XLI THE "MAISON CATHERINE"
BOOK I
THE PONY-SKIN COAT
CHAPTER I
THE PONY-SKIN COAT
It came smash on to my hat, slipped off the brim on to my shoulder, then fell to the pavement. I did not know what had happened. I took off my black felt hat and looked at it. There was a great dent in the crown; if it had not been for my hat something would have happened to my head. And my shoulder hurt. Then I looked at the pavement. At my feet was what seemed to be some sort of canvas bag. I picked it up. It was made of coarse brown canvas, perhaps five inches square, and was stuffed full of what felt to be some sort of metal. It was heavy, weighing perhaps a pound. No wonder it had dented my hat made my shoulder smart. Where could the thing have come from?
As I was wondering I became conscious that a man was moving towards me from the other side of the road moving rapidly. I had been vaguely aware as I came striding along that there was someone on the other side of the road. Now he was positively rushing at me was within a foot before I realised that he was making for me. He said something in some guttural foreign tongue I supposed it to be a foreign tongue, although, so far as I knew, I had never heard it spoken before and made a grab at the bag which had struck me. I put it behind my back in my left hand; my right I placed against his chest and pushed.
"What are you up to?" I inquired.
The inquiry was foolish; it was pretty plain what he was up to he was after that bag. The effect on him was curious. He was so slight and apparently weak that though I had used scarcely any force at all he staggered backwards across the pavement into the road. When I looked at him he raised his arms above his head as if to ward off a blow. He struck me as a man who might be recovering from a severe illness. His hairless face was white and drawn, thin to the verge of emaciation. He wore an old, soft black felt hat which was certainly not English. The whole man was un-English his oddly shaped, long, black frock-coat, so old and shabby that, so to speak, only the threads of the original material seemed to be left; the ancient trousers, so tight and narrow that only thin legs could have got into them; the unblacked, elastic-sided boots everything about him suggested something with which I was unfamiliar.
If he startled me, I seemed to terrify him. When, as it seemed, he realised what kind of man I was to look at no one can say there is anything alarming in my appearance he swung round and tore off down the street as if flying for his life. I stared after him.
"You're a curiosity," I told myself. "What's the meaning of this, I wonder."
I looked at the brown canvas bag, then had another look at my hat. It was badly dented. Whoever was responsible for the damage would have to buy me a new one. I could not walk about with my hat in that condition; at that moment I could not afford to spend money on a substitute. Who was responsible for the damage? I looked about me at the house I was passing up at the windows. I was just in time to catch a glimpse of a head protruding from a window on the top floor. It was only a glimpse I caught; it was withdrawn the moment I looked up. An impression was left upon my mind of a beard and long black hair. No doubt the owner of the head was looking to see what had happened to the canvas bag which he had dropped from the window. A nice, careless sort of person he was, not to take the trouble, in the first instance, to find out who or what was beneath. That wretched bag of his might have killed me. Then, after seeing what had happened, instead of expressing contrition, to snatch back his head as if he wished me to suppose that he had seen nothing! I called out to him:
"Hi! You up there!"
He took not the slightest notice of my call, but I felt sure he had heard. I did not want his canvas bag; I did want a new hat so I knocked at the door of the house. That door had been originally stained to imitate oak, but the stain had peeled off in patches, so that you could see the deal beneath. The instant I touched it with the knocker the door flew open; it opened so rapidly that it is no exaggeration to say that it flew. The moment it opened someone came through the door, took me by the shoulders, drew me into the house unexpectedly, before I could offer the least resistance and shut the door with a bang. So soon as the door was banged the same person continued to grip my shoulders with what seemed to me to be actual ferocity, hauled me along a narrow, darkened passage into a room which was at the end. To say that I was taken by surprise would be inadequately to describe my feelings. I was amazed, astounded, confused, bewildered. Some person or persons I was aware that in that darkened passage there were more persons than one had been guilty of an outrage. A liberty had been taken with me which was without the slightest justification.
"What on earth," I demanded, as soon as I was in the room and had regained a little of my breath, "is the meaning of this? Who are you, sir, that you should handle me as though I were a carcase of beef?"
I put my question to a huge man, well over six feet, broader than he was tall, with a big head and dark, square-jowled face. He had dark hair, which was longer than we wear it in England, and a long frock-coat, fashioned somewhat like that worn by the man on the other side of the road, only not so shabby. Altogether he gave me the idea that he was a giant, in stature and in strength.
It seemed that my words had affected him in a way I had not intended; he glowered at me in a manner to which I objected on every possible ground. Stretching out his immense arm he again grabbed my shoulder with the immense hand at the end of it, and without speaking a word drew me towards him as if I were a puppet which he could handle as he liked. It was no use my attempting to offer resistance. Shaken, disconcerted, confused, I really was like a puppet in his grip. He caused me actual pain. I have a notion that, without intending it, I called out "Don't! you hurt!" Whereupon he hurt me more than before, as if he understood, though, judging by what followed, I doubt if he did. With his face within a foot of mine, he glared; I have seldom felt more uncomfortable.
I was aware that the others were glaring also; there were five other men in the room. My words seemed to have affected them all. They were all glaring; more unprepossessing-looking men I do not remember to have seen.
Close by me on my right was a little man, so short as to be almost a dwarf. Behind him was a big, fat, fair fellow, with an untidy fair beard which seemed to be growing all over his face. Then there was a dark, thin man; something had happened to his nose it was not only broken, it looked as if it had been cut right in two, a long time ago,and never properly joined. Then there was a man who might have been an Englishman; he was well-dressed, properly barbered, red-faced. English or not, there was something sensual about the man which I instinctively disliked. At sight of him I had a ridiculous feeling that he was of the sort of stuff of which murderers are made.
From the spectacular point of view, the fifth man was the most remarkable of the lot. He seemed to be crooked, as if something had twisted his body so that he could not hold himself straight. He had a very long, thin face, with small, reddish-looking eyes which matched his reddish hair. His mouth was a little open, as if he found it difficult to keep it closed; he had a trick of putting the first finger of his right hand between his yellow teeth and gnawing at the tip. Not one of the men in that room was good to look at; but he, I think, was the worst of them all. If these were not undesirable aliens, then their appearance belied them. I wondered what foreign land had been relieved of their presence.
The room itself was not a pleasant one. It was not clean; I doubt if it had known any sort of cleansing process for
