pant of horror from the lawyer's quaking lips! Shrieks--howls--prayers
for mercy--groans to make the hair rise--and curses, at sound of which
I shut my ears in horror, only to open them again in dread as, with one
simultaneous impulse, they flung themselves upon the lawyer who,
foreseeing this rush, had backed up against the wall.
He tried to stem the tide.
"I knew nothing of the poisoning," he protested. "That was not my reason
for declining the drink. I wished to preserve my senses--to carry out my
client's wishes. As God lives, I did not know he meant to carry his
revenge so far. Mercy! Mer--"
But the hands which clutched him were the hands of murderers, and the
lawyer's puny figure could not stand up against the avalanche of human
terror, relentless fury and mad vengeance which now rolled in upon it.
As I bounded to his relief he turned his ghastly face upon me. But the
way between us was blocked, and I was preparing myself to see him sink
before my eyes, when an unearthly shriek rose from behind us, and every
living soul in that mass of struggling humanity paused, set and
staring, with stiffened limbs and eyes fixed, not on him, not on me, but
on one of their own number, the only woman amongst them, Janet
Clapsaddle, who, with clutching hands clawing her breast, was reeling in
solitary agony in her place beside the board. As they looked she fell,
and lay with upturned face and staring eyes, in whose glassy depths the
ill-fated ones who watched her could see mirrored their own impending
doom.
It was an awful moment. A groan, in which was concentrated the despair
of seven miserable souls, rose from that petrified band; then, man by
man, they separated and fell back, showing on each weak or wicked face
the particular passion which had driven them into crime and made them
the victims of this wholesale revenge. There had been some sort of bond
between them till the vision of death rose before each shrinking soul.
Shoulder to shoulder in crime, they fell apart as their doom approached;
and rushing, shrieking, each man for himself, they one and all sought
to escape by doors, windows or any outlet which promised release from
this fatal spot. One rushed by me--I do not know which one--and I felt
as if a flame from hell had licked me, his breath was so hot and the
moans he uttered so like the curses we imagine to blister the lips of
the lost. None of them saw me; they did not even detect the sliding form
of the lawyer crawling away before them to some place of egress of which
they had no knowledge; and, convinced that in this scene of death I
could play no part worthy of her who awaited me, I too rushed away and,
groping my way back through the cellar, sought the side of her who still
crouched in patient waiting against the dismal wall.
IV
THE FINAL SHOCK
Her baby had fallen asleep. I knew this by the faint, low sweetness of
her croon; and, shuddering with the horrors I had witnessed, horrors
which acquired a double force from the contrast presented by the peace
of this quiet spot and the hallowing influence of the sleeping
infant,--I threw myself down in the darkness at her feet, gasping out:
"Oh, thank God and your uncle's seeming harshness, that you have escaped
the doom which has overtaken those others! You and your babe are still
alive; while they--"
"What of them? What has happened to them? You are breathless, trembling;
you have brought no bread--"
"No, no. Food in this house means death. Your relatives gave food and
wine to your uncle at a supper; he, though now in his grave, has
returned the same to them. There was a bottle--"
I stopped, appalled. A shriek, muffled by distance but quivering with
the same note of death I had heard before, had gone up again from the
other side of the wall against which we were leaning.
"Oh!" she gasped; "and my father was at that supper! my father, who died
last night cursing the day he was born! We are an accursed race. I have
known it all my life; perhaps that was why I mistook passion for love;
and my baby-- O God, have mercy! God have mercy!"
The plaintiveness of that cry, the awesomeness of what I had seen--of
what was going on at that moment almost within the reach of our
arms--the darkness, the desolation of our two souls, affected me as I
had never been affected in my whole life before. In the concentrated
experience of the last two hours I seemed to live years under this
woman's eyes; to know her as I did my own heart; to love her as I did my
own soul. No growth of feeling ever brought the ecstasy of that
moment's inspiration. With no sense of doing anything strange, with no
fear of being misunderstood, I reached out my hand and, touching hers
where it lay clasped about her infant, I said:
"We are two poor wayfarers. A rough road loses half its difficulties
when trodden by two. Shall we, then, fare on together--we and the little
child?"
She gave a sob; there was sorrow, longing, grief, hope, in its thrilling
low sound. As I recognized the latter emotion I drew her to my breast.
The child did not separate us.
"We shall be happy," I murmured, and her sigh seemed to answer a
delicious "Yes," when suddenly there came a shock to the partition
against which we leaned and, starting from my clasp, she cried:
"Our duty is in there. Shall we think of ourselves or even of each other
while these men, all relatives of mine, are dying on the other side of
this wall?"
Seizing my hand, she dragged me to the trap; but here I took the lead,
and helped her down the ladder. When I had her safely on the floor at
the foot, she passed in front of me again; but once up the steps and in
front of the kitchen door, I thrust her behind me, for one glance into
the room beyond had convinced me it was no place for her.
But she would not be held back. She crowded forward beside me, and
together we looked upon the wreck within. It was a never-to-be-forgotten
scene. The demon that was in those men had driven them to demolish
furniture, dishes, everything. In one heap lay what, an hour before, had
been an inviting board surrounded by rollicking and greedy guests. But
it was not upon this overthrow we stopped to look. It was upon something
that mingled with it, dominated it and made of this chaos only a setting
to awful death. Janet's face, in all its natural hideousness and
depravity, looked up from the floor beside this heap; and farther on,
the twisted figure of him they called Hector, with something more than
the seams of greedy longing round his wide, staring eyes and icy
temples. Two in this room! and on the threshold of the one beyond a
moaning third, who sank into eternal silence as we approached; and
before the fireplace in the great room, a horrible crescent that had
once been aged Luke, upon whom we had no sooner turned our backs than we
caught glimpses here and there of other prostrate forms which moved once
under our eyes and then moved no more.
One only still stood upright, and he was the man whose obtrusive figure
and sordid expression had so revolted me in the beginning. There was no
color now in his flabby and heavily fallen cheeks. The eyes, in whose
false sheen I had seen so much of evil, were glazed now, and his big and
burly frame shook the door it pressed against. He was staring at a small
slip of paper he held, and, from his anxious looks, appeared to miss
something which neither of us had power to supply. It was a spectacle to
make devils rejoice, and mortals fly aghast. But Eunice had a spirit
like an angel and drawing near him, she said:
"Is there anything I can do for you, Cousin John?"
He started, looked at her with the same blank gaze he had hitherto cast
at the wall; then some words formed on his working lips and we heard:
"I can not reckon; I was never good at figures; but if Luke is gone, and
William, and Hector, and Barbara's boy, and Janet,--_how much does that
leave for me_?"
He was answered almost the moment he spoke; but it was by other tongues
and in another world than this. As his body fell forward, I tore open
the door before which he had been standing, and, lifting the almost
fainting Eunice in my arms, I carried her out into the night. As I did
so, I caught a final glimpse of the pictured face I had found it so hard
to understand a couple of hours before. I understood it now.
A surprise awaited us as we turned toward the gate. The mist had lifted
and a keen but not unpleasant wind was driving from the north. Borne on
it, we heard voices. The village had emptied itself, probably at the
alarm given by the lawyer, and it was these good men and women whose
approach we heard. As we had nothing to fear from them, we went forward
to meet them. As we did so, three crouching figures rose from some
bushes we passed and ran scurrying before us through the gateway. They
were the late comers who had shown such despair at being shut out from
this fatal house, and who probably did not yet know the doom they had
escaped.
* * * * *
There were lanterns in the hands of some of the men who now approached.
As we stopped before them, these lanterns were held up, and by the light
they gave we saw, first, the lawyer's frightened face, then the visages
of two men who seemed to be persons of some authority.
"What news?" faltered the lawyer, seeing by our faces that we knew the
worst.
"Bad," I returned; "the poison had lost none of its virulence by being
mixed so long with the wine."
"How many?" asked the man on his right anxiously.
"Eight," was my solemn reply.
"There were but eight," faltered the lawyer; "that means, then, all?"
"All," I repeated.
A murmur of horror rose, swelled, then died out in tumult as the crowd
swept on past us.
For a moment we stood watching these people; saw them pause before the
door we had left open behind us, then rush in, leaving a wail of terror
on the shuddering midnight air. When all was quiet again, Eunice laid
her hand upon my arm.
"Where shall we go?" she asked despairingly. "I do not know a house that
will open to me."
The answer to her question came from other lips than mine.
"I do not know one that will _not_," spoke up a voice behind our backs.
"Your withdrawal from the circle of heirs did not take from you your
rightful claim to an inheritance which, according to your uncle's will,
could be forfeited only by a failure to arrive at the place of
distribution within the hour set by the testator. As I see the matter
now, this appeal to the honesty of the persons so collected was a test
by which my unhappy client strove to save from the general fate such
members of his miserable family as fully recognized their sin and were
truly repentant."
It was Lawyer Smead. He had lingered behind the others to tell her this.
She was, then, no outcast, but rich, very rich; how rich I dared not
acknowledge to myself, lest a remembrance of the man who was the last to
perish in that house of death should return to make this calculation
hateful. It was a blow which struck deep, deeper than any either of us
had sustained that night. As we came to realize it, I stepped slowly
back, leaving her standing erect and tall in the middle of the roadway,
with her baby in her arms. But not for long; soon she was close at my
side murmuring softly:
"Two wayfarers still! Only, the road will be more difficult and the need
of companionship greater. Shall we fare on together, you, I--and the
little one?"
THE RUBY AND THE CALDRON
As there were two good men on duty that night, I did not see why I
should remain at my desk, even though there was an unusual stir created
in our small town by the grand ball given at The Evergreens.
But just as I was preparing to start for home, an imperative ring called
me to the telephone and I heard:
"Halloo! Is this the police-station?"
"It is."
"Well, then, a detective is wanted at once at The Evergreens. He can not
be too clever or too discreet. A valuable jewel has been lost, which
must be found before the guests disperse for home. Large reward if the
matter ends successfully and without too great publicity."
"May I ask who is speaking to me?"
"Mrs. Ashley."
It was the mistress of The Evergreens and giver of the ball.
"Madam, a man shall be sent at once. Where will you see him?"
"In the butler's pantry at the rear. Let him give his name as Jennings."
"Very good. Good-by."
"Good-by."
A pretty piece of work! Should I send Hendricks or should I send Hicks?
Hendricks was clever and Hicks discreet, but neither united both
qualifications in the measure demanded by the sensible and
quietly-resolved woman with whom I had just been talking. What
alternative remained? But one; I must go myself.
It was not late--not for a ball night, at least--and as half the town
had been invited to the dance, the streets were alive with carriages. I
was watching the blink of their lights through the fast falling snow
when my attention was drawn to a fact which struck me as peculiar. These
carriages were all coming my way instead of rolling in the direction of
The Evergreens. Had they been empty this would have needed no
explanation, but, as far as I could see, most of them were full, and
that, too, with loudly talking women and gesticulating men.
Something of a serious nature must have occurred at The Evergreens.
Rapidly I paced on and soon found myself before the great gates.
A crowd of vehicles of all descriptions blocked the entrance. None
seemed to be passing up the driveway; all stood clustered at the gates,
and as I drew nearer I perceived many an anxious head thrust forth from
their quickly opened doors and heard many an ejaculation of
disappointment as the short interchange of words went on between the
drivers of these various turnouts and a man drawn up in quiet resolution
before the unexpectedly barred entrance.
Slipping round to this man's side, I listened to what he was saying. It
was simple but very explicit.
"Mrs. Ashley asks everybody's pardon, but the ball can't go on
to-night. Something has happened which makes the reception of further
guests impossible. To-morrow evening she will be happy to see you all.
The dance is simply postponed."
This he had probably repeated forty times, and each time it had probably
been received with the same mixture of doubt and curiosity which now
held the lengthy procession in check.
Not wishing to attract attention, yet anxious to lose no time, I pressed
up still nearer, and, bending toward him from the shadow cast by a
convenient post, uttered the one word:
"Jennings."
Instantly he unlocked a small gate at his right. I passed in and, with
professional _sang-froid_, proceeded to take my way to the house through
the double row of evergreens bordering the semicircular approach.
As these trees stood very close together and were, besides, heavily
laden with fresh-fallen snow, I failed to catch a glimpse of the
building itself until I stood in front of it. Then I saw that it was
brilliantly lighted and gave evidence here and there of some festivity;
but the guests were too few for the effect to be very exhilarating and,
passing around to the rear, I sought the special entrance to which I had
been directed.
A heavy-browed porch, before which stood a caterer's wagon, led me to a
door which had every appearance of being the one I sought. Pushing it
open, I entered without ceremony, and speedily found myself in the midst
of twenty or more colored waiters and chattering housemaids. To one of
the former I addressed the question:
"Where is the butler's pantry? I am told that I shall find the lady of
the house there."
"Your name?" was the curt demand.
"Jennings."
"Follow me."
I was taken through narrow passages and across one or two store-rooms to
a small but well-lighted closet, where I was left, with the assurance
that Mrs. Ashley would presently join me. I had never seen this lady,
but I had often heard her spoken of as a woman of superior character and
admirable discretion.
She did not keep me waiting. In two minutes the door opened and this
fine, well-poised woman was telling her story in the straightforward
manner I so much admire and so seldom meet with.
The article lost was a large ruby of singular beauty and great
value--the property of Mrs. Burton, the senator's wife, in whose honor
this ball was given. It had not been lost in the house nor had it been
originally missed that evening. Mrs. Burton and herself had attended the
great foot-ball game in the afternoon, and it was on the college campus
that Mrs. Burton had first dropped her invaluable jewel. But a reward of
five hundred dollars having been at once offered to whoever should find
and restore it, a great search had followed, which ended in its being
picked up by one of the students and brought back as far as the great
step leading up to the front door, when it had again disappeared, and
in a way to rouse conjecture of the strangest and most puzzling
character.
The young man who had brought it thus far bore the name of John Deane,
and was a member of the senior class. He had been the first to detect
its sparkle in the grass, and those who were near enough to see his face
at that happy moment say that it expressed the utmost satisfaction at
his good luck.
"You see," said Mrs. Ashley, "he has a sweetheart, and five hundred
dollars looks like a fortune to a young man just starting life. But he
was weak enough to take this girl into his confidence; and on their way
here--for both were invited to the ball--he went so far as to pull it
out of his pocket and show it to her.
"They were admiring it together and vaunting its beauties to the young
lady friend who had accompanied them, when their carriage turned into
the driveway and they saw the lights of the house flashing before them.
Hastily restoring the jewel to the little bag he had made for it out of
the finger-end of an old glove,--a bag in which he assured me he had
been careful to keep it safely tied ever since picking it up on the
college green,--he thrust it back into his pocket and prepared to help
the ladies out. But just then a disturbance arose in front. A horse
which had been driven up was rearing in a way that threatened to
overturn the light buggy to which he was attached. As the occupants of
this buggy were ladies, and seemed to have no control over the plunging
beast, young Deane naturally sprang to the rescue. Bidding his own
ladies alight and make for the porch, he hurriedly ran forward and,
pausing in front of the maddened animal, waited for an opportunity to
seize him by the rein. He says that as he stood there facing the beast
with fixed eye and raised hand, he distinctly felt something strike or
touch his breast. But the sensation conveyed no meaning to him in his
excitement, and he did not think of it again till, the horse well in
hand and the two alarmed occupants of the buggy rescued, he turned to
see where his own ladies were, and beheld them looking down at him from
the midst of a circle of young people, drawn from the house by the
screaming of the women. Instantly a thought of the treasure he carried
recurred to his mind, and dropping the rein of the now quieted horse, he
put his hand to his pocket. The jewel was gone. He declares that for a
moment he felt as if he had been struck on the head by one of the hoofs
of the frantic horse he had just handled. But immediately the importance
of his loss and the necessity he felt for instant action restored him to
himself, and shouting aloud, 'I have dropped Mrs. Burton's ruby!' begged
every one to stand still while he made a search for it.
"This all occurred, as you must know, more than an hour and a half ago,
consequently before many of my guests had arrived. My son, who was one
of the few spectators gathered on the porch, tells me that there was
only one other carriage behind the one in which Mr. Deane had brought
his ladies. Both of these had stopped short of the stepping-stone, and
as the horse and buggy which had made all this trouble had by this time
been driven to the stable, nothing stood in the way of his search but
the rapidly accumulating snow which, if you remember, was falling very
thick and fast at the time.
"My son, who had rushed in for his overcoat, came running down with
offers to help him. So did some others. But, with an imploring gesture,
he begged to be allowed to conduct the search alone, the ground being in
such a state that the delicately-mounted jewel ran great risk of being
trodden into the snow and thus injured or lost. They humored him for a
moment, then, seeing that his efforts bade fair to be fruitless, my son
insisted upon joining him, and the two looked the ground over, inch by
inch, from the place where Mr. Deane had set foot to ground in alighting
from his carriage to the exact spot where he had stood when he had
finally seized hold of the horse. But no ruby. Then Harrison (that is
my son's name) sent for a broom and went over the place again, sweeping
aside the surface snow and examining carefully the ground beneath,--but
with no better results than before. No ruby could be found. My son came
to me panting. Mrs. Burton and myself stood awaiting him in a state of
suspense. Guests and fete were alike forgotten. We had heard that the
jewel had been found on the campus by one of the students and had been
brought back as far as the step in front and then lost again in some
unaccountable manner in the snow, and we hoped, nay expected from moment
to moment, that it would be brought in.
"When Harrison entered, then, pale, disheveled and shaking his head,
Mrs. Burton caught me by the hand, and I thought she would faint. For
this jewel is of far greater value to her than its mere worth in money,
though that is by no means small.
"It is a family jewel and was given to her by her husband under special
circumstances. He prizes it even more than she does, and he is not here
to counsel or assist her in this extremity. Besides, she was wearing it
in direct opposition to his expressed wishes. This I must tell you, to
show how imperative it is for us to recover it; also to account for the
large reward she is willing to pay. When he last looked at it he noticed
that the fastening was a trifle slack and, though he handed the trinket
back, he told her distinctly that she was not to wear it till it had
been either to Tiffany's or Starr's. But she considered it safe enough,
and put it on to please the boys, and lost it. Senator Burton is a hard
man and,--in short, the jewel must be found. I give you just one hour in
which to do it."
"But, madam--" I protested.
"I know," she put in, with a quick nod and a glance over her shoulder to
see if the door was shut. "I have not finished my story. Hearing what
Harrison had to say, I took action at once. I bade him call in the
guests, whom curiosity or interest still detained on the porch, and seat
them in a certain room which I designated to him. Then, after telling
him to send two men to the gates with orders to hold back all further
carriages from entering, and two others to shovel up and cart away to
the stable every particle of snow for ten feet each side of the front
step, I asked to see Mr. Deane. But here my son whispered something into
my ear, which it is my duty to repeat. It was to the effect that Mr.
Deane believed that the jewel had been taken from him; that he insisted,
in fact, that he had felt a hand touch his breast while he stood
awaiting an opportunity to seize the horse. 'Very good,' said I, 'we'll
remember that, too; but first see that my orders are carried out and
that all approaches to the grounds are guarded and no one allowed to
come in or go out without permission from me.'
"He left us, and I was turning to encourage Mrs. Burton when my
attention was caught by the eager face of a little friend of mine, who,
quite unknown to me, was sitting in one of the corners of the room. She
was studying my countenance in a sort of subdued anxiety, hardly
natural in one so young, and I was about to call her to my side and
question her when she made a sudden dive and vanished from the room.
Some impulse made me follow her. She is a conscientious little thing,
but timid as a hare, and though I saw she had something to say, it was
with difficulty I could make her speak. Only after the most solemn
assurances that her name should not be mentioned in the matter, would
she give me the following bit of information, which you may possibly
think throws another light upon the affair. It seems that she was
looking out of one of the front windows when Mr. Deane's carriage drove
up. She had been watching the antics of the horse attached to the buggy,
but as soon as she saw Mr. Deane going to the assistance of those in
danger, she let her eyes stray back to the ladies whom he had left
behind him in the carriage.