Lord John in New York Part 21

"Hurrah, my lord!" he exclaimed. "What luck to catch you like this! I thought perhaps you'd have got back from Mr. Odell's house by this time, but if you hadn't I was going round to find you. Is the young lady all right?"

"Why do you ask?" I caught him up.

"Because Nance is at our flat. She had leave for the afternoon--the first time she's got off: a sign they trust her. She's got a report, my lord. It's a blood-curdler!"

"Take me to your place and let me hear it," I said, reflecting that it would be stupid to flash off to Long Island, when Nance's news might save a wild goose chase. At worst, I should lose but a few minutes.

And taxying to Teano's, I told him in a few words what a mess I'd made of things.

"They won't have gone back to Long Island," he said excitedly. "You'll understand when you hear Nance and perhaps you'll have some theory."

Nance--a sharp-faced midget who would make as good a thief-catcher as she had been a thief--was proud of her achievement. She was on the way to get proof of the Sisterhood's secret. A girl had half confided in her, and had stopped in fright; but Nance expected to prove soon that the Grey Sisterhood was a "regular gang," a.s.sociated with "high up ones" in New York. "There's a big boss over the whole shebang," she said, "but he's made a bolt. I don't know where--but I'll find out. I guess he's jumped the country; and I guess m'lady o' the mask (that's what we calls the Head Sister behind her back: we all know she wears somethin' under her veil to hide a beauty spot) will be joinin' him.

She's been sort o' gatherin' things together as if for a flit, these last two days, but I couldn't make a break to get word to you."

Nance had more to tell, but nothing which directly concerned Maida. We could only draw our own deductions that the Head Sister wouldn't "flit"

unless she could take the girl. Because Doctor Rameses had found America too hot for him after his last plot against me, no doubt the directress of the Grey Sisterhood had been waiting her chance to play Ruth to his Boaz.

She had now accomplished her great coup, in securing the mummy-case which interested Rameses; and if she'd been able to force or wheedle Maida into breaking faith with me, she could force or wheedle her to the ends of the world.

"Egypt!" I said aloud, as if the word had been spoken in my ear, and I echoed it. "These devils want to get the girl to Egypt and finish the vendetta that began there. What ships sail to-day?"

We learned that one was leaving for Bordeaux, and another for Naples.

Both had been due to sail in the morning, but had been delayed, owing to the strict inspection of cargo. Some lively telephoning followed, but we could get no information from the agents concerning such pa.s.sengers as we described. Nance was ordered back post-haste to Sisterhood House in case, contrary to our theory, the pair had returned. Teano sent a man to the ship sailing for France; and I myself started for the one Naples-bound, the night luggage I'd brought from Long Island on my taxi. I had a mission from my Government, which I served during my convalescence, and I had no right to leave without permission. But I was ready to sacrifice my whole career, rather than see Maida sail for Egypt with a cruel and unscrupulous enemy.

I arrived at the dock just in time to see the ship moving out. In desperation I tried to hire a tug, at no matter what price, to follow and board her when she shed her pilot. The thing was impossible. It was small consolation to be a.s.sured that no such ladies as I described were on board. I felt almost certain they were there, in ordinary dress, having changed from the uniform of the Grey Sisterhood. When every effort had failed in this direction, however, there remained half a hope that they might have been found by Teano's man on the ship starting for Bordeaux. There was a chance of reaching her before she steamed out, and that chance I took; but fate was against me again.

She had been gone twenty minutes when my taxi rushed me to the wharf.

"You've missed nothing. They weren't aboard," said the detective, who awaited my arrival. But how could I be sure that he was right?

The next thing was to cable the police at Naples and Bordeaux: yet so far we had no definite proof against the Head Sister, who had the luck as well as the ingenuity of her supposed partner, Doctor Rameses. She could merely be watched on her arrival at a foreign port, not held: and I dared not even take it firmly for granted that she and Maida had left America, till Teano's frantic energies should bring further particulars of their movements. I blamed myself for the embroglio: still, I would not say, even in the privacy of my own head, "If I hadn't trusted the girl so blindly!"

I spent that night in New York, hoping for news from one direction or other: and though it was not till the morning that Teano picked up anything authentic, I had better fortune. A sudden inspiration came as I walked up and down my room, smoking more cigarettes than were good for me, and racking my brain for a solution of the puzzle.

"What if Maida left a note for you in the shrine, hoping you'd have the sense to look?" a voice seemed to whisper in my ear.

Instantly I became certain that she had done so. It was past ten o'clock, but I jumped into a taxi and flashed back to Roger's house.

After pressing the electric bell a dozen times at least, Winter appeared in deshabille, inclined to grumble. I went straight to the violated shrine, and switched on the electric light in its curious globes of golden gla.s.s. The portrait of Maida's beautiful mother faced the door and gazed into my eyes. Never had I quite realised its likeness to the girl. It was as if Maida looked at me.

"If there's anything, it will be behind that portrait," I thought.

Going straight to it, I lifted the heavy gold frame, and a folded piece of paper fell to the floor. No writing was visible, but I knew I had found what I sought.

Opening the note, I had a shock of surprise. The paper had the name and crest of my New York hotel upon it; and the few lines scrawled in pencil were signed "John Hasle." So well was the writing imitated, that my best friend would have sworn it was mine.

The letter began abruptly (perhaps the forger didn't know how I was accustomed to address Maida): "Something has happened. I am sending a closed automobile to take you away and your friend also. Get her to consent. It is necessary for the safety of your future. The chauffeur and an a.s.sistant will carry down the mummy-case if you ask them. They have my instructions already, and will bring a packing-box in which it can be placed in the hall downstairs, in order not to be conspicuous.

The mummy will no longer be safe where it is. I'll explain when we meet. I am called away from America at once, on official business, and the man with the chauffeur knows the ship on which I sail this afternoon. I beg you will do what he asks, as you may depend on him as my mouthpiece, and I have time now for no more. Yours ever and in haste, John Hasle."

Underneath, Maida had scribbled, also in pencil, "Your letter has been handed me just outside the door of this house. I don't understand it.

Though I suppose it's genuine, so many strange things have happened, I am a little afraid. If there's any trick, and you come to look for me, I earnestly pray you may find this in time. I shall leave a tiny end of paper showing behind my mother's portrait, where I'll hide it."

Rameses I believed to be far away, out of reach: but the a.s.sistant he had left behind was worthy of him. She had reason to know the New York hotel I frequented: the note-paper was easy to get: only the forgery business needed an expert. And what a clever idea that the summons should come from me! The Head Sister had known how hard, perhaps impossible, it would have been to make the girl break her promise. Now I saw why consent had been given to my calling on Maida at her brother's house. Unconsciously I had been but a catspaw: and had not my darling girl felt vaguely suspicious, I might never have guessed how she had been enticed away.

The message told little: but at least it confirmed my theory that the two had gone on board ship. How Maida had been induced actually to sail, was another question, but even that might be answered some day.

In the morning, Teano was surprised, instead of receiving word from Nance, to see her in person. She had been sent on an errand from Sisterhood House to the nearest village, and rather than return had simply--as she expressed it--"taken French leave." The Head Sister had gone, leaving everything in charge of a woman next in authority. The inmates, sisters, lay sisters, and protegees (women and children) were told that the directress had news of a near relative's illness; she was obliged to be absent for a few days, perhaps longer. Unless later instructions arrived, all was to go on as if she were at home. Nance knew that the grey automobile used by the Sisters had come back from New York with a bundle in it; a bundle composed of two grey uniform cloaks and bonnets with veils. Somehow the two ladies had changed their outer garments, probably in that "closed motor" mentioned in the forged letter: and the bundle had been transferred from one car to the other, by the man with the chauffeur, doubtless a servant of the Head Sister.

Nance, prying for other details, had found and pieced together a few torn sc.r.a.ps of paper--the remains of a letter--stuck between the braided wicker-work and ribbon of a waste-paper basket in the directress's study. There were three of these bits, the largest no larger than a child's thumb nail, the smallest not half that size; but patching them together Teano was able to show me the mutilated words "meet--possible--Cair----"

This strengthened my conviction that the Head Sister, with Maida and Maida's mysterious mummy-case, was on the way to Egypt, where she would meet Rameses in Cairo. The two must have been on board the ship sailing for Naples, in some disguise not easy to penetrate. I determined to act on this supposition, explain the circ.u.mstances as best I could to our Amba.s.sador, trying with his aid and, that of the cable, to get leave for Europe. If leave were refused, rather than abandon Maida to the mercy of her enemies, I would "chuck" the army.

Eventually I could volunteer again, when strong enough to serve. But leave was not refused. My affairs were settled with lightning speed, and I sailed a few days later.

At Naples I got no definite news; but it appeared that, on board the suspected ship, there had been a number of nurses wearing a navy-blue uniform, with long veils attached to their small bonnets. Most of the nurses wore their veils thrown back, but a few covered their faces on leaving the ship. This gave me a clue--and a hope. The costume of a nurse afforded the necessary concealment. I guessed that the Head Sister had adopted it for herself and Maida, and that, through Rameses'

influence, she had obtained pa.s.sports.

No nurses in uniform had, so far as I could learn, lately left Naples for Egypt; but with the aid of the police I learned that three days before my arrival a tall, elderly woman, heavily cloaked and veiled, accompanied by a beautiful blonde girl, had sailed for Alexandria.

Their papers described them as the wife and daughter of a French doctor in Cairo, and though permission for women to enter Egypt was difficult to obtain from British authorities at that time, they had it.

Whether or no this "Madame and Mademoiselle Rameau" were the Head Sister and Maida Odell, I could not be sure: but in any case my destination must be Cairo. On arriving there I could hear of no such person as Doctor Rameau: but I found army friends: help from "high up"

was forthcoming. I learned what non-military persons had travelled during the last week, and what direction they had taken. Among the few women on the list there were only two who might be those for whom I searched; and _they were Egyptian ladies_. The sister and aunt of an official in Government employ had left Cairo by rail for Asiut, whence they were to do some days' desert travel, to reach the country house belonging to their relative.

I determined to follow; and at Asiut I engaged a small caravan. The little oasis-town near which I had been told to find the house was two days' journey from "The City of Sacred Cats"; and when we reached the place, the servants of Ahmed Ali Bey were surprised by the questions of my interpreter. Their master was in Cairo with his family, and they had not been warned of the arrival of visitors. They were discreet and guarded in their answers, after the first moment of blank astonishment: but I realised instantly that the women I had followed from Cairo were not bound for this place. I had come up against a blank wall, and had only my own deductions to go upon. Were the supposed aunt and sister of Ahmed Ali Bey, Maida and her companion, or had I taken a false trail? Something within myself said that I was right as to their ident.i.ty, but that the two (protected by the name of some friend of Doctor Rameses) had never intended to come to his house. Where, then, should I look for them?

They must, I thought, have come as far as Asiut, otherwise their pa.s.ses would not have availed them in these days of military supervision. But beyond Asiut the desert stretched wide and mysterious. My only hope lay in the fact that caravans could be tracked, and that there were only certain directions in which stopping-places could be found. My camel-leader, who spoke a little English, described to me the three or four routes, one of which all travellers must choose in order to reach a desert inn or "borg" on the way to distant oasis villages or towns.

But which should I choose?

In any case, we were obliged to retrace our steps for ten or twelve miles, as far as a certain well, and there I should have to decide definitely. It was late in the afternoon when we reached the spot again, and a wind which threatened simoom had covered the heart-shaped footmarks made by our own and other camels, as with a tidal wave. The sky was overcast, and of a faint copper colour, clouded with greyish veils of blowing sand. The desert was empty, or so I thought at first; but as I turned my field-gla.s.ses north, south, east and west, I saw something very far off which moved uncertainly towards us. Presently I made out that this something was a camel, alone, and without pack or rider: yet he must, it seemed, have broken loose from a caravan.

As he came nearer--perhaps sighting us from afar off and wishing for our company--we saw that he was white, or a very pale grey. He was not an ordinary pack-camel, but was of the aristocratic type, a _mehari_, well bred, with graceful swaying movements and long slender legs. My first year in the army I had spent in Egypt, where I'd picked up some Arabic and Turkish, and had been enough impressed with the strangeness of native life to remember many customs and superst.i.tions. As the white _mehari_ approached, a timid air of wildness mingling with its longing for society, I realised that it had been a pampered beast, dear to the heart of its vanished owner. Round its neck was an elaborate collar of beads and sh.e.l.ls, with dangling fetishes of all sorts: bra.s.s and silver "Hands of Fatma," metal tubes for texts from the Koran, horns of coral and lumps of amber.

It seemed to me that there was something strange about the beast. It held its head in a singular way, shaking it from time to time, and my camel man thought as I thought. "This animal has been looked on by the Evil Eye," he said. "It brings misfortune where it goes. Perhaps it has had a fit of madness, and how comes to us in a quiet interval, only to deceive and then attack us. I have seen such things in the desert.

A camel goes mad, kills its master, and seeks other victims for the demon that has entered into it. I will drive it off."

"No," I said, as the Arab would have threatened the camel with his stick. "Keep out of the creature's way if you like. I'm going to see if it will let me touch it."

Very cautiously, in order not to frighten the wild-looking beast, I urged my own mount a few steps forward, and held out a handful of dates. The camel eagerly fixed its eyes on the food and moved towards me as if magnetised. It stretched its neck so that the queer, purse-like nostrils and loose lips quivered above the dates: it hesitated: in another instant it would have s.n.a.t.c.hed a mouthful had I not exclaimed aloud at a thing I saw.

Among the tubes and horns and Hands of Fatma hung a gold bangle with the name "Maida" in emeralds, Madeline Odell's birthstone. I recognised the ornament at a glance. She wore it always, even with the uniform of the Grey Sisterhood. I knew she had ridden this camel and that this was her call for help. She had hoped desperately that I might follow, and feeble as was the chance that I should ever see the bangle, she had s.n.a.t.c.hed it because there was no other.

"Good G.o.d!" I cried sharply--and foolishly, for the camel took fright, and went loping away into the cloud of sand. "Come along!" I yelled to my man, and rode after it. "We must keep up with the beast. We must see where it goes."

I explained no more. Doubtless the Arab thought me as mad as the white camel, but I didn't care. The _mehari_ had come to me as a messenger from Maida, and to lose sight of it would be, I felt, to lose her.

Fortunately, after the first sprint, the creature slackened speed, even turning its long neck now and then to see if we followed. So we went on, behind the shadowy form in the sand-cloud, until we came to the high adobe wall of a desert inn, a borg which my camel-man knew well.

Outside the closed gate our quarry paused: as we drew closer it bounded away, stopped and hovered as if watching to see whether the gate would be opened to let us in. It was opened; and we were greeted by the landlord, a dull-faced fellow, half Arab, half French, who looked as if his favourite tipple were absinthe. In the act of letting us into the big, bare courtyard he spied the white camel in the distance. "Oh, it's you again, is it?" he muttered, and would have shut the gate quickly as my camel leader and I with the three animals of our tiny caravan entered.

"Is that white _mehari_ yours?" I inquired.

The landlord shook his head. "But no!" he protested. "It is mad. It is a beast of evil omen."

"What did I tell the honoured gentleman?" said my man, delighted. But I was obstinate. "Don't shut the beast out," I directed. "It doesn't seem dangerous. I will pay you well to let it in, and for its food--or any damage it may do."