Fred M. White

“ You have been made the victim of a vile conspiracy. For seven years your career has been blighted. And I have lost seven years of my life, too. Have you any idea who your enemy is?"
"Not the faintest, but, believe me, I shall find out in time. And then—-"
A purple blackness like the lurid light of a storm flashed into his eyes, the lines of his mouth grew rigid. Enid laid a hand tenderly on his arm.
"Your enemy is the common enemy of us all," she said. "We have wasted the years, but we are young yet. Your enemy is Reginald Henson."
"Enid, you speak with conviction. ”

“ The same plain, handsome, expensive furniture was here, the same mahogany and engravings, the same dull red walls, with the same light stain over the fire-place—a dull, prosperous, square-toed-looking place. The electric fittings looked a little different, but that might have been fancy. It was the identical room. David had run his quarry to earth, and he began to feel his spirits rising. Doubtless he could scheme some way out of the difficulty and spare his phantom friends at the same time. ”

“ The Moorish clock in its frame of celebrities droned the quarter after twelve; the scent of the Dijon roses floated in from the conservatory.
"I have told nobody as yet," Steel said, hoarsely. "Who in the name of
Heaven are you?"
"That in good time. But I did not think you were a coward."
"No man has ever told me so—face to face."
"Good again. I recognise the fighting ring in your voice. If you lack certain phases of moral courage, you are a man of pluck and resource. Now, somebody who is very dear to me is at present in Brighton, not very far from your own house. ”

“ Bell whispered to David. "There will be very little blood. I like to have a man with me who has coolness and courage. Oh, here is the spot. Feel the depression of the skull, Heritage. That is where the pressure lies, and no larger than a pea."
Heritage nodded, without reply. He took up the knife, there was a flash of steel in the brilliant light and a sudden splash of blood. There was a scrape, scrape that jolted horribly on David's nerves, followed by a convulsive movement of Van Sneck's body. ”

“ Look at those colours blending—"
"Hang those colours," said Bell, vigorously. "Steel, there is nothing like moisture to bring out the full fragrance of flowers. Turn on your hose and give your plants a good watering."
"It's the proper time," David laughed. "Turn on the tap for me."
A cooling stream played on the flowers; plants dropped their heads filled with the diamond moisture; the whole atmosphere was filled with the odour of moist earth. Then the air seemed laden with the mingled scent.
"I can smell the soil," Van Sneck cried. "How good it is to smell anything again! ”

“ To be constantly on the treadmill, to be in the grasp of a pitiless scoundrel. At first you fight against it passionately, with a longing to be doing something, and gradually you give way to despair. And now the weight is off my shoulders, and I am free to act. Fancy the reward of finding Reginald Henson out!"
"Reginald Henson is the blight upon your house. In what way?"
"Ah, I cannot tell you. It is a secret that we never discuss even among ourselves. But he has the power over us, he has blighted all our lives. ”

“ Chris rose with a shudder.
"And if the wretch offers to touch me," she moaned, "If he does—"
"He will not. He dare not. Heaven help him if he tries any experiment of that kind. If he does, Rollo will kill him to a certainty."
"Ah, I had forgotten the faithful dog. Those dogs are more useful to us than a score of men. I will step by the back way and through my dressing-room. Oh, Enid, how glad I shall be to find myself outside the walls of this dreadful house!" ”

“ It pains me to say so, but I am afraid that I cannot contravert your suggestion that Bell is a scoundrel. It grieves me to prove any man that. And in the present instance the proofs were overpowering. But there is always a chance—a chance that we have misjudged a man on false evidence."
"False evidence! Why, the Rembrandt was actually found in Bell's portmanteau."
"Dear friend, I know it," Henson said, with the same slow, forgiving smile. "But there have been cases of black treachery, dark conspiracies that one abhors. And Bell might have made some stupendous discovery regarding his character. ”

“ There are few more beautiful places in England than Littimer Castle. The house stood on a kind of natural plateau with many woods behind, a trout stream ran clean past the big flight of steps leading to the hall, below were terrace after terrace of hanging gardens, and to the left a sloping, ragged drop of 200ft into the sea. To the right lay a magnificently-timbered park, with a herd of real wild deer—perhaps the only herd of this kind in the country. ”

“ Littimer rose to his feet. A sudden anger flared into his eyes. He was a smaller man than Henson, but the latter cowed before him.
"You dog!" he cried. "What greater scandal than that of the past few years? Does not all the world know that there is, or has been, some heavy cloud over the family honour? Lord and Lady Littimer have parted, and her ladyship has gone away. That is only part of what the gossips have said. And in these domestic differences it is always the woman who suffers. Everybody always says that the woman has done something wrong. For years my wife has been under this stigma. ”

“ Enid slipped past him into the bushes and gave a faint click of her lips. Something moved and whined, and two dark objects bounded towards her. She caught them together by their collars and cuffed them soundly. Then she led the way back so as to get on Henson's tracks.
He was walking on ahead of her now, beating time softly to the music of the faintly distant song with his cigar. Enid could distinctly see the sweep of the red circle.
"Hold him, Dan," she whispered. "Watch, Prance; watch, boy."
There was a low growl as the hounds found the scent and dashed forward. ”

“ Henson said, quite stoically, "my visitor will have some champagne."
She seemed to have dropped once again into the commonplace, painfully exact as a hostess of breeding must be to an unwelcome guest. And yet she never seemed to see him; those dark eyes were looking, ever looking, into the dark future. The meal proceeded in silence save for an oily sarcasm from Henson. In the dense stillness the occasional howl of a dog could be heard. A slight flush of annoyance crossed Henson's broad face.
"Some day I shall poison all those hounds," he said.
Enid looked up at him swiftly. ”

“ Bell started back. His mute question stung Littimer to the quick.
"You wanted to be cleared," the latter said. "You wanted to befool me again. You come here in some infernally cunning fashion, you steal my picture from the frame and have the matchless audacity to pass it off for a second one. Man alive, if it were earlier I would have you flogged from the house like the ungrateful dog that you are."
Chris checked down the cry that rose to her lips. She saw, as in a flash of lightning, the brilliancy and simplicity and cunning of Henson's latest and most masterly scheme. ”

“ CHAPTER L RAWLINS IS CANDID "So Reginald Henson bullies women," Rawlins said, after a long pause. There was a queer smile on his face; he appeared perfectly at his ease. He did not look in the least like a desperate criminal whom Chris could have driven out of the country by one word to the police. In his perfectly-fitting grey suit he seemed more like a lord of ancient acres than anything else. "It is not a nice thing to bully women." ”

“ There was something charmingly reminiscent about the girl. She was like somebody he had once known and cared for, but for the life of him he could not think who. And when curiosity sometimes got the better of good breeding Chris would baffle him in the most engaging manner.
"Really, you are an exceedingly clever girl," he said.
"In fact, we are both exceedingly clever," Chris replied, coolly. "And yet nobody is ever quite so clever as he imagines himself to be. Do you ever make bad mistakes, Lord Littimer?" ”

“ Reginald Henson sat propped up in his bed, white and exhausted. Beyond doubt he had had a terrible shock and fright, and the droop of his eyelids told of shattered nerves. There was a thick white bandage round his throat, his left shoulder was strapped tightly. He spoke with difficulty.
"Do we feel any better this morning?" Walker asked, cheerfully.
"No, we don't," said Henson, with a total absence of his usual graciousness of manner. "We feel confoundedly weak, and sick, and dizzy. Every time I drop off to sleep I wake with a start and a feeling that that infernal dog is smothering me. ”

“ He closed the door behind him, and immediately Henson sat up in bed. He reached for his handkerchief and wiped the big beads from his forehead.
"So the danger has come at last," he muttered. "I am face to face with it, and I knew I should be. Hatherly Bell is not the man to quietly lie down under a cloud like that. The man has brains, and patience, and indomitable courage. Now, does he suspect that I have any hand in the business? I must see him when my nerves are stronger and try and get at the truth. If he goes to Lord Littimer with that picture he shakes my power and my position perilously. ”

“ She flew along the corridor and gained her room in safety. It was an instant's work to throw off her cloak and compose herself rigidly under the single white sheet. But though she lay still her heart was beating to suffocation as she heard the creak and thud of a heavy step coming up the stairs. Then the door was opened in a stealthy way and Henson came in. He could see the outline of the white figure, and a sigh of satisfaction escaped him. A less suspicious man would have retired at once; a man less engaged upon his task would have seen two great amber eyes close to the floor. ”

“ Bell said, warmly. "Now that she is free to act she has developed wonderfully. Look how cleverly she worked out that Rembrandt business, how utterly she puzzled Henson, and how she helped me to get into Littimer's good books again without Henson even guessing at the reason. And now she has forced the confidence of that rascal Merritt. She has saved him from a gaol into which she might have thrown him at any moment, she has convinced him that she is something exceedingly brilliant in the way of an adventuress, with a great coup ahead. ”

“ The butler behind made him shiver. Hitherto in Merritt's investigations into great houses he had fought particularly shy of butlers and coachmen and upper servants of that kind. The butler's sniff and his cold suggestion as to hock slightly raised Merritt's combative spirit. And the champagne was poor, thin stuff after all. A jorum of gin and water, or a mug of beer, was what Merritt's soul longed for.
And what a lot of plate there was on the table and sideboard! Some of it was gold, too. ”

“ David could hear the quick gasps of his questioner, could catch the rustle of the silken corsage as she breathed.
"Yes," he said, "I can see a brilliant way out that would satisfy the strictest logician. But you—"
"Thank Heaven! Mr. Steel, I am your heroine. I am placed in exactly the same position as the woman whose story you are going to write. The setting is different, the local colouring is not the same, but the same deadly peril menaces me. For the love of Heaven hold out your hand to save a lonely and desperate woman whose only crime is that she is rich and beautiful. ”

“ I am beginning to comprehend the plot of which I am the victim. But I don't mind admitting that up to the present I fail to comprehend why those girls evolved the grotesque scheme for getting assistance at your hands. The whole thing savours of madness."
"I don't think so," David said, thoughtfully. "The girls are romantic as well as clever. They are bound together by the common ties of a common enmity towards a cunning and utterly unscrupulous scoundrel. By the merest accident in the world they discovered that I am in a position to afford them valuable advice and assistance. ”

“ Bell broke in eagerly, "they failed in that respect at the very outset. You must have been spotted instantly by the foe, who has cunningly placed you in a dangerous position, perhaps as a warning to mind your own business in future. And if those girls come forward to save you—and to do so they must appear in public, mind you—they are bound to give away the whole thing. Mark the beautiful cunning of it. My word, we have a foe worthy of our steel to meet." ”

“ Ethel [Updater's note: Enid?] shuddered slightly as she followed the direction of the extended forefinger.
"But you must try," she whispered. "It is for the good of the family, for the recovery of the secret. Reginald Henson is sly and cruel and clever. But we have one on our side now who is far more clever. And, unless I can get away to-night without that man knowing, the chance may be lost for ever. Come!" ”

“ He was pacing down the garden in the direction of the drive. Did the man know anything? Enid wondered. He had so diabolically cunning a brain. He seemed to find out everything, and to read others before they had made up their minds for themselves.
The cigar seemed to dance like a mocking sprite into the bushes. Usually the man avoided those bushes. If Reginald Henson was afraid of one thing it was of the dogs. ”

“ You come here with a roll of paper in your possession purporting to be a second copy of my famous print. All the time you knew it to be mine—mine, stolen an hour or two ago and passed instantly to you. Could audacity go farther? And then you ask me to believe that you came down from town with a second engraving in your possession."
"As I hope to be saved, I swear it!" Bell cried.
"Of course you do. A man with your temerity would swear anything. Credulous as I may be, I am not credulous enough to believe that my picture would be stolen again at the very time that you found yours." ”

“ Rest assured that we learnt nothing in Brighton. Presently you may gather why I am so deeply interested in you; I have been for the past fortnight. You see, we were not quite certain that you would come to our assistance unless we could find some means of coercing you. Then we go to one of the smartest inquiry agents in the world and say: 'Tell us all about Mr. David Steel without delay. Money is no object.' In less than a week we know all about Beckstein. We leave matters till the last moment. ”