NO. 218, BRUNSWICK SQUARE
The emotion of surprise seemed to have left Steel altogether. After the
last discovery he was prepared to believe anything. Had anybody told him
that the whole Bench of Bishops was at the bottom of the mystery he would
have responded that the suggestion was highly probable.
"Still, it's what the inimitable Dick Swiveller would call a
staggerer," he muttered. "Gates, the millionaire, the one great
capitalist who has the profound respect of the labour world. No, a man
with a record like that couldn't have anything to do with it. Still, it
must have been from his house that the mysterious message came. The
post-office people working the telephone trunk line would know that--a
fact which probably escaped the party who called me up.... I'll go to
Brunswick Square and see that woman. Money or no money, I'll not lie
under an imputation like this."
There was one thing to be done beforehand, and that was to see Dr. Cross.
From the latter's manner he evidently knew nothing of the charge hanging
over Steel's head. Marley was evidently keeping that close to himself and
speaking to nobody.
"Oh, the man is better." Cross said, cheerfully. "He hasn't been
identified yet, though the Press has given us every assistance. I fancy
the poor fellow is going to recover, though I am afraid it will be a
long job."
"He hasn't recovered consciousness, then?"
"No, and neither will he for some time to come. There seems to be a
certain pressure on the brain which we are unable to locate, and we dare
not try the Röntgen rays yet. So on the whole you are likely to escape
with a charge of aggravated assault."
David smiled grimly as he went his way. He walked the whole distance to
Hove along North Street and the Western Road, finally turning down
Brunswick Square instead of _up_ it, as he had done on the night of the
great adventure. He wondered vaguely why he had been specially instructed
to approach the house that way.
Here it was at last, 219, Brunswick Square--220 above and, of course, 218
below the house. It looked pretty well the same in the daylight, the same
door, the same knocker, and the same crimson blind in the centre of the
big bay window. David knocked at the door with a vague feeling of
uncertainty as to what he was going to do next. A very staid,
old-fashioned footman answered his ring and inquired his business.
"Can--can I see your mistress?" David stammered.
The staid footman became, if possible, a little more reserved. If the
gentleman would send in his card he would see if Miss Ruth was
disengaged. David found himself vaguely wondering what Miss Ruth's
surname might be. The old Biblical name was a great favourite of his.
"I'm afraid I haven't a card," he said. "Will you say that Mr. Steel
would like to see--er--Miss Ruth for a few minutes? My business is
exceedingly pressing."
The staid footman led the way into the dining-room. Evidently this was no
frivolous house, where giddy butterflies came and went; such gaudy
insects would have been chilled by the solemn decorum of the place. David
followed into the dining-room in a dreamy kind of way, and with the
feeling that comes to us all at times, the sensation of having done and
seen the same thing before.
Nothing had been altered. The same plain, handsome, expensive furniture
was here, the same mahogany and engravings, the same dull red walls, with
the same light stain over the fire-place--a dull, prosperous,
square-toed-looking place. The electric fittings looked a little
different, but that might have been fancy. It was the identical room.
David had run his quarry to earth, and he began to feel his spirits
rising. Doubtless he could scheme some way out of the difficulty and
spare his phantom friends at the same time.
"You wanted to see me, sir? Will you be so good as to state your
business?"
David turned with a start. He saw before him a slight, graceful figure,
and a lovely, refined face in a frame of the most beautiful hair that he
had ever seen. The grey eyes were demure, with just a suggestion of mirth
in them; the lips were made for laughter. It was as if some dainty little
actress were masquerading in Salvation garb, only the dress was all
priceless lace that touched David's artistic perception. He could imagine
the girl as deeply in earnest as going through fire and water for her
convictions. Also he could imagine her as Puck or Ariel--there was
rippling laughter in every note of that voice of hers.
"I--I, eh, yes," Steel stammered. "You see, I--if I only knew whom I had
the pleasure of addressing?"
"I am Miss Ruth Gates, at your service. Still, you asked for me by name."
David made no reply for a moment. He was tripping over surprises again.
What a fool he had been not to look out the name of the occupant of 219
in the directory. It was pretty evident that Gilead Gates had a house in
Brighton as well as one in town. Not only had that telephone message
emanated from the millionaire's residence, but it had brought Steel to
the philanthropist's abode in Brighton. If Mr. Gates himself had strolled
into the room singing a comic song David would have expressed no emotion.
"Daughter of the famous Gilead Gates?" David asked, feebly.
"No, niece, and housekeeper. This is not my uncle's own house, he has
merely taken this for a time. But, Mr. Steel--"
"Mr. _David_, Steel--is my name familiar to you?"
David asked the question somewhat eagerly. As yet he was only feeling
his way and keenly on the lookout for anything in the way of a clue. He
saw the face of the girl grow white as the table-cover, he saw the
lurking laughter die in her eyes, and the purple black terror dilating
the pupils.
"I--I know you quite well by reputation," the girl gasped. Her little
hands were pressed to her left side as if to check some deadly pain
there. "Indeed, I may say I have read most of your stories. I--I hope
that there is nothing wrong."
Her self-possession and courage were coming back to her now. But the
spasm of fear that had shaken her to the soul was not lost upon Steel.
"I trust not," he said, gravely. "Did you know that I was here two
nights ago?"
"Here!" the girl cried. "Impossible! In the house! The night before last!
Why, we were all in bed long before midnight."
"I am not aware that I said anything about midnight," David
responded, coldly.
An angry flush came sweeping over the face of the girl, annoyance at her
own folly, David thought. She added quickly that she and her uncle had
only been down in Brighton for three days.
"Nevertheless, I was in this room two nights ago," David replied. "If you
know all about it, I pray you to give me certain information of vital
importance to me; if not, I shall be compelled to keep my extraordinary
story to myself, for otherwise you would never believe it. Do you or do
you not know of my visit here?"
The girl bent her head till Steel could see nothing but the glorious
amber of her hair. He could see, too, the fine old lace round her throat
was tossing like a cork on a stream.
"I can tell you nothing," she said. "Nothing, nothing, nothing."
It was the voice of one who would have spoken had she dared. With
anybody else Steel would have been furiously angry. In the present case
he could only admire the deep, almost pathetic, loyalty to somebody who
stood behind.
"Are you sure you were in this house?" the girl asked, at length.
"Certain!" David exclaimed. "The walls, the pictures, the
furniture--all the same. I could swear to the place anywhere. Miss
Gates, if I cannot prove that I was here at the time I name, it is
likely to go very hard with me."
"You mean that a certain inconvenience--"
"Inconvenience! Do you call a charge of murder, or manslaughter at best,
inconvenient? Have you not seen the local papers? Don't you know that two
nights ago, during my absence from home, a strange man was practically
done to death in my conservatory? And during the time of the outrage, as
sure as Heaven is above us, I was in this room."
"I am sorry, but I am sure that you were not."
"Ah, you are going to disappoint me? And yet you know something. You
might have been the guiltiest of creatures yourself when I disclosed my
identity. No prisoner detected in some shameful crime ever looked more
guilty than you."
The girl stood there, saying nothing. Had she rang the bell and ordered
the footman to put him out of the house, Steel would have had no cause
for complaint. But she did nothing of the kind. She stood there torn by
conflicting emotions.
"I can give you no information," she said, presently. "But I am as
positive one way as you are another that you have never been in this
house before. I may surmise things, but as I hope to be judged fairly I
can give you no information. I am only a poor, unhappy girl, who is doing
what she deems to be the best for all parties concerned. And I can tell
you nothing, nothing. Oh, won't you believe that I would do anything to
serve you if I were only free?"
She held out her hand with an imploring gesture, the red lips were
quivering, and her eyes were full of tears. David's warm heart went out
to her; he forgot all his own troubles and dangers in his sympathy for
the lovely creature in distress.
"Pray say no more about it," he cried. He caught the outstretched hand in
his and carried it to his lips. "I don't wish to hurry you; in fact,
haste is dangerous. And there is ample time. Nor am I going to press you.
Still, before long you may find some way to give me a clue without
sacrificing a jot of your fine loyalty to--well, others. I would not
distress you for the world, Miss Gates. Don't you think that this has
been the most extraordinary interview?"
The tears trembled like diamonds on the girl's long lashes and a smile
flashed over her face. The sudden transformation was wonderfully
fascinating.
"What you might call an impossible interview," she laughed. "And all the
more impossible because it was quite impossible that you could ever have
been here before."
"When I was in this room two nights ago," David protested, "I saw---"
"Did you see me, for instance? If not, you couldn't have been here."
A small, misshapen figure, with the face of a Byron--Apollo on the bust
of a Satyr--came in from behind the folding doors at the back of the
dining-room carrying some letters in his hand. The stranger's dark,
piercing eyes were fixed inquiringly upon Steel.
"Bell," the latter cried; "Hatherly Bell! you have been listening!"
The little man with the godlike head admitted the fact, coolly. He
had been writing letters in the back room and escape had been
impossible for him.
"Funny enough, I was going to look you up to-day," he said. "You did me
a great service once, and I am longing to repay you. I came down here to
give my friend Gates the benefit of my advice and assistance over a
large philanthropic scheme he has just evolved. And, writing letters
yonder on that subject, I heard your extraordinary conversation. Can I
help you, Steel?"
"My dear fellow," David cried, "if you offered me every intellect in
Europe I should not choose one of them so gladly as yours."
"Then let us shake hands on the bargain. And now I am going to stagger
you; I heard you state positively that two nights ago you were in this
very room."
"I am prepared to testify the fact on oath anywhere, my dear Bell."
"Very well; will you be good enough to state the hour?"
"Certainly. I was here from one o'clock--say between one and two."
"And I was here also. From eleven o'clock till two I was in this very
room working out some calculations at this very table by the aid of my
reading-lamp, no other light being in the room, or even in the house, as
far as I know. It is one of my fads--as fools call them--to work in a
large, dark room with one brilliant light only. Therefore you could not
possibly have been in the house, to say nothing of this room, on the
night in question."
David nodded feebly. There was no combating Bell's statement.
"I presume that this is No. 219?" he asked.
"Certainly it is," Miss Gates replied. "We are all agreed about _that_."
"Because I read the number over the fanlight," Steel went on. "And I came
here by arrangement. And there was everything as I see it now. Bell, you
must either cure me of this delusion, or you must prove logically to me
that I have made a mistake. So far as I am concerned, I am like a child
struggling with the alphabet."
"We'll start now," said Bell. "Come along."
Steel rose none too willingly. He would fain have lingered with Ruth. She
held out her hand; there was a warm, glad smile on her face.
"May you be successful," she whispered. "Come and see me again, because I
shall be very, very anxious to know. And I am not without guilt.... If
you only knew!"
"And I may come again?" David said, eagerly.
A further smile and a warm pressure of the hand were the only reply.
Presently Steel was standing outside in the road with Bell. The latter
was glancing at the house on either side of 219. The higher house was
let; the one nearest the sea--218--was empty. A bill in the window gave
the information that the property was in the hands of Messrs. Wallace and
Brown, Station Quadrant, where keys could be obtained.
"We'll make a start straightaway," said Bell. "Come along."
"Where are you going to at that pace?" Steel asked.
"Going to interview Messrs. Wallace and Brown. At the present moment I am
a gentleman who is in search of a house of residence, and I have a
weakness for Brunswick Square in particular, especially for No. 218.
Unless I am greatly mistaken I am going to show you something that will
startle even the most callous novelist."