CHAPTER XIII.
THE FACE AT THE BROKEN WINDOW.
Miss Clarasat down—perhaps I should say collapsed down. But for the fact that a huge Chesterfield stood immediately at her back, ready to receive the fair burden of her charms, I am persuaded that her ultimate destination would have been the floor. The suddenness of my statement "dropped" her as neatly as a good marksman "drops" his bird.
Sinking—"all of a flutter," as she afterwards described it, thus unconsciously confirming the aptness of my bird imagery—upon the Chesterfield, this truly remarkable woman merely observed, "Well, I never!" and then as speedily recovering herself, sat up and said, quietly:
"I knew there was something behind it all along."
This was said, I may observe, not in relation to the Chesterfield which had so fortunately been behindher, but to my story.
"Of course you did," I said. "Anyone could see that with half an eye. There are two things behind it. First, I want you to help me to marry your niece, and second, I want to help you to get your brother out of the hands of these blackmailers."
In thus coupling our common interests, and in thus bespeaking, if not assuming, her assistance on my behalf, I was taking a good deal for granted, but she did not seem to resent it.
"You have plenty of impudence, young man," she said, smiling grimly. "You'll be wanting someone to help you to marry me next."
"That," I answered, "is the one regret I shall have, if I succeed in winning your niece. It will prevent me from ever hoping to win the heart and hand (and what a pretty hand it is too!) of her charming and accomplished aunt."
Then I told of my well-deserved ducking in the lake, admitting frankly that I had lied when I had said I could not swim, but pleading my cause and the excuses to be urged in my favour with all the eloquence at my command, and, judging byher increasing friendliness, not altogether without success.
"And now," I said, when I had made an end of it, "now about your brother and the kidnapping?"
"Yes," she replied, "we have to think of that. I expect you think that both Kate and I have taken it coolly, considering. But, you see, you don't know my brother. If you did, you'd have very little fear about his being able to take care of himself, wherever he is. What do you propose?"
"First of all," I said, "I'll ask you to ascertain whether the house is still being watched. You are taking me very much on trust, and if it should turn out that the shadower has returned to his post, or another shadower has been put on duty, it will go a little way to confirm my story, and to prove that I'm not altogether an impostor."
"I either trust people altogether, or don't trust them at all," she answered. "But you've been frank with me, so I'll tell you now that I haven't taken you so entirely upon trust as you imagine. There's an evening paper on that table which has an account of the finding of the bodies, just as you mentioned; and when I went upstairsto speak to my niece, I took the opportunity to peep up and down the road from behind the blinds. Thereisa man watching this house, and also a house somewhere in Taunton Square, just as you said. It certainly is very curious. Come in!"
The last two words were spoken in response to a knock. The door, when opened, revealed Metcalfe with a telegram on a salver. She read the slip of orange paper quite coolly, and then passed it to me, saying, "From my brother."
It was as follows:—
Hope Kate and you not anxious last night. Letter I wrote early yesterday morning explaining was called to Glasgow on business not posted by oversight. Only just discovered it in my pocket. So sorry. May be away some days.—John.
Hope Kate and you not anxious last night. Letter I wrote early yesterday morning explaining was called to Glasgow on business not posted by oversight. Only just discovered it in my pocket. So sorry. May be away some days.—John.
"So, you see, he's safe enough," Miss Clara said, smiling. "Do you really think you're right in thinking he is one of the millionaires they want to kidnap? I admit it is a curious coincidence that someone should be watching the house."
"Perhaps Ihavejumped to conclusions somewhat," I said. "But if someone is really watching the house again, I ought to be at work, not wasting any more ofyour time and my time by gossiping here—especially as it turns out after all that Mr. Carleton is safe. If there is any back door I could slip out by, I think I'll either follow the shadower myself, and see if I can't find out where he comes from, or perhaps even try to get New Scotland Yard to arrest him on suspicion. He's the only clue I've got to the whereabouts of the Dumpling, and it won't do for me to lose sight of him. What's that noise, I wonder, in the street? There's something amiss, clearly. It won't do for me to be seen leaving the house. Would you mind letting your servant inquire?"
"Certainly, if you wish it," she said, ringing the bell.
"Metcalfe, just find out what that disturbance in the street is," she said, when the man appeared, "and come back to report to me."
"I have been out to see already, m'm," Metcalfe answered respectfully. "A man's been stabbed—killed, too. They say he's a brother of Mr. Grant the detective, who lives at No. 10, Taunton Place, and very like him, and that a man who has been hanging about the street all day stabbed himjust as he was coming out of No. 10. Why he did it nobody knows, unless the murderer's a criminal that Mr. Grant was after, and stabbed the brother, thinking it was the detective himself. And the worst of it is he's got away, too! But what's that?"
From the back of the house there came a sound that was suspiciously like the stealthy breaking of glass.
It so happens that I have extraordinary sharp hearing, and was able with some exactness to locate the direction whence the sound came.
Calling out "Follow me, Metcalfe!" I dashed down the stairs and through a door which led to a corridor, at the end of which was a conservatory. A cold wind indicated either an open door or window—perhaps a broken window. As I raced along the corridor—the bewildered Metcalfe so far behind me that I could hear his heavy steps descending the stairs—I saw that though all the other plants in the conservatory were perfectly still, one white-blossomed flower in a pot was swaying and moving as if in a draught, and the next moment there peered, through a broken pane of glass behind it, the white and wicked face of the Dumpling.