Chapter Thirty Four. “Silence for Silence!”

“You!”

It was the only word which the girl uttered, but its tone showed her horror and indignation.

The green-shaded light was, she saw, switched on at the writing-table, and as she entered, there before her, seated in her father’s chair, was the man who had posed as Frank’s friend, “Captain Wetherton!”

As she had slowly opened the door he had raised his head, pale and startled. But only for a second. When he recognised who it was, he rose and, bowing, smiled with perfect sangfroid.

He had entered the house with the false latch-key which he had had made from the wax impression he had taken of the key which Gwen had carried on that night of the false assignation. His only fear had been, however, a meeting with the girl Laura.

Now that he saw that it was not she, he only smiled triumphantly.

“Yes,” he said simply. “It’s me! Are you very surprised?”

Instantly she recognised that, upon the blotting-pad, was lying open the precious document which she herself had typed. He had opened the drawer, abstracted it, and read it.

He, her enemy, knew their secret!

“By what right, pray, are you here, sir?” she demanded, advancing into the room boldly, and facing him.

“I have no right. I’m here just by my own will,” was his quick, defiant response.

“This is my father’s house, and I shall alarm him,” she said determinedly. “You have no right thus to pry into his private affairs!”

“I have to decide that, Miss Griffin,” he said, as over his dark face spread that evil smile she remembered so well.

Having risen from the chair, he had now advanced closely to her. She noticed that he wore thick woollen socks over his boots, so as to muffle his footsteps, while upon his hands were a pair of grey suède gloves which appeared too large for him. Jim Jannaway had been a man of many precautions, ever since his finger-prints had been taken on a certain memorable day at Ipswich police-station, prior to his conviction.

“But,” he laughed, examining her from head to toe, “you really look charming, my dear little girl—even better than when in your walking kit. Why!” he exclaimed, pointing across the room. “Why—what’s that—over there?”

She turned suddenly, taking her eyes off him for an instant, but saw nothing. His ruse succeeded, for that instant was sufficient for him to slip behind her and close the door, turning the key in the lock.

“I must apologise for doing this in your own house, Miss Griffin, but I fear that we may be overheard,” he said. “Now I want to have a very serious chat with you.”

“I wish to say nothing to you, sir,” she replied drawing herself up haughtily, the train of her pretty gown sweeping the floor. “I only demand to know what you are doing here, reading my father’s papers.”

“And suppose I refuse to tell you—eh?” he asked, raising his brows.

“Then I shall scream, and alarm the household. They will hand you over to the police.”

“And if you were so ill-advised as to do that, Miss Griffin,” answered the fellow impudently, advancing a step nearer to her, and looking straight into her face. “Well—you would suffer very severely for it. That’s all.”

“I’m prepared to take all the consequences,” was her calm reply.

“Take care!” he said threateningly, in a low hoarse voice. “I’m a desperate man when driven into a corner.”

“You mean rather that you’re a coward when cornered,” she said coldly. “I am glad to have this opportunity of meeting, in order to repay you for the gross injustice which you have done me.”

“You’re a little fool!” he said in a hard tone. “Keep quiet, or somebody will hear you.”

“You entrapped me in that place. I have now entrapped you—in my own house,” she exclaimed, with a look of triumph.

“Not for long,” he said determinedly. “Do you know that I could strangle you where you stand, and still get clear. Even though you screamed. I already have a rope on the balcony yonder, down into the street. But don’t be alarmed. I have no wish to injure you, my dear little girl—not in the least. We will just make an arrangement, and cry quits.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, listen. You’ve discovered me here, and you could give me away. But I want to buy your silence.”

“Buy my silence!” she exclaimed, staring at him. “Yes. Why not? You must buy mine. Shall we not then be quits?”

She regarded him with a puzzled air. He was her bitterest foe, and she was wondering what was the true meaning of the suggestion. She was undecided, too, whether not to alarm the house, instead of parleying further. She had caught the fellow in her father’s room wearing the apparel of the modern burglar, therefore the police would, without doubt, arrest him as such.

Suddenly her mind was made up, and with a quick movement she rushed across to the electric bell beside the fireplace.

He gave vent to a short dry laugh of triumph, the reason of which was next second plain. The little porcelain push had been broken, and the contact disarranged.

Jim Jannaway always took precautions. He was a cool and calculating scoundrel.

She turned upon him in quick anger, and he saw that she intended to scream for help.

“One moment, if you please, Miss Griffin,” he cried in a low voice. “Just hear my suggestion before you raise the alarm and compel me to depart hurriedly through the window. A word now will save both of us a great deal of unnecessary bother afterwards. You’re a very brave little girl, and I admire you for it. Most other girls, on seeing me here, would have gone into hysterics, or fainted. But you’re a little ‘brick.’”

“Thank you, this is really no time for compliments,” was her cold, resentful reply. “Please say what you have to say, and quickly.”

She had managed to cross the room half-way, and from where she now stood she could see that the precious document she had typed lay open at its last page. The fellow had evidently read it all!

“Well,” he said, in that easy-going manner of his that she found so extremely irritating. “As far as I can at present discern, Miss Griffin, the game is a drawn one. I can quite—”

“I consider it blackguardly impertinence on your part to enter my father’s house at night, and read his private papers,” she protested, her face pale and determined.

“My dear girl, to me your opinion of my actions really doesn’t matter,” he laughed. “I wanted to discover something, and have adopted the easiest means of doing so.”

“Even at risk of being arrested?”

“Oh, I shan’t be arrested,” he laughed. “Don’t think I’m afraid of that. Why, my dear girl, perhaps you wouldn’t believe it, but this isn’t the first time I’ve been in this very room. I know what’s in all those drawers yonder, and even the balance in your father’s banker’s pass-book.”

“You’ve been here before!” gasped the girl astounded. “How did you get in?”

“Why, with your own key. It was easy enough. Your servants never bolt the front door. They really ought to be more careful, you know,” he laughed.

She hesitated for a moment, and in that slight hesitation he, crafty malefactor that he was, recognised that he had triumphed.

“I may presume, I suppose, that you’ve read that document upon the writing-table?” she asked a moment later.

“I have—every word of it,” he replied, with a polite bow.

“That is why you came here?”

“It was. I really expected to experience greater trouble in finding it. I opened only three drawers before coming across it.”

“Probably you’d like a copy of it,” she said, with bitter sarcasm.

“Thank you, no. I have a very excellent memory, and can recollect all I require. Besides, I’ve taken a few notes,” was the bold and defiant answer, “All I would request of you, my dear girl, is to keep a still tongue in your head, go up to bed, and forget all about this unexpected meeting. Such a course will be much the best for you, I assure you.”

“You—my enemy, are trying to advise me as a friend—eh? This is really amusing! I tell you quite frankly that I intend to give you over to the police. You cleverly entrapped me, and now from me you may expect no clemency.”

“I want none,” he laughed. “But if I’m arrested, your friend, ‘Red Mullet,’ shall also see the inside of a prison again. I promise you that.”

“He is innocent of this burglary,” she said.

“But he isn’t innocent of certain other little matters about which Scotland Yard will be only too delighted to know,” replied the fellow, with an evil grin. “So if you don’t want him to go to ‘quod’—and he’s been pretty good to you, I think—you’d better remain silent about to-night. And there’s the other matter—the—”

And he paused, and looked straight into her face, without concluding.

“Well?” she asked in a hard voice, holding the train of her robe with one hand, and still facing him boldly. “And what is the other matter, pray?”

“I wish to tell you quite plainly that if you choose to be a little fool, you’ll take the consequences. They’ll fall on you, and pretty heavily too. Trust me to escape them.”

“And I tell you that I intend to be a little fool, as you so politely put it,” was her fearless response. “It is my duly to my father to go at once and tell him of my discovery. And I will!”

“Very well,” he answered quite calmly, his evil eyes still fixed upon hers. “Go. You are perfectly at liberty. To me, it is of no great consequence, but to you it will mean both the ruin of your reputation and the loss of your lover!”

“How?” she gasped quickly, her face in an instant as pale as death.

“How?” he echoed in a fierce low whisper, advancing until he was close to the girl. “Cannot you see that I shall tell Frank Farquhar the truth of your absence from your home—that you met me, and stayed with me in those rooms!”

“You scoundrel!” she cried, drawing away from him, her cheeks flushed with sudden anger. “You threatened this before—you despicable coward, to thus try and take advantage of a woman’s good name! You destroyed that false telegram, so that I should not have it to show as proof!”

“You could get a copy from the post-office, I daresay,” he laughed airily. “But I merely make plain what is my intention, and that’s why I’ve come to the conclusion that the game between us is a drawn one.”

“Your threats have no terror for me!” she exclaimed, turning fiercely upon him. He saw that in her big eyes was determination and defiance, and was surprised.

“Then shout away, my dear girl—scream the house down, if you like,” he laughed coolly, as though with utter unconcern. “But just let me put things straight again first.” Then walking to the writing-table he took the translation of the decipher, replaced it in its drawer, and relocked it with a key he drew from his pocket.

His coolness was amazing, his cunning, extraordinary. The long window leading to the balcony over the portico was ajar. He had fixed a thin silken rope to the railings ready for escape to the street in case of necessity.

“Your conduct is abominable!” she ejaculated. “What harm have I done you that I should deserve this?”

“My dear girl, my conduct is only abominable of necessity, I assure you,” he argued with an impudent smile. “Our compact is simple enough. You do not wish to lose the man you love. Indeed, why should you?”

“Ah! why indeed?” she cried. “I have you alone to thank for all the evil suspicions cast upon me.”

“You have told them nothing—of course. You’re far too clever for that—eh?” he remarked, standing easily before her with his hands in his pockets. “Besides, what could you say?”

“I could say nothing,” she replied bitterly. “I only know that you lied to me, by posing as Frank’s friend.”

“My dear little girl,” he answered with an arrogant laugh. “I was compelled to tell you a fairy-story, because—well, shall I tell you the truth?—because I was so very anxious for the loan of your latch-key.”

“Then why was I kept there a prisoner? Why did that red-faced blackguard come to me, and threaten me?”

“I had nothing whatever to do with that. I was not there,” he protested.

“You enticed me into the hateful place by saying that Frank was in hiding there,” she replied firmly.

“For the reason I have already explained. I apologise. Can I do more, Miss Griffin?”

“Apologise!” she echoed in a hoarse whisper. “You apologise! I wish for no apology!”

“But you desire your own happiness, and can secure it, providing I am silent,” he said in a low, clear deliberate voice. “Think what it would mean to you if you gave the alarm—the wrecking of your own life, and the arrest of your friend Mullet! But I give you perfect liberty to choose your future course of action. I have no wish to coerce you.”

“You could not, even if you wished!” she declared, yet through her brain surged thoughts of what the loss of Frank would mean to her.

The man before her was a blackguard. He had shown himself as such. With perfect coolness he could besmirch her fair name in such a manner that it could never again be cleared.

At that moment the girl was fighting for her own honour as well as her father’s secret which this man had gained. It was a secret no longer—it could never be. Their enemies had triumphed!

She set her teeth hard, and tried to think.

Jim Jannaway was quick to notice her change of manner.

“Remember,” he remarked, “one word to your father regarding this visit of mine, and your lover and your father shall know the truth!”

“They will know whatever lies you invent regarding me!” she said in a voice of intense bitterness.

He only shrugged his shoulders and smiled. She, a mere innocent girl, had no chance against his quick intellect, sharpened as it had been by years of crafty cunning and double dealing. To the “crooks” and silk-hatted adventurers of London the very name of Jim Jannaway was synonymous of all that was perfection in kid-gloved blackguardism.

“Well,” he said a moment later, “I haven’t time for further argument, Miss Griffin. I’m sorry I can’t stay longer. Perhaps the front door would be a less conspicuous exit for me.”

And so saying he stepped out upon the balcony, untied the silken rope from the railing, rolled it up swiftly, and placed it in his pocket.

A moment later he was again standing before her.

She stood glaring at him with a look of bitter hatred, while he recognised that her lips were already effectually sealed.

She dare not risk the suspicions which he could with a word place upon her. Hence he, alas! held her in his power!

“Remember!” he said, “I shall say nothing until you dare to give me away. It is a compact between us. Silence for silence!”

Then, without further word, he moved across to the door, unlocked it, and next second had disappeared noiselessly down the stairs.

And with him had gone the great secret of the hiding-place of the treasure of Israel which her father believed to be his—and his alone!

The girl cast herself into a chair, and gave way to a paroxysm of tears.

Jim Jannaway and his friends had again triumphed.