IN THE MISTS
At a quarter to one in the morning Cranmere's big, grey, low-built car
slid noiselessly along Wigmore Street and drew up at the entrance to one
of the most imposing-looking houses in Cumberland Place.
The imposing footman got down and rang the bell—he pressed the button
four times in succession, as "Lord Cranmere" had told him to do. Almost
at once the door was opened, and from the car window we saw a tall man
in knee-breeches silhouetted, while a little way behind him stood
another man. "Lord Cranmere" stepped out of the car, and we followed
him—"Baron Poppenheimer" and "Sir Aubrey Belston." In point of fact,
the real Sir Aubrey Belston was at that moment somewhere in the Malay
States, making a tour of the world.
"Lord Cranmere" had told the chauffeur that he would not require him
again that night, and I had noticed the man touch his hat in the belief
that this actually was his employer who addressed him, for the real Earl
of Cranmere had lent us his car. I heard the car purr away in the
darkness, and an instant later the door of number 300 Cumberland Place
shut noiselessly behind us.
The footman in knee-breeches and powdered head, who had admitted us, led
us without a word across the large hall, turned into a long corridor
dimly-lit by tinted electric lamps, turned to the left, then to the
right, then showed us into a small, comfortably-furnished room in which
a fire burned cheerily, while in a corner a column printing machine
ticked out its eternal news from the ends of the earth. We waited
several minutes. Then the door opened and Hugesson Gastrell entered.
Like ourselves, he was in evening clothes. He advanced, shook hands
cordially with "Lord Cranmere," saying that he had received his
telephone message.
"These are my friends of whom I spoke," Cranmere said, "Baron
Poppenheimer and Sir Aubrey Belston."
"Delighted to meet you," Gastrell exclaimed. "Any friend of Cranmere's
is welcome here; one has, of course, to be careful whom one admits on
these occasions—isn't that so, Cranmere? Come upstairs and have
some supper."
We followed him, ascending to the first floor. In a large,
high-ceilinged, well-lit room an elaborate supper was spread. There were
seats for thirty or forty, but only ten or a dozen were occupied. A
strange atmosphere pervaded the place, an atmosphere of secrecy, of
mystery. As we entered, the people at supper, men and women, had glanced
up at us furtively, then continued their conversation. They talked more
or less under their breath.
Gastrell called for a bottle of "bubbly," and about half an hour later
we rose. The room was by this time deserted. Following Gastrell along a
narrow passage, we presently found ourselves in a room larger than the
one we had just left. Here between forty and fifty men and women sat at
several tables. At one _chemin-de-fer_ was in progress; at another
_petits chevaux_; at a third the game which of late years has become so
popular in certain circles—"Sandown Park." On all the tables money was
heaped up, and on all sides one heard the musical chink of gold and the
crackle of bank-notes. Nobody spoke much. Apparently all present were
too deeply engrossed to waste time in conversation.
As I glanced about me I noticed several people I knew intimately, and
four or five I knew only by sight, people well known in Society. I was
on the point of bowing to one woman I knew, who, looking up, had caught
my eye; just in time I remembered that she would not recognize me in my
disguise. Then a man nodded to me, and I nodded back. He looked rather
surprised at seeing me, I thought, and at once it flashed across me that
of course he was under the impression that I was Sir Aubrey Belston, and
probably he had heard that Sir Aubrey was travelling round the world.
Gastrell, after a few minutes' conversation, found us places at a table
where "Sandown Park" was being played. As I seated myself I found,
facing me, Jasmine Gastrell, and for some moments I felt uncomfortable.
I could feel her gaze upon my face as she scrutinized me closely, but
even she did not penetrate my disguise.
"Lord Cranmere" sat upon the opposite side of the table, "Baron
Poppenheimer" on my side, two seats from me. On my right was one of the
unintelligent-looking women I had met at Connie Stapleton's dinner party
at the Rook Hotel in Newbury; on my immediate left a man I did not know.
Connie Stapleton I had looked about for, but she was nowhere visible.
So this was one of the ways Gastrell amassed money—he ran a
gaming-house! I now began to see his object in cultivating the
acquaintance of people of rank and wealth; for I had long ago noticed
that Jasmine and Hugesson Gastrell never missed an opportunity of
becoming acquainted with men and women of position. Also I began to
grasp Preston's line of action. Disguised as the Earl of Cranmere, who
was known to be extremely rich, he had cleverly ingratiated himself with
the Gastrells and led them on to think him rather a fool who could
easily be gulled. Jack had more than once told me how artfully Preston
played his cards when on the track of people he suspected and wished to
entrap, so that I could well imagine Preston's leading the Gastrells on
to ensnare him—as they no doubt supposed they were doing. For that he
would not have been admitted to this gambling den—it evidently became
one at night—unless the Gastrells had believed they could trust him
and his friends implicitly, I felt certain.
My friends tell me that I am a rather good actor, and Preston's coaching
in Sir Aubrey Belston's mannerisms and ways of talking had given me a
measure of self-confidence. When, therefore—I had played for a quarter
of an hour and won a good deal—Jasmine Gastrell suddenly addressed me,
I did not feel disconcerted.
"I mean to follow your lead," she said. "You are so extraordinarily
lucky. How is it you manage to win every time?"
"Not every time," I corrected. "It's quite easy if you set about it in
the right way."
"I wish I knew the right way," she answered, fixing her eyes on me in
the way I knew so well. "Won't you tell me how you do it?"
"Different people must 'do it,' as you put it, in different ways," I
said. "Forgive my asking, but are you superstitious?"
She broke into rippling laughter.
"Superstitious? I?" she exclaimed. "Oh, that's the last thing my enemies
would accuse me of being!"
I paused, looking hard at her.
"And yet," I said seriously, "judging by your eyes, I should say that
you are remarkably psychic, and most people who are psychic are
superstitious up to a point."
I went on looking at her, staring right into her eyes, which she kept
set on mine. She did not in the least suspect my identity—I was now
positive of that. I had spoken all the time in an assumed voice.
"Yes," I said at last, impressively.
"Yes what?" she asked quickly; she was not smiling now. "Why do you say
'yes' like that? What does it mean?"
Apparently our conversation disturbed some of the players, so I said to
her seriously, indicating an alcove at the end of the room:
"Let us go over there. I should like to talk to you."
She made no demur, and presently we sat together in the alcove, partly
concealed by palms and other plants, a small table between us.
"Now tell me how you win, and how I am to win," she exclaimed, as soon
as we were seated. "I should dearly love to know."
I reflected, as I sat looking at her, that she was a consummate actress.
I could not doubt that she ran this establishment in connection with
Gastrell, yet here she was feigning deep anxiety to discover how she
could win.
"I don't know your name," I said at last, ignoring her inquiry, "but you
are one of the most amazing women, I would say one of the most amazing
human beings, I have ever met."
"How do you know that—I mean what makes you say it?" she asked quickly,
evidently disconcerted at my solemnity and at the impressive way
I spoke.
"Your aura betrays it," I answered in the same tone. "Every man and
woman is surrounded by an aura, but to less than one in ten thousand is
the human aura visible. It is visible to me. The human aura betrays, in
too many cases, what I would call its 'victim.' Your aura betrays you."
I leaned forward across the table until my face was close to hers. Then,
still looking straight into her eyes, I said, almost in a whisper:
"Shall I tell you what I see? Shall I tell you what your life has been?"
She turned suddenly pale. Then, struggling to regain her composure, she
said after a brief pause, but in a tone that lacked conviction:
"I don't believe a word you say. Who are you? Whom have I the pleasure
of speaking to?"
"Sir Aubrey Belston," I answered at once. "You may have heard of me.
Good God—the things I see!"
I pretended to give a little shudder. My acting must have been good, for
on the instant she turned almost livid. Again she made a terrific effort
to overcome the terror that I could see now possessed her.
"I _will_ tell you what I see!" I exclaimed, suddenly snatching the
wrist of her hand which lay upon the table, and holding it tightly.
Though almost completely concealed by the palms and plants, she strove
to shrink still further out of sight, as though the players, engrossed
in their games, would have spared time to notice her.
My eyes met hers yet again, but the expression in her eyes had now
completely changed. In place of the bold, impelling look I had always
seen there, was a fearful, hunted expression, as though she dreaded
what I was going to say.
"I see a room," I said in a low, intense tone, holding her wrist very
tightly still. "It is not a large room. It is a first-floor room, for I
see the exterior of the house and the two windows of the room. I see the
interior again. Several people are there—I cannot see them all clearly,
but two stand out distinctly. One is Gastrell, to whom I have this
evening been introduced; the other is you; ah, yes, I see you now more
clearly than before, and I see now another man—handsome, fair, about
twenty-eight or thirty—I can see his aura too—his aura within your
aura—he loves you desperately—and—ah, I see something lying on the
floor—a woman—she is dead—you—"
Her thin wrist suddenly turned cold; her eyes were slowly closing. Just
in time I sprang to my feet to save her from falling off her chair, for
she had fainted.
None of the players were aware of what had happened; all were too deeply
engrossed. Without attempting to restore my companion to
consciousness—for, in the face of what I had now learned practically
beyond doubt to be a fact, I had no wish to revive her—I left her lying
in her chair, stepped noiselessly along behind the mass of plants which
occupied one side of the room, emerged further away, and presently took
a vacant seat at a _chemin-de-fer_ table.
I glanced at my watch. It was nearly two o'clock. Thinking over what had
just happened, and wondering what my next move had better be, and what
Jack and Preston intended doing, I stared carelessly about the room.
At all the tables play was still in progress. At some complete silence
prevailed. From others there arose at intervals a buzz of conversation.
Behind some of the lucky players stood groups of interested watchers.
About the sideboard were clustered men and women refreshing themselves,
the majority smoking and laughing, though a few looked strangely solemn.
Among the latter I suddenly noticed a face I had seen before. It was the
demure, dark little woman who at Connie Stapleton's dinner party had all
the evening seemed so subdued. She was dressed quietly now, just as she
had been then, and she looked even more out of place in this crowd of
men and women gamblers, all of whom were exceedingly well-dressed, than
she had looked at that dinner party. "There is only one person I should
be more surprised at seeing here," I said mentally, "and that
is Dulcie."
The thought of her made me wonder what she would think if she could see
me at this moment, when suddenly my heart seemed to stop beating.
Seated at the table nearest me but one, a table partly surrounded by a
group of excited onlookers, was Connie Stapleton. And close beside her,
engrossed in the game, Dulcie Challoner herself!