Lady Audley’s Secret M. E. Braddon (best historical fiction books of all time TXT) 📖

his ear, he saw that her face had grown ghastly white, and that her beautiful golden ringlets were changing into serpents, and slowly creeping down her fair neck.

He started from his dream to find that there was someone really knocking at the outer door of his chambers.

It was a dreary, wet morning, the rain beating against the windows, and the canaries twittering dismally to each other⁠—complaining, perhaps, of the bad weather. Robert could not tell how long the person had been knocking. He had mixed the sound with his dreams, and when he woke he was only half conscious of other things.

“It’s that stupid Mrs. Maloney, I dare say,” he muttered. “She may knock again for all I care. Why can’t she use her duplicate key, instead of dragging a man out of bed when he’s half dead with fatigue.”

The person, whoever it was, did knock again, and then desisted, apparently tired out; but about a minute afterward a key turned in the door.

“She had her key with her all the time, then,” said Robert. “I’m very glad I didn’t get up.”

The door between the sitting-room and bedroom was half open, and he could see the laundress bustling about, dusting the furniture, and rearranging things that had never been disarranged.

“Is that you, Mrs. Maloney?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“Then why, in goodness’ name, did you make that row at the door, when you had a key with you all the time?”

“A row at the door, sir?”

“Yes; that infernal knocking.”

“Sure I never knocked, Mister Audley, but walked straight in with my kay⁠—”

“Then who did knock? There’s been someone kicking up a row at that door for a quarter of an hour, I should think; you must have met him going downstairs.”

“But I’m rather late this morning, sir, for I’ve been in Mr. Martin’s rooms first, and I’ve come straight from the floor above.”

“Then you didn’t see anyone at the door, or on the stairs?”

“Not a mortal soul, sir.”

“Was ever anything so provoking?” said Robert. “To think that I should have let this person go away without ascertaining who he was, or what he wanted! How do I know that it was not someone with a message or a letter from George Talboys?”

“Sure if it was, sir, he’ll come again,” said Mrs. Maloney, soothingly.

“Yes, of course, if it was anything of consequence he’ll come again,” muttered Robert. The fact was, that from the moment of finding the telegraphic message at Southampton, all hope of hearing of George had faded out of his mind. He felt that there was some mystery involved in the disappearance of his friend⁠—some treachery toward himself, or toward George. What if the young man’s greedy old father-in-law had tried to separate them on account of the monetary trust lodged in Robert Audley’s hands? Or what if, since even in these civilized days all kinds of unsuspected horrors are constantly committed⁠—what if the old man had decoyed George down to Southampton, and made away with him in order to get possession of that £20,000, left in Robert’s custody for little Georgey’s use?

But neither of these suppositions explained the telegraphic message, and it was the telegraphic message which had filled Robert’s mind with a vague sense of alarm. The postman brought no letter from George Talboys, and the person who had knocked at the door of the chambers did not return between seven and nine o’clock, so Robert Audley left Figtree Court once more in search of his friend. This time he told the cabman to drive to the Euston Station, and in twenty minutes he was on the platform, making inquiries about the trains.

The Liverpool express had started half an hour before he reached the station, and he had to wait an hour and a quarter for a slow train to take him to his destination.

Robert Audley chafed cruelly at this delay. Half a dozen vessels might sail for Australia while he roamed up and down the long platform, tumbling over trucks and porters, and swearing at his ill-luck.

He bought the Times newspaper, and looked instinctively at the second column, with a morbid interest in the advertisements of people missing⁠—sons, brothers, and husbands who had left their homes, never to return or to be heard of more.

There was one advertisement of a young man found drowned somewhere on the Lambeth shore.

What if that should have been George’s fate? No; the telegraphic message involved his father-in-law in the fact of his disappearance, and every speculation about him must start from that one point.

It was eight o’clock in the evening when Robert got into Liverpool; too late for anything except to make inquiries as to what vessel had sailed within the last two days for the antipodes.

An emigrant ship had sailed at four o’clock that afternoon⁠—the Victoria Regia, bound for Melbourne.

The result of his inquiries amounted to this⁠—If he wanted to find out who had sailed in the Victoria Regia, he must wait till the next morning, and apply for information of that vessel.

Robert Audley was at the office at nine o’clock the next morning, and was the first person after the clerks who entered it.

He met with every civility from the clerk to whom he applied. The young man referred to his books, and running his pen down the list of passengers who had sailed in the Victoria Regia, told Robert that there was no one among them of the name of Talboys. He pushed his inquiries further. Had any of the passengers entered their names within a short time of the vessel’s sailing?

One of the other clerks looked up from his desk as Robert asked this question. Yes, he said; he remembered a young man’s coming into the office at half-past three o’clock in the afternoon, and paying his passage money. His name was the last on the list⁠—Thomas Brown.

Robert Audley shrugged his shoulders. There could have been no possible reason for George’s taking a feigned name. He asked the clerk who had last spoken if he could remember the appearance