face.
"Streatham, did you say!" he cried. "There seems to be witchery about
the business. Don't tell me that you left the plant in care of a man
called----"
The Shan grabbed for an early edition of an evening paper which
fluttered in his hand like a leaf in a breeze. He found what he wanted
presently and began to read half aloud.
"Yesterday evening Thomas Silverthorne, caretaker at the Lennox Nursery,
Streatham---- Look here, Denvers, read it for yourself. At the Lennox
nursery a man was found dead, murdered by having a rope placed round his
neck, and held there till he was strangled. Silverthorne says there was
a rare orchid or two in the house, and that one of them had been pulled
down and probably stolen. Now if you tell me that your 'Moth' was
placed there, I shall want to murder you."
Harold rose, his face was disturbed and uneasy.
"It is as you imagine," he said. "I did place the 'Moth' there the
night before last. And I would have taken my oath that nobody knew that
the plant was in England, I'll go to Streatham at once; I'll get to the
bottom of this strange mystery."
"Count Lefroy is sorry," murmured the soft-footed servant, as he looked
in, "but he hopes your Highness will see him now as he can wait no
longer."
*CHAPTER V.*
*AN INTERRUPTED FEAST.*
To Frobisher's _petit diner_ the same evening of that eventful day
ostensibly to meet the Shan of Koordstan, Lefroy came large and
flamboyant, with a vivid riband across his dazzling expanse of shirt and
a jewelled collar under his tie. There was an extra gloss on his black
moustache, his swagger was a little more pronounced than usual. He
looked like what he was--a strong man weighed down by not too many
scruples.
There were less than a dozen men altogether, a couple of well-known
members of the Travellers', a popular K.C., and a keen, hatchet-faced
judge with a quiet manner and a marvellous faculty for telling dialect
stories. The inevitable politician and fashionable doctor completed the
party. As Lefroy and his secretary entered the drawing-room most of the
men were admiring a portfolio of Morland's drawings that Frobisher had
picked up lately.
Hafid stepped noiselessly across the floor with a telegram on a salver.
Frobisher read it without the slightest sign of annoyance.
"The Shan is not coming," he said. "Koordstan is indisposed."
"So I gathered when I called professionally this afternoon," Dr.
Brownsmith said dryly.
"Champagne," Frobisher laughed whole-heartedly. "All right, Sir James.
I won't question you too far. So white is not going to mate in three
moves this evening, Lefroy?"
Lefroy shrugged his shoulders carelessly. The Shan of Koordstan was
safe for the present. He had seen to that. Manfred had dropped quietly
into a chair with just the suggestion of pain on his face. A
smooth-voiced butler announced that dinner was served.
"Where does Frobisher get his servants from, Jessop?" Sir James
Brownsmith asked the judge, as the two strolled across the hall
together. "Now there's a model of a butler for you. His voice has a
flavour of old, nutty sherry about it. By Jove, what are those
flowers?"
There were flowers everywhere, mostly arranged by Frobisher himself. In
the centre was a rough handful of green twigs bound together with a
silver cord, and the whole surmounted by a coil of the pinky-white
orchid with its fringe of trembling red moths.
"Orchids," said the politician. "Something fresh, Frobisher? What do
you call it?"
"The specimen is not named at present," Lefroy said meaningly.
Frobisher glanced at the speaker and smiled.
"Lefroy is quite right," he said. "The specimen lacks a name. It came
in the first place from Koordstan, and there were three spines of the
original plant. It is a freak, there never was anything like it before,
and there will probably never be one like it again. That self-same
orchid was very near to being the price of a kingdom once upon a time."
"Only it is unfortunately impossible to tell the story," Lefroy
remarked.
Once again Frobisher glanced at the speaker and smiled. Most of the
guests by this time were busy over their soup. They were not the class
of men to waste valuable sentiment over flowers. It was only Frobisher
who glanced from time to time lovingly at the Cardinal Moth. Manfred
seemed to avoid it altogether. He sat at the table eating nothing and
obviously out of sorts with his food.
"I've a bilious headache, Sir Clement," he explained. "The mere sight
of food and smell of cooking makes me sick to the soul. Would you mind
if I sat in the drawing-room in the dark for a little time? I am
confident that the attack will pass off presently."
"Anything you please, my dear fellow," Frobisher cried hospitably. "A
strong cup of tea! A glass of champagne and a dry biscuit? No? If you
ring the bell Hafid will attend to you."
Hafid salaamed as he dexterously caught a meaning glance from Frobisher.
Lefroy brutally proclaimed aloud that a good dinner was utterly wasted
upon Manfred. Brownsmith with his mouth full of aspic was understood to
say something anent the virtues of bromide. So the dinner proceeded
with pink lakes of light on the table, the flowers and the cut glass and
quaint silver. And there were blossoms, blossoms everywhere, thousands
of them. Frobisher might have been a great scoundrel--that he was a man
of exquisite taste was beyond question. The elaborate dinner dragged
smoothly along, two hours passed, a silver chime proclaimed eleven
o'clock.
The cloth was drawn at length, as the host's whim was, the decanters and
glittering glass stood on a brown glistening lake of polished oak, with
here and there a dash of fruit to give a more vivid touch of colour.
Hafid handed round a silver cigarette-box, a cedar cigar cabinette on
wheels was pushed along the table. Over the shaded electric lights a
blue wrack of smoke hung. The silver chime struck twelve.
"Hafid; you have made Mr. Manfred comfortable?" Frobisher asked.
Hafid replied that he had done all that a man could do. Mr. Manfred was
reclining in the dark near an open window. All the other servants but
himself had retired. The butler had seen that everything necessary was
laid out in the smoking-room.
"Always send the servants to bed as soon as possible," Frobisher
explained. "What with the spread of modern journalism, I find it
necessary. You never know nowadays how far one's butler is interested in
the same stock that you are deeply dipped in. And a long-eared footman
has changed the course of diplomacy before now."
"If everybody pursued the same policy, George," Baron Jessop murmured,
"I and my learned friends of the Bench would have more or less of a
sinecure."
"And Lord Saltaur, yonder would not have lost a beautiful wife," Lefroy
said loudly.
A sudden hush seemed to smite the table. Lord Saltaur whitened to his
lips under his tan; his long, lean hands gripped the edge of the table
passionately. His own domestic scandal had been so new, so painful,
that the whole party stood aghast at the brutality of the insult.
"Frobisher," Saltaur said, hoarsely. "It is not pleasant to be insulted
by a blackguard----"
"What was that word?" Lefroy asked quite sweetly. "My hearing may be a
trifle deficient, but I fancied his lordship said something about a
blackguard."
Frobisher interfered as in duty bound. As a matter of fact he was
enjoying the situation. Lefroy had drunk deeply, but then he had seen
Lefroy's amazing prowess in that direction too many times for any fears
as to his ultimate equilibrium. No, Lefroy was playing some deep game.
As yet only the first card had been laid upon the table.
"I think that the apology lies with you, Count," Frobisher said
tentatively.
"A mere jest," Lefroy said, airily. "A _jeu d'esprit_. Lord Saltaur's
wife."
"You hound!" Saltaur cried passionately. "Whatever I have been, you
might leave the name of a pure woman out of your filthy conversation.
If you don't apologise at once, I'll thrust your words down your throat
for you."
A contemptuous reply came from Lefroy. There was a flash of crystal and
a glass shattered on the Count's dark face, leaving a star-shaped wound
on his cheek. A moment later and he and Saltaur were struggling
together like wild animals. Frobisher had so far forgotten himself as to
lean back in his chair as if this were a mere exhibition got up for his
entertainment.
"Is this part of the evening's amusement, Sir Clement?" the judge asked
coldly.
Frobisher realised his responsibilities with a sigh for his interrupted
pleasure. His civilisation was the thinnest possible veneer, a shoddy
thing like Tottenham Court Road furniture.
"Come, you chaps must drop it," he cried. "I can't have you fighting
over my Smyrna carpet. Saltaur, you shall have your apology. Lefroy, do
you hear me?"
Strong arms interfered, and the two men were dragged apart. Lefroy's
teeth glistened in a ghastly grin; there was a speck of blood on his
white shirt front. Saltaur's laboured breathing could be heard all over
the room.
"I take you all to witness that it was no seeking of mine," he cried.
"I was foully insulted. In a few days all the world will know that I
have been made the victim of a discharged servant's perjury. Frobisher,
I am still waiting for my apology."
Lefroy paused and passed his handkerchief across his face. He seemed to
have wiped the leering expression from it. He looked a perfect picture
of puzzled bewilderment.
"What have I done?" he asked. "What on earth have I said?"
"Beautiful," Frobisher murmured. "Artistic to a fault. What is he
driving at?"
Baron Jessop explained clearly and judiciously. He was glad to have an
opportunity of doing so. Viewing the thing dispassionately, he was bound
to say that Count Lefroy had been guilty of a grave breach of good
taste. But he was quite sure that under the circumstances----
"On my honour, I haven't the slightest recollection of it," Lefroy
cried. "If there is one lady of my acquaintance I honour and respect it
is Lady ---- the charming woman whom Lord Saltaur calls his wife. A
sudden fit of mental aberration, my lord. An old wound in the head
followed by a spell in the sunshine. This is the third time the thing
has happened. The last time in Serbia nearly cost me my life. My dear
Saltaur, I am sorry from the bottom of my heart."
"Funniest case I ever heard of," the puzzled Saltaur murmured. "All the
same, I'm deuced sorry I threw that wine glass at you."
"Oh, so you chucked a wine glass at me! Laid my cheek open, too. Well,
I should have done exactly the same thing under the same circumstances.
From this night I touch nothing stronger than claret. If I'd stuck to
that, this wouldn't have happened."
The good-humoured Saltaur muttered something in reply, the threads of
the dropped conversation were taken up again. Hafid, who had watched
the sudden quarrel with Oriental indifference, had gone off to the
conservatory for hot water to bathe Lefroy's damaged face. There was
just a lull for a moment in the conversation, a sudden silence, and then
the smash of a crystal vessel on a tiled floor and a strangled cry of
terror from Hafid. He came headlong into the room, his eyes starting,
his whole frame quivering with an ungovernable terror.
"Mr. Manfred," he yelled. "Lying on the floor in the conservatory,
dead. Take it and burn it, and destroy it. Take it and burn it, and
destroy it. Take it----"
Frobisher pounced upon the wailing speaker and clutched him by the
throat. As the first hoarse words came from Hafid the rest of the party
had rushed headlong into the orchid-house. Frobisher shook his servant
like a reed is shaken by a storm.
"Silence, you fool!" he whispered. "You didn't kill the man, and I
didn't kill the man. If he is dead he has not been murdered. And it is
no fault of yours."
"Allah knows better," Hafid muttered, sulkily. "You didn't kill him, and
I didn't kill him, but he is dead, and Allah will punish the guilty.
Take it and burn it, and----"
"Idiot! Son of a pig, be silent. And mind, you are to know nothing.
You went to get the hot water from the orchid-house and saw Mr. Manfred
lying there. As soon as you did so you rushed in to tell us. Now come
along."
The limp body of Manfred had been partly raised, and his head rested on
Sir James Brownsmith's knee. The others stood waiting for the verdict.
"The fellow is dead," the great doctor said. "Murdered, I should say,
undoubtedly. He has been strangled by a coarse cloth twisted about his
throat--precisely the same way as that poor fellow was murdered at
Streatham the night before last."
A solemn silence fell upon the group. Hafid stood behind, his lips
moving in silent speech:
"Take it and burn it, and destroy it. Take it and burn it, and destroy
it, for there is blood upon it now and ever."
The drama was none the less moving because of its decorous silence. The
great surgeon knelt on the white marble floor of the orchid-house with
Manfred's head on his knee. Though Sir James Brownsmith's hand was
quite steady, his face was white as his own hair, or the face of the
dead man staring dumbly up to the tangle of ropes and blossoms overhead.
There the Cardinal Moth was dancing and quivering as if exulting over
the crime. A long trail of it had broken away, and one tiny cloud of
blossom danced near the surgeon's ear, as if trying to tell him the
tragedy and its story.
"A ghastly business," the judge murmured. "How did the murderer get in
here?"
"How did he get out?" Frobisher suggested. "There is no exit from here
at all. All the servants have been in bed long ago, and the front door
is generally secured, at least the latch is always down."
"But what brought poor Manfred in here?" Saltaur asked. "I understood
from Hafid that he was lying down in the drawing-room. Oh, Hafid! Wake
up, man!"
"Take it and burn it, and destroy it," Hafid said mechanically.
Frobisher shook him savagely, shook the dreamy horror off him like a
garment. He was sorry, he said, but he could tell the excellent company
nothing. A quarter of an hour before and Mr. Manfred had appeared to be
asleep on the drawing-room sofa. Hafid had asked him if he needed
anything, and he had made no reply.
"Very strange," Sir James murmured, still diagnosing the cruel stranded
pattern about the dead man's throat. "Perhaps Count Lefroy--where is
the Count?"
"He went back into the dining-room," said Saltaur.
Frobisher brought his teeth together with a click. For the moment he
had quite forgotten Count Lefroy. He passed from the library and into
the dining-room. Lefroy stood by the great shining table close against
the fluttering pyramid of red moths, a thin-bladed knife in his hands.
"And what might you be doing?" Frobisher asked softly.
Lefroy smiled somewhat bitterly. He was perfectly self-possessed with
the grip of the man who knows how to hold himself in hand. And he
smiled none the less easily because there was murder raging in his
heart.
"I am cutting my nails," he said.
"Oh, I'll cut your claws for you!" Frobisher said. "Don't do that, what
will your manicure artist say? And a social superiority (feminine)
tells me that you have the finest hand of any man in London. You are
unhinged, my dear Count. This little affair----"
"This cold-blooded murder you mean. Oh, you scoundrel!"
Lefroy had dropped the mask for a moment. There was contempt, loathing,
horror in the last few words. Frobisher, counting the nodding swarm of
crimson moths, merely smiled.
"Twenty-seven, thirty-one, thirty-nine," he said. "You haven't stolen
any of my flowers yet. Not a bad idea of yours to purloin a cluster, and
send it to our tin Solomon yonder, as an earnest of good intentions
later on. And why do you call me scoundrel?"
"You are the most infernal villain that ever breathed."
"Well, perhaps I am. It is very good of you to admit my superior
claims, dear Lefroy. But I am getting old, and you may live to take my
place some day. Why----"
"Why did you kill Manfred?"
"My dear fellow, I didn't kill Manfred. You think he has been murdered
in the ordinary sense of the word. Manfred has not been murdered, and
nobody will ever be hanged for the crime. That you may take my word
for. It is the vengeance of the Crimson Moth, death by visitation of
God; call it what you will. And it might have been yourself."
Frobisher's whole manner had changed, his eyes were gleaming evilly as
he hissed the last words warningly in Lefroy's ear. The latter changed
colour slightly.
"I don't understand what you mean," he stammered.
"And yet you are not usually slow at understanding. I repeat that it
might have been yourself. If you had attempted the raid of the Cardinal
Moth, instead of Manfred, you would have been lying at the present
moment with your head on Brownsmith's knees, and the mark of the beast
about your throat."
"And if I tell those fellows yonder what you say?"
"You are at liberty to say anything you please. But you are not going to
say anything, my dear Lefroy; you are too fine a player for that. You
are going to wait patiently for your next innings. Come back to the
others. And perhaps I had better lock this door."
Lefroy, like a wise man, accepted the inevitable. But the rest of the
party were no longer in the orchid-house. They had carried the dead man
to the back dining-room, where they had laid him out on a couch.
Frobisher rang up the nearest police-station on the telephone with the
request that an inspector should be sent for at once.
"By gad, this is a dreadful thing, don't you know!" Saltaur said with a
shudder. "Fancy that poor fellow being murdered whilst we were
wrangling in the dining-room. I suppose there is no doubt that it is
murder, doctor?"
"Not the shadow of a doubt about it," Sir James replied. "Poor Manfred
must have been admiring the flowers when the assassin stepped behind him
and threw that coarse cloth over his head. A knee could be inserted on
his spine, and the head forced backwards. The cloth must have been
twisted with tremendous force. It is quite a novel kind of murder for
England."
"Oh, then you have heard of something of the same kind before?"
Frobisher asked.
"In India, frequently. I had a chance to examine more than one victim
of Thugee, yonder. You remember what a scourge Thugism used to be in
India some years ago. A Thug killed Manfred, I have not the slightest
doubt about it."
"But there are no Thugs in England," the judge protested.
"My dear fellow, I have had an unfortunate demonstration to the
contrary. And this crime is not necessarily the work of a native.
Thugee is not dead in India yet, and some white scoundrel might have
learnt the trick. Your own servant, Hafid----"
"A robust bluebottle would make a formidable antagonist for Hafid,"
Frobisher interrupted. "Hafid, somebody is ringing the bell. If it's a
policeman, ask him in."
Inspector Townsend came in, small, quiet, soft of manner, and
undoubtedly dressed in Bond Street. He listened gravely to all that
Frobisher and Brownsmith had to say, and then he asked permission to
view the body, and subsequently examine the premises.
A close search of the house only served to deepen the mystery. All the
servants slept on the top floor, and that part of the house was bolted
off every night after the domestic staff had retired. This was a whim of
Sir Clement's, a whim likely to increase his unpopularity in case of
fire, but at present that was a secondary consideration. There was no
exit from the orchid-house, no windows had been left open, and despite
the fact that there were guests in the house, the front-door latch had
been dropped quite early in the evening. A rigid cross-examination of
Hafid led to no satisfactory result. The man was almost congealed with
terror and shock, but it was quite obvious that he knew nothing whatever
about the mystery.
"There will be an inquest to-morrow at twelve, Sir Clement," Townsend
said. "It will probably be a mere formal affair at which you gentlemen
will be present. Good night, sirs."
"We had better follow the inspector's example," Lefroy cried. "Good
night, Frobisher."
"My dear fellow, I wish you a cordial adieu," Frobisher cried. "And I
can only regret that our pleasant evening has had so tragic a
termination. Townsend, you have locked up the back dining-room and taken
the key? Good! I want no extra responsibility."
The big hall-door closed behind the last of them. Frobisher took Hafid
firmly by the collar and led him into the orchid-house.
"Now, you rascal," he asked, "what on earth do you mean by it?"
"Take it and destroy it, and burn it," Hafid wailed, with a wriggling of
his body. He seemed to be trying to shake off something loathsome. "Oh,
master, what is to become of us?"
"You grovelling, superstitious fool," Frobisher said lightly. "Nothing
will become of us. Nobody knows anything, nobody will ever know anything
as long as you remain silent. We haven't murdered anybody!"
"Allah looking down from Paradise knows better than that, master!"
"Well, he is not likely to be called in as a witness," Frobisher
muttered grimly. "I tell you nothing has happened that the law can take
the least cognisance of. Mind you, I didn't know that things would go
quite so far. When I rang up the curtain it was comedy I looked for,
not tragedy. Take the key and go into the dining-room. Remove those
orchids and burn them, taking care that you destroy thirty-nine of the
red flowers. Then you can go to bed."
Hafid recoiled with unutterable loathing on his face.
"I couldn't do it," he whispered. "I couldn't touch one of those
accursed blossoms. Beat me, torture me, turn me into the street to
starve, but don't ask me to do that, master. I dare not."
He cowered abjectly at Frobisher's feet. With good-humoured contempt
the latter kicked him aside. "Go to bed," he said. "You are a greater
coward than even I imagined. Put the lights out, and I'll go to bed
also."
The lights were carefully put out, except in the smoking-room, where
Frobisher sat pondering over the strange events of the evening. He was
not in the least put out or alarmed or distressed; on the contrary, he
looked like a man who had been considerably pleased with an interesting
entertainment. For Manfred he felt neither sorrow nor sympathy.
He did not look fearfully round the room as if half expecting to see the
shadow of Manfred's assassin creeping upon him. But he smiled in his
own peculiar fashion as the door opened and a white-robed figure came
in. It was Angela with her fine hair about her shoulders and a look of
horror in her eyes.
"So you've found out all about it," Sir Clement said. "I'm sorry,
because it will spoil your rest. How did you come to make the
discovery?"
"I had just come in," Angela explained. "I let myself in with my
latchkey. I did not come near you because I could hear that you were
entertaining company, so I went straight to bed. Then I heard Hafid's
cry, and I came to the head of the stairs where I could hear
everything."
"You mean to say that you stood there and listened?"
"I couldn't help it. So far as I could judge there was an assassin in
the house. Just for the moment I was far too frightened to move. That
raving madman might have come for me next."
"Well, you can make your mind quite easy on that score. As you know,
the whole house has been most thoroughly searched from top to bottom,
and there is nobody here but the servants and ourselves now. If I were
you I should keep out of it. Go to bed."
Sir Clement barked out the last few words, but Angela did not move.
"There will be an inquest, of course?" she asked.
"Oh, Lord, yes! The papers will reek of it, and half the reporters in
London will look upon the place as a kind of public-house for the next
week. Take my advice and keep out of it. You know nothing and you want
to continue to know nothing, so to speak."
"But I am afraid that I know a great deal," Angela said slowly. "When I
came in I was going into the conservatory to place a flower that I had
given me to-night. It is a flower that I am likely to be interested in
another time. And there I saw a strange man walking swiftly the same
way. From his air and manner he was obviously doing wrong. My idea was
to follow and stop him. And when I reached the conservatory, to my
intense surprise, he was nowhere to be seen."