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CHAPTER V.

IN spite of the fact that there were frequently in my safe jewels sufficiently valuable to make it well worth the while of a professional burglar to invade my flat, I had never experienced the least nervousness on the subject.

A flat always seems so safe and self-contained! When you close your front door you seem to shut yourself up in your castle and pull up a metaphorical drawbridge between yourself and the world, and there is an added sense of security in the knowledge that though enclosed in your own domain you are not really isolated, and there are human beings within call at your desire.

My safe, a small unostentatious one, was let into the wall of my bedroom, and the door of it draped with a little frivolous hanging curtain of art muslin tied up with knots of ribbon, | | 75 which imparted to it the guileless appearance of a medicine cupboard. I flattered myself that to the casual eye there would seem to be nothing more valuable behind those delicate folds than sal-volatile, and that no one would imagine a small fortune often lay concealed there.

I had only two maid-servants--sisters. Comely, honest country girls, for whom I had sent to the Hampshire village, where I had spent my youth, and whom I knew to be thoroughly trustworthy. Having cautioned them in a general way not to pick up chance acquaintances, nor to gossip too much with their neighbours, I felt a tranquil assurance of safety.

But I confess to having now and then an uneasy feeling that it was time for me to have another adventure of some sort, a vague presentiment of something unpleasant in store for me; and I was especially careful in all my business appointments and meetings.

My employer, Mr. Leighton, had just received a fresh consignment of pearls, amongst | | 76 which were some very fine ones, and arrangements had been made for me to interview several important dealers.

I brought the pearls home one afternoon and put them into my safe.

Usually I locked the door of my room while I was transferring the jewels from their hiding-places in my dress, but on this occasion by chance I forgot to do so, and just at the moment that they lay on my dressing table, while I was unlocking the safe, Kate, my parlour-maid, opened the door abruptly without knocking.

"I beg your pardon, ma'am," she said, "I thought you were still out; I was going to shut your window."

"It's all right, Kate," I answered carelessly, unwilling to betray the vexation I really felt, and moving between her and the pearls.

But she had seen them already, and lifting up her hands in surprise, she said: "Oh what lovely pearls, ma'am, and what a lot of them."

"Yes; they are pretty," I said, "but they don't belong to me. I am taking care of them for someone else. I hope they will not get | | 77 lost during the few days they are in my charge."

I consoled myself after she had left the room by the reflection that she was not likely to speak to anyone about them, and would probably forget the subject all the sooner because I had not made it of special importance, and as she was absolutely honest herself, there was nothing else to fear.

Two days had passed of the three that were to elapse before the interview at which I hoped to arrange the sale of the pearls.

On the evening of the third day I was engaged to dine out with some great friends, and as I was to meet an artist whose latest success in portraits was adorning the walls of the New Gallery, I decided that I ought to go and see it that afternoon.

I had spent a pleasant hour at the Gallery, and was moving away, when some American acquaintances pounced on me and carried me off to tea with them at the Cecil; so that it was late in the afternoon when I got back. And I found that I had only just left myself time to dress.

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I was startled to hear a loud sob from Kate as she opened the door to me, and to see that she was in floods of tears.

"Oh, ma'am," she said, "we are so glad you have come back; we didn't know what to do. Mother is dying, and Mary and me feel we must go to her."

She handed me a telegram containing the words: "Mother had accident, cannot live through the night, both come at once."

"This is dreadful," I said, "I am so sorry. You must go of course."

"But how can we leave you alone?" she answered.

"Oh, I must manage somehow," I said, "I could not think of keeping either of you in such a case."

They were naturally both eager to be off, and there was barely time for them to catch their train, so that I was too much occupied in giving them the money and directions for their journey, and dispatching them in a hansom, to think of anything else until after they had gone.

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Then a disagreeable recollection of the pearls, and the thought that I should be quite alone in the flat that night, flashed across my mind.

But there was no possibility of getting any one in so late in the day, even if I had been able to go and hunt somebody up, and I was due at the Anstruthers' dinner in three-quarters of an hour.

There was nothing for it but to dress and go, taking the latch-key with me, and reassuring myself with the thought that no one could possibly know I was suddenly bereft of both my servants, and that my wisest plan was not to mention it at all. As I passed through the hall on my way out, I saw the ill-fated telegram lying crumpled up on the floor, and picking it up mechanically, smoothed it out and carried it with me. Although I told myself, as I drove towards Eaton Square, that there was nothing to worry about, and that in the morning it would be possible, if the maids did not return, to find someone to take their place, I still felt an indefinite sense of uneasiness. If only | | 80 I had returned home earlier that afternoon I should have had time to arrange something.

I glanced at the telegram to see when it had arrived, and noticed, without at first taking it into my mind, that it had been sent off from Paddington at four o'clock.

I read it over more than once with a sort of puzzled feeling of something being wrong, without knowing where or why.

It seemed quite simple: the mother had met with an accident, and the brother, had telegraphed for his sisters to come to her.

But why Paddington, when they lived in Hampshire? I suddenly asked myself. Why Paddington?

How was it that the telegram, instead of being sent off from their own village, had started from Paddington?

I was still seeking a solution to this problem when I reached the Anstruthers, and was obliged to dismiss the whole matter from my mind.

The artist, a Mr. Charles Seton, turned out to be a very charming man, who spoke little | | 81 of art, but talked well on all subjects, and in the interest roused by his conversation I quite forgot the incident of the telegram, and enjoyed myself very much.

He had brought with him, at the special invitation of the hostess, a splendid dog, the original of one of his own paintings. It was a Russian boarhound, massive and ferocious-looking, but as gentle as a kitten under his control, and he laughingly introduced it to all, making it present a huge paw to each of us in turn.

"Serge is not accustomed to dinner parties," he said, "but he is too well-bred to be shy. Give your paw to Mrs. Delamere, Serge."

The dog did as he was told in a dignified manner, and then lay gently down beside me, and put his head on my lap.

"Serge has adopted you as one of his personal friends," Mr. Seton said; "that is a sign of his especial approval and protection."

Mrs. Anstruther declared that she was jealous, and when we went down to dinner, and Serge leisurely followed me and disposed | | 82 himself under the table at my feet, she tried to lure him away from me with bribes, but unsuccessfully.

After dinner he followed us up to the drawing-room, passing his master with superb indifference, and stalking solemnly after me, much to everyone's amusement.

"I wish I could take you home with me," I said. "I should feel so nice and safe with such a companion."

And then I told Mrs. Anstruther about the unavoidable exodus of my maids, and my enforced loneliness that night.

"My dear," she said, "I wouldn't be you for the whole world. I should not sleep a wink. Why don't you borrow Serge to take care of you? I am sure his master would lend him."

I laughingly repudiated the idea of being nervous, and negatived the suggestion, but in her impetuous good-nature she continued to insist upon it, and finally, when the gentlemen joined us, she told Mr. Seton that she had arranged for Serge to spend a day or two with his new friend. I became rather embarrassed | | 83 at last, and declared that I should be more afraid of Serge himself than of anything else, but this quite offended his master, and I was obliged to retract it.

"I assure you, Mrs. Delamere," he said, "I have only to say to Serge, 'This lady is in your charge; on guard,' and your safety is guaranteed. He would neither harm you himself nor allow anyone else to do so."

Finally the dog himself settled it by walking out of the room after me and following me down-stairs.

"Very well," I said, "You shall come. I will send you back to-morrow."

I felt a sort of relief that after all I should not be absolutely alone in my flat that night--my nerves had not been quite so strong since my first two adventures--and a dog is very much better than nothing in the way of a companion.

He seemed perfectly contented with the arrangement, and waited quietly when we reached the door of my flat while I opened it with my latch-key, exactly as though he had been accustomed to do so always.

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We entered together, and I closed the door and turned into the little room I called my boudoir, out of which on one side led my bedroom, having another door into the passage, further on.

Serge pricked his ears, and looked fixedly at the door between the two rooms, which was slightly ajar, and involuntarily I laid my hand on his collar, and stood still waiting for something--I did not know what. There was dead silence for a moment, then a chink as of some metal, a stealthy movement, and, the door opening towards us, showed a man cautiously peering; through the aperture. He had a coarse, clumsy face, with a smile of triumph on it, and in his hand he held a small packet, rolled up in a torn newspaper. I knew my pearls were there.

I held the dog more firmly. The room was in semi-darkness, and I was between him and the man, who, therefore, did not notice him.

Before I had time to speak the man pointed a Derringer at me.

"Scream, and I fire," he said. "I don't | | 85 want to hurt yer, but I've got to get away. I didn't reckon on you coming home so soon."

I released the dog.

"Fetch him, Serge," I said.

The dog's onslaught was so rapid, that if the man had been one step away from the half-opened door, he couldn't have saved himself.

As it was, he dropped the package in his terror, and it fell just where it prevented the door from shutting.

Serge seized it with his great teeth, and whirled it away, and the man pulled the door to and locked it. The dog tore and bit furiously at the barrier thus interposed between them, and I dropped trembling into a chair. What was I to do next?

The man's voice, changed from its first brutal defiance, came now in subdued accents of entreaty.

"If you call the dog off, I'll come out and go away quietly," he said. "You needn't be hard on me; I haven't took nothing."

"You are safe from the dog where you are," I replied, "and, since you are armed, it would | | 86 be impossible for me to let you out. Besides, how do I know that you would take nothing with you?"

"You can count the stones," he said, "they're all in that package."

I picked it up and proceeded to do so. Yes, they were all there, thank goodness.

But what was I to do about the man?

If I raised an alarm I should be obliged to give him in charge, and to state that he had broken open my safe. This would lead, perhaps, to a revelation about the pearls, and in accounting for their presence in the safe my occupation would become known.

This was exactly what I wished to avoid. At the same time, if I called the dog away the man might open the door and fire straight at me.

I was afraid as it was that he might fire through the door and succeed in wounding poor Serge. I thought it best to assume more decision than I really felt.

"I am going to summon help from down-stairs," I said, "and I shall leave the dog on | | 87 guard. If you attempt to come out he will tear you to pieces."

"For God's sake, let me off!" he said; "it's my first job. I've never tried it on before, and I never will again, s'help me. It was your girls talking about the wonderful lot of pearls you'd got, that put me on to it. I thought I'd step in while you was all out and make off with them."

"You sent the telegram then?" I said.

"Oh, yes," he answered; "they didn't mean no harm, but they got talking to me about their mother and all that, and it seemed as if the whole job was really for me. You see they thought I was a labouring man come up from their part of the country to look for work. They never said a word about the dog, though."

"I suppose, but for the dog, you would have shot me?" I said.

He did not answer, and we remained silent for several minutes.

Serge was lying close to the door, with his head on his paws, and his eyes fixed on the chink of light that came from under it.

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Presently he gave a low growl, and, getting up, sniffed all along the chink, and then stopped listening. I wondered what the man was trying to do, and whether he would still manage to outwit me in getting away.

I wished that, after all, I had given the alarm at once.

In spite of Serge's presence I began to feel frightened. Suddenly, with a snarl of rage and a terrific bound, he sprang past me through the door leading to the hall; there was a crash, a strangled oath, and then a horrible sound, the sound of an animal and a human being in deadly conflict.

I rushed out. The man was lying on the floor with his head and shoulders jammed into an angle of the wall; one arm wedged underneath him by the weight of the dog, who was straining every effort to reach his throat with its huge jaws, while he vainly strove with his hand wound into its collar to choke it off.

His face was covered with blood, and purple with the agony of his effort.

I thought he would be killed, torn to pieces before my eyes.

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"Serge," I cried, "Serge, come away; down, good dog, down."

I seized his collar, and pulled him back. He never attempted to bite me, but continued snarling and showing his teeth at his enemy.

I was only just in time. The wretched man was quite spent, and lay still with closed eyes.

I picked up the Derringer which had fallen in the struggle; it was unloaded, a rusty, useless thing. I suppose he had hoped to frighten me with it, and indeed he would have succeeded but for Serge.

I felt dizzy and faint myself with the sight of that ghastly struggle.

The man had got out of the bedroom by the door leading into the passage, and stealing round, had hoped to get through the hall door before the dog caught him.

I fetched him some brandy and water, and a wet sponge for his face, and the dog watched him all the time, not letting him stir a yard.

Then I ordered Serge to keep still, and, leading the man to the door myself, put him out.

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He began muttering some thanks and protestations, but I cut him short.

"You had better get away as quickly and quietly as you can," I said. "If the porter catches you at the door, he will be sure to ask for your business, and make it unpleasant for you."

He slouched away down the staircase, dazed and crestfallen, and presently the sound of the hall-door closing quietly, assured me that he had managed to escape unseen.

When I sent Serge back to his master the next day, I felt basely ungrateful in not mentioning the good service he had done for me; but I thought it best to tell no one on account of the risk it would add to my business if it became generally known.

Since then, I am glad to say, circumstances have enabled me to tell the whole story of that night, and to thank Mr. Seton more fully for the loan, which was such a fortunate one for me, of his dog.

He insisted on making me a present of Serge, which he said was the most fitting reward for | | 91 the dog's gallantry, and I feel that as long as Serge lives I shall never need to fear a burglary again.

My maids, on finding out that they had been hoaxed, for what reason they never knew, were anxious to return to me at once, but I thought it safer to get two new ones. Honesty is a very good quality as far as it goes, but a little discretion is a necessary adjunct to most virtues, I fancy, and, but for the lucky chance of Serge's advent, I should have suffered an irreparable loss, in consequence of their careless loquacity.