JUDITH LEE (continued 5)

“Mrs. Dawson liked her well enough, I believe; though, in the end, in a sense, she was the actual cause of the old lady’s death, because it was she who rushed into her bedroom screaming out that George Ryder was murdered. However she could have done such a thing, considering that the doctor had warned her to allow nothing to disturb or agitate the old lady, was beyond me altogether. It turned out that she and Mr. Ward had been engaged, under the rose, for ages. After the will was read they were married—within a week or two. Everyone believed that the old lady was well off, but no one guessed how well off until things were gone into. She had not been living on a quarter of her income, and had been investing the other three-quarters as it came in. I’m told that she left over two hundred thousand pounds. Think what even a little of it would have meant to Daisy and me. I’m getting twenty-five pounds a year, and out of that I have to clothe myself and keep my child. They give me lodging, and my food, such as it is, but if I could only manage to earn a little more money.”

“How long are you free now? I’m staying at the Burlington Hotel. Can’t you come and lunch with me?”

“I’m free for this afternoon. My mistress, Mrs. Levison, is out. The children have gone to lunch with a friend. If—if I’m not too shabby, I should like to come and lunch with you very much. It would be a treat.”

The two got up from their seat and walked away. I remained where I was, thinking. It did seem extraordinary that I should have been there when such things were being talked about—things which brought back such odd memories. The girl with the “dreadful eyes,” could she, by any chance, have had any connection with the young woman whose singular eyes had attracted my attention in the tea-shop in the Brompton Road? And Mr. Athelstan Ward—was he red-headed? I wondered.

Suppose that those two chance encounters, in the tea-shop in the Boscombe public gardens, had put into my hands the key to the unsolved mystery, would that not be something very like a miracle? If I had had anything tangible to go upon, I would have spoken to those two women then and there. But what a figure I should have cut if my fashion of putting two and two together had proved all wrong. I might never have seen Mrs. Dawson’s companion in my life—if they had mentioned where Mrs. Dawson had lived I might have got nearer to certainty—and Mr. Athelstan Ward might be a bald-headed gentleman of portly presence. I should have been regarded as a meddler. I have suffered in that direction more than once in my time; I had no wish to suffer again. I endeavoured to dismiss the whole subject from my mind, and went up to Waterloo by the afternoon train.

That the third and last chapter of my connection with the Fulham Mystery seemed to have been brought about by fortuitous circumstances I am ready to agree; but that it was by accident only I am not so sure. So strange a sequel to such singular beginnings, to my mind suggests design.

Nearly another two years elapsed, and I was at Eastbourne, staying with some friends at a big hotel on the front. My friends had gone up to town for a day or two, and I was left in sole possession of their apartments. One morning I was walking rapidly along the Parade. The sky was blue, but the east wind, of which Eastbourne is perhaps rather too fond, did not breathe warmth. One had to move quickly if one wished to keep warm. As I was about to move over to what I hoped was the warmer side of the road, I was accosted by a woman selling flowers. I had already passed two or three, at whom, I am afraid, I had not even glanced; but something about this one’s method of address and manner caused me to look at her. Where, I asked myself, had I seen her before? Her face seemed familiar. I had gone past her perhaps half a dozen steps when it came back to me. The Boscombe public gardens, the two women on the seat—surely this was Mrs. George Ryder. And yet it was impossible. She would not be selling flowers in a public road.

I must have been mistaken, a chance resemblance had taken me in. I thought I would go back and, while buying some of her flowers, have a good look at her. Anyhow, I could always do with a few flowers.

It was Mrs. Ryder—or the resemblance was supernatural. Of course she had altered: she had grown so thin; her cheeks were hollow; her eyes cavernous, even hungry; her skin seemed to be all furrows; yet that she was the woman whom I had seen sitting on the seat, telling her friend the tragic story of the will which had passed her by, I was certain. What to say to her, what to do—these were points on which I could not make up my mind. I bought nearly all her flowers; her gratitude was piteous. Then I gave an order for more, and directed her to bring them to my hotel the next morning at a certain hour. I left her there, standing in the bitter east wind, which I hoped she did not feel to be quite so bitter as before, while I walked away, wondering by what possible means she could have reached so dreadful a position. She was a lady; such a short time ago a happy wife, with such prospects of happiness in front of her—and now selling pennyworths of flowers in the gutter. It was an object lesson on the mutability of human affairs.

I kept thinking of her, even when I got back to the hotel. She was with me all that day; when I was dressing for dinner, as I was going down to the great meal of the day. What sort of dinner was she having—there was much hunger in her eyes, she looked so hungry altogether—and where?

In the absence of my friends I was the solitary occupant of their table. I was down early, and watched the people coming in. I had just finished my fish course when four or five persons came down the room, at the sight of one of whom I almost jumped.

It was the girl of the tea-shop, she of the dreadful eyes. I was sure it was she, though she was altered out of all conscience. To begin with, she was beautifully dressed—rather too well dressed, in fact, for such a place. Her hair was dressed in a way which was really an exaggeration of the latest fashion; she held herself as if she were a person of importance. She had filled out, grown plumper; in many respects she had altered altogether. Yet it was she—surely no other woman in the world could have such eyes as she had. They seemed to have grown larger; they roved as much as ever. They passed all round the room, resting, I should say, on every one in it, as she moved with her party towards their own table.

I observed the other members of her party as they took their seats. Remembering the quickness with which she had noticed my observation when we met for the first time, I did it as furtively as possible. One thing I saw at once—the red-headed youth was not there. This was by way of being a surprise; somehow I had taken it for granted that he would have been. There were three other men and two other women. One of the other men was her husband. I was sure of it from the obvious way in which he was acting as host. She was hostess, the others were guests.

The man, who I was convinced was her husband, was the antipodes of that red-headed youth. He was rather under-sized; his scanty brown hair was parted in the centre and plastered down at the sides. He wore glasses; his clothes did not seem to fit, his shirt front bulged; altogether he appeared to me about as insignificant an individual as one might expect to see. I could not believe that that woman had married him for love. I was as sure as if she had told me so that he was not the sort of man she admired, and that when she decided to become his wife it was for very solid and sufficient reasons.

The head waiter was coming down the room. That was not the first time I had stayed at that hotel; he and I were old acquaintances.

“Can you tell me who those people are who have just come in?”

His manner as he answered was most discreet. He smoothed an imaginary crease out of the tablecloth.

“It’s a dinner party. The lady and gentleman who are giving it are Mr. and Mrs. Athelstan Ward; they arrived this morning—old customers; this is their fifth or sixth visit.—Have you everything you want?”

I assured him that I had. He departed, and my appetite went with him; the feelings which came rushing over me left me no desire to eat.

So, actually, this was Mr. and Mrs. Athelstan Ward, and my wild surmise had been right. The crooked blind in the top window of the house in the street leading off the Fulham Road—the girl whom I had seen demonstrating with her handkerchief how one may signal with a blind had done it; it had been crooked because she had carefully arranged it at the precise and proper angle. In that house Mrs. Dawson had lived, the aunt of the man who had been murdered two hours after I saw that crooked blind. At that time, if what Mrs. George Ryder had told her friend in the public gardens at Boscombe was true, this girl was engaged to the other nephew, who, in a certain eventuality, of which he seemed to have been ignorant, was to benefit by his aunt’s will; that eventuality, by which the girl was to benefit as much as Mr. Ward occurred within two hours of that crooked blind having been seen by that red-headed youth—with whom she had arranged that particular signal. For what purpose?

A cold something stole up my spine as I groped about for an answer. She knew the delicate state of Mrs. Dawson’s health, she was her companion; the physicians had laid on her a special charge; yet the moment the news of the tragedy reached her, well knowing that she ought to do nothing of the kind, she rushed into the presence of the aged invalid, who was really and truly at her mercy, and struck her down by yelling out the news at her.

Things began to look very ugly. Was it by accident, or design, that I was stumbling on these things? What I still had to understand was the relation between the red-headed youth and the girl. That, when I saw them together in the tea-shop, he was her lover I was convinced. Not impossibly, he was so beside himself with love of her, that he was ready to be guilty of any folly, or perhaps worse than folly, for her dear sake; unless I erred, he was that sort of youth. Could she have used him as a tool and then thrown him over? Unless I erred again, she was that sort of girl; it was an action of which she was quite capable. Apparently she had attained the object of her ambition; she was prosperous, as happy, perhaps, as it was in her nature to be. What had become of the red-headed youth? The widow of the murdered man was selling flowers in the gutter.

A page came down the room with a telegram on a waiter. He handed it to Mrs. Athelstan Ward. With a murmured apology to her guests, she tore it open. I do not think I ever saw such a change take place on a woman’s face in public as took place on hers as she read that telegram. She appeared to be incapable of concealing the effect it had upon her. What was the dominant expression on her countenance I could not say; fear and rage were two. She seemed unconscious that the boy was waiting, that her guests were looking at her—until her husband’s voice recalled her to herself. He was facing me. As he pronounced his words with a punctilious correctness which I should say was characteristic of the man, I saw clearly what he said.

“My dear Lily, from whom is your telegram? It appears to be of absorbing interest. Permit me to see it.”

He held out his hand across the table. Then she came back to herself, after a fashion. She looked, or rather she glared, at him. When she saw his outstretched hand, and caught his meaning, she crushed the telegram up into a ball, thrust it into the bosom of her dress, and turned to the page, who instantly departed. She was sitting sideways to me, so that it was not easy for me to read the reply which she made to her husband; but I am quite sure that it was not an expression of her willingness to let him see that telegram.

I resolved to keep my eye on Mrs. Athelstan Ward. By way of a beginning, I thought it might be just as well to see if she would recognize me. To reach the private sitting-room which my friends had at the other end of the building it was necessary for me to pass her table, which I presently did, with something like ostentation. As I approached she looked at me, and I at her. I could see that she recognized me, and was aware that I did the same to her. Her face changed again, and a look came into her eyes which haunted me long after I had quitted the room. The hungry look in the eyes of the murdered man’s widow, and now that dreadful look in hers—they were with me that night even in my dreams.

The next morning I got up early; I could not sleep, and I hate lying between the sheets with my eyes wide open. My window looked out across the garden. As I peeped to see what sort of weather it was, I saw Mrs. Athelstan Ward come through the great front door of the hotel. She was dressed for walking. Crossing the garden to the street, turning to the right, she moved quickly in the direction of Beachy Head. I had one of those intuitions to which I am subject. I felt sure that the purpose which had taken her out at that extremely matutinal hour was of interest to me. It was not only chance which had taken me to the window at just that moment. I dashed into the bath, rushed into my clothes—I do not believe anything feminine can dress quicker than I can—and was out in the street in I am afraid to say how few minutes. Mrs. Ward was out of sight, but I knew the direction in which she was going, and off I tore.

Presently I saw her. She was walking almost as quickly as I was, and was nearly at the point where one begins to ascend the grassy slopes towards Beachy Head. That some special attraction was drawing her to Beachy Head at seven o’clock in the morning I felt convinced. She went round to the right—evidently she knew the shortest way. When I reached the grass I went straight on; I did not wish to keep too closely in her footsteps, lest she should look round and see that she was followed. The ascent at the part at which I took it was pretty steep. I was a little short of breath when I gained the ridge, and was sufficiently on the level to enable me to see what was ahead. There was Mrs. Ward some distance in front, striding rapidly along what I knew to be the better path. She was nearly out of sight when I gained the point from which one can see the top of the Head. A minute or two later some one came out of the little hotel which lies in the hollow on one side, and crossed to her. So this was it—she had an appointment with something masculine; it was a man who had joined her, on the top of Beachy Head, at an hour when they were likely to have it all to themselves.

I had with me a pair of those folding opera-glasses which lie down flat, so that they occupy scarcely any space at all. I focussed them on to the pair in front. I was anxious to see who the man might be. Something within me gave quite a little jump—I never have been able to get quite the better of that sort of thing—as I recognized the red-headed youth of the tea-shop and the signalling blind. Their backs were towards me, so of course I could not see what they were saying, but one had only to observe the man’s gestures to be able to form a very shrewd guess that the subject under discussion was of paramount interest to him. He was talking both with heat and volubility. The woman, on the other hand, was stiff and rigid—suggesting no desire to hear him, and disapprobation of whatever he might be saying.

They passed the signal station, passed the lighthouse, moved on towards Birling Gap, he still talking nineteen to the dozen, she listening with what I would have been willing to bet was contempt. Presently they stopped on a little knoll which was just on the other side of the lighthouse. Down I dropped in a little grassy dell which was just large enough to contain me as I lay full-length, face downwards, and raised myself just sufficiently on my elbows to permit me to have a view of the knoll in front.

I was particularly anxious that they should not see me. That the Fulham Mystery was going to be solved at last some instinct told me, and by that pair ahead. I did not intend to run any risk of losing what I had so long sought. They might, if they looked closely, have seen the top of my hat, but they would have been no wiser if they had. With the aid of that pair of folding glasses I watched their faces.

They were good glasses, the definition was excellent, the morning was clear; they were at a distance, as the crow flies, of perhaps under a hundred yards. When they turned my way I could see even the slightest movement of their lips as well as if they had been within a dozen feet.

It was some seconds, however, before they did turn my way. She had placed herself upon a sort of natural seat, formed by a ridge of earth, with her face at not quite the proper angle to allow of my seeing her mouth; he stood close up to her, saying something which—as he said it—needed a great deal of gesticulation. Suddenly, however, she stood up, fronting him, and also me, and I saw her say, as distinctly as if she had been speaking within reach of my hand:

“It’s no use your ranting. What I’ve said I’ve said, and as I’ve no more to add, there’s an end of it.”

He was silent for an instant. I was sure that he was silent from the way in which he stood motionless. Then he also turned slightly, occupying such a position that, while he looked across the sea, his mouth was as visible as if he had looked at me. I followed his answer through the glasses. He did not gesticulate that time; he spoke rather with what struck me as being an air of profound conviction.

“Lily, if ever there was a heartless devil in the shape of a woman, you are she.”

She replied, with a little flick of the cane she was carrying:

“You’ve told me so before. The remark is not in the least novel. Have you brought me here to make it again?”

“You have lied, and lied, and lied to me.” His gesticulations recommenced. “You have fooled me practically my whole lifelong. I have stolen for you—you know how often you have induced me to steal for you——”

“You didn’t need much inducement.” Her air was contemptuous.

“I did not; you are right. There was nothing I would not have done for you at a word from you; at last, at a word from you, I committed murder.”

“Put it that way if you like. From my point of view you made a mess of the whole thing; I never wanted you to actually kill the man.”

“No, you wanted me to play him some infernally clever trick which would result in his killing himself—as you afterwards killed that old woman. That was as much a murder as mine was. But I was not born with the instinct of killing, as you were, so I blundered, and had to do the poor wretch out of his life with an actual blow. And then you denied me my reward.”

“I never promised you anything.”

“Not in so many words; you were much too clever. But you know what you wished me to understand that you had promised me, and how, afterwards, you robbed me of the price which you had made me believe I was to receive.”

“Listen to me.” Her attitude became all at once that of a person who was giving utterance to a final decision. “You have been to me a continual nuisance—not practically all your life, but actually all your life. There was a time when I tried to put up with you, though it wasn’t easy. You’ve always been a penniless beggar, so that if you wanted to make me a present you had to steal it; now you throw it in my face. Afterwards—you know when—I explained that if a certain person were to die before a certain time it might be an advantage both to you and to me.”

“Especially to you.”

“Yes—especially to me; that is obvious.” The air of scorn with which she said it! “I took the greatest pains in explaining to you how, if certain things were done, other things would necessarily follow. You offered to do them. If you had done them as I had explained no crime would have been committed.”

“No legal crime, you mean; it would still have been murder.”

“Murder for which you can’t be punished doesn’t count. Do you suppose that if I had known you were going to do what you did I would have allowed you to do it?”

“I’m not so sure; I have my doubts. You were very keen, you know.”

“Yes, but not keen like that; I’m not such a fool.—Well, anyhow you did do it—the wrong way. And I had to bear the brunt.”

“You had to!—You beautiful creature!—You miserable thing!”

The marked variety of emphasis with which he delivered himself of these two remarks was most perceptible through the glasses.

“It is easy enough for you to speak in that cock-a-doodle sort of tone, but the fact remains that it is as I said. To begin with, haven’t I kept you ever since?”

“Kept me!—My God!—Kept me! When I think of how and why you’ve kept me, how often I wish that he had killed me instead of I him.”

“He didn’t. If you really wished it, you made a mess even of that.—Now you have the assurance to send me that telegram.—It came to me last night, in the middle of a dinner party, ordering me to come and meet you here. And now that I’ve come, what is it you want me to do? You want me to desert my husband, to throw away everything for which I’ve worked and struggled, and—think of it!—to come and live with you. Let me tell you this—I wouldn’t live with you if there wasn’t another man in the world; I wouldn’t willingly stay in the same house in which you were, or even in the same town. I’ve grown to hate you—if you only knew how I hate you as I see you standing there, and how willingly I’d see you tumble dead at my feet.” She drew a great breath—the glasses made it perfectly plain. “I believe I should go back to Eastbourne almost a happy woman again if I knew that you were dead.”

“You mean that?”

“I never meant anything half so much.”

“Then—you shall go back a happy woman.”

They were standing within a few feet of the edge. The turf sloped downward. He ran down this little slope; when he had run as far as he could, he gave a sort of jump and sprang into space more than five hundred feet above the rocks below. The woman was left alone on the knoll. I was so taken aback by the horror of the thing that my joints seemed to have got locked; my limbs seemed rigid.

There stood the woman, alone, and there I lay watching her through the glasses. For several seconds we remained motionless, as if incapable of movement. Then, with what seemed to me to be a violent effort, I scrambled on to my feet and went rushing towards the woman across the intervening grass. When she turned and saw me coming, she staggered—she obviously staggered, and I thought she would have fallen. But, recovering herself just as she seemed to have lost her balance, she stood awaiting me. When I got to her I took her by the arm; I was beside myself with a strange sort of passion—when I look back I understand how people feel when they kill each other. At that moment I certainly felt like killing her.

“You’ve murdered him,” I gasped. “I’ve a mind to send you after him.”

“Send me.” Her face was white; her great eyes glared at me; but she never flinched. “I am perfectly willing that you should send me after him. He’s better off than I am.”

The consciousness which came to me, even in that terrible moment, that this might be so, gave my thoughts a new direction. Still gripping her by the arm I turned and shouted: “Help! Help!” Two men came running out of the coastguard station; they were followed by a third, and then a fourth. When she saw them coming she asked me, as coolly as if it were the most casual question:

“What are you going to tell them?—Lies?—He jumped over of his own accord.”

I said nothing to her, but when they came within hail I called to them:

“A man has just jumped over the cliff; he was with this lady.”

“I did not know he was going to jump,” she declared. “I believe he’s mad.”

The coastguards took her address and mine, then began to search for what was left of the man. People came out of the hotel; women and children came out of the coastguards’ station; on that lonely cliff, even at that hour of the morning, a small crowd began to assemble. I took the woman back with me to Eastbourne, holding her by the arm all the way.

“You needn’t hold me,” she said, when we were half-way down. “With you holding me like this it is not easy to walk on this rough ground. I shan’t run away. Besides, why should I run away? There’s no reason why I should run.”

But she knew better. I kept my hold. My friends had a private sitting-room at the hotel, on the ground-floor, to which admission was gained by a separate entrance. I led her to that sitting-room.

“Where are you taking me?” she remonstrated. “You’ve no right to keep hold of me like this; you are hurting my arm. I’m not your prisoner.”

I paid no heed. When I had got her into the sitting-room I rang the bell.

“Send up to Mr. Stephens, in number one hundred and twenty, and tell him that I shall be glad to see him here as soon as he can make it convenient to come.”

“Who’s Mr. Stephens?” asked the woman, as soon as the waiter had gone. “And what are you going to say to my husband? And who are you, anyhow?—Who are you?—Let go of my arm.”

She spoke savagely, trying to shake herself loose. But she was weaker than I, and she could not do it.

“I am Judith Lee,” I told her. “I am going to tell your husband everything I know about you.”

“And what do you know? I only saw you once before in my life.”

“Only once.—You will presently hear what I know about you, if you have not already guessed.”

I think she had; I saw it on her face. Almost immediately her husband came hurriedly into the room. He seemed disturbed.

“I am told that Miss Lee wants to see me. Are you Miss Lee? What are you doing here with my wife?”

I told him—she kept still. I told him everything; she never even attempted to interrupt. As I pieced my story together I think she began to have a feeling that I was something almost supernatural—that she was afraid of me. I fancy that she recognized in me the pointing finger which, though it sometimes seems to move so slowly, touches the criminal on the spot at last, showing that from the very first, when all seemed most secure, there was already starting in pursuit the avenging hand of justice.

I told about that interview on which I had tumbled in the tea-shop; about the experiment with the handkerchief illustrating the signals which might be made with a blind—how her eyes seemed to distend as she heard me! I spoke of the chance meeting with the red-headed youth, who was staring at the crooked blind, and then of the murder which was done two hours afterwards. I passed the next two years and came to the interview which I had witnessed in the Boscombe gardens. When I narrated what the dead man’s wife had said to her friend, Mr. as well as Mrs. Athelstan Ward stood there like images of guilt stricken by their own consciences. Then came the story of what had happened that morning. When I repeated, word for word, the conversation which had taken place between the guilty pair, the woman sank on to the floor, and the man seemed dazed. Then came the horror of the suicide which she had prompted.

“I am aware,” I said, “that it would be difficult, Mr. Ward, to bring home against your wife the full measure of her guilt to the satisfaction of a criminal court. I admit the dexterity with which she has eluded responsibility. On one condition I am willing to let her go with you, to wherever you may choose to take her, and to hold my tongue. She has done all these things to gain possession of the fortune left by the late Mrs. Dawson. Render an account of the money she left; resign all claim to it; transfer it in its entirety to the woman to whom it rightfully belongs, and I will leave Mrs. Ward to her conscience. I do not, at this moment, suggest on your part complicity with your wife, though I cannot but feel that at some period you have probably had some sort of guilty knowledge. But if you ask why you should make this sacrifice to cover her, I will remark that I believe, if the whole truth were to be made public, that it would be held that you, at any rate, have no claim to the money which you pretend to have inherited. That is a point for you to consider. I may add that I communicated last night with the authorities at Scotland Yard, and that a detective is coming to Eastbourne by the first train which leaves London. If this matter is settled as I have suggested before he appears—so far well; if not, the matter will pass out of my hands into his. I have sent a message to a friend, who is staying in the hotel, Mr. Arthur Stephens, a solicitor of high standing. He will probably be here in a minute or two, ready to draw up a formal assignment to Mrs. George Ryder of what ought to have been hers at the beginning. I must ask you to give your answer, Mr. Ward, at once. How is it to be?”

I could see that his lips were dry; with the tip of his tongue he moistened them. His voice was husky.

“I—I’m willing to do what you wish, Miss Lee. I am willing to do everything, and anything, if only you will say nothing to anyone else of what you have just now been saying to us.”

Then I knew that my surmise had been correct, and that he had at least some sort of guilty knowledge of his wife’s nefarious conduct. Arthur Stephens entered.

“I’m very sorry to have disturbed you, Mr. Stephens, but I am in pressing need of your services. This is Mr. Athelstan Ward. He is in possession of certain property, to which he has no title; at any rate, no moral title. Conscious of that fact, he wishes to assign it to the rightful owner. I want you to draw up a short form which shall give legal and valid expression to that wish of his. Afterwards, I may have to request you to go with him into matters of account. That you will be able to do later in the day. At present, all I ask you to do is to draw up a brief form which shall have the effect I have mentioned.—Here are pen, ink, and paper.”

Within a very few minutes that form was drawn up. As Mr. Ward was in the act of affixing his signature the door opened, and some one else I knew came in.

“This,” I explained, “is Inspector Ellis of Scotland Yard.—Inspector, this is Mr. Athelstan Ward. He is about to sign a document; perhaps you wouldn’t mind acting as one of the witnesses to his signature.”

The paper was signed and witnessed. Then I made certain other explanations. I kept within the letter of my bond, and I gave Mr. and Mrs. Athelstan Ward to understand that if they did not keep strictly within the letter of theirs, their trouble was only just beginning. After breakfast the Inspector and Mr. Stephens went up to London with that undesirable husband and his still less desirable wife. In the evening they returned to Eastbourne. They rendered their report: Mr. and Mrs. Ward had been called to a strict account; in the course of the day they had been stripped of every farthing of their ill-gotten gains. Berths had been booked for them on a steamer which was leaving the very next day for a South American port. They were informed that a certain amount of money would be credited to their account when they landed; with that they would have to begin the world afresh. Whether they succeeded, or failed, they would return to England at their peril. I do not think that either of them is ever likely to set foot on English soil again.

Soon after the quartette quitted the hotel on their way to London I kept an appointment which I had made the day before. A woman, who was selling flowers, was shown into the sitting-room. I met her on the threshold.

“Come in,” I said. “I am very glad to see you.”

She seemed alarmed, as if the way in which I tried to be friendly and treat her as an equal was terrible—since decent treatment from any quarter was a thing she was unused to.

“Please don’t look so frightened; there’s nothing to alarm you. I have asked you here because I want the flowers I see you have brought, and also because I wish to tell you something which I fancy you will think very wonderful, and also, I hope, very pleasant. I believe you are Mrs. George Ryder.”

At once she turned to flee, but I had her by the hand.

“Please—please don’t call me by that name—please don’t.”

“Why not, since it is your name? Is it not your name?”

“How do you know it’s my name? Who told you it was my name? Is it written on my forehead?”

Her looks were so wild that she looked almost like a person who was out of her senses. When I began to tell her, in her turn, my story, the change that took place in her! Many times have I been thankful for the gift which God gave me—never, I think, more thankful than I was then. She has often told me since that she felt, more and more, as the tale unfolded, that she was in the presence of a miracle—a miracle of blessing. I doubt if she has ever quite rid herself of the notion until this hour.

When I explained that she was to have the money which was meant for her husband, after all, and laid before her Mr. Athelstan Ward’s assignment, she broke into dry-eyed sobbing.

“Do you know”—the words broke from her between her sobs—“my child is dying for want of sufficient and proper nourishment—she is dying of starvation, and now—thank God!—thank God!”

IX. UNCLE JACK

Why are some men so silly—so many men—nearly all of them? I was once almost prevented from doing a man a very signal service by the very singular delusion he was under that I was in love with him. I was staying at the Cliftonville Hotel at Margate with a Mr. and Mrs. Hastings, and their daughter Netta, who was a pupil of mine. Netta, although deaf and dumb, was an extremely intelligent young lady of about eighteen, and by no means ill-looking. She and I were having tea one afternoon in the gardens on the cliff. She could speak quite well when she chose—although she had never heard a sound in her life, but there were occasions on which, if only for convenience’ sake, she used the sign language. She used it then. She said to me:

“Watch those two women who are having tea at the table under the tent.”

I had noticed the pair. They were under the shade of a big umbrella which rose from the centre of the table at which they were sitting, and the top of which could be adjusted at any angle. As I glanced round, induced to do so by Netta’s words, I saw one say to the other:

“What about John Finlayson?”

The other was smoking a cigarette as she stirred her tea. She withdrew the cigarette, expelled the smoke, and I saw her say:

“I don’t know whether or not to marry him.”

“My dear,” rejoined the first speaker, “if you are ever likely to get a chance of marrying him, take my advice and do.”

The smoker considered; then she smiled—rather as if she sneered.

“I’m not so sure. You can pay too dear even for a husband with money; Finlayson would bore me stiff inside a week. What I want is ready cash—you could do with a little.”

“You bet.” The reply was to the point, if not elegant. Then the speaker added: “I could do with more than a little, I could do with a lot—I fancy you could too.”

The smoker indulged in a whiff; she sipped her tea; then she asked, as if she were putting a very serious question:

“Meg, what do you say to a thousand golden sovereigns—could you do with them?” The other glanced sharply at the speaker—I never saw a woman whose eyes were more flagrantly made up in the broad daylight. She was made up altogether, but her eyes were the worst. I thought they were dreadful. She answered, echoing the other’s words.

“Could I do with a thousand golden sovereigns?—Just couldn’t I?”

“You wouldn’t stick at a trifle to get them?”

“My love, I’d stick at nothing—I’d rob a bank.”

“I wouldn’t for anything suggest your doing that; besides, I think we could get them easier out of Finlayson than out of a bank.” Then she added something which rather startled me. “See how those two creatures at the next table are watching us; they can’t possibly hear what we are saying, but suppose we talk of something else.”

I dare say we had been rather more attentive to them than was good manners—that chance shot of hers went home. Netta laughed outright—she can read lips almost as well as I can; I taught her how to do it—I could have shaken her. To be accused of eavesdropping was not nice; especially as, although the speakers might not know it, we had been caught in the very act. I did not look again in their direction. A few minutes after I got up with Netta and walked away.

“Did you see what they were saying?” she asked me as we went. Of course I had seen; I had an uncomfortable feeling that they knew that I had seen. No consideration of the kind seemed to trouble Netta. She continued: “It was of Uncle Jack that they were talking.”

That was precisely the point—it was because of that that I had watched. Mr. John Finlayson was Mrs. Hastings’ brother—Netta’s uncle; a bachelor of about forty years’ standing, with a good opinion both of himself and of his money. There was a great deal of the latter; but so far as I was able to judge, there was nothing of the former worth considering. All the same, I did not like to feel that he was being talked about in that fashion by those two striking-looking women who were the talk of the place, and that in Margate is saying something.

Some persons—probably most of them of the masculine sex—might think that the one who had been smoking was beautiful; and she certainly was what I believe is called “a very fine young woman.” She was probably nearly six feet high; she held herself very straight; her figure was perfect; her features were regular; her hair wonderful; her clothes expensive. How much she owed to nature and how much to art was a problem I should not have cared to determine. What any decent man can see in a person of that kind I suppose we women never will understand; I had reason to suspect that Mr. Finlayson saw a good deal. He had taken her and her companion out with him in his motor-car; he had dined at their table; and, very much to his sister’s disgust, had associated himself with them in more ways than one. All the same, I had been startled to see the young woman hint that if she chose she could marry him; I had no idea that matters had gone so far as that; what his sister would say if she knew I really almost trembled to think. Keen-witted Netta seemed to read my thoughts.

“Shall I tell mamma,” she asked, “what I saw them say?”

I hesitated—it was not an easy question to answer; then I said:

“I don’t think, if I were you, I should—it would only upset her; and probably they were only talking nonsense.”

Netta was silent till we had quitted the garden; then as we were crossing the road to the hotel she said, still speaking in the sign language:

“I shouldn’t wonder if Uncle Jack did marry Miss Parsons—I believe I nearly caught him kissing her last night on the veranda.”

She spoke with a little malicious smile; I was aware that she had not too high an opinion of her relative, but her words took me aback. Before I could reply, her mother came towards us down the steps, with Mr. Finlayson himself at her heels.

Mrs. Hastings bore Netta off into the town; Mr. Finlayson returned to the balcony of the hotel, and I went with him. He was a scanty-haired little man, inclined to stoutness. A monocle was rarely absent from his right eye, and he wore two tiny tufts of hair upon his upper lip, which he had once confided to me he thought made him look French, and which I thought made him look ridiculous. He had inherited a large fortune from a relative, had never done anything useful—so far as I could see, his chief occupation was changing his clothes. I do not know how many suits he had, but I do not think it is any exaggeration to say that he changed from head to foot half a dozen times a day. My belief is that the majority of men are conceited—in that respect he was far ahead of his fellows. Yet, since his sister and her husband had shown themselves very good, and thoughtful, and generous to me, and I owed them many kindnesses, I felt that I could not allow his simplicity to make him the victim of that intriguing young woman, who called herself Parsons, without at least attempting to put him on his guard.

The veranda of the Cliftonville Hotel runs along the road, being raised a few feet above the pavement. As I stood there with him, Miss Parsons and her friend, coming out of the garden across the way, passed close by us. Mr. Finlayson acknowledged their presence with a sweeping bow, and Miss Parsons smiled—a smile which evidently pleased him.

“Most attractive young lady that—don’t you think so?” He was the sort of person who always spoke of a woman as a lady. “Very odd how strange some ladies are. My sister, now, has taken up a most extraordinary position as regards Miss Parsons—she simply doesn’t like her.”

“I fancy Mrs. Hastings’ instinct in such matters is generally to be relied on. Of course, Mr. Finlayson, you are much older than I am, and should know more of the world——” He cut me short.

“I don’t know about being much older, Miss Lee; but there’s no doubt that I do know more of the world. A man in my position would.”

He spoke with a smirk which I thought comical.

“In spite of your wider knowledge of the world, Mr. Finlayson, I hope you won’t mind my suggesting that it might be the part of wisdom to be on your guard against Miss Parsons.”

“My dear Miss Lee, I’m always on my guard against all ladies—I know them. I always say to myself when I meet a fresh one: Now what designs has she on me? In such matters I’m the soul of caution.”

The man was perfectly absurd; what he meant by his last words I could not guess. If I had not felt that the danger was a very real one, and was thinking more of Mr. and Mrs. Hastings than of him, I would have left him alone in his conceit.

“Is it not possible that you imagine yourself to be better acquainted with the sex of which I am a member than you really are? Isn’t it conceivable that Miss Parsons, for instance, may understand you better than you do her?”

His rejoinder was so preposterous that I could have shaken him.

“What I said to my sister I say to you—jealousy in a lady’s breast takes many forms; Eleanor is jealous of Miss Parsons, and so are you. You will excuse me saying so, won’t you?—but facts are facts.”

“Facts are facts!” Despite his impertinence I was disposed to laugh at him. “On what conceivable grounds do you say that I am jealous of—that woman?” He gave a sort of little hop.

“There you are—‘that woman’—the very phrase betrays you. Now, Miss Lee, permit me for one moment. I do not say that jealousy in your case is unbecoming—quite the contrary. I’ve had—shall we say an idea?—for some time past that your feelings towards me were—of the most flattering kind. I have known you, off and on, at frequently recurring intervals, for about three years. During that time I have observed you with, I may say, growing interest. The result has been that I have come to the conclusion that you are in all respects an estimable young lady—yes, Miss Lee, I really mean it. I discussed you with my sister——”

“You discussed me with your sister!”

“Yes, and with her husband; and they both agree that, since the period has arrived at which it is desirable that I should have an establishment of my own, although the difference in our fortunes is immense, you are a young lady eminently fitted to become the head of it. Therefore your jealousy of the fascinating Miss Parsons is excusable, but, I assure you, baseless; one does not marry such persons; no, no, do not suppose it for one moment. My choice, Miss Lee, is fixed on you—there is no reason why I should not take advantage of this opportunity to tell you so; it may relieve your mind. I have cause to know that the announcement of our engagement will relieve my sister’s mind. Therefore, with your permission, I will make that announcement this—no, not this evening at dinner, I happen to have an engagement this evening”—he wore a slight air of confusion—“but—on the first occasion which offers.”

When he stopped, which he did just as I was wondering when he was going to, I could only gasp. A foolish person I had always supposed him to be, but such folly eclipsed my conception of him altogether. What he expected me to say I do not know; he beamed at me with a most fatuous air; but when he permitted himself to put out his hand and touch my glove, I rapidly withdrew. He affected to be amused.

“My dear Miss Lee—what harm is there, even in such a public place as this?—especially as our relations to each other will soon be public property.”

I saw that it was necessary to make myself quite plain to this little man.

“Mr. Finlayson, I won’t pretend that I don’t understand what you have been talking about, though anything funnier I never heard.”

“Funny?—My dear young lady!—Nothing was further from my intention than to be funny.”

“That’s the funniest part of it—that anyone could be so unintentionally funny. I don’t know if I may take it that you have just been offering me your hand in marriage?”

He nodded his head like some brightly hued and foolish bird.

“Exactly, precisely—you have it—there is that way of putting it.”

“As you observe, there is that way of putting it—though I notice that is not the way you put it; you seem to be under the impression that you have only to throw your glove at my feet and I will pick it up and be grateful. I don’t know what gave you that impression; you are quite mistaken if you suppose that I ever meant to. You certainly have amused me, Mr. Finlayson; I always have felt that you were a funny little man; but as for anything else—I, at an early age, made up my mind to live and die an old maid, and if anything could strengthen my resolution, it is the fact that there are in the world such funny little men as you, and that some women, poor souls! have to have them as husbands.”

I just walked off the balcony and left him there. It so chanced that as I entered the hotel Miss Parsons came into the hall. Not a little to my surprise—it was an afternoon of surprises—she addressed me.

“I should like to say two or three words to you, Miss—I believe it—is Lee. May I ask why, since you are quite a stranger to me, you take such an interest in my movements?”

It was no use my telling her that I did not know what she meant, because I did. Her assault, coming so quickly after my surprising interview with Mr. Finlayson, took me aback. I had no answer ready. She went on:

“This afternoon, to give an example of the sort of thing I mean, you and that deaf and dumb young woman, whose governess I believe you are, watched my friend and myself while we were having tea, as if you were doing your very best to overhear every word we said. I don’t like that sort of thing; don’t let it happen again, or I may show my dislike in a way you won’t like.”

She walked off, with her nose in the air, very much as I had just walked off from Mr. Finlayson. Had I been the dirt beneath her feet she could not have treated me with more contempt—and in that public place!

I could hardly have said, when I reached my bedroom, with whom I felt maddest—with her, Mr. Finlayson, Netta, or myself; Netta, for calling my attention to them first of all; Mr. Finlayson, for his astonishing stupidity; Miss Parsons, for her studied insolence; myself, for ever having had anything to do with any of the three. But the crowning blow was to come. I was stamping up and down, feeling that I must do something to some one, when Netta came into the room; without an instant’s warning she burst out with:

“Well, why wouldn’t you marry him?” I stared, wondering if I could have understood her; she repeated the question with a clearness which put the matter beyond all doubt. “Why wouldn’t you marry Uncle Jack when he asked you?”

“Netta!—What are you talking about?—What do you mean?”

She explained, with a horrible lucidity.

“I was on the cliff on the other side of the garden. I looked over the hedge, and there were you with Uncle Jack on the balcony—and I saw a good deal of what you were saying.” She was, as I have already said, quite an adept at lip-reading, especially in the case of persons she knew well. “I didn’t see all he said, but I did see that he was what he meant to be proposing; then you strutted off as if you were twenty feet high—which is a trick you have—and left poor Uncle Jack despairing. Why on earth wouldn’t you marry him?”

I could not tell her—plainly the absurdity of the affair did not appeal to her so clearly as it did to me. I could not even try to explain—I do not often lose my temper with my pupils, but I nearly lost it with Netta then. Her persistence nearly drove me mad. When she had gone, on one point, it seemed to me, there were no two opinions—Cliftonville was no longer the place for me. I would not stop and confront the insolent Miss Parsons, with whom I wished to have no sort of traffic; still less would I give the keen-eyed Netta a chance of enjoying herself at my expense, in observing my efforts to avoid her singular relation. Mr. and Mrs. Hastings were leaving in two or three days in any case. I had had a letter that morning from an aunt who was passing through London, and who wanted me, if I was in town, to meet her. I resolved that I would be in town that night. I packed my trunk; scribbled a note to Mrs. Hastings; and departed for the station—without anyone of the least consequence, so far as I knew, becoming conscious of my departure. I congratulated myself on the manner in which, avoiding explanations, I had contrived to slip away. But I got no farther than the station; in spite of the fashion in which I had congratulated myself, I did not go to town that night.

I reached the station several minutes before my train was due to start. The arrival platform was crowded with passengers; a train had just come in from London. As I went towards the bookstall to buy some papers I passed two men whose appearance had a curious effect upon me; I was conscious of what I call one of those premonitory little shivers which I say are sent to me as warnings—it may be a mere superstition, but it is one which I hold strongly, that certain evil things emanate, in a sense which is perhaps my own, an atmosphere to whose presence I am acutely sensitive; it gives me what I call a premonitory shiver. That shiver went all over me as I passed those two men, and it startled me. Close behind them were two other men. I saw one of them say to the other:

“See those two? The one on the right is Chicago Charlie. It isn’t often he’s walking about; if he’d had his rights he’d have been strung up long ago. I shouldn’t like to be within reach of him if I’d anything on me worth having; he’s more like a wild beast than a man. I wonder what his game is down here—some one’s in for trouble. I could tell you some tales of him.”

I should have liked him to tell me some of those tales—I could not have said why, but I should. He was a hard, weather-beaten individual, who looked as if he might have had some queer experiences of his own. At the bookstall I turned and looked after the two men who had passed me. A woman was coming down the platform to meet them; it was the woman who had been having tea with Miss Parsons at the next table to ours. Her presence there gave me shock number two. She greeted the pair with an air of a familiar acquaintance; was “Chicago Charlie” Miss Parsons’ friend as well as her own?

They were going out of the gate at the end of the platform; I went to a door on the left, and, hurrying, got there first. Under cover of the paper I had bought I watched them coming; the woman was too engaged in talking to her companions to notice that a female was holding her newspaper up in front of her face. I saw Chicago Charlie ask:

“What’s the fellow’s name?”

“John Finlayson—he’s soft as butter—one of nature’s own mugs. She says he’s good for fifty thousand pounds—if properly handled.”

“Soft as butter, is he? And he’ll be handled by a master. If there’s anything left when I’m through with him he can keep it.”

She looked at him sharply. I should very much like to have known what her answer was, but I could not see from the back of her—they were past before she spoke again. Apparently, since they paid no heed to the cabman who hailed them, they were going to walk to where they were going. What was I to do? I had my ticket, my luggage was labelled, my train was due; I had advised Mrs. Hastings of my departure, I had washed my hands of Mr. Finlayson for ever and a day, what might happen to him was no concern of mine; the obvious course was for me to carry out my intentions and go to town. And yet—— That was it—and yet!

It is contrary to every instinct in my being to stand by and see anyone, even the meanest of God’s creatures, in danger without offering help—such help as I can offer; or even helping without offering, if it comes to that. It was certainly impossible for me to offer to help Uncle Jack. He had misunderstood me once; he should have no chance of misunderstanding me a second time.

There was the sound of a whistle; a train was steaming into the station—my train. I should have to hurry if I meant to catch it—they would send my luggage by it, since it was labelled, if I went or not. That consideration did start me moving. I rushed over to the departure platform; caught a porter—my porter—in the act of putting my luggage into the van; stopped him, explaining that I had changed my mind and did not propose to travel by that train; induced him to take my luggage back and put it on to a cab—and then looked to see if the three persons on whom my interest was centred were still anywhere in sight. They were; they were at a distance of perhaps two hundred yards, and were moving at a leisurely pace towards the town. I said to the cabman:

“I suppose your horse can go slowly?”

The cabman grinned; he thought I was joking.

“It isn’t his fault if he ever does anything else—about two miles an hour is what he likes—either that or standing still.”

“I don’t want him to stand still, but two miles an hour will about suit me; I want to read my paper and enjoy this beautiful evening. You go straight along at not more than three miles an hour—until I give you further directions.”

That cabman carried out my instructions to the letter; we certainly did not exceed the limit I had imposed, and I pretended to read my paper. The trio in front were going about as fast as we were—straight on, with us still about two hundred yards behind. Presently I saw them turn into an hotel overlooking the sea. When we reached it I stopped the driver.

“Pull up, please. I want to see if they can let me have a room here.”

They could, rather a pleasant one, looking towards Cliftonville. Then it struck me that it was about time to consider. I was quite aware that I had done an eminently foolish thing. I had given way to my irresistible inclination to meddle in other people’s affairs without having the faintest notion what sort of meddling it was going to be. What kind of mental standard Miss Parsons’ friend might have I did not know; unless she was extremely unobservant, she had taken sufficient stock of me that afternoon to know me again. Even if she had not noticed me before, I had noticed her several times, and had an idea that she was supposed to be a Mrs. Hammond. Miss Parsons had a room at the Cliftonville—where Mrs. Hammond was staying I did not know; she might not be residing at the hotel in which I had taken a room, but might merely have entered, with the two men, for the purpose of refreshment. I had to risk that—I have taken a good many risks of that sort in the course of my adventures; what I did not want to risk was the chance of being recognized.

Reluctantly—I do not like to do it, though there are occasions when I have to—I say, reluctantly I took out of a case which was in my trunk an article which is known as a “transformation.” It is simply amazing what an alteration is produced in a woman’s appearance by a change of hair—if the change is well done. My hair is very dark brown; it has been called black, but I doubt if there is any really black hair in the world. When I am crowned with scarlet, a casual acquaintance would have to stare and stare, and yet be in doubt. “Transformation” is a polite synonym for a wig; the one I donned that night was scarlet. I touched my countenance here and there—I did not want the contrast between my complexion and my hair to be too striking; attired myself in my most gorgeous robe—I had a notion that a red-haired, unattached young woman, in an hotel at Margate, ought to be gorgeous; and I went down to dinner. The first thing I saw when I entered the dining-room was a table at which were seated Mrs. Hammond and her two male acquaintances.

As I entered Mrs. Hammond bestowed on me the glance which, under such circumstances, every woman does bestow on every other woman. But for that I was prepared; I was pretty nearly certain that she did not recognize me as a person whom she had ever seen before. There was a difficulty about my table. All the small tables were occupied. The waiter offered me the choice of sharing a very small table with a pimply-faced old gentleman, who looked as if he might be a publican, or of a seat at the large table which occupied the centre of the room. I accepted the latter; although I did not tell that waiter so, nothing could have suited me better. There were seats at the table for I suppose a dozen people; I was quite content, at least on that occasion, to be one of a crowd, especially as it was decorated with old-fashioned ornaments in the shape of epergnes and tall vases full of flowers, and my chair was directly in front of a structure, half metal, half glass, than which nothing could have served me better as a screen. The table with which I was concerned was directly in my line of vision; I had only to lift my eyes from my plate to see the three persons who were at it perfectly, while I was behind a quantity of flowers and foliage which made it impossible for them to see me at all without a special effort. One trial I foresaw I should have to face—on one side of me was a middle-aged man, on the other was a mere boy. I thought it not improbable that before very long they would both of them be trying to talk to me. That I did not mind; my attention does not wander because I have to listen to inane remarks; my eyes serve me quite as well when I am talking.

Mrs. Hammond had on a not unbecoming dress of violet silk; her hair was fair—I fancy it was as much hers as my scarlet crown was mine. Chicago Charlie had what seemed to be rather a nice diamond in the middle of his shirt front. His companion was a big, bullet-headed man, who looked as if he were something in the prize-fighting line. “Charlie” was a lean, hatchet-faced man, with an over large nose, too wide a mouth, a protruding chin. He had small blue eyes, which had the fixed, stony stare of the glass beads which you see in the head of a doll. Had he only known it, his mouth was his most unfortunate feature; every word he uttered was so distinctly shaped on his long, thin lips, that, from my point of view, he might as well have shouted. I have no doubt that they spoke in the most decorous, subdued tones—they had need to do so, for they said some very curious things—but that made no difference to me; that man’s mouth was like a magnifying glass, giving almost uncanny prominence to every syllable he uttered. The first words of his I saw were sufficiently startling.

“What did I do to him? I killed him, that’s what I did to him. They think nothing of that sort of thing out there; it’s a man’s business to see—that he isn’t killed.”

He raised his glass of champagne and emptied it. Mrs. Hammond and the other man exchanged glances; I fancied they were asking each other if the speaker was to be taken seriously. For my part, I set him down as that homicidal type of criminal who holds human life of no account at all; who, indeed, in the gratification of his own lusts, holds nothing of any account. Mrs. Hammond remarked, as she carefully removed the head and tail from a smelt on her plate:

“You know, Charlie, there mustn’t be any killing here. As some French gentleman said—I believe it was a Frenchman—in England that’s not a crime, it’s a blunder; no man’s life is worth to you so much as your own.”

Charlie’s reply was characteristic.

“I’m not so sure of that; I have met men—and women—for whom I’d be glad to swing.—How long has Finlayson been here?”

“Baby says that he came down last week, but it doesn’t necessarily follow that he did. She’s a curiosity, Baby is. She’s been down here about a month; I’ve been here nearly three weeks. It seems that she began planning this almost directly after she came, but she never so much as breathed a word about it to me till this afternoon; for keeping a thing dark I never saw her equal.”

“Baby Parsons can hold her tongue better than any woman I ever met.” This was the bullet-headed man. “I’ve been in more than one little game with her, when silence was everything, so I know.”

“There are times when a dumb woman is more precious than rubies.”

As he delivered himself of this profound sentiment, Charlie smiled. Mrs. Hammond retorted—and I smiled as I saw what she said:

“Then in that case there’s a girl stopping up at the Cliftonville who ought to suit you—she’s deaf and dumb. She’s in charge of some governess kind of creature whose neck I’d like to wring.”

It was at those latter words I smiled. I wondered if her desire would have been intensified if she had suspected the identity of the scarlet-headed creature at the centre table. It was towards the end of the meal that the trio began to touch upon the topic which interested me most; I feared that they might never touch on it at all, preferring to leave so delicate a theme for private discussion. Probably what they ate and drank loosened their tongues; or they might have been excused for taking it for granted that speaking together in lowered tones, at their own particular table, they were as private as need be. They probably were not aware that there was in the world such an ability for taking notes as was possessed by the creature with the scarlet head. The table had been cleared for dessert, when, without any preamble, Chicago Charlie plunged into the very middle of things.

“So Mr. Griffiths, or Miss Parsons, or both of them together, have taken a house in a retired neighbourhood, at a convenient distance from this town, in a position in which uninvited interruptions need not be feared; and to this house the excellent Mr. Finlayson has been invited for a little evening party.”

“Prefaced by a little dinner for three, like ours—Bob Griffiths, Baby, and Uncle Jack.” So Mrs. Hammond—for she was the speaker—had picked up the Hastings’ trick of speaking of him as “Uncle Jack.” “There was some idea of having the Kitten in for dinner, and so making the party square, but it was felt that even Uncle Jack might find her a little hard to swallow. The Kitten will eat with her knife, and is never quite sure whether to use her fork or her fingers.”

“The Kitten,” observed the bullet-headed man, who seemed to answer to a variety of names—I had seen them address him as “Lobster,” “Arthur,” and “Puncher”—“is a child of nature. If it weren’t that she will get outside the contents of a bottle, I know few women I’d sooner have beside me in a row.”

“I presume,” continued Charlie, “that the programme is that Mr. Finlayson is to be well done at dinner, so that he can be done better afterwards, when we come in to complete the party.”

Mrs. Hammond explained, leaning over the table with a cigarette between her lips:

“Baby has found out all about him; he is so fond of braying that any woman can do that who likes—I don’t know any girl who’s better at that sort of thing than Baby is. It seems that he has been telling her all about himself—the silly ass! A mortgage of over fifty thousand pounds has just been paid up; the money is lying at his banker’s. He’s going to buy something with it when he’s made up his mind what—stock, I mean; in the meanwhile, as Baby says, there’s a chance for some one.”

“That certainly is so; when we have got the confiding Mr. Finlayson to ourselves, there ought to be a chance for all of us. I’m not greedy; so long as I get my bellyful that’s all I want.” Charlie took his cigar from between his lips and examined it. “The smokes in this hotel do not seem to be so good as they might be, if this one I’ve got is a fair sample.”

The bullet-headed man looked at his watch.

“Isn’t it about time we start? What time are we supposed to get there?”

“No particular time, Baby said—somewhere about ten. They dine at eight; Uncle Jack is very fond of his food, and of his wine; to do him really well, as Charlie put it, takes time. The idea is to get him just drunk enough to make him think that he is still sober.”

“It’s past half-past nine. How are we to get there?”

“Taxi-cab; Baby’s got a friend who drives one. He’s going to call for us.”

“Hanged if Baby doesn’t seem to have friends everywhere. At what time is this particular friend of hers to call? Perhaps he’s come.—Waiter, see if there’s a taxi-cab outside.”

The waiter presently returned with his report: “There is a taxi-cab outside, sir.”

“Good; we’ll be with him in a minute.”

This was the bullet-headed man. Charlie struck in:

“I don’t promise that I’ll be with him in a minute. When I’ve had a decent dinner I hurry over my coffee for no man; as for gulping my liqueur, you may as well throw it down the sink.” Then he asked a question which solved for me what I had been fearing might become a problem. “By the way, where is this house at which the party is to be held? Even when I’m in a strange country I like to know as nearly as may be where I am—I may have to find my way back on my lonesome.”

Mrs. Hammond gave him the information he wanted, and at the same time she gave it me; if she had only known that I needed it so much more than he did!

“The house is called ‘The Wilderness’; it is off the Broadstairs Road, lies back perhaps two hundred yards, is approached by an avenue of trees. Everybody about here knows ‘The Wilderness’; it’s a house which has had a history.”

“To which another page is to be added to-night.” If Charlie had only known how true that was, his smile might have been less suggestive of amusement. “If our dear Mr. Finlayson only knew what pleasures are in store for him!”—and if only the speaker had known!

I left the trio at table; Mrs. Hammond and the bullet-headed man wanted to go, but Charlie declined. It seemed that, to him, coffee was a sacred rite, to say nothing of the liqueur which was to follow—I fancy that after a good dinner he was not a very persuadable person. The three pairs of eyes were fixed on me as I went out; I saw Charlie say:

“That’s rather a fine girl; bit of a stepper.”

Mrs. Hammond said: “I can’t think where I’ve seen some one like her before.”

If only she had cultivated the faculty of observation! Her puzzlement tickled me. I was in the highest spirits, foreseeing that, quite possibly, I was in for the sort of adventure that I loved. I slipped on a long, black coat, with a hood attached, which I drew over my head, and I took a taxi-cab—preferring to take mine off the rank. I did not wish to light, if I could help it, on another of Baby’s many friends. There was a taxi-cab waiting at the door of the hotel; I eyed the driver—wishing to take particular note of him for future reference. I even noted the number of his vehicle.

There were plenty of taxis on the rank. I did not hail the first, but walked past them all, until I saw a lonely taxi in the distance, moving slowly, with its flag up. I advanced towards it.

“Do you know a house called ‘The Wilderness’?”

“On the Broadstairs Road?—Mr. Macfarlane’s?”

“Mr. Macfarlane is not there now, is he?”

“I couldn’t say; I fancy he’s about the town, I saw him only the other day; he’s a gentleman what’s very well known, Mr. Macfarlane is. I know the house you mean. I don’t know that I care to go there at this time of night—there’s my fare back. It’s a lonely place, his house is. There won’t be a soul about. I shall have to come back empty.”

“Don’t you worry about that; I’m going to keep you; I’ll see that you have a fare back. Are there more roads to the house than one?”

“Well, in a manner of speaking, there is, but one of them isn’t a very good one; it gets to the back of the house, the servants’ entrance.”

“You take me by that road—and move. I suppose you can move?”

He grinned—as the cabman had done at the station. “She can do about forty—a bit more, if she’s pressed.”

“Then—I think you might press her. By the way, is there a lodge at the back entrance?”

He shook his head. “No lodge anywhere that I know of.”

“How far is the back entrance, to which that other road takes you, from the house itself?”

“Oh—may be——” He pushed his cap back. “I couldn’t rightly say, it’s a good distance; the grounds are large, and the house stands in the middle.”

“In the house would they hear a taxi-cab approaching along that road?”

“It depends; you see, it’s lonely out there, and in the country, at night, sound travels; there’s no reason why they should know it was me coming along.”

That was sound reasoning, in its way. I got in the cab; we started. I do not know at what pace we travelled, but we did move pretty fast. I know that the vehicle stopped before I expected. The driver came to the door. “Here’s the house, miss, and this is the back entrance—through the gate. Do you want me to drive you in?”

I alighted. There was no moon, but it was a starlight night, and I could see the gate quite plainly.

“Thank you—I want you to wait here till I come back. I suppose if I go through the gate and follow the path I shall have no difficulty in finding the house?”

“Not a bit, miss—you’ve only got to go straight on; there’s a broad drive; as it gets near the house there’s a turning on the left which goes round to the front; but, if you want the servants’ entrance, you don’t turn—you go straight forward.”

“I may be some time, perhaps an hour; but if I’m more than an hour, you had better come up to the house and knock until some one answers—I may require assistance.”

He stared at me as if he did not understand my words—and was not sure that he liked them if he did understand. I quite expected him to ask me for a deposit which would at least guarantee his fare, because for all he knew I might never be coming back at all; in which case, after waiting an hour, he would look awkward. But I imagine that he was of a trusting disposition, or that I inspired confidence; he let me go without a hint of the kind, just touching his cap as I walked off.

It was darkish along that avenue; when—as in places they did—the trees met overhead, I had simply to grope my way. The house came rather with the force of a surprise; there were no lights at the windows—I was on it before I knew that it was there, pulling up only just in time to save myself from blundering into a door.

I waited and listened. There seemed to be no sound on the other side. I tried the handle; the door yielded at once—I slipped through it without a moment’s hesitation. I seemed to be in a sort of entry—there was a light in what was probably a passage round the corner. I explored—there was a passage, and there was a light, a flaring jet of gas; but still not a sound nor a creature in sight. Nothing venture, nothing win, was ever a motto of mine; I sped along that passage, reached a flight of steps, ascended them. There was a glass panelled door at the top, on the left a sort of recess into which it opened; as I reached it I heard steps approaching; I drew back into the recess. Two women appeared; they pushed back the door wholly unconscious of me.

“I thought I heard some one come up the stairs,” said one to the other; “didn’t you?—just as we were coming along?”

“It was your fancy,” replied the other. “There’s no one down there to come upstairs.”

They descended; I waited some moments, then slipped through the door. I was in quite a decent sized hall, lighted by incandescent gas; I could hear voices, but could see no one. Advancing, I came upon rather a good staircase, with lights above. Up I went. The door of a room stood wide open, the brilliant lights came from within. On the left was another door, closed. I chanced it and went through. Where I was I had no idea—all was dark. I had a small electric torch in my pocket, and I switched it on. Apparently I was in a sort of sitting-room; there were double doors on the other side. I went to them, switching off my torch. All at once I heard voices—and a laugh. I had had my doubts about the voices, I had none about the laugh. Anyone who had heard Uncle Jack’s queer little cackling laugh could scarcely fail to recognize it when heard again. Mr. Finlayson was entering the adjoining room with, at least, one companion. I could only catch one other voice besides his, a woman’s—it was Miss Parsons. Were they two alone? I listened, but could not make sure; I should have liked to try the handle of that door and peep. Just as I had almost decided that I might venture, there was the sound of other voices—at least three or four. Then a man said, in what I should have called rather boisterous tones—every word he said was audible to me:

“These people have found their way here at last—I believe, Mr. Finlayson, you know Mrs. Hammond.”

Uncle Jack’s rather ringing voice replied, with another cackle of laughter:

“Oh, yes, yes, yes. I know Mrs. Hammond—of course I know Mrs. Hammond, very well indeed—don’t I, Mrs. Hammond?—Pleased to see you.”

“Not so pleased to see me as I am to see you, Mr. Finlayson; I pay you no compliment in saying that.”

“It’s very good of you to say so; I always like people to be glad to see me—especially if it’s a lady.”

The boisterous voice was heard again.

“Mr. Finlayson, allow me to introduce you to my two friends—Colonel Stewart, of the United States army, a distinguished officer whose name is no doubt well known to you; Mr. Arthur Poyntz, a first-rate sportsman, like yourself.”

I took it that Colonel Stewart was “Chicago Charlie,” and that Mr. Arthur Poyntz was the gentleman with the bullet head. There was a good deal of loud talking, all joining in paying the most egregious compliments to Mr. Finlayson, he swallowing them all with continual little cackles of laughter; I felt sure that he must have been very well done at dinner. Then in a little lull in the conversation, I heard Miss Parsons ask:

“What are you gentlemen going to play?—I believe poker is your game, Mr. Finlayson.”

Uncle Jack laughed—I doubt if he would have been able to explain why; and, as if it were a signal, the others broke into a simultaneous roar of laughter—I have no doubt that they would have been able to explain what caused that mirth. They saw the joke better than he did. The boisterous voice exclaimed:

“Mr. Finlayson, you’re bad to beat—I’ve no doubt all games are the same to you. I shouldn’t wonder if you learnt poker on your mother’s knee.”

“No, no, no. I assure you I did nothing of the kind. I have played the game, oh yes—as you say. I’ve played a good many games, and I don’t say I mightn’t be able to hold my own.”

The boisterous voice spoke again. “Hold your own! I don’t pretend to be a poker player, Mr. Finlayson, in the presence of a man like you I’m timid; I expect we all are.”

“There’s no reason why you should be—not the slightest—you will find me merciful—not a bit alarming.”

“I’ve got some poker chips somewhere. Ah, here they are. Now, boys, to business—I tell you quite frankly, Mr. Finlayson, I’m frightened of you. Miss Parsons, may I ask you to see that we have something to drink? Mrs. Hammond looks as if she were thirsty; Mr. Finlayson looks as if he would like something to drink. You’ve got all the chips you want, gentlemen? Good! Who deals?”

For several minutes the voices were subdued; there were occasional bursts of Uncle Jack’s cackling laughter.

“You’re clearing us all out, Mr. Finlayson. I told you how it would be—I shall have to have more chips. How goes it, Colonel?”

“More chips for me. Mr. Finlayson plays the game as I never saw it played before, and I thought I had seen it played most ways. Mr. Finlayson, you’re a remarkable player.”

Uncle Jack cackled and said:

“I do seem to have got the best of it—I told you I’d played the game before—seem to have most of the chips, haven’t I?—I don’t know how much these chips are worth?”

The boisterous voice rejoined: “You’ve got nearly ten thousand pounds’ worth of chips in front of you, Mr. Finlayson, and here am I buying two thousand five hundred more. We’ll be ruined if this goes on.”

“What!” There was a vibrant note in Uncle Jack’s voice which suggested that the speaker’s words had got through the vinous mists which fogged his brain. “Ten thousand pounds’ worth of chips! You don’t mean to say—— What is the value of each chip?”

“The white are ten pounds, the blue are fifty, the red are a hundred, the green are five hundred. We started with two thousand five hundred pounds’ worth of chips each, and you’ve got them nearly all.”

“But I—I had no idea.” In Uncle Jack’s tremulous tones there was no hint of an inclination to cackle. “Really, you know, this kind of thing is quite out of my line—altogether out of my line. I—I never gambled in my life—I’m not a gambler.”

“I don’t know about being a gambler, Mr. Finlayson. You’ve won ten thousand pounds of our money.”

“But I—I had no notion we were playing for such stakes. What am I to do with these—these chips? We’ve none of us paid for them.”

“I’ll pay for mine right now, sir, if you don’t mind. It’s the general custom for gentlemen in the circles in which I move to pay for their chips at the end of the game. But since you put it that way, I’ll put my money up.” This was unmistakably Chicago Charlie. I wondered how much money he really had—that was money. “Here, Mr. Griffiths, is two thousand five hundred pounds in Bank of England notes.” Although I could not see them, I doubted. “You’re banker; perhaps you’ll just go through them, and at the end of the game pay this gentleman with that money for any of my chips he may have won; and while I’m at it, I’ll have two thousand five hundred pounds’ worth more. And here are the notes, sir.”

The tone of Uncle Jack’s voice when he spoke again gave me some notion of the expression which was on his countenance as he beheld Chicago Charlie’s off-handed manner of dealing with such enormous sums.

“But, my dear sir, I repeat that I never dreamed of playing for such stakes.”

“If the stakes are not large enough for you, Mr. Finlayson, the value of the chips can be raised. We are not children, sir. It may be but a trifle that you’ve won, but, as my friend Griffiths remarked, you have won our money, so what’s the use of talking?—Arthur, it’s you to deal. Mr. Finlayson, your very good health; I like a good game once in a while; I’ve brought a little money with me here to-night, and may you win it all—you’ll find me all smiles if you do. Won’t you drink to me, sir?”

I fancy Uncle Jack did drink to him—in imagination I could see how he did it; his state of fluster; his tremulous hands, causing him to take a bigger drink than he had meant to—and he was in a state in which every thimbleful counted. I supposed the cards were dealt. Several hands were played—I should like to have seen how Mr. Finlayson played them. I could not make out who won; comparative silence reigned—they spoke in lowered voices; only a word or two got through to me. My fingers itched to turn the handle of that door. Then, after an interval of several minutes, during which only murmurs came to me now and then, the boisterous voice was raised.

“I say, you know, I don’t mind a rousing good game, but isn’t this getting rather serious? I don’t know, Mr. Finlayson, if you’re keeping count of the losses—Miss Parsons keeps ladling out the chips—and now you’re cleaned out again. How much has Mr. Finlayson had?”

“I’ve got it all down on this piece of paper.” It was Miss Parsons who replied. “That last lot makes twenty eight thousand six hundred and fifty pounds.”

“What!” This was a sort of shriek from Mr. Finlayson.

“Sure you’re right?” This was the man with the boisterous voice.

“I don’t pretend to be very good at addition—I put down the figures as I give him each lot of chips; you’d better add it up yourself.”

I took it that a paper was handed to Mr. Griffiths, who cast up the various amounts which were on it.

“That’s all right—twenty-eight thousand six hundred and fifty, didn’t you say? There were ten thousand which he had from me. I don’t know how far you’re prepared to go, Mr. Finlayson, but that makes nearly forty thousand.”

“I’m good to go on all night. I’m spoiling for a rousing gamble; what’s forty thousand pounds!” This was Chicago Charlie; I wondered if he had as many farthings of his own in the world.

There was another silence; then Mr. Finlayson began to speak in weak, quavering accents, which made it impossible for his words to reach me. The crisis was approaching—I had to hear what he said; I resolved to risk opening the door; I calculated that they would be so absorbed in listening to and watching him that a slight movement of the door would go unheeded. I had better fortune than I had hoped. I turned the handle, noiselessly—to find that it opened inwards, and that it was screened on the other side by curtains, so that what I had done was entirely unnoticed. I was even able, without being perceived, to glance between the curtains and observe what was happening in the room beyond.

It was a large room, well lit by several inverted incandescent gas-burners. There was a card-table in the centre, at which four men were seated—Chicago Charlie, on his left Mr. Poyntz, opposite Mr. Finlayson, on his right a bullocky sort of man, whom I took to be Mr. Griffiths. There was a little table between each two men, on which were glasses; evidently Mr. Finlayson, for one, had been drinking much more than he should have done, possibly assisted by Mrs. Hammond, who sat on his left to see that his glass was kept filled, and possibly, also, to inform the others what sort of cards he had. On his right was Miss Parsons, with a box divided into partitions, in which were ivory counters of different colours, which are used for the game of poker, and are known as “chips.” Chicago Charlie was leaning back, a big cigar in his mouth, on his face an insolent grin. Poyntz was eyeing Mr. Finlayson as a dog might a rat on which he proposes presently to spring. Griffiths was apparently cast for the part of the genial host, who desires above all else to avoid unpleasantness. The only unhappy looking person present was Uncle Jack. He was sober enough to know that he had made a consummate ass of himself, but too drunk to understand clearly how he had managed to do it, and, still less, how he was to avoid paying the penalty of his folly. The others eyed him with amusement as he did his best to make his position plain.

“You must understand, gentlemen, that I am no gambler—never was. It’s against my principles. My idea was a little friendly game—I had no intention to play for high stakes—so let’s hope there’s no harm done.”

“Certainly there’s no harm done. What’s forty thousand pounds to a man like you?” This was Charlie—the insolence of his grin grew more pronounced; I wondered how often he had played the same sort of part in similar scenes. Uncle Jack tried to wag his finger at him.

“Excuse me, sir—I beg your pardon, Colonel; I forgot for the moment that you were a military gentleman—I say, excuse me, but forty thousand pounds is more money than I ever had in my life.”

Charlie took his cigar from between his lips and carefully knocked off the ash. “And will you excuse me, Mr. Finlayson, if I say you are a liar?”

“Sir! What—what language do you use!”

Griffiths interposed. “Come, Colonel, isn’t that sort of thing a little irregular? We’re all friends here; Mr. Finlayson is both a gentleman and my particular friend.”

“Mr. Griffiths, I’m a man of peace, as you’re aware, so I merely make this remark—Mr. Finlayson has lost to me twenty-three thousand one hundred and fifty pounds; if Mr. Finlayson will hand me his cheque for that amount I will consider the matter closed.”

“Very handsomely said, Colonel, very handsomely indeed. How do you stand with Mr. Finlayson, Poyntz?”

“Mr. Finlayson has lost a few hundred to me, but as he seems to be a bit on the wrong side, they can stand over.”

“I say the same, Mr. Finlayson. You’re just on sixteen thousand down to me, but I’ll wait.”

“I won’t wait; it has always been my rule to play for cash, as all my friends are aware.”

“It’s quite right, Colonel, and a very good rule too. So all you need do, Mr. Finlayson, is to give Colonel Stewart a cheque for the twenty-three thousand odd you are down to him, and we’ll leave the other little matters for friendly discussion later on. You have your cheque-book on you, Mr. Finlayson?”