They passed northwards through the night of London in the Décauville
car, Richard and Teresa side by side on the front seats, old Mrs.
Bridget in her black alpaca behind, up Regent Street, along Oxford
Street, up the interminable Edgware Road, through Kilburn, and so on to
Edgware and the open road and country.
‘Bridget knows all my secrets, Mr. Redgrave,’ said Teresa. ‘Moreover,
she has no ears unless I wish it.’
‘Sure, miss,’ said Bridget, ‘more gets into my head than goes out.
’Tis for all the world like a Jew’s pocket.’
This fragment of conversation was caused by Richard’s sudden stoppage
in the middle or a remark about Micky, who, Teresa told him, had
disappeared concurrently with her father.
‘What were you going to say about Micky?’
Teresa asked.
‘I was going to say,’ Richard answered, ‘that things are not what they
seem.’
‘You mean that Micky, too, was a----’
She hesitated.
‘Yes, like me, only rather more professional.’
‘Bridget told me this morning that she had heard poor father and Micky
at high words in the middle of last night. After that she says there was
a silence for a long time, and then father called her up and gave her
the message for you.’
The sentences were spoken without hesitation, and yet in a strangely
unnatural voice.
‘You’re forgetting one little thing, miss.’
‘Hush, Bridget!’ Teresa exclaimed.
‘If I am to help you I must be in possession of the facts.’
‘Tell him, miss; tell the gintleman, do. The gintleman is a gintleman.’
Teresa sat up straight in the speeding car. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘you must
know. There was a revolver-shot. Bridget says she heard the sound of a
revolver-shot. Oh, Mr. Redgrave! what does it mean? I dared not tell you
of that before. If my father----’
She ceased.
‘Micky has left no trace behind?’
‘None.’
‘Where did the sound of the shot come from?’
‘Sure, from the drawing-room, where the master always kept his
pistol-thing in the clock-case. Master and the scoundrel Micky were
talking in there.’
‘Suppose,’ suggested Richard, ‘that it was Micky who had a revolver.’
‘Then he missed his aim,’ said Bridget, ‘for the master came to me
afterwards on the upper landing as sound as a bell.’
‘Did he seem agitated?’ Richard asked.
‘Not he! Why should a gintleman seem agitated because he has shot a
scoundrel?’
Bridget appeared to glory in the idea that Raphael Craig might indeed
have shot the Scotland Yard detective.
‘And since then you have seen nothing of either your father or Micky?’
‘Nothing whatever,’ said Teresa.
‘And you have no notion where they are?’
‘None; at least--no--none.’
‘I observed this morning,’ said Richard quietly, ‘that the new electric
car was not in the shed.’
‘Sure, and the master must have ridden off on it with the corpse----’
‘Bridget, silence!’ said Teresa imperatively.
Richard had an uncanny vision of Raphael Craig flying from justice
on the electric car, with the corpse of a murdered detective hidden
somewhere behind. The vision struck him, though, as amusing. He could
not believe in the possibility of such a deed on the part of Raphael
Craig. Yet he could see that Bridget’s doubtless fanciful and
highly-coloured report of what had passed in the night had so worked
on Teresa’s brain, already disturbed by sinister events. He could
understand now why she had so incontinently flown to London, in the wild
hope of stopping all further inquiries into her father’s proceedings.
The car climbed over the hill on which stands the town of St. Albans,
and then slipped easily down towards Redbourne and the twelve miles
of lonely and straight Watling Street that separates St. Albans from
Dunstable. On this interminable and monotonous stretch of road there are
only two villages; mile succeeds mile with a sort of dogged persistency,
and the nocturnal traveller becomes, as it were, hypnotized by the
ribbon-like highway that stretches eternally in front of him and behind
him. It was fortunate that the car ran well. Dunstable was reached in
forty minutes after leaving St. Albans, and then as they passed into the
mysterious cutting--resembling a Welsh mountain pass--to the north
of the ancient borough, the thoughts of all flew forward to the empty
farmhouse which Teresa and her attendant had left in the morning. As
soon as you emerge from the cutting you can, in daylight, see Queen’s
Farm quite plainly on the opposite slope of the valley, two miles away.
But at night, of course, you can see nothing of the house of Mr. Raphael
Craig unless it is lighted up.
‘Sure, the master’s returned!’ old Mrs. Bridget exclaimed.
A light faintly twinkled from the direction of Queen’s Farm.
This simple phenomenon produced its effect on both Teresa and Richard.
The old man had come back, and one mystery, therefore, would at length
be solved--provided that the old man chose to open his mouth! The idea
of thus approaching a revelation somehow impressed Raphael Craig’s
daughter and her companion with a sense of awe, a sense almost of fear.
They were secretly afraid lest they might encounter something which it
would have been better not to encounter. Each in fancy pictured Raphael
Craig alone in the house engaged in a strange business. Each silently
asked the question, ‘Where is Micky?’ and answered it with a vague and
terrible surmise. The feeling that Raphael Craig was responsible for
the disappearance of Micky grew on Richard especially. At first he had
scouted it, but he gradually persuaded himself that a man like Raphael
Craig was capable of most things, even to disposing of a detective. If
Raphael Craig had indeed any criminal secret to hide, and he found
out that Micky, a Scotland Yard detective, was prying into the secret,
Richard guessed that the fate of Micky might hazardously tremble in the
balance.
And another aspect of the affair troubled Richard.
‘If your father has returned,’ he said to Teresa, ‘how shall I explain
my presence, or, rather, how will you explain it? It seems to me that I
scarcely know myself why I am here with you on this car. I came on
the assumption that your father was gone. His presence would make me a
rather unnecessary item, wouldn’t it?’
‘Who can tell?’ Teresa murmured absently; and Richard was rather
chagrined at this peculiar reply.
The car was now down in the lowest part of the valley, and the house for
the moment out of sight. When, as the car breasted the hill, the summit
of the slope reappeared to the view, there was no light in Queen’s Farm;
the twinkling illumination was extinguished. Only the plain outline of
the house stood faintly visible under the waning moon.
‘Perhaps father has gone to bed,’ said Teresa, with a desperate
affectation of lightness. ‘I wonder what he would think when he found
the house empty.’
Bridget emitted a weird sound which was between a moan and a groan.
‘Happen ’twas a fairy light we saw,’ she said, the deep instincts of
Celtic superstition always rising thus at the slightest invitation.
The car at length turned into the boreen, and so reached the house. The
gate was opened, and Richard dexterously twisted the car into the drive.
The house--gaunt, bare, sinister--showed no sign whatever of life.
The three occupants of the car descended, and stood for a second within
the porch.
‘The latch-key, Bridget,’ said Teresa curtly. Bridget produced the
latch-key, but on putting it into the keyhole Teresa discovered that the
door was already unfastened. A push, and it swung backwards, revealing
the gloom of the hall.
‘Shall I go first?’ said Richard.
‘If you please,’ Teresa replied eagerly, and Richard stepped within. The
women followed.
He struck a match, which revealed a low bookcase to the left, and on
this a candle. He lighted the candle.
‘Stay here,’ he said, ‘and I will search the house.’
‘Sure,’ said Bridget, ‘we’ll stand or fall together. Where you go, me
and the mistress go too.’
Richard could not avoid a smile. Together, then, they searched the house
from roof to cellar, and found--nothing at all. Apparently not a single
thing had been displaced or touched. What could have been the origin
of the light which they had seen? Had Mr. Craig returned only to depart
again? They stood in the hall asking these questions, which they were
unable to answer. Bridget, however, assured that there was nothing of an
unusual nature within the house, recovered her wits, and set to work to
light lamps in the hall, drawing-room, and kitchen. Richard and Teresa
were alone together in the hall. Richard, glancing idly round, stooped
down and picked from the floor a gold-handled riding-whip which lay
almost under the bookcase. It was a lady’s whip.
‘A pretty whip,’ he remarked. ‘Yours, I suppose?’
Teresa went very white.
‘It isn’t mine,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen it before. I----’
At that very moment there was the sound of hoofs on the gravel of the
drive. Richard started for the door, but Teresa clutched him and held
him back with an action almost mechanical. Her eyes showed apprehension,
mingled with another feeling which Richard almost thought was joy. The
hoofs came up the drive and stopped in front of the door, still ajar.
The two within the house could just discern the legs of a horse and
the skirt of a riding-habit. The rider jumped down, and then cautiously
pushed against the door.
‘Juana!’ cried Teresa, and rushed into the arms of the newcomer.
Richard at once recognised the equestrian of Bosco’s circus--tall, dark,
Spanish, alluring, mysterious.
The two girls exchanged a passionate kiss, and then stood apart and
gazed at each other, Richard discreetly stopped outside and held the
horse’s bridle. In this animal he recognised the strawberry-roan mare,
also of Bosco’s circus. In a moment the two girls came out on to the
porch.
‘Mr. Redgrave,’ said Teresa, ‘let me introduce you to my sister. She had
called here before, and, finding no one, had left. She came back for her
whip. Juana, I am in great trouble. Mr. Redgrave has very kindly come to
my assistance.’
Richard bowed.
‘Come into the drawing-room,’ said Teresa, ‘You can tie the mare up to
this tree, Juana.
‘I expect she won’t mind the car.’
When they were all seated in the drawing-room Richard immediately
perceived that the two girls meant, at any rate partially, to make a
confidant of him. They talked quite openly before him.
‘Suppose father should come in?’ said the circus-girl.
‘You must hide,’ said Teresa positively, and, turning to Richard,
she went on: ‘Mr. Redgrave, my father has not seen my sister for many
months, and there are reasons why he should not see her now. You will
understand----’
‘Perfectly,’ assented Richard.
‘On the whole,’ said Juana, ‘I am quite prepared to see my--father.’
The door of the drawing-room burst open, and Bridget’s head appeared.
‘Miss Teresa, there’s someone in the sheds,’ she cried. ‘I heard a noise
like that of the Banshee of MacGillicuddy. Eh! Miss Juana, and is it
yesilf I see?’
At sight of the circus-girl Bridget wept, but she did not leave the
vicinity of the door.
‘Turn out every light,’ said Richard.
No sooner had he said the word than he leapt up and extinguished the
lamp which hung from the middle of the ceiling.
‘Run, Mrs. Bridget,’ he commanded, ‘and put out the others.’
Bridget departed.
The other three went out into the porch, and at Richard’s suggestion
Juana led her mare away behind the house. They were obliged to leave the
car where it stood, since it was impossible to move it without noise.
The house was now in darkness. Bridget had joined the rest in the porch.
They stood braced, tense, silent, waiting--waiting for they knew not
what.
Presently was heard the ‘birr’ of the electric motor-car from the
direction of the outbuildings, and then the vehicle flashed down the
boreen at fifteen or twenty miles an hour. Owing partly to the
darkness and partly to the height of the glazed ‘cab’ of the machine, a
contrivance designed by Mr. Craig himself, the driver of the car could
not be recognised, but both Richard and Teresa thought that it could be
no other than Raphael Craig, and, further, that he was alone. Just as
the car passed Juana’s mare whinnied, and there was an answering whinny
from the orchard field where, as it afterwards appeared, Mr. Craig’s two
mares had been turned out to grass. But the car showed no inclination to
halt.
‘Sure, the master will be after taking it away!’ Bridget exclaimed.
‘Taking what away, Bridget?’ Juana asked.
‘Micky’s cor----’
‘Silence, Bridget, you foolish creature!’ Teresa stopped her. ‘If you
can’t talk sense you must go and sit in the kitchen alone.’
This threat resulted in a very complete silence on the part of Bridget.
The car turned southwards down Watling Street.
‘He is going to the chalk-pit,’ said Richard quietly.
‘Perhaps we had better follow discreetly and see what happens,’ said
Teresa.
‘I was about to suggest that,’ said Richard; ‘but we ought not all to
go.’
‘And why not, Mr. Redgrave?’ Bridget demanded, in alarm at the prospect
of being left.
‘Because--well, because we had better not,’ said Richard. ‘Four will
make too heavy a load for this car.’
‘Juana,’ said Teresa, ‘you will stay here with Bridget. Mr. Redgrave and
myself will reconnoitre, find out what we can, and return to you with as
little delay as possible.’
‘Very well,’ said Juana, while old Bridget sighed a sad resignation.
In half a minute they had started and were following the car down the
road at a pace which would have been dangerous had not Watling Street
been deserted at one o’clock in the morning. The moon still shone, but
her light scarcely did more than disclose the sides of the road. The
electric car was too far ahead to be discerned.
‘Miss Craig,’ said Richard, ‘your suspicions of what may have happened
are obviously more serious than you care to admit. We do not know the
nature of the adventure upon which we have embarked. Let me beg you to
be frank with me. So far as your knowledge goes, has Mr. Craig committed
any act, wittingly or unwittingly, which might bring him within the
meshes of the law?’
‘Do you mean, do I know whether he has killed Micky, the detective?’
‘No,’ said Richard sharply; ‘I mean no such thing. Go back earlier than
the last few days. Go back a few years, and consider. Mr. Craig told
me last night that a relative had died and left him a hundred thousand
pounds in silver.’
‘Yes,’ said Teresa; ‘that was Great-uncle Andrew, the man who went to
Mexico and then turned “queer.” Father has often told me of him.’
‘You believe that you once had a Great-uncle Andrew, who left all this
silver to your father?’
‘Certainly. I remember father having all the papers and things to sign,
and him fetching the money in casks on his car.’
‘Fetching it from where?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I forget. Some place near London.’
‘What should you say if I told you that you never had a Great-uncle
Andrew, or that if there was such a person, he never left your father
any money?’
‘But we went into mourning!’ said Teresa naïvely.
‘Possibly,’ said Richard.
‘Do you mean to say that poor father made it all up?’
‘With the greatest respect for your father, Miss Craig, I suspect that
that was the case. I do not know for certain, but I suspect. Have you,
too, not had suspicions? Answer that candidly.’
Teresa hesitated.
‘Yes,’ she said in a low voice. ‘But I swear to you that I believed my
father.’
The car went through the tiny village of Chalk Hill, and their talk was
suspended.
Further up the road they could see the open; gate which led by a broad
field-path to the chalk-pit, the path along which Richard had seen the
elephant dragging the other motor-car two evenings ago. Richard directed
the car gently through the gate and then stopped; they dismounted, and
crossed the great field on foot.
‘If the matter of the silver was all fair and square,’ said Richard,
‘why did your father deal with the coin so mysteriously? How did he
excuse himself to you when he asked your assistance?’
‘He didn’t excuse himself,’ said Teresa stiffly.
‘I acted as he told me. I was his daughter. It was not my place to put
questions. Besides, I enjoyed the business. Remember, Mr. Redgrave, that
I am not a middle-aged woman.’
As they got on to the highest part of the field they saw at the far end
the dim shape of the electric car.
They crept cautiously towards it, and saw no sign of Raphael Craig.
At length, avoiding the zigzag path that led down into the pit, they
reached the point where the chalk had been cut precipitously away. Still
moving with all possible discretion, Richard lay on his stomach and
looked over. Twenty-five feet below he saw Raphael Craig standing,
apparently in an attitude of triumph, over the prone form of Micky,
otherwise Nolan, the detective. A lantern held by Craig showed plainly
the drawn and stiffened features of the man from Scotland Yard.
[Illustration: 0170]
Before Richard could prevent her, Teresa had also looked over.
‘God!’ she cried softly. ‘Is my father a----’
She stopped. The old man glanced mildly upwards.
Richard and Teresa with one accord ran along the edge of the pit, and
then down the zigzag path till they stood facing Raphael Craig, the
prone body of the detective between them.
‘What is this?’ questioned the old man coldly, pushing back the gray
hairs from his forehead. ‘Spying again?’
He looked intently at Richard. He seemed to ignore the silent form on
the ground.
‘Father,’ cried Teresa, ‘if you have killed him, fly. Take the motor-car
and get away as far as you can and as fast as you can. Mr. Redgrave and
I----’
‘Killed him!’ Raphael Craig exclaimed.
‘Why should I kill him? I found him lying here--here where I came to
seek him. He must have fallen over this miniature precipice.’
‘He isn’t dead,’ said Teresa eagerly; she had knelt beside the
detective.
‘I did not suppose that he was. But if he had been it would have been
only a just punishment.’
‘Had we not better carry him to the house, sir?’ Richard suggested
quietly.
‘As you wish,’ said Raphael. ‘It appears that you have taken charge of
our affairs.’
‘Mr. Redgrave is here at my urgent request, father,’ said Teresa.
‘You!’ Raphael gazed at her hard. ‘You! Shall I curse you as I cursed
your sister?’
Nevertheless, he helped Richard to carry the body of the detective up
the path and into the field--a task of considerable difficulty. When
they reached the electric car they put the lifeless organism into the
back part of it.
‘Take him,’ said Mr. Craig to Richard succinctly--‘take him off.’
‘And you?’ said Richard.
‘I will follow.’
Richard and Teresa got into the electric car and moved off down the
field. They spoke not a word. Arrived at the house, the detective was
taken upstairs and put into a bed by the three women. The lamps had been
relighted. The little man had regained consciousness, but he was too
feeble to give any utterance to his thoughts. He pointed weakly to his
head, whereon his nurses found a lump, but no other sign of injury. They
surmised that he was suffering from concussion of the brain, how caused
they could only guess. He drank a little brandy-and-water, and lay
extended on the bed as though unwilling almost to put himself to the
exertion of breathing.
The noise of the Décauville sounded outside. Teresa sprang to the
window.
‘Here is father, Juana,’ she said anxiously. ‘If he should come
upstairs----’
‘Go down and stop him from coming upstairs. Bridget and I will attend to
this poor fellow.’
Her voice was charged with sympathy as she glanced at the sufferer on
the bed. The reference to himself caused the detective to open his eyes.
‘I fell over the edge of the pit,’ he murmured faintly. ‘It was owing
to the short grass being so slippery after the rain.’ He had no Irish
accent now.
Then he closed his eyes again.
Teresa gave a sigh of relief as she left the room. Her father, then, was
not in thought a murderer.
As she entered the hall from the stairs
Raphael Craig and Richard came in through the front-door. They had
housed the two cars.
‘Where is he?’ asked Raphael of his daughter.
‘In the back bedroom, father. He is not seriously hurt.’
‘I will go up and have a look at him,’ said Raphael, actuated apparently
by mere idle curiosity.
‘No, father, don’t!’ Teresa pleaded. ‘Bridget is looking after him, and
I believe he is just going to sleep.’
Raphael gave a gesture of assent
‘And now, sir,’ he said to Richard, opening the drawing-room door, ‘a
word with you.’
The two men passed into the drawing-room. Raphael was closing the door
when Teresa stepped forward.
‘I also have a word to say, father,’ she remarked firmly.
‘Say it to me afterwards, then,’ he replied briefly.
‘No. It is a word that must be said now.’
The old man, smiling slightly and ironically, pulled the door open and
allowed his daughter to enter the room.
Raphael Craig sat down on the Chesterfield sofa, but Richard and Teresa
remained standing, Richard, for his part, determined that there should
be no beating about the bush; and he had not the least intention
of allowing the old man to put him in the wrong by asking difficult
questions. So he began at once, fixing his eyes on a greenish-coloured
newspaper that stuck out of Mr. Craig’s right-hand pocket.
‘Mr. Craig,’ he said, ‘let me cut a long story short. I came up here a
few days ago to bring you a Williamson electric car. True, I was for the
time being a genuine employe of the Williamson Company, but that was
not my real business. I confess to you, Mr. Craig, that I am a private
inquiry agent. It was in my professional capacity that I visited your
House.’
‘Ah!’ said Mr. Craig. ‘You were, then, after all, a spy? I had guessed
correctly.’
‘Spy?’ Richard repeated calmly. ‘Yes; it is an epithet that has been
applied to me before.’ He glanced at Teresa, who met his glance fairly.
‘To continue,’ he said: ‘I have abandoned my inquiries. To be precise, I
gave up my mission this morning; therefore, since I am here again, I am
not here as a spy.’
‘What led you to abandon your mission, Mr. Inquiry Agent?’ asked
Raphael, stroking his gray beard.
‘I gave it up, Mr. Craig,’ said Richard plumply, ‘out of regard for your
daughter.’
‘Indeed!’ Raphael remarked, with the frostiest politeness. ‘So my
daughter is fortunate enough to have won your regard?’
‘If you care to put it so.’
‘But,’ said Mr. Craig, ‘all this does not account for your presence here
to-night, Mr. Inquiry Agent.’
‘I am here now----’ Richard began, and then stopped.
‘Mr. Redgrave is here now,’ Teresa said, at the same time seating
herself, ‘because I asked him to come.’
‘When did you ask him, girl?’
‘I went to London in the Décauville to Mr. Redgrave’s office, and----’
‘You went to London alone?’
The old man sprang up thunderously, and the newspaper fell out of his
pocket. Richard quietly picked it up from the floor. It was that day’s
_Westminster Gazette_.
‘Bridget went with me,’ said Teresa, quailing before her father’s
outburst.
It was evident from both their respective demeanours that Mr. Craig’s
temper was not one of absolute serenity.
‘Bridget!’ sneered Raphael. ‘You went down to London to ask Mr. Redgrave
to come up to Hockliffe?’
‘I went to ask him to abandon his inquiries.’
‘But still, you brought him back with you?’
‘Yes.’
‘At one o’clock in the morning?’
‘Yes. But, father----’
‘Miss Craig was in a very awkward situation,’ said Richard.
‘I agree with you,’ the old man interposed.
‘And I was anxious to do anything in my power to help her.’
‘And you helped her by visiting this house at one o’clock in the morning
during my absence?’
‘Father,’ said Teresa pleadingly, ‘can’t you and I discuss that
aspect of the question afterwards? What is it that you want to ask Mr.
Redgrave?’
‘My girl,’ said Mr. Craig, ‘we will, if you please, discuss it now. Mr.
Redgrave is equally involved with yourself. Remember that it was you
that insisted on joining this little conference. You insisted on coming
into the room.’ Then he turned to Redgrave. ‘What was the exact nature
of the difficult situation in which you say my daughter was placed?’
‘I will tell you, hither,’ said Teresa, standing up. ‘If you insist on
Mr. Redgrave hearing it, he shall. I had reason to think that either you
had killed Micky, or that Micky had killed you.’
‘And which proposition did you favour?’
‘I favoured,’ said Teresa, with a coldness equalling her father’s, ‘I
favoured the proposition that you had killed Micky. Bridget heard a
revolver-shot in the night. I knew that you kept a revolver. Bridget
had previously heard you and Micky at high words. This morning you had
disappeared without warning me. Micky had also disappeared. Father, you
were not treating me fairly.’
‘You consider that before I leave my house I must give you “warning”
like a servant, eh, Teresa? I wonder what Mr. Redgrave thinks of all
this.’
‘I do not see that it matters what Mr. Redgrave thinks,’ said Teresa.
‘It matters greatly,’ the old man contradicted; ‘and I will give you the
reason.’ He walked across the room very deliberately to the tall clock.
‘Mr. Redgrave will be your husband, Teresa.’
‘Father!’
Richard tried to think of something suitable to such an extraordinary
occasion, but could not.
‘You have hopelessly compromised yourself with him, and he shall marry
you.’
‘Never!’ said Teresa, with every nerve tingling with a girl’s pride. ‘I
will die first!’
‘Very well,’ said Mr. Craig, with frightful calmness, ‘you will die,
Teresa.’
[Illustration: 0180]
His lips were white, and his eyes blazed as he opened the clock-case and
took there from a revolver.
‘Mr. Craig,’ said Richard, ‘may I beg you to remain calm?’
‘I am entirely calm, sir. Teresa, you have never heard your mother’s
story. It is the remembrance of that story which makes me firm now. Some
day you shall hear it. You may think me mad, but I am not so. You may
think me of uncertain temper, mysterious, secretive, a bully, perhaps a
criminal. Well, you must think those things; but when you know all,
if ever you do know all, you will forgive all.’ His voice softened a
little, and then grew firm again. ‘In the meantime, you shall marry Mr.
Redgrave. You have visited his room at an unconscionable hour; he has
visited this house at an hour still more unconscionable, and there is
only one alternative to marriage. I am quite serious when I say that I
would sooner see you dead than that you should remain single after this
episode. I have seen what I have seen. I know your blood. I know what
darkened my life, and darkened your mother’s life, and finally killed
her.’
‘You threaten----’ Teresa began.
‘Stop, Teresa!’ Richard exclaimed masterfully, and turning to Raphael
Craig: ‘Mr. Craig, nothing will suit me better. I have the honour to ask
your daughter’s hand.’
Teresa started violently.
‘As Teresa’s father,’ said Craig solemnly, ‘I give her to you. May she
prove a worthy wife!’
‘And you?’ Richard questioned, gazing at Teresa.
‘What a farce!’ Teresa sobbed; but at the same moment, try how she might
to prevent it, a smile lighted her tears, and her hand found Richard’s
hand.
Mr. Craig put the revolver back into the clock-case.
‘I expect you know that we didn’t yield to that tool of yours,’
said Richard half playfully. ‘I am truly fond of Teresa--that is the
explanation. You wouldn’t have used that revolver, though you are
certainly in some ways a strange man.’
‘As you are good enough to say, Redgrave, I am a strange man. I should
have used the revolver.’
The way in which these words were uttered created a profound impression
on Richard. Releasing Teresa’s hand, he began to consider what course
he should now adopt in the joint interest of himself and of Teresa. He
could not dismiss the suspicion that he had a madman to deal with.
‘If I may,’ said he to Mr. Craig, ‘I should like a few words with Teresa
outside. After that there are several things to be settled between you,
sir, and me.’
Mr. Craig nodded.
‘It is late,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ said Richard, ‘but such nights as this do not follow every day in
the week.’
‘Teresa!’ the young lover exclaimed when they were in the hall, ‘say you
don’t regret. I have loved you since the moment I saw you first.’
‘I don’t regret,’ she said simply. ‘Why should I?’
‘Call me Dick,’ he demanded.
‘Dick.’
‘And kiss me.’
She kissed him.
‘Thanks,’ he said in his curious, undisturbed way; ‘that is indeed good.
Now go to bed and rest. I will have a thorough explanation with your
father at once. I am determined on that. We must know where we stand,
you and I;’ and without waiting for her to make any reply, he flung back
into the drawing-room and slammed the door.
Raphael still sat on the Chesterfield, apparently lost in thought.
‘Mr. Craig,’ Richard began, ‘I am now, for practical purposes, a
member of your family. Your interests are, presumably, your daughter’s
interests, and your daughter’s interests are certainly my interests;
therefore----’
‘Therefore?’ repeated Mr. Craig imperturbably.
‘Therefore,’ said Richard, ‘don’t you think you had better let me into
some of your secrets?’
‘As, for example----’
‘The secret, for example, of what has occurred between you and Micky,
whose real name you have doubtless learnt since I left you on Saturday
night last. I should tell you that I had ascertained the identity of
that gentleman immediately upon the conclusion of my interview with
you.’
‘And I,’ said Mr. Craig, ‘ascertained it about twenty-four hours later.
It was then that the revolver-shot occurred. The revolver-shot hurt
no one and nothing except the piano.’ Here Mr. Craig lifted up the
embroidered damask cover of the piano, and showed splintered wood
beneath. The perforation in the damask cover was scarcely noticeable.
He continued: ‘I was angry at the man’s calm insolence when I taxed him
with being a detective. I aimed to hit, but aimed badly. Having missed,
I thought better of the idea of an immediate killing, and told him to
go. He went. I saw nothing of him again till I saw him lying senseless
in the pit to-night; but I guessed that he was still prowling about.’
‘Thanks,’ said Richard.
‘Thanks for what?’ asked the old man.
‘For your candour. I hope you will trust me and confide in me.’ Richard
was now trying to be extremely diplomatic. ‘In spite of appearances, I
still believe that you are an honourable man, engaged, however, in some
scheme which may involve you in difficulties. Mr. Craig, let me beg you,
most respectfully, to continue your frankness; you can lose nothing
by it. I need not point out to you that you have been very fortunate
to-night.’
‘In what way?’
‘In the fact that I happen to have fallen in love with Teresa, and was
tempted beyond resistance by the opportunity offered by your amazing
proposition. My love for Teresa has not, I hope, impaired my judgment,
and my judgment infallibly tells me that you had a far more powerful
reason than that of propriety for urging my engagement to your daughter.
And, Mr. Craig, I venture to guess that your reason was that I knew too
much of your affairs. You discerned the nature of my feelings towards
your daughter, and you determined on a bold stroke. You are an
incomparable actor.’
Mr. Craig slowly smiled; it was a smile of almost tragic amusement.
‘Your insight does you credit, Redgrave,’ he said at length. ‘I admit
that it was part of my wish to secure your silence, and perhaps your
co-operation. Nevertheless, my chief reason for insisting on a betrothal
was a regard for Teresa’s future. There are pages in the history of my
life that----’ He stopped.
‘We will not go into that,’ he said shortly.
‘As you please,’ Richard assented. ‘Perhaps, to change the subject, you
will tell ‘me your object in disappearing so completely to-day, to the
grave alarm of my future wife?’
The youth’s spectacles gleamed with good-humoured mischief.
‘I had to perform a certain excursion,’ said Raphael Craig.
‘Now, why in the name of fortune, sir, don’t you say at once that you
went to London?’
‘How do you know that I went to London?’
‘By this paper.’ Richard pointed to the _Westminster Gazette_, which
lay on the floor. ‘It is to-night’s special edition. The _Westminster
Gazette_ is not on sale in Hockliffe.’
‘Yes,’ said the old man half dreamily, ‘I went to London.’
‘In order to close finally the estate of your uncle, who left you all
that silver?’
The irony of Richard’s tone was not lost on the old man.
‘What do you mean, boy?’
‘I said a few moments ago, sir, that you were an incomparable actor. I
alluded to our previous interview in this room. Most cheerfully I admit
that Teresa’s father imposed on me then to perfection. I believed you
absolutely. Since then----’
‘What?’
‘Since then I have found out that you never had any uncle, and that,
consequently, your uncle, being non-existent, could not have left you a
hundred thousand pounds in silver coin.’
Raphael Craig took a long, deep breath.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I lied to you. But it was a good lie--a lie which I
have used so often during the last year or two that I had almost come
to believe it truth. You are a clever fellow, Redgrave. How did you
discover this?’
‘To be precise,’ said Richard, ‘it was not I, but your precious Micky,
who discovered it.’
‘Then you are not so clever a fellow.’
‘Clever enough, sir, to go straight to the point. And the point is, the
point at which I have been gradually arriving since our talk began--how
did you become possessed of that silver? I ask the question, and I
demand an answer to it, as the affianced of your daughter.’
At this moment the lamp, short of oil, began to give a feeble and
still feebler light. A slight smell of oil filled the room. Both men
instinctively glanced up at the lamp.
‘Redgrave, I may, at any rate, assure you that you are not about to
marry a thief’s daughter.’
‘No, sir; probably not. But I may be about to marry the daughter of a
man who in some other way has made an enemy of the law.’
‘Listen,’ said Raphael Craig, ‘and believe that I am not acting now.
Twenty years ago I formed a scheme, a life-plan. To the success of this
scheme money was absolutely essential, money in large quantities. How
was I to get it? I was in the service of a bank, and this fact was very
helpful to the success of my scheme. I therefore did not wish to leave
the bank. But a bank manager cannot make money. At least, he cannot
make much money. I needed a lot. I thought and thought, and at length I
arrived at the solution of the problem. I began to _make_ money.’
‘But how?’ asked Richard, not yet caring to seem to perceive the old
man’s meaning.
‘I made it--made it steadily for nearly twenty years.’
‘You coined it?’
‘I coined it.’
‘Then during the whole of this time you have been spreading bad money
everywhere, and have never been found out?’
‘I didn’t make bad money, Redgrave. I made perfectly good money. I
cheated no one. I merely sinned against the law. The price of silver, as
you know, has been steadily decreasing for many years. The silver in
a half-crown, as silver, is now worth little more than a shilling. A
half-crown piece is only worth half-a-crown because we choose to call
it so. Consult any book on coinage, and you will find that what I say is
strictly true. What more easy, then, given the mechanical skill, which I
possessed, than to make and utter genuine money at a substantial profit?
I made a profit of fifty per cent, on my coinage, and no one on earth
can distinguish my money from that of the Mint. It will stand any test.’
Richard did not conceal that he was impressed by the fine simplicity and
effectiveness of Raphael’s scheme.
‘But,’ the old man continued, ‘I made money faster than I could get rid
of it. It gradually accumulated. Then it was that I invented my Mexican
uncle, so that I might deal with the coin more openly.’
‘Yes?’ said Richard.
‘That is all,’ said Raphael Craig.
‘But the object of the scheme?’ asked Richard. ‘You said you needed all
this money for a certain scheme.’
‘Yes,’ said the old man solemnly, ‘and the scheme is approaching
fruition. Yet a little time, and my task will be done.’
‘It is well,’ Richard put in, ‘that your scheme is nearly completed,
for the methods you have employed might even now be found out, and then
good-bye to the scheme, whatever it is.’
Raphael Craig smiled.
‘No, my friend,’ he remarked composedly, ‘nothing can upset it now. The
last of my silver is disposed of--safely negotiated. Go into my sheds
now, and you will discover--nothing. My machinery is destroyed; all
evidence is annihilated. For twenty years I have been crossing an abyss
by means of a tight-rope; at any moment I might have been precipitated
into the gulf. But at last I am on firm ground once more. It is the
Other, now, who will shortly be plunged into the abyss.’
‘The Other!’ Richard repeated, struck by the strange and mordant accent
with which Raphael Craig had pronounced that word.
‘The Other,’ said the old man. ‘His hour comes.’
‘And who is he?’ demanded Richard.
‘That,’ Raphael Craig said, ‘you will never know until my deed is
accomplished. The train is laid, the fuse is ignited. I have only to
wait.’
‘Then you will tell me nothing more?’ said Richard.
‘Have I not interested you so far?’ said the old man.
‘Undoubtedly, but my curiosity is still not quite sated.’
‘It occurs to me that your curiosity exceeds mine. By what right,
young man, do you put all these questions? I have never sought to
cross-examine you, as I might have done.’
‘Under the circumstances,’ said Richard, ‘I think you have a perfect
right to know, and certainly I have no objection to telling you. I came
on behalf of the directors of the bank.’
‘Which means Mr. Simon Lock,’ said Raphael Craig.
‘Which means Mr. Simon Lock,’ Richard cheerfully admitted.
‘Ah!’
‘Then you decline to admit me further into your confidence?’ Richard
doggedly persisted.
‘Redgrave,’ said the old man, standing up, my scheme is my own. It is
the most precious thing I have--the one thing that has kept me alive,
given me vitality, vivacity, strength, hope. During all these years I
have shared it with none. Shall I share it now? Shall I share it with a
man young enough to be my son, a man who forced himself into my house,
wormed himself into the secrets of my private life? I shall not. It
is too sacred a thing. You do not know what my scheme means to me; you
cannot guess all that is involved in it. I can conceive that you might
even laugh at my scheme--you who do not yet know what life is and what
life means.’
Raphael Craig resumed with dignity his seat on the sofa. Richard was
impressed by this exhibition of profound feeling on the part of the old
man. He was inclined to admit, privately, that perhaps the old man
was right--perhaps he did not know what life was and what life meant;
perhaps there were things in life deeper, more terrible, than he had
ever suspected.
A silence fell upon the room. The old man seemed not inclined to break
it; Richard, still under the hypnotism of the scene, would not speak. To
relieve the intensity of the moment he quietly opened the _Westminster
Gazette_. The lamp had sunk lower and lower, and it was with difficulty
that he could read. His eye, however, chanced to fall on the financial
page, and there, as the heading of a paragraph in the ‘Notes,’ he saw
these words: ‘LOCK RUMOURS.’ He brought the page nearer to his face, and
read: ‘The rumours that the Lock group are in serious difficulties
was again rife on ’Change to-day. Mr. Simon Lock, seen by one of our
representatives, merely smiled when told of the prevalence of these
sinister rumours. He gave our representative the somewhat cryptic answer
that we should see what we should see. We do not doubt the truth of this
remark. Dealing in the shares of the newly-floated “La Princesse” Gold
Mining Company (Westralian) was very active this morning, but fell flat
after lunch. The one-pound shares, which, after a sensational rise last
week, fell on Thursday to a shade over par, are now at five and a half,
with a distinct tendency to harden, in spite of the fact that the demand
is slight.’
Richard looked up from the paper.
‘I see,’ he said, with interest, ‘that it is not absolutely all plain
sailing even with the great Simon Lock. Did you read this paragraph here
about him?’
‘No,’ murmured the old man. ‘Read it to me.’
Richard did so in the rapidly-dying light.
‘Very curious and interesting,’ said Raphael Craig. ‘I have sometimes
permitted myself to wonder whether our respected chairman is, after all,
the impregnable rock which he is usually taken for.’
At this moment the lamp went out, and the two men sat in absolute
darkness.
The next ensuing phenomenon was the sound of an apparently heavy body
falling down the stairs into the hall, and then a girl’s terrified
scream.
Richard sprang to the door, but a few moments elapsed before his fingers
could find the handle. At length he opened the door. The lamp in the
hall was still brightly burning. At the foot of the stairs lay Nolan,
the detective, wrapped in a bedgown. At the head of the stairs, in an
attitude of dismay, stood Juana.
There was a heavy and terrible sigh at Richard’s elbow. He turned his
head sharply. Raphael Craig stood behind him, his body swaying as though
in a breeze.
‘Juana!’ he stammered out hoarsely, his eyes fixed on the trembling
girl.
‘Do not curse me again, father,’ she cried, with a superb gesture; ‘I
have suffered enough.’
An oak chest stood to the left of the drawing-room door. Raphael Craig
sank down upon it, as if exhausted by a sudden and frightful emotion.
‘Go!’ he said in a low voice.
But the girl came steadily downstairs towards him.
No one seemed to take any notice of the body of the detective.