Kitabı oku: «The Sign of the Stranger», sayfa 14
Chapter Twenty Seven
Which Tells of a Heart’s Desire
The result of our consultation did not, as far as I was concerned, enlighten me upon one single point connected with the puzzling affair.
Certain matters were arranged between the man Keene and the woman I so dearly loved, but strangely enough both were equally careful to allow me no loop-hole through which to gain knowledge of their motives or the secret they held.
I made no mention of the remarkable affair at the lonely farm a few miles distant, nor did I inquire of Keene his object in lying concealed there, or of the identity of those foreigners who were the man Logan’s friends in hiding. I felt it wise to keep all this knowledge to myself.
I told Lolita, however, how I had discovered that the police had introduced a female detective as servant to the Stanchester household, and that her inquiries had been directed towards endeavouring to discover the Ownership of the Louis Quinze shoes, the print of which had been found at the spot where Wingfield had fallen.
The news fell upon her like a thunderbolt. She stood utterly unable to reply.
Keene said nothing. He merely looked at her, and then, sighing, turned away.
I did not tell them that a week ago, when passing the cottage of Jacobs, one of the gamekeepers, the man asked me to enter and see something. I had followed the man in, and producing a muddy damp-stained ermine cloak much soiled and ruined by exposure to the weather, he said —
“I found this yesterday in the Monk’s Wood, sir, an’ I’ve been wondering if it might belong to anybody up at the Hall?”
Instantly I had recognised it as Lolita’s, the one she must evidently have worn on the night of the tragedy! It was torn in one part, and a small piece was missing – the piece which had been found near where the dead man lay!
In a moment I had invented an excuse.
“Why,” I said, “that’s the cape my sister lost when she was staying with me. She went out with her little daughter to pick wild flowers, laid it down in the wood and forgot all about it.”
Then I gladly took possession of it, gave Jacobs a tip, dropping a hint at the same time that it was not necessary for him to talk about it, for if he did there would be all sorts of wild theories formed as to its connexion with the mysterious tragedy. “The police would be sure to begin worrying over nothing,” I added.
“I quite understand, sir,” was the gamekeeper’s answer. “Mr Redway and his men are worse than useless. They’ve made a lot of fuss and haven’t even found out yet who the poor young man was! I shall say nothing about it, for they’d only begin to question and worry me, as well as you.”
And so I had taken the fur cape, and that same night had surreptitiously buried it in my garden.
When at last the stranger’s consultation with Lolita had ended, I recognised how completely my love was in the man’s thraldom. He held power over her inevitable and complete. Why?
Was it because he knew her guilty secret?
She had, in a moment of desperation, declared that he did, and besought him to spare her.
“I will do my best,” was his rather evasive answer. “The man who loves you, Lady Lolita, will help me, and between us we may, I hope, effect your freedom.”
“I am ready to do anything – to go anywhere in order to serve her ladyship,” I declared, with deep earnestness. “I am only glad that we have now come to a thorough understanding.”
“Your attention must be directed towards the actions of the Countess,” was Keene’s reply. “Watch her, and see what she does, and whom she meets. I am unable to approach her because she fears me, and also – well, to be frank – she is no friend of mine any more than she is of Lady Lolita.”
“Very well,” I agreed. “I will leave Lady Lolita to your protection and turn my efforts towards watching the Countess. But,” I added, “I am puzzled by all this mystery and all these conflicting motives.”
“No doubt,” he said, as my love wished us good-night, grasping both my hands in trustful thankfulness. “It is but natural. When you know the real facts you will find it to be stranger than you have ever dreamed – more tragic – more terrible – more bewildering. The truth, Mr Woodhouse, will stagger you – as it will the world!”
And with that emphatic expression of opinion we rejoined the men in the smoking-room, had a final whisky-and-soda and cigarettes, and then parted for the night.
Next morning at five the cry of the hounds passing across the park awakened me, and I knew that the Earl was already out cubbing, leaving his party to go shooting after breakfast. Therefore I rose, and was early at work at my desk, for a quantity of the kennel accounts had come in overnight and required checking.
My mind was full of what had passed between us in the red room, and I was anxious to obtain opportunity to watch the young and brilliant mistress of the house.
The shoot that day was over at Beanfield Lawns, and after breakfast the men, including Keene, drove there in the new Mercedes car, a merry party, leaving the ladies to accompany the luncheon. Through the morning I was busy. Once I encountered Lolita in one of the corridors, and found her just a trifle more hopeful.
“Act on Mr Keene’s suggestion,” she urged. “Watch Marigold closely, and ascertain what she is doing. From what I’ve seen to-day I believe there is something curious in progress.”
“Rely upon me,” I answered, “to serve you dearest. I will do anything – that you know.”
“Yes – I feel sure you will,” she responded smiling sweetly upon me, a fresh erect figure in her clean cotton blouse. “I put my trust entirely in you.”
“And I will not betray it,” I declared in deep earnestness.
Then we parted. She had her hat on, and was going out, I knew, to her Saints’ Garden, in order to give directions to the gardener who attended to it. The thought brought back to me a recollection of my recent conversation with the Countess at that same spot, and I returned to my room and was soon again immersed in my rather onerous duties.
About noon the ladies left in the Panhard, carrying the luncheon, and a quiet fell upon the great old mansion. I interviewed the house-steward and his wife regarding stores to be ordered, ate my luncheon in my room, and afterwards started out to walk to my house at Sibberton, for when there were guests at the Hall, and especially during the shooting-season, I was seldom able to get home, owing to my multifarious duties.
I was passing the Countess’s boudoir – the door of which stood open – and having been urged to keep careful watch upon her, I searched her waste-paper basket. The torn letters, however, were of no account – the usual correspondence a fashionable woman receives. Therefore I was disappointed. In her ladyship’s every movement I now scented suspicion. Hitherto I had watched Lolita, and found mystery in all her movements, and now it was the giddy handsome woman so popular in her own gay set of banjo-playing, skirt-dancing, cake-walking and bridge-playing. I would have gone with the shooting-party over to Beanfield, but I had been prevented by pressure of work, and now I was rather sorry that I had not deferred the accounts and taken a gun.
About three o’clock the ladies returned, a gay bevy of well-dressed beauties, and as I stood chatting with them in the hall, a servant handed the hostess a telegram.
I watched how her countenance changed as she read it, then crushing it in her hand, she suddenly recovered herself and thrust it into her pocket. The message contained something that caused her anxiety – of that I was convinced. Her guests had not noticed the quick opening of her eyes, and the slight movement of the mouth betraying apprehension, as the words were revealed to her. What could they be? How I longed to discover.
Lolita, who, lounging in a chair, was chatting with a pretty young girl in tweeds, the daughter of a very up-to-date mother, looked across at me quickly, as though to place me on the alert, and then I fell to wondering how to obtain knowledge of that message.
To try and get hold of it through her maid would be a too risky proceeding, and besides if it contained anything secret she would no doubt destroy it. Therefore the difficulty seemed insurmountable. She had re-composed herself, and had at that moment declared her intention of dressing and going out again to pay an afternoon call, inviting two of her guests to go with her.
Of a sudden an idea occurred to me; therefore I went out through the servants’ hall, and obtaining the bicycle belonging to Murdock, his lordship’s valet, I mounted and rode down the avenue to Sibberton post-office.
“Oh, Miss Allen,” I said, addressing the daughter of the village post-master, “Lady Stanchester received a telegram just now, and doesn’t quite understand it. She wishes it repeated, please,” and I placed sixpence on the counter, adding, “Her ladyship believes there is some mistake. I suppose it won’t take long to repeat, will it?”
“Oh! not very long,” replied the red-haired rustic beauty.
Whereupon I told her she need not send the copy up to the Hall, but as I was going back presently I would deliver it myself.
Warr was at the door of the inn as I passed, and he called me in. When we were in his back parlour he said to me with a mysterious air —
“Do you know, sir, that that tramp who gave me a sovereign tip has been in Sibberton again? I saw him walking through the village the day before yesterday with another gentleman – one who’s staying up at the Hall.”
“No, you’re mistaken,” I answered laughing. “It’s Mr Smeeton, who’s very much like him, an old friend of his lordship’s. I fell into just the same error myself when I first saw him,” I added, in order, if possible, to remove any suspicion from the worthy man’s mind.
“Well, do you know,” he said laughing, “I could have sworn it was the same man, except that his beard has been trimmed. Of course he looks different, dressed as a gentleman.”
“No,” I reassured him. “The man you have evidently seen is Mr Smeeton, with whom his lordship hunted big game in Africa a year or two ago.” Then after a brief chat, in which he expressed surprise that the police had now relinquished all their efforts to discover the identity of the murdered man or his assassin, I went out, returning to the little low-thatched cottage in which was the village post-office.
The red-haired girl handed me a telegram addressed to the Countess of Stanchester, remarking that no error had been discovered in its transmission, and placing it in my pocket I mounted the cycle and rode away up the avenue. As soon, however, as I was alone under the trees, I took out the envelope, tore it open, and saw that the message had been handed in at Ovington in Essex. It was unsigned and read —
“To-night, Charing Cross, nine. Only bring handbag.”
It showed that her ladyship was on the point of flight! Therefore I at once resolved to ascertain her destination and watch her doings.
On returning to the Hall I learnt from the servants that she had not gone out visiting as she intended, but was in her room. The men had not returned, so I took Lolita aside, showed her the telegram, and told her to go upstairs and watch if there was any sign of her intended departure. A quarter of an hour later my love came secretly to my room and told me that she had remarked casually to her that she intended to go to town to fit a dress, which she specially wanted for a garden-party, and would probably go up to town that evening.
That was sufficient for me. I kissed my love fondly, and telling her to remain under Keene’s care, crammed some things into a bag and took the train at five-thirty from Kettering to St. Pancras.
I travelled by the train previous to the one she would catch, therefore I dined leisurely at the café Royal, and at a quarter to nine stood beneath the clock on Charing Cross platform, watching the idlers keeping their appointments and the bustle of departing passengers by the midnight mail for the Continent.
I had to exercise a good deal of caution to avoid detection; but at last, just before the hour, I saw her approach dressed in a dark-brown travelling-gown with a brown gossamer veil that gave her the appearance of an American globe-trotter, and was so thick that it would prevent recognition of her features.
She hurried across from the booking-office to the platform where the Continental express was on the point of starting, as though in fear that some one might detain her.
She was not alone, but at her side walked a man in grey felt hat and long grey overcoat. In him all my interest was centred, for he was none other than Logan.
I had, however, no time for reflection. Only just sufficient, indeed, to dash back to the booking-office, obtain a ticket for Paris, and enter the last compartment of the train before it moved off to our unknown destination.
Chapter Twenty Eight
What! Saw in the Night
The night mail for the Continent backed into Cannon Street for the postal-vans, and then rushed away into the wet stormy night for Dover Pier.
The journey, as far as there, proved uneventful, but as soon as I stepped out upon the rain-swept landing-stage, I saw that our crossing was to be a “dirty” one. Beneath the electric lamps brawny seamen passed in shining oil-skins, and amid the bustle and shouting I saw the neat figure of the Countess with her companion hurry across the gangway to the shelter of a private cabin, wherein she entered and closed the door, while Logan went below to get a drink, and change some money with the steward, an action which was that of the constant traveller.
Not wishing to appear too obtrusive, I remained on deck watching the mails being counted in, until the last bag had been flung into the hold, the cry “All out!” sounded, the hatches were closed, and then slowly the packet began to move out into the rough open Channel.
When Logan emerged on deck I stood back in the darkness, taking a good view of him. He was dressed with every appearance of a gentleman, but from the manner in which he paced the deck I saw that he was greatly agitated and concerned, whether of the Countess’s safety or of his own I could, of course, not determine. Neither had I any idea why the pair were fleeing from England, unless it was to escape some exposure which her ladyship knew to be imminent.
That woman was the enemy of my love; she had deceived me. Therefore the compassion I held for her had been succeeded by a fierce and unrelenting antagonism, and I intended to watch her and discover the truth.
I sat beneath the bridge under shelter from the driving rain, and hidden by the darkness, while the man Logan walked to and fro, utterly heedless of the storm. He did not go to her ladyship’s cabin to inquire after her, therefore it struck me that perhaps they might have quarrelled. In any case his anxiety was intense.
On landing at Calais he took her into the buffet, where they had hot coffee, and a few moments later were joined by a thin black-haired sallow-faced man, evidently a foreigner from the studied manner in which he bowed before her as she sat at the table of the restaurant.
Then the trio sat together in earnest consultation.
The Paris express was announced to depart, but to my surprise they took no heed. The French capital proved not to be their destination, for presently they rose and walked to the Bâle express, the wagon-lit of which they entered, the conductor apparently expecting them.
I was compelled therefore to return to the booking-office and obtain a ticket. As, however, there was but one sleeping-car I could not travel in it for fear of detection, and was therefore forced to enter an ordinary first-class carriage, with the prospect of a twelve hours’ tedious journey.
On we travelled until the dawn spread into a grey damp day, then the sun shone, it grew warmer, and I stretched myself upon the cushions and slept. To descend to get anything to eat was to invite detection; therefore I starved upon a pull from my flask and a couple of sandwiches with which I had provided myself at the Calais buffet.
From Bâle I followed them to Lucerne, and from Lucerne by the Gothard railway to Milan, where we arrived late at night, her ladyship driving alone to the Hotel Metropole, opposite the Duomo, and the two men going off in a cab in another direction.
As soon as I had watched the Countess into the Metropole I went along to the Cavour, where I quickly turned in and was very soon asleep. Milan seemed to be their destination, for at the station they had been met by a second foreigner, an Italian evidently, a short ferret-eyed little man, smoking the stump of a cigar, and after the exchange of a few words he parted from them quickly and was lost to sight.
My own idea was that he had met Logan and his friend and had told them to what address to drive. I, however, could not follow them, being bent upon watching Marigold. Next morning I sent a telegram to Keene informing him of my whereabouts, and then set myself to keep observation on the Countess’s movements.
Milan, the most noisy city of modern Italy, was parched and dusty at that season of the year, and save for a few German tourists the hotels seemed empty. There are, of course, visitors from all corners of the earth at all seasons of the year to see the wonders of the cathedral, but to the man who knows his Italy, and who loves it, there is something so incongruous, so ugly, so utterly rasping upon the nerves in Milan that it is decidedly a city to get away from. The place bears the impress of all that is bad in Italian art of to-day, combined with all the worst features of that complex life which is known as Modern Italy.
Opposite the hotel stood the great stucco arcade, the Gallery of Victor Emmanuel, one of the greatest, if not actually the greatest, in Europe, and about eleven o’clock her ladyship emerged from her hotel alone and wandered through the arcade looking into the shop windows, some of those establishments being the best and most expensive in Italy.
She little dreamed of my presence as I followed her. Previously I had bought a grey felt hat of Italian shape in order that my English “bowler” should not be conspicuous, and with my watchful eyes upon her I sauntered on, wondering why she was waiting. She returned to the hotel to lunch, and in the afternoon went for a drive around the bastions, which, planted with limes now, form the passeggiata of the prosperous Milanese.
It surprised me that Logan and his companion did not return to her, and I regretted that I had not ascertained whither they had gone. At seven o’clock that evening, however, she went alone to the large restaurant in the Galleria known as Biffi’s, and entering found the three men seated at table expecting her. Each greeted her with deep deference, then reseated themselves, and she dined with them.
From where I sat, engrossed in my Tribuna– the top of my head concealed by my new grey hat – I could see that now and then the conversation was of a confidential character, and I also noticed certain strange meaning looks exchanged between the men when the woman’s attention was otherwise engaged.
The three men were certainly not the kind of persons one would have expected as associates of a woman of the Countess of Stanchester’s wealth and social distinction. Her beauty, however, was, I saw, everywhere remarked, even in that foreign café.
“Una bellissima donna!” remarked a man seated near to me to his companion, as he sipped his vermouth and seltzer. “English, I believe. I wonder what those thieves want with her? She evidently don’t know their character, or she and the Englishman wouldn’t be seen with them here, in a public restaurant!”
I was quickly on the alert. These men, probably petty officials employed in the Municipal Offices, had recognised the sallow-faced man who had met Logan at Calais, and his companion. I recollected the curious incident at Hayes’s Farm, and the fact that two foreigners had been of the mysterious party who had lived in concealment there. Were they, I wondered, these self-same men. They were Italians, no doubt, for had they not read the Avanti and the Secolo and other journals, some of which they had left behind on their sudden flight?
Fortunately one of the Continental languages with which I was acquainted was Italian; therefore I turned to the two men seated close to me, and raising my hat politely explained that I had overheard their remarks, and that as the lady and gentleman were my friends I would esteem it a favour if they would give me some further information regarding the two men seated with them at table.
“Why do you wish to know?” inquired the man who had made the remark that had so attracted my attention.
“Well, because my English friends are negotiating some financial business with them,” I explained.
“Oh!” he smiled. “Well then, you can tell your friends that those two men are well-known in Milan, and especially in this café, as knights of industry – persons who live by their wits. I haven’t see them here for months, and believed that they’d fallen into the hands of the law. But it seems that they’re flourishing still.”
“What is known against them?” I asked in Italian. “Are you aware of their names?”
“Yes,” was his reply. “I may as well tell you that I am a delegato of police myself, and I happen to know those two very interesting gentlemen. The tall man is Tito Belotto, a Roman, and the other Bernardo Ostini, a Lucchese. And the name of the beautiful Englishwoman? Who is she?”
“She is from London – a Mrs Price,” I answered, pronouncing the first name that came into my head, for I was by no means anxious that this detective should know her real name.
“Well,” he remarked, “you can warn her to have nothing to do with them, otherwise she must suffer, both in reputation as well as in pocket,” he smiled, and then, having finished his vermouth, he rose with his companion and left.
Then the sallow-faced fellow who had met them at Calais was Tito Belotto, an adventurer! And yet as he sat there in evening dress, smoking his cigar and chatting affably with the handsome Englishwoman, his outward appearance was that of a somewhat superior man. In his shirt-front there shone a small diamond of very good water, and on his finger was another gem that caught the electric light and flashed its radiance towards me.
He had been relating some humorous anecdote to her ladyship, who was laughing heartily at it. Evidently she was in a good-humour, just as these men wished her to be. Belotto, I noticed, paid for the dinner, and then all four walked down the arcade into the Piazza where they entered a closed cab and were driven off.
My own idea is that they were going to a theatre, but as I followed them in another conveyance I quickly found that we were travelling in an opposite direction, namely up the broad Corso Venezia and out by the city gate into that suburb that lies beyond the ancient fortifications. Outside the town the streets are not well-lighted, and the quarter is not one of the most aristocratic. Most of the houses were huge blocks of flats as is usual in Italian cities, and it struck me that they were mostly occupied by labourers. Even at that hour of the night the air seemed close, and a strong odour of garlic permeated everything.
The cab in which the four were riding turned at last into a dark deserted street of high prison-like houses and pulled up, when instantly I ordered my man to stop, jumped out, paid him, and secreted myself in a neighbouring doorway before the first man who alighted could detect my presence.
From the house where they had stopped a man came forth, carrying a lantern, by the light of which he conducted them into that ponderous house of darkness.
The cab then drove off, leaving me alone in the dark dismal street. The house they had entered was a big inartistic place apparently newly-built, for it stood slightly apart from the other buildings, and behind it was a waste plot of ground. From the other tenements in the vicinity came the cries of children, the strumming of a mandoline, a woman’s song, and a man’s voice raised in angry altercation – that babel of noises that one hears at night in every crowded street of an Italian town, and more especially in that noisiest of European cities – Milan.
Why, I wondered, had they gone there? That Marigold was unacquainted with the place, and that she was not altogether confident in the assurances of her conductors, was shown to me by the cautious manner in which she followed the man with the lantern. Besides, I saw distinctly that the two Italians, following her, nudged each other.
Not a light showed in any single window of the place, for at most of them the wooden sun-shutters were closed, as is the Italian habit at night. In one part of the building, however, the windows were devoid of glass, from which I concluded that the place was not yet completely finished. And then it occurred to me that the man with the lantern might be its first occupant.
The minutes lengthened into hours, but I still kept my patient silent vigil. The noises in the other houses around died down, until all was hushed in sleep. I emerged from the doorway and strolled backwards and forwards in the dark and dismal roadway. The closed door of the house where the Countess had been taken was freshly painted, but beyond that I could gather nothing from its exterior.
I looked at my watch and found that it was half-past two. Then I sat down upon a heap of stones close by, waiting for the dawn, and thinking always of Lolita.
I suppose I had been there some twenty minutes or so, when of a sudden I heard a shrill whistle which, as far as I could judge, proceeded from one of the shuttered windows of the unfinished house.
Three times was the whistle blown, when a few moments later I heard the rattle of wheels, and the same cab that had conveyed them there drew up again before the door.
There were no lights on it, however, neither did any light show when the door of the house was opened.
But as I watched I saw something which caused my eyes to start out of my head in astonishment, for the dim light was just sufficient for me to discern two men emerging from the mysterious place, carrying between them to the cab the inanimate form of a woman covered with a dark cloth.
The woman’s arm swung helplessly to the ground as they carried her, and I knew by their suspicious manners, and their hushed whispers, that she was dead.
