Part 57 (1/2)

”They are looking for you everywhere,” I said. ”The sound of that revolver would fill your room.”

”Do you think I don't know it?” he answered. ”Do you think you would not have had a bullet through your forehead before now if I was not sure of it?”

”Put your revolver down and talk sense!” I said. ”I am interested in no one except your niece.”

”It's a lie!” he answered. ”It's through you I'm in this hole!”

”Well, here's a chance for you,” I said. ”They are all of them down at the Court entrance. Probably some of them are on their way up now.

Turn to the left and take the other lift. Leave the hotel by the Embankment entrance.”

”And walk into a trap!” he snarled.

”Upon my honor I know of none,” I answered. ”It is exactly as I have said.”

I knew from his face that he had forgotten the other lift. He s.n.a.t.c.hed up his hat and disappeared. I returned to the sitting-room, and, although I had made no promise, the consciousness of my escape kept me silent as to having seen him. Felicia was sitting on the sofa, talking to her uncle. My lady of the turquoises, with a triumphant smile upon her lips, was occupying the easy-chair.

Felicia rose at once and drew me to the window.

”Capitaine Rotherby,” she said, ”I fear that you will never forgive me nor believe me,--perhaps it does not matter so very much,--but you see I have seen no one but my Uncle Maurice since I was at school. He used to visit me there. He was always kind. My Uncle Ferdinand there came as a stranger. I knew nothing of him except that he was taken ill. How he met with his illness no one told me. Then my Uncle Maurice came to me one night and said that his brother had come to Europe on a wonderful secret mission, and that now he was too ill to go on with it, it must be carried through for the honor of the family. He meant to call himself Ferdinand Delora, and to come to England and do his best, and I was to come with him and hold my peace, and help him where it was possible. I begin to understand now that, somehow or other, this poor Ferdinand was ill-treated, and that my Uncle Maurice took his place, meaning to steal the money he received. But I did not know that. Indeed, I did not know it!” she said, sobbing.

I pa.s.sed my arm around her waist.

”Felicia, dear,” I said, ”who would doubt it? Let them fight this matter out between them. It is nothing to do with us. You are here, and you remain!”

She came a little closer into my arms with a sigh of content. My lady of the turquoises laughed outright.

”You are _infidele_, monsieur!” she exclaimed. ”But there, the poor child is young, and she needs some one to look after her. Listen!

What is that?”

We all heard it,--the sound of a shot in the corridor. I kept Felicia back for the moment, but the others were already outside. The waiter and the valet had rushed out of the service room. A chambermaid, with her ap.r.o.n over her head, ran screaming along the corridor. There in the middle Delora lay, flat on his back, with his hands thrown out and a smoking revolver by his side!...

I did then what might seem to be a callous thing. I left them all crowding around the body of the dead man. I let even Felicia be led back to her room by her companion. I took the lift downstairs, and I made my way into the cafe.

”Where is Louis?” I asked the first waiter I saw.

”He is away for a minute or two, sir,” the man answered.

Almost as he spoke Louis entered from the further end of the restaurant. He did not see me, and I noticed that his fingers were arranging his tie, and that as he pa.s.sed a mirror he glanced at his s.h.i.+rt-front. When I came face to face with him he was breathing fast as though he had been running.

”Louis,” I said, ”five flights of stairs are trying at our time of life!”

He looked at me blankly, and as one who does not comprehend.

”Five flights of stairs, monsieur!” he repeated.

I nodded.

”I myself came down by the lift,” I said. ”Louis, Delora is lying in the corridor outside his rooms with a bullet through his forehead. I am wondering whether he shot himself, or whether--”

”Or whether what?” Louis asked softly.