The Essential Writings of Marie Belloc Lowndes. Marie Belloc Lowndes

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      Chapter XVIII

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      They went up the lift in two parties: Sir Angus Kinross, the house agent, and the two men from Scotland Yard; then Lord St. Amant and Katty Winslow alone.

      As they were going up, he said kindly, "Are you sure you are wise in doing this? I fear—I fear the worst, Mrs. Winslow!"

      With dry lips she muttered, "Yes, so do I. But I would rather come all the same. I'll wait outside the door."

      Poor Katty! She was telling herself that it was surely impossible—impossible that Godfrey Pavely should be dead.

      Though his vitality had always been low, he had been intensely individual. His self-importance, his egoism, his lack of interest in anything but himself, Katty, and the little world where he played so important a part—all that had made him a forceful personality, especially to this woman who had possessed whatever he had had of heart and passionate feeling. She had felt of late as if he were indeed part of the warp and woof of her life, and deep in her scheming mind had grown a kind of superstitious belief that sooner or later their lives would become one.

      The thought that he might be lying dead in this great new building filled her with a sort of sick horror. There seemed something at once so futile and so hideously cruel about so stupid an accident as that described in the Portuguese financier's letter.

      They stepped out on to a top landing, from which branched off several narrow corridors. The agent led the way down one of these. "Room No. 18? This must be it—this is it! Look, there are the two keyholes!"

      The younger and the brawnier of the two plainclothes detectives came forward. "If you'll just stand aside, gentlemen, for a minute or two, we'll soon get this door open. It's quite an easy matter."

      He opened his unobtrusive-looking, comparatively small bag. There was a sound of wrenching wood and metal, and then the door swung backwards into the room together with a thick green velvet curtain fixed along the top of the door on a hinged rod.

      A flood of wintry sunshine, thrown by the blinking now setting sun of a London January afternoon, streamed into the dark passage, and Sir Angus Kinross strode forward into the room, Lord St. Amant immediately behind him.

      Katty shrank back and then placed herself by the wall of the passage. She put her hand over her eyes, as if to shut out a dreadful sight, yet all there was to see was an open door through which came a shaft of pallid wintry afternoon light.

      For a space of perhaps thirty seconds, Sir Angus's trained eyes and mind took in what he supposed to be every detail of the oblong room overlooking the now bare tree tops of the Green Park. He noted that the office furniture was extremely good—first-rate of its kind. Also that the most prominent thing in the room was an American roll-top desk of an exceptionally large size.

      Placed at right angles right across the office, this desk concealed nearly half the room.

      In the corner behind the door was a coat stand, on which there hung a heavy, fur-lined coat, and a silk hat. On the floor was a thick carpet. The only unbroken space of wall was covered by a huge diagram map of what looked like a piece of sea shore.

      One peculiar fact also attracted the attention of the Commissioner of Police. Both the windows overlooking the Park were wide open, fixed securely back as far as they would go: and on the window seats, comfortably, nay luxuriously, padded, and upholstered in green velvet, there now lay a thick layer of grime, the effect of the fog and rain of the last fortnight. As they stood within the door, in spite of those widely opened windows, there gradually stole on the senses of the four men there, a very curious odour, an odour which struck each of them as horribly significant.

      Yet another thing Sir Angus noted in that quick, initial glance; this was that the blind of the narrow window which gave on to the street side of Duke House was drawn down, casting one half of the room in deep shadow.

      He turned, and addressing Lord St. Amant in a very low voice, almost in a whisper, he said: "I think we shall find what we have come to seek over there, behind that desk."

      Walking forward, he edged round by the side of the big piece of walnut wood furniture.

      Then he started back, and exclaimed under his breath, "Good God! How horrible!"

      He had thought to see a body lying at full length on the carpet, but what he did see, sitting upright at the desk, was a stark, immobile figure, of which the head, partly blown away, was sunk forward on the breast....

      Great care had been taken to wedge the dead man securely back in the arm-chair, and a cursory glance, in the dim light in which that part of the room was cast, would have given an impression of sleep, not of death.

      He beckoned to Lord St. Amant. "Come over here," he whispered, "you needn't go any nearer. Do you recognise that as being the body of Godfrey Pavely?"

      And Lord St. Amant, hastening forward, stared with a mixture of curiosity and horror at the still figure, and answered, "Yes. I—I think there's no doubt about it's being Pavely."

      "Perhaps you'd better go and tell Mrs. Winslow. Get her away as quick as you can. I must telephone at once for one of our doctors."

      Lord St. Amant turned without a word, and made his way through the still open door into the queer, rather dark passage.

      Katty's face was still full of the strain and anguish of suspense, but she knew the truth by now. Had nothing been found, some one would have come rushing out at once to tell her so. Three or four minutes had elapsed since she had heard the sudden hush, the ominous silence, which had fallen over them all, in there.

      Her lips formed the words: "Then—they've found him?"

      And Lord St. Amant nodded gravely. "It looks as if that Portuguese chap had told the simple truth."

      "The moment that I read the letter this morning I knew that it was true," she muttered. Then, "I suppose I'd better go away now? They don't want me here."

      She began walking towards the lift, and Lord St. Amant, following, felt very sorry for her. "Look here," he said earnestly, "I'm sure you don't wish to go straight back to poor Laura Pavely? Why should you? 'Twould only rack you. I suppose——" СКАЧАТЬ