THE PALIMPSEST
It was getting late when our friends left us, but nevertheless, as
soon as they were gone, we all drew our chairs up to the fire with the
obvious intention of discussing the situation and began, with one
accord, to fill our pipes. Jervis was the first to get his tobacco
alight, and, having emitted a voluminous preliminary puff, he
proceeded to open the debate.
“That man, Jardine, seems to be a pretty desperate character. Just
think of his actually wallowing in the mire--not merely rolling, mind
you, but wallowing--and of his repulsive habit of consorting with
females; one after the other, too, in rapid succession. It’s a
shocking instance of depravity.”
“Our reverend friend,” said Thorndyke, “reaches his conclusions by a
rather short route--in some cases, at least; in others, his methods
seem a little indirect and roundabout.”
“Yes,” agreed Jervis, “he’s a devil at guessing. But he didn’t get
much food for the imagination out of the man, Thorndyke. Why were you
so extraordinarily secretive? With what he told you and what you knew
before, you could surely have suggested a line of inquiry. Why didn’t
you?”
“Principally because of the man’s personality. I could not have
answered his questions; I could only have suggested one or two highly
probable solutions of the problem that he offered and partial
solutions at that. But I am not much addicted to giving partial
solutions or to handing over the raw material of a promising inquiry.
Certainly, not to a man like this, who seems incapable of a
straightforward action.”
“The reverend father,” said Jervis, “does certainly seem to be a
rather unnecessarily downy bird. And he doesn’t seem to have got much
by his excessive artfulness, after all.”
“No,” agreed Thorndyke; “nothing whatever. Quite the contrary, in
fact. Look at his ridiculous conduct in respect of ‘the man Jardine.’
I don’t complain of his having taken the precaution to obtain that
malefactor’s address; but, when he had got it, if he had not been so
tortuous, so eager to be cunning; if, in short, he had behaved like an
ordinary sensible man, he would have got, at once, all the information
that Jardine had to give. He could have called on Jardine, written to
him, employed a lawyer or applied to the police. Either of these
simple and obvious plans would have been successful; instead of which,
he must needs go to the trouble and expense of engaging this absurd
spy.”
“Who found a mare’s nest and got his head thumped,” remarked Jervis.
“Then,” continued Thorndyke, “look at his behaviour to Marchmont.
Evidently he put the case into Marchmont’s hands, but, equally
evident, he withheld material facts and secretly tinkered at the case
himself. No, Jervis, I give no information to Father Humperdinck until
I have this case complete to the last rivet. But, all the same, I am
greatly obliged to him, and especially to Marchmont for bringing him
here. He has given us a connected story to collate with our rather
loose collection of facts and, what is perhaps more important, he has
put our investigation on a business footing. That is a great
advantage. If I should want to invoke the aid of the powers that be, I
can do so now with a definite _locus standi_ as the legal
representative of interested parties.”
“I can’t imagine,” said I, “in what direction you are going to push
your inquiries. Father Humperdinck has given us, as you say, a
connected story, but it is a very unexpected one, to me, at least, and
does not fall into line at all with what we know--that is, if you are
assuming, as I have been, that the man whom I saw lying in Millfield
Lane was Vitalis Reinhardt.”
“It is difficult,” replied Thorndyke, “to avoid that assumption,
though we must be on our guard against coincidences; but the man whom
you saw agreed with the description that has been given to us, we know
that Reinhardt was in the neighbourhood on that day, and you found the
reliquary on the following morning in the immediate vicinity. We seem
to be committed to the hypothesis that the man was Reinhardt unless we
can prove that he was someone else, or that Reinhardt was in some
other place at the time; which at present we cannot.”
“Then,” said I, “in that case, the Bobby must have been right, after
all. The man couldn’t have been dead, seeing that he called on
Marchmont the following day and was afterwards traced to Paris. But I
must say that he looked as dead as Queen Anne. It just shows how
careful one ought to be in giving opinions.”
“Some authority has said,” remarked Jervis, “that the only conclusive
proof of death is decomposition. I believe it was old Taylor who said
so, and I am inclined to think that he wasn’t far wrong.”
“But,” said Thorndyke, “assuming that the man whom you saw was
Reinhardt, and that he was not dead how do you explain the other
circumstances? Was he insensible from the effects of injury or drugs?
Or was he deliberately shamming insensibility? Was it he who passed
over the fence? and if so, did he climb over unassisted or was he
helped over? And what answers do you suggest to the questions that
Marchmont propounded? You answer his first question: ‘Is Reinhardt
alive?’ in the affirmative. What about the others?”
“As to where he is,” I replied, “I can only say, the Lord knows;
probably skulking somewhere on the Continent. As to his state of mind,
the facts seem to suggest that, in vulgar parlance, he has gone off
his onion. He must be as mad as a hatter to have behaved in the way
that he has. For, even assuming that he wanted to get clear of the
Poor Brothers of Saint Jeremiah Diddler without explicitly saying so,
he adopted a fool’s plan. There is no sense in masquerading as a
corpse one day and turning up smiling at your lawyer’s office the
next. If he meant to be dead, he should have stuck to it and remained
dead.”
“The objection to that,” said Jervis, “is that Marchmont would have
proceeded to get permission to presume death and administer the will.”
“I see. Then I can only suppose that he had got infected by Father
Humperdinck and resolved to be artful at all costs and hang the
consequences.”
“Then,” said Thorndyke, “I understand your view to be that Reinhardt
is at present hiding somewhere on the Continent and that his mind is
more or less affected.”
“Yes. Though as to his being unfit to control his own affairs, I am
not so clear. I fancy there was more evidence in that direction when
he was forking out the bulk of his income to maintain the poverty of
the Poor Brothers. But the truth is, I haven’t any opinions on the
case at all. I am in a complete fog about the whole affair.”
“And no wonder,” said Jervis. “One set of facts seems to suggest most
strongly that Reinhardt must certainly be dead. Another set of facts
seems to prove beyond doubt that he was alive, at least after that
affair in Millfield Lane. He may be perpetrating an elephantine
practical joke on the Poor Brothers; but that doesn’t seem to be
particularly probable. The whole case is a tangle of contradictions
which one might regard as beyond unravelment if it were not for a
single clear and intelligible fact.”
“What is that?” I asked.
“That my revered senior has undertaken to furnish a solution in the
course of a month; from which I gather that my revered senior has
something up his sleeve.”
“There is nothing up my sleeve,” said Thorndyke, “that might not
equally well be up yours. I have made no separate investigations. The
actual data which I possess were acquired in the presence of one or
both of you, and are now the common property of us all. I am
referring, of course, to the original data, not to fresh matter
obtained by inference from, or further examination of those data.”
Jervis smiled sardonically. “It is the old story,” said he. “The
magician offers you his hat to inspect.
“You observe, ladies and gentlemen, that there is no deception. You
can look inside it and examine the lining, and you can also inspect
the top of my head. I now put on my hat. I now take it off again and
you notice that there is a guinea pig sitting in it. There was no
deception, ladies and gentlemen, you had all the data.”
Thorndyke laughed and shook his head.
“That’s all nonsense, Jervis,” he said. “It is a false analogy. I have
done nothing to divert your attention. The guinea pig has been staring
you in the face all the time.”
“Very rude of him,” murmured Jervis.
“I have even drawn your attention to him once or twice. But,
seriously, I don’t think that this case is so very obscure, though
mind you, it is a mere hypothesis so far as I am concerned, and may
break down completely when I come to apply the tests that I have in
view. But what I mean is, that the facts known to us suggested a very
obvious hypothesis and that the suggestion was offered equally to us
all. The verification may fail, but that is another matter.”
“Are you going to work at the case immediately?” I asked.
“No,” Thorndyke replied. “Jervis and I have to attend at the Maidstone
Assizes for the next few days. We are retained on a case which
involves some very important issues in relation to life assurance, and
that will take up most of our time. So this other affair will have to
wait.”
“And meanwhile,” said Jervis, “you will stay at home like a good boy
and mind the shop; and I suppose we shall have to find you something
to do, to keep you out of mischief. What do you say to making a
longhand transcript of Father Humperdinck’s statement?”
“Yes, you had better do that,” said Thorndyke; “and attach it to the
original shorthand copy. And now we must really turn in or we shall
never be ready for our start in the morning.”
The transcription of Father Humperdinck’s statement gave me abundant
occupation for the whole of the following morning. But when that was
finished, I was without any definite employment, and, though I was not
in the least dull--for I was accustomed to a solitary life--I suppose
I was in that state of susceptibility to mischief that is proverbially
associated with unemployment. And in these untoward circumstances I
was suddenly exposed to a great temptation; and after some feeble
efforts at resistance, succumbed ignominiously.
I shall offer no excuses for my conduct nor seek in any way to
mitigate the judgment that all discreet persons will pass upon my
folly. I make no claims to discretion or to the caution and foresight
of a man like Thorndyke. At this time I was an impulsive and rather
heedless young man, and my actions were pretty much those which might
have been expected from a person of such temperament.
The voice of the tempter issued in the first place from our
letter-box, and assumed the sound of the falling of letters thereinto.
I hastened to extract the catch, and sorting out the envelopes,
selected one, the superscription of which was in Sylvia’s now familiar
handwriting. It was actually addressed to Dr. Thorndyke, but a private
mark, on which we had agreed, exposed that naïvely pious fraud and
gave me the right to open it; which I did, and seated myself in the
armchair to enjoy its perusal at my ease.
It was a delightful letter; bright, gossipy and full of frank and
intimate friendliness. As I read it, the trim, graceful figure and
pretty face of the writer rose before me and made me wonder a little
discontentedly how long it would be before I should look on her and
hear her voice again. It was now getting into the third week since I
had last seen her, and, as the time passed, I was feeling more and
more how great a blank in my life the separation from her had caused.
Our friendship had grown up in a quiet and unsensational fashion and I
suppose I had not realized all that it meant; but I was realizing it
now; and, as I conned over her letter, with its little personal notes
and familiar turns of expression, I began to be consumed with a desire
to see her, to hear her speak, to tell her that she was not as other
women to me, and to claim a like special place in her thoughts.
It was towards the end of the letter that the tempter spoke out in
clear and unmistakable language, and these were the words that he
used, through the medium of the innocent and unconscious Sylvia:
“You remember those sketches that you stole for me--‘pinched,’ I think
was your own expression. Well, I have cleaned off the daubs of paint
with which they had been disfigured and put them in rough frames in my
studio. All but one; and I began on that yesterday with a scraper and
a rag dipped in chloroform. But I took off, not only the defacing
marks but part of the surface as well; and then I got such a surprise!
I shan’t tell you what the surprise was, because you’ll see, when you
come out of the house of bondage. I am going to work on it again
to-morrow, and perhaps I shall get the transformation finished. How I
wish you could come and see it done! It takes away more than half the
joy of exploration not to be able to share the discovery with you; in
fact, I have a good mind to leave it unfinished so that we can
complete the transformation together.”
Now, I need not say that, as to the precious sketches, I cared not a
fig what was under the top coat of paint. What I did care for was that
this dear maid was missing me as I missed her; was wanting my sympathy
with her little interests and pleasures and was telling me, half
unconsciously, perhaps, that my absence had created a blank in her
life, as her absence had in mine. And forthwith I began to ask myself
whether there was really any good reason why I should not, just for
this once, break out of my prison and snatch a few brief hours of
sunshine. The spy had been exploded. He was not likely to pick up my
tracks after all this time and now that my appearance was so altered;
and I did not care much if he did, seeing that he had been shown to be
perfectly harmless. The only circumstance that tended to restrain me
from this folly was the one that mitigated its rashness--the change in
my appearance; and even that, now that I was used to it and knew that
my aspect was neither grotesque nor ridiculous, had little weight, for
Sylvia would be prepared for the change and we could enjoy the joke
together.
I was aware, even at the time, that I was not being quite candid with
myself, for, if I had been, I should obviously have consulted
Thorndyke. Instead of which I answered the letter by return,
announcing my intention of coming to tea on the following day; and
having sent Polton out to post it, spent the remainder of the
afternoon in gleeful anticipation of my little holiday, tempered by
some nervousness as to what Thorndyke would have to say on the matter,
and as to what “my pretty friend,” as Mrs. Samway had very
appropriately called her, would think of my having begun my letter
with the words, “My dear Sylvia.”
Nothing happened to interfere with my nefarious plans.
On the following morning, Thorndyke and Jervis went off after an early
breakfast, leaving me in possession of the premises and master of my
actions. I elected to anticipate the usual luncheon time by half an
hour, and, when this meal was disposed of, I crept to my room and
thoroughly cleansed my hair of the grease which Polton still persisted
in applying to it; for, since my hat would conceal it while I was out
of doors, the added disfigurement was unnecessary. I was even tempted
to tamper slightly with my eyebrows, but this impulse I nobly
resisted; and, having dried my hair and combed it in its normal
fashion, I descended on tip-toe to the sitting-room and wrote a short,
explanatory note to Polton, which I left conspicuously on the table.
Then I switched the door-bell on to the laboratory, and, letting
myself out like a retreating burglar, closed the door silently and
sneaked away down the dark staircase.
Once fairly outside, I went off like a lamplighter, and, shooting out
through the Tudor Street gate, made my way eastward to Broad Street
Station, where I was fortunate enough to catch a train that was just
on the point of starting. At Hampstead Heath Station I got out, and,
snuffing the air joyfully, set forth at my best pace up the slope that
leads to the summit; and in little over twenty minutes found myself at
the gate of “The Hawthorns.”
There was no need to knock or ring. My approach had been observed from
the window, and, as I strode up the garden path, the door opened and
Sylvia ran out to meet me.
“It _was_ nice of you to come!” she exclaimed, as I took her hand and
held it in mine. “I don’t believe you ought to have ventured out, but
I am most delighted all the same. Don’t make a noise; Mopsy is having
a little doze in the drawing room. Come into the morning room and let
me have a good look at you.”
I followed her meekly into the front room, where, in the large bay
window, she inspected me critically, her cheeks dimpling with a
mischievous smile.
“There’s something radically wrong about your eyebrows,” she said,
“but, really, you are not in the least the fright that you made out.
As to the beard and moustache, I am not sure that I don’t rather like
them.”
“I hope you don’t,” I replied, “because, off they come at the first
opportunity--unless, of course, you forbid it.”
“Does my opinion of your appearance matter so much then?”
“It matters entirely. I don’t care what I look like to anyone else.”
“Oh! what a fib!” exclaimed Sylvia. “Don’t I remember how very neatly
turned out you always were when you used to pass me in the lane before
we knew one another?”
“Exactly,” I retorted. “We didn’t know one another then. That makes
all the difference in the world--to me, at any rate.”
“Does it?” she said, colouring a little and looking at me
thoughtfully. “It’s very--very flattering of you to say so, Dr.
Jardine.”
“I hope you don’t mean that as a snub,” I said, rather uneasy at the
form of her reply and thinking of my letter.
“A snub!” she exclaimed. “No, I certainly don’t. What did I say?”
“You called me Dr. Jardine. I addressed you in my letter as
‘Sylvia’--‘My dear Sylvia.’”
“And what ought I to have said?” she asked, blushing warmly and
casting down her eyes.
“Well, Sylvia, if you liked me as well as I like you, I don’t see why
you shouldn’t call me Humphrey. We are quite old friends now.”
“So we are,” she agreed; “and perhaps it _would_ be less formal. So
Humphrey it shall be in future, since that is your royal command. But
tell me, how did you prevail on Dr. Thorndyke to let you come here? Is
there any change in the situation?”
“There’s a change in my situation, and a mighty agreeable change, too.
I’m here.”
“Now don’t be silly. How did you persuade Dr. Thorndyke to let you
come?”
“Ha--that, my dear Sylvia, is a rather embarrassing question. Shall we
change the subject?”
“No, we won’t.” She looked at me suspiciously for a moment and then
exclaimed in low, tragical tones:
“Humphrey! You don’t mean to tell me that you came away without his
knowledge!”
“I’m afraid that is what it amounts to. I saw a loop-hole and I popped
through it; and here I am, as I remarked before.”
“But how dreadful of you! Perfectly shocking! And whatever will he say
to you when you go back?”
“That is a question that I am not proposing to present vividly to my
consciousness until I arrive on the doorstep. I’ve broken out of choky
and I’m going to have a good time--to go on having a good time, I
should say.”
“Then you consider that you are having a good time now?”
“I don’t consider. I am sure of it. Am I not, at this very moment
looking at you? And what more could a man desire?”
She tried to look severe, though the attempt was not strikingly
successful, and retorted in an admonishing tone:
“You needn’t try to wheedle me with compliments. You are a very wicked
person and most indiscreet. But it seems to me that some sort of
change has come over you since you retired from the world. Don’t you
think I’m right?”
“You’re perfectly right. I’ve improved. That’s what it is. Matured and
mellowed, you know, like a bottle of claret that has been left in a
cellar and forgotten. Say you think I’ve improved, Sylvia.”
“I won’t,” she replied, and then, changing her mind, she added: “Yes,
I will. I’ll say that you are more insinuating than ever, if that will
do. And now, as you are clearly quite incorrigible, I won’t scold you
any more, especially as you ‘broke out of choky’ to come and see me.
You shall tell me all about your adventures.”
“I didn’t come here to talk about myself, Sylvia. I came to tell you
something--well, about myself, perhaps, but--er--not my adventures you
know or--or that sort of thing--but, I have been thinking a good deal,
since I have been alone so much--about you, I mean, Sylvia--and--er--
Oh! the deuce!”
The latter exclamation was evoked by the warning voice of the gong,
evidently announcing tea, and the subsequent appearance of the
housemaid; who was certainly not such a goose as she was supposed to
be, for she tapped discreetly at the door and waited three full
seconds before entering; and even then she appeared demurely
unconscious of my existence.
“If you please, Miss Sylvia, Miss Vyne has woke up and I’ve taken in
the tea.”
Such was the paltry interruption that arrested the flow of my
eloquence and scattered my flowers of rhetoric to the winds. I
murmured inwardly, “Blow the tea!” for the opportunity was gone; but I
comforted myself with the reflection that it didn’t matter very much,
since Sylvia and I seemed to have arrived at a pretty clear
understanding; which understanding was further clarified by a
momentary contact of our hands as we followed the maid to the
drawing-room. Miss Vyne was on this occasion, as on the last, seated
in the exact centre of the room, and with the same monumental effect;
so that my thoughts were borne irresistibly to the ethnographical
section of the British Museum and especially to that part of it
wherein the deities of Polynesia look out from their cases in
perennial surprise at the degenerate European visitors. If she had
been asleep previously, she was wide enough awake now; but the
glittering eyes were not directed at me. From the moment of our
entering the room they focussed themselves on Sylvia’s face and there
remained rivetted, whereby the heightening of that young lady’s
complexion, which our interview had produced, became markedly
accentuated. It was to no purpose that I placed myself before the
rigid figure and offered my hand. A paw was lifted automatically to
mine, but the eyes remained fixed on Sylvia.
“What did you say this gentleman’s name was?” the waxwork asked
frigidly.
“This is Dr. Jardine,” was the reply.
“Oh, indeed. And who was the gentleman who called some three weeks
ago?”
“Why, that was Dr. Jardine; you know it was.”
“So I thought, but my memory is not very reliable. And this is a Dr.
Jardine, too? Very interesting. A medical family, apparently. But not
much alike.”
I was beginning to explain my identity and the cause of my altered
appearance, when Sylvia approached with a cup of tea and a carefully
dissected muffin, which latter she thrust under the nose of the elder
lady; who regarded it attentively and with a slight squint, owing to
its nearness.
“It’s of no use, you know,” said Sylvia, “for you to pretend that you
don’t know him, because I’ve told you all about the
transformation--that is, all I know myself. Don’t you think it’s
rather a clever make-up?”
“If,” said Miss Vyne, “by ‘make-up’ you mean a disguise, I think it is
highly successful. The beard is a most admirable imitation.”
“Oh, the beard is his own; at least, I think it is.”
I confirmed this statement, ignoring Polton’s slight additions.
“Indeed,” said Miss Vyne. “Then the wig--it is a wig, I suppose?”
“No, of course it isn’t,” Sylvia replied.
“Then,” said Miss Vyne, majestically, “perhaps you will explain to me
what the disguise consists of.”
“Well,” said Sylvia, “there are the eyebrows. You can see that they
have been completely altered in shape.”
“If I had committed the former shape of the eyebrows to memory, as you
appear to have done,” said Miss Vyne, “I should, no doubt, observe the
change. But I did not. It seems to me that the disguise which you told
me about with such a flourish of trumpets just amounts to this; that
Dr. Jardine has allowed his beard to grow. I find the reality quite
disappointing.”
“Do you?” said Sylvia. “But, at any rate, you didn’t recognize him; so
your disappointment doesn’t count for much.”
The old lady, being thus hoist with her own petard, relapsed into
majestic silence; and Sylvia then renewed her demand for an account of
my adventures.
“We want to hear all about that objectionable person who has been
shadowing you, and how you finally got rid of him. Your letters were
rather sketchy and wanting in detail, so you have got to make up the
deficiency now.”
Thus commanded, I plunged into an exhaustive account of those events
which I have already chronicled at length and which I need not refer
to again, nor need I record the cross-examination to which I was
subjected, since it elicited nothing that is not set forth in the
preceding pages. When I had finished my recital, however, Miss Vyne,
who had listened to it in silence, hitherto, put a question which I
had some doubts about answering.
“Have you or Dr. Thorndyke been able to discover who this inquisitive
person is and what is his object in following you about?”
I hesitated. As to my own experiences, I had no secrets from these
friends of mine, excepting those that related to the subjects of
Thorndyke’s investigations, but I must not come here and babble about
what took place in the sacred precincts of my principal’s chambers.
“I think I may tell you,” said I, “that Dr. Thorndyke has discovered
the identity of this man and that he is not the person whom we
suspected him to be. But I mustn’t say any more, as the information
came through professional channels and consequently is not mine to
give.”
“Of course you mustn’t,” said Sylvia; “though I don’t mind admitting
that you have put me on tenterhooks of curiosity. But I daresay you
will be able to tell us everything later.”
I agreed that I probably should; and the talk then turned into fresh
channels.
The short winter day was running out apace. The daylight had long
since gone, and I began, with infinite reluctance, to think of
returning to my cage. Indeed, when I looked at my watch, I was
horrified to see how the time had fled.
“My word!” I exclaimed. “I must be off, or Thorndyke will be putting
the sleuth-hounds of the law on my track. And I don’t know what you
will think of me for having stayed such an unconscionable time.”
“It isn’t a ceremonial visit,” said Sylvia, as I rose and made my
adieux to her aunt. “We should have liked you to stay much longer.”
Here she paused suddenly, and, clasping her hands, gazed at me with an
expression of dismay.
“Good Heavens! Humphrey!” she exclaimed.
“Eh?” said Miss Vyne.
“I was addressing Dr. Jardine,” Sylvia explained, in some confusion.
“I didn’t suppose you were addressing me,” was the withering reply.
“Do you know,” said Sylvia, “that I haven’t shown you those sketches,
after all. You must see them. They were the special object of your
visit.”
This was perfectly untrue, and she knew it; but I did not think it
worth while to contest the statement in Miss Vyne’s presence.
Accordingly I expressed the utmost eagerness to see the trumpery
sketches, and the more so since I had understood that they were on
view in the studio; which turned out to be the case.
“It won’t take a minute for you to see them,” said Sylvia. “I’ll just
run up and light the gas; and you are not to come in until I tell
you.”
She preceded me up the stairs to the little room on the first floor in
which she worked, and, when I had waited a few moments on the landing
she summoned me to enter.
“These are the sketches,” said she, “that I have finished. You see,
they are quite presentable now. I cleaned off the rough daubs of paint
with a scraper and finished up with a soft rag dipped in chloroform.”
I ran my eye over the framed sketches, which, now that the canvases
were strained on stretchers and the disfiguring brush-strokes removed,
were, as she had said, quite presentable, though too rough and
unfinished to be attractive.
“I daresay they are very interesting,” said I, “but they are only bare
beginnings. I shouldn’t have thought them worth framing.”
“Not as pictures,” she agreed; “but as examples of a very curious
technique, I find them most instructive. However, you haven’t seen the
real gem of the collection. This is it, on the easel. Sit down, on the
chair and say when you are ready. I’m going to give you a surprise.”
I seated myself on the chair opposite the easel, on which was a canvas
with its back towards me.
“Now,” said Sylvia. “Are you ready? One, two, three!”
She picked up the canvas, and, turning it round quickly, presented its
face to me. I don’t know what I had expected--if I had expected
anything; but certainly I was not in the least prepared for what I
saw. The sketch had originally represented, very roughly, a dark mass
of trees which occupied nearly the whole of the canvas; but of this
the middle had been cleaned away, exposing an under painting. And this
it was that filled me with such amazement that, after a first startled
exclamation, I could do nothing but stare open-mouthed at the canvas;
for, from the opening in the dark mass of foliage there looked out at
me, distinct and unmistakable, the face of Mrs. Samway.
It was no illusion or chance resemblance. Rough as the painting was,
the likeness was excellent. All the well-known features which made her
so different from other women were there, though expressed by a mere
dextrous turn of the knife; the jet-black, formally-parted hair, the
clear, bright complexion, the pale, inscrutable eyes; all were there,
even to the steady, penetrating expression that looked out at me from
the canvas as if in silent recognition. As I sat staring at the
picture with a surprise that almost amounted to awe, Sylvia looked at
me a little blankly.
“Well!” she exclaimed, at length, “I meant to give you a surprise,
but--what is it, Humphrey? Do you know her?”
“Yes,” I replied; “and so do you. Don’t you remember a woman who
looked in at you through the glass door of Robinson’s shop?”
“Do you mean that black and scarlet creature? I didn’t recognize her.
I had no idea she was so handsome; for this is really a very beautiful
face, though there is something about it that I don’t understand.
Something--well eerie; rather uncanny and almost sinister. Don’t you
think so?”
“I have always thought her a rather weird woman, but this is the
weirdest appearance she has made. How on earth came her face on that
canvas?”
“It _is_ an odd coincidence. And yet I don’t know that it is. She may
have been some relative of that rather eccentric artist, or even his
wife. I don’t know why it shouldn’t be so.”
Neither did I. But the coincidence remained a very striking one, to
me, at least; much more so than Sylvia realized; though what its
significance might be--if it had any--I could not guess. Nor was there
any opportunity to discuss it at the moment, for it was high time for
me to be gone.
“You will send me a telegram when you get back, to say that you have
arrived home safely, won’t you,” said Sylvia, as we descended the
stairs with our arms linked together. “Of course nothing is going to
happen to you, but I can’t help feeling a little nervous. And you’ll
go down to the station by the High Street, and keep to the main roads.
That is a promise, isn’t it?”
I made the promise readily having decided previously to take every
possible precaution, and, when I had wished Sylvia “good-bye” at some
length, I proceeded to execute it; making my way down the
well-populated High Street and keeping a bright look-out both there
and at the station. Once more I was fortunate in the matter of trains,
and, having taken a hansom from Broad Street to the Temple, was set
down in King’s Bench Walk soon after half-past six.
As I approached our building, I looked up with some anxiety at the
sitting-room windows; and when I saw them brightly lighted, a
suspicion that Thorndyke had returned earlier than usual filled me
with foreboding. I had had my dance and now I was going to pay the
piper, and I did not much enjoy the prospect; in fact, as I ascended
the stairs and took my latch-key from my pocket, I was as nervous as a
school-boy who has been playing truant. However, there was no escape
unless I sneaked up to my bed-room, so, inserting the key into the
lock, I turned it as boldly as I could, and entered.