Читать книгу The Broken Thread - Le Queux William - Страница 2

On entering old Mr Mutimer’s house a telegram addressed to Raife lay upon the hall-table. Tearing it open, he read the brief summons. “Come at once, urgent. – Mother.”

The words were startling in their brevity. Turning to his friend, he exclaimed in alarmed accents: “Something serious has happened at home, old man. See what the mater has wired.” He handed the telegram to Teddy.

Teddy read it and gave it back. “I’m awfully sorry, Raife. There’s a good train in about an hour from now. While you are waiting, you might ring up home and find out what’s the matter.”

“A good idea,” said Raife. And at once he entered the study, and, taking up the telephone receiver, got a trunk call.

In less than five minutes he was speaking with Edgson, the old butler at Aldborough Park, his father’s fine place near Tunbridge Wells.

“Is Lady Remington there?” asked Raife, eagerly. “Tell her I want to speak to her.”

“She’s – oh, it’s you, Master Raife, sir! She’s – I’m sorry, sir, her ladyship’s not well, sir.”

“Not well? What’s the matter?” asked the young fellow, speaking eagerly into the mouthpiece.

“Oh, sir, I – I – I can’t tell you over the ’phone,” replied the old servant. “Her ladyship has forbidden us to say anything at all.”

“But, Edgson, surely I may know!” cried the young man, frantically.

“We thought you were on your way home, sir,” the butler replied. “Can’t you come, Master Raife?”

“Yes, of course, I’m leaving now – at once. But I’m anxious to know what has happened.”

“Come home, sir, and her ladyship will tell you.”

“Go at once and say that I am at the ’phone,” Raife ordered, angrily.

“I’m very sorry, sir, but I can’t,” was the response. “I have very strict orders from her ladyship, but I’m sorry to have to disobey you, sir.”

“Can’t you tell me anything? Can’t you give me an inkling of what’s the matter?” urged Raife.

“I’m very sorry, sir, I can’t,” replied the old man, quietly, but very firmly.

Raife knew Edgson of old. With him the word of either master or mistress was law. Edgson had been in his father’s service ever since his earliest recollection, and though fond of a glass of good port, as his ruddy nose betrayed, he was the most trusted servant of all the staff.

He would give no explanation of what had occurred, therefore, Raife, furiously angry with the old man, “rang off.”

The train journey from Southport seemed interminable. His mind was in a whirl. The brief words of the telegram, “Come home at once, urgent,” kept ringing in his ears, above the roar of the carriage wheels. He had the sensations of a man in a nightmare. What could have happened, and to whom? His mother had sent the “wire,” and therefore it most probably concerned his father.

And ever and again, at the back of his mind, racked with this horrible suspense and uncertainty, was the image of the mysterious girl whose acquaintance he had made on the Southport front. He could hear the low, sweet tones of her musical voice, he could see the grace of her dainty figure. Should he ever meet her again? Would she ever be to him more than a fascinating acquaintance?

When at length he got into London, he felt he could not bear the slow torture of another railway journey. He went to a garage close to the station and hired a motor-car. From there to Tunbridge Wells seemed but a short distance: at any rate, there was action in the movement of the throbbing car, as opposed to the monotony of the train.

But even though the speed limit was exceeded many times in the course of that journey, it seemed hours to his impatient mood before they reached the lodge gates and raced up the stately avenue.

The avenue was three-quarters of a mile long, but at last, Raife Remington, at a bend in the drive, came in view of his home – a great, old, ivy-covered Tudor mansion, with quaint gables, high, twisted chimneys, and two pointed towers. At one end was the tall, stained-glass window of the private chapel, while at the other were domestic offices of later date, and in other forms of architecture.

Passing the inner gate, and between the lawns, where the flower beds were gay with geraniums, the car entered the great open gateway, and drew up in the ancient courtyard, around which the grand old place was built – that same quiet courtyard where the horse’s hoofs of King Henry the Seventh had so often echoed upon the uneven cobbles, where Sir Henry Reymingtoune, Chancellor to Elizabeth, had bowed low and made his obeisance to his capricious royal mistress, and where Charles the Second, in later days, had idled, surrounded by his elegant, silk-coated sycophants.

The Remingtons had, ever since the fourteenth century, played their part in England’s government: once a great and powerful family, and even to-day a notable and honourable house.

As the car drew up at the door, Raife sprang out, and rushing through the great stone hall, the flags of which were worn hollow by the tread of generations, and where stood the stands of armour of dead Reymingtounes, he came face to face with old Edgson, grave and white-haired.

“Ah, Master Raife!” cried the old man, “I’m so glad you’ve come, sir. Her ladyship is in the boudoir awaiting you.”

“What’s happened, Edgson?” demanded the young man.

“Please don’t ask me, sir. Her ladyship will tell you,” was the old servant’s response, in a half-choked voice, and he turned away.

A few moments later, Raife entered the small, cosy little room, with the high, diamond-pane windows, whereon were stained-glass escutcheons. Two women were there, his mother seated with her face buried in her hands, sobbing bitterly, and, beside her, her faithful companion, an elderly spinster named Miss Holt, who had been in the family for many years and had, indeed, been at school with Lady Remington.

Miss Holt, who was on her knees trying to comfort Raife’s mother, rose as the son entered.

“Mother!” he cried, rushing towards her. “What’s the matter? Tell me – for heaven’s sake! Edgson will tell me nothing.”

But all the response from the agonised woman was a long, low groan.

“Miss Holt,” he said, turning to her companion. “Tell me, what has happened?”

The angular woman, whose face was pale and thin, raised a warning finger, and pointed in silence to the sobbing lady. Then she whispered:

“Come into the next room, and I will tell you.”

Both passed into the inner room, and when Miss Holt had closed the door, she said:

“I am sorry to have to break the awful news to you, Mr Raife, but a most remarkable and terrible affair occurred here, early this morning. From what I am able to gather, your father, who – as you know – sleeps over the library, was awakened about three o’clock by an unusual noise, and, listening, came to the conclusion that a slow, sawing process was in progress in the library – that some one was below.”

“Burglars!” ejaculated Raife.

“Your father took his revolver and the little electric flash-lamp which he always has in his room, and, preferring to investigate before ringing and alarming the household, crept downstairs and noiselessly opened the library door. Inside, he saw a small light moving. In an instant, a man who had already opened the safe, drew a revolver and fired point blank at your father.”

“Shot my father!” gasped Raife, staring at her. “Yes. Unfortunately the bullet struck Sir Henry. He fell, but while on the ground, and before the burglar could escape, he fired and shot him dead. We were all alarmed by the shots – and for the rest, well, you had better ask Edgson. He will tell you. I must go back to your poor mother.”

“But my father?”

“Alas! he is dead,” was the thin-faced woman’s hushed response.

“Dead!” gasped Raife, staggered. “Then the fellow murdered him!”

Miss Holt nodded in the affirmative.

At that moment old Edgson entered with a message. The doctor had returned to see her ladyship.

Raife barred the old servant’s passage, saying:

“Miss Holt has told me, Edgson. Explain at once what had happened when you were all alarmed.”

“Well, Master Raife, I rushed down, sir,” replied the old fellow, white-faced and agitated. “Burton, the footman, got down first, and when I rushed into the library I found the poor master lying on the carpet doubled up, with blood all over his pyjama-jacket. He recognised me, sir, and declared, in a low, weak voice, that the thief had shot him. At first I was so scared that I couldn’t act or think. But, on switching on the lights, I saw the body of a stranger – an elderly man, wearing thin indiarubber gloves – lying near the French window.”

“Then my father was still conscious?”

“Quite. I sent Burton to the telephone to ring up Doctor Grant, in Tunbridge Wells, while I did all I could to restore the poor master. He was then quite sensible. With Burton’s aid I managed to get him on to the couch in the bedroom, and then he spoke several disjointed sentences while we waited for the doctor’s arrival. He asked for you, sir, and told me to give you a message.”

“A message, Edgson! What message did he leave for me?” asked the son, eagerly.

“His words were these, sir: ‘Tell Master Raife that the blackguard deliberately shot me! Tell him – to be careful – to be wary of the trap. I – I hesitated to tell the boy the truth, but now, Edgson, alas! it is too late!’”

“The truth!” ejaculated young Remington. “What did he mean, Edgson? What did he mean about being careful of the trap?”

“Ah! I don’t know, Master Raife,” replied the old servant, shaking his head gravely. “Some secret of his, no doubt. I pressed the master to reveal it to me; but all he would reply was: ‘I was a fool, Edgson. I ought to have told my boy from the first. Every man has a skeleton in his cupboard, Edgson. This is mine!’ Then he murmured something about ‘her’ and ‘that woman’ – a woman in the case, it struck me, Master Raife.”

“A woman!” echoed young Remington.

“So it seemed. But, Master Raife, in my position I couldn’t well inquire further into the poor master’s secret. Besides, her ladyship and others came in at the moment. So he uttered no other word – and died before Doctor Grant could arrive.”

“But what does this all mean, Edgson?” asked the dead man’s son, astounded.

“I don’t know, Master Raife,” replied the grave-faced old man. “I really don’t know, sir.”

“To my mind, it seems as though his secret was, in some mysterious way, connected with the fellow who shot him,” declared the young fellow, pale and anxious. “My poor mother does not know – eh?”

“She knows nothing, Master Raife. In the years I have been in the service of your family, I have learnt discretion. I have told you this, sir, because you are my master’s son,” was the faithful man’s response.

“You had no inkling of any secret, Edgson?”

“None in the least, sir, though I have been in Sir Henry’s service thirty-two years come next Michaelmas.”

“It’s a complete mystery then?”

“Yes, sir, a complete mystery. But perhaps you’d like to see the master’s murderer? We’ve taken his body over to the empty cottage at the stables. I’m expecting the detectives from London every minute. Inspector Caldwell, from Tunbridge Wells, has wired to Scotland Yard for assistance.”

“Yes. Take me over there, Edgson,” said Raife, boldly. “I wonder if I know him! This secret of my father’s which he intended to reveal to me, though prevented by death, I mean to investigate – to unravel the mystery. Come, Edgson.”

And the young master – now Sir Raife Remington, Baronet – followed the grave old man out of the house and down the broad, gravelled drive, where, in the sunshine, stood the big square stables, the clock of which, in its high, round turret, was at that moment clanging out the hour.