It was exactly five minutes past four as Mr. Robert Audley stepped out upon the platform at Shoreditch, and waited placidly until such time as his dogs and his portmanteau should be delivered up to the attendant porter who had called his cab, and undertaken the general conduct of his affairs, with that disinterested courtesy which does such infinite credit to a class of servitors who are forbidden to accept the tribute of a grateful public. Robert Audley waited with consummate patience for a considerable time; but as the express was generally a long train, and as there were a great many passengers from Norfolk carrying guns and pointers, and other paraphernalia of a critical description, it took a long while to make matters agreeable to all claimants, and even the barrister's seraphic indifference to mundane affairs nearly gave way.
"Perhaps, when that gentleman who is making such a noise about a pointer with liver-colored spots, has discovered the particular pointer and spots that he wants—which happy combination of events scarcely seems likely to arrive—they'll give me my luggage and let me go. The designing wretches knew at a glance that I was born to be imposed upon; and that if they were to trample the life out of me upon this very platform, I should never have the spirit to bring an action against the company."
Suddenly an idea seemed to strike him, and he left the porter to struggle for the custody of his goods, and walked round to the other side of the station.
He heard a bell ring, and looking at the clock, had remembered that the down train for Colchester started at this time. He had learned what it was to have an earnest purpose since the disappearance of George Talboys; and he reached the opposite platform in time to see the passengers take their seats.
There was one lady who had evidently only just arrived at the station; for she hurried on to the platform at the very moment that Robert approached the train, and almost ran against that gentleman in her haste and excitement.
"I beg your pardon," she began, ceremoniously; then raising her eyes from Mr. Audley's waistcoat, which was about on a level with her pretty face, she exclaimed, "Robert, you in London already?"
"Yes, Lady Audley; you were quite right; the Castle Inn is a dismal place, and—"
"You got tired of it—I knew you would. Please open the carriage door for me: the train will start in two minutes."
Robert Audley was looking at his uncle's wife with rather a puzzled expression of countenance.
"What does it mean?" he thought. "She is altogether a different being to the wretched, helpless creature who dropped her mask for a moment, and looked at me with her own pitiful face, in the little room at Mount Stanning, four hours ago. What has happened to cause the change?"
He opened the door for her while he thought this, and helped her to settle herself in her seat, spreading her furs over her knees, and arranging the huge velvet mantle in which her slender little figure was almost hidden.
"Thank you very much; how good you are to me," she said, as he did this. "You will think me very foolish to travel upon such a day, without my dear darling's knowledge too; but I went up to town to settle a very terrific milliner's bill, which I did not wish my best of husbands to see; for, indulgent as he is, he might think me extravagant; and I cannot bear to suffer even in his thoughts."
"Heaven forbid that you ever should, Lady Audley," Robert said, gravely.
She looked at him for a moment with a smile, which had something defiant in its brightness.
"Heaven forbid it, indeed," she murmured. "I don't think I ever shall."
The second bell rung, and the train moved as she spoke. The last Robert Audley saw of her was that bright defiant smile.
"Whatever object brought her to London has been successfully accomplished," he thought. "Has she baffled me by some piece of womanly jugglery? Am I never to get any nearer to the truth, but am I to be tormented all my life by vague doubts, and wretched suspicions, which may grow upon me till I become a monomaniac? Why did she come to London?"
He was still mentally asking himself this question as he ascended the stairs in Figtree Court, with one of his dogs under each arm, and his railway rugs over his shoulder.
He found his chambers in their accustomed order. The geraniums had been carefully tended, and the canaries had retired for the night under cover of a square of green baize, testifying to the care of honest Mrs. Maloney. Robert cast a hurried glance round the sitting-room; then setting down the dogs upon the hearth-rug, he walked straight into the little inner chamber which served as his dressing-room.
It was in this room that he kept disused portmanteaus, battered japanned cases, and other lumber; and it was in this room that George Talboys had left his luggage. Robert lifted a portmanteau from the top of a large trunk, and kneeling down before it with a lighted candle in his hand, carefully examined the lock.
To all appearance it was exactly in the same condition in which George had left it, when he laid his mourning garments aside and placed them in this shabby repository with all other memorials of his dead wife. Robert brushed his coat sleeve across the worn, leather-covered lid, upon which the initials G. T. were inscribed with big brass-headed nails; but Mrs. Maloney, the laundress, must have been the most precise of housewives, for neither the portmanteau nor the trunk were dusty.
Mr. Audley dispatched a boy to fetch his Irish attendant, and paced up and down his sitting-room waiting anxiously for her arrival.
She came in about ten minutes, and, after expressing her delight in the return of "the master," humbly awaited his orders.
"I only sent for you to ask if anybody has been here; that is to say, if anybody has applied to you for the key of my rooms to-day—any lady?"
"Lady? No, indeed, yer honor; there's been no lady for the kay; barrin' it's the blacksmith."
"The blacksmith!"
"Yes; the blacksmith your honor ordered to come to-day."
"I order a blacksmith!" exclaimed Robert. "I left a bottle of French brandy in the cupboard," he thought, "and Mrs. M. has been evidently enjoying herself."
"Sure, and the blacksmith your honor tould to see to the locks," replied Mrs. Maloney. "It's him that lives down in one of the little streets by the bridge," she added, giving a very lucid description of the man's whereabouts.
Robert lifted his eyebrows in mute despair.
"If you'll sit down and compose yourself, Mrs. M.," he said—he abbreviated her name thus on principle, for the avoidance of unnecessary labor—"perhaps we shall be able by and by to understand each other. You say a blacksmith has been here?"
"Sure and I did, sir."
"To-day?"
"Quite correct, sir."
Step by step Mr. Audley elicited the following information. A locksmith had called upon Mrs. Maloney that afternoon at three o'clock, and had asked for the key of Mr. Audley's chambers, in order that he might look to the locks of the doors, which he stated were all out of repair. He declared that he was acting upon Mr. Audley's own orders, conveyed to him by a letter from the country, where the gentleman was spending his Christmas. Mrs. Maloney, believing in the truth of this statement, had admitted the man to the chambers, where he stayed about half an hour.
"But you were with him while he examined the locks, I suppose?" Mr. Audley asked.
"Sure I was, sir, in and out, as you may say, all the time, for I've been cleaning the stairs this afternoon, and I took the opportunity to begin my scouring while the man was at work."
"Oh, you were in and out all the time. If you could conveniently give me a plain answer, Mrs. M., I should be glad to know what was the longest time that you were out while the locksmith was in my chambers?"
But Mrs. Maloney could not give a plain answer. It might have been ten minutes; though she didn't think it was as much. It might have been a quarter of an hour; but she was sure it wasn't more. It didn't seem to her more than five minutes, but "thim stairs, your honor;" and here she rambled off into a disquisition upon the scouring of stairs in general, and the stairs outside Robert's chambers in particular.
Mr. Audley sighed the weary sigh of mournful resignation.
"Never mind, Mrs. M.," he said; "the locksmith had plenty of time to do anything he wanted to do, I dare say, without your being any the wiser."
Mrs. Maloney stared at her employer with mingled surprise and alarm.
"Sure, there wasn't anything for him to stale, your honor, barrin' the birds and the geran'ums, and—"
"No, no, I understand. There, that'll do, Mrs. M. Tell me where the man lives, and I'll go and see him."
"But you'll have a bit of dinner first, sir?"
"I'll go and see the locksmith before I have my dinner."
He took up his hat as he announced his determination, and walked toward the door.
"The man's address, Mrs. M?"
The Irishwoman directed him to a small street at the back of St. Bride's Church, and thither Mr. Robert Audley quietly strolled, through the miry slush which simple Londoners call snow.
He found the locksmith, and, at the sacrifice of the crown of his hat, contrived to enter the low, narrow doorway of a little open shop. A jet of gas was flaring in the unglazed window, and there was a very merry party in the little room behind the shop; but no one responded to Robert's "Hulloa!" The reason of this was sufficiently obvious. The merry party was so much absorbed in its own merriment as to be deaf to all commonplace summonses from the outer world; and it was only when Robert, advancing further into the cavernous little shop, made so bold as to open the half-glass door which separated him from the merry-makers, that he succeeded in obtaining their attention.
A very jovial picture of the Teniers school was presented to Mr. Robert Audley upon the opening of this door.
The locksmith, with his wife and family, and two or three droppers-in of the female sex, were clustered about a table, which was adorned by two bottles; not vulgar bottles of that colorless extract of the juniper berry, much affected by the masses; but of bona fide port and sherry—fiercely strong sherry, which left a fiery taste in the mouth, nut-brown sherry—rather unnaturally brown, if anything—and fine old port; no sickly vintage, faded and thin from excessive age: but a rich, full-bodied wine, sweet and substantial and high colored.
The locksmith was speaking as Robert Audley opened the door.
"And with that," he said, "she walked off, as graceful as you please."
The whole party was thrown into confusion by the appearance of Mr. Audley, but it was to be observed that the locksmith was more embarrassed than his companions. He set down his glass so hurriedly, that he spilt his wine, and wiped his mouth nervously with the back of his dirty hand.
"You called at my chambers to-day," Robert said, quietly. "Don't let me disturb you, ladies." This to the droppers-in. "You called at my chambers to-day, Mr. White, and—"
The man interrupted him.
"I hope, sir, you will be so good as to look over the mistake," he stammered. "I'm sure, sir, I'm very sorry it should have occurred. I was sent for to another gentleman's chambers, Mr. Aulwin, in Garden Court; and the name slipped my memory; and havin' done odd jobs before for you, I thought it must be you as wanted me to-day; and I called at Mrs. Maloney's for the key accordin'; but directly I see the locks in your chambers, I says to myself, the gentleman's locks ain't out of order; the gentleman don't want all his locks repaired."
"But you stayed half an hour."
"Yes, sir; for there was one lock out of order—the door nighest the staircase—and I took it off and cleaned it and put it on again. I won't charge you nothin' for the job, and I hope as you'll be as good as to look over the mistake as has occurred, which I've been in business thirteen years come July, and—"
"Nothing of this kind ever happened before, I suppose," said Robert, gravely. "No, it's altogether a singular kind of business, not likely to come about every day. You've been enjoying yourself this evening I see, Mr. White. You've done a good stroke of work to-day, I'll wager—made a lucky hit, and you're what you call 'standing treat,' eh?"
Robert Audley looked straight into the man's dingy face as he spoke. The locksmith was not a bad-looking fellow, and there was nothing ............