IN THE STARLIGHT.
The conversation at Mr. Dare's dinner-table again turned upon the loss
of the cheque, and the proceedings thereon. It was natural that it
should turn upon it. Mr. Dare's mind was full of it; and he gave
utterance to various conjectures and speculations, as they occurred to
him.
"In spite of what they say, I cannot help thinking that it must have
been William Halliburton," he remarked with emphasis. "He alone was in
the counting-house when the cheque disappeared; and the person changing
it at White's, is proved to have borne the strongest possible
resemblance to him; at all events, to his dress. The face was hidden--as
of course it would be. People who attempt to pass off stolen cheques,
take pretty good care that their features are not seen.
"But who hesitates to bring it home to Halliburton?" inquired Mrs. Dare.
"They all do--as it seems to me. Ashley won't hear a word: laughs at the
idea of Halliburton's being capable of it, and says we may as well
accuse himself. That's nothing: as Cyril says, Mr. Ashley appears to be
imbued with the idea that Halliburton can do no wrong: but now Delves
has veered round. He shifts the blame entirely off Halliburton."
"Upon whom does he shift it?" asked Anthony Dare.
"He won't say," replied Mr. Dare. "He has grown mysterious over it since
the afternoon; nodding and winking, and giving no explanation. He says
he knows who it is who possesses the second cloak."
"The second cloak!" The words were a puzzle to most at table, and Mr.
Dare had to explain that another cloak, similar to that worn by William
Halliburton, was supposed to be in existence.
Cyril looked up, with wonder marked on his face. "Does Delves say there
are two such cloaks?" asked he.
"That there are two such cloaks appears to be an indisputable fact,"
replied Mr. Dare. "The one cloak was parading behind the Halliburtons'
house last night. Samuel Lynn went up to it----"
"The cloak parading tout seul--alone?" interrupted Signora Varsini, with
a perplexed air.
A laugh went round the table. "Accompanied by the wearer, mademoiselle,"
said Mr. Dare, continuing the account of Samuel Lynn's adventure. "Thus
the fact of there being two cloaks is established," he proceeded.
"Still, that tells nothing; unless the owner of the other has access to
Mr. Ashley's counting-house. I pointed this fact out to them. But
Delves--which is most unaccountable--differed from me; and when we
parted he expressed an opinion, with that confident nod of his, that it
was not Halliburton's cloak which had been in the mischief at the
butcher's, but the other."
"What a thundering falsehood!" burst forth Herbert Dare.
"_Sir!_" cried Mr. Dare, while all around the table stared at Herbert's
excited manner.
Herbert had the grace to feel ashamed of his abrupt and intemperate
rudeness. "I beg your pardon, sir; I spoke in my surprise. I mean that
Delves must be telling a falsehood, if he seeks to throw the guilt off
Halliburton. The very fact of the fellow's wearing a strange cloak such
as that, when he went to get rid of the cheque, must be proof positive
of Halliburton's guilt."
"So I think," acquiesced Mr. Dare.
"What sort of a cloak is this that you laugh at, and call scarce?"
inquired the governess.
"The greatest scarecrow of a thing you can conceive, mademoiselle,"
responded Mr. Dare. "I had the pleasure of seeing it to-day on
Halliburton. It is a dark green-and-blue Scotch plaid, made very full,
with a turned up collar lined with red, and a bit of fur edging it."
"Plaid? Plaid?" repeated mademoiselle. "Why it must be----"
"What?" asked Mr. Dare, for she had stopped.
"It must be very ugly," concluded she. But somehow Mr. Dare gathered an
impression that it was not what she had been about to say.
"What is it that Delves says about the cloaks?" eagerly questioned
Cyril. "I cannot make it out."
"Delves says he knows who it is that owns the other; and that it was the
other which went to change the cheque at White's."
"What mysterious words, papa!" cried Adelaide. "The cloak went to change
the cheque!"
"They were Delves' own words," replied Mr. Dare. "He did seem remarkably
mysterious over it."
"Is he going to hunt up the other cloak?" resumed Cyril.
"I conclude so. He was pondering over it for some time before he could
remember who it was that he had seen wear a similar cloak. When the
recollection came to him, he started up with surprise. Sharp men, these
police-officers!" added Mr. Dare. "They forget nothing."
"And they ferret out everything," said Herbert with some testiness.
"Instead of wasting time over vain speculations touching cloaks, why
does not he secure Halliburton? It is impossible that the other
cloak--if there is another--could have had anything to do with the
affair."
"I dropped a note to Delves after he left me, recommending him to follow
up the suspicion on Halliburton, whether Mr. Ashley is agreeable or
not," said Mr. Dare. "I have rarely in my life met with a stronger case
of presumptive evidence."
So, many, besides Mr. Dare, would have felt inclined to say. Herbert,
like his father, was firm in the belief that William Halliburton must
have taken the money; that it must have been he who paid the visit to
the butcher. What Cyril thought may be best inferred from his actions. A
sudden fear had come over him that Sergeant Delves was really going to
search out the other cloak. A most inconvenient procedure for Cyril,
lest, in the process, the sergeant should search out _him_. He laid down
his knife and fork. He had had quite enough dinner for one day.
"Are you not hungry, Cyril?" asked his mother.
"I had a tremendous lunch," answered Cyril. "I can't eat more now."
He sat at the table until they had finished, feeling that he was being
choked with dread. But that a guilty conscience deprives us of free
action, he would have left the table and gone about some work he was now
eager to do.
He rose when the rest did, looked about for a pair of large scissors,
and glided with them up the staircase, his eyes and ears on the alert,
lest there should be any watching him. No human being in that house had
the slightest knowledge of what Cyril was about to do, or that he was
going to do anything; but to Cyril's guilty conscience it seemed that
all must be on the look-out.
A candle and scissors in hand he stole up to Herbert's room and locked
himself in. Inside a closet within the room hung a dark blue camlet
cloak, and Cyril took it from the hook. It had a plaid lining: a lining
of the precise pattern and colours that the material of William
Halliburton's cloak was composed of. The cloak was of the same full,
old-fashioned make; its collar was lined with red, tipped with fur: in
short, the one cloak worn on the right side and the other worn on the
wrong side, could not have been told apart. This cloak belonged to
Herbert Dare; occasionally, though not often, he went out at dusk,
wearing it wrong side outermost. It was he, no doubt, whom Sergeant
Delves had seen wearing one. He was a little taller than William
Halliburton, towering above six feet. What his motive had been in
causing a cloak to be lined so that, turned, it should resemble William
Halliburton's, or whether the similarity in the lining had been
accidental, was only known to Herbert himself.
With trembling fingers, and sharp scissors that were not particular
where they cut, Cyril began his task of taking out this plaid lining.
That he had worn it to the butcher's, and that he feared it might tell
tales of him, were facts only too apparent. Better put it out of the way
for ever! Unpicking, cutting, snipping, Cyril tore away at the lining,
and at length got it out, the cloak suffering considerable damage in the
shape of cuts and rents, and loose threads. Hanging the cloak up again,
he twisted the lining together.
He was thus engaged when the handle of the door was briskly turned, as
if some one essayed to enter who had not expected to find it fastened.
Cyril dashed the lining under the bed, and made a spring to the window.
To leap out? surely not: for the fall would have killed him. But he had
nearly lost all presence of mind in his perplexity and fear.
Another turn at the handle, and the steps went on their way. Cyril
thought he recognized them for the housemaid's, Betsy. He supposed she
was going her evening round of the chambers. Gathering the lining under
his arm, he halted to think. His hands shook, and his face was white.
What should he do with this tell-tale thing? He could not eat it; he
dared not burn it. There was no room, of those which had fires, where he
might make sure of being alone: and the smell would alarm the house.
What _was_ he to do with it?
Dig a hole and bury it, came a prompting voice within him; and Cyril
waited for no better suggestion, but crept with it down the stairs, and
out to the garden.
Seizing a spade, he dug a hole rapidly in an unfrequented place; and
when it was large enough thrust the stuff in. Then he covered it over
again, to leave the spot apparently as he found it.
"I wish those stars would give a stronger light," grumbled Cyril,
looking up at the dark blue canopy. "I must come again in the morning, I
suppose, and see that it's all safe. It wouldn't do to bring a lantern."
Now it happened that Mr. Herbert Dare was bound on a private errand that
evening. His intention was to go abroad in his cloak while he executed
it. Just about the time that Cyril was putting the finishing touch to
the hole, Herbert went up to his room to get the cloak.
To get the cloak, indeed! When Herbert opened the closet-door, nothing
except the mutilated object just described met his eye. A torn, cut
thing, the threads hanging from it loosely. Nothing could exceed
Herbert's consternation as he stared at it. He thought he must be in a
dream. _Was_ it his cloak? Just before dinner, when he came up to wash
his hands, he had seen his cloak hanging there, perfect. He shook it, he
pulled it, he peered at it. His cloak it certainly was; but who had
destroyed it? A suspicion flashed into his mind that it might be the
governess. He made but a few steps to the school-room, carrying the
cloak with him.
The governess was sitting there, listlessly enough. Perhaps she was
waiting for him. "I say, mademoiselle," he began, "what on earth have
you been doing to my cloak?"
"To your cloak!" responded she. "What should I have been doing to it?"
"Look here," he said, spreading it out before her. "Who or what has done
this? It was all right when I went down to dinner."
She stared at it in astonishment great as Herbert's, and threw off a
volley of surprise in her foreign tongue. But she was a shrewd woman.
Ay, never was there a shrewder than Bianca Varsini. Mr. Sergeant Delves
was not a bad hand at ferreting out conclusions; but she would have
beaten the sergeant hollow.
"Tenez," cried she, putting up her forefinger in thought, as she gazed
at the cloak. "Cyril did this."
"Cyril!"
She nodded her head. "You stood it out to me that you did not come in on
Saturday evening and go out again between ten and eleven----"
"I did not," interrupted Herbert. "I told you truth, but you would not
believe me."
"But this cloak went out. And it was turned the plaid side outwards, and
your cap was on, tied down at the ears. Naturally I thought it was you.
It must have been Cyril! Do you comprehend?"
"No, I don't," said Herbert. "How mysteriously you are speaking!"
"It must have been Cyril who robbed Mr. Ashley."
"Mademoiselle!" interrupted Herbert indignantly.
"Ecoutez, mon ami. He was blanched as white as a mouchoir, while your
father spoke of it at dinner--did you see that he could not eat? 'You
look guilty, Monsieur Cyril,' I said to myself, not really thinking him
to be so. But be persuaded it was no other. He must have taken the
paper-money--or what you call it--and come home here for your cloak and
cap to wear, while he changed it for gold, thinking it would fall on
that other one who wears the cloak; that William Hall----I cannot say
the name; c'est trop dur pour les levres. It is Cyril, and no other. He
has turned afraid now, and has torn the lining out."
Herbert could make no rejoinder at first, partly in dismay, partly in
astonishment. "It cannot have been Cyril!" he reiterated.
"I say it is Cyril," persisted the young lady. "I saw him creep up the
stairs after dinner, with a candle and your mother's great scissors in
his hand. He did not see me. I was in the dark, looking out of my room.
Depend he was going to do it then."
"Then, of all blind idiots, Cyril's the worst!--if he did take the
cheque," uttered Herbert. "Should it become known, he is done for; and
that for life. And my father helping to fan the flame!"
The governess shrugged her shoulders. "I not like Cyril," she said. "I
have never liked him since I came."
"But you will not tell against him!" cried Herbert, in fear.
"No, no, no. Tell against your brother! Why should I? It is no concern
of mine. Unless people meddle with me, I not meddle with them. Cyril is
safe, for me."
"What on earth am I to do for my cloak to-night?" debated Herbert. "I
was going--going where I want it."
"Why you want it so to-night?" asked mademoiselle sharply.
"Because it's cold," responded Herbert. "The cloak was warmer than my
overcoat is."
"Last night you go out, to-night you go out, to-morrow you go out. It is
always so now!"
"I have a lot of perplexing business upon me," answered Herbert. "I have
no time to see about it in the day."
Some little time longer he remained talking with her, partially
disputing. The Italian, from some cause or other, went into ill-humour
and said some provoking things. Herbert, it must be confessed, received
them with good temper, and she grew more affable. When he left her, she
offered to pick the loose threads out of the cloak, and hem up the
bottom.
"You'll lock the door while you do it?" he urged.
"I will take it to my chamber," she said. "No one will molest me there."
Herbert left it with her and went out. Cyril went out. Anthony had
already gone out. Mr. Dare remained at home. He and his wife were
conversing over the dining-room fire, in the course of the evening, when
Joseph came in.
"You are wanted, please, sir," he said to his master.
"Who wants me?" asked Mr. Dare.
"It's Policeman Delves, sir."
"Oh, show him in here," said Mr. Dare. "I hope something will be done in
this," he added to his wife. "It may turn out a good slice of luck for
me."
Sergeant Delves came in. In point of fact, he had just returned from
that interview with the butcher, where he had been accompanied by Mr.
Ashley and William.
"Well, Delves, did you get my note?" asked Mr. Dare.
"Yes, sir, I did," said the sergeant, taking the seat offered him. "It's
what I have come up about."
"Do you intend to act upon my advice?"
"Why--no, I think not," replied the sergeant. "Not, at any rate, until I
have had a talk with you."
"What will you take?"
"Well, sir, the night's cold. I don't mind a drop of brandy-and-water."
It was brought, and Mr. Dare joined his visitor in partaking of it. He
agreed with him that the night was cold. But nothing could Mr. Dare make
of him. As often as he turned the conversation on the subject in hand,
so often did the sergeant turn it off again. Mrs. Dare grew tired of
listening to nothing; and she departed, leaving them together.
Then the manner of Sergeant Delves changed. He drew his chair forward;
and bent towards Mr. Dare.
"You have been urging me to go against young Halliburton," he began. "It
won't do. Halliburton no more fingered that cheque, or had anything to
do with it, than you or I had. Mr. Dare, don't you stir in this matter
any further."
"My present intention is to stir it to the bottom," returned Mr. Dare.
"Look here," said the sergeant in an undertone; "I am not obliged to
take notice of offences that don't come legally in my way. Many a thing
has been done in this town--ay, and is being done now--that I am obliged
to wink at; it don't lay right in my duty to take notice of it, so I
keep my eyes shut. Now that's just it in this case. So long as the
parties concerned, Mr. Ashley, or White, don't put it into my hands
officially, I am not obliged to take so-and-so into custody, or to act
upon my own suspicions. And I won't do it upon suspicions of my own: I
promise it. If I am forced, that's another matter."
"Are you alluding to Halliburton?"
"No. You are on the wrong scent, I say."
"And you think you are on the right one?"
"I could put my finger out this night and lay it on the fox. But I tell
you, sir, I don't want to, unless I am compelled. Don't _you_ compel me,
Mr. Dare, of all people in the world."
Mr. Dare leaned back in his chair, his thumbs in his waistcoat armholes.
No suspicion of the truth had crossed him, and he could not understand
either the sergeant or his manner. The latter rose to depart.
"The other cloak, similar to young Halliburton's, belongs to your son
Herbert," he whispered, as he passed Mr. Dare. "It was his brother,
Cyril, who wore it on Saturday night, and who changed the cheque:
therefore we may give a guess as to who took the cheque out of Mr.
Ashley's desk. Now you be still over it, sir, for his sake, as I shall
be. If I can, I'll call at your office to-morrow, Mr. Dare, and talk
further. White must have the money refunded to him, or _he_ won't be
still."
Anthony Dare fell into a confusion of horror and consternation, leaving
the sergeant to bow himself out. Mrs. Dare heard the departure, and
returned to the room.
"Well," cried she briskly, "is he going to accuse Halliburton?"
Mr. Dare did not answer. He looked up in a beseeching, helpless sort of
manner, as one who is stunned by a blow.
"What is the matter?" she questioned, gazing at him closely. "Are you
ill?"
He rose up shaking, as if ague were upon him. "No--no."
"Perhaps you are cold," said Mrs. Dare. "I asked you what Delves was
going to do. Will he accuse Halliburton?"
"Be still!" sharply cried Mr. Dare in a tone of pain. "The matter is to
be hushed up. It was not Halliburton."