CHAPTER XIX
HELENE EXPLAINS
And what she heard made her blood run cold.
Mme. Dauvray spoke in a hushed, awestruck voice.
"There is a presence in the room."
It was horrible to Celia that the poor woman was speaking the jargonwhich she herself had taught to her.
"I will speak to it," said Mme. Dauvray, and raising her voice alittle, she asked: "Who are you that come to us from the spirit-world?"
No answer came, but all the while Celia knew that Wethermill wasstealing noiselessly across the floor towards that voice which spokethis professional patter with so simple a solemnity.
"Answer!" she said. And the next moment she uttered a little shrillcry--a cry of enthusiasm. "Fingers touch my forehead--now they touch mycheek--now they touch my throat!"
And upon that the voice ceased. But a dry, choking sound was heard, anda horrible scuffling and tapping of feet upon the polished floor, asound most dreadful. They were murdering her--murdering an old, kindwoman silently and methodically in the darkness. The girl strained andtwisted against the pillar furiously, like an animal in a trap. But thecoils of rope held her; the scarf suffocated her. The scuffling becamea spasmodic sound, with intervals between, and then ceased altogether.A voice spoke--a man's voice--Wethermill's. But Celia would never haverecognised it--it had so shrill and fearful an intonation.
"That's horrible," he said, and his voice suddenly rose to a scream.
"Hush!" Helene Vauquier whispered sharply. "What's the matter?"
"She fell against me--her whole weight. Oh!"
"You are afraid of her!"
"Yes, yes!" And in the darkness Wethermill's voice came querulouslybetween long breaths. "Yes, NOW I am afraid of her!"
Helene Vauquier replied again contemptuously. She spoke aloud and quiteindifferently. Nothing of any importance whatever, one would havegathered, had occurred.
"I will turn on the light," she said. And through the chinks in thecurtain the bright light shone. Celia heard a loud rattle upon thetable, and then fainter sounds of the same kind. And as a kind ofhorrible accompaniment there ran the laboured breathing of the man,which broke now and then with a sobbing sound. They were stripping Mme.Dauvray of her pearl necklace, her bracelets, and her rings. Celia hada sudden importunate vision of the old woman's fat, podgy hands loadedwith brilliants. A jingle of keys followed.
"That's all," Helene Vauquier said. She might have just turned out thepocket of an old dress.
There was the sound of something heavy and inert falling with a dullcrash upon the floor. A woman laughed, and again it was Helene Vauquier.
"Which is the key of the safe?" asked Adele.
And Helene Vauquier replied:--
"That one."
Celia heard some one drop heavily into a chair. It was Wethermill, andhe buried his face in his hands. Helene went over to him and laid herhand upon his shoulder and shook him.
"Do you go and get her jewels out of the safe," she said, and she spokewith a rough friendliness.
"You promised you would blindfold the girl," he cried hoarsely.
Helene Vauquier laughed.
"Did I?" she said. "Well, what does it matter?"
"There would have been no need to--" And his voice broke off shudderingly.
"Wouldn't there? And what of us--Adele and me? She knows certainly thatwe are here. Come, go and get the jewels. The key of the door's on themantelshelf. While you are away we two will arrange the pretty baby inthere."
She pointed to the recess; her voice rang with contempt. Wethermillstaggered across the room like a drunkard, and picked up the key intrembling fingers. Celia heard it turn in the lock, and the door bang.Wethermill had gone upstairs.
Celia leaned back, her heart fainting within her. Arrange! It was herturn now. She was to be "arranged." She had no doubt what sinistermeaning that innocent word concealed. The dry, choking sound, thehorrid scuffling of feet upon the floor, were in her ears. And it hadtaken so long--so terribly long!
She heard the door open again and shut again. Then steps approached therecess. The curtains were flung back, and the two women stood in frontof her--the tall Adele Rossignol with her red hair and her coarse goodlooks and her sapphire dress, and the hard-featured, sallow maid. Themaid was carrying Celia's white coat. They did not mean to murder her,then. They meant to take her away, and even then a spark of hope lit upin the girl's bosom. For even with her illusions crushed she stillclung to life with all the passion of her young soul.
The two women stood and looked at her; and then Adele Rossignol burstout laughing. Vauquier approached the girl, and Celia had a moment'shope that she meant to free her altogether, but she only loosed thecords which fixed her to the pillar and the high stool.
"Mademoiselle will pardon me for laughing," said Adele Rossignolpolitely; "but it was mademoiselle who invited me to try my hand. Andreally, for so smart a young lady, mademoiselle looks too ridiculous."
She lifted the girl up and carried her back writhing and strugglinginto the salon. The whole of the pretty room was within view, but inthe embrasure of a window something lay dreadfully still and quiet.Celia held her head averted. But it was there, and, though it wasthere, all the while the women joked and laughed, Adele Rossignolfeverishly, Helene Vauquier with a real glee most horrible to see.
"I beg mademoiselle not to listen to what Adele is saying," exclaimedHelene. And she began to ape in a mincing, extravagant fashion themanner of a saleswoman in a shop. "Mademoiselle has never looked soravishing. This style is the last word of fashion. It is what there isof most CHIC. Of course, mademoiselle understands that the costume isnot intended for playing the piano. Nor, indeed, for the ballroom. Itleaps to one's eyes that dancing would be difficult. Nor is it intendedfor much conversation. It is a costume for a mood of quiet reflection.But I assure mademoiselle that for pretty young ladies who are thefavourites of rich old women it is the style most recommended by thecriminal classes."
All the woman's bitter rancour against Celia, hidden for months beneatha mask of humility, burst out and ran riot now. She went to AdeleRossignol's help, and they flung the girl face downwards upon the sofa.Her face struck the cushion at one end, her feet the cushion at theother. The breath was struck out of her body. She lay with her bosomheaving.
Helene Vauquier watched her for a moment with a grin, paying herselfnow for her respectful speeches and attendance.
"Yes, lie quietly and reflect, little fool!" she said savagely. "Wereyou wise to come here and interfere with Helene Vauquier? Hadn't youbetter have stayed and danced in your rags at Montmartre? Are the smartfrocks and the pretty hats and the good dinners worth the price? Askyourself these questions, my dainty little friend!"
She drew up a chair to Celia's side, and sat down upon it comfortably.
"I will tell you what we are going to do with you, Mlle. Celie. AdeleRossignol and that kind gentleman, M. Wethermill, are going to take youaway with them. You will be glad to go, won't you, dearie? For you loveM. Wethermill, don't you? Oh, they won't keep you long enough for youto get tired of them. Do not fear! But you will not come back, Mile.Celie. No; you have seen too much to-night. And every one will thinkthat Mlle. Celie helped to murder and rob her benefactress. They arecertain to suspect some one, so why not you, pretty one?"
Celia made no movement. She lay trying to believe that no crime hadbeen committed, that that lifeless body did not lie against the wall.And then she heard in the room above a bed wheeled roughly from itsplace.
The two women heard it too, and looked at one another.
"He should look in the safe," said Vauquier. "Go and see what he isdoing."
And Adele Rossignol ran from the room.
As soon as she was gone Vauquier followed to the door, listened, closedit gently, and came back. She stooped down.
"Mlle. Celie," she said, in a smooth, silky voice, which terrified thegirl more than her harsh tones, "there is just one little thing wrongin your appearance,
one tiny little piece of bad taste, if mademoisellewill pardon a poor servant the expression. I did not mention it beforeAdele Rossignol; she is so severe in her criticism, is she not? Butsince we are alone, I will presume to point out to mademoiselle thatthose diamond eardrops which I see peeping out under the scarf are alittle ostentatious in her present predicament. They are a provocationto thieves. Will mademoiselle permit me to remove them?"
She caught her by the neck and lifted her up. She pushed the lace scarfup at the side of Celia's head. Celia began to struggle furiously,convulsively. She kicked and writhed, and a little tearing sound washeard. One of her shoe-buckles had caught in the thin silk covering ofthe cushion and slit it. Helene Vauquier let her fall. She feltcomposedly in her pocket, and drew from it an aluminium flask--the sameflask which Lemerre was afterward to snatch up in the bedroom inGeneva. Celia stared at her in dread. She saw the flask flashing in thelight. She shrank from it. She wondered what new horror was to gripher. Helene unscrewed the top and laughed pleasantly.
"Mlle. Celie is under control," she said. "We shall have to teach herthat it is not polite in young ladies to kick." She pressed Celia downwith a hand upon her back, and her voice changed. "Lie still," shecommanded savagely. "Do you hear? Do you know what this is, Mlle.Celie?" And she held the flask towards the girl's face. "This isvitriol, my pretty one. Move, and I'll spoil these smooth whiteshoulders for you. How would you like that?"
Celia shuddered from head to foot, and, burying her face in thecushion, lay trembling. She would have begged for death upon her kneesrather than suffer this horror. She felt Vauquier's fingers lingeringwith a dreadful caressing touch upon her shoulders and about herthroat. She was within an ace of the torture, the disfigurement, andshe knew it. She could not pray for mercy. She could only lie quitestill, as she was bidden, trying to control the shuddering of her limbsand body.
"It would be a good lesson for Mlle. Celie," Helene continued slowly."I think that if Mlle. Celie will forgive the liberty I ought toinflict it. One little tilt of the flask and the satin of these prettyshoulders--"
She broke off suddenly and listened. Some sound heard outside had givenCelia a respite, perhaps more than a respite. Helene set the flask downupon the table. Her avarice had got the better of her hatred. Sheroughly plucked the earrings out of the girl's ears. She hid themquickly in the bosom of her dress with her eye upon the door. She didnot see a drop of blood gather on the lobe of Celia's ear and fall intothe cushion on which her face was pressed. She had hardly hidden themaway before the door opened and Adele Rossignol burst into the room.
"What is the matter?" asked Vauquier.
"The safe's empty. We have searched the room. We have found nothing,"she cried.
"Everything is in the safe," Helene insisted.
"No."
The two women ran out of the room and up the stairs. Celia, lying onthe settee, heard all the quiet of the house change to noise andconfusion. It was as though a tornado raged in the room overhead.Furniture was tossed about and over the room, feet stamped and ran,locks were smashed in with heavy blows. For many minutes the stormraged. Then it ceased, and she heard the accomplices clattering downthe stairs without a thought of the noise they made. They burst intothe room. Harry Wethermill was laughing hysterically, like a man offhis head. He had been wearing a long dark overcoat when he entered thehouse; now he carried the coat over his arm. He was in a dinner-jacket,and his black clothes were dusty and disordered.
"It's all for nothing!" he screamed rather than cried. "Nothing but theone necklace and a handful of rings!"
In a frenzy he actually stooped over the dead woman and questioned her.
"Tell us--where did you hide them?" he cried.
"The girl will know," said Helene.
Wethermill rose up and looked wildly at Celia.
"Yes, yes," he said.
He had no scruple, no pity any longer for the girl. There was no gainfrom the crime unless she spoke. He would have placed his head in theguillotine for nothing. He ran to the writing-table, tore off half asheet of paper, and brought it over with a pencil to the sofa. He gavethem to Vauquier to hold, and drawing out the sofa from the wallslipped in behind. He lifted up Celia with Rossignol's help, and madeher sit in the middle of the sofa with her feet upon the ground. Heunbound her wrists and fingers, and Vauquier placed the writing-pad andthe paper on the girl's knees. Her arms were still pinioned above theelbows; she could not raise her hands high enough to snatch the scarffrom her lips. But with the pad held up to her she could write.
"Where did she keep her jewels! Quick! Take the pencil and write," saidWethermill, holding her left wrist.
Vauquier thrust the pencil into her right hand, and awkwardly andslowly her gloved fingers moved across the page.
"I do not know," she wrote; and, with an oath, Wethermill snatched thepaper up, tore it into pieces, and threw it down.
"You have got to know," he said, his face purple with passion, and heflung out his arm as though he would dash his fist into her face. Butas he stood with his arm poised there came a singular change upon hisface.
"Did you hear anything?" he asked in a whisper.
All listened, and all heard in the quiet of the night a faint click,and after an interval they heard it again, and after another butshorter interval yet once more.
"That's the gate," said Wethermill in a whisper of fear, and a pulse ofhope stirred within Celia.
He seized her wrists, crushed them together behind her, and swiftlyfastened them once more. Adele Rossignol sat down upon the floor, tookthe girl's feet upon her lap, and quietly wrenched off her shoes.
"The light," cried Wethermill in an agonised voice, and Helena Vauquierflew across the room and turned it off.
All three stood holding their breath, straining their ears in the darkroom. On the hard gravel of the drive outside footsteps became faintlyaudible, and grew louder and came near. Adele whispered to Vauquier:
"Has the girl a lover?"
And Helene Vauquier, even at that moment, laughed quietly.
All Celia's heart and youth rose in revolt against her extremity. Ifshe could only free her lips! The footsteps came round the corner ofthe house, they sounded on the drive outside the very window of thisroom. One cry, and she would be saved. She tossed back her head andtried to force the handkerchief out from between her teeth. ButWethermill's hand covered her mouth and held it closed. The footstepsstopped, a light shone for a moment outside. The very handle of thedoor was tried. Within a few yards help was there--help and life. Justa frail latticed wooden door stood between her and them. She tried torise to her feet. Adele Rossignol held her legs firmly. She waspowerless. She sat with one desperate hope that, whoever it was who wasin the garden, he would break in. Were it even another murderer, hemight have more pity than the callous brutes who held her now; he couldhave no less. But the footsteps moved away. It was the withdrawal ofall hope. Celia heard Wethermill behind her draw a long breath ofrelief. That seemed to Celia almost the cruellest part of the wholetragedy. They waited in the darkness until the faint click of the gatewas heard once more. Then the light was turned up again.
"We must go," said Wethermill. All the three of them were shaken. Theystood looking at one another, white and trembling. They spoke inwhispers. To get out of the room, to have done with the business--thathad suddenly become their chief necessity.
Adele picked up the necklace and the rings from the satin-wood tableand put them into a pocket-bag which was slung at her waist.
"Hippolyte shall turn these things into money," she said. "He shall setabout it to-morrow. We shall have to keep the girl now--until she tellsus where the rest is hidden."
"Yes, keep her," said Helene. "We will come over to Geneva in a fewdays, as soon as we can. We will persuade her to tell." She glanceddarkly at the girl. Celia shivered.
"Yes, that's it," said Wethermill. "But don't harm her. She will tellof her own will. You will see. The delay won't hurt now. We can't comeback and search for
a little while."
He was speaking in a quick, agitated voice. And Adele agreed. Thedesire to be gone had killed even their fury at the loss of theirprize. Some time they would come back, but they would not searchnow--they were too unnerved.
"Helene," said Wethermill, "get to bed. I'll come up with thechloroform and put you to sleep."
Helene Vauquier hurried upstairs. It was part of her plan that sheshould be left alone in the villa chloroformed. Thus only couldsuspicion be averted from herself. She did not shrink from thecompletion of the plan now. She went, the strange woman, without atremor to her ordeal. Wethermill took the length of rope which hadfixed Celia to the pillar.
"I'll follow," he said, and as he turned he stumbled over the body ofMme. Dauvray. With a shrill cry he kicked it out of his way and creptup the stairs. Adele Rossignol quickly set the room in order. Sheremoved the stool from its position in the recess, and carried it toits place in the hall. She put Celia's shoes upon her feet, looseningthe cord from her ankles. Then she looked about the floor and picked uphere and there a scrap of cord. In the silence the clock upon themantelshelf chimed the quarter past eleven. She screwed the stopper onthe flask of vitriol very carefully, and put the flask away in herpocket. She went into the kitchen and fetched the key of the garage.She put her hat on her head. She even picked up and drew on her gloves,afraid lest she should leave them behind; and then Wethermill came downagain. Adele looked at him inquiringly.
"It is all done," he said, with a nod of the head. "I will bring thecar down to the door. Then I'll drive you to Geneva and come back withthe car here."
He cautiously opened the latticed door of the window, listened for amoment, and ran silently down the drive. Adele closed the door again,but she did not bolt it. She came back into the room; she looked atCelia, as she lay back upon the settee, with a long glance ofindecision. And then, to Celia's surprise--for she had given up allhope--the indecision in her eyes became pity. She suddenly ran acrossthe room and knelt down before Celia. With quick and feverish hands sheuntied the cord which fastened the train of her skirt about her knees.
At first Celia shrank away, fearing some new cruelty. But Adele's voicecame to her ears, speaking--and speaking with remorse.
"I can't endure it!" she whispered. "You are so young--too young to bekilled."
The tears were rolling down Celia's cheeks. Her face was pitiful andbeseeching.
"Don't look at me like that, for God's sake, child!" Adele went on, andshe chafed the girl's ankles for a moment.
"Can you stand?" she asked.
Celia nodded her head gratefully. After all, then, she was not to die.It seemed to her hardly possible. But before she could rise a subduedwhirr of machinery penetrated into the room, and the motor-car cameslowly to the front of the villa.
"Keep still!" said Adele hurriedly, and she placed herself in front ofCelia.
Wethermill opened the wooden door, while Celia's heart raced in herbosom.
"I will go down and open the gate," he whispered. "Are you ready?"
"Yes."
Wethermill disappeared; and this time he left the door open. Adelehelped Celia to her feet. For a moment she tottered; then she stoodfirm.
"Now run!" whispered Adele. "Run, child, for your life!"
Celia did not stop to think whither she should run, or how she shouldescape from Wethermill's search. She could not ask that her lips andher hands might be freed. She had but a few seconds. She had onethought--to hide herself in the darkness of the garden. Celia fledacross the room, sprang wildly over the sill, ran, tripped over herskirt, steadied herself, and was swung off the ground by the arms ofHarry Wethermill.
"There we are," he said, with his shrill, wavering laugh. "I opened thegate before." And suddenly Celia hung inert in his arms.
The light went out in the salon. Adele Rossignol, carrying Celia'scloak, stepped out at the side of the window.
"She has fainted," said Wethermill. "Wipe the mould off her shoes andoff yours too--carefully. I don't want them to think this car has beenout of the garage at all."
Adele stooped and obeyed. Wethermill opened the door of the car andflung Celia into a seat. Adele followed and took her seat opposite thegirl. Wethermill stepped carefully again on to the grass, and with thetoe of his shoe scraped up and ploughed the impressions which he andAdele Rossignol had made on the ground, leaving those which Celia hadmade. He came back to the window.
"She has left her footmarks clear enough," he whispered. "There will beno doubt in the morning that she went of her own free will."
Then he took the chauffeur's seat, and the car glided silently down thedrive and out by the gate. As soon as it was on the road it stopped. Inan instant Adele Rossignol's head was out of the window.
"What is it?" she exclaimed in fear.
Wethermill pointed to the roof. He had left the light burning in HeleneVauquier's room.
"We can't go back now," said Adele in a frantic whisper. "No; it isover. I daren't go back." And Wethermill jammed down the lever. The carsprang forward, and humming steadily over the white road devoured themiles. But they had made their one mistake.