A Mysterious Disappearance

“Your flippancy will not avail you. See, here is the letter itself – your own production – written on paper of which you have a quantity in this very room.”

The shot was a bold one, and it very nearly hit the mark. She was staggered, almost subdued by this melodramatic production of the original, and his clever guess at the existence of similar notepaper in the house.

But her dogged temperament saved her. Jane Harding was British, notwithstanding her penchant for a French-sounding name, and she would have died sooner than beat a retreat.

“I will thank you to leave me alone, Mr. Bruce,” she said.

There was nothing for it but to retire as gracefully as possible, but the barrister was more than satisfied with the result of his visit. He had now established beyond a shadow of doubt that for some reason which he could not fathom the ex-lady’s maid not only knew of her mistress’s death, but wished to conceal it.

This desire, too, had the essential feature of every other branch of the inquiry; it grew to maturity long after the day when Lady Dyke was actually killed. What did it all mean?

From Bloomsbury he strolled west to Portman Square, and found Sir Charles on the point of going for a drive in the Park.

He briefly told him his discovery.

The baronet at first was sceptical. “Do you mean to say, Claude,” he cried, fretfully, “that I do not know my wife’s writing when I see it?”

“You may think you do, but when another person can imitate it exactly, of course, you may be deceived. Besides, if this girl, as is probable, was helped in her education by your wife, what is more likely than that Jane Harding should seek to copy that which she would consider the ideal of excellence. Don’t harbor any delusions in the matter, Dyke. The letter you received on Monday morning was written by Jane Harding. I am sure of that from her manner no less than from the accidental resemblance of the two styles of handwriting. What I could not find out was her motive for the deceit.”

“It is a queer business altogether,” said Sir Charles wearily; “I wish it were ended.”

CHAPTER XXV

MISS PHYLLIS BROWNE INTERVENES

Bruce was quite positive in his belief that Jane Harding was the paid agent of some person who wished to conceal the facts concerning Lady Dyke’s death.

Her unexpected appearance in the field at this late hour, no less than the bold rôle she adopted, proved this conclusively. But in England there was no torture-chamber to which she might be led and gradually dismembered until she confessed the truth.

So long as she adhered to the policy of pert denial she was quite safe. The law could not touch her, for the chief witness against her, Sir Charles Dyke, was obviously more than half-inclined to admit the genuineness of the letter, even in opposition to the superior judgment of his friend.

Yet it was a matter which Bruce considered ought to be made known to the police, so he sent for Mr. White and told him of the strange result of his interview with Miss Marie le Marchant.

“Dash everything!” cried the detective, when he heard the news. “I made a note sometime ago that that girl ought to be watched, but I clean forgot all about it.”

“Remember,” said Bruce, “that my discovery was the result of pure accident. My object in visiting her was to endeavor to induce her confidence with regard to Lady Dyke’s former life and habits. Indeed, I handled the business very badly.”

“I don’t see that, sir. You got hold of a very remarkable fact, and thus prevented the success of a bold move by some one which, in my case at any rate, nearly choked me off the inquiry.”

“True. Thus far, chance favored me. But I ought to have been content with the assumption. There was no need to frighten her by pressing it home.”

“Oh, from that point of view – ” began the detective.

But Bruce was merely thinking aloud – rough-shaping his ideas as they grouped themselves in his brain.

“Perhaps I am wrong there too,” he went on. “If this girl is working to instructions she would have refused to help me in any way, and she already knows that I am on the trail. There is one highly satisfactory feature in the Jane Harding adventure, Mr. White.”

“And what is that?”

“The person, or persons, responsible for Lady Dyke’s death know that the matter has not been dropped. They are inclined to think that the circle is narrowing. In some of our casts, Mr. White, we must have come so unpleasantly close to them, that they deemed it advisable to throw us off the scent by a bold effort.”

“No doubt you are right, sir, but I wish to goodness I knew when we were ‘warm,’ as I am becoming tired of the business. Every new development deepens the mystery.”

The detective’s face was as downcast as his words.

“Surely not! The more pieces of the puzzle we have to handle the less difficult should be the final task of putting them together.”

“Not when every piece is a fresh puzzle in itself.”

“Why, what has disconcerted you to-day?”

“Mrs. Hillmer.”

“What of her?”

“I have had another talk with the maid, – her companion, you know, – a girl named Dobson. It struck me that it was advisable to know more about Mrs. Hillmer than we do at present.”

Bruce made no comment, but he could not help reflecting that Corbett, the stranger from Wyoming, had entertained the same view.

“Well,” continued the detective, “I went about the affair as quietly as possible, but the maid, though willing, could not tell me much. Mrs. Hillmer, she thinks, married very young, and was badly treated by her husband. Finally, there was a rumpus, and she went on the stage, while Hillmer drank himself to death. He died a year ago, and they had been separated nearly five years. He was fairly well-to-do, but he squandered all his money in dissipation and never gave her a cent. Three years last Michaelmas she set up her present establishment at Raleigh Mansions, and there she has been ever since.”

“Then where does the money come from? It must cost her at least £2,000 a year to live.”

“That’s just what the maid can’t tell me. Her mistress led a very secluded life, and was never what you could call fast, though a very pretty woman. During this time she had only one visitor – a gentleman.”

“Ah!”

“It sounds promising, but it ends in smoke, so far as I can see.”

“Why?”

“This gentleman was a Colonel Montgomery – an old friend – though he wasn’t much turned thirty, the maid says. He interested himself a lot in Mrs. Hillmer’s affairs, looked after some investments for her, and was on very good terms with her, and nobody could whisper a word against the character of either of them. He was never there except in the afternoon. On very rare occasions he took Mrs. Hillmer, whose maid always accompanied them, to Epping Forest, or up the river, or on some such journey.”

“Go on!”

“I’m sorry, sir, but the chase is over. He’s dead.”

“Dead?”

“Yes. The maid doesn’t know how, or when, exactly, but one day she found her mistress crying, and when she asked her what was the matter, Mrs. Hillmer said, ‘I’ve lost my friend.’ The maid said, ‘Surely not Colonel Montgomery, madam?’ and she replied, ‘Yes.’ She quite took on about it.”

“Had the maid no idea as to the date of this interesting occurrence?”

“Only a vague one. Sometime in the autumn or before Christmas. By Jove, yes; it escaped me at the time, but she said that soon after the Colonel’s death another gentleman called and took her mistress out to dinner. I was so busy thinking about the colonel that I slipped the significance of that statement. It must have been you, Mr. Bruce.”

“So it seems.”

The barrister’s active brain was already assimilating this new information. If a woman like Mrs. Hillmer had lost a dear and valuable friend – one who practically formed the horizon of her life – she would certainly have worn mourning for him. It was a singular coincidence that Mrs. Hillmer “lost” Colonel Montgomery about the same time that Lady Dyke disappeared. Detective and maid alike had drawn a false inference from Mrs. Hillmer’s words.