Dead Man's Love

"This is not the time for explanations," I said; "leave all that till the morning. Go to bed, and try not to remember anything that has happened; and lock your door."

I heard the key turn in the lock before I came away; not till then did I retrace my steps back to the corridor. I was scarcely surprised to find the man standing almost in the same attitude – only now his head had lowered a little, and he seemed to be musing. Without moving he looked up at me, and a queer sort of grin spread over his features.

"Smart man!" he whispered, with a sneer. "How did it happen? How much do you know?"

"More than you would have me know?" I replied. "Would it not be well to fasten up that door again?" I jerked my head in the direction of the end of the corridor.

Without a word he handed the lamp to me, and started towards the opening. He went so quickly that I thought for the moment he meant to hurl himself upon that death he had intended for the girl; but he stopped at the end, and seemed to be fumbling with the doors.

By that time I had reached him, and, with the aid of the lamp, I could see that there were two heavy doors opening inwards and fastened with a great bar that dropped across them, and with bolts at the top and at the bottom. Quite as though he had forgotten the incidents of the night, he turned to me, and gave an explanation of the doors.

"There used to be an iron staircase against the wall of the house, leading down from here at one time," he said. "It was the whim of some former owner. I found these doors by accident."

"And opened them with a purpose," I reminded him.

He said nothing in reply. Having secured the doors, he motioned to me to go in front, which I did, carrying the light, and in that order we came to my room. I would have handed him the lamp at the door, but he motioned to me to go in, and, following himself, closed the door. I set down the lamp, and waited for what he had to say. He was a long time coming to it; he wandered about the room for a time, stopping now and then, with his back to me, and with his finger tracing out the pattern of the wall paper. When at last he spoke he was still tracing that pattern, and he did not look round.

"You have done me a service to-night, and one I'm not likely to forget," he said.

"A service?" I asked in amazement. "I should scarcely have thought you'd call it that."

"I do – I do!" he exclaimed, swinging round upon me suddenly. "I meant to kill her, and you've saved me from that. I thank my God for it!"

"I don't believe you," I said doggedly. "You planned the thing too well for that."

"I did not plan it, except by the opening of the doors," he said. "I knew that she walked in her sleep sometimes, and I thought – "

"You lie!" I exclaimed fiercely. "I watched you, and heard you while you suggested to her that she should walk in this eastern corridor at midnight, and should come to the end wall. And you knew that there would be no wall there."

He looked at me in a bewildered fashion for what seemed a long time; then he nodded slowly twice. "So you heard that, did you? Well, I suppose there's nothing for it but confession. I did plan the thing; it was by a method you don't understand – what we call hypnotic suggestion. That means that you tell a person that they are to do a certain thing at a certain hour, and when that hour arrives they must inevitably set about to do it."

"Why did you want to kill her?"

"Why do we always desire to crush the thing that we can't possess?" he snapped back at me. "Because I love her – because I would sell my immortal soul – if I have one – to bend her or break her to my will. You are a sleepy dolt, understanding nothing of passions such as sway stronger men; you are not likely to understand this. But she maddens me when she sticks that pretty chin of hers in the air, and I see the contempt flash out of her eyes. If you saw so much, you probably saw the beginning of it, when she said she would have nothing further to do with me, and threatened to get away out of the house. Then the thought came over me that I would put an end to it all; and I made that suggestion to her that she should walk here to-night; and I came first, and opened the old doors. I thank God you saved her!"

He suddenly dropped his head in his hands and groaned aloud; and my heart melted a little with pity for him. I guessed something of what a stormy nature was hidden in the man; and I, who thought I had read something of love in her eyes for me, could afford to pity the man to whose pleadings she turned a deaf ear. Fool that I was, I did not realise the cunning of the creature who stood with hidden face before me; I did not understand that this was but a bit of play-acting, to put me off my guard. I was to learn all that later.

"Do you think you'll help your case by such a business as this of to-night?" I asked. "It's a poor way to make love, to strive to kill the woman."

"She won't know anything about it; she won't guess," he exclaimed eagerly, looking up at me. "She does not know that I suggested to her what to do; she will only wonder at finding the doors open. I can give some explanation of that, if necessary."

"And what will you do now?" I asked him, as I lighted my own lamp and put his into his hand.

"Give up the game," he replied, with a faint smile. "This has taught me a lesson to-night; it has shown me how near the best of us may come to a crime. I am sincere in that; I thank you from the bottom of my heart for what you've done. The lover in me is gone; henceforth I'm her guardian and the friend of her dead father. There's my hand on it!"

I looked into his eyes, and once again I believed him; I began to feel that I had misjudged the man. True, his hand was cold enough in my grasp, but I paid no heed to that; I seemed to see only before me a changed and humbled man. He wished me "Good-night!" with much cordiality, and went off to his own room. For my part, I felt something of a missionary, and congratulated myself upon the night's work.

I had made up my mind that I would see Debora as early as possible on the following morning. I was anxious to know what impression that startling occurrence of the previous night had made upon her. I wanted to see her before there was any possibility of Bardolph Just confronting her; and in that I was successful.

It was a very fine morning, and I supposed that I should find her in the grounds. I felt that I might reasonably expect that she would make her way to that summer-house in which we had met and talked before; and in that also I was right. Quite early, before breakfast was announced, I came upon her in the morning sunlight; and for a long time, as it seemed, we held hands without a word.

"You slept well?" I asked her.

She nodded brightly. "Better than I should have done, I suppose," she said, with a smile; "but then, I was sure of my friend – certain that no harm could come to me. How much have you to tell me of last night?"

"Nothing," I said, shaking my head. "There is nothing that you need be told, now that everything is ended. For the future you have to trust to me – just as you trusted last night. You said I was your friend; and I am going to look after you."

"That makes me very happy. By the way, what am I to call you?" she asked artlessly.

I felt the colour mounting in my cheeks. "You know my name," I said.

"Yes – John," she replied, and we both laughed.

Now this is, of course, all very shameful, and I had no right to be standing there, holding her hands, and letting her talk to me in that fashion; but I did not remember then what I was, or from what I had come. Indeed, it is more than possible that if I had remembered I should scarcely have changed my attitude, for but little joy had ever come into my life. I merely set this down here, in order to record the fact that, save for one lamentable lapse, we were "John" and "Debora" to each other from that day forward.

But I had some instructions to give her for her own safety. She listened attentively while I gave them.

"You had better not refer to last night at all," I said. "Let the doctor imagine that you have forgotten about it, or at least have believed that it was some ugly dream. Meet him as usual – show him, if anything, a little more kindness than you have done."

"I can't do that," she said hastily.

"You must; it is imperative," I urged. "I can tell you this, at least: I have his promise that he will not molest you again, and that he will be for the future simply your guardian, and nothing else."

"He said that?" she asked in astonishment.

"Yes, and I believe he means it," I answered steadily.

"I don't believe it, John; it's a trick," she said, shaking her head. "I've seen too much of him; I know him too well. He is trying to throw you off the scent. Don't you understand how helpless we both are? You tell me that you are in his power, because he knows something about your past life: how can you fight against him, or help me?"

"I can, and I will," I assured her. "And you can help, by being discreet, and by waiting until we have an opportunity to do something in concert."

She promised faithfully that she would do that, and she left me, with a smile and a wave of the hand. I followed her slowly to the house, and found the doctor in his usual place at the breakfast table, talking quietly to her. The woman Leach was behind him, as usual.

It became obvious, in a minute or two, that Bardolph Just was anxious to find out how much she remembered, or how much she understood, of the events of the previous night; he had already begun to question Debora cautiously. He appeared to be in a genial mood, and yet in a softened mood; he gave me a smile as I took my place.

"So you slept well?" said Bardolph Just to the girl, as he leaned towards her. "Not disturbed by anything?"

She shook her head, and looked at him with raised eyebrows of perplexity; truly I felt that she had learnt her lesson well. "What should disturb me?"

"Nothing, nothing!" he replied, evidently at a loss. "Only I thought that there was some noise in the house last night; I almost went out to investigate. But, of course, if you heard nothing – "

It happened that at that moment I glanced up over his head, and I saw the woman behind him turn a swift glance out of those dark eyes of hers at the girl; it was but a momentary thing, and then her eyes were cast down in the usual humble fashion; but in that instant I had read something that I had not understood before. I read not only hatred of the girl, and defiance of her; I saw, as clearly as though it had been written, that she knew of the events of the night before, and that she knew that the girl was not speaking the truth. I wondered exactly what had happened, or in what way she had gained her knowledge: I was to learn that swiftly enough.

Somewhat later in the forenoon, I was practically alone in the house. I knew that Debora had gone off into the grounds with a book, and I did not care to disturb her. Bardolph Just had gone down into London on business. I was lounging at my full length in an easy chair in the dining-room, smoking, and reading the newspaper, when the door opened softly, and Martha Leach came in. I did not turn my head, but I saw her moving round the room in a large mirror hanging on the wall opposite my chair. Indeed, our eyes met in that mirror, before they met elsewhere. She stopped, and, somewhat to my surprise, spoke.

"You are a very brave man," she said, with a quick glance at the long windows, as though fearing interruption. "And a strong man, too."

"Who told you that?" I asked, without shifting my position.