William lifted my bag and led the way. On the first landing, where the
doors stood open and the music went merrily to the last figure of the
Lancers, we had to pick our way through a fantastic crowd which eyed me
with polite curiosity. Couples seated on the next flight drew aside to
let us pass. But the second landing was empty, and I halted for a moment
at the door of my own workroom, within which lay my precious manuscript.
"This room is unoccupied?"
"Indeed, no, sir. The mistress considers it the cheerfullest in the
'ouse."
"Our tastes agree then."
"She had her bed moved in there the very first night."
"Indeed." I swung round on him hastily. "By-the-by, what is your
mistress's name?"
He drew back a pace and eyed me with some embarrassment. "You'll excuse
me, sir, but that ain't quite a fair question as between you and me."
"No? I should have thought it innocent enough."
"Of course, it's a hopen secret, and you're only askin' it to try me.
But so long as the mistress fancies a hincog--"
"Lead on," said I. "You are an exemplary young man, and I, too, am
playing the game to the best of my lights."
"Yes, sir." He led me up to a room prepared for me--with candles lit, hot
water ready, and bed neatly turned down. On the bed lay the full costume
of a Punchinello: striped stockings, breeches with rosettes, tinselled
coat with protuberant stomach and hump, cocked hat, and all proper
accessories--even to a false nose.
"Am I expected to get into these things?" I asked.
"If I can be of any assistance, sir--"
"Thank you: no." I handed him the key of my bag, flung off coat and
waistcoat, and sat down to unlace my boots. "Your mistress is in the
drawing-room, I suppose, with her guests?"
"She is, sir."
"And Mr. Herbert?"
"Mr. 'Erbert was to have been 'ome by ten-thirty. He is--as you know,
sir--a little irregilar. But youth,"--William arranged my brushes
carefully--"youth must 'ave its fling. Oh, he's a caution!" A chuckle
escaped him; he checked it and was instantly demure. Almost, indeed, he
eyed me with a look of rebuke. "Anything more, sir?"
"Nothing more, thank you."
He withdrew. I thrust my feet into the dressing slippers he had set out
for me, and, dropping into an armchair, began to take stock of the
situation. "The one thing certain," I told myself, "is that Trewlove in
my absence has let my house. Therefore Trewlove is certainly an impudent
scoundrel, and any grand jury would bring in a true bill against him for a
swindler. My tenants are a lady whose servants may not reveal her name,
and a young man--her husband perhaps--described as 'a little irregilar.'
They are giving a large fancy-dress ball below--which seems to prove
that, at any rate, they don't fear publicity. And, further, although
entire strangers to me, they are expecting my arrival and have prepared a
room. Now, why?"
Here lay the real puzzle, and for some minutes I could make nothing of it.
Then I remembered my telegram. According to William it had been referred
back to the post office. But William on his own admission had but
retailed pantry gossip caught up from Mr. Horrex (presumably the butler).
Had the telegram been sent back _unopened?_ William's statement left this
in doubt. Now supposing these people to be in league with Trewlove, they
might have opened the telegram, and, finding to their consternation that I
was already on the road and an exposure inevitable, have ordered my room
to be prepared, trusting to throw themselves on my forgiveness, while
Trewlove lay a-hiding or fled from vengeance across the high seas.
Here was a possible explanation; but I will admit that it seemed, on
second thoughts, an unlikely one. An irate landlord, returning
unexpectedly and finding his house in possession of unauthorised
tenants--catching them, moreover, in the act of turning it upside-down
with a fancy-dress ball--would naturally begin to be nasty on the
doorstep. The idea of placating him by a bedroom near the roof and the
costume of a Punchinello was too bold altogether, and relied too much on
his unproved fund of goodnature. Moreover, Mr. Herbert (whoever he might
be) would not have treated the situation so cavalierly. At the least (and
however 'irregilar'), Mr. Herbert would have been waiting to deprecate
vengeance. A wild suspicion occurred to me that 'Mr. Herbert' might be
another name for Trewlove, and that Trewlove under that name was gaining a
short start from justice. But no: William had alluded to Mr. Herbert as
to a youth sowing his wild oats. Impossible to contemplate Trewlove under
this guise! Where then did Trewlove come in? Was he, perchance,
'Mr. Horrex,' the butler?
I gave it up and began thoughtfully, and not without difficulty, to case
myself in the disguise of Punchinello. I resolved to see this thing
through. The costume had evidently not been made to my measure, and in
the process of induing it I paused once or twice to speculate on the
eccentricities of the figure to which it had been shaped or the abstract
anatomical knowledge of the tailor who had shaped it. I declare that the
hump seemed the one normal thing about it. But by this time my
detective-hunger--not to call it a thirst for vengeance--was asserting
itself above petty vanity. I squeezed myself into the costume; and then,
clapping on the false nose, stood arrayed--as queer a figure, surely, as
ever was assumed by retributive Justice.
So, with a heart hardened by indignation and prepared for the severest
measures, I descended to the drawing-room landing. Two doors opened upon
it--that of the drawing-room itself, which faced over a terrace roofing
the kitchens and across it to a garden in the rear of the house, and that
of a room overlooking the street and scarcely less spacious. This had
been the deceased General's bedroom, and in indolence rather than impiety
I had left it unused with all its hideous furniture--including the
camp-bed which his martial habits affected. And this was the apartment I
entered, curious to learn how it had been converted into a reception-room
for the throng which now filled it.
I recognised only the wall-paper. The furniture had been removed, the
carpet taken up, the boards waxed to a high degree of slipperiness; and
across the far end stretched a buffet-table presided over by a venerable
person in black, with white hair, a high clear complexion, and a
deportment which hit a nice mean between the military and the episcopal.
I had scarcely time to tell myself that this must be Mr. Horrex, before he
looked up and caught sight of me. His features underwent a sudden and
astonishing change; and almost dropping a bottle of champagne in his
flurry, he came swiftly round the end of the buffet towards me.
I knew not how to interpret his expression: surprise was in it, and
eagerness, and suppressed agitation, and an appeal for secrecy, and at the
same time (if I mistook not) a deep relief.
"I beg your pardon, sir," he began, in a sort of confidential whisper,
very quick and low, "but I was not aware you had arrived."