"Where am I?"
Head throbbing horribly, a nauseous taste in the mouth, throat
constricted and painful upon an attempt to swallow, and a strange mental
confusion which provoked the above question.
The answer came at once.
In a miserable, musty-smelling, four-wheeled cab, whose windows were
drawn up, and so spattered with mud and the heavy rain which fell upon
the roof that the gleam from the street lamps only produced a dim, hazy
light within, as the vehicle jangled slowly along, with wheels and some
loose piece of iron rattling loudly in concert with the beat of the
horse's feet.
"Whatever am I doing here?" was Fred Chester's next question.
Lying back in the corner, in an awkward position, as if in a state of
collapse, and only saved from subsiding into the bottom of the cab by
his feet being propped up on the front cushion, the doctor kept
perfectly still trying to think, but every retrogressive attempt gave
the idea that he was gazing at a vast black cloud which completely shut
out the past.
He uttered a faint groan, for he felt startled; but after lying back
listening to the beating rain and the jarring of the ill-fitting
glasses, he recovered somewhat.
"How absurd!" he muttered. "Where am I going? Ask the driver."
He drew up his legs and let his feet drop into the cab, as he tried to
sit up, but the effort gave him the sensation of molten lead running
from one of his temples to the other, and he lay perfectly still while
the agonising pain passed slowly away, trying hard to think what had
happened, but in vain. There was the black cloud before him mentally,
though he could see the gleaming of a lamp he passed through the blurred
panes of glass.
At last, feeling more and more startled by his condition, he made a
brave effort, raised himself upright, and reached out for the strap, so
as to lower the front window; but at the first movement he was seized
with a sickening giddiness, lurched forward, and thrust himself back to
recline in the corner again till the molten lead had ceased to flow from
side to side of his head.
At last, very slowly and cautiously, bit by bit, he edged himself
forward till his knees rested against the front cushion, and then,
thrusting one hand into the left corner, he reached out for the strap,
raised the window, and let it glide sharply and loudly down.
"Hi! Cabby!" he cried hoarsely.
"Right, sir!" came back, and the cab was drawn up by the kerb beneath
the next street lamp.
Then the driver got down and opened the door, to stand with the rain
streaming off his waterproof hat and cape.
"Mornin', sir," he said in a husky voice, closely following a chuckle.
"Feel better now?"
"No, I am horribly ill. Where am I?"
"Why, here, sir," said the man, chuckling. "My word, it's a wet 'un
outside."
"But what street's this?"
"Halkin Street, Belgrave Square, sir."
"What? But how came I in your cab?--I can't remember."
"S'pose not, sir," said the man, good-humouredly. "Does make yer feel a
bit muzzy till yer've had another snooze. Shall I try and find one o'
the early purlers where the market-garden chaps goes?"
"What? What do you mean?"
"Drop o' somethin' to clear your head, sir--and keep some o' the wet out
o' me."
"But--but I don't understand you," cried Chester, whose head still
throbbed so that he dreaded losing his senses again.
"Oh, it's all right, sir. Have a drop o' something; you'll be better
then."
"But how came I in your cab?"
"Your friend and me put you there, sir."
"My friend?"
"Yes, him as you'd been dining with, sir; on'y you don't seem to ha'
heat much."
"My friend?"
"Yes, sir; that's right."
"Where was it?"
"Pickydilly Circus; 'bout three hours ago."
"Yes--yes. Well?"
"And he says, `Take care of him, kebby,' he says, `and drive him home.
Bad cham,' he says, `and he ain't used to it.'"
"Then why didn't you drive me home?" cried Chester, angrily.
"S'elp me! I like that!--I did; and no one was sittin' up for yer; I
knocked and rung for 'bout arf an hour before the old chap shoved up the
winder and began a-cussin' and a-swearin' at me awful."
"What old chap?" faltered Chester in his amaze.
"Your old guv'nor, I s'pose; and he wouldn't come down, and told me to
drive you to the `oh no, we never mentions him!' for you warn't coming
in there. Then he bangs down the winder, and I waited ten minutes for
him to get cool, and then knocks and rings again. This time he shoves
up the winder and swears he'd shoot at me if I warn't off; and as I got
set agen 'orspittles ever since I was there for two months, I got up on
the box again and drove off, for there was a bobby coming up; and I've
been driving you about ever since."
"Driving me about ever since?"
"That's so, sir. We've been round Belgrave Square about a dozen times,
and I was just going to drive you back to our stables, where it ain't
quite so wet, when you downed the window."
"I can't grasp it," said Chester, hoarsely.
"Oh, never you mind about that, sir; you'll be all right soon. You see,
beggin' your pardon, you was precious tight, and your friend had all he
could do to hold you up. `Just like a jelly, kebby,' he says; and you
was, sir. Your legs doubled up like a two-foot rule with a weak jynte."
"My friend!" cried Chester, snatching at that as something to cling to.
"Who was that?"
"That's what I'm a-telling you, sir. Your friend--"
"But what sort of a person was it?"
"Big, stout young fellow, like a Lifeguardsman, but a real gent. Very
jovial sort. `Take great keer of him, kebby,' he says, and he tipped me
a quid. `Help him up the steps when you get him home.' `Right you are,
sir,' I says, as soon as I'd shut you up. `But wheer to?'
`Thirty-three Chrissal Square, Chelsea,' he says, and there I drove you,
and there you'd be, only your guv'nor cut up so rough."
"Chrissal Square, Chelsea?" cried Chester, eagerly.
"That's it, sir."
"Why didn't he tell you Raybeck Square?"
"Dunno, I'm sure, sir. That's where all the doctors is."
"Yes, of course."
"Didn't think you was bad enough, I s'pose, sir. And you ain't. You
on'y want a drop to clear your head a bit."
"Drive me to Raybeck Square, thirty-four, at once."
"Won't you have a drop of something first, sir? Do you more good than
going to a doctor's, and me, too."
"No, no, absurd. But one moment. You said Piccadilly Circus?"
"That's right, sir."
"And my friend helped me into the cab, and paid you to drive me home?"
"That's it, sir. You're getting it now--all by heart."
"A tall, stout gentleman?"
"Well, not exactly that, sir. I don't mean a fat 'un with a big weskit.
A reg'lar strong-built un."
"I can't grasp it," muttered Chester. Then aloud,--"But why did he tell
you to drive me to the wrong house?"
"Bit on too, sir. Arter dinner. Did it for a lark, p'ra'ps."
"Drive me home," said Chester, sinking back. "I can't recollect a bit."
"Course you can't, sir. Better have a hair o' the dog as bit you."
"No, no. There, I'll give you a glass of brandy when we get back."
"Suppose your guv'nor won't let you in, sir?"
"Nonsense, man. I have a latch-key."
"Wish I'd ha' knowed it," muttered the man, as he tried to close the
door; "blessed if I wouldn't ha' picked your pocket of it and risked it
I'd ha' carried you into the passage, and chanced it. Blister the door,
how it sticks!" he growled, as he banged it to, the jerk raising the
glass, and it dropped down. "Chrissal Square, sir?"
"No, no, Raybeck Square; and make haste out of the rain."
"Oh, I'm as wet as I can be, sir, and it don't matter now," grumbled the
man, as he ascended to the box, and once more the maddening rattle and
jangle began.
Chester's head was as blank as ever with regard to the past when the cab
drew up at his home, but it was perfectly clear as to the present, and
he was still hard at work trying to make out where he had been dining,
with whom, and how it was possible for him to have so far forgotten
himself as to have drunk till he was absolutely imbecile, when the man
opened the door.
"One moment; my latch-key. Yes; all right, I said I'd give you a glass
of brandy."
"You did, sir, and welkum it'll be as the flowers o' May. Jump out
quick, sir, and run up the steps, for it's all one big shower bath."
"Can you leave your horse?"
"Leave him, sir?" said the man, with a chuckle; "for a month. He's got
hoofs like hanchors. But I will hitch his nose-bag on, and let him see
if he can find that there oat he was a-'untin' for in the chaff last
time he had it on."
The next minute Chester was inside, with his head throbbing; but he was
not so giddy, and his first glance was at the hall clock, illumined by
the half turned down gas.
"Four o'clock," he muttered. "How strange!"
"May I come inside, sir? Horse'll be all right if there don't come a
bobby prowling round. If he ain't a fool he'll be under someone's
doorway, for there ain't likely to be no burgling a time like this."
"Shut the door, and come in here," said Chester, shortly; and he led the
way into his consulting-room, turned up the gas, and from a closet took
a decanter and glass, filled the latter for the cabman, who was making a
pool on the thick carpet, and then poured himself out a few drops from a
small-stoppered bottle, added some water from a table filter, and tossed
off the mixture.
"Thank you, sir, and hope that there'll do you as much good as this
here's done me a'ready. Didn't know you was a doctor."
"Here's a crown for you," said Chester, taking the money from a little
drawer.
"Five bob! Oh, thank ye, sir," said the man, with a grin. "Makes a
fellow feel quite dry. Sorry for your carpet, sir. Good-mornin'. I
don't think I want another fare."
As the door was closed after the man, the potent drops Chester had taken
began to have some effect, and it seemed as if the dawn was coming
through the black cloud which separated him mentally from what had taken
place overnight.
"The man's right," he muttered. "I must sleep. Good heavens! What a
state my brain is in!"
"Is that you, Fred?"
He started as if he had been stung, and the dawn brightened as he
replied sharply--
"Yes, aunt; all right. Go to bed. Why are you up?"
There was no reply, and he turned the hall light nearly out again, and
went into his consulting-room to serve the gas jet there the same, and
sank into an easy-chair instead; but he had hardly allowed himself to
sink back when he sprang up again, for there, in the open doorway, stood
the grotesque figure of Aunt Grace, in broad-frilled, old-fashioned
night-cap and dressing-gown, a flat candlestick in her hand, and a
portentous frown upon her brow, as she walked straight to him, wincing
sharply as one slippered foot was planted in the pool left by the
cabman, but continuing her slow, important march till she was about a
yard away from her nephew, when she stopped.
"Why, aunt," he cried, "what's the matter? Surely you are not walking
in your sleep!"
"Matter?" she cried in a low, deep voice, full of the emotion which
nearly choked her. "Oh, you vile, wicked, degraded boy! How dare you
treat your poor sister and me like this?"
"Pooh! Hush! Nonsense, old lady. It's all right. I've been dining
with a friend."
"With a friend!" she said, with cutting sarcasm.
"Yes, at his club. There, I must have been unwell. I was a little
overdone. What a terrible night."
"Terrible indeed, sir, when my nephew stoops to lie to me like that. A
friend--at his club! Do you think me such a baby that I do not know you
have been with that abandoned woman?"
"Hush! Silence!" he whispered angrily. "For your dear, dead father's
and mother's sake, sir, I will not be silenced."
"But you will arouse Laura."
"She wants no arousing. She is lying ill in bed, sleepless in her
misery, sir, with her wretched brother staying out like this."
"Confound you for a silly old woman!" he cried angrily. "Is a man to
live the life of a hermit? If I had been away to a patient till
breakfast-time nobody would have said a word. Poor little Laury! But
how absurd!"
"Absurd, sir!" cried the old lady, who was scarlet with indignation.
"Then I suppose it was absurd for poor Isabel Lee to have gone home
broken-hearted because of your conduct."
"What!" he cried, springing up, with a glimmer of memory coming back.
"Why, surely you two did not canvass my being out one night till the
poor girl was so upset that she--that she--went back--yes, she was
stopping here. Oh, aunt, your foolish, suspicious ways are disgraceful.
What have you done?"
"I done, you wretched boy? It's what have you done? She was with us
for a whole week after you had gone, fighting against me, and insisting
that there was a reason for your being away, or that you had had an
accident."
"Here, aunt, are you going to be ill?" he cried, catching at her wrist;
but she snatched it away.
"Don't touch me, sir!" she cried. "Oh, Fred, Fred! I'd have given the
world not to know that you were so wicked. And just when you were about
to marry her, poor girl, to go away as you did."
"_Go_ away--as I did?" he faltered, gazing at her blankly.
"Yes, I knew something was wrong when I saw that wretched woman's face.
I felt it; but I could not have believed you would be so base. A whole
fortnight too; and to think that this was to have been your
wedding-day!"
He caught her by the shoulders, and she uttered a faint cry and dropped
the candlestick, as he stood swaying to and fro, staring at the doorway,
through which his sister hesitatingly passed, and came slowly toward
him.
"A fortnight!" he stammered--"Isabel gone!"
"Yes, gone--gone for ever," said Laura, sadly. "Oh, Fred, how could
you?"
"Stop! Don't touch me," he cried angrily. "Don't speak to me. Let me
try to think."
He threw his head back and shook it violently in his effort to clear it,
but the confusion and mental darkness began to close in once more, while
the throbbing in his brain grew agonising. It was as if his head were
opening and shutting--letting the light in a little and then blotting it
out; till he felt his senses reeling--the present mingling with the
darkness of the past he strove so vainly to grasp.
"I can't think. Am I going mad?" he groaned, as he staggered to a
chair.
"Mad, indeed," said his aunt, bitterly. "Come away, Laura, and leave
him to his conscience. Better if it had been as you and poor Isabel
thought--that he had met with some accident, and was dead."
She caught her niece by the arm, but Laura shook herself free and took a
step or two towards where, in his utter despair, Chester sat bent down
with his head resting in his hands. But he made no movement, and with a
bitter sob she turned and followed her aunt from the room.