AUGUST seemed determined to justify her claim to be numbered amongst the summer months before making her exit. Apparently she had repented her of having recently veiled the country in a mist that might have been regarded as a very creditable effort even on the part of November, for to-day the sun was blazing down out of a cloudless sky and scarcely a breath of wind swayed the nodding cornstalks, heavy with golden grain.
Jean, her strained ankle now practically recovered, was tramping along the narrow footpath through the cornfield, following in Blaise’s footsteps, while Nick brought up the rear of the procession. She had not seen Claire since her engagement had become an actual fact, though a characteristically warm-hearted little note from the latter had found its way to Staple, and this morning Jean had declared her inability to exist another day “without a ‘heart-to-heart’ talk with Claire.”
Hence the afternoon’s pilgrimage across the cornfield which formed part of a short cut between Staple and Chamwood.
At first Jean had feared lest her new-found happiness might raise a barrier of sorts betwixt herself and Claire. The contrast between the respective hands that fate had dealt them was so glaring, and the rose and gold with which love had suddenly decked Jean’s own life seemed to make the bleak tragedy which enveloped Claire’s appear ever darker than before.
But Claire’s letter, full of a quiet, unselfish rejoicing in the happiness which had fallen to the lot of her friend, had somehow smoothed away the little uncomfortable feeling which, to anyone as sensitive as Jean, had been a very real embarrassment. Nick’s felicitations, too, had been tendered with frank cordiality and affection, and with a delicate perception that had successfully concealed the sting of individual pain which the contrast could hardly fail to have induced.
So that it was with a considerably lightened heart that Jean, with her escort of two, passed between the great gates of Charnwood and, avoiding the lengthy walk entailed by following the windings of the drive, struck off across the velvety lawns—smooth stretches of close-cropped sward which, broken only by branching trees and shrubbery, and undefaced by the dreadful formality of symmetrical flower-beds, swept right up to the gravelled terrace fronting the windows of the house itself.
The two men loitered to discuss the points of a couple of young spaniels rollicking together on the grass, but Jean, eager to see Claire, smilingly declined to wait for them, and, speeding on ahead, she mounted the short flight of steps leading to the terrace from the lower level of the lawns.
Facing her, as she reached the topmost step was a glass door, giving entrance to Claire’s own particular sanctum, which usually, in summer, stood wide open to admit the soft, warm air and the fragrant scents breathed out from a border of old-fashioned flowers, sweet and prim and quaint, which encircled the base of the house.
But to-day the door was shut and forbidding-looking, and Jean experienced a sudden sense of misgiving. Supposing Claire chanced to be out just when she had arrived brimming over with the hundred little feminine confidences that were to have formed part of the “heart-to-heart” talk! It would be too aggravating!
Her eager glance flew ahead, searching the room’s interior, clearly visible through the wide glass panel of the door. Then, with a startled cry, she halted, her hand clapped against her lips to stifle the involuntary exclamation of dismay and terror that had leapt to them.
The afternoon sunshine slanted in upon a picture of grotesque horror—-a nightmare conception that could only have sprung from the macabre imagination of a madman.
In the middle of the room Claire sat bound to a high-backed chair, secured by cords which cut cruelly across her slender body. Her face had assumed a curious ashen shade, and her eyes were fixed in a numbed look of fascinated terror upon the tall, angular figure of her husband, which pranced in front of her jerkily, like a marionette, while he threatened her with a revolver, his thin lips, smiling cruelly, drawn back from his teeth like those of a snarling animal.
He was addressing her in queer, high-pitched tones that had something inhuman about them—the echoing, empty sound of a voice no longer controlled by a reasoning brain.
“And you needn’t worry that Mr. Brennan will be overwhelmed with grief at your early demise. He won’t—te-he-he!”—he gave a foolish, cackling laugh—“he won’t have time to miss you much! I’ll attend to that—I’ll attend to that! There’ll be a second bullet for your dear friend, Mr. Brennan.” ... Crack! The sharp report of a revolver shattered the summer silence as Jean sprang forward and wrenched at the handle of the door. But it refused to yield. It had been locked upon the inside!
Then, as the smoke cleared away, she saw that Claire was Unhurt. Sir Adrian had deliberately fired above her head and was now rocking his long, lean body to and fro in a paroxysm of horrible, noiseless mirth. Evidently he purposed to amuse himself by inflicting the torture of suspense upon his victim before he actually murdered her, for Latimer had been at one time an expert revolver shot, and, even drug-ridden as he had since become, he could not well have missed his helpless target by accident.
Claire’s head had fallen back, but no merciful oblivion of unconsciousness had come to her relief. Her mouth was a little open and the breath came in short, quick gasps between her grey lips. Her face looked like a mask, set in a blank stupor of horror.
The sound of the shot brought Blaise and Nick racing to Jean’s side. One glance through the glass door sufficed them.
“God in heaven! He’s gone mad!” Nick’s voice was quick with fear for the woman he loved.
“Get Tucker here at once!”
Blaise’s swift command, flung at her as he and Nick leaped forward, sent Jean flying along the terrace as fast as feet winged with unutterable terror could carry her. As she ran, she heard the crash of splintering glass as the two men she had left behind smashed in the panel of the locked door, and, almost simultaneously, Sir Adrian’s pistol barked again—another shot, and then a third in quick succession.
The sound seemed to wring every nerve in her body... had that madman shot him?
With sobbing breath she rushed blindly on into the house and met the butler, running too, white faced and horror-stricken.
“My God, miss! Sir Adrian’s murdering her ladyship—and the room door’s locked!”
The man almost babbled out the words in his extremity of fear.
“The terrace door... Quick, Tucker!”—Jean gasped out the order. “Mr. Brennan’s there they’ve broken in the glass...”
Not waiting to hear the end of the sentence, Tucker bolted out of the hall and along the terrace, while Jean leaned up against the doorway drawing long, shuddering breaths that seemed actually to tear their way through her throat and yet brought no relief to the agonised thudding of her heart. For the moment she was physically unable to run another yard.
But her mind was working with abnormal clarity and swiftness. This was her doing—hers! If she had not dissuaded Nick that day when he had proposed taking Claire away with him, all this would never have happened.... Claire would have been safe—safe! But she had interfered, clinging to her belief that no real good ever came by doing wrong, and now her creed had failed her utterly. Nick’s resistance of temptation was culminating in a ghastly tragedy that might have been avoided. To Jean it seemed in that moment as if her world were falling in ruins about her.
Sick with apprehension, she almost reeled out again into the mocking summer sunlight, and, running as fast as the convulsive throbbing of her heart would let her, regained the far end of the terrace and peered through the door that led into Claire’s room.
Its great panes were shattered. Jagged teeth and spites of glass stuck out from the wooden framework, while here and there, dependent from them, were bits of cloth tom from the men’s coats as they had scrambled through.
Within the room Jean could discern a confused hurly-burly of swaying, writhing figures—Blaise and Nick and the butler struggling to overpower Sir Adrian, who was fighting them with all the cunning and the amazing strength of madness. From beyond came the clamour of people battering uselessly at the door, the shrill, excited voices of the frightened servants who had collected in the hall outside the room.
For a few breathless seconds Jean was in doubt—wondered wildly whether Sir Adrian would succeed in breaking away from his captors. Then she saw Nick’s foot shoot out suddenly like the piston-rod of an engine, and Sir Adrian staggered and came crashing down on to his knees. The other two closed in upon him swiftly, and a minute later he was lying prone on his back with the three men holding him down by main force.
With difficulty avoiding the protruding pieces of glass, Jean stepped into the room. Her first thought was for Claire, who now hung helpless and unconscious against the bonds that held her. But Blaise very speedily directed her attention to something of more urgent importance for the moment.
“Unlock that door,” he called to her. “Quick!” He was still panting from the exertion of the recent struggle. “Get a rope of some sort!”
Jean turned the key and tore open the door leading into the hall. The little flock of servants gathered outside it overflowed into the room, frightened and excitedly inquisitive.
“Get some cord, one of you,” commanded Jean authoratively. “Anything will do if it’s strong.”
Two or three of the servants broke away from the main body and ran frantically in search of the required cord, glad to be of use, and very soon Sir Adrian, bound as humanely as his struggles rendered possible, was borne to his own room and laid upon his bed.
“Ring up the doctor,” ordered Blaise, as he assisted in the rather difficult process of conveyin............