Thorne Guy
The Angel

With eyes that were not quite dry the great financier took Joseph by the arm and marched down the alley, followed by the others.

They walked cautiously down the place, which seemed strangely deserted. Sir Augustus was talking eagerly to Joseph, opening his heart in a way to which he had long been a stranger, when there was a sudden loud report in the air above them.

Looking upwards with startled eyes, they saw that a little coil of blue smoke was floating out of an open window high above them.

A second afterwards Sir Augustus Kirwan sighed twice and fell forward upon his face, dead, shot through the heart.

CHAPTER XXI
WAITING!

Mr. Andrew Levison lived in Jermyn Street. His establishment was comfortable, but modest. A sitting-room, a small dining-room, a bedroom for himself, and one for his man – these, together with the bath-room, completed his suite.

It was a bright morning as he opened his Daily Wire and sat down before the kedjeree and kidneys that his servant had just brought him for breakfast. It was rather late; the Jew had been at a theatrical supper-party the night before until long after midnight. During the party, at which a great many of the stars of the lighter stage had been present, the conversation had turned almost entirely upon the marked slump in theatrical business during Joseph's ministry in London.

One and all of their company were united in their hatred and alarm of this evangelist who bade fair to ruin them.

The whole situation was, moreover, aggravated because of the immense public support Joseph was receiving from some of the most wealthy and influential people in society. There was no getting over this fact. And yet no one had any remedy to suggest.

Lord Ballina and Mimi Addington had also been of the party, and a keen observer might possibly have detected a certain furtive look which passed between the actress, the peer, and the theatrical manager. All three, however, held their peace, and contributed little or nothing to the problem of how the situation was to be dealt with.

And now Mr. Levison, as he sat at table, smiled quietly to himself, reflecting that he could very considerably astonish many of his colleagues if it had been possible to do so.

The sitting-room – for Levison did not breakfast in the dining-room – was full of sunshine. A great bowl of sulphur-colored hothouse roses stood on the writing-table. The white panelled walls, hung with rare old Japanese color prints, caught and reflected the apricot light of the sun, which poured in through the windows.

The room was carpeted with a fabric from Persia – the veritable peacock blue and dark red of Teheran. The armchairs were upholstered in vermilion leather. Everything harmonized and was in taste, and it was with complacency that Levison looked round him and picked up the paper.

Almost the first thing that struck his eye was a paragraph headed "Movements of Joseph."

Mr. Levison started, and read with great attention. The paragraph ran as follows: —

"We are able to give our readers exclusive information as to the next move in the vast campaign for the reformation of London which is being undertaken by the teacher known as Joseph, in company with his distinguished colleagues and helpers. One of the most crying evils of the day is undoubtedly the fact that, while one section of the population lives in a splendor and luxury perhaps unparalleled in the history of civilization, another section, and this by far the larger, lives under conditions of squalor so great that it becomes a horror, conditions that can only be hinted at in polite society or in the public prints. The state of the East End of London has long engaged the attention of philanthropists, but very little has been done to ameliorate it in comparison with its crying needs. Sociologists have long since recognized that under present conditions very little can be done until the rich property owners combine and agree to sacrifice a portion of their emoluments in order to improve the condition of the poor. The teacher Joseph has recognized this fact, and is beginning a movement which may be very far-reaching in its consequences. To-day, we understand, a party of wealthy and distinguished gentlemen will be taken by the evangelist to some of the worst parts of the East End there to see for themselves the true condition of affairs. The remarkable personality which is at present the talk of London will indeed have accomplished a greater miracle than any of those strange and unexplained occurrences attributed to him if he can cleanse and purify one half-mile of Stepney or Whitechapel. For our part, we wish Joseph and his helpers every possible success in their endeavors."

Mr. Levison laid down the paper, and got up from his seat. He walked up and down the room twice, looked at his breakfast, shook his head, and then, going to a sideboard, poured some brandy from a tantalus into a glass, added a little water with a hand that shook slightly, and drank the mixture off.

So it was to be to-day, then? Mr. Levison had not realized the imminence of his plot. It was one thing to reflect complacently that one had arranged to remove a troublesome intruder from one's path on some unspecified date; it was, as Levison realized now, quite another thing to sit down and wait for the event to happen in an hour or two.

Levison looked at his watch. It was eleven o'clock. He supposed, though he did not know with any certainty, that the party to the East End would hardly start before midday.

"They can't leave much before twelve, I should think, from wherever they meet," he muttered to himself. "Give them an hour to get down to the East End, another hour or more, perhaps, for the people" – another and far less pleasing word almost escaped Mr. Levison's lips – "for the people I have employed to do what has to be done. Roughly, I suppose there ought to be some news in the paper between four and five."

The man's face had grown quite white, and his hands began to tremble more and more. No one had ever seen the self-possessed, genial-mannered entrepreneur like this. And when he stopped in front of the glass which hung over the mantel-shelf, he started at the sight of his own guilty and terrified countenance.

Supposing that something should go wrong! Supposing the man was caught, and confessed! A thousand horrid apprehensions began to crowd into his mind, and the sweat came out cold and damp upon his forehead.

There were hours to wait. How should he employ them? The theatre was closed; there was no particular business claiming his attention at the moment. And he felt less and less inclined to sit alone in his chambers waiting. Exercise, he came to the conclusion, a long, brisk walk, was the only thing that could restore his mental tone.

He rang for his coat and hat, took a stick from the stand in the hall, and went out into Jermyn Street. For a moment he was undecided as to his direction. The thought of the Park crossed his mind, but it was superseded by another and more welcome one. He would walk up to St. John's Wood – that was a good distance – and he would call on Mimi Addington, and tell her the news that he had read in the paper. He smiled maliciously at the idea. Perhaps Lord Ballina might be there, too; if so, well and good. His fellow conspirators should share his uneasiness. They were in the thing as much as he was, and he saw no reason why he should be the only one to suffer. The idea appealed to his Oriental imagination, and in picturing to himself the probable fears of his companions when they knew that this was the actual day on which the assassination was to be attempted, Levison forgot his own, and it was quite with a jaunty step that he turned into St. James' Street.

Even at the moment when he had realized that the dark deed which he had instigated was to be attempted on that very day, Levison had felt not the slightest remorse or compunction. Fear he had felt, the fear of discovery, but that was all. A criminal is nothing more or less than a supreme egotist. Levison saw everything in its relation to himself, and himself alone; never in relation to other people, or to God. Joseph was ruining his business, therefore he had plotted Joseph's death. He had no bitter feeling against Joseph whatever, even though the Teacher's advent and appearance in the theatre had done him such serious harm. Levison was a philosophic scoundrel, and took things as they came, and wasted no brain power or mental force in the exercise of personal dislikes.

He arrived at Mimi Addington's house in St. John's Wood a little before two, not having hurried at all. The actress was at home, and he was at once shown into the drawing-room, where she was sitting with Lord Ballina and a friend of his, who was introduced to Levison as Mr. Errol Smith. Fortunately for Levison's plans, Lord Ballina's friend was on the point of departure, and shortly went away, leaving the three conspirators together.

"Well, Andrew, how goes it?" Ballina said, with his vacuous dissipated little simper. "When are you going to open the theatre again?"

"Well, that depends," Levison answered, with a meaning look. "You know very well what that depends on!"

He was watching the effect of his words upon Mimi Addington as he spoke, and saw the hard, cruel eyes glisten with hate at his reference, and the beautifully shaped mouth harden into a thin line of crimson.

"It's some time now since we had that little talk, Andrew," the woman said, in a voice that she strove to keep well under control, though every now and then the hysteria of her hate crept into it and suggested that which lay, lava-hot, deep down in her heart.

"Well, d'you know, my dear," Levison said, taking out a cigar and lighting it with great deliberation – "well, d'you know that it's the little matter that we discussed that I've come up about this afternoon."

"How much longer is that Joseph to be allowed to cumber London?" she said, with a hissing intake of the breath.

"Well, that all depends," Levison answered, amused with the skill with which he could play upon her passion. The Jew loved power and the exercise of it. He gratified himself now by playing on her as if she were an instrument and noticing how swiftly she responded to his touch.

"Oh, hang it all, Andrew," Lord Ballina said, "don't tease Mimi. If you've got any news about this business let's have it."

Levison thought he had gone far enough, and took the Daily Wire which he had brought with him from his pocket.

"Read that," he said, handing it to the young peer.

Ballina read out the paragraph in a monotonous sing-song, with now and then such observations as suggested themselves to his limited and vicious intelligence.

"Well," he said, "for the matter of that, Andrew, the papers are full of the fellow every day, and his goings on. I don't see what news there is in that, it's only just another of his games. Was that all you came up to tell us?"

Levison saw the look of scorn that Mimi Addington flashed at the young man. Her own intelligence was infinitely keener; and though Levison had not gone into any details about the arrangements he had made, she saw the significance of the fact in the newspaper immediately.

"What a duffer you are, Bally," she said contemptuously. "Why, it's perfectly clear of course. What better place could you have for knocking a Johnny on the head than an East End slum? That's what Andrew means, and that's what he's come to tell us, isn't it, Andrew?"

"Your brilliant intellect, assisted by your personal dislike, has at once divined the truth, Mimi," said Levison, leaning back upon the divan and blowing a blue cloud of smoke up towards the hanging Moorish lamp.

"Why, then," Lord Ballina broke in suddenly – "why, then, it's this afternoon!" His voice had grown high and thin with excitement, and Levison saw once more a face from which all the color had ebbed, and hands that twitched with sudden realization.

Mimi Addington suddenly rose up from her seat with a curiously sinuous and panther-like movement.

"This afternoon!" she said. "Then I shall sleep happy this night!"

"Oh, come, Mimi," Lord Ballina said, "you needn't go quite so far as that. As a matter of fact, I – er – confound it, I wish we'd let the chap alone!"

The woman had sunk back upon the divan. She stretched out one slender, white hand, covered with flashing rings, and patted Levison upon the arm.

He shuddered at her touch, scoundrel as he was, but she did not see it.

Ballina was walking up and down the room, his feet making no sound upon the thick pile of the carpet. He snapped his fingers in an odd, convulsive fashion.

"I say, you know," he said at length, "I really don't like it. I wish to Heaven I'd never been mixed up in the affair. Supposing anything gets out?"

"Well, that's supposing me to be rather a bigger fool than I am," Levison answered, though the fear of the other had in some subtle way affected him, and all his own tremors of the morning were beginning to revive.

Then there was silence in the room for a time.

Although the morning had been bright and cheerful, the sun had become obscured shortly after midday, and a heavy gloom of fog above which thunder had muttered now and then had spread itself high up in the sky.

The oppression in the air had become much more marked during the last hour, and now, as the three people sat together, they were all experiencing it to the full.

For a long time nobody spoke at all, and when at length Mimi Addington made some casual observation, both the men started involuntarily. The woman's voice also was changed now. It was like the voices of her companions, loaded with sinister apprehension.

"When do you suppose," Lord Ballina said, in a shaking voice – "when do you suppose that we shall know if anything has happened, Andrew? Have you made arrangements with your – er – er – friends to report to you about it?"

"I'm not mad!" Levison answered shortly. "Hear! Why, if there's anything to hear you'll hear soon enough – What's that?"

He had started violently, and the perspiration was beginning to run down his face. A distant rumble of thunder breaking suddenly in upon the quiet of the room had startled him and betrayed more than anything else in what a state his nerves were.

"It's only thunder," Mimi replied. "Good Heavens, Andrew, you are enough to give one the jumps yourself! But if we're to know, how shall we know?"

"Why, it's very simple," Levison answered. "Don't you see that if anything has – er – happened, it'll be in the evening papers and in the streets within three-quarters of an hour from the time it's occurred. There will be journalists with this man Joseph, of course, there always are wherever he goes. Well, the papers will be up here by the motors in half-an-hour after they're issued, and we shall hear the newsboys shouting it out all over the place."

"There's an old man who sells papers at the corner of Florence Street, only a few yards away," Mimi Addington broke in quickly. "The boys on the bicycles come up and supply him with all the new editions as they come out. I often hear them shouting."

"Then all we've got to do," said Andrew Levison, "is to wait until we hear that shouting."

They sat waiting – three murderers – and as they sat there a presence stole into the room, unseen, but very real. The grisly phantom Fear was among them. Waiting!

CHAPTER XXII
THE HOUSE DESOLATE

The echo of the shot which had struck down Sir Augustus Kirwan had hardly died away when two of the police inspectors, accompanied by Eric Black, rushed into one of the open doorways of the court. Their feet could be heard thundering up the rickety, wooden stairs of the old house, as Joseph and Sir Thomas Ducaine knelt, horror-struck, by the side of the dead man, while the others crowded round in uncontrollable dismay.

Joseph himself seemed absolutely stunned for a moment. And it was Sir Thomas's firm and capable hands which were moving rapidly over Sir Augustus' chest, endeavoring to test the movement of the heart.

The young Duke of Dover was talking rapidly and in an undertone with the police inspector, and pointing upwards to the black, unglazed window-hole from which the smoke of the shot was still eddying out.

The whole series of events had occurred in a mere flash of time, with an astonishing swiftness which seemed to outstrip or to numb the lightning operations of thought itself.

There they stood in a group, stiffened and frozen into momentary immobility. The tall figure of Joseph bent over the empty shell which lay upon the ground; the others clustered round, with wan faces of horror. The peer had his right hand upon the shoulder of the inspector and his left extended to the black and silent orifice above. And still the thunder of the feet of Eric Black and his companions could be heard as they raced upwards towards the room of the assassin.

Then suddenly, as if the noise of the shot, which now must have been fired for at least thirty-five or forty seconds, had awakened a sleeping population, a murmur arose like the murmur of a hive of bees suddenly disturbed.

It arose, grew louder and louder, resolved itself into tumultuous and divided voices, and then, from every doorway, the foul, mocking, and unclean denizens of the worst slum in London came pouring, trotting, and slouching out of their lairs.

The air was immediately filled with a horrid clamor, and to the keen, attentive ears of, at any rate, the Duke and the policeman, there seemed something ungenuine in the sound – that is to say, it was not the instinctive product of real surprise, but as though the people who had suddenly appeared out of what had seemed silence and desolation were well aware that this was going to happen.

Of this Joseph and Sir Thomas Ducaine, who were lifting the portly body of the great financier, saw and understood nothing at all.

Just as Joseph and Sir Thomas, assisted by the others, were supporting the limp figure in their arms, the remaining inspector lifted his whistle to his lips and blew a loud and piercing call.

At the sound, the horrid crowd which surrounded the little group of death suddenly grew silent. They knew that ominous summons very well; it was in their blood to know it, for to many of them it had been a note of doom.

The silence continued for a very short time, and was only broken in one significant and instinctive way.

A tall, thin man, with a face which was a sheer wedge of sin and bestial impulse, suddenly pressed to the front of the crowd, where his eyes fell upon Joseph.

The inspector heard him say, in a quick, vibrating voice to some one at his side whom the inspector could not see —

"The wrong bloke!"

The whistle had its effect, and in a space of time which would have suggested to any one who had thought of it that the police arrangements for guarding the distinguished company which had ventured into these dark places were more complete than that company itself had any idea of, several uniformed constables came hurrying into the court.

The crowd of slum-dwellers melted away as a small piece of ice in the sun, and, save that the doors and low windows of the surrounding houses were now thronged with interested faces, the group in the middle of the place was free of interruption.

Three stalwart constables lifted up the body and bore it away. Joseph and the rest of his friends filed in a horror-struck procession.

The Teacher's head was bowed. His thin, white hands were clasped in front of him, and the tears were rolling down his cheeks.

Hampson was at his side, and as he looked up at his old comrade once more he was thrilled to the very marrow, even as he had been thrilled on that strange eventful afternoon when the two great beams of wood had fallen from on high and struck down Joseph Bethune in the form of a cross.

For what Hampson now saw in his quick, imaginative brain, accustomed as it was to constant artistic images of the past, when Jesus walked in Jerusalem, was now the tall, bowed figure of the Saviour with wrists bound in front of Him, moving towards the shameful death which was to save and regenerate mankind.

Another scene in the Via Dolorosa!

It was now the middle of the afternoon. With magic celerity, even in that poverty-stricken district, carriages were found, and an ambulance brought from an adjacent police-station.

Then, through the crowded streets of the East, the long and busy thoroughfares of Fleet Street and the Strand, into the wide and spacious district where the rich dwell, the sad procession took its way.

And of all the crowds of busy humans that moved and ran about their business, no one suspected what these vehicles might mean. They passed through the busiest centres of the Modern Babylon without an indication or word of the true import of their passage.

Only Eric Black, who had come back disheartened with the two police-officers from a hurried yet interminable search among the huge and fetid warrens of the murder-hole, was speeding towards the office of the Evening Wire– the afternoon edition of the great daily – his heart full of pity and terror, while yet his keen journalistic brain was weaving burning words and sentences with which to announce what had happened to London.

The cortège arrived at last at the great house in Berkeley Square.

The day, which had begun brightly enough, was as if the elements in London were sympathetic to the tragedy in which one of her foremost citizens had perished. They were now beginning to throw a heavy and thunderous gloom over the City.

Swiftly, while the frightened and white-faced servants stood speechless in the hall, the body of Sir Augustus Kirwan was borne into the library, and the family physician sent for at once. One of the police inspectors remained in the house; the other hurried off to Scotland Yard to give his version of the affair, though by now all the district in which the murder had occurred was being thoroughly searched, and guarded on all sides by special police, who had been summoned by telephone from various parts of the metropolis.

Marjorie Kirwan was away upon a short visit to some friends. Lady Kirwan was, fortunately, out when the body of her husband was brought into the house.

In a very few minutes the doctor arrived, and after a brief examination, announced what all present knew only too well – that the baronet had been shot through the heart, and that the death had been painless and instantaneous.

The blinds in front of the house were all pulled down, and the butler was interrogated as to the whereabouts of Lady Kirwan by The Duke and Sir Thomas Ducaine.

"I'm sure I have no idea, my lord and Sir Thomas," said the faithful old fellow, with the tears rolling down his cheeks, "where my lady has gone. I know that she went out shortly after lunch, on foot. She said that she did not wish for the motor-brougham or a carriage. Sometimes of an afternoon my lady likes to go out on foot, for the sake of a little exercise; and the day being fine, it must have tempted her."

"Her maid will know, perhaps," Sir Thomas replied.

"I'm afraid not, sir," the butler answered, "for I know that Mrs. Summers has my lady's permission to visit her relatives at Camberwell this afternoon."

"Then," Sir Thomas replied, "where is Miss Lys?"

"I can answer that," Joseph replied sadly. "She is working up in Bloomsbury, at the house of the Brotherhood."

"She must be sent for at once," Sir Thomas answered. "Indeed, in a few minutes, I will go for Mary myself, and break this terrible news to her. It will be a frightful blow to my poor girl; but she is so strong and self-reliant that she will be invaluable to receive Lady Kirwan when she returns, and to break this awful news, as only a woman, and such a woman as Mary is, could possibly do."

For a moment the young man's face lit up with love and tenderness, even in the presence of death, as he thought of the sweet and noble lady who had already given some of the best years of her life to the healing of sorrow, and who alone, in this great crisis, cost her what it might, could be depended upon to help the widow through the dark hours that lay before.

Now it happened that Lady Kirwan had indeed not gone very far. A few streets away from Berkeley Square there was a quiet little shop which was kept by a society of ladies who had interested themselves in the revival of fine lace manufacture in England. Girls were being taught all over the country to produce gossamer fabrics as beautiful as anything made in the hamlets around Ghent and Brussels or in the Beguinage at Bruges. Lady Kirwan was a patroness of the movement, and on this afternoon she had walked round to discuss the question of profit-sharing with the lady who was in charge of the establishment.

Lady Kirwan liked to carry her own latchkey when she went out on little excursions of this sort, when there was no groom to run up the steps and open the front door. She had taken her key with her on this afternoon, and after doing the business for which she had set out, returned homewards in a peculiarly happy state of mind, which even the heavy atmosphere and lowering approach of thunder failed to disturb.

The lace business was going well, and the poor girls all over the country would have a substantial bonus added to their earnings. And other more important things contributed to the kindly woman's sense of goodwill. Mary's engagement to Sir Thomas Ducaine was in itself a cause for immense congratulation. Despite all Mary's stupid ways – as Lady Kirwan was accustomed to call them – in spite of all the wasted years in the hospital, the girl had, nevertheless, captured one of the most eligible young men in London, and her wedding would be one of the greatest events in the modern history of the family of Lys. Marjorie also seemed to be more than a little attracted by the young Duke of Dover. He was a peer of very ancient lineage, upright, an honorable gentleman, and very well liked in society. That he was not rich made no difference whatever. The Kirwans' own enormous wealth would be lavished at the disposal of the young couple. And, finally, at a great political reception a few nights ago, the Prime Minister had taken Lady Kirwan into supper, and had told her, without any possibility of mistake, that in a week or two more the great services of Sir Augustus to the Government, and the financial weight exerted at a critical moment, which had forced a foreign Power to modify its demands, were to receive high recognition, and that the baronetcy was to be exchanged for the rank of viscount.

As Lady Kirwan, smiling and stately, ascended the steps of her house in Berkeley Square, and took from her reticule the tiny Bramah key which unlocked the massive portal, she felt she had not a care in the world, and was a woman blessed indeed.

"We must get rid of this Joseph fellow now," she thought, as she inserted the key. "He has played his part well enough in bringing Mary and Thomas together; but I don't think it will be advisable, even though he is a fashionable pet at present, to have very much to do with him. I never cared very much for the man, and it is awkward to have him about the house. One can always send him a cheque now and then for his good works!"

The door swung open, and she entered the hall. At the moment there was nobody there – a fact which she noted for a future word of remonstrance, as a footman was always supposed to sit there at all times. But from the farther end of the hall, from the library, the door of which was a little ajar, her quick ear detected a murmur of voices in the silence.

She took a step or two forward, when suddenly Sir Thomas Ducaine came striding quickly and softly out of the library, the door closing quietly behind him.

"Ah, Tom, my dear boy!" Lady Kirwan said. "So you are all back, then? I do hope you're not fatigued by those terrible places that you've all been to see. Horrible it must have been? Don't forget that you are dining with us to-night. Mary has promised to leave her nonsense up at Bloomsbury and be home in time, so we shall have a pleasant family dinner. Where is Augustus? Is he in the library?"

Then Lady Kirwan noticed something strange in the young man's face. The color had all ebbed from it; it was white with a horrid, ghastly whiteness, that absolutely colorless white one sees on the under side of a turbot or a sole.

"Good gracious!" she said, with slightly faltering voice. "Are you ill, Tom? Why, what is the matter? Has anything happened?"

The young man's brain was whirling. Lady Kirwan's sudden and unexpected appearance had driven all his plans and self-control to the winds. He shook with fear and agitation. He tried to speak twice, but the words rattled in his mouth with a hollow sound.

The current of fear ran from him to the tall and gracious dame who stood before him, and flashed backwards and forwards between the two like a shuttle – in the loom of Fate.

"What is it?" she said, in a high-pitched voice. "Tell me at once!"

As she spoke the hall suddenly became filled with silent servants – servants whose faces were covered with tears, and who stood trembling around the vast, luxurious place.

The dame's eyes swept round in one swift survey. Then, suddenly, she drew herself to her full height.

"Where is Augustus?" she said in a low, vibrating voice that thrilled the heart of every person there with pain. "Where is my husband?"

"Sir Augustus, my dear Lady Kirwan," Sir Thomas began to gasp, with tears running down his cheeks – "Sir Augustus is very ill; but – "

He got no further, Lady Kirwan began to move quickly, as if some dread instinct had told her the truth, towards the library door.

"No, no, dear Lady Kirwan," Sir Thomas said – "don't go!"

She brushed him aside as if he had been a straw in her path, and the terrified group of people saw her burst upon the great white-painted door which led to the chamber of death.

There was a silence, an agonized silence of several seconds, and then what all expected and waited for came.

A terrible cry of anguish pealed out into the house, a cry so wild and despairing that the very walls seemed to shudder in fearful sympathy.