The Black Bag Part 18

However, he mounted the steps to the ground floor without adventure and found himself at last in the same dim and ghostly hall which he had entered some six hours before; the mockery of dusk admitted by the fan-light was just strong enough to enable him to identify the general lay of the land and arrangement of furniture.

More confidently with each uncontested step, he continued his quest.

Elation was stirring his spirit when he gained the first floor and moved toward the foot of the second flight, approaching the spot whereat he was to begin the search for the missing purse. The knowledge that he lacked means of obtaining illumination deterred him nothing; he had some hope of finding matches in one of the adjacent rooms, but, failing that, was prepared to ascend the stairs on all fours, feeling every inch of their surface, if it took hours. Ever an optimistic soul, instinctively inclined to father faith with a hope, he felt supremely confident that his search would not prove fruitless, that he would win early release from his temporary straits.

And thus it fell out that, at the instant he was thinking it time to begin to crawl and hunt, his stockinged feet came into contact with something heavy, yielding, warm--something that moved, moaned, and caused his hair to bristle and his flesh to creep.

We will make allowances for him; all along he had gone on the a.s.sumption that his antagonist of the dark stairway would have recovered and made off with all expedition, in the course of ten or twenty minutes, at most, from the time of his accident. To find him still there was something entirely outside of Kirkwood's reckoning: he would as soon have thought to encounter say, Calendar,--would have preferred the latter, indeed. But this fellow whose disability was due to his own interference, who was reasonably to be counted upon to raise the very deuce and all of a row!

The initial shock, however shattering to his equanimity, soon, lost effect.

The man evidently remained unconscious, in fact had barely moved; while the moan that Kirkwood heard, had been distressingly faint.

"Poor devil!" murmured the young man. "He must be in a pretty bad way, for sure!" He knelt, compa.s.sion gentling his heart, and put one hand to the insentient face. A warm sweat moistened his fingers; his palm was fanned by steady respiration.

Immeasurably perplexed, the American rose, slipped on his shoes and b.u.t.toned them, thinking hard the while. What ought he to do? Obviously flight suggested itself,--incontinent flight, antic.i.p.ating the man's recovery. On the other hand, indubitably the latter had sustained such injury that consciousness, when it came to him, would hardly be reinforced by much aggressive power. Moreover, it was to be remembered that the one was in that house with quite as much warrant as the other, unless Kirkwood had drawn a rash inference from the incident of the ragged sentry. The two of them were mutual, if antagonistic, trespa.s.sers; neither would dare bring about the arrest of the other. And then--and this was not the least consideration to influence Kirkwood--perhaps the fellow would die if he got no attention.

Kirkwood shut his teeth grimly. "I'm no a.s.sa.s.sin," he informed himself, "to strike and run. If I've maimed this poor devil and there are consequences, I'll stand 'em. The Lord knows it doesn't matter a d.a.m.n to anybody, not even to me, what happens to me; while _he_ may be valuable."

Light upon the subject, actual as well as figurative, seemed to be the first essential; his mind composed, Kirkwood set himself in search of it.

The floor he was on, however, afforded him no a.s.sistance; the mantels were guiltless of candles and he discovered no matches, either in the wide and silent drawing-room, with its ghastly furniture, like mummies in their linen swathings, or in the small boudoir at the back. He was to look either above or below, it seemed.

After some momentary hesitation, he went up-stairs, his ascent marked by a single and grateful accident; half-way to the top he trod on an object that clinked underfoot, and, stooping, retrieved the lost purse. Thus was he justified of his temerity; the day was saved--that is, to-morrow was.

The rooms of the second-floor were bedchambers, broad, deep, stately, inhabited by seven devils of loneliness. In one, on a dresser, Kirkwood found a stump of candle in a china candlestick; the two charred ends of matches at its base were only an irritating discovery, however--evidence that real matches had been the mode in Number 9, at some remote date.

Disgusted and oppressed by c.u.mulative inquisitiveness, he took the candle-end back to the hall; he would have given much for the time and means to make a more detailed investigation into the secret of the house.

Perhaps it was mostly his hope of chancing on some clue to the mystery of Dorothy Calender--bewitching riddle that she was!--that fascinated his imagination so completely. Aside from her altogether, the great house that stood untenanted, yet in such complete order, so self-contained in its darkened quiet, intrigued him equally with the train of inexplicable events that had brought him within its walls. Now--since his latest entrance--his vision had adjusted itself to cope with the obscurity to some extent; and the street lights, meagerly reflected through the windows from the bosom of a sullen pall of cloud, low-swung above the city, had helped him to piece together many a detail of decoration and furnishing, alike somber and richly dignified. Kirkwood told himself that the owner, whoever he might be, was a man of wealth and taste inherited from another age; he had found little of meretricious to-day in the dwelling, much that was solid and sedate and homely, and--Victorian.... He could have wished for more; a box of early Victorian vestas had been highly acceptable.

Making his way down-stairs to the stricken man--who was quite as he had been--Kirkwood bent over and thrust rifling fingers into his pockets, regardless of the wretched sense of guilt and sneakishness imparted by the action, stubbornly heedless of the possibility of the man's awakening to find himself being searched and robbed.

In the last place he sought, which should (he realized) have been the first, to wit, the fob pocket of the white waistcoat, he found a small gold matchbox, packed tight with wax vestas; and, berating himself for cra.s.s stupidity--he had saved a deal of time and trouble by thinking of this before--lighted the candle.

As its golden flame shot up with scarce a tremor, preyed upon by a perfectly excusable concern, he bent to examine the man's countenance....

The arm which had partly hidden it had fallen back into a natural position.

It was a young face that gleamed pallid in the candlelight--a face unlined, a little vapid and insignificant, with features regular and neat, betraying few characteristics other than the purely negative attributes of a character as yet unformed, possibly unformable; much the sort of a face that he might have expected to see, remembering those thin and pouting lips that before had impressed him. Its owner was probably little more than twenty. In his attire there was a suspicion of a fop's preciseness, aside from its accidental disarray; the cut of his waistcoat was the extreme of the then fashion, the white tie (twisted beneath one ear) an exaggerated "b.u.t.terfly," his collar nearly an inch too tall; and he was shod with pumps suitable only for the dancing-floor,--a whim of the young-bloods of London of that year.

"I can't make him out at all!" declared Kirkwood. "The son of a gentleman too weak to believe that cubs need licking into shape? Reared to man's estate, so sheltered from the wicked world that he never grew a bark?...

The sort that never had a quarrel in his life, 'cept with his tailor?...

Now what the devil is _this_ thing doing in this midnight mischief?...

d.a.m.n!"

It was most exasperating, the incongruity of the boy's appearance a.s.sorted with his double role of persecutor of distressed damsels and nocturnal house-breaker!

Kirkwood bent closer above the motionless head, with puzzled eyes striving to pin down some elusive resemblance that he thought to trace in those vacuous features--a resemblance to some one he had seen, or known, at some past time, somewhere, somehow.

"I give it up. Guess I'm mistaken. Anyhow, five young Englishmen out of every ten of his cla.s.s are just as blond and foolish. Now let's see how bad he's hurt."

With hands strong and gentle, he turned the round, light head. Then, "Ah!"

he commented in the accent of comprehension. For there was an angry looking b.u.mp at the base of the skull; and, the skin having been broken, possibly in collision with the sharp-edged newel-post, a little blood had stained and matted the straw-colored hair.

Kirkwood let the head down and took thought. Recalling a bath-room on the floor above, thither he went, unselfishly forgetful of his predicament if discovered, and, turning on the water, sopped his handkerchief until it dripped. Then, returning, he took the boy's head on his knees, washed the wound, purloined another handkerchief (of silk, with a giddy border) from the other's pocket, and of this manufactured a rude but serviceable bandage.

Toward the conclusion of his attentions, the sufferer began to show signs of returning animation. He stirred restlessly, whimpered a little, and sighed. And Kirkwood, in consternation, got up.

"So!" he commented ruefully. "I guess I am an a.s.s, all right--taking all that trouble for you, my friend. If I've got a grain of sense left, this is my cue to leave you alone in your glory."

He was lingering only to restore to the boy's pockets such articles as he had removed in the search for matches,--the match-box, a few silver coins, a bulky sovereign purse, a handsome, plain gold watch, and so forth. But ere he concluded he was aware that the boy was conscious, that his eyes, open and blinking in the candlelight, were upon him.

They were blue eyes, blue and shallow as a doll's, and edged with long, fine lashes. Intelligence, of a certain degree, was rapidly informing them.

Kirkwood returned their questioning glance, transfixed in indecision, his primal impulse to cut-and-run for it was gone; he had nothing to fear from this child who could not prevent his going whenever he chose to go; while by remaining he might perchance worm from him something about the girl.

"You're feeling better?" He was almost surprised to hear his own voice put the query.

"I--I think so. Ow, my head!... I say, you chap, whoever you are, what's happened?... I want to get up." The boy added peevishly: "Help a fellow, can't you?"

"You've had a nasty fall," Kirkwood observed evenly, pa.s.sing an arm beneath the boy's shoulder and helping him to a sitting position. "Do you remember?"

The other snuffled childishly and scrubbed across the floor to rest his back against the wall.

"Why-y ... I remember fallin'; and then ... I woke up and it was all dark and my head achin' fit to split. I presume I went to sleep again ... I say, what're you, doing here?"

Instead of replying, Kirkwood lifted a warning finger.

"Hush!" he said tensely, alarmed by noises in the street. "You don't suppose--?"

He had been conscious of a carriage rolling up from the corner, as well as that it had drawn up (presumably) before a near-by dwelling. Now the rattle of a key in the hall-door was startlingly audible. Before he could move, the door itself opened with a slam.

Kirkwood moved toward the stair-head, and drew back with a cry of disgust.

"Too late!" he told himself bitterly; his escape was cut off. He could run up-stairs and hide, of course, but the boy would inform against him and....

He b.u.t.toned up his coat, settled his hat on his head, and moved near the candle, where it rested on the floor. One glimpse would suffice to show him the force of the intruders, and one move of his foot put out the light; then--_perhaps_--he might be able to rush them.

Below, a brief pause had followed the noise of the door, as if those entering were standing, irresolute, undecided which way to turn; but abruptly enough the glimmer of candlelight must have been noticed. Kirkwood heard a hushed exclamation, a quick clatter of high heels on the parquetry, pattering feet on the stairs, all but drowned by swish and ripple of silken skirts; and a woman stood at the head of the flight--to the American an apparition profoundly amazing as she paused, the light from the floor casting odd, theatric shadows beneath her eyes and over her brows, edging her eyes themselves with brilliant light beneath their dark lashes, showing her lips straight and drawn, and shimmering upon the spangles of an evening gown, visible beneath the dark cloak which had fallen back from her white, beautiful shoulders.

VIII

MADAME L'INTRIGANTE

"Mrs. Hallam!" cried Kirkwood, beneath his breath.

The woman ignored his existence. Moving swiftly forward, she dropped on both knees by the side of the boy, and caught up one of his hands, clasping it pa.s.sionately in her own.

"Fred!" she cried, a curious break in her tone. "My little Freddie! Oh, what has happened, dearie?"

"Oh, h.e.l.lo, Mamma," grunted that young man, submitting listlessly to her caresses and betraying no overwhelming surprise at her appearance there.