Kirkwood sought her eyes, and found them wholly ingenuous. It seemed that Calendar had not taken her into his confidence, after all. She was, therefore, in no way implicated in her father's affairs. Inexplicably the young man's heart felt lighter. "A mistake; the fellow took me for some one he knew," he told her carelessly.
The assurance satisfied her. She rested quietly, wrapped up in personal concerns. Her companion pensively contemplated an infinity of arid and hansom-less to-morrows. About them the city throbbed in a web of misty twilight, the humid farewell of a dismal day. In the air a faint haze swam, rendering the distances opalescent. Athwart the western sky the after-glow of a drenched sunset lay like a wash of rose-madder. Piccadilly's asphalt shone like watered silk, black and lustrous, reflecting a myriad lights in vibrant ribbons of party-colored radiance. On every hand cab-lamps danced like fire-flies; the rumble of wheels blended with the hollow pounding of uncounted hoofs, merging insensibly into the deep and solemn roar of London-town.
Suddenly Kirkwood was recalled to a sense of duty by a glimpse of Hyde Park Corner. He turned to the girl. "I didn't know where you wished to go—?"
She seemed to realize his meaning with surprise, as one, whose thoughts have strayed afar, recalled to an imperative world.
"Oh, did I forget? Tell him please to drive to Number Nine, Frognall Street, Bloomsbury."
Kirkwood poked his cane through the trap, repeating the address. The cab wheeled smartly across Piccadilly, swung into Half Moon Street, and thereafter made better time, darting briskly down abrupt vistas of shining pavement, walled in by blank-visaged houses, or round two sides of one of London's innumerable private parks, wherein spring foliage glowed a tender green in artificial light; now and again it crossed brilliant main arteries of travel, and eventually emerged from a maze of backways into Oxford Street, to hammer eastwards to Tottenham Court Road.
Constraint hung like a curtain between the two; a silence which the young man forbore to moderate, finding more delight that he had cared (or dared) confess to, in contemplation of the pure girlish profile so close to him.
She seemed quite unaware of him, lost in thought, large eyes sober, lips serious that were fashioned for laughter, round little chin firm with some occult resolution. It was not hard to fancy her nerves keyed to a high pitch of courage and determination, nor easy to guess for what reason. Watching always, keenly sensitive to the beauty of each salient line betrayed by the flying lights, Kirkwood's own consciousness lost itself in a profitless, even a perilous labyrinth of conjecture.
The cab stopped. Both occupants came to their senses with a little start. The girl leaned out over; the apron, recognized the house she sought in one swift glance, testified to the recognition with a hushed exclamation, and began to arrange her skirts. Kirkwood, unheeding her faint-hearted protests, jumped out, interposing his cane between her skirts and the wheel. Simultaneously he received a vivid mental photograph of the locality.
Frognall Street proved to be one of those by-ways, a short block in length, which, hemmed in on all sides by a meaner purlieu, has (even in Bloomsbury!) escaped the sordid commercial eye of the keeper of furnished lodgings, retaining jealously something of the old-time dignity and reserve that were its pride in the days before Society swarmed upon Mayfair and Belgravia.
Its houses loomed tall, with many windows, mostly lightless—materially aggravating that air of isolate, cold dignity which distinguishes the Englishman's castle. Here and there stood one less bedraggled than its neighbors, though all, without exception, spoke assertively of respectability down-at-the-heel but fighting tenaciously for existence. Some, vanguards of that imminent day when the boarding-house should reign supreme, wore with shamefaced air placards of estate-agents, advertising their susceptibility to sale or lease. In the company of the latter was Number 9.
The American noted the circumstance subconsciously, at a moment when Miss Calendar's hand, small as a child's, warm and compact in its white glove, lay in his own. And then she was on the sidewalk, her face, upturned to his, vivacious with excitement.
"You have been so kind," she told him warmly, "that one hardly knows how to thank you, Mr. Kirkwood."
"I have done nothing—nothing at all," he mumbled, disturbed by a sudden, unreasoning alarm for her.
She passed quickly to the shelter of the pillared portico. He followed clumsily. On the door-step she turned, offering her hand. He took and retained it.
"Good night," she said.
"I'm to understand that I'm dismissed, then?" he stammered ruefully.
She evaded his eyes. "I—thank you—I have no further need—"
"You are quite sure? Won't you believe me at your service?"
She laughed uneasily. "I'm all right now."
"I can do nothing more? Sure?"
"Nothing. But you—you make me almost sorry I can't impose still further upon your good nature."
"Please don't hesitate ..."
"Aren't you very persistent, Mr. Kirkwood?" Her fingers moved in his; burning with the reproof, he released them, and turned to her so woebegone a countenance that she repented of her severity. "Don't worry about me, please. I am truly safe now. Some day I hope to be able to thank you adequately. Good night!"
Her pass-key grated in the lock. Opening, the door disclosed a dark and uninviting entry-hall, through which there breathed an air heavy with the dank and dusty odor of untenanted rooms. Hesitating on the threshold, over her shoulder the girl smiled kindly upon her commandeered esquire; and stepped within.
He lifted his hat automatically. The door closed with an echoing slam. He turned to the waiting cab, fumbling for change.
"I'll walk," he told the cabby, paying him off.
The hansom swept away to a tune of hammering hoofs; and quiet rested upon the street as Kirkwood turned the nearest corner, in an unpleasant temper, puzzled and discontented. It seemed hardly fair that he should have been dragged into so promising an adventure, by his ears (so to put it), only to be thus summarily called upon to write "Finis" beneath the incident.
He rounded the corner and walked half-way to the next street, coming to an abrupt and rebellious pause by the entrance to a covered alleyway, of two minds as to his proper course of action.
In the background of his thoughts Number 9, Frognall Street, reared its five-story façade, sinister and forbidding. He reminded himself of its unlighted windows; of its sign, "To be let"; of the effluvia of desolation that had saluted him when the door swung wide. A deserted house; and the girl alone in it!—was it right for him to leave her so?
The covered alleyway gave upon Quadrant Mews; or so declared a notice painted on the dead wall of the passage.
Overhead, complaining as it swayed in the wind, hung the smirched and weather-worn sign-board of the Hog-in-the-Pound public house; wherefrom escaped sounds of such revelry by night as is indulged in by the British working-man in hours of ease. At the curb in front of the house of entertainment, dejected animals drooping between their shafts, two hansoms stood in waiting, until such time as the lords of their destinies should see fit to sally forth and inflict themselves upon a cab-hungry populace. As Kirkwood turned, a third vehicle rumbled up out of the mews.
Kirkwood can close his eyes, even at this late day, and both see and hear it all again—even as he can see the unbroken row of dingy dwellings that lined his way back from Quadrant Mews to Frognall Street corner: all drab and unkempt, all sporting in their fan-lights the legend and lure, "Furnished Apartments."
For, between his curiosity about and his concern for the girl, he was being led back to Number 9, by the nose, as it were,—hardly willingly, at best. Profoundly stupefied by the contemplation of his own temerity, he yet returned unfaltering. He who had for so long plumed himself upon his strict supervision of his personal affairs and equally steadfast unconsciousness of his neighbor's businesses, now found himself in the very act of pushing in where he was not wanted: as he had been advised in well-nigh as many words. He experienced an effect of standing to one side, a witness of his own folly, with rising wonder, unable to credit the strength of the infatuation which was placing him so conspicuously in the way of a snubbing.
If perchance he were to meet the girl again as she was leaving Number 9,—what then? The contingency dismayed him incredibly, in view of the fact that it did not avail to make him pause. To the contrary he disregarded it resolutely; mad, impertinent, justified of his unnamed apprehensions, or simply addled,—he held on his way.
He turned up Frognall Street with the manner of one out for a leisurely evening stroll. Simultaneously, from the farther corner, another pedestrian debouched, into the thoroughfare—a mere moving shadow at that distance, brother to blacker shadows that skulked in the fenced areas and unlively entries of that poorly lighted block. The hush was something beyond belief, when one remembered the nearness of blatant Tottenham Court Road.
Kirkwood conceived a wholly senseless curiosity about the other wayfarer. The man was walking rapidly, heels ringing with uncouth loudness, cane tapping the flagging at brief intervals. Both sounds ceased abruptly as their cause turned in beneath one of the porticos. In the emphatic and unnatural quiet that followed, Kirkwood, stepping more lightly, fancied that another shadow followed the first, noiselessly and with furtive stealth.
Could it be Number 9 into which they had passed? The American's heart beat a livelier tempo at the suggestion. If it had not been Number 9—he was still too far away to tell—it was certainly one of the dwellings adjacent thereunto. The improbable possibility (But why improbable?) that the girl was being joined by her father, or by friends, annoyed him with illogical intensity. He mended his own pace, designing to pass whichever house it might be before the door should be closed; thought better of this, and slowed up again, anathematizing himself with much excuse for being the inquisitive dolt that he was.
Approaching Number 9 with laggard feet, he manufactured a desire to light a cigarette, as a cover for his design, were he spied upon by unsuspected eyes. Cane under arm, hands cupped to shield a vesta's flame, he stopped directly before the portico, turning his eyes askance to the shadowed doorway; and made a discovery sufficiently startling to hold him spellbound and, incidentally, to scorch his gloves before he thought to drop the match.
The door of Number 9 stood ajar, a black interval an inch or so in width showing between its edge and the jamb.
Suspicion and alarm set his wits a-tingle. More distinctly he recalled the jarring bang, accompanied by the metallic click of the latch, when the girl had shut herself in—and him out. Now, some person or persons had followed her, neglecting the most obvious precaution of a householder. And why? Why but because the intruders did not wish the sound of closing to be audible to her—or those—within?
He reminded himself that it was all none of his affair, decided to pass on and go his ways in peace, and impulsively, swinging about, marched straight away for the unclosed door.
"'Old'ard, guvner!"
Kirkwood halted on the cry, faltering in indecision. Should he take the plunge, or withdraw? Synchronously he was conscious that a man's figure had detached itself from the shadows beneath the nearest portico and was drawing nearer, with every indication of haste, to intercept him.
"'Ere now, guvner, yer mykin' a mistyke. You don't live 'ere."
"How do you know?" demanded Kirkwood crisply, tightening his grip on his stick.
Was this the second shadow he had seemed to see—the confederate of him who had entered Number 9; a sentry to forestall interruption? If so, the fellow lacked discretion, though his determination that the American should not interfere was undeniable. It was with an ugly and truculent manner, if more warily, that the man closed in.
"I knows. You clear hout, or—"
He flung out a hand with the plausible design of grasping Kirkwood by the collar. The latter lifted his stick, deflecting the arm, and incontinently landed his other fist forcibly on the fellow's chest. The man reeled back, cursing. Before he could recover Kirkwood calmly crossed the threshold, closed the door and put his shoulder to it. In another instant, fumbling in the darkness, he found the bolts and drove them home.
And it was done, the transformation accomplished; his inability to refrain from interfering had encompassed his downfall, had changed a peaceable and law-abiding alien within British shores into a busybody, a trespasser, a misdemeanant, a—yes, for all he knew to the contrary, in the estimation of the Law, a burglar, prime candidate for a convict's stripes!
Breathing hard with excitement he turned and laid his back against the panels, trembling in every muscle, terrified by the result of his impulsive audacity, thunder-struck by a lightning-like foreglimpse of its possible consequences. Of what colossal imprudence had he not been guilty?
"The devil!" he whispered. "What an ass, what an utter ass I am!"
Behind him the knob was rattled urgently, to an accompaniment of feet shuffling on the stone; and immediately—if he were to make a logical deduction from the rasping and scraping sound within the door-casing—the bell-pull was violently agitated, without, however, educing any response from the bell itself, wherever that might be situate. After which, as if in despair, the outsider again rattled and jerked the knob.
Be his status what it might, whether servant of the household, its caretaker, or a night watchman, the man was palpably determined both to get himself in and Kirkwood out, and yet (curious to consider) determined to gain his end without attracting undue attention. Kirkwood had expected to hear the knocker's thunder, as soon as the bell failed to give tongue; but it did not sound although therewasa knocker,—Kirkwood himself had remarked that antiquated and rusty bit of ironmongery affixed to the middle panel of the door. And it made him feel sure that something surreptitious and lawless was in process within those walls, that the confederate without, having failed to prevent a stranger from entering, left unemployed a means so certain-sure to rouse the occupants.
But his inferential analysis of this phase of the proceedings was summarily abrupted by that identical alarm. In a trice the house was filled with flying echoes, wakened to sonorous riot by the crash and clamor of the knocker; and Kirkwood stood fully two yards away, his heart hammering wildly, his nerves a-jingle, much as if the resounding blows had landed upon his own person rather than on stout oaken planking.
Ere he had time to wonder, the racket ceased, and from the street filtered voices in altercation. Listening, Kirkwood's pulses quickened, and he laughed uncertainly for pure relief, retreating to the door and putting an ear to a crack.
The accents of one speaker were new in his hearing, stern, crisp, quick with the spirit of authority which animates that most austere and dignified limb of the law to be encountered the world over, a London bobby.
"Now then, my man, what do you want there? Come now, speak up, and step out into the light, where I can see you."
The response came in the sniffling snarl of the London ne'er-do-well, the unemployable rogue whose chiefest occupation seems to be to march in the ranks of The Unemployed on the occasion of its annual demonstrations.
"Le' me alone, carntcher? Ah'm doin' no 'arm, officer,—"
"Didn't you hear me? Step out here. Ah, that's better.... No harm, eh? Perhaps you'll explain how there's no harm breakin' into unoccupied 'ouses?"
"Gorblimy, 'ow was I to know? 'Ere's a toff 'ands me sixpence fer hopenin' 'is cab door to-dye, an', sezee, 'My man,' 'e sez, 'yer've got a 'onest fyce. W'y don'cher work?' sezee. ''Ow can I?' sez I. ''Ere'm I hout of a job these six months, lookin' fer work every dye an' carn't find it.' Sezee, 'Come an' see me this hevenin' at me home, Noine, Frognall Stryte,' 'e sez, an'—"
"That'll do for now. You borrow a pencil and paper and write it down and I'll read it when I've got more time; I never heard the like of it. This 'ouse hasn't been lived in these two years. Move on, and don't let me find you round 'ere again. March, I say!"
There was more of it—more whining explanations artfully tinctured with abuse, more terse commands to depart, the whole concluding with scraping footsteps, diminuendo, and another perfunctory, rattle of the knob as the bobby, having shoo'd the putative evil-doer off, assured himself that no damage had actually been done. Then he, too, departed, satisfied and self-righteous, leaving a badly frightened but very grateful amateur criminal to pursue his self-appointed career of crime.
He had no choice other than to continue; in point of fact, it had been insanity just then to back out, and run the risk of apprehension at the hands of that ubiquitous bobby, who (for all he knew) might be lurking not a dozen yards distant, watchful for just such a sequel. Still, Kirkwood hesitated with the best of excuses. Reassuring as he had found the sentinel's extemporized yarn,—proof positive that the fellow had had no more right to prohibit a trespass than Kirkwood to commit one,—at the same time he found himself pardonably a prey to emotions of the utmost consternation and alarm. If he feared to leave the house he had no warrant whatever to assume that he would be permitted to remain many minutes unharmed within its walls of mystery.
The silence of it discomfited him beyond measure; it was, in a word, uncanny.
Before him, as he lingered at the door, vaguely disclosed by a wan illumination penetrating a dusty and begrimed fan-light, a broad hall stretched indefinitely towards the rear of the building, losing itself in blackness beyond the foot of a flight of stairs. Save for a few articles of furniture,—a hall table, an umbrella-stand, a tall dumb clock flanked by high-backed chairs,—it was empty. Other than Kirkwood's own restrained respiration not a sound throughout the house advertised its inhabitation; not a board creaked beneath the pressure of a foot, not a mouse rustled in the wainscoting or beneath the floors, not a breath of air stirred sighing in the stillness.
And yet, a tremendous racket had been raised at the front door, within the sixty seconds past! And yet, within twenty minutes two persons, at least, had preceded Kirkwood into the building! Had they not heard? The speculation seemed ridiculous. Or had they heard and, alarmed, been too effectually hobbled by the coils of their nefarious designs to dare reveal themselves, to investigate the cause of that thunderous summons? Or were they, perhaps, aware of Kirkwood's entrance, and lyingperdui, in some dark corner, to ambush him as he passed?
True, that were hardly like the girl. True, on the other hand, it were possible that she had stolen away while Kirkwood was hanging in irresolution by the passage to Quadrant Mews. Again, the space of time between Kirkwood's dismissal and his return had been exceedingly brief; whatever her errand, she could hardly have fulfilled it and escaped. At that moment she might be in the power and at the mercy of him who had followed her; providing he were not friendly. And in that case, what torment and what peril might not be hers?
Spurred by solicitude, the young man put personal apprehensions in his pocket and forgot them, cautiously picking his way through the gloom to the foot of the stairs. There, by the newel-post, he paused. Darkness walled him about. Overhead the steps vanished in a well of blackness; he could not even see the ceiling; his eyes ached with futile effort to fathom the unknown; his ears rang with unrewarded strain of listening. The silence hung inviolate, profound.
Slowly he began to ascend, a hand following the balusters, the other with his cane exploring the obscurity before him. On the steps, a carpet, thick and heavy, muffled his footfalls. He moved noiselessly. Towards the top the staircase curved, and presently a foot that groped for a higher level failed to find it. Again he halted, acutely distrustful.
Nothing happened.
He went on, guided by the balustrade, passing three doors, all open, through which the undefined proportions of a drawing-room and boudoir were barely suggested in a ghostly dusk. By each he paused, listening, hearing nothing.
His foot struck with a deadened thud against the bottom step of the second flight, and his pulses fluttered wildly for a moment. Two minutes—three—he waited in suspense. From above came no sound. He went on, as before, save that twice a step yielded, complaining, to his weight. Toward the top the close air, like the darkness, seemed to weigh more heavily upon his consciousness; little drops of perspiration started out on his forehead, his scalp tingled, his mouth was hot and dry, he felt as if stifled.
Again the raised foot found no level higher than its fellows. He stopped and held his breath, oppressed by a conviction that some one was near him. Confirmation of this came startlingly—an eerie whisper in the night, so close to him that he fancied he could feel the disturbed air fanning his face.
"Is it you, Eccles?" He had no answer ready. The voice was masculine, if he analyzed it correctly. Dumb and stupid he stood poised upon the point of panic.
"Eccles, is it you?"
The whisper was both shrill and shaky. As it ceased Kirkwood was half blinded by a flash of light, striking him squarely in the eyes. Involuntarily he shrank back a pace, to the first step from the top. Instantaneously the light was eclipsed.
"Halt or—or I fire!"
By now he realized that he had been scrutinized by the aid of an electric hand-lamp. The tremulous whisper told him something else—that the speaker suffered from nerves as high-strung as his own. The knowledge gave him inspiration. He cried at a venture, in a guarded voice, "Hands up!"—and struck out smartly with his stick. Its ferrule impinged upon something soft but heavy. Simultaneously he heard a low, frightened cry, the cane was swept aside, a blow landed glancingly on his shoulder, and he was carried fairly off his feet by the weight of a man hurled bodily upon him with staggering force and passion. Reeling, he was borne back and down a step or two, and then,—choking on an oath,—dropped his cane and with one hand caught the balusters, while the other tore ineffectually at wrists of hands that clutched his throat. So, for a space, the two hung, panting and struggling.
Then endeavoring to swing his shoulders over against the wall, Kirkwood released his grip on the hand-rail and stumbled on the stairs, throwing his antagonist out of balance. The latter plunged downward, dragging Kirkwood with him. Clawing, kicking, grappling, they went to the bottom, jolted violently by each step; but long before the last was reached, Kirkwood's throat was free.
Throwing himself off, he got to his feet and grasped the railing for support; then waited, panting, trying to get his bearings. Himself painfully shaken and bruised, he shrewdly surmised that his assailant had fared as ill, if not worse. And, in point of fact, the man lay with neither move nor moan, still as death at the American's feet.
And once more silence had folded its wings over Number 9, Frognall Street.
More conscious of that terrifying, motionless presence beneath him, than able to distinguish it by power of vision, he endured interminable minutes of trembling horror, in a witless daze, before he thought of his match-box. Immediately he found it and struck a light. As the wood caught and the bright small flame leaped in the pent air, he leaned forward, over the body, breathlessly dreading what he must discover.
The man lay quiet, head upon the floor, legs and hips on the stairs. One arm had fallen over his face, hiding the upper half. The hand gleamed white and delicate as a woman's. His chin was smooth and round, his lips thin and petulant. Beneath his top-coat, evening dress clothed a short and slender figure. Nothing whatever of his appearance suggested the burly ruffian, the midnight marauder; he seemed little more than a boy old enough to dress for dinner. In his attitude there was something pitifully suggestive of a beaten child, thrown into a corner.
Conscience-smitten and amazed Kirkwood stared on until, without warning, the match flickered and went out. Then, straightening up with an exclamation at once of annoyance and concern, he rattled the box; it made no sound,—was empty. In disgust he swore it was the devil's own luck, that he should run out of vestas at a time so critical. He could not even say whether the fellow was dead, unconscious, or simply shamming. He had little idea of his looks; and to be able to identify him might save a deal of trouble at some future time,—since he, Kirkwood, seemed so little able to disengage himself from the clutches of this insane adventure! And the girl—. what had become of her? How could he continue to search for her, without lights or guide, through all those silent rooms, whose walls might inclose a hundred hidden dangers in that house of mystery?
But he debated only briefly. His blood was young, and it was hot; it was quite plain to him that he could not withdraw and retain his self-respect. If the girl was there to be found, most assuredly, he must find her. The hand-lamp that had dazzled him at the head of the stairs should be his aid, now that he thought of it,—and providing he was able to find it.
In the scramble on the stairs he had lost his hat, but he remembered that the vesta's short-lived light had discovered this on the floor beyond the man's body. Carefully stepping across the latter he recovered his head-gear, and then, kneeling, listened with an ear close to the fellow's face. A softly regular beat of breathing reassured him. Half rising, he caught the body beneath the armpits, lifting and dragging it off the staircase; and knelt again, to feel of each pocket in the man's clothing, partly as an obvious precaution, to relieve him of his advertised revolver against an untimely wakening, partly to see if he had the lamp about him.
The search proved fruitless. Kirkwood suspected that the weapon, like his own, had existed only in his victim's ready imagination. As for the lamp, in the act of rising he struck it with his foot, and picked it up.
It felt like a metal tube a couple of inches in diameter, a foot or so in length, passably heavy. He fumbled with it impatiently. "However the dickens," he wondered audibly, "does the infernal machine work?" As it happened, the thing worked with disconcerting abruptness as his untrained fingers fell hapchance on the spring. A sudden glare again smote him in the face, and at the same instant, from a point not a yard away, apparently, an inarticulate cry rang out upon the stillness.
Heart in his mouth, he stepped back, lowering the lamp (which impishly went out) and lifting a protecting forearm.
"Who's that?" he demanded harshly.
A strangled sob of terror answered him, blurred by a swift rush of skirts, and in a breath his shattered nerves quieted and a glimmer of common sense penetrated the murk anger and fear had bred in his brain. He understood, and stepped forward, catching blindly at the darkness with eager hands.
"Miss Calendar!" he cried guardedly. "Miss Calendar, it is I—Philip Kirkwood!"
There was a second sob, of another caliber than the first; timid fingers brushed his, and a hand, warm and fragile, closed upon his own in a passion of relief and gratitude.
"Oh, I am so g-glad!" It was Dorothy Calendar's voice, beyond mistake. "I—I didn't know what t-to t-think.... When the light struck your face I was sure it was you, but when I called, you answered in a voice so strange,—not like yours at all! ... Tell me," she pleaded, with palpable effort to steady herself; "what has happened?"
"I think, perhaps," said Kirkwood uneasily, again troubled by his racing pulses, "perhaps you can do that better than I."
"Oh!" said the voice guiltily; her fingers trembled on his, and were gently withdrawn. "I was so frightened," she confessed after a little pause, "so frightened that I hardly understand ... But you? How did you—?"
"I worried about you," he replied, in a tone absurdly apologetic. "Somehow it didn't seem right. It was none of my business, of course, but ... I couldn't help coming back. This fellow, whoever he is—don't worry; he's unconscious—slipped into the house in a manner that seemed to me suspicious. I hardly know why I followed, except that he left the door an open invitation to interference ..."
"I can't be thankful enough," she told him warmly, "that you did interfere. You have indeed saved me from ..."
"Yes?"
"I don't know what. If I knew the man—"
"You don'tknowhim?"
"I can't even guess. The light—?"
She paused inquiringly. Kirkwood fumbled with the lamp, but, whether its rude handling had impaired some vital part of the mechanism, or whether the batteries through much use were worn out, he was able to elicit only one feeble glow, which was instantly smothered by the darkness.
"It's no use," he confessed. "The thing's gone wrong."
"Have you a match?"
"I used my last before I got hold of this."
"Oh," she commented, discouraged. "Have you any notion what he looks like?"
Kirkwood thought briefly. "Raffles," he replied with a chuckle. "He looks like an amateurish and very callow Raffles. He's in dress clothes, you know."
"I wonder!" There was a nuance of profound bewilderment in her exclamation. Then: "He knocked against something in the hall—a chair, I presume; at all events, I heard that and put out the light. I was ... in the room above the drawing-room, you see. I stole down to this floor—was there, in the corner by the stairs when he passed within six inches, and never guessed it. Then, when he got on the next floor, I started on; but you came in. I slipped into the drawing-room and crouched behind a chair. You went on, but I dared not move until ... And then I heard some one cry out, and you fell down the stairs together. I hope you were not hurt—?"
"Nothing worth mention; buthemust have got a pretty stiff knock, to lay him out so completely." Kirkwood stirred the body with his toe, but the man made no sign. "Dead to the world ... And now, Miss Calendar?"
If she answered, he did not hear; for on the heels of his query banged the knocker down below; and thereafter crash followed crash, brewing a deep and sullen thundering to rouse the echoes and send them rolling, like voices of enraged ghosts, through the lonely rooms.
"What's that?" At the first alarm the girl had caught convulsively at Kirkwood's arm. Now, when a pause came in the growling of the knocker, she made him hear her voice; and it was broken and vibrant with a threat of hysteria. "Oh, what can it mean?"
"I don't know." He laid a hand reassuringly over that which trembled on his forearm. "The police, possibly."
"Police!" she iterated, aghast. "What makes you think—?"
"A man tried to stop me at the door," he answered quickly. "I got in before he could. When he tried the knocker, a bobby came along and stopped him. The latter may have been watching the house since then,—it'd be only his duty to keep an eye on it; and Heaven knows we raised a racket, coming head-first down those stairs! Now we are up against it," he added brightly.
But the girl was tugging at his hand. "Come!" she begged breathlessly. "Come! There is a way! Before they break in—"
"But this man—?" Kirkwood hung back, troubled.
"They—the police are sure to find and care for him."
"So they will." He chuckled, "And serve him right! He'd have choked me to death, with all the good will in the world!"
"Oh, do hurry!"
Turning, she sped light-footed down the staircase to the lower hall, he at her elbow. Here the uproar was loudest—deep enough to drown whatever sounds might have been made by two pairs of flying feet. For all that they fled on tiptoe, stealthily, guilty shadows in the night; and at the newel-post swung back into the unbroken blackness which shrouded the fastnesses backward of the dwelling. A sudden access of fury on the part of the alarmist at the knocker, spurred them on with quaking hearts. In half a dozen strides, Kirkwood, guided only by instinct and thefrou-frouof the girl's skirts as she ran invisible before him, stumbled on the uppermost steps of a steep staircase; only a hand-rail saved him, and that at the last moment. He stopped short, shocked into caution. From below came a contrite whisper: "I'm so sorry! I should have warned you."
He pulled himself together, glaring wildly at nothing. "It's all right—"
"You're not hurt, truly? Oh, do come quickly."
She waited for him at the bottom of the flight;—happily for him, for he was all at sea.
"Here—your hand—let me guide you. This darkness is dreadful ..."
He found her hand, somehow, and tucked his into it, confidingly, and not without an uncertain thrill of satisfaction.
"Come!" she panted. "Come! If they break in—"
Stifled by apprehension, her voice failed her.
They went forward, now less impetuously, for it was very black; and the knocker had fallen still.
"No fear of that," he remarked after a time. "They wouldn't dare break in."
A fluttering whisper answered him: "I don't know. We dare risk nothing."
They seemed to explore, to penetrate acres of labyrinthine chambers and passages, delving deep into the bowels of the earth, like rabbits burrowing in a warren, hounded by beagles.
Above stairs the hush continued unbroken; as if the dumb Genius of the Place had cast a spell of silence on the knocker, or else, outraged, had smitten the noisy disturber with a palsy.
The girl seemed to know her way; whether guided by familiarity or by intuition, she led on without hesitation, Kirkwood blundering in her wake, between confusion of impression, and dawning dismay conscious of but one tangible thing, to which he clung as to his hope of salvation: those firm, friendly fingers that clasped his own.
It was as if they wandered on for an hour; probably from start to finish their flight took up three minutes, no more. Eventually the girl stopped, releasing his hand. He could hear her syncopated breathing before him, and gathered that something was wrong. He took a step forward.
"What is it?"
Her full voice broke out of the obscurity startlingly close, in his very ear.
"The door—the bolts—I can't budge them."
"Let me ..."
He pressed forward, brushing her shoulder. She did not draw away, but willingly yielded place to his hands at the fastenings; and what had proved impossible to her, to his strong fingers was a matter of comparative ease. Yet, not entirely consciously, he was not quick. As he tugged at the bolts he was poignantly sensitive to the subtle warmth of her at his side; he could hear her soft dry sobs of excitement and suspense, punctuating the quiet; and was frightened, absolutely, by an impulse, too strong for ridicule, to take her in his arms and comfort her with the assurance that, whatever her trouble, he would stand by her and protect her.... It were futile to try to laugh it off; he gave over the endeavor. Even at this critical moment he found himself repeating over and over to his heart the question: "Can this be love? Can this be love? ..."
Could it be love at an hour's acquaintance? Absurd! But he could not laugh—nor render himself insensible to the suggestion.
He found that he had drawn the bolts. The girl tugged and rattled at the knob. Reluctantly the door opened inwards. Beyond its threshold stretched ten feet or more of covered passageway, whose entrance framed an oblong glimmering with light. A draught of fresh air smote their faces. Behind them a door banged.
"Where does this open?"
"On the mews," she informed him.
"The mews!" He stared in consternation at the pallid oval that stood for her face. "The mews! But you, in your evening gown, and I—"
"There's no other way. We must chance it. Are you afraid?"
Afraid? ... He stepped aside. She slipped by him and on. He closed the door, carefully removing the key and locking it on the outside; then joined the girl at the entrance to the mews, where they paused perforce, she as much disconcerted as he, his primary objection momentarily waxing in force as they surveyed the conditions circumscribing their escape.
Quadrant Mews was busily engaged in enjoying itself. Night had fallen sultry and humid, and the walls and doorsteps were well fringed and clustered with representatives of that class of London's population which infests mews through habit, taste, or force of circumstance.
On the stoops men sprawled at easy length, discussing short, foul cutties loaded with that rank and odoriferous compound which, under the name and in the fame of tobacco, is widely retailed at tuppence the ounce. Their women-folk more commonly squatted on the thresholds, cheerfully squabbling; from opposing second-story windows, two leaned perilously forth, slanging one another across the square briskly in the purest billingsgate; and were impartially applauded from below by an audience whose appreciation seemed faintly tinged with envy. Squawking and yelling children swarmed over the flags and rude cobblestones that paved the ways. Like incense, heavy and pungent, the rich effluvia of stable-yards swirled in air made visible by its faint burden of mist.
Over against the entrance wherein Kirkwood and the girl lurked, confounded by the problem of escaping undetected through this vivacious scene, a stable-door stood wide, exposing a dimly illumined interior. Before it waited a four-wheeler, horse already hitched in between the shafts, while its driver, a man of leisurely turn of mind, made lingering inspection of straps and buckles, and, while Kirkwood watched him, turned attention to the carriage lamps.
The match which he raked spiritedly down his thigh, flared ruddily; the succeeding paler glow of the lamp threw into relief a heavy beefy mask, with shining bosses for cheeks and nose and chin; through narrow slits two cunning eyes glittered like dull gems. Kirkwood appraised him with attention, as one in whose gross carcass was embodied their only hope of unannoyed return to the streets and normal surroundings of their world. The difficulty lay in attracting the man's attention and engaging him without arousing his suspicions or bringing the population about their ears. Though he hesitated long, no favorable opportunity presented itself; and in time the Jehu approached the box with the ostensible purpose of mounting and driving off. In this critical situation the American, forced to recognize that boldness must mark his course, took the girl's fate and his own in his hands, and with a quick word to his companion, stepped out of hiding.
The cabby had a foot upon the step when Kirkwood tapped his shoulder.
"My man—"
"Lor, lumme!" cried the fellow in amaze, pivoting on his heel. Cupidity and quick understanding enlivened the eyes which in two glances looked Kirkwood up and down, comprehending at once both his badly rumpled hat and patent-leather shoes. "S'help me,"—thickly,—"where'd you drop from, guvner?"
"That's my affair," said Kirkwood briskly. "Are you engaged?"
"If you mykes yerself my fare," returned the cabby shrewdly, "Iham."
"Ten shillings, then, if you get us out of here in one minute and to—say—Hyde Park Corner in fifteen."
"Us?" demanded the fellow aggressively.
Kirkwood motioned toward the passageway. "There's a lady with me—there. Quick now!"
Still the man did not move. "Ten bob," he bargained; "an' you runnin' awye with th' stuffy ol' gent's fair darter? Come now, guvner, is it gen'rous? Myke it a quid an'—"
"A pound then.Willyou hurry?"
By way of answer the fellow scrambled hastily up to the box and snatched at the reins. "Ck! Gee-e hup!" he cried sonorously.
By now the mews had wakened to the fact of the presence of a "toff" in its midst. His light topcoat and silk hat-rendered him as conspicuous as a red Indian in war-paint would have been on Rotten Row. A cry of surprise was raised, and drowned in a volley of ribald inquiry and chaff.
Fortunately, the cabby was instant to rein in skilfully before the passageway, and Kirkwood had the door open before the four-wheeler stopped. The girl, hugging her cloak about her, broke cover (whereat the hue and cry redoubled), and sprang into the body of the vehicle. Kirkwood followed, shutting the door. As the cab lurched forward he leaned over and drew down the window-shade, shielding the girl from half a hundred prying eyes. At the same time they gathered momentum, banging swiftly, if loudly out of the mews.
An urchin, leaping on the step to spy in Kirkwood's window, fell off, yelping, as the driver's whiplash curled about his shanks.
The gloom of the tunnel inclosed them briefly ere the lights of the Hog-in-the-Pound flashed by and the wheels began to roll more easily. Kirkwood drew back with a sigh of relief.
"Thank God!" he said softly.
The girl had no words.
Worried by her silence, solicitous lest, the strain ended, she might be on the point of fainting, he let up the shade and lowered the window at her side.
She seemed to have collapsed in her corner. Against the dark upholstery her hair shone like pale gold in the half-light; her eyes were closed and she held a handkerchief to her lips; the other hand lay limp.
"Miss Calendar?"
She started, and something bulky fell from the seat and thumped heavily on the floor. Kirkwood bent to pick it up, and so for the first time was made aware that she had brought with her a small black gladstone bag of considerable weight. As he placed it on the forward seat their eyes met.
"I didn't know—" he began.
"It was to get that," she hastened to explain, "that my father sent me ..."
"Yes," he assented in a tone indicating his complete comprehension. "I trust ..." he added vaguely, and neglected to complete the observation, losing himself in a maze of conjecture not wholly agreeable. This was a new phase of the adventure. He eyed the bag uneasily. What did it contain? How did he know ...?
Hastily he abandoned that line of thought. He had no right to infer anything whatever, who had thrust himself uninvited into her concerns—uninvited, that was to say, in the second instance, having been once definitely given his congé. Inevitably, however, a thousand unanswerable questions pestered him; just as, at each fresh facet of mystery disclosed by the sequence of the adventure, his bewilderment deepened.
The girl stirred restlessly. "I have been thinking," she volunteered in a troubled tone, "that there is absolutely no way I know of, to thank you properly."
"It is enough if I've been useful," he rose in gallantry to the emergency.
"That," she commented, "was very prettily said. But then I have never known any one more kind and courteous and—and considerate, than you." There was no savor of flattery in the simple and direct statement; indeed, she was looking away from him, out of the window, and her face was serious with thought; she seemed to be speaking of, rather than to, Kirkwood. "And I have been wondering," she continued with unaffected candor, "what you must be thinking of me."
"I? ... What should I think of you, Miss Calendar?"
With the air of a weary child she laid her head against the cushions again, face to him, and watched him through lowered lashes, unsmiling.
"You might be thinking that an explanation is due you. Even the way we were brought together was extraordinary, Mr. Kirkwood. You must be very generous, as generous as you have shown yourself brave, not to require some sort of an explanation of me."
"I don't see it that way."
"I do ... You have made me like you very much, Mr. Kirkwood."
He shot her a covert glance—causelessly, for hernaivetéwas flawless. With a feeling of some slight awe he understood this—a sensation of sincere reverence for the unspoiled, candid, child's heart and mind that were hers. "I'm glad," he said simply; "very glad, if that's the case, and presupposing I deserve it. Personally," he laughed, "I seem to myself to have been rather forward."
"No; only kind and a gentleman."
"But—please!" he protested.
"Oh, but I mean it, every word! Why shouldn't I? In a little while, ten minutes, half an hour, we shall have seen the last of each other. Why should I not tell you how I appreciate all that you have unselfishly done for me?"
"If you put it that way,—I'm sure I don't know; beyond that it embarrasses me horribly to have you overestimate me so. If any courage has been shown this night, it is yours ... But I'm forgetting again." He thought to divert her. "Where shall I tell the cabby to go this time, Miss Calendar?"
"Craven Street, please," said the girl, and added a house number. "I am to meet my father there, with this,"—indicating the gladstone bag.
Kirkwood thrust head and shoulders out the window and instructed the cabby accordingly; but his ruse had been ineffectual, as he found when he sat back again. Quite composedly the girl took up the thread of conversation where it had been broken off.
"It's rather hard to keep silence, when you've been so good. I don't want you to think me less generous than yourself, but, truly, I can tell you nothing." She sighed a trace resentfully; or so he thought. "There is little enough in this—this wretched affair, that I understand myself; and that little, I may not tell ... I want you to know that."
"I understand, Miss Calendar."
"There's one thing I may say, however. I have done nothing wrong to-night, I believe," she added quickly.
"I've never for an instant questioned that," he returned with a qualm of shame; for what he said was not true.
"Thank you ..."
The four-wheeler swung out of Oxford Street into Charing Cross Road. Kirkwood noted the fact with a feeling of some relief that their ride was to be so short; like many of his fellow-sufferers from "the artistic temperament," he was acutely disconcerted by spoken words of praise and gratitude; Miss Calendar, unintentionally enough, had succeeded only in rendering him self-conscious and ill at ease.
Nor had she fully relieved her mind, nor voiced all that perturbed her. "There's one thing more," she said presently: "my father. I—I hope you will think charitably of him."
"Indeed, I've no reason or right to think otherwise."
"I was afraid—afraid his actions might have seemed peculiar, to-night ..."
"There are lots of things I don't understand, Miss Calendar. Some day, perhaps, it will all clear up,—this trouble of yours. At least, one supposes it is trouble, of some sort. And then you will tell me the whole story.... Won't you?" Kirkwood insisted.
"I'm afraid not," she said, with a smile of shadowed sadness. "We are to say good night in a moment or two, and—it will be good-by as well. It's unlikely that we shall ever meet again."
"I refuse positively to take such a gloomy view of the case!"
She shook her head, laughing with him, but with shy regret. "It's so, none the less. We are leaving London this very night, my father and I—leaving England, for that matter."
"Leaving England?" he echoed. "You're not by any chance bound for America, are you?"
"I ... can't tell you."
"But you can tell me this: are you booked on theMinneapolis?"
"No—o; it is a—quite another boat."
"Of course!" he commented savagely. "It wouldn't be me to haveanysort of luck!"
She made no reply beyond a low laugh. He stared gloomily out of his window, noting indifferently that they were passing the National Gallery. On their left Trafalgar Square stretched, broad and bare, a wilderness of sooty stone with an air of mutely tolerating its incongruous fountains. Through Charing Cross roared a tide-rip of motor-busses and hackney carriages.
Glumly the young man foresaw the passing of his abbreviated romance; their destination was near at hand. Brentwick had been right, to some extent, at least; it was quite true that the curtain had been rung up that very night, upon Kirkwood's Romance; unhappily, as Brentwick had not foreseen, it was immediately to be rung down.
The cab rolled soberly into the Strand.
"Since we are to say good-by so very soon," suggested Kirkwood, "may I ask a parting favor, Miss Calendar?"
She regarded him with friendly eyes. "You have every right," she affirmed gently.
"Then please to tell me frankly: are you going into any further danger?"
"And is that the only boon you crave at my hands, Mr. Kirkwood?"
"Without impertinence ..."
For a little time, waiting for him to conclude his vague phrase, she watched him in an expectant silence. But the man was diffident to a degree—At length, somewhat unconsciously, "I think not," she answered. "No; there will be no danger awaiting me at Mrs. Hallam's. You need not fear for me any more—Thank you."
He lifted his brows at the unfamiliar name. "Mrs. Hallam—?"
"I am going to her house in Craven Street."
"Your father is to meet you there?"—persistently.
"He promised to."
"But if he shouldn't?"
"Why—" Her eyes clouded; she pursed her lips over the conjectural annoyance. "Why, in that event, I suppose—It would be very embarrassing. You see, I don't know Mrs. Hallam; I don't know that she expects me, unless my father is already there. They are old friends—I could drive round for a while and come back, I suppose."
But she made it plain that the prospect did not please her.
"Won't you let me ask if Mr. Calender is there, before you get out, then? I don't like to be dismissed," he laughed; "and, you know, you shouldn't go wandering round all alone."
The cab drew up. Kirkwood put a hand on the door and awaited her will.
"It—it would be very kind ... I hate to impose upon you."
He turned the knob and got out. "If you'll wait one moment," he said superfluously, as he closed the door.
Pausing only to verify the number, he sprang up the steps and found the bell-button.
It was a modest little residence, in nothing more remarkable than its neighbors, unless it was for a certain air of extra grooming: the area railing was sleek with fresh black paint; the doorstep looked the better for vigorous stoning; the door itself was immaculate, its brasses shining lustrous against red-lacquered woodwork. A soft glow filled the fanlight. Overhead the drawing-room windows shone with a cozy, warm radiance.
The door opened, framing the figure of a maid sketched broadly in masses of somber black and dead white.
"Can you tell me, is Mr. Calendar here?"
The servant's eyes left his face, looked past him at the waiting cab, and returned.
"I'm not sure, sir. If you will please step in."
Kirkwood hesitated briefly, then acceded. The maid closed the door.
"What name shall I say, sir?"
"Mr. Kirkwood."
"If you will please to wait one moment, sir—"
He was left in the entry hall, the servant hurrying to the staircase and up. Three minutes elapsed; he was on the point of returning to the girl, when the maid reappeared.
"Mrs. Hallam says, will you kindly step up-stairs, sir."
Disgruntled, he followed her; at the head of the stairs she bowed him into the drawing-room and again left him to his own resources.
Nervous, annoyed, he paced the floor from wall to wall, his footfalls silenced by heavy rugs. As the delay was prolonged he began to fume with impatience, wondering, half regretting that he had left the girl outside, definitely sorry that he had failed to name his errand more explicitly to the maid. At another time, in another mood, he might have accorded more appreciation to the charm of the apartment, which, betraying the feminine touch in every detail of arrangement and furnishing, was very handsome in an unconventional way. But he was quite heedless of externals.
Wearied, he deposited himself sulkily in an armchair by the hearth.
From a boudoir on the same floor there came murmurs of two voices, a man's and a woman's. The latter laughed prettily.
"Oh, any time!" snorted the American. "Any time you're through with your confounded flirtation, Mr. George B. Calendar!"
The voices rose, approaching. "Good night," said the woman gaily; "farewell and—good luck go with you!"
"Thank you. Good night," replied the man more conservatively.
Kirkwood rose, expectant.
There was a swish of draperies, and a moment later he was acknowledging the totally unlooked-for entrance of the mistress of the house. He had thought to see Calendar, presuming him to be the man closeted with Mrs. Hallam; but, whoever that had been, he did not accompany the woman. Indeed, as she advanced from the doorway, Kirkwood could hear the man's footsteps on the stairs.
"This is Mr. Kirkwood?" The note of inquiry in the well-trained voice—a very alluring voice and one pleasant to listen to, he thought—made it seem as though she had asked, point-blank, "Who is Mr. Kirkwood?"
He bowed, discovering himself in the presence of an extraordinarily handsome and interesting woman; a woman of years which as yet had not told upon her, of experience that had not availed to harden her, at least in so far as her exterior charm of personality was involved; a woman, in brief, who bore close inspection well, despite an elusive effect of maturity, not without its attraction for men. Kirkwood was impressed that it would be very easy to learn to like Mrs. Hallam more than well—with her approval.
Although he had not anticipated it, he was not at all surprised to recognize in her the woman who, if he were not mistaken, had slipped to Calendar that warning in the dining-room of the Pless. Kirkwood's state of mind had come to be such, through his experiences of the past few hours, that he would have accepted anything, however preposterous, as a commonplace happening. But for that matter there was nothing particularly astonishing in thisrencontre.
"I am Mrs. Hallam. You were asking for Mr. Calendar?"
"He was to have been here at this hour, I believe," said Kirkwood.
"Yes?" There was just the right inflection of surprise in her carefully controlled tone.
He became aware of an undercurrent of feeling; that the woman was estimating him shrewdly with her fine direct eyes. He returned her regard with admiring interest; they were gray-green eyes, deep-set but large, a little shallow, a little changeable, calling to mind the sea on a windy, cloudy day.
Below stairs a door slammed.
"I am not a detective, Mrs. Hallam," announced the young man suddenly. "Mr. Calendar required a service of me this evening; I am here in natural consequence. If it was Mr. Calendar who left this house just now, I am wasting time."
"It was not Mr. Calendar." The fine-lined brows arched in surprise, real or pretended, at his first blurted words, and relaxed; amused, the woman laughed deliciously. "But I am expecting him any moment; he was to have been here half an hour since.... Won't you wait?"
She indicated, with a gracious gesture, a chair, and took for herself one end of a davenport. "I'm sure he won't be long, now."
"Thank you, I will return, if I may." Kirkwood moved toward the door.
"But there's no necessity—" She seemed insistent on detaining him, possibly because she questioned his motive, possibly for her own divertisement.
Kirkwood deprecated his refusal with a smile. "The truth is, Miss Calendar is waiting in a cab, outside. I—"
"Dorothy Calendar!" Mrs. Hallam rose alertly. "But why should she wait there? To be sure, we've never met; but I have known her father for many years." Her eyes held steadfast to his face; shallow, flawed by her every thought, like the sea by a cat's-paw he found them altogether inscrutable; yet received an impression that their owner was now unable to account for him.
She swung about quickly, preceding him to the door and down the stairs. "I am sure Dorothy will come in to wait, if I ask her," she told Kirkwood in a high sweet voice. "I'm so anxious to know her. It's quite absurd, really, of her—to stand on ceremony with me, when her father made an appointment here. I'll run out and ask—"
Mrs. Hallam's slim white fingers turned latch and knob, opening the street door, and her voice died away as she stepped out into the night. For a moment, to Kirkwood, tagging after her with an uncomfortable sense of having somehow done the wrong thing, her figure—full fair shoulders and arms rising out of the glittering dinner gown—cut a gorgeous silhouette against the darkness. Then, with a sudden, imperative gesture, she half turned towards him.
"But," she exclaimed, perplexed, gazing to right and left, "but the cab, Mr. Kirkwood?"
He was on the stoop a second later. Standing beside her, he stared blankly.
To the left the Strand roared, the stream of its night-life in high spate; on the right lay the Embankment, comparatively silent and deserted, if brilliant with its high-swung lights. Between the two, quiet Craven Street ran, short and narrow, and wholly innocent of any form of equipage.