The Black Cabinet

by Patricia Wentworth

  “I would stay here all night if it would be any good,” said Martin Fossetter in the voice which made Chloe’s heart beat. She prepared for flight.

  “I must go.”

  “Chloe,” said Martin quickly. “Come with me now! I can’t bear your going back. Come with me now!”

  Chloe was kneeling on the wall; her hands held the brick coping tightly.

  “No, I can’t,” she said very quickly. “I must bring the letters—I can’t leave the letters behind.” “Chloe I” said Martin in the darkness.

  “Good-bye,” said Chloe. “Six o’clock to-morrow morning—if the taxi doesn’t come. If;—if it does—”

  “Oh, I’ll be at the station,” said Martin. He heard her drop down on the other side of the wall.

  Chloe ran all the way back to the house, and then had to stand on the terrace to get her breath before going in. There was a little wind that came in gusts, a cold damp wind that promised rain.

  She went in reluctantly, and sat in the drawing-room, her ears strained for the sound of wheels, and her fingers busy unravelling a tangle of silks for Emily Wroughton’s interminable embroidery. She was at present engaged in working bright pink flowers, hybrids mercifully unknown to nature, upon a black satin ground. The silks on Chloe’s lap were of every shade imaginable. She pulled out strand after strand, and sometimes said “Yes” or “No” when Emily paused in her prattle; but all the time she was listening, listening, until the strained sense mocked her by simulating each expected sound in turn. It was long before she gave up hope. But when the dressing bell rang, and no taxi had arrived, she turned resolutely to her plans for getting out of the house in the darkness next morning.

  She went up to bed early, and considered very seriously the question of how to get the letters away. She could get out of the house herself, but she couldn’t possibly carry her black school box as far as the kitchen garden; something smaller and handier must be found. There were some suit-cases at the back of her cupboard. They would be better.

  She went into the cupboard and switched on the light. The suit-cases were marked with Mr. Dane’s initials, and she would not have taken them if she could have thought of any other way of getting the letters away. She chose two of good size, and, by dint of squeezing, got all the letters into them. She couldn’t lock the cases, of course, but she fastened the spring catches and did up the straps. Then she stood up and looked about her.

  “I must have some clothes, but they’ll just have to go in a parcel.” In the end she found a small cardboard dress-box which she filled with things that she really could not do without. All the rest of her clothes she packed in the old black box. Then she went to bed, and was asleep almost before she had finished saying to herself, “Five o’clock—I must be sure to wake at five.”

  It was really on that last word that she passed into sleep, because in the middle of saying it, she saw herself standing in front of an avenue of enormous 5’s, hundreds of feet high and glittering like icicles in the sun. She had to walk down the avenue to reach the bottom of Maxton High Street, where she would be quite safe. She began to run, and as soon as she came into the avenue she found that the 5’s really were made of ice; a wind blew between them and shook the frost from them in flakes that cut her hands. She was carrying the suit-cases that held the letters, and they got heavier every moment. It was most frightfully cold. She wanted to leave the letters and run away, but she knew she mustn’t. If she could only reach the very bright light at the end of the avenue, she would be safe. The light was the arc light outside the railway station; Maxton, and Chloe wanted to reach it more than she had ever wanted anything. She tried to run faster, but her feet would not do what she wanted them to; they stopped and would not move. And just behind her she heard Mr. Dane say in his soft, cold voice, “Don’t love anyone, don’t trust anyone. Never trust anyone, Chloe.”

  “Oh!” said Chloe in her dream. It was not a scream, but a struggling, sobbing cry. “Oh!” she said again between sleeping and waking, and then the dream was gone; everything was gone except darkness—and some one moving in the darkness.

  Chapter XXII

  Chloe lay on her bed in the dark, quite rigid. The fire was out; all the bed-clothes had slipped off on one side, leaving her uncovered. That was why she was so cold. She had had a dream about being cold, and about Mr. Dane. She must have dreamt that some one had moved just now. It couldn’t be true, because she had locked her door and put the key under her pillow. In the darkness by the door somebody moved again. Chloe heard the sound of a quick breath that was very nearly a gasp, and then, in an uneven whisper, her name:

  “Miss Dane! Miss Dane!”

  Chloe bounced up in bed, full of righteous indignation. All that agony of fear for Emily—Emily who wouldn’t scare a fly.

  “What on earth”, she began, and made a dive for the lost bed-clothes.

  “Ssh,” said Emily. “Oh, please. Oh, Miss Dane, I must speak to you!”

  Chloe put up her hand and switched on the light in the little reading lamp beside her. A rosy glow showed the incongruous figure of Emily Wroughton standing just inside the door and leaning back against it. Her mouse-coloured hair hung down in tightly braided plaits. She wore a dressing-gown of purple ripple-cloth trimmed with cheap Nottingham lace of a yellowish shade. Her face came very near the lace in colour, and her knees shook under her. Quite obviously she was very much frightened.

  “Mrs. Wroughton, what is it?” said Chloe. “Are you ill?”

  “No—n’ no,” said Emily. She put her hand to her throat as if she were strangling, and came forward with slow, tottering steps until she reached the bed. She sank upon the floor beside it.

  “The light!” she whispered. “Put it out!”

  “Mrs. Wroughton!”

  “Put it out! He’ll see it. He mustn’t, mustn’t know.”

  “Who’ll see it?”

  “Leonard,” said Leonard’s wife. With a sudden spasm she reared herself up, snatched at the switch, and gave a gasp of relief as the glow faded into blackness. “I must speak to you—I simply must.” Terror seemed to flow out from her in waves. Chloe felt the touch of it, and shivered a little.

  “What on earth’s the matter? Has anything happened?” She felt Emily come a little nearer, and knew her to be half kneeling, half crouching against the side of the bed.

  “I couldn’t bear it any longer—I had to tell you—I had to! He’d kill me if he knew, but I couldn’t let you—let you go on, and not warn you.”

  Chloe began to feel afraid.

  “What is it?”

  Emily sniffed.

  “Why—oh, why didn’t you open the safe?” she wailed. “They only wanted the papers; and really, you know, they were Leonard’s just as much as they were Mr. Dane’s. Why didn’t you let him have them?”

  Chloe put out her hand and took Emily firmly by the shoulder.

  “Do you know what those papers were?” she asked in a sort of cold rage.

  “No—no. Oh, you’re hurting me!”

  Chloe actually shook her.

  “Then don’t, don’t talk such utter bunkum: And for goodness sake tell me what’s upset you so.” Emily drew away, sobbing.

  “Oh, how dreadfully unkind you are!—and I’m doing my best, my very best, to help you.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Chloe with sudden repentance. “Look here, I’m most awfully sorry if I was rude or hurt you just now. But if you would get on with it, and just tell me why you’re so upset—”

  “Oh, Miss Dane—” said Emily. She paused, sniffed, and blew her nose. Then, with another gasp, “It’s such a dreadful thing, and I don’t know how to say it.”

  “Nonsense!” said Chloe. “I suppose they’re not going to murder me?”

  “No, no,” said Emily, in a quick, scared voice. “Well then, what is it?”

  “It’s—it’s a pl
ot,” said Emily Wroughton under her breath.

  “Yes?” said Chloe. “Please go on.”

  Emily went on in a flurried whisper:

  “Leonard thinks that Mr. Dane showed you how to open the safe. And he thinks you’ve opened it and taken out papers that really belong to him. And—and he thinks that you’ve burnt some of them; and he wants to stop your burning the rest of them. You see, they really belong to him, and he says they’re worth a great deal of money. And, oh, my dear Miss Dane, he means to get hold of them somehow—he does indeed.”

  “All right,” said Chloe, “let him go on and get hold of them.”

  “Oh, my dear, don’t, don’t talk like that. You’re so young, and you don’t know. That’s why I couldn’t bear it any longer—I felt that I had to warn you.”

  “Look here,” said Chloe, “don’t you think it’s time you stopped hinting at all sorts of dreadful things, and just told me straight out whatever it is you’ve come here to tell me?”

  “It’s—it’s so difficult to begin,” said Emily. “I don’t think you know what danger you’re in.”

  “Danger?” said Chloe. “Nonsense! What on earth’s to prevent my walking out of the house to-morrow and going back to Maxton?”

  Emily seemed to choke for a moment. “Leonard would prevent you—and Dr. Jennings would prevent you,” she whispered.

  “They couldn’t—they wouldn’t dare.”

  “You don’t understand. It’s so hard to tell you. But I must tell you. Everybody—everybody all round—believes that you’re queer in the head. If would be quite easy to stop your getting away.”

  “What utter rubbish!” said Chloe in angry, heartfelt tones. “How could anyone believe such nonsense?”

  “They do,” said Emily with trembling insistence. “They all think that you’re not—not responsible, and that Leonard and I are looking after you. They think that it’s you who has been dismissing most of the servants, and getting rid of the cars, and having the telephone cut off. They think that you’ve got a craze about infection, that you believe the house is in quarantine won’t see anyone. Surely you must have noticed that no one has been here—none of your grandfather’s old friends or—or even the Vicar. Sure you must have noticed it and thought it very odd?”

  “I thought it was because they didn’t like Mr. Dane.”

  “No—no,” said Emily, “it’s because they think you’re mad. Leonard and Dr. Jennings have made them think that you’re mad. There isn’t anybody who doesn’t believe it; and there isn’t anybody who would help you to get away.”

  A very, very comforting vision of Martin Fossetter, and Martin Fossetter’s car rose at that moment in Chloe’s mind; but even this did not keep her heart from beating rather hard.

  “But it’s such nonsense—such nonsense,” she whispered, and heard Emily’s sudden, protesting movement, Emily’s quick answer:

  “Perfectly sane people have been shut up in asylums before now, Miss Dane.”

  Chloe’s heart beat faster still. It was true there was a case last year; everybody in Maxton was talking about it. She clutched the bedclothes about her and fought with panic. Emily was speaking again:

  “I had to warn you. Oh, my dear Miss Dane there’s only one thing for you to do, there is indeed.”

  “What is it?” said Chloe, and hoped her voice was reasonably steady.

  “If you could get away at once before they’ve finished making their plans, and if you could hide, really hide yourself until you’re of age—”

  “Yes?”

  “If they couldn’t find you, they couldn’t do anything. If you could get away to London and hide, just for two months until you’re of age.”

  “I could go to Mr. Hudson,” said Chloe, speaking more to herself than to Emily.

  “No. No! He’s in it too—you mustn’t do it. Miss Dane, don’t you see that they’re all in together? You must get right away, and hide til you’re of age.” Emily steadied herself by edge of the bed, and got to her feet. “I had to tell you. But Leonard would kill me if he knew,” she said in a low, hopeless voice. Then she blew her nose violently, bumped against the table, and began to feel her way to the door.

  Chloe heard her open it with a last sob. She listened till the door was shut again and she heard the sound of a key withdrawn fumblingly—another key. That was how Emily had got in. The thought just came and passed as Emily’s steps receded When she could hear nothing more Chloe flung herself down upon her pillow and cried her heart out. Emily Wroughton went back to her own room with a slow, dragging step. She felt very unhappy indeed. “How wicked I am—how wicked!” she kept saying to herself.

  Her room was warm and brightly lighted. Leonard Wroughton stood before the fire in his dressing-gown, waiting. For once his look approved her, and as soon as she had shut the door he laughed and said:

  “Bravo, old girl! That was a top-hole performance, and it ought to do the trick.”

  “Leonard, you listened!”

  “Naturally. I couldn’t afford to leave anything to chance. I really had no idea that you would be such a star performer.”

  For an instant Emily sunned herself in the unaccustomed smile. It was such years since Leonard had seemed to like anything that she did. Then that dreadful feeling of wickedness swept over her again.

  “Leonard! Leonard, you’re not going to harm her! You promised. I wouldn’t have done it—you know I wouldn’t—if you hadn’t promised me that.”

  Leonard Wroughton laughed again.

  “My good Emily—” he began; and then with an ugly sneer, “Why, she stands to get what fortune-tellers promise as their choicest plum.”

  “What’s that?” gasped Emily; her pale eyes widened.

  “Why, a handsome husband and ten thousand a year,” said Leonard Wroughton.

  Emily began to cry.

  “It frightens me,” she said. “It frightens me dreadfully, for you, and for us all. Leonard what—what will you do if she goes on saying that she won’t take the money?”

  “I think,” said Leonard Wroughton, “that you may trust the handsome husband to see to that. And there are always the letters. I don’t mind saying that it was a considerable relief to my mind to know that she’s got the bulk of them safe.”

  Chapter XXIII

  Chloe did not have to wake herself at five after all, because only the most fitful snatches of sleep came to her after she heard Emily lock the door and go away. Her dream, the darkness, and Emily’s revelation had shaken her. With the cumulative pressure of lonely days behind them, they had shaken her almost to the point of panic. Time and again she woke from a half dose to find fresh tears upon her cheeks, and a dreadful feeling of fear at her heart.

  “Martin—Martin will take me away. They can’t do anything, really, because Martin’s going to take me away.” The thought beat panic back. If it hadn’t been for Martin,—no, she mustn’t think of that, or the terror would sweep over her again. Martin wouldn’t fail her. Only just a few hours, and he would be waiting in the dusk of Langton Lane.

  “Oh,” said Chloe from the very, very bottom of her heart, “Oh, Martin, I do bless you and bless you.”

  At five o’clock she decided that the night was really over, and got up. It was, of course, pitch dark—the coldest, darkest hour of all the twenty-four. She dressed quickly, and put on, not the black she had been wearing for Mr. Dane, but her own clothes that she had had at Maxton—the tan woolly jumper, a dark brown coat and skirt, and a long tweed coat to go over it all. It was going be cold in an open car, cold and windy. She found an old brown scarf, and crammed a close-fitting felt hat well down on her head; it was old too, but its bright tan colour suited her.

  It was when she looked in the glass that the lurking fear began to pass away and her spirits to rise. And yet the really difficult and dangerous part of her escape was still before her.
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  At a quarter to six she opened the door, slid the two suit-cases into the passage, and went back for the cardboard box which held her clothes. Then she came out of her room, locked the door, and put the key in her pocket.

  The suit-cases balanced each other very well, but the cardboard box was awkward. In the end she tied it to one of the suit-cases with her scarf and made her way very, very cautiously to the head of the stairs, and from there down into the hall, feeling before her with her foot at every step. She had made up her mind not to attempt to open the front door—“Too many bolts, and bars, and jangly chains and things”—; one of the study windows would be ever so much easier to manage. And manage it she did, with as little sound and as much haste as possible.

  From the moment that she got out of the house and into the dark garden with its smell of wet earth, all Chloe’s fear left her; she didn’t care a bit how dark it was, or how cold. There was an up-rush of hope in her heart as she made haste to meet a new day, new ways—and Martin waiting in the lane.

  From the top of the wall she peered down into a pit of gloom; and, before she could speak, Martin spoke from just beneath her:

  “Hullo—that you?”

  “Yes,” said Chloe breathlessly. “Me, and two suit-cases and a cardboard box.” She heard him laugh softly.

  “What a little brick you are! Here, let me have them.”

  Chloe handed down the precious suit-cases, dropped the cardboard box, and then proceeded to get over the wall herself. She hung by her hands, Martin steadying her, and then came down with a rush into his arms. Just for a moment she stood there leaning against him, and felt his clasp tighten. Just for a moment the darkness and the silence were full of warmth and light, and the sound of Chloe’s beating heart. It was over. She was safe; she had got away. Martin would take care of her now.

  “Chloe,” said Martin Fossetter. “Chloe!” But Chloe laughed, slipped away, and scrambled down the bank into the lane.

  There was a keen, tingling sense of adventure in the air; the darkness was full of it; the wind that presently blew in their faces was full of it. The car slipped down the lane, swung round two crooked corners, and came out upon the London road. Chloe spoke then: