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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/37338-h.zip b/37338-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..417098b --- /dev/null +++ b/37338-h.zip diff --git a/37338-h/37338-h.htm b/37338-h/37338-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cbba254 --- /dev/null +++ b/37338-h/37338-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7773 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<!-- $Id: header.txt 236 2009-12-07 18:57:00Z vlsimpson $ --> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Crime Doctor, by Ernest W. Hornung. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + +table { + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; +} + +.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; +} /* page numbers */ + +.linenum { + position: absolute; + top: auto; + left: 4%; +} /* poetry number */ + +.blockquot { + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +.sidenote { + width: 20%; + padding-bottom: .5em; + padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; + padding-right: .5em; + margin-left: 1em; + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; + color: black; + background: #eeeeee; + border: dashed 1px; +} + +.bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + +.bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + +.bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + +.br {border-right: solid 2px;} + +.bbox {border: solid 2px;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + +.u {text-decoration: underline;} + +.caption {font-weight: bold;} + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; +} + +.figleft { + float: left; + clear: left; + margin-left: 0; + margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-right: 1em; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +.figright { + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-left: 1em; + margin-bottom: + 1em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-right: 0; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +/* Footnotes */ +.footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + +.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + +.footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + +.fnanchor { + vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: + none; +} + +/* Poetry */ +.poem { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + text-align: left; +} + +.poem br {display: none;} + +.poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + +.poem span.i0 { + display: block; + margin-left: 0em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i2 { + display: block; + margin-left: 2em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i4 { + display: block; + margin-left: 4em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Crime Doctor, by Ernest William Hornung + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Crime Doctor + +Author: Ernest William Hornung + +Illustrator: Frederick Dorre Steele + +Release Date: September 8, 2011 [EBook #37338] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME DOCTOR *** + + + + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +book was produced from scanned images of public domain +material from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<h1>THE CRIME DOCTOR</h1> + +<h2><i>By</i> ERNEST W. HORNUNG</h2> + +<h3>Author of Raffles, The Amateur Cracksman, The Thousandth Woman, etc.</h3> + + +<p class="center"><i>With Illustrations by</i><br /> +FREDERIC DORR STEELE</p> + +<p class="center">INDIANAPOLIS<br /> +THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY<br /> +PUBLISHERS</p> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Copyright 1914<br /> +The Bobbs-Merrill Company</span></p> + +<p class="center">PRESS OF<br /> +BRAUNWORTH & CO.<br /> +BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS<br /> +BROOKLYN, N. Y.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>"It was struck with—this"</h3> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table width="50%"> +<tr><td>I </td><td><a href="#I"><span class="smcap">The Physician Who Healed Himself</span> </a></td><td align="right">1</td></tr> + +<tr><td>II </td><td><a href="#II"><span class="smcap">The Life-Preserver</span> </a></td><td align="right">40</td></tr> + +<tr><td>III </td><td><a href="#III"><span class="smcap">A Hopeless Case</span> </a></td><td align="right">77</td></tr> + +<tr><td>IV </td><td><a href="#IV"><span class="smcap">The Golden Key</span> </a></td><td align="right">118</td></tr> + +<tr><td>V </td><td><a href="#V"><span class="smcap">A Schoolmaster Abroad</span> </a></td><td align="right">159</td></tr> + +<tr><td>VI </td><td><a href="#VI"><span class="smcap">One Possessed</span> </a></td><td align="right">199</td></tr> + +<tr><td>VII </td><td><a href="#VII"><span class="smcap">The Doctor's Assistant</span> </a></td><td align="right">237</td></tr> + +<tr><td>VIII </td><td><a href="#VIII"><span class="smcap">The Second Murderer</span> </a></td><td align="right">272</td></tr> +</table> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h2>THE CRIME DOCTOR</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>THE PHYSICIAN WHO HEALED HIMSELF</h3> + + +<p>In the course of his meteoric career as Secretary of State for the Home +Department, the Right Honorable Topham Vinson instituted many reforms +and earned the reformer's whack of praise and blame. His methods were +not those of the permanent staff; and while his notorious courage +endeared him to the young, it was not in so strong a nature to leave +friend or foe lukewarm. An assiduous contempt for tradition fanned the +flame of either faction, besides leading to several of those personal +adventures which were as breath to the Minister's unregenerate nostrils, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span>but which never came out without exposing him to almost universal +censure. It is matter for thanksgiving that the majority of his +indiscretions were unguessed while he and his held office; for he was +never so unconventional as in pursuance of those enlightened tactics on +which his reputation rests, or in the company of that kindred spirit who +had so much to do with their inception.</p> + +<p>It was early in an autumn session that this remarkable pair became +acquainted. Mr. Vinson had been tempted by the mildness of the night to +walk back from Westminster to Portman Square. He had just reached home +when he heard his name cried from some little distance behind him. The +voice tempered hoarse excitement with the restraint due to midnight in a +quiet square; and as Mr. Vinson turned on his door-step, a young man +rushed across the road with a gold chain swinging from his outstretched +hand.</p> + +<p>"Your watch, sir, your watch!" he gasped, and displayed a bulbous hunter +with a monogram on one side and the crest of all the Vinsons on the +other.</p> + +<p>"Heavens!" cried the Home Secretary, feeling in an empty waistcoat +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>pocket before he could believe his eyes. "Where on earth did you find +that? I had it on me when I left the House."</p> + +<p>"It wasn't a case of findings," said the young man, as he fanned himself +with his opera hat. "I've just taken it from the fellow who took it from +you."</p> + +<p>"Who? Where?" demanded the Secretary of State, with unstatesmanlike +excitement.</p> + +<p>"Some poor brute in North Audley Street, I think it was."</p> + +<p>"That's it! That was where he stopped me, just at the corner of +Grosvenor Square!" exclaimed Vinson. "And I went and gave the old +scoundrel half-a-crown!"</p> + +<p>"He probably had your watch while you were looking in your purse."</p> + +<p>And the young man dabbed a very good forehead, that glistened in the +light from the open door, with a white silk handkerchief just extracted +from his sleeve.</p> + +<p>"But where were you?" asked Topham Vinson, taking in every inch of him.</p> + +<p>"I'd just come into the square myself. You had just gone out of it. The +pickpocket was looking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> to see what he'd got, even while he hurled his +blessings after you."</p> + +<p>"And where is he now? Did he slip through your fingers?"</p> + +<p>"I'm ashamed to say he did; but your watch didn't!" its owner was +reminded with more spirit. "I could guess whose it was by the crest and +monogram, and I decided to make sure instead of giving chase."</p> + +<p>"You did admirably," declared the Home Secretary, in belated +appreciation. "I'm in the papers quite enough without appearing as a mug +out of office hours. Come in, please, and let me thank you with all the +honors possible at this time of night."</p> + +<p>And, taking him by the arm, he ushered the savior of his property into a +charming inner hall, where elaborate refreshments stood in readiness on +a side-table, and a bright fire looked as acceptable as the saddlebag +chairs drawn up beside it. A bottle and a pint of reputable champagne +had been left out with the oysters and the caviar; and Mr. Vinson, +explaining that he never allowed anybody to sit up for him, opened the +bottle with the precision<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> of a practised hand, and led the attack on +food and drink with schoolboy gusto and high spirits.</p> + +<p>In the meantime there had been some mutual note-taking. The Home +Secretary, whose emphatic personality lent itself to the discreet pencil +of the modern caricaturist, was in appearance exactly as represented in +contemporary cartoons; there was nothing unexpected about him, since his +boyish vivacity was a quality already over-exploited by the Press. His +frankness was something qualified by a gaze of habitual penetration, but +still it was there, and his manner could evidently be grand or +colloquial at will. The surprise was in his surroundings rather than in +the man himself. The perfect union of luxury and taste is none too +common in the professed Sybarite who is that and nothing more; in men of +action and pugnacious politicians it is yet another sign of sheer +capacity. The bits of rich old furniture, the old glass twinkling at +every facet, the brasses blazing in the firelight, the few but fine +prints on the Morris wallpaper, might have won the approval of an art +student, and the creature comforts that of the youngest epicure.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p> + +<p>The young man from the street was easily pleased in all such respects; +but indoors he no longer looked quite the young man. He had taken off an +overcoat while his host was opening the champagne, and evening clothes +accentuated a mature gauntness of body and limb. His hair, which was +dark and wiry, was beginning to bleach at the temples; and up above one +ear there was a little disk of downright silver, like a new florin. The +shaven face was pale, eager, and austere. Dark eyes burnt like beacons +under a noble brow, and did not lose in character or intensity by a +distinct though slight strabism. So at least it seemed to Topham Vinson, +who was a really wonderful judge of faces, yet had seldom seen one +harder to sum up.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry you don't smoke," said he, snipping a cigar which he had +extolled in vain. "And that champagne, you know! You haven't touched it, +and you really should."</p> + +<p>The other was on his legs that instant. "I never smoke and seldom +drink," he exclaimed; "but I simply can not endure your hospitality, +kind as it is, Mr. Vinson, without being a bit more honest with you than +I've been so far. I didn't lose that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> pickpocket by accident or because +he was too quick for me. I—I purposely packed him off."</p> + +<p>In the depths of his softest chair Mr. Vinson lolled smiling—but not +with his upturned eyes. They were the steel eyes of all his tribe, but +trebly keen, as became its intellectual head and chief.</p> + +<p>"The fellow pitched a pathetic yarn?" he conjectured. He had never seen +a more miserable specimen, he was bound to say.</p> + +<p>"It wasn't that, Mr. Vinson. I should have let him go in any case—once +I'd recovered what he'd taken—as a matter of principle."</p> + +<p>"Principle!" cried the Secretary of State. But he did not modify his +front-bench attitude; it was only the well-known eyebrows that rose.</p> + +<p>"The whole thing is," his guest continued, yet more frankly, "that I +happen to hold my own views on crime and its punishment If I might be +permitted to explain them, however briefly, they would at least afford +the only excuse I have to offer for my conduct. If you consider it no +excuse, and if I have put myself within reach of the law, there, sir, is +my card; and here am I, prepared to take the consequences of my act."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p> + +<p>The Home Secretary leaned forward and took the card from a sensitive +hand, vibrant as the voice to which he had just been listening, but no +more tremulous. Again he looked up, into a pale face grown paler still, +and dark eyes smoldering with suppressed enthusiasm. It was by no means +his baptism of that sort of fire; but it seemed to Mr. Vinson that here +was a new type of eccentric zealot; and it was only by an effort that he +resumed his House of Commons attitude and his smile.</p> + +<p>"I see, Doctor Dollar, that you are a near neighbor of mine—only just +round the corner in Welbeck Street. May I take it that your experience +as a consultant is the basis of the views you mention?"</p> + +<p>"My experience as an alienist," said Doctor Dollar, "so far as I can lay +claims to that euphemism."</p> + +<p>"And how far is that, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"In the sense that all crime is a form of madness."</p> + +<p>"Then you would call yourself——"</p> + +<p>The broken sentence ended on a note as tactfully remote from the direct +interrogative as practised speech could make it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p> + +<p>"In default of a recognized term," said Doctor Dollar, "which time will +confer as part of a wider recognition, I can only call myself a crime +doctor."</p> + +<p>"A branch not yet acknowledged by your profession?"</p> + +<p>"Neither by my profession nor by the law, Mr. Vinson; but both have got +to come to it, just as surely as we all accept the other scientific +developments of the day."</p> + +<p>"But have you reduced your practise to a science, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"I am doing so," said Doctor Dollar, with the restrained confidence +which could not but impress one who knew the value of that quality in +himself and in others. "I have made a start; if it were not so late I +would tell you all about it. You are the Home Secretary of England, the +man of all others whom I could wish to convert to my views. But already +I have kept you up too long. If you would grant me an appointment——"</p> + +<p>"Not at all," interrupted Mr. Vinson, as he settled himself even more +comfortably in his chair. "The night is still young—so is my cigar. +Pray say all you care to say, and say it as confidentially<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> as you +please. You interest me, Doctor Dollar; nor can I forget that I am much +indebted to you."</p> + +<p>"I don't want to trade on that," returned the doctor, hastily. "But it +is an old dream of mine to tell you, sir, about my work, and how and why +I came to take it up. I was not intended for medicine, you see; my +people are army people, were Border outlaws once upon a time, and +fighting folk ever since. My father was an ensign in the Crimea—Scots +Fusiliers. I joined the Argyll and Sutherlands the year before South +Africa—where, by the way, I remember seeing you with your Yeomen."</p> + +<p>"I had eighteen months of it without a headache or a scratch."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could say the same, Mr. Vinson. I was shot through the head at +the Modder, ten days after I landed."</p> + +<p>"Through the head, did you say?" asked the Home Secretary, lifting his +own some inches.</p> + +<p>The doctor touched the silver patch in his dark strong hair. "That's +where the bullet came slinking out; any but a Mauser would have carried +all before it! As it was, it left me with a bit of a squint, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> you can +see; otherwise, in a very few weeks, I was as fit as ever—physically."</p> + +<p>"Wonderful!"</p> + +<p>"Physically and even mentally—from a medical point of view—but not +morally, Mr. Vinson! Something subtle had happened, some pressure +somewhere, some form of local paralysis. And it left me a pretty +low-down type, I can tell you! It was a case of absolute automatism—but +I won't go into particulars now, if you don't mind."</p> + +<p>"On no account, my dear doctor!" exclaimed the Secretary of State, with +inadvertent cordiality. "This is all of extraordinary interest. I +believe I can see what's coming. But I want to hear every word you care +to tell me—and not one that you don't."</p> + +<p>"It had destroyed my moral sense on just one curious point; but, thank +God, I came to see the cause as well as to suffer unspeakably from the +effect. After that it was a case of killing or curing oneself by hook or +by crook. I decided to try the curing first. And—to cut a long yarn +short—I <i>was</i> cured."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Easily?"</p> + +<p>"No. The slander may come home to roost, but I shall never think much of +the London specialist! I've dropped my two sovereigns and a florin into +too many of their itching palms, beginning with the baronets and knights +and ending up with the unknown adventures. But not a man-Jack of them +was ashamed to pocket his two guineas (in one case three) for politely +telling me I was as mad as a hatter to think of such a thing as really +was the matter with me!"</p> + +<p>"And in the end?"</p> + +<p>"In the end I struck a fellow with an open mind—but not in England—and +if I said that he literally opened mine it might be an exaggeration, but +that's all. He did go prospecting in my skull—risked his reputation as +against my life—but we both came out on top."</p> + +<p>"And you've been your own man ever since?"</p> + +<p>Topham Vinson asked the question gravely; it would have taken as keen a +superficial observer as himself to detect much difference in his manner, +in his eyes, in anything about him. Doctor Dollar was not that kind of +observer. To see far one must<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> look high, and to look high is to miss +things under one's nose. It is all a matter of mental trajectory. In the +sheer height of his enthusiasm, the soaring visionary was losing touch +with the hard-headed groundling in the chair.</p> + +<p>"I was cured," he answered with tense simplicity. "It was a miraculous +cure, and yet no miracle. Anybody could perform its like, given the +nerve and skill. Yet it seemed to me a new thing; its possibilities were +almost appalling in their fascination. I must not speak of them, for in +a large measure they are only possibilities still. But I resolved to +qualify, so that at least I might be in a position to do as I had been +done by. I had already left the service; but my fighting days were not +over. I was going to fight Crime as it had never been fought before!"</p> + +<p>There was a challenge in the pause made here. But the listener did not +take it up, and the harangue ended on a humbler note:</p> + +<p>"I studied at St. Mary's under men whose names you know as well as they +know yours. I was at Berlin under Winterschladen, and with Jens Jennsen +in Stockholm. Before I was thirty I had put up<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> my plate in Welbeck +Street, and there I am still."</p> + +<p>"And yet," said the Home Secretary, with a faint and wary smile—"and +yet the possibilities are still only possibilities!"</p> + +<p>"On the surgical side, yes; there I was misled by my own abnormal case. +When another sudden injury makes a monkey of an honest man, I know where +to take him; but the average injury is too gradual, too subtle for the +knife. Congenital cases are, of course, quite hopeless in that respect. +Yet there are ways of curing even what I regard as the very worst type +of congenital criminal at the present day."</p> + +<p>"I wish I knew of some!" said Mr. Vinson cheerily. "But what, may I ask, +do you regard as the very worst type of congenital criminal at the +present day?"</p> + +<p>"The society type," replied the crime doctor without an instant's +hesitation.</p> + +<p>His host permitted himself to open his eyes once more.</p> + +<p>"Your ideas are rather sensational, aren't they, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"It's rather a sensational age, isn't it, Mr.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> Vinson? Your +twentieth-century criminal, with his telephone and his motor-car—for +professional purposes—his high explosives and his scientific tools, has +got to be an educated person, to begin with; and I am afraid there's an +increasing number of educated people who have got to be criminals or +else paupers all their lives. A vicious circle, I think you must agree?"</p> + +<p>"If you can square it with the truth."</p> + +<p>"Isn't it almost a truism, Mr. Vinson? When society women making a +living out of bridge, traffic in tickets for Royal enclosures, charge a +fat fee for a presentation at Court, and a small fortune for launching +an unlikely family in their own set, there must be some reason for it +apart from their own depravity. They are no more naturally depraved than +I am, but their purse is perhaps even smaller, and their wants are +certainly ten times as great. Cupidity is not the motive power; it's +simple shortage of the needful—from their point of view. Society +increases and multiplies in everything but money, and transmits its +expensive tastes without the means to indulge them. So we get our good +ladies with their tariff of introductions, and our<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> members of the best +clubs always ready for a deal over a horse or a car or anything else +that's going to bring them in a fiver. It's a short step from that sort +of thing to a shady trick, and from a shady trick to downright crime. +But it's a step often taken by the type I mean—though not necessarily +with their eyes open. And that's just where the crime doctor should come +in."</p> + +<p>"In opening their eyes?"</p> + +<p>"In saving 'em from themselves while they're still worth saving; in that +prevention which is not only better than cure, but the vital principle +of modern therapeutics in every other direction. In keeping good +material out of prison at all costs, Mr. Vinson, and even though you +turn your prisons into country houses with feather beds and moral +entertainments every night in life!"</p> + +<p>The Secretary of State smiled again, but this time with some sympathy +and much less restraint. He was beginning to see some method in what had +seemed at first unmitigated mania, and to take some interest in a point +of view at least novel and entertaining. But the prison system was not +to be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> attacked, even in terms of fantastic levity, without protest from +its official champion.</p> + +<p>"Prisons, my dear Doctor Dollar, exist for the benefit of those who keep +out of them rather than those who will insist on getting in. Of course, +the ideal thing would be to benefit both sides; and that's what we're +aiming at all the time. It isn't our fault if a man who gets into quod +is a marked man ever after; he shouldn't get into quod."</p> + +<p>"You've put your finger on your own vulnerable point!" cried the eager +doctor. "Why should he be a marked man? Why force a professional status +on the mere dabbler in crime, who might never have dabbled again? It +isn't as if it undid anything he's done; even hanging your murderer +doesn't bring your victim back to life, and the chances are that he +would never want to murder anybody else. On the other hand, how many +serious crimes might be hushed up without anybody being a bit worse off +than they were the very moment after their commission!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Vinson had been framing an ironical rebuke in the name of morality +and the Mosaic law; but he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> was not sorry to drop the irony and pin his +opponent down.</p> + +<p>"I hope, Doctor Dollar, it is not to be a function of the new faculty to +collaborate in the concealment of crime and criminals?"</p> + +<p>"It is impossible," replied the enthusiast, duly drawn, "to define the +scope of an embryonic science. When the crime doctor has come to +stay—as he will—I can see him playing a Protean part with the full +sanction of his profession and of the law. He will be preventive +officer, private detective, and father confessor in one, if not even +privileged accessory after some awful fact. The humbler pioneer can hope +for no such powers; his only chance is to work in the dark on his own +lines, to use his own judgment and to take his own risks as I've done +to-night. If he really can save a man by screening him, let him do it +and blow the odds! If he can stop a thing without giving it away, all +the better for everybody, and if he fails to stop it all the worse for +him! Let him be a law unto his patient and himself, but let him stand +the racket if his law won't work."</p> + +<p>"In other words, you would tackle character as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> ordinary doctors and +persons devote themselves to the body and the soul?"</p> + +<p>"It would come to that, Mr. Vinson. It's a large order, I know, and I +don't expect to see the goods delivered in my time. It will take better +men than I am, and many of 'em, even to start delivery on the scale I +dream about. But that's the idea all right. Punishment has never +signified prevention; what we want is to get under the criminal's skin +<i>before</i> we make it smart, if not before there's an actual criminal in +the case at all!"</p> + +<p>"A very plausible confession of faith, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>The Minister's tone was dry after the other, but that was all. His fixed +eyes seemed to be looking through the doctor's into the scheme itself, +probing it on its merits in the very spirit in which it had been +propounded. It is only the small men who laugh in the face of genuine +enthusiasm, however wild and flighty it may seem. Topham Vinson was not +a small man; but he, too, had been guilty of some wild flights in his +day, and office had not altogether clipped his wings. The sportsman and +the charlatan within him were only too ready to see themselves in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> +another, to hear their own voices on other lips. But the appeal to +temperament does not necessarily compromise the mind. And that citadel +still flew a neutral flag.</p> + +<p>"What about the practise?" asked Topham Vinson, forcing himself back to +facts.</p> + +<p>"Rome took less building than a London practise, by an unknown man +striking out a new line for himself."</p> + +<p>"I really don't wonder. Who would come to consult you about a homicidal +tendency, or a trick of tampering with special offertories?"</p> + +<p>"In the first instance, most likely, the patient's people; then they +might send him to see me on some other pretext."</p> + +<p>"And what form would the treatment take?"</p> + +<p>"It would depend, of course, upon the case. They don't all know that +they're being treated for incipient criminality. The majority think they +are in an ordinary nursing home."</p> + +<p>"A home!" cried the Secretary of State. The word had brought him to his +feet at last, in a frame of mind no longer to be concealed by nods and +smiles. "You don't mean to tell me, Doctor Dollar,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> that you actually +run a nursing home for unconvicted criminals?"</p> + +<p>"Potential criminals, Mr. Vinson. I have at present no patient who is +actually wanted by the police."</p> + +<p>"And where is this extraordinary establishment?"</p> + +<p>"Under my own roof here in Welbeck Street."</p> + +<p>"A few hundred yards from where we stand, yet this is the first I hear +of it!"</p> + +<p>"I can see that. It's not my fault, sir. I have done my best to bring it +before your notice."</p> + +<p>"How?"</p> + +<p>"By writing many times to tell you all about myself and the home, Mr. +Vinson."</p> + +<p>"Then I never saw the letters. A Home Secretary stands to be shot at by +every crank who can hold a pen. I employ more than one young gentleman +expressly to divert that sort of fire. You should have got an +introduction to me, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>The doctor had smiled at an expression that he could not but take to +himself. His smile sweetened under the kindlier tone which succeeded +that one unmeasured word.</p> + +<p>"I am not sorry I waited for the introduction which time has given me, +Mr. Vinson."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You wanted me to assist the good work, I take it?"</p> + +<p>"By your countenance and influence—if you could."</p> + +<p>"I must see something of it first. I must inspect this home of yours, +Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>The steel eyes of the Vinsons could seldom have cut deeper at a glance, +or been met by a pair more candid and unafraid. And yet there was just +that cruel suspicion of a cast, to prejudice both the candor and the +courage of the finer face.</p> + +<p>"It is open to your inspection day or night," said Doctor Dollar.</p> + +<p>"Even at this hour? Even to-night?"</p> + +<p>The Home Secretary sounded as keen as he looked; but on the other side +there was now just enough hesitation to correspond with that one slight +flaw in the finer eyes.</p> + +<p>"This minute, by all means," said the doctor, with resolute cordiality. +"There's always somebody up, and the patients can be seen without being +disturbed."</p> + +<p>"Then," said the Home Secretary, "it's a chance at a time when every +moment of the day is full.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> Let us strike, doctor, while the iron is as +hot as I can assure you that you have made it."</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>That deplorable passion for adventure, which had turned the hope of the +last Opposition into a guerrilla warrior in South Africa, but which the +Home Secretary of England might have subdued before accepting his +portfolio, was by no means a dead volcano as Topham Vinson sallied forth +with his extraordinary companion. It was to be noticed that he took with +him a thick stick instead of an umbrella, though the deserted streets +had become moist with a midnight drizzle. What he expected can only be +surmised. But the odds are that it did not include the shriek of a +police-whistle in the sedate region of Wigmore Street, and the +instantaneous bolting of Doctor Dollar round the first corner to the +left!</p> + +<p>Now, the Secretary of State was one of those men who keep up their games +out of a cold-blooded regard for the figure; he considered himself as +fit at forty as any man in England, and he gave chase<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> with his usual +confidence. But the long-legged doctor would have left him behind with +the lamp-posts, but for the fact that he was really tearing toward the +sound, not flying from it as his pursuer was so ready to suppose. In a +matter of seconds they had both fetched up at a brilliantly lighted +house, where a more than usually obese policeman was alternately +pounding on the door and splitting the sober welkin with his whistle.</p> + +<p>"Stop that infernal row!" cried Doctor Dollar, with incensed authority. +"Out of the way with you—this is my house!"</p> + +<p>And the Home Secretary arrived on the scene of an imminent assault on +his police, just in time to divert the outraged officer's attention by +asking what had happened, while the doctor found his key.</p> + +<p>"Lord only knows!" said the policeman, kicking some broken glass on one +side. "Murder, it sounds like; there's somebody been loosing off——"</p> + +<p>And even as he spoke somebody loosed off again! The terrific report was +followed by screams within and a fresh shower of glass from the +fanlight. But by this time Doctor Dollar had his latch-key in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> lock. +If the door had opened outward, a tangled trio would have fallen into +the street; as it was, it hardly would open for the man in white who was +struggling with a woman (in red flannel) and a boy (in next to nothing) +on the mat.</p> + +<p>Dollar exclaimed "Barton!" in blank amazement. But it was not the +unlucky Barton who had run amuck. "They won't let me at him! They'll get +the lot of us shot dead!" he spluttered, with ungrateful objurgations; +and then the newcomers grasped the situation. On the stairs, at the end +of the narrow passage, they beheld an enormous revolver, against a +background of pink sleeping-suit, with a ferocious eye looking down the +barrel.</p> + +<p>The crime doctor slipped in front of the Hogarthian group, and stood +between everybody and the armed man—shaking his head with an expression +that nobody else could see.</p> + +<p>"Ozzie, I'm surprised at you!" they heard him say with severity. "I +thought you were a better sportsman than to go playing the fool the one +night I'm out. If you want to frighten people, do it where you don't +damage their property; if you mean<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> murder, I'm your mark, my lad! Aim +at my waistcoat buttons and perhaps you'll get me in the mouth; that's +better; now blaze away!"</p> + +<p>But the pink-striped miscreant was not lowering his barrel to improve +his aim. He lowered it altogether. And his other wild eye was open now, +and both were blinking with unlovely woe.</p> + +<p>"I—I didn't mean any harm," he faltered. "It was only a rag—and I'll +pay for the door."</p> + +<p>"It'll be a great rag, won't it, if you fire bang into your own foot? +Better give me that thing before you do." Dollar held out the steadiest +of hands. "No, t'other way round if you don't mind; 'tisn't manners to +pass knives and forks business-end first. Ta! Now make yourself scarce +before Barton goes for you by kind permission of his family."</p> + +<p>The young man in pink stood wildly staring, then fled up-stairs with a +smothered sob.</p> + +<p>"After him, Barton, before he does something silly," said the doctor +under his breath. "My dear Mrs. Barton, you shall tell me the whole +thing from A to Z in the morning; go down to bed like a good soul, and +be satisfied that you prevented bloodshed. Bobby, take one of the +decanters from the tantalus and give your mother a good<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> nightcap." He +turned round as the unpresentable pair made off. The street-door was +shut; the Home Secretary had sole possession of the mat. "Why, Mr. +Vinson, what's happened to the myrmidon?"</p> + +<p>"I thought you would like me to get rid of him," said Topham +Vinson dryly. "He's waiting outside to explain matters to the +reinforcements—as a joke."</p> + +<p>"Rather an unconvincing joke!" said the doctor, wiping his forehead with +the back of his hand.</p> + +<p>"I'm glad you admit it, Doctor Dollar. Am I to understand that the whole +thing was a practical joke, carefully rehearsed for my benefit?"</p> + +<p>The doctor opened his shining eyes.</p> + +<p>"Does it look like one? Hark back a little, Mr. Vinson!"</p> + +<p>"There's no need. I didn't think of it till you put the word into my +mouth. But it's well, rather a coincidence, doctor, coming on top of the +one about my watch—and you of all men catching the thief!"</p> + +<p>"Yet this is the sort of thing that's always liable to happen when one's +back is turned, and always will be until——"</p> + +<p>"Yes?" said the Home Secretary, as Dollar paused and looked at him.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Until you make it at least as difficult to buy revolvers and +ammunition, Mr. Vinson, as a dose of prussic acid! Here's a young man, +unsteady, and an epileptic, who has just been placed under my care. I +don't run a private asylum, nor is he ripe for one. I must give him his +head a little, and this happens in a minute! If it should lead to fresh +revolver regulations—but I mustn't forget myself in my excitement. If +you would come in here and smoke a cigarette, I shall have to make a +round directly to see how things are quieting down, and should be only +too glad to take you with me."</p> + +<p>The round was made after further conversation in a dining-room as +Spartan as the rest of the crime doctor's characteristic abode. An +instructed taste in aged but uncomfortable oak gave it the chill +severity of a refectory; and the suggestion was strengthened by a glance +into the minute consulting-room next door, which struck the visitor, +perhaps in the light of one of Dollar's own similitudes, as a sort of +monkish cell and confessional in one. The carven table, rugged yet +elaborate, pale with age, might once have been an altar; the chair +behind it was certainly an ecclesiastical chair. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> cumbrous pieces +were yet the fruit of a fastidious eye, and apparently its only fruit. +Everything else throughout the house was ultra-sanitary, refreshingly +utilitarian, twentieth century. No shred nor thread made for dust on the +linoleum, no picture harbored it on the glazed paper. Walls and floors +were of the same uncompromising type up-stairs and down. Yet, when a +peep was taken through one of the numbered doors above, hothouse flowers +bloomed in glass bowls on glass tables, and the bedroom ware was glass +again. The very books were bound in glassy vellum; there was a pile of +them beside the bed, in which a very young man, swathed in bandages, lay +reading under the green glass shade of an electric lamp.</p> + +<p>The doctor expressed his sorrow for the occurrence down-stairs; the +patient, scarcely looking up, said that since he could not have moved to +save his life, he had gone on reading all the time; and they left him at +it, obviously glad to be rid of them.</p> + +<p>"That," whispered the doctor on the landing, "is a young fellow who will +one day be—well, never mind! Until he came to me he had never of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> +own free will read anything but a bad novel or a newspaper; he is now +deep in the immortal work of another weak young man who was swayed by +strength, and is himself for the time being under Doctor Johnson's +salutary thumb."</p> + +<p>"What was his weakness?"</p> + +<p>"Pyromania."</p> + +<p>"<i>What?</i>"</p> + +<p>"A passion for setting places on fire. He started it as quite a small +boy; they licked it out of him then. All his boyhood he went in fear of +the rod, and it kept him straight. Only the other day he goes up to +Oxford, and promptly sets fire to his rooms."</p> + +<p>"Some form of atavism, I presume?"</p> + +<p>"A very subtle case, if I were free to give you its whole history."</p> + +<p>"I should be even more interested in your treatment."</p> + +<p>"Well, I needn't tell you that he's bandaged up for burns; but you might +not guess that he has come by this lot since I've had him, if not almost +at my hands."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, man!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> + +<p>"At any rate I'm responsible for what happened, and it's going to cure +him. It was a case of undisciplined imagination acting on a bonnet with +just one bee in it. He had never realized what a hell let loose a fire +really was; now he <i>knows</i> through his own skin."</p> + +<p>The statesman's eyebrows were like the backs of two mutually displeased +cats.</p> + +<p>"But surely that's an old wives' trick pushed beyond all bounds?"</p> + +<p>"Pushed further than I intended, Mr. Vinson, I must confess. I only +meant him to see a serious fire. So I arranged with the brigade to ring +me up when there was a really bad one, and with my man to take the boy +out at night for all his walks. There was another good reason for that; +and altogether nothing can have seemed more natural than the way they +both appeared on the scene of this ghastly riding-school affair."</p> + +<p>"I know what's coming!" cried the Home Secretary. "This is the fellow +who dashed in to help save the horses, and got away afterward without +giving his name!"</p> + +<p>"That's it. He says he'll hear those horses till<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> his dying hour! He was +in the thick of it before Barton or anybody else could stop him—they +only succeeded in stopping poor Barton from following. Well, I can take +no credit for the very last thing I should have dreamt of allowing; but +I fancy the odds are fairly long that the tempting element will never, +never again tempt our young friend up-stairs!"</p> + +<p>They had drifted down again during this recital; and he who had led the +way stood staring at the crime doctor, in his monkish cell, with that +intent inscrutability which was one of Topham Vinson's most effective +masks; but now it was a mask imperfectly adjusted, with the warm light +of admiration breaking through, and the shadow of something else +interfering with that light. When Doctor Dollar had marched upon the +loaded revolver, talking down the barrel as to an infant pointing a +popgun—daring another daredevil to shoot him dead—the same admiring +look had come over the face behind him, qualified in precisely the same +fashion. But then the doctor had not seen it, and now it made him wince +a little, as though he dreaded something that was bound to come.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> + +<p>This was what came:</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar, I should prefer not to ask you to show me or tell me any +more. I know a good man when I see one, and I know good work when I +catch him at it. Perhaps that was necessary in the case of such +extraordinary work as yours; yet you say it was a sheer coincidence that +I caught you at it to-night—or rather that such tough work was waiting +for you when we got here?"</p> + +<p>"Do you still doubt it? Why, you yourself insisted on coming round to +see the place in the middle of this blessed night!"</p> + +<p>"Exactly. That establishes your second coincidence; but with all +respect, doctor, I don't believe in two of the same sort on the same +night to the same two people!"</p> + +<p>"What was the other coincidence?" demanded the doctor, huskily.</p> + +<p>"Your catching <i>any</i> old pickpocket with my watch—and letting him off! +Come, doctor, do one more thing for me, and I'll do all in my power for +you and your great work. That is, of course, if you still want me to +take the interest I certainly should have taken if I had seen your +letters."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></p> + +<p>"If!" cried the young man from the fulness of his heart. "Your interest +is the one thing I do want of you, and you are the one person I want to +interest!"</p> + +<p>His eyes shone like big brown lamps, straight enough now in their +intensity, and dim with the glory of their vision. He could tremble, +too, it seemed, where the stake was not dear life, but a life's dearer +work. And Topham Vinson was almost moved himself; he really was absorbed +and thrilled; but not to the detriment of his penetrative astuteness, +his political instinct for a bargain.</p> + +<p>"Come, then," said he: "show me the fellow who sneaked my watch."</p> + +<p>"Show him to you? What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>The doctor had not started. But the injured eye showed its injury once +more.</p> + +<p>"It was one of your patients who picked my pocket," said the Home +Secretary, with as much confidence as though he had known it all the +time. "Would you have been in such a hurry to wash your hands of anybody +else, and to undo what he'd done?"</p> + +<p>Dollar made no answer, no denial; but he glanced<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> at a venerable +one-handed clock, whose unprotected pendulum shaved the wall with noisy +sweeps. It was two o'clock in the morning, but already night must have +been turned into dreadful and disturbing day for all the inmates. The +doctor abandoned that excuse unmade, and faced his visitor in +desperation.</p> + +<p>"So you want to see him—now?"</p> + +<p>"I do. I have my reasons. But it shall end at that—if I do see him. +<i>That</i> won't nip my goodwill in the bud!" It was obvious what would.</p> + +<p>"You shall see him," said the doctor, as though racking his mind once +more. "But there are difficulties you perhaps can't quite appreciate. It +means giving away a patient—don't you see?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly. It seems to me a very proper punishment, since it's all +he'll get. Yet you don't want to lose your hold. Couldn't you send him +down here on some pretext, instead of taking me up to him?"</p> + +<p>The crime doctor's face lit up as if by electricity.</p> + +<p>"I can and I will!" he cried. "Wait here, Mr. Vinson. He's another +reader; he shall come down for a book!"</p> + +<p>The great man waited with the satisfaction of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> slightly overbearing +personality for once very nearly overborne. He was now intensely +interested in the crime doctor and his unique establishment. It was an +interest that he had no intention of sharing with his closest colleague, +until he had gone deeper into a theory and practise that were already a +revelation to him. They might both prove unworkable on any large scale, +and yet they might light the way to sensational legislation of the very +type that Topham Vinson was the very man to introduce. Boundless +ambition was one of the forces of a nature that responded to the call of +any sufficiently dazzling crusade; but the passion for adventure ran +ambition hard; and a crusade calculated to gratify both appetites was +dazzling even to eyes of triple steel!</p> + +<p>Only, he must show this new ally his power before they struck up their +alliance; that was the great reason for insisting on seeing the +pickpocket. But there was a little reason besides. An excellent memory +had supplied Mr. Vinson with a kind of post-impression of the +pickpocket. And within one minute of the doctor's departure, and one +second<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> of the patient's prompt appearance, a certain small suspicion +had been confirmed.</p> + +<p>"I think we've met before, my man?" he had begun. His man started +stagily—was altogether of the stage—a bearded scarecrow in rags too +ragged to be true. Vinson found the switches and made more light. "Not +half a bad disguise," he continued, "whoever you may be! I suppose +they're supplied on the premises for distinguished patients?"</p> + +<p>"How do you know it's a disguise?" croaked the hairy man, with downcast +eyes.</p> + +<p>"Well, you don't look a distinguished patient, do you?" said the Home +Secretary airily. "On the other hand, your kit doesn't convince me at +all; looks to me as if it would fall to pieces but for what the ladies +call a foundation—eh?"</p> + +<p>And he swooped down on the ragged tails as their owner turned a +humiliated back. And the "foundation" was a perfectly good overcoat +turned inside out; moreover, it was a coat that Topham Vinson seemed to +know; it was a coat that he suddenly remembered, as he shot up to his +full height and then stood deadly still.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p> + +<p>The pickpocket had not turned round. But his wig and beard lay at his +elbow on the mantelpiece; his diminished head had sunk into his hands; +and the electric light blazed upon a medallion of silver hair, up above +one burning ear.</p> + +<p>"Doctor—Dollar!" exclaimed Topham Vinson. And the ingenuous ring of his +own startled voice only added to his sense of outrage.</p> + +<p>"Yes! I was the man.... It was only to get at you—you know that!"</p> + +<p>It was a hoarse voice muttering to the wall, in a dire discomfiture that +had its effect on the insulted Minister.</p> + +<p>"So that was your weakness!" The plain comment was icier than any sneer. +"Picking and stealing—and your hand still keeps its cunning!"</p> + +<p>"Yes. That was how my wound had taken me." There was less shame in the +hoarse voice, thanks to the bracing coldness of the other. "It started +in the field hospital—orderlies laughed and encouraged me—nurses at +Netley just as bad! Everybody treated it as a joke; the doctor used to +ask for his watch or his handkerchief after every visit; and the great +score was when he thought I had one, and it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> was really the other—or +both—or the keys out of his trousers pocket! It amused the ward and +made me popular—made me almost suicidal—because I alone knew that I +couldn't help doing it to save my life.... And the rest <i>you</i> know."</p> + +<p>"I do, indeed!"</p> + +<p>"This beastly kit, I had it made on purpose so that I could run after +you one minute with what I'd taken from you the minute before! It was a +last attempt to gain your ear—to get you interested. And now——"</p> + +<p>"And now," said Topham Vinson, with a kind hand on the bent shoulders, +yet a keen eye on the bent head—"and now I suppose you think you've put +the lid on it? So you have, my dear doctor—on any sneaking doubts I had +about you! You've struck a job after my own heart, and you've led me +into it as I never was led into anything in my life before. Well, you've +just got to keep me in it now; and I'm conceited enough to believe I +shall be worth my place. Don't you think you might turn round, Doctor +Dollar, and let us shake hands on that?"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>THE LIFE-PRESERVER</h3> + + +<p>The Lady Vera Moyle had made herself notorious in a cause that scored +some points through her allegiance. She it was who cajoled the Home +Secretary outside Palace Yard, and sent him about his weighty business +with the colors of a hated Union pinned to his unconscious back. It is +true that some of her excesses had less to redeem them, but all were +committed with a pious zest which recalled the saying that the Moyles +were a race of Irish rebels who had intermarried with the saints. It was +reserved for Lady Vera to combine the truculence of her forefathers with +the serene solemnity of their wives, and to enact her devilments, as she +took their consequences, with a buxom austerity all her own.</p> + +<p>But she was not at her best when she went to see Doctor Dollar on +Christmas Eve; for it was just<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> two months after the autumn raid, which +had caused the retirement of Lady Vera Moyle, and some of her political +friends, for precisely that period. Otherwise, the autumn raid had been +a triumph for the raiders, thanks to a fog of providential density, +which had fought on their side as the stars in their courses fought +against Sisera for the earliest militant. Never had private property +been destroyed on so generous a scale, with fewer casualties on the side +of the destroying angels; and yet there had been one unnecessary blot on +the proceedings, which they were the first to repudiate and condemn.</p> + +<p>A vile male member of the common criminal classes had not only taken +occasion to loot a jeweler's window, broken by some innocent lady, but +had coolly murdered a policeman who interfered with him in the +perpetration of his selfish crime. Fortunately the wretch had been +traced through the stolen trinkets, expeditiously committed and +condemned, and was on the point of paying the supreme penalty. No sane +person could doubt his guilt, and yet there were those who sought to fix +a certain responsibility on the women! The charge of moral complicity +had disgraced and stultified both Press<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> and platform, and the Home +Secretary, pestered for a reprieve, had only sealed the murderer's fate +at the eleventh hour. Even the steel nerves of the Vinsons had suffered +under a complex strain: it was just as well that he was on the point of +departure for the holidays.</p> + +<p>A deplorable circumstance was the way the Minister's last hours in town +had been embittered by his implacable tormentor, Lady Vera Moyle. That +ingrate had celebrated her release by trying to invade the Home Office, +and by actually waylaying the Secretary of State in Whitehall. An +unobtrusive body-guard had nipped the annoyance in the bud; but it had +caused Topham Vinson to require champagne at his club, whither he was +proceeding on the arm of his last ally and most secret adviser, Doctor +John Dollar of Welbeck Street. And before dark the doctor had been +invaded in his turn.</p> + +<p>"You must blame the Home Secretary for this intrusion," began Lady Vera, +with all the precision of a practised speaker who knew what she had to +say. "He refused, as you heard, to listen to what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> I had to say to him +this morning; but the detective-in-waiting informed me that you were not +only a friend of Mr. Vinson's, but yourself a medical expert in +criminology. I have therefore a double reason for coming to you, Doctor +Dollar, though it would not have been necessary if Mr. Topham Vinson had +treated me with ordinary courtesy."</p> + +<p>"I am very glad you have done so, Lady Vera," rejoined the doctor in his +most conciliatory manner. "Mr. Vinson, to be frank with you, is not in a +fit state for the kind of scene he was afraid you were going to make. He +is in a highly nervous condition for a man of his robust temperament. +Truth, Lady Vera, compels me to add that you and your friends have had +something to do with this, but the immediate cause is a far more unhappy +case which he has just settled."</p> + +<p>"<i>Has</i> he settled it?" cried Lady Vera, turning paler than before +between her winter sables and a less seasonable hat.</p> + +<p>"This morning," said Dollar, with a very solemn air.</p> + +<p>"He isn't going to hang that poor man?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> + +<p>No breath came between the opened lips that prison had bleached and +parched, but neither did they tremble as the doctor bowed.</p> + +<p>"If you mean Alfred Croucher," said he, "convicted of the murder of +Sergeant Simpkins during the last suffragist disturbance, I can only say +there would be an end of capital punishment if he had been reprieved."</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar," returned Lady Vera, under great control, "it was about +this case, and nothing else, that I wanted to speak to the Home +Secretary. I never heard of it until this morning, for I have been out +of the way of newspapers, as you may know; and it is difficult to take +in a whole trial at one hurried reading. Do you mind telling me why +everybody is so sure that this man is the murderer? Did anybody see him +do it?"</p> + +<p>The crime doctor smiled as he shook his head.</p> + +<p>"Very few murders are actually witnessed, Lady Vera; yet this would have +been one of the few, but for the fog. Croucher was plainly seen through +the jeweler's window, helping himself one moment, then struggling with +the unfortunate sergeant."</p> + +<p>"Was the struggle seen as plainly as the robbery?"</p> + +<p>"Not quite, perhaps, but the evidence was equally<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> convincing about +both. Then the stolen goods were found, some of them, still in +Croucher's possession; and the way he tried to account for that, in the +witness-box, was only less suicidal than his fatal attempt at an alibi."</p> + +<p>"Poor fool!" exclaimed Lady Vera, with perhaps less pity than +impatience. "Of course he was there—I saw him!"</p> + +<p>Dollar was not altogether unprepared for this.</p> + +<p>"You were there yourself, then, Lady Vera?"</p> + +<p>"I should think I was!"</p> + +<p>"It—it wasn't you who broke the window for him?"</p> + +<p>"Of course it was! Yet nobody tried to find me as a witness! It is only +by pure chance that I come out in time to save an innocent man's life, +for innocent he is of everything but theft. <i>I</i> know—too well!"</p> + +<p>Her voice was no longer under inhuman control; and there was something +in its passionate pitch that sent a cold thrill of conviction down +Dollar's spine. He gazed in horror at the unhappy girl, in her luxurious +sables, drawn up to her last inch in the pitiless glare of his electric +light; and even as he gazed—and guessed—all horror melted into the +most<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> profound emotion he had ever felt. It was she who first found her +voice, and now it was calmer than it had been as yet.</p> + +<p>"One thing more about the trial," she said. "What was the weapon he is +supposed to have used?"</p> + +<p>"His knife."</p> + +<p>"Yet it seems to have been a small wound?"</p> + +<p>"It had a small blade."</p> + +<p>"But was there any blood on it?"</p> + +<p>She had to press him for these details; any squeamishness was on his +side, and he a doctor!</p> + +<p>"There was," he said. "Croucher had an explanation, but it wasn't +convincing."</p> + +<p>"The truth often isn't," said Lady Vera, bitterly. "You may be surprised +to hear that the blow wasn't struck with a knife at all. It was struck +with—this!"</p> + +<p>Her right hand flew from her glossy muff; in it was no flashing steel, +but a short, black, round-knobbed life-preserver, that she handed over +without more words.</p> + +<p>"But his skull wasn't smashed!" exclaimed John Dollar, and for an +instant he looked at his visitor with the eye of the alienist. "It was a +puncture<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> of the carotid artery, and you couldn't do that with this if +you tried."</p> + +<p>"Hit the floor with it," said Lady Vera, "but don't hold it quite by the +end."</p> + +<p>Dollar bent down and did as directed; at the blow, a poniard flew out of +the opposite end to the round knob; the point caught in his sleeve.</p> + +<p>"That's how it was done," continued Lady Vera. "And I am the person it +was done by, Doctor Dollar!"</p> + +<p>"It was—an accident?" he said, hoarsely. He could look at her as though +the accident had not been fatal; he had less command of his voice.</p> + +<p>"I call it one; the law may not," said she resignedly. "Yet I didn't +even know that I possessed such a weapon as this; it was sold to me as a +life-preserver, and nothing else, out of a pawnbroker's window, where I +happened to see it on the very morning of the raid. I thought it would +be just the thing for smashing other windows, especially with that thong +to go round one's wrist. I thought, too—I don't mind telling you—that, +if I were roughly handled, it was a thing I could use in self-defense as +I couldn't very well use a hammer."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p> + +<p>And here she showed no more shame than a soldier need feel about his +bayonet after battle; and Dollar met her eyes on better terms. He had +been making mechanical experiments with the life-preserver. Some spring +was broken. That was why it became a dagger at every blow, instead of +only when you gave it a jerk.</p> + +<p>"And you were roughly handled by Sergeant Simpkins?" he suggested +eagerly.</p> + +<p>"Very," she said, with a certain reluctance. "But I expect the poor +fellow was as excited as I was when I tried to beat him off."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you hardly knew what you were doing, Lady Vera?"</p> + +<p>"Not only that, Doctor Dollar, but I didn't know what I had done."</p> + +<p>"Thank God for that!"</p> + +<p>"But did you imagine it for a moment? That's the whole point and +explanation of everything that has happened. The worst was over in a few +seconds, in the thick of that awful fog, but, of course I never dreamt +what I had done. I did think that I had knocked him out. But that was +all that ever entered my head until this very morning."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Were you close to your broken window at the time?"</p> + +<p>"Very close, and yet out of sight in the fog."</p> + +<p>"And you had seen nothing of this man Croucher, and his hand in the +affair?"</p> + +<p>"Not after I'd done my part. I did just before. I'm certain it was the +same huge man that they describe. But I heard the whole thing while we +were struggling. They were blowing a police-whistle and calling out +'Thieves!' I remember hoping that the policeman would hear them, and let +me go. But I suppose his blood was up, as well as mine."</p> + +<p>"And after you had—freed yourself?" said the doctor, trying not to set +his teeth.</p> + +<p>"I ran off, of course! I knew that I had done much more than I ever +intended; but that's all I knew, or suspected, even when I found this +horrid thing open in my hand. I tried to shut it again, but couldn't. So +I hid it in my dress, and ran up Dover Street to my club, where I put it +straight into a bag that I had there. Then I made myself decent +and—turned out again with a proper hammer."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span></p> + +<p>The doctor groaned; he could not help it. Yet it was his first audible +expression of disapproval; he had restrained himself while all the worst +was being told; and the girl's face acknowledged his consideration. Her +color had come at last. Thus far, in recounting her intentional +misdeeds, as though they were all in the great day's work, she had shown +a divine indifference to his opinion of her or her proceedings. There +had been nothing aggressive about it—he merely doubted whether the +question of his views had ever entered her mind. But now he could see +that it did; he had shown her something that she did not want to lose, +and her fine candor hid that fact as little as any other.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know what I'd done, remember!" she said with sharp solicitude. +"I never did know until this morning, when I heard of the case for the +first time, and for the first time saw the stains on the dagger—at +which you've been trying so hard not to look! Do look at them, Doctor +Dollar. Of course, there can be no doubt what they are, but I shall be +only too glad for you to prove it to everybody's satisfaction."</p> + +<p>"'Only too glad,' Lady Vera?"</p> + +<p>They gazed at each other for several seconds.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> Her face was tragic to +him now; but emotion, apparently, was the one thing she would condescend +to hide. But for her eyes, she might have been incredibly callous and +cold-blooded; her blue Irish eyes were great and glassy with a grief not +soluble in tears.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar," she said, tensely, "nothing can undo this hideous +thing, though I hope to live long enough to make such poor amends as a +human being can. But in this other direction they must be made at once. +It's no use thinking of what can't be undone till we <i>have</i> undone what +we can—if we are quick! That's why I tried to go straight to the Home +Secretary, and why I have come straight to you. Take me to him, Doctor +Dollar, and help me to convince him that what I have told you is the +whole truth and nothing else! If you think it will make it easier, +satisfy yourself about those blood-stains. Then we can take the dagger +with us."</p> + +<p>The doctor applied a crude test on the spot. He stooped over the fire, +heated the stained steel between the bars, cooled it at the open window, +picked off a scale and examined it briefly under a microscope. All this +was done with tremendous energy tempered by extreme precision and +nicety. And<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> Lady Vera followed the operation with an impersonal +interest that could not but include the operator, so intent upon his +task, so obviously thankful to have a task of any sort in hand. But when +he rose from his microscope it was with a shrug of the shoulders, an +almost angry shake of the head.</p> + +<p>"Of course, this is all no good, you know!" he cried, as if it were her +test. "It would take hours to make the analysis that's really wanted."</p> + +<p>"But as far as you have gone, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"As far as I have gone—which isn't a legal or medical inch—it +certainly does look like blood, Lady Vera."</p> + +<p>"Of course it is blood. There's another thing that will help us, too."</p> + +<p>"What's that?"</p> + +<p>"One of the best points in the defense, so far as I've had time to make +out, was about the prisoner's knife. Now, if we take this with us, +either to the Home Secretary, or, if he still refuses to see me, to New +Scotland Yard——"</p> + +<p>"Lady Vera!" the doctor interrupted, aghast at her suicidal zeal. "Is it +possible that you realize<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> the position you are in? It isn't only a +situation that you've got to face; that you have already done, superbly! +But have you any conception of the consequences?"</p> + +<p>"I think I have," said Lady Vera, smiling. "I don't believe they will +hang me; it would be affectation to pretend I did. But, of course, +that's their business—mine is to change places with an innocent man."</p> + +<p>"That you will never do," replied the doctor warmly. "There's no +innocent man in the case; this Croucher is a thief and a perjurer, +besides being an old convict who has spent half his life in prison! He +would have had five years for the other night's work, without any +question of a murder; they'll simply pack him off to Dartmoor or +Portland when we've saved his miserable neck. And save it we will, no +fear about that; but at what a price—at what a price!"</p> + +<p>"I don't see that you need trouble about it," said Lady Vera, concerned +at his distress, "beyond putting me in touch with Mr. Vinson. The rest +will be up to him, as they say; and, after all, it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> won't be anything so +very terrible to me. I am an old prisoner myself, you must remember!"</p> + +<p>There was a gleam of her notorious audacity with all this; but it was +like the glow of flowers on a grave. The horror of things to happen had +never possessed her valiant eyes, and yet it must have been there, for +all at once Dollar missed it. He read her look. He had relieved her mind +about the man in the cell, only to open it at last to the man in his +grave. Grief crippled her as horror had not; prisons could be broken, +but not the prison to which her hand had sent a fellow creature. Yet her +grief was mastered in its turn, forced out of sight before his eyes, +even while her flippant speech rang through him as the bravest utterance +he had ever heard.</p> + +<p>It blew a bugle in the man's brain, and the call was clear and definite. +He knew his own mind only less instantaneously than he had penetrated +hers. Never in all his days had he known his mind quite so well as when +she thought better of the very words which had enlightened him, and went +on to add to them in another key:</p> + +<p>"So now, Doctor Dollar, will you crown all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> your great kindness by +taking me to see the Home Secretary at once?"</p> + +<p>"Lady Vera," he exclaimed, with unreasonable irritation, "what is the +good of asking impossibilities? I couldn't take you to Topham Vinson +even if I would. He would begin by doubting your sanity; there would be +all manner of silly difficulties. Moreover, he's not in town."</p> + +<p>She showed displeasure at the statement of fact only.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar, are you serious?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly."</p> + +<p>"Have you forgot that I saw you together at almost two o'clock?"</p> + +<p>"I think not quite so late as that. The Home Secretary left Euston at +2:45."</p> + +<p>"Where for?"</p> + +<p>She looked panic-stricken.</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you, Lady Vera, if you promise not to follow him by the next +train."</p> + +<p>"When does it go?"</p> + +<p>"Not for some time. There's only one more; we debated which he should +take. But you mustn't take the other, Lady Vera; you must leave that to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> +me. I want you to leave the whole thing to me—from this very moment +till you hear from me again."</p> + +<p>"When would that be, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"As soon as I have seen Mr. Vinson."</p> + +<p>"You would undertake to tell him everything?"</p> + +<p>"Every detail, exactly as you have told me."</p> + +<p>"Will it seem credible at second-hand?"</p> + +<p>"Quite enough so to justify a respite. That's the first object; and this +is the first step to it, believe me! There's plenty of time between this +and—Tuesday."</p> + +<p>"Oh! I know that," she returned, bluntly disdainful of a well-meant +hesitation. "There's still not a moment to lose while that poor man lies +facing death."</p> + +<p>"I'm not sure that he does, Lady Vera. The decision's only just been +made; it won't be out till the day after to-morrow. I don't believe they +would break it to Croucher on Christmas Day."</p> + +<p>"They can break the good news instead. Where is Mr. Vinson? It's all +right, I won't attempt to tackle him till you have. That's a +promise—and I don't break them like windows!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></p> + +<p>John Dollar ignored that boast with difficulty. He saw through her +tragic levity as through a glass, and his heart cried out with a +sympathy hard indeed to keep to himself; but it was obviously the last +thing required of him by Lady Vera Moyle. He gave her the required +information in a voice only less well managed than her own. And he +thought her eyes softened with the faintest recognition of his +restraint.</p> + +<p>"I thought the Duke had washed his hands of his notorious nephew," she +remarked. "Well, we shall have to spoil the family gathering, I'm +afraid."</p> + +<p>"That's my job, Lady Vera."</p> + +<p>"And I never thanked you for taking it on! Nor will I, Doctor Dollar; +thanks don't meet a case like this!" Very frankly she took his hand +instead: it was hotter and less steady than her own. "And now what about +your train?"</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid there's not one till seven o'clock. Vinson talked of going +down by it at first."</p> + +<p>The time-table confirmed his fear; he threw it down, and plunged into +the telephone directory instead. Lady Vera watched him narrowly. He had +dropped into his old oak chair, and the sheen of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> age on the table +betrayed his face as though it were bent over clear brown water. She +could see its anxiety as he had not allowed her to see it yet.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you wouldn't care to face it in a motor?"</p> + +<p>She was faltering for the first time.</p> + +<p>"That's exactly what I mean to do," he answered, without looking up from +the directory. "I'm just going to telephone for a car."</p> + +<p>"Then you needn't!" she cried joyfully. "We have at least two eating +their bonnets off in our mews. I'll go home in a taxi, and send one of +them straight round with a driver who knows the way, and a coat that you +must promise to wear, Doctor Dollar. All my people are away except my +mother, and she won't know; she isn't strong enough to use the cars. But +I mustn't speak of poor mother, or I shall make a fool of myself yet. +It's partly my fault as it is, you see, and of course all this will make +her worse. But I'm not so sure of that, either! My mother is the kind of +person who has all the modern ailments and no modern ideas—but she +could show us all how to play the game at a pinch. She will be the first +to back me up in the only conceivable course."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></p> + +<p>This speech had not come quite so fluently as might be supposed, though +Dollar had only interrupted it to send for a taxicab. It had interrupted +itself when Lady Vera Moyle was betrayed into speaking of poor Lady +Armagh, whose heart-felt disapproval of her daughter's escapades was +public property. Dollar had heard from Topham Vinson—that very day at +lunch—that the last one had made her seriously ill; then what indeed of +impending resolutions, and the nine days' tragic scandal which was the +very least that could come of them unless——</p> + +<p>"Unless!"</p> + +<p>In the doctor's mind so many broken sentences began with that +will-o'-the-wisp among words, that others really spoken fell upon stony +ears, and he knew as little what he said in reply. In a dream he saw a +small hand wave as the taxicab vanished round the corner to the right; +in a dream he sprang up-stairs, hiding under his coat the weapon with +which that little hand had dealt out death; and awoke in his wintriest +clothes, his greatest coat, to find himself called upon to top the lot +with another of unkempt fur sent with the car.</p> + +<p>That aluminum clipper—a fifteen-horse-power<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> Invincible Talboys—was +indeed at the door in incredibly quick time. Twin headlights lit long +wedges of London mud; two pairs of goblin goggles mounted up behind +them—one sent with the coat and a message that was more than law. The +dapper chauffeur huddled down behind the wheel; the passenger sat bolt +upright at his side; the Barton family, his faithful creatures, carried +out an impromptu tableau in the background. Mother and son—those +unpresentable features of a former occasion—now appeared as immaculate +cook and page at the top of the area steps and on the lighted threshold +respectively. Barton himself leaned out of an upper window, still in his +white suit—it was the typically muggy Christmas of a degenerate young +century—but with all the black cares of the strange establishment quite +apparent on his snowy shoulders. The dapper driver gave his horn a +spiteful pinch. And then they were off, only to be held up in Oxford +Street by the Christmas traffic, but doing better in the Edgware Road, +and soon on the way to Edgware itself, and Elstree and St. Albans, and +all the lighted towns and pitch-dark roads that lie by night between the +capital of England and her smallest county.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Least trem-lines this wye," said the dapper one, a mile or two out; and +said no more for another fifty. But he drove like a little genius, and +the car responded to his cunning hands as a horse that knows its master. +She proved to be a sound roadster whose only drawback was a lack of +racing speed; the lad had her in prime condition, and the good road ran +from under her like silk from a silent loom.</p> + +<p>Dollar sat beside him, in the shelter of a wind-screen that glazed and +framed a continuous study in nocturnal values. Now the fine shades would +be broken by a cluster of lights, soon to scatter and go out like sparks +from a pipe; now only by the acetylene lamps that kept the foreground in +a blaze between villages. Often a ghostly portent appeared hovering over +the road ahead; but this was only the doctor's own anxious face, seen +dimly in the screen.</p> + +<p>And yet he was not really anxious for those first fifty miles. At the +start he was too thankful to be under way, and the road was never empty +of exciting and diverting possibilities. But at Bedford they stopped for +supper: it was Dollar's sudden idea, the hour being now between eight +and nine; but the treasure at the wheel professed his readiness to push +on, and it would have been better for Dollar<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> to have taken him at his +word. The break in the run also broke up the dreamy lull induced by the +keen air and the low smooth hum of the car. In the warm hotel, all holly +and Christmas cheer, he came back to real life with a thud, and its most +immediate problem beset him all the rest of the way.</p> + +<p>Hitherto his one anxiety had been to get at the Home Secretary that +night; henceforth he was having the interview over and over again, with +a different result every time. He knew, indeed, what he meant to say +himself; he had known that before he said good-by to Lady Vera Moyle. +But what would the Home Secretary say? Was it conceivable that the +blood-stained life-preserver would be enough for him? It would be +supported by the sworn statement of a man whom he had learned to trust. +But was such utterly indirect evidence in the least likely to upset a +decision already taken, if not already communicated to the man in the +condemned cell?</p> + +<p>The very thought of that hapless wretch was fraught with definite and +vivid horror. The crime doctor had once seen the inside of a condemned +cell; he could see it still. The door was open, the pitiful occupant at +exercise in an adjacent yard. He had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> looked in. The cell was not so +gloomy as it should have been. Texts on the walls, sunlight through the +bars, and on the fixed flap of clean worn wood, a big open book.</p> + +<p>Dollar recalled every detail with morbid fidelity. He had gone in to +look at the book, and found it a bound volume of <i>Good Words</i>, open at a +laudable serial by a lady then in vogue with the virtuous. Yet that +particular reader had cut a woman's throat over a quarrel about a +shilling, and Dollar had seen him striding jauntily up and down the +narrow yard, cracking some joke with the attendant warders, a smile on +his scrubby lips and in his bold blue eyes. He could see the fellow as +he had seen him for ten seconds years ago. Yet his pity for one in the +same awful case, for a crime he had not committed, was as nothing to his +infinite sorrow and compassion for her who had committed it unawares, +comparatively light as the punishment for such a deed was bound to be.</p> + +<p>But was it? Not for Lady Vera Moyle, at all events! Either she would go +scot-free, or her punishment might well be worse than death. It might +easily kill her mother; then the tragedy would be a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> double tragedy +after all, and Lady Vera would still be its author. Supposing she had +not discovered her own crime! Croucher would have been no loss to the +community; life-long criminals like Croucher were best out of the way, +murderers or no murderers. The crime doctor was convinced of that. They +were the incurables; extermination was the only thing for them.</p> + +<p>"I would shut up my penitentiaries, but enlarge my lethal chamber," he +sometimes said, and would be quite serious about it. Yet not for a +moment could he have carried his ideas to their logical conclusion in +the concrete case of Alfred Croucher and Lady Vera Moyle. He could have +let a man of that stamp go technically innocent to the gallows—or he +thought he could just then. But he could not have allowed the greatest +monster to suffer for Lady Vera's sins—and that he felt in his bones. +It was the personal equation as supplied by her that made the thing +impossible. Such a load on such a soul! Better any punishment than that!</p> + +<p>At Kettering a right-hand turn led up-hill and down-dale into little +Rutland, and Dollar ceased glaring at his own ghost in the wind-screen; +a healthily<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> immediate anxiety kept him peering at his watch instead. +But now they were skirting one of the longest and stumpiest stone walls +in feudal England, and all of a sudden it parted in twin turrets joined +by triple gates. Over the central arch heraldic monsters pawed the +stars; underneath an arc lamp hung resplendent; all three gates were +open, and the drive beyond was a perspective of guiding lights. It was +evidently a case of Christmas festivities on a suitable scale at +Stockersham Hall.</p> + +<p>Miles up the drive, a semicircle of motor-cars fringed a country edition +of the Horseguards Parade, dominated by an escaped hotel; and the car +that really was from London had becoming palpitations in the zone of +light. Before a comparatively simple portico a superlatively splendid +menial looked askance at the doctor's borrowed furs, but was not +unimpressed by a curt inquiry for Mr. Topham Vinson, and consented to +inquire in his turn.</p> + +<p>"Be quick and quiet, and give him this card," said the doctor, slipping +half-a-sovereign underneath it. "I want to see Mr. Vinson—no one +else—on urgent business from the Home Office."</p> + +<p>Yet the next minute merely brought forth an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> imposing personage whom the +dapper driver did not fail to salute; even Dollar was not positive +whether it was the Duke or his butler until summoned indoors with the +subtle condescension of the supreme servitor. He went as he was, in +hirsute coat and goggles, the butler stalking at arm's length, with an +air of personal repudiation happily not lost upon the little London lynx +in charge of the car.</p> + +<p>That artist would have been an endless joy to eyes not turned within. +His silent endurance and efficiency, his phlegmatic zest in an adventure +which might have a professional interest for him, but obviously did not +engage his curiosity, were qualities which even the tormented Dollar had +appreciated at intervals on the road. But now he missed a treat. The +little Cockney ran his engine till the first flunkey returned and said +things through the noise. Then he looked under his bonnet, as a monkey +into its offspring's head. But the climax arrived with sandwiches on a +lordly tray, when a glass of beer was sent back, and one of champagne +brought instead to this choice specimen of a contemporary type. It was +scarcely down before the passenger reappeared, accompanied by another +swollen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> figure in motoring disguise, as well as by my Lord Duke, who +saw them off himself, and did look less ducal than the butler after all.</p> + +<p>The many lights of Stockersham dwindled and disappeared into the night +and one long wave of incandescence flowed back as it had come, by +finespun hedge and wirework thicket, through dead villages and sleeping +towns, like phosphorescent foam before a vessel's bows. And in the +torpedo body of the Invincible Talboys, where Dollar now sat behind his +companion of the outward trip, and the Home Secretary of England behind +a fat cigar, there was a strained silence through two entire counties, +but something like an explosion on the confines of the third.</p> + +<p>"Do you still refuse to give her name?" demanded Topham Vinson, exactly +as though they had been talking all the time. The stump of his second +cigar was so short that angry light and angry mouth were one.</p> + +<p>"I must," said Dollar, in a muffled voice, and he pointed to the hunched +shoulders within a yard of their noses.</p> + +<p>"In that case we have no secrets," replied the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> Home Secretary with a +sneer. "But why must you, Dollar? She seems to have made no reservations +with you, yet you would make this enormous one with me."</p> + +<p>"It's a secret of the consulting-room, Mr. Vinson; those of the +confessional are not more sacred, as you know perfectly well."</p> + +<p>"And you expect me to eat my decision on the strength of a hearsay +anonymous confession?"</p> + +<p>"I do—in the first instance," said Dollar decidedly. "An immediate +respite would commit you to nothing, but I don't ask even for that on +the unsupported strength of what I told you at Stockersham. You know +what you've got in your overcoat pocket. Hand it over to your own +analyst; have an exhumation, if you like, and see if the weapon doesn't +actually fit the wound; if it doesn't, hang your man."</p> + +<p>"I'm much obliged for your valuable advice. But it's got to be one thing +or the other, once for all; the poor devil has been on tenter-hooks +quite long enough."</p> + +<p>"And have you forgotten how nearly you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> decided in his favor, Mr. +Vinson, without all this to turn the scale?"</p> + +<p>It was perhaps an ominous feature of their mushroom intimacy that the +younger man had not yet been invited to drop the formal prefix in +addressing his senior by a short decade. But this would not have been +the moment even for a familiarity encouraged in happier circumstances. +And yet Dollar dared to pat the great man's arm as he spoke; and the +gesture was as the button on the foil; it prevented a shrewd thrust from +drawing blood, and if anything it improved Topham Vinson's temper.</p> + +<p>"It's no good, my dear fellow!" he exclaimed in friendly settlement of +the general question. "I must have the lady's name, unless she's +determined to defeat her own ends."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say that it's her name or Croucher's life?"</p> + +<p>Topham Vinson had not meant to say any such thing—in so many words—and +it was annoying to have them put into his mouth. But he had decided not +to be annoyed any more. It did not pay with this fellow Dollar; at +least, it had not paid on that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> occasion; but anybody might be at a +disadvantage after a heavy political strain, a lengthy journey, an +excellent dinner, and a development as untimely as it was embarrassing. +Mr. Vinson relapsed into silence and an attitude unconsciously modeled +on that of the gallant little driver. His body sank deep into the rugs, +his head as deep between his shoulders. It was almost Hertfordshire +before he spoke again.</p> + +<p>"Vera Moyle was one of the Oxford Street division," he remarked at last. +"I know all about her movements on the night of battle; otherwise I +should want to know about them now. If I thought <i>she</i> was the +woman——"</p> + +<p>"What's that?" said Dollar lethargically. "I was almost asleep."</p> + +<p>The remarks did not gain weight by repetition, but the broken sentence +was finished with some effect: "I'd let her drain the cup."</p> + +<p>"I don't wonder," rejoined Dollar, sympathetically.</p> + +<p>"Yet you would have me risk my political existence for one of her +kidney!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't follow."</p> + +<p>"You would reprieve the apparent murderer, and let the real one continue +militant here on earth?"</p> + +<p>"I believe she has had her fill of militancy."</p> + +<p>"Not she!"</p> + +<p>"I'll go bail for her if you like. It was an accident She is +heart-broken about it—and you don't know her—I do! I'd back her not to +run the risk of such another accident!"</p> + +<p>"And what if she rounded on me? However such a thing came out, it would +be my ruin, Dollar."</p> + +<p>"It wouldn't come out through her!"</p> + +<p>A certain fervor crept into the doctor's voice. It was obviously +unconscious, and Topham Vinson was far too astute a person to engender +consciousness and caution by so much as a rallying syllable. But he did +hazard a leading question, subtly introduced as nothing of the sort.</p> + +<p>"I'm not trying to get at what I want in a roundabout way," he had the +nerve to state. "I've given up trying to pump you, Dollar; but—would it +make a <i>very</i> great scandal if we had to fix this thing on this +particular young lady?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I can't answer about scandals," replied the still not unwary doctor. +"It would break hearts—probably cause death—make her a double murderer +in her own eyes, and God knows what else as a result! And it wouldn't do +anybody the least bit of good, because you would still have to give +Croucher a suitable term for his authentic offense."</p> + +<p>It was three o'clock on Christmas morning when they saw the lights of +London from the top of Brockley Hill; a minute later they were on the +tram-lines at the foot, and almost immediately in the purlieus of the +town.</p> + +<p>The trip did not end without a telling taste of Mr. Vinson's very +individual quality. In Maida Vale he suddenly announced his intention of +having the life-preserver identified in those very small hours by the +pawnbroker who had sold it on the morning of the autumn raid. The crime +doctor was terrified; for aught he knew the man might be well aware that +he had sold it to Lady Vera Moyle. She was notorious enough, in all +conscience; his only hope lay in the fact that he himself had not known +her by sight before that day. In vain he raised various objections; they +were well met by his own<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> previous arguments for the immediate reprieve +of Alfred Croucher, and he feared to press them. He knew only the name +of the pawnbroker's street, but here Cockney sharpness came in again, +and they were pounding on the right shutters by half past three. An +up-stairs window flew alight, up went a sash, and out came an angry +head.</p> + +<p>"My name is Topham Vinson," said one of the swaddled men in a sepulchral +voice. "I'm the Home Secretary, but I can't force you to come down and +speak to me because of that. I can only make it more or less worth your +while."</p> + +<p>He was fishing for his sovereign-case as he spoke. In another minute the +private door had shut behind him and Doctor Dollar, and an obsequious +sack of humanity shuffled before them into a sanctum still redolent of a +somewhat highly-seasoned meal.</p> + +<p>"I remember 'aving it in the thop," said the unkempt head protruding +from the sack. "But I can't thay 'ow it came here—that I can thwear in +a court of juthtith, my lord! It'th a narthy, beathly thing, but I +thwear it wath here when I took over the bithneth."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't care how or when it came here," said Topham Vinson, counting +the sovereigns in the gold case attached to the watch-chain of other +memories. "I want to know if you remember selling this life-preserver?"</p> + +<p>"Yeth, I do!"</p> + +<p>"When?"</p> + +<p>"It would be—let me thee—thome time lartht October or November."</p> + +<p>"Do you remember who bought it?"</p> + +<p>"Yeth—a young lady!"</p> + +<p>Dollar breathed again. The man did not know her name; at first he was +extremely shaky on the point of personal appearance. But the doctor +assisted him by unscrupulously suggesting a number of marked +characteristics which Lady Vera Moyle did not happen to possess. The man +fell straight into the trap, recalled every imaginary feature, and +finally earned big gold by quite convincingly connecting the sale of the +life-preserver with the date of the great women's raid. Mr. Vinson +looked very stern as he led the way out into the street; and it was he +who sharply woke the little chauffeur, who was snoring heartily over his +wheel.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I like that lad," he muttered in the car. "He does nothing by halves. +No more do I! Do you mind dropping me first at Portman Square?"</p> + +<p>Dollar gave the order, and they slid through the empty streets as though +man and car were fresh from the garage. There was not a soul in Portman +Square, or a light in any of the houses except the Home Secretary's. +They had telephoned through from Stockersham after his departure, and +the door opened as he emptied his remaining sovereigns into the +chauffeur's hand, before taking Dollar's with no lack of warmth.</p> + +<p>"I can't ask you in this time," said Topham Vinson, smiling. "Apart from +the hour, I've got to go straight to the telephone, get through to +Pentonville, and spoil the Governor's night!"</p> + +<p>"Reprieved?" gasped the doctor. It was the one word that would come.</p> + +<p>The Home Secretary nodded rather grimly, but was smiling as he shut the +door almost on the hand with which John Dollar would have seized his +once more. There was a shooting of bolts inside.</p> + +<p>Dollar turned slowly round, wondering if at last<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> he could tell the +little driver something about the night's enterprise in which he had +played so heroic a part. There was no need. The driver had kept eyes and +ears wide open—and collapsed once more over the wheel. This time it was +not in sleep, but in a dead faint; and the driving goggles were all +awry, the driver's hat had tumbled off, the driver's hair had broken +bounds.</p> + +<p>It was a girl's hair, and the girl was Lady Vera Moyle.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>A HOPELESS CASE</h3> + + +<p>Alfred Croucher had the refreshing attribute of looking almost as great +a ruffian as he really was. His eyes swelled with a vulgar cunning, his +mouth was coarse and pitiless; no pedestal of fine raiment could have +corrected so low a cast of countenance, or enabled its possessor to pass +for a moment as a gentleman or a decent liver. But he had often looked a +worse imitation than on the morning of his triumphant exit from the +jail, his bullet head diminished in a borrowed cap, his formidable +physique tempered by a Burberry all too sober for his taste.</p> + +<p>Nor was that all the change in Mr. Croucher at this agreeable crisis of +his career. The bulging eyes were glazed with a wonder which quite +eclipsed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> the light of triumph; and they were fixed, in unwilling +fascination, upon the tall figure to which the borrowed plumes belonged, +whom he had never beheld before that hour, but at whose heels he trotted +from the bowels of the prison to the motor-car flashing in the sun +beyond the precincts.</p> + +<p>"'Alf a mo'!" cried Croucher, making a belated stand instead of jumping +in as he was bid. "I didn't rightly catch your name inside, let alone +wot you got to do with me an' my affairs. If you come from my s'lic'tor, +I should like to know why; if you're on the religious lay, 'ere's your +'at an' coat, and I won't trouble you for a lift."</p> + +<p>"My name is Dollar," replied the motorist. "My business is neither legal +nor religious, and it need not necessarily be medical, though I do +happen to be a doctor. I came at the request of a friend of yours, in +that friend's car, to see if there's nothing we can do to make up to you +for all you've been through."</p> + +<p>"A friend of mine!" ejaculated Croucher, with engaging incredulity.</p> + +<p>The doctor smiled, but dryly, as he had spoken. "It's one of the many +unknown friends you have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> gained lately, Mr. Croucher. And I should like +to make one more, if only to the extent of a little spin and some +breakfast at my house. There is more sympathy for you than you seem to +realize, and one or two of us are ready to show it in any way you will +permit. But I wouldn't stand here, unless you want a public +demonstration first."</p> + +<p>Mr. Croucher decided to disregard the suspicions that a kindness always +excited in his mind, and took his place in the car without further +argument or a second look at the handful of the curious already +collecting on the pavement. In a moment he was wondering why he had been +such a fool as to hesitate at all. The car slid out of the shadow of the +prison into the sunlight of a bright spring morning, over a sparkling +Thames, and through the early traffic without let or hitch. And the +gentleman in the car knew how to hold his tongue, and to submit himself +to sidelong inspection as a gentleman should. But little had Croucher +made of him by Welbeck Street, except that he looked too knowing to be a +crank, and not half soft enough for his notion of the good Samaritan.</p> + +<p>Breakfast removed any lingering misgivings, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> might have created them +in a more sophisticated mind. It was an English breakfast fit for a +foreign potentate; there were soles, kidneys, eggs and bacon, hot rolls, +and lashings of such coffee as made Mr. Croucher forget a previous +craving for alcohol. He thought it funny that so generous a repast +should be served on a black old table without a cloth, and he did not +fancy the leathern chairs with the great big nails, more fit for a +museum than a private gentleman's house. But a subsequent cigar, in +which the private gentleman did not join him, was up to the visitor's +highest standard, and the subject of a more articulate appreciation than +all that had gone before.</p> + +<p>"You shall smoke the box if you care to stay with me," said Doctor +Dollar, with a warmer smile.</p> + +<p>"Stay with you!" exclaimed Croucher, suffering a return of his worst +suspicions. "Why should I stay with you?"</p> + +<p>"Because there are worse places, Croucher, and one of them has left you +a bit of a wreck."</p> + +<p>"A bit of one!" cried the other, in a sudden snarling whine. "They've +just about done me in, doctor, if you want to know. Two munfs' 'ard, +that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> I was never ordered, on top of one in the condemned cell for what +I never done! That's 'ow they've tret me—somefink crool—wuss than wot +you'd treat a dawg wot give you 'ydrophobia. And wot <i>'ad</i> I done? +'Elped meself when the stuff was under my nose, an' me starvin', an' the +jooler's winder ready broke for a cove by them as never 'ad his +temptitions. I don't say it was right, mind you; but that much I did do, +and not what they said I 'ad an' couldn't prove. They couldn't prove it, +because I never done it; they couldn't 'ang me, because they didn't +dare; but they made me sweat an' shiver just the same. They took ten +years off of me life; they give me such a time as I shan't forget till +my dying day. And as if that wasn't thick enough, they give me two +munfs' 'ard on their own—no judge or jury for that little lot—an' turn +me out wot <i>you</i> calls a bit of a wreck, but <i>I</i> calls a creepin' +corpse!"</p> + +<p>And the animated remains wiped a forehead wet already with the throes of +deglutition, and eyes that were not wet at all, before applying a +flickering light to his neglected Upmann.</p> + +<p>"What you say is perfectly fair," observed the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> doctor, in a sadly +unimpassioned tone; "but it is also fair to remember that others have +been saying it for you for some time past, and that you are free this +morning as the result. I confess I feared they might keep you longer; +but I evidently had not your grasp of the niceties of your actual +offense. As to your mental and bodily sufferings, I can see some of the +effects for myself, and those at least I could undo. That was the idea +in meeting you, and perhaps I ought to say at once that it was not my +idea. It was that of the unknown friend of whom I have already spoken; +but I am prepared to carry it out. I run a kind of nursing home, here in +my house, and there's a bed ready for you if you care to occupy it."</p> + +<p>"A nursing 'ome!" said Croucher, shrinking from a vision of lint and +ligatures. "There's nuffunk so much the matter with me that I want to go +into an 'ome."</p> + +<p>"Nothing that rest could not cure—rest and diet—I agree," said the +doctor, with an eye on the empty dishes.</p> + +<p>"But won't it cost a lot?" inquired Croucher,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> thinking of the kidneys +especially. "I'm stony-broke, you see," he explained with increased +bitterness.</p> + +<p>"Our friend insists on paying the bill," said the doctor, grimly.</p> + +<p>"And who is our wonderful friend, doctor, when 'e or she's at 'ome?"</p> + +<p>Doctor Dollar laughed as he pushed back his chair. "That's the one thing +you mustn't ask me; but come up and see the room before you make up your +mind against it."</p> + +<p>It was at the top and back of the house, less lofty than those into +which the Home Secretary had peeped on a previous occasion, but +similarly appointed, and more attractive in the morning light and that +of a fire already crackling in the grate. By the fireside stood a white +wicker chair and a glass table strewn with the newest and lightest of +monthly and weekly literature; ash-trays and match-boxes were in +comfortable evidence; a bed of vestal purity was turned down in +readiness, and a suit of gay pajamas airing with a bathgown on a set of +bright brass pipes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The bathroom is next door," explained the doctor; "you would have it +practically to yourself, but your room would be your castle."</p> + +<p>And he pointed out an efficient bolt upon the door.</p> + +<p>"You wouldn't lock me in on the other side?" suggested Croucher +suspiciously.</p> + +<p>"Certainly not; you may have the key; but I should expect you to keep to +your own floor, and, of course, to the house. You would not be a +prisoner in any sense; but if you went out, Croucher, I'm afraid you +would have to stay out. Otherwise my treatment would not have a fair +chance; what you require, in the first instance, is absolute rest and no +more truck with the outside world than you had where you have been."</p> + +<p>"An' good 'olesome grub?" suggested Croucher with another slant of his +goggle eyes.</p> + +<p>"And plenty of square meals. Perhaps not so square as this morning's, +because you won't have any exercise; but that sort of thing."</p> + +<p>"A little drop of anythin' to drink, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"With your meals, and in moderation, by all means; but don't ask me for +nightcaps, and don't try to smuggle anything in."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I wouldn't do such a thing!" exclaimed Croucher, with virtuous +decision. "Doctor, I'm your man, and ready to turn in as soon as ever +you like."</p> + +<p>And a shabby waistcoat hung unbuttoned at the swoop of a horned thumb.</p> + +<p>"One moment," said the doctor. "If you are really coming to me, and +coming to stay, I am to telephone to my tailor, who will take some +little time getting here."</p> + +<p>"Your tailor!" cried Croucher. "Where the dooce does <i>'e</i> come in?"</p> + +<p>"You may well ask!" replied Dollar with involuntary candor. "That friend +in need, who was the first to assert your innocence, and to whom you owe +more than you will ever know, is anxious to give you a fresh start in +life, and an entire new outfit in which to make it."</p> + +<p>"Well! I call that 'andsome," declared Alfred Croucher, for once without +reserve. "I won't arst 'oo it is no more, but I shall live in 'opes o' +findin' out an' sayin' thanky like a man. Not but wot it's right," he +added after all, "for them as is rich to 'old out an 'elpin' 'and to +them as is pore and 'ave been tret like I've been, through no fault o' +their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> own. But it ain't everybody as sees it like that, an' it makes +you think better o' the world when you strike them as does."</p> + +<p>"I agree," said the doctor, in a tone entirely lost on his expansive +patient.</p> + +<p>"I'm griteful to 'im," that worthy went so far as to assert, "and to you +too, sir, if it comes to that."</p> + +<p>Doctor Dollar took the opportunity of being no less explicit in his +turn.</p> + +<p>"There's no reason why it should come to that, Croucher, I assure you. I +can not too strongly impress on you that anything I do for you is by +business arrangement with the friend who takes this extraordinary +interest in your career."</p> + +<p>In this statement, but especially in its relative clause, there was a +note of sheer resentment which recalled other notes and other clauses to +the retentive memory of Mr. Croucher. In a flash the lot had fused in +his suspicious mind, and so visibly that Dollar was relieved to find +himself the object of suspicion.</p> + +<p>"You talk as if it went against your grain," said Croucher, with a growl +and a show of growler's teeth. "I 'ope you don't think I went an' done +it all the time, do yer?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't follow you, Croucher."</p> + +<p>"I mean the big job—the first job—the one I very near swung for!" +muttered the fellow, hoarse and hot with evident emotion.</p> + +<p>"No; indeed I don't," responded the doctor, in an unexpected voice; and +he sighed, as though to think that his sentiments toward his patient +should have been so misunderstood.</p> + +<p>Such at least was the patient's final interpretation of all that was +unsatisfactory in the doctor's manner; and if a doubt still rankled in +his mind, it was but the crumpled petal in what was almost literally a +bed of roses. Bed and room alike were the most luxurious in which Alfred +Croucher had ever lain; after prison they were as the seventh heaven +after the most excruciating circle of Dante's Inferno. He stretched his +great limbs in peace ineffable, fell asleep dreaming of the fine flash +suits for which they had been duly measured, and was never decently +awake until the evening.</p> + +<p>A substantial tea, when he did wake up, was the least they could provide +after neglecting to rouse a man for his midday meal; but a distinct +grievance on that score was forgot in the appetite that accrued for +dinner, and the infinitely tactful choice<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> of the eventful viands. Steak +and onions was the strong act of a romantic drama after the very heart +of this transpontine rough. If he had been shown a bill of fare, Alfred +Croucher would have chosen steak and onions, with Welsh rarebit to +follow; and Welsh rarebit did follow, as if by magic. There was rather +less to be said for the drink; the patient could have done with a longer +and a stronger draught. But it was a drop of good stuff, if Mr. Croucher +was any judge; and he decided not to create a possibly prejudicial +impression by complaints of quality or quantity.</p> + +<p>"You done me top-'ole," he murmured, rolling his bulbs of eyes when the +doctor stood over him once more. "Top-'ole, you 'ave, and no error. I +never struck a nicer bit o' fillet. Saucy glass o' wine that, too. Not +that I was ever much 'and at the liquor, but there are times w'en it +seems to do yer good."</p> + +<p>"You shall continue to take it, medicinally," returned Dollar, gravely; +"but don't count on the type of fare you've had to-day. Three meals in +future, but rather lighter ones. The first day was different, I tried to +put myself in your place, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> am glad I seem to have succeeded on the +whole. But remember you are here to lie low, and that doesn't do on +fighting food. Sufficient for the day, Croucher! Here are some flowers +from the friend who works by stealth, and these are the weeds I promised +you this morning. You might do worse than judge the givers by their +gifts."</p> + +<p>It was perhaps as well that Alfred Croucher did not pause to puzzle out +that saying, for the rare blooms were as pearls before his kindred of +the sty, but the box of Upmanns as a trough of offal. One was ignited +without delay; yet it was hardly a matter of hours before the chartered +sluggard was blissfully asleep once more, his door locked and bolted on +principle, and a red fire dying in the grate.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>It might have been a falling coal that woke him up. Such was the +innocent Croucher's first impression. But in that case it was nothing +less than a shower of coals, a gentle but continuous downpour, and they +fell with a curiously crisp and metallic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> tinkle. Moreover, the sound +was not from the fire after all, but apparently from the window on the +opposite side of the room.</p> + +<p>Croucher lay listening until his quickened senses could no longer be +deceived. Somebody was at his window, the dormer window that anybody +could get at over the leads, that ought to have been securely barred but +wasn't, as he suddenly remembered with aggrieved dismay. He had himself +considered that unprotected window and those conducive leads, in one of +his last waking moments, as a not impossible solution of the whisky +problem.</p> + +<p>But this was different; this was awful; this was a case for alarming the +house without scruple or delay. It should have been a great moment for a +bit of an expert, who had once served the humane equivalent of seven +years for an ambitious burglary of his own; but the defect of character +which had spelled failure on that occasion, when an elderly householder +had held him up with an unloaded revolver, rendered Mr. Croucher +incapable of appreciating the present situation as it deserved. He was +far too shaken to think of the former affair, or to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> feel for a moment +like a 'busman on his proverbial holiday or an actor at the front of the +house. He did feel bitterly indignant that a patient in a nursing home +should be exposed to such terrors by night; and he had got as far as his +elbow toward a display of spirit (and incipient virtue) when the catch +flew back with as much noise as he might have made himself. Before more +could happen, Mr. Croucher had relapsed upon his pillow with a +stentorian snore.</p> + +<p>Then a sash went up too slowly, limbs crossed the sill and felt the +floor with excessive caution, and for a little lifetime Alfred Croucher +suffered more exquisitely than toward the end in the condemned cell. The +monster was leaning over him, breathing hotly in his face, all but +touching his frozen skin.</p> + +<p>"Alfie!" said a blessed voice, as a tiny light struck through the +compressed eyelids. "Alfie, it's me!"</p> + +<p>And once more Alfred Croucher was a man and a liar. "Shoddy!" he croaked +with a sepulchral sob. "An' me asleep an' dreamin' like a bloomin' +babby! Why, wot the 'ell you doin' 'ere, Shod?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Come to see you, old son," said Shoddy. "But it's more like me arskin' +what <i>you're</i> up to in a 'ouse like this?"</p> + +<p>"'Avin the time o' me life!" whispered the excited patient. "Livin' like +a fightin' cock, on the fat o' the teemin' land, at some ruddy old +josser's expense!"</p> + +<p>And he poured into the still adjacent ear the true fairy tale of his +first day's freedom, from his introduction to Doctor Dollar in the +precincts of that very jail which was to have been his place of +execution and obscene sepulcher.</p> + +<p>"I know. I seen you come out with him," said Shoddy, "an' drive off in +yer car like a hairy lord. I was there with a taxi meself——"</p> + +<p>"There to meet me, Shod?"</p> + +<p>"That's it. That's 'ow I tracked you to this 'ere 'ouse. The room took +more findin'; but there's an old pal o' mine a shover in the mews. 'E +showed me the back o' the 'ouse, an' blowed if I didn't spot yer at yer +winder first go off!"</p> + +<p>"That must've been early on, old man? I bin in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> bed all day. Oh, such a +bed, Shoddy! I'm goin' to sleep me 'ead into a pulp afore I leave it."</p> + +<p>"You ain't," said Shoddy firmly. "You're comin' along o' me, Alfie. +That's why I'm 'ere."</p> + +<p>"Not me," replied Alfie, with equal firmness. "I know w'en I'm well +off—and it's time I was."</p> + +<p>"I'm wiv yer there!" Shoddy nodded in adroit sympathy; he had kept his +electric lamp burning all the time; and an extra prominence of eye and +cheek-bone, a looseness of lip and a flickering glance, were not +inarticulate in the chastened countenance of his friend. "It must've +been 'ell, Alfie, real, old red-'ot 'ell!"</p> + +<p>"And all for wot I never done," he was reminded with some stiffness.</p> + +<p>"That's it," the other agreed, with perfunctory promptitude. "But that's +exactly why I'm 'ere, Alfie. You didn't think I done a job like this for +the sake o' tikin' 'old o' yer 'and, didger? It's just because it seems +you didn't commit yerself, Alfie, that I'd got to see yer by 'ook or +crook before the day was out."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Where's the fire?" inquired Alfie, idiomatically; but his professional +friend, like other artists in narration, and all givers of real news, +was not going to surrender the bone of the situation until his audience +sat up and begged for it.</p> + +<p>Mr. Croucher literally did sit up, while the exasperating Shoddy +interrupted himself to make a stealthy tour of the room, in the course +of which his electric torch illumined the comfortably bolted door, and +the delectable box of Upmanns. To one of these he helped himself without +permission, but a brace were in blast before he resumed his position on +the bed.</p> + +<p>"The fire?" said he, as though seconds and not minutes had elapsed since +the cryptic question. "There's no fire anywhere as I know of—not +to-night—but there soon may be, that's why I want you out o' this. If +you didn't commit yourself, Alfie, don't you see as somebody else must +'ave done?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, bring it up!" cried Croucher under his breath.</p> + +<p>"Well, if you didn't stiffen that copper on the night o' the sufferygite +disturbance—an' we know you didn't—then somebody else did!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You don't mean to tell me you know who did?"</p> + +<p>There had been a tense though tiny pause; there was another while Shoddy +changed the torch to his right hand, and blew a cloud over the head of +his now recumbent companion.</p> + +<p>"I know what everybody says, Alfie."</p> + +<p>"More than their prayers, I'll bet, like they did before. Wot do they +say?"</p> + +<p>"One o' the sufferygites——"</p> + +<p>"Corpsed the copper?"</p> + +<p>"That's it, old man."</p> + +<p>"And I never thought of it!"</p> + +<p>"It bears some thinkin' about, don't it?" said Shoddy. "Why, you're +trem'lin' like a blessed leaf!"</p> + +<p>"I should think I was trem'lin'! So would you if you'd been through wot +I been ... Shod!"</p> + +<p>"Yuss, Alfie?"</p> + +<p>"I see the 'ole blessed thing!"</p> + +<p>"I thought you would."</p> + +<p>"It was 'er wot broke the jooler's winder for me!"</p> + +<p>"That's wot they say."</p> + +<p>"They? Who?"</p> + +<p>"Lots o' people. I 'eard it down some mews:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> some o' the pipers 'ave +'inted at it. Topham's in fair 'ot water all round; they say 'e's 'ushed +it up because she's in serciety."</p> + +<p>"Wot's 'er nime, Shod?"</p> + +<p>"Lidy Moyle—Lidy Vera Moyle, I think it is. And 'ere's another thing, a +thing that I was forgettin'."</p> + +<p>"Out with it."</p> + +<p>"I see 'er come 'ere this afternoon, whilst I was watchin' the 'ouse in +case you come out."</p> + +<p>"My Gawd, Shoddy! Let me sit up. I can't breathe lyin' down."</p> + +<p>"She 'ad some flowers wiv 'er," said Shoddy, pursuing his reminiscences. +"Looks as though she's got a friend in the 'ome."</p> + +<p>"I'm the friend," said Mr. Croucher grimly. "Take and run yer light over +that wash-stand; the guv'nor brought 'em up 'isself wiv these 'ere +smokes."</p> + +<p>"Roses, in the month o' March!" murmured Shoddy, as a bowl of beauties +filled the disk of light; "'ot'ouse flowers for little Alfie! Why, the +girl's fair struck on you, cully!"</p> + +<p>"I'll strike 'er!" said Alfie, through teeth that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> chattered with +emotion. "I very near 'anged for the little biter, and don't you forget +it!"</p> + +<p>"Not me," said Shoddy, steering for the bed with his headlights of +white-hot filament and red-hot cigar. "That's wot brought me 'ere +through thick and thin."</p> + +<p>"So she's the great unknown!" said Croucher more than once, but not +twice in the same tone. "So it was 'er, was it?" he inquired as often, +until Shoddy insisted on a hearing.</p> + +<p>"Don't I keep tellin' yer?" said Shoddy. "That's wot brings me, at the +gaudiest risks you ever see—only to 'ear you gas! Can't you listen for +a change? There's a big thing on if you've guts enough for the job."</p> + +<p>It was a simple thing, however, like most big things; the projector had +it at his finger-ends; and in a very few minutes Mr. Croucher was +considering a complete, crude, and yet eminently practical proposition.</p> + +<p>"There's money in it," he was forced to admit, "if there ain't the big +money you flatter yerself. But I believe she thinks o' givin' me a start +in life any'ow."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> + +<p>"This'd be a start an' a finish, Alfie! Besides, it'd be your revenge; +don't you forget wot you've been through," urged the other.</p> + +<p>"Catch me!" said Croucher, eagerly. "But—don'cher see? I been through +so much that I was lookin' forward to dossin' down 'ere a bit. I ain't +the man I was. It's wot I need. Where's the fire, as I said afore? The +gal won't run away."</p> + +<p>"That's just wot she will, Alfie; goin' abroad any day—an' might get +married any day, a piece like 'er. Then you might find it more of a job. +There's another 'old we've got, an' might lose any old day."</p> + +<p>The other hold appealed with peculiar power to the character and +temperament of Alfred Croucher, and not less strongly to a certain +sagacity which added more to his equipment. But he had never been quite +so comfortable in his life; comfort had never been so decidedly his due; +and the substance of present luxury (with a fresh start in the near +future) was not lightly to be exchanged for a gold-mine, with all a +gold-mine's gambling chances, including the proverbial optimism of +prospectors.</p> + +<p>The discussion ended in a compromise and the withdrawal of Shoddy by the +catlike ways and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> means of his arrival. But he did not depart without +pointing, through the open window and a forest of chimney-stacks, to a +lighted but uncurtained square on a lower level. And thither, at certain +appointed hours, the patient might have been caught peeping, or even in +the act of rude and furtive signals, for several days to come.</p> + +<p>Handled as it deserves, the tale of those days would make a +psychological chapter of dual interest, and for reasons that may yet +appear. But for the moment Alfred Croucher holds the stage, and +soliloquies are out of vogue. Yet even his objective life had points of +interest. He slept less than he had planned to sleep, but read more than +he had ever read in all his life; and his reading, if not a sign of +grace, was at least a straw that showed the way the wind might have +blown but for the intrusive Shoddy.</p> + +<p>Out of the doctor's little typewritten list, the patient in the +top-floor-back began by choosing <i>For the Term of His Natural Life</i>. It +held him—with a tortured brow that sometimes glistened. When the book +was finished, he was advised that <i>It Is Never Too Late to Mend</i> was a +better thing of the same kind; "In spite of its name," added Dollar,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> in +studied disparagement. Croucher took the hint, and was soon breathing as +hard as he had done before he knew that Shoddy was Shoddy; was heard +blaspheming over Hawes in his solitude, and left wondering what Tom +Robinson's creator would have made of Alfred Croucher. Something of that +speculation found its way into words, with the return of the book, and +was the cause of lengthier visitations from the doctor, whose eye began +to brighten when it fell on Croucher, as that of a man put on his mettle +after all.</p> + +<p>And then one morning he came in with a blue review and a new long poem, +which might have hurt but might have helped; only it had no chance of +doing either, because the top back room was empty of Alfred Croucher, +who had walked out of the house in the loudest of his brand-new clothes.</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>The Rome Express had left Paris sprinkled with the green flakes of a +precocious spring; and it hummed through a mellow evening into a night +of velvet clasped with a silver moon. The famous train was not +uncomfortably crowded; it is not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> everybody who will pay two pounds, +eight shilling, seven pence for a berth in a sleeper which in +Switzerland, say, would cost some twenty francs. Most of those who had +committed the extravagance seemed by way of getting their money's worth; +even the lady traveling alone in the foremost <i>wagon-lit</i>, though she +refrained from dining in the restaurant-car, would have struck an +acquaintance as in better spirits than for some months past. And so she +was. But she was still far from being the Lady Vera Moyle of last year's +fogs.</p> + +<p>She was going to her mother, who had been seriously ill since Christmas, +but was now completing her recovery in Rome. And yet her illness had +meant less to Lady Armagh than to the wayward child who had been told +(by the rest of the family) to consider herself its cause; it might +indeed have been a direct dispensation to tie Lady Vera's hands and +tongue; and in the <i>train de luxe</i>, perhaps for the first time, she +herself recognized the merciful wisdom of Providence in the matter.</p> + +<p>Alfred Croucher was a free man: that was the great thing. There were +moments when it was an even greater thing than Lady Armagh's +convalescence. But there was later and greater news yet<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> for Lady Vera +to gloat over in the train. Not only was poor Croucher a free man, but +that dear Doctor Dollar had hopes of him at last! He had said so the day +she left for Paris; he had never said anything of the kind before. +Nothing could have been more pessimistic than the crime doctor's first +report on his latest patient; nothing franker than the way he had made +room for him in the home, merely and entirely to gratify her whim. +Alfred Croucher was "not his style," and there had been an end of him +but for the fact that Lady Vera was.</p> + +<p>She belonged to the class that he was pleased to consider as potentially +the most criminal of all. She was well aware of it, and the knowledge +provided her with a considerable range of feelings as the train flew on +and on. She felt herself the object of a purely pathological interest; +she felt almost as small as a specimen under a microscope; she felt +lonelier than ever in her life before....</p> + +<p>Lonely she was in the way that mattered least. She was traveling for +once without a maid. The faithful creature (a would-be militant of the +blood-thirstiest, in her day) had been with her dear ladyship<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> over the +Sunday in Paris (hobnobbing with certain exiles for the Cause); but just +as they were leaving their hotel a telegram had come to summon her to a +bucolic death-bed. Esther would have let her old father die without her, +but her beloved ladyship, still quick with her own filial awakenings, +had sent her about her dismal business with a kiss.</p> + +<p>The compartment was overheated; they always are unless you complain in +time. Lady Vera had made her efficient little fuss too late, and the +result was not apparent before the small hours and Modane. During the +long wait there she lay awake, though she had duly entrusted her keys to +the conductor, and the voices of those who had omitted that precaution +caused a welcome change in her "long, long thoughts." She put her mind +to her fellow-passengers, and kept it on them with native resolution.</p> + +<p>She was in decent company: a moderately well-known man and wife in one +adjoining compartment, a white-haired ecclesiastic in the other. She +wove a romance about the venerable gentleman, and speculated on the +well-being of the other pair. In such innocent ways could she amuse<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> +herself when out of muddle-headed mischief in the name of God knows +what. In all else she was sweet and sane enough—unless it was just one +tiny matter that annoyed her memory before she fell asleep to the +renewed lullaby of the express. It was the utterly unimportant matter of +a youngish man in a loud suit, one of a brace of incredibly common +Englishmen, who had nevertheless been staying at the hotel in Paris, had +"passed a remark" to Esther in the lift, and certainly stared with +insolence at Esther's mistress, not only in Paris but in passing along +the corridor of this very train, before and after the hour for dinner.</p> + +<p>To Vera Moyle there seemed no time at all between her passing thought of +this creature and the vile glare that woke her up. At first it blinded +her, for she was in the upper berth, within inches of the excruciating +blaze. It came almost as a relief when a head bobbed between the glare +and her eyes.</p> + +<p>Lady Vera blinked her indignation. She was too sleepy to do more at +first, and too old a traveler to make much fuss about a mere piece of +stupidity. She could not see the man's face, but his head was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> of the +type which occasions the inevitable libel on the bullet, and its +hideousness hardly mitigated by the Rembrandtesque effect of the +electric light behind it. She conceived it to belong to some blundering +official, and ordered him out in pretty sharp French. But the man did +not move. And in another short moment Vera Moyle had become aware of +three very horrible things: it was the creature in the loud suit, and he +had shut the door behind him, and was holding an automatic pistol to her +breast.</p> + +<p>"One syl'ble that anybody else can 'ear," he muttered as her mouth +opened, "an' it's yer larst in life! 'Old yer noise an' I won't be 'ard +on you—not 'alf as 'ard as you been on me!"</p> + +<p>"It isn't—oh, surely it isn't Croucher?" cried the girl, with an +emotion made up of every element but fear.</p> + +<p>"It is Croucher," said he in brutal mimicry. "That bein' just so, I puts +away the barker—see?—no decepshun!" The pistol dropped into a loud +tweed pocket. "I reckon I can do me own bit o' barkin'—yuss! an' +bitin', too!" concluded Croucher, with an appropriate snarl.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Will you please go out?" said Lady Vera, still with sorrow in her +steady eyes.</p> + +<p>"No, I will not please. I'll see you damned first!" said Croucher, with +sudden ferocity—"like you very near seen me! If we're over'eard, you'll +be thought no better'n you ought to be; but by Gawd they won't think you +as bad as wot you are!"</p> + +<p>Lady Vera took no advantage of a studious pause. The ruffian was making +his points with more than merely ruffianly effect; the whole thing might +have been carefully rehearsed. But to the girl in the upper berth it was +now no more than she deserved. It was a light enough punishment for the +dreadful deed by her committed—no matter how unconscious, in how fine a +frenzy or how just a cause—and on him visited with all but the last +dread vengeance of the criminal law. He had a right to say what he liked +to her after that, even to say it then and there, with all his natural +and acquired brutality. Was it not she who had done most of all to +brutalize him?</p> + +<p>"That is, until I tell 'em," added Croucher, with crafty significance. +His hearer had to recall the words before the pause; when she had done +so, he was again requested to leave the compartment, and there was a +harder light in her eyes.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>"Surely it isn't Croucher?"</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>"I'll see you in the morning," she promised. "I'm going on to Rome."</p> + +<p>He laughed scornfully. "You needn't tell <i>me</i> where you're goin'! I know +all about you, and 'ave done for some time. I been on yer tracks, my +dear! You seen me. It's your own fault we didn't 'ave it out before. +This ain't quite the pitch—but it's a better place than the one you got +me into!"</p> + +<p>"I got you—out again," was what Lady Vera had begun to say, but +something about him made her stop short of that. "I was doing my best +for you," she continued humbly. "I thought you were going to let me give +you a fresh start in life."</p> + +<p>"A fresh start! I want a bit more than that, lidy!"</p> + +<p>"Well, what do you want?"</p> + +<p>He rolled his eyeballs over the racks laden with her hand-luggage.</p> + +<p>"Your jewel-case," said he promptly. "Which is it?"</p> + +<p>"That one, in this corner, over my feet."</p> + +<p>Her equal alacrity might have been the mere<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> measure of her eagerness to +get rid of him; but Alfred Croucher was far too old in deception to be +himself very easily deceived.</p> + +<p>"Then you can keep it, with my love!" said he. "I'll trouble you for +them rings instead—<i>and</i> the rest wot you're 'idin' be'ind 'em!"</p> + +<p>The girl turned paler in the electric light She was sitting up in her +suspicious readiness to point out the jewel-case; the other hand, with +most of her rings on it, had flown instinctively to her throat; for she +was traveling, as ladies will, with her greatest treasures—her diamond +necklace and pendant, and a string of pearls—on her neck for safety.</p> + +<p>"Suppose I refuse and——"</p> + +<p>She glanced toward the bell.</p> + +<p>"Then I'll say what <i>I</i> know."</p> + +<p>"And what do you know?" Her back was to the wall.</p> + +<p>"What I see that night! What I see an' was mug enough not to twig till I +come out an' 'eard all the talk! Is that good enough? If not, the +rest'll keep; but it'll put you in the jug all right, I don't care 'oo's +on your side. It's one law for the rich and one for the pore. 'Ang me as +never<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> done it, an' 'ush you up, as did! But I've heard tell that murder +will out, an' you'll find that murderers will in—to prison—even when +they're titled lidies with the King on 'is throne be'ind 'em! It'll ruin +you, if it does no more—ruin you an' yours—an' break all your 'earts!"</p> + +<p>It was enough. She stripped her neck, she stripped her fingers; rings +and necklace, pearls and pendant, all lay in a shimmering heap in his +capacious palm, held for a moment's triumph under the electric light, +reflected for that moment in a mirror which his bulky frame had hidden +until now.</p> + +<p>It was the mirror on the door of the miniature dressing-room between +every two compartments in the <i>train de luxe</i>; but in the very moment of +his exultation it ceased to reflect either Alfred Croucher or his +ill-gotten spoil. The door had opened; it framed a sable figure crowned +with silvery locks; lean hands flew out from the black shoulders, and +met round the neck of Croucher with the fell dexterity of a professional +garroter.</p> + +<p>The pair backed together without a word. The one had murder in his set +teeth, the other death in the bulging eyes and darkening face, with its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> +collar of interlaced fingers white to the nails with their own pressure. +Lady Vera watched the two men as the fawn might watch the python struck +to timely death, until the communicating door shut upon them both, and +only her own unearthly form remained in the mirror. And the train ran on +and on, and the whole coach creaked and trembled, as coaches will even +in a <i>train de luxe</i>, only in that particular compartment it had not +been noticeable for some time.</p> + +<p>Presently, as her nerve came back, one or two further observations of a +negative order were gradually made by Vera Moyle. She may be said to +have noticed that she did not notice one or two things she might have +expected to notice by now. The chief thing was that there was no sound +whatever from the compartment beyond the looking-glass door, no fuss or +undue traffic in the corridor. What had happened? Only too soon she +knew.</p> + +<p>They had stopped at some nameless station between the tags of the +Italian boot. It was a chance of peeping out, and out peeped the shaken +girl from her window overlooking the line. And there,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> skipping on to +the next low platform, bag in hand, went the loud trousers under Alfred +Croucher's equally new and noisy ulster; and there at his elbow went the +venerable ecclesiastic, even holding him by the sleeve!</p> + +<p>It was a long road to Rome for Lady Vera Moyle, but toward the end there +came another stage in which the <i>wagon-lit</i> forgot to swing and sing +like humbler coaches, and the pale Campagna swam past unseen. It began +with a knock behind the drawn blind of her compartment—now but a +mirrored divan of Utrecht velvet and stamped leather—as unsuggestive of +a good night's rest as the white face and the bright eyes behind the +tiny table in the corner.</p> + +<p>"<i>Entrez!</i>" she cried with nervous irritation.</p> + +<p>The door opened and shut upon the somber face and long athletic limbs of +John Dollar.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar! I had no idea you were in the train!"</p> + +<p>Her voice had broken with very joy; her hand trembled pitifully during +its momentary repose in his.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You have never shown up, you see," said he. "I have been in the next +compartment all the way from Paris."</p> + +<p>"The next compartment on which side?"</p> + +<p>He jerked his head at his own reflection in the looking-glass door.</p> + +<p>"But there was a priest in there!" cried the girl.</p> + +<p>"There was the high priest of a new religion in which you'll never +believe any more," said Dollar with a wry smile. "May he sit down for a +minute, Lady Vera?"</p> + +<p>She looked at him with cooling eyes. "Certainly, Doctor Dollar, if it +makes an explanation any easier."</p> + +<p>"I didn't intend to explain at all," he had the nerve to tell her. "I +meant my ecclesiastical body to do that for me—but its wig was blown +out of the window on the other side of Genoa. I've been hanging about +all day in the hope of catching you. I couldn't leave it any longer. I +had to give you these."</p> + +<p>And he placed upon the table between them the diamond necklace and +pendant, the string of pearls,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> and the handful of rings she had been +wearing in the night.</p> + +<p>"You made him give them up!" she cried, in thankful tears that never +fell, but only softened and sweetened her indescribably.</p> + +<p>"Naturally," he laughed. "It wasn't very difficult."</p> + +<p>"And I thought you were a confederate when I saw you crossing the line +together!"</p> + +<p>"I was putting the fear of a foreign jail upon him to the last. But he +had a confederate in the train; he was in reserve outside your berth +until I lured him into mine and laid him out. Otherwise I should have +been with you sooner; but in one way it was better to take our man with +your jewels on him—there was no getting out of it. The two of them were +only too glad to be kicked out at the first station. And the other +fellow was a man who broke into my house to see Croucher the first night +we had him there."</p> + +<p>"Did they tell you so?"</p> + +<p>"No. I knew it at the time. I heard the whole thing, even to fragments +of a conversation from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> which it was possible to reconstruct the plan +they actually brought off last night. I make it a rule not to listen at +patients' doors, any more than one would at other people's, but I'm not +going to blush for this particular exception."</p> + +<p>Her soft wet eyes were looking him through and through.</p> + +<p>"Yet you kept him on—for my sake!"</p> + +<p>"Not altogether, Lady Vera." They were an honest couple. "It put me on +my mettle; it gave me something to prevent. At first—as I'm afraid you +knew—I really didn't want to touch the fellow with a pole. He was an +obvious incurable; he would have been better hanged—justly or +unjustly."</p> + +<p>"Don't speak of that—or do!" exclaimed the girl. "It makes me forgive +him everything!"</p> + +<p>"Well, my first idea was about right. He was beyond reclaim. But I never +thought he would give me a definite move to block; that, as you know; is +one's chief job after all, and it put a new complexion on the case. It +was as though—as though one took a man on for cancer and found him +plotting to shoot the Chancellor of the Exchequer before he died! I +apologize for the analogy, Lady<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> Vera," said Dollar, making the most of +their laugh, "but the man became a new proposition on the spot. And the +funny thing is that I believe I almost might have cured him after +all—done him some good, anyhow—but for the very thing that bucked me +up!"</p> + +<p>Lady Vera looked out at a flying brake of naked trees, the color of +cigar-ash. He had lost her attention for the moment.</p> + +<p>"I was a little fool," she said at length. "I should have listened to +you, and been content to help in some other way. I am sorry."</p> + +<p>"I'm not!" replied Doctor Dollar. "It was a very sporting folly—but +everything you ever did was that!"</p> + +<p>She shook her head sadly, as a brown river, girt with olives, flashed +under the train like a child's skipping-rope.</p> + +<p>"I haven't changed my opinions," she said, just a trifle aggressively. +"But I would give my life to undo many of my actions—not only that +one—many, many!" and she looked him bravely and humbly in the eyes. "So +the whole thing has served me right, and will if it happens all over +again."</p> + +<p>"If what does?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span></p> + +<p>"This blackmailing of me by that poor man!"</p> + +<p>"It won't. I've frightened him."</p> + +<p>"He will think of some subtler way."</p> + +<p>"There's no subtlety in him, no power, no initiative, no anything but +mere brute force," said Dollar, with a touch of that same strength and +weakness in his unusually emphatic assertion. "The fellow is a deadly +tool and nothing more. He knuckled under to me in a moment."</p> + +<p>Lady Vera shook her head again, but this time she was looking firmly in +his face.</p> + +<p>"I feel," she said, with a stoical conviction, "that I shall be fair +game to him as long as we are both in the world. And it's what I +deserve."</p> + +<p>Dollar abandoned his attempt at disingenuous disabuse; the extreme to +which he flew instead was a little startling, but these two knew each +other.</p> + +<p>"You must marry, Lady Vera," he was moved to say. But his manner was +eminently uninspired. He might have been telling her she must hand her +keys to the hotel porter at Rome. That was in fact the note he meant to +take, only he sang it louder than he knew.</p> + +<p>"I can never marry," she answered calmly. "I have blood upon my hands."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You can marry a man who knows!"</p> + +<p>And the unaltered note took on a tremolo of which he was both aware and +ashamed; but still their eyes were frankly locked.</p> + +<p>"I can marry nobody, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>"The man I mean isn't fit to black your boots! But he'd protect you, +he'd help you, and you would be the making not only of him but of his +dream—and not only <i>his</i> little dream——"</p> + +<p>It was her hand that stopped him. It had taken his across the little +table.</p> + +<p>"The man you mean is worth ten million of me! But I can never marry him +or anybody. And you, and you alone, know why!"</p> + +<p>She bent her brave eyes back on the Campagna; a pale tufted heath was +swimming by; gum-trees hardly heightened the prevailing neutral tint; a +modern corrugated roof, pinned in place by a few primeval boulders, held +her attention on its swift course across the window-panes; and when she +looked round, Lady Vera was all alone.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>THE GOLDEN KEY</h3> + + +<p>"Shelley was quite right!" exclaimed the young man at the book-shelf, +with the prematurely bent back turned upon Doctor Dollar at his old oak +desk.</p> + +<p>"He was never wrong when he stuck to poetry," said the doctor, looking +up from an unfinished prescription on which the ink was nevertheless +dry.</p> + +<p>The other gave a guilty start. He was an immaculate young wreck, with +the fashionable glut of hair plastered back from a good enough face, as +if to make the most of its haggard pallor. And he was in full evening +dress, for the crime doctor's patients came at all hours.</p> + +<p>"Did I say anything?" he asked with exaggerated embarrassment.</p> + +<p>"You thought something aloud," said Dollar,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> smiling. "Don't let it +worry you; that's not one of the straws that shows an ill wind. What is +it of Shelley's, Mr. Edenborough?"</p> + +<p>"Only a bit of one of his letters," said the young man. "I just happened +to open them at something that rather appealed to me." And the book shot +back into its place.</p> + +<p>"Not the bit about the prussic acid, I hope?" suggested the doctor, for +all the world as if in fun.</p> + +<p>"What was that?" said Edenborough, with a face that would not have +imposed upon an infant.</p> + +<p>"A little commission from Shelley to Trelawny, for a small quantity of +the 'essential oil of bitter almonds,' as he called it, so that he might +'hold in his possession that golden key to the chamber of perpetual +peace.'"</p> + +<p>"That was it," said the youth at length. "I may as well be honest about +it. But I don't know how on earth you knew!"</p> + +<p>The doctor gave a kindly little laugh.</p> + +<p>"Only by knowing the book," he assured the patient. "It's rather a +notorious passage—and you had just been clamoring for at least a silver +key to some chamber of temporary peace!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You said you would give me one, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>"And now I think I won't," said the doctor, rising from his aged chair. +"No; you shall not go without hearing my reasons, and what I am going to +propose to you instead. These keys, Mr. Edenborough"—and he tore the +unfinished prescription into little bits—"gold or silver, they are not +keys at all, but burglars' jemmies that injure and vitiate the chambers +they break into. It certainly is so with the night's rest you want at +any price; it may be the same with the perpetual peace that Shelley took +for granted. Yet I happen to have a Chamber of Peace of sorts here in +this house. It's my latest fad. You've found it a name, and in return I +should like to offer it to you for the night."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean a room that sends you off instead of drugs?"</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus3.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>"Did I say anything?"</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p> + +<p>Young Edenborough was looking puzzled, but for the moment taken out of +himself. He had heard of Doctor Dollar as a rather eccentric consultant, +but as the very man for him, from no less an authority than the Home +Secretary of England, and no further back than that very evening at +dinner. He had come straight round from Portman Square, foreseeing +miracles and magic potions; but he had not foreseen John Dollar, or his +unprofessional conversation, or the slight cast that actually added to +his magnetic eyes, his cheery yet gentle confidence, or (least of all) a +serious if casual invitation for the night.</p> + +<p>"That's exactly what I do mean," said the author of these surprises. +"It's the most silent room in London, and there are other little points +about it. I got our friend Topham to give it a trial during the bread +strike. His verdict was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would sleep +the sleep of the just there!"</p> + +<p>Edenborough had a laugh that turned him back into a schoolboy; but he +checked it sharply, as though the sound put him to shame and pain.</p> + +<p>"I would give anything for one decent night," he said. "But you are far +too good, sir, especially to a man you know nothing at all about."</p> + +<p>"I ought to know more in the morning, Mr. Edenborough, but it will keep +very well till then.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> Enough for the night that you're a friend of the +Home Secretary, and at your worst at just the time when a man wants to +be at his best."</p> + +<p>Edenborough smote his brow like a young man on the stage, but with a +piteous spontaneity beyond all histrionic art.</p> + +<p>"It's on Thursday!" he cried, as one in exquisite dread. "My God, I'm to +be married on Thursday, and this is Sunday night! How can I toe the mark +unless I get some sleep? And how can I sleep——"</p> + +<p>"Leave that to me," said Dollar, cutting a pregnant pause as short as +possible; "leave everything to me, and come straight up-stairs. I keep +the room in constant readiness; you shall be fitted with pajamas, and +I'll send a special messenger anywhere you like for whatever you may +want in the morning. Come, my dear man! I am burning to give my Chamber +of Peace a crucial test, because I know we shall all come out with +flying colors!"</p> + +<p>There was less confidence in the Doctor Dollar who ran down-stairs a +little later and sat at his telephone with an urgent face. In another +minute he had left the house, and in another two Mr.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> Topham Vinson was +opening the door to him in Portman Square.</p> + +<p>"I call this too bad of you," began the doctor, short of breath and +shorter still of patience with his powerful friend.</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow, I couldn't help it," vowed the Minister, with disarming +meekness. "He would go straight to you, and just then I couldn't have +rung you up without giving him away at this end."</p> + +<p>"I can stay five minutes," said Dollar, looking at his watch, "to hear +as much as you can tell me in the time of what I ought to have known +before I saw your neurotic friend."</p> + +<p>"Hasn't he told you all about himself?"</p> + +<p>"Hardly a word worth anything in a case like this, where the cause +matters more than the effect. Of course I could have insisted, but that +might have finished him off for the night. I gather, however, that he's +one of the First Lord's secretaries, but a friend of yours, on the brink +of being married, and in more than the normal state about it, or +something to do with it."</p> + +<p>"I'll take your points in order," said Topham<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> Vinson, who could be +brisker than anybody when he chose. "George Edenborough is not only one +of Stockton's secretaries, but the most private and most confidential of +the crowd. I don't know about his being a friend of mine; I've been a +friend to him for family reasons, and found him a nice enough fellow. +But the girl he's going to marry—if they do marry—is one of us."</p> + +<p>"If!" cried the doctor. "Do you mean to say she'd draw back in the last +week?"</p> + +<p>"She may not be able to help herself," was the grave reply. "George +Edenborough is under a cloud that may burst at any moment."</p> + +<p>"A sudden cloud?"</p> + +<p>"Out of the blue for me. I only heard of it from Stockton on Friday +night. But it's no new thing to him. He might have told me sooner, I +think, seeing it was through me that Edenborough ever went to him."</p> + +<p>"In some special capacity, I rather gather?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; he can draw a bit—in fact, he's not a secretary at all except in +name, but the First Lord's private draftsman. Stockton's a whale for +details but a dunce at technicalities. What he likes is the thing on +paper, as he sees it with his own<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> eyes; so he makes his inspections +with Edenborough and a sketch-block, illustrated notes are taken at +every turn, and all sorts of impossible improvements worked out in +subsequent collaboration. I had that this evening from the boy himself. +It will show you what chances he has had of giving things +away—or—selling them!"</p> + +<p>"Is it as bad as that?"</p> + +<p>"Stockton swears it is. To me it's inconceivable. But he gives chapter +and verse of at least one drawing that found its way across the North +Sea early in the year. Edenborough admits that he either lost it or had +it stolen from him. He seems to have been more careful—whichever way +you look at it—during the summer. But this autumn the trouble has begun +again. A dockyard sketch-map has flown the German Ocean, come home to +roost by some means into which we'd better not inquire, and is +pronounced by Stockton a bad imitation of one made for him by +Edenborough six weeks ago."</p> + +<p>"Why a bad imitation, I wonder?"</p> + +<p>"The original has been in the First Lord's archives ever since; he says +the copy must have been made from memory; but he has good reasons why +nobody but Edenborough could have made it."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Reasons that are not so good in law, apparently?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly; as yet there's no case and there has been no accusation. But I +very much fear that traps are being set, and I've taken it on myself to +put the madman on his guard."</p> + +<p>"To-night?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; it was the first chance of getting hold of him, and that only by +having the poor little bride to dinner as well. Heavy work, Dollar, +drinking their healths and knowing what was in the air! The only comfort +was that Edenborough knew as well as I did; it was written on his face, +if you had the key, and I hadn't to do much beating about the bush when +I got him to myself. He was wonderfully frank, from his point of view. +He told me that the air of suspicion was driving him out of his mind; he +said he hadn't slept for nights and nights."</p> + +<p>"Although no accusation has been made?"</p> + +<p>"Although not an open word has been said to connect him with the bad +copy of his own map!"</p> + +<p>"That's the worst thing you've told me," said Dollar quietly. "He +protested his innocence, of course?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span></p> + +<p>"In absolute tears!"</p> + +<p>"And what was your own impression, Mr. Vinson?"</p> + +<p>"Extremely mixed. I felt that he was speaking the truth, and yet not the +whole truth. He had an air of guilty knowledge, if not of actual guilt."</p> + +<p>"His physical condition bears you out," observed the doctor with +reluctance. "And the poor devil's to be married in four days' time!"</p> + +<p>"There my pity's on the other side."</p> + +<p>"But the girl's another friend of yours? May I ask her name?"</p> + +<p>"Lucy Trevellyn."</p> + +<p>"Any relation of Admiral Trevellyn?"</p> + +<p>"Own daughter to the old sea-dog, and if anything the breezier of the +two! I couldn't imagine a young girl more like an old salt at heart. +She'd go to sea if she could; as she can't, she's a little pillar of the +Navy League—and engaged to the First Lord's best young man! Could you +conceive a more ingenious irony, or a greater tragedy when the truth +comes out? Dollar, it must come out before Thursday, if it's ever coming +out at all!"</p> + +<p>"Is it otherwise a likely match?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The very likeliest, but for this world's goods, and there'll be more of +them one day. She has go enough for two, and they have tastes in common. +I told you he could draw a bit, but she's a little artist, though you +wouldn't think it if you saw her teaching him to skate at Prince's or +taking me on at golf! Lucy Trevellyn's the best type of +sportswoman—just as Vera Moyle is one gone wrong."</p> + +<p>John Dollar was on his feet.</p> + +<p>"Well, I've stayed longer than I intended," said he abruptly. "I +promised to go up within half an hour to see if he was asleep. And he +will be. But what's a night's rest against such a tragedy as the whole +thing's bound to be!"</p> + +<p>"Or such a mystery?" suggested Topham Vinson. "If you could only get to +the bottom of that, Dollar, we might know how to act."</p> + +<p>"I'm not a detective," returned the doctor—but the stiff words were +hardly out before the stiff lips relaxed in a smile. "I've said that +before, Vinson, and I shouldn't wonder if you made me say it again. I am +out to stop things happening, not to bother about things that have been +done and can't be mended. But in this case discovery may be the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> mother +of prevention, and I must have a shot with both barrels while there's +time."</p> + +<p>He had come in glum and grumbling; he went off gay and incisive, subtly +enlivened by the very gravity of the matter, as he always was. But it +was grave enough, as was Dollar himself behind the sparkling mask that +he wore unawares in all times of stress. And on one point his confidence +was justified without delay; the young man in the Chamber of Peace was +found drenched already in slumbers worthy of the name he had unwittingly +bestowed upon that magic fastness.</p> + +<p>But this was not a case in which the crime doctor could leave well +alone. Every hour of the night he was up-stairs and down again; and, in +the intervals, either deep in such grim reading as the Illustrative +Cases of Transitory Mania, in the terrible fourth volume of <i>Casper's +Forensic Medicine</i>, or deeper yet in his own cognate speculations.</p> + +<p>In the morning it was he who carried up the patient's suit-case, woke +him up, and watched the rising tide of memory drown the thanks in his +throat. Now was the doctor's chance of checking Mr. Vinson's version of +the young man's troubles; but he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> waited for George Edenborough to open +his own heart, and waited in vain till the last five minutes, when the +boy began to thank him and ended with the whole story.</p> + +<p>It differed very little from the second-hand synopsis, but it confirmed +more than one impression which Dollar would have given much to +relinquish. The talk of intolerable suspicions was indeed more +consistent with a guilty conscience than anything else, since it was +duly followed by the admission that nobody had expressed such suspicions +in anything like so many words. The crime doctor was sorry he had put +the question; it was the only one he asked. But by exhorting Edenborough +to get all the exercise he could, and by saying he had heard great +things of Miss Trevellyn's skating, the reluctant dissembler had little +difficulty in obtaining an immediate invitation to tea at Prince's +Skating Club.</p> + +<p>Edenborough had departed with a face almost radiant at the prospect; yet +he had scarcely spoken of his beloved until the subject of skating +cropped up. It was as though that was the only relation in which he +could still think of her without pain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> and shame; and in due course he +was discovered on the ice with the same look of lingering pride and joy.</p> + +<p>It was the height of the skating afternoon, and the glassy strip an +opaque pane on which a little giant might have been scribbling with a +big diamond. The eye swam with pairs rotating as in a circus—with +single practitioners at work under dashing instructors down the middle +of the rink—while the ear sang with a resounding swish of skates. One +of the workers was George Edenborough, who came off one leg, with a +glistening forehead, to find his guest a good place behind the barrier.</p> + +<p>"So glad you're not late for the waltzing," he said nervily. "I've had a +long day out of town, and didn't get here myself till much later than I +expected. Lucy's writing a letter in the lounge, but she'll be here in a +minute for the enclosure, and after that we'll have tea."</p> + +<p>Dollar ascertained that the waltzing enclosure was a close +quarter-of-an-hour for all but those more or less proficient in that +delicate and astounding art. Edenborough said that he himself was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> not +quite up to the standard of these displays, and suited the action to the +word by taking the floor unsteadily on his skates. As he seated himself +a gong sounded, the band struck up, beginners dispersed, confident hands +clasped lissome waists, long edges ended in lightning threes, and the +rink was a maze of sweeping grace and symmetry.</p> + +<p>Dollar had never seen anything like it in his life, for artificial ice +was in its infancy in London before the war, and ever since he had been +a busy man. He followed first one couple and then another, and each +seemed to him more competent and graceful than the last. Yet the first +short waltz was not over before an involuntary selection had eliminated +all but a dark strong girl in red and a swarthy man with bright eyes and +a black mustache.</p> + +<p>"Those two are the best," said he—"that girl in red and the heavy +alien."</p> + +<p>"Do you think so?" cried the delighted Edenborough. "Then you're a +judge, because that's Lucy!"</p> + +<p>"I didn't mean to insult her partner," said Dollar in some dismay. "He's +the best waltzer on the ice except Miss Trevellyn."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He's an Italian marquis," returned Edenborough, in another voice. +"Rocchi's his beastly name. I've no use for the fellow. But he can +skate."</p> + +<p>The first waltz finished there were two more in quick succession, and +Edenborough had a better word for Miss Trevellyn's next partner. He was +only a glowing schoolboy, home from Eton for his leave, but the past +mistress lent herself to his dash and fling with a gusto equal to his +own.</p> + +<p>"I'm glad that's over," said Edenborough, as she escaped with her life +from the desperado's clutches. "I say, confound that fellow Rocchi!"</p> + +<p>She was waltzing with the handsome brute again; for he looked no less, +with his deep blue chin and insolent eyes, and his air of conscious +mastery. Edenborough plainly loathed him, chafing visibly as the pair +swept past with certainly the appearance of some extra verve for his +benefit. Dollar himself was very disagreebly impressed, and that down to +the end, when Rocchi skated up with the lady, whom he surrendered with a +gleam of palpable bravado.</p> + +<p>Yet that impression altered with the very opening of Miss Trevellyn's +not less resolute mouth. She<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> had good teeth and a hearty voice, and +eyes of a breezy and humane audacity. Dollar thought of Topham Vinson's +tribute, and agreed with all except the odious comparison. There was, +indeed, no comparing types as different as Lucy Trevellyn and Vera +Moyle; but the one had never puzzled him in the past more completely +than did the other before he took his leave.</p> + +<p>And they had talked about the wedding, and their presents, and the +wedding trip, as though neither God nor man could interfere!</p> + +<p>"Only three days to go!" said Dollar to himself. And two of the three +were soon gone without alarums or excursions, except on the part of the +crime doctor himself. He was neglecting his practise for the case in +hand; he was nowhere to be found when badly wanted on the Tuesday night, +nor yet on the Wednesday morning; and this was the more extraordinary in +that it was George Edenborough who wanted him, now with an ashier face +than ever, and now on the telephone in a frantic voice.</p> + +<p>At dusk on the Wednesday his key turned in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> the latch, and next day's +bridegroom burst from the waiting-room at the same moment.</p> + +<p>"At last!" cried Edenborough; and looked so ghastly in the electric +light that Dollar did not switch it on in the consulting-room, or ask a +question as he shut the door.</p> + +<p>It was one of those mild unseasonable days on which the best of servants +keep up the biggest fires; the doctor opened the French window that led +from his den, down rusty steps, into a foul and futile enclosure of +grimy gravel and moribund shrubs. In the meantime Edenborough had not +taken a seat as mechanically bidden, but had planted himself in defiant +pose before the fire; and the glow showed restless hands twitching into +fists, but not the face of which one look had been enough.</p> + +<p>"You might have left word where you were!" he began with great +bitterness.</p> + +<p>"I have just done so," returned Dollar, "at your rooms. I was wanting to +see you—presently. It seems like fate, to find you here before me."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you've heard the latest, wherever you've been?" pursued +Edenborough, aware and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> jealous of some independent perplexity on the +part of Dollar.</p> + +<p>"I have heard so much!" said the doctor, dropping into a chair. "Better +be explicit—and as expeditious as you can, my dear fellow. I have an +appointment almost directly."</p> + +<p>"Oh! there's not much to say," rejoined the other sardonically. "You +remember when you came to Prince's, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"I do, indeed."</p> + +<p>They both spoke as if it were weeks ago.</p> + +<p>"You know I told you I'd had a hard day out of town?"</p> + +<p>"I remember."</p> + +<p>"I meant with my chief—Lord Stockton—seeing his new brood of +submarines."</p> + +<p>"In their unfledged state, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"That was it—and making the usual sketches. That's my job—or was! I +was Stockton's walking Kodak until yesterday afternoon; then I got the +boot for a wedding present, and a chance of the jug for my honeymoon!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> + +<p>The harsh voice broke, for all its sudden slang and satire. Dollar was +driven to his only policy.</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to pretend I don't know of this," he said. "I know of it +from the Home Secretary. A duplicate of one of those last drawings of +yours——"</p> + +<p>"A duplicate!"</p> + +<p>"Well, a bad imitation, if you like."</p> + +<p>The doctor paused as though he had finished a sentence, as though the +amended phrase had interrupted his thought.</p> + +<p>"Well?" said Edenborough grimly. "Did you hear how they got hold of it?"</p> + +<p>"Intercepted in the post, I gathered, on its way abroad."</p> + +<p>"In our post," said Edenborough. "Almost a <i>casus belli</i> in itself, I +should have thought!"</p> + +<p>"And have you no idea how it came there?" asked the doctor bluntly—but +now he meant to be blunt; he was not sorry when his man flew into a +feeble passion on the spot.</p> + +<p>"What the devil do you mean, Doctor Dollar?<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> I know no more about the +matter than—I was going to say, than you do—but I begin to think you +know more than you pretend!"</p> + +<p>"I didn't think I had pretended," said Dollar, simply.</p> + +<p>"Well, what <i>do</i> you know?" demanded Edenborough, in a fury of +suspicion. "All, I suppose?" he added, with a schoolboy sneer, when the +answer was slow to come.</p> + +<p>"Yes; all," said the doctor, very gravely and reluctantly, as though +driven into a pronouncement of life or death.</p> + +<p>There was no outcry of surprise from Edenborough. He had some pride. But +his knees began to tremble in the firelight, and his unclenched hands to +twitch.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe it," he exclaimed at length. "You tell me what you +know!"</p> + +<p>"All that you yourself suspected, and made yourself ill with +suspecting—and couldn't sleep for suspecting—long ago!"</p> + +<p>Pitiful tone and tender hand carried a heavier conviction than the +words. And now it was the patient who had sunk into the chair, the +doctor bending over his bowed and quivering shoulders.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus4.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>"Mark my words closely"</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You are not the first man, my dear Edenborough," he went on, "who would +seem to have been betrayed in cold blood by a woman—by <i>the</i> woman. +Mark my words closely. I say it seems so. I would not condemn the +greatest malefactor unheard. I meant to hear Miss Trevellyn +first—feeling in my bones, against all reason, that there may still be +some unimaginable explanation. But, if the worst be true of her, then +the best is true of you; for you are the first man I have known bear the +brunt as you have borne it, my very dear fellow!"</p> + +<p>"What makes you suspect her?" groaned Edenborough to the ground.</p> + +<p>"It's not a case of suspicion—don't deceive yourself as to that, +Edenborough. I <i>know</i> that Miss Trevellyn produced—and parted +with—those last two sketches about which there's been all the trouble. +I only <i>suspect</i> that she got you to show her the originals, almost as +soon as they were made, on the plea of her tremendous interest in the +Navy."</p> + +<p>"Quite true; she did," said Edenborough, but as though he did not +appreciate what he was saying, as though something else had stuck in his +mind. "But it <i>was</i> a tremendous interest!" he exclaimed, jumping up. +"It was her father's interest; his life,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> indeed! Isn't it inconceivable +that his daughter—apart from everything else I've found her—that she +of all people should do a thing like this?"</p> + +<p>"I am afraid the inconceivable happens almost as often as the +unexpected," said Dollar, with a sigh. "Criminology, indeed, prepares us +for little else. Think of the perfectly good mothers who have flown to +infanticide as the first relief of a mind unhinged! The inversion of the +ruling passions is one of the sure symptoms of insanity."</p> + +<p>"But of course she's mad," cried Edenborough, "if she's guilty at all. +But that's what I can't and won't believe. I can believe it one minute +but not the next, just as I've suspected and laughed at my suspicions +all this nightmare time. One look in her face has always been enough, +and would be at this minute."</p> + +<p>"Well, we shall soon see," said Dollar, glancing at the clock. "But I +can only warn you that my evidence is overwhelming."</p> + +<p>"Let's have it, then; what is your evidence?" demanded Edenborough, in a +fresh fit of stone-blind defiance.</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow, you force my hand!" said<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> Dollar. "God knows you have a +right—and it can't make matters worse than they are. My evidence +consists of a full and circumstantial confession by a scoundrel to whom +I took your own dislike at sight, and whose career I have spent the week +investigating. I needn't tell you I mean the infamous Rocchi."</p> + +<p>"Rocchi!" whispered Edenborough at the second attempt, as though his +very tongue rejected the abhorrent name. Yet now he stood perfectly +still, like a man who sees at last. "Well," he added in an ominously +rational voice, "I must live long enough to send <i>him</i> to hell, whatever +else I do."</p> + +<p>"You will have to find him first," said Dollar. "He has gone back to his +paymasters—not his own countrymen—they kicked him out long ago. I've +taken it on myself to do the same, instead of handing him over to the +police and doing an infinite deal more harm than good."</p> + +<p>But Edenborough was not listening to a word; he was talking to himself, +and he talked aloud as soon as he was given a chance.</p> + +<p>"Now we know why she was so keen on my wretched job ... on the whole +Navy?... No,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> not a life-long fraud like that.... And she pretended to +dislike that brute as much as I did! I believe she did, too, but for his +waltzing.... No, never jealous of him, and I'm not now ... but so much +the worse, so much the more damnably cold-blooded!"</p> + +<p>Dying philosopher could not have displayed a more acute detachment. But +the last touch was lost upon Dollar, whose expectant ear had caught the +ting of an electric bell.</p> + +<p>"Edenborough," he said, in the voice of urgent conciliation, "the time +has come for you to show what's in you. So far you have kept your head +and played the man; keep it now, and you will play the hero! I still +can't imagine what Miss Trevellyn can have to say for herself—but I +implore you to hear her out, for I believe she is being admitted at this +moment."</p> + +<p>"Lucy—here—and you expected her?"</p> + +<p>"I told you I had another appointment. But you were here first, one +thing led to another, and it may be better as it is. You were bound to +have this out between you—and to-day. If you wish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> me to be +present—but no human being can help!"</p> + +<p>"Unless it's you!" suggested Edenborough in a panic-stricken whisper. "I +can't face her alone—I can't trust myself!"</p> + +<p>Dollar took no notice of a knock at the door. "Edenborough, you must," +he said gently; "and whatever she may have to say—much or little, and +it may be much—you must hear patiently to the end. It's your duty, man! +Don't flinch from it, for God's sake!"</p> + +<p>"But I do flinch from it!" cried Edenborough below his breath. "I flinch +from it for her sake as much as mine. I'm not the one to shame her, even +if Rocchi's telling——"</p> + +<p>The door opened in response to Dollar's decisive call. It was the little +Barton boy, to say that Miss Trevellyn was in the waiting-room.</p> + +<p>"Show her in," said Dollar. "I have more than Rocchi's bare word, +Edenborough."</p> + +<p>The distracted youth looked about him like a wild creature in a cage, +and saw his loophole at the last moment.</p> + +<p>"I won't be the one to shame her, whatever she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> has done!" he whimpered +through his teeth. "If there's any explanation, she need never know I +knew; if there's not, good-by!"</p> + +<p>And he slipped through the open window, out upon the iron steps, as +Dollar switched on the lights that turned the outer dusk to darkness; +and the door opened even as the curtain was drawn in desperation, with a +last signal to Edenborough to stand his ground and at least hear all.</p> + +<p>"Good evening, Doctor Dollar," said Miss Trevellyn, briskly, and with +that she stopped in her sturdy stride. "Is anything the matter?"</p> + +<p>"Is it possible you don't know what?"</p> + +<p>"Is it anything to do with George? You're his doctor, aren't you?" These +questions quicker, but with a sensible check on any premature anxiety.</p> + +<p>"He has consulted me, but the matter more directly concerns yourself. +It's no use beating about the bush, Miss Trevellyn!" exclaimed the +doctor, with a sudden irritation at her straight carriage and straighter +look. "I have to speak to you about the Marchese Rocchi."</p> + +<p>"Have you, indeed!"</p> + +<p>Miss Trevellyn had winced at the name, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> already her eyes looked +brighter and bolder, and the firm face almost serenely obdurate.</p> + +<p>"The Marchese Rocchi," he continued, "fled the country yesterday, Miss +Trevellyn."</p> + +<p>"I wondered why he was not at Prince's!"</p> + +<p>"He fled because of a scandal in which you are implicated," said Dollar +very sternly. "He has been trafficking in naval secrets—this country's +secrets, Miss Trevellyn—and he swears you sold them to him. Is it +true?"</p> + +<p>"One moment," said the girl, with a first trace of emotion. "Is all this +of your own accord, or on behalf of Mr. Edenborough?"</p> + +<p>"Of my own accord entirely."</p> + +<p>"You've been ferreting things out for yourself, have you?"</p> + +<p>"You are entitled to put it so."</p> + +<p>"Detective as well as doctor, it appears?"</p> + +<p>"Miss Trevellyn, I implore you to tell me if these things are true!"</p> + +<p>"So that you may tell your patient, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"No. I shall not tell him," said Dollar, disingenuously enough, but with +the deeper sorrow.</p> + +<p>"Very well! I'll tell you, and you can shout it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> from the roof for all I +care now. It's perfectly true!"</p> + +<p>Dollar started, not at the thing that had to come, but at the +manner in which it came. It seemed, indeed, the last word in +wickedness—impenitent, unblushing, even vainglorious to eye and ear +alike. His glance flew to the curtained window, but no sound or movement +came from the iron stair outside.</p> + +<p>"True that you sold those drawings to this man Rocchi?" he heard himself +saying at last, in a tone so childish that he scarcely wondered at the +smile it drew.</p> + +<p>"Perfectly true," said Miss Trevellyn.</p> + +<p>"Drawings made by George Edenborough for the First Lord of the +Admiralty, and shown to you because you were the stronger character and +insisted on seeing them, but only in such confidence as might almost be +justified between future man and wife?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't sell his drawings," said Miss Trevellyn, impatiently. "I +copied them, more or less from memory, and sold my own efforts."</p> + +<p>"Of course I know that! It was a slip of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> tongue," he admonished +her, while marveling more and more. "And you can put the whole thing +plainly without so much as a blush!"</p> + +<p>"I am going to put you to the blush instead, Doctor Dollar," returned +the lady, with a lighter touch. "You are very clever at finding out what +I did, but you don't ask why I did it; that's not so clever of such a +clever man, and I must just enlighten you before I go. The first drawing +was not a copy; it was the original they got that time, and it was +stolen from Mr. Edenborough on his way home from the Admiralty. He never +knew exactly where it was stolen, but I always thought I knew. You are a +bit of a detective, Doctor Dollar; well, so am I in my way. You have not +let me into the secret of your success, and I shouldn't think of boring +you with mine. I thought it happened at Prince's, and I suspected +Rocchi, that was all. It was last spring, and I had all the summer to +think about it. But when Prince's opened I set to work, for there was +Rocchi making up to us both as before. He didn't get much change out of +George, but perhaps I made amends when George wasn't there, and +sometimes even when he was!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> He could waltz, you see, and so can I," +said Lucy Trevellyn, with something like a sigh for her bereavement on +the rink.</p> + +<p>"Yet you copied the other two drawings, and you even admit you sold him +the copies?"</p> + +<p>"I sold them quite well," said Miss Trevellyn, with sparkling eyes—"and +you may guess what I did with the money—but it's not fair to call them +copies. I made them as inaccurate as possible without spoiling +everything, and indeed I couldn't have made them very accurate from +memory, and they were only rough sketches to begin with! Of course +George was wrong to let me see them, but he was assisting in the best of +causes. Rocchi was an expert professional spy. I soon sized him down as +one. But he was not a naval expert—and I'm that as well! That's my last +boast, Doctor Dollar; but it's not unjustifiable, if you come to think +of George and me between us keeping a national enemy out of serious +mischief, feeding a friendly Power with false plans, and giving the +money to our own dear Navy League!"</p> + +<p>Dollar surveyed the radiant minx with eyes that needed rubbing. His only +sorrow was that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> Edenborough did not burst through the curtains without +more ado; he must have extraordinary self-control, when he liked.</p> + +<p>"Not that George was a conscious party to the fraud; he wouldn't have +approved of it, he couldn't possibly, poor George!" said George's bride. +"But I shall tell him all about it now; of course I always meant to tell +him—after to-morrow—but he has had quite enough bothers of his own, +and this was my show. I suppose you don't know what's been bothering +him, Doctor Dollar? He says it's overwork, and I do think Lord +Stockton's an old slave-driver; do you know, I haven't even seen George +since the day before yesterday at Prince's?"</p> + +<p>"Nor I," said Dollar, no longer with the least compunction, "from that +hour to this."</p> + +<p>"Of course I know he's all right," concluded Miss Trevellyn, as they +were parting perfect friends, "because he has rung me up several times +to say so, and he looked better on Monday than for ever so long. But I +must own I shall be glad when I get him away for a real good rest."</p> + +<p>She had refused to hear another word from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> Dollar in explanation, or of +regret, and she made her departure with all the abruptness of a +constitutionally decided person. But she had blushed once at least in +the last few minutes. And the doctor ran back into his den with singing +heart, ready to fall upon his patient's neck in deep thanksgiving and +even more profound congratulation.</p> + +<p>No patient was there to meet him even now, but the curtain swayed a +little before the open window. Dollar reached it at a bound; but there +was nobody outside on the iron steps, and the curtain filled behind him +as the inner door banged in the draft. The horrid little space at the +back of the house, between the high black walls with the broken-bottle +coping, lay empty of all life in the plentiful light from the back +windows—but for an early cat that fled before Dollar's precipitate +descent into the basement.</p> + +<p>"The gentleman's gone," said Mrs. Barton at once. "He come through this +way some time ago—said he couldn't wait no longer out there!"</p> + +<p>"How long do you suppose he had waited?"</p> + +<p>"Not long," said Mrs. Barton firmly. "Bob here was at his tea when he +had to go up to show the young lady in; and the young gentleman, it +couldn't've<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> been more than three or four minutes before he was through +'ere as if something had 'appened."</p> + +<p>"I didn't hear him."</p> + +<p>"He was anxious you shouldn't be disturbed, sir."</p> + +<p>"Did you show him out, Bobby?"</p> + +<p>The master had never been so short with them. Mrs. Barton felt that +something was the matter, but Bobby quaked.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir!"</p> + +<p>"Which way did he go—and how—foot or taxi?"</p> + +<p>"I—please, sir—I never stopped to see, sir!"</p> + +<p>Dollar flew to his telephone; forsook it for a taxicab; drew +Edenborough's rooms in vain; inquired as vainly (as an anonymous wedding +guest, uncertain of the church) at Admiral Trevellyn's; was at the House +of Commons by half past six, and at Scotland Yard (armed with written +injunctions from the Secretary of State) before seven.</p> + +<p>At that hour and place the matter passed out of the hands of Doctor John +Dollar, who could only hasten home to Welbeck Street, there to enter +upon the most shattering vigil of his life—the terrible telephone at +his elbow—and still more terrible inquirers on the telephone as the +night wore on!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> + +<p>But never one word of news.</p> + +<p>Toward midnight Topham Vinson arrived with the elaborate sandwiches and +even the champagne that he had found awaiting him at home. It was the +measure of a born leader; the doctor had not broken his fast since +lunch; and in the small hours he once dozed for some minutes in his +chair.</p> + +<p>But the politician had not the temperament to wait for the telephone to +talk to him; he talked repeatedly into the telephone, set a round dozen +of myrmidons by the ears, and at last was rightly served by being sent +off to Hammersmith to identify the dead body of a defaulting clerk, just +recovered from the Thames.</p> + +<p>"I'm not coming with you," Dollar had said, even when the description +seemed to tally. "Edenborough wouldn't drown himself—and this is my +place."</p> + +<p>It was a being ten years older who opened his own front door again at +daybreak. His face was as gray as the wintry dawn, the whole man bowed +and broken. Topham Vinson stood aghast on the step.</p> + +<p>"It isn't all over, is it?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span></p> + +<p>The doctor nodded with compressed lips.</p> + +<p>"When and where?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Come in. They're getting up down-stairs; there'll be some +tea in a minute."</p> + +<p>"For God's sake tell me what you've heard!"</p> + +<p>"Haven't I told you? They rang up just after you went. He bought prussic +acid yesterday!"</p> + +<p>Dollar had dropped into his elaborate old chair; the bent head between +his hands drooped over its own reflection in the monastic writing-table.</p> + +<p>"Who rang up?" asked the man on his legs.</p> + +<p>"Some of your people."</p> + +<p>"Was that all they had to tell you?"</p> + +<p>"That was all; we shan't have long to wait for the rest."</p> + +<p>"Where did he buy it?"</p> + +<p>"At his own chemist's—'to put a poor old dog out of its misery!' His +very words, Vinson, so they tell me! I shall hear them all my life."</p> + +<p>"And it has taken all night to learn this, has it, from the chemist's +where the poor devil dealt!"</p> + +<p>Dollar understood this outburst of truculent emotion.</p> + +<p>"That was my fault," said he. "I told them to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> confine their attention +to entries made in the poison books after five o'clock yesterday +afternoon. Edenborough had signed his name and got the stuff earlier in +the day."</p> + +<p>"Before you told him anything?"</p> + +<p>"He had his own suspicions, you must remember. I had confirmed them—and +<i>her</i> first words left no more to be said, that he could bear to hear! +If only he had waited another minute! If only I had dragged him back to +face it out!" groaned Dollar, in a bottomless pit of self-reproach. "I +call myself a crime doctor, yet I let my patient creep into space with a +bottle of prussic acid, and commit the one crime I had to prevent!"</p> + +<p>"Why prussic acid, I wonder?"</p> + +<p>The idle question was not asked for information, but it happened to be +one that Dollar could answer, and it brought him to his book-shelves +with a certain alacrity.</p> + +<p>"I know," he said, "though I never thought of it till this minute! I was +trying to write him a prescription on Sunday night, when the poor chap +suddenly remarked that Shelley was right, and I found him dipping into +these Letters, and had the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> luck to spot the very bit he'd struck. It +was this"—and he read out the passage beginning: "You, of course, enter +into society at Leghorn: should you meet with any scientific person, +capable of preparing the <i>Prussic Acid, or essential oil of bitter +almonds</i>, I should regard it as a great kindness if you could procure me +a small quantity"—down to "it would be a comfort to me to hold in my +hands that golden key to the chamber of perpetual peace."</p> + +<p>Topham Vinson's only comment was to pick up the book, which had fallen +to the floor with the concluding words. Dollar was swaying where he +stood, glancing in horror toward the door; at that moment it opened, and +Mrs. Barton entered with the tea-tray.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Barton," said the doctor, in a voice that failed him as it had not +done all night, "I don't want to hurt your feelings, but did that boy of +yours speak the truth when he told me he had seen Mr. Edenborough out?"</p> + +<p>"He did not, sir, and his father thrashed him for it!" cried the good +woman. "And that was very wrong of Barton, because I was as bad as the +boy, in not telling you at the time. So we've all done<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> wrong together, +and we don't deserve to stay, as I told the both of them!"</p> + +<p>The poor soul was forgiven and consoled, with an unconscious sympathy +not lost on Topham Vinson, to whom it was extended a moment later.</p> + +<p>"Take a drink of your tea," said Dollar. "It will do you good."</p> + +<p>"What about you?"</p> + +<p>"I'm going up-stairs first."</p> + +<p>"You've thought of something!"</p> + +<p>"I have," replied Dollar in a tragic whisper. "I've thought of my +'chamber of perpetual peace.'"</p> + +<p>That sanctuary was on the second floor, and it had triple doors so +spaced that each could be shut in turn before the next was opened. The +house might have been in an uproar, and yet one might have entered this +room without admitting the slightest sound by the door. The window was +of triple glass that would have deadened an explosion on its sill, and +the walls were thickly wadded behind an inner paneling of aromatic pine.</p> + +<p>The first sensation on entering was one of ineffable peace and quiet; +next came a subtle, soothing scent, as of all the spices of Arabia; and +lastly a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> surprising sense of scientific ventilation, as though the four +sound-proof walls were yet not impervious to the outer air, but as +though it were the pungent air of pine-clad mountains, in miraculous +circulation here in the heart of London.</p> + +<p>All this would have struck the visitor by degrees; but to John Dollar, +who had devised and superintended every detail, it all came home +together and afresh as he entered softly with the Home Secretary; and a +certain composite effect, unforeseen in the beginning and still +unexplained, fell upon him even now, and with it all the weight of his +own fatigue; so that he could have flung himself on bed or couch as a +doomed wretch sinks into the snow, but for the light in the room and +what the light revealed.</p> + +<p>It was light of a warm, strange, coppery shade, that he had found for +himself by dyeing frosted electric lamps as children dye Easter eggs; it +was the very softest and yet least sensuous shade that eyes ever +penetrated with perfect ease, and it turned the room into a little hall +of bronze. The simple curtains might have been golden lace, richly +tarnished with age; the furniture solid copper; the bed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> an Eastern +divan, and the form upon the bed a sleeping Arab.</p> + +<p>It was George Edenborough lying there in all his clothes, a girl's +photograph beside him on the coverlet, and beside the photograph a tiny +phial that caught the light.</p> + +<p>"Stay where you are!" whispered Dollar in a voice that thrilled his +companion to the core. And he stole to the bed, stooped over it for a +little lifetime, and so came stealing back.</p> + +<p>"How long has he been dead?" said Topham Vinson, harshly; but in realty +his blood was freezing at an unearthly smile in that unearthly light.</p> + +<p>"Dead?" was the doctor's husky echo. "Don't you know the smell of bitter +almonds, and have you smelt it yet? Here's the golden bottle he hadn't +opened when he lay down—perhaps for the first time since he was here on +Sunday night—and this is his wedding morning, and he's only—only fast +asleep!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>A SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD</h3> + + +<p>It is a small world that flocks to Switzerland for the Christmas +holidays. It is also a world largely composed of that particular class +which really did provide Doctor Dollar with the majority of his cases. +He was therefore not surprised, on the night of his arrival at the great +Excelsior Hotel, in Winterwald, to feel a diffident touch on the +shoulder, and to look round upon the sunburned blushes of a quite recent +patient.</p> + +<p>George Edenborough had taken Winterwald on his wedding trip, and nothing +would suit him and his nut-brown bride but for the doctor to join them +at their table. It was a slightly embarrassing invitation, but there was +good reason for not persisting in a first refusal. And the bride carried +the situation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> with a breezy vitality, while her groom chose a wine +worthy of the occasion, and the newcomer explained that he had arrived +by the afternoon train, but had not come straight to the hotel.</p> + +<p>"Then you won't have heard of our great excitement," said Mrs. +Edenborough, "and I'm afraid you won't like it when you do!"</p> + +<p>"If you mean the strychnine affair," returned Dollar, with a certain +deliberation, "I heard one version before I had been in the place an +hour. I can't say that I did like it. But I should be interested to know +what you both think about it all."</p> + +<p>Edenborough returned the wine-list to the waiter with sepulchral +injunctions.</p> + +<p>"Are you telling him about our medical scandal?" he inquired briskly of +the bride. "My dear doctor, it'll make your professional hair stand on +end! Here's the local practitioner been prescribing strychnine pills +warranted to kill in twenty minutes!"</p> + +<p>"So I hear," said the crime doctor, dryly.</p> + +<p>"The poor brute has been frightfully overworked," continued Edenborough, +in deference to a more phlegmatic front than he had expected of the +British faculty. "They say he was up two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> whole nights last week; he +seems to be the only doctor in the place, and the hotels are full of +fellows doing their level best to lay themselves out. We've had two +concussions of the brain and one complicated fracture this very week. +Still, to go and give your patient a hundred times more strychnine than +you intended——"</p> + +<p>And he stopped himself, as though the subject, which he had taken up +with a purely nervous zest, was rather near home after all.</p> + +<p>"But what about his patient?" adroitly inquired the doctor. "If half +that one hears is true, he wouldn't have been much loss."</p> + +<p>"Not much, I'm afraid," said Lucy Edenborough, with the air of a Roman +matron turning down her thumbs.</p> + +<p>"He's a fellow who was at my private school, just barely twenty-one, and +making an absolute fool of himself," exclaimed Edenborough, touching his +glass. "It's an awful pity. He used to be such a nice little chap, Jack +Laverick."</p> + +<p>"He was nice enough when he was out here a year ago," the bride +admitted, "and he's still a sportsman. He won half the toboggan races +last season,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> and took it all delightfully; he's quite another person +now, and gives himself absurd airs on top of everything else. Still, I +shall expect Mr. Laverick either to sweep the board or break his neck. +He evidently wasn't born to be poisoned."</p> + +<p>"Did he come to grief last year, Mrs. Edenborough?"</p> + +<p>"He only nearly had one of his ears cut off, in a spill on the ice-run. +So they said; but he was tobogganing again next day."</p> + +<p>"Doctor Alt looked after him all right then, I hear," added Edenborough, +as the champagne arrived. "But I only wish <i>you</i> could take the fellow +in hand! He really used to be a decent chap, but it would take even you +all your time to make him one again, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>The crime doctor smiled as he raised his glass and returned compliments +across the bubbles. It was the smile of a man with bigger fish to fry. +Yet it was he who came back to the subject of young Laverick, asking if +he had not a tutor or somebody to look after him, and what the man meant +by not doing his job.</p> + +<p>In an instant both the Edenboroughs had turned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> upon their friend. Poor +Mr. Scarth was not to blame! Poor Mr. Scarth, it appeared, had been a +master at the preparatory school at which Jack Laverick and George +Edenborough had been boys. He was a splendid fellow, and very popular in +the hotel, but there was nothing but sympathy with him in the matter +under discussion. His charge was of age, and in a position to send him +off at any moment, as indeed he was always threatening in his cups. But +there again there was a special difficulty: one cup was more than enough +for Jack Laverick, whose weak head for wine was the only excuse for him.</p> + +<p>"Yet there was nothing of the kind last year," said Mrs. Edenborough, in +a reversionary voice; "at least, one never heard of it And that makes it +all the harder on poor Mr. Scarth."</p> + +<p>Dollar declared that he was burning to meet the unfortunate gentleman; +the couple exchanged glances, and he was told to wait till after the +concert, at which he had better sit with them. Was there a concert? His +face lengthened at the prospect, and the bride's eyes sparkled at his +expense. She would not hear of his shirking it, but went so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> far as to +cut dinner short in order to obtain good seats. She was one of those +young women who have both a will and a way with them, and Dollar soon +found himself securely penned in the gallery of an ambitious ballroom +with a stage at the other end.</p> + +<p>The concert came up to his most sardonic expectations, and he resigned +himself to a boredom only intensified by the behavior of some crude +humorists in the rows behind. Indifferent song followed indifferent +song, and each earned a more vociferous encore from those gay young +gods. A not unknown novelist told dialect stories of purely territorial +interest; a lady recited with astounding spirit; another fiddled, no +less courageously; but the back rows of the gallery were quite out of +hand when a black-avised gentleman took the stage, and had not opened +his mouth before those back rows were rows of Satan's reproving sin and +clapping with unsophisticated gusto.</p> + +<p>"Who's this!" asked Dollar, instantly aware of the change behind him. +But even Lucy Edenborough would only answer, "Hush, doctor!" as she bent +forward with shining eyes. And certainly a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> hairpin could not have been +dropped unheard before the dark performer relieved the tension by +plunging into a scene from <i>Pickwick</i>.</p> + +<p>It was the scene of Mr. Jingle's monologue on the Rochester coach—and +the immortal nonsense was inimitably given. Yet nobody could have been +less like the emaciated prototype than this tall tanned man, with the +short black mustache, and the flashing teeth that bit off every word +with ineffable snap and point.</p> + +<p>"Mother—tall lady, eating sandwiches—forgot the +arch—crash—knock—children look round—mother's head off—sandwich in +her hand—no mouth to put it in——" and his own grim one only added to +the fun and swelled the roar.</p> + +<p>He waited darkly for them to stop, the wilful absence of any amusement +on his side enormously increasing that of the audience. But when it came +to the episode of Donna Christina and the stomach-pump, with the +culminating discovery of Don Bolaro Fizzgig in the main pipe of the +public fountain, the guffaws of half the house eventually drew from the +other half the supreme compliment of exasperated demands for silence. +Mrs. George<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> Edenborough was one of the loudest offenders. George +himself had to wipe his eyes. And the crime doctor had forgot that there +was such a thing as crime.</p> + +<p>"That chap's a genius!" he exclaimed, when a double encore had been +satisfied by further and smaller doses of Mr. Jingle, artfully held in +reserve. "But who is he, Mrs. Edenborough?"</p> + +<p>"Poor Mr. Scarth!" crowed the bride, brimming over with triumphant fun.</p> + +<p>But the doctor's mirth was at an end.</p> + +<p>"That the fellow who can't manage a bit of a boy, when he can hold an +audience like this in the hollow of his hand?"</p> + +<p>And at first he looked as though he could not believe it, and then all +at once as though he could. But by this time the Edenboroughs were +urging Scarth's poverty in earnest, and Dollar could only say that he +wanted to meet him more than ever.</p> + +<p>The wish was not to be gratified without a further side-light and a +fresh surprise. As George and the doctor were repairing to the +billiard-room, before the conclusion of the lengthy program, they found +a group of backs upon the threshold, and a ribald uproar in full swing +within. One voice was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> in the ascendent, and it was sadly indistinct; +but it was also the voice of the vanquished, belching querulous +futilities. The cold steel thrusts of an autocratic Jingle cut it +shorter and shorter. It ceased altogether, and the men in the doorway +made way for Mr. Scarth, as he hurried a disheveled youth off the scene +in the most approved constabulatory manner.</p> + +<p>"Does it often happen, George?" Dollar's arm had slipped through his +former patient's as they slowly followed at their distance.</p> + +<p>"Most nights, I'm afraid."</p> + +<p>"And does Scarth always do what he likes with him—afterward?"</p> + +<p>"Always; he's the sort of fellow who can do what he likes with most +people," declared the young man, missing the point. "You should have +seen him at the last concert, when those fools behind us behaved even +worse than to-night! It wasn't his turn, but he came out and put them +right in about a second, and had us all laughing the next! It was just +the same at school; everybody was afraid of Mostyn Scarth, boys and men +alike; and so is Jack Laverick still—in spite of being of age and +having<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> the money-bags—as you saw for yourself just now."</p> + +<p>"Yet he lets this sort of thing happen continually?"</p> + +<p>"It's pretty difficult to prevent. A glass about does it, as I told you, +and you can't be at a fellow's elbow all the time in a place like this. +But some of Jack's old pals have had a go at him. Do you know what +they've done? They've taken away his Old Etonian tie, and quite right +too!"</p> + +<p>"And there was nothing of all this last year?"</p> + +<p>"So Lucy says. I wasn't here. Mrs. Laverick was, by the way; she may +have made the difference. But being his own master seems to have sent +him to the dogs altogether. Scarth's the only person to pull him up, +unless—unless you'd take him on, doctor! You—you've pulled harder +cases out of the fire, you know!"</p> + +<p>They had been sitting a few minutes in the lounge. Nobody was very near +them; the young man's face was alight and his eyes were shining. Dollar +took him by the arm once more, and they went together to the lift.</p> + +<p>"In any case I must make friends with your<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> friend Scarth," said he. "Do +you happen to know his number?"</p> + +<p>Edenborough did—it was 144—but he seemed dubious as to another +doctor's reception after the tragedy that might have happened in the +adjoining room.</p> + +<p>"Hadn't I better introduce you in the morning?" he suggested with much +deference in the lift. "I—I hate repeating things—but I want you to +like each other, and I heard Scarth say he was fed up with doctors!"</p> + +<p>This one smiled.</p> + +<p>"I don't wonder at it."</p> + +<p>"Yet it wasn't Mostyn Scarth who gave Doctor Alt away."</p> + +<p>"No?"</p> + +<p>Edenborough shook his head as they left the lift together. "No, doctor. +It was the chemist here, a chap called Schickel; but for him Jack +Laverick would be a dead man; and but for him again, nobody need ever +have heard of his narrow shave. He spotted the mistake, and then started +all the gossip."</p> + +<p>"I know," said the doctor, nodding.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But it was a terrible mistake! Decigrams instead of milligrams, so I +heard. Just a hundred times too much strychnine in each pill."</p> + +<p>"You are quite right," said John Dollar quietly. "I have the +prescription in my pocket."</p> + +<p>"<i>You</i> have, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"Don't be angry with me, my dear fellow! I told you I had heard one +version of the whole thing. It was Alt's. He's an old friend—but you +wouldn't have said a word about him if I had told you that at first—and +I still don't want it generally known."</p> + +<p>"You can trust me, doctor, after all you've done for me."</p> + +<p>"Well, Alt once did more for me. I want to do something for him, that's +all."</p> + +<p>And his knuckles still ached from the young man's grip as they rapped +smartly at the door of No. 144.</p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>It was opened a few inches by Mostyn Scarth. His raiment was still at +concert pitch, but his face<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> even darker than it had been as the crime +doctor saw it last.</p> + +<p>"May I ask who you are and what you want?" he demanded—not at all in +the manner of Mr. Jingle—rather in the voice that most people would +have raised.</p> + +<p>"My name's Dollar and I'm a doctor."</p> + +<p>The self-announcement, pat as a polysyllable, had a foreseen effect only +minimized by the precautionary confidence of Doctor Dollar's manner.</p> + +<p>"Thanks very much. I've had about enough of doctors."</p> + +<p>And the door was shutting when the intruder got in a word like a wedge.</p> + +<p>"Exactly!"</p> + +<p>Scarth frowned through a chink just wide enough to show both his eyes. +It was the intruder's tone that held his hand.</p> + +<p>"What does that mean?" he demanded with more control.</p> + +<p>"That I want to see you about the other doctor—this German fellow," +returned Dollar, against the grain. But the studious phrase admitted +him.</p> + +<p>"Well, don't raise your voice," said Scarth, lowering<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> his own as he +shut the door softly behind them. "I believe I saw you down-stairs +outside the bar. So I need only explain that I've just got my bright +young man off to sleep, on the other side of those folding-doors."</p> + +<p>Dollar could not help wondering whether the other room was as good as +Scarth's, which was much bigger and better appointed than his own. But +he sat down at the oval table under the electrolier, and came abruptly +to his point.</p> + +<p>"About that prescription," he began, and straightway produced it from +his pocket.</p> + +<p>"Well, what about it?" the other queried, but only keenly, as he sat +down at the table, too.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Alt is a very old friend of mine, Mr. Scarth."</p> + +<p>Mostyn Scarth exhibited the slight but immediate change of front due +from gentleman to gentleman on the strength of such a statement. His +grim eyes softened with a certain sympathy; but the accession left his +gravity the more pronounced.</p> + +<p>"He is not only a friend," continued Dollar, "but the cleverest and best +man I know in my profession. I don't speak from mere loyalty; he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> was my +own doctor before he was my friend. Mr. Scarth, he saved more than my +life when every head in Harley Street had been shaken over my case. All +the baronets gave me up; but chance or fate brought me here, and this +little unknown man performed the miracle they shirked, and made a new +man of me off his own bat. I wanted him to come to London and make his +fortune; but his work was here, he wouldn't leave it; and here I find +him under a sorry cloud. Can you wonder at my wanting to step in and +speak up for him, Mr. Scarth?"</p> + +<p>"On the contrary, I know exactly how you must feel, and am very glad you +have spoken," rejoined Mostyn Scarth, cordially enough in all the +circumstances of the case. "But the cloud is none of my making, Doctor +Dollar, though I naturally feel rather strongly about the matter. But +for Schickel, the chemist, I might be seeing a coffin to England at this +moment! He's the man who found out the mistake, and has since made all +the mischief."</p> + +<p>"Are you sure it was a mistake, Mr. Scarth?" asked Dollar quietly.</p> + +<p>"What else?" cried the other, in blank astonishment.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> "Even Schickel has +never suggested that Doctor Alt was trying to commit a murder!"</p> + +<p>"Even Schickel!" repeated Dollar, with a sharp significance. "Are you +suggesting that there's no love lost between him and Alt?"</p> + +<p>"I was not, indeed." Scarth seemed still astonished. "No. That never +occurred to me for a moment."</p> + +<p>"Yet it's a small place, and you know what small places are. Would one +man be likely to spread a thing like this against another if there were +no bad blood between them?"</p> + +<p>Scarth could not say. The thing happened to be true, and it made such a +justifiable sensation. He was none the less frankly interested in the +suggestion. It was as though he had a tantalizing glimmer of the crime +doctor's meaning. Their heads were closer together across the end of the +table, their eyes joined in mutual probation.</p> + +<p>"Can I trust you with my own idea, Mr. Scarth?"</p> + +<p>"That's for you to decide, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>"I shall not breathe it to another soul—not even to Alt himself—till I +am sure."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You may trust me, doctor. I don't know what's coming, but I shan't give +it away."</p> + +<p>"Then I shall trust you even to the extent of contradicting what I just +said. I <i>am</i> sure—between ourselves—that the prescription now in my +hands is a clever forgery!"</p> + +<p>Scarth held out his hand for it. A less deliberate announcement might +have given him a more satisfactory surprise; but he could not have +looked more incredulous than he did, or subjected Dollar to a cooler +scrutiny.</p> + +<p>"A forgery with what object, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"That I don't pretend to say. I merely state the fact—in confidence. +You have your eyes upon a flagrant forgery."</p> + +<p>Scarth raised them twinkling. "My dear Doctor Dollar, I saw him write it +out myself!"</p> + +<p>"Are you quite sure?"</p> + +<p>"Absolutely, doctor! This lad, Jack Laverick, is a pretty handful; +without a doctor to frighten him from time to time, I couldn't cope with +him at all. His people are in despair about him—but that's another +matter. I was only going to say that I took<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> him to Doctor Alt myself, +and this is the prescription they refused to make up. Schickel may have +a spite against Alt, as you suggest, but if he's a forger I can only say +he doesn't look the part."</p> + +<p>"The only looks I go by," said the crime doctor, "are those of the +little document in your hand."</p> + +<p>"It's on Alt's paper."</p> + +<p>"Anybody could get hold of that."</p> + +<p>"But you suggest that Alt and Schickel have been on bad terms?"</p> + +<p>"That's a better point, Mr. Scarth, that's a much better point," said +Dollar, smiling and then ceasing to smile as he produced a +magnifying-lens. "Allow me to switch on the electric standard, and do me +the favor of examining that handwriting with this loop; it's not very +strong, but the best I could get here at the photographer's shop."</p> + +<p>"It's certainly not strong enough to show anything fishy, to my +inexperience," said Scarth, on a sufficiently close inspection.</p> + +<p>"Now look at this one."</p> + +<p>Dollar had produced a second prescription from the same pocket as +before. At first sight they seemed identical.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Is this another forgery?" inquired Scarth, with a first faint trace of +irony.</p> + +<p>"No. That's the correct prescription, rewritten by Alt at my request, as +he is positive he wrote it originally."</p> + +<p>"I see now. There are two more noughts mixed up with the other +hieroglyphs."</p> + +<p>"They happen to make all the difference between life and death," said +Dollar gravely. "Yet they are not by any means the only difference +here."</p> + +<p>"I can see no other, I must confess." And Scarth raised his eyes just as +Dollar's fell from his broad brown brow.</p> + +<p>"The other difference is, Mr. Scarth, that the prescription with the +strychnine in deadly decigrams has been drawn backward instead of being +written forward."</p> + +<p>Scarth's stare ended in a smile.</p> + +<p>"Do you mind saying all that again, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"I'll elaborate it. The genuine prescription has been written in the +ordinary way—<i>currente calamo</i>. But forgeries are not written in the +ordinary way, much less with running pens; the best of them are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> written +backward, or rather they are <i>drawn upside down</i>. Try to copy writing as +writing, and your own will automatically creep in and spoil it; draw it +upside down and wrong way on, as a mere meaningless scroll, and your own +formation of the letters doesn't influence you, because you are not +forming letters at all. You are drawing from a copy, Mr. Scarth."</p> + +<p>"You mean that I'm deriving valuable information from a handwriting +expert," cried Scarth, with another laugh.</p> + +<p>"There are no such experts," returned Dollar, a little coldly. "It's all +a mere matter of observation, open to everybody with eyes to see. But +this happens to be an old forger's trick; try it for yourself, as I +have, and you'll be surprised to see how much there is in it."</p> + +<p>"I must," said Scarth. "But I can't conceive how you can tell that it +has been played in this case."</p> + +<p>"No? Look at the start, 'Herr Laverick,' and at the finish, 'Doctor +Alt.' You would expect to see plenty of ink in the 'Herr,' wouldn't you? +Still plenty in the 'Laverick,' I think, but now less and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> less until +the pen is filled again. In the correct prescription, written at my +request to-day, you will find that this is so. In the forgery the +progression is precisely the reverse; the <i>t</i> in 'Alt' is full of ink, +but you will find less and less till the next dip in the middle of the +word 'Mahlzeit' in the line above. The forger, of course, dips oftener +than the man with the running pen."</p> + +<p>Scarth bent in silence over the lens, his dark face screwed awry. +Suddenly he pushed back his chair.</p> + +<p>"It's wonderful!" he cried softly. "I see everything you say. Doctor +Dollar, you have converted me completely to your view. I should like you +to allow me to convert the hotel."</p> + +<p>"Not yet," said Dollar, rising, "if at all as to the actual facts of the +case. It's no use making bad worse, Mr. Scarth, or taking a dirty trick +too seriously. It isn't as though the forgery had been committed with a +view to murdering your young Laverick."</p> + +<p>"I never dreamed of thinking that it was!"</p> + +<p>"You are quite right, Mr. Scarth. It doesn't bear thinking about. Of +course, any murderer<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> ingenious enough to concoct such a thing would +have been far too clever to drop out <i>two</i> noughts; he would have been +content to change the milligrams into centigrams, and risk a recovery. +No sane chemist would have dispensed the pills in decimals. But we are +getting off the facts, and I promised to meet Doctor Alt on his last +round. If I may tell him, in vague terms, that you at least think there +may have been some mistake, other than the culpable one that has been +laid at his door, I shall go away less uneasy about my unwarrantable +intrusion than I can assure you I was in making it."</p> + +<p>It was strange how the balance of personality had shifted during an +interview which Scarth himself was now eager to extend. He had no longer +the mesmeric martinet who had tamed an unruly audience at sight; the +last of Mr. Jingle's snap had long been in abeyance. And yet there was +just one more suggestion of that immortal, in the rather dilapidated +trunk from which the swarthy exquisite now produced a bottle of whisky, +very properly locked up out of Laverick's reach. And weakness of will +could not be imputed to the young man who induced John Dollar to cement +their acquaintance with a thimbleful.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>It was early morning in the same week; the crime doctor lay brooding +over the most complicated case that had yet come his way. More precisely +it was two cases, but so closely related that it took a strong mind to +consider them apart, a stronger will to confine each to the solitary +brain-cell that it deserved. Yet the case of young Laverick was not only +much the simpler of the two, but infinitely the more congenial to John +Dollar, and not the one most on his nerves.</p> + +<p>It was too simple altogether. A year ago the boy had been all right, +wild only as a tobogganer, lucky to have got off with a few stitches in +his ear. Dollar heard all about that business from Doctor Alt, and only +too much about Jack Laverick's subsequent record from other informants. +It was worthy of the Welbeck Street confessional. His career at Oxford +had come to a sudden ignominious end. He had forfeited his motoring +license for habitually driving to the public danger, and on the last +occasion had barely escaped imprisonment for his condition at the wheel. +He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> had caused his own mother to say advisedly that she would "sooner +see him in his coffin than going on in this dreadful way"; in writing +she had said it, for Scarth had shown the letter addressed to him as her +"last and only hope" for Jack; and yet even Scarth was powerless to +prevent that son of Belial from getting "flown with insolence and wine" +more nights than not. Even last night it had happened, at the masked +ball, on the eve of this morning's races! Whose fault would it be if he +killed himself on the ice-run after all?</p> + +<p>Dollar writhed as he thought upon this case; yet it was not the case +that had brought him out from England, not the reason of his staying out +longer than he had dreamed of doing when Alt's telegram arrived. It was +not, indeed, about Jack Laverick that poor Alt had telegraphed at all. +And yet between them what a job they could have made of the unfortunate +youth!</p> + +<p>It was Dollar's own case over again—yet he had not been called +in—neither of them had!</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, when all was said that could be said to himself, or even +to Alt—who did not quite agree—Laverick's was much the less serious +matter;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> and John Dollar had turned upon the other side, and was +grappling afresh with the other case, when his door opened violently +without a knock, and an agitated voice spoke his name.</p> + +<p>"It's me—Edenborough," it continued in a hurried whisper. "I want you +to get into some clothes and come up to the ice-run as quick as +possible!"</p> + +<p>"Why? What has happened?" asked the doctor, jumping out of bed as +Edenborough drew the curtains.</p> + +<p>"Nothing yet. I hope nothing will——"</p> + +<p>"But something has!" interrupted the doctor. "What's the matter with +your eye?"</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you as you dress, only be as quick as you can. Did you forget +it was the toboggan races this morning? They're having them at eight +instead of nine, because of the sun, and it's ten to eight now. Couldn't +you get into some knickerbockers and stick a sweater over all the rest? +That's what I've done—wish I'd come to you first. They'll <i>want</i> a +doctor if we don't make haste!"</p> + +<p>"I wish you'd tell me about your eye," said Dollar, already in his +stockings.</p> + +<p>"My eye's all right," returned Edenborough,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> going to the glass. "No, by +jove, it's blacker than I thought, and my head's still singing like a +kettle. I shouldn't have thought Laverick could hit so hard—drunk <i>or</i> +sober."</p> + +<p>"That madman?" cried Dollar, looking up from his laces. "I thought he +turned in early for once in a way?"</p> + +<p>"He was up early, anyhow," said Edenborough, grimly; "but I'll tell you +the whole thing as we go up to the run, and I don't much mind who hears +me. He's a worse hat even than we thought. I caught him tampering with +the toboggans at five o'clock this morning!"</p> + +<p>"Which toboggans?"</p> + +<p>"One of the lot they keep in a shed just under our window, at the back +of the hotel. I was lying awake and I heard something. It was like a +sort of filing, as if somebody was breaking in somewhere. I got up and +looked out, and thought I saw a light. Lucy was fast asleep; she is +still, by the way, and doesn't know a thing."</p> + +<p>"I'm ready," said Dollar. "Go on when we get outside."</p> + +<p>It was a very pale blue morning, not a scintilla<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> of sunlight in the +valley, neither shine nor shadow upon clambering forest or overhanging +rocks. Somewhere behind their jagged peaks the sun must have risen, but +as yet no snowy facet winked the news to Winterwald, and the softer +summits lost all character against a sky only less white than +themselves.</p> + +<p>The village street presented no difficulties to Edenborough's gouties +and the doctor's nails; but there were other people in it, and voices +travel in a frost over silent snow. On the frozen path between the +snow-fields, beyond the village, nails were not enough, and the novice +depending upon them stumbled and slid as the elaborated climax of +Edenborough's experience induced even more speed.</p> + +<p>"It was him all right—try the edge, doctor, it's less slippy. It was +that young brute in his domino, as if he'd never been to bed at all, and +me in my dressing-gown not properly awake. We should have looked a funny +pair in—have my arm, doctor."</p> + +<p>"Thanks, George."</p> + +<p>"But his electric lamp was the only light. He didn't attempt to put it +out. 'Just tuning up my toboggan,' he whispered. 'Come and have a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> +look.' I didn't and don't believe it was his own toboggan; it was +probably that Captain Strong's, he's his most dangerous rival; but, as I +tell you, I was just going to look when the young brute hit me full in +the face without a moment's warning. I went over like an ox, but I think +the back of my head must have hit something. There was daylight in the +place when I opened the only eye I could."</p> + +<p>"Had he locked you in?"</p> + +<p>"No; he was too fly for that; but I simply couldn't move till I heard +voices coming, and then I only crawled behind a stack of garden chairs +and things. It was Strong and another fellow—they did curse to find the +whole place open! I nearly showed up and told my tale, only I wanted to +tell you first."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad you have, George."</p> + +<p>"I knew your interest in the fellow—besides, I thought it was a case +for you," said George Edenborough simply. "But it kept me prisoner till +the last of the toboggans had been taken out—I only hope it hasn't made +us too late!"</p> + +<p>His next breath was a devout thanksgiving, as a fold in the glistening +slopes showed the top of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> ice-run, and a group of men in sweaters +standing out against the fir-trees on the crest. They seemed to be +standing very still. Some had their padded elbows lifted as though they +were shading their eyes. But there was no sign of a toboggan starting, +no sound of one in the invisible crevice of the run. And now man after +man detached himself from the group, and came leaping down the +subsidiary snow-track meant only for ascent.</p> + +<p>But John Dollar and George Edenborough did not see all of this. A yet +more ominous figure had appeared in their own path, had grown into +Mostyn Scarth, and stood wildly beckoning to them both.</p> + +<p>"It's Jack!" he shouted across the snow. "He's had a smash—self and +toboggan—flaw in a runner. I'm afraid he's broken his leg."</p> + +<p>"Only his leg!" cried Dollar, but not with the least accent of relief. +The tone made Edenborough wince behind him, and Scarth in front look +round. It was as though even the crime doctor thought Jack Laverick +better dead.</p> + +<p>He lay on a litter of overcoats, the hub of a wheel of men that broke of +itself before the first doctor on the scene. He was not even +insensible,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> neither was he uttering moan or groan; but his white lips +were drawn away from his set teeth, and his left leg had an odd look of +being no more a part of him than its envelope of knickerbocker and +stocking.</p> + +<p>"It's a bu'st, doctor, I'm afraid," the boy ground out as Dollar knelt +in the snow. "Hurting? A bit—but I can stick it."</p> + +<p>Courage was the one quality he had not lost during the last year; nobody +could have shown more during the slow and excruciating progress to the +village, on a bobsleigh carried by four stumbling men; everybody was +whispering about it. Everybody but the crime doctor, who headed the +little procession with a face in keeping with the tone which had made +Edenborough wince and Scarth look round.</p> + +<p>The complex case of the night—this urgent one—both were forgot in +Dollar's own case of years ago. He was back again in another Winterwald, +another world. It was no longer a land of Christmas-trees growing out of +mountains of Christmas cake; the snow melted before his mind's eye; he +was hugging the shadows in a street of toy-houses yielding resin to an +August sun, between<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> green slopes combed with dark pines, under a sky of +intolerable blue. And he was in despair; all Harley Street could or +would do nothing for him. And then—and then—some forgotten ache or +pain had taken him to the little man—the great man—down this very +turning to the left, in the little wooden house tucked away behind the +shops.</p> + +<p>How he remembered every landmark—the handrail down the slope—the +little porch—the bare stairs, his own ladder between death and +life—the stark surgery with its uncompromising appliances in full view! +And now at last he was there with such another case as his own—the +minor case that he had yet burned to bring there—and there was Alt to +receive them in the same white jacket and with the same simple +countenance as of old!</p> + +<p>They might have taken him on to the hotel, as Scarth indeed urged +strongly; but the boy himself was against another yard, though otherwise +a hero to the end.</p> + +<p>"Chloroform?" he cried faintly. "Can't I have my beastly leg set without +chloroform? You're not going to have it off, are you? I can stick +anything short of that."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span></p> + +<p>The two doctors retired for the further consideration of a point on +which they themselves were not of one mind.</p> + +<p>"It's the chance of our lives, and the one chance for him," urged Dollar +vehemently. "It isn't as if it were such a dangerous operation, and I'll +take sole responsibility."</p> + +<p>"But I am not sure you have been right," demurred the other. "He has not +even had concussion, a year ago. It has been only the ear."</p> + +<p>"There's a lump behind it still. Everything dates from when it happened; +there's some pressure somewhere that has made another being of him. It's +a much simpler case than mine, and you cured me. Alt, if you had seen +how his own mother wrote about him, you would be the very last man to +hesitate!"</p> + +<p>"It is better to have her consent."</p> + +<p>"No—nobody's—the boy himself need never know. There's a young bride +here who'll nurse him like an angel and hold her tongue till doomsday. +She and her husband may be in the secret, but not another soul!"</p> + +<p>And when Jack Laverick came out of chloroform,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> to feel a frosty +tickling under the tabernacle of bedclothes in which his broken bone was +as the Ark, the sensation was less uncomfortable than he expected. But +that of a dull deep pain in the head drew his first complaint, as an +item not in the estimate.</p> + +<p>"What's my head all bandaged up for?" he demanded, fingering the turban +on the pillow.</p> + +<p>"Didn't you know it was broken, too?" said Lucy Edenborough gravely. "I +expect your leg hurt so much more that you never noticed it!"</p> + + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>Ten days later Mostyn Scarth called at Doctor Alt's, to ask if he +mightn't see Jack at last. He had behaved extremely well about the whole +affair; others in his position might easily have made trouble. But there +had been no concealment of the fact that injuries were not confined to +the broken leg, and the mere seat of the additional mischief was enough +for a man of sense. It is not the really strong who love to display +their power. Scarth<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> not only accepted the situation, but voluntarily +conducted the correspondence which kept poor Mrs. Laverick at half +Europe's length over the critical period. He had merely stipulated to be +the first to see the convalescent, and he took it as well as ever when +Dollar shook his head once more.</p> + +<p>"It's not our fault this time, Mr. Scarth. You must blame the sex that +is privileged to change its mind. Mrs. Laverick has arrived without a +word of warning. She is with her son at this moment, and you'll be glad +to hear that she thinks she finds him an absolutely changed +character—or, rather, what he was before he ever saw Winterwald a year +ago. I may say that this seems more or less the patient's own impression +about himself."</p> + +<p>"Glad!" cried Scarth, who for the moment had seemed rather staggered. +"I'm more than glad; I'm profoundly relieved! It doesn't matter now +whether I see Jack or not. Do you mind giving him these magazines and +papers, with my love? I am thankful that my responsibility's at an end."</p> + +<p>"The same with me," returned the crime doctor. "I shall go back to my +work in London with a better conscience than I had when I left it—with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> +something accomplished—something undone that wanted undoing."</p> + +<p>He smiled at Scarth across the flap of an unpretentious table, on which +lay the literary offering in all its glory of green and yellow wrappers; +and Scarth looked up without a trace of pique, but with an answering +twinkle in his own dark eyes.</p> + +<p>"Alt exalted—restored to favor—Jack reformed character—born +again—forger forgot—forging ahead, eh?"</p> + +<p>It was his best Mr. Jingle manner; indeed, a wonderfully ready and +ruthless travesty of his own performance on the night of Dollar's +arrival. And that kindred critic enjoyed it none the less for a second +strain of irony, which he could not but take to himself.</p> + +<p>"I have not forgot anybody, Mr. Scarth."</p> + +<p>"But have you discovered who did the forgery?"</p> + +<p>"I always knew."</p> + +<p>"Have you tackled him?"</p> + +<p>"Days ago!"</p> + +<p>Scarth looked astounded. "And what's to happen to him, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know." The doctor gave a characteristic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> shrug. "It's not my +job; as it was, I'd done all the detective business, which I loathe."</p> + +<p>"I remember," cried Scarth. "I shall never forget the way you went +through that prescription, as though you had been looking over the +blighter's shoulder! Not an expert—modest fellow—pride that apes!"</p> + +<p>And again Dollar had to laugh at the way Mr. Jingle wagged his head, in +spite of the same slightly caustic undercurrent as before.</p> + +<p>"That was the easiest part of it," he answered, "although you make me +blush to say so. The hard part was what reviewers of novels call the +'motivation.'"</p> + +<p>"But you had that in Schickel's spite against Alt."</p> + +<p>"It was never quite strong enough to please me."</p> + +<p>"Then what was the motive, doctor?"</p> + +<p>"Young Laverick's death."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!"</p> + +<p>"I wish it were, Mr. Scarth."</p> + +<p>"But who is there in Winterwald who could wish to compass such a thing?"</p> + +<p>"There were more than two thousand visitors<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> over Christmas, I +understand," was the only reply.</p> + +<p>It would not do for Mostyn Scarth. He looked less than politely +incredulous, if not less shocked and rather more indignant than he need +have looked. But the whole idea was a reflection upon his care of the +unhappy youth. And he said so in other words, which resembled those of +Mr. Jingle only in their stiff staccato brevity.</p> + +<p>"Talk about 'motivation'!—I thank you, doctor, for that word—but I +should thank you even more to show me the thing itself in your theory. +And what a way to kill a fellow! What a roundabout, risky way!"</p> + +<p>"It was such a good forgery," observed the doctor, "that even Alt +himself could hardly swear that it was one."</p> + +<p>"Is <i>he</i> your man?" asked Scarth, in a sudden whisper, leaning forward +with lighted eyes.</p> + +<p>The crime doctor smiled enigmatically. "It's perhaps just as lucky for +him, Scarth, that at least he could have had nothing to do with the +second attempt upon his patient's life."</p> + +<p>"What second attempt?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The hand that forged the prescription, Scarth, with intent to poison +young Laverick, was the one that also filed the flaw in his toboggan, in +the hope of breaking his neck."</p> + +<p>"My dear doctor," exclaimed Mostyn Scarth, with a pained shake of the +head, "this is stark, staring madness!"</p> + +<p>"I only hope it was—in the would-be murderer," rejoined Dollar gravely. +"But he had a lot of method; he even did his bit of filing—a burglar +couldn't have done it better—in the domino Jack Laverick had just taken +off!"</p> + +<p>"How do you know he had taken it off? How do you know the whole job +wasn't one of Jack's drunken tricks?"</p> + +<p>"What whole job?"</p> + +<p>"The one you're talking about—the alleged tampering with his toboggan," +replied Scarth, impatiently.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I only thought you meant something more." Dollar made a pause. +"Don't you feel it rather hot in here, Scarth?"</p> + +<p>"Do you know, I do!" confessed the visitor, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> though it were Dollar's +house and breeding had forbidden him to volunteer the remark. "It's the +heat of this stove, with the window shut. Thanks so much, doctor!"</p> + +<p>And he wiped his strong, brown, beautifully shaven face; it was one of +those that require shaving more than once a day, yet it was always +glossy from the razor; and he burnished it afresh with a silk +handkerchief that would have passed through a packing-needle's eye.</p> + +<p>"And what are you really doing about this—monster?" he resumed, as who +should accept the monster's existence for the sake of argument.</p> + +<p>"Nothing, Scarth."</p> + +<p>"Nothing? You intend to do nothing at all?"</p> + +<p>Scarth had started, for the first time; but he started to his feet, +while he was about it, as though in overpowering disgust.</p> + +<p>"Not if he keeps out of England," replied the crime doctor, who had also +risen. "I wonder if he's sane enough for that?"</p> + +<p>Their four eyes met in a protracted scrutiny, without a flicker on +either side.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p> + +<p>"What I am wondering," said Scarth deliberately, "is whether this +Frankenstein effort of yours exists outside your own imagination, Doctor +Dollar."</p> + +<p>"Oh! he exists all right," declared the doctor. "But I am charitable +enough to suppose him mad—in spite of his method <i>and</i> his motive."</p> + +<p>"Did he tell you what that was?" asked Scarth with a sneer.</p> + +<p>"No; but Jack did. He seems to have been in the man's power—under his +influence—to an extraordinary degree. He had even left him a wicked sum +in a will made since he came of age. I needn't tell you that he has now +made another, revoking——"</p> + +<p>"No, you need not!" cried Mostyn Scarth, turning livid at the last +moment. "I've heard about enough of your mares' nests and mythical +monsters. I wish you good morning, and a more credulous audience next +time."</p> + +<p>"That I can count upon," returned the doctor at the door. "There's no +saying what they won't believe—at Scotland Yard!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>ONE POSSESSED</h3> + + +<p>Lieutenant-General Neville Dysone, R.E., V.C., was the first really +eminent person to consult the crime doctor by regular appointment in the +proper hours. Quite apart from the feat of arms which had earned him the +most coveted of all distinctions, the gigantic General, deep-chested and +erect, virile in every silver-woven hair of his upright head, filled the +tiny stage in Welbeck Street and dwarfed its antique properties, as no +being had done before. And yet his voice was tender and even tremulous +with the pathetic presage of a heartbreak under all.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar," he began at once, "I have come to see you about the +most tragic secret that a man can have. I would shoot myself for saying +what I have to say, did I not know that a patient's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> confidence is +sacred to any member of your profession—perhaps especially to an +alienist?"</p> + +<p>"I hope we are all alike as to that," returned Dollar, gently. He was +used to these sad openings.</p> + +<p>"I ought not to have said it; but it hardly is my secret, that's why I +feel such a cur!" exclaimed the General, taking his handkerchief to a +fine forehead and remarkably fresh complexion, as if to wipe away its +noble flush. "Your patient, I devoutly hope, will be my poor wife, who +really seems to me to be almost losing her reason"—but with that the +husband quite lost his voice.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps we can find it for her," said Dollar, despising the pert +professional optimism that told almost like a shot "It is a thing more +often mislaid than really lost."</p> + +<p>And the last of the other's weakness was finally overcome. A few weighty +questions, lightly asked and simply answered, and he was master of a +robust address, in which an occasional impediment only did further +credit to his delicacy.</p> + +<p>"No. I should say it was entirely a development of the last few months," +declared the General emphatically. "There was nothing of the kind in +our<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> twenty-odd years of India, nor yet in the first year after I +retired. All this—this trouble has come since I bought my house in the +pine country. It's called Valsugana, as you see on my card; but it +wasn't before we went there. We gave it the name because it struck us as +extraordinarily like the Austrian Tyrol, where—well, of which we had +happy memories, Doctor Dollar."</p> + +<p>His blue eyes winced as they flew through the open French window, up the +next precipice of bricks and mortar, to the beetling sky-line of other +roofs, all a little softened in the faint haze of approaching heat. It +cost him a palpable effort to bring them back to the little dark +consulting-room, with its cool slabs of aged oak and the summer fernery +that hid the hearth.</p> + +<p>"It's good of you to let me take my time, doctor, but yours is too +valuable to waste. All I meant was to give you an idea of our +surroundings, as I know they are held to count in such cases. We are +embedded in pines and firs. Some people find trees depressing, but after +India they were just what we wanted, and even now my wife won't let me +cut down one of them. Yet depression is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> no name for her state of mind; +it's nearer melancholy madness, and latterly she has become subject +to—to delusions—which are influencing her whole character and actions +in the most alarming way. We are finding it difficult, for the first +time in our lives, to keep servants; even her own nephew, who has come +to live with us, only stands it for my sake, poor boy! As for my +nerves—well, thank God I used to think I hadn't got any when I was in +the service; but it's a little hard to be—to be as we are—at our time +of life!" His hot face flamed. "What am I saying? It's a thousand times +harder on <i>her</i>! She had been looking forward to these days for years."</p> + +<p>Dollar wanted to wring one of the great brown, restless hands. Might he +ask the nature of the delusions?</p> + +<p>The General cried: "I'd give ten years of my life if I could tell you!"</p> + +<p>"You can tell me what form they take?"</p> + +<p>"I must, of course; it is what I came for, after all," the General +muttered. He raised his head and his voice together. "Well, for one +thing she's got herself a ferocious bulldog and a revolver."</p> + +<p>Dollar did not move a doctor's muscle. "I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> suppose there must be a dog +in the country, especially where there are no children. And if you must +have a dog, you can't do better than a bulldog. Is there any reason for +the revolver? Some people think it another necessity of the country."</p> + +<p>"It isn't with us—much less as she carries it."</p> + +<p>"Ladies in India get in the habit, don't they?"</p> + +<p>"She never did. And now——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, General? Has she it always by her?"</p> + +<p>"Night and day, on a curb bracelet locked to her wrist!"</p> + +<p>This time there were no professional pretenses. "I don't wonder you have +trouble with your servants," said Dollar, with as much sympathy as he +liked to show.</p> + +<p>"You mayn't see it when you come down, doctor, as I am going to entreat +you to do. She has her sleeves cut on purpose, and it is the smallest +you can buy. But I know it's always there—and always loaded."</p> + +<p>Dollar played a while with a queer plain steel ruler, out of keeping +with his other possessions, though it too had its history. It stood on +end before he let it alone and looked up.</p> + +<p>"General Dysone, there must be some sort of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> reason or foundation for +all this. Has anything alarming happened since you have been +at—Valsugana?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing that firearms could prevent"</p> + +<p>"Do you mind telling me what it is that has happened?"</p> + +<p>"We had a tragedy in the winter—a suicide on the place."</p> + +<p>"Ah!"</p> + +<p>"Her gardener hanged himself. Hers, I say, because the garden is my +wife's affair. I only paid the poor fellow his wages."</p> + +<p>"Well, come, General, that was enough to depress anybody——"</p> + +<p>"Yet she wouldn't have even that tree cut down—nor yet come away for a +change—not for as much as a night in town!"</p> + +<p>The interruption had come with another access of grim heat and further +use of the General's handkerchief. Dollar took up his steel tube of a +ruler and trained it like a spy-glass on the ink, with one eye as +carefully closed as if the truth lay at the bottom of the blue-black +well.</p> + +<p>"Was there any rhyme or reason for the suicide?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span></p> + +<p>"One was suggested that I would rather not repeat."</p> + +<p>The closed eye opened to find the blue pair fallen. "I think it might +help, General. Mrs. Dysone is evidently a woman of strong character, and +anything——"</p> + +<p>"She is, God knows!" cried the miserable man. "Everybody knows it +now—her servants especially—though nobody used to treat them better. +Why, in India—but we'll let it go at that, if you don't mind. I have +provided for the widow."</p> + +<p>Dollar bowed over his bit of steel tubing, but this time put it down so +hastily that it rolled off the table. General Dysone was towering over +him with shaking hand outstretched.</p> + +<p>"I can't say any more," he croaked. "You must come down and see her for +yourself; then you could do the talking—and I shouldn't feel such a +damned cur! By God, sir, it's awful, talking about one's own wife like +this, even for her own good! It's worse than I thought it would be. I +know it's different to a doctor—but—but you're an old soldierman as +well, aren't you? Didn't I hear you were in the war?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I was."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," cried the General, and his blue eyes lit up with simple +cunning, "that's where we met! We've run up against each other again, +and I've asked you down for this next week-end! Can you manage it? Are +you free? I'll write you a check for your own fee this minute, if you +like—there must be nothing of that kind down there. You don't mind +being Captain Dollar again, if that was it, to my wife?"</p> + +<p>His pathetic eagerness, his sensitive loyalty—even his sudden and +solicitous zest in the pious fraud proposed—made between them an +irresistible appeal. Dollar had to think; the rooms up-stairs were not +empty; but none enshrined a more interesting case than this sounded. On +the other hand, he had to be on his guard against a weakness for mere +human interest as apart from the esoteric principles of his practise. +People might call him an empiric—empiric he was proud to be, but it was +and must remain empiricism in one definite direction only. Psychical +research was not for him—and the Dysone story had a psychic flavor.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the end he said quite bluntly:</p> + +<p>"I hope you don't suggest a ghost behind all this, General?"</p> + +<p>"I? Lord, no! I don't believe in 'em," cried the warrior, with a nervous +laugh.</p> + +<p>"Does any member of your household?"</p> + +<p>"Not—now."</p> + +<p>"<i>Not</i> now?"</p> + +<p>"No. I think I am right in saying that." But something was worrying him. +"Perhaps it is also right," he continued, with the engaging candor of an +overthrown reserve, "and only fair—since I take it you are coming—to +tell you that there was a fellow with us who thought he saw things. But +it was all the most utter moonshine. He saw brown devils in flowing +robes, but what he'd taken before he saw them I can't tell you! He +didn't stay with me long enough for us to get to know each other. But he +wasn't just a servant, and it was before the poor gardener's affair. +Like so many old soldiers on the shelf, Doctor Dollar, I am writing a +book, and I run a secretary of sorts; now it's Jim Paley, a nephew of +ours; and thank God he has more sense."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yet even he gets depressed?"</p> + +<p>"He has had cause. If our own kith and kin behaved like one +possessed——" He stopped himself yet again; this time his hand found +Dollar's with a vibrant grip. "You will come, won't you? I can meet any +train on Saturday, or any other day that suits you better. I—for her +own sake, doctor—I sometimes feel it might be better if she went away +for a time. But you will come and see her for yourself?"</p> + +<p>Before he left it was a promise; a harder heart than John Dollar's would +have ended by making it, and putting the new case before all others when +the Saturday came. But it was not only his prospective patient whom the +crime doctor was now really anxious to see; he felt fascinated in +advance by the scene and every person of an indubitable drama, of which +at least one tragic act was already over.</p> + +<p>There was no question of meeting him at any station; the wealthy mother +of a still recent patient had insisted on presenting Doctor Dollar with +a fifteen-horse-power Talboys, which he had eventually accepted, and +even chosen for himself (with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> certain expert assistance), as an +incalculable contribution to the Cause. Already the car had vastly +enlarged his theater of work; and on every errand his heart was +lightened and his faith fortified by the wonderful case of the young +chauffeur who sat so upright at the wheel beside him. In the beginning +he had slouched there like the worst of his kind; it was neither precept +nor reprimand which had straightened his back and his look and all about +him. He was what John Dollar had always wanted—the unconscious patient +whose history none knew—who himself little dreamed that it was all +known to the man who treated him almost like a brother.</p> + +<p>The boy had been in prison for dishonesty; he was being sedulously +trusted, and so taught to trust himself. He had come in March, a sulky +and suspicious clod; and now in June he could talk cricket and sixpenny +editions from the Hounslow tram-lines to the wide white gate opening +into a drive through a Berkshire wood, with a house lurking behind it in +a mask of ivy, out of the sun.</p> + +<p>But in the drive General Dysone stepped back<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> into the doctor's life, +and, on being directed to the stables, he who had filled it for the last +hour drove out of it for the next twenty-four.</p> + +<p>"I wanted you to hear something at once from me," his host whispered +under the whispering trees, "lest it should be mentioned and take you +aback before the others. We've had another little tragedy—not a horror +like the last—yet in one way almost worse. My wife shot her own dog +dead last night!"</p> + +<p>Dollar put a curb upon his parting lips.</p> + +<p>"<i>In</i> the night?" he stood still to ask.</p> + +<p>"Well, between eleven and twelve."</p> + +<p>"In her own room, or where?"</p> + +<p>"Out-of-doors. Don't ask me how it happened; nobody seems to know, and +don't <i>you</i> know anything if she speaks of it herself."</p> + +<p>His fine face was streaming with perspiration; yet he seemed to have +been waiting quietly under the trees, he was not short of breath, and he +a big elderly man. Dollar asked no questions at all; they dropped the +subject there in the drive. Though the sun was up somewhere out of +sight, it was already late in the long June afternoon, and the guest was +taken straight to his room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span></p> + +<p>It was a corner room with one ivy-darkened casement overlooking a +shadowy lawn, the other facing a forest of firs and chestnuts on which +it was harder to look without an instinctive qualm. But the General +seemed to have forgot his tragedies, and for the moment his blue eyes +almost brightened the somber scene on which they dwelt with involuntary +pride.</p> + +<p>"Now don't you see where Tyrol comes in?" said he. "Put a mountain +behind those trees—and there <i>was</i> one the very first time we saw the +house! It was only a thunder-cloud, but for all the world it might have +been the Dolomites. And it took us back ... we had no other clouds +then!"</p> + +<p>Dollar found himself alone; found his things laid out and his shirt +studded, and a cozy on the brass hot-water can, with as much +satisfaction as though he had never stayed in a country house before. +Could there be so very much amiss in a household where they knew just +what to do for one, and just what to leave undone?</p> + +<p>And it was the same with all the other creature comforts; they meant +good servants, however short their service; and good servants do not +often<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> mean the mistress or the hostess whom Dollar had come prepared to +meet. He dressed in pleasurable doubt and enhanced excitement—and those +were his happiest moments at Valsugana.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dysone was a middle-aged woman who looked almost old, whereas the +General was elderly with all the appearance of early middle age. The +contrast was even more complete in more invidious particulars; but +Dollar took little heed of the poor lady's face, as a lady's face. Her +skin and eyes were enough for him; both were brown, with that almost +ultra-Indian tinge of so many Anglo-Indians. He was sensible at once of +an Oriental impenetrability.</p> + +<p>With her conversation he could not quarrel; what there was of it was +crisp, unstudied, understanding. And the little dinner did her the kind +of credit for which he was now prepared; but she only once took charge +of the talk, and that was rather sharply to change a subject into which +she had been the first to enter.</p> + +<p>How it had cropped up, Dollar could never think, especially as his +former profession and rank duly obtained throughout his visit. He had +even warned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> his chauffeur that he was not the doctor there; it could +not have been he himself who started it, but somebody did, as somebody +always does when there is one topic to avoid. It was probably the nice +young nephew who made the first well-meaning remark upon the general +want of originality, with reference to something or other under +criticism at the moment; but it was neither he nor Dollar who laid it +down that monkeys were the most arrant imitators in nature—except +criminals; and it certainly was the General who said that nothing would +surprise him less than if another fellow went and hanged himself in +their wood. Then it was that Mrs. Dysone put her foot down—and Dollar +never forgot her look.</p> + +<p>Almost for the first time it made him think of her revolver. It was out +of sight; and full as her long sleeves were, it was difficult to believe +that one of them could conceal the smallest firearm made; but a tiny +gold padlock did dangle when she raised her glass of water; and at the +end of dinner there was a second little scene, this time without words, +which went far to dispel any doubt arising in his mind.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span></p> + +<p>He was holding the door open for Mrs. Dysone, and she stood a moment on +the threshold, peering into the far corners of the room. He saw what it +was she had forgot—saw it come back to her as she turned away, with +another look worth remembering.</p> + +<p>Either the General missed that, or the anxieties of the husband were now +deliberately sunk in the duties of the host. He had got up some Jubilee +port in the doctor's honor; they sat over it together till it was nearly +time for bed. Dollar took little, but the other grew a shade more +rubicund, and it was good to hear him chat without restraint or an +apparent care. Yet it was strange as well; again he drifted into +criminology, and his own after-dinner defect of sensibility only made +his hearer the more uncomfortable.</p> + +<p>Of course, he felt, it was partly out of compliment to himself as crime +doctor; but the ugly subject had evidently an unhealthy fascination of +its own for the fine full-blooded man. Not that it seemed an inveterate +foible; the expert observer thought it rather the reflex attraction of +the strongest possible horror and repulsion, and took it the more +seriously on that account. Of two evils<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> it seemed to him the less to +allow himself to be pumped on professional generalities. It was +distinctly better than encouraging the General to ransack his long +experience for memories of decent people who had done dreadful deeds. +Best of all to assure him that even those unfortunates might have +outlived their infamy under the scientific treatment of a more +enlightened day.</p> + +<p>If they must talk crime, let it be the Cure of Crime! So the doctor had +his heart-felt say; and the General listened even more terribly than he +had talked; asking questions in whispers, and waiting breathless for the +considered reply. It was the last of these that took most answering.</p> + +<p>"And which, doctor, for God's sake, which would you have most hope of +curing: a man or a woman?"</p> + +<p>But Dollar would only say: "I shouldn't despair of <i>anybody</i>, who had +done <i>anything</i>, if there was still an intelligence to work upon; but +the more of that the better."</p> + +<p>And the General said hardly another word, except "God bless you!" +outside the spare-room door. His wife had been seen no more.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span></p> + +<p>But Dollar saw her in every corner of his delightful quarters; and the +acute contrast that might have unsettled an innocent mind had the +opposite effect on his. There were electric lamps in all the right +places; there were books and biscuits, a glass of milk, even a miniature +decanter and a bottle of Schweppes. He sighed as he wound his watch and +placed it in the little stand on the table beside the bed; but he was +only wondering exactly what he was going to discover before he wound it +up again.</p> + +<p>Outside one open window the merry crickets were playing castanets in +those dreadful trees. It was the other blind that he drew up; and on the +lawn the dying and reviving glow of a cigarette gave glimpses of a white +shirt-front, a black satin tie, the drooping brim of a Panama hat. It +was the nice young nephew, who had retreated before the Jubilee port. +And Dollar was still wondering on what pretext he could go down and join +him, when his knock came at the door.</p> + +<p>"Only to see if you'd everything you want," explained young Paley, +ingenuously disingenuous; and shut the door behind him before the +invitation to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> enter was out of the doctor's mouth. But he shut it very +softly, trod like a burglar, and excused himself with bated breath: "You +are the first person who has stayed with us since I've been here, +Captain Dollar!" And his wry young smile was as sad as anything in the +sad house.</p> + +<p>"You amaze me!" cried Dollar. Indeed, it was the flank attack of a new +kind of amazement. "I should have thought—" and his glance made a +lightning tour of the luxurious room.</p> + +<p>"I know," said Paley, nodding. "I think they must have laid themselves +out for visitors at the start. But none come now. I wish they did! It's +a house that wants them."</p> + +<p>"You are rather a small party, aren't you?"</p> + +<p>"We are rather a grim party! And yet my old uncle is absolutely the +finest man I ever struck."</p> + +<p>"I don't wonder that you admire him."</p> + +<p>"You don't know what he is, Captain Dollar. He got the V.C. when he was +my age in Burmah, but he deserves one for almost every day of his +ordinary home life."</p> + +<p>Dollar made no remark; the young fellow offered<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> him a cigarette, and +was encouraged to light another himself. He required no encouragement to +talk.</p> + +<p>"The funny thing is that he's not really my uncle. I'm <i>her</i> nephew; and +she's a wonderful woman, too, in her way. She runs the whole place like +a book; she's thrown away here. But—I can't help saying it—I should +like her better if I didn't love him!"</p> + +<p>"Talking of books," said Dollar, "the General told me he was writing +one, and that you were helping him?"</p> + +<p>"He didn't tell you what it was about?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Then I mustn't. I wish I could. It's to be the last word on a certain +subject, but he won't have it spoken about. That's one reason why it's +getting on his nerves."</p> + +<p>"<i>Is</i> it his book?"</p> + +<p>"It and everything. Doesn't he remind you of a man sitting on a +powder-barrel? If he weren't what he is, there'd be an explosion every +day. And there never is one—no matter what happens!"</p> + +<p>Dollar watched the pale youth swallowing his smoke.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Do they often talk about crime?"</p> + +<p>"Always! They can't keep off it. And Aunt Essie always changes the +subject as though she hadn't been every bit as bad as uncle. Of course +they've had a good lot to make them morbid. I suppose you heard about +poor Dingle, the last gardener?"</p> + +<p>"Only just"</p> + +<p>"He was the last man you would ever have suspected of such a thing. It +was in those trees just outside." The crickets made extra merry as he +paused. "They didn't find him for a day and a night!"</p> + +<p>"Look here! I'm not going to let you talk about it," said Dollar. But +the good-humored rebuff cost him an effort. He wanted to hear all about +the suicide, but not from this worn lad with an old man's smile. He knew +and liked the type too well.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry, Captain Dollar." Jim Paley looked sorry. "Yet, it's all very +well! I don't suppose the General told you what happened last night?"</p> + +<p>"Well, yes, he did, but without going into any particulars."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span></p> + +<p>And now the doctor made no secret of his curiosity; this was a matter on +which he could not afford to forego enlightenment. Nor was it like +raking up an old horror; it would do the boy more good than harm to +speak of this last affair.</p> + +<p>"I can't tell you much about it myself," said he. "I was wondering if I +could, just now on the lawn. That's where it happened, you know."</p> + +<p>"I didn't know."</p> + +<p>"Well, it was, and the funny thing is that I was there at the time. I +used to go out with the dog for a cigarette when they turned in; last +night I was foolish enough to fall asleep in a chair on the lawn. I had +been playing tennis all the afternoon, and had a long bike-ride both +ways. Well, all I know is that I woke up thinking I'd been shot; and +there was my aunt with a revolver she insists on carrying—and poor +Muggins as dead as a door-nail."</p> + +<p>"Did she say it was an accident?"</p> + +<p>"She behaved as if it had been; she was all over the poor dead brute."</p> + +<p>"Rather a savage dog, wasn't it?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I never thought so. But the General had no use for him—and no wonder! +Did he tell you he had bitten him in the shoulder?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Well, he did, only the other day. But that's the old General all over. +He never told me till the dog was dead. I shouldn't be surprised if——"</p> + +<p>"Yes?"</p> + +<p>"——if my aunt hadn't been in it somehow. Poor old Muggins was such a +bone between them!"</p> + +<p>"You don't suppose he'd ended by turning on her?"</p> + +<p>"Hardly. He was like a kitten with her, poor brute!"</p> + +<p>Another cigarette was lighted; more inhaling went on unchecked.</p> + +<p>"Was Mrs. Dysone by herself out there—but for you?"</p> + +<p>"Well—yes."</p> + +<p>"Does that mean she wasn't?"</p> + +<p>"Upon my word, I don't know!" said young Paley, frankly. "It sounds most +awful rot, but just for a moment I thought I saw somebody in a sort of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> +surplice affair. But I can only swear to Aunt Essie, and she was in her +dressing-gown, and it wasn't white."</p> + +<p>Dollar did not go to bed at all. He sat first at one window, watching +the black trees turn blue, and eventually a variety of sunny greens; +then at the other, staring down at the pretty scene of a deed ugly in +itself, but uglier in the peculiar quality of its mystery.</p> + +<p>A dog; only a dog, this time; but the woman's own dog! There were two +new sods on the place where he supposed it had lain withering....</p> + +<p>But who or what was it that these young men had seen—the one the +General had told him about, and this obviously truthful lad whom he +himself had questioned? "Brown devils in flowing robes" was perhaps only +the old soldier's picturesque phrase; they might have turned brown in +his Indian mind; but what of Jim Paley's "somebody in a sort of surplice +affair"? Was that "body" brown as well?</p> + +<p>In the wood of worse omen the gay little birds tuned up to deaf ears at +the open window. And a cynical soloist went so far as to start saying,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> +"Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty!" in a liquid contralto. But a little +sharp shot, fired two nights and a day before, was the only sound to get +across the spare-room window-sill....</p> + +<p>The bathroom was next door; in that physically admirable house there was +boiling hot water at six o'clock in the morning; the servants made tea +when they heard it running; and the garden before breakfast was almost a +delight. It might have been an Eden ... it <i>was</i> ... with the serpent +still in the grass!</p> + +<p>Blinds went up like eyelids under bushy brows of ivy. The grass remained +gray with dew; there was not enough sun anywhere, though the whole sky +beamed. Dollar wandered indoors the way the General had taken him the +day before. It was the way through his library. Libraries are always +interesting; a man's bookcase is sometimes more interesting than the man +himself, sometimes the one existing portrait of his mind. Dollar spent +the best part of an absorbing hour without taking a single volume from +its place. But this was partly because those he would have dipped into +were under glass and lock and key. And partly it was due to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> more +accessible distractions crowning that very piece of ostensible antiquity +which contained the books, and of which the top drawer drew out into the +General's desk.</p> + +<p>The distractions were a peculiarly repulsive gilded idol, squatting with +its tongue out, as if at the amateur author, and a heathen sword on the +wall behind it. Nothing more; but Dollar also had served in India in his +day, and his natural interest was whetted by a certain smattering of +lore. He was still standing on a newspaper and a chair when a voice +hailed him in no hospitable tone.</p> + +<p>"Really, Captain Dollar! I should have asked the servants for a ladder +while I was about it!"</p> + +<p>Of course it was Mrs. Dysone, and she was not even pretending to look +pleased. He jumped down with an apology which softened not a line of her +sallow face and bony figure.</p> + +<p>"It was an outrage," he owned. "But I did stand on a paper to save the +chair. I say, though, I never noticed it was this week's <i>Field</i>."</p> + +<p>Really horrified at his own behavior, he did his best to smooth and wipe +away his footmarks on the wrapper of the paper. But those subtle eyes, +like<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> blots of ink on old parchment, were no longer trained on the +offender, who missed yet another look that might have helped him.</p> + +<p>"My husband's study is rather holy ground," was the lady's last word. "I +only came in myself because I thought he was here."</p> + +<p>Mercifully, days do not always go on as badly as they begin; more +strangely, this one developed into the dullest and most conventional of +country-house Sundays.</p> + +<p>General Dysone was himself not only dull, but even a little stiff, as +became a good Briton who had said too much to too great a stranger +overnight. His natural courtesy had become conspicuous; he played +punctilious host all day; and Dollar was allowed to feel that, if he had +come down as a doctor, he was staying on as an ordinary guest, and in a +house where guests were expected to observe the Sabbath. So they all +marched off together to the village church, where the General trumpeted +the tune in his own octave, read the lessons, and kept waking up during +the sermon. There were the regulation amenities with other devout gentry +of the neighborhood; there was the national Sunday<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> sirloin at the +midday meal, and no more untoward topics to make the host's forehead +glisten or the hostess gleam and lower. In the afternoon the whole party +inspected every animal and vegetable on the premises; and after tea the +visitor's car came round.</p> + +<p>Originally there had been much talk of his staying till the Monday; the +General went through the form of pressing him once more, but was not +backed up by his wife, who had shadowed them suspiciously all day. Nor +did he comment on this by so much as a sidelong glance at Dollar, or +contrive to get another word with him alone. And the crime doctor, +instead of making any excuse to remain and penetrate these new +mysteries, showed a sensitive alacrity to leave.</p> + +<p>Of the nephew, who looked terribly depressed at his departure, he had +seen something more, and had even asked two private favors. One, that he +would keep out of that haunted garden for the next few nights, and try +going to bed earlier; the other an odd request for an almost middle-aged +man about town, but rather flattering to the young fellow. It was for +the loan of his Panama, so that Dollar's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> hatter might see if he could +not get him as good a one. Paley's was the kind that might be carried up +a sleeve, like the modern handkerchief; he explained that the old +General had given it him.</p> + +<p>Dollar tried it on almost as soon as the car was out of sight of +Valsugana—while his young chauffeur was still wondering what he had +done to make the governor sit behind. It was funny of him, just when a +chap might have been telling him a thing or two that he had heard down +there at the coachman's place. But it was all the more interesting when +they got back to town at seven in the evening, and he was ordered to +fill up with petrol and be back at nine, to make the same trip over +again.</p> + +<p>"I needn't ask you," the doctor added, "to hold your tongue about +anything you may have heard at General Dysone's. I know you will, +Albert."</p> + +<p>And almost by lighting-up time they were shoulder to shoulder on the +road once more.</p> + +<p>But at Valsugana it was another dark night, and none too easy to find +one's way about the place on the strength of a midsummer day's +acquaintance. And for the first time Dollar was glad the dog of the +house was dead, as he finished a circuitous<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> approach by stealing +through the farther wood, toward the jagged lumps of light in the +ivy-strangled bedroom windows; already everything was dark down-stairs.</p> + +<p>Here were the pale new sods; they could just be seen, though his feet +first felt their inequalities. His cigarette was the one pin-prick of +light in all the garden, though each draw brought the buff brim of Jim +Paley's Panama within an inch of his eyes, its fine texture like coarse +matting at the range. And the chair in which Jim Paley had sat smoking +this time last night, and dozing the night before when the shot +disturbed him, was just where he expected his shins to find it; the +wickers squeaked as John Dollar took his place.</p> + +<p>Less need now not to make a sound; but he made no more than he could +help, for the night was still and sultry, without any of the garden +noises of a night ago. It was as though nature had stopped her orchestra +in disgust at the plot and counterplot brewing on her darkened stage. +The cigarette-end was thrown away; it might have been a stone that fell +upon the grass, and Dollar could almost hear it sizzling in the dew. His +aural nerves were tuned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> to the last pitch of sensitive acknowledgment; +a fly on the drooping Panama-brim would not have failed to "scratch the +brain's coat of curd." ... How much less the swift and furtive footfall +that came kissing the wet lawn at last!</p> + +<p>It was more than a footfall; there was a following swish of some long +garment trailing through the wet. It all came near; it all stopped dead. +Dollar had nodded heavily as if in sleep; had jerked his head up higher; +seemed to be dropping off again in greater comfort.</p> + +<p>The footfalls and the swish came on like thunder now. But now his +eyelids were only drooping like the brim above them; in the broad light +of their abnormal perceptivity, it was as if his own eyes threw a +dreadful halo round the figure they beheld. It was a swaddled figure, +creeping into monstrosity, crouching early for its spring. It had draped +arms extended, with some cloth or band that looped and tightened at each +stride: on the rounded shoulders bobbed the craning head and darkened +face of General Dysone.</p> + +<p>In his last stride he swerved, as if to get as much behind the chair as +its position under the tree<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> permitted. The cloth clapped as it came +taut over Dollar's head, but was not actually round his neck when he +ducked and turned, and hit out and up with all his might. He felt the +rasp of a fifteen-hours' beard, heard the click of teeth; the lawn +quaked, and white robes settled upon a senseless heap, as the plumage on +a murdered pigeon.</p> + +<p>Dollar knelt over him and felt his pulse, held an electric lamp to eyes +that opened, and quickly something else to the dilated nostrils.</p> + +<p>"O Jim!" shuddered a voice close at hand. It was shrill yet broken, a +cry of horror, but like no voice he knew.</p> + +<p>He jumped up to face the General's wife.</p> + +<p>"It's not Jim, Mrs. Dysone. It's I—Dollar. He'll soon be all right!"</p> + +<p>"Captain—Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"No—doctor, nowadays—he called me down as one himself. And now I've +come back on my own responsibility, and—put him under chloroform; but I +haven't given him much; for God's sake let us speak plainly while we +can!"</p> + +<p>She was on her knees, proving his words without uttering one. Still +kneeling speechless, she leaned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> back while he continued: "You know what +he is as well as I do, Mrs. Dysone; you may thank God a doctor has found +him out before the police! Monomania is not their business—but neither +are you the one to cope with it. You have shielded your husband as only +a woman will shield a man; now you must let him come to me."</p> + +<p>His confidence was taking some effect; but she ignored the hands that +would have helped her to her feet; and her own were locked in front of +her, but not in supplication.</p> + +<p>"And what can any of you do for him," she cried fiercely—"except take +him away from me?"</p> + +<p>"I will only answer for myself. I would control him as you can not, and +I would teach him to control himself if man under God can do it. I am a +criminal alienist, Mrs. Dysone, as your husband knew before he came to +consult me on elaborate pretenses into which we needn't go. He trusted +me enough to ask me down here; in my opinion, he was feeling his way to +greater trust, in the teeth of his terrible obsession, but last night he +said more than he meant to say, so to-day he wouldn't say a word. I only +guessed his secret this morning—when<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> you guessed I had! It would be +safe with me against the world. But how can I take the responsibility of +keeping it if he remains at large as he is now?"</p> + +<p>"You can not," said Mrs. Dysone. "I am the only one."</p> + +<p>Her tone was dreamy and yet hard and fatalistic; the arms in the wide +dressing-gown sleeves were still tightly locked. Something brought +Dollar down again beside the senseless man, bending over him in keen +alarm.</p> + +<p>"He'll be himself again directly—quite himself, I shouldn't wonder! He +may have forgot what has happened; he mustn't find me here to remind +him. Something he will have to know, and you are the one to break it to +him, and then to persuade him to come to me. But you won't find that so +easy, Mrs. Dysone, if he sees how I tricked him. He had much better +think it <i>was</i> your nephew. My motor's in the lane behind these trees; +let him think I never went away at all, that we connived and I am +holding myself there at your disposal. It would be true—wouldn't +it—after this? I'll wait night and day until I know!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar," said Mrs. Dysone, when she had risen without aid and +set him to the trees, "you may or may not know the worst about my poor +husband, but you shall know it now about me. I wish you to take +this—and keep it! You have had two escapes to-night."</p> + +<p>She bared the wrist from which the smallest of revolvers dangled; he +felt it in the darkness—and left it dangling.</p> + +<p>"I heard you had one. He told me. And I thought you carried it for your +own protection!" cried Dollar, seeing into the woman at last.</p> + +<p>"No. It was not for that"—and he knew that she was smiling through her +tears. "I did save his life—when my poor dog saved Jim's—but I carried +this to save the secret I am going to trust to you!"</p> + +<p>Dollar would only take her hand. "You wouldn't have shot me, or any +man," he assured her. "But," he added to himself among the trees, "what +a fool I was to forget that <i>they</i> never killed women!"</p> + +<p>It turned almost cold beside the motor in the lane; the doctor gave his +boy a little brandy, and together they tramped up and down, talking +sport and fiction by the small hour together. The stars<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> slipped out of +the sky, the birds began, and the same cynic shouted "Pretty, pretty, +pretty!" at the top of its strong contralto. At long last there came +that other sound for which Dollar had never ceased listening. And he +turned back into the haunted wood with Jim Paley.</p> + +<p>The poor nephew—still stunned calm—was as painfully articulate as a +young bereaved husband. He spoke of General Dysone as of a man already +dead, in the gentlest of past tenses. He was dead enough to the boy. +There had been an appalling confession—made as coolly, it appeared, as +Paley repeated it.</p> + +<p>"He thought <i>I</i> knocked him down, and I had to let him think so! Aunt +Essie insisted; she <i>is</i> a wonder, after all! It made him tell me things +I simply can't believe.... Yet he showed me a rope just like it—meant +for me!"</p> + +<p>"Do you mean just like the one that—hanged the gardener?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. <i>He</i> did it, so he swears ... <i>afterward</i>. He'll tell you +himself—he wants to tell you. He says he first ... I can't put my +tongue to it!" The lapse into the present tense had made him human.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Like the Thugs?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—like that sect of fiendish fanatics who went about strangling +everybody they met! <i>They</i> were what his book was about. How did you +know?"</p> + +<p>"That's Bhowanee, their goddess, on top of his bureau, and he has +Sleeman and all the other awful literature locked up underneath. As a +study for a life of sudden idleness, in the depths of the country, it +was enough to bring on temporary insanity. And the strong man gone wrong +goes and does what the rest of us only get on our nerves!"</p> + +<p>Dollar felt his biceps clutched and clawed, and the two stood still +under more irony in a gay contralto.</p> + +<p>"Temporary, did you say? Only <i>temporary</i>?" the boy was faltering.</p> + +<p>"I hope so, honestly. You see, it was just on that one point ... and +even there ... I believe he <i>did</i> want his wife out of the way, and for +her own sake, too!" said Dollar, with a sympathetic tremor of his own.</p> + +<p>"But do you know what he's saying? He means to tell the whole world now, +and let them hang him, and serve him right—he says! And he's as sane<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> +as we are now—only he might have been through a Turkish bath!"</p> + +<p>"More signs!" cried Dollar, looking up at the brightening sky. "But we +won't allow that. It would undo nothing and he has made all the +reparation.</p> + +<p>" ... Come, Paley! I want to take him back with me in the car. It's broad +daylight."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>THE DOCTOR'S ASSISTANT</h3> + + +<p>The doctor was coping with his Sunday meal when the telephone went off +in the next room. On his ears the imperious summons never fell without a +thrill; in his sight, the tulip-shaped receiver became a live thing +trumpeting for help; and he would answer the call himself, at any hour +of the day or night. It was necessary at night, with the Bartons asleep +in the basement like a family in a vault, but it was just the same when +they were all on duty, as at the present moment. Back went the +Cromwellian chair, at the head of the bare and solitary trestle table. +An excited personage, who might have been just outside the window, was +expeditiously appeased in monosyllables. And Dollar returned with an +appetite to what had been set before him.</p> + +<p>"Send Bobby round to the garage, Barton, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> order the car at once. He +can tell Albert I shall be ready as soon as he is, but to take his +headlights and fill up with petrol." This was repeated with paternal +severity in the wings. "Now, Barton, my little red road-book, and see if +you can find Pax Monktons in the wilds of Surrey. It can't be more than +a hamlet. Try the Cobham country if it's not in the index."</p> + +<p>This took longer—took a survey map and two pairs of eyes before Pax +Monktons Chase was discovered in microscopic print, and the light green +peppered with dots signifying timber three hundred feet above sea-level.</p> + +<p>"Never heard of it in my life before," said Dollar, as he laced brown +shoes before his coffee. "Or of the man either, or his double-barreled +name for that matter. You might see if there's a Dale-Bulmer in <i>Who's +Who</i>."</p> + +<p>But again Barton was unsuccessful; and here his services ended, though +through no fault of his own, or failure of unselfish zeal for one of +those more than probable adventures which made him hate the chauffeur +who was always in them, and curse the duties that kept other people out.</p> + +<p>"Will you take your flask, sir?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Lord, no! I'm not going to the North Pole."</p> + +<p>"Or your—or one of those revolvers, sir?"</p> + +<p>"What on earth for? Besides, they're not mine; they ought to be in the +Black Museum at Scotland Yard." The nucleus of a branch exhibition was +forming itself in Welbeck Street. "Don't you give way to nerves, Barton! +I'm only going down to see a man who seems anxious to see me, but I +shouldn't be going to him if we had anybody up-stairs. You three make an +afternoon of it somewhere; never mind if I'm back first; go out and +enjoy yourselves."</p> + +<p>And he was off as if on a deliberate jaunt; but an involuntary chuckle +in the voice over the telephone, the hint of a surprise, the possibility +of a trick, made lively thinking after the doldrums of the dog-days; and +the fine September afternoon seemed expressly ordered for motorists with +time upon their hands. Dollar had only been thinking so when the call +came through, to supply just the object which gives a run its zest, and +nothing else mattered in the least. However frivolous the end and +errand, the means and the meantime were so much to the good on such a +day.</p> + +<p>It was warm, yet delightfully keen at thirty miles<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> an hour; clear as +crystal within rifle-shot, and deliciously hazy in the distance; the +bronze upon the trees seldom warming to a premature red, often lapsing +into the liquid greens of midsummer; but all the way an autumnal smear +of silver in the sunlight. Dollar divided his mind between a sensuous +savoring of the heavenly country, and more or less romantic speculations +on the case in store. Some people's notions of a crime doctor's +functions were so much wider even than his own; ten months out of the +twelve, he could not have afforded to come so far afield without a +distastefully definite foreword about fees.</p> + +<p>This afternoon he was prepared to do almost anything for next to +nothing: and after twenty sedentary miles he was on his legs as often as +not in the next two or three, asking his way at likely lodges, or from +strolling bands of shaven yokels, all Sunday collars and cigarettes.</p> + +<p>"Pax Monktons Chase?" at last said one who seemed to have heard the name +before. "Straight as ever you can go, and the first lodge on the left. +But there's no one there."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No one there!" echoed Dollar. "Do you mean the place is empty?"</p> + +<p>"I believe there's workmen there on week-days, but you won't find +anybody now, unless the chap that's bought it's motored over."</p> + +<p>"Isn't he living there, then?"</p> + +<p>"Not yet; there's alterations being made; and I don't know where he does +live, or anything at all about him, except that he motors over sometimes +on a Sunday."</p> + +<p>Dollar felt dashed until he remembered to appreciate one of the few +possibilities for which he had not come quite prepared. There was some +promise in a surprise thus early and so complete. But it made Pax +Monktons Chase fall a little flat when found. It robbed the dreary lodge +of all its value as an eye-opener; it made the chase itself look vast +and desolate for nothing, and a noble pile of seasoned stone fling but +drab turrets and ineffective battlements against a silver sky, which the +sun had ceased to polish in the last tortuous mile.</p> + +<p>It was all the pleasanter to find a ruddy, genial, bearded face, mounted +on a spotted tie that went<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> twice round a nineteen-inch neck, smiling a +welcome under the entrance arch. The man introduced himself as +Dale-Bulmer, bolting a mouthful made for rolling on the tongue. Dollar +was much taken with the humor and simplicity of his address and bearing. +A smart chauffeur waited with a plutocratic car in the sweep of the +drive. And there was no third sign of life about the place.</p> + +<p>"Awfully good of you to come," said Dale-Bulmer, with apologetic warmth. +"I thought you might, from what I'd heard of you, and you seemed to jump +at it when I rang you up. I haven't known anybody take so kindly to a +trip since I left the bush."</p> + +<p>"An Australian?" asked the doctor, with all a doctor's readiness to make +talk; but he was more curious than ever to learn the secret of his +summons.</p> + +<p>"Yes! I come from that enlightened land, where Labor runs the show and +Women have the Vote. In fact," the big man added, with the fat chuckle +heard over the telephone, "that's precisely why I <i>have</i> come from +Australia—as I was fool enough to say the other night at a meeting in +these parts. But I seem to have jumped out of the frying-pan into the +fire."</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus5.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>There was no sign of life</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I'm sorry to hear that," observed Dollar, with polite forbearance.</p> + +<p>"Well, not quite into the fire, as it happens," said Dale-Bulmer, +chuckling again in his noble neck. "Come inside, and you'll see." He led +the way into a broad central corridor, choked with ladders and builders' +tools, pipes and tubing, curtain-rods, and a stack of boards; but a +model of order compared with the chaos visible through an open door at +which he paused. Here were more bare joists than navigable floor, and a +forest of scaffolding therefrom to the crisscrossed plaster ceiling. +"Look you here!" said the man from Australia, and pointed to a heap of +shavings on a remnant of the floor.</p> + +<p>"The British workman's such a careless dog," sighed Dollar, shaking a +sententious head, for a box of vestas had been spilt about the place.</p> + +<p>"British workman be hanged!" cried the other bluntly. "The British +workman's got a job here that will keep him in beer and betting-money +till Christmas, and as much longer as he can spin it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> out. This is the +little game of another sporting type—the British lady burning for the +vote!"</p> + +<p>"So that's it! But are you sure?" asked Dollar, though he wanted to ask +if that was all.</p> + +<p>"Certain. I met a flaming brace of 'em on bicycles, just outside my +boundary. This is what I was to get for speaking out about them the +other night."</p> + +<p>"I don't see their literature, and I can't smell their paraffin."</p> + +<p>"It's in that bottle on the mantelpiece. Something must have scared them +at the last moment—all but one sportswoman."</p> + +<p>"What about her?"</p> + +<p>"I've got her," said Dale-Bulmer, with sepulchral excitement.</p> + +<p>"Got her prisoner?"</p> + +<p>"I should hope so! Why, I caught her on the very point of setting fire +to that very heap of shavings—and me without a hose-pipe in the house! +Those are her matches on the floor; <i>she</i> wasn't going to turn tail till +she'd done her job—and didn't till I nearly trod on it! You could +hardly expect me to bow her out of the front door after that!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p> + +<p>Dollar could only stare into the jovial face wreathed in rubicund grins, +but no longer free from a certain serio-comic compunction and concern.</p> + +<p>"But, my dear sir——"</p> + +<p>"Don't pitch into me!" pleaded Dale-Bulmer, pathetically. "I had to do +something; if I hadn't thought of you, and one or two things I've heard +about you, doctor, I should only have telephoned to the police; and +what's the good of putting these young women in the jug, to be poured +out again within a week? I heard you ran a nursing-home for criminals, +worth all the prisons in the world."</p> + +<p>"But I don't run people into it," said the doctor; "they've got to come +in of their own free will. What have you done with this young woman?"</p> + +<p>"I? Nothing; it's her own doing entirely. She chose her cover—I only +turned the key."</p> + +<p>"You've locked her up in some room?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—more or less—rather more."</p> + +<p>And Dale-Bulmer laughed a rather nervous, guilty laugh.</p> + +<p>"Up-stairs somewhere?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—look you here! She was picking up those matches when I spotted her +from this door,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> and out she streaked through that one over there. Come +and have a look at her line of country, doctor."</p> + +<p>It led into an anteroom or inner hall, or the well of some staircase +still to come, with a lashed ladder towering in its midst, but not quite +reaching a skeleton landing of yawning joists. Dale-Bulmer gazed aloft, +wagging a horizontal beard.</p> + +<p>"Surely she didn't go up there?" said Dollar.</p> + +<p>"Like a lamplighter, doctor! I went the way we'll both go now, if it's +all the same to you."</p> + +<p>A fine forked staircase bore them from the lower corridor to its +counterpart above. And here the leader trod gently, a finger laid across +his lips.</p> + +<p>"That's the room," he whispered, pointing to a shut door in a side +passage. "I—I almost think I'll leave her to you, doctor. It's not +locked—not the door."</p> + +<p>"I thought she was your prisoner?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—but you'll see where she's hidden herself. I did turn <i>that</i> key, +doctor, but that's all I did. Still, I think I'd rather you let her +out."</p> + +<p>There was nothing facetious in his droll air of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> guilt; he seemed really +rather ashamed of his impetuous measures, as if long in doubt as to +their gallantry, and abashed by the unspoken criticisms of the man whom +he had brought so far afield on the spur of a flustering moment. But the +truth was that Dollar did not blame him in the least, as he turned the +handle softly, and heard a pusillanimous step retreating down the +corridor.</p> + +<p>It was a light and lofty room, with a broad bay-window overlooking the +park; and in the bay a window-seat forming a coffer, which had been +broken open from within; and just clear of the splinters, her hands +raised to her disheveled hair, hat awry and country clothes begrimed, a +young woman risen like Aphrodite from the foam. She had been gazing out +as she put herself to rights; but at the opening of the door she turned +with a light disdain, and the pair of them stood rooted to the floor.</p> + +<p>"Lady—Vera!" he could only gasp.</p> + +<p>She made him an abrupt little bow; then her head went back to the +truculent angle necessitated by a jelly-bag hat worn almost as a mask; +and her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> eyes hung under the brim like great blue rain-drops, grim and +gleaming, but with little of his blank amazement, and nothing of the +shame that shook his soul.</p> + +<p>"No wonder you would never see me!" he muttered more to himself than to +her. "Not a word even when I wrote—and I wondered what I'd done! I +thought of heaps of things—but I never thought of this!"</p> + +<p>She shook her head as abruptly as she had bowed; the blue rain-drops +looked frozen where they hung, but the firm lips parted impulsively. +Instinct prepared him for something inconceivable. But her +self-restraint was a lesson and a reproof; and, in laying it to heart +and listening to what she did say he for the moment ceased from +wondering what it was that she had just kept back—what charge she had +deferred against him.</p> + +<p>"Tell me one thing, Doctor Dollar." Her voice was all that it had been +in other emergencies, only colder by some degrees. "Have you been +following me, or is this pure chance?"</p> + +<p>"Not chance—pure Fate!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Did you dog me down here, or did you not?"</p> + +<p>"Not consciously. Do I look as if I had?"</p> + +<p>"You look as if you'd seen a ghost," she told him, with a sudden twinkle +of the big blue drops.</p> + +<p>"So I have!" he cried in passionate earnest. "I've seen the ghost of +everything I held most——"</p> + +<p>"Thank you," she said quietly, when he had checked himself on her model. +"I know what you must think—what you really have a special right to +think—after two years ago. Do be generous and don't say it! This isn't +altogether fun for me, you know, much less after being buried alive for +hours!" She just turned her head toward the broken window-seat, and his +eyes devoured the light upon her profile. "What's going to happen to me? +Is my natural enemy a friend of yours? Has he sent for the police?"</p> + +<p>"No—for me instead."</p> + +<p>"Did he know who it was at sight?"</p> + +<p>"He didn't, and he doesn't, and he never shall unless you tell him!" +exclaimed Dollar vehemently. "O Vera, when I was longing to see you, to +warn you against your enemies, that you should go the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> way to put +yourself more than ever in their power!"</p> + +<p>A glitter under the tilted hat had unconsciously rebuked an unconscious +liberty; yet once this man had begged this woman to marry him, and once +she had practically said she would but for the burden on her soul. +Ceremony, at least, they had foregone of old. Was it merely her new +lease of error that had come between them of late months? He was +beginning to ask himself the question when she broke in with one of her +own:</p> + +<p>"What enemies do you mean, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"We are not to speak of two years ago."</p> + +<p>"Croucher!" She shuddered almost like a law-abiding lady. "I haven't +heard of him since that night in the train."</p> + +<p>"I said you wouldn't But I also said, if you remember, that Croucher was +only deadly as a tool. Well, he has fallen into the deadliest hands I +know—that's all."</p> + +<p>It was not, and Lady Vera knew that it was not. The angle of her hat was +all amicable attention now, and her eyes shone clear of the brim, with a +softer light that made her all at once incredible in her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> latest +incarnation. Dollar's feelings flew back into his face; she read them +with a smile that made him wince, by its cynical resemblance to one or +two that still enriched his dreams.</p> + +<p>"You think I'm as bad as any of them," she divined aloud.</p> + +<p>"I think the crime of arson is worse than most crimes," he made sturdy +answer, standing up to the little body with the strangest difficulty, as +though he were the culprit and she the man. "It's a thing absolutely +nothing on earth can possibly excuse. I think you'd have died rather +than descend to it—two years ago!"</p> + +<p>He had heard a step behind him, and lowered his voice; but Lady Vera +raised hers as a burly form halted shyly on the threshold; and her tone +was like none that she had taken hitherto.</p> + +<p>"Two years ago," she declaimed, "women had not been treated quite so +shabbily as they have been since. Then this miserable Government—"</p> + +<p>"Look you here!" blustered Dale-Bulmer, striding out of his shyness into +the center of the stage.</p> + +<p>"Two years ago," she reiterated for his benefit,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> "it wasn't war to the +handle of the knife! Now it would be fire and sword, if we were any good +with the sword; as we are not, it's simply fire!"</p> + +<p>"You really think you can burn your way to political power?" cried the +man of extremes, with ungovernable indignation.</p> + +<p>"Political existence is all we ask."</p> + +<p>"As a first instalment! I know you! I come from a country where you +started just like that!"</p> + +<p>"As you told your audience the other night, if you are Mr. Dale-Bulmer," +said Lady Vera, with an explosive little sigh.</p> + +<p>"I am; and for that I'm to have a house like this burned to the ground; +and you ladies think that's the way to advance your cause, to prove your +value to the State! Well, I suppose you know your own business best. +It's no use reasoning with you; but it really is enough to set one off, +after what I caught you doing down-stairs."</p> + +<p>"I wish to goodness you hadn't caught me," cried Lady Vera, with quite +extraordinary simplicity.</p> + +<p>But neither of them took her up; the doctor could only shake his head in +professional despair, while the injured householder recovered his +composure, and the little criminal looked as if she were<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> trying not to +look the mistress of the situation.</p> + +<p>"I only came," resumed Dale-Bulmer, rather as one who had no right in +the room, "to say that a run-about car has been found in the yard behind +one of the empty lodges. As I fancy your friends were on bicycles, it +struck me that the two-seater might perhaps be yours?"</p> + +<p>Was it just the nature of the man to change his whole manner in a +moment, or had the quality of the woman something to do with it? He +seemed unconscious of the change himself—unaware that he had dropped +into a tone of courteous consideration bordering almost on the +apologetic. But the corners of her little mutinous mouth showed that +nothing was lost upon Lady Vera.</p> + +<p>"It sounds like mine," she confessed without indecent amusement. "But I +hope you don't think, because there's room for two, that there's another +of us still concealed about the premises? I came down quite by myself, +in the car you have discovered. And who's to drive it back to town +again, I'm sure <i>I</i> don't know!"</p> + +<p>Dale-Bulmer glanced defiantly at Dollar, a flash-light in his eyes.</p> + +<p>"I do," he cried. "Yourself!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Myself, Mr. Dale-Bulmer? In—handcuffs?"</p> + +<p>And it was not her worst smile that was subdued in deference to the full +glow of his shamefaced magnanimity.</p> + +<p>"Don't talk nonsense!" said he gruffly. "Your car is ready waiting for +you at the door."</p> + +<p>"Not really?"</p> + +<p>"Of course. I buried you alive, didn't I?" His eyes came from the +wrecked window-seat. "Won't that meet the immediate case for martyrdom?" +And he managed another twinkle after all.</p> + +<p>It was a last amenity. He had been thanked, but without the smile which +had been ready enough when it was out of place; now that she had cause +to smile, the perversity of these women came out, as of course it would! +Not that this one took everything quite for granted; on the contrary, +she caused an explosion by offering to pay for the damage to the +window-seat. The militant party would have wished him to secure ample +compensation from his insurance people, she asserted, if the place <i>had</i> +been burned down. "Then I might have built the kind of house I really +want, instead of trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear!" he +had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> retorted in his better manner, as though he had been a fool to +interfere.</p> + +<p>But it was not his best manner; it was almost as unrepresentative as the +calm self-centered way in which the released prisoner spent the last +minutes looking for her gloves, and, when she failed to find them, held +out her bare hand with a brazen air of innocence, and no more thanks +than would have become a parting guest.</p> + +<p>Even John Dollar felt a new pang of disappointment as the two-seater +shrank panting out of sight and ear-shot, beneath the bronzed timber of +the disappearing drive, and Dale-Bulmer turned on his heel under the +arch.</p> + +<p>"Doesn't that take the cake?" he cried, when he had swallowed his pique +with a chastened chuckle. "A real well-bred 'un—if ever there was +one—playing the very devil, and carrying it off like a little angel of +light! That's what did me—the way she carried it off! I wanted to give +her a fatherly word, to tell her not to go on making such a wicked +little fool of herself. But she simply wouldn't look the part, would +she? I hadn't even the cheek to ask her name—had you?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No. I don't know why you let her off," said Dollar, irritably; but at +the moment he hated Dale-Bulmer for extorting his common gratitude at +the expense of his sacred flame.</p> + +<p>"Why?" cried that cavalier. "Didn't you guess how I found out about her +car?"</p> + +<p>"How?"</p> + +<p>"Reported to me by the police!"</p> + +<p>"The police? Were there any about?"</p> + +<p>Dollar felt as cold down the back as though his sacred flame had never +flickered behind iron bars.</p> + +<p>"Two blighters," said Dale-Bulmer. "I caught sight of 'em just after I +had left you to have it out with her. That's what they had to say for +themselves when I went out to let off steam; swore they were from +Scotland Yard, and trumped up the two-seater when I pretended not to +believe them. Nor did I till I'd run them down to the lodge and seen it +for myself."</p> + +<p>"And then?"</p> + +<p>"I swore it belonged to a friend, of course, and sent them both to the +devil."</p> + +<p>"And—and you were man enough not to say a word about it to—to her?" It +was as much as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> Dollar could do to keep his enthusiastic respect within +bounds of discretion.</p> + +<p>"Man enough? I wasn't going to have that sort of carrion coming in and +spoiling <i>your</i> job!"</p> + +<p>Then he perceived how he had spoilt it himself; hung his great head like +an elderly elephantine schoolboy; turned his broad back with an +inimitable shrug, and stood shaken to the pit with sobs of mirth. Dollar +joined him with a shout that relieved them both. And they roared +together until a gaunt caretaker appeared on the scene, with a face +expressive of such crass bewilderment that their poor clay quaked with a +second shock.</p> + +<p>"He lives in the bowels of the house," moaned Dale-Bulmer. "He doesn't +know a thing that's happened. If he did I might have to double his +screw. And—and I'd much rather treble your fee!"</p> + +<p>He was solemn once more in his remorse, but not so solemn as the doctor +had become within a minute.</p> + +<p>"I would <i>pay</i> a fee to take his place till to-morrow morning! I mean +it, my dear sir. If you think you owe me any little amends, let me do +this, for my own satisfaction!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span></p> + +<p>This from a Dollar at whom the other stared as though they had only just +met. It was the crime doctor come at last.</p> + +<p>"Stay here for the night, Doctor Dollar?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—alone."</p> + +<p>"But why, my good fellow?"</p> + +<p>"I can hardly tell you; only let me stay, if you can trust me!"</p> + +<p>"You know it isn't that."</p> + +<p>"Then do let me! It isn't so much for your sake—I won't pretend it +is—yet what if there should be a second attempt on the house? Then I +might even earn the fee you talk about; otherwise, not a brass farthing! +I wouldn't have missed the case for anything, even as it stands. And you +only took my treatment out of my mouth; you did the very thing I was +going to beg you to do, but not more earnestly than I beg of you now to +leave me in charge here to-night."</p> + +<p>"But not without this man of mine to look after you?"</p> + +<p>"Especially without that man of yours! He gave me the idea—he's my own +height and build—we can change places beautifully. I want him to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> put +on my cap and coat and goggles, and to drive away in my car, so that +anybody looking would think they had seen the last of me."</p> + +<p>"But who should be looking? Surely not that little——"</p> + +<p>"God forbid! But perhaps somebody on her side—or perhaps only somebody +on her tracks. Curious about those two detectives; but the whole +business bristles with curiosities, which I long to investigate in +peace, unknown to the whole outside world. This is the only way it can +be done; and this, my dear Mr. Dale-Bulmer, is the one and only thing +that you can do for me!"</p> + +<p>The boy with the beard gave way by inches. As long as there was a dog's +chance of any further excitement, he did not see why he should be out of +it, much less in his own house, and after the humdrum life he had led +since Labor and the Ladies had driven him home from Australia. But the +man with the stronger will seemed perfectly sincere in his further +asservations that there were features in the case which he wanted to +study for his own private and professional ends; that he honestly +believed, they had no more to fear from their friends<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> the enemy, but +that somebody ought to remain on guard, that he was the obvious man. All +this rang true enough; and but for Dollar's strange anxiety in the +matter, and Dale-Bulmer's sudden discovery that he squinted, the plan +might have gained earlier acceptance than it did. It was settled, +however, by a timely telephone call from the Australian's furnished +house at Esher, to ask if anything had happened to him, and was he never +going to tear himself away from Pax Monktons Chase?</p> + +<p>Thus it was nearly five o'clock before the crime doctor was alone at +last, with certain plain quarters and plainer fare at his disposal, but +with every nook and cranny of a country mansion to himself until next +morning. The situation had the intrinsic charm of all lonely vigils; +even if nothing was likely to come of this one, it would at least afford +that continuous possibility of a thrill which becomes more thrilling +than the thrill itself. And the whole business was supremely after John +Dollar's heart; nothing could have been more congenial to him; and yet, +though he did look forward to the night, and whatever the night might +still bring forth, it was not for the night's sake that he had +maneuvered to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> remain in the empty house. It was for the residue of +daylight, and the systematic investigations it would enable him to make.</p> + +<p>On these he started, with the precaution of a seaman marooned on a +desolate island, not indubitably uninhabited, as soon as the front door +shut upon Dale-Bulmer and the two chauffeurs, with the gaunt caretaker +his muffled image in his own car. And these motorists were not followed +out of sight or hearing, from the fading pile that looked so empty in +the drooping eye of heaven. But it very soon seemed to the man within as +if the whole house were a-hum with its own abysmal silence, and his +lightest breath a stertorous disturbance of its ponderous peace.</p> + +<p>He began by searching the unfurnished room in which the fire would have +originated. There could be no doubt about the fell attempt so nearly +made. It would have been diabolically certain of success. The +scaffolding, like sticks in a gigantic grate; the draft through the +joists, where the floor had been taken up; the natural flue formed by +the adjoining well, so lofty that an ordinary ladder was too short to +reach the landing—all these were as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> bellows and chimney, and the best +of fuel ready laid for lighting. And here were the shavings, all nicely +swept together, and the matches spilled at the last moment; as Dollar +put them back into the box, his finger-tips ached for all they might +have learned from that which they held—for the whole truth about the +guilty hand which had let the match-box fall.</p> + +<p>It was the whole truth, too, that he was seeking next upon his knees, in +the rubble down between the joists; some fresh fact, still inconceivable +as a concrete discovery, that he hoped against hope to find and to set +against the facts beyond dispute. Facts could not lie, but they might +exaggerate; somewhere, surely, there must be something to extenuate, +something to redeem even this atrocious attempt, if only the silent +walls could speak up for one who never made excuses for herself!</p> + +<p>It was a childish instinct, a quite babyish yearning to undo what has +once been done, and yet this had been the spring of that dense desire to +be left behind in the house at all costs. Then he had only felt it, like +a dull ache; now it became a dear and poignant conviction that there was +some discovery<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> still to make, and that he was the man to make it; that +one of these walls had a word to say to him, and to him alone.</p> + +<p>But it was none of the new bricks and mortar, wanting even their first +coat of plaster; it was nothing under the lofty rafters of a quiet +baronial hall where the builder had not been turned loose, nor any +intruder left a trace; it was not in the round room, filled with a first +instalment of the Dale-Bulmer furniture, nor yet anywhere else +down-stairs, in spite of the shrill tale told by the scullery window. +There the Amazons had entered, after breaking a pane like journeymen +burglars. They had fled incontinently by the door. But what else had +they done, and where else had they been, within those sardonically +silent walls?</p> + +<p>Had they been up-stairs before Vera Moyle ran up the ladder? Dollar +returned to that speaking spot, and climbed up gingerly, in an agony of +enthusiasm for her misused pluck. The gap between the top rung and the +new landing was unpleasant even for him, and he was at least a foot +taller than the little fool. The little fool! A pretty way to think of +her, even now; but there was a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> worse way; and still there was a better, +vaguely haunting him all the time, but almost ceasing to be vague in the +room where he had found her in the flesh. He could see her there again. +She had not faced him like a little fool, but a little heroine, God +forgive her! Not so much as a pout about her horrible imprisonment under +the window-seat! Not a moment's loss of dignity, even after that; not a +moment's loss of temper. Head up, and eyes shining in the shadow of her +wicked little hat!</p> + +<p>Here, to an inch, he had caught her gazing out of that window, out and +down into the chase—rolling right up to the house on this side—beating +against a breakwater of a sunk fence just underneath, and dotted with +leafy sail. Deer in the distance, and swallows darting across and across +the window, like shuttles weaving the scene in silk, brought the picture +back to good dry land. But the wide sky was still rather like a sea-sky; +and it had lightened again with the approach of evening; there were +silver rims to the clouds, as John Dollar tore himself from the +enchanted scene.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus6.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>"Now look at this one"</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span></p> + +<p>It was nearly dark when he returned unsteadily, with a face like a +cheer—with a face that would have lighted up a tomb. In his hands he +clasped a pair of innocent little gloves, that anybody might have found, +and somebody traced to their beloved little owner. But that was not all. +A wall had spoken, in certain handwriting hastily rubbed out, and a +whole bathroom had told a yet more eloquent tale!</p> + +<p>Hours later they were speaking still, wafting sweet music through the +corridors, filling the honored room with strains of joy for the +enchanted man on the broken window-seat, all in the dark at dead of +night. There might have been a moon; he did not know. There might have +been a stealthy advance, in very open order—a taking of cover behind +trees wide apart—a joining of forces down there in the dark, that was +not so dark if one was used to it. But Dollar had been for hours gazing +into his own heart, and that was still so dazzlingly alight that he +might not have seen anything if he had looked out; it still sang so loud +that he heard nothing down-stairs until there was noise enough to wake a +deeper dreamer out of actual sleep.</p> + +<p>Even then he scarcely knew what had brought him so suddenly to feet +grown numb, but not more<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> numb than the whole outer man in the endless +inner joy of that which he believed himself to have discovered along +with his dear lady's gloves. Those sacred relics he still clasped in his +hands, and that fond belief he was still hugging in his heart, when a +louder sound pricked his undertaking to the quick. It was the sound of +voices in the empty house. He tore off his shoes, limped over to the +door, opened it as softly, and stood listening in a heavy horror. They +were women's voices, accompanied by the scuttle of women's feet!</p> + +<p>In an instant, but still with an instinctive stealth, he was out on the +landing at the head of the stairs. And there, but only there, his fond +dream ended in an awakening as terrible as any nightmare; for one woman +stood on the half-landing between the two prongs of the forked +staircase; all attention she stood, as if on guard; hair silvered by a +shaft of moonshine through the staircase window, shoulders hunched +intently, but the head itself just tilted as if in sudden alarm, and +full in the moonlight the wicked unmistakable little hat of Lady Vera +Moyle.</p> + +<p>Her gloves dropped out of his hands. Did she hear them fall? She looked +as if she had; he had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> not the heart to make sure. He had nothing like +the heart to confront and shame her first—at her worst a passive party +to the crime—when her guiltier companions were even then at their vile +work lower down. The ladder was the thing! Then he could scare those +others first, and she and he need never meet at all. Better never again +than at this hideous juncture! And as for him, better death itself than +such a death to such a dream!</p> + +<p>It was a sheer stampede the man made now, back along the landing with +great heavy strides, even shouting as he went to put the she-devils to +flight. It was what he called them as he ran; had they not dragged an +angel into this. And they heard him, and he heard them—scuttling and +clucking in headlong flight.</p> + +<p>This time they could afford to fly; their second attempt was no failure +like the first. The little new landing was like a gridiron over a +flickering glare from the well beneath. Dollar flung his full length on +the brink—hung dangling from the armpits—hung lashing out for the +ladder like a boy on a horizontal bar with a mattress just underneath. +The top rung took some finding in his reckless<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> haste; and then his +hands had to change places with his feet; and it was all a pretty +desperate business for no light-weight, in a frenzy of excitement, at +the tip-top of a tremulous ladder that leaned against thin air. But his +very recklessness saw him down somehow with unbroken bones, and on the +threshold of the burning room before the fire had really taken hold. And +there he stopped, instead of dashing in; there he stood shrinking from +the red light within.</p> + +<p>For again one of the women had stayed behind the rest; and through a +forest of scaffolding poles, and a swirl of smoke and steam, he beheld +her in a glow already dying by her hand, under a hissing stream flung +right and left, in glittering coils and spirals, as coolly as a gardener +waters the grass. It was his very dream, come true in the end! And +Dollar stood there because he was ashamed to look Vera Moyle in the +face—after fearing for one moment that it was nothing but a dream!</p> + +<p>But last of all the stream played through the darkness and the smoke, +upon the threshold even at his feet, and a dry voice cried:</p> + +<p>"I see you all right! I saw you up-stairs; come round and tell me why +you ran away."</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus7.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>The little landing was like a gridiron</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span></p> + +<p>But it was no moment for going round. He went to her through sparks and +splinters in his socks, and felt the pain no more than the relief when +he stood beside her on the cool flags of the corridor, with both her +hands in his.</p> + +<p>"I might have known!" he spluttered through the smoke. "I might have +known it even from the first!"</p> + +<p>"It's jolly bad luck that you should know it at all," said Lady Vera, in +the same dry little voice. "I'm not proud of it, I can tell you."</p> + +<p>"Not of stopping an absolutely wanton crime?"</p> + +<p>"Not of turning against my old lot—and I haven't, either!" cried Lady +Vera, with more passion than he had ever heard from her. "I feel +everything I said up-stairs. I think we've all been treated more +abominably than ever. I don't blame them a bit for all this sort of +thing——"</p> + +<p>"Vera, you do—you know you do!"</p> + +<p>"I don't; how can I? Haven't I done worse? I may think they're going +rather far, and I may put in my spoke——"</p> + +<p>"This is not the first time!" he exulted, still only with her hands in +his, yet little knowing how he hurt them.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span></p> + +<p>"That's my business," she said, with a sudden laugh that broke her +voice. "It's the least I can do—after two years ago."</p> + +<p>"And I knew you'd done it!" he was quick to cry. "I knew it hours back, +though you did frighten me again just now. I found the hose-pipe in the +bathroom with your gloves, and their rotten message rubbed out on the +wall! I knew the hose was yours, because I'd just been told there wasn't +such a thing in the house. But I was looking for something of the kind. +I knew there was something to be found, that the whole thing wasn't what +it seemed. And ever since it's been the happiest night of my life, on +top of my most miserable hour!"</p> + +<p>"I'll motor you back to town for that," said Lady Vera, with another +poor little laugh. "I—I'm sorry I didn't tell you this afternoon."</p> + +<p>"I'm not!"</p> + +<p>"Somehow it didn't seem quite the game by the others, though of course I +hoped you would guess that I had only come in after them as a kind of +scarecrow. Of course I don't know if it will make you the least bit less +miserable——" But there she stuck.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span></p> + +<p>"If what will?"</p> + +<p>And now it was she who held his hands the faster—only across a gulf of +darkness like a solid wall—only with a kindness that reminded him it +was nothing else—only with a glow more dear than an embrace.</p> + +<p>"If it makes you the very least bit happier," she whispered, "why, of +course it was only just your own game, doctor, that I was trying to +play!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>THE SECOND MURDERER</h3> + + +<p>It was yet another Lady Vera who brought her own sunshine out of the +weeping dusk of that October morning. To veil embarrassment on either +side, Dollar had switched off the light by which he had just read the +line scribbled on her card; but there was no sanction for his nervous +sensibility in the little picture he beheld next moment. An audacious +study in Venetian red—a tripping fashion-plate with a practical +waist—it was only Vera by virtue of the radiant face between the +donkey-eared toque and the modish modicum of fur. And though the +radiance was lovely as ever in his eyes, and lovelier still as a +surprise, this frivolous modernity was pain and puzzledom to Dollar +until their hands met, and the one in the tight glove trembled.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It's no use beating about the bush," said Vera Moyle, and there was no +sort of tremor in her voice. "Do you mind telling me exactly what you +know of a Mr. Mostyn Scarth?"</p> + +<p>"Mostyn Scarth!" cried Dollar. "Do <i>you</i> know him?"</p> + +<p>"Only too well!"</p> + +<p>"I was afraid of it."</p> + +<p>"But I want your opinion and experience of him first. I believe you saw +something of each other in Switzerland?"</p> + +<p>"We did," replied Dollar weightily. "He was supposed to be looking after +a young temporary lunatic, who was of age, rich, and not irresponsible +in the eye of the law. Scarth induced the boy to leave him vast sums of +money in a will, and then made two distinct attempts to murder him."</p> + +<p>"No!"</p> + +<p>"He did. You ask what I know of this man, and I make no bones about +telling you. It's a thing the whole world ought to know for its +protection. He made two separate attempts on the lad's life, the last +more ingenious than the first; first he tried to poison him by means of +a forged prescription, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> next to break his neck by tampering with his +toboggan."</p> + +<p>"In Switzerland, when you were there?"</p> + +<p>"I was sent for after the first effort; the second was made under my +nose."</p> + +<p>"And yet you did nothing?"</p> + +<p>Lady Vera's indignation was not confined to the absent miscreant; her +demigod came in for his share.</p> + +<p>"There was not much to be done," he protested humbly. "We were in a +foreign country; the evidence wouldn't have been overwhelming under our +own law. I let Scarth know that I had found him out, got the boy out of +his clutches—pulled <i>him</i> together all right—and laid the whole case +before Topham Vinson when I came home. He consulted his law officers; +they thought I had so little to go upon that our man wasn't even marked +down for surveillance by the police. I had to keep my own eye on him +when he turned up in town again. Scarth made that easy by immediately +getting on my tracks, and discovering in Mr. Croucher another old friend +who had his knife in me. They tried between them to pervert my +chauffeur; then I lost<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> sight of them; and it was then I wanted to put +you on your guard, but you were never in, and my letters seemed to +miscarry."</p> + +<p>"They didn't," said Lady Vera, with frank contrition. "I am ashamed to +tell you why I never answered them; but I will in a minute. So it was +Mr. Scarth you meant when you told me the other day that poor Croucher +had fallen into such bad hands?"</p> + +<p>"Poor Croucher! Yes, it was; and there really is no comparison between +them. One was born in the scarlet, so to speak, but the other's the only +really educated and quite cold-blooded villain I have ever met."</p> + +<p>Vera Moyle sat forward in the patient's chair, in the very attitude of +two years before, with the same firelight illumining the same steadfast +look of moral and intellectual honesty; and the fuller health upon her +cheek, the deeper wisdom in her eyes, made no more difference to Dollar +than her superfluous smartness now. She was the same utterly candid +creature, about to tell him the whole truth about some fresh trouble, +and extenuate nothing that concerned herself.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't want to waste many words on Mr. Scarth," she began, in the +least vindictive of human voices; "but I ought to tell you that I quite +liked him until the other day. I met him first at a country house where +he was supposed to be tutoring the boys, but was really the life and +soul of the whole party. It was extraordinary how he ran everything and +everybody for those people; we were all devoted to him, and he says I +asked him to come and see us in town, but he certainly never came until +near the end of this last season. Then he made up for lost time; he's +capital company, as you know, and we had him to dinner, and my eldest +brother asked him down to stay in August when I was there. That was when +we saw most of each other, and Mr. Scarth asked me to marry him——"</p> + +<p>"Good God!"</p> + +<p>"Of course I didn't like him well enough for that, though he <i>had</i> put +me against <i>you</i>!"</p> + +<p>"How?" said Dollar grimly. She was still peering into the fire; but he +flattered himself there was more than firelight in the flush that almost +rivaled the Venetian red still nearer to the bars.</p> + +<p>"He knows what I did two years ago."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Croucher, of course?"</p> + +<p>"He said it was you—that you gave me away to him in Switzerland!"</p> + +<p>"And you believed him?"</p> + +<p>"He made it just credible. He said you told him in confidence; he showed +me a letter in which you reminded him not to let it go any further."</p> + +<p>"A forgery!"</p> + +<p>"I see that now; but it was a very good one, written on your club +paper."</p> + +<p>"The man's an expert forger. Anybody can go into a club to write a note +and steal some stationery. If only you had tackled me about it!"</p> + +<p>"I promised I wouldn't. I could hardly believe it of you, all the +same—not that you were the first to tell him. But—but it did put me +off—in spite of everything—and that was only in July."</p> + +<p>"Just when I was trying to see you, to put you on your guard!"</p> + +<p>She gave him her eyes at last, and they were wet but beaming. "I doubted +it still more from one or two things he said when we had our little +scene in the country; but I <i>knew</i> there wasn't a word of truth in it +before <i>you</i> said a dozen words to me the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> other Sunday! It was all a +plot to keep us apart—to get me under his thumb."</p> + +<p>"Did he threaten you when you—had your little scene?"</p> + +<p>"Not in so many words."</p> + +<p>"He will. That's where I shall come in."</p> + +<p>"His position was that I and my secret would only be safe with him."</p> + +<p>"As it never was with me?"</p> + +<p>"That was it; but now he knows that I don't believe him. I told him so +when he called last week."</p> + +<p>"So you have had another little scene?"</p> + +<p>"I cut it short at that."</p> + +<p>"And there the matter ended?"</p> + +<p>"Between him and me."</p> + +<p>"Don't make too sure. You don't know your Mostyn Scarth as well as I do. +I wonder what his next move will be!"</p> + +<p>The wonder lit the doctor's face with eager interest, but brighter still +was the answering light under the toque with the ass's ears of watered +silk.</p> + +<p>"I don't know about his next, but I can tell you what his latest move +is," said Lady Vera. "He has<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> taken to dogging me all over the place, to +see if I don't commit another crime! He was one of the alleged +detectives at Pax Monktons Chase!"</p> + +<p>"Never!" cried Dollar, taken fairly by surprise. He had forgot almost +every feature of the affair in question, except how magnificently Vera +Moyle had come out of it. The episode remained in his mind only as the +one great dream of his that had come true as yet; the details had +disappeared like those of any other dream.</p> + +<p>"I happen to know it," said Lady Vera, with some little embarrassment. +"I had it from—the other detective."</p> + +<p>"Not—" and Dollar stopped to frown—"not Croucher himself?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"He has dared to speak to you!"</p> + +<p>"For the very first time since that night in the train; now do listen, +and be fair to the poor fellow. He never was as bad as you thought him; +you say yourself that he's a saint compared with Mr. Scarth." Dollar was +too savage to smile at this free version of what he had said. "Well, +they have fallen out, and Croucher's in a bad way altogether;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> and he +has turned to me for a helping hand—not for money or anything of that +kind."</p> + +<p>"Not the least little hint of blackmail?"</p> + +<p>"Not a word or a sign of anything of the sort, except that he asked me +to forgive him for the other time, and of course I did."</p> + +<p>"Of course you would, though he actually robbed you under arms!" cried +Dollar, as sardonically as he felt he must.</p> + +<p>But he was let off with the caution of a frown that would have escaped +attention on a face less consistently serene than Lady Vera Moyle's.</p> + +<p>"You forget what he had been through first," said she, gently. "Within +forty-eight hours of execution, for something he had never done! +Thinking what he thought, and I neither denied nor admitted, then or at +any time, the wonder is not that he behaved as badly as he did that +night, but as well as he has ever since. However much you frightened him +at the time, he might have gone on blackmailing me without your +knowledge, and that's the last thing he's trying to do now. But I want +to do something for him! You say yourself that he has fallen into the +worst of hands—well, I want to get<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> him out of them. You once told me +that, when you had him here before, you found yourself trying to make a +decent being of him, and beginning to feel that you might almost +succeed. Doctor, I want you to try again, for my sake! He is frightfully +sorry for what he did before, and he has been very badly used by Mostyn +Scarth. He looks ill. I want you to save his life, and more than his +life! He has told me with tears in his eyes that he was never so happy +as when you had him here before. Dear man, do take him in again, and +give him one more chance, to please me!"</p> + +<p>Her voice had broken, and for once her eyes had played her false as +well, and Dollar had waited grimly while she recovered her voice or +dried her eyes. But he could not answer grimly when in her turn she +waited for him to speak. In her frivolous little blazing skirt, in the +toque that he liked even less; over-dressy as he dared to think her in +his simple heart of hearts, she appealed to him the more profoundly for +those very vanities, so far from vanity were the letter and the spirit +of her intercession.</p> + +<p>"So you really came to see me about Alfred<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> Croucher?" said Dollar, but +very gently, without the faintest accent of reproach.</p> + +<p>"It was about both of them, but chiefly about him," she admitted. "Of +course I wanted to check his account of Mr. Scarth. If you had given him +a good character, that would have been the end; but you gave him a much +worse one than I expected. Croucher seems almost immaculate by +comparison; honestly, I shouldn't wonder if he were less lost to decency +through his very association with a man so much worse than himself."</p> + +<p>"Did he tell you so?"</p> + +<p>"He said it had brought him up with a round turn."</p> + +<p>"It's possible," said Dollar, not more dryly than he could help. "The +psychology is all right." He was smiling and nodding now. "And where is +Mr. Croucher at the moment?"</p> + +<p>"Walking up and down outside."</p> + +<p>"Until we call him in?"</p> + +<p>"If only you will let me!"</p> + +<p>She was on her feet, to take him at his word as soon as spoken; but he +said that was Barton's job, and, wondering aloud how Barton would like +it,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> went out presumably to see. He was not gone long, and in another +minute Alfred Croucher was cringing before them like a beaten cur.</p> + +<p>But few curs whine as this one did that morning, while the crime doctor +listened and their little lady winced. She was right about one thing. He +did look ill; his cough was not altogether put on. He had been "tret +somefink crool," he declared, but without entering into particulars, for +which Dollar did not press; but on the character of Mostyn Scarth there +were no such reservations. Croucher denounced that monster with the +white hatred of a holy warrior, casting up his eyes with all manner of +passionate and pious invocations.</p> + +<p>"Only take me away from 'im, before it's too late!" he implored, +reluctant murder in the whites of his rolling eyes. "'E's a bad man, a +very bad man 'e is! The 'appiest days o' me life was wot I spent in 'ere +eighteen munf ago. It seems more like eighteen years—'ard. I never +should've quit but for Shod, wot's got a good long stretch for 'is +pines. 'E's another bad man; but for 'im you 'ad me in the 'oller of yer +'and, and might 've made a man o' me in no time."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yet you went straight from me to threaten and rob the lady who sent you +here!"</p> + +<p>It was a dangerous opening, but Croucher did not take it. In ignoble +emotion he fell upon the knees of a flash pair of trousers, which still +showed the track of an ineradicable crease, and once more sued for the +mercy and forgiveness already vouchsafed to him. And Lady Vera turned +from the sly, leering, blinking, darting eyes to a pair turned hard as +nails, and the harder for an oblique inner twinkle all their own.</p> + +<p>"All right!" snapped Dollar, to her intense relief. "I'll take you in, +Croucher, for better or worse. Well make it for better, if we can; but +do get to your two legs, man, instead of fawning on all four! Are you +free to stop as you are, or is there anything you want to settle up +first?"</p> + +<p>"There's me rooms," said Croucher, eagerly. "There's nuffink worth +fetching, but I shouldn't like to bilk the people, 'speshly w'en 'er +lidyship's gawn an' give me the money, Gawd bless 'er!"</p> + +<p>Dollar precipitated the creature's exit, on the verge of fresh saurian +tears, of which there were further signs for his benefit on the mat. He +might<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> be a bad man, too, might Mr. Croucher, but he wasn't as bad as +Mostyn Scarth. And in that modest claim, at least, there was a bitter +sincerity which received its due in a nod of keen acknowledgment.</p> + +<p>"I never did think you were more than a second murderer, Croucher!"</p> + +<p>"Wot's that?"</p> + +<p>The whites of those quick, furtive eyes were showing quite horribly in a +moment.</p> + +<p>"Only a technical expression, Croucher, meaning the minor malefactor."</p> + +<p>And he returned rather slowly into the eager presence of Lady Vera +Moyle.</p> + +<p>"I suppose I mustn't fawn, either," she said, in the softened tone of +one of her rare rebukes. "But—<i>do</i> you think you can make anything of +him—this time?"</p> + +<p>"I hope so; but I shall be very glad to have him back, even if I fail +again."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>The crime doctor gave her another of his oblique smiles.</p> + +<p>"I shall be all the better able to watch Scarth's latest move," he +said.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Over against the back windows of a nice new street of tall red houses, +beyond the high red wall enclosing their common strip of shrubs and +gravel, runs a humbler row of windows in connection with a mews. In one +you may still catch a coachman shaving for the box, but more likely a +chauffeur's lady engrossed in her novelette; and on the next sill are +pots of geraniums, while the next but one keeps the evening's kippers +nice and fresh. Most of the windows have muslin curtains, and in some +the lights are on all night. Last October there was only one without any +kind of covering, except a newspaper stuck across a broken pane.</p> + +<p>It was the scandal of the row; a battered billycock lay rotting on the +roof above; strange fragments of song were always liable to burst from +within, as of a gentleman roistering in his sleep, and at times a +bristly countenance would roll red eyes over the backs of the red +houses, beginning and ending with the flats at the bottom of the street. +If a dark handsome face appeared simultaneously at a top flat window, +the chances were that both would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> vanish, but it would have been +difficult to detect the exchange of actual signals.</p> + +<p>On the return of Alfred Croucher, shaven and collared, from the audience +in Welbeck Street, he went so far as to wink and wave from the window +that disgraced the mews to the one that crowned the flats. His rolling +eyes still had their whites about them; his wrists were still in +unaccustomed cuffs; and Mostyn Scarth was at his elbow before it could +be lifted with the bottle brought in to celebrate the occasion.</p> + +<p>"Just one!" said Croucher, pitching his mongrel whine in the key of +comic extravaganza. "I deserve all ten fingers for what I got to tell +yer!"</p> + +<p>"Not a drop, my Lazarus!" said Scarth. "When do you move in?"</p> + +<p>"To-day—now."</p> + +<p>"You shall have the whole bottle when you come out. You may want it. +What about that stamped note-paper?"</p> + +<p>"Couldn't lay 'ands on a scrap."</p> + +<p>"Hadn't you the waiting-room to yourself?"</p> + +<p>"My witin'-room was the street, gov'nor."</p> + +<p>"Well, I must have a sheet or two as soon as you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> can stick them in the +post; three or four would be safer, and at least a couple of his +envelopes, in case of accidents. Now tell me everything that happened; +and perhaps you <i>shall</i> have a drink before you go."</p> + +<p>There was no light that night in the window with the broken pane pasted +over with newspaper; next day it was mended properly, and the sodden +billycock removed from the roof before Alfred Croucher awoke from his +innocent and protracted slumbers in the crime doctor's patent chamber of +perpetual peace.</p> + +<p>His first impression was that some mysterious miracle had been performed +expressly for his behoof. He must have been drunk to have slept so +sound, and yet he had none of the disagreeable sensations which a long +experience associated with the ordinary orgy. He felt profoundly rested +and refreshed; never had he lain in so luxurious a bed; and the air was +faintly scented, subtly soothing, and there was plenty of it, yet not a +sound except the gentle stirring of his own breathing body between the +sheets. His palate was clean and cool beyond belief. He opened his eyes, +and saw a plain room<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> sharp as crystal to the sight: not the bronze +bedchamber that he suddenly remembered, but the same place steeped in +purest sunshine, and ten thousand times fairer for the change.</p> + +<p>Then he knew where he was, and precisely why he was there; and it was +the mental equivalent of what Mr. Croucher called "'ot coppers," only +this made him hot all over. He might have been in a fever; he hoped +violently that he was. He remembered his cough, and began to practise +it. A determined paroxysm revived his spirits; he was not fit to get up, +and other people would just have to wait until he was, and serve 'em +jolly well right!</p> + +<p>Other people couldn't get at him there; yet one other person could, and +did, to Mr. Croucher's mingled discomfort and relief. The doctor duly +kept him in bed; but there was too much of the doctor; and yet the time +hung heaviest when he was not there, and there were heavier burdens even +than the time. The patient had lost his liking for a book. Conversation +was more to his taste this time. His mind would wander when he read. It +would follow the doctor down-stairs to his consulting-room, or across +the landing to the room in which he slept.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> The man haunted him; it was +better to have him there in the flesh, than to see him as Croucher +continually saw him when he was not there at all.</p> + +<p>Better, again, to talk of some things than to dwell on them night and +day, especially when those subjects seemed to possess an equally awful +fascination for the crime doctor. Of course, they were in his line; that +accounted for the doctor's morbid taste, and the patient's most terrible +experience was quite enough to account for his. There was nothing +unnatural in their talks. They had the thing in common, only from +opposite poles of experience, which enormously enhanced the mutual +interest. If there was one subject they were bound to have discussed, +with no false delicacy on either side, each being what he was, it was +the subject of the sixth commandment.</p> + +<p>"Of course you think about it," said Dollar, dismissing an incoherent +excuse on the second day. "It must haunt you; it's only natural that it +should. All I should like you to do, since you never committed one, and +are the last man in the world to commit one now, is to take a rather +lighter view of that particular misdeed."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span></p> + +<p>"A lighter view!" repeated Croucher, goggling; and he added with a +shuddering inconsequence: "The lor o' the land don't make light of it!"</p> + +<p>"Literature has been known to," rejoined the doctor, with as little +apparent point. "But you are not the reader you were last year; +otherwise there's a little thing, <i>On Murder Considered as One of the +Fine Arts</i>, that I should like to lend you."</p> + +<p>"One o' the 'ow much?" said Mr. Croucher, uncertain whether to grin, or +frown, and meanwhile glaring more than he supposed.</p> + +<p>Dollar went for the book, and read a few extracts aloud. They appeared +to afford him extraordinary enjoyment; they were altogether over the +bullet head on the pillow. Croucher could only gather that some people +seemed to imagine it was good sport to commit a murder. Funny fools! Let +them try a fortnight in the condemned cell, for one they never did +commit, and see how they took to that!</p> + +<p>But he could understand them that knew nothing about it writing a lot of +rot like this; what beat him was that the crime doctor, of all people, +and with all his uncanny knowledge of the subject, that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> even he was +able to view the worst of crimes in a light which would never have +dawned on the independent intellect of Alfred Croucher. It seemed to him +a more lurid light than any in which he himself, at his worst, had ever +seen such things; horrible, to his mind, that one who ran every risk of +being murdered should sit there gloating over "the shades of merit" in +one murder, and over others as "the sublimest and most entire in their +excellence that ever were committed." What was more horrible, however, +was the hollow note of Mr. Croucher's own laughter, and the furtive +gleaming of his restless eyes, while his body twitched between the +sheets.</p> + +<p>He asked for the book when Dollar rose to go; and was discovered, in due +course, bathed in a perspiration which he made less effort to conceal.</p> + +<p>"It ain't all like them funny bits," he assured the doctor, with an open +shudder. "There's a bit I struck about a servant gal, on one side of a +door, an' a bloke wot's done the 'ole bloomin' family in on the other. +My cripes! I 'ad to 'old me breff over that, and it's made me sweat like +a pig."</p> + +<p>"On which side of the door were you?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Wot's that?"</p> + +<p>"In your mind's eye, my good fellow!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Croucher had seldom found it easier to tell the truth, and he made +the most of his opportunity.</p> + +<p>"I felt as if I was the gal," said he. "Shouldn't wonder if I dreamt I +was 'er to-night!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! I always find myself on the inside," said Dollar, with +extraordinary gusto. "I'd much rather have been the girl. She had the +open street behind her, and the street-lamps; he had only his own +handiwork in the dark, and hardly room enough to step out of the way of +it. She got away, too, whereas he had to make away with himself. But I +always would rather be the victim; he doesn't know what's coming; and +it's not a thousandth part as bad as—the other thing—when it does +come.... I'm sorry, Croucher! You shouldn't have asked me to leave you +the book; but there's nothing like looking at a thing from all sides, +and it may console you to know that you've perspired over the best +description of a murder ever written."</p> + +<p>Yet that was not the last of their morbid conversations; they would +hardly be five minutes together before the noxious subject would crop +up,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> nearly always through some reluctant yet irresistible allusion on +the patient's part. The doctor might come in overflowing with deliberate +gaiety; there was something about him that set the bulbous eyes rolling +with uneasy cunning, the cockney tongue wagging in its solitary strain, +as it were under protest from the beaded brow.</p> + +<p>On one occasion Dollar was the prime offender. It was the day after +Croucher's introduction to De Quincey and the first bad night spent by +anybody in the Chamber of Peace. He declared he had not slept a wink, +and was advised to get up and go for a walk.</p> + +<p>"Alone?" said Croucher in a low voice.</p> + +<p>"Why not? This isn't prison, and I never hear you cough. <i>You</i> are not +going to die just yet, Croucher!"</p> + +<p>"I 'ope nobody is, not 'ere," said Croucher, with a horrid twitch. "I +feel as it <i>might</i> buck me up—a breff of air on a nice fine day like +this." His eyes rolled undecidedly, and the oil ran out of his voice. +"But it ain't no fun goin' out alone."</p> + +<p>"Haven't you any friends you could go and see?"</p> + +<p>"No!" cried Croucher, with an emphasis that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> pulled him up. "I—I might +write a letter, though—if you could spare me a bit o' paper wiv the +address."</p> + +<p>It was a very short letter that Alfred Croucher wrote, but a remarkably +thick envelope that he himself took to the post, after looking many +times up and down the street. And at the pillar-box, which was not many +yards from the door, he again hesitated sadly before thrusting it in.</p> + +<p>In the afternoon Dollar took him out in the car, and then it was that +for once the poisonous topic was not introduced by Mr. Croucher.</p> + +<p>"See that house?" said Dollar, pointing out one of the most modest in +the purlieus of Park Lane. "There was no end of a murder <i>there</i> once. +Swiss valet cut his master's throat, made what he flattered himself were +the hall-marks of burglars, and had the nerve to go into the room to +wake the dead man up next morning."</p> + +<p>"Fair swine, eh?" said Mr. Croucher, with all the symptoms of disgust.</p> + +<p>"A very fair artist, too," rejoined the disciple of De Quincey. "That +wasn't his only good touch. He cut the old gentleman's throat from ear +to ear,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> and yet there wasn't a spot of blood on his garments. How do +you suppose he managed that? It's a messy operation, Croucher; you or I +would have made a walking shambles of ourselves!"</p> + +<p>"How did he manage it?" asked Croucher, in a shaky growl.</p> + +<p>"By taking off every stitch before he did the trick. How about that for +a tip?"</p> + +<p>Croucher made no reply. His teeth were clenched like those of a man +bearing physical pain. They were nearly out of town, and Dollar had +discoursed upon autumn tints and the nip in the air before being +abruptly interrogated as to the "fair swine's" fate.</p> + +<p>"Need you ask?" said he. "The poor devil was too clever by half, and +made a big mistake for each of his strokes of genius. He was taken, +tried, condemned, and all the rest of it! And a greater writer than the +gentleman who kept you awake last night wrote the best description +of—all the rest of it—in existence. But don't you ask me to lend you +that!"</p> + +<p>"They always seem to forget somefink," said Alfred Croucher, another +long mile out of town.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The first thing being that the best murders oughtn't to look like +murders," the criminologist agreed. "They ought to look like accidents, +or suicides at the most. But it takes a Mostyn Scarth to cut as deep as +that."</p> + +<p>"Wot the 'ell mikes yer fink of 'im?" cried Croucher, in a fury at the +very name.</p> + +<p>"Well, among other things, the fact that he saw us off in the car just +now. Do you mean to say you didn't see through the false beard of the +gentleman who was picking up his umbrella as we turned into Wigmore +Street?"</p> + + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>Never again did Alfred Croucher venture out alone, even as far as the +pillar-box; not another letter had he to post, though he received one, +wrapped round a stone, once when his window was open, and literally +devoured every word. He did go out, but only with the crime doctor in +his car, for an hour or two in the afternoon.</p> + +<p>More than once they got out at Richmond Park, sent the car across to one +of the other gates, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> followed at a brisk walk, shoulder to shoulder, +with Croucher often peeping over his, but Dollar never. The walk was +sometimes broken for as long as it took Croucher to smoke a pipe in one +or another of the beautiful wooded enclosures which are the inner glory +of the most glorious of all public parks. There, under red canopies of +dying leaves, their feet upon a russet carpet of the dead, the smoker +would rest in a restless silence, because the one subject which had made +him eloquent was now tabooed. Even in the Chamber of Peace there was no +peace for Alfred Croucher, and but little sleep, although the doctor had +walked him off his legs and would sit beside him till all hours. So the +literary and conversational treatment had been altered once for all; and +now the patient would hardly read or speak a word.</p> + +<p>Late one night, in the second half of the month, the crime doctor, +seated like a waxwork in a chair that never creaked, had just made sure +that his man was asleep at last. He decided to steal out and write some +letters, and take them to the post himself before locking up; and was +getting by inches to his catlike feet, when some sense held<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> him bent +like a bow. It could hardly have been his hearing, in his own +sound-proof sanctuary between double windows and triple doors. Yet +suddenly he was all on edge, listening with nerves laid bare by forced +vigils in that slumberous room, brown as an Arab in its weird lighting; +the silver patch in his hair changed from a florin to a new penny, the +whites of his eyes like broad gold rings; their one flaw augmented by an +infinite fatigue, their one care the human wreckage on the +bed—shattered utterly by him, to be by him built up afresh, but not in +the midst of excursions and alarms. And here was the inmost door +opening, so softly, so slowly, at deadliest dead of night!</p> + +<p>It was a woman who entered like a ghost, and he knew her step, though he +could not hear it even now. And though her cloak and head-dress were +those of a trained nurse, he knew, rather than saw, that the wearer was +Lady Vera Moyle.</p> + +<p>"Hush!" she was the first to whisper, and very softly closed the last +door, through which he would have hurried her out again. Already her +soundless movements, her air of vast precaution, puzzled him even more +than her presence or her dress; but he still had anxieties on this side +of the door.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Just asleep," he whispered, pointing to the bed. "Bad time I've given +him, poor brute, but a better one coming, I do believe. Did you come to +see how he was doing?" Even in the stained light she looked so beaming +now, so frankly triumphant, he made sure that was it. "I'd have written, +but thought you were away. Who let you in?"</p> + +<p>"This!"</p> + +<p>And she held up a new Yale key.</p> + +<p>"Where did you get it?"</p> + +<p>"Specially cut for me." Every line in his red man's face was a note of +blank interrogation. "Mostyn Scarth has another—cut specially for him! +I've had him watched."</p> + +<p>"Vera!"</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> was watching <i>for</i> him—from the nursing home opposite—suffrage +friends of mine."</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you tell me?"</p> + +<p>"You had enough to do."</p> + +<p>He shook his head. "Well?"</p> + +<p>"He's somewhere in the house."</p> + +<p>"This house?"</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you tell me?"</p> + +<p>She nodded. "Hiding—in your room, I think."</p> + +<p>"I'll soon have him out!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Wait!" She had eyes for the amber bed at last. "Are you sure he's +asleep?"</p> + +<p>Dollar stole across and back. The great frame was breathing gently and +evenly as a child. "But he's a terribly light sleeper; we mustn't +disturb him, if we can help it."</p> + +<p>"Disturb him!" She clutched his hand for the first time. "I wish to God +I had never brought him to you! There's a plot between them, doctor—I +know there's some plot!"</p> + +<p>"There <i>was</i>, of course," he said, smiling, but wincing at his own "of +course" that instant. "I'm delighted you brought him," he reassured her. +"I've taken some of the plot out of him—and now for Mr. Scarth!"</p> + +<p>He reached past her to open the door. In a flash she put something in +his hand. It was a showy little revolver, the handle mother-of-pearl, +the barrel golden in that light.</p> + +<p>"Thanks," he said-briefly—but there was a whole novel in his look. "Now +will you do something more for me?"</p> + +<p>"No!" she said flatly, and was at his elbow when he opened his own door +across the landing.</p> + +<p>It was such a plain little room that there was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> indeed small danger of a +surprise from the concealed intruder. The only possible cover was under +the bed, behind the curtains, or in the wardrobe. Dollar just went +through the form of glancing under the bed, as he whipped up the poker +in his left hand; with it he parted the curtains, and in the same second +had his man comfortably covered at arm's length.</p> + +<p>"Well done!" cried the girl.</p> + +<p>Scarth repaid her with a gleam of saturnine enlightenment; it was the +first change in his swarthy, unemotional, unconquerable visage. On the +Balkan battle-fields there may have been myriads of such faces, not with +the unique intellectual quality of this one, but alike in their fierce +contempt of battle, murder, and sudden death, as little matters not +worth a qualm, whether in the active or the passive party to the +business. Among educated Englishmen the temperament is rare, and rarer +still the mental attitude; in the combination lie the makings of the +hell-born villain, and Mostyn Scarth was the finished article.</p> + +<p>Stoical in his discomfiture, he saw his opening<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> with no more than a +glitter of his insolent eyes, and took it as though he had never +foreseen anything else.</p> + +<p>"So I've caught you both out, my virtuous friends!" said he. "And you +dare to present that thing at me, as though I were here for a felonious +purpose!"</p> + +<p>"I shall not empty it into you, Scarth, however much you may tempt me," +replied the crime doctor. "What do you say to clasping both hands behind +your head and leading the way down-stairs?"</p> + +<p>"I'll see you damned first," said Mostyn Scarth.</p> + +<p>"Good! It's exactly the same to me, only you may find it harder not to +take one of those hands out of your trousers pockets, and the moment you +show a finger I shall cripple you for life. I thought, too, that you +might like to hear what we say to the police."</p> + +<p>"I don't take the faintest interest in what <i>you</i> say to them," returned +Scarth, with a broader gleam to light his meaning.</p> + +<p>"Good again! Do you mind going down and ringing up New Scotland Yard, +Lady Vera? On<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> your way you might please see if all three doors are shut +in the room opposite; then, perhaps—no! I should leave this one open +after all, I think." Three seconds had sufficed to close the triple +doors, one more quickly than another, behind them.</p> + +<p>"I should, if I were you," said Scarth. "And I should think a good many +times before carrying out your other instructions—if I were the lady at +the bottom of one of the few mysteries that still puzzle Scotland Yard."</p> + +<p>There was a pause, in which Dollar heard only a sharp intake of breath +on the threshold just behind him; but that was enough.</p> + +<p>"I believe I shall have to shoot you, after all," said he, and the +hammer of the mother-of-pearl revolver clicked to full cock.</p> + +<p>"Won't that rather spoil your game?" said Scarth, blandly.</p> + +<p>"Mine is not the game that matters at the moment—yours <i>is</i>. As, +however, you have been fool enough to have a key cut expressly to fit my +front-door lock, and have been discovered in my room at midnight——"</p> + +<p>"In the most distinguished company! Go on,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> Dollar. Nothing +extenuate—bang the field-piece—twang the lyre!"</p> + +<p>His teeth were showing as they had shown on the platform at Winterwald +nine months before; the tag from his famous impersonation had slipped +out with all the snap and gusto which had captivated an unruly audience +then; and it was not without a slight mesmeric effect on the man who had +him at his mercy. If Scarth in turn had not held Vera Moyle at <i>his</i> +mercy, and if John Dollar had not known him to be utterly devoid of that +quality, he could have admired the cool daredevil, swaggering at bay.</p> + +<p>"Remember the concert at Winterwald, doctor," he went on, "and our talk +afterward, and the last talk we ever had there? He thought I had two +tries to kill a fellow, Lady Vera—two bites at such a green young nut! +Better to finish 'em off at one fell blow, isn't it? Not such fun for +the widow, or the poor innocent devil who nearly swings for the job, but +great work for the militant Millies and their lady leader! Splendid for +you all until the truth comes out—as it will the minute a policeman +shows his nose!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span></p> + +<p>It was Lady Vera who had obtained him this hearing. She had stepped up +to Dollar, had taken his arm, had even put her other hand in front of +her own revolver.</p> + +<p>"Let him go on; we may as well know where we are," she had said in the +middle of Scarth's speech. And now she asked him what he proposed, as if +she were inquiring the price of a dress, with the civility doubly due to +an inferior.</p> + +<p>"You have had my proposal," said Scarth. "It's not the kind that one +repeats before a third party."</p> + +<p>"I may as well ring them up," said Lady Vera, trying to disengage her +arm; but Dollar's had closed upon it, and his left hand held hers as in +a vise.</p> + +<p>"You shan't!" he ground out. "It's all bluff. They have no evidence."</p> + +<p>"They are welcome to all I can give them," she answered. "I have always +regretted I didn't come forward in the beginning. But there was more +excuse than there is now—then there was no question of letting a worse +person go for the second time."</p> + +<p>But this was not said for the worse person's benefit; for the Vera +Moyles it is impossible to speak <i>at</i> the worst person in the world. The +point<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> was merely urged as an argument for Dollar's private ear. But the +Mostyn Scarths are expert listeners; not a syllable was lost upon the +consummate chieftain of that foul family; and he grinned gaily through +as much of the open door as he could see from this point.</p> + +<p>"So you admit that you administered his coup de grace to the late +lamented Sergeant Simpkins?"</p> + +<p>But the heavy shaft was not winged by one of Mostyn Scarth's feathered +glances. His grinning gaze still sped past them to the landing.</p> + +<p>"I have never denied it in my life."</p> + +<p>"Hear that, Croucher?" cried Scarth. "'Full confession by Lady Vera +Moyle—extry spechul.'"</p> + +<p>The pair stood closer as one of them looked round; and there, indeed, on +the threshold, bulked Alfred Croucher, larger than life in a white +bathgown that sat better on him than his loudest clothes. And his +unwholesome face looked only a shade less white than all the rest of +him, but for the little red sleepless eyes fixed on Mostyn Scarth, who +still enjoyed the crime doctor's undivided attention.</p> + +<p>"'Ow the 'ell did <i>you</i> get 'ere?" said Croucher huskily.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I'm obliged to you for asking. Our virtuous friends are so ready to +take a felony for granted, that it seems never to have occurred to them +that I walked in at the door—partly to see you—chiefly to bowl them +out." Lady Vera could not help smiling at that which seemed never to +have occurred to her; nothing else left any mark, save upon John Dollar, +on whom Scarth now trained his ivory grin. "The worst of a Yale lock, +doctor," he went on, "is that all the keys are numbered; the worst of a +Turkish bath is that your enemy may do that thing, and have a look at +your latch-key if you will leave it in your pocket on its chain. +Northumberland Avenue may be a good place after a bad night, but that's +where I really found my way into your house. You didn't see me because I +had the bad taste to prefer the cave of electricity to the public +hot-rooms and your capital company."</p> + +<p>The note of insolence had been forced for Croucher's benefit, the +libretto elaborated to impress that elemental mind, and it was to +Croucher that Scarth turned for applause. It might have been more +articulate; there was little merriment in the guttural laugh; and it was +not in open mockery,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> if not with any visible respect, that the little +red eyes sought the silent object of these insults.</p> + +<p>Dollar met them for a moment with a sidelong flash; that was as much as +the little red eyes could stand. Scarth glowered, but Mr. Croucher was +not looking up any more. Between the two strong men, one spitting +insults with his tongue, the other darting questions with his eyes, +flabby Croucher found it convenient to study the toes of his bedroom +slippers. But his right hand shook deep in the far pocket of the +voluminous bathgown. None of them saw that but Mostyn Scarth, and him it +filled with gleaming confidence.</p> + +<p>"Come, Alfred," said he, "get into your street clothes, if they haven't +been taken away from you. If they have, go down as you are and call a +taxi. I'm going to take you out of this hole. You look more dead than +alive. I thought you might; that's one reason why I came."</p> + +<p>"Croucher is going to do something for me first," said the crime doctor. +"<i>Then</i> he can do what he likes."</p> + +<p>"Sorry you haven't got a soul to call your own, Alfred."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Who says I haven't?"</p> + +<p>"Doctor Dollar. Didn't you hear him?"</p> + +<p>"If he does, he's a——"</p> + +<p>"Croucher! Croucher!" said the doctor. "All I want you to do is to hand +me the razor case from the dressing-table. In fact you needn't do all +that; just arm yourself with the weapon you ought to find there. Then +somebody will be more of a match for me. And Mr. Scarth isn't raising +any further objection, you will notice."</p> + +<p>What Croucher noticed, as the red eyes came up at last, was that Mostyn +Scarth had suddenly lost a little of his usual healthy tan; but the +bedroom slippers remained planted where they were.</p> + +<p>And then without a word Lady Vera stepped from the doctor's side, took +the razor-case in both her hands, pulled it in two and exhibited the +empty halves.</p> + +<p>"Which of you has borrowed my razor?" said John Dollar.</p> + +<p>"Not <i>me</i>!" cried Croucher with tremendous emphasis. But his right hand +was still in his far pocket, as only Mostyn Scarth could see; and the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> +sight restored a little of that healthy tan which so becomes dark faces.</p> + +<p>"Not you, Croucher?"</p> + +<p>"No, not me, by Gawd!"</p> + +<p>"Yet I believe your original mission in this house was to possess +yourself of that razor—and—use it?"</p> + +<p>Dollar did not finish the sentence without feeling for a little hand +with his left; that little hand met it half-way, and was the first to +give a reassuring squeeze.</p> + +<p>"You were to do something to me with it, I believe, and to leave it in +my hand to show I'd done it myself?"</p> + +<p>And then, under another sidelong flash, that steadied down into a +will-destroying gleam, Croucher came out with a dreadful phrase.</p> + +<p>"To guide yer 'and!" said he, hoarsely.</p> + +<p>"To guide my hand! Exactly! But it was not exactly your idea?"</p> + +<p>"No. It was——"</p> + +<p>But here his eyes rolled into Mostyn Scarth's, and dropped once more.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Exactly!" repeated Dollar. "But you didn't quite feel like doing it, so +at last your master had to come in to do it for you?"</p> + +<p>"He ain't my master now, blast 'im!"</p> + +<p>"Steady, Croucher. May I ask what that is in your hand?"</p> + +<p>It was a letter. Only a letter out of that far pocket, after all! +Scarth's eyes started, and he found his tongue once more.</p> + +<p>"You—give—that—to me, Croucher!"</p> + +<p>Croucher wavered at his voice; it was terribly threatening, each subtle +tone a poisoned barb.</p> + +<p>"What if I don't?"</p> + +<p>"You know what!"</p> + +<p>"The game deepens," said the crime doctor; and he did not know that his +left hand had dropped the hand of hands for him.</p> + +<p>"<i>Your</i> game's up if you show that letter!" cried Scarth to Croucher, +who only showed him the broad of his back.</p> + +<p>"Can you be tried twice for the same thing, doctor?" he began—but in +the same breath he desperately added: "I don't care whether you can or +you can't! You read that, whether or no!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span></p> + +<p>The letter was in an envelope superscribed "To <span class="smcap">the Coroner</span>," in a +wonderful imitation of Dollar's handwriting; but the letter itself, +written on his own stamped paper, was a still more marvelous forgery, in +which the crime doctor bade farewell to the world before stultifying his +own life's work by the crime of suicide.</p> + +<p>"That's better than anything you did in Switzerland," said Dollar, +nodding to the livid man between the curtains.</p> + +<p>"But it ain't the best thing 'e's done," cried Croucher, and stopped to +roll his eyes and gloat. "The bounder's best bit was squeezin' two +people for the same job—the guilty an' the innercent—'er as thought +she must 've done it, an' 'im as knew 'e done it all the time!"</p> + +<p>"That's the end of <i>you</i>," said Scarth, with sardonic satisfaction.</p> + +<p>"It's the beginning of us all!" said the crime doctor, in a voice they +hardly knew. "Do you—can you mean yourself and this lady?"</p> + +<p>That lady shook her head and smiled.</p> + +<p>"I do, if I swing to-morrow!" swore Alfred Croucher. "I told +'<i>im</i>"—with a truculent thrust<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span> of the bullet head—"one night in me +cups; an' fust 'e starts squeezin' 'er to marry 'im, an' then squeezin' +me to do yer in before yer forbids 'is banns! Oh, 'e's a nut, I tell +yer—though we've been the nuts an' 'im the cracker!"</p> + +<p>Lady Vera looked like a little ghost, still unable to believe her ears, +still staring into space as if the trouble were rather with those great +Irish eyes of hers.</p> + +<p>But the doctor was the doctor an instant longer. His left hand went out +to his patient first.</p> + +<p>"You'll sleep to-night! I'll give you the other when it's free," he +said, still covering the man with his hands in his pockets, the curtains +on each side of him, and a back window just behind.</p> + +<p>Then two things happened in quick succession; but the first brought the +lover back to life with such a throb that the second was not even seen.</p> + +<p>Just saying, "I'm afraid I'm going to make a fool of myself," all that +he loved on earth collapsed at his feet. The doctor was down on his +knees beside her, getting the girl into his arms. And even Mr. Croucher +did not see the curtains close, or hear anything happen behind them; for +he, too, was on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span> his knees, holding out a dripping sponge, and babbling +faster than the drops pattered on the floor.</p> + +<p>"It's right! I done it ... that pore copper in the fog! She sent 'im +reelin'—into me arms—but I done all the rest. Never meant to, mind +yer, but that's neither here nor there. Ready to swing, I was, an' don't +care now if I do! She saved me—little knock-out—an' look 'ow I went +an' tret 'er for it!... Gawd, doctor, wot a fair swine I was!"</p> + +<p>But the crime doctor had even less time to listen to him now; for the +eyes of eyes had opened, were gazing up into his; and not one of them +had heard the window raised behind the curtains, or the clanging thud +upon the iron steps just underneath.</p> + + +<h4>THE END</h4> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Crime Doctor, by Ernest William Hornung + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME DOCTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 37338-h.htm or 37338-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/3/3/37338/ + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +book was produced from scanned images of public domain +material from the Google Print project.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Crime Doctor + +Author: Ernest William Hornung + +Illustrator: Frederick Dorre Steele + +Release Date: September 8, 2011 [EBook #37338] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME DOCTOR *** + + + + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +book was produced from scanned images of public domain +material from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + + + + + THE CRIME DOCTOR + + _By_ ERNEST W. HORNUNG + +Author of Raffles, The Amateur Cracksman, The Thousandth Woman, etc. + + + _With Illustrations by_ + FREDERIC DORR STEELE + + INDIANAPOLIS + THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY + PUBLISHERS + + COPYRIGHT 1914 + THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY + + PRESS OF + BRAUNWORTH & CO. + BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS + BROOKLYN, N. Y. + + + + +[Illustration: "It was struck with--this"] + + + + +CONTENTS + + + I THE PHYSICIAN WHO HEALED HIMSELF 1 + + II THE LIFE-PRESERVER 40 + + III A HOPELESS CASE 77 + + IV THE GOLDEN KEY 118 + + V A SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD 159 + + VI ONE POSSESSED 199 + + VII THE DOCTOR'S ASSISTANT 237 + + VIII THE SECOND MURDERER 272 + + + + +THE CRIME DOCTOR + + + + +I + +THE PHYSICIAN WHO HEALED HIMSELF + + +In the course of his meteoric career as Secretary of State for the Home +Department, the Right Honorable Topham Vinson instituted many reforms +and earned the reformer's whack of praise and blame. His methods were +not those of the permanent staff; and while his notorious courage +endeared him to the young, it was not in so strong a nature to leave +friend or foe lukewarm. An assiduous contempt for tradition fanned the +flame of either faction, besides leading to several of those personal +adventures which were as breath to the Minister's unregenerate nostrils, +but which never came out without exposing him to almost universal +censure. It is matter for thanksgiving that the majority of his +indiscretions were unguessed while he and his held office; for he was +never so unconventional as in pursuance of those enlightened tactics on +which his reputation rests, or in the company of that kindred spirit who +had so much to do with their inception. + +It was early in an autumn session that this remarkable pair became +acquainted. Mr. Vinson had been tempted by the mildness of the night to +walk back from Westminster to Portman Square. He had just reached home +when he heard his name cried from some little distance behind him. The +voice tempered hoarse excitement with the restraint due to midnight in a +quiet square; and as Mr. Vinson turned on his door-step, a young man +rushed across the road with a gold chain swinging from his outstretched +hand. + +"Your watch, sir, your watch!" he gasped, and displayed a bulbous hunter +with a monogram on one side and the crest of all the Vinsons on the +other. + +"Heavens!" cried the Home Secretary, feeling in an empty waistcoat +pocket before he could believe his eyes. "Where on earth did you find +that? I had it on me when I left the House." + +"It wasn't a case of findings," said the young man, as he fanned himself +with his opera hat. "I've just taken it from the fellow who took it from +you." + +"Who? Where?" demanded the Secretary of State, with unstatesmanlike +excitement. + +"Some poor brute in North Audley Street, I think it was." + +"That's it! That was where he stopped me, just at the corner of +Grosvenor Square!" exclaimed Vinson. "And I went and gave the old +scoundrel half-a-crown!" + +"He probably had your watch while you were looking in your purse." + +And the young man dabbed a very good forehead, that glistened in the +light from the open door, with a white silk handkerchief just extracted +from his sleeve. + +"But where were you?" asked Topham Vinson, taking in every inch of him. + +"I'd just come into the square myself. You had just gone out of it. The +pickpocket was looking to see what he'd got, even while he hurled his +blessings after you." + +"And where is he now? Did he slip through your fingers?" + +"I'm ashamed to say he did; but your watch didn't!" its owner was +reminded with more spirit. "I could guess whose it was by the crest and +monogram, and I decided to make sure instead of giving chase." + +"You did admirably," declared the Home Secretary, in belated +appreciation. "I'm in the papers quite enough without appearing as a mug +out of office hours. Come in, please, and let me thank you with all the +honors possible at this time of night." + +And, taking him by the arm, he ushered the savior of his property into a +charming inner hall, where elaborate refreshments stood in readiness on +a side-table, and a bright fire looked as acceptable as the saddlebag +chairs drawn up beside it. A bottle and a pint of reputable champagne +had been left out with the oysters and the caviar; and Mr. Vinson, +explaining that he never allowed anybody to sit up for him, opened the +bottle with the precision of a practised hand, and led the attack on +food and drink with schoolboy gusto and high spirits. + +In the meantime there had been some mutual note-taking. The Home +Secretary, whose emphatic personality lent itself to the discreet pencil +of the modern caricaturist, was in appearance exactly as represented in +contemporary cartoons; there was nothing unexpected about him, since his +boyish vivacity was a quality already over-exploited by the Press. His +frankness was something qualified by a gaze of habitual penetration, but +still it was there, and his manner could evidently be grand or +colloquial at will. The surprise was in his surroundings rather than in +the man himself. The perfect union of luxury and taste is none too +common in the professed Sybarite who is that and nothing more; in men of +action and pugnacious politicians it is yet another sign of sheer +capacity. The bits of rich old furniture, the old glass twinkling at +every facet, the brasses blazing in the firelight, the few but fine +prints on the Morris wallpaper, might have won the approval of an art +student, and the creature comforts that of the youngest epicure. + +The young man from the street was easily pleased in all such respects; +but indoors he no longer looked quite the young man. He had taken off an +overcoat while his host was opening the champagne, and evening clothes +accentuated a mature gauntness of body and limb. His hair, which was +dark and wiry, was beginning to bleach at the temples; and up above one +ear there was a little disk of downright silver, like a new florin. The +shaven face was pale, eager, and austere. Dark eyes burnt like beacons +under a noble brow, and did not lose in character or intensity by a +distinct though slight strabism. So at least it seemed to Topham Vinson, +who was a really wonderful judge of faces, yet had seldom seen one +harder to sum up. + +"I'm sorry you don't smoke," said he, snipping a cigar which he had +extolled in vain. "And that champagne, you know! You haven't touched it, +and you really should." + +The other was on his legs that instant. "I never smoke and seldom +drink," he exclaimed; "but I simply can not endure your hospitality, +kind as it is, Mr. Vinson, without being a bit more honest with you than +I've been so far. I didn't lose that pickpocket by accident or because +he was too quick for me. I--I purposely packed him off." + +In the depths of his softest chair Mr. Vinson lolled smiling--but not +with his upturned eyes. They were the steel eyes of all his tribe, but +trebly keen, as became its intellectual head and chief. + +"The fellow pitched a pathetic yarn?" he conjectured. He had never seen +a more miserable specimen, he was bound to say. + +"It wasn't that, Mr. Vinson. I should have let him go in any case--once +I'd recovered what he'd taken--as a matter of principle." + +"Principle!" cried the Secretary of State. But he did not modify his +front-bench attitude; it was only the well-known eyebrows that rose. + +"The whole thing is," his guest continued, yet more frankly, "that I +happen to hold my own views on crime and its punishment If I might be +permitted to explain them, however briefly, they would at least afford +the only excuse I have to offer for my conduct. If you consider it no +excuse, and if I have put myself within reach of the law, there, sir, is +my card; and here am I, prepared to take the consequences of my act." + +The Home Secretary leaned forward and took the card from a sensitive +hand, vibrant as the voice to which he had just been listening, but no +more tremulous. Again he looked up, into a pale face grown paler still, +and dark eyes smoldering with suppressed enthusiasm. It was by no means +his baptism of that sort of fire; but it seemed to Mr. Vinson that here +was a new type of eccentric zealot; and it was only by an effort that he +resumed his House of Commons attitude and his smile. + +"I see, Doctor Dollar, that you are a near neighbor of mine--only just +round the corner in Welbeck Street. May I take it that your experience +as a consultant is the basis of the views you mention?" + +"My experience as an alienist," said Doctor Dollar, "so far as I can lay +claims to that euphemism." + +"And how far is that, doctor?" + +"In the sense that all crime is a form of madness." + +"Then you would call yourself----" + +The broken sentence ended on a note as tactfully remote from the direct +interrogative as practised speech could make it. + +"In default of a recognized term," said Doctor Dollar, "which time will +confer as part of a wider recognition, I can only call myself a crime +doctor." + +"A branch not yet acknowledged by your profession?" + +"Neither by my profession nor by the law, Mr. Vinson; but both have got +to come to it, just as surely as we all accept the other scientific +developments of the day." + +"But have you reduced your practise to a science, doctor?" + +"I am doing so," said Doctor Dollar, with the restrained confidence +which could not but impress one who knew the value of that quality in +himself and in others. "I have made a start; if it were not so late I +would tell you all about it. You are the Home Secretary of England, the +man of all others whom I could wish to convert to my views. But already +I have kept you up too long. If you would grant me an appointment----" + +"Not at all," interrupted Mr. Vinson, as he settled himself even more +comfortably in his chair. "The night is still young--so is my cigar. +Pray say all you care to say, and say it as confidentially as you +please. You interest me, Doctor Dollar; nor can I forget that I am much +indebted to you." + +"I don't want to trade on that," returned the doctor, hastily. "But it +is an old dream of mine to tell you, sir, about my work, and how and why +I came to take it up. I was not intended for medicine, you see; my +people are army people, were Border outlaws once upon a time, and +fighting folk ever since. My father was an ensign in the Crimea--Scots +Fusiliers. I joined the Argyll and Sutherlands the year before South +Africa--where, by the way, I remember seeing you with your Yeomen." + +"I had eighteen months of it without a headache or a scratch." + +"I wish I could say the same, Mr. Vinson. I was shot through the head at +the Modder, ten days after I landed." + +"Through the head, did you say?" asked the Home Secretary, lifting his +own some inches. + +The doctor touched the silver patch in his dark strong hair. "That's +where the bullet came slinking out; any but a Mauser would have carried +all before it! As it was, it left me with a bit of a squint, as you can +see; otherwise, in a very few weeks, I was as fit as ever--physically." + +"Wonderful!" + +"Physically and even mentally--from a medical point of view--but not +morally, Mr. Vinson! Something subtle had happened, some pressure +somewhere, some form of local paralysis. And it left me a pretty +low-down type, I can tell you! It was a case of absolute automatism--but +I won't go into particulars now, if you don't mind." + +"On no account, my dear doctor!" exclaimed the Secretary of State, with +inadvertent cordiality. "This is all of extraordinary interest. I +believe I can see what's coming. But I want to hear every word you care +to tell me--and not one that you don't." + +"It had destroyed my moral sense on just one curious point; but, thank +God, I came to see the cause as well as to suffer unspeakably from the +effect. After that it was a case of killing or curing oneself by hook or +by crook. I decided to try the curing first. And--to cut a long yarn +short--I _was_ cured." + +"Easily?" + +"No. The slander may come home to roost, but I shall never think much of +the London specialist! I've dropped my two sovereigns and a florin into +too many of their itching palms, beginning with the baronets and knights +and ending up with the unknown adventures. But not a man-Jack of them +was ashamed to pocket his two guineas (in one case three) for politely +telling me I was as mad as a hatter to think of such a thing as really +was the matter with me!" + +"And in the end?" + +"In the end I struck a fellow with an open mind--but not in England--and +if I said that he literally opened mine it might be an exaggeration, but +that's all. He did go prospecting in my skull--risked his reputation as +against my life--but we both came out on top." + +"And you've been your own man ever since?" + +Topham Vinson asked the question gravely; it would have taken as keen a +superficial observer as himself to detect much difference in his manner, +in his eyes, in anything about him. Doctor Dollar was not that kind of +observer. To see far one must look high, and to look high is to miss +things under one's nose. It is all a matter of mental trajectory. In the +sheer height of his enthusiasm, the soaring visionary was losing touch +with the hard-headed groundling in the chair. + +"I was cured," he answered with tense simplicity. "It was a miraculous +cure, and yet no miracle. Anybody could perform its like, given the +nerve and skill. Yet it seemed to me a new thing; its possibilities were +almost appalling in their fascination. I must not speak of them, for in +a large measure they are only possibilities still. But I resolved to +qualify, so that at least I might be in a position to do as I had been +done by. I had already left the service; but my fighting days were not +over. I was going to fight Crime as it had never been fought before!" + +There was a challenge in the pause made here. But the listener did not +take it up, and the harangue ended on a humbler note: + +"I studied at St. Mary's under men whose names you know as well as they +know yours. I was at Berlin under Winterschladen, and with Jens Jennsen +in Stockholm. Before I was thirty I had put up my plate in Welbeck +Street, and there I am still." + +"And yet," said the Home Secretary, with a faint and wary smile--"and +yet the possibilities are still only possibilities!" + +"On the surgical side, yes; there I was misled by my own abnormal case. +When another sudden injury makes a monkey of an honest man, I know where +to take him; but the average injury is too gradual, too subtle for the +knife. Congenital cases are, of course, quite hopeless in that respect. +Yet there are ways of curing even what I regard as the very worst type +of congenital criminal at the present day." + +"I wish I knew of some!" said Mr. Vinson cheerily. "But what, may I ask, +do you regard as the very worst type of congenital criminal at the +present day?" + +"The society type," replied the crime doctor without an instant's +hesitation. + +His host permitted himself to open his eyes once more. + +"Your ideas are rather sensational, aren't they, Doctor Dollar?" + +"It's rather a sensational age, isn't it, Mr. Vinson? Your +twentieth-century criminal, with his telephone and his motor-car--for +professional purposes--his high explosives and his scientific tools, has +got to be an educated person, to begin with; and I am afraid there's an +increasing number of educated people who have got to be criminals or +else paupers all their lives. A vicious circle, I think you must agree?" + +"If you can square it with the truth." + +"Isn't it almost a truism, Mr. Vinson? When society women making a +living out of bridge, traffic in tickets for Royal enclosures, charge a +fat fee for a presentation at Court, and a small fortune for launching +an unlikely family in their own set, there must be some reason for it +apart from their own depravity. They are no more naturally depraved than +I am, but their purse is perhaps even smaller, and their wants are +certainly ten times as great. Cupidity is not the motive power; it's +simple shortage of the needful--from their point of view. Society +increases and multiplies in everything but money, and transmits its +expensive tastes without the means to indulge them. So we get our good +ladies with their tariff of introductions, and our members of the best +clubs always ready for a deal over a horse or a car or anything else +that's going to bring them in a fiver. It's a short step from that sort +of thing to a shady trick, and from a shady trick to downright crime. +But it's a step often taken by the type I mean--though not necessarily +with their eyes open. And that's just where the crime doctor should come +in." + +"In opening their eyes?" + +"In saving 'em from themselves while they're still worth saving; in that +prevention which is not only better than cure, but the vital principle +of modern therapeutics in every other direction. In keeping good +material out of prison at all costs, Mr. Vinson, and even though you +turn your prisons into country houses with feather beds and moral +entertainments every night in life!" + +The Secretary of State smiled again, but this time with some sympathy +and much less restraint. He was beginning to see some method in what had +seemed at first unmitigated mania, and to take some interest in a point +of view at least novel and entertaining. But the prison system was not +to be attacked, even in terms of fantastic levity, without protest from +its official champion. + +"Prisons, my dear Doctor Dollar, exist for the benefit of those who keep +out of them rather than those who will insist on getting in. Of course, +the ideal thing would be to benefit both sides; and that's what we're +aiming at all the time. It isn't our fault if a man who gets into quod +is a marked man ever after; he shouldn't get into quod." + +"You've put your finger on your own vulnerable point!" cried the eager +doctor. "Why should he be a marked man? Why force a professional status +on the mere dabbler in crime, who might never have dabbled again? It +isn't as if it undid anything he's done; even hanging your murderer +doesn't bring your victim back to life, and the chances are that he +would never want to murder anybody else. On the other hand, how many +serious crimes might be hushed up without anybody being a bit worse off +than they were the very moment after their commission!" + +Mr. Vinson had been framing an ironical rebuke in the name of morality +and the Mosaic law; but he was not sorry to drop the irony and pin his +opponent down. + +"I hope, Doctor Dollar, it is not to be a function of the new faculty to +collaborate in the concealment of crime and criminals?" + +"It is impossible," replied the enthusiast, duly drawn, "to define the +scope of an embryonic science. When the crime doctor has come to +stay--as he will--I can see him playing a Protean part with the full +sanction of his profession and of the law. He will be preventive +officer, private detective, and father confessor in one, if not even +privileged accessory after some awful fact. The humbler pioneer can hope +for no such powers; his only chance is to work in the dark on his own +lines, to use his own judgment and to take his own risks as I've done +to-night. If he really can save a man by screening him, let him do it +and blow the odds! If he can stop a thing without giving it away, all +the better for everybody, and if he fails to stop it all the worse for +him! Let him be a law unto his patient and himself, but let him stand +the racket if his law won't work." + +"In other words, you would tackle character as ordinary doctors and +persons devote themselves to the body and the soul?" + +"It would come to that, Mr. Vinson. It's a large order, I know, and I +don't expect to see the goods delivered in my time. It will take better +men than I am, and many of 'em, even to start delivery on the scale I +dream about. But that's the idea all right. Punishment has never +signified prevention; what we want is to get under the criminal's skin +_before_ we make it smart, if not before there's an actual criminal in +the case at all!" + +"A very plausible confession of faith, Doctor Dollar." + +The Minister's tone was dry after the other, but that was all. His fixed +eyes seemed to be looking through the doctor's into the scheme itself, +probing it on its merits in the very spirit in which it had been +propounded. It is only the small men who laugh in the face of genuine +enthusiasm, however wild and flighty it may seem. Topham Vinson was not +a small man; but he, too, had been guilty of some wild flights in his +day, and office had not altogether clipped his wings. The sportsman and +the charlatan within him were only too ready to see themselves in +another, to hear their own voices on other lips. But the appeal to +temperament does not necessarily compromise the mind. And that citadel +still flew a neutral flag. + +"What about the practise?" asked Topham Vinson, forcing himself back to +facts. + +"Rome took less building than a London practise, by an unknown man +striking out a new line for himself." + +"I really don't wonder. Who would come to consult you about a homicidal +tendency, or a trick of tampering with special offertories?" + +"In the first instance, most likely, the patient's people; then they +might send him to see me on some other pretext." + +"And what form would the treatment take?" + +"It would depend, of course, upon the case. They don't all know that +they're being treated for incipient criminality. The majority think they +are in an ordinary nursing home." + +"A home!" cried the Secretary of State. The word had brought him to his +feet at last, in a frame of mind no longer to be concealed by nods and +smiles. "You don't mean to tell me, Doctor Dollar, that you actually +run a nursing home for unconvicted criminals?" + +"Potential criminals, Mr. Vinson. I have at present no patient who is +actually wanted by the police." + +"And where is this extraordinary establishment?" + +"Under my own roof here in Welbeck Street." + +"A few hundred yards from where we stand, yet this is the first I hear +of it!" + +"I can see that. It's not my fault, sir. I have done my best to bring it +before your notice." + +"How?" + +"By writing many times to tell you all about myself and the home, Mr. +Vinson." + +"Then I never saw the letters. A Home Secretary stands to be shot at by +every crank who can hold a pen. I employ more than one young gentleman +expressly to divert that sort of fire. You should have got an +introduction to me, Doctor Dollar." + +The doctor had smiled at an expression that he could not but take to +himself. His smile sweetened under the kindlier tone which succeeded +that one unmeasured word. + +"I am not sorry I waited for the introduction which time has given me, +Mr. Vinson." + +"You wanted me to assist the good work, I take it?" + +"By your countenance and influence--if you could." + +"I must see something of it first. I must inspect this home of yours, +Doctor Dollar." + +The steel eyes of the Vinsons could seldom have cut deeper at a glance, +or been met by a pair more candid and unafraid. And yet there was just +that cruel suspicion of a cast, to prejudice both the candor and the +courage of the finer face. + +"It is open to your inspection day or night," said Doctor Dollar. + +"Even at this hour? Even to-night?" + +The Home Secretary sounded as keen as he looked; but on the other side +there was now just enough hesitation to correspond with that one slight +flaw in the finer eyes. + +"This minute, by all means," said the doctor, with resolute cordiality. +"There's always somebody up, and the patients can be seen without being +disturbed." + +"Then," said the Home Secretary, "it's a chance at a time when every +moment of the day is full. Let us strike, doctor, while the iron is as +hot as I can assure you that you have made it." + + +II + +That deplorable passion for adventure, which had turned the hope of the +last Opposition into a guerrilla warrior in South Africa, but which the +Home Secretary of England might have subdued before accepting his +portfolio, was by no means a dead volcano as Topham Vinson sallied forth +with his extraordinary companion. It was to be noticed that he took with +him a thick stick instead of an umbrella, though the deserted streets +had become moist with a midnight drizzle. What he expected can only be +surmised. But the odds are that it did not include the shriek of a +police-whistle in the sedate region of Wigmore Street, and the +instantaneous bolting of Doctor Dollar round the first corner to the +left! + +Now, the Secretary of State was one of those men who keep up their games +out of a cold-blooded regard for the figure; he considered himself as +fit at forty as any man in England, and he gave chase with his usual +confidence. But the long-legged doctor would have left him behind with +the lamp-posts, but for the fact that he was really tearing toward the +sound, not flying from it as his pursuer was so ready to suppose. In a +matter of seconds they had both fetched up at a brilliantly lighted +house, where a more than usually obese policeman was alternately +pounding on the door and splitting the sober welkin with his whistle. + +"Stop that infernal row!" cried Doctor Dollar, with incensed authority. +"Out of the way with you--this is my house!" + +And the Home Secretary arrived on the scene of an imminent assault on +his police, just in time to divert the outraged officer's attention by +asking what had happened, while the doctor found his key. + +"Lord only knows!" said the policeman, kicking some broken glass on one +side. "Murder, it sounds like; there's somebody been loosing off----" + +And even as he spoke somebody loosed off again! The terrific report was +followed by screams within and a fresh shower of glass from the +fanlight. But by this time Doctor Dollar had his latch-key in the lock. +If the door had opened outward, a tangled trio would have fallen into +the street; as it was, it hardly would open for the man in white who was +struggling with a woman (in red flannel) and a boy (in next to nothing) +on the mat. + +Dollar exclaimed "Barton!" in blank amazement. But it was not the +unlucky Barton who had run amuck. "They won't let me at him! They'll get +the lot of us shot dead!" he spluttered, with ungrateful objurgations; +and then the newcomers grasped the situation. On the stairs, at the end +of the narrow passage, they beheld an enormous revolver, against a +background of pink sleeping-suit, with a ferocious eye looking down the +barrel. + +The crime doctor slipped in front of the Hogarthian group, and stood +between everybody and the armed man--shaking his head with an expression +that nobody else could see. + +"Ozzie, I'm surprised at you!" they heard him say with severity. "I +thought you were a better sportsman than to go playing the fool the one +night I'm out. If you want to frighten people, do it where you don't +damage their property; if you mean murder, I'm your mark, my lad! Aim +at my waistcoat buttons and perhaps you'll get me in the mouth; that's +better; now blaze away!" + +But the pink-striped miscreant was not lowering his barrel to improve +his aim. He lowered it altogether. And his other wild eye was open now, +and both were blinking with unlovely woe. + +"I--I didn't mean any harm," he faltered. "It was only a rag--and I'll +pay for the door." + +"It'll be a great rag, won't it, if you fire bang into your own foot? +Better give me that thing before you do." Dollar held out the steadiest +of hands. "No, t'other way round if you don't mind; 'tisn't manners to +pass knives and forks business-end first. Ta! Now make yourself scarce +before Barton goes for you by kind permission of his family." + +The young man in pink stood wildly staring, then fled up-stairs with a +smothered sob. + +"After him, Barton, before he does something silly," said the doctor +under his breath. "My dear Mrs. Barton, you shall tell me the whole +thing from A to Z in the morning; go down to bed like a good soul, and +be satisfied that you prevented bloodshed. Bobby, take one of the +decanters from the tantalus and give your mother a good nightcap." He +turned round as the unpresentable pair made off. The street-door was +shut; the Home Secretary had sole possession of the mat. "Why, Mr. +Vinson, what's happened to the myrmidon?" + +"I thought you would like me to get rid of him," said Topham +Vinson dryly. "He's waiting outside to explain matters to the +reinforcements--as a joke." + +"Rather an unconvincing joke!" said the doctor, wiping his forehead with +the back of his hand. + +"I'm glad you admit it, Doctor Dollar. Am I to understand that the whole +thing was a practical joke, carefully rehearsed for my benefit?" + +The doctor opened his shining eyes. + +"Does it look like one? Hark back a little, Mr. Vinson!" + +"There's no need. I didn't think of it till you put the word into my +mouth. But it's well, rather a coincidence, doctor, coming on top of the +one about my watch--and you of all men catching the thief!" + +"Yet this is the sort of thing that's always liable to happen when one's +back is turned, and always will be until----" + +"Yes?" said the Home Secretary, as Dollar paused and looked at him. + +"Until you make it at least as difficult to buy revolvers and +ammunition, Mr. Vinson, as a dose of prussic acid! Here's a young man, +unsteady, and an epileptic, who has just been placed under my care. I +don't run a private asylum, nor is he ripe for one. I must give him his +head a little, and this happens in a minute! If it should lead to fresh +revolver regulations--but I mustn't forget myself in my excitement. If +you would come in here and smoke a cigarette, I shall have to make a +round directly to see how things are quieting down, and should be only +too glad to take you with me." + +The round was made after further conversation in a dining-room as +Spartan as the rest of the crime doctor's characteristic abode. An +instructed taste in aged but uncomfortable oak gave it the chill +severity of a refectory; and the suggestion was strengthened by a glance +into the minute consulting-room next door, which struck the visitor, +perhaps in the light of one of Dollar's own similitudes, as a sort of +monkish cell and confessional in one. The carven table, rugged yet +elaborate, pale with age, might once have been an altar; the chair +behind it was certainly an ecclesiastical chair. The cumbrous pieces +were yet the fruit of a fastidious eye, and apparently its only fruit. +Everything else throughout the house was ultra-sanitary, refreshingly +utilitarian, twentieth century. No shred nor thread made for dust on the +linoleum, no picture harbored it on the glazed paper. Walls and floors +were of the same uncompromising type up-stairs and down. Yet, when a +peep was taken through one of the numbered doors above, hothouse flowers +bloomed in glass bowls on glass tables, and the bedroom ware was glass +again. The very books were bound in glassy vellum; there was a pile of +them beside the bed, in which a very young man, swathed in bandages, lay +reading under the green glass shade of an electric lamp. + +The doctor expressed his sorrow for the occurrence down-stairs; the +patient, scarcely looking up, said that since he could not have moved to +save his life, he had gone on reading all the time; and they left him at +it, obviously glad to be rid of them. + +"That," whispered the doctor on the landing, "is a young fellow who will +one day be--well, never mind! Until he came to me he had never of his +own free will read anything but a bad novel or a newspaper; he is now +deep in the immortal work of another weak young man who was swayed by +strength, and is himself for the time being under Doctor Johnson's +salutary thumb." + +"What was his weakness?" + +"Pyromania." + +"_What?_" + +"A passion for setting places on fire. He started it as quite a small +boy; they licked it out of him then. All his boyhood he went in fear of +the rod, and it kept him straight. Only the other day he goes up to +Oxford, and promptly sets fire to his rooms." + +"Some form of atavism, I presume?" + +"A very subtle case, if I were free to give you its whole history." + +"I should be even more interested in your treatment." + +"Well, I needn't tell you that he's bandaged up for burns; but you might +not guess that he has come by this lot since I've had him, if not almost +at my hands." + +"Nonsense, man!" + +"At any rate I'm responsible for what happened, and it's going to cure +him. It was a case of undisciplined imagination acting on a bonnet with +just one bee in it. He had never realized what a hell let loose a fire +really was; now he _knows_ through his own skin." + +The statesman's eyebrows were like the backs of two mutually displeased +cats. + +"But surely that's an old wives' trick pushed beyond all bounds?" + +"Pushed further than I intended, Mr. Vinson, I must confess. I only +meant him to see a serious fire. So I arranged with the brigade to ring +me up when there was a really bad one, and with my man to take the boy +out at night for all his walks. There was another good reason for that; +and altogether nothing can have seemed more natural than the way they +both appeared on the scene of this ghastly riding-school affair." + +"I know what's coming!" cried the Home Secretary. "This is the fellow +who dashed in to help save the horses, and got away afterward without +giving his name!" + +"That's it. He says he'll hear those horses till his dying hour! He was +in the thick of it before Barton or anybody else could stop him--they +only succeeded in stopping poor Barton from following. Well, I can take +no credit for the very last thing I should have dreamt of allowing; but +I fancy the odds are fairly long that the tempting element will never, +never again tempt our young friend up-stairs!" + +They had drifted down again during this recital; and he who had led the +way stood staring at the crime doctor, in his monkish cell, with that +intent inscrutability which was one of Topham Vinson's most effective +masks; but now it was a mask imperfectly adjusted, with the warm light +of admiration breaking through, and the shadow of something else +interfering with that light. When Doctor Dollar had marched upon the +loaded revolver, talking down the barrel as to an infant pointing a +popgun--daring another daredevil to shoot him dead--the same admiring +look had come over the face behind him, qualified in precisely the same +fashion. But then the doctor had not seen it, and now it made him wince +a little, as though he dreaded something that was bound to come. + +This was what came: + +"Doctor Dollar, I should prefer not to ask you to show me or tell me any +more. I know a good man when I see one, and I know good work when I +catch him at it. Perhaps that was necessary in the case of such +extraordinary work as yours; yet you say it was a sheer coincidence that +I caught you at it to-night--or rather that such tough work was waiting +for you when we got here?" + +"Do you still doubt it? Why, you yourself insisted on coming round to +see the place in the middle of this blessed night!" + +"Exactly. That establishes your second coincidence; but with all +respect, doctor, I don't believe in two of the same sort on the same +night to the same two people!" + +"What was the other coincidence?" demanded the doctor, huskily. + +"Your catching _any_ old pickpocket with my watch--and letting him off! +Come, doctor, do one more thing for me, and I'll do all in my power for +you and your great work. That is, of course, if you still want me to +take the interest I certainly should have taken if I had seen your +letters." + +"If!" cried the young man from the fulness of his heart. "Your interest +is the one thing I do want of you, and you are the one person I want to +interest!" + +His eyes shone like big brown lamps, straight enough now in their +intensity, and dim with the glory of their vision. He could tremble, +too, it seemed, where the stake was not dear life, but a life's dearer +work. And Topham Vinson was almost moved himself; he really was absorbed +and thrilled; but not to the detriment of his penetrative astuteness, +his political instinct for a bargain. + +"Come, then," said he: "show me the fellow who sneaked my watch." + +"Show him to you? What do you mean?" + +The doctor had not started. But the injured eye showed its injury once +more. + +"It was one of your patients who picked my pocket," said the Home +Secretary, with as much confidence as though he had known it all the +time. "Would you have been in such a hurry to wash your hands of anybody +else, and to undo what he'd done?" + +Dollar made no answer, no denial; but he glanced at a venerable +one-handed clock, whose unprotected pendulum shaved the wall with noisy +sweeps. It was two o'clock in the morning, but already night must have +been turned into dreadful and disturbing day for all the inmates. The +doctor abandoned that excuse unmade, and faced his visitor in +desperation. + +"So you want to see him--now?" + +"I do. I have my reasons. But it shall end at that--if I do see him. +_That_ won't nip my goodwill in the bud!" It was obvious what would. + +"You shall see him," said the doctor, as though racking his mind once +more. "But there are difficulties you perhaps can't quite appreciate. It +means giving away a patient--don't you see?" + +"Perfectly. It seems to me a very proper punishment, since it's all +he'll get. Yet you don't want to lose your hold. Couldn't you send him +down here on some pretext, instead of taking me up to him?" + +The crime doctor's face lit up as if by electricity. + +"I can and I will!" he cried. "Wait here, Mr. Vinson. He's another +reader; he shall come down for a book!" + +The great man waited with the satisfaction of a slightly overbearing +personality for once very nearly overborne. He was now intensely +interested in the crime doctor and his unique establishment. It was an +interest that he had no intention of sharing with his closest colleague, +until he had gone deeper into a theory and practise that were already a +revelation to him. They might both prove unworkable on any large scale, +and yet they might light the way to sensational legislation of the very +type that Topham Vinson was the very man to introduce. Boundless +ambition was one of the forces of a nature that responded to the call of +any sufficiently dazzling crusade; but the passion for adventure ran +ambition hard; and a crusade calculated to gratify both appetites was +dazzling even to eyes of triple steel! + +Only, he must show this new ally his power before they struck up their +alliance; that was the great reason for insisting on seeing the +pickpocket. But there was a little reason besides. An excellent memory +had supplied Mr. Vinson with a kind of post-impression of the +pickpocket. And within one minute of the doctor's departure, and one +second of the patient's prompt appearance, a certain small suspicion +had been confirmed. + +"I think we've met before, my man?" he had begun. His man started +stagily--was altogether of the stage--a bearded scarecrow in rags too +ragged to be true. Vinson found the switches and made more light. "Not +half a bad disguise," he continued, "whoever you may be! I suppose +they're supplied on the premises for distinguished patients?" + +"How do you know it's a disguise?" croaked the hairy man, with downcast +eyes. + +"Well, you don't look a distinguished patient, do you?" said the Home +Secretary airily. "On the other hand, your kit doesn't convince me at +all; looks to me as if it would fall to pieces but for what the ladies +call a foundation--eh?" + +And he swooped down on the ragged tails as their owner turned a +humiliated back. And the "foundation" was a perfectly good overcoat +turned inside out; moreover, it was a coat that Topham Vinson seemed to +know; it was a coat that he suddenly remembered, as he shot up to his +full height and then stood deadly still. + +The pickpocket had not turned round. But his wig and beard lay at his +elbow on the mantelpiece; his diminished head had sunk into his hands; +and the electric light blazed upon a medallion of silver hair, up above +one burning ear. + +"Doctor--Dollar!" exclaimed Topham Vinson. And the ingenuous ring of his +own startled voice only added to his sense of outrage. + +"Yes! I was the man.... It was only to get at you--you know that!" + +It was a hoarse voice muttering to the wall, in a dire discomfiture that +had its effect on the insulted Minister. + +"So that was your weakness!" The plain comment was icier than any sneer. +"Picking and stealing--and your hand still keeps its cunning!" + +"Yes. That was how my wound had taken me." There was less shame in the +hoarse voice, thanks to the bracing coldness of the other. "It started +in the field hospital--orderlies laughed and encouraged me--nurses at +Netley just as bad! Everybody treated it as a joke; the doctor used to +ask for his watch or his handkerchief after every visit; and the great +score was when he thought I had one, and it was really the other--or +both--or the keys out of his trousers pocket! It amused the ward and +made me popular--made me almost suicidal--because I alone knew that I +couldn't help doing it to save my life.... And the rest _you_ know." + +"I do, indeed!" + +"This beastly kit, I had it made on purpose so that I could run after +you one minute with what I'd taken from you the minute before! It was a +last attempt to gain your ear--to get you interested. And now----" + +"And now," said Topham Vinson, with a kind hand on the bent shoulders, +yet a keen eye on the bent head--"and now I suppose you think you've put +the lid on it? So you have, my dear doctor--on any sneaking doubts I had +about you! You've struck a job after my own heart, and you've led me +into it as I never was led into anything in my life before. Well, you've +just got to keep me in it now; and I'm conceited enough to believe I +shall be worth my place. Don't you think you might turn round, Doctor +Dollar, and let us shake hands on that?" + + + + +II + +THE LIFE-PRESERVER + + +The Lady Vera Moyle had made herself notorious in a cause that scored +some points through her allegiance. She it was who cajoled the Home +Secretary outside Palace Yard, and sent him about his weighty business +with the colors of a hated Union pinned to his unconscious back. It is +true that some of her excesses had less to redeem them, but all were +committed with a pious zest which recalled the saying that the Moyles +were a race of Irish rebels who had intermarried with the saints. It was +reserved for Lady Vera to combine the truculence of her forefathers with +the serene solemnity of their wives, and to enact her devilments, as she +took their consequences, with a buxom austerity all her own. + +But she was not at her best when she went to see Doctor Dollar on +Christmas Eve; for it was just two months after the autumn raid, which +had caused the retirement of Lady Vera Moyle, and some of her political +friends, for precisely that period. Otherwise, the autumn raid had been +a triumph for the raiders, thanks to a fog of providential density, +which had fought on their side as the stars in their courses fought +against Sisera for the earliest militant. Never had private property +been destroyed on so generous a scale, with fewer casualties on the side +of the destroying angels; and yet there had been one unnecessary blot on +the proceedings, which they were the first to repudiate and condemn. + +A vile male member of the common criminal classes had not only taken +occasion to loot a jeweler's window, broken by some innocent lady, but +had coolly murdered a policeman who interfered with him in the +perpetration of his selfish crime. Fortunately the wretch had been +traced through the stolen trinkets, expeditiously committed and +condemned, and was on the point of paying the supreme penalty. No sane +person could doubt his guilt, and yet there were those who sought to fix +a certain responsibility on the women! The charge of moral complicity +had disgraced and stultified both Press and platform, and the Home +Secretary, pestered for a reprieve, had only sealed the murderer's fate +at the eleventh hour. Even the steel nerves of the Vinsons had suffered +under a complex strain: it was just as well that he was on the point of +departure for the holidays. + +A deplorable circumstance was the way the Minister's last hours in town +had been embittered by his implacable tormentor, Lady Vera Moyle. That +ingrate had celebrated her release by trying to invade the Home Office, +and by actually waylaying the Secretary of State in Whitehall. An +unobtrusive body-guard had nipped the annoyance in the bud; but it had +caused Topham Vinson to require champagne at his club, whither he was +proceeding on the arm of his last ally and most secret adviser, Doctor +John Dollar of Welbeck Street. And before dark the doctor had been +invaded in his turn. + +"You must blame the Home Secretary for this intrusion," began Lady Vera, +with all the precision of a practised speaker who knew what she had to +say. "He refused, as you heard, to listen to what I had to say to him +this morning; but the detective-in-waiting informed me that you were not +only a friend of Mr. Vinson's, but yourself a medical expert in +criminology. I have therefore a double reason for coming to you, Doctor +Dollar, though it would not have been necessary if Mr. Topham Vinson had +treated me with ordinary courtesy." + +"I am very glad you have done so, Lady Vera," rejoined the doctor in his +most conciliatory manner. "Mr. Vinson, to be frank with you, is not in a +fit state for the kind of scene he was afraid you were going to make. He +is in a highly nervous condition for a man of his robust temperament. +Truth, Lady Vera, compels me to add that you and your friends have had +something to do with this, but the immediate cause is a far more unhappy +case which he has just settled." + +"_Has_ he settled it?" cried Lady Vera, turning paler than before +between her winter sables and a less seasonable hat. + +"This morning," said Dollar, with a very solemn air. + +"He isn't going to hang that poor man?" + +No breath came between the opened lips that prison had bleached and +parched, but neither did they tremble as the doctor bowed. + +"If you mean Alfred Croucher," said he, "convicted of the murder of +Sergeant Simpkins during the last suffragist disturbance, I can only say +there would be an end of capital punishment if he had been reprieved." + +"Doctor Dollar," returned Lady Vera, under great control, "it was about +this case, and nothing else, that I wanted to speak to the Home +Secretary. I never heard of it until this morning, for I have been out +of the way of newspapers, as you may know; and it is difficult to take +in a whole trial at one hurried reading. Do you mind telling me why +everybody is so sure that this man is the murderer? Did anybody see him +do it?" + +The crime doctor smiled as he shook his head. + +"Very few murders are actually witnessed, Lady Vera; yet this would have +been one of the few, but for the fog. Croucher was plainly seen through +the jeweler's window, helping himself one moment, then struggling with +the unfortunate sergeant." + +"Was the struggle seen as plainly as the robbery?" + +"Not quite, perhaps, but the evidence was equally convincing about +both. Then the stolen goods were found, some of them, still in +Croucher's possession; and the way he tried to account for that, in the +witness-box, was only less suicidal than his fatal attempt at an alibi." + +"Poor fool!" exclaimed Lady Vera, with perhaps less pity than +impatience. "Of course he was there--I saw him!" + +Dollar was not altogether unprepared for this. + +"You were there yourself, then, Lady Vera?" + +"I should think I was!" + +"It--it wasn't you who broke the window for him?" + +"Of course it was! Yet nobody tried to find me as a witness! It is only +by pure chance that I come out in time to save an innocent man's life, +for innocent he is of everything but theft. _I_ know--too well!" + +Her voice was no longer under inhuman control; and there was something +in its passionate pitch that sent a cold thrill of conviction down +Dollar's spine. He gazed in horror at the unhappy girl, in her luxurious +sables, drawn up to her last inch in the pitiless glare of his electric +light; and even as he gazed--and guessed--all horror melted into the +most profound emotion he had ever felt. It was she who first found her +voice, and now it was calmer than it had been as yet. + +"One thing more about the trial," she said. "What was the weapon he is +supposed to have used?" + +"His knife." + +"Yet it seems to have been a small wound?" + +"It had a small blade." + +"But was there any blood on it?" + +She had to press him for these details; any squeamishness was on his +side, and he a doctor! + +"There was," he said. "Croucher had an explanation, but it wasn't +convincing." + +"The truth often isn't," said Lady Vera, bitterly. "You may be surprised +to hear that the blow wasn't struck with a knife at all. It was struck +with--this!" + +Her right hand flew from her glossy muff; in it was no flashing steel, +but a short, black, round-knobbed life-preserver, that she handed over +without more words. + +"But his skull wasn't smashed!" exclaimed John Dollar, and for an +instant he looked at his visitor with the eye of the alienist. "It was a +puncture of the carotid artery, and you couldn't do that with this if +you tried." + +"Hit the floor with it," said Lady Vera, "but don't hold it quite by the +end." + +Dollar bent down and did as directed; at the blow, a poniard flew out of +the opposite end to the round knob; the point caught in his sleeve. + +"That's how it was done," continued Lady Vera. "And I am the person it +was done by, Doctor Dollar!" + +"It was--an accident?" he said, hoarsely. He could look at her as though +the accident had not been fatal; he had less command of his voice. + +"I call it one; the law may not," said she resignedly. "Yet I didn't +even know that I possessed such a weapon as this; it was sold to me as a +life-preserver, and nothing else, out of a pawnbroker's window, where I +happened to see it on the very morning of the raid. I thought it would +be just the thing for smashing other windows, especially with that thong +to go round one's wrist. I thought, too--I don't mind telling you--that, +if I were roughly handled, it was a thing I could use in self-defense as +I couldn't very well use a hammer." + +And here she showed no more shame than a soldier need feel about his +bayonet after battle; and Dollar met her eyes on better terms. He had +been making mechanical experiments with the life-preserver. Some spring +was broken. That was why it became a dagger at every blow, instead of +only when you gave it a jerk. + +"And you were roughly handled by Sergeant Simpkins?" he suggested +eagerly. + +"Very," she said, with a certain reluctance. "But I expect the poor +fellow was as excited as I was when I tried to beat him off." + +"I suppose you hardly knew what you were doing, Lady Vera?" + +"Not only that, Doctor Dollar, but I didn't know what I had done." + +"Thank God for that!" + +"But did you imagine it for a moment? That's the whole point and +explanation of everything that has happened. The worst was over in a few +seconds, in the thick of that awful fog, but, of course I never dreamt +what I had done. I did think that I had knocked him out. But that was +all that ever entered my head until this very morning." + +"Were you close to your broken window at the time?" + +"Very close, and yet out of sight in the fog." + +"And you had seen nothing of this man Croucher, and his hand in the +affair?" + +"Not after I'd done my part. I did just before. I'm certain it was the +same huge man that they describe. But I heard the whole thing while we +were struggling. They were blowing a police-whistle and calling out +'Thieves!' I remember hoping that the policeman would hear them, and let +me go. But I suppose his blood was up, as well as mine." + +"And after you had--freed yourself?" said the doctor, trying not to set +his teeth. + +"I ran off, of course! I knew that I had done much more than I ever +intended; but that's all I knew, or suspected, even when I found this +horrid thing open in my hand. I tried to shut it again, but couldn't. So +I hid it in my dress, and ran up Dover Street to my club, where I put it +straight into a bag that I had there. Then I made myself decent +and--turned out again with a proper hammer." + +The doctor groaned; he could not help it. Yet it was his first audible +expression of disapproval; he had restrained himself while all the worst +was being told; and the girl's face acknowledged his consideration. Her +color had come at last. Thus far, in recounting her intentional +misdeeds, as though they were all in the great day's work, she had shown +a divine indifference to his opinion of her or her proceedings. There +had been nothing aggressive about it--he merely doubted whether the +question of his views had ever entered her mind. But now he could see +that it did; he had shown her something that she did not want to lose, +and her fine candor hid that fact as little as any other. + +"I didn't know what I'd done, remember!" she said with sharp solicitude. +"I never did know until this morning, when I heard of the case for the +first time, and for the first time saw the stains on the dagger--at +which you've been trying so hard not to look! Do look at them, Doctor +Dollar. Of course, there can be no doubt what they are, but I shall be +only too glad for you to prove it to everybody's satisfaction." + +"'Only too glad,' Lady Vera?" + +They gazed at each other for several seconds. Her face was tragic to +him now; but emotion, apparently, was the one thing she would condescend +to hide. But for her eyes, she might have been incredibly callous and +cold-blooded; her blue Irish eyes were great and glassy with a grief not +soluble in tears. + +"Doctor Dollar," she said, tensely, "nothing can undo this hideous +thing, though I hope to live long enough to make such poor amends as a +human being can. But in this other direction they must be made at once. +It's no use thinking of what can't be undone till we _have_ undone what +we can--if we are quick! That's why I tried to go straight to the Home +Secretary, and why I have come straight to you. Take me to him, Doctor +Dollar, and help me to convince him that what I have told you is the +whole truth and nothing else! If you think it will make it easier, +satisfy yourself about those blood-stains. Then we can take the dagger +with us." + +The doctor applied a crude test on the spot. He stooped over the fire, +heated the stained steel between the bars, cooled it at the open window, +picked off a scale and examined it briefly under a microscope. All this +was done with tremendous energy tempered by extreme precision and +nicety. And Lady Vera followed the operation with an impersonal +interest that could not but include the operator, so intent upon his +task, so obviously thankful to have a task of any sort in hand. But when +he rose from his microscope it was with a shrug of the shoulders, an +almost angry shake of the head. + +"Of course, this is all no good, you know!" he cried, as if it were her +test. "It would take hours to make the analysis that's really wanted." + +"But as far as you have gone, Doctor Dollar?" + +"As far as I have gone--which isn't a legal or medical inch--it +certainly does look like blood, Lady Vera." + +"Of course it is blood. There's another thing that will help us, too." + +"What's that?" + +"One of the best points in the defense, so far as I've had time to make +out, was about the prisoner's knife. Now, if we take this with us, +either to the Home Secretary, or, if he still refuses to see me, to New +Scotland Yard----" + +"Lady Vera!" the doctor interrupted, aghast at her suicidal zeal. "Is it +possible that you realize the position you are in? It isn't only a +situation that you've got to face; that you have already done, superbly! +But have you any conception of the consequences?" + +"I think I have," said Lady Vera, smiling. "I don't believe they will +hang me; it would be affectation to pretend I did. But, of course, +that's their business--mine is to change places with an innocent man." + +"That you will never do," replied the doctor warmly. "There's no +innocent man in the case; this Croucher is a thief and a perjurer, +besides being an old convict who has spent half his life in prison! He +would have had five years for the other night's work, without any +question of a murder; they'll simply pack him off to Dartmoor or +Portland when we've saved his miserable neck. And save it we will, no +fear about that; but at what a price--at what a price!" + +"I don't see that you need trouble about it," said Lady Vera, concerned +at his distress, "beyond putting me in touch with Mr. Vinson. The rest +will be up to him, as they say; and, after all, it won't be anything so +very terrible to me. I am an old prisoner myself, you must remember!" + +There was a gleam of her notorious audacity with all this; but it was +like the glow of flowers on a grave. The horror of things to happen had +never possessed her valiant eyes, and yet it must have been there, for +all at once Dollar missed it. He read her look. He had relieved her mind +about the man in the cell, only to open it at last to the man in his +grave. Grief crippled her as horror had not; prisons could be broken, +but not the prison to which her hand had sent a fellow creature. Yet her +grief was mastered in its turn, forced out of sight before his eyes, +even while her flippant speech rang through him as the bravest utterance +he had ever heard. + +It blew a bugle in the man's brain, and the call was clear and definite. +He knew his own mind only less instantaneously than he had penetrated +hers. Never in all his days had he known his mind quite so well as when +she thought better of the very words which had enlightened him, and went +on to add to them in another key: + +"So now, Doctor Dollar, will you crown all your great kindness by +taking me to see the Home Secretary at once?" + +"Lady Vera," he exclaimed, with unreasonable irritation, "what is the +good of asking impossibilities? I couldn't take you to Topham Vinson +even if I would. He would begin by doubting your sanity; there would be +all manner of silly difficulties. Moreover, he's not in town." + +She showed displeasure at the statement of fact only. + +"Doctor Dollar, are you serious?" + +"Perfectly." + +"Have you forgot that I saw you together at almost two o'clock?" + +"I think not quite so late as that. The Home Secretary left Euston at +2:45." + +"Where for?" + +She looked panic-stricken. + +"I'll tell you, Lady Vera, if you promise not to follow him by the next +train." + +"When does it go?" + +"Not for some time. There's only one more; we debated which he should +take. But you mustn't take the other, Lady Vera; you must leave that to +me. I want you to leave the whole thing to me--from this very moment +till you hear from me again." + +"When would that be, Doctor Dollar?" + +"As soon as I have seen Mr. Vinson." + +"You would undertake to tell him everything?" + +"Every detail, exactly as you have told me." + +"Will it seem credible at second-hand?" + +"Quite enough so to justify a respite. That's the first object; and this +is the first step to it, believe me! There's plenty of time between this +and--Tuesday." + +"Oh! I know that," she returned, bluntly disdainful of a well-meant +hesitation. "There's still not a moment to lose while that poor man lies +facing death." + +"I'm not sure that he does, Lady Vera. The decision's only just been +made; it won't be out till the day after to-morrow. I don't believe they +would break it to Croucher on Christmas Day." + +"They can break the good news instead. Where is Mr. Vinson? It's all +right, I won't attempt to tackle him till you have. That's a +promise--and I don't break them like windows!" + +John Dollar ignored that boast with difficulty. He saw through her +tragic levity as through a glass, and his heart cried out with a +sympathy hard indeed to keep to himself; but it was obviously the last +thing required of him by Lady Vera Moyle. He gave her the required +information in a voice only less well managed than her own. And he +thought her eyes softened with the faintest recognition of his +restraint. + +"I thought the Duke had washed his hands of his notorious nephew," she +remarked. "Well, we shall have to spoil the family gathering, I'm +afraid." + +"That's my job, Lady Vera." + +"And I never thanked you for taking it on! Nor will I, Doctor Dollar; +thanks don't meet a case like this!" Very frankly she took his hand +instead: it was hotter and less steady than her own. "And now what about +your train?" + +"I'm afraid there's not one till seven o'clock. Vinson talked of going +down by it at first." + +The time-table confirmed his fear; he threw it down, and plunged into +the telephone directory instead. Lady Vera watched him narrowly. He had +dropped into his old oak chair, and the sheen of age on the table +betrayed his face as though it were bent over clear brown water. She +could see its anxiety as he had not allowed her to see it yet. + +"I suppose you wouldn't care to face it in a motor?" + +She was faltering for the first time. + +"That's exactly what I mean to do," he answered, without looking up from +the directory. "I'm just going to telephone for a car." + +"Then you needn't!" she cried joyfully. "We have at least two eating +their bonnets off in our mews. I'll go home in a taxi, and send one of +them straight round with a driver who knows the way, and a coat that you +must promise to wear, Doctor Dollar. All my people are away except my +mother, and she won't know; she isn't strong enough to use the cars. But +I mustn't speak of poor mother, or I shall make a fool of myself yet. +It's partly my fault as it is, you see, and of course all this will make +her worse. But I'm not so sure of that, either! My mother is the kind of +person who has all the modern ailments and no modern ideas--but she +could show us all how to play the game at a pinch. She will be the first +to back me up in the only conceivable course." + +This speech had not come quite so fluently as might be supposed, though +Dollar had only interrupted it to send for a taxicab. It had interrupted +itself when Lady Vera Moyle was betrayed into speaking of poor Lady +Armagh, whose heart-felt disapproval of her daughter's escapades was +public property. Dollar had heard from Topham Vinson--that very day at +lunch--that the last one had made her seriously ill; then what indeed of +impending resolutions, and the nine days' tragic scandal which was the +very least that could come of them unless---- + +"Unless!" + +In the doctor's mind so many broken sentences began with that +will-o'-the-wisp among words, that others really spoken fell upon stony +ears, and he knew as little what he said in reply. In a dream he saw a +small hand wave as the taxicab vanished round the corner to the right; +in a dream he sprang up-stairs, hiding under his coat the weapon with +which that little hand had dealt out death; and awoke in his wintriest +clothes, his greatest coat, to find himself called upon to top the lot +with another of unkempt fur sent with the car. + +That aluminum clipper--a fifteen-horse-power Invincible Talboys--was +indeed at the door in incredibly quick time. Twin headlights lit long +wedges of London mud; two pairs of goblin goggles mounted up behind +them--one sent with the coat and a message that was more than law. The +dapper chauffeur huddled down behind the wheel; the passenger sat bolt +upright at his side; the Barton family, his faithful creatures, carried +out an impromptu tableau in the background. Mother and son--those +unpresentable features of a former occasion--now appeared as immaculate +cook and page at the top of the area steps and on the lighted threshold +respectively. Barton himself leaned out of an upper window, still in his +white suit--it was the typically muggy Christmas of a degenerate young +century--but with all the black cares of the strange establishment quite +apparent on his snowy shoulders. The dapper driver gave his horn a +spiteful pinch. And then they were off, only to be held up in Oxford +Street by the Christmas traffic, but doing better in the Edgware Road, +and soon on the way to Edgware itself, and Elstree and St. Albans, and +all the lighted towns and pitch-dark roads that lie by night between the +capital of England and her smallest county. + +"Least trem-lines this wye," said the dapper one, a mile or two out; and +said no more for another fifty. But he drove like a little genius, and +the car responded to his cunning hands as a horse that knows its master. +She proved to be a sound roadster whose only drawback was a lack of +racing speed; the lad had her in prime condition, and the good road ran +from under her like silk from a silent loom. + +Dollar sat beside him, in the shelter of a wind-screen that glazed and +framed a continuous study in nocturnal values. Now the fine shades would +be broken by a cluster of lights, soon to scatter and go out like sparks +from a pipe; now only by the acetylene lamps that kept the foreground in +a blaze between villages. Often a ghostly portent appeared hovering over +the road ahead; but this was only the doctor's own anxious face, seen +dimly in the screen. + +And yet he was not really anxious for those first fifty miles. At the +start he was too thankful to be under way, and the road was never empty +of exciting and diverting possibilities. But at Bedford they stopped for +supper: it was Dollar's sudden idea, the hour being now between eight +and nine; but the treasure at the wheel professed his readiness to push +on, and it would have been better for Dollar to have taken him at his +word. The break in the run also broke up the dreamy lull induced by the +keen air and the low smooth hum of the car. In the warm hotel, all holly +and Christmas cheer, he came back to real life with a thud, and its most +immediate problem beset him all the rest of the way. + +Hitherto his one anxiety had been to get at the Home Secretary that +night; henceforth he was having the interview over and over again, with +a different result every time. He knew, indeed, what he meant to say +himself; he had known that before he said good-by to Lady Vera Moyle. +But what would the Home Secretary say? Was it conceivable that the +blood-stained life-preserver would be enough for him? It would be +supported by the sworn statement of a man whom he had learned to trust. +But was such utterly indirect evidence in the least likely to upset a +decision already taken, if not already communicated to the man in the +condemned cell? + +The very thought of that hapless wretch was fraught with definite and +vivid horror. The crime doctor had once seen the inside of a condemned +cell; he could see it still. The door was open, the pitiful occupant at +exercise in an adjacent yard. He had looked in. The cell was not so +gloomy as it should have been. Texts on the walls, sunlight through the +bars, and on the fixed flap of clean worn wood, a big open book. + +Dollar recalled every detail with morbid fidelity. He had gone in to +look at the book, and found it a bound volume of _Good Words_, open at a +laudable serial by a lady then in vogue with the virtuous. Yet that +particular reader had cut a woman's throat over a quarrel about a +shilling, and Dollar had seen him striding jauntily up and down the +narrow yard, cracking some joke with the attendant warders, a smile on +his scrubby lips and in his bold blue eyes. He could see the fellow as +he had seen him for ten seconds years ago. Yet his pity for one in the +same awful case, for a crime he had not committed, was as nothing to his +infinite sorrow and compassion for her who had committed it unawares, +comparatively light as the punishment for such a deed was bound to be. + +But was it? Not for Lady Vera Moyle, at all events! Either she would go +scot-free, or her punishment might well be worse than death. It might +easily kill her mother; then the tragedy would be a double tragedy +after all, and Lady Vera would still be its author. Supposing she had +not discovered her own crime! Croucher would have been no loss to the +community; life-long criminals like Croucher were best out of the way, +murderers or no murderers. The crime doctor was convinced of that. They +were the incurables; extermination was the only thing for them. + +"I would shut up my penitentiaries, but enlarge my lethal chamber," he +sometimes said, and would be quite serious about it. Yet not for a +moment could he have carried his ideas to their logical conclusion in +the concrete case of Alfred Croucher and Lady Vera Moyle. He could have +let a man of that stamp go technically innocent to the gallows--or he +thought he could just then. But he could not have allowed the greatest +monster to suffer for Lady Vera's sins--and that he felt in his bones. +It was the personal equation as supplied by her that made the thing +impossible. Such a load on such a soul! Better any punishment than that! + +At Kettering a right-hand turn led up-hill and down-dale into little +Rutland, and Dollar ceased glaring at his own ghost in the wind-screen; +a healthily immediate anxiety kept him peering at his watch instead. +But now they were skirting one of the longest and stumpiest stone walls +in feudal England, and all of a sudden it parted in twin turrets joined +by triple gates. Over the central arch heraldic monsters pawed the +stars; underneath an arc lamp hung resplendent; all three gates were +open, and the drive beyond was a perspective of guiding lights. It was +evidently a case of Christmas festivities on a suitable scale at +Stockersham Hall. + +Miles up the drive, a semicircle of motor-cars fringed a country edition +of the Horseguards Parade, dominated by an escaped hotel; and the car +that really was from London had becoming palpitations in the zone of +light. Before a comparatively simple portico a superlatively splendid +menial looked askance at the doctor's borrowed furs, but was not +unimpressed by a curt inquiry for Mr. Topham Vinson, and consented to +inquire in his turn. + +"Be quick and quiet, and give him this card," said the doctor, slipping +half-a-sovereign underneath it. "I want to see Mr. Vinson--no one +else--on urgent business from the Home Office." + +Yet the next minute merely brought forth an imposing personage whom the +dapper driver did not fail to salute; even Dollar was not positive +whether it was the Duke or his butler until summoned indoors with the +subtle condescension of the supreme servitor. He went as he was, in +hirsute coat and goggles, the butler stalking at arm's length, with an +air of personal repudiation happily not lost upon the little London lynx +in charge of the car. + +That artist would have been an endless joy to eyes not turned within. +His silent endurance and efficiency, his phlegmatic zest in an adventure +which might have a professional interest for him, but obviously did not +engage his curiosity, were qualities which even the tormented Dollar had +appreciated at intervals on the road. But now he missed a treat. The +little Cockney ran his engine till the first flunkey returned and said +things through the noise. Then he looked under his bonnet, as a monkey +into its offspring's head. But the climax arrived with sandwiches on a +lordly tray, when a glass of beer was sent back, and one of champagne +brought instead to this choice specimen of a contemporary type. It was +scarcely down before the passenger reappeared, accompanied by another +swollen figure in motoring disguise, as well as by my Lord Duke, who +saw them off himself, and did look less ducal than the butler after all. + +The many lights of Stockersham dwindled and disappeared into the night +and one long wave of incandescence flowed back as it had come, by +finespun hedge and wirework thicket, through dead villages and sleeping +towns, like phosphorescent foam before a vessel's bows. And in the +torpedo body of the Invincible Talboys, where Dollar now sat behind his +companion of the outward trip, and the Home Secretary of England behind +a fat cigar, there was a strained silence through two entire counties, +but something like an explosion on the confines of the third. + +"Do you still refuse to give her name?" demanded Topham Vinson, exactly +as though they had been talking all the time. The stump of his second +cigar was so short that angry light and angry mouth were one. + +"I must," said Dollar, in a muffled voice, and he pointed to the hunched +shoulders within a yard of their noses. + +"In that case we have no secrets," replied the Home Secretary with a +sneer. "But why must you, Dollar? She seems to have made no reservations +with you, yet you would make this enormous one with me." + +"It's a secret of the consulting-room, Mr. Vinson; those of the +confessional are not more sacred, as you know perfectly well." + +"And you expect me to eat my decision on the strength of a hearsay +anonymous confession?" + +"I do--in the first instance," said Dollar decidedly. "An immediate +respite would commit you to nothing, but I don't ask even for that on +the unsupported strength of what I told you at Stockersham. You know +what you've got in your overcoat pocket. Hand it over to your own +analyst; have an exhumation, if you like, and see if the weapon doesn't +actually fit the wound; if it doesn't, hang your man." + +"I'm much obliged for your valuable advice. But it's got to be one thing +or the other, once for all; the poor devil has been on tenter-hooks +quite long enough." + +"And have you forgotten how nearly you decided in his favor, Mr. +Vinson, without all this to turn the scale?" + +It was perhaps an ominous feature of their mushroom intimacy that the +younger man had not yet been invited to drop the formal prefix in +addressing his senior by a short decade. But this would not have been +the moment even for a familiarity encouraged in happier circumstances. +And yet Dollar dared to pat the great man's arm as he spoke; and the +gesture was as the button on the foil; it prevented a shrewd thrust from +drawing blood, and if anything it improved Topham Vinson's temper. + +"It's no good, my dear fellow!" he exclaimed in friendly settlement of +the general question. "I must have the lady's name, unless she's +determined to defeat her own ends." + +"Do you mean to say that it's her name or Croucher's life?" + +Topham Vinson had not meant to say any such thing--in so many words--and +it was annoying to have them put into his mouth. But he had decided not +to be annoyed any more. It did not pay with this fellow Dollar; at +least, it had not paid on that occasion; but anybody might be at a +disadvantage after a heavy political strain, a lengthy journey, an +excellent dinner, and a development as untimely as it was embarrassing. +Mr. Vinson relapsed into silence and an attitude unconsciously modeled +on that of the gallant little driver. His body sank deep into the rugs, +his head as deep between his shoulders. It was almost Hertfordshire +before he spoke again. + +"Vera Moyle was one of the Oxford Street division," he remarked at last. +"I know all about her movements on the night of battle; otherwise I +should want to know about them now. If I thought _she_ was the +woman----" + +"What's that?" said Dollar lethargically. "I was almost asleep." + +The remarks did not gain weight by repetition, but the broken sentence +was finished with some effect: "I'd let her drain the cup." + +"I don't wonder," rejoined Dollar, sympathetically. + +"Yet you would have me risk my political existence for one of her +kidney!" + +"I don't follow." + +"You would reprieve the apparent murderer, and let the real one continue +militant here on earth?" + +"I believe she has had her fill of militancy." + +"Not she!" + +"I'll go bail for her if you like. It was an accident She is +heart-broken about it--and you don't know her--I do! I'd back her not to +run the risk of such another accident!" + +"And what if she rounded on me? However such a thing came out, it would +be my ruin, Dollar." + +"It wouldn't come out through her!" + +A certain fervor crept into the doctor's voice. It was obviously +unconscious, and Topham Vinson was far too astute a person to engender +consciousness and caution by so much as a rallying syllable. But he did +hazard a leading question, subtly introduced as nothing of the sort. + +"I'm not trying to get at what I want in a roundabout way," he had the +nerve to state. "I've given up trying to pump you, Dollar; but--would it +make a _very_ great scandal if we had to fix this thing on this +particular young lady?" + +"I can't answer about scandals," replied the still not unwary doctor. +"It would break hearts--probably cause death--make her a double murderer +in her own eyes, and God knows what else as a result! And it wouldn't do +anybody the least bit of good, because you would still have to give +Croucher a suitable term for his authentic offense." + +It was three o'clock on Christmas morning when they saw the lights of +London from the top of Brockley Hill; a minute later they were on the +tram-lines at the foot, and almost immediately in the purlieus of the +town. + +The trip did not end without a telling taste of Mr. Vinson's very +individual quality. In Maida Vale he suddenly announced his intention of +having the life-preserver identified in those very small hours by the +pawnbroker who had sold it on the morning of the autumn raid. The crime +doctor was terrified; for aught he knew the man might be well aware that +he had sold it to Lady Vera Moyle. She was notorious enough, in all +conscience; his only hope lay in the fact that he himself had not known +her by sight before that day. In vain he raised various objections; they +were well met by his own previous arguments for the immediate reprieve +of Alfred Croucher, and he feared to press them. He knew only the name +of the pawnbroker's street, but here Cockney sharpness came in again, +and they were pounding on the right shutters by half past three. An +up-stairs window flew alight, up went a sash, and out came an angry +head. + +"My name is Topham Vinson," said one of the swaddled men in a sepulchral +voice. "I'm the Home Secretary, but I can't force you to come down and +speak to me because of that. I can only make it more or less worth your +while." + +He was fishing for his sovereign-case as he spoke. In another minute the +private door had shut behind him and Doctor Dollar, and an obsequious +sack of humanity shuffled before them into a sanctum still redolent of a +somewhat highly-seasoned meal. + +"I remember 'aving it in the thop," said the unkempt head protruding +from the sack. "But I can't thay 'ow it came here--that I can thwear in +a court of juthtith, my lord! It'th a narthy, beathly thing, but I +thwear it wath here when I took over the bithneth." + +"I don't care how or when it came here," said Topham Vinson, counting +the sovereigns in the gold case attached to the watch-chain of other +memories. "I want to know if you remember selling this life-preserver?" + +"Yeth, I do!" + +"When?" + +"It would be--let me thee--thome time lartht October or November." + +"Do you remember who bought it?" + +"Yeth--a young lady!" + +Dollar breathed again. The man did not know her name; at first he was +extremely shaky on the point of personal appearance. But the doctor +assisted him by unscrupulously suggesting a number of marked +characteristics which Lady Vera Moyle did not happen to possess. The man +fell straight into the trap, recalled every imaginary feature, and +finally earned big gold by quite convincingly connecting the sale of the +life-preserver with the date of the great women's raid. Mr. Vinson +looked very stern as he led the way out into the street; and it was he +who sharply woke the little chauffeur, who was snoring heartily over his +wheel. + +"I like that lad," he muttered in the car. "He does nothing by halves. +No more do I! Do you mind dropping me first at Portman Square?" + +Dollar gave the order, and they slid through the empty streets as though +man and car were fresh from the garage. There was not a soul in Portman +Square, or a light in any of the houses except the Home Secretary's. +They had telephoned through from Stockersham after his departure, and +the door opened as he emptied his remaining sovereigns into the +chauffeur's hand, before taking Dollar's with no lack of warmth. + +"I can't ask you in this time," said Topham Vinson, smiling. "Apart from +the hour, I've got to go straight to the telephone, get through to +Pentonville, and spoil the Governor's night!" + +"Reprieved?" gasped the doctor. It was the one word that would come. + +The Home Secretary nodded rather grimly, but was smiling as he shut the +door almost on the hand with which John Dollar would have seized his +once more. There was a shooting of bolts inside. + +Dollar turned slowly round, wondering if at last he could tell the +little driver something about the night's enterprise in which he had +played so heroic a part. There was no need. The driver had kept eyes and +ears wide open--and collapsed once more over the wheel. This time it was +not in sleep, but in a dead faint; and the driving goggles were all +awry, the driver's hat had tumbled off, the driver's hair had broken +bounds. + +It was a girl's hair, and the girl was Lady Vera Moyle. + + + + +III + +A HOPELESS CASE + + +Alfred Croucher had the refreshing attribute of looking almost as great +a ruffian as he really was. His eyes swelled with a vulgar cunning, his +mouth was coarse and pitiless; no pedestal of fine raiment could have +corrected so low a cast of countenance, or enabled its possessor to pass +for a moment as a gentleman or a decent liver. But he had often looked a +worse imitation than on the morning of his triumphant exit from the +jail, his bullet head diminished in a borrowed cap, his formidable +physique tempered by a Burberry all too sober for his taste. + +Nor was that all the change in Mr. Croucher at this agreeable crisis of +his career. The bulging eyes were glazed with a wonder which quite +eclipsed the light of triumph; and they were fixed, in unwilling +fascination, upon the tall figure to which the borrowed plumes belonged, +whom he had never beheld before that hour, but at whose heels he trotted +from the bowels of the prison to the motor-car flashing in the sun +beyond the precincts. + +"'Alf a mo'!" cried Croucher, making a belated stand instead of jumping +in as he was bid. "I didn't rightly catch your name inside, let alone +wot you got to do with me an' my affairs. If you come from my s'lic'tor, +I should like to know why; if you're on the religious lay, 'ere's your +'at an' coat, and I won't trouble you for a lift." + +"My name is Dollar," replied the motorist. "My business is neither legal +nor religious, and it need not necessarily be medical, though I do +happen to be a doctor. I came at the request of a friend of yours, in +that friend's car, to see if there's nothing we can do to make up to you +for all you've been through." + +"A friend of mine!" ejaculated Croucher, with engaging incredulity. + +The doctor smiled, but dryly, as he had spoken. "It's one of the many +unknown friends you have gained lately, Mr. Croucher. And I should like +to make one more, if only to the extent of a little spin and some +breakfast at my house. There is more sympathy for you than you seem to +realize, and one or two of us are ready to show it in any way you will +permit. But I wouldn't stand here, unless you want a public +demonstration first." + +Mr. Croucher decided to disregard the suspicions that a kindness always +excited in his mind, and took his place in the car without further +argument or a second look at the handful of the curious already +collecting on the pavement. In a moment he was wondering why he had been +such a fool as to hesitate at all. The car slid out of the shadow of the +prison into the sunlight of a bright spring morning, over a sparkling +Thames, and through the early traffic without let or hitch. And the +gentleman in the car knew how to hold his tongue, and to submit himself +to sidelong inspection as a gentleman should. But little had Croucher +made of him by Welbeck Street, except that he looked too knowing to be a +crank, and not half soft enough for his notion of the good Samaritan. + +Breakfast removed any lingering misgivings, but might have created them +in a more sophisticated mind. It was an English breakfast fit for a +foreign potentate; there were soles, kidneys, eggs and bacon, hot rolls, +and lashings of such coffee as made Mr. Croucher forget a previous +craving for alcohol. He thought it funny that so generous a repast +should be served on a black old table without a cloth, and he did not +fancy the leathern chairs with the great big nails, more fit for a +museum than a private gentleman's house. But a subsequent cigar, in +which the private gentleman did not join him, was up to the visitor's +highest standard, and the subject of a more articulate appreciation than +all that had gone before. + +"You shall smoke the box if you care to stay with me," said Doctor +Dollar, with a warmer smile. + +"Stay with you!" exclaimed Croucher, suffering a return of his worst +suspicions. "Why should I stay with you?" + +"Because there are worse places, Croucher, and one of them has left you +a bit of a wreck." + +"A bit of one!" cried the other, in a sudden snarling whine. "They've +just about done me in, doctor, if you want to know. Two munfs' 'ard, +that I was never ordered, on top of one in the condemned cell for what +I never done! That's 'ow they've tret me--somefink crool--wuss than wot +you'd treat a dawg wot give you 'ydrophobia. And wot _'ad_ I done? +'Elped meself when the stuff was under my nose, an' me starvin', an' the +jooler's winder ready broke for a cove by them as never 'ad his +temptitions. I don't say it was right, mind you; but that much I did do, +and not what they said I 'ad an' couldn't prove. They couldn't prove it, +because I never done it; they couldn't 'ang me, because they didn't +dare; but they made me sweat an' shiver just the same. They took ten +years off of me life; they give me such a time as I shan't forget till +my dying day. And as if that wasn't thick enough, they give me two +munfs' 'ard on their own--no judge or jury for that little lot--an' turn +me out wot _you_ calls a bit of a wreck, but _I_ calls a creepin' +corpse!" + +And the animated remains wiped a forehead wet already with the throes of +deglutition, and eyes that were not wet at all, before applying a +flickering light to his neglected Upmann. + +"What you say is perfectly fair," observed the doctor, in a sadly +unimpassioned tone; "but it is also fair to remember that others have +been saying it for you for some time past, and that you are free this +morning as the result. I confess I feared they might keep you longer; +but I evidently had not your grasp of the niceties of your actual +offense. As to your mental and bodily sufferings, I can see some of the +effects for myself, and those at least I could undo. That was the idea +in meeting you, and perhaps I ought to say at once that it was not my +idea. It was that of the unknown friend of whom I have already spoken; +but I am prepared to carry it out. I run a kind of nursing home, here in +my house, and there's a bed ready for you if you care to occupy it." + +"A nursing 'ome!" said Croucher, shrinking from a vision of lint and +ligatures. "There's nuffunk so much the matter with me that I want to go +into an 'ome." + +"Nothing that rest could not cure--rest and diet--I agree," said the +doctor, with an eye on the empty dishes. + +"But won't it cost a lot?" inquired Croucher, thinking of the kidneys +especially. "I'm stony-broke, you see," he explained with increased +bitterness. + +"Our friend insists on paying the bill," said the doctor, grimly. + +"And who is our wonderful friend, doctor, when 'e or she's at 'ome?" + +Doctor Dollar laughed as he pushed back his chair. "That's the one thing +you mustn't ask me; but come up and see the room before you make up your +mind against it." + +It was at the top and back of the house, less lofty than those into +which the Home Secretary had peeped on a previous occasion, but +similarly appointed, and more attractive in the morning light and that +of a fire already crackling in the grate. By the fireside stood a white +wicker chair and a glass table strewn with the newest and lightest of +monthly and weekly literature; ash-trays and match-boxes were in +comfortable evidence; a bed of vestal purity was turned down in +readiness, and a suit of gay pajamas airing with a bathgown on a set of +bright brass pipes. + +"The bathroom is next door," explained the doctor; "you would have it +practically to yourself, but your room would be your castle." + +And he pointed out an efficient bolt upon the door. + +"You wouldn't lock me in on the other side?" suggested Croucher +suspiciously. + +"Certainly not; you may have the key; but I should expect you to keep to +your own floor, and, of course, to the house. You would not be a +prisoner in any sense; but if you went out, Croucher, I'm afraid you +would have to stay out. Otherwise my treatment would not have a fair +chance; what you require, in the first instance, is absolute rest and no +more truck with the outside world than you had where you have been." + +"An' good 'olesome grub?" suggested Croucher with another slant of his +goggle eyes. + +"And plenty of square meals. Perhaps not so square as this morning's, +because you won't have any exercise; but that sort of thing." + +"A little drop of anythin' to drink, doctor?" + +"With your meals, and in moderation, by all means; but don't ask me for +nightcaps, and don't try to smuggle anything in." + +"I wouldn't do such a thing!" exclaimed Croucher, with virtuous +decision. "Doctor, I'm your man, and ready to turn in as soon as ever +you like." + +And a shabby waistcoat hung unbuttoned at the swoop of a horned thumb. + +"One moment," said the doctor. "If you are really coming to me, and +coming to stay, I am to telephone to my tailor, who will take some +little time getting here." + +"Your tailor!" cried Croucher. "Where the dooce does _'e_ come in?" + +"You may well ask!" replied Dollar with involuntary candor. "That friend +in need, who was the first to assert your innocence, and to whom you owe +more than you will ever know, is anxious to give you a fresh start in +life, and an entire new outfit in which to make it." + +"Well! I call that 'andsome," declared Alfred Croucher, for once without +reserve. "I won't arst 'oo it is no more, but I shall live in 'opes o' +findin' out an' sayin' thanky like a man. Not but wot it's right," he +added after all, "for them as is rich to 'old out an 'elpin' 'and to +them as is pore and 'ave been tret like I've been, through no fault o' +their own. But it ain't everybody as sees it like that, an' it makes +you think better o' the world when you strike them as does." + +"I agree," said the doctor, in a tone entirely lost on his expansive +patient. + +"I'm griteful to 'im," that worthy went so far as to assert, "and to you +too, sir, if it comes to that." + +Doctor Dollar took the opportunity of being no less explicit in his +turn. + +"There's no reason why it should come to that, Croucher, I assure you. I +can not too strongly impress on you that anything I do for you is by +business arrangement with the friend who takes this extraordinary +interest in your career." + +In this statement, but especially in its relative clause, there was a +note of sheer resentment which recalled other notes and other clauses to +the retentive memory of Mr. Croucher. In a flash the lot had fused in +his suspicious mind, and so visibly that Dollar was relieved to find +himself the object of suspicion. + +"You talk as if it went against your grain," said Croucher, with a growl +and a show of growler's teeth. "I 'ope you don't think I went an' done +it all the time, do yer?" + +"I don't follow you, Croucher." + +"I mean the big job--the first job--the one I very near swung for!" +muttered the fellow, hoarse and hot with evident emotion. + +"No; indeed I don't," responded the doctor, in an unexpected voice; and +he sighed, as though to think that his sentiments toward his patient +should have been so misunderstood. + +Such at least was the patient's final interpretation of all that was +unsatisfactory in the doctor's manner; and if a doubt still rankled in +his mind, it was but the crumpled petal in what was almost literally a +bed of roses. Bed and room alike were the most luxurious in which Alfred +Croucher had ever lain; after prison they were as the seventh heaven +after the most excruciating circle of Dante's Inferno. He stretched his +great limbs in peace ineffable, fell asleep dreaming of the fine flash +suits for which they had been duly measured, and was never decently +awake until the evening. + +A substantial tea, when he did wake up, was the least they could provide +after neglecting to rouse a man for his midday meal; but a distinct +grievance on that score was forgot in the appetite that accrued for +dinner, and the infinitely tactful choice of the eventful viands. Steak +and onions was the strong act of a romantic drama after the very heart +of this transpontine rough. If he had been shown a bill of fare, Alfred +Croucher would have chosen steak and onions, with Welsh rarebit to +follow; and Welsh rarebit did follow, as if by magic. There was rather +less to be said for the drink; the patient could have done with a longer +and a stronger draught. But it was a drop of good stuff, if Mr. Croucher +was any judge; and he decided not to create a possibly prejudicial +impression by complaints of quality or quantity. + +"You done me top-'ole," he murmured, rolling his bulbs of eyes when the +doctor stood over him once more. "Top-'ole, you 'ave, and no error. I +never struck a nicer bit o' fillet. Saucy glass o' wine that, too. Not +that I was ever much 'and at the liquor, but there are times w'en it +seems to do yer good." + +"You shall continue to take it, medicinally," returned Dollar, gravely; +"but don't count on the type of fare you've had to-day. Three meals in +future, but rather lighter ones. The first day was different, I tried to +put myself in your place, and am glad I seem to have succeeded on the +whole. But remember you are here to lie low, and that doesn't do on +fighting food. Sufficient for the day, Croucher! Here are some flowers +from the friend who works by stealth, and these are the weeds I promised +you this morning. You might do worse than judge the givers by their +gifts." + +It was perhaps as well that Alfred Croucher did not pause to puzzle out +that saying, for the rare blooms were as pearls before his kindred of +the sty, but the box of Upmanns as a trough of offal. One was ignited +without delay; yet it was hardly a matter of hours before the chartered +sluggard was blissfully asleep once more, his door locked and bolted on +principle, and a red fire dying in the grate. + + +II + +It might have been a falling coal that woke him up. Such was the +innocent Croucher's first impression. But in that case it was nothing +less than a shower of coals, a gentle but continuous downpour, and they +fell with a curiously crisp and metallic tinkle. Moreover, the sound +was not from the fire after all, but apparently from the window on the +opposite side of the room. + +Croucher lay listening until his quickened senses could no longer be +deceived. Somebody was at his window, the dormer window that anybody +could get at over the leads, that ought to have been securely barred but +wasn't, as he suddenly remembered with aggrieved dismay. He had himself +considered that unprotected window and those conducive leads, in one of +his last waking moments, as a not impossible solution of the whisky +problem. + +But this was different; this was awful; this was a case for alarming the +house without scruple or delay. It should have been a great moment for a +bit of an expert, who had once served the humane equivalent of seven +years for an ambitious burglary of his own; but the defect of character +which had spelled failure on that occasion, when an elderly householder +had held him up with an unloaded revolver, rendered Mr. Croucher +incapable of appreciating the present situation as it deserved. He was +far too shaken to think of the former affair, or to feel for a moment +like a 'busman on his proverbial holiday or an actor at the front of the +house. He did feel bitterly indignant that a patient in a nursing home +should be exposed to such terrors by night; and he had got as far as his +elbow toward a display of spirit (and incipient virtue) when the catch +flew back with as much noise as he might have made himself. Before more +could happen, Mr. Croucher had relapsed upon his pillow with a +stentorian snore. + +Then a sash went up too slowly, limbs crossed the sill and felt the +floor with excessive caution, and for a little lifetime Alfred Croucher +suffered more exquisitely than toward the end in the condemned cell. The +monster was leaning over him, breathing hotly in his face, all but +touching his frozen skin. + +"Alfie!" said a blessed voice, as a tiny light struck through the +compressed eyelids. "Alfie, it's me!" + +And once more Alfred Croucher was a man and a liar. "Shoddy!" he croaked +with a sepulchral sob. "An' me asleep an' dreamin' like a bloomin' +babby! Why, wot the 'ell you doin' 'ere, Shod?" + +"Come to see you, old son," said Shoddy. "But it's more like me arskin' +what _you're_ up to in a 'ouse like this?" + +"'Avin the time o' me life!" whispered the excited patient. "Livin' like +a fightin' cock, on the fat o' the teemin' land, at some ruddy old +josser's expense!" + +And he poured into the still adjacent ear the true fairy tale of his +first day's freedom, from his introduction to Doctor Dollar in the +precincts of that very jail which was to have been his place of +execution and obscene sepulcher. + +"I know. I seen you come out with him," said Shoddy, "an' drive off in +yer car like a hairy lord. I was there with a taxi meself----" + +"There to meet me, Shod?" + +"That's it. That's 'ow I tracked you to this 'ere 'ouse. The room took +more findin'; but there's an old pal o' mine a shover in the mews. 'E +showed me the back o' the 'ouse, an' blowed if I didn't spot yer at yer +winder first go off!" + +"That must've been early on, old man? I bin in bed all day. Oh, such a +bed, Shoddy! I'm goin' to sleep me 'ead into a pulp afore I leave it." + +"You ain't," said Shoddy firmly. "You're comin' along o' me, Alfie. +That's why I'm 'ere." + +"Not me," replied Alfie, with equal firmness. "I know w'en I'm well +off--and it's time I was." + +"I'm wiv yer there!" Shoddy nodded in adroit sympathy; he had kept his +electric lamp burning all the time; and an extra prominence of eye and +cheek-bone, a looseness of lip and a flickering glance, were not +inarticulate in the chastened countenance of his friend. "It must've +been 'ell, Alfie, real, old red-'ot 'ell!" + +"And all for wot I never done," he was reminded with some stiffness. + +"That's it," the other agreed, with perfunctory promptitude. "But that's +exactly why I'm 'ere, Alfie. You didn't think I done a job like this for +the sake o' tikin' 'old o' yer 'and, didger? It's just because it seems +you didn't commit yerself, Alfie, that I'd got to see yer by 'ook or +crook before the day was out." + +"Where's the fire?" inquired Alfie, idiomatically; but his professional +friend, like other artists in narration, and all givers of real news, +was not going to surrender the bone of the situation until his audience +sat up and begged for it. + +Mr. Croucher literally did sit up, while the exasperating Shoddy +interrupted himself to make a stealthy tour of the room, in the course +of which his electric torch illumined the comfortably bolted door, and +the delectable box of Upmanns. To one of these he helped himself without +permission, but a brace were in blast before he resumed his position on +the bed. + +"The fire?" said he, as though seconds and not minutes had elapsed since +the cryptic question. "There's no fire anywhere as I know of--not +to-night--but there soon may be, that's why I want you out o' this. If +you didn't commit yourself, Alfie, don't you see as somebody else must +'ave done?" + +"Oh, bring it up!" cried Croucher under his breath. + +"Well, if you didn't stiffen that copper on the night o' the sufferygite +disturbance--an' we know you didn't--then somebody else did!" + +"You don't mean to tell me you know who did?" + +There had been a tense though tiny pause; there was another while Shoddy +changed the torch to his right hand, and blew a cloud over the head of +his now recumbent companion. + +"I know what everybody says, Alfie." + +"More than their prayers, I'll bet, like they did before. Wot do they +say?" + +"One o' the sufferygites----" + +"Corpsed the copper?" + +"That's it, old man." + +"And I never thought of it!" + +"It bears some thinkin' about, don't it?" said Shoddy. "Why, you're +trem'lin' like a blessed leaf!" + +"I should think I was trem'lin'! So would you if you'd been through wot +I been ... Shod!" + +"Yuss, Alfie?" + +"I see the 'ole blessed thing!" + +"I thought you would." + +"It was 'er wot broke the jooler's winder for me!" + +"That's wot they say." + +"They? Who?" + +"Lots o' people. I 'eard it down some mews: some o' the pipers 'ave +'inted at it. Topham's in fair 'ot water all round; they say 'e's 'ushed +it up because she's in serciety." + +"Wot's 'er nime, Shod?" + +"Lidy Moyle--Lidy Vera Moyle, I think it is. And 'ere's another thing, a +thing that I was forgettin'." + +"Out with it." + +"I see 'er come 'ere this afternoon, whilst I was watchin' the 'ouse in +case you come out." + +"My Gawd, Shoddy! Let me sit up. I can't breathe lyin' down." + +"She 'ad some flowers wiv 'er," said Shoddy, pursuing his reminiscences. +"Looks as though she's got a friend in the 'ome." + +"I'm the friend," said Mr. Croucher grimly. "Take and run yer light over +that wash-stand; the guv'nor brought 'em up 'isself wiv these 'ere +smokes." + +"Roses, in the month o' March!" murmured Shoddy, as a bowl of beauties +filled the disk of light; "'ot'ouse flowers for little Alfie! Why, the +girl's fair struck on you, cully!" + +"I'll strike 'er!" said Alfie, through teeth that chattered with +emotion. "I very near 'anged for the little biter, and don't you forget +it!" + +"Not me," said Shoddy, steering for the bed with his headlights of +white-hot filament and red-hot cigar. "That's wot brought me 'ere +through thick and thin." + +"So she's the great unknown!" said Croucher more than once, but not +twice in the same tone. "So it was 'er, was it?" he inquired as often, +until Shoddy insisted on a hearing. + +"Don't I keep tellin' yer?" said Shoddy. "That's wot brings me, at the +gaudiest risks you ever see--only to 'ear you gas! Can't you listen for +a change? There's a big thing on if you've guts enough for the job." + +It was a simple thing, however, like most big things; the projector had +it at his finger-ends; and in a very few minutes Mr. Croucher was +considering a complete, crude, and yet eminently practical proposition. + +"There's money in it," he was forced to admit, "if there ain't the big +money you flatter yerself. But I believe she thinks o' givin' me a start +in life any'ow." + +"This'd be a start an' a finish, Alfie! Besides, it'd be your revenge; +don't you forget wot you've been through," urged the other. + +"Catch me!" said Croucher, eagerly. "But--don'cher see? I been through +so much that I was lookin' forward to dossin' down 'ere a bit. I ain't +the man I was. It's wot I need. Where's the fire, as I said afore? The +gal won't run away." + +"That's just wot she will, Alfie; goin' abroad any day--an' might get +married any day, a piece like 'er. Then you might find it more of a job. +There's another 'old we've got, an' might lose any old day." + +The other hold appealed with peculiar power to the character and +temperament of Alfred Croucher, and not less strongly to a certain +sagacity which added more to his equipment. But he had never been quite +so comfortable in his life; comfort had never been so decidedly his due; +and the substance of present luxury (with a fresh start in the near +future) was not lightly to be exchanged for a gold-mine, with all a +gold-mine's gambling chances, including the proverbial optimism of +prospectors. + +The discussion ended in a compromise and the withdrawal of Shoddy by the +catlike ways and means of his arrival. But he did not depart without +pointing, through the open window and a forest of chimney-stacks, to a +lighted but uncurtained square on a lower level. And thither, at certain +appointed hours, the patient might have been caught peeping, or even in +the act of rude and furtive signals, for several days to come. + +Handled as it deserves, the tale of those days would make a +psychological chapter of dual interest, and for reasons that may yet +appear. But for the moment Alfred Croucher holds the stage, and +soliloquies are out of vogue. Yet even his objective life had points of +interest. He slept less than he had planned to sleep, but read more than +he had ever read in all his life; and his reading, if not a sign of +grace, was at least a straw that showed the way the wind might have +blown but for the intrusive Shoddy. + +Out of the doctor's little typewritten list, the patient in the +top-floor-back began by choosing _For the Term of His Natural Life_. It +held him--with a tortured brow that sometimes glistened. When the book +was finished, he was advised that _It Is Never Too Late to Mend_ was a +better thing of the same kind; "In spite of its name," added Dollar, in +studied disparagement. Croucher took the hint, and was soon breathing as +hard as he had done before he knew that Shoddy was Shoddy; was heard +blaspheming over Hawes in his solitude, and left wondering what Tom +Robinson's creator would have made of Alfred Croucher. Something of that +speculation found its way into words, with the return of the book, and +was the cause of lengthier visitations from the doctor, whose eye began +to brighten when it fell on Croucher, as that of a man put on his mettle +after all. + +And then one morning he came in with a blue review and a new long poem, +which might have hurt but might have helped; only it had no chance of +doing either, because the top back room was empty of Alfred Croucher, +who had walked out of the house in the loudest of his brand-new clothes. + + +III + +The Rome Express had left Paris sprinkled with the green flakes of a +precocious spring; and it hummed through a mellow evening into a night +of velvet clasped with a silver moon. The famous train was not +uncomfortably crowded; it is not everybody who will pay two pounds, +eight shilling, seven pence for a berth in a sleeper which in +Switzerland, say, would cost some twenty francs. Most of those who had +committed the extravagance seemed by way of getting their money's worth; +even the lady traveling alone in the foremost _wagon-lit_, though she +refrained from dining in the restaurant-car, would have struck an +acquaintance as in better spirits than for some months past. And so she +was. But she was still far from being the Lady Vera Moyle of last year's +fogs. + +She was going to her mother, who had been seriously ill since Christmas, +but was now completing her recovery in Rome. And yet her illness had +meant less to Lady Armagh than to the wayward child who had been told +(by the rest of the family) to consider herself its cause; it might +indeed have been a direct dispensation to tie Lady Vera's hands and +tongue; and in the _train de luxe_, perhaps for the first time, she +herself recognized the merciful wisdom of Providence in the matter. + +Alfred Croucher was a free man: that was the great thing. There were +moments when it was an even greater thing than Lady Armagh's +convalescence. But there was later and greater news yet for Lady Vera +to gloat over in the train. Not only was poor Croucher a free man, but +that dear Doctor Dollar had hopes of him at last! He had said so the day +she left for Paris; he had never said anything of the kind before. +Nothing could have been more pessimistic than the crime doctor's first +report on his latest patient; nothing franker than the way he had made +room for him in the home, merely and entirely to gratify her whim. +Alfred Croucher was "not his style," and there had been an end of him +but for the fact that Lady Vera was. + +She belonged to the class that he was pleased to consider as potentially +the most criminal of all. She was well aware of it, and the knowledge +provided her with a considerable range of feelings as the train flew on +and on. She felt herself the object of a purely pathological interest; +she felt almost as small as a specimen under a microscope; she felt +lonelier than ever in her life before.... + +Lonely she was in the way that mattered least. She was traveling for +once without a maid. The faithful creature (a would-be militant of the +blood-thirstiest, in her day) had been with her dear ladyship over the +Sunday in Paris (hobnobbing with certain exiles for the Cause); but just +as they were leaving their hotel a telegram had come to summon her to a +bucolic death-bed. Esther would have let her old father die without her, +but her beloved ladyship, still quick with her own filial awakenings, +had sent her about her dismal business with a kiss. + +The compartment was overheated; they always are unless you complain in +time. Lady Vera had made her efficient little fuss too late, and the +result was not apparent before the small hours and Modane. During the +long wait there she lay awake, though she had duly entrusted her keys to +the conductor, and the voices of those who had omitted that precaution +caused a welcome change in her "long, long thoughts." She put her mind +to her fellow-passengers, and kept it on them with native resolution. + +She was in decent company: a moderately well-known man and wife in one +adjoining compartment, a white-haired ecclesiastic in the other. She +wove a romance about the venerable gentleman, and speculated on the +well-being of the other pair. In such innocent ways could she amuse +herself when out of muddle-headed mischief in the name of God knows +what. In all else she was sweet and sane enough--unless it was just one +tiny matter that annoyed her memory before she fell asleep to the +renewed lullaby of the express. It was the utterly unimportant matter of +a youngish man in a loud suit, one of a brace of incredibly common +Englishmen, who had nevertheless been staying at the hotel in Paris, had +"passed a remark" to Esther in the lift, and certainly stared with +insolence at Esther's mistress, not only in Paris but in passing along +the corridor of this very train, before and after the hour for dinner. + +To Vera Moyle there seemed no time at all between her passing thought of +this creature and the vile glare that woke her up. At first it blinded +her, for she was in the upper berth, within inches of the excruciating +blaze. It came almost as a relief when a head bobbed between the glare +and her eyes. + +Lady Vera blinked her indignation. She was too sleepy to do more at +first, and too old a traveler to make much fuss about a mere piece of +stupidity. She could not see the man's face, but his head was of the +type which occasions the inevitable libel on the bullet, and its +hideousness hardly mitigated by the Rembrandtesque effect of the +electric light behind it. She conceived it to belong to some blundering +official, and ordered him out in pretty sharp French. But the man did +not move. And in another short moment Vera Moyle had become aware of +three very horrible things: it was the creature in the loud suit, and he +had shut the door behind him, and was holding an automatic pistol to her +breast. + +"One syl'ble that anybody else can 'ear," he muttered as her mouth +opened, "an' it's yer larst in life! 'Old yer noise an' I won't be 'ard +on you--not 'alf as 'ard as you been on me!" + +"It isn't--oh, surely it isn't Croucher?" cried the girl, with an +emotion made up of every element but fear. + +"It is Croucher," said he in brutal mimicry. "That bein' just so, I puts +away the barker--see?--no decepshun!" The pistol dropped into a loud +tweed pocket. "I reckon I can do me own bit o' barkin'--yuss! an' +bitin', too!" concluded Croucher, with an appropriate snarl. + +"Will you please go out?" said Lady Vera, still with sorrow in her +steady eyes. + +"No, I will not please. I'll see you damned first!" said Croucher, with +sudden ferocity--"like you very near seen me! If we're over'eard, you'll +be thought no better'n you ought to be; but by Gawd they won't think you +as bad as wot you are!" + +Lady Vera took no advantage of a studious pause. The ruffian was making +his points with more than merely ruffianly effect; the whole thing might +have been carefully rehearsed. But to the girl in the upper berth it was +now no more than she deserved. It was a light enough punishment for the +dreadful deed by her committed--no matter how unconscious, in how fine a +frenzy or how just a cause--and on him visited with all but the last +dread vengeance of the criminal law. He had a right to say what he liked +to her after that, even to say it then and there, with all his natural +and acquired brutality. Was it not she who had done most of all to +brutalize him? + +"That is, until I tell 'em," added Croucher, with crafty significance. +His hearer had to recall the words before the pause; when she had done +so, he was again requested to leave the compartment, and there was a +harder light in her eyes. + +[Illustration: "Surely it isn't Croucher?"] + +"I'll see you in the morning," she promised. "I'm going on to Rome." + +He laughed scornfully. "You needn't tell _me_ where you're goin'! I know +all about you, and 'ave done for some time. I been on yer tracks, my +dear! You seen me. It's your own fault we didn't 'ave it out before. +This ain't quite the pitch--but it's a better place than the one you got +me into!" + +"I got you--out again," was what Lady Vera had begun to say, but +something about him made her stop short of that. "I was doing my best +for you," she continued humbly. "I thought you were going to let me give +you a fresh start in life." + +"A fresh start! I want a bit more than that, lidy!" + +"Well, what do you want?" + +He rolled his eyeballs over the racks laden with her hand-luggage. + +"Your jewel-case," said he promptly. "Which is it?" + +"That one, in this corner, over my feet." + +Her equal alacrity might have been the mere measure of her eagerness to +get rid of him; but Alfred Croucher was far too old in deception to be +himself very easily deceived. + +"Then you can keep it, with my love!" said he. "I'll trouble you for +them rings instead--_and_ the rest wot you're 'idin' be'ind 'em!" + +The girl turned paler in the electric light She was sitting up in her +suspicious readiness to point out the jewel-case; the other hand, with +most of her rings on it, had flown instinctively to her throat; for she +was traveling, as ladies will, with her greatest treasures--her diamond +necklace and pendant, and a string of pearls--on her neck for safety. + +"Suppose I refuse and----" + +She glanced toward the bell. + +"Then I'll say what _I_ know." + +"And what do you know?" Her back was to the wall. + +"What I see that night! What I see an' was mug enough not to twig till I +come out an' 'eard all the talk! Is that good enough? If not, the +rest'll keep; but it'll put you in the jug all right, I don't care 'oo's +on your side. It's one law for the rich and one for the pore. 'Ang me as +never done it, an' 'ush you up, as did! But I've heard tell that murder +will out, an' you'll find that murderers will in--to prison--even when +they're titled lidies with the King on 'is throne be'ind 'em! It'll ruin +you, if it does no more--ruin you an' yours--an' break all your 'earts!" + +It was enough. She stripped her neck, she stripped her fingers; rings +and necklace, pearls and pendant, all lay in a shimmering heap in his +capacious palm, held for a moment's triumph under the electric light, +reflected for that moment in a mirror which his bulky frame had hidden +until now. + +It was the mirror on the door of the miniature dressing-room between +every two compartments in the _train de luxe_; but in the very moment of +his exultation it ceased to reflect either Alfred Croucher or his +ill-gotten spoil. The door had opened; it framed a sable figure crowned +with silvery locks; lean hands flew out from the black shoulders, and +met round the neck of Croucher with the fell dexterity of a professional +garroter. + +The pair backed together without a word. The one had murder in his set +teeth, the other death in the bulging eyes and darkening face, with its +collar of interlaced fingers white to the nails with their own pressure. +Lady Vera watched the two men as the fawn might watch the python struck +to timely death, until the communicating door shut upon them both, and +only her own unearthly form remained in the mirror. And the train ran on +and on, and the whole coach creaked and trembled, as coaches will even +in a _train de luxe_, only in that particular compartment it had not +been noticeable for some time. + +Presently, as her nerve came back, one or two further observations of a +negative order were gradually made by Vera Moyle. She may be said to +have noticed that she did not notice one or two things she might have +expected to notice by now. The chief thing was that there was no sound +whatever from the compartment beyond the looking-glass door, no fuss or +undue traffic in the corridor. What had happened? Only too soon she +knew. + +They had stopped at some nameless station between the tags of the +Italian boot. It was a chance of peeping out, and out peeped the shaken +girl from her window overlooking the line. And there, skipping on to +the next low platform, bag in hand, went the loud trousers under Alfred +Croucher's equally new and noisy ulster; and there at his elbow went the +venerable ecclesiastic, even holding him by the sleeve! + +It was a long road to Rome for Lady Vera Moyle, but toward the end there +came another stage in which the _wagon-lit_ forgot to swing and sing +like humbler coaches, and the pale Campagna swam past unseen. It began +with a knock behind the drawn blind of her compartment--now but a +mirrored divan of Utrecht velvet and stamped leather--as unsuggestive of +a good night's rest as the white face and the bright eyes behind the +tiny table in the corner. + +"_Entrez!_" she cried with nervous irritation. + +The door opened and shut upon the somber face and long athletic limbs of +John Dollar. + +"Doctor Dollar! I had no idea you were in the train!" + +Her voice had broken with very joy; her hand trembled pitifully during +its momentary repose in his. + +"You have never shown up, you see," said he. "I have been in the next +compartment all the way from Paris." + +"The next compartment on which side?" + +He jerked his head at his own reflection in the looking-glass door. + +"But there was a priest in there!" cried the girl. + +"There was the high priest of a new religion in which you'll never +believe any more," said Dollar with a wry smile. "May he sit down for a +minute, Lady Vera?" + +She looked at him with cooling eyes. "Certainly, Doctor Dollar, if it +makes an explanation any easier." + +"I didn't intend to explain at all," he had the nerve to tell her. "I +meant my ecclesiastical body to do that for me--but its wig was blown +out of the window on the other side of Genoa. I've been hanging about +all day in the hope of catching you. I couldn't leave it any longer. I +had to give you these." + +And he placed upon the table between them the diamond necklace and +pendant, the string of pearls, and the handful of rings she had been +wearing in the night. + +"You made him give them up!" she cried, in thankful tears that never +fell, but only softened and sweetened her indescribably. + +"Naturally," he laughed. "It wasn't very difficult." + +"And I thought you were a confederate when I saw you crossing the line +together!" + +"I was putting the fear of a foreign jail upon him to the last. But he +had a confederate in the train; he was in reserve outside your berth +until I lured him into mine and laid him out. Otherwise I should have +been with you sooner; but in one way it was better to take our man with +your jewels on him--there was no getting out of it. The two of them were +only too glad to be kicked out at the first station. And the other +fellow was a man who broke into my house to see Croucher the first night +we had him there." + +"Did they tell you so?" + +"No. I knew it at the time. I heard the whole thing, even to fragments +of a conversation from which it was possible to reconstruct the plan +they actually brought off last night. I make it a rule not to listen at +patients' doors, any more than one would at other people's, but I'm not +going to blush for this particular exception." + +Her soft wet eyes were looking him through and through. + +"Yet you kept him on--for my sake!" + +"Not altogether, Lady Vera." They were an honest couple. "It put me on +my mettle; it gave me something to prevent. At first--as I'm afraid you +knew--I really didn't want to touch the fellow with a pole. He was an +obvious incurable; he would have been better hanged--justly or +unjustly." + +"Don't speak of that--or do!" exclaimed the girl. "It makes me forgive +him everything!" + +"Well, my first idea was about right. He was beyond reclaim. But I never +thought he would give me a definite move to block; that, as you know; is +one's chief job after all, and it put a new complexion on the case. It +was as though--as though one took a man on for cancer and found him +plotting to shoot the Chancellor of the Exchequer before he died! I +apologize for the analogy, Lady Vera," said Dollar, making the most of +their laugh, "but the man became a new proposition on the spot. And the +funny thing is that I believe I almost might have cured him after +all--done him some good, anyhow--but for the very thing that bucked me +up!" + +Lady Vera looked out at a flying brake of naked trees, the color of +cigar-ash. He had lost her attention for the moment. + +"I was a little fool," she said at length. "I should have listened to +you, and been content to help in some other way. I am sorry." + +"I'm not!" replied Doctor Dollar. "It was a very sporting folly--but +everything you ever did was that!" + +She shook her head sadly, as a brown river, girt with olives, flashed +under the train like a child's skipping-rope. + +"I haven't changed my opinions," she said, just a trifle aggressively. +"But I would give my life to undo many of my actions--not only that +one--many, many!" and she looked him bravely and humbly in the eyes. "So +the whole thing has served me right, and will if it happens all over +again." + +"If what does?" + +"This blackmailing of me by that poor man!" + +"It won't. I've frightened him." + +"He will think of some subtler way." + +"There's no subtlety in him, no power, no initiative, no anything but +mere brute force," said Dollar, with a touch of that same strength and +weakness in his unusually emphatic assertion. "The fellow is a deadly +tool and nothing more. He knuckled under to me in a moment." + +Lady Vera shook her head again, but this time she was looking firmly in +his face. + +"I feel," she said, with a stoical conviction, "that I shall be fair +game to him as long as we are both in the world. And it's what I +deserve." + +Dollar abandoned his attempt at disingenuous disabuse; the extreme to +which he flew instead was a little startling, but these two knew each +other. + +"You must marry, Lady Vera," he was moved to say. But his manner was +eminently uninspired. He might have been telling her she must hand her +keys to the hotel porter at Rome. That was in fact the note he meant to +take, only he sang it louder than he knew. + +"I can never marry," she answered calmly. "I have blood upon my hands." + +"You can marry a man who knows!" + +And the unaltered note took on a tremolo of which he was both aware and +ashamed; but still their eyes were frankly locked. + +"I can marry nobody, Doctor Dollar." + +"The man I mean isn't fit to black your boots! But he'd protect you, +he'd help you, and you would be the making not only of him but of his +dream--and not only _his_ little dream----" + +It was her hand that stopped him. It had taken his across the little +table. + +"The man you mean is worth ten million of me! But I can never marry him +or anybody. And you, and you alone, know why!" + +She bent her brave eyes back on the Campagna; a pale tufted heath was +swimming by; gum-trees hardly heightened the prevailing neutral tint; a +modern corrugated roof, pinned in place by a few primeval boulders, held +her attention on its swift course across the window-panes; and when she +looked round, Lady Vera was all alone. + + + + +IV + +THE GOLDEN KEY + + +"Shelley was quite right!" exclaimed the young man at the book-shelf, +with the prematurely bent back turned upon Doctor Dollar at his old oak +desk. + +"He was never wrong when he stuck to poetry," said the doctor, looking +up from an unfinished prescription on which the ink was nevertheless +dry. + +The other gave a guilty start. He was an immaculate young wreck, with +the fashionable glut of hair plastered back from a good enough face, as +if to make the most of its haggard pallor. And he was in full evening +dress, for the crime doctor's patients came at all hours. + +"Did I say anything?" he asked with exaggerated embarrassment. + +"You thought something aloud," said Dollar, smiling. "Don't let it +worry you; that's not one of the straws that shows an ill wind. What is +it of Shelley's, Mr. Edenborough?" + +"Only a bit of one of his letters," said the young man. "I just happened +to open them at something that rather appealed to me." And the book shot +back into its place. + +"Not the bit about the prussic acid, I hope?" suggested the doctor, for +all the world as if in fun. + +"What was that?" said Edenborough, with a face that would not have +imposed upon an infant. + +"A little commission from Shelley to Trelawny, for a small quantity of +the 'essential oil of bitter almonds,' as he called it, so that he might +'hold in his possession that golden key to the chamber of perpetual +peace.'" + +"That was it," said the youth at length. "I may as well be honest about +it. But I don't know how on earth you knew!" + +The doctor gave a kindly little laugh. + +"Only by knowing the book," he assured the patient. "It's rather a +notorious passage--and you had just been clamoring for at least a silver +key to some chamber of temporary peace!" + +"You said you would give me one, Doctor Dollar." + +"And now I think I won't," said the doctor, rising from his aged chair. +"No; you shall not go without hearing my reasons, and what I am going to +propose to you instead. These keys, Mr. Edenborough"--and he tore the +unfinished prescription into little bits--"gold or silver, they are not +keys at all, but burglars' jemmies that injure and vitiate the chambers +they break into. It certainly is so with the night's rest you want at +any price; it may be the same with the perpetual peace that Shelley took +for granted. Yet I happen to have a Chamber of Peace of sorts here in +this house. It's my latest fad. You've found it a name, and in return I +should like to offer it to you for the night." + +"Do you mean a room that sends you off instead of drugs?" + +[Illustration: "Did I say anything?"] + +Young Edenborough was looking puzzled, but for the moment taken out of +himself. He had heard of Doctor Dollar as a rather eccentric consultant, +but as the very man for him, from no less an authority than the Home +Secretary of England, and no further back than that very evening at +dinner. He had come straight round from Portman Square, foreseeing +miracles and magic potions; but he had not foreseen John Dollar, or his +unprofessional conversation, or the slight cast that actually added to +his magnetic eyes, his cheery yet gentle confidence, or (least of all) a +serious if casual invitation for the night. + +"That's exactly what I do mean," said the author of these surprises. +"It's the most silent room in London, and there are other little points +about it. I got our friend Topham to give it a trial during the bread +strike. His verdict was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would sleep +the sleep of the just there!" + +Edenborough had a laugh that turned him back into a schoolboy; but he +checked it sharply, as though the sound put him to shame and pain. + +"I would give anything for one decent night," he said. "But you are far +too good, sir, especially to a man you know nothing at all about." + +"I ought to know more in the morning, Mr. Edenborough, but it will keep +very well till then. Enough for the night that you're a friend of the +Home Secretary, and at your worst at just the time when a man wants to +be at his best." + +Edenborough smote his brow like a young man on the stage, but with a +piteous spontaneity beyond all histrionic art. + +"It's on Thursday!" he cried, as one in exquisite dread. "My God, I'm to +be married on Thursday, and this is Sunday night! How can I toe the mark +unless I get some sleep? And how can I sleep----" + +"Leave that to me," said Dollar, cutting a pregnant pause as short as +possible; "leave everything to me, and come straight up-stairs. I keep +the room in constant readiness; you shall be fitted with pajamas, and +I'll send a special messenger anywhere you like for whatever you may +want in the morning. Come, my dear man! I am burning to give my Chamber +of Peace a crucial test, because I know we shall all come out with +flying colors!" + +There was less confidence in the Doctor Dollar who ran down-stairs a +little later and sat at his telephone with an urgent face. In another +minute he had left the house, and in another two Mr. Topham Vinson was +opening the door to him in Portman Square. + +"I call this too bad of you," began the doctor, short of breath and +shorter still of patience with his powerful friend. + +"My dear fellow, I couldn't help it," vowed the Minister, with disarming +meekness. "He would go straight to you, and just then I couldn't have +rung you up without giving him away at this end." + +"I can stay five minutes," said Dollar, looking at his watch, "to hear +as much as you can tell me in the time of what I ought to have known +before I saw your neurotic friend." + +"Hasn't he told you all about himself?" + +"Hardly a word worth anything in a case like this, where the cause +matters more than the effect. Of course I could have insisted, but that +might have finished him off for the night. I gather, however, that he's +one of the First Lord's secretaries, but a friend of yours, on the brink +of being married, and in more than the normal state about it, or +something to do with it." + +"I'll take your points in order," said Topham Vinson, who could be +brisker than anybody when he chose. "George Edenborough is not only one +of Stockton's secretaries, but the most private and most confidential of +the crowd. I don't know about his being a friend of mine; I've been a +friend to him for family reasons, and found him a nice enough fellow. +But the girl he's going to marry--if they do marry--is one of us." + +"If!" cried the doctor. "Do you mean to say she'd draw back in the last +week?" + +"She may not be able to help herself," was the grave reply. "George +Edenborough is under a cloud that may burst at any moment." + +"A sudden cloud?" + +"Out of the blue for me. I only heard of it from Stockton on Friday +night. But it's no new thing to him. He might have told me sooner, I +think, seeing it was through me that Edenborough ever went to him." + +"In some special capacity, I rather gather?" + +"Yes; he can draw a bit--in fact, he's not a secretary at all except in +name, but the First Lord's private draftsman. Stockton's a whale for +details but a dunce at technicalities. What he likes is the thing on +paper, as he sees it with his own eyes; so he makes his inspections +with Edenborough and a sketch-block, illustrated notes are taken at +every turn, and all sorts of impossible improvements worked out in +subsequent collaboration. I had that this evening from the boy himself. +It will show you what chances he has had of giving things +away--or--selling them!" + +"Is it as bad as that?" + +"Stockton swears it is. To me it's inconceivable. But he gives chapter +and verse of at least one drawing that found its way across the North +Sea early in the year. Edenborough admits that he either lost it or had +it stolen from him. He seems to have been more careful--whichever way +you look at it--during the summer. But this autumn the trouble has begun +again. A dockyard sketch-map has flown the German Ocean, come home to +roost by some means into which we'd better not inquire, and is +pronounced by Stockton a bad imitation of one made for him by +Edenborough six weeks ago." + +"Why a bad imitation, I wonder?" + +"The original has been in the First Lord's archives ever since; he says +the copy must have been made from memory; but he has good reasons why +nobody but Edenborough could have made it." + +"Reasons that are not so good in law, apparently?" + +"Exactly; as yet there's no case and there has been no accusation. But I +very much fear that traps are being set, and I've taken it on myself to +put the madman on his guard." + +"To-night?" + +"Yes; it was the first chance of getting hold of him, and that only by +having the poor little bride to dinner as well. Heavy work, Dollar, +drinking their healths and knowing what was in the air! The only comfort +was that Edenborough knew as well as I did; it was written on his face, +if you had the key, and I hadn't to do much beating about the bush when +I got him to myself. He was wonderfully frank, from his point of view. +He told me that the air of suspicion was driving him out of his mind; he +said he hadn't slept for nights and nights." + +"Although no accusation has been made?" + +"Although not an open word has been said to connect him with the bad +copy of his own map!" + +"That's the worst thing you've told me," said Dollar quietly. "He +protested his innocence, of course?" + +"In absolute tears!" + +"And what was your own impression, Mr. Vinson?" + +"Extremely mixed. I felt that he was speaking the truth, and yet not the +whole truth. He had an air of guilty knowledge, if not of actual guilt." + +"His physical condition bears you out," observed the doctor with +reluctance. "And the poor devil's to be married in four days' time!" + +"There my pity's on the other side." + +"But the girl's another friend of yours? May I ask her name?" + +"Lucy Trevellyn." + +"Any relation of Admiral Trevellyn?" + +"Own daughter to the old sea-dog, and if anything the breezier of the +two! I couldn't imagine a young girl more like an old salt at heart. +She'd go to sea if she could; as she can't, she's a little pillar of the +Navy League--and engaged to the First Lord's best young man! Could you +conceive a more ingenious irony, or a greater tragedy when the truth +comes out? Dollar, it must come out before Thursday, if it's ever coming +out at all!" + +"Is it otherwise a likely match?" + +"The very likeliest, but for this world's goods, and there'll be more of +them one day. She has go enough for two, and they have tastes in common. +I told you he could draw a bit, but she's a little artist, though you +wouldn't think it if you saw her teaching him to skate at Prince's or +taking me on at golf! Lucy Trevellyn's the best type of +sportswoman--just as Vera Moyle is one gone wrong." + +John Dollar was on his feet. + +"Well, I've stayed longer than I intended," said he abruptly. "I +promised to go up within half an hour to see if he was asleep. And he +will be. But what's a night's rest against such a tragedy as the whole +thing's bound to be!" + +"Or such a mystery?" suggested Topham Vinson. "If you could only get to +the bottom of that, Dollar, we might know how to act." + +"I'm not a detective," returned the doctor--but the stiff words were +hardly out before the stiff lips relaxed in a smile. "I've said that +before, Vinson, and I shouldn't wonder if you made me say it again. I am +out to stop things happening, not to bother about things that have been +done and can't be mended. But in this case discovery may be the mother +of prevention, and I must have a shot with both barrels while there's +time." + +He had come in glum and grumbling; he went off gay and incisive, subtly +enlivened by the very gravity of the matter, as he always was. But it +was grave enough, as was Dollar himself behind the sparkling mask that +he wore unawares in all times of stress. And on one point his confidence +was justified without delay; the young man in the Chamber of Peace was +found drenched already in slumbers worthy of the name he had unwittingly +bestowed upon that magic fastness. + +But this was not a case in which the crime doctor could leave well +alone. Every hour of the night he was up-stairs and down again; and, in +the intervals, either deep in such grim reading as the Illustrative +Cases of Transitory Mania, in the terrible fourth volume of _Casper's +Forensic Medicine_, or deeper yet in his own cognate speculations. + +In the morning it was he who carried up the patient's suit-case, woke +him up, and watched the rising tide of memory drown the thanks in his +throat. Now was the doctor's chance of checking Mr. Vinson's version of +the young man's troubles; but he waited for George Edenborough to open +his own heart, and waited in vain till the last five minutes, when the +boy began to thank him and ended with the whole story. + +It differed very little from the second-hand synopsis, but it confirmed +more than one impression which Dollar would have given much to +relinquish. The talk of intolerable suspicions was indeed more +consistent with a guilty conscience than anything else, since it was +duly followed by the admission that nobody had expressed such suspicions +in anything like so many words. The crime doctor was sorry he had put +the question; it was the only one he asked. But by exhorting Edenborough +to get all the exercise he could, and by saying he had heard great +things of Miss Trevellyn's skating, the reluctant dissembler had little +difficulty in obtaining an immediate invitation to tea at Prince's +Skating Club. + +Edenborough had departed with a face almost radiant at the prospect; yet +he had scarcely spoken of his beloved until the subject of skating +cropped up. It was as though that was the only relation in which he +could still think of her without pain and shame; and in due course he +was discovered on the ice with the same look of lingering pride and joy. + +It was the height of the skating afternoon, and the glassy strip an +opaque pane on which a little giant might have been scribbling with a +big diamond. The eye swam with pairs rotating as in a circus--with +single practitioners at work under dashing instructors down the middle +of the rink--while the ear sang with a resounding swish of skates. One +of the workers was George Edenborough, who came off one leg, with a +glistening forehead, to find his guest a good place behind the barrier. + +"So glad you're not late for the waltzing," he said nervily. "I've had a +long day out of town, and didn't get here myself till much later than I +expected. Lucy's writing a letter in the lounge, but she'll be here in a +minute for the enclosure, and after that we'll have tea." + +Dollar ascertained that the waltzing enclosure was a close +quarter-of-an-hour for all but those more or less proficient in that +delicate and astounding art. Edenborough said that he himself was not +quite up to the standard of these displays, and suited the action to the +word by taking the floor unsteadily on his skates. As he seated himself +a gong sounded, the band struck up, beginners dispersed, confident hands +clasped lissome waists, long edges ended in lightning threes, and the +rink was a maze of sweeping grace and symmetry. + +Dollar had never seen anything like it in his life, for artificial ice +was in its infancy in London before the war, and ever since he had been +a busy man. He followed first one couple and then another, and each +seemed to him more competent and graceful than the last. Yet the first +short waltz was not over before an involuntary selection had eliminated +all but a dark strong girl in red and a swarthy man with bright eyes and +a black mustache. + +"Those two are the best," said he--"that girl in red and the heavy +alien." + +"Do you think so?" cried the delighted Edenborough. "Then you're a +judge, because that's Lucy!" + +"I didn't mean to insult her partner," said Dollar in some dismay. "He's +the best waltzer on the ice except Miss Trevellyn." + +"He's an Italian marquis," returned Edenborough, in another voice. +"Rocchi's his beastly name. I've no use for the fellow. But he can +skate." + +The first waltz finished there were two more in quick succession, and +Edenborough had a better word for Miss Trevellyn's next partner. He was +only a glowing schoolboy, home from Eton for his leave, but the past +mistress lent herself to his dash and fling with a gusto equal to his +own. + +"I'm glad that's over," said Edenborough, as she escaped with her life +from the desperado's clutches. "I say, confound that fellow Rocchi!" + +She was waltzing with the handsome brute again; for he looked no less, +with his deep blue chin and insolent eyes, and his air of conscious +mastery. Edenborough plainly loathed him, chafing visibly as the pair +swept past with certainly the appearance of some extra verve for his +benefit. Dollar himself was very disagreebly impressed, and that down to +the end, when Rocchi skated up with the lady, whom he surrendered with a +gleam of palpable bravado. + +Yet that impression altered with the very opening of Miss Trevellyn's +not less resolute mouth. She had good teeth and a hearty voice, and +eyes of a breezy and humane audacity. Dollar thought of Topham Vinson's +tribute, and agreed with all except the odious comparison. There was, +indeed, no comparing types as different as Lucy Trevellyn and Vera +Moyle; but the one had never puzzled him in the past more completely +than did the other before he took his leave. + +And they had talked about the wedding, and their presents, and the +wedding trip, as though neither God nor man could interfere! + +"Only three days to go!" said Dollar to himself. And two of the three +were soon gone without alarums or excursions, except on the part of the +crime doctor himself. He was neglecting his practise for the case in +hand; he was nowhere to be found when badly wanted on the Tuesday night, +nor yet on the Wednesday morning; and this was the more extraordinary in +that it was George Edenborough who wanted him, now with an ashier face +than ever, and now on the telephone in a frantic voice. + +At dusk on the Wednesday his key turned in the latch, and next day's +bridegroom burst from the waiting-room at the same moment. + +"At last!" cried Edenborough; and looked so ghastly in the electric +light that Dollar did not switch it on in the consulting-room, or ask a +question as he shut the door. + +It was one of those mild unseasonable days on which the best of servants +keep up the biggest fires; the doctor opened the French window that led +from his den, down rusty steps, into a foul and futile enclosure of +grimy gravel and moribund shrubs. In the meantime Edenborough had not +taken a seat as mechanically bidden, but had planted himself in defiant +pose before the fire; and the glow showed restless hands twitching into +fists, but not the face of which one look had been enough. + +"You might have left word where you were!" he began with great +bitterness. + +"I have just done so," returned Dollar, "at your rooms. I was wanting to +see you--presently. It seems like fate, to find you here before me." + +"I suppose you've heard the latest, wherever you've been?" pursued +Edenborough, aware and jealous of some independent perplexity on the +part of Dollar. + +"I have heard so much!" said the doctor, dropping into a chair. "Better +be explicit--and as expeditious as you can, my dear fellow. I have an +appointment almost directly." + +"Oh! there's not much to say," rejoined the other sardonically. "You +remember when you came to Prince's, doctor?" + +"I do, indeed." + +They both spoke as if it were weeks ago. + +"You know I told you I'd had a hard day out of town?" + +"I remember." + +"I meant with my chief--Lord Stockton--seeing his new brood of +submarines." + +"In their unfledged state, I suppose?" + +"That was it--and making the usual sketches. That's my job--or was! I +was Stockton's walking Kodak until yesterday afternoon; then I got the +boot for a wedding present, and a chance of the jug for my honeymoon!" + +The harsh voice broke, for all its sudden slang and satire. Dollar was +driven to his only policy. + +"I'm not going to pretend I don't know of this," he said. "I know of it +from the Home Secretary. A duplicate of one of those last drawings of +yours----" + +"A duplicate!" + +"Well, a bad imitation, if you like." + +The doctor paused as though he had finished a sentence, as though the +amended phrase had interrupted his thought. + +"Well?" said Edenborough grimly. "Did you hear how they got hold of it?" + +"Intercepted in the post, I gathered, on its way abroad." + +"In our post," said Edenborough. "Almost a _casus belli_ in itself, I +should have thought!" + +"And have you no idea how it came there?" asked the doctor bluntly--but +now he meant to be blunt; he was not sorry when his man flew into a +feeble passion on the spot. + +"What the devil do you mean, Doctor Dollar? I know no more about the +matter than--I was going to say, than you do--but I begin to think you +know more than you pretend!" + +"I didn't think I had pretended," said Dollar, simply. + +"Well, what _do_ you know?" demanded Edenborough, in a fury of +suspicion. "All, I suppose?" he added, with a schoolboy sneer, when the +answer was slow to come. + +"Yes; all," said the doctor, very gravely and reluctantly, as though +driven into a pronouncement of life or death. + +There was no outcry of surprise from Edenborough. He had some pride. But +his knees began to tremble in the firelight, and his unclenched hands to +twitch. + +"I don't believe it," he exclaimed at length. "You tell me what you +know!" + +"All that you yourself suspected, and made yourself ill with +suspecting--and couldn't sleep for suspecting--long ago!" + +Pitiful tone and tender hand carried a heavier conviction than the +words. And now it was the patient who had sunk into the chair, the +doctor bending over his bowed and quivering shoulders. + +[Illustration: "Mark my words closely"] + +"You are not the first man, my dear Edenborough," he went on, "who would +seem to have been betrayed in cold blood by a woman--by _the_ woman. +Mark my words closely. I say it seems so. I would not condemn the +greatest malefactor unheard. I meant to hear Miss Trevellyn +first--feeling in my bones, against all reason, that there may still be +some unimaginable explanation. But, if the worst be true of her, then +the best is true of you; for you are the first man I have known bear the +brunt as you have borne it, my very dear fellow!" + +"What makes you suspect her?" groaned Edenborough to the ground. + +"It's not a case of suspicion--don't deceive yourself as to that, +Edenborough. I _know_ that Miss Trevellyn produced--and parted +with--those last two sketches about which there's been all the trouble. +I only _suspect_ that she got you to show her the originals, almost as +soon as they were made, on the plea of her tremendous interest in the +Navy." + +"Quite true; she did," said Edenborough, but as though he did not +appreciate what he was saying, as though something else had stuck in his +mind. "But it _was_ a tremendous interest!" he exclaimed, jumping up. +"It was her father's interest; his life, indeed! Isn't it inconceivable +that his daughter--apart from everything else I've found her--that she +of all people should do a thing like this?" + +"I am afraid the inconceivable happens almost as often as the +unexpected," said Dollar, with a sigh. "Criminology, indeed, prepares us +for little else. Think of the perfectly good mothers who have flown to +infanticide as the first relief of a mind unhinged! The inversion of the +ruling passions is one of the sure symptoms of insanity." + +"But of course she's mad," cried Edenborough, "if she's guilty at all. +But that's what I can't and won't believe. I can believe it one minute +but not the next, just as I've suspected and laughed at my suspicions +all this nightmare time. One look in her face has always been enough, +and would be at this minute." + +"Well, we shall soon see," said Dollar, glancing at the clock. "But I +can only warn you that my evidence is overwhelming." + +"Let's have it, then; what is your evidence?" demanded Edenborough, in a +fresh fit of stone-blind defiance. + +"My dear fellow, you force my hand!" said Dollar. "God knows you have a +right--and it can't make matters worse than they are. My evidence +consists of a full and circumstantial confession by a scoundrel to whom +I took your own dislike at sight, and whose career I have spent the week +investigating. I needn't tell you I mean the infamous Rocchi." + +"Rocchi!" whispered Edenborough at the second attempt, as though his +very tongue rejected the abhorrent name. Yet now he stood perfectly +still, like a man who sees at last. "Well," he added in an ominously +rational voice, "I must live long enough to send _him_ to hell, whatever +else I do." + +"You will have to find him first," said Dollar. "He has gone back to his +paymasters--not his own countrymen--they kicked him out long ago. I've +taken it on myself to do the same, instead of handing him over to the +police and doing an infinite deal more harm than good." + +But Edenborough was not listening to a word; he was talking to himself, +and he talked aloud as soon as he was given a chance. + +"Now we know why she was so keen on my wretched job ... on the whole +Navy?... No, not a life-long fraud like that.... And she pretended to +dislike that brute as much as I did! I believe she did, too, but for his +waltzing.... No, never jealous of him, and I'm not now ... but so much +the worse, so much the more damnably cold-blooded!" + +Dying philosopher could not have displayed a more acute detachment. But +the last touch was lost upon Dollar, whose expectant ear had caught the +ting of an electric bell. + +"Edenborough," he said, in the voice of urgent conciliation, "the time +has come for you to show what's in you. So far you have kept your head +and played the man; keep it now, and you will play the hero! I still +can't imagine what Miss Trevellyn can have to say for herself--but I +implore you to hear her out, for I believe she is being admitted at this +moment." + +"Lucy--here--and you expected her?" + +"I told you I had another appointment. But you were here first, one +thing led to another, and it may be better as it is. You were bound to +have this out between you--and to-day. If you wish me to be +present--but no human being can help!" + +"Unless it's you!" suggested Edenborough in a panic-stricken whisper. "I +can't face her alone--I can't trust myself!" + +Dollar took no notice of a knock at the door. "Edenborough, you must," +he said gently; "and whatever she may have to say--much or little, and +it may be much--you must hear patiently to the end. It's your duty, man! +Don't flinch from it, for God's sake!" + +"But I do flinch from it!" cried Edenborough below his breath. "I flinch +from it for her sake as much as mine. I'm not the one to shame her, even +if Rocchi's telling----" + +The door opened in response to Dollar's decisive call. It was the little +Barton boy, to say that Miss Trevellyn was in the waiting-room. + +"Show her in," said Dollar. "I have more than Rocchi's bare word, +Edenborough." + +The distracted youth looked about him like a wild creature in a cage, +and saw his loophole at the last moment. + +"I won't be the one to shame her, whatever she has done!" he whimpered +through his teeth. "If there's any explanation, she need never know I +knew; if there's not, good-by!" + +And he slipped through the open window, out upon the iron steps, as +Dollar switched on the lights that turned the outer dusk to darkness; +and the door opened even as the curtain was drawn in desperation, with a +last signal to Edenborough to stand his ground and at least hear all. + +"Good evening, Doctor Dollar," said Miss Trevellyn, briskly, and with +that she stopped in her sturdy stride. "Is anything the matter?" + +"Is it possible you don't know what?" + +"Is it anything to do with George? You're his doctor, aren't you?" These +questions quicker, but with a sensible check on any premature anxiety. + +"He has consulted me, but the matter more directly concerns yourself. +It's no use beating about the bush, Miss Trevellyn!" exclaimed the +doctor, with a sudden irritation at her straight carriage and straighter +look. "I have to speak to you about the Marchese Rocchi." + +"Have you, indeed!" + +Miss Trevellyn had winced at the name, but already her eyes looked +brighter and bolder, and the firm face almost serenely obdurate. + +"The Marchese Rocchi," he continued, "fled the country yesterday, Miss +Trevellyn." + +"I wondered why he was not at Prince's!" + +"He fled because of a scandal in which you are implicated," said Dollar +very sternly. "He has been trafficking in naval secrets--this country's +secrets, Miss Trevellyn--and he swears you sold them to him. Is it +true?" + +"One moment," said the girl, with a first trace of emotion. "Is all this +of your own accord, or on behalf of Mr. Edenborough?" + +"Of my own accord entirely." + +"You've been ferreting things out for yourself, have you?" + +"You are entitled to put it so." + +"Detective as well as doctor, it appears?" + +"Miss Trevellyn, I implore you to tell me if these things are true!" + +"So that you may tell your patient, I suppose?" + +"No. I shall not tell him," said Dollar, disingenuously enough, but with +the deeper sorrow. + +"Very well! I'll tell you, and you can shout it from the roof for all I +care now. It's perfectly true!" + +Dollar started, not at the thing that had to come, but at the +manner in which it came. It seemed, indeed, the last word in +wickedness--impenitent, unblushing, even vainglorious to eye and ear +alike. His glance flew to the curtained window, but no sound or movement +came from the iron stair outside. + +"True that you sold those drawings to this man Rocchi?" he heard himself +saying at last, in a tone so childish that he scarcely wondered at the +smile it drew. + +"Perfectly true," said Miss Trevellyn. + +"Drawings made by George Edenborough for the First Lord of the +Admiralty, and shown to you because you were the stronger character and +insisted on seeing them, but only in such confidence as might almost be +justified between future man and wife?" + +"I didn't sell his drawings," said Miss Trevellyn, impatiently. "I +copied them, more or less from memory, and sold my own efforts." + +"Of course I know that! It was a slip of the tongue," he admonished +her, while marveling more and more. "And you can put the whole thing +plainly without so much as a blush!" + +"I am going to put you to the blush instead, Doctor Dollar," returned +the lady, with a lighter touch. "You are very clever at finding out what +I did, but you don't ask why I did it; that's not so clever of such a +clever man, and I must just enlighten you before I go. The first drawing +was not a copy; it was the original they got that time, and it was +stolen from Mr. Edenborough on his way home from the Admiralty. He never +knew exactly where it was stolen, but I always thought I knew. You are a +bit of a detective, Doctor Dollar; well, so am I in my way. You have not +let me into the secret of your success, and I shouldn't think of boring +you with mine. I thought it happened at Prince's, and I suspected +Rocchi, that was all. It was last spring, and I had all the summer to +think about it. But when Prince's opened I set to work, for there was +Rocchi making up to us both as before. He didn't get much change out of +George, but perhaps I made amends when George wasn't there, and +sometimes even when he was! He could waltz, you see, and so can I," +said Lucy Trevellyn, with something like a sigh for her bereavement on +the rink. + +"Yet you copied the other two drawings, and you even admit you sold him +the copies?" + +"I sold them quite well," said Miss Trevellyn, with sparkling eyes--"and +you may guess what I did with the money--but it's not fair to call them +copies. I made them as inaccurate as possible without spoiling +everything, and indeed I couldn't have made them very accurate from +memory, and they were only rough sketches to begin with! Of course +George was wrong to let me see them, but he was assisting in the best of +causes. Rocchi was an expert professional spy. I soon sized him down as +one. But he was not a naval expert--and I'm that as well! That's my last +boast, Doctor Dollar; but it's not unjustifiable, if you come to think +of George and me between us keeping a national enemy out of serious +mischief, feeding a friendly Power with false plans, and giving the +money to our own dear Navy League!" + +Dollar surveyed the radiant minx with eyes that needed rubbing. His only +sorrow was that Edenborough did not burst through the curtains without +more ado; he must have extraordinary self-control, when he liked. + +"Not that George was a conscious party to the fraud; he wouldn't have +approved of it, he couldn't possibly, poor George!" said George's bride. +"But I shall tell him all about it now; of course I always meant to tell +him--after to-morrow--but he has had quite enough bothers of his own, +and this was my show. I suppose you don't know what's been bothering +him, Doctor Dollar? He says it's overwork, and I do think Lord +Stockton's an old slave-driver; do you know, I haven't even seen George +since the day before yesterday at Prince's?" + +"Nor I," said Dollar, no longer with the least compunction, "from that +hour to this." + +"Of course I know he's all right," concluded Miss Trevellyn, as they +were parting perfect friends, "because he has rung me up several times +to say so, and he looked better on Monday than for ever so long. But I +must own I shall be glad when I get him away for a real good rest." + +She had refused to hear another word from Dollar in explanation, or of +regret, and she made her departure with all the abruptness of a +constitutionally decided person. But she had blushed once at least in +the last few minutes. And the doctor ran back into his den with singing +heart, ready to fall upon his patient's neck in deep thanksgiving and +even more profound congratulation. + +No patient was there to meet him even now, but the curtain swayed a +little before the open window. Dollar reached it at a bound; but there +was nobody outside on the iron steps, and the curtain filled behind him +as the inner door banged in the draft. The horrid little space at the +back of the house, between the high black walls with the broken-bottle +coping, lay empty of all life in the plentiful light from the back +windows--but for an early cat that fled before Dollar's precipitate +descent into the basement. + +"The gentleman's gone," said Mrs. Barton at once. "He come through this +way some time ago--said he couldn't wait no longer out there!" + +"How long do you suppose he had waited?" + +"Not long," said Mrs. Barton firmly. "Bob here was at his tea when he +had to go up to show the young lady in; and the young gentleman, it +couldn't've been more than three or four minutes before he was through +'ere as if something had 'appened." + +"I didn't hear him." + +"He was anxious you shouldn't be disturbed, sir." + +"Did you show him out, Bobby?" + +The master had never been so short with them. Mrs. Barton felt that +something was the matter, but Bobby quaked. + +"Yes, sir!" + +"Which way did he go--and how--foot or taxi?" + +"I--please, sir--I never stopped to see, sir!" + +Dollar flew to his telephone; forsook it for a taxicab; drew +Edenborough's rooms in vain; inquired as vainly (as an anonymous wedding +guest, uncertain of the church) at Admiral Trevellyn's; was at the House +of Commons by half past six, and at Scotland Yard (armed with written +injunctions from the Secretary of State) before seven. + +At that hour and place the matter passed out of the hands of Doctor John +Dollar, who could only hasten home to Welbeck Street, there to enter +upon the most shattering vigil of his life--the terrible telephone at +his elbow--and still more terrible inquirers on the telephone as the +night wore on! + +But never one word of news. + +Toward midnight Topham Vinson arrived with the elaborate sandwiches and +even the champagne that he had found awaiting him at home. It was the +measure of a born leader; the doctor had not broken his fast since +lunch; and in the small hours he once dozed for some minutes in his +chair. + +But the politician had not the temperament to wait for the telephone to +talk to him; he talked repeatedly into the telephone, set a round dozen +of myrmidons by the ears, and at last was rightly served by being sent +off to Hammersmith to identify the dead body of a defaulting clerk, just +recovered from the Thames. + +"I'm not coming with you," Dollar had said, even when the description +seemed to tally. "Edenborough wouldn't drown himself--and this is my +place." + +It was a being ten years older who opened his own front door again at +daybreak. His face was as gray as the wintry dawn, the whole man bowed +and broken. Topham Vinson stood aghast on the step. + +"It isn't all over, is it?" + +The doctor nodded with compressed lips. + +"When and where?" + +"I don't know. Come in. They're getting up down-stairs; there'll be some +tea in a minute." + +"For God's sake tell me what you've heard!" + +"Haven't I told you? They rang up just after you went. He bought prussic +acid yesterday!" + +Dollar had dropped into his elaborate old chair; the bent head between +his hands drooped over its own reflection in the monastic writing-table. + +"Who rang up?" asked the man on his legs. + +"Some of your people." + +"Was that all they had to tell you?" + +"That was all; we shan't have long to wait for the rest." + +"Where did he buy it?" + +"At his own chemist's--'to put a poor old dog out of its misery!' His +very words, Vinson, so they tell me! I shall hear them all my life." + +"And it has taken all night to learn this, has it, from the chemist's +where the poor devil dealt!" + +Dollar understood this outburst of truculent emotion. + +"That was my fault," said he. "I told them to confine their attention +to entries made in the poison books after five o'clock yesterday +afternoon. Edenborough had signed his name and got the stuff earlier in +the day." + +"Before you told him anything?" + +"He had his own suspicions, you must remember. I had confirmed them--and +_her_ first words left no more to be said, that he could bear to hear! +If only he had waited another minute! If only I had dragged him back to +face it out!" groaned Dollar, in a bottomless pit of self-reproach. "I +call myself a crime doctor, yet I let my patient creep into space with a +bottle of prussic acid, and commit the one crime I had to prevent!" + +"Why prussic acid, I wonder?" + +The idle question was not asked for information, but it happened to be +one that Dollar could answer, and it brought him to his book-shelves +with a certain alacrity. + +"I know," he said, "though I never thought of it till this minute! I was +trying to write him a prescription on Sunday night, when the poor chap +suddenly remarked that Shelley was right, and I found him dipping into +these Letters, and had the luck to spot the very bit he'd struck. It +was this"--and he read out the passage beginning: "You, of course, enter +into society at Leghorn: should you meet with any scientific person, +capable of preparing the _Prussic Acid, or essential oil of bitter +almonds_, I should regard it as a great kindness if you could procure me +a small quantity"--down to "it would be a comfort to me to hold in my +hands that golden key to the chamber of perpetual peace." + +Topham Vinson's only comment was to pick up the book, which had fallen +to the floor with the concluding words. Dollar was swaying where he +stood, glancing in horror toward the door; at that moment it opened, and +Mrs. Barton entered with the tea-tray. + +"Mrs. Barton," said the doctor, in a voice that failed him as it had not +done all night, "I don't want to hurt your feelings, but did that boy of +yours speak the truth when he told me he had seen Mr. Edenborough out?" + +"He did not, sir, and his father thrashed him for it!" cried the good +woman. "And that was very wrong of Barton, because I was as bad as the +boy, in not telling you at the time. So we've all done wrong together, +and we don't deserve to stay, as I told the both of them!" + +The poor soul was forgiven and consoled, with an unconscious sympathy +not lost on Topham Vinson, to whom it was extended a moment later. + +"Take a drink of your tea," said Dollar. "It will do you good." + +"What about you?" + +"I'm going up-stairs first." + +"You've thought of something!" + +"I have," replied Dollar in a tragic whisper. "I've thought of my +'chamber of perpetual peace.'" + +That sanctuary was on the second floor, and it had triple doors so +spaced that each could be shut in turn before the next was opened. The +house might have been in an uproar, and yet one might have entered this +room without admitting the slightest sound by the door. The window was +of triple glass that would have deadened an explosion on its sill, and +the walls were thickly wadded behind an inner paneling of aromatic pine. + +The first sensation on entering was one of ineffable peace and quiet; +next came a subtle, soothing scent, as of all the spices of Arabia; and +lastly a surprising sense of scientific ventilation, as though the four +sound-proof walls were yet not impervious to the outer air, but as +though it were the pungent air of pine-clad mountains, in miraculous +circulation here in the heart of London. + +All this would have struck the visitor by degrees; but to John Dollar, +who had devised and superintended every detail, it all came home +together and afresh as he entered softly with the Home Secretary; and a +certain composite effect, unforeseen in the beginning and still +unexplained, fell upon him even now, and with it all the weight of his +own fatigue; so that he could have flung himself on bed or couch as a +doomed wretch sinks into the snow, but for the light in the room and +what the light revealed. + +It was light of a warm, strange, coppery shade, that he had found for +himself by dyeing frosted electric lamps as children dye Easter eggs; it +was the very softest and yet least sensuous shade that eyes ever +penetrated with perfect ease, and it turned the room into a little hall +of bronze. The simple curtains might have been golden lace, richly +tarnished with age; the furniture solid copper; the bed an Eastern +divan, and the form upon the bed a sleeping Arab. + +It was George Edenborough lying there in all his clothes, a girl's +photograph beside him on the coverlet, and beside the photograph a tiny +phial that caught the light. + +"Stay where you are!" whispered Dollar in a voice that thrilled his +companion to the core. And he stole to the bed, stooped over it for a +little lifetime, and so came stealing back. + +"How long has he been dead?" said Topham Vinson, harshly; but in realty +his blood was freezing at an unearthly smile in that unearthly light. + +"Dead?" was the doctor's husky echo. "Don't you know the smell of bitter +almonds, and have you smelt it yet? Here's the golden bottle he hadn't +opened when he lay down--perhaps for the first time since he was here on +Sunday night--and this is his wedding morning, and he's only--only fast +asleep!" + + + + +V + +A SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD + + +It is a small world that flocks to Switzerland for the Christmas +holidays. It is also a world largely composed of that particular class +which really did provide Doctor Dollar with the majority of his cases. +He was therefore not surprised, on the night of his arrival at the great +Excelsior Hotel, in Winterwald, to feel a diffident touch on the +shoulder, and to look round upon the sunburned blushes of a quite recent +patient. + +George Edenborough had taken Winterwald on his wedding trip, and nothing +would suit him and his nut-brown bride but for the doctor to join them +at their table. It was a slightly embarrassing invitation, but there was +good reason for not persisting in a first refusal. And the bride carried +the situation with a breezy vitality, while her groom chose a wine +worthy of the occasion, and the newcomer explained that he had arrived +by the afternoon train, but had not come straight to the hotel. + +"Then you won't have heard of our great excitement," said Mrs. +Edenborough, "and I'm afraid you won't like it when you do!" + +"If you mean the strychnine affair," returned Dollar, with a certain +deliberation, "I heard one version before I had been in the place an +hour. I can't say that I did like it. But I should be interested to know +what you both think about it all." + +Edenborough returned the wine-list to the waiter with sepulchral +injunctions. + +"Are you telling him about our medical scandal?" he inquired briskly of +the bride. "My dear doctor, it'll make your professional hair stand on +end! Here's the local practitioner been prescribing strychnine pills +warranted to kill in twenty minutes!" + +"So I hear," said the crime doctor, dryly. + +"The poor brute has been frightfully overworked," continued Edenborough, +in deference to a more phlegmatic front than he had expected of the +British faculty. "They say he was up two whole nights last week; he +seems to be the only doctor in the place, and the hotels are full of +fellows doing their level best to lay themselves out. We've had two +concussions of the brain and one complicated fracture this very week. +Still, to go and give your patient a hundred times more strychnine than +you intended----" + +And he stopped himself, as though the subject, which he had taken up +with a purely nervous zest, was rather near home after all. + +"But what about his patient?" adroitly inquired the doctor. "If half +that one hears is true, he wouldn't have been much loss." + +"Not much, I'm afraid," said Lucy Edenborough, with the air of a Roman +matron turning down her thumbs. + +"He's a fellow who was at my private school, just barely twenty-one, and +making an absolute fool of himself," exclaimed Edenborough, touching his +glass. "It's an awful pity. He used to be such a nice little chap, Jack +Laverick." + +"He was nice enough when he was out here a year ago," the bride +admitted, "and he's still a sportsman. He won half the toboggan races +last season, and took it all delightfully; he's quite another person +now, and gives himself absurd airs on top of everything else. Still, I +shall expect Mr. Laverick either to sweep the board or break his neck. +He evidently wasn't born to be poisoned." + +"Did he come to grief last year, Mrs. Edenborough?" + +"He only nearly had one of his ears cut off, in a spill on the ice-run. +So they said; but he was tobogganing again next day." + +"Doctor Alt looked after him all right then, I hear," added Edenborough, +as the champagne arrived. "But I only wish _you_ could take the fellow +in hand! He really used to be a decent chap, but it would take even you +all your time to make him one again, Doctor Dollar." + +The crime doctor smiled as he raised his glass and returned compliments +across the bubbles. It was the smile of a man with bigger fish to fry. +Yet it was he who came back to the subject of young Laverick, asking if +he had not a tutor or somebody to look after him, and what the man meant +by not doing his job. + +In an instant both the Edenboroughs had turned upon their friend. Poor +Mr. Scarth was not to blame! Poor Mr. Scarth, it appeared, had been a +master at the preparatory school at which Jack Laverick and George +Edenborough had been boys. He was a splendid fellow, and very popular in +the hotel, but there was nothing but sympathy with him in the matter +under discussion. His charge was of age, and in a position to send him +off at any moment, as indeed he was always threatening in his cups. But +there again there was a special difficulty: one cup was more than enough +for Jack Laverick, whose weak head for wine was the only excuse for him. + +"Yet there was nothing of the kind last year," said Mrs. Edenborough, in +a reversionary voice; "at least, one never heard of it And that makes it +all the harder on poor Mr. Scarth." + +Dollar declared that he was burning to meet the unfortunate gentleman; +the couple exchanged glances, and he was told to wait till after the +concert, at which he had better sit with them. Was there a concert? His +face lengthened at the prospect, and the bride's eyes sparkled at his +expense. She would not hear of his shirking it, but went so far as to +cut dinner short in order to obtain good seats. She was one of those +young women who have both a will and a way with them, and Dollar soon +found himself securely penned in the gallery of an ambitious ballroom +with a stage at the other end. + +The concert came up to his most sardonic expectations, and he resigned +himself to a boredom only intensified by the behavior of some crude +humorists in the rows behind. Indifferent song followed indifferent +song, and each earned a more vociferous encore from those gay young +gods. A not unknown novelist told dialect stories of purely territorial +interest; a lady recited with astounding spirit; another fiddled, no +less courageously; but the back rows of the gallery were quite out of +hand when a black-avised gentleman took the stage, and had not opened +his mouth before those back rows were rows of Satan's reproving sin and +clapping with unsophisticated gusto. + +"Who's this!" asked Dollar, instantly aware of the change behind him. +But even Lucy Edenborough would only answer, "Hush, doctor!" as she bent +forward with shining eyes. And certainly a hairpin could not have been +dropped unheard before the dark performer relieved the tension by +plunging into a scene from _Pickwick_. + +It was the scene of Mr. Jingle's monologue on the Rochester coach--and +the immortal nonsense was inimitably given. Yet nobody could have been +less like the emaciated prototype than this tall tanned man, with the +short black mustache, and the flashing teeth that bit off every word +with ineffable snap and point. + +"Mother--tall lady, eating sandwiches--forgot the +arch--crash--knock--children look round--mother's head off--sandwich in +her hand--no mouth to put it in----" and his own grim one only added to +the fun and swelled the roar. + +He waited darkly for them to stop, the wilful absence of any amusement +on his side enormously increasing that of the audience. But when it came +to the episode of Donna Christina and the stomach-pump, with the +culminating discovery of Don Bolaro Fizzgig in the main pipe of the +public fountain, the guffaws of half the house eventually drew from the +other half the supreme compliment of exasperated demands for silence. +Mrs. George Edenborough was one of the loudest offenders. George +himself had to wipe his eyes. And the crime doctor had forgot that there +was such a thing as crime. + +"That chap's a genius!" he exclaimed, when a double encore had been +satisfied by further and smaller doses of Mr. Jingle, artfully held in +reserve. "But who is he, Mrs. Edenborough?" + +"Poor Mr. Scarth!" crowed the bride, brimming over with triumphant fun. + +But the doctor's mirth was at an end. + +"That the fellow who can't manage a bit of a boy, when he can hold an +audience like this in the hollow of his hand?" + +And at first he looked as though he could not believe it, and then all +at once as though he could. But by this time the Edenboroughs were +urging Scarth's poverty in earnest, and Dollar could only say that he +wanted to meet him more than ever. + +The wish was not to be gratified without a further side-light and a +fresh surprise. As George and the doctor were repairing to the +billiard-room, before the conclusion of the lengthy program, they found +a group of backs upon the threshold, and a ribald uproar in full swing +within. One voice was in the ascendent, and it was sadly indistinct; +but it was also the voice of the vanquished, belching querulous +futilities. The cold steel thrusts of an autocratic Jingle cut it +shorter and shorter. It ceased altogether, and the men in the doorway +made way for Mr. Scarth, as he hurried a disheveled youth off the scene +in the most approved constabulatory manner. + +"Does it often happen, George?" Dollar's arm had slipped through his +former patient's as they slowly followed at their distance. + +"Most nights, I'm afraid." + +"And does Scarth always do what he likes with him--afterward?" + +"Always; he's the sort of fellow who can do what he likes with most +people," declared the young man, missing the point. "You should have +seen him at the last concert, when those fools behind us behaved even +worse than to-night! It wasn't his turn, but he came out and put them +right in about a second, and had us all laughing the next! It was just +the same at school; everybody was afraid of Mostyn Scarth, boys and men +alike; and so is Jack Laverick still--in spite of being of age and +having the money-bags--as you saw for yourself just now." + +"Yet he lets this sort of thing happen continually?" + +"It's pretty difficult to prevent. A glass about does it, as I told you, +and you can't be at a fellow's elbow all the time in a place like this. +But some of Jack's old pals have had a go at him. Do you know what +they've done? They've taken away his Old Etonian tie, and quite right +too!" + +"And there was nothing of all this last year?" + +"So Lucy says. I wasn't here. Mrs. Laverick was, by the way; she may +have made the difference. But being his own master seems to have sent +him to the dogs altogether. Scarth's the only person to pull him up, +unless--unless you'd take him on, doctor! You--you've pulled harder +cases out of the fire, you know!" + +They had been sitting a few minutes in the lounge. Nobody was very near +them; the young man's face was alight and his eyes were shining. Dollar +took him by the arm once more, and they went together to the lift. + +"In any case I must make friends with your friend Scarth," said he. "Do +you happen to know his number?" + +Edenborough did--it was 144--but he seemed dubious as to another +doctor's reception after the tragedy that might have happened in the +adjoining room. + +"Hadn't I better introduce you in the morning?" he suggested with much +deference in the lift. "I--I hate repeating things--but I want you to +like each other, and I heard Scarth say he was fed up with doctors!" + +This one smiled. + +"I don't wonder at it." + +"Yet it wasn't Mostyn Scarth who gave Doctor Alt away." + +"No?" + +Edenborough shook his head as they left the lift together. "No, doctor. +It was the chemist here, a chap called Schickel; but for him Jack +Laverick would be a dead man; and but for him again, nobody need ever +have heard of his narrow shave. He spotted the mistake, and then started +all the gossip." + +"I know," said the doctor, nodding. + +"But it was a terrible mistake! Decigrams instead of milligrams, so I +heard. Just a hundred times too much strychnine in each pill." + +"You are quite right," said John Dollar quietly. "I have the +prescription in my pocket." + +"_You_ have, doctor?" + +"Don't be angry with me, my dear fellow! I told you I had heard one +version of the whole thing. It was Alt's. He's an old friend--but you +wouldn't have said a word about him if I had told you that at first--and +I still don't want it generally known." + +"You can trust me, doctor, after all you've done for me." + +"Well, Alt once did more for me. I want to do something for him, that's +all." + +And his knuckles still ached from the young man's grip as they rapped +smartly at the door of No. 144. + + +II + +It was opened a few inches by Mostyn Scarth. His raiment was still at +concert pitch, but his face even darker than it had been as the crime +doctor saw it last. + +"May I ask who you are and what you want?" he demanded--not at all in +the manner of Mr. Jingle--rather in the voice that most people would +have raised. + +"My name's Dollar and I'm a doctor." + +The self-announcement, pat as a polysyllable, had a foreseen effect only +minimized by the precautionary confidence of Doctor Dollar's manner. + +"Thanks very much. I've had about enough of doctors." + +And the door was shutting when the intruder got in a word like a wedge. + +"Exactly!" + +Scarth frowned through a chink just wide enough to show both his eyes. +It was the intruder's tone that held his hand. + +"What does that mean?" he demanded with more control. + +"That I want to see you about the other doctor--this German fellow," +returned Dollar, against the grain. But the studious phrase admitted +him. + +"Well, don't raise your voice," said Scarth, lowering his own as he +shut the door softly behind them. "I believe I saw you down-stairs +outside the bar. So I need only explain that I've just got my bright +young man off to sleep, on the other side of those folding-doors." + +Dollar could not help wondering whether the other room was as good as +Scarth's, which was much bigger and better appointed than his own. But +he sat down at the oval table under the electrolier, and came abruptly +to his point. + +"About that prescription," he began, and straightway produced it from +his pocket. + +"Well, what about it?" the other queried, but only keenly, as he sat +down at the table, too. + +"Doctor Alt is a very old friend of mine, Mr. Scarth." + +Mostyn Scarth exhibited the slight but immediate change of front due +from gentleman to gentleman on the strength of such a statement. His +grim eyes softened with a certain sympathy; but the accession left his +gravity the more pronounced. + +"He is not only a friend," continued Dollar, "but the cleverest and best +man I know in my profession. I don't speak from mere loyalty; he was my +own doctor before he was my friend. Mr. Scarth, he saved more than my +life when every head in Harley Street had been shaken over my case. All +the baronets gave me up; but chance or fate brought me here, and this +little unknown man performed the miracle they shirked, and made a new +man of me off his own bat. I wanted him to come to London and make his +fortune; but his work was here, he wouldn't leave it; and here I find +him under a sorry cloud. Can you wonder at my wanting to step in and +speak up for him, Mr. Scarth?" + +"On the contrary, I know exactly how you must feel, and am very glad you +have spoken," rejoined Mostyn Scarth, cordially enough in all the +circumstances of the case. "But the cloud is none of my making, Doctor +Dollar, though I naturally feel rather strongly about the matter. But +for Schickel, the chemist, I might be seeing a coffin to England at this +moment! He's the man who found out the mistake, and has since made all +the mischief." + +"Are you sure it was a mistake, Mr. Scarth?" asked Dollar quietly. + +"What else?" cried the other, in blank astonishment. "Even Schickel has +never suggested that Doctor Alt was trying to commit a murder!" + +"Even Schickel!" repeated Dollar, with a sharp significance. "Are you +suggesting that there's no love lost between him and Alt?" + +"I was not, indeed." Scarth seemed still astonished. "No. That never +occurred to me for a moment." + +"Yet it's a small place, and you know what small places are. Would one +man be likely to spread a thing like this against another if there were +no bad blood between them?" + +Scarth could not say. The thing happened to be true, and it made such a +justifiable sensation. He was none the less frankly interested in the +suggestion. It was as though he had a tantalizing glimmer of the crime +doctor's meaning. Their heads were closer together across the end of the +table, their eyes joined in mutual probation. + +"Can I trust you with my own idea, Mr. Scarth?" + +"That's for you to decide, Doctor Dollar." + +"I shall not breathe it to another soul--not even to Alt himself--till I +am sure." + +"You may trust me, doctor. I don't know what's coming, but I shan't give +it away." + +"Then I shall trust you even to the extent of contradicting what I just +said. I _am_ sure--between ourselves--that the prescription now in my +hands is a clever forgery!" + +Scarth held out his hand for it. A less deliberate announcement might +have given him a more satisfactory surprise; but he could not have +looked more incredulous than he did, or subjected Dollar to a cooler +scrutiny. + +"A forgery with what object, Doctor Dollar?" + +"That I don't pretend to say. I merely state the fact--in confidence. +You have your eyes upon a flagrant forgery." + +Scarth raised them twinkling. "My dear Doctor Dollar, I saw him write it +out myself!" + +"Are you quite sure?" + +"Absolutely, doctor! This lad, Jack Laverick, is a pretty handful; +without a doctor to frighten him from time to time, I couldn't cope with +him at all. His people are in despair about him--but that's another +matter. I was only going to say that I took him to Doctor Alt myself, +and this is the prescription they refused to make up. Schickel may have +a spite against Alt, as you suggest, but if he's a forger I can only say +he doesn't look the part." + +"The only looks I go by," said the crime doctor, "are those of the +little document in your hand." + +"It's on Alt's paper." + +"Anybody could get hold of that." + +"But you suggest that Alt and Schickel have been on bad terms?" + +"That's a better point, Mr. Scarth, that's a much better point," said +Dollar, smiling and then ceasing to smile as he produced a +magnifying-lens. "Allow me to switch on the electric standard, and do me +the favor of examining that handwriting with this loop; it's not very +strong, but the best I could get here at the photographer's shop." + +"It's certainly not strong enough to show anything fishy, to my +inexperience," said Scarth, on a sufficiently close inspection. + +"Now look at this one." + +Dollar had produced a second prescription from the same pocket as +before. At first sight they seemed identical. + +"Is this another forgery?" inquired Scarth, with a first faint trace of +irony. + +"No. That's the correct prescription, rewritten by Alt at my request, as +he is positive he wrote it originally." + +"I see now. There are two more noughts mixed up with the other +hieroglyphs." + +"They happen to make all the difference between life and death," said +Dollar gravely. "Yet they are not by any means the only difference +here." + +"I can see no other, I must confess." And Scarth raised his eyes just as +Dollar's fell from his broad brown brow. + +"The other difference is, Mr. Scarth, that the prescription with the +strychnine in deadly decigrams has been drawn backward instead of being +written forward." + +Scarth's stare ended in a smile. + +"Do you mind saying all that again, Doctor Dollar?" + +"I'll elaborate it. The genuine prescription has been written in the +ordinary way--_currente calamo_. But forgeries are not written in the +ordinary way, much less with running pens; the best of them are written +backward, or rather they are _drawn upside down_. Try to copy writing as +writing, and your own will automatically creep in and spoil it; draw it +upside down and wrong way on, as a mere meaningless scroll, and your own +formation of the letters doesn't influence you, because you are not +forming letters at all. You are drawing from a copy, Mr. Scarth." + +"You mean that I'm deriving valuable information from a handwriting +expert," cried Scarth, with another laugh. + +"There are no such experts," returned Dollar, a little coldly. "It's all +a mere matter of observation, open to everybody with eyes to see. But +this happens to be an old forger's trick; try it for yourself, as I +have, and you'll be surprised to see how much there is in it." + +"I must," said Scarth. "But I can't conceive how you can tell that it +has been played in this case." + +"No? Look at the start, 'Herr Laverick,' and at the finish, 'Doctor +Alt.' You would expect to see plenty of ink in the 'Herr,' wouldn't you? +Still plenty in the 'Laverick,' I think, but now less and less until +the pen is filled again. In the correct prescription, written at my +request to-day, you will find that this is so. In the forgery the +progression is precisely the reverse; the _t_ in 'Alt' is full of ink, +but you will find less and less till the next dip in the middle of the +word 'Mahlzeit' in the line above. The forger, of course, dips oftener +than the man with the running pen." + +Scarth bent in silence over the lens, his dark face screwed awry. +Suddenly he pushed back his chair. + +"It's wonderful!" he cried softly. "I see everything you say. Doctor +Dollar, you have converted me completely to your view. I should like you +to allow me to convert the hotel." + +"Not yet," said Dollar, rising, "if at all as to the actual facts of the +case. It's no use making bad worse, Mr. Scarth, or taking a dirty trick +too seriously. It isn't as though the forgery had been committed with a +view to murdering your young Laverick." + +"I never dreamed of thinking that it was!" + +"You are quite right, Mr. Scarth. It doesn't bear thinking about. Of +course, any murderer ingenious enough to concoct such a thing would +have been far too clever to drop out _two_ noughts; he would have been +content to change the milligrams into centigrams, and risk a recovery. +No sane chemist would have dispensed the pills in decimals. But we are +getting off the facts, and I promised to meet Doctor Alt on his last +round. If I may tell him, in vague terms, that you at least think there +may have been some mistake, other than the culpable one that has been +laid at his door, I shall go away less uneasy about my unwarrantable +intrusion than I can assure you I was in making it." + +It was strange how the balance of personality had shifted during an +interview which Scarth himself was now eager to extend. He had no longer +the mesmeric martinet who had tamed an unruly audience at sight; the +last of Mr. Jingle's snap had long been in abeyance. And yet there was +just one more suggestion of that immortal, in the rather dilapidated +trunk from which the swarthy exquisite now produced a bottle of whisky, +very properly locked up out of Laverick's reach. And weakness of will +could not be imputed to the young man who induced John Dollar to cement +their acquaintance with a thimbleful. + + +III + +It was early morning in the same week; the crime doctor lay brooding +over the most complicated case that had yet come his way. More precisely +it was two cases, but so closely related that it took a strong mind to +consider them apart, a stronger will to confine each to the solitary +brain-cell that it deserved. Yet the case of young Laverick was not only +much the simpler of the two, but infinitely the more congenial to John +Dollar, and not the one most on his nerves. + +It was too simple altogether. A year ago the boy had been all right, +wild only as a tobogganer, lucky to have got off with a few stitches in +his ear. Dollar heard all about that business from Doctor Alt, and only +too much about Jack Laverick's subsequent record from other informants. +It was worthy of the Welbeck Street confessional. His career at Oxford +had come to a sudden ignominious end. He had forfeited his motoring +license for habitually driving to the public danger, and on the last +occasion had barely escaped imprisonment for his condition at the wheel. +He had caused his own mother to say advisedly that she would "sooner +see him in his coffin than going on in this dreadful way"; in writing +she had said it, for Scarth had shown the letter addressed to him as her +"last and only hope" for Jack; and yet even Scarth was powerless to +prevent that son of Belial from getting "flown with insolence and wine" +more nights than not. Even last night it had happened, at the masked +ball, on the eve of this morning's races! Whose fault would it be if he +killed himself on the ice-run after all? + +Dollar writhed as he thought upon this case; yet it was not the case +that had brought him out from England, not the reason of his staying out +longer than he had dreamed of doing when Alt's telegram arrived. It was +not, indeed, about Jack Laverick that poor Alt had telegraphed at all. +And yet between them what a job they could have made of the unfortunate +youth! + +It was Dollar's own case over again--yet he had not been called +in--neither of them had! + +Nevertheless, when all was said that could be said to himself, or even +to Alt--who did not quite agree--Laverick's was much the less serious +matter; and John Dollar had turned upon the other side, and was +grappling afresh with the other case, when his door opened violently +without a knock, and an agitated voice spoke his name. + +"It's me--Edenborough," it continued in a hurried whisper. "I want you +to get into some clothes and come up to the ice-run as quick as +possible!" + +"Why? What has happened?" asked the doctor, jumping out of bed as +Edenborough drew the curtains. + +"Nothing yet. I hope nothing will----" + +"But something has!" interrupted the doctor. "What's the matter with +your eye?" + +"I'll tell you as you dress, only be as quick as you can. Did you forget +it was the toboggan races this morning? They're having them at eight +instead of nine, because of the sun, and it's ten to eight now. Couldn't +you get into some knickerbockers and stick a sweater over all the rest? +That's what I've done--wish I'd come to you first. They'll _want_ a +doctor if we don't make haste!" + +"I wish you'd tell me about your eye," said Dollar, already in his +stockings. + +"My eye's all right," returned Edenborough, going to the glass. "No, by +jove, it's blacker than I thought, and my head's still singing like a +kettle. I shouldn't have thought Laverick could hit so hard--drunk _or_ +sober." + +"That madman?" cried Dollar, looking up from his laces. "I thought he +turned in early for once in a way?" + +"He was up early, anyhow," said Edenborough, grimly; "but I'll tell you +the whole thing as we go up to the run, and I don't much mind who hears +me. He's a worse hat even than we thought. I caught him tampering with +the toboggans at five o'clock this morning!" + +"Which toboggans?" + +"One of the lot they keep in a shed just under our window, at the back +of the hotel. I was lying awake and I heard something. It was like a +sort of filing, as if somebody was breaking in somewhere. I got up and +looked out, and thought I saw a light. Lucy was fast asleep; she is +still, by the way, and doesn't know a thing." + +"I'm ready," said Dollar. "Go on when we get outside." + +It was a very pale blue morning, not a scintilla of sunlight in the +valley, neither shine nor shadow upon clambering forest or overhanging +rocks. Somewhere behind their jagged peaks the sun must have risen, but +as yet no snowy facet winked the news to Winterwald, and the softer +summits lost all character against a sky only less white than +themselves. + +The village street presented no difficulties to Edenborough's gouties +and the doctor's nails; but there were other people in it, and voices +travel in a frost over silent snow. On the frozen path between the +snow-fields, beyond the village, nails were not enough, and the novice +depending upon them stumbled and slid as the elaborated climax of +Edenborough's experience induced even more speed. + +"It was him all right--try the edge, doctor, it's less slippy. It was +that young brute in his domino, as if he'd never been to bed at all, and +me in my dressing-gown not properly awake. We should have looked a funny +pair in--have my arm, doctor." + +"Thanks, George." + +"But his electric lamp was the only light. He didn't attempt to put it +out. 'Just tuning up my toboggan,' he whispered. 'Come and have a +look.' I didn't and don't believe it was his own toboggan; it was +probably that Captain Strong's, he's his most dangerous rival; but, as I +tell you, I was just going to look when the young brute hit me full in +the face without a moment's warning. I went over like an ox, but I think +the back of my head must have hit something. There was daylight in the +place when I opened the only eye I could." + +"Had he locked you in?" + +"No; he was too fly for that; but I simply couldn't move till I heard +voices coming, and then I only crawled behind a stack of garden chairs +and things. It was Strong and another fellow--they did curse to find the +whole place open! I nearly showed up and told my tale, only I wanted to +tell you first." + +"I'm glad you have, George." + +"I knew your interest in the fellow--besides, I thought it was a case +for you," said George Edenborough simply. "But it kept me prisoner till +the last of the toboggans had been taken out--I only hope it hasn't made +us too late!" + +His next breath was a devout thanksgiving, as a fold in the glistening +slopes showed the top of the ice-run, and a group of men in sweaters +standing out against the fir-trees on the crest. They seemed to be +standing very still. Some had their padded elbows lifted as though they +were shading their eyes. But there was no sign of a toboggan starting, +no sound of one in the invisible crevice of the run. And now man after +man detached himself from the group, and came leaping down the +subsidiary snow-track meant only for ascent. + +But John Dollar and George Edenborough did not see all of this. A yet +more ominous figure had appeared in their own path, had grown into +Mostyn Scarth, and stood wildly beckoning to them both. + +"It's Jack!" he shouted across the snow. "He's had a smash--self and +toboggan--flaw in a runner. I'm afraid he's broken his leg." + +"Only his leg!" cried Dollar, but not with the least accent of relief. +The tone made Edenborough wince behind him, and Scarth in front look +round. It was as though even the crime doctor thought Jack Laverick +better dead. + +He lay on a litter of overcoats, the hub of a wheel of men that broke of +itself before the first doctor on the scene. He was not even +insensible, neither was he uttering moan or groan; but his white lips +were drawn away from his set teeth, and his left leg had an odd look of +being no more a part of him than its envelope of knickerbocker and +stocking. + +"It's a bu'st, doctor, I'm afraid," the boy ground out as Dollar knelt +in the snow. "Hurting? A bit--but I can stick it." + +Courage was the one quality he had not lost during the last year; nobody +could have shown more during the slow and excruciating progress to the +village, on a bobsleigh carried by four stumbling men; everybody was +whispering about it. Everybody but the crime doctor, who headed the +little procession with a face in keeping with the tone which had made +Edenborough wince and Scarth look round. + +The complex case of the night--this urgent one--both were forgot in +Dollar's own case of years ago. He was back again in another Winterwald, +another world. It was no longer a land of Christmas-trees growing out of +mountains of Christmas cake; the snow melted before his mind's eye; he +was hugging the shadows in a street of toy-houses yielding resin to an +August sun, between green slopes combed with dark pines, under a sky of +intolerable blue. And he was in despair; all Harley Street could or +would do nothing for him. And then--and then--some forgotten ache or +pain had taken him to the little man--the great man--down this very +turning to the left, in the little wooden house tucked away behind the +shops. + +How he remembered every landmark--the handrail down the slope--the +little porch--the bare stairs, his own ladder between death and +life--the stark surgery with its uncompromising appliances in full view! +And now at last he was there with such another case as his own--the +minor case that he had yet burned to bring there--and there was Alt to +receive them in the same white jacket and with the same simple +countenance as of old! + +They might have taken him on to the hotel, as Scarth indeed urged +strongly; but the boy himself was against another yard, though otherwise +a hero to the end. + +"Chloroform?" he cried faintly. "Can't I have my beastly leg set without +chloroform? You're not going to have it off, are you? I can stick +anything short of that." + +The two doctors retired for the further consideration of a point on +which they themselves were not of one mind. + +"It's the chance of our lives, and the one chance for him," urged Dollar +vehemently. "It isn't as if it were such a dangerous operation, and I'll +take sole responsibility." + +"But I am not sure you have been right," demurred the other. "He has not +even had concussion, a year ago. It has been only the ear." + +"There's a lump behind it still. Everything dates from when it happened; +there's some pressure somewhere that has made another being of him. It's +a much simpler case than mine, and you cured me. Alt, if you had seen +how his own mother wrote about him, you would be the very last man to +hesitate!" + +"It is better to have her consent." + +"No--nobody's--the boy himself need never know. There's a young bride +here who'll nurse him like an angel and hold her tongue till doomsday. +She and her husband may be in the secret, but not another soul!" + +And when Jack Laverick came out of chloroform, to feel a frosty +tickling under the tabernacle of bedclothes in which his broken bone was +as the Ark, the sensation was less uncomfortable than he expected. But +that of a dull deep pain in the head drew his first complaint, as an +item not in the estimate. + +"What's my head all bandaged up for?" he demanded, fingering the turban +on the pillow. + +"Didn't you know it was broken, too?" said Lucy Edenborough gravely. "I +expect your leg hurt so much more that you never noticed it!" + + +IV + +Ten days later Mostyn Scarth called at Doctor Alt's, to ask if he +mightn't see Jack at last. He had behaved extremely well about the whole +affair; others in his position might easily have made trouble. But there +had been no concealment of the fact that injuries were not confined to +the broken leg, and the mere seat of the additional mischief was enough +for a man of sense. It is not the really strong who love to display +their power. Scarth not only accepted the situation, but voluntarily +conducted the correspondence which kept poor Mrs. Laverick at half +Europe's length over the critical period. He had merely stipulated to be +the first to see the convalescent, and he took it as well as ever when +Dollar shook his head once more. + +"It's not our fault this time, Mr. Scarth. You must blame the sex that +is privileged to change its mind. Mrs. Laverick has arrived without a +word of warning. She is with her son at this moment, and you'll be glad +to hear that she thinks she finds him an absolutely changed +character--or, rather, what he was before he ever saw Winterwald a year +ago. I may say that this seems more or less the patient's own impression +about himself." + +"Glad!" cried Scarth, who for the moment had seemed rather staggered. +"I'm more than glad; I'm profoundly relieved! It doesn't matter now +whether I see Jack or not. Do you mind giving him these magazines and +papers, with my love? I am thankful that my responsibility's at an end." + +"The same with me," returned the crime doctor. "I shall go back to my +work in London with a better conscience than I had when I left it--with +something accomplished--something undone that wanted undoing." + +He smiled at Scarth across the flap of an unpretentious table, on which +lay the literary offering in all its glory of green and yellow wrappers; +and Scarth looked up without a trace of pique, but with an answering +twinkle in his own dark eyes. + +"Alt exalted--restored to favor--Jack reformed character--born +again--forger forgot--forging ahead, eh?" + +It was his best Mr. Jingle manner; indeed, a wonderfully ready and +ruthless travesty of his own performance on the night of Dollar's +arrival. And that kindred critic enjoyed it none the less for a second +strain of irony, which he could not but take to himself. + +"I have not forgot anybody, Mr. Scarth." + +"But have you discovered who did the forgery?" + +"I always knew." + +"Have you tackled him?" + +"Days ago!" + +Scarth looked astounded. "And what's to happen to him, doctor?" + +"I don't know." The doctor gave a characteristic shrug. "It's not my +job; as it was, I'd done all the detective business, which I loathe." + +"I remember," cried Scarth. "I shall never forget the way you went +through that prescription, as though you had been looking over the +blighter's shoulder! Not an expert--modest fellow--pride that apes!" + +And again Dollar had to laugh at the way Mr. Jingle wagged his head, in +spite of the same slightly caustic undercurrent as before. + +"That was the easiest part of it," he answered, "although you make me +blush to say so. The hard part was what reviewers of novels call the +'motivation.'" + +"But you had that in Schickel's spite against Alt." + +"It was never quite strong enough to please me." + +"Then what was the motive, doctor?" + +"Young Laverick's death." + +"Nonsense!" + +"I wish it were, Mr. Scarth." + +"But who is there in Winterwald who could wish to compass such a thing?" + +"There were more than two thousand visitors over Christmas, I +understand," was the only reply. + +It would not do for Mostyn Scarth. He looked less than politely +incredulous, if not less shocked and rather more indignant than he need +have looked. But the whole idea was a reflection upon his care of the +unhappy youth. And he said so in other words, which resembled those of +Mr. Jingle only in their stiff staccato brevity. + +"Talk about 'motivation'!--I thank you, doctor, for that word--but I +should thank you even more to show me the thing itself in your theory. +And what a way to kill a fellow! What a roundabout, risky way!" + +"It was such a good forgery," observed the doctor, "that even Alt +himself could hardly swear that it was one." + +"Is _he_ your man?" asked Scarth, in a sudden whisper, leaning forward +with lighted eyes. + +The crime doctor smiled enigmatically. "It's perhaps just as lucky for +him, Scarth, that at least he could have had nothing to do with the +second attempt upon his patient's life." + +"What second attempt?" + +"The hand that forged the prescription, Scarth, with intent to poison +young Laverick, was the one that also filed the flaw in his toboggan, in +the hope of breaking his neck." + +"My dear doctor," exclaimed Mostyn Scarth, with a pained shake of the +head, "this is stark, staring madness!" + +"I only hope it was--in the would-be murderer," rejoined Dollar gravely. +"But he had a lot of method; he even did his bit of filing--a burglar +couldn't have done it better--in the domino Jack Laverick had just taken +off!" + +"How do you know he had taken it off? How do you know the whole job +wasn't one of Jack's drunken tricks?" + +"What whole job?" + +"The one you're talking about--the alleged tampering with his toboggan," +replied Scarth, impatiently. + +"Oh! I only thought you meant something more." Dollar made a pause. +"Don't you feel it rather hot in here, Scarth?" + +"Do you know, I do!" confessed the visitor, as though it were Dollar's +house and breeding had forbidden him to volunteer the remark. "It's the +heat of this stove, with the window shut. Thanks so much, doctor!" + +And he wiped his strong, brown, beautifully shaven face; it was one of +those that require shaving more than once a day, yet it was always +glossy from the razor; and he burnished it afresh with a silk +handkerchief that would have passed through a packing-needle's eye. + +"And what are you really doing about this--monster?" he resumed, as who +should accept the monster's existence for the sake of argument. + +"Nothing, Scarth." + +"Nothing? You intend to do nothing at all?" + +Scarth had started, for the first time; but he started to his feet, +while he was about it, as though in overpowering disgust. + +"Not if he keeps out of England," replied the crime doctor, who had also +risen. "I wonder if he's sane enough for that?" + +Their four eyes met in a protracted scrutiny, without a flicker on +either side. + +"What I am wondering," said Scarth deliberately, "is whether this +Frankenstein effort of yours exists outside your own imagination, Doctor +Dollar." + +"Oh! he exists all right," declared the doctor. "But I am charitable +enough to suppose him mad--in spite of his method _and_ his motive." + +"Did he tell you what that was?" asked Scarth with a sneer. + +"No; but Jack did. He seems to have been in the man's power--under his +influence--to an extraordinary degree. He had even left him a wicked sum +in a will made since he came of age. I needn't tell you that he has now +made another, revoking----" + +"No, you need not!" cried Mostyn Scarth, turning livid at the last +moment. "I've heard about enough of your mares' nests and mythical +monsters. I wish you good morning, and a more credulous audience next +time." + +"That I can count upon," returned the doctor at the door. "There's no +saying what they won't believe--at Scotland Yard!" + + + + +VI + +ONE POSSESSED + + +Lieutenant-General Neville Dysone, R.E., V.C., was the first really +eminent person to consult the crime doctor by regular appointment in the +proper hours. Quite apart from the feat of arms which had earned him the +most coveted of all distinctions, the gigantic General, deep-chested and +erect, virile in every silver-woven hair of his upright head, filled the +tiny stage in Welbeck Street and dwarfed its antique properties, as no +being had done before. And yet his voice was tender and even tremulous +with the pathetic presage of a heartbreak under all. + +"Doctor Dollar," he began at once, "I have come to see you about the +most tragic secret that a man can have. I would shoot myself for saying +what I have to say, did I not know that a patient's confidence is +sacred to any member of your profession--perhaps especially to an +alienist?" + +"I hope we are all alike as to that," returned Dollar, gently. He was +used to these sad openings. + +"I ought not to have said it; but it hardly is my secret, that's why I +feel such a cur!" exclaimed the General, taking his handkerchief to a +fine forehead and remarkably fresh complexion, as if to wipe away its +noble flush. "Your patient, I devoutly hope, will be my poor wife, who +really seems to me to be almost losing her reason"--but with that the +husband quite lost his voice. + +"Perhaps we can find it for her," said Dollar, despising the pert +professional optimism that told almost like a shot "It is a thing more +often mislaid than really lost." + +And the last of the other's weakness was finally overcome. A few weighty +questions, lightly asked and simply answered, and he was master of a +robust address, in which an occasional impediment only did further +credit to his delicacy. + +"No. I should say it was entirely a development of the last few months," +declared the General emphatically. "There was nothing of the kind in +our twenty-odd years of India, nor yet in the first year after I +retired. All this--this trouble has come since I bought my house in the +pine country. It's called Valsugana, as you see on my card; but it +wasn't before we went there. We gave it the name because it struck us as +extraordinarily like the Austrian Tyrol, where--well, of which we had +happy memories, Doctor Dollar." + +His blue eyes winced as they flew through the open French window, up the +next precipice of bricks and mortar, to the beetling sky-line of other +roofs, all a little softened in the faint haze of approaching heat. It +cost him a palpable effort to bring them back to the little dark +consulting-room, with its cool slabs of aged oak and the summer fernery +that hid the hearth. + +"It's good of you to let me take my time, doctor, but yours is too +valuable to waste. All I meant was to give you an idea of our +surroundings, as I know they are held to count in such cases. We are +embedded in pines and firs. Some people find trees depressing, but after +India they were just what we wanted, and even now my wife won't let me +cut down one of them. Yet depression is no name for her state of mind; +it's nearer melancholy madness, and latterly she has become subject +to--to delusions--which are influencing her whole character and actions +in the most alarming way. We are finding it difficult, for the first +time in our lives, to keep servants; even her own nephew, who has come +to live with us, only stands it for my sake, poor boy! As for my +nerves--well, thank God I used to think I hadn't got any when I was in +the service; but it's a little hard to be--to be as we are--at our time +of life!" His hot face flamed. "What am I saying? It's a thousand times +harder on _her_! She had been looking forward to these days for years." + +Dollar wanted to wring one of the great brown, restless hands. Might he +ask the nature of the delusions? + +The General cried: "I'd give ten years of my life if I could tell you!" + +"You can tell me what form they take?" + +"I must, of course; it is what I came for, after all," the General +muttered. He raised his head and his voice together. "Well, for one +thing she's got herself a ferocious bulldog and a revolver." + +Dollar did not move a doctor's muscle. "I suppose there must be a dog +in the country, especially where there are no children. And if you must +have a dog, you can't do better than a bulldog. Is there any reason for +the revolver? Some people think it another necessity of the country." + +"It isn't with us--much less as she carries it." + +"Ladies in India get in the habit, don't they?" + +"She never did. And now----" + +"Yes, General? Has she it always by her?" + +"Night and day, on a curb bracelet locked to her wrist!" + +This time there were no professional pretenses. "I don't wonder you have +trouble with your servants," said Dollar, with as much sympathy as he +liked to show. + +"You mayn't see it when you come down, doctor, as I am going to entreat +you to do. She has her sleeves cut on purpose, and it is the smallest +you can buy. But I know it's always there--and always loaded." + +Dollar played a while with a queer plain steel ruler, out of keeping +with his other possessions, though it too had its history. It stood on +end before he let it alone and looked up. + +"General Dysone, there must be some sort of reason or foundation for +all this. Has anything alarming happened since you have been +at--Valsugana?" + +"Nothing that firearms could prevent" + +"Do you mind telling me what it is that has happened?" + +"We had a tragedy in the winter--a suicide on the place." + +"Ah!" + +"Her gardener hanged himself. Hers, I say, because the garden is my +wife's affair. I only paid the poor fellow his wages." + +"Well, come, General, that was enough to depress anybody----" + +"Yet she wouldn't have even that tree cut down--nor yet come away for a +change--not for as much as a night in town!" + +The interruption had come with another access of grim heat and further +use of the General's handkerchief. Dollar took up his steel tube of a +ruler and trained it like a spy-glass on the ink, with one eye as +carefully closed as if the truth lay at the bottom of the blue-black +well. + +"Was there any rhyme or reason for the suicide?" + +"One was suggested that I would rather not repeat." + +The closed eye opened to find the blue pair fallen. "I think it might +help, General. Mrs. Dysone is evidently a woman of strong character, and +anything----" + +"She is, God knows!" cried the miserable man. "Everybody knows it +now--her servants especially--though nobody used to treat them better. +Why, in India--but we'll let it go at that, if you don't mind. I have +provided for the widow." + +Dollar bowed over his bit of steel tubing, but this time put it down so +hastily that it rolled off the table. General Dysone was towering over +him with shaking hand outstretched. + +"I can't say any more," he croaked. "You must come down and see her for +yourself; then you could do the talking--and I shouldn't feel such a +damned cur! By God, sir, it's awful, talking about one's own wife like +this, even for her own good! It's worse than I thought it would be. I +know it's different to a doctor--but--but you're an old soldierman as +well, aren't you? Didn't I hear you were in the war?" + +"I was." + +"Well, then," cried the General, and his blue eyes lit up with simple +cunning, "that's where we met! We've run up against each other again, +and I've asked you down for this next week-end! Can you manage it? Are +you free? I'll write you a check for your own fee this minute, if you +like--there must be nothing of that kind down there. You don't mind +being Captain Dollar again, if that was it, to my wife?" + +His pathetic eagerness, his sensitive loyalty--even his sudden and +solicitous zest in the pious fraud proposed--made between them an +irresistible appeal. Dollar had to think; the rooms up-stairs were not +empty; but none enshrined a more interesting case than this sounded. On +the other hand, he had to be on his guard against a weakness for mere +human interest as apart from the esoteric principles of his practise. +People might call him an empiric--empiric he was proud to be, but it was +and must remain empiricism in one definite direction only. Psychical +research was not for him--and the Dysone story had a psychic flavor. + +In the end he said quite bluntly: + +"I hope you don't suggest a ghost behind all this, General?" + +"I? Lord, no! I don't believe in 'em," cried the warrior, with a nervous +laugh. + +"Does any member of your household?" + +"Not--now." + +"_Not_ now?" + +"No. I think I am right in saying that." But something was worrying him. +"Perhaps it is also right," he continued, with the engaging candor of an +overthrown reserve, "and only fair--since I take it you are coming--to +tell you that there was a fellow with us who thought he saw things. But +it was all the most utter moonshine. He saw brown devils in flowing +robes, but what he'd taken before he saw them I can't tell you! He +didn't stay with me long enough for us to get to know each other. But he +wasn't just a servant, and it was before the poor gardener's affair. +Like so many old soldiers on the shelf, Doctor Dollar, I am writing a +book, and I run a secretary of sorts; now it's Jim Paley, a nephew of +ours; and thank God he has more sense." + +"Yet even he gets depressed?" + +"He has had cause. If our own kith and kin behaved like one +possessed----" He stopped himself yet again; this time his hand found +Dollar's with a vibrant grip. "You will come, won't you? I can meet any +train on Saturday, or any other day that suits you better. I--for her +own sake, doctor--I sometimes feel it might be better if she went away +for a time. But you will come and see her for yourself?" + +Before he left it was a promise; a harder heart than John Dollar's would +have ended by making it, and putting the new case before all others when +the Saturday came. But it was not only his prospective patient whom the +crime doctor was now really anxious to see; he felt fascinated in +advance by the scene and every person of an indubitable drama, of which +at least one tragic act was already over. + +There was no question of meeting him at any station; the wealthy mother +of a still recent patient had insisted on presenting Doctor Dollar with +a fifteen-horse-power Talboys, which he had eventually accepted, and +even chosen for himself (with certain expert assistance), as an +incalculable contribution to the Cause. Already the car had vastly +enlarged his theater of work; and on every errand his heart was +lightened and his faith fortified by the wonderful case of the young +chauffeur who sat so upright at the wheel beside him. In the beginning +he had slouched there like the worst of his kind; it was neither precept +nor reprimand which had straightened his back and his look and all about +him. He was what John Dollar had always wanted--the unconscious patient +whose history none knew--who himself little dreamed that it was all +known to the man who treated him almost like a brother. + +The boy had been in prison for dishonesty; he was being sedulously +trusted, and so taught to trust himself. He had come in March, a sulky +and suspicious clod; and now in June he could talk cricket and sixpenny +editions from the Hounslow tram-lines to the wide white gate opening +into a drive through a Berkshire wood, with a house lurking behind it in +a mask of ivy, out of the sun. + +But in the drive General Dysone stepped back into the doctor's life, +and, on being directed to the stables, he who had filled it for the last +hour drove out of it for the next twenty-four. + +"I wanted you to hear something at once from me," his host whispered +under the whispering trees, "lest it should be mentioned and take you +aback before the others. We've had another little tragedy--not a horror +like the last--yet in one way almost worse. My wife shot her own dog +dead last night!" + +Dollar put a curb upon his parting lips. + +"_In_ the night?" he stood still to ask. + +"Well, between eleven and twelve." + +"In her own room, or where?" + +"Out-of-doors. Don't ask me how it happened; nobody seems to know, and +don't _you_ know anything if she speaks of it herself." + +His fine face was streaming with perspiration; yet he seemed to have +been waiting quietly under the trees, he was not short of breath, and he +a big elderly man. Dollar asked no questions at all; they dropped the +subject there in the drive. Though the sun was up somewhere out of +sight, it was already late in the long June afternoon, and the guest was +taken straight to his room. + +It was a corner room with one ivy-darkened casement overlooking a +shadowy lawn, the other facing a forest of firs and chestnuts on which +it was harder to look without an instinctive qualm. But the General +seemed to have forgot his tragedies, and for the moment his blue eyes +almost brightened the somber scene on which they dwelt with involuntary +pride. + +"Now don't you see where Tyrol comes in?" said he. "Put a mountain +behind those trees--and there _was_ one the very first time we saw the +house! It was only a thunder-cloud, but for all the world it might have +been the Dolomites. And it took us back ... we had no other clouds +then!" + +Dollar found himself alone; found his things laid out and his shirt +studded, and a cozy on the brass hot-water can, with as much +satisfaction as though he had never stayed in a country house before. +Could there be so very much amiss in a household where they knew just +what to do for one, and just what to leave undone? + +And it was the same with all the other creature comforts; they meant +good servants, however short their service; and good servants do not +often mean the mistress or the hostess whom Dollar had come prepared to +meet. He dressed in pleasurable doubt and enhanced excitement--and those +were his happiest moments at Valsugana. + +Mrs. Dysone was a middle-aged woman who looked almost old, whereas the +General was elderly with all the appearance of early middle age. The +contrast was even more complete in more invidious particulars; but +Dollar took little heed of the poor lady's face, as a lady's face. Her +skin and eyes were enough for him; both were brown, with that almost +ultra-Indian tinge of so many Anglo-Indians. He was sensible at once of +an Oriental impenetrability. + +With her conversation he could not quarrel; what there was of it was +crisp, unstudied, understanding. And the little dinner did her the kind +of credit for which he was now prepared; but she only once took charge +of the talk, and that was rather sharply to change a subject into which +she had been the first to enter. + +How it had cropped up, Dollar could never think, especially as his +former profession and rank duly obtained throughout his visit. He had +even warned his chauffeur that he was not the doctor there; it could +not have been he himself who started it, but somebody did, as somebody +always does when there is one topic to avoid. It was probably the nice +young nephew who made the first well-meaning remark upon the general +want of originality, with reference to something or other under +criticism at the moment; but it was neither he nor Dollar who laid it +down that monkeys were the most arrant imitators in nature--except +criminals; and it certainly was the General who said that nothing would +surprise him less than if another fellow went and hanged himself in +their wood. Then it was that Mrs. Dysone put her foot down--and Dollar +never forgot her look. + +Almost for the first time it made him think of her revolver. It was out +of sight; and full as her long sleeves were, it was difficult to believe +that one of them could conceal the smallest firearm made; but a tiny +gold padlock did dangle when she raised her glass of water; and at the +end of dinner there was a second little scene, this time without words, +which went far to dispel any doubt arising in his mind. + +He was holding the door open for Mrs. Dysone, and she stood a moment on +the threshold, peering into the far corners of the room. He saw what it +was she had forgot--saw it come back to her as she turned away, with +another look worth remembering. + +Either the General missed that, or the anxieties of the husband were now +deliberately sunk in the duties of the host. He had got up some Jubilee +port in the doctor's honor; they sat over it together till it was nearly +time for bed. Dollar took little, but the other grew a shade more +rubicund, and it was good to hear him chat without restraint or an +apparent care. Yet it was strange as well; again he drifted into +criminology, and his own after-dinner defect of sensibility only made +his hearer the more uncomfortable. + +Of course, he felt, it was partly out of compliment to himself as crime +doctor; but the ugly subject had evidently an unhealthy fascination of +its own for the fine full-blooded man. Not that it seemed an inveterate +foible; the expert observer thought it rather the reflex attraction of +the strongest possible horror and repulsion, and took it the more +seriously on that account. Of two evils it seemed to him the less to +allow himself to be pumped on professional generalities. It was +distinctly better than encouraging the General to ransack his long +experience for memories of decent people who had done dreadful deeds. +Best of all to assure him that even those unfortunates might have +outlived their infamy under the scientific treatment of a more +enlightened day. + +If they must talk crime, let it be the Cure of Crime! So the doctor had +his heart-felt say; and the General listened even more terribly than he +had talked; asking questions in whispers, and waiting breathless for the +considered reply. It was the last of these that took most answering. + +"And which, doctor, for God's sake, which would you have most hope of +curing: a man or a woman?" + +But Dollar would only say: "I shouldn't despair of _anybody_, who had +done _anything_, if there was still an intelligence to work upon; but +the more of that the better." + +And the General said hardly another word, except "God bless you!" +outside the spare-room door. His wife had been seen no more. + +But Dollar saw her in every corner of his delightful quarters; and the +acute contrast that might have unsettled an innocent mind had the +opposite effect on his. There were electric lamps in all the right +places; there were books and biscuits, a glass of milk, even a miniature +decanter and a bottle of Schweppes. He sighed as he wound his watch and +placed it in the little stand on the table beside the bed; but he was +only wondering exactly what he was going to discover before he wound it +up again. + +Outside one open window the merry crickets were playing castanets in +those dreadful trees. It was the other blind that he drew up; and on the +lawn the dying and reviving glow of a cigarette gave glimpses of a white +shirt-front, a black satin tie, the drooping brim of a Panama hat. It +was the nice young nephew, who had retreated before the Jubilee port. +And Dollar was still wondering on what pretext he could go down and join +him, when his knock came at the door. + +"Only to see if you'd everything you want," explained young Paley, +ingenuously disingenuous; and shut the door behind him before the +invitation to enter was out of the doctor's mouth. But he shut it very +softly, trod like a burglar, and excused himself with bated breath: "You +are the first person who has stayed with us since I've been here, +Captain Dollar!" And his wry young smile was as sad as anything in the +sad house. + +"You amaze me!" cried Dollar. Indeed, it was the flank attack of a new +kind of amazement. "I should have thought--" and his glance made a +lightning tour of the luxurious room. + +"I know," said Paley, nodding. "I think they must have laid themselves +out for visitors at the start. But none come now. I wish they did! It's +a house that wants them." + +"You are rather a small party, aren't you?" + +"We are rather a grim party! And yet my old uncle is absolutely the +finest man I ever struck." + +"I don't wonder that you admire him." + +"You don't know what he is, Captain Dollar. He got the V.C. when he was +my age in Burmah, but he deserves one for almost every day of his +ordinary home life." + +Dollar made no remark; the young fellow offered him a cigarette, and +was encouraged to light another himself. He required no encouragement to +talk. + +"The funny thing is that he's not really my uncle. I'm _her_ nephew; and +she's a wonderful woman, too, in her way. She runs the whole place like +a book; she's thrown away here. But--I can't help saying it--I should +like her better if I didn't love him!" + +"Talking of books," said Dollar, "the General told me he was writing +one, and that you were helping him?" + +"He didn't tell you what it was about?" + +"No." + +"Then I mustn't. I wish I could. It's to be the last word on a certain +subject, but he won't have it spoken about. That's one reason why it's +getting on his nerves." + +"_Is_ it his book?" + +"It and everything. Doesn't he remind you of a man sitting on a +powder-barrel? If he weren't what he is, there'd be an explosion every +day. And there never is one--no matter what happens!" + +Dollar watched the pale youth swallowing his smoke. + +"Do they often talk about crime?" + +"Always! They can't keep off it. And Aunt Essie always changes the +subject as though she hadn't been every bit as bad as uncle. Of course +they've had a good lot to make them morbid. I suppose you heard about +poor Dingle, the last gardener?" + +"Only just" + +"He was the last man you would ever have suspected of such a thing. It +was in those trees just outside." The crickets made extra merry as he +paused. "They didn't find him for a day and a night!" + +"Look here! I'm not going to let you talk about it," said Dollar. But +the good-humored rebuff cost him an effort. He wanted to hear all about +the suicide, but not from this worn lad with an old man's smile. He knew +and liked the type too well. + +"I'm sorry, Captain Dollar." Jim Paley looked sorry. "Yet, it's all very +well! I don't suppose the General told you what happened last night?" + +"Well, yes, he did, but without going into any particulars." + +And now the doctor made no secret of his curiosity; this was a matter on +which he could not afford to forego enlightenment. Nor was it like +raking up an old horror; it would do the boy more good than harm to +speak of this last affair. + +"I can't tell you much about it myself," said he. "I was wondering if I +could, just now on the lawn. That's where it happened, you know." + +"I didn't know." + +"Well, it was, and the funny thing is that I was there at the time. I +used to go out with the dog for a cigarette when they turned in; last +night I was foolish enough to fall asleep in a chair on the lawn. I had +been playing tennis all the afternoon, and had a long bike-ride both +ways. Well, all I know is that I woke up thinking I'd been shot; and +there was my aunt with a revolver she insists on carrying--and poor +Muggins as dead as a door-nail." + +"Did she say it was an accident?" + +"She behaved as if it had been; she was all over the poor dead brute." + +"Rather a savage dog, wasn't it?" + +"I never thought so. But the General had no use for him--and no wonder! +Did he tell you he had bitten him in the shoulder?" + +"No." + +"Well, he did, only the other day. But that's the old General all over. +He never told me till the dog was dead. I shouldn't be surprised if----" + +"Yes?" + +"----if my aunt hadn't been in it somehow. Poor old Muggins was such a +bone between them!" + +"You don't suppose he'd ended by turning on her?" + +"Hardly. He was like a kitten with her, poor brute!" + +Another cigarette was lighted; more inhaling went on unchecked. + +"Was Mrs. Dysone by herself out there--but for you?" + +"Well--yes." + +"Does that mean she wasn't?" + +"Upon my word, I don't know!" said young Paley, frankly. "It sounds most +awful rot, but just for a moment I thought I saw somebody in a sort of +surplice affair. But I can only swear to Aunt Essie, and she was in her +dressing-gown, and it wasn't white." + +Dollar did not go to bed at all. He sat first at one window, watching +the black trees turn blue, and eventually a variety of sunny greens; +then at the other, staring down at the pretty scene of a deed ugly in +itself, but uglier in the peculiar quality of its mystery. + +A dog; only a dog, this time; but the woman's own dog! There were two +new sods on the place where he supposed it had lain withering.... + +But who or what was it that these young men had seen--the one the +General had told him about, and this obviously truthful lad whom he +himself had questioned? "Brown devils in flowing robes" was perhaps only +the old soldier's picturesque phrase; they might have turned brown in +his Indian mind; but what of Jim Paley's "somebody in a sort of surplice +affair"? Was that "body" brown as well? + +In the wood of worse omen the gay little birds tuned up to deaf ears at +the open window. And a cynical soloist went so far as to start saying, +"Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty!" in a liquid contralto. But a little +sharp shot, fired two nights and a day before, was the only sound to get +across the spare-room window-sill.... + +The bathroom was next door; in that physically admirable house there was +boiling hot water at six o'clock in the morning; the servants made tea +when they heard it running; and the garden before breakfast was almost a +delight. It might have been an Eden ... it _was_ ... with the serpent +still in the grass! + +Blinds went up like eyelids under bushy brows of ivy. The grass remained +gray with dew; there was not enough sun anywhere, though the whole sky +beamed. Dollar wandered indoors the way the General had taken him the +day before. It was the way through his library. Libraries are always +interesting; a man's bookcase is sometimes more interesting than the man +himself, sometimes the one existing portrait of his mind. Dollar spent +the best part of an absorbing hour without taking a single volume from +its place. But this was partly because those he would have dipped into +were under glass and lock and key. And partly it was due to more +accessible distractions crowning that very piece of ostensible antiquity +which contained the books, and of which the top drawer drew out into the +General's desk. + +The distractions were a peculiarly repulsive gilded idol, squatting with +its tongue out, as if at the amateur author, and a heathen sword on the +wall behind it. Nothing more; but Dollar also had served in India in his +day, and his natural interest was whetted by a certain smattering of +lore. He was still standing on a newspaper and a chair when a voice +hailed him in no hospitable tone. + +"Really, Captain Dollar! I should have asked the servants for a ladder +while I was about it!" + +Of course it was Mrs. Dysone, and she was not even pretending to look +pleased. He jumped down with an apology which softened not a line of her +sallow face and bony figure. + +"It was an outrage," he owned. "But I did stand on a paper to save the +chair. I say, though, I never noticed it was this week's _Field_." + +Really horrified at his own behavior, he did his best to smooth and wipe +away his footmarks on the wrapper of the paper. But those subtle eyes, +like blots of ink on old parchment, were no longer trained on the +offender, who missed yet another look that might have helped him. + +"My husband's study is rather holy ground," was the lady's last word. "I +only came in myself because I thought he was here." + +Mercifully, days do not always go on as badly as they begin; more +strangely, this one developed into the dullest and most conventional of +country-house Sundays. + +General Dysone was himself not only dull, but even a little stiff, as +became a good Briton who had said too much to too great a stranger +overnight. His natural courtesy had become conspicuous; he played +punctilious host all day; and Dollar was allowed to feel that, if he had +come down as a doctor, he was staying on as an ordinary guest, and in a +house where guests were expected to observe the Sabbath. So they all +marched off together to the village church, where the General trumpeted +the tune in his own octave, read the lessons, and kept waking up during +the sermon. There were the regulation amenities with other devout gentry +of the neighborhood; there was the national Sunday sirloin at the +midday meal, and no more untoward topics to make the host's forehead +glisten or the hostess gleam and lower. In the afternoon the whole party +inspected every animal and vegetable on the premises; and after tea the +visitor's car came round. + +Originally there had been much talk of his staying till the Monday; the +General went through the form of pressing him once more, but was not +backed up by his wife, who had shadowed them suspiciously all day. Nor +did he comment on this by so much as a sidelong glance at Dollar, or +contrive to get another word with him alone. And the crime doctor, +instead of making any excuse to remain and penetrate these new +mysteries, showed a sensitive alacrity to leave. + +Of the nephew, who looked terribly depressed at his departure, he had +seen something more, and had even asked two private favors. One, that he +would keep out of that haunted garden for the next few nights, and try +going to bed earlier; the other an odd request for an almost middle-aged +man about town, but rather flattering to the young fellow. It was for +the loan of his Panama, so that Dollar's hatter might see if he could +not get him as good a one. Paley's was the kind that might be carried up +a sleeve, like the modern handkerchief; he explained that the old +General had given it him. + +Dollar tried it on almost as soon as the car was out of sight of +Valsugana--while his young chauffeur was still wondering what he had +done to make the governor sit behind. It was funny of him, just when a +chap might have been telling him a thing or two that he had heard down +there at the coachman's place. But it was all the more interesting when +they got back to town at seven in the evening, and he was ordered to +fill up with petrol and be back at nine, to make the same trip over +again. + +"I needn't ask you," the doctor added, "to hold your tongue about +anything you may have heard at General Dysone's. I know you will, +Albert." + +And almost by lighting-up time they were shoulder to shoulder on the +road once more. + +But at Valsugana it was another dark night, and none too easy to find +one's way about the place on the strength of a midsummer day's +acquaintance. And for the first time Dollar was glad the dog of the +house was dead, as he finished a circuitous approach by stealing +through the farther wood, toward the jagged lumps of light in the +ivy-strangled bedroom windows; already everything was dark down-stairs. + +Here were the pale new sods; they could just be seen, though his feet +first felt their inequalities. His cigarette was the one pin-prick of +light in all the garden, though each draw brought the buff brim of Jim +Paley's Panama within an inch of his eyes, its fine texture like coarse +matting at the range. And the chair in which Jim Paley had sat smoking +this time last night, and dozing the night before when the shot +disturbed him, was just where he expected his shins to find it; the +wickers squeaked as John Dollar took his place. + +Less need now not to make a sound; but he made no more than he could +help, for the night was still and sultry, without any of the garden +noises of a night ago. It was as though nature had stopped her orchestra +in disgust at the plot and counterplot brewing on her darkened stage. +The cigarette-end was thrown away; it might have been a stone that fell +upon the grass, and Dollar could almost hear it sizzling in the dew. His +aural nerves were tuned to the last pitch of sensitive acknowledgment; +a fly on the drooping Panama-brim would not have failed to "scratch the +brain's coat of curd." ... How much less the swift and furtive footfall +that came kissing the wet lawn at last! + +It was more than a footfall; there was a following swish of some long +garment trailing through the wet. It all came near; it all stopped dead. +Dollar had nodded heavily as if in sleep; had jerked his head up higher; +seemed to be dropping off again in greater comfort. + +The footfalls and the swish came on like thunder now. But now his +eyelids were only drooping like the brim above them; in the broad light +of their abnormal perceptivity, it was as if his own eyes threw a +dreadful halo round the figure they beheld. It was a swaddled figure, +creeping into monstrosity, crouching early for its spring. It had draped +arms extended, with some cloth or band that looped and tightened at each +stride: on the rounded shoulders bobbed the craning head and darkened +face of General Dysone. + +In his last stride he swerved, as if to get as much behind the chair as +its position under the tree permitted. The cloth clapped as it came +taut over Dollar's head, but was not actually round his neck when he +ducked and turned, and hit out and up with all his might. He felt the +rasp of a fifteen-hours' beard, heard the click of teeth; the lawn +quaked, and white robes settled upon a senseless heap, as the plumage on +a murdered pigeon. + +Dollar knelt over him and felt his pulse, held an electric lamp to eyes +that opened, and quickly something else to the dilated nostrils. + +"O Jim!" shuddered a voice close at hand. It was shrill yet broken, a +cry of horror, but like no voice he knew. + +He jumped up to face the General's wife. + +"It's not Jim, Mrs. Dysone. It's I--Dollar. He'll soon be all right!" + +"Captain--Dollar?" + +"No--doctor, nowadays--he called me down as one himself. And now I've +come back on my own responsibility, and--put him under chloroform; but I +haven't given him much; for God's sake let us speak plainly while we +can!" + +She was on her knees, proving his words without uttering one. Still +kneeling speechless, she leaned back while he continued: "You know what +he is as well as I do, Mrs. Dysone; you may thank God a doctor has found +him out before the police! Monomania is not their business--but neither +are you the one to cope with it. You have shielded your husband as only +a woman will shield a man; now you must let him come to me." + +His confidence was taking some effect; but she ignored the hands that +would have helped her to her feet; and her own were locked in front of +her, but not in supplication. + +"And what can any of you do for him," she cried fiercely--"except take +him away from me?" + +"I will only answer for myself. I would control him as you can not, and +I would teach him to control himself if man under God can do it. I am a +criminal alienist, Mrs. Dysone, as your husband knew before he came to +consult me on elaborate pretenses into which we needn't go. He trusted +me enough to ask me down here; in my opinion, he was feeling his way to +greater trust, in the teeth of his terrible obsession, but last night he +said more than he meant to say, so to-day he wouldn't say a word. I only +guessed his secret this morning--when you guessed I had! It would be +safe with me against the world. But how can I take the responsibility of +keeping it if he remains at large as he is now?" + +"You can not," said Mrs. Dysone. "I am the only one." + +Her tone was dreamy and yet hard and fatalistic; the arms in the wide +dressing-gown sleeves were still tightly locked. Something brought +Dollar down again beside the senseless man, bending over him in keen +alarm. + +"He'll be himself again directly--quite himself, I shouldn't wonder! He +may have forgot what has happened; he mustn't find me here to remind +him. Something he will have to know, and you are the one to break it to +him, and then to persuade him to come to me. But you won't find that so +easy, Mrs. Dysone, if he sees how I tricked him. He had much better +think it _was_ your nephew. My motor's in the lane behind these trees; +let him think I never went away at all, that we connived and I am +holding myself there at your disposal. It would be true--wouldn't +it--after this? I'll wait night and day until I know!" + +"Doctor Dollar," said Mrs. Dysone, when she had risen without aid and +set him to the trees, "you may or may not know the worst about my poor +husband, but you shall know it now about me. I wish you to take +this--and keep it! You have had two escapes to-night." + +She bared the wrist from which the smallest of revolvers dangled; he +felt it in the darkness--and left it dangling. + +"I heard you had one. He told me. And I thought you carried it for your +own protection!" cried Dollar, seeing into the woman at last. + +"No. It was not for that"--and he knew that she was smiling through her +tears. "I did save his life--when my poor dog saved Jim's--but I carried +this to save the secret I am going to trust to you!" + +Dollar would only take her hand. "You wouldn't have shot me, or any +man," he assured her. "But," he added to himself among the trees, "what +a fool I was to forget that _they_ never killed women!" + +It turned almost cold beside the motor in the lane; the doctor gave his +boy a little brandy, and together they tramped up and down, talking +sport and fiction by the small hour together. The stars slipped out of +the sky, the birds began, and the same cynic shouted "Pretty, pretty, +pretty!" at the top of its strong contralto. At long last there came +that other sound for which Dollar had never ceased listening. And he +turned back into the haunted wood with Jim Paley. + +The poor nephew--still stunned calm--was as painfully articulate as a +young bereaved husband. He spoke of General Dysone as of a man already +dead, in the gentlest of past tenses. He was dead enough to the boy. +There had been an appalling confession--made as coolly, it appeared, as +Paley repeated it. + +"He thought _I_ knocked him down, and I had to let him think so! Aunt +Essie insisted; she _is_ a wonder, after all! It made him tell me things +I simply can't believe.... Yet he showed me a rope just like it--meant +for me!" + +"Do you mean just like the one that--hanged the gardener?" + +"Yes. _He_ did it, so he swears ... _afterward_. He'll tell you +himself--he wants to tell you. He says he first ... I can't put my +tongue to it!" The lapse into the present tense had made him human. + +"Like the Thugs?" + +"Yes--like that sect of fiendish fanatics who went about strangling +everybody they met! _They_ were what his book was about. How did you +know?" + +"That's Bhowanee, their goddess, on top of his bureau, and he has +Sleeman and all the other awful literature locked up underneath. As a +study for a life of sudden idleness, in the depths of the country, it +was enough to bring on temporary insanity. And the strong man gone wrong +goes and does what the rest of us only get on our nerves!" + +Dollar felt his biceps clutched and clawed, and the two stood still +under more irony in a gay contralto. + +"Temporary, did you say? Only _temporary_?" the boy was faltering. + +"I hope so, honestly. You see, it was just on that one point ... and +even there ... I believe he _did_ want his wife out of the way, and for +her own sake, too!" said Dollar, with a sympathetic tremor of his own. + +"But do you know what he's saying? He means to tell the whole world now, +and let them hang him, and serve him right--he says! And he's as sane +as we are now--only he might have been through a Turkish bath!" + +"More signs!" cried Dollar, looking up at the brightening sky. "But we +won't allow that. It would undo nothing and he has made all the +reparation. + +" ... Come, Paley! I want to take him back with me in the car. It's broad +daylight." + + + + +VII + +THE DOCTOR'S ASSISTANT + + +The doctor was coping with his Sunday meal when the telephone went off +in the next room. On his ears the imperious summons never fell without a +thrill; in his sight, the tulip-shaped receiver became a live thing +trumpeting for help; and he would answer the call himself, at any hour +of the day or night. It was necessary at night, with the Bartons asleep +in the basement like a family in a vault, but it was just the same when +they were all on duty, as at the present moment. Back went the +Cromwellian chair, at the head of the bare and solitary trestle table. +An excited personage, who might have been just outside the window, was +expeditiously appeased in monosyllables. And Dollar returned with an +appetite to what had been set before him. + +"Send Bobby round to the garage, Barton, to order the car at once. He +can tell Albert I shall be ready as soon as he is, but to take his +headlights and fill up with petrol." This was repeated with paternal +severity in the wings. "Now, Barton, my little red road-book, and see if +you can find Pax Monktons in the wilds of Surrey. It can't be more than +a hamlet. Try the Cobham country if it's not in the index." + +This took longer--took a survey map and two pairs of eyes before Pax +Monktons Chase was discovered in microscopic print, and the light green +peppered with dots signifying timber three hundred feet above sea-level. + +"Never heard of it in my life before," said Dollar, as he laced brown +shoes before his coffee. "Or of the man either, or his double-barreled +name for that matter. You might see if there's a Dale-Bulmer in _Who's +Who_." + +But again Barton was unsuccessful; and here his services ended, though +through no fault of his own, or failure of unselfish zeal for one of +those more than probable adventures which made him hate the chauffeur +who was always in them, and curse the duties that kept other people out. + +"Will you take your flask, sir?" + +"Lord, no! I'm not going to the North Pole." + +"Or your--or one of those revolvers, sir?" + +"What on earth for? Besides, they're not mine; they ought to be in the +Black Museum at Scotland Yard." The nucleus of a branch exhibition was +forming itself in Welbeck Street. "Don't you give way to nerves, Barton! +I'm only going down to see a man who seems anxious to see me, but I +shouldn't be going to him if we had anybody up-stairs. You three make an +afternoon of it somewhere; never mind if I'm back first; go out and +enjoy yourselves." + +And he was off as if on a deliberate jaunt; but an involuntary chuckle +in the voice over the telephone, the hint of a surprise, the possibility +of a trick, made lively thinking after the doldrums of the dog-days; and +the fine September afternoon seemed expressly ordered for motorists with +time upon their hands. Dollar had only been thinking so when the call +came through, to supply just the object which gives a run its zest, and +nothing else mattered in the least. However frivolous the end and +errand, the means and the meantime were so much to the good on such a +day. + +It was warm, yet delightfully keen at thirty miles an hour; clear as +crystal within rifle-shot, and deliciously hazy in the distance; the +bronze upon the trees seldom warming to a premature red, often lapsing +into the liquid greens of midsummer; but all the way an autumnal smear +of silver in the sunlight. Dollar divided his mind between a sensuous +savoring of the heavenly country, and more or less romantic speculations +on the case in store. Some people's notions of a crime doctor's +functions were so much wider even than his own; ten months out of the +twelve, he could not have afforded to come so far afield without a +distastefully definite foreword about fees. + +This afternoon he was prepared to do almost anything for next to +nothing: and after twenty sedentary miles he was on his legs as often as +not in the next two or three, asking his way at likely lodges, or from +strolling bands of shaven yokels, all Sunday collars and cigarettes. + +"Pax Monktons Chase?" at last said one who seemed to have heard the name +before. "Straight as ever you can go, and the first lodge on the left. +But there's no one there." + +"No one there!" echoed Dollar. "Do you mean the place is empty?" + +"I believe there's workmen there on week-days, but you won't find +anybody now, unless the chap that's bought it's motored over." + +"Isn't he living there, then?" + +"Not yet; there's alterations being made; and I don't know where he does +live, or anything at all about him, except that he motors over sometimes +on a Sunday." + +Dollar felt dashed until he remembered to appreciate one of the few +possibilities for which he had not come quite prepared. There was some +promise in a surprise thus early and so complete. But it made Pax +Monktons Chase fall a little flat when found. It robbed the dreary lodge +of all its value as an eye-opener; it made the chase itself look vast +and desolate for nothing, and a noble pile of seasoned stone fling but +drab turrets and ineffective battlements against a silver sky, which the +sun had ceased to polish in the last tortuous mile. + +It was all the pleasanter to find a ruddy, genial, bearded face, mounted +on a spotted tie that went twice round a nineteen-inch neck, smiling a +welcome under the entrance arch. The man introduced himself as +Dale-Bulmer, bolting a mouthful made for rolling on the tongue. Dollar +was much taken with the humor and simplicity of his address and bearing. +A smart chauffeur waited with a plutocratic car in the sweep of the +drive. And there was no third sign of life about the place. + +"Awfully good of you to come," said Dale-Bulmer, with apologetic warmth. +"I thought you might, from what I'd heard of you, and you seemed to jump +at it when I rang you up. I haven't known anybody take so kindly to a +trip since I left the bush." + +"An Australian?" asked the doctor, with all a doctor's readiness to make +talk; but he was more curious than ever to learn the secret of his +summons. + +"Yes! I come from that enlightened land, where Labor runs the show and +Women have the Vote. In fact," the big man added, with the fat chuckle +heard over the telephone, "that's precisely why I _have_ come from +Australia--as I was fool enough to say the other night at a meeting in +these parts. But I seem to have jumped out of the frying-pan into the +fire." + +[Illustration: There was no sign of life] + +"I'm sorry to hear that," observed Dollar, with polite forbearance. + +"Well, not quite into the fire, as it happens," said Dale-Bulmer, +chuckling again in his noble neck. "Come inside, and you'll see." He led +the way into a broad central corridor, choked with ladders and builders' +tools, pipes and tubing, curtain-rods, and a stack of boards; but a +model of order compared with the chaos visible through an open door at +which he paused. Here were more bare joists than navigable floor, and a +forest of scaffolding therefrom to the crisscrossed plaster ceiling. +"Look you here!" said the man from Australia, and pointed to a heap of +shavings on a remnant of the floor. + +"The British workman's such a careless dog," sighed Dollar, shaking a +sententious head, for a box of vestas had been spilt about the place. + +"British workman be hanged!" cried the other bluntly. "The British +workman's got a job here that will keep him in beer and betting-money +till Christmas, and as much longer as he can spin it out. This is the +little game of another sporting type--the British lady burning for the +vote!" + +"So that's it! But are you sure?" asked Dollar, though he wanted to ask +if that was all. + +"Certain. I met a flaming brace of 'em on bicycles, just outside my +boundary. This is what I was to get for speaking out about them the +other night." + +"I don't see their literature, and I can't smell their paraffin." + +"It's in that bottle on the mantelpiece. Something must have scared them +at the last moment--all but one sportswoman." + +"What about her?" + +"I've got her," said Dale-Bulmer, with sepulchral excitement. + +"Got her prisoner?" + +"I should hope so! Why, I caught her on the very point of setting fire +to that very heap of shavings--and me without a hose-pipe in the house! +Those are her matches on the floor; _she_ wasn't going to turn tail till +she'd done her job--and didn't till I nearly trod on it! You could +hardly expect me to bow her out of the front door after that!" + +Dollar could only stare into the jovial face wreathed in rubicund grins, +but no longer free from a certain serio-comic compunction and concern. + +"But, my dear sir----" + +"Don't pitch into me!" pleaded Dale-Bulmer, pathetically. "I had to do +something; if I hadn't thought of you, and one or two things I've heard +about you, doctor, I should only have telephoned to the police; and +what's the good of putting these young women in the jug, to be poured +out again within a week? I heard you ran a nursing-home for criminals, +worth all the prisons in the world." + +"But I don't run people into it," said the doctor; "they've got to come +in of their own free will. What have you done with this young woman?" + +"I? Nothing; it's her own doing entirely. She chose her cover--I only +turned the key." + +"You've locked her up in some room?" + +"Yes--more or less--rather more." + +And Dale-Bulmer laughed a rather nervous, guilty laugh. + +"Up-stairs somewhere?" + +"Yes--look you here! She was picking up those matches when I spotted her +from this door, and out she streaked through that one over there. Come +and have a look at her line of country, doctor." + +It led into an anteroom or inner hall, or the well of some staircase +still to come, with a lashed ladder towering in its midst, but not quite +reaching a skeleton landing of yawning joists. Dale-Bulmer gazed aloft, +wagging a horizontal beard. + +"Surely she didn't go up there?" said Dollar. + +"Like a lamplighter, doctor! I went the way we'll both go now, if it's +all the same to you." + +A fine forked staircase bore them from the lower corridor to its +counterpart above. And here the leader trod gently, a finger laid across +his lips. + +"That's the room," he whispered, pointing to a shut door in a side +passage. "I--I almost think I'll leave her to you, doctor. It's not +locked--not the door." + +"I thought she was your prisoner?" + +"Yes--but you'll see where she's hidden herself. I did turn _that_ key, +doctor, but that's all I did. Still, I think I'd rather you let her +out." + +There was nothing facetious in his droll air of guilt; he seemed really +rather ashamed of his impetuous measures, as if long in doubt as to +their gallantry, and abashed by the unspoken criticisms of the man whom +he had brought so far afield on the spur of a flustering moment. But the +truth was that Dollar did not blame him in the least, as he turned the +handle softly, and heard a pusillanimous step retreating down the +corridor. + +It was a light and lofty room, with a broad bay-window overlooking the +park; and in the bay a window-seat forming a coffer, which had been +broken open from within; and just clear of the splinters, her hands +raised to her disheveled hair, hat awry and country clothes begrimed, a +young woman risen like Aphrodite from the foam. She had been gazing out +as she put herself to rights; but at the opening of the door she turned +with a light disdain, and the pair of them stood rooted to the floor. + +"Lady--Vera!" he could only gasp. + +She made him an abrupt little bow; then her head went back to the +truculent angle necessitated by a jelly-bag hat worn almost as a mask; +and her eyes hung under the brim like great blue rain-drops, grim and +gleaming, but with little of his blank amazement, and nothing of the +shame that shook his soul. + +"No wonder you would never see me!" he muttered more to himself than to +her. "Not a word even when I wrote--and I wondered what I'd done! I +thought of heaps of things--but I never thought of this!" + +She shook her head as abruptly as she had bowed; the blue rain-drops +looked frozen where they hung, but the firm lips parted impulsively. +Instinct prepared him for something inconceivable. But her +self-restraint was a lesson and a reproof; and, in laying it to heart +and listening to what she did say he for the moment ceased from +wondering what it was that she had just kept back--what charge she had +deferred against him. + +"Tell me one thing, Doctor Dollar." Her voice was all that it had been +in other emergencies, only colder by some degrees. "Have you been +following me, or is this pure chance?" + +"Not chance--pure Fate!" + +"Did you dog me down here, or did you not?" + +"Not consciously. Do I look as if I had?" + +"You look as if you'd seen a ghost," she told him, with a sudden twinkle +of the big blue drops. + +"So I have!" he cried in passionate earnest. "I've seen the ghost of +everything I held most----" + +"Thank you," she said quietly, when he had checked himself on her model. +"I know what you must think--what you really have a special right to +think--after two years ago. Do be generous and don't say it! This isn't +altogether fun for me, you know, much less after being buried alive for +hours!" She just turned her head toward the broken window-seat, and his +eyes devoured the light upon her profile. "What's going to happen to me? +Is my natural enemy a friend of yours? Has he sent for the police?" + +"No--for me instead." + +"Did he know who it was at sight?" + +"He didn't, and he doesn't, and he never shall unless you tell him!" +exclaimed Dollar vehemently. "O Vera, when I was longing to see you, to +warn you against your enemies, that you should go the way to put +yourself more than ever in their power!" + +A glitter under the tilted hat had unconsciously rebuked an unconscious +liberty; yet once this man had begged this woman to marry him, and once +she had practically said she would but for the burden on her soul. +Ceremony, at least, they had foregone of old. Was it merely her new +lease of error that had come between them of late months? He was +beginning to ask himself the question when she broke in with one of her +own: + +"What enemies do you mean, Doctor Dollar?" + +"We are not to speak of two years ago." + +"Croucher!" She shuddered almost like a law-abiding lady. "I haven't +heard of him since that night in the train." + +"I said you wouldn't But I also said, if you remember, that Croucher was +only deadly as a tool. Well, he has fallen into the deadliest hands I +know--that's all." + +It was not, and Lady Vera knew that it was not. The angle of her hat was +all amicable attention now, and her eyes shone clear of the brim, with a +softer light that made her all at once incredible in her latest +incarnation. Dollar's feelings flew back into his face; she read them +with a smile that made him wince, by its cynical resemblance to one or +two that still enriched his dreams. + +"You think I'm as bad as any of them," she divined aloud. + +"I think the crime of arson is worse than most crimes," he made sturdy +answer, standing up to the little body with the strangest difficulty, as +though he were the culprit and she the man. "It's a thing absolutely +nothing on earth can possibly excuse. I think you'd have died rather +than descend to it--two years ago!" + +He had heard a step behind him, and lowered his voice; but Lady Vera +raised hers as a burly form halted shyly on the threshold; and her tone +was like none that she had taken hitherto. + +"Two years ago," she declaimed, "women had not been treated quite so +shabbily as they have been since. Then this miserable Government--" + +"Look you here!" blustered Dale-Bulmer, striding out of his shyness into +the center of the stage. + +"Two years ago," she reiterated for his benefit, "it wasn't war to the +handle of the knife! Now it would be fire and sword, if we were any good +with the sword; as we are not, it's simply fire!" + +"You really think you can burn your way to political power?" cried the +man of extremes, with ungovernable indignation. + +"Political existence is all we ask." + +"As a first instalment! I know you! I come from a country where you +started just like that!" + +"As you told your audience the other night, if you are Mr. Dale-Bulmer," +said Lady Vera, with an explosive little sigh. + +"I am; and for that I'm to have a house like this burned to the ground; +and you ladies think that's the way to advance your cause, to prove your +value to the State! Well, I suppose you know your own business best. +It's no use reasoning with you; but it really is enough to set one off, +after what I caught you doing down-stairs." + +"I wish to goodness you hadn't caught me," cried Lady Vera, with quite +extraordinary simplicity. + +But neither of them took her up; the doctor could only shake his head in +professional despair, while the injured householder recovered his +composure, and the little criminal looked as if she were trying not to +look the mistress of the situation. + +"I only came," resumed Dale-Bulmer, rather as one who had no right in +the room, "to say that a run-about car has been found in the yard behind +one of the empty lodges. As I fancy your friends were on bicycles, it +struck me that the two-seater might perhaps be yours?" + +Was it just the nature of the man to change his whole manner in a +moment, or had the quality of the woman something to do with it? He +seemed unconscious of the change himself--unaware that he had dropped +into a tone of courteous consideration bordering almost on the +apologetic. But the corners of her little mutinous mouth showed that +nothing was lost upon Lady Vera. + +"It sounds like mine," she confessed without indecent amusement. "But I +hope you don't think, because there's room for two, that there's another +of us still concealed about the premises? I came down quite by myself, +in the car you have discovered. And who's to drive it back to town +again, I'm sure _I_ don't know!" + +Dale-Bulmer glanced defiantly at Dollar, a flash-light in his eyes. + +"I do," he cried. "Yourself!" + +"Myself, Mr. Dale-Bulmer? In--handcuffs?" + +And it was not her worst smile that was subdued in deference to the full +glow of his shamefaced magnanimity. + +"Don't talk nonsense!" said he gruffly. "Your car is ready waiting for +you at the door." + +"Not really?" + +"Of course. I buried you alive, didn't I?" His eyes came from the +wrecked window-seat. "Won't that meet the immediate case for martyrdom?" +And he managed another twinkle after all. + +It was a last amenity. He had been thanked, but without the smile which +had been ready enough when it was out of place; now that she had cause +to smile, the perversity of these women came out, as of course it would! +Not that this one took everything quite for granted; on the contrary, +she caused an explosion by offering to pay for the damage to the +window-seat. The militant party would have wished him to secure ample +compensation from his insurance people, she asserted, if the place _had_ +been burned down. "Then I might have built the kind of house I really +want, instead of trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear!" he +had retorted in his better manner, as though he had been a fool to +interfere. + +But it was not his best manner; it was almost as unrepresentative as the +calm self-centered way in which the released prisoner spent the last +minutes looking for her gloves, and, when she failed to find them, held +out her bare hand with a brazen air of innocence, and no more thanks +than would have become a parting guest. + +Even John Dollar felt a new pang of disappointment as the two-seater +shrank panting out of sight and ear-shot, beneath the bronzed timber of +the disappearing drive, and Dale-Bulmer turned on his heel under the +arch. + +"Doesn't that take the cake?" he cried, when he had swallowed his pique +with a chastened chuckle. "A real well-bred 'un--if ever there was +one--playing the very devil, and carrying it off like a little angel of +light! That's what did me--the way she carried it off! I wanted to give +her a fatherly word, to tell her not to go on making such a wicked +little fool of herself. But she simply wouldn't look the part, would +she? I hadn't even the cheek to ask her name--had you?" + +"No. I don't know why you let her off," said Dollar, irritably; but at +the moment he hated Dale-Bulmer for extorting his common gratitude at +the expense of his sacred flame. + +"Why?" cried that cavalier. "Didn't you guess how I found out about her +car?" + +"How?" + +"Reported to me by the police!" + +"The police? Were there any about?" + +Dollar felt as cold down the back as though his sacred flame had never +flickered behind iron bars. + +"Two blighters," said Dale-Bulmer. "I caught sight of 'em just after I +had left you to have it out with her. That's what they had to say for +themselves when I went out to let off steam; swore they were from +Scotland Yard, and trumped up the two-seater when I pretended not to +believe them. Nor did I till I'd run them down to the lodge and seen it +for myself." + +"And then?" + +"I swore it belonged to a friend, of course, and sent them both to the +devil." + +"And--and you were man enough not to say a word about it to--to her?" It +was as much as Dollar could do to keep his enthusiastic respect within +bounds of discretion. + +"Man enough? I wasn't going to have that sort of carrion coming in and +spoiling _your_ job!" + +Then he perceived how he had spoilt it himself; hung his great head like +an elderly elephantine schoolboy; turned his broad back with an +inimitable shrug, and stood shaken to the pit with sobs of mirth. Dollar +joined him with a shout that relieved them both. And they roared +together until a gaunt caretaker appeared on the scene, with a face +expressive of such crass bewilderment that their poor clay quaked with a +second shock. + +"He lives in the bowels of the house," moaned Dale-Bulmer. "He doesn't +know a thing that's happened. If he did I might have to double his +screw. And--and I'd much rather treble your fee!" + +He was solemn once more in his remorse, but not so solemn as the doctor +had become within a minute. + +"I would _pay_ a fee to take his place till to-morrow morning! I mean +it, my dear sir. If you think you owe me any little amends, let me do +this, for my own satisfaction!" + +This from a Dollar at whom the other stared as though they had only just +met. It was the crime doctor come at last. + +"Stay here for the night, Doctor Dollar?" + +"Yes--alone." + +"But why, my good fellow?" + +"I can hardly tell you; only let me stay, if you can trust me!" + +"You know it isn't that." + +"Then do let me! It isn't so much for your sake--I won't pretend it +is--yet what if there should be a second attempt on the house? Then I +might even earn the fee you talk about; otherwise, not a brass farthing! +I wouldn't have missed the case for anything, even as it stands. And you +only took my treatment out of my mouth; you did the very thing I was +going to beg you to do, but not more earnestly than I beg of you now to +leave me in charge here to-night." + +"But not without this man of mine to look after you?" + +"Especially without that man of yours! He gave me the idea--he's my own +height and build--we can change places beautifully. I want him to put +on my cap and coat and goggles, and to drive away in my car, so that +anybody looking would think they had seen the last of me." + +"But who should be looking? Surely not that little----" + +"God forbid! But perhaps somebody on her side--or perhaps only somebody +on her tracks. Curious about those two detectives; but the whole +business bristles with curiosities, which I long to investigate in +peace, unknown to the whole outside world. This is the only way it can +be done; and this, my dear Mr. Dale-Bulmer, is the one and only thing +that you can do for me!" + +The boy with the beard gave way by inches. As long as there was a dog's +chance of any further excitement, he did not see why he should be out of +it, much less in his own house, and after the humdrum life he had led +since Labor and the Ladies had driven him home from Australia. But the +man with the stronger will seemed perfectly sincere in his further +asservations that there were features in the case which he wanted to +study for his own private and professional ends; that he honestly +believed, they had no more to fear from their friends the enemy, but +that somebody ought to remain on guard, that he was the obvious man. All +this rang true enough; and but for Dollar's strange anxiety in the +matter, and Dale-Bulmer's sudden discovery that he squinted, the plan +might have gained earlier acceptance than it did. It was settled, +however, by a timely telephone call from the Australian's furnished +house at Esher, to ask if anything had happened to him, and was he never +going to tear himself away from Pax Monktons Chase? + +Thus it was nearly five o'clock before the crime doctor was alone at +last, with certain plain quarters and plainer fare at his disposal, but +with every nook and cranny of a country mansion to himself until next +morning. The situation had the intrinsic charm of all lonely vigils; +even if nothing was likely to come of this one, it would at least afford +that continuous possibility of a thrill which becomes more thrilling +than the thrill itself. And the whole business was supremely after John +Dollar's heart; nothing could have been more congenial to him; and yet, +though he did look forward to the night, and whatever the night might +still bring forth, it was not for the night's sake that he had +maneuvered to remain in the empty house. It was for the residue of +daylight, and the systematic investigations it would enable him to make. + +On these he started, with the precaution of a seaman marooned on a +desolate island, not indubitably uninhabited, as soon as the front door +shut upon Dale-Bulmer and the two chauffeurs, with the gaunt caretaker +his muffled image in his own car. And these motorists were not followed +out of sight or hearing, from the fading pile that looked so empty in +the drooping eye of heaven. But it very soon seemed to the man within as +if the whole house were a-hum with its own abysmal silence, and his +lightest breath a stertorous disturbance of its ponderous peace. + +He began by searching the unfurnished room in which the fire would have +originated. There could be no doubt about the fell attempt so nearly +made. It would have been diabolically certain of success. The +scaffolding, like sticks in a gigantic grate; the draft through the +joists, where the floor had been taken up; the natural flue formed by +the adjoining well, so lofty that an ordinary ladder was too short to +reach the landing--all these were as bellows and chimney, and the best +of fuel ready laid for lighting. And here were the shavings, all nicely +swept together, and the matches spilled at the last moment; as Dollar +put them back into the box, his finger-tips ached for all they might +have learned from that which they held--for the whole truth about the +guilty hand which had let the match-box fall. + +It was the whole truth, too, that he was seeking next upon his knees, in +the rubble down between the joists; some fresh fact, still inconceivable +as a concrete discovery, that he hoped against hope to find and to set +against the facts beyond dispute. Facts could not lie, but they might +exaggerate; somewhere, surely, there must be something to extenuate, +something to redeem even this atrocious attempt, if only the silent +walls could speak up for one who never made excuses for herself! + +It was a childish instinct, a quite babyish yearning to undo what has +once been done, and yet this had been the spring of that dense desire to +be left behind in the house at all costs. Then he had only felt it, like +a dull ache; now it became a dear and poignant conviction that there was +some discovery still to make, and that he was the man to make it; that +one of these walls had a word to say to him, and to him alone. + +But it was none of the new bricks and mortar, wanting even their first +coat of plaster; it was nothing under the lofty rafters of a quiet +baronial hall where the builder had not been turned loose, nor any +intruder left a trace; it was not in the round room, filled with a first +instalment of the Dale-Bulmer furniture, nor yet anywhere else +down-stairs, in spite of the shrill tale told by the scullery window. +There the Amazons had entered, after breaking a pane like journeymen +burglars. They had fled incontinently by the door. But what else had +they done, and where else had they been, within those sardonically +silent walls? + +Had they been up-stairs before Vera Moyle ran up the ladder? Dollar +returned to that speaking spot, and climbed up gingerly, in an agony of +enthusiasm for her misused pluck. The gap between the top rung and the +new landing was unpleasant even for him, and he was at least a foot +taller than the little fool. The little fool! A pretty way to think of +her, even now; but there was a worse way; and still there was a better, +vaguely haunting him all the time, but almost ceasing to be vague in the +room where he had found her in the flesh. He could see her there again. +She had not faced him like a little fool, but a little heroine, God +forgive her! Not so much as a pout about her horrible imprisonment under +the window-seat! Not a moment's loss of dignity, even after that; not a +moment's loss of temper. Head up, and eyes shining in the shadow of her +wicked little hat! + +Here, to an inch, he had caught her gazing out of that window, out and +down into the chase--rolling right up to the house on this side--beating +against a breakwater of a sunk fence just underneath, and dotted with +leafy sail. Deer in the distance, and swallows darting across and across +the window, like shuttles weaving the scene in silk, brought the picture +back to good dry land. But the wide sky was still rather like a sea-sky; +and it had lightened again with the approach of evening; there were +silver rims to the clouds, as John Dollar tore himself from the +enchanted scene. + +[Illustration: "Now look at this one"] + +It was nearly dark when he returned unsteadily, with a face like a +cheer--with a face that would have lighted up a tomb. In his hands he +clasped a pair of innocent little gloves, that anybody might have found, +and somebody traced to their beloved little owner. But that was not all. +A wall had spoken, in certain handwriting hastily rubbed out, and a +whole bathroom had told a yet more eloquent tale! + +Hours later they were speaking still, wafting sweet music through the +corridors, filling the honored room with strains of joy for the +enchanted man on the broken window-seat, all in the dark at dead of +night. There might have been a moon; he did not know. There might have +been a stealthy advance, in very open order--a taking of cover behind +trees wide apart--a joining of forces down there in the dark, that was +not so dark if one was used to it. But Dollar had been for hours gazing +into his own heart, and that was still so dazzlingly alight that he +might not have seen anything if he had looked out; it still sang so loud +that he heard nothing down-stairs until there was noise enough to wake a +deeper dreamer out of actual sleep. + +Even then he scarcely knew what had brought him so suddenly to feet +grown numb, but not more numb than the whole outer man in the endless +inner joy of that which he believed himself to have discovered along +with his dear lady's gloves. Those sacred relics he still clasped in his +hands, and that fond belief he was still hugging in his heart, when a +louder sound pricked his undertaking to the quick. It was the sound of +voices in the empty house. He tore off his shoes, limped over to the +door, opened it as softly, and stood listening in a heavy horror. They +were women's voices, accompanied by the scuttle of women's feet! + +In an instant, but still with an instinctive stealth, he was out on the +landing at the head of the stairs. And there, but only there, his fond +dream ended in an awakening as terrible as any nightmare; for one woman +stood on the half-landing between the two prongs of the forked +staircase; all attention she stood, as if on guard; hair silvered by a +shaft of moonshine through the staircase window, shoulders hunched +intently, but the head itself just tilted as if in sudden alarm, and +full in the moonlight the wicked unmistakable little hat of Lady Vera +Moyle. + +Her gloves dropped out of his hands. Did she hear them fall? She looked +as if she had; he had not the heart to make sure. He had nothing like +the heart to confront and shame her first--at her worst a passive party +to the crime--when her guiltier companions were even then at their vile +work lower down. The ladder was the thing! Then he could scare those +others first, and she and he need never meet at all. Better never again +than at this hideous juncture! And as for him, better death itself than +such a death to such a dream! + +It was a sheer stampede the man made now, back along the landing with +great heavy strides, even shouting as he went to put the she-devils to +flight. It was what he called them as he ran; had they not dragged an +angel into this. And they heard him, and he heard them--scuttling and +clucking in headlong flight. + +This time they could afford to fly; their second attempt was no failure +like the first. The little new landing was like a gridiron over a +flickering glare from the well beneath. Dollar flung his full length on +the brink--hung dangling from the armpits--hung lashing out for the +ladder like a boy on a horizontal bar with a mattress just underneath. +The top rung took some finding in his reckless haste; and then his +hands had to change places with his feet; and it was all a pretty +desperate business for no light-weight, in a frenzy of excitement, at +the tip-top of a tremulous ladder that leaned against thin air. But his +very recklessness saw him down somehow with unbroken bones, and on the +threshold of the burning room before the fire had really taken hold. And +there he stopped, instead of dashing in; there he stood shrinking from +the red light within. + +For again one of the women had stayed behind the rest; and through a +forest of scaffolding poles, and a swirl of smoke and steam, he beheld +her in a glow already dying by her hand, under a hissing stream flung +right and left, in glittering coils and spirals, as coolly as a gardener +waters the grass. It was his very dream, come true in the end! And +Dollar stood there because he was ashamed to look Vera Moyle in the +face--after fearing for one moment that it was nothing but a dream! + +But last of all the stream played through the darkness and the smoke, +upon the threshold even at his feet, and a dry voice cried: + +"I see you all right! I saw you up-stairs; come round and tell me why +you ran away." + +[Illustration: The little landing was like a gridiron] + +But it was no moment for going round. He went to her through sparks and +splinters in his socks, and felt the pain no more than the relief when +he stood beside her on the cool flags of the corridor, with both her +hands in his. + +"I might have known!" he spluttered through the smoke. "I might have +known it even from the first!" + +"It's jolly bad luck that you should know it at all," said Lady Vera, in +the same dry little voice. "I'm not proud of it, I can tell you." + +"Not of stopping an absolutely wanton crime?" + +"Not of turning against my old lot--and I haven't, either!" cried Lady +Vera, with more passion than he had ever heard from her. "I feel +everything I said up-stairs. I think we've all been treated more +abominably than ever. I don't blame them a bit for all this sort of +thing----" + +"Vera, you do--you know you do!" + +"I don't; how can I? Haven't I done worse? I may think they're going +rather far, and I may put in my spoke----" + +"This is not the first time!" he exulted, still only with her hands in +his, yet little knowing how he hurt them. + +"That's my business," she said, with a sudden laugh that broke her +voice. "It's the least I can do--after two years ago." + +"And I knew you'd done it!" he was quick to cry. "I knew it hours back, +though you did frighten me again just now. I found the hose-pipe in the +bathroom with your gloves, and their rotten message rubbed out on the +wall! I knew the hose was yours, because I'd just been told there wasn't +such a thing in the house. But I was looking for something of the kind. +I knew there was something to be found, that the whole thing wasn't what +it seemed. And ever since it's been the happiest night of my life, on +top of my most miserable hour!" + +"I'll motor you back to town for that," said Lady Vera, with another +poor little laugh. "I--I'm sorry I didn't tell you this afternoon." + +"I'm not!" + +"Somehow it didn't seem quite the game by the others, though of course I +hoped you would guess that I had only come in after them as a kind of +scarecrow. Of course I don't know if it will make you the least bit less +miserable----" But there she stuck. + +"If what will?" + +And now it was she who held his hands the faster--only across a gulf of +darkness like a solid wall--only with a kindness that reminded him it +was nothing else--only with a glow more dear than an embrace. + +"If it makes you the very least bit happier," she whispered, "why, of +course it was only just your own game, doctor, that I was trying to +play!" + + + + +VIII + +THE SECOND MURDERER + + +It was yet another Lady Vera who brought her own sunshine out of the +weeping dusk of that October morning. To veil embarrassment on either +side, Dollar had switched off the light by which he had just read the +line scribbled on her card; but there was no sanction for his nervous +sensibility in the little picture he beheld next moment. An audacious +study in Venetian red--a tripping fashion-plate with a practical +waist--it was only Vera by virtue of the radiant face between the +donkey-eared toque and the modish modicum of fur. And though the +radiance was lovely as ever in his eyes, and lovelier still as a +surprise, this frivolous modernity was pain and puzzledom to Dollar +until their hands met, and the one in the tight glove trembled. + +"It's no use beating about the bush," said Vera Moyle, and there was no +sort of tremor in her voice. "Do you mind telling me exactly what you +know of a Mr. Mostyn Scarth?" + +"Mostyn Scarth!" cried Dollar. "Do _you_ know him?" + +"Only too well!" + +"I was afraid of it." + +"But I want your opinion and experience of him first. I believe you saw +something of each other in Switzerland?" + +"We did," replied Dollar weightily. "He was supposed to be looking after +a young temporary lunatic, who was of age, rich, and not irresponsible +in the eye of the law. Scarth induced the boy to leave him vast sums of +money in a will, and then made two distinct attempts to murder him." + +"No!" + +"He did. You ask what I know of this man, and I make no bones about +telling you. It's a thing the whole world ought to know for its +protection. He made two separate attempts on the lad's life, the last +more ingenious than the first; first he tried to poison him by means of +a forged prescription, and next to break his neck by tampering with his +toboggan." + +"In Switzerland, when you were there?" + +"I was sent for after the first effort; the second was made under my +nose." + +"And yet you did nothing?" + +Lady Vera's indignation was not confined to the absent miscreant; her +demigod came in for his share. + +"There was not much to be done," he protested humbly. "We were in a +foreign country; the evidence wouldn't have been overwhelming under our +own law. I let Scarth know that I had found him out, got the boy out of +his clutches--pulled _him_ together all right--and laid the whole case +before Topham Vinson when I came home. He consulted his law officers; +they thought I had so little to go upon that our man wasn't even marked +down for surveillance by the police. I had to keep my own eye on him +when he turned up in town again. Scarth made that easy by immediately +getting on my tracks, and discovering in Mr. Croucher another old friend +who had his knife in me. They tried between them to pervert my +chauffeur; then I lost sight of them; and it was then I wanted to put +you on your guard, but you were never in, and my letters seemed to +miscarry." + +"They didn't," said Lady Vera, with frank contrition. "I am ashamed to +tell you why I never answered them; but I will in a minute. So it was +Mr. Scarth you meant when you told me the other day that poor Croucher +had fallen into such bad hands?" + +"Poor Croucher! Yes, it was; and there really is no comparison between +them. One was born in the scarlet, so to speak, but the other's the only +really educated and quite cold-blooded villain I have ever met." + +Vera Moyle sat forward in the patient's chair, in the very attitude of +two years before, with the same firelight illumining the same steadfast +look of moral and intellectual honesty; and the fuller health upon her +cheek, the deeper wisdom in her eyes, made no more difference to Dollar +than her superfluous smartness now. She was the same utterly candid +creature, about to tell him the whole truth about some fresh trouble, +and extenuate nothing that concerned herself. + +"I don't want to waste many words on Mr. Scarth," she began, in the +least vindictive of human voices; "but I ought to tell you that I quite +liked him until the other day. I met him first at a country house where +he was supposed to be tutoring the boys, but was really the life and +soul of the whole party. It was extraordinary how he ran everything and +everybody for those people; we were all devoted to him, and he says I +asked him to come and see us in town, but he certainly never came until +near the end of this last season. Then he made up for lost time; he's +capital company, as you know, and we had him to dinner, and my eldest +brother asked him down to stay in August when I was there. That was when +we saw most of each other, and Mr. Scarth asked me to marry him----" + +"Good God!" + +"Of course I didn't like him well enough for that, though he _had_ put +me against _you_!" + +"How?" said Dollar grimly. She was still peering into the fire; but he +flattered himself there was more than firelight in the flush that almost +rivaled the Venetian red still nearer to the bars. + +"He knows what I did two years ago." + +"Croucher, of course?" + +"He said it was you--that you gave me away to him in Switzerland!" + +"And you believed him?" + +"He made it just credible. He said you told him in confidence; he showed +me a letter in which you reminded him not to let it go any further." + +"A forgery!" + +"I see that now; but it was a very good one, written on your club +paper." + +"The man's an expert forger. Anybody can go into a club to write a note +and steal some stationery. If only you had tackled me about it!" + +"I promised I wouldn't. I could hardly believe it of you, all the +same--not that you were the first to tell him. But--but it did put me +off--in spite of everything--and that was only in July." + +"Just when I was trying to see you, to put you on your guard!" + +She gave him her eyes at last, and they were wet but beaming. "I doubted +it still more from one or two things he said when we had our little +scene in the country; but I _knew_ there wasn't a word of truth in it +before _you_ said a dozen words to me the other Sunday! It was all a +plot to keep us apart--to get me under his thumb." + +"Did he threaten you when you--had your little scene?" + +"Not in so many words." + +"He will. That's where I shall come in." + +"His position was that I and my secret would only be safe with him." + +"As it never was with me?" + +"That was it; but now he knows that I don't believe him. I told him so +when he called last week." + +"So you have had another little scene?" + +"I cut it short at that." + +"And there the matter ended?" + +"Between him and me." + +"Don't make too sure. You don't know your Mostyn Scarth as well as I do. +I wonder what his next move will be!" + +The wonder lit the doctor's face with eager interest, but brighter still +was the answering light under the toque with the ass's ears of watered +silk. + +"I don't know about his next, but I can tell you what his latest move +is," said Lady Vera. "He has taken to dogging me all over the place, to +see if I don't commit another crime! He was one of the alleged +detectives at Pax Monktons Chase!" + +"Never!" cried Dollar, taken fairly by surprise. He had forgot almost +every feature of the affair in question, except how magnificently Vera +Moyle had come out of it. The episode remained in his mind only as the +one great dream of his that had come true as yet; the details had +disappeared like those of any other dream. + +"I happen to know it," said Lady Vera, with some little embarrassment. +"I had it from--the other detective." + +"Not--" and Dollar stopped to frown--"not Croucher himself?" + +"Yes." + +"He has dared to speak to you!" + +"For the very first time since that night in the train; now do listen, +and be fair to the poor fellow. He never was as bad as you thought him; +you say yourself that he's a saint compared with Mr. Scarth." Dollar was +too savage to smile at this free version of what he had said. "Well, +they have fallen out, and Croucher's in a bad way altogether; and he +has turned to me for a helping hand--not for money or anything of that +kind." + +"Not the least little hint of blackmail?" + +"Not a word or a sign of anything of the sort, except that he asked me +to forgive him for the other time, and of course I did." + +"Of course you would, though he actually robbed you under arms!" cried +Dollar, as sardonically as he felt he must. + +But he was let off with the caution of a frown that would have escaped +attention on a face less consistently serene than Lady Vera Moyle's. + +"You forget what he had been through first," said she, gently. "Within +forty-eight hours of execution, for something he had never done! +Thinking what he thought, and I neither denied nor admitted, then or at +any time, the wonder is not that he behaved as badly as he did that +night, but as well as he has ever since. However much you frightened him +at the time, he might have gone on blackmailing me without your +knowledge, and that's the last thing he's trying to do now. But I want +to do something for him! You say yourself that he has fallen into the +worst of hands--well, I want to get him out of them. You once told me +that, when you had him here before, you found yourself trying to make a +decent being of him, and beginning to feel that you might almost +succeed. Doctor, I want you to try again, for my sake! He is frightfully +sorry for what he did before, and he has been very badly used by Mostyn +Scarth. He looks ill. I want you to save his life, and more than his +life! He has told me with tears in his eyes that he was never so happy +as when you had him here before. Dear man, do take him in again, and +give him one more chance, to please me!" + +Her voice had broken, and for once her eyes had played her false as +well, and Dollar had waited grimly while she recovered her voice or +dried her eyes. But he could not answer grimly when in her turn she +waited for him to speak. In her frivolous little blazing skirt, in the +toque that he liked even less; over-dressy as he dared to think her in +his simple heart of hearts, she appealed to him the more profoundly for +those very vanities, so far from vanity were the letter and the spirit +of her intercession. + +"So you really came to see me about Alfred Croucher?" said Dollar, but +very gently, without the faintest accent of reproach. + +"It was about both of them, but chiefly about him," she admitted. "Of +course I wanted to check his account of Mr. Scarth. If you had given him +a good character, that would have been the end; but you gave him a much +worse one than I expected. Croucher seems almost immaculate by +comparison; honestly, I shouldn't wonder if he were less lost to decency +through his very association with a man so much worse than himself." + +"Did he tell you so?" + +"He said it had brought him up with a round turn." + +"It's possible," said Dollar, not more dryly than he could help. "The +psychology is all right." He was smiling and nodding now. "And where is +Mr. Croucher at the moment?" + +"Walking up and down outside." + +"Until we call him in?" + +"If only you will let me!" + +She was on her feet, to take him at his word as soon as spoken; but he +said that was Barton's job, and, wondering aloud how Barton would like +it, went out presumably to see. He was not gone long, and in another +minute Alfred Croucher was cringing before them like a beaten cur. + +But few curs whine as this one did that morning, while the crime doctor +listened and their little lady winced. She was right about one thing. He +did look ill; his cough was not altogether put on. He had been "tret +somefink crool," he declared, but without entering into particulars, for +which Dollar did not press; but on the character of Mostyn Scarth there +were no such reservations. Croucher denounced that monster with the +white hatred of a holy warrior, casting up his eyes with all manner of +passionate and pious invocations. + +"Only take me away from 'im, before it's too late!" he implored, +reluctant murder in the whites of his rolling eyes. "'E's a bad man, a +very bad man 'e is! The 'appiest days o' me life was wot I spent in 'ere +eighteen munf ago. It seems more like eighteen years--'ard. I never +should've quit but for Shod, wot's got a good long stretch for 'is +pines. 'E's another bad man; but for 'im you 'ad me in the 'oller of yer +'and, and might 've made a man o' me in no time." + +"Yet you went straight from me to threaten and rob the lady who sent you +here!" + +It was a dangerous opening, but Croucher did not take it. In ignoble +emotion he fell upon the knees of a flash pair of trousers, which still +showed the track of an ineradicable crease, and once more sued for the +mercy and forgiveness already vouchsafed to him. And Lady Vera turned +from the sly, leering, blinking, darting eyes to a pair turned hard as +nails, and the harder for an oblique inner twinkle all their own. + +"All right!" snapped Dollar, to her intense relief. "I'll take you in, +Croucher, for better or worse. Well make it for better, if we can; but +do get to your two legs, man, instead of fawning on all four! Are you +free to stop as you are, or is there anything you want to settle up +first?" + +"There's me rooms," said Croucher, eagerly. "There's nuffink worth +fetching, but I shouldn't like to bilk the people, 'speshly w'en 'er +lidyship's gawn an' give me the money, Gawd bless 'er!" + +Dollar precipitated the creature's exit, on the verge of fresh saurian +tears, of which there were further signs for his benefit on the mat. He +might be a bad man, too, might Mr. Croucher, but he wasn't as bad as +Mostyn Scarth. And in that modest claim, at least, there was a bitter +sincerity which received its due in a nod of keen acknowledgment. + +"I never did think you were more than a second murderer, Croucher!" + +"Wot's that?" + +The whites of those quick, furtive eyes were showing quite horribly in a +moment. + +"Only a technical expression, Croucher, meaning the minor malefactor." + +And he returned rather slowly into the eager presence of Lady Vera +Moyle. + +"I suppose I mustn't fawn, either," she said, in the softened tone of +one of her rare rebukes. "But--_do_ you think you can make anything of +him--this time?" + +"I hope so; but I shall be very glad to have him back, even if I fail +again." + +"Why?" + +The crime doctor gave her another of his oblique smiles. + +"I shall be all the better able to watch Scarth's latest move," he +said. + + +II + +Over against the back windows of a nice new street of tall red houses, +beyond the high red wall enclosing their common strip of shrubs and +gravel, runs a humbler row of windows in connection with a mews. In one +you may still catch a coachman shaving for the box, but more likely a +chauffeur's lady engrossed in her novelette; and on the next sill are +pots of geraniums, while the next but one keeps the evening's kippers +nice and fresh. Most of the windows have muslin curtains, and in some +the lights are on all night. Last October there was only one without any +kind of covering, except a newspaper stuck across a broken pane. + +It was the scandal of the row; a battered billycock lay rotting on the +roof above; strange fragments of song were always liable to burst from +within, as of a gentleman roistering in his sleep, and at times a +bristly countenance would roll red eyes over the backs of the red +houses, beginning and ending with the flats at the bottom of the street. +If a dark handsome face appeared simultaneously at a top flat window, +the chances were that both would vanish, but it would have been +difficult to detect the exchange of actual signals. + +On the return of Alfred Croucher, shaven and collared, from the audience +in Welbeck Street, he went so far as to wink and wave from the window +that disgraced the mews to the one that crowned the flats. His rolling +eyes still had their whites about them; his wrists were still in +unaccustomed cuffs; and Mostyn Scarth was at his elbow before it could +be lifted with the bottle brought in to celebrate the occasion. + +"Just one!" said Croucher, pitching his mongrel whine in the key of +comic extravaganza. "I deserve all ten fingers for what I got to tell +yer!" + +"Not a drop, my Lazarus!" said Scarth. "When do you move in?" + +"To-day--now." + +"You shall have the whole bottle when you come out. You may want it. +What about that stamped note-paper?" + +"Couldn't lay 'ands on a scrap." + +"Hadn't you the waiting-room to yourself?" + +"My witin'-room was the street, gov'nor." + +"Well, I must have a sheet or two as soon as you can stick them in the +post; three or four would be safer, and at least a couple of his +envelopes, in case of accidents. Now tell me everything that happened; +and perhaps you _shall_ have a drink before you go." + +There was no light that night in the window with the broken pane pasted +over with newspaper; next day it was mended properly, and the sodden +billycock removed from the roof before Alfred Croucher awoke from his +innocent and protracted slumbers in the crime doctor's patent chamber of +perpetual peace. + +His first impression was that some mysterious miracle had been performed +expressly for his behoof. He must have been drunk to have slept so +sound, and yet he had none of the disagreeable sensations which a long +experience associated with the ordinary orgy. He felt profoundly rested +and refreshed; never had he lain in so luxurious a bed; and the air was +faintly scented, subtly soothing, and there was plenty of it, yet not a +sound except the gentle stirring of his own breathing body between the +sheets. His palate was clean and cool beyond belief. He opened his eyes, +and saw a plain room sharp as crystal to the sight: not the bronze +bedchamber that he suddenly remembered, but the same place steeped in +purest sunshine, and ten thousand times fairer for the change. + +Then he knew where he was, and precisely why he was there; and it was +the mental equivalent of what Mr. Croucher called "'ot coppers," only +this made him hot all over. He might have been in a fever; he hoped +violently that he was. He remembered his cough, and began to practise +it. A determined paroxysm revived his spirits; he was not fit to get up, +and other people would just have to wait until he was, and serve 'em +jolly well right! + +Other people couldn't get at him there; yet one other person could, and +did, to Mr. Croucher's mingled discomfort and relief. The doctor duly +kept him in bed; but there was too much of the doctor; and yet the time +hung heaviest when he was not there, and there were heavier burdens even +than the time. The patient had lost his liking for a book. Conversation +was more to his taste this time. His mind would wander when he read. It +would follow the doctor down-stairs to his consulting-room, or across +the landing to the room in which he slept. The man haunted him; it was +better to have him there in the flesh, than to see him as Croucher +continually saw him when he was not there at all. + +Better, again, to talk of some things than to dwell on them night and +day, especially when those subjects seemed to possess an equally awful +fascination for the crime doctor. Of course, they were in his line; that +accounted for the doctor's morbid taste, and the patient's most terrible +experience was quite enough to account for his. There was nothing +unnatural in their talks. They had the thing in common, only from +opposite poles of experience, which enormously enhanced the mutual +interest. If there was one subject they were bound to have discussed, +with no false delicacy on either side, each being what he was, it was +the subject of the sixth commandment. + +"Of course you think about it," said Dollar, dismissing an incoherent +excuse on the second day. "It must haunt you; it's only natural that it +should. All I should like you to do, since you never committed one, and +are the last man in the world to commit one now, is to take a rather +lighter view of that particular misdeed." + +"A lighter view!" repeated Croucher, goggling; and he added with a +shuddering inconsequence: "The lor o' the land don't make light of it!" + +"Literature has been known to," rejoined the doctor, with as little +apparent point. "But you are not the reader you were last year; +otherwise there's a little thing, _On Murder Considered as One of the +Fine Arts_, that I should like to lend you." + +"One o' the 'ow much?" said Mr. Croucher, uncertain whether to grin, or +frown, and meanwhile glaring more than he supposed. + +Dollar went for the book, and read a few extracts aloud. They appeared +to afford him extraordinary enjoyment; they were altogether over the +bullet head on the pillow. Croucher could only gather that some people +seemed to imagine it was good sport to commit a murder. Funny fools! Let +them try a fortnight in the condemned cell, for one they never did +commit, and see how they took to that! + +But he could understand them that knew nothing about it writing a lot of +rot like this; what beat him was that the crime doctor, of all people, +and with all his uncanny knowledge of the subject, that even he was +able to view the worst of crimes in a light which would never have +dawned on the independent intellect of Alfred Croucher. It seemed to him +a more lurid light than any in which he himself, at his worst, had ever +seen such things; horrible, to his mind, that one who ran every risk of +being murdered should sit there gloating over "the shades of merit" in +one murder, and over others as "the sublimest and most entire in their +excellence that ever were committed." What was more horrible, however, +was the hollow note of Mr. Croucher's own laughter, and the furtive +gleaming of his restless eyes, while his body twitched between the +sheets. + +He asked for the book when Dollar rose to go; and was discovered, in due +course, bathed in a perspiration which he made less effort to conceal. + +"It ain't all like them funny bits," he assured the doctor, with an open +shudder. "There's a bit I struck about a servant gal, on one side of a +door, an' a bloke wot's done the 'ole bloomin' family in on the other. +My cripes! I 'ad to 'old me breff over that, and it's made me sweat like +a pig." + +"On which side of the door were you?" + +"Wot's that?" + +"In your mind's eye, my good fellow!" + +Mr. Croucher had seldom found it easier to tell the truth, and he made +the most of his opportunity. + +"I felt as if I was the gal," said he. "Shouldn't wonder if I dreamt I +was 'er to-night!" + +"Ah! I always find myself on the inside," said Dollar, with +extraordinary gusto. "I'd much rather have been the girl. She had the +open street behind her, and the street-lamps; he had only his own +handiwork in the dark, and hardly room enough to step out of the way of +it. She got away, too, whereas he had to make away with himself. But I +always would rather be the victim; he doesn't know what's coming; and +it's not a thousandth part as bad as--the other thing--when it does +come.... I'm sorry, Croucher! You shouldn't have asked me to leave you +the book; but there's nothing like looking at a thing from all sides, +and it may console you to know that you've perspired over the best +description of a murder ever written." + +Yet that was not the last of their morbid conversations; they would +hardly be five minutes together before the noxious subject would crop +up, nearly always through some reluctant yet irresistible allusion on +the patient's part. The doctor might come in overflowing with deliberate +gaiety; there was something about him that set the bulbous eyes rolling +with uneasy cunning, the cockney tongue wagging in its solitary strain, +as it were under protest from the beaded brow. + +On one occasion Dollar was the prime offender. It was the day after +Croucher's introduction to De Quincey and the first bad night spent by +anybody in the Chamber of Peace. He declared he had not slept a wink, +and was advised to get up and go for a walk. + +"Alone?" said Croucher in a low voice. + +"Why not? This isn't prison, and I never hear you cough. _You_ are not +going to die just yet, Croucher!" + +"I 'ope nobody is, not 'ere," said Croucher, with a horrid twitch. "I +feel as it _might_ buck me up--a breff of air on a nice fine day like +this." His eyes rolled undecidedly, and the oil ran out of his voice. +"But it ain't no fun goin' out alone." + +"Haven't you any friends you could go and see?" + +"No!" cried Croucher, with an emphasis that pulled him up. "I--I might +write a letter, though--if you could spare me a bit o' paper wiv the +address." + +It was a very short letter that Alfred Croucher wrote, but a remarkably +thick envelope that he himself took to the post, after looking many +times up and down the street. And at the pillar-box, which was not many +yards from the door, he again hesitated sadly before thrusting it in. + +In the afternoon Dollar took him out in the car, and then it was that +for once the poisonous topic was not introduced by Mr. Croucher. + +"See that house?" said Dollar, pointing out one of the most modest in +the purlieus of Park Lane. "There was no end of a murder _there_ once. +Swiss valet cut his master's throat, made what he flattered himself were +the hall-marks of burglars, and had the nerve to go into the room to +wake the dead man up next morning." + +"Fair swine, eh?" said Mr. Croucher, with all the symptoms of disgust. + +"A very fair artist, too," rejoined the disciple of De Quincey. "That +wasn't his only good touch. He cut the old gentleman's throat from ear +to ear, and yet there wasn't a spot of blood on his garments. How do +you suppose he managed that? It's a messy operation, Croucher; you or I +would have made a walking shambles of ourselves!" + +"How did he manage it?" asked Croucher, in a shaky growl. + +"By taking off every stitch before he did the trick. How about that for +a tip?" + +Croucher made no reply. His teeth were clenched like those of a man +bearing physical pain. They were nearly out of town, and Dollar had +discoursed upon autumn tints and the nip in the air before being +abruptly interrogated as to the "fair swine's" fate. + +"Need you ask?" said he. "The poor devil was too clever by half, and +made a big mistake for each of his strokes of genius. He was taken, +tried, condemned, and all the rest of it! And a greater writer than the +gentleman who kept you awake last night wrote the best description +of--all the rest of it--in existence. But don't you ask me to lend you +that!" + +"They always seem to forget somefink," said Alfred Croucher, another +long mile out of town. + +"The first thing being that the best murders oughtn't to look like +murders," the criminologist agreed. "They ought to look like accidents, +or suicides at the most. But it takes a Mostyn Scarth to cut as deep as +that." + +"Wot the 'ell mikes yer fink of 'im?" cried Croucher, in a fury at the +very name. + +"Well, among other things, the fact that he saw us off in the car just +now. Do you mean to say you didn't see through the false beard of the +gentleman who was picking up his umbrella as we turned into Wigmore +Street?" + + +III + +Never again did Alfred Croucher venture out alone, even as far as the +pillar-box; not another letter had he to post, though he received one, +wrapped round a stone, once when his window was open, and literally +devoured every word. He did go out, but only with the crime doctor in +his car, for an hour or two in the afternoon. + +More than once they got out at Richmond Park, sent the car across to one +of the other gates, and followed at a brisk walk, shoulder to shoulder, +with Croucher often peeping over his, but Dollar never. The walk was +sometimes broken for as long as it took Croucher to smoke a pipe in one +or another of the beautiful wooded enclosures which are the inner glory +of the most glorious of all public parks. There, under red canopies of +dying leaves, their feet upon a russet carpet of the dead, the smoker +would rest in a restless silence, because the one subject which had made +him eloquent was now tabooed. Even in the Chamber of Peace there was no +peace for Alfred Croucher, and but little sleep, although the doctor had +walked him off his legs and would sit beside him till all hours. So the +literary and conversational treatment had been altered once for all; and +now the patient would hardly read or speak a word. + +Late one night, in the second half of the month, the crime doctor, +seated like a waxwork in a chair that never creaked, had just made sure +that his man was asleep at last. He decided to steal out and write some +letters, and take them to the post himself before locking up; and was +getting by inches to his catlike feet, when some sense held him bent +like a bow. It could hardly have been his hearing, in his own +sound-proof sanctuary between double windows and triple doors. Yet +suddenly he was all on edge, listening with nerves laid bare by forced +vigils in that slumberous room, brown as an Arab in its weird lighting; +the silver patch in his hair changed from a florin to a new penny, the +whites of his eyes like broad gold rings; their one flaw augmented by an +infinite fatigue, their one care the human wreckage on the +bed--shattered utterly by him, to be by him built up afresh, but not in +the midst of excursions and alarms. And here was the inmost door +opening, so softly, so slowly, at deadliest dead of night! + +It was a woman who entered like a ghost, and he knew her step, though he +could not hear it even now. And though her cloak and head-dress were +those of a trained nurse, he knew, rather than saw, that the wearer was +Lady Vera Moyle. + +"Hush!" she was the first to whisper, and very softly closed the last +door, through which he would have hurried her out again. Already her +soundless movements, her air of vast precaution, puzzled him even more +than her presence or her dress; but he still had anxieties on this side +of the door. + +"Just asleep," he whispered, pointing to the bed. "Bad time I've given +him, poor brute, but a better one coming, I do believe. Did you come to +see how he was doing?" Even in the stained light she looked so beaming +now, so frankly triumphant, he made sure that was it. "I'd have written, +but thought you were away. Who let you in?" + +"This!" + +And she held up a new Yale key. + +"Where did you get it?" + +"Specially cut for me." Every line in his red man's face was a note of +blank interrogation. "Mostyn Scarth has another--cut specially for him! +I've had him watched." + +"Vera!" + +"_I_ was watching _for_ him--from the nursing home opposite--suffrage +friends of mine." + +"Why didn't you tell me?" + +"You had enough to do." + +He shook his head. "Well?" + +"He's somewhere in the house." + +"This house?" + +"Why didn't you tell me?" + +She nodded. "Hiding--in your room, I think." + +"I'll soon have him out!" + +"Wait!" She had eyes for the amber bed at last. "Are you sure he's +asleep?" + +Dollar stole across and back. The great frame was breathing gently and +evenly as a child. "But he's a terribly light sleeper; we mustn't +disturb him, if we can help it." + +"Disturb him!" She clutched his hand for the first time. "I wish to God +I had never brought him to you! There's a plot between them, doctor--I +know there's some plot!" + +"There _was_, of course," he said, smiling, but wincing at his own "of +course" that instant. "I'm delighted you brought him," he reassured her. +"I've taken some of the plot out of him--and now for Mr. Scarth!" + +He reached past her to open the door. In a flash she put something in +his hand. It was a showy little revolver, the handle mother-of-pearl, +the barrel golden in that light. + +"Thanks," he said-briefly--but there was a whole novel in his look. "Now +will you do something more for me?" + +"No!" she said flatly, and was at his elbow when he opened his own door +across the landing. + +It was such a plain little room that there was indeed small danger of a +surprise from the concealed intruder. The only possible cover was under +the bed, behind the curtains, or in the wardrobe. Dollar just went +through the form of glancing under the bed, as he whipped up the poker +in his left hand; with it he parted the curtains, and in the same second +had his man comfortably covered at arm's length. + +"Well done!" cried the girl. + +Scarth repaid her with a gleam of saturnine enlightenment; it was the +first change in his swarthy, unemotional, unconquerable visage. On the +Balkan battle-fields there may have been myriads of such faces, not with +the unique intellectual quality of this one, but alike in their fierce +contempt of battle, murder, and sudden death, as little matters not +worth a qualm, whether in the active or the passive party to the +business. Among educated Englishmen the temperament is rare, and rarer +still the mental attitude; in the combination lie the makings of the +hell-born villain, and Mostyn Scarth was the finished article. + +Stoical in his discomfiture, he saw his opening with no more than a +glitter of his insolent eyes, and took it as though he had never +foreseen anything else. + +"So I've caught you both out, my virtuous friends!" said he. "And you +dare to present that thing at me, as though I were here for a felonious +purpose!" + +"I shall not empty it into you, Scarth, however much you may tempt me," +replied the crime doctor. "What do you say to clasping both hands behind +your head and leading the way down-stairs?" + +"I'll see you damned first," said Mostyn Scarth. + +"Good! It's exactly the same to me, only you may find it harder not to +take one of those hands out of your trousers pockets, and the moment you +show a finger I shall cripple you for life. I thought, too, that you +might like to hear what we say to the police." + +"I don't take the faintest interest in what _you_ say to them," returned +Scarth, with a broader gleam to light his meaning. + +"Good again! Do you mind going down and ringing up New Scotland Yard, +Lady Vera? On your way you might please see if all three doors are shut +in the room opposite; then, perhaps--no! I should leave this one open +after all, I think." Three seconds had sufficed to close the triple +doors, one more quickly than another, behind them. + +"I should, if I were you," said Scarth. "And I should think a good many +times before carrying out your other instructions--if I were the lady at +the bottom of one of the few mysteries that still puzzle Scotland Yard." + +There was a pause, in which Dollar heard only a sharp intake of breath +on the threshold just behind him; but that was enough. + +"I believe I shall have to shoot you, after all," said he, and the +hammer of the mother-of-pearl revolver clicked to full cock. + +"Won't that rather spoil your game?" said Scarth, blandly. + +"Mine is not the game that matters at the moment--yours _is_. As, +however, you have been fool enough to have a key cut expressly to fit my +front-door lock, and have been discovered in my room at midnight----" + +"In the most distinguished company! Go on, Dollar. Nothing +extenuate--bang the field-piece--twang the lyre!" + +His teeth were showing as they had shown on the platform at Winterwald +nine months before; the tag from his famous impersonation had slipped +out with all the snap and gusto which had captivated an unruly audience +then; and it was not without a slight mesmeric effect on the man who had +him at his mercy. If Scarth in turn had not held Vera Moyle at _his_ +mercy, and if John Dollar had not known him to be utterly devoid of that +quality, he could have admired the cool daredevil, swaggering at bay. + +"Remember the concert at Winterwald, doctor," he went on, "and our talk +afterward, and the last talk we ever had there? He thought I had two +tries to kill a fellow, Lady Vera--two bites at such a green young nut! +Better to finish 'em off at one fell blow, isn't it? Not such fun for +the widow, or the poor innocent devil who nearly swings for the job, but +great work for the militant Millies and their lady leader! Splendid for +you all until the truth comes out--as it will the minute a policeman +shows his nose!" + +It was Lady Vera who had obtained him this hearing. She had stepped up +to Dollar, had taken his arm, had even put her other hand in front of +her own revolver. + +"Let him go on; we may as well know where we are," she had said in the +middle of Scarth's speech. And now she asked him what he proposed, as if +she were inquiring the price of a dress, with the civility doubly due to +an inferior. + +"You have had my proposal," said Scarth. "It's not the kind that one +repeats before a third party." + +"I may as well ring them up," said Lady Vera, trying to disengage her +arm; but Dollar's had closed upon it, and his left hand held hers as in +a vise. + +"You shan't!" he ground out. "It's all bluff. They have no evidence." + +"They are welcome to all I can give them," she answered. "I have always +regretted I didn't come forward in the beginning. But there was more +excuse than there is now--then there was no question of letting a worse +person go for the second time." + +But this was not said for the worse person's benefit; for the Vera +Moyles it is impossible to speak _at_ the worst person in the world. The +point was merely urged as an argument for Dollar's private ear. But the +Mostyn Scarths are expert listeners; not a syllable was lost upon the +consummate chieftain of that foul family; and he grinned gaily through +as much of the open door as he could see from this point. + +"So you admit that you administered his coup de grace to the late +lamented Sergeant Simpkins?" + +But the heavy shaft was not winged by one of Mostyn Scarth's feathered +glances. His grinning gaze still sped past them to the landing. + +"I have never denied it in my life." + +"Hear that, Croucher?" cried Scarth. "'Full confession by Lady Vera +Moyle--extry spechul.'" + +The pair stood closer as one of them looked round; and there, indeed, on +the threshold, bulked Alfred Croucher, larger than life in a white +bathgown that sat better on him than his loudest clothes. And his +unwholesome face looked only a shade less white than all the rest of +him, but for the little red sleepless eyes fixed on Mostyn Scarth, who +still enjoyed the crime doctor's undivided attention. + +"'Ow the 'ell did _you_ get 'ere?" said Croucher huskily. + +"I'm obliged to you for asking. Our virtuous friends are so ready to +take a felony for granted, that it seems never to have occurred to them +that I walked in at the door--partly to see you--chiefly to bowl them +out." Lady Vera could not help smiling at that which seemed never to +have occurred to her; nothing else left any mark, save upon John Dollar, +on whom Scarth now trained his ivory grin. "The worst of a Yale lock, +doctor," he went on, "is that all the keys are numbered; the worst of a +Turkish bath is that your enemy may do that thing, and have a look at +your latch-key if you will leave it in your pocket on its chain. +Northumberland Avenue may be a good place after a bad night, but that's +where I really found my way into your house. You didn't see me because I +had the bad taste to prefer the cave of electricity to the public +hot-rooms and your capital company." + +The note of insolence had been forced for Croucher's benefit, the +libretto elaborated to impress that elemental mind, and it was to +Croucher that Scarth turned for applause. It might have been more +articulate; there was little merriment in the guttural laugh; and it was +not in open mockery, if not with any visible respect, that the little +red eyes sought the silent object of these insults. + +Dollar met them for a moment with a sidelong flash; that was as much as +the little red eyes could stand. Scarth glowered, but Mr. Croucher was +not looking up any more. Between the two strong men, one spitting +insults with his tongue, the other darting questions with his eyes, +flabby Croucher found it convenient to study the toes of his bedroom +slippers. But his right hand shook deep in the far pocket of the +voluminous bathgown. None of them saw that but Mostyn Scarth, and him it +filled with gleaming confidence. + +"Come, Alfred," said he, "get into your street clothes, if they haven't +been taken away from you. If they have, go down as you are and call a +taxi. I'm going to take you out of this hole. You look more dead than +alive. I thought you might; that's one reason why I came." + +"Croucher is going to do something for me first," said the crime doctor. +"_Then_ he can do what he likes." + +"Sorry you haven't got a soul to call your own, Alfred." + +"Who says I haven't?" + +"Doctor Dollar. Didn't you hear him?" + +"If he does, he's a----" + +"Croucher! Croucher!" said the doctor. "All I want you to do is to hand +me the razor case from the dressing-table. In fact you needn't do all +that; just arm yourself with the weapon you ought to find there. Then +somebody will be more of a match for me. And Mr. Scarth isn't raising +any further objection, you will notice." + +What Croucher noticed, as the red eyes came up at last, was that Mostyn +Scarth had suddenly lost a little of his usual healthy tan; but the +bedroom slippers remained planted where they were. + +And then without a word Lady Vera stepped from the doctor's side, took +the razor-case in both her hands, pulled it in two and exhibited the +empty halves. + +"Which of you has borrowed my razor?" said John Dollar. + +"Not _me_!" cried Croucher with tremendous emphasis. But his right hand +was still in his far pocket, as only Mostyn Scarth could see; and the +sight restored a little of that healthy tan which so becomes dark faces. + +"Not you, Croucher?" + +"No, not me, by Gawd!" + +"Yet I believe your original mission in this house was to possess +yourself of that razor--and--use it?" + +Dollar did not finish the sentence without feeling for a little hand +with his left; that little hand met it half-way, and was the first to +give a reassuring squeeze. + +"You were to do something to me with it, I believe, and to leave it in +my hand to show I'd done it myself?" + +And then, under another sidelong flash, that steadied down into a +will-destroying gleam, Croucher came out with a dreadful phrase. + +"To guide yer 'and!" said he, hoarsely. + +"To guide my hand! Exactly! But it was not exactly your idea?" + +"No. It was----" + +But here his eyes rolled into Mostyn Scarth's, and dropped once more. + +"Exactly!" repeated Dollar. "But you didn't quite feel like doing it, so +at last your master had to come in to do it for you?" + +"He ain't my master now, blast 'im!" + +"Steady, Croucher. May I ask what that is in your hand?" + +It was a letter. Only a letter out of that far pocket, after all! +Scarth's eyes started, and he found his tongue once more. + +"You--give--that--to me, Croucher!" + +Croucher wavered at his voice; it was terribly threatening, each subtle +tone a poisoned barb. + +"What if I don't?" + +"You know what!" + +"The game deepens," said the crime doctor; and he did not know that his +left hand had dropped the hand of hands for him. + +"_Your_ game's up if you show that letter!" cried Scarth to Croucher, +who only showed him the broad of his back. + +"Can you be tried twice for the same thing, doctor?" he began--but in +the same breath he desperately added: "I don't care whether you can or +you can't! You read that, whether or no!" + +The letter was in an envelope superscribed "To THE CORONER," in a +wonderful imitation of Dollar's handwriting; but the letter itself, +written on his own stamped paper, was a still more marvelous forgery, in +which the crime doctor bade farewell to the world before stultifying his +own life's work by the crime of suicide. + +"That's better than anything you did in Switzerland," said Dollar, +nodding to the livid man between the curtains. + +"But it ain't the best thing 'e's done," cried Croucher, and stopped to +roll his eyes and gloat. "The bounder's best bit was squeezin' two +people for the same job--the guilty an' the innercent--'er as thought +she must 've done it, an' 'im as knew 'e done it all the time!" + +"That's the end of _you_," said Scarth, with sardonic satisfaction. + +"It's the beginning of us all!" said the crime doctor, in a voice they +hardly knew. "Do you--can you mean yourself and this lady?" + +That lady shook her head and smiled. + +"I do, if I swing to-morrow!" swore Alfred Croucher. "I told +'_im_"--with a truculent thrust of the bullet head--"one night in me +cups; an' fust 'e starts squeezin' 'er to marry 'im, an' then squeezin' +me to do yer in before yer forbids 'is banns! Oh, 'e's a nut, I tell +yer--though we've been the nuts an' 'im the cracker!" + +Lady Vera looked like a little ghost, still unable to believe her ears, +still staring into space as if the trouble were rather with those great +Irish eyes of hers. + +But the doctor was the doctor an instant longer. His left hand went out +to his patient first. + +"You'll sleep to-night! I'll give you the other when it's free," he +said, still covering the man with his hands in his pockets, the curtains +on each side of him, and a back window just behind. + +Then two things happened in quick succession; but the first brought the +lover back to life with such a throb that the second was not even seen. + +Just saying, "I'm afraid I'm going to make a fool of myself," all that +he loved on earth collapsed at his feet. The doctor was down on his +knees beside her, getting the girl into his arms. And even Mr. Croucher +did not see the curtains close, or hear anything happen behind them; for +he, too, was on his knees, holding out a dripping sponge, and babbling +faster than the drops pattered on the floor. + +"It's right! I done it ... that pore copper in the fog! She sent 'im +reelin'--into me arms--but I done all the rest. Never meant to, mind +yer, but that's neither here nor there. Ready to swing, I was, an' don't +care now if I do! She saved me--little knock-out--an' look 'ow I went +an' tret 'er for it!... Gawd, doctor, wot a fair swine I was!" + +But the crime doctor had even less time to listen to him now; for the +eyes of eyes had opened, were gazing up into his; and not one of them +had heard the window raised behind the curtains, or the clanging thud +upon the iron steps just underneath. + + +THE END + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Crime Doctor, by Ernest William Hornung + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME DOCTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 37338.txt or 37338.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/3/3/37338/ + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +book was produced from scanned images of public domain +material from the Google Print project.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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