Читать книгу The Magnificent Hoax - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 3

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A human being, the shrunken shadow of a man he seemed, was toiling slowly and painfully up the stone steps of the gaunt tenement house. With his left hand he grasped the iron balustrade. His head remained immovably lowered. His footsteps grew wearier and wearier. On the last landing but one he paused for breath. He leaned for a moment or two against the rail. His eyes, sad eyes they were, set in hollow depths, looked wistfully out of the dust-encrusted window, over the tops of the houses, to the curving line of the river with its tangled cluster of masts, a semi-derelict steamer or two moored against the wharves. He moved across to the narrow cracked slit of clouded glass. His fingers failed to dislodge it, to make the slightest effect upon its fastening. It seemed as though it had remained closed since the day it was built. He looked out for a few minutes like a prisoner from his cell, then he returned to his task. Wearily he crawled up to the landing and turned to face the last flight of stairs. After the third step he halted, trembling. It was the one place he dreaded. There was a gap in the balustrade for at least three yards. From where he was, he clutched the end of the iron rail and looked fearfully downwards. All that he could see was a terrifying pool of blackness.

“What a hell of a place,” he muttered to himself.

He stood there shivering. It seemed impossible, with his insignificant stock of courage, that he should ever pass that unprotected space. Presently he decided that he must move over to the wall side and lean against that for the remainder of the journey. For a moment or two, however, that glance below seemed to have completely unnerved him. His knees were shaking. There seemed to be a vacuum at the back of his head.

From the landing below there was a sudden stream of light. A door had been opened. A gaudily dressed woman stepped out and paused for a moment, swinging a key upon her finger. She caught a glimpse of the shrinking figure above.

“Hello!” she exclaimed. “Who’s that?”

“I’m Loman,” he answered. “Anthony Loman—the top-floor lodger here. I’m just home from abroad and the climb is almost too much for me. You look good-natured,” he went on wistfully. “I wonder whether you would mind—er—leaving your door open whilst I tackle these last few steps?”

She laughed in a kind way.

“I believe you’re afraid of that gap in the balustrade,” she said.

“I am,” he confessed with a groan. “My nerve isn’t good.”

“Stay where you are,” she directed, “and I’ll come and help you up.”

“You’re very kind,” he murmured.

She swung up to his side, the powder puff which she had been using still in her hand. Her movements were unusual in their grace, and there was a certain elegance about her entirely at variance with her showy clothes and clumsy use of cosmetics. She seemed to envelop him with a wave of cheap perfume as she reached his side and passed her strong arm through his.

“Now then,” she said encouragingly, “you have nothing to fear. I’ll be your balustrade. You can lean on me as much as you like. One step—two—up we go. Nothing when you’ve got an arm to help you, is it? You’re the only one on this landing, aren’t you?”

“I am all alone up here,” he answered. “My room is just an attic.”

She looked around at the bare walls, at the heavy door of the fire escape which stood half open. The stark nakedness of the place oppressed her. She shivered as she tightened her grip upon his arm.

“Aren’t you lonely up here?” she asked.

“I want to be,” he assured her.

She shook her head.

“This house is full of bad characters, you know,” she warned him. “I should hate to be up here all alone. There are ten other rooms on my landing. It seems to me that the occupants must spend at least half their time in prison, but anyhow when they’re about they are human beings. I should hate it up 6 here—without a soul near. How the wind whistles through that fire escape door, too!”

“I’m not afraid,” he told her weakly. “I’m only glad to get back. I’ve been in danger. I have been abroad and in hospital but I still have work to do.”

“What sort of work?” she enquired curiously.

“Not work that one talks about. One has to keep one’s mouth closed all the time.”

“Well, is there anything else I can do for you?” she asked. “I’ll be getting along if there isn’t. This place gives me the shivers.”

He made no answer. He had suddenly become almost a dead weight upon her supporting arm. There was an eager, half-terrified light in his deep-set eyes. His trembling finger was pointing towards the door of his room a few feet away.

“What’s that?” he gasped. “For God’s sake tell me. What is it?”

The girl’s eyes followed the direction of his shaking forefinger. She passed her other arm around him. It was obvious that he was on the point of collapse.

“Nothing to be afraid of,” she assured him encouragingly. “It’s just a telegram pinned onto your door.”

“A telegram!” he gasped.

“Yes. Don’t you understand?” she explained. “The telegraph boy has evidently been here, found no one at home and pinned it to the door. Better 7 than pushing it underneath, anyway. Don’t tell me you’re afraid of a telegram!”

The man made no movement. She was conscious, however, that he was making a great struggle.

“Here—give me your key,” she went on. “I’ll open the door for you. I can’t stand about here all night. Give me your key, then I’ll open the door for you and you can go inside and read your telegram. Seems to me you’ve come out of hospital a bit before your time.”

He moved unsteadily forward, still relying chiefly upon her support. She unlocked the door and pushed it back. His head remained fixed all the time. His eyes were rivetted upon the telegram attached to the door by a bent pin. His own name in crude white paint stared at him: L-O-M-A-N.

“Let’s see if we can get any light,” she suggested. “I expect your metre has run out.”

She tried the switch. A feeble light shone out from the single burner. She looked around. It was an attic room with a small iron bedstead, a single chair, a plain deal chest of drawers. There was no pretence at carpet or furnishings of any sort.

“Why don’t you take down your telegram?” she asked. “Shall I do it for you? Here you are.”

She drew out the pin, threw it away and passed him the envelope. A feminine curiosity stirred for a moment in her.

“Want me to read it for you?”

His fingers gripped the envelope. He released her arm. His strength seemed to be returning.

“No,” he declined, with unexpected firmness. “Thank you very much, Miss—Judy, isn’t it?”

“That’s the only name I have hereabouts,” she admitted with a little laugh. “It’s good enough. My, you seem bare here,” she added, looking round. “Haven’t you got anything to eat, or a teapot or anything?”

He moistened his dry lips.

“I’m all right,” he assured her. “I thank you very much for your help, Miss Judy.”

He held the door open. He now seemed feverishly anxious for her to go. She watched the hand which gripped the telegram. It was still shaking violently.

“Are you quite sure that you’re fit to be left alone?” she asked bluntly.

“I must be left alone,” he insisted. “I must read this—message.”

“Well, if it’s good news I shall expect you to come and tell me about it,” she declared, as she held the handle of the door in her fingers. “Eighty-seven, just below. Judy’s the only name on the door—Judy of Bunter’s Buildings. That’s a nice name and address, isn’t it? This is your last chance, Mr. Loman. I haven’t much to give away, but I should like to do something for you. What about a loaf of bread and some margarine? There’s a cup of tea left in my pot, too—only wants warming up.”

“Thank you,” he said wearily, “I need nothing. I must read this message. Afterwards I may need to go out again. I do not wish to seem discourteous,” 9 he added, with what seemed to be a queer reversion to a former forgotten manner of speech, “but I wish you to go. I am pursued by enemies. Now that I have this message, for my safety’s sake I must go further and hide. The Society for which I work will provide me with food and shelter. I have plenty of friends when I dare to communicate with them.”

She indulged in a transient grimace as she turned away. She had intended to slam the door as a slight protest against his ingratitude. She caught a glimpse of him, however, at the last moment—a wan, shadowy figure brought almost to the threshold of death by weakness and anxiety—and she changed her mind. She slipped away noiselessly. Once or twice on her way down the stone steps she paused to listen. There came no sound from the room above.

For a young woman who professed to have been late for several of her engagements, Judy of Bunter’s Buildings seemed in a curiously undecided frame of mind after she had regained the privacy of her apartment. The first thing she did was to prop the door a few inches open by means of some books and then wheel up a heavy chair to keep it in position. Afterwards she turned out her light and stood for a long time close to that slightly opened space. The minutes passed. The silence which reigned in the upper storeys, at any rate, of the bleak, squalid building, was unbroken. She 10 slipped off her shoes and stood in front of the window. The street below was thronged with people, mostly of the lower nautical type, dwarfed out of all recognition. Lights were flaming from the scattered stalls. Through the window, which she had cautiously opened a few inches, she heard the strains of raucous music from a public house and the shouts of the street vendors around the corner. She opened it still farther and leaned out so far, grasping the side of the sash for security, that she could see the entrance to the building below. All manner of people passed it. No one entered. She drew away for a time wearily. This period of watching was full of sickening doubts. She had always hated inaction. She had one last look out of the window, glancing across at the river with its traffic of barges, motor craft, and wheezy old steamers being drawn by tugs to what, it seemed, must be their last home. She glanced down at Bunter’s Wharf, lying up alongside which was the only decent-looking steamer in sight—a queerly shaped, apparently top-heavy cargo boat. Then she turned back into the room and, with her hands behind her back, commenced a stealthy regular promenade of its narrow limits.

Of all sounds in this gathering darkness that was the one which she had dreaded most. She stood by the door, breathlessly silent, and listened. Someone was mounting the stairs from below, mounting not with the tired uncertainty of a sick man but 11 with a long, bounding stride, shuffling but full of eagerness to arrive at his destination. To her excited apprehensions there was menace in these rapidly approaching footsteps. They had reached the last flight. She crept a little nearer to the crack in the door. Her long delicate fingers trembled as she drew it an inch or two more open. The ascending figure shaped itself through the darkness. A human being—indeterminate of age and physique in his long soiled mackintosh and the hat pulled over his eyes. . . . He was on the landing now. She stood still and let him pass. What she could see of his face was horrible. Deep-set, evil eyes. The complexion of a vampire. The weak slobbery mouth of an idiot. She closed her eyes and drew back, shrinking, into the room.

She remained in the place after the ascending figure had passed, numb for several moments. Then she called out after him. There was no reply. She leaned over the threshold. He was crossing the landing above now, walking swiftly towards Loman’s door. She called out once more, but even to herself her voice sounded feeble. The knowledge was suddenly swept in upon her that effort of any sort was useless. Nothing could stop what was to happen. She picked up her small hat and thrust a pin savagely through it. Once more she disfigured her face with dabs of the cheap cosmetics, then she threw everything into her bag and opened the door with trembling fingers. There was no sound to be 12 heard. Was it all over, she wondered? She herself had need of the balustrade as she descended that flight of stairs. Halfway down she stopped as though paralysed. The sound was so faint that it barely reached her ears, but it had its own peculiar horror. It was the cry of a man terrified unto death—the cry of death itself. She turned and ran down the flights of stone steps one after the other into the misty gloom of the night.