Scarhaven Keep by J. S. Fletcher (best value ebook reader TXT) 📕

Mr. Petherton, who frowned very much and appeared to be greatly disturbed by these irregularities, twisted sharply round on the visitor.

“Where is your father?” he demanded.

“Where you can’t find him!” retorted Addie, with a flash of the eye that lit up her whole face. “So’s Andrius. They’re off, my good sir!⁠—both of ’em. Neither you nor the police can lay hands on ’em now. And you’ll do no good by laying hands on me. Come now,” she went on, “I said I’d come to ask for mercy. But I came for more. This game’s all over! It’s⁠—up. The curtain’s down⁠—at least it’s going down. Why don’t you let me tell you all about it and then we can be friends?”

Mr. Petherton gazed at Addie for a moment as if she were some extraordinary specimen of a new race. Then he took off his glasses, waved them at Sir Cresswell and dropped into a chair with a snort.

“I wash my hands of the whole thing!” he exclaimed. “Do what you like⁠—all of you. Irregular⁠—most irregular!”

Vickers gave Addie a sly look.

“Don’t incriminate yourself, Miss Chatfield,” he said. “There’s no need for you to tell anything against yourself, you know.”

“Me!” exclaimed Addie. “Why, I’ve been playing good angel all day long⁠—me incriminate myself, indeed! If Miss Greyle there only knew what I’d done for her!⁠—look here,” she continued, suddenly turning to Sir Cresswell. “I’ve come to tell all about it. And first of all⁠—every penny of that money that my father drew from the bank has been restored this afternoon.”

“We know that,” said Sir Cresswell.

“Well, that was me!⁠—I engineered that,” continued Addie. “And second⁠—the Pike will be back at Scarhaven during the night, to unload everything that was being carried away. My doing, again! Because, I’m no fool, and I know when a game’s up.”

“So⁠—there was a game?” suggested Vickers.

Addie leaned forward from the chair which Sir Cresswell had given her at the end of the table and planting her elbows on the table edge began to check off her points on the tips of her slender fingers. She was well aware that she had the stage to herself by that time and she showed her consciousness of it.

“You have it,” she answered. “There was a game⁠—and perhaps I know more of it than anybody. I’ll tell now. It began at Bristol. I was playing there. One morning my father fetched me out from rehearsal to tell me that he’d been down to Falmouth to meet the new Squire of Scarhaven, Marston Greyle, and that he found him so ill that they’d had to go to a doctor, who forbade Greyle to travel far at a time. They’d got to Bristol⁠—there, Greyle was so much worse that my father didn’t know what to do with him. He knew that I was in the town, so he came to me. I got Greyle a quiet room at my lodgings. A doctor saw him⁠—he said he was very bad, but he didn’t say that he was in immediate danger. However, he died that very night.”

Addie paused for a moment, and Copplestone and Gilling exchanged glances. So far, this was all known to them⁠—but what was coming?

“Now, I was alone with Greyle for awhile that evening,” continued Addie. “It was while my father was getting some food downstairs. Greyle said to me that he knew he was dying, and he gave me a pocketbook in which he said all his papers were: he said I could give it to my father. I believe he became unconscious soon after that; anyway, he never mentioned that pocketbook to my father. Neither did I. But after Greyle was dead I examined its contents carefully. And when I was in London at the end of the week, I showed them to⁠—my husband.”

Addie again paused, and at least two of the men glanced at each other with a look of surprise. “Her⁠—husband! Who the⁠—”

“The fact is,” she went on suddenly, “Captain Andrius is my husband. But nobody knew that⁠—not even my own father. We’ve been married three years⁠—I met him when I was crossing over to America once. We got married⁠—we kept the marriage secret for reasons of our own. Well, he met me in London the Sunday after Greyle’s death, and I showed him the papers which were in Greyle’s pocketbook. And⁠—now this, of course, was where it was very wicked in me⁠—and him⁠—though we’ve tried to make up for it today, anyhow⁠—we fixed up what I suppose you two gentlemen would call a conspiracy. My husband had a brother, an actor⁠—not up to much, nor of much experience⁠—who had been brought up in the States and who was then in town, doing nothing. We took him into confidence, coached him up in everything, furnished him with all the papers in the pocketbook, and resolved to pass him off as the real Marston Greyle.”

Mr. Petherton stirred angrily in his chair and turned a protesting face on Sir Cresswell.

“Apart from being irregular,” he exclaimed, “this is altogether outrageous! This woman is openly boasting of conspiracy and⁠—”

“You’re wrong!” said Addie. “I’m not boasting⁠—I’m explaining. You ought to be obliged to me. And⁠—”

“If Mrs. Andrius⁠—to give the lady her real name⁠—cares to unburden her secrets to us, I really don’t see why we shouldn’t listen to them, Mr. Petherton,” observed Vickers. “It simplifies matters greatly.”

“That’s what I say,” agreed Addie. “I’m done with all this and I want to clear things up, whatever comes of it. Well⁠—I say we fixed that up with my brother-in-law.”

“His name⁠—his real name, if you please,” inquired Vickers.

“Oh⁠—ah!⁠—well, his real name was Martin Andrius, but he’d another name for the stage,” replied Addie. “We gave him the papers and arranged for him to go down to Scarhaven to my father. Now I want to assure you all, right here, that my father never did really know that Martin was an imposter. He began to suspect something at the end, but he didn’t know for a fact. Martin went down to him