Meanwhile Berrington had stepped aside after having arranged to give Field the signal. And Berrington had made a discovery, the importance of which it was impossible to overestimate. For the moment it had almost deprived him of the power of thinking about anything else, but now it came to him that Beatrice might be in some little danger.
In the first place, the girl was in possession of a parcel of valuable diamonds, the possession of which the others knew of and coveted. The rascals were in a tight place now, and they would not stick at much to make their escape. If they were short of funds the diamonds in Beatrice's pocket would come in useful. But Berrington, like the cool soldier that he was, had decided not to spoil the thing by an eager haste. There was plenty of assistance outside, and besides, he had a trusty revolver in his pocket. He stood now in the hall where he was in a position to hear all that was going on.
Beatrice had rushed to the door and beat her hands upon it. She was pulled away more or less roughly by the man called Reggie, but she did not seem to notice it.
"Am I mad or dreaming?" she said as she pressed her hands to her forehead. "I could have sworn that I heard a voice calling me, a voice——"
"All nonsense," said Sartoris hoarsely. "You areoverstrung, and your imagination is too real for you. Did any of the rest of you hear a voice?"
The other two denied that they had heard anything. Beatrice broke out scornfully——
"It is a lie," she said. "You all heard it. Everybody heard it. If not, why are you all so white, and why do you all look so curiously at one another?"
It was quite true, and Sartoris had no reply for the moment. He seemed to be struggling to regain his lost self-possession. Then he glanced at the man called Reggie, who shrugged his shoulders. Sartoris was himself again by this time.
"It was certainly an effect of the imagination," he cried. "Let us talk of other things. My dear young lady, my friends here have been good enough to betray the fact that you have a lot of valuable diamonds in your pocket. Is that a fact?"
Beatrice scorned to lie, and now in any case it would have been useless. She looked from one to the other and wondered what had become of Berrington. Berrington was listening outside the door and feeling that the time for him to interfere was close at hand.
"It is exactly as these people say," Beatrice admitted.
"It is very good of them to take all this trouble," Sartoris said in a sulky voice. "Because of those stones in your pocket they are here to-night. They followed you here, because they are both lovers of that kind of thing. Out of purely disinterested motives, they had made up their minds not to tell me, but a little indiscretion on the part of my fair lady prevented that silent policy from becoming a success."
"What's all this about?" Cora asked uneasily.
"Why ask?" Sartoris said with contempt. "So that was your game, eh? Fill your own pockets and leave the rest of us to look after ourselves. Go off together and try the air of South America once more, you reptiles!"
The other two said nothing. They had a proper respect for the keen intelligence of Carl Sartoris, and they knew that he had found them out. There was a queer gleam in his eyes.
"We will have a friendly discussion on the ethics of the case some other time," he said with an ominous frown. "Meanwhile I think you can leave the matter to me. My dear young lady, I should very much like to see those diamonds."
"I regret that I cannot accommodate you," Beatrice said. "In the first place they are not mine."
"No, but they belong to Stephen Richford, which is much the same thing."
"Again I am sorry to have to disagree with you," Beatrice went on quietly. "The man who calls himself my husband has ended his career disgracefully. He has been guilty of fraudulent conduct, and even at the present moment he may be in the hands of the police."
Beatrice spoke more truly than she had imagined. She was not in the least frightened, and yet she knew perfectly well that these people would not stick at trifles.
"My husband came to me to-night," she said. "He came and asked me for these gems. He wanted to turn them into money to fly with; he desired to have a luxurious retreat. I might have parted with them but for one thing—he seemed to have no sorrow for thosethat he had robbed. So I declined to part with the diamonds. I am going to keep them and hand them over to my husband's creditors. I took them from the safe in my hotel, fearing that there would be complications, but I was wrong, and I am sorry that I did so."
"And why are you sorry?" Sartoris asked.
"Because the stones were far safer there than they are here," Beatrice said.
There was no mistaking the girl's insinuation; even Sartoris reddened.
"So you mean to say that you suspect me?" he asked.
"Most certainly I do," Beatrice said boldly. "I have only to look into your face to see that. You are all three together; there is no honesty between you. You are not even loyal to each other. And I know who you are and what part you all played in the removal of my father's body from the hotel. You who call yourself Sartoris, are the little cripple of the black hansom cab, you others are the rogues who posed as Countess de la Moray and General Gastang. And if those diamonds are to become your property, you must take them by force."
"Le brave chien," the woman sneered. "Well, I suppose what must be, must. Who will do it?"
"Who better than yourself?" Sartoris asked. "I had rather not lay hands on a woman, but——"
"There is no necessity. The painful thing is not going to be done at all. It is well that I am here to shield your consciences from such an outrage."
The door had opened so suddenly that the man Reggie was almost carried off his feet, and Berrington stood in the room. Beatrice gave a sudden sob of relief, for she had forgotten Berrington altogether in the tension of the moment. He stood there erect and upright, his face pale with anger and his eyes blazing like stars.
Sartoris burst out furiously and impatiently——
"Damnation!" he screamed. "I had clean forgotten all about this fellow. His very existence had passed altogether out of my mind."
"Then your memory is very short and very convenient," Berrington said. "It is not so very long ago that my presence in the house was exceedingly convenient to you."
"You saved my life for what it is worth," Sartoris growled sullenly.
"Well, it may be worth a great deal to the police," Berrington retorted. "I saved your life, which was perhaps a foolish thing to do, especially as you had made preparations to sacrifice mine for so doing. Whilst your hands have been so full, I have been making investigations in the house. Really, I have been very well repaid for my trouble."
Sartoris started and looked up uneasily. For once his ready tongue failed him.
"Perhaps you had better be a little more explicit," he said.
"Time enough for that, presently. My first discovery was in connection with the dining-room fireplace. I fancy you know what I mean. The next item was connected with the stairs. You murderous dog, so that was the trap you laid for me. I was not to go until you had seen me again. I was to stay for the sake of your sister. Well, I am glad that I obeyed now. Butmy little discoveries did not end here. Mrs. Richford, what is this?"
Berrington held out a strip of soiled linen and Beatrice took it in her hand.
"It looks like a collar," she said. "It is a collar. If you have made a discovery, Colonel Berrington, I have made another. This collar belongs to my father; I marked it for him in some new ink that does not want heating. Melanyl, I think they call it. It was one of a set of a dozen collars and I marked them all, the day of that fatal dinner party. You see that, as my father had had no valet of late——"
"You acted in his stead," Berrington said eagerly; "when did you mark this?"
"About half-past four on the day of the dinner party."
"Not long before your father went up to dress for dinner, I suppose?"
"Yes, it would be about that time. After marking the collars that had just come from the makers, I placed them in father's wardrobe in his bedroom."
"Then this is the very collar that he wore for the dinner party," Berrington cried; "the very collar that he was wearing at the time he disappeared. And the same collar I found not an hour ago in Mr. Sartoris's dining-room. Not in the dining-room proper, but in a kind of vault under the floor. What is the explanation of this, I wonder?"
"If you are so cursedly clever," Sartoris sneered, "you had better find out for yourself. Get him out of the way, get both of them out of the way, get the diamonds, and let us disappear. The game is up so far as England is concerned. Get him out of the way."
Sartoris's voice had risen to a wild scream. He sent his chair rapidly across the room in the direction of the door. Berrington pulled him up sharp.
"No tricks," he said sternly. "Now none of those electrical contrivances of yours. If you move so much as an inch further I'll shoot you like a dog."
Sartoris pulled up suddenly. He did not need to look at Berrington's face to feel sure that he was in deadly earnest. At the same time the man called Reggie leaped at Berrington's throat and bore him backwards. The assault was so sudden that Berrington dropped the revolver that he had drawn, at the feet of Beatrice.
"Never mind about me," he called out. "Point the weapon upwards and pull the trigger."
In a mechanical kind of way Beatrice did as she was told. As the weapon swayed, the trigger clicked, and the bullet, deflected on the table, snapped the back leg of Sartoris's chair clean off, so that he came a huddled mass of bones to the floor. A report followed, and before the smoke had fully cleared away from Beatrice's eyes it seemed to her that the room was full of people. There were three or four policemen in uniform, Field cool and collected, Richford white and sullen, with the twitching face of Bentwood in the background.
As the man Reggie rose to his feet, the handcuffs were slipped over his wrists, and the woman was treated in a similar fashion. Only Sartoris, being absolutely helpless, was spared the like indignity. Field looked quite satisfied.
"Bagged the whole covey," he said. "Go and stand at the front door, one of you, and see that nobody goes out. There may be others present, of whom we knownothing as yet. Now, Mr. Sartoris, I should like to have a few words with you touching the disappearance of Sir Charles Darryll."
"You think that I murdered him?" Sartoris sneered.
"Certainly not," Field replied. "You can't have murder without a corpse, and in this case we do not even pretend to look for the corpse."
"Or a body perhaps," Sartoris went on. He was quite the coolest person in the room. "Well, what do you want me to say or do? If you produce the corpse——"
"As I said before, there is no corpse," Field said. "Colonel Berrington seems to have discovered something. He may be able to help us if you won't."
"I can help you," Berrington said in a thrilling voice, "beyond your most sanguine hopes."
Sartoris sat a huddled heap on the floor, with his white snarling face looking out like the head of an angry snake. He was not in the least afraid, and yet the expression of his eyes told that he knew everything was over. As he struggled painfully to his feet, Mary ran forward and guided him to a chair. He did not thank her by so much as a gesture. All the care and tenderness was wasted upon that warped nature.
"If I were not a cripple," he snarled, "this would never have happened. And yet a cursed bag of aching bones has got the better of you all, ay, and would have kept the better, too, if I could only have moved about like the rest. But you are not going to get me to say anything if I sit here all night."
It was a strange scene, altogether,—Sartoris a huddled heap, cursing and snarling in his chair, the man Reggie and the woman Cora standing by, with uneasy grins on their faces, trying to carry it off in a spirit of false bravado. To the right of them stood Bentwood, now quite sober and shaking, and Richford sullen and despairing. Beatrice was in the shadow behind Mark Ventmore. Mary moved forward, followed by Berrington.
"What is the charge?" the man Reggie asked. "What have we done?"
Field shrugged his shoulders. Really the questiondid not deserve a reply. Sartoris took up the same line in his snarling voice.
"That's what we want to know," he said. "What is the charge? If you have a warrant, read it aloud. We have every right to know."
"I have a warrant so far as you are concerned," Field replied. "For the present, you are charged with forgery and uttering a certain document, purporting to be an assignment of mining interests in Burmah from Sir Charles Darryll to yourself. The document is in my pocket, and I can produce it for your inspection, if you like. I need not tell you that there will be other charges later on, but these will suffice for the present."
"That does not touch us, at all," the woman Cora said.
"I am arresting you on my own responsibility," Field said curtly. "If I have made any mistake, then you can bring an action for illegal detention later on. Colonel Berrington, we are wasting time here. Had we not better get on with our search?"
Berrington nodded approval. There was an exulting gleam in his eyes that betokened the discovery of something out of the common. Mary crossed the room rapidly and threw herself in an utter abandonment of grief at her brother's feet.
"Oh, why don't you tell them everything?" she cried. "Why don't you tell the whole truth and save yourself? I have friends here, more than one, who care for me, and who for my sake would do much to save you from the shame and humiliation that lie before you. I know much, but I do not know all. For the sake of the old name——"
"Burn the old name," Sartoris said. "What has itdone for me? You have been a good sister to me, but your attentions have been a little embarrassing sometimes. And if you had hoped to change me, you had your trouble for your pains. You may put me on the rack and torture me, but not one word do I say."
"It seems so hard, so very hard," Mary moaned. "And when I look back to the time——"
"Oh, never mind looking back to any time," Sartoris muttered. "The game's up, I tell you. I have been beaten, and there's an end of it. I should play the same hand again if I had the chance, so make no mistake about that. Wheel me as far as the dining-room."
"It will not be of the slightest use," Berrington said in a cold, clear voice. "I know that you would blow the whole lot of us to Eternity if you got the chance, as a kind of revenge for our victory, but I have put an end to that. You will find all the wires disconnected from your battery. After that you are quite free to go into the dining-room."
Sartoris grinned and displayed his teeth in an evil smile. Heaven only knows what new form of villainy he was plotting. And he would cheerfully have blown up the house and destroyed everybody there, including himself, if he had had the opportunity to complete his revenge.
"We are wasting time," Field said. "Take all the prisoners away, except Dr. Bentwood. I have very good reasons for asking him to remain."
Bentwood smiled in a mean and sinister way. He had tried to hide himself in a corner of the room. There was something so cringing and fawning about the fellow that Berrington longed to kick him. Sartoris spoke in a waspish whisper:
"So the land lies in that quarter," he said. "We have an informer amongst us. If I had known that before, my good Bentwood,—if I had known that before!"
Big as he was, Bentwood looked small and mean at that moment.
"You are quite mistaken," he cried. "You are altogether wrong, my dear Carl. I am as much of a prisoner as any of you. I was taken in fair fight outside after a desperate struggle. What have I to gain by an attitude of unreasonable obstinacy?"
"Oh, nothing," Sartoris replied. "But you can make things easy for yourself by affording the police information. You will probably get off with ten years. I would fight the thing out to the bitter end and chance it. But you and I are made of different stuff."
Mark Ventmore, watching the two men, thought so too, but he said nothing. One was a mere bag of bones, the other a fine figure of a man, but Mark would have preferred the cripple, who made no sign and showed no feeling as he tottered to the door, between the policemen. Mary would have said something to him, but he waved her back.
"Now don't you trouble about me any more," he said. "I shall be safe for some years to come, the law will see to that. We shall never meet again, for the simple reason that a physique like mine will not stand the prison treatment. I shall die there. Good bye."
Mary kept back her tears. She would have felt better if she could have seen even the slightest trace of remorse in her brother.
"Marry Berrington," he said. "He has been pretty faithful to you and you will be alone in the world now.You should think yourself lucky with a man like that to fall back upon. I have to say adieu to the lot of you."
Sartoris was gone at last. In fact the whole lot were packed on the motor car which the police had sent down at Field's instigation. Being a cripple, Sartoris had been accommodated in the seat by the driver. With her eyes heavy with tears, Mary watched them depart. Sartoris was fatally correct in his prophecy; it was the last time that Mary was destined to see him. He had always recognised the fact that jail would be the death of him. He had the germs of a disease in his breast that he had only kept at bay by constant occupation and mental activity. Mary never looked upon the face of her brother in the flesh again.
Field turned to Berrington and drew a long breath.
"The atmosphere smells all the sweeter for the loss of that lot," he said. "My word, this has been an anxious night for me. I don't know when I have felt so nervous. But I see that you have made a discovery, Colonel Berrington. What is it?"
"It seems to me that I have made more than one," Berrington said. "In the first place my suspicion that the body of Sir Charles Darryll was brought here has been confirmed. To begin with, I have got to the bottom of that mysterious dining-room business. Come this way and I will show you. Bentwood and that officer of yours had better stay here for the moment."
"Anything that I can do for you, gentlemen," Bentwood said meekly. "Any information that lies in my power. You have only to command me, and I will respond."
"Presently," Field said contemptuously. "We willquestion you later on. Then you shall tell me all about that secret Eastern drug that you understand so well, and what effect it is likely to have on a sleeping man."
Bentwood gave a gasp, and his face grew livid. It was evident that Field had struck and tapped a mine that the doctor had considered to be hidden from everybody. Then Bentwood sat down moodily and looked into the fire.
Berrington led the way into the dining-room, where he proceeded to explain everything in relation to the room under the floor and the vault in connection therewith. Field was particularly interested. All this worked out beautifully with his theory.
"I expect the body was concealed here," he said. "The thing has been well worked out. But do you suppose that Sartoris went to all this trouble and expense for the simple reason——"
"He didn't," Berrington explained. "Miss Sartoris, or Miss Grey as I prefer to call her, told me all about that. The house was taken four years ago and occupied by an American electrical engineer whom Sartoris knew quite well. It was he who put in all these dodges. When he died, Sartoris took the place, doubtless feeling that he might be able to use the mysteries here to good effect. I don't suppose at that time that he knew anything about the full value of Sir Charles Darryll's concessions. But once he had to take action, then this room came in very usefully."
"Do you know why they brought the body here?" Field asked.
"Yes, I have a pretty good idea on that score. Sir Charles had certain papers in his room in theRoyal Palace Hotel, and these people wanted to gain possession of them. The robbery was fixed to take place on the night of that dinner party. Mind you, Richford did not know anything about that, because Sartoris had kept him in the dark. Bentwood was to work it. Bentwood was to administer the drug, but he gave too much. The consequence was an overdose, as you may gather."
Field smiled peculiarly, but he gave no hint as to the extent of his own discovery.
"These people did not want apost mortem," Berrington said. "They did not desire that any traces of that practically unknown drug should be discovered."
"And you think that they all ran that risk to guard their secret?" asked Field. "Well, you have provided me with one or two surprises, but I am going to provide you with as many before we go to bed. Have you discovered anything further?"
"Oh, yes," said Berrington, "this collar, for instance. I am in a position to prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that Sir Charles wore it on the night of the dinner party. I found that down here in this very vault. No further proof is wanted that the body was here. But what puzzles me is this: we were so quickly on the spot that those rascals had not the slightest chance of disposing of the corpse. What then has become of it—why can't we find it? Now that one knows all about the ruby mines and the concessions—which appear to me to be very valuable—the mystery becomes tolerably clear. But the corpse, where is it?"
"Are you quite sure that there is a corpse?" asked Field drily. "Let us go and ask Bentwood."
Bentwood sat up and smiled as his two chief tormentors came back. He was ready to afford any information that the gentlemen required.
"It is not much that I am going to ask," said Field. "Only this: Please take us at once to the spot where we can find the body of Sir Charles Darryll."
Bentwood jumped nimbly to his feet. The question seemed to fairly stagger him. If he had thought of concealing anything, he abandoned the idea now.
"Come this way, gentlemen," he said. "You are too many for me altogether. I wish to heaven that I had kept my medical discoveries to myself."
Bentwood led the way from the dining-room up a back staircase, and paused before what looked like a portion of the wallpaper. There was a little discoloured spot about half way between the dado and the floor, and on this the doctor pressed a shaking thumb. A part of the wall fell away and disclosed a small room beyond. The room had evidently been occupied lately, for there was a fire in the grate and the remains of a meal on the table. The room itself was empty.
"Well, I'm hanged," Bentwood cried. "Gentlemen, I can't tell you now. You asked to see the body of Sir Charles Darryll, and I have done my best to satisfy your curiosity. The last time I saw the body it was here. It seems to have vanished, and I know no more than the dead what has happened. I'm telling you no more than the truth."
That the man was telling the truth was evidenced by the expression of his face. Field had no more questions to ask, because he was quite sure of the fact. On the table lay a letter, which the inspector first glanced at and then placed in his pocket.
"I am just a little disappointed," he said, "because I fancied that I had the complete and crowning surprise for you here tonight, Colonel. You had better go off with my men, because I have no further need of your services for the present, Dr. Bentwood. Perhaps to-morrow I may have the pleasure of calling upon you. Good night."
The doctor vanished from the house, which was empty now, save for Berrington and Field. The latter put out the lights and prepared to leave by way of the front door.
"What are you going to do next?" Berrington asked.
"Go back to headquarters and report progress," Field explained. "The rest is a matter of chance. I fancy I can see my way pretty clearly as to what has happened. Come along, sir; on the whole we have no call to be dissatisfied."
But the events of the night were by no means over yet. A battered constable at the Yard who had just had his head bandaged up had a story to tell. The prisoners from No. 100, Audley Place, had not been conveyed to durance vile without one accident that had been attended with a fatal tragedy. The officer told his story painfully.
"It was that little devil by the side of the driver," he said. "It's lucky for me that he was not a big man instead of a bag of bones. We'd come about half way when he turned and half throttled the driver and then put speed on the motor. There was a struggle for the steering gear, and then the whole show came to grief on a bridge. We were all pitched out, but we hung to our prisoners, who are a pretty sight, sir. Mr. Richford pitched over the side of the bridge on to the metals of the railway lines below and he was killed on the spot. I don't want another game like that."
Surely enough Richford had been killed. His neck had been broken, and he had died without the slightest pain. Berrington, listening gravely to the story, feltno shock from the recital that he had heard. The world was well rid of a poisonous scoundrel, and Beatrice would be free now to marry the man of her choice.
"Was Sartoris hurt?" he asked, a little ashamed to feel that he would have been glad to hear so for Mary's sake. "A delicate man like that——"
"Internally, the doctor says," the officer went on; "been spitting blood ever since he has."
Berrington expressed a desire to see the cripple, who received him without any sign of feeling. He was lying back in an arm chair, his face white and set.
"You need not condole with me," he said. "Don't ask me to make a deathbed confession, for that kind of thing is sheer waste of time. I know that I'm dying. I know that I may fall back at any moment, and then there will be the end. I'm full of blood inside. I might have told that fool of a doctor what he had come to find out—that a broken rib has pierced the lung, and I'm bleeding away quietly. Feel my hands."
Berrington touched the cold, clammy fingers. They were icy with the touch of death.
"Rigor mortis," Sartoris said. "Only a few minutes now. It's a good thing for you, and it's a good thing for Mary, who has been cursed with a brother like me. It's, it's——"
Sartoris said no more. There was a bubbling kind of sigh, blood welled from his mouth and ran down his coat, his head dropped on one side, and he was gone. There was nothing to be said, nothing to be done. On the whole it was just as well.
"It's a ghastly business altogether," Berrington said to Field. "Old soldier as I am, I have had quite enough of horrors for one night. I understand thatMiss Grey returned to theRoyal Palacewith Mrs. Richford. I had better go and tell them both what has happened."
Field agreed, and Berrington departed on his errand. It was not much past eleven yet, so there was plenty of time. Mary and Beatrice had gone back to the hotel in care of Mark Ventmore. They were seated in the drawing-room when Berrington arrived.
Beatrice crossed the room quickly. She wanted to have a few words with Berrington before the others joined in the discussion; she wanted to know if anything had been discovered.
"About my father?" she asked. "This suspense is horrible. Have they not got on the track yet? Why did they want to do that disgraceful thing at all?"
Berrington explained as far as possible. Beatrice was quick to see the meaning of it all. The recital of the story made her a little easier in her mind.
"Possibly by this time to-morrow," Berrington said. "Meanwhile I have something to tell both you and Miss Grey that will be a shock to you, though personally it would be hypocritical to regard it in the light of a deplorable event. There was an accident to the motor car."
"Mr. Sartoris, I mean Mr. Grey, has he escaped?" Beatrice cried. "Yes?"
"I don't think that he was trying to escape. I fancy it was more in the spirit of diabolical mischief than anything else, but he attacked the driver and made a grab for the steering wheel. The result was a smash on a bridge, and the motor was upset. Stephen Richford was pitched clean over the bridge on to the lines, and—and——"
"Killed on the spot?" Beatrice asked quietly. "Would that I could say that I am sorry. It is the best thing that could have happened. And the rest of them?"
"There was not much damage done, except to Sartoris, or Grey, rather. The body of the car struck him on the chest, and a rib stuck into his lung. He bled to death. I was the last person to see him. To the end he was as hard and callous as ever. Will you tell Mary, please? It would come better from you."
Berrington and Ventmore stood talking quietly together whilst Beatrice performed her sad task. Mark listened to all that Berrington had to tell.
"And yet all this bother might have been saved," he said. "My father knew all about those concessions, and he has a pretty good idea of the value of them. Only yesterday he was talking to me about it. If Sir Charles had gone to him, he could have got every penny that he required. But you see, I was not on good terms with my father at the time, though that is all forgiven and forgotten now. At any rate I think we should ask my father's assistance if only to clear the good name of Sir Charles, and make a provision for Beatrice. Now that Richford is dead, something will have to be done. Don't you think so?"
"I am quite sure that you are right," Berrington said. "Your father is rich, and a remarkably good man of business. He is the very one to put matters on a proper footing, and see that the money is returned to the company that Sir Charles was entangled with. You say that those ruby mines are really a good property?"
"My father says that they are splendid," Mark replied. "Enough to give Sir Charles a large income, pay his debts, and provide for Miss Decié besides. I shall see my father to-night, and will go thoroughly into the question with him."
The thing was left at that, and Berrington made his preparations to depart. Mary was crying quietly now with the keen edge of her grief taken off. Mark and Beatrice drew aside, so that the others could talk in private.
"What shall I say to you, Mary?" Berrington asked.
"What can you say?" the girl asked in a gentle tone. "You are a good man, Phil, and it is good to know that you have loved me so devotedly and sincerely. I shall be able to come to you now and take up the thread of my happiness, where I deliberately snapped it three years ago. If my brother had not been misled by a designing woman——"
"Mary," Berrington said with firmness. "You are utterly wrong. I have had the story from Field only to-night, who has heard it from the lips of Miss Decié herself. She is a girl as good and pure as yourself. From first to last she was deceived. If Frank Leviter, the man who sacrificed his life for her sake and whom she loved, had lived, the mask would have fallen from your eyes. Your brother treated Violet Decié as he treated you, as he treated everybody. He was bad to the core of his being, and he has been saved from a shameful death by an accident. If you will try to get all that into your mind you will be a happier woman. You have lost three of the best years of your life—years that belonged to me as well as to you—in pursuit of a mistaken sense of duty. This must be clearly understood between us if the path of our married life is to be free from care."
Mary bent her head and said nothing. And yet, deep down in her heart she knew that Berrington had said no more than the truth. She placed her hand in his.
"I am ready for you when the time comes, Phil," she whispered. "Only one thing I ask. Never let this be mentioned between us again."
"That I faithfully promise," said Berrington. "It is what I was going to suggest. Do you stay here to-night with Beatrice Darryll?"
Mary replied that that was the arrangement. Meanwhile Mark had been discussing the future with Beatrice. She had warmly approved of all that her lover had said about his father. She was glad to know that old Mr. Ventmore would not oppose the marriage, and that her love for him would not tend to keep Mark a poor man.
"So perhaps you had better let me have all those papers that Sartoris was so anxious to get hold of," Mark concluded. "Could you let me have them now?"
"Of course I can," Beatrice said. "I'll go and get them for you from my room. Mary Grey is sharing my bed with me to-night—to-morrow I shall arrange for her to have my father's room. I'll get the papers at once if you will wait."
The papers were found with some little delay, and Beatrice was preparing to come downstairs again when it seemed to her that she heard a noise in the room next to her, the bedroom that had been occupied by SirCharles. It was a creeping kind of noise followed by what was most unmistakably a sneeze.
Beatrice hesitated just for a moment, for her nerves had been much strained lately. Then she put her fear from her and walked into the next room. Only one of the electric lights gave a feeble glimmer over the room. A man stood there, a man who was changing his upper garments. Beatrice gave a little cry and staggered back into the doorway. The man turned at the same time, and saw that he was observed. His face was as white as that of Beatrice.
"Father!" the girl said, "father! Is it possible that I am not dreaming and that you are in the flesh before me again? Oh, father, father!"
A deadly faintness came over Beatrice. Torn and distracted as she had been of late, this last discovery was almost too much for her. She could only stand there with her hand upon her heart to still its passionate beating.
Yes, it was her father, beyond the shadow of a doubt. How he got there Beatrice could not possibly have told. He was looking much the same as when Beatrice had seen him last, save that his clothes were not so neat and he had not been shaved for some days. He seemed quite resigned to the situation although his expression was cross and irritable. He motioned to Beatrice to shut the door.
"Why don't you close the door?" he demanded. "Suppose anybody saw me?"
Beatrice was getting back some of her self-possession by this time. She closed the door and then took her seat on the edge of her father's bed.
"Why should you not be seen?" she asked. "What difference can it possibly make? We have all been looking for you everywhere. Where have you been?"
"I'm not quite sure," was the strange reply. "But you seem to have lost sight of my peculiar situation, Beatrice. My head is a little strange and confused, but I dare say it will come right presently. What happened to me on the night of the dinner party?"
"I did not see that anything happened," Beatrice said. "I suppose you went to bed in the ordinary way. I did not see that there was anything——"
"You didn't notice that I had too much wine with my dinner?"
Beatrice was fain to admit that she had not noticed anything of the kind. She wondered how much her father really knew as to what had happened.
"There has been a great deal of fuss," Sir Charles said. He proceeded to dress himself in certain old clothes and took up a beard and spectacles from the dressing table. Beatrice watched him with a growing feeling that he had taken leave of his senses.
"Why are you going to use those things?" she asked.
"Because it is absolutely necessary," Sir Charles said irritably. "I came here in this disguise to pick out certain things that I needed. A kind friend furnished this disguise, and also money for me to get away."
"But why do you want to get away?" Beatrice asked, more puzzled than ever.
"My dear child, your memory must be sadly defective," Sir Charles said sharply. "You seem to forget that I am in great difficulties. Richford was going to put me right, but Richford is dead. It is just my luck."
"Who told you that?" Beatrice asked. "Why it was only tonight——"
"My dear, there was a gentleman outside the hotel who told somebody else. Richford was arrested at the house of a friend of mine; I saw the thing done. Then I realized that my position was desperate. You see I have been stopping at Wandsworth with a friend for the last two or three days."
Beatrice began to understand a little. The cunning nature of the plot was beginning to unfold itself before her.
"The name of that friend is Mr. Carl Sartoris, I suppose?" Beatrice asked.
"That's the man. Though I cannot see how you came to know that. I met Sartoris before on business. He wanted me to sell him some rubbishy Ruby Mines concessions that Lord Edward Decié and myself procured years ago. I refused to take his money then; it did not seem fair. Besides I was in funds at the time."
Beatrice could hardly refrain from smiling at the naïve confession.
"I should like to hear more about that," she said.
"I was just coming to it," Sir Charles went on. "I must have taken too much wine on that night; I seemed to sleep for days. When I came to myself I was in a strange room, with a doctor bending over me."
"A tall man with a beard? A man who carries drink all over him?" Beatrice asked.
"That is the fellow," Sir Charles said with obvious surprise, "though how you could know all these things puzzles me. Name of Bentwood. Sartoris was in the room, too. He told me that I had been found wandering about, and he told me that I was in danger of immediate arrest. When I suggested sending for Richford, he said that Richford had come to grief, and that the police were after him. Altogether, my dear child, my situation was not one to be envied."
"I quite understand that," Beatrice said, not without sarcasm.
"My dear, it was dreadful. Richford had come togrief. So far as I knew to the contrary, my only child was mated to a felon. Think of my mental agony!"
"I don't think we need dwell on that," Beatrice said with some traces of scorn in her voice. "You always knew that Stephen Richford was a scoundrel. He was not the less of a scoundrel because he could give me a position as the wife of a rich man, and because he could free you from a great and terrible danger. My mental agony counted for something too."
"I should think it did," Sir Charles said pompously. "I find that you were married, that all the papers were talking of my strange disappearance. Strangely enough, I never could get a sight of a daily newspaper. I don't know why. At any rate, you were married. Richford had come to grief, and thus was in hourly expectation of arrest. It was at this point that my friend Carl Sartoris came in. He kept me safe, he insisted upon giving me £500 for those concessions, which really was a delicate way of finding me the money to leave the country. Everything was arranged for my departure when the police came to the house of my friend Sartoris and tookhimoff also. Directly I found that out, that something was wrong there, I crept away from the house, and here I am."
Sir Charles held out his hands helplessly. He always expected other people to do things for him. Beatrice began to see her side of the case. Richford was dead, and the large sum of money that he had promised Sir Charles was no longer available. And Beatrice recalled the night of the dinner party, when her father had taken her to the window, and had shown her the two men watching silently below. The dangerwas just as great as ever; it was just as imperative that Sir Charles should leave the country.
Out of the whirling emotion in Beatrice's head order began to be restored. Everybody, so far as the girl knew, believed her father to be dead. The body had been spirited away for some reason known to Sartoris and his colleagues; nobody ever expected to see Sir Charles again. If he could slip out of the country now, and go abroad, the danger would be averted. Beatrice began to see her way to manage the thing.
"I will do what I can," she said. "You have that £500 intact? Very good. But there are some things that I am bound to tell you. People who are in a position to know, say that your mining concessions are very valuable indeed."
"Worth absolutely nothing," Sir Charles said. "Tried it before. Besides, if they were worth a lot of money, it is impossible to work the mine. The country is too disturbed and dangerous for anything of that kind. Besides, I have sold the concessions, and there is an end of it. Even without a business mind you can see that."
"All the same, I feel pretty sure that I am right," Beatrice said. "My dear father, you have been the victim of a strange conspiracy. You had not taken too much wine that night, but you were drugged by some mineral or vegetable in such a manner that the next day you were taken for dead. I did not know that fact till I was married; indeed, the news was kept from me and brought to me at church. The man whom you regard as your benefactor wanted certain papers of yours, and the doctor, Bentwood, was going to do the drugging. It was done too well; you were regarded asdead. Then, for some reason or other, probably because it was necessary for you to sign certain papers—your body was stolen, and you were taken, still in a state like death, to the house of Carl Sartoris at Wandsworth."
"God bless my soul, you don't really mean it?" Sir Charles cried.
"Indeed I do," Beatrice went on. "This Bentwood is a doctor who is an expert in the miracles and the hocus pocus of the East. The drug they administered to you is not known in England; the thing has never been seen here. I understand that they could have kept you in a state of suspended animation as long as they pleased. But they desired to see you in the flesh again so that you could sign that paper relating to those mines."
"I signed the paper this very morning," Sir Charles cried. "But I don't understand it all. Begin at the beginning and tell me all over again."
Beatrice did so, but it was a long time before her father appeared to comprehend. When he did so he was utterly incapable of seeing what Carl Sartoris had had in his mind.
"I can see that they didn't want to murder me," he said. "Apost-mortemwould have prevented that part of the scheme that required my signature—hence the daring theft of my body. But the main thing is that I have made £500 by the transaction."
Beatrice's lip curled scornfully.
"I had hoped that you would have taken another view of the case," she said. "I am afraid that you will never alter, father. Richford is dead, and I am free from him. Sartoris is dead, also, so we shall neverknow what his ultimate designs were. I don't see that you can keep that money under the circumstances, father."
Sir Charles was emphatically of a different opinion. Besides, as he pointedly put it, how was he going to get away without funds?
"I had forgotten that side of the matter," Beatrice said. "But I am not without friends. There is Mark Ventmore, for instance. If I were to ask him——"
"You are not to do anything of the kind," Sir Charles said angrily. "How on earth am I going to restore this money to Sartoris when the poor fellow is dead? He may not have a single relative in the world, for all I know. The money is honestly mine, and it is sufficient to take me out of this accursed country where detectives are waiting for me at every corner. And now you want to bring Mark Ventmore into it."
"Mark is the soul of honour," Beatrice said. "I am sure that he——"
"Has been in the past a confounded nuisance," Sir Charles interrupted. "It looks as if he were going to be just as much trouble in the future."
"He is the man I am going to marry," Beatrice said quietly. "I offered my life to save you and your good name, and a merciful providence released me from the sacrifice. Next time, I please myself. I shall never marry anybody but Mark."
"Of course you won't," Sir Charles said, in an aggrieved voice. "If you had never seen Mark Ventmore you would have been married to Richford a year ago, in which case I should not stand in my present awkward position. But we are only wasting time. Help me on with this beard and then walk as far asthe hall with me. Then you can give me a kiss, and I'll take a cab and give you my blessing."
Beatrice said nothing. She would keep his secret. And all the world should hear that Sir Charles had been the victim of a calamity that could not be solved.
Therefore there was nothing to be done. Perhaps after the lapse of years Mark might be told the strange sequel to the story. Sir Charles might be visited from time to time in the place where he would choose to hide himself. It would be by no means an enviable fate for a man who had lived and enjoyed the world as Sir Charles had done, but he must lie on the bed that he had made.
"It shall be exactly as you say," Beatrice said. "One moment and I will be with you again. I have some friends, downstairs, who will wonder at my long absence. I will go and make some excuse for you. Perhaps you had better come to the foot of the stairs."
At the foot of the stairs leading to the great hall, Mark stood waiting. At the sight of him Sir Charles drew back, muttering something by no means complimentary to the young man, under his breath.
"I stay in the bedroom till he has gone," he said, as he stepped back.
Beatrice hoped that her face did not betray signs of very much agitation. All the same, she rather wondered why Mark looked at her so very fixedly. Perhaps it was an uneasy conscience that was troubling the girl. Mark's first words startled her.
"So you have been the first to find it out?" he said.
"Find out what?" Beatrice stammered. "I—I don't understand what you mean."
"My dear girl, why try to blind me to the truth? Field told me Berrington actuallyknowsthat your father was concealed at 100, Audley Place. And I know all about that disgraceful City business, because my father told me all about it. Sir Charles has come back, he was with you just now; he is going to make his way to the Continent."
Beatrice had no reply for the moment; her face was red with shame.
"Forgive me," she whispered at length. "You have guessed everything. I suppose it was your quick instinct that told you my companion was my father. But, my dearest Mark, cannot you see that he must fly? He has the money from Sartoris——"
"Who gave it him on purpose," Mark said eagerly. "Who bought a valuable thing for a mere song, thus putting a fortune in his pocket, and getting Sir Charles out of the way for good and all, at the same time. My dearest child, whatever your father may think or say, those ruby mine concessions are of fabulous value. My father has gone into the matter carefully, and he is prepared to back his opinion by large sums of money. My father is never wrong in these things. There is a fortune here for Sir Charles and also for Miss Decié. Let your father come out and say that he has been the victim of swindlers who had resolved to get his property from him. Let him call on my father, who to-morrow will give him a cheque for ten times the amount required to get him out of all his troubles. I can guarantee that."
"You mean to say that your father is actually prepared——"
"Certainly he is—on condition that Sir Charlesand he are equal partners. I'll go and get my father to come round here now. Only I'll see Sir Charles first."
Beatrice would have dissuaded him, but he would take no refusal. He burst into the bedroom of the discomfited baronet and asked him to remove his disguise. Sir Charles was too weak to do more than remonstrate in a gentlemanly way, but his troubled face grew clear as Mark proceeded with the argument. The sanguine side of the baronet's nature came up again.
"Really, my dear boy, this is exceedingly kind of you," he said. "Fact is, I had not the least idea that I was being treated in a really scandalous manner. I regarded Sartoris as a thoroughly good fellow who was going out of his way to do me a service. And if your father says that those mines are valuable, I am prepared to believe him, for there is no shrewder judge in the City. As Sartoris is dead, that deed that I signed falls to the ground."
"It would fall to the ground in any case," Mark said, "seeing that it was obtained by fraud. Now be so good as to dress yourself properly, and I will take a cab and go and fetch my father. The whole business can be settled on the spot."
Mark went off, Beatrice saying that she must go back to Mary Grey.
She hung lovingly on the arm of Mark as they crossed the corridor. The light was low there and nobody was about.
"I hope you are going to forgive me, dear," she said. "I came very near to paying a heavy penalty for not trusting in you, Mark. But everything is going my way now."
"Our way," Mark protested. "I don't care whether anybody is looking or not, I am going to kiss you, dearest. You have always belonged to me and to nobody else. I cannot possibly regard you in the light of Stephen Richford's widow. If I were you, I would not say anything to the others until after I have settled matters between your father and mine. Let Mary Grey have a good night's rest, and pack her off to bed as soon as possible."
Mary was safely in bed and asleep before Mark came back. Berrington stayed long enough for Beatrice to tell him exactly what had happened. The melancholy shade that Beatrice had seen so long on Berrington's face had vanished altogether.
"My poor little girl is going to have peace and happiness at last," he said, with a deep thrill in his voice. "We shall value it all the more because we have waited for it so long, so that the three years of our probation will not be altogether wasted. I expect there will be a good deal of talk about Carl Sartoris for a few days to come, but that need not concern Mary, who has never been identified with that scoundrel, and whose name is Grey, after all. In the course of a few days I am going to take Mary away and we shall be married very quietly. I am determined to try to get the roses back to her cheeks again."
"I hope you will be happy, as you deserve to be," Beatrice said with some emotion. "But I shall be sorry to lose two such good, kind friends, and——"
"You are not going to lose us," Berrington said. "I am going to give up soldiering altogether. I have only carried it on for the last few years, because I needed something to keep me from brooding over mytroubles. I am going to settle down on my property at last. Good-night."
Beatrice shook Berrington warmly by the hand, and he kissed her little fingers. He had barely departed before Mark was back with a little wiry man with a keen face and a pair of grey eyes that seemed to see into everything.
"So this is Beatrice," he said, as he shook hands. "You must let me call you that, my dear, because you are going to be my daughter, Mark tells me. I am a plain man who has more or less lived for business all his life, but begins to see lately that business is not everything. It does not make for happiness, for instance. When I was ill I began to see that. But at any rate the result of my business can make others happy."
Beatrice blushed and smiled. She began to see that she was going to like Mark's father very much indeed. In quite a natural way she kissed him. The little grey man beamed with pleasure.
"Now that was real nice of you," he said. "Mark has a great deal more sense and discretion than I gave him credit for. He is making a name for himself, too. But you can't live on that kind of thing, at least not at first, and I'm going to give Mark £5000 a year, on condition that he takes a pretty little place in the country, where I can come and see you week ends. My dear, I feel that we are going to be very good friends indeed."
"I am quite certain of it," Beatrice said with tears in her eyes. "Everybody is so good to me. I can't think why, but they are."
"You'll find out if you look at yourself in theglass," Mr. Ventmore laughed. "There the secret lies. Not a bad compliment, eh, from a man who never tried his hand at that kind of thing before? And now let me go and see that father of yours. Did I bring my cheque-book, Mark?"
Mark gaily answered his father that he did, and together the two went up the stairs. When they came down at length, there was an expression on the face of Mr. Ventmore that showed that he was by no means displeased with himself. Sir Charles was whistling an opera tune and was regarding a cigar with an air of critical attention.
"Everything is settled," he said. "Those City people will be paid off to-morrow, and I shall be free of them altogether. I shall never touch business again, Beatrice; this has been a lesson to me. And if not a rich man, I shall be very comfortably off. Whatever luxuries you may need in the future will not have to be schemed for. My dear girl, will you order a chicken and some salad and a pint of some good dry champagne to be brought here? I'm particularly ravenous with hunger. Wonderful how one's appetite comes back when you get your mind free from worry. And to think of those concessions being of that value, after all. Ring the bell, please."
The next day was a good one for the evening papers. Sir Charles was interviewed till he was hot and angry and disposed to order his tormentors out of the room. Scotland Yard had its own version of the case, too, which was not quite in accordance with the real facts. But as Berrington said, the excitement soon cooled down, and the next sensation drove the recollection of Sir Charles's wonderful experience out of the publicmind. Sir Charles and his daughter went off to the country, so as to escape so much attention, and Berrington and Mary Grey went along. At the end of the week there was a wedding at the pretty church in the village, and Mary was happy at last. Mark and Beatrice would have to wait for six months or so, because there was public opinion to be thought of, though as a matter of fact the thing was the most empty form.
"I hope we shall be as happy as they are," Mark said as he and Beatrice watched the train slowly glide into the darkness. "They have earned it, too."
"I think we both have," Beatrice said. "But don't look backward, especially on a day like this. Let us go into the big wood, and pick daffodils."
And in the train Berrington had gathered his wife to his heart and kissed her tenderly. He looked down into the soft eyes from which the shadow had gone for ever.
"And you are happy at last, darling?" he said; "though you are very silent."
"Silent, yes," Mary said quietly. "Quiet, too. But thank God no longer the Slave of Silence!"