A Mysterious Disappearance by Louis Tracy (most read book in the world TXT) đź“•
"I opened your message. Alice not here. I have not seen her for over a week. What do you mean by wire? Am coming to town at once.--EDITH."
The baronet's pale face and strained voice betrayed the significance of the thought underlying the simple question.
"What do you make of it, Claude?"
Bruce, too, was very grave. "The thing looks queer," he said; "though the explanation may be trifling. Come, I will help you. Let us reach your house. It is the natural centre for inquiries."
They hailed a hansom and whirled off to Portman Square. They did not say much. Each man felt that the affair might not end so happily and satisfactorily as he hoped.
CHAPTER II
INSPECTOR WHITE
Lady Dyke had disappeared.
Whether dead or alive, and if alive, whether detained by force or absent of her own unfettered volition, this handsome and well-known leader of Society had vanished utterly from the moment when Cl
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“I am not innocent,” said Mrs. Hillmer, her words falling with painful distinctness upon the ears of the three men. “Heaven help me! I am responsible for it!”
Her brother started to his feet, and caught her by the shoulder.
“What folly is this,” he cried. “Do you know what you are saying?”
“Fully. My words are like sledge-hammers. I will forever feel their weight. I tell you I am responsible for the death of Lady Dyke.”
“Then how did she die, Mrs. Hillmer?” said Bruce, whose glance sought to read her soul.
“I do not know. I do not want to know. It matters little to me.”
“In other words, you are assuming a responsibility you should not bear. You were not even aware of this poor lady’s death until I told you. Why should you seek to avert suspicion from others merely because Lady Dyke is shown to have met her death in your apartments?”
“But how is it shown?” interrupted Mensmore vehemently. He was more disturbed by his sister’s unaccountable attitude than he had ever been by the serious charge against himself.
“Easily enough,” said White, feeling that he ought to have some share in the conversation. “A piece of the damaged fender placed in your rooms, Mr. Mensmore, was found in the murdered lady’s head.”
“Was it?” he cried. “Then, by Heaven, I refuse to see my sister sacrificed for anybody’s sake. She has borne too long the whole burden of misery and degradation. I tell you, Gwen, that if you do not save yourself I will save you against your will. That furniture came to my room because—”
“Bertie, I beseech you, for the sake of the woman you love, to spare me.”
Mrs. Hillmer flung herself on her knees before him and caught hold of his hands, while she burst into a storm of tears.
Mensmore was unnerved. He turned to Bruce, and said:
“Help me in this miserable business, old chap. I don’t know what to say or do; my sister had no more connection with Lady Dyke’s death than I had. This statement on her part is mere hysteria, arising from other circumstances altogether.”
“That I feel acutely,” said the barrister. “Yet some one killed her, and, whatever the pain that may be caused, and whoever may suffer, I am determined that the truth shall come out.”
“I tell you,” wailed Mrs. Hillmer between her sobs, “that I must bear all the blame. Why do you hesitate? She was killed in my house, and I confess my guilt.”
“This is rum business,” growled Mr. White aloud, half unconsciously.
At that moment the door opened unexpectedly, and Smith entered.
Before Bruce had time to vociferate an order to his astounded servitor the man stuttered an excuse:
“Beg pardon, sir,” he said, “but Sir Charles Dyke has called, and wants to know if you will be disengaged soon.”
CHAPTER XXIII THE LETTERQuick on the heels of the footman’s stammered explanation came the voice of Sir Charles himself:
“Sorry to disturb you, Bruce, if you are busy, but I must see you for a moment on a matter of the utmost importance.”
There was that in his utterance which betokened great excitement. He was not visible to the occupants of the room. During the audible silence that followed his words, they could hear him stamping about the passage, impatiently awaiting Bruce’s presence.
Mrs. Hillmer quietly collapsed on the floor. She had fainted.
The barrister rushed out, calling for Mrs. Smith, and responding to Sir Charles Dyke’s proffered statement as to the reason for his presence by the startling cry:
“Wait a bit, Dyke. There’s a lady in a faint inside. We must attend to her at once.”
Mrs. Smith, fortunately, was at hand, and with the help of her ministrations, Mrs. Hillmer gradually regained her senses.
After a whispered colloquy with White, the barrister said to Mensmore:
“You must remove your sister to her residence as quickly as possible. She is far too highly strung to bear any further questioning to-night. Perhaps to-morrow, when you and she have discussed matters fully together, you may be able to send for us and clear up this wretched business.”
For answer Mensmore silently pressed his hand. With the help of the housekeeper he led his sister from the room, passing Sir Charles Dyke in the hall. The baronet politely turned aside, and Mensmore did not look at him, being far too engrossed with his sister to pay heed to aught else at the moment. As for Mrs. Hillmer, she was in such a state of collapse as to be practically unconscious of her surroundings.
She managed to murmur at the door:
“Where are you taking me to, Bertie?”
“Home, dear.”
“Home? Oh, thank Heaven!”
They all heard her, and even the detective was constrained to say:
“Poor thing, she needn’t have been afraid. She is suffering for some one else.”
Sir Charles Dyke grasped Bruce’s arm.
“What on earth is going on?” he said.
“Merely a foolish woman worrying herself about others,” replied Bruce grimly.
“But those people were my old friends, Mensmore and his sister?”
“Yes.”
“What are they doing here?”
“Mensmore has been brought back to London by Mrs. Hillmer to face the allegations made against him with regard to your wife’s disappearance. They came here by their own appointment, and—”
“Did I not tell you that this charge against Mensmore was wild folly on the face of it?”
“So it seems, when we have just discovered that your wife was killed in his sister’s house, and Mrs. Hillmer persists in declaring that she was responsible for the crime.”
“Look here, Bruce. Don’t lose your head like everybody else mixed up in this wretched business. My wife is not dead.”
“What!” The cry was a double one, for both Bruce and White gave simultaneous utterance to their amazement.
“It is true. She is alive all the time. I have had a letter from her.”
“A letter. Surely, Dyke—”
“I am neither mad nor drunk. The letter reached me by this morning’s post. I came here with it as fast as I could travel. I have been in the train all day, and am nearly fainting from hunger.”
“Where is it?” cried White. “Is it genuine?”
“I could swear to her writing amidst a thousand letters. Here it is. I have brought some old correspondence of hers for the purpose of comparison, as I could hardly believe my eyes when I first received it.”
Bruce was so dumfounded by this remarkable development that he could but mutely take the document produced by the baronet and read it.
He himself recognized Lady Dyke’s handwriting, which he had often seen—a clear, bold, well-defined script, more like the caligraphy of a banker than of a fashionable lady.
The letter was dated February 1, bore no other superscription, and read as follows:
“My Dear Charles,—I have just seen in the newspapers the announcement of my death, and the theories set on foot to account for my disappearance on November 6. This seems to convey to me the strange fact that you have not received the explanation I sent you of my reasons for leaving London so suddenly. Otherwise you must have kept your own counsel very closely. However, I do not now desire to reopen the question of motive; let it suffice to say that no one save myself was responsible for my disappearance, and that neither you nor any one acquainted with me will ever see me again. Do not search for me; it will be time wasted. If you have legal proof of my death and wish to marry again, be satisfied. Tear up this letter and forget it. I am dead—to you and to the world. You can neither refuse to accept the genuineness of this letter nor trace me by reason of it, as I have taken such precautions that the latter course will be impossible. Let me repeat—forget me.
“Alice.”
The barrister carefully refolded the sheet after scrutinizing the water-mark against the light, and noting that the paper was British made; he then examined the envelope. The obliterating postmark was “London, February 4, 9 P.M., West Strand.” The office of delivery was “Wensley, February 6.”
“Posted at the West Strand Post-Office on Saturday,” he said. “Detained in London all Sunday, and delivered to you this morning in the North.”
“Exactly.”
“It was written three days earlier, if the date be accurate. So the writer is somewhere in Europe.”
“That’s how I take it,” said Sir Charles.
“Unless the whole thing is a fraud.”
“How can it be a fraud? I am sure as to the handwriting. Why, even yourself, Bruce, must have a good recollection of my wife’s style.”
“Undoubtedly. No man born could swear that this was not Lady Dyke’s production.”
“Well, what are we to do?”
“And what did Mrs. Hillmer mean by kicking up that fuss when we spoke to her?” interpolated White. “I’ll take my oath that some one was killed in her house, else how comes it that a woman found in the Thames at Putney is carrying about in her head some of Mrs. Hillmer’s ironwork? I wish she hadn’t fainted just now. Why, she said herself that she was the cause of Lady Dyke’s death, and here is Lady Dyke writing to say she is alive. This business is beyond me, but Mrs. Hillmer has got to explain a good deal yet before I am done with her.”
The detective’s wrath at this check in the hunt after a criminal did not appeal to the baronet.
“You can please yourself, Mr. White, of course,” he said coldly; “but so far as I am concerned, I will respect my wife’s wishes, and let the matter rest where it is.”
“My dear fellow,” said the barrister, “such a course is impossible. Assuming that her ladyship is really alive, why did she leave you?”
“How can I tell? She herself refuses to give a reason. She apparently stated one in a letter which never reached me, as you know. She has selfishly caused me a world of suffering and misery for three long months. I refuse to be plagued in the matter further.”
Sir Charles was excited and angry. He was in bitter revolt against circumstances.
“Do you intend to show this letter to Lady Dyke’s relatives?” asked Bruce, at a loss for the time to discuss the situation coherently.
“I do not know. What would you advise? I trust fully to your judgment. But is it not better to obey her wishes?—to forget, as she puts it?”
“We must decide nothing hastily. I am perplexed beyond endurance by this business. There is so much that is wildly impossible in its irreconcilable features. I must have time. Will you give me a copy of the letter?”
“Certainly, keep it yourself. We have all seen it.”
“Thank you.” Bruce placed the envelope and its contents in his pocket-book. Then, turning to the detective, he said:
“Now, Mr. White, do me a favor. Do not worry Mrs. Hillmer until you hear from me.”
“By all means, Mr. Bruce. But am I to report to the Commissioner that Lady Dyke has been found, or has, at any rate, explained that she is not dead?”
“There is no immediate necessity why a report of any kind should be made.”
“None.”
“Then leave matters where they are at present.”
“But why,” put in Sir Charles. “Is it not better to end all inquiries, at least so far as my wife is concerned? It is her desire, and, I may add, my own, now that I know something of her fate.”
“Of course, if you wish it, Dyke, I have no valid objection.”
“Oh, no, no. Do not look at it in that way. I leave the ultimate decision entirely to you.”
“In that case, I recommend complete silence in all quarters at present.”
The detective left them, and as he passed out into Victoria Street his philosophy could find
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