IN THE PASSAGE
The inspector I dragged in by the collar of his coat. I slammed the
door in the faces of his friends, keeping my foot against it while I
shot the bolts.
“This won’t do! I’m not going to stand any more of your nonsense! You
let my men in!”
There was a flaming gas-bracket in the passage. By its flare I eyed
the inspector.
“You be so good as to understand, Mr. Symonds, that I’m going to have
no more of your nonsense.” He put his hand up to his mouth--a whistle
between his fingers. Gripping his wrist, I pinned him by the throat
against the wall. “If you are not careful, you’ll get hurt.”
He gasped out, between his clenched teeth, “I’ll make you pay for
this! You let my men in!”
“I’ll not let your men in--until you and I have had an explanation.”
The lady interposed. “Don’t hurt him!”
“I’ll not hurt him--unless he compels me. Look here, Symonds, there’s
been a mystification--a hideous blunder.”
“I don’t want to have anything to say to you. You open that door!”
His hands returned to his lips. Again I had to pin him against the
wall; this time I wrenched the whistle from between his fingers.
“If you give any sort of signal, you’ll be sorry.”
“You’ve broken my wrist!”
“I haven’t; but I will if you don’t look out. I tell you, man, that
we’ve been on the wrong scent; you and I, and all of us. It isn’t
Edwin Lawrence who’s been murdered; he isn’t even dead.”
“Don’t tell your tales to me.”
“Tales! I tell you tales! Here’s Mr. Edwin Lawrence to tell his own.”
Lawrence was standing a few steps farther down the passage, an
apparently interested spectator of what had been taking place. Symonds
turned to him.
“This man? Who is this man?”
Lawrence thrust his thumbs into his waistcoat armholes.
“I’m the corpse on whom the coroner’s been sitting.”
“Don’t play your mountebank tricks with me, sir.”
“I’m the murdered man.”
“Indeed? And pray what may be your name?”
“Edwin Lawrence--at your service, entirely to command. Though I may
mention that that’s only a form of words; since, at present, I’m
really, and actually, in the service of another--a lady. Bound to her
hand and foot by a tie there’s no dissolving.”
Symonds perceived that in his manner, to say the least, there was
something curious. As he looked at me I endeavoured to give him the
assurance which I saw that he required.
“It is Mr. Edwin Lawrence, you may safely take my word for it. The
lady can confirm what I say.”
Which the lady did upon the instant. The inspector was still, plainly,
in a state of uncertainty; which, under the circumstances, was
scarcely strange.
“I don’t know if this is a trick which you have got up between you,
and which you think you can play off on me; but, anyhow, who do you
say the dead man is?”
Lawrence chose to take the question as addressed to him. He chuckled;
there was something in the chuckle which suggested the maniac more
vividly than anything which had gone before.
“Who’s the dead man? Ah! there’s the puzzle--and the joke! The dead
man must be me. It’s in the papers--in people’s mouths--it’s the talk
of the town. The police are searching for the wretch that slew me--the
coroner and his jury have viewed my body. It’s plain the dead man must
be me. And yet, although it’s very odd, he isn’t. It’s the rarest jest
that ever yet was played--and all hers.” He pointed with his thumb
along the passage. “It’s all her doing, conception and execution,
both. And how she has enjoyed it! Ever since she has done nothing else
but laugh. Can’t you hear her? She’s laughing now!”
There did seem to come, through the door which was at the end of the
passage, the sound of a woman’s laughter. We all heard it. The lady
drew closer to me; I gritted my teeth; the inspector, with whom, as
yet, it had no uncomfortable associations, treated it as though it
were nothing out of the way.
“Who’s it you’ve got in there?”
Lawrence raised his hands as if they had been notes of exclamation.
“A goddess! Such an one!--a pearl of the pantheon! A demon!--out of
the very heart of hell!” He fingered his shirt-collar as if it were
tight about his neck. “That’s why she relished her humorous conception
more than I have. The qualities which go to the complete enjoyment of
the jokes she plays, I lack. The laughter she compels has
characteristics which I do not find altogether to my taste. It gets
upon my brain; steals my sleep; nips my heart; fills the world
with--faces; grinning faces, all of them--like his. And so I’m
resolved to tell the joke, and I promise that it shan’t be spoilt in
telling.” This with a smile upon his lips, a something elusive in his
eyes, which, to my mind, again betrayed the lunatic. He threw out his
arms with a burst of sudden wildness. “Let them all come in--the whole
street--the city-ful! So that as many as may be may be gathered
together for the enjoyment of the joke!”
Symonds and I exchanged glances. I spoke to him in an undertone.
“If you take my advice, you will listen to what he has to say. Before
he’s finished, the whole story will have come out.”
All the time there had been knockings at the door. Now some one
without made himself prominent above the others. A shout came through
the panels.
“Symonds! Is that you in there? Shall we break down the door?”
The voice was Hume’s. I proffered a suggestion to the inspector.
“There is no reason why Dr. Hume should not come in. He will be able
to resolve your doubts as to whether or not this is Mr. Edwin
Lawrence. Your men I should advise you to keep outside. They will be
close at hand if they are wanted.”
He regarded me askance, evidently still by no means sure as to the
nature of the part which I might be playing.
“You are a curious person, Mr. Ferguson. You have your own ideas of
the way in which justice is administered in England. However, you
shall have your own way. Let Dr. Hume come in. My men can wait outside
till they are wanted.”
I unbolted the door, keeping my foot against it, to guard against a
sudden rush. The crowd was still in waiting. It had evidently grown
larger. As the people saw that the door was being opened, there were
cries and exclamations. Hume was standing just outside. It seemed that
it had been his intention to make a dart within; but the spectacle of
me in the doorway caused him to hesitate. By him were the inspector’s
friends. Misunderstanding the situation, they made an effort to force
the door wider open. It was all I could do to hold it against them.
“Hume, you can come in. Inspector Symonds, give your men their
instructions.”
“Gray, are you there?”
“Yes, sir! Do you want us?”
“Not just now. I may do shortly; keep where you are. Send along for
some one to keep those people moving.”
“Very good, sir. Are you all right in there?”
“For the present I am. Keep a sharp look-out. If you hear me give the
word, come in at once--if you have to break down the door to do it.”
“Right, sir!”
I rebolted the door, boos and groans coming from the crowd as they
perceived themselves being shut out from the sight of anything which
there might be to see. Hume had entered. He was looking about him as
if the position of affairs were beyond his comprehension.
“Symonds, what does all this mean? Ferguson, what new madness have you
been up to? Miss Moore, you here! This is no place for you!”
“I think it is.”
“I say it’s not. You ought to be in bed. Who gave you permission to
leave your room?”
“I gave myself permission, thank you. I am quite able to take care of
myself. And, if I’m not, here’s Mr. Ferguson.”
“Mr. Ferguson! Mr. Ferguson stands in need of some one to take care of
him.” He turned to me. “If you’ve had a hand in bringing Miss Moore
here, you ought to be ashamed of yourself, if you’re capable of shame,
which I’m beginning to doubt. Surely your own sense of decency,
embryonic though it may be, ought to have told you that it is no place
for her. What is this den which you have brought her to?”
“Here is some one who can tell you better than I. Ask him, not me.”
Lawrence broke into laughter.
“That’s it, Ferguson. Hume, ask the corpse.”
Hume stared at the speaker, as if he had been a spectre; which,
apparently, he was more than half disposed to believe that he was.
“Lawrence! Edwin Lawrence! Is it a living man, some demoniacal
likeness, or is it a ghost? My God! is it a ghost?”
Again Lawrence laughed. He went closer to the bewildered doctor; his
eyes flaming, his manner growing wilder as he continued speaking.
“A ghost, Hume, write it down a ghost! I wonder if I could cheat
myself into believing I’m a ghost? Hume, you’re an authority on
madness. Look at me; do you think I’m mad? It’s a question I’ve been
putting to myself since--she began to be humorous. I see things--I
hear things--like the men who’ve been--thirsty. There’s a face which
looks into mine--a face all cut and slashed and sliced into ribbons;
and, as the blood streams down the cheek-bones, which are laid all
bare, its teeth grin at me, inside the torn and broken jaws, and it
says, ‘After all I’ve done, this is the end!’ I strike at it, with
both my fists, where the eyeballs ought to be, but I can’t knock it
away; it won’t go, it keeps on being there. I can’t sleep, though I’d
give all the world to. I’m afraid to try, because, when I shut my
eyes, I see it plainer. The blood gets on my hands; the taste gets
into my mouth; the idiot words get on my brain, ‘After all I’ve done,
this is the end!’ I can’t get away from the face and the words;
whatever I do, wherever I go, they’re there. I seem to carry them with
me. I’ve been drinking, but I can’t drink enough to shut them out; I
can’t get drunk. And, Hume, do you think I’m mad? I hope I am. For
while I’m being tortured she laughs; she keeps laughing all the time.
It’s her notion of a jest. I hope that it’s but a madman’s fancy, what
I see and hear; and that, when I get my reason back again, they’ll
go--the face and the words. You’re a scientific man. Tell me if I’m
mad.”
Hume turned towards me. His countenance was pasty-hued.
“What devil’s trick is this?”
Lawrence answered, in his own fashion, as if the question had been
addressed to him.
“That’s what it is--a devil’s trick! Hers! The Goddess’s! She’s a
demon! I’ll--I’ll tell you how it was done. She’s got me--by the
throat; bought me--body and soul. But I don’t care, I’ll be even. She
shan’t do all the scoring; I will play a hand, although, directly
afterwards, she drags me down to hell with her. Let her drag! I’m in
hell already. It can’t be worse--where she has sprung from.”
Taking Hume by the shoulder with one hand, with the other he pointed
to the door which was at the end of the passage. He was dreadful to
look at. As he himself said, he already looked as if he were suffering
the torments of the damned.
“She’s in there--behind that door. But although she is in there she’s
with me here. She’s always with me, wherever I am; she, the face, and
the words. You think I’m romancing, passing off on you the coinage of
a madman’s brain. I would it were so. I wish that they were lies of my
own invention, a maniac’s imaginings. Come with me; judge for
yourself. You shall see her. I will show you how the devil’s trick was
done.”
He led the way along the passage. We followed. I know not what
thoughts were in the minds of the others. I do know that I myself had
never before been so conscious of a sense of discomfort. The lady
slipped her hand into mine. It was cold. Her fingers trembled. Even
then I would have stayed her from seeing what we were to see if I
could; but I could not. It was as if we were being borne onward
together in a dream. All the while I had a suspicion that, of us all,
Inspector Symonds was most at his ease, while it seemed to me that
Hume carried himself like a man who moved to execution.