Читать книгу THE YELLOW CLAW - Sax Rohmer - Страница 4

Leroux clutched at the corner of the writing-table to steady himself

and stood there looking at the deathly face. Under the most favorable

circumstances, he was no man of action, although in common with the rest

of his kind he prided himself upon the possession of that presence of

mind which he lacked. It was a situation which could not have alarmed

“Martin Zeda,” but it alarmed, immeasurably, nay, struck inert with

horror, Martin Zeda's creator.

Then, in upon Leroux's mental turmoil, a sensible idea intruded itself.

“Dr. Cumberly!” he muttered. “I hope to God he is in!”

Without touching the recumbent form upon the chesterfield, without

seeking to learn, without daring to learn, if she lived or had died,

Leroux, the tempo of his life changed to a breathless gallop, rushed

out of the study, across the entrance hail, and, throwing wide the flat

door, leapt up the stair to the flat above--that of his old friend, Dr.

Cumberly.

The patter of the slippered feet grew faint upon the stair; then, as

Leroux reached the landing above, became inaudible altogether.

In Leroux's study, the table-clock ticked merrily on, seeming to hasten

its ticking as the hand crept around closer and closer to midnight.

The mosaic shade of the lamp mingled reds and blues and greens upon the

white ceiling above and poured golden light upon the pages of manuscript

strewn about beneath it. This was a typical work-room of a literary man

having the ear of the public--typical in every respect, save for the

fur-clad figure outstretched upon the settee.

And now the peeping light indiscreetly penetrated to the hem of a silken

garment revealed by some disarrangement of the civet fur. To the eye

of an experienced observer, had such an observer been present in Henry

Leroux's study, this billow of silk and lace behind the sheltering fur

must have proclaimed itself the edge of a night-robe, just as the ankle

beneath had proclaimed itself to Henry Leroux's shocked susceptibilities

to be innocent of stocking.

Thirty seconds were wanted to complete the cycle of the day, when one of

the listless hands thrown across the back of the chesterfield opened and

closed spasmodically. The fur at the bosom of the midnight visitor began

rapidly to rise and fall.

Then, with a choking cry, the woman struggled upright; her hair, hastily

dressed, burst free of its bindings and poured in gleaming cascade down

about her shoulders.

Clutching with one hand at her cloak in order to keep it wrapped about

her, and holding the other blindly before her, she rose, and with that

same odd, groping movement, began to approach the writing-table. The

pupils of her eyes were mere pin-points now; she shuddered convulsively,

and her skin was dewed with perspiration. Her breath came in agonized

gasps.

“God!--I... am dying... and I cannot--tell him!” she breathed.

Feverishly, weakly, she took up a pen, and upon a quarto page, already

half filled with Leroux's small, neat, illegible writing, began to

scrawl a message, bending down, one hand upon the table, and with her

whole body shaking.

Some three or four wavering lines she had written, when intimately,

for the flat of Henry Leroux in Palace Mansions lay within sight of the

clock-face--Big Ben began to chime midnight.

The writer started back and dropped a great blot of ink upon the paper;

then, realizing the cause of the disturbance, forced herself to continue

her task.

The chime being completed: ONE! boomed the clock; TWO!... THREE! ...

FOUR!...

The light in the entrance-hall went out!

FIVE! boomed Big Ben;--SIX!... SEVEN!...

A hand, of old ivory hue, a long, yellow, clawish hand, with part of a

sinewy forearm, crept in from the black lobby through the study doorway

and touched the electric switch!

EIGHT!...

The study was plunged in darkness!

Uttering a sob--a cry of agony and horror that came from her very

soul--the woman stood upright and turned to face toward the door,

clutching the sheet of paper in one rigid hand.

Through the leaded panes of the window above the writing-table swept

a silvern beam of moonlight. It poured, searchingly, upon the fur-clad

figure swaying by the table; cutting through the darkness of the room

like some huge scimitar, to end in a pallid pool about the woman's

shadow on the center of the Persian carpet.

Coincident with her sobbing cry--NINE! boomed Big Ben; TEN!...

Two hands--with outstretched, crooked, clutching fingers--leapt from the

darkness into the light of the moonbeam.

“God! Oh, God!” came a frenzied, rasping shriek--“MR. KING!”

Straight at the bare throat leapt the yellow hands; a gurgling cry

rose--fell--and died away.

Gently, noiselessly, the lady of the civet fur sank upon the carpet by

the table; as she fell, a dim black figure bent over her. The tearing

of paper told of the note being snatched from her frozen grip; but never

for a moment did the face or the form of her assailant encroach upon the

moonbeam.

Batlike, this second and terrible visitant avoided the light.

The deed had occupied so brief a time that but one note of the great

bell had accompanied it.

TWELVE! rang out the final stroke from the clock-tower. A low, eerie

whistle, minor, rising in three irregular notes and falling in weird,

unusual cadence to silence again, came from somewhere outside the room.

Then darkness--stillness--with the moon a witness of one more ghastly

crime.

Presently, confused and intermingled voices from above proclaimed the

return of Leroux with the doctor. They were talking in an excited

key, the voice of Leroux, especially, sounding almost hysterical. They

created such a disturbance that they attracted the attention of Mr. John

Exel, M. P., occupant of the flat below, who at that very moment had

returned from the House and was about to insert the key in the lock of

his door. He looked up the stairway, but, all being in darkness, was

unable to detect anything. Therefore he called out:--

“Is that you, Leroux? Is anything the matter?”

“Matter, Exel!” cried Leroux; “there's a devil of a business! For

mercy's sake, come up!”

His curiosity greatly excited, Mr. Exel mounted the stairs, entering

the lobby of Leroux's flat immediately behind the owner and Dr.

Cumberly--who, like Leroux, was arrayed in a dressing-gown; for he had

been in bed when summoned by his friend.

“You are all in the dark, here,” muttered Dr. Cumberly, fumbling for the

switch.

“Some one has turned the light out!” whispered Leroux, nervously; “I

left it on.”

Dr. Cumberly pressed the switch, turning up the lobby light as Exel

entered from the landing. Then Leroux, entering the study first of the

three, switched on the light there, also.

One glance he threw about the room, then started back like a man

physically stricken.

“Cumberly!” he gasped, “Cumberly”--and he pointed to the furry heap by

the writing-table.

“You said she lay on the chesterfield,” muttered Cumberly.

“I left her there.”...

Dr. Cumberly crossed the room and dropped upon his knees. He turned the

white face toward the light, gently parted the civet fur, and pressed

his ear to the silken covering of the breast. He started slightly and

looked into the glazing eyes.

Replacing the fur which he had disarranged, the physician stood up and

fixed a keen gaze upon the face of Henry Leroux. The latter swallowed

noisily, moistening his parched lips.

“Is she”... he muttered; “is she”...

“God's mercy, Leroux!” whispered Mr. Exel--“what does this mean?”

“The woman is dead,” said Dr. Cumberly.

In common with all medical men, Dr. Cumberly was a physiognomist; he was

a great physician and a proportionately great physiognomist. Therefore,

when he looked into Henry Leroux's eyes, he saw there, and recognized,

horror and consternation. With no further evidence than that furnished

by his own powers of perception, he knew that the mystery of this

woman's death was as inexplicable to Henry Leroux as it was inexplicable

to himself.

He was a masterful man, with the gray eyes of a diplomat, and he knew

Leroux as did few men. He laid both hands upon the novelist's shoulders.

“Brace up, old chap!” he said; “you will want all your wits about you.”

“I left her,” began Leroux, hesitatingly--“I left”...

“We know all about where you left her, Leroux,” interrupted Cumberly;

“but what we want to get at is this: what occurred between the time you

left her, and the time of our return?”

Exel, who had walked across to the table, and with a horror-stricken

face was gingerly examining the victim, now exclaimed:--

“Why! Leroux! she is--she is... UNDRESSED!”

Leroux clutched at his dishevelled hair with both hands.

“My dear Exel!” he cried--“my dear, good man! Why do you use that tone?

You say 'she is undressed!' as though I were responsible for the poor

soul's condition!”

“On the contrary, Leroux!” retorted Exel, standing very upright, and

staring through his monocle; “on the contrary, YOU misconstrue ME! I did

not intend to imply--to insinuate--”

“My dear Exel!” broke in Dr. Cumberly--“Leroux is perfectly well aware

that you intended nothing unkindly. But the poor chap, quite naturally,

is distraught at the moment. You MUST understand that, man!”

“I understand; and I am sorry,” said Exel, casting a sidelong glance

at the body. “Of course, it is a delicate subject. No doubt Leroux can

explain.”...

“Damn your explanation!” shrieked Leroux hysterically. “I CANNOT

explain! If I could explain, I”...

“Leroux!” said Cumberly, placing his arm paternally about the shaking

man--“you are such a nervous subject. DO make an effort, old fellow.

Pull yourself together. Exel does not know the circumstances--”

“I am curious to learn them,” said the M. P. icily.

Leroux was about to launch some angry retort, but Cumberly forced him

into the chesterfield, and crossing to a bureau, poured out a stiff

peg of brandy from a decanter which stood there. Leroux sank upon the

chesterfield, rubbing his fingers up and down his palms with a

curious nervous movement and glancing at the dead woman, and at Exel,

alternately, in a mechanical, regular fashion, pathetic to behold.

Mr. Exel, tapping his boot with the head of his inverted cane, was

staring fixedly at the doctor.

“Here you are, Leroux,” said Cumberly; “drink this up, and let us

arrange our facts in decent order before we--”

“Phone for the police?” concluded Exel, his gaze upon the last speaker.

Leroux drank the brandy at a gulp and put down the glass upon a little

persian coffee table with a hand which he had somehow contrived to

steady.

“You are keen on the official forms, Exel?” he said, with a wry smile.

“Please accept my apology for my recent--er--outburst, but picture this

thing happening in your place!”

“I cannot,” declared Exel, bluntly.

“You lack imagination,” said Cumberly. “Take a whisky and soda, and help

me to search the flat.”

“Search the flat!”

The physician raised a forefinger, forensically.

“Since you, Exel, if not actually in the building, must certainly have

been within sight of the street entrance at the moment of the crime, and

since Leroux and I descended the stair and met you on the landing, it is

reasonable to suppose that the assassin can only be in one place: HERE!”

“HERE!” cried Exel and Leroux, together.

“Did you see anyone leave the lower hall as you entered?”

“No one; emphatically, there was no one there!”

“Then I am right.”

“Good God!” whispered Exel, glancing about him, with a new, and keen

apprehensiveness.

“Take your drink,” concluded Cumberly, “and join me in my search.”

“Thanks,” replied Exel, nervously proffering a cigar-case; “but I won't

drink.”

“As you wish,” said the doctor, who thus, in his masterful way, acted

the host; “and I won't smoke. But do you light up.”

“Later,” muttered Exel; “later. Let us search, first.”

Leroux stood up; Cumberly forced him back.

“Stay where you are, Leroux; it is elementary strategy to operate from a

fixed base. This study shall be the base. Ready, Exel?”

Exel nodded, and the search commenced. Leroux sat rigidly upon the

settee, his hands resting upon his knees, watching and listening. Save

for the merry ticking of the table-clock, and the movements of the

searchers from room to room, nothing disturbed the silence. From the

table, and that which lay near to it, he kept his gaze obstinately

averted.

Five or six minutes passed in this fashion, Leroux expecting each to

bring a sudden outcry. He was disappointed. The searchers returned, Exel

noticeably holding himself aloof and Cumberly very stern.

Exel, a cigar between his teeth, walked to the writing-table, carefully

circling around the dreadful obstacle which lay in his path, to help

himself to a match. As he stooped to do so, he perceived that in the

closed right hand of the dead woman was a torn scrap of paper.

“Leroux! Cumberly!” he exclaimed; “come here!”

He pointed with the match as Cumberly hurriedly crossed to his side.

Leroux, inert, remained where he sat, but watched with haggard eyes. Dr.

Cumberly bent down and sought to detach the paper from the grip of the

poor cold fingers, without tearing it. Finally he contrived to release

the fragment, and, perceiving it to bear some written words, he spread

it out beneath the lamp, on the table, and eagerly scanned it, lowering

his massive gray head close to the writing.

He inhaled, sibilantly.

“Do you see, Exel?” he jerked--for Exel was bending over his shoulder.

“I do--but I don't understand.”

“What is it?” came hollowly from Leroux.

“It is the bottom part of an unfinished note,” said Cumberly, slowly.

“It is written shakily in a woman's hand, and it reads:--'Your wife'”...

Leroux sprang to his feet and crossed the room in three strides.

“Wife!” he muttered. His voice seemed to be choked in his throat; “my

wife! It says something about my wife?”

“It says,” resumed the doctor, quietly, “'your wife.' Then there's a

piece torn out, and the two words 'Mr. King.' No stop follows, and the

line is evidently incomplete.”

“My wife!” mumbled Leroux, staring unseeingly at the fragment of paper.

“MY WIFE! MR. KING! Oh! God! I shall go mad!”

“Sit down!” snapped Dr. Cumberly, turning to him; “damn it, Leroux, you

are worse than a woman!”

In a manner almost childlike, the novelist obeyed the will of the

stronger man, throwing himself into an armchair, and burying his face in

his hands.

“My wife!” he kept muttering--“my wife!”...

Exel and the doctor stood staring at one another; when suddenly, from

outside the flat, came a metallic clattering, followed by a little

suppressed cry. Helen Cumberly, in daintiest deshabille, appeared in

the lobby, carrying, in one hand, a chafing-dish, and, in the other,

the lid. As she advanced toward the study, from whence she had heard her

father's voice:--

“Why, Mr. Leroux!” she cried, “I shall CERTAINLY report you to Mira,

now! You have not even touched the omelette!”

“Good God! Cumberly! stop her!” muttered Exel, uneasily. “The door was

not latched!”...

But it was too late. Even as the physician turned to intercept his

daughter, she crossed the threshold of the study. She stopped short

at perceiving Exel; then, with a woman's unerring intuition, divined a

tragedy, and, in the instant of divination, sought for, and found, the

hub of the tragic wheel.

One swift glance she cast at the fur-clad form, prostrate.

The chafing-dish fell from her hand, and the omelette rolled, a

grotesque mass, upon the carpet. She swayed, dizzily, raising one hand

to her brow, but had recovered herself even as Leroux sprang forward to

support her.

“All right, Leroux!” cried Cumberly; “I will take her upstairs again.

Wait for me, Exel.”

Exel nodded, lighted his cigar, and sat down in a chair, remote from the

writing-table.

“Mira--my wife!” muttered Leroux, standing, looking after Dr. Cumberly

and his daughter as they crossed the lobby. “She will report to--my

wife.”...

In the outer doorway, Helen Cumberly looked back over her shoulder,

and her glance met that of Leroux. Hers was a healing glance and a

strengthening glance; it braced him up as nothing else could have done.

He turned to Exel.

“For Heaven's sake, Exel!” he said, evenly, “give me your advice--give

me your help; I am going to 'phone for the police.”

Exel looked up with an odd expression.

“I am entirely at your service, Leroux,” he said. “I can quite

understand how this ghastly affair has shaken you up.”

“It was so sudden,” said the other, plaintively. “It is incredible

that so much emotion can be crowded into so short a period of a man's

life.”...

Big Ben chimed the quarter after midnight. Leroux, eyes averted, walked

to the writing-table, and took up the telephone.