When the Countess had gone, leaving behind her a sweet breath of
"Ideale," that newest invention of the Parisian perfumer, I sat with my
elbows idly upon the table, pondering over her strange words and
becoming more than ever puzzled.
Beauty may be only skin-deep, yet it makes a very deep impression. The
brilliant woman who was my dear friend's wife had never captivated me.
Nevertheless I had seen in her a genuine desire for reform and had
therefore given her my promise. Still the mystery of it all seemed to
increase, instead of diminish.
The Earl of Stanchester had, of course, seen the dead man on the morning
after the discovery, but had not recognised him. At least it was quite
clear that he had no suspicion whatever of who the young man really
might be.
From a drawer I took that piece of paper with those puzzling numerals
upon it which I had managed to obtain in secret. The cipher was,
however, utterly unreadable. Staring at the paper I sat wondering what
was written there. If only I could learn the meaning of those figures,
then I knew that the truth would quickly become revealed.
Only that morning I had received a response from an expert in cipher--
one of the officials at the Record Office in London--to whom I had
submitted a copy of that tantalising document.
"This," he wrote, "is what is known as the checker-board cipher, a
numerical cipher invented by a Russian revolutionist some forty years
ago, and of all secret means of correspondence is the most complicated
and ingenious. It is absolutely undecipherable unless the keyword or
words agreed upon by the two correspondents be known, and it is
therefore much used by Anarchists and Revolutionists. The meaning of
the present cipher can never be solved until you gain knowledge of the
keyword used, for in writing it the numbers representing each letter of
that word are added to the numbers representing each letter of the
message. Therefore, in deciphering, the proper subtraction must be made
before any attempt can be successful in learning the message contained.
I enclose you a copy of the checker-board used in writing the cipher,
but without knowledge of the keyword this can be of no use whatever. It
will, however, serve to show you what an extremely ingenious cipher it
is, devised as it has been by a Russian of quick and subtle intellect,
and used as means of secret communication in the constant plots against
the Russian aristocracy. In the Russian prisons this square with its
five numbers and twenty-five letters is used in a variety of ways, for
most political prisoners have committed it to memory. If two persons
are in separate cells, for instance, and one wishes to communicate with
the other, who in all probability is acquainted with the use of the
square, he will ask, `Who are you?' by rapping on the wall, thus, 5
raps, a pause, 2 raps, a pause (W); 2 raps, a pause, 3 raps, a pause
(H); 3 raps, a pause, 4 raps, a pause (O); and so on until the whole
question is rapped out. This is the way in which the cipher you have
submitted to me is written, but in this case, as I have said, with the
numbers of the keyword added. Discover that, and the secret here will
be yours."
Enclosed was a half sheet of note-paper on which was drawn the following
device:--
- 1 2 3 4 5
1 A B C D E
2 F G H I K
3 L M N O P
4 Q R S T U
5 V W X Y Z
Ah! If only I could read what was written there! I placed the key
beside the message, but saw that all the numbers were higher than those
of the checker board, showing that the unknown keyword had been added,
thus rendering the cipher secure from any save the person aware of the
pre-arranged word. If, however, the expert failed to decipher what was
written there, how could I hope to decipher it? I therefore replaced
the papers in the drawer regretfully, locked it, and went upstairs to
the long, old-fashioned room set apart for me when I dined and slept at
the Hall.
My thoughts were full of Lolita and of the curious effect the news of
Richard Keene's return had produced upon the Countess. For a long time
I sat gazing out across the park, flooded as it was by the bright white
light of the harvest moon.
My window was open, and the only sound that reached me there was the
distant barking of the hounds in the kennels and the bell of the old
Norman church of Sibberton striking two o'clock.
Over there, beyond the long dark line of the avenue, was the spot where
the tragedy had been enacted, the spot where, in the clay, was left the
imprints of Lolita's shoes. Time after time I tried to get rid of those
grave suspicions that ever rose within me, but could not succeed. The
evidence against my love, both confirmed by her own words and by the
circumstances of the affair, was so strong that they seemed to convey an
overwhelming conviction.
Yet somehow the Countess herself seemed to have united with Lolita in
order to preserve the secret. Their interests, it seemed, were
strangely identical. And it was this latter fact that rendered the
enigma even more puzzling than ever.
Next day the guests shot over at Banhaw, the Countess accompanying them,
but "cubbing" having just opened, the Earl was out with the hounds at
five o'clock at the Lady Wood.
A letter I received by the morning post from Lolita at Strathpeffer told
of a gay season at the Spa, for quite a merry lot of well-known people
always assemble there in early autumn and many pleasant entertainments
are given. One passage in the letter, however, caused me considerable
apprehension. "If Marigold should question you regarding the
re-appearance of a certain person at the inn in Sibberton, tell her
_nothing_. She must not know."
What could she mean? Unfortunately her warning had come too late! I
had told the Countess exactly what was contrary to my love's interests.
Could any situation be more perilous or annoying?
When I recollected her ladyship's words of the previous night I saw with
chagrin how clever and cunning she was, and with what marvellous tact
she had succeeded in eliciting the truth from me.
Pink came in during the afternoon, and flinging himself into the
armchair opposite me, took a pinch of snuff with his usual nonchalant
air.
"Thought you'd be out cubbing this morning," he commenced. "Too early
for you--eh? We killed a brace in Green Side Wood. Frank Gordon was
there, of course. He's as keen a sportsman as he ever was, and rides as
straight as half the young ones. Wonderful man! They say he used, back
in the fifties, to ride seventy miles to the meet, hunt all day, and
ride home again. That's what I call a sportsman!"
"Yes," I said. "There are few left nowadays like old Frank Gordon. He
was one of the hunting crowd at the Haycock at Wansford in the old days
when men rode hard, drank hard, and played hard. He did the first, but
always declares that his present good health is due to abstinence from
the other two."
The old gentleman we were speaking of was the _doyen_ among hunting-men
in the Midlands. He had hunted with the Belvoir half a century ago, and
was as fine a specimen of an Englishman as existed in these degenerate
days when men actually go to meets in motor cars.
The doctor himself hunted, as indeed did every one, the parson of
Sibberton included, and the opening of "cubbing" was always a time of
speculation as to what the season was to be, good or bad. The Earl had
been delighted at his success at winning the cup for the best dog-hound
at the Hound Show at Doncaster back in July, and certainly the pack was
never in better form even under the old Earl than it was at present. Of
course he spent money lavishly upon it, and money, as is so often the
case, meant efficiency. The thousand pounds or so subscribed annually
by the Hunt was but a drop in the ocean of expenditure, for a Master of
Hounds, if he wishes to give his followers good sport, must be a rich
man and not mind spending money to secure that end.
"I had a funny adventure last night," the doctor remarked presently,
after we had discussed the prospects of hunting and all appertaining to
it. "Devilish funny! I can't make it out. Of course you won't say a
word of what I tell you, for we doctors aren't supposed to speak about
our patients."
"I sha'n't say anything," I assured him.
"Well, I was called out about eleven last night, just as I was going up
to bed, by an old labourer who drove into Sibberton in a light cart, and
who told me that a woman was lying seriously ill at a farmhouse which he
described as beyond Cherry Lap. It was out of my district, but he told
me that he had been into Thrapston, but one doctor was out at a case and
the other was away, therefore he had driven over to me. From what he
said the case seemed serious, therefore I mounted my horse and rode
along at his side in the moonlight. The night was lovely. We went by
Geddington Chase, through Brigstock, and out on the Oundle Road, a good
eleven miles in all, when he turned up a narrow drift for nearly
half-a-mile where stood a small lonely farmhouse on the edge of a
spinney. The place was in darkness, but as soon as I had dismounted the
door opened, and there appeared a big powerful-looking man, holding a
candle in his hand, and behind him was the figure of an old woman, who
made a remark to him in a low voice. Then I heard a man somewhere
speaking in some foreign language."
"A foreign language?" I remarked, quickly interested.
"Yes. That's what first aroused my suspicion," he said. "I was taken
upstairs, and in a rather poorly-furnished room found a person in bed.
The light had been purposely placed so that I could not see the features
distinctly, and so dark was the corner where the patient lay that at
first I could distinguish nothing.
"My daughter here has--well, she's met with a slight accident," the
sinister-looking fellow explained, standing behind me, and then as he
shifted the paraffin lamp a little there was revealed a young woman,
dark-haired and rather good-looking, lying pale and insensible. Upon
the pillow was a quantity of blood, which had, I saw, flowed from an
ugly gaping wound on the left side of the neck--distinctly a
knife-wound.
"`Accident!' I exclaimed, looking at the man. `Why, she couldn't have
inflicted such a wound as that herself. Who did it?' `Never mind,
doctor, who did it,' the fellow growled surlily. `You sew it up or
something. This ain't the time for chin--the girl may die.' He was a
rough customer, and I did not at all like the look of him. I was,
indeed, sorry that I had entered there, for both he and the woman also
in the room were a very mysterious pair. Therefore I got the latter to
bring some warm water, and after a little time succeeded in sewing the
wound and properly bandaging it. Just as I had finished, the young
woman gradually recovered consciousness. `Where am I?' she inquired in
a faint, rather refined voice. `Hold your jaw!' roughly replied the
fellow. `If you don't it'll be the worse for you!' `But, where's
George?' she demanded. `Oh, don't bother about him,' was the gruff
injunction. `Ah!' she shrieked suddenly, raising herself in her bed and
glaring at him wildly. `I know the truth! I remember now! You caught
him by the throat and you strangled him?--you coward! You believe that
Dick Keene doesn't know about the Sibberton affair, but he does.
They've seen him, and told him everything--how--' The man turned to her
with his fist raised menacingly saying, `Lie quiet! you silly fool! If
you don't, you'll be sorry for it! No more gab now!' Then turning to
me he said with a short harsh laugh, `The girl's a bit off her head,
doctor. Come, let's go downstairs!' And he hurried me out lest she
should make any more allegations.
"My first inclination was to remain and question her, yet it seemed
clear that I was among a very queer lot, and that discretion was the
best course. Therefore I followed the man down, although my patient
shrieked aloud for me to return."
"By Jove!" I exclaimed, aroused to activity by mention of the man
Keene. "That was a strange adventure--very strange!"
"Yes," he continued. "The fellow evinced the greatest anxiety that I
should leave, pressed into my hand half-a-sovereign as a fee, and again
assured me that the girl's mind was wandering. Again and again she
called after me `Doctor! doctor!' but in a room beyond I again heard
men's voices, speaking low in a foreign language, therefore I hesitated,
and presently mounted my mare and rode away. Now," he added, taking
another long pinch of snuff, "what do you make out of it, Woodhouse?"
"Seems very much as though there's been another tragedy," I remarked.
"I wonder who the injured girl is?" I added, utterly amazed at his
narrative.
"I wonder," he added, "and who is this man Keene who knows all about the
Sibberton affair? Could she have been referring to the tragedy in the
park, do you think?"
"Yes, undoubtedly," I said quickly. "We must return there, get to see
her in secret, and hear her story."
"The worst of it is that as I was there at night, just at a time when
the moon was hidden behind the clouds, I doubt whether I'll be able to
recognise the place again."
"Let's try," I suggested eagerly, springing up. "Don't let us lose an
instant. I have a suspicion that we're on the track of the truth."