"Everybody has to make a will," Jones, lying again, put in. "There has
been a new law passed. The eternal revenue collector requires it."
Cassy smoothed the rug, put the handkerchief on the table, opened a
drawer, got out some paper, a pen, a bottle of ink.
In a moment she had gone.
Jones seated himself at the table. "Forgive me for asking, but may I
assume that you believe in God, a life hereafter and in the rewards and
punishments which, we are told, await us?"
The musician closed his eyes.
"Thank you," said Jones, who began to write:
I, Angelo Cara, being in full possession of my senses and conscious
of the immanence of death, do solemnly swear to the truth of this
my dying declaration, which, I also solemnly swear, is made by me
without any collusion with Keith Lennox. First; I firmly believe in
God, in a life hereafter, and in future rewards and punishments.
Second; I alone am guilty of the murder of Montagu Paliser, Jr.,
whom I killed without aid or accomplices and without the privity or
knowledge of any other person.
Jones, wishing that in his law-school days he had crammed less and
studied more, looked up.
"I cannot compliment you on your pen, Mr. Cara. But then, pen and ink
always seem so emphatic. Personally, I prefer a pencil. Writing with a
pencil is like talking in a whisper."
It was in an effort to deodorise the atmosphere, charged with the
ghastly, that he said it. The declarant did not appear to notice. His
sunken eyes had been closed. Widely they opened.
"The other side!"
Jones blotted the declaration. "The other side cannot be very different
from this side. Not that part of it at least which people, such as you
and I, first visit. A bit farther on, I suppose we prepare for our
return here. For that matter, it will be very careless of us, if we
don't. We relive and redie and redie and relive, endlessly, ad
infinitum. The Church does not put it in just that manner, but the
allegory of the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting
amounts, perhaps, to the same thing. 'Never the spirit was born, the
spirit shall cease to be never.' That is the way Edwin Arnold expressed
it, after the 'Gita' had expressed it for him. But probably you have not
frequented the 'Gita,' Mr. Cara. It is an exceedingly----"
"Cassy's lace dress is all torn. It was so pretty."
He is in the astral now, thought Jones, who said: "She will have a much
prettier one."
But now again from the hall came that quick click and Cassy appeared, a
little fat man behind her.
Jones stood up. "How do you do. You know Mr. Cara. Mr. Cara wants his
signature attested."
The little man exhibited his gold teeth. "With a will that is not the
way. I told this young lady so but she would have it that I come along."
The young lady, who was taking her hat off, left the room.
Jones fished in a pocket. "It is very good of you. Here, if you please,
is your fee. The document is not a will, it is a release."
As the novelist spoke, he put the pen in the musician's hand and,
finding it necessary, or thinking that it was, for, as he afterward
realised, it was not, he guided it.
"You acknowledge this----" the notary began. But at the moment Cassy
returned and, it may be, distracted by her, he mumbled the rest, took
the reply for granted, applied the stamp, exhibited his teeth. Then, at
once, the hall had him.
Cassy turned to Jones. Her face disclosed as many emotions as an opal
has colours. Relief, longing, uncertainty, and distress were there,
ringed in beauty.
"Miss Austen ought to know how she has misjudged him. Do you suppose she
would let me see her?"
Bully for you! thought Jones, who said: "I cannot imagine any one
refusing you anything."
In speaking, he heard something. Cassy turned. She too had heard it. But
what?