He was absolutely sure from the valet"s manner that the servants were not "in the know." A wild impulse came on him to take the exhibitor of these remnants of his past into his confidence. To say right out: "I"m Jones. Victor Jones of Philadelphia. I"m no Lord. Here, gimme those clothes and let me out of this--let"s call it quits."
The word "police" already dropped held him back. He was an impostor. If he were to declare the facts before Rochester returned, what might be the result? Whatever the result might be one thing was certain, it would be unpleasant. Besides, he was no prisoner, once downstairs he could leave the house.
So instead of saying: "I"m Victor Jones of Philadelphia," he said: "Take them away," and finding himself alone once more he sat down to consider.
Rochester must have gone through his pockets, not for loot, but for the purpose of removing any article that might cast suspicion, or raise the suspicion that he, Jones, was not Rochester. That seemed plain enough, and there was an earnestness of purpose in the fact that was disturbing.
There was no use in thinking, however. He would go downstairs and make his escape. He was savagely hungry, but he reckoned the Savoy was good enough for one more meal--if he could get there.
Leaving the watch and chain--unambitious to add a charge of larceny to his other troubles, should Fate arrest him before the return of Rochester, he came down the corridor to a landing giving upon a flight of stairs, up which, save for the gradient, a coach and horses might have been driven.
The place was a palace. Vast pictures by gloomy old artists, pictures of men in armour, men in ruffs, women without armour or ruffs, or even a rag of chiffon, pictures worth millions of dollars no doubt, hung from the walls of the landing, and the wall flanking that triumphant staircase.
Jones looked over into the well of the hall, then he began to descend the stairs.
He had intended, on finding a hat in the hall, to clap it on and make a clean bolt for freedom and the light of heaven, get back to the Savoy, dress himself in another suit, and once more himself, go for Rochester, but this was no hall with a hat-rack and umbrella-stand. Knights in armour were guarding it, and a flunkey, six feet high, in red plush breeches, and with calves that would have made Victor Jones scream with laughter under normal conditions.
The flunkey, seeing our friend, stepped to a door, opened it, and held it open for him. Not to enter the room thus indicated would have been possible enough, but the compelling influence of that vast flunkey made it impossible to Jones.
His volition had fled, he was subdued to his surroundings, for the moment conquered.
He entered a breakfast room, light and pleasantly furnished, where at a breakfast table and before a silver tea urn sat a lady of forty or so, thin faced, high nosed, aristocratic and rather faded.
She was reading a letter, and when she saw the incomer she rose from the table and gathered some other letters up. Then she, literally, swept from the room. She looked at him as she pa.s.sed, and it seemed to Jones that he had never known before the full meaning of the word "scorn."
For a wild second he thought that all had been discovered, that the police were now sure to arrive. Then he knew at once. Nothing had been discovered, the delusion held even for this woman, that glance was meant for Rochester, not for him, and was caused by the affair of last night, by other things, too, maybe, but that surely.
Uncomfortable, angry, nervous, wild to escape, and then yielding to caution, he took his seat at the table where a place was laid--evidently for him.
The woman had left an envelope on the table, he glanced at it.
THE HONBLE: VENETIA BIRDBROOK, 10A Carlton House Terrace, London, S. W.
Victor read the inscription written in a bold female hand.
It told him where he was, he was in the breakfast-room of 10A Carlton House Terrace, but it told him nothing more.
Was the Honble: Venetia Birdbrook his wife, or at least the wife of his twin image? This thought blinded him for a moment to the fact that a flunkey--they seemed as numerous as flies in May--was at his elbow with a _menu_, whilst another flunkey, who seemed to have sprung from the floor, was fiddling at the sideboard which contained cold edibles, tongue, ham, chicken and so forth.
"Scrambled eggs," said he, looking at the card.
"Tea or coffee, my Lord?"
"Coffee."
He broke a breakfast roll and helped himself mechanically to some b.u.t.ter, which was instantly presented to him by the sideboard fiddler, and he had just taken a mechanical bite of b.u.t.tered roll, when the door opened and the Archiepiscopal gentleman who had pulled up his window blind that morning entered. Mr. Church, for Jones had already gathered that to be his name, carried a little yellow basket filled with letters in his right hand, and in his left a great sheaf, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Morning Post, Daily Mail, Daily Express, Chronicle, and Daily News. These papers he placed on a side table evidently intended for that purpose. The little letter basket he placed on the table at Jones" left elbow.
Then he withdrew, but not without having spoken a couple of murmured words of correction to the flunkey near the sideboard, who had omitted, no doubt, some point in the mysterious ritual of which he was an acolyte.
Jones glanced at the topmost letter.
THE EARL OF ROCHESTER, 10A, Carlton House Terrace, London, S. W.
Ah! now he knew it. The true name of the juggler who had played him this trick. It was plain, too, now, that Rochester had sent him here as a subst.i.tute.
But the confirmation of his idea did not ease his mind. On the contrary it filled him with a vague alarm. The feeling of being in a trap came upon him now for the first time. The joke had lost any semblance of colour, the thing was serious. Rochester ought to have been back to put an end to the business before this. Had anything happened to him? Had he got jailed?
He did not touch the letters. Without raising suspicion, acting as naturally as possible the part of a peer of the realm, he must escape as swiftly as possible from this nest of flunkeys, and with that object in view he accepted the scrambled eggs now presented to him, and the coffee.
When they were finished, he rose from the table. Then he remembered the letters. Here was another tiny tie. He could not leave them unopened and untouched on the table without raising suspicion. He took them from the basket, and with them in his hand left the room, the fellow in waiting slipping before to open the door.
The hall was deserted for a wonder, deserted by all but the men in armour. A room where he might leave the infernal letters, and find a bell to fetch a servant to get him a hat was the prime necessity of the moment.
He crossed to a door directly opposite, opened it, and found a room half library, half study, a pleasant room used to tobacco, with a rather well worn Turkey carpet on the floor, saddle bag easy chairs, and a great escritoire in the window, open and showing pigeon holes containing note paper, envelopes, telegraph forms, and a rack containing the A. B.
C. Railway Guide, Whitakers Almanac, Ruffs" Guide to the Turf, Who"s Who, and Kelly.
Pipes were on the mantel piece, a silver cigar box and cigarette box on a little table by one of the easy chairs, matches--nothing was here wanting, and everything was of the best.
He placed the letters on the table, opened the cigar box and took from it a Ramon Alones. A blunt ended weapon for the destruction of melancholy and unrest, six and a half inches long, and costing perhaps half-a-crown. A real Havana cigar. Now in London there are only four places where you can obtain a real and perfect Havana cigar. That is to say four shops. And at those four shops--or shall we call them emporiums--only known and trusted customers can find the sun that shone on the Vuelta Abajos in such and such a perfect year.
The Earl of Rochester"s present representative was finding it now, with little enough pleasure, however, as he paced the room preparatory to ringing the bell. He was approaching the electric b.u.t.ton for this purpose, when the faint and far away murmuring of an automobile, as if admitted by a suddenly opened hall door, checked his hand. Here was Rochester at last. He waited listening.
He had not long to wait.
The door of the room suddenly opened, and the woman of the breakfast table disclosed herself. She was dressed for going out, wearing a hat that seemed a yard in diameter, and a feather boa, from which her hen-like face and neck rose to the crowning triumph of the hat.
"I am going to Mother," said she. "I am not coming back."
"Um-um," said Jones.
She paused. Then she came right in and closed the door behind her.
Standing with her back close to the door she spoke to Jones.
"If you cannot see your own conduct as others see it, who can make you?
I am not referring to the disgrace of last night, though heaven knows that was bad enough, I am talking of _everything_, of your poor wife who loves you still, of the estate you have ruined by your lunatic conduct, of the company you keep, of the insults you have heaped on people--and now you add drink to the rest. That"s new." She paused.
"That"s new. But I warn you, your brain won"t stand _that_. You know the taint in the family as well as I do, it has shewn itself in your actions. Well, go on drinking and you will end in Bedlam instead of the workhouse. They call you "Mad Rochester"; you know that." She choked. "I have blushed to be known as your sister--I have tried to keep my place here and save you. It"s ended." She turned to the door.
Jones had been making up his mind. He would tell the whole affair. This Rochester was a thoroughly bad lot evidently; well, he would turn the tables on him now.
"Look here," said he. "I am not the man you think I am."
"Tosh!" cried the woman.
She opened the door, pa.s.sed out, and shut it with a snap.
"Well, I"m d----d," said Jones, for the second time in connection with Rochester.