A Mysterious Disappearance by Louis Tracy (most read book in the world TXT) 📕

“Dearest One,—You must forgive me, but we are both so miserable about that wretched money that I told mother everything. She likes you, and though she gave me a blowing up, she has promised to give me £500 to-morrow. We can never thank her sufficiently. Do come around and see me for a minute. I will be in the verandah until eleven.

“Ever yours,
“Phyllis.”

Claude returned the note.

“Luck! you’re the luckiest fellow in the South of France!” he said. “Why, here’s the mother plotting with the daughter on your behalf. Sir William hasn’t the ghost of a chance. Off you go to that blessed verandah.”

When Mensmore had quitted the hotel Bruce descended to the bureau to take up the threads of his neglected quest. The letter to Sydney H. Corbett was still unclaimed, and he thought he was justified in examining it. On the reverse of the envelope was the embossed stamp of an electric-lighting company, so the contents were nothing more important than a bill.

An hour later Mensmore joined him in the billiard-room, radiant and excited.

“Great news,” he said. “I squared everything with Lady Browne. Told her I was only chaffing Phil about the five hundred, because she spoiled my aim by shrieking out. Sir William has chartered a steam yacht to go for a three weeks’ cruise along the Gulf of Genoa and the Italian coast. They have put him up to ask me in the morning to join the party. Great Scott! what a night I’m having!”

They parted soon afterwards, and next morning Bruce was informed that his friend had gone out early, leaving word that he had been summoned to breakfast at the Grand Hotel, where Sir William Browne was staying.

During the afternoon Mensmore came to him like a whirlwind. “We’re off to-day,” he said. “By the way, where shall I find you in London?”

The barrister gave him his address, and Mensmore, handing him a card, said, “My permanent address is given here, the Orleans Club, St. James’s. But I will look you up first. I shall be in town early in March. And you?”

“Oh, I shall be home much sooner. Good-bye, and don’t let your good luck spoil you.”

“No fear! Wait until you know Phyllis. She would keep any fellow all right once he got his chance, as I have done. Good-bye, and—and—God bless you!”

During the next three days Bruce devoted himself sedulously to the search for Corbett. He inquired in every possible and impossible place, but the man had utterly vanished.

Nor did he come to claim his letter at the Hotel du Cercle. It remained stuck on the baize-covered board until it was covered with dust, and the clerk of the bureau had grown weary of watching people who scrutinized the receptacle for their correspondence.

Others came and asked for Corbett—sharp-featured men with imperials and long moustaches—the interest taken in the man was great, but unrequited. He never appeared.

At last the season ended, the hotel was closed, and the mysterious letter was shot into the dustbin.

Bruce announced his departure from Monte Carlo by a telegram to his valet.

Nevertheless, he did not expect to find that useful adjunct to his small household—Smith and his wife comprised the barrister’s ménage—standing on the platform at Charing Cross when the mail train from the Continent steamed into the station.

Smith, who had his doubts about this sudden trip to the Riviera, was relieved when he saw his master was alone. “Sir Charles Dyke called this afternoon, sir,” he explained. “I told Sir Charles about your wire, sir, and he is very anxious that you should dine with him to-night. You can dress at Portman Square, and if I come with you—”

“Yes; I understand. Bundle everything into a four-wheeler.”

“Sir Charles thought you might come, sir, so he sent his carriage.”

London looked dull but familiar as they rolled across Leicester Square and up Regent Street. Your true Cockney knows that he is out of his latitude when the sky is blue overhead. Let him hear the tinkle of the hansoms’ bells through a dim, fog-laden atmosphere, and he knows where he is. There is but one London, and Cockneydom is the order of Melchisedek. Claude’s heart was glad within him to be home again, even though the band was just gathering in the Casino gardens, and the lights of Monaco were beginning to gleam over the moon-lit expanse of the Mediterranean.

At Wensley House the traveller was warmly welcomed by the baronet, who seemed to have somewhat recovered his health and spirits.

Nevertheless, Bruce was distressed to note the ineffaceable signs of the suffering Sir Charles Dyke had undergone since the disappearance of his wife. He had aged quite ten years in appearance. Deep lines of sorrowful thought had indented his brow, his face was thinner, his eyes had acquired a wistful look; his air was that of a man whose theory of life had been forcibly reversed.

At first both men fought shy of the topic uppermost in their minds, but the after-dinner cigar brought the question to Dyke’s lips:

“And now, Claude, have you any further news concerning my wife’s—death?”

The barrister noted the struggle before the final word came. The husband had, then, resigned all hope.

“I have none,” he answered. “That is to say, I have nothing definite. I promised to tell you everything I did, so I will keep my promise, but you will, of course, differentiate between facts and theories?”

The baronet nodded an agreement.

“In the first place,” said Bruce, “let me ask you whether or not you have seen Jane Harding, the missing maid?”

“Yes. It seems that she called here twice before she caught me at home. At first she was very angry about a squabble there had been between Thompson and herself. I refused to listen to it. Then she told me how you had found her at some theatre, and she volunteered an explanation of her extraordinary behavior. She said that she had unexpectedly come into a large sum of money, and that it had turned her head. She was sorry for the trouble her actions had caused, so, under the circumstances, I allowed her to take away certain clothes and other belongings she had left here.”

“Did she ask for these things?”

“Yes. Made quite a point of it.”

“Did you see them?”

“No.”

“So you do not know whether they were of any value, or the usual collection of rubbish found in servants’ boxes.”

“I have not the slightest notion.”

“Have they ever been thoroughly examined by any one?”

“’Pon my honor, I believe not. Now that you remind me of it I think the girl seemed rather anxious on that point. I remember my housekeeper telling me that Harding had asked her if her clothes had been ransacked by the detectives.”

“And what did the housekeeper say?”

“She will tell you herself. Let us have her up.”

“Don’t trouble her. If I remember aright the police did not examine Jane Harding’s room. They simply took your report and the statements of the other servants, while the housekeeper was responsible for the partial search made through the girl’s boxes for some clue that might lead to her discovery.”

“That is so.”

The barrister smoked in silence for a few minutes, until Sir Charles broke out rather querulously:

“I suppose I did wrong in letting Harding take her traps?”

“No,” said Bruce. “It is I who am to blame. There is something underhanded about this young woman’s conduct. The