The Sign of the Stranger Part 6

"You have saved me, Willoughby. You can save my life, if you will."

"I will," was my earnest reply. "You know my secret," I added, raising her fingers to my hot pa.s.sionate lips before we parted.

She made no mention of the tragedy, and what, indeed, could I remark?

My journey to London I was compelled to postpone in view of what had occurred. She had not referred to it, and to tell the truth I felt that my presence beside her just then was of greater need. Thus, after awaiting my housekeeper's return in order to preserve appearances, I ate my breakfast with the air of a man entirely undisturbed.

Just before nine the doctor came in, ruddy and well-shaven, and throwing himself into an armchair exclaimed--

"You didn't keep your promise! I called and found n.o.body at home. You were out."

"I'd gone down the village," I explained.

"Well, I've been up into the park with the police. They've sent that blundering fool Redway--worse than useless! We've been over the ground, but there's so many footprints that it's impossible to distinguish any-- save one."

"And what's that?"

"Well, strangely enough, my dear fellow, it's a woman's."

"A woman's!" I gasped, for I saw that all my work had been in vain and in my hurry I must have unfortunately overlooked one.

"Yes, it's the print of a woman's slipper with a French heel--not the kind of shoe usually worn in Sibberton," remarked the doctor. "Funny, isn't it?"

"Very," I agreed with a sickly feeling. "What do the police think?"

"Redway means to take a plaster cast of it--says it's an important clue.

Got a cigarette?"

I pushed the box before him, with sinking heart, and at the same time invited him to the table to have breakfast, for I had not yet finished.

"Breakfast!" he cried. "Why, I had mine at six, and am almost ready for lunch. I'm an early bird, you know."

It was true. He had cultivated the habit of early rising by going cub-hunting with the Stanchester hounds, and it was his boast that he never breakfasted later than six either summer or winter.

"Did they find anything else?" I inquired, fearing at the same time to betray any undue curiosity.

"Found a lot of marks of men's boots, but they might have been ours," he answered in his bluff way as he lit his cigarette. "My theory is that the mark of the woman's shoe is a very strong clue. Some woman knows all about it--that's very certain, and she's a person who wears thin French shoes, size three."

"Does Redway say that?"

"No, I say it. Redway's a fool, you know. Look how he blundered in that robbery in Northampton a year ago. I only wish we could get a man from Scotland Yard. He'd nab the murderer before the day is out."

At heart I did not endorse this wish. On the contrary the discovery of this footmark that had escaped me was certainly a very serious _contretemps_. My endeavours must, I saw, now all be directed towards arranging matters so that, if necessary, Lolita could prove a complete _alibi_.

"Do you know," went on the doctor, "there's one feature in the affair that's strangest of all, and that is that there seems to have been an attempt to efface certain marks, as though the a.s.sa.s.sin boldly returned to the spot after the removal of the body and sc.r.a.ped the ground in order to wipe out his footprints. Redway won't admit that, but I'm certain of it--absolutely certain. I suppose the a.s.s won't accept the theory because it isn't his own."

I tried to speak, but what could I say? The words I uttered resolved themselves into a mere expression of blank surprise, and perhaps it was as well, for the man before me was as keen and shrewd as any member of the Criminal Investigation Department. He was essentially a man of action, who whether busy or idle could not remain in one place five minutes together. He rushed all over the country-side from early morning, or dashed up to London by the express, spent the afternoon in Bond Street or the Burlington, and was back at home, a hundred miles distant, in time for dinner. He was perfectly tireless, possessing a demeanour which no amount of offence could ruffle, and an even temper and chaffing good-humour that was a most remarkable characteristic. The very name of Pink in Northamptons.h.i.+re was synonymous of patient surgical skill combined with a spontaneous gaiety and bluff good-humour.

"I've given over that bit of white fur to Red way," he went on. "And I expect we shall find that the owner of it is also owner of the small shoes. I know most of the girls of Sibberton--in fact, I've attended all of them, I expect--but I can't suggest one who would, or even could, wear such a shoe as that upon the woman who was present at the tragedy, if not the actual a.s.sa.s.sin."

"Redway will make inquiries, I suppose?" I remarked in a faint hollow voice.

"At my suggestion he has wired for a.s.sistance, and I only hope they'll get a man down from London. If they don't--by Gad! I'll pay for one myself. We must find this woman, Woodhouse," he added, rising and tossing his cigarette-end into the grate. "We'll find her--at all costs!"

CHAPTER SEVEN.

IS FULL OF MYSTERY.

The doctor's keen desire to solve the mystery caused me most serious apprehension. His bluff good-humour, at other times amusing, now irritated me, and I was glad when he rose restlessly and went out, saying that he had wired to Doctor Newman at Northampton, and that they intended to make the post-mortem at two o'clock.

Presently, after a rest, which I so sorely needed, I walked along to the _Stanchester Arms_ and had a private consultation with Warr in the little back parlour of the old-fas.h.i.+oned inn. Standing back from the road with its high swinging sign, it was a quaint, picturesque place, long and rambling, with the attic windows peeping forth from beneath the thatch. Half-hidden by climbing roses, clematis and jessamine it was often the admiration of artists, and many times had it been painted or sketched, for it was certainly one of the most picturesque of any of the inns in rural Northamptons.h.i.+re, and well in keeping with the old-world peace of the Sibberton village itself.

Having again impressed upon the landlord the necessity of delivering the letter to Lolita in secret, as well as remaining utterly dumb regarding the stranger's visit, I was allowed to view the body of the unknown victim. It lay stretched upon some boards in the outhouse at rear of the inn, covered by a sheet, which on being lifted revealed the cold white face.

We stood there together in silence. In the dim light of the previous night and the uncertain glimmer of the lantern, I had not obtained an adequate idea of the young man's features, and it was in order to do this that I revisited the chamber of the dead.

For a long time I gazed upon that blanched countenance and sightless eyes, a face that seemed in those few hours to have altered greatly, having become shrunken, more refined, more transparent. The closely-cropped hair, the very even dark eyebrows, and the rather high cheek-bones were the most prominent features, and all of them, combined with the cut of his clothes and the shape of his boots, went to suggest that he was not an Englishman.

In those moments every feature of that calm dead face became photographed upon the tablets of my memory, and as it did so I somehow became convinced that he was not altogether a stranger. I had, I believed, met him previously somewhere--but where I could not determine.

I recollected Warr's evasion of my question. Was he also puzzled, like myself?

Outside the inn half Sibberton had a.s.sembled to discuss the terrible affair, many of the village women wearing their lilac sun-bonnets, those old-world head-dresses that are, alas! so fast disappearing from rural England. The other half of the village had entered the park to see the spot where the terrible tragedy had been enacted.

For a moment I halted talking with a couple of men who made inquiry of me, knowing that I had first raised the alarm. And then I heard a dozen different theories in as many minutes. The rural mind is always quick to suggest motive where tragedy is concerned.

At noon I walked up to the Hall again, wondering if my love would show herself. I longed to get up to London and make inquiries at that p.a.w.nbroker's in the Westminster Bridge Road, as well as to call at the address she had given me in Chelsea. As she had said, only myself stood between her and death. The situation all-round was one of great peril, and I had, at all costs, to save her.

As I entered and crossed the hall, Slater, the old butler, approached, saying--

"His lords.h.i.+p would like to see you, sir. He's in the library."

So I turned and walked up the corridor of the east wing to that fine long old room with its thousands of rare volumes that had been the chief delight of the white-headed old peer who had spent the evening of his days in study.

"I say, Woodhouse!" cried the young Earl, springing from his chair as I entered, "what does this murder in the park last night mean?"

"It's a profound mystery," I replied. "The murdered man has not yet been identified."

"I know, I know," he said. "I went down to the inn with Pink this morning and saw him. And, do you know, he looks suspiciously like a fellow who followed me about in town several times last season."

"That's strange!" I exclaimed, much interested. "Yes, it is. I can't make it out at all. There's a mystery somewhere--a confounded mystery."

And the young Earl thrust his hands deeply into his trousers pockets as he seated himself on the arm of a chair.

Tall, dark, good-looking, and a good all-round athlete, he was about thirty, the very picture of the well-bred Englishman. A few years in the Army had set him up and given him a soldierly bearing, while his face and hands, tanned as they were, showed his fondness for out-door sports. He kept up the Stanchester hounds, of which he was master, to that high degree of efficiency which rendered them one of the most popular packs in the country; he was an excellent polo player, a splendid shot, and a thorough all-round sportsman. In his well-worn grey flannels, and with a straw hat stuck jauntily on his head, he presented the picture of healthy manhood, wealthy almost beyond the dreams of avarice, a careless, easy-going, good-humoured man-of-the-world, whose leniency to his tenants was proverbial, and whose good-nature gave him wide popularity in Society, both in London and out of it.

By the man-in-the-street he was believed to be supremely content in his great possessions, his magnificent mansions, his princely bank balance, his steam yacht and his pack of hounds, yet I, his confidential friend and secretary, knew well the weariness and chagrin that was now eating out his heart. Her ladys.h.i.+p, two years his junior, was one of the three celebrated beauties known in London drawing-rooms as "the giddy Gordons," and who, notwithstanding her marriage, still remained the leader of that ultra-smart set, and always had one or two admirers in her train. She was still marvellously beautiful; her portraits, representing her yachting, motoring, shooting or riding to hounds, were familiar to every one, and after her marriage it had become the fas.h.i.+on to regard the Countess of Stanchester as one of the leaders of the London _mode_.

All this caused her husband deep regret and worry. He was unhappy, for with her flitting to and from the Continental spas, to Rome, to Florence, to Scotland, to Paris and elsewhere, he enjoyed little of her society, although he loved her dearly and had married her purely on that account.

Often in the silence of his room he sighed heavily when he spoke of her to me, and more than once, old friends that we were, he had unbosomed himself to me, so that, knowing what I did, I honestly pitied him.