Part 17 (1/2)

Suddenly, as I stood there on the crowded pavement, I became conscious that I was attracting attention. I recollected my dusty clothes and dirty, dishevelled face. I must have presented a strange, dissipated, out-all-night appearance. And further, I had lost a thousand pounds.

Up and down before the long range of shop-windows I walked, patiently awaiting her reappearance. I was anxious to know the truth concerning the previous night's happenings--a truth which I intended she should not conceal from me.

I glanced at my watch. It was already past eleven o'clock. Morning shopping in Regent Street had now commenced in real earnest. The thoroughfare was lined with carriages, for was it not the height of the London season?

In and out of the big drapery establishment pa.s.sed crowds of well-dressed women, most of them with pet dogs, and others with male friends led like lambs to the slaughter. The spectacle of a man in silk hat out shopping with a lady friend is always a pitiable one. His very look craves the sympathy of the onlooker, especially if he be laden with soft-paper parcels.

My brain was awhirl. My only thought was of Sylvia and of her strange connection with these undesirable persons who had so ingeniously stolen my money, and who had baited such a fatal trap.

Anxious as I was to get to a telephone and ring up Jack, yet I could not leave my post--I had promised to await her.

Nearly an hour went by; I entered the shop and searched its labyrinth of ”departments.” But I could not distinguish her anywhere. Upstairs and downstairs I went, inquiring here and there, but n.o.body seemed to have seen the fair young lady in black; the great emporium seemed to have swallowed her up.

It was now noon. Even though she might have been through a dress-fitting ordeal, an hour was certainly ample time. Therefore I began to fear that she had missed me. There were several other exits higher up the street, and also one which I discovered in a side street.

I returned to her taxi, for I had already paid off my man. The driver had not seen his ”fare.”

”I was hailed by the lady close to Chapel Street,” he said, ”and I drove 'er to Oxford Street, not far from Tottenham Court Road. We stood at the kerb for about ten minutes. Then she ordered me to drive with all speed over 'ere.”

”Did you see her speak with any gentleman?”

”She was with a dark, youngish gentleman when they hailed me. She got in and left 'im in Chapel Street. I heard 'im say as we went off that he'd see 'er again soon.”

”That's all you know of her?”

”Yes, sir. I've never seen 'er before,” replied the driver. Then he added with a smile, ”Your man's been tellin' me as how you thought I had a bank-thief in my cab!”

”Yes, but I was mistaken,” I said. ”I must have made a mistake in the cab.”

”That's very easy, sir. We're so much alike--us red 'uns.”

Sylvia's non-appearance much puzzled me. What could it mean? For another half-hour--an anxious, impatient, breathless half-hour--I waited, but she did not return.

Had she, too, cleverly escaped by entering the shop, and pa.s.sing out by another entrance?

Another careful tour of the establishment revealed the fact that she certainly was not there.

And so, after a wait of nearly two hours, I was compelled to accept the hard and very remarkable fact that she had purposely evaded me, and escaped!

Then she was in league with the men who had stolen my thousand pounds!

And yet had not that selfsame man declared that she, having betrayed him, was to meet the same terrible fate as that prepared for me?

For a final five minutes I waited; then annoyed, disappointed and dismayed, entered the taxi, and drove to Wilton Street.

On entering with my latch-key, Browning came forward with a puzzled expression, surprised, no doubt, at my dishevelled appearance.

”I've been very anxious about you, Mr. Owen,” exclaimed the old man. I was always Mr. Owen to him, just as I had been when a lad. ”When I went to your room this morning I found your bed empty. I wondered where you had gone.”