"You are, not unnaturally, overlooking some of the circ.u.mstances that affect Miss Bellingham; but I don't suppose she has failed to grasp their meaning. Do you realize what her position really is? I mean with regard to her uncle's disappearance?"

"I don't think I quite understand you."

"Well, there is no use in blinking the facts," said Thornd.y.k.e. "The position is this: if John Bellingham ever went to his brother's house at Woodford, it is nearly certain that he went there after his visit to Hurst. Mind, I say '_if_ he went'; I don't say that I believe he did.

But it is stated that he appears to have gone there; and if he did go, he was never seen alive afterward. Now, he did not go in at the front door. No one saw him enter the house. But there was a back gate, which John Bellingham knew, and which had a bell which rang in the library. And you will remember that, when Hurst and Jellicoe called, Mr. Bellingham had only just come in. Previous to that time Miss Bellingham had been alone in the library; that is to say, she was alone in the library at the very time when John Bellingham is said to have made his visit. That is the position, Berkeley. Nothing pointed has been said up to the present. But, sooner or later, if John Bellingham is not found, dead or alive, the question will be opened. Then it is certain that Hurst, in self-defense, will make the most of any facts that may transfer suspicion from him to some one else. And that some one else will be Miss Bellingham."

I sat for some moments literally paralyzed with horror. Then my dismay gave place to indignation. "But d.a.m.n it!" I exclaimed, starting up--"I beg your pardon--but could anyone have the infernal audacity to insinuate that that gentle, refined lady murdered her uncle?"

"That is what will be hinted, if not plainly a.s.serted; and she knows it. And that being so, is it difficult to understand why she should refuse to allow you to be publicly a.s.sociated with her? To run the risk of dragging your honorable name into the sordid transactions of the police-court or the Old Bailey? To invest it, perhaps, with a dreadful notoriety?"

"Oh, don't! for G.o.d's sake! It is too horrible! Not that I would care for myself. I would be proud to share her martyrdom of ignominy, if it had to be; but it is the sacrilege, the blasphemy of even thinking of her in such terms that enrages me."

"Yes," said Thornd.y.k.e; "I understand and sympathize with you. Indeed, I share your righteous indignation at this dastardly affair. So you mustn't think me brutal for putting the case so plainly."

"I don't. You have only shown me the danger that I was fool enough not to see. But you seem to imply that this hideous position has been brought about deliberately."

"Certainly I do! This is no chance affair. Either the appearances indicate the real events--which I am sure they do not--or they have been created of a set purpose to lead to false conclusions. But the circ.u.mstances convince me that there has been a deliberate plot; and I am waiting--in no spirit of Christian patience, I can tell you--to lay my hand on the wretch who has done this."

"What are you waiting for?" I asked.

"I am waiting for the inevitable," he replied; "for the false move that the most artful criminal invariably makes. At present he is lying low; but presently he will make a move, and then I shall have him."

"But he may go on lying low. What will you do then?"

"Yes, that is the danger. We may have to deal with the perfect villain who knows when to leave well alone. I have never met him, but he may exist, nevertheless."

"And then we should have to stand by and see our friends go under."

"Perhaps," said Thornd.y.k.e; and we both subsided into gloomy and silent reflection.

The place was peaceful and quiet, as only a backwater of London can be.

Occasional hoots from far-away tugs and steamers told of the busy life down below in the crowded Pool. A faint hum of traffic was borne in from the streets outside the precincts, and the shrill voices of newspaper boys came in unceasing chorus from the direction of Carmelite Street. They were too far away to be physically disturbing, but the excited yells, toned down as they were by distance, nevertheless stirred the very marrow in my bones, so dreadfully suggestive were they of those possibilities of the future at which Thornd.y.k.e had hinted.

They seemed like the sinister shadows of coming misfortunes.

Perhaps they called up the same a.s.sociation of ideas in Thornd.y.k.e's mind, for he remarked presently:

"The newsvendor is abroad to-night like a bird of ill-omen. Something unusual has happened; some public or private calamity, most likely, and these yelling ghouls are out to feast on the remains. The newspaper men have a good deal in common with the carrion-birds that hover over a battle-field."

Again we subsided into silence and reflection. Then, after an interval, I asked:

"Would it be possible for me to help in any way in this investigation of yours?"

"That is exactly what I have been asking myself," replied Thornd.y.k.e.

"It would be right and proper that you should, and I think you might."

"How?" I asked eagerly.

"I can't say offhand; but Jervis will be going away for his holiday almost at once--in fact, he will go off actual duty to-night. There is very little doing; the long vacation is close upon us, and I can do without him. But if you would care to come down here and take his place, you would be very useful to me; and if there should be anything to be done in the Bellinghams' case, I am sure you would make up in enthusiasm for any deficiency in experience."

"I couldn't really take Jervis's place," said I, "but if you would let me help you in any way it would be a great kindness. I would rather clean your boots than be out of it altogether."

"Very well. Let us leave it that you come here as soon as Barnard has done with you. You can have Jervis's room, which he doesn't often use nowadays, and you will be more happy here than elsewhere, I know. I may as well give you my latch-key now. I have a duplicate upstairs, and you understand that my chambers are yours too from this moment."

He handed me the latch-key and I thanked him warmly from my heart, for I felt sure that the suggestion was made, not for any use that I should be to him, but for my own peace of mind. I had hardly finished speaking when a quick step on the paved walk caught my ear.

"Here is Jervis," said Thornd.y.k.e. "We will let him know that there is a loc.u.m tenens ready to step into his shoes when he wants to be off."

He flashed the lantern across the path, and a few moments later his junior stepped up briskly with a bundle of newspapers tucked under his arm.

It struck me that Jervis looked at me a little queerly when he recognized me in the dim light; also he was a trifle constrained in his manner, as if my presence were an embarra.s.sment. He listened to Thornd.y.k.e's announcement of our newly made arrangement without much enthusiasm and with none of his customary facetious comments. And again I noticed a quick glance at me, half curious, half uneasy, and wholly puzzling to me.

"That's all right," he said when Thornd.y.k.e had explained the situation.

"I daresay you'll find Berkeley as useful as me, and, in any case, he'll be better here than staying on with Barnard." He spoke with unwonted gravity, and there was in his tone a solicitude for me that attracted my notice and that of Thornd.y.k.e as well, for the latter looked at him curiously, though he made no comment. After a short silence, however, he asked: "And what news does my learned brother bring? There is a mighty shouting among the outer barbarians and I see a bundle of newspapers under my learned friend's arm. Has anything in particular happened?"

Jervis looked more uncomfortable than ever. "Well--yes," he replied hesitatingly, "something has happened--there! It's no use beating about the bush; Berkeley may as well learn it from me as from those yelling devils outside." He took a couple of papers from his bundle and silently handed one to me and the other to Thornd.y.k.e.

Jervis's ominous manner, naturally enough, alarmed me not a little. I opened the paper with a nameless dread. But whatever my vague fears, they fell far short of the occasion; and when I saw those yells from without crystallized into scare head-lines and flaming capitals I turned for a moment sick and dizzy with fear.

The paragraph was only a short one, and I read it through in less than a minute.

"THE MISSING FINGER

"DRAMATIC DISCOVERY AT WOODFORD

"The mystery that has surrounded the remains of a mutilated human body, portions of which have been found in various places in Kent and Ess.e.x, has received a partial and very sinister solution. The police have, all along, suspected that those remains were those of a Mr. John Bellingham who disappeared under circ.u.mstances of some suspicion about two years ago. There is now no doubt upon the subject, for the finger which was missing from the hand that was found at Sidcup has been discovered at the bottom of a disused well _together with a ring_, which has been identified as one habitually worn by Mr. John Bellingham.

"The house in the garden of which the well is situated was the property of the murdered man, and was occupied at the time of the disappearance by his brother, Mr. G.o.dfrey Bellingham. But the latter left it very soon after, and it has been empty ever since. Just lately it has been put in repair, and it was in this way that the well came to be emptied and cleaned out. It seems that Detective-Inspector Badger, who was searching the neighborhood for further remains, heard of the emptying of the well and went down in the bucket to examine the bottom, where he found the three bones and the ring.

"Thus the ident.i.ty of the body is established beyond all doubt, and the question that remains is, Who killed John Bellingham? It may be remembered that a trinket, apparently broken from his watch-chain, was found in the grounds of this house on the day that he disappeared, and that he was never again seen alive. What may be the import of these facts time will show."

That was all; but it was enough. I dropped the paper to the ground and glanced round furtively at Jervis, who sat gazing gloomily at the toes of his boots. It was horrible! It was incredible! The blow was so crushing that it left my faculties numb, and for a while I seemed unable even to think intelligibly.

I was aroused by Thornd.y.k.e's voice--calm, business-like, composed:

"Time will show, indeed! But meanwhile we must go warily. And don't be unduly alarmed, Berkeley. Go home, take a good dose of bromide with a little stimulant, and turn in. I am afraid this has been rather a shock to you."

I rose from my chair like one in a dream and held out my hand to Thornd.y.k.e; and even in the dim light and in my dazed condition I noticed that his face bore a look that I had never seen before; the look of a granite mask of Fate--grim, stern, inexorable.

My two friends walked with me as far as the gateway at the top of Inner Temple Lane, and as we reached the entry a stranger, coming quickly up the Lane, overtook and pa.s.sed us. In the glare of the lamp outside the porter's lodge he looked at us quickly over his shoulder, and though he pa.s.sed on without halt or greeting, I recognized him with a certain dull surprise which I did not understand then and do not understand now. It was Mr. Jellicoe.

I shook hands once more with my friends and strode out into Fleet Street, but as soon as I was outside the gate I made direct for Nevill's Court. What was in my mind I do not know; only that some instinct of protection led me there, where my lady lay unconscious of the hideous menace that hung over her. At the entrance to the Court a tall, powerful man was lounging against the wall, and he seemed to look at me curiously as I pa.s.sed; but I hardly noticed him and strode forward into the narrow pa.s.sage. By the shabby gateway of the house I halted and looked up at such of the windows as I could see over the wall. They were all dark. All the inmates, then, were in bed.

Vaguely comforted by this, I walked on to the New Street end of the Court and looked out. Here, too, a man--a tall, thick-set man--was loitering; and as he looked inquisitively into my face I turned and reentered the Court, slowly retracing my steps. As I again reached the gate of the house I stopped to look once more at the windows, and turning I found the man whom I had last noticed close behind me. Then, in a flash of dreadful comprehension, I understood. These two were plainclothes policemen.

For a moment a blind fury possessed me. An insane impulse urged me to give battle to this intruder; to avenge upon this person the insult of his presence. Fortunately the impulse was but momentary, and I recovered myself without making any demonstration. But the appearance of those two policemen brought the peril into the immediate present, imparted to it a horrible actuality. A chilly sweat of terror stood on my forehead, and my ears were ringing when I walked with faltering steps out into Fetter Lane.