Читать книгу The Nine Bears - Edgar Wallace - Страница 6

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THE next morning, at the stroke of ten, Van Ingen, faultlessly clad, sprang from his hansom in front of the American Embassy and tossed the astonished jarvey a sovereign.

"Because it's a fine morning," explained Van Ingen gaily, "and also because something nice is going to happen to-day."

He stood for a moment, drawing in the fresh April air, sweet with the breath of approaching spring. He caught the scent of lilacs from an adjoining florist shop. Overhead, the sky was faintly blue. He was feeling fit, very fit indeed—he made passes with his cane at an imaginary foe—and he was to lunch with Doris and her father at the Savoy. That was the "something nice"—with perhaps a stroll later along the Embankment with Doris alone.

He turned and took the stairs three at a time, whistling softly to himself.

"Chief in yet?" he enquired of Jamieson, the secretary, who looked up in astonishment at his entrance, and then at the clock.

"No, he's not down yet. You've broken your record."

Cord grinned. "I've got to get away early." Tossing his hat upon his desk, he sat down and went methodically through his mail. Half-an-hour later, he leaned back languidly and unfolded his Times, which in his haste he had thrust unread into his pocket.

"Beastly bore, this keeping up with the times," he grumbled in an aggrieved tone. "Why does the chief make us wade through all this stuff? Make us diplomats, forsooth!"

He yawned and glanced down at the flaring headlines on the front page. With a little horrified cry he sprang to his feet. He was suddenly pale, and the hand which gripped the paper shook.

"Good God!" he exclaimed.

Jamieson swung about in his swivel chair.

"What's up?" he enquired alertly.

"Grayson!" he muttered huskily. "Gerald Grayson has committed suicide!"

"Yes, so I read," remarked Jamieson cheerfully. "Supposed to be a fabulously rich old johnny, wasn't he, and turned out to be a bankrupt. Friend of yours?" he asked curiously.

Van Ingen lifted a face from which every vestige of colour had been drained. "I—I was with him at the opera last night," he said. Jamieson whistled softly.

"He was slightly indisposed and left early," continued Van Ingen, "and I thought no more about it."

He rose hurriedly and reached for his hat. "I must go to them. Perhaps something can be done. Doris—" He broke off, unable to continue, and turned away sharply.

Jamieson looked at him sympathetically. "Why don't you go round by the newspaper offices?" he suggested. "There may be new developments—possibly a mistake. You note that the—the body has not been recovered?"

Van Ingen's face brightened. "A fine idea! Thanks, old man." He wrung the other's hand fervently. "I'll be off at once."

Out upon the pavement, he caught a passing taxi-cab. "Drive to the nearest newspaper office," he directed, "and wait for me."

At the information desk inside the huge building where he preferred his request, his worst fears were realised. The note was unmistakably in Grayson's handwriting.

"We verified that, of course," said the reporter who had been sent out to speak to the young man.

"How?" asked Van Ingen sharply.

"Through his daughter, naturally," was the calm response. "We sent a man out this morning to her aunt's house, and she recognised the handwriting at once."

Van Ingen groaned. "Couldn't you have left her in peace?" he demanded.

"Mr. Van Ingen, you don't seem quite to realise the importance of this tragedy. Grayson was a financial king—a multimillionaire. Or, at least, he was so considered up to this morning. It now appears that he had speculated heavily during the last few weeks—we gathered this from Lady Dinsmore—who kindly told us what she knew—and lost everything, every penny of his own and his daughter's fortune. Last night, in a fit of despair, he ended his life."

Van Ingen looked at him in a kind of stupefaction. Was it of Grayson the man was talking such drivel? Grayson who only the week before had told him in high gratification that within the last month he had added a cool million to his girl's marriage portion. Grayson who but yesterday had hinted mysteriously of a gigantic financial coup in the near future. He passed a bewildered hand across his eyes. And now all that fortune was lost, and the loser was lying at the bottom of the Thames!

"I think I must be going mad!" he muttered.

"Grayson wasn't the kind to kill himself. Why, I tell you," he cried, "that last night, when I bade him good-night, he was gay, smiling. He looked like a man who goes forth to meet success."

"You saw him, then?" the reporter queried eagerly. "When? Where? Please give us full details, Mr. Van Ingen. This may turn out to be of tremendous importance." He pulled out his note-book.

"I was at the opera with his party last night," replied Van Ingen. He repeated the events of the previous evening.

"Grayson was not meditating suicide when I left him," he concluded positively. "I could swear it! Rather, he seemed to be reflecting with relish upon some particularly fine joke. May I see that note he is supposed to have written?"

"Certainly!" The reporter vanished into an inner room, and presently returned holding a scrap of white paper in his hand. "Torn from his memorandum book, you see," he observed quietly. Van Ingen read it through. "It's his handwriting, right enough," he admitted. "But somehow, it doesn't sound like Grayson himself. Too theatrical, dramatic!" He frowned, as if trying to catch some haunting impression. "It sounds like—" He broke off sharply, his face paling.

"Good God, no!" he whispered, "that couldn't be! And yet "—his eyes sought the paper again —"it's the dead ringer of the kind of rot he talks! But why—" He pressed his hand to his temples. "I give it up!" He returned the slip to the reporter, who had been watching him with cool, level eyes.

"You have a clue?" he asked.

"No, no!" replied Van Ingen hurriedly. "The whole affair is utterly inexplicable to me at present. I cannot believe that Grayson deliberately killed himself. The thing is beyond reason! The paper says that his hat and overcoat were found?"

"Together with his wallet and some personal letters. It seems a clear case." The reporter hesitated a moment. "It is not as yet known to the public, but I think I may tell it to you that Mr. T.B. Smith has been given charge of the matter. He will probably wish to know your address. And in the meantime, if you run across anything—"

"Certainly! I will let you know. Smith is an able man, of course." Van Ingen gave the number of his chambers, and retreated hastily, glad that the man had questioned him no further.

Out in the fresh air he drew a deep breath of relief, which ended in a sigh. But, at any rate, he had not betrayed his suspicions, if indeed they could be termed suspicions—those wild surmises which had flashed like forked lightning across the blackness of his mind. He found his cab and flung himself wearily back against the cushions. And now for Doris!

But Doris was not visible. Lady Dinsmore met him in the morning-room, her usually serene countenance full of trouble. He took her hand in silence.

"It is good of you, my dear Cord, to come so quickly. You have heard all?"

He nodded. "How is Doris?"

She sank into a chair and shook her head. "The child is taking it terribly hard! Quite tearless, but with a face like frozen marble! She refused quite scornfully to believe the news, until she saw his own handwriting. Then she fainted. She fell to the floor at the man's feet as if she had been stabbed to the heart." Lady Dinsmore took out her lace handkerchief and wiped her eyes. "Doris," she continued in a moment, "has sent for Count Poltavo."

Van Ingen started. "Why?" he demanded in a low voice.

"I cannot say, definitely," she replied, with a sigh. "She is a silent girl. But I fancy she feels that the count knows something. She believes that Gerald met with foul play."

Cord leaned forward breathlessly. "My own idea!" he articulated.

Lady Dinsmore surveyed him with faint, good-humoured scorn. "You do not know Gerald!" she said finally.

"But—I do not follow you! If it was not murder it must have been suicide. But why should Grayson kill himself?"

"I am sure that he had not the slightest idea of doing anything so unselfish," returned Lady Dinsmore composedly.

"Then what—"

She leaned forward and tapped him on the shoulder with her fan.

"Why are you so absolutely sure that he is dead?" she asked softly.

Cord stared at her in blank amazement. "What do you mean?" he gasped. Was she mad also?

"Simply that he is no more dead than you or I," she retorted coolly. "What evidence have we? A letter, in his own handwriting, telling us gravely that he has decided to die! Does it sound probable? It is a safe presumption that that is the farthest thing from his intentions. For when did Gerald ever tell the truth concerning his movements? No, depend on it, he is not dead. But, for purposes of his own, he is pretending to be. He has decided to exist—surreptitiously."

"Why should he?" muttered Cord. This was the maddest theory of all. His head swam with the riot of conflicting impressions. He seemed to have been hurled headlong into a frightful nightmare, and he longed to emerge again into the light of the prosaic, everyday world.

The door at the farther end of the room opened. He looked up eagerly, half expecting to see Grayson himself smiling upon the threshold.

It was Doris. She stood there for a moment, uncertain, gazing at them rather strangely. In her white morning dress, slightly crumpled, and her dark hair arranged in smooth bandeaux, she was amazingly like a child. The somewhat cold spring sunlight which streamed through the window showed her pallid, as though the event of the night had already set its mark upon her. There were faint violet shadows beneath her eyes.

Cord came forward hastily, everything blotted from his mind but the sight of her white, grief-stricken face. He took both her hands in his own warm clasp. All he found to say, huskily, was, "Doris! Doris!"

The girl gave him a wide, deep look. Suddenly her lips dipped and quivered uncontrollably. With a short, smothered sob, she flung herself into his arms and hid her face on his shoulder.

Cord held her tenderly. "Don't!" he whispered unsteadily. "Don't cry, dear!"

In her sorrow, she was inexpressibly sweet and precious to him.

The moment recalled vividly an incident in their childhood, when her pet collie had died, and the little girl of seven had flown down the path with streaming eyes to meet him and sobbed out her grief in his arms.

He bent down and smoothed with gentle fingers the soft dusky hair. The fragrance of it filled his nostrils. Its softness sent a delicious ecstasy thrilling from his finger-tips up his arm. He trembled throughout his entire frame. All his life, he declared to himself with passionate sincerity, he would love her like this. All his life he would remember this one moment. He gazed down at her tenderly, a wonderful light in his young face.

"Dear!" he whispered again.

She lifted a pallid face to him. Her violet eyes were misty, and tiny drops of dew were still tangled in her lashes.

"You—you are good to me," she murmured.

At his answering look, a faint colour swept into her cheeks. She disengaged herself and sat down.

Lady Dinsmore came forward, and seating herself beside the girl upon the divan, drew her close within the shelter of her arms.

"Now, Cord," she said cheerily, indicating a chair opposite, "sit down, and let us take counsel together. And first of all," she pressed the girl's cold hand, "let me speak my strongest conviction. Gerald is not dead. Something tells me that he is safe and well."

Doris turned her eyes to the young man wistfully. "You have heard something—later?" she asked.

He shook his head. "There has been no time for fresh developments yet. I came past the newspaper office, and they are doing what they can. Scotland Yard is in charge of the affair, and T.B. Smith has been put upon the case."

She shuddered and covered her face with her hands.

"How strange and ghastly it all is!" she whispered. "I—I cannot get it out of my head. The dark river—my father—I can see him there—" She broke off with a low moan.

Lady Dinsmore looked helplessly across to the young man. Tears were in her kind eyes.

The curtain at the lower end of the room parted, and a footman stood framed in the opening.

"A message for Miss Grayson," he announced discreetly.

Lady Dinsmore arched her eyebrows significantly. "Poltavo!" she breathed.

Doris darted forward and snatched the letter from the man's hand. She broke the seal and tore out the contents at a glance. A little strangled cry of joy escaped her. Her face, which had been pale, flushed a rosy hue. She bent to read it again, her lips parted. Her whole aspect breathed renewed hope and radiance. She folded the note, slipped it into her bosom, and, without a word, glided from the room.

Without a word she glided from the room.

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Cord stared after her, white to the lips with rage and wounded love.

Lady Dinsmore rose briskly to her feet. "Excuse me, dear Cord," she murmured, "and wait here!" She rustled after her niece.

Van Ingen paced up and down the room distractedly, momentarily expecting her reappearance.

Alternate waves of jealousy and grief inundated his being. Only a short half-hour ago, with Doris' head pillowed upon his breast, he had felt supremely happy; now he was plunged into an abyss of utter wretchedness. What were the contents of that brief note which had affected her so powerfully? Why should she secrete it with such care unless it conveyed a lover's assurance? His foot came into contact with a chair, and he swore under his breath. Then he sighed.

The servant, who had entered unobserved, coughed deprecatingly. "Her ladyship sends her excuses, sir," he said, "and says she will write you later." He ushered the young man to the outer door.

Upon the top step Van Ingen halted stiffly. He found himself face to face with Poltavo.

The count greeted him gravely. "A sad business!" he murmured. "You have seen the ladies? How does Miss Grayson bear it? She is well?"

Van Ingen gazed at him darkly. "Your note recovered her!" he said with harsh bitterness.

"Mine!" Surprise was in the count's voice.

"But I have not written. I am come in person."

Cord's face expressed scornful incredulity. He lifted his hat grimly and descended the steps.