I went home that night wondering whether Vernon had got rid of the
black spaniel. Perhaps he had found it impossible to reconcile it to
its new quarters, and had sold it or given it back to the man with the
fur cap. Or perhaps it was still in the house. If that were so, it was
very strange, very unlike Vernon to have concealed the fact from Arthur
Gernham. But, in either case, he had been deceitful, deliberately
deceitful, with a friend, and a friend whom he greatly admired and
respected.
This incident of my meeting with Gernham deepened my sense of fear,
of mystery. My instinct—I now felt sure of it—was right. Some strange
under side of Vernon’s character was active at this moment. I knew him
only in part; much of him I did not know. A stranger now seemed to
confront me in the night, a stranger by whose feet crouched something
black and terrified. What was this stranger’s purpose? What could it be?
I reviewed carefully my whole acquaintance with Vernon, but especially
the latter part of my acquaintance with him, when Deeming was in
relation with us both. It was then, when Deeming came into his life,
and only then, that Vernon had shown me for the first time a man in
him whose presence I had not suspected, whose exact nature I did not
know. This man was roused by Deeming. I should have let him sleep. But,
having been roused, he had surely been sleepless ever since. Yes, that
was so. Thus far, things were clear to me. Something—the strange man in
Vernon—had been wakeful, ardent ever since, was wakeful, ardent now.
This man it was who worked shoulder to shoulder with Gernham. This man
it was who had bought the black spaniel.
So far, light. But now came the darkness. What had been Vernon’s
purpose in buying the black spaniel? When he saw it he had looked at
it fatally. At that moment, while he looked at it, his purpose had
sprung up full-grown in his mind, full-grown and fierce. I was not
to know that purpose. Arthur Gernham was not to know it. He now had
some purpose in connection with an animal that Arthur Gernham, his
close friend and colleague, his leader in a campaign of kindness, of
pity, to which he was dedicating all his activities and giving all his
enthusiasm, was not to know or even suspect. That purpose, since it was
in connection with an animal, must surely be one of kindness, of pity.
But here my instinct rebelled violently against my knowledge of Vernon.
My instinct said that it was not so; that Vernon’s purpose in buying
the black spaniel had been sad, even perhaps terrible. Yet how could
that be?
The dog’s eyes haunted me. They seemed to me to know what I did not
know, to know what Vernon’s purpose was.
Deeming—again I thought of him, of Vernon’s short and strange
connection with him. Once Vernon had said to me that he believed
Deeming was a man haunted by a mania for persecution. He had spoken
without knowledge then. Later, he had travelled to England to gain
knowledge. He had taken the house in Wimpole Street to gain knowledge.
Had he gained it? I did not know. Vernon had never told me. Was that
why I was in the dark now? It began to seem to me that, perhaps, if
I could find out what Vernon knew of Deeming I should understand
something of his present purpose, of his purpose in buying the black
spaniel.
At this stage in my mental debate I reached the Piccadilly corner of
Albemarle Street, and was just going to turn towards my house, when a
familiar face, a face respectable, close-shaven, English, looked upon
me in the lamplight, and a bowler hat was deferentially lifted.
“Cragg!” I said.
“Good-night, Sir,” said Cragg. “A fine night, Sir.”
“Yes—wait a minute, Cragg.”
“Certainly, Sir.”
Vernon’s man stood still.
“Just walk with me to my door, will you?”
“With pleasure, Sir.”
We turned side by side into the comparative quiet of Albemarle Street.
“How is Mr. Kersteven, Cragg?”
“Well, Sir⸺” The man slightly hesitated. “Oh, Sir, he’s in his usual
health, I think.”
“Working hard, isn’t he?”
“Very hard, Sir.”
“With Mr. Gernham.”
“Yes, Sir, with Mr. Gernham.”
“And—and how’s the dog, Cragg?”