The Red Room

“Look here,” I exclaimed again, raising my voice in anger at this open denial of what I knew to be the truth, “on the night of your escape from Sussex Place, the house was searched, and I found evidences of all traces of the crime having been effaced in the furnace of the laboratory.”

“I know,” was his simple response. “I was quite well aware of that. I hope, however, Holford, that you have kept your promise and kept a still tongue.”

“To a certain extent, yes.”

“You told Langton nothing, I trust?” he asked anxiously.

“Why are you in such mortal fear of Langton?” I demanded hotly, halting before him as he stood on the hearthrug coolly surveying me, with his back to the fire.

“My dear fellow,” he answered, “pray calm yourself. Have a drink, and let’s discuss this matter amicably from a purely business-like standpoint. Surely when I invoked your aid I did not commit a grave error of judgment? You have been judicious throughout, I hope? You have not forgotten the great issues which I explained depended upon your silence?”

“My silence you shall command no longer, Mr Kirk!” I cried, suddenly interrupting him. “I’ve been silent far too long.”

“Ah!” he remarked, still unruffled. “I see. Well, your attitude is quite justifiable, my dear sir – quite. You have lost your wife, I understand.”

“Yes,” I said, advancing towards him a couple of paces in a manner which I now believe must have appeared threatening. “And you know more about the trap into which my poor wife has been led than anybody else. That is why I’m here to-night – to compel you to speak – you crafty old cur!”

“My dear Holford, why – what’s the matter?” he asked, even then quite unperturbed. “Now if I did not know you so well I might easily be annoyed, but I’m not. No doubt the loss of Mrs Holford has seriously upset you.” And the fellow actually smiled at this.

I grew furious. The mysterious man’s eyes gleamed with a triumphant light, and his pale lips parted, revealing his pointed teeth.

“You make pretence of ignorance!” I cried. “You think that I believe you when you say you know nothing of where she is, but – ”

“I assure you, Holford, that these suspicions of myself are entirely groundless. I have no knowledge whatever of the lady. I have seen her once or twice at her dining-room window, it is true.”

“And yet I’ve been out to Florence, to the Grand Bretagne, where I was informed that you had been in her company!” was my hasty reply.

“I can’t help what cock-and-bull story you’ve been told by an Italian hotel-keeper. They are notorious for their untruths, as you would discover if you travelled as much up and down Italy as I do,” he said with an evil grin. “I can only tell you, once and for all, that I have no knowledge whatever of your wife’s present whereabouts.”

“Then who has?”

“How can I tell, my dear sir? You ask me a riddle. On my arrival at Charing Cross an hour ago one of my friends who met me told me of Mrs Holford’s sudden journey abroad and her disappearance into space. The story set me wondering as to the motive of the plot – for plot it undoubtedly must be. Mrs Holford and yourself, I am told, are devoted to each other. There is no reason for her leaving you, is there?”

“Understand this, Kirk,” I said. “I’ve been fooled quite long enough. As my wife has been enticed away, and is held aloof in some unknown place, I give you full and ample warning of my intention. It is to go straight to the police, and while invoking their aid to try and find her, at the same time to tell them the whole story of the affair at Sussex Place, just as I know it.”

The man half turned from me and bit his thin under-lip. His grey, furrowed countenance had become even more grey and more determined, while in his eyes I saw an evil glitter.

“Ah! You’ve been trying to seek solution of the mystery for yourself. I know all about that!” He laughed hollowly. “But, as you are aware of only half the tangled skein of mysterious facts, it is hardly likely that you’ll succeed, do you think? Did I not tell you to remain silent and inactive? Instead of that, you’ve been chattering and trying to act the part of amateur detective. It was fatal. Because of that – and for that reason alone – the misfortune has been placed upon you.”

“What misfortune?”

“The loss of your wife. It has occupied your mind in another way, just as it was intended by your enemies it should do.”

“And yours is the master mind, Mr Kirk, which has planned this subtle revenge,” I exclaimed, my eager hands clenched in frantic desperation. “Because I disobeyed your extraordinary injunctions Mabel has been taken from me. You may as well admit the whole truth now at once.”

“I admit nothing,” he answered, drawing himself up defiantly.

“Then, by Heaven, I’ll force you to speak – to tell me where she is!” I shouted, as I raised my hands with a sudden movement. And then, before he could ward me off, my fingers closed upon his hard, bony throat.

I was desperate. Nay, in the presence of that sphinx-like, taciturn adventurer whom I now knew to be my enemy, I was mad.

Yes, mad, or surely I would never have dared to lay hands upon him.

Chapter Twenty Two

Defiance Proves Defence

I had, I confess, allowed my anger to rise above my gorge. That action of mine in attacking Kirk was both ill-timed and very injudicious, for in an instant – before even those frantic words had left my lips – I found myself looking down the ugly black barrel of a big Browning revolver, that most effective and deadly of all man-killing weapons.

“Kindly release me, Holford,” he said, rather hoarsely and with some difficulty, as my muscular fingers had closed upon his scraggy throat. “Come, this is all very foolish! Let me go! I have no desire to harm you,” he added, quite calmly.

“Then tell me where I can find my wife,” I repeated.

“I would – if I could.”

“Tell me who can!” I demanded fiercely, my fingers still closed upon his throat, so that he breathed only with great difficulty.

“Give me time – time to make – inquiry!” he gasped. “I’ve only just returned, and am in ignorance of a great deal of what has transpired.”

“Upon your own admission, Mabel has fallen a victim of a plot merely because I became too active and too inquisitive. You feared lest I might discover something.”

“I have admitted nothing, my dear sir!” he cried. “One day you will withdraw all these malicious words – mark me,” he added, in a hard voice, lowering his weapon and replacing it in his hip-pocket as I released my convulsive grip.

“I’ve lost my wife, Mr Kirk, and you know where she is,” I said.

“In that you are quite mistaken,” he declared. “As I’ve already explained, I’ve not yet had opportunity for making inquiry. I believed,” he added in reproach, “that you would assist me in this strange affair concerning Professor Greer. Yet my confidence in you, Holford, has been sadly misplaced. Recall for one moment what I told you – of the seriousness of what was at stake, and of the absolute necessity for complete secrecy. Yet to-night you threaten to bungle the whole affair by going to the police.”

“I’ve lost my wife!” I interrupted. “She’s the victim of some plot or other, and it is to find her that I intend to invoke the aid of Scotland Yard.”

“Well, by adopting that course, you would not find her – but you’d lose her,” was the old fellow’s brief response.

“Antonio told me the very same thing when we met in Rome!” I exclaimed. “Your threat shows me that you are in league in this conspiracy of silence.”

Kershaw Kirk burst out laughing, as though he considered my anger a huge joke. It annoyed me that he did not take me seriously, and that he regarded the loss of Mabel so lightly.

“Look here, Mr Holford,” he said at last, looking straight into my face. “It’s plain that you suspect me of being the assassin of Professor Greer. That being so, I’ve nothing more to say. Yet I would ask you to regard the present situation both logically and calmly. Do you for one moment suppose that were I guilty I would have taken you to Sussex Place and explained the whole affair in detail? Is it, indeed, to be supposed that I would place myself so entirely and completely in the hands of a stranger?”

I shook my head dubiously.

“Well,” he went on, “I repeat to you now all that I told you that night, and assert that all I told you was the truth.”

“But how do you account for Ethelwynn being still alive?” I interrupted quickly.

“There is an explanation of that,” he declared; “one that you will probably be told very shortly. Fortunately, the poor girl was not dead, though I confess I was entirely deceived by the symptoms. You will remember that the mirror remained unclouded by her breath?”

“I remember every incident, alas! only too vividly,” was my slow, distinct reply. “But,” I asked very pointedly, “pray tell me, Mr Kirk, what was your object in calling upon me and inducing me to go to Sussex Place?”

He thrust his hands into his trousers pockets and smiled.