CHAPTER V
THE MAN IN THE STREET
Rachel's perturbation was only the greater from her success inconcealing, or at least suppressing it, during the actual process ofthis singular interview. You may hold your breath without moving amuscle, but the muscles will make up for it when their turn comes, andit was so with Rachel and her nerves; they rose upon her even on theplatform, and she climbed the many stairs in a tremor from head to foot.And at the top, in the open night, and at all the many corners of asquare that is nothing of the kind, from hoarse throat and on flutteringplacard, it was "Trial and Verdict," or "Sensational Verdict at the OldBailey," here as at the other end of the town.
But now all Rachel's thoughts were of this mysterious Mr. Steel; of hisinexplicable behavior towards her, and of her own attitude towards him.Yet, when all was said, or when all that had been said could beremembered, would his behavior be found so very inexplicable? Rachel wasnot devoid of a proper vanity, albeit that night she had probably lessthan most women with a tithe of her personal attractions; and yet uponreflection she could conceive but one explanation of such conduct in anelderly man.
"There is no fool like an old fool," quoted Rachel to herself; and itwas remarkable that until this moment she had never thought of Mr. Steelas either elderly or old. His eyes were young; his voice was young; shecould hear him and see him still, so the strong impression was not allon one side. No more, it would seem, was the fascination. Rachel,indeed, owned to no such feeling, even in her inmost heart. But she didbegin to blame herself, alike for her reception of advances which mightwell have been dictated by mere eccentric benevolence, and for herreadiness now to put another construction upon them. And all this timeshe was threading the streets of Chelsea at a pace suggestive of adestination and a purpose, while in her mind she did nothing but lookback.
Impulsive by nature, Rachel had also the courage of each impulse whileit lasted; on the other hand, if quick to act, she was only too ready toregret. Like many another whose self-reliance is largely on the surface,an achievement of the will and not the gift of a temperament, sheusually paid for a display of spirit with the most dispiritingreaction; and this was precisely the case in point. Rachel was ashamedalike of her rudeness and her vanity; the latter she traced to itssource. It was inspired by vague memories of other women who had beenthrough the same ordeal as herself. One had been handed a bouquet in thedock; another had been overwhelmed by proposals of marriage. Rachelherself had received letters of which the first line was enough. Butthere had been no letter from Mr. Steel. Ah! but he had attended hertrial; she remembered him now, his continual presence had impresseditself very subtly upon her mind, without the definite memory of asingle glance; and after the trial he sent her his card, he dogged herin the train! What was she to think? There was the voice in which he hadoffered her his aid; there was the look in his eyes; there was thedelicate indirectness of that offer.
A year or two ago, with all her independence, Rachel would not have beenso ready to repel one whose advances, however unwarrantable inthemselves, were yet marked by so many evidences of sympathy andconsideration. She had not always been suspicious and repellent; and shesighed to think how sadly she must have changed, even before thenightmare of the last few weeks.
But a more poignant reminder of her married life was now in store forRachel Minchin. She had come to Chelsea because it was the only portionof the town in which she had the semblance of a friend; but there didlive in Tite Street a young couple with whom the Minchins had at onetime been on friendly terms. That was in the day of plenty andextravagance; and the acquaintance, formed at an hotel in the Trossachs,had not ripened in town as the two wives could have wished. It was Mrs.Carrington, however, who had found the Minchins their furnished house,while her husband certainly interested himself in Rachel's defence.Carrington was a barrister, who never himself touched criminal work, buthe had spoken to a friend who did, to wit the brilliant terror of femalewitnesses, and caustic critic of the police, to whom Rachel owed solittle. But to Carrington himself she owed much--more indeed than shecared to calculate--for he was not a man whom she liked. She wished tothank him for his kindness, to give certain undertakings and to ask hisadvice, but it was Mrs. Carrington whom she really hoped to see. Therewas a good heart, or Rachel was much mistaken. They would have seen moreof each other if Mrs. Carrington had had her way. Rachel remembered heron the occasion of the solitary visit she had received at Holloway--forMrs. Carrington had been the visitor.
"Don't tell Jim," she had said, "when you get off and come to see us."
And she had kissed her captive sister in a way that made poor Rachelsometimes think she had a friend in England after all; but that wasbefore her committal; and thereafter from that quarter not a word. Itwas not Mrs. Carrington whom Rachel blamed, however, and those lastwords of hers implied an invitation which had never been withdrawn. Butinvitation or no invitation, friend or no friend, Mrs. Carrington shewould have to see. And even he would be different now that he knew shewas innocent; and if it was easy to see what he had believed of herbefore, well, so much the more credit to him for what he had done.
So Rachel had decided before quitting the precincts of the Old Bailey;but her subsequent experiences in street and train so absorbed her thatshe was full of the interview that was over when she ought to have beenpreparing for the one still before her. And, in her absence of mind, theforce of habit had taken advantage of her; instead of going on to TiteStreet, she turned too soon, and turned again, and was now appalled tofind herself in the very street in which her husband had met his death.
The little street was as quiet as ever; Rachel stood quite still, andfor the moment she was the only person in it. She stole up to the house.The blinds were down, and it was in darkness, otherwise all was as sheremembered it only too well. Her breath came quickly. It was a strangetrick her feet had played her, bringing her here against her will! Yetshe had thought of coming as a last resort. The furnished house shouldbe hers for some months yet; it had been taken for six months from July,and this was only the end of November. At the worst--if no one wouldtake her in--
She shuddered at the unfinished thought; and yet there was something init that appealed to Rachel. To go back there, if only for the shortesttime--to show her face openly where it was known--not to slink and hideas though she were really guilty! That might give her back herself-respect; that might make others respect her too. But could she doit, even if she would? Could she bring herself to set foot inside thathouse again?
Rachel felt tremulously in her pocket; there had been more keys thanone, and that which had been in her possession when she was arrestedwas in it still. Nobody had asked her for it; she had kept it for this;dare she use it after all? The street was still empty; it is thequietest little street in Chelsea. There would never be a better chance.
Rachel crept up the steps. If she should be seen!
She was not; but a footstep rang somewhere in the night, and on that thekey was fitted and the door opened without another moment's hesitation.Rachel entered, the door shut noisily behind her, and then her own steprang in turn upon the floor. It was bare boards; and as Rachel felt herway to the electric switches, beyond the dining-room door, her fingersmissed the pictures on the walls. This prepared her for what she foundwhen the white light sprang out above her head. The house had beendismantled; not a stick in the rooms, not so much as a stair-rod on thestairs, nor a blind to the window at their head.
The furniture removed while the use of it belonged legally to her! Hadthey made so sure of her conviction as all that? Rachel's blood camestraight from zero to the boil; this was monstrous, this was illegal andwicked. The house was hers for other two months; and there were thingsof hers in it, she had left everything behind her. If they had beenremoved, then this outrage was little short of felony, and she wouldinvoke the law from whose clutches she herself had escaped. Rachel hadexpected to be terrified in the house; she was filled insted with angerand indignation.
It wa
s as she expected; not a trunk had been left; and the removal hadtaken place that very week. This would account for the electric lightbeing still intact. Rachel discovered it by picking up a crumplednewspaper, which seemed to have contained bread and cheese; it didcontain a report of the first day of the trial. They might have waitedtill her trial was over; they should suffer for their impatience, it wastheir turn. So angry was Rachel that her own room wounded her with nomemories of the past. It was an empty room, and nothing more; and onlyon her return to the lower floor did that last dread night come back toher in all its horror and all its pitifulness.
The double doors of the late professor! Rachel forgot her grudge againsthis widow; she pulled the outer door, and pushed the inner one, just asshe had done in the small hours of that fatal morning, but this time allwas darkness within. She had to put on the electric light for herself.The necessity she could not have explained, but it existed in her mind;she must see the room again. And the first thing she saw was that thewindow was broken still.
Rachel looked at it more closely than she had done on the morning whenshe had given her incriminating opinion to the police, and the longershe looked the less reason did she see to alter that opinion. The brokenglass might have been placed upon the sill in order to promote the verytheory which had been so gullibly adopted by the police, and the watchand chain hidden in the chimney for the same purpose. They might havehanged the man who kept them; and surely this was not the first thiefwho had slunk away empty-handed after the committal of a crimeinfinitely greater than the one contemplated.
Rachel had never wavered in these ideas, but neither had she dwelt onthem to any extent, and now they came one instant only to go the next.Her husband was dead--that was once more the paramount thought--and shehis widow had been acquitted on a charge of murdering him. But for themoment she was thinking only of him, and her eyes hung over the spotwhere she had seen him sitting dead--once without dreaming it--and soonthey filled. Perhaps she was remembering all that had been good in him,perhaps all that had been evil in herself; her lips quivered, and hereyes filled. But it was hard to pity one who was at rest, hard for herwith the world to face afresh that night, without a single friend. TheCarringtons? Well, she would see; and now she had a very definite pointupon which to consult Mr. Carrington. That helped her, and she went,quietly and unseen as she had come.
There was still a light in the ground-floor windows of the Tite Streethouse, strong lights and voices; it was the dining-room, for theMinchins had dined there once; and the voices did not include a feminineone that Rachel could perceive. If there were people dining with them,the ladies must have gone upstairs, and Mrs. Carrington was the woman tosee Rachel for five minutes, and the one woman in England to whom shecould turn. It was an opportunity not to miss--she had not the courageto let it pass--and yet it required almost as much to ring the bell. Andeven as she rang--but not until that moment--did Rachel recognize andadmit to herself the motive which had brought her to that door. It wasnot to obtain the advice of a clever man; it was the sympathy of anotherwoman that she needed that night more than anything else in all theworld.
She was shown at once into the study behind the dining-room, andimmediately the voices in the latter ceased. This was ominous; it wasfor Mrs. Carrington that Rachel had asked; and the omen was instantlyfulfilled. It was Mr. Carrington who came into the room, dark, dapper,and duskily flushed with his own hospitality, but without the genialfront which Rachel had liked best in him. His voice also, when he hadcarefully shut the door behind him, was unnaturally stiff.
"I congratulate you," he said, with a bow but nothing more; and Rachelsaw there and then how it was to be; for with her at least this man hadnever been stiff before, having indeed offended her with his familiarityat the time when her husband and he were best friends.
"I owe it very largely to you," faltered Rachel. "How can I thank you?"
Carrington said it was not necessary.
"Then I only hope," said Rachel, on one of her impulses, "that you don'tdisagree with the verdict?"
"I didn't read the case," replied Carrington glibly, and with neithermore nor less of the contemptuous superiority with which he would havereferred to any other Old Bailey trial; but the man himself was quick tosee the brutality of such a statement, and quicker yet to tone it down.
"It wasn't necessary," he added, with a touch of the early manner whichshe had never liked; "you see, I knew you."
The insincerity was so obvious that Rachel could scarcely bring herselfto confess that she had come to ask his advice. "What was the point?" hesaid to that, so crisply that the only point which Rachel could think ofwas the fresh, raw grievance of the empty house.
"Didn't your solicitor tell you?" asked Carrington. "He came to me aboutit; but I suppose--"
Rachel knew well what he supposed.
"He should have told you to-night," added Carrington, "at any rate. Therent was only paid for half the term--quite right--the usual way. Thepermanent tenant wanted to be done with the house altogether, and thatentitled her to take her things out. No, I'm afraid you have nogrievance there, Mrs. Minchin."
"And pray," demanded Rachel, "where are my things?"
"Ah, your solicitor will tell you that--when you give him the chance! Hevery properly would not care to bother you about trifles until the caseagainst you was satisfactorily disposed of. By the way, I hope you don'tmind my cigar? We were smoking in the next room."
"I have taken you from your guests," said Rachel, miserably. "I know Iought not to have come at such an hour."
Carrington did not contradict her.
"But there seemed so much to speak about," she went desperately on."There are the money matters and--and--"
"If you will come to my chambers," said Carrington, "I shall bedelighted to go into things with you, and to advise you to the best ofmy ability. If you could manage to come at half-past nine on Mondaymorning, I would be there early and could give you twenty minutes."
He wrote down the address, and, handing it to Rachel, rang the bell.This drove her to despair; evidently it never occurred to him that shewas faint with weariness and hunger, that she had nowhere to go for thenight, and not the price of a decent meal, much less a bed, in herpurse. And even now her pride prevented her from telling the truth; butit would not silence her supreme desire.
"Oh!" she cried; "oh, may I not speak to your wife?"
"Not to-night, if you don't mind," replied Carrington, with his bow andsmile. "We can't both desert our guests."
"Only for a minute!" pleaded Rachel. "I wouldn't keep her more!"
"Not to-night," he repeated, with a broader smile, a clearerenunciation, and a decision so obviously irrevocable that Rachel said nomore. But she would not see the hand that he could afford to hold out toher now; and as for going near his chambers, never, never, though shestarved!
"No, I wouldn't have kept her," she sobbed in the street; "but she wouldhave kept me! I know her! I know her! She would have had pity on me, inspite of him; but now I can never go near either of them again!"
Then where was she to go? God knew! No respectable hotel would take herin without luggage or a deposit. What was she to do?
But while she wondered her feet were carrying her once more in the olddirection, and as she walked an idea came. She was very near the fatallittle street at the time. She turned about, and then to the left. In afew moments she was timorously knocking at the door of a house with acard in the window.
"It's you!" cried the woman who came, almost shutting the door inRachel's face, leaving just space enough for her own.
"You have a room to let," said Rachel, steadily.
"But not to you," said the woman, quickly; and Rachel was notsurprised, the other was so pale, so strangely agitated.
"But why?" she asked. "I have been acquitted--thanks partly to your ownevidence--and yet you of all women will not take me in! Do you mean totell me that you actually think I did it still?"
Rachel fully expected an affirmative
. She was prepared for that opinionnow from all the world; but for once a surprise was in store for her.The pale woman shifted her eyes, then raised them doggedly, and the lookin them brought a sudden glow to Rachel's heart.
"No, I don't think that, and never did," said the one independentwitness for the defence. "But others do, and I am too near where ithappened; it might empty my house and keep it empty."
Rachel seized her hand.
"Never mind, never mind," she whispered. "It is better, ten thousandtimes, that you should believe in me, that any woman should! Thank you,and God bless you, for that!"
She was turning away, when she faced about upon the steps, gazing pastthe woman who believed in her, along the passage beyond, an unspokenquestion beneath the tears in her eyes.
"He is not here," said the landlady, quickly.
"But he did get over it?"
"So we hope; but he was at death's door that morning, and for days andweeks. Now he's abroad again--I'm sure I don't know where."
Rachel said good-night, and this time the door not only shut before shehad time to change her mind again, but she heard the bolts shot as shereached the pavement. The fact did not strike her. She was thinking fora moment of the innocent young foreigner who had brought matters to acrisis between her husband and herself. On the whole she was glad thathe was not in England--yet there would have been one friend.
And now her own case was really desperate; it was late at night; she wasfamished and worn out in body and mind, nor could she see the slightestprospect of a lodging for the night.
And that she would have had in the condemned cell, with food and warmthand rest, and the blessed certainty of a speedy issue out of all herafflictions.
It was a bitter irony, after all, this acquittal!
There was but one place for her now. She would perish there of cold andhorror; but she might buy something to eat, and take it with her; and atleast she could rest, and would be alone, in the empty house, the houseof misery and murder, that was yet the one shelter that she knew of inall London.
She crept to the King's road, and returned with a few sandwiches,walking better in her eagerness to break a fast which she had only feltsince excitement had given place to despair. But now it was making herfaint and ill. And she hurried, weary though she was.
But in the little street itself she stood aghast. A crowd filled it; thecrowd stood before the empty house of sorrow and of crime; and in amoment Rachel saw the cause.
It was her own fault. She had left the light burning in the upper room,the bedroom on the second floor.
Rachel joined the skirts of the crowd--drawn by an irresistiblefascination--and listened to what was being said. All eyes were upon thelighted window of the bedroom--watching for herself, as she soondiscovered--and this made her doubly safe where she stood behind thepress.
"She's up there, I tell yer," said one.
"Not her! It's a ghost."
"Her 'usband's ghost, then."
"But vere's a chap 'ere wot sore 'er fice to fice in the next street;an' followed 'er and 'eard the door go; an' w'en 'e come back wiv 'ispals, vere was vat light."
"Let's 'ave 'er aht of it."
"Yuss, she ain't no right there."
"No; the condemned cell's the plice for 'er!"
"Give us a stone afore the copper comes!"
And Rachel saw the first stone flung, and heard the first glass break;and within a very few minutes there was not a whole pane left in thefront of the house; but that was all the damage which Rachel herself sawdone.
A hand touched her lightly on the shoulder.
"Do you still pin your faith to the man in the street?" said a voice.
And, though she had heard it for the first time that very evening, itwas a voice that Rachel seemed to have known all her life.