The Vanished Messenger

by Edward Phillips Oppenheimer

  No one else made any remark. It was strange to see how dominated they all were by that queer little fragment of humanity, whose head scarcely reached a foot above the table before which he sat. They departed silently, almost abjectly, dismissed with a single wave of the hand. Mr. Fentolin beckoned his secretary to remain. She came a little nearer.

  "Sit down, Lucy," he ordered.

  She seated herself a few feet away from him. Mr. Fentolin watched her for several moments. He himself had his back to the light. The woman, on the other hand, was facing it. The windows were high, and the curtains were drawn back to their fullest extent. A cold stream of northern light fell upon her face. Mr. Fentolin gazed at her and nodded her head slightly.

  "My dear Lucy," he declared, "you are wonderful—a perfect cameo, a gem. To look at you now, with your delightful white hair and your flawless skin, one would never believe that you had ever spoken a single angry word, that you had ever felt the blood flow through your veins, or that your eyes had ever looked upon the gentle things of life."

  She looked at him, still without speech. The immobility of her face was indeed a marvellous thing. Mr. Fentolin's expression darkened.

  "Sometimes," he murmured softly, "I think that if I had strong fingers—really strong fingers, you know, Lucy—I should want to take you by the throat and hold you tighter and tighter, until your breath came fast, and your eyes came out from their shadows."

  She turned over a few pages of her notebook. To all appearance she had not heard a word.

  "To-day," she announced, "is the fourth of April. Shall I send out the various checks to those men in Paris, New York, Frankfort, St. Petersburg, and Tokio?"

  "You can send the checks," he told her. "Be sure that you draw them, as usual, upon the Credit Lyonaise and in the name you know of. Say to Lebonaitre of Paris that you consider his last reports faulty. No mention was made of Monsieur C's visit to the Russian Embassy, or of the supper party given to the Baron von Erlstein by a certain Russian gentleman. Warn him, if you please, that reports with such omissions are useless to me."

  She wrote a few words in her book.

  "You made a note of that?"

  She raised her head.

  "I do not make mistakes," she said.

  His eyebrows were drawn together. This was his work, he told himself, this magnificent physical subjection. Yet his inability to stir her sometimes maddened him.

  "You know who is in this house?" he asked. "You know the name of my unknown guest?"

  "I know nothing," she replied. "His presence does not interest me."

  "Supposing I desire you to know?" he persisted, leaning a little forward. "Supposing I tell you that it is your duty to know?"

  "Then," she said, "I should tell you that I believe him to be the special envoy from New York to The Hague, or whatever place on the Continent this coming conference is to be held at."

  "Right, woman!" Mr. Fentolin answered sharply. "Right! It is the special envoy. He has his mandate with him. I have them both—the man and his mandate. Can you guess what I am going to do with them?"

  "It is not difficult," she replied. "Your methods are scarcely original. His mandate to the flames, and his body to the sea!"

  She raised her eyes as she spoke and looked over Mr. Fentolin's shoulder, across the marshland to the grey stretch of ocean. Her eyes became fixed. It was not possible to say that they held any expression, and yet one felt that she saw beneath the grey waves, even to the rocks and caverns below.

  "It does not terrify you, then," he asked curiously, "to think that a man under this roof is about to die?"

  "Why should it?" she retorted. "Death does not frighten me—my own or anybody else's. Does it frighten you?"

  His face was suddenly livid, his eyes full of fierce anger. His lips twitched. He struck the table before him.

  "Beast of a woman!" he shouted. "You ghoul! How dare you! How dare you—"

  He stopped short. He passed his hand across his forehead. All the time the woman remained unmoved.

  "Do you know," he muttered, his voice still shaking a little, "that I believe sometimes I am afraid of you? How would you like to see me there, eh, down at the bottom of that hungry sea? You watch sometimes so fixedly. You'd miss me, wouldn't you? I am a good master, you know. I pay well. You've been with me a good many years. You were a different sort of woman when you first came."

  "Yes," she admitted, "I was a different sort of woman."

  "You don't remember those days, I suppose," he went on, "the days when you had brown hair, when you used to carry roses about and sing to yourself while you beat your work out of that wretched typewriter?"

  "No," she answered, "I do not remember those days. They do not belong to me. It is some other woman you are thinking of."

  Their eyes met. Mr. Fentolin turned away first. He struck the bell at his elbow. She rose at once.

  "Be off!" he ordered. "When you look at me like that, you send shivers through me! You'll have to go; I can see you'll have to go. I can't keep you any longer. You are the only person on the face of the earth who dares to say things to me which make me think, the only person who doesn't shrink at the sound of my voice. You'll have to go. Send Sarson to me at once. You've upset me!"

  She listened to his words in expressionless silence. When he had finished, carrying her book in her hand, she very quietly moved towards the door. He watched her, leaning a little forward in his chair, his lips parted, his eyes threatening. She walked with steady, even footsteps. She carried herself with almost machine-like erectness; her skirts were noiseless. She had the trick of turning the handle of the door in perfect silence. He heard her calm voice in the hall.

  "Doctor Sarson is to go to Mr. Fentolin."

  Mr. Fentolin sat quite still, feeling his own pulse.

  "That woman," he muttered to himself, "that—woman—some day I shouldn't be surprised if she really—"

  He paused. The doctor had entered the room.

  "I am upset, Sarson," he declared. "Come and feel my pulse quickly. That woman has upset me."

  "Miss Price?"

  "Miss Price, d-n it! Lucy—yes!"

  "It seems unlike her," the doctor remarked. "I have never heard her utter a useless syllable in my life."

  Mr. Fentolin held out his wrist.

  "It's what she doesn't say," he muttered.

  The doctor produced his watch. In less than a minute he put it away.

  "This is quite unnecessary," he pronounced. "Your pulse is wonderful."

  "Not hurried? No signs of palpitation?"

  "You have seven or eight footmen, all young men," Doctor Sarson replied drily. "I will wager that there isn't one of them has a pulse so vigorous as yours."

  Mr. Fentolin leaned a little back in his chair. An expression of satisfaction crept over his face.

  "You reassure me, my dear Sarson. That is excellent. What of our patient?"

  "There is no change."

  "I am afraid," Mr. Fentolin sighed, "that we shall have trouble with him. These strong people always give trouble."

  "It will be just the same in the long run," the doctor remarked, shrugging his shoulders.

  Mr. Fentolin held up his finger.

  "Listen! A motor-car, I believe?"

  "It is Miss Fentolin who is just arriving," the doctor announced. "I saw the car coming as I crossed the hall."

  Mr. Fentolin nodded gently.

  "Indeed?" he replied. "Indeed? So my dear niece has returned. Open the door, friend Sarson. Open the door, if you please. She will be anxious to see me. We must summon her."

  Chapter X

  Mr. Fentolin raised to his lips the little gold whistle which hung from his neck and blew it. He seemed to devote very little effort to the operation, yet the strength of the note was wonderful. As the echoes died away, he let it fall by his side and waited with a pleased smile upon his lips. In a few seconds there was the hurried flutter of skirts and the sound of footsteps. The girl who had just completed her ra
ilway journey entered, followed by her brother. They were both a little out of breath, they both approached the chair without a smile, the girl in advance, with a certain expression of apprehension in her eyes. Mr. Fentolin sighed. He appeared to notice these things and regret them.

  "My child," he said, holding out his hands, "my dear Esther, welcome home again! I heard the car outside. I am grieved that you did not at once hurry to my side."

  "I have not been in the house two minutes," Esther replied, "and I haven't seen mother yet. Forgive me."

  She had come to a standstill a few yards away. She moved now very slowly towards the chair, with the air of one fulfilling a hateful task. The fingers which accepted his hands were extended almost hesitatingly. He drew her closer to him and held her there.

  "Your mother, my dear Esther, is, I regret to say, suffering from a slight indisposition," he remarked. "She has been confined to her room for the last few days. Just a trifling affair of the nerves; nothing more, Doctor Sarson assures me. But my dear child," he went on, "your fingers are as cold as ice. You look at me so strangely, too. Alas! you have not the affectionate disposition of your dear mother. One would scarcely believe that we have been parted for more than a week."

  "For more than a week," she repeated, under her breath.

  "Stoop down, my dear. I must kiss your forehead—there! Now bring up a chair to my side. You seem frightened—alarmed. Have you ill news for me?"

  "I have no news," she answered, gradually recovering herself.

  "The gaieties of London, I fear," he protested gently, "have proved a little unsettling."

  "There were no gaieties for me," the girl replied bitterly. "Mrs. Sargent obeyed your orders very faithfully. I was not allowed to move out except with her."

  "My dear child, you would not go about London unchaperoned!"

  "There is a difference," she retorted, "between a chaperon and a jailer."

  Mr. Fentolin sighed. He shook his head slowly. He seemed pained.

  "I am not sure that you repay my care as it deserves, Esther," he declared. "There is something in your deportment which disappoints me. Never mind, your brother has made some atonement. I entrusted him with a little mission in which I am glad to say that he has been brilliantly successful."

  "I cannot say that I am glad to hear it," Esther replied quietly.

  Mr. Fentolin sat back in his chair. His long fingers played nervously together, he looked at her gravely.

  "My dear child," he exclaimed, in a tone of pained surprise, "your attitude distresses me!"

  "I cannot help it. I have told you what I think about Gerald and the life he is compelled to live here. I don't mind so much for myself, but for him I think it is abominable."

  "The same as ever," Mr. Fentolin sighed. "I fear that this little change has done you no good, dear niece."

  "Change!" she echoed. "It was only a change of prisons."

  Mr. Fentolin shook his head slowly—a distressful gesture. Yet all the time he had somehow the air of a man secretly gratified.

  "You are beginning to depress me," he announced. "I think that you can go away. No, stop for just one moment. Stand there in the light. Dear me, how unfortunate! Who would have thought that so beautiful a mother could have so plain a daughter!"

  She stood quite still before him, her hands crossed in front of her, something of the look of the nun from whom the power of suffering has gone in her still, cold face and steadfast eyes.

  "Not a touch of colour," he continued meditatively, "a figure straight as my walking-stick. What a pity! And all the taste, nowadays, they tell me, is in the other direction. The lank damsels have gone completely out. We buried them with Oscar Wilde. Run along, my dear child. You do not amuse me. You can take Gerald with you, if you will. I have nothing to say to Gerald just now. He is in my good books. Is there anything I can do for you, Gerald? Your allowance, for instance—a trifling increase or an advance? I am in a generous humour."

  "Then grant me what I begged for the other day," the boy answered quickly. "Let me go to Sandhurst. I could enter my name next week for the examinations, and I could pass to-morrow."

  Mr. Fentolin tapped the table thoughtfully with his forefinger.

  "A little ungrateful, my dear boy," he declared, "a little ungrateful that, I think. Your confidence in yourself pleases me, though. You think you could pass your examinations?"

  "I did a set of papers last week," the boy replied. "On the given percentages I came out twelfth or better. Mr. Brown assured me that I could go in for them at any moment. He promised to write you about it before he left."

  Mr. Fentolin nodded gently.

  "Now I come to think of it, I did have a letter from Mr. Brown," he remarked. "Rather an impertinence for a tutor, I thought it. He devoted three pages towards impressing upon me the necessity of your adopting some sort of a career."

  "He wrote because he thought it was his duty," the boy said doggedly.

  "So you want to be a soldier," Mr. Fentolin continued musingly. "Well, well, why not? Our picture galleries are full of them. There has been a Fentolin in every great battle for the last five hundred years. Sailors, too—plenty of them—and just a few diplomatists. Brave fellows! Not one, I fancy," he added, "like me—not one condemned to pass their days in a perambulator. You are a fine fellow, Gerald—a regular Fentolin. Getting on for six feet, aren't you?"

  "Six feet two, sir."

  "A very fine fellow," Mr. Fentolin repeated. "I am not so sure about the army, Gerald. You see, there are some people who say, like your American friend, that we are even now almost on the brink of war."

  "All the more reason for me to hurry," the boy begged.

  Mr. Fentolin closed his eyes.

  "Don't!" he insisted. "Have you ever stopped to think what war means—the war you speak of so lightly? The suffering, the misery of it! All the pageantry and music and heroism in front; and behind, a blackened world, a trail of writhing corpses, a world of weeping women for whom the sun shall never rise again. Ugh! An ugly thing war, Gerald. I am not sure that you are not better at home here. Why not practise golf a little more assiduously? I see from the local paper that you are still playing at two handicap. Now with your physique, I should have thought you would have been a scratch player long before now."

  "I play cricket, sir," the boy reminded him, a little impatiently, "and, after all, there are other things in the world besides games."

  Mr. Fentolin's long finger shot suddenly out. He was leaning a little from his chair. His expression of gentle immobility had passed away. His face was stern, almost stony.

  "You have spoken the truth, Gerald," he said. "There are other things in the world besides games. There is the real, the tragical side of life, the duties one takes up, the obligations of honour. You have not forgotten, young man, the burden you carry?"

  The boy was paler, but he had drawn himself to his full height.

  "I have not forgotten, sir," he answered bitterly. "Do I show any signs of forgetting? Haven't I done your bidding year by year? Aren't I here now to do it?"

  "Then do it!" Mr. Fentolin retorted sharply. "When I am ready for you to leave here, you shall leave. Until then, you are mine. Remember that. Ah! this is Doctor Sarson who comes, I believe. That must mean that it is five o'clock. Come in, Doctor. I am not engaged. You see, I am alone with my dear niece and nephew. We have been having a little pleasant conversation."

  Doctor Sarson bowed to Esther, who scarcely glanced at him. He remained in the background, quietly waiting.

  "A very delightful little conversation," Mr. Fentolin concluded. "I have been congratulating my nephew, Doctor, upon his wisdom in preferring the quiet country life down here to the wearisome routine of a profession. He escapes the embarrassing choice of a career by preferring to devote his life to my comfort. I shall not forget it. I shall not be ungrateful. I may have my faults, but I am not ungrateful. Run away now, both of you. Dear children you are, but one wearies, you know, of everything. I am going
out. You see, the twilight is coming. The tide is changing. I am going down to meet the sea."

  His little carriage moved towards the door. The brother and sister passed out. Esther led Gerald into the great dining-room, and from there, through the open windows, out on to the terrace. She gripped his shoulder and pointed down to the Tower.

  "Something," she whispered in his ear, "is going to happen there."

  Chapter XI

  The little station at which Hamel alighted was like an oasis in the middle of a flat stretch of sand and marsh. It consisted only of a few raised planks and a rude shelter—built, indeed, for the convenience of St. David's Hall alone, for the nearest village was two miles away. The station-master, on his return from escorting the young lady to her car, stared at this other passenger in some surprise.

  "Which way to the sea?" Hamel asked.

  The man pointed to the white gates of the crossing.

  "You can take any of those paths you like, sir," he said. "If you want to get to Salthouse, though, you should have got out at the next station."

  "This will do for me," Hamel replied cheerfully.

  "Be careful of the dikes," the station-master advised him. "Some of them are pretty deep."

  Hamel nodded, and passing through the white gates, made his way by a raised cattle track towards the sea. On either side of him flowed a narrow dike filled with salt-water. Beyond stretched the flat marshland, its mossy turf leavened with cracks and creeks of all widths, filled also with sea-slime and sea-water. A slight grey mist rested upon the more distant parts of the wilderness which he was crossing, a mist which seemed to be blown in from the sea in little puffs, resting for a time upon the earth, and then drifting up and fading away like soap bubbles.

  More than once where the dikes had overflown he was compelled to change his course, but he arrived at last at the little ridge of pebbled beach bordering the sea. Straight ahead of him now was that strange-looking building towards which he had all the time been directing his footsteps. As he approached it, his forehead slightly contracted. There was ample confirmation before him of the truth of his fellow-passenger's words. The place, left to itself for so many years, without any attention from its actual owner, was neither deserted nor in ruins. Its solid grey stone walls were sea-stained and a trifle worn, but the arched wooden doors leading into the lifeboat shelter, which occupied one side of the building, had been newly painted, and in the front the window was hung with a curtain, now closely drawn, of some dark red material. The lock from the door had been removed altogether, and in its place was the aperture for a Yale latch-key. The last note of modernity was supplied by the telephone wire attached to the roof of the lifeboat shelter. He walked all round the building, seeking in vain for some other means of ingress. Then he stood for a few moments in front of the curtained window. He was a man of somewhat determined disposition, and he found himself vaguely irritated by the liberties which had been taken with his property. He hammered gently upon the framework with his fist, and the windows opened readily inwards, pushing back the curtain with them. He drew himself up on to the sill, and, squeezing himself through the opening, landed on his feet and looked around him, a little breathless.