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- Herausgeber: Booksell-Verlag
- Kategorie: Krimi
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
In "The Whispering Lane," Fergus Hume crafts a masterful blend of mystery and psychological intrigue, enveloped in the moody atmosphere of Victorian London. This compelling narrative weaves together elements of suspense with richly drawn characters, exploring themes of isolation, societal expectation, and moral ambiguity. Hume employs a distinctive literary style characterized by his vivid descriptions and an intricate plot that draws the reader into a labyrinth of secrets, where whispers of the past haunt the present and propel the story toward a gripping conclusion. Fergus Hume, an influential figure in the realm of detective fiction, gained significant acclaim for his innovative storytelling and ability to captivate audiences. Born in 1859 in England, his multicultural background and varied experiences, such as his time in Australia, no doubt informed his exploration of class and dislocation. "The Whispering Lane" reflects Hume's keen observations of human nature and societal dynamics, making his work resonate deeply with readers seeking both entertainment and insight into the complexities of human behavior. This book is highly recommended for aficionados of classic detective fiction and Victorian literature alike. Hume'Äôs keen psychological insights and masterful plotting will engage those drawn to suspenseful narratives, while his evocative portrayal of 19th-century London provides a rich backdrop that invites reflection on the nature of crime, conscience, and the shadows we carry.
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The Whispering Lane
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 A Terrible Discovery
"AMERICA! Goodness to gracious, why do you want to go to America?"
With an astonished face, in an equally astonished tone, the girl in the blue knitted silk jumper and short cream skirt, pushed back her chair from the breakfast-table. Standing up straightly, in the pride of her beautiful youth, she stared hard at the dark-eyed, grey-haired woman, seated opposite, whose black stuff dress with stiffly starched collar and cuffs, suggested the uniform of an hospital nurse. No answer was forthcoming for the elder of the two twisted her thin hands nervously and gazed, unseeingly, as it were, out of the window, over the lawn, at a belt of stone-pines, which shut off the cottage from the high-road. What she found in the view to interest her, it was impossible to conjecture; but her gaze was so intent that the girl turned and looked also. Seeing nothing unusual in the everyday landscape, she faced her companion again, this time with a significant look at the glass of hot milk, which her friend was sipping. "Edith!" she spoke reproachfully, "you have been smoking opium again."
"I have had a wakeful night," rejoined the other, hurriedly, and hoarsely, "my neuralgia—the long, dark hours—disagreeable memories—shaken nerves. The black smoke helps me to endure the nightly journey through Hell."
"Helps you to enter a Fool's Paradise, you mean. Oh my dear, my dear!" greatly distressed the girl knelt by Edith's chair. "You know how much I love you for your kindness to me—how much I owe you—how I have tried to help you, so that you might give up that Devil's Elixir. Yet—yet"—she broke off her speech, overcome with emotion, and sat back to cover a tearful face with her hands.
Edith smoothed the golden head tenderly. "I know—I know! But the past has ruined the present, and my sole chance of happiness is to drug myself into forgetfulness. Unless"—she hesitated—"America!"
The girl glanced up understandingly. "You mean that in another country you would have another chance?"
"Something like that, Aileen. I have half a mind to give myself that chance—yet half a mind to end it all in another way—perhaps the only way."
Aileen sprang to her feet, frankly horrified. "You mean—?"
"What if I do?" demanded the other, wearily, "who would care?"
"I would—you know I would."
"Ah, yes. For a day, a week, a year: afterwards you would forget. And rightly forget. Why should I ruin your life, as I have ruined my own?" she made a gesture of despair, drank hurriedly what remained of the milk, and leaned back gloomily in her chair, again twisting her thin hands.
"Dear!" murmured the girl softly, "I owe you so much that—"
Edith threw up one hand in protest. "You owe me nothing—nothing!"
"Let us leave it at that," suggested Aileen, coaxingly, "and talk over things quietly, before we decide what is best to be done."
"Ah well. As you will," agreed Miss Danby, listlessly, and closed her eyes.
Aileen nodded approvingly. Silence was the best anodyne to tranquillize this brain-storm, so she left her friend to its steadying influence, and moved towards the low-set window. Actually it was so low, that by pushing up the sash and bending slightly over the sill, she could easily have stepped out on to the lawn. And indeed, at the moment, she was strongly inclined to do so, feeling that the cool greyness of the early October morning would calm her own mind, stirred up to sympathetic unrest by the mysterious sorrows of Edith Dauby. For mysterious they most assuredly were, so far as she had acquaintance with the surface of things. Troubles, Edith undoubtedly endured in common with most post-war men and women, but none so great as could not be diminished by the exercise of common-sense. The mole-hill certainly was by no means small, but there was no need to enlarge it into a Mount Blanc.
Often, during her year's companionship with Edith in the lonely Essex cottage, had Aileen wondered what tragedy was written on the turned-down page in the woman's life-history. It must be, thought the girl, anew, a singularly sinister chronicle to have changed the handsome fresh-coloured buxom brunette, she recollected ten years back, into the grey-haired, silent, dull-eyed creature, who was drugging herself so deliberately. The victim herself admitted as much,—that she smoked opium advisedly in the endeavour to banish the memory of some poignant experience, the details of which she never revealed, even in confidential moments. And so life had gone on ever since Aileen More had come to live in Fryfeld village. Month after month, the atmosphere of that ancient cottage on its outskirts became increasingly charged with something of vague menace, hinting at a vague climax. Unknown to Aileen the climax had come that very morning—that very moment. The danger, long lingering at the door, had entered the house.
"America!" repeated Miss Danby, recalling the girl from the window. "Yes, I must go to America at once—next week, if possible. You need not come with me, Aileen: indeed, I prefer that you should not. Stay in this cottage, and I shall allow you a reasonable income."
"Edith!" Aileen was wholly bewildered by this sudden insistence upon an unexpected journey. "What do you mean?"
The tormented woman did not reply, but looked sadly and a trifle enviously at the slim grace of the girl's somewhat boyish figure, at her bobbed hair of feathery gold, at her distressed blue eyes and charmingly flushed face. There was no question, but that Aileen was delicately lovely with that alluring air of feminine dependence upon masculine strength, which attracts men to protect forlorn beauty. And the girl in her budding womanhood, graciously fresh as a spring flower, had already attracted at least one genuine admirer. "Does Mr. Hustings love you?" asked Edith abruptly, and ignoring the question so vehemently put.
"I think so—I don't know—I can't be sure—perhaps. He looks much, but says little. And—and what has he to do with our conversation?"
"Much; as I intend to cross over to America as soon as is possible—alone. And I should like to leave England with the certain knowledge that Mr. Hustings will marry you—for protection."
Aileen pouted resentfully, so peremptory was the speech. "I don't want to marry and be protected I can look after myself. I am not in love with Mr. Hustings, although I like him. And I certainly don't want to leave the only friend I have in the wide, wide world."
"Child, you must marry and leave me," said Miss Danby with a desponding look, "it is for your good that I speak, and I sacrifice much in so speaking. God knows that I love you dearly—so dearly, that I refuse to drag you down."
"Oh, Edith!" Aileen was both distressed and deeply moved. "Why do you talk in this dreadful way. I know you have troubles, of which I know little: Dr. Slanton who persecutes you to marry him—your health broken down by years of war-work in hospitals—this terrible opium habit, and—and—what else, what else? There is something in your life, which worries you constantly, and which you won't tell me. Yet if you do, I may be able to help you."
"Perhaps! Maybe! I don't know! But—"
Edith broke off tremulously and once more her eyes strayed to the trees across the lawn. Suddenly she braced herself and spoke with a resumption of her hospital authority. "Come here child. I shall tell you as much as I dare tell you."
The younger woman obeyed, crossing the old-fashioned parlour to kneel again beside the chair and to look up trustfully into her friend's ravaged face. Whatever might be hidden behind that mask of torment: however dreadful the happenings, which had created its pain, the girl saw nothing there but gentle love and kind protection. "I don't care what you have done," she cried with defiant confidence, "you will always be to me the best of women; the sweetest and dearest of friends." And her fresh red lips touched caressingly the grey lips of the face bending over hers.
"Some day you may change your mind," muttered Miss Danby, in a trembling voice. "I—I—I"—she held her breath, then leaned back in her chair with a long-drawn sigh. Shaken by some over-powering emotion to the core of her being, she fought silently to regain self-control. Finally she succeeded: checked the climbing sorrow in her throat, and spoke with carefully calculated calmness. "Listen to me, Aileen, while I place before you, things as they were, and things as they are. A twice-told tale you will say. Yes! Yet one to be repeated, since who knows what the day may bring forth."
"What can the day bring forth, other than usual?" asked Aileen, wonderingly.
"Hold your tongue," commanded Miss Danby, harshly, although her caressing hand, smoothing the girl's hair, intimated that the harshness was largely feigned. "Listen I tell you. Before the war I was secretary to a clever man—an inventor—a scientist—"
"My father, George More. I know that."
"Did I not say that I was repeating a twice-told tale? Don't interrupt me more than you can help. When the war came, I gave up my post and took up nursing, sometimes at home, sometimes abroad. It was at a base-hospital in France that I nursed your brother Roderick. I loved him, if you remember, when I was your father's secretary."
"Yes! Yes!" broke in the girl, eagerly. "I was only ten years of age at that time, and Roddy told me that you were to be my new sister."
"I hoped to be," sighed Edith with a yearning look in her dark eyes, "but your father objected to the marriage, because I was poor and of humble birth. I did not meet Roderick again, until he was brought in, badly wounded, to the hospital. It was cruel, cruel. You were a dear little child, Aileen. I loved you, I loved Roderick, I admired your father; we could all have been so happy together. Now! Now! Ah me! Roderick is dead, your father is missing, and I am a wreck, old before my time, heart-broken, despairing."
"Poor dear, poor dear," cooed Aileen, fondling the hand she held, "but don't lose heart, Edith. Hope for the best."
"Your youth speaks," cried the forlorn woman, bitterly, "how can I hope, when my beloved is lying in a foreign grave; when that man Slanton persecutes me to be his wife. Beast!" she clenched her teeth and frowned hatred. "As you know, Aileen, he was the doctor of the hospital, where I nursed Roderick, and even then paid his addresses to me. Ugh!" she shuddered. "But I loved your brother; yes, and he loved me, when we met again. All the passion of our early years revived. Even though he was sick unto death, we became engaged. He gave me this ring"—Edith kissed the golden emblem of past delight—"Dear, dear Roderick! And thinking he would die—there was every chance of that—he made a will, leaving me his income of two thousand a year. And then—and then—" the woman's hands rose in trembling despair, and her voice died away in a faint sorrowful cry.
"Then he died," whispered the girl, ending the sentence and burying her face in Edith's lap.
For quite three minutes there was an eloquent silence, the two remaining motionless with overpowering emotion. "Yes. He died of—of—his wounds," whispered Edith in a steamed, unnatural voice, "and I was left, a rich woman to face the persecutions of Cuthbert Slanton. Beast!" she cried again, and fiercely, "he has no love for me, for anyone but himself. It is only the money he desires—the two thousand a year which my dead love left to me. When the War was over, I returned to London, and went to see your father—to insist that he should take back the money, so that I might prove to his hard heart, that my love for Roderick was selfless; also that I might be set free from the persecutions of Slanton. But your father had disappeared some months before. The house was shut up."
Aileen, sat back to fold her hands loosely on her lap, and looked sadly at a sandy-haired cat, lying comfortably before the fire. "Father gave up all his scientific work, during the war, and took a Government appointment, with the idea of making aeroplanes more perfect. He had wonderful powers of invention you know, Edith. He sent me to school at Brighton, and only wrote me occasionally. Just before the Armistice was signed, his letters ceased, and he was reported as missing. Since then I have heard nothing from him; nothing of him."
"What has become of him I wonder?" Edith spoke more to herself than to Aileen.
"No one knows. It was said that the Germans took him prisoner. But I can't believe that, as, by this time, he would have been set free. I think he must be dead, else he would have returned. But father never cared for me much," sighed the girl sadly, "he tolerated me, but adored Roddy. Oh, how he loved Roddy."
"Not sufficiently to allow him to gain happiness by marrying me," commented the gaunt, grey woman, harshly, "but let that pass. My darling is dead, your father is missing, as I learned at the Wax1 Office. I looked you up at your school, Aileen, but found that you had gone into a London office, as a clerk."
"Yes! The man with whom father left money for me, ran away. I was stranded. Then you found me, you angel!" Aileen flung herself forward to embrace Miss Danby's waist, "and brought me here to live in peace and plenty. Oh you are good to me, Edith. How can I ever, ever thank you for all your kindness."
"Don't talk nonsense," retorted the other, sharply.
"I offered Roderick's money to you, only to be refused. The least I could do was to ask you to live with me, as my companion, so that you might enjoy some of the money. Oh enjoy—enjoy!" she looked round the old-fashioned parlour contemptuously, "and in an isolated furnished cottage. I should have done better for you than this."
Aileen rose to her feet, and also glanced round the room, with its Victorian decorations, and crowded furniture. It was old and shabby, but somehow comfortable in a home-like way, soothing to the nerves. "I don't know that I want anything better than this, Edith," she said slowly, "after all the trials of the war and my solitary life in London as a badly-paid clerk, I love this isolation, and middle-class comfort, which you needn't despise. We can be quite happy here, so I don't see why you should want to go to America."
Miss Danby jumped up and flung out her arms recklessly. "Don't you understand that I wish to escape from that beast, Slanton," she almost shouted, and with the look of a tragedy queen, "does he give me any peace? If he isn't in this room twice a week, he worries me with letters nearly every day! I can't stand it; he will drive me crazy."
"Why don't you appeal to the police for protection?" asked Aileen, with a flash of anger, for she also detested the doctor fervently.
Miss Danby sank back into the chair with a ghastly look: "I—I—I—daren't."
"Has he any hold over you?" demanded the girl, shrewdly.
"No! No! No! Of course he hasn't. Why—why should you think that?" Edith was now white to the lips, but put the question with an uneasy laugh.
"How can I help thinking it? This is a free country, and men are not allowed to persecute women, as Dr. Slanton is persecuting you. For some reason—I can't guess what it is—you are afraid of him. But whatever the cause may be, better face the worst and ask for the aid of the Law."
"I can't—I shan't," breathed Edith, sullenly.
"You must," urged the girl vigorously, "I'll stand by you. This man is driving you to smoke opium: to shut yourself up in this isolated cottage. He seems to make you do what he likes, even to keeping that photograph of him on the mantelpiece. Beast! I use your own word, Edith. Beast!"
Miss Danby flushed redly and furiously in the face of this pointed rebuke, and when Aileen hurled the last word at her, she deliberately rose, took the photograph from the mantelpiece and held it before the girl's eyes. "Look at him!" she said, dourly. "Number 666. That is the number of the Beast in Revelations." Aileen stared hard at the lean saturnine face in the picture with its heavy square jaw, and piercing little eyes. A cruel, cunning face—the face of a reckless scoundrel, who would stop at nothing to gain his ends. "Oh, he is Number 666 right enough," she said, scornfully, "all the same I would defy him and his devilments, whatever they may be."
"I do defy him and them," cried Edith, viciously, and, ripping the photograph out of its silver frame, she tore it into four pieces, flung them on the carpet and stamped on them. "There! That shows you how much I care," she ended with a defiant laugh, which yet had in it, an echo of fear.
"Good!" Aileen nodded her satisfaction, "And now go further. The Law—"
"No!" the woman quailed, and again her face became the colour of ashes, "it is impossible for me to appeal to the Law. The only way of escape is to cross the Atlantic."
"That's running away: and running away isn't playing the game."
"How do you know what game I am playing with Slanton?" demanded Edith, in fierce tones, and her eyes became hard.
"I know nothing, because you won't tell me anything. But I can't understand why you should let this man make a hell of your life. If I were you—" Aileen stiffened her fragile body and flashed defiance from her very observant blue eyes—"I should fight him—fight him to the last ditch."
"And be ruined when I fell into it," muttered Edith wretchedly. "Impossible!—Impossible! Yet I must do something!" and for the third time she looked at the belt of stone-pines.
"Why do you keep staring in that direction?"
"Oh, nothing, nothing!" said the other, hastily, "I am only trying to find a solution for my troubles." She stopped speaking, then stepped forward to face the girl squarely. "If I were a bad wicked woman, would you stand by me?" she hurled the question almost savagely at Aileen.
"Yes, I would. I don't believe you are bad," answered the girl, steadily, "you aren't greedy over money, or you wouldn't want to give me, or father, the income Roderick left you. You are not a society vampire, or you wouldn't stay here at the Back-of-Beyond. You don't seem to gain anything by being wicked, therefore, you can't be wicked, so far as I can see. We can talk of this later, when Dr. Slanton comes on one of his persecuting visits. This time he will find that he has me to face as well as you."
"No! No! You mustn't—"
"Yes I must. If you haven't pluck, I have, and I don't care what you say, or he says. I'm going to fight. Do you hear. Fight! Meanwhile your nerves are screaming from your opium silliness, and this hot room doesn't help them to improve. A little air,"—she walked to the window, raised the lowered sash, and looked over her shoulder—"come for a stroll."
"Too tired," refused Edith languidly, and stooping to gather the sleeping sandy cat on to her lap. "Take Toby out for a run on the lawn. But don't go into the wood, or you'll get your feet wet. Toby has been scratching at the door for the last five minutes."
"Keep Amelia safe then," advised Aileen, nodding towards the cat, and she threw open the parlour door to admit a joyous wire-haired terrier, who immediately began to race wildly round the room. "Toby. Toby. Behave yourself.''
But Toby had no desire to obey, since he possessed to the full, that usual amount of original sin, inherent in his breed. With a victorious bark he sprang for Edith's lap and bit Amelia, who, nothing daunted, responded with a vigorous scratch. Pandemonium ensued, as the women tried to part the combatants: until Amelia settled the question by squirming out of Edith's arms to dart out of the window with Toby in full cry after her swift heels. Aileen bent herself to step out in pursuit, hearing Miss Danby's warning cry, as she sped, like Atalanta across the lawn. "Don't go into the wood," cried the woman, and it seemed to the girl as if the distant voice was charged with dread.
But Aileen was compelled to neglect this advice, if Amelia was to be saved from the eager jaws of Toby. The flying animals made straight for the stone-pines, and the girl was shortly almost knee-deep in bracken under the dripping trees. Toby just missed his prey by a hair-breadth, for Amelia was up and over the mouldering red brick wall like a flash of lightning, leaving her enemy to bark and caper at the base. But Aileen paid no attention to his antics. She was staring dumb-foundered at the body of a man, over which she had stumbled. It lay amongst the yellowing grasses, and wet brown ferns, with a handkerchief laid over the face and with the hands crossed on the breast. For a moment or two the shaken girl could neither move, nor cry out, but stared and stared and stared at that thing which was lying so stilly amongst the jumbled wreckage of autumn. Then movement came back to her. She bent down cautiously and lifted the handkerchief, to behold a frozen face with four letters tattooed across a discoloured forehead. "C-A-I-N" spelled the girl, dumbly. "Cain!" Then she examined the face, and became white with terror. For the face was that of Cuthbert Slanton.
Chapter 2 The Best Policy
NOTWITHSTANDING her youthful years and fragile looks, Aileen More was remarkably strong-willed and self-possessed. Naturally, she endured an age-long sixty seconds of sheer horror, when stumbling so unexpectedly upon Edith's enemy lying dead in the grounds of Edith's cottage. The thought of a possible explanation flashed into her mind immediately, as she recalled the late conversation; and a vivid sense of her friend's peril, suggested instant action. After ascertaining that Slanton really was lifeless, she picked up Toby, who circled distrustfully round the corpse, and returned swiftly to the cottage. Here a fresh shock awaited her. Edith was lying unconscious on the floor near the open window.
"Jenny! Jenny!" Aileen flew to open the door and summon the servant. "Bring a jug of water at once. Miss Danby had fainted. Get the smelling salts and sal volatile from my bedroom. Be quick, be quick."
Issuing these directions rapidly, she crossed the passage to shut up the terrier in the opposite room; then returned to attend to the insensible woman. Kneeling beside her, the girl loosened her collar, chafed her hands, placed a cushion under her head, and did all that was possible at the moment, to better the situation. Jenny, a stout red-haired damsel, not over-gifted with brains, and extremely stolid on all and every occasion, tardily arrived with a jug in one hand and two bottles in the other. "Lor Miss, whatever did missus go off like this for?" asked Jenny, heavily.
"A sleepless night—the heat of the room—Oh, I don't know. Here, give me the jug!" and Aileen dashed the water over Edith's white face. Very wisely, she decided to say as little as possible to the maid, who was known to be a notorious gossip. Then, as Edith showed no signs of returning to her senses, she ordered Jenny to help place her on the sofa. "You lift her feet," she said, slipping her hands under Miss Danby's arms. "Careful now."
The two women accomplished the transfer from floor to couch, fairly easily, as Edith was little else than skin and bone, owing to the wasting effect of secret troubles. The smelling salts produced some signs of revival, for Miss Danby heaved a long weary sigh, half-opened her eyes, and closed them again, listlessly. "Get me a glass of water and a tea-spoon," commanded Aileen, uncorking the sal volatile bottle: and these came to hand in less time than might have been expected from Jenny's cumbersome appearance. "Now you can go. She'll soon be herself again. I'll call you if I want anything."
Thus banished at this thrilling moment, the overgrown domestic retired reluctantly, overwhelmed with justifiable curiosity as to the reason for the unexpected fainting of her mistress. Despite her stolidity and limited capacity, she inherited all the easily-aroused suspicion of the lower-class scandalmonger, and had long since guessed that there was "something queer" about Miss Danby. Aileen knew that the girl was a born mischief-maker, so wisely took the precaution of getting rid of her, lest Edith should reveal too much, when she regained her senses. The situation was so strained and suggestively dangerous, that it was necessary to move discreetly, if a public scandal was to be averted. But indeed, Aileen, watching her unhappy friend, slowly coming back to consciousness, did not see how it could be avoided in any way. The presence of the dead body in the wood must needs be explained, and the explanation would most surely bring to light uncomfortable matters best left in the dark. "It is the climax sure enough," said Aileen, and, unconsciously, she said it aloud.
"Climax!" muttered Miss Danby, confusedly, "what climax?"
"Never mind," said the girl quickly, "take another sip of sal volatile, and I'll get the brandy. Feel better don't you, dear?"
Edith sat up weakly, pushing back her grey hair with a bewildered expression. "Feel better?" she echoed, brokenly, "why—what—when—?"
"You fainted," explained Aileen, quietly, and stepped over to the side-board to fill a wine-glass with brandy.
"Fainted! Fainted! Why—what—when?—oh I am sick—very sick!" and the miserable woman rocked herself to and fro, trembling violently.
"Hush! Hush!" Aileen held the glass to her lips, "drink this. Lie back, and in a few minutes you will be able to talk."
"But I don't—don't understand."
"Rest! Rest! We can speak later."
Speaking coaxingly, the girl adjusted the cushion, made her patient lie back comfortably, and stroked her forehead with a gentle hand. Shortly Edith closed her eyes and became more placid, although every now and then, she moaned pitifully. Aileen crossed to the window silently, and as silently drew down the lower sash, looking meanwhile—as Edith had done several times that morning—over the lawn to the belt of stone-pines. Knowing what lay underneath those pines, she shuddered and wondered if, indeed, Edith knew also. It was evident that she did, else why her constant looking in that ominous direction, and why the unexpected fainting? Then again, the dead man had been her enemy, whom she frankly detested: whom she openly longed to get rid of. Had she accomplished this by violence, and was the projected journey to America a flight from justice? Aileen asked herself these dreadful questions, and the answers which suggested themselves filled her with dismay. Yet plausible as the answers were, the girl could not bring herself to believe that the best friend she had in the world, had committed a cold-blooded murder. She comforted herself with the thought that there must be some exonerating circumstance, and that Edith would explain the circumstance in due time.
A low wailing cry from the sofa, brought back Aileen in a hurry with an anxious face, and a rapidly-beating heart. She dreaded to hear what Edith might confess; yet knew that she must listen carefully, so as to plan future action. Assuring herself, by peering into the passage, that Jenny was not eaves-dropping, she closed the door and returned to the sofa. Edith was sitting up, composed and apologetic, but smiling uneasily as she raised her eyes. "I don't know how I came to faint in this silly way," she said, with a foolish titter. "Probably the want of sleep last night."
"I thought that the opium made you sleep?" suggested Aileen, dryly.
"On and off: off and on," mumbled the other effecting lightness and swinging her legs on to the floor, "but I feel weak."
"Try and feel strong." Aileen's voice was still dry. "I have something very unpleasant to tell you "
Miss Danby winced, stood up and stationed herself on the hearth-rug. In her severely plain garb, now hanging so loosely on her tall figure, she looked miserably grey and gaunt. Her eyes did not meet those of Aileen, but stared over the lawn, as they had done previously. "Yes!" said the girl, immediately seizing the opening, "he is lying there."
"He—Who?" Miss Danby suddenly stiffened and looked as hard and grim as granite.
"Dr. Slanton!" retorted the other, bluntly.
"What is he doing there?"
"He isn't there."
"You said that he was."
"Only his body."
"Body! Body!" Edith's voice hinted at a scream, although she spoke hoarsely. "Do you mean to tell me that he is—he is—dead," she whispered the last word, wild-eyed with panic.
Aileen nodded, looking straightly into her friend's eyes. She met therein an emotion, which made her recoil; not a human emotion, but one which suggested the animal, which lies dormant in all. A she-wolf peered out of those eyes—the merest hint of one, then again disappeared in a flood of fear, the new emotion overwhelming the old. "Murdered!" said Aileen, driving home the intensity of the moment.
"No! No!" Miss Danby shrank back against the mantelpiece, thrusting her two hands out before her, as if to ward off a blow, "it's—it's impossible."
"It is true. Come and see for yourself."
"I can't—I daren't!" her voice lowered to a horrified whisper.
"Why daren't you?" Aileen had recovered from her second of sick loathing when the animal strain had surged to the surface, and pursued her examination relentlessly. Even if this wretched woman was guilty, it was the duty of the girl she had succoured, to stand by her in the hour of her need.
"I'm afraid!" faltered Edith, trembling, "he troubled me, when alive, so why should I let him trouble me now that he is dead? Dead!" her voice steadied and leaped an octave, "Who killed him?"
"I should ask you that, Edith, and I do."
"What do you mean? I know nothing about the matter," her words poured out in spate, tumbling furiously over one another, "I have not been to the wood—it's impossible—you are mistaken. That beast can't be there: he isn't dead. Men like Cuthbert Slanton cannot die. They live—live to torment unhappy women," and she paused, breathless with wordy haste.
"Unhappy women sometimes take the law into their own hands," hinted Aileen, and again came the torrent of denial.
"Why do you say that—what do you mean—I know nothing—why should I know anything—you said you were my friend—you know you did."
"I am your friend," came the steady answer, "and for that very reason I wish to get at the truth."
"The truth—the truth. I know nothing of the truth. Why come to me? I am ignorant of everything."
The girl, controlling herself amazingly, placed her hands on the woman's shoulders, "Can you swear to that?"
"I can—I can—why shouldn't I?" Edith shook her off. "How dare you think—"
Aileen interrupted. "It is not what I think, but what the police will think."
Miss Danby clutched at her breast and gasped painfully, her mouth opening and shutting with never a sound, for one long, long minute. Then, "You won't—tell the police of—of—this."
"Edith, it is impossible to keep this thing quiet. Dr. Slanton is dead, and his body lies in the wood yonder, so—"
"We can bury it!" Miss Danby clutched Aileen round the waist and whispered the suggestion hoarsely, "you and I—to-night—when there's no one about."
The girl pulled herself away, turning even paler than she already was. This hint at concealment was in itself an admission of guilt. "I lend myself to no such underhand doings," she said sternly, and her face grew bleak, "if we acted so madly, think what would happen. Dr. Slanton would be missed—it is known that he comes here—to the village, to the cottage. Inquiries would be made, and if the—the"—she shuddered and brought out the ominous word with an effort—"grave was found, both you and I would be accused of murdering him."
"But we are innocent. You know nothing—I know nothing," urged Edith, twisting her thin hands in a frenzy of fear. "I haven't seen Slanton for two weeks—you know I have not."
"I don't know what took place last night," was the significant answer.
"Nor do I—nor do I," moaned Edith, and flung herself on the sofa, crying.
Aileen sat down beside her, and took one of the limp hands between her own cold fingers: for cold they were, and cold she was to her heart's centre, so heavily did this nightmare horror weigh her down. "You know that I am your true friend, Edith—that I mean to stand by you, whatever happens. Tell me all you know—all you have done. Did you kill this man—not thinking to kill him perhaps—but in a moment of passion?"
"I know nothing, nothing," came from the woman in muffled tones, as she buried her face in the sofa-cushion.
"Think! Think! Had you been smoking opium? Were you unconscious of what you were doing? Drugged by the black smoke, you might have killed blindly."
"I know nothing!"
"You must know," urged Aileen. "Did you quarrel when Slanton came last night?"
"He never came: I never saw him."
"He did come: you did see him," insisted the girl, fiercely, for she realized clearly that the worst must come to the worst, if she failed to gain the miserable creature's confidence, "he insulted you, didn't he? And you struck at him, not knowing what you were doing? And afterwards, coming to your senses, you grew afraid and dragged the body into the wood to hide it."
"As you seem to be so certain of my guilt, it is useless for me to deny anything!" said Miss Danby, bitterly, and sat up rigidly obstinate.
The girl wrung her hands, desperately. "How can I help you, when you won't be plain with me—when you refuse to confess."
"I have nothing to confess," retorted the woman, sullenly, "you construct the whole scene of what did not happen, so glibly, that it is evident you think me guilty. A fine friend you are, I must say."
"You won't allow me to be your friend!" Aileen rose, and the extreme terror of the position, forced her to brace up and face the worst. "Can't you understand that honesty is the best policy. We can't keep this murder quiet."
"You run on too fast. It may not be a murder."
"It is a murder, else why should the body be lying in yonder wood. And why did you tattoo the name 'Cain' on the forehead? You did it."
Edith clasped and unclasped her hands, restlessly. "I did nothing of the sort—this is the first time I heard of the thing. How can I have tattooed the forehead, when I have no instruments to do so, and would not know how to use them, if they were in my possession. Cain!" she rose to pace the room, swiftly, as if to work off her superabundant emotion in exercise. "Why should I brand that name on Slanton's forehead?"
"I don't know. I know nothing."
"Neither do I," retorted Miss Danby, throwing up her hands despairingly, "the whole thing is a mystery to me."
"Then the mystery must be solved by the police," said Aileen, moving past the woman, and towards the door.
Edith caught her by the arm. "Where are you going?"
"Down to the village to see the policeman."
"You'll ruin me if you go?"
"I'll ruin you and myself also if I don't go. Honesty is the best policy."
"You said that before, parrot that you are. Aileen, don't make bad worse. In some way Slanton came here last night: in some way he has been murdered. But I swear that I know nothing of the matter."
"In that case, you can't object to my going to the policeman in the village."
"You believe that I am guilty?"
"No! I can't—I can't," cried the girl, trying to persuade herself that she spoke truly, "you couldn't have done it."
A cynical smile curved the grey lips of the other. "You blow hot and cold," she sneered, contemptuously, "one minute you say this: another minute you say that. Ah well—I am guilty."
Aileen cried out in horror. "You admit it?"
Edith shook her head, positively. "I am only saying what the policeman will say—what the judge and jury will say."
"The judge and jury," echoed Aileen, faintly, the full danger of the situation coming home to her.
"Yes! If you go down to the village and tell, what you conceive to be the truth," said Miss Danby, with a shrug, and, although her face was deathly white, she spoke firmly, "everything is against me. I hated Slanton—he came here frequently—we quarrelled incessantly—you overheard our quarrels—Jenny, always with her ear to the key-hole, heard them also. Slanton is murdered you say, and his body lies in my grounds. Who will believe that I am guiltless?"
"I believe, unless you did it in a moment of frenzy."
"Then you don't believe," Edith laughed contemptuously, flung back her head, tossed her arms, "well then, go. I can meet the worst, if the worst is to come, as it most assuredly will come, if you betray me."
"I am not betraying you. I am acting for the best."
"When I am under lock and key you will think differently."
"I will stand by you."
"Are you standing by me now?"
"Yes I am. You know I am. It is better for you to face the lesser, danger of admission, than the greater danger of concealment."
Miss Danby reflected for a moment, then went to look into the mirror over the fire-place and smooth her disordered grey hair. "Suppose I kill myself while you are away, preparing my uncomfortable future."
"Then I shall know you are guilty," rejoined Aileen, promptly.
"You are frank." Edith wheeled round with a frown.
"Because I believe you to be innocent, unless you unconsciously—"
"Bah! Hot and cold again in your blowing. Well, for your comfort I say that I am innocent—that I don't intend to kill myself, and you—?"
"I shall discover the truth, somewhere, somehow."
"The truth! What is the truth?" questioned Edith, cynically, after the fashion of Pontius Pilate. "I should like to know it myself. How did Slanton come to the wood: who killed him: who branded him: and why was he murdered and so tattooed? Difficult questions these, my dear, and I shall be asked to answer the lot. H'm! Here is a new Hell to walk through. Are you ready to walk along with me?"
"Yes! I won't leave you until you are out of the Hell you speak of."
"Aileen!" Miss Danby moved forward swiftly; laid her arms round the girl, and kissed her impetuously. "You are a dear child and my best friend. Do what you will: I agree with you that honesty is the best policy. But"—she removed her arm from Aileen's neck, and returned to the hearth-rug—"nothing will be said, or done by me to prove that it is the best."
"Edith! Edith! You must defend yourself."
"There is no defence," stated the grey woman, coldly.
"But—but—"
"There is no defence! I know nothing—I have seen nothing: I am completely at the mercy of circumstances."
The girl looked imploringly at the inflexible face, now impassive as that of the Sphinx. There was no evidence of fear: no signs of yielding, so she turned and left the room. Her heart ached for Edith, and she fervently wished that common-sense did not compel her to bring this further trouble upon one already burdened. Nevertheless, she felt that the way she was taking was the right way, and went upstairs to make ready for her errand. This did not take long, for in ten minutes Aileen descended drawing on her gloves. Before opening the front door, she peered into the parlour. Miss Danby was still standing on the hearth-rug: but her gaze was directed towards the window, staring as formerly, over the lawn to the belt of stone-pines, which sheltered the lifeless body of her enemy. Only God knew what her thoughts were: but Aileen trembled to think what those thoughts might be.
It was a pale and very perplexed young woman, who hurried down the tangled avenue of the isolated cottage, out through the crazy wooden gates, swinging between weather-worn brick pillars, and on to the broad highway. Under the showering autumnal foliage, discarded by the bordering elm-trees: between the dwindling leafage of the red-berried hedges, she walked swiftly along the road to where it curved round the bare stubbled fields, towards Fryfeld. Everything looked sad and forlorn beneath the sullen grey clouds, moving sluggishly at the hest of the damp-blowing winds. The brooding mood of earth and sky was also Aileen's mood, for she, likewise, felt forlorn and sad, deserted and despondent. The presence of the body in that sinister wood, the silence of Edith, and the crying horror of the whole unfathomable mystery, quenched the light of her youth with most unholy gloom. She was inclined to risk immediate flight from this nightmare; to run and run and run, everlastingly, until the ghastly thing was left uncounted leagues behind. But the recollection of Edith's kindness, of Edith's peril, brought her to a halt in the village street. And yonder stood Constable Kemp, the one and only guardian of the peace in Fryfeld. One word from her, and he would hurry hot-footed to find the dead man, maybe to arrest Edith, as it were, red-handed.
Suddenly the idea of appealing to the higher authorities at Tarhaven some eight miles distant, came into her mind. She immediately turned aside into the grocer-shop-post-office at her elbow to enter the telephone-box. A few brief words committed the tragedy to world-wide publicity, and having brought about the worst through the necessity of facing the worst, Aileen went to inform Constable Kemp. The smile with which he saluted her was speedily wiped off his face, when she abruptly addressed him: "There is a murdered man lying in Miss Danby's wood. I have called up the Tarhaven police. Come!"
Chapter 3 Facing The Worst
NOONDAY brought a motor-car from Tarhaven, which decanted Detective-Inspector Trant, two of his underlings and the Divisional-surgeon, at the gates of the cottage. Already the ill news—travelling proverbially fast—was known in Fryfeld, and a gradually-increasing stream of excited villagers, surged eagerly along the curved road towards the scene of the tragedy. Men and women, also children, morbidly curious, invaded the grounds of the solitary dwelling, to stare fearfully at its grim walls of grey stone, and pointed roof of sombre slates. They peered in at the windows, tapped nervously on the green-painted door, rambled here, there, and everywhere, generally taking possession of the place. Constable Kemp was unable to cope with the throng single-handed, so contented himself with standing guard over the corpse, now hidden decorously under a tarpaulin. This mysterious crime was the most sensational event which had ever happened in Fryfeld, and its somnolent inhabitants were resolved to make the most of it. As the village wit remarked, shrewdly, "We don't kill a pig every day."
