The Whispering Lane/Chapter 7
CHAPTER VII
WHAT THE WOMAN SAID
“What is your opinion of this case, as it now stands?”
Hustings put this question to Trant very bluntly, and waited somewhat impatiently for an answer. The Inspector withheld the same for three or four minutes, as he was not quite certain what to say. The two men were seated in the detective’s private room in the Tarhaven police-station, discussing the doings of the previous day, which had caused so great a sensation at Fryfeld. Ten minutes earlier, Dick had arrived, asking for an interview, which was readily accorded by the officer. The latter wished to work along with the former, as the case in hand perplexed him greatly. It was this very perplexity which delayed his reply, and he turned the matter over carefully in his mind before speaking. “Well, Mr. Hustings!” he said at length, “if you had asked me that prior to the inquest proceedings, I should have been better able to answer plainly. Now,”—Trant shook his head and rubbed his chin with a worried air.
Hustings nodded, comprehendingly. “You have examined the window?”
“This morning!” responded Trant, nodding also. “I agree with you that the snick was pushed back with a knife-blade inserted between the upper and lower sash. And lately, for the planed surface, where the sliver was sliced off, is perfectly fresh. There is no doubt in my mind but that the window has been forced.”
“And that means the intrusion of a third person into this matter!” declared Dick, trimphantly.
“It certainly looks like it. Nevertheless, Miss Danby’s character is not cleared by such intrusion.”
“To some degree, I think it is, Trant. That third person can only have broken into the cottage for the purpose of hiding the lacquer-box in the book-case. If Miss Danby was an accomplice of the intruder, that unknown individual would scarcely have left behind such dangerous evidence.”
“He—let us assume, for the moment, that this unknown person is a man,” said the Inspector, argumentatively, “he may have wished to get rid of the woman, and so left behind him sufficient evidence to implicate her thoroughly.”
“I don’t think so: I can’t think so. It would be too much risk for him to take, for how could he be sure that she would keep silent in the face of his betraying her to her death.”
“All the same, she is silent.”
“Granted! But with the silence of ignorance. If she knew the name and the whereabouts of the man who hid the box, it is only natural to suppose that she would give him up to save her life.”
“She may do so yet.”
“I think not. Her confession, made at the inquest, convinces me that she knows nothing about the box, nor how it came to be in the book-case. Consider, Trant—would there have been any need for the forcing of the window, by a man who could have been admitted into the parlour by Miss Danby herself? No! No! Believe me, this is a conspiracy to implicate the poor creature in a necessary murder.”
“A necessary murder,” echoed Trant, raising his eyebrows.
“I speak advisedly,” said Hustings with deliberate firmness, “a necessary murder. Someone—the man who forced the window, maybe—had a strong reason for putting away Slanton. Knowing of Miss Danby’s stormy relations with the doctor and the doctor’s frequent visits, this man implicated her by means of the lacquer-box and the tattooing, so as to ward off suspicion from himself. Yes, and perhaps to get rid of her also.”
“But, if she has any such enemy,” said Trant, impatiently, “she would speak out.”
“As I am to interview her to-day—you said earlier that I could do so—I hope to make her speak out.”
Trant shook his head. “She is a mule for obstinacy.”
“I intend to appeal to her love for Miss More. Tell her that the girl is in danger of being arrested as an accessory-after-the-fact.”
“Yes!” the Inspector nodded approvingly, “a hint of that kind might lead to the breaking down of the reserve—especially as it is true.”
“True!” Dick sprang from his chair, furiously. “You don’t mean to say that you doubt Aileen—you, who owe so much to her father?”
“Oh, she told you that, did she?” queried Trant, coolly. “Well all the better, as you can judge how loathe I would be to proceed to such an extreme. Nevertheless, if I were other than I am, Aileen would be arrested. It seems inconceivable that all this should have taken place in a tiny cottage without her knowing something, hearing something, seeing something.”
“She couldn’t hear because she was sound asleep when the crime was committed, and she couldn’t see as she was in bed upstairs, and she can’t know anything or she would speak out, if only to save her friend.”
“Perhaps her speaking out would condemn her friend,” observed Trant cynically. “Don’t grow angry Mr. Hustings, Aileen is as dear to me as to you.”
“How do you know that she is dear to me?” asked Dick, flushing redly.
“Village gossip, your expression when you look at her, her expression when she looks at you. It’s my business to read faces. Anyhow,” Trant rose briskly, “it is just as well that she has a friend in you as well as in me, for her position is both difficult and dangerous.”
“She is as innocent as—as—Miss Danby,” retorted the young man, angrily, “and in some way I’ll get them both out of the difficult and dangerous position.”
“Good luck to you!” Trant grasped Dick’s hand and shook it heartily. “I am as keen in this matter as you are. Keep me advised of what you discover—of what you hear from Miss Danby, and then we can consider what is best to be done.”
Dick nodded, made for the door and turned back. “There is one thing I wish to tell you,” he said, slowly, “did Slanton’s neck-tie have a scarf-pin in it, shaped like a swastika?”
“What on earth is a swastika?” asked the Inspector, openly puzzled.
Hustings scribbled the symbol on the blotting-paper with his pencil. “That is an occult sign. Hindoo mysticism: Yogi business. Slanton, as I learned from Aileen, meddled with such dangerous things. The swastika scarf-pin was set with rough turquoise stones.”
Trant ran over in his mind the number and nature of the articles found on the dead man, and shook his head. “I saw no scarf-pin whatsoever; much less one of that kind. Its oddity would have fixed it in my memory had I seen it.”
“Yet Slanton declared to Aileen that he always wore that scarf-pin, so as to bring him luck. He must have worn it when he was murdered. Why is it missing from the body? I wonder,” said the young man, suddenly, “if there is any occult devilment behind all this. Slanton was a spiritualist, and from this swastika, it would seem that he concerned himself with eastern mysteries. Did the man who branded him—who killed him—who forced the window—who hid the lacquer-box in the book-case, steal that pin?”
“You propose riddles?” said Trant, shrugging.
“Riddles which I mean to solve.”
“How are you going to begin?”
“That depends upon what I hear from Miss Danby.” Dick turned towards the door again, and again turned back. “When will she be brought before the magistrate?”
“In eight days.”
“It’s a short time in which to work wonders. But I am so sure of Miss Danby’s innocence that a miracle may happen.”
“Let us hope so. Meanwhile, as things are, you must interview your client and see if in any way she can help you to perform the miracle.”
“And meanwhile,” repeated Dick, opening the door, “you won’t take any action against Aileen?”
“No! From old associations connected with her father I look upon her as my daughter. It is my duty to have her watched as a necessary witness, since she is involved, unconsciously it is true, in this matter. But she can remain in the cottage unmolested in every way. And I take it,” went on Trant, fixing a piercing gaze on his visitor, “that you will be frank with me—that all you learn will be confided to me?”
“Of course. I am as anxious to work with you, as you are to work with me, since two heads are better than one. Between us, we shall win to the root of this trouble, hard though it seems to dig downward to that root.”
“The ever-hopeful assurance of youth,” sighed Trant, smiling approvingly, and returned to his desk, as the door closed on Hustings. He was by no means so sure of success as the young man, but, unwilling to damp his ardour, refrained from saying so.
Fifteen minutes later Dick was in Miss Danby’s cell, explaining his reason for seeking an interview. The Inspector had arranged for strict privacy, knowing full well that if Hustings was dexterous enough to extract any kind of confession, the woman would not make it if a third person was present. Also he had the assurance that the same would be made known to him in due course. “So, as your solicitor,” said Dick, telling all this to Edith, “I wish you to say to me in private, what you refused to say in public.”
“I have nothing to add to what I said yesterday,” replied the woman, who was seated on her bed, wrapped up, as usual, in the grey cloak.
“But consider, Miss Danby,” urged the visitor, earnestly, “in eight days you will be brought up before the magistrate, and if you fail to make a defence, you will be sent up for trial at the Assizes.”
“What will be, will be.”
“But consider,” he urged again, “your reputation, your position?”
Miss Danby threw back her head and laughed terribly. “My reputation—my position!” she sneered with quivering lips, pale and dry. “What are those to one already condemned to death.”
“You are not condemned yet; you will not be, if—”
“Yes—‘if’!” she interrupted, swiftly; “Much virtue in ‘if,’ as Touchstone says. But there is no virtue in yours, Mr. Hustings. I am condemned, already, and by a higher tribunal than any on earth.”
“What do you mean?” Dick was at once puzzled and startled.
“I mean—Cancer,” said Edith, pronouncing the sinister word callously. “No one knows—not even Aileen—that I suffer from cancer, that I have not long to live. For that reason I took to opium-smoking. I called it neuralgia,”—she laughed scornfully, “but now you know the truth.”
Hustings surveyed her with profound pity. He was no physician, but even his untrained eye could see the hints of approaching dissolution. The livid, sagging skin, the dull eyes, the dreadful leanness of the figure, and the air of utter exhaustion, pervading her being. “I wish I could do something to help,” he cried impetuously; for it seemed terrible to him that such a once splendidly handsome woman should decay into what he saw before him.
“You are doing as much as you can do,” said Miss Danby, wearily, and huddled herself on the bed, like a crooked old witch, then added with a dreary smile: “But there is one thing helpful to me at the moment.”
“Yes. Anything I can do”
“Marry Aileen. She is dearer to me than anything on earth; dearer than ever now, since she is standing by me in these straits. My position matters little to me. I shall probably be dead before it comes to my hanging: for hanged I must be on the evidence I heard yesterday. But I wish to see Aileen safe in your arms before I go. I know that you love her.”
“I do—I do—with all my heart and soul.”
“Does she love you?”
“I think so—I am almost sure; yes, I am certain she does. Otherwise her promise that she would allow me to talk to her of what is in my heart, after you are saved, would mean nothing.”
“It depends upon my salvation then?” queried Edith shrugging, hopelessly.
“More or less. But you can set your mind at rest, Miss Danby. Come good, come bad, sooner or later, I hope to make Aileen my wife.”
“Thank Heaven for that,” murmured the woman, gratefully, “and she will not go to you penniless. No! I have made a will, leaving her the money which her brother left to me. It is rightfully hers, and when I am gone she need have no scruples in taking back her own, even though she may believe me to be a murderess.”
“Aileen does not believe that,” said Dick, sturdily, “nor do I.”
Miss Danby looked at him rather cynically, “Strange that you should say that, seeing how strong the evidence is against my being innocent.”
“There may be even stronger evidence found, likely to be in your favour.”
“Where are you going to look for that saving evidence?”
“In the direction you indicate,” said Hustings promptly.
Edith laughed drearily. “How often am I to tell you that I can give no help?”
“As often as you like, as I refuse to take such an answer. Before I leave you I am sure you will give me some clue to the truth.”
She shook her head. “I know of no clue. The death of Slanton is a mystery to me, as to you and to all.”
“But think—think—and consider before you refuse to help me. Aileen!”
“What about her?” Miss Danby looked up alertly.
“She is in the position of being arrested as an accessory-after-the-fact.”
The woman sprang to her feet, and straightened her gaunt figure. “You dare not tell me that!” she exclaimed threateningly.
“I do tell you. The sole reason why she has not yet been arrested is that the Inspector is her father’s old friend who knew Aileen when she was a child. He is allowing her all possible freedom just now, and while the case remains in his hands he will keep her name out of it, so far as is consistent with his duty. But suppose,” Hustings bent forward to whisper the next sentence, “suppose, Miss Danby, the Scotland Yard authorities intervene?”
“They dare not arrest Aileen,” gasped Edith, passionately, “she knows nothing.”
“So she says; so you say,” said Dick with studied emphasis, as it was necessary to arouse her fears for the girl’s safety to the uttermost, “but consider the position. Two women living in a lonely cottage, both hating a man who has been murdered on their door-step, as one might say. It is only reasonable for an outsider to credit both with guilt.”
“Why not credit three women with guilt,” she taunted, contemptuously, “there is Jenny Walton, who was sent from London by that beast Slanton to be my servant and spy upon me.”
“That is news to me, and will be news to Trant,” said Dick, startled by the information. “What does Jenny know about this man?”
“I don’t know—I never asked her. I was obliged to take her when Slanton requested me to do so, otherwise”—she stopped and pursed up her mouth.
“Otherwise?”
“That is my secret. I can tell you nothing.”
“If you don’t, then Aileen is in danger,” warned Hustings, significantly.
“The revelation of my secret would not save her: I only wish it could save her,” cried the wretched woman, wringing her hands, “but my secret, which concerns only myself and Slanton, has nothing to do with his death. Why he was killed and who killed him, I know no more than you do. Ask Jenny for information about Slanton’s past life. She may be able to shed some light on the subject.”
“I shall certainly question Jenny, and so will Trant,” remarked the young man, deliberately, and rising, as if about to retire, “I am sorry you can’t help Aileen. The Inspector will ward off all danger from her while he can but if in the end he is forced to have her arrested”
Miss Danby sprang forward and clutched him by the sleeve. “She must not be arrested. She knows nothing, I tell you. Wait! Wait! Let me think,” and she went back to sit on the bed with clasped hands and a frowning face.
Hustings held his peace, as he guessed that she was making up her mind whether to speak out or to keep silent. The woman twisted her body under the stress of some strong emotion: then, unable to control her self, rose impetuously to walk rapidly up and down the narrow limits of the cell. With her fierce lean face and gaunt body, and profuse grey hair now flying loose, she reminded Dick of a trapped wolf. “If I could only give you a clue,” she cried despairingly, “but I can’t—I can’t.”
“Let me be the judge of that,” suggested the lawyer, “tell me the truth.”
“I have told it—at the inquest.”
“Not all. I wish to know exactly what took place on that night. I believe that you went to bed at ten o’clock, that you smoked opium. But!” added Dick, emphatically, “I believe also that you know about the death. Else why did you warn Aileen not to go into the wood, when she ran after the animals?”
Edith flung her body backwards, threw out her arms, and looked upward, as if to seek information. Then—“How do I know but what you will use any confidence I may give you against me?”
“As your solicitor I am bound to help, not to hinder. Of course, if you are about to confess that you are guilty”
“I don’t confess that,” she interrupted vehemently, “not for one instant. But, as you say that you are my friend and promise to marry Aileen, I confess one thing. Whether it will help to save her or not, I can’t say.” She returned to the bed, and again huddled herself up against the pillow, sullenly afraid. Yes. And so patently afraid that Dick had to urge her to speak.
“What is the one thing you speak of, Miss Danby?”
With an effort she blurted out the truth, “I did see Slanton on that night.”
“Yes! Goon.”
“He was—was—alive.”
Hustings recoiled in horror, “Then you did kill”
“No! No! No! I swear that I did not: never suggest such a thing. Listen. I shall tell you all I can, for Aileen’s sake,” and, flinging back her loose grey tresses she poured out a torrent of rapid speech: “I did go to bed at ten o’clock as I said. But I did not smoke my pipe immediately. For hours I lay awake, thinking of my foolish, reckless past”
“Which you refuse to tell me,” interjected Dick, reproachfully.
“Because it has nothing to do with the present,” retorted Miss Danby savagely. “Be quiet, you fool, or you will learn nothing. I lay awake I tell you, for hours—for years—for centuries, in that hell of my own making. Then, towards the morning, I fancied I heard some noise outside: footsteps on the gravel of the path. I waited, thinking that I was mistaken—I can’t tell you for how long. Then again I heard the noise of footsteps on the gravel, and this time was so sure that I got out of bed, put on my dressing-gown and slippers, and went across the passage into the parlour.”
“Why didn’t you look out of your bedroom window?”
“Because the noise seemed to be towards the other side of the house. I lighted a candle, and entered the parlour, but everything seemed to be as it was before I went to bed at ten o’clock.”
“Was the window down?”
“Yes.”
“You heard the noise of footsteps you say. Did you also hear the noise of the window being pushed up and pulled down?”
“No! I only heard the footsteps: heard them twice, the second time so clearly that I got up to investigate, as I told you. Then, seeing, as I thought, that everything was safe in the parlour, I opened the front door to peer out.”
“Did you take the lighted candle with you?” asked Dick, profoundly interested.
Miss Danby nodded, impatiently, and hurried her speech. “But there was no need, as the moon had risen. The sky was covered with grey clouds, but sufficient light filtered through to let me see a dark body lying on. the lawn.”
“At the moment did you think that it was the body of Dr. Slanton?”
“As Heaven is my judge I did not,” asseverated Edith solemnly, “he was not in my thoughts at the moment. Indeed I had no thoughts, being so distraught and weak. But when I bent down, holding the candle to see who it was,”—here her voice cracked shrilly—“I realized that Slanton was lying there.”
“And alive!”
“I did not think so at the moment. I believed that he was dead, as he did not move, did not even seem to breathe. And—and,”—she caught her breath, faint with the recollection:—“and his forehead: oh, that was a terrible sight, all mangled and swollen. I knelt by the body, panic-stricken, appalled by the horror of the discovery. I wonder—wonder that I did not—not lose my—my reason!” and, covering her face with her hands, she rocked to and fro, groaning.
“Why did you not give the alarm immediately. Call up Aileen and Jenny to send for help to the village?”
Edith lowered her hands and looked at him wonderingly. “You ask that when you know how I hated the man—how I longed to get rid of him and his hateful attentions? You fool, why should I have signed my death-warrant?” She got on to her feet, gesticulating and speaking rapidly. “I saw my danger in a flash, should I be caught, as it were, red-handed, and therefore dragged the body towards the wood. I wanted to hide it—to bury it—to do anything, so long as I could put away this evidence of my having committed a crime, which”—she drew herself up indignantly—“I did not commit.”
“I see your dilemma,” admitted Hustings, sensibly. “Well?”
“Well?” she echoed, angrily, “what else can I tell you?”
“What you did next.”
Edith passed a thin hand wearily across her forehead and did her best to recall the doings of that nightmare moment. “I tried to think how this dreadful thing had come to pass. I dragged the body in a frenzy across the lawn, anxious only to hide it. When I got it into the wood, to where Aileen found it next morning, I knelt down beside it again, hoping against hope that Slanton was not dead—that he had only fainted. I fancied that the twice-heard steps had been his, and that he had fainted when stepping on to the lawn.”
“Didn’t you notice the marks on his throat and guess that he had been strangled?” questioned Dick, believing all she had confessed so far.
“No! How could I in the dim moonlight, for the candle had gone out when I dropped it on the lawn at the horror of the discovery. I only noticed the swollen forehead, and wondered why it was swollen—the idea of tattooing never occurred to me. And hoping, as I say, that he might be alive, I shook him again and again. And”—her voice leaped an octave—“he was alive, opening his eyes to look up straightly into my face bending over him. And then—then—I—I ran away.”
“You—ran—away?” Hustings looked amazed, “But why, when, having revived, the man might have explained the whole business?”
“I was—frightened,” said the woman with a terrified glance round the cell, “yes—frightened out of what remaining wits I had. Just when he opened his eyes and—spoke”
“Spoke!” Dick was all ears and eyes, “did he really speak?”
“Yes! Yes! Yes! Don’t interrupt. I can’t remember everything at once,” she said peevishly. “Just when he spoke I thought that I heard cautious footsteps on the high road beyond the wall. I might have been mistaken—I don’t know—for in my then disturbed state of mind, I might have seen anything—heard anything—believed anything. Think, Mr. Hustings!” Edith gripped her listener by the arm, shaking from head to foot with sheer terror, “There was I, alone with my enemy in that dark wood: alone in the night with that dying beast. The night has a thousand eyes they say, and those eyes were all looking at me. I had no chance—I was spied upon—I was trapped. Oh, my God, how could you expect me to wait!” she dropped his arm and clutched her head frantically. “I couldn’t stay—I doubt if you could have stayed. I was crazy with fear, and tore back to the house, to drug myself into a stupor with opium. No! No!” she thrust out her hands to silence the eager questions on Hustings’s tongue, and shrank against the wall, against which the bed was placed. “I can say no more. Go! Go!”
“Just one thing,” implored Dick hurriedly, “what did Slanton say?”
“Only one word.”
“And that word?”
“Whispering!”
“Whispering! What does?” then, because Edith had exhausted her strength and was moaning, face downward on the pillow, he refrained from pressing the question. “Be calm and hopeful,” he said, touching her bowed head. “I believe in your innocence and will prove your innocence.”
She only moaned and trembled, so Dick moved hurriedly out of the cell, having given what sympathy and assurance he could to the unhappy creature. But he frowned thoughtfully when he found himself in the street. “Whispering” he muttered, “now what does ‘whispering’ mean?”