Men of Marlowe's

by Mrs. Henry Dudeney

While he waited he noticed that there was something unusual about the paneling of the wall—something that he had never observed before. It was near the window, at a part where Orion’s leather paper had peeled off. There was a slight but unmistakable difference in the molding. The possibility of a secret cupboard in the wall at once occurred to him. At the same moment he seized it feverishly as an omen, a thing that might make a free man of him once more. The nervous, prompting fiend at his side made him say to himself, as his quivering fingers fiddled at the wood:

“If there should be a secret place behind, then there will be an end to your foolery. It won’t matter whether Augusta wears red or blue. Mrs. Worsell may stay away until ten, if she chooses.”

He tapped and pushed and pressed and coaxed for a little, and at last the panel moved slightly upward. He put his hand in, felt a bolt, drew it down, and sliding up the panel saw a shallow cupboard. It was full of dust, and empty except for a knife. Ah! The knife. The knife which later on was to investigate the very recesses of Murphy’s heart. A knife with a chased silver handle and a fine blade.

He held it in his hand, and stood pondering on it and on the shallow hidden place behind the panel. He became conscious of something heavy and still in the air, something waiting, watchful, as his hand gripped that handle. Every little sound in other sets became full of portent. That knife! Who had hidden it there? How had it been used? How long ago was it since a human hand, warm with life, made a blur on that polished, delicately chased handle?

Then he suddenly thought that he would take it down and show it to Kinsman, who was very interested in curios and had some knowledge of them. He gave a last rapid look at the time-table, and decided that he would not go down to Dulwich in time for dinner; he’d have a steak at Gatti’s. Kinsman would be interested in the knife. He went downstairs as he was, in his old slippers, leaving his door ajar and his rooms in darkness. He had not lighted the lamp because he had been telling himself every half-hour that he would get off to Dulwich.

On the way downstairs he heard a woman’s clear strong voice singing “Tatters.” It was Sophia’s voice, and Sophia was the worst tease of them all. He began to clear his throat directly he thought of her. He would not go downstairs to Kinsman. He would wait until he could find him alone. He would go upstairs and get his hat and bag, and put on his boots and be off to Dulwich. It was evening. Augusta—dear, tender little Augusta—would have on her evening gown—red nun’s veiling.

As ill-luck would have it, there was a light under Murphy’s door. And Murphy’s oak was hospitably black, and the inner door with its gleaming brass knocker seemed to wink an invitation. The very knife in his hand seemed to point to Murphy’s door. Well, why not show it to Murphy? He was a bit of a fool, but he would be interested.

So he pulled up, knocked at the door—and you know the rest.

He swore to the very last that he did not do it, that he was merely the agent of the knife—that diabolical knife with the secret history.

Murphy came to the door. His pretty, dissolute face was rather flushed with annoyance. His lips, those pouting, cherry-red lips like a girl’s, showed his white, even teeth under his mustache, which was turning white. His sodden brown eyes, half veiled in a web of crow’s feet, his smirking, unfailing air of conceit and satisfaction, struck clean-living, over-wrought Stapley as disgusting. The man was an evil clod upon an honest earth. There was the trail of twenty years’ intrigue, shuffling, and sham on his features. His eyes were dull with the ruin of many women. He was accursed, heavy, hateful with old secrets, old sins—like the knife. The knife! It claimed kinship. It flew forward to his heart.