The Mystery of a Hansom Cab by Fergus Hume (autobiographies to read txt) 📕

“he said he wanted to see Mr. Frettlby particularly, so I took him up to the study.”

“But I thought that papa said he was not to be disturbed?”

“Yes, miss, but the gentleman had an appointment with him.”

“Poor papa,” sighed Madge, turning again to the piano. “He has always got such a lot to do.”

Left to themselves, Madge began playing Waldteufel’s last new valse, a dreamy, haunting melody, with a touch of sadness in it, and Brian, lying lazily on the sofa, listened. Then she sang a gay little French song about Love and a Butterfly, with a mocking refrain, which made Brian laugh.

“A memory of Offenbach,” he said, rising and coming over to the piano. “We certainly can’t approach the French in writing these airy trifles.”

“They’re unsatisfactory, I think,” said Madge, running her fingers over the keys; “they mean nothing.”

“Of course not,” he replied, “but don’t you remember that De Quincy says there is no moral either big or little in the Iliad.”

“Well, I think there’s more music in Barbara Allan than all those frothy things,” said Madge, with fine scorn. “Come and sing it.”

“A five-act funeral, it is,” groaned Brian, as he rose to obey; “let’s have Garry Owen instead.”

Nothing else however would suit the capricious young person at the piano, so Brian, who had a pleasant voice, sang the quaint old ditty of cruel Barbara Allan, who treated her dying love with such disdain.

“Sir John Graham was an ass,” said Brian, when he had finished; “or, instead of dying in such a silly manner, he’d have married her right off, without asking her permission.”

“I don’t think she was worth marrying,” replied Madge, opening a book of Mendelssohn’s duets; “or she wouldn’t have made such a fuss over her health not being drunk.”

“Depend upon it, she was a plain woman,” remarked Brian, gravely, “and was angry because she wasn’t toasted among the rest of the country belles. I think the young man had a narrow escape—she’d always have reminded him about that unfortunate oversight.”

“You seem to have analysed her nature pretty well,” said Madge, a little dryly; “however, we’ll leave the failings of Barbara Allan alone, and sing this.”

This was Mendelssohn’s charming duet, “Would that my Love,” which was a great favourite of Brian’s. They were in the middle of it when suddenly Madge stopped, as she heard a loud cry, evidently proceeding from her father’s study. Recollecting Dr. Chinston’s warning, she ran out of the room, and upstairs, leaving Brian rather puzzled by her unceremonious departure, for though he had heard the cry, yet he did not attach much importance to it.

Madge knocked at the study door, and then she tried to open it, but it was locked.

“Who’s there?” asked her father, sharply, from inside.

“Only me, papa,” she answered. “I thought you were—”

“No! No—I’m all right,” replied her father, quickly. “Go down stairs, I’ll join you shortly.”

Madge went back to the drawingroom only half satisfied with the explanation. She found Brian waiting at the door, with rather an anxious face.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, as she paused a moment at the foot of the stairs.

“Papa says nothing,” she replied, “but I am sure he must have been startled, or he would not have cried out like that.”

She told him what Dr. Chinston had said about the state of her father’s heart, a recital which shocked Brian greatly. They did not return to the drawingroom, but went out on the verandah, where, after wrapping a cloak around Madge, Fitzgerald lit a cigarette. They sat down at the far end of the verandah somewhat in the shadow, and could see the hall door wide open, and a warm flood of mellow light pouring therefrom, and beyond the cold, white moonshine. After about a quarter of an hour, Madge’s alarm about her father having somewhat subsided, they were chatting on indifferent subjects, when a man came out of the hall door, and paused for a moment on the steps of the verandah. He was dressed in rather a fashionable suit of clothes, but, in spite of the heat of the night, he had a thick white silk scarf round his throat.

“That’s rather a cool individual,” said Brian, removing his cigarette from between his lips. “I wonder what—Good God!” he cried, rising to his feet as the stranger turned round to look at the house, and took off his hat for a moment—“Roger Moreland.”

The man started, and looked quickly round into the dark shadow of the verandah where they were seated, then, putting on his hat, he ran quickly down the path, and they heard the gate clang after him.

Madge felt a sudden fear at the expression on Brian’s face, as revealed by a ray of moonlight streaming full on it.

“Who is Roger Moreland?” she asked, touching his arm—“Ah! I remember,” with sudden horror, “Oliver Whyte’s friend.”

“Yes,” in a hoarse whisper, “and one of the witnesses at the trial.”

 

CHAPTER XXIX.

 

MR. CALTON’S CURIOSITY IS SATISFIED.

 

There was not much sleep for Brian that night. He left Madge almost immediately, and went home, but he Aid not go to bed. He felt too anxious and ill at ease to sleep, and passed the greater part of the night walking up and down his room, occupied with his own sad thoughts. He was wondering in his own mind what could be the meaning of Roger Moreland’s visit to Mark Frettlby. All the evidence that he had given at the trial was that he had met Whyte, and had been drinking with him during the evening. Whyte then went out, and that was the last Moreland had seen of him. Now, the question was, “What did he go to see Mark Frettlby for?” He had no acquaintance with him, and yet he called by appointment. It is true he might have been in poverty, and the millionaire being well-known as an extremely generous man, Moreland might have called on him for money. But then the cry which Frettlby had given after the interview had lasted a short time proved that he had been startled. Madge had gone upstairs and found the door locked, her father refusing her admission. Now, why was he so anxious Moreland should not be seen by any one? That he had made some startling revelation was certain, and Fitzgerald felt sure that it was in connection with the hansom cab murder case. He wearied himself with conjectures about the matter, and towards daybreak threw himself, dressed as he was, on the bed, and slept heavily till twelve o’clock the next day. When he arose and looked at himself in the glass, he was startled at the haggard and worn appearance of his face. The moment he was awake his mind went back to Mark Frettlby and the visit of Roger Moreland.

“The net is closing round him,” he murmured to himself. “I don’t see how he can escape. Oh! Madge! Madge! if only I could spare you the bitterness of knowing what you must know, sooner or later, and that other unhappy girl—the sins of the fathers will be visited on the children—God help them.”

He took his bath, and, after dressing himself, went into his sitting-room, where he had a cup of tea, which refreshed him considerably. Mrs. Sampson came crackling merrily upstairs with a letter, and gave vent to an exclamation of surprise, on seeing his altered appearance.

“Lor, sir!” she exclaimed, “what ‘ave you bin a-doin’—me knowin’ your ‘abits know’d as you’d gone to bed, not to say as it’s very temptin’ in this ‘ot weather, but with excuses, sir, you looks as if you ‘adn’t slept a blessed wink.”

“No, more I have,” said Brian, listlessly holding out his. hand for the letter. “I was walking up and down my room all last night—I must have walked miles.”

“Ah! ‘ow that puts me in mind of my pore ‘usband,” chirped the cricket; “bein’ a printer, and accustomed like a howl to the darkness, when ‘e was ‘ome for the night ‘e walked up and down till ‘e wore out the carpet, bein’ an expensive one, as I ‘ad on my marriage, an’ the only way I could stop ‘im was by givin’ ‘im something soothin’, which you, sir, ought to try—whisky ‘ot, with lemon and sugar—but I’ve ‘eard tell as chloroform—”

“No, d—it,” said Brian, hastily, startled out of his politeness, “I’ve had enough of that.”

“Achin’ teeth, no doubt,” said the landlady, going to the door, “which I’m often taken that way myself, decayed teeth runnin’ in the family, tho’, to be sure, mine are stronger than former, a lodger of mine ‘avin’ bin a dentist, an’ doin’ them beautiful, instead of payin’ rent, not avin’ ready cash, his boxes bein’ filled with bricks on ‘is departure from the ‘ouse.”

As Brian did not appear particularly interested in these domestic reminiscences, and seemed as if he wanted to be left alone, Mrs. Sampson, with a final crackle, went down stairs and talked with a neighbour in the kitchen, as to the desirability of drawing her money out of the Savings Bank, in case the Russians should surprise and capture Melbourne. Brian, left alone, stared out of the window at the dusty road and the black shadows cast by the tall poplars in front of the house.

“I must leave this place,” he said to himself; “every chance remark seems to bear on the murder, and I’m not anxious to have it constantly by my Bide like the skeleton at the feast.”

Suddenly he recollected the letter which he held in his hand, and which he now looked at for the first time. It proved to be from Madge, and tearing it open hastily, he read it.

“I cannot understand what is the matter with papa,” she wrote.

“Ever since that man Moreland left last night, he hae shut himself up in his study, and is writing there hour after hour. I went up this morning, but he would not let me in. He did not come down to breakfast, and I am getting seriously alarmed Come down to-morrow and see me, for I am anxious about his state of health, and I am sure that Moreland told him something which has upset him.”

“Writing,” said Brian, as he put the letter in his pocket, “what about, I wonder? Perhaps he is thinking of committing suicide! if so, I for one will not stop him. It is a horrible thing to do, but it would be acting for the best under the circumstances.”

In spite of his determination to see Calton and tell all, Fitzgerald did not go near him that day. He felt ill and weary, the want of sleep, and mental worry, telling on him terribly, and he looked ten years older than he did before the murder of Whyte. It is trouble which draws lines on the smooth forehead and furrows round the mouth. If a man has any mental worry, his life becomes a positive agony to him. Mental tortures are quite as bad as physical ones, if not worse. The last thing before dropping off to sleep is the thought of trouble, and with the first faint light of dawn, it returns and hammers all day at the weary brain. But while a man can sleep, life is rendered at least endurable; and of all the blessings which Providence has bestowed, there is none so precious as that same sleep, which, as wise Sancho Panza says, “Wraps every man like a cloak.” Brian felt the need of rest, so sending a telegram to Calton to call on him in the morning, and another to Madge, that he would be down to luncheon next day, he stayed indoors all day, and amused himself with smoking and reading. He went to bed