Blind Policy

by George Manville Fenn

Chester was about to follow, but checked himself upon the threshold as the question arose in his mind, What for?

To demand an explanation of their conduct toward him.

Well, he felt that he might demand it, but he knew that they would preserve the same attitude as before, and treat him with contempt—treat him as if he were some half-witted being who claimed acquaintance; and how could he get people to believe in his strange story—how could he advance his position with respect to Marion?

He calmed down as quickly as he had grown excited and began to feel that to force a quarrel in the club to which these men belonged could have but one ending, that of the police being called in and his being ejected.

“And what then?” he asked himself. “Possibly the whole business would be dragged into the police court, then into the daily papers, and if Marion were ready to continue her intimacy with the man who had saved her brother’s life, would she not be hurt and annoyed with him for forcing into publicity an affair which the conduct of all concerned showed them to be eager to keep hushed up?”

Chester walked down St James’s Street again, with the intention of cooling his burning head in the quiet gloom of the Park; but he altered his mind and turned off to his left, along Pall Mall, re-entered his club and went up to the smoking-room, which proved to be a little more full than before, but this did not trouble him now. He sat down and took a cigar and began smoking, thinking, trying to argue out the reason for the strange behaviour of these Clareboroughs. He could understand that there had been a desperate quarrel, resulting in the use of the revolver, and he was ready to grant that the elder brother’s conduct toward Marion had been the moving cause for that. But he felt convinced that there was something more behind; else why all the secrecy?

Here they were, a wealthy family, evidently moving in good society, and living in a magnificently-appointed mansion; but during all the days of his enforced stay, with the exception of the old housekeeper, he had not seen a single servant, and nothing to suggest that any were in the place. That they kept domestics was plain enough, for he had since seen the butler and footman. Then, too, there had been the coachman who drove the carriage that night, though he, as an out-door servant, might easily have been kept in ignorance of all that took place in the house. But where were the others, the staff which would be necessary for carrying on such an establishment?

There was no answer to the question, even at the finishing of a second cigar, and he gave it up, and then smiled to himself as he rose.

“How absurd!” he muttered. “Everything else passed out of my head. I meant to cross to-night. Well, it is not too late, is it? Pish! Two hours. Oh, impossible! I cannot leave town. How could I go knowing that even now she may be praying for my help?”

Chester passed out again into the cool night, and involuntarily turned in the direction of the Park, crossed it, and walked slowly toward Highcombe Street, where, he hardly knew why, he began to promenade the pavement on the opposite side of the road, stopping at last just inside a doorway when a cab came sharply along; and his nerves began to thrill as he saw it pulled up at the door of the mansion.