Jane stood in the dark, her hand upon the door knob. Slowly, very
slowly, she released it. As she leaned there, her head almost touching
the panelling, she could hear two men talking in the hall beyond. They
spoke in English, but only the outer sound of the words came to her.
With an immense effort she straightened herself, and was about to move
away when a thought struck her like a knife-blow—the key—the second
tell-tale key—if she had forgotten it!
Her hand slid back, touched the cold key, turned and withdrew it, moving
with a steady firmness that surprised herself.
Then she made a half-turn and tried to visualise the room as she had
seen it in the light.
Immediately opposite, the cupboard with the looking-glass panel. The
window in the right-hand wall, and the bed between window and cupboard.
At the foot of the bed a chair, and on the same side as the window a
chest of drawers with a looking-glass upon it and Renata’s plain
schoolgirlish brush and comb.
When she had placed everything, Jane began to move forward in the
direction of the window. Her left hand touched the rail of the bed-foot,
her right, groping, brushed the counterpane and rested on something
oddly familiar. Her heart gave a sudden jerk, for this was her own bag,
which Renata should have taken. She opened it with quick, trembling
fingers, took out her handkerchief, and then stuffed the bag right down
inside the bed.
A couple of steps brought her to the window, and she pressed closely to
it, listening, and wished she dared to open it. There was no sound from
outside. She leaned her forehead against the glass, and wondered how
many years had passed since the morning. It seemed impossible for this
day to come to an end.
Then quite suddenly a key turned in the lock, and the door opened, not
widely, but as one opens the door of a room where some one is asleep. A
man’s head was silhouetted against the hall light. Part of his shoulder
showed in a dark overcoat.
He spoke, and a hint of brogue beneath a good deal of American twang
informed Jane that this was her official father.
“Are you awake, Renata?”—and, as he asked the question, a second man
came up behind him and stood there listening.
“Yes,” said Jane, muffling her voice with her handkerchief.
He hesitated a moment, and then said:
“Well, good-night to you”—and the other man, speaking over his shoulder,
said in an easy, cultivated voice without any accent at all:
“Pleasant dreams, Miss Renata.”
Jane’s “Good-night” was just audible and no more, but obviously it
satisfied the two men, for the door was shut, the key turned and
withdrawn, and presently the hall light went out, and the darkness was
absolute and unrelieved, except where the midnight sky showed just less
black than the interior of the room.
After what seemed a long, long time, Jane undressed and got to bed. It
was strange to grope for and find Renata’s neatly folded nightdress.
Presently she lay down, and presently she slept. Time ceased; the day
was over.
She woke suddenly a few hours later. It was still dark. She came broad
awake at once, and sat up in bed as if some one had called to her. Her
mind was full of one horrifying thought.
The plank—what had Arnold done with the plank?
Impossible that he should have helped Renata down the fire-escape and
carried the plank as well, and somehow Jane did not see Arnold troubling
to come back for it.
One thing was certain; if Arnold had left the plank in its compromising
position, it must be removed before daylight.
Jane got out of bed, shivering. She went to the window, opened it, and
leaned out. The yard, mews, wall, and parapet—all were veiled in the
same thick dusk. She strained her eyes, but it was impossible to
distinguish anything. There was nothing for it but to cross that horrid
little hall again, open the window, and make sure.
With the key in her hand, and mingled rage and terror in her heart, she
felt her way to the door, opened it noiselessly, and crossed barefoot to
the window. The hasp was stiff, it creaked, and the window stuck.
Recklessness took possession of Jane. With a jerk she pushed it up; as
it chanced, recklessness made less noise than caution would have done.
She leaned right out, and there, sure enough, was the plank.
Even Jane’s anger could provide her with nothing more cutting than, “How
exactly like Arnold Todhunter.”
She stood quite still and considered.
A bold course was the only one. Remembering the plank’s previous fall
and the perfect calm with which the neighbourhood had received it, she
decided to take the same chance again—only, she must be quick and have
it all planned in her head: first a shove to the plank, then down with
the window and latch it, five steps—no, six—across the hall, and then
her own door, and on no account must she forget the key.
She drew a long breath, leaned out, and pushed. The board was heavier
than she had supposed—harder to move. She had to pull it in, until the
sudden weight and strain told her that it was clear of the coping upon
which the farther end had rested. Then she pushed with all her might,
and as it fell, her hands were on the window quick and steady. Next
moment she was crouching in Renata’s bed, the clothes clutched about
her, the door key cold in her palm. She pushed it far down beneath the
clothes, and sat breathless—listening.
The crash with which the plank had landed seemed to have deafened her,
but as the vibrations died away, she heard, sharp and unmistakable, the
click of a latch and hurrying footsteps.
The next moment her door was opened and her light switched on. Quick as
thought her hand was over her eyes and the sheet up to her chin.
Molloy stood in the doorway, and beyond him the other.
“What’s doing? Did you hear it?” he stammered, and then the other man
pushed him aside.
“I’d like a look from your window if you’ll excuse me, Miss Renata,” he
said, and crossed the room.
As he leaned out, Jane watched him from beneath her hand, and recalled
Renata’s words, “He generally wears a fur coat; they call him Number
Two.” This man wore a fur coat over pale blue silk pyjamas. When he
turned, saying, “I can’t see a thing,” she was ready with her stammered,
“What was it?”
“You heard it, then?” said Molloy.
“Such a fearful crash! It—it frightened me most dreadfully,”—and here
Jane spoke the literal truth.
“I don’t know.” It was Molloy who answered again, but the other man’s
eyes travelled round the room, and a feeling of terror came over Jane.
If she had forgotten anything, if there were one shred of incriminating
evidence, those eyes would miss nothing! She felt as if they must pierce
the bedclothes and see her bag and the hidden key, but he merely nodded
to Molloy, and they left the room, switching out the light and locking
the door.
Jane drew a long breath of relief, turned upon her side, and in five
minutes was asleep again.
The day came in with a thick mist. Jane opened her eyes upon it
sleepily.
She began to think what a strange dream she had had, and then, as sleep
ebbed from her, she remembered that it was not a dream at all. She was
Renata Molloy under lock and key, and in front of her stretched a day
that might be even more crowded with adventure than yesterday.
She jumped out of bed, and as she dressed her eyes brightened and her
courage rose. With Renata’s scissors she unpicked the initials which
marked her underclothes. This was a game at which one must not make a
single slip. Her bag worried her a little, but it was just such a plain
leather bag as any one might possess. She ransacked it carefully, and
frowned over an envelope addressed to Miss Jane Smith. What in the world
was she to do with it?
There were no matches, so it could not be burned. After some thought she
soaked it in water, scratched the name to shreds with a hairpin, and
crumpling the wet paper into a ball, tossed it out of the window.
By the time her door was unlocked, she was very hungry. This time, it
appeared, she was being summoned to bid the departing Mr. Molloy a fond
farewell.
His luggage was already being carried out to the lift, and two or three
men were coming and going. The man in the fur coat stood with his back
to the window, smoking a cigarette. Obviously Molloy’s farewell was not
to be said in private.
Jane looked at him with some curiosity—a tall man, strongly built, with
a bold air and a florid complexion.
It was he who had opened the door, and he stood still holding the handle
and looking, not at Jane, but over her shoulder. For this she felt
grateful.
“Well, well then, I’m off,” said Molloy. “You’ll be a good girl and do
as you’re bid, and I’ll be having you out to keep house for me in less
than no time.”
From what she had seen of Renata, Jane fancied that a sob would meet the
occasion. She therefore sobbed, and pressed her handkerchief to her
eyes.
“There, there,” said Molloy hastily.
He bent and deposited an awkward kiss upon the top of her head. Then he
took his hand from the door and was gone.
The lift gate clanged, and Jane realised that the real adventure had
begun.
The man by the window threw the end of his cigarette into the fireplace
and came towards her.
“Parental devotion is a beautiful thing, isn’t it, Miss Renata? Suppose
we have some breakfast.”
A meal, a proper meal, enough to eat! As she passed into the dining-room
and beheld a ham, coffee, and boiled eggs, Jane felt as if she could
confront any one or anything. Besides, the first trick was hers.
In the full light of day, and under those cold, pale eyes, she had
passed as Renata.
She allowed herself to sigh and dab her eyes, and then—oh, how good was
the rather stale bread, the London egg, and the indifferent ham.
The man watched her quizzically.
As she finished her second cup of coffee, he remarked that she had a
good appetite, and there was something in his tone that cast a chill
upon the proceedings.
Jane pushed back her chair.
“I’ve finished,” she said.
“Well, then,” said the man, “I think we must talk. Yes, sit down again,
please. I won’t keep you very long.”
Jane did as she was told.
“Well, Molloy’s gone,” he said. “You know what that means? He’s washed
his hands of you. Just in case—just in case, you’ve been relying on
Molloy, I would like to point out to you that his own position is none
too secure. The firm he works for has not been entirely satisfied with
him for some time. It is, therefore, quite out of the question that he
should influence any decision that may be come to with regard to
yourself. His going off like this shows that he realises the position
and accepts it. Self-preservation is Molloy’s trump suit, first, last,
and all the time. I shouldn’t advise you to count upon trifles like
parental devotion, or anything of that sort. In a word—he can’t help
you, _but I can_.”
The man leaned forward as he spoke, and a sudden smile changed his
features.
“Just be frank,” he went on. “Tell me what you really heard, and I’ll
see you through.”
Jane let her eyes meet his. That smile had puzzled her; it was so
spontaneous and charming, but it did not reach his eyes.
She looked and found them cold and opaque, and as she looked, she saw
the pupils narrow, expand, and then narrow again.
He got up from his chair, walked to the mantelpiece, stopped for a light
to his cigarette, and came back again with a thin blue haze of smoke
about him.
“Perhaps I haven’t been altogether frank with you,” he said. “That
little romance of mine about a firm of chemists who employ your
father—you didn’t really believe it? No, I thought not. The fact is,
that first night I took you for just a schoolgirl, and one can’t tell
schoolgirls everything. But now, now I’m talking to you as a woman. I
can’t tell you everything, even so, but I can tell you this. It’s a
Government matter, a most important one, and it is vital that I should
know just what you overheard.”
Jane looked down.
“I don’t understand,” she said in a low voice. “I was dreaming and I
waked up suddenly. There was a screen in front of me, and some one on
the other side of the screen called out very loud, ‘The door, the door!’
That’s what I heard.”
She felt the pale eyes upon her face. Then with an abrupt movement the
man came over to her.
“Stand up,” he said.
Jane stood up.
“Look at me.”
Jane looked at him.
After what seemed like a very long time, he threw out his hand with an
impatient gesture. It struck the table edge with a sharp rap, the spring
that held his wrist watch gave, and the watch on its gold curb flew off
and fell on the floor behind Jane.
She turned, glad of an excuse to turn, and bent to pick it up. The back
of the watch was open; her fingers caught and closed it instantly, but
not for nothing had she told Henry that she had gimlet eyes. The back of
the watch contained a photograph, and Jane had seen the photograph
before. Henry’s voice sounded in her ears. “It was done from Amory’s
portrait of her, in 1915—the year of her marriage.”
Number Two, the man in the fur coat, Renata’s “worst of them all,” had
in the back of his watch a photograph of Lady Heritage!
Jane laid the watch on the table without giving it a second glance.