The Dark House at Highgate

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10699, 21 August 1912, Page 2

The Dark House at Highgate

OUR SERIAL.)

CHAPTER XXV.—(Continued.)

"I never thought it would comn to this." 1 began quivtly. "when f met you at that, little imi in the country. ' You to Id mo, .1 remember, that your business was to heal the sick. How you have come to substitute for that tin coward o ft he prisoner T can't even guess; l>ut F think the ehangcin you must have been gradual and that even now your employment goes against the grain," He stared at me with glassy eyes, hut said nothing. I would not plead for my life—it never occurred to me to do that—but 1 felt bound to keep on talking.

' "it goes against the grain." T rerouted, "because cruelty is not nat- ' urally a your nature. Do von know T have-"often felt that T could have liked you if things had happened differently. Once,l think, you were a good fellow, an ambitious, generousminded boy " He winced., but was silent .still. Had he some vision at that moment of a young soldier, clean if purpose, full of enthusiam. marching away from a New England to fight and bleed under Grant? For lie had mentioned, on the night when he had brought me out to dine at Highgato, that as a lad he had fought on the side of the victorious North and had been wounded during the Civil War.

"You 'must have altered sadly," I continued, "since you shouldered a rifle and -.vent off to fight for a cause you believed to be right. I don't think you would have stopped at assassination, then, when you marched with 'the boys' and joined in your wonderful battle hymn—how does it it goP—'Mine eves have seen the glory' " By accident, it seemed I had touch the right key, and stirred up poignant, memories of days of high purpose and heart-kindling deeds,, for his face was white, his forehead beaded, and his hands clutched at the cloth. "Stop!" he gasped; and then, "Give me water." But 1 had nothing to offer him except the wine- that ho himself had converted into a lethal draft, and he could not touch that.

Ho i'OSO slowly } ; m( i 1 could see that he was very ill'. He swayed against the table, and the candle fell from its scone and wo were in darkness. I heard him groan and ask to be taken to ctio air, and, forgetting for the moment all antagonism, I went quickly round the table, caught bim by the waist, and led mm to tiie sofa, which was near the open window. He sank into it heavily, as helpless for the time being as an infant. Then lie must have swooned.

There could lie no doubt that lie had driven himself too last lor many years ; he had grown soft, too, for want ot proper exercise, and the sharp excitement of the last few minutes, coming after a period of intense mental strain, had been, too much for imu. And so, for the present, my enemy lay silent and inert in the darkness. Now'was my time for action, and a delirium of hone possessed me. 1 searched his pockets quickly, hut found neither key nor weapon. The door, I remembered, had been locked on the outside by Thompson, and Itimingtou had apparently supposed that he would stand in no need of a pistol. I was again at a deadlock; but while 1 pondered how to make use of what had seemed like a turn of fortune's wheel the key of the door clicked. I groped my way quickly toward the door, keeping against the wall; then I heard it open and knew that some one had come into the room. Then, dimly, 1 saw a man creep past me.

<<S—sh!" lie whispered. '"S—r-.h! Is it all over, doctor?" I felt the skin of my scalp creep as Thompson put this terribly signigcant question. "Thought I'd better come to make sure, doctor, as you was in two minds about it," lie continued, speaking aloud, but in a subdued voice. "Where is he?" T ~ I hesitated. "On the sofa," I whispered. Then I was outside the room, noiselessly turning the key upon my enemies. I was going back —could itbe possible? —to Anno, to happiness, to the living world.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE LAST PERIL

I found myself in the dark passage. With my hands outspread before mc I hurried up it till I ran into the baizecovered door and on the stairs.

* I stumbled up the uncarpeted stairs, and this time the heavy door at the head of the staircase was unlocked. 1 had my hand on the latch of when a shriek of blood-curdling horror came up to nie from below, muffled behind doors, but plainly audible. It was instantly succeeded by a sound of furious hammering, and 1 knew that the wry-necked scoundrel who had asked so callously whether it was all over with me had discovered that ho was a prisoner.

With a gulping laugh of triumph I opened the door before mo and passed into the hall, locking the door and keeping the key; but I could not shut out the sound of that frantic hammering.

The door of the drawing-room was

BY DERWENT MIALL A thor of "Lady Rosalie's Leg acy," "Bellamy's Warning," "The Strange Case -i Vincent Hume," "in. the Web. " Etc Etc.

(To he Continued.)

| half open, and something— curiosity, | perhaps— prompted me to look into itlie long, ill-lighted apartment. | At the fur end of it Madame Claude i stood at the. window, with her back i tiirmnl to me. She heard me, though f (mi to red quiet! v.

"Well," she said,- "you have not blundered this time?" It cost her some effort, I think, to keep Jier voice stead v.

"T mado no reply. She thought, nf course, that Rimitigton had come'in, but she seemed afraid to turn and face him, and no wonder, considering upon what errand he had gone from her presence half an hour since. She mistook my silence for emotion, no doubt.

"It had to be done." she continued, in a low voice, "and if you had shrunk from it you know it would have meant ruin for v.s a!!."

"J said nothing, but advanced noiselessly toward her.

J "You showed mo how I misrJit revenge myself upon that hateful race —upon the whole 'world, for that matter," she went on, "and when the plan was perfect it would have heon madness to let one scruple wreck it all. What did your favourite, Napoleon, say—'one must break a few eggs to make an omelet.' Tut! I think I am more of a man than you are, Doctor Rimington." I moved nearer; I was close upon • her when she turned. And then, when at last she faced mo, her eyes reminded me of something I had seen ! before, something that it was terrible to see —a glimpse into a soul stricken with unspeakable fear. She put her hands to her throat and gave a stilled scream,, cowering back against the dark window curtins. With my pale and unshaven face I dare say I looked like an apparition, and the muffled, intermittent knocking below, sounding , louder and louder, till the gloomy house seemed shuddering with horror, may have warned her at the same moment of her peril and defeat. What the woman had been scheming I knew not, but certainly in so far as her scheme involved my destruction it had failed.

A light footstep, a musical voice at the door, and I looked round to see Cecile enter the room. She was palo and startled, of all that had been happening bolowstairs.

"What is it?" she asked with her pretty foreign accent. "What is happening in the house to-night?" Then she recognised me and came forward.

"Mr Rycroft? I did not hear you come in," she said, in great astonishment, and holding ont her hand. At the clasp of her hand I seemed to come back out of a world where ordinary convention were a dead letter, tvhore every one was swayed by unaccountable passions, and to be once more in touch with sanity and properly ordered life.

"You may well ask. mademoiselle," I said, "what is happening in this house. Very strange tilings indeed have been happening, hut for a full explanation of them I must refer you to your'mother. J may say, however, that ,'!' have- boon a. prisoner hero for many days." "Here:-"' she asked blankly. "Where?" "Downstairs, -where I Lave fust had the pleasure of locking up my jailers. You can hear them now." I could not resist glancing, with a laugh, at Madame Claude. And for tl?at exhibition of triumph I very nearly paid with my life. I had turnde again to Ceeile when to my amazement, the girl'flashed past me, and the next moment T saw her holding one of Madame Claude's wrists in her both hands, and her oivit arm streakfd with blood. A poignard, adapted for use as a paper nife—but a deadly weapon, nevertheless, for the point was sharp —dropped from inadame's hand. Ceeile had nrcvented her from striking me in the back with it , having seen her snatch it up from a side tabic near the window. "What does it all mean?" panted Ceeile. frightened, hurt, and bewilderdered.

I placed myself between them and hurriedly bandaged the .scratched i.rm with a handkerchief.

"It means, mademoisoilo," T said, "as you see. -Hut y.v::r mother wov'A rather T were dead than nllvc; and I can't nido from yon any longer what I would much t a titer you did not know — that sh.? ha? boon plotr'rg against my iifo " "She is no moiYv to -hk,"cried Ceeile passionately, and I «uppos>' v .! she was speaking rhetorically till she added: "Tn an unhappy hour my father married her— to his sorrow and mine. Tt is my stepmother who stands there, hating me for what T have just done, as she ahvays hated me."

"Then that relieves me of my last scruple at acting as I am obliged to act," I said. "If you have, a cab whistle, may I ling yon to go to the front door and Mow it as loudly as you can till a policeman comes." "I am so frightened, hut T will do it,"Cecilo replied. I think the next few minutes were among the most uncomfortable T have ever spent in mv life.