Ambrotox and Limping Dick Part 13

The fire flared, and shed its changing light on the green silk, so that by its iridescence of interwoven colours, chasing each other as the garment wavered in the draught, he knew it. Amaryllis had worn it at dinner last night.

Under the light of the big lamp in the hall it had made her figure turn colour like an opal. And again, as she ran with that letter to her bedroom, crimson, purple, peac.o.c.k blue and a green never the same, had chased each other down the swaying folds of her skirt.

The little Dutchwoman eyed the frock, hating while she admired; then suddenly she pushed a fold of the silk into her mouth, and pulled with hands and tore with teeth until long streamers of silk flickered their reds and greens towards the fire.

At last, with a sound between purring and growling, she bunched the stuff together and pushed it down on the coals, lifted the paper tray of fuel from the floor, laid it in the grate over the silk, turned away, threw off her overall and ran cat-footed into the house and out of his sight.

And with her vanished d.i.c.k's last shadow of hesitation.

He crept from behind the door, faced its outer edge, laid a hand from each side on its top, set his right foot on the inside k.n.o.b of the handle, raised his left to the outer, and thence with a quick movement sprang astride of the top.

CHAPTER XI.

THE WINDOW.

When Amaryllis awoke from a sleep in which the remains of the drug Melchard had given her had happily combated the restlessness of fear, she had no memory of how she came to the room in which she found herself.

Under the shock of the strange surroundings she sprang from the bed, and as her feet touched the floor, last night came back to her.

She tried the door--locked!

She went to the window, and had already raised the lower part until it jammed, when there came running beneath an angry woman, threatening with gesture and unintelligible words.

It was Fridji, who was once Sir Randal's parlour-maid, and last night Melchard's companion in the car.

Amaryllis drew back and looked round the room for her gown--the green silk she had worn at dinner last night. It had been taken from her body before she was laid on the bed. The rest of her clothes she still wore, even to the evening shoes which were hurting her feet. But the green frock was gone--an added precaution, no doubt, against her escape.

Fear thrilled in her heart, and grew so terrible that, if the window had given her any prospect but that foul yard and the dark pine trees behind it, she would have broken its gla.s.s and screamed for help.

Almost in despair, she sat trembling on the bed, and thought of her father and of the two Bellamys, and of what they would do, when they caught them, to the men who had stolen Ambrotox and the woman they loved.

All the three? Well, two at least. Yet somehow she felt that it would not be surprising if the worst vengeance should be Limping d.i.c.k's.

And inside her she smiled, and the shaking of her body began to subside.

But before her courage was firm in the saddle there came footsteps in the pa.s.sage--a foot that she knew. The key grated, the door opened, and Melchard entered the room, dressed in a soft, new-looking suit of purplish grey; the jacket too long in the body and too close in the waist, the wide, unstarched cuffs of the mauve shirt turned back--an embryo fashion--over the coat-sleeves.

And with him came the miasma of that nauseating perfume.

The mercy of G.o.d sent her anger, and she forgot that she rose before this intruder covered only in white princess petticoat, green silk stockings and high-heeled bronze shoes.

The petticoat was cut low on neck and shoulders, and the white of the lace shoulder-straps showed bluish between the warm cream-colour of neck and of arms. The face, a moment before pale and worn almost to haggardness, was now flushed with the indignation which gave point and edge to the words which overwhelmed for a moment even the shameless and commercialized criminal.

Of what he was, she knew little, but what she thought of him he could not escape hearing.

Yet, when she paused in, rather than concluded her invective, he had already recovered his effrontery.

"My dear Miss Caldegard," he said, "we were compelled last night, for your own good, to exhibit a mild opiate. Your health required it. It has impaired, I fear, your memory of the circ.u.mstances which have brought you under my care. When you have had a few weeks in which to benefit by the devoted care and scientific attention which we shall bring to bear on your case, you will learn to look on me as what I am--your medical attendant, and to forget--or--or----" and here he ogled her horribly with his fine eyes--"or remember in a new fashion your old lover."

And with this disgusting phrase he came close up to her.

"Lover still," he said, "though discarded and trampled upon."

Amaryllis could not know that her very truculence was a fan to his flame.

"Go out of my room," she cried, and struck him on his mouth and cheek.

The blow was delivered with the action of a slap, but the fingers were clenched, and the arm was swung from the shoulder.

Melchard seized her by the elbows, cruelty and joy making in his countenance a horrible mixture of emotion.

With his face close to hers, he said:

"Oh, yes, I'll go--soon! That tawny hair of yours, Amaryllis, is splendidly voluptuous against your skin of live, creamy satin. I long to run my fingers into its meshes."

And actually he would have touched it--her hair!--but for a voice which spoke sharply through the partly-open door:

"You're wanted, Alban. Come!"

And Amaryllis, in spite of fear and disgust, almost laughed at the disgust and fear in his face as he released her.

"My men downstairs," he said. "Soon--soon I shall see you again."

Then, at the door, he turned to add: "There are four of them, prompt, even rash fellows--all armed but faithful and devoted to me. I beg you to wait until your breakfast is sent up. Attempts to escape are dangerous."

Again the key was turned, and Amaryllis flung herself on the bed, shaking with rage and horror.

But her attention was distracted from herself by the absence of departing footsteps.

The man must be still at the door--listening, spying through some crevice, perhaps.

No--he was talking--listening--replying, in a voice too low for the words to reach her.

And then an answering voice, which rose by swift crescendo, until it drove the man with hasty steps down the pa.s.sage, followed by a screaming final curse.

Fridji the parlour-maid was jealous, was angry, and was making her Melchard a scene! Oh, but how funny things would be if they weren't so beastly!

But Dutch Fridji, having no humour, entered the room in the worst temper of a depraved woman.

"You want breakfast?" she said, locking the door and taking out the key.

Amaryllis looked up with disdainful laziness.

"Of course," she said, "please be quick."