"Bah!" exclaimed Hazen with a violent gesture of disappointment. "There comes your familiar. Now I suppose you will cry off."
"Not necessarily," returned Ransom. "But this much is certain. I shall certainly consult him before hazarding this experiment. I am not so sure of myself or—pardon me—of yourself as to take any steps in the dark while I have at hand so responsible a guide as the man whom you choose to call my familiar."
CHAPTER XXII
A SUSPICIOUS TEST
"Let him make his experiment. It will do no harm, and if it rids us of him, well and good."
Such was Mr. Harper's decision after hearing all that Mr. Ransom had to tell him of the present situation.
"His disappointment when he learns that he has nothing to hope for from his sister's generosity calls for some consideration from us," proceeded the lawyer. "Go and have your little talk with the landlady or take whatever other means suggest themselves for luring this girl from her room. I will summon Hazen and hold him very closely under my eye till the whole affair is over. He shall get no chance for any hocus-pocus business, not while I have charge of your interests. He shall do just what he has laid out for himself and nothing more; you may rely on that."
Ransom expressed his satisfaction, and left the room with a lighter heart than he had felt since Hazen came upon the scene. He did not know that all he had been through was as nothing to what lay before him.
It was an hour before he returned. When he did, it was to find Hazen and the lawyer awaiting him in ill-concealed impatience. These two were much too incongruous in tastes and interests to be very happy in a forced and prolonged tête-à-tête.
"Have you done it?" exclaimed Hazen, leaping eagerly to his feet as the door closed softly behind Ransom. "Is she out of her room? I have listened and listened for her step, but could not be sure of it. There seem to be a lot of people in the house to-night."
"Too many," quoth Ransom. "That is why I couldn't get hold of Mrs. Deo any sooner. Anitra is having her hair brushed or something else of equal importance done for her in one of the rear rooms. So we can proceed fearlessly. Have you looked to see if you can get a good glimpse of her door through the keyhole of this one?"
"Haven't you already made a trial of that? Then do so now," suggested Hazen, drawing out the key and laying it on the table.
But this was too uncongenial a task for Ransom.
"I shall be satisfied," said he, "if Mr. Harper tells me that it can."
"It can," asserted that gentleman, falling on his knees and adjusting his eye to the keyhole. "Or rather, you can see plainly the face of any one approaching it. I don't suppose any of us expected to see the door itself."
"No, it is not the door, but the woman entering the door, we want to see. Did you ask for an extra lamp?"
"Yes, and saw it placed. It is on a small table almost opposite her room."
"Then everything is ready."
"All but the mark which I am to put on the panel."
"Very good. Here is the chalk. Let us see what you mean to do with it before you risk an attempt on the door itself."
Ransom thought a minute, then with one quick twist produced the following:
"Correct," muttered Hazen, with what Harper thought to be a slight but unmistakable shudder. "One would think you had been making use of this very cabalistic sign all your life."
"Then one would be mistaken. I have simply a true eye and a ready hand."
"And a very remarkable memory. You have recalled every little line and quirk."
"That's possible. What I have made once I can make the second time. It's a peculiarity of mine."
There was no mistaking the continued intensity of Hazen's gaze. Ransom felt his color rise, but succeeded in preserving his quiet tone, as he added:
"Besides, this character is not a wholly new one to me. My attention was called to it months ago. It was when I was courting Georgian. She was writing a note one day when she suddenly stopped to think and I saw her pen making some marks which I considered curious. But I should not have remembered them five minutes, if she had not impulsively laid her hand over them when she saw me looking. That fixed the memory of them in my mind, and when I saw this combination of lines again, I remembered it. That is why I lent myself so readily to this experiment. I lent that what you said about her acquaintance with this odd arrangement of lines was true."
Hazen's hand stole up to his neck, a token of agitation which Ransom should have recognized by this time.
"And her account of the use we made of it tallied with mine?"
"She gave me no account of any use she had ever made of it."
"That was because you didn't ask her."
"Just so. Why should I ask her? It was a small matter to trouble her about."
"You are right," acquiesced Hazen, wheeling himself away towards the window. Then after a momentary silence, "It was so then, but it is likely to prove of some importance now. Let me see if the hall is empty."
As he bent to open the door, the lawyer, who had not moved nor spoken till now, turned a quick glance on Ransom and impulsively stretched out his hand. But he dropped it very quickly and subsided into his old attitude of simple watchfulness, as Hazen glanced back with the remark:
"There's nobody stirring; now's your time, Ransom."
The moment for action had arrived.
Ransom stepped into the hall. As he passed Hazen, the latter whispered:
"Don't forget that last downward quirk. That was the line she always emphasized."
Ransom gave him an annoyed look. His nerves as well as his feelings were on a keen stretch, and this persistence of Hazen's was more than he could bear.
"I'll not forget the least detail," he answered shortly, and passed quickly down the hall, while Hazen watched him through the crack of the door, and the lawyer watched Hazen.
Suddenly Mr. Harper's brow wrinkled. Hazen had uttered such a sigh of relief that the lawyer was startled. In another moment Ransom re-entered the room.
"She's coming," said he, striving to hide his extreme emotion. "I heard her voice in the hall beyond."
Hazen sprang to the door which Ransom had carefully closed, and was about to fall on his knees before the keyhole when he suddenly stiffened himself and, turning towards the lawyer, cried with a new strain of loftiness in his tone:
"You. You shall do the looking, only promise to be very minute in your description of her behavior. It's a great trust I repose in you. See that you honor it."
The revulsion of feeling caused in the lawyer by this show of confidence was not perceptible. But it softened his step as well as his manner as he crossed to do the other's bidding.
The remaining two stood at his side breathless, waiting for his first word.
It came in a whisper:
"She's approaching her room. She looks tired. Her eyes are stealing this way;—no, they are resting on her own door. She sees the sign. She stands staring at it, but not like a person who has ever seen it before. It's the stare of an uneducated woman who runs upon something she does not understand. Now she touches it with one finger and glances up and down the hall with a doubtful shake of the head. Now she is running to another door, now to another. She is looking to see if this scrawl is to be found anywhere else; she even casts her eye this way—I feel like leaving my post. If I do, you may know that she's coming—No, she's back at her own door and—gentlemen, her bringing up or rather coming up asserts itself. She has put her palm to her mouth and is vigorously rubbing off the marks."