Edmund Shuttleworth, the thin-faced, clean-shaven Hampshire rector,
had spoken the truth. His manner and speech were that of an honest
man.
Within myself I could but admit it. Yet I loved Sylvia. Why, I cannot
tell. How can a man tell why he loves? First love is more than the
mere awakening of a passion: it is transition to another state of
being. When it is born the man is new-made.
Yet, as the spring days passed, I lived in suspicion and wonder, ever
mystified, ever apprehensive.
Each morning I looked eagerly for a letter from her, yet each morning
I was disappointed.
It seemed true, as Shuttleworth had said, that an open gulf lay
between us.
Where was she, I wondered? I dared not write to Gardone, as she had
begged me not to do so. She had left there, no doubt, for was she not
a constant wanderer? Was not her stout, bald-headed father the modern
incarnation of the Wandering Jew?
May lengthened into June, with its usual society functions and all the
wild gaiety of the London season. The Derby passed and Ascot came,
the Park was full every day, theatres and clubs were crowded, and the
hotels overflowed with Americans and country cousins. I had many
invitations, but accepted few. Somehow, my careless cosmopolitanism
had left me. I had become a changed man.
And if I were to believe the woman who had come so strangely and so
suddenly into my life, I was a marked man also.
Disturbing thoughts often arose within me in the silence of the night,
but, laughing at them, I crushed them down. What had I possibly to
fear? I had no enemy that I was aware of. The whole suggestion seemed
so utterly absurd and far-fetched.
Jack Marlowe came back from Denmark hale and hearty, and more than
once I was sorely tempted to explain to him the whole situation. Only
I feared he would jeer at me as a love-sick idiot.
What was the secret held by that grey-faced country parson? Whatever
it might be, it was no ordinary one. He had spoken of the seal of The
Confessional. What sin had Sylvia Pennington confessed to him?
Day after day, as I sat in my den at Wilton Street smoking moodily and
thinking, I tried vainly to imagine what cardinal sin she could have
committed. My sole thoughts were of her, and my all-consuming
eagerness was to meet her again.
On the night of the twentieth of June--I remember the date well
because the Gold Cup had been run that afternoon--I had come in from
supper at the Ritz about a quarter to one, and retired to bed. I
suppose I must have turned in about half-an-hour, when the telephone
at my bedside rang, and I answered.
"Hulloa!" asked a voice. "Is that you, Owen?"
"Yes," I replied.
"Jack speaking--Jack Marlowe," exclaimed the distant voice. "Is that
you, Owen? Your voice sounds different."
"So does yours, a bit," I said. "Voices often do on the 'phone. Where
are you?"
"I'm out in Bayswater--Althorp House, Porchester Terrace," my friend
replied. "I'm in a bit of a tight corner. Can you come here? I'm so
sorry to trouble you, old man. I wouldn't ask you to turn out at this
hour if it weren't imperative."
"Certainly I'll come," I said, my curiosity at once aroused. "But
what's up?"
"Oh, nothing very alarming," he laughed. "Nothing to worry over. I've
been playing cards, and lost a bit, that's all. Bring your
cheque-book; I want to pay up before I leave. You understand. I know
you'll help me, like the good pal you always are."
"Why, of course I will, old man," was my prompt reply.
"I've got to pay up my debts for the whole week--nearly a thousand.
Been infernally unlucky. Never had such vile luck. Have you got it in
the bank? I can pay you all right at the end of next week."
"Yes," I said, "I can let you have it."
"These people know you, and they'll take your cheque, they say."
"Right-ho!" I said; "I'll get a taxi and be up with you in
half-an-hour."
"You're a real good pal, Owen. Remember the address: Althorp House,
Porchester Terrace," cried my friend cheerily. "Get here as soon as
you can, as I want to get home. So-long."
And, after promising to hurry, I hung up the receiver again.
Dear old Jack always was a bit reckless. He had a good income allowed
him by his father, but was just a little too fond of games of chance.
He had been hard hit in February down at Monte Carlo, and I had lent
him a few hundreds to tide him over. Yet, by his remarks over the
'phone, I could only gather that he had fallen into the hands of
sharpers, who held him up until he paid--no uncommon thing in London.
Card-sharpers are generally blackmailers as well, and no doubt these
people were bleeding poor Jack to a very considerable tune.
I rose, dressed, and, placing my revolver in my hip pocket in case of
trouble, walked towards Victoria Station, where I found a belated
taxi.
Within half-an-hour I alighted before a large dark house about
half-way up Porchester Terrace, Bayswater, standing back from the
road, with small garden in front; a house with closely-shuttered
windows, the only light showing being that in the fanlight over the
door.
My approaching taxi was being watched for, I suppose, for as I crossed
the gravel the door fell back, and a smart, middle-aged man-servant
admitted me.
"I want to see Mr. Marlowe," I said.
"Are you Mr. Biddulph?" he inquired, eyeing me with some suspicion.
I replied in the affirmative, whereupon he invited me to step
upstairs, while I followed him up the wide, well-carpeted staircase
and along a corridor on the first floor into a small sitting-room at
the rear of the house.
"Mr. Marlowe will be here in a few moments, sir," he said; "he left a
message asking you to wait. He and Mr. Forbes have just gone across
the road to a friend's house. I'll send over and tell him you are
here, if you'll kindly take a seat."
The room was small, fairly well furnished, but old-fashioned, and lit
by an oil-lamp upon the table. The air was heavy with tobacco-smoke,
and near the window was a card-table whereat four players had been
seated. The cigar-ash bore testimony to recent occupation of the four
chairs, while two packs of cards had been flung down just as the men
had risen.
The window was hidden by long curtains of heavy moss-green plush,
while in one corner of the room, upon a black marble pedestal, stood a
beautiful sculptured statuette of a girl, her hands uplifted together
above her head in the act of diving. I examined the exquisite work of
art, and saw upon its brass plate the name of an eminent French
sculptor.
The carpet, of a peculiar shade of red which contrasted well with the
dead-white enamelled walls, was soft to the tread, so that my
footsteps fell noiselessly as I moved.
Beside the fireplace was a big inviting saddle-bag chair, into which I
presently sank, awaiting Jack.
Who were his friends, I wondered?
The house seemed silent as the grave. I listened for Jack's footsteps,
but could hear nothing.
I was hoping that the loss of nearly a thousand pounds would cure my
friend of his gambling propensities. Myself, I had never experienced a
desire to gamble. A sovereign or so on a race was the extent of my
adventures.
The table, the cards, the tantalus-stand and the empty glasses told
their own tale. I was sorry, truly sorry, that Jack should mix with
such people--professional gamblers, without a doubt.
Every man-about-town in London knows what a crowd of professional
players and blackmailers infest the big hotels, on the look-out for
pigeons to pluck. The American bars of London each have their little
circle of well-dressed sharks, and woe betide the victims who fall
into their unscrupulous hands. I had believed Jack Marlowe to be more
wary. He was essentially a man of the world, and had always laughed at
the idea that he could be "had" by sharpers, or induced to play with
strangers.
I think I must have waited for about a quarter of an hour. As I sat
there, I felt overcome by a curious drowsiness, due, no doubt, to the
strenuous day I had had, for I had driven down to Ascot in the car,
and had gone very tired to bed.
Suddenly, without a sound, the door opened, and a youngish,
dark-haired, clean-shaven man in evening dress entered swiftly,
accompanied by another man a few years older, tall and thin, whose
nose and pimply face was that of a person much dissipated. Both were
smoking cigars.
"You are Mr. Biddulph, I believe!" exclaimed the younger. "Marlowe
expects you. He's over the road, talking to the girl."
"What girl?"
"Oh, a little girl who lives over there," he said, with a mysterious
smile. "But have you brought the cheque?" he asked. "He told us that
you'd settle up with us."
"Yes," I said, "I have my cheque-book in my pocket."
"Then perhaps you'll write it?" he said, taking a pen-and-ink and
blotter from a side-table and placing it upon the card-table. "The
amount altogether is one thousand one hundred and ten pounds," he
remarked, consulting an envelope he took from his pocket.
"I shall give you a cheque for it when my friend comes," I said.
"Yes, but we don't want to be here all night, you know," laughed the
pimply-faced man. "You may as well draw it now, and hand it over to us
when he comes in."
"How long is he likely to be?"
"How can we tell? He's a bit gone on her."
"Who is she?"
"Oh! a little girl my friend Reckitt here knows," interrupted the
younger man. "Rather pretty. Reckitt is a fair judge of good looks.
Have a cigarette?" and the man offered me a cigarette, which, out of
common courtesy, I was bound to take from his gold case.
I sat back in my chair and lit up, and as I did so my ears caught the
faint sound of a receding motor-car.
"Aren't you going to draw the cheque?" asked the man with the pimply
face. "Marlowe said you would settle at once; Charles Reckitt is my
name. Make it out to me."
"And so I will, as soon as he arrives," I replied.
"Why not now? We'll give you a receipt."
"I don't know at what amount he acknowledges the debt," I pointed out.
"But we've told you, haven't we? One thousand one hundred and ten
pounds."
"That's according to your reckoning. He may add up differently, you
know," I said, with a doubtful smile.
"You mean that you doubt us, eh?" asked Reckitt a trifle angrily.
"Not in the least," I assured him, with a smile. "If the game is fair,
then the loss is fair also. A good sportsman like my friend never
objects to pay what he has lost."
"But you evidently object to pay for him, eh?" he sneered.
"I do not," I protested. "If it were double the amount I would pay it.
Only I first want to know what he actually owes."
"That he'll tell you when he returns. Yet I can't see why you should
object to make out the cheque now, and hand it to us on his arrival.
I'll prepare the receipt, at any rate. I, for one, want to get off to
bed."
And the speaker sat down in one of the chairs at the card-table, and
wrote out a receipt for the amount, signing it "Charles Reckitt"
across the stamp he stuck upon it.
Then presently he rose impatiently, and, crossing the room,
exclaimed--
"How long are we to be humbugged like this? I've got to get out to
Croydon--and it's late. Come on, Forbes. Let's go over and dig Marlowe
out, eh?"
So the pair left the room, promising to return with Jack in a few
minutes, and closed the door after them.
When they had gone, I sat for a moment reflecting. I did not like the
look of either of them. Their faces were distinctly sinister and their
manner overbearing. I felt that the sooner I left that silent house
the better.
So, crossing to the table, I drew out my cheque-book, and hastily
wrote an open cheque, payable to "Charles Reckitt," for one thousand
one hundred and ten pounds. I did so in order that I should have it
in readiness on Jack's return--in order that we might get away
quickly.
Whatever possessed my friend to mix with such people as those I could
not imagine.
A few moments later, I had already put the cheque back into my
breast-pocket, and was re-seated in the arm-chair, when of a sudden,
and apparently of its own accord, the chair gave way, the two arms
closing over my knees in such a manner that I was tightly held there.
It happened in a flash. So quickly did it collapse that, for a moment,
I was startled, for the chair having tipped back, I had lost my
balance, my head being lower than my legs.
And at that instant, struggling in such an undignified position and
unable to extricate myself, the chair having closed upon me, the door
suddenly opened, and the man Reckitt, with his companion Forbes,
re-entered the room.