CHAPTER XV
CURRENTS AND COUNTER CURRENTS
Not far from one of the entrances to Regent's Park or the hum of CamdenTown's main artery of traffic, lay a little winding street which,because of its curving lines, had long been known as Spiral Row.Although many would not deign in passing to glance twice down thismodest thoroughfare, it presented, nevertheless, a romantic air of charmand mystery. The houses nestled timidly behind time-worn walls; it wasalways very quiet within this limited precinct, and one wonderedsometimes, by day, if the various secluded abodes were really inhabited,and by whom? An actress, said vague rumor; a few scribblers, a pair ofpainters, a military man or two. Here Madam Grundy never ventured, butCalliope and the tuneful nine were understood to be occasional callers.One who once lived in the Row has likened it to a tiny Utopia where eachand every one minded his own business and where the comings and goingsof one's neighbor were matters of indifference.
Into this delectable byway there turned, late in the night of the secondday after that memorable evening at Strathorn House, a man who, lookingquickly around him, paused before the closed gate of one of thedwellings. The street, ever a quiet one, appeared at that advanced hourabsolutely deserted, and, after a moment's hesitation, the man pulledthe bell; for some time he waited; but no response came. He looked in;through the shrubbery he could dimly make out the house, set well back,and in a half uncertain way he stood staring at it, when from the end ofthe street, he heard a vehicle coming rapidly toward him.
More firmly the man jerked at the handle of the bell; this time hisefforts were successful; a glimmer as from a candle appeared at thefront door, and a few minutes later a dark form came slowly down thegraveled walk. As it approached the vehicle also drew nearer; the manregarded the latter sidewise; now it was opposite him, and he turned hisback quickly to the flare of its lamps. But in a moment it had whirledby, with a note of laughter from its occupants, light pleasure seekers;at the same time a key turned in a lock and the gate swung open.
"Good evening, Dennis," said the caller. The faint gleam of the candlerevealed the drowsy and unmistakably Celtic face of him he addressed, aman past middle age, who regarded the new-comer with a look ofrecognition. "I'm afraid I've interrupted your slumbers. This is rathera late hour at which to arrive."
"No matter, sir. Sure and I sat up expecting you, Mr. Steele, untilafter midnight, and had only just turned in when--"
"What--?" The new-comer, now fairly within the garden, could notsuppress a start of surprise, which however the other, engaged inrelocking the gate, did not appear to notice. "Expecting--?"
"Although I'd given up thinking you'd be here to-night," the latter wenton. "But won't you be stepping in, sir?"
The other silently followed, walking in the manner of one tired andworn; he did not, however, at that moment seem concerned with fatigue orphysical discomfort; the uncertain light of the candle before him showedhis brows drawn, his eyes questioning, as if something had happened tocause him to think deeply, doubtfully. At the door the servant stoodaside to allow him to enter; then ushered him into a fairly commodiousand comfortable sitting-room.
"My master did not come back with you, sir, from Strathorn House?"
"No; Captain Forsythe's gone on to Germany."
"To attend some court, I suppose. Sure, 'tis a dale he has done of that,Mr. Steele, after the both of us were wounded by those black devils inIndia and retired from active service." The servant's voice had aninquiring accent; his glance rested now in some surprise on thenew-comer's garments,--a gamekeeper's well-worn coat and cap,--and onthe dusty, almost shabby-looking shoes.
"A wager," said John Steele, noting the old orderly's expression. "FromStrathorn House to London by foot, within a given time, don't you know;fell in with some rough customers last night who thought my coat and hatbetter than these."
"I beg your pardon, sir, but--" The man's apprehensive look fasteneditself on a dark stain on the coat, near the shoulder.
"Just winged me--a scratch," replied John Steele with an indifferentshrug, sinking into a chair near the fire which burned low.
"It's lucky you came off no worse, sir, and you'll be finding a changeof garments up-stairs; I put them out for you myself--"
"I'm afraid, Dennis, I'm rather large for your master's clothes," wasthe visitor's reply in a voice that he strove vainly to make light.
"Sure, they're your own, sir." The other looked up quickly. "I'll geteverything ready for a bath, and if you've a mind for anything to eatafterward--"
"I think I'll have a little of the last, first," said the visitorslowly.
"Right you are, sir. You do look a bit done up, sir," sympathetically,"but there's a veal and 'ammer in the cupboard that will soon make youfit."
"One moment, Dennis." John Steele leaned back; the dying embers revealeda haggard face; his eyes half closed as if from lack of sleep butimmediately opened again. "You spoke of expecting me; how," he stretchedout his legs, "did you know--?"
"Sure, sir, by your luggage; it arrived with my master's heavier boxesthat he didn't take along with him over the wather." The listener didnot stir; was he too weary to experience surprise or even deeperemotion?
His luggage there!--where no one knew--could have known, he was going!The place he had selected, under what he had considered propitiouscircumstances, as a haven, a refuge; where he might find himself for abrief period comparatively safe, could he reach it, turn in, withoutbeing detected! This last he believed he had successfully accomplished;and then to be told by the man--All John Steele's excuses for coming inthis unceremonious fashion that he had planned to put to the servant ofCaptain Forsythe were at the moment forgotten. Who could have guessedthat he would make his way straight hither--or had any one? An enemy,divining a lurking place for which he was heading, would not haveobligingly forwarded his belongings. What then? Had Jocelyn Wray orderedthem sent on with Captain Forsythe's boxes and bags, in order that theymight be less likely to fall into the hands of the police?
This line of reasoning seemed to lead into most unwonted channels; itwas not probable she would concern herself so much further about acommon fugitive. The cut and bruised fingers of the man before thefireplace linked and unlinked; an indefinable feeling of new dangers hehad not calculated on assailed him. Suppose the police should havelearned--should elect to trace, those articles of his? It was acontingency, a hazard to be considered; he knew that every possibleeffort would be made to find him; that if his antagonists were eagerbefore, they would embark on the present quest with redoubled zeal. Hehad been in their hands and had got away; disappointment would drivethem more fiercely on to employ every expedient. They might even now beat the gate; at the moment, however, he felt as if he hardly cared, onlythat he was very tired, too exhausted to move on. His exertions of thelast few days had been of no ordinary kind; his shoulder was stiff andit pained.
"Here you are, sir." The servant had entered and reentered, had set thetable without the man in the arm-chair being conscious of his coming andgoing. "Remembered my master inviting you once, when you were here, topitch your camp at Rosemary Villa any time you should be after yearningfor that quietood essential for literary composition and to windin' upthe campaign on your book. So when I saw your luggage--"
"Exactly." It was curious the man should have spoken thus, should havevoiced one of the very subterfuges Steele had had in mind himself toutter, to show pretext for his too abrupt appearance. But now--?
The situation was changed; yet he felt too exhausted to disavow theservant's conclusion. Certainly the episode of the luggage had made histask easier at this point; only, however, to enhance the greaterhazards, as if fate were again laughing at him, offering him too muchease, too great comfort, seeking to allure him with a false estimate ofhis security. As he ate, mechanically, but with the zest of one who hadlong fasted, he listened; again a vehicle went by; then another.
"Rather livelier than usual to-night?" he observed and received anaffirmative answer. Some evenings now
you'd hardly ever hear anythingpassing from sunset to sunrise and find it as quiet as the tomb.
Who lived on the right, on the left? The visitor asked several questionscasually; the house to the right, the man thought, might be vacant; noone appeared to live in it very long. At least the moving van seemed tohave acquired a habit of stopping there; the one on the left had a morestable tenant; a lady who appeared in the pantomime, or the opera, hewasn't sure which,--only, foreign people sometimes went in and out.
John Steele rose with an effort; no, there was nothing more he required,except rest! Which room would he prefer, he was asked when he foundhimself on the upper landing; the man had put his things in a frontchamber; but the back one was larger. John Steele forced himself toconsider; he even inspected both of the rooms; that on the front floorhad one window facing the Row; the second chamber looked out over a rearwall separating the vegetable garden of Rosemary Villa from theshrub-adorned confines of a place which fronted on the next street.
The visitor decided on the former chamber; he carefully closed theblinds and drew across the window the dark, heavy curtains. This wouldanswer very well; excellent accommodations for a man whose own chambersin the city were now in the hands of renovators--the painters, thepaper-hangers, the plumbers. And the back room? He paused, as ifconsidering the servant's assumption of his purpose in coming hither. Hemight as well let the fellow think--
Yes, he would venture to make use of that for his work; could thus takeadvantage of the force of circumstances that had arisen to alienate himfrom prosaic citations, writs or arraignments. But he must, withstrained lightness, emphasize one point; for a brief spell he did notwish to be disturbed. People might call; people probably would, anxiousclients, almost impossible to get rid of, unless--
No one must know where he was, under any circumstances; his voicesounded almost jocular, at singular variance with the heaviness, theweariness of his face. He, the old servant, had been a soldier; knew howto fulfil, then, a request or an order. Something crinkled in thespeaker's hand, passed to the other who was now busying himself with thebath; the man's moist fingers did not hesitate to close on the note. Hehad been a hardened campaigner and incidentally a good forager; heremarked at once he would carry out to the letter all his master'svisitor asked.
Half an hour later, John Steele, clad in his dressing-gown, sat alonenear the fire in his room; every sound had ceased save at intervals alow creaking of old timber. Now it came from overhead, then from thehall or near the window, as if spirit feet or fingers were busy in thatvenerable, quaint domicile. But these faint noises, inseparable fromhouses with a history, John Steele did not hear; the food and the bathhad awakened in him a momentary alertness; he seemed waiting--for what?Something that did not happen; heaviness, depression again weighed onhim; to keep awake he stirred himself and again glanced about. Here wereevidences of odd taste on the part of the tenant in the matter ofhousehold decoration; a chain and ball that had once been worn by acertain famous convict reposed on an _etagere_, instead of the customaryvase or jug of pottery; other souvenirs of prisons and the people thathad been in them adorned a few shelves and brackets.
John Steele smiled grimly; but soon his thoughts seemed floating offbeyond control, and rising suddenly, he threw himself on the bed. For amoment he strove to consider one or two tasks that should have beenaccomplished this night but which he must defer; was vaguely consciousof the slamming of a blind next door; then over-strained nature yielded.
Hours passed; the sun rose high in the heavens, began to sink; still theheavy sleep of utter exhaustion claimed him. Once or twice the servantcame to the door, listened, and stole away again. The afternoon was welladvanced when, as half through a dream, John Steele heard the rudejingling of a bell,--the catmeat man, or the milkman, drowsily he toldhimself. In fancy he seemed to see the broad, flowing river from awindow of his own chambers, the dawn stealing over, marshaling itstints,--crimson until--
Slowly through the torpor of his brain realization began also to dawn;this room?--it was not his. The gleaming lances of sunlight that dartedthrough the half-closed shutters played on the strange wall-paper of astrange apartment; no, he remembered it now--last night!
The loud and emphatic closing of the front gate served yet more speedilyto arouse him; hastily he sat up; his head buzzed from a long-neededsleep that had been over sound; his limbs still ached, but every senseon an instant became unnaturally keen. Footsteps resounded on thegravel; he heard voices; those of two men, who were coming toward thehouse.
"So it's the meter man you are?" John Steele recognized the inquiringvoice as that of the caretaker. "Sure, you're a new one from the lastthat was here."
"Yes; we change beats occasionally," was the careless answer, as the menpassed around the side of the house and entered a rear door. For a timethere was silence; John Steele sprang from his bed and crept very softlytoward the hall. "A new man--" He heard them talking again after a fewminutes; he remained listening at his door, now slightly ajar.
"There must be a leak somewhere from the quantity you've burned. I'llhave a look around; might save your master a few shillings."
The man moved from room to room and started, at length, up the stairs.John Steele closed and noiselessly locked his door; the "meter man"crossed the upper hall and stepped, one after the other, into theseveral rooms. Having apparently made there the necessary examination,he walked over and tried the door of John Steele's room.
"This room's occupied by a visitor," interposed the servant quickly in ahushed voice. "And he's asleep now; he wouldn't thank you for thedisturbing of his repose."
"All right." Did the listener detect an accent of covert satisfaction inthe caller's low tones? "I'll not wake him. Don't find the leak I waslooking for; will drop in again, though, when I have more time."
Their footsteps receded and shortly afterward, the man left the house;as he did so, John Steele, pushing back the blinds a little, looked outof his room; the man who had reached the front of the place glancedback. His gaze at that instant, meeting the other's, seemed to betray amomentary eagerness; quickly Steele turned away; no doubt now lingeredin his mind as to the purpose of the visit.
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