A Duel Part 44

"What do you want with him?" she demanded.

"I am going to appeal to that officer for protection, and I don't think you will find that I shall do so in vain. You will compel people to summon the police--it is extremely unwise."

The constable was sauntering towards them. Recognising, apparently, that there was logic in what Mr. Luker said, without waiting for the policeman to approach, also without going through the empty formula of wishing the solicitor good-afternoon, she marched off and left Mr. Luker alone. When she had gone, perhaps, a hundred yards, she stopped and looked back.

Mr. Luker, who was still where she had left him, was seemingly enjoying a little friendly converse with the constable. She continued her progress for, possibly, another hundred yards, and then again looked back. This time Mr. Luker had vanished. She could distinguish the stalwart figure of the constable striding along in solitary state in the distance. She signalled to a hansom. "Stamford Street, Blackfriars Bridge end," was the direction she gave the driver. When the vehicle had brought her to the point she desired, descending, she dismissed it. She stood for two or three minutes, scanning the pa.s.sers-by, keenly observing, so far as she was able, every one in sight. Then, turning into Stamford Street, she presently turned again into a street on her right. She was coming into a very shady neighbourhood, in which one opined that women of her appearance were very occasional visitants. She twisted and turned, however, with the unerring rapidity of one who knew it uncommonly well, until at last she found herself in what was rather an alley than a street, and a cul-de-sac at that, for at the end was nothing but a high blank wall. Here the tenements were not only extremely small, apparently consisting of five or six rooms at most, they were also of disreputable appearance. Pausing in front of one she regarded it with an attentive eye. The fact that the blinds were down gave it a deserted look. She knocked once, twice--there was no bell. When no one answered she drew a conclusion of her own.

"He's not come yet; I'll wait."

She did wait, for a good half-hour, with exemplary patience, in spite of the fact that long before the period of waiting was at an end she had become an object of much interest to a large number of curious eyes. Just as the observers were beginning to wonder how long she did intend to stop, the object of her flattering quest came into sight, in the shape of the legal gentleman from whom she had so lately parted--Mr. Isaac Luker.

Contrary to her hopes and expectations he was not alone; once more her wily old friend had proved equal to the needs of the occasion. On either side of him were men whose character, or, rather, want of character, was written large all over them--two more unmistakable ruffians one would have to go far to see. At sight of her Mr. Luker came to a standstill.

"I thought I should find you waiting for me here; your presence is not at all unexpected. So, as in this neighbourhood the police are not much protection, and I suspected that I might stand in need of protection, I brought my two friends here with me. They think little of putting a woman of your sort into the river, as gentlemen of their profession generally do, so I'll leave them to deal with you after the mode with which they are most familiar."

"Is this 'er?" inquired one of the friends, a beetle-browed person, with an open gash running right down his filthy cheek.

"That's her, my good friend. You talk to her, in any way you please, while I go inside."

As he produced his latch-key Mrs. Lamb moved towards him in a forlorn-hope sort of spirit.

"Let me come in! There's something which I must say to you."

Without giving her a hint of his intention the beetle-browed person struck her with his clenched fist on the shoulder in such fashion that, had she not lurched against the wall, Mrs. Lamb would have gone headlong to the ground. Mr. Luker stood to comment on the action.

"That's right, my friend; that's how she likes to talk to others."

He disappeared into the house; they heard him locking and bolting the door. The beetle-browed person placed himself in unpleasant proximity to Mrs. Lamb; his manner was, if possible, even more eloquent than his words.

"Now then, are you going to take yourself off, or have we got to move you? Make up your mind, because our time's valuable."

She made up her mind, there and then. Realising that she was doomed to still another disappointment, she took herself off, with Mr. Luker's two "friends" at her heels. When she was back again into Stamford Street she stopped and spoke to them.

"There are police here, as, if you try to follow me another step, you'll find."

"We don't want to follow you--not much! We only want to keep you off the governor, that's all. You can go where you like, and you can do what you like, but if you come near his crib again we'll mark you."

Hailing another hansom Mrs. Lamb left Mr. Luker's two "friends"

standing on the pavement.

CHAPTER XXVII

PURE ETHER

At the house in Connaught Square Mrs. Lamb had to knock and ring four times without, apparently, attracting the attention of any one inside. She was meditating gaining admittance through the area door, when a fifth a.s.sault upon the bell and knocker was productive of a more definite result. After a good deal of what seemed unnecessary fumbling with the handle, the door was opened sufficiently wide to admit of Cottrell, the butler, being seen within. He was attired in the same extremely undignified costume in which he had greeted his mistress in the morning, which, however, showed certain signs of what might be called degeneration. The shirt-front was, if possible, more crumpled than before; the collar was gone; the waistcoat had, in some mysterious way, strayed out of the straight, so that while it was on one side of his body the shirt was on the other; his hair was rumpled; the whole man looked as if a plentiful application of cold, clean water might do him a great deal of good.

He held the door just wide enough open to enable him to display his person and to see who was there, seeming to be not at all abashed when he perceived that it was his mistress.

"So it's you, is it! So you've come at last; it's about time; we thought you never were coming. I hope you've brought some money--everybody hopes so. It's no good your coming into this house if you haven't--not the least."

Mrs. Lamb was in a bad temper, which, perhaps, on the whole was not surprising. She had been in a bad temper when she had started to visit Messrs. McTavish & Brown. The incidents which had marked the afternoon had not tended to sweeten it. On the contrary, for quite a time she had been looking for somebody on whom, to use an expressive euphemism, she might "let herself go". Had Mr. Cottrell been aware of the lady's state of mind, even in his then peculiar condition, he might have realised that there are occasions on which discretion is the better part of valour. He would certainly hardly have afforded her not only so excellent an opportunity of giving expression to her feelings, but also so capital an occasion of making her quarrel just. She looked at Mr. Cottrell with something in her eyes which should in itself have been sufficient to serve as a warning; there was still time for him to perform a strategic retreat. Without a word she went quickly up the steps, flung the door wide open, seized him by the shoulders, and sent him spinning into the street. He sat, for some moments, on the kerb, as if overcome.

Then, exceeding rash, he retraced his way up the steps as best he could, with the apparent intention of inquiring why he had been handled in such unceremonious fashion. Before, however, he had gained the actual summit, he went flying backwards, with the lady's a.s.sistance, in such summary fashion that it was only the back of his head being brought into contact with the pavement that stopped him.

When he understood, dimly, what had happened, he began to raise an agreeable hullabaloo, mingling imprecations on all and sundry, with curses on the lady in particular, and cries of help to the public and the police. Mrs. Lamb, for the third time that day, was brought into contact with a constable. A policeman appearing round the corner, perceiving Mr. Cottrell gesticulating on the pavement, came sauntering up to learn what was wrong. The butler explained.

"I give her into custody, that's what I do!--tried to murder me, that's what she's done!--broken my brains out!--a.s.sault and battery, that's what it is; and that's what I charge her with, policeman. You put the handcuffs on her, and take her to the station, and I'll come round and give all the evidence that's wanted."

The officer was calmer than Mr. Cottrell. He heard the butler to an end, then he glanced at his mistress.

"What's wrong?"

She explained.

"That man's my butler, although you would not think it to look at him. He has taken advantage of my absence to get into that condition. He kept me waiting for more than twenty minutes on the doorstep, and then when he opened he was not only drunk but insolent. I have dismissed him from my service, and put him into the street, and out in the street he stops. I should be obliged by your moving him away, and preventing his making a disturbance in front of the house."

The policeman, who was young, leaped to the conclusion that right was on the side of the lady. He was disposed to give the butler but a short shrift.

"Now, then, move on! Away you go! We don't want any of your nonsense here!"

Mr. Cottrell vehemently objected.

"Don't talk to me like that, policeman! She owes me three months' wages; there's another nearly due, and another instead of notice. You let her pay me five months' wages before she talks of putting me out into the street."

The policeman looked up at the lady.

"Is what he says true?"

"It's an entire falsehood. Any claim he may have to make must be made in the proper quarter."

She threw the door wide open. By now other members of the household had, unwisely enough, come up to see what the discussion was about. Her action revealed them.

"You see, officer, here are some more of my servants. They, also, have taken advantage of my absence, and are like that man--drunk. I dismiss them all--now. Perhaps you won't mind coming in and seeing their boxes packed; I suspect them of having property of mine in their possession."

The policeman went in--Mr. Cottrell went in also, with his a.s.sistance; he saw their boxes packed. It was a process in which the packers fared badly, the butler in particular. Each servant in the house, almost without exception, was shown to be in possession of property which was indisputably Mrs. Lamb's. Their mistress' att.i.tude was one of magnanimity. She declined to prefer a charge against them, at any rate just then, whatever she might do later. Though, of course, under the circ.u.mstances, to pay them anything in the shape of wages was altogether out of the question. All she wanted to do was to see their backs. And she saw them. A shamefaced, miserable, draggle-tailed crew they looked, as, one after the other, under the policeman's cold official glance, they took their boxes out into the street. Then Mrs. Lamb presented that zealous young officer with a sovereign.

He made short work of clearing the debris away from the front.

So Mrs. Lamb was left alone in that great mansion without a servant to wait on her of any sort or kind.

She went into the boudoir; that and her bedroom, and indeed the whole house, was exactly in the same condition in which she had found it in the morning. It seemed as if no one had moved a finger to put anything in order. Removing her hat, she sat down and tried to think. The result was a failure. Her thoughts would not travel on the lines she wished; they would launch out in undesirable directions. She had scarcely been there a minute before she began to become conscious of an unpleasant feeling that she was not alone, when, all the time, she knew she was. An odd, morbid obsession began to overpower her, as, directly she was alone, it had shown an uncomfortable apt.i.tude to do of late.

Putting her hands up to her eyes she rubbed them with her palms, as if she were endeavouring to rub something away from them.

Then, removing her hands again, she looked about her, queerly.

"Of course it's ridiculous, and I suppose the real explanation is that I'm not so well as I ought to be; but it's funny how I'm always seeming to be back in his room, and how plainly I can see it all; and the bed--the bed." There was a rigid expression on her face which it was not agreeable to observe, as she herself seemed to understand. Standing up she gave herself a little shake, as if she were trying to shake something from off her.

"This won't do--it won't do. It's not healthy. And yet there's something which I ought to look at--to see; to understand. It's something in the room. It's not the bed--not only the bed; it's something else. I wish I could think what it was; I wish I could understand; then perhaps it might go."

The overturned decanter which had been on the buhl table in the morning was still there. She picked it up, holding it up to the light. It was empty. She went to what seemed to be a buhl liqueur case which stood on the floor in a corner. It was locked. She went to her bedroom to look for the key. It was not in its usual place.