"Is it me that should be running for it? Not if I know it; brandy, I like that!"

"Then leave the room," I exclaimed imperatively; and with that she went off, banging the door behind her, and I was alone with the man and his jewels. I think it was the strangest situation I have ever known. Some thousands of pounds' worth of gems lay scattered upon the coverlet, upon the sheets, and even upon the carpet. Ladd himself lay like the figure upon a tomb, white and motionless; there was only the light of a common paraffin lamp; and three parts of the room lay in darkness. My first thought was for the man's life, and remembering that I had a flask in my pocket, I forced brandy between his clenched teeth, and laid him flat upon his back. In a few moments there was a perceptible, though very quick beat of his pulse, and after that, when he had taken more of the spirit, he opened his eyes, and endeavored to raise himself; but I forbade him roughly, and gathering up his gems I bundled them in the greater safe, and turned the key upon them. He however, watched me with glazing eyes, scarce being able, for lack of strength, to utter a word; but he motioned for me to give him the key, and this he placed under the pillow of his bed, and fell presently into a gentle sleep, which was of good omen.

I should mention that it was now full dark outside, and, as I judged, about the hour of ten. I had got the man's jewels into his safe for him, and he was sleeping; but where the bewitching little hussy was I did not know; or what was the value of the old man's fears about his nephew.

It was clear to me, however, that he had been robbed, probably by the immediate agency of the girl who acted as his servant; and it was equally obvious that I had no alternative but to stay by him, even if prospect of probable business in the future had not moved me to do so.

An inspection of his room by the flickering light of the lamp disclosed to me a small dressing-room leading from it, this containing a sofa; and when I had quite a.s.sured myself that my patient, as I chose to regard him, slept easily, and that his pulse was no longer intermittent nor faint, I took my boots off and lay down upon the hard horsehair antiquity which was to serve me for bed. Strange to say, in half an hour I fell into a dreamless sleep, for I was heavy with fatigue, and had walked many hours upon the Kennett's bank; but when I awoke, the room was utterly dark, and the screams of a dying man rang in my ears.

In moments of emergency one's individuality a.s.serts itself in curious actions. I am somewhat stolid, and a poor subject for panics, and I remember on this particular occasion that my first act was to draw on my boots with deliberation, and even to turn in the tags carefully before I struck a match, and got a sight of the scene which I remember so well though many months have pa.s.sed since its happening. When I had light, I found Ladd standing by the door of his large safe, which was open, but there was a deep crimson stain upon his shirt, and he no longer had the voice to scream. In fact, he was dying then; and presently he fell p.r.o.ne with a deep gasp, and I knew that he was dead. In the same instant a black shadow, as of a man, pa.s.sed between me and the flicker of the light; and as the match went out the door of the chamber swung upon its hinges, and the a.s.sa.s.sin pa.s.sed from the room.

Now, Ladd had scarce fallen before I was in the dark pa.s.sage, listening with great tension of the ear for a sound of the hiding man's footstep.

But the place was as still as the grave; and then there came upon me the horrid thought that the fellow lurked with me about the room's door, and presently would serve me as he had served the other. Cold with fear at the possibility, I struck a match, and advanced along the pa.s.sage, using half a box of lucifers in the attempt. At the corner I came suddenly upon a cranny; and as the light died away, two gleaming eyes shot up glances to mine, and a man sprang out flashing a blade in the air, but rushing past me, and fleeing like the wind towards the southern wing--the unfinished one. So swift did he go that I saw nothing of his face, and it seemed scarce a moment before I heard a door open, and another great cry, followed by a splashing of water and utter silence.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Two gleaming eyes shot up glances to mine."

--_Page 179_]

This second cry took, I think, what little nerve I had left; and while the echo of it was still in the pa.s.sages my last match went out. The place was now black with unbroken darkness; every step that I took appeared to reach mysterious stairs and to send me staggering; but at last a sudden patch of moonlight from a corner encouraged me to go on, and I reached the spot where the man had disappeared. At that point a door creaked and banged upon its hinges, but the white light coming through it saved me from the fate of him who had gone before. It showed me at a glance that the door was built in a side of the unfinished wall of the wing, and that the man, who evidently had mistaken it for the entrance to the back staircase, which I saw a few feet farther on, had crashed down fifty feet into the moat below, carrying, as I supposed, his plunder in his hands. Then I knew the meaning of the gurgling cry and the horrid thud; and terror seemed to strike me to my very marrow.

How I got out of the house I do not know to this day. Thrice I made a circuit of winding corridors only to find myself again before the room where Ladd's body lay in the circle of moonlight which the window focused upon the safe; thrice I reached doors which seemed to give access to the yard; but led only into gloomy shuttered chambers where curious shapes of the yellow rays came through the dusty crevices. At last, however, I reached the frowsy kitchen, and the yard, and stood a minute to breathe the chill night air, and to think what was to be done; whither first to go; to whom to appeal. The whine of a voice from the stable seemed to answer me. I entered the roofless shanty, and there found the dark-eyed girl sitting upon a rotting garden roller, and quivering in every limb. She too was dressed ready to accompany the man who then lay in the moat, I did not doubt; but at the first sight of me she started up with blanched face, and clinging to me she cried,--"Take me away; oh, my G.o.d, take me away from it!" and rather incoherently she muttered that she was innocent, and protested it in a score of phrases.

I saw a flush of dawn-light upon her babyish face as she spoke, and it occurred to me when I was putting the horse to the dog-cart that she was unmistakably pretty, and that her customary occupation was not that of a housemaid. But I only said to her,--

"Keep anything you have to say for the police. I am going to fetch them." And with that I drove off, and the last I saw of my lady showed her as she sat moaning on the straw, her hair tumbling upon her shoulders, and her face buried in her hands.

The trial of this woman, and her acquittal by the jury, are well remembered in Caversham; nor is the mystery of Jabez Ladd's jewels and their disappearance by any means an infrequent topic for alehouses. What became of the precious stones which Arthur Vernon Ladd, the old man's nephew, took from the safe on the night he murdered his uncle, one man alone knows--and that is myself. The people of the town will tell you that the moat was dragged and drained with no result. I myself saw the body of the murderer--the velvet-coated man of Pangbourne; but although at least a couple of thousand pounds worth of jewels were missing from the safe, there was not one of them about him, or to be found upon the _concrete_ bottom of the moat into which he had dropped with the blood of Ladd fresh upon his hands. In vain the police searched the girl--her name was Rachel Peters, she said--and her boxes; equally in vain the old house was ransacked from top to bottom. The thing was a black mystery; it was gossip not only for inns and beerhouses, but for the county. The report of it spread even to America, and to this moment it has remained unsolved.

The jewels being undiscoverable, and Ladd having been murdered to my knowledge by his nephew, the girl, Rachel Peters, was, as I have said, discharged. She returned to the old house for her boxes, and immediately disappeared from the knowledge of the county. Ten months later I saw her dancing on the stage of an opera house in Florida, and she was wearing _five of the seven emeralds_ which Ladd had lost! The spectacle seemed so amazing to me that I sought her out between the acts, and found her as full of _chic_ and _verve_ as a Parisian _soubrette_. Nor did she disguise anything from me, telling me everything over a cigarette with a relish and a sparkle which was astounding to see.

"Yes," said she--but I give her story in plain words, for her way of telling it is not to be written down--"I had known Vernon Ladd for years. I doubt if there was a worse man in Europe; but I was frightened of him, and I entered old Ladd's service at his wish to help him to steal the jewels. We got at the emeralds first, because they were in the small safe; but we didn't know where the keys of the other safe were, and we put two sham emeralds in the case to keep the old boy quiet while we worked. That night you came to the house Vernon Ladd was already inside, concealed behind the old man's bed; and he watched you open the great safe and spread the jewels. The mischief of it was that Ladd woke up five minutes too soon, and caught the boy by the throat--you know what he got for that, for you saw it and you know how Vernon mistook the door, and went down in a hurry. Well, when you'd gone for the police, I ran round to the back of the house, and what should I see but the bag of jewels stuck on a ledge just under the landing window. He'd dropped them as he fell, and there they were lying so plain that one could have seen them a mile off. I just ran up and reached them with my arm, but when I was in the stable again, and thinking of hiding them, I heard you driving up the road, and I slipped the bag in the first thing handy--it was your own fishing creel.

"No, you never found them, did you? just because they were hanging up there plain for every one to see. When the judge discharged me at the Court, I went again to the house to get my box, never thinking to see the stones; but you'd gone away without the creel, and it was the first thing I touched lying in the straw of the stable. You may be sure it didn't lie there long. I'd saved up enough money for a pa.s.sage to the States, and when I got here I started as an actress, as I was before, and I sold the things one by one. These emeralds are all that's left--and if you're a brick, you'll buy them!"

This was her story. She was a clever woman, and having been discharged on the accusation of robbing the dead miser Ladd, could not be sent to her trial again. Her invitation for me to buy the emeralds was tempting.

I had already purchased two from the unhappy lady of Pangbourne, who was married to the velvet-coated Vernon Ladd, and is now living in seclusion in Devonshire. The other five would have made the set of great value.

Ladd had no heirs; it was altogether a nice point. I debated it.

THE PURSUIT OF THE TOPAZ.

THE PURSUIT OF THE TOPAZ.

I was struggling heroically to force my arms through the sleeves of a well-starched shirt, when the man knocked upon the door of my bedroom for the second time. I had heard him faintly five minutes before, when my head was as far in a basin as the limitations of Parisian toilet-ware would allow it to go; but now he knocked imperiously, and when I opened to him he stood hesitatingly with a foolish leer upon his face, and that which he meant for discretion upon his lips.

"Well," said I, "what the devil do you want? Can't you see I'm dressing?"

At this he looked with obvious pity for me towards the basin, but quickly recovered himself.

"Dame," said he, with a fine Gascon accent, "there is a lady waiting for monsieur in the _salon_."

"A lady!" cried I with surprise; "who is she?"

"I am but three days in Paris," replied he, "and she is a stranger to me. If monsieur prefers it, I will ask her some questions."

"You will please do nothing of the sort; did she give her name?"

"I seem to remember that she did, but it has escaped me. I shall say that you are engaged, and will see her to-morrow; monsieur leaves Paris at nine o'clock _hein_?"

He said this with another vulgar leer, but I turned round upon him fiercely, for I had begun to brush what is left of my hair.

"You impudent poltroon!" exclaimed I; "leave the room instantly, and tell the lady that I will be with her in five minutes."

"Ah," said he, "it is like that then? Very good; I shall safeguard your interests; trust in me. May I be permitted to light the candles?"

He said this with a fine eye to the bill; but I sent him away after some display of temper, and finished my dressing quickly, wondering all the time who the woman was, and what she wanted of me. Although I have lived in Paris nigh as much as in London, I have cultivated few acquaintances there other than those arising in the path of business. The domestic side of Parisian life has never appealed to me; I am equally callous to the vaunted attractions of the dismal halls of light and twaddle with which the foreigner usually boasts acquaintance. It was, therefore, not only with profound surprise, but also with a piquant curiosity, that I fell to speculating upon the ident.i.ty of my visitor, and the mission which brought her to me.

At the time of this occurrence I had been in the French capital for one week, being carried there by the announcement of the sale of the Countess Boccalini's jewels. After my usual custom, I had engaged rooms in the little Hotel de Bard, which is almost the neighbor of the Grand Hotel, and had pa.s.sed the week in the haggling and disputation which are the salt of life to a jeweler. The result was the purchase of a superb necklace of brilliants, which subsequently I sold here for nine thousand pounds, and of a quant.i.ty of smaller stones, and of chrysoprase, the gem which is now becoming exceedingly fashionable in London. But on the night of which I am writing, my trading was done, and a ridiculous promise to go to the Opera Ball alone kept me in Paris. How the promise came to be given to my friend Tussal I cannot remember; but he had a.s.sured me that the ball was the event of April, and that my education would remain imperfect until I had gazed upon the spectacle of _calicots_ and _flaneurs_ rioting in the great house which Garnier designed and Delaunay painted. And so pressing was he, and so largely did I trade with him, that I yielded at last to his solicitations, and agreed to accept a seat in his box.

By the terms of his invitation I was to meet him at the Grand Cafe at midnight, and thence was to proceed to the Opera House at half-past twelve. I had determined to dine quietly at my own hotel, and afterwards to spend the intervening hours at the Theatre de la Porte St. Martin; for which purpose I dressed at a comparatively early hour; and dressing, received the stiff-necked Gascon's message that a lady wished to see me.

Yet for what purpose she came, or who she might be, I had not an idea; and I turned over a hundred theories in my mind as I descended to the little reception room of the hotel, and there found her sitting by the uncovered table with a railway guide before her, but obviously agitated, and as obviously pretty.

When looking back upon the extraordinary mystery of which this childish girl was for me the center, I have often remembered that she was one of the few Frenchwomen I have met who had a thoroughly English face. Her skin was white and pink, untouched by that olive tint which is so prevalent in Paris; her eyes were wondrously blue; she had rich brown hair shot with golden tresses, which gave to the whole a magnificent l.u.s.ter; she was entirely free of that restless gesture which is the despair of a man of nerves. As I first saw her, she wore a captivating apology for a bonnet, which seemed to consist of a spray of jet and a hairpin; but her hands were gloved as only a Frenchwoman's hands are, and a long cloak of steel-gray cloth edged with fur, fell about her shoulders, yet permitted one to see an exquisite outline of figure beneath. Indeed, she made a perfect little picture, and her exceeding prettiness lost nothing for the rush of color to her cheeks when I spoke to her.

"I am Bernard Sutton," said I; "if it is possible that I can be of any service to you, the privilege is mine----"

"Thank you, a thousand times," said she, speaking with an accent which added to the charm of her English. "I have heard of you often from Madame Carmalovitch, whose husband owned the famous opal; you were very kind to her----"

"I was exceedingly sorry for her," I replied; "are you a relation of hers?"

"Oh, no!" she exclaimed; "I am Mademoiselle Edile Bernier, and I live with my mother at 32, Rue Boissiere. You will laugh to hear why I come to you. It is about something you alone can advise me upon, and, of course, you will guess it at once."

"I won't waste your time by being ambiguous," said I; "you have come to consult me about some jewels; pray let me see them."

There was no one else in the _salon_ at that time, the few people in the hotel being at dinner. The girl had, therefore, no hesitation in opening a bracelet case, which she had carried under her cloak, and showing me a plain band of gold which served as a mount for a small circle of turquoise and an exceedingly large rose-pink topaz, which possessed all the l.u.s.tre of a diamond. I saw at once that the gem was from Brazil, and was large enough and rich enough to be worth a considerable sum, but I have never known hunger for the topaz myself, and when I had taken one look at the bracelet I handed it back to her.

"It's exceedingly pretty," said I, "and your stones are very good. There is a little green at the base of the larger turquoises, but you will hardly match the topaz in Paris. Are you seeking to know the value of it?"

"I would never ask that," she answered quickly; "it was a gift from my _fiance_, Monsieur Georges Barre, whom you may know by name."

I vow it was very bewitching to watch the rosy blush which suffused her cheek when she made this confession. Yet she spoke with the ring of pride in her voice, and I replied to her encouragingly while she put her treasure beneath her cloak, as though she feared that other eyes than hers should rest even upon the case of it.

"Monsieur Barre is well known to me by name," said I; "his bust of Victor Hugo from last year's salon is at this moment the chief ornament of my library. I must now congratulate him for the second time."