Читать книгу The White Glove - Fred M. White - Страница 8

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The man hesitated for a moment.

"Well, if you must, you must," Sefton said politely regretful. "But one moment, will you do me a slight favor? I have an important letter to write, and my hand is injured. I would get Rayne or one or the others to write the letter, only it has to do with a mutual acquaintance who would not like any of our set to know the circumstances of the case. Would you mind doing it for me from dictation?"

Clifford expressed his pleasure; indeed, he could do nothing else. Sefton indicated a table where pens and ink and paper lay. The paper was quite plain; it had not even a stamped heading, as Clifford noticed. Evidently Sefton's tastes were severe.

"Never mind about the address," the latter said. "Simply Tuesday night. Are you ready?"

"My Dear Friend,—I am very sorry to get your letter, the third of a similar kind during the past month. Really I don't know what you do with it all, though, of course, you are one of the very unlucky ones. Fortunately for me—and you—I have had a good run lately, and I am able to do what you ask. Still, I have to be pretty quiet, and, for the most part, I am lying low at my country seat, which is not a hundred miles from Tunbridge Wells. I enclose you the 'monkey,' and pretty hard it has been to get. You had better destroy this immediately—Yours as ever,

"C.M."

Clifford dashed the letter off, Sefton smilingly explaining that "C. M." stood for a nickname of his, by which he was known by a few intimates. He took a case from his pocket and produced a thick wad of notes. The envelope was torn in forcing them in.

"Deucedly annoying," Sefton said, "especially as I have no large envelopes in the house. It's not easy to get a hundred £5 notes in the limit of even a business envelope. If they were only notes for a larger amount! By the way, do you happen to have any notes for greater value about you?"

"As a matter of fact, I have," Clifford admitted. "I put £500 in my pocket when I came out to-night, all in £25 notes. I daresay you can get a score of them in your letter."

"Capital," Sefton cried eagerly. "Would you mind making the exchange, my dear fellow? It will make no difference to you, and it will be a great convenience to me."

Clifford made the desired exchange readily enough, and Sefton succeeded in getting the notes of higher value into the envelope. He sealed down the letter, and rang the bell, which was immediately answered by the footman.

"There," he said, "I fancy that is satisfactorily finished. And now, Marsh, can't I persuade you to join our party again. It seems to me—"

Rayne and the fourth member of the quartette came somewhat noisily in demanding to know what had become of their host.

"An unexpected letter I had to answer," Sefton explained. "And Marsh was so good as to write it for me. I'm trying to induce him to remain."

"I sincerely hope you will," Rayne said politely. "That young cub, Seymour, ought to be soundly kicked for the way he insulted you to-night. The only excuse is that he was drunk, and that a very little liquor overcomes him. However, we have put the little beast to bed now, and he is not likely to trouble you any more."

Clifford suffered himself to be overcome. After all was said and done his main duty was to find out all about Rayne, and it would be far more pleasure to do so from the inside of the house. These other men might or might not be the confederates of Rayne, but Clifford had to take the chance of that.

"Very well," he said. "I will play for an hour longer. We will forget the unpleasantness."

They went back to the smoking-room again. The room seemed to have grown very dark, Clifford thought. Sefton laughingly suggested a drink, which Clifford declined, and the offer was not pressed. At the end of an hour a genuine thirst possessed the guest, and he rose and filled himself a glass of soda-water at the sideboard.

"Don't forget the whiskey," Rayne laughed. "Not that I touch it my self. I find that lime-juice cordial on the little tray much more to my taste."

The hint was acceptable to Clifford, the suggestion of lime-juice being refreshing. He took a long steady pull at the grateful fluid, and placed it by his side. He was getting very tired and sleepy now; the long day with its early anxieties and the want of food up to a certain hour was telling on him.

"Upon my word, I can hardly keep my eyes open," he said.

He struggled on until the end of another game, and then the cards fell from his hand, and his head drooped forward on the table. The other men said nothing, they made no comment, but pulled steadily at their cigars, the abandoned cards lying neglected before them. For a long time nothing was heard but the steady breathing of the sleeping man. Then Rayne bent over and grasped a portion of Clifford's arm between his fingers.

"Wake up," he cried roughly, "this is no place to sleep, man."

No response came. Sefton looked on with an evil grin. He rose and went to the door and called "Myra" two or three times at the top of his voice.

"Just to make sure," he explained. "Pretty soundly off, I think."

"Sound as the floor," Rayne muttered. "Now are we on the right track, or have we made a mistake? Are we breaking a butterfly? Still, the chap was closeted with old Barrymore to-night, he comes from South Africa, and he admits that he knows all about diamonds. Go through his pockets, Sefton."

"Spoken with your own practical wisdom," Sefton laughed. "Nothing here but a packet of £5 notes to the tune of £500. Seeing that the Syndicate is decidedly short of the ready, and seeing that money is infernally tight in the City—and elsewhere—I propose that we annex the booty."

"Put from the chair and carried unanimously," the third man laughed. "But there does not seem to be anything else."

"Look close, make a thorough search," Rayne said curtly.

But nothing further rewarded the efforts of the party. Beyond the banknotes not a single scrap of paper or information of any kind was found on Clifford. Rayne frowned.

"He is either ignorant of the whole thing, or he is deeper than we anticipated," he said. "But a man who plays poker, and who has the nerves of this chap, is by no means a fool. My trusty friends, there is a man to beware of, to get out of the way."

The last words were spoken with a thrilling whisper, the grin died off the face of the third man. Sefton crossed to the door, and called "Myra" three times aloud.

"We must be careful," he said. "Myra was at Mother Raby's to-night, and our friend here did her a service. Myra is pretty well in hand, but girls are so sentimental, and, to do him justice, Marsh is a good-looking chap."

"What's to be the game?" asked the third man.

"Upstairs," Sefton said. "One of the rooms at the top of the house. Lay him on the bed there and shut the door. And if one of you carelessly turns the gas on after I have turned it out without the necessary formality of putting a light to it, why really it seems to me that—"

"Be silent, you fool," Rayne muttered angrily. "Your tongue will get you into trouble some of these days. Is there gas in the house?"

"After the second floor," Sefton explained. "The old boy didn't see his way to take the electric light everywhere. Come along."

"Better carry him in the chair," the third man suggested.

Silently the unconscious burden was carried up the stairs, and laid up on bed in a disused room. The blinds were drawn, and the gas turned on so that the conspirators could see that nothing had been left undone. Then the gas was turned off and on again, so that the singing of the escape made a hissing noise in the room. The door was closed again, and the trio of would-be murderers crept into the smoking-room.

"Come along," Rayne said huskily. "Let's get out of this. It has been a very bold and audacious dodge on the part of Sefton, but he'll have to try elsewhere after to-night."

Without another word being spoken the trio left the house. Upstairs in the darkened bedroom the noisy hiss of the deadly gas could be heard. Gradually the stentorian breathing of the man on the bed grew quieter. There was a sound in the empty house as of somebody creeping up the stairs, the soft opening and shutting of doors. In the dim light a white figure came along to the room where Clifford lay, the handle of the door turned, and the white figure started back.

The fumes of the gas caused the girl to reel for a moment. She, with her handkerchief tightly crammed into her mouth and against her nostrils, entered and felt her way to the window. Her heart was beating thick and fast before she found it, the spring blind flew up with a bang, the casement was pushed up. The girl drew a long, deep breath of fresh air, and then returned to the lock again. She found the tap of the gas bracket and the loud snake-like hiss suddenly ceased.

"Thank God I have come in time," she murmured. "Thank God, thank God."

The girl sobbed, and the tears came into her eyes. Having given the room time to clear, she lighted the gas again. With cold water and a sponge she worked at the figure on the bed. Perhaps the drug had not been quite so strong as the conspirators had intended, but at the end of an hour Clifford sat up on the bed. When the dreamy feeling passed away he saw that he was face to face with the pretty heroine of the card table.

"Where am I? What has happened?" he asked.

"You have been drugged and robbed," the girl said. "You must go away from here at once. Never mind about me. I shall be quite safe. Nothing can happen to me. Only please go at once, and ask no questions, or you will get me into serious trouble. If I should be missed they will come back for me—oh, do go."

The girl wrung her hands in an agony of distress. Dazed still and half-drunk, Clifford found his way down the stairs. In the open air he came to himself, the muddled feeling passed away. Gradually it was all coming back to him. He put his hand in his pocket, but his money was gone. The whole thing seemed incredible, an evil dream. At the very outset he had lost everything. He had half a mind to go back and force the truth from the girl. It seemed strange that people who occupied palatial houses should stoop to vulgar robbery. A policeman passing by stopped at Clifford's question as to who lived at 15 Arlington Gardens.

"Why, Lord Arlingbury, the Foreign Secretary, of course," was the reply. "Family out of town at present. Good-night, sir."

"Good heavens!" Clifford murmured to himself. "Am I mad or dreaming? What vile mystery is here?"