The Witness on the Roof (29 page)

As she floated across the stage, rising and sinking in a motion that was at once graceful and bewildering, one caught glimpses through the glittering tissue of white rounded limbs, of waves of dark hair, but the face—the face remained veiled always.

From chance remarks he had overheard as they were entering the hall, Hewlett had learned that the veiled dancer had appeared for the first time only a month ago, that she had caught on at once, and that so for no one, not even the manager, had seen her unveiled. Consequently, curiosity and speculation as to her identity were rife.

Septimus Lockyer looked at him.

“I told you you would recognize an old acquaintance.”

“I have.” Hewlett indicated Gregory with a jerk of his head.

“Two old acquaintances I should have said,” the
K.C.
corrected. “Look at the veiled dancer, Hewlett. Graceful figure, isn't she? A bit big perhaps, but—” He shrugged his shoulders.

Hewlett looked at her again, but there was nothing familiar about the lissom figure enveloped now in golden clouds.

“Carry your mind back to the Towers,” Septimus Lockyer whispered, “to the day Lady Warchester gave us her half of the broken sixpence. Do you remember meeting some one in the drive?”

“Why, of course!” A sudden flash of recognition gleamed in Hewlett's face. “You mean Miss—”

“Precisely!” The
K.C.
nodded. “Take another look, Hewlett.”

But the veiled dancer's turn was coming to an end; a tremendous clapping from the audience testified to the satisfaction she had given. Gregory got up from his place and hurriedly made his way to the exit. Septimus Lockyer glanced at Hewlett.

“Seen enough? The veiled dancer only does one turn a night.”

Still puzzled, Hewlett assented, and they both left the hall. Neither of them spoke until they were once more in a cab: then the
K.C.
looked at his companion.

“Well?”

“If that is Miss Cécile De Lavelle,” Hewlett said sturdily, “I am of opinion that she ought to be interrogated at once with regard to her life while she was dancing as one of the Sisters De Lavelle. It is possible that she might be able to give us most valuable information that might lead to the discovery of the Grove Street murderer, and we might manage to frighten it out of her by threatening to prosecute her for imposture.”

A curious smile curved Septimus Lockyer's lips.

“We might,” he assented, “but I don't think we will try that plan just yet, Hewlett. I have a plan of my own. You must help me with that, and then very soon, probably within the week, you shall have your interview with Miss Cécile De Lavelle—the pseudo-Evelyn Davenant.”

M
R.
E
DWARD
Wallace sat in his room, waiting quietly. Presently there was a knock at the door—three distinct taps. Mr. Wallace got up lazily and opened it.

Mr. Hewlett, the detective, stepped inside.

“Any news, Simpson?” Mr. Hewlett had not resumed his moustache to-day, and its absence made a considerable difference to his appearance.

“Our man is here, sir,” answered Simpson, alias Mr. Edward Wallace, “and we think Archer's plan with the door will answer all right; he has managed to shave a bit off the wainscoting too. He is there now; I am expecting him up every minute. In the meantime, sir—” He went over to the cupboard and, bringing out a pair of black list slippers, handed them to Hewlett, who took off his boots at once.

He had just put on the slippers in their stead when the boy, Archer, came softly into the room.

“He is there, sir, and Mrs. Perks and somebody else. I can't see plain through the crack, but I think it is a woman.” Hewlett stood up.

“You wait here, Simpson.”

He crept softly down the back stairs and found himself in a sort of square hall into which the back door opened. That was locked and bolted, as Mr. Hewlett soon ascertained; of the other two doors, one led into Mrs. Perks's sitting-room, the other into the large pantry and kitchens. There was no one about; Mrs. Perks did all the work that was needed with the help of a charwoman. A streak of light beneath the parlour door testified to Archer's handiwork. Hewlett caught the sound of voices within—a low, deep, guttural growl easily to be recognized as Gregory's, and Mrs. Perks's tearful accents mingled with a louder, more defiant voice.

“You won't play me false twice!” Gregory was speaking. “You understand! I have made the appointment and you will have to keep it or you will take the consequences this time.”

“I don't know but what I'd just as soon take the consequences!”

As Detective Hewlett, with his ear close to the keyhole, caught the answer he started violently. Surely he was not mistaken—it was the voice he had heard in the avenue at the Towers, the voice of the veiled dancer of last night, of the one-time mistress of Davenant Hall.

Gregory laughed harshly.

“Suppose you try them! The worst of it is you won't be able to tell us how you like them!”

“Oh, Jim, Jim, don't!” The low, wailing cry was Mrs. Perks's. “I—I am sure I don't know how to sleep o' nights when I remember!”

“It takes a good deal to keep some folk awake!” was Mr. Gregory's unsympathetic rejoinder. “I dare say though, if Cissie there isn't punctual to time to-morrow that you won't need an alarm for a week or two!”

A low hoarse sob broke from Mrs. Perks.

“You—you are a brute, Jim Gregory!”

“If I am, it is the fault of the folk that made me so!” the man returned in a stubborn voice. “It's no use you trying on that game with me, Maria Perks. I've been done out of my rights once, this time I'm going to make sure. It has got to be the one thing or the other.”

“Don't put yourself out, Jim!” The loud, hard voice of Evelyn Spencer's impersonator was a little subdued now, the detective fancied. “If I make a promise, I keep it.”

“No, you don't—not always!” Gregory rejoined uncompromisingly. “But you are a-going to this time, my girl, so you needn't make any mistake! And if my Lord Tomnoddy, or whatever his name is, sends his flowers and his presents to the veiled dancer again—why, he will have to reckon with me, that is all!”

There was a pause; then the dancer laughed unsteadily. “What a fool you are, Jim! Why, if Lord Sandford chooses to give me diamonds, do you suppose I am going to refuse them? But as for anything else, haven't I promised you—”

“Ay, and I'll see you keep it!” Evidently Gregory was not going to be smoothed down. “'Tain't going to be Basil Wilton over again, anyhow!”

“You beast!” There was a sound as of a heavy missile being flung across the room. “You keep a civil tongue in your head, Jim Gregory, or I don't go a step to the Harrow Road to-morrow, do as you will!”

“Oh, yes you will, Cissie!” Gregory's voice had dropped to a kind of rough pleading. “It—it isn't altogether my fault if I cut up a bit rough sometimes. It drives me mad when I see you looking and smiling at other fellows! If—if I was sure of you it would be different. I should be that gentle and loving!”

“Ugh! I dare say you would, but I haven't any use for that sort of thing.” The dancer's tone was very scornful. “I'll do what I said, but remember I won't have any of your nonsense!”

“It will come, though, Cissie, it will come,” Gregory urged. It was quite evident to the listener that the man was unwontedly moved, that the dancer was correspondingly calm. Mrs. Perks continued to sob weakly. “I have waited for years and years,” the man went on. “I ha' known my time must come at last, and come it has. But I'm not going to be done out of it by any lordlings!” with a sudden accession of fury. “When I saw him waiting at the stage door the other night I could ha' stuck a knife into him with a will!”

“More fool you!” the woman responded with a laugh, yet Hewlett fancied there was a touch of real anxiety in her voice. “You would not have mended your cause by that, I can tell you!”

“Nor hurt it!” Gregory finished stolidly. “You are a-going to give me my way because you have got to, my girl! I don't make no mistake about that, no more need you! Ten o'clock to-morrow morning, and see as you don't keep me waiting!”

“That is enough!” There was a stir as if the dancer had kicked back her chair in a rage. “I shan't stand much more of this, Jim Gregory, so I tell you! I have promised you. Best for you to be off while I'm in the same mind!”

“Ah—ah, I am going!” Gregory apparently bestirred himself. “Well, so long till to-morrow morning, Cissie! So long, Mrs. Perks.”

Hewlett held his breath, fearing that Mr. Gregory might elect to go out the back way, but in a moment he heard him open the other door and knew that that danger was passed.

The two women were left alone; there was a silence broken only by the sound of Mrs. Perks's sobbing. At last the other spoke:

“I have brought my pigs to a pretty market! Stop that crying, Maria, or I shall do you a mischief! It aggravates me!”

“I can't bear to think of it, Cissie! That Jim Gregory frightens me. Suppose he don't keep his word after all!”

“Oh, he will do that for his own sake,” the dancer returned. “He hasn't the wit to see—”

“What?” Mrs. Perks questioned breathlessly,

“That a few mumbled words can't tie a woman down for ever,” the other finished. “I must be off now; Maria. I have got an early turn to-night. Shall you be there to-morrow?”

“No, no! I couldn't bear it!” Mrs. Perks said huskily.

“All right, then! I shall see you later on. Good-bye! I am going to walk to Southwick Crescent and see if I can pick up a taxi.” There was another silence; the door into the hall opened again, then the dancer stepped back. “Don't cry, old girl! I haven't been much of a sister to you. You have no need to fret about me.” Then the door closed softly and Mrs. Perks was alone.

Hewlett stole silently up the stairs and back to Mr. Edward Wallace's room at the top of the house.

Hewlett looked at him.

“I can't make much of this, Simpson. Gregory has got some sort of hold over this woman, but what it is I don't just see.”

Simpson hesitated.

“I know he has some sort of a hold, sir—I made out as much the other day—and it might be over her pretending to be Miss Spencer. I dare say Gregory has heard we are making inquiries about her, and of course he does not know that we can lay our hands on her at any minute.”

“That may have something to do with it,” Hewlett assented thoughtfully. “Curious she should turn out to be Mrs. Perks's sister! Well, the next thing for me to do is to go round to Mr. Lockyer and tell him what we have heard. It may be useful, or it may not. I shall have to go over it a bit before I make up my mind.”

As Mr. Hewlett went downstairs he noticed that the door of Mrs. Perks's sitting-room stood ajar; he even caught the sound of a low sob.

“Now does she know anything, or does she not?” he soliloquized. “The husband was all right, but I don't feel so sure of her. And yet—well, it is a puzzle altogether!”

In Edgware Road he took a cab to St. James's Street. Septimus Lockyer was at home and expecting him.

“Any news, Hewlett?” the
K.C.
asked as he drew a sheet of blotting-paper over a note he had just written. Hewlett looked a little depressed.

“I have overheard an interview between Miss Cécile De Lavelle and Gregory and Mrs. Perks, sir; but I'm not sure that it sheds much light upon matters. Here are my notes, if you can make them out.”

Septimus Lockyer held out his hand for the book and studied it in silence for a minute, his brows drawn together, his fingers tapping rhythmically on the table. At last he looked up.

“I think this is just what we wanted, Hewlett.”

“Is it, sir?” The detective looked thoroughly at sea.

Septimus Lockyer nodded.

“Yes, you have done good work over this case, Hewlett. But for you I doubt whether the Grove Street Mystery would ever have been elucidated. I shall see that your share of it is heard of in the proper quarter. If I have been more fortunate than you in tracking down the real criminal at the end it is merely because the luck has been with me. All the real hard work—the tracing of Evelyn's Spencer's identity— was done by you. Now for what time did Mr. Gregory make this appointment? Ten o'clock in Harrow Road. Humph! May I trouble you to pass me that directory, Hewlett?”

The detective did as he was asked. His mind was in a more chaotic state than ever. He was unable to see what possible bearing upon the Grove Street Mystery the conversation he had overheard was likely to have. It seemed to him that it might refer to something very different.

Septimus Lockyer lifted the blotting-paper, took out the note he had written, tore it in two, and tossed it into the fire. Then he went over to the telephone and carried on a colloquy of which Hewlett could only catch stray sentences.

Coming back, he took a fresh sheet of paper, and, seeming for the moment to forget the detective, scribbled a hasty note. Presently, however, he threw it across.

“Read that, Hewlett.”

The detective took it blankly, and read:

“Well?” the
K.C.
interrogated as the detective looked up.

“I am beginning to understand what you mean, sir,” Mr. Hewlett said slowly, “but I don't quite see now—”