The Red Symbol. Ironside John

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СКАЧАТЬ no! Didn’t you see Jim lend her his latch-key? We knew it would be a late affair, – that’s why we didn’t go, – and that some one would see her safe home, even if you weren’t there. The Amory’s motored her home in their car; they had to wait for the storm to clear. I had been sleeping the sleep of the just for hours, and never even heard her come in. She’ll be dead tired, poor dear, having next to no sleep, and then rushing off like this – ”

      “What’s wrong with Mr. Pendennis?” I interpolated. “Was the letter from him?”

      “Why, certainly; who should it be from? We didn’t guess it was important, or we’d have sent it round to her at Mrs. Sutherland’s last night. He’s been sick for some days, and Anne believes he’s worse than he makes out. She only sent word to my room a little before eight; and then she was all packed and ready to go. Wild horses wouldn’t keep Anne from her father if he wanted her! We’re to send her trunks on to-morrow.”

      While my cousin prattled on, I was recalling the events of a few hours back. I must have been mistaken, after all! What a fool I had been! Why hadn’t I gone straight to Kensington after I left Lord Southbourne? I should have spared myself a good deal of misery. And yet – I thought of Anne’s face as I saw it just now, looking out of the window, pale and agitated, just as it had looked in the moonlight last night. No! I might mentally call myself every kind of idiot, but my conviction remained fixed; it was Anne whom I had seen. Suppose she had left Mrs. Sutherland’s early, as I had decided she must have done, when I racked my brains in the night. It was close on one o’clock when I saw her on the river; she might have landed lower down. I did not know – I do not know even now – if there were any steps like those by Westminster Bridge, where a landing could be effected; but suppose there were, she would be able to get back to Cayleys by the time she had said. But why go on such an expedition at all? Why? That was the maddening question to which I could not even suggest an answer.

      “What was it you called to Anne about seeing her on Tuesday?” demanded Mary, who fortunately did not notice my preoccupation.

      “I shall break my journey there.”

      “Of course. I forgot you were off to-morrow. Where to?”

      “St. Petersburg.”

      “My! You’ll have a lively time there by all accounts. Here we are; I hadn’t time for breakfast, and I’m hungry. Aren’t you?”

      As we crossed the hall I saw a woman’s dark cloak, flung across an oak settee. It struck me as being rather like that which Anne – if it were Anne – had worn. Mary picked it up.

      “That oughtn’t to be lying there. It’s Mrs. Sutherland’s. Anne borrowed it last night as her own was flimsy for a car. I must send it back to-day. Go right up to Jim’s dressing-room, Maurice; you’ll find all you want there.”

      She ran up the stairs before me, the cloak over her arm, little thinking how significant that cloak was to me.

      I cut myself rather badly while shaving, and I evinced a poor appetite for breakfast. Jim and Mary, especially Jim, saw fit to rally me on that, and on my solemn visage, which was not exactly beautified by the cut. I took myself off as soon after the meal as I decently could, on the plea of getting through with my packing; though I promised to return in the evening to say good-bye.

      I had remembered my appointment with the old Russian, and was desperately anxious not to be out if he should come.

      On one point I was determined. I would give no one, not even Mary, so much as a hint of the mysteries that were half-maddening me; at least until I had been able to seek an explanation of them from Anne herself.

      My man never turned up, nor had he been there while I was absent, as I elicited by a casual inquiry of Jenkins as to whether any one had called.

      I told him when I returned from the Cayleys that I was going away in the morning, and he came to lend a hand with the packing and clearing up.

      “No, sir, not a soul’s been; the street door was shut all morning. I’d rather be rung up a dozen times than have bad characters prowling about on the staircase. There’s a lot of wrong ’uns round about Westminster! Seems quieter than usual up here to-day, don’t it, sir? With all the residentials away, except you.”

      “Why, is Cassavetti away, too?” I asked, looking up.

      “I think he must be, sir, for I haven’t seen or heard anything of him. But I don’t do for him as I do for you and the other gents. He does for himself, and won’t let me have a key, or the run of his rooms. His tenancy’s up in a week or two, and a pretty state we shall find ’em in, I expect! We shan’t miss him like we miss you, sir. Shall you be long away this time?”

      “Can’t say, Jenkins. It may be one month or six – or forever,” I added, remembering Carson’s fate.

      “Oh, don’t say that, sir,” remonstrated Jenkins.

      “I wonder if Mr. Cassavetti is out. I’d like to say good-bye to him,” I resumed presently. “Go up and ring, there’s a good chap, Jenkins. And if he’s there, you might ask him to come down.”

      It struck me that I might at least ascertain from Cassavetti what he knew of Anne. Why hadn’t I thought of that before?

      Jenkins departed on his errand, and half a minute later I heard a yell that brought me to my feet with a bound.

      “Hello, what’s up?” I called, and rushed up the stairs, to meet Jenkins at the top, white and shaking.

      “Look there, sir,” he stammered. “What is it? ’Twasn’t there this morning, when I turned the lights out, I’ll swear!”

      He pointed to the door-sill, through which was oozing a sluggish, sinister-looking stream of dark red fluid.

      “It’s – it’s blood!” he whispered.

      I had seen that at the first glance.

      “Shall I go for the police?”

      “No,” I said sharply. “He may be only wounded.”

      I went and hammered at the door, avoiding contact with that horrible little pool.

      “Cassavetti! Cassavetti! Are you within, man?” I shouted; but there was no answer.

      “Stand aside. I’m going to break the lock,” I cried.

      I flung myself, shoulder first, against the lock, and caught at the lintel to save myself from falling, as the lock gave and the door swung inwards, – to rebound from something that it struck against.

      I pushed it open again, entered sideways through the aperture, and beckoned Jenkins to follow.

      Huddled up in a heap, almost behind the door, was the body of a man; the face with its staring eyes was upturned to the light.

      It was Cassavetti himself, dead; stabbed to the heart.

      CHAPTER VII

      A RED-HAIRED WOMAN!

      I bent over the corpse and touched the forehead tentatively with my finger-tips. It was stone cold. The man must have been dead many hours.

      “Come on; we must send for the police; pull yourself together, man!” I said to СКАЧАТЬ