Part 33 (1/2)

GENTLEMEN--Please give the bearer my jewels--or such of them as are finished, if you have not done with all--that he may bring them to me immediately, as I have instant need of them.

Yours faithfully,

MARGARET LARUE.

This she pa.s.sed over to the stage manager, with a request to ”Please read that, Mr. Lampson, and certify over your signature that it is authentic, and that you vouch for having seen me write it.” After which she got up suddenly, and said as calmly as she could: ”Mr.

Super Master, I want to borrow one of your men to go on an important errand to Trent & Son for me. This one will do,” signalling out her brother. ”Spare him, please. This way, my man--come quickly!”

With that she suddenly caught up the note she had written--and which the stage manager had, as requested, certified--and, beckoning her brother to follow, walked hurriedly off the stage to a deserted point in the wings.

”Why have you done this dreadful thing?” she demanded in a low, fierce tone as soon as he came up with her. ”Are you a fool as well as a knave that you come here and risk losing your only support by a thing like this?”

”I wanted to see you--I had to see you--and it was the only way,” he gave back in the same guarded tone. ”The wife is dead. She died last night, and I've got to get money somewhere to bury her. I'd no one to send, since you've taken Ted away and sent him to school, so I had to come myself.”

The knowledge that it was for no more desperate reason than this that he had forced himself into her presence came as a great relief to Miss Larue. She hastened to get rid of him by sending him to Trent & Son with the note that she had written, and to tell him to carry the parcel that would be handed to him to the rooms she was occupying in Portman Square--and which she made up her mind to vacate the very next day--and there to wait until she came home from rehearsal.

He took the note and left the theatre at once, upon which Miss Larue, considerably relieved, returned to the duties in hand, and promptly banished all thought of him from her mind.

It was not until something like two hours afterward that he was brought back to mind in a somewhat disquieting manner.

”I say, Miss Larue,” said the stage manager as she came off after thrice rehearsing a particularly trying scene, and, with a weary sigh, dropped into a vacant chair at his table, ”aren't you worried about that chap you sent with the note to Trent & Son? There's been time for him to go and return twice over, you know; and I observe that he's not back yet. Aren't you a bit uneasy?”

”No. Why should I be?”

”Well, for one thing, I should say it was an extremely risky business unless you knew something about the man. Suppose, for instance, he should make off with the jewels? A pretty pickle you'd be in with the parties from whom you borrowed them, by Jove!”

”Good gracious, you don't suppose I sent him for the originals, do you?” said Miss Larue with a smile. ”Trent & Son _would_ think me a lunatic to do such a thing as that. What I sent him for was, of course, merely the paste replicas. The originals I shall naturally go for myself.”

”G.o.d bless my soul! The paste replicas, do you say?” blurted in Mr.

Lampson excitedly. ”Why, I thought--Trent & Son will be sure to think so themselves under the circ.u.mstances! They can't possibly think otherwise.”

”'Under the circ.u.mstances'? 'Think otherwise'?” repeated Miss Larue, facing round upon him sharply. ”What do you mean by that, Mr.

Lampson? Good heavens! not that they could possibly be mad enough to give the man the originals?”

”Yes, certainly! Good Lord! what else can they think--what else can they give him? They sent the paste duplicates here by their own messenger this morning! They are in the manager's office--in his safe--at this very minute; and I was going to bring them round to you as soon as the rehearsal is over!”

Consternation followed this announcement, of course. The rehearsal was called to an abrupt halt. Mr. Lampson and Miss Larue flew round to the front of the house in a sort of panic, got to the telephone, and rang up Trent & Son, who confirmed their worst fears. Yes, the man had arrived with the note from Miss Larue something over an hour ago, and they had promptly handed him over the original jewels. Not all of them, of course, but those which they had finished duplicating and of which they had sent the replicas to the theatre by their own messenger that morning. Surely that was what Miss Larue meant by the demand, was it not? No other explanation seemed possible after they had sent her the copies and--Good Lord! hadn't heard about it? Meant the imitations?

Heavens above, what an appalling mistake! What was that? The man?

Oh, yes; he took the things after Mr. Trent, senior, had removed them from the safe and handed them over to him, and he had left Mr. Trent's office directly he received them. Miss Larue could ascertain exactly what had been delivered to him by examining the duplicates their messenger had carried to the theatre.

Miss Larue did, discovering, to her dismay, that they represented a curious ruby necklace, of which the original had been lent her by the d.u.c.h.ess of Oldhampton, a stomacher of sapphires and pearls borrowed from the Marquise of Chepstow, and a rare Tudor clasp of diamonds and opals which had been lent to her by the Lady Margery Thraill.

In a panic she rushed from the theatre, called a taxi, and, hoping against hope, whirled off to her rooms at Portman Square. No Mr.

James Colliver had been there. Nor did he come there ever. Neither did he return to the squalid home where his dead wife lay; nor did any of his cronies nor any of his old haunts see hide or hair of him from that time. Furthermore, n.o.body answering to his description had been seen to board any train, steams.h.i.+p, or sailing-vessel leaving for foreign parts, nor could there be found any hotel, lodging-house, furnished or even unfurnished apartment into which he had entered that day or upon any day thereafter.

In despair, Miss Larue drove to Scotland Yard and put the matter into the hands of the police, offering a reward of 1,000 for the recovery of the jewels; and through the medium of the newspapers promised Mr. James Colliver that she would not prosecute, but would pay that 1,000 over to _him_ if he would return the gems, that she might restore them to their rightful owners.