XXXII + 

A New Client + 

On the afternoon of Friday, June 2, 18⁠—, I was entering in my casebook some memoranda having reference to the very curious matter of the Duchess of Datchet’s Deed-box. It was about two o’clock. Andrews came in and laid a card upon my desk. On it was inscribed “Mr. Paul Lessingham.” + 

“Show Mr. Lessingham in.” + 

Andrews showed him in. I was, of course, familiar with Mr. Lessingham’s appearance, but it was the first time I had had with him any personal communication. He held out his hand to me. + 

“You are Mr. Champnell?” + 

“I am.” + 

“I believe that I have not had the honour of meeting you before, Mr. Champnell, but with your father, the Earl of Glenlivet, I have the pleasure of some acquaintance.” + 

I bowed. He looked at me, fixedly, as if he were trying to make out what sort of man I was. “You are very young, Mr. Champnell.” + 

“I have been told that an eminent offender in that respect once asserted that youth is not of necessity a crime.” + 

“And you have chosen a singular profession⁠—one in which one hardly looks for juvenility.” + 

“You yourself, Mr. Lessingham, are not old. In a statesman one expects grey hairs.⁠—I trust that I am sufficiently ancient to be able to do you service.” + 

He smiled. + 

“I think it possible. I have heard of you more than once, Mr. Champnell, always to your advantage. My friend, Sir John Seymour, was telling me, only the other day, that you have recently conducted for him some business, of a very delicate nature, with much skill and tact; and he warmly advised me, if ever I found myself in a predicament, to come to you. I find myself in a predicament now.” + 

Again I bowed. + 

“A predicament, I fancy, of an altogether unparalleled sort. I take it that anything I may say to you will be as though it were said to a father confessor.” + 

“You may rest assured of that.” + 

“Good.⁠—Then, to make the matter clear to you I must begin by telling you a story⁠—if I may trespass on your patience to that extent. I will endeavour not to be more verbose than the occasion requires.” + 

I offered him a chair, placing it in such a position that the light from the window would have shone full upon his face. With the calmest possible air, as if unconscious of my design, he carried the chair to the other side of my desk, twisting it right round before he sat on it⁠—so that now the light was at his back and on my face. Crossing his legs, clasping his hands about his knee, he sat in silence for some moments, as if turning something over in his mind. He glanced round the room. + 

“I suppose, Mr. Champnell, that some singular tales have been told in here.” + 

“Some very singular tales indeed. I am never appalled by singularity. It is my normal atmosphere.” + 

“And yet I should be disposed to wager that you have never listened to so strange a story as that which I am about to tell you now. So astonishing, indeed, is the chapter in my life which I am about to open out to you, that I have more than once had to take myself to task, and fit the incidents together with mathematical accuracy in order to assure myself of its perfect truth.” + 

He paused. There was about his demeanour that suggestion of reluctance which I not uncommonly discover in individuals who are about to take the skeletons from their cupboards and parade them before my eyes. His next remark seemed to point to the fact that he perceived what was passing through my thoughts. + 

“My position is not rendered easier by the circumstance that I am not of a communicative nature. I am not in sympathy with the spirit of the age which craves for personal advertisement. I hold that the private life even of a public man should be held inviolate. I resent, with peculiar bitterness, the attempts of prying eyes to peer into matters which, as it seems to me, concern myself alone. You must, therefore, bear with me, Mr. Champnell, if I seem awkward in disclosing to you certain incidents in my career which I had hoped would continue locked in the secret depository of my own bosom, at any rate till I was carried to the grave. I am sure you will suffer me to stand excused if I frankly admit that it is only an irresistible chain of incidents which has constrained me to make of you a confidant.” + 

“My experience tells me, Mr. Lessingham, that no one ever does come to me until they are compelled. In that respect I am regarded as something worse even than a medical man.” + 

A wintry smile flitted across his features⁠—it was clear that he regarded me as a good deal worse than a medical man. Presently he began to tell me one of the most remarkable tales which even I had heard. As he proceeded I understood how strong, and how natural, had been his desire for reticence. On the mere score of credibility he must have greatly preferred to have kept his own counsel. For my part I own, unreservedly, that I should have deemed the tale incredible had it been told me by Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of by Paul Lessingham. + 

XXXIII + 

What Came of Looking Through a Lattice + 

He began in accents which halted not a little. By degrees his voice grew firmer. Words came from him with greater fluency. + 

“I am not yet forty. So when I tell you that twenty years ago I was a mere youth I am stating what is a sufficiently obvious truth. It is twenty years ago since the events of which I am going to speak transpired. + 

“I lost both my parents when I was quite a lad, and by their death I was left in a position in which I was, to an unusual extent in one so young, my own master. I was ever of a rambling turn of mind, and when, at the mature age of eighteen, I left school, I decided that I should learn more from travel than from sojourn at a university. So, since there was no one to say me nay, instead of going either to Oxford or Cambridge, I went abroad. After a few months I found myself in Egypt⁠—I was down with fever at Shepheard’s Hotel in Cairo. I had caught it by drinking polluted water during an excursion with some Bedouins to Palmyra. + 

“When the fever had left me I went out one night into the town in search of amusement. I went, unaccompanied, into the native quarter, not a wise thing to do, especially at night, but at eighteen one is not always wise, and I was weary of the monotony of the sickroom, and eager for something which had in it a spice of adventure. I found myself in a street which I have reason to believe is no longer existing. It had a French name, and was called the Rue de Rabagas⁠—I saw the name on the corner as I turned into it, and it has left an impress on the tablets of my memory which is never likely to be obliterated. + 

“It was a narrow street, and, of course, a dirty one, ill-lit, and, apparently, at the moment of my appearance, deserted. I had gone, perhaps, halfway down its tortuous length, blundering more than once into the kennel, wondering what fantastic whim had brought me into such unsavoury quarters, and what would happen to me if, as seemed extremely possible, I lost my way. On a sudden my ears were saluted by sounds which proceeded from a house which I was passing⁠—sounds of music and of singing. + 

“I paused. I stood awhile to listen. + 

“There was an open window on my right, which was screened by latticed blinds. From the room which was behind these blinds the sounds were coming. Someone was singing, accompanied by an instrument resembling a guitar⁠—singing uncommonly well.” + 

Mr. Lessingham stopped. A stream of recollection seemed to come flooding over him. A dreamy look came into his eyes. + 

“I remember it all as clearly as if it were yesterday. How it all comes back⁠—the dirty street, the evil smells, the imperfect light, the girl’s voice filling all at once the air. It was a girl’s voice⁠—full, and round, and sweet; an organ seldom met with, especially in such a place as that. She sang a little chansonnette, which, just then, half Europe was humming⁠—it occurred in an opera which they were acting at one of the Boulevard theatres⁠—La P’tite Voyageuse. The effect, coming so unexpectedly, was startling. I stood and heard her to an end. + 

“Inspired by I know not what impulse of curiosity, when the song was finished, I moved one of the lattice blinds a little aside, so as to enable me to get a glimpse of the singer. I found myself looking into what seemed to be a sort of café⁠—one of those places which are found all over the Continent, in which women sing in order to attract custom. There was a low platform at one end of the room, and on it were seated three women. One of them had evidently just been accompanying her own song⁠—she still had an instrument of music in her hands, and was striking a few idle notes. The other two had been acting as audience. They were attired in the fantastic apparel which the women who are found in such places generally wear. An old woman was sitting knitting in a corner, whom I took to be the inevitable patronne. With the exception of these four the place was empty. + 

“They must have heard me touch the lattice, or seen it moving, for no sooner did I glance within than the three pairs of eyes on the platform were raised and fixed on mine. The old woman in the corner alone showed no consciousness of my neighbourhood. We eyed one another in silence for a second or two. Then the girl with the harp⁠—the instrument she was manipulating proved to be fashioned more like a harp than a guitar⁠—called out to me, + 

“ ‘Entrez, monsieur!⁠—Soye le bienvenu!’ + 

“I was a little tired. Rather curious as to whereabouts I was⁠—the place struck me, even at that first momentary glimpse, as hardly in the ordinary line of that kind of thing. And not unwilling to listen to a repetition of the former song, or to another sung by the same singer. + 

“ ‘On condition,’ I replied, ‘that you sing me another song.’ + 

“ ‘Ah, monsieur, with the greatest pleasure in the world I will sing you twenty.’ + 

“She was almost, if not quite, as good as her word. She entertained me with song after song. I may safely say that I have seldom if ever heard melody more enchanting. All languages seemed to be the same to her. She sang in French and Italian, German and English⁠—in tongues with which I was unfamiliar. It was in these Eastern harmonies that she was most successful. They were indescribably weird and thrilling, and she delivered them with a verve and sweetness which was amazing. I sat at one of the little tables with which the room was dotted, listening entranced. + 

“Time passed more rapidly than I supposed. While she sang I sipped the liquor with which the old woman had supplied me. So enthralled was I by the display of the girl’s astonishing gifts that I did not notice what it was I was drinking. Looking back I can only surmise that it was some poisonous concoction of the creature’s own. That one small glass had on me the strangest effect. I was still weak from the fever which I had only just succeeded in shaking off, and that, no doubt, had something to do with the result. But, as I continued to sit, I was conscious that I was sinking into a lethargic condition, against which I was incapable of struggling. + 

“After a while the original performer ceased her efforts, and, her companions taking her place, she came and joined me at the little table. Looking at my watch I was surprised to perceive the lateness of the hour. I rose to leave. She caught me by the wrist. + 

“ ‘Do not go,’ she said;⁠—she spoke English of a sort, and with the queerest accent. ‘All is well with you. Rest awhile.’ + 

“You will smile⁠—I should smile, perhaps, were I the listener instead of you, but it is the simple truth that her touch had on me what I can only describe as a magnetic influence. As her fingers closed upon my wrist, I felt as powerless in her grasp as if she held me with bands of steel. What seemed an invitation was virtually a command. I had to stay whether I would or wouldn’t. She called for more liquor, and at what again was really her command I drank of it. I do not think that after she touched my wrist I uttered a word. She did all the talking. And, while she talked, she kept her eyes fixed on my face. Those eyes of hers! They were a devil’s. I can positively affirm that they had on me a diabolical effect. They robbed me of my consciousness, of my power of volition, of my capacity to think⁠—they made me as wax in her hands. My last recollection of that fatal night is of her sitting in front of me, bending over the table, stroking my wrist with her extended fingers, staring at me with her awful eyes. After that, a curtain seems to descend. There comes a period of oblivion.” + 

Mr. Lessingham ceased. His manner was calm and self-contained enough; but, in spite of that I could see that the mere recollection of the things which he told me moved his nature to its foundations. There was eloquence in the drawn lines about his mouth, and in the strained expression of his eyes. + 

So far his tale was sufficiently commonplace. Places such as the one which he described abound in the Cairo of today; and many are the Englishmen who have entered them to their exceeding bitter cost. With that keen intuition which has done him yeoman’s service in the political arena, Mr. Lessingham at once perceived the direction my thoughts were taking. + 

“You have heard this tale before?⁠—No doubt. And often. The traps are many, and the fools and the unwary are not a few. The singularity of my experience is still to come. You must forgive me if I seem to stumble in the telling. I am anxious to present my case as baldly, and with as little appearance of exaggeration as possible. I say with as little appearance, for some appearance of exaggeration I fear is unavoidable. My case is so unique, and so out of the common run of our everyday experience, that the plainest possible statement must smack of the sensational. + 

“As, I fancy, you have guessed, when understanding returned to me, I found myself in an apartment with which I was unfamiliar. I was lying, undressed, on a heap of rugs in a corner of a low-pitched room which was furnished in a fashion which, when I grasped the details, filled me with amazement. By my side knelt the Woman of the Songs. Leaning over, she wooed my mouth with kisses. I cannot describe to you the sense of horror and of loathing with which the contact of her lips oppressed me. There was about her something so unnatural, so inhuman, that I believe even then I could have destroyed her with as little sense of moral turpitude as if she had been some noxious insect. + 

“ ‘Where am I?’ I exclaimed. + 

“ ‘You are with the children of Isis,’ she replied. What she meant I did not know, and do not to this hour. ‘You are in the hands of the great goddess⁠—of the mother of men.’ + 

“ ‘How did I come here?’ + 

“ ‘By the loving kindness of the great mother.’ + 

“I do not, of course, pretend to give you the exact text of her words, but they were to that effect. + 

“Half raising myself on the heap of rugs, I gazed about me⁠—and was astounded at what I saw. + 

“The place in which I was, though the reverse of lofty, was of considerable size⁠—I could not conceive whereabouts it could be. The walls and roof were of bare stone⁠—as though the whole had been hewed out of the solid rock. It seemed to be some sort of temple, and was redolent with the most extraordinary odour. An altar stood about the centre, fashioned out of a single block of stone. On it a fire burned with a faint blue flame⁠—the fumes which rose from it were no doubt chiefly responsible for the prevailing perfumes. Behind it was a huge bronze figure, more than life size. It was in a sitting posture, and represented a woman. Although it resembled no portrayal of her I have seen either before or since, I came afterwards to understand that it was meant for Isis. On the idol’s brow was poised a beetle. That the creature was alive seemed clear, for, as I looked at it, it opened and shut its wings. + 

“If the one on the forehead of the goddess was the only live beetle which the place contained, it was not the only representation. It was modelled in the solid stone of the roof, and depicted in flaming colours on hangings which here and there were hung against the walls. Wherever the eye turned it rested on a scarab. The effect was bewildering. It was as though one saw things through the distorted glamour of a nightmare. I asked myself if I were not still dreaming; if my appearance of consciousness were not after all a mere delusion; if I had really regained my senses. + 

“And, here, Mr. Champnell, I wish to point out, and to emphasise the fact, that I am not prepared to positively affirm what portion of my adventures in that extraordinary, and horrible place, was actuality, and what the product of a feverish imagination. Had I been persuaded that all I thought I saw, I really did see, I should have opened my lips long ago, let the consequences to myself have been what they might. But there is the crux. The happenings were of such an incredible character, and my condition was such an abnormal one⁠—I was never really myself from the first moment to the last⁠—that I have hesitated, and still do hesitate, to assert where, precisely, fiction ended and fact began. + 

“With some misty notion of testing my actual condition I endeavoured to get off the heap of rugs on which I reclined. As I did so the woman at my side laid her hand against my chest, lightly. But, had her gentle pressure been the equivalent of a ton of iron, it could not have been more effectual. I collapsed, sank back upon the rugs, and lay there, panting for breath, wondering if I had crossed the border line which divides madness from sanity. + 

“ ‘Let me get up!⁠—let me go!’ I gasped. + 

“ ‘Nay,’ she murmured, ‘stay with me yet awhile, O my beloved.’ + 

“And again she kissed me.” + 

Once more Mr. Lessingham paused. An involuntary shudder went all over him. In spite of the evidently great effort which he was making to retain his self-control his features were contorted by an anguished spasm. For some seconds he seemed at a loss to find words to enable him to continue. + 

When he did go on, his voice was harsh and strained. + 

“I am altogether incapable of even hinting to you the nauseous nature of that woman’s kisses. They filled me with an indescribable repulsion. I look back at them with a feeling of physical, mental, and moral horror, across an interval of twenty years. The most dreadful part of it was that I was wholly incapable of offering even the faintest resistance to her caresses. I lay there like a log. She did with me as she would, and in dumb agony I endured.” + 

He took his handkerchief from his pocket, and, although the day was cool, with it he wiped the perspiration from his brow. + 

“To dwell in detail on what occurred during my involuntary sojourn in that fearful place is beyond my power. I cannot even venture to attempt it. The attempt, were it made, would be futile, and, to me, painful beyond measure. I seem to have seen all that happened as in a glass darkly⁠—with about it all an element of unreality. As I have already remarked, the things which revealed themselves, dimly, to my perception, seemed too bizarre, too hideous, to be true. + 

“It was only afterwards, when I was in a position to compare dates, that I was enabled to determine what had been the length of my imprisonment. It appears that I was in that horrible den more than two months⁠—two unspeakable months. And the whole time there were comings and goings, a phantasmagoric array of eerie figures continually passed to and fro before my hazy eyes. What I judge to have been religious services took place; in which the altar, the bronze image, and the beetle on its brow, figure largely. Not only were they conducted with a bewildering confusion of mysterious rites, but, if my memory is in the least degree trustworthy, they were orgies of nameless horrors. I seem to have seen things take place at them at the mere thought of which the brain reels and trembles. + 

“Indeed it is in connection with the cult of the obscene deity to whom these wretched creatures paid their scandalous vows that my most awful memories seem to have been associated. It may have been⁠—I hope it was, a mirage born of my half delirious state, but it seemed to me that they offered human sacrifices.” + 

When Mr. Lessingham said this, I pricked up my ears. For reasons of my own, which will immediately transpire, I had been wondering if he would make any reference to a human sacrifice. He noted my display of interest⁠—but misapprehended the cause. + 

“I see you start, I do not wonder. But I repeat that unless I was the victim of some extraordinary species of double sight⁠—in which case the whole business would resolve itself into the fabric of a dream, and I should indeed thank God!⁠—I saw, on more than one occasion, a human sacrifice offered on that stone altar, presumably to the grim image which looked down on it. And, unless I err, in each case the sacrificial object was a woman, stripped to the skin, as white as you or I⁠—and before they burned her they subjected her to every variety of outrage of which even the minds of demons could conceive. More than once since then I have seemed to hear the shrieks of the victims ringing through the air, mingled with the triumphant cries of her frenzied murderers, and the music of their harps. + 

“It was the cumulative horrors of such a scene which gave me the strength, or the courage, or the madness, I know not which it was, to burst the bonds which bound me, and which, even in the bursting, made of me, even to this hour, a haunted man. + 

“There had been a sacrifice⁠—unless, as I have repeatedly observed, the whole was nothing but a dream. A woman⁠—a young and lovely Englishwoman, if I could believe the evidence of my own eyes, had been outraged, and burnt alive, while I lay there helpless, looking on. The business was concluded. The ashes of the victim had been consumed by the participants. The worshippers had departed. I was left alone with the woman of the songs, who apparently acted as the guardian of that worse than slaughterhouse. She was, as usual after such an orgy, rather a devil than a human being, drunk with an insensate frenzy, delirious with inhuman longings. As she approached to offer to me her loathed caresses, I was on a sudden conscious of something which I had not felt before when in her company. It was as though something had slipped away from me⁠—some weight which had oppressed me, some bond by which I had been bound. I was aroused, all at once, to a sense of freedom; to a knowledge that the blood which coursed through my veins was after all my own, that I was master of my own honour. + 

“I can only suppose that through all those weeks she had kept me there in a state of mesmeric stupor. That, taking advantage of the weakness which the fever had left behind, by the exercise of her diabolical arts, she had not allowed me to pass out of a condition of hypnotic trance. Now, for some reason, the cord was loosed. Possibly her absorption in her religious duties had caused her to forget to tighten it. Anyhow, as she approached me, she approached a man, and one who, for the first time for many a day, was his own man. She herself seemed wholly unconscious of anything of the kind. As she drew nearer to me, and nearer, she appeared to be entirely oblivious of the fact that I was anything but the fibreless, emasculated creature which, up to that moment, she had made of me. + 

“But she knew it when she touched me⁠—when she stooped to press her lips to mine. At that instant the accumulating rage which had been smouldering in my breast through all those leaden torturing hours, sprang into flame. Leaping off my couch of rugs, I flung my hands about her throat⁠—and then she knew I was awake. Then she strove to tighten the cord which she had suffered to become unduly loose. Her baleful eyes were fixed on mine. I knew that she was putting out her utmost force to trick me of my manhood. But I fought with her like one possessed, and I conquered⁠—in a fashion. I compressed her throat with my two hands as with an iron vice. I knew that I was struggling for more than life, that the odds were all against me, that I was staking my all upon the casting of a die⁠—I stuck at nothing which could make me victor. + 

“Tighter and tighter my pressure grew⁠—I did not stay to think if I was killing her⁠—till on a sudden⁠—” + 

Mr. Lessingham stopped. He stared with fixed, glassy eyes, as if the whole was being reenacted in front of him. His voice faltered. I thought he would break down. But, with an effort, he continued. + 

“On a sudden, I felt her slipping from between my fingers. Without the slightest warning, in an instant she had vanished, and where, not a moment before, she herself had been, I found myself confronting a monstrous beetle⁠—a huge, writhing creation of some wild nightmare. + 

“At first the creature stood as high as I did. But, as I stared at it, in stupefied amazement⁠—as you may easily imagine⁠—the thing dwindled while I gazed. I did not stop to see how far the process of dwindling continued⁠—a stark raving madman for the nonce, I fled as if all the fiends in hell were at my heels.” + 

XXXIV + 

After Twenty Years + 

“How I reached the open air I cannot tell you⁠—I do not know. I have a confused recollection of rushing through vaulted passages, through endless corridors, of trampling over people who tried to arrest my passage⁠—and the rest is blank. + 

“When I again came to myself I was lying in the house of an American missionary named Clements. I had been found, at early dawn, stark naked, in a Cairo street, and picked up for dead. Judging from appearances I must have wandered for miles, all through the night. Whence I had come, or whither I was going, none could tell⁠—I could not tell myself. For weeks I hovered between life and death. The kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Clements was not to be measured by words. I was brought to their house a penniless, helpless, battered stranger, and they gave me all they had to offer, without money and without price⁠—with no expectation of an earthly reward. Let no one pretend that there is no Christian charity under the sun. The debt I owed that man and woman I was never able to repay. Before I was properly myself again, and in a position to offer some adequate testimony of the gratitude I felt, Mrs. Clements was dead, drowned during an excursion on the Nile, and her husband had departed on a missionary expedition into Central Africa, from which he never returned. + 

“Although, in a measure, my physical health returned, for months after I had left the roof of my hospitable hosts, I was in a state of semi-imbecility. I suffered from a species of aphasia. For days together I was speechless, and could remember nothing⁠—not even my own name. And, when that stage had passed, and I began to move more freely among my fellows, for years I was but a wreck of my former self. I was visited, at all hours of the day and night, by frightful⁠—I know not whether to call them visions, they were real enough to me, but since they were visible to no one but myself, perhaps that is the word which best describes them. Their presence invariably plunged me into a state of abject terror, against which I was unable to even make a show of fighting. To such an extent did they embitter my existence, that I voluntarily placed myself under the treatment of an expert in mental pathology. For a considerable period of time I was under his constant supervision, but the visitations were as inexplicable to him as they were to me. + 

“By degrees, however, they became rarer and rarer, until at last I flattered myself that I had once more become as other men. After an interval, to make sure, I devoted myself to politics. Thenceforward I have lived, as they phrase it, in the public eye. Private life, in any peculiar sense of the term, I have had none.” + 

Mr. Lessingham ceased. His tale was not uninteresting, and, to say the least of it, was curious. But I still was at a loss to understand what it had to do with me, or what was the purport of his presence in my room. Since he remained silent, as if the matter, so far as he was concerned, was at an end, I told him so. + 

“I presume, Mr. Lessingham, that all this is but a prelude to the play. At present I do not see where it is that I come in.” + 

Still for some seconds he was silent. When he spoke his voice was grave and sombre, as if he were burdened by a weight of woe. + 

“Unfortunately, as you put it, all this has been but a prelude to the play. Were it not so I should not now stand in such pressing want of the services of a confidential agent⁠—that is, of an experienced man of the world, who has been endowed by nature with phenomenal perceptive faculties, and in whose capacity and honour I can place the completest confidence.” + 

I smiled⁠—the compliment was a pointed one. + 

“I hope your estimate of me is not too high.” + 

“I hope not⁠—for my sake, as well as for your own. I have heard great things of you. If ever man stood in need of all that human skill and acumen can do for him, I certainly am he.” + 

His words aroused my curiosity. I was conscious of feeling more interested than heretofore. + 

“I will do my best for you. Man can do no more. Only give my best a trial.” + 

“I will. At once.” + 

He looked at me long and earnestly. Then, leaning forward, he said, lowering his voice perhaps unconsciously, + 

“The fact is, Mr. Champnell, that quite recently events have happened which threaten to bridge the chasm of twenty years, and to place me face to face with that plague spot of the past. At this moment I stand in imminent peril of becoming again the wretched thing I was when I fled from that den of all the devils. It is to guard me against this that I have come to you. I want you to unravel the tangled thread which threatens to drag me to my doom⁠—and, when unravelled to sunder it⁠—forever, if God wills!⁠—in twain.” + 

“Explain.” + 

To be frank, for the moment I thought him mad. He went on. + 

“Three weeks ago, when I returned late one night from a sitting in the House of Commons, I found, on my study table, a sheet of paper on which there was a representation⁠—marvellously like!⁠—of the creature into which, as it seemed to me, the woman of the songs was transformed as I clutched her throat between my hands. The mere sight of it brought back one of those visitations of which I have told you, and which I thought I had done with forever⁠—I was convulsed by an agony of fear, thrown into a state approximating to a paralysis both of mind and body.” + 

“But why?” + 

“I cannot tell you. I only know that I have never dared to allow my thoughts to recur to that last dread scene, lest the mere recurrence should drive me mad.” + 

“What was this you found upon your study table⁠—merely a drawing?” + 

“It was a representation, produced by what process I cannot say, which was so wonderfully, so diabolically, like the original, that for a moment I thought the thing itself was on my table.” + 

“Who put it there?” + 

“That is precisely what I wish you to find out⁠—what I wish you to make it your instant business to ascertain. I have found the thing, under similar circumstances, on three separate occasions, on my study table⁠—and each time it has had on me the same hideous effect.” + 

“Each time after you have returned from a late sitting in the House of Commons?” + 

“Exactly.” + 

“Where are these⁠—what shall I call them⁠—delineations?” + 

“That, again, I cannot tell you.” + 

“What do you mean?” + 

“What I say. Each time, when I recovered, the thing had vanished.” + 

“Sheet of paper and all?” + 

“Apparently⁠—though on that point I could not be positive. You will understand that my study table is apt to be littered with sheets of paper, and I could not absolutely determine that the thing had not stared at me from one of those. The delineation itself, to use your word, certainly had vanished.” + 

I began to suspect that this was a case rather for a doctor than for a man of my profession. And hinted as much. + 

“Don’t you think it is possible, Mr. Lessingham, that you have been overworking yourself⁠—that you have been driving your brain too hard, and that you have been the victim of an optical delusion?” + 

“I thought so myself; I may say that I almost hoped so. But wait till I have finished. You will find that there is no loophole in that direction.” + 

He appeared to be recalling events in their due order. His manner was studiously cold⁠—as if he were endeavouring, despite the strangeness of his story, to impress me with the literal accuracy of each syllable he uttered. + 

“The night before last, on returning home, I found in my study a stranger.” + 

“A stranger?” + 

“Yes.⁠—In other words, a burglar.” + 

“A burglar?⁠—I see.⁠—Go on.” + 

He had paused. His demeanour was becoming odder and odder. + 

“On my entry he was engaged in forcing an entry into my bureau. I need hardly say that I advanced to seize him. But⁠—I could not.” + 

“You could not?⁠—How do you mean you could not?” + 

“I mean simply what I say. You must understand that this was no ordinary felon. Of what nationality he was I cannot tell you. He only uttered two words, and they were certainly in English, but apart from that he was dumb. He wore no covering on his head or feet. Indeed, his only garment was a long dark flowing cloak which, as it fluttered about him, revealed that his limbs were bare.” + 

“An unique costume for a burglar.” + 

“The instant I saw him I realised that he was in some way connected with that adventure in the Rue de Rabagas. What he said and did, proved it to the hilt.” + 

“What did he say and do?” + 

“As I approached to effect his capture, he pronounced aloud two words which recalled that awful scene the recollection of which always lingers in my brain, and of which I never dare to permit myself to think. Their very utterance threw me into a sort of convulsion.” + 

“What were the words?” + 

Mr. Lessingham opened his mouth⁠—and shut it. A marked change took place in the expression of his countenance. His eyes became fixed and staring⁠—resembling the glassy orbs of the somnambulist. For a moment I feared that he was going to give me an object lesson in the “visitations” of which I had heard so much. I rose, with a view of offering him assistance. He motioned me back. + 

“Thank you.⁠—It will pass away.” + 

His voice was dry and husky⁠—unlike his usual silvern tones. After an uncomfortable interval he managed to continue. + 

“You see for yourself, Mr. Champnell, what a miserable weakling, when this subject is broached, I still remain. I cannot utter the words the stranger uttered, I cannot even write them down. For some inscrutable reason they have on me an effect similar to that which spells and incantations had on people in tales of witchcraft.” + 

“I suppose, Mr. Lessingham, that there is no doubt that this mysterious stranger was not himself an optical delusion?” + 

“Scarcely. There is the evidence of my servants to prove the contrary.” + 

“Did your servants see him?” + 

“Some of them⁠—yes. Then there is the evidence of the bureau. The fellow had smashed the top right in two. When I came to examine the contents I learned that a packet of letters was missing. They were letters which I had received from Miss Lindon, a lady whom I hope to make my wife. This, also, I state to you in confidence.” + 

“What use would he be likely to make of them?” + 

“If matters stand as I fear they do, he might make a very serious misuse of them. If the object of these wretches, after all these years, is a wild revenge, they would be capable, having discovered what she is to me, of working Miss Lindon a fatal mischief⁠—or, at the very least, of poisoning her mind.” + 

“I see.⁠—How did the thief escape⁠—did he, like the delineation, vanish into air?” + 

“He escaped by the much more prosaic method of dashing through the drawing-room window, and clambering down from the verandah into the street, where he ran right into someone’s arms.” + 

“Into whose arms⁠—a constable’s?” + 

“No; into Mr. Atherton’s⁠—Sydney Atherton’s.” + 

“The inventor?” + 

“The same.⁠—Do you know him?” + 

“I do. Sydney Atherton and I are friends of a good many years’ standing.⁠—But Atherton must have seen where he came from;⁠—and, anyhow, if he was in the state of undress which you have described, why didn’t he stop him?” + 

“Mr. Atherton’s reasons were his own. He did not stop him, and, so far as I can learn, he did not attempt to stop him. Instead, he knocked at my hall door to inform me that he had seen a man climb out of my window.” + 

“I happen to know that, at certain seasons, Atherton is a queer fish⁠—but that sounds very queer indeed.” + 

“The truth is, Mr. Champnell, that, if it were not for Mr. Atherton, I doubt if I should have troubled you even now. The accident of his being an acquaintance of yours makes my task easier.” + 

He drew his chair closer to me with an air of briskness which had been foreign to him before. For some reason, which I was unable to fathom, the introduction of Atherton’s name seemed to have enlivened him. However, I was not long to remain in darkness. In half a dozen sentences he threw more light on the real cause of his visit to me than he had done in all that had gone before. His bearing, too, was more businesslike and to the point. For the first time I had some glimmerings of the politician⁠—alert, keen, eager⁠—as he is known to all the world. + 

“Mr. Atherton, like myself, has been a postulant for Miss Lindon’s hand. Because I have succeeded where he has failed, he has chosen to be angry. It seems that he has had dealings, either with my visitor of Tuesday night, or with some other his acquaintance, and he proposes to use what he has gleaned from him to the disadvantage of my character. I have just come from Mr. Atherton. From hints he dropped I conclude that, probably during the last few hours, he has had an interview with someone who was connected in some way with that lurid patch in my career; that this person made so-called revelations, which were nothing but a series of monstrous lies; and these so-called revelations Mr. Atherton has threatened, in so many words, to place before Miss Lindon. That is an eventuality which I wish to avoid. My own conviction is that there is at this moment in London an emissary from that den in the whilom Rue de Rabagas⁠—for all I know it may be the Woman of the Songs herself. Whether the sole purport of this individual’s presence is to do me injury, I am, as yet, in no position to say, but that it is proposed to work me mischief, at any rate, by the way, is plain. I believe that Mr. Atherton knows more about this person’s individuality and whereabouts than he has been willing, so far, to admit. I want you, therefore, to ascertain these things on my behalf; to find out what, and where, this person is, to drag her!⁠—or him;⁠—out into the light of day. In short, I want you to effectually protect me from the terrorism which threatens once more to overwhelm my mental and my physical powers⁠—which bids fair to destroy my intellect, my career, my life, my all.” + 

“What reason have you for suspecting that Mr. Atherton has seen this individual of whom you speak⁠—has he told you so?” + 

“Practically⁠—yes.” + 

“I know Atherton well. In his not infrequent moments of excitement he is apt to use strong language, but it goes no further. I believe him to be the last person in the world to do anyone an intentional injustice, under any circumstances whatever. If I go to him, armed with credentials from you, when he understands the real gravity of the situation⁠—which it will be my business to make him do, I believe that, spontaneously, of his own accord, he will tell me as much about this mysterious individual as he knows himself.” + 

“Then go to him at once.” + 

“Good. I will. The result I will communicate to you.” + 

I rose from my seat. As I did so, someone rushed into the outer office with a din and a clatter. Andrews’ voice, and another, became distinctly audible⁠—Andrews’ apparently raised in vigorous expostulation. Raised, seemingly, in vain, for presently the door of my own particular sanctum was thrown open with a crash, and Mr. Sydney Atherton himself came dashing in⁠—evidently conspicuously under the influence of one of those not infrequent “moments of excitement” of which I had just been speaking. + 

XXXV + 

A Bringer of Tidings + 

Atherton did not wait to see who might or might not be present, but, without even pausing to take breath, he broke into full cry on the instant⁠—as is occasionally his wont. + 

“Champnell!⁠—Thank goodness I’ve found you in!⁠—I want you!⁠—At once!⁠—Don’t stop to talk, but stick your hat on, and put your best foot forward⁠—I’ll tell you all about it in the cab.” + 

I endeavoured to call his attention to Mr. Lessingham’s presence⁠—but without success. + 

“My dear fellow⁠—” + 

When I had got as far as that he cut me short. + 

“Don’t ‘dear fellow’ me!⁠—None of your jabber! And none of your excuses either! I don’t care if you’ve got an engagement with the Queen, you’ll have to chuck it. Where’s that dashed hat of yours⁠—or are you going without it? Don’t I tell you that every second cut to waste may mean the difference between life and death?⁠—Do you want me to drag you down to the cab by the hair of your head?” + 

“I will try not to constrain you to quite so drastic a resource⁠—and I was coming to you at once in any case. I only want to call your attention to the fact that I am not alone.⁠—Here is Mr. Lessingham.” + 

In his harum-scarum haste Mr. Lessingham had gone unnoticed. Now that his observation was particularly directed to him, Atherton started, turned, and glared at my latest client in a fashion which was scarcely flattering. + 

“Oh!⁠—It’s you, is it?⁠—What the deuce are you doing here?” + 

Before Lessingham could reply to this most unceremonious query, Atherton, rushing forward, gripped him by the arm. + 

“Have you seen her?” + 

Lessingham, not unnaturally nonplussed by the other’s curious conduct, stared at him in unmistakable amazement. + 

“Have I seen whom?” + 

“Marjorie Lindon!” + 

“Marjorie Lindon?” + 

Lessingham paused. He was evidently asking himself what the inquiry meant. + 

“I have not seen Miss Lindon since last night. Why do you ask?” + 

“Then Heaven help us!⁠—As I’m a living man I believe he, she, or it has got her!” + 

His words were incomprehensible enough to stand in copious need of explanation⁠—as Mr. Lessingham plainly thought. + 

“What is it that you mean, sir?” + 

“What I say⁠—I believe that that Oriental friend of yours has got her in her clutches⁠—if it is a ‘her;’ goodness alone knows what the infernal conjurer’s real sex may be.” + 

“Atherton!⁠—Explain yourself!” + 

On a sudden Lessingham’s tones rang out like a trumpet call. + 

“If damage comes to her I shall be fit to cut my throat⁠—and yours!” + 

Mr. Lessingham’s next proceeding surprised me⁠—I imagine it surprised Atherton still more. Springing at Sydney like a tiger, he caught him by the throat. + 

“You⁠—you hound! Of what wretched folly have you been guilty? If so much as a hair of her head is injured you shall repay it me ten thousandfold!⁠—You mischief-making, intermeddling, jealous fool!” + 

He shook Sydney as if he had been a rat⁠—then flung him from him headlong on to the floor. It reminded me of nothing so much as Othello’s treatment of Iago. Never had I seen a man so transformed by rage. Lessingham seemed to have positively increased in stature. As he stood glowering down at the prostrate Sydney, he might have stood for a materialistic conception of human retribution. + 

Sydney, I take it, was rather surprised than hurt. For a moment or two he lay quite still. Then, lifting his head, he looked up his assailant. Then, raising himself to his feet, he shook himself⁠—as if with a view of learning if all his bones were whole. Putting his hands up to his neck, he rubbed it, gently. And he grinned. + 

“By God, Lessingham, there’s more in you than I thought. After all, you are a man. There’s some holding power in those wrists of yours⁠—they’ve nearly broken my neck. When this business is finished, I should like to put on the gloves with you, and fight it out. You’re clean wasted upon politics⁠—Damn it, man, give me your hand!” + 

Mr. Lessingham did not give him his hand. Atherton took it⁠—and gave it a hearty shake with both of his. + 

If the first paroxysm of his passion had passed, Lessingham was still sufficiently stern. + 

“Be so good as not to trifle, Mr. Atherton. If what you say is correct, and the wretch to whom you allude really has Miss Lindon at her mercy, then the woman I love⁠—and whom you also pretend to love!⁠—stands in imminent peril not only of a ghastly death, but of what is infinitely worse than death.” + 

“The deuce she does!” Atherton wheeled round towards me. “Champnell, haven’t you got that dashed hat of yours yet? Don’t stand there like a tailor’s dummy, keeping me on tenterhooks⁠—move yourself! I’ll tell you all about it in the cab.⁠—And, Lessingham, if you’ll come with us I’ll tell you too.” + 

XXXVI + 

What the Tidings Were + 

Three in a hansom cab is not, under all circumstances, the most comfortable method of conveyance⁠—when one of the trio happens to be Sydney Atherton in one of his “moments of excitement” it is distinctly the opposite; as, on that occasion, Mr. Lessingham and I both quickly found. Sometimes he sat on my knees, sometimes on Lessingham’s, and frequently, when he unexpectedly stood up, and all but precipitated himself on to the horse’s back, on nobody’s. In the eagerness of his gesticulations, first he knocked off my hat, then he knocked off Lessingham’s, then his own, then all three together⁠—once, his own hat rolling into the mud, he sprang into the road, without previously going through the empty form of advising the driver of his intention, to pick it up. When he turned to speak to Lessingham, he thrust his elbow into my eye; and when he turned to speak to me, he thrust it into Lessingham’s. Never, for one solitary instant, was he at rest, or either of us at ease. The wonder is that the gymnastics in which he incessantly indulged did not sufficiently attract public notice to induce a policeman to put at least a momentary period to our progress. Had speed not been of primary importance I should have insisted on the transference of the expedition to the somewhat wider limits of a four-wheeler. + 

His elucidation of the causes of his agitation was apparently more comprehensible to Lessingham than it was to me. I had to piece this and that together under considerable difficulties. By degrees I did arrive at something like a clear notion of what had actually taken place. + 

He commenced by addressing Lessingham⁠—and thrusting his elbow into my eye. + 

“Did Marjorie tell you about the fellow she found in the street?” Up went his arm to force the trapdoor open overhead⁠—and off went my hat. “Now then, William Henry!⁠—let her go!⁠—if you kill the horse I’ll buy you another!” + 

We were already going much faster than, legally, we ought to have done⁠—but that, seemingly to him was not a matter of the slightest consequence. Lessingham replied to his inquiry. + 

“She did not.” + 

“You know the fellow I saw coming out of your drawing-room window?” + 

“Yes.” + 

“Well, Marjorie found him the morning after in front of her breakfast-room window⁠—in the middle of the street. Seems he had been wandering about all night, unclothed⁠—in the rain and the mud, and all the rest of it⁠—in a condition of hypnotic trance.” + 

“Who is the ⸻ gentleman you are alluding to?” + 

“Says his name’s Holt, Robert Holt.” + 

“Holt?⁠—Is he an Englishman?” + 

“Very much so⁠—City quill-driver out of a shop⁠—stony broke absolutely! Got the chuck from the casual ward⁠—wouldn’t let him in⁠—house full, and that sort of thing⁠—poor devil! Pretty passes you politicians bring men to!” + 

“Are you sure?” + 

“Of what?” + 

“Are you sure that this man, Robert Holt, is the same person whom, as you put it, you saw coming out of my drawing-room window?” + 

“Sure!⁠—Of course I’m sure!⁠—Think I didn’t recognise him?⁠—Besides, there was the man’s own tale⁠—owned to it himself⁠—besides all the rest, which sent one rushing Fulham way.” + 

“You must remember, Mr. Atherton, that I am wholly in the dark as to what has happened. What has the man, Holt, to do with the errand on which we are bound?” + 

“Am I not coming to it? If you would let me tell the tale in my own way I should get there in less than no time, but you will keep on cutting in⁠—how the deuce do you suppose Champnell is to make head or tail of the business if you will persist in interrupting?⁠—Marjorie took the beggar in⁠—he told his tale to her⁠—she sent for me⁠—that was just now; caught me on the steps after I had been lunching with Dora Grayling. Holt re-dished his yarn⁠—I smelt a rat⁠—saw that a connection possibly existed between the thief who’d been playing confounded conjuring tricks off on to me and this interesting party down Fulham way⁠—” + 

“What party down Fulham way?” + 

“This friend of Holt’s⁠—am I not telling you? There you are, you see⁠—won’t let me finish! When Holt slipped through the window⁠—which is the most sensible thing he seems to have done; if I’d been in his shoes I’d have slipped through forty windows!⁠—dusky coloured charmer caught him on the hop⁠—doctored him⁠—sent him out to commit burglary by deputy. I said to Holt, ‘Show us this agreeable little crib, young man.’ Holt was game⁠—then Marjorie chipped in⁠—she wanted to go and see it too. I said, ‘You’ll be sorry if you do,’⁠—that settled it! After that she’d have gone if she’d died⁠—I never did have a persuasive way with women. So off we toddled, Marjorie, Holt, and I, in a growler⁠—spotted the crib in less than no time⁠—invited ourselves in by the kitchen window⁠—house seemed empty. Presently Holt became hypnotised before my eyes⁠—the best established case of hypnotism by suggestion I ever yet encountered⁠—started off on a pilgrimage of one. Like an idiot I followed, leaving Marjorie to wait for me⁠—” + 

“Alone?” + 

“Alone!⁠—Am I not telling you?⁠—Great Scott, Lessingham, in the House of Commons they must be hazy to think you smart! I said, ‘I’ll send the first sane soul I meet to keep you company.’ As luck would have it, I never met one⁠—only kids, and a baker, who wouldn’t leave his cart, or take it with him either. I’d covered pretty nearly two miles before I came across a peeler⁠—and when I did the man was cracked⁠—and he thought me mad, or drunk, or both. By the time I’d got myself within nodding distance of being run in for obstructing the police in the execution of their duty, without inducing him to move a single one of his twenty-four-inch feet, Holt was out of sight. So, since all my pains in his direction were clean thrown away, there was nothing left for me but to scurry back to Marjorie⁠—so I scurried, and I found the house empty, no one there, and Marjorie gone.” + 

“But, I don’t quite follow⁠—” + 

Atherton impetuously declined to allow Mr. Lessingham to conclude. + 

“Of course you don’t quite follow, and you’ll follow still less if you will keep getting in front. I went upstairs and downstairs, inside and out⁠—shouted myself hoarse as a crow⁠—nothing was to be seen of Marjorie⁠—or heard; until, as I was coming down the stairs for about the five-and-fiftieth time, I stepped on something hard which was lying in the passage. I picked it up⁠—it was a ring; this ring. Its shape is not just what it was⁠—I’m not as light as gossamer, especially when I come jumping down stairs six at a time⁠—but what’s left of it is here.” + 

Sydney held something in front of him. Mr. Lessingham wriggled to one side to enable him to see. Then he made a snatch at it. + 

“It’s mine!” + 

Sydney dodged it out of his reach. + 

“What do you mean, it’s yours?” + 

“It’s the ring I gave Marjorie for an engagement ring. Give it me, you hound!⁠—unless you wish me to do you violence in the cab.” + 

With complete disregard of the limitations of space⁠—or of my comfort⁠—Lessingham thrust him vigorously aside. Then gripping Sydney by the wrist, he seized the gaud⁠—Sydney yielding it just in time to save himself from being precipitated into the street. Ravished of his treasure, Sydney turned and surveyed the ravisher with something like a glance of admiration. + 

“Hang me, Lessingham, if I don’t believe there is some warm blood in those fishlike veins of yours. Please the piper, I’ll live to fight you after all⁠—with the bare ones, sir, as a gentleman should do.” + 

Lessingham seemed to pay no attention to him whatever. He was surveying the ring, which Sydney had trampled out of shape, with looks of the deepest concern. + 

“Marjorie’s ring!⁠—The one I gave her! Something serious must have happened to her before she would have dropped my ring, and left it lying where it fell.” + 

Atherton went on. + 

“That’s it!⁠—What has happened to her!⁠—I’ll be dashed if I know!⁠—When it was clear that there she wasn’t, I tore off to find out where she was. Came across old Lindon⁠—he knew nothing;⁠—I rather fancy I startled him in the middle of Pall Mall, when I left he stared after me like one possessed, and his hat was lying in the gutter. Went home⁠—she wasn’t there. Asked Dora Grayling⁠—she’d seen nothing of her. No one had seen anything of her⁠—she had vanished into air. Then I said to myself, ‘You’re a first-class idiot, on my honour! While you’re looking for her, like a lost sheep, the betting is that the girl’s in Holt’s friend’s house the whole jolly time. When you were there, the chances are that she’d just stepped out for a stroll, and that now she’s back again, and wondering where on earth you’ve gone!’ So I made up my mind that I’d fly back and see⁠—because the idea of her standing on the front doorstep looking for me, while I was going off my nut looking for her, commended itself to what I call my sense of humour; and on my way it struck me that it would be the part of wisdom to pick up Champnell, because if there is a man who can be backed to find a needle in any amount of haystacks it is the great Augustus.⁠—That horse has moved itself after all, because here we are. Now, cabman, don’t go driving further on⁠—you’ll have to put a girdle round the earth if you do; because you’ll have to reach this point again before you get your fare.⁠—This is the magician’s house!” + 

XXXVII + 

What Was Hidden Under the Floor + 

The cab pulled up in front of a tumbledown cheap “villa” in an unfinished cheap neighbourhood⁠—the whole place a living monument of the defeat of the speculative builder. + 

Atherton leaped out on to the grass-grown rubble which was meant for a footpath. + 

“I don’t see Marjorie looking for me on the doorstep.” + 

Nor did I⁠—I saw nothing but what appeared to be an unoccupied ramshackle brick abomination. Suddenly Sydney gave an exclamation. + 

“Hullo!⁠—The front door’s closed!” + 

I was hard at his heels. + 

“What do you mean?” + 

“Why, when I went I left the front door open. It looks as if I’ve made an idiot of myself after all, and Marjorie’s returned⁠—let’s hope to goodness that I have.” + 

He knocked. While we waited for a response I questioned him. + 

“Why did you leave the door open when you went?” + 

“I hardly know⁠—I imagine that it was with some dim idea of Marjorie’s being able to get in if she returned while I was absent⁠—but the truth is I was in such a condition of helter skelter that I am not prepared to swear that I had any reasonable reason.” + 

“I suppose there is no doubt that you did leave it open?” + 

“Absolutely none⁠—on that I’ll stake my life.” + 

“Was it open when you returned from your pursuit of Holt?” + 

“Wide open⁠—I walked straight in expecting to find her waiting for me in the front room⁠—I was struck all of a heap when I found she wasn’t there.” + 

“Were there any signs of a struggle?” + 

“None⁠—there were no signs of anything. Everything was just as I had left it, with the exception of the ring which I trod on in the passage, and which Lessingham has.” + 

“If Miss Lindon has returned, it does not look as if she were in the house at present.” + 

It did not⁠—unless silence had such meaning. Atherton had knocked loudly three times without succeeding in attracting the slightest notice from within. + 

“It strikes me that this is another case of seeking admission through that hospitable window at the back.” + 

Atherton led the way to the rear. Lessingham and I followed. There was not even an apology for a yard, still less a garden⁠—there was not even a fence of any sort, to serve as an enclosure, and to shut off the house from the wilderness of waste land. The kitchen window was open. I asked Sydney if he had left it so. + 

“I don’t know⁠—I dare say we did; I don’t fancy that either of us stood on the order of his coming.” + 

While he spoke, he scrambled over the sill. We followed. When he was in, he shouted at the top of his voice, + 

“Marjorie! Marjorie! Speak to me, Marjorie⁠—it is I⁠—Sydney!” + 

The words echoed through the house. Only silence answered. He led the way to the front room. Suddenly he stopped. + 

“Hollo!” he cried. “The blind’s down!” I had noticed, when we were outside, that the blind was down at the front room window. “It was up when I went, that I’ll swear. That someone has been here is pretty plain⁠—let’s hope it’s Marjorie.” + 

He had only taken a step forward into the room when he again stopped short to exclaim. + 

“My stars!⁠—here’s a sudden clearance!⁠—Why, the place is empty⁠—everything’s clean gone!” + 

“What do you mean?⁠—was it furnished when you left?” + 

The room was empty enough then. + 

“Furnished?⁠—I don’t know that it was exactly what you’d call furnished⁠—the party who ran this establishment had a taste in upholstery which was all his own⁠—but there was a carpet, and a bed, and⁠—and lots of things⁠—for the most part, I should have said, distinctly Eastern curiosities. They seem to have evaporated into smoke⁠—which may be a way which is common enough among Eastern curiosities, though it’s queer to me.” + 

Atherton was staring about him as if he found it difficult to credit the evidence of his own eyes. + 

“How long ago is it since you left?” + 

He referred to his watch. + 

“Something over an hour⁠—possibly an hour and a half; I couldn’t swear to the exact moment, but it certainly isn’t more.” + 

“Did you notice any signs of packing up?” + 

“Not a sign.” Going to the window he drew up the blind⁠—speaking as he did so. “The queer thing about this business is that when we first got in this blind wouldn’t draw up a little bit, so, since it wouldn’t go up I pulled it down, roller and all, now it draws up as easily and smoothly as if it had always been the best blind that ever lived.” + 

Standing at Sydney’s back I saw that the cabman on his box was signalling to us with his outstretched hand. Sydney perceived him too. He threw up the sash. + 

“What’s the matter with you?” + 

“Excuse me, sir, but who’s the old gent?” + 

“What old gent?” + 

“Why the old gent peeping through the window of the room upstairs?” + 

The words were hardly out of the driver’s mouth when Sydney was through the door and flying up the staircase. I followed rather more soberly⁠—his methods were a little too flighty for me. When I reached the landing, dashing out of the front room he rushed into the one at the back⁠—then through a door at the side. He came out shouting. + 

“What’s the idiot mean!⁠—with his old gent! I’d old gent him if I got him!⁠—There’s not a creature about the place!” + 

He returned into the front room⁠—I at his heels. That certainly was empty⁠—and not only empty, but it showed no traces of recent occupation. The dust lay thick upon the floor⁠—there was that mouldy, earthy smell which is so frequently found in apartments which have been long untenanted. + 

“Are you sure, Atherton, that there is no one at the back?” + 

“Of course I’m sure⁠—you can go and see for yourself if you like; do you think I’m blind? Jehu’s drunk.” Throwing up the sash he addressed the driver. “What do you mean with your old gent at the window?⁠—what window?” + 

“That window, sir.” + 

“Go to!⁠—you’re dreaming, man!⁠—there’s no one here.” + 

“Begging your pardon, sir, but there was someone there not a minute ago.” + 

“Imagination, cabman⁠—the slant of the light on the glass⁠—or your eyesight’s defective.” + 

“Excuse me, sir, but it’s not my imagination, and my eyesight’s as good as any man’s in England⁠—and as for the slant of the light on the glass, there ain’t much glass for the light to slant on. I saw him peeping through that bottom broken pane on your left hand as plainly as I see you. He must be somewhere about⁠—he can’t have got away⁠—he’s at the back. Ain’t there a cupboard nor nothing where he could hide?” + 

The cabman’s manner was so extremely earnest that I went myself to see. There was a cupboard on the landing, but the door of that stood wide open, and that obviously was bare. The room behind was small, and, despite the splintered glass in the window frame, stuffy. Fragments of glass kept company with the dust on the floor, together with a choice collection of stones, brickbats, and other missiles⁠—which not improbably were the cause of their being there. In the corner stood a cupboard⁠—but a momentary examination showed that that was as bare as the other. The door at the side, which Sydney had left wide open, opened on to a closet, and that was empty. I glanced up⁠—there was no trap door which led to the roof. No practicable nook or cranny, in which a living being could lie concealed, was anywhere at hand. + 

I returned to Sydney’s shoulder to tell the cabman so. + 

“There is no place in which anyone could hide, and there is no one in either of the rooms⁠—you must have been mistaken, driver.” + 

The man waxed wroth. + 

“Don’t tell me! How could I come to think I saw something when I didn’t?” + 

“One’s eyes are apt to play us tricks;⁠—how could you see what wasn’t there?” + 

“That’s what I want to know. As I drove up, before you told me to stop, I saw him looking through the window⁠—the one at which you are. He’d got his nose glued to the broken pane, and was staring as hard as he could stare. When I pulled up, off he started⁠—I saw him get up off his knees, and go to the back of the room. When the gentleman took to knocking, back he came⁠—to the same old spot, and flopped down on his knees. I didn’t know what caper you was up to⁠—you might be bum bailiffs for all I knew!⁠—and I supposed that he wasn’t so anxious to let you in as you might be to get inside, and that was why he didn’t take no notice of your knocking, while all the while he kept a eye on what was going on. When you goes round to the back, up he gets again, and I reckoned that he was going to meet yer, and perhaps give yer a bit of his mind, and that presently I should hear a shindy, or that something would happen. But when you pulls up the blind downstairs, to my surprise back he come once more. He shoves his old nose right through the smash in the pane, and wags his old head at me like a chattering magpie. That didn’t seem to me quite the civil thing to do⁠—I hadn’t done no harm to him; so I gives you the office, and lets you know that he was there. But for you to say that he wasn’t there, and never had been⁠—blimey! that cops the biscuit. If he wasn’t there, all I can say is I ain’t here, and my ’orse ain’t here, and my cab ain’t neither⁠—damn it!⁠—the house ain’t here, and nothing ain’t!” + 

He settled himself on his perch with an air of the most extreme ill usage⁠—he had been standing up to tell his tale. That the man was serious was unmistakable. As he himself suggested, what inducement could he have had to tell a lie like that? That he believed himself to have seen what he declared he saw was plain. But, on the other hand, what could have become⁠—in the space of fifty seconds!⁠—of his “old gent”? + 

Atherton put a question. + 

“What did he look like⁠—this old gent of yours?” + 

“Well, that I shouldn’t hardly like to say. It wasn’t much of his face I could see, only his face and his eyes⁠—and they wasn’t pretty. He kept a thing over his head all the time, as if he didn’t want too much to be seen.” + 

“What sort of a thing?” + 

“Why⁠—one of them cloak sort of things, like them Arab blokes used to wear what used to be at Earl’s Court Exhibition⁠—you know!” + 

This piece of information seemed to interest my companions more than anything he had said before. + 

“A burnoose do you mean?” + 

“How am I to know what the thing’s called? I ain’t up in foreign languages⁠—’tain’t likely! All I know that them Arab blokes what was at Earl’s Court used to walk about in them all over the place⁠—sometimes they wore them over their heads, and sometimes they didn’t. In fact if you’d asked me, instead of trying to make out as I sees double, or things what was only inside my own noddle, or something or other, I should have said this here old gent what I’ve been telling you about was a Arab bloke⁠—when he gets off his knees to sneak away from the window, I could see that he had his cloak thing, what was over his head, wrapped all round him.” + 

Mr. Lessingham turned to me, all quivering with excitement. + 

“I believe that what he says is true!” + 

“Then where can this mysterious old gentleman have got to⁠—can you suggest an explanation? It is strange, to say the least of it, that the cabman should be the only person to see or hear anything of him.” + 

“Some devil’s trick has been played⁠—I know it, I feel it!⁠—my instinct tells me so!” + 

I stared. In such a matter one hardly expects a man of Paul Lessingham’s stamp to talk of “instinct.” Atherton stared too. Then, on a sudden, he burst out, + 

“By the Lord, I believe the Apostle’s right⁠—the whole place reeks to me of hankey-pankey⁠—it did as soon as I put my nose inside. In matters of prestidigitation, Champnell, we Westerns are among the rudiments⁠—we’ve everything to learn⁠—Orientals leave us at the post. If their civilisation’s what we’re pleased to call extinct, their conjuring⁠—when you get to know it!⁠—is all alive oh!” + 

He moved towards the door. As he went he slipped, or seemed to, all but stumbling on to his knees. + 

“Something tripped me up⁠—what’s this?” He was stamping on the floor with his foot. “Here’s a board loose. Come and lend me a hand, one of you fellows, to get it up. Who knows what mystery’s beneath?” + 

I went to his aid. As he said, a board in the floor was loose. His stepping on it unawares had caused his stumble. Together we prised it out of its place⁠—Lessingham standing by and watching us the while. Having removed it, we peered into the cavity it disclosed. + 

There was something there. + 

“Why,” cried Atherton, “it’s a woman’s clothing!” + 

XXXVIII + 

The Rest of the Find + 

It was a woman’s clothing, beyond a doubt, all thrown in anyhow⁠—as if the person who had placed it there had been in a desperate hurry. An entire outfit was there, shoes, stockings, body linen, corsets, and all⁠—even to hat, gloves, and hairpins;⁠—these latter were mixed up with the rest of the garments in strange confusion. It seemed plain that whoever had worn those clothes had been stripped to the skin. + 

Lessingham and Sydney stared at me in silence as I dragged them out and laid them on the floor. The dress was at the bottom⁠—it was an alpaca, of a pretty shade in blue, bedecked with lace and ribbons, as is the fashion of the hour, and lined with sea-green silk. It had perhaps been a “charming confection” once⁠—and that a very recent one!⁠—but now it was all soiled and creased and torn and tumbled. The two spectators made a simultaneous pounce at it as I brought it to the light. + 

“My God!” cried Sydney, “it’s Marjorie’s!⁠—she was wearing it when I saw her last!” + 

“It’s Marjorie’s!” gasped Lessingham⁠—he was clutching at the ruined costume, staring at it like a man who has just received sentence of death. “She wore it when she was with me yesterday⁠—I told her how it suited her, and how pretty it was!” + 

There was silence⁠—it was an eloquent find; it spoke for itself. The two men gazed at the heap of feminine glories⁠—it might have been the most wonderful sight they ever had seen. Lessingham was the first to speak⁠—his face had all at once grown grey and haggard. + 

“What has happened to her?” + 

I replied to his question with another. + 

“Are you sure this is Miss Linden’s dress?” + 

“I am sure⁠—and were proof needed, here it is.” + 

He had found the pocket, and was turning out the contents. There was a purse, which contained money and some visiting cards on which were her name and address; a small bunch of keys, with her nameplate attached; a handkerchief, with her initials in a corner. The question of ownership was placed beyond a doubt. + 

“You see,” said Lessingham, exhibiting the money which was in the purse, “it is not robbery which has been attempted. Here are two ten-pound notes, and one for five, besides gold and silver⁠—over thirty pounds in all.” + 

Atherton, who had been turning over the accumulation of rubbish between the joists, proclaimed another find. + 

“Here are her rings, and watch, and a bracelet⁠—no, it certainly does not look as if theft had been an object.” + 

Lessingham was glowering at him with knitted brows. + 

“I have to thank you for this.” + 

Sydney was unwontedly meek. + 

“You are hard on me, Lessingham, harder than I deserve⁠—I had rather have thrown away my own life than have suffered misadventure to have come to her.” + 

“Yours are idle words. Had you not meddled this would not have happened. A fool works more mischief with his folly than of malice prepense. If hurt has befallen Marjorie Lindon you shall account for it to me with your life’s blood.” + 

“Let it be so,” said Sydney. “I am content. If hurt has come to Marjorie, God knows that I am willing enough that death should come to me.” + 

While they wrangled, I continued to search. A little to one side, under the flooring which was still intact, I saw something gleam. By stretching out my hand, I could just manage to reach it⁠—it was a long plait of woman’s hair. It had been cut off at the roots⁠—so close to the head in one place that the scalp itself had been cut, so that the hair was clotted with blood. + 

They were so occupied with each other that they took no notice of me. I had to call their attention to my discovery. + 

“Gentlemen, I fear that I have here something which will distress you⁠—is not this Miss Lindon’s hair?” + 

They recognised it on the instant. Lessingham, snatching it from my hands, pressed it to his lips. + 

“This is mine⁠—I shall at least have something.” He spoke with a grimness which was a little startling. He held the silken tresses at arm’s length. “This points to murder⁠—foul, cruel, causeless murder. As I live, I will devote my all⁠—money, time, reputation!⁠—to gaining vengeance on the wretch who did this deed.” + 

Atherton chimed in. + 

“To that I say, Amen!” He lifted his hand. “God is my witness!” + 

“It seems to me, gentlemen, that we move too fast⁠—to my mind it does not by any means of necessity point to murder. On the contrary, I doubt if murder has been done. Indeed, I don’t mind owning that I have a theory of my own which points all the other way.” + 

Lessingham caught me by the sleeve. + 

“Mr. Champnell, tell me your theory.” + 

“I will, a little later. Of course it may be altogether wrong;⁠—though I fancy it is not; I will explain my reasons when we come to talk of it. But, at present, there are things which must be done.” + 

“I vote for tearing up every board in the house!” cried Sydney. “And for pulling the whole infernal place to pieces. It’s a conjurer’s den.⁠—I shouldn’t be surprised if cabby’s old gent is staring at us all the while from some peephole of his own.” + 

We examined the entire house, methodically, so far as we were able, inch by inch. Not another board proved loose⁠—to lift those which were nailed down required tools, and those we were without. We sounded all the walls⁠—with the exception of the party walls they were the usual lath and plaster constructions, and showed no signs of having been tampered with. The ceilings were intact; if anything was concealed in them it must have been there some time⁠—the cement was old and dirty. We took the closet to pieces; examined the chimneys; peered into the kitchen oven and the copper;⁠—in short, we pried into everything which, with the limited means at our disposal, could be pried into⁠—without result. At the end we found ourselves dusty, dirty, and discomfited. The cabman’s “old gent” remained as much a mystery as ever, and no further trace had been discovered of Miss Lindon. + 

Atherton made no effort to disguise his chagrin. + 

“Now what’s to be done? There seems to be just nothing in the place at all, and yet that there is, and that it’s the key to the whole confounded business I should be disposed to swear.” + 

“In that case I would suggest that you should stay and look for it. The cabman can go and look for the requisite tools, or a workman to assist you, if you like. For my part it appears to me that evidence of another sort is, for the moment, of paramount importance; and I propose to commence my search for it by making a call at the house which is over the way.” + 

I had observed, on our arrival, that the road only contained two houses which were in anything like a finished state⁠—that which we were in, and another, some fifty or sixty yards further down, on the opposite side. It was to this I referred. The twain immediately proffered their companionship. + 

“I will come with you,” said Mr. Lessingham. + 

“And I,” echoed Sydney. “We’ll leave this sweet homestead in charge of the cabman⁠—I’ll pull it to pieces afterwards.” He went out and spoke to the driver. “Cabby, we’re going to pay a visit to the little crib over there⁠—you keep an eye on this one. And if you see a sign of anyone being about the place⁠—living, or dead, or anyhow⁠—you give me a yell. I shall be on the lookout, and I’ll be with you before you can say Jack Robinson.” + 

“You bet I’ll yell⁠—I’ll raise the hair right off you.” The fellow grinned. “But I don’t know if you gents are hiring me by the day⁠—I want to change my horse; he ought to have been in his stable a couple of hours ago.” + 

“Never mind your horse⁠—let him rest a couple of hours extra tomorrow to make up for those he has lost today. I’ll take care you don’t lose anything by this little job⁠—or your horse either.⁠—By the way, look here⁠—this will be better than yelling.” + 

Taking a revolver out of his trousers’ pocket he handed it up to the grinning driver. + 

“If that old gent of yours does appear, you have a pop at him⁠—I shall hear that easier than a yell. You can put a bullet through him if you like⁠—I give you my word it won’t be murder.” + 

“I don’t care if it is,” declared the cabman, handling the weapon like one who was familiar with arms of precision. “I used to fancy my revolver shooting when I was with the colours, and if I do get a chance I’ll put a shot through the old hunks, if only to prove to you that I’m no liar.” + 

Whether the man was in earnest or not I could not tell⁠—nor whether Atherton meant what he said in answer. + 

“If you shoot him I’ll give you fifty pounds.” + 

“All right!” The driver laughed. “I’ll do my best to earn that fifty!” + 

XXXIX + 

Miss Louisa Coleman + 

That the house over the way was tenanted was plain to all the world⁠—at least one occupant sat gazing through the window of the first floor front room. An old woman in a cap⁠—one of those large old-fashioned caps which our grandmothers used to wear, tied with strings under the chin. It was a bow window, and as she was seated in the bay looking right in our direction she could hardly have failed to see us as we advanced⁠—indeed she continued to stare at us all the while with placid calmness. Yet I knocked once, twice, and yet again without the slightest notice being taken of my summons. + 

Sydney gave expression to his impatience in his own peculiar vein. + 

“Knockers in this part of the world seem intended for ornament only⁠—nobody seems to pay any attention to them when they’re used. The old lady upstairs must be either deaf or dotty.” He went out into the road to see if she still was there. “She’s looking at me as calmly as you please⁠—what does she think we’re doing here, I wonder; playing a tune on her front door by way of a little amusement?⁠—Madam!” He took off his hat and waved it to her. “Madam! might I observe that if you won’t condescend to notice that we’re here your front door will run the risk of being severely injured!⁠—She don’t care for me any more than if I was nothing at all⁠—sound another tattoo upon that knocker. Perhaps she’s so deaf that nothing short of a cataclysmal uproar will reach her auditory nerves.” + 

She immediately proved, however, that she was nothing of the sort. Hardly had the sounds of my further knocking died away than, throwing up the window, she thrust out her head and addressed me in a fashion which, under the circumstances, was as unexpected as it was uncalled for. + 

“Now, young man, you needn’t be in such a hurry!” + 

Sydney explained. + 

“Pardon me, madam, it’s not so much a hurry we’re in as pressed for time⁠—this is a matter of life and death.” + 

She turned her attention to Sydney⁠—speaking with a frankness for which, I imagine, he was unprepared. + 

“I don’t want none of your imperence, young man. I’ve seen you before⁠—you’ve been hanging about here the whole day long!⁠—and I don’t like the looks of you, and so I’ll let you know. That’s my front door, and that’s my knocker⁠—I’ll come down and open when I like, but I’m not going to be hurried, and if the knocker’s so much as touched again, I won’t come down at all.” + 

She closed the window with a bang. Sydney seemed divided between mirth and indignation. + 

“That’s a nice old lady, on my honour⁠—one of the good old crusty sort. Agreeable characters this neighbourhood seems to grow⁠—a sojourn hereabouts should do one good. Unfortunately I don’t feel disposed just now to stand and kick my heels in the road.” Again saluting the old dame by raising his hat he shouted to her at the top of his voice. “Madam, I beg ten thousand pardons for troubling you, but this is a matter in which every second is of vital importance⁠—would you allow me to ask you one or two questions?” + 

Up went the window; out came the old lady’s head. + 

“Now, young man, you needn’t put yourself out to holler at me⁠—I won’t be hollered at! I’ll come down and open that door in five minutes by the clock on my mantelpiece, and not a moment before.” + 

The fiat delivered, down came the window. Sydney looked rueful⁠—he consulted his watch. + 

“I don’t know what you think, Champnell, but I really doubt if this comfortable creature can tell us anything worth waiting another five minutes to hear. We mustn’t let the grass grow under our feet, and time is getting on.” + 

I was of a different opinion⁠—and said so. + 

“I’m afraid, Atherton, that I can’t agree with you. She seems to have noticed you hanging about all day; and it is at least possible that she has noticed a good deal which would be well worth our hearing. What more promising witness are we likely to find?⁠—her house is the only one which overlooks the one we have just quitted. I am of opinion that it may not only prove well worth our while to wait five minutes, but also that it would be as well, if possible, not to offend her by the way. She’s not likely to afford us the information we require if you do.” + 

“Good. If that’s what you think I’m sure I’m willing to wait⁠—only it’s to be hoped that that clock upon her mantelpiece moves quicker than its mistress.” + 

Presently, when about a minute had gone, he called to the cabman. + 

“Seen a sign of anything?” + 

The cabman shouted back. + 

“Ne’er a sign⁠—you’ll hear a sound of popguns when I do.” + 

Those five minutes did seem long ones. But at last Sydney, from his post of vantage in the road, informed us that the old lady was moving. + 

“She’s getting up;⁠—she’s leaving the window;⁠—let’s hope to goodness she’s coming down to open the door. That’s been the longest five minutes I’ve known.” + 

I could hear uncertain footsteps descending the stairs. They came along the passage. The door was opened⁠—“on the chain.” The old lady peered at us through an aperture of about six inches. + 

“I don’t know what you young men think you’re after, but have all three of you in my house I won’t. I’ll have him and you”⁠—a skinny finger was pointed to Lessingham and me; then it was directed towards Atherton⁠—“but have him I won’t. So if it’s anything particular you want to say to me, you’ll just tell him to go away.” + 

On hearing this Sydney’s humility was abject. His hat was in his hand⁠—he bent himself double. + 

“Suffer me to make you a million apologies, madam, if I have in any way offended you; nothing, I assure you, could have been farther from my intention, or from my thoughts.” + 

“I don’t want none of your apologies, and I don’t want none of you neither; I don’t like the looks of you, and so I tell you. Before I let anybody into my house you’ll have to sling your hook.” + 

The door was banged in our faces. I turned to Sydney. + 

“The sooner you go the better it will be for us. You can wait for us over the way.” + 

He shrugged his shoulders, and groaned⁠—half in jest, half in earnest. + 

“If I must I suppose I must⁠—it’s the first time I’ve been refused admittance to a lady’s house in all my life! What have I done to deserve this thing?⁠—If you keep me waiting long I’ll tear that infernal den to pieces!” + 

He sauntered across the road, viciously kicking the stones as he went. The door reopened. + 

“Has that other young man gone?” + 

“He has.” + 

“Then now I’ll let you in. Have him inside my house I won’t.” + 

The chain was removed. Lessingham and I entered. Then the door was refastened and the chain replaced. Our hostess showed us into the front room on the ground floor; it was sparsely furnished and not too clean⁠—but there were chairs enough for us to sit upon; which she insisted on our occupying. + 

“Sit down, do⁠—I can’t abide to see folks standing; it gives me the fidgets.” + 

So soon as we were seated, without any overture on our parts she plunged in medias res. + 

“I know what it is you’ve come about⁠—I know! You want me to tell you who it is as lives in the house over the road. Well, I can tell you⁠—and I dare bet a shilling that I’m about the only one who can.” + 

I inclined my head. + 

“Indeed. Is that so, madam?” + 

She was huffed at once. + 

“Don’t madam me⁠—I can’t bear none of your lip service. I’m a plainspoken woman, that’s what I am, and I like other people’s tongues to be as plain as mine. My name’s Miss Louisa Coleman; but I’m generally called Miss Coleman⁠—I’m only called Louisa by my relatives.” + 

Since she was apparently between seventy and eighty⁠—and looked every year of her apparent age⁠—I deemed that possible. Miss Coleman was evidently a character. If one was desirous of getting information out of her it would be necessary to allow her to impart it in her own manner⁠—to endeavour to induce her to impart it in anybody else’s would be time clean wasted. We had Sydney’s fate before our eyes. + 

She started with a sort of roundabout preamble. + 

“This property is mine; it was left me by my uncle, the late George Henry Jobson⁠—he’s buried in Hammersmith Cemetery just over the way⁠—he left me the whole of it. It’s one of the finest building sites near London, and it increases in value every year, and I’m not going to let it for another twenty, by which time the value will have more than trebled⁠—so if that is what you’ve come about, as heaps of people do, you might have saved yourselves the trouble. I keep the boards standing, just to let people know that the ground is to let⁠—though, as I say, it won’t be for another twenty years, when it’ll be for the erection of high-class mansions only, same as there is in Grosvenor Square⁠—no shops or public houses, and none of your shanties. I live in this place just to keep an eye upon the property⁠—and as for the house over the way, I’ve never tried to let it, and it never has been let, not until a month ago, when, one morning, I had this letter. You can see it if you like.” + 

She handed me a greasy envelope which she ferreted out of a capacious pocket which was suspended from her waist, and which she had to lift up her skirt to reach. The envelope was addressed, in unformed characters, “Miss Louisa Coleman, The Rhododendrons, Convolvulus Avenue, High Oaks Park, West Kensington.”⁠—I felt, if the writer had not been of a humorous turn of mind, and drawn on his imagination, and this really was the lady’s correct address, then there must be something in a name. + 

The letter within was written in the same straggling, characterless calligraphy⁠—I should have said, had I been asked offhand, that the whole thing was the composition of a servant girl. The composition was about on a par with the writing. + 

“The undersigned would be oblidged if Miss Coleman would let her emptey house. I do not know the rent but send fifty pounds. If more will send. Please address, Mohamed el Kheir, Post Office, Sligo Street, London.” + 

It struck me as being as singular an application for a tenancy as I remembered to have encountered. When I passed it on to Lessingham, he seemed to think so too. + 

“This is a curious letter, Miss Coleman.” + 

“So I thought⁠—and still more so when I found the fifty pounds inside. There were five ten-pound notes, all loose, and the letter not even registered. If I had been asked what was the rent of the house, I should have said, at the most, not more than twenty pounds⁠—because, between you and me, it wants a good bit of doing up, and is hardly fit to live in as it stands.” + 

I had had sufficient evidence of the truth of this altogether apart from the landlady’s frank admission. + 

“Why, for all he could have done to help himself I might have kept the money, and only sent him a receipt for a quarter. And some folks would have done⁠—but I’m not one of that sort myself, and shouldn’t care to be. So I sent this here party⁠—I never could pronounce his name, and never shall⁠—a receipt for a year.” + 

Miss Coleman paused to smooth her apron, and consider. + 

“Well, the receipt should have reached this here party on the Thursday morning, as it were⁠—I posted it on the Wednesday night, and on the Thursday, after breakfast, I thought I’d go over the way to see if there was any little thing I could do⁠—because there wasn’t hardly a whole pane of glass in the place⁠—when I all but went all of a heap. When I looked across the road, blessed it the party wasn’t in already⁠—at least as much as he ever was in, which, so far as I can make out, never has been anything particular⁠—though how he had got in, unless it was through a window in the middle of the night, is more than I should care to say⁠—there was nobody in the house when I went to bed, that I could pretty nearly take my Bible oath⁠—yet there was the blind up at the parlour, and, what’s more, it was down, and it’s been down pretty nearly ever since. + 

“ ‘Well,’ I says to myself, ‘for right down imperence this beats anything⁠—why he’s in the place before he knows if I’ll let him have it. Perhaps he thinks I haven’t got a word to say in the matter⁠—fifty pounds or no fifty pounds, I’ll soon show him.’ So I slips on my bonnet, and I walks over the road, and I hammers at the door. + 

“Well, I have seen people hammering since then, many a one, and how they’ve kept it up has puzzled me⁠—for an hour, some of them⁠—but I was the first one as begun it. I hammers, and I hammers, and I kept on hammering, but it wasn’t no more use than if I’d been hammering at a tombstone. So I starts rapping at the window, but that wasn’t no use neither. So I goes round behind, and I hammers at the back door⁠—but there, I couldn’t make anyone hear nohow. So I says to myself, ‘Perhaps the party as is in, ain’t in, in a manner of speaking; but I’ll keep an eye on the house, and when he is in I’ll take care that he ain’t out again before I’ve had a word to say.’ + 

“So I come back home, and as I said I would, I kept an eye on the house the whole of that livelong day, but never a soul went either out or in. But the next day, which it was a Friday, I got out of bed about five o’clock, to see if it was raining, through my having an idea of taking a little excursion if the weather was fine, when I see a party coming down the road. He had on one of them dirty-coloured bedcover sort of things, and it was wrapped all over his head and round his body, like, as I have been told, them there Arabs wear⁠—and, indeed, I’ve seen them in them myself at West Brompton, when they was in the exhibition there. It was quite fine, and broad day, and I see him as plainly as I see you⁠—he comes skimming along at a tear of a pace, pulls up at the house over the way, opens the front door, and lets himself in. + 

“ ‘So,’ I says to myself, ‘there you are. Well, Mr. Arab, or whatever, or whoever, you may be, I’ll take good care that you don’t go out again before you’ve had a word from me. I’ll show you that landladies have their rights, like other Christians, in this country, however it may be in yours.’ So I kept an eye on the house, to see that he didn’t go out again, and nobody never didn’t, and between seven and eight I goes and I knocks at the door⁠—because I thought to myself that the earlier I was the better it might be. + 

“If you’ll believe me, no more notice was taken of me than if I was one of the dead. I hammers, and I hammers, till my wrist was aching, I daresay I hammered twenty times⁠—and then I went round to the back door, and I hammers at that⁠—but it wasn’t the least good in the world. I was that provoked to think I should be treated as if I was nothing and nobody, by a dirty foreigner, who went about in a bed-gown through the public streets, that it was all I could do to hold myself. + 

“I comes round to the front again, and I starts hammering at the window, with every knuckle on my hands, and I calls out, ‘I’m Miss Louisa Coleman, and I’m the owner of this house, and you can’t deceive me⁠—I saw you come in, and you’re in now, and if you don’t come and speak to me this moment I’ll have the police.’ + 

“All of a sudden, when I was least expecting it, and was hammering my very hardest at the pane, up goes the blind, and up goes the window too, and the most awful-looking creature ever I heard of, not to mention seeing, puts his head right into my face⁠—he was more like a hideous baboon than anything else, let alone a man. I was struck all of a heap, and plumps down on the little wall, and all but tumbles head over heels backwards. And he starts shrieking, in a sort of a kind of English, and in such a voice as I’d never heard the like⁠—it was like a rusty steam engine. + 

“ ‘Go away! go away! I don’t want you! I will not have you⁠—never! You have your fifty pounds⁠—you have your money⁠—that is the whole of you⁠—that is all you want! You come to me no more!⁠—never!⁠—never no more!⁠—or you be sorry!⁠—Go away!’ + 

“I did go away, and that as fast as ever my legs would carry me⁠—what with his looks, and what with his voice, and what with the way that he went on, I was nothing but a mass of trembling. As for answering him back, or giving him a piece of my mind, as I had meant to, I wouldn’t have done it not for a thousand pounds. I don’t mind confessing, between you and me, that I had to swallow four cups of tea, right straight away, before my nerves was steady. + 

“ ‘Well,’ I says to myself, when I did feel, as it might be, a little more easy, ‘you never have let that house before, and now you’ve let it with a vengeance⁠—so you have. If that there new tenant of yours isn’t the greatest villain that ever went unhung it must be because he’s got near relations what’s as bad as himself⁠—because two families like his I’m sure there can’t be. A nice sort of Arab party to have sleeping over the road he is!’ + 

“But after a time I cools down, as it were⁠—because I’m one of them sort as likes to see on both sides of a question. ‘After all,’ I says to myself, ‘he has paid his rent, and fifty pounds is fifty pounds⁠—I doubt if the whole house is worth much more, and he can’t do much damage to it whatever he does.’ + 

“I shouldn’t have minded, so far as that went, if he’d set fire to the place, for, between ourselves, it’s insured for a good bit over its value. So I decided that I’d let things be as they were, and see how they went on. But from that hour to this I’ve never spoken to the man, and never wanted to, and wouldn’t, not of my own free will, not for a shilling a time⁠—that face of his will haunt me if I live till Noah, as the saying is. I’ve seen him going in and out at all hours of the day and night⁠—that Arab party’s a mystery if ever there was one⁠—he always goes tearing along as if he’s flying for his life. Lots of people have come to the house, all sorts and kinds, men and women⁠—they’ve been mostly women, and even little children. I’ve seen them hammer and hammer at that front door, but never a one have I seen let in⁠—or yet seen taken any notice of, and I think I may say, and yet tell no lie, that I’ve scarcely took my eye off the house since he’s been inside it, over and over again in the middle of the night have I got up to have a look, so that I’ve not missed much that has took place. + 

“What’s puzzled me is the noises that’s come from the house. Sometimes for days together there’s not been a sound, it might have been a house of the dead; and then, all through the night, there’ve been yells and screeches, squawks and screams⁠—I never heard nothing like it. I have thought, and more than once, that the devil himself must be in that front room, let alone all the rest of his demons. And as for cats!⁠—where they’ve come from I can’t think. I didn’t use to notice hardly a cat in the neighbourhood till that there Arab party came⁠—there isn’t much to attract them; but since he came there’s been regiments. Sometimes at night there’s been troops about the place, screeching like mad⁠—I’ve wished them farther, I can tell you. That Arab party must be fond of ’em. I’ve seen them inside the house, at the windows, upstairs and downstairs, as it seemed to me, a dozen at a time. + 

XL + 

What Miss Coleman Saw Through the Window + 

As Miss Coleman had paused, as if her narrative was approaching a conclusion, I judged it expedient to make an attempt to bring the record as quickly as possible up to date. + 

“I take it, Miss Coleman, that you have observed what has occurred in the house today.” + 

She tightened her nutcracker jaws and glared at me disdainfully⁠—her dignity was ruffled. + 

“I’m coming to it, aren’t I?⁠—if you’ll let me. If you’ve got no manners I’ll learn you some. One doesn’t like to be hurried at my time of life, young man.” + 

I was meekly silent;⁠—plainly, if she was to talk, everyone else must listen. + 

“During the last few days there have been some queer goings on over the road⁠—out of the common queer, I mean, for goodness knows that they always have been queer enough. That Arab party has been flitting about like a creature possessed⁠—I’ve seen him going in and out twenty times a day. This morning⁠—” + 

She paused⁠—to fix her eyes on Lessingham. She apparently observed his growing interest as she approached the subject which had brought us there⁠—and resented it. + 

“Don’t look at me like that, young man, because I won’t have it. And as for questions, I may answer questions when I’m done, but don’t you dare to ask me one before, because I won’t be interrupted.” + 

Up to then Lessingham had not spoken a word⁠—but it seemed as if she was endowed with the faculty of perceiving the huge volume of the words which he had left unuttered. + 

“This morning⁠—as I’ve said already⁠—” she glanced at Lessingham as if she defied his contradiction⁠—“when that Arab party came home it was just on the stroke of seven. I know what was the exact time because, when I went to the door to the milkman, my clock was striking the half hour, and I always keep it thirty minutes fast. As I was taking the milk, the man said to me, ‘Hollo, Miss Coleman, here’s your friend coming along.’ ‘What friend?’ I says⁠—for I ain’t got no friends, as I know, round here, nor yet, I hope no enemies neither. + 

“And I looks round, and there was the Arab party coming tearing down the road, his bedcover thing all flying in the wind, and his arms straight out in front of him⁠—I never did see anyone go at such a pace. ‘My goodness,’ I says, ‘I wonder he don’t do himself an injury.’ ‘I wonder someone else don’t do him an injury,’ says the milkman. ‘The very sight of him is enough to make my milk go sour.’ And he picked up his pail and went away quite grumpy⁠—though what that Arab party’s done to him is more than I can say.⁠—I have always noticed that milkman’s temper’s short like his measure. I wasn’t best pleased with him for speaking of that Arab party as my friend, which he never has been, and never won’t be, and never could be neither. + 

“Five persons went to the house after the milkman was gone, and that there Arab party was safe inside⁠—three of them was commercials, that I know, because afterwards they came to me. But of course they none of them got no chance with that there Arab party except of hammering at his front door, which ain’t what you might call a paying game, nor nice for the temper, but for that I don’t blame him, for if once those commercials do begin talking they’ll talk forever. + 

“Now I’m coming to this afternoon.” + 

I thought it was about time⁠—though for the life of me, I did not dare to hint as much. + 

“Well, it might have been three, or it might have been half past, anyhow it was thereabouts, when up there comes two men and a woman, which one of the men was that young man what’s a friend of yours. ‘Oh,’ I says to myself, ‘here’s something new in callers, I wonder what it is they’re wanting.’ That young man what was a friend of yours, he starts hammering, and hammering, as the custom was with everyone who came, and, as usual, no more notice was taken of him than nothing⁠—though I knew that all the time the Arab party was indoors.” + 

At this point I felt that at all hazards I must interpose a question. + 

“You are sure he was indoors?” + 

She took it better than I feared she might. + 

“Of course I’m sure⁠—hadn’t I seen him come in at seven, and he never hadn’t gone out since, for I don’t believe that I’d taken my eyes off the place not for two minutes together, and I’d never had a sight of him. If he wasn’t indoors, where was he then?” + 

For the moment, so far as I was concerned, the query was unanswerable. She triumphantly continued: + 

“Instead of doing what most did, when they’d had enough of hammering, and going away, these three they went round to the back, and I’m blessed if they mustn’t have got through the kitchen window, woman and all, for all of a sudden the blind in the front room was pulled not up, but down⁠—dragged down it was, and there was that young man what’s a friend of yours standing with it in his hand. + 

“ ‘Well,’ I says to myself, ‘if that ain’t cool I should like to know what is. If, when you ain’t let in, you can let yourself in, and that without so much as saying by your leave, or with your leave, things is coming to a pretty pass. Wherever can that Arab party be, and whatever can he be thinking of, to let them go on like that because that he’s the sort to allow a liberty to be took with him, and say nothing, I don’t believe.’ + 

“Every moment I expects to hear a noise and see a row begin, but, so far as I could make out, all was quiet and there wasn’t nothing of the kind. So I says to myself, ‘There’s more in this than meets the eye, and them three parties must have right upon their side, or they wouldn’t be doing what they are doing in the way they are, there’d be a shindy.’ + 

“Presently, in about five minutes, the front door opens, and a young man⁠—not the one what’s your friend, but the other⁠—comes sailing out, and through the gate, and down the road, as stiff and upright as a grenadier⁠—I never see anyone walk more upright, and few as fast. At his heels comes the young man what is your friend, and it seems to me that he couldn’t make out what this other was a-doing of. I says to myself, ‘There’s been a quarrel between them two, and him as has gone has hooked it.’ This young man what is your friend he stood at the gate, all of a fidget, staring after the other with all his eyes, as if he couldn’t think what to make of him, and the young woman, she stood on the doorstep, staring after him too. + 

“As the young man what had hooked it turned the corner, and was out of sight, all at once your friend he seemed to make up his mind, and he started off running as hard as he could pelt⁠—and the young woman was left alone. I expected, every minute, to see him come back with the other young man, and the young woman, by the way she hung about the gate, she seemed to expect it too. But no, nothing of the kind. So when, as I expect, she’d had enough of waiting, she went into the house again, and I see her pass the front room window. After a while, back she comes to the gate, and stands looking and looking, but nothing was to be seen of either of them young men. When she’d been at the gate, I daresay five minutes, back she goes into the house⁠—and I never saw nothing of her again.” + 

“You never saw anything of her again?⁠—Are you sure she went back into the house?” + 

“As sure as I am that I see you.” + 

“I suppose that you didn’t keep a constant watch upon the premises?” + 

“But that’s just what I did do. I felt something queer was going on, and I made up my mind to see it through. And when I make up my mind to a thing like that I’m not easy to turn aside. I never moved off the chair at my bedroom window, and I never took my eyes off the house, not till you come knocking at my front door.” + 

“But, since the young lady is certainly not in the house at present, she must have eluded your observation, and, in some manner, have left it without your seeing her.” + 

“I don’t believe she did, I don’t see how she could have done⁠—there’s something queer about that house, since that Arab party’s been inside it. But though I didn’t see her, I did see someone else.” + 

“Who was that?” + 

“A young man.” + 

“A young man?” + 

“Yes, a young man, and that’s what puzzled me, and what’s been puzzling me ever since, for see him go in I never did do.” + 

“Can you describe him?” + 

“Not as to the face, for he wore a dirty cloth cap pulled down right over it, and he walked so quickly that I never had a proper look. But I should know him anywhere if I saw him, if only because of his clothes and his walk.” + 

“What was there peculiar about his clothes and his walk?” + 

“Why, his clothes were that old, and torn, and dirty, that a ragman wouldn’t have given a thank you for them⁠—and as for fit⁠—there wasn’t none, they hung upon him like a scarecrow⁠—he was a regular figure of fun; I should think the boys would call after him if they saw him in the street. As for his walk, he walked off just like the first young man had done, he strutted along with his shoulders back, and his head in the air, and that stiff and straight that my kitchen poker would have looked crooked beside of him.” + 

“Did nothing happen to attract your attention between the young lady’s going back into the house and the coming out of this young man?” + 

Miss Coleman cogitated. + 

“Now you mention it there did⁠—though I should have forgotten all about it if you hadn’t asked me⁠—that comes of your not letting me tell the tale in my own way. About twenty minutes after the young woman had gone in someone put up the blind in the front room, which that young man had dragged right down, I couldn’t see who it was for the blind was between us, and it was about ten minutes after that that young man came marching out.” + 

“And then what followed?” + 

“Why, in about another ten minutes that Arab party himself comes scooting through the door.” + 

“The Arab party?” + 

“Yes, the Arab party! The sight of him took me clean aback. Where he’d been, and what he’d been doing with himself while them there people played hi-spy-hi about his premises I’d have given a shilling out of my pocket to have known, but there he was, as large as life, and carrying a bundle.” + 

“A bundle?” + 

“A bundle, on his head, like a muffin-man carries his tray. It was a great thing, you never would have thought he could have carried it, and it was easy to see that it was as much as he could manage; it bent him nearly double, and he went crawling along like a snail⁠—it took him quite a time to get to the end of the road.” + 

Mr. Lessingham leaped up from his seat, crying, “Marjorie was in that bundle!” + 

“I doubt it,” I said. + 

He moved about the room distractedly, wringing his hands. + 

“She was! she must have been! God help us all!” + 

“I repeat that I doubt it. If you will be advised by me you will wait awhile before you arrive at any such conclusion.” + 

All at once there was a tapping at the window pane. Atherton was staring at us from without. + 

He shouted through the glass, “Come out of that, you fossils!⁠—I’ve news for you!” + 

XLI + 

The Constable⁠—His Clue⁠—and the Cab + 

Miss Coleman, getting up in a fluster, went hurrying to the door. + 

“I won’t have that young man in my house. I won’t have him! Don’t let him dare to put his nose across my doorstep.” + 

I endeavoured to appease her perturbation. + 

“I promise you that he shall not come in, Miss Coleman. My friend here, and I, will go and speak to him outside.” + 

She held the front door open just wide enough to enable Lessingham and me to slip through, then she shut it after us with a bang. She evidently had a strong objection to any intrusion on Sydney’s part. + 

Standing just without the gate he saluted us with a characteristic vigour which was scarcely flattering to our late hostess. Behind him was a constable. + 

“I hope you two have been mewed in with that old pussy long enough. While you’ve been tittle-tattling I’ve been doing⁠—listen to what this bobby’s got to say.” + 

The constable, his thumbs thrust inside his belt, wore an indulgent smile upon his countenance. He seemed to find Sydney amusing. He spoke in a deep bass voice⁠—as if it issued from his boots. + 

“I don’t know that I’ve got anything to say.” + 

It was plain that Sydney thought otherwise. + 

“You wait till I’ve given this pretty pair of gossips a lead, officer, then I’ll trot you out.” He turned to us. + 

“After I’d poked my nose into every dashed hole in that infernal den, and been rewarded with nothing but a pain in the back for my trouble, I stood cooling my heels on the doorstep, wondering if I should fight the cabman, or get him to fight me, just to pass the time away⁠—for he says he can box, and he looks it⁠—when who should come strolling along but this magnificent example of the metropolitan constabulary.” He waved his hand towards the policeman, whose grin grew wider. “I looked at him, and he looked at me, and then when we’d had enough of admiring each other’s fine features and striking proportions, he said to me, ‘Has he gone?’ I said, ‘Who?⁠—Baxter?⁠—or Bob Brown?’ He said, ‘No, the Arab.’ I said, ‘What do you know about any Arab?’ He said, ‘Well, I saw him in the Broadway about three-quarters of an hour ago, and then, seeing you here, and the house all open, I wondered if he had gone for good.’ With that I almost jumped out of my skin, though you can bet your life I never showed it. I said, ‘How do you know it was he?’ He said, ‘It was him right enough, there’s no doubt about that. If you’ve seen him once, you’re not likely to forget him.’ ‘Where was he going?’ ‘He was talking to a cabman⁠—four-wheeler. He’d got a great bundle on his head⁠—wanted to take it inside with him. Cabman didn’t seem to see it.’ That was enough for me⁠—I picked this most deserving officer up in my arms, and carried him across the road to you two fellows like a flash of lightning.” + 

Since the policeman was six feet three or four, and more than sufficiently broad in proportion, his scarcely seemed the kind of figure to be picked up in anybody’s arms and carried like a “flash of lightning,” which⁠—as his smile grew more indulgent, he himself appeared to think. + 

Still, even allowing for Atherton’s exaggeration, the news which he had brought was sufficiently important. I questioned the constable upon my own account. + 

“There is my card, officer, probably, before the day is over, a charge of a very serious character will be preferred against the person who has been residing in the house over the way. In the meantime it is of the utmost importance that a watch should be kept upon his movements. I suppose you have no sort of doubt that the person you saw in the Broadway was the one in question?” + 

“Not a morsel. I know him as well as I do my own brother⁠—we all do upon this beat. He’s known amongst us as the Arab. I’ve had my eye on him ever since he came to the place. A queer fish he is. I always have said that he’s up to some game or other. I never came across one like him for flying about in all sorts of weather, at all hours of the night, always tearing along as if for his life. As I was telling this gentleman I saw him in the Broadway⁠—well, now it’s about an hour since, perhaps a little more. I was coming on duty when I saw a crowd in front of the District Railway Station⁠—and there was the Arab, having a sort of argument with the cabman. He had a great bundle on his head, five or six feet long, perhaps longer. He wanted to take this great bundle with him into the cab, and the cabman, he didn’t see it.” + 

“You didn’t wait to see him drive off.” + 

“No⁠—I hadn’t time. I was due at the station⁠—I was cutting it pretty fine as it was.” + 

“You didn’t speak to him⁠—or to the cabman?” + 

“No, it wasn’t any business of mine you understand. The whole thing just caught my eye as I was passing.” + 

“And you didn’t take the cabman’s number?” + 

“No, well, as far as that goes it wasn’t needful. I know the cabman, his name and all about him, his stable’s in Bradmore.” + 

I whipped out my notebook. + 

“Give me his address.” + 

“I don’t know what his Christian name is, Tom, I believe, but I’m not sure. Anyhow his surname’s Ellis and his address is Church Mews, St. John’s Road, Bradmore⁠—I don’t know his number, but anyone will tell you which is his place, if you ask for Four-Wheel Ellis⁠—that’s the name he’s known by among his pals because of his driving a four-wheeler.” + 

“Thank you, officer. I am obliged to you.” Two half-crowns changed hands. “If you will keep an eye on the house and advise me at the address which you will find on my card, of anything which takes place there during the next few days, you will do me a service.” + 

We had clambered back into the hansom, the driver was just about to start, when the constable was struck by a sudden thought. + 

“One moment, sir⁠—blessed if I wasn’t going to forget the most important bit of all. I did hear him tell Ellis where to drive him to⁠—he kept saying it over and over again, in that queer lingo of his. ‘Waterloo Railway Station, Waterloo Railway Station.’ ‘All right,’ said Ellis, ‘I’ll drive you to Waterloo Railway Station right enough, only I’m not going to have that bundle of yours inside my cab. There isn’t room for it, so you put it on the roof.’ ‘To Waterloo Railway Station,’ said the Arab, ‘I take my bundle with me to Waterloo Railway Station⁠—I take it with me.’ ‘Who says you don’t take it with you?’ said Ellis. ‘You can take it, and twenty more besides, for all I care, only you don’t take it inside my cab⁠—put it on the roof.’ ‘I take it with me to Waterloo Railway Station,’ said the Arab, and there they were, wrangling and jangling, and neither seeming to be able to make out what the other was after, and the people all laughing.” + 

“Waterloo Railway Station⁠—you are sure that was what he said?” + 

“I’ll take my oath to it, because I said to myself, when I heard it, ‘I wonder what you’ll have to pay for that little lot, for the District Railway Station’s outside the four-mile radius.’ ” As we drove off I was inclined to ask myself, a little bitterly⁠—and perhaps unjustly⁠—if it were not characteristic of the average London policeman to almost forget the most important part of his information⁠—at any rate to leave it to the last and only to bring it to the front on having his palm crossed with silver. + 

As the hansom bowled along we three had what occasionally approached a warm discussion. + 

“Marjorie was in that bundle,” began Lessingham, in the most lugubrious of tones, and with the most woebegone of faces. + 

“I doubt it,” I observed. + 

“She was⁠—I feel it⁠—I know it. She was either dead and mutilated, or gagged and drugged and helpless. All that remains is vengeance.” + 

“I repeat that I doubt it.” + 

Atherton struck in. + 

“I am bound to say, with the best will in the world to think otherwise, that I agree with Lessingham.” + 

“You are wrong.” + 

“It’s all very well for you to talk in that cocksure way, but it’s easier for you to say I’m wrong than to prove it. If I am wrong, and if Lessingham’s wrong, how do you explain his extraordinary insistance on taking it inside the cab with him, which the bobby describes? If there wasn’t something horrible, awful in that bundle of his, of which he feared the discovery, why was he so reluctant to have it placed upon the roof?” + 

“There probably was something in it which he was particularly anxious should not be discovered, but I doubt if it was anything of the kind which you suggest.” + 

“Here is Marjorie in a house alone⁠—nothing has been seen of her since⁠—her clothing, her hair, is found hidden away under the floor. This scoundrel sallies forth with a huge bundle on his head⁠—the bobby speaks of it being five or six feet long, or longer⁠—a bundle which he regards with so much solicitude that he insists on never allowing it to go, for a single instant, out of his sight and reach. What is in the thing? don’t all the facts most unfortunately point in one direction?” + 

Mr. Lessingham covered his face with his hands, and groaned. + 

“I fear that Mr. Atherton is right.” + 

“I differ from you both.” + 

Sydney at once became heated. + 

“Then perhaps you can tell us what was in the bundle?” + 

“I fancy I could make a guess at the contents.” + 

“Oh you could, could you, then, perhaps, for our sakes, you’ll make it⁠—and not play the oracular owl!⁠—Lessingham and I are interested in this business, after all.” + 

“It contained the bearer’s personal property: that, and nothing more. Stay! before you jeer at me, suffer me to finish. If I am not mistaken as to the identity of the person whom the constable describes as the Arab, I apprehend that the contents of that bundle were of much more importance to him than if they had consisted of Miss Lindon, either dead or living. More. I am inclined to suspect that if the bundle was placed on the roof of the cab, and if the driver did meddle with it, and did find out the contents, and understand them, he would have been driven, out of hand, stark staring mad.” + 

Sydney was silent, as if he reflected. I imagine he perceived there was something in what I said. + 

“But what has become of Miss Lindon?” + 

“I fancy that Miss Lindon, at this moment, is⁠—somewhere; I don’t, just now, know exactly where, but I hope very shortly to be able to give you a clearer notion⁠—attired in a rotten, dirty pair of boots; a filthy, tattered pair of trousers; a ragged, unwashed apology for a shirt; a greasy, ancient, shapeless coat; and a frowsy peaked cloth cap.” + 

They stared at me, opened-eyed. Atherton was the first to speak. + 

“What on earth do you mean?” + 

“I mean that it seems to me that the facts point in the direction of my conclusions rather than yours⁠—and that very strongly too. Miss Coleman asserts that she saw Miss Lindon return into the house; that within a few minutes the blind was replaced at the front window; and that shortly after a young man, attired in the costume I have described, came walking out of the front door. I believe that young man was Miss Marjorie Lindon.” + 

Lessingham and Atherton both broke out into interrogations, with Sydney, as usual, loudest. + 

“But⁠—man alive! what on earth should make her do a thing like that? Marjorie, the most retiring, modest girl on all God’s earth, walk about in broad daylight, in such a costume, and for no reason at all! my dear Champnell, you are suggesting that she first of all went mad.” + 

“She was in a state of trance.” + 

“Good God!⁠—Champnell!” + 

“Well?” + 

“Then you think that⁠—juggling villain did get hold of her?” + 

“Undoubtedly. Here is my view of the case, mind it is only a hypothesis and you must take it for what it is worth. It seems to me quite clear that the Arab, as we will call the person for the sake of identification, was somewhere about the premises when you thought he wasn’t.” + 

“But⁠—where? We looked upstairs, and downstairs, and everywhere⁠—where could he have been?” + 

“That, as at present advised, I am not prepared to say, but I think you may take it for granted that he was there. He hypnotised the man Holt, and sent him away, intending you to go after him, and so being rid of you both⁠—” + 

“The deuce he did, Champnell! You write me down an ass!” + 

“As soon as the coast was clear he discovered himself to Miss Lindon, who, I expect, was disagreeably surprised, and hypnotised her.” + 

“The hound!” + 

“The devil!” + 

The first exclamation was Lessingham’s, the second Sydney’s. + 

“He then constrained her to strip herself to the skin⁠—” + 

“The wretch!” + 

“The fiend!” + 

“He cut off her hair; he hid it and her clothes under the floor where we found them⁠—where I think it probable that he had already some ancient masculine garments concealed⁠—” + 

“By Jove! I shouldn’t be surprised if they were Holt’s. I remember the man saying that that nice joker stripped him of his duds⁠—and certainly when I saw him⁠—and when Marjorie found him!⁠—he had absolutely nothing on but a queer sort of cloak. Can it be possible that that humorous professor of hankey-pankey⁠—may all the maledictions of the accursed alight upon his head!⁠—can have sent Marjorie Lindon, the daintiest damsel in the land!⁠—into the streets of London rigged out in Holt’s old togs!” + 

“As to that, I am not able to give an authoritative opinion, but, if I understand you aright, it at least is possible. Anyhow I am disposed to think that he sent Miss Lindon after the man Holt, taking it for granted that he had eluded you.⁠—” + 

“That’s it. Write me down an ass again!” + 

“That he did elude you, you have yourself admitted.” + 

“That’s because I stopped talking with that mutton-headed bobby⁠—I’d have followed the man to the ends of the earth if it hadn’t been for that.” + 

“Precisely; the reason is immaterial, it is the fact with which we are immediately concerned. He did elude you. And I think you will find that Miss Lindon and Mr. Holt are together at this moment.” + 

“In men’s clothing?” + 

“Both in men’s clothing, or, rather, Miss Lindon is in a man’s rags.” + 

“Great Potiphar! To think of Marjorie like that!” + 

“And where they are, the Arab is not very far off either.” + 

Lessingham caught me by the arm. + 

“And what diabolical mischief do you imagine that he proposes to do to her?” + 

I shirked the question. + 

“Whatever it is, it is our business to prevent his doing it.” + 

“And where do you think they have been taken?” + 

“That it will be our immediate business to endeavour to discover⁠—and here, at any rate, we are at Waterloo.” + 

XLII + 

The Quarry Doubles + 

I turned towards the booking-office on the main departure platform. As I went, the chief platform inspector, George Bellingham, with whom I had some acquaintance, came out of his office. I stopped him. + 

“Mr. Bellingham, will you be so good as to step with me to the booking-office, and instruct the clerk in charge to answer one or two questions which I wish to put to him. I will explain to you afterwards what is their exact import, but you know me sufficiently to be able to believe me when I say that they refer to a matter in which every moment is of the first importance.” + 

He turned and accompanied us into the interior of the booking-case. + 

“To which of the clerks, Mr. Champnell, do you wish to put your questions?” + 

“To the one who issues third-class tickets to Southampton.” + 

Bellingham beckoned to a man who was counting a heap of money, and apparently seeking to make it tally with the entries in a huge ledger which lay open before him⁠—he was a short, slightly-built young fellow, with a pleasant face and smiling eyes. + 

“Mr. Stone, this gentleman wishes to ask you one or two questions.” + 

“I am at his service.” + 

I put my questions. + 

“I want to know, Mr. Stone, if, in the course of the day, you have issued any tickets to a person dressed in Arab costume?” + 

His reply was prompt. + 

“I have⁠—by the last train, the 7:25⁠—three singles.” + 

Three singles! Then my instinct had told me rightly. + 

“Can you describe the person?” + 

Mr. Stone’s eyes twinkled. + 

“I don’t know that I can, except in a general way⁠—he was uncommonly old and uncommonly ugly, and he had a pair of the most extraordinary eyes I ever saw⁠—they gave me a sort of all-overish feeling when I saw them glaring at me through the pigeon hole. But I can tell you one thing about him, he had a great bundle on his head, which he steadied with one hand, and as it bulged out in all directions its presence didn’t make him popular with other people who wanted tickets too.” + 

Undoubtedly this was our man. + 

“You are sure he asked for three tickets?” + 

“Certain. He said three tickets to Southampton; laid down the exact fare⁠—nineteen and six⁠—and held up three fingers⁠—like that. Three nasty looking fingers they were, with nails as long as talons.” + 

“You didn’t see who were his companions?” + 

“I didn’t⁠—I didn’t try to look. I gave him his tickets and off he went⁠—with the people grumbling at him because that bundle of his kept getting in their way.” + 

Bellingham touched me on the arm. + 

“I can tell you about the Arab of whom Mr. Stone speaks. My attention was called to him by his insisting on taking his bundle with him into the carriage⁠—it was an enormous thing, he could hardly squeeze it through the door; it occupied the entire seat. But as there weren’t as many passengers as usual, and he wouldn’t or couldn’t be made to understand that his precious bundle would be safe in the luggage van along with the rest of the luggage, and as he wasn’t the sort of person you could argue with to any advantage, I had him put into an empty compartment, bundle and all.” + 

“Was he alone then?” + 

“I thought so at the time, he said nothing about having more than one ticket, or any companions, but just before the train started two other men⁠—English men⁠—got into his compartment; and as I came down the platform, the ticket inspector at the barrier informed me that these two men were with him, because he held tickets for the three, which, as he was a foreigner, and they seemed English, struck the inspector as odd.” + 

“Could you describe the two men?” + 

“I couldn’t, not particularly, but the man who had charge of the barrier might. I was at the other end of the train when they got in. All I noticed was that one seemed to be a commonplace looking individual and that the other was dressed like a tramp, all rags and tatters, a disreputable looking object he appeared to be.” + 

“That,” I said to myself, “was Miss Marjorie Lindon, the lovely daughter of a famous house; the wife-elect of a coming statesman.” + 

To Bellingham I remarked aloud: + 

“I want you to strain a point, Mr. Bellingham, and to do me a service which I assure you you shall never have any cause to regret. I want you to wire instructions down the line to detain this Arab and his companions and to keep them in custody until the receipt of further instructions. They are not wanted by the police as yet, but they will be as soon as I am able to give certain information to the authorities at Scotland Yard⁠—and wanted very badly. But, as you will perceive for yourself, until I am able to give that information every moment is important.⁠—Where’s the Station Superintendent?” + 

“He’s gone. At present I’m in charge.” + 

“Then will you do this for me? I repeat that you shall never have any reason to regret it.” + 

“I will if you’ll accept all responsibility.” + 

“I’ll do that with the greatest pleasure.” + 

Bellingham looked at his watch. + 

“It’s about twenty minutes to nine. The train’s scheduled for Basingstoke at 9:06. If we wire to Basingstoke at once they ought to be ready for them when they come.” + 

“Good!” + 

The wire was sent. + 

We were shown into Bellingham’s office to await results. Lessingham paced agitatedly to and fro; he seemed to have reached the limits of his self-control, and to be in a condition in which movement of some sort was an absolute necessity. The mercurial Sydney, on the contrary, leaned back in a chair, his legs stretched out in front of him, his hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, and stared at Lessingham, as if he found relief to his feelings in watching his companion’s restlessness. I, for my part, drew up as full a précis of the case as I deemed advisable, and as time permitted, which I despatched by one of the company’s police to Scotland Yard. + 

Then I turned to my associates. + 

“Now, gentlemen, it’s past dinner time. We may have a journey in front of us. If you take my advice you’ll have something to eat.” + 

Lessingham shook his head. + 

“I want nothing.” + 

“Nor I,” echoed Sydney. + 

I started up. + 

“You must pardon my saying nonsense, but surely you of all men, Mr. Lessingham, should be aware that you will not improve the situation by rendering yourself incapable of seeing it through. Come and dine.” + 

I haled them off with me, willy nilly, to the refreshment room. I dined⁠—after a fashion; Mr. Lessingham swallowed with difficulty, a plate of soup; Sydney nibbled at a plate of the most unpromising looking “chicken and ham,”⁠—he proved, indeed, more intractable than Lessingham, and was not to be persuaded to tackle anything easier of digestion. + 

I was just about to take cheese after chop when Bellingham came hastening in, in his hand an open telegram. + 

“The birds have flown,” he cried. + 

“Flown!⁠—How?” + 

In reply he gave me the telegram. I glanced at it. It ran: + 

“Persons described not in the train. Guard says they got out at Vauxhall. Have wired Vauxhall to advise you.” + 

“That’s a levelheaded chap,” said Bellingham. “The man who sent that telegram. His wiring to Vauxhall should save us a lot of time⁠—we ought to hear from there directly. Hollo! what’s this? I shouldn’t be surprised if this is it.” + 

As he spoke a porter entered⁠—he handed an envelope to Bellingham. We all three kept our eyes fixed on the inspector’s face as he opened it. When he perceived the contents he gave an exclamation of surprise. + 

“This Arab of yours, and his two friends, seem rather a curious lot, Mr. Champnell.” + 

He passed the paper on to me. It took the form of a report. Lessingham and Sydney, regardless of forms and ceremonies, leaned over my shoulder as I read it. + 

“Passengers by 7:30 Southampton, on arrival of train, complained of noises coming from a compartment in coach 8964. Stated that there had been shrieks and yells ever since the train left Waterloo, as if someone was being murdered. An Arab and two Englishmen got out of the compartment in question, apparently the party referred to in wire just to hand from Basingstoke. All three declared that there was nothing the matter. That they had been shouting for fun. Arab gave up three third singles for Southampton, saying, in reply to questions, that they had changed their minds, and did not want to go any farther. As there were no signs of a struggle or of violence, nor, apparently, any definite cause for detention, they were allowed to pass. They took a four-wheeler, No. 09435. The Arab and one man went inside, and the other man on the box. They asked to be driven to Commercial Road, Limehouse. The cab has since returned. Driver says he put the three men down, at their request, in Commercial Road, at the corner of Sutcliffe Street, near the East India Docks. They walked up Sutcliffe Street, the Englishmen in front, and the Arab behind, took the first turning to the right, and after that he saw nothing of them. The driver further states that all the way the Englishman inside, who was so ragged and dirty that he was reluctant to carry him, kept up a sort of wailing noise which so attracted his attention that he twice got off his box to see what was the matter, and each time he said it was nothing. The cabman is of opinion that both the Englishmen were of weak intellect. We were of the same impression here. They said nothing, except at the seeming instigation of the Arab, but when spoken to stared and gaped like lunatics. + 

“It may be mentioned that the Arab had with him an enormous bundle, which he persisted, in spite of all remonstrances, on taking with him inside the cab.” + 

As soon as I had mastered the contents of the report, and perceived what I believed to be⁠—unknown to the writer himself⁠—its hideous inner meaning, I turned to Bellingham. + 

“With your permission, Mr. Bellingham, I will keep this communication⁠—it will be safe in my hands, you will be able to get a copy, and it may be necessary that I should have the original to show to the police. If any inquiries are made for me from Scotland Yard, tell them that I have gone to the Commercial Road, and that I will report my movements from Limehouse Police Station.” + 

In another minute we were once more traversing the streets of London⁠—three in a hansom cab. + 

XLIII + 

The Murder at Mrs. ’Enderson’s + 

It is something of a drive from Waterloo to Limehouse⁠—it seems longer when all your nerves are tingling with anxiety to reach your journey’s end; and the cab I had hit upon proved to be not the fastest I might have chosen. For some time after our start, we were silent. Each was occupied with his own thoughts. + 

Then Lessingham, who was sitting at my side, said to me, + 

“Mr. Champnell, you have that report.” + 

“I have.” + 

“Will you let me see it once more?” + 

I gave it to him. He read it once, twice⁠—and I fancy yet again. I purposely avoided looking at him as he did so. Yet all the while I was conscious of his pallid cheeks, the twitched muscles of his mouth, the feverish glitter of his eyes⁠—this Leader of Men, whose predominate characteristic in the House of Commons was immobility, was rapidly approximating to the condition of a hysterical woman. The mental strain which he had been recently undergoing was proving too much for his physical strength. This disappearance of the woman he loved bade fair to be the final straw. I felt convinced that unless something was done quickly to relieve the strain upon his mind he was nearer to a state of complete mental and moral collapse than he himself imagined. Had he been under my orders I should have commanded him to at once return home, and not to think; but conscious that, as things were, such a direction would be simply futile, I decided to do something else instead. Feeling that suspense was for him the worst possible form of suffering I resolved to explain, so far as I was able, precisely what it was I feared, and how I proposed to prevent it. + 

Presently there came the question for which I had been waiting, in a harsh, broken voice which no one who had heard him speak on a public platform, or in the House of Commons, would have recognised as his. + 

“Mr. Champnell⁠—who do you think this person is of whom the report from Vauxhall Station speaks as being all in rags and tatters?” + 

He knew perfectly well⁠—but I understood the mental attitude which induced him to prefer that the information should seem to come from me. + 

“I hope that it will prove to be Miss Lindon.” + 

“Hope!” He gave a sort of gasp. + 

“Yes, hope⁠—because if it is I think it possible, nay probable, that within a few hours you will have her again enfolded in your arms.” + 

“Pray God that it may be so! pray God!⁠—pray the good God!” + 

I did not dare to look round for, from the tremor which was in his tone, I was persuaded that in the speaker’s eyes were tears. Atherton continued silent. He was leaning half out of the cab, staring straight ahead, as if he saw in front a young girl’s face, from which he could not remove his glance, and which beckoned him on. + 

After a while Lessingham spoke again, as if half to himself and half to me. + 

“This mention of the shrieks on the railway, and of the wailing noise in the cab⁠—what must this wretch have done to her? How my darling must have suffered!” + 

That was a theme on which I myself scarcely ventured to allow my thoughts to rest. The notion of a gently-nurtured girl being at the mercy of that fiend incarnate, possessed⁠—as I believed that so-called Arab to be possessed⁠—of all the paraphernalia of horror and of dread, was one which caused me tangible shrinkings of the body. Whence had come those shrieks and yells, of which the writer of the report spoke, which had caused the Arab’s fellow-passengers to think that murder was being done? What unimaginable agony had caused them? what speechless torture? And the “wailing noise,” which had induced the prosaic, indurated London cabman to get twice off his box to see what was the matter, what anguish had been provocative of that? The helpless girl who had already endured so much, endured, perhaps, that to which death would have been preferred!⁠—shut up in that rattling, jolting box on wheels, alone with that diabolical Asiatic, with the enormous bundle, which was but the lurking place of nameless terrors⁠—what might she not, while being borne through the heart of civilised London, have been made to suffer? What had she not been made to suffer to have kept up that continued “wailing noise”? + 

It was not a theme on which it was wise to permit one’s thoughts to linger⁠—and particularly was it clear that it was one from which Lessingham’s thoughts should have been kept as far as possible away. + 

“Come, Mr. Lessingham, neither you nor I will do himself any good by permitting his reflections to flow in a morbid channel. Let us talk of something else. By the way, weren’t you due to speak in the House tonight?” + 

“Due!⁠—Yes, I was due⁠—but what does it matter?” + 

“But have you acquainted no one with the cause of your nonattendance?” + 

“Acquaint!⁠—whom should I acquaint?” + 

“My good sir! Listen to me, Mr. Lessingham. Let me entreat you very earnestly, to follow my advice. Call another cab⁠—or take this! and go at once to the House. It is not too late. Play the man, deliver the speech you have undertaken to deliver, perform your political duties. By coming with me you will be a hindrance rather than a help, and you may do your reputation an injury from which it never may recover. Do as I counsel you, and I will undertake to do my very utmost to let you have good news by the time your speech is finished.” + 

He turned on me with a bitterness for which I was unprepared. + 

“If I were to go down to the House, and try to speak in the state in which I am now, they would laugh at me, I should be ruined.” + 

“Do you not run an equally great risk of being ruined by staying away?” + 

He gripped me by the arm. + 

“Mr. Champnell, do you know that I am on the verge of madness? Do you know that as I am sitting here by your side I am living in a dual world? I am going on and on to catch that⁠—that fiend, and I am back again in that Egyptian den, upon that couch of rugs, with the Woman of the Songs beside me, and Marjorie is being torn and tortured, and burnt before my eyes! God help me! Her shrieks are ringing in my ears!” + 

He did not speak loudly, but his voice was none the less impressive on that account. I endeavoured my hardest to be stern. + 

“I confess that you disappoint me, Mr. Lessingham. I have always understood that you were a man of unusual strength; you appear instead, to be a man of extraordinary weakness; with an imagination so ill-governed that its ebullitions remind me of nothing so much as feminine hysterics. Your wild language is not warranted by circumstances. I repeat that I think it quite possible that by tomorrow morning she will be returned to you.” + 

“Yes⁠—but how? as the Marjorie I have known, as I saw her last⁠—or how?” + 

That was the question which I had already asked myself, in what condition would she be when we had succeeded in snatching her from her captor’s grip? It was a question to which I had refused to supply an answer. To him I lied by implication. + 

“Let us hope that, with the exception of being a trifle scared, she will be as sound and hale and hearty as ever in her life.” + 

“Do you yourself believe that she’ll be like that⁠—untouched, unchanged, unstained?” + 

Then I lied right out⁠—it seemed to me necessary to calm his growing excitement. + 

“I do.” + 

“You don’t!” + 

“Mr. Lessingham!” + 

“Do you think that I can’t see your face and read in it the same thoughts which trouble me? As a man of honour do you care to deny that when Marjorie Lindon is restored to me⁠—if she ever is!⁠—you fear she will be but the mere soiled husk of the Marjorie whom I knew and loved?” + 

“Even supposing that there may be a modicum of truth in what you say⁠—which I am far from being disposed to admit⁠—what good purpose do you propose to serve by talking in such a strain?” + 

“None⁠—no good purpose⁠—unless it be the desire of looking the truth in the face. For, Mr. Champnell, you must not seek to play with me the hypocrite, nor try to hide things from me as if I were a child. If my life is ruined⁠—it is ruined⁠—let me know it, and look the knowledge in the face. That, to me, is to play the man.” + 

I was silent. + 

The wild tale he had told me of that Cairene inferno, oddly enough⁠—yet why oddly, for the world is all coincidence!⁠—had thrown a flood of light on certain events which had happened some three years previously and which ever since had remained shrouded in mystery. The conduct of the business afterwards came into my hands⁠—and briefly, what had occurred was this: + 

Three persons⁠—two sisters and their brother, who was younger than themselves, members of a decent English family, were going on a trip round the world. They were young, adventurous, and⁠—not to put too fine a point on it⁠—foolhardy. The evening after their arrival in Cairo, by way of what is called “a lark,” in spite of the protestations of people who were better informed than themselves, they insisted on going, alone, for a ramble through the native quarter. + 

They went⁠—but they never returned. Or, rather the two girls never returned. After an interval the young man was found again⁠—what was left of him. A fuss was made when there were no signs of their reappearance, but as there were no relations, nor even friends of theirs, but only casual acquaintances on board the ship by which they had travelled, perhaps not so great a fuss as might have been was made. Anyhow, nothing was discovered. Their widowed mother, alone in England, wondering how it was that beyond the receipt of a brief wire, acquainting her with their arrival at Cairo, she had heard nothing further of their wanderings, placed herself in communication with the diplomatic people over there⁠—to learn that, to all appearances, her three children had vanished from off the face of the earth. + 

Then a fuss was made⁠—with a vengeance. So far as one can judge the whole town and neighbourhood was turned pretty well upside down. But nothing came of it⁠—so far as any results were concerned, the authorities might just as well have left the mystery of their vanishment alone. It continued where it was in spite of them. + 

However, some three months afterwards a youth was brought to the British Embassy by a party of friendly Arabs who asserted that they had found him naked and nearly dying in some remote spot in the Wady Haifa desert. It was the brother of the two lost girls. He was as nearly dying as he very well could be without being actually dead when they brought him to the Embassy⁠—and in a state of indescribable mutilation. He seemed to rally for a time under careful treatment, but he never again uttered a coherent word. It was only from his delirious ravings that any idea was formed of what had really occurred. + 

Shorthand notes were taken of some of the utterances of his delirium. Afterwards they were submitted to me. I remembered the substance of them quite well, and when Mr. Lessingham began to tell me of his own hideous experiences they came back to me more clearly still. Had I laid those notes before him I have little doubt but that he would have immediately perceived that seventeen years after the adventure which had left such an indelible scar upon his own life, this youth⁠—he was little more than a boy⁠—had seen the things which he had seen, and suffered the nameless agonies and degradations which he had suffered. The young man was perpetually raving about some indescribable den of horror which was own brother to Lessingham’s temple and about some female monster, whom he regarded with such fear and horror that every allusion he made to her was followed by a convulsive paroxysm which taxed all the ingenuity of his medical attendants to bring him out of. He frequently called upon his sisters by name, speaking of them in a manner which inevitably suggested that he had been an unwilling and helpless witness of hideous tortures which they had undergone; and then he would rise in bed, screaming, “They’re burning them! they’re burning them! Devils! devils!” And at those times it required all the strength of those who were in attendance to restrain his maddened frenzy. + 

The youth died in one of these fits of great preternatural excitement, without, as I have previously written, having given utterance to one single coherent word, and by some of those who were best able to judge it was held to have been a mercy that he did die without having been restored to consciousness. And, presently, tales began to be whispered, about some idolatrous sect, which was stated to have its headquarters somewhere in the interior of the country⁠—some located it in this neighbourhood, and some in that⁠—which was stated to still practise, and to always have practised, in unbroken historical continuity, the debased, unclean, mystic, and bloody rites, of a form of idolatry which had had its birth in a period of the world’s story which was so remote, that to all intents and purposes it might be described as prehistoric. + 

While the ferment was still at its height, a man came to the British Embassy who said that he was a member of a tribe which had its habitat on the banks of the White Nile. He asserted that he was in association with this very idolatrous sect⁠—though he denied that he was one of the actual sectaries. He did admit, however, that he had assisted more than once at their orgies, and declared that it was their constant practice to offer young women as sacrifices⁠—preferably white Christian women, with a special preference, if they could get them, to young English women. He vowed that he himself had seen with his own eyes, English girls burnt alive. The description which he gave of what preceded and followed these foul murders appalled those who listened. He finally wound up by offering, on payment of a stipulated sum of money, to guide a troop of soldiers to this den of demons, so that they should arrive there at a moment when it was filled with worshippers, who were preparing to participate in an orgy which was to take place during the next few days. + 

His offer was conditionally accepted. He was confined in an apartment with one man on guard inside and another on guard outside the room. That night the sentinel without was startled by hearing a great noise and frightful screams issuing from the chamber in which the native was interned. He summoned assistance. The door was opened. The soldier on guard within was stark, staring mad⁠—he died within a few months, a gibbering maniac to the end. The native was dead. The window, which was a very small one, was securely fastened inside and strongly barred without. There was nothing to show by what means entry had been gained. Yet it was the general opinion of those who saw the corpse that the man had been destroyed by some wild beast. A photograph was taken of the body after death, a copy of which is still in my possession. In it are distinctly shown lacerations about the neck and the lower portion of the abdomen, as if they had been produced by the claws of some huge and ferocious animal. The skull is splintered in half-a-dozen places, and the face is torn to rags. + 

That was more than three years ago. The whole business has remained as great a mystery as ever. But my attention has once or twice been caught by trifling incidents, which have caused me to more than suspect that the wild tale told by that murdered native had in it at least the elements of truth; and which have even led me to wonder if the trade in kidnapping was not being carried on to this very hour, and if women of my own flesh and blood were not still being offered up on that infernal altar. And now, here was Paul Lessingham, a man of worldwide reputation, of great intellect, of undoubted honour, who had come to me with a wholly unconscious verification of all my worst suspicions! + 

That the creature spoken of as an Arab⁠—and who was probably no more an Arab than I was, and whose name was certainly not Mohamed el Kheir!⁠—was an emissary from that den of demons, I had no doubt. What was the exact purport of the creature’s presence in England was another question. Possibly part of the intention was the destruction of Paul Lessingham, body, soul and spirit; possibly another part was the procuration of fresh victims for that long-drawn-out holocaust. That this latter object explained the disappearance of Miss Lindon I felt persuaded. That she was designed by the personification of evil who was her captor, to suffer all the horrors at which the stories pointed, and then to be burned alive, amidst the triumphant yells of the attendant demons, I was certain. That the wretch, aware that the pursuit was in full cry, was tearing, twisting, doubling, and would stick at nothing which would facilitate the smuggling of the victim out of England, was clear. + 

My interest in the quest was already far other than a merely professional one. The blood in my veins tingled at the thought of such a woman as Miss Lindon being in the power of such a monster. I may assuredly claim that throughout the whole business I was urged forward by no thought of fee or of reward. To have had a share in rescuing that unfortunate girl, and in the destruction of her noxious persecutor, would have been reward enough for me. + 

One is not always, even in strictly professional matters, influenced by strictly professional instincts. + 

The cab slowed. A voice descended through the trap door. + 

“This is Commercial Road, sir⁠—what part of it do you want?” + 

“Drive me to Limehouse Police Station.” + 

We were driven there. I made my way to the usual inspector behind the usual pigeonhole. + 

“My name is Champnell. Have you received any communication from Scotland Yard tonight having reference to a matter in which I am interested?” + 

“Do you mean about the Arab? We received a telephonic message about half an hour ago.” + 

“Since communicating with Scotland Yard this has come to hand from the authorities at Vauxhall Station. Can you tell me if anything has been seen of the person in question by the men of your division?” + 

I handed the Inspector the “report.” His reply was laconic. + 

“I will inquire.” + 

He passed through a door into an inner room and the “report” went with him. + 

“Beg pardon, sir, but was that a Harab you was a-talking about to the Hinspector?” + 

The speaker was a gentleman unmistakably of the guttersnipe class. He was seated on a form. Close at hand hovered a policeman whose special duty it seemed to be to keep an eye upon his movements. + 

“Why do you ask?” + 

“I beg your pardon, sir, but I saw a Harab myself about a hour ago⁠—leastways he looked like as if he was a Harab.” + 

“What sort of a looking person was he?” + 

“I can’t ’ardly tell you that, sir, because I didn’t never have a proper look at him⁠—but I know he had a bloomin’ great bundle on ’is ’ead.⁠ ⁠… It was like this, ’ere. I was comin’ round the corner, as he was passin’, I never see ’im till I was right atop of ’im, so that I haccidentally run agin ’im⁠—my heye! didn’t ’e give me a downer! I was down on the back of my ’ead in the middle of the road before I knew where I was and ’e was at the other end of the street. If ’e ’adn’t knocked me more’n ’arf silly I’d been after ’im, sharp⁠—I tell you! and hasked ’im what ’e thought ’e was a-doin’ of, but afore my senses was back agin ’e was out o’ sight⁠—clean!” + 

“You are sure he had a bundle on his head?” + 

“I noticed it most particular.” + 

“How long ago do you say this was? and where?” + 

“About a hour ago⁠—perhaps more, perhaps less.” + 

“Was he alone?” + 

“It seemed to me as if a cove was a follerin’ ’im, leastways there was a bloke as was a-keepin’ close at ’is ’eels⁠—though I don’t know what ’is little game was, I’m sure. Ask the pleesman⁠—he knows, he knows everything the pleesman do.” + 

I turned to the “pleesman.” + 

“Who is this man?” + 

The “pleesman” put his hands behind his back, and threw out his chest. His manner was distinctly affable. + 

“Well⁠—he’s being detained upon suspicion. He’s given us an address at which to make inquiries, and inquiries are being made. I shouldn’t pay too much attention to what he says if I were you. I don’t suppose he’d be particular about a lie or two.” + 

This frank expression of opinion re-aroused the indignation of the gentleman on the form. + 

“There you hare! at it again! That’s just like you peelers⁠—you’re all the same! What do you know about me?⁠—Nuffink! This gen’leman ain’t got no call to believe me, not as I knows on⁠—it’s all the same to me if ’e do or don’t, but it’s trewth what I’m sayin’, all the same.” + 

At this point the Inspector reappeared at the pigeonhole. He cut short the flow of eloquence. + 

“Now then, not so much noise outside there!” He addressed me. “None of our men have seen anything of the person you’re inquiring for, so far as we’re aware. But, if you like, I will place a man at your disposal, and he will go round with you, and you will be able to make your own inquiries.” + 

A capless, wildly excited young ragamuffin came dashing in at the street door. He gasped out, as clearly as he could for the speed which he had made: + 

“There’s been murder done, Mr. Pleesman⁠—a Harab’s killed a bloke.” + 

“Mr. Pleesman” gripped him by the shoulder. + 

“What’s that?” + 

The youngster put up his arm, and ducked his head, instinctively, as if to ward off a blow. + 

“Leave me alone! I don’t want none of your ’andling!⁠—I ain’t done nuffink to you! I tell you ’e ’as!” + 

The Inspector spoke through the pigeonhole. + 

“He has what, my lad? What do you say has happened?” + 

“There’s been murder done⁠—it’s right enough!⁠—there ’as!⁠—up at Mrs. ’Enderson’s, in Paradise Place⁠—a Harab’s been and killed a bloke!” + 

XLIV + 

The Man Who Was Murdered + 

The Inspector spoke to me. + 

“If what the boy says is correct it sounds as if the person whom you are seeking may have had a finger in the pie.” + 

I was of the same opinion, as, apparently, were Lessingham and Sidney. Atherton collared the youth by the shoulder which Mr. Pleesman had left disengaged. + 

“What sort of looking bloke is it who’s been murdered?” + 

“I dunno! I ’aven’t seen ’im! Mrs. ’Enderson, she says to me! ‘ ’Gustus Barley,’ she says, ‘a bloke’s been murdered. That there Harab what I chucked out ’alf a hour ago been and murdered ’im, and left ’im behind up in my back room. You run as ’ard as you can tear and tell them there dratted pleese what’s so fond of shovin’ their dirty noses into respectable people’s ’ouses.’ So I comes and tells yer. That’s all I knows about it.” + 

We went four in the hansom which had been waiting in the street to Mrs. Henderson’s in Paradise Place⁠—the Inspector and we three. “Mr. Pleesman” and “ ’Gustus Barley” followed on foot. The Inspector was explanatory. + 

“Mrs. Henderson keeps a sort of lodging-house⁠—a ‘Sailors’ Home’ she calls it, but no one could call it sweet. It doesn’t bear the best of characters, and if you asked me what I thought of it, I should say in plain English that it was a disorderly house.” + 

Paradise Place proved to be within three or four hundred yards of the Station House. So far as could be seen in the dark it consisted of a row of houses of considerable dimensions⁠—and also of considerable antiquity. They opened on to two or three stone steps which led directly into the street. At one of the doors stood an old lady with a shawl drawn over her head. This was Mrs. Henderson. She greeted us with garrulous volubility. + 

“So you ’ave come, ’ave you? I thought you never was a-comin’ that I did.” She recognised the Inspector. “It’s you, Mr. Phillips, is it?” Perceiving us, she drew a little back “Who’s them ’ere parties? They ain’t coppers?” + 

Mr. Phillips dismissed her inquiry, curtly. + 

“Never you mind who they are. What’s this about someone being murdered.” + 

“Ssh!” The old lady glanced round. “Don’t you speak so loud, Mr. Phillips. No one don’t know nothing about it as yet. The parties what’s in my ’ouse is most respectable⁠—most! and they couldn’t abide the notion of there being police about the place.” + 

“We quite believe that, Mrs. Henderson.” + 

The Inspector’s tone was grim. + 

Mrs. Henderson led the way up a staircase which would have been distinctly the better for repairs. It was necessary to pick one’s way as one went, and as the light was defective stumbles were not infrequent. + 

Our guide paused outside a door on the topmost landing. From some mysterious recess in her apparel she produced a key. + 

“It’s in ’ere. I locked the door so that nothing mightn’t be disturbed. I knows ’ow particular you pleesmen is.” + 

She turned the key. We all went in⁠—we, this time, in front, and she behind. + 

A candle was guttering on a broken and dilapidated single washhand stand. A small iron bedstead stood by its side, the clothes on which were all tumbled and tossed. There was a rush-seated chair with a hole in the seat⁠—and that, with the exception of one or two chipped pieces of stoneware, and a small round mirror which was hung on a nail against the wall, seemed to be all that the room contained. I could see nothing in the shape of a murdered man. Nor, it appeared, could the Inspector either. + 

“What’s the meaning of this, Mrs. Henderson? I don’t see anything here.” + 

“It’s be’ind the bed, Mr. Phillips. I left ’im just where I found ’im, I wouldn’t ’ave touched ’im not for nothing, nor yet ’ave let nobody else ’ave touched ’im neither, because, as I say, I know ’ow particular you pleesmen is.” + 

We all four went hastily forward. Atherton and I went to the head of the bed, Lessingham and the Inspector, leaning right across the bed, peeped over the side. There, on the floor in the space which was between the bed and the wall, lay the murdered man. + 

At sight of him an exclamation burst from Sydney’s lips. + 

“It’s Holt!” + 

“Thank God!” cried Lessingham. “It isn’t Marjorie!” + 

The relief in his tone was unmistakable. That the one was gone was plainly nothing to him in comparison with the fact that the other was left. + 

Thrusting the bed more into the centre of the room I knelt down beside the man on the floor. A more deplorable spectacle than he presented I have seldom witnessed. He was decently clad in a grey tweed suit, white hat, collar and necktie, and it was perhaps that fact which made his extreme attenuation the more conspicuous. I doubt if there was an ounce of flesh on the whole of his body. His cheeks and the sockets of his eyes were hollow. The skin was drawn tightly over his cheek bones⁠—the bones themselves were staring through. Even his nose was wasted, so that nothing but a ridge of cartilage remained. I put my arm beneath his shoulder and raised him from the floor; no resistance was offered by the body’s gravity⁠—he was as light as a little child. + 

“I doubt,” I said, “if this man has been murdered. It looks to me like a case of starvation, or exhaustion⁠—possibly a combination of both.” + 

“What’s that on his neck?” asked the Inspector⁠—he was kneeling at my side. + 

He referred to two abrasions of the skin⁠—one on either side of the man’s neck. + 

“They look to me like scratches. They seem pretty deep, but I don’t think they’re sufficient in themselves to cause death.” + 

“They might be, joined to an already weakened constitution. Is there anything in his pockets?⁠—let’s lift him on to the bed.” + 

We lifted him on to the bed⁠—a featherweight he was to lift. While the Inspector was examining his pockets⁠—to find them empty⁠—a tall man with a big black beard came bustling in. He proved to be Dr. Glossop, the local police surgeon, who had been sent for before our quitting the Station House. + 

His first pronouncement, made as soon as he commenced his examination, was, under the circumstances, sufficiently startling. + 

“I don’t believe the man’s dead. Why didn’t you send for me directly you found him?” + 

The question was put to Mrs. Henderson. + 

“Well, Dr. Glossop, I wouldn’t touch ’im myself, and I wouldn’t ’ave ’im touched by no one else, because, as I’ve said afore, I know ’ow particular them pleesmen is.” + 

“Then in that case, if he does die you’ll have had a hand in murdering him⁠—that’s all.” + 

The lady sniggered. “Of course Dr. Glossop, we all knows that you’ll always ’ave your joke.” + 

“You’ll find it a joke if you have to hang, as you ought to, you⁠—” The doctor said what he did say to himself, under his breath. I doubt if it was flattering to Mrs. Henderson. “Have you got any brandy in the house?” + 

“We’ve got everythink in the ’ouse for them as likes to pay for it⁠—everythink.” Then, suddenly remembering that the police were present, and that hers were not exactly licensed premises, “Leastways we can send out for it for them parties as gives us the money, being, as is well known, always willing to oblige.” + 

“Then send for some⁠—to the tap downstairs, if that’s the nearest! If this man dies before you’ve brought it I’ll have you locked up as sure as you’re a living woman.” + 

The arrival of the brandy was not long delayed⁠—but the man on the bed had regained consciousness before it came. Opening his eyes he looked up at the doctor bending over him. + 

“Hollo, my man! that’s more like the time of day! How are you feeling?” + 

The patient stared hazily up at the doctor, as if his sense of perception was not yet completely restored⁠—as if this big bearded man was something altogether strange. Atherton bent down beside the doctor. + 

“I’m glad to see you looking better, Mr. Holt. You know me don’t you? I’ve been running about after you all day long.” + 

“You are⁠—you are⁠—” The man’s eyes closed, as if the effort at recollection exhausted him. He kept them closed as he continued to speak. + 

“I know who you are. You are⁠—the gentleman.” + 

“Yes, that’s it, I’m the gentleman⁠—name of Atherton.⁠—Miss Lindon’s friend. And I daresay you’re feeling pretty well done up, and in want of something to eat and drink⁠—here’s some brandy for you.” + 

The doctor had some in a tumbler. He raised the patient’s head, allowing it to trickle down his throat. The man swallowed it mechanically, motionless, as if unconscious what it was that he was doing. His cheeks flushed, the passing glow of colour caused their condition of extraordinary, and, indeed, extravagant attentuation, to be more prominent than ever. The doctor laid him back upon the bed, feeling his pulse with one hand, while he stood and regarded him in silence. + 

Then, turning to the Inspector, he said to him in an undertone; + 

“If you want him to make a statement he’ll have to make it now, he’s going fast. You won’t be able to get much out of him⁠—he’s too far gone, and I shouldn’t bustle him, but get what you can.” + 

The Inspector came to the front, a notebook in his hand. + 

“I understand from this gentleman⁠—” signifying Atherton⁠—“that your name’s Robert Holt. I’m an Inspector of police, and I want you to tell me what has brought you into this condition. Has anyone been assaulting you?” + 

Holt, opening his eyes, glanced up at the speaker mistily, as if he could not see him clearly⁠—still less understand what it was that he was saying. Sydney, stooping over him, endeavoured to explain. + 

“The Inspector wants to know how you got here, has anyone been doing anything to you? Has anyone been hurting you?” + 

The man’s eyelids were partially closed. Then they opened wider and wider. His mouth opened too. On his skeleton features there came a look of panic fear. He was evidently struggling to speak. At last words came. + 

“The beetle!” He stopped. Then, after an effort, spoke again. “The beetle!” + 

“What’s he mean?” asked the Inspector. + 

“I think I understand,” Sydney answered; then turning again to the man in the bed. “Yes, I hear what you say⁠—the beetle. Well, has the beetle done anything to you?” + 

“It took me by the throat!” + 

“Is that the meaning of the marks upon your neck?” + 

“The beetle killed me.” + 

The lids closed. The man relapsed into a state of lethargy. The Inspector was puzzled;⁠—and said so. + 

“What’s he mean about a beetle?” + 

Atherton replied. + 

“I think I understand what he means⁠—and my friends do too. We’ll explain afterwards. In the meantime I think I’d better get as much out of him as I can⁠—while there’s time.” + 

“Yes,” said the doctor, his hand upon the patient’s pulse, “while there’s time. There isn’t much⁠—only seconds.” + 

Sydney endeavoured to rouse the man from his stupor. + 

“You’ve been with Miss Lindon all the afternoon and evening, haven’t you, Mr. Holt?” + 

Atherton had reached a chord in the man’s consciousness. His lips moved⁠—in painful articulation. + 

“Yes⁠—all the afternoon⁠—and evening⁠—God help me!” + 

“I hope God will help you my poor fellow; you’ve been in need of His help if ever man was. Miss Lindon is disguised in your old clothes, isn’t she?” + 

“Yes⁠—in my old clothes. My God!” + 

“And where is Miss Lindon now?” + 

The man had been speaking with his eyes closed. Now he opened them, wide; there came into them the former staring horror. He became possessed by uncontrollable agitation⁠—half raising himself in bed. Words came from his quivering lips as if they were only drawn from him by the force of his anguish. + 

“The beetle’s going to kill Miss Lindon.” + 

A momentary paroxysm seemed to shake the very foundations of his being. His whole frame quivered. He fell back on to the bed⁠—ominously. The doctor examined him in silence⁠—while we too were still. + 

“This time he’s gone for good, there’ll be no conjuring him back again.” + 

I felt a sudden pressure on my arm, and found that Lessingham was clutching me with probably unconscious violence. The muscles of his face were twitching. He trembled. I turned to the doctor. + 

“Doctor, if there is any of that brandy left will you let me have it for my friend?” + 

Lessingham disposed of the remainder of the “shillings worth.” I rather fancy it saved us from a scene. + 

The Inspector was speaking to the woman of the house. + 

“Now, Mrs. Henderson, perhaps you’ll tell us what all this means. Who is this man, and how did he come in here, and who came in with him, and what do you know about it altogether? If you’ve got anything to say, say it, only you’d better be careful, because it’s my duty to warn you that anything you do say may be used against you.” + 

XLV + 

All That Mrs. ’Enderson Knew + 

Mrs. Henderson put her hands under her apron and smirked. + 

“Well, Mr. Phillips, it do sound strange to ’ear you talkin’ to me like that. Anybody’d think I’d done something as I didn’t ought to ’a’ done to ’ear you going on. As for what’s ’appened, I’ll tell you all I know with the greatest willingness on earth. And as for bein’ careful, there ain’t no call for you to tell me to be that, for that I always am, as by now you ought to know.” + 

“Yes⁠—I do know. Is that all you have to say?” + 

“Rilly, Mr. Phillips, what a man you are for catching people up, you rilly are. O’ course that ain’t all I’ve got to say⁠—ain’t I just a-comin’ to it?” + 

“Then come.” + 

“If you presses me so you’ll muddle of me up, and then if I do ’appen to make a herror, you’ll say I’m a liar, when goodness knows there ain’t no more truthful woman not in Limehouse.” + 

Words plainly trembled on the Inspector’s lips⁠—which he refrained from uttering. Mrs. Henderson cast her eyes upwards, as if she sought for inspiration from the filthy ceiling. + 

“So far as I can swear it might ’ave been a hour ago, or it might ’ave been a hour and a quarter, or it might ’ave been a hour and twenty minutes⁠—” + 

“We’re not particular as to the seconds.” + 

“When I ’ears a knockin’ at my front door, and when I comes to open it, there was a Harab party, with a great bundle on ’is ’ead, bigger nor ’isself, and two other parties along with him. This Harab party says, in that queer foreign way them Harab parties ’as of talkin’, ‘A room for the night, a room.’ Now I don’t much care for foreigners, and never did, especially them Harabs, which their ’abits ain’t my own⁠—so I as much ’ints the same. But this ’ere Harab party, he didn’t seem to quite foller of my meaning, for all he done was to say as he said afore, ‘A room for the night, a room.’ And he shoves a couple of ’arf crowns into my ’and. Now it’s always been a motter o’ mine, that money is money, and one man’s money is as good as another man’s. So, not wishing to be disagreeable⁠—which other people would have taken ’em if I ’adn’t, I shows ’em up ’ere. I’d been downstairs it might ’ave been ’arf a hour, when I ’ears a shindy a-coming from this room⁠—” + 

“What sort of a shindy?” + 

“Yelling and shrieking⁠—oh my gracious, it was enough to set your blood all curdled⁠—for ear-piercingness I never did ’ear nothing like it. We do ’ave troublesome parties in ’ere, like they do elsewhere, but I never did ’ear nothing like that before. I stood it for about a minute, but it kep’ on, and kep’ on, and every moment I expected as the other parties as was in the ’ouse would be complainin’, so up I comes and I thumps at the door, and it seemed that thump I might for all the notice that was took of me.” + 

“Did the noise keep on?” + 

“Keep on! I should think it did keep on! Lord love you! shriek after shriek, I expected to see the roof took off.” + 

“Were there any other noises? For instance, were there any sounds of struggling, or of blows?” + 

“There weren’t no sounds except of the party hollering.” + 

“One party only?” + 

“One party only. As I says afore, shriek after shriek⁠—when you put your ear to the panel there was a noise like some other party blubbering, but that weren’t nothing, as for the hollering you wouldn’t have thought that nothing what you might call ’umin could ’ave kep’ up such a screechin’. I thumps and thumps and at last when I did think that I should ’ave to ’ave the door broke down, the Harab says to me from inside, ‘Go away! I pay for the room! go away!’ I did think that pretty good, I tell you that. So I says, ‘Pay for the room or not pay for the room, you didn’t pay to make that shindy!’ And what’s more I says, ‘If I ’ear it again,’ I says, ‘out you goes! And if you don’t go quiet I’ll ’ave somebody in as’ll pretty quickly make you!’ ” + 

“Then was there silence?” + 

“So to speak there was⁠—only there was this sound as if some party was a-blubbering, and another sound as if a party was a-panting for his breath.” + 

“Then what happened?” + 

“Seeing that, so to speak, all was quiet, down I went again. And in another quarter of a hour, or it might ’ave been twenty minutes, I went to the front door to get a mouthful of hair. And Mrs. Barker, what lives over the road, at No. 24, she comes to me and says, ‘That there Arab party of yours didn’t stop long.’ I looks at ’er, ‘I don’t quite foller you,’ I says⁠—which I didn’t. ‘I saw him come in,’ she says, ‘and then, a few minutes back, I see ’im go again, with a great bundle on ’is ’ead he couldn’t ’ardly stagger under!’ ‘Oh,’ I says, ‘that’s news to me, I didn’t know ’e’d gone, nor see him neither⁠—’ which I didn’t. So, up I comes again, and, sure enough, the door was open, and it seems to me that the room was empty, till I come upon this pore young man what was lying be’ind the bed.” + 

There was a growl from the doctor. + 

“If you’d had any sense, and sent for me at once, he might have been alive at this moment.” + 

“ ’Ow was I to know that, Dr. Glossop? I couldn’t tell. My finding ’im there murdered was quite enough for me. So I runs downstairs, and I nips ’old of ’Gustus Barley, what was leaning against the wall, and I says to him, ‘ ’Gustus Barley, run to the station as fast as you can and tell ’em that a man’s been murdered⁠—that Harab’s been and killed a bloke.’ And that’s all I know about it, and I couldn’t tell you no more, Mr. Phillips, not if you was to keep on asking me questions not for hours and hours.” + 

“Then you think it was this man”⁠—with a motion towards the bed⁠—“who was shrieking?” + 

“To tell you the truth, Mr. Phillips, about that I don’t ’ardly know what to think. If you ’ad asked me I should ’ave said it was a woman. I ought to know a woman’s holler when I ’ear it, if anyone does, I’ve ’eard enough of ’em in my time, goodness knows. And I should ’ave said that only a woman could ’ave hollered like that and only ’er when she was raving mad. But there weren’t no woman with him. There was only this man what’s murdered, and the other man⁠—and as for the other man I will say this, that ’e ’adn’t got twopennyworth of clothes to cover ’im. But, Mr. Phillips, howsomever that may be, that’s the last Harab I’ll ’ave under my roof, no matter what they pays, and you may mark my words I’ll ’ave no more.” + 

Mrs. Henderson, once more glancing upward, as if she imagined herself to have made some declaration of a religious nature, shook her head with much solemnity. + 

XLVI + 

The Sudden Stopping + 

As we were leaving the house a constable gave the Inspector a note. Having read it he passed it to me. It was from the local office. + 

“Message received that an Arab with a big bundle on his head has been noticed loitering about the neighbourhood of St. Pancras Station. He seemed to be accompanied by a young man who had the appearance of a tramp. Young man seemed ill. They appeared to be waiting for a train, probably to the North. Shall I advise detention?” + 

I scribbled on the flyleaf of the note. + 

“Have them detained. If they have gone by train have a special in readiness.” + 

In a minute we were again in the cab. I endeavoured to persuade Lessingham and Atherton to allow me to conduct the pursuit alone⁠—in vain. I had no fear of Atherton’s succumbing, but I was afraid for Lessingham. What was more almost than the expectation of his collapse was the fact that his looks and manner, his whole bearing, so eloquent of the agony and agitation of his mind, was beginning to tell upon my nerves. A catastrophe of some sort I foresaw. Of the curtain’s fall upon one tragedy we had just been witnesses. That there was worse⁠—much worse, to follow I did not doubt. Optimistic anticipations were out of the question⁠—that the creature we were chasing would relinquish the prey uninjured, no one, after what we had seen and heard, could by any possibility suppose. Should a necessity suddenly arise for prompt and immediate action, that Lessingham would prove a hindrance rather than a help I felt persuaded. + 

But since moments were precious, and Lessingham was not to be persuaded to allow the matter to proceed without him, all that remained was to make the best of his presence. + 

The great arch of St. Pancras was in darkness. An occasional light seemed to make the darkness still more visible. The station seemed deserted. I thought, at first, that there was not a soul about the place, that our errand was in vain, that the only thing for us to do was to drive to the police station and to pursue our inquiries there. But as we turned towards the booking-office, our footsteps ringing out clearly through the silence and the night, a door opened, a light shone out from the room within, and a voice inquired: + 

“Who’s that?” + 

“My name’s Champnell. Has a message been received from me from the Limehouse Police Station?” + 

“Step this way.” + 

We stepped that way⁠—into a snug enough office, of which one of the railway inspectors was apparently in charge. He was a big man, with a fair beard. He looked me up and down, as if doubtfully. Lessingham he recognised at once. He took off his cap to him. + 

“Mr. Lessingham, I believe?” + 

“I am Mr. Lessingham. Have you any news for me?” + 

I fancy, by his looks⁠—that the official was struck by the pallor of the speaker’s face⁠—and by his tremulous voice. + 

“I am instructed to give certain information to a Mr. Augustus Champnell.” + 

“I am Mr. Champnell. What’s your information?” + 

“With reference to the Arab about whom you have been making inquiries. A foreigner, dressed like an Arab, with a great bundle on his head, took two single thirds for Hull by the midnight express.” + 

“Was he alone?” + 

“It is believed that he was accompanied by a young man of very disreputable appearance. They were not together at the booking-office, but they had been seen together previously. A minute or so after the Arab had entered the train this young man got into the same compartment⁠—they were in the front wagon.” + 

“Why were they not detained?” + 

“We had no authority to detain them, nor any reason. Until your message was received a few minutes ago we at this station were not aware that inquiries were being made for them.” + 

“You say he booked to Hull⁠—does the train run through to Hull?” + 

“No⁠—it doesn’t go to Hull at all. Part of it’s the Liverpool and Manchester Express, and part of it’s for Carlisle. It divides at Derby. The man you’re looking for will change either at Sheffield or at Cudworth Junction and go on to Hull by the first train in the morning. There’s a local service.” + 

I looked at my watch. + 

“You say the train left at midnight. It’s now nearly five-and-twenty past. Where’s it now?” + 

“Nearing St. Albans, it’s due there 12:35.” + 

“Would there be time for a wire to reach St. Albans?” + 

“Hardly⁠—and anyhow there’ll only be enough railway officials about the place to receive and despatch the train. They’ll be fully occupied with their ordinary duties. There won’t be time to get the police there.” + 

“You could wire to St. Albans to inquire if they were still in the train?” + 

“That could be done⁠—certainly. I’ll have it done at once if you like.” + 

“Then where’s the next stoppage?” + 

“Well, they’re at Luton at 12:51. But that’s another case of St. Albans. You see there won’t be much more than twenty minutes by the time you’ve got your wire off, and I don’t expect there’ll be many people awake at Luton. At these country places sometimes there’s a policeman hanging about the station to see the express go through, but, on the other hand, very often there isn’t, and if there isn’t, probably at this time of night it’ll take a good bit of time to get the police on the premises. I tell you what I should advise.” + 

“What’s that?” + 

“The train is due at Bedford at 1:29⁠—send your wire there. There ought to be plenty of people about at Bedford, and anyhow there’ll be time to get the police to the station.” + 

“Very good. I instructed them to tell you to have a special ready⁠—have you got one?” + 

“There’s an engine with steam up in the shed⁠—we’ll have all ready for you in less than ten minutes. And I tell you what⁠—you’ll have about fifty minutes before the train is due at Bedford. It’s a fifty mile run. With luck you ought to get there pretty nearly as soon as the express does.⁠—Shall I tell them to get ready?” + 

“At once.” + 

While he issued directions through a telephone to what, I presume, was the engine shed, I drew up a couple of telegrams. Having completed his orders he turned to me. + 

“They’re coming out of the siding now⁠—they’ll be ready in less than ten minutes. I’ll see that the line’s kept clear. Have you got those wires?” + 

“Here is one⁠—this is for Bedford.” + 

It ran: + 

“Arrest the Arab who is in train due at 1:29. When leaving St. Pancras he was in a third-class compartment in front wagon. He has a large bundle, which detain. He took two third singles for Hull. Also detain his companion, who is dressed like a tramp. This is a young lady whom the Arab has disguised and kidnapped while in a condition of hypnotic trance. Let her have medical assistance and be taken to a hotel. All expenses will be paid on the arrival of the undersigned who is following by special train. As the Arab will probably be very violent a sufficient force of police should be in waiting. + 

“And this is the other. It is probably too late to be of any use at St. Albans⁠—but send it there, and also to Luton.” + 

“Is Arab with companion in train which left St. Pancras at 13:00? If so, do not let them get out till train reaches Bedford, where instructions are being wired for arrest.” + 

The Inspector rapidly scanned them both. + 

“They ought to do your business, I should think. Come along with me⁠—I’ll have them sent at once, and we’ll see if your train’s ready.” + 

The train was not ready⁠—nor was it ready within the prescribed ten minutes. There was some hitch, I fancy, about a saloon. Finally we had to be content with an ordinary old-fashioned first-class carriage. The delay, however, was not altogether time lost. Just as the engine with its solitary coach was approaching the platform someone came running up with an envelope in his hand. + 

“Telegram from St. Albans.” + 

I tore it open. It was brief and to the point. + 

“Arab with companion was in train when it left here. Am wiring Luton.” + 

“That’s all right. Now unless something wholly unforeseen takes place, we ought to have them.” + 

That unforeseen! + 

I went forward with the Inspector and the guard of our train to exchange a few final words with the driver. The Inspector explained what instructions he had given. + 

“I’ve told the driver not to spare his coal but to take you into Bedford within five minutes after the arrival of the express. He says he thinks that he can do it.” + 

The driver leaned over his engine, rubbing his hands with the usual oily rag. He was a short, wiry man with grey hair and a grizzled moustache, with about him that bearing of semi-humorous, frank-faced resolution which one notes about engine-drivers as a class. + 

“We ought to do it, the gradients are against us, but it’s a clear night and there’s no wind. The only thing that will stop us will be if there’s any shunting on the road, or any luggage trains; of course, if we are blocked, we are blocked, but the Inspector says he’ll clear the way for us.” + 

“Yes,” said the Inspector, “I’ll clear the way. I’ve wired down the road already.” + 

Atherton broke in. + 

“Driver, if you get us into Bedford within five minutes of the arrival of the mail there’ll be a five-pound note to divide between your mate and you.” + 

The driver grinned. + 

“We’ll get you there in time, sir, if we have to go clear through the shunters. It isn’t often we get a chance of a five-pound note for a run to Bedford, and we’ll do our best to earn it.” + 

The fireman waved his hand in the rear. + 

“That’s right, sir!” he cried. “We’ll have to trouble you for that five-pound note.” + 

So soon as we were clear of the station it began to seem probable that, as the fireman put it, Atherton would be “troubled.” Journeying in a train which consists of a single carriage attached to an engine which is flying at topmost speed is a very different business from being an occupant of an ordinary train which is travelling at ordinary express rates. I had discovered that for myself before. That night it was impressed on me more than ever. A tyro⁠—or even a nervous “season”⁠—might have been excused for expecting at every moment we were going to be derailed. It was hard to believe that the carriage had any springs⁠—it rocked and swung, and jogged and jolted. Of smooth travelling had we none. Talking was out of the question;⁠—and for that, I, personally, was grateful. Quite apart from the difficulty we experienced in keeping our seats⁠—and when every moment our position was being altered and we were jerked backwards and forwards up and down, this way and that, that was a business which required care⁠—the noise was deafening. It was as though we were being pursued by a legion of shrieking, bellowing, raging demons. + 

“George!” shrieked Atherton, “he does mean to earn that fiver. I hope I’ll be alive to pay it him!” + 

He was only at the other end of the carriage, but though I could see by the distortion of his visage that he was shouting at the top of his voice⁠—and he has a voice⁠—I only caught here and there a word or two of what he was saying. I had to make sense of the whole. + 

Lessingham’s contortions were a study. Few of that large multitude of persons who are acquainted with him only by means of the portraits which have appeared in the illustrated papers, would then have recognised the rising statesman. Yet I believe that few things could have better fallen in with his mood than that wild travelling. He might have been almost shaken to pieces⁠—but the very severity of the shaking served to divert his thoughts from the one dread topic which threatened to absorb them to the exclusion of all else beside. Then there was the tonic influence of the element of risk. The pick-me-up effect of a spice of peril. Actual danger there quite probably was none; but there very really seemed to be. And one thing was absolutely certain, that if we did come to smash while going at that speed we should come to as everlasting smash as the heart of man could by any possibility desire. It is probable that the knowledge that this was so warmed the blood in Lessingham’s veins. At any rate as⁠—to use what in this case, was simply a form of speech⁠—I sat and watched him, it seemed to me that he was getting a firmer hold of the strength which had all but escaped him, and that with every jog and jolt he was becoming more and more of a man. + 

On and on we went dashing, clashing, smashing, roaring, rumbling. Atherton, who had been endeavouring to peer through the window, strained his lungs again in the effort to make himself audible. + 

“Where the devil are we?” + 

Looking at my watch I screamed back at him. + 

“It’s nearly one, so I suppose we’re somewhere in the neighbourhood of Luton.⁠—Hollo! What’s the matter?” + 

That something was the matter seemed certain. There was a shrill whistle from the engine. In a second we were conscious⁠—almost too conscious⁠—of the application of the Westinghouse brake. Of all the jolting that was ever jolted! the mere reverberation of the carriage threatened to resolve our bodies into their component parts. Feeling what we felt then helped us to realise the retardatory force which that vacuum brake must be exerting⁠—it did not seem at all surprising that the train should have been brought to an almost instant standstill. + 

Simultaneously all three of us were on our feet. I let down my window and Atherton let down his⁠—he shouting out, + 

“I should think that Inspector’s wire hasn’t had its proper effect, looks as if we’re blocked⁠—or else we’ve stopped at Luton. It can’t be Bedford.” + 

It wasn’t Bedford⁠—so much seemed clear. Though at first from my window I could make out nothing. I was feeling more than a trifle dazed⁠—there was a singing in my ears⁠—the sudden darkness was impenetrable. Then I became conscious that the guard was opening the door of his compartment. He stood on the step for a moment, seeming to hesitate. Then, with a lamp in his hand, he descended on to the line. + 

“What’s the matter?” I asked. + 

“Don’t know, sir. Seems as if there was something on the road. What’s up there?” + 

This was to the man on the engine. The fireman replied: + 

“Someone in front there’s waving a red light like mad⁠—lucky I caught sight of him, we should have been clean on top of him in another moment. Looks as if there was something wrong. Here he comes.” + 

As my eyes grew more accustomed to the darkness I became aware that someone was making what haste he could along the six-foot way, swinging a red light as he came. Our guard advanced to meet him, shouting as he went: + 

“What’s the matter! Who’s that?” + 

A voice replied, + 

“My God! Is that George Hewett. I thought you were coming right on top of us!” + 

Our guard again. + 

“What! Jim Branson! What the devil are you doing here, what’s wrong? I thought you were on the twelve out, we’re chasing you.” + 

“Are you? Then you’ve caught us. Thank God for it!⁠—We’re a wreck.” + 

I had already opened the carriage door. With that we all three clambered out on to the line. + 

XLVII + 

The Contents of the Third-Class Carriage + 

I moved to the stranger who was holding the lamp. He was in official uniform. + 

“Are you the guard of the 12:00 out from St. Pancras?” + 

“I am.” + 

“Where’s your train? What’s happened?” + 

“As for where it is, there it is, right in front of you, what’s left of it. As to what’s happened, why, we’re wrecked.” + 

“What do you mean by you’re wrecked?” + 

“Some heavy loaded trucks broke loose from a goods in front and came running down the hill on top of us.” + 

“How long ago was it?” + 

“Not ten minutes. I was just starting off down the road to the signal box, it’s a good two miles away, when I saw you coming. My God! I thought there was going to be another smash.” + 

“Much damage done?” + 

“Seems to me as if we’re all smashed up. As far as I can make out they’re matchboxed up in front. I feel as if I was all broken up inside of me. I’ve been in the service going on for thirty years, and this is the first accident I’ve been in.” + 

It was too dark to see the man’s face, but judging from his tone he was either crying or very near to it. + 

Our guard turned and shouted back to our engine, + 

“You’d better go back to the box and let ’em know!” + 

“All right!” came echoing back. + 

The special immediately commenced retreating, whistling continually as it went. All the country side must have heard the engine shrieking, and all who did hear must have understood that on the line something was seriously wrong. + 

The smashed train was all in darkness, the force of the collision had put out all the carriage lamps. Here was a flickering candle, there the glimmer of a match, these were all the lights which shone upon the scene. People were piling up debris by the side of the line, for the purpose of making a fire⁠—more for illumination than for warmth. + 

Many of the passengers had succeeded in freeing themselves, and were moving hither and thither about the line. But the majority appeared to be still imprisoned. The carriage doors were jammed. Without the necessary tools it was impossible to open them. Every step we took our ears were saluted by piteous cries. Men, women, children, appealed to us for help. + 

“Open the door, sir!” “In the name of God, sir, open the door!” + 

Over and over again, in all sorts of tones, with all degrees of violence, the supplication was repeated. + 

The guards vainly endeavoured to appease the, in many cases, half-frenzied creatures. + 

“All right, sir! If you’ll only wait a minute or two, madam! We can’t get the doors open without tools, a special train’s just started off to get them. If you’ll only have patience there’ll be plenty of help for every one of you directly. You’ll be quite safe in there, if you’ll only keep still.” + 

But that was just what they found it most difficult to do⁠—keep still! + 

In the front of the train all was chaos. The trucks which had done the mischief⁠—there were afterwards shown to be six of them, together with two guards’ vans⁠—appeared to have been laden with bags of Portland cement. The bags had burst, and everything was covered with what seemed gritty dust. The air was full of the stuff, it got into our eyes, half blinding us. The engine of the express had turned a complete somersault. It vomited forth smoke, and steam, and flames⁠—every moment it seemed as if the woodwork of the carriages immediately behind and beneath would catch fire. + 

The front coaches were, as the guard had put it, “match-boxed.” They were nothing but a heap of debris⁠—telescoped into one another in a state of apparently inextricable confusion. It was broad daylight before access was gained to what had once been the interiors. The condition of the first third-class compartment revealed an extraordinary state of things. + 

Scattered all over it were pieces of what looked like partially burnt rags, and fragments of silk and linen. I have those fragments now. Experts have assured me that they are actually neither of silk nor linen! but of some material⁠—animal rather than vegetable⁠—with which they are wholly unacquainted. On the cushions and woodwork⁠—especially on the woodwork of the floor⁠—were huge blotches⁠—stains of some sort. When first noticed they were damp, and gave out a most unpleasant smell. One of the pieces of woodwork is yet in my possession⁠—with the stain still on it. Experts have pronounced upon it too⁠—with the result that opinions are divided. Some maintain that the stain was produced by human blood, which had been subjected to a great heat, and, so to speak, parboiled. Others declare that it is the blood of some wild animal⁠—possibly of some creature of the cat species. Yet others affirm that it is not blood at all, but merely paint. While a fourth describes it as⁠—I quote the written opinion which lies in front of me⁠—“caused apparently by a deposit of some sort of viscid matter, probably the excretion of some variety of lizard.” + 

In a corner of the carriage was the body of what seemed a young man costumed like a tramp. It was Marjorie Lindon. + 

So far as a most careful search revealed, that was all the compartment contained. + 

XLVIII + 

The Conclusion of the Matter + 

It is several years since I bore my part in the events which I have rapidly sketched⁠—or I should not have felt justified in giving them publicity. Exactly how many years, for reasons which should be sufficiently obvious, I must decline to say. + 

Marjorie Lindon still lives. The spark of life which was left in her, when she was extricated from among the debris of the wrecked express, was fanned again into flame. Her restoration was, however, not merely an affair of weeks or months, it was a matter of years. I believe that, even after her physical powers were completely restored⁠—in itself a tedious task⁠—she was for something like three years under medical supervision as a lunatic. But all that skill and money could do was done, and in course of time⁠—the great healer⁠—the results were entirely satisfactory. + 

Her father is dead⁠—and has left her in possession of the family estates. She is married to the individual who, in these pages, has been known as Paul Lessingham. Were his real name divulged she would be recognised as the popular and universally reverenced wife of one of the greatest statesmen the age has seen. + 

Nothing has been said to her about the fateful day on which she was⁠—consciously or unconsciously⁠—paraded through London in the tattered masculine habiliments of a vagabond. She herself has never once alluded to it. With the return of reason the affair seems to have passed from her memory as wholly as if it had never been, which, although she may not know it, is not the least cause she has for thankfulness. Therefore what actually transpired will never, in all human probability, be certainly known and particularly what precisely occurred in the railway carriage during that dreadful moment of sudden passing from life unto death. What became of the creature who all but did her to death; who he was⁠—if it was a “he,” which is extremely doubtful; whence he came; whither he went; what was the purport of his presence here⁠—to this hour these things are puzzles. + 

Paul Lessingham has not since been troubled by his old tormentor. He has ceased to be a haunted man. None the less he continues to have what seems to be a constitutional disrelish for the subject of beetles, nor can he himself be induced to speak of them. Should they be mentioned in a general conversation, should he be unable to immediately bring about a change of theme, he will, if possible, get up and leave the room. More, on this point he and his wife are one. + 

The fact may not be generally known, but it is so. Also I have reason to believe that there still are moments in which he harks back, with something like physical shrinking, to that awful nightmare of the past, and in which he prays God, that as it is distant from him now so may it be kept far off from him forever. + 

Before closing, one matter may be casually mentioned. The tale has never been told, but I have unimpeachable authority for its authenticity. + 

During the recent expeditionary advance towards Dongola, a body of native troops which was encamped at a remote spot in the desert was aroused one night by what seemed to be the sound of a loud explosion. The next morning, at a distance of about a couple of miles from the camp, a huge hole was discovered in the ground⁠—as if blasting operations, on an enormous scale, had recently been carried on. In the hole itself, and round about it, were found fragments of what seemed bodies; credible witnesses have assured me that they were bodies neither of men nor women, but of creatures of some monstrous growth. I prefer to believe, since no scientific examination of the remains took place, that these witnesses ignorantly, though innocently, erred. + 

One thing is sure. Numerous pieces, both of stone and of metal, were seen, which went far to suggest that some curious subterranean building had been blown up by the force of the explosion. Especially were there portions of moulded metal which seemed to belong to what must have been an immense bronze statue. There were picked up also, more than a dozen replicas in bronze of the whilom sacred scarabaeus. + 

That the den of demons described by Paul Lessingham, had, that night, at last come to an end, and that these things which lay scattered, here and there, on that treeless plain, were the evidences of its final destruction, is not a hypothesis which I should care to advance with any degree of certainty. But, putting this and that together, the facts seem to point that way⁠—and it is a consummation devoutly to be desired. + 

By the by, Sydney Atherton has married Miss Dora Grayling. Her wealth has made him one of the richest men in England. She began, the story goes, by loving him immensely; I can answer for the fact that he has ended by loving her as much. Their devotion to each other contradicts the pessimistic nonsense which supposes that every marriage must be of necessity a failure. He continues his career of an inventor. His investigations into the subject of aerial flight, which have brought the flying machine within the range of practical politics, are on everybody’s tongue. + 

The best man at Atherton’s wedding was Percy Woodville, now the Earl of Barnes. Within six months afterwards he married one of Mrs. Atherton’s bridesmaids. + 

It was never certainly shown how Robert Holt came to his end. At the inquest the coroner’s jury was content to return a verdict of “Died of exhaustion.” He lies buried in Kensal Green Cemetery, under a handsome tombstone, the cost of which, had he had it in his pockets, might have indefinitely prolonged his days. + 

It should be mentioned that that portion of this strange history which purports to be The Surprising Narration of Robert Holt was compiled from the statements which Holt made to Atherton, and to Miss Lindon, as she then was, when, a mud-stained, shattered derelict he lay at the lady’s father’s house. + 

Miss Linden’s contribution towards the elucidation of the mystery was written with her own hand. After her physical strength had come back to her, and, while mentally, she still hovered between the darkness and the light, her one relaxation was writing. Although she would never speak of what she had written, it was found that her theme was always the same. She confided to pen and paper what she would not speak of with her lips. She told, and retold, and retold again, the story of her love, and of her tribulation so far as it is contained in the present volume. Her MSS. invariably began and ended at the same point. They have all of them been destroyed, with one exception. That exception is herein placed before the reader. + 

On the subject of the Mystery of the Beetle I do not propose to pronounce a confident opinion. Atherton and I have talked it over many and many a time, and at the end we have got no “forrarder.” So far as I am personally concerned, experience has taught me that there are indeed more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy, and I am quite prepared to believe that the so-called Beetle, which others saw, but I never, was⁠—or is, for it cannot be certainly shown that the thing is not still existing⁠—a creature born neither of God nor man. + 