Both the young men stood still for a moment, shocked beyond the
power of speech at what Geoffrey had done.
But it was only for a moment. Then Gerard knelt down beside the
huddled-up form of Reginald Candover, and laying a hand on his heart
said:--
“I don’t think he is dead, after all. Look here! There’s a doctor who
lives quite close--a Dr. Fendall. Go and fetch him. And mind you come
back, there’s a good chap. We may want more help, and there’s nobody
here but a parcel of silly, giggling girls.”
But Geoffrey was watching the face of the man whom for the first
moment he thought he had killed, and he said:--
“It’s my belief that he’s not only alive, but that he’s shamming. He
hears what we’re saying, I’ll swear.”
Gerard, however, was not so sanguine.
“Go and fetch the doctor, there’s a good chap,” said he. “And I’ll
find some one to give me a hand, and we’ll get him on the sofa.”
Geoffrey went away, not quite happy, but putting on an air of bravado.
“If he is dead, mind you,” said he to his cousin at the door, as he
went out, “it serves him jolly well right. For he was going to shoot
you when I, watching him through the crack of the cupboard door,
sprang out just in time to stop him.”
Gerard expressed his thanks for the service by an emphatic nod and ran
up the short flight of stairs to the showrooms.
Here he found little promise of competent assistance. The girls in the
showroom, who were all young, had been thrown off their balance in the
first place by the absence of Mademoiselle Laure and Audrey; and when
they heard the unusual sounds of men meeting and conversing on the
staircase, and peeping out saw them disappear into the little
back-room, and then reappear and go out again, they were all seized,
naturally enough, with the idea that something was wrong, and that the
business had come to an abrupt standstill.
Whereupon they took, some to their hats, and some to hysterical tears;
when, listening intently for any indication of what might be going on
in the back room, they heard the heavy fall of Mr. Candover’s body on
the floor, followed by the exclamations and muffled ejaculations of
Gerard and his cousin, a panic seized upon them all; and when Gerard
came out in search of help, he found the last of the girls taking
flight, with her jacket on her arm and her hands in the act of ramming
long hatpins into her big picture hat as she followed the others to
the door.
“Tell me where I can get some water, and--and come and give me a hand,
there’s a good girl,” said he persuasively. “Mr. Candover’s fallen
down and--er--and hurt himself.”
But the girl, seeing blood upon his cuff, answered with an hysterical
scream:--
“Oh, I couldn’t, I really couldn’t, sir! The sight of--of anything
dreadful would upset me, I know. But there’s water in the jug in
Mademoiselle’s room, through there, sir--and I believe she keeps a
drop of brandy in the cupboard. I’ll send some one up to help, if you
like, sir.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“Thanks. If it’s anybody as useful as yourself, you needn’t take the
trouble,” said Gerard sarcastically, as he passed the young lady and
went in search of the restoratives of which she had spoken.
But Mademoiselle Laure kept the door of her room locked when she was
away; and angry and impatient, Gerard dashed back through the rooms
and ran downstairs into the shop below in search of more intelligent
assistance.
By the time he got back to the little room where he had left the body
of Reginald Candover stretched upon the floor, however, a strange
thing had happened, a thing which reminded him of a certain mysterious
occurrence related to him by his wife.
For the door of the little room was open, and there was no one in it
but Mademoiselle Laure, sallow, forbidding, with stealthy eyes, and a
district messenger boy to whom she was giving money and a telegram to
be dispatched.
Mademoiselle looked at him steadily and he returned the look. Though
they had not met before, each guessed who the other was, and mutual
antagonism was apparent in their stiff greeting.
“Mr. Candover is gone then?” said Gerard, raising his hat and holding
out the brandy he had brought.
She merely shrugged her shoulders coldly, pretending not to
understand, and walked up to the showrooms, leaving him to enter the
little room where the unlucky incident had occurred, and to await, in
much perplexity, the return of his own emissaries.
In the meantime he remarked that the rug on which Mr. Candover had
fallen, and which had been stained with his blood, had been taken
away.
It seemed a long time before Geoffrey came back, and when he did so,
he was alone. He came slowly and as it were reluctantly up the stairs,
and opening the door of the room very slowly, put his head inside, and
asked in a fearful whisper:--
“Has he come round yet?”
“He’s come round and gone off,” replied Gerard rather gruffly. “So if
you’ve brought a doctor----”
“But I haven’t,” retorted Geoffrey briskly, as he swung himself into
the room with a look of great relief, and stared in some bewilderment
at his cousin. “What have you done with the fellow?” said he.
“I? Nothing. I went to get brandy, and when I came up he was gone, and
there was a horrible old Frenchwoman here.”
“Old Laure, I suppose. I know her.”
“And she pretended not to understand my questions. So we bowed to each
other, and separated. But what has become of the man I haven’t the
least idea.”
Geoffrey looked round him apprehensively, and thrust his hand through
his cousin’s arm.
“Look here,” said he, “I’ve had enough of this den. And so have you, I
should think. You look awful, white as a sheet and with eyes like two
holes burnt in a blanket. Come along and let’s have some luncheon and
a bottle of champagne.”
Gerard freed himself.
“No,” said he. “I’ve got to stay here, where there’s something to be
found out. I couldn’t go away, if I would, till Audrey comes back. You
forget that. You needn’t stay unless you like.”
Geoffrey gave a grotesque and uneasy sigh.
“No. I must stand by you, now we’re in for it,” he said. “After all,
I’m nearly as much interested in the business as you are, and if we’re
really going to find out that this Candover was at the bottom of the
forgery business----”
“Sh--sh,” said Gerard, who knew how very necessary it was to be
cautious in such a shady neighbourhood.
So they dropped into a long silence, broken only by occasional
whispered remarks, until, as minutes grew into hours, both men grew
restless, anxious and suspicious that something untoward had happened.
Neither cared to leave the other to go to the lawyer’s in search of
Audrey; but when she had been away nearly four hours, the anxiety felt
by Gerard grew so keen that he was about to send his cousin on a
mission of inquiry, when, to the intense relief of both the young men,
they heard the voices of Edgar and Audrey upon the staircase.
A moment later the door was thrown open, and the four met, all
haggard, pale, excited, and worn out with suspense.
“What news?” asked Gerard, as soon as they were all shut in the room,
after making a careful survey of the big cupboard in which Geoffrey
had concealed himself and of the staircase outside.
“Nothing good,” said poor Audrey tearfully, as she let him take her
limp, nerveless hand.
“You saw Mr. Masson?”
“Yes. And told him everything. He listened, asked questions, made
notes. But I don’t think he believed one word in ten!”
And the poor overwrought woman burst into a flood of tears.
“Oh, come, he must have thought something of what you said. He kept
you a very long time!” said Gerard.
She shook her head.
“A good deal of that time,” she said, “I was simply waiting, waiting.
For when I had told him everything, he went out of the room, and was
away nearly an hour. And when he came back he seemed to have forgotten
everything, for he made me go all over it again. Every word. It was
heartbreaking. And after all he could give me no hope, no help, no
encouragement. He simply got up, wished me good-bye, and said he would
write to you.”
But Gerard saw that this was much better than it seemed to the
unsophisticated woman.
“It’s all right,” said he. “Masson never wastes time. If he made you
repeat it all it was with an object. Perhaps to see whether you would
tell the same story twice.”
“But why should he think I wasn’t telling the truth? Why----”
“Listen,” said Gerard quietly. “It’s all right. He would never have
kept you so long if he hadn’t considered your statement important.
Wait patiently now till you get his letter.”
“And you, what has happened to you?” asked Audrey curiously.
“Something, I’m sure. You both--” and she looked from him to
Geoffrey--“have a curious look, as if--as if----”
“Does he look,” said Geoffrey in a deep-voiced whisper, leaning across
to Audrey, and pointing dramatically at Gerard, “as if he’d been
within an ace of being murdered?” She uttered a low cry. He went on:
“And do I look”--and Geoffrey thumped his own chest with an air of
triumph--“as if I’d saved his life?”
“What?” said Edgar, who had returned in a depressed and nervous
condition, fully convinced that his cousin and Audrey were in league
with each other for the concoction of a monstrous string of fables.
Geoffrey insisted upon telling his tale himself, which he did in the
same loud whisper, illustrating his points with expressive gestures:--
“Gerard heard Candover’s voice, and went out to speak to him,” said
he. “And I, thinking it as well he should have a witness, got into the
cupboard here, and took the poker with me.”
“Poker! What on earth for?” said Edgar.
“You shall hear. Candover smelt a rat directly, though Gerard smiled
and tried to look pleasant. And as the two came in, I, peeping out
through the crack of the cupboard door, saw that Candover meant
mischief. They sat down together here,” and he pointed to the hearth,
“and began to talk. And though Gerard betrayed nothing in his words,
he did by his face. And presently I saw Candover fumbling with--a
revolver.”
“Oh, nonsense!” said Edgar.
Audrey only clasped her hands, but said nothing.
“He was getting up from his chair, with the revolver hidden under the
front of his overcoat, when I dashed out and knocked him over. And, by
Jove, we thought I’d killed him!”
“You’ll get yourself into a nice mess if you’ve hurt him!” said Edgar
uneasily.
“I’ll risk that,” said Geoffrey recklessly. “At any rate I can prove
why I did it, for I’ve got his revolver.”
And as he spoke he took out of his pocket and flourished before his
brother’s eyes the weapon he had taken from the hand of Mr. Candover
as the latter lay on the floor.
It was loaded in all the five chambers.
A silence fell upon the group as they looked at it, and the sense grew
strong upon them all that they were involved in an affair more
desperate than they had guessed. Edgar, perhaps for the first time in
his life, showed the spirit of a man, and spoke in words befitting the
future head of a noble house.
“By Jove!” said he, “this is serious! Gerard, we’ll see you through
this. But we must first put your wife in a place of safety. She ought
not to stay here!”
But Audrey refused to go away.
“I must stay with Gerard,” she said. “And for that matter, what have
we got to be afraid of now that Mr. Candover’s gone away?”
“Well, we can’t feel sure about that,” said Gerard dubiously. “I’m
more inclined to think that he is on the premises still. Mademoiselle
Laure may be keeping him close, at any rate, till she’s patched him up
a bit. He was scarcely in a fit state to go out when we last saw him,
was he, Geoff?”
“Hardly! However, whether he’s here or not, it’s not likely he will
dare to make another attack on anybody just yet.”
“Hadn’t we better go again to the solicitor’s,” suggested Edgar, “and
tell him of this fresh outrage? If he didn’t think the case strong
enough before, he will now, I should think!”
“I think the best place to go to would be the police-station,” said
Geoffrey.
“Not yet,” said Gerard. “I should like this gang to think we’re shy of
calling in the police, so that we may have the chance of running up
against some more of them.”
“Well, while waiting,” said Geoffrey, “we’ll have something to eat and
drink. I’ll go and order some luncheon to be sent in from the
restaurant up the street. But first, let me tell you of an odd thing
that went out of my head when I came back and found the bird flown.
You know you sent me for a doctor, a Dr. Fendall. You said he lived
near here?”
“Yes.”
“Well, there’s no such person. I asked everywhere, and at last I found
a good-natured chap who looked the name up in the directory. There’s
no doctor of that name about here.”
Audrey listened with keen ears.
“I was sure of it!” she said. “Dr. Fendall was the man Johnson. And
being one of the gang, of course he saw nothing, or said he saw
nothing, no trace of the woman in the white dress!”
The number of uncanny revelations which were forced upon them made
them all feel sick and shivery. They made no further objection
therefore to Geoffrey’s proposition, and he had left them on his
errand when, on reaching the bottom of the stairs, he suddenly ran up
again to report the surprising intelligence that there were “two
awfully pretty girls outside, in a hansom, asking for Madame Rocada”.
Audrey uttered a little cry.
“It must be Pamela and her sister--his daughters!” cried she in
consternation. “Oh, what shall we do?”
There was upon them all a terrible sense of the difficulty of the
position in which they were being placed. But Gerard whispered:--
“There’s nothing to be done now but for you to see them and see what
they want. They are coming upstairs now. Go and meet them.”
Audrey, trembling from head to foot, obeyed, and going out of the
room, saw that Pamela and Barbara, smiling but shy, were standing at
the top of the stairs, looking about them.
They uttered little cries of delight when they saw Audrey, who ran up
to them and kissed them both, scarcely able to speak in consequence of
the vivid emotion caused by their arrival at such a moment.
“We’re in a terrible difficulty, Madame,” said Pamela, “and we want
your advice and help.”
“Yes,” said Babs, “we want you, please, to speak for us to papa!”
Audrey shuddered as the innocent girls poured these words into her
ears.
They wanted her to “speak for them to papa!” To the very man, who,
unless Geoffrey had made the most grievous of mistakes, had tried, not
two hours ago, to murder her husband! And who was, in all probability,
at that very moment lying unconscious from the effects of a blow
administered by the avenging arm of Gerard’s cousin!
“Come in here,” said Audrey, mechanically, in a low voice, as she led
the girls into the deserted showroom.