IV The Man Behind the Door
Being still young and passably beautiful, I had no wish to become a cynic. But the events of the next fortnight tended to make me so. I reverted to my old idea of making a conquest of some big business firm in my belief that I had ideas and could make suggestions and that these were worth money.
I still believe that ideas and suggestions are worth money—pots of money. I also believe that it is extremely difficult to get a guinea for the best of them.
I tried an inflated and gigantic shop, one of the stores where you buy everything, and I asked to see the manager. I do not suppose I did see the manager, but I saw someone who was more or less in authority in a back office. There was a clerk at work in that office, and the clerk made me nervous. If I could have rung and had him removed I might have got on better. As I was pretty and well dressed and did not look poor, and might have called to complain of the quality of the bacon supplied, the managerial person was at first extremely polite, and asked in what way he could serve me.
“I believe,” I said, “that this is a business in which new ideas are of value.”
“Yes,” he said suavely, “in fact, we’ve already noticed it.” He was still polite, but one could detect a slight shade of irony.
“Well,” I said blunderingly, “I am a woman with ideas—heaps of ideas. I have thought about your business particularly, and I am full of suggestions. I believe them to be valuable, but before I hand them over to you I should like to come to some business arrangement; either in the way of a cash payment, or, where practicable, a percentage on profits. In the latter case, of course, I should expect permission to inspect your books and——”
At this moment the clerk, who had been writing at a side table, with his back to me, went off like a soda-water bottle. I am inclined to think now that for some moments he must have been suffering severely.
“Shut up, or get out!” said the manager to the clerk.
The clerk, being unable to shut up, got out at once. Then the manager turned to me.
“Extraordinary!” he said seriously. “Most extraordinary. And yet you don’t look as if you’d been drinking.”
Then I got up. “My proposal seems to you very silly,” I said. “And, because I was nervous, I put it all very badly. But I do not think that justifies you in behaving like a cad.”
He gave a jump in his chair. Being a person in authority, he did not get a chance to hear the plain truth about himself often.
“Nor do I,” he said reflectively. “I beg your pardon. Still, the thing was so outrageous; you must see, my dear young lady, that we could not dream for one moment——”
“Thanks,” I said. “I won’t trouble you any further.”
If I had stuck to that man and given him one or two of my ideas in advance, reserving the question of terms, I am not sure that I might not have done something. He would have liked to compensate for his rudeness, if he could have done it. But, being proud and angry and an idiot, I walked out. My one idea was to get out of the awful place.
I tried two or three other shops, and began at the right end, but did very little better. One man listened to three of my ideas for Christmas novelties, very politely regretted that he could not avail himself of them, and showed me out. He used two of those ideas subsequently and made money with them, and I hope it may choke him. Another man listened to a still longer list and, while disclaiming any legal liability, offered me five shillings for my trouble.
So, as things were going rather badly, I was particularly glad of the windfall which came to me in connection with the man behind the door. It was one of those queer things that cannot happen except in big cities. It is part of the fascination of London that every moment of the day and night something more wicked and more strange is happening than one could ever invent.
I had been into the North End Road to do a little shopping. I had got six eggs and a pound of tomatoes and a new tooth-brush and some other luxuries, and my hands were full. I managed to get my door open with the latch-key, but in trying to get it out again I nearly dropped those eggs. So I went through into my little sitting-room, put my parcels down carefully, and was just going back to shut the outer door and get my key, when I distinctly heard the door shut. It did not shut with a bang, as if it had been blown to; it was shut very gently and carefully, as if the object had been to avoid noise. So I was just about as frightened as a school girl in a barrel of live mice. But I went out into the passage all the same.
There, in the passage behind the door, stood a tall and extremely well-dressed gentleman of about forty. His frock-coat was buttoned and fitted his good figure to perfection. In one hand he held the glossiest of silk hats, and in the other his gloves and walking-stick. His appearance was foreign; his hair was not grotesque, but it was longer than an Englishman generally wears it. He wore a pointed beard and, for a man, he was by no means ugly. He spoke good enough English, though with a slight accent.
“Pardon me, mademoiselle,” he said. “I would not have taken this liberty except under great compulsion. If you will permit me to remain here for a few minutes you will be doing me a very important service. I assure you of my good intentions, and of my reluctance to annoy you in this way. Only,” he paused and shrugged his shoulders, “one is reluctant to die also. Permit me to hand you your latch-key.”
I suppose I ought to have thought the man was mad, or worse. But it never occurred to me. He had not the manner of it.
“Thanks,” I said, as I took the key. “You may wait a few moments if you like, and if you will tell me what is the matter. Won’t you come into the sitting-room?”
“You are too kind, mademoiselle. I will explain myself fully. But may I ask, in your sitting-room should I be seen from the street?”
“Not if you stand at the back of the room.”
“That is very good. I shall stand at the back of the room. If you would do me one more favour, you would stand at the window and tell me who comes past.”
I went to the window without a word, and turned back to him. “There is a policeman,” I said.
“Ah, the London policeman. He is a charming man. I love him. And next?”
“A lady in black.”
“Possibly bereaved. Poor lady. But I know nothing of her. But do you not see a man of much the same appearance as myself?”
“No. I mean, yes. He has just come into view. He is remarkably like you. He walks very fast.”
At this the man in my room sat down and looked very white and shaky. His back-bone seemed to have been taken out and he was all huddled up.
“You can’t faint in here, you know,” I said sharply.
“Has he gone?” he asked hoarsely.
“Gone? Of course he’s gone. He’s at the other end of the street by this time.” As I spoke I poured out a glass of water and handed it to him. He thanked me, protested that he was not in the least faint, and took a sip of the water. Then he turned to me.
“Now, mademoiselle, I must really explain myself.”
“Well?” I said. I rather liked the idea of having helped him to escape. Any woman would help anyone to escape from anything. And after all, this was more romantic than talking about corkscrews to a shopman who did not want to listen.
“I have been hunted,” he said. “I have been hunted all the morning. Three years ago I left France to get away from this man who, by the way, is my brother. For those three years I have been in England. You see I speak the English very nicely—is it not so?”
“Yes, you speak it well enough. Go on.”
“During the whole of that time I never met my brother. This morning I came upon him, face to face, at Charing Cross Station. I walked away, and he came after me. I went down the steps to the underground station and booked to Wimbledon. He followed and did the same. I got out at Gloucester Road, and he stepped out of the next compartment after me. I took a hansom back to Charing Cross. He followed in another. Then I tried to tire him out with walking. I have walked all the way here, and have not come directly, but by the most circuitous routes. Always he was a little way behind me. As we drew near to this street I quickened my pace very much. He was tired, and I saw there was no cab. I got round the corner, nearly a hundred yards ahead of him, and saw your door open. What a chance!”
“It sounds queer enough to be true.”
“Mademoiselle,” he said in a pained voice, “I would not repay your kindness by deceiving you.”
“But I don’t understand. What did your brother say when you met?”
“Nothing. Nor I. We shall not speak again, except perhaps at the very last.”
“But why? Why do you run away from him? What does he want?”
“He wants,” said the man dreamily, “and I think that it is the only thing in the world that he does want, to kill me. He has wanted that for just a little more than three years. He does not wish for any publicity or, if possible, any scandal. He would have liked this morning to have found out where I lived and then made his opportunity.”
“But this is perfectly absurd. The law does not permit anything of the kind. If you thought your brother was following you with the intention of injuring you in any way, you had only to speak to the nearest policeman.”
“Ah, mademoiselle,” he said, with an indulgent smile, “there are just a few matters on which one does not speak to the nearest policeman, and this is one of them. It is a private matter—a family matter. The honour of three women is involved in it. Our family name is involved in it. We do not want talk in the newspapers.”
“What a cold-blooded brute your brother must be!”
“Really, I do not think so. I can quite understand his desire to kill me. If he succeeded it would be but just. All the same I do not wish to die. I have escaped him for three years, and I propose to go on escaping. But here I babble of my own affairs and do not even thank you for having saved my life. You have done me a great service, mademoiselle—a very great service. I shall not forget it.”
At this I laughed. “It is not a very great matter. Indeed, it is hardly worth thanks.”
“You shall not find me ungrateful. But I must not inflict myself upon you longer than is necessary. If the coast is clear now, I can get away with safety. Might I ask you to inspect from the window once more?”
I went to the window and turned back to him. “It is no good,” I said, “your brother has come back again. He is standing on the opposite side of the road.”
“He saw you?”
“Yes, I think so. Indeed, I am sure of it.”
“Then he saw, as I did, that you gave a little start. Possibly he also saw you watching at the window when he passed the first time. He is rather a clever man, and he can make deductions. I fear, mademoiselle, that in a few moments you will be troubled with a visit from my brother.”
“But you,” I said, “what about you?”
“If I got through the window of the room at the back of this flat where should I be?”
“You would drop into the little yard of the flat below this. It is at present untenanted, and you might make your way into it, or else climb the wall and get——”
My electric bell purred loudly. A shower of light taps came from the knocker of the door.
“Keep him back for a minute or two, if you can!” said my guest in a whisper.
I waited until the kitchen door had closed on him, and then opened the front door to his brother.
Seeing him now close at hand, I found that he differed in many ways from the man that he was pursuing. He was much older and his hair was beginning to go grey. He gave me the impression of being a better man altogether than his brother. I do not know and shall never know what the quarrel between them was, but I feel sure it was his brother who was in the wrong.
He told me with a pleasant smile that he had come from the house agents who had the letting of these fiats. He could not remember their names; he was a foreigner and these English names easily escaped him. But he believed that there was a flat to be let in that block.
“Yes,” I said, “the basement flat is to let. You understand—the basement flat? You go down the area steps to get to it. Why ring here in order to tell me that?”
He was desolated. “Because, mademoiselle, I have had the very great misfortune to lose the key of that basement flat. Possibly your own latch-key would fit it.”
“No, it would not. But you need not mind, for you would not have taken the flat in any case. They are not intended for rich people.”
He laughed. “Appearances are so deceptive,” he said. Then quite suddenly and rather adroitly he stepped past me into the passage. “Ah,” he said, looking round, “if I could have a little place like this, furnished and arranged with the exquisite taste that is shown here, I should be perfectly content.”
“Will you please go away?” I said.
“Certainly, mademoiselle, in one moment. Your kindness will permit me just to see the arrangement of the rooms, so that I may determine whether a flat here would be suitable for me. You have made me a little nervous by casting doubt upon it.”
“You cannot see any of the rooms,” I said. “You must go at once.”
“And if not?” He smiled.
“If not, I shall fetch a policeman and hand you over to him.”
He still smiled. “Believe me,” he said, “I am sorry indeed to give you this extra trouble, but I am afraid I must ask you to fetch that policeman. In your absence I can inspect the rooms at my leisure. I can at least promise you that I will take the greatest care not to injure them in any way.”
Quickly and adroitly he slipped past me again and went straight into the kitchen. I held my breath and listened, and did not fetch the policeman. In a moment he came out of the kitchen again.
“No policeman yet?” he said. “You are kind to me, and I will repay it by leaving at once. I see,” he added meaningly, “that you keep your kitchen window wide open. The English love fresh air, do they not? Good morning.”
So that was all right. The man behind the door had escaped.
Two days later I received two surprises. The van of a West-End florist degraded itself by stopping at my flat and delivered a hamper of exquisite flowers and fruit. I had ordered nothing, and could not at first believe that they were intended for me. But a short note was enclosed.
“Permit me, dear mademoiselle, with these few flowers to make my apologies look prettier than my rudeness the other day. I shall not take the basement flat after all.”
The evening post brought me another letter, registered, containing five Bank of England twenty-pound notes, and another letter.
“You seemed, mademoiselle, to think so little of your great kindness to me on Tuesday, that I think you should have some souvenir of it. It would be idle of me to match my taste against yours, and with renewed gratitude I leave the choice to you.”
Neither letter bore any address or any signature. At first I was a little puzzled to make out how they had got my name. But there were many ways in which that might have been managed. A simple inquiry at the house agents would have been one of them. It was impossible to return their presents, and, to be quite honest, I doubt if I should have returned them if it had been possible. For the next few days I fed on peaches and bought things and lived gloriously.
About a year later I read in a newspaper a curious story. A man had jumped overboard in mid-Channel and another had immediately gone over after him. It was supposed to be a gallant attempt at rescue, and the statement of a passenger that he saw the rescuer grip the other man by the throat as if to choke him was not credited. The men bore different names, but in personal appearance were remarkably like one another. The phrase used was, “They might have been brothers.” A description of the appearance left little doubt in my mind, and I could fully believe that passenger’s story.