Chapter Four.The Click of the Telegraph.When at noon, in accordance with the urgent and strangely-worded telegram I had received from the Earl of Warnham, I alighted at Horsham Station, in Sussex, I found one of the carriages from the Hall awaiting me. As I entered it, I was followed by a man I knew slightly, Superintendent Frayling, chief of the Criminal Investigation Department at Scotland Yard, who had apparently travelled down by the same train from Victoria.Greeting me, he took the place beside me, and a moment later the footman sprang upon the box and we sped away towards the open country. To my question as to his business with the Earl, he made an evasive reply, merely stating that he had received a telegram requesting an immediate interview.“This summons is rather unusual,” he added, smiling. “Has anything serious occurred, do you know?”“Not that I’m aware of. Perhaps there’s been a burglary at the Hall?” I suggested.“Hardly that, I think,” he replied, with a knowing look, stroking his pointed brown beard. “If burglars had visited the place, he would have asked for a clever officer or two, not for a personal interview with me.” With this view I was compelled to agree, then, lighting cigarettes, we sat back calmly contemplating the beautiful, fertile country through which we were driving. The road, leaving the quaint old town, descended sharply for a short distance, then wound uphill through cornfields lined by high hedges of hawthorn and holly. On, past a quaint old water-mill we skirted Warnham Pond, whereon Shelley in his youthful days sailed paper boats, then half-a-mile further entered the handsome lodge-gates of Warnham Park. Through a fine avenue, with a broad sweep of park on either side well stocked with deer, emus and many zoological specimens, we ascended, until at last, after negotiating the long, winding drive in front of the Hall, the carriage pulled up with a sudden jerk before its handsome portico.As I alighted, old Stanford, the white-haired butler, came forward hurriedly, saying,—“His Lordship is in the library awaiting you, sir. He told me to bring you to him the moment you arrived.”“Very well,” I said, and the aged retainer, leading the way along a spacious but rather cheerless corridor, stopped before the door of the great library, and throwing it suddenly open, announced me.“At last, Deedes,” I heard the Earl exclaim in a tone that showed him to be in no amiable mood; and as I entered the long, handsome chamber, lined from floor to ceiling with books, I did not at first notice him until he rose slowly from a large writing-table, behind which he had been hidden. His face, usually wizened and pale, was absolutely bloodless. Its appearance startled me.“I wired you last night, and expected you by the 9:18 this morning, Why did you not come?” was his first question, uttered in a sharp tone of annoyance.“The sudden death of a friend caused me to lose the train I intended to catch,” I explained.“Death!” he snapped, in the manner habitual to him when impatient. “Is the death of a friend any account when the interests of the country are at stake? On the night my wife was dying I was compelled to leave her bedside to travel to Balmoral to have audience of Her Majesty regarding a document I had sent for the Royal assent. When I returned, Lady Warnham had been dead fourteen hours. In the successful diplomat there must be no sentiment—none.”“The five minutes I lost when I discovered my friend dead caused me to miss my train from Staines to London,” I explained.“But you received my telegram, and should have strictly regarded its urgency,” he answered, with an air of extreme dissatisfaction. “The fact of its being in cipher was sufficient to show its importance.”“I was out dining, and my man brought it along to me,” I said.“Why did he do so?” he inquired quickly.“Because he thought it might be urgent.”“Did he open it?”“No. Even if he had it was in cipher.”“Is your man absolutely trustworthy?” he asked.“He has been in the service of my family for fifteen years. He was my father’s valet at the Hague.”“Is his name Juckes?” he inquired.“Yes.”“Ah! I know him. He is absolutely trustworthy; a most excellent man.”The Earl’s manner surprised me. His face, usually calm, sphinx-like and expressionless, betrayed the most intense anxiety and suspicion. That my delay had caused him great annoyance was apparent, but the anxious expression upon his ashen, almost haggard face was such, that even in moments of extreme perplexity, when dealing with one or other of the many complex questions of foreign policy, it had never been so intense.Standing with his back to one of the great bay windows that commanded extensive views of the picturesque park, he was silent for a moment, then turning his keen, grey eyes upon me, he suddenly exclaimed, in a tone of extreme gravity,—“Since yesterday, Deedes, a catastrophe has occurred.”“You briefly hinted at it in your telegram,” I answered. “What is its nature?”“The most serious that has happened during the whole of my administration,” he said in a voice that plainly betrayed his agitation. “The clauses of the secret defensive alliance which Hammerton brought from Berlin yesterday are known in St Petersburg.”“What!” I cried in alarm, remembering the Earl’s words, and his elaborate precautions to preserve its secrecy. “Surely they cannot be already known?”“We have been tricked by spies, Deedes,” he answered sternly. “Read this,” and he handed me a telegram in the private cipher known only to the Minister himself. Its transcript was written beneath, and at a glance I saw it was from a Russian official in the Foreign Office at St Petersburg, who acted as our secret agent there and received a large sum yearly for his services. The dispatch, which showed that it had been handed in at Hamburg at six o’clock on the previous evening—all secret messages being sent in the first instance to that city—and re-transmitted—read as follows:—“Greatest excitement caused here by receipt by telegraph an hour ago of verbatim copy of secret defensive alliance between England and Germany. Have seen telegram, which was handed in at 369, Strand, London, at 3:30. Just called at Embassy and informed Lord Strathavon. Council of Ministers has been summoned.”“It is amazing,” I gasped, when I had read the dispatch. “How could our enemies have learned the truth?”Without replying he took from his writing-table another message, which read:—“From Strathavon, St Petersburg. To the Earl of Warnham, London.—Defensive alliance known here. Hostilities feared. French ambassador has had audience at Winter Palace, and telegraphed to Paris for instruction. Shall wire hourly.”One by one he took up the telegraphic dispatches which, during the night, had been re-transmitted from the Foreign Office over the private wire to the instrument that stood upon a small table opposite us. As I read each of them eagerly, I saw plainly that Russia and France were in complete accord, and that we were on the verge of a national disaster, sudden and terrible. With such secrecy and rapidity were negotiations being carried on between Paris and St Petersburg, that in Berlin, a city always well-informed in all matters of diplomacy, nothing unusual was suspected.A further telegram from our secret agent in the Russian Foreign Office, received an hour before my arrival at Warnham, read:—“The secret is gradually leaking out. TheNovostihas just issued a special edition hinting at the possibility of war with England, and this has caused the most intense excitement everywhere. The journal, evidently inspired, gives no authority for its statement, nor does it give any reason for the startling rumour.”I laid down the dispatch in silence, and as I raised my head the Minister’s keen, penetrating eyes met mine.“Well,” he exclaimed, in a dry, harsh tone. “What is is your explanation, sir?”“My explanation?” I cried, in amazement, noticing his determined demeanour. “I know nothing of the affair except the telegrams you have shown me.”“Upon you alone the responsibility of this catastrophe rests,” he said angrily. “It is useless to deny all knowledge of it and only aggravates your offence. Because you come of a diplomatic family I have trusted you implicitly, but it is evident that my confidence has been utterly misplaced.”“I deny that I have ever, for a single instant, betrayed the trust you have placed in me,” I replied hotly. “I know nothing of the means by which the Tzar’s army of spies have obtained knowledge of our secret.”He snapped his bony fingers impatiently, saying,—“It is not to be expected that you will acknowledge yourself a traitor to your country, sir; therefore we must prove your guilt.”“You are at liberty, of course, to act in what manner you please,” I answered. “I tell you frankly, however, that this terrible charge you bring against me is as startling as the information I have just read. I can only say I am entirely innocent.”“Bah!” he cried, turning on his heel with a gesture of disgust. Then, facing me again, his eyes flashing with anger, he added, “If you are innocent, tell me why you were so long absent yesterday when registering the dispatch; tell me why, when such an important document was in your possession, you did not remain in the office instead of being absent over an hour?”“I went out to lunch,” I said.“With the document in your pocket?”“Yes. But surely you do not suspect me of being a spy?” I cried.“I do not suspect you, sir. I have positive proof of it.”“Proof!” I gasped. “Show it to me.”“It is here,” he answered, his thin, nervous hands turning over the mass of papers littering his writing-table, and taking from among them an official envelope. In an instant I recognised it as the one containing the treaty.“This remains exactly as I took it from the safe with my own hands and cut it open.”With trembling fingers I drew the document from its envelope and opened it.The paper was blank!I glanced at him in abject dismay, unable to utter a word.“That is what you handed me on my return from the Cabinet Council,” he said, with knit brows. “Now, what explanation have you to offer?”“What can I offer?” I cried. “The envelope I gave you was the same that you handed to me. I could swear to it.”“No, it was not,” he replied quickly. “Glance at the seal.”Taking it to the light I examined the seal carefully, but failed to detect anything unusual. It bore in black wax the Warnham coat of arms impressed by the large, beautifully-cut amethyst which the Earl wore attached to the piece of rusty silk ribbon that served him as watch chain.“I can see nothing wrong with this,” I said, glancing up at him.“I admit that the imitation is so carefully executed that it is calculated to deceive any eye except my own.” Then, putting on hispince-nez, he made an impression in wax with his own seal and pointed out a slight flaw which, in the impression upon the envelope, did not exist.“And your endorsement. Is it not in your own hand?” he inquired.I turned over the envelope and looked. It bore the designation “B27,893,” just as I had written it, and the writing was either my own or such a marvellously accurate imitation that I was compelled to confess my inability to point out any discrepancy.“Then the writing is yours, eh?” the Earl asked abruptly. “If it is, you must be aware who forged the seal.”“The writing certainly contains all the characteristics of mine, but I am not absolutely sure it is not a forgery. In any case, I am confident that the document you gave me I handed back to you.” Then I explained carefully, and in detail, the events which occurred from the time he gave the treaty into my possession, up to the moment I handed it back to him.“But how can you account for giving back to me a blank sheet of paper in an envelope secured by a forged seal?” he asked, regarding me with undisguised suspicion. “You do not admit even taking it from your pocket, neither have you any suspicion of the friend with whom you lunched. I should like to hear his independent version.”“That is impossible,” I answered.“Why?” he asked, pricking up his ears and scenting a mystery.“Because he is dead.”At that moment our conversation was interrupted by the sharp ringing of the bell of the telegraph instrument near us, and an instant later the telegraphist in charge entered, and seated himself at the table.Click, click, click—click—click began the needle, and next moment the clerk, turning to the Earl, exclaimed,—“An important message from St Petersburg, your Lordship.”“Read it as it comes through,” the Earl replied breathlessly, walking towards the instrument and bending eagerly over it.Then, as the rapid metallic click again broke the silence, the clerk, in monotonous tones, exclaimed,—“From Lobetski, St Petersburg, via Hamburg. To Earl of Warnham.—A proclamation signed by the Tzar declaring war against England has just been received at the Foreign Office, but it is as yet kept secret. It will probably be posted in the streets this evening. Greatest activity prevails at the War Office and Admiralty. Regiments in the military districts of Charkoff, Odessa, Warsaw and Kieff have received orders to complete their cadres of officers to war strength, recalling to the colours all officers on the retired list and on leave. This is a preliminary step to the complete mobilisation of the Russian forces. All cipher messages now refused.”The Earl, with frantic effort, grasped at the edge of the table, then staggered unevenly, and sank back into a chair, rigid and speechless.
When at noon, in accordance with the urgent and strangely-worded telegram I had received from the Earl of Warnham, I alighted at Horsham Station, in Sussex, I found one of the carriages from the Hall awaiting me. As I entered it, I was followed by a man I knew slightly, Superintendent Frayling, chief of the Criminal Investigation Department at Scotland Yard, who had apparently travelled down by the same train from Victoria.
Greeting me, he took the place beside me, and a moment later the footman sprang upon the box and we sped away towards the open country. To my question as to his business with the Earl, he made an evasive reply, merely stating that he had received a telegram requesting an immediate interview.
“This summons is rather unusual,” he added, smiling. “Has anything serious occurred, do you know?”
“Not that I’m aware of. Perhaps there’s been a burglary at the Hall?” I suggested.
“Hardly that, I think,” he replied, with a knowing look, stroking his pointed brown beard. “If burglars had visited the place, he would have asked for a clever officer or two, not for a personal interview with me.” With this view I was compelled to agree, then, lighting cigarettes, we sat back calmly contemplating the beautiful, fertile country through which we were driving. The road, leaving the quaint old town, descended sharply for a short distance, then wound uphill through cornfields lined by high hedges of hawthorn and holly. On, past a quaint old water-mill we skirted Warnham Pond, whereon Shelley in his youthful days sailed paper boats, then half-a-mile further entered the handsome lodge-gates of Warnham Park. Through a fine avenue, with a broad sweep of park on either side well stocked with deer, emus and many zoological specimens, we ascended, until at last, after negotiating the long, winding drive in front of the Hall, the carriage pulled up with a sudden jerk before its handsome portico.
As I alighted, old Stanford, the white-haired butler, came forward hurriedly, saying,—
“His Lordship is in the library awaiting you, sir. He told me to bring you to him the moment you arrived.”
“Very well,” I said, and the aged retainer, leading the way along a spacious but rather cheerless corridor, stopped before the door of the great library, and throwing it suddenly open, announced me.
“At last, Deedes,” I heard the Earl exclaim in a tone that showed him to be in no amiable mood; and as I entered the long, handsome chamber, lined from floor to ceiling with books, I did not at first notice him until he rose slowly from a large writing-table, behind which he had been hidden. His face, usually wizened and pale, was absolutely bloodless. Its appearance startled me.
“I wired you last night, and expected you by the 9:18 this morning, Why did you not come?” was his first question, uttered in a sharp tone of annoyance.
“The sudden death of a friend caused me to lose the train I intended to catch,” I explained.
“Death!” he snapped, in the manner habitual to him when impatient. “Is the death of a friend any account when the interests of the country are at stake? On the night my wife was dying I was compelled to leave her bedside to travel to Balmoral to have audience of Her Majesty regarding a document I had sent for the Royal assent. When I returned, Lady Warnham had been dead fourteen hours. In the successful diplomat there must be no sentiment—none.”
“The five minutes I lost when I discovered my friend dead caused me to miss my train from Staines to London,” I explained.
“But you received my telegram, and should have strictly regarded its urgency,” he answered, with an air of extreme dissatisfaction. “The fact of its being in cipher was sufficient to show its importance.”
“I was out dining, and my man brought it along to me,” I said.
“Why did he do so?” he inquired quickly.
“Because he thought it might be urgent.”
“Did he open it?”
“No. Even if he had it was in cipher.”
“Is your man absolutely trustworthy?” he asked.
“He has been in the service of my family for fifteen years. He was my father’s valet at the Hague.”
“Is his name Juckes?” he inquired.
“Yes.”
“Ah! I know him. He is absolutely trustworthy; a most excellent man.”
The Earl’s manner surprised me. His face, usually calm, sphinx-like and expressionless, betrayed the most intense anxiety and suspicion. That my delay had caused him great annoyance was apparent, but the anxious expression upon his ashen, almost haggard face was such, that even in moments of extreme perplexity, when dealing with one or other of the many complex questions of foreign policy, it had never been so intense.
Standing with his back to one of the great bay windows that commanded extensive views of the picturesque park, he was silent for a moment, then turning his keen, grey eyes upon me, he suddenly exclaimed, in a tone of extreme gravity,—
“Since yesterday, Deedes, a catastrophe has occurred.”
“You briefly hinted at it in your telegram,” I answered. “What is its nature?”
“The most serious that has happened during the whole of my administration,” he said in a voice that plainly betrayed his agitation. “The clauses of the secret defensive alliance which Hammerton brought from Berlin yesterday are known in St Petersburg.”
“What!” I cried in alarm, remembering the Earl’s words, and his elaborate precautions to preserve its secrecy. “Surely they cannot be already known?”
“We have been tricked by spies, Deedes,” he answered sternly. “Read this,” and he handed me a telegram in the private cipher known only to the Minister himself. Its transcript was written beneath, and at a glance I saw it was from a Russian official in the Foreign Office at St Petersburg, who acted as our secret agent there and received a large sum yearly for his services. The dispatch, which showed that it had been handed in at Hamburg at six o’clock on the previous evening—all secret messages being sent in the first instance to that city—and re-transmitted—read as follows:—
“Greatest excitement caused here by receipt by telegraph an hour ago of verbatim copy of secret defensive alliance between England and Germany. Have seen telegram, which was handed in at 369, Strand, London, at 3:30. Just called at Embassy and informed Lord Strathavon. Council of Ministers has been summoned.”
“It is amazing,” I gasped, when I had read the dispatch. “How could our enemies have learned the truth?”
Without replying he took from his writing-table another message, which read:—
“From Strathavon, St Petersburg. To the Earl of Warnham, London.—Defensive alliance known here. Hostilities feared. French ambassador has had audience at Winter Palace, and telegraphed to Paris for instruction. Shall wire hourly.”
One by one he took up the telegraphic dispatches which, during the night, had been re-transmitted from the Foreign Office over the private wire to the instrument that stood upon a small table opposite us. As I read each of them eagerly, I saw plainly that Russia and France were in complete accord, and that we were on the verge of a national disaster, sudden and terrible. With such secrecy and rapidity were negotiations being carried on between Paris and St Petersburg, that in Berlin, a city always well-informed in all matters of diplomacy, nothing unusual was suspected.
A further telegram from our secret agent in the Russian Foreign Office, received an hour before my arrival at Warnham, read:—
“The secret is gradually leaking out. TheNovostihas just issued a special edition hinting at the possibility of war with England, and this has caused the most intense excitement everywhere. The journal, evidently inspired, gives no authority for its statement, nor does it give any reason for the startling rumour.”
I laid down the dispatch in silence, and as I raised my head the Minister’s keen, penetrating eyes met mine.
“Well,” he exclaimed, in a dry, harsh tone. “What is is your explanation, sir?”
“My explanation?” I cried, in amazement, noticing his determined demeanour. “I know nothing of the affair except the telegrams you have shown me.”
“Upon you alone the responsibility of this catastrophe rests,” he said angrily. “It is useless to deny all knowledge of it and only aggravates your offence. Because you come of a diplomatic family I have trusted you implicitly, but it is evident that my confidence has been utterly misplaced.”
“I deny that I have ever, for a single instant, betrayed the trust you have placed in me,” I replied hotly. “I know nothing of the means by which the Tzar’s army of spies have obtained knowledge of our secret.”
He snapped his bony fingers impatiently, saying,—
“It is not to be expected that you will acknowledge yourself a traitor to your country, sir; therefore we must prove your guilt.”
“You are at liberty, of course, to act in what manner you please,” I answered. “I tell you frankly, however, that this terrible charge you bring against me is as startling as the information I have just read. I can only say I am entirely innocent.”
“Bah!” he cried, turning on his heel with a gesture of disgust. Then, facing me again, his eyes flashing with anger, he added, “If you are innocent, tell me why you were so long absent yesterday when registering the dispatch; tell me why, when such an important document was in your possession, you did not remain in the office instead of being absent over an hour?”
“I went out to lunch,” I said.
“With the document in your pocket?”
“Yes. But surely you do not suspect me of being a spy?” I cried.
“I do not suspect you, sir. I have positive proof of it.”
“Proof!” I gasped. “Show it to me.”
“It is here,” he answered, his thin, nervous hands turning over the mass of papers littering his writing-table, and taking from among them an official envelope. In an instant I recognised it as the one containing the treaty.
“This remains exactly as I took it from the safe with my own hands and cut it open.”
With trembling fingers I drew the document from its envelope and opened it.
The paper was blank!
I glanced at him in abject dismay, unable to utter a word.
“That is what you handed me on my return from the Cabinet Council,” he said, with knit brows. “Now, what explanation have you to offer?”
“What can I offer?” I cried. “The envelope I gave you was the same that you handed to me. I could swear to it.”
“No, it was not,” he replied quickly. “Glance at the seal.”
Taking it to the light I examined the seal carefully, but failed to detect anything unusual. It bore in black wax the Warnham coat of arms impressed by the large, beautifully-cut amethyst which the Earl wore attached to the piece of rusty silk ribbon that served him as watch chain.
“I can see nothing wrong with this,” I said, glancing up at him.
“I admit that the imitation is so carefully executed that it is calculated to deceive any eye except my own.” Then, putting on hispince-nez, he made an impression in wax with his own seal and pointed out a slight flaw which, in the impression upon the envelope, did not exist.
“And your endorsement. Is it not in your own hand?” he inquired.
I turned over the envelope and looked. It bore the designation “B27,893,” just as I had written it, and the writing was either my own or such a marvellously accurate imitation that I was compelled to confess my inability to point out any discrepancy.
“Then the writing is yours, eh?” the Earl asked abruptly. “If it is, you must be aware who forged the seal.”
“The writing certainly contains all the characteristics of mine, but I am not absolutely sure it is not a forgery. In any case, I am confident that the document you gave me I handed back to you.” Then I explained carefully, and in detail, the events which occurred from the time he gave the treaty into my possession, up to the moment I handed it back to him.
“But how can you account for giving back to me a blank sheet of paper in an envelope secured by a forged seal?” he asked, regarding me with undisguised suspicion. “You do not admit even taking it from your pocket, neither have you any suspicion of the friend with whom you lunched. I should like to hear his independent version.”
“That is impossible,” I answered.
“Why?” he asked, pricking up his ears and scenting a mystery.
“Because he is dead.”
At that moment our conversation was interrupted by the sharp ringing of the bell of the telegraph instrument near us, and an instant later the telegraphist in charge entered, and seated himself at the table.
Click, click, click—click—click began the needle, and next moment the clerk, turning to the Earl, exclaimed,—
“An important message from St Petersburg, your Lordship.”
“Read it as it comes through,” the Earl replied breathlessly, walking towards the instrument and bending eagerly over it.
Then, as the rapid metallic click again broke the silence, the clerk, in monotonous tones, exclaimed,—
“From Lobetski, St Petersburg, via Hamburg. To Earl of Warnham.—A proclamation signed by the Tzar declaring war against England has just been received at the Foreign Office, but it is as yet kept secret. It will probably be posted in the streets this evening. Greatest activity prevails at the War Office and Admiralty. Regiments in the military districts of Charkoff, Odessa, Warsaw and Kieff have received orders to complete their cadres of officers to war strength, recalling to the colours all officers on the retired list and on leave. This is a preliminary step to the complete mobilisation of the Russian forces. All cipher messages now refused.”
The Earl, with frantic effort, grasped at the edge of the table, then staggered unevenly, and sank back into a chair, rigid and speechless.
Chapter Five.Lord Warnham’s Admission.“Anything further?” inquired the great statesman in a low, mechanical tone, his gaze fixed straight before him as he sat.“Nothing further, your Lordship,” answered the telegraphist.The Earl of Warnham sighed deeply, his thin hands twitching with a nervous excitement he strove in vain to suppress.“Ask if Lord Maybury is in town,” he said hoarsely, suddenly rousing himself.Again the instrument clicked, and a few moments later the telegraphist, turning to the Foreign Minister, said,—“The Premier is in town, your Lordship.”The Earl glanced at his watch a few seconds in silence, then exclaimed,—“Tell Gaysford to inform Lord Maybury at once of the contents of this last dispatch from St Petersburg, and say that I will meet the Premier at 5:30 at the Foreign Office.” The telegraphist touched the key, and in a few moments the Minister’s orders were obeyed. Then, taking a sheet of note-paper and a pencil, he wrote in a private cipher a telegram, which he addressed to Her Majesty at Osborne. This, too, the clerk dispatched at once over the wire, followed by urgent messages to members of the Cabinet Council and to Lord Kingsbury, Commander-in-Chief of the British Army, asking them to meet informally at six o’clock that evening at the Foreign Office.When all these messages had been transmitted with a rapidity that was astonishing, the telegraphist turned in his chair and asked,—“Anything more, your lordship?”“Nothing for the present,” he answered. “Leave us.” Then, when he had gone, the Earl rose slowly, and with bent head, and hands clasped behind his back, he strode up and down the library in silent contemplation. Suddenly he halted before me where I stood, and abruptly asked,—“What did you say was the name of that friend who lunched with you yesterday?”“Ogle,” I answered. “Dudley Ogle.”“And his profession?”“He had none. His father left him with enough to live upon comfortably.”“Who was his father?” he inquired, with a sharp look of doubt.“A landowner.”“Where?”“I don’t know.”The Earl slightly raised his shaggy grey brows, then continued,—“How long have you known this friend?”“Several years.”“You told me that he has died since yesterday,” his lordship said. “Is not that a rather curious fact—if true?”“True!” I cried. “You apparently doubt me. A telegram to the police at Staines will confirm my statement.”“Yes, I never disguise my doubts, Deedes,” the Earl snapped, fixing his grey eyes upon mine. “I suspect very strongly that you have sold the secret to our enemies; you have, to put it plainly, betrayed your country.”“I deny it!” I replied, with fierce anger. “I care not for any of your alleged proofs. True, the man who was with me during the whole time I was absent is dead. Nevertheless I am prepared to meet and refute all the accusations you may bring against me.”“Well, we shall see. We shall see,” he answered dryly, snapping his fingers, and again commencing to pace the great library from end to end with steps a trifle more hurried than before. “We have—nay, I, personally have been the victim of dastardly spies, but I will not rest until I clear up the mystery and bring upon the guilty one the punishment he deserves. Think,” he cried. “Think what this means! England’s prestige is ruined, her power is challenged; and ere long the great armies of Russia and France will be swarming upon our shores. In the fights at sea and the fights on land with modern armaments the results must be too terrible to contemplate. The disaster that we must face will, I fear, be crushing and complete. I am not, I have never been, one of those over-confident idiots who believe our island impregnable; but am old-fashioned enough to incline towards Napoleon’s opinion. We are apt to rely upon our naval strength, a strength that may, or may not, be up to the standard of power we believe. If it is a rotten reed, what remains? England must be trodden beneath the iron heel of the invader, and the Russian eagle will float beside the tricolour in Whitehall.”“But can diplomacy do nothing to avert the catastrophe?” I suggested.“Not when it is defeated by the devilish machinations of spies,” he replied meaningly, flashing a glance at me, the fierceness of which I did not fail to observe.“But Russia dare not take the initiative,” I blurted forth.“Permit me, sir, to express my own opinion upon our relations with St Petersburg,” he roared. “I tell you that for years Russia has held herself in readiness to attack us at the moment when she received sufficient provocation, and for that very object she contracted an alliance with France. The Tzar’s recent visit to England was a mere farce to disarm suspicion, a proceeding in which, thank Heaven! I refused to play any part whatever. The blow that I have long anticipated, and have sought to ward off all these long years of my administration as Premier and as Foreign Secretary, has fallen. To-day is the most sorry day that England has ever known. The death-knell of her power is ringing,” and he walked down the room towards me, pale-faced and bent, his countenance wearing an expression of unutterable gloominess. He was, I knew, a patriot who would have sacrificed his life for his country’s honour, and every word he had uttered came straight from his heart.“How the secret agents of the Tzar obtained knowledge of the treaty surpasses comprehension,” I exclaimed.“The catastrophe is due to you—to you alone!” he cried. “You knew of what vital importance to our honour it was that the contents of that document should be kept absolutely secret. I told you with my own lips. You have no excuse whatever—none. Your conduct is culpable in the highest degree, and you deserve, sir, instant dismissal and the publication in theGazetteof a statement that you have been discharged from Her Majesty’s service because you were a thief and a spy!”“I am neither,” I shouted in a frenzy of rage, interrupting him. “If you were a younger man, I’d—by Heaven! I’d knock you down. But I respect your age, Lord Warnham, and I am not forgetful of the fact that to you I owe more than I can ever repay. My family have faithfully served their country through generations, and I will never allow a false accusation to be brought upon it, even though you, Her Majesty’s Foreign Secretary, may choose to make it.” He halted, glancing at me with an expression of unfeigned surprise.“You forget yourself, sir,” he answered, with that calm, unruffled dignity that he could assume at will. “I repeat my accusation, and it is for you to refute it.”“I can! I will!” I cried.“Then explain the reason you handed me a sheet of blank paper in exchange for the instrument.”“I cannot, I—”He laughed a hard, cynical laugh, and, turning upon his heel, paced towards the opposite window.“All I know is that the envelope I gave you was the same that you handed to me,” I protested.“It’s a deliberate lie,” he cried, as he turned in anger to face me again. “I opened the dispatch, read it through to ascertain there was no mistake, and, after sealing it with my own hands, gave it to you. Yet, in return, you hand me this!” and he took from the table the ingeniously-forged duplicate envelope and held it up.Then, casting it down again passionately, he added,—“The document I handed to you was exchanged for that dummy, and an hour later the whole thing was telegraphedin extensoto Russia. The original was in your possession, and even if you are not actually in the pay of our enemies, you were so negligent of your duty towards your Queen and country that you are undeserving the name of Englishman.”“But does not London swarm with Russian agents?” I said. “Have we not had ample evidence of that lately?”“I admit it,” he answered. “But what proof is there to show that you yourself did not hand the original document to one of these enterprising gentlemen who take such a keen interest in our affairs?”“There is no proof that I am a spy,” I cried hotly. “There never will be; for I am entirely innocent of this disgraceful charge. You overlook the fact that after it had been deposited in the safe it may have been tampered with.”“I have overlooked no detail,” he answered, with calmness. “Your suggestion is an admirable form of excuse, but, unfortunately for you, it will not hold water. First, because, as you must be aware, there is but one key to that safe, and that never leaves my person; secondly, no one but you and I are possessed of the secret whereby the safe may be opened or closed; thirdly, the packet you gave me did not remain in the safe. In order that you should believe that the document was deposited there, I put it in in your presence, but when you left my room I took it out again, and carried it home with me to Berkeley Square, intending to show it to Lord Maybury. The Premier did not call as he had promised, but I kept the document in my pocket the whole time, and at six o’clock returned to the Foreign Office and deposited it again in the safe. Almost next moment—I had not left the room, remember—some thought prompted me to reopen the envelope and reassure myself of the wording of one of the clauses. Walking to the safe, I took out the envelope and cut it open, only to discover that I had been tricked. The paper was blank!”“It might have been stolen while in your possession just as easily as while in mine!” I exclaimed, experiencing some satisfaction at being thus able to turn his own arguments against himself.“Knowing its vital importance, I took the most elaborate precautions that such circumstances were rendered absolutely impossible.”“From your words, when Hammerton arrived from Berlin, it was plain that you suspected treachery. On what ground were your suspicions founded?”Upon his sphinx-like face there rested a heavy frown of displeasure as he replied,—“I refuse to submit to any cross-examination, sir. That I entertained certain suspicions is enough.”“And you actually accuse me without the slightest foundation?” I cried with warmth.“You are in error,” he retorted very calmly, returning to his writing-table and taking up some papers. “I have here the original of the telegram handed in at the branch post-office in the Strand yesterday afternoon.”“Well?”“It has been examined by the calligraphic expert employed by the police, and declared to be in your handwriting.”“What?” I gasped, almost snatching the yellow telegraph form from his hand in my eagerness to examine the mysterious jumble of letters and figures composing the cypher. My heart sank within me when next instant I recognised they were in a hand so nearly resembling my own that I could scarcely detect any difference whatever.As I stood gazing at this marvellous forgery, open-mouthed in abject dismay, there broke upon my ear a short, harsh laugh—a laugh of triumph.Raising my head, the Earl’s penetrating gaze met mine. “Now,” he exclaimed, “come, acknowledge the truth. It is useless to prevaricate.”“I have told the truth,” I answered. “I never wrote this.”For an instant his steely eyes flashed as his blanched face assumed an expression of unutterable hatred and disgust. Then he shouted,—“You are a thief, a spy and a liar, sir! Leave me instantly. Even in the face of such evidence as this you protest innocence with childish simplicity. You have betrayed your country into the hands of her enemies, and are, even now, seeking to throw blame and suspicion upon myself. You—”“I have not done so. I merely suggested that the document might have been exchanged while in your possession. Surely—”“And you actually come to me with a lame, absurd tale that the only man who can clear you is dead! The whole defence is too absurd,” he thundered. “You have sold your country’s honour and the lives of your fellow-men for Russian roubles. Go! Never let me see you again, except in a felon’s dock.”“But surely I may be permitted to clear myself?” I cried.“Your masters in St Petersburg will no doubt arrange for your future. In London we require your faithless services no longer,” the Earl answered, with intense bitterness. “Go!”
“Anything further?” inquired the great statesman in a low, mechanical tone, his gaze fixed straight before him as he sat.
“Nothing further, your Lordship,” answered the telegraphist.
The Earl of Warnham sighed deeply, his thin hands twitching with a nervous excitement he strove in vain to suppress.
“Ask if Lord Maybury is in town,” he said hoarsely, suddenly rousing himself.
Again the instrument clicked, and a few moments later the telegraphist, turning to the Foreign Minister, said,—
“The Premier is in town, your Lordship.”
The Earl glanced at his watch a few seconds in silence, then exclaimed,—
“Tell Gaysford to inform Lord Maybury at once of the contents of this last dispatch from St Petersburg, and say that I will meet the Premier at 5:30 at the Foreign Office.” The telegraphist touched the key, and in a few moments the Minister’s orders were obeyed. Then, taking a sheet of note-paper and a pencil, he wrote in a private cipher a telegram, which he addressed to Her Majesty at Osborne. This, too, the clerk dispatched at once over the wire, followed by urgent messages to members of the Cabinet Council and to Lord Kingsbury, Commander-in-Chief of the British Army, asking them to meet informally at six o’clock that evening at the Foreign Office.
When all these messages had been transmitted with a rapidity that was astonishing, the telegraphist turned in his chair and asked,—
“Anything more, your lordship?”
“Nothing for the present,” he answered. “Leave us.” Then, when he had gone, the Earl rose slowly, and with bent head, and hands clasped behind his back, he strode up and down the library in silent contemplation. Suddenly he halted before me where I stood, and abruptly asked,—
“What did you say was the name of that friend who lunched with you yesterday?”
“Ogle,” I answered. “Dudley Ogle.”
“And his profession?”
“He had none. His father left him with enough to live upon comfortably.”
“Who was his father?” he inquired, with a sharp look of doubt.
“A landowner.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
The Earl slightly raised his shaggy grey brows, then continued,—
“How long have you known this friend?”
“Several years.”
“You told me that he has died since yesterday,” his lordship said. “Is not that a rather curious fact—if true?”
“True!” I cried. “You apparently doubt me. A telegram to the police at Staines will confirm my statement.”
“Yes, I never disguise my doubts, Deedes,” the Earl snapped, fixing his grey eyes upon mine. “I suspect very strongly that you have sold the secret to our enemies; you have, to put it plainly, betrayed your country.”
“I deny it!” I replied, with fierce anger. “I care not for any of your alleged proofs. True, the man who was with me during the whole time I was absent is dead. Nevertheless I am prepared to meet and refute all the accusations you may bring against me.”
“Well, we shall see. We shall see,” he answered dryly, snapping his fingers, and again commencing to pace the great library from end to end with steps a trifle more hurried than before. “We have—nay, I, personally have been the victim of dastardly spies, but I will not rest until I clear up the mystery and bring upon the guilty one the punishment he deserves. Think,” he cried. “Think what this means! England’s prestige is ruined, her power is challenged; and ere long the great armies of Russia and France will be swarming upon our shores. In the fights at sea and the fights on land with modern armaments the results must be too terrible to contemplate. The disaster that we must face will, I fear, be crushing and complete. I am not, I have never been, one of those over-confident idiots who believe our island impregnable; but am old-fashioned enough to incline towards Napoleon’s opinion. We are apt to rely upon our naval strength, a strength that may, or may not, be up to the standard of power we believe. If it is a rotten reed, what remains? England must be trodden beneath the iron heel of the invader, and the Russian eagle will float beside the tricolour in Whitehall.”
“But can diplomacy do nothing to avert the catastrophe?” I suggested.
“Not when it is defeated by the devilish machinations of spies,” he replied meaningly, flashing a glance at me, the fierceness of which I did not fail to observe.
“But Russia dare not take the initiative,” I blurted forth.
“Permit me, sir, to express my own opinion upon our relations with St Petersburg,” he roared. “I tell you that for years Russia has held herself in readiness to attack us at the moment when she received sufficient provocation, and for that very object she contracted an alliance with France. The Tzar’s recent visit to England was a mere farce to disarm suspicion, a proceeding in which, thank Heaven! I refused to play any part whatever. The blow that I have long anticipated, and have sought to ward off all these long years of my administration as Premier and as Foreign Secretary, has fallen. To-day is the most sorry day that England has ever known. The death-knell of her power is ringing,” and he walked down the room towards me, pale-faced and bent, his countenance wearing an expression of unutterable gloominess. He was, I knew, a patriot who would have sacrificed his life for his country’s honour, and every word he had uttered came straight from his heart.
“How the secret agents of the Tzar obtained knowledge of the treaty surpasses comprehension,” I exclaimed.
“The catastrophe is due to you—to you alone!” he cried. “You knew of what vital importance to our honour it was that the contents of that document should be kept absolutely secret. I told you with my own lips. You have no excuse whatever—none. Your conduct is culpable in the highest degree, and you deserve, sir, instant dismissal and the publication in theGazetteof a statement that you have been discharged from Her Majesty’s service because you were a thief and a spy!”
“I am neither,” I shouted in a frenzy of rage, interrupting him. “If you were a younger man, I’d—by Heaven! I’d knock you down. But I respect your age, Lord Warnham, and I am not forgetful of the fact that to you I owe more than I can ever repay. My family have faithfully served their country through generations, and I will never allow a false accusation to be brought upon it, even though you, Her Majesty’s Foreign Secretary, may choose to make it.” He halted, glancing at me with an expression of unfeigned surprise.
“You forget yourself, sir,” he answered, with that calm, unruffled dignity that he could assume at will. “I repeat my accusation, and it is for you to refute it.”
“I can! I will!” I cried.
“Then explain the reason you handed me a sheet of blank paper in exchange for the instrument.”
“I cannot, I—”
He laughed a hard, cynical laugh, and, turning upon his heel, paced towards the opposite window.
“All I know is that the envelope I gave you was the same that you handed to me,” I protested.
“It’s a deliberate lie,” he cried, as he turned in anger to face me again. “I opened the dispatch, read it through to ascertain there was no mistake, and, after sealing it with my own hands, gave it to you. Yet, in return, you hand me this!” and he took from the table the ingeniously-forged duplicate envelope and held it up.
Then, casting it down again passionately, he added,—
“The document I handed to you was exchanged for that dummy, and an hour later the whole thing was telegraphedin extensoto Russia. The original was in your possession, and even if you are not actually in the pay of our enemies, you were so negligent of your duty towards your Queen and country that you are undeserving the name of Englishman.”
“But does not London swarm with Russian agents?” I said. “Have we not had ample evidence of that lately?”
“I admit it,” he answered. “But what proof is there to show that you yourself did not hand the original document to one of these enterprising gentlemen who take such a keen interest in our affairs?”
“There is no proof that I am a spy,” I cried hotly. “There never will be; for I am entirely innocent of this disgraceful charge. You overlook the fact that after it had been deposited in the safe it may have been tampered with.”
“I have overlooked no detail,” he answered, with calmness. “Your suggestion is an admirable form of excuse, but, unfortunately for you, it will not hold water. First, because, as you must be aware, there is but one key to that safe, and that never leaves my person; secondly, no one but you and I are possessed of the secret whereby the safe may be opened or closed; thirdly, the packet you gave me did not remain in the safe. In order that you should believe that the document was deposited there, I put it in in your presence, but when you left my room I took it out again, and carried it home with me to Berkeley Square, intending to show it to Lord Maybury. The Premier did not call as he had promised, but I kept the document in my pocket the whole time, and at six o’clock returned to the Foreign Office and deposited it again in the safe. Almost next moment—I had not left the room, remember—some thought prompted me to reopen the envelope and reassure myself of the wording of one of the clauses. Walking to the safe, I took out the envelope and cut it open, only to discover that I had been tricked. The paper was blank!”
“It might have been stolen while in your possession just as easily as while in mine!” I exclaimed, experiencing some satisfaction at being thus able to turn his own arguments against himself.
“Knowing its vital importance, I took the most elaborate precautions that such circumstances were rendered absolutely impossible.”
“From your words, when Hammerton arrived from Berlin, it was plain that you suspected treachery. On what ground were your suspicions founded?”
Upon his sphinx-like face there rested a heavy frown of displeasure as he replied,—
“I refuse to submit to any cross-examination, sir. That I entertained certain suspicions is enough.”
“And you actually accuse me without the slightest foundation?” I cried with warmth.
“You are in error,” he retorted very calmly, returning to his writing-table and taking up some papers. “I have here the original of the telegram handed in at the branch post-office in the Strand yesterday afternoon.”
“Well?”
“It has been examined by the calligraphic expert employed by the police, and declared to be in your handwriting.”
“What?” I gasped, almost snatching the yellow telegraph form from his hand in my eagerness to examine the mysterious jumble of letters and figures composing the cypher. My heart sank within me when next instant I recognised they were in a hand so nearly resembling my own that I could scarcely detect any difference whatever.
As I stood gazing at this marvellous forgery, open-mouthed in abject dismay, there broke upon my ear a short, harsh laugh—a laugh of triumph.
Raising my head, the Earl’s penetrating gaze met mine. “Now,” he exclaimed, “come, acknowledge the truth. It is useless to prevaricate.”
“I have told the truth,” I answered. “I never wrote this.”
For an instant his steely eyes flashed as his blanched face assumed an expression of unutterable hatred and disgust. Then he shouted,—
“You are a thief, a spy and a liar, sir! Leave me instantly. Even in the face of such evidence as this you protest innocence with childish simplicity. You have betrayed your country into the hands of her enemies, and are, even now, seeking to throw blame and suspicion upon myself. You—”
“I have not done so. I merely suggested that the document might have been exchanged while in your possession. Surely—”
“And you actually come to me with a lame, absurd tale that the only man who can clear you is dead! The whole defence is too absurd,” he thundered. “You have sold your country’s honour and the lives of your fellow-men for Russian roubles. Go! Never let me see you again, except in a felon’s dock.”
“But surely I may be permitted to clear myself?” I cried.
“Your masters in St Petersburg will no doubt arrange for your future. In London we require your faithless services no longer,” the Earl answered, with intense bitterness. “Go!”
Chapter Six.The Veil.Leaving the Earl’s presence, I refused old Stanford’s invitation to take some refreshment, and, walking along the corridor on my way out, came face to face with Frayling, who was being conducted to the library.“Going?” he inquired.“Yes,” I answered, and passing on, engrossed in bitter thoughts that overwhelmed me, strode out into the park, wandering aimlessly across the grass to where a well-kept footpath wound away among the trees. Taking it, heedless of my destination, I walked on mechanically, regardless of the brilliant sunshine and the songs of the birds, thinking only of the unjust accusation against me, and of my inability to clear myself. I saw that the stigma upon me meant ruin, both social and financial. Branded as a spy, I should be spurned by Ella, sneered at by Mrs Laing, and avoided by Beck. Friends who had trusted me would no longer place any confidence in a man who had, according to their belief, sold his country into the hands of her enemies, while it was apparent from the Earl’s words that he had no further faith in my actions.Yet the only man who could have cleared me, who could have corroborated my statement as to how I spent my time during my absence at lunch, and shown plainly that I had never entered the Strand nor visited the branch post-office next to Exeter Hall, was dead. His lips were for ever sealed.I went forward, plunged deeply in thought, until passing a small gate I left the park, and found myself in Warnham Churchyard. For a moment I stood on the peaceful spot where I had often stood before, admiring the quaint old church, with its square, squat, ivy-covered tower, its gilded clock face, and its ancient doors that, standing open, admitted air and sunshine. Before me were the plain, white tombs of the departed earls, the most recent being that in memory of the Countess, one of the leaders of London society, who had died during her husband’s absence on his official duties; while across the well-kept lawn stood a quaint old sun-dial that had in silence marked the time for a century or so. From within the church the organ sounded softly, and I could see the Vicar’s daughter, a pretty girl still in her teens, seated at the instrument practising.Warnham was a quiet Sussex village unknown to the world outside, unspoiled by modern progress, untouched by the hand of the vandal. As presently I passed the lych-gate and entered its peaceful street, it wore a distinctly old-world air. At the end of the churchyard wall stood the typical village blacksmith, brown-faced and brawny, swinging his hammer with musical clang upon his anvil set beneath a great chestnut tree in full bloom; further along stood the schools, from the playground of which came the joyous sound of children’s voices; and across the road was the only inn—the Sussex Arms—where, on more than one occasion, I had spent an hour in the bare and beery taproom, chatting with the garrulous village gossips, the burly landlord and his pleasant spouse. The air was heavy with the scent of June roses and the old-fashioned flowers growing in cottage gardens, whilst the lilacs sent forth a perfume that in my perturbed state of mind brought me back to a realisation of my bitterness. Lilac was Ella’s favourite scent, and it stirred within me thoughts of her. How, I wondered, had she borne the news of Dudley’s tragic and mysterious end? How, I wondered, would she greet me when next we met?Yet somehow I distrusted her, and as I walked on through the village towards the Ockley road, nodding mechanically to a man I knew, I was seriously contemplating the advisability of never again seeing her. But I loved her, and though I strove to reason with myself that some secret tie existed between her and Beck, I found myself unable to break off my engagement, for I was held in her toils by the fascination of her eyes.For fully an hour I walked on, ascending the hill swept by the fresh breeze from the Channel, only turning back on finding myself at the little hamlet at Kingsfold. In that walk I tried to form resolutions—to devise some means to regain the confidence of the Earl, and to conjecture the cause of Dudley’s death—but all to no purpose. The blows which had fallen in such swift succession had paralysed me. I could not think, neither could I act.Re-passing the Sussex Arms, I turned in, dusty and thirsty. In the bare taproom, deserted at that hour, old Denman, a tall, tight-trousered, splay-footed, grey-haired man, who drove the village fly, and acted as ostler and handy man about the hostelry, was busy cleaning some pewters, and as I entered, looked up and touched his hat.“Well, Denman,” I said, “you don’t seem to grow very much older, eh?”The man, whose hair and beard were closely-cropped, and whose furrowed face had a habit of twitching when he spoke, grinned as he answered,—“No, sir. People tells me I bear my age wonderful well. But won’t you come into the parlour, sir?”Declining, I told him to get me something to drink, and when he brought it questioned him as to the latest news in the village. Denman was an inveterate gossip, and in his constant drives in the rickety and antiquated vehicle known as “the fly,” to villages and towns in the vicinity, had a knack of picking up all the news and scandal, which he retailed at night for the delectation of customers at the Sussex Arms.“I dunno as anything very startling has happened lately in Warnham. The jumble sale came off at the schools last Tuesday fortnight, and there’s a cricket match up at the Lodge next Saturday. Some gentlemen are coming down from London to play.”“Anything else?”Denman removed his hat and scratched his head.“Oh, yes,” he said suddenly. “You knows Mr Macandrew what’s steward for Mr Thornbury? Well, last Monday week an old gentleman called at his house up street and asked to see him. His wife asked him into the parlour, and Mr Macandrew went in. ‘Are you Mr Macandrew?’ says the old gent. ‘I am,’ says Mr Macandrew. ‘Well, I shouldn’t ’ave known you,’ says the old man. And it turned out afterwards that this old man was actually Mr Macandrew’s father, who’s lived ever so many years in America, and hasn’t seen Mr Macandrew since he wor a boy. I did laugh when I heard it.”“Extraordinary. Have you had any visitors down from London?” I inquired, for sometimes people took the houses of the better-class villagers, furnished for the season.“We had a lively young gent staying here in the inn for four days last week. He was a friend of somebody up at the Hall, I think, for he was there a good deal. He came from London. I wonder whether you’d know him.”“What was his name?”“Funny name,” Denman said, grinning. “Ogle, Mr Ogle.”“Ogle!” I gasped. “What was his Christian name?”“Dudley, I fancy it was.”“Dudley Ogle,” I repeated, remembering that he had been absent from Shepperton for four days, and had told me he had been in Ipswich visiting some friends. “And he has been here?”“Yes, sir. We made him as comfortable as we could, and I think he enjoyed hisself.”“But what did he do—why was he down here?” I inquired eagerly.“Do you know him, sir? Jolly gentleman, isn’t he? Up to all manners o’ tricks, and always chaffing the girls.”“Yes, I knew him, Denman,” I answered gravely. “Tell me, as far as you know, his object in coming to Warnham. I’m very interested in his doings.”“As far as I know, sir, he came to see somebody up at the Hall. I drove him about a good deal, over to Ockley, to Cowfold, and out to Handcross; and I took him into Horsham every day.”“Do you know who was his friend at the Hall?”“No, I don’t, sir. He never spoke about it; but I did have my suspicions,” he answered, smiling.“Oh! what were they?” I asked.“I fancy he came to see Lucy Bryden, the housekeeper’s daughter. She’s a good-looking girl, you know,” and the old man winked knowingly.“What made you think that, eh?”“Well, from something I was told,” he replied mysteriously. “He was seen walking with a young lady across the park one night, and I ’eard as ’ow it was Mrs Bryden’s daughter. But next day I ’ad a surprise. A young lady called here for him, and she was dressed exactly as the young woman who had been in the park with him was. But it wasn’t Mrs Bryden’s daughter.”“Then who was it?”“I heard him call her Ella. She came from London.”“Ella?” I gasped. “What the deuce do you mean, Denman? What sort of a girl was she? A lady?”“Yes, sir, quite a lady. She was dressed in brown, and one thing I noticed was that she had on a splendid diamond bracelet. It was a beauty.”“A diamond bracelet!” I echoed. There was no doubt that Ella had actually been to Warnham without my knowledge, for the bracelet that the old ostler, in reply to my eager questions, described accurately, was the one I had given her.“What time in the day did she call? Where did they go?” I demanded, in surprise.“She came about mid-day, and they both went for a walk towards Broadbridge Heath. They were gone, I should reckon, about three hours, and when they returned, it was evident from her eyes that she’d been crying.”“Crying! Had Ogle been talking to her angrily, do you think?”“No. I don’t believe so. They remained here and had some tea together in the parlour, and then I drove ’em to Horsham, and they caught the 6:25 to London.”I was silent. There was some remarkable, unfathomable mystery in this.“Now, Denman,” I said at last, “I know you’ve got a sharp pair of ears when you’re perched up on that box of yours. Did you overhear their conversation while driving them to Horsham?”Again the old man removed his battered hat and calmly scratched his head.“Well, sir, to tell you the truth, I did ’ear a few words,” he answered. “I ’eard the young lady say as ’ow she wor powerless. He seemed to be a-begging of her to do something which horrified her. I ’eard her ask him in a whisper whether he thought they would be discovered, and he laughed at her fear, and said, ‘If you don’t do it, you know the consequences will be fatal.’”“Do you think they went up to the Hall when they went out walking?”“I don’t know, sir. They could, of course, have got into the park that way. But you don’t look very well, sir. I hope what I’ve told you isn’t—isn’t very unpleasant,” the old ostler added, with a look of apprehension.“No. Get me some brandy, Denman,” I gasped.While he was absent I rose and walked unsteadily to the window that overlooked a comfortable-looking corner residence surrounded by a belt of firs, a wide road, and a beautiful stretch of valley and blue downs beyond. The landscape was peaceful and picturesque, and I sought solace in gazing upon it. But this latest revelation had unnerved me. Dudley and Ella had met in that quiet, rural place for some purpose which I could not conceive. Their meeting had evidently been pre-arranged, and their object, from the words the old man had overheard, was apparently of a secret and sinister character.The strange, inquiring look I had detected in Ella’s face whenever she had glanced surreptitiously at Dudley on the previous night was, I now felt assured, an index of guilty conscience; and Mrs Laing’s dread that Ella should know the truth of my friend’s tragic end appeared to prove, in a certain degree, the existence of some secret knowledge held by all three.Yet I could not bring myself to believe that my well-beloved had wilfully deceived me. From what Denman had said, it appeared as if Ogle had held her under some mysterious thrall, and was trying to compel her to act against her better judgment. Her pure, womanly conscience had, perhaps, revolted against his suggestion, and she had shed the tears the old ostler had noticed; yet he had persisted and held over her a threat that had cowed her, and, perhaps, for aught I knew, compelled her to submit.My thought that the man who was my friend should have thus treated the woman I adored filled me with fiercest anger and hatred. With bitterness I told myself that the man in whom I placed implicit confidence, and with whom I had allowed Ella to spend many idle hours punting or sculling while I was absent at my duties in London, was actually my enemy.With sudden resolve I determined to travel back to Staines and, by possession of the knowledge of her mysterious visit to that village, worm from her its object. At that moment Denman entered, and I drank the brandy at one gulp, afterwards ordering the fly and driving back to Horsham station, whence I returned to London.At my flat in Rossetti Mansions, Chelsea, I found a telegram from the Staines police summoning me to the inquest to be held next morning at eleven o’clock, and also one from Ella asking me to return. The latter I felt inclined to disregard; the former I could not. Her words and actions were, indeed, beyond comprehension, but in the light of this knowledge I had by mere chance acquired, it seemed plain that her declaration of her unworthiness of my love was something more than the natural outcome of highly-strung nerves and a romantic disposition. Women of certain temperaments are prone to self-accusation, and I had brought myself to believe her words to be mere hysterical utterances; but now, alas! I saw there was some deep motive underlying them. I had been tricked. I had, it seemed, been unduly jealous of Beck, and unsuspecting of my real enemy, the man whose lips were closed in death.I now regretted his end, not as a friend regrets, but merely because no effort would be availing to compel his lying tongue to speak the truth. Yet, if he were my rival for Ella’s hand, might he not have lied when questioned regarding the events of that fateful afternoon when the secret defensive alliance had been so mysteriously exchanged for a dummy? Jealousy knows neither limit nor remorse.Next morning, after spending the greater part of the night sitting alone smoking and endeavouring to penetrate the ever-increasing veil of mystery that had apparently enveloped her, I travelled down to Staines, arriving there just in time to take a cab to the Town Hall, where the inquest was to be held. The town was agog, for a crowd of those unable to enter because the room was already filled to overflowing, stood in the open space outside, eagerly discussing the tragic affair in all its various aspects, and hazarding the wildest and most impossible theories. Entering the hall, I elbowed my way forward, and as I did so I heard my name shouted loudly by a police constable. I was required as a witness, and succeeded in struggling through to the baize-covered table whereat the grave-faced Coroner sat.He stretched forth his hand to give me the copy of Holy Writ whereon to take the oath, when suddenly my eyes fell upon a watch and a collection of miscellaneous articles lying upon the table, the contents of the dead man’s pockets.One small object alone riveted my attention. Heedless of the Coroner’s words I snatched it up and examined it closely.Next second I stood breathless and aghast, dumbfounded by an amazing discovery that staggered belief.
Leaving the Earl’s presence, I refused old Stanford’s invitation to take some refreshment, and, walking along the corridor on my way out, came face to face with Frayling, who was being conducted to the library.
“Going?” he inquired.
“Yes,” I answered, and passing on, engrossed in bitter thoughts that overwhelmed me, strode out into the park, wandering aimlessly across the grass to where a well-kept footpath wound away among the trees. Taking it, heedless of my destination, I walked on mechanically, regardless of the brilliant sunshine and the songs of the birds, thinking only of the unjust accusation against me, and of my inability to clear myself. I saw that the stigma upon me meant ruin, both social and financial. Branded as a spy, I should be spurned by Ella, sneered at by Mrs Laing, and avoided by Beck. Friends who had trusted me would no longer place any confidence in a man who had, according to their belief, sold his country into the hands of her enemies, while it was apparent from the Earl’s words that he had no further faith in my actions.
Yet the only man who could have cleared me, who could have corroborated my statement as to how I spent my time during my absence at lunch, and shown plainly that I had never entered the Strand nor visited the branch post-office next to Exeter Hall, was dead. His lips were for ever sealed.
I went forward, plunged deeply in thought, until passing a small gate I left the park, and found myself in Warnham Churchyard. For a moment I stood on the peaceful spot where I had often stood before, admiring the quaint old church, with its square, squat, ivy-covered tower, its gilded clock face, and its ancient doors that, standing open, admitted air and sunshine. Before me were the plain, white tombs of the departed earls, the most recent being that in memory of the Countess, one of the leaders of London society, who had died during her husband’s absence on his official duties; while across the well-kept lawn stood a quaint old sun-dial that had in silence marked the time for a century or so. From within the church the organ sounded softly, and I could see the Vicar’s daughter, a pretty girl still in her teens, seated at the instrument practising.
Warnham was a quiet Sussex village unknown to the world outside, unspoiled by modern progress, untouched by the hand of the vandal. As presently I passed the lych-gate and entered its peaceful street, it wore a distinctly old-world air. At the end of the churchyard wall stood the typical village blacksmith, brown-faced and brawny, swinging his hammer with musical clang upon his anvil set beneath a great chestnut tree in full bloom; further along stood the schools, from the playground of which came the joyous sound of children’s voices; and across the road was the only inn—the Sussex Arms—where, on more than one occasion, I had spent an hour in the bare and beery taproom, chatting with the garrulous village gossips, the burly landlord and his pleasant spouse. The air was heavy with the scent of June roses and the old-fashioned flowers growing in cottage gardens, whilst the lilacs sent forth a perfume that in my perturbed state of mind brought me back to a realisation of my bitterness. Lilac was Ella’s favourite scent, and it stirred within me thoughts of her. How, I wondered, had she borne the news of Dudley’s tragic and mysterious end? How, I wondered, would she greet me when next we met?
Yet somehow I distrusted her, and as I walked on through the village towards the Ockley road, nodding mechanically to a man I knew, I was seriously contemplating the advisability of never again seeing her. But I loved her, and though I strove to reason with myself that some secret tie existed between her and Beck, I found myself unable to break off my engagement, for I was held in her toils by the fascination of her eyes.
For fully an hour I walked on, ascending the hill swept by the fresh breeze from the Channel, only turning back on finding myself at the little hamlet at Kingsfold. In that walk I tried to form resolutions—to devise some means to regain the confidence of the Earl, and to conjecture the cause of Dudley’s death—but all to no purpose. The blows which had fallen in such swift succession had paralysed me. I could not think, neither could I act.
Re-passing the Sussex Arms, I turned in, dusty and thirsty. In the bare taproom, deserted at that hour, old Denman, a tall, tight-trousered, splay-footed, grey-haired man, who drove the village fly, and acted as ostler and handy man about the hostelry, was busy cleaning some pewters, and as I entered, looked up and touched his hat.
“Well, Denman,” I said, “you don’t seem to grow very much older, eh?”
The man, whose hair and beard were closely-cropped, and whose furrowed face had a habit of twitching when he spoke, grinned as he answered,—
“No, sir. People tells me I bear my age wonderful well. But won’t you come into the parlour, sir?”
Declining, I told him to get me something to drink, and when he brought it questioned him as to the latest news in the village. Denman was an inveterate gossip, and in his constant drives in the rickety and antiquated vehicle known as “the fly,” to villages and towns in the vicinity, had a knack of picking up all the news and scandal, which he retailed at night for the delectation of customers at the Sussex Arms.
“I dunno as anything very startling has happened lately in Warnham. The jumble sale came off at the schools last Tuesday fortnight, and there’s a cricket match up at the Lodge next Saturday. Some gentlemen are coming down from London to play.”
“Anything else?”
Denman removed his hat and scratched his head.
“Oh, yes,” he said suddenly. “You knows Mr Macandrew what’s steward for Mr Thornbury? Well, last Monday week an old gentleman called at his house up street and asked to see him. His wife asked him into the parlour, and Mr Macandrew went in. ‘Are you Mr Macandrew?’ says the old gent. ‘I am,’ says Mr Macandrew. ‘Well, I shouldn’t ’ave known you,’ says the old man. And it turned out afterwards that this old man was actually Mr Macandrew’s father, who’s lived ever so many years in America, and hasn’t seen Mr Macandrew since he wor a boy. I did laugh when I heard it.”
“Extraordinary. Have you had any visitors down from London?” I inquired, for sometimes people took the houses of the better-class villagers, furnished for the season.
“We had a lively young gent staying here in the inn for four days last week. He was a friend of somebody up at the Hall, I think, for he was there a good deal. He came from London. I wonder whether you’d know him.”
“What was his name?”
“Funny name,” Denman said, grinning. “Ogle, Mr Ogle.”
“Ogle!” I gasped. “What was his Christian name?”
“Dudley, I fancy it was.”
“Dudley Ogle,” I repeated, remembering that he had been absent from Shepperton for four days, and had told me he had been in Ipswich visiting some friends. “And he has been here?”
“Yes, sir. We made him as comfortable as we could, and I think he enjoyed hisself.”
“But what did he do—why was he down here?” I inquired eagerly.
“Do you know him, sir? Jolly gentleman, isn’t he? Up to all manners o’ tricks, and always chaffing the girls.”
“Yes, I knew him, Denman,” I answered gravely. “Tell me, as far as you know, his object in coming to Warnham. I’m very interested in his doings.”
“As far as I know, sir, he came to see somebody up at the Hall. I drove him about a good deal, over to Ockley, to Cowfold, and out to Handcross; and I took him into Horsham every day.”
“Do you know who was his friend at the Hall?”
“No, I don’t, sir. He never spoke about it; but I did have my suspicions,” he answered, smiling.
“Oh! what were they?” I asked.
“I fancy he came to see Lucy Bryden, the housekeeper’s daughter. She’s a good-looking girl, you know,” and the old man winked knowingly.
“What made you think that, eh?”
“Well, from something I was told,” he replied mysteriously. “He was seen walking with a young lady across the park one night, and I ’eard as ’ow it was Mrs Bryden’s daughter. But next day I ’ad a surprise. A young lady called here for him, and she was dressed exactly as the young woman who had been in the park with him was. But it wasn’t Mrs Bryden’s daughter.”
“Then who was it?”
“I heard him call her Ella. She came from London.”
“Ella?” I gasped. “What the deuce do you mean, Denman? What sort of a girl was she? A lady?”
“Yes, sir, quite a lady. She was dressed in brown, and one thing I noticed was that she had on a splendid diamond bracelet. It was a beauty.”
“A diamond bracelet!” I echoed. There was no doubt that Ella had actually been to Warnham without my knowledge, for the bracelet that the old ostler, in reply to my eager questions, described accurately, was the one I had given her.
“What time in the day did she call? Where did they go?” I demanded, in surprise.
“She came about mid-day, and they both went for a walk towards Broadbridge Heath. They were gone, I should reckon, about three hours, and when they returned, it was evident from her eyes that she’d been crying.”
“Crying! Had Ogle been talking to her angrily, do you think?”
“No. I don’t believe so. They remained here and had some tea together in the parlour, and then I drove ’em to Horsham, and they caught the 6:25 to London.”
I was silent. There was some remarkable, unfathomable mystery in this.
“Now, Denman,” I said at last, “I know you’ve got a sharp pair of ears when you’re perched up on that box of yours. Did you overhear their conversation while driving them to Horsham?”
Again the old man removed his battered hat and calmly scratched his head.
“Well, sir, to tell you the truth, I did ’ear a few words,” he answered. “I ’eard the young lady say as ’ow she wor powerless. He seemed to be a-begging of her to do something which horrified her. I ’eard her ask him in a whisper whether he thought they would be discovered, and he laughed at her fear, and said, ‘If you don’t do it, you know the consequences will be fatal.’”
“Do you think they went up to the Hall when they went out walking?”
“I don’t know, sir. They could, of course, have got into the park that way. But you don’t look very well, sir. I hope what I’ve told you isn’t—isn’t very unpleasant,” the old ostler added, with a look of apprehension.
“No. Get me some brandy, Denman,” I gasped.
While he was absent I rose and walked unsteadily to the window that overlooked a comfortable-looking corner residence surrounded by a belt of firs, a wide road, and a beautiful stretch of valley and blue downs beyond. The landscape was peaceful and picturesque, and I sought solace in gazing upon it. But this latest revelation had unnerved me. Dudley and Ella had met in that quiet, rural place for some purpose which I could not conceive. Their meeting had evidently been pre-arranged, and their object, from the words the old man had overheard, was apparently of a secret and sinister character.
The strange, inquiring look I had detected in Ella’s face whenever she had glanced surreptitiously at Dudley on the previous night was, I now felt assured, an index of guilty conscience; and Mrs Laing’s dread that Ella should know the truth of my friend’s tragic end appeared to prove, in a certain degree, the existence of some secret knowledge held by all three.
Yet I could not bring myself to believe that my well-beloved had wilfully deceived me. From what Denman had said, it appeared as if Ogle had held her under some mysterious thrall, and was trying to compel her to act against her better judgment. Her pure, womanly conscience had, perhaps, revolted against his suggestion, and she had shed the tears the old ostler had noticed; yet he had persisted and held over her a threat that had cowed her, and, perhaps, for aught I knew, compelled her to submit.
My thought that the man who was my friend should have thus treated the woman I adored filled me with fiercest anger and hatred. With bitterness I told myself that the man in whom I placed implicit confidence, and with whom I had allowed Ella to spend many idle hours punting or sculling while I was absent at my duties in London, was actually my enemy.
With sudden resolve I determined to travel back to Staines and, by possession of the knowledge of her mysterious visit to that village, worm from her its object. At that moment Denman entered, and I drank the brandy at one gulp, afterwards ordering the fly and driving back to Horsham station, whence I returned to London.
At my flat in Rossetti Mansions, Chelsea, I found a telegram from the Staines police summoning me to the inquest to be held next morning at eleven o’clock, and also one from Ella asking me to return. The latter I felt inclined to disregard; the former I could not. Her words and actions were, indeed, beyond comprehension, but in the light of this knowledge I had by mere chance acquired, it seemed plain that her declaration of her unworthiness of my love was something more than the natural outcome of highly-strung nerves and a romantic disposition. Women of certain temperaments are prone to self-accusation, and I had brought myself to believe her words to be mere hysterical utterances; but now, alas! I saw there was some deep motive underlying them. I had been tricked. I had, it seemed, been unduly jealous of Beck, and unsuspecting of my real enemy, the man whose lips were closed in death.
I now regretted his end, not as a friend regrets, but merely because no effort would be availing to compel his lying tongue to speak the truth. Yet, if he were my rival for Ella’s hand, might he not have lied when questioned regarding the events of that fateful afternoon when the secret defensive alliance had been so mysteriously exchanged for a dummy? Jealousy knows neither limit nor remorse.
Next morning, after spending the greater part of the night sitting alone smoking and endeavouring to penetrate the ever-increasing veil of mystery that had apparently enveloped her, I travelled down to Staines, arriving there just in time to take a cab to the Town Hall, where the inquest was to be held. The town was agog, for a crowd of those unable to enter because the room was already filled to overflowing, stood in the open space outside, eagerly discussing the tragic affair in all its various aspects, and hazarding the wildest and most impossible theories. Entering the hall, I elbowed my way forward, and as I did so I heard my name shouted loudly by a police constable. I was required as a witness, and succeeded in struggling through to the baize-covered table whereat the grave-faced Coroner sat.
He stretched forth his hand to give me the copy of Holy Writ whereon to take the oath, when suddenly my eyes fell upon a watch and a collection of miscellaneous articles lying upon the table, the contents of the dead man’s pockets.
One small object alone riveted my attention. Heedless of the Coroner’s words I snatched it up and examined it closely.
Next second I stood breathless and aghast, dumbfounded by an amazing discovery that staggered belief.
Chapter Seven.Ella’s Suspicions.The formula of the oath fell upon my ears in a dull monotone, as mechanically I raised the Bible to my lips, afterwards replying to the Coroner’s formal questions regarding my name, address and occupation. The discovery I had made filled me with fierce, bitter hatred against my dead companion, and, dazed by the startling suddenness of the revelation, I stood like a man in a dream.Dr Diplock, the Coroner, noticed it, and his sharp injunction to answer his question brought me back to a knowledge of my surroundings. I was standing in full view of an assembly of some three hundred persons, so filled by curiosity, and eager to hear my story, that the silence was complete.“I beg your pardon, but I did not hear the question,” I said, bracing myself with effort.“The deceased was your friend, I believe?”“Yes,” I answered. “He shared a furnished cottage with me at Shepperton. I have known him for some time.”“Were you with him at the day of his death?”“I left him at Shepperton in the morning, when I went to town, and he called upon me at the Foreign Office about one o’clock. We lunched together, and then, returning to Downing Street, parted. We met again at Shepperton later, and came here, to Staines, in response to an invitation to dinner at ‘The Nook.’ I—”A woman’s low, despairing cry broke the silence, and as I turned to the assembly I saw, straight before me, Ella, rigid, almost statuesque. Her terror-stricken gaze met mine; her eyes seemed riveted upon me.“Kindly proceed with your evidence,” exclaimed the Coroner, impatiently.“We dined at ‘The Nook,’” I went on, turning again to face him. “Then we went for a row, and on our return Mr Ogle left us to walk back to Shepperton.”“Alone?”“Yes.”“Why did you not accompany him?”“Because I had, during the evening, received a telegram summoning me away.”“Who was the message from?”“The Earl of Warnham,” I replied. Then obeying his request to continue, I explained how, on leaving “The Nook” about an hour later to catch my last train, I had stumbled upon the body of my friend.Then, when I had concluded, the Coroner commenced his cross-examination. Many of his questions were purely formal in character, but presently, when he began to take me through the events which occurred at the Foreign Office, I experienced a very uncomfortable feeling, fearing lest I should divulge the suspicions that had during the last half-hour been aroused within me. It was, I recognised, absolutely necessary that I should keep my discovery a strict secret, for upon my ability to do so everything depended.“Was there any reason why he should call for you at the Foreign Office and ask you to lunch with him? Was he in the habit of doing this?” inquired the Coroner.“No; there seemed no reason, beyond the fact that he was compelled to come to town, and merely wanted to pass an idle hour away,” I said.“Why did he go to London?”“I have no idea what business took him there.”“He never told you that he had any enemy, I suppose?” the official asked, with an air of mystery.“Never. He was, on the contrary, most popular.”“And no incident other than what you have related occurred at the Foreign Office? You are quite certain of this?”For a moment I hesitated, half inclined to relate the whole story of the mysterious theft of the secret convention; but risking perjury rather than an exposure of facts that I saw must remain hidden, I answered as calmly as I could,—“No other incident occurred.”“Have you any reason to suspect that he was a victim of foul play?” the Coroner continued, looking at me rather suspiciously, I thought.At that moment I glanced at Ella, and was astounded to see how intensely excited she appeared, with her white face upturned, her mouth half open, her eyes staring, eagerly drinking in every word that fell from my lips. Her whole attitude was of one who dreaded that some terrible truth might be brought to light.“I have no reason to suspect he was murdered,” I answered in a low tone, and as I surreptitiously watched the face of the woman I loved I saw an instant transformation. Her breast heaved with a heavy sigh of relief as across her countenance there passed a look of satisfaction she was unable to disguise. She was in deadly fear of something, the nature of which I could not conjecture.“You have no suspicion whatever that the deceased had an enemy?” asked the foreman of the jury, who had the appearance of a local butcher.“None whatever,” I answered.“I frequently saw Mr Ogle on the river of an afternoon with Miss Laing,” the man observed. “Was there, as far as you are aware, any affection between them?”Glancing at Ella, I saw she had turned even paler than before, and was trembling. The question nonplussed me. In my heart I strongly suspected that some attachment existed between them; but resenting this impertinent question from a man who struck me as a local busybody, I made a negative reply.“Then jealousy, it would appear, was not the cause of the crime,” the foreman observed to his fellow-jurymen.The Coroner, however, quickly corrected him, pointing out that they had not yet ascertained whether death had, or had not, been due to natural causes.Turning to me, he said,—“I believe I am right in assuming that you are engaged to be married to Miss Laing, am I not?”“I was engaged to her,” I replied hoarsely.“Then you are not engaged at the present moment? Why was the match broken off?”I hesitated for several moments, trying to devise some means to avoid answering this abrupt question. The bitter thought of Ella’s double dealing occurred to me, and with foolish disregard for consequences I resolved not to spare her.“Because of a confession she made to me,” I said.“A confession! What of?”“Of unworthiness.”“She acknowledged herself unfaithful to you, I presume?” observed one of the jurymen who had not before spoken; but to this I made no reply.“Now, have you any suspicion that any secret affection existed between her and the deceased?” the Coroner asked, in a dry, distinct voice, that could be heard all over the room.“I—I cannot say,” I faltered.The movement among the audience showed the sensation my reply had caused, and it was increased by Ella suddenly rising from her place and shrieking hysterically: “That answer is a lie—a foul lie!”“Silence!” shouted the Coroner, who, above all things, detested a scene in his Court. “If that lady interrupts again, she must be requested to leave.”“Have you any further question to ask Mr Deedes?” he inquired, turning to the jury; but as no one replied, he intimated that the examination was at an end, and I felt that I had, at last, successfully passed through the ordeal I had dreaded.Retiring to a seat, my place as a witness was at once taken by Beck; but scarcely had I sunk into a chair near where Ella was sitting when I felt within my hand the object I had taken from among the things found in the dead man’s possession. It had not been missed, and I wondered whether its loss would ever be detected. To keep it was, I felt, extremely dangerous; nevertheless I sat holding it in my palm, listening to the evidence of the well-known member for West Rutlandshire. His story, related in that loud, bombastic tone that had at first so prejudiced me against him, was much to the same effect as mine regarding the discovery of the body, its removal into the house, and the subsequent examination by the doctor, until there commenced the minute cross-examination.“How long have you known the deceased?” the Coroner inquired, looking up suddenly from his notes.“A few months. About six, I should think,” he answered.“Have you any suspicion that he had an enemy?”“No. He was about the last man in the world who would arouse the hatred of anybody. In fact, he was exceedingly popular.”“You say you have been a frequent visitor at Mrs Laing’s. Now, from your own observations, have you seen anything that would lead you to the belief that he loved Miss Laing?”“Nothing whatever,” he replied. “Ella was engaged to Mr Deedes, and although she was on the river a great deal with Ogle, I am confident she never for a moment regarded him as her lover.”“Why are you so confident?”“Because of certain facts she has confided in me.”“What are they?”He was silent. Evidently he had no intention of being led on in this manner, but, even finding himself cornered, his imperturbable coolness never deserted him, for he calmly replied, with a faint smile,—“I refuse to answer.”“Kindly reply to my question, sir, and do not waste the time of the Court,” exclaimed the Coroner, with impatience. “What were these facts?”Again he was silent, twisting his gloves around his fingers uneasily.“Come, answer if you please.”“Well,” he replied, after considerable hesitation, “briefly, she gave me to understand that she loved Deedes, and had refused to listen to the deceased’s declaration of affection.”“How came she to confide this secret of hers to you?” the Coroner asked eagerly.Through my memory at that moment there flashed the scene I had witnessed in secret in the garden on that memorable night when I had detected this man with his arm around Ella’s waist, and I looked on in triumph at his embarrassment.“I am a friend of the family,” he answered, with a calm, irritating smile a moment later. “She has told me many of her secrets.”I knew from the expression upon his face that he lied. Was it not far more likely that on that night when I had discovered them he was uttering words of affection to her, and she, in return, had confessed that she loved me?“Are you aware whether Mr Deedes had any knowledge that the deceased was his rival for Miss Laing’s hand?” inquired the Coroner, adding, self-apologetically, “I much regret being compelled to ask these questions, for I am aware how painful it must be to the family.”“I believe he was utterly ignorant of it,” Beck replied. “He regarded Mr Ogle as his closest friend.”“A false one, to say the least,” Dr Diplock observed in tones just audible. Beck shrugged his shoulders, but did not reply.The inquisitive foreman of the jury then commenced a series of clumsy, impertinent questions, many of which the witness cleverly evaded. He resented this man’s cross-examination just as I had done, and during the quarter of an hour’s fencing with the tradesman no noteworthy fact was elicited. The Coroner, seeing this, suddenly put an end to the foreman’s pertinacious efforts to draw from the Member of Parliament further facts regarding home life at “The Nook,” and called Dr Allenby.The doctor, who had apparently had long experience of inquests, took the oath in a business-like manner, and related the facts within his knowledge clearly and succinctly, describing how I had summoned him, his visit to “The Nook,” and the appearance of the dead man.“Have you made apost-mortem?” the Coroner asked, without looking up from the notes he was making.“I made an examination yesterday, in conjunction with Dr Engall. We found no trace of disease, with the exception of a slight lung trouble of recent date.”“Was it sufficient to cause death?”“Certainly not; neither was the bruise upon the forehead, which had, no doubt, been caused by the fall upon the gravel. The heart was perfectly normal, and we failed utterly to detect anything that would result fatally. The contents of the stomach have been analysed by Dr Adams, of the Home Office, at the instigation of the police, I believe.”“Then, as far as you are concerned, you are unable to determine the cause of death?”“Quite. It is a mystery.”The next witness was a thin, white-haired, dapper little man, who, in reply to questions, explained that he was analyst to the Home Office, and had, at the request of the police, submitted the contents of the deceased’s stomach to analysis, the position of the hands pointing to a slight suspicion of poison.“And what have you discovered?” inquired the Coroner, the Court being so silent that the proverbial pin, if it had been dropped at that moment, might have been heard.“Nothing,” he answered clearly. “There was no sign of anything of a deleterious nature whatsoever. The deceased was certainly not poisoned.”The assembly of excited townspeople again shifted uneasily, as it was wont to do after every important reply which might elucidate the mystery. It seemed as though a rumour had been circulated that Dudley had been poisoned, and this declaration of the renowned analyst set at rest for ever that wild, unfounded report. People turned to one another, whispering excitedly, and a shadow of disappointment rested upon their inquisitive countenances. They had expected it to be pronounced a case of murder, whereas it would now be proved that death had occurred from some natural but sudden and unknown cause.“Then you have no opinion to offer as to the cause of death!” the Coroner exclaimed.“None whatever,” was the reply, and that concluded the analyst’s important testimony.The foreman of the jury expressed a wish to put a question to Ella, and a few moments later she stood where I had stood, and removing her glove, took the oath with trembling voice.“Have you any reason to suppose, Miss Laing, that Mr Ogle’s declaration of love to you had aroused the enmity of Mr Deedes?” asked the man, seriously.“No,” she answered in a tone so low that I could scarcely distinguish the word.“Mr Deedes was your lover, wasn’t he?”“I am still engaged to him,” she replied, tears welling in her eyes. “He tells a falsehood when he says that our love is at an end.”“Then why did you not tell him of Mr Ogle’s declaration?”“Because they were friends, and I did not wish to arouse animosity between them.”Slight applause followed this reply, but it was instantly suppressed.The Coroner, to bring matters to a conclusion, asked, “Now, knowing Mr Ogle as intimately as you did, do you suspect that he might have been murdered?”She gasped, swayed slowly forward and gripped the corner of the baize-covered table to steady herself.“Yes,” she answered in a clear but tremulous voice. “I—I believe he was murdered.”A thrill of excitement and wonder ran through the onlookers. Her handsome face was ashen pale, and her breast, beneath her blouse of cool-looking muslin, rose and fell quickly, showing how intense was her agitation.“And what causes you to believe this?” asked the Coroner, raising his brows in interrogation.“I have suspicions,” she answered in a low voice, striving to remain calm, and glancing quickly around the silent assembly.“You suspect some person of having been guilty of murder?” he asked, interested.“Not exactly that,” she said quickly. “That Mr Ogle was murdered I feel confident, but who committed the crime I am unaware. It is a mystery. Knowing Mr Ogle so well as I did, he entrusted to me knowledge of certain facts that he strenuously kept secret from others. Yet I cannot conceive who would profit by his death.”At this point the inspector of police rose and expressed a desire to know, through the Coroner, whether she had quarrelled with Mr Ogle.“The day prior to his death we had a few words,” she faltered.“Upon what subject?” asked the Coroner.She at first refused to reply, but after being pressed, said, “We quarrelled about my engagement to Mr Deedes.”So she acknowledged with her own lips that the dead man had been my bitter enemy, as I, too late, had discovered.“He wished you to marry him?” suggested the Coroner. She did not answer, but burst into a fit of hysterical tears, and a few moments later was led out of the Court.“I think, gentlemen,” the Coroner observed, turning to the jury, “no end can be obtained in pursuing this very painful inquiry further. You have heard the evidence, and while on the one hand the exact cause of death has not been established, on the other we have Miss Laing declaring that the unfortunate gentleman was murdered. The evidence certainly does not point to such a conclusion, and there are two courses that may be pursued; either to adjourn the inquiry, or to return an open verdict and leave the elucidation of the mystery in the hands of the police.”The jury, after consulting among themselves, retired, but only for five minutes, coming back into court and returning an open verdict of “Found dead.”Then, as the Coroner thanked the twelve tradesmen for their attendance, I rose and crossed to Beck, afterwards walking with him to “The Nook.”
The formula of the oath fell upon my ears in a dull monotone, as mechanically I raised the Bible to my lips, afterwards replying to the Coroner’s formal questions regarding my name, address and occupation. The discovery I had made filled me with fierce, bitter hatred against my dead companion, and, dazed by the startling suddenness of the revelation, I stood like a man in a dream.
Dr Diplock, the Coroner, noticed it, and his sharp injunction to answer his question brought me back to a knowledge of my surroundings. I was standing in full view of an assembly of some three hundred persons, so filled by curiosity, and eager to hear my story, that the silence was complete.
“I beg your pardon, but I did not hear the question,” I said, bracing myself with effort.
“The deceased was your friend, I believe?”
“Yes,” I answered. “He shared a furnished cottage with me at Shepperton. I have known him for some time.”
“Were you with him at the day of his death?”
“I left him at Shepperton in the morning, when I went to town, and he called upon me at the Foreign Office about one o’clock. We lunched together, and then, returning to Downing Street, parted. We met again at Shepperton later, and came here, to Staines, in response to an invitation to dinner at ‘The Nook.’ I—”
A woman’s low, despairing cry broke the silence, and as I turned to the assembly I saw, straight before me, Ella, rigid, almost statuesque. Her terror-stricken gaze met mine; her eyes seemed riveted upon me.
“Kindly proceed with your evidence,” exclaimed the Coroner, impatiently.
“We dined at ‘The Nook,’” I went on, turning again to face him. “Then we went for a row, and on our return Mr Ogle left us to walk back to Shepperton.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you not accompany him?”
“Because I had, during the evening, received a telegram summoning me away.”
“Who was the message from?”
“The Earl of Warnham,” I replied. Then obeying his request to continue, I explained how, on leaving “The Nook” about an hour later to catch my last train, I had stumbled upon the body of my friend.
Then, when I had concluded, the Coroner commenced his cross-examination. Many of his questions were purely formal in character, but presently, when he began to take me through the events which occurred at the Foreign Office, I experienced a very uncomfortable feeling, fearing lest I should divulge the suspicions that had during the last half-hour been aroused within me. It was, I recognised, absolutely necessary that I should keep my discovery a strict secret, for upon my ability to do so everything depended.
“Was there any reason why he should call for you at the Foreign Office and ask you to lunch with him? Was he in the habit of doing this?” inquired the Coroner.
“No; there seemed no reason, beyond the fact that he was compelled to come to town, and merely wanted to pass an idle hour away,” I said.
“Why did he go to London?”
“I have no idea what business took him there.”
“He never told you that he had any enemy, I suppose?” the official asked, with an air of mystery.
“Never. He was, on the contrary, most popular.”
“And no incident other than what you have related occurred at the Foreign Office? You are quite certain of this?”
For a moment I hesitated, half inclined to relate the whole story of the mysterious theft of the secret convention; but risking perjury rather than an exposure of facts that I saw must remain hidden, I answered as calmly as I could,—
“No other incident occurred.”
“Have you any reason to suspect that he was a victim of foul play?” the Coroner continued, looking at me rather suspiciously, I thought.
At that moment I glanced at Ella, and was astounded to see how intensely excited she appeared, with her white face upturned, her mouth half open, her eyes staring, eagerly drinking in every word that fell from my lips. Her whole attitude was of one who dreaded that some terrible truth might be brought to light.
“I have no reason to suspect he was murdered,” I answered in a low tone, and as I surreptitiously watched the face of the woman I loved I saw an instant transformation. Her breast heaved with a heavy sigh of relief as across her countenance there passed a look of satisfaction she was unable to disguise. She was in deadly fear of something, the nature of which I could not conjecture.
“You have no suspicion whatever that the deceased had an enemy?” asked the foreman of the jury, who had the appearance of a local butcher.
“None whatever,” I answered.
“I frequently saw Mr Ogle on the river of an afternoon with Miss Laing,” the man observed. “Was there, as far as you are aware, any affection between them?”
Glancing at Ella, I saw she had turned even paler than before, and was trembling. The question nonplussed me. In my heart I strongly suspected that some attachment existed between them; but resenting this impertinent question from a man who struck me as a local busybody, I made a negative reply.
“Then jealousy, it would appear, was not the cause of the crime,” the foreman observed to his fellow-jurymen.
The Coroner, however, quickly corrected him, pointing out that they had not yet ascertained whether death had, or had not, been due to natural causes.
Turning to me, he said,—
“I believe I am right in assuming that you are engaged to be married to Miss Laing, am I not?”
“I was engaged to her,” I replied hoarsely.
“Then you are not engaged at the present moment? Why was the match broken off?”
I hesitated for several moments, trying to devise some means to avoid answering this abrupt question. The bitter thought of Ella’s double dealing occurred to me, and with foolish disregard for consequences I resolved not to spare her.
“Because of a confession she made to me,” I said.
“A confession! What of?”
“Of unworthiness.”
“She acknowledged herself unfaithful to you, I presume?” observed one of the jurymen who had not before spoken; but to this I made no reply.
“Now, have you any suspicion that any secret affection existed between her and the deceased?” the Coroner asked, in a dry, distinct voice, that could be heard all over the room.
“I—I cannot say,” I faltered.
The movement among the audience showed the sensation my reply had caused, and it was increased by Ella suddenly rising from her place and shrieking hysterically: “That answer is a lie—a foul lie!”
“Silence!” shouted the Coroner, who, above all things, detested a scene in his Court. “If that lady interrupts again, she must be requested to leave.”
“Have you any further question to ask Mr Deedes?” he inquired, turning to the jury; but as no one replied, he intimated that the examination was at an end, and I felt that I had, at last, successfully passed through the ordeal I had dreaded.
Retiring to a seat, my place as a witness was at once taken by Beck; but scarcely had I sunk into a chair near where Ella was sitting when I felt within my hand the object I had taken from among the things found in the dead man’s possession. It had not been missed, and I wondered whether its loss would ever be detected. To keep it was, I felt, extremely dangerous; nevertheless I sat holding it in my palm, listening to the evidence of the well-known member for West Rutlandshire. His story, related in that loud, bombastic tone that had at first so prejudiced me against him, was much to the same effect as mine regarding the discovery of the body, its removal into the house, and the subsequent examination by the doctor, until there commenced the minute cross-examination.
“How long have you known the deceased?” the Coroner inquired, looking up suddenly from his notes.
“A few months. About six, I should think,” he answered.
“Have you any suspicion that he had an enemy?”
“No. He was about the last man in the world who would arouse the hatred of anybody. In fact, he was exceedingly popular.”
“You say you have been a frequent visitor at Mrs Laing’s. Now, from your own observations, have you seen anything that would lead you to the belief that he loved Miss Laing?”
“Nothing whatever,” he replied. “Ella was engaged to Mr Deedes, and although she was on the river a great deal with Ogle, I am confident she never for a moment regarded him as her lover.”
“Why are you so confident?”
“Because of certain facts she has confided in me.”
“What are they?”
He was silent. Evidently he had no intention of being led on in this manner, but, even finding himself cornered, his imperturbable coolness never deserted him, for he calmly replied, with a faint smile,—
“I refuse to answer.”
“Kindly reply to my question, sir, and do not waste the time of the Court,” exclaimed the Coroner, with impatience. “What were these facts?”
Again he was silent, twisting his gloves around his fingers uneasily.
“Come, answer if you please.”
“Well,” he replied, after considerable hesitation, “briefly, she gave me to understand that she loved Deedes, and had refused to listen to the deceased’s declaration of affection.”
“How came she to confide this secret of hers to you?” the Coroner asked eagerly.
Through my memory at that moment there flashed the scene I had witnessed in secret in the garden on that memorable night when I had detected this man with his arm around Ella’s waist, and I looked on in triumph at his embarrassment.
“I am a friend of the family,” he answered, with a calm, irritating smile a moment later. “She has told me many of her secrets.”
I knew from the expression upon his face that he lied. Was it not far more likely that on that night when I had discovered them he was uttering words of affection to her, and she, in return, had confessed that she loved me?
“Are you aware whether Mr Deedes had any knowledge that the deceased was his rival for Miss Laing’s hand?” inquired the Coroner, adding, self-apologetically, “I much regret being compelled to ask these questions, for I am aware how painful it must be to the family.”
“I believe he was utterly ignorant of it,” Beck replied. “He regarded Mr Ogle as his closest friend.”
“A false one, to say the least,” Dr Diplock observed in tones just audible. Beck shrugged his shoulders, but did not reply.
The inquisitive foreman of the jury then commenced a series of clumsy, impertinent questions, many of which the witness cleverly evaded. He resented this man’s cross-examination just as I had done, and during the quarter of an hour’s fencing with the tradesman no noteworthy fact was elicited. The Coroner, seeing this, suddenly put an end to the foreman’s pertinacious efforts to draw from the Member of Parliament further facts regarding home life at “The Nook,” and called Dr Allenby.
The doctor, who had apparently had long experience of inquests, took the oath in a business-like manner, and related the facts within his knowledge clearly and succinctly, describing how I had summoned him, his visit to “The Nook,” and the appearance of the dead man.
“Have you made apost-mortem?” the Coroner asked, without looking up from the notes he was making.
“I made an examination yesterday, in conjunction with Dr Engall. We found no trace of disease, with the exception of a slight lung trouble of recent date.”
“Was it sufficient to cause death?”
“Certainly not; neither was the bruise upon the forehead, which had, no doubt, been caused by the fall upon the gravel. The heart was perfectly normal, and we failed utterly to detect anything that would result fatally. The contents of the stomach have been analysed by Dr Adams, of the Home Office, at the instigation of the police, I believe.”
“Then, as far as you are concerned, you are unable to determine the cause of death?”
“Quite. It is a mystery.”
The next witness was a thin, white-haired, dapper little man, who, in reply to questions, explained that he was analyst to the Home Office, and had, at the request of the police, submitted the contents of the deceased’s stomach to analysis, the position of the hands pointing to a slight suspicion of poison.
“And what have you discovered?” inquired the Coroner, the Court being so silent that the proverbial pin, if it had been dropped at that moment, might have been heard.
“Nothing,” he answered clearly. “There was no sign of anything of a deleterious nature whatsoever. The deceased was certainly not poisoned.”
The assembly of excited townspeople again shifted uneasily, as it was wont to do after every important reply which might elucidate the mystery. It seemed as though a rumour had been circulated that Dudley had been poisoned, and this declaration of the renowned analyst set at rest for ever that wild, unfounded report. People turned to one another, whispering excitedly, and a shadow of disappointment rested upon their inquisitive countenances. They had expected it to be pronounced a case of murder, whereas it would now be proved that death had occurred from some natural but sudden and unknown cause.
“Then you have no opinion to offer as to the cause of death!” the Coroner exclaimed.
“None whatever,” was the reply, and that concluded the analyst’s important testimony.
The foreman of the jury expressed a wish to put a question to Ella, and a few moments later she stood where I had stood, and removing her glove, took the oath with trembling voice.
“Have you any reason to suppose, Miss Laing, that Mr Ogle’s declaration of love to you had aroused the enmity of Mr Deedes?” asked the man, seriously.
“No,” she answered in a tone so low that I could scarcely distinguish the word.
“Mr Deedes was your lover, wasn’t he?”
“I am still engaged to him,” she replied, tears welling in her eyes. “He tells a falsehood when he says that our love is at an end.”
“Then why did you not tell him of Mr Ogle’s declaration?”
“Because they were friends, and I did not wish to arouse animosity between them.”
Slight applause followed this reply, but it was instantly suppressed.
The Coroner, to bring matters to a conclusion, asked, “Now, knowing Mr Ogle as intimately as you did, do you suspect that he might have been murdered?”
She gasped, swayed slowly forward and gripped the corner of the baize-covered table to steady herself.
“Yes,” she answered in a clear but tremulous voice. “I—I believe he was murdered.”
A thrill of excitement and wonder ran through the onlookers. Her handsome face was ashen pale, and her breast, beneath her blouse of cool-looking muslin, rose and fell quickly, showing how intense was her agitation.
“And what causes you to believe this?” asked the Coroner, raising his brows in interrogation.
“I have suspicions,” she answered in a low voice, striving to remain calm, and glancing quickly around the silent assembly.
“You suspect some person of having been guilty of murder?” he asked, interested.
“Not exactly that,” she said quickly. “That Mr Ogle was murdered I feel confident, but who committed the crime I am unaware. It is a mystery. Knowing Mr Ogle so well as I did, he entrusted to me knowledge of certain facts that he strenuously kept secret from others. Yet I cannot conceive who would profit by his death.”
At this point the inspector of police rose and expressed a desire to know, through the Coroner, whether she had quarrelled with Mr Ogle.
“The day prior to his death we had a few words,” she faltered.
“Upon what subject?” asked the Coroner.
She at first refused to reply, but after being pressed, said, “We quarrelled about my engagement to Mr Deedes.”
So she acknowledged with her own lips that the dead man had been my bitter enemy, as I, too late, had discovered.
“He wished you to marry him?” suggested the Coroner. She did not answer, but burst into a fit of hysterical tears, and a few moments later was led out of the Court.
“I think, gentlemen,” the Coroner observed, turning to the jury, “no end can be obtained in pursuing this very painful inquiry further. You have heard the evidence, and while on the one hand the exact cause of death has not been established, on the other we have Miss Laing declaring that the unfortunate gentleman was murdered. The evidence certainly does not point to such a conclusion, and there are two courses that may be pursued; either to adjourn the inquiry, or to return an open verdict and leave the elucidation of the mystery in the hands of the police.”
The jury, after consulting among themselves, retired, but only for five minutes, coming back into court and returning an open verdict of “Found dead.”
Then, as the Coroner thanked the twelve tradesmen for their attendance, I rose and crossed to Beck, afterwards walking with him to “The Nook.”