Fearing lest his quick eye should detect my presence, I stood there
motionless as a statue.
The pair, in earnest conversation, suddenly strolled away over the
fallen leaves at the edge of the wood, whereupon Tramu emerged silently
from his hiding-place and crept after them, I being compelled to remain
where I was.
So the French police had traced Shaw to his place of concealment!
I longed to give him warning, but was unable. What should I do? How
should I act?
Asta was at the Bath Hotel at Bournemouth. At least I could ring her up
on the telephone, and tell her what I had seen! So the watcher and the
watched having disappeared, I hurried across the park until at length I
gained the main road, and went on at a brisk pace till I was back again
at my hotel.
It took me a full hour to get on to Bournemouth, and after long delay I
at last heard her sweet, well-remembered voice at the instrument.
I expressed regret at awakening her, but told her that I was leaving by
motor in half an hour to meet her.
"Where is your father?" I inquired.
"I don't exactly know. He left me at Burford Bridge Hotel, at Box Hill,
last Monday, and I came here to await him. Five days have gone, and
I've had no letter."
"Then he hasn't been to Bournemouth?"
"No."
"Well," I said, "do not go out of the hotel until I arrive, will you?"
"Not if you wish me to remain in," was her reply; and then, promising I
would be with her at the earliest moment, as I wished to see her on a
matter of gravest importance, I rang off. Half an hour afterwards I
paid my bill, even though it were the middle of the night, and going out
to the garage, started my engine, and with my bag in the back of the car
sped away in the drizzling rain eastward out of Bath.
I chose the road through Norton St Philip, Warminster, and Wilton to
Salisbury, where I had an early breakfast at the old White Hart, and
then, striking south, I went by Downton Wick and Fordingbridge, through
Ringwood and Christchurch, past the grey old abbey church and on through
suburban Boscombe until, just after nine o'clock, I pulled up before the
big entrance to the Bath Hotel in Bournemouth.
Into the pretty palm-court, where I waited, Asta, my lost love, came at
last with outstretched hand, smiling me a welcome greeting. She looked
dainty in blue serge skirt and muslin blouse, and there being no one
else in the place at that early hour,--the idlers not yet having arrived
to read the papers and novels,--we sat together in a corner to chat.
By the pallor of her soft, delicate countenance, I saw that she was
nervous and troubled, though she showed a brave front, and affected a
gay lightheartedness that was only feigned.
"Tell me, Miss Seymour," I said presently, bending to her very
seriously, "what happened to you on that night in Aix?"
"Happened!" she echoed, her dark eyes opening widely. "Ah! It was,
indeed, a narrow escape. Had Dad not provided himself with a key to the
back stairs in readiness for emergencies, we should have both been
arrested--just as you were."
"Yes," I smiled. "But I was released. What happened to you?"
"We caught the Paris express--only just as it was leaving; but Dad,
fearing that our flight had been telephoned to Paris, decided to get out
at Laroche, where we stopped to change engines, and from there we took
train by Troyes and Nancy to Strassbourg. Then, once in Germany, we
could, of course, escape Tramu's attentions," and she smiled.
"And from Germany?"
"We remained a week in Berlin; thence we went to Copenhagen by way of
Kiel and Korsor, and ten days ago crossed from Hamburg to Harwich--home
again."
"Your father is certainly extremely clever in evading the police," I
said, with a laugh.
"Our only fear was for you," she said; "whether they would learn any
thing by watching you."
"They learnt nothing, even though they submitted me to a very close
examination. But," I added, "how did you know Tramu was in Aix?"
"I was ascending in the lift that evening, and as we passed the first
floor I saw him talking with the hotel manager. Dad had once pointed
him out to me at Monte Carlo. So I suspected the reason of his visit
there, and scribbled you a line of warning before we took our bags and
slipped away."
"But for what reason is he so anxious to secure your arrest?" I asked,
looking straight into her face. "Cannot you tell me the truth, Miss
Seymour? Remember, I am your friend," I added earnestly.
"Please do not ask me," she urged. "I cannot betray the man who has
been father to me all these years," she added in a low, pained voice.
"But are you quite certain that he is as devoted to you as he
professes?" I asked very gravely.
"Absolutely. Am I not the only real friend he has?"
I recollected that letter written by the man who had loved her, and the
allegations he had made.
"Do you know," I said, "the other night I had burglars at my home. They
tried to break open the safe which contains that mysterious cylinder
given into my charge by Mr Melvill Arnold."
"The cylinder!" she gasped, instantly turning pale as death. "Ah! that
hateful cylinder, which brings upon its possessor misfortune and
disaster. Why don't you get rid of it, Mr Kemball?"
"I have. It is now in the Safe Deposit Company's vaults in Chancery
Lane."
She held her breath, her gaze fixed upon me. Then involuntarily she
laid her slim white hand upon my coat-sleeve, and said--
"I--I always fear for your safety, Mr Kemball, while that thing is in
your possession. Give it away. Destroy it--anything--only get rid of
it!"
"But I cannot until the third of November. I accepted a sacred trust,
remember, given by a dying man," I said.
"Yes--but--"
"But what?" I asked. Then in a low voice, as I bent towards her, I
added: "Miss Seymour, I have deep suspicion that your father--a friend
of Arnold's--knows what the cylinder contains, and is extremely eager to
get possession of it. Is not that so?"
She was silent. Her lips moved nervously. Her indecision to speak told
me the truth. We were friends, therefore she could not deliberately lie
to me.
A faint smile overspread her pale, refined features. That was all, but
it told its own tale.
"Well," I said, "the burglars, whoever they were, were experts, and only
the electric alarm prevented the theft. What the ancient cylinder
really contains I cannot imagine. Indeed, I am filled with anxiety and
impatience for the dawn of November the third, when, without doubt, I
shall learn the truth."
"Yes, no doubt," she said in a slow, tremulous tone. "And the truth
will surely be a stranger one than you have ever dreamed."
Our _tete-a-tete_ was suddenly interrupted by a woman entering the
lounge; therefore, as Asta had her hat and coat with her, I suggested
that we should walk down to the beach, an idea which she readily
adopted.
Then, when there was no one to overhear, I told her of my adventure in
the night, of Tramu's inquiries in the neighbourhood of Ridgehill Manor,
and of his surveillance of the movements of Mrs Olliffe and her father.
"Tramu!" she gasped, her face white as death. "Then he has found poor
Dad! Why didn't you tell me this before?"
"Because I had no wish to alarm you unduly, Miss Seymour," I said very
quietly.
"But Dad may be arrested!" she cried. "Ah! how fatal to associate again
with that accursed woman."
"She is certainly no friend of yours."
"But she makes great pretence of friendship. I have often been her
guest."
"For the last time, I trust."
"Yes. But what can we do? How can I warn Dad?" she asked in deep
anxiety.
"Ah, Miss Seymour," I said, after a brief silence, "I fear that you
think a little too much of your foster-father, and too little of your
own self."
"Why?" she asked quickly, with some resentment. Again I hesitated. We
had wandered upon the pier, but it was as yet early, and few people,
save the early-morning exercise men, were about.
"Let us sit here a moment," I suggested at last. "It is pleasant in the
sunshine. I have something to show you."
Without a word she seated herself where I suggested, on a seat near the
empty band-stand, and then I drew from my pocket the letter which Guy
Nicholson had written to me on the night of his tragic death and handed
it to her.
I watched her sweet face, so pale and anxious. In an instant she
recognised the writing of the hand now dead, and read it through eagerly
from end to end.
I explained how it had come so tardily into my possession, whereupon she
said--
"It is true. He disliked Dad for some inexplicable reason."
"Apparently he had become aware of some extraordinary truth. It was
that truth which he had intended to explain to me, but, poor fellow, he
was prevented from doing so by his sudden death."
Sight of that letter had recalled to her visions of the man whom she had
loved so fondly, and next instant I hated myself for having acted
injudiciously in showing her the curious missive.
Ah, how deeply, how devotedly I loved her! and yet I dared not utter one
single word of affection. That calm, sweet countenance, with those big,
wonderful eyes, was ever before me, sleeping or waking, and yet I knew
not from hour to hour that she might not be arrested and placed in a
criminal dock, as accomplice of that arch-adventurer Shaw--that man who
led such a strange dual existence of respectability and undesirability.
"I cannot understand what he discovered regarding the apparition of the
hand," she exclaimed at last, still gazing upon the letter in a
half-dreamy kind of way.
"It seems as though, by some fact accidentally discovered, he arrived at
the solution of the mystery," I said. "It was to explain this to me
that he intended to come over to Upton End, but was, alas! prevented."
"But why didn't he tell me?" she queried. "It surely concerned myself
for I had seen it, not in our own house, remember, but in the house of a
friend at Scarborough."
"And I saw it in an obscure French inn," I said; "and previously I had
been warned against it."
"Yes, I agree, Mr Kemball. It is a complete mystery. Ah! how
unfortunate that poor Guy never lived to tell you his theory concerning
the strange affair. But," she added, "our present action must concern
dear old Dad. What do you suggest we should do? How can we give him
warning?"
"I can suggest nothing," was my reply. "Tramu is watching them both.
Probably he is fully aware of some ingenious conspiracy in progress."
"Ah! I foresaw danger in his association with her," the girl declared,
pale and anxious in her despair.
"But why has not your father returned to Lydford? Surely while his
whereabouts could be preserved from Tramu he would be safer there than
anywhere!"
"You might be watched, and if you visited us, you might be followed.
Tramu is, as you know, one of the most famous detectives in Europe."
"And he has, in your father, one who is a past-master in the art of
evasion. But," I added, "tell me frankly, Miss Seymour, do you
anticipate that he is anxious to possess himself of the bronze
cylinder?" She hesitated again.
"Well--yes. As you ask me for a plain reply, I tell you that I believe
his intention is to gain possession of it."
"Why?"
"Because of the great secret therein contained."
"And of what nature is this remarkable secret?" I demanded eagerly,
much puzzled by her response.
"Ah! how can we tell? It is a secret from all, save to the person who
shall dare break it open and examine it."
"And dare you break it open, Miss Seymour?" I asked.
"No--a thousand times no!" she cried, alarmed at the very suggestion.
"I would rather see it taken up and cast deep into the sea. Why don't
you do that, Mr Kemball? Take it out in a boat and sink it deep in the
waters, where no man--not even divers--could ever recover it. Sink it
deeply," she urged, "so that all fears may be dispelled, and peace and
love may reign."
But I shook my head, expressing regret at my utter inability to accede
to her desire.
And then very slowly we retraced our steps back to the hotel, where an
unexpected surprise was, we found, awaiting us.