The Goddess: a Demon
Copyright© 2024 by Richard Marsh
Chapter 15: The Letter
But it was not Symonds. It was a messenger-boy—an impertinent young rascal.
“Mr. John Ferguson? I thought every one was out, I’ve been knocking for the last ten minutes.”
“Have you indeed? I trust the delay has caused you no serious inconvenience. Yes, I am Mr. John Ferguson.”
“No answer.”
He thrust an envelope into my hand, and, turning on his heel, was about to march away. I caught him by the shoulder.
“Pardon me—one second! From whom does this communication come?”
“I say there’s no answer.”
He wriggled in my grasp.
“I hear you—still, if you could manage to wait for a moment, I think it might be worth your while. Let me beg of you to enter.”
Drawing him into the room, I shut the door. He surveyed me with indignation.
“My orders are that when there’s no answer I’m not to wait.”
“Good boy! Always obey orders.”
The address on the envelope was typewritten; as were the sentences on the sheet of paper it contained.
“Because Edwin Lawrence is dead, don’t suppose that the £1880 are paid. You have not hit on a new way to pay old debts. A knife in the back is not a quittance. You are wrong if you suppose it is. Have the money ready; hard cash—notes and gold; all gold preferred. NO CHEQUE. Edwin Lawrence has left an heir; to whom all that he had belongs, your debt among the rest. Be prepared to pay when asked. If the request has to be made a second time it will come in a different form.
“The Goddess.”
That was what the envelope contained—an anonymous letter.
“Who sent this?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t read it.”
“Possibly not; and yet you might know who was the sender.”
“I don’t see how. I’d just been on an errand right over to Finchley. As soon as I came in that was given me. All I was told was that there was no answer.”
The messenger spoke in a tone of resentment, as if suffering from a grievance. He was a small youth, with crisp black hair and sharp black eyes; combativeness writ large all over him.
“You didn’t see who brought this to the office?”
“I did not.”
“Where do you come from?”
“Victoria.”
“What’s your name?”
“George Smith. Though I don’t see what that’s got to do with you.”
“Then that only shows that your range of vision’s limited. Because, Mr. George Smith, although there’s no answer to this little communication, you’re likely to hear of it again. Good-day.”
The young gentleman withdrew with something like a sniff of scorn. I read the letter through again. As Hume stood watching me, his curiosity got the upper hand.
“What is it?”
“I was wondering if I should tell you. I don’t see why not.” I handed him the sheet of paper. He scanned it with eager eyes. “What do you make of it?”
“It is for me, rather, to put that question to you.”
“I’ll tell you one thing I make of it—that the typewriter, from the anonymous letter-writer’s point of view, is an excellent invention. In the case of a written letter, one can occasionally guess what kind of person it is from whom it comes; but, when it’s typewritten, the Lord alone can tell.”
“‘The Goddess.’ Does the signature convey no meaning to your mind? Think.”
“I’m thinking. The Goddess? I certainly don’t know any one who’s entitled to write herself down like that. Let me look at the thing again.” He returned me the sheet of paper. “This seems to suggest that some one else is disposed to take a hand in the game—some person at present unknown.”
“But who knows that you owed Lawrence £1880? And—who knows how much besides?”
“Just so. I wonder!”
Hume eyed me as if he were endeavouring to decipher, on my face, the key to a riddle.
“If some one applies to you for the money what shall you do?”
“Hang him, or her, straight off. That is, I should hand the gentleman, or lady, over to Symonds, with that end in view. Don’t you see what such an application would imply? Lawrence was murdered within an hour or two of our playing that game of cards. How comes any one to know what was the amount he claimed to have won? No one saw him between the finish of the game and his death, except the man who murdered him.”
“Miss Moore saw him—and you.”
“Are you suggesting that Miss Moore wrote this letter—or I?”
“I see your point. You infer that whoever did write it killed Lawrence, because it discloses knowledge which could only be in possession of his murderer. There is something in the inference. But, if the thing’s so plain, isn’t it an act of rashness to have written you at all—rashness which is almost inconceivable?”
“‘De l’audace’—you know the wise man’s aphorism. I don’t say the thing is plain. On the contrary, I believe it’s more obscure than you think. Granting that whoever wrote that letter killed Lawrence—and I fancy you’ll find that is the case—the question is who wrote it. It’s signed ‘The Goddess.’ I believe ‘The Goddess’ was the writer. Query, who’s ‘The Goddess’? There’s the puzzle.”
“Are you intentionally speaking in cryptograms? May I ask what you mean?”
“I’m not quite sure that I know myself. I don’t go so far as to say that there is anything supernatural about the business, but—it’s uncommonly queer.”
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