A Maker of History - E. Phillips Oppenheim (best books to read for students TXT) 📗

in place of these things, yet in his own mind these things were as if they had not been. Every interest and energy of his life was concentrated upon the one simple object of his search.

He gave the man half a crown, and walked to the lift whistling. The porter shook his head, and Duncombe receded considerably in his estimation, notwithstanding the tip. He considered Mademoiselle Flossie a little obvious for a gentleman of Duncombe's class. Duncombe treated himself to a cocktail and a cigarette as he changed his clothes. It was positively the first gleam of hope he had had. And then suddenly he remembered Spencer's warning, and he became grave.

He was at the Café Sylvain early. He ordered dinner, gave elaborate instructions about a young lady when she arrived, and with a glass of absinthe and another cigarette sat down to wait. At a quarter to eight he began to get restless. He summoned the waiter again, and gave a more detailed description of Mademoiselle Flossie. The waiter was regretful but positive. No young lady of any description had arrived expecting to meet a gentleman in a private room. Duncombe tried him with her name. But yes, Mademoiselle Mermillon was exceedingly well known there! He would give orders that she should be shown up immediately she arrived. It would be soon, without doubt.

At a quarter-past eight Duncombe dined alone, too disappointed to resent the waiter's sympathetic attitude. At nine o'clock he returned to the hotel on the chance that a message might have been sent there. He read the English newspapers, and wrote letters until midnight. Then he ordered a carriage and drove to the Café Montmartre.

He mounted the stairs and passed through the little bar which led into the supper-room. Monsieur Albert came forward with a low bow.

"You can find me a table, I suppose?" Duncombe remarked, looking round. "Where shall I sit?"

Monsieur Albert shook his head slowly. His hands were outstretched, his manner sad, but resigned.

"I am very sorry, Monsieur, but to-night every place is taken. I have had to turn others away already," he declared. "A thousand regrets."

Duncombe looked at him astonished. The place was more than half empty.

"Surely you can find me a small table somewhere," he said. "I was here last evening, you know. If it is because I am alone I will order supper for two and a magnum of wine."

Monsieur Albert was immovable. He remembered Duncombe well, and he was proud of his patronage, but to-night it was impossible to offer him a table. Duncombe began to be annoyed.

"Very well," he said, "I will stay in the bar. You can't turn me out of there, can you?"

Monsieur Albert was evasive. He desired Monsieur Duncombe to be amused, and the people who remained in the bar—well, it was not possible to get rid of them, but they were not fitting company for him.

"There is the Café Mazarin," he added confidentially, "a few steps only from here—a most amusing place. The most wonderful ladies there, too, very chic, and crowded every night! Monsieur should really try it. The commissionaire would direct him—a few yards only."

"Much obliged to you," Duncombe answered, turning on his heel. "I may look in there presently."

He seated himself at a small round table and ordered a drink. The people here were of a slightly different class from those who had the entrée to the supper-room and were mostly crowded round the bar itself. At a small desk within a few feet of him a middle-aged woman with a cold, hard face sat with a book of account before her and a pile of bills. There was something almost Sphynx-like about her appearance. She never spoke. Her expression never changed. Once their eyes met. She looked at him steadfastly, but said nothing. The girl behind the bar also took note of him. She was very tall and slim, absolutely colorless, and with coils of fair hair drawn tightly back from her forehead. She was never without a cigarette, lighting a fresh one always from its predecessor, talking all the while unceasingly, but without the slightest change of expression. Once she waved the men and girls who stood talking to her on one side, and Duncombe fancied that it was because she desired a better view of him.

Suddenly he was startled by a voice close at hand. He looked up. The woman at the desk was speaking to him.

"Monsieur would be well advised," she said, "if he departed."

Duncombe looked at her in amazement. She was writing rapidly in her book, and her eyes were fixed upon her work. If he had not actually heard her, it would have been hard to believe that she had spoken.

"But why, Madame?" he asked. "Why should I go? I am in no one's way. I can pay for what I have."

She dipped her pen in the ink.

"I know nothing of Monsieur or his business," she said, still without even glancing towards him, "but I know that Monsieur Albert does not wish him to remain."

"The devil take Monsieur Albert!" Duncombe answered angrily. "I am waiting to speak to some one who comes here regularly, and I shall stay until she comes."

The woman wrote steadily for a moment. Then she blotted the page on which she had been writing, and raising her head, looked at him.

"It is no affair of mine," she said, "but Monsieur Albert has sent for the police. They may say that you have had too much wine, or that you owe money. In either case you will be removed. The police will not listen to you. Monsieur Albert has special discretion. It is no affair of mine," she repeated, "but if I were Monsieur I would go."

Duncombe rose slowly to his feet, and summoning a waiter paid his bill. The man produced a second one, dated a few days back, for a large amount.

"What is the meaning of this?" he asked. "I do not owe you anything."

"Monsieur was here with a party last Thursday night," he said glibly. "He promised to pay the next time. I will call the manager."

Duncombe tore the bill in half and turned away. He bowed to the lady at the desk.

"I see that you were right," he said. "I will leave."

"Monsieur is wise," she answered without looking up.

He left the café without speaking to any one further. When he reached the pavement he slipped a five-franc piece into the hand of the tall commissionaire.

"You know most of the young ladies who come here, I suppose?" he asked.

"But certainly!" the man answered with a smile, "Monsieur desires?"

"I want the address of a young lady named Mermillon—Flossie, I think they call her," Duncombe said.

"Thirty-one, Rue Pigalle," the man answered promptly. "But she should be here within an hour. She never misses."

Duncombe thanked him, and hailed a carriage.

"Shall I give Mademoiselle any message?" the man asked confidentially.

"I am going to call for her," Duncombe answered. "If I do not find her I will return."

To drive to the Rue Pigalle was an affair of five minutes only. Duncombe climbed a couple of flights of narrow stairs, pushed open a swing gate, and found himself in front of an office, in which an elderly woman sat reading.

"Can you tell me where to find Mademoiselle Mermillon?" Duncombe asked.

"Next floor; first door on the left," the woman answered. "Mademoiselle is not often in at this hour, though."

Duncombe thanked her, and climbed another flight of stairs. He had to strike a match to look for a bell or knocker, and then found neither. He knocked on the door with his knuckles. There was no reply. He was on the point of departure, when he noticed that the door was ajar. After a moment's hesitation he pushed it open.

He found himself in a narrow passage, with dresses and other articles of apparel hanging from a row of pegs on the wall. The place was in complete darkness. He struck another match. At the end of the passage was an inner door, also ajar. He rapped upon it, and finally pushed it open. Just then his match went out!

CHAPTER X SPENCER'S SURPRISE

Duncombe had the nerves and temperament of the young Englishman of his class, whose life is mostly spent out of doors, and who has been an athlete all his days. But nevertheless at that moment he was afraid. Something in the stillness of the room oppressed him. He could see nothing, hear nothing except the clock ticking upon the mantlepiece. And yet he was afraid.

He fumbled desperately in his pocket for his matchbox. When he had found it he discovered that it was empty. With a sense of positive relief he backed out of the room and hastily descended the stairs. The old lady was still in her sitting-room reading the paper. She set it down at his entrance, and looked at him over the top of her spectacles.

"Pardon, Madame," he said, removing his hat, "I find the rooms of Mademoiselle are open, but all is in darkness. I cannot make any one hear."

Madame took up her paper.

"Then Mademoiselle is probably out," she declared. "It is generally so at this hour. Monsieur can leave his name."

"But the doors are all open!" Duncombe said.

"I go presently and close them," Madame answered. "The careless hussy!"

Duncombe produced a small piece of gold. Madame laid down the paper at once. She looked at it as though ready to snatch it from his hand.

"Madame would oblige me very much if she would ascend with me at once," Duncombe said. "I should like to make quite sure whether the young lady is there or not."

Madame was on her feet with remarkable celerity. She accepted the coin and carefully placed it in a purse drawn from somewhere amongst the folds of her voluminous skirts.

"We shall need a candle," Duncombe reminded her.

She lit a lamp, talking all the while.

"Monsieur is very generous," she declared. "Mademoiselle Flossie is a charming young lady. No wonder she has many friends. There was one," she continued, "who came here with her this afternoon—but he left almost at once," she added hastily, aware of her indiscretion. "Ah, these stairs! They grow steeper for one so corpulent. At last!"

She pushed open the door and went sideways down the narrow passage. Directly they had entered it they had a view of the room beyond. Madame cried out, and Duncombe felt all his vague fears spring into a terrified apprehension of actual evil.

The curtain before the window had been hastily drawn, but the lamp which the portress carried was sufficient feebly to illuminate the room. The table-cloth and a broken vase lay upon the floor. A few feet off was an overturned chair. Upon the canopied bed lay a prostrate figure, the head thrown back at an unnatural angle, the eyes open but glazed. Duncombe dared do no more than cast one single horrified glance at it. Madame set down the lamp upon the table, and made the room hideous with shrieks.

"Good God!" she cried. "It is the little one who is dead!"

Duncombe himself fetched in the gendarmes, and waited whilst they took voluminous notes of the occurrence. The murder seemed to them and to Madame to be one of a very common class. The assassin had left no clue whatever behind him. The poor girl's rings had been torn from her fingers, her little stock of jewellery ransacked, her purse was empty, everything of value had been taken. There was not a shred of evidence against any one. Madame, who had seen the man upon the stairs, could only say that he was short, and wore a black felt hat. The officer who took down what they had to say shrugged his shoulders as he replaced the book in his pocket. The affair would pass most certainly, he feared, into the long list of undiscoverable