The Clue of the Twisted Candle, Edgar Wallace [whitelam books txt] 📗

been a vulgar blackmailer he had retained his hold, not only upon this particular property of Lady Bartholomew, but upon certain other articles which were discovered, with no other object, apparently, than to compel influence from quarters likely to be of assistance to him in his schemes.

The inquest on the murdered man which the Assistant Commissioner attended produced nothing in the shape of evidence and the coroner's verdict of "murder against some person or persons unknown" was only to be expected.

T. X. spent a very busy and a very tiring week tracing elusive clues which led him nowhere. He had a letter from John Lexman announcing the fact that he intended leaving for the United States. He had received a very good offer from a firm of magazine publishers in New York and was going out to take up the appointment.

Meredith's plans were now in fair shape. He had decided upon the line of action he would take and in the pursuance of this he interviewed his Chief and the Minister of Justice.

"Yes, I have heard from my daughter," said that great man uncomfortably, "and really she has placed me in a most embarrassing position. I cannot tell you, Mr. Meredith, exactly in what manner she has done this, but I can assure you she has."

"Can I see her letter or telegram?" asked T. X.

"I am afraid that is impossible," said the other solemnly; "she begged me to keep her communication very secret. I have written to my wife and asked her to come home. I feel the constant strain to which I am being subjected is more than human can endure."

"I suppose," said T. X. patiently, "it is impossible for you to tell me to what address you have replied?"

"To no address," answered the other and corrected himself hurriedly; "that is to say I only received the telegram--the message this morning and there is no address--to reply to."

"I see," said T. X.

That afternoon he instructed his secretary.

"I want a copy of all the agony advertisements in to-morrow's papers and in the last editions of the evening papers--have them ready for me tomorrow morning when I come."

They were waiting for him when he reached the office at nine o'clock the next day and he went through them carefully. Presently he found the message he was seeking.

B. M. You place me awkward position. Very thoughtless. Have received package addressed your mother which have placed in mother's sitting-room. Cannot understand why you want me to go away week-end and give servants holiday but have done so. Shall require very full explanation. Matter gone far enough. Father.

"This," said T. X. exultantly, as he read the advertisement, "is where I get busy."


CHAPTER XVI


February as a rule is not a month of fogs, but rather a month of tempestuous gales, of frosts and snowfalls, but the night of February 17th, 19--, was one of calm and mist. It was not the typical London fog so dreaded by the foreigner, but one of those little patchy mists which smoke through the streets, now enshrouding and making the nearest object invisible, now clearing away to the finest diaphanous filament of pale grey.

Sir William Bartholomew had a house in Portman Place, which is a wide thoroughfare, filled with solemn edifices of unlovely and forbidding exterior, but remarkably comfortable within. Shortly before eleven on the night of February 17th, a taxi drew up at the junction of Sussex Street and Portman Place, and a girl alighted. The fog at that moment was denser than usual and she hesitated a moment before she left the shelter which the cab afforded.

She gave the driver a few instructions and walked on with a firm step, turning abruptly and mounting the steps of Number 173. Very quickly she inserted her key in the lock, pushed the door open and closed it behind her. She switched on the hall light. The house sounded hollow and deserted, a fact which afforded her considerable satisfaction. She turned the light out and found her way up the broad stairs to the first floor, paused for a moment to switch on another light which she knew would not be observable from the street outside and mounted the second flight.

Miss Belinda Mary Bartholomew congratulated herself upon the success of her scheme, and the only doubt that was in her mind now was whether the boudoir had been locked, but her father was rather careless in such matters and Jacks the butler was one of those dear, silly, old men who never locked anything, and, in consequence, faced every audit with a long face and a longer tale of the peculations of occasional servants.

To her immense relief the handle turned and the door opened to her touch. Somebody had had the sense to pull down the blinds and the curtains were drawn. She switched on the light with a sigh of relief. Her mother's writing table was covered with unopened letters, but she brushed these aside in her search for the little parcel. It was not there and her heart sank. Perhaps she had put it in one of the drawers. She tried them all without result.

She stood by the desk a picture of perplexity, biting a finger thoughtfully.

"Thank goodness!" she said with a jump, for she saw the parcel on the mantel shelf, crossed the room and took it down.

With eager hands she tore off the covering and came to the familiar leather case. Not until she had opened the padded lid and had seen the snuffbox reposing in a bed of cotton wool did she relapse into a long sigh of relief.

"Thank heaven for that," she said aloud.

"And me," said a voice.

She sprang up and turned round with a look of terror.

"Mr.--Mr. Meredith," she stammered.

T. X. stood by the window curtains from whence he had made his dramatic entry upon the scene.

"I say you have to thank me also, Miss Bartholomew," he said presently.

"How do you know my name?" she asked with some curiosity.

"I know everything in the world," he answered, and she smiled. Suddenly her face went serious and she demanded sharply,

"Who sent you after me--Mr. Kara?"

"Mr. Kara?" he repeated, in wonder.

"He threatened to send for the police," she went on rapidly, "and I told him he might do so. I didn't mind the police--it was Kara I was afraid of. You know what I went for, my mother's property."

She held the snuff-box in her outstretched hand.

"He accused me of stealing and was hateful, and then he put me downstairs in that awful cellar and--"

"And?" suggested T. X.

"That's all," she replied with tightened lips; "what are you going to do now?"

"I am going to ask you a few questions if I may," he said. "In the first place have you not heard anything about Mr. Kara since you went away?"

She shook her head.

"I have kept out of his way," she said grimly.

"Have you seen the newspapers?" he asked.

She nodded.

"I have seen the advertisement column--I wired asking Papa to reply to my telegram."

"I know--I saw it," he smiled; "that is what brought me here."

"I was afraid it would," she said ruefully; "father is awfully loquacious in print--he makes speeches you know. All I wanted him to say was yes or no. What do you mean about the newspapers?" she went on. "Is anything wrong with mother?"

He shook his head.

"So far as I know Lady Bartholomew is in the best of health and is on her way home."

"Then what do you mean by asking me about the newspapers!" she demanded; "why should I see the newspapers--what is there for me to see?"

"About Kara?" he suggested.

She shook her head in bewilderment.

"I know and want to know nothing about Kara. Why do you say this to me?"

"Because," said T. X. slowly, "on the night you disappeared from Cadogan Square, Remington Kara was murdered."

"Murdered," she gasped.

He nodded.

"He was stabbed to the heart by some person or persons unknown."

T. X. took his hand from his pocket and pulled something out which was wrapped in tissue paper. This he carefully removed and the girl watched with fascinated gaze, and with an awful sense of apprehension. Presently the object was revealed. It was a pair of scissors with the handle wrapped about with a small handkerchief dappled with brown stains. She took a step backward, raising her hands to her cheeks.

"My scissors," she said huskily; "you won't think--"

She stared up at him, fear and indignation struggling for mastery.

"I don't think you committed the murder," he smiled; "if that's what you mean to ask me, but if anybody else found those scissors and had identified this handkerchief you would have been in rather a fix, my young friend."

She looked at the scissors and shuddered.

"I did kill something," she said in a low voice, "an awful dog... I don't know how I did it, but the beastly thing jumped at me and I just stabbed him and killed him, and I am glad," she nodded many times and repeated, "I am glad."

"So I gather--I found the dog and now perhaps you'll explain why I didn't find you?"

Again she hesitated and he felt that she was hiding something from him.

"I don't know why you didn't find me," she said; "I was there."

"How did you get out?"

"How did you get out?" she challenged him boldly.

"I got out through the door," he confessed; "it seems a ridiculously commonplace way of leaving but that's the only way I could see."

"And that's how I got out," she answered, with a little smile.

"But it was locked."

She laughed.

"I see now," she said; "I was in the cellar. I heard your key in the lock and bolted down the trap, leaving those awful scissors behind. I thought it was Kara with some of his friends and then the voices died away and I ventured to come up and found you had left the door open. So--so I--"

These queer little pauses puzzled T. X. There was something she was not telling him. Something she had yet to reveal.

"So I got away you see," she went on. "I came out into the kitchen; there was nobody there, and I passed through the area door and up the steps and just round the corner I found a taxicab, and that is all."

She spread out her hands in a dramatic little gesture.

"And that is all, is it?" said T. X.

"That is all," she repeated; "now what are you going to do?"

T. X. looked up at the ceiling and stroked his chin.

"I suppose that I ought to arrest you. I feel that something is due from me. May I ask if you were sleeping in the bed downstairs?"

"In the lower cellar?" she demanded,--a little pause and then, "Yes, I was sleeping in the cellar downstairs."

There was that interval of hesitation almost between each word.

"What are you going to do?" she asked again.

She was feeling more sure of herself and had suppressed the panic which his sudden appearance had produced in her. He rumpled his hair, a gross imitation, did she but know