The rooms--two in number--occupied by Alec Forsyth in John Street,
Adelphi, were in a house let off in bachelor chambers, with the
exception of the ground floor, which was used as an office by a firm of
wholesale wine-merchants. The young Scotsman's limited income had
precluded a more aristocratic locality; and, at any rate, John Street
offered the advantage of being within a few minutes' walk of his daily
work in Downing Street.
In the daytime, when the tenants were out at their various avocations,
the upper part of the dingy old building was deserted, save by the
housekeeper in the attics; while the counting-house abutting on the
street was all life and bustle. At night the conditions were reversed,
the wine-merchant's premises being locked up and silent, and the rooms
above occupied.
On the evening of that Monday on which the Duke of Beaumanoir called on
the Shermans at the residence of General Sadgrove, Alec was busy in his
sitting-room, tearing up papers and preparing generally for his
departure to Prior's Tarrant on the morrow. It was past eight, and he
had just lit the gas, when the door suddenly opened and Beaumanoir came
in.
"Why, Charley--hang it! Duke, I mean--I thought you were in the
country!" Alec exclaimed, more astonished by his friend's actions than
by his appearance there.
For, after slipping quietly in, Beaumanoir had turned sharp round and
loosed the catch of the spring-lock. Not satisfied with that, he also
shot home the two old-fashioned bolts with which the door was fitted,
top and bottom, and then flung himself into an easy chair, mopping his
brow with his handkerchief.
"I don't think I was spotted, but it's best to be on the safe side," he
muttered. Then aloud: "I came to ask you to give me a shake-down
to-night, old chap, on a sofa or anything; only I don't know if it's
fair to you; my proximity carries a pretty considerable risk. But I've
been--rather worried, and I seem to want company."
Forsyth rose, and laid an affectionate hand on the Duke's shoulder.
"Now, look here," he said, firmly. "I'm going to forget that you're my
employer at a generous salary, and remember only that I'm your friend.
What does all this mean? You've been hurt somehow, too. Just make a
clean breast of it, and let's see what can be done."
Beaumanoir shook his head sadly.
"I can't make a clean breast of it," he began; then pulled up short and
went on. "At least, I can't tell you causes, but I'll tell you effects.
My life has been attempted twice certainly, possibly three times, since
noon yesterday."
"How?" said Alec with Scotch brevity.
"A lame gardener was set upon at Prior's Tarrant, and released on his
assailants finding that they had mistaken him for me. And at night they
got on the roof and tried to suffocate me by letting a brazier of
charcoal down into the grate and plugging the chimney. Luckily I awoke,
and managed to crawl out of the room in time."
"But surely you raised an alarm and caught the fellows? They couldn't
get off the roof and escape so quickly as that," exclaimed Alec, half
incredulous.
Again the Duke shook his head.
"I raised no alarm, and they did get away, after pulling up the brazier
and leaving no trace," he replied. "There are reasons, Alec, why I could
not have appeared against them had they been caught--the same reasons
why I can't confide more fully in you."
"You must have done something very bad--murder at least," said Forsyth,
gravely.
"On the contrary, I have done nothing at all," Beaumanoir retorted. "It
is for not doing something that I am being persecuted."
"Well, what about the third attempt?"
"It happened this afternoon, as I was on my way to your uncle's. A
carriage knocked me down and very nearly crumpled me. But that may have
been an accident."
"Did you take stock of the driver and the people in the carriage?"
Beaumanoir was obliged to admit that he had not. In his disheveled state
he had been only anxious to be cleaned down and have his wrist attended
to, and it was not till after the carriage had driven rapidly away that
he had connected the incident with the other attempts.
Forsyth said nothing for the moment, but fetched some cigarettes from
the mantelpiece; and it was not until they had smoked in silence for
awhile that he blurted out suddenly:
"This can't be allowed to go on. It makes everything impossible. Have
you any reason to think that the people who are pursuing you will do so
indefinitely--until they have settled you?"
Beaumanoir considered before replying, as though the point had not
occurred to him before.
"No," he said, with a nervous laugh. "Things have crowded so in the last
few hours that I haven't thought much about any sort of future. I cannot
be sure, but I believe if I could pull through till the end of next
week--say, for another fortnight--that the danger would pass."
Forsyth sat and ruminated, blowing blue smoke-rings; and then, after two
or three minutes of silence, a faint noise sounded in the room. The
Duke, whose nerves were tuned to concert pitch, heard it first, and
turned a pair of wide-open eyes on the door. Forsyth's gaze followed,
and they both saw the handle of the door move. The door itself, being
locked and double bolted, of course refused to yield to the gentle
pressure from without.
Forsyth laid his finger to his lips for silence, and motioned Beaumanoir
to retire into the bedroom, which communicated by means of folding doors
with the sitting-room. When the Duke had noiselessly disappeared,
Forsyth stole to the outer door, and having first quietly drawn the
bolts he quickly unlocked it and flung it open, to be confronted by an
under-sized little man, who shrank back from his threatening attitude.
"Who the deuce are you--and what do you want, disturbing me at this time
of night?" Forsyth demanded fiercely.
"These are Mr. Crofton's chambers, ain't they, sir?" bleated the
intruder.
"No; they are not. There's no one of that name in the house that I know
of," replied Forsyth, partially mollified by his mild manner, and wholly
so when the little man proceeded to apologize for his mistake,
explaining that he was from a chemist's in the Strand with some medicine
for the gentleman, but that he must have come to the wrong house.
Holding up a bottle as evidence of his _bona fides_, he retreated
downstairs, excusing himself to the last; but before going he had
managed to snatch a comprehensive glance round the room. Forsyth waited
on the landing until his steps had died away, and then went back into
his room, barring the door as before.
"It's all right," he said, going to the folding doors. "Only some chap
who had mistaken the address."
"Not much mistake there," replied the Duke, outwardly calm, but gone
very white. "I caught a peep of him. He's a johnny who shadowed me over
from America, and never left me till just before I met you at the Cecil.
He called himself Marker, and--and he's in this business, Alec."
"He didn't look very formidable. Why, you could lick the thread-paper
little skimp with one hand," said Forsyth, beginning to wonder if his
friend's mind were unhinged. It was not like the once gay hussar Charley
Hanbury--intrepid horseman, champion boxer, and good all-round
athlete--to funk a miserable wisp such as that!
"He is only the spy, I expect--sent to find out if I was here," replied
Beaumanoir, passing a weary hand over his eyes.
Moved by a sudden impulse, Forsyth went into the bedroom, shutting the
door behind him so as to be in the dark. The window commanded a view of
the street, and the blind had not been drawn. Looking down, he saw a man
sauntering on the opposite pavement, who presently coming under the rays
of a street-lamp was revealed as Marker. Forsyth waited until the spy
turned and slowly retraced his steps, and then went back into the
sitting-room.
"You have convinced me that there is something in all this," he said.
"That fellow is mouching about outside."
"I'll go. I can't subject you to this sort of thing," said Beaumanoir,
reaching for the new hat which he had purchased after his "accident."
But Forsyth pushed him back into his chair.
"A duke isn't necessarily a fool," he said, roughly. "What you want most
is a good sleep, and you shall have it--here in these rooms. Mr. Marker
can't _know_ that you are here, or he wouldn't have come to the door
with that bogus yarn. Also, he is evidently not satisfied that you are
_not_ here, or he would have gone away. It remains to throw dust in his
eyes and fool him a bit. Lord! how I wish my uncle, General Sadgrove,
was with us!"
"He seemed to me a trifle dull," remarked the Duke, inconsequently.
Forsyth made allowances, and did not answer.
"See here," he said, after a minute's reflection. "This is the plan to
throw the spy off the scent. It's nine o'clock--just the hour when it
would be quite natural for a bachelor to go to his club. I will stroll
round to Northumberland Avenue, and drop into the Constitutional for an
hour. In the meanwhile, do you stay here and lie low behind locked
doors, and with gas turned down. That rascal will almost certainly
retire to his employers baffled, for he would not think that I should go
out and leave you alone."
"That sounds promising," Beaumanoir assented. "But don't stay a moment
longer than the hour, Alec. I don't think I could stand it."
Forsyth reassured him, and having slipped into evening clothes and
donned a light overcoat, he issued his final instructions. It was
beginning to be natural to him now to take the lead, after that glimpse
of the lurking figure in the light of the street-lamp. Beaumanoir was to
lock and bolt himself in, and only open on hearing the password "_Rat_."
These matters arranged, Forsyth departed, and, after waiting until he
heard the bolts shot, went down into the street, where the spy was still
in evidence, prowling on the other side. He made no attempt to follow
Forsyth, who, affecting not to notice him, walked rapidly the short
distance to his club. There he remained in the smoking-room with what
patience he could muster for the full hour, determined not to return
till time enough had elapsed for Marker to come to the desired
conclusion and act upon it.
It was half-past ten when Forsyth set out to retrace his steps to John
Street, and almost as soon as he entered that deserted thoroughfare he
saw that the watcher was no longer at his post. Eager to relieve
Beaumanoir from his solitary state of siege, he made all haste to the
house, and was passing quickly through the entry when he heard footsteps
on the landing above. A gas-jet was kept burning over the closed door of
the wine-merchant's office, for the benefit of the resident tenants on
the upper floors, so that he had a clear view of the straight stone
stairs. Before he reached the latter two men came into view, hurriedly
descending, and talking together in muffled undertones--one a gaunt,
hungry-looking individual in the garb of a clergyman; the other, burly
and bull-necked, dressed in shabby tweeds and bowler hat.
Forsyth stood aside at the stair-foot for them to pass, and then, moved
by the furtive glances they turned back at him, he ran upstairs two
steps at a time. He knew all his fellow-lodgers by sight; but these men
were strangers, and he did not like the looks of the curiously assorted
pair. On coming to the door of his rooms, he rapped and spoke the agreed
signal, but something prompted him not to wait, and simultaneously he
turned the handle. The door swung open at once, without any unbarring
from within.
"Where have you got to?" cried Forsyth, peering round the room, in which
the gas burned low, just as he had left it.
There was no response; and with a sinking heart he turned on a full
light and dashed into the bedroom, only to find that also vacant. The
Duke of Beaumanoir had vanished from his refuge.
There was no doubt that he was in neither of the rooms. A hasty search
put that beyond question. Instinctively Forsyth ran to the outer door
and at once made the discovery--for which he was already prepared--that
his chambers had been forcibly entered during his absence. The door had
been wrenched open with a jemmy, and had simply been pulled to on the
departure of the intruders. The shattered woodwork round the spring-lock
told its own tale, though the mystery was increased by the fact that the
old-fashioned bolts had been withdrawn.
But what of Beaumanoir?