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THE
SILENT HOUSE
BY
FERGUS HUME
New York
C. H. DOSCHER
Copyright, 1907, by
C. H. DOSCHER
[Illustration: I have ample time at my command, and I shall only be
too happy to place it and myself at your service]
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I--The Tenant of the Silent House 1
II--Shadows on the Blind 10
III--An Unsatisfactory Explanation 20
IV--Mrs. Kebby's Discovery 29
V--The Talk of the Town 38
VI--Mrs. Vrain's Story 47
VII--The Assurance Money 56
VIII--Diana Vrain 65
IX--A Marriage That Was a Failure 74
X--The Parti-Coloured Ribbon 83
XI--Further Discoveries 93
XII--The Veil and Its Owner 101
XIII--Gossip 111
XIV--The House in Jersey Street 121
XV--Rhoda and the Cloak 131
XVI--Mrs. Vrain at Bay 141
XVII--A Denial 151
XVIII--Who Bought the Cloak? 160
XIX--The Defence of Count Ferruci 169
XX--A New Development 179
XXI--Two Months Pass 187
XXII--At Berwin Manor 196
XXIII--A Startling Theory 206
XXIV--Lucian Is Surprised 215
XXV--A Dark Plot 224
XXVI--The Other Man's Wife 233
XXVII--A Confession 241
XXVIII--The Name of the Assassin 252
XXIX--Link Sets a Trap 262
XXX--Who Fell into the Trap 272
XXXI--A Strange Confession 282
XXXII--The Confession (_continued_) 291
XXXIII--What Rhoda Had to Say 301
XXXIV--The End of It All 310
THE SILENT HOUSE
CHAPTER I
THE TENANT OF THE SILENT HOUSE
Lucian Denzil was a briefless barrister, who so far departed from the
traditions of his brethren of the long robe as not to dwell within the
purlieus of the Temple. For certain private reasons, not unconnected
with economy, he occupied rooms in Geneva Square, Pimlico; and, for the
purposes of his profession, repaired daily, from ten to four, to
Serjeant's Inn, where he shared an office with a friend equally
briefless and poor.
This state of things sounds hardly enviable, but Lucian, being young and
independent to the extent of £300 a year, was not dissatisfied with his
position. As his age was only twenty-five, there was ample time, he
thought, to succeed in his profession; and, pending that desirable
consummation, he cultivated the muses on a little oatmeal, after the
fashion of his kind. There have been lives less happily circumstanced.
Geneva Square was a kind of backwater of the great river of town life
which swept past its entrance with speed and clamour without disturbing
the peace within. One long, narrow street led from a roaring
thoroughfare into a silent quadrangle of tall grey houses, occupied by
lodging-house keepers, city clerks and two or three artists, who
represented the Bohemian element of the place. In the centre there was
an oasis of green lawn, surrounded by rusty iron railings the height of
a man, dotted with elms of considerable age, and streaked with narrow
paths of yellow gravel.
The surrounding houses represented an eminently respectable appearance,
with their immaculately clean steps, white-curtained windows, and neat
boxes of flowers. The windows glittered like diamonds, the door-knobs
and plates shone with a yellow lustre, and there were no sticks, or
straws, or waste paper lying about to mar the tidy look of the square.
With one exception, Geneva Square was a pattern of all that was
desirable in the way of cleanliness and order. One might hope to find
such a haven in some somnolent cathedral town, but scarcely in the
grimy, smoky, restless metropolis of London.
The exception to the notable spotlessness of the neighborhood was No.
13, a house in the centre of the side opposite to the entrance. Its
windows were dusty, and without blinds or curtains, there were no
flower-boxes on the ledges, the steps lacked whitewash, and the iron
railings looked rusty for want of paint. Stray straws and scraps of
paper found their way down the area, where the cracked pavement was damp
with green slime. Such beggars as occasionally wandered into the square,
to the scandal of its inhabitants, camped on the doorstep; and the very
door itself presented a battered, dissolute appearance.
Yet, for all its ill looks and disreputable suggestions, those who dwelt
in Geneva Square would not have seen it furbished up and occupied for
any money. They spoke about it in whispers, with ostentatious
tremblings, and daunted looks, for No. 13 was supposed to be haunted,
and had been empty for over twenty years. By reason of its legend, its
loneliness and grim appearance, it was known as the Silent House, and
formed quite a feature of the place. Murder had been done long ago in
one of its empty, dusty rooms, and it was since then that the victim
walked. Lights, said the ghost-seers, had been seen flitting from window
to window, groans were sometimes heard, and the apparition of a little
old woman in brocaded silk and high-heeled shoes appeared on occasions.
Hence the Silent House bore an uncanny reputation.
How much truth there was in these stories it is impossible to say; but
sure enough, in spite of a low rental, no tenant would take No. 13 and
face its ghostly terrors. House and apparition and legend had become
quite a tradition, when the whole fantasy was ended in the summer of '95
by the unexpected occupation of the mansion. Mr. Mark Berwin, a
gentleman of mature age, who came from nobody knew where, rented No. 13,
and established himself therein to lead a strange and lonely life.
At first, the gossips, strong in ghostly tradition, declared that the
new tenant would not remain a week in the house; but as the week
extended into six months, and Mr. Berwin showed no signs of leaving,
they left off speaking of the ghost and took to discussing the man
himself. In a short space of time quite a collection of stories were
told about the newcomer and his strange ways.
Lucian heard many of these tales from his landlady. How Mr. Berwin lived
all alone in the Silent House without servant or companion; how he spoke
to none, and admitted no one into the mansion; how he appeared to have
plenty of money, and was frequently seen coming home more or less
intoxicated; and how Mrs. Kebby, the deaf charwoman who cleaned out Mr.
Berwin's rooms, declined to sleep in the house because she considered
that there was something wrong about her employer.
To such gossip Denzil paid little attention, until his skein of life
became unexpectedly entangled with that of the strange gentleman. The
manner of their meeting was unforeseen and peculiar.
One foggy November night, Lucian, returning from the theatre, shortly
after eleven o'clock, dismissed his hansom at the entrance to the square
and walked thereinto through the thick mist, trusting to find his way
home by reason of two years' familiarity with the precincts. As it was
impossible to see even the glare of the near gas lamp in the murky air,
Lucian felt his way cautiously along the railings. The square was filled
with fog, dense to the eye and cold to the feel, so that Lucian shivered
with the chill, in spite of the fur coat over his evening clothes.
As he edged gingerly along, and thought longingly of the fire and supper
awaiting him in his comfortable rooms, he was startled by hearing a
deep, rich voice boom out almost at his feet. To make the phenomenon
still more remarkable, the voice shaped itself into certain well-known
words of Shakespeare:
"Oh!" boomed this _vox et præterea nihil_ in rather husky tones, "Oh!
that a man should put an enemy in his mouth to steal away his brains!"
And then through the mist and darkness came the unmistakable sound of
sobs.
"God bless me!" cried Lucian, leaping back, with shaken nerves. "Who is
this? Who are you?"
"A lost soul!" wailed the deep voice, "which God will not bless!" And
then came the sobbing again.
It made Denzil's blood run cold to hear this unseen creature weeping in
the gloom. Moving cautiously in the direction of the sound, he stumbled
against a man with his folded arms resting on the railings, and his face
bent down on his arms. He made no attempt to turn when Lucian touched
him, but with downcast head continued to weep and moan in a very frenzy
of self-pity.
"Here!" said the young barrister, shaking the stranger by the shoulder,
"what is the matter with you?"
"Drink!" stuttered the man, suddenly turning with a dramatic gesture. "I
am an object lesson to teetotalers; a warning to topers; a modern helot
made shameful to disgust youth with vice."
"You had better go home, sir," said Lucian sharply.
"I can't find home. It is somewhere hereabout, but where, I don't know."
"You are in Geneva Square," said Denzil, trying to sharpen the dulled
wits of the man.
"I wish I was in No. 13 of it," sighed the stranger. "Where the deuce is
No. 13? Not in this Cloudcuckooland, anyhow."
"Oh!" cried Lucian, taking the man's arm. "Come with me. I'll lead you
home, Mr. Berwin."
Scarcely had the name passed his lips than the stranger drew back
suddenly, with a hasty exclamation. Some suspicion seemed to engender a
mixture of terror and defiance which placed him on his guard against
undue intimacy, even when some undefined fear was knocking at his heart.
"Who are you?" he demanded in a steadier tone. "How do you know my
name?"
"My name is Denzil, Mr. Berwin, and I live in one of the houses of this
square. As you mention No. 13, I know you can be none other than Mr.
Mark Berwin, the tenant of the Silent House."
"The dweller in the haunted house," sneered Berwin, evidently relieved,
"who stays there with ghosts, and worse than ghosts."
"Worse than ghosts?"
"The phantoms of my own sins, young man. I have sowed folly, and now I
am reaping the crop. I am----" Here his further speech was interrupted
by a fit of coughing, which shook his lean figure severely. At its
conclusion he was so exhausted that he was forced to support himself
against the railings. "A portion of the crop," he murmured.
Lucian was sorry for the man, who seemed scarcely capable of looking
after himself, and he thought it unwise to leave him in such a plight.
At the same time, he was impatient of lingering in the heart of the
clammy fog at such a late hour; so, as his companion seemed indisposed
to move, he caught him again by the arm without ceremony. The abrupt
action seemed to waken again the fears of Berwin.
"Where would you take me?" he asked, resisting the gentle force used by
Lucian.
"To your own house. You will be ill if you stay here."
"You are not one of them?" asked the man suddenly.
"One of whom?"
"One of those who wish to harm me?"
Denzil began to think he had to do with a madman, and to gain his ends
he spoke to him in a soothing manner, as he would to a child: "I wish to
do you good, Mr. Berwin," said he gently. "Come to your home."
"Home! home! Ah, God, I have no home!"
Nevertheless, he gathered himself together, and with his arm in that of
his guide, stumbled along in the thick, chill mist. Lucian knew the
position of No. 13 well, as it almost faced the lodgings occupied by
himself, and by skirting the railings with due caution, he managed to
half lead, half drag his companion to the house. When they stood before
the door, and Berwin had assured himself that he was actually home by
the use of his latch-key, Denzil wished him a curt good-night. "And I
should advise you to go to bed at once," he concluded, turning to
descend the steps.
"Don't go! Don't go!" cried Berwin, seizing the young man by the arm. "I
am afraid to go in by myself--all is so dark and cold! Wait until I get
a light!"
As the creature's nerves seemed to be unhinged by over-indulgence in
alcohol, and he stood gasping and shivering on the threshold like some
beaten animal, Lucian took compassion on him.
"I'll see you indoors," said he, and striking a match, stepped into the
darkness after the man. The hall of No. 13 seemed to be almost as cold
as the world without, and the trifling glimmer of the lucifer served
rather to reveal than dispel the surrounding darkness. The light, as it
were, hollowed a gulf out of the tremendous gloom and made the house
tenfold more ghostly than before. The footsteps of Denzil and Berwin
sounding on the bare boards--for the hall was uncarpeted--waked hollow
echoes, and when they paused the silence which ensued seemed almost
menacing. The grim reputation of the mansion, its gloom and silence,
appealed powerfully to the latent superstition of Lucian. How much more
nearly, then, would it touch the shaken and excited nerves of the tragic
drunkard who dwelt continually amid its terrors!
Berwin opened a door on the right-hand side of the hall and turned up
the light of a handsome oil-lamp which had been screwed down pending his
arrival. This lamp was placed on a small square table covered with a
white cloth and a dainty cold supper. The young barrister noted that the
napery, cutlery, and crystal were all of the finest; that the viands
were choice; that champagne and claret were the beverages. Evidently
Berwin was a luxurious gentleman and indulgent to his appetites.
Lucian tried to gain a long look at him in the mellow light, but Berwin
kept his face turned away, and seemed as anxious now for his visitor to
go as he had been for him to enter. Denzil, quick in comprehension, took
the hint at once.
"I'll go now, as you have the light burning," said he. "Good-night."
"Good-night," replied Berwin shortly, and added to his discourtesy by
letting Lucian find his way out alone.
And so ended the barrister's first meeting with the strange tenant of
the Silent House.