2
Archibald Basil Travers Deacon—his parents have much to answer for—was in the drawing-room. He sprawled in an easy-chair beside the open windows. A book lay face-downwards upon his knees.
Anthony, entering softly, had difficulty in persuading himself that this was the man he sought. He had expected the conventional private secretary; he found a man in the late twenties with the face of a battered but pleasant prize-fighter, the eyes of a lawyer, and the body of Heracles.
Anthony coughed. The secretary heaved himself to his feet. The process took a long time. The unfolding complete, he looked down upon Anthony’s six feet from a height superior by five inches. He stretched out a hand and engulfed Anthony’s. A tremendous smile split his face.
He boomed softly: “You must be Gethryn. Heard a lot about you. So you’re here disguised as a bloodhound, what? Stout fellah!”
They sat, and Anthony produced cigars. When these were well alight,
“Queer show, this,” said Deacon.
“Very,” Anthony agreed.
Silence fell. Openly they studied each other. Deacon spoke first.
“Boyd,” he said, settling a cushion behind his great shoulders, “is quite wrong.”
“Eh?” Anthony was startled.
“I remarked, brother, that your Wesleyan-lookin’ detective friend was shinning up the wrong shrub.”
“Indeed,” said Anthony. “How?”
“Your caution, brother, is commendable; but I think you know what I mean. Chief Detective-Inspector, or whatever he is, W. B. Boyd of Scotland Yard’s Criminal Investigation Department—bless his fluffy little bed-socks—is labourin’ under the delusion that I, to wit Archibald Etcetera Deacon, am the man who killed John Hoode. You apprehend me, Stephen?”
Anthony raised his eyebrows. “How much do you know, I wonder?”
“All depends on your meanin’, If you’re asking whether I know anything about how the chief was done in, the answer’s ‘nothing.’ But if you mean how much do I know of Scotland Yard’s suspicion of me, that’s a different story.”
“Number two’s right,” said Anthony. “Fire ahead.”
“Comrade Boyd,” said the secretary, “is a tenacious, an indefatigable old bird, and he’s found out some funny things. But what he doesn’t see is that they’re only funny and no more. First, I didn’t contradict him—very foolish of me, that—when it was obvious that he thought I’d been in my room last night from ten until after they found the chief done in in his study. I didn’t contradict him because the mistake seemed as if it would get me out of a very compromising position. You see, at about a quarter-past ten I left my room, went downstairs, out of the front door, and enjoyed a cheery stroll on my lonesome. When I came back I found the whole damn’ place in an uproar, the murder having been already discovered. There was such a general shemozzle that nobody noticed me come in until I got there, what! My—what’s the officialese for it?—‘suppression of the truth’ gave Boyd clue number one.
“Clue number two was the money. And the money was what had made me seize on an alibi when it was handed to me on a plate—the alibi, I mean. You see, it was so hellish awkward, this money business, and I let old Bloodhound Boyd fog himself because I wanted time to think. It was like this: the chief and I really were very good friends indeed—he was a damn’ good fellah—though we did growl at each other occasional-like; and I believe the poor old lad was really attached to me; anyhow the money made it seem like that. He was a very canny old Haggis, you know, but he was subject to fits of extraordinary generosity. I mentioned some days ago—forget how it came up—that Wednesday was my birthday. Well, last night, or rather yesterday afternoon about five—when I took some papers in to him in the study, he wished me many happy returns of the day before, apologised for having forgotten the ceremony, and shoved an envelope into my mit: in that envelope were ten crisp little tenners, all nice and new and crumply-lookin’. Of course I did the hummin’ and haain’ act, but he’d have none of it.
“ ‘No, my boy,’ he says, ‘you keep it. Must let an old fellah like me do what I want.’ So I scraped at the old forelock and salaamed. Thought it was damned decent of him, you know. As I was clearin’ out, though, he stopped me, coughin’ and hum-hummin’ and lookin’ all embarrassed. ‘Deacon,’ he said, ‘er-um-er-um—don’t you mention that little memento to—to any one, will you?’ ‘Not if you’d rather I didn’t, sir,’ says I. He gave a sickly sort of grin and muttered. But I understood him all right. He meant his sister. She’s one of those holy terrors that’s not a bad sort really. I always knew she kept a pretty Jewish fist on the purse-ropes, though. P’r’aps that’s why he didn’t give me a cheque.”
Anthony took the cigar from his mouth. “And Boyd,” he said, “finds out that Hoode had this money in the house, institutes a search, and finds it in your collar-box, which looks like an ingenious hiding-place but was really just an accidental safe. He also finds out that you weren’t in your room last night during all the time that you let him think you were, and that you entered the house—probably by the verandah door—just after the body was found. He looks at you and connects your obvious strength with the ruts in Hoode’s skull. He sees your titanic length of leg and argues that you’re the only person in the house likely to be able to step through that open study-window without marking the flower-bed by treading on the flowers. He does a sum, and the answer is: x equals the murderer and Archibald Deacon equals x. That’s what you know, isn’t it?”
“You have it all, old thing, all! Quel lucidité!”
“But you haven’t,” said Anthony, thinking of the finger-prints and his promise to Boyd. “There’s more in it than that, I’m afraid.” He puffed at his cigar. “By the way, you didn’t do it, did you?”
“No,” said Deacon, and laughed.
Anthony smiled. “I shouldn’t have believed you if you’d said yes. You can’t give me a line, I suppose? Any private suspicions of your own? I’ve a bag of data, but nothing to hang it on.”
“The answer, old thing, is a lemon. Nary suspicion. But what’s all this about data? Found anythin’ fresh?”
“Oh, well, you know”—Anthony waved vague hands. “Possibly yes, possibly no, if you follow me. I mean, you never can tell.”
Deacon smiled. “Kamerad!” he said. “Served me right. But that’s me all over, I’m afraid. Damn nosey! But you must admit I’m an interested party.”
“I do,” Anthony said; then suddenly leaned forward. “Have you told me all you know?” he asked. “And are you going to tell me anything you don’t know, but merely feel?”
Deacon was silent for perhaps a minute. “I can’t tell you anything more that I know,” he said at last and slowly. “And as to the other, what exactly are you driving at? D’you mean: do I definitely suspect any one as being the murderer?”
Anthony nodded. “Just that.”
“Then the answer’s no. But I’ll tell you what I do feel very strongly, and that’s that it isn’t any one belonging to the house.”
“So you think that, do you?” said Anthony. “You know, I’ve heard that before about this affair.”
Deacon sat up. “Oh! And what do you think? The reverse?”
Anthony shrugged non-committal shoulders.
“But it’s absurd,” said the secretary. “Quite utterly imposs’, my dear feller!”
“Is it?” Anthony raised his eyebrows. “Ever read detective stories, Deacon? Good ones, I mean. Gaboriau, for instance. If you do, you’ll know that the ‘It’ is very often found among a bunch of ‘unlikely and impossibles.’ And one of my chief stays in life is my well-proved theory that Fiction is Truth. The trouble is that the stories are often more true than the real thing. And that’s just where one goes wrong, and sometimes gets left quite as badly off the mark as the others. I’m beginning to think I may be doing that here.”
Deacon scratched his head. “I think you’re ahead of me,” he said.
“Never mind, I’m ahead of myself. A long way ahead.”
“Well, says I, I hope you catches yourself up soon.”
“Thanks.” Anthony got to his feet. “Is it possible for me to see Miss Hoode this afternoon?”
“ ’Fraid not. Our Mr. Boyd saw her this morning, and she’s given orders that that was enough.”
“Well, I prowl,” said Anthony, and walked to the door. “By the way, on that walk of yours last night, that awkward walk, did you meet any one? or even see any one?”
“No. And that’s awkward, too, isn’t it? Nary human being did I pass.”
Anthony opened the door. “Any time you think I’d be useful, let me know,” he said, and passed into the passage.
Deacon’s voice followed him. “Thanks. When you’re wanted I’ll make a noise like a murderer. Stout fellah!”
Walking down the passage which led to the great square hall, Anthony pondered. It seemed impossible that this gigantic imperturbability was a murderer. But how to explain the finger-prints? And Deacon did not know of those prints. What would he do when told of them?
“The man’s in a mess,” he said to himself. “This week’s problem: how to extricate him? The solution will be published in our next week’s issue—per-haps!”
He came out into the hall. The utter silence of the house oppressed him. Any sound, he thought, would be welcome, would make things seem less like a nightmare.
He turned to his left, making for the verandah door. His fingers on its handle, he paused. Behind him, to his right, was the door of the study. His ears had caught a sound, a rustling sound, from that direction. He looked about him. No one was near, in sight even. The two men Boyd had left on duty had disappeared.
Quietly, he crossed to the study door. He laid his ear against it. He heard the click of a lock, a light lock, then a rustle of paper, then soft footsteps.
He crossed the hall to the foot of the stairs in three jumps. A barometer and a clock hung on the wall. He studied them.
He heard the study door open, slowly, as if the one who opened were anxious not to be noisy. Then came a rustle of skirts. He stepped out from the shadow.
Half-way between the study and where he stood by the foot of the stairs was a woman. Her hand, which had been at the bosom of her dress, fell to her side.
Anthony moved towards her. Closer, he saw her more plainly—a tall, square-shouldered grenadier of a woman, with a sexless, high-cheekboned, long-nosed face. The features, the sand-coloured hair, were reminiscent of the dead minister.
“Miss Hoode?” Anthony bowed. “My name is Gethryn. I believe that Sir Arthur Digby-Coates has explained my presence.”
“Yes.” The woman’s tones were flat, lifeless as her face. She essayed cordiality. “Yes, indeed. I told him I was glad, very glad, to have your help. I need to apologise for not having spoken to you before, but—I—but——”
Anthony raised a hand. “Believe me, madam, I quite understand. I would like, if it is not an impertinence, to express my condolence.”
The woman bowed her head. “Thank you,” she said; pressing a hand to her heart. “I—I must leave you. Give orders for anything you may want.”
Anthony watched her mount the stairs and disappear. “My good woman—if you really are a woman—what’s your trouble? Sorrow? Or fear? Or both?” he thought. “And why were you in the study? And why were you so secret about it? And above all, what did you hide in your flat bosom when you saw me? Two whats and two whys.”
He stood filling his pipe. Assuredly this fresh mystery must be investigated. And so must that of the lady that swam rivers in the night and blinded her pursuer’s eyes and assaulted his heart in the morning. If it had not been for Her all this would have been great fun; but now—well, it was anything but amusing. She must know something, and since Boyd had seen fit to suspect the one obviously innocent person, it was Anthony Ruthven Gethryn’s business to find out what she knew. What was so disturbing was the unreasonableness of the affair. Nothing seemed to have motive behind it. Of course, there was reason for everything—the Lady of the Sandal’s swim over the river, the secret ravishing of the study by the bosomless, sexless sister of the corpse, even the appearance of an innocent man’s finger-prints on the murderer’s weapon—but were they sane reasons? At present it seemed as if they could not be, and what could be more hopeless than the search of a sane man for the motives of lunatics!
Anthony shook himself, chided and took himself in hand. “Gethryn,” he murmured, “do something, man! Don’t stand here saying how difficult everything is. Well, what shall I do? Have a look at the study? All right.”
He still had the hall to himself. Quietly, he entered the study and closed the door behind him.
He surveyed the room. He strove for memory of the sounds he had heard just now when Laura Hoode had been there and he outside.
There had been a fumbling, a click, a pause and then the rustling of paper. The writing-table was the most likely place. The drawers, he knew, were all locked, but perhaps the gaunt sister had duplicate keys. The originals were in Boyd’s official possession.
But it was unlikely that sister would have keys. He looked thoughtfully at the table. Something of a connoisseur, he judged it as belonging to the adolescence of the last century.
A desk more than a hundred years old! A mysterious, sinister woman searching in it! “A hundred to one on. Secret Drawer!” thought Anthony, and probed among the pigeon-holes. He met with no success, and felt cheated. His theory of the essential reality of story-books had played him false, it seemed.
Loath to let it go, he tried again; this time pulling out from their sheaths the six small, shallow drawers which balanced the pigeon-holes on the other side of the alcove containing the ink-well. The top drawer, he noticed with joy, was shorter by over an inch than its five companions. He felt in its recess with long, sensitive fingers. He felt a thin rim of wood. He pressed, and nothing happened. He pulled, and it came easily away. The Great Story-book Theory was vindicated.
He peered into the unveiled hollow. It was filled with papers, from their looks recently tossed and crumpled.
“Naughty, naughty Laura!” said Anthony happily, and pulled them out.
There were letters, a small leather-covered memorandum-book, a larger note-book and a bunch of newspaper-cuttings.
He pulled a chair up to the table and began to read. When he had finished, he replaced the two little books and the letters. They were, he judged, unimportant. The newspaper-cuttings he retained, slipping them into his wallet. The illegality of the proceeding did not apparently distress him.
He replaced the little drawers, careful to leave things as he had found them. On his way to the door, he paused to examine the little polished rosewood table which stood beside the grandfather clock and was the fellow of that which supported the two tall vases he had spoken of to Boyd. A blemish upon its glossy surface had caught his eye.
On close inspection he found a faint scar some twelve inches long and two wide. This scar was compounded of a series of tiny dents occurring at frequent and regular intervals along its length and breadth.
Anthony became displeased with himself. He ought to have noticed this on his first visit to the room. Not that it seemed important—the wood-rasp had obviously been laid there, probably by the murderer, possibly by some one else—but, he ought, he considered, to have noticed it.
He left the room, passed through the still empty hall and so into the garden. Here, pacing up and down the flagged walk outside the study, he became aware of fatigue. The lack of a night’s sleep and the energies of the day were having their effect.
To keep himself awake, he walked. He also thought. Presently he halted and stood glaring at the wall above the windows of the study. As he glared, he muttered to himself: “That bit of dead creeper, now. It’s untidy. Very untidy! And it doesn’t fit!”
Ten minutes later Sir Arthur found him, heavy-eyed, hands in pockets, still looking up at the wall, heavy-eyed, and swaying ever so little on his feet.
“Hallo, Gethryn, hallo!” Sir Arthur looked at him keenly. “You looked fagged out, my boy. This won’t do. I prescribe a whisky and soda.” He caught Anthony’s arm. “Come along.”
Anthony rubbed his eyes. “Well, I grow old, I grow old,” he said. “Did you say a drink? Forward!”
Chapter VII.
The Prejudiced Detective
Thornton, Mrs. Lemesurier’s parlour-maid, was enjoying her evening out. To Mrs. Lemesurier and her sister, drinking their coffee after dinner, came Thornton’s second-in-command.
“Please, ma’am,” she said, “there is a gentleman.”
“What? Who?” Lucia pushed back her chair.
“There is a gentleman, ma’am. In the drawing-room. He says might he see you. Very important, he said it was. Please, ma’am, he wouldn’t give no name.” The girl twisted her apron-strings nervously.
“Shall I go, dear?” Dora asked placidly. Inwardly she was frightened. She had thought her sister recovered from her attack of the afternoon, but here she was getting ill again. White-faced! Nervy! Not at all like the usual Lucia.
Mrs. Lemesurier rose to her feet. “No, no. I’d better see him. Elsie, what name—oh, you said he wouldn’t give one. All right. The drawing-room, you said?” She walked slowly from the room.
Outside the drawing-room door she paused, fought for composure, gained it, and entered. Anthony came forward to meet her.
Her hand went to her naked throat. “You!” she whispered.
Anthony bowed. “You are right, madam.”
“What do you want? What have you come here for, again?” So low was her voice that he could barely catch the words.
“You know,” said Anthony, “we’re growing melodramatic. Please sit down.” He placed a chair.
Mechanically she sank into it, one hand still at the white throat. The great eyes, wide with fear, never left his face.
“Now,” said Anthony, “let us clear the atmosphere. First, please understand that I have no object here except to serve you. I wasn’t quite clear about that this morning, hence my clumsy methods. The next move’s up to you. Suppose you tell me all about it.”
Her eyes fell from his. “All about what? Really, Mr.—Mr. Gethryn, do you always behave in this extraordinary way?”
“Good! Quite good!” Anthony approved. “But it won’t do, you know. It won’t do. I repeat, suppose you tell me all about it.”
She essayed escape by another way. She looked up into his face, a light almost tender in her eyes.
“Did you—do you—really mean that about—about serving? Is it true that you want to help me?” she asked. And still her voice was soft; but with how different a softness!
“Most certainly.”
“Then I assure you, Mr. Gethryn, most honestly and sincerely, that you will help me best by—by”—she hovered on the brink of admission—“by not asking me anything, by not trying any more to—to——” She broke down. Her voice died away.
Anthony shook his head. “No. You’re wrong, quite wrong. I’ll show you why. Last night John Hoode was murdered. During the night you swam across the river, crept up to the house, and crouched outside the window of the room in which the murder was done. Why did you do all this? Certainly not for amusement or exercise. Then, unless a coincidence occurred greater than any ever invented by a novelist in difficulties, your visit was in some way connected with the murder. Or, at any rate, some of the circumstances of the murder are known to you.”
“No! No!” Lucia shrank back into her chair.
“There you are, you see.” Anthony made a gesture. “I was putting the point of view of the police and public—what they would say if they knew—not giving my own opinion.
“The sleuth-hounds of fiction,” he went on, “are divinely impartial. The minions of Scotland Yard are instructed to be. But I, madam, am that rarissima avis, a prejudiced detective. Ever since this case began I’ve been prejudiced. I’ve been picking up new prejudices at every corner. And the strongest, healthiest, and most unshakable prejudice of them all is the one in favour of you. Now, suppose you tell me all about it.”
“I—I don’t understand,” she murmured, and looked up at him wide-eyed. “You’re so—so bewildering!”
“I’ll go further, then. If I say that even if you killed Hoode and tell me so, I won’t move in any way except to help you, will—you—tell—me—all—about—it?”
Those eyes blazed at him. “Do you dare to suggest that I——”
“Oh, woman, Illogicality should be thy name,” Anthony groaned. “I was merely endeavouring, madam, to show how safe you’d be in telling me all that you know. Listen. I’m in this business privately. I oblige a friend. If I don’t like my own conclusions, I shall say nothing about them. I seek neither Fame nor Honorarium. I have, thank God, more money than is good for me.” He was silent for a moment, and then added: “Now, suppose you tell me all about it.”
She half rose, then sank back into her chair. Her eyes were full on his. For a moment that seemed an hour he lost consciousness of all else. He saw nothing, felt nothing, but those dark twin pools and the little golden lights that danced deep down in the darkness.
“I believe you,” she said at last. “I will tell you”—she laughed a little—“all about it.”
Anthony bowed. “May I sit?” he asked.
“Oh! Please, please forgive me!” She sprang to her feet. “You look so tired—and I’ve kept you standing all this time. And while I’ve been so melodramatic, too. Is there anything you——”
“Only your story.” Anthony had discovered a need to keep a hold upon himself. Contrition had made her, impossibly, yet more beautiful. He pulled up a chair and sat facing her.
The white hands twisted in her lap. She began: “I—I hardly know where to begin. It’s all so—it doesn’t seem real, only it’s too dreadful to be anything else——”
“Why did you go to Abbotshall last night? And why, in Heaven’s name, since you did go there, did you choose to swim?” Anthony conceived that questions would help.
“There wasn’t time to do anything else,” she said, seeming to gather confidence. She went on, the words tumbling over each other: “We’d been out all day—Dora and I and some friends. I—when we got back——Dora and I—there was only just time to change for dinner. As I came in I saw some letters in the hall, and remembered I’d not read them in the morning—we’d been in such a hurry to start. Then I went and forgot them again till after dinner.
“It wasn’t till after half-past ten that I thought of them. And then, when—when I read the one from Jimmy, I—I—oh, God!—” She covered her face with her hands.
“Who,” said Anthony sharply, “is Jimmy?”
With an effort so great that it hurt him to watch, she recovered. The hands dropped to her lap again. He saw the long fingers twist about each other.
“Jimmy,” she said, “is my brother. I’m most awfully fond of him, you know. He is such a darling! Only—only he’s not been quite the same since he got back from Germany. He—he’s ill—and he’s—he’s been d-drinking—and—he was a prisoner there for three years! When they got him he was wounded in the head and they never even—the beasts! The beasts! Oh, Jim, darling——”
“That letter, madam,” Anthony was firm.
“Yes—yes, the letter.” She choked back a sob.
“I—I read it. I read it, and I thought I should go mad! He said he was going—going to sh-shoot Hoode—that night!”
“Your brother? What had he to do with Hoode?” Anthony was at once relieved and bewildered. He knew why she had said, ‘Who shot him?’ But why should Brother want to shoot?
She seemed not to have heard his question. “I tried hard—ever so hard—to persuade myself that the letter was all nonsense, that it was a practical joke, or that Jimmy was ill or—or anything. But I couldn’t. He—he was so precise. The train he was coming by—and everything. The——”
“What had your brother to do with Hoode?” Anthony interrupted. He felt that unless she were kept severely to the point her self-control would vanish altogether.
“He was his secretary until Archie took his place—about six months ago. I—I never knew why Jimmy left, he wouldn’t tell me. He wouldn’t tell me, I say!”
Anthony shifted uneasily in his chair. There had been a note of hysteria in those last words.
Suddenly she was on her feet. “He did it! He did it!” she wailed, her hands flung above her head. “Oh, Christ! he’ll be—oh, Jimmy, Jimmy!” And then she began to laugh.
Anthony jumped at her, took her by the shoulders, and shook. The ivory-white flesh seemed at once to chill and burn his clutching fingers. With every movement of his arms her head lolled helplessly. Knowing himself right, he yet detested himself.
The dreadful laughter changed to sobbing; the sobbing to silence.
“I’m s-sorry, p-please,” she said.
Anthony’s hands fell to his sides. “I,” he said, “am a brute. Please sit down again.”
They sat. A silence fell.
At last he broke it. “Then you were so impressed by the sincerity of your brother’s letter that you determined you must try to stop him. Is that right?”
She nodded.
“But why, in God’s name, didn’t you walk or run, or do anything rather than swim?”
“There wasn’t time. You see, it—it was so late—as I explained—before I read the—the l-letter that I knew th-that Jimmy was probably almost there. There wasn’t time to—to—to——”
“I see. Judging that you’d save at least ten minutes by crossing the river here, you pretended you were going to bed, probably removed the more clinging of your garments—if you didn’t put on a bathing-dress—put on a pair of bathing-sandals to make running easy without hindering swimming, slipped out of the house quietly and beat all previous records to Abbotshall by at least ten minutes. That right?”
“Yes.” Besides other emotions there was wonder in her tones.
“Good. Now, when you were kneeling outside the window of Hoode’s study, what did you see? You’ll understand that if I am to be allowed to help you I must find out all I can and as quickly as I can.”
Their lids veiled the great eyes. A convulsive movement of the white throat told of the strain she was under. When she spoke it was without feeling, without emphasis, like a dull child repeating a lesson memorised but not understood.
“I saw a man lying face-downwards by the fireplace. There was blood on his head. It was a bald head. I saw a clock half-fallen over; and chairs too. And I came away. I ran to the river.”
“Do you know,” Anthony asked slowly, “what time it was when you got back here?”
“No,” said the lifeless ghost of the voice that had thrilled him.
He was disappointed, and fell silent. Nothing new here, except, of course, the brother. And of this business of Brother James he did not yet know what to think.
With this silence, Lucia’s cloak of impassivity left her. ‘What shall we do?’ she whispered. “What shall we do? They’ll find out that Jimmy—they’ll find out. I know they will, I——”
“The police know nothing about your brother, Mrs. Lemesurier.” Anthony’s tone was soothing. “And if they did, they wouldn’t worry their heads about him. You see, they’ve found a man they’re sure is the murderer. There’s quite a good prima facie case against him, too.”
Relief flooded her face with colour. For a moment she lay relaxed in her chair; then suddenly sat bolt upright again, her hands clutching at its arms.
“But—but if they’re accusing some one else, they—we must tell them about—about—Jimmy.” Her face was white, dead white, again.
“You go too fast, you know,” said Anthony.
“Don’t you think we’d better find out a few people who didn’t do it before we unburden ourselves to the Law?”
She laid eager hands on his arm. “You mean—you think Jim didn’t—didn’t do it?”
Anthony nodded. “More prejudice, you see. And I know the man the bobbies have got hold of had nothing to do with it either. Again prejudice. Bias, lady, bias! There’s nothing like it to clear the head, nothing! Now, have you a telephone?”
“Yes, yes,” she said eagerly. Hope, trust and other emotions showed in the velvet darkness of her eyes.
“And your brother’s address?”
Unhesitatingly she gave it; then added: “The phone’s in here.” She pointed to a writing-table at the far end of the room.
As he turned to go to it, she clutched again at his arm. “Damn it!” thought Anthony. “I wish she wouldn’t keep doing that. So disturbing!” But he smiled down at her.
“Isn’t it dangerous to use the telephone?” she whispered. “Isn’t it? The girls at the exchange—if you use his name——”
“Credit me with guile,” smiled Anthony.
He crossed the room, sat by the table and pulled the instrument towards him. She stood beside him, her fingers gripping the back of his chair. He lifted the receiver and asked for a city number.
“Is it a trunk-call?” he added. “No? Good!”
To Lucia, her heart in her mouth, it seemed hours before he spoke again. Then—
“Hallo. That The Owl office?” he said. “It is? Well, put me on to Mr. Hastings, please. At once. You can’t? My child, if I’m not put through at once you’ll go to-morrow! Understand?” A pause. To Lucia it seemed that the heavy thudding of her heart must be filling the room with sound. She pressed a hand to her breast.
Then Anthony’s voice again. “Ah, that you, Spencer? Oh, it’s the unerring Miss Warren, is it? Yes, Gethryn speaking. He is, is he? When’ll he be back? Or won’t he? Oh, you’re all always there until after midnight, are you? Well, when he comes in, will you please tell him—this is important—that I’ve run across some one who knows where our old friend Masterson, Jimmy Masterson, is. Hastings will want to see him at once, I know. He and I have been trying to find Masterson for years. And say that I want to find out what Jimmy was doing last night. Tell Hastings to ask him or find out somehow where he was. It’s a great joke.
“The address is 84, Forest Road, N.W. 5. Now, Miss Warren, if you wouldn’t mind repeating the message?” A pause. Then: “That’s exactly right, Miss Warren, thanks. You never make mistakes, do you? Don’t forget to tell Hastings he simply must go there this evening, whether the work’ll allow him or not. And he’s got to ring me up here—Greyne 23—and tell me how he got on. And, by the way, ask him from me if he remembers his Cicero, and tell him I said: Haec res maxim est: statim pare. Got it? I won’t insult you by offering to spell it.
“Thanks so much, Miss Warren. Good-night.”
He replaced the receiver and rose from his chair. He turned to find the face of his hostess within an inch of his own. The colour had fled again from her cheeks; the eyes again held fear in them. It seemed as if this passing-on of her brother’s name had revived her terror.
“Preserve absolute calm,” said Anthony softly. “The cry of the moment is ‘dinna fash.’ ”. Gently, he forced her into a chair.
The eyes were piteous now. “I don’t—I don’t understand anything!” she gasped. “What was that message? What will it do? What am I to—to do? Oh, don’t go! Please don’t go!”
“The message,” Anthony said, “was to a great friend whose discretion is second only to mine own. Don’t you think it was a nice message? Nothing there any long ears at the exchange could make use of, was there? All so nice and above board, I thought. And I liked the very canine Latin labelled libellously ‘Cicero.’ That was to make sure he understood that the affair was urgent. The need for discretion he’ll gather from the way the message was wrapped up. Oh, I’m undoubtedly a one, I am!
“And as for going, I’m not until I’ve had an answer from Hastings. That ought to be about midnight. At least, I won’t go unless you ask me to.” He sat down, heavily, upon a sofa.
Something—his calmness, perhaps—succeeded. He saw the fear leave the face, that face of his dreams. For a moment, he closed his eyes. He was thirsty for sleep, yet desired wakefulness. She glanced at him, timidly almost, and saw the deep lines of fatigue in the thin face, the shadows under the eyes.
“Mr. Gethryn,” she said softly.
“Yes?” Anthony’s eyes opened.
“You look so tired! I feel responsible. I’ve been so very difficult, haven’t I? But I’m not going to be silly any more. And—and isn’t there anything I can do? You are tired, you know.”
Anthony smiled and shook his head.
Suddenly: “Fool that I am!” she exclaimed; and was gone from the room.
Anthony blinked wonderingly. He found consecutive thought difficult. This sudden recurrence of fatigue was a nuisance. “Haven’t seen her laugh yet,” he murmured. “Must make her laugh. Want to hear. Now, what in hell do we do if Brother James turns out to be the dastardly assassin after all? But I don’t believe he is. It wouldn’t fit. No, not at all!”
His eyes closed. With an effort, he opened them. To hold sleep at bay he picked up a book that lay beside him on the couch. He found it to be a collection of essays, seemingly written in pleasant and even scholarly fashion. He flicked over the leaves. A passage caught his eye. “And so it is with the romantic. He is as a woman enslaved by drugs. From that first little sniff grows the craving, from the craving the necessity, from the necessity—facilis descensus Averno.…”
The quotation set his mind working lazily. So unusual to find that dative case; they nearly all used the almost-as-correct but less pleasant ‘Averni.’ But he seemed to have seen ‘Averno’ somewhere else, quite recently, too. Funny coincidence.
The book slipped from his hand to the floor. In a soft wave, sleep came over him again. His eyes closed.
He opened them to hear the door of the room closed softly. From behind him came a pleasant sound. He sat upright, turning to investigate.
Beside a small, tray-laden table stood his hostess. She was pouring whisky from decanter to tumbler with a grave preoccupation which lent an added charm to her beauty. Anthony, barely awake, exclaimed aloud.
She turned in a flash. “You were asleep,” she said, and blushed under the stare of the green eyes.
“I’m so psychic, you know,” sighed Anthony. “I always know when spirits are about.”
She laughed; and the sound gave him more pleasure even that he had anticipated. Like her voice, it was low and soft and golden.
She lifted the decanter again. “Say when,” she said, and when he had said it: “Soda?”
“Please—a little.” He took the glass from her hand and tasted. “Mrs. Lemesurier, I have spent my day in ever-increasing admiration of you. But now you surpass yourself. This whisky—prewar, I think?”
“Yes.” She nodded absently, then burst out: “Tell me, why are you doing all this for me—taking all this trouble? Tell me!”
To-night Anthony’s mind was running in a Latin groove. “Veni, vidi, vicisti!” he said, and drained his glass.