CHAPTER VI
Francis Eversleigh returned to the office in Lincoln's Inn next day, andstrove to take up his work again, but with indifferent success; theshadow of his impending ruin never lifted itself from his mind. On theother hand, Cooper Silwood, having determined to act alone, began tomake preparations for carrying out his scheme.
All that day Silwood was incessantly occupied with the ordinary businessof that department of the office which was his special care. No mancould have told from his aspect, or from the manner in which he did hisbusiness, that anything pressed heavily upon him; he seemed in no waydifferent from the imperturbable, shrewd, capable lawyer people believedhim always to be. But what he purposed doing was never absent from histhoughts.
According to custom, at six o'clock Williamson brought him the lettersfor signature. This signing of the letters served as a sort of signal,for shortly afterwards the clerks left and the office was closed, thoughit was not an uncommon thing for Silwood to stay on by himself foranother hour or two. The Eversleighs went earlier in order to catch thefast five-o'clock suburban train.
At six o'clock Williamson went into Silwood's room with the letters; heplaced them silently before his master, who read them over rapidly, andthen affixed the firm's signature in his careful, small handwriting.Williamson stood waiting, while he tried to read his master's face, butSilwood's air was perfectly inscrutable.
"I shall not go at once," said Silwood. "I have not quite finished; butthere is no need for any one to stay."
He gathered the letters together in a bunch, and passed them on toWilliamson.
"By the way," he asked, looking at the clerk with a sharp glance, "howdoes Mr. Eversleigh strike you? I'm afraid he's not very well."
"I thought he seemed poorly--very poorly," replied Williamson. "I feltvery sorry for him, and I ventured to suggest--having been with the firmso many years, sir--to him that he needed a holiday."
"You did! That was good. It's my own idea, too. And what did he say?"
"He said he was all right, or soon would be; there was nothing much thematter with him. Said it was the heat."
"But about taking a holiday?"
"He said it was not at all necessary."
"Well, I agree with you, Mr. Williamson. It seems to me that he doesneed a change. I told him that also. I urged him to take a month off,but he won't hear of it. He keeps on saying he is not ill really--only abit out of sorts owing to the hot weather. And it is hot, isn't it? Imust confess I feel this frightful heat very much; the office ishorribly close. Unless the weather becomes cooler, I declare I shallrequire a holiday myself. And if Mr. Eversleigh still persists inrefusing a holiday--well, I believe I shall take one. I haven't had areal vacation for a very long time. But I had much rather he went."
"You certainly have had no holiday, Mr. Silwood, for a long time--threeor four years, it must be," said Williamson, immensely surprised at theturn the conversation had taken. "When would you think of going, sir?"
"Oh, I haven't thought much about it all," replied Silwood; "my taking aholiday is only a possibility. Still, if this heat does not moderate, Ishould not wonder if I did go. But it's not settled."
"I understand, sir," said Williamson, who, as a matter of fact, wascompletely mystified. "What's up now?" he asked himself. Still, onreflection, he had to admit there was no reason why Silwood should nottake a holiday if he wished to do so.
"That's all, I think," said Silwood; and with a nod he dismissed thehead-clerk.
Silwood waited for half an hour, so as to allow plenty of time for allthe clerks to have left the office, and then he took a look into thevarious rooms to see if there was any one still there; but they were allempty. Satisfied on this point, he returned to his own room and shuthimself in.
Next he went to the large japanned box in the corner, touched theconcealed spring, and laid open the secret chamber, from which he took anumber of papers, including the sheet of figures against which wereplaced initials. He pored over these papers, studying them with theintentness of one who is committing a subject to memory. He made two orthree alterations in the figures, and then put all the documents backin their hiding-place. He tried to close up the chamber, but the springwould not work properly. He tried again and again, but he did notsucceed.
With each failure his manner showed a rapidly rising agitation, anincreasing apprehension, his usual impassivity dropping away from himcompletely. He examined the mechanism of the arrangement, but he couldfind nothing wrong with it; so far as he could see, it appeared to be inperfect order. As he struggled with it, his pale face becameextraordinarily livid, his lips twitched convulsively, the perspirationstood in beads on his forehead. For he knew that if the box would notshut, then his scheme would tumble to pieces.
He had almost given it up in despair when the accidental pressure of hisknee against one of the sides of the box caused the spring to act, andthe opening suddenly closed up of itself.
Trembling and gasping, Silwood sat down and looked at the box as if itwere some hateful living thing.
"It ought to be seen to," he said to himself, "but I cannot permit anyone to touch it. No one but myself must know of the secret chamber--thatis vital. And yet--no, I must run the risk."
He went on looking darkly at the box.
"Oh, what a fright you gave me!" he said aloud to it, and then glancedabout fearfully at the sound of his own voice. "How absurd!" he said tohimself, reassuringly. "I must not let the thing get on my nerves likethis."
It was now not far from eight o'clock, which was the hour for Silwood'sdinner. In a few minutes more, therefore, he betook himself to therestaurant in Holborn which he was in the habit of patronizing. Alittle after nine he walked back to Lincoln's Inn, which he entered bythe small door at the side of the fine gateway opening into Lincoln'sInn Fields. He spoke to the porter for some seconds, and then went on tohis private chambers in Stone Buildings, his rooms being on the topfloor of the north-east corner building overlooking Chancery Lane. Hehad lived here for several years.
After he had let himself in he locked the door, filled a black clay pipeand lit it, took an armchair and sat down. And there he sat for a longwhile very still and quiet, save for the puff--puff--puffing of thesmoke from his lips. The pipe burnt itself out, and he looked at hiswatch.
"It is too soon," he said to himself; and he filled a second black claypipe. And this too he smoked out.
With a leisurely movement he at length rose and went to the window,threw up the sash, and peered out into the half-darkness of the street.He ran his eye up and down Chancery Lane, and noted that all the lightsexcept the street-lamps were out, and that the pavements were bare ofhuman forms, save for one or two dark-flitting, shadowy beings.
"It will soon be time," he thought; and he closed the window.
He sat down again, and proceeded to smoke a third pipe. All the while hehad been going over the details of his scheme; now he was thinkingwhether he had not been too abrupt in making the suggestion that hemight take a holiday to Williamson.
"What does it matter?" he concluded; "he knows nothing."
He smoked on until twelve boomed through the air--the strokes came in agreat volume of sound from the clocks in the Strand and from far andnear. When it had died away, he put down his pipe, and walked into hisbedroom.
But it was not to go to bed.
For, a few minutes later, a figure emerged from Cooper Silwood'sbedroom--the figure of a man of the height and general build of CooperSilwood, but otherwise not like him in the least. Yet it was he, thoughchanged beyond recognition.
His mien was that of a respectable workman in his everyday clothes. Theywere such clothes as might be worn by men of half a dozen differenttrades with equal appropriateness, so little distinctive of any onetrade were they, and yet they stamped themselves unmistakably as aworkman's clothes. Silwood wore them like one who was thoroughly at homein them; he moved at ease in them. To all appearance he was a workman,and from his bearing it might be guessed that th
e part he was playingwas no new one. To be in this disguise was no novelty to him.
That it was no new _role_ for him to assume was also manifest from theskill and success with which his face was made up. To begin with, theheavy brown wig he usually had on his head had disappeared, and he wasnow quite bald, with the exception of a narrow fringe of dark-grey hairround the base of the skull. He was no longer clean-shaven; an untidyblackish moustache covered his upper lip. A dark line had been pencilledon either side of his nose, these lines alone imparting to the face amarvellous change in its expression. Besides, the skin of the face hadbeen slightly stained, as had also been that of the hands.
His disguise was absolute. His own mother, as the phrase goes, would nothave known him. He looked to the life the part he was playing. Mr.Cooper Silwood, the eminent solicitor, had disappeared, and a sober,respectable workman had taken his place.
Could Francis Eversleigh now have seen this partner of his he would havehad much food for thought; if he could have followed him he would havehad much more.
The night was now very still--the roar of London was hushed. Silwoodopened his door gently, and listened. The stairs were lit, but no soundcame from any of the chambers. Locking his door softly, he stole downinto the court of Stone Buildings; they, too, were wrapped in silence.For a moment he stood still and strained his ears to catch the slightestnoise, but there was not a breath. Taking from his pocket a key, heunlocked a small iron gate at the north-east corner of the court, andpassed through it and went along a short narrow footway closed on theChancery Lane side by another iron gate, which he opened, and so reachedChancery Lane. All this he did without hurry or confusion. It was plainthat he had got out of Lincoln's Inn by this footway many times before.Yet it was believed to be shut up every evening by the porter, who wassupposed to be the only person possessing the keys of the gates.
From this footway--which is not much used even in the day-time, and ishardly to be noticed at all in the night-time--to Holborn is but a step.Silwood found Chancery Lane deserted; no one saw him emerge from theInn. He was quickly in Holborn, and set out eastwards at a rapid pace.And on he went, mile after mile, stepping out briskly, through the cityproper, and on, on beyond it until he reached one of the great districtsof East-End London, where in small humble houses, huddled together in awilderness of mean streets, thousands upon thousands live out theirobscure and uneventful lives.
Silwood went on like a man who knows his way well. Never once did hepause until he reached the end of his journey. He halted at a door inDouglas Street, Stepney, and knocked a peculiar knock. Two or threeminutes passed, and then a light was shown at the window, whereuponSilwood knocked in the same way a second time.
"Is it you, James?" asked a woman's voice, as the door was partiallyopened.
"Yes, Meg; let me in," said Silwood.
"I did not expect you," she said, while Silwood embraced heraffectionately. "Is anything the matter?"
The woman who put the question was a plump, personable woman of aboutforty, with kindly brown eyes and a tender mouth. She loved but wasrather afraid of this man, who yet was always good and kind to her. Buthe had told her very little about himself. She knew he was engaged insome mysterious business which necessitated long absences from her, andthe wearing of a disguise; she had tried to guess the nature of hisbusiness, and had come to the conclusion that it was some kind of secretpolice work.
Any romance there was in Silwood's life was connected with this woman,of whom he was sincerely fond, though he was still fonder of theirchild. Some years before, an accident one evening in the street led tohis meeting her, and he took a fancy to her. The thing jumping wellwith other things he followed her up and married her, though he wascareful not to let her know who he was.
When with her and the child Silwood was another man; he seemed to haveshed like a skin the cold formality which characterized him in Lincoln'sInn; his very nature appeared changed.
"Is anything the matter?" she asked.
"No, Meg, though there's news. But how is Davy?"
"Poor lamb! He's as usual. He's asleep just now."
"Let me see him," said Silwood.
They went into a bedroom, and in a cot was their child. The boy was acripple--he had been born a cripple, and the parents were all the moreattached to him on that account. There is no explaining the workings ofhuman nature; Silwood, who had confessed himself a criminal to hispartner, Eversleigh, was deeply attached to the boy. He now gazed at thesleeping child, and the love that shone in his eyes was as pure as anangel's.
"Poor lad! dear lad!" he said, and there were tears in his voice.
Then the father and mother tip-toed out of the room.
"You said there was news, James," suggested the wife.
"Yes, I think you won't live here much longer. My business will take meabroad, and I dare say I will by-and-by--it may be very soon--send foryou. I may be away from England for a long time."
"Away from England!" she murmured. "Oh, James! Where is it you aregoing?"
"I don't know," he answered; "I am not quite sure yet. I'll let you knowin a few days, and meanwhile I want you to get ready, so that you cantravel at a minute's notice."
"Yes, James; it's rather sudden, but I'll do what you tell me."
"Now I must leave you," he said.
She was accustomed to these abrupt partings, but as he was going shehung upon his neck while he kissed her repeatedly.
The following day he was at his office at half-past ten, looking as ifit were impossible for such a man as he to lead a double life.