The Sign of the Stranger

“Then you have been loyal to me, Willoughby. You have kept your promise!” she exclaimed with a sad sweetness. “Would that you could rescue me from the cruel fate that must now be mine!”

I strove to speak, but utterance was denied me. She seemed so convinced of the hopelessness of the future that her very conviction seemed to carry upon it evidence of her guilt.

Could poor Hugh Wingfield, the man who had carried that secret cipher in his pocket and who had worn her portrait on his finger, have actually been struck down by that very hand that I had kissed?

Ah! no! Perish such a thought. She was my love – and my love was, I knew full well, the innocent victim of as foul and base a conspiracy as had ever been conceived by the ingenious mind of man.

I doubted her, but only on account of the character of the persons with whom she was in secret association. When I enumerated them in my mind I saw what a strange mysterious group they were – the young Frenchwoman, the man Logan, the two sallow-faced foreigners who had been diligent readers of socialistic newspapers, and, last of all, the rough-mannered hunter of big game, Smeeton, alias Keene – the man over whom the young Countess of Stanchester appeared to possess some secret power.

Was Marigold the evil genius of the situation? Her past had been so full of adventure, and the rumours about her – mostly untrue be it said – had been so many that I confess I felt inclined to prejudge and condemn her.

A vain, pretty married woman, fond of admiration and moving in the ultra-smart set, can seldom escape the evil tongue of gossip. Yet although I made every allowance for her social surroundings and the fact of her being one of “the giddy Gordons,” there were certain facts of my own knowledge with which I could not well reconcile her position as my friend’s wife. For that reason, as well as because of her open declaration of antagonism to Keene, I held her in suspicion. She had cleverly deceived me as to her real motive, and that was sufficient to cause me to regard her as an enemy.

“Why not admit this man Logan and let us consult together?” I suggested at last. “We might arrive at some way out of this deadly peril of yours.”

“We might,” she admitted. “But he would never meet and discuss the matter with you. Remember he is wanted by the police, and has no guarantee that you might not betray him. He told me of your meeting in Chelsea, how you raised the alarm, and how narrowly he escaped being captured. Therefore he views you with no great affection. No,” she added, “for the present you must not meet. It would be unwise. He must not even know that you axe in Edinburgh.”

“Why not?”

“Because – well, because if he knows you are here with me he will hesitate to act in the manner I am trying to induce him to act. Fear of you will prevent him.”

“What are you inducing him to do?” I asked.

“I am trying to prevail upon him to assist me in performing a certain service – one by which I hope to gain my release from these torturing fears that hold me. It is my last resource. If my project fails, death alone remains to me.”

She spoke with a deep breathless earnestness which told me plainly that her words were no idle ones. True she had spoken of self-destruction many times, but it was with the firm conviction of a woman hounded to her own destruction.

The world, curiously enough, regards a wealthy woman of title as though she were a different being to themselves, believing her to possess attributes denied to the commoner, and a mind devoid of any of the cares of the weary workaday existence. Yet if the truth be told, the woman who is dressed by Laferrier, Raudnitz or Callot often has a far uglier skeleton in her cupboard than she who is compelled to go bargain-hunting in Oxford Street at sales for her next season’s gown. The smart victoria, the matched pair, the liveried servants and the emblazoned panels form the necessary background of the woman who is chic, but, alas! how often she hates the very sight of all that hollow show of wealth and superiority, and how she longs for the quiet of obscurity. How very true it is that wealth does not bring happiness; that there is no pleasure in this world without the gall of pain, that love finds sanctuary in the heart of the princess just as it does in that of the factory-girl. There is no peace on this side of eternity, therefore we must forever court the illusions which evade us.

What could I say? If it were to her interest to see this man alone – this man of whom the police were in such active search – then to serve her I ought not to object. I felt indignant that my well-beloved should be polluted by the presence of such an adventurer, and yet I recollected how they had walked together in the wood, and what was more – that the man must be aware of her secret, whatever it was! He had walked and spoken to her; he had seen her, her white dress of the previous night wet, mud-stained and bedraggled – he must know, or at least guess, the truth!

Did she hold him in fear on that account? Was she beneath the thrall of this adventurer?

For a long time we stood talking, until as though in fear that the man whose call had been so unwelcome and disturbing should grow tired of waiting in the hall below, she urged me gently to take leave of her.

“Go, Willoughby – for my sake – do!” she implored of me with those soft pleading blue eyes that were so resistless. “Let me see him alone. Let me do this – if – if you wish to save me,” she urged.

And I saw by her pale anxious face that she was desperate.

Therefore I kissed her once again with fondness, and assuring her of my trust and love, left her, promising to return next morning.

Yes, I foolishly left her to the threats and insults of that man who knew her secret.

Ah! Had I only known the truth!

Chapter Twenty Five

Whereby Richard Keene is Surprised

In the entrance-hall of the hotel I saw the man Logan, the man who held my love’s secret, seated in a chair patiently awaiting her summons. There were others, well-dressed men and women, in evening toilettes lounging there in the hour before retiring. It is curious with what studied ease women lounge at hotels. The woman who is alert and upright at home falls into the most graceful poses after dinner at a hotel, presumably to court the admiration of strangers.

The man Logan, however, still wore his light overcoat over his dinner-jacket, and his head was buried in an evening paper, whether, however, this was to conceal his features or not I was unable to determine. Still, he was wanted by the police, and was therefore taking every precaution against being recognised. From where I stood at the back of the large square hall, I saw that his features had been slightly altered by the darkening of his eyebrows, undoubtedly with that object in view.

As I stood watching unseen, a waiter approached, spoke to him, and then he followed the man upstairs to the presence of my adored.

Had I done wrong in allowing the fellow to go to her alone? That was the thought which next moment seized me. Yet when I recollected her earnest appeal I could only remain lost in wonderment at her motive. But determined on watching the man in secret, I fetched my hat and overcoat, and sat patiently in the hall to await his return.

The clock chimed eleven musically, and a party of Americans noisily left to catch the night mail to London. The staff changed, the night-porter came on duty, and the little group of idlers in the hall gradually diminished. Indeed, they grew so few that I feared in passing out he might recognise me. Therefore at half-past eleven I strode forth into the night. Princes Street with its long line of lights, looked bright and pleasant even at that hour, yet it was almost deserted save for one or two belated wayfarers.

I took up my position at the railings on the opposite side of the road, from where I could see each person emerging from the hotel. Long and anxiously I waited, wondering what was transpiring in that room the window of which was straight before me. The blind was down, but no shadow was cast upon it, so I could surmise nothing.

At last he came. For a moment he stood on the steps, evidently in hesitation. Then he descended and hurried away. I followed him closely, across the railway, up High Street, and then he plunged into an intricate labyrinth of narrow streets quite unknown to me. At the time I believed he was not aware that I was following him, but when I recollect how cleverly he evaded me I now quite recognise that he must have detected my presence from the first. At any rate, after leading me through a number of narrow thoroughfares in a low quarter of the city, he suddenly turned a corner and disappeared from my sight as completely as though he had vanished into air.

My own idea is that he disappeared into a house – probably into one of those whose doors are open always as a refuge for thieves, and there are many in every big city in the kingdom, houses where pressure on the door causes it to yield and close again noiselessly, and from which there is an exit into another thoroughfare.

I spent some little time in making an examination of the houses at the spot where he had so suddenly become lost, but finding myself baffled, turned, and after wandering for a full half-hour lost in those crooked streets of old Edinburgh, I at last found myself in a thoroughfare I recognised, and turned to the hotel more than ever convinced of the man’s shrewdness.

Next morning, at ten o’clock, I found Lolita alone in her sitting-room, and on entering saw by her countenance that the night had, for her, been a sleepless one.

“Well,” I said, raising her hand reverently to my lips as was my wont, “and what was the result of last night’s interview?”

She drew a long breath, shook her head sadly, and replied —

“The situation is, for me, as perilous as it ever was. I am now convinced that what you have said regarding Marigold is right – she actually is my enemy, and yet I have foolishly taken her into my confidence!”

“But you are still hopeful?” I asked anxiously. “This man Logan has surely not refused to stand your friend?”

“He refuses to tell me certain facts which, if revealed, would place me in a position of safety,” she responded blankly.

“But he must be compelled!” I cried. “I will compel him.”

“Ah! you cannot,” she cried despairingly. “If you approach him, you will upset everything. He must not know of your visit to me. If he did it would be fatal – fatal.”

I held my breath, for had I not foolishly betrayed my presence to him on the previous night? And had he not cleverly tricked me? I hesitated whether to tell my love the bitter truth of my injudicious act, but at last resolved to do so, and explained the incident briefly, just as I have related it to you.

“Ah?” she exclaimed. “Then I fear that all I have arranged with him will be of no avail. He will now believe that I intend to play him false. My only hope now lies in Richard Keene.”

“Then I will return to him and act as you wish,” I said.

She stood thoughtfully looking out of the window for a long time. At last she said —

“I think it best, after all, to return to Sibberton. My aunt had a letter from George this morning asking her to join the house-party at once, and she seems anxious to do this and go to Lord Penarth’s afterwards.”

“Very well,” I said eagerly; “let us all return together.” I felt somehow that she would be safer at home beneath my protection than wandering about in hotels exposed to the perils which her unscrupulous enemies were placing before her.

And so it happened that on that same night we joined the party assembled in the drawing-room at Sibberton just before dinner, and there, in front of them all, the young Earl introduced Keene and Lolita, believing them to be unacquainted.

At the instant the introduction was made I chanced to glance around, and there saw Marigold standing in the doorway, her face pale as death. She had been out, and being unaware of Lolita’s return was, I saw, amazed and filled with apprehension, while Keene on his part bowed over my love’s hand with a distant respect as though they were perfect strangers.

Dinner was, as usual, a long function, served with that stateliness and ceremony that characterised everything in the Stanchester household. George made a point of preserving punctiliously all the ancient traditions of his noble house, even to the ceremony, and, after the port, of passing round the snuff to the men in the great old silver box that had been a present of King James the Second to the Earl of his time.

I saw that Marigold was ill at ease at Lolita’s return. She had whispered something to her as they went in to dinner, but what it was I knew not. Keene, on the other hand, preserved an utter disregard of what was in progress, except that once I detected a meaning glance cast at the brilliant hostess upon whose throat scintillated the wonderful Stanchester diamonds.

Afterwards, in order to learn something more, I played billiards with him. We were alone in the room, for bridge and music were attracting the others. He was, I found, an excellent player, yet not in good practice.

“You know,” he said apologetically, “I get so little billiards, living as I do mostly in the forest. I played a good deal in town a few years ago, but nowadays rarely ever touch a cue.”

I complimented him upon a break of eighteen he had that moment made, whereupon he exclaimed suddenly —

“Oh, by the way! Lord Stanchester told me yesterday that it was you who discovered that mysterious affair in the park here some time ago. Tell me all about it. I’m always fond of mysteries.”

He hid his dark-bearded face from me, occupying himself in chalking his cue. But his demand told me that, as I expected, he had not recognised me as Warr’s visitor on the evening when, tired and dusty, he had refreshed himself at the Stanchester Arms.

“I suppose you read all about it in the papers?” I said, not quite understanding his motive.

“George showed me some of the accounts. Most extraordinary affair – wasn’t it? They don’t even know the poor fellow’s name, do they?”

“The police axe in ignorance of it as far as I know,” was my response.

“But explain to me the exact position in which you found him,” he urged, leaving off playing, leaning with his back against the stone mantelshelf, and drawing heavily at his cigar. “I take a keen interest in such matters as this. Out after big game, we become almost like detectives so necessary it is to follow clues and footprints.”

“Well,” I said, “I simply heard a cry in the darkness, and got Warr, the publican from the village, to help me to search – and we found him.”

“He was dead, of course – quite dead?” he asked eagerly, as though, it seemed, in fear that the victim had still been conscious and had spoken.

“Quite,” I replied, still much puzzled. He had himself invited me to billiards, and it seemed for the purpose of obtaining from me the exact details of the discovery. “He had been struck a cowardly blow in the back which the doctors declared must have proved fatal at once.”

“You heard his cry?” he said, looking me straight in the face. “It was that which attracted you?”

“I heard a cry,” was my answer.

“Ah! Then you didn’t recognise the voice?”

“How could I recognise the voice of a person unknown to me?” I asked.

“I mean that the cry was a man’s?”

“No – a woman’s.”

“What?” he exclaimed, taking his cigar from his lips, and staring at me with a hardness at the corners of his mouth. “Are you quite sure of that? It isn’t in the evidence I’ve read.”

“I know it isn’t,” I said. “There are several things known to me that are not in the depositions.”

“And what are they?”

“Matters which concern only myself,” I replied. “I’m endeavouring to obtain a solution of the mystery. The police have failed, so I am making independent inquiries on my own account.”

His brows again contracted slightly, and I saw that what I said was to him the reverse of welcome.

“And what have you discovered?” he asked with a dark look which struck me as curious. “You have surely good scope for your efforts in such an affair. Lord Stanchester is exceedingly anxious that the truth should be revealed. He asked me my opinion – knowing my keen interest in mysteries of all sorts.”

“And what is your opinion?”

“Shall I tell you, Mr Woodhouse?” he asked with a mysterious smile, bending earnestly towards me and lowering his voice. “Well, my own opinion is that you yourself know more about it than any one.”

“Me!” I cried, looking at the fellow. “You don’t imply that I’m guilty of the murder, do you?”

“Oh! – not at all – not at all?” he hastened to assure me. “I intended to convey that you are in possession of certain facts unknown to the police. Do you understand me?”

“Not exactly,” I replied. “If you suggest that I know the dead man’s real name, then I admit it. His name was Wingfield – Hugh Wingfield.”

“What!” he gasped, his sinister countenance turning pale, as he stood aghast. “You know that! Who told you?”

“I found out for myself,” I answered, looking him full in the face. “I discovered it by the same means as I discovered other things – that the dead man wore on his finger the portrait of Lady Lolita, and – ”

“And what else?” he asked breathlessly. “Be frank with me as I will, in a moment, be frank with you. Did you discover anything in his pockets – any letter – or anything written in numbers – a cipher?”

“I did.”

“Then show it to me,” he urged quickly. “Let me see it.”

“I shall do nothing of the sort!” was my firm response. “What is written there is my own affair.”

“Of course. But you can’t read it without the key,” he declared with a defiant laugh.

“I desire no assistance,” I said briefly.

“But if I mistake not, Mr Woodhouse, you entertain affection towards Lady Lolita – and – well, your affection is reciprocated – at least so she tells me,” he added with a slight sneer, I thought.

“And what, pray, does that concern the paper found in the dead man’s pocket?” I inquired resentfully. “I know rather more of the affair than you conjecture,” I added. “And as you wish me to speak plainly I may as well remark that I have certainly no confidence in the person who is guest in this house under the name of Smeeton, and whose real name is Richard Keene.”

The man drew back with a start and stood glaring at me blankly, open-mouthed, his eyes starting from his head.

I smiled when I saw the effect upon him of my sudden accusation.

But next moment my smile of triumph died from my lips, and I it was who stood bewildered.

Chapter Twenty Six

Refers to Certain Ugly Facts

Richard Keene placed his cue upon the floor, and leaning upon it, looked straight at me and said —

“Yes. It is quite true that I’m in this house under false colours. But do you think it will be to your advantage, Mr Woodhouse, to quarrel with me?”

“I only know that your presence here is unwelcome to certain members of Lord Stanchester’s household,” I exclaimed. “And I should consider it a very wise course if you excused yourself and left.”

“Why should I?” he asked triumphantly. “I’m really enjoying myself here very much. The Earl gives his guests plenty of sport.”

“And you, on your part, are making sport of an innocent woman!” I said, with rising anger at the fellow’s defiance.

“I suppose Lady Lolita has told you something, then?” he remarked.

“Lady Lolita has told me of your merciless attitude towards her,” I said. “I am quite well aware of your secret communications with Lady Stanchester,” I added. “And it is plain to me in what direction your efforts are directed.”

He started again, looking at me as though uncertain how far my knowledge of his past extended. Then he slowly stroked his short-cropped beard.

“In other words then the two women have betrayed me – eh?” he observed thoughtfully in a harsh mechanical voice, as though speaking to himself.

“Not in the least,” was my answer. “They dare not betray you – that you know quite well. But my affection for Lady Lolita, to which you referred just now, has caused me to make certain inquiries with somewhat curious results. Therefore, I tell you plainly, Mr Keene, that if you are not desirous of exposure you had better leave Sibberton before noon to-morrow.”

“And if not?” he inquired, raising his eyebrows.

“If not, I shall go to his lordship and tell him your real name.”

He laughed in my face.

“Well, that’s exactly what would bring matters to a head,” he declared. “Perhaps, after all, it would be best if he did know – for I could then reveal to him, and to the world, a truth that would be both ugly and startling. Tell him who I am, if you wish, but before doing so, is it not better to carefully consider all the eventualities?”

At that instant Lolita’s maid Weston opened the door, apparently looking for her mistress. Her eyes met Keene’s, and I saw a look of mutual recognition. But in an instant the young woman closed the door again.

Keene made no remark, but I saw surprise and apprehension written upon his sun-bronzed features.

“Then, in a word, you refuse to relieve these ladies of your presence?” I said in a firm tone.

“I refuse to obey any paid servant of Lord Stanchester,” was his insulting response.

“But if you recollect the manner in which you first visited Sibberton – as a hungry tramp who drank beer at the Stanchester Arms– you must admit that your presence here is, to say the least, suspicious. You entrusted to Warr a letter to Lady Lolita – and village publicans will gossip, you know.”

“What, has that fellow been talking – surely not?” he exclaimed quickly.

“I only speak from my own knowledge – not from hearsay.”

He took a long draw at his cigar, looking me calmly in the face, as though undecided how to act. At last, after full deliberation, he said, in a much more conciliatory tone —

“Really, Mr Woodhouse, I don’t know, after all, whether either of us will gain anything by being antagonists. We both have our own ends to serve. You love Lady Lolita, and wish to – well – to save her; while I, too, have an object in view – a distinct object. Why cannot we unite in a friendly manner?”

“Against whom?”

“Against those who seek to bring ruin and disgrace upon the woman you love.”

“But you are her enemy,” I said. “How can I join you in this affair?”

“Ah, there you are quite mistaken. She, too, is mistaken. True, I was once her enemy, but circumstances have changed, and I am now her friend.”

“Is your friendship so prone then to being influenced by every adverse wind that blows?” I asked, by no means convinced of the genuineness of his proposals.

“Of course you hesitate,” he remarked. “And perhaps that is only natural. Let us, however, call Lady Lolita into consultation.”

This suggestion of his I readily acted upon, and ringing for a servant told him to find her ladyship at once, and ask her whether she could make it convenient to see me for a moment in the red room on business connected with next day’s shooting luncheon.

Then we put down our cues and together walked through the long corridors to the old wing of the great mansion, to the red room, a small boudoir to which visitors never went, and where I knew that we might exchange confidences in secret.

I switched on the electric light, and standing together in the small old-fashioned apartment, furnished in crimson silk damask of a century ago, and red silk upon the walls, we anxiously awaited her coming.

At last we heard her light footstep in the corridor, but she halted upon the threshold, utterly taken aback at sight of my companion. She had avoided him studiously all the evening, and was of course, unaware of our present intention.

“I regret very much to call your ladyship here,” Keene commenced. “But it seems to have become imperative that Mr Woodhouse and I should, in your presence, arrive at some understanding.”

Though radiant in dress, her beautiful face was pale to the lips, and her thin hands trembled nervously.

She advanced slowly without a word, like a woman in a dream, and stepping up behind her I closed the door and locked it.

“I must explain, Lady Lolita,” said Keene, “that had I known you were returning here I should have left before your arrival, for I have no desire to thrust upon you my presence, which I know must, having regard to the past, be most unwelcome. However, we have met, and I am a guest here in your home. Further circumstances compel me to remain here for some time longer, therefore I am anxious that we should thoroughly understand one another.”