strange touch of solemnity, and again Major Lane, with an inward
wincing, stared fixedly at the young man now standing on the hearth-rug,
a stalwart, _debonair_ figure, between himself and his old friend.
"Can you assure me--can you assure us both--that you never met Mrs.
Jarvice?"
Carden looked down at his father with a puzzled expression.
"Of course I can't assure you of anything of the kind," he said, still
speaking quite placidly. "I may have met her somewhere or other, but I
can't remember having done so; and I think I should have remembered it,
both because the name is an uncommon one, and because"--he turned to
Major Lane--"isn't she said to be an extraordinarily pretty woman?"
As the last words were being uttered an odd thing happened. Thomas
Carden suddenly dropped the cup he was holding in his hand; it rang
against the brass fender and broke in several pieces, while the spoon
went clattering into the fireplace.
"Father!" exclaimed Theodore, and then quickly he added, "Don't trouble
to do that," for the old man was stooping over the rug, and fumbling
with the broken pieces. But Thomas Carden shook his head; it was evident
that he was, for the moment, physically incapable of speech.
A great fear came into the son's mind; he turned to Major Lane, and
muttered in an urgent, agonised whisper, "Is it--can it be a seizure?
Hadn't I better go and try to find Dr. Curle?"
But the other, with a dubious expression on his face, shook his head.
"No, no," he said; "it's nothing of the kind. Your father's getting
older, Carden, as we all are, and I've had to speak to him to-day about
a very disagreeable matter."
He looked fixedly, probingly, at the young man.
"I think it's thoroughly upset him." The speaker hesitated, and then
added: "I daresay he'll tell you about it; in any case, I'd better go
now and come back later. If you can spare me half an hour this evening,
I should like to have a talk with you--about the same matter."
During the last few moments Major Lane had made up his mind to take a
certain course, even to run a certain risk, and that not for the first
time that day, for he had already set his own intimate knowledge of
Thomas Carden, the lifelong friend whose condition now wrung him with
pity, against what was, perhaps, his official duty.
Some two hours before, the Head Constable had entered the house where he
had been so constantly and so hospitably entertained, with the firm
conviction that Theodore Carden had been the catspaw of a clever,
unscrupulous woman; in fact that there had come a repetition, but a
hundred times more serious, of that now half-forgotten entanglement
which had so nearly brought Carden to grief some seven or eight years
before. Once more he had come prepared to do his best to save his
friend's son, so far as might be possible, from the consequences of his
folly.
But now? Ah, now, the experienced, alert official had to admit to
himself that the incidents of the last ten minutes had completely
altered his view of the matter. He realised that in any case Theodore
Carden was no fool; for the first time that day the terrible suspicion
came into Major Lane's mind that the man before him might, after all, be
more closely connected with the Jarvice mystery than had seemed
possible.
Never, during his long connection with crime, had the Head Constable
come across as good an actor, as cool a liar, as he now believed this
man of business to be.
Well, he would give Theodore Carden one more chance to tell the truth;
Theodore was devoted to his father, so much was certainly true, and
perhaps his father would be able to make him understand the gravity of
the case. Major Lane felt bitterly sorry that he had come first to the
old man--but then, he had so completely believed in the "scrape"
theory; and now he hardly knew what to believe!
For the moment, at any rate, so the Head Constable told himself, the
mask had fallen; Theodore Carden could not conceal his relief at the
other's approaching departure.
"Certainly," he said hastily, "come in this evening by all means; I
won't ask you to stay to dinner, for I mean to try and make father go to
bed, but later I shall be quite free. If, however, you want to ask me
anything about the Jarvice affair, I'm afraid I can't help you much;
I've not even read the case with any care."
The old man, still sitting by the fire, had caught a few of the muttered
words, and before Major Lane could leave the room Thomas Carden had
risen from his chair, his face paler, perhaps, than usual, but once more
his collected, dignified self.
"Stay," he said firmly; "having gone so far, I think we should now
thresh the matter out."
He walked over to where his son and his friend were standing, and he put
his hand on the older man's arm.
"Perhaps I cannot expect you, Lane, to be convinced, as I, of course,
have been convinced, by my son's denials. It is, as I told you this
afternoon, either a plot on the part of someone who bears a grudge
against us, or else--what I think more likely--there are two men in this
great town each bearing the name of Theodore Carden. But I appreciate, I
deeply appreciate, the generous kindness which made you come and warn us
of this impending calamity; but you need not fear that we shall fail to
meet it with a complete answer."
"Father! Major Lane! What does this mean?"
For the first time a feeling of misgiving, of sudden fear, swept over
Theodore Carden's mind. Without waiting for an answer, he led the way
back to the fireplace, and, deliberately drawing forward a chair,
motioned to Major Lane to sit down likewise.
"Now then," he said, speaking with considerable authority and decision,
"I think I have a right to ask what this is all about! In what way are
we, my father and myself, concerned in the Jarvice affair? For my part,
Major Lane, I can assure you, and that, if you wish it, on oath, that I
did not know Mr. Jarvice, and, to the best of my belief, I have never
seen, still less spoken to, Mrs. Jarvice----"
"If that be indeed so," said the man whom he addressed, and who, for
the first time, was beginning to feel himself shaken in his belief, nay,
in his absolute knowledge, that the young man was perjuring himself,
"can you, and will you, explain these letters?" and he drew out of his
pocket a folded sheet of foolscap.
Carden bent forward eagerly; there was no doubt, so the Head Constable
admitted to himself, as to his eagerness to be brought face to face with
the accusation--and yet, at that moment, a strong misgiving came over
Major Lane.
Even if Theodore Carden could continue to be the consummate actor he had
already proved himself, was it right, was it humane, to subject him to
this terrible test, and that, too, before his old father? Whatever the
young man's past relation to Mrs. Jarvice, nay, whatever his connection
might be with the crime which Major Lane now knew to have been
committed, Carden was certainly ignorant of the existence of these
terrible, these damnatory documents, and they constituted so far the
only proof that Carden had been lying when he denied any knowledge of
Mrs. Jarvice. But then, alas! they constituted an irrefutable proof.
With a sudden movement Major Lane withdrew his right hand, that which
held the piece of paper.
"Stop a moment, Theodore; do you really wish this discussion to take
place before your father? I wonder if you remember"--he paused, and then
went on firmly, "an interview you and I had many years ago?"
For the first time the younger man's whole manner changed; a look of
fear, of guilt, came over his strong, intelligent face.
"Father," he said imploringly, "I beg you not to listen to Major Lane.
He is alluding to a matter which he gave me his word--his word of
honour--should never be mentioned to anyone, least of all to you;" then,
turning with an angry gesture to the Head Constable, "Was that not so?"
he asked imperiously.
"Yes, I admit that by asking you this question I have broken my word,
but good God! man, this is no passing scrape that we have to consider
now; to-morrow morning all Birmingham will be ringing with your
name--with your father's name, Theodore--for by some horrible mischance
the papers have got hold of the letters in question. I did my best, but
I found I was powerless."
He turned and deliberately looked away, as he added in a low,
hesitating voice: "And now, once more I ask you whether we had not
better delay this painful discussion until you and I are alone?"
"No!" cried Carden, now thoroughly roused, "certainly not! You have
chosen to come and tell my father something about me, and I insist that
you tell me here, and at once, what it is of which I am accused."
He instinctively looked at his father for support, and received it in
full measure, for at once the old man spoke.
"Yes, Lane, I think my son is right; there's no use in making any more
mystery about the matter. I'm sure that the letters you have brought to
show Theodore will puzzle him as much as they have me, and that he will
be able to assure you that he has no clue either to their contents or to
their writer."
Very slowly, with a feeling of genuine grief and shame for the man who
seemed incapable of either sorrow or shame, Major Lane held out the
folded paper; and then in very pity he looked away as his old friend's
son eagerly unrolled the piece of foolscap, placing it close under the
lamp-shade in order that he might thoroughly master its contents.
As Theodore Carden completed the trifling action, that of unrolling the
piece of paper which was to solve the mystery, he noted, with a curious
feeling of relief, that the documents (or were they letters?) regarded
by the Head Constable as so damnatory, were but two, the first of some
length, the second consisting of a very few lines, and both copied in
the fair round hand of Major Lane's confidential clerk.
And then, with no premonitory warning, Carden became the victim of a
curious physical illusion.
Staring down at the long piece of blue paper, he found that he was only
able to master the signature, in both cases the same, with which each
letter terminated. Sometimes only one word, one name--that of
_Pansy_--stood out clearly, and then again he seemed only to see the
other word, the other name--that of _Jarvice_. The two names appeared to
play hide-and-seek with one another, to leap out alternately and smite
his eyes, pressing and printing themselves upon his brain.
At last, while he was still staring silently, obstinately, at the black
lines dancing before him, he heard the words, and they seemed to be
coming from a long way off, "Theodore! Oh, my boy, what is the matter?"
and then Major Lane's voice, full of rather angry concern, "Rouse
yourself, Carden, you are frightening your father."
"Am I?" he said dully; "I mustn't do that;" then, handing back the sheet
of foolscap to the Head Constable, he said hoarsely, "I can't make them
out. Will you read them to me?"
And Major Lane, in passionless accents, read aloud the two letters which
he already almost knew by heart.
6, LIGHTWOOD PLACE,
_January 28th_.
You told me to write to you if ever I was in real trouble and
thought you could help me. Oh! Theo, darling, I am in great
trouble, and life, especially since that happy time--you know when
I mean--is more wretched than ever. You used to say I was
extraordinarily pretty, I wonder if you would say so now, for I am
simply ill--worn out with worry. He--you know who--has found out
something; such a little insignificant thing; and since then he
makes my life unbearable with his stupid jealousy. It isn't as if
he knew about you and me, that would be something real to grumble
at, wouldn't it, darling? Sometimes I feel tempted to tell him all
about it. How he would stare! He is incapable of understanding
anything romantic. However, I'm in no mood for laughing now. He's
got a woman in to watch me, a governess, but luckily I've quite
got her to be on my side, though of course I haven't told her
anything about my private affairs.
Will you meet me one day this week, to-morrow if you can, at No.
15, Calthorpe Street? Four o'clock is the safest time for me.
Between the two small shops you will see a swing door with "Madame
Paula, Milliner," on it; push it open and go straight upstairs. On
the first landing you will see a door with "Gone out, enquire
upstairs," on it. Push up the door knob (don't try to turn it) and
walk in. The room will be empty, but you will see a door leading to
a back room; push _up_ the knob and there--there you will find your
poor little Pansy, fainting with joy at seeing her big strong Theo
again.
Send me a postcard, saying, "Mrs. Jarvice can be fitted on (day you
select)." If posted before eleven, it will reach me in time. Of
course, I'm running a risk in meeting you _here_, so near my home,
but I _must_ see you, for I have a great favour to ask you, Theo,
and I dare not propose going away even for one day.
PANSY JARVICE.
Major Lane paused a moment, then went on:
Theo, I wrote to you ten days ago, but I have had no answer. I am
dreadfully worried; I know you are in Birmingham, for I saw your
name in a paper before I wrote to you. I have gone through such
terrible days waiting for the postcard I asked you to send me.
Write, if only to say you don't want to hear again of poor
miserable
PANSY JARVICE.
"I suppose you will now admit that you know who wrote these letters?"
asked Major Lane sternly.
"Yes--at least I suppose they were written by Mrs. Jarvice."
Theodore Carden spoke with a touch of impatience. The question seemed to
him to be, on the part of his father's old friend, a piece of useless
cruelty.
"And can you suggest to whom they were written, if not to yourself?"
"No, of course not; I do not doubt that they were written to me," and
this time his face was ravaged with a horror and despair to which the
other two men had, so far, no clue. "And yet," he added, a touch of
surprise in his voice, "I never saw these letters--they never reached
me."
"But of course you received others?"
Major Lane spoke with a certain eagerness; then, as the young man seemed
to hesitate, he added hastily: "Nay, nay--say nothing that might
incriminate yourself."
"But indeed--indeed I have never received a letter from her--that
perhaps is why I did not know the handwriting."
"Theodore!" cried his father sharply, "think what you are saying! What
you've been shown are only copies--surely you understood that? What Lane
has just shown you are copies of letters which purport to have been
addressed to you, but which were intercepted on their way to the
post--is that not so?" and he turned to the Head Constable.
"Yes," said Major Lane; then he added, very deliberately.
"The originals of these two letters, which were bought for a large sum
from Mrs. Jarvice's governess, evidently the woman referred to in the
first letter, are now in the hands of the news editor of the _Birmingham
Dispatch_. I was shown them as a great favour"--a grim smile distorted,
for a moment, the Head Constable's narrow jaw.
"I did my best--for your father's sake, Theodore--to frighten these
people into giving them up; I even tried to persuade them to hold them
over, but it was no good. I was told that no Birmingham paper had ever
had such a--'scoop', I believe, was the word used. You and your father
are so well known in this city." And again Theodore Carden marvelled at
the cruelty of the man.
Thomas Carden broke in with a touch of impatience:
"But nothing else has been found, my boy! Lane should tell you that the
whole theory of your having known Mrs. Jarvice rests on these two
letters--which never reached you."
Father and son seemed suddenly to have changed places. The old man spoke
in a strong, self-confident tone, but the other, his grey face supported
on his hands, was staring fixedly into the fire.
"Yes," said Major Lane, more kindly, "I ought perhaps to tell you that
within an hour of my being shown these letters I had Mrs. Jarvice's
house once more searched, and nothing was found connecting you with the
woman, excepting, I am sorry to say, this;"--and he held out an envelope
on which was written in Theodore Carden's clear handwriting the young
man's name and business address.
"Now, I should like you to tell me, if you don't mind doing so, where,
when, and how this name and address came to be written?"
"Yes, I will certainly tell you."
The young man spoke collectedly; he was beginning to realise the
practical outcome of the conversation.
"I wrote that address about the middle of last October, in London, at
Mansell's Hotel in Pall Mall East."
"The poor fellow's going to make a clean breast of it at last," so
thought Major Lane with a strange feeling of relief, for on the flap of
the envelope, which he had kept carefully turned down, was stamped
"Mansell's Hotel."
It was in a considerate, almost kindly tone, that the Head Constable
next spoke.
"And now, I beg you, for your own sake, to tell me the truth. Perhaps I
ought to inform you, before you say anything, that, according to our
theory, Mrs. Jarvice was certainly assisted in procuring the drug with
which there is no doubt she slowly poisoned her husband. As yet we have
no clue as to the person who helped her, but we have ascertained that
for the last two months, in fact, from about the date of the first
letter addressed to you, a man did purchase minute quantities of this
drug at Birmingham, at Wolverhampton, and at Walsall. Now, mind you, I
do not suspect, I never have suspected, you of having any hand in that,
but I fear you'll have to face the ordeal of being confronted with the
various chemists, of whom two declare most positively that they can
identify the man who brought them the prescription which obtained him
the drug in question."
While Major Lane was speaking, Theodore Carden had to a certain extent
regained his self-possession; here, at least, he stood on firm ground.
"Of course, I am prepared to face anything of the kind that may be
necessary." He added almost inaudibly: "I have brought it on myself."
Then he turned, his whole voice altering and softening: "Father, perhaps
you would not mind my asking Major Lane to go into the library with me?
I should prefer to see him alone."
II
And then the days dragged on, a week of days, each containing full
measure of bitter and public humiliation; full measure also of feverish
suspense, for Theodore Carden did not find it quite so easy as he had
thought it would be to clear himself of this serious, and yet
preposterous accusation of complicity in murder.
But Major Lane was surprised at the courage and composure with which the
young man faced the ordeal of confrontation with the various men, any
one of whom, through a simple mistake or nervous lapse of memory, might
compel his presence, if not in the dock, then as a witness at the coming
murder trial.
At last the awful ordeal was over, for, as a matter of fact, none of
those brought face to face with him in the sordid promiscuity of such
scenes, singled out Theodore Carden as resembling the mysterious
individual who had almost certainly provided Mrs. Jarvice with the means
wherewith to poison her husband.
But it was after the need for active defence had passed away that
Theodore Carden's true sufferings began.... The moment twilight fell he
was haunted, physically and mentally possessed, by the presence of the
woman he had known at once so little and so well--that is, of her he now
knew to be Pansy Jarvice.
Especially terrible were the solitary evenings of those days when his
father was away, performing the task of breaking so much of the truth as
could be told to the girl to whom his son had been engaged.
As each afternoon drew in Theodore found himself compelled to remain
more or less concealed in the room which overlooked the garden of
Waterhead. For, with the approach of night, the suburban road in front
of the fine old house was filled by an ever coming and going crowd of
bat-like men and women, eager to gaze with morbid curiosity at the
dwelling of the man who had undoubtedly been, if not Mrs. Jarvice's
accomplice--that, to the annoyance of the sensation-mongers, seemed
decidedly open to question--then, her favoured lover.
But to these shameful and grotesque happenings Theodore Carden gave
scarce a thought, for it was when he found himself alone in the
drawing-room or library that his solitude would become stealthily
invaded by an invisible and impalpable wraith.
So disorganised had become his nerves, so pitiable the state of his body
and mind, that constantly he seemed conscious of a faint, sweet odour,
that of wood violets, a scent closely associated in his thoughts with
Pansy Jarvice, with the woman whom he now knew to be a murderess.
He came at last to long for a tangible delusion, for the sight of a
bodily shape which he could tell himself was certainly not there. But
no such relief was vouchsafed him; and yet once, when sitting in the
drawing-room, trying to read a book, he had felt a rounded cheek laid
suddenly to his, a curl of silken, scented hair had touched his neck....
Terrifying as was the peopled solitude of his evenings, Carden dreaded
their close, for at night, during the whole of each long night, the
woman from whom he now felt so awful a repulsion held him prisoner.
From the fleeting doze of utter exhaustion he would be awakened by
feeling the pressure of Pansy's soft, slender arms about his neck; they
would wind themselves round his shuddering body, enclosing him slowly,
inexorably, till he felt as if he must surely die under their gyves-like
pressure.
Again--and this, perhaps, was what he learnt to dread in an especial
degree--he would be suddenly roused by Pansy's liquid, laughing voice,
whispering things of horror in his ear; it was then, and then only, that
he found courage to speak, courage to assure her, and so assure himself,
that he was in no sense her accomplice, that he had had naught to do
with old Jarvice's death. But then there would come answer, in the eager
tones he remembered so well, and the awful words found unwilling echo
in his heart: "Yes, yes, indeed you helped!"
* * * * *
And now the last day, or rather the last night, had come, for the next
morning Theodore Carden was to leave Birmingham, he hoped for ever, for
New Zealand.
The few people he had been compelled to see had been strangely kind;
quiet and gentle, as folk, no doubt, feel bound to be when in the
presence of one condemned. As for Major Lane, he was stretching--no one
knew it better than Carden himself--a great point in allowing the young
man to leave England before the Jarvice trial.
During those last days, even during those last hours, Theodore
deliberately prevented himself from allowing his mind to dwell on his
father. He did not know how much the old man had been told, and he had
no wish to know. A wall of silence had arisen between the two who had
always been so much, nay, in a sense, everything, to one another. Each
feared to give way to any emotion, and yet the son knew only too well,
and was ashamed of the knowledge, with what relief he would part from
his father.
There had been a moment when Major Lane had intimated his belief that
the two would go away and make a new life together, but Theodore Carden
had put aside the idea with rough decision. Perhaps when he was far away
on the other side of the world, the former relations of close love and
sympathy, if not of confidence, might be re-established between his
father and himself, but this, he felt sure, would never be while they
remained face to face.
And now he was lying wide awake in the darkness, in the pretty peaceful
room which had once been his nursery, and where he had spent his happy
holidays as a schoolboy.
His brain remained abnormally active, but physically he was oppressed by
a great weariness; to-night, for the first time, Carden felt the
loathsome wraith that haunted him, if not less near, then less
malicious, less watchful than usual, above all less eager to assert her
power.... Yet, even so, he lay very still, fearing to move lest he
should once more feel about his body the clinging, enveloping touch he
dreaded with so great a dread.
* * * * *