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

than to allow such a thing to occur he would give her the money. An hour later he handed her fifty ten-pound notes.”

“What a wretched mistake,” cried Bruce involuntarily. This unmasking of his unfortunate friend’s duplicity was the most painful feature of all to him.

“Perhaps it was,” replied the detective, “but the thing is not yet quite clear to me. That is why I am here. But to continue. The girl admitted that she lost her head a bit. Instead of leaving the house openly, without attracting comment, she simply bolted, thus giving rise to the second sensational element attending Lady Dyke’s disappearance. But she resolved to be faithful to her promise. When you found her she held her tongue, and even wrote to Sir Charles to assure him that she had not spoken a word to a soul. He sent for her, and pitched into her about not going to America, but took her address in case he wished to see her again.”

“He recognized her letter-writing powers, no doubt.”

“Evidently. She was surprised last Thursday week to receive a telegram asking her to meet him at York Station. When she arrived there he asked her to write the letter he handed to you and to post it in London on Saturday evening. He explained that his action was due to his keen anxiety to shield his wife’s name, and that this letter would settle the affair altogether. As he handed her another bundle of notes, and promised to settle £100 a year on her for life, she was willing enough to help him. During your interview with her you guessed the reason why she wrote Lady Dyke’s hand so perfectly. She had copied it for three years.”

“All this must have astonished you considerably?”

“Mr. Bruce, astonished isn’t the word. I was flabbergasted! Once she started talking I let her alone, only rattling the handcuffs when she seemed inclined to stop. But all the time I felt as if the top of my head had been blown off.”

“I imagine she had not much more to tell you?”

“She pitched into you as the cause of all the mischief, and went so far as to say that she was sure it was not Sir Charles who killed Lady Dyke, but you yourself.”

Bruce winced at Jane Harding’s logic. Were he able to retrieve the past three months the mystery of Lady Dyke’s death would have remained a mystery forever.

“Now about the photograph,” said the detective. “After I had left Jane Harding with a solemn warning to speak to no one until I saw her again, I made a round of the fashionable photographers and soon obtained an excellent likeness of Sir Charles. I showed it to Dobson, and she said: ‘That is Colonel Montgomery.’ I showed it to the foreman of the furniture warehouse, and he said: ‘That is the image of the man who ordered Mrs. Hillmer’s suite.’ Now, what on earth is the upshot of this business to be? I called at Wensley House, but was told Sir Charles was not in town. Had he been in, I would not have seen him until I had discussed matters with you.”

“That is very good of you, Mr. White. May I ask your reason for showing him this consideration?”

The policeman, who was very earnest and very excited, banged his hand on the table as he cried:

“Don’t you see what all this amounts to? I have no option but to arrest Sir Charles Dyke for the murder of his wife.”

“That is a sad conclusion.”

“And do you believe he killed her?”

“Strange as it may seem to you, I do not.”

“And I’m jiggered if I do either.”

“I—I am greatly obliged to you, White.”

Claude bent his head almost to his knees, and for some minutes there was complete silence. When he again looked at the detective there were tears in his eyes.

“What can we do to unravel this tangled skein without creating untold mischief?” he murmured.

“It beats me, sir,” was the perplexed answer. “But when I came in I imagined that Jane Harding or some one had been to see you. Surely, you had learned something of all this before my arrival?”

“Yes, indeed. I had reached your goal, but by a different route. Unfortunately, my discovery only goes to confirm yours.”

Bruce then told him of his visit to the lawyer’s office, and its result. Mr. White listened to the recital with knitted brows.

“It is very clear,” he said, when the barrister had ended, “that Lady Dyke was killed in Mrs. Hillmer’s flat, that Sir Charles knew of her death, that he himself conveyed the body to the river bank at Putney, and that ever since he has tried to throw dust in our eyes and prevent any knowledge of the true state of affairs reaching us.”

“Your summary cannot be disputed in the least particular.”

“Well, Mr. Bruce, we must do something. If you don’t like to interfere, then I must.”

“There is but one person in the world who can enlighten us as to the facts. That person obviously is Sir Charles Dyke himself.”

“Unquestionably.”

Bruce looked at his watch. It was 10.30 P.M. He rose.

“Let us go to him,” he said.

“But he is not in London.”

“He is. I expect you will find that he gave orders for no one to be admitted, and told the servants to say he had left town to make the denial more emphatic.”

“It will be a terrible business, I fear, Mr. Bruce.”

“I dread it—on my soul I do. But I cannot shirk this final attempt to save my friend. My presence may tend to help forward a final and full explanation. No matter what the pain to myself, I must be present. Come, it is late already!”

CHAPTER XXVIII SIR CHARLES DYKE’S JOURNEY

The streets were comparatively deserted as they drove quickly up Whitehall and crossed the south side of Trafalgar Square. It is a common belief, even among Londoners themselves, that the traffic is dense in the main thoroughfares at all hours of the night until twelve o’clock has long past.

But to the experienced eye there is a marked hiatus between half-past nine and eleven o’clock. At such a time Charing Cross is negotiable, Piccadilly Circus loses much of its terror, and a hansom may turn out of Regent Street into Oxford Street without the fare being impelled to clutch convulsively at the brass window-slide in a make-believe effort to save the vehicle from being crushed like a walnut shell between two heavy ’buses.

Such considerations did not appeal to the barrister and his companion on this occasion.

For some inexplicable cause they both felt that they were in a desperate hurry.

A momentary stoppage at the turn into Orchard Street caused each man to swear, quite unconsciously. Now that the supreme moment in this most painful investigation was at hand they resented the slightest delay. Though they were barely fifteen minutes in the cab, it seemed an hour before they alighted at Wensley House, Portman Square.

In response to an imperative ring a footman appeared. Instead of answering the barrister’s question as to whether Sir Charles was at home or not, he said: “You are Mr. Bruce, sir, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Sir Charles is at home, but he retired to his room before dinner. He is not well, and he may have gone to bed, but he said that if you came you were to be admitted. I will ask Mr. Thompson.”

“Better send Thompson to me,” said Bruce decisively; and in a minute the old butler stood before him.

“I hear that Sir Charles has retired for the night,” said Claude.

Thompson had caught sight of the detective standing on the steps. A few hours earlier he had himself told him that the baronet was out of town. It was an awkward dilemma, and he coughed doubtingly while he racked his brains for a judicious answer.

But Bruce grasped his difficulty. “It is all right, Thompson. Mr. White quite understands the position. Do you think Sir Charles is in bed?”

“I will go and see, sir. He was very anxious that you should be sent upstairs if you called. But that was when he was in the library.”

Bruce and the detective entered the hall, the butler closed the door behind them, and then solemnly ascended the stairs to Sir Charles Dyke’s bedroom, which was situated on the first floor along a corridor towards the back of the house.

They distinctly heard the polite knock at the door and Thompson’s query, “Are you asleep, Sir Charles?”

After a pause, there was another knock, and the same question in a slightly louder key.

Then the butler returned, saying as he came down the stairs:

“Sir Charles seems to be sound asleep, sir.”

Bruce and the detective exchanged glances. The barrister was disappointed, almost perturbed, but he said:

“In that case we will not disturb him. Sir Charles does not often retire so early.”

“No, sir. I have never known him to go to his room so early before. He told me not to serve dinner, as he wasn’t well. He would not let me get anything for him. He just took some wine, and I have not seen him since.”

“Since when?”

“About 7.30, sir.”

Bruce turned to depart, but Thompson, with the privilege of an old servant when talking to one whom he knew to be on familiar terms with his master, whispered:

“That there blessed maid turned up again this afternoon, sir.”

The barrister started violently.

“Not Jane Harding, surely?”

“Yes, sir. She came at four o’clock and asked for Sir Charles, as bold as brass.”

“Did he see her?”

“Oh yes, sir.”

“Do you hear that, White?”

The detective nodded.

“She must have reached the house about half-an-hour before me,” he said, addressing the butler.

“That’s about right, sir.”

“But I understood,” went on Bruce, “that Sir Charles was not at home to ordinary callers?”

Thompson shuffled about somewhat uneasily. He wished now he had held his tongue.

“I had my orders, sir,” he murmured, in extenuation of his apparently diverse actions.

“Tell me what your orders were,” persisted Bruce.

The man hesitated, not wishful to offend his master’s friend, but too well trained to reveal the explicit instructions given him by Sir Charles Dyke.

“Do not be afraid. I will explain everything to Sir Charles personally. We cannot best judge what to do—whether to wake him or not—unless we know the position,” went on the barrister.

Thus absolved from blame, Thompson took from his waistcoat pocket a folded sheet of notepaper.

“I don’t pretend to understand the reason, sir,” he said, “but Sir Charles wrote this himself, and told me to be careful to obey him exactly.”

The barrister eagerly grasped the note and read: