Three days later Esther sat by the window in the hotel sitting-room of
the Cliffords' suite, waiting for Roger. She had made rapid progress
during the past twenty-four hours, but she still felt rather wan and
tremulous, as though she had been through a long illness. Moreover she
now knew all there was to know about the affair in which she had played
a leading part. She had insisted on being told what had happened to
Lady Clifford, and in spite of the inevitable shock to her nerves she
had since felt steadier. She had now beside her all the papers
containing accounts of the death of the Frenchwoman and the
disappearance of Dr. Sartorius, both well-known figures in Cannes, and
she had read with the keenest interest all the diverse theories which
strove to connect the two events. Up till now not one report had hit
upon the true facts of the case; all the stories were wide of the mark,
and the general impression given to the public was that in some
mysterious way the doctor was responsible for his employer's
catastrophic end. There was one garbled account which mentioned her
own name--gleaned, most likely, from one of the French servants at the
villa--but so far Roger, in his determination to prevent the Press from
persecuting her, had kept her well out of it.
It seemed almost unbelievable that after three whole days so little of
the actual affair should be known. The sensation caused was a big one,
but it remained in the nature of an enigma. Rumour in several quarters
had it that Lady Clifford had simply committed suicide because of the
desertion of her lover. The result of the inquest was not yet known.
and the fact that the death was due to an accident was difficult for
most people to grasp.
Esther, however, knew how the awful thing had happened, and amid her
complex emotions she was conscious of a sort of admiration for the
Frenchwoman's courage in setting out as she must have done, in the
darkness and rain, on her perilous mission--a mission she had all but
accomplished, too, for it had now been established that the bottle upon
the shelf in Roger's bathroom contained pure Evian water, innocent of
contamination. Thérèse had therefore effected the exchange and was on
her return journey when she lost her balance.
Looking out upon the Croisette and the harbour beyond, where the myriad
lights of yachts began to twinkle in the violet dusk, Esther drew a
deep breath and assembled her thoughts more calmly than she had as yet
been able to do. The terrible experience through which she had passed
had left its imprint upon her; she was still ready to jump at the
slightest sound, or even, absurdly, to burst into tears. Yet deep
within her was a warm consciousness of security, an earnest of
happiness to come. No word of actual love had been spoken between her
and Roger, she had not been alone with him since that night at the
villa, yet it was enough for her to recall the pressure of his face
against her hands and the hungry way in which his eyes had dwelt upon
her. In that hour she had learned how much she mattered to him. She
closed her eyes now and revelled in the delicious certainty of what was
coming to her. Her heart beat almost as it had done during those
dreadful moments in the laboratory which she was striving to forget; it
thumped against her ribs with great blows, so that instinctively she
put her hands upon her breast to quiet it.
"What an idiot I am to take so much for granted," she reflected,
chiding herself. "Suppose I'm mistaken about him after all?"
She knew she wasn't mistaken. She also knew that old Miss Clifford
scented a romance, was indeed keeping out of the way now to let her be
alone with Roger. This was the first time that Esther had had her
clothes on; the old lady had helped her to dress, unpacking with her
own hands the little steamer-trunk that had been fetched from the Route
de Grasse, and given orders to the chambermaid to press all its
contents and put them in order.
Esther glanced down at her frock. It was the peach-coloured one she
had worn that night when she had danced at the Ambassadeurs. It felt a
little loose upon her now, for she had lost a good deal of weight,
perhaps six or seven pounds, she reflected. Her hair needed trimming,
the curly bronze locks played about her neck and ears in a fashion that
stirred her displeasure. Still, that could soon be remedied; she would
take herself in hand at once. She was glad to be in mufti for a bit,
to indulge with a clear conscience in a riot of feminine distractions.
Even to sit here quietly, her hands in her lap, after the storm she had
passed through, was in itself a luxury. Her feeling of security and
well-being was so acute that the realisation of it brought a little
stab of almost pain, while tears, so close to the surface now, rushed
into her eyes.
It was at this moment that the door opened and Roger came in, his arms
filled with an immense bunch of pale pink roses. She rose hurriedly,
brushing the tears away with a feeling of shame, and smiling at him.
He came close and looked with a grave face at the drops still clinging
to her lashes.
"What are those for?" he inquired in a serious tone.
"Nothing at all. If I tell you, you'll think me such a fool! I--I was
only thinking to myself how happy I was to be alive, and--and all that."
He looked down at her for a long moment with so penetrating a gaze that
she grew embarrassed.
"There--that's the look of yours I like so much," he said at last,
watching her colour rise. "You know you are just a nice child,
Esther--an awfully nice child! That's how I first thought of you."
With a gesture half-afraid he put up one finger and touched a tendril
of hair that had strayed loose on her neck. She felt shyer than
before, and turned her attention to the roses.
"For me?" she asked, burying her face in their cool depths. "How too
beautiful! I don't think I've ever seen roses so lovely before.
There's--there's something special about them, somehow," she added
truthfully.
"There is," he replied gravely, as he deposited his burden on the table.
Suddenly tongue-tied, she made an effort to speak naturally of other
matters, avoiding the personal.
"Any news of ... of that man?" she inquired.
Stupid that she still could not speak of him easily!
Roger saw that a faint shadow had darkened her upturned eyes, and it
cut him to the heart.
"No, nothing yet--but don't let that distress you. The fellow is bound
to be caught; it's only a question of time. You are not to be worried
about it. Look at me! You are worrying, this minute."
"I'm not at all," she denied stoutly. "Why should I bother about
him--now?"
For answer he drew forward the biggest arm-chair and gently made her
sit down. The slight hollow of her delicate cheek, the dark circles
under the eyes, caused him acute suffering.
"Seriously, Esther, when I think of what you have been through, when I
think that it must have left a terrible impression on you and that
nothing I can do can remove that impression, it is almost more than I
can bear. I feel it is all our fault."
"How perfectly absurd! It was nobody's fault. And you ought to be
thankful it has turned out as it has. I am, I can tell you. As for
me, I shall get over this, don't worry! I'm not neurotic or anything
queer, whatever that man wanted to make you believe. I am really
frightfully normal."
"Yes, thank God! I feel an ass to think I could ever have doubted it."
"I don't know. When I think what I must have looked like bursting in
on you that night--a sort of Curfew-Shall-Not-Ring-To-night, I
suppose--I don't wonder at anyone's thinking me a lunatic. How I ever
got there at all is a mystery to me. I believe I was unconscious part
of the time. I scarcely remember it; the whole thing seems like a sort
of feverish nightmare. When the taxi came to a standstill I simply
gave everything up for lost. I only set out to walk that last mile in
a sort of dogged desperation; I never thought I should get there, or
that if I did it would be in time. It was all uphill, too. I remember
the perspiration running in trickles with the rain down my face, all in
my eyes, so that I could scarcely see. Every little while I just
toppled over altogether and lay on the sidewalk. It was the purest
good luck that I wasn't run in for a drunken person. That would have
finished it!"
"My dear!"
"Oh, well, let's not talk about it any more. I want to forget all that
part of it--if I can."
He sat down close to her on the window-seat, silent for a moment. Then
he said:
"Esther, tell me one thing. What first put the suspicion into your
head that there was something not quite straight about my father's
illness?"
She knit her brow and thought hard for a bit.
"I hardly know," she replied at last. "It's awfully difficult to say.
There were certain tiny, unimportant things that I noticed, even before
I took on the case, but taken separately not one would have meant
anything much. I don't believe I can say exactly when I first began to
feel uncomfortable about the situation. Perhaps I shouldn't have done
so at all if it hadn't been for the pure accident of overhearing a
conversation between your stepmother and Captain Holliday that
afternoon I told you about."
"I know you saw them together, but you never told me you heard what
they were talking about."
"Well, I did hear quite a lot. I listened hard, pretending not to, of
course. I got tremendously interested. He was saying he had almost
made up his mind to go to South America with his Spanish friend, and
she showed very plainly that she was afraid to let him go, that she
believed he wouldn't come back to her. Then she made it pretty clear
that it was the attitude of a person she called 'Charles' which had
caused all the trouble. Of course I didn't know who Charles was! But
after that she said something which interested me enormously. She
described a visit to a crystal-gazer, or a medium of some kind, and she
said the woman saw 'Charles' lying ill in bed, with a nurse beside him
and a doctor. And who do you think she said the doctor was?
Sartorius!"
"You don't mean it!"
"You see, I had just come from Sartorius's house. I had gone there
that afternoon to try to get a job. You may imagine how interested I
was to find this woman was a patient of the man I expected to work for.
And then ... I got the idea that both Lady Clifford and the young man
seemed disappointed because the medium didn't see anything further, and
Captain Holliday was very bitter about it and said that Charles would
recover and live to be ninety, which upset the lady very much."
"Do you think at that time..."
"No, I don't. What I believe is that Lady Clifford had no definite
determination to do anything until she heard Holliday say he would
probably be sailing on the 8th. I think it was the certainty of losing
him so soon that drove her to take a positive step. No doubt she knew
a good deal about the doctor through Holliday, and how he might be got
at through his desire to be free from routine. As for him, human life
as such meant nothing whatever to him--I heard him say so. All he
cares for is science."
"Do you think Holliday had anything to do with it?" Roger asked
tentatively, playing with the window-cord.
"I am fairly sure he hadn't, though he may have suspected something.
At the last he was dragged into it quite against his will, or at least
I got that idea. He was in a blue funk, too--simply dying to clear
out."
"Just the same," remarked Roger rather grimly, "our friend Arthur is
not going to be able to skin out of the affair so easily as he thinks.
A wireless has already been sent to the boat he sailed on, and when he
reaches port he'll be detained and sent back here. In any case, he'll
be wanted as an accessory after the act, which may prove an unpleasant
business for him.... Go on, though; tell me how you actually came to
make up your mind that something was wrong."
"I never did make up my mind until it was too late--that was the awful
part! When I think it all over, though, I can see that the thing that
most roused my suspicions--not altogether by itself, but taken together
with what happened later--was the doctor's flying into a passion with
me for mislaying a hypodermic needle. I haven't told you that yet,
have I?"
"No. Was it after _the_ injection?"
"It was, and at the very moment when you cut your hand. I put the
needle down to attend to you, and I completely forgot where I had laid
it. He was fearfully angry, called me names and abused me in a way
that got my back up. There seemed no reason for it; I couldn't
understand it at all. Then the same day your father got suddenly
worse, you remember, and I should have forgotten all about the beast's
nasty temper, only..."
"Yes, what happened?"
"Why, quite suddenly, I found the needle! Where do you think? Inside
a big book of drawings! I began wondering; I put two and two
together.... You see, I didn't dare mention my awful suspicion--I
couldn't! It might have ruined me for ever if I was wrong. So I did
the only thing I could think of: I took the needle to that chemist and
got it analysed. You know all the rest."
"If only you had confided in me, Esther!"
"Even so it was too late to save your father; nothing would have saved
him. And you quite understand that if the suspicion had proved
unfounded it would have finished me as a nurse for all time!"
He looked at her intently.
"Would that have meant so much to you?"
"Well, what do you think? I've got to earn my living."
"But as far as that goes you might have guessed--that is you might
have..."
He broke off as a knock at the door heralded the entrance of a waiter
bearing a tray with two frosty cocktails.
"Ah! here's something to put a little colour in your cheeks. You want
bucking up, you know! Here's how!"
She took an appreciative sip, then set down her glass, turning on him a
slightly troubled face.
"Roger ... I suppose if this man is caught, it will mean a trial. I
shall be wanted as a witness, sha'n't I? The chief witness, even!"
"Yes, my dear, you will," he replied reluctantly. "I hate the thought
of it as much as you do. I wish there were some way to spare you."
"I expect he'll try to prove I'm insane," she said slowly. "Or else
that I had some low motive in trying to fasten suspicion on to him.
Perhaps he'll even suggest to his lawyer that I was out to blackmail
him!"
"Esther, you're frightfully astute to think of such a thing. It's
quite on the cards he will do that. He'll use every weapon in his
power, unless ..."
"Unless what?"
"Well, there's a pretty black lot of evidence against him. Thérèse's
death in itself, the way in which she died, was a damaging admission.
It seems to me possible that he'll give up the fight entirely. It's
hard to predict anything. One doesn't know what cards he has up his
sleeve."
Her clouded gaze strayed past him out of the window at the glimmering
points of light.
"There is something still so terrifying to me about his machine-like
efficiency," she said, "that I can believe him capable of anything.
His whole plan was so perfectly thought out, down to the smallest
detail. It only broke down through the purely accidental. Once
through my losing the needle--though that wasn't so bad as his losing
his temper!--and once because he let Holliday give me the injection
instead of doing it himself. And yet when I think of what he may say
at the trial..."
He leaned forward suddenly and took her two hands in his.
"Esther, listen to me! Will you promise to marry me, at once, before
this beastly trial comes on?"
Once again the wave of colour swept over her face. She gave a little
nervous laugh.
"But you haven't asked me at all, yet!"
"I'm asking you now. Besides, you knew I meant to. I've been making
inquiries this afternoon. There are a lot of formalities that have to
be gone through with: we have to see an English solicitor, sign a lot
of papers, be _affichéd_ two Sundays--a sort of banns, you know--and
then we have to be married at the _mairie_. Altogether the business
takes just over a couple of weeks, so the sooner one decides the sooner
one can set about it, you see?"
She could think of no reply. Her home, her sisters, came into her
mind; she stammered, then laughed again with a lump in her throat.
Those tears again! She mustn't be so stupid...
There was a sharp rap at the door, more businesslike than the last.
"Who in hell is that?" Roger burst out in irritable annoyance.
It proved to be the valet, obsequious and apologetic, yet full of
importance.
"There is a _sergent-de-ville_ to speak with Monsieur," he informed
them mysteriously, but with a Frenchman's full appreciation of the
ruptured tête-à-tête.
"I'll have to go, I suppose," Roger informed her. "But I'll get it
disposed of as quickly as possible."
Ten minutes went slowly by. She had tried not to let Roger see how
much she dreaded the prospect of the witness-box. In her present state
of nerves she felt she might be guilty of a hundred contradictions and
indiscretions, if faced with the basilisk eyes and over-powering
personality of the man she feared. At the very thought of him she
began to tremble all over as though with ague. It was perfectly
absurd, of course, but there it was. Still now, if she chose, she
could face the trying experience as a married woman, as Roger
Clifford's wife. That security somehow promised her a new strength.
Roger's wife! And in a fortnight's time! A different sort of tremor
seized her, a _frisson_ of exquisite joy....
The door opened. Roger came towards her, took her hands again in his,
and looked at her closely. She grew apprehensive of what he had to
tell her.
"What is it? What has happened?"
"Don't be frightened. They have caught Sartorius. They captured him
aboard a fruit-boat in the harbour, about an hour ago. The boat was
under sailing orders, bound for a port in Morocco; they think the
captain was a friend of Sartorius's. Anyway, they surrounded the
doctor in his cabin. He didn't put up any fight--simply looked at
them, blew his nose, and followed them up without a word."
She stared at him blankly, wondering what more he had to say.
"Yes--go on. What then?"
"They handcuffed him, of course, and let him sit between two of them in
the car. He was quite composed, had nothing to say. It was dark
inside the car; they couldn't see him very well. One of the officers
thought he leaned against him pretty heavily. When they got to the
station he didn't get up, didn't move at all."
"What do you mean?"
"He did us a good turn, Esther. He was quite dead--poisoned, beyond
doubt."
"Poisoned! I wonder how he did it?"
"It is amazing, isn't it? It was the stolid calmness of the fellow
that put them off, I suppose. They think he must have taken something
he had ready when he blew his nose."
She looked at him, her pupils dilated, trying to adjust her ideas to
this new development. She felt strangely bewildered.
"It seems so--so stupid! I can't take it in. A clever man like that
... first to run away, then to throw up the sponge..."
"I know, that's the way it strikes me, too; he seemed at the last so
lacking in resource. Still, he was probably like one of those big,
heavy cars that are wonderful on the straight, but can't turn quickly
in a sharp corner. Take one of those two-ton Hispano-Switzers----"
"Or the Juggernaut," she suggested slowly.
"By Jove, yes, the Juggernaut ... he was like that."
He looked at her with an awful realisation of how near her slender body
had come to being ruthlessly crushed by the human machine--simply
because it happened to put itself in the path. That he, too, had all
unconsciously been in the path and had barely escaped destruction was
now of minor importance.
For several seconds Esther stood with her hands against her heart,
making an effort to grasp, to envisage, the whole of her strange
adventure. Since she had set foot in Cannes two months before she had
watched an old man done slowly to death, had saved a life that meant
everything to her, and had been directly responsible for the events
leading up to two deaths. What a part she had played! She could
scarcely take it in....
She came out of her reverie to find herself in Roger's strong arms, his
lips warm upon hers. Thought deserted her for a breathless moment.
"Do you know what I'm thinking?" he whispered in what might be termed
the first conscious interval. "There may not be any pressing necessity
for an immediate wedding, and yet..."
"Yes?" she murmured, her face against his, her heart beating fast.
"Well, a fortnight is a pretty long engagement--at least for me. What
do you say?"
Her answer, somewhat muffled, came after a longish pause.
"Since you force me to admit it," she whispered against his neck, "it's
quite long enough for me--too!"
THE END