CHAPTER VI

A FRESH DISCOVERY

In placing herself in the dock, so to speak, Mrs. Moxton had been defiant, loud-voiced and reckless, daring Ellis to denounce her for a crime of which she knew herself innocent. His refusal, and the cause he gave for such refusal, took her by surprise. Long since she had guessed that the doctor loved her, but she did not count on his proclaiming the fact so soon. Nor would he have done so had he not been thrown off his guard by her appeal. But her demand and his answer to it produced on both sides a stupefied calm. Ellis, frightened at his own boldness, remained silent after uttering the fatal words; Mrs. Moxton, on the other hand, felt her wrath die away in sheer surprise. Then her cheeks flushed from an unexplained emotion, and a light beamed from her eyes.

"You love me!" she murmured softly, and looked at Ellis.

Something in her regard, her tone, in her whole attitude, seemed to melt the frozen silence of the man. He sprang forward and touched her hand.

"You are not angry?" he asked, with eagerness.

The touch recalled Mrs. Moxton to a sense of what she owed to herself, and woke in her a feeling of wrath at the audacity of the man, who could speak the word to a woman lately widowed in so terrible a manner.

"How dare you!" she cried angrily, retreating. "What must you think of me to talk like that!"

"I think the world of you," replied Ellis, doggedly. "I have said the truth."

"You deceive yourself. What you take for the truth is fantasy. You cannot love one whom you have known only three weeks."

"Love can be born of a glance."

"In romances, I grant, but not in real life." She paused and burst out laughing. "Oh, it is too absurd."

Ellis was piqued. "I fail to see the absurdity. I speak as I feel."

For the moment Mrs. Moxton appeared to meditate an answer to this plain statement. Suddenly she bit her lip, drew back and shook her head. "You speak folly. You think madness," she said. "Consider! I am a three weeks' widow. My husband died by violence, and his death is not avenged. My name is smirched. My--no! This is no time for such talk. Let us forget the words you have uttered."

"I cannot forget."

"Then I must lose my friend," said Mrs. Moxton, determinedly. "I really cannot meet you on these terms. I am a newly-made widow, not a possible wife for you."

"But in the future?"

"Let the future look after itself," she cried petulantly. "What we have to do, is to attend to the present. You wish to help me. Do so by leaving this crime to be punished by Heaven."

"But your smirched name?"

"I can bear that. I have borne worse things. Oh, do not look so astonished, Dr. Ellis. I have had a queer up-and-down, topsy-turvy sort of life. Some day I may tell it to you, but we don't know each other well enough for that yet. If I find that you deserve my confidence---" She broke off the sentence abruptly. "Never mind that now. I have work to do. Yes! I shall take your advice about calling on Mr. Busham. This very day I shall call and ask him about the will. Could you meet me here at three o'clock, doctor?"

Ellis felt his breath taken away by the boldness of the demand. "If you wish me to come."

"Of course I wish it or I would not ask. Remember, doctor, you are my friend. No, don't repeat that folly. We are comrades at present, nothing more. You do not understand me now. You will when I explain."

"Will you ever explain?"

"Yes! No! I can't say. So much depends upon what kind of a man I find you to be. Now, go, please, as I must dress for my visit. Mind, I shall expect you at three o'clock, to tell you the result of my interview."

"At three o'clock," repeated Ellis, earnestly, and so they parted.

When the doctor found himself in the broad, cheerful sunshine of the Jubilee Road he was not quite certain if he was asleep or awake. To him Mrs. Moxton was more of an enigma than the murder itself. He could not understand her attitude, nor could he guess what motive she had in acting thus strangely. She was apparently pleased that he loved her; she was angry at his abrupt declaration; he could not gain her confidence; yet she requested him to meet her at three o'clock to ask his advice about her visit. What was he to understand from such a medley of contradictions? He sought in his own mind for every possible explanation, but could find none, so concluding that it was the more sensible course to possess his soul in patience until this sphinx explained her own riddle, he returned home. Here, to his surprise, he found a friend of the morbid lady's come to consult him about her heart, and in the joy of such promise of an increasing practice he forgot Mrs. Moxton and her eccentricities. In a similar situation a woman would not have forgotten, but Byron's lines give the reason for that:

"Man's love is of man's life a thing apart; 'Tis woman's whole existence."

Nevertheless, when his mind was less occupied with material things, the feeling about Mrs. Moxton revived, and he waited impatiently for the hour of three. It would seem that circumstances were about to involve him in the drama,--it might be tragedy--of this woman's life, and he felt eager for the call to step on the stage. What part would be assigned to him he could not guess. Was he to be the husband of the heroine or merely the friend, or would he pose as the foil to that shadowy lover in whose existence and guilt Cass believed? Altogether Ellis was in the dark, afraid to venture forward for fear of the unknown. He waited for a hand to draw him on to his doom--in plain English, for the hand and guidance of Mrs. Moxton. These strange thoughts, passing through the doctor's mind, made him fear that its usually accurate balance was disturbed.

Shortly after three o'clock struck from the bran-new brick tower of the bran-new Dukesfield church, he saw her walking briskly down the road. Even in his pre-occupation he noted her trim figure, the decided way in which she set down and lifted her feet, and the general air of alert resolution which stamped her whole being. Here was a woman of mind, of decision, of character, with few feminine failings, and more than ever Ellis wondered at her past history, as related by herself at the inquest. He began to suspect that there might be something after all in the ideas of Harry Cass. Mrs. Basket declared the woman "was a deep 'un." That also might be true.

"Good news! good news!" cried Mrs. Moxton, when she arrived. "I have seen Mr. Busham and I am right. Old Moxton made a will leaving the property to Edgar."

"But he is dead. How do you stand now?"

The widow let the gate click behind her, and walked up the path with a wrinkled brow, betokening thought. "That depends upon Edgar's will."

"Did he make one?"

"I think so. In one of his good humours he made a will leaving all his property to me. I believe the will was signed and witnessed at Monte Carlo. He told me about it, but I never saw it."

"Then how do you know it exists?"

"Edgar told me of it," repeated Mrs. Moxton. "It will no doubt be in his despatch-box, or in this room."

By this time the pair were again in the cheerful parlour, and her gaze was fixed upon a well-filled bookcase. "I should not wonder if it was hidden amongst the books," said Mrs. Moxton, pensively.

Ellis showed some amazement at this strange remark. "Why should he have put a valuable document amongst his books, Mrs. Moxton?"

The widow sat down and signed to Ellis to do likewise. "My dear doctor, do you know anything about drunken men?"

This was even a stranger remark than the former.

"I have come into contact with them," said Ellis, with a slight smile, "but what has that to do with this will?"

"More than you think," she retorted. "Edgar was never very sane at the best of times; but when drunk, as he often was, he took leave of his senses completely. Drunken men, as I daresay you know, have each their various idiosyncrasies which display the true animal within. Edgar's indwelling animal was a magpie."

"Oh!" The doctor seized on her meaning at once. "You believe that he concealed things!"

"Yes! When drunk he would hide his watch, chain, jewellery, money, and when sober could not remember where he put them. I was set to hunt them out, and often found them in that bookcase. Lately he took to hiding papers, so it is not unlikely he concealed his will. However, it may be in his despatch-box after all. That is in the bedroom, and I have the keys, so I shall go and look. In the meantime, doctor, would you turn out those books and see if it is concealed there?"

"Certainly; but one moment, Mrs. Moxton," he added as she was about to leave the room; "if your husband has left no will, what becomes of the property?"

"Half goes to Mr. Busham as the next-of-kin, and half to me as the widow, but, of course, I get all if Edgar left a will in my favour."

"Mr. Busham won't like that."

"No!" Mrs. Moxton frowned. "I'll tell you what he is," she burst out; "a mean, grasping miser. His manner to me was most disagreeable. I feel sure he suspects me of the murder. While he can get half the property I daresay he will hold his tongue, but if all comes to me I am certain he will make trouble."

"About the murder?"

"Yes, but I am not afraid. I can defend myself, and I have you for a friend."

"But what can I do?"

"Defend me!" Mrs. Moxton threw a searching glance at the amazed face of Ellis. "Look for the will," she said abruptly, and left the room.

By this time the doctor's capacity for astonishment was completely exhausted. Mrs. Moxton's conduct became more extraordinary at every interview, and it was worse than useless trying to account for it. Only further acquaintance and observation could explain her personality and apparently purposeless remarks; therefore Ellis, taking this sensible view, devoted himself to the task of searching for the will.

The bookcase was of white-painted wood, of no great size, and with three shelves. French novels in yellow and green paper covers predominated and Ellis tumbled these ruthlessly on to the floor. To all appearance the taste of the late Mr. Moxton had not been over-refined, for the majority of the novels were by the most sensual Parisian authors. But mingled with these decadent works were a number of old-fashioned books, mostly educational, with here and there a slim old-fashioned volume of travels. For the first ten minutes of his search Ellis paid no attention to these, but looked for the will at the back of the shelves. It was not to be found in any one of them, but he came across an amazing number of music-hall programmes, headed: "The Merryman, Viper Street, Soho." Evidently someone had been an assiduous attendant at this place of amusement, if the programmes were to be taken as evidence.

"Moxton!" said Ellis to himself, when this idea occurred to him. "So this is where he went night after night." He examined the dates of the programmes. "Yes! all within the last three months, one night after another. H'm! Mrs. Moxton said that she did not know where her husband went, yet these programmes must have informed her even if he held his tongue. Extraordinary woman! I can't understand her actions or denials."

Failing to find the will on the shelves, Ellis examined the books. One of these, a fat little brown volume, entitled, _The Universal Informer_, was inscribed on the flyleaf, "Janet Gordon, from her father, Thomas Gordon, Edinburgh," both of which names were unknown to Ellis. The book opened of itself at a turned-down page, on which was set forth a list of the towns and cities of the world. Now, what struck Ellis as strange was the fact that the turned-down page was towards the end of the list, and contained the towns beginning with "Z." This was one of the letters concealed in the blood signs, and to say the least it is not a letter generally used. Wondering if he was on the track of a discovery, Ellis glanced down the page. His eye caught the word "lizard," and he eagerly read the paragraph in which it was contained. Four lines informed him that "Zirknitz is a town in Austria, and that in its environs is found a peculiar species of lizard." Ellis reflected. "On the arm was the letter 'Z' concealed in a sign, and the representation of a lizard. This book, which opens of itself at this particular page, mentions an Austrian town called Zirknitz and a peculiar lizard. There must be some connection between the murder and this paragraph, but I can't see it myself. What can an Austrian town have to do with the crime in Jubilee Road?"

Finding no answer to this question he pursued his search. The old-fashioned books seemed to belong to Thomas Gordon, of Edinburgh, but in one or two he had inscribed their presentation to his "daughter Janet," or to his "daughter Laura."

"Laura!" murmured Ellis. "That is Mrs. Moxton's name. Perhaps she is the Laura Gordon who owns these books. In fact, she must be. If so, she has a sister Janet; it is the first I have heard of her sister. Hullo, what's this?"

"This" was a novel of Catulle Mendes, which had a name scribbled in pencil on the outside. The name was "Rudolph Zirknitz."

"R. U. Z.," said the doctor, staring at the pencilled autograph; "so it stands for Rudolph Zirknitz, who evidently takes his name and the totem of the lizard from that Austrian town."

At this moment Mrs. Moxton entered with a disconsolate air. "Have you found the will, doctor?" she inquired; "it is not in the despatch-box."

"No, Mrs. Moxton, I have not found the will, but I have learnt the name of the man who killed your husband."

The widow became as grey as the wall-paper, and leant against the door for support. "What? Who? I--I do not understand," she gasped.

"The murderer is called Rudolph Zirknitz," explained Ellis. "Now, who is Rudolph Zirknitz?"

Mrs. Moxton made no attempt to answer this question. Closing her eyes she slipped quietly on to the floor, and lay at the feet of Ellis, white and insensible.