The Lighted Way

ISAAC IN HIDING

Arnold, as he neared the end of his journey, felt, indeed, that he had found his way into some alien world. The streets through which, after many directions, he had passed, had all been strange to him, strange not only because of their narrowness, their poverty, their ill flavor, but on account, also, of the foreign names above the shops, the street cries, and the dark, unfamiliar aspects of the people. After losing his way more than once, he discovered at last a short street branching out of a narrow but populous thoroughfare. There were no visible numbers, but counting the houses on the left-hand side, and finding the door of the seventh open, he made his way inside. The place was silent and seemed deserted. He climbed the stairs to the second story and knocked at the door of the front room. So far, although barely a hundred yards away was a street teeming with human beings, he had not seen a soul in the place.

"What the devil are you doing here?"

The light was as suddenly turned off. Arnold could see now that the man whom he had come to visit had barricaded himself behind an upturned table in a distant corner of the room.

"I want a word or two with you, Isaac," Arnold said.

"Who told you where to find me?"

"Count Sabatini."

"Have you told any one else?"

"No!"

"Are you alone?"

"Absolutely."

Isaac came slowly out into the room. His appearance, if possible, was a little more ghastly even than when Arnold had seen him last. He was unshaven, and his eyes shone with the furtiveness of some hunted animal. In his hand he was holding a murderous-looking pistol.

"Say what you want—be quick—and get away," Isaac muttered. "I am not here to receive visitors—not your sort, any way. You understand that?"

"You seem to be prepared to receive some one in a most unpleasant manner," Arnold said gravely. "Is that sort of thing worth while, Isaac?"

"Worth while!"

"You," he said to Arnold, "are one of the clods of the earth, to whom it is not given to understand. You are one of those who would fall before the carriages of the rich and hold out your hands for their alms. You are one of those who could weep and weep and watch the children die, wringing your hands, while the greedy ones of the world stuff themselves at their costly restaurants. The world is full of such as you. It is full, too, of many like myself, in whose blood the fever burns, into whose brain the knowledge of things has entered, in whose heart the seared iron burns."

"That's all right for Hyde Park," Arnold declared, bluntly, "but do you imagine you are going to help straighten the world by this sort of thing?"

"In my way, I am," Isaac snarled. "What do you know of it, you smooth-faced, healthy young animal, comfortably born, comfortably bred, falling always on your feet in comfortable fashion, with the poison of comfort in your veins? You look at my pistol as an evil thing, because it can spell the difference between life and death. I will tell you what it represents to me. It represents my rebellion and the rebellion of my class against what you choose to call here law and order. Law and order are good enough things, but they have become the tools with which the smug rich keep themselves in luxury in the fat places of the world, while millions of others, gripping vainly at the outside of life, fall off into the bottomless chasm."

Isaac threw out his hand—a little gesture, half of contempt, not altogether without its touch of dignity.

"This isn't any place for words," he said, "nor is it given to you to be the champion of your class. Let me alone. Speak your errand and be gone! No one can tell when the end may come. It will be better for you, when it does, that you are not here."

"I have come on account of your niece, whom you left penniless and homeless," Arnold said sternly. "With your immense sympathy for others, perhaps you can explain this little act of inattention on your part?"

Isaac's start of surprise was genuine enough.

"I had forgotten her," he admitted curtly. "I saw the red fires that night and since then there has been no moment to breathe or think—nothing to do but get ready for the end. I had forgotten her."

"She is safe, for the present," Arnold told him. "My circumstances have improved and I have taken a small flat in which there is a room for her. This may do for the present, but Ruth, after all, is a young woman. She is morbidly sensitive. However willing I may be, and I am willing, it is not right that she should remain with me. I have always taken it for granted that save for you she has no relatives and no friends. Is this the truth? Is there no one whom she has the right to ask for a home?"

"Listen," he said hoarsely, "I am a dead man already in all but facts. I can tell you nothing of Ruth's relatives. Better that she starved upon the streets than found them. But there is her chance still. My mind has been filled with big things and I had forgotten it. Before we moved into Adam Street, the last doctor who saw Ruth suggested an operation. He felt sure that it would be successful. It was to cost forty guineas. I have saved very nearly the whole of that money. It stands in her name at the Westminster Savings Bank. If she goes there and proves her identity, she can get it. I saved that money—God knows how!"

"What is the name of the doctor?" Arnold asked.

"His name was Heskell and he was at the London Hospital," Isaac replied. "Now I have done with you. That is Ruth's chance—there is nothing else I can do. Be off as quickly as you can. If you give information as to my whereabouts, you will probably pay for it with your life, for there are others besides myself who are hiding in this house. Now go. Do you hear?"

Arnold's anger against the man suddenly faded away. It seemed to him, as he stood there, that he was but a product of the times, fashioned by the grinding wheel of circumstance, a physical wreck, a creature without love or life or hope.

Isaac made no reply. Only his long, skinny forefinger shot out toward the door. Arnold knew that he might just as well have been talking to the most hopeless lunatic ever confined in padded room.

"If this is to be farewell, Isaac," he continued, "let me at least tell you this before I go. You are doing Ruth a cruel wrong. God knows I am willing enough to take charge of her, but it's none the less a brutal position for you to put her in. You have the chance, if you will, to set her free. Think what her life has been up till now. Have you ever thought of it, I wonder? Have you ever thought of the long days she has spent in that attic when you have been away, without books, with barely enough to eat, without companionship or friends? These are the things to which you have doomed her by your cursed selfishness. If she has friends who could take her away, and you refuse to speak, then all I can say is that you deserve any fate that may come to you."

Isaac remained silent for several moments. His face was dark and dogged. When he spoke, it was with reluctance.

"Young man," he said, "every word which you have spoken has been in my brain while I have lain here waiting for the end. A few hours ago I slept and had a dream. When I awoke, I was weak. See here."

He drew from his pocket two sheets of closely-written foolscap.

Arnold was light on his feet, with a great reach, and Isaac was unprepared. In a moment the latter was on his back, and the soiled sheets of foolscap were in Arnold's pocket. Isaac's fingers seemed to hover upon the trigger of his pistol as he lay there, crouched against the wall.

"Don't be a fool!" Arnold cried, roughly. "You'll do no good by killing me. The girl has a right to her chance."

There were several seconds of breathless silence, during which it seemed to Arnold that Isaac had made up and changed his mind more than once. Then at last he lowered his pistol.

"We'll call it chance," he muttered. "I never meant to write the rubbish. Since you have got it, though, it is the truth. Do with it what you will. There is one thing more. You know this man Sabatini?"

"If you mean the Count Sabatini, it was he who gave me your address," Arnold reminded him.

Isaac smiled grimly.

"Citizen Sabatini is all we know him by here. He knows well that to a man with his aspirations, a man who desires to use as his tools such as myself and my comrades, a title is an evil recommendation. He came to us first, as a man and a brother,—he, Count Sabatini, Marquis de Lossa, Chevalier de St. Jerome, Knight of the Holy Roman Empire,—an aristocrat, you perceive, and one of the worst. Yet we have trusted him."

"I do not believe," Arnold exclaimed, "that Sabatini would betray any one!"

"Yes," Arnold answered, "I will do that."

"Tell him, if indeed he has the courage which fame has bestowed upon him, to come here and bid me farewell. I have certain things to say to him."

"I will give him your message," Arnold promised, "but I shall not advise him to come."

A look of anger flashed in Isaac's face. The pistol which had never left his grip was slowly raised, only to be lowered again.

"Do as I say," he repeated. "Tell him to come. Perhaps I may have more to say to him about that other matter than I choose to say to you."

"About Ruth?"

"About Ruth," Isaac repeated, sternly.

"You would trust a stranger," Arnold exclaimed, "with information which you deny me—her friend?"

Isaac waved him away.

"Be off," he said, tersely. "I have queer humors sometimes lying here waiting for the end. Don't let it be your fate to excite one of them. You have had your escape."

"What do you mean?" Arnold demanded.

Isaac laughed hoarsely.

"How many nights ago was it," he asked, "that you threw up a window in the man Weatherley's house—the night Morris and I were there, seeking for Rosario?"

"I never saw you!" Arnold exclaimed.

Arnold was speechless.

"You mean that he was there that night looking for me?" he cried.

"He hated you all," Isaac muttered, "you and the woman and Sabatini, and he was a little mad—just a little mad. If he had found you all there—"

"Well?" Arnold interposed, breathlessly.

Isaac shook his head.

"Never mind!"

"But I do mind," Arnold insisted. "I want to know about that night. Was it in search of us—"

Isaac held out his skinny hand. There was a dangerous glitter in his eyes.

"It is enough," he snarled. "I have no more to say about what is past. Send me Sabatini and he shall hear news from me."

Arnold retreated slowly towards the threshold.

"If you will take the advice of a sane man," he said, "you will throw that thing away and escape. If I can help—"

Isaac was already creeping to his hiding-place. He turned around with a contemptuous gesture.

"There is no escape for me," he declared. "Every day the police draw their circle closer. So much the better! When they come, they will find me prepared! If you are still here in sixty seconds," he added, "I will treat you as I shall treat them."

Arnold closed the door and made his way into the street.

SABATINI'S DAUGHTER

Sabatini, already dressed for the evening, his coat upon his arm, paused only to light a cigarette and read once more the telegram which he held between his fingers, before he left his house to step into the automobile which was waiting outside. His servant entered the room with his silk hat.

"You will remember carefully my instructions, Pietro?" he said.

"Assuredly, sir," the man answered.

"If there is a telegram, any communication from the Embassy, or telephone message, you will bring it to me yourself, at once, at number 17, Grosvenor Square. If any one should call to see me, you know exactly where I am to be found."

"There is a young gentleman here now, sir," the man announced. "He has just arrived."

"The young gentleman who was here before, to-day?" Sabatini asked.

"The same, Excellency."

Sabatini laid down his coat.

"You can show him in," he directed. "Wait for me outside."

"You have seen Isaac?" he asked.

"I have seen him," Arnold assented.

"You bring me news?"

"It is true," Arnold replied. "I bring news."

Sabatini waited patiently. Arnold remained, for a moment, gloomily silent. It was hard to know how to commence.

"You will forgive my reminding you," Sabatini said quietly, "that I am on the point of starting out to keep an engagement. I would not mention it but in one respect London hostesses are exacting. There are many liberties which are permitted here, but one must not be late for dinner."

Arnold's memory flashed back to the scene which he had just left—to Isaac, the outcast, crouched beneath his barricade of furniture, waiting in the darkness with his loaded pistol and murder in his heart. Sabatini, calm and dignified in his rigidly correct evening dress, his grace and good-looks, represented with curious appositeness the other extreme of life.

"I will not keep you long," Arnold began, "but there is something which you must hear from me, and hear at once."

"Assuredly," Sabatini murmured. "It is something connected with your visit to this poor, misguided outcast. I am afraid there is nothing we can do for him."

Sabatini bowed.

"The young lady is still under your care?" he asked.

"She is still with me," Arnold admitted. "I took two rooms not very far away from here. I did it because it was the only thing to do, but I can see now that as a permanent arrangement it will not answer. Already, even, a shadow seems to have sprung up between us. I am beginning to understand what it is. I have always looked upon Ruth as being somewhat different from other women because of her infirmity. It is dawning upon me now that, after all, the infirmity counts for little. She is a woman, with a woman's sensibility and all that goes with it. It troubles her to be living alone with me."

A shadow of perplexity passed across Sabatini's face. This young man was very much in earnest and spoke as though he had good reasons for these explanations, yet the reasons themselves were not obvious and the minutes were passing.

"She seemed to me," he murmured, "to be a very charming and distinguished young lady."

"It was a reasonable request," Sabatini remarked. "I trust that the fellow recognized the situation?"

"He had already written out Ruth's history," Arnold said, his voice shaking a little. "He had written it out in pencil on a couple of sheets of foolscap. He gave them to me to bring away with me. I read them coming up. I am here now to repeat their purport to you."

Sabatini gave a little nod of interest. His glance at the clock was apologetic. He had thrown his overcoat once more upon his arm, and, with his white-gloved hand resting upon the back of a chair, stood listening in an attitude of courteous ease.

"I shall be glad to hear the story," he said. "I must admit that although I only met the young lady for those few minutes at Bourne End, I found myself most interested in her. I feel sure that she is charming in every way. Please go on."

"If Isaac's story is true," Arnold continued slowly, "you should indeed be interested in her."

Sabatini's eyebrows were slightly raised.

"I scarcely understand," he murmured. "I—pray go on."

"According to his story," Arnold said, "Ruth Lalonde is your daughter."

"Is this a jest?"

"Isaac's story is that you married her mother, who was his sister, in Paris, nineteen and a half years ago. Her name was Cécile Ruth Leneveu, and she was acting at one of the theatres. She was really Isaac's half-sister. His father had brought him from Paris when he was only a child, and married again almost at once. According to his story, Ruth's mother lived with you for two years—until, in fact, you went to Chili to take command of the troops there, at the time of the revolution. When you returned, she was dead. You were told that she had given birth to a daughter and that she, too, had died."

"That is true," Sabatini admitted slowly. "I came back because of her illness, but I was too late."

"The child did not die," Arnold continued. "She was brought up by Isaac in a small convent near Rouen, where she remained until two years ago, when he was forced to come to England. He brought her with him as, owing to her accident, she was unable to take the post of teacher for which she had been intended, and the convent where she was living was unexpectedly broken up. Since then she has lived a sad life with him in London. His has been simply a hand-to-mouth existence."

"But I do not understand why I was kept in ignorance," Sabatini declared. "Why did he not appeal to me for help? Why was my daughter's existence kept a secret from me?"

Sabatini turned stiffly away. He walked to the window, standing for a moment or two with his back to Arnold, looking out into the quiet street. Then he came back.

"I must go to this man at once," he said. "You can take me there?"

"I can take you," Arnold assented, doubtfully, "and I have even a message from him asking you to visit him, but I warn you that he is in a dangerous mood. I found him the solitary occupant of a miserable room in the back street of a quarter of London which reminded me more than anything else of some foreign city. He has cleared the furniture from the room, reared a table up on end, and is crouching behind it with a Mauser pistol in his hand and a box of cartridges by his side. My own belief is that he is insane."

"It is of no account, that," Sabatini declared. "One moment."

He touched the bell for his servant, who entered almost immediately.

"You will take a cab to 17, Grosvenor Square, Pietro," he directed. "Present my compliments to the lady of the house, and tell her that an occurrence of the deepest importance deprives me of the honor of dining to-night."

"Very good, your Excellency."

Sabatini turned to Arnold.

They started off citywards. Sabatini, for a time, sat like a man in a dream, and Arnold, respecting his companion's mood, kept silent. There seemed to be something unreal about their progress. To Arnold, with this man by his side, the amazing story which he had gathered from those ill-written pages, with their abrupt words and brutal cynicism, still ringing in his brain, their errand seemed like some phantasmal thing. The familiar streets bore a different aspect; the faces of the people whom they passed struck him always with a curious note of unreality. Ruth was Sabatini's daughter! His brain refused to grasp so amazing a fact. Yet curiously enough, as he leaned back among the cushions, the likeness was there. The turn of the lips, the high forehead, the flawless delicacy of her oval face, in the light of this new knowledge were all startlingly reminiscent of the man who sat by his side now in a grim, unbroken silence. The wonder of it all remained unabated, but his sense of apprehension grew.

"We are too late!" he exclaimed. "They have found him! They must be making the arrest even now!"

CLOSE TO TRAGEDY

The two men stood up in the automobile. Sabatini's face had darkened. He leaned over and said something to the chauffeur. They drove on through the press of people, who gave way sullenly. A police inspector came to the side of the car.

"This way is blocked for the present, sir," he said to Sabatini. "If you want to get past, you had better take one of the turnings to the left."

"My destination is just here," Sabatini replied. "Tell me, what is the cause of this disturbance?"

"Some of our men have gone to make an arrest in the street there, sir," the inspector replied, "and we are having some trouble."

"Is it the man Isaac Lalonde whom you are after?" Sabatini asked.

"That is so, sir," the inspector admitted. "A desperate scoundrel he is, too. He's shot at and wounded all three of the policemen who entered the house, and he lies crouching before the window, threatening to shoot any one who passes up the street."

"Who is in charge here?" Sabatini inquired.

"Take me to him," Sabatini directed. "I may be of use in this matter."

The crowd opened to let them pass through. They were on the corner of the pavement now, and the street to their right was empty. There was a disposition on the part of the people to hug the wall and peer only round the corner, for they were within easy range of the grimy window opposite.

"Mr. Inspector," Sabatini said, "I am Count Sabatini, a nobleman of the country from which that man comes. I think, perhaps, that if you will allow me to make the effort he will listen to me. I may be able to save the loss of useful lives."

The chief inspector saluted.

"I shouldn't recommend you to go near him, sir," he declared. "They say he's an out-and-out anarchist, the leader of one of the most dangerous gangs in London. We've got the back of the house covered and he can't escape, but he's shot three of our men who tried to get at him. The chief of police is on his way down, and we are waiting for instructions from him."

Sabatini's lips parted in the faintest of smiles. One could well have imagined that he would have devised some prompter means to have secured this man if he had been in command.

"You will not forbid my making the attempt, I trust?" he said, courteously. "I do so at my own risk, of course."

The inspector hesitated. Sabatini, with a sudden swing of his powerful arm, made his way into the front rank. Arnold clutched at him.

Sabatini turned round with an air of gentle superiority.

"My young friend," he said, "do you not understand that Isaac will not be taken alive? There is a question I must ask him before he dies."

The inspector stepped forward—afterwards he said that it was for the purpose of stopping Sabatini. He was too late, however. The crowd thronging the end of the street, and the hundreds of people who peered from the windows, had a moment of wonderful excitement. One could almost hear the thrill which stirred from their throats. Across the empty street, straight towards the window behind which the doomed man lay, Sabatini walked, strangest of figures amidst those sordid surroundings, in his evening clothes, thin black overcoat, and glossy silk hat. Step by step he approached the door. He was about three yards from the curbstone when the window behind which Isaac was crouching was suddenly smashed, and Isaac leaned out. The crowd, listening intently, could hear the crash of falling glass upon the pavement. They had their view of Isaac, too—a wan, ghostlike figure, with haggard cheeks and staring eyes, eyes which blazed out from between the strands of black hair.

"Stand where you are," he shouted, and the people who watched saw the glitter of the setting sun upon the pistol in his hand. Sabatini looked up.

"Isaac Lalonde," he called out, "you know who I am?"

Sabatini shrugged his shoulders slightly.

"As to that," he answered firmly, "one may have opinions. My hand at least is free from bloodshed. You are there with nothing but death before you. I am here to ask a question."

"Ask it, then," the man at the window muttered. "Can't you see that the time is short?"

"Is it true, this message which you sent me by that young man? Is it my daughter, the child of Cécile, whom you have kept from me all these years?"

Isaac leaned further forward out of the window. Every one in the crowd could see him now. There were a few who began to shout. Every one save Sabatini himself seemed conscious of his danger. Sabatini, heedless or unconscious of it, stood with one foot upon the curbstone, his face upturned to the man with whom he was talking.

"Ay, it is true!" Isaac shouted. "She is your daughter, child of the wife whom you hid away, ashamed of her because she came from the people and you were an aristocrat. She is your child, but you will never see her!"

"It's a rotten death, boy," he whispered hoarsely; "a cur's bullet, that. Look after her for me. I'd rather—I'd rather hear the drums beating."

Arnold gripped him by the shoulders.

"Hold on to yourself, man!" he gasped. "There's a doctor coming—he's here already. Hold on to yourself, for all our sakes! We want you—Ruth will want you!"

Sabatini smiled very faintly. He was barely conscious.

"I'd rather have heard the drums," he muttered again.

MR. WEATHERLEY RETURNS

It was twenty minutes past nine on a Saturday morning when the wonderful thing happened. Precisely at his accustomed hour, in his accustomed suit of gray clothes, and with his silk hat a little on the back of his head, Mr. Weatherley walked into his office, pausing as usual to knock the ash from his cigar before he entered the clerks' counting house. Twelve young men gazed at him in frank and undiluted amazement. As though absolutely unconscious of anything unusual, Mr. Weatherley grunted his "Good morning!" and passed on into the private room. Arnold and Mr. Jarvis were busy sorting the letters which had arrived by the morning's post. Mr. Weatherley regarded them with an expression of mingled annoyance and surprise.

"What the devil are you doing, opening the letters before I get here?" he exclaimed. "I'm punctual, am I not? Twenty-two minutes past nine to the tick. Get out of my chair, Jarvis!"

Mr. Jarvis rose with a promptitude which was truly amazing, considering that a second ago he had been sitting there as though turned to stone. Mr. Weatherley was disposed to be irritable.

Mr. Jarvis made a slow retreat towards the door. Every now and then he turned and looked back over his shoulder.

"You will allow me to say, sir," he faltered, "that I—that we all are glad to see you back."

"See me back?" Mr. Weatherley repeated, frowning heavily. "What the devil do you mean, sir? Why, I was here till nearly six last evening, straightening out the muddle you'd got Coswell's account into."

Mr. Jarvis withdrew precipitately, closing the door behind him. Mr. Weatherley glanced across the room to where Arnold was standing.

"I'm hanged if I can understand Jarvis lately," he said. "The fellow seems off his head. See me back, indeed! Talks as though I'd been away for a holiday."

Arnold opened his lips and closed them again without speech. Mr. Weatherley took up the letters and began to read them, at first in silence. Presently he began to swear.

"Anything wrong, sir?" Arnold asked.

"Has every one taken leave of their senses?" Mr. Weatherley demanded, in a startled tone. "These can't be this morning's letters. They're all about affairs I know nothing of. They're dated—yes, they're all dated July 1. I was here yesterday—I remember signing the cheques—May 4, it was. What the—"

"Come here, Chetwode, quickly," he begged.

Arnold hurried over towards his employer. Mr. Weatherley had lost flesh and there were bags under his eyes. His appearance now was the appearance of a man who has received some terrifying shock. His hands clasped the sides of his chair.

"I'm all right, Chetwode?" he gasped. "I haven't been ill or anything? This isn't a nightmare? The office seems all changed. You've moved the safe. The letters—I can't understand the letters! Give me the Day Book, quick."

Arnold passed it to him silently. Mr. Weatherley turned over the pages rapidly. At May 4, he stopped.

"Yes, yes! I remember this!" he exclaimed. "Twenty barrels of apples, Spiers & Pond. Fifty hams to Coswell's. I remember this. But what—"

His finger went down the page. He turned over rapidly, page after page. The entries went on. They stopped at June 30. He shrank back in his chair.

"Have I been ill, Chetwode?" he muttered.

Arnold put his arm upon his employer's shoulder.

"Not exactly ill, sir," he said, "but you haven't been here for some time. You went home on May 4—we've none of us seen you since."

There was a silence. Very slowly Mr. Weatherley began to shake his head. He seemed suddenly aged.

"Go on, please!" Arnold exclaimed, breathlessly.

Mr. Weatherley nodded slowly.

Mr. Weatherley paused and felt his forehead.

"All the time, Chetwode," he went on, "I was watching the fellow, and it began to dawn upon me that he was there to do her some mischief. I didn't understand what it was all about but I could see it in his face. He was an ill-looking ruffian. I remembered then that Fenella had been frightened by some one hanging about the house, more than once. Well, there he was opposite to me, Chetwode, and by degrees I'd been moving a little nearer to him. He was after mischief—I was sure of it. What should you have done, Chetwode?"

"I am not quite sure," Arnold answered. "What did you do?"

"We're coming to that," Mr. Weatherley declared, leaning a little forward. "We're coming to that. Now in that open case, close to where I was, my wife had some South American curios. There was a funny wooden club there. The end was quite as heavy as any lead. I caught hold of it and rushed in upon him. You see, Chetwode, I was quite sure that he meant mischief. If Fenella had come in, he might have hurt her."

"Well, I gripped the club in my right hand," Mr. Weatherley explained, seizing a ruler from the table, "like this, and I ran in upon him. I took him rather by surprise—he hadn't expected anything of the sort. He had one shot at me and missed. I felt the bullet go scorching past my cheek—like this."

Mr. Weatherley struck the side of his face sharply with the flat of his hand.

"He had another go at me but it was too late,—I was there upon him. He held out his arm but I was too quick. I didn't seem to hit very hard the first time but the club was heavy. His foot slipped on the marble hearthstone and he went. He fell with a thud. Have you ever killed a man, Chetwode?"

"Never, sir," Arnold answered, his voice shaking a little.

"Well, I never had before," Mr. Weatherley went on. "It really seems quite amazing that that one blow right on the head should have done it. He lay there quite still afterwards and it made me sick to look at him. All the time, though, I kept on telling myself that if I had not been there he would have hurt Fenella. That kept me quite cool. Afterwards, I put the club carefully back in the case, pushed him a little under the sofa, and then I stopped to think for a moment. I was quite clever, Chetwode. The window was open through which the man had come, so I locked the door on the inside, stepped out of the window, came in at the front door with my latchkey, crept upstairs, undressed quickly and got into bed. The funny part of it all was, Chetwode," he concluded, "that nobody ever really found the body."

Mr. Weatherley laughed contemptuously.

"What an absurd idea!" he exclaimed. "What a perfectly absurd idea! Besides, although it did disappear, they came up and told me that there was a man lying in the boudoir. You understand now how it all happened," he went on. "It seemed to me quite natural at the time. Still, when the morning came I realized that I had killed a man. It's a horrid thing to kill a man, Chetwode!"

"Of course it is, sir," Arnold said, sympathetically. "Still, I don't see what else you could have done."

Mr. Weatherley beamed.

"I am glad to hear you say that, Chetwode," he declared, "very glad. Still, I didn't want to go to prison, you know, so a few days afterwards I went away. I meant to hide for quite a long time. I—I don't know what I'm doing back here."

He looked around the office like a trapped animal.

"I didn't mean to come back yet, Chetwode!" he exclaimed. "Don't leave me! Do you hear? Don't leave me!"

"Only for one second, sir," Arnold replied, taking an invoice from the desk. "They are wanting this in the warehouse."

Arnold stepped rapidly across to Mr. Jarvis's desk.

"Telephone home for his wife to come and bring a doctor," he ordered. "Quick!"

"He's out of his mind!" Jarvis gasped.

"Stark mad," Arnold agreed.

"Mrs. Weatherley is calling round presently, sir," he announced. "You'll be glad to see her again."

Mr. Weatherley went deadly pale.

"Does she know?" he moaned.

"She knows that some one was hurt," Arnold said. "As a matter of fact," he continued, "I don't think the man could have been dead. We were all out of the room for about five minutes, and when we came back he was gone. I think that he must have got up and walked away."

"You don't think that I murdered him, then?" Mr. Weatherley inquired, anxiously.

"Not you," Arnold assured him. "You stopped his hurting Mrs. Weatherley, though."

Mr. Weatherley sighed.

"I should like to have killed him," he admitted, simply. "Fenella and Sabatini, too, her brother,—they both laugh at me. They're a little inclined to be romantic and they think I'm a queer sort of a stick. I could never make out why she married me," he went on, confidentially. "Of course, they were both stoneybroke at the time and I put up a decent bit of money, but it isn't money, after all, that buys a woman like Fenella."

"I'm sure she will be very pleased to see you again, sir," Arnold said.

"I'll make it all right with Mrs. Weatherley," Arnold promised. "We can't go into all these matters now."

"Of course not—of course not," Mr. Weatherley agreed. "You're quite right, Chetwode. A time for everything, eh? How's the little lady you brought down to Bourne End?"

"She's very well, thank you, sir," Arnold replied.

"Now it's a queer thing," Mr. Weatherley continued, "but only yesterday—or was it the day before—I was trying to think whom she reminded me of. It couldn't have been my brother-in-law, could it, Chetwode. Did you ever fancy that she was like Sabatini?"

"I had noticed it, sir," Arnold admitted, with a little start. "There is a likeness."

Arnold had turned a little away. He was beginning to feel the strain of the situation.

"I wish Fenella would come," Mr. Weatherley wandered on. "I don't seem to be able to get on with my work this morning, since you told me she was coming down. Queer thing, although I was with her last evening, you know, Chetwode, I feel, somehow, as though I'd been away from her for weeks and weeks. I can't remember exactly how long—there's such a buzzing in my head when I try. What do you do when you have a buzzing in your head, Chetwode?"

"I generally try and rest in an easy-chair," Arnold replied.

"I'll try that, too," Mr. Weatherley decided, rising to his feet. "It's a—most extraordinary thing, Chetwode, but my knees are shaking. Hold me up—catch hold of me, quick!"

Arnold half carried him to the easy-chair. The horn of the automobile sounded outside.

"Mrs. Weatherley is here, sir," Arnold whispered.

Mr. Weatherley opened his eyes.

"Good!" he murmured. "Let me sit up."

There was a moment's pause. Arnold moved to the door and held it open. They heard the swish of her skirts as she came through the outer office, and the heavier footsteps of the doctor who followed. Mr. Weatherley tried vainly to rise to his feet. He held out his arms. Fenella hastened towards him.

She fell on her knees by his side.

"You dear, brave man," she murmured. "I believe you saved my life."

He smiled. His face was suddenly childlike. He was filled with an infinite content.

"I think," he said, "that I should like—to go home now—if this other gentleman and Chetwode will kindly help me out. You see, I haven't been here since May 4, and to-day is July 2. I think I must have overslept myself. And that idiot Jarvis was opening the letters when I arrived! Yes, I'm quite ready."

They helped him out to the carriage. He stepped in and took his usual place without speaking again. The car drove off, Fenella holding his hand, the doctor sitting opposite.