Читать книгу A Front of Brass - Fred M. White - Страница 5

Table of Contents

Hubert was inclined to be amused. The correctness and solemnity of Jenner's manner by no means disguised his nervousness. The man was white and frightened. On the other hand Grant regarded the situation with a certain feeling of amusement. The idea of a lady burglar was distinctly a novel one. Doubtless one of the maids had come prowling about in the darkness, and Jenner had magnified her into a professional thief.

"Better make sure first," Hubert suggested. "It seems hardly possible that anybody should come here whilst so many lights are burning. Your burglar is not noted for audacity. Go and ask her what she wants. She is probably a house maid."

"I think not, sir," Jenner said quite firmly. "I don't make those mistakes, sir. I have been in service with the best families too long sir. It is a lady."

"You mean that you have seen her face?"

"Well, no, sir. I can't go so far as that. But with my experience it is impossible to make a mistake. There's a certain delicacy of perfume that the lower classes can't get. Even a lady's maid, who ought to know better, always over does it. And the way she carries her clothes. I shall be very much obliged if you will come this way, sir."

Hubert rose from his chair. It seemed to him that Jenner's philosophy had gone far enough. He was no longer amused; on the contrary he was vexed with himself for having wasted so much valuable time. Even in this interval the daring thief might have got away with some plunder of price. And a troubled doubt began to assail Hubert. There was something very wrong about this house, some thing sinister in connection with his partner. May Leverton had come here on a more or less desperate errand, and here was another woman on a similar quest apparently. Unless it might be that the two women—

The mere suggestion sent the blood humming through Hubert's head. The idea was preposterous and absurd, and yet stranger things had happened. It would be just as well perhaps to take this matter out of Jenner's hands altogether. Even if his suspicions were groundless, there was no necessity for Jenner to know too much. Taking it for granted that the intruder was a lady; the fact was almost in itself a proof that she was here on some desperate enterprise not necessarily connected with common robbery.

"We will go and investigate," Hubert said with a gaiety he was not altogether feeling. "I don't think there will be any occasion for us to arm ourselves. I'll go in front."

Jenner did not contest the point; he appeared quite content to fall modestly in the background and leave the whole affair to Grant.

The door of the library was open, and in the darkness somebody could be heard moving about. In a corner by a window stood the big safe. A moment later a match flared out; there was a sudden jingling of keys and the click of a lock. A pale, pretty, desperately frightened face stood out just for an instant in a luminous bath of light.

It was only for an instant, but it was quite long enough for Hubert. All his wits were alert and vigorous now. In the dim rays of the match he could make out Jenner with his hand on the switch ready to flood the room with the gleam of electrics.

Without the slightest hesitation, Grant's right arm shot out, and landed heavily on Jenner's temple. He went down like a log without a groan. The whole thing was too quick and clever for the servant to guess from what quarter the assault came.

He dropped on the carpet with a heavy thud. A muffled scream came from the figure by the safe. She darted headlong in the direction of the door, and as she passed him, Hubert caught her by the arm. She moaned piteously as Grant held her tight.

"You are quite safe," he whispered. "Absolutely there is no danger. But what possessed you to do it, what peculiar form of madness is this, May?"

The girl trembled from head to foot in a violent fit of sobbing. She was fighting hard with a wild desire to burst out into hysterical laughter. Grant's soothing words prevailed at length.

"I had to come," she whispered. "I meant to return when I left you this afternoon. It—it was a great shock to me to find you here at all. I did not expect anything of the kind. And I had to deceive you. Because the secret is not altogether mine."

Grant felt his way across the room and turned on the lights. May drew back in horror at the sight of Jenner lying there white and unconscious on the floor.

"Somebody has killed him," she cried. "He is dead."

"Not so much noise," Grant said. "The servants are all safe in bed, and it would be a great pity to disturb them. The man is all right. It was he who discovered that you were in the house. He had not recognised you when you lighted that match, but he would have done so had I not taken strong measures and knocked him senseless. He is beginning to move."

At a sign from Grant, May darted back behind the curtains. Jenner struggled to his feet.

"What happened?" he asked. "Where am I, sir?"

"Somebody must have struck you a blow," Grant exclaimed glibly. "It was quite sudden. In the confusion of the moment it is difficult to follow these things. There is nobody here now, and it would be a waste of time to try catch the thieves. I'll telephone the police in the morning. In the meantime you had better go to bed."

Jenner needed no further persuasion. The man was horribly frightened. He was anxious enough to have all the trouble and danger off his hands. If Mr. Grant was going to sit up until Mr. Spencer returned, he would like to retire. His head ached terribly, and in his present condition he would be quite useless.

Hubert watched Jenner disappear up the stairs, he heard the butler's room door closed and locked before he returned to the library. From the gentle draught that swayed the curtains to and fro he gathered that the windows were open. Obviously May had come that way. He whispered her name, and she came timidly towards him.

"You are very angry with me?" she asked, imploringly.

"I don't think so," Hubert said quietly. "It is all so strange and unexpected that I don't know what to think. Surely it must be some desperate trouble that impels you to do this daring thing! Won't you confide in me now, May? Won't you tell me everything?"

"I hardly know how I can look you in the face," May murmured. "There is no necessity, dearest. If it helps your courage we will talk in the dark. Perhaps it would be as well for us to do so in any case. I am expecting Mr. Spencer back soon, and I am quite sure that you don't want to see him at this hour."

"Oh, no, no," May shuddered, "I came this afternoon to try to persuade him to do me a favour. It was a great disappointment for me to find that he was away. Not that I believed for a moment that he would listen to anything that I had to say. It was when I was talking to you that I made up my mind. As I went away I looked in through the window of this room, and I saw that Mr. Spencer had left his keys on his desk."

Grant started. He had not noticed this oversight himself. It was very unlike his partner to do anything like that. But then he had been greatly distressed and agitated by that mysterious telegram, he had gone off without the least delay.

"You desired to rob Mr. Spencer's safe?" he asked. "Why?"

There was a long pause before May replied. Hubert could feel her trembling from head to foot. He waited patiently; he soothed her, with loving words and assurances of his loyalty to her.

"I am sure that you sorely need a friend," he said. "You are in some dreadful trouble that is caused by no fault of your own. And who better could you have to tell than me? I am not your husband yet, but I am going to be. Tell me, dearest."

A long sigh came from Mary's lips.

"How good, you are to me!" she murmured. "How nobly you treat me! And yet my conduct could not appear to you in a worse light. You are justified in regarding me as a common thief and never speaking to me again."

"I am quite certain that you are not to blame, May. I am quite certain that you are trying to shield somebody else. Who is it?"

"My—my mother," May whispered. "I ought not to have told you, but I could not keep it to myself any longer. It is only fair that you should be told. In that safe are my mother's jewels, or at least the jewels that my mother was taking care of."

"Taking care of! Then they are not here at all. Pray go on."

"I will try to make the matter plain, Hubert. Mr. Spencer is a scoundrel. There is no man whom I regard with more contempt and loathing. He—he wanted to marry me."

"To marry you! But where, how, when—I am amazed to hear this."

"We met frequently in London last winter. Mr. Spencer is a rich man, and he became very friendly with my mother. It was not right, because my father hates the man. You have heard me speak of my mother frequently. She is not bad, only foolish and frivolous, and very fond of getting into smart society. To do that nowadays it is necessary to gamble recklessly. And my mother has always had a weakness that way. She lost large sums of money, and Mr. Spencer paid them for her. But he always wanted security. He had her own jewels one by one. But that is not the worst. When Lady Mossingford had to go abroad suddenly to see her boy, who was dangerously ill in Paris, she was staying with us at Grant Lea. She left a large portion of her jewels in my mother's charge, and—and—"

May paused as if unable to proceed. Hubert kissed her tenderly.

"Let me finish," he said. "In a fit of madness your mother pledged those gems to get money to pay her gambling debts, and Spencer knows whom they belong to. He is using his knowledge as a lever to get your mother to force you to marry him. You came here this afternoon to try to induce Mr. Spencer to do the proper thing, and you found me here instead. And when you happened to see the keys on the desk, you made the desperate resolve of coming back to try to get possession of those gems. And all the time I have been in absolute ignorance as to what was going on. I told my partner this afternoon that I was going to marry you, and he took it as if it was the most ordinary piece of news. And all this time I have been the partner of an infernal scoundrel without dreaming of the fact. Why didn't you tell me?"

May was crying quietly, with her head on Hubert's shoulder.

"I did not dare to," she said. "I was afraid of making mischief between you. I see now how weak and foolish I have been. And I had my mother to think of. I only found out how bad things were quite by accident. At the present moment I am supposed to be in bed and asleep. I came by the road along the cliffs in the moonlight, and I am going back presently the same way. But I must have those jewels. It is a vile and dishonourable thing to do, but my mother is the first consideration. You will help me, Hubert?"

Grant hesitated. The situation was hedged with difficulties.

"We must take time," he said. "If you—but come outside. Let us go down the grounds in the direction of the cliffs. Unless I am greatly mistaken, Spencer has come back. I am quite sure that I heard his steps in the dining room."

Somebody was moving about the dining room certainly. Followed by May, Grant crept into the garden and made his way towards the cliffs.

"Wait for me," he said. "Stay here and have patience. I'll be back presently."

He hurried back to the house and into the dining-room. The lights were fully on; the blinds were drawn and by the table stood a figure in evening dress. To Grant's surprise he saw that the intruder was not Spencer, but a stranger.

"There is some mistake here," he said. "You are—"

"Very much at your service, sir," the stranger said. "Be so good as to be seated. You want naturally to know my name. Then call me Smith—Mr. John Smith—of London."