The Woman with One Hand (and) Mr. Ely's Engagement Part 3

"I suppose that at that dreadful sight I must have fainted, because the next thing I can remember is finding myself lying on the floor and the room all dark. For some time I dared scarcely breathe, far less move; I did not know where my husband might be. How I summoned up courage to enable me to creep upstairs, to this hour I do not know.

When I did I found my husband fast asleep in bed."

"You really must excuse my asking, Mrs. Barnes, but do you happen to recollect what you ate for supper that night, and are you in the habit of suffering from nightmare?"

"Nightmare! That was the first time I watched him. I have watched him over and over again since then. I soon found out that regularly every Friday night he walked in his sleep, and went downstairs, and gloated over that dreadful hand."

"You say that he did this every Friday. Are you suggesting that with him Friday was some sort of anniversary?"

"I don't know. What was I to think? What was any one to think? Don't laugh at me--don't! You think I am a fool, or lying. You shall see the hand for yourself, and tell me what you make of it. I will show it you, if I have to break his box open with a hammer."

In a state of considerable and evident excitement, she crossed the room. I rose to enable her to approach the bureau. She took a small canvas bag out of the pocket of her dress. Out of this bag she took some keys.

"He has my keys. He made me give him them. He never knew that I had duplicates. But I always have had. He seldom went outside the front door; I think he was afraid of being seen in the streets. Whenever he did go I used to lock myself in here, and try to find the spring which opened the box. I had an idea that there might be something in it which I had not seen. I will open it now, if I have to smash it into splinters."

She let down the flap of the bureau. Within there were nests of drawers, and one small centre cupboard. This cupboard she unlocked.

When she had done so, she gave a stifled exclamation. "It has gone!"

she said.

I stooped beside her. "What has gone?"

She turned to me a face which was ghastly in its revelation of abject terror. Her voice had suddenly degenerated into a sort of panting hiss.

"The box! It was here last night. After he had gone I unlocked the bureau, and I looked, and saw it was there." She caught me by the arm, she gripped me with a strength of which, in her normal condition, I should imagine her incapable. "He must have come back like a thief in the night and taken it. He may be hidden somewhere in the house this moment. Oh, my G.o.d!"

CHAPTER III

THE MAN IN THE DOORWAY

I called at Messrs. Cleaver and Caxton's to ask what I should do with the four five-pound notes which had arrived in the letter. The individual who had taken me to the hotel was the only person in the office. It seemed, from his own statement, that he was Mr. Cleaver, the senior partner. When he learned why I had come, he laughed.

"Do with them? Why, spend them, or throw them into the river, or give them to me."

I hesitated. The truth is, the situation threatened to become too complicated. I had an uneasy consciousness that the something which James Southam was to hear of might be something to his exceeding disadvantage. I had heard enough of that sort of thing of late. I did not wish to stand in somebody else's shoes for the sake of hearing more. I resolved to have some sort of understanding with Mr. Cleaver.

"Who is Duncan Rothwell? Is he the client for whom you are acting?"

Mr. Cleaver was occupying himself in tearing a piece of paper into tiny shreds with his fingers. He replied to my question with another.

"Why do you ask?"

"Because the signature attached to the letter which brought the bank-notes is Duncan Rothwell; and, as to my knowledge, I know no Duncan Rothwell, I should like to know who Duncan Rothwell is."

"Do you mind my looking at the letter?"

I did not mind. I let him look at it. He read it through.

"If you will take a hint from me, Mr. Southam, I think I should advise you to restrain your not unnatural curiosity, and wait for things to take their course."

"But, unless I am careful, I may find myself in a false position. I may not be the required James Southam. In fact, I don't mind telling you that I don't believe I am. I am acquainted with no Duncan Rothwell. His whole letter is double Dutch to me. There may be dozens of James Southams about."

"Recent inhabitants of Dulborough? I thought Dulborough was a mere hamlet."

"So it is."

"How long did you live there?"

"I was born and bred in the place."

"Have you any relatives of your own name?"

"I have not a relative in the world."

"If, as you say, you were born and bred in such a place as Dulborough, I presume that you had some knowledge of the inhabitants?'

"I believe I knew something of every creature in all the country side."

"And did you know anything of another James Southam?"

"That is the queer part of it. So far as I know, I was the only Southam thereabouts."

Mr. Cleaver laughed.

"According to your own statement, it appears that, to put it mildly, there is at least a possibility of your being the James Southam we have been instructed to find. Frankly, Mr. Southam, we know very little more about the matter than you do yourself. We have simply been instructed to discover the present address of James Southam, at one time of Dulborough, and we have done so."

"Is that the case?"

From their manner the day before I had suspected that Messrs. Cleaver and Caxton might be merely, as it were, lay figures, and that it was somebody else who held the strings.

"There is something else I should like to mention: I wish to change my hotel." Mr. Cleaver stared.

"Change your hotel? Why? Isn't it good enough?"

"It is not that exactly. It is the domestic arrangements which are not to my taste."

"The domestic arrangements? What do you mean?"

I did not know how to explain; or rather, I did not know how much to explain.

"What do you know of Mrs. Barnes's husband?"

"Really, Mr. Southam, your b.u.mp of curiosity appears to be fully developed. What has Mrs. Barnes's husband to do with you--or with me?

If you don't like your present quarters you are at perfect liberty to change them;--only in that case you must become responsible for your own expenditure." I turned to go. "One moment. If you intend to change your quarters, perhaps, under the circ.u.mstances, you will be so good as to let us know where you propose to go."

"I will let you know if I do go. At any rate, until to-morrow I intend to remain where I am."

Whether it would have been better for me, considering the tragedy which followed, never to have returned to Mrs. Barnes's house at all, is more than I can say. That particular tragedy might not have happened, but, looking at the matter from a purely personal and selfish point of view, whether that would have been better for me, or worse, is another question altogether.