The Avenger Part 2

There came not the slightest response. Then for the first time the hideous meaning of those farewell words of hers broke in upon his brain.

Had she meant it? Had she known or guessed? He leaned forward and touched the white-gloved hand. He raised it and let go. It fell like a dead, inert thing. He stepped back and confronted the cabman, who was rubbing his eyes.

"There's something wrong with your fare, cabby," he said.

The cabby raised the trap door, looked down, and descended heavily on to the pavement.

"Well, I'm blowed!" he said. "Here, wake up, guv'nor!"

There was no response. The cabby threw open the ap.r.o.n of the cab and gently shook the rec.u.mbent figure.

"I can't wait 'ere all night for my fare!" he exclaimed. "Wake up, G.o.d luv us!" he broke off.

He stepped hastily back on to the pavement, and began tugging at one of his lamps.

"Push his hat back, sir," he said. "Let's 'ave a look at 'im."

Wrayson stood upon the step of the cab and lifted the silk hat from the head of the rec.u.mbent figure. Then he sprang back quickly with a little exclamation of horror. The lamp was shining full now upon the man's face, livid and white, upon his staring but sightless eyes, upon something around his neck, a fragment of silken cord, drawn so tightly that the flesh seemed to hang over and almost conceal it.

"Throttled, by G.o.d!" the cabman exclaimed. "I'm off to the police station."

He clambered up to his seat, and without another word struck his horse with the whip. The cab drove off and disappeared. Wrayson turned slowly round, and, closing the door of the flats, mounted with leaden feet to the fourth story.

He entered his own rooms, and walked without hesitation to the window, which was still open. The fresh air was almost a necessity, for he felt himself being slowly stifled. His knees were shaking, a cold icy horror was numbing his heart and senses. A feeling of nightmare was upon him, as though he had risen unexpectedly from a bed of delirium. There in front of him, a little to the left, was the broad empty street amongst whose shadows she had disappeared. On one side was the Park, and there was obscurity indefinable, mysterious; on the other a long row of tall mansions, a rain-soaked pavement, and a curving line of gas lamps.

Beyond, the river, marked with a glittering arc of yellow dots; further away the glow of the sleeping city. Shelter enough there for any one--even for her. A soft, damp breeze was blowing in his face; from amongst the dripping trees of the Park the birds were beginning to make their morning music. Already the blackness of night was pa.s.sing away, the clouds were lightening, the stars were growing fainter. Wrayson leaned a little forward. His eyes were fixed upon the exact spot where she had crossed the road and disappeared. All the horror of the coming day and the days to come loomed out from the background of his thoughts.

CHAPTER III

DISCUSSING THE CRIME

The murder of Morris Barnes, considered merely as an event, came as a G.o.dsend to the halfpenny press, which has an unwritten but immutable contract with the public to provide it with so much sensation during the week, in season or out of season. Nothing else was talked about anywhere.

Under the influence of the general example, Wrayson found himself within a few days discussing its details with perfect coolness, and with an interest which never flagged. He seemed continually to forget his own personal and actual connection with the affair.

It was discussed, amongst other places, at the Sheridan Club, of which Wrayson was a member, and where he spent most of his spare time. At one particular luncheon party the day after the inquest, nothing else was spoken of. For the first time, in Wrayson's hearing, a new and somewhat ominous light was thrown upon the affair.

There were four men at the luncheon party, which was really not a luncheon party at all, but a promiscuous coming together of four of the men who usually sat at what was called the Colonel's table. First of all there was the Colonel himself,--Colonel Edgar Fitzmaurice, C.B., D.S.O.,--easily the most popular member of the club, a distinguished retired officer, white-haired, kindly and genial, a man of whom no one had ever heard another say an unkind word, whose hand was always in his none too well-filled pockets, and whose sympathies were always ready to be enlisted in any forlorn cause, deserving or otherwise. At his right hand sat Wrayson; on his left Sydney Mason, a rising young sculptor, and also a popular member of this somewhat Bohemian circle. Opposite was Stephen Heneage, a man of a different and more secretive type. He called himself a barrister, but he never practised; a journalist at times, but he seldom put his name to anything he wrote. His interests, if he had any, he kept to himself. In a club where a man's standing was reckoned by what he was and what he produced, he owed such consideration as he received to a certain air of reserved strength, the more noteworthy amongst a little coterie of men, who amongst themselves were accustomed to speak their minds freely, and at all times. If he was never brilliant, he had never been heard to say a foolish thing or make a pointless remark. He moved on his way through life, and held his place there more by reason of certain negative qualities which, amongst a community of optimists, were universally ascribed to him, than through any more personal or likable gifts. He had a dark, strong face, but a slim, weakly body. He was never unduly silent, but he was a better listener than talker. If he had no close friends, he certainly had no enemies. Whether he was rich or poor no man knew, but next to the Colonel himself, no one was more ready to subscribe to any of those charities which the Sheridanites were continually inaugurating on behalf of their less fortunate members. The man who succeeds in keeping the "ego" out of sight as a rule neither irritates nor greatly attracts. Stephen Heneage was one of those who stood in this position.

They were talking about the murder, or rather the Colonel was talking and they were listening.

"There is one point," he remarked, filling his gla.s.s and beaming good-humouredly upon his companions, "which seems to have been entirely overlooked. I am referring to the s.e.x of the supposed a.s.sa.s.sin!"

Wrayson looked up inquiringly. It was a point which interested him.

"Nearly all of you have a.s.sumed," the Colonel continued, "that it must have taken a strong man to draw the cord tight enough to have killed that poor fellow without any noticeable struggle. As a matter of fact, a child with that particular knot could have done it. It requires no strength, only delicacy of touch, rapidity and nerve."

"A woman, then--" Wrayson began.

"Bless you, yes! a woman could have done it easily," the Colonel declared, "only unfortunately there don't seem to have been any women about. Why, I've seen it done in Korea with a turn of the wrist. It's all knack."

Wrayson shuddered slightly. The Colonel's words had troubled him more than he would have cared to let any one know.

"Woman or man or child," Mason remarked, "the person who did it seems to have vanished in some remarkable manner from the face of the earth."

"He certainly seems," the Colonel admitted, "to have covered up his traces with admirable skill. I have read every word of the evidence at the inquest, and I can understand that the police are completely confused."

Heneage and Mason exchanged glances of quiet amus.e.m.e.nt whilst the Colonel helped himself to cheese.

"Dear old boy," the latter murmured, "he's off on his hobby. Let him go on! He enjoys it more than anything in the world."

Heneage nodded a.s.sent, and the Colonel returned to the subject with avidity a few moments later.

"This man Morris Barnes," he affirmed, "seems to have been a somewhat despicable, at any rate, a by no means desirable individual. He was of Jewish origin, and he had not long returned from South Africa, where Heaven knows what his occupation was. The money of which he was undoubtedly possessed he seems to have spent, or at any rate some part of it, in aping the life of a dissipated man about town. He was known to the fair promenaders of the Empire and Alhambra, he was an _habitue_ of the places where these--er--ladies partake of supper after the exertions of the evening. Of home life or respectable friends he seems to have had none."

"This," Mason declared, leaning back and lighting a cigarette, "is better than the newspapers. Go on, Colonel! Your biography may not be sympathetic, but it is lifelike!"

The Colonel's eyes were full of a distinct and vivid light. He scarcely heard the interruption. He was on fire with his subject.

"You see," he continued, "that the man's days were spent amongst a cla.s.s where the pa.s.sions run loose, where restraint is an unknown virtue, where self and sensuality are the upraised G.o.ds. One can easily imagine that from amongst such a slough might spring at any time the weed of tragedy.

In other words, this man Morris Barnes moved amongst a cla.s.s of people to whom murder, if it could be safely accomplished, would be little more than an incident."

The Colonel lit a cigar and leaned back in his chair. He was enjoying himself immensely.

"The curious part of the affair is, though," he continued deliberately, "that this murder, as I suppose we must call it, bears none of the hall-marks of rude pa.s.sion. On the contrary, it suggests in more ways than one the touch of the finished artist. The man's whole evening has been traced without the slightest difficulty. He dined at the Cafe Royal alone, promenaded afterwards at the Alhambra, and drove on about supper-time to the Continental. He left there at 12.30 with a couple of ladies whom he appeared to know fairly well, called at their flat for a drink, and sent one out to his cabby--rather unusual forethought for such a bounder. When he reappeared and directed the man to drive him to Cavendish Mansions, Battersea, the driver tried to excuse himself. Both he and his horse were dead tired, he said. Barnes, however, insisted upon keeping him, and off they went. At Cavendish Mansions, Barnes alighted and offered the man a sovereign. Naturally enough the fellow could not change it, and Barnes went in to get some silver from his rooms, promising to return in a minute or two. The cabby descended and walked to the corner of the street to see if he could beg a match for his pipe from any pa.s.ser-by. He may have been away for perhaps five minutes, certainly no more, during which time he stood with his back to the Mansions. Seeing no one about, he returned to his cab, ascended to his seat, naturally without looking inside, and fell fast asleep. The next thing he remembers is being awakened by Wrayson here! So much for the cabby."

"What a fine criminal judge was lost to the country, Colonel, when you chose the army for a career," Mason remarked, turning round to order some coffee. "Such coherence--such an eye for detail. Pa.s.s the matches, Wrayson. Thanks, old chap!"

The Colonel smiled placidly.

"I am afraid," he said, "that I should never have had the heart to sentence anybody to anything, but I must admit that things of this sort do interest me. I love to weigh them up and theorize. The more melodramatic they are the better."

Heneage helped himself to a cigarette from Mason's case, and leaned back in his chair.

"I never have the patience," he remarked, "to read about these things in the newspapers, but the Colonel's _resume_ is always thrilling. Do go on.

There won't be any pool till four o'clock."

The Colonel smiled good-naturedly.

"It's good of you fellows to listen to my prosing," he remarked. "No use denying that it is a sort of hobby of mine. You all know it. Well, we'll say we've finished with the cabby, then. Enter upon the scene, of all people in the world, our friend Wrayson!"

"Hear, hear!" murmured Mason.

Wrayson changed his position slightly. With his head resting upon his hand, he seemed to be engaged in tracing patterns upon the tablecloth.

"Wrayson knows nothing of Barnes beyond the fact that they are neighbours in the same flats. Being the a.s.sistant editor of a journal of world-wide fame, however, he has naturally a telephone in his flat. By means of that instrument he receives a message in the middle of the night from an unknown person in an unknown place, which he is begged to convey to Barnes. The message is in itself mysterious. Taken in conjunction with what happened to Barnes, it is deeply interesting. Barnes, it seems, is to go immediately on his arrival, at whatever hour, to the Hotel Francis.

Presumably he would know from whom the message came, and the sender does not seem to have doubted that if it was conveyed to Barnes he would obey the summons. Wrayson agrees to and does deliver it. That is to say, he writes it down and leaves it in the letter-box of Barnes door, Barnes not having yet returned. Now we begin to get mysterious. That communication from our friend here has not been discovered. It was not in the letter-box; it was not upon the person of the dead man. We cannot tell whether or not he ever received it. I believe that I am right so far?"