HOW DOROTHY MADE HER EXIT
In the darkness--that was the worst. When she realised that they
indeed had gone, and that she was alone, she came out from behind the
blind, parted the curtains, and found that the room was all dark. That
was the worst. She could see so much better in the darkness, for
though she might not be able to use the eye of sense she was at the
mercy of the more vivid eye of the imagination--at its mercy. It made
her see what she never would, what she never could, have seen in the
light. Within sixty seconds of her having been left alone in the
darkness she had already begun to have a vision of horrors. Yet she
dared not switch on the electric lights; although she knew how
to--there were none in the convent, but she had learnt all about them
since--she did not dare. The inspector had spoken of leaving one of
his men outside to keep an eye on the door; if he had not done so it
was only because the landlord had promised that he would make it his
especial charge; which meant that he would see that a watch was kept
on it. Therefore, if she switched on the light, it would be seen at
once; you could always tell from the outside if there was a light
inside a room. If it was seen, they would know that she was there.
Beyond a doubt that woman had not found her; probably the hue-and-cry
was already out. Quite possibly it might dawn upon them ere long,
that, since no one had seen her go out, she might have been in the
room all the while and no one had had the sense to look. The danger of
their repairing the omission, and coming back to look, was quite great
enough, without the added danger of a light being seen inside the
room.
And yet, to be left alone with her guardian lying on the table--that
was much worse than seeing him huddled upon the chair. What might he
not be doing, lying stretched out on the table at which she herself
had such a little while ago been seated? Was he turning round to look
at her? Turning what was left him of his head? It was so still. How
loudly she breathed. She could hear her own respirations. Could he
hear them too? She caught at the curtains with tightened fingers. Was
that not someone trying to speak in a whisper?
All at once there was a sound. Someone was in the room. She felt
herself trembling from head to foot; she clung to the curtains as for
dear life. It was only after some consideration that she understood
that the visitor was probably a mouse. She had been used to mice at
the convent. There they had scampered about all over the place;
sometimes about the room in which she had slept. The convent was old;
the hotel was old; evidently the small marauders had taken up their
quarters in the one building as they had done in the other.
The new-comer was joined by others. She had an impression that, after
a while, numbers of mice were in the room. If they were conscious of
her presence they ignored it. Certainly they cared nothing for the
dead. She wondered if they were attracted by the smell of the
champagne which had been spilt upon the floor when the stranger broke
the bottle. Suddenly there were sounds quite close to her feet; she
felt as if something ran over one of them; as if a fresh detachment
were coming out of some crevice in the wood panelling of the recess in
which she was standing. Was she to be shut up all night--alone with
the dead, while the mice held festival? Was she to remain there,
upright? Or should she seek rest on the floor? On the floor the mice
might run to and fro across her body. She did not mind that so much as
the thought that her guardian might be peering down at her from his
place upon the table. There was a couch on her left; should she take
refuge on that? To what purpose? Even suppose she slept, when they
came in the morning would she rather that they should find her on it
asleep or waking? If they were to find her at all, then it would be
better, on all accounts, that she should turn on the lights at once,
ring the bell, and bid them do with her what they would. Besides, she
would be afraid to go to sleep with that in the room. The whole place
was full of it. Each time her glance strayed, on this side or that,
seeking, in the darkness, for she knew not what, with, as it were, an
irresistible jerk, her head was brought right round again, so that she
had to look towards where she knew the table was, with its burden. She
could not remain standing through the night; she dare not lie upon the
floor; she dare not take refuge on the couch; she was unwilling to
venture out from the sheltering curtains into the room; for all she
could tell he might have got off the table, and be waiting for her
just on the other side of them.
As she realised, more and more clearly, the disagreeable nature of her
position, her thoughts recurred to the window, to the handles which
hung on either side of the lower sash. It seemed incredible that a
window, even a silly English window, should be made not to open at
all, either at the top or bottom. After an interval of she knew not
how long, she summoned up resolution enough to make another effort.
Moving very softly, being anxious to be heard by no one, most of all
by what was on the table, turning towards the window, she felt for the
handles, and, finding them, began to pull, It was impossible to
discriminate between the colours: she could only learn from experiment
if she had the right ones. Apparently, to commence with, she had not:
pull as she might, nothing happened. When, however, after one or two
fumbling changes she tugged again something yielded: the handles came
down towards her with a run. She did not doubt that she had succeeded
in opening the upper portion of the window, at least in part. Not only
was the movement so unexpected as to occasion her a sensation of
shock, it was accompanied by a noise which made the sensation greater
still. Either she had not tugged just as she should have done, or else
the sash, or something which actuated it, stood much in need of
oiling: it moved with a creaking sound which seemed to Dorothy to be
one of the most frightful sounds she had ever heard. In her agitation
she did not improve matters. So completely was she taken unawares that
she loosed the handles as if they had been hot coals; swinging back
they hit the window and the woodwork a series of raps as with a pair
of hammers. To the girl's excited imagination it seemed very much as
if pandemonium had all at once broken loose. That such a tumult could
have remained unheard seemed to her incredible. If it had not actually
called attention to the experiments she was trying on the window,
beyond a doubt it had roused suspicion; which was already sufficiently
on the alert, owing to the significant fact--with which, probably, the
entire establishment had been made acquainted before now--that the
mysterious young lady who had accompanied Mr Emmett had disappeared.
She clearly realised how general a theme of conversation her
inexplicable evanishment had probably become. How the men were asking
the maids if they had seen anything of her; and how the maids were
replying by putting the same question to the men. If anyone had heard
the clatter she had caused--and someone must have heard it--he or she
would promptly report the fact; inquiries into its origin would at
once be set on foot; before many minutes had passed it would be traced
to its source.
The girl crouched against the side of the recess, every nerve on edge,
quivering with apprehension, expecting each moment to hear the key
being inserted in the lock of the door, the click of the turning lock,
the opening of the door, the steps of those who had decided, at last,
to leave no nook or cranny of the room unvisited in which she might,
by any possibility, be hidden. But as the minutes went, and no one
came, her immediate fears grew less. Perhaps, after all, she had been
unheard. In which case it might be wise, and safe, to endeavour to
find out what had really been the fruit of all her tugging.
Drawing aside the blind, she looked up. The window was open, but the
blind prevented her seeing how much. It was in the way; it would be
difficult, in any event, to take advantage of the open window while it
was there. With anxious fingers she began to draw it up. It rose more
smoothly than she had feared. It was only when it was half way up that
it struck her that if anyone's eyes were on the window they could
hardly fail to see the mounting blind. The tardy appreciating of the
fact occasioned her another touch of panic. Pausing, she had a mind to
let it stay where it was; then, with sudden recklessness, drew it
right to the top, holding her breath, when it was up, fearful of the
result. She still seemed to have attracted no one's attention. It
seemed to be a clear night, she could see the stars in the sky. By
their light she saw that she had drawn the top sash down some nine or
ten inches, so that it was plain that at least part of the window was
meant to open. She had only to draw it down as far as she could; it
might mean for her a way of escape. Again she gripped the handles--it
was easy now to grip the right ones; in the dim light she could see
that they hung down below the others; again she tugged; again the sash
came down, with that horrid creaking noise. In desperate recognition
of the truth that hers was a case in which she might as well be hung
for a sheep as a lamb she went on tugging, in spite of the persistent
creaking, till she could tug no more. Apparently she had opened the
window to its widest extent.
When she ceased to tug she strained her ears to listen. This time she
heard a sound which seemed to make her feel that all which had gone
before had been as nothing. It came from within the room. At first she
had not the vaguest notion what it was; what it meant. Yet, the
instant it reached her ear, she was oppressed as by the consciousness
of something strange. It came, and went, so quickly that it left her
in terrified doubt as to whether it had not been born of her
imagination.
Then after an interval, which seemed to her of grimly portentous
length, it came again--the sound. There was no mistake that that was
real. Equally certain was it that it came from the other side of the
curtains, from the room which was empty, save for the mice and the man
stretched out upon the table. No mouse, no gathering of mice, could
have produced that sound; and the man on the table was dead. Was it
possible that anyone could have come into the room without her
knowledge? Surely she must have heard the opening of the door if it
had been opened. She had noticed that the key turned in the lock with
a grating noise, as if either the lock or the key were rusty. She was
convinced that if the door had been opened she must have heard it;
there was no other way into the room, yet she had heard that sound.
It came a third time. Was it not someone breathing, or trying to
breathe? It sounded like it. As if someone were gasping, struggling
for breath, as if some too heavy sleeper were making a stertorous
effort to wake out of slumber. If no one had come into the room--and
how could anyone have come without her knowing it--who could it be?
There was another point: such a noise could hardly come from a person
who was in a normal condition. It had gone again; all was still,
though she listened with all her ears, with every sense she had. Just
as she was wondering if it had gone for good, hoping that it had, it
came again--louder, more obvious, more terrible, than before. For
there was a terrible quality in the noise itself, quite apart from the
circumstances under which it was audible. A sensitive soul, hearing it
in broad daylight, anywhere, would have shuddered; it had about it
such a suggestion of physical discomfort: as though someone,
spellbound in unwholesome sleep, strove to regain consciousness, in
order to escape from some agonising nightmare, and strove in vain. Had
Dorothy had any experience of modern medicine she would have
recognised its likeness to the noise some surgical patients make as
they gradually come back to life from the stupefying effects of some
powerful anæsthetic.
What Dorothy did realise was that, after all, her guardian might not
be so dead as everyone had supposed. How that might be she did not
understand; she did not try to understand. The appreciation of the
fact was enough for her; indeed, it was too much, though her
appreciation was imperfect. She did not wish to make sure if her
guardian really had still in him the spark of life, however dim the
spark might be; she desired nothing less. It did not occur to her to
think that the spark might be indeed so dim that only instant, expert
aid could succeed in fanning it back to flame. She did not stay to
consider that if the man was not entirely dead; that if prompt
attention might bring him back to a hold on life, however precarious
that hold might be; then it was her business, and her duty, to use
every available means to procure for him that assistance with the
least possible delay; and that if she neglected, wittingly, to do so
and, in consequence, he met that fate which, but for her, he might, at
least temporarily, have been snatched from, then the actual
responsibility for his death lay at her door, as something for which,
one day, she might be called to account. Believing that he was
struggling back to life, her one wish was to escape before he
succeeded; it was his success she feared, not his failure. Failing
to recognise the fact that, if he did succeed, the burden of
blood-guiltiness would be lifted from the stranger's shoulders, and
from hers; all she cared for was that he should not find her there.
Panic made her callous. Plainly his struggles increased; each second
he fought harder and harder for his life. It never occurred to her
that if she did escape he would probably be left alone till the
morning, when the odds were that assistance would came too late. She
gave no heed to the thought of the strong man contending, in the
pitch-black room, helplessly, with death, with help, willing help, so
close at hand; that was a picture which was to occur to her later. By
standing on tiptoe she could just get hold of the top of the open
window. Pulling herself up; getting her feet on to the sill; leaning
out of the open upper half, she tried to see what was beyond. It was
not easy to decide. The light was puzzling. Although the stars were
visible overhead they were not sufficiently bright to enable her to
make out, with certainty, what was below. She seemed to be looking
down into some sort of yard, in which dark objects were dimly visible.
She supposed it was probably the stable yard; what the dark objects
were she could not determine. There were no lights; no one appeared to
be moving about; they could hardly be vehicles which, at that hour,
had been left out in the open. She seemed to be higher than she
expected. Although the ground was invisible it seemed to be very far
below. How she was to reach it from the window she had not a notion;
her heart failed at the thought of trying to do so. The only way would
be to scramble, somehow, over the top sash; then to descend, also
somehow, to the sill without; then to lower herself, for the third
time, somehow, till she hung from the sill by her hands; and drop, she
did not know how far through space, nor did she know into, or on to,
what. The prospect was not an alluring one.
At the convent there had been a girl, a refractory young lady, who,
finding herself ill at ease in her surroundings, essayed to elude them
by way of a window which looked out, over the wall, on to the road.
That it was unnecessary to take such an unusual route, since she had
only to give utterance to her desire to leave to find herself outside
as quickly as she could wish, was nothing to her. She was a young lady
of a romantic turn of mind. Possibly she wished to make an impression,
not only on her schoolfellows and the Sisters, but also on her
parents. She knotted together the sheets which she took from her bed;
it was presumed that she tied one end to a bar which ran across the
window, and, squeezing past it, began to descend by means of the
sheets to which she clung. If she did tie one end of the sheet to the
bar, then, apparently, it was not tied very securely; because,
seemingly, before she got very far, it came unfastened, with the
result that she descended with a degree of rapidity which exceeded her
expectations. She struck her head, it seemed, with great force against
the wall; so that by the time she reached the ground, on which they
found her, some twelve feet below, she was, in all human probability,
already dead.
That young lady's tragic fate was the one event which marked the
fifteen years Dorothy had spent in the convent. Now, as she leaned out
of the open upper half of the window, peering down at the impenetrable
darkness which masked whatever might be below, the story came back to
her with a vividness which was most unwelcome. Dorothy's plight was
worse than hers. She had made elaborate preparations for what she well
knew was in front of her; yet she had come to utter dire grief. How
much more likely, Dorothy felt, was disaster to overtake her, if she
plunged, practically blindfold, through unknown depths into unknown
perils? She turned giddy at the thought of trying to climb on to the
top of that open sash. Almost involuntarily she drew her head back
into the room. Better, almost, anything rather than that she should
risk being dashed to pieces by flinging herself blindly into space.
She would give up her mad attempt.
Moved by this new impulse to observe discretion, she had begun to
lower herself on to the floor of the room, when, again, there came
that sound--louder, more insistent, as if someone were bursting his
lungs in the violence of his gasps for breath. Then there was a crash,
which shook the room, as someone, something, fell from the table on to
the floor. All was still. In that ominous silence, the girl, seized
with a sudden frenzy of panic, was on to the top of the sash probably
before she clearly realised what it was that she was doing; over on
the other side; standing on the sill; from which she began to lower
herself with a swiftness and an agility of which she would scarcely
have been capable had the conditions been normal. For some seconds she
clung with her small hands to the rough edge of the sill. She was
conscious that she had brought her leg into unpleasant contact with
the wall, and inflicted on herself various contusions. Even in that
eleventh hour, as she hung between earth and heaven, conviction came
to her of the madness of what she was doing. Had it been possible she
would have drawn herself back into the room even then, but it was not
possible. From where she was there was no way back. Her slender arms
were incapable of raising even her slight body. Such muscles as she
had became relaxed; she seemed to be dragging her arms out of their
sockets; her hands were slipping. Though she gripped the sill till she
felt the rough stone cutting her fingers she could get no hold. The
question as to whether she would risk death by dropping into space was
no longer one for her decision; with all the unwillingness in the
world to let herself go, she could not keep from falling. She made an
effort to stay where she was for yet another breathing space; so that,
at least, she might collect her thoughts before she went, perhaps,
into eternity. The effort had the contrary effect to that which she
intended. Instead of delaying it, it hastened the end. Her hands could
grip the sill no longer. Her finger-tips were on the very edge. In
another instant they would be over, and then---- Of what might happen
then she dared not think.
That instant came. The slip came quickly at the last; the sill seemed
suddenly to be jerked away. She tried to catch at something, and could
not. She closed her eyes; convulsively rather than of intention; as if
she would shut out the sight of what was about to happen; she held her
breath, and fell. As she fell strange noises were in her ears, which
seemed to come from the room from which, at last, she had escaped.