Richard Marsh

“ You'd better be careful, Rodney, what you are saying. What do you mean by 'if'?"
"My dear girl, it was only a way of speaking."
"Then don't you speak that way. 'If' it is your child! When you knew me I was innocent, and I'm innocent now except for you. Don't you dare to say if! You know it is your child!"
"My dear girl, of course I know it's my child. You won't let a fellow finish what he is going to say. I was only going to say that the child shall want for nothing; it shall have everything a child can have. So shall you; you'll be much better off than if you were my wife." ”

“ Miss Joyce flounced out of the room. For some moments he sat considering her words. Who told her that he went to Brighton, on the Pullman? Was it a lucky guess? Hardly; probably someone had seen him. People's eyes were everywhere. He would have to be careful what tale he told. It was odd how gingerly one had to walk when one was in a delicate position; there were so many unseen strings over which one might stumble.
As he ate his breakfast he read Stella's letter. It was a girl's first letter to her lover; which is apt to be a wonderful production, as in this case. ”

“ Miss Carmichael sent a cloud of smoke up into the air.
"A girl's position is so different from a man's. I must marry someone, and, so far as I can see, it may as well be Tom."
"Why must you marry someone?"
"Don't be absurd! Can you conceive me as a spinster? Rather than be an old maid I'd--marry you; I can't say anything stronger."
"You've a friendly way of paying compliments."
"My dear young fellow; as a--chum, when I'm in the mood, you're ripping, simply ripping; but as a husband--good Lord, deliver us! ”

“ If that coroner hadn't had a notion in his head when he started, he might have got at the facts as easily as I have."
"And, from what you call the facts, what is the inference you draw? What dreadful charge against me have you been formulating in your mind?"
"Rodney, a wife can't give evidence against her husband in a charge of murder."
"I believe I have heard as much. And then?"
"I'm the only creature in the world who has any suspicion. If you marry me you're safe."
"You, pretending to love me, can marry the sort of man you believe I am?" ”

“ Then, seating himself opposite, he looked his uncle carefully over with an artist's eye for detail. In his present attitude, with that open box with its tell-tale contents held tightly between his stiffened fingers, it seemed to Rodney that a coroner would be bound to instruct his jury that suicide was the only possible explanation of Graham Patterson's death. Having satisfied himself on which point, he withdrew to the opposite end of the carriage, being, in spite of himself, conscious of a feeling that the dead man's too immediate neighbourhood was not a thing to be desired. ”

“ No other man can ever be to me what you have been."
"That's more like the Mabel I know."
"But don't imagine that I'm under any delusion about you; you'll know better by the time I've done. You're the kind of man who's not to be trusted with a girl. You make love to every woman you meet--what you call love! You're entangled with no end of women. I know! I don't know how many think you're going to marry them, but I shouldn't be surprised if Miss Patterson and Miss Austin both think you are. ”

“ I'm alive--very much alive; and I want you to take a particular note of that."
"Do you think I don't know that you're alive?"
Mr. Dale's tone grew suddenly fierce.
"I haven't got Mr. Rodney Elmore's pretty tone, nor his pretty manners, nor his pretty words; but I do care for you." He laughed. "Care for you! Why, I'd eat the dirt you walk on; and you've made me do it more than once. Mabel, if I keep my mouth shut, and get others to keep theirs shut, will you stop treating me as if I were dirt, and treat me as if I were a man?" ”

“ She drew a long breath, as if it were a sigh of pleasure.
"And you really and truly want me to be your wife?"
"As Tom said of Mary--if I get you I get all that I want in the world."
"Then, why didn't you try to get me before?"
"Stella, every man has his own standard. You have money; perhaps one day you'll have more; I have no money; perhaps I never may have. Under those circumstances, though I worshipped the ground you stood on, I had, and have, no right to ask you to be my wife. ”

“ My dearest uncle--you really must permit me to lay stress upon your avuncular relationship on what will probably be my last chance of doing so--you are not going to pull the alarm bell, you are not going to stop the train. You have no more chance of doing either than you have of flying to the moon, so get that into your drink-sodden brain. Nor are you going to libel me to Gladys, nor commit me to the mercy of a ruthless police. ”

“ Obviously an office boy could do what he had to do for five shillings a week. Under the circumstances, the fact that he had acquired such an insight into the ins and outs, the pros and cons, of his uncle's business transactions spoke volumes for his keenness and acumen. He often smiled to himself as he pictured the expression which would come on his uncle's rubicund countenance if he guessed what an intimate knowledge his office boy had of his affairs. Rodney was perfectly aware that the expression would not be one of pleasure ”

“ Between ourselves, Master Elmore is an all-round scoundrel; I swear to you that I'm convinced that no rascality would be too steep for him. He is a liar of the very first water, a thief, and a forger; so much I can prove. I would sooner have my girl dead than his wife; the damned young blackguard is after her for all he knows. But I am going to clear him out in charge of a constable when I get back to the office; I doubt if he has got tight enough hold of my girl to induce her to marry a convict--it will be a clear case of penal servitude for him. ”

“ Why do you take it for granted that anything's wrong?"
"Because I've got two eyes in my head, that's why. She's not the same girl she was; that something's wrong I'm certain sure; but she snaps my nose off directly I open my mouth. I know she thinks a lot of you. I wondered if she'd said anything to you."
"Absolutely nothing."
"Then I can't understand the girl, and that's flat!"
With that somewhat cryptic utterance Mrs. Joyce went out of the room as impetuously as she had entered. Rodney stood looking at the door for a moment or two, as if in doubt whether she would return. ”

“ Stella, emblematic of the domestic virtues; Gladys, for physical pleasure; Mary, suggestive of the arch in the sky, which, though a man may walk for many days, he shall never find the end of. To his thinking she was as many-tinted as a rainbow; as beautiful, as elusive. He doubted if the average man were her husband whether he would have any but the dimmest comprehension of her at the finish; she had a knack of surprising even him. ”

“ Rodney resumed his seat, still keeping his glance fixed on his uncle, in whose demeanour a change seemed to have taken place which was both mental and physical. Possibly his nephew had used more violence than he supposed. The vigour had gone all out of him; inert, he stared at Rodney with bloodshot eyes, as if drink had taken sudden effect and bemused his brain. The young man's smile became more pronounced, as if he found the singularity of the other's appearance amusing. ”

“ Odd, wasn't it?"
"The only thing odd about it, my dear Mabel, is that you should have such a vivid imagination. Both these ladies are old friends of mine."
"Old friends, are they? In what sense? In the sense that I'm an old friend?"
"No one could be nicer than you have been."
"I see. Have they been nice to you like that?"
"My dear Mabel, in what quarter sits the wind? Where's Mrs. Joyce?"
"Mother's out; she's going to stay at aunt's till to-morrow. You and I are alone together."
"Good business! Come and give me a kiss." ”

“ Parker seemed to address his remarks particularly to Rodney:
"You never would have thought that it could be so easy to kill a man, and have it brought in as suicide, would you? When I read the report of the inquest in the papers, I was amazed to find how easy it really was. Then it occurred to me that as, of course, he had been murdered--I knew that--why shouldn't I communicate with the police, after all? No harm would come to me; lunatics are protected by the law. ”

“ On Sunday evening I bolted from my keeper, one Metcalf, in whose charge I have been for six or seven months, and of whom I was tired to extinction--an unclubable fellow who never talks unless he has something to say. I left Brighton station on the 9.10 train. Until the train started I was the sole occupant of a first-class carriage, at which I was not displeased. I had some idea of committing suicide myself. Life, I assure you, has little to offer me. I am just sane enough to know that I never shall be saner. ”

“ She is not quite the ordinary type of girl. When she gave her heart to Rodney Elmore, it was given for ever; although she would probably be the last person in the world to admit it, he has it still. As, she declares, she will never marry save where her heart is, her prospects of remaining Stella Austin are stronger than either her father or her mother care to own. Tom is married; was married within six months of his heart being finally broken--to the girl with the mischievous eyes. And he is happy as a man may be; and he is a man, even up to his father's standard of manhood. ”

“ This is the age of miracles, which, when you look into them, have the simplest natural causes. Seriously, Gladys, there's no reason why, properly handled, the business of which you are now the sole proprietress--because you can easily get rid of Andrews--should not make you rich beyond the dreams of avarice. Wilkes has been quick in taking the hint, hasn't he?"
"I don't like him--I never did. I think I shall like Mr. Parmiter much better."
"I'm sure you will. He's an awfully good sort and as clever as they make them--and straight! He'll make your interests his own." ”

“ Would such an attitude be recognised as proper for a suicide? Would, that is, a doctor--any doctor--be prepared to assert that a man who had killed himself with potassium cyanide might, under the circumstances, quite conceivably die in such an attitude, or assume it after death? To Rodney's supernaturally keen vision there were trifles about his uncle's appearance which scarcely marked this as inevitably a case of suicide. ”

“ After another brief moment of hesitation, with a glance of what was very like reproach towards the lawyer, Andrews quitted the room, with the air of one who was both bewildered and hurt. So soon as he had gone Mr. Wilkes observed:
"Mr. Elmore, you are taking a very great deal upon yourself; you certainly have the courage of youth, but be warned by me, don't take too much. If it is shown that your uncle's depositions are not what you are taking it for granted they are, your position will be rendered more difficult by the attitude you are now taking up." ”

“ You've heard what's happened to my uncle?"
"I remember your telling me you were with an uncle, but I don't know how many uncles you have nor to which of them you're referring."
"I have, or, rather, had, only one uncle, and last night he committed suicide in the Brighton train."
"Great Scott! Whatever for?"
"That's it. I'll tell you in as few words as possible what the position is. He's left a daughter, an only child, who is now an orphan, to whom I'm engaged to be married. To her he was not--well, all that a father might have been; he drank, and he womanised."
"Did he? Nice man!" ”

“ Often a man lives to a ripe old age, ignorant how many women are contained in the one woman he knows best. Then, as if unwittingly, his fingers strayed to the pocket in which were the proceeds of the cheque he had cashed while Gladys, without in the cab, had supposed him to have gone into the bank for his letter-case. ”

“ I'm an example of the inadequacy of the law to protect the public from what I may describe as the lunatic at large. It is not sufficiently recognised that there is an order of dementia which may at any time develop into homicidal mania, and that, therefore, a lunatic, unless he is kept in safe keeping, may kill, with impunity, whom he pleases--as I have done. I have killed Graham Patterson; yet no one may venture to kill me. My life is more sacred than that of a sane man in the eyes of the law."
The inspector looked at the girl significantly. ”

“ I've a list locked up in a drawer at the office the details of which, when they are produced in court, will surprise you. No jury will recommend you to mercy after hearing that, and no judge will listen to them if they do. You'll be sentenced to a long term of imprisonment as sure as you are sitting there. You'll be branded as a felon for the rest of your life. I'll teach you, you thief, to try to associate as an equal with that girl of mine. ”

“ They had not to go far over the slopes before they had left the few people who were up there behind, and were as much alone as if they had the world to themselves. Rodney spread the rug on the grass at the bottom of one of those little hollows shaped like cups which are to be found thereabouts by those who seek. On it they reclined; the gentleman lit a cigar, the lady a cigarette. They were as much at home with each other as either could desire. Their conversation was frankness itself. ”

“ Help!"
As the uncle opened his mouth to cry for aid the nephew caught him by the throat and slipped between his lips the tiny white lozenge which he had taken from the silver box. Then he struck up his jaw with a click and held it shut, so that he could not put it out again. Forcing back his head, he gripped him tight. His uncle was seized with a convulsion which seemed to Rodney as if it must have shaken the carriage. Almost at the same instant it was as if all vitality had gone clean out of him. The nephew was gripping a limp corpse. ”