"At a price," I said bitterly.
"As you are a business man, so I am a business woman, Mr. Royle," she replied quite calmly. "When I see an opportunity of making money, I do not hesitate to seize it."
"But if you know the truth--if this is the actual truth which at present I will not believe--then it is your duty, nay, you are bound by law to go to the police and tell them what you know."
"I shall do that, never fear," she laughed. "But first I shall try and get something for my trouble."
"And whom do you intend to bring up as witness against Miss Shand?" I asked.
"Wait and see. There will be a witness--an eye-witness, who was present, and whose evidence will be corroborated," she declared in due course with a self-satisfied air. "I have not resolved to reveal the truth without fully reviewing the situation. When the police know--as they certainly will--you will then find that I have not lied, and perhaps you will alter your opinion of the girl you now hold in such high esteem."
CHAPTER XVIII.
DISCLOSES THE TRAP.
The woman"s words held me speechless.
She seemed so cold, so determined, so certain of her facts that I felt, when I came to consider what I already had proved, that she was actually telling me the ghastly truth.
And yet I loved Phrida. No. I refused to allow my suspicions to be increased by this woman who had approached the police openly and asked for payment for her information.
She was Phrida"s enemy. Therefore it was my duty to treat her as such, and in a moment I had decided upon my course of action.
"So I am to take it that both Digby and yourself are antagonistic towards Phrida Shand?" I exclaimed, leaning against the round mahogany table and facing her.
She did not speak for a few seconds, then, springing to her feet, exclaimed:
"Would you excuse me for a few seconds? I forgot to give an order to my servant who is just going out."
And she bustled from the room, leaving me alone with my own confused thoughts.
Ah! The puzzling problem was maddening me. In my investigations I now found myself in a cul-de-sac from which there seemed no escape. The net, cleverly woven without a doubt, was slowly closing about my poor darling, now so pale, and anxious, and trembling.
Had she not already threatened to take her own life at first sign of suspicion being cast upon her by the police!
Was that not in itself, alas! a sign that her secret was a guilty one?
I knew not what to do, or how to act.
I suppose my hostess had been absent for about five minutes when the door suddenly re-opened, and she entered.
"When we were interrupted, Mrs. Petre," I said, as she advanced towards me, "I was asking you a plain question. Please give me a plain reply. You and Phrida Shand are enemies, are you not?"
"Well, we are not exactly friends," she laughed, "after all that has occurred. I think I told you that in London."
"I remember all that you told me," I replied. "But I want to know the true position, if--whether we are friends, or enemies? For myself, it matters not. I will be your friend with just as great a satisfaction as I will be your enemy. Now, let us understand each other. I have told you, I"m a man of business."
The woman, clever and resourceful, smiled sweetly, and in a calm voice replied:
"Really, Mr. Royle, I don"t see why, after all, we should be enemies, that is, if what you tell me is the positive truth, that you owe my friend Digby no ill-will."
"I owe no man ill-will until his perfidy is proved," was my reply. "I merely went to Brussels to try and find him and request an explanation.
He charged me with a mission which I discharged with the best of my ability, but which, it seems, has only brought upon me a grave calamity--the loss of the one I love. Hence I am ent.i.tled to some explanation from his own lips!"
"Which I promise you that you shall have in due course. So rest a.s.sured upon that point," she urged. "But that is in the future. We are, however, discussing the present. By the way--you"ll take something to drink, won"t you?"
"No, thank you," I protested.
"But you must have something. I"m sorry I have no whisky to offer you, but I have some rather decent port," and disregarding my repeated protests, she rang the bell, whereupon the young man who had admitted me--whom I now found to my surprise to be a servant--entered and bowed.
"Bring some port," his mistress ordered, and a few moments later he reappeared with a decanter and gla.s.ses upon a silver tray.
She poured me out a gla.s.s, but refused to have any herself.
"No, no," she laughed, "at my time of life port wine would only make me fat--and Heaven knows I"m growing horribly stout now. You don"t know, Mr.
Royle, what horror we women have of stoutness. In men it is a sign of ease and prosperity, in women it is suggestive of alcoholism and puts ten years on their ages."
Out of politeness, I raised my gla.s.s to her and drank. Her demeanour had altered, and we were now becoming friends, a fact which delighted me, for I saw I might, by the exercise of a little judicious diplomacy, act so as to secure protection for Phrida.
While we were chatting, I suddenly heard the engine of my taxi started, and the clutch put in with a jerk.
"Why!" I exclaimed, surprised. "I believe that"s my taxi going away. I hope the man isn"t tired of waiting!"
"No. I think it is my servant. I "phoned for a cab for her, as I want her to take a message into Colchester," Mrs. Petre replied. Then, settling herself in the big chair, she asked:
"Now, why can"t we be friends, Mr. Royle?"
"That I am only too anxious to be," I declared.
"It is only your absurd infatuation for Phrida Shand that prevents you,"
she said. "Ah!" she sighed. "How grossly that girl has deceived you!"
I bit my lip. My suspicions were surely bitter enough without the sore being re-opened by this woman.
Had not Phrida"s admissions been a self-condemnation to which, even though loving her as fervently as I did, I could not altogether blind myself.
I did not speak. My heart was too full, and strangely enough my head seemed swimming, but certainly not on account of the wine I had drunk, for I had not swallowed more than half the gla.s.s contained.
The little room seemed to suddenly become stifling. Yet that woman with the dark eyes seemed to watch me intently as I sat there, watch me with a strange, deep, evil glance--an expression of fierce animosity which even at that moment she could not conceal.
She had openly avowed that the hand of my well-beloved had killed the unknown victim because of jealousy. Well, when I considered all the facts calmly and deliberately, her words certainly seemed to bear the impress of truth.
Phrida had confessed to me that, rather than face inquiry and condemnation she would take her own life. Was not that in itself sufficient evidence of guilt?
But no! I strove to put such thoughts behind me. My brain was awhirl, nay, even aflame, for gradually there crept over me a strange, uncanny feeling of giddiness such as I had never before experienced, a faint, sinking feeling, as though the chair was giving way beneath me.