The Red Room

“But you are so mysterious. You have never been open and above-board with me!” I declared. “You are full of mystery.”

“Did I not tell you on the first evening you sat here with me that I was a dealer in secrets?” he asked, blowing a cloud of smoke from his cigar.

“No, Holford,” went on my mysterious neighbour, very seriously, “you are like most other men – far too inquisitive. Had you been able to repress your curiosity, and at the same time preserve your pledge of secrecy, matters to-day would have been vastly different, and, acting in concert, we might have been able to solve this extraordinary enigma of Professor Greer’s death. But now you’ve been and made all sorts of wild statements to the Commissioner of Police. Well, it has stultified all my efforts.”

He spoke with such an air of injured innocence that I hesitated whether I had not, after all, somewhat misjudged him. Yet as I looked into that grey, crafty face I could not help doubting him. It was true that he had taken me into his confidence, but was it not done only for his own ingenious and devilish purpose?

“My wife is lost,” I observed at last. “It is her loss that has, perhaps, led me to say more than I would otherwise have done.”

“And love for your wife makes you forget your word of honour given to me, eh?” he asked. “Your code of honour is distinctly peculiar, Mr Holford,” he added, with biting sarcasm. “I, of course, regret that Mrs Holford has fallen a victim to the machinations of our enemies, but surely even that is no excuse for a man to act treacherously towards his friend.”

“That is not the point,” I declared. “You have never satisfied me as to your motive in taking me to Sussex Place and exhibiting to me the evidence of the crime.”

“Because – well, because, had I done so, you would not have understood. Some day, perhaps, you will know; and when you learn the truth you will be even more astounded than you are to-day. Meanwhile, I can assure you that you suspect me entirely without cause.”

“Then why were you in the house at the time the traces of the crime were being effaced in the furnace?” I asked in a hard voice.

He hesitated for a moment, and I thought his bony hand trembled slightly.

“For reason’s of my own,” he replied at last. “You allowed me to wriggle out of a very tight corner, and I intended to show you my gratitude, had you given me an opportunity.”

“I desire no expression of gratitude, Mr Kirk,” I replied, with dignified disgust. “All I require is a statement from you concerning the whereabouts of my dear wife. Give me that, and I’m satisfied to retire from the whole affair altogether.”

“Because you have now realised that Scotland Yard refuse their assistance, eh?” he asked, with an evil grin. “Are you not now agreed with me that our much-praised Criminal Investigation Department, with all its hide-bound rules and its tangle of red-tape, is useless? It is not the men who are at fault – for some of them are the finest and best fellows in the whole metropolis – but the system which is radically wrong.”

I was bound, after my experience, to agree with him. But again I referred to Mabel, and to the manner in which she had been decoyed from home.

“You hear that, Joseph?” he exclaimed, turning to his feathered pet, who had been chatting and screeching as we had been speaking. “This gentleman suspects your master, Joseph. What do you say?”

“You’re a fool for your pains! You’re a fool for your pains!” declared the bird. “Poor Jo-sef! Poor Jo-sef wants to go to bed!”

“Be quiet! You’ll go to bed presently,” answered the queer, grey visaged, sphinx-like man, who, turning again towards me, and looking me straight in the face, once more assured me that I was foolish in my misapprehension of the truth.

“To me it really does not matter who killed Professor Greer, or who has usurped his place in the world of science,” I said. “My only aim now is to recover my lost wife. Antonio, when I met him in Rome, was anxious that, in exchange for information concerning her, I should consent to keep a still tongue as to what had occurred in Sussex Place.”

“Rubbish, my dear sir!” – and Kirk laughed heartily. “What can Antonio possibly know? He’s as ignorant and innocent of the whole affair as you are yourself.”

“How do you know that, pray?”

“Well, am I not endeavouring to elucidate the mystery?” he asked.

“And you know more than you will tell me?”

I said.

“Perhaps – just a little.”

“Yet you desire that I should still trust you implicitly, that I should give myself into your hands blindly and unreservedly – you, who lead this dual existence! In Whitehall Court you are a wealthy man of leisure, while here you pose as shabby and needy.”

“I may be shabby, Mr Holford, for certain purposes – but needy never! I have, I’m thankful to say, quite sufficient for my wants,” he exclaimed, correcting me. “And as for my dual existence, as you term it, have I ever endeavoured to conceal it from you?”

“Tell me – once and for all – are you aware of my wife’s whereabouts?” I demanded in frantic anxiety. “Can’t you see that this suspense is turning my brain?”

“Yes, it is very unfortunate – and still more unfortunate that I can afford you no satisfaction. The fact of Mrs Holford’s prolonged absence is as great a mystery to me as to yourself.”

“Scotland Yard will render me no help,” I said in bitter chagrin.

“Probably not – after the amazing story you told them,” was his rather spiteful response.

“What am I to do?”

“Remain patient and watchful,” he said. “Believe in me, and try and persuade yourself that, after all, I’m not an assassin,” he smiled.

I held my breath for a few seconds. Here was the crux of the whole matter. He was still cleverly and ingeniously endeavouring to lead me into a false sense of security – to make me believe that he was innocent of all knowledge of that most astounding tragedy in Sussex Place.

Ah! his was indeed a clever ruse. But my eyes were now opened, so I only smiled within myself at the futility of his crafty and clever attempt further to mislead and cheat me.

A man was with my wife, passing himself off as myself – Henry Holford, motor engineer. And yet I could look to no one for counsel, advice, or aid!

Now that the police had refused to inquire into the death of poor Greer, the attitude of my weird, grey-faced neighbour had become more defiant. He was full of bitter reproaches, yet at the same time entirely heedless of my future actions.

Once or twice while speaking to me he turned, as was his habit, to Joseph the parrot, addressing asides to his pet, causing the bird to screech noisily, grow excited, and make idiotic responses.

“Mark me, Mr Holford,” he said at length, “you did a most foolish thing to betray me to Scotland Yard. In you I’m most disappointed, I assure you. My confidence was misplaced.”

“I understand you’ve been to my garage and in my absence purchased an Eckhardt tyre,” I remarked.

“Well?” he said, opening his eyes slightly. “I only came down to see you, but when I found you absent I bought a tyre as an excuse.”

“And you expect me to believe that, eh?” I asked, with a dry laugh.

“You can believe it or not believe it, just as you think fit,” was his quick reply. “I have no use for motor-tyres, not possessing a car.”

I grinned in disbelief, recollecting the air of secrecy with which he had examined the tyre on the first occasion he had called upon me, and also the effect produced upon him later when I told him of the two other men who had called to inspect the tyre.

I think I remained with him for nearly an hour. Then, after he had told me that his intention was to stay in England, at least for the present, I left him and walked back to my desolate home, where, Gwen having retired, I sat for a further hour in my den, deeply thinking.

That Kirk was in some secret way in association with the bogus Professor was plain. Was it not, then, more than likely that they would ere long meet again? If I kept a wary eye upon him, I might, I saw, discover something of great interest.

Who could this man be who led a dual existence for no apparent cause; this man who was narrow-minded and penurious in Bedford Park, yet was wealthy and open-handed in Whitehall Court?

As I calmly reviewed the whole extraordinary situation I saw that, in turn, I mistrusted the whole of the actors in that bewildering drama. Ethelwynn, the calm, sweet, clear-eyed girl, so content in her great love for Leonard Langton, though she had actually witnessed her father lying dead and cold, yet now refused to presume his death! Why? Doctor Flynn I disliked instinctively; Langton was evidently playing a double game, having denied all knowledge of Kirk, whereas the latter was his friend; Antonio and Pietro were away; while Kirk himself, silent and cunning, was pretending a complete ignorance which was only ill-feigned.

And the most important point of all was that not a breath of suspicion of the Professor’s death had yet leaked out to the public.

Thus, utterly bewildered, I again retired to rest.

Early astir next morning, I set watch upon Kirk’s movements, assisted by Dick Drake, my clean-shaven, bullet-headed chauffeur. A few moments before eleven he came forth, thinly clad and shabby, as he generally appeared in Chiswick, and, walking to Ravenscourt Park Station, took a third-class ticket to Westminster, whence he walked to a rather grimy house situate in Page Street, a poor neighbourhood lying behind the Abbey. There he remained for some time, after which, fearing lest he should recognise me, I directed Drake to follow him, and returned to the garage.