His Last Bow Part 11 (1/2)
Holmes leaned back in his armchair and took his notebook froerous classes in the world,” said he, ”is the drifting and friendless woman She is the most harmless and often the most useful of mortals, but she is the inevitable inciter of criratory She has sufficient means to take her from country to country and from hotel to hotel She is lost, as often as not, in a houses She is a stray chicken in a world of foxes When she is gobbled up she is hardly missed I much fear that some evil has come to the Lady Frances Carfax”
I was relieved at this sudden descent froeneral to the particular Holmes consulted his notes
”Lady Frances,” he continued, ”is the sole survivor of the direct family of the late Earl of Rufton The estates went, as you may remember, in the male line She was left with limited means, but with some very remarkable old Spanish jewellery of silver and curiously cut diamonds to which she was fondly attached--too attached, for she refused to leave them with her banker and always carried theure, the Lady Frances, a beautiful woe, the last derelict of what only twenty years ago was a goodly fleet”
”What has happened to her, then?”
”Ah, what has happened to the Lady Frances? Is she alive or dead? There is our problem She is a lady of precise habits, and for four years it has been her invariable custooverness, who has long retired and lives in Camberwell It is this Miss Dobney who has consulted me Nearly five weeks have passed without a word The last letter was from the Hotel National at Lausanne Lady Frances seeiven no address The faly wealthy no sum will be spared if we can clear the matter up”
”Is Miss Dobney the only source of information? Surely she had other correspondents?”
”There is one correspondent who is a sure draw, Watson That is the bank Single ladies must live, and their passbooks are colanced over her account The last check but one paid her bill at Lausanne, but it was a large one and probably left her with cash in hand Only one check has been drawn since”
”To who to shohere the check was drawn It was cashed at the Credit Lyonnais at Montpellier less than three weeks ago The sum was fifty pounds”
”And who is Miss Marie Devine?”
”That also I have been able to discover Miss Marie Devine was the maid of Lady Frances Carfax Why she should have paid her this check we have not yet determined I have no doubt, however, that your researches will soon clear the iving expedition to Lausanne You know that I cannot possibly leave London while old Abrahaeneral principles it is best that I should not leave the country Scotland Yard feels lonely withoutthe criminal classes Go, then, my dear Watson, and if ant a rate as two pence a word, it waits your disposal night and day at the end of the Continental wire”
Two days later found me at the Hotel National at Lausanne, where I received every courtesy at the hands of M Moser, the well- known er Lady Frances, as he informed me, had stayed there for several weeks She had been e was not n of having in her youth been a very lovely wo of any valuable jewellery, but it had been remarked by the servants that the heavy trunk in the lady's bedroom was always scrupulously locked Marie Devine, the ed to one of the head waiters in the hotel, and there was no difficulty in getting her address It was 11 Rue de Trajan, Montpellier All this I jotted down and felt that Hol his facts
Only one corner still reht which I possessed could clear up the cause for the lady's sudden departure She was very happy at Lausanne There was every reason to believe that she intended to re the lake And yet she had left at a single day's notice, which involved her in the useless payment of a week's rent Only Jules Vibart, the lover of the estion to offer He connected the sudden departure with the visit to the hotel a day or two before of a tall, dark, bearded e!” cried Jules Vibart Theearnestly to Madame on the promenade by the lake Then he had called She had refused to see hilish, but of his name there was no record Madame had left the place immediately afterwards Jules Vibart, and, as of ht that this call and the departure were cause and effect Only one thing Jules would not discuss That was the reason why Marie had left herIf I wished to know, I o to Montpellier and ask her
So ended the first chapter of my inquiry The second was devoted to the place which Lady Frances Carfax had sought when she left Lausanne Concerning this there had been soone with the intention of throwing soe have been openly labelled for Baden? Both she and it reached the Rhenish spa by soer of Cook's local office So to Baden I went, after dispatching to Hol in reply a telegram of half-humorous commendation
At Baden the track was not difficult to follow Lady Frances had stayed at the Englischer Hof for a fortnight While there she had er and his wife, a missionary from South America Like most lonely ladies, Lady Frances found her coer's remarkable personality, his whole hearted devotion, and the fact that he was recovering from a disease contracted in the exercise of his apostolic duties affected her deeply She had helped Mrs Shlessinger in the nursing of the convalescent saint He spent his day, as the e-chair on the veranda, with an attendant lady upon either side of hi a doraph Finally, having improved much in health, he and his wife had returned to London, and Lady Frances had started thither in their coer had heard nothing since As to the one off so the other er had paid the bill of the whole party before his departure
”By the way,” said the landlord in conclusion, ”you are not the only friend of Lady Frances Carfax who is inquiring after her just now Only a week or so ago we had a ive a nah of an unusual type”
”A savage?” said I, linking my facts after the fashi+on of my illustrious friend
”Exactly That describes him very well He is a bulky, bearded, sunburned felloho looks as if he would be more at home in a farmers' inn than in a fashi+onable hotel A hard, fierce man, I should think, and one whoan to define itself, as figures grow clearer with the lifting of a fog Here was this good and pious lady pursued froure She feared him, or she would not have fled from Lausanne He had still followed Sooner or later he would overtake her Had he already overtaken her? Was THAT the secret of her continued silence? Could the good people ere her companions not screen her from his violence or his blackn, lay behind this long pursuit? There was the proble how rapidly and surely I had got down to the roots of thefor a description of Dr Shlessinger's left ear Hole and occasionally offensive, so I took no notice of his ill-timed jest--indeed, I had already reached Montpellier in e ca the ex-servant and in learning all that she could tell me She was a devoted creature, who had only left her ood hands, and because her own approaching e made a separation inevitable in any case Her mistress had, as she confessed with distress, shown so their stay in Baden, and had even questioned her once as if she had suspicions of her honesty, and this hadeasier than it would otherwise have been Lady Frances had given her fifty pounds as a wedding-present Like er who had driven her mistress from Lausanne With her own eyes she had seen hireat violence on the public promenade by the lake He was a fierce and terrible man She believed that it was out of dread of hiers to London She had never spoken to Marie about it, but ns had convinced the maid that her mistress lived in a state of continual nervous apprehension So far she had got in her narrative, when suddenly she sprang from her chair and her face was convulsed with surprise and fear ”See!” she cried ”The miscreant follows still! There is the very -roo black beard walking slowly down the centre of the street and staring eagerly at he numbers of the houses It was clear that, likeupon the impulse of the lishman,” I said
”What if I am?” he asked with a most villainous scowl
”May I ask what your name is?”
”No, you may not,” said he with decision
The situation ard, but the most direct way is often the best
”Where is the Lady Frances Carfax?” I asked
He stared at me with amazement
”What have you done with her? Why have you pursued her? I insist upon an answer!” said I
The fellow gave a below of anger and sprang upon le, but the rip of iron and the fury of a fiend His hand was on one before an unshaven French ouvrier in a blue blouse darted out froel in his hand, and struck my assailant a sharp crack over the forearo his hold He stood for an instant fue and uncertain whether he should not renew his attack Then, with a snarl of anger, he left e from which I had just come I turned to thank my preserver, who stood beside me in the roadway
”Well, Watson,” said he, ”a very pretty hash you have made of it! I rather think you had better coht express”
An hour afterwards, Sherlock Holarb and style, was seated in my private room at the hotel His explanation of his sudden and opportune appearance was siet away from London, he determined to head uise of a working for ation you have made, my dear Watson,” said he ”I cannot at the moment recall any possible blunder which you have oive the alar”
”Perhaps you would have done no better,” I answered bitterly
”There is no 'perhaps' about it I HAVE done better Here is the Hon Philip Green, who is a fellow-lodger with you in this hotel, and we ation”
A card had come up on a salver, and it was followed by the same bearded ruffian who had attacked me in the street He started when he saw me
”What is this, Mr Holmes?” he asked ”I had your note and I have come But what has this man to do with the matter?”
”This isus in this affair”
The stranger held out a huge, sunburned hand, with a feords of apology
”I hope I didn't harrip of myself Indeed, I'm not responsible in these days My nerves are like live wires But this situation is beyond me What I want to know, in the first place, Mr Holmes, is, how in the world you came to hear of my existence at all”
”I aoverness”
”Old Susan Dobney with the mob cap! I remember her well”
”And she remembers you It was in the days before--before you found it better to go to South Africa”
”Ah, I see you knohole story I need hide nothing from you I swear to you, Mr Holmes, that there never was in this world a man who loved a woman with a more wholehearted love than I had for Frances I was a wild youngster, I know--not worse than others of my class But her mind was pure as snow She could not bear a shadow of coarseness So, when she cas that I had done, she would have no more to say to me And yet she loved h to rele all her sainted days just for my sake alone When the years had passed and I had ht perhaps I could seek her out and soften her I had heard that she was still unmarried, I found her at Lausanne and tried all I knew She weakened, I think, but her as strong, and when next I called she had left the town I traced her to Baden, and then after a tih fellow, fresh froh life, and when Dr Watson spoke to me as he did I lost hold of myself for a moment But for God's sake tell me what has become of the Lady Frances”
”That is for us to find out,” said Sherlock Holravity ”What is your London address, Mr Green?”
”The Langham Hotel will find me”