MR. RANSOM WAITS
Gerridge rose early, primed, as he said to himself, for business. But to
his great disappointment he found Mr. Ransom in a frame of mind which
precluded action. Indeed, that gentleman looked greatly changed. He not
only gave evidence of a sleepless night but showed none of the spirit of
the previous evening, and hesitated quite painfully when Gerridge asked
him if he did not intend to go ahead with the interview they had promised
themselves.
"That's as it may be," was the hesitating reply. "I hardly think that I
shall visit the man you mean this morning. He interests me and I hope
that none of his movements will escape you. But I'm not ready to talk to
him. I prefer to wait a little; to give my wife a chance. I should feel
better, and have less to forget."
"Just as you say," returned the detective stiffly. "He's under our thumb
at present, I can't tell when he may wriggle out."
"Not while your eye's on him. And your eye won't leave him as long as you
have confidence in the reward I've promised you."
"Perhaps not; but you take the life out of me. Last night you were too
hot; this morning you are too cold. But it's not for me to complain. You
know where to find me when you want me." And without more ado the
detective went out.
Mr. Ransom remained alone and in no enviable frame of mind. He was
distrustful of himself, distrustful of the man who had made all this
trouble, and distrustful of her, though he would not acknowledge it.
Every baser instinct in him drove him to the meeting he declined. To see
the man--to force from him the truth, seemed the only rational thing to
do. But the final words of his wife's letter stood in his way. She had
advised patience. If patience would clear the situation and bring him the
result he so ardently desired, then he would be patient--that is, for a
day; he did not promise to wait longer. Yes, he would give her a day.
That was time enough for a man suffering on the rack of such an
intolerable suspense--one day.
But even that day did not pass without breaks in his mood and more than
one walk in the direction of the St. Denis Hotel. If Gerridge's eye was
on him as well as on the special object of his surveillance, he must have
smiled, more than once, at the restless flittings of his client about the
forbidden spot. In the evening it was the same, but the next morning he
remained steadfastly at his hotel. He had laid out his future course in
these words: "I will extend the time to three days; then if I do not hear
from her I will get that wry-necked fellow by the throat and twist an
explanation from him." But the three days passed and he found the
situation unchanged. Then he set as his limit the end of the week, but
before the full time had elapsed he was advised by Gerridge that he
himself was being followed in his turn by a couple of private detectives;
and while still under the agitation of this discovery was further
disconcerted by having the following communication thrust into his hand
in the open street by a young woman who succeeded in losing herself in
the crowd before he had got so much as a good look at her.
You can judge of his amazement as he read the few lines it contained.
Read the papers to-night and forget the stranger at the St. Denis.
That was all. But the writing was hers. The hours passed slowly till the
papers were cried in the street. What Mr. Ransom read in them increased
his astonishment, I might say his anxiety. It was a paragraph about his
wife, an almost incredible one, running thus:
A strange explanation is given of the disappearance of Mrs. Roger
Ransom on her wedding-day. As our readers will remember, she
accompanied her husband to the hotel, but managed to slip away and
leave the house while he still stood at the desk. This act, for which
nothing in her previous conduct has in any way prepared her friends, is
now said to have been due to the shock of hearing, some time during her
wedding-day, that a sister whom she had supposed dead was really alive
and in circumstances of almost degrading poverty. As this sister had
been her own twin the effect upon her mind was very serious. To find
and rescue this sister she left her newly made husband in the
surreptitious manner already recorded in the papers. That she is not
fully herself is shown by her continued secrecy as to her whereabouts.
All that she has been willing to admit to the two persons she has so
far taken into her confidence--her husband and the agent who conducts
her affairs--is that she has found her sister and cannot leave her.
Why, she does not state. The case is certainly a curious one and Mr.
Ransom has the sympathy of all his friends.
Confused, and in a state of mind bordering on frenzy, Mr. Ransom returned
to the hotel and sought refuge in his own room. He put no confidence in
what he had just read; he regarded it as a newspaper story and a great
fake; but she had bid him read it, and this fact in itself was very
disturbing. For how could she have known about it if she had not been
its author, and if she was its author, what purpose had she expected it
to serve?
He was still debating this question when he reached his own room. On the
floor, a little way from the sill, lay a letter. It had been thrust under
the door during his absence. Lifting it in some trepidation, he cast a
glance at its inscription and sank staggering into the nearest chair,
asking himself if he had the courage to open and read it. For the
handwriting, like that of the note handed him in the street, was
Georgian's, and he felt himself in a maze concerning her which made
everything in her connection seem dreamlike and unreal. It was not long,
however, before he had mastered its contents. They were strange enough,
as this transcription of them will show.
You have seen what has happened to me, but you cannot understand how I
feel. _She looks exactly like me._ It is that which makes the world
eddy about me. I cannot get used to it. It is like seeing my own
reflected image step from the mirror and walk about doing things. Two
of us, Roger, two! If you saw her you would call her Georgian. And she
says that she knows _you_, admires _you_! _and she says it in my
voice_! I try to shut my ears, but I hear her saying it even when her
lips do not move. She is as ignorant as she is afflicted and I cannot
leave her. She cannot hear a sound, though she can talk well enough
about what is going on in her own mind, and she is so wayward and
uncertain of temper, owing to her ignorance and her difficulty in
understanding me, that I don't know what she would do if once let out
of my sight. I love you--I love you--but I must stay right here.
Your affectionate and most unhappy
Georgian.
The sheet with its tear-stained lines fell from his grasp. Then he caught
it up again and looked carefully at the signature. It was his wife's
without doubt. Then he studied the rest of the writing and compared it
with that of the note which had been thrust into his hands earlier in the
day. There was no difference between them except that there were
evidences of faltering in the latter, not noticeable in the earlier
communication. As he noted these tokens of weakness or suffering, he
caught up the telephone receiver in good earnest and called out
Gerridge's number. When the detective answered, he shouted back:
"Have you read the evening papers? If you haven't, do so at once; then
come directly to me. It's business now and no mistake; and our first
visit shall be on the fellow at the St. Denis."