Through the gate of a high wall set about a low-built house the car
containing Penelope Noelson and Larry Hughes passed. A ground mist as
high as a man's waist was rising; but as far as the girl could see
there was nothing within view of the place but a desolate and dreary
tract of marshland. She shivered as though the spot chilled her.
Larry helped her to descend. "This is my country home," he said, "a
place I picked up cheap because it is eight miles from a railway
station, and five from anything resembling a road. Tricky business,
too, for a stranger to find a way about these marshes."
She did not miss the hint. "You think you are going to hold me as a
sort of prisoner here? Don't forget, Mr. Hughes, that I have friends."
He patted her on the shoulder. "Nothing so melodramatic as that,
I assure you. You are my guest. I'm afraid you will find the
accommodation a little rough, but I assure you we will do our best to
make you comfortable till I have time to make other arrangements. As
for your friends--including Inspector Labar--they will not worry us.
For your own sake it will be well to make yourself at home. I don't
want you to get lost, so it will be better for you to keep within the
walls of the grounds."
Pushing an arm through hers he led her up a stoneflagged pathway into
the house. A big-boned, pleasant-looking woman was standing on the
threshold.
"This is Mrs. Lengholm," he said. "We call her Sophie. She will look
after you. Did you get my wire, Sophie?"
"Yes, sir. Everything is ready. There's a fire in the lady's room, and,
as you said she had to leave hurriedly, I got a few clothes and other
necessaries for her."
"Thank you. Then she may like you to show her to her room." He turned
to Penelope. "If there is anything you would like, just tell Sophie.
And I hope you will not waste your time trying to bribe or threaten
her. We have known each other a long time, Sophie and I."
If other matters had not been teeming in Penelope's mind she might
have viewed with some surprise the furnishings of the room to which
she was ushered. The dingy aspect of the outside of the house had
promised nothing of this kind. It might have been the boudoir of some
princess. Luxurious carpets, chaste and delicate silken hangings, a bed
and chairs made by artists of long ago and matching the small bookcase
and writing-desk that seemed designed for the niches into which they
fitted, and two or three dainty water colours that in themselves must
have cost a small fortune, completed a room that would have sent a
professional decorator into ecstasy. On that small room money and
thought had been lavished.
"You see it's a kind of sitting-room as well as a bedroom?" explained
Sophie. "I have laid out some things for you on the bed. I had only a
general idea of your size but I think they will fit. Would you like me
to help you try them on?"
"Oh, no, no. Not now," said Penelope. She caught the other by the arm.
"Where is this place, Mrs. Lengholm?"
Sophie shook her head. "I'm to do anything for you except answer
questions, miss."
"I know I'm somewhere on the Kent or Sussex coast," said the girl. "The
signposts coming down told me that."
Sophie maintained an inflexible silence. Penelope considered her for a
moment.
"Perhaps you don't know that I have been brought down here by force,"
she ventured. "If you could post a letter for me--to let my friends
know. I could make it worth your while----"
A slow ironic smile broke over the elder woman's face. Penelope saw
what the answer must be before she spoke. "Didn't you hear what Mr.
Hughes said? You can't bribe me." She moved towards the door. "If you
want anything more, will you please ring."
Down in one of the morning rooms Larry Hughes smoked a thoughtful
cigarette and nursed his right knee between his hands. He straightened
up as Sophie entered soft footed.
"Well," he demanded, "everything all right?"
"She offered me money to post a letter."
"Didn't you take it?" he replied carelessly. "More fool you."
He did not even look at her, and the glowering eyes of the woman were
lost to him. "What are you going to do with her?" she asked.
He flicked the ash from his cigarette, and turned curiously to her.
"You're growing inquisitive in your old age, Sophie," he said with a
slight rising inflection in his voice. "All you've got to do is to look
after her while I tell you."
"There's some things I won't do, Larry Hughes," she retorted steadily.
He got to his feet and with darkened face took a step towards her.
"What's that you say, woman? Don't I pay you enough?"
She met his eyes stubbornly. "The pay's all right. I'm not complaining
of that. You've always done generously by me in that way. And I've been
useful to you. I may be a crook, but I'm not that sort of woman."
"What's biting you?" he asked threateningly. "Do you know where you
would be in a couple of days if I passed the word? In gaol with your
husband and seven or ten years staring you in the face. Tread on the
soft pedal, Sophie--and don't Larry Hughes me. Sir, from you, and
don't you forget it."
She placed her hands on her hips. "I know. All the same I won't be
dragged into this kind of dirtiness."
His frown faded. Comprehension showed in his face. "I see," he smiled.
"I didn't know that you were that kind of puritan. You can relieve
yourself of any scruples. I intend to marry the lady."
"If that's the case----" She hesitated in doubt.
"Oh, it's all true enough," he insisted. "She knows too much for my
health. If ever I go down, Sophie, it's going to be bad for a lot of
us. So I'm going to shut her mouth by marrying her. I think I'd have
married her anyway. Now you've got the strength of the whole thing,
Sophie."
He resumed the attitude he had held on her entrance, and accepting
this as a dismissal she withdrew. Larry grinned to himself with some
cynicism over this touch of human nature. Here was old Sophie Lengholm,
daughter of criminal parents, married to a man even now in prison for
an attack on a police officer that was only just short of murder, and
herself a not inconsiderable ally in all sorts of wickedness for years,
turning squeamish over what she thought was an affair of morals. Women
were queer cattle. Well, anyway, she could be relied upon now that he
had put matters straight for her. Quite apart from all considerations
of money she would risk too much if she played any monkey business with
him. He trusted none over whom he could not crack a whip.
Meantime, alone in her room Penelope was trying to decide upon some
course of action. Her head ached with the effort to see some solution.
She had no doubt that Larry Hughes had meant what he said when he
declared his intention to marry her. The very audacity by which he
had trapped her showed that there was no length to which he was not
prepared to go. She was afraid, but she told herself that she must not
let her faculties become paralysed. He could not force her to marry
him. Such things were not done these days. At all costs she must try to
get some word to London. The construction that would be put upon her
absence was appallingly plain to her. But how? Her baffled mind beat
wildly about the problem.
Gradually she became more collected. If an opportunity was to come for
a way out she must look for it. She wondered if it would be possible to
throw Larry off his guard. Could he be duped by an apparent acceptance
of the situation on her part until such time as she found an avenue of
escape? If he could be lulled into relaxing his precautions she might
at the worst get some word to the local police or perhaps even to Labar.
She doubted if she had the nerve to hold her emotions and her fears in
control to that extent, but even while she reflected she was fingering
one of the dresses on the bed. And scarcely conscious of what she was
doing she changed and wandered out down the old oaken staircase.
An uneasy feeling that hidden eyes were watching her every movement
possessed her, but that she put down to her shaken nerves. A gloomy
quiet brooded over the house. Once she gently opened one of the massive
doors and peeped into a sombre panelled room furnished as a study. A
dog growled and she had a glimpse of a big Alsatian wolf-hound rising
menacingly from the hearth. She hurriedly closed the door. Apart from
that she heard no sound of life about the place.
Avoiding the morning-room which she had seen Hughes enter on their
arrival, she strolled with an appearance of nonchalance that cost
her an effort to maintain into the grounds. They had a derelict and
unkempt appearance. Indeed, viewed from the outside the whole house and
its domain afforded a singular contrast from the well-kept if gloomy
interior.
Ragged and untrimmed shrubs, overgrown flowerbeds, lank grass and
ill-kept gravel paths all told of neglect that, she noted, must have
been deliberately intended to convey an impression to any visitor
straying in the vicinity. The tall weather-beaten concrete wall,
however, showed no sign of deterioration. She followed it round till
she came to the wrought iron gates of the drive. They were closed and a
steel chain secured by an efficient modern padlock held them.
Penelope glanced around. Then she shook the gates. They were
immovable. A wild notion had come to her and she thoughtfully examined
the spikes on the top. They were not so formidable. An active person
with a little care might scale the gates without injury.
She set a foot on one of the twirls of the iron and gripping the bars
pulled herself up. Her hand had reached the topmost spikes and she
was seeking farther foothold when she heard a discreet cough. Tom,
the valet, who had accompanied Hughes, was standing a few yards back
chewing a straw and regarding her speculatively. With as much dignity
as she could muster she lowered herself to the grounds.
"I shouldn't try that again if I were you, miss," he said respectfully.
"You might hurt yourself. Besides, all those things are wired to alarms
in the house."
The girl stooped to brush herself. When she arose she flashed an
ingenuous smile towards the man.
"I just wanted a look round," she explained, "I wasn't trying to run
away. I want to know where I am."
Tom shifted his straw to another angle, and before answering flung it
to the ground. "There's miles of marshes round this place, miss. Acres
and acres with big dykes crisscrossing them and no roads to speak of.
I'd be afraid of trying to cross a maze like that."
"But, Tom--your name is Tom, isn't it?--I can feel the sea."
"Yes, miss. The sea's away about a mile over there." He waved an arm
vaguely to the right. "Difficult to get to and a lonely waste of
shingle if you do."
"I see. Then if there's no chance of my getting away why are you
watching me?"
The glimmer of an appreciative smile showed on the immobile face of the
valet. "I'm not exactly spying on you, miss. Mr. Hughes was afraid that
as you didn't know the district you might get into trouble--fall into
one of the dykes perhaps. So one of us will be always keeping an eye on
you."
She bit her lip. "Very considerate of Mr. Hughes. Do you suppose he
means to starve me as well as keep me a prisoner?"
"I was to tell you, miss, that Mr. Hughes is waiting for you in the
dining-room."
It would be doing an injustice to the imperturbability of the
well-trained Tom, to suggest that he had shown in any manner that he
was prepared for certain contingencies. But Penelope was not lacking
in observation and reason. These qualities were perhaps sharpened by
the emergency with which she was faced. It had not escaped her that the
well-fitting jacket of the valet sagged a little on the right hand side
as though something heavy reposed in his pocket.
She moved closer to him. "You might as well show me the way," she said
and fell into step by his right hand.
They had not moved a couple of yards when she acted. Before he could be
aware of her purpose her hand had dropped swiftly to his pocket and had
closed over the butt of a small automatic pistol. Her surmise had been
right.
He sprang silently towards her but recoiled as he heard the click of
the safety catch and the blue barrel was thrust into his face.
"Now then. Open that gate," she demanded.
"I haven't got the key," he declared, his eyes searching her face for
the slightest sign of hesitation, of distraction. Give him one fraction
of a second start, he told himself, and he would have that gun away
from her.
But Penelope was keyed for anything. "If you don't open that gate in
ten seconds," she said, with some surprise at the steadiness of her own
voice, "I shall shoot."
Sullenly he began to search his pockets. "One," she counted,
"two--three--four--five--six--seven----"
A key rattled on the ground in front of her. She made no move to touch
it. His intention was evident to her. "Pick that up," she ordered, "and
open the gate. Quick. Eight--nine."
His face still a mask he reluctantly obeyed. Tense she waited for the
faintest suspicious movement. The key slipped into the lock.
A hand stole from behind her and struck her wrist a sharp blow. The
pistol dropped from her grip. The soft voice of Larry Hughes was in
her ears as she saw him stoop to recover the weapon.
"Don't you think we've had enough of this nonsense, Penelope?" he
asked.