Chapter Thirteen.
Tells of Another Mystery
In the drawing-room a startling scene presented itself.
Lying in a heap across the blue silk-covered sofa lay the figure of the lady whom I had seen from without, seated at the piano, while beside her were the gardener and a scared female servant bending over her, and trying to restore her to consciousness.
A short distance away a second female figure was lying face downwards upon the carpet near the window – a young woman in cap and apron whom I recognised as the maid who had lowered the Venetian blinds. Around her face a long black scarf had been twisted tightly, and she lay there motionless.
“Oh! Mr Taking!” gasped the woman, bending over her mistress, “I’m so glad you’re here. There’s been men in the house!”
“Men!” he cried, amazed. “What’s happened to Mrs Parham?”
“We don’t knew. We’ve sent for the doctor and the perlice.”
“But look at Jane!” he exclaimed, crossing to her. “She’ll be suffocated;” and falling on his knees he quickly untied the slip-knot by which the black scarf – a long narrow one with coloured stripes at the ends like an Italian santuzza – had been secured around the girl’s face.
As we turned her over we saw that her drawn countenance was white to the lips. There was no movement that either of us could discover.
I stood gazing at the startling scene, wondering what had occurred.
Mrs Parham was, I saw, a brown-haired, good-looking young lady of about twenty-six. Her black silk blouse was fastened at the throat by a beautiful diamond brooch – one from her husband’s stock perhaps – but she wore no other ring except the badge of matrimony.
Her eyes were closed, and it appeared as though she had fainted, yet across her left cheek from mouth to ear was a deep livid ridge. A scarf somewhat similar to that used to stifle the cries of the maid had been used upon her.
“Tell us what’s happened?” inquired Laking, eagerly. “Who’s done this?”
The housemaid, turning from her mistress, replied, —
“Jane went to pull down the blinds about three-quarters of an hour ago, and I heard the mistress playing the piano in here. Then she suddenly stopped, but knowing that Jane was here I thought she was talking to her. Then I didn’t think any more about it till I found that the hot water hadn’t been put in the mistress’s bedroom, and that the blinds were still up. I went down to the kitchen, but cook said that Jane was still with the mistress. I said she’d been there a long time, and cook said perhaps she was getting a blowing up. It was ’er night out last night, and she was a half-hour late, and Mrs Parham is very particular, as you know.”
“And didn’t you hear anything?” I asked, surprised.
“Not a sound. It was the quietness of the place that first aroused my suspicion,” said the girl. “I crept along the hall and listened at the door to hear what the mistress was saying to Jane. But there was no sound. Then I went back and told cook, and we thought that they’d both gone upstairs perhaps. Presently I went back and tapped at the door, for it was nearly an hour since Jane had gone into the room. Nobody answered, so I pushed the door open, and there, to my horror, saw ’em both lying on the floor with these black things round their faces.”
“And you rushed out and gave the alarm?”
“I called in Lane, who’d just finished work and was going home. Then we hailed a telegraph boy who was passing and sent him for the doctor and the police. At first we thought the poor mistress was dead, but, you see, she’s still breathing, although very slightly. Look!” she added, holding up the scarf, “there’s a funny smell about it.”
“Chloroform!” declared the gardener, Lane. “I ’ad it when I ’ad my operation in the ’orspital. I know that smell well enough.”
“But what was the motive?” I asked, puzzled, glancing around the room and noticing that beyond a chair having been overturned and an antimacassar lying on the floor there was no sign of disorder.
The electric bell rang sharply, the cook went to answer the door, and a few moments later a constable in uniform entered.
To him I briefly explained the circumstances, without, however, telling him of the strange scene I had witnessed when I halted outside the gate. Then after the housemaid and gardener had told their stories, he bent over the prostrate lady, listening intently.
“She’s still alive, that’s quite certain,” was his remark, then crossing over to the girl he knelt beside her.
He made a cursory examination and shook his head dubiously. Like ourselves, he had doubts whether she still breathed. I had placed my hand upon her heart, but could discover no palpitation. There was a rigidity about the body, too, that caused me to suspect that the scarf had been around her mouth too long, and that she had expired under the effects of the drug.
We explained to the constable that a doctor in the vicinity had been called, and while we awaited his arrival I made a tour of the room with the officer.
It was a beautifully furnished apartment in the Louis Quinze style, with massive gold-framed mirrors and consoles, and furniture in gilt and pale blue, a room which betrayed everywhere the hand of a woman of culture and artistic taste.
Upon the wall was a large velvet-lined frame, on which were a number of beautiful old miniatures, and behind the grand piano stood a huge palm that reached nearly to the ceiling. Suddenly as I advanced to the window, close to where the maid had been lying – for the gardener and the cook’s brother had now lifted her on to a small couch – I noticed that there was a little glass-topped table in which were displayed some fine pieces of antique silver, and standing upon it was a cabinet portrait in a dark red leather frame.
The picture caught my eye and caused me to start. I stood glaring at it in utter bewilderment, scarce believing my own eyes.
Was I mistaken in those features? No. It was the same face – undoubtedly the same face!
The portrait was exactly similar, but somewhat larger, than that which Eric and I had discovered in Winsloe’s kitbag – the picture of the dead unknown!
A sudden suggestion occurred to me to obtain possession of it. It might be of the greatest use to us in establishing the unfortunate man’s identity. I therefore took it up, glanced at it, and in an abstracted manner placed it upon a side table near a curtain, intending later on to transfer it to the pocket of my overcoat – even at the risk of committing the offence of theft. In this I saw no harm. I was seeking to solve a mystery; and surely every mode was fair, now that a man had been done to death.
I recollected Eric’s terrible accusation, and held my breath.
Yes, he was Sybil’s secret lover without a doubt. Those letters were sufficient proof of that.
And yet was it not strange that Mrs Parham should place the portrait in her room in a position so conspicuous?
The constable was as much puzzled as myself regarding the motive of the attack.
My own theory was that there had been two men lurking in the house, and hearing Mrs Parham playing the piano, they managed to enter the room unobserved, for there was a large Japanese screen before the door. An instant afterwards the maid entered, switched on the light, and let down the blinds, but while doing so, the men so suddenly discovered made a bold attack upon both, deftly twisting the scarves about their faces ere either of them could call for assistance.
The maid had evidently been attacked from behind by one of the men concealed at the back of the curtain at the moment when she had lowered the last blind. From this fact I suspected that the girl knew them and they feared recognition.
Yet the reason of that bold, desperate attack was surely an entire mystery.
Subsequent examination showed that they must have entered the front door with a duplicate key, probably almost immediately before, otherwise the gardener or Mrs Parham herself must have seen them approaching the house.
But when they had so successfully silenced both mistress and maid, what had been their next action? That was the mystery.
At first my impulse was to explain what I had seen from the pavement, yet I saw, on due reflection, that it was far better to keep that knowledge to myself, more especially if I could manage to obtain possession of that very valuable piece of evidence, the dead man’s photograph.
Laking went into the other rooms on the ground floor, and switched on the light in all of them, while the constable and myself made a careful examination in order to see whether any robbery had taken place. As far as we could ascertain, however, nothing had been disturbed. No drawer stood open, and although in both dining-room and library were large glass cases filled with valuable antiques, china, enamels, miniatures and old glass, nothing had apparently been touched.
“I wonder if the men are in the ’ouse now?” suggested the maid-servant suddenly, the word “man” being always very expressive in the vocabulary of the kitchen.
“Not likely,” declared the constable. “They’ve gone long ago. I wonder who they were?”
“Perhaps they thought that only Mrs Parham and Jane were at home,” remarked the cook’s brother. “And then, when they found Lane, my sister and Emily they got frightened, and cleared out.”
“Most probably,” was the policeman’s reply. “They were disturbed by something; that’s very evident. They intended to have the silver, because it’s easy got rid of. Perhaps it’s the gang what worked Norwood a couple of months ago. Two of ’em got five years at the Old Bailey last week.”
“They were a desperate pair, whoever they were,” I said. “Men don’t carry scarves like these and chloroform all ready if they don’t mean to do some big piece of business. The affair, whatever it was, must have been well planned.”
“They had their pals outside this house, no doubt. Men like those don’t work without spies watching the house to give alarm.”
His words caused me to ponder.
If one of the gang had been outside, then I had certainly been noted, for I had stood before the gate for quite a minute. I had been noticed, without a doubt! They knew that I had seen that thin, tall figure crossing the room so stealthily!
Perhaps I had quite unintentionally frightened them and prevented them from fully carrying out their object! When I had gone the spy outside might have given the signal which caused them to make their escape.
Now that I recollected, I remembered most distinctly that while I had spoken to the lamplighter, somebody a little distance down the road was whistling gaily a music-hall air.
There was a muffin-man, too, who had suddenly commenced to ring his bell as I had stopped to speak and was balancing his tray upon his head as he passed by us, glancing into my face.
Was he the spy?
I was in the study, discussing the affair with the constable, when the doctor was announced.
I followed him into the drawing-room and noted his surprise when he saw Mrs Parham lying there.
Quickly he made his examination and relieved our minds by declaring that she would before long return to consciousness.
Then he crossed to the maid Jane, placed his hand upon her heart, opened her eyes, felt her hands, and bent the fingers.
For a long time he scrutinised her very carefully, taking up a small mirror and holding it close to her mouth, while we stood anxiously awaiting his verdict.
At last he turned to us, shook his grey head, and said, —
“The poor girl is dead?”
Chapter Fourteen.
Relates what we Discovered
While the doctor occupied himself with restoring the mistress of the house to consciousness, I stood by watching, and then turned to the window abstractedly, and awaiting my opportunity, succeeded in transferring the photograph of the dead unknown to my overcoat pocket.
Suddenly the housemaid, on returning to the room with some water, pointed to a corner, exclaiming, —
“Why? Look there, sir!”
We all glanced in the direction she indicated, and noticed that from the corner of the room the blue carpet had been torn up, and lay back disclosing about a foot of flooring.
Quickly I bent down to examine it, and found to my surprise that one of the boards had been cut across about nine inches from the wainscoting, and was hinged, so that it could be pulled up. There had evidently been a strong fastening which had been forced, for the wood was newly splintered.
After some little difficulty I pulled it up, revealing a small box-like cavity lined with sheet-iron, well designed in order to hide plate or valuables secretly and securely. I placed my hand down, but could feel nothing. It was empty. The men, whoever they were, knew of that secret hiding-place, and had taken whatever it had contained.
I struck a vesta in order to examine the place more closely, and the others grouped eagerly around me, when I distinguished at the bottom of the box a further flap, which I lifted, and saw something concealed in the false bottom. It was a small red morocco jewel-case about four inches square, which I opened very carefully.
Next instant those around me with one breath gave vent to exclamations of surprise and horror. And well they might.
The object which the jewel-case contained was truly startling. I stood staring at it amazed. Since that moment when I had stood with Sybil in the Long Gallery at Ryhall every hour seemed to bring with it some fresh mystery, or some gruesome problem.
That jewel-case contained a most curious and uncommon object, a dark and somewhat shrivelled, but yet well-preserved, human eye!
The doctor, leaving the unconscious woman’s side, took it from me, and putting on his pince-nez examined it long and carefully beneath the light.
It was a horrid thing, the white bloodshot, and the pupil a dark leaden grey.
“It’s a man’s eye,” declared the doctor, after long and very careful scrutiny. “It was removed by somebody unskilled in anatomy, and has been treated with some preservative. There’s mystery here,” he added, looking round at the scared faces of those grouped around him.
“I wonder if the men wanted to get hold of that?” the constable suggested, a theory which Lane and the housemaid at once declared to be a sound one. “At any rate,” he added, “I think I’d better report the affair at the station. They’ll certainly want to make some inquiry about that eye.”
“For the present I’ll take possession of it,” said the doctor, replacing the ghastly-looking little object in the velvet-lined case, and closing it with a snap.
Then he returned to Mrs Parham, who a few minutes afterwards stirred slightly, while her eyelids quivered. It was a good sign, as he pointed out, and ten minutes later the poor lady opened her eyes and looked wonderingly around.
“Remain quiet, madam,” the doctor urged in a gentle voice. “You are not very well.”
“No,” she gasped faintly. “I – I don’t think I – ”
Then her jaws became fixed. She could not conclude the sentence, and lapsed again into unconsciousness.
The constable had sent Lane round to the police station, and an inspector, entering the room, was told what had occurred, and was shown the human eye.
When he saw it he knit his brows. Like ourselves, he scented tragedy, especially as the poor girl Jane was lying dead.
The inspector was also shown the secret cavity beneath the carpet. He examined the windows of all the rooms on the ground floor, made a tour of the exterior of the house, and closely questioned all the servants.
The absence of the master of the house somewhat puzzled him, for the cook explained that Mr Parham returned from the country two days before and remained at home all the afternoon, packed another big travelling bag and left again about seven o’clock, telling his wife that he had to go to Birmingham.
When, a little later, we returned to the drawing-room we found Mrs Parham propped up with pillows and attended by the doctor and the housemaid. She was talking with them, and looked at me inquiringly as I entered with the inspector. She probably took me for a police officer in plain clothes.
“I was sitting at the piano playing when Jane entered and drew down one of the blinds,” she said, in a low voice, speaking with some difficulty. “Then she switched on the light and drew down the other blind. At that instant I heard a movement behind me, and turning I saw a man, but next moment something was slipped over my head and eyes. I struggled and at the same time heard Jane cry out. While my assailant held me tightly I heard Jane struggling, therefore there must have been two men in the room at least. A few moments later I lost consciousness and know nothing else until I found you all here standing around me. What has happened?” she inquired, in a refined voice, looking from the doctor across to me.
“We don’t quite know yet, mum,” answered the police inspector. “It seems as though the men were thieves who being disturbed slipped away.”
“Thieves!” she gasped, open-mouthed. “Have they taken anything?”
“We can’t make out. When you feel a little better you must come round the house with us.”
“They’ve opened a place under the floor, across there,” explained the doctor, pointing to the corner where the carpet was still laid back from the boards.
She raised herself quickly upon her elbow and glanced in the direction indicated, staring straight at the spot with a look of terror in her eyes. No word escaped her lips. Her jaws seemed again fixed, her breath held, her fingers clenched into the palms.
She realised that the secret hiding-place had been discovered.
“What have they taken?” she gasped, in a low, terrified tone, when at last she found tongue.
“Apparently everything,” I replied. “The place is empty.”
“Empty!” she echoed, raising herself to her feet with an effort, but reeling unsteadily back to the couch, for her head was still swimming after the effects of the chloroform. “The fiends!” she cried.
“And poor Jane. How is she?”
“I much regret, madam, that the chloroform administered to her has had a fatal effect,” said the doctor, gravely.
“Dead! Jane dead?”
“Yes. They’ve killed her,” declared the inspector. “It’s wilful murder, that’s what it is, mum. Therefore, if you can give us any information as to who these ruffians may be we’ll be very glad. We must arrest them at all costs. Who do you think they might be?”
But Mrs Parham, although a strange look crossed her white, haggard features, made no response to the officer’s question.
“Poor Jane! Poor Jane – the brutes!” she kept on repeating, her wild eyes staring across to where the body of the dead maid-servant was lying.
From her manner I felt convinced that she suspected who the intruders were, now that she knew that their motive had been to search in that secret cavity beneath the floor of the drawing-room, and possess themselves of something concealed there.
Would she denounce them?
The inspector again questioned her, but her answers were evasive.
“My husband is in the country,” she explained. “He is very often away, for his business often takes him on the Continent, to Paris and Amsterdam.”
“But how do you think these men got into the house?” the officer asked. “I notice that the inner glass door of the hall closes with a latch which can only be opened from the inside. Therefore, if they had entered the front door with a false key they could not have passed the inner door.”
This fact was interesting, and one which I had entirely overlooked.
“I have no idea how they could have entered. Perhaps by a window.”
“Or perhaps by the servants’ entrance,” Lane suggested.
“They couldn’t have got in that way, mum, because they’d have to pass through the kitchen, and cook was there all the time. Besides, we’re always very careful that that door is never left ajar.”
“It’s evident that they were concealed in the house,” I remarked, recollecting that tall shadowy figure that had crossed the room on tip-toe at the instant that the blind had been lowered.
“Of course,” agreed the inspector. “But what we want to know is whether this lady has any suspicion of anyone to whose advantage it would be to obtain possession of what was concealed there.”
“I don’t know what was in there,” she declared, in a weak, nervous voice. “My husband made the place himself a few months ago, as he often has valuable jewellery here. In the City he has a strong room, of course, but here he deemed it best to make a secret hiding-place rather than have a fire-proof safe, which is always discussed by servants, and the knowledge of which in a private house so soon becomes common property.”
“Then he used to keep valuables there?” asked the inspector.
“I believe so, but I never looked inside. It opened with a spring, the secret of which he alone knew.”
“Who made it? The man who constructed it knew the secret, no doubt. He may be one of those implicated.”
“The piece of board with the spring he brought home with him from Paris one day. It was made there, he said. The steel box was made somewhere in Chelsea.”
“And who fitted the board so evenly?”
“He did himself. He is an amateur cabinetmaker, and at one time used to make furniture. He made that table over there,” she added, pointing to a small round table standing near the corner where was the secret cavity.
“Then no workman was actually employed in fitting it up?” remarked the inspector, disappointedly.
“No. He did it himself, so that nobody should know. And he would not even let me know the secret of the spring.”
“Which showed some distrust,” remarked the inspector. “He evidently possessed something there which he did not wish you to see.”
“Yes. That, however, is not surprising,” she remarked. “Many husbands have secrets – family affairs and such like – with which they hesitate to trouble their wives.”
“Certainly,” he said, glancing dubiously at me, and no doubt recollecting that gruesome object now in the doctor’s pocket. “But it seems very strange that thieves should come here so boldly, attack both you and the maid-servant, and go straight to that secret hiding-place if there was not some very strong motive. They evidently knew there was something there – something of which they desired to obtain possession.”
“But they didn’t know the secret of the spring, for they prised it open.”
I placed my hand in my overcoat pocket, and it came in contact with the portrait which I had succeeded in taking – the picture of the dead unknown.
Why had it been kept in such a prominent position in her room? I longed to question her, but at that moment was unable.
The mystery of the murderous attack in which the maid had lost her life; the mystery of that tall, thin man who crept across the apartment; the mystery of the theft; the mystery of the human eye, were all enigmas utterly beyond solution.
I took Laking aside and obtained a promise from him not to explain the circumstances under which we had met. Then to Mrs Parham I introduced myself later as a casual passer-by who had been alarmed by the startling discovery. I did this because I intended to call again and make the acquaintance of her husband.
Half an hour later, after all inquiry of Mrs Parham had failed to elicit a single fact regarding any person who might have a motive for the outrage and robbery, I left the house, and walked down the dark, deserted suburban thoroughfare accompanied by the police inspector, who was on his way back to the station to telegraph the curious facts to Scotland Yard.
“Well?” I asked, when we were out in the roadway, “and what do you make of the affair?”
“What do I think? Why, the lady is lying. She knows who did it, but fears to tell us the truth. There was something hidden under the floor which those people intended to get, and got it. Mark me! She dare not speak, otherwise she’ll ruin her own reputation. When we fathom the mystery of to-night it will be found to be a very interesting one, depend upon it.”
“Then you really suspect her?” I remarked. “Yes, I suspect her. She has some secret from her husband – and she fears that through this robbery he may learn the truth.”
“You know Mr Parham, perhaps – I mean you know something about him?”
“Well, yes,” he answered, smiling curiously. “We happen to know Mr Parham – and if what I suspect is true, then the affair of to-night is not surprising. Wait and see. The real facts, when they come to light, will very probably amaze you.”