"Do you really deny you have ever seen me before?" I asked, astounded at his barefaced pretence of ignorance.
"Never to my knowledge," replied the sallow-faced man whose countenance I so well recollected.
"Then you forget a certain night not so long ago when I was called into your house in Stretton Street, and you chatted confidentially with me--about your wife and your little son?"
"My dear sir!" he cried. "Whatever do you mean? I have never seen you at Stretton Street; and I have certainly never discussed my wife with you!"
I stood aghast at his continued denial.
"But you _did_," I a.s.serted. "And there was another matter--a matter about which I must question you--the----"
"Ah! I see!" he interrupted. "You"re here to blackmail me--eh?
Well--let me hear the worst," and across his rather Oriental face there spread a mocking, half amused smile.
"I am not a blackmailer!" I protested angrily. "I want no money--only to know the truth."
"Of what?"
"Well, the truth concerning the death of Miss Gabrielle Engledue."
"The death of Miss Gabrielle Engledue!" he cried. "I really don"t understand you, Mr.--Mr. Garfield!"
At mention of the name I saw that he started, but almost imperceptibly. The man was certainly a most perfect actor, and his protestations of ignorance were, indeed, well-feigned.
"Then you actually deny all knowledge of the young lady!" I said.
"I know no lady of that name."
"But she is your niece."
"I have only one niece--Lady Shalford."
"And how old is she?"
He hesitated for a few moments. Then he answered.
"Oh! She must be about thirty-five. She married Shalford about ten years ago, and she lives at Wickenham Grange, near Malton, in Yorkshire."
"And you have no other niece?"
"None--I a.s.sure you. But why do you ask such a question? You puzzle me."
"Not more than you puzzle me, Mr. De Gex," I replied with pique. "It would be so much easier if you would be frank and open with me."
"My dear sir, you seem to me to have a bee in your bonnet about something or other. Tell me, now, what is it?"
"Simply that you know me very well, but you deny it. You never thought that I should make this unwelcome reappearance."
"Your appearance here as a mad-brained person is certainly unwelcome," he retorted. "You first tell me that you visited me at Stretton Street. Well, you may have been in the servants" quarters for all I know, and----"
"Please do not be insulting!" I cried angrily.
"I have no intention of offering you an insult, sir, but your att.i.tude is so very extraordinary! You speak of a girl named Engledue--that was the name, I think--and allege that she is my niece. Why?"
"Because the young lady is dead--she died under most suspicious circ.u.mstances. And you know all about it!" I said bluntly.
"Oh! perhaps you will allege that I am a murderer next!" he laughed, as though enjoying the joke.
"It is no laughing matter!" I cried in fury.
"Why not? I find all your allegations most amusing," and across his dark handsome face there spread a good-humoured smile.
His was a face that I could never forget. At one moment its expression was kindly and full of _bonhomie_, the next it was hard and unrelenting--the face of an eccentric criminal.
"To me they are the reverse of amusing," I said. "I allege that on the night of Wednesday, November the seventh last, I was pa.s.sing your house in Stretton Street, Park Lane, when your man, Horton, invited me inside, and--well, well--I need not describe what occurred there, for you recollect only too vividly--without a doubt. But what I demand to know is why you asked me in, and what happened to me after you gave me that money?"
"Money! I gave you money?" he cried. "Why, man alive, you"re dreaming!
_You must be!_"
"I"m not dreaming at all! It is a hard fact. Indeed, I still have the money--five thousand pounds in bank notes."
Oswald De Gex looked at me strangely. His sallow face coloured slightly, and his lips compressed. I had cornered him. A little further firmness, and he would no doubt admit that we had met at Stretton Street.
"Look here, Mr. Garfield," he said in a changed voice. "This is beyond a joke. You now tell me that I presented you with five thousand pounds."
"I do--and I repeat it."
"But why should I give you this sum?"
"Because I a.s.sisted you in the commission of a crime."
"That"s a lie!" he declared vehemently. "Forgive me for saying so, but I can only think that you are not quite in your right mind."
"I have not been in my right mind for a month or more--thanks to your deep plotting," I retorted sharply. "Further, I am telling the truth--as I shall later on tell it before a court of law. I intend to solve the mystery of the death of Gabrielle Engledue."
"Well--I will not hinder you," he laughed grimly.
"You mean that you will not a.s.sist me?"
"I mean that I have no knowledge of any such person; nor have I any knowledge of you," he said. "A perfect stranger, you come here, present your card, and at once start a series of most serious allegations against me, the chief of them being that I gave you five thousand pounds for some a.s.sistance which you refuse to describe."
"If I tell you, you will only deny it, Mr. De Gex," I exclaimed bitterly. "So what is the use?"
"None. In fact I don"t see that any object is to be gained in prolonging this interview," was his quick retort. "If, as you say, I gave you five thousand--which I certainly never did--then what more can you want? I however, suspect that the five thousand exists only in your own imagination."
"But I have the sum intact--in a drawer at my home in London."
"It would be of interest to see it. Are they the same notes which you say I gave you?"