The Lost Million Read online

stairs.

  Back at the bedside in the fast-fading light of the hot day of earlyJune, I took the old man's bony hand in silent farewell.

  He turned his eyes upon me, gazing at me with a strange intense look, asthough trying to read my very soul.

  He endeavoured to speak, but though I bent my ear to his mouth, I couldcatch no words. His thin nervous hands clenched themselves, his greybeard moved, and he struggled violently to communicate with me, butwithout avail. Then with his right hand, he made a sign that he wishedto write.

  Instantly I obtained a pen and scrap of paper which I placed before him.

  For a long time his hand trembled, so that he could make no intelligiblewriting. At last, however, he managed slowly, and with infinitedifficulty, to trace very unevenly the words--

  "_Remember the name Harford--be friendly, but beware of him and theHand_."

  He watched my face eagerly as I read.

  Of a sudden, the light went out of his grey countenance, the pen droppedfrom his thin, nerveless fingers, a scarlet spot fell upon the paper,and a deep, long-drawn sigh escaped his ashen lips.

  Then a great stillness fell--a great silence broken only by the low roarof the London traffic.

  And I knew that Melvill Arnold, the man of mystery, was dead.

  CHAPTER TWO.

  CONTAINS SEVERAL SURPRISES.

  For some moments I stood gazing upon the dead man's changed face, notknowing how to act.

  I, Lionel Kemball, had, perhaps very unwisely, accepted a strangeresponsibility. I had acted with complete indiscretion.

  On my way home from Australia, where I had been for a voyage for myhealth, the liner had called at Naples, and Mr Melvill Arnold hadjoined us. On the day after we had sailed I heard that he had had asudden heart seizure, and was confined to his cabin, therefore--why, Ican't exactly tell--I sought him out, and spent a good many hourschatting with him, and keeping him company.

  Perhaps it was that, having been something of an invalid myself, I knewthe weary monotony of being confined to bed; I could sympathise withanybody who was ill.

  From the first I realised that Arnold was a man of no ordinary stamp.Possessed of a clear and quick intelligence, he was a cultured mannotwithstanding his rather rough exterior, and full of a quiet soundphilosophy. To me, it appeared as though he had lived abroad a goodmany years, and was consequently out of touch with England. Whence hehad come he never told me, save to casually mention that he had been agreat traveller and had "lived out in the wilds for years." Thepossession of the golden god seemed to point to the fact that he hadcome from Egypt.

  "London has nowadays no attraction for me," he told me one day. "I onlygo there merely because I am forced to do so. I finished with Londonlong, long ago."

  Surely, as I, a prosaic man-of-the-world, sat in that narrow cabin as westeamed up the Mediterranean towards Gibraltar, I had never dreamed thatin his old kit-bag, smothered as it was with faded hotel labels, therereposed a fortune in banknotes.

  He had been perfectly frank on one point. He was a man without a singlefriend. And now I knew that he had an enemy--and that his name wasHarford.

  Presently I bent to the dead man's bag--and examining it thoroughly,discovered that one letter had remained unburned--a letter which, by theLondon postmark upon it, had been written two years ago. It wasaddressed in a fine, angular, woman's hand to "Arnold Edgcumbe, Esquire,Post Office, Kingswear, South Devon."

  The name caused me to ponder. Had not he admitted that Melvill Arnoldwas not his real name? Was it not to be supposed that his actual namewas Edgcumbe?

  The letter was, to say the least, a curious communication. It bore noaddress, but on the half-sheet of paper was written, in the samefeminine hand, the words: "You, no doubt, saw the newspapers of 6thSeptember, and the sentence of the Court upon the person they know asLancaster. Rest assured that her betrayal will not go unrevenged by--Her Friend."

  I stood gazing at the missive which the dead man had evidently believedthat I had burned. It would not be difficult to search the files of thenewspapers for 6th September 1908, and ascertain for what crime aprisoner named Lancaster had been sentenced. The information might,perhaps, lead me to some further discovery.

  I placed the letter carefully aside and made a most minute search of thedead man's clothes, and of his other belongings, but found absolutelynothing. Then, crossing the wasted hands, and placing the sheettenderly over the white face, I left the room, and, descending, informedthe hotel manager of what had occurred, while he, in turn, telephoned toan undertaker.

  The effects of the deceased were taken possession of by the hotelmanager pending the opening of the letter of instructions, while Iconveyed to my own room the ancient bronze cylinder and the golden imagethat was to be my mascot.

  Death in an hotel is always the cause of unpleasantness with themanagement, who declare it to be injurious to the reputation of theestablishment, hence the body was conveyed away by night to awaitinterment, while I moved to the Cecil.

  But that same night a man from the undertaker's came to me and asked mesomewhat mysteriously what I knew concerning the dead man.

  "He was my friend," I replied. "Why do you make this inquiry?"

  "Well, sir," he answered, "the guv'nor sent me round to say that he'sfound he wore a false beard. It fell off!"

  The man's statement mystified me, more especially when he added--

  "The body is that of a much younger man than the gentleman appeared tobe. The guv'nor fancies there's a bit of a mystery about him."

  "Probably he's right," I said, but the judicious administration of agolden coin quickly put matters straight, and my visitor bowed himselfout.

  Sorely was I tempted to tear open that letter which the mysterious man,now dead, had with calm forethought prepared, yet on the envelope wasboldly written the words: "Not to be opened until after my burial."That plain injunction deterred me.

  Yet on the following morning I went down Fleet Street to the office ofthe _Daily Telegraph_, and there asked to see the file of the paper forSeptember 1908.

  It was not long before I was turning over the pages of the news of theday in question. For some time I searched, until my eye at last caughtthe name of Lancaster in the report of a trial at Old Bailey.

  The report was headed--

  "LADY LETTICE LANCASTER

  "Amazing Life-Story of an Adventuress.

  "The story of a woman adventuress is always interesting, and that ofLettice Earnshaw, _alias_ Lady Lettice Lancaster, is no exception. Sheis a woman of mystery. Born thirty-four years ago in the West ofEngland, she has lived the greater part of her life more or less by herwits. Always a woman of mystery, she has used many names and lived inmany districts, generally changing her name and abode when theattentions of her creditors became too pressing. Many attempts havebeen made to trap her, but she has always escaped, until yesterday, whenshe was convicted at the Old Bailey of removing furniture in order tocheat her creditors, and was sent to gaol for nine months.

  "The discoveries made by the police reveal a remarkable romance. Herbirth has always been shrouded in mystery, but it is probable that shewas to a certain extent entitled to rise the name Lancaster. Herfather, believed to have been a distant relative of a well-known man oftitle, married an actress. Needless to say, trouble was occasioned bythe advent of a child. The family naturally attempted to hush up themarriage, and the little infant was sent to Camborne in Cornwall, whereher mother had a brother who was a policeman. Lettice grew up into aknowing and pretty child, looking much older than her real age, and in1890 she met a medical student, who was staying in the neighbourhood.Although at this time she was only fifteen, she looked some years older,and on 9th April she was married at Exeter, to the student, whose namewas given as Henry Earnshaw.

  "At this youthful age the young bride started her long list of aliases.According to the marriage register she was nineteen years of age--a jumpof four years--and her name was given as Edith Jane Lucy Hadd
on, thesurname being that of her nurse's daughter. Her actual life immediatelyafter marriage is not known, but about a year later she was living atManchester, where, according to the prosecuting counsel in the caseheard yesterday, she was obtaining her living by acting in a pantomime.Her stay in that city was perhaps her longest in any one district, andshe did not obtain notoriety until some years later. In Manchester shewas known as the Hon. Lucy Huntingdon, and also as Lady Ella Earnshaw.The Hon. Lucy was unmarried, but Lady Ella had entered the bonds ofwedlock.

  "With her many aliases and a husband and foster-brother, whoconveniently changed places as the occasion demanded, Lady LetticeLancaster, to give her the name by which she is best known, has nearlyalways contrived to enjoy life at the expense of others. When the billsbegan to arrive, she denied responsibility, the husband or brother towhom the creditors were referred was not to be found, and yet, when asuitable opportunity