RICHARD IS DISMISSED
For an instant the two men stared at each other in blank amazement
as they stood in front of the big safe, the door of which had been
unlocked with such startling results.
The elder man recovered himself first. His was a strong, resolute
character, and it was always said of him by those who knew him
intimately, that no man could grasp the bearings of an unexpected
situation more readily. Croxton seemed dazed and stupefied beyond the
power of speech.
“But they were there, all of them, when we shifted them the other
morning, the packet of notes, the bag of diamonds, the parcel of
papers. You saw them, we both saw them.”
The young man’s voice was trembling as he answered: “We both saw them,
as you say, sir. They were there, right enough.”
The big financier took a great interest in the mechanism of safes; it
had always been one of his hobbies. He had tried half a dozen different
kinds during his business career, and in the present one he was
confident he had found the latest thing in ingenuity and safety.
In truth it was a marvel, and there was nothing else like it in all
the world. He had availed himself to the full of the resources of the
locksmith’s art, and had contributed a few practical suggestions as to
the actual mechanism himself. It had a marvellous time lock, the secret
of which was only known to himself and his secretary. The time when the
safe could be opened was automatically controlled by the day of the
month.
For example, if it was secretly set to open at nine o’clock on June the
twelfth, it would not open before nine plus six (the sixth month of
the year), plus twelve (the day of the month). Therefore, it would be
twenty-seven minutes past nine before the two keys could be inserted,
and then only for one minute. If that time passed, the safe could not
be opened till next day, and then not one minute but two minutes later.
There was a long pause in which both men were thinking furiously.
Richard Croxton, recovering slowly from the shock, was beginning to
realize the awkwardness of the situation with regard to himself, and to
anticipate the thoughts that were forming themselves in the mind of the
man who had, up to the present, treated him more like a father than an
employer.
Gradually over Morrice’s countenance came that hard, grim look which
Richard had seen a few times during their association together; notably
in the early days when some gross act of carelessness or inattention
had aroused dissatisfaction and subsequent anger.
“Well, what have you to say about it?” thundered the banker at length.
When he had once come to a conclusion he never beat about the bush, but
went to the point as straight as an arrow.
The unfortunate young man moistened his dry lips with his tongue.
It was an agonizing moment for him, and, engrossed as he was with
the terrible aspect of the situation, he could not help thinking of
Rosabelle and her heartening words uttered a few hours previously.
This was the day on which he had resolved to confess to her uncle his
love for the charming girl, and beg his consent to their betrothal.
In a few seconds this roseate prospect had been blotted out, and he
was confronting, not a kindly master and friend, but a stern and angry
judge.
“I have nothing to say, sir, except that I am innocent, and that
statement you do not look as if you were inclined to believe.”
The elder man emitted an angry exclamation, and the grim expression
grew grimmer as he gazed searchingly at the pale and shaken young man.
“Richard Croxton, you are no fool, you can see the situation as it
presents itself to me, as it would present itself to anybody who knew
the circumstances. The secret of that safe is known only to us two, you
and I alone have access to it with our separate keys. Even supposing
for a moment, and it is a most wild supposition, that some third party
could have gained temporary possession of your key and mine, and, after
taking impressions of them, had duplicates made, how was he to know the
secret of the mechanism, the time at which the safe would open. We saw
the articles here two days ago; they have been taken between yesterday
and this morning.” He paused and added significantly: “At that time
when the safe could be opened, I had left the house early, and was in
my private room in the city. You had work to finish here, and were to
come down to me with the report you were preparing at twelve o’clock.”
It was difficult for Croxton to preserve his faculties of thought as
the damning evidence grew and accumulated on him. But a ray of light
seemed to pierce suddenly through his benumbed brain.
“We breakfasted together at eight o’clock, sir, and you left directly
you had finished. After you had gone, I went up to my own room, and
remained till it was time for me to leave to join you in the city. I
never during that time entered this apartment. To that I am ready to
swear; I will take any solemn oath you care to dictate to me.”
Morrice seemed just a little staggered by the solemnity with which
these words were uttered, and for a second the hard, stern look melted,
but only for a second. His keen, logical mind at once prompted the
question.
“You say that you were in your own room practically all the time you
were alone. Is there any evidence you can bring forward to corroborate
this statement? Did Mrs. Morrice, Rosabelle, any of the servants look
in upon you during that period?”
The young man made a despairing gesture: “Alas, no. It is very rarely
that either Mrs. Morrice or Rosabelle pays me a visit when I am at
work. The servants are hardly ever about the house at that time. And I
know from what they said that both the ladies were out very early on
a shopping expedition. I don’t suppose that anybody knew for certain
whether I was here or in my own room. I have nothing to offer you, sir,
but my bare word, my solemn oath, if you choose to accept it. But if I
am what you appear to think me, my oath would carry no more weight than
my word. Again I say, much as appearances are against me, inexplicable
and astounding as the whole thing is, before heaven I am not the thief
who has stolen your property.”
“Then if you are not the thief, I must be,” cried the irate financier
with bitter sarcasm, “though, I take it, the most suspicious detective
in the world would hardly dare to suspect me of purloining my own
money and diamonds.”
There was another long pause. Morrice walked up and down the spacious
room with long strides, the stern frown on his face now deepening,
now clearing a little, as his conflicting thoughts raced through his
brain. No doubt to him the brazen effrontery of the young man seemed
incredible, in view of the damning facts of the situation. And that
seemingly feeble excuse that he had been in his own room during the
time of the burglary, during the whole period between breakfast and the
moment when he left the house—did it hold water?
Was it a lie invented on the spur of the moment, or had it been thought
out beforehand to be produced at the moment of discovery. And yet, if
Richard were a cunning criminal, would he not have taken precautions to
secure some sort of alibi? The theft from the safe would not have taken
more than a minute, the articles were all together, their removal would
have taken no time. He could have gone back to his room, rung the bell
three or four times to summon a servant on one pretext or another. It
might not have been convincing proof, for the robbery could have been
accomplished so quickly, but it would have been better than no proof at
all.
But then the cleverest criminals made often very stupid mistakes, and
he could not believe the young man to be a hardened malefactor. He had
some secret vices that had never been suspected, he had got into money
difficulties; in his perplexity he had taken advantage of the trust
reposed in him, and yielded to a sudden temptation.
And then, in the midst of his anger and disappointment, came softening
thoughts of the dead mother whom he had loved with such a passionate
devotion. Could he act towards her child as if he were a stranger
between whom there had been no tie save that between employer and
employed. The stern look melted away; he came up to the stricken
Richard and laid his hand upon his shoulder.
“Listen to me, Dick. You are the son of the woman whom I would have
given up everything else to make my wife, had she not preferred your
father to me. When you were left to the tender mercies of the world, an
orphan cast aside by your own family, with a small pittance, enough to
keep you from actual want, I came to your rescue. I took you into my
business; I took you into my house. I have not perhaps told you very
definitely of my future intentions, but you can guess what they were
likely to be. In a year or two I proposed to give you a share of my
business. I have noticed the attachment between you and Rosabelle, who
is very dear to me. I should have put no obstacles in your way.”
The bitter irony of it all! But for this disastrous happening, what
a fair and golden future! The unhappy young man could not speak, but
inwardly he was suffering tortures. Those beautiful dreams of an
honourable and prosperous career, of a happy wedded life with the
charming girl he loved so dearly—all had vanished in those hateful few
moments!
“Listen to me, Dick,” went on the deep, resonant voice, and the tone
was now one more of sorrow than anger. “Abandon this stubborn attitude
of pretended innocence. Don’t regard me as the stern and inflexible
judge, ready to mete out deserved punishment, but one who will incline
to mercy, the mercy that all of us may stand in need of some day. Your
mother’s son cannot be naturally dishonest, it is impossible. You have
got into difficulties that I have never suspected; in an evil hour your
better instincts yielded to your pressing needs, your fear of disgrace;
and you did this base thing. Confess your fault, make restitution if
you can, if it is not too late, and I will help you as I vowed to your
mother I always would.”
A dreadful groan escaped from the tortured Richard. “You are one of the
best and kindest men on God’s earth; my mother whom you so loved always
told me so. If I were the guilty wretch you believe me to be I would go
on my knees and implore your pardon. But I am not a thief, and I cannot
restore what I have never taken.”
But Morrice, more than ever convinced of his obduracy, continued to
urge him, in tones that were almost pleading.
“There must of course be something between us that can never be quite
blotted out, in spite of repentance on the one side and forgiveness
on the other. I could never again put you in a position of trust, for
that fatal weakness might come over you once more. But I would give you
a post where temptation could not assail you. You have spoken of your
mother, so dear to us both. I implore you by the memory of that beloved
woman who, for aught we know, is even now watching us from afar, to
quit this stubborn attitude and confess the truth.”
No reply came from the accused man, and the hard, stern look came
back to the banker’s face. At that moment the door of the room slowly
opened, and the charming vision of Rosabelle, looking her sweetest and
daintiest, stood framed in the opening.
“May I come in?” she cried in her fresh, girlish voice.
“Come in, my poor child,” was her uncle’s answer. “Come in; something
has happened that you will have to know sooner or later, although I
fear the knowledge may break your heart.”
White as death at these ominous words, she advanced into the room,
closing the door, her troubled glance changing from the stern, set
face of her uncle to the pallid countenance of her lover, the two men
who were the dearest to her in the world, loving the one with a filial
devotion that could not have been surpassed by a daughter, the other
with all the fervour of her ardent youth.
It was a painful scene. In a few trenchant words, the more weighty from
the cold, judicial tone in which they were uttered, Morrice explained
to her what had happened. She learned to a certain extent the secret
of that wonderful safe, about the protecting properties of which she
had so often laughingly rallied its owner, this wretched safe which had
worked the ruin of Richard, and now menaced her own happiness.
She was too much dazed by the sudden and tragic happening to do much
more than grasp a few salient facts. The safe was opened by two keys,
one carried by each of the two men. They alone of all the inmates of
the house knew of its mechanism. That safe had been opened, and certain
valuable property extracted.
“But how could it be opened by one person, if it requires two keys?”
she cried, grasping at the first difficulty that presented itself to
her in her distress.
Mr. Morrice did not mince matters. “If I had a duplicate key of the one
carried by the other man, I could open it alone, and vice versa,” he
explained.
She understood the horrible suggestion, but her heart refused to credit
it. Of course she realized that her uncle would not steal his own
property, that would be a surmise altogether too ridiculous. But it was
equally impossible to believe that Richard, the man in whom the great
financier had placed such implicit trust, to whom her whole soul went
out in pity and yearning, should stoop to such a dastardly act, with
all the long and sinister preparations for its execution.
She stretched her hands out imploringly to her lover. “Richard, you
are no thief, nothing shall ever convince me of it,” she cried in a
voice of agony. “Deny it, deny it to us both. Say something that will
persuade him of the falseness of the accusation, of the injustice he is
doing you.”
The miserable young man was hardly less moved than herself. “I have
denied it, Rosabelle; I have offered to swear it, to take any oath he
may dictate to me. But he refuses to believe either word or oath. I can
do no more. Thank heaven, black as appearances are, you believe that I
am an honest man.”
“Oh yes, oh yes,” she cried brokenly. “I do not care a straw for
appearances, if they were twice as strong against you as they are.
I know you so well, my heart tells me that you have not done this
horrible thing.”
And then Morrice delivered his sentence. Incensed as he was at what he
considered the obstinacy of Croxton, he could not fail to be moved by
the girl’s passionate vindication of her lover.
“Richard Croxton, needless to say that from this day forth we are
strangers; my house can no longer give you shelter. For the sake of one
whose memory I shall always revere, I shall take no steps. Nobody but
Rosabelle and my wife will know the real reasons of your departure.
I am now going to the city to get money to replace that which has
been stolen. I shall go there and return here as quickly as possible.
I have no heart for any other business to-day. When I return, let
me find you gone. Later on I will invent some plausible explanation
of the severance of our relations, and give it out to those who are
interested.”
He turned on his heel without vouchsafing another glance at the
miserable man upon whom, up to the present, he had lavished kindness
and affection, strode through the hall, and a minute later he had left
the house.
The two wretched lovers were left alone, and when the door had closed,
the poor girl broke down, and threw herself into Richard’s arms,
sobbing bitterly.