A BOX AT THE OPERA.
"I tell you what it is, Simcoe," Harrison said two months later, "this
affair of yours is getting to be a good deal more troublesome than I
bargained for. It all looked simple enough; one only had to pick up a
child, drive him in a cab across London, then down in a trap to Pitsea,
hand him over to a man I knew would take good care of him, and take the
payments for him when they became due, which would be no trouble, as I
had to see the man occasionally on my own business. Of course I expected
that there would be a big hue and cry for him, but I had no fear
whatever of his being found. Then I managed through another man to get
that body from the workhouse undertaker, and you managed the rest easily
enough; but I tell you that the matter is getting a good deal hotter
than I ever thought it would.
"I told you that I had been followed several times after leaving your
place, and one morning when I went out early I saw footmarks, showing
that someone had been walking round my house and trying to look in at
the windows. I have a strong suspicion that I have been followed to my
office, and I know that someone got in there one day at my dinner hour.
I know, because I always fasten a piece of thread, so that if the door
is opened it breaks it. There is nothing there that anyone could make
anything of, but it is just as well to know if anyone has been prying
about. The woman of the house was sure that she had not been in there,
nor had she let anyone in; so the lock must have been picked. Of course
anyone is liable to have his office robbed when he is out and it is
empty; but nothing was taken, and if a common thief had found nothing
else he would probably have made off with my dress suit, which would
have brought him a sov. in a second-hand clothes shop.
"You know I have an excessive objection to being watched. I have had
nothing on hand lately, at any rate nothing that has come off, but I
might have had, you know. Well, yesterday I was going down to see my man
in the marshes, and to tell him that likely enough I should bring
something down to him next week. I got out of the train at Tilbury, and,
as you know, there are not a dozen houses anywhere near the station.
Now, I have a habit of keeping my eyes open, and I saw a man sitting on
an old boat. What called my attention particularly to him was that he
was turned half round watching the entrance to the station as I came
out. You can always tell whether a man is watching for someone, or
whether he is merely looking generally in that direction, and this man
was certainly watching for someone. The instant his eye fell upon me he
turned round and stared at the river. The path to the public house lay
just behind him. Now, it would be natural that hearing a footstep a man
doing nothing would look round and perhaps say a word--ask the time, or
something of that sort. Well, he didn't turn round. Now, it is my habit,
and a very useful one, always to carry a glass of about the size of a
folded letter in my pocket. Instead of going on to the public house I
turned off from the path and walked away from the river. When I had got
some little distance I took out my glass, and still walking along, I
held it up so that I could see in it what was going on behind. The man
was standing up, watching me. I put the glass in my pocket and dropped
my handkerchief. I stooped down to pick it up, of course partly turning
as I did so, and saw that he had instantly dropped into a sitting
position again, with his back to me.
"That was good enough. I turned, cut across the fields, went straight
back to the station and took the next ferry-boat to Gravesend, and came
back that way. It is quite clear to me that not only is this girl on
the track still, but the chase is getting to be a very hot one, and
that not only are they watching you, but they are watching me, and have
in some way or other, though how, I cannot guess, found out that I go
down to Tilbury, and have accordingly sent a man down to follow me. Now,
I tell you frankly, I will have no more to do with the matter--that is
to say, as far as going down on your business. As I have told you, I
have always managed my own affairs so well that the police and I have no
acquaintance whatever; and I am not going to be spied upon and followed
and have the 'tecs upon my track about an affair in which I have no
interest at all, except that, you having stood by my brother, I was glad
to do you any service I could. But this is getting serious. I don't like
it. I have told you I have business with the man, and get things off
abroad through him that I should have great trouble in getting rid of in
any other way; but unless in quite exceptional cases, these things are
so small that they could be hidden away for months without much risk of
their being found, however sharp the hunt after them might be. As I am
in no way pressed for money I can afford to wait, though I own that I
like to get the things off my hands as soon as I can, and as I
considered that I ran practically no risk in going down with them into
Essex, I never kept them at my house. However, for a time I must do so.
I must tell you that when I am going down I always write beforehand and
make an appointment for him to have his barge at the wharf at Pitsea,
and I send my letter addressed to him: 'Mr. William Nibson, barge _Mary
Ann_, care of Mr. Scholey, Spotted Horse, Pitsea.' You had better write
to him in future. You need not put anything inside the envelope except
notes for twenty-five pounds, and the words, 'For the child's keep for
six months.' I need not say that you had better disguise your writing,
both on the envelope and on the inside, and it is best that you should
get your notes from some bookmaker on a race-course. You tell me you
often go to races now and do a little betting. They are not the sort of
men who take the numbers of the notes they pay out, and it would be
next to impossible for them to be traced to you."
"Thank you, Harrison; you have behaved like a true pal to me, and I am
ever so much obliged to you. I quite see what you mean, and indeed it is
as much for my interest as yours that you should not go down there any
more. Confound that girl Covington! I am sure she is the moving spirit
of it all. I always felt uneasy about her from the first, and was sure
that if there was any trouble it would come from her. I wonder how the
deuce she ever found out that you went down to Tilbury."
"That beats me too, Simcoe. As you may guess, I am always most cautious
about it, and always take a very roundabout way of going to the
station."
"I have been uneasy ever since that girl at our place left so suddenly.
A fortnight afterwards we found that there was a hole bored through the
doorpost. Of course it might have been bored before I went there; but in
that case it is curious that it was never noticed before. I cannot help
thinking that she did it."
"Yes, you told me; but you said that you tried the experiment, and found
that when your man and his wife were talking there in a loud voice, and
you had your ear at the hole, you could not catch a single word."
"Yes, that was certainly so. I could hear them talking, but I could not
make out a word of their conversation. Still it is evident that somebody
has been trying to hear. I cannot help thinking that it was that girl,
though both Johnstone and his wife spoke very highly of her. Certainly
the story she told them was true to a certain extent, for when they sent
the box down to Reading I sent a man down there to watch, and she called
to fetch it, and my man found out that she labeled it 'Oxford,' and took
it away with her on the down train. As he had no directions to follow
her farther he came back. After we found the hole I sent him down again;
but he never came upon her traces, though he inquired at every village
near Oxford."
"She may have been put there as a spy," the other said; "but as it is
evident that she couldn't hear through that hole, it is clear that she
could not have done them any good. That is, I suppose, why they called
her off; so the puzzle still remains how they got on my track at
Tilbury. I should like to have a good look at this Covington girl. I can
admire a clever wench, even when she is working against me."
"There is 'The Huguenots' at Her Majesty's to-night, the first time this
season. She very often goes in Lady Moulton's box, and it is likely
enough that she will go to-night. It's the third box from the stage, on
the first tier; I will go down to Bond Street and see if I can get hold
of a box opposite, on the second or third tier. The money will be well
laid out, for I should very much like you to study her face, and I won
enough at pool at the club this afternoon to pay for it."
"Very well, then I will come round to your place. I really am curious to
see the girl. I only caught a passing glimpse of her in the park that
day."
Simcoe was not wrong in his conjecture, for Hilda dined at Lady
Moulton's, and they took their places in the latter's box just as the
first bar of the overture sounded. She was in half mourning now, and in
black lace, with white camellias in her hair and breast, was, as Netta
had told her before starting, looking her best.
"That is the girl," Simcoe exclaimed, as she went forward to the front
of the box.
"Well, there is no denying that she is good-looking," the other said, as
he turned his glasses upon her; "there is not a better-looking woman in
the house. Plenty of self-possession too," he added, as Hilda took her
seat and at once, in apparent ignorance that any glasses were upon her,
took her own lorgnettes from their case and proceeded calmly to scan the
stalls and boxes, to see who among her numerous acquaintances were
there. As her eyes fell upon the two men sitting nearly opposite to her,
her glasses steadied, then after a minute she lowered them.
"Lady Moulton, I regard it as a providence that you brought me here
this evening. Do you see those two men there in the box nearly opposite,
in the second tier? Well, one of the men is Simcoe, to whom my uncle
left all his property if Walter should not live to come of age, and who
I am absolutely convinced carried the child away."
"I see them, my dear; they are staring at you. I suppose they are as
much interested in you as you in them."
Hilda again put her glasses to her eyes.
"She has just told Lady Moulton who I am," Simcoe said.
"She has a clever face, Simcoe--broad across the chin--any amount of
determination, I should say. Ah! there, she is getting up to make room
for somebody else."
"Stay where you are, my dear," Lady Moulton said, putting her hand on
Hilda's arm; "there is plenty of room for three."
"Plenty," she replied; "but I want to watch those two men, and I cannot
keep my glasses fixed on them while I am sitting in the front row."
"Hardly, my dear," Lady Moulton said with a smile. "Well, have your own
way."
A fourth lady came in almost immediately. She took the third chair in
the front, and Hilda, sitting half in the shade, was able to devote
herself to her purpose free from general observation. She had already
heard that Simcoe's companion had apparently suspected that he was
watched, and had returned to town at once without speaking to anyone at
Tilbury. She felt that he would probably henceforth choose some other
route, and the chances of following him would be greatly diminished. The
opportunity was a fortunate one indeed. For months she had been hoping
that some day or other she could watch these men talking, and now, as it
seemed by accident, just at the moment when her hopes had fallen, the
chance had come to her.
"She has changed her place in order to have a better look at us," John
Simcoe said, as she moved. "She has got her glasses on us."
"We came to stare at her. It seems to me that she is staring at us,"
Harrison said.
"Well, I should think that she knows my face pretty well by this time,"
Simcoe laughed. "I told you she has a way of looking through one that
has often made me uncomfortable."
"I can quite understand that. I noticed myself that when she looked at
us, without her glasses, there was a curious intentness in her
expression, as if she was taking stock of every point about us. She
cannot be the girl who has been to your lodging."
"Certainly not," the other said; "I know her a great deal too well for
her to try that on. Besides, beyond the fact that the other was a
good-looking girl too--and, by the way, that she had the same trick of
looking full in your face when you spoke--there was no resemblance
whatever between them."
The curtain now drew up, and silence fell upon the house, and the men
did not speak again until the end of the first act. They then continued
their conversation where they had left it off.
"She has moved, and has been attending to the opera," Simcoe said; "but
she has gone into the shade again, and is taking another look at us."
"I am not given to nervousness, but upon my word those glasses fixed
upon me make me quite fidgety."
"Pooh, man! she is not looking at you; she is looking at me. I don't
know whether she thinks that she can read my thoughts, and find out
where the child is hidden. By the way, I know nothing about this place
Pitsea. Where is it, and which is the best way to get there?"
"You can drive straight down by road through Upminster and Laindon. The
place lies about three miles this side of Benfleet. There are only about
half a dozen houses, at the end of a creek that comes up from Hole
Haven. But I should not think of going near the house. The latter,
directed as I told you, is sure to find the man."
"Oh, I am not thinking of going! but I shall get a man to watch the
fellows they sent down to watch you, and if I find that they seem to be
getting on the right track, I shall run down at all hazards and take him
away."
"Your best plan by far will be to go with him, on board Nibson's barge,
up to Rochester. No doubt he can find some bargeman there who will take
the boy in. Or, what would perhaps be better, hire a trap there, and
drive him down to Margate or Ramsgate. There are plenty of schools
there, and you might get up a yarn about his being a nephew of yours,
and leave him there for a term or two. That would give you time to
decide. By this time he will have but a very faint remembrance of his
life in town, and anything that he may say about it will certainly meet
with no attention."
"Would it be as well to do it at once, do you think?" Simcoe asked.
"No; we have no idea how many people they may have on the watch, and it
would be only running unnecessary risks. Stick to the plan that we have
already agreed on, of communicating only by writing. But I think your
idea of sending two or three sharp fellows down there to find out what
the party are doing is really a good one."
Hilda lowered her glasses as the curtain rose again. "Oh, Lady Moulton!"
she whispered, "I have found out all that I have been so long wanting to
know. I believe now that in three days I shall have the child home
again."
Lady Moulton turned half round.
"How on earth have you found that out, Hilda? Are you a wizard indeed,
who can read men's thoughts in their faces? I always thought that there
was something uncanny about you, ever since that day of my fete."
To Harrison's relief, Miss Covington did not turn her glass towards him
again during the evening. When the curtain fell on the next act a
gentleman, to whom Lady Moulton had nodded in the stalls, came in. After
shaking hands with her and her friends, he seated himself by the side
of Hilda.
"Miss Covington," he said, "I have never had an opportunity of speaking
to you since that fete at Lady Moulton's. I have understood that the
gypsy on that occasion was engaged by you, and that there was, if you
will excuse me saying so, some little mystery about it. I don't wish to
pry into that, but if you should ever see the woman again you will
oblige me very greatly by telling her that I consider I owe her a deep
debt of gratitude. She said something to me then that made a tremendous
impression upon me, and I do not mind telling you it brought me up with
a round turn. I had been going ahead a great deal too fast, and I see
now that, had I continued on the same course, I should have brought
absolute ruin upon myself, and blighted my life in every way. The shock
she gave me by warning me what would come if I did not give up cards and
racing showed me my utter folly, and on that day I swore never to touch
a card or lay a penny upon a horse for the rest of my life. When I tell
you that I have completely pulled myself round, and that, by the aid of
an old uncle, to whom I went and made a clean breast of all, I am now
straight in every way, and, as you may have heard, am going to be
married to Miss Fortescue in a fortnight, you may guess what deep reason
I have to be grateful to this gypsy woman of yours, and how I hope that,
should you come across her again, you will tell her so, and should there
be any possible way in which I can prove my gratitude, by money or
otherwise, I shall be delighted to do so."
"I will tell her, Captain Desmond," the girl said in a low voice. "I am
sure that it will make her happy to know that she did some good that
evening. I do not think that she is in need of money or assistance of
any kind, but should she be so I will let you know."
"And do you really mean that you have discovered where General
Mathieson's grandson is living?" Lady Moulton asked, as they rose to
leave their seats when the curtain fell.
"I think so; I am almost sure of it."
Lady Moulton had heard a good deal from Hilda as to the situation. Mr.
Pettigrew had strongly impressed upon both Hilda and Colonel Bulstrode
that it was very important that the contents of the will should not be
talked about. "We don't want our private affairs discussed in the press
and made the subject of general talk," he had said, and it was only to
Lady Moulton that Hilda had spoken freely of the matter, so far as the
discovery of the new will, the change that had been made, and the
singularity of Walter being missing. She had also mentioned her belief
that Simcoe was at the bottom of this, but had breathed no words of her
suspicion that the General had come to his death by foul play, or of her
own conviction that Simcoe was an impostor, although there had been some
talk in the clubs over the matter, for Colonel Bulstrode was by no means
so discreet as Hilda, and among his intimate friends spoke his mind with
great vehemence and strength of language as to General Mathieson having
made so singular a disposition of his property, and he made no secret of
his suspicion that Simcoe was at the bottom of Walter's disappearance.
Thus the matter had gradually gone the round of the clubs; but it was
not until Simcoe's own counsel had drawn from him the fact that Walter's
death would put him into possession of the estate that the public in
general learned the facts.
"It was a clever move," Mr. Pettigrew had said, talking it over with his
partner. "No doubt he was afraid that the question would be asked by our
counsel, and he thought that it was better that the fact should come
voluntarily from himself. His best plan by far was to brazen it out. No
doubt nine men out of ten will consider that the affair is a very
suspicious one, and some of them will give him the cold shoulder; but
whatever their opinions, they dare not express them without laying
themselves open to an action for libel, while, on the other hand, the
fact that a man is heir to a good estate will always cause a good many
to rally round him. Not the best of men, you know, but enough to
prevent his being a lonely figure in a club.
"Yes, I think he was certainly well advised to declare his heirship
voluntarily, instead of having it drawn from him. He must have known, of
course, that sooner or later the matter would be made public, and it is
better for him to get the talk and gossip over now instead of the matter
being known for the first time when he begins to take legal steps to
compel us to put him into possession of the estate."
"What on earth did you mean, Hilda," Lady Moulton said, as the door of
the carriage was closed and they drove off from Her Majesty's, "by
saying that you had discovered a clew by which you might in a few days
find your little cousin?"
"I cannot tell you exactly how I discovered it. At present it is a
secret that both my mother and uncle charged me to keep, but when these
troubles are over I will explain it all to you, though I should
certainly do so to no one else."
"Well, I suppose I must be content with that, Hilda. But it certainly
does seem extraordinary to me that by merely seeing two men in a box on
the other side of the house you should have obtained a clew to what you
have for a year now been trying to get at."
"It does seem extraordinary, Lady Moulton, but it really is not so, and
I hope to convince you that I am right by producing Walter in a week
from the present time."
"I hope you will, Hilda. I sincerely hope so, both for the child's sake,
yours, and my own. Of course, when he is found there will be no possible
reason for your keeping yourself shut up as you have done. I have missed
you very much, and shall be very glad to have you under my wing again."
"Thank you for saying so, Lady Moulton; but so far as I have formed my
plans, they are that Walter's trustees shall either let or sell the
house in Hyde Park Gardens, and that I shall go down for a time with him
into the country. I have had a great deal of anxiety this last year,
and I shall be very glad of complete rest for a time."
"That is reasonable enough, my dear, but I do hope that you are not
thinking of burying yourself in the country for good. There, I am at
home. Good-night, Hilda; thanks for the lift. It is not often my horses
or my coachmen have a night off during the season."