Kitabı oku: «Dangerous Ground: or, The Rival Detectives», sayfa 8

CHAPTER XIX.
CALLED TO ACCOUNT

It was a long road for a woman to travel at that unconventional hour, but Leslie Warburton was fleet-footed, and fear and excitement lent her strength.

Necessity had taught her how to enter and escape from the dangerous maze where the people who claimed a right in her existence dwelt. And on being forced to flee by her haughty brother-in-law, she bowed her head and wrapping herself in her dark cloak sped away through the night.

She had little fear of being missed by her guests, – a masquerade affords latitude impossible to any other gathering, and contrary to the usual custom, the maskers were to continue their incognito until the cotillion began. If her guests missed her, she would be supposed to be in some other apartment. If she were missed by Winnie, that little lady would say: “She is with Archibald, of course.”

Nevertheless, it was an unsafe journey. But she accomplished it, and arrived, panting, weary, and filled with a terrible dread at the thought of the exposure that must follow her encounter with Alan.

They were dancing still, her light-hearted guests, and Leslie resumed her Sunlight robes, and going back to her place among them forced herself to smile and seem to be gay, while her heart grew every moment heavier with its burden of fear and dire foreboding.

Anxiously she watched the throng, hoping, yet dreading, to see the sailor costume of Alan, fearing lest, in spite of his high courage, disaster had overtaken him.

It was in the grey of morning, and her guests were dispersing, when Alan Warburton reappeared. He was muffled as at first, in the black and scarlet domino, and he moved with the slow languor of one utterly exhausted or worn with pain.

At length it was over; the last guest had departed, the house was silent, and Leslie and Alan stood face to face under the soft light of the library chandelier.

During the ceremonies of departure, he had remained constantly near her. And when they were left, at last, with only Winnie French beside them, Leslie, seeing that the interview was inevitable, had asked Winnie to look in upon little Daisy, adding, as the girl, with a gay jest, turned to go:

“I will join you there soon, Winnie, dear; just now Alan and I have a little to say about some things that have occurred to-night.”

Tossing a kiss to Leslie, and bestowing a grimace upon Alan as he held open the door for her exit, Winnie had pirouetted out of the room, and sped up the broad stairway as fleetly as if her little feet were not weary with five hours’ dancing.

Then Leslie, with a stately gesture, had led the way to the library.

Silently, and as if by one accord, they paused under the chandelier, and each gazed into the face of the other.

His eyes met hers, stern, accusing, and darkened with pain; while she – her bearing was proud as his, her face mournful, her eyes resolute, her lips set in firm lines. She looked neither criminal nor penitent; she was a woman driven to bay, and she would fight rather than flee.

Looking him full in the face, she made no effort to break the silence. Seeing which, Alan Warburton said:

“Madam, you play your part well. You are not now the nocturnal wanderer menaced by a danger – ”

“From which you rescued me,” she interrupts, her face softening. “Alan, it was a brave deed, and I thank you a thousand times!”

“I do not desire your gratitude, Madam. I could have done no less, and would do yet more to save from disgrace the name we bear in common. Was your absence noted? Did you return safely and secretly?”

“I have not been missed, and I returned as safely and as secretly as I went.”

Her voice was calm, her countenance had hardened as at first.

“Madam, let us understand each other. One year ago the name of Warburton had never known a stain; now – ”

He let the wrath in his eyes, the scorn in his face, finish what his lips left unsaid.

But the eyes of his beautiful opponent flashed him back scorn for scorn.

“Now,” she said, with calm contempt in her voice, “now, the proudest man of the Warburton race has stepped down from his pedestal to play the spy, and upon a woman! I thank you for rescuing me, Alan Warburton, but I have no thanks to offer for that!”

“A spy!” He winced as his lips framed the word. “We are calling hard names, Mrs. Warburton. If I was a spy in that house, what were you! I have been a spy upon your actions, and I have seen that which has caused me to blush for my brother’s wife, and tremble for my brother’s honor. More than once I have seen you leave this house, and return to it, clandestinely. It was one of these secret expeditions, which I discovered by the merest chance, that aroused my watchfulness. More than once have letters passed to and fro through some disreputable-looking messenger. To-night, for the first time, I discovered where you paid your visits, but not to whom. To-night I traced you to the vilest den in all the city. Madam, this mystery must be cleared up. What wretched secret have you brought into my brother’s house? What sin or shame are you hiding under his name? What is this disgrace that is likely to burst upon us at any moment?”

Slowly she moved toward him, looking straight into his angry, scornful face. Slowly she answered:

“Alan Warburton, you have appointed yourself my accuser; you shall not be my judge. I am answerable to you for nothing. From this moment I owe you neither courtesy nor gratitude. I have a secret, but it shall be told to my husband, not to you. If I have done wrong, I have wronged him, not you. You have insulted me under my own roof to-night, for the last time. I will tell my story to Archibald now; he shall judge between us.”

She turned away, but he laid a detaining hand upon her arm.

“Stop!” he said, “you must not go to Archibald with this; you shall not!”

“Shall not!” she exclaimed scornfully; “and who will prevent it?”

“I will prevent it. Woman, have you neither heart nor conscience? Would you add murder to your list of transgressions?”

“Let me go, Alan Warburton,” she answered impatiently; “I have done with you.”

“But I have not done with you! Oh, you know my brother well; he is trusting, confiding, blind where you are concerned. He believes in your truth, and he must continue so to believe. He must not hear of this night’s work.”

“But he shall; every word of it.”

“Every word! Take care, Mrs. Warburton. Will you tell him of the lover who was here to-night, disguised as a woman, the better to hover about you?”

“You wretch!” She threw off his restraining hand and turned upon him, her eyes blazing. Then, after a moment, the fierce look of indignation gave place to a smile of contempt.

“Yes,” she said, turning again toward the door, “I shall tell him of that too.”

“Then you will give him his death-blow; understand that! Yesterday, when his physician visited him, he told us the truth. Archibald’s life is short at best; any shock, any strong emotion or undue excitement, will cause his death. Quiet and rest are indispensable. To-morrow – to-day, you were to be told these things. By Archibald’s wish they were withheld from you until now, lest they should spoil your pleasure in the masquerade.”

The last words were mockingly uttered, but Leslie paid no heed to the tone.

“Are you telling me the truth?” she demanded. “Must I play my part still?”

“I am telling you the truth. You must continue to play your part, so far as he is concerned. For his sake I ask you to trust me. You bear our name, our honor is in your keeping. Whatever your faults, your misdeeds, have been, they must be kept secrets still. I ask you to trust me, – not that I may denounce you, but to enable me to protect us all from the consequences of your follies.”

If the words were conciliatory, the tone was hard and stern. Alan Warburton could ill play the role he had undertaken.

The look she now turned upon him was one of mingled wonder and scorn.

“You are incomprehensible,” she said. “I am gratified to know that it was not my life nor my honor, but your own name, that you saved to-night, – it lessens my obligation. Being a woman, I am nothing; being a Warburton, disgrace must not touch me! So be it. If I may not confide in my husband, I will keep my own counsel still. And if I cannot master my trouble alone, then, perhaps, as a last resort, and for the sake of the Warburton honor, I will call upon you for aid.”

There was no time for a reply. While the last words were yet on her lips, the heavy curtains were thrust hastily aside and Winnie French, pallid and trembling, stood in the doorway.

“Leslie! Alan!” she cried, coming toward them with a sob in her throat, “we have lost little Daisy!”

“Lost her!”

Alan Warburton uttered the two words as one who does not comprehend their meaning. But Leslie stood transfixed, like one stunned, yet not startled, by an anticipated blow.

“We have hunted everywhere,” Winnie continued wildly. “She is not in the house, she is not – ”

She catches her breath at the cry that breaks from Leslie’s lips, and for a moment those three, their festive garments in startling contrast with their woe-stricken faces, regard each other silently.

Then Leslie, overcome at last by the accumulating horrors of this terrible night, sways, gasps, and falls forward, pallid and senseless, at Alan Warburton’s feet.

CHAPTER XX.
BETRAYED BY A PICTURE

Little Daisy Warburton was missing. The blow that had prostrated Leslie at its first announcement, struck Archibald Warburton with still heavier force. It was impossible to keep the truth from him, and when it became known, his feeble frame would not support the shock. At day-dawn, he lay in a death-like lethargy. At night, he was raving with delirium. And on the second day, the physicians said:

“There is no hope. His life is only a thing of days.”

Leslie and Alan were faithful at his bedside, – she, the tenderest of nurses; he, the most sleepless of watchers. But they avoided an interchange of word or glance. To all appearance, they had lost sight of themselves in the presence of these new calamities – Archibald’s hopeless condition, and the loss of little Daisy.

No time had been wasted in prosecuting the search for the missing child. When all had been done that could be done, – when monstrous rewards had been offered, when the police were scouring the city, and private detectives were making careful investigations, – Leslie and Alan took their places at the bedside of the stricken father, and waited, the heart of each heavy with a burden of unspoken fear and a new, terrible suspicion.

So two long, dreary days passed away, with no tidings from the lost and no hope for the dying.

During these two days, Van Vernet and Richard Stanhope were not idle.

The struggle between them had commenced on the night of the masquerade, and now there would be no turning back until the one became victor, the other vanquished.

Having fully convinced himself that Vernet had deliberately ignored all their past friendship, and taken up the cudgel against him, for reward and honor, Stanhope resolved at least to vindicate himself; while Vernet, dominated by his ambition, had for his watchword, “success! success!”

Fully convinced that behind that which was visible at the Francoise hovel, lay a mystery, Vernet resolved upon fathoming that mystery, and he set to work with rare vigor.

Having first aroused the interest of the authorities in the case, Vernet caused three rewards to be offered. One for the apprehension of the murderer of the man who had been identified as one Josef Siebel, professional rag-picker, and of Jewish extraction, having a sister who ran a thieving “old clo’” business, and a brother who kept a disreputable pawn shop.

The second and third rewards were for the arrest of, or information concerning, the fellow calling himself “Silly Charlie,” and the parties who had occupied the hovel up to the night of the murder.

These last “rewards” were accompanied by such descriptions of Papa and Mamma Francoise as Vernet could obtain at second-hand, and by more accurate descriptions of the Sailor, and Silly Charlie.

Rightly judging that sooner or later Papa Francoise, or some of his confederates, would attempt to remove the concealed booty from the deserted hovel, – which, upon being searched, furnished conclusive proof that buying rags at a bargain was not Papa’s sole occupation, – Van Vernet set a constant watch upon the house, hoping thus to discover the new hiding-place of the two Francoise’s. Having accomplished thus much, he next turned his attention to his affairs with the aristocrat of Warburton Place.

This matter he now looked upon as of secondary importance, and on the second day of Archibald Warburton’s illness he turned his steps toward the mansion, intent upon bringing his “simple bit of shadowing” to a summary termination.

He had gathered no new information concerning Mrs. Warburton and her mysterious movements, nevertheless he knew how to utilize scant items, and the time had come when he proposed to make Richard Stanhope’s presence at the masquerade play a more conspicuous part in the investigation which he was supposed to be vigorously conducting.

The silence and gloom that hung over the mansion was too marked to pass unnoticed by so keen an observer.

Wondering as to the cause, Vernet pulled the bell, and boldly handed his professional card to the serious-faced footman who opened the door.

In obedience to instructions, the servant glanced at the card, and reading thereon the name and profession of the applicant, promptly admitted him, naturally supposing him to be connected with the search for little Daisy.

“Tell your master,” said Vernet, as he was ushered into the library, “tell your master that I must see him at once. My business is urgent, and my time limited.”

The servant turned upon him a look of surprise.

“Do you mean Mr. Archibald Warburton, sir?”

“Yes.”

“Then it will be impossible. Mr. Warburton has been dangerously sick since yesterday. The shock – Mr. Alan receives all who have business.”

Mentally wondering what the servant could mean, for in the intensity of his interest in his new search, he had not informed himself as to the late happenings that usually attract the attention of all connected with the police, and was not aware of the disappearance of Archibald Warburton’s little daughter, Vernet said briefly, and as if he perfectly understood it all:

“Nevertheless, you may deliver my message.”

Somewhat overawed by the presence of this representative of justice, the servant went as bidden, and in another moment stood before Alan Warburton, presenting the card of the detective and delivering his message.

Alan Warburton started at sight of the name upon the card, and involuntarily turned his gaze toward the mirror. The face reflected there was not the face we saw unmasked, for a moment, at the masquerade. The brown moustache and glossy beard, the abundant waving hair, were gone. To the wonder and disapproval of all in the house, Alan had appeared among them, on the morning following the masquerade, with smooth-shaven face and close-cropped hair, looking like a boy-graduate rather than the distinguished man of the world he had appeared on the previous day.

Van Vernet had seen his bearded face but once, and there was little cause to fear a recognition; nevertheless, recalling Stanhope’s warning, Alan chose the better part of valor, and said calmly:

“Tell the person that Mr. Warburton is so ill that his life is despaired of, and that he is quite incapable of transacting business. He cannot see him at present.”

Wondering somewhat at this cavalier message, the servant retraced his steps, and Alan returned to the sick-room, murmuring as he went:

“It seems the only way. I dare not trust my voice in conversation with that man. For our honor’s sake, my dying brother must be my representative still.”

And then, as his eye rested upon Leslie, sitting by the bedside pale and weary, a thrill of aversion swept over him as he thought:

“But for her, and her wretched intrigue, I should have no cause to deceive, and no man’s scrutiny to fear.”

Alas for us who have secrets to keep; we should be “as wise as serpents,” and as farseeing as veritable seers.

While Alan Warburton, above stairs, was congratulating himself, believing that he had neglected nothing of prudence or precaution, Van Vernet, below stairs, was grasping a clue by which Alan Warburton might yet be undone.

Reentering the library, the servant found Vernet, his cheeks flushed, his eyes ablaze with excitement, standing before an easel which upheld a life-sized portrait – a new portrait, recently finished and just sent home, and as like the original, as he had appeared on yesterday, as a picture could be like life.

When the servant had delivered his message, and without paying the slightest heed to its purport, Vernet demanded, almost fiercely:

“Who is the original of that portrait?”

“That, sir,” said the servant, “is Mr. Alan Warburton.”

CHAPTER XXI.
A PROMISE TO THE DYING

Paying no further heed to the servant, and much to the surprise of that functionary, Van Vernet turned his gaze back upon the picture, and looked long and intently, shifting his position once or twice to obtain a different view. Then taking up his hat, he silently left the house, a look of mingled elation and perplexity upon his face.

“It’s the same!” he thought, as he hurried away; “it’s the same face, or a most wonderful resemblance. Allow for the difference made by the glazed cap, the tattoo marks and the rough dress, and it’s the very same face! It seems incredible, but I know that such impossibilities often exist. What is there in common between Mr. Alan Warburton, aristocrat, and a nameless sailor, with scars upon his face and blood upon his hands? The same face, certainly, and – perhaps the same delicate hands and dainty feet. It may be only a resemblance, but I’ll see this Alan Warburton, and I’ll solve the mystery of that Francoise hovel yet.”

While Van Vernet thus soliloquizes over his startling discovery, we will follow the footsteps of Richard Stanhope.

He is walking away from the more bustling portion of the city, and turning into a quiet, home-like street, pauses before a long, trim-looking building, turns a moment to gaze about him in quest of possible observers, and then enters.

It is a hospital, watched over by an order of noble women, and affording every relief and comfort to the suffering ones within its walls.

Passing the offices and long wards, he goes on until he has reached a private room in the rear of the building. Here coolness and quiet reign, and a calm-faced woman is sitting beside a cot, upon which a sick man tosses and mutters feverishly. It is the ex-convict who was rescued from the Thieves’ Tavern by Stanhope, only a few nights ago.

“How is your patient?” queries the detective, approaching the bed and gazing down upon the man whom he has befriended.

“He has not long to live,” replies the nurse. “I am glad you are here, sir. In his lucid moments he asks for you constantly. His delirium will pass soon, I think, and he will have a quiet interval. I hope you will remain.”

“I will stay as long as possible,” Stanhope says, seating himself by the bed. “But I have not much time to spare to-night.”

The dying man is living his childhood over again. He mutters of rolling prairies, waving trees, sweeping storms, and pealing thunder. He laughs at the review of some pleasing scene, and then cries out in terror as some vision of horror comes before his memory.

And while he mutters, Richard Stanhope listens – at first idly, then curiously, and at last with eager intensity, bending forward to catch every word.

Finally he rises, and crossing the room deposits his hat upon a table, and removes his light outer coat.

“I shall stay,” he says briefly. “How long will he live?”

“He cannot last until morning, the surgeon says.”

“I will stay until the end.”

He resumes his seat and his listening attitude. It is sunset when his watch begins; the evening passes away, and still the patient mutters and moans.

It is almost midnight when his mutterings cease, and he falls into a slumber that looks like death.

At last there comes an end to the solemn stillness of the room. The dying man murmurs brokenly, opens his eyes with the light of reason in them once more, and recognizes his benefactor.

“You see – I was – right,” he whispers, a wan smile upon his face; “I am going to die.”

He labors a moment for breath, and then says:

“You have been so good – will – will you do one thing – more?”

“If I can.”

“I want my – mother to know – I am dead. She was not always good – but she was – my mother.”

“Tell me her name, and where to find her?”

The voice of the dying man sinks lower. Stanhope bends to catch the whispered reply, and then asks:

“Can you answer a few questions that I am anxious to put to you?”

“Y – yes.”

“Now that you know yourself dying, are you willing to tell me anything I may wish to know?”

“You are the – only man – who was ever – merciful to me,” said the dying man. “I will tell you – anything.”

Turning to the nurse, Stanhope makes a sign which she understands, and, nodding a reply, she goes softly from the room.

When Richard Stanhope and the dying man are left alone, the detective bends his head close to the pillows, and the questions asked, and the answers given, are few and brief.

Suddenly the form upon the bed becomes convulsed, the eyes roll wildly and then fix themselves upon Stanhope’s face.

“You promise,” gasps the death-stricken man, “you will tell them – ”

The writhing form becomes limp and lifeless, the eyes take on a glassy stare, and there is a last fluttering breath.

Richard Stanhope closes the staring eyes, and speaks his answer in the ears of the dead.

“I will tell them, poor fellow, at the right time, but – before my duty to the dead, comes a duty to the living!”