Chapter 15

to me. However, here are a few facts I am going to bring before you. Four months ago, one of the turns at a vaudeville show down Broadway consisted of a performance by a Professor Franklin and his two daughters, Elizabeth and Beatrice. The professor hypnotized, told fortunes, felt heads, and the usual rigmarole. Beatrice sang, Elizabeth danced. People came to see the show, not because it was any good but because the girls, even in New York, were beautiful.”

“A music-hall in New York!” Tavernake muttered.

The detective nodded.

“Among the young bloods of the city,” he continued, “were two brothers, as much alike as twins, although they aren't twins, whose names were Wenham and Jerry Gardner. There's nothing in fast life which those young men haven't tried. Between them, I should say they represented everything that was known of debauchery and dissipation. The eldest can't be more than twenty-seven to-day, but if you were to see them in the morning, either of them, before they had been massaged and galvanized into life, you'd think they were little old men, with just strength enough left to crawl about. Well, to cut a long story short, both of them fell in love with Elizabeth.”

“Brutes!” Tavernake interjected.

“I guess they found Miss Elizabeth a pretty tough nut to crack,” the detective went on. “Anyhow, you know what her price was from her name, which is hers right enough. Wenham, who was a year younger than his brother, was the first to bid it. Three months ago, Mr. and Mrs. Wenham Gardner, Miss Beatrice, and the devoted father left New York in the Lusitania and came to London.”

“Where is this Wenham Gardner, then?” Tavernake demanded.

Pritchard took his cigar case from his pocket and selected another cigar.

“Say, that's where you strike the nail right on the head,” he remarked. “Where is this Wenham Gardner?”

“I don't mind telling you, Mr. Tavernake, that to discover his whereabouts is exactly what I am over on this side for. I have a commission from the family to find out, and a blank cheque to do it with.”

“Do you mean that he has disappeared, then?” asked Tavernake.

“Off the face of the earth, sir,” Pritchard replied. “Something like two months ago, the young married couple, with Miss Beatrice, started for a holiday tour somewhere down in the west of England. A few days after they started, Miss Beatrice comes back to London alone. She goes to a boarding-house, is practically penniless, but she has shaken her sister--has, I believe, never spoken with her since. A little later, Elizabeth alone turns up in London. She has plenty of money, more money than she has ever had the control of before in her life, but no husband.”

“So far, I don't see anything remarkable about that,” Tavernake interposed.

“That may or may not be,” Pritchard answered, drily. “This creature, Wenham Gardner--I hate to call him a man--was her abject slave--up till the time they reached London, at any rate. He would never have quit of his own accord. He stopped quite suddenly communicating with all his friends. None of their cables, even, were answered.”

“Why don't you go and ask Mrs. Gardner where he is?” Tavernake demanded bluntly.

“I have already,” Pritchard declared, “taken that liberty. With tears in her eyes, she assured me that after some slight quarrel, in which she admits that she was the one to blame, her husband walked out of the house where they were staying, and she has not seen him since. She was quite ready with all the particulars, and even implored me to help find him.”

“I cannot imagine,” Tavernake said, “why any one should disbelieve her.”

The detective smiled.

“There are a few little outside circumstances,” he remarked, looking at the ash of his cigar. “In the first place, how do you suppose that this young Wenham Gardner spent the last week of his stay in New York?”

“How should I know?” Tavernake replied, impatiently.

“By realizing every cent of his property on which he could lay his hands,” the detective continued. “It isn't at any time an easy business, and the Gardner interest is spread out in many directions, but he must have sailed with something like forty thousand pounds in hard cash. A suspicious person might presume that that forty thousand pounds has found its way to the stronger of the combination.”

“Anything else?” Tavernake asked.

“I won't worry you much more,” the detective answered. “There are a few other circumstances which seem to need explanation, but they can wait. There is one serious one, however, and that is where you come in.”

“Indeed!” Tavernake remarked. “I was hoping you would come to that soon.”

“The two sisters, Beatrice and Elizabeth, have been together ever since we can learn anything of their history. Those people who don't understand the disappearance of Wenham Gardner would like to know why they quarreled and parted, why Beatrice is keeping away from her sister in this strange manner. I personally, too, should like to know from Miss Beatrice when she last saw Wenham Gardner alive.”

“You want me to ask Miss Beatrice these things?” Tavernake demanded.

“It might come better from you,” Pritchard admitted. “I have written her to the theatre but naturally she has not replied.”

Tavernake looked curiously at his companion.

“Do you really suppose,” he asked, “that, even granted there were any unusual circumstances in connection with that quarrel--do you seriously suppose that Beatrice would give her sister away?”

The detective sighed.

“No doubt, Mr. Tavernake,” he said, “these young ladies are friends of yours, and perhaps for that reason you are a little prejudiced in their favor. Their whole bringing-up and associations, however, have certainly not been of a strict order. I cannot help thinking that persuasion might be brought to bear upon Miss Beatrice, that it might be pointed out to her that a true story is the safest.”

“Well, if you've finished,” Tavernake declared, “I'd like to tell you what I think of your story. I think it's all d--d silly nonsense! This Wenham Gardner, by your own saying, was half mad. There was a quarrel and he's gone off to Paris or somewhere. As to your suggestions about Mrs. Gardner, I think they're infamous.”

Pritchard was unmoved by his companion's warmth.

“Why, that's all right, Mr. Tavernake,” he affirmed. “I can quite understand your feeling like that just at first. You see, I've been among crime and criminals all my days, and I learn to look for a certain set of motives when a thing of this sort happens. You've been brought up among honest folk, who go the straightforward way about life, and naturally you look at the same matter from a different point of view. But you and I have got to talk this out. I want you to understand that those very charming young ladies are not quite the class of young women whom you know anything about. Mind you, I haven't a word to say against Miss Beatrice. I dare say she's as straight as they make 'em. But--you must take another whiskey and soda, Mr. Tavernake. Now, I insist upon it. Tim, come right over here.”

Mr. Pritchard seemed to have forgotten what he was talking about. The room had been suddenly invaded. The whole of the little supper party, whose individual members he had pointed out to his companion, came trooping into the room. They were all apparently on the best of terms with themselves, and they all seemed to make a point of absolutely ignoring Pritchard's presence. Elizabeth was the one exception. She was carrying a tiny Chinese spaniel under one arm; with the fingers of her other hand she held a tortoise-shell mounted monocle to her eye, and stared directly at the two men. Presently she came languidly across the room to them.

“Dear me,” she said, “I had no idea that even your wide circle of acquaintances, Mr. Pritchard, included my friend, Mr. Tavernake.”

The two men rose to their feet. Tavernake felt confused and angry. It was as though he had been playing the traitor in listening, even for a moment, to these stories.

“Mr. Pritchard introduced himself to me only a few minutes ago,” he declared. “He brought me in here and I have been listening to a lot of rubbish from him of which I don't believe a single word.”

She flashed a wonderful smile upon him.

“Mr. Pritchard is so very censorious,” she murmured. “He takes such a very low view of human nature. After all, though, I suppose we must not blame him. I think that as men and women we do not exist to him. We are simply the pegs by means of which he can climb a little higher in the esteem of his employers.”

Pritchard took up his soft hat and stick.

“Mrs. Gardner,” he said, “I will confess that I have been wasting my time with this young man. You are a trifle severe upon me. You may find, and before long, that I am your best friend.”

She laughed delightfully.

“Dear Mr. Pritchard,” she exclaimed, “it is a strange thought, that! If only I dared hope that some day it might come true!”

“More unlikely things, madam, are happening every hour,” the detective remarked. “The world--our little corner of it, at any rate--is full of anomalies. There might even come a time to any one of us three when liberty was more dangerous than the prison cell itself.”

He nodded carelessly to Tavernake, and with a bow to Elizabeth turned and left the room. Elizabeth remained as though turned to stone, looking after him as he descended the stairs.

“The man is a fool!” Tavernake cried, roughly.

Elizabeth shook her head and sighed.

“He is something far more ineffective,” she said. “He is just a little too clever.”

CHAPTER, XV. GENERAL DISCONTENT

Elizabeth did not at once rejoin her friends. Instead, she sank on to the low settee close to where she had been standing, and drew Tavernake down to her side. She waved her hand across at the others, who were calling for her.

“In a moment, dear people,” she said.

Then she leaned back among the cushions and laughed at her companion.

“Tell me, Mr. Tavernake,” she asked, “don't you feel that you have stepped into a sort of modern Arabian Nights?”

“Why?”

“Oh, I know Mr. Pritchard's weakness,” she continued. “He loves to throw a glamour around everything he says or does. Because he honors me by interesting himself in my concerns, he has probably told you all sorts of wonderful things about me and my friends. A very ingenious romancer, Mr. Pritchard, you know. Confess, now, didn't he tell you some stories about us?”

She might have spared herself the trouble of beating about the bush. There was no hesitation about Tavernake.

“He said that your friends were every one of them criminals,” Tavernake declared, “and he admitted that he was working hard at the present moment to discover that you were one, too.”

She laughed softly but heartily.

“I wonder what was his object,” she remarked, “in taking you into his confidence.”

“He happened to know,” Tavernake explained, “that I was intimate with your sister. He wanted me to ask Beatrice a certain question.”

Elizabeth laughed no more. She looked steadfastly into his eyes.

“And that question?”

“He wanted me to ask Beatrice why she left you and hid herself in London.”

She tried to smile but not very successfully.

“According to his story,” Tavernake continued, “you and Beatrice and your husband were away together somewhere in the country. Something happened there, something which resulted in the disappearance of your husband. Beatrice came back alone and has not been near you since. Soon afterwards, you, too, came back alone. Mr. Gardner has not been seen or heard of.”

Elizabeth was bending over her dog, but even Tavernake, unobservant though he was, could see that she was shaken.

“Pritchard is a clever man, generally,” she remarked, “diabolically clever. Why has he told you all this, I wonder? He must have known that you would probably repeat it to me. Why does he want to show me his hand?”

“I have no idea,” Tavernake replied. “These matters are all beyond me. They do not concern me in any way. I am not keeping you from your friends? Please send me away when you like.”

“Don't go just yet,” she begged. “Sit with me for a moment. Can't you see,” she added, whispering, “that I have had a shock? Sit with me. I can't go back to those others just yet.”

Tavernake did as he was bidden. The woman at his side was still caressing the little animal she carried. Watching her, however, Tavernake could see that her bosom was rising and falling quickly. There was an unnatural pallor in her cheeks, a terrified gleam in her eyes. Nevertheless, these things passed. In a very few seconds she was herself again.

“Come,” she said, “it is not often that I give way. The only time I am ever afraid is when there is something which I do not understand. I do not understand Mr. Pritchard to-night. I know that he is my enemy. I cannot imagine why he should talk to you. He must have known that you would repeat all he said. It is not like him. Tell me, Mr. Tavernake, you have heard all sorts of things about me. Do you believe them? Do you believe--it's rather a horrible thing to ask, isn't it?” she went on hurriedly,--“do you believe that I made away with my husband?”

“You surely do not need to ask me that question,” Tavernake answered, fervently. “I should believe your word, whatever you told me. I should not believe that you could do anything wrong.”

Her hand touched his for a moment and he was repaid.

“Don't think too well of me,” she begged. “I don't want to disappoint you.”

Some one pushed open the swing doors and she started nervously. It was only a waiter who passed through into the bar.

“What I think of you,” Tavernake said slowly, “nothing could alter, but because I am stupid, I suppose, there is quite a good deal that I cannot understand. I cannot understand, for instance, why they should suspect you of having anything to do with your husband's disappearance. You can prove where you were when he left you?”

“Quite easily,” she answered, “only, unfortunately, no one seems to have seen him go. He timed his departure so cunningly that he apparently vanished into thin air. Even then,” she continued, “but for one thing I don't suppose that any one would have had suspicions. I dare say Mr. Pritchard told you that before we left New York my husband sold out some of his property and brought it over to Europe with him in cash. We had both determined that we would live abroad and have nothing more to do with America. It was not I who persuaded him to do this. It made no difference to me. If he had run away and left me, the courts would have given me money. If he had died and I had been a widow, he would have left me his property. But simply because there was all this money in our hands, and because he disappeared, his people and this man Pritchard suspect me.”

“It is wicked,” he muttered.

She turned slowly towards him.

“Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “do you know that you can help me very much indeed?”

“I only wish I could,” he replied. “Try me.”

“Can't you see,” she went on, “that the great thing against me is that Beatrice left me suddenly when we were on that wretched expedition, and came back alone? She is in London, I know, quite close to me, and still she hides. Pritchard asks himself why. Mr. Tavernake, go and tell her what people are saying, go and tell her everything that has happened, let her understand that her keeping away is doing me a terrible injury, beg her to come and let people see that we are reconciled, and warn her, too, against Pritchard. Will you do this for me?”

“Of course I will,” Tavernake answered. “I will see her to-morrow.”

Elizabeth drew a little sigh of relief.

“And you'll let me know what she says?” she asked, rising.

“I shall be only too glad to,” Tavernake assured her.

“Good-night!”

She looked up into his face with a smile which had turned the heads of hardened stagers in New York. No wonder that Tavernake felt his heart beat against his ribs! He took her hands and held them for a moment. Then he turned abruptly away.

“Good-night!” he said.

He disappeared through the swing doors. She strolled across the room to where her friends were sitting in a circle, laughing and talking. Her father, who had just come in and joined them, gripped her by the arm as she sat down.

“What does it mean?” he demanded, with shaking voice. “Did you see that he was there with Pritchard--your young man--that wretched estate agent's clerk? I tell you that Pritchard was pumping him for all he was worth.”

“My dear father,” she whispered, coldly, “don't be melodramatic. You give yourself away the whole time. Go to bed if you can't behave like a man.”

The lights had been turned low, there was no one else in the room. The little old gentleman with the eyeglass leaned forward.

“Have you any notion, my dear Elizabeth,” he asked, “why our friend Pritchard is so much in evidence just at present?”

“Not on account of you, Jimmy,” she answered, “nor of any one else here, in fact. The truth is he has conceived a violent admiration for me--an admiration so pronounced, indeed, that he hates to let me out of his sight.”

They all laughed uproariously. Then Walter Crease, the journalist, leaned forward,--a man with a long, narrow face, yellow-stained fingers, and hollow cheekbones. He glanced around the room before he spoke, and his voice sounded like a hoarse whisper.

“See here,” he said, “seems to me Pritchard is getting mighty awkward. He hasn't got his posse around him in this country, anyway.”

There was a dead silence for several seconds. Then the little old gentleman nodded solemnly.

“I am a trifle tired of Pritchard myself,” he admitted, “and he certainly knows too much. He carries too much in his head to go around safely.”

The eyes of Elizabeth were bright.

“He treats us like children,” she declared. “To-night he has told the whole of my affairs to a perfect stranger. It is intolerable!”

The little party broke up soon after. Only Walter Crease and the man called Jimmy Post were left talking, and they retired into the window-seat, whispering together.

Tavernake, with his hands thrust deep in his overcoat pockets, left the hotel and strode along the Strand. Some fancy seized him before he had gone many paces, and turning abruptly to the left he descended to the Embankment. He made his way to the very seat upon which he had sat once before with Beatrice. With folded arms he leaned back in the corner, looking out across the river, at the curving line of lights, at the black, turgid waters, the slowly-moving hulk of a barge on its way down the stream. It was a new thing, this, for him to have to accuse himself of folly, of weakness. For the last few days he had moved in a mist of uncertainty, setting his heel upon all reflection, avoiding every issue. To-night he could escape those accusing thoughts no longer; to-night he was more than ever bitter with himself. What folly was this which had sprung up in his life--folly colossal, unimaginable, as unexpected as though it had fallen a thunderbolt from the skies! What had happened to change him so completely!

His thought traveled back to the boarding-house. It was there that the thing had begun. Before that night upon the roof, the finger-posts which he had set up with such care and deliberation along the road which led towards his coveted goal, had seemed to him to point with unfaltering directness towards everything in life worthy of consideration. To-night they were only dreary phantasms, marking time across a miserable plain. Perhaps, after all, there had been something in his nature, some rebel thing, intolerable yet to be reckoned with, which had been first born of that fateful curiosity of his. It had leapt up so suddenly, sprung with such scanty notice into strenuous and insistent life. Yet what place had it there? He must fight against it, root it out with both hands. What was this world of intrigue, this criminal, undesirable world, to him? His common sense forbade him altogether to dissociate Elizabeth from her friends, from her surroundings. She was the secret of the pain which was tearing at his heartstrings, of all the excitement, the joy, the passion which had swept like a full flood across the level way of his life, which had set him drifting among the unknown seas. Yet it was Beatrice who had brought this upon him. If she had never left, if he had not tasted the horrors of this new loneliness, he might have been able to struggle on. He missed her, missed her diabolically. The other things, marvelous though they were, had been more or less like a mirage. This world of new emotions had spread like a silken mesh over all his thoughts, over all his desires. Beatrice had been a tangible person, restful, delightful, a real companion, his one resource against this madness. And now she was gone, and he was powerless to get her back. He turned his head, he looked up the road along which he had torn that night with his arms around her. She owed him her life and she had gone! With all a man's inconsequence, it seemed to him as he rose heavily to his feet and started homeward, that she had repaid him with a certain amount of ingratitude, that she had left him at the one moment in his life when he needed her most.