A CHANGE OF FRONT
HE found the task no easy one, however, although he went at it with his
characteristic vigor and energy. Few men knew the seamy side of London
better than John Steele: its darksome streets and foul alleys, its
hovels and various habitations. And this knowledge he utilized to the
best advantage, always to find that his efforts came to naught. The
snares he set before possible hiding-places proved abortive; the
artifices he employed to uncover the quarry in maze or labyrinth were
fruitless. The man had appeared like a vision from the past, and
vanished. Whither? Out of the country, once more? Over the seas? Had he
taken quick alarm at Steele's words, and effected a hasty retreat from
the scenes of his graceless and nefarious career?
Reluctantly John Steele found himself forced to entertain the
possibility of this being so; otherwise the facilities at his command
were such that he should most likely, ere this, have been able to attain
his end, find what he sought. Soberly attired, he attracted no very
marked attention in the slums,--breeding spots of the criminal classes;
the denizens knew John Steele; he had been there oft before.
He had, on occasion, assisted some of them with stern good advice or
more substantial services. He was acquainted with these men and women;
had, perhaps, a larger charity for them than most people find it
expedient to cherish. His glance had always seemed to read them through
and through, with uncompromising realization of their infirmities,
weaknesses of the flesh and inherited moral imperfections. His very
fearlessness had ever commended him to that lower world; it did now,
enabling him the better to cast about in divers directions.
To hear nothing, to learn nothing, at least, very little! One man had
seen the object of Steele's solicitude and to this person, a weazened
little "undesirable," the red-headed giant had confided that London was
pretty hot and he thought of decamping from it.
"'Arter all this time that's gone by,' he says to me, bitter-like, 'to
think a man can't come back to 'is native 'ome without being spied on
for what ought long ago to be dead and forgot!' But you're not trying to
lay hands on 'im, to put 'im in the pen, gov'ner?"
"I?" A singular glint shot from Steele's gaze. "No, no, my man, I'm not
seeking him for that. But he didn't say where he expected to go?"
"Not he."
"Nor what had brought him to London?"
"I expect it was 'omesickness, sir. 'E's been a bad lot, but 'e has a
heart, arter all. It was to see 'is mother 'e came back; the old woman
drew 'im 'ere. You see 'e had written 'er from foreign parts, but could
never 'ear; 'cause she had moved; used to keep a place where a woman was
found--"
"Dead?"
"Murdered!" said the man; John Steele was silent. "And she, 'is mother
'ad gone, 'aving saved a bit, out into a peaceable-like little 'amlet,
where there weren't no bobbies, only instead, bits of flower gardens and
bright bloomin' daffy-down-dillies. But, blime me, when Tom come and
found out where she 'ad changed to, if she 'adn't gone and shuffled off,
and all 'e 'ad for 'is pains was the sight of a mound in the
churchyard."
"Yes; she's buried," said John Steele thoughtfully, "and all she might
have told about the woman who was--murdered, is buried with her."
"But she did tell, sir; at the time," quickly, "of the trial."
"True." The visitor's tone changed. "If you can find Tom, give him this
note; you'll be well paid--"
"I ain't askin' for that; you got me off easy once and gave me a lift,
arter I was let out--"
"Well, well!" Steele made a brusk gesture. "We all need a helping hand
sometimes," he said turning away.
And that was as near as he had come to attainment of his desires.
Summer passed; sometimes, the better to think, to plan, to keep himself
girded by constant exercise, he repaired to the park, now neglected by
fashion and given over to that nebulous quantity of diverse qualities
called the people. Where fine gentlemen and beaux had idled,
middle-class nurse-maids now trundled their charges or paused to
converse with the stately guardians of the place. Almost deserted were
roads and row; landau, victoria and brougham, with their varied
coats-of-arms, no longer rolled pompously past; only the occasional
democratic cab, of nimble possibilities, speeding by with a fare lent
pretext of life to the scene. True, the nomad appeared in ever
increasing numbers, holding his right to the sward for a couch as an
inalienable privilege; John Steele encountered him on every hand. Once,
beneath a great tree, where Jocelyn Wray and he had stopped their horses
to talk for a moment, the bleared, bloated face of what had been a man
looked up at him. The sight for an instant seemed to startle the
beholder; a wave of anger at that face, set in a place where imagination
had an instant before played with a picture altogether different, passed
over him; then quickly went.
As he strode forward at a swinging pace, his thoughts swept swiftly
again into another channel, one they had been flowing in when he had
first entered the park that day. Above him the leaves rustled
ceaselessly; their restless movements seemed in keeping with his mood
wherein impatience mingled with other and fiercer emotions. Fate had
been against him, the inevitable "what must be," which, in the end,
crushes alike Faintheart or Strongheart. Of what avail to square his
shoulders? the danger pressed close; he felt it, by that intuition men
sometimes have. What if he left, left the field, this England? Who could
accuse him of cowardice if in that black moment he yielded to the
hateful course and went, like the guilty, pitiable skulkers?
"How do you do, Steele? Just the man I wanted to see!"
Near the main exit, toward which John Steele had unconsciously stepped,
the sound of a familiar voice and the appearance of a well-known stocky
form broke in, with startling abruptness, on the dark train of thought.
"Deep in some point of law?" went on Sir Charles. "'Pon honor, believe
you would have cut me. However, don't apologize; you're forgiven!"
"Most amiable of you to say so, Sir Charles!" perfunctorily.
"Not at all! Especially as our meeting is quite apropos. Obliged to run
up to town on a little matter of business; but, thank goodness, it's
done. Never saw London more deserted. Dined at the club, nobody there.
Supped at the hotel, dining-room empty. Strolled up Piccadilly, not a
soul to be seen. That is," he added, "no one whom one has seen before,
which is the same thing. But how did you enjoy your trip to the
continent?"
"It was not exactly a trip for pleasure," returned the other with a
slight accent of constraint.
"Ah, yes; so I understood. But fancy going to the continent on business!
One usually goes for--which reminds me, how would you like to go back
into the country with me?"
"I? It is impossible at the moment for--"
But Sir Charles seemed not to listen. "Deuced dull journey for a man to
take alone; good deal of it by coach. You'll find a few salmon to
kill--trout and all that. Think of the joy of whipping a stream, after
having been mewed up all these months in the musty metropolis! Besides,
I made a wager with Jocelyn you wouldn't refuse a second opportunity to
bask in Arcadia." He laughed. "'I really couldn't presume to ask him
again,' is the way she expressed it, 'but if you can draw a sufficiently
eloquent picture of the rural attractions of Strathorn to woo him from
his beloved dusty byways, you have my permission to try.'"
"Did she say that?" John Steele spoke quickly. Then, "I am sorry, it is
impossible, but," in a low tone, "how is Miss Wray?"
"Never better. Enjoying every moment. Jolly party and all that. Lord
Ronsdale and--" Here Sir Charles enumerated a number of people.
"Lord Ronsdale is there?"
"Yes; couldn't keep him away from Strathorn House now," he laughed. "As
a matter of fact he has asked my permission to--there!" Sir Charles
stopped, then laughed again with a little embarrassment. "I've nearly
let the cat out of the bag."
John Steele spoke no word; his face was set, immovable; his lashes
shaded his eyes. A flood of traffic at a corner held them; he appeared
attentive only for it. The wheels pounded and rattled; the whips snapped
and cracked.
"You mean he has proposed for her hand and she--" Steele seemed to speak
with difficulty--"has consented?"
The noise almost drowned the question but Sir Charles heard.
"Well, not exactly. She appears complaisant, as it were," he answered.
"But really, I shouldn't have mentioned the matter at all; quite
premature, you understand. Let's say no more about it. And--what was it
you said about going back with me?"
"Yes," said John Steele with a sudden strength and energy that Sir
Charles might attribute to the desire to make himself understood above
the din of the street. "I'll go back with you at"--the latter words,
lower spoken, the other did not catch--"no matter what cost!"
Sir Charles dodged a vehicle; he did not observe the light, the fire,
the sudden play of fierce, dark passion on his companion's face.
"Good!" he said. "And when you get tired of 'books in the running
brooks'--"
Steele's hand closed on his arm. "When do you leave?" he asked abruptly.
"To-day--to-morrow--Suit your convenience."
"Let it be to-day, then! To-day!"
Sir Charles looked at him quickly; John Steele's face recovered its
composure.
"I believe I have become weary of what your niece calls the 'dusty
byways,'" he explained with a forced laugh.
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