Making a grimace to his back, the maid closed the front door and herself went into an apartment of the oddest character. To begin with, heavy curtains were drawn closely across the windows although it was broad daylight outside. The room itself was lit by softly-shaded electric lights which imparted an air of twilight. It was heavily and richly furnished with velvet hangings and many adornments. Near a delightfully carved fireplace, on the hearth of which a small wood fire was burning, was a large divan heaped up with heavy cushions, while nearby stood a small table on which a meal was laid for two with excellent silver and glass. The whole gave the idea of voluptuous, if somewhat overpowering comfort, a trifle Oriental in conception and gaudy in execution, but showing a modicum of good taste in selection.
On the divan was seated a young woman whose main article of dress was a billowy negligée. She was slenderly built, of scarcely medium height, with fair hair, diminutively regular features, and that deceptively innocent look which is often attained by the London-born girl who has had, from an early age, to fend for herself, in circumstances of unromantic difficulty, at the expense of the other sex.
“How’s the old man?” she asked the maid eagerly.
“Like a thunderstorm,” was the reply.
“Oh lord, he does expect a lot, doesn’t he? It ought to be enough for me to sit about like this without his coming in bad-tempered into the bargain. I don’t know why I stand it.”
“I know why well enough,” said the maid, in a matter-of-fact tone. “Because he pays well. We both know that.”
“All right, Rose,” was the petulant reply. “No need to rub it in. You don’t have to hang about like this, at any rate.”
“And I don’t get the money for it,” came the sharp retort.
“You wouldn’t, if you did.”
“I wouldn’t mind having a try at it.”
The blonde maiden looked at the other curiously for a moment and then said, “Well, Rose, old girl, it’s no use our getting quarrelsome over it. His lordship’s here and that’s that. Is his dinner ready?”
“You bet,” was the answer. “Smells pretty good, too.”
“I get tired of this restaurant stuff, day in and day out. He’s got queer ideas, I must say. Still, it’s better than going hungry.”
“I should say it is.”
“Spray a bit of scent about, Rose. He’ll be here in a minute and you know how he likes it.”
The maid did as she was told, not forgetting a liberal allowance around the person of the blonde maiden.
The appearance of a figure at the door threw these two women into almost theatrical poses, the mistress into one of enchanting languor and the maid of efficient servility. It would have indeed been difficult to recognise, in the cause of this exhibition, the man who had come into the flat a short time before, for the main effect was that of an elaborately figured silk dressing-gown, beyond which could be seen the open collar of a shirt of some fine material and, beneath the flowing folds, elegant leather slippers.
Although he had been familiarly described as the “old man,” the newcomer was certainly not beyond his fortieth year. His face was long, clean-shaven and somewhat cadaverous. His hair was thinning, leaving a disproportionate expanse of forehead. His eyes were deep sunk and had a sleepy look which left the impression of feline alertness below. The man himself was thin, which gave his medium height an effect of tallness. He greeted neither of the women, but advanced gloomily into the room and threw himself beside the blonde maiden on the divan.
Dismissing the maid with an over-elegant gesture, she began to stroke the man’s head, but was rudely repulsed.
“Something has upset my Francie,” she murmured in a crooningly baby voice.
The figure on the divan snapped something inaudible. It was obvious, however, that the lady was used to such behaviour, for, taking no account of rebuffs or even of the semblance of a struggle, she drew the man’s head onto her lap.
“Now you feel better,” she crooned.
The man was silent, and then cried, suddenly, in an extraordinarily vicious tone, “Why the devil do women want to commit suicide. Tell me that, Dorice?”
“I’m sure I don’t know,” came the honey-voiced reply. “I’m sure I don’t want to. Not while I have my Francie.”
“How do I know?” said the man. “All women are treacherous. You can’t trust any of them.”
“My Francie trusts me,” the blonde head murmured as it bent low over his.
“I do, Dorice, don’t I?” said the man, with a little more animation and good temper. “I’ve given you this flat and it’s yours. I haven’t been suspicious, have I? I never use my key. I always ring the bell so that you would have any amount of time to hide somebody, if they were here. That’s trusting you, isn’t it?”
“Of course it is, my Francie.”
“And I don’t stop you going out, do I? You can do what you like when I’m not here. I only ask you not to talk to anyone about me or the flat. That’s fair, isn’t it?”
“More than fair.”
“And I give you money to spend and Rose has what she wants. I’m generous, aren’t I?”
“You bet you are,” came the vigorous reply.
“Don’t talk like that, Dorice. You know how I hate slang.” The man’s voice took on a rather affected tone of weary culture and he lay on the divan in an attitude of almost Oscar Wilde abandon to match.
“Sorry, Francie,” answered the girl, “I do try to speak better, really I do.”
“I know you do,” was the almost tender reply, but the frown returned to the man’s face and rigidity to his body as he recalled the paragraph in the newspaper.
“You’re sure you don’t talk to anyone when I’m not about? You’re sure you haven’t blurted things to some other man and are trying to hide it from me?”
“Of course I haven’t.”
“I hope for your sake you haven’t,” went on the man, rising from his position as the maid appeared with a silver tray on which were two small glasses.
“I was just reminding your mistress, Locket,” he said, in formal and somewhat stilted tone, “of what she owed to me.”
“We both owe you a great deal, sir,” answered the maid, with great humility, handing the tray, from which they each took a glass, and then silently disappearing.
“Your sister realises, at any rate,” he continued when the maid had disappeared. “You were pretty well in the gutter when I picked you out of it. And the police after you, too. That’s true, isn’t it? You ought to be grateful, heaven knows.”
“And I am grateful,” was the aggrieved reply.
“I hope you are. I sincerely hope you are. But I can’t help thinking sometimes, and having my own ideas. You ought to have had your lesson, at any rate. You didn’t think I should catch you at it, did you? The very first time, too. Answer me, did you?”
“No, I didn’t, Frances.” The fright in her voice had robbed her of any inclination to use the affectionate diminutive.
“But I did. I keep my eyes and ears open. I have my ways of hearing things, haven’t I? You can’t do anything or say anything without my knowing, I can tell you. And you know what happened afterwards, don’t you?”
The look of horror and loathing which spread over the girl’s face was sufficient proof that her memory was unpleasantly vivid. She shivered, although the room was now becoming so heavily warm as to be positively uncomfortable. Her eyes glazed as if looking at some fearful apparition. This seemed to mollify her friend, for he smiled and sipped his drink.
“A great lad, Goliath,” he murmured with relish.
“A monster,” cried the girl. “A brute. A horrible brute.” She covered her face with her hands.
“He didn’t do anything to you, did he?” demanded the man.
“No, he didn’t,” admitted the girl. “But the way he looked at me. Sat there with his filthy eyes fixed on me. It was beastly. Horrible! Horrible!”
“You can’t stop a man looki
ng at a woman,” was the cheerful comment. “Goliath admires you, too, so why shouldn’t he have a look? And he’s seen some beautiful women in his time, has Goliath. It’s a bit of a compliment, you know.”
“A compliment,” echoed the girl, and her body shook with the shuddering she could not control, and her fingers dug fiercely into the cushions. “I don’t want his compliments. Keep him away from here, for God’s sake, Francie. Don’t let him come again. I should go mad if I had to sit here and let him look at me like that again.”
“Poor old Goliath,” said the man. “He’d be heart-broken if he knew. He’s always talking about you. Still, I can’t be cruel to my little Dorice. I’ll keep him away. He won’t come again without my telling him to, and I shan’t do that unless there’s a reason.”
“There won’t be a reason, I swear it,” answered the girl, breathlessly, “On my sacred honour.”
“I don’t expect there will,” said the man, complacently, the wine having soothed his feelings and given him a pleasant glow of bodily well-being. “For if there was, Goliath might not be so easy to manage a second time. It might not be only for an afternoon, you know, and then he might get tired of just looking at you.”
The colour left the girl’s face. Her eyes dilated wider with terror, stark, staring terror. She shuddered again while the picture he conjured up to himself seemed to afford her companion exquisite amusement.
“But we’re not going to quarrel, are we, my darling?” he went on. “I know I get irritable and angry, but I’m very fond of my little Dorice really. She’s not cross with her Francie, is she?”
With a sigh of relief, the blonde maiden finished her drink and, speedily realising that the present crisis was over, returned to her armoury of baby-faced endearments.
“Francie says hard things to a girl,” she exclaimed, putting her head on his shoulder. “Francie isn’t kind.”
“Francie knows,” was the reply. “Business worries upset him.”
“And why should Francie ask his Dorice why she thought of committing suicide?”
“He wasn’t thinking of his Dorice.”
“Then his Dorice is jealous. Her Francie is thinking of some other girl.”
“He never thinks of any other girl.”
“Then why does he talk about women committing suicide?”
“Let’s drop the subject,” said the man, firmly.
“But Dorice wants to know,” came the almost tearful reply, with an irresistible pout.
“One of Francie’s business worries, that’s all.”
“Poor Francie,” said the girl. “Poor, poor Francie.”
The reappearance of the maid made the couple hastily separate, for it was obvious that no display of feeling was justified in front of mortals of the baser sort. She placed food on the table and pushed it towards the divan. Her movements were light and noiseless and, when she had finished, she left the room like a high-trained phantom.
“Francie is tired,” said the girl. “Francie will rest while his Dorice looks after his food. Poor, tired man, worried by the naughty, naughty, world.”
This was obviously to the great satisfaction of the gentleman in the silk dressing-gown and the manner in which he graciously accepted the suggestion proved that it was by no means an unusual occurrence. With a servility which would have done credit to a fancied picture of an Eastern potentate, the two women waited upon him. The food they served was of good taste and quality, while the china, silver and glass was of a definitely high order. The quaintly clad figure on the heavily-cushioned divan to whom the blonde maiden often knelt in the action of offering him food, the soft shading of the light which seemed to add its own quota to the unreality of the room, the heavy smell of scent and the warmth given out by the fire, mainly composed of logs, all these, seen for a brief moment by a curious (and invisible) spectator, would have made him tremble for his own sanity that, a few yards away, was one of the least romantic quarters of London.
The meal served, all to the accompaniment of sweet phrases from the lips of the lady addressed as Dorice, the man lay back for a moment at peace with the world. Again obviously following the usual routine, she produced a cigar of no mean proportions and prepared to light it. The curious spectator might have expected a hookah, and the cigar appeared a little incongruous.
“Not today, my little Dorice,” said the man.
“My Francie not smoking,” she replied. “Is he ill?”
“I haven’t time.”
“But my Francie must make time. He can’t miss his beautiful smoke.”
“Don’t rub it in, Dorice,” was the answer, while he drew her to sit beside him on the divan. “Important business engagement. Your Francie must make money sometimes for you to be able to live here. Mustn’t he?”
“But my Francie loves his smoke.”
“Of course he does. But that shows how serious his business is, my dove. Francie would give anything to be able to stay but he can’t. He will have to be off in a moment.”
The cigar was regretfully put aside and, soon afterwards, the man jumped up, in a business-like fashion, and prepared to depart.
“Tomorrow, then, Dorice,” he said, kissing her again.
“And Francie promises no horrid business to take him away so quickly tomorrow?”
“I’ll do my best.”
“I know you will,” was the tenderly-sighed comment.
Soon afterwards, dressed in the drab and uninteresting clothes of everyday life, the man, looking almost as undistinguished as his garb, was being shown out of the flat by the maid.
Pausing by the front door before she opened it for him, he looked back and said, “All snug?”
The maid also looked back, and saw that the door of the blonde maiden’s bower was closed. “I think so, Mr. Manners,” she answered.
“I’m getting to like you, Rose,” he said.
“That’s very kind of you, sir,” was the innocent reply.
The man suddenly took her in his arms and kissed her quickly.
“Oh, Mr. Manners,” exclaimed the girl, making a half-hearted attempt to release herself.
“I may be able to do a lot for you one day, Rose,” he went on. “More than you expect.”
He kissed her again, and then set her free. As he went out of the door, he pressed a Treasury note into her hand and said, “That’s for yourself, Rose. Mind you’re a good girl.”
The door closed and he found himself out in the prosaic atmosphere of Bloomsbury. He moved quickly off and, following a number of side turnings with which he seemed very familiar, he came out in a small street near the Strand. Here he paused, almost as if he were looking round to see if he had been followed, or, at any rate, were being watched, and suddenly dived into a recess, above which, in gay and rich colours, was the enticing inscription, “Solomon’s Snack Bar.”
The place might almost be described as a day coffee stall, and a number of them are to be found in different parts of London. In some recess where the speculative builders have not yet decided to place a shop, and often between two modern buildings looking respectably askance at it on either side, an enterprising gentleman, not overburdened with capital, has erected a shelter, open to the street. There is little room inside, for a counter, on which are spread cheap cakes, sandwiches and the like, occupies most of the space, but there is just sufficient for the patrons to be protected from the rigours of the weather while they consume their portion and tell the gossip of the day.
Solomon himself was always to be found on duty behind his counter. An unassuming man, he rarely joined in the conversation of his customers, though he was not above listening to all they said. Occasionally he had been visited by the police in his snack bar, and once had been warned that it was getting a bad name as a rendezvous for undesirable characters. Solomon expressed his detestation of such citizens, and asked the police if they, as the proud possessors of a snack bar from which they tried, with poor success, to make an honest living, would have time to exam
ine the habits of every man who came to purchase a slab of cake and a mug of coffee. His argument was not too politely received and, being a cautious man, Solomon was not above taking the hint.
The place was innocent enough at the moment. Indeed there was only one customer who, if a criminal, hardly gave the appearance of being sprung from the loins of the aristocracy of that class; certainly not one to give the police undue misgiving.
The man, addressed by the name of Manners, came up to the counter, whereupon the slightest twitch of Solomon’s eyebrow hinted to the other customer to disappear from earshot. He therefore took his cup of coffee and stood by the street entrance.
“Good afternoon,” said the man.
“Good afternoon,” courteously returned Solomon.
“Anything good?”
“You bet.”
“I don’t bet. I buy certainties. I’ve had a stroke of bad luck.”
“That’s a pity,” said Solomon. “This is a certainty, all right.”
“Who got it?”
“Tony the Pancake.”
“That sounds good enough. How much?”
“Ten.”
“It isn’t worth it?”
“I tell you it is,” said Solomon.
“How much is Tony getting?”
“That’s my business.”
“Trust you for business, Solomon. Still, ten’s a lot.”
“It’s worth it, I tell you,” said Solomon, emphatically. “Tony’s no fool.”
“I know he isn’t,” was the reply, the man being evidently impressed by Solomon’s tone. “Still, he can’t know the value of a bit of paper to me, can he?”
“He can guess.”
“What’s it like?”
“Search me,” answered Solomon. “That’s Tony’s little secret. All I know is that it’s going for ten.”
“Make it nine.”
“Nothing doing.”
“Can you get hold of Tony if I do buy?”
“Straight away.”
“Very well, I suppose I must,” said the man, sadly. He produced a battered wallet while Solomon obtrusively poured out a cup of coffee. This he pushed in front of his customer, receiving in return ten one pound notes.
Methylated Murder Page 2