Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu (Illustrated)

by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

  “Extremely. What do you suppose his object to be — to extort money?”

  “Possibly; but he may have another object. In any case, he wants to make money by this move.”

  “Very audacious, then. He must know, if he is fit for his trade, how much risk there is in it; and his signing his name and address to his letter, and seeking an interview with a witness by seems to me utterly infatuated,” said David Arden, with his eye upon Mr. Longcluse.

  “So it does, except upon one supposition; I mean that the man believes his story,” said Mr. Longcluse, walking beside him, for they had resumed their march towards the gate.

  “Really! believes that you committed the murder?” said Uncle David, again coming to a halt and looking full at him.

  “I can’t quite account for it otherwise,” said Longcluse; “and I think the right course is for me to meet him. But I have no intimacies in London, and that is my difficulty.”

  “How? Why don’t you arrest him?” said David Arden.

  David Arden had seldom felt so oddly. A quarter-of-an-hour since, he expected to have been seated in his carriage with his ward and Vivian Darnley, driving into town in quiet humdrum fashion, by this time. How like a dream was the actual scene! Here he was, standing on the grass among the noble timber, under the moonlight, with the pale face beside him which had begun to haunt him so oddly. The strange smile of his mysterious companion, the cold tone that jarred sweetly, somehow, on his ear, lending a sinister eccentricity to the extraordinary confession he was making.

  In this situation, which had come about almost unaccountably, there was a strange feeling of unreality. Was this man, from whom he had felt an indescribable repulsion, now by his side, and drawing him, in this solitude, into a mysterious confidence? and had not this confidence an unaccountable though distant relation to the vague suspicions that had touched his mind? With a little effort he resumed, —

  “I beg pardon, but if the case were mine I should put the letters at once into the hands of the police and prosecute him.”

  “Precisely my own first impulse. But the letters are more cautiously framed than you might at first sight suppose. I should be placed in an awkward position were my prosecution to fail. I am obliged to think of this because, although I am nothing to the public, I am a good deal to myself. But I’ve resolved to take a course not less bold, though less public. I am determined to meet him face to face with an unexceptionable witness present, and to discover distinctly whether he acts from fraud or delusion, and then to proceed accordingly. I have communicated with him.”

  “Oh, really!”

  “Yes, I was clear I ought to meet him, but I would consent to nothing with an air of concealment.”

  “I think you were right, Sir.”

  “He wanted our meeting by night on board a Thames boat; then in a dilapidated house in Southwark; then in a deserted house that is to be let in Thames Street; but I named my own house, in Bolton Street, at halfpast twelve tonight.”

  “Then you really wish to see him. I suppose you have thought it well over; but I am always for taking such miscreants promptly by the throat. However, as you say, cases differ, and I daresay you are well advised.”

  “And now may I venture a request, which, were it not for two facts within my knowledge, I should not presume to make? But I venture it to you, who take so special an interest in this case, because you have already taken trouble and, like myself, contributed money to aid the chances of discovery; and because only this evening you said you would bestow more labour, more time, and more money with pleasure to procure the least chance of an additional light upon it: now it strikes me as just possible that the writer of those letters may be, to some extent, honest. Though utterly mistaken about me, still he may have evidence to give, be it worth much or little; and so, Mr. Arden, having the pleasure of being known to some members of your family, although till tonight by name only to you, I beg as a great kindness to a man in a difficulty, and possibly in the interests of the public, that you will be so good as to accompany me, and be present at the interview, that cannot be so well conducted before any other witness whom I can take with me.”

  David Arden paused for a moment, but independently quite of his interest in this case: he felt a strange curiosity about this pale man, whose eyes from under their oblique brows gleamed back the cold moonlight; while a smile, the character of which a little puzzled him, curled his nostril and his thin lip, and showed the glittering edge of his teeth. Did it look like treachery? or was it defiance, or derision? It was a face, thus seen, so cadaverous and Mephistophelian, that an artist would have given something for a minute to fix a note of it in white and black.

  David Arden was not to be disturbed in a practical matter by a pictorial effect, however, and in another moment he said —

  “Yes, Mr. Longcluse, as you desire it I will accompany you, and see this fellow, and hear what he has to say. Certainly.”

  “That’s very kind — only what I should have expected, also, from your public spirit. I’m extremely obliged.”

  They resumed their walk towards the gate.

  “I shall get into my brougham and call at home, to tell them not to expect me for an hour or so. And what is the number of your house?”

  He told him; and David Arden having offered to take him, in his carriage, to the place where his own awaited him, which however he declined, they parted for a little time, and Mr. Arden’s brougham quickly disappeared under the shadow of the tall trees that lined the curving road.

  CHAPTER XXIII.

  THE MEETING.

  As David Arden drove towards town, his confusion rather increased. Why should Mr. Longcluse select him for this confidence? There were men in the City whom he must know, if not intimately, at least much better than he knew him. It was a very strange occurrence; and was not Mr. Longcluse’s manner, also, strange? Was he not, somehow, very oddly cool under a charge of murder? There was something, it seemed, indefinably incongruous in the nature of his story, his request, and his manner.

  *

  It was five or ten minutes before the appointed time when David Arden and Longcluse met in the latter gentleman’s “study” in Bolton Street. There was a slight, odd flutter at Longcluse’s heart, although his pale face betrayed no sign of agitation, as the shuffling tread of a heavy foot was heard on the doorsteps, followed by a faint knock, like that of a tremulous postman. It was the preconcerted summons of Mr. Paul Davies.

  Longcluse smiled at David Arden and raised his finger, as he lightly drew near the room door, with an air of warning. He wished to remind his companion that he was to receive their visitor alone. Mr. Arden nodded, and Mr. Longcluse withdrew. In a minute more the servant opened the study-door, and said— “Mr. Davies, Sir.”

  And the tall ex-detective entered, and looked with a silky simper stealthily to the right and to the left from the corners of his eyes, and glided in, shutting the door behind him.

  Uncle David received this man without even a nod. He eyed him sternly, from his chair at the end of the table.

  “Sit in that chair, please,” said he, pointing to a seat at the other end.

  The ex-policeman made his best bow, and turning out his toes very much, he shuffled with his habitual sly smirk on, to the chair, in which he seated himself, and with his big red hands on the table began turning, and twisting, and twiddling a short pencil, which was a good deal bitten at the uncut end, between his fingers and thumbs.

  “You came here to see Mr. Longcluse?” asked David Arden.

  “A few words of business at his desire. Sir, I ask your parding, I came, Sir, by his wishes, not mine, which has brought me here at his request.”

  “And who am I, do you suppose?”

  The man, still smiling, looked at him shrewdly. “Well, I don’t know, I’m sure; I may ‘a’ seen you.”

  “Did you ever see that gentleman?” said David Arden, as Mr. Longcluse entered the room.

  The ex-detective looked also shrewdly at Long
cluse, but without any light of recognition. “I may have seen him, Sir. Yes, I saw him in Saint George’s, Hanover Square, the day Lord Charles Dillingsworth married Miss Wygram, the hairess. I saw him at Sydenham the second week in February last when the Freemasons’ dinner was there; and I saw him on the night of the match between Hood and Markham, at the Saloon Tavern.”

  “Do you know my name?” said David Arden.

  “Well, no, I don’t at present remember.”

  “Do you know that gentleman’s name?”

  “His name?”

  “Ay, his name.”

  “Well, no; I may have heard it, and I may bring it to mind, by-and-by.”

  Longcluse smiled and shrugged, looking at Mr. Arden, and he said to the man —

  “So you don’t know that gentleman’s name, nor mine?”

  The man looked at each, hard and a little anxiously, like a person who feels that he may be making a very serious mistake; but after a pause he said decisively— “No, I don’t at present. I say I don’t know your names, either of you gentlemen, and I don’t.”

  The two gentlemen exchanged glances.

  “Is either of us as tall as Mr. Longcluse?” asked David Arden, standing up.

  The man stood up also, to make his inspection.

  “You’re both,” he said, after a pause, “much about his height.”

  “Is either of us like him?”

  “No,” answered Davies, after a pause.

  “Did you write these letters?” asked Mr. Longcluse laughing.

  “Well, I did, or I didn’t, and what’s that to you?”

  “Something, as you shall know presently.”

  “I think you’re trying it on. I reckon this is a bit of a plant. I don’t care a scratch o’ that pencil if it be. I wrote them letters, and I said nothin’ but what’s true, and I’ll go with you now to the station if you like, and tell all I knows.”

  The fellow seemed nettled, and laughed viciously a little, and swaggered at the close of his speech. The faintest flush imaginable tinged Longcluse’s forehead, as he shot a searching glance at him.

  “No, we don’t want that,” said he; “but you may be of more use in another way, although just now you are in the wrong box, and have mistaken your man, for I am Mr. Longcluse. You have been misinformed, you see, as to the identity of the person you suspect; but some person you have, no doubt, in your mind, and possibly a case worth sifting, although you have been deceived as to his name. Describe the appearance of the man you supposed to be Mr. Longcluse. You may be frank with me; I mean you no harm.”

  “I defy any man to harm me, Sir, if you please, so long as I do my dooty,” said Paul Davies. “Mr. Longcluse, if that be his name, the man I mean, he’s about your height, with round shoulders and red hair, and talks with a north-country twang on his tongue; he’s a bit rougher, and a swaggerin’ cove, and a yard o’ red beard over his waistcoat, and bigger hands a deal than you, and broader feet.”

  “And have you a case against him?”

  “Partly, but it ain’t, Sir, if you please, by no means so complete as would answer as yet. If I was sure you were really Mr. Longcluse, I could say more, for I partly guess who this other gent is — a most respectable party. I think I do know you, Sir, by appearance; if you had your ‘at on, Sir, I could say to a certainty. But I think, Sir, if you please, I’m not very far wrong when I say that I would identify you for Mr. David Arden.”

  “So I am; that is quite true.”

  “Thank you, Sir, I am obleeged; that’s very quietin’ to my mind, Sir, having full confidence in your character; and if you, Sir, please to tell me that gentleman is undoubtingly Mr. Longcluse, the propperieter of this house, I must ‘a’ been let into a mistake; I don’t think they was agreenin’ of me, but it was a mistake, if you please, Sir, if you say so.”

  “This is Mr. Longcluse — I know of no other — and he resides in this house,” said David Arden. “But if you have information to give respecting that red-bearded fellow, there is no reason why you should not give it forthwith to the police.”

  “Parding me, Sir, if you please, Mr. Arden. There is, I would say, strong reasons for a poor man in rayther anxious circumstances, like myself, Sir, ‘aving an affectionate mother to, in a measure, support, and been himself unfortunately rayther hard up, he can’t answer it nohow to his conscience if he lets a hoppertunity like the present pass him and his aged mother by unimproved. There been a reward offered, Sir, I naturally wish, Sir, if you please, to earn it myself by valuable evidence leading to the conviction of the guilty cove; and if I was to tell all I knows and ‘av’ made out by my own hindustry to the force, Sir, other persons would, don’t you conceive, Sir, draw the reward, and me and my mother should go without. If I could get a hinterview with the man I ‘av’ bin a-gettin’ things together for, I’d lead him, I ‘av’ no doubt, to make such hadmissions as would clench the prosecution, and vendicate justice.”

  “I see what you mean,” said David Arden.

  “And fair enough, I think,” added Longcluse.

  CHAPTER XXIV.

  MR. LONGCLUSE FOLLOWS A SHADOW.

  The ex-detective cleared his voice, shook his head, and smirked.

  “A hinterview, gentlemen,” said he, “is worth much in the hands of a persuasive party. I have hanged several obnoxious characters, and let others in for penal for life, by means of a hinterview. You remember Spikes, gentlemen, as got into difficulties for breaking Mr. Winterbotham’s desk? Spikes would have frusterated justice, if it wasn’t for me. It was done in one hinterview. Says I, ‘Mr. Spikes, you have a wife and five children.’”

  The recollection of Mr. Paul Davies’ diplomacy was so gratifying to that smiling gentleman, that he could not forbear winking at his auditors as he proceeded.

  “‘And my belief is, Mr. Spikes, Sir,’” he continued, “‘that it was all the hinfluence of Tom Sprowles. It was Sprowles persuaded yer — it was him as got the whole thing up. That’s my belief; and you did not want to do it, no-wise, and only consented to force the henges in the belief that Sprowles wanted to read the papers, and no more. I have a bad opinion of Sprowles,’ says I, ‘for deceiving you, I may say innocently;’ and talking this way, you conceive, I got it all out of him, and he’s under penal for life. Whenever you want to get round a man, and to turn him inside out, your way is to sympathise with him. If I had but an hinterview with that man, I know enough to draw it out of him, every bit. It’s all done by sympathising.”

  “But do you think you can discover the man?” asked Mr. Arden.

  “I’m sure to make him out, if you please, Sir; I’ll find out all about him. I’d a found out the facks long ago, but for the mistake, which it occurred most unlucky. I saw him twice sence, and I know well where to look for him; and I’ll have it all right before long, I’m thinkin’.”

  “That will do, then, for the present,” said Mr. Longcluse. “You have said all you have to say, and you see into what a serious mistake you have blundered; but I sha’n’t give you any trouble about it — it is too ridiculous. Goodnight, Mr. Davies.”

  “No mistake of mine, Sir, please. Misinformed, Sir, you will kindly remark — misinformed, if you please — misinformed, as may occur to the sharpest party going. Goodnight, gentlemen; I takes my leave without no unpleasant feelin’, and good wishes for your ‘ealth and ‘appiness, both, gentlemen.” And blandly, and with a sly sleepy smile, this insinuating person withdrew.

  “It is the reward he is thinking of,” said Longcluse.

  “Yes, he won’t spare himself; you mentioned that your own suspicions respecting him were but vague,” said David Arden.

  “I merely stated what I saw to the coroner, and it was answered that he was watching the Frenchman Lebas, because the detective police, before Paul Davies’ dismissal, had received orders to keep an eye on all foreigners; and he hoped to conciliate the authorities, and get a pension, by collecting and furnishing information. The police did not seem to think his dogging and
watching the unfortunate little fellow really meant more than this.”

  “Very likely. It is a very odd affair. I wonder who that fellow is whom he described. He did not give a hint as to the circumstances which excited his suspicions.”

  “It is strange. But that man, Paul Davies, kept his eye upon Lebas from the motive I mentioned, and this circumstance may have led to his seeing more of the matter than, with the reward in his mind, he cares to make known at present. I think I did right in meeting him face to face.”

  “Quite right, Sir.”

  “It has been always a rule with me to go straight at everything. I think the best diplomacy is directness, and that the truest caution lies in courage.”

  “Precisely my opinion, Mr. Longcluse,” said Uncle David, looking on him with eyes of approbation. He was near adding something hearty in the spirit of our ancestors’ saying, “I hope you and I, Sir, may be better acquainted;” but something in the look and peculiar face of this unknown Mr. Longcluse chilled him, and he only said —

  “As you say, Mr. Longcluse, courage is safety, and honesty the best policy. Goodnight, Sir.”

  “A thousand thanks, Mr. Arden. Might I ask one more favour, that you will endorse on each of these threatening letters a memorandum of the facts of this strange interview? — I mean a sentence or two, which may at any time confound this fellow, should he turn out to be a villain.”

  “Certainly,” said Mr. Arden thoughtfully, and he sat down again, and wrote a few lines on the back of each, which, having signed, he handed them to Mr. Longcluse, with the question, “Will that answer?”

  “Perfectly, thank you very much; it is indeed impossible for me to thank you as I ought and wish to,” said Mr. Longcluse with effusion, extending his hand at the same time; but Mr. Arden took it without much warmth, and said, in comparison a little drily —

  “No need to thank me, Mr. Longcluse; as you said at first, there are motives quite sufficient, of a kind for which you can owe me, personally, no thanks whatever, to induce the very slight trouble of coming here.”