INCREASES THE INTEREST
"But, dad," cried Gabrielle, "I am telling you the truth! Cannot you
believe me, your daughter, before this man who is your enemy?"
"Because of my affliction I am, it seems, deceived by every one," was
his hard response.
To where they stood had come the sound of wheels upon the gravelled
drive outside, and a moment later Hill entered, announcing, "A gentleman
to see you very urgently, Sir Henry. He is from Baron de Hetzendorf."
"From the Baron!" gasped the blind man. "I'll see him later."
"Why, it may be Hamilton!" cried Murie; who, looking through the door,
saw his old friend in the corridor, and quickly called him in.
As he faced Flockart he drew himself up. The attitude of them all made
it apparent to him that something unusual was in progress.
"You've arrived at a very opportune moment, Hamilton," Murie said. "You
have met Miss Heyburn before, and also Flockart, I believe, at Lady
Heyburn's, in Paris."
"Yes, but----"
"Sir Henry," Walter said in a quiet tone, "this gentleman sent by the
Baron is his secretary, the same Mr. Edgar Hamilton of whom Gabrielle
has just been speaking."
"Ah, then, perhaps he can furnish us with further facts regarding this
most extraordinary statement of my daughter's," the blind man exclaimed.
"Gabrielle has just told her father the truth regarding a certain tragic
occurrence in the Forest of Pontarmé. Explain to us all you know,
Edgar."
"What I know," said Hamilton, "is very quickly told. Has Miss Heyburn
mentioned the man Krail?"
"Yes, I have told them about him," the girl answered.
"You have, however, perhaps omitted to mention one or two small facts in
connection with the affair," he said. "Do you not remember how, on that
eventful afternoon in the forest, when searching for us, you first
encountered Krail walking with this man Flockart at some distance from
the others?"
"Yes, I recollect."
"And do you remember that when we returned to sit down to luncheon
Flockart insisted that I should take the seat which was afterwards
occupied by the unfortunate Miss Bryant? Do you recollect how I spread a
rug for her at that spot and preferred myself to stand? The reason of
their invitation to me to sit there I did not discover until afterwards.
That wine had been prepared for _me_, not for her."
"For you!" the girl gasped, amazed.
"Yes. The plot was undoubtedly this--"
"There was no plot," protested Flockart, interrupting. "This girl killed
Edna Bryant through intense jealousy."
"I repeat that there was a foul and ingenious plot to kill me, and to
entrap Miss Heyburn," Hamilton said. "It was, of course, clear that Miss
Heyburn was jealous of the girl, for she had written to her mother
making threats against Miss Bryant's life. Therefore, the plot was that
I should drink the fatal wine, and that Miss Gabrielle should be
declared to be the murderess, she having intended the wine to be
partaken of by the girl she hated with such deadly hatred. The marked
cordiality of Krail and Flockart that I should take that seat aroused
within me some misgivings, although I had never dreamed of this
dastardly and cowardly plot against me--not until I saw the result of
their foul handiwork."
"It's a lie! You are trying to implicate Krail and myself! The girl is
the only guilty person. She placed the wine there!"
"She did not!" declared Hamilton boldly. "She was not there when the
bottle was changed by Krail, but I was!"
"If what you say is true, then you deliberately stood by and allowed the
girl to drink."
"I watched Krail go to the spot where luncheon was laid out, but could
not see what he did. If I had done so I should have saved the girl's
life. You were a few yards off, awaiting him; therefore you knew his
intentions, and you are as guilty of that girl's tragic death as he."
"What!" cried Flockart, his eyes glaring angrily, "do you declare, then,
that I am a murderer?"
"You yourself are the best judge of your own guilt," answered Hamilton
meaningly.
"I deny that Krail or myself had any hand in the affair."
"You will have an opportunity of making that denial in a criminal court
ere long," remarked the Baron's secretary with a grim smile.
"What," gasped Lady Heyburn's friend, his cheeks paling in an instant,
"have you been so indiscreet as to inform the police?"
"I have--a week ago. I made a statement to M. Hamard of the Sûreté in
Paris, and they have already made a discovery which you will find of
interest and somewhat difficult to disprove."
"And pray what is that?"
Hamilton smiled again, saying, "No, my dear sir, the police will tell
you themselves all in due course. Remember, you and your precious friend
plotted to kill me."
"But why, Mr. Hamilton?" inquired the blind man. "What was their
motive?"
"A very strong one," was the reply. "I had recognised in Krail a man who
had defrauded the Baron de Hetzendorf of fifty thousand kroners, and for
whom the police were in active search, both for that and for several
other serious charges of a similar character. Krail knew this, and he
and his friend--this gentleman here--had very ingeniously resolved to
get rid of me by making it appear that Miss Gabrielle had poisoned me by
accident."
"A lie!" declared Flockart fiercely, though his efforts to remain
imperturbed were now palpable.
"You will be given due opportunity of disproving my allegations,"
Hamilton said. "You, coward that you are, placed the guilt upon an
innocent, inexperienced girl. Why? Because, with Lady Heyburn's
connivance, you with your cunning accomplice Krail were endeavouring to
discover Sir Henry's business secrets in order, first, to operate upon
the valuable financial knowledge you would thus gain, and so make a big
_coup_; and, secondly, when you had done this, it was your intention to
expose the methods of Sir Henry and his friends. Ah! don't imagine that
you and Krail have not been very well watched of late," laughed
Hamilton.
"Do you allege, then, that Lady Heyburn is privy to all this?" asked the
blind man in distress.
"It is not for me to judge, sir," was Hamilton's reply.
"I know! I know how I have been befooled!" cried the poor helpless man,
"befooled because I am blind!"
"Not by me, Sir Henry," protested Flockart.
"By you and by every one else," he cried angrily. "But I know the truth
at last--the truth how my poor little daughter has been used as an
instrument by you in your nefarious operations."
"But----"
"Hear me, I say!" went on the old man. "I ask my daughter to forgive me
for misjudging her. I now know the truth. You obtained by some means a
false key to my safe, and you copied certain documents which I had
placed there in order to entrap any who might seek to learn my secrets.
You fell into that trap, and though I confess I thought that Gabrielle
was the culprit, on Murie's behalf, I only lately found out that you and
your accomplice Krail were in Greece endeavouring to profit by knowledge
obtained from here, my private house."
"Krail has been living in Auchterarder of late, it appears," Hamilton
remarked, "and it is evidently he who, gaining access to the house one
night recently, used his friend's false key, and obtained those
confidential Russian documents from your safe."
"No doubt," declared Sir Henry. Then, again addressing Flockart, he
asked, "Where are those documents which you and your scoundrelly
accomplice have stolen, and for the return of which you are trying to
make me pay?"
"I don't know anything about them," answered Flockart sullenly, his face
livid.
"He'll know more about them when he is taken off by the two detectives
from Edinburgh who hold the extradition warrant," Hamilton remarked with
a grim smile.
The fellow started at those words. His demeanour was that of a guilty
man. "What do you mean?" he gasped, white as death. "You--you intend to
give me into custody? If you do, I warn you that Lady Heyburn will
suffer also."
"She, like Miss Gabrielle, has only been your tool," Hamilton declared.
"It was she who, under compulsion, has furnished you with means for
years, and whose association with you has caused something little short
of a scandal. Times without number she has tried to get rid of you and
your evil influence in this household, but you have always defied her.
Now," he said firmly, looking the other straight in the face, "you have
upon you those stolen documents which you have, by using an assumed name
and a false address, offered to sell back to their owner, Sir Henry. You
have threatened that if they are not purchased at the exorbitant price
you demand you will sell them to the Russian Ministry of Finance. That
is the way you treat your friend and benefactor, the man who is blind
and helpless! Come, give them back to Sir Henry, and at once."
"You must ask Krail," stammered the man, now so cornered that all
further excuse or denial had become impossible.
"That's unnecessary. I happen to know that those papers are in your
pocket at this moment, a fact which shows how watchful an eye we've been
keeping upon you of late. You have brought them here so that your friend
Krail may come to terms with Sir Henry for their repossession. He
arrived from London with you, and is at the 'Strathavon Arms' in the
village, where he stayed before, and is well known."
"Flockart," demanded the blind man very seriously, "you have papers in
your possession which are mine. Return them to me."
A dead silence fell. All eyes save those of Sir Henry were turned upon
the man who until that moment had stood so defiant and so full of
sarcasm. But in an instant, at mention of Krail's presence in
Auchterarder, his demeanour had suddenly changed. He was full of alarm.
"Give them to me and leave my house," Sir Henry said, holding up his
thin white hand.
"I--I will--on one condition: if I may be allowed to go."
"We shall not prevent you leaving," was the Baronet's calm reply.
The man fumbled nervously in the inner pocket of his coat, and at last
brought out a sealed and rather bulgy foolscap envelope.
"Open it, Gabrielle, and see what is within," her father said.
She obeyed, and in a few moments explained the various documents it
contained.
"Then let the man go," her father said.
"But, Sir Henry," cried Hamilton, "I object to this! Krail is down in
the village forming a plot to make you pay for the return of those
papers. He arrived from London by the same train as this man. If we
allow him to leave he will inform his accomplice, and both will escape."
Murie had his back to the door, the long window on the opposite side of
the room being closed.
"It was a promise of Sir Henry's," declared the unhappy adventurer.
"Which will be observed when Krail has been brought face to face with
Sir Henry," answered Murie, at the same time calling Hill and one of the
gardeners who chanced to be working on the lawn outside.
Then, with a firmness which showed that they were determined, Hamilton
and Murie conducted Flockart to a small upstairs room, where Hill and
the gardener, with the assistance of Stewart, who happened to have come
into the kitchen, mounted guard over him.
His position, once the honoured guest at Glencardine, was the most
ignominious conceivable. But Sir Henry sat in gratification that at
least he had got back those documents and saved the reputation of his
friend Volkonski, as well as that of his co-partners.