The Man Without A Face

by The Man Without a Face (retail) (epub)

  “That sounds a reasonable explanation,” said Harrison. “Is that the one Mr. Marston gives himself?”

  “He has really said nothing at all,” replied the doctor. “I found him standing here, looking at the body, when I arrived, and there he remained, without saying a word, until you arrived and Mrs. Marston took him away. It must have been a fearful shock to him.”

  “Pretty terrible,” said Harrison.

  “But no one can blame him,” said the doctor. “It was a pure accident, and one might almost say, if Sir Jeremiah turned round suddenly, he brought it on himself.”

  At that moment another person came into the summer-house. It proved to be a young man of about twenty-three or twenty-four. The doctor went towards him and took him by the arm.

  “Philip,” he said, “what have they told you?”

  “Is it very bad?” asked the young man.

  “Very bad, indeed,” replied the doctor.

  “Poor father,” said Philip Bamberger, walking over to the bench and kneeling at the side of the body.

  “I don’t think you need me any more, doctor,” whispered Harrison. “You’ll look after the boy. I’m going to Mr. and Mrs. Marston.”

  “Very well, Mr. Harrison,” said the doctor.

  At the name, the young man started and seemed about to say something. He looked again, however, towards his father and was silent. Harrison gave him a look of sympathy. He had been impressed by the manner in which the young man had taken the news and by the sincere affection, unalloyed by hysterical demonstration, he had shown.

  Harrison found Mr. and Mrs. Marston walking on the terrace in front of the house.

  “Oh, Mr. Harrison,” exclaimed Mrs. Marston, as he came up to them, “what is going to happen now?”

  “I’ve made a mess,” said Marston, “and I suppose I shall have to pay for it.”

  “I don’t think it’s as bad as that,” said Harrison. “Have you any idea yourself what happened, Mr. Marston?”

  “None at all,” answered Marston. “I should never have thought a knock like that would have killed him.”

  “You did not strike him very heavily, then?”

  “It might have appeared so,” said Marston, looking inquiringly at Harrison; “but really, it was only a playful blow. I can’t believe such a thing has happened.”

  “There will have to be an inquest, I suppose?” asked Mrs. Marston.

  “I’m afraid so,” answered Harrison; “and the obvious place is in the house here.”

  “The sooner it’s over the better,” said Marston.

  “I can quite appreciate your position, Mr. Marston,” said Harrison. “Believe me, I want to help as much as I possibly can, but there is little I can do at the moment—except give a piece of advice.”

  “What is it?” asked Mrs. Marston. “You know we shall appreciate it, Mr. Harrison.”

  “It may sound callous,” answered Harrison, “but you don’t want your daughter’s celebrations to be spoilt. I feel that is the last thing Sir Jeremiah would have wanted, and I expect his son is of the same mind. I think we should agree that a serious accident has taken place, but not a fatal one. Let us assume just for this evening that Sir Jeremiah is not dead but seriously hurt. Get the police to allow the body to be taken to his own home. They will agree to that, I’m certain, and warn the doctor not to talk too much. Do you feel fit enough to do that, Mr. Marston?”

  “I must do something,” was the emphatic reply. “I can’t stop here thinking in circles. The more I have to do, the better I shall like it. I think your idea is the best. I don’t like all the pretending, but it would be very hard on Livia if we didn’t.”

  “Good,” said Harrison. “And you, Mrs. Marston, must make certain that the servants are all right. Some of them—for example, the man who came up to you—have been told Sir Jeremiah is dead. You must contradict that, for the moment; in my opinion, to-morrow will be quite time enough for the whole tragic business to be known.”

  “I will,” said Mrs. Marston. “They’re a good set of servants, taking them all round. I don’t think they can do much harm.”

  Mr. and Mrs. Marston went off to their respective duties, and Harrison felt that the all-powerful name of Marston would be enough to get his advice carried out.

  Slowly he strolled back to the arena, where the last scenes of the play were being enacted. The audience generally had no idea that anything serious had happened, being still under the impression that the carrying-off of Sir Jeremiah was all a part of a very amusing episode. A burst of laughter greeted a further absurdity from the whimsical mind of Miss Livia Marston as Harrison slipped into his seat beside Henry.

  Henry greeted him with terrific excitement. “You’re right, sir,” he exclaimed. “It’s her.”

  “Henry, Henry,” said Harrison, reprovingly, “your grammar.”

  “But have a look at her, sir,” said Henry. “I should know her anywhere. It must be her.”

  “Be careful, Henry,” answered Harrison, looking across at the seat which had been empty for so long. “That lady’s name is Helen Williams.”

  “Well, it was Jeanne de Marplay once, I’ll swear, sir,” exclaimed Henry.

  “Very difficult to prove.”

  “But, sir, look at her. The way she sits, moves. Everything is the same. It must be her.”

  “There is an uncanny resemblance, I admit, Henry,” said Harrison. “As attractive as ever, too, so it seems to me.”

  “Be careful, sir,” said Henry.

  “But it won’t do, Henry,” said Harrison. “You’re the victim of a suggestion I myself made. You know as well as I do the coincidences there are over looks—especially if you are trying to find them. The lady’s name is Helen Williams, and that’s the name she’ll stick to, however much we may say she looks like an old acquaintance of ours.”

  “But if she were, sir,” leaded Henry, “that would prove there was something funny going on here.”

  “If, if, if, Henry,” said Harrison. “But at present all I know about her is that she is Miss Helen Williams, an exceedingly attractive woman, who is very popular with all the people she meets, who drives at high speed and with great danger to human life all over the countryside, and—”

  “And, sir?”

  “And prefers the window of her bedroom to the door when she goes out at night.”

  “I should say that proves it, sir,” said Henry, triumphantly.

  “Henry,” said Harrison, sternly, “you’re jumping again, and this time without any justification. You really mustn’t say things like that. It’s only because you want to prove you’re right that you call it a proof at all. She’s Helen Williams to me, at any rate, until we get some solid facts to show she isn’t.”

  Henry, watchful of Harrison’s moods, saw that a hint was implied in these words, so that when the play was over and the guests were dispersing he gave no sign of having imagined that he had seen Miss Williams before. It seemed to him that Harrison passed the lady very closely for the purposes of recognition, but, although she looked at them and seemed even to ask her neighbours who they might be, she did not suggest any previous acquaintance. By the time the dinner-hour was reached the company had gathered that Sir Jeremiah was rather seriously hurt, and were somewhat subdued in consequence. There was no sign of Philip Bamberger at the meal itself, but Mr. and Mrs. Marston made a brave show, and Livia was obviously ignorant of the true position. Harrison watched Marston with the greatest care and saw the strain he was undergoing. Any moment he looked as if he might collapse, but his will-power proved strong enough to keep him going.

  Harrison found himself sitting next to Miss Williams and assumed that this had been arranged at her request. Twin sister of Jeanne de Marplay or not, Miss Helen was an exceedingly attractive woman of the very fair and clear-complexioned type. Slim and inclining to tallness, she had a beauty which was not entirely English, in some vague way but which one would hardly have attributed to a Celtic strain, justified by her
Welsh name. Her eyes were extraordinarily bright, and she seemed to have a perfect knowledge of their use. There seemed no doubt that she also had no mean knowledge of the power of her physical attractions, and possession of a definite continental smartness in her manner of dress might be added to her other charms.

  “It is a great pleasure to meet you, Mr. Harrison,” she began, with a brilliant smile.

  “Thank you for a quite undeserved compliment,” was the reply. “But by some stupid mistake, I suppose in the excitement of all these happenings, we haven’t really been introduced. You know my name, I see, but yours—” He left the sentence in the air.

  The woman looked at him intently and then smiled again, as if relishing the remark.

  “You don’t know me, then?” she asked.

  “I’m afraid not,” said Harrison. “I have a vague recollection of having seen your face—”

  “Where?”

  “Oh, not in the flesh,” he replied. “To have seen you once would be to remember you for all time. I may not be very gallant, but I cannot help saying that yours is an unforgettable face.”

  “You are more than gallant, Mr. Harrison, believe me. But I am puzzled. Where could you have seen my face—if not in the flesh?”

  “Of course, most people think a detective’s only resource is to spend his time looking at the pictures of wanted criminals—” He paused and looked at the woman, who did not speak for a moment. Her fingers were twitching slightly at her napkin.

  “Do you think I resemble someone you know?” she asked, very quietly.

  “Good heavens, no!” answered Harrison, with a laugh. “I hope you didn’t take my remark about wanted criminals seriously. You didn’t let me finish. I was only saying that was what people thought detectives did.”

  “You’re making fun of me, Mr. Harrison,” said the woman, with a slight tone of annoyance, emphasised by an angry flash of the eyes. “I am not used to that kind of thing, and I certainly object to it.”

  “I was never more serious,” answered Harrison. “I am only a very modest kind of detective who does not go often into society. I apologise if I was behaving crudely, but you never gave me the chance to explain myself. I suppose I am rather blunt, but I have had no chance of acquiring the right polish. All I meant to say was that I behave sometimes like a normal human being, and therefore occasionally look at the weekly illustrated papers. I suppose it is there I must have seen photographs of you from time to time.”

  “Is that all you meant?” she asked.

  “I am afraid women are naturally suspicious,” he said, without directly answering her question; “but I thought I was being really rather flattering.”

  “And you don’t even know my name?”

  “I am conscience-stricken at having to confess it, but I don’t.”

  The woman looked at him again and seemed to be trying to throw the whole of her physical spell around him. “My name is Helen Williams,” she said, and the tone seemed to Harrison like the conscious effort at an overpowering caress.

  Mentally Harrison shook himself as if to get free from the insidious influence of the woman, and then he said, “Not the Helen Williams?”

  “So you have heard of me, then?” she asked, with another smile, although Harrison felt that she had a feeling of suspicion as well.

  “Mrs. Marston talks of no one else. And besides—”

  “And what?”

  “It is to you I owe the honour of being invited down here.”

  “Not quite that, Mr. Harrison.”

  “You wouldn’t deny, Miss Williams,” said Harrison, “that you suggested my name to Mrs. Marston?”

  “Oh, no, of course I wouldn’t,” she answered. “For a woman, Mr. Harrison, I’m remarkably keen on telling the truth. It saves such a lot of trouble. Try as I may, I find a downright lie so hard to live up to. And besides, people don’t expect the truth, and that makes it all the more amusing when you tell it. Sometimes if it’s unpleasant they just refuse to believe it altogether. You must have done it yourself sometimes?”

  “Done what, Miss Williams?”

  “Told the truth knowing you were not going to be believed.”

  “It depends on my company,” said Harrison. “There are some people—yourself, for example—I wouldn’t risk it with.”

  “Is that a compliment?”

  “As you like. I have too high a respect for some people’s intelligence to risk it, that’s all.”

  “And so you lie?”

  “That’s putting it rather harshly, isn’t it?” said Harrison. “And as there can be no unpleasant truth I am likely to tell you, Miss Williams, why worry about it?”

  “You fence very neatly, Mr. Harrison,” answered Miss Williams. “But it is fencing, after all. My method may occasionally get me into trouble, but I am afraid I cannot have as much respect for the intelligence of others as you.”

  “You may be justified,” said Harrison. “But come back to me. Why did you ask me here?”

  “I didn’t ask you here,” was the reply. “You’re Mrs. Marston’s guest.”

  “Well, if that’s your idea of telling the truth,” commented Harrison, laughing, “I don’t see much in it.”

  “Possibly Mr. Harrison is not now giving me the chance of explaining myself.”

  “I’m sorry, Miss Williams.”

  “The truth is, Mr. Harrison,” replied Helen Williams, looking intently at him again, “I have heard a great deal about you. I move around a lot, on the Continent as well as in England, and I must say the name of Clay Harrison IS becoming quite a household word. It seems to be better known outside our own country, but it certainly is well known, and I wanted to meet you. So I got Mrs. Marston to invite you down here so that you could be near me during these celebrations. That’s the truth. Don’t you feel flattered?”

  “Of course.”

  “A pretty weak answer, Mr. Harrison. Many men would give anything to have that said to them by Helen Williams, and really I’m not unusually vain. But possibly you don’t believe me?”

  “Of course I do,” said Harrison, more heartily. “But why should Helen Williams be so interested in Clay Harrison?”

  “I have already explained that.”

  “And the need for me to come down here to do a little of my own work was just an excuse?”

  “Quite.”

  “I can’t believe that.”

  “Why not?”

  “You know why Mrs. Marston asked me to come?”

  “Of course, to find out something about poor Sir Jeremiah. She suggested vaguely that it would be a good idea—”

  “Maybe I did. I can’t remember. But, at any rate. I jumped at it and sang your praises until she invited you.”

  “Just a blind, then?”

  “You think it unscrupulous of me?”

  “Well, I hate being treated as a curiosity.”

  “Not quite that, Mr. Harrison,” said the woman, with a delightful laugh. “Still, quite seriously, it was worth even that little deception to get you here.”

  “I appreciate your interest, Miss Williams,” said Harrison, gravely, “and of course I feel very flattered. You said, ‘poor Sir Jeremiah’; what did you mean by that?”

  Helen Williams raised her eyebrows at the sudden change of the conversation to a direct question.

  “Strategy, I suppose, Mr. Harrison,” she said. “This quick change of idea. I expect I said that because he seems to have had a pretty bad time.”

  “Not as bad as all that,” said Harrison.

  “Really,” commented Miss Williams, incredulously. “I gathered it was serious, if not fatal.”

  Harrison looked at her innocently. “Who on earth put that into your head?” he asked.

  “General gossip, I suppose,” she replied. “Isn’t it true?”

  “Good heavens, no!” said Harrison. “Sir Jeremiah slipped just as Mr. Marston hit him. I shouldn’t be surprised if he is quite all right to-morrow.”

  “What
a relief,” said Miss Williams, and again looked fixedly into Harrison’s eyes, but found nothing there. “By the way, Mr. Harrison, I wanted to explain one thing to you before we finish dinner. You see, we may not see each other again as I am going off early in the morning.”

  “I doubt it,” said Harrison.

  “Why?” asked Miss Williams.

  “I have taken a leaf from your book, Miss Williams, and have started telling the truth. I doubt whether you will go early in the morning. I have no explanation. I just doubt it, and say so.”

  Helen Williams shrugged her exquisite shoulders with impatience. “I trust you will treat me seriously one day, Mr. Harrison,” she said.

  “Believe me, I treat you very seriously,” was the answer. “But what on earth could you want to explain to me?”

  “Climbing out of my window last night,” said Miss Williams.

  Harrison was really surprised and did not attempt to conceal it.

  “You don’t mean to say you didn’t see me?” she asked. “I saw you.”

  Harrison laughed. “I can understand your wish to explain,” he said.

  “You may or may not know that I am a very keen motorist,” said Miss Williams. “You certainly cannot know that I am a bad sleeper. The only thing that really cheers me up when I cannot possibly get to sleep is a run in the car. Of course, that is more difficult in other people’s houses than in one’s own home. It isn’t fair to go wandering about, un-bolting front doors, at two or three in the morning, in a strange house. So, having been given the key of the garage by Mrs. Marston, I go gently out of the window—I have always been pretty active in that way—and trouble nobody.”

  “But the risk?”

  “The risk to my neck is negligible and the risk of being taken for a burglar is worth running. Nothing has happened up to now, and it wouldn’t be difficult to explain.”

  “Does Mrs. Marston know?”

  “Of course she doesn’t,” was the reply. “I do it to save her trouble. If she knew she’d insist on getting the whole house up to escort me to the garage.”

  “And you did that last night?”

  “Exactly,” answered Miss Williams, with a twinkling eye. “I had had a headache and I couldn’t sleep. So I dropped my rope and started to go down. As I passed your window, Mr. Harrison, I looked through a little gap in the curtains—my eyesight is extremely good, you know—and there I saw you, sitting without a light, looking towards me. It gave me quite a shock.”