The Shadow In The House

by Maxwell March

  CHAPTER XIII

  The City of Strangers

  THE RAIN CAME DOWN. It was not torrential or whipping and intermittent but a slow, quiet, steady downpour which had persisted all the afternoon and would probably go on far into the night.

  At the rush hour, when the homegoing thousands poured into buses and tubes, the cold misery of the streets was accentuated, and even the bright lights winking down upon the oilskin capes of the policemen and glinting on the sides of the great red omnibuses seemed to add to the general discomfort.

  Mary ran until she was out of breath and then slowed down to a steady walk, her head still bowed, her ears still strained for the sound of scurrying feet behind her.

  After a while, however, her panic passed, and she began to realize the truth. She had left the De Lianes behind. She had escaped from them. She was free.

  With this discovery there came another. She was free, but only in the most terrible way in the world. She was alone. Every one of the millions around her was hurrying somewhere: she alone had nowhere to go. She had no money, not even a purse. The rain was soaking the shoulders of her new tweed jacket, and already her small feet squelched inside her brown shoes.

  It was night, and there was no one in the world to whom she could turn. The discovery overwhelmed her. Anything, it had seemed, would have been better than being the prisoner of the De Lianes, but now she was the prisoner of something almost as terrible, the prisoner of London, the prisoner of a million strangers.

  She dared not go to the police. That, she knew, would be to walk straight back into her husband’s arms.

  Plunging on through the maze of narrow streets bounded by high, dark buildings, she tried to pull herself together, to marshal her scattered wits, to find some way to establish herself once again in the civilized world. She was like a dancer out of step fighting desperately to get back into the swing.

  She had not even a name. Somewhere out in that deserted cemetery there was a little mound to account for her very identity.

  She thrust her hand into her pocket and, pulling out a handkerchief, wiped the makeup hastily off her face. At least she would look herself.

  All the time she was walking. She was tired. The effects of the drug had left her weak and ill. That was another danger: if she should collapse she would be taken to a hospital and then Mrs de Liane would find her, she knew it instinctively. If it were humanly possible Mrs de Liane would find her somehow.

  She thought of Merton House far away on the other side of London. She had no very high opinion of Miss Campbell-Smith, but at least she could identify her: that would be something.

  She glanced up at the name of the street. She knew where she was. Merton House was miles away, but it was her only hope; at least it was somewhere to go. She turned on her heel and emerged at last onto Ludgate Hill.

  She walked through to Holborn and straight on down Oxford Street, intending to turn up Baker Street and get out towards Finchley.

  By the time she turned off to go through Manchester Square she was very nearly exhausted. Her coat was wet through, and her feet were lagging, and all the time her heart was beating in terror lest the big black car should pull up beside her and Mrs de Liane’s soft, horrible voice sound gently in her ear.

  The man in the fawn raincoat was striding down the pavement towards her when he stopped abruptly and peered down into her face.

  “Mary Coleridge!” he said.

  The sound of her own name uttered in a strange but friendly voice brought the girl to a full stop, her eyes widening and her heart turning over in her side. She found herself looking up into the face of a big fresh-faced man nearing sixty. The raindrops glistened on the rim of his hat, and he had come along walking like a countryman, as if he enjoyed the weather. He laughed at her astonishment.

  “You’re going to tell me you don’t remember me,” he said.

  “I don’t,” she said huskily.

  “I’m hurt. I thought any daughter of Tom Coleridge would recognize me.”

  At the sound of her father’s name Mary gasped, and to her horror tears rose in her eyes, while she sought anxiously in her mind for the recollection of any patient or friend of her father’s who resembled the stranger in any way.

  Meanwhile he was looking at her closely.

  “My dear child,” he said, “you’re wringing wet! What are you doing striding about like this without an umbrella?”

  Mary did not answer him. “Who are you?” she said.

  “George Lissen, from Wickham. Don’t you remember me? You didn’t go out with your father much, did you? I lost a good friend and the best doctor in the world when he died.”

  Mary stood staring at him. For the last hour she had been alone in a strange and terrible world, a world in which she had no place, no right; and here, out of the thousands of strangers, had come one who had recognized her. The sound of her own name, her father’s name, the name of the town which had been near her village home, were like talismans, and she stood looking at him, her lips quivering, the raindrops glistening on her soaked tweeds.

  For the first time he seemed to notice that something was wrong, and he looked more closely into her face.

  “What’s the matter? Why, Miss Coleridge, you’re crying. Anything wrong?”

  Mary put out her hand to steady herself against the weakness which was fast overcoming her.

  “No—no, I’m all right,” she said unconvincingly.

  He hesitated. “Look here,” he said, “I’m an old friend of your father’s; won’t you come and have some food with me? Or—look, there’s a tea shop over there. Let’s have a coffee, and you can tell me the trouble. What about it?”

  Mary nodded gratefully. As she sat at one of the little marble-topped tables in the tea shop she looked across her coffee at the man who had found her so opportunely, and her spirits began to rise in spite of herself.

  Mr Lissen was plump and fatherly and indubitably respectable. His clothes were old-fashioned and good, and the same might have been said of his manners. At the moment he was looking at her with a puzzled expression, and Mary hesitated. When she considered the story she had to tell, nobody in the world would believe it, she reflected, much less this sturdy, conventional old gentleman who belonged to that other world, the world her father had known, the world where high adventure was considered not only improbable but rather unpleasant.

  Suddenly an idea occurred to her. Here was the witness she wanted. Here was the heaven-sent respectable person who could vouch for her identity. She looked up at him.

  “Mr Lissen,” she said, “you do know I’m Mary Coleridge, don’t you?”

  He was naturally somewhat taken aback, but he laughed.

  “Of course I do,” he said. “The last I heard of you was from Mrs Briden. She said you were teaching at a kindergarten up here. Is that right?”

  Mary could have wept with sheer relief. The De Lianes knew nothing of her life, and the foolish fear she had entertained that this stranger might in some way be connected with them was dispelled.

  A few minutes later she was pouring out the whole story. She did not look at the man until she had finished. At any moment she expected him to get up and walk out, hurrying to get away from the young lunatic. But he remained silent, looking at her with kindly, shrewd dark eyes, and when the story came to an end he leant forward.

  “Where were you going just now?”

  She told him. “To Merton House. I must get hold of someone who knows who I am, mustn’t I?”

  “Haven’t you any other friends?” he enquired. “No sweethearts?”

  “No,” said Mary, remembering with a tremor of alarm that other time when the same question had been put to her on the day when she had first visited Baron’s Tye.

  “I see. Well, it’s a very extraordinary story.” Mr Lissen spoke seriously and as though he meant what he said and not as if he doubted her integrity. “What do you want me to do?”

  Mary thought she detected a note of suspicion
in his voice and did not blame him for it.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Unless you’d come with me to the police. I daren’t go alone, you see, or they’d give me back to the De Lianes, who would simply swear I was mad.”

  Mr Lissen was silent and appeared to be thinking.

  “Look here,” he said at last, “I have a friend at Scotland Yard. I think he’s the man we want. It’s a very serious charge, you see. It involves kidnapping, false pretences and heaven knows what else. Did you ever meet my wife?” He answered the last question himself. “No, of course you didn’t. But still, I’ll tell you what we’ll do. She and I are both staying at the Plantagenet Hotel in the City. I’m going along there now. I’ll take you with me, and you can stay with her while I go down to Scotland Yard and get hold of my friend, and then I’ll bring him back with me if I can and we’ll all talk it over. How about that?”

  Mary hesitated. “I—I ought not to bother you,” she said weakly and looked up to find him laughing at her.

  “My dear child,” he said, “in a case like this one can’t worry about the little niceties of polite society. You come with me.”

  Feeling wonderfully relieved and that her feet were at last on firm ground, Mary followed him out into the rain again and climbed into the taxi he hailed.

  She found him a particularly comforting person because, oddly enough, she did not altogether like him. He was kind but he was pompous, friendly but sceptical, and altogether an ordinary genuine unsentimentalized sort of person, real and solid and everyday.

  As they returned to the City again he turned to her.

  “Look here, I’ve got to call in at my office, if you don’t mind. I shan’t be more than ten minutes or so, but there are one or two papers I have to collect and go over tonight for a business conference tomorrow. The delay won’t take up more than fifteen minutes of our time. You don’t mind, do you?”

  “Of course not,” she said naturally, and when the cab pulled up outside a large City building she got out and waited while he paid off the taxi.

  “I could keep him,” Mr Lissen remarked, “but I don’t think I will. A penny saved is a penny earned, you know. I don’t believe you young people nowadays think enough about that.”

  And with this observation he led her into the building. There was a night porter in uniform on duty who touched his cap very civilly to Mr Lissen and took them both up in the lift.

  When they reached the second floor Mary followed her guide down a marble corridor lined with heavy mahogany doors. Taking a key from his pocket, the businessman let himself into one of the huge apartments at the end of the corridor, and the girl found herself in an office whose magnificence made Mr Latcher’s walnut elegance look shabby and out of date.

  The room was thickly carpeted, its white-panelled walls hung with valuable prints. The ashes of a coal fire still smouldered in an open grate. The desk was a miracle of modern efficiency, and the two leather armchairs were as big as Austin Sevens.

  Mr Lissen waved to one of them.

  “Sit down and wait for me,” he said. “I shan’t be a moment. The papers I want are just out here.”

  He went over to another door behind the desk and disappeared, closing it softly behind him.

  Mary sat down thankfully, a wet, pathetic little figure in the midst of so much pretentious luxury.

  She had just assimilated the odd procession of events which had led up to this unexpected solution of her affairs when a faint sound outside the door through which she had entered caught her attention. Her experiences of the past few days had made her suspicious, and springing to her feet, she went over and turned the knob quietly.

  To her horror the door did not move. She tried it again and again, fear rising in her heart. It remained firm.

  She turned and flung herself across the room towards the other door.

  “Mr Lissen!” she called helplessly. “Mr Lissen!”

  The last word died abruptly on her lips. The inner door had opened, and through it came a tall, cadaverous stranger dressed in the formal morning clothes of the elegant City man.

  He paused, regarding her thoughtfully, and she, looking at him anxiously, was aware at once that he was a person of distinction and probably of considerable power and consequence.

  “Ah,” he said, and the voice was unexpectedly deep, “Mary Coleridge. Sit down, will you, Miss Coleridge? You and I have something very important to discuss. I have been looking for you for some time.”

  Mary stared at him. His appearance had been completely unexpected, and his opening words were frankly incomprehensible. For a lightheaded moment she wondered if she was suffering from hallucinations.

  Meanwhile he remained with his back to the inner door, looking down at her steadily. There was a conventional smile upon his thin, distinguished face, and his narrow grey eyes were sharp and wary.

  Her astonishment was so apparent that he attempted to dispel it by laughing pleasantly.

  “I’m afraid my methods to ensure this interview were a little unconventional,” he began, “but then, my dear young lady, you’re used to unconventional people, aren’t you?”

  He eyed her as he spoke, and she was conscious of an insinuation in the final words. She did not attempt to follow it, however, and stepped back nervously. The light fell upon her bedraggled little figure, and the newcomer noticed for the first time that she was wringing wet.

  “Won’t you take your coat off and let it dry?” he said easily. “It’s a wretched fire, I’m afraid, but perhaps we can do something to it.”

  He walked over to the fireplace and made it up somewhat inexpertly.

  “Now,” he said, waving her to one of the armchairs and planting himself squarely on the rug in front of her, “we must have our little talk, mustn’t we?”

  “Who are you?” Mary blurted out the words involuntarily, and he raised his eyebrows at her and smiled depreciatingly.

  “I don’t think that matters very much at the moment,” he said. “You probably know that I’m one of—say—three people, but which one I am I don’t think matters. What I want to assure you is that you can be perfectly frank with me and that I wish to deal with you as an independent agent. Now, Miss Coleridge, this is a point I want to make very clear. …”

  He paused, and she was aware of his sharp eyes peering into her own.

  “You told Mr Lissen that you were without friends. Am I to understand that you mean that literally? You are entirely without friends? Real friends? You do mean that?”

  Mary was completely bewildered. The man before her did not look like a lunatic: on the contrary he gave her the impression that he was talking very intelligently about something which she ought to understand, whereas she found him utterly incomprehensible. However, there seemed nothing to be afraid of in his manner, and she answered him truthfully.

  “No, I have no friends at all.”

  “You mean that?”

  “Of course I do. I have no friends. I’m alone.”

  The assurance seemed to please him, for he smiled at her.

  “Oh well, that makes it very much simpler. If you really are an independent agent we can come to some arrangement. By the way, you don’t hunt yourself, do you?”

  The unexpected question was too much for Mary. She sat forward, the colour rushing into her face.

  “I—I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she began.

  The man laughed. “You’re a very transparent young person,” he said. “Shall we say, then, that the answer to my question is that you prefer to watch? Well then, Miss Coleridge, I have a proposition to make to you.”

  Mary wriggled out of the deep chair and stood opposite the man on the hearthrug. She was completely mystified, frightened, and had the uncomfortable impression that she was being persuaded to hint things which she did not understand.

  “Look here,” she said, “I don’t understand you. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I met Mr Lissen, who was an old friend of my father�
�s, and I told him of—of certain difficulties with which I am confronted and he promised to take me to see his wife while he went to find a friend of his at Scotland Yard. He came in here for some papers, and then you appeared. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I think you’re making a mistake.”

  The stranger sighed. “You were being so reasonable,” he said. “I had hopes of you. Why must you women be so difficult? I am being perfectly straight with you, perfectly honest, and you wriggle about as though I were trying to pin you down to something. Look here, Miss Coleridge, I know who you are. I know all about you. I know where you’ve been during the last two or three days, and I can guess very much what your relations with certain—er—certain people have been. Now you assure me that you have no friends, no loyalties to consider, and I am preparing to make you an offer.”

  The little touch of irritation in his tone awakened an answering flame in the girl.

  “If you’ll send for Mr Lissen and get him to take me to the police,” she said, “I shall be very pleased. Or if you think you can prove who I am, if you’ll take me to them yourself I shall be grateful.”

  The man raised a pale, carefully manicured hand.

  “My dear young lady, no threats if you please,” he said stiffly. “You came here with Mr Lissen because you were prepared to talk to me: get that into your head.”

  “But Mr Lissen was my father’s patient and friend. He said so. He knew all about me. He——”

  Mary’s voice quivered and broke, and the man in front of her made an exasperated sound with his tongue.

  “Why can’t you be straightforward?” he said wearily, and, moving across the room, he opened the inner door and put his head inside. “Oh Lissen,” he said, “come here a moment, will you?”

  George Lissen, looking, if possible, even more respectable, more pompous and more elderly, came immediately. He stood just inside the room, his face wooden and unresponsive.