seize him. But—I could not.’
‘You could not?—How do you mean you could not?’
‘I mean simply what I say. You must understand that this was no ordinary felon. Of what nationality he was I cannot tell you. He only uttered two words, and they were certainly in English, but apart from that he was dumb. He wore no covering on his head or feet. Indeed, his only garment was a long dark flowing cloak which, as it fluttered about him, revealed that his limbs were bare.’
‘An unique costume for a burglar.’
‘The instant I saw him I realised that he was in some way connected with that adventure in the Rue de Rabagas. What he said and did, proved it to the hilt.’
‘What did he say and do?’
‘As I approached to effect his capture, he pronounced aloud two words which recalled that awful scene the recollection of which always lingers in my brain, and of which I never dare to permit myself to think. Their very utterance threw me into a sort of convulsion.’
‘What were the words?’
Mr Lessingham opened his mouth,—and shut it. A marked change took place in the expression of his countenance. His eyes became fixed and staring,—resembling the glassy orbs of the somnambulist. For a moment I feared that he was going to give me an object lesson in the ‘visitations’ of which I had heard so much. I rose, with a view of offering him assistance. He motioned me back.
‘Thank you.—It will pass away.’
His voice was dry and husky,—unlike his usual silvern tones. After an uncomfortable interval he managed to continue.
‘You see for yourself, Mr Champnell, what a miserable weakling, when this subject is broached, I still remain. I cannot utter the words the stranger uttered, I cannot even write them down. For some inscrutable reason they have on me an effect similar to that which spells and incantations had on people in tales of witchcraft.’
‘I suppose, Mr Lessingham, that there is no doubt that this mysterious stranger was not himself an optical delusion?’
‘Scarcely. There is the evidence of my servants to prove the contrary.’
‘Did your servants see him?’
‘Some of them,—yes. Then there is the evidence of the bureau. The fellow had smashed the top right in two. When I came to examine the contents I learned that a packet of letters was missing. They were letters which I had received from Miss Lindon, a lady whom I hope to make my wife. This, also, I state to you in confidence.’
‘What use would he be likely to make of them?’
‘If matters stand as I fear they do, he might make a very serious misuse of them. If the object of these wretches, after all these years, is a wild revenge, they would be capable, having discovered what she is to me, of working Miss Lindon a fatal mischief,—or, at the very least, of poisoning her mind.’
‘I see.—How did the thief escape,—did he, like the delineation, vanish into air?’
‘He escaped by the much more prosaic method of dashing through the drawing-room window, and clambering down from the verandah into the street, where he ran right into someone’s arms.’
‘Into whose arms,—a constable’s?’
‘No; into Mr Atherton’s,—Sydney Atherton’s.’
‘The inventor?’
‘The same.—Do you know him?’
‘I do. Sydney Atherton and I are friends of a good many years’ standing.—But Atherton must have seen where he came from;—and, anyhow, if he was in the state of undress which you have described, why didn’t he stop him?’
‘Mr Atherton’s reasons were his own. He did not stop him, and, so far as I can learn, he did not attempt to stop him. Instead, he knocked at my hall door to inform me that he had seen a man climb out of my window.’
‘I happen to know that, at certain seasons, Atherton is a queer fish,—but that sounds very queer indeed.’
‘The truth is, Mr Champnell, that, if it were not for Mr Atherton, I doubt if I should have troubled you even now. The accident of his being an acquaintance of yours makes my task easier.’
He drew his chair closer to me with an air of briskness which had been foreign to him before. For some reason, which I was unable to fathom, the introduction of Atherton’s name seemed to have enlivened him. However, I was not long to remain in darkness. In half a dozen sentences he threw more light on the real cause of his visit to me than he had done in all that had gone before. His bearing, too, was more businesslike and to the point. For the first time I had some glimmerings of the politician,—alert, keen, eager,—as he is known to all the world.
‘Mr Atherton, like myself, has been a postulant for Miss Lindon’s hand. Because I have succeeded where he has failed, he has chosen to be angry. It seems that he has had dealings, either with my visitor of Tuesday night, or with some other his acquaintance, and he proposes to use what he has gleaned from him to the disadvantage of my character. I have just come from Mr Atherton. From hints he dropped I conclude that, probably during the last few hours, he has had an interview with someone who was connected in some way with that lurid patch in my career; that this person made so-called revelations, which were nothing but a series of monstrous lies; and these so-called revelations Mr Atherton has threatened, in so many words, to place before Miss Lindon. That is an eventuality which I wish to avoid. My own conviction is that there is at this moment in London an emissary from that den in the whilom Rue de Rabagas—for all I know it may be the Woman of the Songs herself. Whether the sole purport of this individual’s presence is to do me injury, I am, as yet, in no position to say, but that it is proposed to work me mischief, at any rate, by the way, is plain. I believe that Mr Atherton knows more about this person’s individuality and whereabouts than he has been willing, so far, to admit. I want you, therefore, to ascertain these things on my behalf; to find out what, and where, this person is, to drag her!—or him;—out into the light of day. In short, I want you to effectually protect me from the terrorism which threatens once more to overwhelm my mental and my physical powers,—which bids fair to destroy my intellect, my career, my life, my all.’
‘What reason have you for suspecting that Mr Atherton has seen this individual of whom you speak,—has he told you so?’
‘Practically,—yes.’
‘I know Atherton well. In his not infrequent moments of excitement he is apt to use strong language, but it goes no further. I believe him to be the last person in the world to do anyone an intentional injustice, under any circumstances whatever. If I go to him, armed with credentials from you, when he understands the real gravity of the situation,—which it will be my business to make him do, I believe that, spontaneously, of his own accord, he will tell me as much about this mysterious individual as he knows himself.’
‘Then go to him at once.’
‘Good. I will. The result I will communicate to you.’
I rose from my seat. As I did so, someone rushed into the outer office with a din and a clatter. Andrews’ voice, and another, became distinctly audible,—Andrews’ apparently raised in vigorous expostulation. Raised, seemingly, in vain, for presently the door of my own particular sanctum was thrown open with a crash, and Mr Sydney Atherton himself came dashing in,—evidently conspicuously under the influence of one of those not infrequent ‘moments of excitement’ of which I had just been speaking.
Athertondid not wait to see who might or might not be present, but, without even pausing to take breath, he broke into full cry on the instant,—as is occasionally his wont.
‘Champnell!—Thank goodness I’ve found you in!—I want you!—At once!—Don’t stop to talk, but stick your hat on, and put your best foot forward,—I’ll tell you all about it in the cab.’
I endeavoured to call his attention to Mr Lessingham’s presence,—but without success.
‘My dear fellow—’
When I had got as far as that he cut me short.
‘Don’t “dear fellow” me!—None of your jabber! And none of your excuses either! I don’t care if you’ve got an engagement with the Queen, you’ll have to chuck it. Where’s that dashed hat of yours,—or are you going without it? Don’t I tell you that every second cut to waste may mean the difference between life and death?—Do you want me to drag you down to the cab by the hair of your head?’
‘I will try not to constrain you to quite so drastic a resource,—and I was coming to you at once in any case. I only want to call your attention to the fact that I am not alone.—Here is Mr Lessingham.’
In his harum-scarum haste Mr Lessingham had gone unnoticed. Now that his observation was particularly directed to him, Atherton started, turned, and glared at my latest client in a fashion which was scarcely flattering.
‘Oh!—It’s you, is it?—What the deuce are you doing here?’
Before Lessingham could reply to this most unceremonious query, Atherton, rushing forward, gripped him by the arm.
‘Have you seen her?’
Lessingham, not unnaturally nonplussed by the other’s curious conduct, stared at him in unmistakable amazement.
‘Have I seen whom?’
‘Marjorie Lindon!’
‘Marjorie Lindon?’
Lessingham paused. He was evidently asking himself what the inquiry meant.
‘I have not seen Miss Lindon since last night. Why do you ask?’
‘Then Heaven help us!—As I’m a living man I believe he, she, or it has got her!’
His words were incomprehensible enough to stand in copious need of explanation,—as Mr Lessingham plainly thought.
‘What is it that you mean, sir?’
‘What I say,—I believe that that Oriental friend of yours has got her in her clutches,—if it is a “her;” goodness alone knows what the infernal conjurer’s real sex may be.’
‘Atherton!—Explain yourself!’
On a sudden Lessingham’s tones rang out like a trumpet call.
‘If damage comes to her I shall be fit to cut my throat,—and yours!’
Mr Lessingham’s next proceeding surprised me,—I imagine it surprised Atherton still more. Springing at Sydney like a tiger, he caught him by the throat.
‘You——you hound! Of what wretched folly have you been guilty? If so much as a hair of her head is injured you shall repay it me ten thousandfold!—You mischief-making, intermeddling, jealous fool!’
He shook Sydney as if he had been a rat,—then flung him from him headlong on to the floor. It reminded me of nothing so much as Othello’s treatment of Iago. Never had I seen a man so transformed by rage. Lessingham seemed to have positively increased in stature. As he stood glowering down at the prostrate Sydney, he might have stood for a materialistic conception of human retribution.
Sydney, I take it, was rather surprised than hurt. For a moment or two he lay quite still. Then, lifting his head, he looked up his assailant. Then, raising himself to his feet, he shook himself,—as if with a view of learning if all his bones were whole. Putting his hands up to his neck, he rubbed it, gently. And he grinned.
‘By God, Lessingham, there’s more in you than I thought. After all, you are a man. There’s some holding power in those wrists of yours,—they’ve nearly broken my neck. When this business is finished, I should like to put on the gloves with you, and fight it out. You’re clean wasted upon politics.—Damn it, man, give me your hand!’
Mr Lessingham did not give him his hand. Atherton took it,—and gave it a hearty shake with both of his.
If the first paroxysm of his passion had passed, Lessingham was still sufficiently stern.
‘Be so good as not to trifle, Mr Atherton. If what you say is correct, and the wretch to whom you allude really has Miss Lindon at her mercy, then the woman I love—and whom you also pretend to love!—stands in imminent peril not only of a ghastly death, but of what is infinitely worse than death.’
‘The deuce she does!’ Atherton wheeled round towards me. ‘Champnell, haven’t you got that dashed hat of yours yet? Don’t stand there like a tailor’s dummy, keeping me on tenter-hooks,—move yourself! I’ll tell you all about it in the cab.—And, Lessingham, if you’ll come with us I’ll tell you too.’
Threein a hansom cab is not, under all circumstances, the most comfortable method of conveyance,—when one of the trio happens to be Sydney Atherton in one of his ‘moments of excitement’ it is distinctly the opposite; as, on that occasion, Mr Lessingham and I both quickly found. Sometimes he sat on my knees, sometimes on Lessingham’s, and frequently, when he unexpectedly stood up, and all but precipitated himself on to the horse’s back, on nobody’s. In the eagerness of his gesticulations, first he knocked off my hat, then he knocked off Lessingham’s, then his own, then all three together,—once, his own hat rolling into the mud, he sprang into the road, without previously going through the empty form of advising the driver of his intention, to pick it up. When he turned to speak to Lessingham, he thrust his elbow into my eye; and when he turned to speak to me, he thrust it into Lessingham’s. Never, for one solitary instant, was he at rest, or either of us at ease. The wonder is that the gymnastics in which he incessantly indulged did not sufficiently attract public notice to induce a policeman to put at least a momentary period to our progress. Had speed not been of primary importance I should have insisted on the transference of the expedition to the somewhat wider limits of a four-wheeler.
His elucidation of the causes of his agitation was apparently more comprehensible to Lessingham than it was to me. I had to piece this and that together under considerable difficulties. By degrees I did arrive at something like a clear notion of what had actually taken place.
He commenced by addressing Lessingham,—and thrusting his elbow into my eye.
‘Did Marjorie tell you about the fellow she found in the street?’ Up went his arm to force the trap-door open overhead,—and off went my hat. ‘Now then, William Henry!—let her go!—if you kill the horse I’ll buy you another!’
We were already going much faster than, legally, we ought to have done,—but that, seemingly to him was not a matter of the slightest consequence. Lessingham replied to his inquiry.
‘She did not.’
‘You know the fellow I saw coming out of your drawing-room window?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, Marjorie found him the morning after in front of her breakfast-room window—in the middle of the street. Seems he had been wandering about all night, unclothed,—in the rain and the mud, and all the rest of it,—in a condition of hypnotic trance.’
‘Who is the——gentleman you are alluding to?’
‘Says his name’s Holt, Robert Holt.’
‘Holt?—Is he an Englishman?’
‘Very much so,—City quilldriver out of a shop,—stony broke absolutely! Got the chuck from the casual ward,—wouldn’t let him in,—house full, and that sort of thing,—poor devil! Pretty passes you politicians bring men to!’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Of what?’
‘Are you sure that this man, Robert Holt, is the same person whom, as you put it, you saw coming out of my drawing-room window?’
‘Sure!—Of course I’m sure!—Think I didn’t recognise him?—Besides, there was the man’s own tale,—owned to it himself,—besides all the rest, which sent one rushing Fulham way.’
‘You must remember, Mr Atherton, that I am wholly in the dark as to what has happened. What has the man, Holt, to do with the errand on which we are bound?’
‘Am I not coming to it? If you would let me tell the tale in my own way I should get there in less than no time, but you will keep on cutting in,—how the deuce do you suppose Champnell is to make head or tail of the business if you will persist in interrupting?—Marjorie took the beggar in,—he told his tale to her,—she sent for me—that was just now; caught me on the steps after I had been lunching with Dora Grayling. Holt re-dished his yarn—I smelt a rat—saw that a connection possibly existed between the thief who’d been playing confounded conjuring tricks off on to me and this interesting party down Fulham way—’
‘What party down Fulham way?’
‘This friend of Holt’s—am I not telling you? There you are, you see,—won’t let me finish! When Holt slipped through the window—which is the most sensible thing he seems to have done; if I’d been in his shoes I’d have slipped through forty windows!—dusky coloured charmer caught him on the hop,—doctored him—sent him out to commit burglary by deputy. I said to Holt, “Show us this agreeable little crib, young man.” Holt was game—then Marjorie chipped in—she wanted to go and see it too. I said, “You’ll be sorry if you do,”—that settled it! After that she’d have gone if she’d died,—I never did have a persuasive way with women. So off we toddled, Marjorie, Holt, and I, in a growler,—spotted the crib in less than no time,—invited ourselves in by the kitchen window—house seemed empty. Presently Holt became hypnotised before my eyes,—the best established case of hypnotism by suggestion I ever yet encountered—started off on a pilgrimage of one. Like an idiot I followed, leaving Marjorie to wait for me—’
‘Alone?’
‘Alone!—Am I not telling you?—Great Scott, Lessingham, in the House of Commons they must be hazy to think you smart! I said, “I’ll send the first sane soul I meet to keep you company.” As luck would have it, I never met one,—only kids, and a baker, who wouldn’t leave his cart, or take it with him either. I’d covered pretty nearly two miles before I came across a peeler,—and when I did the man was cracked—and he thought me mad, or drunk, or both. By the time I’d got myself within nodding distance of being run in for obstructing the police in the execution of their duty, without inducing him to move a single one of his twenty-four-inch feet, Holt was out of sight. So, since all my pains in his direction were clean thrown away, there was nothing left for me but to scurry back to Marjorie,—so I scurried, and I found the house empty, no one there, and Marjorie gone.’
‘But, I don’t quite follow—’
Atherton impetuously declined to allow Mr Lessingham to conclude.
‘Of course you don’t quite follow, and you’ll follow still less if you will keep getting in front. I went upstairs and downstairs, inside and out—shouted myself hoarse as a crow—nothing was to be seen of Marjorie,—or heard; until, as I was coming down the stairs for about the five-and-fiftieth time, I stepped on something hard which was lying in the passage. I picked it up,—it was a ring; this ring. Its shape is not just what it was,—I’m not as light as gossamer, especially when I come jumping downstairs six at a time,—but what’s left of it is here.’
Sydney held something in front of him. Mr Lessingham wriggled to one side to enable him to see. Then he made a snatch at it.
‘It’s mine!’
Sydney dodged it out of his reach.
‘What do you mean, it’s yours?’
‘It’s the ring I gave Marjorie for an engagement ring. Give it me, you hound!—unless you wish me to do you violence in the cab.’
With complete disregard of the limitations of space,—or of my comfort,—Lessingham thrust him vigorously aside. Then gripping Sydney by the wrist, he seized the gaud,—Sydney yielding it just in time to save himself from being precipitated into the street. Ravished of his treasure, Sydney turned and surveyed the ravisher with something like a glance of admiration.
‘Hang me, Lessingham, if I don’t believe there is some warm blood in those fishlike veins of yours. Please the piper, I’ll live to fight you after all,—with the bare ones, sir, as a gentleman should do.’
Lessingham seemed to pay no attention to him whatever. He was surveying the ring, which Sydney had trampled out of shape, with looks of the deepest concern.
‘Marjorie’s ring!—The one I gave her! Something serious must have happened to her before she would have dropped my ring, and left it lying where it fell.’
Atherton went on.
‘That’s it!—What has happened to her!—I’ll be dashed if I know!—When it was clear that there she wasn’t, I tore off to find out where she was. Came across old Lindon,—he knew nothing;—I rather fancy I startled him in the middle of Pall Mall, when I left he stared after me like one possessed, and his hat was lying in the gutter. Went home,—she wasn’t there. Asked Dora Grayling,—she’d seen nothing of her. No one had seen anything of her,—she had vanished into air. Then I said to myself, “You’re a first-class idiot, on my honour! While you’re looking for her, like a lost sheep, the betting is that the girl’s in Holt’s friend’s house the whole jolly time. When you were there, the chances are that she’d just stepped out for a stroll, and that now she’s back again, and wondering where on earth you’ve gone!” So I made up my mind that I’d fly back and see,—because the idea of her standing on the front doorstep looking for me, while I was going off my nut looking for her, commended itself to what I call my sense of humour; and on my way it struck me that it would be the part of wisdom to pick up Champnell, because if there is a man who can be backed to find a needle in any amount of haystacks it is the great Augustus.—That horse has moved itself after all, because here we are. Now, cabman, don’t go driving further on,—you’ll have to put a girdle round the earth if you do; because you’ll have to reach this point again before you get your fare.—This is the magician’s house!’
Thecab pulled up in front of a tumbledown cheap ‘villa’ in an unfinished cheap neighbourhood,—the whole place a living monument of the defeat of the speculative builder.
Atherton leaped out on to the grass-grown rubble which was meant for a footpath.
‘I don’t see Marjorie looking for me on the doorstep.’
Nor did I,—I saw nothing but what appeared to be an unoccupied ramshackle brick abomination. Suddenly Sydney gave an exclamation.
‘Hullo!—The front door’s closed!’
I was hard at his heels.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Why, when I went I left the front door open. It looks as if I’ve made an idiot of myself after all, and Marjorie’s returned,—let’s hope to goodness that I have.’
He knocked. While we waited for a response I questioned him.
‘Why did you leave the door open when you went?’
‘I hardly know,—I imagine that it was with some dim idea of Marjorie’s being able to get in if she returned while I was absent,—but the truth is I was in such a condition of helter skelter that I am not prepared to swear that I had any reasonable reason.’
‘I suppose there is no doubt that you did leave it open?’
‘Absolutely none,—on that I’ll stake my life.’
‘Was it open when you returned from your pursuit of Holt?’
‘Wide open,—I walked straight in expecting to find her waiting for me in the front room,—I was struck all of a heap when I found she wasn’t there.’
‘Were there any signs of a struggle?’
‘None,—there were no signs of anything. Everything was just as I had left it, with the exception of the ring which I trod on in the passage, and which Lessingham has.’
‘If Miss Lindon has returned, it does not look as if she were in the house at present.’
It did not,—unless silence had such meaning. Atherton had knocked loudly three times without succeeding in attracting the slightest notice from within.
‘It strikes me that this is another case of seeking admission through that hospitable window at the back.’
Atherton led the way to the rear. Lessingham and I followed. There was not even an apology for a yard, still less a garden,—there was not even a fence of any sort, to serve as an enclosure, and to shut off the house from the wilderness of waste land. The kitchen window was open. I asked Sydney if he had left it so.
‘I don’t know,—I dare say we did; I don’t fancy that either of us stood on the order of his coming.’
While he spoke, he scrambled over the sill. We followed. When he was in, he shouted at the top of his voice,
‘Marjorie! Marjorie! Speak to me, Marjorie,—it is I,—Sydney!’
The words echoed through the house. Only silence answered. He led the way to the front room. Suddenly he stopped.
‘Hollo!’ he cried. ‘The blind’s down!’ I had noticed, when we were outside, that the blind was down at the front room window. ‘It was up when I went, that I’ll swear. That someone has been here is pretty plain,—let’s hope it’s Marjorie.’
He had only taken a step forward into the room when he again stopped short to exclaim.
‘My stars!—here’s a sudden clearance!—Why, the place is empty,—everything’s clean gone!’
‘What do you mean?—was it furnished when you left?’
The room was empty enough then.
‘Furnished?—I don’t know that it was exactly what you’d call furnished,—the party who ran this establishment had a taste in upholstery which was all his own,—but there was a carpet, and a bed, and—and lots of things,—for the most part, I should have said, distinctly Eastern curiosities. They seem to have evaporated into smoke,—which may be a way which is common enough among Eastern curiosities, though it’s queer to me.’
Atherton was staring about him as if he found it difficult to credit the evidence of his own eyes.
‘How long ago is it since you left?’
He referred to his watch.
‘Something over an hour,—possibly an hour and a half; I couldn’t swear to the exact moment, but it certainly isn’t more.’
‘Did you notice any signs of packing up?’
‘Not a sign.’ Going to the window he drew up the blind,—speaking as he did so. ‘The queer thing about this business is that when we first got in this blind wouldn’t draw up a little bit, so, since it wouldn’t go up I pulled it down, roller and all, now it draws up as easily and smoothly as if it had always been the best blind that ever lived.’
Standing at Sydney’s back I saw that the cabman on his box was signalling to us with his outstretched hand. Sydney perceived him too. He threw up the sash.
‘What’s the matter with you?’
‘Excuse me, sir, but who’s the old gent?’
‘What old gent?’
‘Why the old gent peeping through the window of the room upstairs?’
The words were hardly out of the driver’s mouth when Sydney was through the door and flying up the staircase. I followed rather more soberly,—his methods were a little too flighty for me. When I reached the landing, dashing out of the front room he rushed into the one at the back,—then through a door at the side. He came out shouting.
‘What’s the idiot mean!—with his old gent! I’d old gent him if I got him!—There’s not a creature about the place!’
He returned into the front room,—I at his heels. That certainly was empty,—and not only empty, but it showed no traces of recent occupation. The dust lay thick upon the floor,—there was that mouldy, earthy smell which is so frequently found in apartments which have been long untenanted.
‘Are you sure, Atherton, that there is no one at the back?’
‘Of course I’m sure,—you can go and see for yourself if you like; do you think I’m blind? Jehu’s drunk.’ Throwing up the sash he addressed the driver. ‘What do you mean with your old gent at the window?—what window?’
‘That window, sir.’
‘Go to!—you’re dreaming, man!—there’s no one here.’
‘Begging your pardon, sir, but there was someone there not a minute ago.’
‘Imagination, cabman,—the slant of the light on the glass,—or your eyesight’s defective.’
‘Excuse me, sir, but it’s not my imagination, and my eyesight’s as good as any man’s in England,—and as for the slant of the light on the glass, there ain’t much glass for the light to slant on. I saw him peeping through that bottom broken pane on your left hand as plainly as I see you. He must be somewhere about,—he can’t have got away,—he’s at the back. Ain’t there a cupboard nor nothing where he could hide?’
The cabman’s manner was so extremely earnest that I went myself to see. There was a cupboard on the landing, but the door of that stood wide open, and that obviously was bare. The room behind was small, and, despite the splintered glass in the window frame, stuffy. Fragments of glass kept company with the dust on the floor, together with a choice collection of stones, brickbats, and other missiles,—which not improbably were the cause of their being there. In the corner stood a cupboard,—but a momentary examination showed that that was as bare as the other. The door at the side, which Sydney had left wide open, opened on to a closet, and that was empty. I glanced up,—there was no trap door which led to the roof. No practicable nook or cranny, in which a living being could lie concealed, was anywhere at hand.
I returned to Sydney’s shoulder to tell the cabman so.
‘There is no place in which anyone could hide, and there is no one in either of the rooms,—you must have been mistaken, driver.’
The man waxed wroth.
‘Don’t tell me! How could I come to think I saw something when I didn’t?’
‘One’s eyes are apt to play us tricks;—how could you see what wasn’t there?’
‘That’s what I want to know. As I drove up, before you told me to stop, I saw him looking through the window,—the one at which you are. He’d got his nose glued to the broken pane, and was staring as hard as he could stare. When I pulled up, off he started,—I saw him get up off his knees, and go to the back of the room. When the gentleman took to knocking, back he came,—to the same old spot, and flopped down on his knees. I didn’t know what caper you was up to,—you might be bum bailiffs for all I knew!—and I supposed that he wasn’t so anxious to let you in as you might be to get inside, and that was why he didn’t take no notice of your knocking, while all the while he kept a eye on what was going on. When you goes round to the back, up he gets again, and I reckoned that he was going to meet yer, and perhaps give yer a bit of his mind, and that presently I should hear a shindy, or that something would happen. But when you pulls up the blind downstairs, to my surprise back he come once more. He shoves his old nose right through the smash in the pane, and wags his old head at me like a chattering magpie. That didn’t seem to me quite the civil thing to do,—I hadn’t done no harm to him; so I gives you the office, and lets you know that he was there. But for you to say that he wasn’t there, and never had been,—blimey! that cops the biscuit. If he wasn’t there, all I can say is I ain’t here, and my ’orse ain’t here, and my cab ain’t neither,—damn it!—the house ain’t here, and nothing ain’t!’
He settled himself on his perch with an air of the most extreme ill usage,—he had been standing up to tell his tale. That the man was serious was unmistakable. As he himself suggested, what inducement could he have had to tell a lie like that? That he believed himself to have seen what he declared he saw was plain. But, on the other hand, what could have become—in the space of fifty seconds!—of his ‘old gent’?
Atherton put a question.
‘What did he look like,—this old gent of yours?’
‘Well, that I shouldn’t hardly like to say. It wasn’t much of his face I could see, only his face and his eyes,—and they wasn’t pretty. He kept a thing over his head all the time, as if he didn’t want too much to be seen.’
‘What sort of a thing?’
‘Why,—one of them cloak sort of things, like them Arab blokes used to wear what used to be at Earl’s Court Exhibition,—you know!’
This piece of information seemed to interest my companions more than anything he had said before.
‘A burnoose do you mean?’
‘How am I to know what the thing’s called? I ain’t up in foreign languages,—’tain’t likely! All I know that them Arab blokes what was at Earl’s Court used to walk about in them all over the place,—sometimes they wore them over their heads, and sometimes they didn’t. In fact if you’d asked me, instead of trying to make out as I sees double, or things what was only inside my own noddle, or something or other, I should have said this here old gent what I’ve been telling you about was a Arab bloke,—when he gets off his knees to sneak away from the window, I could see that he had his cloak thing, what was over his head, wrapped all round him.’
Mr Lessingham turned to me, all quivering with excitement.
‘I believe that what he says is true!’
‘Then where can this mysterious old gentleman have got to,—can you suggest an explanation? It is strange, to say the least of it, that the cabman should be the only person to see or hear anything of him.’
‘Some devil’s trick has been played,—I know it, I feel it!—my instinct tells me so!’
I stared. In such a matter one hardly expects a man of Paul Lessingham’s stamp to talk of ‘instinct.’ Atherton stared too. Then, on a sudden, he burst out,
‘By the Lord, I believe the Apostle’s right,—the whole place reeks to me of hankey-pankey,—it did as soon as I put my nose inside. In matters of prestidigitation, Champnell, we Westerns are among the rudiments,—we’ve everything to learn,—Orientals leave us at the post. If their civilisation’s what we’re pleased to call extinct, their conjuring—when you get to know it!—is all alive oh!’
He moved towards the door. As he went he slipped, or seemed to, all but stumbling on to his knees.
‘Something tripped me up,—what’s this?’ He was stamping on the floor with his foot. ‘Here’s a board loose. Come and lend me a hand, one of you fellows, to get it up. Who knows what mystery’s beneath?’
I went to his aid. As he said, a board in the floor was loose. His stepping on it unawares had caused his stumble. Together we prised it out of its place,—Lessingham standing by and watching us the while. Having removed it, we peered into the cavity it disclosed.
There was something there.
‘Why,’ cried Atherton, ‘it’s a woman’s clothing!’
THEY STARED AT ME IN SILENCE AS I DRAGGED THESE OUT AND LAID THEM ON THE FLOOR.
THEY STARED AT ME IN SILENCE AS I DRAGGED THESE OUT AND LAID THEM ON THE FLOOR.
Itwas a woman’s clothing, beyond a doubt, all thrown in anyhow,—as if the person who had placed it there had been in a desperate hurry. An entire outfit was there, shoes, stockings, body linen, corsets, and all,—even to hat, gloves, and hairpins;—these latter were mixed up with the rest of the garments in strange confusion. It seemed plain that whoever had worn those clothes had been stripped to the skin.
Lessingham and Sydney stared at me in silence as I dragged them out and laid them on the floor. The dress was at the bottom,—it was an alpaca, of a pretty shade in blue, bedecked with lace and ribbons, as is the fashion of the hour, and lined with sea-green silk. It had perhaps been a ‘charming confection’ once—and that a very recent one!—but now it was all soiled and creased and torn and tumbled. The two spectators made a simultaneous pounce at it as I brought it to the light.
‘My God!’ cried Sydney, ‘it’s Marjorie’s!—she was wearing it when I saw her last!’
‘It’s Marjorie’s!’ gasped Lessingham,—he was clutching at the ruined costume, staring at it like a man who has just received sentence of death. ‘She wore it when she was with me yesterday,—I told her how it suited her, and how pretty it was!’
There was silence,—it was an eloquent find; it spoke for itself. The two men gazed at the heap of feminine glories,—it might have been the most wonderful sight they ever had seen. Lessingham was the first to speak,—his face had all at once grown grey and haggard.
‘What has happened to her?’
I replied to his question with another.
‘Are you sure this is Miss Lindon’s dress?’
‘I am sure,—and were proof needed, here it is.’
He had found the pocket, and was turning out the contents. There was a purse, which contained money and some visiting cards on which were her name and address; a small bunch of keys, with her nameplate attached; a handkerchief, with her initials in a corner. The question of ownership was placed beyond a doubt.
‘You see,’ said Lessingham, exhibiting the money which was in the purse, ‘it is not robbery which has been attempted. Here are two ten-pound notes, and one for five, besides gold and silver,—over thirty pounds in all.’
Atherton, who had been turning over the accumulation of rubbish between the joists, proclaimed another find.
‘Here are her rings, and watch, and a bracelet,—no, it certainly does not look as if theft had been an object.’
Lessingham was glowering at him with knitted brows.
‘I have to thank you for this.’
Sydney was unwontedly meek.
‘You are hard on me, Lessingham, harder than I deserve,—I had rather have thrown away my own life than have suffered misadventure to have come to her.’
‘Yours are idle words. Had you not meddled this would not have happened. A fool works more mischief with his folly than of malice prepense. If hurt has befallen Marjorie Lindon you shall account for it to me with your life’s blood.’
‘Let it be so,’ said Sydney. ‘I am content. If hurt has come to Marjorie, God knows that I am willing enough that death should come to me.’
While they wrangled, I continued to search. A little to one side, under the flooring which was still intact, I saw something gleam. By stretching out my hand, I could just manage to reach it,—it was a long plait of woman’s hair. It had been cut off at the roots,—so close to the head in one place that the scalp itself had been cut, so that the hair was clotted with blood.
They were so occupied with each other that they took no notice of me. I had to call their attention to my discovery.
‘Gentlemen, I fear that I have here something which will distress you,—is not this Miss Lindon’s hair?’
They recognised it on the instant. Lessingham, snatching it from my hands, pressed it to his lips.
‘This is mine,—I shall at least have something.’ He spoke with a grimness which was a little startling. He held the silken tresses at arm’s length. ‘This points to murder,—foul, cruel, causeless murder. As I live, I will devote my all,—money, time, reputation!—to gaining vengeance on the wretch who did this deed.’
Atherton chimed in.
‘To that I say, Amen!’ He lifted his hand. ‘God is my witness!’
‘It seems to me, gentlemen, that we move too fast,—to my mind it does not by any means of necessity point to murder. On the contrary, I doubt if murder has been done. Indeed, I don’t mind owning that I have a theory of my own which points all the other way.’
Lessingham caught me by the sleeve.
‘Mr Champnell, tell me your theory.’
‘I will, a little later. Of course it may be altogether wrong;—though I fancy it is not; I will explain my reasons when we come to talk of it. But, at present, there are things which must be done.’
‘I vote for tearing up every board in the house!’ cried Sydney. ‘And for pulling the whole infernal place to pieces. It’s a conjurer’s den.—I shouldn’t be surprised if cabby’s old gent is staring at us all the while from some peephole of his own.’
We examined the entire house, methodically, so far as we were able, inch by inch. Not another board proved loose,—to lift those which were nailed down required tools, and those we were without. We sounded all the walls,—with the exception of the party walls they were the usual lath and plaster constructions, and showed no signs of having been tampered with. The ceilings were intact; if anything was concealed in them it must have been there some time,—the cement was old and dirty. We took the closet to pieces; examined the chimneys; peered into the kitchen oven and the copper;—in short, we pried into everything which, with the limited means at our disposal, could be pried into,—without result. At the end we found ourselves dusty, dirty, and discomfited. The cabman’s ‘old gent’ remained as much a mystery as ever, and no further trace had been discovered of Miss Lindon.
Atherton made no effort to disguise his chagrin.
‘Now what’s to be done? There seems to be just nothing in the place at all, and yet that there is, and that it’s the key to the whole confounded business I should be disposed to swear.’
‘In that case I would suggest that you should stay and look for it. The cabman can go and look for the requisite tools, or a workman to assist you, if you like. For my part it appears to me that evidence of another sort is, for the moment, of paramount importance; and I propose to commence my search for it by making a call at the house which is over the way.’
I had observed, on our arrival, that the road only contained two houses which were in anything like a finished state,—that which we were in, and another, some fifty or sixty yards further down, on the opposite side. It was to this I referred. The twain immediately proffered their companionship.
‘I will come with you,’ said Mr Lessingham.
‘And I,’ echoed Sydney. ‘We’ll leave this sweet homestead in charge of the cabman,—I’ll pull it to pieces afterwards.’ He went out and spoke to the driver. ‘Cabby, we’re going to pay a visit to the little crib over there,—you keep an eye on this one. And if you see a sign of anyone being about the place,—living, or dead, or anyhow—you give me a yell. I shall be on the lookout, and I’ll be with you before you can say Jack Robinson.’
‘You bet I’ll yell,—I’ll raise the hair right off you.’ The fellow grinned. ‘But I don’t know if you gents are hiring me by the day,—I want to change my horse; he ought to have been in his stable a couple of hours ago.’
‘Never mind your horse,—let him rest a couple of hours extra to-morrow to make up for those he has lost to-day. I’ll take care you don’t lose anything by this little job,—or your horse either.—By the way, look here,—this will be better than yelling.’
Taking a revolver out of his trousers’ pocket he handed it up to the grinning driver.
‘If that old gent of yours does appear, you have a pop at him,—I shall hear that easier than a yell. You can put a bullet through him if you like,—I give you my word it won’t be murder.’
‘I don’t care if it is,’ declared the cabman, handling the weapon like one who was familiar with arms of precision. ‘I used to fancy my revolver shooting when I was with the colours, and if I do get a chance I’ll put a shot through the old hunks, if only to prove to you that I’m no liar.’
Whether the man was in earnest or not I could not tell,—nor whether Atherton meant what he said in answer.
‘If you shoot him I’ll give you fifty pounds.’
‘All right!’ The driver laughed. ‘I’ll do my best to earn that fifty!’
Thatthe house over the way was tenanted was plain to all the world,—at least one occupant sat gazing through the window of the first floor front room. An old woman in a cap,—one of those large old-fashioned caps which our grandmothers used to wear, tied with strings under the chin. It was a bow window, and as she was seated in the bay looking right in our direction she could hardly have failed to see us as we advanced,—indeed she continued to stare at us all the while with placid calmness. Yet I knocked once, twice, and yet again without the slightest notice being taken of my summons.
Sydney gave expression to his impatience in his own peculiar vein.
‘Knockers in this part of the world seem intended for ornament only,—nobody seems to pay any attention to them when they’re used. The old lady upstairs must be either deaf or dotty.’ He went out into the road to see if she still was there. ‘She’s looking at me as calmly as you please,—what does she think we’re doing here, I wonder; playing a tune on her front door by way of a little amusement?—Madam!’ He took off his hat and waved it to her. ‘Madam! might I observe that if you won’t condescend to notice that we’re here your front door will run the risk of being severely injured!—She don’t care for me any more than if I was nothing at all,—sound another tattoo upon that knocker. Perhaps she’s so deaf that nothing short of a cataclysmal uproar will reach her auditory nerves.’
She immediately proved, however, that she was nothing of the sort. Hardly had the sounds of my further knocking died away than, throwing up the window, she thrust out her head and addressed me in a fashion which, under the circumstances, was as unexpected as it was uncalled for.
‘Now, young man, you needn’t be in such a hurry!’
Sydney explained.
‘Pardon me, madam, it’s not so much a hurry we’re in as pressed for time,—this is a matter of life and death.’
She turned her attention to Sydney,—speaking with a frankness for which, I imagine, he was unprepared.
‘I don’t want none of your imperence, young man. I’ve seen you before,—you’ve been hanging about here the whole day long!—and I don’t like the looks of you, and so I’ll let you know. That’s my front door, and that’s my knocker,—I’ll come down and open when I like, but I’m not going to be hurried, and if the knocker’s so much as touched again, I won’t come down at all.’
She closed the window with a bang. Sydney seemed divided between mirth and indignation.
‘That’s a nice old lady, on my honour,—one of the good old crusty sort. Agreeable characters this neighbourhood seems to grow,—a sojourn hereabouts should do one good. Unfortunately I don’t feel disposed just now to stand and kick my heels in the road.’ Again saluting the old dame by raising his hat he shouted to her at the top of his voice. ‘Madam, I beg ten thousand pardons for troubling you, but this is a matter in which every second is of vital importance,—would you allow me to ask you one or two questions?’
Up went the window; out came the old lady’s head.
‘Now, young man, you needn’t put yourself out to holler at me,—I won’t be hollered at! I’ll come down and open that door in five minutes by the clock on my mantelpiece, and not a moment before.’
The fiat delivered, down came the window. Sydney looked rueful,—he consulted his watch.
‘I don’t know what you think, Champnell, but I really doubt if this comfortable creature can tell us anything worth waiting another five minutes to hear. We mustn’t let the grass grow under our feet, and time is getting on.’
I was of a different opinion,—and said so.
‘I’m afraid, Atherton, that I can’t agree with you. She seems to have noticed you hanging about all day; and it is at least possible that she has noticed a good deal which would be well worth our hearing. What more promising witness are we likely to find?—her house is the only one which overlooks the one we have just quitted. I am of opinion that it may not only prove well worth our while to wait five minutes, but also that it would be as well, if possible, not to offend her by the way. She’s not likely to afford us the information we require if you do.’
‘Good. If that’s what you think I’m sure I’m willing to wait,—only it’s to be hoped that that clock upon her mantelpiece moves quicker than its mistress.’
Presently, when about a minute had gone, he called to the cabman.
‘Seen a sign of anything?’
The cabman shouted back.
‘Ne’er a sign,—you’ll hear a sound of popguns when I do.’
Those five minutes did seem long ones. But at last Sydney, from his post of vantage in the road, informed us that the old lady was moving.
‘She’s getting up;—she’s leaving the window;—let’s hope to goodness she’s coming down to open the door. That’s been the longest five minutes I’ve known.’
I could hear uncertain footsteps descending the stairs. They came along the passage. The door was opened—‘on the chain.’ The old lady peered at us through an aperture of about six inches.
‘I don’t know what you young men think you’re after, but have all three of you in my house I won’t. I’ll have him and you’—a skinny finger was pointed to Lessingham and me; then it was directed towards Atherton—‘but have him I won’t. So if it’s anything particular you want to say to me, you’ll just tell him to go away.’
On hearing this Sydney’s humility was abject. His hat was in his hand,—he bent himself double.
‘Suffer me to make you a million apologies, madam, if I have in any way offended you; nothing, I assure you, could have been farther from my intention, or from my thoughts.’
‘I don’t want none of your apologies, and I don’t want none of you neither; I don’t like the looks of you, and so I tell you. Before I let anybody into my house you’ll have to sling your hook.’
The door was banged in our faces. I turned to Sydney.
‘The sooner you go the better it will be for us. You can wait for us over the way.’
He shrugged his shoulders, and groaned,—half in jest, half in earnest.
‘If I must I suppose I must,—it’s the first time I’ve been refused admittance to a lady’s house in all my life! What have I done to deserve this thing?—If you keep me waiting long I’ll tear that infernal den to pieces!’
He sauntered across the road, viciously kicking the stones as he went. The door reopened.
‘Has that other young man gone?’
‘He has.’
‘Then now I’ll let you in. Have him inside my house I won’t.’
The chain was removed. Lessingham and I entered. Then the door was refastened and the chain replaced. Our hostess showed us into the front room on the ground floor; it was sparsely furnished and not too clean,—but there were chairs enough for us to sit upon; which she insisted on our occupying.
‘Sit down, do,—I can’t abide to see folks standing; it gives me the fidgets.’
So soon as we were seated, without any overture on our parts she plungedin medias res.
‘I know what it is you’ve come about,—I know! You want me to tell you who it is as lives in the house over the road. Well, I can tell you,—and I dare bet a shilling that I’m about the only one who can.’
I inclined my head.
‘Indeed. Is that so, madam?’
She was huffed at once.
‘Don’t madam me,—I can’t bear none of your lip service. I’m a plain-spoken woman, that’s what I am, and I like other people’s tongues to be as plain as mine. My name’s Miss Louisa Coleman; but I’m generally called Miss Coleman,—I’m only called Louisa by my relatives.’
Since she was apparently between seventy and eighty—and looked every year of her apparent age—I deemed that possible. Miss Coleman was evidently a character. If one was desirous of getting information out of her it would be necessary to allow her to impart it in her own manner,—to endeavour to induce her to impart it in anybody else’s would be time clean wasted. We had Sydney’s fate before our eyes.
She started with a sort of roundabout preamble.
‘This property is mine; it was left me by my uncle, the late George Henry Jobson,—he’s buried in Hammersmith Cemetery just over the way,—he left me the whole of it. It’s one of the finest building sites near London, and it increases in value every year, and I’m not going to let it for another twenty, by which time the value will have more than trebled,—so if that is what you’ve come about, as heaps of people do, you might have saved yourselves the trouble. I keep the boards standing, just to let people know that the ground is to let,—though, as I say, it won’t be for another twenty years, when it’ll be for the erection of high-class mansions only, same as there is in Grosvenor Square,—no shops or public houses, and none of your shanties. I live in this place just to keep an eye upon the property,—and as for the house over the way, I’ve never tried to let it, and it never has been let, not until a month ago, when, one morning, I had this letter. You can see it if you like.’
She handed me a greasy envelope which she ferreted out of a capacious pocket which was suspended from her waist, and which she had to lift up her skirt to reach. The envelope was addressed, in unformed characters, ‘Miss Louisa Coleman, The Rhododendrons, Convolvulus Avenue, High Oaks Park, West Kensington.’—I felt, if the writer had not been of a humorous turn of mind, and drawn on his imagination, and this really was the lady’s correct address, then there must be something in a name.
The letter within was written in the same straggling, characterless caligraphy,—I should have said, had I been asked offhand, that the whole thing was the composition of a servant girl. The composition was about on a par with the writing.