SUCCESSFUL NOVELS
By AMBROSE PRATT.
VIGOROUS DAUNT, BILLIONAIRE.
The Newcastle Journal.—"Mr. Ambrose Pratt has with conspicuous success followed up his previous ventures in the world of romance with a tale that for sensation and daring originality goes to the furthermost limit. 'Vigorous Daunt' is an amazing creation."
The Sheffield Telegraph.—"'Vigorous Daunt, Billionaire,' is worthy of a place among the best of its kind. The book is capital reading."
The Scotsman.—"The novel is at once fresh, witty, ingenious, and full of entertainment. In his portrayal of character and the creation of incidents and situations, Mr. Pratt's audacity simply defies criticism; he has given free rein, with literary taste, to a vivacious imagination."
The Dundee Courier.—"If you want innocent excitement read 'Vigorous Daunt.' His wild adventures will make you grasp your chair-arms as you read."
The Hull Weekly News.—"Well written, this book is one that can be well recommended. It is certain to keep the attention and to prove attractive."
JAN DIGBY.
Financial Times.—"The book is written in a clear, lively style, and as the interest is well sustained to the end, it should enhance the author's already considerable reputation."
People's Saturday Journal.—"A tale in no wise lacking in human interest. From the first page to the last the tale grips, and its pleasant humour is well handled and its cynicism will appeal to all who like a breezy tale well told."
The Bristol Times.—"Mr. Ambrose Pratt has given us of the best of his work in this tale. We have not for some time read a novel that interested and held us right through as this has done."
Glasgow Herald.—"The very considerable merit of the story lies in its vivid picture of the resolutely adverse and conflicting forces. Besides illustrating the author's grip of characterization, the story gives fresh evidence of his descriptive vigour and his literary accomplishment."
Northern Whig.—"A tale at once cleverly told and absorbingly interesting throughout. It will appeal to all readers who relish rapid movement and imaginative sweep of a writer who evidently closely observes men and manners."
THE COUNTERSTROKE.
The Daily Telegraph.—"Mr. Pratt is nothing if not startling. In this story he unfolds amazing experiences in such a dauntless and effective manner that he almost succeeds in making such curious and furiously exciting adventures appear to be real."
The Daily Graphic.—"In 'The Counterstroke' the author has surpassed his previous efforts and given us a tale which is daring in its conception and powerful in its narration. From the first page, on which we are introduced to the 'Academy of ex-Ambassadors' and Mr. Perigord, their mysterious master, down to the last, the book never loses its hold upon the reader."
Dundee Advertiser.—"Ambrose Pratt is to be heartily congratulated on the imaginary gifts and the marvellous ingenuity displayed in his book. It is one of absorbing interest, and the reader pursues with almost breathless eagerness the many and varied experiences of Lord Francis Crossingham, the brave hero of the book."
The People's Journal.—"There have been many Nihilist novels written, but few which contain the grip and strength of Mr. Ambrose Pratt's story. His plot is daring to a degree. It is worked out with an ingenuity which cannot but appeal to all those readers who like a cleverly-constructed romance in which the interest is kept up to the end."
The Evening News.—"A novel never to be forgotten."
Belfast Northern Whig.—"A story which keeps the reader absorbed all the time."
The Dublin Daily Express.—"A novel which should be eagerly read, and anyone who reads it will look eagerly for further books from Mr. Pratt's pen."
The Newcastle Chronicle.—"Tremendously exciting."
Southport Visitor.—"Crowded with incident, is full of excitement, and abounds in dramatic and delicate situations."
Leeds Mercury.—"Written in vigorous and dashing style, the story will certainly commend itself to a wide circle of readers."
FIRST PERSON PARAMOUNT
"In another second I had him by the throat." ([Page 189])
FIRST PERSON
PARAMOUNT
BY
AMBROSE PRATT
AUTHOR OF
"VIGOROUS DAUNT: BILLIONAIRE," ETC., ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY J. MACFARLANE
LONDON
WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED
1908
CONTENTS
The House in Curzon Street
The Foundation of a Fortune
The Kingsmere Hospital for Consumptives
The Operation
The Campaign Opens
A Battle of Wits
A Dream of Love
Torture
"The Anglo-American Hotels, Limited"
The House among the Pines
FIRST PERSON PARAMOUNT
I
THE HOUSE IN CURZON STREET
My name is Agar Hume. My mother died when I was two years old. My father was the first violin in a second-rate music hall orchestra at Birmingham. He had once been a gentleman. He taught me French and how to play the flute. Between whiles he treated me like a dog. He wished me to become a member of his orchestra. My tastes, however, inclined to the stage. From early childhood I had possessed an almost perfect talent for mimicry. When I was nineteen years old, there was not an artist I had ever seen whom I could not represent to the life. One morning, about that time, in a fit of drunken rage my father gave me a terrible beating. I was then somewhat undersized—the result of irregular meals and bad food. I could neither retaliate nor defend myself. That night, as soon as my father had set off for the theatre, I ran away from home. I walked to Liverpool, and easily obtained employment at a music hall, where for three years I nightly imitated every actor and person of note whom the Liverpudlians wished to see. They grew tired of me at last and ceased to applaud my turn. I was promptly discharged by the management. Not caring to return to Birmingham, as my father had never forgiven me for deserting him, I made my way to London. I had saved a little money, and I thought that before it was spent I should procure a new engagement. The London market, however, was simply glutted with mimics, and before three months had passed I was penniless and still without a place. I haunted the theatres and employment agencies to no purpose. I was obliged to pawn my wardrobe, and at last a day came when I stood in the Strand owning nothing in the world but the suit of decent black I wore and my make-up box, which I carried in my hand because I had been turned out of my lodging-house that morning. I had not tasted food for four-and-twenty hours. I mentioned the latter fact ten minutes later to the manager of the next employment agency I visited. He had seen me so often that he knew me well, and he sympathized with my misfortune.
"Look here," said he, "if you are so hard up as all that, your only hope is to try your hand at something else. There is no chance for you at the theatres."
"I'm ready to turn boot-black!" I assured him.
"Well, well," said he, "a client of ours inquired yesterday for a valet. If you are really willing to put your pride in your pocket, I shall personally recommend you."
"I have no pride," I answered, "but I have also no experience."
He gave me a pitying smile. "Certainly not, but I believe that you are hungry—you look it!"
I was so hungry indeed that I thanked him warmly, and a few minutes afterwards I was walking as fast as I could towards Piccadilly with a letter in my pocket which bore the following address:—"Sir William Dagmar, Bart., 22a Curzon Street."
It was a small two-storied house, but it looked good, and I raised the knocker tremblingly.
A footman opened the door, to whom I gave my precious letter. He was civil because my clothes were well cut, and because I have the appearance of a gentleman. He invited me to a seat in an anteroom, and went off with my letter. When he returned, he carried his nose in the air, and his bearing was unaffectedly contemptuous.
"Huh!" he sniffed. "Step this way, but wipe your shoes on that mat first, please!"
I obeyed. He led me to a room on the first floor, opened the second door and announced in an oily voice
"The valet—Sir William."
Had I been a man of pride, I should have felt offended. As it was I walked into the room quite undisturbed, and with the most respectful mien I was able to assume.
The door closed behind me. The walls of the room, which was a large one, were piled from floor to ceiling with books, which ran in long straggling tiers, on shelves of carven oak. Books littered the carpet about the bases of the shelves. Rows of books lying one upon another, were heaped upon an immense table that occupied the centre of the room. Dust covered the books. A revolving bookcase crammed with books stood beside the chair upon which Sir William Dagmar sat. The apartment resembled, except for its air of general untidiness, nothing so much as a corner in the British Museum library. It possessed no windows, and was lighted from the roof like a gallery of pictures. I am a keenly observant man by nature, and from a lad I had persistently developed my peculiar faculty for the sake of my profession. At that time it was only necessary for me to glance at a place, person or thing in order to photograph its character and details on my mind. A second after I entered the room I looked at Sir William, but I had already said to myself: "A book-worm!"
So he appeared, and nothing to my surprise. He was of middle size and age. His features were regular and even handsome. His complexion was yellow and bloodless. He possessed a broad rather high forehead, and a large head covered with a mass of stubbly iron-grey hair. His nose was long and straight. His chin was a trifle weak. He was clean shaven. The key to his face was his mouth. It was large and sensitive. It had a trick of screwing itself up at the corners, and sending the upper lip into a curl of sneering querulousness, which I immediately experienced an itch to imitate. His teeth were long, even and very white, but the right incisor was lacking, and this circumstance made his voice sound slightly sibilant. His eyes were grey like my own, but they were set deeper in his head, and the man had twice my weight of years stooping his narrow shoulders.
He regarded me appraisingly. "I need a valet," he began. His voice was querulous like his mouth.
"Yes, sir," said I.
"You are recommended by Mr. Bray. You look young—rather too young. Why did you leave your last place?"
"My employer could not afford to keep me any longer. I was with him for three years, sir."
"Show me your references."
I had expected that demand. "I gave them to Mr. Bray, sir," I answered glibly. "Did he not send them on to you? He said he would enclose them in his letter!"
Sir William shook his head, and a bored look crept into his eyes. "I suppose they are all right," he muttered wearily. "I like your voice; it is soft. If you want to please me never raise it. My head aches very easily."
"I shall remember, sir," I answered in my mildest accents.
"When could you commence your duties?"
"At once, sir."
He raised his eyebrows, then nodded languidly.
"Very well. I shall give you a trial. Your wages will be £5 a month and your keep. Butts, the footman, will show you to your room and explain my ways to you. I shall ring when I require you."
"Thank you, sir."
"By the way, Bray writes me that your name is Agar Hume. I dislike it. Once upon a time I had a friend named Hume. I shall call you Brown."
"Very good, sir."
I backed out of the room, and as I half expected found the footman in the passage. His air of defiant indifference informed me that he had been listening through the keyhole. He was an owlish looking creature, but there were garrulous wrinkles about his eyes and lips which determined me to treat him civilly.
"Sir William has engaged me, Mr. Butts," I said in a low voice. "Will you be good enough to show me to my room. I am to start work at once."
"You won't stay here long," he mumbled as he tip-toed off. "They never do."
I had no intention of staying one day longer than I could help. But I did not confide the fact to Butts. As I followed him my one thought was to get my hands on food as soon as possible. I was desperately hungry. He took me upstairs to an attic room at the back of the house. It was small, but well lighted and clean, also it smelt of lavender. It contained a deal wardrobe with a full length mirror, a truckle bed, a dressing table and a wash stand. There was also a carpet on the floor. I felt pleased, but I was famished.
"Here you hare!" growled Butts.
I put down my make-up box, and faced him.
"I should like to be friends with you, Mr. Butts," I said. "I dare say we shall be cast a good deal in each other's company. What do you say?" I offered him my hand.
He grinned and took it. My apparent ingenuousness had melted him at once. He was not a bad hearted fellow, it seemed.
"All right," he said. "What's yer name?"
"Brown."
"What did yer think of 'im," he jerked his thumb over his shoulder.
"A book-worm, isn't he—but what do you say if we discuss him over a glass of beer and some bread and cheese?"
"Good!" said Butts, and with an alacrity that delighted me, he led the way by the servants' staircase to the pantry on the ground floor. For beer, however, he gave me port wine, and for bread and cheese a cold partridge.
"You seem to live well here," I commented with my mouth full.
"So so!" answered Butts with a sigh. "Tucker's all right—but it's so cursed lonely. Master never goes out, except to meals, and it's very seldom he hever has any company here, honly about once a month."
"Oh! a bit of a hermit, eh?"
"A bloomin' misanthrope—that's what I call him! He 'ates noise like poison. Hif I was to drop a plate 'e'd ring to know what the devil I meant by it?"
"Married?"
"No. He 'ates women wors'n noise, I believe."
"How does he pass his time?"
"Reads all day—half the night too."
"What does he want with a valet, then?"
"You'll soon find out," said Butts with a snort of contempt.
"Please tell me."
Butts wagged his head. "Bar shavin' him you won't 'ave much to do, 'cept give him his medicines at the proper hours. He's a sick man is Sir William Dagmar! The last valet 'e had here, Joe Bates, was a real smart un he was. He'd done for Lord X—— and Mr. Francis, and a lot more tip-toppers. He was just celebrated for fixing hevenin' dress ties; and Sir William always wears ready made ones to save trouble. Bates got the miserables in a week, an' hup an' cleared out before the fortnight was up."
"What is the matter with Sir William?"
"Consumption! He's got it bad!"
"Oh! is he rich?"
"Rich as Croesus."
"Any relatives?"
"A cousin he 'ates wors'n noise and wors'n women. A young chap name o' Sefton Dagmar. He's heir to the title, but I'm not thinkin' he'll get much o' the splosh. Sir William's got it all in Government bonds and he can leave it as he likes."
"What is this Sefton Dagmar like?"
"Not a bad sort. He's always haffable enough to me. He lives at Newhaven, but he calls here once in a while to see how Sir William is. But he hardly ever sees him. Hi! there's master's bell—I'll be back in a minute."
As soon as Butts had disappeared I gave my appetite free rein and a very hearty meal I made. He was absent a quarter of an hour, and on his return he wore a look of annoyance. "Nuisance!" he began. "He's halways worriting about this time. He's goin' to give a dinner party to-morrow night. He gives one every month. But he wants you! Hurry up, he 'ates to be kep waitin'."
I was up the stairs in a twinkle, and again standing before Sir William. He looked bored to death.
"Some gentlemen will dine with me to-morrow night, Brown," he drawled. "Six in all. Their names are on this paper, and their table places marked. I wish you to serve—Butts is a clumsy waiter."
I received the paper with a deferential bow. "Very good, sir!" I murmured.
"You will also see that card tables are arranged in the smoking room. Butts will order the dinner, he knows my ways. But you will take charge of the arrangements. You seem a capable young fellow."
"Thank you, sir!"
"And Brown," he frowned heavily.
"Yes, sir."
"Don't fill my glass too often. I am an invalid, you know, and wine does not agree with me. That is all. I shall not want you again until seven o'clock this evening, when you may dress me for dinner!"
Butts and I studied the paper that Sir William had given me, with the greatest attention. I soon gathered that the six gentlemen who were to dine with my master were not members of the smart set of society such as Butts called "tip-toppers," but men of intellectual attainment, and leaders of thought, if not of fashion. Butts knew them all. "They belong to Sir William's club, the 'Athenian,'" he remarked. "This here Sir Charles Venner who's to take the seat of honour is a cove what cuts up dead dogs and such like while they are alive."
"A vivisectionist?" I asked smiling.
"Don't know what you call 'em," responded Butts. "But he's doctor, and so is Mr. Fulton, who is to sit opposite on master's left. The next chap on the right—Luke Humphreys—is a hauthor, on political economy. Mr. Husband is the chap who wrote that article in the National Review on the weakness of the Navy, which kicked up such a blessed fuss a while since. You must have heard of him?"
"Oh, yes."
"Well, George Cavanagh is an artist and a R.A. Master has one of his pictures in the dining room—you'll see it presently: a naked woman with a chap—'Love and Death' it's called."
I had much ado not to laugh outright. "I've seen prints of it," I muttered. "Who is the last, Mr. Nevil Pardoe, Butts?"
"He's a playwright," answered Butts with a sigh. "They're playin' one of his pieces now at the Kensington Theatre. I went there the other night and got my pocket picked for my trouble." He kicked over a chair as he spoke, as if carried away by temper in remembering his misfortune. The bell rang on instant. "Oh, Lor!" groaned Butts. "I'm in for it again, that man has the ears of a mole!"
He came back a few minutes later looking very sour. "Called me a clod hopper!" he growled in a low voice. "He's got a reptile tongue. But come upstairs, Brown, and I'll show you his bedroom—an' where he keeps his clothes an' things!"
It was an immense apartment, magnificently furnished. But it was very untidy and medicine bottles, some full, some empty, crowded the mantelpiece and dressing tables. The place smelt like a druggist's store. "I'll clear that rubbish away first thing," I declared. But the footman seized my arm as I caught up the first bottle. "He'd go ravin' stark starin' mad if one of them was shifted," he cried. "Don't you touch 'em, lad."
I shrugged my shoulders, and watched Butts ransack our master's wardrobe, he explaining to me the while certain preferences in matters of taste and dress which Sir William had always manifested. It appeared that he detested colours. All his suits were black, also his boots and gloves.
"You seem to know him so well, Butts," I remarked at last, "that I wonder more and more why he has not made you his valet."
"It's my haccent!" sighed Butts. "He can't abear it. Whenever I drop a haitch, in his 'earing, he shrivels up."
During the afternoon I borrowed half a sovereign from Butts, and purchased some fresh linen.
While dressing Sir William Dagmar later in the evening, I only spoke when he addressed me, and then in softest monosyllables. He seemed pleased with my attentions. But then I have frequently noticed that no man is hard to please whose idiosyncrasies are humoured when detected. He gave me a list of his medicines and the hours when they should be administered, after which he departed to dine at a neighbouring restaurant, in which his habit was to take most of his meals in a private room, perfectly alone.
Butts and I dined together in the pantry, and a merry time we spent, until our master's return, when noise was prohibited.
On the morrow the house was more or less in the hands of a bevy of restaurateurs preparing for the dinner. Sir William went out early in the morning, and he was absent all day, but he returned in time for me to dress him, and he appeared to be pleased with our arrangements. The table indeed looked magnificent, for I had taken care to deck it with flowers, and my taste in such matters is excellent. I did not see the guests until dinner was served, and they were all seated at the table. I wore an evening suit of my master's, which on Butts' advice I had borrowed beforehand without the formality of asking permission, having none of my own. Sir William was not an observant man, grace au Dieu! I entered the room noiselessly, and slipped behind my master's chair. The table had been previously spread with oysters. No one spoke, until the shells were emptied; meanwhile I studied the six attentively. They were intelligent, but cold-faced men. Sir Charles Venner had an enormous nose, and very small grey eyes. Dr. Fulton possessed a hare-lip. Mr. Humphreys rejoiced in a squint. George Cavanagh might have stepped from a portrait by Van Dyck, but he had a trick of screwing up the tip of his nose under the influence of excitement, at intervals, as a rabbit does. Mr. Husband put out his tongue, to meet his fork as he ate, he possessed a prodigious chin; and Mr. Nevil Pardoe had watchful heavy lidded eyes. These traits were their key-notes so to speak—their individual and predominant peculiarities, which distinguished them from each other and from other distinguished men. From the rest of the world, they were one and all distinguished by a common pallor of complexion, and a curious cough, which stamped them as consumptives.
As I removed their plates, Sir Charles Venner broke a silence that I at least was beginning to find oppressive. "I believe you will be the first to go after all, Dagmar!" he remarked in French, casting a keen glance at my master. "Pardoe seems picking up. He doesn't cough so much to-night." It was evident that no one suspected me of an acquaintanceship with French.
Sir William shrugged his shoulders. "I am ready," he returned. "But I don't think so. Will you bet, or any one?"
"I'll lay you even money that Pardoe turns up his toes before you, Dagmar!" cut in Mr. Husband.
"Very good," said Sir William. "How much?"
"A hundred!"
"It is a wager!" Sir William took out his pencil and scrawled some figures on his shirt cuff.
"I'll take you too, Husband," cried Mr. Cavanagh.
"And I," chorused Dr. Fulton and Sir Charles.
"No thanks," retorted Mr. Husband drily. "My book is full. How are you feeling yourself, Venner?"
"Nice and poorly, thanks, but with care I'll out-last the lot of you!" He broke out into a fit of coughing as he finished speaking, and the others bending forward, watched him eagerly. Their expressions reminded me of a lot of hungry carnivora eyeing a bone held just beyond their reach.
They drank their soup in silence, but while I served to them the entrée, they conversed again.
"I'm in the hands of a quack," began Nevil Pardoe. "The enterprising devil has agreed to cure me for the sake of an advertisement."
"Oh! How long?"
"Ten days now. Upon honour I feel a little better already."
"Where is he to be found?" demanded my master suddenly.
A roar of laughter drowned the reply. But Sir William looked annoyed. "It's not that I want to live," he explained in tones of anger. "I know I'm doomed, but Cavanagh stands to lose two thousand pounds—if I predecease Pardoe, and as he is only a poor devil of an artist—I'd like to improve his chances!"
"Quite so," sneered Sir Charles. "We all know your affection for Cavanagh. But my dear Dagmar, fair play is a jewel you know. You must kill or cure yourself off your own bat, unless you choose to pair with Pardoe and adopt his treatment altogether. Those are the rules."
"You need not remind me," said my master drily. "By the way, Husband, what was the result of your last examination?"
"Two pounds short of my former weight, but the hole in my remaining lung has not sensibly increased. Jackson gives me solid assurance of at least twelve months."
"Lucky devil!" sighed Mr. Cavanagh. "I'm booked in half the time, though I might drag on for a year or two if I were to try Egypt!"
"Has your limit been changed since our last meeting, Fulton," asked Mr. Pardoe.
"Only by effluxion of the intervening time. I'll feed the worms in just under ten months, unless a cab runs over me, or some other accident occurs."
Sir William raised his wineglass. "Gentlemen," said he, "I drink to the Tubercle Bacillus!"
"Our master!" chorused the others, and every glass was drained.
I quickly refilled all but Sir William's, wondering the while whether I had fallen among an assembly of ghouls, or if I was not the victim of some ghastly joke. The pièce de résistance of the dinner was a dressed calf's head, which Sir William Dagmar carved. Not one of his guests began to eat until all were helped. But when that was done, my master suddenly ordered me to leave the room. Butts regarded me enquiringly as I came out. "Spoke some foreign lingo, didn't they?" he asked.
I nodded.
"They allers do," he went on. "Why, I don't know, for the life o' me. A lot of death's heads I call them."
"They look like consumptives," I suggested.
"Like as not they hare!" he returned. "Look at this muss, Brown! What do you make of it?"
He held up a huge bowl of cream into which a hundred different species of nuts had been grated. "This is what they take for sweets," he said with a shiver. "It tastes 'orrible!"
"Perhaps it is medicine."
"May be. I spose you didn't make out hanything they said, Brown?"
"They spoke in French, Butts," I replied.
He shrugged his shoulders, and we waited for the bell. When it rang I took in the bowl of nut cream.
"Do you understand French, Brown?" demanded my master as soon as the door closed behind me.
"Not a word, sir."
"Very good. Serve the sweets, please."
A murmur of approval went round the table. The gentlemen ate their cream in silence, and washed it down with champagne. I refilled their glasses with the dexterity of an expert waiter, and I was about to resume my old place behind my master's chair, when he fixed me with his eyes, and addressed me suddenly in French. "Brown!" cried he, "leave the room this instant!"
I halted and looked at him with a stupid air. "Beg pardon, sir. Did you speak to me, sir?"
He smiled and answered in English. "Yes, Brown, fill my glass please. I forgot that you do not understand French!"
"You should have tested the fellow beforehand," said Sir Charles Venner in French. "The closer you approach your tomb, Dagmar, the more careless you become!"
"What does it matter," said my master wearily. "Pardoe, kindly present your report!"
Mr. Pardoe got slowly to his feet, and I marvelled to see for the first time, his lean ungainly frame. A bag of skin and bone it was, no more. A frightful fit of coughing preluded his speech. When he had recovered, he put his right foot on a chair, and leaning on his bony knee, began as follows:—
"Gentlemen, this is our seventeenth monthly gathering since the initiation of our order, and we are all, seven of us, still above ground, although we were all condemned as incurable before we first foregathered. During the period I have indicated not one of us has flinched from his bargain, and as your latest secretary, gentlemen, I am pleased to announce that I have duly and regularly received from each member the weekly contribution fixed by our rules. The amount at present standing to my credit in trust for the order is £7,000." He took a small pass-book from his pocket, and handed it to his nearest neighbour, who glanced at its contents and passed it up the table to Sir William. "You will find in that book, gentlemen, a cheque for the amount named marked 'good' by the Bank. I have the honor now to tender you my resignation. Mr. Cavanagh should, I believe, be my successor."
He sat down again, coughing terribly.
Sir William nodded. "It is your turn, Cavanagh," he said quietly. "You will hold office for the current month."
"Very well," replied Mr. Cavanagh, tugging fiercely at his moustache as he spoke. "You fellows can forward your subs, direct to my studio, without waiting for notices. I never write letters."
Sir William arose, holding the cheque above his head. "Whose shall it be this time, friends?" he demanded. "Remember that I have won three times running. Will any give me odds?"
"I," cried Dr. Fulton sharply. "I'll lay you seven to one in hundreds, Dagmar, that you do not win to-night."
"Done! Come, gentlemen."
They trooped out of the room, and I, ablaze with curiosity, made haste to follow them, carrying a silver tray of coffee and liqueurs with which Butts supplied me.
I found them standing around the larger card-table, watching, in perfect silence, Mr. Nevil Pardoe shaking an iron dice-box. Upon the middle of the cloth lay the cheque for £7,000 face upwards, which Mr. Pardoe had given to Sir William. No one heeded me, so I put down the tray and watched them. Presently Mr. Pardoe scattered the dice upon the cloth.
"Five," said Mr. Cavanagh, picking up the dice. "Your turn, Sir Charles."
Sir Charles took up the box, scarcely rattled it, and threw.
"Six," said Mr. Cavanagh. "Dr. Fulton."
The doctor threw eleven; Mr. Husband five; Mr. Humphreys thirteen, and Mr. Cavanagh sixteen.
When the latter's fortune was declared, Dr. Fulton rubbed his hands together. "He! he! he! beat that, Dagmar!" he chuckled.
Sir William took up the box for half a minute, and scattered the pieces without looking at the board.
"Seventeen!" said Mr. Cavanagh in a stifled voice. The poor young man's face was a ghastly sight to witness. He had evidently made sure of winning, and the snatching of the cup from his lips had cost him a month of his fast dwindling life, or his looks belied him. He sank into a chair and began to cough so violently that a bloody foam soon stained the handkerchief he held before his mouth.
Sir William, with a curiously blank smile, took up the cheque and slipped it into his pocket. "I'll trouble you for seven hundred pounds at your leisure, Fulton," he said quietly.
"I'll post it," snapped the doctor. "May the furies seize your luck! That is the fourth time in succession you have fleeced us!"
The others shrugged their shoulders, and sought chairs, which they drew about the board. I served them immediately with coffee. A moment later, each had a pile of bank-notes and gold before him, and at the centre of the table, in a little cup-like depression, lay a heap of sovereigns. The game was draw poker. It was a strange experience for me to watch them. All seven seemed gamblers born. All had death in their faces, and were living only by the grace of their disease. All were men of uncommon intellect. They played with a rigid affectation of indifference, that poorly concealed their underlying eagerness. They only spoke to bet, and the stakes ran high. From the first Sir William Dagmar won. His luck was marvellous. Standing as I did behind his chair, I could see his cards and his opponents' faces. Twice running, four queens were dealt him. Each time he won a considerable sum, and each time six pair of wolfish eyes detested his good fortune. Twice again he drew for a flush, and made it. On the latter occasion, two of his opponents held full hands—Sir Charles Venner and Mr. Cavanagh. The others passed out, but Venner and Cavanagh bet to the limit, a hundred pounds. Sir William called them, and with his customary blandness, scooped the pool. They arose, with muttered curses, to their feet, and became spectators. Half an hour later the game broke up. Sir William had despoiled the last of his guests, and his pockets simply bulged with money.
"It is an omen!" he declared. "I now believe that I shall be the first to go! Fate is fond of such little ironies! Brown," he added in English. "Help these gentlemen to don their cloaks. My friends, good-night."
They replied with the curtest of nods, and I attended them from the house.
While I was undressing my master I racked my brains to try to discern a means of turning to my own advantage what I had seen and heard that night. Sir William seemed worn out, and he got into bed immediately. But as I was about to extinguish the gas, he called me to him. "Well, Brown," said he, "what do you think of my luck?"
"Wonderful, sir!" I replied, "simply wonderful."
He nodded, and a sneer curled his lips. "In this life, Brown," he muttered, "the things we neither need nor desire are oftenest showered upon us. Be good enough to count my winnings."
I obeyed, eyeing him covertly the while. But he had turned his back, and appeared to pay me no heed.
"Seven thousand six hundred and thirteen pounds," I announced at last.
He glanced round at me, a smile upon his face. "I am glad to see that you are an honest man, Brown," he said quietly. "That will do—you may go."
I had been bitterly tempted, but, well he had turned his back upon me. Charmed with the result of my astuteness, I left the room and sought my own. There I occupied myself for a few minutes with my make-up box, and when quite satisfied with my appearance, I tip-toed down stairs to the pantry.
Butts was seated before a dainty meal, and in the act of opening a bottle of champagne.
"Butts!" said I, "when did I give you permission to drink my champagne?"
He sprang to his feet uttering a cry of terror, and the bottle toppled over the table.
"Sir William!" he gasped, "Oh, sir; oh, sir!"
"Look at me!" I commanded.
His eyes almost bulged out of his head. "Is there anything in my appearance?" I demanded, "which might lead you to suppose that I am the sort of man to allow my servants such indulgence."
"Oh, sir. Please forgive me, sir!" he mumbled, shaking like a leaf. "I—I——"
"Dishonest in one thing, then in another," I interrupted sternly. "How much did you steal in providing to-night's dinner? Tell me the truth, or I shall send for the police!"
"Not a penny sir—so—help me! The wine man gave me two pounds commission on the order, that is all, sir—so help me!"
"Hand it over to me at once, and let this be a lesson to you!" I commanded.
Butts, trembling, placed two sovereigns in my outstretched palm.
"Was Brown a partner in your rascality?" I demanded.
"No—no, sir," he stammered. "Oh! oh! please forgive me, sir. I'll never do it again, sir—so help me!" The fellow actually fell on his knees before me, and tears of entreaty rolled down his cheeks.
"I'll forgive you this once!" I returned, and swinging on my heel, I left the pantry.
Ten minutes later Butts poured into my ears a wild tale of how Sir William Dagmar had caught him opening a bottle of champagne, and of the row that they had had. But he told me nothing about the two sovereigns reposing that instant in my pocket.
I went to sleep that night perfectly self-satisfied, and so reconciled with my position as Sir William Dagmar's valet, that I would not have changed places with Dan Leno himself. I had formed a fine plan to enrich myself, and I determined to abandon the stage for ever.
II
THE FOUNDATION OF A FORTUNE
The next month passed very quietly. I got used to Sir William and his ways, and so assiduously attended him that I had the satisfaction to perceive that my services were gradually becoming indispensable to his comfort. I studied him so closely that before long I was able almost to read his thoughts, certainly to anticipate his wishes. I waited upon him like a shadow, as silently, as faithfully. His life was for the most part of fixed habit. At nine o'clock he arose and breakfasted. He then repaired to his library where he read or wrote until noon. I found that he was engaged in compiling a compendium of philosophy, one volume of which had already been published and which had procured for him a great measure of literary fame. His heart was wrapped up in his work. It had more charms to him than the love of woman to an abandoned rake, or dice to a gambler. Once seated there before his manuscript he permitted nothing to interrupt him, except noise—at which he raged like a madman. I have seen him bend murderous glances on Butts—entering by chance with some persistent visitor's pasteboard. I, however, came and went as I pleased with his medicines, which I obliged him to take at the proper hours. For me he had always a smile, impatient truly, but a smile; for I wore shoes of felt, and from careful practice my voice became more softly modulated every day. At noon Sir William went out for a walk in the park, and for lunch at his restaurant. He returned at three and worked steadily until seven, when I dressed him for dinner, for which he also went abroad. From ten o'clock until midnight he worked again, when I put him to bed. Such was our daily round for six days in every week. On the seventh Sir William arose an hour earlier than usual, and immediately after breakfast he left the house and seldom returned until past midnight. What he did or where he went on those occasions I could not by any means discover, for Butts was as ignorant as I, and I dared not ask our master. I determined that one day in the near future I would follow him, but I could not do so immediately, because of Butts. Visitors came to the house at times, but he seldom received any, and if he saw his friends at all it must have been during meals. I directed my leisure hours to the perfection of the plan I had formed for my own aggrandisement. In that behalf I prosecuted diligent inquiries concerning the six gentlemen who were my master's monthly guests. I could learn very little of them it is true, try how I would, and nothing at all of the curious link of agreement which I knew bound them together. But I found that they were all men of private fortune and of great esteem in the world of learning; also that each of them, like my master, was passionately devoted to a particular intellectual hobby horse. Sir Charles Venner, it seemed, had already spent ten years of research in extending the acquaintance of science with the functions of the thyroid gland. Dr. Fulton's ambition was to discover some great destructive to the bacillus of bubonic plague, yet otherwise harmless to the human system. Mr. Humphreys was engaged upon a propagandist mission to teach the masses the blessings of what he called "Purer Socialism." Mr. Cavanagh painted riddles of pictures for the Academy, which his brother Academicians wished, without daring, to reject. Mr. Nevil Pardoe wrote problem plays, and Mr. Husband was a naval expert. Like my master, all were confirmed bachelors who had acquired a reputation for misogyny because they remorselessly eschewed society. Earnest workers and infernal idiots! So I came to regard them the more I heard of them. Indeed, who but a fool would prefer to waste his life in barren study, when he might squire instead such exquisitely beautiful dames as I saw and coveted every time I wandered down Piccadilly or the Row?
The secret of my master's monthly entertainments cost me many an unquiet night of puzzled thought and anxious contemplation. I tried to believe that he and his six fellow students had simply agreed to assemble periodically at Sir William Dagmar's house in order to enjoy a quiet gamble as a recreation from their ordinary and persistent labours, and also to gratify a morbid desire of marking the ravages which their common disease had made in each other since their last meeting. Some instinct, however, forbade me to rest satisfied with an explanation so simple. Why, I asked myself, should they always converse in French, if they had nothing better worthy of concealing? Why, again, should they subscribe weekly to a common fund, the combined fruits of which evidently passed into one man's keeping at the dictation of the dice? That seemed a curious thing, and it was a circumstance all the more puzzling to account for, since they gambled at cards for high stakes as well. Was it just possible that the winner of the cheque was bound, by rule, to apply the money to some esoteric purpose? I felt inclined to suspect it was! But what then? I watched Sir William, the last winner of the cheque, as a cat might a mouse for three weeks—but I discovered nothing. I censored his correspondence with a like result. Every Monday morning he gave me a letter to post to Mr. Cavanagh. I opened those over a bowl of steam, but each only contained a crossed and unnegotiable cheque for £250, with never a line of explanation. As for the rest of his post budget, he received many letters, but he answered none, and his correspondents seemed to be for the most part beggars. The mystery irritated me so much that it began to trouble my sleep. Butts also annoyed me. He developed such a fancy for my company that I was obliged to lock my door whenever I wished to be alone; and I frequently wished to be alone, for my great plan required that I should be able to imitate at will Sir William Dagmar's every look and gesture, his every tone and trick of speech. I foresaw that I should have to get rid of Butts. He was a naturally inquisitive, interfering fellow. But I reflected that when I had got rid of him, it would be necessary for me to perform his duties as well as my own, if I wished to have a clear field for my designs. If Sir William engaged another footman, I should have my work to do all over again. With that end in view, I persuaded Butts to instruct me in the business of ordering and providing the monthly dinners, cleaning silver, and so forth. Pride is not one of my weaknesses, as I have remarked before. I felt able to assume his post in a very few days, just two days indeed before the next monthly dinner was due. That very night I dressed myself up to resemble my master, and marched stealthily downstairs into the pantry about the hour when I knew, from experience, that Butts enjoyed a first night-cap of port wine. There he stood, a bottle before him, glass in hand.
"Butts!" said I, without preliminary, "I was wrong to forgive you for stealing my wine. But I wished to give you a chance—No, don't speak to me, Butts. You have had your chance and wasted it. If you are not out of my house before breakfast hour to-morrow, I shall give you in charge of the police. If, however, you make the least noise in taking your boxes downstairs, I shall prosecute you in any case. Be careful, therefore! Good night, Butts!"
I left him standing like a frozen image, staring after me. Half an hour later he came to my room and poured the whole story into my sympathetic ears. He was almost drunk, and bitterly incensed with my master, also he was terribly afraid of the police. I sincerely commiserated with him, and earned his undying gratitude by forcing into his hand one of the sovereigns of which I had previously despoiled him, and which I had had no occasion to spend, for Butts had put me in the way of replenishing my wardrobe on the credit system. I felt truly sorry for Butts, but he had to go. He stood in my way. My philosophy is embraced in the maxim, "First person paramount." I may be thought inhuman by some of the people who read these memoirs, but I dare swear that none will consider me a fool. The surest way to succeed in life is to kick down as soon as may be the ladders by which one climbs. To do otherwise is to court disaster, for envy is the most powerful passion of the soul, and envy is inevitably excited by contemplation of the successes of our equals or inferiors.
When I had half dressed Sir William on the following morning, I broke my fixed habit of silence.
"If you please, sir," I said very softly, "I have something to inform you which I fancy you should know."
My master looked as much surprised as if he had previously considered me to be a dummy.
"What is it?" he curtly demanded.
"Butts left this morning, sir, soon after daylight, in order to catch a train to the West. His closest living relative is dying, I believe; I persuaded him not to trouble you last night by asking your permission."
"What a cursed nuisance!" cried Sir William with a frown. "I expect guests to dinner here to-morrow night. When will Butts return?"
"I don't think he will come back, sir, he has expectations of inheriting a little fortune; he has, however, given me minute instructions regarding the dinner, and if you will be good enough to confide the matter to my hands, I think I can promise that you'll not be disappointed!"
"You are an invaluable fellow, Brown," said my master in tones of great relief. "Certainly, take charge of everything. I know that I can trust you."
"Thank you, sir," I said demurely. "Will your guests be the same as last time, sir?"
"Yes!" He shrugged his shoulders and slipped his arms into the coat I held out for him.
"And will they be placed at table as before, sir?"
"Exactly. But what about my breakfast this morning, Brown?"
"It will be ready for you in five minutes, sir."
I slipped out of the room and hurried down stairs. I had not studied my master's tastes for nothing. The breakfast I had prepared comprised every dainty that he cared about, and the look of surprise he cast about the table sufficiently rewarded my forethought.
"Why, Brown," said he, as he sat down, "you are a perfect treasure. If Butts does not return I shall feel inclined to double your duties and your pay. Some years ago I had a valet who managed the whole house without assistance."
"I could do that," I assured him quietly. "There is really only work here for one man, sir. Pardon me for saying it, sir, but half my time so far has hung upon my hands, and I detest being idle, sir."
"Well, well, we shall see," he replied. I felt that I had gained my point and I said no more.
I made four pounds in spot cash by way of commission in ordering the dinner. It was really very easy. The restaurateurs were so anxious indeed to secure my custom that I might have made more, but I am not a greedy man, and four sovereigns seemed a lot to me just then.
The dinner passed off much as the first had done. Similar grisly jokes were interchanged in the French tongue, and many bets were concluded between Sir William and his guests. They toasted the tubercle bacillus again, and after I had served the nut cream Mr. Cavanagh handed a cheque for £7,000 to Sir William and then resigned his office in favour of Dr. Fulton, just as Mr. Pardoe had done upon the former occasion. I noticed that Mr. Pardoe looked very ill, frightfully ill, in fact, and his cough was horrible to hear. It is true that all looked worse than they had before, but Mr. Pardoe had outstripped the others, and he was mercilessly rallied on his appearance. The most consequential wager was arranged between Mr. Humphreys and Sir Charles Venner. The latter laid the former six to four in hundreds that Mr. Pardoe would die within the next month. I shall never forget Mr. Pardoe's face as he listened. Its expression was indescribably vexed and full of despair, but the others roared with laughter to see it. As for me, I confess that their laughter sickened me, and I had to slip out of the room in order to recover my nerve. Such monstrous disregard of a fellow creature's manifest anguish inspired me with dismay and something like terror. Were these people men of flesh and blood, I asked myself, or ghouls? But my curiosity was so poignant that I soon returned, and when they trooped out to the card room I followed closely at their heels.
The same formula was observed as upon the first occasion that I had witnessed. The cheque was placed upon the table and all gathered round to watch and throw the dice.
Sir Charles Venner was the first to cast. As he rattled the box he looked about him with a sort of snarling smile. "By all the laws of chance it should be my turn!" he declared. "I have never won the incubus yet!"
He threw eighteen! The others exclaimed, but Mr. Cavanagh did more. He stepped back from the throng and gritting his teeth he threw out his clenched hands with a gesture of savage abandon. "There," said I to myself, "is a man who wishes more passionately to win than the rest, but why?"
"Cavanagh, your turn," said Dr. Fulton.
The artist's face was chalk white as he took up the box. "You tremble!" cried Sir Charles in mocking tones. "You tremble!"
"Bah!" exclaimed Mr. Cavanagh, and he threw.
"Eighteen!" shouted Dr. Fulton.
Sir Charles flushed crimson, and swore beneath his breath. But Mr. Cavanagh uttered a cry of triumph that had yet in it a note of agony. I watched him attentively thenceforward, because it suddenly occurred to me that he would better repay such trouble than the others. His passions were least well controlled of any there. His was the weakest face and most ingenuous. I determined that he should be my key to the mystery I wished to solve. He was a wonderfully handsome person, small, slight, elegant, exquisite. His hair was thick and black, but his moustache and pointed beard were of rich red gold. He had large and singularly soulful eyes, whose colour changed with light from black to amber. His mouth, however, though full and beautifully shaped, betrayed a vacillating and unstable disposition. I judged him for a man to trust, to admire, to like, but not to lean upon. He waited for his turn to throw again in a fever of inquietude. His hands clenched and unclenched. His features spasmodically twitched and the tip of his nose moved up and down with alarming speed. Not any of the others was lucky enough to throw eighteen, so presently Sir Charles Venner took up the dice again. He looked perfectly indifferent, but I saw his eyes, and they were gleaming. He allowed the dice to fall one by one.
"Seven!" announced Dr. Fulton.
Sir Charles bit his lip and handed the box in silence to Mr. Cavanagh.
The latter threw eight. Dropping the box he darted forward and clawed up the cheque, with a strangled, animal-like cry. The others exchanged glances of disgust; all, that is to say, except my master. He shot a look of passionate menace at the artist and called him in a dreadful voice by name.
Mr. Cavanagh stood erect, shaking and ghastly. He seemed convulsed with shame.
"I—I—forgive me, I am not myself to-night," he muttered.
"A fine, a fine," shouted Mr. Humphreys. "He has pleaded his ill-health."
"Ay, ay," cried the others, "a fine!"
"Twenty pounds!" said Sir William Dagmar.
Mr. Cavanagh paid the money to my master without demur. Sir William gave it to Dr. Fulton, and a second later all were seated at the table.
I served them with coffee, and they began to play. My master had no luck that night—he lost about four hundred pounds. Mr. Cavanagh also lost rather heavily, and so did Dr. Fulton. The principal winners were Mr. Pardoe and Sir Charles Venner; Mr. Humphreys left off as he commenced, while Mr. Husband disgustedly declared that he had won a paltry sovereign. As before, on the first stroke of midnight the game broke up and all arose. As before, no farewell greetings were exchanged, but the guests departed after curtly nodding to their host. My master looked more wearied than I had ever seen him. He retired at once to bed, and he was half asleep before he touched the pillow with his head. But I was more than pleased thereat, for the time was ripe to prosecute the first move of my plan. As soon as he dismissed me, I hurried to my room, and in less than twenty minutes I was Sir William Dagmar to the life, save for one tiny circumstance. My master, as I have previously mentioned, possessed a fine set of teeth, but his right incisor was lacking. When I had impersonated him for Butts' benefit, that detail had not troubled me, for Butts was a dull, unobservant creature. I reflected, however, that Mr. Cavanagh might be of a different calibre, and I dared run no risks. Now every tooth in my head is false. Moreover, I was wearing at that moment my stage set, which was so peculiarly constructed that with very little bother and a screw driver I might remove any tooth I pleased. I therefore whipped out the plate from my mouth, and with the aid of a penknife, I presently abstracted my right incisor. A glance in the mirror made me tingle with triumph. I believe that had Sir William seen me at that moment he would have swooned with sheer shock at seeing so perfect a double of himself. Having provided myself with a latch-key, I stole downstairs and abstracted from the hall my master's hat and cloak. A few minutes afterwards I was flying towards Mr. Cavanagh's studio and residence at St. John's Wood, in a hansom, which I chose wisely, for the horse was a speedy brute, and he drew up at Hamilton Crescent in less than half an hour.
In answer to my vigorous tug at the bell, the door opened quickly and a servant's face appeared.
"Be good enough to ask Mr. Cavanagh to let me see him for a moment, my name is Dagmar," I said haughtily, "Sir William Dagmar," I added, for the fellow seemed to hesitate.
He admitted me forthwith. "Mr. Cavanagh has not long come in," he volunteered in sleepy tones. "He is in the studio—step this way, if you please, sir." He yawned in my face and turned about. I followed him down a spacious dimly lighted hall, furnished with almost regal magnificence in the oriental style. He opened a door at the further end, announced me in quiet tones between two yawns and immediately withdrew. Sir William Dagmar would not have put up with such a servant for five minutes. Evidently, thought I, Mr. Cavanagh is not a hard man to please. I entered the studio and shut the door behind me; but to my astonishment, I perceived Mr. Cavanagh, seated in a deep saddle-bag chair beneath an immense arc glow lamp, fast asleep. His chin was sunk upon his chest, his arms hung at his side, and he was breathing stertorously. I glanced about the room. It was rich and commodious, but conventional. Priceless silks and satins covered the walls. Rugs and skins from all parts of the world bestrewed the polished parquet floor. A large crimson curtained easel stood upon a daïs of carven oak beside Mr. Cavanagh's chair, and in a far corner glimmered an ebony framed grand piano. Beyond a few pieces of rather fine statuary, a prodigious chesterfield, and half a dozen antique throne-shaped chairs, the place contained no other furniture of note. I had expected something out of the common rather than rich, and I felt keenly disappointed, for I had seen a dozen such studios pictured in the monthly magazines and fashionable periodicals. I marched straight up to Mr. Cavanagh and placed a heavy hand upon his shoulder. He opened his eyes and looked up at me in a dazed questioning fashion, but having grasped the situation as it was apparent to him, he sprang to his feet with a cry of consternation.
"Dagmar!" he gasped. "You—you—you!" His voice trailed off in an ascending inflection into a whisper of what I considered terrified amazement.
I pointed to the chair he had just quitted, "Sit down!" I commanded sternly.
He obeyed limply; his eyes were dilated, fixed and staring. It was plain that he stood in real fear of me. I determined grimly to discover why.
Standing before him I folded my arms, and bending my brows together I surveyed him, as I had seen Irving in some of his heavy parts confront a character he was destined by his playwright to subdue.
This for two full minutes in a silence like that of the tomb. The wretched man began to shake and shiver.
"For God's sake, Dagmar," he stammered at last. His voice was as hoarse as a raven's croak.
"Cavanagh!" said I, "what are you intending to do with the money given you by the dice to-night?"
To my astonishment he covered his face with his hands and his body began to heave with sobs. Without stirring a muscle I waited for his explanation. I divined that to be my cue. He grew calmer by degrees, and at length with a sheer muscular effort he forced himself to look at me. He shivered as he met my eyes and groaned aloud.
"Woman!" I muttered cuttingly.
"You—hard devil!" he hissed with sudden passion. He started forward, and our glances contended for a moment, but his quailed before mine.
"Answer me," I commanded.
He bit his lips until the blood appeared, and he gripped the sides of his chair with all his energy.
"Answer me," I repeated.
Of a sudden he began to cough. He coughed so violently that the convulsions racked his frame, and at length he sank back in his chair half-fainting, with half closed eyes.
I waited pitiless as fate. "Answer me," I repeated. "Must I wait for ever?"
But the fight had gone out of him. He heaved a sigh, and two salt tears trickled down his cheeks. "You know," he muttered, in a low, heartbroken wail. "You know—you know!"
"Answer me," I thundered. Sir William Dagmar might have known, you see, but I was ignorant.
"I am going to give it to her—to her," he murmured; his eyes were now quite closed and he seemed upon the verge of a collapse. This would never do!
I strode forward and shook him roughly by the shoulder.
"To whom?" I hissed.
"To Marion, Marion Le Mar." He sat up and looked dazedly around. "Oh, do what you please," he cried wildly, as he met my eyes. "What do I care—I have not long to live in any case. A few months more or less, what does it matter? And she—God help her, she needs it—needs it as well you know—you hard, inhuman devil!"
"You are mad!" I hissed. "What claim has that woman upon you?"
"The woman I love?" He sprang to his feet and faced me with just such a look as a tiger might defend his mate. "The woman I should have married, but for the accursed laws of the society which you enticed me into joining!"
"You are a consumptive, a death's head!" I sneered. "A nice man you to marry any woman! Fool that you are, ask yourself would she have married you?"
He gave me a look of almost sublime contempt. "She loves me!" he said, and there was in his bearing a dignity so proudly self-conscious, yet compassionate, that my heart went out to the man; I began to pity him profoundly, ay, and wish to help him. I could hardly understand myself. I had never felt like that for any living creature prior to that instant. But I had work to do, pressing work, and I put my feelings resolutely aside.
"George Cavanagh," said I, "you reproach me with having bound you to a society whose laws forbid your marrying the woman you love. But it seems to me you aspire to break another of its laws in giving her this money. What of that?"
"Fear nothing," he replied in tones of ice. "I shall pay the penalty. When next the society foregathers at your house, Fulton will announce your numbers lessened by one death."
In spite of myself I started. Aha! thought I—I grow hot upon the track.
"You will kill yourself?" I demanded.
He bowed his head, and sat down again. He had once more fallen to trembling. A curious man this, a mixture of strength and weakness. He was past redemption, wedded to the grave by his disease, and yet he shivered at the thought of death. And yet again, he could deliberately resolve to shorten his life.
I frowned down at him. "Cavanagh," said I, "I wish you to be good enough to repeat to me, word for word, the rule you dare to dream of breaking."
"Useless!" he retorted. "I have well considered it. For God's sake leave me, Dagmar, I am done and desperate. I believe you mean me well, but you are killing me."
I saw indeed that he was desperate, and straight away I changed my tactics.
"George," I murmured in a soft and winning voice, "I have come here to-night to save you if I can, not to break you. Listen to me—it has been well said that no rule or law was ever yet devised by human ingenuity which might not be evaded by a criminal with brains enough. You seek to be a criminal. Well, well!" I nodded my head mysteriously. "It is a pity—but I like you, boy—I don't want you to die just yet. There may be a way out, in spite of all. Now—trust me and obey me."
A curious pang altogether strange to my experience shot through my breast, as I watched the glow of hope that flashed into the poor fellow's eyes, and the colour flame into his ashen cheeks.
"Dagmar!" he gasped, "Dagmar!" and he stretched out his shaking hands as a child might do.
"Repeat it word for word!" I commanded. "Come, calm yourself—that is better; now!"
He could hardly articulate at first, but he grew calmer as he proceeded.
"Whosoever shall win!" he began, "shall win the proceeds of one completed month's joint contributions, shall—during—the succeeding month, apply the gold so gifted him by hazard of the dice unto the—the—purpose that—that is—is provided for by rule three. Should he, on the contrary, apply it—to—to—Ah! you know, Dagmar, you know."
"Ay!" said I, "I know what follows—it spells suicide in brief. But, my dear George—there is hope for you in rule three."
"Impossible!" he gasped. "Impossible!"
I smiled. "There is no such word in my vocabulary," I answered firmly. "Now, George, give me all your mind, every atom of your attention, and I shall show you a path from your dilemma—an honourable expedient. Repeat rule three!"
He knitted his brows together, and a curiously strained introspective look came into his eyes.
"You are trying me!" he muttered. "Dagmar—if you dared——"
"Fool!" I interrupted hoarsely—for my suspense was painfully intense. "What object could I serve? Do as I bid you! Do as I bid you!" I pressed his hands more tightly, and with all my strength I strove to subordinate his will to mine. I succeeded.
"I'll trust you!" he muttered in a tense trembling whisper. "I'll trust you, Dagmar. God forgive you if you play me false!"
There was something so infectious in his emotion that I felt myself tremble too, and involuntarily I followed the terrified suspicious glances that he darted about the room.
"Amen!" I cried. "Now Cavanagh—"
But he uttered an exclamation. "Oh! You are hurting me!" he cried.
In my excitement I had forgotten the man's womanish physique, and I had cruelly crushed his hands. Upon such trifling incidents does an ironical malicious fate love to hang tremendous issues! I do not remember if I have previously mentioned the fact that the thumb of Sir William Dagmar's right hand lacks a joint. But such is the case. He had lost it through a gunshot when a lad. Now this circumstance constituted the one flaw in my disguise, for my hands are perfect. In the earlier part of the interview I had been careful to conceal them from view, but startled by Cavanagh's cry of pain and words of reproach I did an unpardonably foolish thing. I permitted myself, for one second, to be victimized by a human impulse. Forgetting everything except that I had hurt him and was sorry, I opened my hands—and looked down at his delicate crumpled fingers from which my brutal grasp had driven all the blood. On the instant I realized my own fatuity and attempted to repair my error. It was, however, too late.
Mr. Cavanagh staggered back a pace. At first he looked dazed, almost stunned, but his face turned livid as I watched it and his eyes filled with flame. They swept over me with glances that scorched, that wished intemperately to harm, to avenge—to kill! Finally they met my eyes, and for a long moment we gazed into each other's souls. His was full of rage, despair and terror—mine of savage self-contempt and baffled hope, and fiery but impotent regret.
"Who are you?" he hissed. "Curse you—who are you?"
Desperate diseases require desperate remedies. Already there floated before my eyes visions of police, of handcuffs, courthouses and gaols. I saw myself a prisoner serving sentence for criminal impersonation. A shudder of horror shot through my frame. Then came a blessed inspiration. "Mr. Cavanagh belongs to a society—" cried my thoughts—"which must have a criminal foundation, since its laws dare impose such a penalty as suicide for their infraction." I set my teeth together with a grim snap and hoarsely retorted to his question. "You wish to know who I am, sir. Well, I shall answer you in part. I am a detective from Scotland Yard!"
The effect of my announcement was completely terrible.
Mr. Cavanagh threw up his hands, and with a deep groaning gasp sank limp and insensible to the floor. His face was so ghastly that I thought him dead. I sprang to his side, and kneeling down pressed my ear to his breast. I could not hear his heart beat. With a moan of agony I stood erect. I was shaking like a man in an ague—and for the first time in my life fear took hold of me, sharp, senseless fear. My mastering wish was to escape quickly and without being seen. Darting to the door, I waited but to open it without sound, and then hurried through the hall, thanking Providence in my heart that I still wore my felt-soled shoes. No one hindered, no one saw me. In another second I was out of the house, and seated in my waiting hansom.
"Marble Arch!" I muttered to the driver, "and quickly man, quickly, if you wish to earn a double fare!"
When I reached the Marble Arch I was still panic-stricken and incapable of coherent thought. I do not wish it to be supposed that I am in any sense a craven. But this was the first great crisis of my career, and, like certain brave soldiers I have read of who had fled from the field during their first battle at the first fire, I was governed by an overwhelming blind impulse impossible to withstand immediately. I believe now that my excited imagination convinced me that I stood in peril of being caught and hanged for murder. At any rate, it seemed terribly necessary to hide myself, and adopt every conceivable expedient to shake all possible pursuers off my trail. Running down Oxford Street, I hailed the first cab I met and drove to London Bridge. There I took another hansom and doubled back to Piccadilly Circus. A third took me to Tottenham Court Road. A clock chimed two as I stepped upon the footpath. I was a good deal calmer then, although still in a wreck of jangling nerves. But I found that I could both control my thoughts and think. I set off at once at a brisk walk towards Holborn, growing more tranquil at every step. I racked my brain for a plan of action. I felt that I must get out of England at once and start life anew in some foreign land. Fear, you see, was still my tyrant. But how to effect my purpose? I had only three pounds in the world, for the cabs had run away with a sovereign. Bitterly I cursed my folly and the panic which had prevented me from rifling Mr. Cavanagh's pockets. They would have yielded me a golden harvest I doubted not! Of a sudden, as I strode along, I caught sight of my reflection in a tailor's window. I stopped short, shocked—horrified. I was still Sir William Dagmar to the life! For two minutes I stood there paralyzed in body and mind, then came a second inspiration. I swung on my heel and glanced about me. The street was almost deserted, but a belated hansom was approaching. I hailed the driver. "200 Harley Street," I cried and sprang inside. I had given the fellow Sir Charles Venner's address. In a very few minutes I was ringing at Sir Charles Venner's bell. After a long wait and three successive summons, the physician himself attired in an eiderdown dressing gown and slippers opened the door.
"What, Dagmar!" he cried, in great astonishment. "Come in. Whatever is the matter?"
"A call of private urgency!" I replied. "The fact is, Venner, you can do me a favour, if you will. A very dear friend of mine must get away from England before morning on a matter of life and death, and he needs more money in cash than I have by me in the house. If you'll be so good as to let me have three hundred pounds immediately, I shall post you a cheque within the next hour."
We were standing confronting each other in the hall beneath a low turned swinging gas jet. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders.
"Will three hundred do?" he asked.
"Yes, thank you!"
"Then excuse me for a moment."
I waited in breathless suspense, but he returned almost immediately, carrying a bag of gold and notes from which he counted three hundred pounds into my hand—you may be sure—into my left hand. I kept my right behind me.
I curtly thanked him, begged him to excuse me, and hastily withdrew. But he stood at the door and watched me enter the cab.
I was therefore obliged to give the cabby Sir William Dagmar's address. "Back to Curzon Street!" I called out. As soon as we had turned the first corner, however, I redirected the driver to Victoria Station, and during the journey I set to work to alter my appearance as much as lay in my power. I tore off my false eyebrows, and with my kerchief I vigorously rubbed the paint from my cheeks and brow. A mirror set in an angle of the hansom showed me, by the light of a match, a blotchy nondescript face that nevertheless could not be mistaken for my master's. Better satisfied, I began to reflect on my position, and to my intense gratification I found that I was no longer the slave of fear. Arrived at the station, I discharged the cab and made inquiries for the trains to the south. I found that I should have to wait a great while. I therefore selected a dark corner and gave myself up to thought. In ten minutes I was wondering what on earth I had ever been afraid of—and calling myself moreover by very nasty names. Even if Mr. Cavanagh were dead, and I began to doubt if my perturbed examination of his body had given me the truth, who could accuse me of his death? Again, if he lived, he would infallibly, on his recovery, still believe me a detective. He had not remotely guessed at my identity. Oh! the fool I had been! But what next? Were I to fly to France, I should give myself away! My master would search my room and discover my make-up box and various disguises. Were I to stay it would probably never enter his mind to suspect me! Ai! Ai! With patience, boldness, and a little luck, I might even yet convert the defeat I had sustained that night into a triumph. I felt the blood bound in my veins. Waiting for no more I sprang to my feet and hurried from the station. Ten minutes later I noiselessly inserted my latch-key into Sir William Dagmar's door, and gently as any burglar stepped into the house. The place was profoundly still. I hung up my master's coat and hat in the hall and crept upstairs. At Sir William's bedroom door I stopped, and stooping pressed my ear to the key-hole. I distinctly heard him breathing. He was a heavy sleeper, and his respirations were deep and somewhat laboured. I passed on with a smile of purest joy. Upon my dressing table stood my make-up box and a profusion of wigs, beards and moustaches. The sight gave me pause. "It is wise to be bold!" I thought, "but not rash. Here is danger. When Mr. Cavanagh recovers and informs Sir William of to-night's happenings—Ah!—and when, moreover, Sir Charles Venner discovers that he has been swindled! What then? It is unlikely, but at the same time just possible that my master's thoughts may turn to me!"
I caught up the wigs and stuffed them into the box which I locked. Where to hide it? Not in my room, nor in the pantry! nor in any place under my control! Search would reveal it there—infallibly. I must then dispose it in some place not likely to be searched. Where then? For a third time in one evening I was suddenly inspired. Seizing the box, I stole downstairs into my master's private study and, using the utmost caution, I bestowed it behind some mounds of books that were covered with many summers' dust. Heaving a deep sigh of relief and satisfaction I returned to my little chamber and leisurely undressed. Three o'clock chimed as I pulled off my boots. I then removed the last traces of my disguise with a lavish application of soap and water, and last of all I screwed back into its plate the tooth I had removed from my false set earlier in the evening in order more perfectly to resemble my master. After that I got into bed. I felt secure and almost happy—was I not a capitalist? Under my pillow reposed three hundred pounds, and never in my life until then had I possessed more than a paltry fraction of that sum. I rejoiced in determining to bank it on the morrow, and I sleepily assured myself that I would make it the seed of a great fortune. I should have been quite happy, save for one thing. I was already beginning to repent the magnanimity or cowardice which had prevented me from asking Sir William Venner for six hundred pounds instead of three. I felt sure he would have given me six as readily as three, and it was a great opportunity wasted. Wasted! It is terribly sad to look back upon wasted opportunities; a heartrending thing indeed. Even now I recall that circumstance with melancholy. I dreamed of death and murders and shadowy unutterable horrors. Soon after dawn I awoke, bathed in perspiration, and shivering in every limb. There was a sound of rushing waters in my ears, and I retained a shuddersome impression of a dark brooding figure bending over me. With a gasp of terror I plunged my hand beneath my pillow, but my three hundred pounds were safe. The delight of that discovery quickly dispelled the phantoms of my tired fancies, and I arose, with a glad heart, to begin the work of the day, by performing the work that I should have done on the previous night—the clearing up from the dinner party.
III
THE KINGSMERE HOSPITAL FOR CONSUMPTIVES
I prepared a particularly tasty breakfast that morning for my master, and I took special pains to please him as I assisted him to dress. He was not a man given to paying compliments, but when he entered the dining-room, and was unable to discover a single trace of last night's feast, he did not dissemble his surprise.
"You have re-established order very quickly—here at all events," he remarked, "Butts always took a day or two to clear up."
"That is not my way," I softly replied. "I could not sleep until I had cleared up everything. If you take the trouble to visit my pantry, sir, I will challenge you to find a stain on floor or wall, or a single speck on plate or cutlery."
"You appear to know your business," he conceded.
"From A to Z, sir," I answered. "Let me persuade you to try this omelette, Sir William. I cooked it myself."
A talent for making omelettes is one of the few accomplishments I had acquired from my father.
My master nodded, and helped himself to a dainty little roll. He tasted it, and actually smacked his lips.
"Excellent!" he observed. "Brown, I hope that Butts will not return, for his own sake. I wish you to take charge of my household henceforth from to-day. Your salary will be eight pounds a month."
"Thank you, sir," I murmured gratefully. "I shall do my best to please you, sir."
The street bell rang as I spoke. I slipped out, and opened the front door. Mr. George Cavanagh waited upon the steps, and on either side of him stood Sir Charles Venner and Dr. Fulton.
Well was it then that over my features I can exercise an admirable control, for at sight of that trio my heart felt like lead, and I shivered in my shoes.
"We must see Sir William Dagmar at once!" said Mr. Cavanagh. "Our business is of the utmost importance."
I bowed and invited him to enter. "Sir William is at breakfast, gentlemen," I muttered as I closed the door. "I shall warn him of your presence at once. In the meanwhile will you kindly step into this ante-room."
"No!" replied Sir Charles. "We shall go directly to him. Don't be alarmed, Brown, we are sufficiently intimate with Sir William to take such a liberty."
I shrugged my shoulders, and deferentially preceded them. Their faces were paste coloured and preternaturally solemn. I was, however, glad to see Mr. Cavanagh; I liked him, and it was a relief to be sure that he was still alive.
Tapping softly at the dining-room door, I opened it and entered, but I had no occasion to utter a word, for the others had trooped in on my heels.
"Excuse this intrusion, Dagmar," began Sir Charles in the French tongue, "you may believe me when I tell you that nothing could have induced me so to invade you except necessity."
My master leaned back in his chair, his mouth agape with astonishment. "Necessity!" he repeated. "What the deuce has happened?"
"Nothing less than a calamity. But first dismiss your servant—we must run no risks, the matter is too serious."
"Brown," said my master in English, "kindly leave the room. I shall ring when I require you."
I bowed and obeyed. I would have cheerfully given my three hundred pounds for an opportunity of listening unseen to their conversation. But my fate was in the balance, and I dared not play the spy. Making a virtue of necessity I retired to the pantry, and tried to eat. But in truth I had no appetite. My nerves were on the jump. I lighted a cigarette, and consumed it in half a dozen puffs. I chewed another to pulp, but smoked the third. The sixth restored me to calm. I felt myself again, and began to polish the glassware. I postured my indifference to myself and experienced an itch to whistle, just to show myself how brave I was. Needless to say, however, I suppressed the inclination. An hour passed so, and then the library bell smartly tingled. So they had left the dining-room. I hurried upstairs, smoothing my expression as I ran. My master met me at the door—a letter in his hand. "I wish you to go out at once, and post this at the nearest post-office—not in a letter box," he commanded. "It is an important missive."
"Certainly, sir!" I replied, and took the letter. He looked at me very keenly. His face was expressionless, but it bore traces of recent agitation. "I shall hurry back," I said.
"Not in a letter box!" he repeated. "Remember, Brown."
I bowed deeply and departed. In half a minute I was out of the house, but not until I had turned the corner did I so much as glance at the "important missive." It was directed to Mr. John Brown, Box 89, G.P.O. The envelope was of thin foreign parchment. I held it up to the sun and smiled. It contained a single sheet of blank paper. My message then was a ruse to withdraw me from the house while they searched my room. I felt so confident, however, that they would never discover my make-up box, that I smiled again, and to save myself the bother of walking, I took a cab. After posting the letter, I entered the first bank I came to, and requested the manager to allow me to make a deposit. He wished a reference, and I was bold enough to refer him to my master. I then paid into the credit of Agar Hume £290, and left the office. Two minutes later, I returned and paid in nine pounds. I thus procured two deposit slips. The one for £290 I tore in very small pieces, which I scattered far and wide; I was not afraid that the bank would swindle me. But the other I treasured carefully. I walked home very leisurely, and I found my master alone in his study. He was pacing the floor, with an abstracted air, his hands clasped tightly behind his back.
"I posted the letter, sir!" I announced.
He stopped in his walk and frowningly regarded me. "Very good, Brown," he replied. "By the way, my man, I want you to be very careful in admitting visitors here again. I don't refer to the three gentlemen who came this morning, they are friends of mine. But strangers."
"Yes, sir."
"Above all, Brown, permit no one, stranger or otherwise, to question you concerning me. If any one attempts to do such a thing, inform me at once!"
"Certainly, sir."
"That will do, you may go."
"I beg your pardon, sir," I muttered hesitatingly, "I hope you will forgive me, sir, but the fact is I have ventured to take a liberty with you this morning, sir."
"Ah!" He started and looked at me with piercing eyes.
"It's this way, sir," I said quickly, "I'm a saving man, sir, and I've always wished to have an account at a real bank, sir, not a post-office. Well, sir, I went into a bank while I was out just now, but they would not let me open an account without a reference. So—so I dared to give them your name, sir. I hope you'll excuse me, sir."
His eyes bored through me like a pair of gimlets. "How much money have you saved?" he demanded.
"Nine pounds, sir. Here is the ticket!" I eagerly handed him the slip.
He glanced at it, and his face cleared immediately.
"That is all right, Brown!" he said, smiling slightly. "If they apply to me, I shall try to satisfy them that they have secured a worthy client. Good luck to you, my man, I am glad to know you are thrifty."
It is a curious thing how tenacious of life one's conscience is. My master looked at me so kindly, that I felt a perfect brute for having so mercilessly deceived him, and I vow that for one fateful moment I was on the point of voicing my compunction.
"You are t—too kind, sir," I began. "I—I'm afraid I——"
But he cut me short with a frown. "That will do, my man," he interrupted in harsh tones. "I am busy, and I wish to be alone."
Had he remained silent, or allowed me to proceed, it is just possible that these memories might never have had occasion to be written. As it was, I hastily backed out of the room, and my conscience yielded up its final spark in the passage.
Anxious to verify my suspicion, I proceeded to my bed-room. It appeared, at first glance, exactly as I had left it, but I am not a casual observer. The door of my wardrobe stood slightly ajar. I had latched it. My ready made evening suit was still lying neatly folded in its drawer, but the waistcoat occupied a different position from that to which I had formerly assigned it. Finally the napped edge of my counterpane was tucked beneath the bed-tick. I had left it hanging, so as to curtain the iron rail. I noted these trifling discrepancies with all the pride of an explorer who has discovered a new territory. There is no experience more gratifying to one's vanity than to have successfully penetrated and prevised another man's intention. I began to believe myself a prodigiously clever fellow, and even yet I dare to boast with reason. I have no deep learning, indeed, my knowledge of the sciences might be scratched with a pin, but I have nevertheless not permitted the talents God has given me to rust, and there is one book with whose contents I am fairly well acquainted, the book of life.
Immediately my master had gone out to lunch, I repaired to his study, and repossessed myself of my make-up box. This I carried to my bed-room, and placed in the wardrobe. I did not, however, intend to leave it there very long. I did not anticipate another search party, it is true, but I thought it thoroughly advisable to have clean hands at home. My idea was (now that I had capital to work upon) to secure a private room somewhere in the neighbourhood, which I might use as a stronghold, and to which I might repair whenever I should desire to disguise myself. During the next few days I took frequent excursions abroad in my leisure hours, and at last I discovered exactly the place I wanted. It was on the top floor of a bachelor apartment house in Bruton Street. The chamber was small, but excellently lighted, and it had this advantage, it was disconnected by an angle of the building from its fellows; moreover its door faced the stairs, and was not overlooked by any other. On that very account, it had long been untenanted, but me it suited perfectly. After a good deal of haggling with the agent, I secured it on lease for £25 a year, and by paying six months' rent in advance, I persuaded him to dispense with references. I furnished it only with things I absolutely needed. A bed-chair, in case I might ever be obliged to sleep there, an oil stove, a thick rug for the floor, a fine three-fly-full-length mirror set upon a revolving stand, a dressing-table, and a large cabinet. I procured a locksmith to fit the door with a practically impregnable latch lock, and with the key upon my chain, I felt as proud as the most bloated land-holder in Westminster. My next move was to purchase a fresh supply of paints, wigs and various other sartorial disguises including a number of new and second-hand character costumes. I have before remarked on the fact that every tooth in my head is false. Now in all the paraphernalia of disguises, there is nothing so important as the item of teeth. Teeth give expression to both mouth and voice. A difference of one twentieth fraction of an inch in their length for instance, will alter the voice beyond hope of recognition, even to a truly practised ear, however fine its sense of perception. As for the lips, they at once become drawn out, and utterly transformed in shape. My last and most tender care, therefore, was bestowed upon my teeth. I visited a dozen different dentists, and procured a dozen sets of varying shapes and sizes, whose only point of resemblance was, that they fitted my mouth. When all was done, my bank account was depleted by a hundred and fifty pounds, but I felt that I had acquired a first-rate stock-in-trade, and I did not repent of the expenditure.
While I was busy with these arrangements, I by no means neglected my master. For a week or two after the disturbing visit paid by Sir Charles Venner, Mr. Cavanagh, and Dr. Fulton, he remained in a preoccupied and gloomy mood, and seemed unable to settle down to work. I listened in my pantry by the hour, to his footsteps restlessly pacing the floor of his library above my head. He also went out more frequently than was his custom, and remained longer away from the house. He was irritable and hard to please. However quietly I entered any room where he was, he heard and anxiously confronted me. He seemed constantly to expect an unwelcome visitor. Sometimes he swore at me for startling him, but he always apologised, and I saw that he was beginning to like me well. I longed for him to trust me, for I was burning with curiosity to know what determination his society had arrived at, regarding his daring impersonator. But that was out of the question, and I was obliged to content myself with guesses. Gradually his alarm passed off, and he resumed his literary labours as of yore. That pleased me, for I felt that his attitude might be relied upon to reflect the feelings of his fellow conspirators. I began to consider what further step I should take in my campaign to elucidate the mystery surrounding that strange brotherhood. After a great deal of reflection, I resolved to shadow Sir William on the next Sunday excursion, for I could not help suspecting that his regular absences from home on that day in each week had something to do with the secret society to which he belonged. With that end in view, on the following Saturday afternoon, I begged my master to allow me a holiday until the Monday morning, pleading by way of excuse a dear friend's sudden illness. He graciously consented, upon my promising to prepare his breakfast beforehand. I left the house about nine o'clock, and repaired to my little stronghold in Bruton Street, where I spent the night. Always an early riser, I arose at dawn, and made a hearty meal of the provisions which I had brought with me. I occupied the next few hours in selecting and perfecting a disguise. On this head, I may here remark, that I have never in my life committed a mistake of attempting to assume a character representative of a class. Such an undertaking requires too great a strain upon the imagination, and however clever one may be, breeds mischievous errors of detail and anachronisms, so to say, which may readily be detected by a keen observer. My method has always been to impersonate, that is, to duplicate as closely as possible, some living person, with whose habits and idiosyncrasies I am familiar. On this occasion I chose for my model an old actor with whom I had once upon a time shared rooms in Birmingham. His name was Francis Leigh. He was a tragedian of a bygone generation, and he had many tricks and mannerisms which I had delighted to imitate. When I had completed my make-up, I am sure that had Francis and I chanced to meet in the street, he would have believed that he looked upon his own counterfeit presentment in a mirror. I wore a frock suit of shabby genteel respectability, a frayed topper, and well-worn shoes. The original character of my mouth was altered by a set of false teeth, much longer than those I ordinarily made use of. Long iron-grey locks fell from my hat rim, to my collar, my nose was attenuated by skilfully-painted hollows, and a pair of heavily frowning false eyebrows cast my eyes into a natural and also a senna-tinted shade. I was quite ready by seven o'clock, but I occupied the hour I had to spare in practising gestures before the mirror. Perfectly satisfied at last, I strolled to Curzon Street, and before many minutes had elapsed I was gratified to perceive Sir William Dagmar emerge from his house, and set off at a brisk walk towards Park Lane. I followed him at a reasonable distance, keeping all my faculties alert. Entering Park Lane, he pursued his way towards Marble Arch, without once looking behind him. He was dressed in a sack suit of plain grey tweed, he wore a soft felt slouch hat, and he carried a stout walking stick, and a dark overcoat. Convinced that he was not in the least mindful of my existence, I gradually diminished the distance between us, until I could distinctly hear his somewhat laboured breathing. When almost at the corner of Oxford Street, he paused suddenly, glanced about him for a moment, as though he had forgotten where he was, and then abruptly crossed the road to the cab stand. He chose a hansom, and ordered the driver to take him to Hampstead Heath by way of Finchley Road and Frognal Rise. I waited until he had disappeared, then followed in a second hansom, which bore me leisurely in his wake. He alighted and dismissed his cab at the gates of the Heath. I did likewise. I had watched him enter the Heath, and proceed in the direction of Jack Straw's Castle, as my vehicle toiled up the hill. For a while I lost sight of him, but hurrying through the gates, I was just in time as I came to White Stone Pond, to perceive him enter the inn. He emerged as I approached, wiping his lips with his handkerchief. Evidently he had partaken of refreshments. Without wasting a glance at me, he turned down Heath Brow, and set off in a north-westerly direction, towards Heath House and Hendon. He descended the hill slowly, as though already fatigued, and often he rested in a musing fashion, looking steadily before him for a minute at a time. I lingered at a great distance, confident of overtaking him when I wished. It was a glorious morning, and the green sparkling Heath was dotted with still and moving figures of men and women, taking advantage of the sunshine, in which I was revelling. Sir William Dagmar looked, however, neither to right nor left. Either he was too bitter-minded to notice and rejoice in the beauties of the landscape, or he had some pressing business to perform, which absorbed his attention. Crossing the valley he began to climb an opposing slope, and at length entered a long straggling thicket. From where I stood, I could see three different paths emerging from the thicket's further side, and as the country thereabouts was rugged and broken up with rocks and trees, I waited for some time in order to discover which path he might choose, lest I should lose him. Ten minutes went by, however, and he did not appear. At the end of another five, I began to fear that he had given me the slip. Hurrying down the hill, I crossed the slowly rising vale and cautiously approached the thicket, by the route that my master had taken. It was less dense than it appeared at a distance, but in places it was thick enough for a man to hide in. A hundred paces brought me to the edge of a small, clear patch of fresh green-sward, furnished with a couple of rustic benches, set fairly close together. Upon the further bench, my master was seated, his face set towards me, in earnest converse with a woman. I almost cried aloud in my surprise. Indeed, I must have in some fashion exclaimed, for he raised his eyes and surveyed me with an intolerant annoyed expression, as though to inform me that I intruded. On instant I pretended to be the worse for liquor. Shambling forward, I sank down upon the first bench, stretched out my feet before me, and permitted my hands to fall limply by my sides. For three or four minutes a dead silence reigned. Conscious of their examination, I kept my face set straight, and frowning heavily. I heard at length the mutter of exchanged whispers, and fearing to drive them away, I began to act. Flinging out my right hand with a fiercely tragic gesture, I declaimed in a hoarse voice, broken with hiccoughs, portions of Hamlet's immortal soliloquy. This gave me opportunity for an occasional glance at my quarry. Sir William was very pale, and he looked weary. His companion was watching me, but her face was veiled. Her figure was lithe, and beautifully shaped, and she was richly dressed. I knew she must be young. Of a sudden I resolved upon a bold stroke. I rose up, and ceasing to declaim, staggered towards them. "Friends!" I cried, "in me you behold a wreck of former greatness, a shattered hulk, cast by unkind fate on a lee shore of fortune. Gaze on this battered form, this shrunken frame, these gaunt and famished limbs, and t—r—r—emble when I tell you that time was, when in happier hours, a shouting populace acclaimed their owner's frame immortal!" I paused, and swaying from side to side the while, I drew from my pocket a tattered kerchief. "Sic transit gloria mundi—Good friends," I wailed, "kind friends, if you have tears prepare to shed them now, for by'r Lady do I swear to ye that nor bite nor sup has passed these parched and fever-smitten lips these four and twenty hours!"
I put up my kerchief to my eyes, and sobbed aloud; but my hard-hearted auditors preserved a stony silence.
Without uncovering my face, I stretched out my left hand. "Charity, friends, charity!" I muttered brokenly.
"No, Marion," said my master's voice. "Cannot you see that the rogue is tipsy?"
"True, but a small gift may induce him to depart." The woman's tones were of dulcet softness, but the accent was distinctly foreign.
"Charity!" I hiccoughed, "Charity!"
"Be off with you, you rascal!" cried my master sharply. I clutched a shilling, and broke into a stream of drunken sobbing thanks. Moving off I collided designedly with the vacant bench, and sprawled upon the ground. There I lay pretending to be senseless. They came up, and turned me over on my back; Sir William Dagmar also kicked my ribs, but I answered all attempts to revive me with snores.
Satisfied apparently with my condition, they presently returned to their seats and began to converse. The crown of my head was presented to their gaze, so I could not see them, but I could hear, and not a word escaped me. "I thought for a moment he was really hurt," said the woman.
"He is half stunned and wholly asleep," replied my master, "nevertheless let us speak in French. We cannot be too careful, Marion."
"Would it not be as well to move on?" asked the woman.
"For you perhaps, my child. You are young and strong, but I am old, and my stroll has tired me out. Let us rest yet a little!"
"As you please, M'sieur."
"You were describing the effects of the picra toxic solution," suggested my master.
"That is true. Alas! M'sieur, we have once more a failure to record—so many failures!" she replied drearily. "The operation is always so perfect, so perfect, and yet always the patients die,—of shock!"
"Ah! Then the woman is dead."
"There will be a funeral to-morrow, M'sieur. The failure is complete. Sir Charles is sad. He does not speak, but he shuts his mouth, so!"
"And Fulton?"
"From the first he had no hope, M'sieur. He declared the drug a poison, a neurotic intoxicant—malignant, deadly. He smiles—so—like a dog, and shrugs his shoulders. But he too said little!"
"What next Marion?" asked my master in a hoarse hollow voice.
"God knows, M'sieur. Soon we shall have exhausted the pharmacopoeia. Providence is very cruel to us, very cruel. We have been vouchsafed one half of the secrets of life, and it seems to me that in seeking the remainder we expand our energies in vain. Meanwhile the hands of us all become more deeply dyed with blood! M'sieur, as God hears me, I sometimes think myself a murderess."
"Hush, Marion!"
"No, M'sieur, I shall speak what is in my heart. I cannot see these wretched creatures die, as day by day they perish, without often asking myself the question—are we justified? I have spoken to Sir Charles and Dr. Fulton, but they freeze me with their cold cold 'Science.' I swear to you, M'sieur, that were it not for George, I would be tempted to break my oath!"
"Foolish child, you must not trifle with this weakness. Crush it, subdue it!"
"Ah! Bah! M'sieur. Bid the breeze cease blowing. A woman's heart is weak!"
"But not the heart of a woman who loves, my child. Remember, this is George's life for which you are striving. And those others, what are they but worthless ones, condemned already past redemption. Granted perhaps that our experiments may hasten the inevitable end. Of what do we deprive them, but a few weeks or days of painful suffering. Ah, no my child, you must not turn back now. Any day the secret may be discovered, the door of life thrown open to us all. And that to you will mean the instant realizing of your dearest dreams. Think of it, Marion, your lover yours to wed, yours for long years of happiness."
The woman answered in a sobbing voice. "George is so miserable, M'sieur."
"Does he yet know?"
"Yes, and he speaks of death, he is filled with despair!"
"You must be firm with him, my child. I have discovered that he is in debt, deeply in debt. For that reason he most despairs, because he fears to leave you poor as well as desolate. I fear that he contemplates some desperate expedition. But you must persuade him to be patient. You know, Marion, that we are all pledged not to assist each other financially. On that account I dare not help your lover, though I care for him as if he were my son. But with you it is different."
"How, M'sieur?"
"Why, my dear—you are not of our order, being a woman, although you are attached to us by ties which may not be unravelled. Take this package, child. It contains a great sum of money. Ten thousand pounds. I shall not ask you to tell me what you do with it. No child, not a word."
"M'sieur, M'sieur!" cried the woman.
I was so amazed, so confounded with astonishment, that to have saved my life I could no longer have kept still. I sat up, and turned my head. The tableau is as clear to my remembrance now as though it had happened yesterday. My master was gazing at the woman, his companion, with a look of paternal tenderness. His countenance was transfigured beyond recognition, for in place of his half saturnine, half querulous aspect, I saw an expression of such holy and unselfish love, that in very wonder I caught my breath. The woman with both hands held the package he had given her, to her breast. Her bosom heaved and fell with deep inarticulate emotion. Moreover she had raised her veil. Never had I seen a face one half so beautiful. Her eyes were large and finely shaped, in colour a passionate red brown. Her nose was straight, and cast in the Grecian mould, with thin quivering curved nostrils. Her mouth a perfect bow. The lips were tremulously parted. I have since seen the expression they wore then, perpetuated on the canvas of Botticelli's most famous Madonna. It was indescribably pathetic, full of both bliss and pain. Her face was pure oval, and so delicately tinted was the skin, that I could have fancied that I looked upon an inspired painting, rather than a mere human woman. Fortunately for me, neither had remarked my movement. As soon as I perceived the indiscretion of which I had been guilty, I turned about again, and bending my forehead to my knees, I groaned aloud. The sound broke the spell. I heard them mutter together, and a moment later their departing footsteps. I waited until all sound had died away, then rose hurriedly to my feet, and cautiously pursued them. Shielded by the trees, I watched them from the edge of the grove take a north-westerly course, that seemed destined to lead them to a point between Child's Hill and Hendon. I followed in a diagonal direction, taking advantage of every obstacle in the landscape to conceal myself from view, for the woman frequently looked back. Quitting the Heath at length, they entered a hedge-fenced road, full of twists and turns, which helped my purpose famously. At the angle of each curve, I waited until they had turned the next, and so on. Soon, however, they abandoned the main road, in favour of a devious maze of lanes. At last I lost them; lingering over long at one bend, when I reached the next they had disappeared. They had been moving so slowly, that I knew very well that they must have entered some house. I retraced my steps, and searched the lane, which had evidently swallowed them up. Only one house had a frontage to that spot. It was a large grey stone edifice, set back about a quarter mile from the road. The grounds were encompassed with a high stone wall, and planted thickly with beeches, chestnuts, and elm trees. I nodded and approached the gates, which stood wide open. Upon one of the posts was fastened a small brass plate, inscribed with the following legend:—"Kingsmere Hospital for Consumptives." I closed one eye slowly, and nodded again. As well as if Sir William Dagmar had informed me, I knew that before me lay the key to the mystery, which it was my self-constituted task to solve. In order to make assurance doubly sure, I passed through the gates, and with the cautious cunning of an Indian, I approached the house. The path was wide and gravelled, but somewhat overgrown with weeds. It often bifurcated to surround a grove of shrubs, or shade trees. The whole garden wore a rank, uncared-for look. The plantations were thick with undergrowth. In certain beds the unpruned rose-bushes had become giants, and had grown into thickets, while in others grasses choked all memory of cultivation. The place was in fact a wilderness. The cover was so excellent, that I was able to insinuate myself within twenty paces of the building, without risk of discovery. Striking aside from the road at that point, I sneaked into a grove of laurels, that commanded a view of two sides of the house. There I cast myself down upon the ground, and although perfectly defended from the keenest observation myself, by peering through the weeds and tree trunks, I could watch both path and house, as well as any spy could wish to do. The building was three storied, but of no great size. Its front was ornamented with a doric porch; otherwise it was plain, square, and unpretentious. I judged it to contain a dozen large rooms at most. Its windows were all shut, and covered with impenetrable green blinds, though the lattices stood open, perhaps for purposes of sanitation. At the rear I could see a line of straggling stone, slate roofed sheds, which seemed to have been recently erected, for their cemented walls had a fresh, unweathered look. I wondered what they contained, for they were too large and numerous to be assigned as stores for ordinary domestic uses. "Morgues perhaps!" I thought, and shuddered. "By chance the dead patient, of whom the woman and my master had conversed, was even now lying in one of them!"
The idea gave me the creeps, for I have a horror of death. I tried to forget the sheds, and resolutely watched the house. A soundless hour went by, and I was feeling hungry, but I did not think of departing. My Waterbury told me it was half-past two o'clock. At three, I began to wonder at the silence of the place. At four, I was suspecting the place to be deserted. The shadows were lengthening to the day's close, and I was chewing my handkerchief to assuage my famished appetite when of a sudden I heard a curious noise. It was hoarse, guttural, chattering, and it seemed to issue from the sheds, which I had fancied to be morgues. I listened with every sense on strain. The noise increased, and subsided at intervals, sometimes it became a perfect babel, and harsh animal-like cries quivered through the din. My curiosity became a plague, but I no longer doubted that the place was tenanted, and I dared not explore. The queer sounds I have attempted to describe, lasted about twenty minutes, and then all was still again. I did not know what to think. Were wild animals confined in those sheds? I was still wondering when I heard footfalls on the gravel path, rapidly approaching the house from the lane. A moment later I saw Sir William Venner striding through the twilight. His face was quite expressionless. He marched up to the porch, and disappeared. As I heard neither knock nor sound of bell, I concluded that he had entered with a latch-key. More than ever determined to remain, I fought my appetite as best I could for the next three hours. By then it was quite dark, and the glow of lamps appeared through the green blinds, covering the windows of the house. Feeling wretchedly stiff and cramped, and cold to my bones, I stood up and rubbed my limbs. When the circulation was restored, I crept out of the covert, where I had lain so long and stealthily approached the line of sheds. Their back walls were of blank stone, and showed me nothing; moreover, although of different size and height, all were attached together, and also to the house. I skirted the rear, and turned the corner. Still no window, but before me stretched an asphalted court-yard. Peering round the second corner, I saw into the hospital's kitchen, through the open back door. It was lighted up, and a comfortable fire burned in a large stove, before which stood a covered spit. A wrinkled old woman sat before a table kneading some pastry with her fingers. An old, grey-bearded man sat in a distant corner, his knees crossed, his arms folded. He was smoking a pipe, and the light glistened on his bald pate. It made rather a pretty picture, that kitchen, with its Darby and Joan interior. I considered it a while, and then glanced along the face of the mysterious sheds, only once more to be baffled. It consisted of a blank wall, pierced only with an occasional padlocked door.
Thoroughly disgusted I returned to the front of the house, and took up a position hard by the trunk of a fine old elm tree, that grew at the first branch of the path. There I waited for another hour, but at last my patience was rewarded. The door suddenly opened, a man came out, and approached me with a quick firm tread. It was too dark to see his face, but I guessed him to be Sir Charles Venner. He passed me so closely, that by stretching out my hand I could have brushed his cloak. He had not taken another ten steps, however, before the house door was again thrown open, and another man issued at a run. "Venner!" he shouted, "Venner!"
The voice was Dr. Fulton's.
"What is it?" demanded Sir Charles, from behind me, coming to an abrupt halt.
"One moment, Venner, where are you?"
"Here!"
Sir Charles Venner returned towards the house, and the two men met at the very angle of the path, within six feet of my nose. I hugged the tree-trunk, and waited, hardly daring to breathe.
"Could you strain a point, Venner, and operate to-morrow night?" asked Dr. Fulton in a pleading voice.
"No, old chap, I can't. You know my rule. I must give myself three days between each, for the sake of my nerve."
"Just for once!"
"Impossible, Fulton. I wonder that you ask me. I have myself to consider as well as the cause. We may succeed or we may not. But I am hanged if I deliberately risk destroying my own health for anything or anyone. I consider that I do quite enough for the cause as it is."
"You do, Venner, you do; but just for once do oblige Marion. She begged me to ask you. You see, the fact is, Cavanagh is cranky."
"Damn Cavanagh!"
"With all my heart, but then you see, there is Marion. What should we do without her?"
"That is all very well. But what should we do without me!"
"The poor girl is half out of her mind worrying about Cavanagh. He has not even had the grace to come here all day, though he promised."
"He is an infernal young cad!"
"I think so too, but it does not mend matters. The girl is crazily in love with him, and she thinks he will kill himself, if we can't do something for him soon."
"Puppy!" The tone was bitterly contemptuous. Sir Charles seemed to hesitate. "Look here, Fulton," he proceeded, "I am sorry for Marion, of course; nevertheless, I cannot help her. Tell her I am out of sorts, or make any other excuse you like. I shall not operate until Tuesday evening. Good-night to you!"
"One second, Venner, She begged me, if you refused her first request, to ask leave for Cavanagh to be present at the operation. You'll have no objection to that I suppose!"
"Oh! curse the fellow," exclaimed Sir Charles very irritably. "He becomes the bane of my existence. If we admit him to the room, we are bound to have a scene. He will either faint or do something equally idiotic. You know very well that the least interruption may play the devil with my knife."
"She has pledged his good behaviour, Venner. Besides, I'll promise to look after him. Come, come, old chap, don't send me back to her quite empty-handed."
"The consequences must be upon your own head then."
"Thank you, Venner, you are a good fellow! Good-night!"
"I am, on the contrary, a soft-hearted fool. Good-night!"
They parted, and I heaved a sigh of relief.
When the silence had resumed itself, I stole through the plantation to the gate, whence, after carefully fixing the locale of the hospital in my mind, I made a speedy return to civilization, and an hour later I was discussing a hearty meal in a private room at Jack Straw's Castle.
IV
THE OPERATION
Tuesday arrived before I knew quite what to do. On that particular morning the postman handed me, amongst a sheaf of bills and circulars, a letter sealed with a peculiar signet, addressed like the others to my master. As it wanted an hour to Sir William's waking time, I had plenty of leisure to investigate its contents. It puzzles me how any people can be foolish enough to imagine that a mere dab of wax, however cunningly impressed, can confer security upon their correspondence. In two minutes the seal was lying safe and uninjured upon my pantry table, and the detached envelope rested confidingly across the mouth of a bowl of boiling water. The letter ran as follows: "My dear Dagmar,—Whoever the rascal really is who imposed upon Cavanagh and myself on a recent memorable evening, he lied in declaring himself an emissary of the police. I have just succeeded in establishing this fact, and take the earliest opportunity of reassuring you, while allowing detailed explanations to await until we meet. I have no longer any doubt but that our adversary is a blackmailer, and I feel sure that before long one or other of us will be approached. I sincerely trust that the fellow will turn out, as you suspected, to be your scapegrace nephew. In that case you, of course, must deal with him, but in any other event I am convinced that our best course will be to prosecute. This will notify you that I intend to propose such a resolution at our next conclave.—Yours sincerely, Charles Venner.
"P.S.—If you can, see Cavanagh to-day. I have been weak enough to permit him to witness the operation. It is possible that you may dissuade him.—C.V."
I carefully resealed the letter, and pressed the envelope with a heated flat-iron in order to remove all traces of my manipulations. All the time I was in a whirl of thought. For three days I had been wondering how I might get a footing inside the hospital and witness the operation which Mr. Cavanagh had extorted a privilege to see. After reading Sir Charles Venner's letter I was more anxious than ever to do so, but the more determined I became the less hopeful seemed my prospects. If Mr. Cavanagh had been a bigger man I believe I should have resorted to some desperate expedient to get him out of the way, so that I might take his place. Unhappily for me, however, he lacked full two inches of my stature, and I dared not attempt to impersonate him under the brilliant light which must necessarily pervade a surgeon's operating-room. I solved the problem that was troubling me, while preparing my master's breakfast, and when I proceeded to his room and handed him his letters, I knew exactly what to do. Sir William Dagmar had a scapegrace nephew—well, his scapegraceship should be my scapegoat. It is true that part of Dr. Venner's letter put the idea into my mind. I do not pretend to pose as a superhumanly clever person, but I am not without talent, and my genius is in my power to twist every accident to my own advantage.
It was my master's custom to dispose of his correspondence while I prepared his bath after awaking him. As I re-entered his bed-chamber to announce his bath ready, I found him standing before the fireplace in his dressing-gown, watching the transmutation of Sir Charles Venner's missive into ashes in the grate.
"Your pardon, sir," I murmured softly. "About a fortnight ago you commanded me to immediately inform you if any stranger should venture to question me concerning your affairs."
He swung round on the instant and faced me, his lids narrowed over his eyes, and his lips compressed in a hard straight line.
"Well!" he grated. "Well!"
"This morning, sir, about two hours ago, a man came here and asked to see you——"
"His name?" he interrupted harshly.
"He would not give his name, sir, and for that reason I took the liberty of refusing to admit him."
"You did well, Brown. What had he to say?"
"He left a message for you, sir. He asked me to tell you that Mr. Sefton Dagmar wished you to meet him alone on the railway station at Newhaven, at nine o'clock to-night precisely." Butts had told me that Sefton Dagmar lived at Newhaven. One of my greatest natural endowments is an almost perfect memory.
My master's eyes glistened and his cheeks flushed. "Oh, indeed!" he muttered. "Anything else, Brown?"
"Y—yes, sir!" I lowered my eyes and tried to look abashed. "I—I—scarcely like to tell you, sir," I stammered; "the messenger was—most—im—most impertinent, sir."
"Never mind, Brown; tell me exactly what he said."
"He declared, sir, that if you did not keep the appointment, you'd have leisure to repent your foolishness in gaol!"
"What!" he thundered, and threatened me with his clenched hands. His face went purple, then pale as death, but his eyes glowed like coals.
"I'm sure I beg your pardon, sir," I muttered, stepping back quickly and affecting to be terrified. "You—you made me tell you, sir."
With a great and manifest effort my master recovered his composure. He even contrived to smile. "I—I—you must forgive me, Brown," he muttered. "I—I could not for a moment conceive that—that my nephew would dare to send me such a message. Mr. Sefton Dagmar is my nephew, Brown, and I am sorry to say that——"
I raised my hand and quickly interrupted him. "Please, don't say any more, sir," I cried in tones of deep respect. "I am your servant, sir, and I hope I know my place. When you know me better, sir, you will find that I am not one of the prying sort, who is always trying to hear more than he should. It's likely that in your anger now you'd be telling me something that you'd afterwards regret, and if you'll forgive me for speaking plainly, sir, I like you too much, and I'm too happy in your service to want to risk losing your confidence and my place together! Such a thing has happened to me before, sir, and without my seeking either."
Sir William Dagmar was the most surprised looking man in the world at that moment. He seemed to have forgotten everything, but the enigma before him, and he stared at me as if he wished to read into my soul.
"Have you no curiosity?" he demanded at last.
"None that I can't control, sir," I replied respectfully.
"Well, I'll be damned!" he muttered. "You are either a superlatively finished hypocrite or a philosopher of sorts. Which is it, Brown?"
I looked into his eyes and sighed. "It's as you please, sir, and I won't pretend not to understand you," I answered mournfully. "But if I did act the hypocrite a bit in anticipating the occasion to speak as I did just now, where's the harm, sir? You are a rich gentleman, Sir William, and you have no idea of what a cursed thing it is for a poor fellow like me to go about looking for employment, and eating up my little bit of savings, sir. Last time I was out of a place it cost me six pounds for board, not to speak of the agent's fee; and I have been hoping that I was settled here for life, sir."
"You may yet be, if you choose, Brown. I am perfectly satisfied with you; and, upon my soul, I believe you are reliable."
"Just so, sir; but you won't continue to believe that long if you trust me with more than a servant should be trusted. It's not in human nature, sir!"
"You mule!" he cried with a gesture of impatience. "But have your way, have your way! Now return to the subject. What more have you to tell me?"
"Very little, sir, except that the man tried to pump me, but I gave him not a whit of satisfaction. Oh, I beg pardon, sir. The postman came up while he was talking. I'd have shut the door on him before, only I saw the postman coming."
"Yes, yes."
"Well, sir, the man saw that letter, and he offered me five pounds for it—cash down, sir."
"Ah! What reply did you give him?"
"I shut the door in his face, sir."
My master nodded. "What sort of a man did he appear to you, Brown. Not exactly a gentleman, I suppose?"
"No, indeed, sir. A low creature and poorly dressed. I was ashamed for the postman to catch us talking, sir."
"Would you recognize him again?"
"Among a thousand; he had a scar across his left cheek and half his left ear gone, sir."
My master nodded, and, turning, walked thoughtfully into the adjoining bath-room. We did not converse upon the matter again, but all that day the poison I had instilled into his mind was working, working. I perceived its effects when he returned to the house somewhat late in the afternoon, doubtless after having paid a visit to Mr. Cavanagh, for he did not go abroad during the forenoon. He looked worried and distrait as I admitted him, and passing me without a word, he went straight up to his bedroom. Ten minutes later his bell rang. I hurried up to find him standing in the hall, clad for the street, a heavy fur-lined overcoat across his arm and a bag in one hand.
"I'll not be home until to-morrow morning," he said curtly, "so you need not wait up for me, Brown; but, please, on no account leave the house."
"Very good, sir."
"Above all, admit no caller. You understand?"
"Yes, sir. Shall I call a cab for you, sir?"
"No." He pointed to the door, I opened it, and he went out. A cab was waiting for him beside the pavement. The clock struck five as I shut the door. At six o'clock I entered my little stronghold in Bruton Street. At eight I descended the stairs, in all things my master's double. In all things I declare advisedly, for warned by experience I wore upon the thumb of my left hand just such a little finger-stall of violet velvet as Sir William Dagmar used in order to conceal his deformity whenever he went abroad. This was secured around my wrist with an elastic band, and I took the precaution to stiffen its interior with a thin ferrule, so that no involuntary working of the thumb joint might betray me. For precaution's sake I carried a revolver, mastering by an effort of will my natural repugnance for such gruesome implements. I proceeded to the Heath by three different hansoms, and a fourth conveyed me to my point of destination, a secluded little tree sheltered spot at an angle of a lane about a hundred yards from the gate of the Kingsmere Hospital for Consumptives. There I alighted, and bidding the driver to await me, I hurried towards the hospital. The gate upon the occasion of my first visit stood open; now it was shut, but latched, not locked. I passed through and sought the house. It was my opinion, from what I had observed, that all welcome visitors to that building possessed master keys to the front door, and were accustomed to enter unceremoniously. Unwilling to attract unnecessary attention to myself, since I had no latch-key, I decided upon a rear attack. I therefore passed down the side of the house and, flanking the sheds, approached the kitchen door. It was shut, the window blinds were closely drawn, but a light gleamed through the crevices. I rapped gently on the panels once, twice, thrice, at short intervals. Upon the third summons I heard the sound of cautiously drawn bolts, and the door opened about four inches on a chain. A wrinkled grey-bearded face peered out at me. "Qui va là? Who is dare?" demanded a cracked voice, its foreign accent in the English fairly rasping the evidently unfamiliar words.
"It is I, my friend, Sir William Dagmar," I replied very softly in French.
The old man immediately released the chain and threw the door wide.
"Enter, Monsieur," he said politely.
I did not require a second invitation, but before attending to me the old man refastened the door. He then turned and looked at me inquiringly. His expression was a curious combination of cunning and intelligence. I saw at once that he was astonished at the manner of my coming, and that he considered that he was entitled to an explanation. "I wish to see Mademoiselle Le Mar, privately and quickly," I muttered in his ear.
"But, Monsieur," he began.
I took a sovereign from my pocket and allowed him to perceive it. He stopped dead in his speech and a greedy look came into his eyes.
"Contrive to let her know that I am here," I said quietly.
He nodded and hobbled out of the kitchen, making so little noise, however, in his exit that I guessed he wore rubber-soled boots. Mine were shod with felt. My object in sending for Marion Le Mar was to obtain a guide over the house, a very important desideratum, since I had never been inside its walls until that moment. I was kept waiting about ten minutes, when the old fellow suddenly reappeared.
"Monsieur! She comes," he muttered, and stretched out a skinny paw for the money.
I let it drop into his hand, and turned at a sound to behold standing in the open doorway the woman I had seen in my master's company last Sunday on the Heath. I had thought her beautiful on that occasion, although her head and all the upper portion of her face were hidden with a veil. Now I caught my breath, and for an instant dreamed I looked upon a spirit from some other world. Her forehead was broad and low; her head, exquisitely shaped, was covered with a glory of gleaming gold which admirably contrasted with the dark and level pencilling of her brows, and the russet flashing of her wonderful red-brown eyes. The one weak spot in my composition is that I am the slave of female beauty wherever found, and yet until that moment I had been wise enough to worship the sex collectively. But standing in the doorway I recognized my fate, and I bowed my head before her.
She advanced and offered me her hand. Only then I perceived that she wore a uniform, a nurse's uniform; but that stiff apparel which makes most women appear unlovely could not deny the expression of her charms.
"Monsieur," she whispered, "you sent for me."
"Yes, my child," I answered in still lower tones. I pressed her hand, then let it fall, though I grieved to release it. "Where is Cavanagh?"
"Upstairs in the operating room with Dr. Fulton. I must be quick, for they are almost ready to begin. Sir Charles has just arrived."
"Ah! so Cavanagh still persists. I had hoped to find it otherwise."
"Alas! Monsieur. I have begged him to go, but he had determined to see all."
"In that case, for your sake, my child, I shall bear him company."
"What—you!"
"Yes, Marion! You have work to do, and he may need my care!"
She gazed at me a moment with a look of passionate gratitude, then of a sudden, stooping low, she caught and kissed my hand. It tingled for days afterwards.
"Heaven bless you, Monsieur!" she cried, her whole face radiant. "Come, then, and we shall go to them. Sir Charles will be enchanted, for he hates that George should be present, since we have no one to spare who might attend him if the poor boy should feel ill or swoon. If that should happen, Monsieur, you will take him away at once; is it not so?"
"Immediately, my child."
It seemed that there no longer existed any reason why we should converse in whispers, and we did not. Indeed, my beautiful conductress filled the journey with gay chatter and musical ripples of laughter. Evidently, thought I, she must love Cavanagh already to distraction, when the small courtesy I have proposed can inspire her with such happy spirits. Absurd as it may appear, I began to feel jealous of Cavanagh already, although Marion had never seen me in my proper person, and was no doubt unaware of my existence. She led me down a spacious hall carpeted with oil cloth, and up a staircase that was not carpeted at all, to the floor above. We passed down a corridor and stopped at the third closed door, from beneath which exuded a long narrow bar of brilliant white light. Her manner while ascending the stairs had gradually calmed, but she was still excited, and she opened the door with a burst of informing words pouring from her lips. Never shall I forget that moment. I glanced in with a face that I flatter myself was expressionless to the perfection of indifference, and I took care to make my lip curl in Sir William Dagmar's characteristic aspect of querulous cynicism. But in truth my every sense was awake and poignantly acquisitive. The apartment was large, full thirty feet square. It contained two operating benches placed within easy distance. The upper slab of one was absent; upon the other lay a squat, bulky figure, strapped into position and covered with a sheet. Above each table depended from the ceiling a perfect swarm of incandescent lamps, each furnished with a powerful reflector which caught and cast the rays of light upon the bench beneath. Tables stood about the walls of the room, at regular intervals, covered with all manner of basins, batteries, knives, forceps, scissors, and other surgical instruments. There was no other furniture except a solitary chair perched near the door, upon which Mr. Cavanagh was seated. Sir Charles Venner and Dr. Fulton, clad in clean white aprons and overalls, with their sleeves rolled up and secured with bands above their bare elbows, stood beside one of the tables steeping some ugly looking knives in a basin of steaming fluid. At the end of the occupied operating bench stood two full blood African negroes. Their appearance was not remarkable, and in the glance I flashed upon them I could discover no point in which they differed from any other negroes I had seen, except that like the surgeons they were both attired in white. Mr. Cavanagh got to his feet as we entered. His countenance was pale and tense. I perceived that he was nervous, but he had evidently wound himself up to the highest pitch of determination of which his nature was capable, and I thought it probable, whatever the others expected, that he would comport himself like a man. Marion addressed her announcement to the surgeons, but her eyes were bent upon her lover, and to him in truth she spoke. She lauded what she called my devotion to the skies, and to my surprise the others appeared to accept me at her valuation.
Sir Charles Venner nodded commendingly. Dr. Fulton said, "It is confoundedly good of you, Dagmar," and Mr. Cavanagh gave me a look of earnest gratitude.
I dismissed the subject with a shoulder shrug, and asked Dr. Fulton to assign me a position. He directed me to stand near Cavanagh until all was ready. I obeyed, and for a space of some minutes I watched Marion, who flitted about the place arranging certain instruments upon the several tables, and wringing dripping sponges dry with antiseptic towels.
When Sir Charles had completed his preparations, he turned to the nearest negro. "Beudant," he said, "you may light the asbestos." He spoke in French.
The fellow bowed and hurried to the fireplace. I saw a great flame rise, which flushed the negro's glistening forehead with a crimson glow.
"Jussieu," said Sir Charles, "it is time!"
The second negro bowed and glided from the room, followed by Dr. Fulton. Sir Charles dipped his hands into a basin of fluid offered him by Marion, and wiped his fingers with a towel. Two minutes later a bell tinkled, "Beudant," said the surgeon.
The negro bowed again like a slave to a lamp, and noiselessly departed. Very soon I heard the dull tramp of slippered feet on the corridor without. The door opened, and the negroes re-entered the room bearing between them a long slab, on which rested the inert figure of a young man. He seemed about twenty-two years of age. His face was extremely pale. His eyes were closed and his mouth was propped wide open with a curious spring wedge. He was nude to the waist, but thence downwards wrapped in an eiderdown shawl. His chest was narrow and his body hideously emaciated. As his chest moved up and down under his deep laboured breathing the ribs projected horribly, leaving dark hollows between. He was strapped securely to the slab and in such a thorough fashion that he could scarcely have moved a muscle howsoever much he had been minded. But he was evidently unconscious, doubtless in an anaesthetised sleep. This curious procession was followed by Dr. Fulton and a tall elderly gentleman similarly apparelled to the surgeons. I had never set eyes on him before. He had an eager, enthusiastic face. His nose was very long; he had high cheek-bones and prominent grey eyes full of a strange fanatical light. I put him down at one glance as a devotee of science. Afterwards I discovered that his name was Vernet, that he was a Frenchman, and resident house-surgeon to the hospital, which in fact he owned.
He was the last to enter, and he closed and locked the door behind him. The negroes advanced to the bench, and having deposited the slab with its senseless burden, they moved over to the other operating table. Already the room had become oppressively hot, and I noticed beads of perspiration stand out on Sir Charles Venner's forehead as he bent to examine his patient with a stethoscope. Dr. Fulton beckoned Cavanagh and myself to approach, and by signs he directed us to stand at the feet of the young man upon whom Sir Charles was about to operate. We were thus quite out of the way of those who had work to do, but we could see everything, and I desired no better vantage post. Dr. Fulton stood behind the patient's head at the other end of the slab, holding in one hand a large rubber face mask, in the other a large stoppered phial, connected by a tube with the mask. Sir Charles Venner stood beside the patient between the two operating benches; and beside him was Dr. Vernet. Marion faced them from across the patient's body. She held in one hand a sponge, in the other a basin.
Sir Charles Venner lost no time in proceeding to business, nor did he give us the least warning of his intention. Casting his stethoscope aside, he seized a small thin-bladed knife and applied its edge with a free sweeping stroke, as an accomplished artist might draw a freehand with a pencil, diagonally across the patient's third and fourth ribs, within an inch of the breast bone. A thin streak of blood followed the cut as quickly as thunder follows lightning. Marion instantly applied her sponge to the wound, and the red line disappeared. The surgeon, without pausing, made another swift incision at right angles to the first along the third rib, and followed this with a third, parallel to the first, some six inches apart. Marion pursued his cuts with her sponge, dipping it each time into her basin, which doubtless contained some powerful astringent drug, for the wounds once touched ceased to bleed. Sir Charles Venner made some further rapid cuts, and with inimitable dexterity he presently raised the flap of flesh and muscle so detached by his knife from the patient's ribs, back across the chest, and secured it there with a dart attached by a string to a bandage passed about the subject's loins. With the speed of magic he applied half a dozen tiny silver spring clips to the dripping flesh, in order to secure the ruptured blood vessels. Dr. Vernet then handed him a tiny razor bladed saw, with which, to my horror, he immediately attacked the bared heaving ribs. The ghastly sight sickened me so much that I closed my eyes, and for some minutes I fought like a tiger with the weakness that threatened to undo me. The world was rocking, rocking, ay, and beginning to swing. I should in the end probably have fainted, but that my companion, Mr. Cavanagh, observing my condition of a sudden pressed his handkerchief to my nostrils. I inhaled an intoxicating, subtle, but most powerful reviving essence. Afterwards I learned that Marion had supplied him with several capsules of nitrate of amyl, of which he had himself already consumed more than one. I felt the blood rush to my head and swell out my cheeks and scalp and skin. The effect was magical. My weakness passed like a black dream, and with restored courage I opened my eyes. There was now a gaping cavity in the patient's breast, through which I could see at work the mysterious machinery of life. The inner flap of the exposed lung had been uplifted and secured aside with a ligature. Below panted and pulsed a crimson and purple-coloured shapeless thing. It fascinated and at the same time terrified me. With a frightful effort I tore my eyes away and looked at Sir Charles. He was screwing a sharp-edged, curved hollow tube to the end of a long and curiously fashioned syringe. This syringe was furnished here and there with golden taps and tubes and tiny force pumps. One tube stretched beyond the operator and ran to the other operating table. I followed it with my eyes and saw that it terminated in a long, thick, hollow needle which reposed in the hands of the negro Beudant. The other negro, Jussieu, knife in hand, bent over an object lying on the slab before him—the squat, bulky figure which had excited my curiosity upon my entering the chamber, and which then had been covered with a sheet. But the sheet had now vanished, and before and exposed to my view lay an enormous ape, a chimpanzee I fancy, which was strapped to the bench exactly in the same fashion and attitude as Sir Charles Venner's patient. The ape's huge hairy breast was disfigured with a square, bloody opening, but I saw that he was alive, for he breathed. The negro Jussieu had evidently performed an operation on all fours with that executed by Sir Charles Venner! The idea almost stunned me. Jussieu was then a great surgeon, although a negro. Next instant I considered the ape, and a panic horror almost overwhelmed me. George Cavanagh was again my saviour. There came a sound of rushing waters to my ears, and the room began to whirl and sway. On the very threshold of oblivion once again the thin and penetrating flavour of the nitrate of amyl restored to me my faculties. I buried my teeth in my lower lip and cursed myself for a pitiful poltroon. I looked up to meet Marion's eyes. She smiled at me so tender an encouragement that I turned cold with shame; that she, a delicate woman, could bear unmoved a sight that stole my manhood, fired my heart with more of rage than wonder, though I wondered too. I fiercely resolved not to be weak again.
Until that moment the silence had been absolute, but of a sudden Sir Charles spoke. "Wait for the systole, Vernet!"
I glanced down and saw Dr. Vernet insert his right hand into the hole in the patient's breast. He was armed with a large, cup-shaped clasp. He fumbled for a moment, and then, nodding his head, he withdrew his hand.
Sir Charles threw Cavanagh a quick scornful glance. "Attend, if you wish to understand," he commanded. "I'll try to be explicit!"
I looked for the first time at Cavanagh. He held a kerchief tightly to his face, but his eyes, which I alone could see, were simply lurid.
"Go on!" he muttered in a muffled voice.
Sir Charles inserted the edged tube attached to the syringe with both hands into the patient's breast.
"This is the right ventricle," he began, speaking in quick, disjointed sentences. "Its function is to force the venous blood through the pulmonary veins to the right auricle; thence to be distributed over the body. I am now—about to—insert—a needle into the right ventricle through the pericardium and walls. How is the pulse, Fulton?"
"Right, sir."
"Are you ready, Beudant, Jussieu?"
"At the word, sir," replied the negroes.
"Good!" exclaimed Sir Charles. "I am too!" He withdrew one hand from the ghastly cavity and seized the syringe pump, which he began to compress. "I am now forcing into our subject's right ventricle the solution of my invention, which is destined to slay the tubercle bacilli. In two seconds the lungs will be suffused with the fluid, and in two minutes we shall have worked the miracle of absolutely destroying every bacillus contained therein. But we shall also have killed the patient's blood. See, it is already decomposing. Mark how white the lung grows. To work, Jussieu!" he cried. "To work!"
"Ready, sir!" cried back the negro. I could not see what he did, but I saw the tube connecting Sir Charles Venner's patient with the opposite table suddenly rigidify as though a rod had been slipped down its hollow interior.
"We are now correcting the solution's destructive action on our subject's blood by forcing into his heart a fresh supply of living arterial blood taken from the left auricle of the ape lying yonder," explained Sir Charles. "Vernet is meanwhile extracting our subject's own decomposed and now useless blood, which is really blood no longer, from the greater artery in his right leg. You see, Cavanagh, we have established a perfect system of drainage. We are supplying good blood and removing bad."
"My God!" cried Cavanagh. "It is white!"
His exclamation referred to Dr. Vernet's work. The French surgeon had made a deep incision in the patient's right thigh, from which gushed a steady fountain of yellow fluid.
"Shout when it colours, Vernet!" commanded Sir Charles.
I looked on, speechless with amazement, I had no longer the least inclination to faint. Indeed, my whole soul was so steeped in wonder, that I forgot I lived. I was merely a rapt acquisitive spirit being initiated into the fundamental mysteries of nature by a great, indeed, a giant intellect. Sir Charles Venner appeared to me then something like a god. His left hand was plunged into the patient's breast, perhaps grasping the heart, that seat of life. His right compressed and controlled the movements of the syringe. His face gleamed like marble in the brilliant white light of the reflectors. It was pale, composed, expressionless, yet full of watchful intelligence and power. He stood upon his feet as steady as a rock. Every moment he uttered some sharp, pregnant direction to one or other of his assistants, which was at once implicitly obeyed. "No greater man has ever lived!" thought I then, and I have not altered my opinion since.
In about three minutes, though the period seemed longer to my electrified imagination, I saw a red light flash into the milky fountain that flowed under Dr. Vernet's guidance.
"Enough!" he cried.
"Good!" exclaimed Sir Charles.
The fountain stopped flowing on instant, for Dr. Vernet had squeezed the artery between a pair of forceps, and with deft fingers he began to bind it with a ligature of golden wire. I glanced from him to Sir Charles. He was now bending closely above the cavity in the subject's breast; the syringe had disappeared. He seemed to be sewing something in the hollow, but I could distinguish nothing for blood. Marion's sponge plied backwards and forwards with the regularity of a machine.
"What are you doing now?" cried a voice beside me, so harsh and strained that I hardly recognized it.
"Sewing up the punctured ventricle," replied Sir Charles with a sort of chuckle. "Some of your friends would be a bit surprised, eh, Cavanagh, if you told them that you saw a doctor patch a man's heart with thread and needle, as a sempstress might a rent gown!"
Cavanagh uttered a hollow groan, and I turned just in time to catch him. He had swooned! I carried him to the other end of the room, where I laid him down upon the floor and hurriedly unfastened his collar and cravat. I was hot with rage, for I wished to witness the end of the operation; but I dared not leave him because of Marion. Even as I knelt to chafe his wrists, I heard Sir Charles address her sharply: "Now then, Marion, attend to me. The young fool is all right. Dagmar will look after him."
I managed to awaken Cavanagh at last with a capsule I found clutched in his hand, but several precious minutes had been wasted, and we returned to the table only in time to see Sir Charles sewing up with golden wire the flap of muscle which had been the door of his more important work.
The operation was over. The negroes were already starting to remove the carcase of the dead ape, whose life blood had been stolen to try and prolong the existence of its fellow creature, man! The other surgeons were grouped about the still living subject, but Sir Charles Venner was no longer in command. Dr. Fulton now held supreme authority. He occupied Venner's former post, and with one hand he fingered the subject's now unfastened wrists, while in the other he grasped a small hypodermic syringe. For some moments a deathly hush obtained, that was but intensified by the slow and stertorous breathing of the patient on the slab.
Dr. Fulton's expression was strained and passionately anxious. It formed a curious contrast to Sir Charles Venner's stolid immobility. The others watched him, not the patient. That is to say, all but Marion. She had slipped an arm about George Cavanagh, and she was tenderly supporting him, oblivious of everything else.
"Well?" asked Sir Charles at last.
I gasped with relief to hear his voice.
"Weaker; curse it!" replied Dr. Fulton.
"Inject?"
"No; last of all. The battery, quick, the glass stool!"
Sir Charles and Dr. Vernet darted off. Sir Charles returned with a glass bench, which he placed upon the floor at Fulton's feet, and upon which Fulton immediately stepped. Dr. Vernet stopped beside a distant table and began to pull out something that looked like a cylinder from the side of a huge wooden box. We heard the rapidly intermittent clicking sound of the working battery at once.
"Stop!" shouted Fulton.
I saw the patient's legs twitch and draw up half way to his stomach, and his arms spasmodically jerk.
This was repeated a dozen times in as many seconds, but gradually the motions ceased.
"Awaken him!" commanded Dr. Fulton.
Sir Charles applied a small phial to the patient's nostrils. After a while the poor fellow turned his head aside as though unconsciously trying to escape a torture. But the phial followed him remorselessly, and presently he moaned. Sir Charles at once removed the spring wedge from his mouth. His teeth clicked, shut, and he uttered a heartrending gurgling groan.
"More battery!" shouted Fulton. "Softly, softly!"
The patient's muscles jerked again, but less violently than before. He tossed and turned his head, trying vainly to escape the phial; thus for a moment, then of a sudden his eyes opened and he gazed about him.
"Stop battery!" cried Dr. Fulton. "Marion, come here!"
The girl left her lover and hurried forward. She stooped over the patient and looked into his eyes. "Ah, my poor fellow!" she murmured soothingly in English, "you are awake at last, I see. It is all over now—all over—nothing more to fear now. Soon you will be well and strong. Stronger than you have ever been in your life before—for you are cured."
He looked up at her with a dull, vacant stare, then uttered a little gasp of pain, for Dr. Fulton had plunged the hypodermic needle in his arm.
The injection's effect was miraculous. Within three minutes his face flushed crimson, his dull eyes brightened, and he actually attempted to sit up. Marion, however, gently pressed him back, but she allowed his head to rest upon her arm.
"I—I—feel fine!" he gasped.
"Hush!" said Marion; "you must not talk. You must be very good and keep still, for that is the only way you can get better."
Sir Charles Venner pressed a glass into her hand.
"Try and drink this," she proceeded. "It is not medicine, only a little brandy and water. Ah! that's right. You'll do splendidly now. There, my boy, shut your eyes, and try to sleep. You'll soon sleep, and you'll wake well and strong."
The poor lad obeyed her, and he seemed to sleep immediately, but Marion's prophecy was not fulfilled. He never opened his eyes again.
For a long hour we watched him, the hearts of us all racked with anxiety. Every few minutes Dr. Fulton injected some drug into his arm, and by degrees the full force of the battery was applied. But all in vain.
"He is dead!" said Dr. Fulton at last, stepping dejectedly from the glass stool. "Turn off the battery, Vernet, please."
"Our nineteenth failure!" observed Sir Charles Venner, folding his arms and looking down at the corpse with a face of stone. "And they have all died of shock. Nothing else."
Mr. Cavanagh started forward. "How can you be sure of that?" he demanded. "How do you know that your accursed solution did not poison him?" The young man's face was the hue of ivory, but his big eyes were ablaze with passion.
Sir Charles Venner gave a wintry smile. "We have proved it beyond doubt," he replied. "We have tested the blood a hundred times."
"Bah!" retorted Cavanagh with a savage sneer. "A fig for your tests. But even if they are reliable, how do you know that he did not bleed to death from the wound you made in his heart?"
"Test again, autopsy. Would you care to see? Look here!" He caught up a knife and approached the corpse. "I'm willing, Cavanagh, to bet you a thousand pounds that not one drop of blood has passed my puncture in the ventricle!"
"Done!"
"Venner," cried Dr. Fulton, "Venner, you are betting on a certainty."
"Then I'll pay the stake I win to any charity you like to name." Sir Charles Venner bent over the body, but even as he poised the knife to cut, Mr. Cavanagh cried out in strangled tones: "Stop! I—I withdraw."
Venner looked up with a cold sneering laugh. "Then pay!" said he.
"No—no! I—I—can't afford it." Mr. Cavanagh put his right hand into his breast pocket. His countenance was perfectly livid. He stepped back a pace and looked at Marion.
"George!" she cried, "what ails you, dear?" She was trembling like a leaf in the wind.
"Life!" he answered, and uttered a laugh that still echoes in my ears.
Next instant he produced a revolver and before our eyes put the muzzle to his mouth. There followed a click, a sharp report, and he fell at our feet a corpse.
There are periods of crisis in human happenings when a cycle of years may be compressed into a few minutes of ordinary time, and such a period was that which succeeded the tragedy I have described. I felt my soul grow cold and hard and more old than all my previous life had made it. I stood like a frozen image gazing at the artist's clay, waiting in an agony of expectation for Marion to scream. But she made no cry, and after a long, most dreadful pause, something impelled me to look at her. She was swaying to a fall and already insensible. I took her in my arms and bore her senseless body from the awful room. At the door, however, I was obliged to halt, for the threshold was occupied with the two negroes and the wrinkled old woman I had seen in the kitchen the first night I had visited the hospital. They were transfixed with horror, and I had to force a passage for my burden. In doing so, involuntarily I turned. Dr. Fulton was kneeling beside Mr. Cavanagh examining his wound. Sir Charles Venner stood at a little distance puffing calmly at a cigarette. I shuddered and passed on. Where I would have gone, Providence alone knows. But the old woman followed me, crying out in a cracked voice in French: "But, M'sieur, why not come this way, to Mademoiselle's own room."
She led me to a prettily furnished little chamber at the very end of the corridor. I laid Marion very gently down upon the bed, and turned to the old woman, who was already fussing at my side with salts and sal volatile.
"Don't touch her!" I commanded sternly. "Let her sleep as long as God wills. She will awake too soon in any case to the misery this night has brought her."
"As Monsieur pleases!" replied the beldame, and with a look of ghoulish delight she hurried off, doubtless to gloat over the corpses in the operating room.
Left alone, I leaned over the unconscious girl, and softly pressed my lips upon her beautiful, but clay cold brow. An angel could not have been the worse for that caress, for in my heart there was no thought save of pitiful and tender reverence.
A moment later I was traversing the passage, on my way to the staircase. Someone called to me as I passed the chamber of death, but I paid no heed, and I descended the steps as quickly as I could. The hall door stood before me. The latch yielded to my touch. Issuing forth I banged it shut, and ran out into the night as though I were pursued with furies. On alighting from my cab at the Marble Arch I glanced at my watch. To my astonishment it pointed barely to midnight. I thought it must have stopped, but the public-houses were still open.
A second cab took me to Bruton Street, whence having changed my attire, I drove to my master's house. As I entered I noted upon the floor at my feet a paste-board visiting card, which had evidently been slipped beneath the door by a disappointed caller. I picked it up and held it to the light, uttering, as I read, a long, low whistle of surprise. It was inscribed with three printed words: "Mr. Sefton Dagmar."
V
THE CAMPAIGN OPENS
That paste-board gave me a shock; it sent a chill, creepy feeling down my spine. It smelt dangerous. I read the name again: "Mr. Sefton Dagmar!" So, while my master was away journeying down to Newhaven to keep the appointment, I had fabricated, with his nephew; by a snarl of chance, his nephew had called at his house in London. Perhaps they had passed each other on the road.
I turned over the card and received a second shock. Across it was scrawled in pencil:—"Will call to-morrow morning at 10. Urgent."
"Curse the luck!" I muttered. "Uncle and nephew will meet and my master will learn that, in spite of his injunction not to leave the house, I disobeyed him. Subsequent discoveries will infallibly re-excite his first and easily smothered distrust of myself!" It seemed to be more than ever important that the secret of the identity of my master's impersonator should be preserved and that not the remotest breath of suspicion should attach to me. Otherwise it would be impossible to improve my fortunes without assuming the naked and hideous character of a blackmailer, the very idea of which was bitterly repugnant to my disposition. I hurried into Sir William Dagmar's library, lit the gas and caught up a time-table. It informed me that the first passenger train from Newhaven would arrive in London on the following morning at 10.15. I made a hasty calculation. It would take Sir William fifteen minutes to drive from the station, and the train might be a little late, trains often are. If Mr. Sefton Dagmar therefore might be relied on to be punctual, I should have at least half an hour wherein to smoothe out the snarl of fate arranged for my undoing. Much might be done in half an hour! Relieved by the reflection, I put out the light and went upstairs to bed. I was very tired, but I cannot truthfully declare that I slept. Whenever my eyes closed I saw horrid visions. Mr. Cavanagh lying on the floor with his skull shattered and blood oozing from the hole in his head; or a white faced man stretched upon a marble slab with a dreadful bloody cavity in his chest; sometimes a hairy chested ape similarly situated! God defend me from such another night! At dawn I arose from my bed of torture and lay for an hour in a plunge bath filled with hot water. A subsequent ice cold shower and a careful toilet restored to my appearance its pristine freshness, but there were many grey hairs about my temples which I had never seen before. I am not a lover of wine, but I dared not face the day without support, and I derived the stimulus I needed from a bottle of my master's champagne. Afterwards I felt better, but I also felt that I should never be able to smile light-heartedly again. The hours that followed I devoted to thoughts of Marion Le Mar. I admitted to myself that I loved her, and deep down in my heart I knew that for her sake and at her bidding I would sacrifice, if need arose, anything, even my life. It was a strange conviction that, to be entertained by a man like me—a man whose motto had ever been—"First person paramount." And yet I speedily recognized that it was as much a part of me as my hand, and might only as easily be combated or parted with. I had no hope of winning her, however, no hope at all, hardly even a wish. She seemed set as far beyond my reach as the stars, and her contemplation inspired me with a realization of my unworthiness and her divinity which was neither humiliating nor discomforting. "For," thought I, "the stars shine upon us all, the noble and the base alike, and who shall say that they discriminate between the ardent looks of worshippers?"
The bell rang and I opened the door for Mr. Sefton Dagmar. In one second I comprehended why Sir William disliked his nephew. My master, for all his faults, was a deep-natured man of large mental mould. Before me stood his absolute antithesis. I saw a small, shallow, smiling, cunning face, that betrayed to the keen observer every emotion of the mind. The features were regular, even handsome, yet puny, and the soul that looked out of his eyes was facile, treacherous and sycophantic. He wore a slight yellow moustache, and his eyebrows were white. He looked too young. I judged him to be twenty-five. He was tall and very slight; he wore a pale brown overcoat and a suit beneath of tasteless checked tweed.
"Mr. Sefton Dagmar?" I asked with deference.
He nodded, looking me swiftly up and down. "Uncle in?" he airily demanded.
"No, sir; but I expect him shortly. Will you step inside?"
"Might as well," he drawled, but he entered with alacrity, and I led the way to the ante-chamber.
"Where is my uncle?" he enquired, as I removed his overcoat.
"I do not know, sir?"
"He got my card, I suppose?"
"Not yet, sir. He has been away."
"All night?"
"Yes sir."
He whistled then faced me with a cunning smile. "You are new," he began. "Where is Butts?"
"He left a month ago."
"What is your name?"
"Brown, sir?"
He nodded, eyeing me as a cat might a mouse. "You look a good sort," he declared presently. "How do you get on with my uncle, Brown?"
I affected to hesitate. "Fairly well, thank you, sir," I replied stammering a little.
"That means damned poorly," he retorted, nodding his head again. "Oh! I know him, Brown; I know him, you need'nt tell me. Why Brown, I'm his only living relative, his sole heir, and how do you think he treats me?"
"I'm sure I don't know, sir?"
"He allows me a paltry three hundred a year, on the condition that I live in Newhaven with a beastly solicitor fellow to whom he made me sign articles!"
"That seems very hard, sir."
"Hard, Brown," he cried, his eyes agleam, "Hard! you call it hard! Why the old monster is a millionaire, and as I told you before I am his only living relative!"
I put on an expression of shocked sympathy. "It is almost incredible!" I gasped.
He gave me a grateful look. "It is true, though!" he declared, "true as gospel. And the only excuse he could rake up for doing it was that I outran the constable a bit at Oxford. He's the meanest old skin-flint in the United Kingdom!"
"I wish I could help you, sir," I murmured in my most reverential manner. "It seems very hard and really wrong, sir, that a nice handsome young gentleman like you, if you'll pardon me for speaking so, sir, to your face, should be tied up in a little village like Newhaven when you might be enjoying yourself and seeing life in London and Paris, sir!"
"As I ought to be," he cried hotly, evidently stirred to anger at my picture of his misfortune. "It's a cursed shame, Brown, a cursed shame!"
"It is indeed, sir. I only wish I could help you, sir."
He gave me a thoughtful look. "You never know," he muttered, "the mouse helped the lion!"
I nearly laughed in his face, but controlling the impulse I said instead—"And with the best of good will, sir!"
"You're a damned good fellow, Brown!" he cried with energy. "And when I am Sir Sefton Dagmar I shall not forget you." His voice sank into a low confidential key. "By the way, Brown, there is a small service you might render me."
"Anything," I answered eagerly, "I'd do anything for you, sir!"
He grinned with pleasure, the callow youth. "It's nothing much," he muttered. "Only I want you to tell me exactly how your master is—the state of his health, I mean. I can never get any satisfaction out of him, and I have a lot of friends who want to know." He sighed and frowned.
Post obit bond-holders—was my reflection.
"I don't think he will live very long, sir," I whispered, looking nervously about me. "At night he coughs something dreadful, sir, and he just lives on medicines."
Mr. Sefton Dagmar's face looked for a moment like that of a happy cherub.
"Do you really think so, Brown?" he cried excitedly.
"I'm sure of it, sir."
"Well, see here, Brown, when he dies, I'll make you my man, if you like!"
"Will you really, sir?" I tried to look extravagantly delighted.
"Yes—and I'll give you twice as much screw as you get now, whatever he gives you. But for that I'll expect you to do some things for me in the meanwhile." He looked me keenly in the eyes.
"Anything at all, sir," I protested.
"Very good. I want you to drop me a line every week to tell me how he is, and if he takes any sudden turn for the worse you may send me a telegram."
"Certainly, sir. Is that all?"
"No!" He glanced anxiously towards the door. "No one can hear us, can they?"
"There's no one in the house, sir, but you and me."
"That's famous; well, Brown, see here, I'm heavily in debt and some of the beggars are pressing me into a corner. That's why I came up to town."
"Yes, sir!"
"And—and—" his face changed colour, "there is a woman too!" he stammered, "an actress!"
"There's always a woman, I should think, where a handsome young gentleman like you, sir, is concerned," I murmured with a sympathetic smile.
His vanity was tickled, but the conceited grin my words had called to his lips quickly faded into a look of anxiety. The matter was manifestly serious.
"They are the devil, Brown," he solemnly assured me. "This one has got me into a dickens own mess, she's as pretty as a picture, Brown, but a perfect brute all the same!"
"Breach of promise, sir?"
He nodded, with a lugubrious frown. "I've been served with a writ," he muttered, "and there's nothing for it but to make a clean breast to the governor!"
"Can I help you in any way, sir?"
"I thought you might have something to suggest as to how I should broach it to him, Brown. When is he in the best humour—morning, afternoon or evening?"
"If you'd take my advice, sir," I replied, "you'll not tell your uncle at all, sir. He can't last long, and I should think that, as you are a lawyer, you ought to be able to stave off the proceedings for a month or so. If you were to confess, he'd be bound to be terribly annoyed, and the odds are he'd do you some injury in his will. He knows he is dying, sir."
Mr. Sefton Dagmar turned quite pale. "I never thought of that!" he cried. "By Jove, so he might. He might cut me off with a shilling. The entail is barred long enough ago."
I was dying to get him out of the house, if only for half an hour. I had hit upon the tail end of a plan.
"It would never do to run such a risk!" I assured him. "And if you'll allow me to guide you, sir, you'll run away at once. He will be here in a minute, and the odds are that he'll come in bad tempered."
"I'll go!" he replied. "But, Brown, I'd like to see him, just to be sure how he is looking."
"Then come back in an hour or two. But be sure, sir, and say nothing about your having been here before. He's a terribly suspicious man, and if he thought that you and I had been conferring, he would dismiss me straight off the reel!"
"Never fear, Brown. I wouldn't have you sacked for the world. You'll be too useful to me here."
"I really believe I shall, sir."
In another moment he had gone, and I watched him walking up the street, through a slit in the blind, until he had disappeared. It was exactly twenty minutes past ten. I hurried to my master's study and, quick as thought, turned the whole place topsy turvy. I ransacked his private drawers and scattered their contents broadcast, I even overturned his heap of reference books. I heard the latch turn in the front door as I descended the stairs.
"Oh, it is you at last, sir. Thank God!" I cried as Sir William Dagmar appeared.
He was looking like a ghost, white and utterly wearied out, and his chin was sunk upon his chest; but my words startled him, and he turned on me with compressed lips, in sudden energy.
"What is the matter, Brown?" he demanded.
"Oh, if you please, sir, I have had a terrible night!" (I poured out the words in a perfect stream.) "Just as I was going to bed, sir, it was about eight o'clock, sir, for I was uncommon tired, the bell rang. I went down to open the door and there you were standing, at least I thought it was you, sir. He looked exactly like you, and he spoke like you, sir, and he called me 'Brown,' sir——"
"Great God!" exclaimed my master, and he fell to trembling like a leaf. "What is that you say, but wait! wait!——"
He staggered into the dining room and clutched a decanter of spirit, which he held up with a shaking hand to his lips. He took a deep draught, and then broke into a frightful fit of coughing. I tended upon him as gently as a woman, and half led, half carried him to a sofa, where I forced him to lie down. But his anxiety was in flames, and as soon as he could he sat up and commanded me to proceed.
"What did this—this double of me say and do?" he gasped. "Tell me quickly!"
"He went straight up stairs, sir. He was there about half an hour, and then your study bell rang. He was standing by your desk with your time-table in his hand, sir. He said to me—'I suppose, Brown, you thought I had gone to Newhaven!'
"'Yes, sir,' said I, and he laughed like anything, just as though he was very much amused about something, and all the while I thought he was you, sir. The only thing was, sir, that he wore a different overcoat, and I kept wondering what you had done with your fur coat, sir. He was searching the time-table, and presently, sir, he looked over at me and he said—'Why, Brown, if I'd gone to Newhaven, I couldn't have got back until ten fifteen to-morrow morning.'
"'Indeed, sir!' says I. And at that he simply roared out laughing. 'Brown,' he cries, 'you'll be the death of me!' I was very much astonished, sir, and I thought that you'd taken leave of your senses, sir, but after you—that is to say—he—after he'd got over his laughing—he looks me in the face and says—says he—'Brown, you fool, 'can't you see I'm not your master! Here look at my thumbs!' And sure enough, sir, he had both his thumbs quite complete, sir, and then I knew he couldn't be you, sir! I was that dumbfounded for a bit, sir, that I was ready to sink through the floor, and all I could do was just gape at his hands. Then of a sudden he whips one of them into his pocket, sir, and he pulled out a pistol, which he clapped to my head. 'Listen to me, Brown!' says he, very quiet like, but in a terrible voice, sir, 'Listen to me, Brown!' says he. 'Your master is in Newhaven by now, and he can't get back till the morning. When he comes tell him from me, that his double will find out to-night all he wants to know, and that he'll hear from me within a week. Tell him, too, that he needn't bother suspecting young Sefton, I could have got the young ass to help me if I'd wanted, but he was too great a fool, and I scorn to have him blamed. Tell Sir William I'm playing a lone hand, and that it rests with him to keep it a lone hand. And now, Brown, you just stay here for the next half hour, while I go through the house, and don't you budge, or as sure as death I'll plug a bullet through your brains!'
"With that, sir, he dragged me into a corner, and put my face to the wall—and—and—I stayed there, sir!"
"What!" thundered my master. "How long?"
I began to whimper. "I—I—take shame to admit I played the coward, sir," I blubbed out.
"But if—if you'd heard him—speak, sir—and seen the look in his eyes—sir—you—you—may be——'"
"Enough!" he interjected very sharply. "I'm not blaming you, my man, I'm asking for information. How long did you stay in the corner where he put you?"
"A long while, sir."
"How soon did he leave the house?"
"I don't know, sir. I seemed to hear noises for hours and hours, sir—and—and—" here I broke down with a really artistic sob. "It's turned me quite grey, sir—all about the temples—and I was brown as brown—last evening, sir!"
Sir William got to his feet and placed a hand upon my shoulder.
"There, there, Brown, compose yourself!" he said in kinder tones. "I can see that you have had a great fright, and you were right to run no risks. But tell me did you send for the police after you discovered that the man had gone?"
"I—no, sir," I stammered. "You told me on no account to leave the house!"
"Brown!" he cried indignantly.
"Well, sir—I—I—I—simply daren't venture outside the house, sir!" I blurted out.
My master frowned and shook his head. "Just as well, perhaps!" he muttered to himself. He added in a louder key. "Well, my man, you have given me much to think over, and I have trouble enough upon my hands already."
"Trouble, sir!" I repeated.
"A dear friend of mine is dead. You know him, Brown, Mr. George Cavanagh. He shot himself last night in his studio!"
It was on the tip of my tongue to scream out—"in his studio!" I was so surprised, but I restrained myself just in time and cried instead:—
"Good heavens! sir, how awful! Why did he do it, sir?"
Sir William shrugged his shoulders. "They say that it was in a fit of despair, because the great picture he was painting was accidentally destroyed by fire. But you may read for yourself, Brown, the morning papers are full of it!"
The papers! I had never even thought to look at one. I had been so preoccupied. My master went on speaking. "I'll go upstairs, Brown, and have a bath," he said, "after which I shall attend the inquest!"
"But your double, sir!" I cried. "Ought not we to tell the police at once about him, sir?"
He shook his head. "No, no, Brown. Better not, better not. He is probably some friend of mine who has been playing a practical joke at my expense. Keep what has happened to yourself, Brown. I do not wish to be laughed at!"
"Very good, sir," I muttered dubiously. "But all the same I don't think he was joking, sir. I'll be bound you'll find he has robbed you. The study is just upside down! I have not tried to put it in order, sir, so that you might see it as he left it!"
Sir William gave me a wan smile. "I keep no valuables in the house, Brown," he replied, "except my manuscripts, and they are worthless to anyone but myself."
Without another word he left the room, and I also hurried out in order to prepare his bath. I did not venture to converse with him again, for he had fallen into one of his impenetrable silent moods which inevitably stirred him to wrath against any interrupter. As soon as I had dressed him he left the house, still steeped in speechless thought. He looked ten years older than he had the previous day, and I felt really sorry to remember the additional cup of fear and horror he would be called upon to drink when he and the others had ascertained the full extent and import of my most recent impersonation.
After he had gone, I snatched open the first paper that came to my hand. It was the Morning Mail. I discovered the black scare headline in a second. Yes, sure enough it related how Mr. Cavanagh's valet had found his master lying on the studio floor a little after midnight, stone dead, with a revolver clutched in his right hand. The man had not heard the shot, but he had been awakened by some noise, and he had thought his master had called out to him. He admitted that he was a heavy sleeper, and he did not remember hearing Mr. Cavanagh enter the house. The artist's great picture upon which he had been working for a year, and which was almost finished, was half destroyed by fire, and it looked as though by accident, for a naked gas jet burned perilously close to the easel. The bullet which had killed Mr. Cavanagh had been found by the police embedded in the plaster of a distant wall, near the ceiling. The writer of the article had ingeniously concluded that the artist on entering his studio and observing the fruit of his ardent labours destroyed beyond repair, had, in the first sharp flush of his despair, committed suicide!
As for me, when I scanned the page and considered one by one the circumstantial dove-tailing details of that ghastly history—I confess that for a moment I doubted my senses' evidence. A little reflection, however, brought me to a realization of the truth, and a greater respect than ever for a certain eminent surgeon—to wit—Sir Charles Venner. I saw in everything I read, his calm, cold-blooded scheming. On my last glimpse he had been languidly smoking a cigarette, which he must have lighted before the breath had quite departed from poor Cavanagh's mutilated corpse. Perhaps nay, undoubtedly, he had even then been planning how to act, and so arrange matters that no scandal might be associated with the name of his accursed hospital.
As clearly as though I had been present I saw him ordering that dreadful funeral; saw him take Cavanagh's latch-key from his chain; saw him direct one of the negroes to prepare a conveyance; saw him lead the negroes carrying the body to a waiting vehicle—and that silent cortége move across the Heath to St. John's Wood. I saw him then open Mr. Cavanagh's door and noiselessly motion the negroes to bear the corpse within. I watched him dispose the body on the floor with scientific calculation as to the proper direction of the bullet, and then climbing upon a chair or perhaps on the negroes' shoulders force the bullet through the curtain into the plaster. Perhaps that noise had awakened Cavanagh's drowsy headed servant! I saw him approach the easel and set fire to the great picture, so as to supply the world with a motive for the suicide—and finally I saw him steal away with his ebony attendants from the house—three dark malignant spirits, veritable caterers of death!
Somehow I shuddered to think of Sir Charles Venner. I felt him to be a foeman more worthy of my steel than all his fellows, and I half wished, half feared to cross swords with him. It is true that already I had twice managed to out-wit him, and he had not dreamed in either case of doubting my assumed identity. But I could not claim much credit in the latter bout, nor feel much satisfaction, since throughout that awful evening Sir Charles had been too occupied to do more than throw a hasty glance in my direction. What would happen, I wondered, in a real fair battle of wits, each of us forewarned of the encounter? I had profound faith in my powers and resources, but I dared not forecast that issue! Twice we had met, and twice I had succeeded. Would we strive again, and who would win on the third and fatal meeting?
Such were the questions I asked myself unceasingly; but I could answer none of them.
It was not until almost four o'clock in the afternoon that my master returned home, and he was accompanied by Sir Charles Venner and Dr. Fulton. I was at once called into the study and put through a rigid cross-examination, by all three, regarding my pretended visitor of the previous evening. But I had expected such an ordeal, and I came through with colours flying. I was much concerned, however, to perceive that Sir William Dagmar looked very ill. He coughed incessantly and so haggard and careworn was his visage that I believed he would presently collapse. My prognostications were justified by the event. Soon after I had been dismissed the bell rang violently, and I hurried upstairs to see the two surgeons carrying my master's unconscious body to the bedroom. I undressed him there and put him to bed; whereupon they carefully examined him, and held a long and anxious consultation over his condition. An hour passed before he recovered from his swoon, but even when he awoke it was not to his proper senses, for he immediately began to babble a stream of meaningless nonsense. The surgeons looking very grave agreed to administer an opiate, and they injected some fluid hypodermically into his arm.
Sir Charles then informed me that they feared a serious attack of meningitis, and he promised to send a trained nurse within an hour to look after the sick man. He left at once, but Dr. Fulton remained until my master went to sleep. The nurse arrived half an hour later, and I prepared one of the spare bed-rooms for her use. She was an angular hard-featured woman named Hargreaves, but she had a soft voice and pleasing manners, and she seemed to know her business. Mr. Sefton Dagmar arrived at about seven o'clock. As soon as he heard that his uncle was ill and likely to die, he went half crazy with joy and insisted upon staying in the house. I did not wish him to at all, but there was nothing for me to do except put up with the infliction, and prepare another bed-room. However, he sent me out soon after dinner to despatch a telegram to Newhaven for his baggage, and for that little involuntary service that he did me, I became reconciled to his presence. The fact was, I needed an excuse to quit the house upon business of my own. Ever since my master had swooned I had been thinking very hard, and it seemed to me that if I wished to improve my fortunes, I must strike at once before all the geese, whom I expected to lay me golden eggs, should die. Having sent Mr. Sefton Dagmar's wire, I took a cab to Cheapside and sought out a cheap stationer's shop. I bought some common note paper and envelopes, and begging the loan of a pen, I scratched in straggling print the following epistle to Sir Charles Venner:—
"Sir—If you will inquire at the Colonnade Hotel for Mr. Seth Halford to-morrow evening at nine o'clock, you will be shown to a room, where you will find Dagmar the second. Kindly bring money and come alone!"
I posted this letter at the G.P.O., and returned to Curzon Street. In the morning Sir William Dagmar was in a high fever and raving deliriously. As I had a houseful to provide for, and am not a lover of trouble, I went early abroad and arranged with a restaurateur to supply all our meals. I then drove in a cab to a post office in the Old Kent Road and sent myself a telegram from my dying mother, which arrived at noon. Sir Charles Venner visited his patient at one, and after he had gone I showed my telegram to Mr. Sefton Dagmar and Nurse Hargreaves, both of whom urged me to attend the summons, assuring me that I was not needed at the house. I tearfully allowed their protestations to prevail, and betook myself to my little stronghold in Bruton Street. There arrived, I spent the rest of that day making myself up to represent the old actor whom I had impersonated on the occasion when I had shadowed my master to the Kingsmere Hospital for Consumptives. For a purpose, to be afterwards explained, I furnished my pockets with a small assortment of wigs, beards and moustaches. When darkness fell I issued forth and rode in a cab to the Colonnade Hotel. The clerk stared at me rather haughtily when I asked for a room in so swell a place, but I satisfied his scruples with half a sovereign, which tip no doubt induced him to believe me an eccentric millionaire. I told him that I expected a visitor, my friend, Sir Charles Venner, the great surgeon, at nine o'clock, and desired him to be shown up at once to my bedroom. After that he was all obsequiousness. I dined at the hotel, and to fortify myself for the fray I drank a small bottle of sparkling burgundy. At a quarter to nine I repaired to my room, which was situated near the first angle of the building on turning from the staircase, on the second floor. It was furnished in the ordinary style very plainly and simply. I quickly stripped the dressing-table of its contents and placed it in the middle floor. I set a chair on either side of the table, and I sat down upon the one that faced the door—which I had left unlatched—I then put on a pair of goggles and waited.
Sir Charles Venner was praiseworthily punctual. Big Ben was still chiming the hour when I heard his tap on the panel.
"Come in!" I cried.
The handle turned and he entered, just pausing on the threshold to tip the waiter who had brought him up.
"My dear old chap!" I exclaimed for the waiter's benefit, "this is good of you, as ever, punctual to the tick!"
He closed the door carefully behind him, and advanced towards the table, pulling off his gloves as he did so. I, on the contrary, had been careful to keep my hands thickly gloved, for I wanted those keen eyes of his to have as few recognizing details as possible to remember, and hands are tell tale things, as I had proved sufficiently already.
"I suppose I may be seated!" he began in steady tones.
I nodded, eating him with my gaze. His countenance was perfectly impassive, but his eyes returned my stare with penetrating interest.
He sat down and calmly crossed his knees. "My time is limited," he declared. "Kindly proceed to business. You sent for me and I am here!"
I bowed my head. "True, Sir Charles," I replied in an assumed voice. "I do not propose to detain you long. The Kingsmere Hospital for Consumptives doubtless claims your care, so I shall be as brief as possible!"
I watched him sharply, but he did not turn a hair nor move a muscle. "Go on!" was all he said.
"Shall we avoid details?" I enquired.
"Unnecessary details, sir. But tell me all you know!"
"Not very much!" I said gently. "Unlawful secret society! We'll call that number one, and bracket with it George Cavanagh's death by suicide." A look of relief crossed his face at the word suicide. I smiled and proceeded. "Number two: Vivisection is unlawful—I fancy—and you might be convicted of murder on my showing. It would be for a jury to determine, for all the great surgeon that you are. I think that is enough Sir Charles!"
"Bah!" said he, and a curious gleam came into his eyes. "You can scandalize and perhaps destroy my practice, that is all. I admit you have me in a chain, but take care not to strain the bond too far. I do not depend upon my practice for a living, and in the cause of science I shall dare to face scandal, if you press me!"
"I am glad to hear that you have a private fortune," I answered quietly. "I have the less compunction in asking you to contribute to another man's support. The world's wealth is distributed very unevenly, Sir Charles. Do you not agree with me?"
For the first time a shade of annoyance crossed his face. "I must decline to discuss abstractions with a blackmailer," he replied in irritated tones. "What is your name, and what is your price?"
"My name for the present is Seth Halford, Sir Charles. I shall not deny that it is liable to frequent change—" I smiled—"but I defy you to detect its transmutations, sir, or follow its vicarious possessor to his lair. As for my price, I have no object in withholding that—It is ten thousand pounds!"
"And is it not subject, like your name, to change?"
"Not by so much as one farthing, Sir Charles."
He nodded and got languidly to his feet. "I came here prepared to sacrifice five hundred," he said quietly. "Two in cash, the balance to-morrow. I am not sure that I am not pleased to save the money."
"Will you save it?" I asked.
"Unless you hedge immediately in your outrageously extravagant demand."
"Unhappily, Sir Charles, that is utterly impossible."
"Then I shall save it!"
"How?"
"By calling in the police and arresting you for attempted blackmail."
I broke into a soft rippling laugh. "So—" I muttered, "you only value your neck at five hundred pounds! Such fine and delicate vertebrae they are too!"
The irony brought some colour to his cheek. "My neck is in no danger," he retorted angrily. "What can you prove against us you fool, except that I performed a wonderful operation in the cause of science, in the ardent hope of saving a man's life, and in the sure trust of benefitting the whole human race?"
"But the man died, doctor, and he was one of nineteen! The coroner will shortly have a harvest, nineteen autopsies, Sir Charles! Think of them! Nineteen autopsies!"
"You fool," he repeated in tones of repressed passion, "if there were even ninety—what of it? But enough of this! choose between five hundred pounds and the lock-up. Choose quickly!"
He turned as he spoke and strode to the door. His hand was already on the latch. In another second the door would have been thrown wide. Perhaps there was a policeman in the passage, I thought it unlikely but still—possible! At all events it was time for me to cease trifling with my adversary.
"You appear, Sir Charles Venner, to have forgotten the matter of Cavanagh's death!" I hissed out. "He killed himself at the hospital, and his body was discovered at the studio!"
"That can be explained!" he retorted; but his hand fell softly from the latch. "We have plenty of witnesses who saw his suicide."
"Suicide!" I sneered. "What of rule three, you one of seven murderers!"
Sir Charles Venner re-crossed the room and quietly resumed his chair. His face was still as expressionless as a mask, but all the lustre had departed from his eyes.
"What do you know of rule three?" he asked in lifeless tones after a long intense pause.
I knew so little that it seemed necessary to lie. "Enough to hang you," I murmured, smiling pleasantly. "I should tell you perhaps, my dear Sir Charles, that I have impersonated Sir William Dagmar more often than I have fingers and toes—during the past twelve months. Ha! you start!" I laughed wickedly. "Did you really permit yourself to dream that you have guessed the full extent of my depredations on your order—from your one or two chance and predestined discoveries. Oh! oh! Ha! ha! This is really too good!"
He bit his lips and eyed me sternly. "I shall need better proof than your word," he said.
I nodded, got to my feet and strode to the door. I threw it open and with an elaborate bow pointed to the passage.
"You shall have it," I cried, "but only in the police court!"
"Bluff!" he sneered. "Bluff!" He did not move from his chair.
"Oh!" said I, "you choose to pay yourself a compliment! So you think I would follow your example of a moment since? But you are wrong!" I walked to the electric bell and pressed the button.
Sir Charles Venner's impassivity disappeared like magic. His face turned scarlet and he sprang instantly afoot.
"Curse you!" he grated out, "what would you do?"
"Sir, our interview is at an end. My servant will show you to the street!"
"The sum you ask is utterly beyond our means!"
I shrugged my shoulders.
"Five thousand!" he hissed.
I yawned.
"Seven then, though it will ruin us!" he cried distractedly.
I took out a cigarette and struck a light. He watched me expel five puffs of vapour from my mouth, but I did not so much as glance at him. Then a servant appeared in the doorway.
"You rang, sir?" he enquired.
"Yes!" I looked at the fellow approvingly. He was a much stouter man and perhaps an inch taller than I, and he had large feet. He was attired in the hotel uniform. He wore a dragoon's moustache, and he looked like an old soldier. "I wish you to be good enough to show my dear friend, Sir Charles Venner, to the street." I turned to Sir Charles and immediately perceived that my adversary had become my victim.
"When and where shall we meet again?" he muttered hoarsely.
"Ten?" said I. He was grey, grey to his lips. His eyes shone like stars.
"Yes, ten!" he replied.
"I'll drop you a line!" I said with a smile. "But how careless of me, I almost forget my hospital subscription list. How much may I put you down for? You know the cause is a deserving one. Shall we say two hundred pounds?"
"Oh, I suppose so," he said.
"Cash, old chap? Or will you send me a cheque?" I frowned as our eyes met, and he read my meaning.
"I brought the money with me," he replied. "I may as well hand it over to you now. I shall thereby save a postage stamp!" He threw a bundle of notes upon the table.
I smiled again and looking steadily into his eyes held out one hand. "Well, good night to you, old boy—sleep well—and be good till we meet again!"
I fancy Sir Charles Venner had never been submitted to a more intolerable piece of degradation. To be commanded to shake hands with one's blackmailer! His eyes were simply murderous, but he obeyed. It was only a form of course, for our fingers barely touched, but his involuntary shiver of repulsion was communicated to my frame even in that swift contact, and I had enough fine feeling in me to appreciate his passionate disgust. To be candid, I liked him all the better because of it, for although there is not a spark of pride in my composition, a constitutional weakness obliges me to respect pride in other people.
Five minutes after he had gone, I left my room and strolled to the head of the stairs. As I had expected, a gentleman was seated upon the lounge that faced the door of the elevator, I could not see his face for it was concealed behind a newspaper. But I marked one incongruous circumstance in his apparel. He wore evening dress, and ordinary street boots of black leather. I am afraid I was so vulgar as to permit myself the indulgence of a wink. I passed him and leisurely descended the first flight of stairs. Of a sudden I stopped, and turning about ran upstairs again at the top of my speed, taking three steps at a time. My gentleman had already begun to descend the stairs. I passed him without a glance, swearing in a low but audible key at my forgetfulness. In another moment I was back in my room pressing the electric button. "So!" thought I, "they have employed a detective to shadow me. Well, we shall see!"
Presently a knock sounded on the door, and the waiter entered, who had shown Sir Charles out.
"Shut it," I said. He obeyed.
"What is your name?" I demanded.
"Martin, sir."
"Well, look here, Martin," said I, "my old friend Sir Charles Venner has just bet me a hundred pounds that I cannot succeed in getting out of this hotel in some disguise, without his suspecting me, during the next half hour. Now he is waiting in the vestibule, is he not?"
The waiter grinned. "No, sir, just inside the coffee room door; I was wondering what he wanted. He gave me half a crown, sir."
"Half a crown!" I sneered. "Look here Martin——" I took Sir Charles' own roll from my pocket and selected two brand new five pound notes. "Now Sir Charles thinks himself very smart, and he fancies he can see through a disguise in a second. But I reckon a bit on my smartness too, for when I was a young man before I made a fortune out of mining I was on the stage. With your help, my man, I'll do Sir Charles up, do him brown—and these notes will be yours for helping me!"
Martin's eyes almost burst out of their sockets. "All right, sir!" he cried excitedly. "What do you want me to do?"
"Exchange clothes with me for ten minutes. Here are the notes, my man—I'll pay you beforehand. All I'll have to do to win my bet is to slip out of the house and return. Hurry up, Martin!"
But Martin had already begun to slip off his coat. The bank notes were tightly clutched between his teeth, so he could not reply, but I was rather glad of that. I induced him to remove even his boots, and in five minutes I was to all appearances a hotel waiter. A false moustache gave me a general look of Martin, but a glance in the mirror showed me a bad fault, the long hair of my previous character, the old Shakesperean actor, fell upon my collar, while Martin's hair was cropped closely to his head. But I dared not exchange the wig I was wearing for another in Martin's presence, for fear of exciting his distrust, neither dared I remove my false bushy grey eyebrows.
Difficulties, however, are made to be surmounted. Whispering a word of warning in Martin's ear, I opened the door, and in a loud voice commanded him to procure me a cab. Martin cried out—"Very good, sir!" and I slipped into the passage, banging the door behind me. My trick was successful, the corridor was deserted. In two seconds I had pulled off my wig and substituted another, also I tore off my false eyebrows and stuffed them into my pocket, that is to say, into Martin's pocket. I then strode down the corridor and turned the corner with the brisk step and manner of a waiter going on an urgent message. My gentleman spy was again seated on the lounge that faced the elevator, and once more intrenched behind a newspaper.
He threw at me one quick glance over the edge of the journal, and his face vanished. I had just time to photograph his features on my mind—no more. Running down the stairs I reached the vestibule, which to my delight was thronged with guests. A moment later, having given the coffee room a wide berth, I passed through the open hall door and gained the street. A gentleman was standing on the footpath paying off a cab from which he had just alighted. I sprang into the vehicle and drove to Piccadilly Circus. A second took me to Marble Arch, and a third to Bruton Street. Feeling assured that I had not been followed, I slipped upstairs and into my room.
An hour later, Brown, Sir William Dagmar's discreet valet, stepped out of an omnibus before the General Post Office, letter in hand addressed to Sir Charles Venner. The letter, which was subscribed in printed characters, contained these words:—"To-morrow afternoon, at 4.30, inquire at Bolingbroke Hotel, Piccadilly, for Dr. Rudolf Garschagen. Bank of England notes alone acceptable. Dagmar II."
I slept that night at Bruton Street.
VI
A BATTLE OF WITS
At ten o'clock on the next morning, as I approached my master's house in Curzon Street, I saw Sir Charles Venner's brougham waiting before the door. I thought it highly probable that Sir Charles would require me to give an account of my absence from duty, whether he suspected me or not, for he was in the position of a man obliged by circumstances to suspect everyone, even his nearest and dearest friend. Nerving myself for the encounter, I assumed a dejected and lugubrious expression, and slowly mounting the steps, I inserted my latch-key in the lock. The hall was deserted, but I heard a mutter of voices in the ante-room, and thither I betook myself at once. "Best get it over quickly," was my thought.
The door was ajar, and peering through I perceived Mr. Sefton Dagmar and Sir Charles Venner in earnest converse. Mr. Dagmar's hat was lying upon the table. Sir Charles carried his in his hand. I rapped softly upon the panel and entered.
"Ah, Brown!" exclaimed the younger man. "Back, I see."
"Good morning, sir," I muttered, and turning to Sir Charles I anxiously enquired after my master.
"Your master is much worse!" he replied, looking at me very keenly. "I expect the crisis to-night!"
"He will recover, sir, I hope. You will surely save him, Sir Charles!"
"I don't know!"
Mr. Sefton Dagmar took up his hat and left the room, throwing me a wink as he passed. "I think it's up to me to take a constitutional," he observed, by way of excusing his departure. "Au revoir, Sir Charles!"
"Au revoir!" returned the surgeon. His eyes had never left my face. He waited until we heard the street door close, then he said quietly: "And how is your mother, Brown?"
"She is dead, sir!" I spoke the words in a low, dull tone, but without attempting any exhibition of emotion. I knew better than to play such a game with the man before me.
"I'm sorry to hear that," he observed. "You'll want to attend her funeral, I suppose. When is she to be buried?"
"This afternoon, sir," I answered looking at the floor.
He drew in a long, sharp inspiration, which said plainer than words: "I thought so!"
I understood that he suspected me. I raised my eyes to his, however, with a worried melancholy expression, and I said in a hesitating way. "It's very good of you, sir, to sympathize with me—I'm sure—I—I—I—feel almost emboldened to take a liberty. I'm, I'm in great trouble, sir?"
"Well, Brown?" His eyes were gleaming like drawn swords.
"It's this way, sir," I muttered. "My mother's illness has run away—with my little bit of savings, sir—and—and—the undertaker wants spot cash for the coffin, sir. He won't trust me, and I don't know what to do, seeing master is so ill. It'd be all right, if he was well, for I haven't drawn my last month's wages, sir."
"I see, you wish me to lend you some money."
I hung my head in real artistic shame. "I'd never dare—ask—you, sir!" I muttered brokenly, "but since you've said it yourself, sir, I—I—" I paused as if unable to proceed.
"How much do you need?"
"Five pounds would do, sir. Master owes me eight, and I could make it over to you, if you'd only be so good. You see, sir, I'd hate"—I choked—"a—a—pauper funeral, sir."
"Naturally, my man," his voice was much kinder. "But there will be no need for that. I shall lend you the money with pleasure. Let me see, it's ten now, I shall return to see your master again at twelve and bring the money with me. I have only a few shillings about me at this moment!"
"Thank you, sir," I stammered. "I'll never forget it of you, sir!" At that juncture I allowed a tear to roll down my cheek, as I raised my face to look at him, but I brushed it hastily away, as though ashamed.
He did not appear to notice anything, however, and without another word he left the house. I considered that I had allayed his suspicions, but I dared not make too sure, for that man possessed a more admirable control of feature than any other I had ever known. I determined, therefore, to be careful and remit no precaution, however small or troublesome, in order to secure myself. To that end I took an early opportunity of confiding my trouble to Nurse Hargreaves, and I almost made her weep by the touching manner in which I described my mother's death.
Sir Charles returned punctually at twelve o'clock and he put five sovereigns into my hand as I admitted him. He was also kind enough to tell me that I might leave the house at once, in order to conduct my mother's funeral arrangements. I took him at his word. My first thought as I stepped into the street was this:—"Am I to be shadowed? And if so, how shall I discover the spy?" The pavement was dotted with pedestrians who all appeared to be minding their own business. I walked briskly towards Piccadilly. Before long I knew that I was followed, I cannot explain how I knew, for although I seized every opportunity I could to look back, I could not locate my shadower; but I felt that I was shadowed, felt it in my bones. I was thrilled, exhilarated! Difficulties and dangers always delight me, and always call, as with a trumpet blast, my best faculties to action. I considered what to do. I might easily have shaken off my pursuer had I wished, but to even display such a desire would inevitably convert Sir Charles Venner's suspicions into convictions. It was my ambition, on the other hand, to destroy his suspicions altogether. An inspiration came to me at Piccadilly Circus. I smothered a cry of delight, and entered an Oxford Street omnibus. The end seat was vacant. I took it, and gazed watchfully behind me. To even a trained observer like myself, it was no easy task to pick out of the great moving throng that followed my conveyance the man whose business was wrapped up in my own. But I did not despair, and set steadily to work. At Oxford Circus I was sure that he had not entered my 'bus. There I alighted and took another to London Bridge. In which of the omnibuses and cabs trailing behind me was he then seated? Nearest of all was a Bank 'bus; I did not believe it contained him. Beyond that an empty hansom rolled along, then a fourwheeler, then a greengrocer's cart, with a smart looking pony between the shafts. I thought he might be in the fourwheeler, but no, it turned down Museum Street. This brought the greengrocer's cart nearer to the empty hansom, and gave me a chance to examine some of the passengers on a Chancery Lane 'bus beyond. At Red Lion Street we pulled up, and the Bank 'bus passed us with a good start, also the empty hansom. I had now a good view of the Chancery Lane 'bus over the greengrocer's cart, and of another 'bus behind that, bound for Gray's Inn Road. We soon passed Chancery Lane, and so lost one more 'bus. The pony drawing the greengrocer's cart was now almost touching our steps with his nose. Not a soul of those who alighted from the Chancery Lane 'bus came our way. I examined the Gray's Inn Road 'bus, but it contained only three women and a boy. Two hansoms now joined the procession, but the first carried an eye-glassed snob, and the other an officer in uniform. I was beginning to feel very puzzled when it suddenly occurred to me to prospect the greengrocer's cart, which hitherto I had scarcely more than glanced at. Two costers occupied the seat, but otherwise the cart was empty. The driver was a real unmistakable hall-marked coster, but his companion gave me a doubt. For one thing, he was smoking a cigar; for another, he held on to his seat in order to support himself; for a third, although he wore no collar, he had a remarkably white neck—for a coster.
"There," said I, "is my man."
I did not look at him again. There was no need. To kill time I bought a paper at the next corner, and diligently studied its contents, until we came to London Bridge, where I alighted, and transferred myself to a New Cross 'bus. I mounted to the top and began to scan the houses that we passed with the closest possible attention. It was not, however, until we left Tabard Street behind and had half traversed the Old Kent Road, that I discovered what I was looking for. This was a "double event"—so to speak. An apartment house and an undertaker's establishment, situated within easy walking distance of each other. Many a coffin shop did I see, and many an apartment house, but they were unhappily too separated for my purpose. The fortunate combination occurred between Astley Street and Ossary Road. First came the undertaker's shop, and then the apartment house. Nothing could have been more suitable. Opposite the latter I swung myself from the 'bus, and stepped upon the footpath. The greengrocer's cart passed me by some twenty yards at a smart trot, then slowed down to a walk. I strode up to the door of the apartment house, and rapped sharply on the knocker. It was a low, grimy, building, with many grimy windows, whose shuttered blinds had once been green, but now were grey with grease and dust. A card in either lower windows signified its calling: "Apartments to let!"
The door was opened by a greasy-faced woman, whose coal black oily locks were crimped in curl-papers. I pushed past her into the hall, without so much as "by your leave," and shut the door behind me. I acted so, lest my shadower should suspect that I visited the house for the first time. The woman at once began to protest at the top of her voice, against my cavalier behaviour. But I cut her short with a sovereign, which she bit, in the fashion of her class, eyeing me the while as though she expected me to snatch it back again.
Silence thus secured, I addressed her in this fashion: "Madam, I am a woodcarver by trade, and a rich old gentleman has just commissioned me to carve a wonderful design upon a coffin in which he wishes to bury his wife who is lately dead. My master, however, jealous at my good fortune, has dismissed me from his employ, and as it is necessary for me to get immediately to work, I must hire a room in the neighbourhood without delay. If you have a front room on the ground floor which you can let to me, I shall be glad to pay you for it at the rate of one pound for every day I use it in advance, and give you the pound you are biting, into the bargain!"
"Lawks!" she cried, then uttered a croaking laugh. "You must be getting well paid for the job!"
"A hundred pounds!" I replied.
"No wonder you are in a hurry."
"Have you such a room as I require?" I demanded impatiently.
She opened a door at her right hand, and showed me a musty guest chamber, which still smelt of its former occupant, who must have been a tanner, I should say.
"It will do," I declared.
"Yes, but will you bring the coffin here?"
"Assuredly."
"Not for a pound a day, though, mister!" she retorted with a cunning smile. "Why, all my boarders would clear out!"
"How much do you want, then?"
"Two quid, not a penny less."
I paid the money into her hand. Her eyes glinted with rage and self-contempt, because she had not demanded three, but I did not choose to heed.
"I shall return in ten minutes with the coffin!" I said quickly. "In the meanwhile that room is mine. Please see that no one goes into it, and do not on any account open the window!"
In another moment I was out of the house, and walking back briskly towards the city, followed at a distance by the greengrocer's cart.
The undertaker's shop was half a mile away. I reached it in less than four minutes, and entered with the air of a busy bourgeois.
"How much that box?" I asked of the proprietor, pointing to an imitation oak coffin that was half hidden behind several more showy constructions.
"Four pounds," said he.
"Could you deliver it at once?"
"No, sir, my carts are all out."
"You have attendants?"
He scratched his head, "How fur?" he questioned.
"Only a few hundred yards down the street! I'm willing to pay an extra five shillings for promptitude." He stepped to an open glass door and shouted—"Jim! Frank!"
Two young men, evidently apprentices, answered his call. I put down four sovereigns and five shillings on the counter.
The undertaker picked up the money, and pointed to my purchase. "Pick out the plain oak and take it to this gentleman's house!" he commanded. "He'll show you the way! Do you want a receipt, sir?"
"I'll call back for it," I replied, and strode from the shop.
The small procession that I headed occasioned a good deal of comment, and excited not a few grisly jests as we proceeded. But I paid no heed to any, and marched along with the expression of a lover lately bereaved of his sweetheart.
One pitiful "poor chap, he looks down in the mug, Bill, don't he?" more than rewarded me for all the honest effort I was putting forth, and compensated for the jokes besides. I looked neither to right nor left, and not once back; but I knew that the greengrocer's cart still steadily dogged my wanderings.
My new landlady admitted us without a protest. I made my attendants place the coffin upon the bed, and dismissed them with a shilling apiece. I then locked the door and crept to the window. I was just in time to see, through a slit in the shutter, the greengrocer's cart set off at a swift trot towards London. Cautiously raising the sash I pushed aside the blind and craned out my head. No, I had not been misled. The road ran straight, and although I watched the cart until it was swallowed up in a maze of other vehicles, near a thousand yards away, neither of the costers seemed to find it worth while to look back.
I closed the window, and sitting down beside the coffin, laughed until my sides ached. Once again I had crossed swords with Sir Charles Venner, and once again the victory was mine. I did not respect him the less, but I admit that I glorified myself the more. I could not, however, afford much time for self-gratulation. I had a great deal to do, and it was already two o'clock. Stepping into the passage, I shouted for the landlady, and made that astonished woman a present of my coffin. It is evident that she thought me a lunatic, but what cared I for that? In another moment I was hasting down the road, looking on all sides for a cab. An empty fourwheeler overtook me at last, and I drove like mad to London Bridge, where I took a hansom to Bruton Street. I was very hungry by then, but I could not spare a minute for a meal, and I comforted myself with the reflection that, granted a little luck, I might dine that evening in absolute security on the fat of the land, a rich man in veritable deed.
I had once known rather intimately a Polish Jew named Kutnewsky, who had been my fellow lodger in a boarding-house at Leeds. Him I resolved to personate. He was a fat, podgy person, with a hook nose, and a long, thick black beard, and his voice was oily, his foreign accent hideous. All the while I dressed, I practised his voice and accent. I had it at last to a T. The wonderful development of my facial muscles enabled me to raise or depress the tip of my nose at will, so as to lend it either a pug, or a Judaic cast, as I preferred. A false wig and beard with clothes in keeping completed my disguise. I was very soon a Jew—in fact, the double of Kutnewsky. I then packed a small valise with a complete suit of fashionable clothes, which had been originally made for a man of my size, by a Bond Street tailor, and which were still almost brand new, although I had bought them at a rag shop for a song. I included also in my bag, a travelling cap, a white shirt, a doubled linen collar, a smart tie, and a pair of light patent leather boots. The boots I wore were heavy hand-sewn bluchers, two sizes too large for me. I slipped into my pocket a black moustache and a pair of large black eyebrows. Finally, I exchanged my ordinary set of false teeth for a plate planted with hideous yellow fangs, some of which protruded from my lip. At a quarter to four, I was ready to face the world. A glance at the window showed me that a fine rain was falling; I therefore put on a mackintosh, and cramming a glossy silk hat upon my head, I set out armed with my valise and an umbrella. A fourwheeler took me to Oxford Circus, whence a hansom brought me back to Piccadilly and the Bolingbroke Hotel. I presented myself to the clerk, whom I informed in execrable broken English, that I was the famous German Court Surgeon, Herr Dr. Garschagen, just arrived from Berlin, to confer with my equally eminent colleague, Sir Charles Venner, upon a case of great moment, in which my advice had been urgently demanded. I declared that I had telegraphed from Berlin to secure apartments on the first floor, and I became very angry when the clerk protested that my message had not been received, and that there was not a single vacant apartment on the first floor. He, however, very deferentially led me himself to a room on the third floor, which I reluctantly engaged. I told him to send Sir Charles up immediately he arrived, and with a foreign boorishness I slammed the door in his face. My first act was to empty my valise and conceal its contents in a wardrobe. That effected, I arranged the dressing-table just as I had done on the previous day in my room at the Colonnade Hotel, and I set my empty valise thereon. I then removed my waterproof, and putting on a pair of goggles, I sat down to await my victim. As before he was prompt to the fraction of a minute. A small thin-featured waiter ushered him in. As before Sir Charles gave his attendant a shilling and entered the room; I, grinding out the while, a string of guttural, yet oily greetings in broken English. Sir Charles Venner's face was pale, but icily composed. He eyed me for a full minute with a look of piercing hate, then, taking off his hat, he quietly sat down upon the chair I had provided. I followed his example.
"Is Dr. Rudolf Garschagen identical with Mr. Seth Halford?" he asked quietly.
"Undoubtedly, Sir Charles."
"I stood in need of your assurance!" he muttered frowning. "But I confess I should like you to explain the meaning of your present mummery. You were excellently well disguised before!"
I bowed profoundly. "Thank you for the compliment, Sir Charles. I shall explain with pleasure. It is my custom to change my appearance as often as my clothes. The wisdom of this course will be apparent to you, when you consider that you have already confessed to a confused impression of me in your mind!"
His frown grew more black. "You appear to be a confoundedly clever fellow!" he exclaimed in irritated tones.
"I entertain such a lively respect for my opponent that I have tried to show you my best!" I replied, laying a gloved hand on my heart.
"I did not come here to exchange compliments with you," he retorted coldly. "Kindly get to business."
"Have you the money?" I demanded.
"Yes. But I shall not give you a solitary farthing until I am furnished with a substantial guarantee that this will be your last impertinence. My—er—friends and I do not propose to let you hold our souls in pawn."
"What guarantee do you require?"
He took a paper from his packet and tossed it carelessly upon the table. "Read!" said he.
The paper contained a confession that I—a blank was left for my name—on a certain night, stole from Sir Charles Venner, by means of impersonation and fraud, the sum of three hundred pounds.
"I suppose you wish me to sign this?" I asked.
"Certainly, and to disclose your identity besides!"
I smiled grimly and tore the paper into shreds.
"You must be satisfied with my oath, which I give you freely, that you will never hear from me again, Sir Charles. Now, please, the money."
"I am sorry," he said softly. "But we cannot do business on those terms!"
I bowed and got at once to my feet. "Then our interview is at an end!" I moved towards the bell, but I had not advanced two paces when he cried out, "Stop!"
I turned to look into the muzzle of a revolver. Sir Charles Venner's right eye gleamed behind the sights, and his expression was diabolically wicked. I hate fire-arms. They make me nervous, especially when pointed in the direction of my vital organs, by a presumably desperate man. A cold shivering thrill quivered up my spine, and I felt my knee joints loosen. My eyes, however, did not cease to serve me, and with a gasp of reviving hope I noted that the pistol was not cocked. It, however, takes more than a second to recover from such a shock as I had received, and Sir Charles had only perceived my first sharp gush of fear.
"Remove your glasses and your wig!" he commanded in a low but terrible voice.
My impulse was to obey unhesitatingly, but with an iron effort I subdued it.
"Be quick!" he cried.
I smiled. It was a miserable grimace, I dare admit, nevertheless I smiled.
"By the God above us you will die in your tracks, unless you are unmasked before I count six!"
I said to myself—"Oh, no, I shall not. Sir Charles Venner is a consumptive, with at most a year of life before him. Men cling to life most dearly when their days are numbered. Moreover, well he knows, this surgeon, that if he kills me he must hang! and speedily."
"One!" said he.
I smiled again.
"Two!"
"You are a great mathematician!" I sneered, and bowed to him.
"Three!"
"Murder me some other time, Sir Charles!" I muttered, "when you may do so with some hope of giving the penalty leg bail!"
"Four!" he cried, in a voice that froze my blood. And with his thumb he raised the hammer of the pistol.
"You will hang!" I gasped. "You will hang, and we shall meet in Hell!"
"Five!" he hissed.
"Fire!" I cried. It was the most courageous act of my life!
Sir Charles Venner let his hand fall, and his eyes. I heard a click, and I watched him restore the pistol to his pocket. In one second he had aged ten years. He was now an old man, haggard faced and trembling.
I strode to the bell and pressed the button. I had won the battle well—woe to the vanquished! I stalked over to the door and threw it wide. "Get out of this!" I grated. "Get out of this and go—hang yourself if you want to cheat the hangman. You've had your fun, and now by heaven! I'll have my pound of flesh!"
He raised to me the face of a panic-stricken craven. "For Christ's sake!" he cried, and even pleaded with his hands. He was beaten indeed. Not only his courage, but his pride was shattered into fragments. I surveyed the wreck I had occasioned, and relented.
"Well, then!" I said, "the money!"
With feverish hands he tore from his coat a small bundle of notes and forced them upon me.
"Count them, count them!" he mumbled.
"Go!" I ordered sternly.
"But, but—your oath!"
"I'll keep it—go!"
He uttered a hollow groan, and rushed out of the room.
I looked at the notes. They were brand new, and ten in number. Each represented one thousand pounds. Hearing footfalls I concealed them, and a second later, there came to me the small thin-faced waiter who had conducted Sir Charles to my apartment.
I gave him a florin, and said. "I want a man, big—my own size—just like me—to carry a box. You are too small. Send me a man like I want at once, but he must belong to your hotel, I can trust no strangers!"
The fellow bowed and promised, and hurried off. I put on my hat, and as soon as he had disappeared, I followed him. A gentleman stood by the elevator door, as though waiting for it to ascend. I passed him, and began to descend the stairs. He immediately rang the bell three times. Was that a signal, I wondered. I returned very quickly, but he still stood there, and he did not seem to be aware of my existence. But he rang the bell once. I again began to descend the stairs. Again the bell rang three times. I came to the lower floor, and there another gentleman was standing before the elevator door. I passed him and he rang the bell twice. "How curious!" thought I, "my room is on the third floor of the hotel. There the bell was thrice rung; but on the second floor only twice, and most remarkable coincidence of all, the elevator does not trouble to appear!" I had left the second floor—I returned to it! The waiting gentleman rang once! I was satisfied. "Sir Charles Venner," said I, "has put at least three detectives on my trail!"
I marched straight up to the elevator door and rang the bell myself—one long continued ring. It appeared at once. "Ze third floor!" I muttered to the attendant. "Ich haf forgotten zomding!" I gave the man a shilling, and a moment later I was back in my room with the door shut. I began to undress, and when the knock that I expected sounded, I stood in my socks and underclothes alone.
"Come in," I cried.
A burly red face waiter entered. He wore a short black beard at the sight of which I rejoiced. "Shut the door!" said I. He obeyed.
"Mein friendt!" said I, looking at him very keenly, "do you vish to earn a sovereign?"
"Rather!" he cried.
"Then vill you go a message for me!"
"Yes, sir—"
"You see dose boots." I pointed to the pair I had removed.
"Yes, sir."
"Take off your own and put on dose. You are going to valk through some mud, and as it rains I do not vish you to catch cold. They will fit you!" I added, for he seemed to hesitate. He looked extremely astonished, but he sat down and did my bidding. I smiled upon him very genially. "If you do well, I shall double your reward!" I said. "What is your name, my man!"
"Clint, sir."
"Very good, Clint. Now I vant you to leaf zis hotel without any von knowing dat you go! I tell you vy ven you come back. Here, take zis zovereign."
He took it, but he frowned. "I'd get into a row, sir, if it was known," he muttered doubtfully.
I gave him another sovereign. "Don't you vorry apout dot row," said I. "I fix you wit your boss. I not vant you to do nozzing wrong, my boy, hein?"
"No, sir, of course not!" He looked much happier.
"Zen put on zis waterproof of mine, so. Button it opp to ze chin. Ach, Himmel, zat is goot! Now mein friend, zis cap, so! button ze flap under ze chin! So, sehr goot, your mutter not know you now, hein!"
He looked in the glass and laughed aloud at his reflection. I took off my goggles and handed them to him. "Put on dose!" I said, "und dat is all!"
He obeyed me, and I almost shouted out in my delight, he looked so very like a man disguised.
"Now mein friendt, you can go!" said I.
"Where to, sir?" he enquired.
I gave him a handful of silver. "You take a cab," I began, "and you drive to ze Marble Arch, zere you get out, und you take a 'bus to Cricklewood, you mind dat?"
"Yes, sir."
"Vell, ven you come to ze Cricklewood terminus, you find a man zere vaiting for you—a big Sherman gentleman, like me. You say to him: "Doctor!" und he vill take you at once across a hill to his house, und he give you a small box! You bring that box back to me quick, und take care not to lose it—for it is vorth much geld—zat is money. You know now what you do? Hein?"
He assured me that he understood, and would follow my instructions to the letter, whereupon I dismissed him to his fate. In another moment I had changed my fang teeth for a more fashionable set, and ten minutes later I slipped out of the passage, locking my door behind me, as smart a dude as ever stepped from a Bond Street band-box. My facial disguise consisted of a monocle, a dark wig, black eyebrows, and a sweet little silky black moustache. I walked with mincing steps, and I screwed up my features till they looked as vacuous and expressionless as possible. I found on turning the corner that a gentleman, whose figure I recognized, was standing before the elevator door. For a second I went cold. "Had my decoy then failed of its purpose?" I asked myself. In a fever of anxiety I began to descend the stairs, straining my ears to listen. No signal bell rang—but I heard swift footfalls in the passage. In a flash I understood. Two of my three shadowers had followed the waiter, Clint, but the third had remained behind to watch my room. He would certainly be furnished with a master key, and within a minute, he would open my door and discover my escape. Moreover, he would know for certain whom he must thenceforth follow, for he had given me a sharp look as I passed him.
Instead of hurrying, however, I walked more leisurely than before. Three spies would have been too much for me, but one I did not care for. I felt confident I would elude him as soon as I pleased. As it transpired we reached the ground floor almost together, for he descended in the elevator. I took a good look at him, and marched to the street door. Beckoning to a porter, I directed him in mealy tones to fetch me a hansom. One stood already by the kerb, but instinct told me that it belonged to my spy. The porter blew his whistle, and a second hansom soon appeared. I threw the porter half a crown and sprang aboard. "Streeters', Bond Street!" I cried, and we were off. My mission was to dispose of my bank-notes; for well I knew that their numbers would be noted, and that the longer they remained in my possession the more certainly would they provide a clue to the ultimate establishment of my identity. On the other hand, to pay them into my bank would have been equivalent to making a present of my secret to my enemy. I would, it is true, lose something by the exchange, but I could well afford to pay handsomely for my security. My shadower followed me so closely, that I perceived he was no longer anxious to conceal his occupation. We alighted from our cabs within ten paces of each other, and he trod upon my heels as I entered the great jewellers. I had a mind to turn and offer him my arm. I bought two magnificent necklaces, and a long string of splendid brilliants under his very nose, paying therefore my £10,000, and receiving two hundred pounds in change. I then purchased a little brooch for twenty guineas. As we left the shop, I nodded kindly to my shadower, and advised him in an underbreath to be careful. He made no reply, but he gritted his teeth together in the manner of a bull-dog. He looked rather like a bull-dog too, in other respects. He had a long forehead, great heavy jaws, and little watchful eyes. The clocks were striking a quarter to six as we resumed our hansoms. I drove to the Alhambra Music Hall and purchased a stall. I then proceeded to Verrey's restaurant and ordered a first-rate dinner. My spy took a seat at my table without asking my permission, and we gazed at each other steadily while we discussed the meal. But while I ate roast pheasant, he partook of beef, and while I drank sparkling Burgundy, he absorbed a quart of bitter beer. I would have engaged him in conversation, for I am of a sociable disposition, and I bore him no ill-will, but the fact is, he was an extremely vulgar fellow, and if I had not been simply ravenous, his table manners must infallibly have destroyed my appetite. When I could eat no more, I bought from my waiter a sheet of note-paper, an envelope, and a lead pencil. I then smoked a cigar, and when eight struck, I drove to the theatre. My shadower secured a seat three rows behind me. I studied the programme, and discovered that the second succeeding item was to be a song dance performed by a lady named Pearl Glynn. I had never heard of her, but I know her class as well as any man that lives. Taking out my pencil and paper, I scratched the following epistle: "Dear Miss Glynn,—A humble adorer begs you to accept the enclosed, and to grant him a moment's interview, before your turn." I slipped this into the envelope together with the brooch I had bought at Streeters' for twenty guineas; I addressed it and beckoned to an usher. I gave it to him together with a wink and half a sovereign. He returned in ten minutes and begged me to follow him. I got up and glanced at my spy. He also got up, looking horribly uneasy. But I knew the theatre and he did not. I fancied I could hear him gnash his teeth, in impotent rage, to see his quarry escaping under his nose. As I approached the wing door leading to the stage and dressing rooms with my conductor, I took care not to lose sight of him. Oblivious of the comfort of those who obstructed him, he was toilfully climbing over empty fauteuils, or squeezing his way between rows of people in my wake. I feel sure that many of his victims thought him mad, but I heartily admired him for his energy and perseverance, and just before the door closed behind me, and upon him, I turned and kissed my hand to him in token of appreciation. I knew well what he would do. Finding he could not pass the door, he would turn and rush out of the theatre to wait for me at the stage-door in the other street. I stopped dead and addressed the usher.
"My man," said I, "I have changed my mind. I'll go back."
He shrugged his shoulders. "Just as you like, sir," he replied.
In fact, we immediately returned into the auditorium, and two minutes later, I had traversed the promenade, descended the stairs, and was running like a hare across Leicester Square; alone, alone!
A cab took me to Bruton Street, and nine o'clock had barely struck when I was once again plain Brown, Sir William Dagmar's discreet and faithful valet.
I have never been intoxicated in my life, but it is often wise to assume a virtue, though you have it not, as the old proverb advises.
It seemed good to me to be drunk just then, and better still, the nearer I approached my master's house. As I mounted the steps I reeled. It cost me eighty seconds of painful effort to find the keyhole. I did not, as it happens, use it even when found, for the door opened suddenly, and I staggered forward into Sir Charles Venner's arms. I had expected him to confront me, nevertheless, it shocked me to find my expectations realized, and to be convinced how tenaciously he had clung to his first suspicions. I picked myself up and stood before him, a swaying, blinking maudlin figure. With much circumstance and drunken gravity, I explained to him that I had buried my mother, and that to steady my nerves I had taken afterwards a single glass of wine, which must surely have been drugged. Sir Charles treated me as tenderly as any woman could have done. He pretended to believe my story, and he protested that the rascally landlord, who had drugged me, deserved richly to be prosecuted. He guided me to my bed-room, and assisted me to bed. He then declared that he would prepare me a reviving draught, and taking a tumbler from my dressing-table, he dissolved with water a couple of tiny white pillules, which mixture he persuaded me to drink. I knew his purpose, of course. He wished to search me. But I was in no wise alarmed nor unwilling, for I had left everything I possessed at Bruton Street, and my pockets contained only my keys, and half a handful of loose silver. Saying to myself: "Morphia!" I swallowed the draught, and even drained the glass. Within five minutes I was sleeping like the dead, whereupon Sir Charles Venner searched to his heart's content, poor man.
VII
A DREAM OF LOVE
I awoke with a racking headache and an uneasy sensation that I had overslept myself. I sprang up and dipped my head into a basin of ice-cold water. That tranquillized the pain I suffered, yet my uneasiness continued, nay, it became intensified when I glanced at my watch, and saw that it was after nine o'clock. Very hastily I began to dress, but ere I came to my collar I paused and reflected. I am not a particularly introspective man, nor more than a skin-deep psychologist, but it was not a difficult thing to trace to its source the cause of my uneasiness. It patently derived its origin from the habits of servitude to which I had submitted myself during the last three months. There suddenly occurred to me to ask myself this question: "Agar Hume, how long will you permit such habits to persist?" I answered at once: "Why, a day or two, at most!"
The fact is, I was a rich man, and the pride of purse, the first pride I had ever experienced, was beginning to swell my head already.
In my room at Bruton Street I had almost five hundred pounds in cash, as well as jewels for which I had last night paid £9,800. I possessed, moreover, a credit balance at my bank of exactly one hundred and forty-two pounds. I considered therefore that it would be absurd for me to continue playing the lackey to my master for a beggarly eight pounds per month, when a sufficient capital was ready to my hands, with which, and one or two smiles of the fickle goddess, I could make myself a millionaire. I forthwith determined to quit Sir William Dagmar's service as soon as possible. Yes; that very morning I would leave! Why linger, when every day now spent in Curzon Street postponed my advancement in life, and perhaps wasted opportunities for self-aggrandisement that might never return. Such a course would certainly awaken and fortify Sir Charles Venner's suspicions, but what cared I for that. He could prove nothing against me, and, besides, I would soon be utterly beyond his reach. It was my idea to go to France; there realize upon my jewels, and with the proceeds speculate upon the Bourse. If I won, well and good! If I lost, also well and good, there was always England and the blackmailing business to fall back upon! My only regret in departing was contained in this fact. Although I had met with marvellous success in exploring the secrets of my master's ghastly society of consumptives, I had by no means plumbed all its depths. The mystery of the monthly dicing by the members for the £7,000 cheque was still unexplained, and I could not think of it without tasting something of the torture that afflicted Tantalus. It was not only curiosity that plagued me. I am a good workman and, like every other really conscientious artisan, it distresses me to see a job blotched or scamped for the lack of a little skill or perseverance. For that reason in particular I hated the thought of leaving any part of the task which I had set myself to perform unfinished. Nevertheless, I felt that I should be standing in my own light if I allowed personal vanity to prevent me from seizing the earliest opportunity to improve my fortunes.
"Yes; I'll go!" said I aloud at last; and I leisurely completed my toilet. I then packed into a bag my few belongings, and proceeded noiselessly downstairs, resolved to enjoy a last breakfast at my master's expense, and thereafter bid the place a long farewell. The house was very silent. Sir William's door was shut, and no one appeared to be awake. So much the better, thought I, and having arrived upon the ground floor, I pushed open the pantry door and entered.
To my surprise, Nurse Hargreaves was standing before the table, with her back to me, doing something; but what, I could not see. She had not heard my approach, that was evident, for she did not turn her head. The stove was ablaze and the kettle was merrily singing. Perhaps its song had drowned my footfalls.
"Making a poultice, nurse?" I asked, stepping forward.
She started at my voice and turned. I uttered a little cry, then with a curious heart thrill I caught my breath and paused, transfixed, overwhelmed! I looked not at Nurse Hargreaves, but into the eyes of Marion Le Mar.
"Ah!" she murmured, "you thought I was Nurse Hargreaves?"
"My name is Le Mar!" she went on, turning calmly to her work again. "Nurse Hargreaves has gone to another case. I have taken her place!"
She was just as beautiful, nay, rather more beautiful than ever, in spite of her expression of deep melancholy and the dark sleepless hollows that undercast her eyes. I watched her—dumbstricken, but with all my heart in the looks with which I worshipped her—and through the while I gladly wondered how for one instant I could have forgotten that incomparable woman. I had forgotten her! I had coldly purposed to leave England and her. But already that resolve was dead and buried. Not even to make myself a millionaire could I forego the rapture I discovered in gazing on her face; and to remain now, meant that I should dwell under the same roof!
I forgot my life governing maxim at that moment: "First person paramount!" I was the slave of a woman, who had never seen me in my proper person until then, and who seeing me at last had turned carelessly away, after one swift unlingering regard. It was a galling thought, but it possessed no influence except to wound. I loved her and I knew it. I knew besides that her heart was buried in a dead man's grave. And yet I, the most selfish wretch alive, there and then bowed my head to fate, and in sad humility determined to sacrifice my fortunes to the uncertain chance of serving her and the sure bliss of seeing her and breathing the air she breathed.
Life is a very marvellous affair, and so too is love. I have never professed to understand either. Therefore I shall make no pretence to explain nor even speculate upon my strange experience. I shall merely relate what passed as best I may.
Marion's interest in her occupation was sincere, but it did not prevent her mentally remarking on my silence. I saw her brows contract at length, and soon afterwards she spoke, but without looking up.
"You are Brown, I suppose?"
"Yes—at—at least," I stammered, "that is how Sir William Dagmar calls me."
"Indeed! What then is your name?"
"Agar Hume, madam."
She gave me a glance of nascent curiosity, and asked me to pour some boiling water in a bowl. I complied, and she prepared to leave the room. Her poultice was made.
"Pardon me," I said. "How is Sir William this morning?"
"Still very low, although sensible. His crisis is past, however, and Sir Charles Venner feels confident he will recover."
"Thank you!" I bowed gravely. "Permit me, madam, to relieve you of that burden."
"Please do not trouble."
"Madam, pardon me, but I insist!"
She raised her eyebrows, but she gave me the bowl. I read her thoughts; they said: "This valet has borrowed manners from his master. He might almost pass for a gentleman."
My cheeks burned. I followed her upstairs and into my master's room.
Sir William Dagmar was awake. He looked a mere skeleton, and his transparent face was as white as the coverlid.
He greeted me with a wan smile and a hoarse whisper: "It is good to see you again, Brown," he muttered. "It proves to me that I am on the mend."
I took his feeble hand and pressed it gently. At the bottom of my heart I really liked the man. "You must make haste and get well, sir," I said softly. "The world grows impatient for your book."
Ah! vanity! Sir William's cheeks flushed, and a warm light flashed into his deep thoughtful eyes. "I'll not keep it waiting a minute longer than I can help!" he cried. But at that Marion stepped forward and compelled me from the room.
It was a keen pleasure to prepare her breakfast. I gave her the things that I myself liked best, and half an hour later it fed my vanity to watch her eat. I waited upon her, but she did not speak to me throughout the meal. Nurse Hargreaves had once insisted upon my sitting down with her to table. But somehow I preferred to serve Marion as a flunkey, rather than dine with any other woman in the world.
Presently she gave me instance of her spirit. Mr. Sefton Dagmar entered the room when she had almost finished.
"Ah, Brown!" said he, "I'm late as usual. Good morning, Miss Le Mar; you are looking rather pale. Did the old buck give you a bad night?"
The vacuous puppy! Marion blushed and her eyes glittered.
"Do you refer to your uncle?" she asked in freezing tones.
"Well, now," he replied with a leer of admiration, "who else would you suppose? Much better have taken my tip and gone with me to a music-hall, my dear. You are too doocid pretty a girl to be tied up by a sick bed. Waste of charms, and all that sort of thing."
Marion arose from her chair, and with a curling lip, swept out of the room. I darted forward to open the door for her, but she passed me in disdain, without a glance. Mr. Sefton Dagmar laughed loud and long. But I was mad with him, and malice prompted me to cut his laughter short.
"Sir," said I, "have you seen Sir William this morning?"
"No!" he cried, "have you?"
"Yes—he has rounded the corner. He is sensible again, and Sir Charles Venner declares that he is on the high road to recovery!"
"Hell and curses!" gasped Mr. Dagmar. "Is that true?"
"Too true!" I heaved a sigh, but in truth his despairing rage had thoroughly delighted me. He had insulted Marion.
"What in blazes am I to do?" he muttered, pushing his plate aside with savage gesture. His appetite had incontinently vanished.
"If I were you, sir," I ventured gently, "I should return at once to Newhaven. If your uncle knew you were here, who knows what he might say?"
"Be damned if I do!" he snapped. "It may be only a flash in the pan. Curse me, if I don't go up and have a look at the old boy myself."
I began to protest at once, but he hurled an oath at my head and rushed out. Desperation had lent him a rat's courage. I followed quickly, but he was already in the sick-room before I reached the door. There I paused and silently surveyed the scene. Marion, as though conscious that her patient would dislike to see his visitor, had swiftly interposed herself between Mr. Sefton and the bed, and by signs she now forbade the young man to advance.
Sir William was asleep.
"Kindly stand aside," muttered Mr. Sefton Dagmar; "I intend to see my uncle, and you won't prevent me!"
"Another time," whispered Marion, whose eyes were simply ablaze. "You cannot see him now; he is asleep!"
What wild fancy possessed the young man I do not know. Perhaps the fool imagined that his uncle was dead, and that for some base, esoteric purpose Marion wished to hide his death. At all events, he suddenly stepped forward and thrust her brutally aside.
The noise of that scuffle, slight as it was, awakened the sick man. His eyes opened and he looked up to gaze upon his nephew's rage-distorted visage. "You here!" he gasped.
Mr. Sefton Dagmar turned grey. "I—I—I—hope—I hope you're feeling better, sir!" he stammered.
"Why are—you—in London?" whispered Sir William.
"I—I—your illness, sir."
"When did you come up?"
"Last night, sir," lied the nephew.
The uncle closed his eyes, and appeared to reflect. A moment passed and then very silently he opened them again. "Marion!" he said.
She stepped to his side. She still seemed greatly agitated.
"Make him go!" whispered the sick man very faintly. "Make him leave my house at once. Tell Brown!"
The words died in a sigh. He closed his eyes once more and to all appearances he slept.
Marion turned to Mr. Sefton Dagmar with the imperial manner of a queen.
"You heard, sir!" she said coldly.
The young man for a moment made no reply; then he broke into a snarling stream of words.