William Le Queux (continued 3)

Chapter Fourteen.

A Revelation.

Although many days passed, no word of apology came from my mysterious correspondent for not having kept the appointment. I watched every post for nearly a fortnight, and as I received no explanation, my suspicion regarding Mabel’s connexion with the strange affair became, of course, strengthened.

With heart-sinking I had taken leave of her on the kerb in Kensington High Street on that well-remembered evening, feeling that the likelihood of our frequent meeting was very remote, especially now that she apparently held me in suspicion. In this case, however, I was mistaken, for within a week we met again quite accidentally in Bond Street, and, finding her disposed to accept my companionship, I accompanied her shopping, and spent an extremely pleasant afternoon. Her mother was rather unwell, she explained, and that accounted for her being alone.

She was dressed entirely in black, but with a quiet elegance that was surprising. I had never known before that day how smart and chic a woman could appear in a gown of almost funereal aspect. Her manner towards me retained nothing of its previous suspicion; she was bright and merry, without that cloud of unhappiness that had so strangely overshadowed her on the last occasion we had been together. She possessed a clever wit, and gossiped and joked amusingly as we went from shop to shop, ordering fruit for dessert, and flowers for table-decoration. That her mother was wealthy appeared certain from the extravagant prices which she gave for fruits out of season and choice hothouse flowers. She bought the best she could procure, and seemed utterly regardless of expense.

I remarked how dear were some grapes which she had ordered, but she only smiled and gave her shoulders a little shrug.

This recklessness was not done to impress me, for I was quick to detect that the shopkeepers knew her as a good customer, and brought forward their most expensive wares as a matter of course.

Although at first she declined my invitation, as though she considered it a breach of the convenances, I at length persuaded her to take some tea with me at Blanchard’s, and we continued our gossip as we sat together at one of the little tables surrounded by other ladies out shopping with their male encumbrances.

I had, rather unwisely, perhaps, passed a critical remark regarding a lady who had entered in an unusually striking toilette, in which she looked very hot and extremely uncomfortable, and laughing at what I had said, she replied—

“You are certainly right. We women always overweigh ourselves in our garments, to say nothing of other and more fatiguing things. Half of life’s little worries accrue from our clothes. From tight collar to tight shoe, and not forgetting a needlessly befeathered hat, we take unto ourselves burdens that we should be much happier without.”

“I agree entirely,” I said, smiling at her philosophy. “Some blatant crank bent on self-advertisement might do worse than found an Anti-ornamental Dress League. Just think how much of life’s trials would at once slip off a man if he wore neither collar nor tie—especially the dress-tie!”

“And off a woman, if she wore neither belt, gloves, nor neck arrangement!”

“Exactly. It would be actually making us a present for life of nearly an hour a day. That would be seven hours a week, or nearly a fortnight a year,” I said. “It’s worth consideration.”

“Do you remember the derision heaped upon that time-saving arrangement of our ancestors, the elastic-side boot?” she observed, with a merry smile. “But just fancy the trouble they must have saved in lacing and buttoning! Sewing on shoe-buttons ought always to be done by criminals condemned to hard labour. Button-sewing tries the conscientiousness and thoroughness of the work more than anything else, and I’m certain oakum-picking can’t be worse. It also tries the quality of the thread more than anything else; and as to cottons, well, it treats them as Samson did the withs.”

The carriage met her outside the Stores in the Haymarket at five o’clock, and before she took leave of me she mischievously asked—

“Well, and how do you find me when I wear my mask?”

“Charming,” I responded with enthusiasm. “Mask or no mask, you are always the same to me, the most charming friend I have ever had.”

“No, no,” she laughed. “It isn’t good form to flatter. Good-bye.”

And she stretched forth her small hand, which I pressed warmly, with deep regret at parting. A moment later the footman in his brown livery assisted her into the carriage. Then she smiled merrily, and bowed as I raised my hat, and she was borne away westward in the stream of fine equipages, hers the smartest of them all.

A week later, having seen nothing further of her, I wrote and received a prompt response. Then in the happy autumn days that followed we contrived to meet often, and on each occasion I grew deeper and deeper in love with her. Since that evening when we had stood together beneath the street lamp in Kensington, she had made no mention of the pencil-case or of its owner. Indeed, it seemed that her sudden identification of it had betrayed her into acknowledging that its owner had been her lover, and that now she was trying to do all she could to remove any suspicion from my mind.

Nevertheless, the remembrance of that crime and of all the events of that midnight adventure was ever within my mind, and I had long ago determined to make its elucidation the chief object of my life. I had placed myself beneath the thrall of some person unknown, and meant to extricate myself and become again a free agent at all costs.

On several occasions I had seen the cabman West on the rank at Hyde Park Corner, but although he had constantly kept his eyes open in search of Edna, his efforts had all been in vain. I had seen also the old cab-driver who bore the nickname “Doughy,” but it turned out that it had not been his cab which my mysterious protectress had taken after parting from me. One point, however, I settled satisfactorily. On one of our walks together I contrived that, the man West should see Mabel, but he afterwards declared that the woman of whom he was in search did not in the least resemble her. Therefore, it was certain that Mabel and Edna were not, as I had once vaguely suspected, one and the same person.

Sometimes I would meet my idol after her studies at the Royal Academy of Music, and accompany her across the park; at others we would stroll together in the unfrequented part of Kensington Gardens, or I would walk with her shopping and carry her parcels, all our meetings being, of course, clandestine ones.

One morning in the middle of November I was overfed at receiving an invitation from Mrs Anson to dine at The Boltons, and a couple of days later the sum of my happiness was rendered complete by finding myself seated beside Mabel in her own home.

The house possessed an air of magnificence and luxury which I scarcely expected. It was furnished with great elegance and taste, while the servants were of an even more superior character than the house itself. Among the homes of my many friends in the West End this was certainly the most luxurious, for money seemed to have been literally squandered upon its appointments, and yet withal there was nothing whatever garish nor any trace of a plebeian taste. There was a combined richness and quietness about the whole place which impressed one with an air of severity, while the footman who ushered me in was tall, almost a giant in stature, and solemn as a funeral mute.

Mrs Anson rose and greeted me pleasantly, while Mabel, in a pretty gown of coral-pink, also shook my hand and raised her fine dark eyes to mine with a glance of pleasure and triumph. It was, no doubt, due to her that I had been bidden there as guest. A red-headed, ugly-faced man named Hickman, and a thin, angular, irritating woman, introduced to me as Miss Wells, were my only fellow-guests. The man regarded me with some suspicion as I entered, and from the first I took a violent dislike to him. It may have been his forbidding personal appearance which caused my distrust. Now that I reflect, I think it was. His face was bloated and deeply furrowed, his eyes large, his lips thick and flabby, his reddish beard was ill-trimmed and scanty. He was thick-necked; his face was further disfigured by a curious dark-blue scar upon the left jaw, and I could not help remarking within myself, that if some faces resembled those of animals, his was closely allied to that of a savage bulldog. Indeed, I had never before seen such an eminently ugly face as his.

Yet he spoke with the air and perfect manner of a gentleman. He bowed with refined dignity as I was introduced, although I thought his smile seemed supercilious, while I was almost certain that he exchanged a curious, contemptuous look with Mabel, who stood behind me.

Was he aware of our little exchanges of confidences? Had he secretly watched us in our walks along the leafy byways of Kensington Gardens, and detected that I loved her? It seemed very much as though he had, and that he had endeavoured to disparage me in her eyes.

At Mrs Anson’s invitation, I took Mabel in to dinner, and sat next her, while opposite us sat the dog-faced man with the irritating spinster. The latter was a fitting companion for him, bony of countenance, her back straight as a board, her age uncertain, and her voice loud, high-pitched, and rasping. She wore a number of bangles on her left wrist; one of them had pigs and elephants hanging on it, with hearts, crosses, bells, and framed and glazed shamrock leaves mixed in. That would not have mattered much had she not been eating, but as dinner progressed the room grew a trifle warm, and she unfortunately had a fan as well as those distressing bangles, which fan she rhythmically waved to and fro, playing the orchestra softly when fanning herself, or loudly as she plied her knife and fork “click-clack, jingle-jingle, tinkle-tinkle, click-clack!” until the eternal music of those pigs, elephants, crosses, hearts and bells prevented anything beyond a jerky conversation. She turned and twisted and toyed with her menu, tinkling and jingling the whole time like a coral consoler or an infant’s rattle. Little wonder, I thought, that she remained a spinster. With such an irritating person to head his household, the unfortunate husband would be a candidate for Colney Hatch within a month. Yet she was evidently a very welcome guest at Mrs Anson’s table, for my hostess addressed her as “dear,” and seemed to consider whatever positive opinion she expressed as entirely beyond dispute.

I liked Mrs Anson. Although of that extremely frigid type of mother, very formal and unbending, observing all the rules of society to the letter, and practically making her life a burden by the conventionalities, she possessed, nevertheless, a warm-hearted affection for her child, and seemed constantly solicitous of her welfare. She spoke with the very faintest accent with her “r’s,” and I had, on the first evening we had met at the colonel’s, wondered whether she were of Scotch, or perhaps foreign, extraction. The general conversation in the interval of the Irritating Woman’s orchestra turned upon foreign travel, and incidentally, in answer to an ingenious question I put to her, she told me that her father had been German, but that she had nearly all her life lived in England.

The Irritating Woman spoke of going to the Riviera in December, whereupon Mabel remarked—

“I hope mother will go too. I’m trying to persuade her. London is so dull and miserable in winter compared with Cannes or Nice.”

“You know the Riviera well, I suppose?” I inquired of her.

“Oh, very well,” she responded. “Mother and I have spent four winters in the south. There’s no place in Europe in winter like the Côte d’Azur—as the French call it.”

“I much prefer the Italian Riviera,” chimed Miss Wells’s high-pitched voice. She made it a point of honour to differ with everybody. “At Bordighera, Ospedaletti, San Remo, and Alassio you have much better air, the same warmth, and at about half the price. The hotels in Nice and Cannes are simply ruinous.” Then, turning to Mrs Anson, she added, “You know, dear, what you said last year.”

“We go to the Grand, at Nice, always,” answered Mrs Anson. “It is dear, certainly, but not exaggeratedly so in comparison with the other large hotels.”

“There seems of late to have been a gradual rise in prices all along the Riviera,” remarked Hickman. “I’ve experienced it personally. Ten or twelve years ago lived in Nice for the season for about half what it costs me now.”

“That exactly bears out my argument,” exclaimed the Irritating Woman, in triumph. “The fact is that the French Riviera has become far too dear, and English people are, fortunately for themselves, beginning to see that by continuing their journey an extra twenty miles beyond Nice they can obtain just as good accommodation, live better, breathe purer air, and not be eternally worried by those gaudy tinsel-shows called Carnivals, or insane attempts at hilarity miscalled Battles of Flowers.”

“Oh, come, Miss Wells,” protested Mabel, “surely you won’t condemn the Battles of Flowers at Nice! Why, they’re acknowledged to be amongst the most picturesque spectacles in the world!”

“I consider, my dear, that they are mere rubbishy ruses on the part of the Niçois to cause people to buy their flowers and throw them into the roadway. It’s only a trick to improve their trade.”

We all laughed.

“And the Carnival?” inquired Hickman, much amused.

“Carnival!” she snorted. “A disgraceful exhibition of a town’s lawlessness. A miserable pageant got up merely to attract the unsuspecting foreigner into the web spread for him by extortionate hotel-keepers. All the so-called fun is performed by paid mountebanks; the cars are not only inartistic, but there is always something extremely offensive in their character, while the orgies which take place at the masked balls at the Casino are absolutely disgraceful. The whole thing is artificial, and deserves no support at all from winter visitors.”

Mrs Anson, for once, did not agree with this sweeping condemnation, while Mabel declared that she always enjoyed the fun of the battles of flowers and paper confetti, although she admitted that she had never had the courage to go out on those days when the pellets of lime, or “harp confetti,” are permitted. Both Hickman and myself supported Mabel in defence of the annual fêtes at Nice as being unique in all the world.

But the Irritating Woman was not to be convinced that her opinions were either ill-formed or in the least distorted. She had never been present at a Carnival ball, she admitted, but it had been described to her by two estimable ladies who had, and that was, for her, sufficient. They were a pair of pious souls, and would, of course, never exaggerate to the length of a lie.

Dinner over, the ladies retired, and Hickman and myself were left to smoke and gossip. He was certainly a very ugly man, and at times asserted an overbearing superiority in conversation; but having watched him very closely, I at length arrived at the conclusion that this was his natural manner, and was not intended to be offensive. Indeed, ever since that first moment when I had entered and been introduced, he had shown himself to be very pleasant and affable towards me.

“Poor Miss Wells!” he laughed, after the door had closed. “She’s so infernally positive about everything. It would be as good as an entertainment to induce her to expound her views upon religious matters.”

“Any argument seems utterly useless,” I remarked.

“Do you know Nice well?” he inquired, after reflecting a moment.

“I’ve spent three winters there,” I answered.

“And at Monte Carlo, I suppose?”

“Yes, of course,” I responded, laughing. “I suppose scarcely any man goes to Nice without going over to Monty and risking a few louis.”

“Were you lucky?”

“So, so. One season I won five thousand francs. In fact, I’ve never lost on the whole season. I’ve always left the Riviera with some of the bank’s money.”

“Then you can heartily congratulate yourself,” he said, “I’m the reverse. I generally lose. Do you believe in any system at roulette?”

“No; they are all frauds,” I answered promptly. “Except one,” he interposed. “There’s one based on the law of averages, which must turn up in your favour if you’re only patient enough. The reason why it is so difficult is because it’s such a long and tedious affair.”

“Explain it,” I urged, for a new system that was infallible was, to me, of greatest interest. I had, in the days before my blindness, made a study of the chances at roulette, and had played carefully upon principles which had, to me, appeared most natural. The result had been that with care I had won—not much, it was true—but it was better than leaving one’s money to swell the company’s dividends.

“The system,” he said, tossing off his glass of curaçoa at one gulp, “is not at all a complicated one. If you study the permanences of any table—you can get them from the Gazette Rose—you’ll find that each day the largest number of times either colour comes up in succession is nine. Now, all you have to do is to go to a table at the opening of the play, and taking one colour, red or black it makes no difference, stake upon it, and allow your money to accumulate until it is swept away. If the colour you stake upon comes up eight times in succession, and you have originally staked twenty francs, your gains lying on the table will amount to two thousand five hundred and sixty francs. Even then, don’t touch it. The colour must, in the law of averages, come up nine times in succession each day, taking the week through. If it comes up, you’ll win five thousand and twenty francs for the louis you staked, and then at once leave the table, for it will not come up nine times again that day. Of course, this may occur almost at the opening of the play, or not until the table is near closing, therefore it requires great patience and constant attendance. To-day it may not come up nine times, but it will probably come up nine times on two occasions to-morrow, and so the average always rights itself.”

His theory was certainly a novel one, and impressed me. There might, I thought, be something in it. He had never had patience to try it, he admitted, but he had gone through a whole year’s “permanences,” and found that only on three or four occasions had it failed.

For half an hour or so he sat lucidly explaining the results of his studies of the game with the air of a practised gambler. In these I became at once interested—as every man is who believes he has found the secret of how to get the right side of the bank; but we were at length compelled to put down our cigars, and he led the way into the drawing-room, where the ladies awaited us.

The room was a large, handsome one, elegantly furnished, and lit by two great lamps, which shed a soft, subdued light from beneath their huge shades of silk and lace. Mabel was sitting at the open grand piano, the shaded candlelight causing the beautiful diamond star in the coils of her dark-brown hair to flash with a dazzling iridescence, and as I entered she turned and gave me a sweet smile of welcome.

A second time I glanced around that spacious apartment, then next instant stood breathless—transfixed.

I could not believe my own eyes. It seemed absolutely incredible. Yet the truth was beyond all doubt.

In the disposition of the furniture, and in the general appointments of that handsome salon, the home of the woman I so dearly loved, I recognised the very room which I had once explored with my keen sense of touch—the room in which had been committed that ghastly, mysterious, midnight crime!

Chapter Fifteen.

What I Saw.

“How you men gossip!” Mabel exclaimed, tingling upon the piano-stool, and laughing merrily.

“I wasn’t aware that we had been very long,” I answered, sinking into a low armchair near her. “If so, I’m sure I apologise. The fact is, that Mr Hickman was explaining a new system of how to break the bank at Monte Carlo.”

“Oh, Mr Hickman!” she cried, turning at once to him. “Do explain it, and I’ll try it when we go to the Riviera.”

“Mabel, my dear,” exclaimed her mother, scandalised, “you’ll do nothing of the kind. You know I don’t approve of gambling.”

“Oh, I think it’s awfully good fun,” her daughter declared.

“If you win,” I added.

“Of course,” she added; then, turning again to Hickman, she induced him to explain his new and infallible system just as he had explained it to me.

The trend of the conversation was, however, lost to me. My ears were closed to all sound, and now that I reflect I am surprised that I succeeded in retaining my self-possession. I know I sat there rigid, as one held motionless in terror; I only replied in monosyllables to any remark addressed to me, and I knew instinctively that the colour had left my countenance. The discovery was as bewildering as it was unexpected.

Every detail of that handsome room was exactly as I had pictured it. The blind, with their keen sense of touch, are quick to form mental impressions of places and things, and the general character of this apartment I had riveted upon my mind with the fidelity of a photograph.

The furniture was of gilt, just as I had detected from its smoothness, and covered with a rich brocade in wide stripes of art green and dull red-brown—an extremely handsome pattern; the carpet was dark, with a pile so thick that one’s feet fell noiselessly; the three long windows, covered by heavy curtains of brocade to match the furniture, reached from the high-painted ceiling to the ground, exactly as I had found them in my blind gropings. About the room were two or three tables with glass tops, in trays beneath which were collections of choice bric-à-brac, including some wonderful Chinese carvings in ivory, while before the fireplace was spread the great tiger-skin, with paws and head preserved, which I so well remembered.

I sat there speechless, breathless. Not a single detail was there wanting. Never before, in all my life, had amazement held me so absolutely dumbfounded.

Close to where I saw was a spacious couch, over the centre of which was thrown an antimacassar of silken crochet-work. It was covered with the same brocade as the rest of the furniture, and I stretched forth my hand, with feigned carelessness and touched it. Its contact was the same, its shape exact; its position in the room identical.

Upon that very couch I had reclined while the foul tragedy had been enacted in that room. My head swam; I closed my eyes. The great gilt clock, with its pendulum representing the figure of a girl swinging beneath the trees, standing on the mantelshelf, ticked out low and musically, just as it had done on that fateful night. In an instant, as I sat with head turned from my companions and my eyes shut, the whole of that tragic scene was re-enacted. I heard the crash, the woman’s scream, the awe-stricken exclamation that followed in the inner room. I heard, too, the low swish of a woman’s skirts, the heavy blow struck by an assassin’s hand, and in horror felt the warm life-blood of the unknown victim as it trickled upon my hand.

Mabel suddenly ran her white fingers over the keys, and the music brought me back to a realisation of my true position. I had at length discovered the actual house in which the mysterious tragedy had been enacted, and it became impressed upon me that by the exercise of greatest care I might further be enabled to prosecute secret investigations to a successful issue, and at length solve the enigma.

My eyes fixed themselves upon the couch. It was the very spot where I had rested, sightless, helpless, while those strange events had taken place about me. Was it any wonder that I became filled with apprehensions, or that I sat there petrified as one turned to stone?

The square, dark-green antimacassar had been placed in the exact centre of the couch, and sewed down in order to keep it in its place. Where I was sitting was fortunately in the shadow, and when Mabel commenced playing I rose—unsteadily I think—and reseated myself upon the couch, as being more comfortable. Then, while the woman who held me entranced played a selection from the “Trovatore,” I, unnoticed by the others, succeeded in breaking the stitches which tacked the antimacassar to the brocade. The feat was a difficult one, for one does not care to be detected tearing the furniture of one’s hostess. Nevertheless, after ten minutes or so I succeeded in loosening it, and then, as if by the natural movement of my body, commenced to work aside.

The music ceased, and even though all my attention was now centred upon my investigations, I congratulated Mabel upon her accurate execution. Hickman was standing beside her, and together they began to search for some piece he had requested her to play, while Miss Wells, with her hearts and elephants jingling, turned to me and commenced to talk. By this I was, of course, interrupted; nevertheless, some ten minutes later, I rose, and naturally turned back to straighten the rumpled antimacassar. In doing so I managed to lift it and glance beneath.

In an instant the truth was plain. Concealed beneath that square of green crochet-work was a large dark-brown stain upon the brocade. It was the mark of the life-blood of that thin, well-dressed, unknown victim, who had, in an instant, been struck to the heart!

The shock at its discovery caused me to start, but next instant I smoothed out the antimacassar into its former place without attracting any attention, and passed across the room with the motive of inspecting an object which I well remembered discovering when I had made my blind search. Upon a pedestal of black marble stood an exquisite little statuette of a Neapolitan dancing-woman, undoubtedly the work of some Italian master. Without pausing to examine it, I took in its every detail as I passed. It was exactly as I had felt it, and in the self-same spot as on that fatal night.

Beside the couch, as I turned again to look, I saw that a large skin rug had been thrown down. Without doubt it had been placed there to conceal the ugly stain of blood upon the carpet.

And yet there, on the scene of one of the foulest and most cowardly assassinations, we were actually spending the evening quietly, as became a respectable household. The thing seemed absolutely incredible. A dozen times I endeavoured to persuade myself that the whole discovery was but a chimera, arising from my disordered imagination. Nevertheless, it was impossible to disguise from myself the fact that in every detail the truth was borne out. In that very room the unknown man had been struck dead. The marks of his blood still remained as evidence of the truth.

I saw that beside the high lamps at that moment in use, there was a magnificent candelabra suspended from the ceiling, and in this were electric lamps. Then, at the door, I noticed the switch, and knew that it was the same which I had heard turned off by the assassin before leaving the house.

At the end of the room, too, were the folding doors, now concealed by curtains. It was through those very doors that Edna, my mysterious protectress, had passed and repassed to that inner room whence had come the sound of champagne being uncorked and the woman’s piercing scream.

Mabel leaned over and spoke to me, whereupon I sank again into the chair I had previously occupied. She began to chat, but although her beautiful eyes held me fixed, and her face seemed more handsome than any I had ever seen, the diamonds in her hair dazzled my eyes, and I fear that my responses were scarcely intelligible.

“You are not quite yourself to-night, I think,” she remarked at last, rising from the piano, and taking the low chair that I drew up for her. “Are you unwell?”

“Why?” I asked, laughing.

“Because you look rather pale. What’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” I answered, as carelessly as I could. “A slight headache. But it has passed now.”

My eyes wandered to those curtains of green plush. How I longed to enter that room beyond!

At that moment she took out her handkerchief. Even that action added to the completion of the mental picture I had formed. Her tiny square of lawn and lace exhaled a sweet odour. It was that of peau d’Espagne, the same subtle perfume used by the mysterious Edna! It filled my nostrils until I seemed intoxicated by its fragrance combined with her beauty.

Her dress was discreetly decolleté, and as she sat chatting to me with that bright vivaciousness which was so charming, her white neck slowly heaved and fell. She had, it seemed, been striving all the evening to get a tête-à-tête chat with me, but the chatter of that dreadful Irritating Woman and the requests made by Hickman had prevented her.

As she gossiped with me, now and then waving her big feather fan, she conveyed to my mind an impression of extreme simplicity in the midst of the most wonderful complexity. She seemed to take the peculiar traits from many characters, and so mingle them that, like the combination of hues in a sunbeam, the effect was as one to the eye. I had studied her carefully each time we had met, and had found that she had something of the romantic enthusiasm of a Juliet, of the truth and constancy of a Helen, of the dignified purity of an Isabel, of the tender sweetness of a Viola, of the self-possession and intellect of a Portia—combined together so equally and so harmoniously that I could scarcely say that one quality predominated over the other. Her dignity was imposing, and stood rather upon the defensive; her submission, though unbounded, was not passive, and thus she stood wholly distinct in her sweetness from any woman I had ever met.

The following day was one on which she was due to take her music-lesson, and I inquired whether I might, as usual, meet her and escort her across the Park.

“You are really very kind,” she responded; “but I fear I take up far too much of your time.”

“Not at all,” I hastened to assure her. “I always enjoy our walks together.”

She smiled, but a moment later said—

“I fear that I shall be prevented from going to Hanover Square to-morrow, as I shall be making calls with mother. We’ve been neglecting to call of late, and have such a host to make.”

“Then I shan’t see you at all to-morrow?” I said in deep disappointment.

“No, I fear not,” she answered. “As a matter of fact, my movements for the next few days are rather uncertain.”

“But you’ll write and tell me when you are free?” I urged earnestly.

“If you wish,” she responded, smiling sweetly. Apparently she was in no wise averse to my companionship, a fact which had become to me more apparent now that she had induced her mother to invite me to their table.

I endeavoured to extract from her some appointment, but she only whispered—

“Remember that our meetings are clandestine. Don’t let them overhear us. Let’s change the subject.” And then she began to discuss several of the latest novels.

She had apparently a wide knowledge of French fiction, for she explained how a friend of hers, an old schoolfellow, who had married a French baron and lived in Paris, sent her regularly all the notable novels. Of English fiction, too, she was evidently a constant reader, for she told me much about recent novels that I was unaware of, and criticised style in a manner which betrayed a deep knowledge of her subject.

“One would almost think you were a lady novelist, or a book-reviewer,” I remarked, in response to a sweeping condemnation which she made regarding the style of a much-belauded writer.

“Well, personally, I like books with some grit in them,” she declared. “I can’t stand either the so-called problem novel, or a story interlarded with dialect. If any one wants nasty problems, let them spend a few shillings in the works of certain French writers, who turn out books on the most unwholesome themes they can imagine, and fondly believe themselves realists. We don’t want these queue-de-siècle works in England. Let us stick to the old-fashioned story of love, adventure, or romance. English writers are now beginning to see the mistake they once made in trying to follow the French style, and are turning to the real legitimate novel of action—the one that interests and grips from the first page to the last.”

She spoke sensibly, and I expressed my entire accord with her opinion. But this discussion was only in order to hide our exchange of confidences uttered in an undertone while Hickman and the two ladies were chatting at the further end of the room.

All the time I was longing to get a sight of the interior of the adjoining apartment, the room whence had burst forth that woman’s agonised cry in the stillness of the night. I racked my brain to find some means of entering there, but could devise none. A guest can hardly wander over his hostess’s house on the first occasion he receives an invitation. Besides, to betray any interest in the house might, I reflected, arouse some suspicion. To be successful in these inquiries would necessitate the most extreme caution.

The fragrant odour of peau d’Espagne exhaled by her chiffons seemed to hold me powerless.

The gilt clock with its swinging girl had already struck eleven on its silver bell, and been re-echoed by another clock in the hall playing the Westminster chimes, when suddenly Mrs Anson, with a book in her hand, looked across to her daughter, saying—

“Mabel, dear, I’ve left my glasses on the table in the library. Will you kindly fetch them for me?”

In an instant I saw my chance, and, jumping to my feet, offered to obtain them. At first she objected, but finding me determined, said—

“The library is the next room, there. You’ll find them on the writing-table. Mother always leaves them there. It’s really too bad to thus make a servant of you. I’ll ring for Arnold.”

“No, no,” I protested, and at once went eagerly in search of them.

Chapter Sixteen.

The Inner Room.

The adjoining room was, I found, in the front part of the house—a rather small one, lined on one side with books, but furnished more as a boudoir than a library, for there were several easy-chairs, a work-table, and a piano in a corner. At this instrument the mysterious player had on that night sat executing Chopin’s “Andante-Spinato” the moment before it became interrupted by some tragic and unexpected spectacle. I glanced around and noted that the furniture and carpet were worn and faded, that the books were dusty and evidently unused, and that the whole place presented an air of neglect, and had nothing whatever in keeping with the gorgeousness of the other handsome apartments.

The glasses were, as Mrs Anson had said, lying beside the blotting-pad upon a small rosewood writing-table. I took them up, and, having made a tour of inspection, was about to leave the place, when suddenly, on the top of some books upon a shelf close to the door, I espied a small volume.

The curious incident of the birthday book occurred to me; therefore I took down the little volume and found that it really was a birthday book. No name was inscribed on the title-page as owner, but there were many names scribbled therein. In swift eagerness I turned to the page of my own birthday—the 2nd of July. It was blank.

I stood pondering with the book still in my hand. The absence of my name there proved one or two things, either I had not signed a birthday book at all, or, if I had, it was not the one I had discovered. Now, there are frequently two birthday-books in one house, therefore I resolved, ere I gave the matter reflection, to prosecute my investigations further and ascertain whether there was not a second book.

With this object I made a second tour around the room, noting the position of every article of furniture. Some music lay scattered beside the piano, and, on turning it over, I found the actual copy of Chopin’s “Andante” which had been played on the night of the tragedy. The cover had been half torn away, but, on examining it closely beneath the light, I detected plainly a small smear of blood upon it.

Truly the house was one of mystery. In that room several persons had drunk champagne on that memorable night when blind Fate led me thither; in that room a woman had, according to the man’s shout of alarm, been foully done to death, although of this latter fact I was not altogether sure. At any rate, however, it was plain that some tragic event had previously taken place there, as well as in that room beyond where I had reclined blind and helpless. It was strange also that the apartment should remain neglected and undusted, as though the occupants entertained some dislike to it. But I had been absent long enough, and, returning to the drawing-room with the missing glasses, handed them to Mrs Anson.

Hickman had, in my absence, crossed to Mabel, and was sitting beside her in earnest conversation, therefore I was compelled to seat myself with my hostess and the Irritating Woman and chat with them. But ere long I contrived again to reach the side of the woman whom I adored, and to again press her for an appointment.

“It is far better forme to write to you,” she answered, beneath her breath. “As I’ve told you, we have so many calls to make and cards to leave.”

“Your mother tells me that you have a box for the Prince of Wales’s on Saturday night, and has asked me to join you,” I said. Her eyes brightened, and I saw that she was delighted at the prospect. But she expressed a hope that I wouldn’t be bored.

“Bored!” I echoed. “Why, I’m never bored when in your company. I fear that it’s the other way about—that I bore you.”

“Certainly not,” she responded decisively. “I very soon contrive to give persons who are bores their congé. Mother accuses me of rudeness to them sometimes, but I assure you I really can’t help being positively insulting. Has mother asked you to dine on Saturday?”

“Yes,” I answered. “But shan’t I see you before then?”

“No; I think it is very unlikely. We’ll have a jolly evening on Saturday.”

“But I enjoy immensely those walks across the Park,” I blurted forth in desperation.

“And I also,” she admitted with a sweet frankness. “But this week it is utterly impossible to make any arrangements.”

Mention of the theatre afforded me an opportunity of putting to her a question upon which, during the past couple of hours, I had reflected deeply.

“You’ve, of course, been to the Exhibition at Earl’s Court, living here in the immediate vicinity,” I said.

“I’ve only been once,” she answered. “Although we’ve had this house nearly two years, exhibitions don’t appeal to me very much. I was there at night, and the gardens were prettily illuminated, I thought.”

“Yes,” I said. “With the exception of the gardens, there is far too much pasteboard scenic effect. I suppose you noticed that serrated line of mountains over which the eternal switchback runs? Those self-same mountains, repainted blue, grey, or purple, with tips of snow, have, within my personal knowledge, done duty as the Alps, the Pyrenees, the Rockies, and the Atlas, not counting half a dozen other notable ranges.”

She laughed, slowly fanning herself the while.

By her reply I had obtained from her own lips a most important fact in the inquiry I intended now to prosecute, namely, that this house had been her home for nearly two years. Therefore it had been in Mrs Anson’s possession at the time of the tragedy.

Since the moment when I had first recognised that; room as the one in which I had been present on the night of the mysterious assassination, the possibility had more than once occurred to me that Mrs Anson might have; unwittingly taken it ready furnished after the committal of the crime. Such, however, was not the fact. Mabel had asserted that for nearly two years she had lived, there.

Again, even as I sat there at her side, deep in admiration of her magnificent figure in that striking toilette of coral-pink, with its soft garniture of lace and chiffons, I could not help reflecting upon the curious fact that she should have recognised the dead man’s pencil-case. And she had, by her silence, assented to my suggestion that he had been her lover. That little gold pencil-case that I had found in his pocket when he lay dead at that very spot where we were now sitting had been one of her love-gifts to him.

The mystery hourly grew more puzzling and bewildering. Yet so also each hour that I was at her side I fell deeper and deeper in love with her, longing always for opportunity to declare to her the secret of my heart, yet ever fearing to do so lest she should turn from me.

Our unexpected meeting at Grosvenor Gate, after I had received that letter from my anonymous correspondent, combined with the startling discovery that it was actually in her house that the mysterious tragedy had been enacted; that in that very room the smart, refined young man who had been her lover had fought so fiercely for life, and had yet been struck down so unerringly, formed an enigma inscrutable and perplexing.

The mystery, however, did not for one moment cause me to waver in my affection for her. I had grown to love her fondly and devotedly; to adore her as my idol, as the one who held my whole future in her hands, therefore whatever suspicion arose within my mind—and I admit that grave suspicion did arise on many occasions—I cast it aside and fell down to worship at the shrine of her incomparable beauty.

Miss Wells’s carriage was announced at last, and the Irritating Woman, tinkling and jingling, rose with a wearied sigh and took her leave, expressing her thanks for “a most delightful evening, my dear.”

Mabel, mischievous as a school-girl, pulled a grimace when the music of the bangles had faded in the hall outside, at which we laughed in merry chorus.

With Hickman I remained ten minutes or so longer, then rose, also declaring that it was time we left. The grave man-servant Arnold served us with whiskies and sodas in the dining-room, and, Mabel having helped me on with my covert-coat, we shook hands with our hostess and her daughter, and left in company.

The night was bright and starlit, and the air refreshing. Turning to the left after leaving the house, we came immediately to a road which gave entrance to that secluded oval called The Boltons. I looked at the name-plate, and saw it was named Gilston Road. It must have been at this corner that I had been knocked down by a passing cab when, on my first adventurous journey alone, I had wandered so far westward.

I turned to look back, and noticed that from the dining-room window of the house we had just left any occurrence at the corner in question could be distinctly seen. Edna had explained that she had witnessed my accident from that window, and in this particular had apparently told me the truth.

The remarkable and unexpected discoveries of that evening had produced a veritable tumult of thoughts within my brain, and as I walked with Hickman I took no note of his merry, irresponsible gossip, until he remarked—

“You’re a bit preoccupied, I think. You’re pondering over Mabel’s good looks, I suppose?”

“No,” I answered, starting at this remark. Then, to excuse myself, I added, “I was thinking of other things. I really beg your pardon.”

“I was asking your opinion of Mabel. Don’t you consider her extremely handsome?”

“Of course,” I answered, trying to suppress my enthusiasm. “She’s charming.”

“A splendid pianist, too.”

“Excellent.”

“It has always been a wonder to me that she has never become engaged,” he remarked. “A girl with her personal charms ought to make an excellent match.”

“Has she never been engaged?” I inquired quickly, eager to learn the truth about her from this man, who was evidently an old friend of the family.

“Never actually engaged. There have been one or two little love-affairs, I’ve heard, but none of them was really serious.”

“He’d be a lucky fellow who married her,” I remarked, still striving to conceal the intense interest I felt.

“Lucky!” he echoed. “I should rather think so, in many ways. It is impossible for a girl of her beauty and nobility of character to go about without lots of fellows falling in love with her. Yet I happen to know that she holds them all aloof, without even a flirtation.”

I smiled at this assertion of his, and congratulated myself that I was the only exception; for had she not expressed pleasure at my companionship on her walks? But recollecting her admission that the victim of the assassin’s knife had been her lover, I returned to the subject, in order to learn further facts.

“Who were the men with whom she had the minor love-affairs—any one I know?” I inquired.

“I think not, because it all occurred before they returned to live in England,” he answered.

“Then you knew them abroad?”

“Slightly. We met in a casual sort of way at Pau, on the Riviera, and elsewhere.”

“Both mother and daughter are alike extremely pleasant,” I said. “In high spirits Mrs Anson is sometimes almost as juvenile as Mabel.”

“Quite so,” he laughed. “One would never believe that she’s nearly sixty. She’s as vivacious and merry as a woman half her age. I’ve myself been surprised at her sprightliness often and often.”

Again and again I endeavoured to turn the conversation back to the identity of Mabel’s former lover, but he either did not know or purposely refused to tell me. He spoke now and then with an intentional vagueness, as though his loyalty to the Ansons prevented him from betraying any confidences reposed in him as a friend of the family. Indeed, this cautiousness showed him to be a trustworthy man, and his character became thereby strengthened in my estimation. On first acquaintance I had instantly experienced a violent aversion to him, but now, on this walk together along the Fulham Road, I felt that we should probably end by becoming friends.

He walked with long strides and a swinging, easy gait that seemed almost military, while his air of careless merriment as he laughed and joked, smoking the choice cigar which the man had handed to him in the hall just before our departure, gave him the aspect of an easy-going man-about-town.

“I fully expect, my dear fellow,” he laughed—“I fully expect that you’ll be falling in love with the pretty Mabel if you’re in her company very much.”

“You’re chaffing,” I protested, echoing his laugh.

“Not at all,” he asserted. “Only take care. Love-making with her is a dangerous pastime—devilish dangerous, I assure you.”

“Dangerous to the man’s heart—eh?”

“Yes,” he responded in a vague tone, glancing at me curiously; “if you like to put it in that way.”

We had passed from the Fulham Road into the King’s Road, Chelsea, and at that moment he halted suddenly at the corner of a street of high, regularly built houses, most of which were in darkness, saying—“I live down here. Come in and have a final whisky and soda with me; then you can take a cab back to the Strand. There are cabs all night on the rank in Sloane Square.”

“I fear it’s too late,” I protested, glancing at my watch, and finding it past one o’clock.

“No, no, my dear fellow, come along,” he urged. “You’ll want a drink before you get home;” and, thus persuaded, I accompanied him up the street to one of the high houses, each exactly similar to its neighbour, with a flight of hearthstoned steps leading up to its front door, and a deep, grimy basement protected by a few yards of iron railings.

In the hall, although the gas had been extinguished, there remained a small hand-lamp alight, evidently placed there for his use. This he took, and conducted me to a front room, upon what the landlady of such a residence would term her “drawing-room floor.” The house smelled close and stuffy; the furniture of the sitting-room was covered with plush which had once been crimson, but which was now sadly worn and badly moth-eaten; the threadbare carpet had been perforated in many places by hot cigarette-ends carelessly thrown down, and there was a general air of disorder about the place which seemed incongruous with my friend’s smart air and general demeanour. I believed him to be a gentleman, yet found that he lived in a not over-clean lodging. To the practical Londoner, whose fate it is to live in “diggings,” apartments in the neighbourhood of the King’s Road are notable as being both dear and dirty.

He threw off his overcoat, tossed his hat aside, and pulled up a long, comfortable wicker-chair for me. Then he opened the buffet, and took therefrom a bottle of whisky and a couple of sodas, with which he proceeded to mix the drinks, his cigar-stump still in his mouth, even though he talked all the time, recounting some amusing stories which caused me to laugh.

I could not quite make him out. The remarks he let fall while, over our coffee, we had discussed the chances at roulette, led me to the suspicion that he was a practised gambler, and here in his rooms I detected evidence that he was fond of sport, of betting, and of other games of hazard.

We had lit fresh cigars from his own box, and as he sat in his big armchair he lifted his glass to me merrily, expressing pleasure at our meeting.

“I hope,” he added, “that we shall meet very often. But take my tip, my dear fellow, and don’t fall in love with Mabel Anson.”

Why he should emphasise this warning just as Channing had done struck me as very curious. It might be, of course, that he was in love with her himself, and regarded me as a possible rival. This, indeed, was the impression conveyed to me by his words, and it aroused within me a vague feeling of distrust. That quick sinister glance when I had been introduced still lingered in my memory.

“I can’t think why you should so repeatedly warn me,” I remarked, laughing with affected amusement. “It really isn’t likely that I shall fall in love with her.”

He made no response. He only puffed slowly at his cigar, and smiled cynically through the veil of smoke he created.

I replaced my cigar in my mouth—for my friend was evidently a connoisseur of Havanas, and this was an excellent one—but at that instant my tongue, as I twisted it in my mouth, came in contact with the cut end of the weed, and I felt pricked as if by some sharp point. Quickly I removed it and examined it closely, exclaiming—

“Do they wrap up needles in your cigars? Look!” And I passed it across to him, indicating where, protruding from the end, which I had chopped off with the cutter on my watchguard, was the tiny point of either a needle or a pin.

“Extraordinary!” he ejaculated, taking it from my hand and examining it carefully.

But ere a few moments had elapsed I felt a strange sensation creeping upon me; a curious chilliness ran down my spine, my tongue seemed swelling until it filled my mouth, and my brain felt aflame.

“God?” I cried, springing to my feet in alarm. “Why, I believe I’m poisoned!”

“Nonsense!” he laughed. His voice seemed to sound afar off, and I saw his dog’s face slowly assume an expression of evil as he sat opposite, intently watching me.

A sudden dizziness seized me; a spasm of sharp pain shot through all my limbs from head to toe; my senses reeled, I could see nothing distinctly. The man Hickman’s ugly visage seemed slowly to fade in a blurred, blood-red mist.

At that same instant my blood was frozen by terror, for I felt convinced that this abrasion of my tongue had been planned by my companion’s devilish ingenuity, and that upon that needle-point had been placed some baneful substance, the action of which was rapid and certain. I saw it all, now that it was, alas! too late.

With a wild cry I stretched forth both hands to steady myself, but, staggering, only clutched the air.

Then a strange and utterly unaccountable thing happened to me—stranger than has ever happened to any other living man.

Chapter Seventeen.

The Marble Hand.

I approach this and the following chapters of my secret personal history with feelings of amazement and of thankfulness that I should still be alive and able to write down the truth freely and without fear, for the events were certainly most remarkable and utterly mystifying.

In no man’s history has there ever been such a strange, bewildering page as the one I am about to reveal to you.

Reader, as I have taken you into my confidence, so also I tell you confidentially that I myself, an ordinary man, would never have believed that in this life of ours such things were possible, had I not myself experienced them, and personally endured the frightful agony of mind which they entailed. But I am writing down in black and white upon these pages the solid unvarnished facts, fearless of contradiction, so that the whole of the strange truth shall be known, and hat she who is dearest to me on earth may be adjudged by the world with fairness and with justice. For that sole reason I have resolved to relate this romance of real life, otherwise it would ever remain in that crabbed writing in that small portfolio, or secret dossier as it is called, numbered, docketed, and reposing in the archives of the Ministry of the Interior of a certain European Power.

Well, I have written the truth here, so that all who read may judge.

Immediately after the slight abrasion of my tongue, caused by the scratch of the needle so cunningly concealed in the cigar, I must have lost all consciousness. Of that I have no doubt. The recollections I have are only the faintest ones, blurred and indistinct, like shadows in a dream. I remember shouting in alarm and fighting fiercely against the drowsiness and general debility which seemed to overcome me, but all was with little or no effect. The last I remember was the ugly face of Hickman glaring evilly into mine. His hideous grin seemed to render his dog’s face the more repulsive, and his laugh of triumph sounded in my ears harsh and discordant, showing plainly that the spirit of murder was in his heart.

At the same instant that I had made a movement towards him, I seemed to have received a stunning blow upon the top of the skull, which so dulled my senses that I was powerless to combat the curious giddiness that seized me, and sank senseless upon the floor of that shabby room, helpless as a log.

The last thought that surged through my brain was the reflection that I was powerless in the hands of an enemy. My first estimate of this man Hickman had been correct, and I regretted that I did not allow my instinctive caution to overrule my desire to become on friendly terms with him. He had enticed me to that place with an evil purpose—possibly that I might share the same fate as did that young man on the fateful night at The Boltons.

The prick of an ordinary needle upon the tongue would never have created such an electrical effect upon me, therefore it was certain that the point had been smeared with some powerful drug or poison. The ingenuity with which the cigar had been prepared was shown by the fact that a needle placed within would, as the tobacco became moistened by the saliva, gradually work downward towards the tongue, while the heat at the further end of the needle would, of course, render liquid any coating placed upon it. Without doubt I had been the victim of a deeply-laid plot, prepared with a cunning that seemed almost beyond comprehension.

The blank in my mind, caused by my sudden unconsciousness, did not appear to me to be of very long duration. All I know is that I was utterly ignorant of every event that transpired about me, and knew nothing whatever of any of the incidents which afterwards took place in that dark, obscure house, or elsewhere. And yet they must have been of a character absolutely unheard of.

I have said that the period of my benighted senses did not appear to be prolonged. Indeed, now on reflection in the calmness of the present, I am inclined to put down the lapse of time during which, in my estimation, I was lost to all knowledge of things about me at two, or perhaps three, hours. Of course, it is difficult to fix time when we awaken after sleeping, except by the degree of light in the heavens. If it is still dark, it is always difficult to gauge the hour. So it was with me when, with a heavy, bruised feeling about the top of my skull, I slowly struggled back to a knowledge of the world.

My first thought as I opened my eyes was of Hickman. My second was a feeling of surprise that I had been unconscious so long, for while it was about two o’clock in the morning when my tongue had, been pricked by the concealed needle, and my adversary had dealt me a crushing blow upon my skull as I had rushed upon him, yet straight before my eyes the sun was shining full upon the carpet, and the particles of dust were dancing in its golden rays.

Surely, I thought, I could not have remained unconscious for nearly twelve hours.

The pain in my skull was excruciating. I put my hand to the wound, and when I withdrew it found blood upon it. I felt a huge bump, but the abrasion of the skin was, I discovered, only slight.

At first my brain was confused and puzzled, as though my dulled senses were wrapped in cotton wool. At a loss to account for the time that had elapsed, I lay upon the carpet just as I was, in vague, ignorant wonderment. My eyes, dazzled by the bright sunlight, pained me, and I closed them. Perhaps I dozed. Of that I am not quite sure. All I know is that when I opened my eyes again the pain in my head seemed better, and my senses seemed gradually to recognise, appreciate, and perceive.

I was lying on my side upon the carpet, and slowly, with a careful effort involuntarily made by the march of intellect, I gazed around me.

The place was unfamiliar—utterly unfamiliar. I wondered if I were actually dreaming. I felt my head, and again glanced at my hand. No. There was sufficient proof that my skull had been injured, and that I was lying alone in that room with the bar of sunlight slanting straight before my eyes.

Gradually, and not without considerable difficulty—for I was still half-dazed—I made out the objects about me, and became aware of my surroundings.

My eyes were amazed at every turn. Whereas Hickman’s apartment was a dirty, shabby lodging-house sitting-room of that stereotyped kind so well known to Londoners, the place wherein I found myself was a rather large, handsomely furnished drawing-room, the two long windows of which opened out upon a wide lawn, with a park and a belt of high trees far beyond. From where I was I could see a wealth of roses, and across the lawn I saw the figure of a woman in a white summer blouse.

The carpet whereon I was stretched was soft and rich, the furniture was of ebony, with gilt ornamentations—I think French, of the Empire period—while close to me was a grand piano, and upon a chair beside it a woman’s garden hat.

I looked at that hat critically. It belonged to a young woman, no doubt, for it was big and floppy, of soft yellow straw, with cherries, and had strings to tie beneath the chin. I pictured its owner as pretty and attractive.

About that room there were screens from Cairo, little inlaid coffee-tables from Algiers, quaint wood-carvings of the Madonna beneath glass shades, fashioned by the peasants of Central Russia, Italian statuary, and modern French paintings. The room seemed almost a museum of souvenirs of cosmopolitan travel. Whoever was its owner, he evidently knew the value of bric-à-brac, and had picked up his collection in cities far afield.

The door was closed, and over it hung a rich portière of dark-blue plush edged with gold. The sculptured over-mantel, in white marble, was, I quickly detected, a replica of one I had seen and admired in the Bargello, in Florence. One object, however, aroused my wonder. It was lying on the floor straight before me, an object in white marble, the sculptured arm of a woman with the index-finger outstretched. The limb was of life-size proportions, and had apparently been broken off at the elbow.

I staggered unevenly to my feet, in order to further pursue my investigations, and then I saw, upon a pedestal close to me, the marble figure of a Phryne with its arm broken.

In the centre of that handsome apartment I stood and gazed wonderingly around. My transition from that bizarre sitting-room in Chelsea to this house, evidently in the country, had been effected in a manner beyond comprehension. My surprising surroundings caused my weakened brain to reel again. I was without hat or overcoat, and as I glanced down at my trousers they somehow did not seem to be the same that I had been wearing on the previous night.

Instinctively I felt that only by some extraordinary and mysterious means could I have been conveyed from that close-smelling lodging in Chelsea to this country mansion. The problem uppermost in my mind was the identity of the place where I had thus found myself on recovering my senses, and how I got there.

My eyes fell upon the push of an electric-bell. My position, lying there injured upon the carpet, demanded explanation, and without further hesitation I walked across and pressed the ivory button.

I heard no sound. The bell must have rung far away, and this gave me the idea that the house was a large one.

Intently I listened, and a few minutes later heard a footstep. The door opened, and an elderly man-servant, with grey whiskers, appeared in the entry asking—“Did you ring, sir?”

“Yes,” I answered. “Will you kindly inform me where I am?”

He regarded me with a strange, puzzled expression, and then, in alarm, he rushed forward to me, crying—“Why, sir! You’ve hurt your head! Look! You’re covered with blood!”

His grey face was pale, and for an instant he stood regarding me open-mouthed.

“Can’t you answer my question?” I demanded hastily. “I know that I’ve injured my head. I didn’t call you in order to learn that. I want to know where I am.”

The man’s countenance slowly assumed a terrified expression as he regarded me, and then, without further word, he flew from the room as fast as his legs could carry him. I heard him shouting like a lunatic, in some other part of the house, and stood utterly dumbfounded at his extraordinary behaviour. He had escaped from my presence as though he had seen an apparition.

A few minutes later, however, he returned, accompanied by a dark-haired, well-dressed man of about thirty, tall, rather good-looking, and apparently a gentleman. The instant the latter saw me he rushed forward, crying, in a voice of distress—

“Oh, my dear sir, whatever has happened?”

“My head,” I explained. “It was that ugly-faced scoundrel Hickman. Where is he?”

“Hickman?” echoed the new-comer. “Hickman? Who’s he?”

“Oh, it’s all very well for you to pretend to know nothing about it,” I cried angrily. “But I tell you that as soon as I’m able I’ll apply for a warrant for his arrest on a charge of attempted murder. Last night he tried to kill me.”

“I don’t understand you,” the stranger responded. “I don’t, of course, expect you to admit any complicity in the affair,” I snapped. “You’d be a fool if you did. All I tell you is that an attempt has been made upon my life by a man to whom I was introduced as Hickman.”

“Not in this room?”

I hesitated.

“No, not in this room,” I admitted. “It was in a house at Chelsea.”

The young man exchanged meaning glances with the man-servant.

“At Chelsea!” repeated the stranger. “In London?”

“In London.”

“Well, that’s very curious,” he remarked. Then, turning to the servant, said—

“Gill, go and fetch Doctor Britten at once. Say nothing of this to any one in the house.”

“Yes, sir,” answered the servant, who instantly withdrew.

“I suppose you’ve sent for the doctor to bandage my head?” I remarked cynically. “I’m perfectly competent to do that if you’ll kindly oblige me with a little warm water, a sponge, and some clean old linen.”

“No, no,” he urged. “Wait in patience until Britten comes. He’ll be here in a moment. I saw him returning home only ten minutes ago.”

“But how came I here?” I demanded.

He hesitated, regarding me with evident distrust, mingled with considerable alarm.

“I—I really don’t know,” he responded lamely.

“That’s all nonsense,” I cried, with more force than politeness. “I find myself here, in this room, wounded and weak through loss of blood, after having been half murdered, and then you have the cool impudence to deny all knowledge of how I came here. You’re a liar—that’s plain.”

I had grown angry at this lame attempt of his to feign ignorance.

“You are extremely complimentary,” he answered, colouring slightly.

“Well, perhaps you won’t mind telling me the time. I find that that cunning scoundrel Hickman, not content with trying to poison me with a prepared cigar and striking me on the head in that cowardly way, has also robbed me of my watch and chain.”

He glanced at his watch.

“It’s half-past two,” he answered abruptly.

“Half-past two! Then it happened more than twelve hours ago,” I observed.

“I wish Britten would hurry,” the young man remarked. “I don’t like the look of that wound. It’s such a very nasty place.”

“Only a scalp-wound,” I said lightly. “Properly bandaged, it will be all right in a few days. There’s fortunately no fracture.”

“Well, you’re in a pretty mess, at any rate.”

“And so would you be,” I said, “if you had been entrapped as I’ve been.”

His face seemed bloodless, as though the discovery of my presence there had caused him the utmost alarm. He fidgeted and glanced eagerly now and then towards the door.

At last I distinguished advancing footsteps, and there entered an elderly, dapper, white-bearded little man, whose general demeanour and buttoned frock-coat gave him the air of the medical practitioner. He held his silk hat in his hand, and as he placed it down I noticed that his stethoscope reposed cross-wise in the lining.

“My dear sir! My dear sir! What’s this?” he began fussily. “Come, sit down;” and he drew me towards a chair, and seated himself upon the edge of another close to me.

“My head has been injured. Examine for yourself.”

“Ah!” he exclaimed, first regarding me fixedly, and then rising and examining my head. “A nasty scalp-wound, I see.” He felt it carefully with his fingers, causing me a sharp twinge of pain. “No fracture, no fracture. That’s fortunate—very fortunate. It’s not serious at all, I’m glad to tell you—nothing serious. How did it occur?”

“I was struck, that’s all I remember,” I answered, turning to him and looking into his face.

“With something sharp-pointed, evidently;” and he looked extremely puzzled.

“I don’t know what it was.”

“From what I can feel, I think you must have had a previous blow upon the same spot at some time or another. Do you remember it?”

“Not at all,” I answered. “I once received a blow on the head by the kick of a horse, but it was at the side.”

“Ah, perhaps this was a blow in infancy, and you don’t recollect it.”

Then, as he exchanged a strange look with the young man who stood eager and anxious at his side, his quick eyes suddenly fell upon the broken arm of the statue.

“Why, what’s this?” he cried, a sudden light apparently dawning upon him. “Look here, there’s blood and hair upon this marble finger. You’ve evidently struck your head against it in passing, and so violently as to break the marble. See!”

I looked, and there, sure enough upon the outstretched index-finger of the marble hand was a trace of blood, to which two or three hairs still clung.

“We’ve solved the mystery!” he cried. “I must dress your wound, and then, my dear sir, you must rest—rest. It will do your head good, you know.”

“But I was struck down last night by a man named Hickman in his rooms at Chelsea. He attempted to murder me.”

“Yes, yes,” he said, as though intentionally humouring me. “We’ve heard all about that. But come with me upstairs and let me dress your wound at once. Gill,” he added, turning to the servant, “get me some lukewarm water at once.”

Then he took my arm and led me upstairs to a well-fitted dressing-room, where he fussily washed and bandaged my head, while I sat silent, dazed, and wondering.

Chapter Eighteen.

Mystery Inexplicable.

Britten was, I immediately detected, one of those men whose well-feigned air of fussy sympathy, whose unruffled good humour, and whose quick perception enabled him to gauge to a nicety his patient’s character, and to thus ingratiate himself. By the younger people he was, no doubt, pronounced clever on account of his age and known experience, while old ladies—those whose very life depended upon regularly seeing the doctor—declared him to be “such a dear, kind man.” Upon the family doctor’s manner alone depends the extent of his popularity and the size of his practice. The most ignorant charlatan who ever held a diploma can acquire a wide practice if he is only shrewd enough to humour his patients, to take pains to feign the deepest interest in every case, and assume an outward show of superior knowledge. In medicine be the man ever so clever, if he has no tact with his patients his surgery bell will remain for ever silent.

Dr Britten was a shrewd old fellow; a bit of a bungler, who made up for all defects by that constant good humour which people like in a medical man. “Don’t worry, my dear sir; don’t worry,” he urged, when he had finished. “Rest well, and you’ll be right again very soon.”

“But the events of last night?” I said. “A man made a dastardly attempt upon my life, and I intend to secure his arrest.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” he answered, patting me on the shoulder with a familiarity curious when I reflected that I had never set eyes upon him till half an hour before. “But take my advice, and don’t reflect upon it.”

“If you know, then perhaps you’ll kindly give me some explanation?” I said, resenting his manner. He was treating me as he would a child.

“I only know what you’ve told me,” he responded. “It’s a strange story, certainly. But don’t you think that it is, greater part of it, imagination?”

“Imagination!” I cried, starting up angrily. “I tell you, Doctor Britten—or whatever your name is—that it is no imagination. The wound on my head is sufficient proof of that.”

“The wound was inflicted by yourself,” he answered calmly. “You accidentally ran against the statue.”

“I don’t believe it,” I said, bluntly. “It’s all a confounded conspiracy, and, moreover, you are staking your professional reputation by assisting in it.”

He shrugged his shoulders and raised his grey eyebrows with an expression of regret.

“I have been called to you, my dear sir, because you have met with an accident,” he said. “I have merely given you the best of my advice—namely, to remain quiet, and not trouble about anything that has passed. Your brain requires rest after the severe shock it has received.”

“Doctor Britten,” I said determinedly, “I quite understand the meaning of your vague words. You believe that I’m not quite right in my mind.”

“No, no,” he assured me quickly. “I did not say that. Pray do not misunderstand me. I merely advise rest and perfect quiet. Indeed, you would be far better in bed for a few days—far better.”

“I know my own feelings best, thanks,” I replied, for his manner, although it might impress nervous old ladies, aroused within me a strong resentment.

“Exactly. But surely you should, for your own sake, attend to the suggestions of your medical adviser?”

“You have formed wrong conclusions—entirely wrong conclusions,” I laughed. “Is it likely that I shall take notice of anything you say when you believe that I’m not responsible for my actions?”

I had watched his face carefully, and I knew that, like the dark-faced young man and Gill, the servant, he believed my brain unbalanced.

“I assure you, my dear sir, you entirely misunderstand me,” he protested. “I merely say—”

“Oh, enough!” I cried angrily, turning upon my heel and leaving the room abruptly. I was sick of the chattering old idiot, who evidently believed that I was not responsible for my actions.

Down the wide oak stairs I passed, and in the great hall, which seemed to run the whole length of the house, and was filled with stands of armour, tattered banners, and trophies of the chase, I encountered the pale-faced man who had sent for old Britten.

I was passing him by, intent upon exploring this strange house in which I found myself, when, approaching me, he said—

“Would you please come into the library for one moment?”

“The library?” I asked, looking at him, puzzled. “Where is it?”

He opened a door close by, and I followed him into a comfortable study, lined with books from floor to ceiling. In the centre was a large writing-table littered with papers, while close beside was another smaller table, very severe and business-like.

“Well?” I inquired. “What do you want?”

“This telegram has just arrived,” he answered excitedly, unlocking a drawer in the smaller writing-table, and taking out a telegram, which he handed to me.

Puzzled, I took the flimsy paper and read the words written thereon, as follows:—

“We are to-day in receipt of following telegram from our Vancouver branch—‘Inform Wilford Heaton that Charles Mawson, Dawson City, has struck it seven dollars to pan.’ Bank of British North America, London.”

Such a message was utterly unintelligible to me.

“Well?” I inquired, raising my eyes and looking at him, surprised. “I don’t see why this Charles Mawson, whoever he is, need hasten to tell me that. What does it matter to me?”

“Matter? My dear sir? Matter?” he cried, staring at me, as though in wonder. “There must, I think, be something the matter with you.”

“Well, perhaps you’ll kindly explain what it means?” I said, “I have, I assure you, no idea.”

“Why, it means,” he said, his face betraying his intense excitement—“it means that Woodford’s report is correct, that there is, after all, rich gold on the concession; in short, that, being owner of one of the most valuable placer concessions, you are a millionaire!”

“That’s all very interesting,” I remarked with a smile, while he stood staring at me in abject wonder.

“I fear,” he said, “that you’re not quite yourself to-day. The injury to your head has possibly affected you.”

“No, it hasn’t,” I snapped quickly. “I’m quite as clear-headed as you are.”

“Then I should have thought that to any man in his sane senses such a telegram as that would have been extremely gratifying,” he observed.

“Now, tell me,” I said; “do you know who I am?”

“I think I do. You are Mr Wilford Heaton.”

“And you tell me that I’m a millionaire?”

“I do, most certainly.”

“Then, much as I regret to be compelled to say it, young man,” I answered, “I am of opinion that you’re a confounded liar.”

“But Mawson has struck the gold seven dollars to the pan,” he pointed out in protest.

“Well, what in the name of Fortune has it to do with me if he’s struck it a thousand dollars to the handful?” I cried.

“I should be inclined to say it had a great deal to do with you as holder of the concession,” he answered quite coolly.

“Oh, bother the concession,” I said hastily. “I don’t understand anything whatever about it, and, what’s more, I don’t want to be worried over any mining swindles.” Then I added, sinking into the padded chair before the writing-table. “You seem to know all about me. Tell me, now—what’s your name?”

“My name?” he echoed, staring at me blankly, as though utterly puzzled. “Well, I thought you knew it long ago. I’m Gedge—Reginald Gedge.”

“And what are you, pray?”

“I’m your secretary.”

“My secretary!” I echoed, gasping in amazement. Then I added, “Look here, you’re trying to mislead me, all of you. I have no secretary—I’ve never had one. All this chatter about mines and concessions and such things is pure and simple rubbish.”

“Very well,” he answered with a slight sigh. “If you would have it so it must be. Britten has already said that you are somewhat confused after your accident.”

“Britten be hanged!” I roared. “I’m no more confused than you are. All I want is a straightforward explanation of how I came here, in this house.”

He smiled, pityingly I thought. That old medical idiot had apparently hinted to both the servant and this young prig, who declared himself my secretary, that I was not responsible for my actions; therefore, what could I expect?

“The explanation is one which I regret I cannot give you,” he answered. “All I want is your instructions what to wire to Mawson.”

“Oh, bother Mawson!” I cried angrily. “Wire him whatever you like, only don’t mention his name again to me. I don’t know him, and don’t desire to make any acquaintance either with him or his confounded pans.”

“I shall send him congratulations, and tell him to remain in Dawson City pending further instructions.”

“He can remain there until the Day of Judgment, for all I care,” I said, a remark which brought a smile to his pale features.

A brief silence fell between us. All this was absolutely bewildering. I had been struck down on the previous night in a street at Chelsea, to find myself next day in a country house, and to be coolly informed by a man who called himself my secretary that I was owner of a great gold concession and a millionaire. The whole thing seemed too utterly incredible.

I felt my head, and found it bandaged. There was no mistake about the reality of it all. It was no curious chimera of the imagination.

Before me upon the blotting-pad were some sheets of blank notepaper. I turned them over in idle curiosity, and found embossed upon them the address in bold, black characters: “Denbury Court, near Budleigh-Salterton.”

“Is this place Denbury Court?” I inquired.

“Yes.”

“And whose guest am I, pray?”

“You are no one’s guest. This is your own house,” was his amazing response.

I turned towards him determinedly, and in a hard voice said—

“I think, Mr Gedge, that you’ve taken leave of your senses. I’ve never heard of this place before, and am certainly not its owner. Are you certain you are not confounding me with some one else—some one resembling me in personal appearance?”

“Absolutely certain,” he replied. “Your name is Wilford Heaton, and I repeat that I am your confidential private secretary.”

I shook my head.

“Well,” he said quickly, “here is some further proof,” and bending beside me he opened one of the drawers of the big writing-table, and took therefrom a number of blank memorandum forms, which he placed before me. In eagerness I read their printed heading. It was “From Wilford Heaton, 103A, Winchester House, Old Broad Street, London, E.C.”

“Well, what are those used for?” I asked in wonder. “They are used at the City office,” he answered, tossing them back into the drawer.

“And you tell me I am wealthy?” I said, with a cynical laugh.

“Your banker’s pass-book should be sufficient proof of that,” he answered; and taking the book from an iron safe let into the opposite wall, he opened it and placed it before me.

I glanced at the cover. Yes, there was no mistake. It was my own pass-book.

My eyes fell upon the balance, standing to my credit, and the largeness of the figures held me open-eyed in astonishment.

It was wealth beyond all my wildest dreams.

“And that is mine—absolutely mine?” I inquired, when at last I found tongue.

“Certainly,” he replied, a moment later adding: “It is really very strange that I have to instruct you in your own private affairs.”

“Why have I an office in the City?” I asked, for that point was puzzling.

“In order to carry on your business.”

“What business?”

“That of financial agent.”

I smiled at the absurdity of the idea. I had never been a thrifty man; in fact, I had never had occasion to trouble my head about finance, and, truth to tell, had always been, from a lad, a most arrant dunce at figures.

“I fear I’m a sorry financier,” I remarked for want of something better to say.

“You are acknowledged to be one of the shrewdest and the soundest in the City of London,” Gedge answered.

“Well,” I remarked, closing the pass-book, securing the flap, and handing it back to him, “all I have to say is that this last hour that has passed has been absolutely replete with mystery. I can make nothing of all these things you tell me—absolutely nothing. I shall begin to doubt whether I’m actually myself very soon.”

“It would be better to rest a little, if I might advise,” he said, in a more deferential tone than before. “Britten suggested repose. That blow has upset you a little. To-morrow you’ll be quite right again, I feel sure.”

“I don’t intend to rest until I’ve cleared up this mystery,” I said determinedly, rising from the table.

At that moment, however, the door opened, and turning quickly, I was confronted by an angular, bony-faced, lantern-jawed woman, whose rouged and powdered face and juvenility of dress struck me as utterly ludicrous. She was fifty, if a day, and although her face was wrinkled and brown where the artificial complexion had worn off, she was nevertheless attired in a manner becoming a girl of twenty.

“Oh, my dear Wilford! Whatever has happened?” she cried in alarm, in a thin, unmusical voice, when she beheld the bandages around my head.

I looked at her in mingled surprise and amusement; she was so doll-like and ridiculous in her painted juvenility.

“Mr Heaton accidentally struck his head against the statue in the drawing-room, madam,” explained Gedge. “Doctor Britten has assured me that the injury is not at all serious. A little rest is all that is necessary.”

“My dear Wilford! Oh, my dear Wilford! Why didn’t you call me at once?”

“Well, madam,” I answered, “that was scarcely possible, considering that I had not the honour of your acquaintance.”

“What!” she wailed. “You—you can’t really stand there and coolly tell me that you don’t know me?”

“I certainly assert, madam, that I have absolutely no knowledge whatever of whom you may be,” I said with some dignity.

“Is your brain so affected, then, that you actually fail to recognise me—Mary, your wife!”

“You!” I gasped, glaring at her, dumbfounded. “You, my wife! Impossible!”

Chapter Nineteen.

My Unknown Wife’s Story.

“My dear Wilford!” exclaimed the thin-faced, angular woman. “I really think you must have taken leave of your senses.”

“My dear madam,” I cried excitedly, “I haven’t the slightest notion of your name. To the best of my knowledge, I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting you before this moment. Yet you have the boldness to assert that you are my wife! The thing is absolutely preposterous!” I laughed cynically.

“You must be mad to talk like this!” the woman answered with some asperity.

“I tell you that I’m not mad, madam,” I protested, “and further, I declare that I have never married.”

“What rubbish you talk!” she said. “This accident to your head has evidently affected your intellect. You must rest, as Doctor Britten has ordered.”

“The doddering old idiot thinks, like yourself, that I’m not quite responsible for my actions,” I laughed. “Well, we shall see.”

“If you were in your right senses you would never deny that I am your wife,” answered the overdressed woman. “The thing’s too absurd.”

“My dear madam,” I cried, growing angry, “your allegations are utterly ridiculous, to say the least. All this is either some confounded conspiracy, or else you mistake me for somebody else. I tell you that I am Wilford Heaton, of Essex Street, Strand, a bachelor who has neither thought nor inclination of marrying.”

“And I tell you that you are Wilford Heaton, my husband, and owner of this house,” she answered, her face growing redder with excitement.

The situation was certainly stranger than any other in which a man could possibly be placed. That it was no dream, but a stern reality, was entirely plain. I glanced around the comfortable library, and saw there evidences of wealth and refinement, while through the window beyond my gaze fell upon the wide park sloping away to a large lake glistening in the sunshine, and through the trees beyond could be seen a distant glimpse of the blue waters of the English Channel.

I stood utterly nonplussed by the startling declaration of this artificial-looking person, who aped youth so ridiculously, and yet spoke with such an air of confidence and determination.

“And you actually expect me to believe this absurd story of yours, that I am your husband, when only last night I dined at The Boltons, and was then a bachelor? Besides, madam,” I added with a touch of sarcasm, for I confess that my anger was now thoroughly aroused, “I think the—well, the difference in our ages is sufficient to convince any one that—”

“No, no,” she hastened to interrupt me, as though that point were very distasteful to her. “Age is entirely out of the question. Am I to understand that you distinctly deny having made me your wife?”

“I do, most decidedly,” I laughed, for the very idea was really too ridiculous to entertain.

She exchanged a pitying look with Gedge, who stood at a little distance, watching in silence.

“Poor Wilford! poor Wilford?” she ejaculated in a tone of sympathy, and, addressing the man who called himself my secretary, said, “It seems quite true what the doctor has declared; the blow has upset the balance of his mind.”

“Madam,” I cried very determinedly, “you will oblige me by not adding further insult to your attempted imposture—for such sympathy is insulting to me.”

She clasped her hands, turned her eyes upwards, and sighed in the manner of the elderly.

“You believe that I’m mad. Therefore you are trying to impose upon me!” I went on furiously. “But I tell you, my dear madam, that I am just as sane as yourself, and am fully prepared to prove that I am not your husband.”

“Ask Mr Gedge whether I speak the truth or not,” she said, turning to the secretary.

“Certainly,” answered the man addressed, looking straight into my face. “I have no hesitation whatever in bearing out Mrs Heaton’s statement.”

“It’s all humbug!” I cried, turning savagely upon him. “I don’t know this woman from Adam!”

“Well,” he laughed cynically, “you ought to know her pretty well, at any rate.”

It was apparent from his tone that he had no very high opinion of her.

“I’m pleased to say that until this present moment we have been strangers,” I said, for I was not in a humour to mince words.

“You are extremely complimentary, Wilford,” she observed resentfully.

“It appears to me that compliments are entirely unnecessary in this affair,” I said. “You are endeavouring to thrust yourself upon me as my wife, in order, I suppose, to achieve some object you have in view. But I tell you once and for all, madam, that any such attempt will be futile. To speak plainly, I don’t know you, neither have I any desire to add you to my list of acquaintances.”

“Well,” she cried; “of all the stories I’ve ever heard, this is the most extraordinary!”

“I think, madam, I may say the same,” I remarked coldly. “Your story is the wildest and most incredible that I’ve ever heard. Last night, as a bachelor, I dined with friends in Kensington, and left at a late hour, calling at a house in Chelsea on my way home to Essex Street. To-day I awake to be told that I am the owner of wealth beyond the dreams of avarice; master of this house—in Devonshire, I believe, isn’t it; and your lawful husband. Now, if you think me capable of swallowing such a pack of palpable fictions as these, you must certainly consider me absolutely insane, for none but a madman would give credence to such a tissue of lies.”

“Doctor Britten considers that your brain is unbalanced, because you do not know the truth,” she said calmly. “I quite agree with him.”

“He’s a fool—a drivelling idiot,” I cried, forgetting myself in the heat of the moment, and using an unwriteable word. Mention of that pottering old fossil’s name was to me as a red rag to a bull. “I surely know who and what I am!” I cried.

“No, my dear Wilford, that’s just it. You don’t know who you are,” the woman answered with a smile.

“Oh!” I exclaimed. “Then perhaps you’ll kindly inform me. All this may be very amusing to you, but I assure you that to me it’s the very reverse.”

“I can only tell you who you are as I know you to be,” answered the powdered-faced, doll-like old lady, whose attempts at juvenile coquetry sickened me.

“Go on,” I said, preparing myself for more attempts to befool me.

“I ask you first whether you are not Wilford Heaton, of Heaton Manor, near Tewkesbury?”

“Certainly.”

“And you were once stricken by blindness?”

“That is so, unfortunately.”

“And you are now carrying on business as a financier in the City of London?”

“I know nothing of finance,” I answered. “This Mr Gedge—or whatever his name is—has told me some absurd fairy tale about my position in London, but knowing myself, as I do, to be an arrant duffer at figures, I’m quite positive that the story is all bunkum.”

“Then how do you account for these memorandum forms?” inquired Gedge, taking some from the table, “and for these letters? Are they not in your handwriting?”

I glanced at the letters he held. They referred to some huge financial transaction, and were certainly in a hand that appeared wonderfully like my own.

“Some one has been imposing upon you, I tell you. This is a case of mistaken identity—it must be, my dear sir.”

“But I tell you it isn’t,” protested Gedge. “All that your wife has said is the absolute truth.”

“My wife!” I cried angrily. “I have no wife—thank Heaven!”

“No, no,” whined the painted old woman, dabbing her eyes with her handkerchief, very lightly, however, so as not to disturb their artificiality. “No, don’t say that, my dear Wilfred, don’t say that! You know that you are my husband—you know you are!”

“I know, my dear madam, quite well that I do not occupy that distinguished position,” I responded very firmly.

“But I can prove it—I can prove it!” she cried, with a futile effort at tears.

“Then I shall be most interested to see this extraordinary fiction proved,” I said. “Perhaps we shall then get down to facts.”

“The facts are as already stated,” Gedge remarked.

“Then let me see proof. There must be a certificate or official entry somewhere if what this lady says is really correct. Where is it?”

“My certificate was stolen when my jewel-case was rifled in the train between Waterloo and Exeter,” she answered. “But, of course, a copy can easily be obtained. Your solicitor in London can get a copy at once from Somerset House.”

“Certificate stolen!” I cried. “A most ingenious excuse. I quite anticipated it, although it, unfortunately, exhibits no originality. Thieves don’t usually steal marriage certificates. They can’t pawn them, you know.”

The woman before me glanced around the room with an air of bewilderment, and I then knew that I had cornered her.

“And where did this extraordinary marriage between us take place, pray?” I inquired, not without some bitter irony.

“At St. Andrew’s, Wells Street.”

“Wells Street, in London?”

“Yes. You surely remember it, don’t you? The church is close by Oxford Circus.”

“I know the church quite well,” I answered. “But I most firmly and distinctly deny ever having been inside it in my life.”

“If you examine the marriage register there you’ll find your signature, together with that of your wife,” Gedge observed, with a confidence that rather surprised me.