The one idea which possessed Kenwick after dragging himself back through
the broken window was to find out if the woman upstairs was safe. The
journey out to the big gate and back had consumed almost an hour, and as
he pulled himself in between the wide board and shattered glass he felt
that it must have been years since he had gone on that painful quest. He
rested for a few moments and then went into the front hall.
To his amazement he found it ablaze with light. Brilliant too was the
living-room beyond. In the latter he had never used anything but the
shaded lamp upon the table. Now the chandeliers in the ceiling had been
lighted from the switchboard button. It was evident that some one had
been all over the lower part of the house while he was gone. It must
have been the woman upstairs. There was no one else on the premises
except that half-witted garden boy.
Grimly resolved to discover whether his mysterious companion was still
concealing herself behind locked doors or whether her apartment had
been stormed by some prowler he made his way up to the room in the front
of the right wing. As he approached it he called to her asking if she
was all right. There was no response. He knocked. The sound echoed dully
down the handsome stairway. Then in a futile sort of way he tried the
knob.
This time it yielded to his touch and swung slowly open. For a moment he
hesitated, dreading to snap on the light. Then the stillness grew
oppressive. His quick, impatient fingers groped along the wall, found
the switch-button, and pressed it. The mysterious apartment flashed into
sudden reality.
Kenwick looked about him, bewildered. The light revealed a large
handsome room furnished in golden oak. There was a massive double bed,
bureau, dressing-table, and several luxurious chairs. A heavy moquette
carpet deadened every footfall, and the rose-colored draperies at the
windows admitted only a restricted view of the outer world. But it was
the condition of the room, not its furnishings, that puzzled the man
upon the threshold. Dust covered every polished surface. The hearth was
swept clean. There had been no fire on it for months, perhaps years. On
the bed was a mattress but no coverings. The mirrors on bureau and
dressing-table showed a thin veil of dust. There were no toilet
articles, no personal belongings of any kind. The room was evidently a
woman's but there was no hint of a woman's presence, except that in the
air hung a faint perfume of heliotrope. He remembered suddenly that it
was the perfume that Marcreta Morgan had always used.
Kenwick went over to one of the chairs and sat down. He felt intensely
relieved. If the woman had gone away she would certainly send some one
back to the house, for she knew that he was alone and injured. But how
had she gone? Was there another entrance to these somber grounds? For
half an hour he sat there trying to think it out. The room grew very
cold. It had apparently been shut off from the furnace connection. He
arose at last, stiffly, and went back downstairs, switching off the
lights. In the living-room and hall he turned them off too, for they
gave to the solemn rooms a garish, incongruous splendor.
He went into the den and took his old place on the upholstered
window-seat. It may have been twenty minutes later that he heard the
sound of wheels crunching the gravel of the driveway. He listened
intently. No, this time he was not mistaken. Some vehicle was
approaching the house. The stranger in goggles had been true to his
promise and had sent back help, or perhaps returned himself. At last
this hideous bondage was to end. He limped into the living-room and
without turning on the light, peered out. There was no one in sight and
no sound of voices, but at the foot of the front steps stood a long
black car. It recalled to him in a flash the beetle-black limousine that
he had seen in the tank-house garage.
Impelled by his entry into the room upstairs to try the front door, he
turned the knob. It was unlocked. Whoever had come in or gone out had
been in too much of a hurry to fasten it this time.
And then, standing there at that half-open door, Kenwick suddenly lost
his headlong impatience. For the realization came to him at last that
his experiences of the last twenty-four hours were no casual adventure.
This was a game, perhaps even a trap. He had inadvertently stepped into
a carefully laid plot. That it had been obviously prepared for somebody
else did not alter the seriousness of his present position. Whoever was
engineering the thing had assumed that he would do and say certain
things. And now, he reminded himself angrily, he had probably done and
said them all. Certainly his every move had been direct, impetuous,
glaringly obvious. He would have to change his course unless he wanted
to die in this accursed house. This game, whatever it was, couldn't be
won by throwing all the cards face up on the table and demanding a
reckoning. The other players wore masks. If he was to have any chance
against them he must adopt their tactics.
He assured himself of all this while he limped down the shallow porch
steps. He hadn't the faintest notion of what he was going to do next,
but decided to trust to impulse. He had reached the lowest step when all
at once he recoiled. Almost with his hand upon the beetle-black
limousine he discovered that it was not a limousine at all. It was a
hearse.
At that same moment, he heard, coming from the near distance, the voice
of some one speaking with unaccustomed restraint. It was a raucous voice
talking in a harsh whisper. And then there was a sound of footsteps
approaching.
Without an instant's hesitation Kenwick opened the door of the hearse,
pulled himself inside, and drew it shut, unlatched behind him. There
was no definite plan in his mind except to escape. And the woman had
apparently fled so he felt no further responsibility for her.
The steps came nearer. In another minute some one might jerk open the
door and discover him. And he remembered uneasily that now he was not
armed. He had left the revolver on the table in the den. The footsteps
stopped close to his head and a man's voice called to somebody at a
distance.
"My orders was to come out here. That's all I know about it. But I'm not
goin' to get myself tied up in any mess like this. It's up to the
coroner first. It just means that I'll have to make another trip out
here to-morrow."
Kenwick heard him clamber to the high seat, and heard him jam his foot
against the starter, heard its throbbing response. And then he started
away on his long weird drive through the black night.
He had expected his conveyance to be almost as close and stifling as a
tomb, but was relieved to find that sufficient air came in through the
crack of the door to make the trip endurable. The only provident thing
that he had done during the whole adventure, he decided, was to put on
his overcoat and hat before leaving the den. One journey bareheaded
into the November night had been sufficient to warn him against a
repetition of such rashness. He was dressed now as he had been when he
first took stock of himself outside the tall iron gate.
The road was smooth asphalt all of the way, and the passenger, stretched
at full length on the hard floor of the hearse, felt more comfortable
than he had all that ghastly day. During the ride he tried to formulate
some definite course of action. For now that the solitary desolation of
the last twenty-four hours was ended, he was able to detach himself from
its events and to view the whole experience as a spectator.
His vivid imagination pictured the somber house in a dozen different
lights. But he discarded them one by one, and his interest centered
about the identity of the woman upstairs and the single shot which had
pierced the stillness of a few hours before. Of only one thing he was
certain--that he was going to get out of Mont-Mer as speedily as
possible. It was all very well to conjecture that the house might be the
disreputable retreat of some Eastern capitalist, or a rendezvous for
radicals, but he preferred to solve the riddle from a distance. He had
no intention of being called as a witness in an ugly exposé. It would
be easy enough to write to Old Man Raeburn and explain that it hadn't
been possible for him to stop off on his way to San Francisco. He
fervently hoped that he would never see Mont-Mer again. Without ever
having really seen it he had come to loathe it.
He had ridden for twenty minutes or more when he felt the vehicle slow
down. It made a sharp turn and came to a stop. Kenwick wondered if the
driver would open the doors, and he lay there waiting, staring into the
dark, impassive in the hands of fate. He heard the man climb down from
his seat and then the sound of his footsteps growing fainter in the
distance.
Ten minutes later Kenwick cautiously pushed open the flimsy doors and
worked himself out of his hiding-place. He was in an alley enclosed on
three sides by the backs of buildings. Half hopping, half crawling he
reached the dimly lighted street. It was almost midnight now and the
little town was deserted. At the corner he found a drug-store. It looked
warm, companionable, inviting. Drawing his fur-collared overcoat about
his ears he hobbled to the door and pushed it open.
Inside two men were leaning against a glass show-case talking with the
clerk. At Kenwick's entrance the conversation stopped abruptly like the
dialogue of movie actors when the camera clicks the scene's end. The
intruder, clutching at one of the show-cases for support, forced a
comradely smile. "If I can't put one over here," he told himself, "I
don't deserve to be called a fiction-writer."
But before he had time to speak one of the men came forward with a
startled questioning. "You look all in, man; white as a sheet. Sit down
here. What's the idea?"
"Pretty close call," Kenwick told him. "A fellow in a car bowled me over
as I was crossing the street. He went right on, but I doubt if I'll be
able to for a while."
"Well, what do you know about that?" the drug clerk challenged, as he
helped his visitor into a chair behind the prescription-desk. "Say, this
is gettin' to be one of the worst towns on the coast for auto accidents.
Didn't get his number, I suppose?"
"No. And I'm just a stranger passing through here. I don't know many
people."
"Hard luck." It was evident that the trio were disappointed in the
meagerness of his story. One of them stooped and was probing the
swollen leg with skilful fingers. Kenwick winced.
"You've got a bad sprain there all right," the doctor told him. "It's
swollen a good deal, too, for being so recent. Have you walked far?"
"Yes, rather." Kenwick watched in silence while the physician bound up
the injured member in a stout bandage. In spite of his best efforts one
sharp moan escaped him.
"Your nerves are badly shaken, I can see that," the doctor decided. "Fix
him up a little bromide, Gregson."
Kenwick took the glass, furious to note that it trembled in his hand.
The druggist attempted to joke him back to normal poise. "A little more
of a jolt and you'd have had to pass him up to Gifford, Doc. Gifford,
here," he went on by way of introduction, "is shipping a body north
to-night on the twelve-thirty. Bein' two of you, he might have got the
railroad to give your folks a special rate if you're goin' his way."
The patient evinced mild interest. "San Francisco?" he inquired. The
undertaker nodded.
"That's the train I hoped to make," Kenwick sighed. "But my money seems
to have been jolted out of me and----" He went carefully through his
pockets as he spoke. And then Gifford came over and stood beside him.
"If you don't mind," he began, "I'd like to know your name."
Kenwick's reply was glibly reassuring. "Kenneth Rogers."
"Oh! You that young Rogers that's been visiting for a few days at the
Paddington place, 'Utopia'?" It was the doctor who asked this question.
Kenwick nodded warily.
The physician extended his hand. "I'm Markham. Had an engagement to play
golf with you out at the country club this afternoon. Awfully sorry you
couldn't make it but I got the message all right from your sister that
you were having trouble with your car out near Hillside Inn and you
couldn't get away."
As Kenwick wrung his hand with easy cordiality there flashed before his
mental vision the picture of the wayfarer in goggles. Could a malign
fate have trapped him into taking the name of that visitor to Mont-Mer,
or any visitor, who might some day arise and challenge him? He had got
to get out of this place before the net that the gods were weaving about
him should bind him hand and foot.
"Say, listen." Gifford forced himself to the front again, speaking with
a mixture of eagerness and hesitation. "If you're goin' up to the city
to-night, I wonder if----You see, it's like this. I've got a big
masonic funeral on here for Thursday morning. It'll be a hell of a rush
for me to get back in time if I have to make this trip. But I promised a
little woman that I'd see personally to this shipment; send a
responsible party or go myself. I haven't got a soul to send, but if
you----."
Kenwick shook his head. "I won't be able to leave now until to-morrow.
I'll have to wait and get some money."
Gifford waved aside the objection. "Your expenses will be paid, of
course, as mine would have been. I'll advance you the funds. And you
don't have to _do_ a thing, you know. Wellman's man will meet the train
at the other end. Wait and see the casket in his hands and then you're
through."
He watched the other man eagerly. For a moment Kenwick didn't trust
himself to meet his gaze. He hoped that he was not betraying in his face
the jubilant conviction that his guardian angel had suddenly returned
from a vacation and had renewed an interest in him. In order not to
appear too eagerly acquiescent he asked casually: "Who is the fellow?
Or who was he?"
"Man by the name of Marstan. He wasn't known around here. His wife had
to come down from the city to identify him." He glanced at his watch.
"There's just about time to make the train now. I've got my car outside.
It's luck, your stumbling in here like this. Sheer luck."
"Luck is too mild a word for it," Kenwick assured himself as he crawled
into his Pullman a few moments later. "It's providence, old boy. That's
what it is."
The bromide had begun to do its work. And his leg, properly bandaged,
gave him no pain. Almost hilarious over the knowledge that daylight
would find him among familiar surroundings again, he fell into the
delicious slumber that follows sudden surcease of mental strain.
When he awoke the train was speeding through the oak-dotted region of
San Mateo. He had refused to accept any expense-money from Gifford
except enough for his breakfast, and after a cup of coffee in the diner,
he sat gazing out of the window, not caring to open conversation with
any of his fellow-travelers, completely absorbed in the business of
readjusting himself to this environment that he had loved and from
which the war had so abruptly uprooted him.
It was glorious to be back again, to catch up the loose threads of the
old life. And in spite of the stark bareness of winter, the landscape
had never seemed so appealing. The wide level stretches of pasture, cut
by ribbons of asphalt, the prosperous little towns which the Coast
Company's fast train ignored on its thunderous dash northward, the
children walking to school, the pruners waving their shears to him as he
sped by--all these breathed a healthy normal living that made the
neurotic adventures of the past day seem remote and unreal.
Under the long shed of the Third and Townsend Depot he lingered only
until he had carried out Gifford's instructions. Then he went on down
the open corridor to the waiting-rooms. Outside the voices of
taxi-drivers and hotel busmen made the radiant winter morning hideous
with their cries. The waiting-room was warm and bright. There was no
better place, Kenwick reflected, to map out his program. The air was a
tonic, crisp and tipped with frost. It was too cold to be without an
overcoat and yet, if Everett did not make punctual reply to the message
that he was about to send, he might have to part with it for a time.
He found a seat in a corner where he would be out of the draft of
incessantly opening doors. For in spite of his good night's sleep he
felt weak and a little giddy. Resolving to dismiss the past from his
mind and concern himself solely with the present was good logic, but
difficult of accomplishment. First, and dominating all his thought, was
Marcreta Morgan. The thought of her brought him a dull pain. So many
letters he had written her since his return to New York, and not one of
them had she ever answered. Once, in vague alarm, he had even written to
Clinton, but there had been no reply. And then pride had held him
silent. So he couldn't go to the house on Pine Street now. He wouldn't
go, he decided fiercely, until he had a decent position and had
reëstablished himself in civilian life.
Over at the news-stand a girl was fitting picture post-cards into a
rack. Kenwick walked over to her and with a part of the change left from
his meager breakfast bought a morning paper. While she picked it off the
pile he stood twirling the circular rack absently with one hand. The
Cliff House, Golden Gate Park, and prominent business blocks whirled
past his eyes, but he was not conscious of them. He took his newspaper
and turned away.
Halfway to the door he opened it and glanced at the sensational menu
spread out for his delectation upon the front page. All at once
something inside his brain seemed to crumple up. The Cliff House, Golden
Gate Park, and tall office-buildings sped around him in a circle, like a
merry-go-round gone mad. Somehow he found his way back to the corner
seat and sank into it. And there he sat like a stone man, staring at,
but no longer seeing, the front page of his newspaper.