In White Raiment

“The Major is, of course, fully aware of the circumstances of your marriage. He is our nearest friend.”

“Marriage rather unconventional, eh?” the other remarked to me. “Poor Beryl! It is a thousand pities that she has been struck down like that. Six months ago down at Wyndhurst she was the very soul of the house-parties – and here to-day she is dying.”

“Extremely sad,” I remarked. “As a medical man I see too vividly the uncertainty of human life.”

“How is she now?” inquired the Major of her father. “The same, alas!” answered the Tempter with well-assumed sorrow. “She will, we fear, not live till midnight.”

“Poor girl! Poor girl!” the new-comer ejaculated with a sigh, while the Tempter, excusing himself for an instant left the room.

I would have risen and followed, but the Major, addressing me confidentially, said —

“This is a strange whim of my old friend’s, marrying his daughter in this manner. There seems no motive for it, as far as I can gather.”

“No, none,” I responded. “Mr Wynd has struck me as being somewhat eccentric.”

“He’s a very good fellow – an excellent fellow. Entirely loyal to his friends. You are fortunate, my dear fellow, in having him as a father-in-law. He’s amazingly well off, and generosity itself.”

I recollected his dastardly suggestion that my wife should not live longer than sundown, and smiled within myself. This friend of his evidently did not know his real character.

Besides, being an observant man by nature, I noticed as I sat there one thing which filled me with curiosity. The tops of the Major’s fingers and thumb of his right hand were thick and slightly deformed, while the skin was hardened and the nails worn down to the quick.

While the left hand was of normal appearance, the other had undoubtedly performed hard manual labour. A major holding her Majesty’s commission does not usually bear such evident traces of toil. The hand was out of keeping with the fine diamond ring that flashed upon it.

“The incident of to-day,” I said, “has been to me most unusual. It hardly seems possible that I am a bridegroom, for, truth to tell, I fancied myself the most confirmed of bachelors. Early marriage always hampers the professional man.”

“But I don’t suppose you will have any cause for regret on that score,” he observed. “You will have been a bridegroom and a widower in a single day.”

I was silent. His words betrayed him. He knew of the plot conceived by his friend to bribe me to kill the woman to whom I had been so strangely wedded!

But successfully concealing my surprise at his incautious words, I answered —

“Yes, mine will certainly have been a unique experience.”

He courteously offered me a cigarette, and lighting one himself, held the match to me. Then we sat chatting, he telling me what a charming girl Beryl had been until stricken down by disease.

“What was her ailment?” I inquired.

“I am not aware of the name by which you doctors know it. It is, I believe, a complication of ailments. Half a dozen specialists have seen her, and all are agreed that her life cannot be saved. Wynd has spared no expense in the matter, for he is perfectly devoted to her.”

His words, hardly coincided with the truth, I reflected. So far from being devoted to her, he was anxious, for some mysterious reason, that she should not live after midnight.

“To lose her will, I suppose, be a great blow to him?” I observed, with feigned sympathy.

“Most certainly. She has been his constant friend and companion ever since his wife died, six years ago. I’m awfully sorry for both poor Beryl and Wynd.”

I was about to reply, but his words froze upon my lips, for at that instant there rang through the house a shrill scream – the agonised scream of a woman.

“Listen!” I cried. “What’s that?”

But my companion’s jaw had dropped, and he sat immovable, listening intently.

Again the scream rang out, but seemed stifled and weaker.

The Tempter was with his daughter whom he had determined should die. The thought decided me, and turning, without further word, I dashed from the room, and with quickly-beating heart ran up the wide thickly-carpeted staircase.

Chapter Four

The Note of Interrogation

On reaching the corridor I was confronted by the thin, spare figure of the Tempter standing resolutely before a closed door – that of Beryl’s chamber.

His black eyes seemed to flash upon me defiantly, and his face had reassumed that expression which was sufficient index to the unscrupulousness of his character.

“Let me pass!” I cried roughly, in my headlong haste. “I desire to see my wife.”

“You shall not enter?” he answered, in a voice tremulous with an excitement which he strove in vain to control.

“She is in distress. I heard her scream. It is my duty, both as a doctor and as her husband, to be at her side.”

“Duty?” he sneered. “My dear sir, what is duty to a man who will sell himself for a handful of banknotes?”

“I yielded to your accursed temptation, it is true!” I cried fiercely. “But human feeling is not entirely dead in my heart, as it is in yours. Thank God that my hands are still unsullied!”

He laughed – the same harsh, discordant laugh that had escaped him when, below in the library, I had refused to accept the vile condition of the compact.

He stood there barring my passage to that room wherein lay the unknown woman who had been so strangely united to me. Whoever she was, I was resolved to rescue her. Mystery surrounded her – mystery that I resolved at all hazards to penetrate.

“You were in want of money, and I offered it to you,” the Tempter answered coldly. “You have refused, and the matter is ended.”

“I think not,” I said warmly. “You will hear something more of this night’s work.”

He laughed again, displaying an uneven row of discoloured teeth. To argue with him further was useless.

“Come, stand aside?” I cried, making a movement forward.

He receded a couple of paces, until he stood with his back against the door, and as I faced him I looked down the shining barrel of a revolver.

I do not know what possessed me at that instant. I did not fully realise my danger, that is certain. My mind was too full of the mystery surrounding the unknown woman who was lying within, and whose hand had showed me that she was no invalid. Physically I am a muscular man, and without a second’s hesitation I sprang upon my adversary and closed with him. His strength was marvellous. I had under-calculated it, for he was wiry, with muscles like iron.

For a few moments we swayed to and fro in deadly embrace, until I felt that he had turned the weapon until the barrel touched my neck. Next instant there was a loud report. The flash burned my face, but fortunately the bullet only grazed my cheek.

I was unharmed, but his deliberate attempt to take my life urged me to desperation, and with an almost superhuman effort I tripped him by a trick, and kneeling upon him, wrenched the weapon from his grasp. Then, leaving him, I dashed towards the door and turned the handle, but in vain. It was locked. Without more ado I stepped back, and taking a run, flung myself against the door, bursting the lock from its socket and falling headlong into the chamber.

The light was insufficient in that great chamber; therefore I drew up one of the blinds partially and crossed to the bed, full of curiosity.

My wife was lying there, silent and still. Her wealth of dishevelled hair strayed across the lace-edged pillow, and the hand with the wedding-ring I had placed upon it was raised above her head and tightly clenched in that attitude often assumed by children in their sleep.

She had screamed. That sound I had heard, so shrill and plain, was undoubtedly the voice of a young woman, and it had come from this room, which was directly above the library. Yet, as far as I could see, there was nothing to indicate the cause of her alarm.