Room 13
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 sitting-room 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, open-mouthed, 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
strong-rooms? 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 gone! Phone him! Tell him you never wanted to marry
me, and it was only to make him happy that you did--you’ve got to
break his heart, anyway. You might as well start now.”
“He’d kill you,” she breathed.
“Maybe he would. And that’d be a fine idea too. We’d have Peter on the
trap. It would be worth dying for. But I guess he wouldn’t kill me. At
the sight of a gun in his hands, I’d shoot him like a dog. But don’t
let that stop you telling him, Marney darling.”
He stretched out his hand, but she recoiled from him in horror and
loathing.
“You planned it all… this was your revenge?”
He nodded.
“But Johnny… Johnny doesn’t know.”
She saw the change in the man’s face, that suave assurance of his
vanish.
“He does know.” She pointed an accusing finger at him. “He knows!”
“He knows, but he let you go, honey,” said Jeff. “He’s one of us, and
we never squeak. One of us!” he repeated the words mechanically.
She sat down and covered her face with her hands, and Jeffrey,
watching her, thought at first that she was crying. When she raised
her face, her eyes were dry. And, more extraordinary to him the fear
that he had seen was no longer there.
“Johnny will kill you,” she said simply. “He wouldn’t let me go… like
that… if he knew. It isn’t reasonable to suppose that he would, is
it?”
It was Jeff Legge’s turn to be uncomfortable. Not at the menace of
Johnny’s vengeance, but at her utter calmness. She might have been
discussing the matter impartially with a third person. For a moment he
lost his grip of the situation. All that she said was so obviously, so
patently logical, and instinctively he looked round as though he
expected to find Johnny Gray at his elbow. The absurdity of the
situation struck him, and he chuckled nervously.
“Johnny!” he sneered. “What do you expect Johnny to do, eh? He’s just
out of ‘bird’--that’s jail; it is sometimes called ‘boob’--I see
there’s a whole lot of stuff you’ve got to learn before you get right
into the family ways.”
He lounged toward her and dropped his hands on her shoulders.
“Now, old girl,” he said, “there are two things you can do. You can
call up Peter and put him wise, or you can make the best of a bad
job.”
“I’ll call father,” she said, springing up. Before she could reach the
telephone, his arm was round her, and he had swung her back.
“You’ll call nothing,” he said. “There’s no alternative, my little
girl. You’re Mrs. Legge, and I lowered myself to marry the daughter of
such a squealing old hound! Marney, give me a kiss. You’ve not been
very free with your tokens of affection, and I haven’t pressed you,
for fear of scaring you off. Always the considerate gentleman--that’s
Jeff Legge.”
Suddenly she was in his arms, struggling desperately. He tried to
reach her lips, but she buried her face in his coat, until, with a
savage jerk that almost dislocated her shoulder, he had flung her at
arm’s distance. She looked up at the inflamed face and shuddered.
“I’ve got you, Marney.” His voice was hoarse with triumph. “I’ve got
you properly… legally. You’re my wife! You realise that? No man can
come between you and me.”
He pulled her toward him, caught her pale face between his hands, and
turned it up to his. With all the strength of utter horror and
loathing, she tore herself free, fled to the door, flung it open, and
stood back, wide-eyed with amazement.
In the doorway stood a tall, broad woman, with vividly red hair and a
broad, good-humoured face. From her costume she was evidently one of
the chambermaids of the hotel. From her voice she was most obviously
Welsh.
“What are you doing here?” demanded Jeff. “Get out, damn you!”
“Why do you talk so at me now, look you? I will not have this bad
language. The maid of this suite I am!”
Marney saw her chance of escaping, and, running into the room, slammed
the door and locked it.
CHAPTER X
For a moment Jeff Legge stood, helpless with rage. Then he flung all
his weight against the door, but it did not yield. He took up the
telephone, but changed his mind. He did not want a scandal. Least of
all did he wish to be advertised as Jeffrey Legge. Compromise was a
blessed word--he knocked at the door.
“Marney, come out and be sensible,” he said. “I was only joking. The
whole thing was just to try you----”
She offered no reply. There was probably a telephone in the bedroom,
he thought. Would she dare call her father? He heard another door
unlocked. The bedroom gave on to the corridor, and he went out, to see
the big chambermaid emerging. She was alone, and no sooner was she
outside the door than it was locked upon her.
“I’ll report you to the management,” he said furiously. He could have
murdered her without compunction. But his rage made no impression upon
the phlegmatic Welsh woman.
“A good character I have, look you, from all my employers. To be in
the bedroom, it was my business. You shall not use bad language to me,
look you, or I will have the law on you!”
Jeffrey thought quickly. He waited in the corridor until the woman had
disappeared, then he beckoned from the far end a man who was evidently
the floor waiter.
“Go down to the office and ask the manager, with my compliments, if I
can have a second set of keys to my rooms,” he said suavely. “My wife
wishes to have her own.”
He slipped a bill into the man’s hand, of such magnitude that the
waiter was overwhelmed.
“Certainly, sir. I think I can arrange,” he said.
“And perhaps you would lend me your pass key,” said Jeff carelessly.
“I haven’t a pass key, sir. Only the management have that,” replied
the man; “but I believe I can get you what you want.”
He came back in a few minutes to the sitting-room with many apologies.
There were no duplicate sets of keys.
Jeff closed the sitting-room door on the man and locked it. Then he
went over to the bedroom door.
“Marney!” he called, and this time she answered him. “Are you going to
be sensible?”
“I think I’m being very sensible,” was her reply.
“Come out and talk to me.”
“Thank you, I would rather remain here.”
There was a pause.
“If you go to your father, I will follow and kill him. I’ve got to
shoot first, you know, Marney, after what you’ve told me.”
There was a silence, and he knew that his words had impressed her.
“Think it over,” he suggested. “Take your time about it.”
“Will you promise to leave me alone?” she asked.
“Why, sure, I’ll promise anything,” he said, and meant it. “Come out,
Marney,” he wheedled. “You can’t stay there all day. You’ve got to
eat.”
“The woman will bring me my dinner,” was the instant reply, and
Jeffrey cursed her softly.
“All right, have it your own way,” he said. “But I tell you this, that
if you don’t come out to-night, there will be trouble in your happy
family.”
He was satisfied, even though she did not answer him, that Marney
would make no attempt to communicate with her father--that night, at
least. After that night, nothing mattered.
He got on to the telephone, but the man he sought had not arrived. A
quarter of an hour later, as he was opening his second bottle of
champagne, the telephone bell tinkled and Emanuel Legge’s voice
answered him.
“She’s giving me trouble,” he said in a low voice, relating what had
happened.
He heard his father’s click of annoyance and hastened to excuse his
own precipitancy.
“She had to know sooner or later.”
“You’re a fool,” snarled the old man. “Why couldn’t you leave it?”
“You’ve got to cover me here,” said Jeff urgently. “If she phones to
Peter, there is going to be trouble. And Johnny----”
“Don’t worry about Johnny,” said Emanuel Legge unpleasantly. “There
will be no kick coming from him.”
He did not offer any explanation, and Jeff was too relieved by the
assurance in his father’s voice to question him on the subject.
“Take a look at the keyhole,” said Emanuel, “and tell me if the key’s
in the lock. Anyway, I’ll send you a couple of tools, and you’ll open
that door in two jiffs--but you’ve got to wait until the middle of the
night, when she’s asleep.”
Half an hour later a small package arrived by district messenger, and
Jeffrey, cutting the sealed cord, opened the little box and picked out
two curiously wrought instruments. For an hour he practised on the
door of the second bedroom leading from the saloon, and succeeded in
turning the key from the reverse side. Toward dinner-time he heard
voices in Marney’s bedroom, and, creeping to the door, listened. It