Kitabı oku: «The Duke's Sweetheart: A Romance», sayfa 17
CHAPTER X.
"FIRE!"
Hour after hour went by that day, and although Bracken came back three times from Kennington, he brought nothing new. The local men had not been able to find a single trace of Marion after the moment she left, the house in Garthorne Street. They had made inquiries at all the lodging-houses and hotels in the district, and had discovered absolutely nothing. They, of course, were hopeful; policemen and private detectives always are. But despite all this hope, and the knowledge that unlimited money was at their disposal, they could not get the slightest additional trace of the fugitive.
In order to beguile the time, rather than from any hope Marion had returned, Cheyne went more than once to Tenby Terrace. There he found poor Miss Traynor had at last succumbed, and gone to bed; but no trace or tidings of the missing girl. If "to be wroth with those we love works like madness in the brain," there is some self-sustaining power in the anger itself; but to love tenderly, and seek the loved object in vain, is more wearing and depressing than mere anger.
He went to Mr. Macklin; but the energetic lawyer was able to do nothing beyond find out that No. 8, Garthorne Street might be bought for eight hundred pounds, upon which Cheyne told him to buy; and when the purchase had been effected, to make a deed of gift in favour of Mrs. Harriet Dumaresq, and hand the documents to the widow without comment or explanation. The purchase and the gift were to be made in the name of Ashington. Cheyne wished to benefit in a substantial way the woman who had been gentle to his love, and careful of her when she was away from him.
The long summer day began to wane, and yet there were no definite tidings-nothing beyond the news Bracken had gathered of the widow in the morning. The detective was quite sure she was in the neighbourhood of Kennington; but beyond this he was sure of nothing.
Cheyne could hardly believe it possible she had not been found. It was, indeed, only by an effort he could believe she had been lost. When his mind was not busy with the subject of her disappearance, he always felt as though she were in Knightsbridge, and he was going over presently to see her, and chat with and chide her humorously for some fault of his own inventing. Then a great sadness fell upon, him, and he thought of all her sweet secret ways and gentle sprightliness. All her sweet ways were secret, and only to be found out by accident. Often and often she had been saucy to him, but never, as far as he knew, to her aunt. But her sauciness fascinated him more than anything else, and now a thousand instances of it crowded in upon him, and filled him with anguish at his loss. He had always been a man of few wants and desires; but, as often happens with such men, those wants were paramount with him, and the loss of anything he loved or had set his heart upon seemed to make his life bankrupt. He could have lived without wine or fine clothes, and never felt the want of either; but clean linen and tobacco were necessaries to him, as bread and beef are to other men. Although in the old days he had spoken of dukes and marquises, he had never longed to be one; he had never thought of being one; and now that things had taken such a different aspect, he set his titles and his riches down at a very low rate, and would rather have given up the marquisate of Southwold, or even the dukedom itself, than abandon the use of tobacco.
Now what had he lost? The only being on earth he loved. What were all his lands and castles and titles if he might not share them with her, if he might not live in the glory of her happiness? To feel that she was happy because he was with her, and that her happiness was diverted from his own individuality only by the contemplation or possession of something procured for her by him, was the end and aim of all his own expectations of happiness as far as the relations between man and woman are concerned. He had his independent masculine ambitions and hopes. He did not believe he should die if Marion were never found. He did not think he should throw his money and his coronet into the Thames, and lead the life of a recluse ever afterwards. But he knew that never again could he wrap anyone in such a beautiful mystical chivalry. Never again in all his life should he be able to taste the sweet perfume of romantic passion. He had the feelings of a poet, and she was his best-beloved poem. He had the ardour of a lover, and she was his most dear mistress. He worshipped beauty, and she was the most beautiful spirit in his earthly paradise.
And now she was gone, gone away from him? No one whom he knew could tell him where she was, and he could not find her. Good Heavens! what an unhappy ending to all the happy hours he had spent with her, all the happy hours he had spent thinking of her when away from her! He had in the still times of his leisure thought of nothing else. "She was his festival to see;" and he had brightened some of his darkest hours with thoughts of her. He had never to her betrayed his love emotionally. He looked on emotion with suspicion. But his passions, like his frame, were strong. His rage, his pity, his love, would have carried him any distance. But for mere emotion, that quality of human nature which appraises everything by the accident of the present moment, he had a supreme contempt.
He became restless. He could not remain in one place. The same faculty of his nature which drove him down in a fury to Silverview now drove him between the two extremes of rage and despair. His passions, when roused, were grotesque. In his ordinary moods few men had a more level or equable temper; but once excited, he knew no self-control, attempted no moderation. At one time he thought of going to Bracken, seizing him by the shoulders, and knocking his brains out against a wall; at another time he thought of putting an advertisement in the papers, setting forth the whole facts of the case and offering a stupendous reward for any information about her.
At last daylight failed, and the long summer day was over. Macklin, who remained at his office, declared that he had been belied by events; and Bracken confessed that, since morning, no progress had been made, and that practically no progress could be made during the night. Cheyne asked Bracken what was to be done; and Bracken said little or nothing could be done till morning. What was there for him to do? Nothing. He might go to bed, but there was no chance of his sleeping. This night was worse than last, for nothing had been done towards the recovery of the girl last night, and he had felt the fullest confidence in the men he had put on her track. Now a whole day had been passed in active search, and nothing had been discovered.
What if she had met with an accident, and was now lying in a hospital? But no; Bracken surely had inquired at all the hospitals in London. Then there was the worst chance, the most awful chance. Perhaps she had met with an accident, and was now beyond the united skill of all the hospitals in London! The Thames, the treacherous, lithe, sleek, murderous Thames, could it have anything to do with the fact that she had not written, the fact that no trace of her had been found of later date than yesterday evening? That woman over there in Kennington had told them the missing girl had seemed in great distress. Could it be that, driven desperate by her desolate condition, she had-
The thought was unendurable. It drove him mad. He would not, he could not, sit any longer inactive under it. What was the good of rank and civilisation, and wealth and police, if a young girl might disappear, and the cleverest men in London could find no trace of her? Why, in the American forests a hunter could follow up his poor, helpless, simple child.
When he came upon the idea of her being a helpless simple child, he groaned and stamped and struck his thigh with his clenched fist; then got up, and swore an oath he would go and find her himself. He was in the hotel at the time, and it was then ten o'clock. Having asked Macklin to act for him in his absence, he left the hotel and crossed the river on foot.
Going over Westminster Bridge he paused, and looked down at the dark swift waters beneath. Could it be that black heedless tyrant below there had strangled his love? Could it be the swirling tide below was now waving to and fro that beautiful brown hair? – that brown hair on which he had loved to lay his hand, that he might feel sanctified. Had loved-had loved! Gracious heavens, had it come to that? Was his love already a thing of the past? Had the love, which was yesterday a living passion with worshipper and idol, in one brief moment left finally for want of an object? Was his life widowed of the one passion which had ennobled it? And here was he, strong, rich, titled, possessed of almost unlimited power to prosecute such an inquiry, as helpless against this mystery as he was against the accursed water rushing beneath his feet!
He left the bridge, and moved on. It was now quite dark-that is, as dark as night is in mid-summer. It was fresh, and not too warm for walking with comfort. The streets were crowded with people, and nearly all the shops were still open.
Cheyne strode on at a rapid pace, his great form cleaving its way through the crowd as a descending stone divides water. He went on without looking to either side until he passed Newington Butts. Here he slackened; here he ceased to be indifferent to the people, and looked sharply every moment from side to side, examining every face with anxious care. If he had been in his ordinary mental condition, he would have known quite well that nothing was more unlikely than that Marion would be walking out at such an hour. But he was not in his ordinary mental condition; and when, after awhile, that thought occurred to him, he put it away impatiently, and said to himself:
"Better fail myself to find her here than listen to the history of others' failures over there." And he turned round and looked indignantly back upon the way he had come. Then he resumed his walk and his eager questioning glance at the unfamiliar passers-by.
On and on he kept until he got to the top of Kennington Road; then he turned, and, having crossed the road, walked back again to Newington Butts. Then, facing round again, he went hither and thither, down by-streets, he knew not, he cared not where.
Gradually the streets became deserted and more deserted. Lights shone a short time in upper windows, and were then put out. The cabs, which had set down people coming home from the theatres, had long since rattled away; The great silent dome of night, fretted with millions of stars, seemed to have absorbed from earth all the unruly noises of day, and only now and then the sound of a solitary footfall broke upon the ear, like a penitential ghost from the dead day. The stormy heart of day was eased of its trouble by that "sweet oblivious antidote" – night. There lingered in remote distances marvellous tones of music. The harsh inconsistencies of day had lain down to sleep, like weary wayward children. The peace of the desert had descended on the great city. Upon all the land had fallen night, that great Sabbath of Nature, when men cease from doing evil to their neighbours and blaspheming God, when the earth rises up out of the great ocean of sunlight, which is for the uses of the earth only, towards the great light of illimitable heaven, which is for the peace of the soul.
All round people were asleep. So great was the silence that the ticking of the clocks could be distinguished through the front doors. It was almost possible to fancy the breathing of the people above could be heard.
As the night wore on, and the chill dawn paled and pushed back the flaming stars, Cheyne's mood changed from one of indignant determination to melancholy. He seemed no longer possessed of vitality enough to be angry. The long walk and the depressing influence of the hour overcame him, and he felt inclined to weep.
Slowly the day broadened. A solitary crow broke the overwhelming silence of the morning with a single cry, that reverberated through the streets and went rolling away among the distant echoes. That one sound seemed more like the last note of an expiring world than the reveille for the world's work.
Cheyne looked up, stopped, and kept his eyes fixed on the one thing visible in the zenith, that solitary bird.
Then, while he was still watching the crow, down through the streets rang a very different sound:
"Fire!"
CHAPTER XI.
DAWN
Cheyne looked up and down. He had taken little or no notice of the street. Now for the first time he observed that it was a quiet by-street of inferior order. There was but one other person visible, and that a man of the working class, who yelled at the top of his voice:
"Fire!"
Cheyne saw this man a few hundred yards in advance of him, standing in front of a three-storey house. Again the man yelled "Fire!" and then ran up and knocked loudly at the door of one of the houses. Cheyne walked on rapidly in the direction of the house, and saw no symptom of fire. When Cheyne came up the man was still knocking at the door. There was an area, and into this Cheyne now looked. He could see nothing unusual, but he heard a crackling angry noise.
"Fire!" shouted the man again, as he thundered at the door. Then he turned round and saw Cheyne. "Do you know where the station is?" he asked.
"No," answered Cheyne; "I am a stranger here."
"Very good, then," he said; "you rouse them, and I'll fetch the engine."
At that moment a crash was heard, and on looking into the area Cheyne perceived the glass of the kitchen window had been broken, and that through the hole issued a long lazy-moving cloud of smoke.
Cheyne now seized the knocker and knocked, and shouted "Fire!" with all his might. The working-man ran up the street at the top of his speed. Above, the crow sailed serenely on. Around, the people lay sleeping quietly. In this house, the existence of which was now threatened, the inmates had not yet awakened.
From the first cry of "Fire!" to this time not more than five minutes had passed. Now the flames began to beat against the kitchen window, and glass fell out again. Cheyne knocked and shouted. At last the window of a room on the second-floor was opened; a man appeared at it, and asked what was the matter.
"Fire!" answered Cheyne. "Your house is on fire; get all the people out at once. A messenger is gone for the engine. Look sharp!" The man withdrew in terror to rouse the household. Cheyne could do nothing more. So he stood at the area railings watching the progress of the disaster.
It had got firm hold. Owing to the smoke he could not see plainly, but he now and then caught sight of a tenacle of flame as it shot forth and seized some new object. The crackling sound had increased to a muffled roar, through which occasionally came a sharp hiss. Some of the neighbours had been roused by this time and were at the windows talking excitedly.
Cheyne heard a crash, and for a moment there was more smoke and less flame and noise. Then a dulness seemed to come on the glass of the first-floor room. It was smoke. The plastering of the kitchen ceiling had fallen, and the smoke was making its way up through the laths and boards.
There was no time to be lost, for the flames must soon reach the hall and staircase.
Again Cheyne went to the door and knocked. At last the door opened, and a man and his wife and two servants came out half-clad into the street. They were terrified and only partly awake. Each carried something or other.
"Anyone else in the house?" asked Cheyne.
"No," answered the man, "we are all here. My wife, two servants and myself. But shall we not be able to save any of our things? They are not insured."
"You, I am greatly afraid, will not, and ought to think yourself lucky in getting off with your lives." As Cheyne spoke, the fire burst through the door at the head of the kitchen stairs, and rushed up the hall towards the entrance. Cheyne caught hold of the handle and banged the door.
"What did you do that for?" asked the man angrily.
"To give you the only chance you have of saving your furniture."
"What do you mean?" said the man, in bewilderment. "How are we to get at it now?"
"The air, my dear sir, the air. You cannot go into that hall now to get at anything. Nothing can be done until the firemen come; and if you left the front door open, you would only be blowing the flame upstairs."
"The mistress of the house had by this time been taken in by a neighbour opposite, but the servants declined a sanctuary, preferring the excitement and the spectacle in the street. Cheyne approached one of the servants and said:
"Are you quite sure no one else is in that house, for I greatly fear there is little hope of saving a stick of it."
"Oh yes, sir," said the girl. "Quite sure. We have a lodger.
"And where is he?"
"Gone out of town for a few days. She's been with us a good while, and went away on her holidays this very day. It's a lady, sir; Mrs. Carpenter."
"And you're quite sure she has left the house?"
"Yes, sir, quite sure; I helped to bring her things downstairs for her this night, and saw her get into a cab and drive off to the railway-station. She went away from here about ten o'clock, and drove straight to the station. I heard her tell the cabman to take her to Waterloo."
"Oh, then, it's all right?" said Cheyne.
"All right!" exclaimed the servant indignantly; "and it was only the day before yesterday that missis got in a new wardrobe that cost every penny, and the odd shillings too, of twelve guineas! I can smell the varnish of it burning now. It's a shame the fireman aren't here. Oh, yes," went on the loquacious maid, "Mrs. Carpenter is safe enough, and I'm glad of it; for there isin't, sir, in all London, a nicer or a kinder lady. She's been with us now ever so long; she's been with us before I came into this place. I was in a situation in Dulwich before I came here. I ought to know she is safe, for I was the only person in the house, sir, when she left. The master and missis went to the theatre in London, and cook was out-it was her evening out. But I stayed in until Mrs. Carpenter was gone, and then I went over, sir, to see my mother, who does washing in Canterbury Lane, off the Brixton Road. Missis said I might go when Mrs. Carpenter was gone; for I am general servant, and there was not a thing to do, and missis gave cook the latchkey, and I had leave till eleven o'clock; and at eleven to the minute I was back, and cook let me in, and the master and missis were not home until nigh to twelve o'clock, as they had to come from London in a cab. Mrs. Carpenter locked her door before she went away, as she said there were things about, and she'd rather tidy them herself than put me to the trouble. She is a real lady, and lives on her own money, which her own husband left to her out of the coal business. And now all the poor lady's things are going to be burned up. That is her room there, at the top. She had the drawing-room too-that, see, beginning to light up now. Mercy on us, there's the beautiful plate-glass gone all to bits, and the furniture only two years old, and master's got no insurance on it! Oh, it's a cruel pity! But, as I was saying, I saw Mrs. Carpenter into the cab, and she gave me half-a-sovereign-I may as well do her justice and own to it, now that her things are going to be burnt up. And she locked the door of her bed-room, and took away the key, and when I came back from my mother's in Canterbury Lane, I put my hand on the handle of the door, and it was locked sure enough, so she's safe, and I'm glad of it; for she's a good kind lady, and I sha'n't meet her like again, I know."
The servant had by this time a large group for audience. Cheyne was standing among that group, and he had heard, in an unconscious kind of way, all she had said.
It was full daylight. All round that now awakened street the same profound quiet reigned as before, but scarcely a house from one side to the other was without a representative in the crowd. Almost every front door was open, and people half-clad were at the windows of the opposite houses, looking on in affrighted amazement.
Meanwhile the flames had gained ground rapidly. They were now pouring out of the basement and ground-floor windows, and already the smoke wreathed and curled against the windows of the drawing-room on the first-floor. The top or third-floor was yet uninvaded. On the front door the paint cracked and blistered, and as it became hotter and hotter, chinks opened in it, and through those chinks the fumes streamed in an idle and leisurely manner. The flames and heat issuing from the basement window had scorched the paint of the area-railings, and the wreaths of flame and smoke had already marked the walls with bars of soot.
The people next door on either side were already busy moving the furniture, for there was no saying what dimensions the fire might ultimately assume. Plenty of neighbours were able and willing to help, and already, not more than twenty minutes after the first alarm, two growing piles of furniture stood on the opposite footpath. All was done silently and with a business-like absence of bustle, as if the people had been brought up to the work. The men were in their shirts, trousers and slippers, and spoke little. They took their orders from the owners of the houses, and carried out the things as carefully as if they had been their own. Sashes had been removed from windows, and ropes had been procured somewhere, and by means of these ropes the heavier articles of furniture were being lowered into the street.
Cheyne stood merely looking on. At another time, under ordinary circumstances, he would have been in the thick of the fight. But there were men enough and to spare for the work, and he felt too depressed and wretched to take much interest in saving a few pounds' worth of tables and chairs. He stood by, idly looking on.
The police and the turncock had by this time arrived, and a column of water five feet high was boiling up in the street a little distance from the burning house. It was evident that the house on fire was doomed. Nothing could save it. Even if the engines came now they would not avail. Already the flames were visible in the drawing-room.
Another clatter of glass sounded through the whirring and flapping of the flames, and the glass of the drawing-room windows fell, clashing and shrieking from window-sill to window-sill until it shot down the area, shattered into a thousand echoing pieces.
At this moment the fire-escape arrived, and almost at the same instant a steam fire-engine came clattering up the street. As the fire escape was not needed, it was placed at the end of the street. The engine drew up in position, and in a few minutes was ready for work.
The fire-escape was ordered up and reared against the burning house. A man mounted the escape with a hose, and began playing through one of the drawing-room windows. Through the ground-floor window the flames were rushing out in great volumes, and frequently the position of the man on the ladder became extremely critical.
Now the fire darted out, and bending upwards and sideways, seemed to try to reach him. Now it contented itself with darting a fang at the ladder, as though exasperated at not being able to meet him, it had resolved not to be baulked of some prey outside the scope of its present activity.
The gradual growth of day progressed meanwhile, and the broad dawn was white and full. In the fierce glare of day the flames grew paler and paler, until they almost disappeared. Now the position of the fire was marked by a column of dense black smoke, for there was not a breath of wind to blow it away. The sun had risen above the horizon, and its white light stood up against the black shaft of smoke. No bird was now in the air over the doomed house. The great city still slept; all but those of it who had sorrows.
The flames were at their fiercest. The man still stood on the ladder and directed the water through the windows. The flames darted out still more angrily, and came nearer to him, but he did not flinch.
The crowd was small, and the police did not insist on the people keeping at any great distance. Cheyne leaned against a railing, and looked on quietly at the scene. It was better to look at such a scene, which prevented one thinking, than to wander through the streets brooding over his loss.
The burning house faced the east; and now that the flames were on a level with the window-sill of the third-floor the sunlight struck the windows full, and they blazed with light. The people murmured, thinking the upper floor was burning.
For a moment all eyes were directed upwards; and while dispute ran high as to whether the glare came from within or without there was a crash below, and a shout of dismay, and all eyes were lowered.
The ladder on which the fireman had been standing had snapped in two, and he and a portion of the ladder had fallen into the area.
For a moment there was silence.
Cheyne stood up and shook himself. He might be of help to this poor fellow, who had been so cruelly treated by Fate in the discharge of his perilous duty.
All at once a yell of horror burst from the crowd, and someone shrieked:
"Look up!"
A hundred arms pointed frantically aloft.
Cheyne raised his eyes, and saw, at the window of the third-floor of the burning house, lighted up by the sweet cool light of early summer morning, Marion Durrant!
