The Attic Murder

by Sydney Fowler

C. & J. Temple
1946

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This is a work of fiction, and all characters in the book are drawn from the author's imagination. If any names or titles belonging to living persons have been used, this has been done inadvertently and no reference to such person or persons is intended.

CHAPTER I

I'M afraid I can't give you references. I'm a stranger to London. Perhaps I'd better pay a week in advance?" His hand went boldly to his empty pocket. It was time he wanted - time at whatever cost. He could hear the police-whistles outside.

        The old woman looked at him doubtfully. She had asked forty-five shillings, and would have taken half the amount.

        "Have you got any luggage, Mr. - - " she began.

        "Edwards," he answered. "Henry Edwards. . . . Yes. I shall bring my luggage this evening. Perhaps you could let me have some tea now, and a wash?"

        He did not develop his proposal to pay in advance, and the old woman did not press it. He had a face and manner that inspired confidence. Had not Counsel for the Crown turned even this circumstance against him, and had not the soft-tongued Judge, with his tone of measured impartiality, supported the argument with a deadlier ingenuity? "You may regard the younger prisoner," he had said, "as having been under the influence of his more hardened companion. The impression which he will have made upon you while in the witness-box may not have been entirely unfavourable, even though, as men of the world - as men of common sense - you may observe the improbabilities of the tale he told you. But, if you are satisfied of his guilt, you must not allow such an impression to deflect your judgement, nor to cause you to forget the oaths you have taken. It is inevitable that men engaged in such crimes as that of which the prisoners are accused should be of sufficient address and plausibility to draw their intended victims into their clutches. The question of the prisoners' previous records (so far as they can be properly weighed against this class of criminality) will receive due and separate considerations, should you decide that their guilt is proved."

        He had gone on to impress the jury with the gravity of the crime of which the confidence trickster is guilty, its increasing prevalence, and the reluctance of its victims to prosecute. All of which was true enough, but utterly irrelevant to the question of his guilt or innocence, and could only dispose the jury to convict him without too scrupulous weighing of the defence he had offered.

        After hearing the summing-up, he had had no doubt of what that verdict would be. His most active resentment had been against the tone in which he had been told to stand up to hear the judgement delivered. Tony Welch had had five years. Well, he supposed he deserved it. And for him there had been fifteen months in the second division.

        Before that, he had been asked whether he had any reason to offer why sentence should not be passed upon him. He knew that it was nothing more than a mockery of formula, but he had looked at the jury as he answered: "It only shows how useless it is to tell the truth," and he had seen one of them drop his eyes uncomfortably.

        That had been an hour ago. Barely that. And then he had been hurried from the dock, and there had been a moment's confusion when the Inspector had knocked over the carafe in the room below, and - he had walked out. It had been as simple as that.

        It must have been observed in five seconds, and his liberty would have been of the briefest, had he not noticed the street door standing unlatched, and the card APARTMENTS in the window, as he had turned the corner at a quick walk, which did not dare to seem hurried - and, at the moment's impulse, he had stepped inside and closed it.

        No one had noticed. The street had been too full, and too busy.

        He had stood in the little hall, after closing the door, and knocked on the table there, till the landlady had come up from the basement. "I couldn't make your bell ring, and the door was open," he had said pleasantly, and she had accepted his explanation without suspicion.

        Half an hour later, he sat eating a stale egg, and drinking some ill-brewed tea, while he reviewed his position.

        After all, it was largely his own fault, even apart from the impulsive folly which had involved him with August Garten, and made him so maddeningly easy a catspaw in a game which he did not guess. He could, perhaps, have defended himself more easily had he given his own name, and enabled the police to establish an identity which would have made it at least improbable that he had been more than a recent and casual acquaintance of the major criminal. But the thought of Marian! His sister-in-law's outraged respectability, and his brother's jeers - no, he had been right to conceal it, at whatever cost.

        But, that having been so, why should he not now go boldly back to his own identity? He considered the possibility only to discard it. There was the time of his absence, which would coincide so exactly with that during which he had been awaiting trial - above all, there were the fingerprints. What a fool he had been to allow them to be taken! But it had been done so suavely, and it was true that its first result had been to show that he was innocent of any previous charge.

        It had seemed best not to object at the time - and now he had rendered his identification absolute and undeniable so long as his life should last, unless his hands should be lopped away. It was as though he walked the world with an indelible brand. . . . And he would always be a convicted criminal: always liable to be arrested and subjected to the unserved sentence: always liable to the blackmailing activities of any who should discover his identity.

        Was there no way out? There were three, two of which he was unwilling to face, and the third was a forlorn hope at the best.

        There was suicide. Always that. But to those who are young and healthy of mind it is a way that does not appeal: to those who have courage it is the way of cowardice and shame. He dismissed it at once. A theoretical road of escape, but one which he knew he would never take.

        There was the way of submission. He might surrender himself to the blind omnipotence of the law, serve the sentence imposed, and return to his own identity with some invented excuse for his silent absence; and with at least something less to fear from exposure or blackmail than must be his lot while he continued to evade the penalty his conviction brought.

        But he saw this also as an impossible choice. If he should be recaptured, he must submit to a power against which he had no strength to contend; but to do so by his own choice was beyond any resolution that he possessed. He had experienced too much already of the physical indignities, the degradations of enforced routines, which have substituted a spiritual persecution for the cruelties of neglect and dirt which were the prison horrors of a previous century. Beyond that, he had a natural, if somewhat illogical feeling that to make such a surrender would be to accept the judgement of the court, as though he himself admitted guilt, and accepted the sentence which an impartial justice had imposed upon him.

        The third road of escape was of a less sinister but more difficult character. He must obtain such evidence as would demonstrate his own innocence, and enable him to gain remission of the penalty. He knew too little of law to understand what obstacles of procedure there might be for one in such a position, already condemned, and avoiding the infliction of the allotted punishment; nor did his mind go so far ahead as to concern itself with such possibilities. The first part of such a programme presented sufficient difficulties for immediate consideration.

        And - more urgent still - if he were to endeavour to obtain evidence that he were not the accomplice of organized fraud which twelve of his fellow citizens had declared him to be, he must consider how his immediate necessities could be supplied, and either this or another hiding-place be rendered permanently secure.

        For the short moment he might be safe. Probably no one had seen him enter the house; and its proximity to the court would make it an unlikely place for the police to suspect. But there was no lasting comfort in this, when he considered the emptiness of his pockets, and that the luggage of which he had spoken would not arrive.

        He had a well-founded fear that the police, being human, would give an amount of attention to such an escape disproportionate to any importance it might have to impartial eyes. It was certain that the assistance of the press would be invoked: that his description would be promptly circulated with the full and accurate details that the police cords would supply.

        He had, of course, worn his own clothes in the dock. He was not embarrassed by prison garb. But there was little comfort in that while they could describe not only his appearance in every detail, but every garment that he had on. And he saw that, if he should go out after the next edition of evening papers had reached the street, not the police only, but every man he met would be his potential foe.

        In imagination, he ran from pursuing crowds: he heard police whistles rousing those ahead to obstruct his way: he jumped walls: he trod deeply in garden dirt: he was horribly cornered in cul-de-sacs: he crouched in corners, hearing voices that became louder with the sound of approaching feet.

        And to avoid such ends he must think - think and plan - in the short hours of security that were his, while the search spread past him, and outward on every side. As he got up from the table, and moved to a fireside chair, leaving a well-cleared tray - for what certainty was there as to where or when his next meal would be? - he even had a faint transient smile for that abortive search on which he rightly guessed that so much energy was being wasted, while he had been taking a quiet meal almost within sight of the door out of which he walked.

CHAPTER II

AS Francis Hammerton reflected thus, Mrs. Benson came in to clear.

        He knew her name already from inspection of a business card that occupied a prominent position among the heterogeneous mantelpiece ornaments, and as he now parried questions to which accurate replies would have been of too startling a character, and assured himself with some difficulty that they were prompted by nothing more than a natural curiosity, he looked, with concealed anxiety, at the woman who might hold his fate in her hands in the next hour.

        He supposed that she would be likely to indulge herself with an evening paper. It was less probable that she would go out to buy it. It would be pushed under her door. That might be any time now. Or she might prefer to have the final edition, two - even three hours later than this.

        If she should have it earlier, it might not be read till she had finished her washing up, and got other evening tasks off her mind. But, sooner or later, she would be certain to pick it up. Very soon she would see that headline: PRISONER ESCAPED FROM - - . It was the kind of thing she would be certain to read. The financial news - the semi-final at Bolton - the trouble in Abyssinia - any of these she might be very likely to miss. But the escape of a prisoner in the next street! No, she would not overlook that.

        Equally certain was it that she would guess who her new lodger was most likely to be. She would remember how he had let himself into the hall. She would calculate the time of his arrival, comparing it with that at which Harold Vaughan had escaped. She would read his description, and recognize some convincing detail.

        Probably she might make excuse to come up, and refresh her memory, after which she would go or send to the police.

        Should he give her time to do that? No, at the first sign of suspicion, he must make a quick bolt from the house. His over-excited imagination saw her obstructing him, attempting to hold him till the police should arrive. He struck at her clutching hands. He pushed her roughly away. She fell, and her head struck that sharp edge at the base of the table-leg, showing under the untidy table-cloth that drooped too far on this side. She lay still. He broke from the house, perhaps a hunted murderer now. She had to repeat her question of whether he would like macaroni for his evening meal, with a nice bit of plum-tart she had over from the midday dinner, before he heard it. . . .

        He decided that she might not be a bad woman with whom to deal - almost certainly of a harmless type in normal circumstances but that if she guessed who he was she might betray him for half-a-crown.

        Yet, was betrayal a fair word? He had come to her with a false name and a lying tale, and had bluffed her with a gesture of offering money he did not possess. And the crime of which he had been convicted was not of a pleasant kind. . . . No, he could not blame her should she decide that inclination and duty pointed in the same direction.

        Then should he leave at once, before suspicion could be aroused? He debated this, after she had withdrawn from the room, and it appeared in no better light.

        He would be penniless, shelterless with the knowledge that every policeman he passed would be looking, with a sharp eye, for just such a one as himself; and that to apply for a lodging anywhere within walking distance would be to invite suspicion of who he was. And with no money - no luggage - what possible resort could he have that would avoid starvation, and would not lead to instant arrest?

        Pondering thus, he resolved that the risks of the open street could not be less than those of the precarious shelter that he had found, and from this decision he saw further that he might have a better chance if he should himself reveal his identity, rather than to leave it to the almost certain discovery of the next hours.

        By doing so, he could at least assert his innocence; could tell his tale, perhaps, so that it would rouse the sympathy of his auditor, and avoid the prejudice that his deception would naturally excite, should she learn of it by other means.

        Deciding this, he had to consider what proposal he could make for discharging the cost of his lodging.

        If he could win the woman's sympathy, he might remain there in almost absolute security, so long as he should not venture outside the door. And after a time he might walk boldly out, at least in the darker hours, trusting that the keenness of the first search would have relaxed, and that wherever it might be pursued, it would not be most active around the place of his conviction, with the immediate vicinity of which he had had no other connection, and to which it might seem particularly improbable that he would return.

        But to remain in hiding thus would give him little opportunity of engaging in any occupation of a remunerative character. He could not hope for a sympathetic hearing if he should add to the fact that he was a convict dodging arrest a proposal that he should be fed and boarded free for an indefinite period, or until he should be recaptured by the police, and disappear for that which his sentence required.

        This consideration naturally turned his thoughts to the I money that was his, in his true name, and which he could obtain tomorrow by the simple process of cashing a cheque, if he should be prepared to face the risk of a walk through the streets, or of boarding a 'bus in the daylight hours, and of entering the bank, where he would be known, with the vague improbable risk that the police would have ascertained that Harold Vaughan and Francis Hammerton were the same, and be on the watch for him to enter so well-baited a trap.

        He was not sure how he would attempt to reach it, but it was the thought of that available money that gave him courage for the present purpose he had in mind. He would tell the woman just how he was placed: would admit that he had lied about his luggage and other things. But he would add that he could get funds from his bank in the morning, and that he would then pay her in advance as he had first proposed; and she might well prefer, even if her sympathies remained unstirred, to take the money of so quietly-disposed a lodger, rather than have the barren satisfaction of turning him out.

        Anyway, it could be tried, on the proverbial argument that a poor chance is better than none at all. . . . If he should be dissatisfied with her response, he would walk out at once to the street where already the twilight fell. . . . He need not delay to pack!

        With these thoughts, being of a nature to challenge fate rather than dodge its blows, he went out to the hall and descended the basement stairs, down which he had heard Mrs. Benson's steps recede after she had cleared his table.

        He was guided by the sound of a woman's voice along an ill-lighted passage to the door of her private retreat, and was about to knock when he was deterred by the words which he could clearly hear.

CHAPTER III

FRANCIS HAMMERTON, if we are to think of him by his true name, had not considered the probability that Mrs. Benson might not be the sole occupant of the house, his mind having been concentrated upon aspects of his position which threatened more definite hazards.

        Actually, the woman whose voice he heard was a next-door neighbour, Miss Janet Brown, who had looked in with no further purpose than to return a borrowed flat-iron. But it happened that she was already informed of the exciting incident of the afternoon, and when Mrs. Benson detained her for a cup of the tea which could be cheaply obtained by adding fresh water to the leaves in the lodger's teapot, and naturally mentioned the good fortune which had walked in less than two hours before Janet was quick to see the connection between the events.

        "Edwards?" she asked scornfully. "You call him Mr. Vaughan next time you go up, and see how he'll jump, or else answer his name without noticing how he's giving himself away which would be just as good proof."

        "I don't think I shall try that," Mrs. Benson answered doubtfully. She was sensibly trembling between the disappointment at the prospective loss of a most promising lodger, and vaguer fear of what so cunning and unscrupulous a character might be doing among the dowdy dining-room furniture. "I suppose," she concluded, "I'd better let the police know."

        Miss Brown, a fair-haired angular woman, who showed her half Scottish ancestry only in her bony figure, and the practical shrewdness with which she faced a difficult world, considered this proposition, and pronounced against it.

        "There'll be a reward offered, if you wait, more like than not. It might be a hundred pounds! You'll be a fool if you let them know before that. Keep him close, I say, till you see how the cat jumps."

        Mrs. Benson wavered miserably between the prospect of such wealth, and the shadow of a great fear. She was a woman who prided herself upon her respectability, which meant, among other things, that she came of a family who had no dealings with the police.

        Even for a criminal to be arrested beneath her roof would tend to taint her with the stigma of an undesired and undesirable notoriety. It was not at all the kind of thing which her deceased parents would have approved. It might not be quite so disgraceful as being behind with the rent (which had actually happened three years ago, though, by the combined mercies of Heaven and Mr. Clay, it was known to none but herself and the landlord's agent), but it was not the kind of thing that should occur in the house of a woman whose uncle was a builder's merchant, and whose brother-in-law had once sat on a Rural District Council.

        But, far worse than that, suppose that, by not giving information at once, she should "get in trouble" with the

        "I don't know," she said, "what I ought to do. Not rightly. He might clear off before then."

        The last sentence was spoken in a tone between hope and fear. Had she heard the front door bang at that moment, her first sensation might have been relief, rather than regret for a lodger lost, or the romantic shadow of reward faded away.

        But Miss Brown put the suggestion aside. "Not he," she said. "If you don't let him see you suspect. He'll be lying too snug for that. . . . You'll find he won't stir out of the door, more likely than not. . . . You can just wait till the reward comes out, and walk round the corner to pick it up."

        "Suppose they say I ought to have told them before?"

        "Told them what? Your lodger's a different name, isn't he? How can you tell that as you don't know? Even then, you won't do more than a guess.

        "You don't read the papers much. You're too busy for that, with all our lodgers to feed, and to wash and mend, and the house cleaning from attic down. . . . But you see the bills. £100 REWARD! Anyone'd stop to read them. - And you go straight round on the chance."

        Francis Hammerton, having heard the most part of this conversation, or at least Janet's part in it, for Mrs. Benson had a voice of less penetrating quality, did not wait to hear more.

        He had heard sufficient to conclude that he would not be immediately denounced, and to see that he would increase his peril by confessing an identity already guessed. Janet's last statement led him to conclude that there were most probably other lodgers in the house, and he saw that this must increase the risk of discovery while he remained listening at Mrs. Benson's door.

        Even in a less compromising position, he would have had no inclination to make himself known to the other occupants of the house, or to give occasion for his presence to be narrated to them. He went back while he safely could.

CHAPTER IV

WITH some trepidation, only partially controlled, Mrs. Benson brought up the supper.

        It was a condition of which her lodger might have been less observant had he not already heard the suspicions which had been suggested to her. He had resolved that he would say nothing to confirm them, but rather aim to confuse her with a doubt as to whether her neighbour's accusation might be no more than a baseless guess, and he was therefore careful to give no sign of observing her agitation. He talked in a casual manner of trivial indifferent things, as one who had the leisure of an unoccupied mind.

        The evening had turned wet as the dusk fell, and now the rattling of the ill-fitting window-frame, and the beat of heavy rain on the glass, gave him a good excuse as he said: "I don't think I'll go out to fetch my luggage tonight, Mrs. Benson, if you don't mind. . . . I shall have to go to the bank in the morning, and I can do everything at the same time. . . . I daresay I can manage somehow till then. . . . And I'll settle up tomorrow for the first week We're strangers to one another as yet, so I'd rather have it that way, though I hope you'll get to know me better before long."

        Mrs. Benson was flutteringly acquiescent in her replies. "Yes, sir. It's for you to say, sir. . . . Yes, sir. I hope you will. If there's anything that I could do. Would you like the paper, sir, if as how you'll be sitting quiet? There's no one else coming in tonight till the last thing. . . . Yes, sir, thank you. I wouldn't ask, but the truth is I've been doing that bad since Mr. Michaelson left. . . . But I'll bring it up if you'll be wanting something to read."

        The last offer, which had had its birth in Janet Brown's livelier brain, was brought out, and repeated, in nervous haste, like a lesson learned. But Mr. Edwards still appeared to notice nothing strange in his landlady's manners or speech. He said pleasantly that he should like to see it, if it wouldn't be robbing her. And when she came up, half an hour later, to clear the table, and bringing the final edition of the Evening News, he restrained the half-fearful desire he had to see the published account of his trial and subsequent escape, turning to the sporting page in a desultory manner, until the table was cleared, and she had left the room.

        The report itself was not long, the detailed interest of the case having been the news of the previous day, when the evidence had been heard. It consisted mainly of a skilfully condensed summary of the Judge's address to the jury, the time during which they had been absent from court, and other similar details with which he was already too familiar to give them more than one swift comprehending glance, which went on to where, in bolder type, was the news of his own escape.

        It gave him a thrill of exaltation, overcoming for one brief moment the misery that possessed his mind, to realize the extent and energy of the futile search which was being made while he remained within two hundred yards of the head-quarters of the baffled power of the law.

        But the feeling changed to a greater depression with realization of the desperation of his position, as he went on to read the accurate description of himself which the police had been prompt to communicate to the Press.

        He saw a portrait also, which might have been more exact had the artist not thought it necessary to give him a cunningly ingratiating expression, less natural to himself than to the character which the jury's verdict had fixed upon him.

        But for that overheard conversation, he would have walked out at once, trusting to darkness and rain, and regardless of all beside under the urgent fear that the hunted have. As it was, he wondered with what object the newspaper had been brought. If it had been meant as a test, he thought that his demeanour must have puzzled the woman, though, with that detailed description to support suspicion already formed, it could hardly have had a more negative result.

        Was it possible that it had been brought up in simplicity and goodwill, without previous reading of the exposure which it contained? Remembering what he had heard, he put the idea aside. The improbability was too great.

        But the issue of all his doubts was to resolve that it would be a less risk to remain in his present quarters till morning came than to wander penniless in the rain through the midnight hours.

        He went up to a better bed than the jail authorities would have provided, with little expectation that sleep would be quick to come, and was conscious of nothing more till he saw the light of the winter dawn invading a dingy room.

CHAPTER V

IT must be eight o'clock by the growing light. It was time to rise. But there was no instant hurry for that. Let him think first. He might have been commencing his first day as a convict now, with no option as to the hour when he must leave his bed!

        That was something gained, though there might be penalties in the opposite scale when he should be caught, which he recognized, in the clear light of thought that the morning gives, to be the most probable end.

        But meanwhile there was a precarious haven, even in the shabbiness of this unwashed room, where he could lie for the time he would. . . . Perhaps only till there should come the sound of heavy feet on the stairs, and he would be ignominiously conducted back to the servitude he had sought to dodge. . . . There was such a foot on the stair now.

        But it was going down, not up. It receded, and there was silence again. Was he a fool to stay longer here? Would it not be well to have breakfast and go while he still could? In the open street he would be less easy to catch.

        He considered, for the first time, that his recent associates would have read the tale of his escape, and might anticipate that he would be coming to them for help. He was not sure what reception he would get, but he saw danger in the attempt, for it was in that direction that the police would be most alert, and the meshes of the net would be very small. It was exactly there that he must not go. Perhaps his best chance of escape lay in the fact that he was not really one of the gang, and that he had resources in a direction which he still felt some confidence that the police did not suspect. . . .

        Yet, if he were to keep distant from those resorts, how did he suppose that he could obtain evidence through which his own innocence could be proved? . . . August Garten would know that he had got free. He would have liked to see her again. To have reproached her with all the bitterness of the love abused that had brought him here. To see the shame - or would it be ridicule? - in her eyes. But not to ask help from her. Never that.

        Yet money he must have, without which, or the help of friends, he saw that his chance of prolonged freedom was small indeed. It must be got from his own bank, and it would be best to walk in there without having the appearance of a man who had spent the night on the streets. . . . A razor he must certainly get. . . . Unless, of course, he should prefer to disguise himself with a growth of beard. That might be a good idea, but it was a form of camouflage which required time to bring it to perfect flower. He supposed that a two or three days' growth would attract notice rather than cause him to be overlooked, and though he was vague in guessing how long a respectable beard would take to grow, or how soon a reward for an escaped prisoner might be announced, he had a sound suspicion that the second period might be the shorter.

        But a razor was not an article which Mrs. Benson would be likely to have in readiness to lend at her lodgers' needs, nor was it likely that she would consent to borrow it for him from the room of the overhead lodger whose step he had heard as he left the house.

        He was half dressed by this time, and opened his door on to a small square of landing from which narrow stairs descended to the ground floor, and others, narrower still, mounted to attic rooms.

        There was no sound. Probably Mrs. Benson was in the basement. There might be no others in the house. It could be done at a small risk. If he were challenged, he would tell the truth. He sought to borrow a razor which he unfortunately lacked till his luggage should have arrived. Very quietly, he mounted the stairs.

        He came to an uncarpeted landing, which had a closed door upon either side. It was lit by a skylight in the sloping roof, the lowness of which suggested that the rooms could not be let to any but impecunious tenants. Doubtless, the one was occupied by the man whose heavy descending step he had heard, and the other, most probably, by Mrs. Benson herself. If so, it was unlikely that he would be disturbed, for the woman would not be in her bedroom during the breakfast hour.

        With nothing but chance to direct his choice, he approached the left-hand door, and knocked. As he had expected, there was no reply, and he turned the handle boldly, to discover that he was faced by a locked door.

        The next moment, he heard a girl's voice: "Is that you, Mrs. Benson?"

        The voice had a timid uncertain sound, and he stood for a moment in hesitation as to whether he should reply, and, while he did so, she spoke again "It's no use waiting here. I shan't be up for hours yet. I thought you'd gone." And then, in a firmer tone: "It's no use waiting, I tell you. You d better go. I shan't unlock the door till Mrs. Benson comes up."

        The words gave him a simple clue. It was evident that he was supposed to be the occupant of the opposite room. If so, what more natural than that he should return to it after this rebuff? What more satisfactory than to know that the other would remain locked until he should be heard to descend, apart from the unlikely chance that the landlady would promptly appear?

        Treading loudly now on the bare boards, he took the two strides that the narrow landing required, and had the satisfaction of opening an unlocked door, and looking round on an empty room.

        It was low-ceiled, as he had expected to see, and lighted only by a dormer window, but its appearance was surprising in other ways. It was evident, even to his first hurried glance, that, though the furnishing of the room was of the kind which might have been anticipated by one who had become familiar with the lower parts of the house, it contained the possessions of a man who did not dress or live in a mean way. Even the quality of the cabin-trunk, which was too large to be pushed close to the low wall of the slant-roofed attic, and must have been difficult to get up the narrow twisting stairs, was incongruous to the setting in which it stood.

        But it was an incongruity of which Francis Hammerton was only subconsciously aware, having more urgent interests to engage his mind. He saw a shaving-glass on the wall, and, beneath it, the safety-razor he sought. A minute later, he was back in his own room, not without a feeling of satisfaction in the success of this minor operation of the criminal character which had been thrust upon him. But there was a new doubt now in his mind of whether he should venture upstairs again to return the borrowed article as soon as he had finished its present use, or trust to the chance of a later hour, or the probability that he would have left the house before discovery of that petty pilfering would be made.

        Finally, he decided to return it at once, which he did apparently without observation, and went down to the room in which he had had his meals during the previous day, his mind being now made up that he would leave the house as soon as he had eaten the breakfast which his empty pockets could procure in no other place.

        To call at his own bank might be hazardous, but it was a risk he could not avoid, and, if it were to be done at all, it could not be tried too soon.

        He saw that, in view of the suspicion with which he was regarded by his landlady, and the plan he had overheard, he must walk out in such a way that she would not doubt that he would return. He must either leave his bill permanently unpaid, or incur the risk of a subsequent communication, with the probability that he might be arrested in the meantime, in which case he could not tell what facilities would be permitted him for discharging the debt.

        He saw, as he thought of this, and of the lies he had told already, and of the purpose that had taken him to the attic rooms, how hard it may be for one who has been labelled criminal by the law to avoid the character which is placed upon him. Whatever he be at first, he may be forced to the incidence of a life of crime. . . . His mind returned to more practical considerations as he entered the room, and perceived that breakfast was laid for two.

        His step, being audible to Mrs. Benson in her basement room, was sufficient signal to bring her up with a pot of tea, more or less fresh, and a plate of quite decent bacon, which she laid on the table with a remark that Miss Jones ought to have been down before this. She supposed that she must have overslept.

        Francis recalled the conversation by which he had secured asylum on the previous afternoon, and recognized that he had not been promised exclusive occupation of the room. It had been assumed by him, rather than said by her, and his position had not been favourable to a critical examination of the nature of the lodging, with partial board, for which Mrs. Benson had quoted. But he saw that if he were expected to take his breakfast (included in the quoted figure), or other meals (which would be extras), under the observation of others who would be able to compare him at close quarters with the descriptions which the morning newspapers would supply, it was an additional reason why his departure should not delay.

        With these thoughts at the back of his mind, he answered Mrs. Benson's remark as casually as it had been made: "Perhaps she won't be long. I'm afraid I'm rather late myself."

        He glanced at a massive mantelpiece clock, the hands of which pointed to twenty minutes to nine. Her eyes followed his, and she said: "You mustn't go by that. It's half an hour slow, if not more."

        She pulled a chair up to the table for him, and he sat down as he replied: "It doesn't really matter to me. I don't think the bank opens before ten."

        "I'd better see if Miss Jones is up now," Mrs. Benson replied, inconsequently, with a note of irritation in her voice. It was an hour at which she expected to have her breakfasts cleared away, and her washing-up done.

        He saw that a newspaper lay on the table with an appearance of not having been opened. "I suppose that is Miss Jones' paper?" he asked, as the woman was about to withdraw. If it were one that was free to the lodgers generally, he would much prefer to have it in his own hands before the lady's arrival. Probably it would have another of those infernal portraits! But he doubted that Mrs. Benson would make such provision for her guests.

        "No, sir. That's Mr. Rabone's, but he doesn't look at it, more mornings than not."

        "And I suppose he's another one who's rather late this morning?"

        "No, sir. He's gone before now. He always leaves before this." She went out as she replied, and he heard her ascending the creaking stairs.

        He picked up the paper, but did not turn to the account of his own conviction, or subsequent escape. He had seen enough in the Evening News concerning a matter on which he knew more than he was likely to read. Nor did he need to be informed that the criminal was still "at large", as it would be certain to state. It would be better that Miss Jones, if she were of an observant disposition, should see him reading the sporting news, or studying the exchanges of the previous day.

        Supposing it to be the etiquette of the table that each lodger should settle to his own meal without reference to other comers, he commenced his breakfast, observing, as he did so, that he sat facing a window the side-curtains of which did not exclude the observation of those who passed in the street, though, the room being on a slightly higher level, it might be no more than his head which would be visible to anyone of average height. Suppose that a policeman, strolling along, and occupied only in observation of the potential criminals on his beat - - The fact that the rain was descending steadily made such leisurely observation unlikely, but offered another trouble to his harassed mind. He had neither umbrella nor other covering from the weather. He neither desired to be soaked, nor to enter the bank with the appearance of a half-drowned fowl.

        It was possible that Mr. Rabone had left a spare overcoat in his room, but there was little doubt as to what Mrs. Benson's reaction would be if she should meet her new lodger on the stairs with such a garment upon him. . . . It seemed that it would be necessary to wait for the rain to cease.

        He was still considering this problem when Miss Jones entered the room.

CHAPTER VI

HIS eyes met those of a girl who was young, slim, dark, and of so self-possessed a manner that he had a moment's doubt of whether it could be she whose voice he had heard through the attic door.

        But when she spoke he recognized it as the same, though it was without any trace of the timidity which he had noticed before.

        "Mrs. Benson told me that she had a new guest. I must introduce myself. I am Mary Jones."

        "It is pleasant to have company," he answered, with more sincerity than he had expected to feel. "I thought I should be alone. My name is - - " There was a second's hesitation as his thought paused for the selection of the right lie, the instinct to give his true name being confused between the two others that he had subsequently assumed; but he did not think it to be observed, her interruption came so quickly: "Oh, yes. Mrs. Benson told me your name."

        Mr. Edwards, as he concluded that he had become to her, having risen to draw out the lady's chair, which was at the side of the table facing the door, at right angles to his own, sat down again, sensible of the attractions of his breakfast companion, but most conscious of the need for that constant watchfulness which is common to most creatures which live in lasting peril of death should their wits relax, but from which civilized man, and some of his domesticated companions, have become normally free. Beneath this instinct there was another, subconsciously strong, urging him to make any friend he could from among those who had become his collective foes. It led him to lay down the newspaper, though with some reluctance, for he had realized its value in hiding him from the eyes of those who passed in the street.

        He talked for a time, as the meal progressed, of trivial or indifferent things, but not without realizing how difficult it was, even in such conversation as that, to avoid self-revealing references to past environment or experience; and with his abnormally sensitive perceptions troubled by a feeling that the girl was concentrating her observation upon him with what he felt to be an abnormal intensity.

        He thought he had the explanation of that, when she asked him, with a cool and smiling deliberation: "Mr. Edwards, do you mind telling me why you knocked at my door this morning?"

        He found the truth to be the easiest, as it was certainly the wisest reply: "I wanted to borrow a razor."

        "And you got it from Mr. Rabone's room?"

        "Yes," he said. "So I did. And returned it afterwards."

        She was silent for a moment, after which she looked at him in a more friendly intimate way than she had done previously. She asked: "Mr. Edwards, should you think it impertinent if I were to give you a word of advice?"

        "No. I should be grateful."

        "I shouldn't mention to Mr. Rabone, if I were you, that you went into his room."

        She spoke with a seriousness that seemed more than the incident could deserve, and he recalled the words that he had heard through the door when she had supposed that it was his fellow-lodger to whom she spoke.

        "You don't like Mr. Rabone?" he ventured.

        Her reply paused. Then she said seriously: "You must please not conclude that. I trust you to respect my confidence when I say no more nor less than that I should be sorry for any stranger whom he might suspect of poking about his room."

        "Yet he leaves it unlocked?"

        "I don't suppose he minds Mrs. Benson putting it straight. That's a very different thing."

        "Well," he said, "thanks for the hint. I'm not likely to go there again." He considered that he had more serious troubles than a borrowed razor was likely to stir, but he appreciated the friendly spirit in which the caution was given. He said: "I don't see that there'll be any occasion to mention it, as I put it back. For that matter, I mayn't be here when he returns."

        He was pleased to see, or imagine, a shadow of annoyance if not regret on the girl's face as she heard that. It strengthened an impulse to give her fuller confidence, which may have sprung in part from natural desire for any friendship he could make, in the loneliness of the life which must now be his.

        "Then you're not staying," she asked, "after today?"

        "I don't quite know what I shall do."

        He thought, as he had done before, that he saw curiosity in her eyes, beyond reason toward one whom she had met in so casual a way. Could it be that she suspected the truth?

        He doubted that, but felt an instinctive desire to tell it; to gain a confidante who, he felt sure, would not betray him, even for a reward. But if she did not herself betray, she might talk. His liberty would not be long if he should reveal his identity to every stranger he met.

        "I'm sorry you're not likely to stay," she said; "we could do with someone else here."

        "You are here permanently yourself?"

        "I don't know any more than you seem to. At present, I'm looking for work that I can't get."

        It was then that a wild vague thought entered his mind that she might be one who would share his fortunes, who would help him (for a consideration, of course) in the delicate operation of drawing the money from his bank for which it might be so dangerous to apply, and was yet so vital to have. Perhaps even to spend it with him on a more permanent basis to help him to a new identity: to assist in rebuilding all that had seemed so utterly lost.

        But, as he looked at her, he did not feel it to be a plan to which she would be likely to conform in a docile way. He had sufficient detachment of mind to see it as an idea which would not have come to him in more normal circumstances But the instinct to confide in those around him, to gain allies if he could, which had taken him down to Mrs. Benson's kitchen the night before, urged him again, and in greater confidence than he had then felt. And he saw that his decision must be promptly made, or the opportunity might be gone. The meal was done. Any moment she might rise and disappear for ever out of his life.

        "Miss Jones," he asked, with a nervousness in his voice she had not noticed before, "have you anything very urgent to do this morning?"

        She looked a natural surprise, but answered simply: No. Why do you want to know?"

        "I wondered whether I might ask you to do something for me. Of course, I'd pay for your time." He added, as though in self-defence: "It was you saying you were looking out for a job that put it into my mind."

        "So I am. It depends upon what it is that you want me to do."

        "It's only to go to the bank for me, but there's something that I should have to explain first."

        "I don't see why I should refuse that. But I'm an utter stranger to you. I think I ought to explain too. I'm out of work, and my money's just about gone. Mr. Rabone might happen to tell you that. . . . So," she concluded with a smile, "you mustn't tempt me too far."

        "I shouldn't worry much about that. . . . Could you believe that anyone could be convicted of a very serious crime, and not be guilty at all?"

        "Yes, I could believe that; though I don't think it often happens. . . . But don't you think you'd better ring the bell first - it's the one on the left, the other's a dud - and let Mrs. Benson clear away before you tell me what you want me to do? . . . I've got a few things to see to upstairs before I could go out."

        With these words, Miss Jones rose and left the room. He saw the wisdom of deferring the tale he had to tell until their landlady should have cleared away, and withdrawn from the scene. He recognized the easy efficiency with which Miss Jones handled the situation, and the difficulty of reconciling this character with the words and tone which he had heard through the attic door recurred to his mind.

        Who could this Rabone be, and why, though he appeared to be one whom she both feared and disliked, should she have confided to him that her money was nearly gone? He felt an active dislike for the man with whose razor he had made acquaintance, though he knew him only as a heavy step on the stair. If the girl were being persecuted or molested by him, the law was surely equal to her protection! Single girls should be secure in their lodgings from molestation by fellow-boarders of habits and manners as execrable as he had doubt that those of Mr. Rabone would prove to be. . . . The law? He saw that it was not a drama in which he could be cast for a leading part.

CHAPTER VII

IT was half an hour later when Miss Jones re-entered the room. She did not come near the fire, but sat down at the farther side of the table, as though desiring that a formal distance should be maintained. "I've been thinking over," she began, "what you said, and I thought at first I'd rather you didn't tell me more than was necessary for what you want me to do, because we're really strangers to one another, and mayn't meet again, for all we know, after today. But I've thought since that you ought to be the best judge, as you know what it is, and I don't; and the more I know the less likely I shall be to put my foot in it, so I'll just leave it to you."

        "I've been thinking it over too," he replied, "and it's clear to me that I can't ask you to do anything till I've fully explained. Apart from other reasons, it wouldn't be fair to you. And if - anything - were to happen, I should like to feel that there's someone who knows what the truth is."

        "Very well," she said. "Fire away. Anyhow, I shouldn't want to go out in this rain. It seems to be getting worse all the time." She sat with her elbows on the table, and her chin in her hands, as she listened to the tale that he had to tell.

        "I suppose," he said, as it concluded, "it makes me sound rather a fool. It's just a question of fool or knave, and the less there is of the one, the more the other comes up. The jury must have seen that, and they may have thought I'd tried to make myself out a bigger fool than anyone was likely to be.

        "But you can see that there were some things that I couldn't tell. I should think that that often happens, and people have to let things that they did sound worse than they really were."

        "Yes," she answered, "perhaps it may. But I should think the jury were rather fools too."

        The remark, noncommittal as it was, gave him a new confidence, with the conviction that she believed his tale. He added: "You see I hadn't even meant to use any name but my own. It wouldn't have come into my mind. I only went there at all because Bob Powell said that if we didn't finish up with a night-club it wouldn't be worth calling a night at all. But then, when we got in, he said that there were some people there who didn't know him by sight, but would know his name, and be certain to tell his wife, and he called himself something that I forget, and introduced me as Harold Vaughan. . . . And I don't know whether Tony ever doubted that it was my own name, though that's hard to say. But I feel sure that August didn't, and it was for her sake that I kept in with the gang.

        "And what part she had in it herself I don't know even now, but I'm glad she didn't get hauled into the dock, though I can't say that I ever want to see her again. But it s a fact that till I was arrested I'd never guessed what the game was.

        "It sounds silly now, but if I'd met Tony it would be easier to understand. he could talk the leg off a chair in his plausible smiling way. . . . And not guessing anything must have made me twice the value to him. . . . But I couldn't say how I met him, and came to be using another name, without it all coming out who I really was, beside giving Bob Powell away."

        "Yes," she answered doubtfully. "I think I see how you felt, though it doesn't sound much of a reason when you look at what a mess you're in now. And the fact that they couldn't find out who you were, that you had no background that they could check up - the judge would know that, even though it mightn't be allowed to come to the jury's ears - would prejudice everyone against you, and make it seem certain that you were one of the gang. . . . But the question is what do you want me to do now?"

        "I've got money in my own bank, which I'm bound to get hold of. I thought, to begin with, I might give you a note to the bank, asking for a cheque-book. They'd know my signature, and wouldn't be likely to ask any questions about that. It wouldn't be exactly like drawing money, and even that they'd have no right to raise any difficulty about."

        "No. Not exactly the same. But I suppose you'd want me to draw the money out a few hours later?"

        The tone was non-committal, if nothing worse. He became aware that he might have to face refusal of his request. But he could not deny that his programme would involve a second call at the bank, and one that should be made very promptly after the first. He said: "You see, I haven't got a penny till I can get a cheque cashed. And I don't want to stay here longer than I'm obliged."

        She turned the conversation to ask "Any special reason for that? You don't think anyone saw you come in?"

        "No. It's a different reason." He hesitated a moment. Was he being as utter a fool as Tony Welch had made him before? But he had the sense to see that he had gone too far for a safe retreat: that to give her a doubt as to whether he were being entirely frank would be worse than to have said nothing at all. After that momentary hesitation, he narrated the conversation that he had overheard the evening before.

        "It does make it a bit awkward," she said thoughtfully. "I was going to suggest that you might stay here safely for a few days, if you could keep out of Mr. Rabone's way, and in that time I might get you the money by other means, if you'd trust me enough for that. I don't know much about how soon they offer rewards for escaped prisoners, nor whether they do it at all, but I shouldn't think there'd be any rush to begin. But if the woman next door's got the idea, she's more likely to talk than not, and - well, it's not raining much now, so if you'll write the note while I'm upstairs, I'll get ready to go." He had to ask for further assistance, having neither paper nor pen, but she was soon ready, and armed with a note from Francis Hammerton, headed with his private address, and requesting his bankers to provide him with a book containing twenty-four uncrossed cheques, and to charge it to his account.

        "If I'm not back," she said, "in the next hour, you'll know that something's happened at the bank which makes me think it's not safe. In that case, you must trust me to come back, or find some other means of letting you know, as soon as I safely can."

        "But," he protested, with the fuller realization of what he was asking her to risk and do which her words brought, "I couldn't ask you to do that. How would you - - ?"

        She interrupted him to reply: "I only said if. I don't expect there'll be any trouble at all. I just wanted you to understand that if I'm not back in an hour it won't mean that I'm forging cheques all over the place. I expect the bank will hand it out without giving me more than a look. Why shouldn't they? There doesn't seem to be anyone but this Bob Powell you mention who could connect you with your real name, and you'd have heard before now if he'd let that out, and in a different way."

        She turned to go, and then hesitated, as though having something further to say. But then she thought: "I don't suppose, if I told him, that it would enable him to get clear in time."

        She had a second impulse that came near to speech, but checked herself again with the thought: "Well, if that happened, he'd find out soon enough; and it would mean explaining a lot if I said it now." She repeated: "I don't suppose I shall be more than an hour," and went out.

        She left him puzzled in mind, but feeling that he had been fortunate in gaining a friend at so great a need.

CHAPTER VIII

FRANCIS became more nervous of the window as the rain ceased and the light improved. He would not retire to his own room, being alert by that time for the girl's return, but he sat by the fire in what he thought would be a natural pose to the eyes of anyone who might glance in, and which kept his face hidden behind the pages of the Daily Record. Doing this, he found after a time that it required an effort of will to move the paper away, lest his eyes should confront those of some suspicious officer of the law gazing in from the street upon a lodger whom Mrs. Benson had acquired during the previous day.

        He told himself irritably that he was a damnable coward, and that it would be better to give himself up at once than to allow his fears to make a purgatory of every hour of the day. But he defended himself from his own contempt with the argument that his empty pockets, and the inaction that they entailed, were responsible for these nervous fears that reason would not control. If he could be active on his own behalf - - How soon would she be back?

        He calculated the time which the journey would require. With all allowances, even to an imagined crowd at the bank counter, it should be done in an hour. He could not make it longer than that.

        But the hour passed, and a half-hour beyond, and she did not come. He must conclude, from her own assurance, that this delay was a sign either that she had been detained or followed, which stirred him to a new fear.

        Would she be sufficiently skilful to dodge pursuit, or would she be traced by those whom his own folly would have guided to his retreat? Or was she now being detained and questioned with a severity which she could not indefinitely sustain? Or, perhaps, herself under some charge which his own knowledge of law was not sufficient to formulate to his own fears, as having applied for a cheque-book without being able or willing to give a proper account of how she came to be sent on such an errand? Could he reasonably expect that she would sustain such an inquisition for one who had given her such casual employment, and had been a stranger to her three hours before?

        While he tried to control these impatient doubts, and the time went by, Mrs. Benson appeared to spread a cloth for the midday meal. He thought she looked at him in a sour way, and as though she hesitated on the edge of saying things which he would not be pleased to hear, or asking questions to which it might not be easy to find reply.

        It was an attitude simple to understand, she thinking him to be what he was, or even something worse, and he having assured her that he was going out to draw money, which he had made no motion to do.

        He could have said that Miss Jones had kindly consented to call at the bank on his behalf, but he doubted the wisdom of that till he knew what the result of her adventure was. But would his silence annoy the woman into denouncing him to the police without waiting for the precarious chance of a reward which must be weighed against the certainty that she was feeding a lodger who did not pay? Would she conclude that his talk of a bank was no more than the ready tale of one who was practised in abusing the confidence of others as his conviction indicated?

        Vexed by these thoughts, to which no satisfactory answers appeared, he did not venture even to look directly at her, lest he should encourage the asking of questions to which he had no reply, and the attitude of dejection and anxiety which she observed actually had a different effect on her mind from that which his fears supposed.

        In fact, her vague horror of criminality, in whatever form, was not entirely proof against actual contact with one who, to the instincts by which those of undeveloped mentality are largely accustomed to rule their lives, did not appear to be of a repellent or hostile type.

        When she did speak, it was only to ask, as she laid for three on the dingy cloth: "I suppose Miss Jones didn't happen to say whether she'd be coming in? She mostly does, or let's me know if she won't."

        "No," he said, with some hesitation, wishing neither to show what he knew, nor to be inconsistent with anything that Miss Jones might say on her return, "she might come in any time, as far as I understood."

        "There'll be Mr. Rabone, anyway," the woman went on. "He said he'd be coming in, as he doesn't do most days, not before-night." She added, in a grumbling under-tone: "I suppose my dinners aren't good enough for the likes of him." And then, in a more audible voice, but still in the tone of one who had a developed habit of muttering aloud, rather than conversing with others: "Not as she'd be more likely to come in for that."

        As she spoke, there was the sound of a latchkey in the street-door, and the heavy step of the top-floor lodger sounded along the passage, and up the thinly-carpeted stairs.

        Francis Hammerton restrained a prudent or cowardly t impulse to rise and withdraw to his own room. He had to face the difficulty of securing solitude in a crowded city, which is particularly great for one whose pockets are bare. Two minutes later, the opportunity had gone. William Rabone entered the room.

        Mrs. Benson, taking his appearance as a signal that the meal should be served, without longer waiting for her female lodger, had retreated to the kitchen to dish it up, and Francis was spared an introduction he did not desire.

        The man who entered was dark, large, heavily built, and of professional rather than commercial aspect, in spite of the absurd toothbrush on his upper lip, which appeared to understudy either Charlie Chaplin or the German Chancellor.

        He looked at Francis with unconcealed annoyance, for which there may have been sufficient reason in the fact that he had anticipated the presence of Mary Jones, and that she would be his sole company at the meal.

        But this first glance was casual in its hostility. The second was more intent.

        "Good morning, Mr. Vaughan," he said, with some stress on the final word. Francis looked at him with an expression which he intended for indifferent surprise. "My name is Edwards."

        "Glad to know. . . . I expect you think it's best not to go out in this weather."

        Francis was spared the necessity of reply by the arrival of Mrs. Benson with a tray bearing a boiled neck of mutton, and two dishes of vegetables; and before she retired Mary Jones had also entered, and taken her seat at the table.

        Miss Jones said nothing, nor did she look at either of her fellow-guests, settling herself to her own meal as indifferently as though she were the only one there.

        It appeared that it was a table at which no one presided, its etiquette being that the dishes were passed or pushed toward each diner in turn, for the satisfaction of their own requirements. Jones accepted these services with monosyllabic thanks to those in whose existence she seemed otherwise uninterested.

        Conversation was slow to commence among three people who were alike in feeling that they were one too many, though they would have differed as to the one whose presence was not required.

        Mr. Rabone, who preferred better meals than Mrs. Benson provided, had come in with the sole object of indulging in the society of Miss Jones in a manner inappropriate to the presence of a third party: Francis had even more urgent, if not more important reason for wishing to talk to that lady alone: Mary Jones had a report to make which was not for Mr. Rabone's ears. She also would have preferred that Francis should have been alone when she arrived, but, as Rabone was there, she had a modified satisfaction in the fact that she was not singly with him. But she told herself that this was mere cowardice, by which she thanked fate for postponing that which she had been active to bring about.

        The neck of mutton had been succeeded by apple-dumplings when Rabone addressed Miss Jones in a direct and serious way. His question was blunt to the edge of rudeness: "Shall you be going out this afternoon?"

        Her reply hesitated, as though the question were an embarrassment, and when she replied it was indirectly, and with a timidity of tone and manner very different from that in which she had conversed with Francis during the morning, and which reminded him again of the voice which he had first heard through the attic door. She said: "I expect I shall be in this evening."

        Mr. Rabone considered this reply, on which he made no comment to her, but he looked at Francis to ask, in a manner which was more a direction than a request: "You will be going out after dark?"

        Francis restrained himself to answer: "Perhaps I shall."

        Mr. Rabone said no more until the meal ended, and Miss Jones had risen and silently left the room. Then he turned to Francis with unfriendly and somewhat contemptuous eyes. "Staying here?" he asked curtly.

        "I may."

        "I think not."

        Francis made no answer to that. He saw that those who recognized him were now in a position to move him on, as a policeman deals with a tramp. But without money - without having the girl's report of the errand in which she had so probably failed - -

        Mr. Rabone spoke again: "Can you give me change for ten shillings?"

        "Not at the moment."

        "So I supposed." He pulled out a pocket-book fat with notes. Evidently it was not poverty which caused him to choose that modest, if respectable lodging.

        He took out a pound-note, hesitated between that and one for half the amount, and finally selected two of ten shillings each, which he passed across the table.

        Francis looked at the money, letting it lie. The action was generous in itself, but it was evidently without good-will. Its manner made it an insult, very hard not to refuse.

        But suppose that the girl had failed, as her delay in returning appeared to indicate? Suppose that she were waiting now for the opportunity to tell him quietly that he could not be too speedy to leave? There might be freedom in those two slips of coloured paper so contemptuously tossed over the cloth. There would surely be rest and food at an urgent need

        Anyway, he must learn to obey the orders of all men who could address him as Harold Vaughan, even though they offered no money to enforce their wills.

        He picked it up with a conventional word of thanks which did attempt pretence of gratitude, as for a friend's aid, nor that he was in less than an utter need. He said: "We will call it a loan. You shall have it back during the next few days."

        "Call it what you will. You must be gone from here when I get back. That's at six tonight."

        He rose, and went up to his room. Ten minutes later Francis heard him leave, and almost immediately after Miss Jones came down.

        She had her bag in her hand, from which she drew the cheque-book that he required.

        "Was it all right?" he asked. "I was afraid when you didn't get back - - "

        "I think so, but I'm not sure. I went to a cashier who was not occupied when I got to the counter, and gave him the note. He was reading it when another customer came up. The cashier looked at him, and then said to me: "Just a moment, please," and went to the back.

        "I thought I should have some trouble to face, but when he returned he just gave me the book in the usual way. The man who came after me had pushed a cheque over to him for payment, and I looked back as I went out of the door, and the cashier wasn't paying it, but talking to him, with it in his hand.

        "That looked as though he had gone behind to enquire something about him rather than me, when he first saw him come up, without wishing to do it so that he would be understood - perhaps to see what his balance was - and I felt easy; but after that I got an idea that I was being followed. It may have been only nervousness, but I went a good way round, to make sure."

        "You are sure?"

        "Yes. I mean I'm sure no one followed me here."

        Francis noticed the quiet confidence in her voice, and that she had been sufficiently conversant with banking methods to judge what had occurred in a cool and probable way. He asked: "You won't mind going again? There'll be just about time before they close."

        She did not refuse, but neither did she agree. She said:

        "It seems rather a needless risk, if we could do it a better way. . . . I wonder whether you'd care to trust me with a cheque that I could get a firm I know to put through their account? We could get the money in a couple of days."

        But it could be traced through another bank?

        "I don't know that that would matter. You've got a right to draw cheques on your own account. They wouldn't give you away."

        He was slow to answer, and there was reserve in her voice when she spoke again: "But I expect you can think of a better plan. Anyway, you've got the cheque-book now."

        He saw that he must have appeared distrustful of the offer, and even ungrateful for what she had already done. He was in danger of losing the one friend he had, at a time when friends were his greatest need. He said: "It isn't that. The fact is I've just been told to clear out before six o'clock. Mr. Rabone knows who I am."

        "What dit he say?"

        He narrated the incident as exactly as possible.

        She frowned in thought over this, and then said: "It's bad luck that he's guessed, but I don't think he'll be in any hurry to let the police know. You needn't worry much about that."

        He asked with surprise: "You'd advise me to risk it, and stay on""

        "I didn't say that. It's not easy to see what's the safest way. But you might leave here and go somewhere that I could reach, if we thought out a plan."

        "But you don't think he'll inform the police? You feel sure that he's not that sort?

        She answered dryly: "No. He's not that sort."

        He attacked the position irritably from another angle: "I suppose he wanted to have you alone here this evening. That's really why he wants me to clear."

        She listened to this, and amusement came to her eyes. "I should call that a good guess. . . . But it isn't that, all the same. Or not that alone. He thinks you've come to the wrong place."

        "If you'd only say what you mean!"

        "That's what I've been trying to do."

        He checked an impatient reply, and made the effort necessary to control a nervous impatience born of the precarious position in which he stood, and remained silent, waiting for her to say more. He was rewarded with: "You told me a good deal. I wonder whether it wouldn't save trouble if I were to pay you back in the same coin."

        He became conscious of the boorishness of his previous mood. What obligation had she to him? He said: "Don't tell me anything you're not sure I should know. There's no reason you should. I'd rather trust you than that."

        Indeed, if she were not worthy of trust, what hope could he have? He was in her hands, in more ways than one. If she sought to rob or betray him, it would be easy for her to tell a tale that he could not test. In his position, he must trust entirely, or not at all, and his choice was already made.

        But she had formed her own resolution, and his words did not change it, but rather confirmed her judgement that she could give a confidence which he would not betray.

        "Trust's all right," she said, "but it's simpler to understand. I don't think you'll give me away to Mr. Rabone, and still less that you'll set the police on him, though I shouldn't care if you did, so long as my name wasn't anywhere in the bill. . . .

        "Mr. Rabone is a bank inspector. He's on the staff of the London & Northern. Bank inspectors have to be men of good character. If they haven't got private means, the bank expects them to live within their salaries, which are substantial, but nothing more.

        "Mr. Rabone is a man against whose financial record nothing is known. He is separated from his wife, but that's understood not to be his fault. She's said to drink like a fish. He has to contribute to her support.

        "He lives simply, in such lodgings as these. He takes expensive holidays, but not more so than his salary may possibly cover, particularly if he was careful in earlier years which report says that he was.

        "But he gives the impression of having money under control. There was an occasion when he avoided scandal by paying what must have been a large sum, though we haven't been able to find out yet what the figure was.

        "No one would have worried themselves to enquire into these matters but for the fact that the London & Northern Bank has been the victim of a succession of forgeries of such a character that there has been a growing suspicion that they could not have been carried out successfully without the assistance, if not the actual direction, of someone with inside knowledge, particularly of the balances lying in the accounts on which the forged cheques were drawn.

        "The Texall Enquiry Agency, of which I am one of the humbler members, was instructed, about a year ago, to make the most searching investigation into the records and occupations of about twenty of the bank staff, each of which could have assisted one or other of the robberies at different branches.

        "The trouble was that no one man could have been in touch with them all, and when we'd failed to discover anything to connect any of them with the incidents in question, though we'd stirred up some unexpected mud in one or two cases, we received instructions to investigate the private life and connections of some of the higher officials, who had been regarded as above such suspicion before."

        "With Mr. Rabone top of the list? Well, I hope you'll prove he's in it up to the neck, as no doubt he is."

        Miss Jones smiled. "You don't love him. It's easy to see that. Neither do I. . . . But we haven't found anything yet, beyond that, if he's really in with a criminal gang, as I think he is, he's an exceptionally circumspect man.

        "The only really unpleasant thing that we should be able to prove as yet is that he has a habit of making friends with lonely girls in his lodgings, or when he goes on holidays, and in some other ways, and seducing them without telling them that he has a wife very much alive.

        "It was in connection with one of these incidents some years ago that he found it prudent to pay a sufficient sum to a girl, who had a baby coming, to go out to New Zealand with her mother without making a fuss. . . . And when I tell you that you'll understand why I'm here."

        "I should have thought it would have been a better reason for keeping a good distance away."

        "Then you didn't listen when I told you what my profession is. . . . I'm a poor girl who's out of a job, and her money down to about ten shillings. I'm rather timid, and more frightened than attracted as yet, but he's very patient and kind, and, in the end, when my money's gone, and - well, what can a poor girl be expected to do? . . . He's trying hard now to get me a job at the bank, but it's a sure bet that he'll fail in that."

        She smiled slightly, and did not change her expression when she saw the lack of response on her hearer's face.

        "I wonder," he said, "that you can talk to the filthy beast."

        "Oh, I don't know," she said lightly. "Being seduced isn't so bad, when it's being done in a cautious way, and you're playing the timid part."

        "And so you've found out nothing yet?"

        "Not quite nothing. There have been two dark nights when he's been visited by callers who come over the roof. The second time, I followed them back. Not closely enough to see who they were, but to find where they went. It was the fourth house from here toward Windsor Terrace. It's quite easy to get along from roof to roof. There's a parapet a foot high, and the dormer windows are close to its inner side."

        "It must have been a very dangerous thing to do."

        "Oh, I wouldn't say that. It's all in the day's work, or perhaps night's might be a better word. . . . But if you should see anyone knocking at the front door that you're not anxious to meet, it might be worth while trying. I don't know what sort of reception you'd have in the other house, but you might get down before anyone'd try to stop you, and they're not likely to be the sort to call in the police."

        "Haven't you found out who they are?"

        "Not much yet, but of course we shall. There'll be someone else digging that up now. I have to concentrate here."

        "It doesn't sound very circumspect to have criminals crawling over the roofs."

        "No? It would be easy to think of other ways more likely to be observed, and not so difficult for us to prove. But I wasn't thinking of that. . . . The fact is that most people who make money in criminal ways give themselves away by how they let it slip through their hands. There's not much fun in risking your liberty or your neck for money you never spend, and it's astonishing how little use it is, even if you risk throwing it round. There isn't much that people of bad character can buy, especially in a quiet way, that's much satisfaction to them, and they daren't get drunk for fear of what they might let out. . . .

        "But Mr. Rabone lives a quiet frugal life, except for his one annual spree, and this habit I've told you about, which may be the only one he's been able to think of in which he can make his money buy what he wants, without behaving in a way that might come to the bank's ears."

        Francis had been sufficiently interested in Miss Jones's narrative to forget, as it had proceeded, the passage of time, and the urgency of his own position; but, as she came to this point, his eyes fell on the clock, and the process of simple mental arithmetic necessitated by Mrs. Benson's explanation of its eccentricity enabled him to see that the question of visiting the bank had answered itself so far as that afternoon was concerned; and this realization brought his mind sharply back to consider how far, if at all, Mr. Rabone's character affected his own precarious security.

        "I don't quite see why his being a rotter should make him anxious for me to clear out, even though he may believe that I was one of the Welch lot."

        "No?" she replied. "But don't you see that if he's in with any criminal gang the last thing he would wish would be to draw enquiry upon himself, as one who appeared to have been associating with you?"

        "You know how you walked in through an open door, but the police don't, and they'll do some lively guessing if they find you've been harboured here.

        "There may be more in it even than that. These gangs are often more or less in touch with one another, and we don't know how closely Tony Welch's arrest may have come to some of Mr. Rabone's own associates - that is, of course, if we're right in our suspicions about himself.

        "The fact that he knew your assumed name, and recognized you so quickly, makes that rather more likely than not.

        "It's easy to see, without bringing me into the picture, that he might prefer you a good distance away; but it doesn't follow that he'd put the police on to you. If we're right as to what he is, it's about the last thing he'd be likely to try."

        "Well, the question I've got to decide is whether I'm to clear out as I'm told, or to risk staying another night."

        "And you want to get hold of some money first? It's because of that that I've been explaining all this about why I'm here. I wanted you to understand that if you can trust me enough, I really could help you, and in a better way than taking a cheque to the bank counter, though it mightn't be quite so quick. But I might manage even that."

CHAPTER IX

HALF an hour later, Francis sat alone again with his own thoughts. He had small occasion for lively spirits, but he was conscious, beyond reason, of the lightening of heart and hope.

        It was not only that he now had a confident expectation of the money that was his most vital need, and that by a method which involved no risk of immediate detection. He was aware that he had found a friend, when his need was greatest, and the probability had been next to none; and though Miss Jones (if such were her real name, which it was easy to doubt, might not be likely to give him the docile companionship and service which had foolishly entered his mind during the earlier day, yet she was likely to be a friend of a better kind than the timid, workless girl he had first thought her to be.

        She had now taken a cheque for £20 to her own firm, on the stipulation, willingly agreed, that if the cash resources of the till should not rise to that total, she should bring what she could, and arrange to let him have the balance on a later day.

        She had promised to be back before six, and the question of his remaining for a. further night had been left for decision then.

        It was evident that, apart from Mr. Rabone's opposition, there could be no more than a precarious safety in a house where his identity was suspected both by his own landlady and a next-door neighbour whose mouth would not be permanently closed. But he was aware that he would go to nothing better than change of perils if he should walk out into the streets to find the shelter of other lodgings where he would be open to the same suspicions, which might become more quickly vocal.

        Against that argument, he reminded himself of his resolution to seek proof of his own innocence, toward which he could do nothing while he remained hidden within Mrs. Benson's doors. When he had money at command, he could have little excuse should he delay to use the hours of uncertain liberty to further his one hope of re-establishing himself securely in the respect of his fellowmen.

        So reason urged, against a strong reluctance to go. In the few hours that he had known these dingy rooms, they had become hiding-place, and, in a sense, home. But would that feeling have been equally strong if Miss Jones had not been there? Asking himself this, he saw where the greatest source of his hesitation lay. To leave her with that cad - - And with the programme to which she had so lightly referred - - And not knowing when, nor even if, he would ever see her again - -

        His mind began to invent a score of reasons why it would be safer to remain until the next morning. He would have more time to look round for such a lodging as he could safely take. He would have time to get much farther away, to some place where suspicion would not be so quickly aroused. He would be able to purchase the luggage which it was so essential to have. To walk in anywhere late at night, ant with empty hands, would be to ask for the trouble which he would be almost certain to find!

        It was twenty to six when he heard Miss Jones enter, with her own latchkey, at the street-door; and by this time he had arrived at a definite resolution that he would not leave till the next day.

        She came in with a smile indicative of the success which she demonstrated next moment by drawing a bundle of notes from her handbag, which she laid on the table, with five shillings in silver.

        "By good luck," she said, "there was lots of cash in the till. Mr. Banks made no trouble about changing it. He took my word for it being all right. But he charged five shillings. He's that sort. He won't do anything without being paid."

        "I don't mind that."

        "No. I didn't suppose you would. Besides, it's a good thing in a way. It makes it a matter of business, and so it's confidential to the firm."

        Francis picked up the money. It gave him a sense of freedom and power, to an extent of which he might not have been conscious had he not had those previous penniless hours. He said: "I can't thank you enough. Taking me on trust, in the way you have, and in spite of the things you know - - "

        "Never mind that," she replied. "There's no time. Mr. Rabone may be in any minute now. The question is, if you're going to leave, how I can get in touch with you again."

        "You mean that? It is more than I had a right to ask or expect."

        "Well, I thought, if you want to get even with Tony Welch's gang, I might give you some help. We might arrange to meet at the office. There shouldn't be any special risk about that, unless you want to get out of London."

        "I don't know that I do. . . . Anyway, I don't mean to leave here tonight. We'll talk it over tomorrow, when there won't be any pressure of time."

        He was pleased to see an expression of satisfaction on her face as he said this. She answered: "I'm glad you've decided to stay the night. I'd been thinking that it might be the safer way. And if we go out together in the morning, the police will be less likely to give you a second look while you've got a companion, and we're talking like friends together. . . . But if I were you I should get upstairs before Mr. Rabone comes. It'll save friction, if nothing else. And, if you like, I'll tell Mrs. Benson that I've got some money for you, and I know that you're going to settle with her in the morning."

        It was advice which had the tone of a request also, and was of an obvious wisdom. Reluctant though he might be, he had sense enough to go without argument or delay. He would miss the evening meal, but, placed as he was, it would be folly to weigh that against larger issues. He said: "You might tell Mrs. Benson that I'm not very well, and I've gone to bed."

        He went upstairs, hearing Mr. Rabone's heavy step in the hall as he closed his own door.

        There was a clothes-closet in his room, at the back of which a pile of old books had been pushed away. Among less readable matter, he found a soiled copy of Vanity Fair, with which he tried to divert his mind from wondering what might be going on in the room below.

        He listened at times, but there were no sounds that came through his closed door. By the stillness, he might have been the sole occupant of the house.

        After a time, he became chilly, and, having no other means of obtaining warmth, got into bed.

        He read stubbornly, finding it hard to hold his mind to the words that passed under his eyes. He stopped at times to listen and wonder what might be going on in the room below, at others, his mind wandered to regret the follies of the unchangeable past, or to speculate upon the unpromising future . . . And then, unexpectedly, sleep came.

CHAPTER X

FRANCIS waked suddenly. He was conscious that he had been sharply disturbed, though he could not tell how. Were the police at the door?

        The single electric light was still burning, as it had been when he fell asleep. The book had fallen on to the floor. Was it possible that he had been waked by that?

        He listened, and heard nothing. He got up to put out the light. He told himself that it was natural that he should be disturbed by a slight cause, if not none, being the hunted man that he was.

        As he got back into bed, he heard light quick footsteps on the floor above. That was in the room which Miss Jones occupied. He had reckoned before this that it must t be over his own. So she was still awake, and up. He heard her door closed and locked. She crossed the floor again with the same quick firm tread. Probably she had just gone up to bed, and it was no more than that which had waked him so thoroughly. It came from going to sleep at so unusually early an hour.

        Then what time was it now? He got out again. The only electric switch which the room contained was by the door. He put the light on again, and looked at his watch. The time was 2.17 a.m. A late hour for girls placed in Miss Jones's position to be retiring to bed!

        Had she been downstairs with Rabone till now? It was more than nine hours since he had come upstairs as the bank inspector had entered the house. What could she have been doing with him for so endless a time?

        But it appeared that whatever might have happened was over now. Certainly, there was nothing that he could do. His interference would be absurd, and would be little likely to be welcomed by her.

        Besides, did she not deserve that he should give her a better trust than his doubts implied? Or was that the right word? Jealous he might be, but there was no loyalty that she owed to him.

        There were still slight noises over his head. He thought, but was not sure, that he heard her open her window. After that, the sounds ceased entirely. Doubtless, she was in bed. Probably already asleep, as he would be if he had not come up at so confoundedly early an hour. . . .

        Horribly through the silence there came the sound of a human scream. It ceased abruptly, as though cut off before it had come to a natural end.

        Francis had dozed, but he was widely awake while the sound was still loud on the air. The light in his room still burned. He leapt up. The cry had surely come from the floor above, but not, he thought, from the room over his head.

        He had no doubt what he should do now. He must lose no instant to find the cause of that dreadful cry. Yet the tyranny of custom prevailed so far that he delayed to put on some clothes - the circumstances under which he came having left him without a sleeping-suit, so that he had lain down in his shirt - and while he hurriedly half-dressed he heard footsteps, light and quick, crossing the floor over his head, as he had heard them before.

        He opened his door to face a house that had become silent again. He switched on a landing-light. He looked down the dark well of the narrow stairs, from which there came no motion, nor light, nor sound. It seemed that the cry, loud and agonized as it was, had been insufficient to disturb Mrs. Benson's rest.

        Could there be reason for him to hasten up, where it seemed that nothing was happening now? And what would it be to find?

        He looked up, and the silence became sinister. He lost the sense of urgency in that of fear - fear of that which the I silence held.

        It was the thought of the girl who might be in peril above, or sick with fear in her locked room, that gave him courage to climb the stairs to encounter he knew not what. If, he thought, he had a weapon of any kind - - . Yet what danger could he expect to meet on the silent landing above?

        As he approached it, he became aware of a cold draught, and then had his first surprise on seeing that the bedroom door was open, which he believed that he had heard Miss Jones lock at so late an hour. The opposite door was closed.

        He called: "Miss Jones, are you all right?" in a low, and then in a louder voice.

        He approached the open door, pushing it wider. The light was switched on. The draught came from the window, which was open. Still getting no reply, he entered the room.

        The bed appeared to have been occupied. The clothes had been thrown back, and half on to the floor, as though it had been hurriedly or carelessly left. The room was clearly vacant.

        Had she been abducted by criminals who had come over the roofs, perhaps having guessed her to be a detective upon their tracks? Had they murdered her, and dragged her body away? Was it her death-cry that had roused him from sleep?

        He did not think that the voice had been hers, but perplexity was mingled with a great fear as he crossed the landing, and knocked upon Mr. Rabone's door.

        There was no reply, though he called aloud, and his fear grew. He had no desire to wake the bank inspector without evident cause, and he had most urgent reason for avoiding anything which might involve him in a further publicity, but it had become a matter which he must pursue, at whatever cost.

        He tried the handle, and the door opened as it turned. The room was in darkness, and still no one answered his call. Had Rabone also gone in the night?

        There was no light on the upper landing. All that entered the room was from the open door opposite. He stepped a pace in, feeling along the wall for the switch which he had missed nearer the jamb, and as he did so he trod on a man's hand, which moved slightly beneath his heel.

        He looked down with eyes sharpened by fear, and which were growing used to the gloom. A body sprawled largely over the floor.

        He stepped quickly back, and, as he did so, his hand touched the switch which he had avoided before.

        The light showed William Rabone lying face downward If he had any flicker of life, it was yet evident that he was far beyond human aid. His throat was cut, and the dusty carpet was bright with blood.

CHAPTER XI

FRANCIS stood for some moments, his hand still on the switch. Only his brain moved. He would have I had a greater horror of what he saw, had not his heart been cold with the quick instinct of a personal fear.

        Should he put out the light, and go back to bed, leaving it for others to discover what it was not his business to know? Who could say that he had been disturbed by a cry which seemed to have aroused no one except himself? But that would be of little avail unless he should have left the house before Mrs. Benson would get about, and perhaps discover that which the attic held. And, if he should slip early away, would it not be like an admission of guilt, especially in the eyes of those who would not, at first, know that he might fly from another fear? Would it not rouse a double urgency of pursuit, before which he would have little chance of escape?

        And when he would be caught, it would be necessary to deny everything, to deny that he had ascended the stairs. And if the police, with their systematic, minute investigations, should be able to prove he had, then he would be lost beyond hope!

        But by what means could they do that? He looked down on the shoes into which he had thrust his feet without lacing them, in the hurry of his dressing, and he saw that the right one was wet with blood into which he had stepped while the room was dark. There would be enough evidence there to hang anyone who should be fool enough to deny having entered the room, or who should delay to give the alarm.

        But why did he assume that it was murder on which he gazed? He had read of men who cut their own throats. But would they give so terrible a cry, if it were an act of deliberate will? It was a question to which he could give no certain reply.

        But if it were William Rabone's own act, the weapon with which he had done it could not be far. As to that, it lay near. An open razor. But would a man inflict so wide a wound with his own hand? Again, it was a question to which he could not reply.

        A new doubt troubled his mind. It seemed that Miss Jones had fled. Had he died by her hand? Perhaps when she found that the game she played was more difficult than she supposed, and her honour could be secured in no other way? If he should give the alarm, would it be to set pursuit on her track, so that she would not escape, as she might otherwise do? He would curse himself to his last hour, if he should do that, through cowardly fear lest suspicion should fall on him.

        Yet was it a probable thing? Was it not more likely that she had been dragged away by the same criminal violence which had left the dead man on the floor? Might it not be urgent that she should be rescued while he stood foolishly there? It was only later that he remembered the light quick step that he had heard crossing the floor after the sound of that dreadful cry.

        Out of these confused thoughts, a counsel of wisdom came. Was he to accept the character of criminality which had been thrust upon him? But for the experience of the last month, would he not have roused alarm without thought of accusation against himself, as the natural, normal thing for a man to do?

        Might it not be his greatest danger that fear should lead him to mimic guilt?

        It may have been twenty seconds that he stood motionless with his hand on the switch, while these thoughts went through his mind. Then he turned and went down the stairs, marking each second step with a bloody shoe.

        He switched on the lights as he went downward from flight to flight, hesitating a moment as he came to the front passage, with an impulse to open the door on the chance that there might be a policeman whom he could call, but he had an irrational feeling that Mrs. Benson should be first informed of the corpse that her attic held, and he went on to the basement, and knocked loudly on the door where he supposed that she slept.

        The woman replied at once, asking what was wrong, in an alarmed voice, to which he answered: "I'm afraid there's something wrong on the top floor, Mrs. Benson. Mr. Rabone's been hurt."

        An agitated voice called out: "Mr. Rabone hurt? How could he be hurt? . . . Well, I'll be coming up. Is he real bad? You'd better go round to Dr. Foster's, if so. He's three doors round the corner in Sefton Street."

        As the voice ceased, there were sounds of movement within the room.

        Francis stood hesitating. To call a doctor might be a wise thing to do. But he did not like to go out for such a purpose without giving her a more adequate idea of what she would have to face when she should arrive at the top of the attic stairs.

        "Yes," he answered, "I'll fetch the doctor at once. But I'm afraid Mr. Rabone's dead. I think he's been killed. I think you ought to let the police know."

        He heard a gasping exclamation inside the room. But it seemed that the old woman rose to the emergency, for she called in a firmer voice: "Well, you'd better get the doctor at once. He's the one to say about that. It's no good standing there. I'll get Miss Brown to come in."

        She heard her new lodger's feet retire as he obeyed this instruction, and emerged a few moments later hastily dressed, and unbarred the basement door with a shaking hand, to summon Miss Janet Brown.

        Francis went out by the front door, which had been chained and bolted as though every burglar in London cast covetous eyes upon Mrs. Benson's ancient furniture. He found Dr. Foster's without difficulty, and a speaking-tube at the side of the night-bell enabled him to inform the doctor of the nature of the case which required his attention.

        Dr. Foster said that he would be down in three minutes. What, more exactly, was the address? Francis could not give a number that he now realized that he did not know. He thought (with a moment's discomfort of doubt) that he could find Mrs. Benson's house again without hesitation. It was less easy to describe it to another, and Dr. Fostcr was decided in mind that he would not risk having to knock up the wrong houses to enquire for a murdered man who was not there. He said that Francis had better wait, and guide him to the address. So he agreed to do, and stood in the street while the three minutes became ten.

        Meanwhile, Miss Brown had taken charge of affairs on the scene of the fatality, whether murder or suicide, on which question she expressed her uncertainty in so decided a voice that it had the sound of a final verdict.

        She had ascended the top flight of stairs, while Mrs. Benson stood in agitation below, gazed grimly for a long moment at the dead man (whom she had always disliked), and decided reasonably that it was an event of which the police should be informed without further delay.

        She returned to her own house, where a telephone was installed, and rang up the police-station.

        It happened that Chief-Inspector Combridge had come in, having been detained late in connection with a raid on a gambling den, which had failed through treachery (as he must suppose) among his own staff. He was ill-tempered, and very tired, and on the point of going home, when Miss Brown's tale came over the wire. He said: "Only half a mile away? Have a car round at once. I'll take Potter and Sears."

        He got to the house before Francis returned with Dr. Foster. He looked at the dead man, and had no difficulty in deciding that there was nothing a doctor could do which would be useful to him. But he learned that a young lodger, Mr. Edwards, had gone out to fetch one, and admitted it to be an orthodox course of action. He reserved his opinion about Mr. Edwards, as he did about everything. The great need in homicidal investigations is to approach everything with an open mind. At present, the case looked like a prosaic suicide, the cause for which would probably be plain enough when the dead man's circumstances were disclosed. A bank inspector? Ten to one there would be something wrong at the bank. Possibly the man had had warning that investigation was taking place, and had chosen the surest road of escape. . . . But he would assume nothing. Here was the doctor who had been summoned. It appeared that the lodger was leading him up the stairs.

        Inspector Combridge would have preferred that the police surgeon (for whom he had already sent) should have been first on the scene, but he allowed nothing of this to appear in the cordiality of his reception of a medical gentleman who had been properly called in.

        His glance passed on quickly from him to the lodger who was showing a modest inclination to retire, of which Inspector Combridge instinctively disapproved. He looked at Francis, who looked at him, and the recognition was mutual.

        "So," he said, "this is where you've been hiding, s it? And what am I to think you've been up to now? . . . You'd better finish dressing, and come back with me. Potter, you can take him in charge."

        Francis became conscious for the first time that he had gone out to summon the doctor without vest or coat.

CHAPTER XII

CHIEF-INSPECTOR COMBRIDGE took a few hours of much-needed sleep, and waked to consideration of the problem the night had brought. He was unsure as yet whether he had to deal with a prosaic suicide or a perplexing crime. At present, he had not even ascertained the essential point of whether Rabone had been a left-handed man.

        He had learnt the danger of developing theory in advance of facts, and he was not disposed to assume that Harold Vaughan was guilty of murder because he had been convicted on a quite different charge. But he knew how frequently enquiry concerning those upon whom suspicion falls will disclose a record of previous intimacy with the law. In the case of Vaughan, he admitted in an honest mind that he was less satisfied of his guilt than the jury's verdict had shown them to be. But it was a sinister fact that his antecedents had not been traced; and if he had twice become involved in crimes in which he was not concerned, he was a most unfortunate young man.

        Anyway, it was satisfactory to feel that he was securely held. He would be available for questioning, and could be charged at leisure if the evidence should appear to point in his direction. . . . Satisfactory, also, that his days of defiant freedom had been cut short, and the reproach of being unable to find him had been lifted from the shoulders of the very capable body to which Inspector Combridge belonged. But it was possible to wish that he had been found in a different way. The murder (or suicide) would acquire an additional dramatic interest in the public mind because it had been occasion for the arrest of Vaughan. He saw that, if murder it were, it would be one of those cases in which the prestige of the Metropolitan Police would be too deeply involved to allow failure to be considered. His own reputation also. He was not one to waste many hours in sleep when such a case was waiting investigation. . . .

        He interviewed Miss Brown, from whom he heard much, but learned little of value which he did not already know.

        He interviewed Mrs. Benson, from whom he learnt more, including certain facts, such as that of Miss Jones's disappearance, which deepened mystery, and others which seemed to increase the probability that Vaughan, possibly in conjunction with the missing girl, was responsible for a brutal crime.

        He learnt from Sir Lionel Tipshift's report that suicide was an improbable explanation - might, indeed, be put out of mind, except as a line of defence which they must be prepared to meet when the murderer should be wriggling to dodge the doom that his guilt deserved.

        He circulated a description of the missing girl.

        He interviewed Sir Reginald Crowe, the chairman of the London & Northern, with whom he had had previous associations, and whom he knew to be his good friend.

        Sir Reginald had no charge to make against the dead man. He was reticent on that point. Inspector Combridge could see him again in a few days, when he would be more fully informed, and would give a final reply. Meanwhile, it must be understood that he made no suggestion of any kind: no accusation at all.

        He gave the Inspector authority to enquire at the branch where Rabone had kept his own private account, though he understood that it had no abnormal features, and was unlikely to contain anything to assist enquiry. Inspector Combridge, having a different hope, went on to interview the branch manager, and came away well content.

        All this was done before 4 p.m., and at this point the Inspector felt that he had come to something too closely resembling a blank wall for his liking - unless the murder could be fixed upon the man who was already under arrest.

        He had a case against him, but it was of conjecture and suspicion rather than proof. It was one which a clever counsel might tear to rags. Unless he could find the girl - - Unless he could be sure what that open window meant - - Well, he had still to interview Vaughan, and there was hope there. He had deliberately deferred doing this until he had collected all the data that other sources supplied.

        Now he would listen with a fair and quite open mind to whatever Vaughan could say in his own defence. It was no evidence that he sought anything but the truth if he anticipated with the confidence of experience that he would obtain a statement which would put the man who would be persuaded to make it in a more precarious position than that in which he already stood.

        Even if he were innocent, there would almost certainly be some circumstance which he would desire to conceal, something which might appear to draw suspicion toward himself, which would tempt him to the more dangerous lie. If he were guilty, it would be still more probable that he would make assertions which careful enquiry would overset.

CHAPTER XIII

THE interval which Inspector Combridge allowed to elapse before questioning his recovered prisoner had given Francis an ample leisure in which to consider his own position.

        His first bitterness against the malice of circumstance had been blended with an undercurrent of fear, and he was disposed to curse the occasion which had given him such improbable freedom, only to return him to bondage with the threat of a second accusation, and the fear of a far more terrible sentence than that which was already his.

        But further thought brought better hope, and the sanguine spirit of youth rose to a vague anticipation that demonstration of his innocence of this greater crime might open the way for reconsideration of the offence of which he was already convicted.

        His money, and the cheque-book with its blank counter-foil, were now in the possession of the police, and it was a reasonable conclusion that his identity would be quickly discovered.

        Seeing that that which he had suffered so stubbornly to prevent had passed beyond his control, he found an unexpected relief in the thought that he would now be able to acknowledge his identity and could establish contact with his own friends.

        He learnt during the day, and felt it to be a good omen, that he was not to be charged immediately with the jail-breaking "offence" he had committed (the law holding, with lamentable absence of humour, that it is the duty of all convicts, even though their cells should be left unlocked, to continue to occupy them for the terms of the sentences they have received), nor was he to be consigned at once to one of the major jails, as would have been the usual routine. If he should not be suspect himself, he saw that he might be reserved as witness of the crime, the perpetrators of which might, for all he knew, be already known to the police, if not actually in their hands.

        He was not surprised, nor unwilling, when, at about 5 p.m., he was summoned to leave his cell, and conducted to a room in which Inspector Combridge sat at a broad desk, and some other police officials, whom he did not know, were scattered about.

        Inspector Combridge said: "Sit down, Vaughan." His tone was curt, but not unkindly. His hand motioned to a chair opposite his own desk.

        As Francis took it, he noticed a police-sergeant at an adjoining table who sat with pen and paper ready to assist the enquiry.

        "Two days ago," the Inspector began, "after conviction and sentence, you escaped from custody?"

        "I walked out. If he got the chance, I suppose anyone would.

        Inspector Combridge did not discuss that. He was merely beginning the examination in an ordinary manner. He asked: "Where did you go?"

        "Where you found me."

        "Straight there?"

        "Yes. The door was open, and I walked in."

        "You expected to find it open?"

        "No. How should I? I hadn't expected to get away."

        "But you might have hoped for acquittal. Where would you have gone then?"

        "I hadn't thought about that."

        "No? - - How long had you known Mr. Rabone?"

        "I never knew him at all."

        "And the young woman - Miss Jones - how long had you known her?"

        "I had never met her before."

        "Well, we shall see." His voice took a serious tone as he went on: "I want you to appreciate the position in which you stand. You escape from custody. Within two days a man is murdered in a house which otherwise is occupied, so far as we are at present informed, only by two women and yourself. One of the women has disappeared and the other is not under suspicion. You slept on the floor below the room of the murdered man. It appears that you were first on the scene of the crime.

        "There is at present no charge against you, and I am under no necessity of warning you, but I tell you now that you are under no obligation to say anything if you prefer to remain silent. In that event, we must establish the truth in our own ways.

        "But, if you are innocent of this murder, you may find the truth to be the simplest and wisest in your own interest.

        "The fact that you were the first one to raise the alarm obviously is not in itself evidence cf any criminal responsibility. But there is one other matter which I must invite you to explain, if you are able to do so.

        "You must have been penniless when you entered Mrs. Benson's house. It appears that you made promises of payment to her which you did not keep. The young woman who has disappeared had also been frank in informing her landlady that she was out of work, and that her money was almost gone.

        "Last evening, if Mrs. Benson's testimony is to be believed, you retired to your room at a very early hour, possibly to avoid meeting the man who was to be murdered during the night; possibly because you were not in a position to make the payment to Mrs. Benson which you had promised earlier in the day.

        "But Miss Jones subsequently gave an assurance on your behalf that you would be able to pay when you came down in the morning.

        "At some time between 2 and 3 a.m., Mr. Rabone, who had a habit of carrying a considerable sum in his pocket-book, was murdered, and robbed.

        "You were then arrested on the scene of the crime, and you had a sum of over twenty pounds in your pockets."

        Francis heard this statement of the case which he had to meet with an outward calmness, for he was conscious that the Inspector watched him keenly for any sign of confusion or admission of guilt. But his heart sank somewhat, for it was a line of attack which he had not expected to hear. In fact, the idea that William Rabone might have been robbed had not previously entered his mind.

        But he recognized the fairness with which he was being treated. He was told what the position was, as against himself, and he could be silent or speak at his own choice.

        He said: "I didn't have the money from him."

        "From Miss Jones?"

        "No. Not from her."

        "Then will you explain how it came to your hands?"

        "I would rather not. I don't really see why I should."

        "It is for you to decide. But I will be more frank with you than you are with us. Treasury notes cannot usually be traced. You may be relying on that. But there are exceptions.

        "When notes are issued for the first time, there may be records of the numbers of the series which are paid out from the Bank of England, and which are distributed over the counter by the bank which receives them in bulk.

        "There were notes of such a kind that Mr. Rabone drew to refill his pocket-book three days ago."

        Francis listened to this statement and was not greatly impressed. Actually, the two ten-shilling notes that he had received from William Rabone did not come to his mind.

        "I should think," he said, "that that should be very useful to you in discovering the thief"

        Inspector Combridge looked his surprise, which he rarely would.

        "And that," he asked, "is all that you have to say?"

        "Yes. About that. I think it is."

        "You still decline to give any explanation of how that money came into your hands during the night?"

        "It wasn't during the night."

        "Or the day before?"

        "Yes. It was my own money. I don't see why I should."

        The Inspector's voice was colder than before as he asked: "Is there any statement that you wish to make concerning the events of the night?"

        "Only that I was waked up by hearing a scream, and got some clothes on as quickly as I could, and went up, and found Mr. Rabone dead."

        "And Miss Jones? Did you see anything of her?"

        "I haven't seen her since I went upstairs about six o clock "

        "You don't know whether she was in her room when you went up?"

        "I know, she wasn't. Her door was open, and I looked in there first."

        "But you don't know whether she was there at the time of the murder?"

        "No How could I?"

        "I asked you."

        Francis became silent. He remembered the steps he had heard after the scream. He could not say they were hers, though he had little doubt. For all he knew, an admission might be fatal to her. Equally possibly, a lie now might make it vain to help with the truth at a later time, if that

should be what her safety required.

        He said: "I think I've told you about all I know. But if you're not satisfied I think I ought to have legal advice before I say more."

        Inspector Combridge became silent. The request was one which could not be refused, nor did it occur to him to make any difficulty about it, though it was the technique of these enquiries to get suspected persons to talk, and if possible to sign statements which had been worded for them, before they could have the protection of legal caution.

        But his doubt was on different grounds. He had a long experience of such crimes, and of the sometimes very unexpected people by whom they are committed, and he had an instinctive feeling that he must look elsewhere for the hand which had used the razor. He was aware of a number of minor evidences which were consistent with, if they did not actually support, the account which Francis gave of how he had discovered the murdered man.

        He saw also that he had as yet no material from which a complete, conclusive case could be built up. In particular, the motive and manner of Miss Jones's disappearance must be resolved.

        On the other hand, here was a man with a criminal record, penniless, and in desperate need of the money which had been in the bank inspector's pocket-book. There was motive, opportunity, and the absence of anyone else in the house upon whom suspicion would naturally fall, if he excepted Miss Jones, and Sir Lionel Tipshift was definite in his opinion that it had not been a woman's work. He spoke of a rather tall man, which was slightly in Francis's favour, for he was not of more than medium height. But it was, at least, far more probable that the blow had been struck by him than by a girl of Miss Jones's description, as that had been given to him.

        In addition to these arguments of motive and opportunity, and of the absence of any other whom it would be equally natural to suspect, there was the fact that a substantial sum of money had been found upon him, together with a cheque-book, concerning which there had not yet been time for enquiry to be made, but which would, in all probability, be found to have come from the possession of the murdered man.

        He knew that two of the notes certainly had, and it would require a very good explanation to induce any jury to believe that their transit had been of an innocent kind, or that the remainder of the money had not been taken from the same source.

        Now, an invitation for such explanation was met by refusal, followed by request for legal assistance. That, if there were no innocent explanation to give, was precisely what Inspector Combridge's experience would expect to hear. He saw that it gave him reasonable ground for charging Harold Vaughan with complicity in the crime, which he might otherwise have delayed to do.

        He said: "As you do not offer any explanation of how the money came into your possession, it becomes my duty to charge you with the murder of William Rabone, and I have to warn you that anything you say may be used in evidence against you."

        "I have nothing to say, except that I have told you the truth already, I had nothing to do with the murder, and don't know who did it."

        "Very well. What solicitor would you like to have?"

        Francis thought of the firm who had undertaken his defence previously, on Tony Welch's instructions. In the result, he was landed here. That might not be their fault, but they were men whom he did not like. He had known, while they had been active and cunning in his defence, that they had assumed his guilt. No doubt, most of their clients were justly charged.

        He thought of Mr. Jellipot, who had been his father's solicitor, and to whom, in his own person, he would most naturally go. Well, he supposed, in any event, his identity must be revealed now. He had a vague idea that Mr. Jellipot was not a criminal lawyer, but he felt that to be an advantage rather than otherwise. The austere respectability of that conveyancing office seemed to thrust the ideas of c