Blue Hand

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Title: Blue Hand (1925) Author: Edgar Wallace

CHAPTER ONE

Mr. Septimus Salter pressed the bell on his table for the third time and uttered a soft growl.

He was a stout, elderly man, and with his big red face and white side-whiskers, looked more like a prosperous farmer than a successful lawyer. The cut of his clothes was queerly out of date, the high white collar and the black satin cravat that bulged above a flowered waistcoat were of the fashion of 1850, in which year Mr. Salter was a little ahead of his time so far as fashions were concerned. But the years had caught him up and passed him, and although there was not a more up-to-date solicitor in London, he remained faithful to the style in which he had made a reputation as a “buck.”

He pressed the bell again, this time impatiently.

“Confound the fellow!” he muttered, and rising to his feet, he stalked into the little room where his secretary was usually to be found.

He had expected to find the apartment empty, but it was not. A chair had been drawn sideways up to the big ink-stained table, and kneeling on this, his elbows on the table, his face between his hands, was a young man who was absorbed in the perusal of a document, one of the many which littered the table.

“Steele!” said Mr. Salter sharply, and the reader looked up with a start and sprang to his feet.

He was taller than the average and broad of shoulder, though he gave an impression of litheness. His tanned face spoke eloquently of days spent out of doors, the straight nose, the firm mouth, and the strong chin were all part of the characteristic “soldier face” moulded by four years of war into a semblance of hardness.

Now he was a little confused, more like the guilty school-boy than the V.C. who had tackled eight enemy aeroplanes, and had come back to his aerodrome with a dozen bullets in his body.

“Really, Steele,” said Mr. Salter reproachfully, “you are too bad. I have rung the bell three times for you.”

“I’m awfully sorry, sir,” said Jim Steele, and that disarming smile of his went straight to the old man’s heart.

“What are you doing here?” growled Mr. Salter, looking at the papers on the desk, and then with a “tut” of impatience, “Aren’t you tired of going over the Danton case?”

“No, sir, I’m not,” said Steele quietly. “I have a feeling that Lady Mary Danton can be found, and I think if she is found there will be a very satisfactory explanation for her disappearance, and one which will rather disconcert—” He stopped, fearful of committing an indiscretion.

Mr. Salter looked at him keenly and helped himself to a pinch of snuff.

“You don’t like Mr. Groat?” he asked, and Jim laughed.

“Well, sir, it’s not for me to like him or dislike him,” he replied. “Personally, I’ve no use for that kind of person. The only excuse a man of thirty can produce for not having been in the war, is that he was dead at the time.”

“He had a weak heart,” suggested Mr. Salter, but without any great conviction.

“I think he had,” said Jim with a little twist of his lips. “We used to call it a ‘poor heart’ in the army. It made men go sick on the eve of a battle, and drove them into dug-outs when they should have been advancing across the open with their comrades.”

Mr. Salter looked down at the papers.

“Put them away, Steele,” he said quietly. “You’re not going to get any satisfaction out of the search for a woman who—why, she must have disappeared when you were a child of five.”

“I wish, sir—” began Steele, and hesitated. “Of course, it’s really no business of mine,” he smiled, “and I’ve no right to ask you, but I’d like to hear more details of that disappearance if you can spare me the time—and if you feel inclined. I’ve never had the courage to question you before. What is the real story of her disappearance?”

Mr. Salter frowned, and then the frown was gradually replaced by a smile.

“I think, Steele, you’re the worst secretary I ever had,” he said in despair. “And if I weren’t your godfather and morally bound to help you, I should write you a polite little note saying your services were not required after the end of this week.”

Jim Steele laughed.

“I have expected that ever since I’ve been here,” he said.

There was a twinkle in the old lawyer’s eyes. He was secretly fond of Jim Steele; fonder than the boy could have imagined. But it was not only friendship and a sense of duty that held Jim down in his job. The young man was useful, and, despite his seeming inability to hear bells when he was wrapped up in his favourite study, most reliable.

“Shut that door,” he said gruffly, and when the other had obeyed, “I’m telling this story to you,” and he pointed a warning finger at Jim Steele, “not because I want to satisfy your curiosity, but because I hope that I’m going to kill all interest in the Danton mystery as you call it for evermore! Lady Mary Danton was the only daughter of the Earl of Plimstock—a title which is now extinct. She married, when she was quite a young girl, Jonathan Danton, a millionaire shipowner, and the marriage was not a success. Jonathan was a hard, sour man, and a sick man, too. You talk about Digby Groat having a bad heart, well, Jonathan had a real bad one. I think his ill-health was partly responsible for his harsh treatment of his wife. At any rate, the baby that was born to them, a girl, did not seem to bring them together—in fact, they grew farther apart. Danton had to go to America on business. Before he left, he came to this office and, sitting at that very table, he signed a will, one of the most extraordinary wills that I have ever had engrossed. He left the whole of his fortune to his daughter Dorothy, who was then three or four months old. In the event of her death, he provided that the money should go to his sister, Mrs. Groat, but not until twenty years after the date of the child’s death. In the meantime Mrs. Groat was entitled to enjoy the income from the estate.”

“Why did he do that?” asked Jim, puzzled.

“I think that is easily understood,” said Mr. Salter. “He was providing against the child’s death in its infancy, and he foresaw that the will might be contested by Lady Mary. As it was drawn up—I haven’t explained all the details—it could not be so contested for twenty years. However, it was not contested,” he said quietly. “Whilst Danton was in America, Lady Mary disappeared, and with her the baby. Nobody knew where she went to, but the baby and a strange nurse, who for some reason or other had care of the child, were traced to Margate. Possibly Lady Mary was there too, though we have no evidence of this. We do know that the nurse, who was the daughter of a fisherman and could handle a boat, took the child out on the sea one summer day and was overtaken by a fog. All the evidence shows that the little boat was run down by a liner, and its battered wreck was picked up at sea, and a week later the body of the nurse was recovered. We never knew what became of Lady Mary. Danton returned a day or two after the tragedy, and the news was broken to him by Mrs. Groat, his sister. It killed him.”

“And Lady Mary was never seen again?”

Salter shook his head.

“So you see, my boy,” he rose, and dropped his hand on the other’s shoulder, “even if by a miracle you could find Lady Mary, you could not in any way affect the position of Mrs. Groat, or her son. There is only one tiny actress in this drama who could ever have benefited by Jonathan Danton’s will, and she,” he lowered his voice until it was little more than a whisper, “she is beyond recall—beyond recall!”

There was a moment of silence.

“I realize that, sir,” said Jim Steele quietly, “only—”

“Only what?”

“I have a queer feeling that there is something wrong about the whole business, and I believe that if I gave my time to the task I could unveil this mystery.”

Mr. Salter looked at his secretary sharply, but Jim Steele met his eyes without faltering.

“You ought to be a detective,” he said ironically.

“I wish to heaven I was,” was the unexpected reply. “I offered my services to Scotland Yard two years ago when the Thirteen Gangs were holding up the banks with impunity.”

“Oh, you did, did you?” said the lawyer sarcastically as he opened the door, and then suddenly he turned. “Why did I ring for you?” he asked. “Oh, I remember! I want you to get out all those Danton leases of the Cumberland property.”

“Is Mrs. Groat selling?” asked Steele.

“She can’t sell yet,” said the lawyer, “but on the thirtieth of May, providing a caveat is not entered, she takes control of the Danton millions.”

“Or her son does,” said Jim significantly. He had followed his employer back to the big private office with its tiers of deed boxes, its worn furniture and threadbare carpet and general air of mustiness.

“A detective, eh?” snorted Mr. Salter as he sat down at his table. “And what is your equipment for your new profession?”

Jim smiled, but there was an unusual look in his face.

“Faith,” he said quietly.

“Faith? What is faith to a detective?” asked the startled Salter.

“‘Faith is the substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things unseen.’” Jim quoted the passage almost solemnly, and for a long time Mr. Salter did not speak. Then he took up a slip of paper on which he had scribbled some notes, and passed it across to Jim.

“See if you can ‘detect’ these deeds, they are in the strong-room,” he said, but in spite of his jesting words he was impressed.

Jim took up the slip, examined it, and was about to speak when there came a tap at the door and a clerk slipped into the room.

“Will you see Mr. Digby Groat, sir?” he asked.

CHAPTER TWO

MR. SALTER glanced up with a humorous glint in his eye. “Yes,” he said with a nod, and then to Jim as he was about to make a hurried exit, “you can wait, Steele. Mr. Groat wrote in his letter that he wanted to see the deeds, and you may have to conduct him to the strong-room.”

Jim Steele said nothing.

Presently the clerk opened the door and a young man walked in.

Jim had seen him before and had liked him less every time he had met him. The oblong sallow face, with its short black moustache, the sleepy eyes, and rather large chin and prominent ears, he could have painted, if he were an artist, with his eyes shut. And yet Digby Groat was good-looking. Even Jim could not deny that. He was a credit to his valet. From the top of his pomaded head to his patent shoes he was an exquisite. His morning coat was of the most fashionable cut and fitted him perfectly. One could have used the silk hat he carried in his hand as a mirror, and as he came into the room exuding a delicate aroma of Quelques Fleurs, Jim’s nose curled. He hated men who scented themselves, however daintily the process was carried out.

Digby Groat looked from the lawyer to Steele with that languid, almost insolent look in his dark eyes, which the lawyer hated as much as his secretary.

“Good morning, Salter,” he said.

He took a silk handkerchief from his pocket and, dusting a chair, sat down uninvited, resting his lemon-gloved hands upon a gold-headed ebony cane.

“You know Mr. Steele, my secretary,” said Salter.

The other nodded his glossy head.

“Oh, yes, he’s a Victoria Cross person, isn’t he?” he asked wearily. “I suppose you find it very dull here, Steele? A place like this would bore me to death.”

“I suppose it would,” said Jim, “but if you’d had four years’ excitement of war, you would welcome this place as a calm haven of rest.”

“I suppose so,” said the other shortly. He was not too well pleased by Jim’s reference to the fact that he had escaped the trials of war.

“Now, Dr. Groat—” but the other stopped him with a gesture.

“Please don’t call me ‘doctor,’” he said with a pained expression. “The fact that I have been through the medical schools and have gained my degrees in surgery is one which I wish you would forget. I qualified for my own amusement, and if people get into the habit of thinking of me as a doctor, I shall be called up all hours of the night by all sorts of wretched patients.”

It was news to Jim that this sallow dandy had graduated in medicines.

“I came to see those Lakeside leases, Salter,” Groat went on. “I have had an offer—I should say, my mother has had an offer—from a syndicate which is erecting an hotel upon her property. I understand there is some clause in the lease which prevents building operations of that character. If so, it was beastly thoughtless of old Danton to acquire such a property.”

“Mr. Danton did nothing either thoughtless or beastly thoughtless,” said Salter quietly, “and if you had mentioned it in your letter, I could have telephoned you the information and saved your calling. As it is, Steele will take you to the strong-room, and you can examine the leases at your leisure.”

Groat looked at Jim sceptically.

“Does he know anything about leases?” he asked. “And must I really descend into your infernal cellar and catch my death of cold? Can’t the leases be brought up for me?”

“If you will go into Mr. Steele’s room, I dare say he will bring them to you,” said Salter, who did not like his client any more than Jim did. Moreover, he had a shrewd suspicion that the moment the Groats gained possession of the Danton fortune, they would find another lawyer to look after their affairs.

Jim took the keys and returned with an armful of deeds, to discover that Groat was no longer with his chief.

“I sent him into your room,” said Salter. “Take the leases in and explain them to him. If there’s anything you want to know, I’ll come in.”

Jim found the young man in his room. He was examining a book he had taken from a shelf.

“What does ‘dactylology’ mean?” he asked, looking round as Jim came in. “I see you have a book on the subject.”

“Finger-prints,” said Jim Steele briefly. He hated the calm proprietorial attitude of the man, and, moreover, Mr. Groat was examining his own private library.

“Finger-prints, eh?” said Groat, replacing the book. “Are you interested in finger-prints?”

“A little,” said Jim. “Here are the Lakeside leases, Mr. Groat. I made a sketchy examination of them in the strong-room and there seems to be no clause preventing the erection of the building you mention.”

Groat took the document in his hand and turned it leaf by leaf.

“No,” he said at last, and then, putting down the document, “so you’re interested in finger-prints, eh? I didn’t know old Salter did a criminal business.”

“He has very little common law practice,” said Jim.

“What are these?” asked Groat.

By the side of Jim’s desk was a bookshelf filled with thick black exercise books.

“Those are my private notes,” said Jim, and the other looked round with a sneering smile.

“What the devil have you got to make notes about, I wonder?” he asked, and before Jim could stop him, he had taken one of the exercise books down.

“If you don’t mind,” said Jim firmly, “I would rather you left my private property alone.”

“Sorry, but I thought everything in old Salter’s office had to do with his clients.”

“You’re not the only client,” said Jim. He was not one to lose his temper, but this insolent man was trying his patience sorely.

“What is it all about?” asked the languid Groat, as he turned one page.

Jim, standing at the other side of the table watching him, saw a touch of colour come into the man’s yellow face. The black eyes hardened and his languid interest dropped away like a cloak.

“What is this?” he asked sharply. “What the hell are you—”

He checked himself with a great effort and laughed, but the laugh was harsh and artificial.

“You’re a wonderful fellow, Steele,” he said with a return to his old air of insouciance. “Fancy bothering your head about things of that sort.”

He put the book back where he had found it, picked up another of the leases and appeared to be reading it intently, but Jim, watching him, saw that he was not reading, even though he turned page after page.

“That is all right,” he said at last, putting the lease down and taking up his top-hat. “Some day perhaps you will come and dine with us, Steele. I’ve had rather a stunning laboratory built at the back of our house in Grosvenor Square. Old Salter called me doctor!” He chuckled quietly as though at a big joke. “Well, if you come along, I will show you something that will at least justify the title.”

The dark brown eyes were fixed steadily upon Jim as he stood in the doorway, one yellow-gloved hand on the handle.

“And, by the way, Mr. Steele,” he drawled, “your studies are leading you into a danger zone for which even a second Victoria Cross could not adequately compensate you.”

He closed the door carefully behind him, and Jim Steele frowned after him.

“What the dickens does he mean?” he asked, and then remembered the exercise book through which Groat had glanced, and which had had so strange an effect upon him. He took the book down from the shelf and turning to the first page, read: “Some notes upon the Thirteen Gang.”

CHAPTER THREE

THAT afternoon Jim Steele went into Mr. Salter’s office. “I’m going to tea now, sir,” he said.

Mr. Salter glanced up at the solemn-faced clock that ticked audibly on the opposite wall.

“All right,” he grumbled; “but you’re a very punctual tea-drinker, Steele. What are you blushing about—is it a girl?”

“No, sir,” said Jim rather loudly. “I sometimes meet a lady at tea, but—”

“Off you go,” said the old man gruffly. “And give her my love.”

Jim was grinning, but he was very red, too, when he went down the stairs into Marlborough Street. He hurried his pace because he was a little late, and breathed a sigh of relief as he turned into the quiet tea-shop to find that his table was as yet unoccupied.

As his tall, athletic figure strode through the room to the little recess overlooking Regent Street, which was reserved for privileged customers, many heads were turned, for Jim Steele was a splendid figure of British manhood, and the grey laughing eyes had played havoc in many a tender heart.

But he was one of those men whose very idealism forbade trifling. He had gone straight from a public school into the tragic theatre of conflict, and at an age when most young men were dancing attendance upon women, his soul was being seared by the red-hot irons of war.

He sat down at the table and the beaming waitress came forward to attend to his needs.

“Your young lady hasn’t come yet, sir,” she said.

It was the first time she had made such a reference to Eunice Weldon, and Jim stiffened.

“The young lady who has tea with me is not my ‘young lady,’” he said a little coldly, and seeing that he had hurt the girl, he added with a gleam of mirth in those irresistible eyes, “she’s your young lady, really.”

“I’m sorry,” said the waitress, scribbling on her order pad to hide her confusion. “I suppose you’ll have the usual?”

“I’ll have the usual,” said Jim gravely, and then with a quick glance at the door he rose to meet the girl who had at that moment entered.

She was slim of build, straight as a plummet line from chin to toe; she carried herself with a dignity which was so natural that the men who haunt the pavement to leer and importune, stood on one side to let her pass, and then, after a glimpse of her face, cursed their own timidity. For it was a face Madonna-like in its purity. But a blue-eyed, cherry-lipped Madonna, vital and challenging. A bud of a girl breaking into the summer bloom of existence. In those sapphire eyes the beacon fires of life signalled her womanhood; they were at once a plea and a warning. Yet she carried the banners of childhood no less triumphantly. The sensitive mouth, the round, girlish chin, the satin white throat and clean, transparent skin, unmarked, unblemished, these were the gifts of youth which were carried forward to the account of her charm.

Her eyes met Jim’s and she came forward with outstretched hand.

“I’m late,” she said gaily. “We had a tiresome duchess at the studio who wanted to be taken in seventeen different poses—it is always the plain people who give the most trouble.”

She sat down and stripped her gloves, with a smile at the waitress.

“The only chance that plain people have of looking beautiful is to be photographed beautifully,” said Jim.

Eunice Weldon was working at a fashionable photographer’s in Regent Street. Jim’s meeting with her had been in the very room in which they were now sitting. The hangings at the window had accidentally caught fire, and Jim, in extinguishing them, had burnt his hand. It was Eunice Weldon who had dressed the injury.

A service rendered by a man to a woman may not lead very much farther to a better acquaintance. When a woman helps a man it is invariably the beginning of a friendship. Women are suspicious of the services which men give, and yet feel responsible for the man they have helped, even to the slightest extent.

Since then they had met almost daily and taken tea together. Once Jim had asked her to go to a theatre, an invitation which she had promptly but kindly declined. Thereafter he had made no further attempt to improve their acquaintance.

“And how have you got on with your search for the missing lady?” she asked, as she spread some jam on the thin bread-and-butter which the waitress had brought.

Jim’s nose wrinkled—a characteristic grimace of his.

“Mr. Salter made it clear to me to-day that even if I found the missing lady it wouldn’t greatly improve matters,” he said.

“It would be wonderful if the child had been saved after all,” she said. “Have you ever thought of that possibility?”

He nodded.

“There is no hope of that.” he said, shaking his head, “but it would be wonderful, as you say, and more wonderful,” he laughed, “if you were the missing heiress!”

“And there’s no hope of that either.” she said, shaking her head. “I’m the daughter of poor but honest parents, as the story-books say.”

“Your father was a South African, wasn’t he?”

She nodded.

“Poor daddy was a musician, and mother I can hardly remember, but she must have been a dear.”

“Where were you born?” asked Jim.

She did not answer immediately because she was busy with her jam sandwich.

“In Cape Town—Rondebosch, to be exact,” she said after a while. “Why are you so keen on finding your long-lost lady?”

“Because I am anxious that the most unmitigated cad in the world should not succeed to the Danton millions.”

She sat bolt upright.

“The Danton millions?” she repeated slowly. “Then who is your unmitigated cad? You have never yet mentioned the names of these people.”

This was perfectly true. Jim Steele had not even spoken of his search until a few days before.

“A man named Digby Groat.”

She stared at him aghast.

“Why, what’s the matter?” he asked in surprise.

“When you said ‘Danton’ I remembered Mr. Curley—that is our chief photographer—saying that Mrs. Groat was the sister of Jonathan Danton?” she said slowly.

“Do you know the Groats?” he asked quickly.

“I don’t know them,” she said slowly, “at least, not very well, only—” she hesitated, “I’m going to be Mrs. Groat’s secretary.”

He stared at her.

“You never told me this,” he said, and as she dropped her eyes to her plate, he realized that he had made a faux pas. “Of course,” he said hurriedly, “there’s no reason why you should tell me, but—”

“It only happened to-day,” she said. “Mr. Groat has had some photographs taken—his mother came with him to the studio. She’s been several times, and I scarcely noticed them until to-day, when Mr. Curley called me into the office and said that Mrs. Groat was in need of a secretary and that it was a very good position; Ł5 a week, which is practically all profit, because I should live in the house.”

“When did Mrs. Groat decide that she wanted a secretary?” asked Jim, and it was her turn to stare.

“I don’t know. Why do you ask that?”

“She was at our office a month ago,” said Jim, “and Mr. Salter suggested that she should have a secretary to keep her accounts in order. She said then she hated the idea of having anybody in the house who was neither a servant nor a friend of the family.”

“Well, she’s changed her views now,” smiled the girl.

“This means that we shan’t meet at tea any more. When are you going?”

“Tomorrow,” was the discouraging reply.

He went back to his office more than a little dispirited. Something deep and vital seemed to have gone out of his life.

“You’re in love, you fool,” he growled to himself.

He opened the big diary which it was his business to keep and slammed down the covers savagely.

Mr. Salter had gone home. He always went home early, and Jim lit his pipe and began to enter up the day’s transactions from the scribbled notes which his chief had left on his desk.

He had made the last entry and was making a final search of the desk for some scrap which he might have overlooked.

Mr. Salter’s desk was usually tidy, but he had a habit of concealing important memoranda, and Jim turned over the law books on the table in a search for any scribbled memo he might have missed. He found between two volumes a thin gilt-edged notebook, which he did not remember having seen before. He opened it to discover that it was a diary for the year 1901. Mr. Salter was in the habit of making notes for his own private reading, using a queer legal shorthand which no clerk had ever been able to decipher. The entries in the diary were in these characters.

Jim turned the leaves curiously, wondering how so methodical a man as the lawyer had left a private diary visible. He knew that in the big green safe in the lawyer’s office were stacks of these books, and possibly the old man had taken one out to refresh his memory. The writing was Greek to Jim, so that he felt no compunction in turning the pages, filled as they were with indecipherable and meaningless scrawls, punctuated now and again with a word in longhand.

He stopped suddenly, for under the heading “June 4th” was quite a long entry. It seemed to have been written in subsequently to the original shorthand entry, for it was in green ink. This almost dated the inscription. Eighteen months before, an oculist had suggested to Mr. Salter, who suffered from an unusual form of astigmatism, that green ink would be easier for him to read, and ever since then he had used no other.

Jim took in the paragraph before he realized that he was committing an unpardonable act in reading his employers’ private notes.

“One month imprisonment with hard labour. Holloway Prison. Released July 2nd. Madge Benson (this word was underlined), 14, Palmer’s Terrace, Paddington. 74, Highcliffe Gardens, Margate. Long enquiries with boatman who owned Saucy Belle. No further trace—”

“What on earth does that mean?” muttered Jim. “I must make a note of that.”

He realized now that he was doing something which might be regarded as dishonourable, but he was so absorbed in the new clues that he overcame his repugnance.

Obviously, this entry referred to the missing Lady Mary. Who the woman Madge Benson was, what the reference to Holloway Gaol meant, he would discover.

He made a copy of the entry in the diary at the back of a card, went back to his room, locked the door of his desk and went home, to think out some plan of campaign.

He occupied a small flat in a building overlooking Regent’s Park. It is true that his particular flat overlooked nothing but the backs of other houses, and a deep cutting through which were laid the lines of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway—he could have dropped a penny on the carriages as they passed, so near was the line. But the rent of the flat was only one-half of that charged for those in a more favourable position. And his flat was smaller than any. He had a tiny private income, amounting to two or three pounds a week, and that, with his salary, enabled him to maintain himself in something like comfort. The three rooms he occupied were filled with priceless old furniture that he had saved from the wreckage of his father’s home, when that easy-going man had died, leaving just enough to settle his debts, which were many.

Jim had got out of the lift on the fourth floor and had put the key in the lock when he heard the door on the opposite side of the landing open, and turned round.

The elderly woman who came out wore the uniform of a nurse, and she nodded pleasantly.

“How is your patient, nurse?” asked Jim.

“She’s very well, sir, or rather as well as you could expect a bedridden lady to be,” said the woman with a smile. “She’s greatly obliged to you for the books you sent in to her.”

“Poor soul,” said Jim sympathetically. “It must be terrible not to be able to go out.”

The nurse shook her head.

“I suppose it is,” she said, “but Mrs. Fane doesn’t seem to mind. You get used to it after seven years.”

A “rat-tat” above made her lift her eyes.

“There’s the post,” she said. “I thought it had gone. I’d better wait till he comes down.”

The postman at Featherdale Mansions was carried by the lift to the sixth floor and worked his way to the ground floor. Presently they heard his heavy feet coming down and he loomed in sight.

“Nothing for you, sir,” he said to Jim, glancing at the bundle of letters in his hand.

“Miss Madge Benson—that’s you, nurse, isn’t it?”

“That’s right,” said the woman briskly, and took the letter from his hand, then with a little nod to Jim she went downstairs.

Madge Benson! The name that had appeared in Salter’s diary!

CHAPTER FOUR

“I’m sick to death of hearing your views on the subject, mother,” said Mr. Digby Groat, as he helped himself to a glass of port. “It is sufficient for you that I want the girl to act as your secretary. Whether you give her any work to do or not is a matter of indifference to me. Whatever you do, you must not leave her with the impression that she is brought here for any other purpose than to write your letters and deal with your correspondence.”

The woman who sat at the other side of the table looked older than she was. Jane Groat was over sixty, but there were people who thought she was twenty years more than that. Her yellow face was puckered and lined, her blue-veined hands, folded now on her lap, were gnarled and ugly. Only the dark brown eyes held their brightness undimmed. Her figure was bent and there was about her a curious, cringing, frightened look which was almost pitiable. She did not look at her son—she seldom looked at anybody.

“She’ll spy, she’ll pry,” she moaned.

“Shut up about the girl!” he snarled, “and now we’ve got a minute to ourselves, I’d like to tell you something, mother.”

Her uneasy eyes went left and right, but avoided him. There was a menace in his tone with which she was all too familiar.

“Look at this.”

He had taken from his pocket something that sparkled and glittered in the light of the table lamp.

“What is it?” she whined without looking.

“It is a diamond bracelet,” he said sternly. “And it is the property of Lady Waltham. We were staying with the Walthams for the week-end. Look at it!”

His voice was harsh and grating, and dropping her head she began to weep painfully.

“I found that in your room,” he said, and his suave manner was gone. “You old thief!” he hissed across the table, “can’t you break yourself of that habit?”

“It looked so pretty,” she gulped, her tears trickling down her withered face. “I can’t resist the temptation when I see pretty things.”

“I suppose you know that Lady Waltham’s maid has been arrested for stealing this, and will probably go to prison for six months?”

“I couldn’t resist the temptation,” she snivelled, and he threw the bracelet on the table with a growl.

“I’m going to send it back to the woman and tell them it must have been packed away by mistake in your bag. I’m not doing it to get this girl out of trouble, but to save myself from a lot of unpleasantness.”

“I know why you’re bringing this girl into the house,” she sobbed; “it is to spy on me.”

His lips curled in a sneer.

“To spy on you!” he said contemptuously, and laughed as he rose. “Now understand,” his voice was harsh again, “you’ve got to break yourself of this habit of picking up things that you like. I’m expecting to go into Parliament at the next election, and I’m not going to have my position jeopardized by an old fool of a kleptomaniac. If there’s something wrong with your brain,” he added significantly, “I’ve a neat little laboratory at the back of this house where that might be attended to.”

She shrank back in terror, her face grey.

“You—you wouldn’t do it—my own son!” she stammered. “I’m all right, Digby; it’s only—”

He smiled, but it was not a pleasant smile to see.

“Probably there is a little compression,” he said evenly, “some tiny malgrowth of bone that is pressing on a particular cell. We could put that right for you, mother—”

But she had thrown her chair aside and fled from the room before he had finished. He picked up the jewel, looked at it contemptuously and thrust it into his pocket. Her curious thieving propensities he had known for a very long time and had fought to check them, and as he thought, successfully.

He went to his library, a beautiful apartment, with its silver grate, its costly rosewood bookshelves and its rare furnishings, and wrote a letter to Lady Waltham. He wrapped this about the bracelet, and having packed letter and jewel carefully in a small box, rang the bell. A middle-aged man with a dark forbidding face answered the summons.

“Deliver this to Lady Waltham at once, Jackson,” said Digby. “The old woman is going out to a concert tonight, by the way, and when she’s out I want you to make a very thorough search of her room.”

The man shook his head. “I’ve already looked carefully, Mr. Groat,” he said, “and I’ve found nothing.”

He was on the point of going when Digby called him back.

“You’ve told the housekeeper to see to Miss Weldon’s room?”

“Yes, sir,” was the reply. “She wanted to put her on the top floor amongst the servants, but I stopped her.”

“She must have the best room in the house,” said Groat. “See that there are plenty of flowers in the room and put in the bookcase and the Chinese table that are in my room.”

The man nodded.

“What about the key, sir?” he asked after some hesitation.

“The key?” Digby looked up. “The key of her room?”

The man nodded.

“Do you want the door to lock?” he asked significantly.

Mr. Groat’s lips curled in a sneer.

“You’re a fool,” he said. “Of course, I want the door to lock. Put bolts on if necessary.”

The man looked his surprise. There was evidently between these two something more than the ordinary relationship which existed between employer and servant. “Have you ever run across a man named Steele?” asked Digby, changing the subject.

Jackson shook his head.

“Who is he?” he asked.

“He is a lawyer’s clerk. Give him a look up when you’ve got some time to spare. No, you’d better not go—ask—ask Bronson. He lives at Featherdale Mansions.”

The man nodded, and Digby went down the steps to the waiting electric brougham.

Eunice Weldon had packed her small wardrobe and the cab was waiting at the door. She had no regrets at leaving the stuffy untidy lodging which had been her home for two years, and her farewell to her dishevelled landlady, who seemed always to have dressed in a violent hurry, was soon over. She could not share Jim Steele’s dislike of her new employers. She was too young to regard a new job as anything but the beginning of an adventure which held all sorts of fascinating possibilities. She sighed as she realized that the little tea-table talks which had been so pleasant a feature of her life were now to come to an end, and yet—surely he would make some effort to see her again?

She would have hours—perhaps half-days to herself, and then she remembered with dismay that she did not know his address! But he would know hers. That thought comforted her, for she wanted to see him again. She wanted to see him more than she had ever dreamt she would. She could close her eyes, and his handsome face, those true smiling eyes of his, would look into hers. The swing of his shoulders as he walked, the sound of his voice as he spoke—every characteristic of his was present in her mind.

And the thought that she might not see him again!

“I will see him—I will!” she murmured, as the cab stopped before the imposing portals of No. 409, Grosvenor Square.

She was a little bewildered by the army of servants who came to her help, and just a little pleased by the deference they showed to her.

“Mrs. Groat will receive you, miss,” said a swarthy-looking man, whose name she afterwards learnt was Jackson.

She was ushered into a small back drawing-room which seemed poorly furnished to the girl’s eye, but to Mrs. Groat was luxury.

The old woman resented the payment of a penny that was spent on decoration and furniture, and only the fear of her son prevented her from disputing every account which was put before her for settlement. The meeting was a disappointment to Eunice. She had not seen Mrs. Groat except in the studio, where she was beautifully dressed. She saw now a yellow-faced old woman, shabbily attired, who looked at her with dark disapproving eyes.

“Oh, so you’re the young woman who is going to be my secretary, are you?” she quavered dismally. “Have they shown you your room?”

“Not yet, Mrs. Groat,” said the girl.

“I hope you will be comfortable,” said Mrs. Groat in a voice that suggested that she had no very great hopes for anything of the sort.

“When do I begin my duties?” asked Eunice, conscious of a chill.

“Oh, any time,” said the old woman off-handedly.

She peered up at the girl.

“You’re pretty,” she said grudgingly, and Eunice flushed. Somehow that compliment sounded like an insult. “I suppose that’s why,” said Mrs. Groat absently.

“Why what?” asked the girl gently.

She thought the woman was weak of intellect and had already lost whatever enthusiasm she had for her new position.

“Nothing,” said the old woman, and with a nod dismissed her.

The room into which Eunice was shown left her speechless for a while.

“Are you sure this is mine?” she asked incredulously.

“Yes, miss,” said the housekeeper with a sidelong glance at the girl.

“But this is beautiful!” said Eunice.

The room would have been remarkable if it had been in a palace. The walls were panelled in brocade silk and the furniture was of the most beautiful quality. A small French bed, carved and gilded elaborately, invited repose. Silk hangings hung at either side of the head, and through the French windows she saw a balcony gay with laden flower-boxes. Under her feet was a carpet of blue velvet pile that covered the whole of the room. She looked round open-mouthed at the magnificence of her new home. The dressing-table was an old French model in the Louis Quinze style, inlaid with gold, and the matching wardrobe must have been worth a fortune. Near one window was a lovely writing-table, and a well-filled bookcase would almost be within reach of her hand when she lay in bed.

“Are you sure this is my room?” she asked again.

“Yes, miss,” said the housekeeper, “and this,” she opened a door, “is your bathroom. There is a bath to every room. Mr. Groat had the house reconstructed when he came into it.”

The girl opened one of the French windows and stepped on to the balcony which ran along to a square and larger balcony built above the porch of the house. This, she discovered, opened from a landing above the stairs.

She did not see Mrs. Groat again that afternoon, and when she inquired she discovered that the old lady was lying down with a bad headache. Nor was she to meet Digby Groat. Her first meal was eaten in solitude.

“Mr. Groat has not come back from the country,” explained Jackson, who waited on her. “Are you comfortable, miss?”

“Quite, thank you,” she said.

There was an air about this man which she did not like. It was not that he failed in respect, or that he was in any way familiar, but there was something proprietorial in his attitude. It almost seemed as though he had a financial interest in the place, and she was glad when her meal was finished. She went straight up to her room a little dissatisfied that she had not met her employer. There were many things which she wanted to ask Mrs. Groat; and particularly did she wish to know what days she would be free.

Presently she switched out the light, and opening the French windows, stepped out into the cool, fragrant night. The after-glow of the sun still lingered in the sky. The square was studded with lights; an almost incessant stream of motor-car traffic passed under her window, for Grosvenor Square is the short cut between Oxford Street and Piccadilly.

The stars spangled the clear sky with a million specks of quivering light. Against the jewelled robe of the northern heavens, the roofs and steeples and stacks of London had a mystery and wonder which only the light of day could dispel. And in the majestic solitude of the night, Eunice’s heart seemed to swell until she could scarcely breathe. It was not the magic of stars that brought the blood flaming to her face; nor the music of the trees. It was the flash of understanding that one half of her, one splendid fragment of the pattern on which her life was cut, was somewhere there in the darkness asleep perhaps—thinking of her, she prayed. She saw his face with startling distinctness, saw the tender kindness of his eyes, felt on her moist palm the pressure of those strong brown fingers….

With a sigh which was half a sob, she closed the window and drew the silken curtains, shutting out the immortal splendours of nature from her view.

Five minutes later she was asleep.

How long she slept she did not know. It must have been hours, she thought. The stream of traffic had ceased and there was no sound from outside, save the distant hoot of a motor-horn. The room was in darkness, and yet she was conscious that somebody was there!

She sat up in bed and a cold shiver ran down her spine. Somebody was in the room! She reached out to turn on the light and could have shrieked, for she touched a hand, a cold, small hand that was resting on the bedside table. For a second she was paralysed and then the hand was suddenly withdrawn. There was a rustle of curtain rings and the momentary glimpse of a figure against the lesser gloom of the night, and, shaking in every limb, she leapt from the bed and switched on the light. The room was empty, but the French window was ajar.

And then she saw on the table by her side, a grey card. Picking it up with shaking hands she read:

“One who loves you, begs you for your life and honour’s sake to leave this house.”

It bore no other signature than a small blue hand. She dropped the card on the bed and stood staring at it for a while, and then, slipping into her dressing-gown, she unlocked the door of her room and went out into the passage. A dim light was burning at the head of the stairs. She was terror-stricken, hardly knew what she was doing, and she seemed to fly down the stairs.

She must find somebody, some living human creature, some reality to which she could take hold. But the house was silent. The hall lamp was burning, and by its light she saw the old clock and was dimly conscious that she could hear its solemn ticking. It was three o’clock. There must be somebody awake in the house. The servants might still be up, she thought wildly, and ran down a passage to what she thought was the entrance to the servants’ hall. She opened a door and found herself in another passage illuminated by one light at the farther end, where further progress was arrested by a white door. She raced along until she came to the door and tried to open it. There was no handle and it was a queer door. It was not made of wood, but of padded canvas.

And then as she stood bewildered, there came from behind the padded door a squeal of agony, so shrill, so full of pain, that her blood seemed to turn to ice.

Again it shrieked, and turning she fled back the way she had come, through the hall to the front door. Her trembling fingers fumbled at the key and presently the lock snapped and the door flew open. She staggered out on to the broad steps of the house and stopped, for a man was sitting on the head of those steps.

He turned his face as the door opened, and in the light from the hall he was revealed. It was Jim Steele!

CHAPTER FIVE

JIM came stumbling to his feet, staring in blank amazement at the unexpected apparition, and for a moment thus they stood, facing one another, the girl stricken dumb with fear and surprise.

She thought he was part of a dreadful dream, an image that was conjured by her imagination and would presently vanish.

“Jim—Mr. Steele!” she gasped.

In a stride he was by her side, his arm about her shoulders.

“What is wrong?” he asked quickly, and in his anxiety his voice was almost harsh.

She shuddered and dropped her face on his breast.

“Oh, it was dreadful, dreadful!” she whispered, and he heard the note of horror in her low voice.

“May I ask what is the meaning of this?” demanded a suave voice, and with a start the girl turned.

A man was standing in the doorway and for a second she did not recognize him. Even Jim, who had seen Digby Groat at close quarters, did not know him in his unusual attire. He was dressed in a long white overall which reached from his throat to his feet; over his head was a white cap which fitted him so that not a particle of his hair could be seen. Bands of white elastic held his cuffs close to his wrists and both hands were hidden in brown rubber gloves.

“May I again ask you, Miss Weldon, why you are standing on my doorstep in the middle of the night, attired in clothes which I do not think are quite suitable for street wear? Perhaps you will come inside and explain,” he said stepping back. “Grosvenor Square is not quite used to this form of midnight entertainment.”

Still clutching Jim’s arm, the girl went slowly back to the passage and Digby shut the door.

“And Mr. Steele, too,” said Digby with ironic surprise, “you’re a very early caller.”

Jim said nothing. His attention was wholly devoted to the girl. She was trembling from head to foot, and he found a chair for her.

“There are a few explanations due,” he said coolly, “but I rather think they are from you, Mr. Groat.”

“From me?’” Mr. Groat was genuinely unprepared for that demand.

“So far as my presence is concerned, that can be explained in a minute,” said Jim. “I was outside the house a few moments ago when the door swung open and Miss Weldon ran out in a state of abject terror. Perhaps you will tell me, Mr. Groat, why this lady is reduced to such a condition?”

There was a cold menace in his tone which Digby Groat did not like to hear.

“I have not the slightest idea what it is all about,” he said. “I have been working in my laboratory for the last half-hour, and the first intimation I had that anything was wrong was when I heard the door open.”

The girl had recovered now, and some of the colour had returned to her face, yet her voice shook as she recited the incidents of the night, both men listening attentively.

Jim took particular notice of the man’s attitude, and he was satisfied in his mind that Digby Groat was as much in ignorance of the visit to the girl’s room as he himself. When she had finished, Groat nodded.

“The terrifying cry you heard from my laboratory,” he smiled, “is easily explained. Nobody was being hurt; at least, if he was being hurt, it was for his own good. When I came back to my house tonight, I found my little dog had a piece of glass in its paw, and I was extracting it.”

She drew a sigh of relief.

“I’m so sorry I made such a fuss,” she said penitently, “but I—I was frightened.”

“You are sure somebody was in your room?” asked Digby.

“Absolutely certain.” She had not told him about the card.

“They came through the French window from the balcony?” She nodded.

“May I see your room?”

She hesitated for a moment.

“I will go in first to tidy it,” she said. She remembered the card was on the bed, and she was particularly anxious that it should not be read.

Uninvited Jim Steele followed Digby upstairs into the beautiful room. The magnificence of the room, its hangings and costly furniture, did not fail to impress him, but the impression he received was not favourable to Digby Groat.

“Yes, the window is ajar. You are sure you fastened it?”

The girl nodded.

“Yes. I left both fanlights down to get the air,” she pointed above, “but I fastened these doors. I distinctly remember that.”

“But if this person came in from the balcony,” said Digby, “how did he or she get there?”

He opened the French door and stepped out into the night, walking along the balcony until he came to the square space above the porch. There was another window here which gave on to the landing at the head of the stairs. He tried it—it was fastened. Coming back through the girl’s room he discovered that not only was the catch in its socket, but the key was turned.

“Strange,” he muttered.

His first impression had been that it was his mother who, with her strange whims, had been searching the room for some trumpery trinket which had taken her fancy. But the old woman was not sufficiently agile to climb a balcony, nor had she the courage to make a midnight foray.

“My own impression is that you dreamt it, Miss Weldon,” he said, with a smile. “And now I advise you to go to bed and to sleep. I’m sorry that you’ve had this unfortunate introduction to my house.”

He had made no reference to the providential appearance of Jim Steele, nor did he speak of this until they had said good night to the girl and had passed down the stairs into the hall again.

“Rather a coincidence, your being here, Mr. Steele,” he said. “What were you doing? Studying dactylology?”

“Something like that,” said Jim coolly.

Mr. Digby Groat searched for a cigarette in his pocket and lit it.

“I should have thought that your work was so arduous that you would not have time for early morning strolls in Grosvenor Square.”

“Would you really?” said Jim, and then suddenly Digby laughed.

“You’re a queer devil,” he said. “Come along and see my laboratory.”

Jim was anxious to see the laboratory, and the invitation saved him from the necessity of making further reference to the terrifying cry which Eunice had heard.

They turned down a long passage through the padded door and came to a large annexe, the walls of which were of white glazed brick. There was no window, the light in the daytime being admitted through a glass roof. Now, however, these were covered by blue blinds and the room owed its illumination to two powerful lights which hung above a small table. It was not an ordinary table; its legs were of thin iron, terminating in rubber-tyred castors. The top was of white enamelled iron, with curious little screw holds occurring at intervals.

It was not the table so much as the occupant which interested Jim. Fastened down by two iron bands, one of which was about its neck and one about the lower portion of its body, its four paws fastened by thin cords, was a dog, a rough-haired terrier who turned its eyes upon Jim with an expression of pleading so human that Jim could almost feel the message that the poor little thing was sending.

“Your dog, eh?” said Jim.

Digby looked at him.

“Yes,” he said. “Why?”

“Haven’t you finished taking the glass out of his paw?”

“Not quite,” said the other coolly.

“By the way, you don’t keep him very clean,” Jim said.

Digby turned.

“What the devil are you hinting at?” he asked.

“I am merely suggesting that this is not your dog, but a poor stray terrier which you picked up in the street half an hour ago and enticed into this house.”

“Well?”

“I’d save you further trouble by saying that I saw you pick it up.”

Digby’s eyes narrowed.

“Oh, you did, did you?” he said softly. “So you were spying on me?”

“Not exactly spying on you,” said Jim calmly, “but merely satisfying my idle curiosity.”

His hand fell on the dog and he stroked its ears gently.

Digby laughed.

“Well, if you know that, I might as well tell you that I am going to evacuate the sensory nerve. I’ve always been curious to—”

Jim looked round.

“Where is your anaesthetic?” he asked gently, and he was most dangerous when his voice sank to that soft note.

“Anaesthetic? Good Lord,” scoffed the other, “you don’t suppose I’m going to waste money on chloroform for a dog, do you?”

His fingers rested near the poor brute’s head and the dog, straining forward, licked the torturer’s hand.

“Filthy little beast!” said Digby, picking up a towel.

He took a thick rubber band, slipped it over the dog’s mouth and nose.

“Now lick,” he laughed; “I think that will stop his yelping. You’re a bit chicken-hearted, aren’t you, Mr. Steele? You don’t realize that medical science advances by its experiments on animals.”

“I realize the value of vivisection under certain conditions,” said Jim quietly, “but all decent doctors who experiment on animals relieve them of their pain before they use the knife; and all doctors, whether they are decent or otherwise, receive a certificate of permission from the Board of Trade before they begin their experiments. Where is your certificate?”

Digby’s face darkened.

“Look here, don’t you come here trying to bully me,” he blustered. “I brought you here just to show you my laboratory—”

“And if you hadn’t brought me in,” interrupted Jim. “I should jolly well have walked in, because I wasn’t satisfied with your explanation. Oh, yes, I know, you’re going to tell me that the dog was only frightened and the yell she heard was when you put that infernal clamp on his neck. Now, I’ll tell you something, Mr. Digby Groat. I’ll give you three minutes to get the clamp off that dog.”

Digby’s yellow face was puckered with rage.

“And if I don’t?” he breathed.

“I’ll put you where the dog is,” said Jim. “And please don’t persuade yourself that I couldn’t do it?”

There was a moment’s silence.

“Take the clamps off that dog,” said Jim.

Digby looked at him.

For a moment they gazed at one another and there was a look of malignity in the eyes that dropped before Jim’s. Another minute and the dog was free.

Jim lifted the shivering little animal in his arms and rubbed its bony head, and Digby watched him glowering, his teeth showing in his rage.

“I’ll remember this,” he snarled. “By God, you shall rue the day you ever interfered with me!”

Jim’s steady eyes met the man’s.

“I have never feared a threat in my life,” he said quietly. “I’m not likely to be scared now. I admit that vivisection is necessary under proper conditions, but men like you who torture harmless animals from a sheer lust of cruelty, are bringing discredit upon the noblest of professions. You hurt in order to satisfy your own curiosity. You have not the slightest intention of using the knowledge you gain for the benefit of suffering humanity. When I came into this laboratory,” he said—he was standing at the door as he spoke—“there were two brutes here. I am leaving the bigger one behind.”

He slammed the padded door and walked out into the passage, leaving a man whose vanity was hurt beyond forgiveness.

Then to his surprise Groat heard Jim’s footsteps returning and his visitor came in.

“Did you close your front door when you went upstairs?”

Digby’s eyebrows rose. He forgot for the moment the insult that had been offered him.

“Yes—why?”

“It is wide open now,” said Jim. “I guess your midnight visitor has gone home.”

CHAPTER SIX

IN the cheerful sunlight of the morning all Eunice’s fear had vanished and she felt heartily ashamed of herself that she had made such a commotion in the night. And yet there was the card. She took it from under her pillow and read it again, with a puzzled frown. Somebody had been in the room, but it was not a somebody whom she could regard as an enemy. Then a thought struck her that made her heart leap. Could it have been Jim? She shook her head. Somehow she was certain it was not Jim, and she flushed at the thought. It was not his hand she had touched. She knew the shape and contour of that. It was warm and firm, almost electric; that which she had touched had been the hand of somebody who was old, of that she was sure.

She went down to breakfast to find Groat standing before the fire, a debonair, perfectly dressed man, who showed no trace of fatigue, though he had not gone to bed until four o’clock.

He gave her a cheery greeting.

“Good morning, Miss Weldon,” he said. “I hope you have recovered from your nightmare.”

“I gave you a lot of trouble,” she said with a rueful smile. “I am so very sorry.”

“Nonsense,” he said heartily. “I am only glad that our friend Steele was there to appease you. By the way, Miss Weldon, I owe you an apology. I told you a lie last night.”

She looked at him open-eyed.

“Did you, Mr. Groat?” she said, and then with a laugh, “I am sure it wasn’t a very serious one.”

“It was really. I told you that my little dog had a piece of glass in his paw; the truth was that it wasn’t my dog at all, but a dog that I picked up in the street. I intended making an experiment upon him; you know I am a doctor.”

She shivered.

“Oh, that was the noise?” she asked with a wry little face.

He shook his head.

“No, he was just scared, he hadn’t been hurt at all—and in truth I didn’t intend hurting him. Your friend, however, persuaded me to let the little beggar go.”

She drew a long sigh of relief.

“I’m so glad,” she said. “I should have felt awful.”

He laughed softly as he took his place at the table.

“Steele thought I was going to experiment without chloroform, but that, of course, was absurd. It is difficult to get the unprofessional man to realize what an enormous help to medical science these experiments are. Of course,” he said airily, “they are conducted without the slightest pain to the animal. I should no more think of hurting a little dog than I should think of hurting you.”

“I’m sure you wouldn’t,” she said warmly.

Digby Groat was a clever man. He knew that Jim would meet the girl again and would give her his version of the scene in the laboratory. It was necessary, therefore, that he should get his story in first, for this girl whom he had brought to the house for his amusement was more lovely than he had dreamt, and he desired to stand well with her.

Digby, who was a connoisseur in female beauty, had rather dreaded the morning meal. The beauty of women seldom survives the cruel searchlight which the grey eastern light throws upon their charms. Love had never touched him, though many women had come and gone in his life. Eunice Weldon was a more thrilling adventure, something that would surely brighten a dreary week or two; an interest to stimulate him until another stimulation came into sight.

She survived the ordeal magnificently, he thought. The tender texture of the skin, untouched by an artificial agent, was flawless; the eyes, bright and vigorous with life, sparkled with health; the hands that lay upon the table, when she was listening to him, were perfectly and beautifully moulded.

She on her side was neither attracted nor repelled. Digby Groat was just a man. One of the thousands of men who pass and repass in the corridor of life; some seen, some unnoticed, some interesting, some abhorrent. Some stop to speak, some pass hurriedly by and disappear through strange doors never to be seen again. He had “stopped to speak,” but had he vanished from sight through one of those doors of mystery she would have been neither sorry nor glad.

“My mother never comes to breakfast,” said Digby halfway through the meal. “Do you think you will like your work?”

“I don’t know what it is yet,” she answered, her eyes twinkling.

“Mother is rather peculiar,” he said, “and just a little eccentric, but I think you will be sensible enough to get on with her. And the work will not be very heavy at first. I am hoping later that you will be able to assist me in my anthropological classification.”

“That sounds terribly important,” she said. “What does it mean?”

“I am making a study of faces and heads,” he said easily, “and to that end I have collected thousands of photographs from all parts of the world. I hope to get a million. It is a science which is very much neglected in this country. It appears to be the exclusive monopoly of the Italians. You have probably heard of Mantaganza and Lombroso?”

She nodded.

“They are the great criminal scientists, aren’t they?” she said to his surprise.

“Oh, I see, you know something about it. Yes, I suppose you would call them criminal scientists.”

“It sounds fascinating,” she said, looking at him in wonder, “and I should like to help you if your mother can spare me.”

“Oh, she’ll spare you,” he said.

Her hand lay on the table invitingly near to his, but he did not move. He was a quick, accurate judge of human nature. He knew that to touch her would be the falsest of moves. If it had been another woman—yes, his hand would have closed gently over hers, there would have been a giggle of embarrassment, a dropping of eyes, and the rest would have been so easy. But if he had followed that course with her, he knew that evening would find her gone. He could wait, and she was worth waiting for. She was gloriously lovely, he thought. Half the pleasure of life lies in the chase, and the chase is no more than a violent form of anticipation. Some men find their greatest joy in visions that must sooner or later materialize, and Digby Groat was one of these.

She looked up and saw his burning eyes fixed on her and flushed. With an effort she looked again and he was a normal man.

Was it an illusion of hers? she wondered.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE first few days of her engagement were very trying to Eunice Weldon.

Mrs. Groat did not overwork her, indeed Eunice’s complaint was that the old woman refused to give her any work at all.

On the third day at breakfast she spoke on the matter to Digby Groat.

“I’m afraid I am not very much use here, Mr. Groat,” she said; “it is a sin to take your money.”

“Why?” he asked quickly.

“Your mother prefers to write her own letters,” she said, “and really those don’t seem to be very many!”

“Nonsense,” he said sharply, and seeing that he had startled the girl he went on in a much gentler tone: “You see, my mother is not used to service of any kind. She’s one of those women who prefer to do things for themselves, and she has simply worn herself to a shadow because of this independence of hers. There are hundreds of jobs that she could give you to do! You must make allowance for old women, Miss Weldon. They take a long time to work up confidence in strangers.”

“I realize that,” she nodded.

“Poor mother is rather bewildered by her own magnificence,” he smiled, “but I am sure when she gets to know you, you will find your days very fully occupied.”

He left the morning-room and went straight into his mother’s little parlour, and found her in her dressing-room crouching over a tiny fire. He closed the door carefully and walked across to her and she looked up with a little look of fear in her eyes.

“Why aren’t you giving this girl work to do?” he asked sharply.

“There’s nothing for her to do,” she wailed. “My dear, she is such an expense, and I don’t like her.”

“You’ll give her work to do from to-day,” he said, “and don’t let me tell you again!”

“She’ll only spy on me,” said Mrs. Groat fretfully, “and I never write letters, you know that. I haven’t written a letter for years until you made me write that note to the lawyer.”

“You’ll find work for her to do,” repeated Digby Groat. “Do you understand? Get all the accounts that we’ve had for the past two years, and let her sort them out and make a list of them. Give her your bank account. Let her compare the cheques with the counterfoils. Give her anything. Damn you! You don’t want me to tell you every day, do you?”

“I’ll do it, I’ll do it, Digby,” she said hurriedly. “You’re very hard on me, my boy. I hate this house,” she said with sudden vehemence. “I hate the people in it. I looked into her room this morning and it is like a palace. It must have cost us thousands of pounds to furnish that room, and all for a work-girl—it is sinful!”

“Never mind about that,” he said. “Find something to occupy her time for the next fortnight.”

The girl was surprised that morning when Mrs. Groat sent for her.

“I’ve one or two little tasks for you, miss—I never remember your name.”

“Eunice,” said the girl, smiling.

“I don’t like the name of Eunice,” grumbled the old woman. “The last one was Lola! A foreign girl. I was glad when she left. Haven’t you got another name?”

“Weldon is my other name,” said the girl good-humouredly, “and you can call me ‘Weldon’ or ‘Eunice’ or anything you like, Mrs. Groat.”

The old woman sniffed.

She had in front of her a big drawer packed with cheques which had come back from the bank.

“Go through these,” she said, “and do something with them. I don’t know what.”

“Perhaps you want me to fasten them to the counterfoils,” said the girl.

“Yes, yes, that’s it,” said Mrs. Groat. “You don’t want to do it here, do you? Yes, you’d better do it here,” she went on hastily. “I don’t want the servants prying into my accounts.”

Eunice put the drawer on the table, gathered together the stubs of the cheque books, and with a little bottle of gum began her work, the old woman watching her.

When, for greater comfort, the girl took off the gold wrist-watch which she wore, a present from her dead father, Mrs. Groat’s greedy eyes focussed upon it and a look of animation came into the dull face.

It looked like being a long job, but Eunice was a methodical worker, and when the gong in the hall sounded for lunch, she had finished her labours.

“There, Mrs. Groat,” she said with a smile, “I think that is the lot. All your cheques are here.”

She put away the drawer and looked round for her watch, but it had disappeared. It was at that moment that Digby Groat opened the door and walked in.

“Hullo, Miss Weldon,” he said with his engaging smile. “I’ve come back for lunch. Did you hear the gong, mother? You ought to have let Miss Weldon go.”

But the girl was looking round.

“Have you lost anything?” asked Digby quickly.

“My little watch. I put it down a few minutes ago, and it seems to have vanished,” she said.

“Perhaps it is in the drawer,” stammered the old woman, avoiding her son’s eye.

Digby looked at her for a moment, then turned to Eunice.

“Will you please ask Jackson to order my car for three o’clock?” he asked gently.

He waited until the door closed behind the girl and then: “Where is that watch?” he asked.

“The watch, Digby?” quavered the old woman.

“The watch, curse you!” he said, his face black with rage.

She put her hand into her pocket reluctantly and produced it.

“It was so pretty,” she snivelled, and he snatched it from her hand.

A minute later Eunice returned.

“We have found your watch,” he said with a smile. “You had dropped it under the table.”

“I thought I’d looked there,” she said. “It is not a valuable watch, but it serves a double purpose.”

She was preparing to put it on.

“What other purpose than to tell you the time?” asked Digby.

“It hides a very ugly scar,” she said, and extended her wrist. “Look.” She pointed to a round red mark, the size of a sixpence. It looked like a recent burn.

“That’s queer,” said Digby, looking, and then he heard a strangled sound from his mother. Her face was twisted and distorted, her eyes were glaring at the girl’s wrist.

“Digby, Digby!” Her voice was a thin shriek of sound. “Oh, my God!”

And she fell across the table and before he could reach her, had dropped to the floor in an inert heap.

Digby stooped over his mother and then turned his head slowly to the frightened girl.

“It was the scar on your hand that did it,” he said slowly. “What does it mean?”

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE story of the scar and the queer effect it had produced on Mrs. Groat puzzled Jim almost as much as it had worried the girl. He offered his wild theory again and she laughed.

“Of course I shall leave,” she said, “but I must stay until all Mrs. Groat’s affairs are cleared up. There are heaps of letters and documents of all kinds which I have to index,” she said, “at least Mr. Groat told me there were. And it seems so unfair to run away whilst the poor old lady is so ill. As to my being the young lady of fortune, that is absurd. My parents were South Africans. Jim, you are too romantic to be a good detective.”

He indulged in the luxury of a taxi to carry her back to Grosvenor Square, and this time went with her to the house, taking his leave at the door.

Whilst they were talking on the step, the door opened and a man was shown out by Jackson. He was a short, thick-set man with an enormous brown beard.

Apparently Jackson did not see the two people on the step, at any rate he did not look toward them, but said in a loud voice:

“Mr. Groat will not be home until seven o’clock, Mr. Villa.”

“Tell him I called,” said the bearded man with a booming voice, and stepped past Jim, apparently oblivious to his existence.

“Who is the gentleman with the whiskers?” asked Jim, but the girl could give him no information.

Jim was not satisfied with the girl’s explanation of her parentage. There was an old school-friend of his in business in Cape Town, as an architect, and on his return to his office, Jim sent him a long reply-paid cablegram. He felt that he was chasing shadows, but at present there was little else to chase, and he went home to his flat a little oppressed by the hopelessness of his task.

The next day he had a message from the girl saying that she could not come out that afternoon, and the day was a blank, the more so because that afternoon he received a reply to his cable. The reply destroyed any romantic dreams he might have had as to Eunice Weldon’s association with the Danton millions. The message was explicit. Eunice May Weldon had been born at Rondebosch; on the l2th June, 1899; her parents were Henry William Weldon, musician, and Margaret May Weldon. She had been christened at the Wesleyan Chapel at Rondebosch, and both her parents were dead.

The final two lines of the cable puzzled him:

“Similar inquiries made about parentage Eunice Weldon six months ago by Selenger & Co., Brade Street Buildings.”

“Selenger & Co.,” said Jim thoughtfully. Here was a new mystery. Who else was making inquiries about the girl? He opened a Telephone Directory and looked up the name. There were several Selengers, but none of Brade Street Buildings. He put on his hat, and hailing a taxi, drove to Brade Street, which was near the Bank, and with some difficulty found Brade Street Buildings. It was a moderately large block of offices, and on the indicator at the door he discovered Selenger & Co. occupied No. 6 room on the ground floor.

The office was locked and apparently unoccupied. He sought the hall-keeper.

“No, sir,” said that man, shaking his head. “Selengers’ aren’t open. As a matter of fact, nobody’s ever there except at night.”

“At night,” said Jim, “that’s an extraordinary time to do business.”

The hall-keeper looked at him unfavourably.

“I suppose it is the way they do their business, sir,” he said pointedly.

It was some time before Jim could appease the ruffled guardian, and then he learnt that Selengers were evidently privileged tenants. A complaint from Selengers had brought the dismissal of his predecessor, and the curiosity of a housekeeper as to what Selengers did so late at night had resulted in that lady being summarily discharged.

“I think they deal with foreign stock,” said the porter. “A lot of cables come here, but I’ve never seen the gentleman who runs the office. He comes in by the side door.”

Apparently there was another entrance to Selengers’ office, an entrance reached by a small courtyard opening from a side passage. Selengers were the only tenants who had this double means of egress and exit, and also, it seemed, they were the only tenants of the building who were allowed to work all night.

“Even the stockbrokers on the second floor have to shut down at eight o’clock,” explained the porter, “and that’s pretty hard on them, because when the market is booming, there’s work that would keep them going until twelve o’clock. But at eight o’clock, it is ‘out you go’ with the company that owns this building. The rents aren’t high and there are very few offices to be had in the city nowadays. They have always been very strict, even in Mr. Danton’s time.”

“Mr. Danton’s time,” said Jim quickly. “Did he own this building? Do you mean Danton the shipowner millionaire?”

The man nodded.

“Yes, sir,” he said, rather pleased with himself that he had created a sensation. “He sold it, or got rid of it in some way years ago. I happen to know, because I used to be an office-boy in these very buildings, and I remember Mr. Danton—he had an office on the first floor, and a wonderful office it was, too.”

“Who occupies it now?”

“A foreign gentleman named Levenski. He’s a fellow who’s never here, either.”

Jim thought the information so valuable that he went to the length of calling up Mr. Salter at his home. But Mr. Salter knew nothing whatever about the Brade Street Buildings, except that it had been a private speculation of Danton’s. It had come into his hands as the result of the liquidation of the original company, and he had disposed of the property without consultation with Salter & Salter.

It was another blank wall.

CHAPTER NINE

“I SHALL not be in the office to-day, sir. I have several appointments which may keep me occupied,” said Jim Steele, and Mr. Salter sniffed.

“Business, Steele?” he asked politely.

“Not all of them, sir,” said Jim. He had a shrewd idea that Mr. Salter guessed what that business was.

“Very good,” said Salter, putting on his glasses and addressing himself to the work on his desk.

“There is one thing I wanted to ask, and that is partly why I came, because I could have explained my absence by telephone.”

Mr. Salter put down his pen patiently.

“I cannot understand why this fellow Groat has so many Spanish friends,” said Jim. “For example, there is a girl he sees a great deal, the Comtessa Manzana; you have heard of her, sir?”

“I see her name in the papers occasionally,” said Mr. Salter.

“And there are several Spaniards he knows. One in particular named Villa. Groat speaks Spanish fluently, too.”

“That is curious,” said Mr. Salter, leaning back in his chair. “His grandfather had a very large number of Spanish friends. I think that somewhere in the background there may have been some Spanish family connection. Old man Danton, that is, Jonathan Danton’s father, made most of his money in Spain and in Central America, and was always entertaining a houseful of grandees. They were a strange family, the Dantons. They lived in little water-tight compartments, and I believe on the day of his death Jonathan Danton hadn’t spoken more than a dozen words to his sister for twenty years. They weren’t bad friends, if you understand. It was just the way of the Dantons. There are other families whom I know who do exactly the same thing. A reticent family, with a keen sense of honour.”

“Didn’t Grandfather Danton leave Mrs. Groat any money? She was one of his two children, wasn’t she?”

Septimus Salter nodded.

“He never left her a penny,” he said. “She practically lived on the charity of her brother. I never understood why, but the old man took a sudden dislike to her. Jonathan was as much in the dark as I am. He used to discuss it with me and wondered what his sister had done to incur the old man’s enmity. His father never told him—would never even discuss the sister with him. It was partly due to the old man’s niggardly treatment of Mrs. Groat that Jonathan Danton made his will as he did.

“Probably her marriage with Groat was one of the causes of the old man’s anger. Groat was nothing, a shipping clerk in Danton’s Liverpool office. A man ill at ease in good society, without an ‘h’ to his name, and desperately scared of his wife. The only person who was ever nice to him was poor Lady Mary. His wife hated him for some reason or other. Curiously enough when he died, too, he left all his money to a distant cousin—and he left about Ł5,000. Where he got it from heaven knows. And now be off, Steele. The moment you come into this office,” said Mr. Salter in despair, “you start me on a string of reminiscences that are deplorably out of keeping with a lawyer’s office.”

Jim’s first call that morning was at the Home Office. He was anxious to clear up the mystery of Madge Benson. Neither Scotland Yard nor the Prisons Commissioners were willing to supply an unofficial investigator with the information he had sought, and in desperation he had applied to the Secretary of State’s Department. Fortunately he had a “friend at court” in that building, a middle-aged barrister he had met in France, and his inquiry, backed by proof that he was not merely satisfying his personal curiosity, had brought him a note asking him to call.

Mr. Fenningleigh received him in his room with a warmth which showed that he had not forgotten the fact that on one occasion Jim had saved him from what might have been a serious injury, if not death, for Jim had dragged him to cover one night when the British headquarters were receiving the unwelcome attentions of ten German bombers.

“Sit down, Steele. I can’t tell you much,” said the official, picking up a slip of paper from his blotting-pad, “and I’m not sure that I ought to tell you anything! But this is the information which ‘prisons’ have supplied.”

Jim took the slip from the barrister’s hand and read the three lines.

“‘Madge Benson, age 26. Domestic Servant. One month with H.L. for theft. Sentenced at Marylebone Police Court. June 5th, 1898. Committed to Holloway. Released July 2nd, 1898.’”

“Theft?” said Jim thoughtfully. “I suppose there is no way of learning the nature of the theft?”

Mr. Fenningleigh shook his head.

“I should advise you to interview the gaoler at Marylebone. These fellows have extraordinary memories for faces, and besides, there is certain to be a record of the conviction at the court. You had better ask Salter to apply; they will give permission to a lawyer.”

But this was the very thing Jim did not want to do.

CHAPTER TEN

EUNICE WELDON was rapidly settling down in her new surroundings. The illness of her employer, so far from depriving her of occupation, gave her more work than she had ever expected. It was true, as Digby Groat had said, that there were plenty of small jobs to fill up her time. At his suggestion she went over the little account books in which Mrs. Groat kept the record of her household expenses, and was astounded to find how parsimonious the old lady had been.

One afternoon when she was tidying the old bureau, she stopped in her work to admire the solid workmanship which the old furniture builders put into their handicraft.

The bureau was one of those old-fashioned affairs, which are half desk and half bookcase, the writing-case being enclosed by glass doors covered on the inside with green silk curtains.

It was the thickness of the two side-pieces enclosing the actual desk, which, unlike the writing-flap of the ordinary secretaire, was immovable, that arrested her attention. She was rubbing her hand admiringly along the polished mahogany surface when she felt a strip of wood give way under the pressure of her fingertips. To her surprise a little flap about an inch wide and about six inches long had fallen down and hung on its in visible hinges, leaving a black cavity. A secret drawer in a secretaire is not an extraordinary discovery, but she wondered whether she ought to explore the recess which her accidental touch had revealed. She put in her fingers and drew out a folded paper. There was nothing else in the drawer, if drawer it could be called.

Ought she to read it, she wondered? If it had been so carefully put away, Mrs. Groat would not wish it to be seen by a third person. Nevertheless, it was her duty to discover what the document was, and she opened it.

To the top a piece of paper was attached on which a few words wire written in Mrs. Groat’s hand:

“This is the will referred to in the instructions contained in the sealed envelope which Mr. Salter has in his possession.”

The word “Salter” had been struck out and the name of the firm of solicitors, which had supplanted the old man had been substituted.

The will was executed on one of those forms, which can be purchased at any law stationer’s. But apart from the preamble it was short:

“I give to my son, Digby Francis Groat, the sum of 20,000 pounds and my house and furniture at 409, Grosvenor Square. The remainder of my estate I give to Ramonez—Marquis of Estremeda, of Calle Receletos, Madrid.”

It was witnessed by two names, unknown to the girl, and as they had described themselves as domestic servants it was probable that they had long since left her employment, for Mrs. Groat did not keep a servant very long.

What should she do with it? She determined to ask Digby.

Later, when going through the drawers on her desk she discovered a small miniature and was startled by the dark beauty of the subject. It was a head and shoulders of a girl wearing her hair in a way, which was fashionable in the late seventies. The face was bold, but beautiful, the dark eyes seemed to glow with life. The face of a girl who had her way, thought Eunice, as she noted the firm round chin. She wondered who it was and showed it to Digby Groat at lunch.

“Oh, that is a picture of my mother,” he said carelessly.

“Your mother,” said Eunice in astonishment, and he chuckled.

“You’d never think she was never like that; but she was, I believe, a very beautiful girl,”—his face darkened—“just a little too beautiful,” he said, without explaining what he meant.

Suddenly, he snatched the miniature from her and looked on the back.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized, and a sudden pallor had come to his face. “Mother sometimes writes things on the back of pictures, and I was rather—” he was going to say “scared “—“and I was rather embarrassed.”

He was almost incoherent, an unusual circumstance, for Digby Groat was the most self-possessed of men.

He changed the subject by introducing an inquiry which he had meant to make some time before.

“Miss Weldon, can you explain that scar on your wrist?” he asked.

She shook her head laughingly.

“I’m almost sorry I showed it to you,” she said. “It is ugly, isn’t it?”

“Do you know how it happened?”

“I don’t know,” she said, “mother never told me. It looks rather like a burn.”

He examined the little red place attentively.

“Of course,” she went on, “it is absurd to think that the sight of my birthmark was the cause of your mother’s stroke.”

“I suppose it is,” he nodded, “but it was a remarkable coincidence.”

He had endeavoured to find from the old woman the reason of her sudden collapse, but without success. For three days she had lain in her bed speechless and motionless and apparently had neither heard nor seen him when he had made his brief visits to the sick room.

She was recovering now, however, and he intended, at the first opportunity, demanding a full explanation.

“Did you find anything else?” he asked suspiciously. He was never quite sure what new folly his mother might commit. Her passion for other people’s property might have come to light.

Should she tell him? He saw the doubt and trouble in her face and repeated his question.

“I found your mother’s will,” she said.

He had finished his lunch, had pushed back his chair and was smoking peacefully. The cigar dropped from his hand and she saw his face go black.

“Her will?” he said. “Are you sure? Her will is at the lawyer’s. It was made two years ago.”

“This will was made a few months ago,” said Eunice, troubled. “I do hope I haven’t betrayed any secret of hers.”

“Let me see this precious document,” said Digby, starting up.

His voice was brusque, almost to rudeness. She wondered what had brought about this sudden change. They walked back to the old woman’s shabby room and the girl produced a document from the drawer.

He read it through carefully.

“The old fool,” he muttered. “The cussed drivelling old fool! Have you read this?” he asked sharply.

“I read a little of it,” admitted the girl, shocked by the man’s brutal reference to his mother.

He examined the paper again and all the time he was muttering something under his breath.

“Where did you find this?” he asked harshly.

“I found it by accident,” explained Eunice. “There is a little drawer here “—she pointed to the seemingly solid side of the bureau in which gaped an oblong cavity.

“I see,” said Digby Groat slowly as he folded the paper. “Now, Miss Weldon, perhaps you will tell me how much of this document you have read? “—he tapped the will on his palm.

She did not know exactly what to say. She was Mrs. Groat’s servant and she felt it was disloyal even to discuss her private affairs with Digby.

“I read beyond your legacy,” she admitted, “I did not read it carefully.”

“And you saw that my mother had left me Ł20,000?” said Digby Groat, “and the remainder to—somebody else.”

She nodded.

“Do you know who that somebody else was?”

“Yes,” she said. “To the Marquis of Estremeda.”

His face had changed from sallow to red, from red to a dirty grey, and his voice as he spoke shook with the rage he could not altogether suppress.

“Do you know how much money my mother will be worth?” he asked.

“No, Mr. Groat,” said the girl quietly, “and I don’t think you ought to tell me. It is none of my business.”

“She will be worth a million and a quarter,” he said between his teeth, “and she’s left me Ł20,000 and this damned house!”

He swung round and was making for the door, and the girl, who guessed his intentions, went after him and caught his arm.

“Mr. Groat,” she said seriously, “you must not go to your mother. You really must not!”

Her intervention sobered him and he walked slowly back to the fireplace, took a match from his pocket, lit it, and before the astonished eyes of the girl applied it to one corner of the document. He watched it until it was black ash and then put his foot upon the debris.

“So much for that!” he said, and turning caught the amazed look in the face of Eunice. “You think I’ve behaved disgracefully, I suppose,” he smiled, his old debonair self. “The truth is, I am saving my mother’s memory from the imputation of madness. There is no Marquis of Estremeda, as far as I know. It is one of the illusions which my mother has, that a Spanish nobleman once befriended her. That is the dark secret of our family, Miss Weldon,” he laughed, but she knew that he was lying.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The door of Digby Groat’s study was ajar, and he caught a glimpse of Eunice as she came in and made her way up to her room. She had occupied a considerable amount of his thoughts that afternoon, and he had cursed himself that he had been betrayed into revealing the ugly side of his nature before one whom he wished to impress. But there was another matter troubling him. In his folly he had destroyed a legal document in the presence of a witness and had put himself into her power. Suppose his mother died, he thought, and the question of a will arose? Suppose Estremeda got hold of her, her testimony in the courts of law might destroy the value of his mother’s earlier will and bring him into the dock at the Old Bailey.

It was an axiom of his that great criminals are destroyed by small causes. The spendthrift who dissipates hundreds of thousands of pounds, finds himself made bankrupt by a paltry hundred pounds, and the clever organizer of the Thirteen who had covered his traces so perfectly that the shrewdest police in the world had not been able to associate him with their many crimes, might easily be brought to book through a piece of stupidity which was dictated by rage and offended vanity. He was now more than ever determined that Eunice Weldon should come within his influence, so that her power for mischief should be broken before she knew how crushingly it might be employed.

It was not an unpleasant task he set himself, for Eunice exercised a growing fascination over him. Her beauty and her singular intelligence were sufficient lures, but to a man of his temperament the knowledge that she added to these gifts a purity of mind and soul gave her an added value. That she was in the habit of meeting the man he hated, he knew. His faithful Jackson had trailed the girl twice, and on each occasion had returned with the same report. Eunice Weldon was meeting Steele in the park. And the possibility that Jim loved her was the greatest incentive of all to his vile plan.

He could strike at Jim through the girl, could befoul the soul that Jim Steele loved best in the world. That would be a noble revenge, he thought, as he sat, pen in hand, and heard her light footsteps pass up the stairs. But he must be patient and the game must be played cautiously. He must gain her confidence. That was essential, and the best way of securing this end, was to make no reference to these meetings, to give her the fullest opportunity for seeing Jim Steele and to avoid studiously any suggestion that he himself had an interest in her.

He had not sought an interview with his mother. She had been sleeping all the afternoon, the nurse had told him, and he felt that he could be patient here also. At night, when he saw the girl at dinner, he made a reference to the scene she had witnessed in the old woman’s sitting-room.

“You’ll think I’m an awful cad, Miss Weldon,” he said frankly, “but mother has a trick of making me more angry than any other person I have met. You look upon me as a very unfilial son?” he smiled.

“We do things we’re ashamed of sometimes when we are angry,” said Eunice, willing to find an excuse for the outburst. She would have gladly avoided the topic altogether, for her conscience was pricking her and she felt guilty when she remembered that she had spoken to Jim on the subject. Digby Groat was to make her a little more uncomfortable by his next remark.

“It is unnecessary for me to tell you, Miss Weldon,” he said, with his smile, “that all which happens within these four walls is confidential. I need not express any fear that you will ever speak to an outsider about our affairs.”

He had only to look at the crimson face, at the downcast eyes and the girl’s fingers playing nervously with the silver, to realize that she had already spoken of the will, and again he cursed himself for his untimely exhibition of temper.

He passed on, to the girl’s great relief, to another subject. He was having certain alterations made in his laboratory and was enthusiastic about a new electrical appliance which he had installed.

“Would you like to see my little den, Miss Weldon?” he asked.

“I should very much,” said the girl.

She was, she knew, being despicably insincere. She did not want to see the laboratory. To her, since Jim had described the poor little dog who had been stretched upon the table, it was a place of horror. But she was willing to agree to anything that would take Digby Groat from the topic of the will, and the thought of her own breach of faith.

There was nothing very dreadful in the laboratory, she discovered. It was so white and clean and neat that her womanly instinct for orderliness could admire the well-arranged little room, with its shelves packed with bottles, its delicate glass retorts and its strange and mysterious instruments.

He did not open the locked doors that hid one cupboard which stood at one end of the laboratory, so she knew nothing of the grisly relics of his investigations. She was now glad she had seen the place, but was nevertheless as pleased to return to the drawing-room.

Digby went out at nine o’clock and she was left alone to read and to amuse herself as best she could. She called at Mrs. Groat’s room on her way up and learnt from the nurse that the old lady was rapidly recovering.

“She will be quite normal tomorrow or the next day,” said the nurse.

Here was another relief. Mrs. Groat’s illness had depressed the girl. It was so terrible to see one who had been as beautiful as the miniature proved her to have been, struck down and rendered a helpless mass, incapable of thought or movement.

Her room, which had impressed her by its beauty the day she had arrived, had now been enhanced by the deft touches which only a woman’s fingers can give. She had read some of the books which Digby Groat had selected for her entertainment, and some she had dipped into only to reject.

She spent the evening with The Virginian, and here Digby had introduced her to one of the most delightful creations of fiction. The Virginian was rather like Jim, she thought—but then all the heroes of all the books she read were rather like Jim.

Searching in her bag for her handkerchief her fingers closed on the little card which had been left on her table the night of her introduction to the Grosvenor Square household. She took it out and read it for the twentieth time, puzzling over the identity of the sender and the object he had in view.

What was the meaning of that little card, she wondered? And what was the story which lay behind it?

She put down her book and, rising, switched on the lamp over her writing-table, examining the card curiously. She had not altered her first impression that the hand had been made by a rubber stamp. It was really a beautiful little reproduction of an open palm and every line was distinct. Who was her mysterious friend—or was he a friend? She shook her head. It could not be Jim, and yet—it worried her even to think of Jim in this connection. Whoever it was, she thought with a little smile, they had been wrong. She had not left the house and nothing had happened to her, and she felt a sense of pride and comfort in the thought that the mysterious messenger could know nothing of Jim, her guardian angel.

She heard a step in the passage and somebody knocked at her door. It was Digby Groat. He had evidently just come in.

“I saw your light,” he said, “so I thought I would give you something I have brought back from the Ambassadors’ Club.”

The “something” was a big square box tied with lavender ribbon.

“For me?” she said in surprise.

“They were distributing them to the guests,” he said, “and I thought you might have a taste for sweeties. They are the best chocolates in England.”

She laughed and thanked him. He made no further attempt to continue the conversation, but, with a nod, went to his room. She heard the door open and close, and five minutes later it opened again and his soft footsteps faded away.

He was going to his laboratory, she thought, and wondered, with a shiver, what was the experiment he was attempting that night.

She had placed the box on the table and had forgotten about it until she was preparing for bed, then she untied the pretty ribbons and displayed the contents.

“They’re delicious,” she murmured, and took one up in her fingers.

Thump!

She turned quickly and dropped the chocolate from her fingers.

Something had hit against her window, it sounded like a fist. She ran to the silken curtains which covered the glass doors from view and hesitated nervously for a moment; then with a little catch of breath she thought that possibly some boys had thrown a ball.

She pulled back the curtains violently and for a moment saw nothing. The balcony was clear and she unfastened the latch and stepped out. There was nobody in sight. She looked on the floor of the balcony for the object which had been thrown but could find nothing.

She went slowly back to her room and was closing the door when she saw and gasped. For on one of the panes was the life-size print of the Blue Hand!

Again that mysterious warning!

CHAPTER TWELVE

EUNICE gazed at the hand spell-bound, but she was now more curious than alarmed. Opening the window again she felt gingerly at the impression. It was wet, and her fingertip was stained a deep greasy blue, which wiped off readily on her handkerchief. Again she stepped out on to the balcony, and following it along, came to the door leading to the head of the stairs. She tried it. It was locked. Leaning over the parapet she surveyed the square. She saw a man and a woman walking along and talking together and the sound of their laughter came up to her. At the corner of the square she saw passing under a street-lamp a helmeted policeman who must, she calculated, have been actually in front of the house when the imprint was made.

She was about to withdraw to her room when, looking down over the portico, she saw the figure of a woman descending the steps of the house. Who was she? Eunice knew all the servants by now and was certain this woman was a stranger. She might, of course, be one of Digby Groat’s friends or a friend of the nurse, but her subsequent movements were so unusual that Eunice was sure that this was the mysterious stranger who had left her mark on the window. So it was a woman, after all, thought Eunice in amazement, as she watched her cross the square to where a big limousine was waiting.

Without giving any instructions to the chauffeur, the woman in black stepped into the car, which immediately moved off.

Eunice came back to the room and sat down in a chair to try to straighten her tangled mind. That hand was intended as a warning, she was sure of that. And now it was clear which way the visitor had come. She must have entered the house by the front door and have got on to the balcony through the door on the landing, locking it after her when she made her escape.

Looking in the glass, Eunice saw that her face was pale, but inwardly she felt more thrilled than frightened, and she had also a sense of protection, for instinctively she knew that the woman was a friend. Should she go downstairs and tell Digby Groat? She shook her head at the thought. No, she would reserve this little mystery for Jim to unravel. With a duster, which she kept in one of the cupboards, she wiped the blue impression from the window and then sat down on the edge of her bed to puzzle out the intricate and baffling problem.

Why had the woman chosen this method of warning her? Why not employ the mundane method of sending her a letter? Twice she had taken a risk to impress Eunice with the sense of danger, when the same warning might have been conveyed to her through the agency of the postman.

Eunice frowned at this thought, but then she began to realize that, had an anonymous letter arrived, she would have torn it up and thrown it into her waste-paper basket. These midnight visitations were intended to impress upon the girl the urgency of the visitor’s fear for her.

It was not by any means certain that the woman who had left the house was the mysterious visitor. Eunice had never troubled to inquire into Digby Groat’s character, nor did she know any of his friends. The lady in black might well have been an acquaintance of his, and to tell Digby of the warning and all that she had seen could easily create a very embarrassing situation for all concerned.

She went to bed, but it was a long time before sleep came to her. She dozed and woke and dozed again and at last decided to get up. She pulled aside the curtains to let in the morning light. The early traffic was rumbling through the street, and the clear fragrance of the unsullied air came coldly as she stood and shivered by the open window. She was hungry, as hungry as a healthy girl can be in that keen atmosphere, and she bethought herself of the box of chocolates which Digby had brought to her. She had taken one from its paper wrapping and it was between her teeth when she remembered with a start that the warning had come at the very moment she was about to eat a chocolate! She put it down again thoughtfully, and went back to bed to pass the time which must elapse before the servants were about and any kind of food procurable.

Jim Steele was about to leave his little flat in Featherdale Mansions that morning when he was met at the door by a district messenger carrying a large parcel and a bulky letter. He at once recognized the handwriting of Eunice and carried the parcel into his study. The letter was written hurriedly and was full of apologies. As briefly as possible Eunice had related the events of the night.

“I cannot imagine that the chocolates had anything to do with it, but somehow you are communicating your prejudice against Digby Groat to me. I have no reason whatever to suspect him of any bad design toward me, and in sending these I am merely doing as you told me, to communicate everything unusual. Aren’t I an obedient girl! And, please, Jim, will you take me out to dinner tonight. It is ‘my night out,’ and I’d love to have a leisurely meal with you, and I’m simply dying to talk about the Blue Hand! Isn’t it gorgeously mysterious! What I shall try to catch up some of my arrears of sleep this afternoon so that I shall be fresh and brilliant.” (She had written “and beautiful” in mockery but had scratched it out.)

Jim Steele whistled. Hitherto he had regarded the Blue Hand as a convenient and accidental method which the unknown had chosen for his or her signature. Now, however, it obtained a new significance. The Blue Hand had been chosen deliberately and for some reason which must be known to one of the parties concerned. To Digby Groat? Jim shook his head. Somehow he knew for certain that the Blue Hand would be as much of a mystery to Digby Groat as it was to the girl and himself. He had no particular reason for thinking this. It was one of those immediate instincts which carry their own conviction. But who else was concerned? He determined to ask his partner that morning if the Blue Hand suggested anything to him.

In the meantime there were the chocolates. He examined the box carefully. The sweetmeats were beautifully arranged and the box bore the label of a well-known West End confectioner. He took out three or four of the chocolates, placed them carefully in an envelope, and put the envelope in his pocket. Then he set forth for the city. As he closed his own door his eye went to the door on the opposite side of the landing, where dwelt Mrs. Fane and the mysterious Madge Benson. The door was ajar and he thought he heard the woman’s voice on the ground floor below talking to the porter of the flats.

His foot was extended to descend the first of the stairs when from the flat came a sharp scream and a voice: “Madge, Madge, help!”

Without a second’s hesitation he pushed open the door and ran down the passage. There were closed doors on either side, but the last on the right was open and a thin cloud of smoke was pouring forth. He rushed in, just as the woman, who was lying on the bed, was rising on her elbow as though she were about to get up, and tearing down the blazing curtains at one of the windows, stamped out the fire. It was all over in a few seconds and he had extinguished the last spark of fire from the blackened lace before he looked round at the occupant of the bed, who was staring at him wide-eyed.

She was a woman of between forty and forty-five, he judged, with a face whose delicate moulding instantly impressed him. He thought he had seen her before, but knew that he must have been mistaken. The big eyes, grey and luminous, the dark brown hair in which a streak of grey had appeared, the beautiful hands that lay on the coverlet, all of these he took in at one glance.

“I’m very greatly obliged to you, Mr. Steele,” said the lady in a voice that was little above a whisper. “That is the second accident we have had. A spark from one of the engines must have blown in through the open window.”

Just beneath her was the cutting of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, and Jim, who had watched the heavily laden trains toiling slowly and painfully up the steep incline, had often wondered if there was any danger from the showers of sparks which the engines so frequently threw up.

“I must apologize for my rather rough intrusion,” he said with his sweet smile. “I heard your screams. You are Mrs. Fane, aren’t you?”

She nodded, and there was admiration in the eyes that surveyed his well-knit figure.

“I won’t start a conversation with you under these embarrassing circumstances,” said Jim with a laugh, “but I’d like to say how sorry I am that you are so ill, Mrs. Fane. Could I send you some more books?”

“Thank you,” she whispered. “You have done almost enough.”

He heard the door close as the servant, unconscious that anything was wrong, came in, and heard her startled exclamation as she smelt the smoke. Coming out into the passage he met Madge Benson’s astonished face.

A few words explained his presence and the woman hustled him to the door a little unceremoniously.

“Mrs. Fane is not allowed to see visitors, sir,” she said. “She gets so excited.”

“What is the matter with her?” asked Jim, rather amused at the unmistakable ejection.

“Paralysis in both legs,” said Madge Benson, and Jim uttered an exclamation of pity.

“Don’t think I’m not grateful to you, Mr. Steele,” said the woman earnestly; “when I saw that smoke coming out into the passage my heart nearly stopped beating. That is the second accident we have had.”

She was so anxious for him to be off that he made no attempt to continue talking.

So that was Mrs. Fane, thought Jim, as he strode along to his office. A singularly beautiful woman. The pity of it! She was still young and in the bloom of health save for this terrible affliction.

Jim had a big heart for suffering humanity, and especially for women and children on whom the burden of sickness fell. He was halfway to the office when he remembered that Mrs. Fane had recognized him and called him by name! How could she have known him—she who had never left her sick-room?

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“Mr. Groat will not be down to breakfast. He was working very late, miss.”

Eunice nodded. She preferred the conversation of Digby Groat to the veiled familiarity of his shrewd-faced servant. It would be difficult for her to define in what way Jackson offended her. Outwardly he was respect itself, and she could not recall any term or word he had employed to which she could reasonably take offence. It was the assurance of the man, his proprietorial attitude, which irritated her. He reminded her of a boarding-house at which she had once stayed, where the proprietor acted as butler and endeavoured, without success, to combine the deference of the servant with the authority of the master.

“You were out very early this morning, miss,” said Jackson with his sly smile as he changed her plates.

“Is there any objection to my going out before breakfast?” asked Eunice, her anger rising.

“None at all, miss,” said the man blandly. “I hope I haven’t offended you, only I happened to see you coming back.”

She had been out to send the parcel and the letter to Jim, the nearest district messenger office being less than a quarter of a mile from Grosvenor Square. She opened her lips to speak and closed them again tightly. There was no reason in the world why she should excuse herself to the servant.

Jackson was not ready to take a rebuff, and besides, he had something important to communicate.

“You weren’t disturbed last night, were you, miss?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” demanded Eunice, looking with a start.

His keen eye was on her and without any reason she felt guilty.

“Somebody was having a joke here last night, miss,” he said, “and the governor is as wild as… well, he’s mad!”

She put down her knife and fork and sat back in her chair.

“I don’t quite understand you, Jackson,” she said coldly. “What is the joke that somebody was having, and why do you ask me if I was disturbed? Did anything happen in the night?”

The man nodded.

“Somebody was in the house,” he said, “and it is a wonder that Mr. Groat didn’t hear it, because he was working in his laboratory. I thought perhaps you might have heard him searching the house afterwards.”

She shook her head. Had the Blue Hand been detected? she wondered.

“How do you know that a stranger was in the house?” she asked.

“Because he left his mark,” said the man grimly. “You know that white door leading to the laboratory, miss?”

She nodded.

“Well, when Mr. Groat came out about half-past two this morning he was going to turn out the hall lights when he saw a smudge of paint on the door. He went back and found that it was the mark of a Blue Hand. I’ve been trying to get it off all the morning, but it is greasy and can’t be cleaned.”

“The mark of a Blue Hand?” she repeated slowly and felt herself change colour. “What does that mean?”

“I’m blessed if I know,” said Jackson, shaking his head. “The governor doesn’t know either. But there it was as plain as a pike-staff. I thought it was a servant who did it. There is one under notice and she might have been up to her tricks, but it couldn’t have been her. Besides, the servants’ sleeping-rooms are at the back of the house, and the door between the front and the back is kept locked.”

So the mysterious visitor had not been satisfied with warning her. She had warned Digby Groat as well!

Eunice had nearly finished breakfast when Digby made his appearance. He was looking tired and haggard, she thought. He never looked his best in the early hours, but this morning he was more unprepossessing than usual. He shot a swift suspicious glance at the girl as he took his place at the table.

“You have finished, I’m afraid, Miss Weldon,” he said briefly. “Has Jackson told you what happened in the night?”

“Yes,” said Eunice quietly. “Have you any idea what it means?”

He shook his head.

“It means trouble to the person who did it, if I catch him,” he said; then, changing the conversation, he asked how his mother was that morning.

Eunice invariably called at Mrs. Groat’s room on her way down, and she was able to tell him that his mother was mending rapidly and had passed a very good night.

“She can’t get well too soon,” he said. “How did you sleep, Miss Weldon?”

“Very well,” she prevaricated.

“Have you tried my chocolates?” he smiled.

She nodded.

“They are beautiful.”

“Don’t eat too many at once, they are rather rich,” he said, and made no further reference either to that matter or to the midnight visitor.

Later in the morning, when she was going about her work, Eunice saw workmen engaged on cleaning the canvas door. Apparently the blue stain could not be eradicated, and after a consultation with Digby the canvas was being painted a dull blue colour.

She knew that Digby was perturbed more than ordinarily. When she had met him, as she had occasionally that morning, he had worn a furtive, hunted look, and once, when she had gone into his study to bring to his notice an account which she had unearthed, he was muttering to himself.

That afternoon there was a reception at Lord Waltham’s house in Park Lane, in honour of a colonial premier who was visiting England. Digby Groat found it convenient to cultivate the acquaintance of the aesthetic Lord Waltham, who was one of the great financial five of the City of London. Digby had gone cleverly to work to form a small syndicate for the immediate purchase of the Danton estate. The time had not yet come when he could dispose of this property, but it was fast approaching.

There were many women in that brilliant assembly who would have been glad to know a man reputedly clever, and certainly the heir to great wealth; but in an inverted sense Digby was a fastidious man. Society which met him and discussed him over their dinner-tables were puzzled by his avoidance of woman’s society. He could have made a brilliant marriage, had he so desired, but apparently the girls of his own set had no attraction for him. There were intimates, men about town, who were less guarded in their language when they spoke across the table after the women had gone, and these told stories of him which did not redound to his credit. Digby in his youth had had many affairs—vulgar, sordid affairs which had left each victim with an aching heart and no redress.

He had only come to “look in,” he explained. There was heavy work awaiting him at home, and he hinted at the new experiment he was making which would take up the greater part of the evening.

“How is your mother, Groat?” asked Lord Waltham.

“Thank you, sir, I think she is better,” replied Digby. He wanted to keep off the subject of his mother.

“I can’t understand the extraordinary change that has come over her in late years,” said Lord Waltham with a little frown. “She used to be so bright and cheerful, one of the wittiest women I have ever met. And then, of a sudden, all her spirits seemed to go and if you don’t mind my saying so, she seemed to get old.”

“I noticed that,” said Digby with an air of profound concern, “but women of her age frequently go all to pieces in a week.”

“I suppose there’s something in that. I always forget you’re a doctor,” smiled Lord Waltham.

Digby took his leave and he, too, was chuckling softly to himself as he went down the steps to his waiting car. He wondered what Lord Waltham would say if he had explained the secret of his mother’s banished brightness. It was only by accident that he himself had made the discovery. She was a drug-taker, as assiduous a “dope” as he had ever met in his professional career.

When he discovered this he had set himself to break down the habit. Not because he loved her, but because he was a scientist addicted to experiments. He had found the source of her supply and gradually had extracted a portion of the narcotic from every pellet until the drug had ceased to have its effect.

The result from the old woman’s point of view was deplorable. She suddenly seemed to wither, and Digby, whom she had ruled until then with a rod of iron, had to his surprise found himself the master. It was a lesson of which he was not slow to take advantage, every day and night she was watched and the drug was kept from her. With it she was a slave to her habit; without it she was a slave to Digby. He preferred the latter form of bondage.

Mr. Septimus Salter had not arrived when Jim had reached the office that morning, and he waited, for he had a great deal to say to the old man, whom he had not seen for the better part of the week.

When he did come, a little gouty and therefore more than a little petulant, he was inclined to pooh-pooh the suggestion that there was anything in the sign of the Blue Hand.

“Whoever the person is, he or she must have had the stamp by them—you say it looks like a rubber stamp—and used it fortuitously. No, I can’t remember any Blue Hand in the business. If I were you, I should not attach too much importance to this.”

Although Jim did not share his employer’s opinion he very wisely did not disagree.

“Now, what is this you wore telling me about a will? You say Mrs. Groat has made a new will, subsequent to the one she executed in this office?”

Jim assented.

“And left all her money away from the boy, eh?” said old Mr. Salter thoughtfully. “Curiously enough, I always had an idea that there was no love lost between that pair. To whom do you say the money was left?”

“To the Marquis of Estremeda.”

“I know the name,” nodded Mr. Salter. “He is a very rich grandee of Spain and was for some time an attache at the Spanish Embassy. He may or may not have been a friend of the Dantons, I cannot recall. There is certainly no reason why she should leave her money to one who, unless my memory is at fault, owns half a province and has three or four great houses in Spain. Now, here you are up against a real mystery. Now, what is your news?” he asked.

Jim had a little more to tell him.

“I am taking the chocolates to an analyst—a friend of mine,” he said, and Mr. Salter smiled.

“You don’t expect to discover that they are poisoned, do you?” he asked dryly. “You are not living in the days of Caesar Borgia, and with all his poisonous qualities I have never suspected Digby Groat of being a murderer.”

“Nevertheless,” said Jim, “I am leaving nothing to chance. My own theory is that there is something wrong with those innocent-looking sweetmeats, and the mysterious Blue Hand knew what it was and came to warn the girl.”

“Rubbish,” growled the old lawyer. “Get along with you. I have wasted too much time on this infernal case.”

Jim’s first call was at a laboratory in Wigmore Street, and he explained to his friend just enough to excite his curiosity for further details, which, however, Jim was not prepared to give.

“What do you expect to find?” said the chemist, weighing two chocolates in his palm.

“I don’t know exactly what I expect,” said Jim. “But I shall be very much surprised if you do not discover something that should not be there.”

The scientist dropped the chocolates in a big test-tube, poured in a liquid from two bottles and began heating the tube over a Bunsen burner.

“Call this afternoon at three o’clock and I will give you all the grisly details,” he said.

It was three o’clock when Jim returned, not expecting, it must be confessed, any startling results from the analysis. He was shown into the chemist’s office, and there on the desk were three test-tubes, standing in a little wooden holder.

“Sit down, Steele,” said Mendhlesohn. He was, as his name implied, a member of a great Jewish fraternity which has furnished so many brilliant geniuses to the world. “I can’t quite make out this analysis,” he said. “But, as you thought, there are certainly things in the chocolates which should not be there.”

“Poison?” said Jim, aghast.

Mendhlesohn shook his head.

“Technically, yes,” he admitted. “There is poison in almost everything, but I doubt whether the eating of a thousand of these would produce death. I found traces of bromide of potassium and traces of hyacin, and another drug which is distilled from cannabis indica.”

“That is hashish, isn’t it?”

Mendhlesohn nodded.

“When it is smoked it is called hashish; when it is distilled we have another name for it. These three drugs come, of course, into the category of poisons, and in combination, taken in large doses, they would produce unconsciousness and ultimately death, but there is not enough of the drug present in these sweets to bring about that alarming result.”

“What result would it produce?” asked Jim.

“That is just what is puzzling me and my friend, Dr. Jakes,” said Mendhlesohn, rubbing his unshaven chin. “Jakes thinks that, administered in small continuous doses, the effect of this drug would be to destroy the will-power, and, what for a better term I would describe in the German fashion, as the resistance-to-evil-power of the human mind. In England, as you probably know, when a nervous and highly excitable man is sentenced to death, it is the practice to place minute doses of bromide in everything he eats and drinks, in order to reduce him to such a low condition of mental resistance that even the thought of an impending doom has no effect upon him.”

Jim’s face had gone suddenly pale, as the horror of the villainous plot dawned upon him.

“What effect would this have upon a high-spirited girl, who was, let us say, being made love to by a man she disliked?”

The chemist shrugged his shoulders.

“I suppose that eventually her dislike would develop into apathy and indifference. She would not completely forgo her resistance to his attentions, but at the same time that resistance would be more readily overcome. There are only two types of mind,” he went on, “the ‘dominant’ and the ‘recessive.’ We call the ‘dominant’ that which is the more powerful, and the ‘recessive’ that which is the less powerful. In this world it is possible for a little weak man to dominate a big and vigorous man, by what you would call the sheer force of his personality. The effect of this drug would ultimately be to turn a powerful mind into a weak mind. I hope I am not being too scientific,” he smiled.

“I can follow you very well.” said Jim quietly. “Now tell me this, Mendhlesohn, would it be possible to get a conviction against the person who supplied these sweets?”

Mendhlesohn shook his head.

“As I told you, the doses are in such minute quantities that it is quite possible they may have got in by accident. I have only been able to find what we chemists call a ‘trace’ so far, but probably the doses would be increased from week to week. If in three weeks’ time you bring me chocolates or other food that has been tampered with, I shall be able to give you a very exact analysis.”

“Were all the chocolates I brought similarly treated?”

Mendhlesohn nodded.

“If they have been doped,” he went on, “the doping has been very cleverly done. There is no discoloration of the interior, and the drug must have been introduced by what we call saturation, which only a very skilful chemist or a doctor trained in chemistry would attempt.”

Jim said nothing. Digby Groat was both a skilled chemist and a doctor trained in chemistry.

On leaving the laboratory he went for his favourite walk in Hyde Park. He wanted to be alone and think this matter out. He must act with the greatest caution, he thought. To warn the girl on such slender foundation was not expedient. He must wait until, the dose had been increased, though that meant that she was to act as a bait for Digby Groat’s destruction, and he writhed at the thought. But she must not know; he was determined as to this.

That night he had arranged a pleasant little dinner, and he was looking forward eagerly to a meeting with one whose future absorbed his whole attention and thoughts. Even the search for Lady Mary Danton had receded into the background, and might have vanished altogether as a matter of interest were it not for the fact that Digby Groat and his affairs were so inextricably mixed up with the mystery. Whilst Eunice Weldon was an inmate of the Groats’ house, the Danton mystery would never be completely out of his thoughts.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

JIM had never seen the girl in evening clothes, and he was smitten dumb by her ethereal beauty. She wore a simple dress of cream charmeuse, innocent of colour, except for the touch of gold at her waist. She looked taller to Jim’s eyes, and the sweet dignity of her face was a benison which warmed and comforted his heart.

“Well,” she asked as the cab was proceeding towards Piccadilly. “Am I presentable?”

“You’re wonderful!” breathed Jim.

He sat stiffly in the cab, scarcely daring to move lest the substance of this beautiful dream be touched by his irreverent hands. Her loveliness was unearthly and he, too, could adore, though from a different standpoint, the glorious promise of her womanhood, the delicious contours of her Madonna-like face. She was to him the spirit and embodiment of all that womanhood means. She was the truth of the dreams that men dream, the divine substance of shadowy figures that haunt their thoughts and dreams.

“Phew!” he said, “you almost frighten me, Eunice.”

He heard her silvery laugh in the darkness.

“You’re very silly, Jim,” she said, slipping her arm into his.

Nevertheless, she experienced a thrill of triumph and happiness that she had impressed him so.

“I have millions of questions to ask you,” she said after they had been ushered to a corner of the big dining-room of the Ritz-Carlton. “Did you get my letter? And did you think I was mad to send you those chocolates? Of course, it was terribly unfair to Mr. Groat, but really, Jim, you’re turning me into a suspicious old lady!”

He laughed gently.

“I loved your letter,” he said simply. “And as for the chocolates—” he hesitated.

“Well?”

“I should tell him that you enjoyed them thoroughly,” he smiled.

“I have,” said the girl ruefully. “I hate telling lies, even that kind of lie.”

“And the next box you receive,” Jim went on, “you must send me three or four of its contents.”

She was alarmed now, looking at him, her red lips parted, her eyebrows crescents of inquiry.

“Was there anything wrong with them?” she asked.

He was in a dilemma. He could not tell her the result of the analysis, and at the same time he could not allow her to run any farther into needless danger. He had to invent something on the spur of the moment and his excuse was lame and unconvincing.

Listening, she recognized their halting nature, but was sensible enough not to insist upon rigid explanations, and, moreover, she wanted to discuss the hand and its startling appearance in the middle of the night.

“It sounds almost melodramatic,” said Jim, but his voice was grave, “and I find a great difficulty in reconciling the happening to the realities of life. Of one thing I’m sure,” he went on, “and it is that this strange woman, if woman it be, has a reason for her acts. The mark of the hand is deliberately designed. That it is blue has a meaning, too, a meaning which apparently is not clear to Digby Groat. And now let us talk about ourselves,” he smiled, and his hand rested for a moment over hers.

She did not attempt to withdraw her own until the waiter came in sight, and then she drew it away so gently as to suggest reluctance.

“I’m going to stay another month with the Groats,” she informed him, “and then if Mrs. Groat doesn’t find some real work for me to do I’m going back to the photographers’—if they’ll have me.”

“I know somebody who wants you more than the photographer,” he said quietly, “somebody whose heart just aches whenever you pass out of his sight.”

She felt her own heart beating thunderously, and the hand that he held under the cover of the table trembled.

“Who is that—somebody?” she asked faintly.

“Somebody who will not ask you to marry him until he can offer you an assured position,” said Jim. “Somebody who loves the very ground you walk upon so much that he must have carpets for your dear feet and a mansion to house you more comfortably than the tiny attic overlooking the London, Midland and Scottish Railway.”

She did not speak for a long time, and he thought he had offended her. The colour came and went in her face, the soft rounded bosom rose and fell more quickly than was usual, and the hand that he held closed so tightly upon his fingers that they were almost numb when she suddenly released her hold.

“Jim,” she said, still averting her eyes, “I could work very well on bare boards, and I should love to watch the London, Midland and Scottish trains—go past your attic.”

She turned her head to his and he saw that her eyes were bright with tears.

“If you’re not very careful, Jim Steele,” she said, with an attempt at raillery, “I shall propose to you!”

“May I smoke?” said Jim huskily, and when she nodded, and he lit his match, she saw the flame was quivering in his shaking hand.

She wondered what made him so quiet for the rest of the evening. She could not know that he was stunned and shaken by the great fortune that had come to him, that his heart was as numb with happiness as his fingers had been in the pressure of her hand.

When they drove back to the house that night she wanted him to take her in his arms in the darkness of the cab and crush her against his breast: she wanted to feel his kisses on her lips, her eyes. If he had asked her at that moment to run away with him, to commit the maddest folly, she would have consented joyously, for her love for the man was surging up like a bubbling stream of subterranean fire that had found its vent, overwhelming and burning all reason, all tradition.

Instead, he sat by her side, holding her hand and dreaming of the golden future which awaited him.

“Good night, Jim.” Her voice sounded cold and a little dispirited as she put her gloved hand in his at the door of 409.

“Good night,” he said in a low voice, and kissed her hand. She was nearly in tears when she went into her room and shut the door behind her. She walked to her dressing-table and looked in the glass, long and inquiringly, and then she shook her head. “I wish he wasn’t so good,” she said, “or else more of a hero!”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

JIM continued his journey to the flat, so enveloped in the rosy clouds which had descended upon him that he was unconscious of time or space, and it seemed that he had only stepped into the cab when it jerked to a halt before the portals of Featherdale Mansions. He might have continued in his dream without interruption had not the cabman, with some asperity, called him back to remind him that he had not paid his fare.

That brought him back to the earth.

As he was about to open the outer door of the flats (it was closed at eleven every night) the door opened of its own accord and he stepped back to allow a lady to pass. She was dressed from head to foot in black and she passed him without a word, he staring after her as she walked with quick steps to a motor-car that he had noticed drawn up a few yards from where his cab had stopped. Who was she? he wondered as the car passed out of sight.

He dismissed her from his thoughts, for the glamour of the evening was not yet passed, and for an hour he sat in his big chair, staring into vacancy and recalling every incident of that previous evening. He could not believe it was true that this half-divine being was to be his; and then, with a deep sigh, he aroused himself to a sense of reality.

There was work to be done, he thought, as he rose to his feet, and it was work for her. His income was a small one, and must be considerably augmented before he dare ask this beautiful lady to share his lot.

He glanced idly at the table. That afternoon he had been writing up his notes of the case and the book was still where he had left it, only—

He could have sworn he had left it open. He had a remarkable memory for little things, tiny details of placements and position, and he was sure the book had not only been closed, but that its position had been changed.

A woman came in the mornings to clean the flat and make his bed and invariably he let her in himself. She usually arrived when he was making his own breakfast—another fad of his. She had no key, and under any circumstances never came at night.

He opened the book and almost jumped.

Between the pages, marking the place where he had been writing, was a key of a peculiar design. Attached to the handle was a tiny label on which was written: “D.G.‘s master key.”

This time there was no sign of the Blue Hand, but he recognized the writing. It was the same which had appeared on the warning card which the girl had received.

The woman in black had been to his flat—and had left him the means to enter Digby Groat’s premises!

“Phew!” whistled Jim in amazement.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

EUNICE woke in the morning with a queer little sense of disappointment. It was not until she was thoroughly awake, sitting up in bed and sipping the fragrant tea which the maid had brought her, that she analysed the cause. Then she laughed at herself.

“Eunice Weldon,” she said, shaking her head sadly, “you’re a bold woman! Because the best man in the world was too good, too silly, or too frightened, to kiss you, you are working up a grievance. In the first place, Eunice Weldon, you shouldn’t have proposed to a man. It was unladylike and certain to lead to your feeling cheap. You should have been content to wait for the beautiful carpet under your feet and the mansion over your head, and should have despised the bare boards of an attic overlooking the railway. I don’t suppose they are bare boards, Eunice,” she mused. “They are certain to be very nicely covered and there will be all sorts of mementos of Jim’s campaigns hanging on the walls or tucked away in odd little cupboards. And I’m sure, when the trains are not rattling past, that the view from the window is beautiful, and, anyway, I shouldn’t have time to look out of the window. There would be Jim’s shirts to mend, Jim’s socks to darn, and—Eunice Weldon, get up!” she said hurriedly as she slipped out of bed.

Going along the corridor Digby Groat heard the sound of her fresh young voice singing in the bathroom, and he smiled.

The ripe beauty of the girl had come on him with a rush. She was no longer desirable, she was necessary. He had intended to make her his plaything, he was as determined now that she should be his decoration. He laughed aloud at the little conceit! A decoration! Something that would enhance him in the eyes of his fellows. Even marriage would be a small price to pay for the possession of that jewel.

Jackson saw him smiling as he came down the stairs.

“Another box of chocolates has arrived, sir,” he said in a low voice, as though he were imparting a shameful secret.

“Throw them in the ashpit, or give them to my mother,” said Digby carelessly, and Jackson stared at him.

“Aren’t you—” he began.

“Don’t ask so many questions, Jackson.” Digby turned his glittering eyes upon his servant and there was an ugly look in his face. “You are getting just a little too interested in things, my friend. And whilst we are on this matter, let me say, Jackson, that when you speak to Miss Weldon I want you to take that damned grin off your face and talk as a servant to a lady; do you understand that?”

“I’m no servant,” said the man sullenly.

“That is the part you are playing now, so play it,” said Digby, “and don’t sulk with me, or—”

His hand went up to a rack hanging on the wall, where reposed a collection of hunting-crops, and his fingers closed over the nearest.

The man started back.

“I didn’t mean anything,” he whined, his face livid. “I’ve tried to be respectful—”

“Get my letters,” said Digby curtly, “and bring them into the dining-room.”

Eunice came into the room at that moment.

“Good morning. Miss Weldon,” said Digby, pulling out her chair from the table. “Did you have a nice dinner?”

“Oh, splendid,” she said, and then changed the conversation.

She was dreading the possibility of his turning the conversation to the previous night, and was glad when the meal was finished.

Digby’s attitude, however, was most correct. He spoke of general topics, and did not touch upon her outing, and when she went to Mrs. Groat’s room to play at work, for it was only playing, the real work had been done, he did not, as she feared he might, follow her.

Digby waited until the doctor called, and waylaying him in the passage learnt that his mother had completely recovered, and though a recurrence of the stroke was possible, it was not immediately likely. He had a few words to say to her that morning.

Old Mrs. Groat sat by the window in a wheeled chair, a huddled, unlovely figure, her dark gloomy eyes surveyed without interest the stately square with its green leafy centrepiece. The change of seasons had for her no other significance than a change of clothing. The wild heart which once leapt to the call of spring, beat feebly in a body in which passion had burnt itself to bitter ashes. And yet the gnarled hands, crossing and re-crossing each other on her lap, had once touched and blessed as they had touched and blasted.

Once or twice her mind went to this new girl, Eunice Weldon. There was no ray of pity in her thought. If Digby wanted the girl, he would take her, and her fate interested old Jane Groat no more than the fate of the fly that buzzed upon the window, and whom a flick of her handkerchief presently swept from existence. There was more reason why the girl should go if… she frowned. The scar on the wrist was much bigger than a sixpence. It was probably a coincidence.

She hoped that Digby would concentrate on his new quest and leave her alone. She was mortally afraid of him, fearing in her own heart the length to which he would go to have his will. She knew that her life would be snuffed out, like the flame of a candle, if it were expedient for Digby to remove her. When she had recovered consciousness and found herself in charge of a nurse, her first thought had been of wonder that Digby had allowed her to revive. He knew nothing of the will, she thought, and a twisted smile broke upon the lined face. There was a surprise in store for him. She would not be there to see it, that was the pity. But she could gloat in anticipation over his chagrin and his impotent rage.

The handle of the door turned and there followed a whispered conversation. Presently the door closed again.

“How are you this morning, mother?” said the pleasant voice of Digby, and she blinked round at him in a flutter of agitation.

“Very well, my boy, very well,” she said tremulously. “Won’t you sit down?” She glanced nervously about for the nurse, but the woman had gone. “Will you tell the nurse I want her, my boy?” she began.

“The nurse can wait,” said her dutiful son coolly. “There are one or two things I want to talk to you about before she returns. But principally I want to know why you executed a will in favour of Estremeda and left me with a beggarly twenty thousand pounds to face the world?”

She nearly collapsed with the shock.

“A will, my boy?” She whined the words. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“The will which you made and put into that secret drawer of your cabinet,” he said patiently, “and don’t tell me that I’m dreaming, or that you did it for a joke, or that it was an act of mental aberration on your part. Tell me the truth!”

“It was a will I made years ago, my dear,” she quavered. “When I thought twenty thousand pounds was all the money I possessed.”

“You’re a liar,” said Digby without heat. “And a stupid old liar. You made that will to spite me, you old devil!”

She was staring at him in horror.

Digby was most dangerous when he talked in that cool, even tone of his.

“I have destroyed the precious document,” said Digby Groat in the same conversational voice, “and when you see Miss Weldon, who witnessed its destruction, I would be glad if you would tell her that the will she saw consumed was one which you made when you were not quite right in your head.”

Mrs. Groat was incapable of speech. Her chin trembled convulsively and her only thought was how she could attract the attention of the nurse.

“Put my chair back against the bed, Digby,” she said faintly. “The light is too strong.”

He hesitated, but did as she asked, then seeing her hand close upon the bell-push which hung by the side of the bed, he laughed.

“You need not be afraid, mother,” he said contemptuously, “I did not intend taking any other action than I have already taken. Remember that your infernal nurse will not be here all the time, and do as I ask you. I will send Miss Weldon up to you in a few minutes on the excuse of taking instructions from you and answering some letters which came for you this morning. Do you understand?”

She nodded, and at that moment the nurse came in.

Summoned to the sick-room, Eunice found her employer looking more feeble than she had appeared before she was stricken down. The old woman’s eyes smouldered their hate, as the girl came into the room. She guessed it was Eunice who had discovered the will and loathed her, but fear was the greater in her, and after the few letters had been formally answered, Mrs. Groat stopped the girl, who was in the act of rising.

“Sit down again, Miss Weldon,” she said. “I wanted to tell you about a will of mine that you found. I’m very glad you discovered it. I had forgotten that I had made it.”

Every word was strained and hateful to utter.

“You see, my dear young woman, I sometimes suffer from a curious lapse of memory, and—and—that will was made when I was suffering from an attack—”

Eunice listened to the halting words and was under the impression that the hesitation was due to the old woman’s weakness.

“I quite understand, Mrs. Groat,” she said sympathetically. “Your son told me.”

“He told you, did he?” said Jane Groat, returning to her contemplation of the window; then, when Eunice was waiting for her dismissal, “Are you a great friend of my son’s?”

Eunice smiled.

“No, not a great friend, Mrs. Groat,” she said.

“You will be,” said the woman, “greater than you imagine,” and there was such malignity in the tone that the girl shuddered.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

JIM loved London, the noise and the smell of it. He loved its gentle thunders, its ineradicable good-humour, its sublime muddle. Paris depressed him, with its air of gaiety and the underlying fierceness of life’s struggle. There was no rest in the soul of Paris. It was a city of strenuous bargaining, of ruthless exploitation. Brussels was a dumpy undergrown Paris, Berlin a stucco Gomorrah, Madrid an extinct crater beneath which a new volcanic stream was seeking a vent.

New York he loved, a city of steel and concrete teeming with sentimentalists posing as tyrants. There was nothing quite like New York in the world. Dante in his most prodigal mood might have dreamt New York and da Vinci might have planned it, but only the high gods could have materialized the dream or built to the master’s plan. But London was London—incomparable, beautiful. It was the history of the world and the mark of civilization. He made a detour and passed through Covent Garden.

The blazing colour and fragrance of it! Jim could have lingered all the morning in the draughty halls, but he was due at the office to meet Mr. Salter.

Almost the first question that the lawyer asked him was:

“Have you investigated Selengers?”

The identity of the mysterious Selengers had been forgotten for the moment, Jim admitted.

“You ought to know who they are,” said the lawyer. “You will probably discover that Groat or his mother are behind them. The fact that the offices were once the property of Danton rather supports this idea—though theories are an abomination to me!”

Jim agreed. There were so many issues to the case that he had almost lost sight of his main object.

“The more I think of it,” he confessed “the more useless my search seems to me, Mr. Salter. If I find Lady Mary, you say that I shall be no nearer to frustrating the Groats?”

Mr. Septimus Salter did not immediately reply. He had said as much, but subsequently had amended his point of view. Theories, as he had so emphatically stated, were abominable alternatives to facts, and yet he could not get out of his head that if the theory he had formed to account for Lady Mary Danton’s obliteration were substantiated, a big step would have been taken toward clearing up a host of minor mysteries.

“Go ahead with Selengers,” he said at last; “possibly you may find that their inquiries are made as much to find Lady Mary as to establish the identity of your young friend. At any rate, you can’t be doing much harm.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

AT twelve o’clock that night Eunice heard a car draw up in front of the house. She had not yet retired, and she stepped out on to the balcony as Digby Groat ascended the steps.

Eunice closed the door and pulled the curtains across. She was not tired enough to go to bed. She had very foolishly succumbed to the temptation to take a doze that afternoon, and to occupy her time she had brought up the last bundle of accounts, unearthed from a box in the wine-cellar, and had spent the evening tabulating them.

She finished the last account, and fixing a rubber band round them, rose and stretched herself, and then she heard a sound; a stealthy foot upon the stone of the balcony floor. There was no mistaking it. She had never heard it before on the occasion of the earlier visits. She switched out the light, drew back the curtains noiselessly and softly unlocked the French window. She listened. There it was again. She felt no fear, only the thrill of impending discovery. Suddenly she jerked open the window and stepped out, and for a time saw nothing, then as her eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, she saw something crouching against the wall.

“Who is that?” she cried.

There was no reply for a little time; then the voice said:

“I am awfully sorry to have frightened you, Eunice.”

It was Jim Steele.

“Jim!” she gasped incredulously, and then a wave of anger swept over her. So it had been Jim all the time and not a woman! Jim, who had been supporting his prejudices by these contemptible tricks. Her anger was unreasonable, but it was very real and born of the shock of disillusionment. She remembered in a flash how sympathetic Jim had been when she told him of the midnight visitor and how he had pretended to be puzzled. So he was fooling her all the time. It was hateful of him!

“I think you had better go,” she said coldly.

“Let me explain, Eunice.”

“I don’t think any explanation is necessary,” she said. “Really, Jim, it is despicable of you.”

She went back to her room with a wildly beating heart. She could have wept for vexation. Jim! He was the mysterious Blue Hand, she thought indignantly, and he had made a laughing-stock of her! Probably he was the writer of the letters, too, and had been in her room that night. She stamped her foot in her anger. She hated him for deceiving her. She hated him for shattering the idol she had set up in her heart. She had never felt so unutterably miserable as she was when she flung herself on her bed and wept until she fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.

“Damn!” muttered Jim as he slipped out of the house and strode in search of his muddy little car. An unprofitable evening had ended tragically.

“Bungling, heavy-footed jackass,” he growled savagely, as he spun perilously round a corner and nearly into a taxi-cab which had ventured to the wrong side of the road. But he was not cursing the cab-driver. It was his own stupidity which had led him to test the key which had made a remarkable appearance on his table the night before. He had gone on to the balcony, merely to examine the fastenings of the girl’s window, with the idea of judging her security.

He felt miserable and would have been glad to talk his trouble over with somebody. But there was nobody he could think of, nobody whom he liked well enough, unless it was—Mrs. Fane. He half smiled at the thought and wondered what that invalid lady would think of him if he knocked her up at this hour to pour his woes into her sympathetic ears! The sweet, sad-faced woman had made a very deep impression upon him; he was surprised to find how often she came into his thoughts.

Halfway up Baker Street he brought his car to a walking pace and turned. He had remembered Selengers, and it had just occurred to him that at this hour he was more likely to profit by a visit than by a daytime call. It was nearly two o’clock when he stopped in Brade Street and descended.

He remembered the janitor had told him that there was a side entrance, which was used alone by Selengers. He found the narrow court which led to the back of the building, and after a little search discovered what was evidently the door which would bring him through the courtyard to the back of Brade Street Buildings. He tried the door, and to his surprise it was unlocked. Hearing the soft pad of the policeman’s feet in the street, and not wishing to be discovered trying strange doors at that hour, he passed through and closed it behind him, waiting till the officer had passed before he continued his investigations.

In preparation for such a contingency, he had brought with him a small electric lamp, and with the aid of this he found his way across the paved yard to a door which opened into the building. This was locked, he discovered to his dismay. There must be another, he thought, and began looking for it. There were windows overlooking the courtyard, but these were so carefully shuttered that it was impossible to tell whether lights shone behind them or not.

He found the other entrance at an angle of two walls, tried it, and to his delight it opened. He was in a short stone corridor and at the farther end was a barred gate. Short of this and to the right was a green door. He turned the handle softly, and as it opened he saw that a brilliant light was burning within. He pushed it farther and stepped into the room.

He was in an office which was unfurnished except for a table and a chair, but it was not the desolate appearance of the apartment which held his eye.

As he had entered a woman, dressed from head to foot in black, was passing to a second room, and at the sound of the door she turned quickly and drew her veil over her face. But she had delayed that action a little too long, and Jim, with a gasp of amazement, had looked upon the face of that “incurable invalid” Mrs. Fane!

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“Who are you, and what do you want?” she asked. He saw her hand drop to the fold of her dress, then: “Mr. Steele,” she said as she recognized him.

“I’m sorry to disturb you,” said Jim as he closed the door behind him, “but I wanted to see you pretty badly.”

“Sit down, Mr. Steele. Did you see my—” she hesitated, “see my face?”

He nodded gravely.

“And did you recognize me?”

He nodded again.

“Yes, you are Mrs. Fane,” he said quietly.

Slowly her hands rose and she unpinned the veil.

“You may lock the door,” she said; “yes, I am Mrs. Fane.”

He was so bewildered, despite his seeming self-possession, that he had nothing to say.

“You probably think that I have been practising a wicked and mean deception,” she said, “but there are reasons—excellent reasons—why I should not be abroad in the daytime, and why, if I were traced to Featherdale Mansions, I should not be identified with the woman who walks at night.”

“Then it was you who left the key?” he said.

She nodded, and all the time her eyes never left his face.

“I am afraid I cannot enlighten you any farther,” she said, “partly because I am not prepared at this moment to reveal my hand and partly because there is so little that I could reveal if I did.”

And only a few minutes before he had been thinking how jolly it would be if he could lay all his troubles and perplexities before her. It was incredible that he should be talking with her at this midnight hour in a prosaic city office. He looked at the delicate white hand which rested against her breast and smiled, and she, with her quick perceptions, guessed the cause of his amusement.

“You are thinking of the Blue Hand?” she said quickly.

“Yes, I am thinking of the Blue Hand,” said Jim.

“You have an idea that that is just a piece of chicanery and that the hand has no significance?” she asked quietly.

“Curiously enough, I don’t think that,” said Jim. “I believe behind that symbol is a very interesting story, but you must tell it in your own time, Mrs. Fane.”

She paced the room deep in thought, her hands clasped before her, her chin on her breast, and he waited, wondering how this strange discovery would develop.

“You came because you heard from South Africa that I had been making inquiries about the girl—she is not in danger?”

“No,” said Jim with a wry face. “At present I am in danger of having offended her beyond pardon.”

She looked at him sharply, but did not ask for an explanation.

“If you had thought my warnings were theatrical and meaningless, I should not have blamed you,” she said after a while, “but I had to reach her in some way that would impress her.”

“There is something I cannot understand, Mrs. Fane,” said Jim. “Suppose Eunice had told Digby Groat of this warning?”

She smiled.

“He knows,” she said quietly, and Jim remembered the hand on the laboratory door. “No, he is not the person who will understand what it all means,” she said. “As to your Eunice,” her lips parted in a dazzling little smile, “I would not like any harm to come to the child.”

“Have you any special reason for wishing to protect her?” asked Jim.

She shook her head.

“I thought I had a month ago,” she said. “I thought she was somebody whom I was seeking. A chance resemblance, fleeting and elusive, brought me to her; she was one of the shadows I pursued,” she said with a bitter little smile, “one of the ghosts that led nowhere. She interested me. Her beauty, her fresh innocence and her character have fascinated me, even though she has ceased to be the real object of my search. And you, Mr. Steele. She interests you too?” She eyed him keenly.

“Yes,” said Jim, “she interests me too.”

“Do you love her?”

The question was so unexpected that Jim for once was not prepared with an answer. He was a reticent man ordinarily, and now that the opportunity presented he could not discuss the state of his feelings towards Eunice.

“If you do not really love her,” said the woman, “do not hurt her, Mr. Steele. She is a very young girl, too good to be the passing amusement that Digby Groat intends she shall be.”

“Does he?” said Jim between his teeth.

She nodded.

“There is a great future for you, and I hope that you will not ruin that career by an infatuation which has the appearance at the moment of being love.”

He looked at the flushed and animated face and thought that next to Eunice she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

“I am almost at the end of my pursuit,” she went on, “and once we can bring Digby Groat and his mother to book, my work will be done.” She shook her head sadly. “I have no further hope, no further hope,” she said.

“Hope of what?” asked Jim.

“Finding what I sought,” said Mrs. Fane, and her luminous eyes were fixed on his. “But I was mad, I sought that which is beyond recall, and I must use the remaining years of my life for such happiness as God will send to me. Forty-three years of waste!” she threw out her arms with a passionate gesture. “Forty-three years of suffering. A loveless childhood, a loveless marriage, a bitter betrayal. I have lost everything, Mr. Steele, everything. Husband and child and hope.”

Jim started back.

“Good God!” he said, “then you are—”

“I am Lady Mary Danton.” She looked at him strangely. “I thought you had guessed that.”

Lady Mary Danton!

Then his search was ended, thought Jim with dismay. A queer unsatisfactory ending, which brought him no nearer to reward or advancement, both of which were so vitally necessary now.

“You look disappointed,” she said, “and yet you had set yourself out to find Lady Mary.”

He nodded.

“And you have found her. Is she less attractive than you had imagined?”

He did not reply. He could not tell her that his real search had not been for her, but for her dead child.

“Do you know I have been seeing you every day for months, Mr. Steele?” she asked. “I have sat by your side in railway trains, in tube trains, and even stood by your side in tube lifts,” she said with the ghost of a smile. “I have watched you and studied you and I have liked you.”

She said the last words deliberately and her beautiful hand rested for a second on his shoulder.

“Search your heart about Eunice,” she said, “and if you find that you are mistaken in your sentiments, remember that there is a great deal of happiness to be found in this world.” There was no mistaking her meaning.

“I love Eunice,” said Jim quietly, and the hand that rested on his shoulder was withdrawn, “I love her as I shall never love any other woman in life. She is the beginning and end of my dreams.” He did not look up at the woman, but he could hear her quick breathing. Presently she said in a low voice:

“I was afraid so—I was afraid so.” And then Jim, whose moral courage was beyond question, rose and faced her.

“Lady Mary,” he said quietly, “you have abandoned hope that you will ever find your daughter?”

She nodded.

“Suppose Eunice were your daughter? Would you give her to me?” She raised her eyes to his.

“I would give her to you with thankfulness,” she said, “for you are the one man in the world whom I would desire any girl I loved to marry “— she shook her head. “But you, too, are pursuing shadows,” she said. “Eunice is not my daughter—I have traced her parentage and there is no doubt at all upon the matter. She is the daughter of a South African musician.”

“Have you seen the scar on her wrist?” he asked slowly. It was his last hope of identification, and when she shook her head, his heart sank.

“I did not know that she had a scar on her wrist. What kind of a scar is it?” she asked.

“A small round burn the size of a sixpence,” said Jim.

“My baby had no such mark—she had no blemish whatever.”

“Nothing that would have induced some evilly disposed person to remove?”

Lady Mary shook her head.

“Oh, no,” she said faintly. “You are chasing shadows, Mr. Steele, almost as persistently as I have done. Now let me tell you something about myself,” she said, “and I warn you that I am not going to elucidate the mystery of my disappearance—that can wait. This building is mine,” she said. “I am the proprietor of the whole block. My husband bought it and in a moment of unexampled generosity presented it to me the day after its purchase. In fact, it was mine when it was supposed to be his. He was not a generous man,” she said sadly, “but I will not speak of his treatment of me. This property has provided me with an income ample for my needs, and I have, too, a fortune which I inherited from my father. We were desperately poor when I married Mr. Danton,” she explained, “and only a week or two later my father’s cousin, Lord Pethingham, died, and father inherited a very large sum of money, the greater portion of which came to me.”

“Who is Madge Benson?” he demanded.

“Need you ask that?” she said. “She is my servant.”

“Why did she go to prison?”

He saw the woman’s lips close tight.

“You must promise not to ask questions about the past until I am ready to tell you, Mr. Steele,” she said, “and now I think you can see me home.” She looked round the office. “There are usually a dozen cablegrams to be seen and answered. A confidential clerk of mine comes in the morning to attend to the dispatch of wires which I leave for him. I have made myself a nuisance to every town clerk in the world, from Buenos Ayres to Shanghai,” she said with a whimsical laugh in which there was a note of pain. “‘The shadow he pursueth—’ You know the old Biblical lines, Mr. Steele, and I am so tired of my pursuit, so very tired!”

“And is it ended now?” asked Jim.

“Not yet,” said Lady Mary, and suddenly her voice grew hard and determined. “No, we’ve still got a lot of work before us, Jim—” She used the word shyly and laughed like a child when she saw him colour. “Even Eunice will not mind my calling you Jim,” she said, “and it is such a nice name, easily remembered, and it has the advantage of not being a popular nickname for dogs and cats.”

He was dying to ask her why, if she was so well off, she had taken up her residence in a little flat overlooking a railway line, and it was probable that had he asked her, he would have received an unsatisfactory reply.

He took leave of her at her door.

“Good night, neighbour,” he smiled.

“Good night, Jim,” she said softly.

And Jim was still sitting in his big arm-chair pondering the events of the night when the first rays of the rising sun made a golden pattern upon the blind.

CHAPTER TWENTY

EARLY the next morning a district messenger arrived at the flat with a letter from Eunice, and he groaned before he opened it.

She had written it in the hurt of her discovery and there were phrases which made him wince.

“I never dreamt it was you, and after all the pretence you made that this was a woman! It wasn’t fair of you, Jim. To secure a sensation you nearly frightened me to death on my first night here, and made me look ridiculous in order that I might fall into your waiting arms! I see it all now. You do not like Mr. Groat, and were determined that I should leave his house, and this is the method which you have followed. I shall find it very hard to forgive you and perhaps you had better not see me again until you hear from me.”

“Oh, damn,” said Jim for the fortieth time since he had left her.

What could he do? He wrote half a dozen letters and tore them all up, every one of them into shreds. He could not explain to her how the key came into his possession without betraying Lady Mary Danton’s secret. And now he would find it more difficult than ever to convince her that Digby Groat was an unscrupulous villain. The position was hopeless and he groaned again. Then a thought struck him and he crossed the landing to the next flat.

Madge Benson opened the door and this time regarded him a little more favourably.

“My lady is asleep,” she said. She knew that Jim was aware of Mrs. Fane’s identity.

“Do you think you could wake her? It is rather important.”

“I will see,” said Madge Benson, and disappeared into the bedroom. She returned in a few moments. “Madame is awake. She heard your knock,” she said. “Will you go in?”

Lady Mary was lying on the bed fully dressed, wrapped in a dressing-gown, and she took the letter from Jim’s hand which he handed her without a word, and read.

“Have patience,” she said as she handed it back. “She will understand in time.”

“And in the meanwhile,” said Jim, his heart heavy, “anything can happen to her! This is the very thing I didn’t want to occur.”

“You went to the house. Did you discover anything?”

He shook his head.

“Take no notice and do not worry,” said Lady Mary, settling down in the bed and closing her eyes, “and now please let me sleep, Mr. Steele; I have not been to bed for twenty-four hours.”

Eunice had not dispatched the messenger with the letter to Jim five minutes before she regretted the impulse which had made her write it. She had said bitter things which she did not really feel. It was an escapade of his which ought to be forgiven, because at the back of it, she thought, was his love for her. She had further reason to doubt her wisdom, when, going into Digby Groat’s library she found him studying a large photograph.

“That is very good, considering it was taken in artificial light,” he said. It was an enlarged photograph of his laboratory door bearing the blue imprint, and so carefully had the photographer done his work, that every line and whorl of the fingertips showed.

“It is a woman’s hand, of course,” he said.

“A woman!” she gasped. “Are you sure?”

He looked up in surprise.

“Of course I’m sure,” said Digby; “look at the size of it! It is much too small for a man.”

So she had wronged Jim cruelly! And yet what was he doing there in the house? How had he got in? The whole thing was so inexplicable that she gave it up, only—she must tell Jim and ask him to forgive her.

As soon as she was free she went to the telephone. Jim was not in the office.

“Who is it speaking?” asked the voice of the clerk.

“Never mind,” said the girl hurriedly, and hung up the receiver.

All day long she was haunted by the thought of the injustice she had done the man she loved. He would send her a note, she thought, or would call her up, and at every ring of the telephone the blood came into her face, only to recede when she heard the answer, and discovered the caller was some person in whom she had no interest.

That day was one of the longest she had ever spent in her life. There was practically no work to do, and even the dubious entertainment of Digby was denied her. He went out in the morning and did not come back until late in the afternoon, going out again as soon as he had changed his clothes.

She ate her dinner in solitude and was comforted by the thought that she would soon be free from this employment. She had written to her old employer and he had answered by return of post, saying how glad he would be if he could get her back. Then they could have their little tea-parties all over again, she thought, and Jim, free of this obsession about Digby Groat, would be his old cheerful self.

The nurse was going out that evening and Mrs. Groat sent for her. She hated the girl, but she hated the thought of being alone much more.

“I want you to sit here with me until the nurse comes home,” she said. “You can take a book and read, but don’t fidget.”

Eunice smiled to herself and went in search of a book.

She came back in time to find Mrs. Groat hiding something beneath her pillow. They sat in silence for an hour, the old woman playing with her hands on her lap, her head sunk forward, deep in thought, the girl trying to read, and finding it very difficult. Jim’s face so constantly came between her and the printed page, that she would have been glad for an excuse to put down the book, glad for any diversion.

It was Mrs. Groat who provided her with an escape from her ennui.

“Where did you get that scar on your wrist?” she asked, looking up.

“I don’t know,” said Eunice. “I have had it ever since I was a baby. I think I must have been burnt.”

There was another long silence.

“Where were you born?”

“In South Africa,” said the girl.

Again there was an interval, broken only by the creak of Mrs. Groat’s chair.

In sheer desperation, for the situation was getting on her nerves, Eunice said: “I found an old miniature of yours the other day, Mrs. Groat.”

The woman fixed her with her dark eyes.

“Of me?” she said, and then, “Oh, yes, I remember. Well? Did you think it looks like me?” she asked sourly.

“I think it was probably like you years ago. I could trace a resemblance,” said Eunice diplomatically.

The answer seemed to amuse Jane Groat. She had a mordant sense of humour, the girl was to discover.

“Like me when I was like that, eh?” she said. “Do you think I was pretty?”

Here Eunice could speak whole-heartedly and without evasion.

“I think you were very beautiful,” she said warmly.

“I was, too,” said the woman, speaking half to herself. “My father tried to bury me in a dead-and-alive village. He thought I was too attractive for town. A wicked, heartless brute of a man,” she said, and the girl was somewhat shocked.

Apparently the old doctrine of filial piety did not run in Jane Groat’s family.

“When I was a girl,” the old woman went on, “the head of the family was the family tyrant, and lived for the exercise of his power. My father hated me from the moment I was born and I hated him from the moment I began to think.”

Eunice said nothing. She had not invited the confidence, nevertheless it fascinated her to hear this woman draw aside the veil which hid the past. What great tragedy had happened, she speculated, that had turned the beautiful original of the miniature into this hard and evil-looking woman?

“Men would run after me, Miss Weldon,” she said with a curious complacence. “Men whose names are famous throughout the world.”

The girl remembered the Marquis of Estremeda and wondered whether her generosity to him was due to the part he had played as pursuing lover.

“There was one man who loved me,” said the old woman reflectively, “but he didn’t love me well enough. He must have heard something, I suppose, because he was going to marry me and then he broke it off and married a simpering fool of a girl from Malaga.”

She chuckled to herself. She had had no intention of discussing her private affairs with Eunice Weldon, but something had started her on a train of reminiscence. Besides, she regarded Eunice already as an unofficial member of the family. Digby would tell her sooner or later. She might as well know from her, she thought.

“He was a Marquis,” she went on, “a hard man, too, and he treated me badly. My father never forgave me after I came back, and never spoke another word in his life, although he lived for nearly twenty years.”

After she had come back, thought Eunice. Then she had gone away with this Marquis? The Marquis of Estremeda. And then he had deserted her, and had married this “simpering fool” from Malaga. Gradually the story was revealing itself before her eyes.

“What happened to the girl?” she asked gently. She was almost afraid to speak unless she stopped the loquacious woman.

“She died,” said Mrs. Groat with a thin smile. “He said I killed her. I only told her the truth. Besides, I owed him something,” she frowned. “I wish I hadn’t,” she muttered, “I wish I hadn’t. Sometimes the ghost of her comes into this room and looks down at me with her deep black eyes and tells me that I killed her!” She mumbled something, and again with that note of complacency in her voice:

“When she heard that my child was the son—” she stopped quickly and looked round. “What am I talking about?” she said gruffly.

Eunice held her breath. Now she knew the secret of this strange household! Jim had told her something about it; told her of the little shipping clerk who had married Mrs. Groat, and for whom she had so profound a contempt. A shipping clerk from the old man’s office, whom he had paid to marry the girl that her shame should be hidden.

Digby Groat was actually the son of—the Marquis of Estremeda! In law he was not even the heir to the Danton millions!

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

EUNICE could only stare at the old woman. “Get on with your book,” grumbled Mrs. Groat pettishly, and the girl, looking up through her lashes, saw the suspicious eyes fixed on her and the tremulous mouth moving as though she were speaking.

She must tell Jim. Despite her sense of loyalty, she realized that this was imperative. Jim was vitally interested in the disposal of the Danton estate, and he must know.

Suddenly the old woman began speaking again.

“What did I tell you just now?” she asked.

“You were talking about your youth,” said the girl.

“Did I say anything about—a man?” asked the old woman suspiciously. She had forgotten! Eunice forced the lie to her lips.

“No,” she replied, so loudly that anybody but this muddled woman would have known she was not speaking the truth.

“Be careful of my son,” said Mrs. Groat after a while. “Don’t cross him. He’s not a bad lad, not a bad lad “—she shook her head and glanced slyly at the girl. “He is like his father in many ways.”

“Mr. Groat?” said Eunice, and felt inexpressively mean at taking advantage of the woman’s infirmity, but she steeled her heart with the thought that Jim must benefit by her knowledge.

“Groat,” sneered, the old woman contemptuously, “that worm. No—yes, of course he was Groat. Who else could he be; who else?” she asked, her voice rising wrathfully.

There was a sound outside and she turned her head and listened.

“You won’t leave me alone. Miss Weldon, until the nurse comes back, will you?” she whispered with pathetic eagerness. “You promise me that?”

“Why, of course I promise you,” said Eunice, smiling; “that is why I am here, to keep you company.”

The door handle turned and the old woman watched it, fascinated. Eunice heard her audible gasp as Digby came in. He was in evening dress and smoking a cigarette through a long holder.

He seemed for the moment taken aback by the sight of Eunice and then smiled.

“Of course, it is the nurse’s night out, isn’t it? How are you feeling tonight, mother?”

“Very well, my boy,” she quavered, “very well indeed. Miss Weldon is keeping me company.”

“Splendid,” said Digby. “I hope Miss Weldon hasn’t been making your flesh creep.”

“Oh, no,” said the girl, shocked, “of course I haven’t. How could I?”

“I was wondering whether you had been telling mother of our mysterious visitor,” he laughed as he pulled up an easy chair and sat down. “You don’t mind my smoke, mother, do you?”

Eunice thought that even if old Jane Groat had objected it would not have made the slightest difference to her son, but the old woman shook her head and again turned her pleading eyes on Eunice.

“I should like to catch that lady,” said Digby, watching a curl of smoke rise to the ceiling.

“What lady, my boy?” asked Mrs. Groat.

“The lady who has been wandering loose round this house at night, leaving her mark upon the panels of my door.”

“A burglar,” said the old woman, and did not seem greatly alarmed.

Digby shook his head.

“A woman and a criminal, I understand. She left a clear finger-print, and Scotland Yard have had the photograph and have identified it with that of a woman who served a sentence in Holloway Gaol.”

A slight noise attracted Eunice and she turned to look at Jane Groat.

She was sitting bolt upright, her black eyes staring, her face working convulsively.

“What woman?” she asked harshly. “What are you talking about?’”

Digby seemed as much surprised as the girl to discover the effect the statement had made upon his mother.

“The woman who has been getting into this house and making herself a confounded nuisance with her melodramatic signature.”

“What do you mean?” asked Mrs. Groat with painful slowness.

“She has left the mark of a Blue Hand on my door—”

Before he could finish the sentence his mother was on her feet, staring down at him with terror in her eyes.

“A Blue Hand!” she cried wildly. “What was that woman’s name?”

“According to the police report, Madge Benson,” said Digby.

For a second she glared at him wildly.

“Blue Hand,” she mumbled, and would have collapsed but for the fact that Eunice had recognized the symptoms and was by her side and took her in her strong young arms.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

OUTSIDE the door in the darkened passage a man was listening intently. He had trailed Digby Groat all that evening, and had followed him into the house. Hearing a movement of footsteps within, he slipped into a side passage and waited. Eunice flew past the entrance to the passage and Jim Steele thought it was time that he made a move. In a few minutes the house would be aroused, for he guessed that the old woman had collapsed. It was a desperate, mad enterprise of his, to enter the great household at so early an hour, but he had a particular reason for wishing to discover the contents of a letter which he had seen slipped into Digby’s hand that night.

Jim had been following him without success until Digby Groat had alighted at Piccadilly Circus apparently to buy a newspaper. Then a stranger had edged close to him and Jim had seen the quick passage of the white envelope. He meant to see that letter.

He reached the ground floor in safety and hesitated. Should he go into the laboratory whither Digby was certain to come, or should he—? A hurried footstep on the stairs above decided him: he slipped through the door leading to Digby’s study. Hiding-place there was none: he had observed the room when he had been in there a few days previously. He was safe so long as nobody came in and turned on the lights. Jim heard the footsteps pass the door, and pulled his soft felt hat further over his eyes. The lower part of his face he had already concealed with a black silk handkerchief, and if the worst came to the worst, he could battle his way out and seek safety in flight. Nobody would recognize him in the old grey suit he wore, and the soft collarless shirt. It would not be a very noble end to the adventure, but it would be less ignominious than being exposed again to the scorn of Eunice.

Suddenly his heart beat faster. Somebody was coming into the library. He saw the unknown open the door and he crouched down so that the big library table covered him from observation. Instantly the room was flooded with light; Jim could only see the legs of the intruder, and they were the legs of Digby Groat. Digby moved to the table, and Jim heard the tear of paper as an envelope was slit, and then an exclamation of anger from the man.

“Mr. Groat, please come quickly!”

It was the voice of Eunice calling from the floor above, and Digby hurried out, leaving the door open. He was scarcely out of sight before Jim had risen; his first glance was at the table. The letter lay as Digby had thrown it down, and he thrust it into his pocket. In a second he was through the doorway and in the passage. Jackson was standing by the foot of the stairs looking up, and for the moment he did not see Jim; then, at the sight of the masked face, he opened his mouth to shout a warning, and at that instant Jim struck at him twice, and the man went down with a crash.

“What is that?” said Digby’s voice, but Jim was out of the house, the door slammed behind him, and was racing along the sidewalk toward Berkeley Square, before Digby Groat knew what had happened. He slackened his pace, turned sharp to the right, so that he came back on his track, and stopped under a street light to read the letter.

Parts of its contents contained no information for him. But there was one line which interested him:

“Steele is trailing you: we will fix him tonight.”

He read the line again and smiled as he walked on at a more leisurely pace.

Once or twice he thought he was being followed, and turned round, but saw nobody. As he strolled up Portland Place, deserted at this hour of the night save for an occasional car, his suspicion that he was being followed was strengthened. Two men, walking one behind the other, and keeping close to the railings, were about twenty yards behind him.

“I’ll give you a run for your money, my lads,” muttered Jim, and crossing Marylebone Road, he reached the loneliest part of London, the outer circle of Regent’s Park. And then he began to run: and Jim had taken both the sprint and the two-mile at the ‘Varsity sports. He heard swift feet following and grinned to himself. Then came the noise of a taxi door shutting. They had picked up the “crawler” he had passed.

“That is very unsporting,” said Jim, and turning, ran in the opposite direction. He went past the cab like a flash, and heard it stop and a loud voice order the taxi to turn, and he slackened his pace. He had already decided upon his plan of action—one so beautifully simple and so embarrassing to Digby Groat and his servitors, if his suspicions were confirmed, that it was worth the bluff. He had dropped to a walk at the sight of a policeman coming toward him. As the taxi came abreast he stepped into the roadway, gripped the handle of the door and jerked it open.

“Come out,” he said sternly.

In the reflected light from the taximeter lantern he saw the damaged face of an old friend.

“Come out, Jackson, and explain just why you’re following me through the peaceful streets of this great city.”

The man was loath to obey, but Jim gripped him by the waistcoat and dragged him out, to the taxi-driver’s astonishment. The second man was obviously a foreigner, a little dark, thin-faced man with a mahogany face, and they stood sheepishly regarding their quarry.

“Tomorrow you can go back to Mr. Digby Groat and tell him that the next time he sets the members of the Thirteen Gang to trail me, I’ll come after him with enough evidence in each hand to leave him swinging in the brick-lined pit at Wandsworth. Do you understand that?”

“I don’t know what you mean about tomorrow,” said the innocent Jackson in an aggrieved tone. “We could have the law on you for dragging us out of the cab.”

“Try it, here comes a policeman,” said Jim. He gripped him by the collar and dragged him toward the interested constable. “I think this man wants to make a charge against me.”

“No, I don’t,” growled Jackson, terrified as to what his master would say when he heard of this undramatic end to the trailing of Jim.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

THERE is little that is romantic about a Police Station, and Digby Groat, who came in a towering rage to release his servants, was so furious that he could not even see the humorous side of the situation.

Once outside the building he dismissed one, Antonio Fuentes, with a curse, and poured the vials of wrath upon the unhappy Jackson.

“You fool, you blundering dolt,” he stormed. “I told you to keep the man in sight; Bronson would have carried out my orders without Steele knowing. Why the hell did you carry a revolver?”

“How did I know he would play a dirty trick on me like that?” growled Jackson; “besides, I’ve never heard of the Firearms Act.”

It was a stupid but a dangerous situation, thought Digby Groat, as he sat gnawing his nails in the library. It was an old theory of his that great schemes come to nought and great crimes are detected through some contemptible little slip on the part of the conspirators. What Jim had done in the simplest, easiest manner, was to set the police moving against the Thirteen, and to bring two of its members into the searching light of a magisterial inquiry. What was worse, he had associated Digby Groat with the proceedings, though Digby had an excuse that Jackson was his valet, and, as such, entitled to his interest. He had disclaimed all knowledge of Fuentes, but, as an act of generosity, as the Spaniard was a friend of his servant, had gone bail for him also.

Had the Thirteen brought off a big coup, their tracks would have been so hidden, their preparations so elaborated, that they would have defied detection. And here through a simple offence, which carried no more than a penalty of a five-pound fine, two of the members of the gang had come under police observation. Madmen!

It was a sleepless night for him—even his three hours was denied him. The doctor attending his mother did not leave until past three o’clock.

“It is not exactly a stroke, but I think a collapse due to some sudden shock.”

“Probably you’re right,” said Digby. “But I thought it best to call you in. Do you think she will recover?”

“Oh. yes. I should imagine she’ll be all right in the morning.”

Digby nodded. He agreed with that conclusion, without being particularly pleased to hear it.

Difficulties were increasing daily, it seemed; new obstacles were besetting the smooth path of his life, and he traced them one by one and reduced them to a single cause—Jim Steele.

The next morning, after he had telephoned to a shady solicitor whom he knew, ordering him to defend the two men who were to be charged at Marylebone with offences under the Firearms Act, he sent for Eunice Weldon.

“Miss Weldon,” he said, “I am making changes in this house, and I thought of taking my mother to the country next week. The air here doesn’t seem to agree with her, and I despair of her getting better unless she has a radical change of environment.”

She nodded gravely.

“I am afraid I shall not be able to accompany you, Mr. Groat.”

He looked up at her sharply.

“What do you mean, Miss Weldon?” he asked.

“There is not sufficient work for me to do here, and I have decided to return to my old employment,” she said.

“I am sorry to hear that, Miss Weldon,” he said quietly, “but, of course, I will put no obstacle in your way. This has been a calamitous house recently, and your experience has not been an exceedingly happy one, and therefore I quite understand why you are anxious to leave us. I could have wished that you would have stayed with my mother until she was settled in my place in the country, but even on this point I will not press you.”

She expected that he would have been annoyed, and his courtesy impressed her.

“I shall not, of course, think of leaving until I have done all that I possibly can,” she hastened to add, as he expected her to do, “and really I have not been at all unhappy here, Mr. Groat.”

“Mr. Steele doesn’t like me, does he?” he smiled, and he saw her stiffen.

“Mr. Steele has no voice in my plans,” she said, “and I have not seen him for several days.”

So there had been a quarrel, thought Digby, and decided that he must know a little more of this. He was too wily to ask her point-blank, but the fact that they had not met on the previous day was known to him.

Eunice was glad to get the interview over and to go up to Mrs. Groat, who had sent for her a little earlier.

The old woman was in bed propped up with pillows, and apparently was her normal self again.

“You’ve been a long time,” she grumbled.

“I had to see your son, Mrs. Groat,” said Eunice.

The old woman muttered something under her breath.

“Shut the door and lock it,” she said. “Have you got your notebook?”

Eunice pulled up a chair to the bedside, and wondered what was the important epistle that Mrs. Groat had decided to dictate. Usually she hated writing letters except with her own hand, and the reason for her summons had taken the girl by surprise.

“I want you to write in my name to Mary Weatherwale. Write that down.” Old Mrs. Groat spelt the name. “The address is in Somerset-Hill Farm, Retherley, Somerset. Now say to her that I am very ill, and that I hope she will forgive our old quarrel and will come up and stay with me—underline that I am very ill,” said Jane Groat emphatically. “Tell her that I will pay her expenses and give her Ł5 a week. Is that too much?” she asked. “No, don’t put the salary at all. I’ll be bound she’ll come; they’re poorly on, the Weatherwales. Tell her she must come at once. Underline that, too.”

The girl scribbled down her instructions.

“Now listen, Miss Weldon.” Jane Groat lowered her voice. “You are to write this letter, and not to let my son know that you have done it: do you understand? Post it yourself; don’t give it to that horrible Jackson. And again I tell you not to let my son know.”

Eunice wondered what was the reason for the mystery, but she carried out the old woman’s instructions, and posted the letter without Digby’s knowledge.