BEHIND THE BLIND
There was a long pause till the sound of the horse's hoofs died away.
Bell was waiting for his companion to speak. Her head was partly turned
from him, so that he could only watch the dainty beauty of her profile.
She stood there cold and still, but he could see that she was
profoundly agitated.
"I never thought to see the day when I should trust you again," she said;
"I never expected to trust any man again."
"You will trust me, darling," Bell said, passionately. "If you still care
for me as I care for you. _Do_ you?"
The question came keen as steel. Enid shivered and hesitated. Bell laid a
light hand on her arm.
"Speak," he said. "I am going to clear myself, I am going to take back
my good name. But if you no longer care for me the rest matters
nothing. Speak."
"I am not one of those who change, God pity me," Enid murmured.
Bell drew a long, deep breath. He wanted no assurance beyond that.
"Then lead the way," he said. "I have come at the right time; I have been
looking for you everywhere, and I find you in the hour of your deepest
sorrow. When I knew your aunt last she was a cheerful, happy woman. From
what I hear now she is suffering, you are all suffering, under some
blighting grief."
"Oh, if you only knew what that sorrow was, Hatherly."
"Hatherly! How good the old name sounds from your lips. Nobody has ever
called me that since--since we parted. And to think that I should have
been searching for you all these years, when Miss Ruth Gates could have
given me the clue at any time. And why have you been playing such strange
tricks upon my friend David Steel? Why have you---What is that?"
Somebody was moving somewhere in the grounds, and a voice shouted for
help. Enid started forward.
"It is Williams coming from the stables," she said. "I have so arranged
it that the dogs are holding up my dear cousin, Reginald Henson, who is
calling upon Williams to release him. If Reginald gets back to the house
now we are ruined. Follow me as well as you can."
Enid disappeared down a narrow, tangled path, leaving Bell to limp along
painfully in her track. A little way off Henson was yelling lustily for
assistance. Williams, who had evidently taken in the situation, was
coming up leisurely, chuckling at the discomfiture of the enemy. The
hounds were whining and baying. From the house came the notes of a love
song passionately declaimed. A couple of the great dogs came snarling up
to Bell and laid their grimy muzzles on his thighs. A cold sensation
crept up and down his spine as he came to a standstill.
"The brutes!" he muttered. "Margaret Henson must be mad indeed to have
these creatures about the place. Ah! would you? Very well, I'll play the
game fairly, and not move. If I call out I shall spoil the game. If I
remain quiet I shall have a pleasant night of it. Let us hope for the
best and that Enid will understand the situation."
Meanwhile Enid had come up with Williams. She laid her hand imperiously
upon his lips.
"Not a word," she whispered. "Mr. Henson is held up by the dogs. He must
remain where he is till I give you the signal to release him. I know you
answered his call, but you are to go no farther."
Williams assented willingly enough. Everything that tended to the
discomfort of Reginald Henson filled him with a peculiar and
deep-seated pleasure.
"Very well, miss," he said, demurely. "And don't you hurry, miss. This is
a kind of job that calls for plenty of patience. And I'm really shocking
deaf tonight."
Williams retreated leisurely in the direction of the stables, but his
malady was not so distressing that he failed to hear a groan and a
snarling curse from Henson. Enid fled back along the track, where she
found Bell standing patiently with a dog's muzzle close to either knee.
His face was white and shining, otherwise he showed no signs of fear.
Enid laid a hand on the head of either dog, and they rolled like great
cats at her feet in the bushes.
"Now come swiftly," she whispered. "There is no time to be lost."
They were in the house at last, crossing the dusty floor, with the motes
dancing in the lamp-light, deadening their footsteps and muffling the
intense silence. Above the stillness rose the song from the drawing-room;
from without came the restless murmur of the dogs. Enid entered the
drawing-room, and Bell limped in behind her. The music immediately
ceased. As Enid glanced at her aunt she saw that the far-away look had
died from her eyes, that the sparkle and brightness of reason were there.
She had come out of the mist and the shadows for a time at any rate.
"Dr. Hatherly Bell to see you, aunt," Enid said, in a low tone.
Margaret Henson shot up from the piano like a statue. There was no
welcome on her face, no surprise there, nothing but deep, unutterable
contempt and loathing.
"I have been asleep," she said. She passed her hand dreamily over her
face. "I have been in a dream for seven long years. Enid brought me back
to the music again to-night, and it touched my heart, and now I am awake
again. Do you recollect the 'Slumber Song,' Hatherly Bell? The last time
I sang it you were present. It was a happy night; the very last happy
night in the world to me."
"I recollect it perfectly well, Lady Littimer," Bell said.
"Lady Littimer! How strange it is to hear that name again. Seven years
since then. Here I am called Margaret Henson, and nobody knows. And
now _you_ have found out. Do you come here to blackmail and rob me
like the rest?"
"I come here entirely on your behalf and my own, my lady."
"That is what they all say--and then they rob me. You stole the
Rembrandt."
The last words came like a shot from a catapult. Enid's face grew colder.
Bell drew a long tube of discoloured paper carefully tied round a stick
from his pocket.
"I am going to disprove that once and for all," he said. "The Rembrandt
is at present in Lord Littimer's collection. There is an account of it in
to-day's _Telegraph_. It is perfectly familiar to both of you. And, that
being the case, what do you think of this?"
He unrolled the paper before Enid's astonished eyes. Margaret Henson
glanced at it listlessly; she was fast sinking into the old, strange
oblivion again. But Enid was all rapt attention.
"I would have sworn to that as Lord Littimer's own," she gasped.
"It is his own," Bell replied. "Stolen from him and a copy placed by some
arch-enemy in my portmanteau, it was certain to be found on the frontier.
Don't you see that there were two Rembrandts? When the one from my
portmanteau was restored to Littimer his own was kept by the thief.
Subsequently it would be exposed as a new find, with some story as to its
discovery, only, unfortunately for the scoundrel, it came into my
possession."
"And where did you find it?" Enid asked. "I found it," Bell said, slowly,
"in a house called 218, Brunswick Square, Brighton."
A strange cry came from Enid's lips. She stood swaying before her lover,
white as the paper upon which her eyes were eagerly fixed. Margaret
Henson was pacing up and down the room, her lips muttering, and raising a
cloud of pallid dust behind her.
"I--I am sorry," Enid said, falteringly. "And all these years I have
deemed you guilty. But then the proof was so plain; I could not deny the
evidence of my own senses. And Von Gulden came to me saying how deeply
distressed he was, and that he would have prevented the catastrophe if he
could. Well?"
A servant stood waiting in the doorway with wondering eyes at the sight
of a stranger.
"I'm sorry, miss," she said, "but Miss Christiana is worse; indeed, she
quite frightens me. I've taken the liberty of telephoning to Dr. Walker."
The words seemed to bring consciousness to Margaret Henson.
"Christiana worse," she said. "Another of them going; it will be a happy
release from a house of sorrow like this. I will come up, Martin."
She swept out of the room after the servant. Enid appeared hardly to have
heard. Bell looked at her inquiringly and with some little displeasure.
"I fancy I have heard you speak of your sister Christiana," he said.
"Is she ill?"
"She is at the point of death, I understand; you think that I am callous.
Oh, if you only knew! But the light will come to us all in time, God
willing. Look at this place, look at the blight of it, and wonder how we
endure it. Hatherly, I have made a discovery."
"We seem to be living in an atmosphere of discoveries. What is it?"
"I will answer your question by asking another. You have been made the
victim of a vile conspiracy. For seven years your career has been
blighted. And I have lost seven years of my life, too. Have you any idea
who your enemy is?"
"Not the faintest, but, believe me, I shall find out in time. And
then---"
A purple blackness like the lurid light of a storm flashed into his eyes,
the lines of his mouth grew rigid. Enid laid a hand tenderly on his arm.
"Your enemy is the common enemy of us all," she said. "We have wasted the
years, but we are young yet. Your enemy is Reginald Henson."
"Enid, you speak with conviction. Are you sure of this?"
"Certain. When I have time I will tell you everything. But not now. And
that man must never know that you have been near the house to-night, not
so much for your sake as for the sake of your friend David Steel. Now I
can see the Providence behind it all. Hatherly, tell me that you forgive
me before the others come back."
"My darling, I cannot see how you could have acted otherwise."
Enid turned towards him with a great glad light in her eyes. She said
nothing, for the simple reason that there was nothing to say. Hatherly
Bell caught her in his strong arms, and she swayed to reach his lips. In
that delicious moment the world was all forgot.
But not for long. There was a sudden rush and a tumble of feet on the
stairs, there was a strange voice speaking hurriedly, then the
drawing-room door opened and Margaret Henson came in. She was looking
wild and excited and talked incoherently. An obviously professional man
followed her.
"My dear madam," he was saying, "I have done all I can. In the last few
days I have not been able to disguise from myself that there was small
hope for the patient. The exhaustion, the shock to the system, the
congestion, all point to an early collapse."
"Is my sister so much worse, Dr. Walker?" Enid asked, quietly.
"She could not be any worse and be alive," the doctor said. "Unless I am
greatly mistaken the gentleman behind you is Mr. Hatherly Bell. I presume
he has been called in to meet me? If so, I am sincerely glad, because I
shall be pleased to have a second opinion. A bad case of"--here followed
a long technical name--"one of the worst cases I have ever seen."
"You can command me, Enid," Bell said. "If I can."
"No, no," Enid cried. "What am I saying? Please to go upstairs
with Martin."
Bell departed, wonderingly. Enid flew to the door and out into the night.
She could hear Henson cursing and shouting, could hear the snarling
clamour of the dogs. At the foot of the drive she paused and called Steel
softly by name. To her intense relief he came from the shadow.
"I am here," he cried. "Do you want me?"
"Yes, yes," Enid panted. "Never more were your services needed. My sister
is dying; my sister must--die. And Hatherly Bell is with her, and--you
understand?"
"Yes," said David. A vivid flash of understanding had come to him. "Bell
shall do as I tell him. Come along."
"Hold him up, dear doggies," Enid murmured. "Hold him up and I'll love
both of you for ever."