A Master of Deception
Copyright© 2025 by Richard Marsh
Chapter 20: The First Line of an Old Song
Rodney Elmore had the unusual attribute of seeming at his best in the morning, as if calm, unruffled sleep, having removed the cobwebs from his brain, returned him rested and buoyant to a world in which there were no shadows. When, on the Wednesday morning, he came downstairs with light steps and dancing eyes, he found among the letters on the breakfast table one which was addressed in a familiar hand. He gave it pride of place.
“My Dear R., --I don’t know what possesses me, but I feel that I simply must write and tell you that I wish you were within kissing distance. Isn’t that a ridiculous feeling to have, especially where you’re concerned? Do you think that I don’t know? I have been conscious of the most extraordinary sensations since Sunday. I made a mistake in asking you to come and console me. You did it so effectually that--well, I would like you to continue the treatment. There’s a dreadful thing to say! Aren’t I a wretch? Poor dear Tom! I know he has all the good qualities I haven’t, and that he’ll make me the best husband in the world, but as for his consoling me--oh, dear! oh, dear! oh, dear! I don’t like the idea at all! I’m nearly sure that, after all, the best husband in the world is not the one I’m looking for. What makes me feel so all over pins and needles when I’m with Tom, and so comfy when I’m with you? Isn’t it odd? Have you any feeling of the kind where I’m concerned? I know you’ll say so, but have you? You’d say anything to anyone, but, all the same, I’ve a feeling somewhere that, if I chose, I could have you on a little bit of string. I daren’t ask you to come here again, I simply daren’t; but, if you do come, mind you give me proper warning. What would you say if I ran up to town? Should I see Stella at the corner of every street? Sweet Stella! Aren’t I a cat? I suppose you couldn’t rob a bank or something? If you and I were starting off to-morrow together, ever so far, for ever so long--I dare not think of it, and that’s the honest truth. Aren’t I insane? No one but you would ever guess it.--M.
“Mind you tear this up the very moment you have read it, and you’re to forget that you ever did read it!
“By the way, by which train did you go up on Sunday? You weren’t sure that you could catch the Pullman, and, if you did miss it, did you go by the 9.10? In that case you must have been in the same train as your uncle. When I saw about it in the paper it gave me quite a shock. Fancy if he was in the next carriage to yours? I suppose the dear man hasn’t left you a millionaire? If he only had! You would--wouldn’t you?
“Tear it up!”
He had just finished reading this somewhat interjectional epistle when Miss Joyce came in, the bearer of his morning meal. He greeted her as if he were really pleased to see her.
“The top of the morning to you, Baby! How moves the world your way? Do you feel like dancing on your pink toes?”
When he called her Baby, the pet name he had for her, she glanced up at him, almost as if she were startled.
“Did you understand what I said to you last night?”
“Perfectly; I’ve been thinking it all over, and I’ve come to a decision. I think you’re quite right in what you wish me to do. As this isn’t Leap Year, let me regularise the position. Mabel, I would like you to be my wife. Will you take me for your husband?”
“You say that because you know you can’t help yourself.”
“You are mistaken. If I didn’t want to be your husband, nothing you or anyone could say or do could make me, rest assured of that. I won’t pretend that, if things had turned out differently, I--should have suggested it; but, as they are, please, Mabel, let me do the proposing--say you will be my wife.”
“I’m going to be your wife; to-morrow, Thursday, at noon, and don’t you make any mistake. There’s the address of the registrar’s office at which you’re going to be married, and mind you’re there to time.”
“Baby--you are only a baby, after all--don’t talk like that; don’t let’s enter the matrimonial state as if we wished to cut each other’s throats; let’s start afresh on the old terms. I hope that when we’re being married you won’t have those white cheeks and unhappy eyes, or the registrar will think that I’m frightening you into being my bride, and you know that will be wrong.”
“Rodney, do you care for me a little bit?”
“My dear Mabel, I care for you in an altogether different fashion from that which you suppose, as I hope to be able to prove to you before very long. Come, let’s be friends.”
“Don’t touch me--don’t! Mother’s waiting for me. She wants me for something; she told me not to be long. I--I want to speak to you before I go. I--I want to warn you against Mr. Dale.”
“You said something to that effect last night. Is Mr. Dale so dangerous?”
“He’s jealous of you.”
“Well, does that constitute him dangerous?”
“He always has been throwing out nasty hints about you.”
“To whom? Surely not to you? You wouldn’t listen to what you yourself call nasty hints about me coming from a man like Dale?”
“It wasn’t so much that I listened as that he was always at it whenever he came near me. I couldn’t stop him. I suppose that my asking him about your going to Brighton on Sunday, and my going to the inquest, and such-like, made him--made him----”
“Yes? Made him what?”
“Started him thinking. Anyhow, he’s--he’s been finding out things, and--I don’t know that he hasn’t found out. You take care of him!”
“My dear Mabel, in what sense am I to take care of him? I’m inclined to think that I should rather like to have a talk with your friend Mr. Dale.”
“You’ll do no good by that.”
“Shan’t I? We’ll see. Where is he to be found--in the booking office at Victoria Station?”
“One week he goes early and comes back about six; the next he has his dinner first and doesn’t come back till after one--this is his late week. He hasn’t had his breakfast yet; he’s still up in his room.”
“Is that so? I’m afraid I can’t stop to talk to him just now, but I certainly will take the first chance which offers.”
“Don’t you say anything to him to make him nasty!”
A feminine voice was heard calling the young lady’s name. “There’s mother calling. She’ll give me a talking to! Mind, to-morrow at noon; and there’s the address upon that piece of paper.”
“My dear Mabel, I’m making arrangements which will permit of my placing the whole of to-morrow at your service. I promise that you shall have something like a wedding day.”
When the lady had gone the gentleman poured himself out a cup of coffee with the air of one who was in the enjoyment of an excellent joke. He propped Miss Carmichael’s letter up against the coffee-pot and read it through again. The second reading seemed to add to his sense of enjoyment.
“Rob a bank? Quite as heinous crimes have been committed for the sake of a woman. I’ve always had a kind of fancy that you’re the type of girl for whom it would be worth one’s while to do such things. If I were to ask you to start upon that little trip at which you hint, I wonder what you’d say--if you knew. Hullo! what’s this?”
He was staring at a sheet of paper which he had taken out of one of the three or four envelopes which were lying on the table. On it were a couple of typewritten lines:
“If you take a friend’s advice you will get clean away while you have still a chance.”
He regarded the words as if in doubt as to whether they were intended to convey to him an esoteric meaning.
“No signature, no address, no date; the first anonymous communication I ever have been favoured with. Postmark on the envelope, Kew, dispatched from there last night at eight o’clock, which doesn’t convey much intelligence to me. So far as I’m aware I have no acquaintance who resides at Kew; and I suppose an anonymous correspondent, if he had his head screwed on, is scarcely likely to reside in the district from which he sends his letter. It’s very good of a friend to make a friendly suggestion, but quite what he means I do not know; nor have I the very dimmest notion who the friend may be. Come in!”
Someone had tapped at the door. In response to his invitation a young man entered of about his own age; not tall, but sturdily built, with close-cut black hair, small dark eyes, and a somewhat voluminous moustache. There was that in his manner which hinted that he was in a state of some excitement; that, indeed, he was an excitable young man. He came right up to the table, with a billycock hat in one hand and a bamboo cane in the other. He looked at Elmore with what were scarcely friendly eyes. When he spoke it was in what evidently were lowered tones and with a curious, staccato utterance, as if he wished to throw his words into the other’s face.
“You’ll have to excuse my coming in like this, but I’m going out, and I want to speak to you before I do go.”
“That’s very good of you. I believe you are Mr. Dale.”
“My name is Dale--George Dale, as you very well know.”
“Pray sit down, Mr. Dale. I don’t remember to have had the pleasure of being introduced to you before.”
“Thanking you all the same, I won’t sit down, and as to being introduced to you, I never have been. It’s only for your sake I’m speaking to you now. I want to ask you a question to begin with.”
“Ask it, Mr. Dale.”
“What are your intentions as regards Miss Joyce?”
“Really, Mr. Dale, I don’t know if you are joking in putting such a question. If you aren’t I certainly don’t know what you mean.”
Rodney smiled at his visitor pleasantly; but the smile, instead of affording Mr. Dale gratification, not only caused his scowl to deepen, but induced him to use language of unexpected vigour.
“You’re a liar! That’s what you are--a liar! You’re a liar, because you know quite well what I mean. I’m not afraid of you. You’re a bigger man than I am, but I can use the gloves. You wouldn’t knock me out so easy as you think. I’d mark you first! But I haven’t come here to fight you.”
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