Mr. Lawford became almost conversational in his apologies.
The young man finished the journey in a Sutton taxi and reached Queen’s Gate late in the afternoon. Parker, who opened the door to him, asked no questions. “I have laid out another suit for you, sir,” he returned to the study to say — the only oblique reference he made to his employer’s disorder.
As he lay in a hot bath, soaking the stiffness out of his limbs, Johnny examined his injuries. They were more or less superficial, but he had had a terribly narrow escape from death, and he was not wholly recovered from the violence of it. Emanuel had intended his destruction. The attempt did not surprise him. Men of Legge’s type worked that way. He met them in Dartmoor. They would go to a killing without fire of rage or frenzy of despair. Once he had seen a convict select with deliberation and care a large jagged stone and drop it upon the head of a man working in the quarry below. Fortunately, a warder had seen the act, and his shout saved the intended victim from mutilation. The assailant had only one excuse. The man he had attacked had slighted him in some way.
In the hearts of these men lived a cold beast. Johnny often pictured it, an obscene shape with pale, lidless eyes and a straight slit of a mouth. He had seen the beast staring at him from a hundred distorted faces, had heard its voice, had seen its hatefulness expressed in actions that he shivered to recall. Something of the beast had saturated into his own soul.
When he came from his bath, the masseur whom Parker had summoned was waiting, and for half an hour he groaned under the kneading hands.
The evening newspaper that Parker procured contained no news of the “accident” – Emanuel was hardly likely to report the matter, even for his own protection. There were explanations he could offer – Johnny thought of several.
Free from the hands of the masseur, he rested in his dressing-gown.
“Has anybody called?” he asked.
“A Mr. Reeder, sir.”
Johnny frowned.
“Mr. Reeder?” he repeated. “What did he want?”
“I don’t know, sir. He merely asked for you. A middle-aged man, with rather a sad face,” said Parker. “I told him you were not at home, and that I would take any message for you, but he gave none.”
His employer made no reply. For some reason, the call of the mysterious Mr. Reeder worried him more than the memory of the tragic happening of that afternoon, more, for the moment, than the marriage of Marney Kane.
Chapter IX
Marney made her journey to London that afternoon in almost complete silence. She sat in a corner of the limousine, and felt herself separated from the man she had married by a distance which was becoming immeasurable. Once or twice she stole a timid glance at him, but he was so preoccupied with his thoughts that he did not even notice. They were not pleasant thoughts, to judge by his unchanging scowl. All the way up he nibbled at his nails; a wrinkle between his eyes.
It was not until the big car was bowling across one of the river bridges that the strain was relieved, and he turned his head, regarding her coldly.
“We’re going abroad tomorrow,” he said, and her heart sank.
“I thought you were staying in town for a week, Jeff,” she asked, trouble in her eyes. “I told father—”
“Does it matter?” he said roughly, and then she found courage to ask him a question that had been in her mind during that dreary ride.
“Jeff, what did you mean this morning, on the way back from the church… ? You frightened me.”
Jeff Legge chuckled softly.
“I frightened you, did I?” he sneered. “Well, if that’s all that’s going to happen to you, you’re a lucky girl!”
“But you’re so changed..,” she was bewildered. “I – I didn’t want to marry you… I thought you wanted… and father was so very anxious…”
“Your father was very anxious that you should marry a man in good society with plenty of money,” he said, emphasising every word. “Well, you’ve married him, haven’t you? When I told you this morning that I’d got your father like that” – he put out his thumb suggestively – “I meant it. I suppose you know your father’s a crook?”
The beautiful face flushed and went pale again.
“How dare you say that?” she asked, her voice trembling with anger. “You know it isn’t true. You know!”
Jeffrey Legge closed his eyes wearily. “There’s a whole lot of revelations coming to you, my good girl,” he said, “but I guess we’d better wait till we reach the hotel.”
Silence followed, until the car drew up before the awning of the Charlton, and then Jeff became his smiling, courteous self, and so remained until the door of their sittingroom closed upon them.
“Now, you’ve got to know something, and you can’t know it too soon,” he said, throwing his hat upon a settee. “My name isn’t Floyd at all. I’m Jeffrey Legge. My father was a convict until six months ago. He was put in prison by Peter Kane.”
She listened, openmouthed, stricken dumb with amazement and fear.
“Peter Kane is a bank robber – or he was till fifteen years ago, when he did a job with my father, got away with a million dollars, and squeaked on his pal.”
“Squeaked?” she said, bewildered.
“Your father betrayed him,” said Jeffrey patiently. “I’m surprised that Peter hasn’t made you acquainted with the technical terms of the business. He squeaked on his pal, and my father went down for twenty years.”
“It is not true,” she said indignantly. “You are inventing this story. My father was a broker. He never did a dishonest thing in his life. And if he had, he would never have betrayed his friend!”
The answer seemed to amuse Legge.
“Broker, was he? I suppose that means he’s a man who’s broken into strongrooms? That’s the best joke I’ve heard for a long time! Your father’s crook! Johnny knows he’s crook. Craig knows he’s crook. Why in hell do you think a broker should be a pal of a ‘busy’? And take that look off your face – a ‘busy’ is a detective. Peter has certainly neglected your education!”
“Johnny knows?” she said, horror-stricken. “Johnny knows father is – I don’t believe it! All you have told me is lies. If it were so, why should you want to marry me?”
Suddenly she realised the truth, and stood, frozen with horror, staring back at the smiling man.
“You’ve guessed, eh? We’ve been waiting to get under Peter’s skin for years. And I guess we’ve got there. And now, if you like, you can tell him. There’s a telephone; call him up. Tell him I’m Jeff Legge, and that all the wonderful dreams he has had of seeing you happy and comfortable are
