"He's waking."
We were sitting in a line with his head and outside his field of vision,
unless he raised himself on his elbow, which at present he was incapable
of doing. We saw his eyes open and close again, open and close again,
the opening each time growing brisker than the faint closing, until he
was strong enough to stare about him and take in two-thirds of the room.
I saw wonder dawning in his face as he found himself unexpectedly in
familiar surroundings; he carried his hand to his head in the effort to
remember how he had got there; then his fingers mechanically slid down
to his throat, and I watched him gingerly exploring certain purple
marks. Abruptly his eyes closed for another long quiescence, but he was
gaining strength and at the next opening he dragged himself unsteadily
to a sitting posture, clapped both hands to his temples and slowly
turned his head until he had brought the whole room under observation.
"Where's Sonia?" he demanded abruptly, looking at me with flickering
eyelids.
"She's not here at the moment," I answered.
He stared uncomprehendingly until a pain at the bruised back of his head
made him wince and despatch one hand to assess the danger.
"How long----" He winced again. "How long have I been here?"
"Since last night," I told him. "You had a fall."
He continued to stare at me without comprehension and then grew suddenly
indignant.
"Had a fall?" he repeated. "I _didn't_ have a fall. What d'you mean?
It's all coming back to me now. I was dining--I don't know where I was
dining, but afterwards I thought I'd come round and see Sonia.... Why
did O'Rane attack me like that? Was he mad?"
George's foot pressed lightly against mine.
"What do you mean--'attack' you?" he asked with fine simulation of
surprise.
"He attacked me," Beresford persisted doggedly. "He knocked me down."
His eyes closed once more. "Where's Sonia?" he asked again.
"She's staying with friends," George answered. "I say, I shouldn't talk
too much, if I were you. You're looking rather cheap, and I hear you've
been pretty bad."
For the first time Beresford was able to twist his features into a
malevolent grin.
"I'm putting on weight again now," he boasted. "You'd look cheap, if
you'd gone through what I have."
"How long were you in prison?" I asked.
Beresford sighed and shook his head.
"I don't know. I was unconscious for some days at the end. They arrested
me on the third, the trial was on--I forget...." He lowered himself
till he was lying full length on the sofa.
"They arrested you on the fourth, you say," I began with a glance at
George.
"The third. My birthday," he corrected me, caressing his bruised throat
with one hand. "There was a ring at the bell, and I got out of bed and
went to the door, expecting to find the postman. Instead of that, there
was an inspector with a warrant. He asked whether I was Mr. Peter
Beresford, read me the warrant. He wouldn't let me shave, I remember; I
suppose he was afraid I might cut my throat; and I was only allowed to
have a bath on condition that he was in the room. I don't know which was
the more embarrassed...."
He paused to laugh feebly, and I withdrew to the window and checked his
date by my engagement book. George raised his eyebrows to me and at my
nod tiptoed to the door and made his way to O'Rane's room.
"What _happened_ last night?" Beresford demanded, covering his eyes with
the hand that had been feeling his throat and rubbing his bruised head
with the other. "Was everyone drunk?"
"I can't quite explain now," I said.
Whether O'Rane had been to bed or not, he was washed and shaved, dressed
and booted, when George went into his room at five o'clock. Beresford
was reported out of danger, and after some hesitation George asked again
to be given the fullest account of O'Rane's unexpected return two months
before.
"I'll tell you my reason now," he said, as O'Rane's expression hardened.
"I want to make certain--I'm _advocatus diaboli_,--I want your evidence
that it was Beresford at all."
"Evidence? I _heard_ him, she admitted it! Who else could it be? And he
comes back here----"
"Steady on, Raney, this is no way to conduct a trial. I'm going to get
Stornaway up here, if I can, and we're going into this very thoroughly."
Beresford was sleeping so tranquilly that I left him without
compunction. Upstairs the court of enquiry had been joined by Bertrand
in pyjamas, dressing-gown, and slippers; George was sitting on the bed
with a blotter and writing-pad on his knee, O'Rane walked to and fro
with the noiseless tread of a cat. We were all grey-faced and haggard in
the diamond, five-o'clock-in-the-morning light. I found myself a chair,
and the proceedings opened with a repetition of the story which Bertrand
had given me as second-hand. It was more temperate and less dramatic, as
O'Rane told it two months after the events; it was slightly fuller, but
in no respect did it vary substantially from the earlier account.
"I'm not a lawyer." George said at the end, looking up from his notes,
"whether you'd get a divorce on that, assuming you wanted one ..." he
added quickly, as O'Rane's eyes narrowed. "We haven't finished yet,
though. You say Sonia admitted it?"
O'Rane nodded and then seemed to repent his nod.
"She didn't _deny_ it," he said to correct himself. "I say, you fellows
don't want me to go into this part of it, do you? It's not very pleasant
for me. I'll just tell you that I _assumed_ it was Beresford----"
"Why did you assume it?" I interrupted.
"She was very intimate with him. She used to talk--I thought it was in
joke, of course, a silly joke that I didn't like--she used to talk about
going off and living with him, if we ever had a disagreement about
anything. Besides, I'd heard him hopping out of here and down the stairs
on one leg. I naturally assumed.... And she accepted it. I--I _can't_
tell you what we said to each other, but it was never in doubt, it never
_has_ been in doubt till this moment."
George pursed up his mouth and shook his head reflectively.
"This is only telling us what the sergeant said," he observed. "However,
let's get every shred of evidence before we let Beresford open."
He looked enquiringly at his uncle, who shrugged his shoulders a little
impatiently.
"It's not _evidence_," Bertrand began. "I'm old-fashioned, I daresay I
attach too much importance to trifles; I can only give you what I've
seen and heard."
It was indeed not direct evidence, it was not even circumstantial
evidence. Mrs. O'Rane had been very intimate with Beresford; when he was
lying ill at "The Sanctuary," she would sit stroking his hand; they
sometimes remained together until a very late hour, and she thought
nothing of kissing him good-night. On his side Beresford made no secret
of his infatuation.
"Neither made any secret of anything!" growled Bertrand, thumping his
fist on his knee.... "I suppose it's the modern method.... I don't
understand it. That's why I say my evidence is no use. If you get up and
tell them they've no business to be kissing, they'll retort that it was
all open and above-board, that I was present as often as not.... And
it's true. I used to come in late from the House, I used to come in at
all hours when I was on Special Constable duty; there they were, billing
and cooing and not in the least embarrassed by me. You'd have said they
rather liked an audience."
The unhappy O'Rane was wincing at every sneer or word of disapproval.
Two months before he would have turned it off with a laugh, as everyone
else did, and protested that it was Sonia's way and that we did not know
Sonia.... But, if he could have been induced to speak frankly, he would
probably have agreed with me that some of his wife's friends and a good
deal of his wife's behaviour were meretricious.
"I'd better add my testimony, while we're about it," I said. The boy
winced again, and I could see him bracing himself.
I told him how at his request I had called on Beresford to warn him
against running his head any further into the trap which was being laid
for him. I described his obvious anxiety to get rid of me, the
embarrassment of our meeting, when Mrs. O'Rane came in, her
light-hearted assurance that I should be _really_ shocked, or something
of the kind, if I knew how often she had visited her patient at such an
hour. It was not pleasant work, but I spared O'Rane nothing that my
memory retained.
At the end George crumpled his notes into a ball and rose from the bed
with a yawn of mental and physical exhaustion.
"As I said, I'm not a lawyer," he observed. "If Raney were bringing a
petition, there's a hundred-to-one chance in favour of his getting a
decree; I suppose there's a six-to-four chance on circumstantial
evidence that you could bring the charge of misconduct home to
Beresford." He paused to frown in perplexity, unconscious that the word
"misconduct" had cut O'Rane like a lash across the face. "If it weren't
for last night," he muttered. "It's--almost incomprehensible. Unless he
came to make a clean breast of it, to tell Raney to divorce her and be
damned...."
O'Rane stopped short in his cat-like prowl and faced us.
"The only thing is to see Beresford," he said. "You'd better come with
me. I can tell something from his voice, but of course I can't see him.
Watch his mouth, don't look at his eyes; it's the mouth that gives a man
away, when he's lying."
The library was stale with cigar-smoke after our long vigil. Beresford
was asleep, but the noise of our feet roused him, and he sat up blinking
at O'Rane, who was a pace before the rest of us.
"Why did you attack me last night?" he demanded the moment that we were
in sight.
O'Rane came to a standstill with his hands in his pockets, swaying
slightly from heel to toe.
"We'll go into that in a moment, if you don't mind," was the answer.
"What was your motive in coming here?"
I had Beresford under vigilant scrutiny, and his surprise was real or
uncommonly well assumed.
"To see Sonia, of course," he replied. "I didn't know you were at home.
Do you usually try to _murder_ people who come to see her?" he demanded
with weak truculence. "I know, of course, that you neglect her and
ill-treat her yourself."
O'Rane rocked contemplatively to and fro, nodding thoughtfully to
himself.
"When did you last see my wife?" he asked suddenly.
"I can't tell you."
"You've got to tell me, Beresford."
"I'm afraid I can't. I spent six weeks in prison and I've had another
fortnight getting convalescent. It was some time before that."
"You have got to tell me the day, the hour and the place."
Beresford lay back with his mouth obstinately shut.
"Come along!" O'Rane cried.
"I can't and I won't. It was some time shortly before I was arrested. If
you want to find out any more, you can ask her."