An Eye for an Eye Part 33

Nothing was locked, and five minutes sufficed to show us that no attempt had been made to conceal anything in any of the two chests of drawers, or in the wardrobe. So thoroughly did Boyd search that in each room he went around the wainscoting, tapping it with the jemmy and examining any part which appeared to be loose or movable. The next room, apparently Lady Glaslyn's room, with a small dressing-room adjoining, we searched with redoubled energy, but beyond establishing the fact that her ladyship was not in want of money by the finding of three five-pound notes placed carelessly in an unlocked drawer, there was nothing to arouse our curiosity.

Adjoining the dressing-room, with its window overlooking the road, was a small but elegant apartment upholstered in pale-blue, quite a luxurious little room with a piano; evidently a boudoir. The carpet was so thick and rich that our feet fell noiselessly, while near the window was a handsome Louis XV escritoire inlaid with various woods and heavy mountings of chased ormolu. A pretty cosy-corner occupied the angle beside the tiled hearth, while the little bamboo table with its small shelves spoke mutely of cosy five-o'clock tea often served there.

"I wonder what's in this?" Boyd said, advancing to the escritoire while his a.s.sistant lit the gas.

Finding it locked, my friend bent, examined the keyhole carefully, and then commenced to ply the various skeleton keys. For some time he was unsuccessful, but at length the lock yielded and he opened it. Then, while the local officer took the dark lantern and went along the corridor to explore what further rooms there were, and their character, Boyd and I proceeded to carefully examine every paper, letter or doc.u.ment the escritoire contained. Some letters were addressed to Lady Glaslyn, others to Eva, but most of them were ordinary correspondence between relatives and friends, while the folded doc.u.ments were receipted bills, together with a file of papers relating to some action at law regarding property near Aberdeen.

Behind the receptacle in which we found these letters was a panel which Boyd at once declared concealed some secret drawers, and being well versed in all the contrivances of cabinet-making, be very soon discovered the means by which the panel could be released. As he had predicted, its removal disclosed three small drawers.

To the first I gave my attention, while he took out the contents of the second. The letters, of which there were seven or eight, secured by an elastic band, I took out and read, being puzzled greatly thereby. They were all type-written and bore the post-mark "London, S.E." The first had been received about three months before, the last as recently as a fortnight ago. They were very friendly, commencing "Dear Eva," and although the writer was apparently extremely intimate, there was, however, not a word of love, a fact which gave me some satisfaction.

They all, without exception, contained a most mysterious reference to "the Silence," in terms extremely guarded and curious, one urging the utmost caution and declaring that a grave peril had unexpectedly arisen which must, at all hazards, be removed. The writer did not appear to be a very educated person, for in many places there were mistakes in spelling, while all were devoid of both address or signature, bearing only the single initial "Z."

I pa.s.sed them over to Boyd, asking his opinion, and as he sat at the writing flap reading them we were both suddenly startled by hearing a plaintive cry near us. It was a poor lean cat, who had accidentally been shut up there and was undoubtedly starving.

"These letters are very strange," Boyd observed, looking up at me. "I wonder to what the silence refers?"

"I don't know," I said. "There's evidently some very good reason that they've been concealed here."

As I was speaking I took from beneath some letters, still remaining in the secret drawer Boyd had opened, a wooden pill-box, from which I removed the lid, there being disclosed a small quant.i.ty of a peculiar greyish-blue powder.

"Hulloa!" Boyd exclaimed, with a quick glance at it. "What's that, I wonder? No label on the box. It looks suspicious!"

"Yes," I agreed. "I wonder what it is, that it should be so carefully concealed?"

"Leave it aside for a moment," he said.

Then taking up a large envelope which, while I had been reading the letters, he had been carefully examining, he drew from it two photographs.

"Do you recognise the originals of these?" he inquired with a grave smile.

"Great Heavens!" I gasped. "Why, they are the man and the woman whom we found at Phillimore Place!"

"Exactly," he said, in a voice of satisfaction, just as his a.s.sistant re-entered.

Then, before I could recover from my bewilderment, he took up the little wooden box, exclaiming--

"This powder here is a very suspicious circ.u.mstance, but we'll test it at once."

Turning to the local officer he said--

"I saw you eating something when you met us and you put part of it in your pocket. What was it?"

"A sandwich. My wife always makes me one when I go out on night-duty,"

the man explained.

"Have you any of it left?"

For answer he drew from his pocket a portion of an uneaten sandwich and placed it upon the table. Boyd, with his pocket-knife, cut off a piece of the meat, upon it sprinkled a grain or so of the mysterious powder, and threw it down to the hungry cat, which was mewing loudly, and purring round our legs.

The thin creature, ravenously hungry, devoured it, but ere ten seconds had pa.s.sed, and while we all three were watching attentively, it staggered, with a faint cry, and almost without a struggle rolled over, dead.

"As I suspected," Boyd observed, turning to me. "This is the powder from the herbalist's."

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

UNDER THE LEADEN SEAL.

"So far," continued Boyd, thoughtfully, pushing his hat to the back of his head, "we've proved one thing--that this stuff is poison."

"Yes," I said. "But these photographs? Is it not extraordinary that we find them here among Eva's possessions?"

"It's all extraordinary," he answered. "The letters more strange than anything," and he unlocked the third drawer expectantly, only, however, to find it contained something small wrapped in a piece of dirty wash-leather. He placed it before him, carefully opening it and disclosing something which caused us both to give vent to exclamations of surprise.

Inside was a most commonplace object, yet to us it had a meaning peculiarly tragic--a single penny.

Both of us recollected vividly the finding of a similar coin carefully wrapped in paper upon the body of the man at Phillimore Place, and there must, we decided, be some mysterious connexion between our two discoveries.

"These letters," observed Boyd, putting aside the coin and its wrapping and taking up the correspondence he had been examining when I had found the box of mysterious powder, "they are all addressed to Miss Glaslyn, and in one only, as far as I can see, is her mother mentioned. They evidently refer to some deep secret."

"Do you think the silence can refer to the affair at Kensington?" I suggested, holding one of the letters in my hand.

"It's impossible to tell," he answered. "We have now the clearest proof that these letters were preserved in secret by Eva Glaslyn, together with some unknown but fatal drug, and the photographs of the victim.

Therefore, if circ.u.mstantial evidence may be trusted, I should be inclined to believe that these letters refer to the matter which we are investigating. Perhaps, indeed, the peril mentioned in one of the letters refers to your own endeavours to fathom the mystery."

"The whole thing is utterly bewildering," I said, re-reading the letter in my hand, a communication which certainly was of a most veiled character, evidently being type-written to disguise the writer's ident.i.ty.

"There is no object whatever to be gained by adopting your suggestion,"

it ran. "The only absolutely safe course is to continue as in the past.

The silence is effectual, and for the present is enough. All your fears are quite groundless. Show a bold front and be cautious always.

If you wish to write, send your letter to the old address."

Each of the others were similarly unintelligible, except perhaps the later one, in which the writer said: "You are right. I, too, have discovered cause for apprehension. A peril threatens, but if the secret is preserved it cannot harm us."

With the ma.s.s of papers and correspondence spread before us we all three examined these suspicious letters very carefully. In the drawer which Boyd had opened was, among other things, a few girlish trinkets and souvenirs of the past, and a note signed "Mary Blain," and dated from Riverdene a couple of months before.

In the face of recent events it was a somewhat noteworthy missive, for beginning "Dearest Eva," it gave her an invitation for tennis on the following day, Tuesday. "I have also your admirer," she went on, "and he will no doubt come. Perhaps I shall be compelled to go to town to-morrow afternoon on business, the urgent nature of which you may guess. If I do I will convey your message to the quarter for which it is intended. Be careful how you act, and what you say to F," (meaning, I suppose, myself), "for I have no great faith in him. His friend is, of course, entirely well-disposed towards us."

I pa.s.sed it to Boyd, and when he had read it, asked--

"What's your opinion of that? Is the person mentioned myself? and is the friend actually d.i.c.k?"

"It really seems so," he responded, with knit brows. "In that case they must have long ago suspected you of being aware of their secret. This would, of course, account for the cowardly attempt to take your life."

"By means of this unknown drug here--eh?" I suggested bitterly, pointing to the small box which I had a moment before closed.

"Certainly," said the detective. "There can now be no further doubt of Miss Glaslyn's complicity in the affair."