Grey Mask

CHAPTER XXXVIII

Charles spent the afternoon going through a stack of papers at Thornhill Square. It was about five o’clock when he finished with them and went out by the garden way. It was dusk but not yet dark. The alley-way was much darker than the garden.

When he had shut and locked the door in the wall, he stood for a moment, and then turned to the right instead of to the left. The impulse which made him do this was so slight and undefined that it took no definite shape in his mind. He turned to the right instead of to the left and walked slowly along the alley-way.

On his right were the other gardens of Thornhill Square, on his left the smaller, narrower gardens of George Street. On both sides, brick walls broken at intervals by wooden doors. The slope of the ground hid all but the top stories of the houses on the right; but the George Street houses showed back windows lighted and curtained,

Charles had walked a dozen yards or so before it occurred to him that it was a sentimental desire to look at the Pelhams’ house which had brought him out of his way. That he might have looked at it any day since his return was true; and it was equally true that he had never felt impelled to do so. He discovered the reason now. It was the empty house that drew him, because, empty, it held a thousand memories.

He walked past the bend in the alley and stood where he had often stood waiting for Margaret to slip through the garden door. The house was larger than the others in the street-larger, and older by a hundred years; a square Georgian house with modern additions. The study was an addition, and a hideous one. It jutted out, breaking the square lines, and from it a frightful iron stair descended to the garden. From the alley you could see the French window and the looped spirals of the stair.

Charles had stood a hundred times where he was standing now and watched for the window to open. He watched now with a definite feeling of what a fool he was to stare at an empty house and people it with memories. The dusk was darkening into night; the house was just a black square. He could no longer discern either window or stair, when suddenly the window sprang into view, a brilliant oblong crossed with black lines. It showed for a moment, and then a man pulled down the blind.

The man was Freddy Pelham; and the sight of Freddy sent all those romantic memories back into the past to which they belonged; their place was taken by the practical consideration that here was a most excellent opportunity of tackling Freddy about the whole stupid Grey Mask imbroglio.

Charles tried the garden door, found it open, and walked briskly up the garden path. The iron stair was wet and slippery under foot, the hand-rail coldly insecure-a beastly contraption like seaside lodgings. He rapped on the window, and could have laughed at Freddy Pelham’s scared face when he raised the blind and peered into the darkness- “Probably thinks it’s one of Grey Mask’s little lot.”

Freddy’s relief at recognizing Charles Moray was touching.

“I’m all alone in the house, you see. And I shouldn’t be much use if it came to a rough-and-tumble with a burglar- what? Now there was Hugo Byrne-you remember Hugo- no, he was before your time-his mother was Edith Peace, and his sister married one of the Dunlop-Murrays-no relation of yours of course. Let me see, what was I going to tell you? Oh yes-burglars. Well, poor old Hugo got up in the middle of the night and thought he heard a burglar and-let me see, did I tell you?-he’d got his wife’s uncle down from Scotland staying with them-he married Josephine Campbell, you know. No, no, not Josephine-she was the dark one-Elizabeth Campbell. Yes, I’m sure it was Elizabeth, because she had red hair, and we used to call her Red Liz-behind her back, you know, behind her back. And- where was I? Oh yes-poor old Hugo and the burglar. Of course it turned out to be old Robert Campbell. And he never left them a penny. Rather too bad-what?”

The study was in its usual condition of disorder. How Freddy ever found anything in it was a mystery. He appeared to have been making some slight attempt to clear things up.

“Frightful mess-what? Sit down-sit down. Here, put those photograph albums on the floor. No-perhaps better leave those. This chair now-we can shift these papers. Nothing of importance there-what? Only bills-nothing to break one’s heart over, if some of them did get lost-what?”

He tilted a confused mass of papers on to the floor.

“Thanks, I won’t sit,” said Charles. “I’m afraid I’m interrupting you. Fact is I wanted to ask you about something, and when I saw the light I thought I’d come up and get it over.”

“Well, what can I do for you? I don’t suppose I shall do much more here anyway. I thought I’d try and clear up some of this mess; but I’m off tomorrow, and there’s too much of it-I can’t tackle it. Margaret’s coming up to say good-bye. I telephoned to her place to let her know I’d be here, and she’ll come along as soon as she gets off. That’s why the garden door’s open-she’ll come along that way. Well, well, I shall be glad when I’m off. I don’t like saying good-bye-that’s a fact. Stupid of me, isn’t it?”

He was fidgeting with the litter on the table. There was something pathetic about the aimless movements and the deprecating glances which accompanied them.

Charles felt very sorry for him. He said,

“Oh, I don’t know,” and then, “It was about Margaret I wanted to speak to you.”

Freddy brightened into curiosity.

“About Margaret-what? You don’t mean to say-no, no, of course not-much better let bygones be bygones. I remember Tommy Hadow now-he got engaged to the second Jenkins girl-I can’t for the life of me remember her name-something short. Dot? No. May? No, it wasn’t May.”

“It’s nothing of that sort,” said Charles firmly.

“Well, well, I’m sorry-in a way, I’m sorry. But all the same I don’t know that it does to bring these things on again. It didn’t answer in Tommy’s case. Separated in a year-and that’s worse than a broken engagement. Gwendoline! That was the girl’s name-Gwendoline Jenkins! And her sister married Sam Fortescue.”

“No, it’s nothing of that sort,” said Charles. He thought Freddy vaguer than ever, and did not feel the slightest interest in the Jenkins family. “Look here, Freddy, I really do want to talk to you. Naturally you’ve got Margaret’s interests very much at heart, and I thought perhaps if we put our heads together, we could do something to help her out of her present false position.”

It was incredibly difficult. The words he was using seemed to him of a stilted ineptitude, a sort of cross between the Meanderings of Monty and the platitudes of the Reverend Mr. Barlow.

Freddy looked across the table at him with a curious fluttered expression.

“Charles-you distress me. I don’t think I understand. What’s all this about a false position?” He did not say, “And what has this got to do with you?” but there was just a hint of it in his manner.

Charles plunged on:

“Margaret is certainly in a false position. And look here, Freddy, you’re going abroad-your plans are apparently very uncertain-you may be away for years-anything may happen. I think you’ll agree that Margaret ought not to be left-” He hesitated for a word, and finally produced “involved.”

Freddy rumpled his mouse-coloured hair.

“My dear boy, you distress me very much. Has Margaret been getting into debt? I’ve offered her an allowance, and she won’t take it. I really don’t know why.”

“I wasn’t talking about debts.”

“But you said ‘involved.’ ”

“I didn’t mean debt. I think you must know what I mean”-he looked away for a minute-“in fact you do know. I want you to understand that I know too.” He paused, and added, “Margaret has told me why she broke off her engagement.”

He looked back at Freddy and saw a blank, white face, small eyes peering, hands shaking. “Good Lord, what a blue funk he’s in!” Rather horrible to see poor little Freddy like that-horrible to see anyone in such a ghastly funk. Why, the forehead under the mouse-coloured hair was streaming wet.

Freddy put up one of those shaking hands and pushed the damp hair back.

“What did she tell you?”

Charles repeated what Margaret had told him.

“She said you’d slipped into it when you were a boy. She said the affair was political-but of course you won’t expect me to believe that. I don’t say you didn’t believe it when you were seventeen. I don’t know anything about that, and it doesn’t matter. But you know as well as I do now that this Grey Mask business is just a big criminal organization run for gain.”

Freddy put his head in his hands. The white wet face was hidden, but Charles felt that the terrified eyes still peered at him through the shaking fingers. A little contempt flavoured his pity. No wonder Margaret had had to bear the brunt if this was a sample of how Freddy went to bits in an emergency.

“Look here, Freddy,” he said. Then, with sudden impatience, “For heaven’s sake, man, pull yourself together! Don’t slump like that.”

An inarticulate sound, half sob, half protest, came from behind Freddy’s hands.

Charles walked up and down.

“I don’t want to reproach you-I’m not going to reproach you; but you must see that it’s up to you to try to get Margaret out of the mess you got her into. You can’t just go off abroad and leave her to it.”

Another sound. Charles made nothing of it.

“Of course she was an absolute fool to sign anything. She told me she put her name to two statements, both highly damaging. Those statements must be got back. That’s really what I’ve come to talk to you about. When people are on the wrong side of the law like this Grey Mask crowd, there must be ways of doing a deal with them. That’s where you come in. You know them-you’re in touch with them- you’re in a position to-”

Freddy dropped his hands.

“You don’t understand. I can’t do anything.”

“Something’s got to be done.”

Freddy leaned back, his hands on his knees, his whole figure limp.

“You don’t know them. You must forgive me-Charles, it was such a shock-to find that you had any knowledge of-” He spoke in a series of jerks, and at the end of each short sentence his voice was almost gone.

“I suppose it was. I want you to understand my position. I’m concerned for two people. Margaret’s one of them, and Greta Wilson is the other. I’m very deeply concerned for Greta, because I believe she is in a very dangerous position; and I’m so placed that I can’t do what I ought to do to protect Greta without running the risk of finding that Margaret is involved.”

“What do you mean?” said Freddy Pelham.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it? Unless we can get back those two statements which you got Margaret to sign, I can’t put Greta under police protection. You heard her story about being followed by a strange car. I believe she was within an ace of being carried off then, just as I believe she was within an ace of slipping to her death under the bus last night. You know she was pushed. Do you know who pushed her?”

Freddy stiffened; everything about him seemed to go rigid. The effect was one of extreme terror, of a creature in a trap with every muscle tense-waiting.

Charles looked at him with something like horror.

“Freddy! For heaven’s sake, don’t say you knew!”

Freddy shook his head. The tension relaxed. He said faintly,

“It was a shock”; and then, “She slipped.”

“She slipped because she was pushed. I mean to know who pushed her. I mean to bring the whole damned crowd to justice. And I want you to help me. For Margaret’s sake-for your own sake-I want you to help me. I don’t ask you to appear in the matter at all. You can go off abroad tomorrow and be out of it all. If you’re wise, you’ll keep out of it. I want to know who’s got those statements of Margaret’s.”

“Grey Mask,” said Freddy with a shudder.

“Who is Grey Mask?”

Freddy shuddered again.

“No-one-knows.”

“Don’t you know?”

Again that curious rigidity, that fixed stare of fear.

“Freddy, pull yourself together! I’m not asking for anything that will compromise you-I only want your help for Margaret. I can’t work in the dark. Give me a hint of whom to approach.”

“I can’t tell you anything.”

“Look here, Freddy, you’re forcing my hand. If you don’t help-if you won’t help me, I shall have to take my own way. I shall have to take it more or less in the dark. Margaret may suffer-you yourself may suffer. Don’t you see that the minute I move I may pull the whole thing down? If you’ll help me, I believe we can get Margaret out, and I swear I’ll do my best for you. But if I have to go on without knowing where I am, it may very easily mean the worst kind of smash.”

Freddy sat silent.

“You see you force my hand. I can’t delay any longer. I can go to the police and tell them what I know, or”-he spoke very slowly and deliberately-“I can go to Pullen and try to do a deal with him.”

Freddy Pelham started forward. His left hand gripped the table leg; his right fell fumbling on the handle of a drawer.

“Who’s-Pullen?”

Charles laughed angrily.

“Don’t you know? I think you do. Well? Are you going to help me? Or am I to try Pullen or-Lenny Morrison?”

Freddy’s mouth opened, but for a moment no sound came. Then in a whisper, he began to say “Go”; and having brought the word out once, it seemed as if he could not stop saying it:

“Go-go-go-”

Charles walked to the door. The scene had become as useless as it was painful. He walked to the door, and with his hand already on the knob, he turned.

He saw the untidy littered room. He saw the untidy littered table. And he saw Freddy Pelham with an automatic in his hand. He saw Freddy’s face, different, quite hard, quite cool. He saw Freddy’s eyes, the eyes of a stranger. And he saw all these things in a flashing moment that could not be counted as time. It had the instantaneous character of thought. And before the next second followed, two things happened simultaneously-Freddy Pelham fired, and Charles ducked. He heard the shot as a muffled sound that passed into the ringing of a thousand bells. He plunged down into darkness.