This House to Let

If Davis read of all this in the papers, he was too concerned with his own danger to emerge from his hiding-place and publish the truth to the world. He would be thankful that, through the villainy of others, he could take a new lease of life, unmenaced by detection. Of course, they had never thought of the possibility that Davis would be cleared by the confession of the real criminal. Like Scotland Yard, they were sure he was guilty, and his silence was a matter of certainty.

And slowly Bryant, drawing from the stores of his vast experience, began to construct in his own mind the details of the murder, executed by two desperate criminals, almost driven to the verge of madness by the knowledge that their carefully-laid plans were about to be frustrated by the action of one man.

The woman, the weaker of the two, was probably more disposed to yield to the force and strength of circumstances. Once before, in her marriage to Jack Pomfret, she had had the cup snatched from her lips, and bowed to the inevitable. From the few words recorded in the Major’s accusing diary, it would seem that, secured of a modest competence, she was ready a second time to accept her fate.

And then, in that week’s interval, it was easy to guess what had happened. She had consulted her old partner in crime, George Burton. He had reasoned, as it turned out, a little shallowly, remove Murchison, and the danger will be past. The resemblance of Murchison to Reginald Davis had occurred to the pair, hence the cunningly prepared letters.

And how was the actual murder accomplished? Had they gone to Cathcart Square together, or had Burton followed her, getting in by means of that broken window-pane at the back? And did they know the Major was alone? In that last interview with Mrs Spencer, had he let out the fact that he had given the caretaker a holiday, so that they should not be disturbed?

These were side problems that could not be solved at the moment. Only two persons could solve them, and those two, in all probability, would never speak.

But how had they killed him? The Major was a strong, muscular fellow who would fight tenaciously for his life. Norah Burton was a slender woman, almost verging on frailness, George Dutton, to call him by his latest name, was certainly of a muscular build, although of only average height.

Well, of course, they had foreseen and prepared for all that. While talking to him, she had sprayed over him the essence of some overpowering and stupefying drug, and while he was staggering about, dazed and blinded, the man had stepped in and done the rest.

Owing to the absence of the caretaker, they had plenty of time. They had rifled his pockets, taking out of them the money which, according to his diary, he had brought along with him, his personal belongings, the ticket which he had received at the luggage room of Victoria Station, and, of course, the confession which Norah Burton had or had not signed. No doubt, they had also examined his linen and underclothing to make sure that his name was not on them. If it had been, they would have dealt with it by stripping the body.

They had carried it out pretty well, on the whole. There were two things they had not reckoned on. One was the resuscitation of Reginald Davis. The other was the fact that Murchison kept a diary, one of the last things that a man of his sort was likely to do.

Bryant, although not a very emotional man, felt very depressed as he came to the result of his meditations. He felt sure that, if Norah Burton could have had her own way, she would have accepted her fate, gone forth on the world again with the slender pittance that either of the two men, her husband or his friend, would have allowed her.

She had suffered herself to be dominated by a more reckless and criminal spirit, with the result that the life of an honourable man had been taken, and she was already standing at the foot of the gallows.

The pair, only knowing that the body had been exhumed and proved to be that of Hugh Murchison – a terribly disturbing thought to them – but ignorant of the discovery of that incriminating diary, were being closely watched. But they felt sure that nothing could be traced to them, they had hidden their tracks so cleverly, as they thought.

It was now only a question of a few hours as to when they should be taken. And Bryant felt that Guy Spencer should know the truth before anybody else. Poor fellow! He would soften the blow to him as much as he could.

That same evening he went round to Eaton Place, about seven o’clock. He reckoned that he would catch Spencer before he went up to dress for dinner. “Poor devil,” thought Bryant, “he won’t have much appetite for dinner after he has read through that diary!”

Spencer was in the library, and the detective, whom he had met before in connection with the mystery of Cathcart Square, was shown in. Spencer welcomed him with his usual cordiality.

“Good-evening, Mr Bryant. Any fresh light upon this terrible thing?”

The footman had left the library door slightly open, after showing Bryant in, and had retired swiftly to his quarters.

He was hardly out of the hall when Stella opened the front-door with her key, and glided noiselessly in. All her movements were noiseless, suggesting, as somebody had once remarked of her, the silent motions of a snake. She always carried a key, declaring that she could not be kept waiting for servants to answer the door.

The library door was open, through the aperture she heard voices, and one of them she recognised. It was that of the Scotland Yard detective, who had cross-examined her very closely as to her various meetings with the dead man. She had been afraid of Bryant. He had looked at her so searchingly, and his manner always conveyed that he knew so much more than he was prepared to disclose.

Bryant was speaking in a low, but very clear voice. Her hearing was singularly acute, and she could catch every word.

“I am come on a very painful errand, Mr Spencer. There is a small volume here which throws a very clear light on what happened at Cathcart Square on that fatal evening of July the fourth.”

Guy’s cheerful accents rang out. “You mean you have got a clue, Mr Bryant. But why painful to me? If you are on the track of the murderer of my poor old friend, nobody will be more rejoiced than I.”

Again the low, grave tones of Bryant:

“Mr Spencer, you will be a very stricken man when you have read through it. Your poor friend left behind him a very copious diary, made up to the morning of the day on which he was murdered. The original is at my office, you can inspect it at any time you like. This is a copy of the entries relating to Cathcart Square. It touches your domestic life very closely, in addition to proving why and by whom he was murdered.”

Stella waited to hear no more. Her face had gone livid, she felt shaking in every limb. That her old enemy, Murchison, had left a diary! They had never thought of that possibility. The game was up. She had staked something on her marriage as Norah Burton with Jack Pomfret, and had lost. This time she had staked everything and lost again, but now she had lost liberty and life in addition. There was but one end. She must seek at once the man who had, in a way, been a good and faithful friend, but also her evil genius.

She stole as quietly out of the hall as she had entered it, and hailed a passing taxi. She knew she would never enter the house at Eaton Place again.

Chapter Twenty Five

Mrs Spencer had plenty of money in her pocket. She was always accustomed to carry a large sum about her. Her adventurous life had taught her that it was always wiser to have a good amount of cash in her possession. The time might come at any moment when you were in a tight corner. She had promised a handsome reward to the taxi-cab driver if he could get to a certain destination within the speed limit.

That destination was Kew Bridge, where it abuts on a little-known neighbourhood called Strand-on-the-Green.

At the foot of Kew Bridge, the wretched and hunted woman halted, and paid the driver his extravagant fare. What did it matter what she paid to-night? To-morrow she might not be able to pay. She shuddered as she thought of that to-morrow.

The taxi-driver drove slowly out of sight. She waited, from a sense of habitual caution, till he was well out of the way. And then, remembering everything, she smiled bitterly. Was there any need of caution now?

She went down a narrow lane, halted at the door of a small cottage, and rang the front-door bell. As she did so, she was aware of a man a few yards away from her, who seemed to be strolling aimlessly about, a man dressed in ill-fitting clothes, and heavy boots.

A detective certainly! This man had followed her from Eaton Place in a taxi almost as swift as her own. Bryant knew his business, he was not going to lose sight of her, or of her reputed cousin, George Dutton.

The door was opened cautiously by George Dutton, alias George Burton.

It was a small furnished cottage that he had rented for some months past, at a rent commensurate with his means. He kept no servant; a feeble old woman came in the morning to clean him up and prepare his breakfast. When he came back at night from the not very prosperous bucket-shop, he looked after himself, and cooked over a gas-stove his evening meal.

The evenings were drawing in, and it was rather a dark night. He peered for a moment at his visitor, before he recognised her.

“Stella, by all that is wonderful.” He called her by the new name, not the old one of Norah. “Come in, dear, but your arrival in this unexpected fashion does not suggest good news.”

She passed hastily through the open doorway. “Shut it quick,” she said, in a low, hoarse voice. “There is a man watching outside, I am sure he is a detective.”

As a matter of fact, there were two detectives within a few feet of each other, but in her agitation she had not observed the second man, who was deputed to keep watch on the movements of Mr George Dutton.

George Dutton was an old hand, and not to be lightly disturbed by small incidents. But he recognised the significance of this visit. His ruddy colour died away.

“You have bad news,” he said quietly.

“The worst, George. Bryant, the detective, paid a visit to Guy this evening. I came in just in the nick of time. The library door was ajar, I heard what Bryant said. The Major has left a diary behind him, and, of course, he had put it all down, up to the arranged meeting in Cathcart Square. The game is up, you will recognise that.”

Dutton’s mentality was a little bit slower than her own. “Did you hear any extracts read from the diary?”

“What a fool you are!” she cried indignantly. “Why should I wait to hear? If the man kept a diary, is it not easy to guess that he would have related every incident connected with me, from our first meeting at the Southleigh dinner-party? Bryant is watching me, there is a detective waiting outside. No doubt he is watching you, too. He is just waiting to pounce.”

“Then why has he gone to your husband?”

“Oh, you are too dense for worlds. Just to soften the blow. Can’t you understand that he wants to warn him beforehand of the shame that is going to fall upon him, the discovery that his wife is a murderess?”

And then Mr Dutton understood. He stretched out appealing arms to her. “My poor little girl, my ever faithful pal! And I have brought you to this!”

“You have brought me to this,” she said bitterly. “Did I not implore you upon my knees to accept the Major’s terms, and you were so obstinate, so set. You would insist upon the other way because it seemed better to you. And I, fool that I was, always yielding to your sinister influence, gave way as I always have done.”

Scoundrel and criminal as he was, hardened by years of evil-doing, the man’s self-control gave way at that accusation. He drew her to him, and, strange to say, she did not shrink from his embrace.

“My poor Stella, I have tried to do my best for you always, even sacrificed myself. But the end has come.”

He recognised that, as she did.

“Yes,” she said stoically, “as you say, the end has come. You have always been very adept in falling into holes, and then digging yourself out again. How are you going to dig yourself and me out of this hole, in the face of that incriminating diary?”

Dutton walked up and down, his face working, his hands and his body trembling. He was up against the gravest problem of his adventurous career. The shadow of the prison had always hovered over him, but now there was a more ghastly menace, the shadow of the gallows. From the prison, he could return. There was no return from the other.

He paused in his restless pacing, and came to a halt before the stricken woman. He had recovered himself to a certain extent. He had gambled and lost, he was prepared to accept the fate of the unsuccessful gambler.

“You are brave, old girl?” he asked briefly.

She looked up at him with a wan smile.

“Yes, I think I am brave. I can guess what you are about to suggest, with the detectives watching us outside.” She burst into a little sob. “Oh, you always thought you were so clever, and yet, if I had had the management of affairs, things might have been so different.”

He spoke humbly. “I think you are right, Norah. I was always full of arrogance and self-conceit. You were weaker in character than I was, but you had always more brains. And I was a blind fool not to admit it. Many a time you gave me your advice, and I rejected it.”

“And what do you suggest now?” she asked, in a voice that had sunk to a whisper.

He looked at her steadily. He had screwed up his courage to the sticking point. Could he count upon an equal fortitude in her?

“It is the finish, old girl. You say the detectives are waiting outside. Bryant has got a good case, and the diary will hang us. There is no getting over that.”

“You propose – ” she said falteringly.

He spoke quite steadily. The end had come, he had made up his mind, so far as regards himself.

“We neither of us want to hang for the murder of Hugh Murchison?”

She shuddered, and hid her face with her hands. “Oh, that awful evening! It has been like a nightmare ever since.”

“I know,” said Dutton soothingly. “It was one of my fatal mistakes. But it is no use crying over spilt milk. To-night we are face to face with facts. We have gambled, and we have lost, and we have got to pay the penalty.”

The wretched woman rose up, and wrung her hands. “And to think I might have been the Countess of Southleigh.”

“I know; don’t think I am not reckoning up all that,” replied Dutton. “But we have got to deal with facts to-night, with the detectives waiting outside. The game is up, you know that as well as I do. We have only a few hours before us, perhaps a few minutes, in which to make the choice.”

“I know,” she answered. “You mean our only alternative is to cheat the law.”

He looked at her steadily. “That is the only way. If we suffer ourselves to be taken, we have not got a dog’s chance.”

Weak woman as she was, she gathered something of his iron resolution. Yes, they must die and die together, to cheat the law. Such was to be the end of the brilliant adventuress who had inveigled two men into marriage, Jack Pomfret and Guy Spencer, with her subtle and elusive charm.

“And what do you suggest, George? You have thought of these things more than I have.”

“I have always thought of them,” said Dutton gloomily. “Well, there are various ways I can suggest to you. I can shoot you first, and myself afterwards.”

She shuddered. “Some other way than that.”

“I can give you some tabloids.”

“Is there any pain?” she queried.

“Hardly any.”

She shuddered again. “Hardly any. That does not sound very convincing.”

He proposed a third alternative. “You can come up to my room, and lie on the bed. I will paper up all the doors and cracks and turn up the gas. You will simply go to sleep and never wake.”

“That is the best,” she said.

“If we had plenty of time. But they may take us in a few minutes. Bryant has seen your husband, he will not wait long after that interview.”

“The tabloids, then,” she said firmly.

Yes, it had come to this, she must cheat the law. Twice, she had had her chance, once as the wife of Jack Pomfret, again as the wife of Guy Spencer. And twice had the cup of triumph been snatched from her lips.

She must die, like a rat in a hole, in this obscure little cottage at Strand-on-the-Green, in the company of the man who had always been her evil genius.

Dutton went across to a small cupboard built in the wall of the shabby parlour, and brought out a little bottle filled with capsules. He extracted one and handed it to the shrinking woman.

“Take yours first, dear, I will take mine after.” There was a look of infinite compassion in the scoundrel’s face as he offered it to her.

Bravely she took it, and swallowed it with a great gulp, sitting in the shabby easy-chair. The effect was almost instantaneous, and when Dutton had made sure that she was beyond human aid, he took a similar tabloid himself, with the same result.

An hour later there was a thundering knock at the door of the cottage. One of the detectives had gone to a telephone office and informed Bryant that the woman had come to Strand-on-the-Green, and was with Dutton. The order came back from Bryant, who had only stayed a few minutes at Eaton Place, that the pair were to be arrested at once.

Of course there was no response. After waiting for a few moments, the men broke in the frail door. But they were too late.

Norah Burton, and the man who had been so long associated with her – brother, cousin, lover, whatever he might be – had gone to their judgment.

It was a nine-days’ wonder, and while his friends and acquaintances were still discussing it at clubs and over tea-tables, Guy Spencer slipped quietly abroad. When he returned to England, at the end of twelve months, these tragic happenings had become little more than a memory to his world.

He stayed a week with the Southleighs at their ancestral home in Sussex, and at the end of that week their friends read an important announcement in The Morning Post: —

“A marriage has been arranged and will shortly take place between Mr Guy Spencer and his cousin, Lady Nina, only daughter and child of the Earl of Southleigh.”

The End