Читать книгу The House of the Schemers - Fred M. White - Страница 9

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The young girl uttered no cry; she was altogether too frightened for that. Some instinct seemed to tell her that she had found a friend in the hour of her need. Ailsa could feel that she was trembling like some frightened animal. She just clung to her protector whilst Lady Altamont entered her boudoir. She was not alone, a clean-shaven man, with an unmistakable legal air, accompanied her.

"I assure you it is quite a mistake," she said. "Mr. Cecil Wanless has never been here at all. He promised to come round to-night; but I expect that something detained him. I saw his sister in the conservatory a little time ago."

The legal-looking gentleman did not appear to be altogether satisfied. He walked round the room with a suggestion of admiring the many works of art with which the apartment was furnished. Ailsa watched him a little curiously as he approached the locked door behind which Lady Altamont's mysterious visitor had been secreted.

"Your pictures are perfect," the stranger said. "Have you others here?—er, I beg your pardon."

In an absent-minded way the speaker tried the locked door. Lady Altamont laughed and said something about a Blue Beard's chamber. She could promise her visitor nothing more romantic than a staircase beyond.

"I suppose that is where the draught comes from," the stranger said. "Upon my word, it is enough to cut one's head off. Look at those curtains."

Ailsa grasped the danger at once. It was no time to hesitate. The draught evidently proceeded from the opening between Ailsa's studio and the boudoir. Very gently she pulled the girl backwards, and shut the secret door. They were absolutely safe now, and Ailsa turned up the gas. Everybody had gone to bed by this time, so that the girls were safe from interruption. The closing of that thin partition had made the position as safe as a fortress.

Ailsa was quite enjoying the situation. Her dull, colourless life had not fitted her for this kind of thing; but all the same she felt the spirit of adventure glowing in her veins. There was a smile on her face as she turned to her pretty companion.

"There is nothing in the least to be afraid of," she said. "We are practically alone in this house, which is No. 13. Perhaps you may have noticed it."

"I certainly have," the girl said. "Once or twice, when calling on Lady Altamont, I have been struck by its desolate appearance. But seeing that you were in the next house——"

"Well, I was and I wasn't. It's rather a long story, and perhaps I had better not tell you too much, as the secret is not entirely mine. It was only to-night, more or less by accident, that I discovered the passage; I was seeking something entirely different when I more or less blundered into Lady Altamont's boudoir. I never suspected the means of a communication between the two houses, nor did anybody else here, I fancy. But I am not sorry that I made the discovery."

"For my sake I am glad, too," the other girl said, with a shudder. "I am afraid of that woman. Not for worlds would I have been found prying into her room."

Ailsa looked thoughtfully at her companion. The stranger was an exceedingly pretty girl, whose face was none the less attractive because it was so very pale. And she did not look like one who is in the habit of doing sly and underhand things. Still, she had been undoubtedly prying in Lady Altamont's boudoir, much as an inquisitive lady's maid might do in the absence of her mistress.

Ailsa had not much knowledge of the world, or she would have been colder to her unexpected guest, and taken steps to get rid of her as soon as possible. For all she knew to the contrary, the girl might have been no more than a clever thief. But Ailsa would have repudiated that idea with scorn. She would have refused to believe such an accusation against a girl whose face was so pure and whose eyes were so steadfast.

On the contrary, her heart went out to the other. She turned away with a pretence of being busy at a table. She wanted the girl to recover herself.

"At any rate, you are quite safe here," she said cheerfully. "This is my very own room, where nobody comes, and where I am absolutely alone. To make quite sure, perhaps I had better lock the door."

"No, no," the other girl protested. "There is no occasion for that. I must try and get accustomed to dangers, for I have so much before me. It is very good of you to trust me. It is very good of you to trust me in this implicit fashion."

"I could trust your face anywhere," Ailsa said, gently.

The other girl smiled in a grateful kind of way.

"That is very good of you," she faltered. "If you knew everything you would be sorry for me. By the sheerest good fortune you have saved me to-night. I tremble to think what would have happened to me to-night if you had not been close at hand."

Ailsa nodded gravely. Fate and opportunity had given her a pretty fair insight into the character of the woman who called herself Lady Altamont. Still, she would have restrained her curiosity had it not been for a sight of that mysterious envelope.

"It was touch and go," she said. "I was never more surprised in my life than when I found myself on the other side of the wall. The hangings hid me, or I should most assuredly have been discovered. I was about to go back when I saw an envelope, partly addressed to a friend of mine. The ink was not yet dry, the address was unfinished, as if the writer had been called away. I was all the more confused and distressed because only just before I had been informed that the person written to was dead——"

"I saw the letter," the girl cried, "or, rather, I saw the envelope. I was too engaged with my own trouble to notice much. But it all comes back to me now. The envelope was addressed to Ronald Braybrooke. Was he a friend of yours?"

"Yes," Ailsa said, without any feeling of surprise. It began to seem quite natural to her now to learn that everybody seemed to know Ronald Braybrooke. "He was a great friend of mine, perhaps the greatest I ever had. I knew him years ago; he was so good and kind to me. And when he vanished out of my life, and I—I——"

"Did not cease to care for him," the girl said, quietly. "I know exactly how it is. You believed in him, even though he proved himself worthless."

"I have yet to learn that he had proved himself worthless," Ailsa said.

The other girl appeared to feel instantly Ailsa's change of manner.

"Forgive me," she said quietly. "I am sorry that I had to speak thus, but it would be far less cruel to go on in the long run. But perhaps I had better tell you my name and some of my history. I could not possibly justify my story unless I do so. And when I have finished we shall have to discuss some scheme for my getting back to No. 14 without attracting attention. My name is Grace Wanless, and I come from Washington. I am quite sure that you are going to be a friend of mine, Miss——"

"Ailsa Lefroy," was the reply. "Yes, I think that I like you already. You are so pretty and so dainty, and you look so true. Though you are naturally timid and nervous, you are doing a plucky thing to-night for the benefit of somebody else. Do sit down."

Grace Wanless sat down and smoothed out the dainty folds of her evening dress. She looked like some pretty little fairy in her gossamer robes.

"It was for my brother Cecil's sake," she explained. "We were a very happy family before Sir George and Lady Altamont came along. They were supposed to be travelling for the sake of Sir George's health. As a matter of fact, he is a poor, dissipated creature, who is kept in the background by his wife, whom I know to be no better than a brilliant adventuress. There were some queer tales told at Washington. We had not heard them then, and we became very intimate. I have no father, and my mother, who is a confirmed invalid, is very rich. My father gave her a deal of priceless jewelry; indeed my mother's jewels were known all over the States. Of course, we had no suspicion of the class of people with whom we were dealing. My brother was infatuated, but I did not know it. My mother was fascinated, too, and when Sir George proposed a voyage to England for a long rest and some yachting in the North Sea, the thing was settled at once. My mother was delighted with the idea, and we came here.

"We had not been long here before I began to suspect things. My suspicions became realities once we were away on the dingy old tub that Sir George called his yacht. I know that my silly brother was madly in love with Lady Altamont, and that she was merely using him for her own set purpose. There was another man on board the yacht, and I am afraid I am going to hurt your feelings by alluding to him—Mr. Ronald Braybrooke."

"I shall be greatly obliged if you will speak quite frankly," Ailsa said. "It is quite evident to me that you did not care for Mr. Braybrooke."

"My dear, kind friend, I hated him. He was not a nice man. He might have been a gentleman and a man of honour at one time, but he had surely deteriorated. He lured my brother to drink, and won large sums of money from him. I did not dare to say anything to my mother; I was all the more terrified to find that she had all her jewels on board. I found also that this was brought about by Lady Altamont."

Ailsa put up her hand and stopped the speaker in the full flow of her narrative.

"Just one moment, please," she said, quietly. "I am deeply interested in your narrative, and I shall hope presently to hear the conclusion of it. I hope also that in future we shall become great friends. I am so lonely that I would give anything for a girl friend. But, first of all, I should like to know more of Ronald Braybrooke."

Grace Wanless's face grew cold and a little hard. She hesitated before she spoke.

"I am so sorry to give you pain," she murmured at length. "All the more sorry because you have been so kind to me. But I cannot say anything that would redound to the credit of Ronald Braybrooke."

Ailsa felt her heart sinking within her. She had clung to the memory of her lover. His image had been the one bright spot in her life. She had always felt that he would come back to her some day and explain the cause of his strange silence. And yet from two different pairs of lips, within a brief space of time, she had heard everything that was to the discredit of the man who held her heart.

"Just another moment," she said. "Ronald Braybrooke is by no means a common name, and yet there may be more than one man so called. Will you be so good as to look at that photograph on the mantelpiece? Is he anything like the Braybrooke you know?"

Grace glanced carefully at the photograph, and shook her head.

"That is a handsome, clean-living man," she said. "No. I see no likeness. Still, I have known a few years' dissipation wreck the fairest face."

"I beg your pardon." Ailsa said. "I see there is a mistake somewhere. I interrupted you at the most interesting stage of your story."

"And now I am coming to the point. I was up late one night and could not sleep. I heard a violent quarrel between my brother and Ronald Braybrooke on deck. There was a squabble, and Mr. Braybrooke was knocked overboard and drowned. In the eyes of the law my brother would have been judged guilty of murder. And I saw it with my own eyes. It was a terrible moment, and I suppose I fainted. At any rate, I uttered no cry, and when I came to myself I was lying on a coil of rope on deck. Lady Altamont knew what had taken place, as I could see by her treatment of my poor, unhappy brother. It was given out that a passenger of ours had fallen overboard and been drowned, and there was an end of it. Cecil said nothing to me, and I dared not mention the matter to him.

"But I could see that he was getting tired of Lady Altamont, and ready to break with her. Alas! he could not do anything of the kind—that infamous woman knew too much. I daresay you can guess what she was after—she wanted my mother's jewels. And when we got finally to Hull the jewels were missing. Of course it was all put down to the wretched man Braybrooke. My mother did not know what happened; as a matter of fact, she does not know still. We have agreed to keep the matter from her on account of her health. All the same, I have taken the precaution of laying everything before the people at Scotland Yard, and they are moving very quietly and secretly in the matter. That is all I can tell you at present."

"You feel quite sure that your brother is at the bottom of this?" Ailsa asked.

"There can be no question about it," Grace said. "I found the fragment of a letter to him from Lady Altamont that removed all my doubts. I gathered from the letter that somewhere near that boudoir the key of the mystery lay. That is why I was there to-night at the risk of betraying the fact that I knew anything."

"Perhaps the key lies in the room beyond." Ailsa suggested. "Let me tell you what I saw before you came creeping into the boudoir. It may help you."

Grace Wanless listened with a flattering interest. She seemed greatly excited about something.

"Tell me something," she demanded. "I take it that this house is precisely like the one next door. You have a room here and another room beyond corresponding to Lady Altamont's boudoir. Where does the room beyond lead to?"

"A staircase that gives on the garden," said Ailsa after a minute's consideration. "The houses here are back to back, if you understand what I mean. There is only a trellis-work between our wilderness of a garden and the one next door. From the garden you can get a pretty good view of the wing where the boudoir lies.'

"Then I should like to go down to the garden and have a look for myself," Grace cried. "Could you manage it for me without disturbing anybody?"

Ailsa thought that she could—there would be no difficulty in the matter at all. The two girls crept silently down the stairs and into the garden. They could see the brilliant lights shining behind the crimson blinds in Lady Altamont's boudoir, and a more feeble glimmer of light behind the room of the locked door. Somebody seemed to be crouching and hiding in the shrubs of the next garden: his face showed for an instant.

"Inspector Burles," Grace whimpered. "The man from Scotland-yard who has my mother's jewel affair in hand. Perhaps he has got a clue. If you think——"

Grace stopped as Ailsa grasped her arm vigorously. Ailsa was looking upwards with her eyes fixed on the window of the locked room next door.

"Look," she whispered in a frozen voice. "What is that at the window?"