Early as it was in the adventure, Bert was already realising
the difficulties of the part he had to play. He had induced the
gratified--though suspicious and thankless--Ned to accept his services
in the matter of the horse; and, having seen him depart with a small
brown paper parcel--which furnished the outward evidence of his
intention to stay the night with his people--had harnessed the animal
again in good time, arrayed himself in the livery belonging to Ned, and
adorned his chin with the false beard provided by Madame Querterot,
so that no time should be wasted on his return. "I do look a guy," he
said to himself, as he contemplated his reflection in the strip of
looking-glass in the harness-room.
Nothing remained but to drive down to Covent Garden, and take his place
on the rank of waiting vehicles. This, he was surprised to find, was not
so easy as he had expected. He discovered that attempting to control
Mrs. Wilkinson's dun horse, which had a willing spirit and a hard mouth,
was a very different affair from driving the old and sluggish beast that
used to meander between the shafts of his uncle's van. Their progress
was erratic in the extreme, and he several times narrowly avoided an
accident. The Providence which looks after bad drivers did not fail
him, however, and at length he found himself, a good deal to his
surprise--for at one period of the journey hope had altogether deserted
him--forming one of the long string of motors and carriages that had
already drawn into line in the vicinity of the opera house.
Now began a time during which the fear that the expected summons would
never reach him alternated with something very like hope that it would
not. As he sat on the box, while minute after minute passed, and still
no voice cried for Mr. Targon's carriage, he was beset with ever
growing misgivings as to the appearance he presented, and felt that his
ill-fitting livery and the false beard, which the scarf he had wrapped
round his neck and chin only partially concealed, must be riveting upon
him the eyes of every beholder; so that not a look was cast in his
direction but he read in it distrust and suspicion.
Even the most seemingly interminable suspense comes to an end at last,
and he had not endured these torments more than a short half-hour before
the words for which he had been waiting fell upon his ear, and making
his way out of the line he succeeded in guiding the dun horse beneath
the portico of the theatre.
The safe accomplishment of this manoeuvre, however, fully occupied
his every faculty, and it was only when the carriage had come to a
standstill before the doors that he had time to glance in the direction
of the lady he was to carry off. With a shock of surprise and dismay he
saw that not one but two elegantly attired women were about to enter the
carriage.
He had not the courage for more than a feeble remonstrance; indeed, it
needed all the courage he could muster to lift up his voice at all in
the presence of the waiting attendants, and in the brilliant glare of
the lamps. After he had driven some way in increasing perplexity and
irresolution, he stopped, and tried again to induce Barbara to get out;
but the attention the ensuing discussion aroused from the passers-by
and the sight of an approaching policeman were too much for his nerves,
and he decided hastily to drive on and allow Madame Querterot to deal
with this unexpected complication. A glimpse of her face when they
arrived in Scholefield Avenue, and she saw what had happened, did not
add to his peace of mind. He drove round to Mrs. Wilkinson's stables,
extinguished the carriage lamps, and unharnessed the dun horse by the
light of his pocket electric torch as quietly and quickly as he might,
his heart sinking at the prospect of what she would say to him when he
returned. It was lucky that the stable gate opened on to such a lonely
street as the one which ran at the back of the gardens of the houses in
Scholefield Avenue.
A blank wall faced it across the road, studded at intervals with the
doors to the gardens at the back of the houses in Westford Avenue,
which lay beyond. There was another stable some hundred yards further
down; but, unless some one were awake and about in that direction, Bert
knew that there was little chance of his presence and movements being
discovered. Still he could not feel secure for a moment, and it was not
till he had put everything in some kind of order and shut the door of
the loose box behind him that he breathed again. He hurried round to No.
13, seeing the fancied forms of lurking policemen behind every tree and
in every shadow, and it was with a hand already shaking with agitation
that he gave the three taps on the door, with which it had been agreed
that he should signal his return to Madame Querterot.
She greeted him, as he had feared she would, with a storm of whispered
reproaches. What had he been thinking of to bring that girl to the
house? Was he mad? As she looked at him, however, in the light of the
gas jet which burned at the foot of the stairs, she saw plainly enough
that he was in a state of nervousness which she had not expected; and
that, if he was to be of any use to her in the crisis that was upon
them, she had better employ herself in soothing rather than adding to
his distress of mind.
"Well, well," she interrupted her own words, "it is perhaps of no such
great consequence. A little more trouble, possibly, for you; but of
that we will talk later. For the moment we must get to business. These
summer nights are short and we have much to do before morning. Go into
the dining-room, while I prevail upon Miss Turner to leave her friend.
I will put her in the library, where she will be out of the way for the
present."
After a few minutes, during which Bert waited, breathless, in the
darkness of the dining-room, she was back again, and announced in a
whisper that all was well. Barbara had been shown into the back room;
and upstairs Mrs. Vanderstein, alone and expectant, awaited the coming
of the Prince.
"She has got on all her jewels," sniggered the Frenchwoman, drawing on
her gloves. "And she little thinks that there are here two people who
appreciate them as her Prince never could. Ah! Bah! Are there imbeciles
in the world? Now then, my friend, you know what you have to do. We rush
into the room, you seize this fair creature and hold her fast, while I
administer a little whiff of chloroform that shall keep her quiet and
prevent any outcry, so that we can remove from her the gems at our ease.
See, I have the bottle ready. Allons donc; à la besogne!"
They went softly and quickly up the stairs. Now that the moment for
action had arrived, Bert's confidence was in some measure restored. The
sight of the diamonds glittering in the light of the brougham lamp,
when Mrs. Vanderstein had stood upbraiding him for his bad driving,
had sharpened his appetite for them, and the prospect of fingering the
shining things was a pleasant one. Inside the four walls of the house,
with the door bolted between them and the interfering outside world,
it seemed again safe and desirable enough to take her jewels from this
pampered member of the idle rich, and afterwards to lead her blindfolded
to some sequestered place, as they had planned, and there release her
to find her own way home. Even if she knew where the house was to which
she had been decoyed, it would be empty and discreetly silent by the
time she could bring to it the avenging hosts of the police. He himself
was so well disguised that she never could recognise him again; besides,
she would only see him for one moment. True, Madame Querterot was well
known to her, but Madame Querterot had her own plans for avoiding any
unpleasant consequences of their deed; so she had informed him, and
knowing her as he did, he never doubted her intention and capacity of
taking care of herself. A medley of these thoughts was in his mind as
they mounted the stairs, and paused for an instant at the drawing-room
door. No sound came from behind it, and with an encouraging whisper to
her companion Madame Querterot turned the handle and went in.
From the end of the room Mrs. Vanderstein rose to greet them, with a
radiant, blushing countenance. Always a beautiful woman, she had never
been more lovely than at this moment. The smile faded from her lips as
she realised that here was not the lover she looked to see; but before
she had time to speak Bert was beside her, clutching her round the
waist and dragging her back towards the sofa, while over the mouth she
opened with a remonstrating cry were clapped the plump hands of Madame
Querterot, holding between them something that choked her with its
sickly, overwhelming odour.
"See," said Madame Querterot, after a short interval, "see, she sleeps!"
But still she continued to hold the mouth of the bottle over Mrs.
Vanderstein's mouth and nose.
It was at this moment that the door was flung open, and Barbara rushed
into the room.
Bert sprang to meet her, fully alive to the undesirability of her
presence. It hardly needed Madame Querterot's cry of "Take her away,"
to make him grasp her by the arms, and half push, half carry her out
on to the landing and down the narrow stairs to the library, where
he left her after a minute or two safely locked in. He listened for
a little while outside the door, for he fancied the girl might raise
the alarm or do some unimagined, desperate thing which should imperil
their safety. She had already threatened to set fire to the house, and
he racked his brains to guess what might be her next move. He was in
no hurry to return to the drawing-room, moreover, for his heart was
beating unpleasantly fast, and the sight of the helpless lady they had
so violently treated, sinking quiet and motionless on to the sofa, had
filled him with vague discomfort.
After all--the thought would not be kept away any longer--what would
Julie think of all this? Could she ever be brought to care for a robber?
Yes, that was what he was--a robber. His fortifying socialistic claptrap
refused, somehow, to come to his aid in this hour of need. What would
Julie say? Already misgivings undermined his unstable resolves. He sat
down half-way up the stairs and buried his face in his hands.
It was ten minutes before he could make up his mind to go back to the
drawing-room.
Madame Querterot looked up quickly as he entered; she was on her knees
beside the unconscious form of Mrs. Vanderstein, engaged in unfastening
the clasp of a bracelet. A bright silk-covered cushion lay on the floor
beside her.
"Where have you been?" she said. "Come and help me to get these things
off."
Bert went over and stood opposite her. As his eyes rested on the figure
that lay so still upon the sofa, a horrible doubt leapt into his
mind. How white, how dreadful Mrs. Vanderstein looked! How quiet, how
motionless she was. Could she indeed be sleeping? There was no movement
to show that she breathed.
Bert looked at Madame Querterot.
"Madame Querterot!" was all he could find to say. But there was a world
of accusation in his hoarse tones, and the Frenchwoman, looking up in
reply to his words, was unable to stand the fixed stare with which he
glared into her face, as if expecting to read the terrible truth upon
it. Poor innocent, to look for the truth upon that face!
Still, for once, she could not meet his eyes, and her glance shifted
furtively to one side.
He knew now; and in the horror and rage which fell upon him he would
have struck her, if the sofa on which Mrs. Vanderstein was stretched had
not been between them.
With dropping jaw and eyes starting from his head he thrust his face
forward towards her.
"You have killed her!" he whispered.
Madame Querterot laughed a little nervously "It was an accident. I gave
her a little more chloroform than I had the intention."
"That is a lie. You meant to kill her all along. That cushion! You have
suffocated her! I see it now. Oh! I see it in your face; murderess!"
"Bert, don't be a fool!"
"Well, we'll see who's a fool," said he. "I am going for the police!"
"My good Bert, you are, as I say, a fool," said Madame Querterot,
resuming with an effort her usual assurance. "For what will you fetch
the police? What will you tell them, eh? That you brought this woman
here in some one else's carriage, which you stole for the purpose; and
that I killed her, I suppose? A likely story! When you are gone I shall
scream and run to Miss Turner, who knows me well; and her I shall tell
that you have done this thing, and that now you would murder me, and
her also. Do you think the police would believe that I have done it?
Why, I am not stronger than Mrs. Vanderstein; it is impossible that I
could have done it alone, and they will see that easily. But it is very
possible that you could have done it, and believe me, Bert, if you are
not sensible and do all that I tell you, it is you, and you alone, who
will dangle in the air as a sequel to this accident."
At this forecast, which he saw too plainly had a smack of probability
about it, Bert's resolution, never a dependable feature in his
composition, wavered and failed him. He flung himself down in a corner
of the room, bewailing his fate and cursing his companion with impartial
heartiness.
Madame Querterot waited till he had exhausted his powers of
recrimination, and busied herself in transferring the jewels from the
body of Mrs. Vanderstein to the bag she had provided for the purpose.
Then she had her turn.
"What," she cried, "did you actually suppose I was sufficiently imbecile
to contemplate allowing this woman to live, when her first act would
have been to have me arrested? How do you suppose either of us could
have escaped, when it was I who made all the arrangements with her that
she should come to this house, and when she knew as well as you do that
it was I that chloroformed her? I could not have done it without your
help, so that you are as responsible as I; and more, for it was you who
brought her to the house. You brought the other girl too, you great,
stupid, whimpering baby, and she will have to die as well before either
you or I are safe. And that will be entirely your doing, for if she had
not come she could have lived till Doomsday for all I cared. Now, what
you have to do is to get the spade which I brought this afternoon from
the tool house in the garden, and dig a grave under the trees at the
back of the house, where you can hide this." She patted the arm of Mrs.
Vanderstein with gruesome familiarity.
But Bert, sick and faint with horror, absolutely refused to do as he
was told in this matter. To go down into the starlit garden, to dig
for interminable hours in the open, with every shadow full of unknown
terrors, which would leap on him from out of the darkness, pounce on him
from behind, come creeping and gibbering at him with every leaf that
stirred or every chance footfall in a distant street! No. Again, it was
a long job to dig a grave; he knew that. The ground would be hard; he
would want a pickaxe. In any case he would not do it.
Nothing Madame Querterot could say shook him in this determination. She
was growing really anxious, for it wanted only two or three hours to
dawn, and it began to look as if the body must be left where it lay,
when, by a lucky inspiration, she thought of the flower stand on the
balcony. Would Bert help her there? It would be quicker done and less
dangerous if he would, but if needs must, she said, she could manage
that alone.
With a furious, shuddering sulkiness, Bert consented to help.
He opened a window and undid the fastening of the shutters. Then,
after putting out the gas, they stepped cautiously out on to the
balcony, Madame Querterot carrying the spade, and, stooping behind the
balustrade, peered anxiously up and down the deserted street. There
was no one to be seen or heard, and with frenzied haste they began to
pull up the plants which adorned the flower box. At Madame Querterot's
direction Bert ladled out shovelfuls of loose soil, till the box was
more than half empty and the balcony was heaped high with black mould.
They stole back to the drawing-room and Madame Querterot took from a
parcel that she had stored away in a corner of the room a bundle of
clothing, which she told Bert to carry downstairs and give to Miss
Turner to put on.
"It would never do," she said, "for either of them to be found with
clothes on them that could be identified as their own. It would be best
that never should they be found at all, but it is well to be prepared
for everything, and though I fear Mrs. Vanderstein is sure to come to
light sooner or later, I prefer to take even more precautions with
regard to Miss Turner, as I shall be obliged to leave the disposal
of her to your scanty wits. Tell the girl, therefore, some cock and
bull story about intending to help her to escape, so that she may
readily attire herself in these clothes, which I had intended for the
Vanderstein. They are all bought in different rag shops, and there is
nothing on any of them to identify them by. Tell her also to undo her
hair and to screw it up plainly so as to hide it as much as possible.
Now go and do as I say."
"But it is impossible," cried Bert, "that that girl should be killed
too. I cannot, I will not let you do it!"
"So far from letting me do it, my dear Bert," replied Madame Querterot
placidly, "it is probable that you will have to do it yourself. But we
will speak of that again."
Bert went reluctantly on his mission, and by the time he returned Madame
Querterot had undressed and decently enveloped the body in the chintz
cover of one of the sofas. Mrs. Vanderstein's clothes lay in a heap on
a chair near by, and the Frenchwoman was vainly trying, with a silken
petticoat, to rub away some large stains which appeared on the carpet,
beside the couch. As Bert came in she got up quickly, abandoning her
efforts.
"What is it?" he asked, "what is that on the floor?"
"Nothing. Only something I spilt. Some of the chloroform. It can easily
be hidden." And she pushed the sofa over the place.
She said nothing to Bert about the vitriol she had used, nor did he
suspect it till the following Thursday night, when he was obliged to
undergo the ghastly ordeal of seeing the body unearthed by Mr. Gimblet.
With a preliminary reconnaissance of the balcony to make sure that no
policeman was patrolling the street below, the young man and the woman
carried out the body of their victim, laid it in the grave they had made
ready, and then fell in silence to the task of restoring to the box the
mound of earth that was heaped upon the floor. When all was finished and
the flowers planted and blooming once more in their former places, there
still remained a quantity of soil for which there was no room in the
stand.
Madame Querterot fetched a couple of housemaid's pails and they carried
the superfluous mould out by the back door to the garden, where they
scattered it widely upon the flower beds. It was a slow business and
necessitated many journeys, but by now Bert, in a paroxysm of fear,
which was in part for his own neck and almost as much at the certainty
that he would irretrievably lose Julie if any trace should ever be
discovered of that night's work, showed himself more tractable, and by
the time they had made the place shipshape was ready to lend a receptive
ear to the proposals of his resourceful leader as to their future
conduct. At her suggestion they sat down opposite to one another in the
back of the drawing-room, to talk over the best means of averting even a
shadow of suspicion.
"We are safe enough," Madame Querterot asserted positively; "how is it
you say? safe as a church! Once the girl is disposed of, that is. Ah,
my friend, you made a mistake when you permitted the inclusion of Miss
Turner in the _partie_, but it is not impossible to remedy that error.
Here is the chloroform. What do you say? Shall we repeat the comedy
which we have just performed? For me, I am ready, for your sake, to do
my share."
"No, no," cried Bert with a shiver, "not that, not that! Besides," he
added weakly, "there is only one flower box on the balcony."
"It is true," mused the Frenchwoman, "that there is no room there for
another burial. And you still refuse to dig a grave? Perhaps to-morrow
night you will have more courage?" she suggested hopefully.
But of this Bert held out no hope. "It would take too long," he said. "I
might screw myself up to commence the job, but I simply couldn't stick
to it for an hour, no more than I could fly. I'll do what I can, Madame
Querterot; I don't want to be hung for your beastly murders, and if I
can't keep my neck out of a noose any other way I suppose I've got to do
what you say--within reason, that is. It's the girl's life or mine right
enough, I believe, and I can't be blamed for thinking of myself first
in such a case," said Bert, nearly crying; "though as a matter of fact
it's not so much myself I'm thinking of, in a manner of speaking, as
it's Joolie. A nice thing for her it would be, to have it said that her
mother was hung! A fair treat, that 'ud be!"
"It's very considerate of you, I'm sure, Bert, to take that view," said
Madame Querterot, with bitter sarcasm, "but it's no good talking like
that if you refuse to do anything to prevent such a scandal, which I
agree with you in thinking is one to be avoided if possible. Here is
another idea, though I think I am too patient with you, and shall not
waste much more time in trying to assist you out of a danger you have
yourself brought upon us. Suppose you take the girl out to a place where
there is some deep water--there is a canal near the Zoological Gardens,
is there not?--and push her in when she is walking beside it. She will
go with you willingly, if you let her think you are helping her to
escape, and you can find a pretext for attaching something heavy to her
first, so that she will not trouble us by rising again to the surface.
It should be easy to do on a dark night, and there is no moon now, as
you know."
Bert had plenty of objections to raise to this plan, and they discussed
others with no better result. In the end he was obliged to admit that
drowning offered the best and easiest solution to the difficulty, and
she wrung from him a promise that he would get rid of the unfortunate
young lady by this means on the following night.
In vain Madame Querterot urged the danger of delay, and the perils
which would attend on their keeping Barbara in the house for the next
twenty-four hours. Bert was obstinately determined not to venture forth
with her at this hour, for it wanted but a short time to sunrise and
any delay would mean that the culminating act must be performed after
the full darkness of the night had been diluted by the coming dawn. Even
Madame Querterot was obliged to admit that there was something in his
argument, and it was finally decided that he should wait till another
day had passed.
In the meantime the Frenchwoman, as had previously been arranged, would
lose no time in leaving England, carrying with her the jewels, which,
she assured Bert, would be very easy for her to dispose of in her own
country without detection, as she had old friends there who were "in
that business." She promised faithfully to send him one-half of the
proceeds as soon as she received the money.
"And then, mon cher," said she, "you and Julie will set up your little
_ménage_. I think you will find my daughter less capricious when I am
gone. She will be lonely, the poor little one, without her mother."
Madame Querterot's voice quavered with emotion at the thought, and she
lifted her handkerchief to her face to wipe away a tear--or was it to
conceal a smile?
In spite of all assurances, she was unable to impart to Bert her
confidence in their safety from suspicion.
"You'll see, something will give the whole show away," he kept saying,
half for the comfort of hearing himself contradicted. "Murder will out;
that's well known."
"It is impossible." Madame Querterot spoke with refreshing conviction.
"Absolutely impossible if you manage the canal affair with discretion.
Consider. You walk innocently along a public path by the waterside, with
a companion who, mon Dieu! is so maladroit as to stumble and to fall
in. If anyone should be attracted by the splash, or she should scream
and be heard, are you not doing your utmost to rescue her?--though,
if possible, at a different place on the bank to the spot at which she
displayed such unfortunate clumsiness--but that is a remote chance, for
with proper care you will be able to manage so that the contretemps
occurs at a point from which no noise will reach the ears of strangers."
"I know where there's a gap in the fence that runs along the park side
of the canal," Bert interrupted involuntarily.
"Mourning her loss," Madame Querterot went on, "but silently, you
understand, you continue your walk, and the world hears no more of Miss
Barbara Turner. Even if her body is eventually found, there will be
nothing on it which can be recognised as belonging to any particular
person; and who would connect the wearer of the clothes I have provided
with the fashionable young lady, who may, perchance, be missing from her
home in Grosvenor Street? No one. I repeat, no one. With regard to Mrs.
Vanderstein we are even more entirely beyond suspicion. In the first
place nobody will even enter this house for some weeks at least. When
they do so it is unlikely that the flower stand will be touched. Though
the plants will be renewed there will be no occasion, as far as I can
see, to disturb the soil to a regrettable depth. But admitting that luck
may go against us and the body be discovered, it will not be identified.
I cut off the initials that were embroidered on her chemise, and the
rest of the clothing I will take home with me now, and burn before I
start on my journey. And I have a still better idea for diverting any
suspicion from us. Listen to this."
And she expounded to Bert a plan, which made him open his eyes in
unwilling admiration of the coolness and courage of the woman. Such a
course as she proposed to adopt would have been entirely beyond his
powers, and well he knew it; indeed at first sight it seemed to require
an almost inhuman audacity to carry it out successfully. Her intention
was to go to a large hotel at some French watering place, Boulogne or
Dieppe for choice, and there to pass herself off as Mrs. Vanderstein for
a day or two, not long enough for the Jewess' friends to discover that
she was there, but long enough to allow no doubt to exist of her having
really been there when the fact should subsequently come to be known.
"I shall be far away by the time inquiries begin to reach to the other
side of the channel," she told Bert, "and the proprietor of the hotel
will answer all questions to our satisfaction. I shall so contrive that
it is not I who write my name in the visitors' book. The manager will
be so obliging as to do it for me when he hears that I have slightly
injured my finger. But I shall not be feeling very well, I shall need
repose after the journey. I think, yes, I think that I shall send for
the doctor. When he is gone I shall give out that he has told me to keep
to my room for a few days, and I shall therefore remain upstairs during
the whole of my visit. When I leave I shall have established beyond
doubt that the lady I impersonate was staying in the hotel when she was
being sought in London, and after that she will be looked for abroad.
Once the police have got the idea fixed in their stupid heads that Mrs.
Vanderstein has left England, they may dig up her body as soon as they
like, and I, for one, shall not feel a moment's anxiety."
"But," objected the startled Bert, "the people at the hotel will
describe you, and that will be a give away."
"They will describe me," said Madame Querterot airily, "or they will
describe Mrs. Vanderstein. It will be the same thing. We are much
alike, she and I. That is," she added hastily, "we were much alike. In
the matter of the colour of my hair, it is true, I must make a great
sacrifice. But I have resolved to forget the value that not I alone have
always attached to the golden hue of my _chevelure_, and to dye it black
this same morning, before I start on my travels. You see that I shrink
at nothing! I promise you that, with a dress such as the Vanderstein
would have worn and a trifling alteration in my colouring, you yourself
would have doubts as to who I am. There will be no risk to speak of,
though it is worth a little to cover my retreat by a stratagem so
masterly."
With Bert's aid the clothes belonging to the two ladies were folded
and made into a tidy parcel, then with a few more words of advice,
and a special recommendation never to come into the house without the
precaution of wearing gloves--for she was deeply impressed with the
dangers attendant on careless finger-prints--Madame Querterot said a
hasty farewell, the early summer dawn being at hand, and in another
moment the back door of the house had shut behind her vanishing figure.
Bert, left alone without the support of the woman's ready resource and
calm confidence, would have soon sunk again into despair if his time
had not been too much occupied to admit of reflection. He was by now,
besides, so tired and exhausted with the emotions he had undergone as to
be incapable of coherent thought, and he was more than content to give
his whole mind to carrying out the instructions he had received.
His first business was to get a brush from the cupboard under the
stairs and to sweep and brush the floor of the hall, and the carpets
of the stairs and drawing-room. He was awkward at the work, but made
up in thoroughness what he lacked in skill. Little shining pieces of
paste off Mrs. Vanderstein's dress were scattered everywhere; he swept
up quantities of them, but still some, better concealed than others,
escaped his diligence.
Then having set straight such of the furniture as had been moved or
disarranged, he quietly opened the dining-room shutters and those of the
back drawing-room, for he did not wish the place to look uninhabited.
The shutters of the front drawing-room, however, he could not bring
himself to touch, though he seemed to hear the words of scorn which
Madame Querterot would have used if she had still been present. He
listened at the door of the library for some time, but not a sound came
from within; at last, seeing no more to do, he stole quietly out of
the house and back to his lodgings, where, in spite of the fears that
pursued him and the dreadful memory of the night's work, he soon slept
the sleep of exhaustion.
Not for long, however. In a couple of hours his alarm clock awakened
him, and he started up to face the new terrors which the day would
bring. He had to feed the dun horse, he remembered; it would not do to
annoy Ned.
After that came breakfast, for which he was surprised to find he had a
certain appetite, and soon it was time to begin his daily routine at
Ennidge and Pring's office.
Every time the door opened that day, and on the days that succeeded it,
Bert expected to see a policeman enter. But the evening came without
any such nightmare materialising, and he even managed to snatch some
more uneasy slumber during the evening, before he once more assumed his
disguising beard and stealthily returned to the house in Scholefield
Avenue, knowing that before him lay far the worst part of the whole
business. He was too frightened for his own safety, however, to
hesitate.
Madame Querterot had counted on that when she mentally balanced his
regard for his own neck against what she would have designated his
milksoppy squeamishness. It was hard to stay in that house of death
alone and in the dark, waiting till the small hours, when his project
might be best entered upon.
Bert was very, very sorry for himself as he sat, trembling violently, in
an arm-chair in the dining-room. His pity did not extend to the other
side of the partition wall, where the girl whose life he was about to
take had sat in the same darkness and solitude for the last twenty-four
hours. For her, Bert, thoroughly selfish by nature and education--as,
cowering among the shadows in the grim company of his fears, he
shuddered away the hours--was shaken from start to finish by no
disabling pang of sympathy. Though at times his heart was like to burst
with compassion, it held barely enough to meet the urgent need of Albert
Tremmels; and when like her he heard the far-off murmurs which heralded
the approaching storm and the angry boom of the thunder began to rumble
closer and closer, though he started at each clap as if it were indeed
the wrathful voice of the Avenger drawing near to him, his whole being
cried out in resentful protest against this judgment that was being
passed on him in the heavens, and against the certainty that it would be
endorsed by mankind.
His intention was to wait till two o'clock, but it was not yet half-past
one when he got to his feet, unable to face his solitary vigil any
longer. Better get it over, he said to himself, like a patient in a
dentist's room who has got to have a tooth out. Only this tooth was not
his. He had long since decided that the spade would be the best thing to
ensure the sinking of his victim, and he had placed it, with a piece of
cord tied to it, ready by the door.
Weighted with that heavy piece of iron, so he comforted himself, there
would be a single splash and all would be over. He would be spared the
sight of a struggling figure rising to the surface, perhaps crying to
him for help or mercy, which above all things was what he most dreaded.
Fortifying himself with a mental vision, in which Julie, the hangman,
and the body in the flower stand upstairs were all mingled, he unlocked
the library door and pushed it open.
It is not necessary to tell again of his walk with Barbara through
the drenching rain and clamour of the storm, which was more severe
and prolonged than any of those that burst over London during a
year remarkable for the number and fierceness of its atmospheric
disturbances. The horror with which, at the last moment, as he was
trying to tie the spade to Barbara before pushing her into the water,
he beheld the running figure of the advancing policeman need not be
described. In a frenzy of disappointment, rage and fear, he lifted the
spade and struck at the girl again and again, missing her the first
time, and, as the handle twisted in his weak grasp, bringing it down
flat on the top of her head at the second blow, instead of edgeways as
he was trying to do. He did not stay to see the result, but throwing
down the spade fled for dear life.
His legs were long, and he could run fast for a short distance. In a
few minutes he had lost himself and his pursuer in the darkness, but
he still ran blindly on, till his utmost efforts would drag him no
further, when he threw himself at full length on one of the park seats
and endeavoured to still his panting, laboured breath. If the policeman
should come upon him now, he thought his only chance lay in being able
to simulate profound slumber. Luckily the working powers of this plan
were not put to the test. Minutes passed, and no one came near him.
It was some time before he could convince himself that he had eluded
all pursuit for the present. When he was at last sure of it the fact
heartened him wonderfully. If he could so easily escape when caught
in the actual perpetration of a violent attack, it would bother the
authorities indeed to fasten on him as one of those concerned in a crime
so well concealed as that in which he had only unwillingly assisted.
It was when he remembered that he was quite ignorant of the damage he
had inflicted on Barbara that doubts assailed him again. It seemed to
him that he must have killed her. But if not ... if not? Why then,
even though she could hardly denounce him, she would not forget Madame
Querterot. And Madame Querterot's first line of defence would be to
accuse him, as she herself had declared.
Curse the woman, how he hated her! From first to last everything was her
doing; he wished, oh, how he wished that it was she he had killed. If he
had thought of that sooner, he told himself savagely, all these troubles
would have been saved. As things were he would probably be arrested that
day.
He did not lose his head, however, and went back presently to
Scholefield Avenue, where he cleared away the broken glass in the
library and put everything in that room to rights, as he had already
done upstairs. Then he conquered his repugnance and went out on to the
balcony with his brush, and swept up a handful or so of earth, which
they had not been able to remove with the spade.
He did not know how to get rid of the broken glass, as by now it was
daylight and he did not dare go out to bury it in the garden; so
he left it in the dustpan, and swept the grains of soil into an old
newspaper, which he crumpled up and thrust into the back of the cupboard
in the basement. Then he closed the shutters again, for he could not
bear to be a moment in the room without the friendly screen that
interposed between him and the flower stand. Finding, however, no more
to do upstairs, he went down, and knocked out the pieces of the window
pane in the library that still remained stuck in the frame; he thought
that the empty space might well pass unobserved for a considerable time.
In doing this he cut his hand, through the glove he was wearing in
obedience to Madame Querterot's reiterated commands, and some drops of
blood fell on to the shining tin of the dustpan, but he wiped them off
carefully and polished the pan with his sleeve as it had certainly never
been polished since it left the shop and entered into domestic service.
At last his anxious mind could suggest nothing further, and he surveyed
the results of his efforts with some complacency.
"I'm bothered," said Bert to himself, "if the brainiest detective on
this rotten earth could set his fingers on a clue now."