CHAPTER XXI. RECORDS A STRANGE STATEMENT.

"Will you permit me to come inside a moment?" I asked the girl. "I want you to tell me one or two things, if you will."

At first she hesitated, but having surveyed me critically and finding, I suppose, that I was not a tramp she opened the door wider and admitted me to the room wherein her mistress had entertained me on the previous night.

I glanced quickly around. Yes, nothing had been altered. There was the chair in which I had sat, and the round, mahogany table upon which my head had laid so helplessly while the reptile, charmed by the Hindu's music, had sat erect with swaying head.

Ah! as that terrible scene again arose before my eyes I stood horrified. The girl noticed my demeanour, and looked askance at me.

"Does your mistress have many visitors?" I asked her. "To tell you the truth, I'm making these confidential inquiries on behalf of an insurance company in London. So you can be perfectly open with me. Mrs. Petre will never know that you have spoken."

"Well, sir," replied the dark-eyed maid, after a pause, during which time she twisted her dainty little apron in her hand, "I suppose I really ought not to say anything, but the fact is mistress acts very curiously sometimes. Besides, I don't like Ali."

"You mean the Indian?"

"Yes. He's too crafty and cunning," she replied. "Sometimes in the middle of the night I wake up and hear Ali, shut up in his room, playing on his flute—such horrible music. And on such occasions the mistress and Horton, the man, are usually with him—listening to his concert, I suppose."

"On those occasions, have there been guests in the house?" I asked quickly.

"Once, I think about a fortnight ago, a gentleman had called earlier in the evening. But I did not see him."

"Did you see him next morning?"

"Oh, no; he did not stay the night."

"But on this particular occasion, how did you know that Mrs. Petre and Horton were in the room with him?"

"Because I listened from the top of the stairs, and could hear voices. The gentleman was in there too, I believe, listening to the noise of Ali's pipes."

Had the stranger fallen a victim to the serpent, I wondered?

Who could he have been, and what was his fate?

"Has your mistress and her two servants left you suddenly like this before?" I inquired.

"Never, sir. I can't make it out. They seem to have gone out with the gentleman who called—and evidently they left all of a hurry."

"Why?"

"Because when I got back I found that my mistress had pulled out the first coat and hat she could find, and had not taken even a handbag. Besides, if she knew she was to be absent she would have left me a note." And she added in a tone of resentment: "It isn't fair to leave me by myself in a lonely house like this!"

"No, it isn't," I agreed. "But, tell me, does your mistress have many callers?"

"Very few. She has had a visitor lately—a gentleman. He stayed a few days, and then left suddenly."

"Young or old?"

"Elderly, clean-shaven, and grey hair. She used to call him Digby."

"Digby!" I echoed. "When was he here? Tell me quickly!"

"Oh, about four days ago, I think. Yes—he went away last Sunday night."

"Tell me all about him," I urged her. "He's a friend of mine."

"Oh, then perhaps I ought not to say anything," said the girl a little confused.

"On the contrary, you will be doing me the very greatest service if you tell me all that you know concerning him," I declared. "Don't think that anything you say will annoy me, for it won't. He was my friend, but he served me a very evil trick."

"Well, sir," she replied, "he arrived here very late one night, and my mistress sat with him in the drawing-room nearly all night talking to him. I crept down to try and hear what was going on, but they were speaking so low, almost whispering, so that I could catch only a few words."

"What did you hear?" I inquired breathlessly.

"Well, from what I could gather the gentleman was in some grave danger—something to do with a girl. Mistress seemed very excited and talked about another girl, which she called Freda, or something like that, and then the gentleman mentioned somebody named Royle, whereon mistress seemed to fly into a passion. I heard her say distinctly, 'You are a fool, Digby! If you're not very careful you'll give the game away.' Then he said, 'If the truth comes out, she will suffer, not me.'"

"Whom did you infer he meant by she?" I asked.

"Ah, sir, that's impossible to say," was her response. "Well, they were alone there for hours. He seemed to be begging her to tell him something, but she steadily refused. And every time he mentioned the name of Royle she became angry and excited. Once I heard her say, 'As long as you keep carefully out of the way, you need not fear anything. Nobody—not even the girl—suspects the truth. So I don't see that you need have the slightest apprehension. But mind, you're going to play the straight game with me, Digby, or, by heaven! it will be the worse for you!'"

"Then she threatened him?" I remarked.

"Yes. She seemed very determined and spoke in a low, hard voice. Of course, I could only catch a few disjointed words, and out of them I tried to make sense. But I overheard sufficient to know that the visitor was in a state of great agitation and fear."

"Did he go out much?"

"All the time he was here I never knew him to go further than the garden," said the maid, who seemed to be unusually intelligent.

"What about Ali?"

"Ali was his constant companion. When they were together they spoke in some foreign language."

A sudden thought flashed across my mind.

Could Ali be a Peruvian Indian and not a Hindu? Was he the accomplice of the mysterious Englishman named Cane—the man suspected of causing the death of Sir Digby Kemsley?

What this girl was revealing was certainly amazing.

"You are quite sure that this man she called Digby left the neighbourhood last Sunday?" I asked her.

"Quite. I overheard him speaking with the mistress late on Saturday night. He said, 'By this time to-morrow I shall be back in Brussels.' And I know he went there, for next day I posted a letter to Brussels."

"To him?" I cried. "What was the address?"

"The name was Bryant, and it was addressed Poste Restante, Brussels. I remember it, because I carefully made a note of it, as the whole affair seemed so extraordinary."

"But this man she called Digby. Was he well-dressed?" I inquired.

"Oh, no—not at all. He seemed poor and shabby. He only had with him a little handbag, but I believe he came from a considerable distance, probably from abroad, expressly to see her."

"Then you think he is in Brussels now?"

"Well, I posted the letter on Monday night. To-day is Wednesday," she said.

I reflected. My first impulse was to go straight to Brussels and send a message to Mr. Bryant at the Poste Restante—a message that would trap him into an appointment with me.

But in face of Phrida's present peril could I possibly leave London?

I was at the parting of the ways. To hesitate might be to lose trace of the man who had proved such a false friend, while, by crossing to Brussels again, I would be leaving Phrida to her fate.

"You heard no other mention of the person named Royle?" I asked her after a brief pause, during which I placed a second half-sovereign in her hand.

She reflected for a moment, her eyes cast down upon the carpet, as we stood together in that sombre little room of horrors.

"Well, yes," she replied thoughtfully. "One afternoon when I was taking tea into the drawing-room where they were sitting together I heard mistress say, 'I don't like that man Royle at all. He means mischief—more especially as he loves the girl.' The gentleman only laughed and said, 'Have no fear on that score. He knows nothing, and is not likely to know, unless you tell him.' Then mistress said, 'I've been a fool, perhaps, but when we met I told him one or two things—sufficient to cause him to think.' Then the gentleman stood up angrily and cried out in quite a loud voice: 'What! you fool! You've actually told him—you've allowed your infernal tongue to wag and let out the truth!' But she said that she had not told all the truth, and started abusing him—so much so that he left the room and went out into the garden, where, a few minutes later, I saw him talking excitedly to Ali. But when the two men talked I could, of course, understand nothing," added the girl.

"Then your mistress declared that she didn't like the man Royle, eh?"

"Yes; she seemed to fear him—fear that he knew too much about some business or other," replied the maid. "And to tell you quite frankly, sir, after watching the mistress and her visitor very narrowly for a couple of days I came to the conclusion that the gentleman was hiding—that perhaps the police were after him."

"Why?" I inquired in a casual tone. "What made you think that?"

"I hardly know. Perhaps from the scraps of conversation I overheard, perhaps from his cunning, secret manner—not but what he was always nice to me, and gave me something when he left."

"You didn't hear any other names of persons mentioned?" I asked. "Try and think, as all that you tell me is of the greatest importance to me."

The girl stood silent, while I paced up and down that room in which, not many hours before, I had endured that awful mental torture. She drew her hand across her brow, trying to recall.

"Yes, there was another name," she admitted at last, "but I can't at the moment recall it."

"Ah, do!" I implored her. "Try and recall it. I am in no hurry to leave."

Again the dark-eyed maid in the dainty apron was silent—both hands upon her brow, as she had turned from me and was striving to remember.

"It was some foreign name—a woman's name," she said.

I recollected the dead girl was believed to have been a foreigner!

Suddenly she cried—

"Ah, I remember! The name was Mary Brack."

"Mary Brack!" I repeated.

"Yes. Of course I don't know how it's spelt."

"Well, if it were a foreign name it would probably be Marie B-r-a-c-q—if you are sure you've pronounced it right."

"Oh, yes. I'm quite sure. Mistress called her 'poor girl!' so I can only suppose that something must have happened to her."

I held my breath at her words.

Yes, without a doubt I had secured a clue to the identity of the girl who lost her life at Harrington Gardens.

Her name, in all probability, was Marie Bracq!