“Yes!--Who’s there?”
“Is that Mrs. Godwin’s?--I want Miss Lucille Godwin.”
“I’ll go and fetch her; what name, please?”
“Ask her to be quick--I’ve something very important to say to her.” I
ignored the question; the person at the other end departed. Apparently
I had hit upon the right Godwin the first time of asking. I waited for
several seconds; suddenly the sound of a girlish voice reached my
ears.
“Yes?--Who are you?--What do you want?--I’m in a hurry--I’ve got an
appointment--I’m just rushing off to keep it.”
“You are going to Isolda.”
There was a note of surprise in the clear young voice.
“How do you know that? Who are you? I don’t recognize your voice. To
whom am I speaking?”
“You are wearing a sprig of white heather for luck.”
“Who told you that?--What do you mean?--Whoever are you?”
“I want you to pay particular attention to what Isolda says to you. He
has been told to tell you that your sister Elsie really died of a
broken heart, because she was in love with a Mr. Harvey.”
“Good gracious!--Who told you that? Will you tell me who you are!”
“He has also been told to tell you that your fate is mixed up with a
short, square man, with red cheeks and blue eyes, whom you will
recognize from his description.”
“Why, that’s George Ratton; this is awful! Before you say another word
will you please tell me who you are?”
“He’s also been told to tell you that you once cheated at baccarat.”
“Oh!” A shriek came over the wire. “Please--please tell me who you
are.”
“Also that you owe money for bets; that cornflowers are your favourite
flowers, and that you carry a cornflower about with you for luck.
Isolda has been told these things about you in order that he may
convey to you the idea that he has occult powers which he doesn’t
possess. The blue-eyed person has proposed to you five times; he
hopes, with Isolda’s help, that you will accept him at the sixth time
of asking. Be on your guard. Good-bye.”
I hung up the receiver and walked away. Something had constrained me
to give Miss Lucille Godwin a friendly warning; a man who could
conspire with such a creature as Isolda against the girl he professed
to love was the kind of person one ought to be warned against. Having
conveyed that warning I felt that I had done all that was required of
an utter stranger. I did not wait for Miss Godwin’s acknowledgments; I
left her to act on the hint I had given, or to ignore it, as she
chose.
Some days afterwards I was glancing down the advertisement columns of
a daily paper when these words caught my eye:
“Will the stranger who sent the telephone message to L.G., about
two-fifteen on Friday last, communicate at once with L.G. at her
address, and so render a very great service.”
“L.G.”? I considered a moment. Clearly those were the initials of
Lucille Godwin. About two-fifteen on the previous Friday I had sent a
telephone message to Lucille Godwin. Could the advertisement refer to
me? I was reading the paper in my own sitting-room, after breakfast;
there was a telephone at my elbow--I should not be likely to do much
harm by ascertaining. I again looked up Miss Godwin’s number; found
it; and was presently informed that the connection was made. There
came, unless I was mistaken, the same voice over the wire.
“Yes, who are you?”
“Can I speak to Miss Lucille Godwin?”
“I don’t know about Miss Lucille, but I dare say you can speak to Miss
May. What name, please?”
“If Miss Lucille can’t come, send Miss May.” I wondered why Miss
Lucille could not come. All at once there came a voice which was very
like the one I had heard on Friday, but not quite the same.
“Yes? Who are you? I am May Godwin.”
“Do you happen to know anything about an advertisement which appears
in to-day’s _Morning Post_?”
“Oh dear, are you the person who telephoned on Friday? Please tell me
who you are. Come and see me, or let me come and see you; I’m in such
frightful trouble.” Something in her voice suggested distress.
“Are you Miss Lucille Godwin’s sister?”
“Of course I am; you know I am. Please tell me to whom I am speaking.”
Then, with a sudden burst, which somehow made me wonder if it were a
child who was speaking: “Oh, please will you come and help me? Lucille
told me all about what you said to her--it was she who put the
advertisement in, and now she’s disappeared.”
“Disappeared? What do you mean by disappeared?”
“She went out two days ago, and nothing has been seen or heard of her
since--suspense is driving me half out of my mind. Papa and mamma are
both abroad, but they’re coming back to-morrow, and what will happen
if Lucille isn’t here I daren’t even imagine.”
The speaker’s voice was broken by what sounded very like a sob.
“Have you no idea of what’s become of your sister?”
“Yes, I have; that’s the worst of it. Oh, please come and see me--do,
do, do!” Each note of exclamation was emphasized by a sob.
“Have you no friends to whom you can apply? I am an utter stranger.”
“That’s one reason why I want you to come. If I go to any of our
friends they’re sure to give Lucille away, and then I don’t know what
will happen. Oh, please come and see me; please!--please! You must
know something about us, or you wouldn’t have sent that message--I
like the sound of your voice, I can hear that you’re a woman, and I’m
sure that you can help me. Oh, please--please do come.”
As the tearful, eager, young voice kept flashing her entreaties along
the wire, I was turning things over in my mind; interference with
matters which were no concern of mine was leading me, as so often was
the case, much farther than I wanted to go. I had nothing very
particular to do that morning; the speaker’s anxiety and distress
seemed genuine enough; after all, there was no real reason why I
should not run round and see what all the pother was about; why and
where Miss Lucille Godwin had disappeared, and what help this frantic
young lady supposed I could render. I said:
“I’ll be with you in about twenty minutes; will that suit you?”
There came to me what almost amounted to a scream of joy.
“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!--Please do come as fast as ever
you can.”
About twenty minutes afterwards I was knocking at the door of a big
house at Hyde Park Gate. It was opened by a footman.
“Can I see Miss May Godwin?”
A slender figure came rushing across the hall; an eager face looked at
me in the open doorway. “Are you----”
“I’ve just been talking to you over the telephone.”
“Of course--yes--please come in; do you mind coming up to our room,
Lucille’s and mine?”
I did not mind where I went, having once embarked upon the enterprise.
She led me to a pretty sitting-room on the second floor, evidently the
sanctum of something both feminine and young. Everywhere were those
odds and ends, trifles, knick-knacks, which are dear to the souls of
very young girls.
“Please will you sit down? May I ask you for your name?”
The speaker assumed a dignity which became her rather well; the
telephone had not misled me; she was extremely young. I set her down
as just turned sixteen; her skirts barely reached her ankles. She was
quite small, I dare say not much over five feet, very slight and
dainty, with small features, bright eyes, and the sweetest mouth. I
fell in love with her at sight.
“My name is Judith Lee.”
“I am May Godwin.”
“So I imagined; I recognized your voice.”
“What do you know of us, Miss Lee?”
“Absolutely nothing; if possible, less than that.”
“But----” The girl looked mystified, as if she were confronted by a
problem which was rather beyond her. She screwed her mouth up into the
most delicious pout. “Didn’t you send a telephone message to Lucille
last Friday?”
“I did.”
“Then you must know something about us, because you told her the most
private things, some of them known only to herself, and some, at most,
to two or three others.”
“Before I answer your questions, will you tell me if I understood you
rightly that your sister has disappeared?”
“She went out two days ago, and I’ve seen and heard nothing of her
since.”
“You knew where she was going?”
“Well, in a way I did, but---- Oh, I wish I knew who you are; won’t
you tell me, please?”
It was rather a wail than an appeal. The dainty face was distorted as
by a spasm of pain.
“Is your sister older than you?”
“Of course she is--she is nearly four years older--she has just turned
twenty-one.”
Then it seemed that the speaker was seventeen--she scarcely looked it.
“I don’t wish to encroach upon your confidence; what I said to your
sister over the telephone I learnt by the merest accident. Did she go
to see Isolda?”
“Of course she did--he told her exactly what you said he would; he
made her so wild that she told him that she knew he was going to say
it--and there was quite a scene; she said that she felt that he would
like to kill her.”
“What has happened since?--Understand, tell me nothing if you’d rather
not.”
She knit her brows in dire perplexity.
“I’ve simply got to tell some one. Things can’t go on as they are; to
tell any of our friends would be to give Lucille away.” She eyed me
very hard, as if she were trying to discover what kind of person I
was. “Can I trust you?”
“You can.”
“Then I will. I liked your voice, and now I like your looks, Miss Lee.
You are sure your name is Lee?” Under the circumstances the question
was a pretty naive one; I assured her that it was. She favoured me
with a further scrutiny, then seemed to come to a final resolution.
“I’ll tell you everything.”
Then she drew a long breath, as if she sighed with relief. Her tongue
began to move almost faster than I could follow it.
“George Ratton--you know George Ratton?”
“Short, square, red cheeks, blue eyes.”
“That’s George; then you do know him?”
“I saw him once.”
“When Lucille came back from Isolda she wrote him such a letter! When
he came over the next morning, she wouldn’t see him. He wrote a note
in the hall--when he sent it up by Tomkins, she sent it back unopened.
Then he sent her a telegram; she had to open that, because, of course,
until she opened it she didn’t know who it was from--such a telegram!
He begged and prayed of her to see him, let him explain, not to
condemn him unheard--in that telegram there were over a hundred
words--and there was a reply paid. She made me fill it up with just
seven words: ‘Wire received. Lucille has nothing to say.’ Soon after
there came another telegram. She made me open that, and when I told
her who it was from she wouldn’t let me read it; then he called to see
me, and she wouldn’t let me see him; he was quite rude to Tomkins.”
“May I ask if you two girls are in the house alone?”
“Well, you see, it’s like this.” To do her justice she did seem rather
confused; then her face was irradiated by a smile which, to my
thinking, made her perfectly lovely. “The fact is, we’ve been a pair
of perfect idiots. I may as well admit it, as that is where all the
trouble began. Mother and father are abroad; we didn’t want to go, so
they put Mrs. Cotterill in charge. Of course, Mrs. Cotterill is quite
nice, but we found her rather trying, so we got up a scheme to get rid
of her, so that we might have a fortnight’s perfect time before the
mater and pater came home. It was rather a neat scheme”--I was sure it
was from the way that young woman’s eyes danced in her head. “I won’t
tell you about it now; it was a perfect success in one way, but in
another it was a dreadful failure--almost from the moment that Mrs.
Cotterill left the house everything began to go wrong. Lucille
quarrelled with Jack----”