The Clue of the Silver Key - Edgar Wallace (read e book txt) 📗

Chapter Twenty

UNCONSCIOUS OF THE fact that she had been shadowed, Mary Lane reached her

objective. She was in a small paved courtyard which was made faintly

malodorous by the presence of an ash-can that had not been emptied for a

week.

 

She moved cautiously, finding her way forward step by step with the aid

of a tiny torch which she had taken from her handbag. At the end of the

courtyard was a small door, flanked on one side by a window.

 

For a little while she stood on the doorstep, listening. Her heart was

beating faster; she was curiously short of breath. Her early morning

resolution to abandon her ridiculous quest came back with a stronger

urge. It was absurd of her, and a little theatrical—she told herself—to

continue these excursions into a realm in which she had no place. Police

work was, in its most elementary phase, men’s work.

 

The quietness of the night, the sense of complete isolation, the gloom

and drabness which the falling rain seemed to emphasize, all these things

worked on her nerves.

 

She took from her bag the replica key that Surefoot had had cut for her

and, finding the keyhole, pushed in the key. The truth or futility of her

theory was to be put to the test.

 

For a moment, as she tried to turn the key, it seemed that she had made a

mistake, and she was almost grateful. And then, as she slightly altered

its position, she felt it turn and the lock snapped back with a loud

‘click!’.

 

She was trembling; her knees seemed suddenly incapable of supporting the

weight of her body; her breathing became painfully shallow. Here her

experiment should have ended, and she should have gone back the way she

came, but the spirit of adventure flickered up feebly and she pushed open

the door.

 

It opened without sound, and she peered into the dark interior fearfully.

Should she go in? Reason said ‘No!’ but reason might be womanly

cowardice—a fear of the dark and the bogies that haunt the dark. She

pushed the door open wider and went in one step. She flashed the torch

around and saw nothing.

 

Then out of the darkness came a sound that froze her blood—the whimpering

of a woman.

 

Her scalp tingled with terror; she thought she was going to faint. It

came from below her feet, and yet from somewhere immediately before her,

as though there were two distinct sounds. The beam of light she cast

ahead wobbled so that she could not see what it revealed. She steadied

her arm against the wall and saw what looked like a cupboard door. To

this she crept and listened.

 

Yes, the sound came from there and below. It was the entrance to a

cellar. She tried the cupboard door; it was locked.

 

And then there came to her an unaccountable fear, greater than any she

had experienced before—there was danger, near, very near; a menace beyond

her understanding. She turned and stood, petrified with horror. The door

was slowly closing. She leaped forward and caught its edge, but somebody

was pressing it, and that somebody was in the room, had been standing

behind the opened door all the time she had been there.

 

As she opened her lips to scream a big hand closed over her mouth,

another gripped her shoulder and jerked her back violently, as the door

closed with a crash.

 

‘Oh, Miss Lane, how could you?’

 

The mincing tone, the falsetto voice, the artificial refinement of it

were unmistakable. She had heard that voice at Kellner’s Hotel when she

had met Mr Washington Wirth. She struggled madly, but the man held her

without difficulty.

 

‘May I suggest, my dear young friend, that you keep quiet and save me

from the necessity of cutting your darling little throat?’

 

Behind the spurious courtesy of that hateful voice lay a threat,

horribly, significantly sincere. She knew him now: he would kill her with

as little compunction as he would slaughter a rabbit. It was not perhaps

expedient to carry out his threat immediately, and her only hope of

salvation lay with her wits. With a moan she went limp in his arms, and

he was so unprepared for this that he nearly dropped her and dropped with

her, for the sudden collapse almost threw him off his balance. Clumsily

he laid her down on the stone floor.

 

She heard his exclamation of anger and, after a while the jingle of keys.

He was unlocking the cupboard door.

 

Noiselessly she rose and felt for the door knob. It turned without a

sound, and in a second she had flung open the door and was racing across

the courtyard. He was too late to stop her, and she was in the deserted

side street before he recovered from his surprise. A few minutes later

she had reached a main road; ahead of her she saw two policemen, and her

first instinct was to fly to them and tell them of her adventure. She

hesitated; they would think she was mad, and besides—

 

‘Hullo, Miss Lane! You gave me a fright.’ It was the detective who had

been following her all the evening, and he did not hide his relief.

 

‘Where on earth did you get to? I’m Stenford from Scotland Yard. Mr Smith

told me that you knew I was trailing you.’ She could have fallen on his

neck in her gratitude—she was horrified to discover that she was

hysterical. She gasped her story; he listened, incredulous. ‘Have you got

the key?’ She shook her head: she had left it in the door.

 

‘I’ll take you home, Miss Lane, and then I’ll report to Mr Smith.’ He was

a young detective, full of zeal, and he had hardly left her at the door

of her flat before he was racing back to conduct a little investigation

on his own before reporting the sum of his discovery to Surefoot Smith.

 

Mary made herself a cup of tea and sat down to steady her nerves before

she went to bed. The flat seemed terribly lonely.

 

Odd noises, common to all houses, kept her jumping. She realized that she

would not sleep that night except in other and less nerve-wearying

surroundings, and was reaching for the telephone when its bell rang

sharply—so unexpectedly that she jumped.

 

It was the voice of Surefoot Smith, urgent and anxious. ‘That you, Miss

Lane? Listen—and get this quickly! Go to your front door and bolt it!

You’re not to open the door until I come—I’ll be with you in ten

minutes.’

 

‘But—’

 

‘Do as I tell you!’

 

She heard a click as he rang off. She was in a panic. Surefoot would not

have been so alarming unless her situation was a perilous one.

 

She went out into the hall. It was in darkness. She knew that she had

left a light burning. Acting on blind impulse, she darted back into the

room she had left, slammed the door and shot home a bolt. As she did so a

heavy weight was flung against the door, the weight of a man’s body.

There were no arms in the room—nothing more formidable than a pair of

scissors.

 

Crash!

 

The door shook; one of the panels bulged. She turned quickly and switched

out the light. ‘I have a revolver and I’ll fire if you don’t go away!’

she cried.

 

There was a silence. She flung up the window. She must be a good actress

or die. ‘Mr Smith! Is that you? Come up the fire escape!’ She screamed

the words.

 

Again the door crashed, and she had an inspiration. She took up the

telephone.

 

‘Get the police station—tell them a man named Moran is trying to break

into my room—Leo Moran—please remember the name in case anything

happens….’

 

She left the receiver off and crept to the door. Stealthy feet were

moving along the corridor; the sound became less audible and ceased.

 

Mary Lane sank down on to the floor and this time there was nothing

theatrical in her faint. It was the frantic knocking on the door and the

voice of Dick Allenby that brought her, reeling, to her feet. She drew

the bolt to admit him and the detective. She had hardly begun to tell her

story when she fainted again.

 

‘Better get a nurse,’ said Surefoot. ‘Phew! I never expected to find her

alive!’

 

An agitated Dick, engaged in bathing the white face of the girl, was not

even interested to ask