CHAPTER XIV.
MISS CLARA "SAVES MY LIFE."
Onearm was stretched through the broken window towards the conservatory door, which he was trying to unlock; but seeing that someone was approaching he withdrew his arm hurriedly, and the white face that had been peering through the jagged hole in the window-pane disappeared. The next instant I was at the conservatory door, all agog to unfasten it and to give chase, when suddenly, from every part of the building, came the ringing of alarm bells, and, with a sharp click, a bolt upon the conservatory door slid into its place. Clearly Miss Clara had pressed the button of the burglar alarm, thus locking the very door to which my hand was then stretched, and so effectually shutting me in, and a possible housebreaker out. With one twist of my fist I turned the key to which the Dumpling had been directing his attention. Then I tried to slide back the only remaining fastening—the bolt which had been shot into its placeby the burglar alarm. It held fast, and cursing Miss Clara, her inventful brother, and his too ingenious burglar box, I tugged at the door with all my strength, but to no purpose. The thing would not budge an inch, and when I snatched up a piece of rockwork from a fernery and bashed desperately at the hateful bolt, I only made matters worse. So far from loosening, the bolt seemed only to set its teeth, bulldogwise, the more tenaciously for my blows. Grinning with rage, and with the strain of concentrating all the strength of my body into my two fists, I threw down the rockwork, with a word I hesitate to repeat, but which Metcalfe, upon whose foot the piece of rockwork fell, had no hesitation in forcibly repeating, what time he limped upon one leg around the conservatory with a grin of pain upon his face more beautiful to behold than the grin which had so recently been upon mine. For the present it was clear that, thanks to Miss Clara and the invention of her resourceful brother, the quarry had escaped me. Long before I could have knocked out sufficient glass to crawl through the conservatory window, long before Miss Clara could have reversed the action of the machineand so released the lock upon the door, the Dumpling would be far away.
"THERE PEERED THROUGH A BROKEN PANE OF GLASS ... THE WHITE AND WICKED FACE OF THE DUMPLING."
Under the circumstances I thought it wise to put the best face I could upon my defeat, delicately hinting at the same time to Metcalfe that I should be personally obliged if he would make it convenient to do the same upon his pain, since much as one might admire a stone gargoyle which bore a resemblance to a human face, a human face which bore a striking likeness to a stone gargoyle in pain was less admirable and more alarming.
"And now," I said, "we'll return to the drawing-room and to Miss Clara, and get her to open the conservatory door so that we can search the garden without delay."
The returning to the drawing-room was easier to speak of than to accomplish, for the door, leading into the corridor from the conservatory, had been securely locked by the same fell agency which had so effectually interfered to prevent my giving chase to the Dumpling; and it was some time before I could persuade the parties, on the other side, that the persons clamouring for entrance were not burglars or murderers, but only Metcalfe and myself.
After a word or two to Miss Clara, I returned, accompanied by Metcalfe, to the conservatory, and thence to the garden. As I had feared, all was to no purpose. The broken window-pane was the only evidence of our recent visitor, for though we scoured the place from end to end, we could not find as much as a footprint by way of a clue. Without a warrant from the police—which I had no possibility of obtaining—I could not hope to explore the neighbouring garden, where it was possible the Dumpling might still be concealed; so we returned, somewhat chapfallen, to the house. Miss Clara, who was awaiting us with a perturbed countenance, refused to share my dissatisfaction at the result which had been brought about by her ill-timed action in setting the burglar alarm at work.
"In all probability I saved your life," she said calmly. "A man like that, who had just committed a murder, and no doubt had come here to commit another, or to burgle the house, was tolerably sure to have been armed; and if you had been able to open the conservatory door and to follow him out, he would in all probability have shot you at sight."
"I thought you said that all the windows were plate glass," I grumbled. "If so, how did the man contrive to break that pane and to get an arm through?"
"I said all the windows in the house," corrected Miss Clara. "The conservatory isn't in the house, and no one could get into the house, from the conservatory, without passing through the corridor door, which, as you know, was fast locked, like the rest of the doors and the windows, when I pressed the burglar bell.
"Well, you have done your best, Mr. Rissler. No man can do more. We shall have the police here directly. They have been a long time in coming as it is, but I expect the entire staff is out hunting for the murderer of poor young Grant. What shall we do when they come?"
"Tell them the facts, of course," I said, "and let them see the broken window-pane and examine the garden for themselves. If I hadn't supposed they were already on the way here, and if I hadn't been in such a hurry to get out and search the garden, as not to give myself a moment to think, I should have urged upon you the necessity of sending for them before. Hush! Was that a ringat the front door? I think so. Very possibly it is they."
It was—a sergeant and an ordinary constable, decent fellows, honest fellows, conscientious fellows, both of them, but not, I imagine, overburdened either of them with brains. Plainly they did not associate the attempt to enter the house with the murder. The impression they gave was that they thought a mere alarm of burglary very small beer when compared with an actual murder. Miss Clara told them that while she and I were talking, we heard the sound of falling glass below, that I had gone down and had seen a man's face at a broken window. She explained the circumstances which prevented me from following him, and added that I believed the face to be that of a man respecting whom I had laid information at Scotland Yard that very morning.
The sergeant and the constable listened to Miss Clara's statement without excitement, and when she had made an end of it expressed a wish to see the conservatory, the broken window and the garden, made a few notes, took my name and address, accepted readily the glass of whisky and water which Miss Clara suggested, butdeclined with equal readiness the half-crown which the same lady, by way of compensation for the trouble to which she had put them, endeavoured to press into their hands, and remarking that they had done no more than their duty, wished us good-night and so departed.
Then I turned to my hostess and unfolded my own plans.
"To tell the honest truth, Miss Carleton," I said, "I was not at all anxious to be mixed up in this new development. I shall have more than enough advertisement at the inquest, which is to be held to-morrow, on the three bodies found off Canvey, and if I am called as a witness at the inquest which will have to be held on the body of young Grant—the police and the public will begin to think my connection with both murders somewhat suspicious. If I were to have followed my inclinations I should have pretended that I was anxious to learn more of the circumstances of young Grant's murder, and should have asked you to let me slip out to see if I could pick up any news, so as to be out of the way when the police called. But a murder, a brutal murder, has been committed, and though I am stillsmarting from the undeserved snubbing I received when I called at Scotland Yard this morning, I should feel that I was behaving not only like a bad citizen, but as little less than a criminal, were I to keep back anything which would assist the police in their search. And now, may I get on to something else which I very much wish to say? The fact that the face I saw at the broken window was that of the Dumpling, is to me very significant. It is, you must admit, a strong confirmation of the theories I have formed, and of which I have already told you. Why did I watch Grant's house? Because if the Dumpling believed Grant to be alive, I was tolerably sure he would lose no time in putting Grant out of the way. What was the result of my watching? This—that I found someone was watching Grant's house, and not only Grant's house, but this house as well. Then came the question, Why was he watching this house? I knew from Parker that the Dumpling had planned to kidnap certain millionaires, and to hold them to ransom. Hearing on inquiry that your brother was a millionaire, I thought it not unlikely that it was he who was to have been kidnapped last night. I thinkso still, but I am inclined to believe that my appearance at the opium den upset the calculations of the conspirators, and so prevented them from carrying out their plans. They are still watching this house, however. Why? Because they are waiting for your brother's return so that they may learn his movements, and lay their plans accordingly.
"Then came the murder of young Grant. It may have been, or it may not have been, the work of the Dumpling and his accomplices. Personally, I haven't a moment's doubt that it was so. While all the neighbourhood is hunting for the murderer, a man tries to remove a pane of glass in your conservatory. Who is this man? Is he a burglar who, with no connection whatever with the murder, has chanced to choose this particular night to break into your house? I don't think so. He could hardly have failed to hear that a murder had just been committed in your immediate neighbourhood, and if so, would he be fool enough to select the very night when he knows the police will be wide awake and on the watch? Not likely. If he had been an ordinary burglar, he would have had hisdiamond with him, and would have cut out, not broken, that pane of glass. The man who broke the glass was a fugitive, and in desperate straits.
"Possibly he thought that at this hour of the night no one would be likely to come into the conservatory, and that he could lie in hiding till the hue and cry had passed. Possibly he hoped to slip through the house unobserved, and so make his way into the street from the front, in order to disarm suspicion. A man who had just committed a murder was not likely to walk boldly out of the front door of such a house as this.
"But why did the Dumpling hit upon this particular house? Was it by chance, and because it was the first which came handy when he managed to evade his pursuers by scaling a wall and lying in hiding, while they went by? I don't think so. That he did escape by scaling a wall I have very little doubt; but I believe that he made his way to the house deliberately, and with set intention. It is quite clear to me that he has designs of some sort upon this house or upon its master. Even if the design were no more than a burglary, you may be tolerably sure that so clever a criminal ashe doesn't attempt to burgle a house without first acquainting himself with the position of the different rooms, and all the difficulties which would be presented in getting in and in getting out. My belief is that the Dumpling chose this house for his hiding-place deliberately. Upon this house, for some reason of his own, he is keeping a watch, and it is from this house that I must set my counter-watch for him. I have a strange presentiment that it will not be long before we shall see him here again. Someone—something—there is in this house upon whom, or upon which, he has designs. It may be its master; it may be only its master's money. To-night, if you will be so good, so very good, Miss Carleton, as to trust me thus far, I want to conceal myself in the garden. If nothing comes of it, no harm is done. If any attempt is made to enter, I shall be there to frustrate it and to give the alarm. You perhaps think my request a strange as well as a foolish one. But listen. Whether the man, looking in at the broken window-pane of the conservatory, recognised me—whether he even saw me at all, I do not know. But I saw him, and for one second's space, before the white face of him disappeared,I not only saw him, but looked him full in the eyes. And in that second I saw something else. As in a dream-tableau, I saw that same man creeping stealthily, and at the darkest, deadest hour of the night, towards the same window, and through the same garden."