"You said she was going away," interrupted Lydia.
"I know," Jean nodded. "Only she wants to give the impression----"
"I see, I see," said Lydia. "Go on."
"_Forgive me for the act I am committing, which you may think is the act of a coward, and try to think as well of me as you possibly can. Your friend----_"
"I don"t know whether to make her sign her name or put her initials,"
said Jean, pursing her lips.
"What is her name?"
"Laura Martin. Just put the initials L.M."
"They"re mine also," smiled Lydia. "What else?"
"I don"t think I"ll do any more," said Jean. "I"m not a good dictator, am I? Though you"re a wonderful amanuensis."
She collected the papers tidily, put them in a little portfolio and tucked them under her arm.
"Let us gamble the afternoon away," said Jean. "I want distraction."
"But your story? Haven"t you to send it off?"
"I"m going to wrestle with it in secret, even if it breaks my wrist,"
said Jean brightly.
She took the portfolio up to her room, locked the door and sorted over the pages. The page which held the farewell letter she put carefully aside. The remainder, including all that part of the story she had written on the previous night, she made into a bundle, and when Lydia had gone off with Marcus Stepney to swim, she carried the paper to a remote corner of the grounds and burnt it sheet by sheet. Again she examined the "letter," folded it and locked it in a drawer.
Lydia, returning from her swim, was met by Jean half-way up the hill.
"By the way, my dear, I wish you would give me Jack Glover"s London address," she said as they went into the house. "Write it here. Here is a pencil." She pulled out an envelope from a stationery rack and Lydia, in all innocence, wrote as she requested.
The envelope Jean carried upstairs, put into it the letter signed "L.
M.," and sealed it down. Lydia Meredith was nearer to death at that moment than she had been on the afternoon when Mordon the chauffeur brought his big Fiat on to the pavement of Berkeley Street.
Chapter XXIX
It was in the evening of the next day that Lydia received a wire from Jack Glover. It was addressed from London and announced his arrival.
"Doesn"t it make you feel nice, Lydia," said Jean, when she saw the telegram, "to have a man in London looking after your interests--a sort of guardian angel--and another guardian angel prowling round your demesne at Cap Martin?"
"You mean Jaggs? Have you seen him?"
"No, I have not seen him," said the girl softly. "I should rather like to see him. Do you know where he is staying at Monte Carlo?"
Lydia shook her head.
"I hope I shall see him before I go," said Jean. "He must be a very interesting old gentleman."
It was Mr. Briggerland who first caught a glimpse of Lydia"s watchman.
Mr. Briggerland had spent the greater part of the day sleeping. He was unusually wakeful at one o"clock in the morning, and sat on the veranda in a fur-lined overcoat, his gun lay across his knees. He had seen many mysterious shapes flitting across the lawn, only to discover on investigation that they were no more than the shadows which the moving tree-tops cast.
At two o"clock he saw a shape emerge from the tree belt and move stealthily in the shadow of the bushes toward the house. He did not fire because there was a chance that it might have been one of the detectives who had promised to keep an eye upon the Villa Casa in view of the murderous threats which Jean had received.
Noiselessly he rose and stepped in his rubber shoes to the darker end of the stoep. It was old Jaggs. There was no mistaking him. A bent man who limped cautiously across the lawn and was making for the back of the house. Mr. Briggerland c.o.c.ked his gun and took aim....
Both girls heard the shot, and Lydia, springing out of bed, ran on to the balcony.
"It"s all right, Mrs. Meredith," said Briggerland"s voice. "It was a burglar, I think."
"You haven"t hurt him?" she cried, remembering old Jaggs"s nocturnal habits.
"If I have, he"s got away," said Briggerland. "He must have seen me and dropped."
Jean flew downstairs in her dressing-gown and joined her father on the lawn.
"Did you get him?" she asked in a low voice.
"I could have sworn I shot him," said her father in the same tone, "but the old devil must have dropped."
He heard the quick catch of her breath and turned apprehensively.
"Now, don"t make a fuss about it, Jean, I couldn"t help it."
"You couldn"t help it!" she almost snarled. "You had him under your gun and you let him go. Do you think he"ll ever come again, you fool?"
"Now look here, I"m not going to----" began Mr. Briggerland, but she s.n.a.t.c.hed the gun from his hand, looked swiftly at the lock and ran across the lawn toward the trees.
Somebody was hiding. She sensed that and all her nerves were alert.
Presently she saw a crouching figure and lifted the gun, but before she could fire it was wrested from her hand.
She opened her lips to cry out for help, but a hand closed over her mouth, and swung her round so that her back was toward her a.s.sailant, and then in a flash his arm came round her neck, the flex of the elbow against her throat.
"Say one of them prayers of yours," said a voice in her ear, and the arm tightened.
She struggled furiously, but the man held her as though she were a child.
"You"re going to die," whispered the voice. "How do you like the sensation?"
The arm tightened on her neck. She was suffocating, dying she thought, and her heart was filled with a wild, mad longing for life and a terror undreamt of. She could faintly hear her father"s voice calling her and then consciousness departed.
When Jean came to herself she was in Lydia Meredith"s arms. She opened her eyes and saw the pathetic face of her father looming from the background. Her hand went up to her throat.
"Hallo, people--how did I get here?" she asked as she struggled into a sitting position.