“Hss—hss,” once more came the noise, and this time she realized that it
proceeded from the doorway. With a frightened look she saw a man peering
and smiling at her between the portières.
“Why, who are you?” she asked, involuntarily retreating toward the bell.
“Sh-h. They are at dinner—a very good dinner, from the smell, too,”
answered the stranger, entering the room with an air of such thorough
good-nature and easy friendliness that Miss Mettleby gained courage. He
was a little, wiry, dapper, insinuating fellow whose cockney smartness
of attire and knowing, “between ourselves” manner suggested almost
anything, from an upper groom or a veterinary’s assistant to a rising
young follower of the turf or a successful burglar with aristocratic
connections.
“I will ring,” said Miss Mettleby, puzzled whether to scream or laugh.
“Oh, I wouldn’t do that, you know,” suggested the visitor pleasantly,
more like one throwing out a friendly suggestion than a burglar
intimidating a very frightened young governess. “You see, miss, I have
business with Mr. Fair—rather nasty business, too, and I never broach a
disagreeable subject until after dinner, do you?”
“But what do you mean by prowling about people’s houses?” asked Kate,
with a dignity born of growing assurance that the man did not contemplate
her immediate murder.
“Oh, I say, let up, miss, you know,” deprecated the invader ruefully.
“You see, when you have passed a few hours back of pianos and under beds
and in wardrobes you grow attached to a house, don’t you, miss? I’m that
attached to this house that you’d be surprised if I was to tell you how
much. You’ll be the governess now, I dare say?”
“Yes, but on my word, you are the coolest thief—” replied Kate, and the
cool one broke in:
“Oh, oh, pretty young lady, recall that there wile insinuation, you know.”
“Well, since you are so cool about it and come here where you are sure
to be seen, I’ll believe you,” answered Miss Mettleby. “But what do you
want? Really, this is refreshing.”
“Ain’t it just, miss?” acquiesced the cool one, sitting down. “Askin’
your pardon, I’ll smoke. Now, miss, that we’re so cozy like, I’ll ask you
a few questions. A dark foreign gentlemen called here about an hour ago.”
“Perhaps he did—what of it?” asked Kate, with a very feeble effort to
cover the alarm which his words created.
“You saw him?” went on the stranger, with an exasperating coolness.
“If I did, I don’t see what business that is of yours,” retorted Kate
haughtily enough, but inwardly quaking. “Who are you, sir?”
“I am Ferret, miss,” he answered, rising and bowing; “Mr. Samuel Ferret,
of the Scotland Yard private detective force—your servant.”
“Good gracious,” cried Miss Mettleby, springing up in spite of her effort
to betray no feeling. “A detective? But why should you come here?”
Poor Kate’s alarm would have been considerably heightened had she only
known that three or four other insinuating and evanescent gentlemen had
been in and out of the premises for the past hour, and that still more of
them were at that moment watching the house, front and rear.
“Well, you see, miss,” replied Ferret, trying by his manner to reassure
the young woman, “I’ve been taking an interest in my foreign friend for a
week. He came here today. I haven’t seen him go away again? Have you?”
“No,” answered Kate, with an indifference which she did not feel; “but he
must have gone, of course. There is no such person about the premises. I
must ring and advise Mr. Fair.”
“Now, really, you know,” exclaimed Ferret, jumping up to intercept her;
“I wouldn’t do that, would you? When a gent goes into a house and don’t
come out again, it is just possible to imagine that he is somewhere
near that house, not to say in that house. You follow me, I hope?
Well, my dear foreign friend came into this here very elegant mansion
and he didn’t go out of it again, so by a stretch of fancy I think he
may be in London yet, and in that part of London which is up in your
attic. Now, don’t jump. If you make a row, you’ll frighten the great
folks at dinner—such a deucedly good dinner, too—and besides give my
foreign friend advance knowledge of my little surprise party—I just love
surprises, don’t you? And them there foreign gents can get out through a
smaller hole than a self-respecting Englishman, let me tell you.”
“But who is the man?” asked Kate, forgetting her alarm as Ferret, with
the oddest winks and gestures with his long thumbs, delivered his speech.
“And what is he doing here? And what do you propose to do about it?”
“Me? What do I propose to do about it?” inquired Ferret as if the thought
that he would be expected to do something about it had just struck him.
“Well, first of all, I propose to ask you to be a nice young lady and
help me a bit. You see, miss, my friend don’t mean any great kindness to
Mr. and Mrs. Fair. Not a bit of it—that ain’t like my friend. In fact,
there’s going to be a row—now, now, don’t jump, you know—I was saying
that there is going to be a row, unless you and I prevent it, you know.”
“Then I insist upon telling Mr. Fair at once—this is awful,” cried Kate,
beginning again to believe that the alleged detective was simply a clever
sneak-thief who was playing upon her ignorance.
“Hawful is it?” smiled Ferret, warning her to remain seated with a hand
lifted eloquently; “but it won’t be hawful, but just a pleasant little
picnic if you will do just what I tell you. Come now, don’t be a fool,
miss, but a dear, good, cool-headed young lady. Will you help me?”
“Yes,” replied Miss Mettleby; “of course I will do anything to help Mr.
Fair—I mean, Mrs. Fair.”
“Of course you will,” said Ferret encouragingly. “I knew you was a
Christian the minute I see you, miss. You stop in this room until I come
back. I am going out to telephone, you see.”
“Oh, we have a telephone in the house, you know,” eagerly remarked Kate,
not liking the idea of being kept a prisoner in the library while this
man roamed about the house at his leisure.
“Yes,” jeered Ferret; “and it would be a fine thing, wouldn’t it, for me
to yell through your telephone downstairs that I wanted the Yard to send
me six constables at once to nab a foreign gentleman—with the foreign
gent himself lying under the very mat on which I was standing. Innocent!
No. I must go out to telephone—and if you sort of want to see me safe
out of the house, why, come down to the door with me—yes, that’s it. I
want you to sit in the little room by the street door, and when my friend
goes out the door follow him—follow him, miss, you understand. He will go
across the street, down the next street to the square, turn to the left,
and call a cab at the corner. You call the next cab and direct the driver
to follow the first one. Watch him, follow him, don’t lose sight of him.”
“But he wouldn’t be such a fool as to go out by the front door,” replied
Kate, thoroughly puzzled by Ferret’s mysterious instructions, which she,
of course, did not understand were merely attempts on his part to get her
out of his way and fixed permanently in some known room.
“Never fear,” answered Ferret; “that’s just what he will do. He’ll go out
of the front door as if he owned the house. In all likelihood I’ll be
over the way when he and you come out, and then of course I’ll follow him
myself, but if I ain’t there, you must do as I say. Follow him no matter
wherever he goes—and then come to Scotland Yard and report.”
“I don’t know about all this,” stoutly returned Kate, shaking her head.
“Why can’t Mr. Fair be advised at once? This is all wrong—and strange.”
“But you see, miss,” quickly protested Ferret, “Mr. Fair has private
reasons for not wishing us to trouble the foreign gent, so he wouldn’t
help us to nab him. Funny, isn’t it? But it often happens that we poor
detectives has to catch all sorts of gents in spite of the very parties
on whose accounts we wants ’em. The aristocracy has objections against
appearing in court even against their own murderers. Now Mr. Fair does
not know this gent’s little game and so he trusts him. We’ve got to do
all this business ourselves—and, I tell you, it’s life and death. So, is
it a go? Will you be a sensible young woman and not make a row, and help
me?”
“I will,” answered Kate, convinced by the fellow’s irresistibly frank
air—and moved by the comforting thought that her consent to his plan
would at least get him out of the house—when she would of course advise
Mr. Fair of the whole matter, even if it did spoil a good dinner.
“That’s a real lady for you,” gallantly remarked Ferret. “Now I’m off.
Come downstairs if you want to see me out of the house—you suspicious
young thing. No? All right. Thanks, but you really must sit in that
little room, you know, for he may be leaving the house at any minute.”
“I’ll get my hat first,” replied Kate, “so that I can be ready to follow
him if he goes out.”
Ferret slid noiselessly out of the library with a warning finger at his
lips, and Kate congratulated herself upon having so cleverly deceived
him. She would hide the parcel containing the surprise and then send word
to the dining-room that she must see Mr. Fair at once.
She sat for a moment trying to think out the impressions which had been
pouring in upon her in this hour of cataclysm and departure. What had
brought the foreign gentleman to the house? What had he done to make him
the subject of police suspicion? And why should Mr. Fair wish to protect
him from the law? And—oh, how the thought came crushing back into her
heart after being dislodged by the detective’s sudden appearance—of what
crime had Mr. Fair spoken? The temporary calmness that the diversion had
purchased for her gave way now to all the torment that had preceded it.
Springing up to carry out her resolution—action being at all events less
dreadful than idle horror—she took the parcel from the table, and going
hurriedly across the room, lifted the lid of the old carved chest. She
dropped the parcel into it—and fell.
* * * * *
Allyne had just elicited a laugh by one of his characterizations of a
certain great personage, when the party at dinner heard a shriek that
brought them all to their feet. Mr. and Mrs. Fair dashed upstairs with
who can say what horror of expectancy in their minds. They found the
governess lying beside the chest in the library. Fair acted promptly.
He heard the others running up the stairs, so as he raised Kate from the
floor he said to Mrs. Fair; “Sit on the chest, Janet—never mind why—and
do not rise from it until I get them all out of here. It is only Miss
Mettleby, the governess—she has fainted,” he added as Mrs. March and
Allyne entered followed by Travers.
“Oh, my dear Mrs. Fair, how pale you look—what has really happened?”
asked Mrs. March anxiously.
“Miss Mettleby has had a bad turn—that’s all. Pray, all of you go,”
replied Fair, for Mrs. Fair, with a white face and vacant look, sat as if
unconscious of what passed.
“Allyne, take Mrs. March down, won’t you?” asked Travers, to relieve the
situation, and then, after Allyne and Mrs. March were gone: “Is there
nothing that I can do, Fair? My God, man, what does it all mean?”
“Thanks, old chap,” answered Fair as he laid Miss Mettleby upon the
leather lounge; “nothing. Go down now, or Lady Poynter will fear there is
something serious the matter. Janet, my love, let Travers see you down.”
Mrs. Fair suffered Travers to lead her away, walking in a trance.
“Kate—Kate,” said Fair, bending over the governess and chafing her hands
which now began to twitch convulsively.
“Has he gone?” asked Kate, opening her eyes and staring nervously around
the room.
“There is nobody here, Miss Mettleby,” quietly answered Fair, helping her
to her feet. “Are you better?”
“I must have fainted—how stupid of me,” replied Miss Mettleby, getting
herself together and shuddering as the reality came back upon her. “It is
nothing, Mr. Fair. Now please go back to your dinner—oh, how foolish and
annoying of me to disturb you all in this way! I will get my hat and take
the air for a few minutes. Come.”
They walked slowly out of the library, and in the passage Kate insisted
on his returning to the dining-room while she ran up to her own room.
Fair went down accordingly, tortured with the fear that she had opened
the chest. Miss Mettleby, hastily preparing for the street, slipped out
of the house and fled along to the corner, where she took a cab and was
driven off at a mad pace.