"No, I have no male relation whatever," he replied. "But we were speaking of the favour I am begging of you to perform for me. On the fourteenth of January I shall not be here, but it is highly necessary that on that evening, at eight o'clock, a secret message should be delivered into the hands of a certain lady a message from myself. Will you do it?"
"Certainly. Are you going abroad again?"
"I well, I can hardly tell. I may be dead by then who knows?" And he smiled grimly.
He returned to his writing-table, unlocked a drawer, and took therefrom a letter which was carefully sealed with black wax.
"Now, listen," he said, holding the letter in his fingers; "on the night of the fourteenth, just at eight o'clock precisely, go to the Piccadilly tube station, stand at the telephone box numbered four on the Haymarket side, when a lady in black will approach you and ask news of me. In response you will give her this note. But there is a further condition: you may be watched and recognised, therefore be extremely careful that you are not followed on that day, and, above all, adopt some effective disguise. Go there dressed as a working-man, I would suggest."
"That request, Kemsley, is certainly a very queer one," I remarked. "Is she the lady?"
He smiled, and I took that as an affirmative.
"You say she'll be dressed in black. Lots of ladies dress in black. I might mistake her."
"Not very likely. I forgot to tell you that she will wear a small spray of mimosa."
"Ah, that shows originality," I remarked. "Mimosa is not often worn on the person."
"It will serve as a distinguishing mark." Then, after a pause, he added, handing me the letter: "There is one further request I want to make or, at least, I want you to give me your promise, Royle. I ask you to make a solemn vow to me that if any suspicion arises within your mind, that you will believe nothing without absolute and decisive proof. I mean that you will not misjudge her."
"I certainly will not."
"Your hand upon it?"
I put forth my hand and, gripping his warmly, gave him my word of honour.
"I hope you will never regret this, Royle," he said in an earnest tone.
"We are friends," I remarked simply.
"And I trust, Royle, you will never regret the responsibility which you have accepted on my behalf," he said in a deep, hard voice the voice of a desperate man. "Remember to treat my successor exactly as you have treated me. Be his best friend, as he will be yours. You will be astonished, amazed, mystified, no doubt, at the events which must, alas! inevitably occur. But it is not my fault, Royle, believe me," he declared with solemn emphasis. "It is, alas! my misfortune!"
CHAPTER II.
THE SCENT
After giving me the letter, and receiving my assurance that it would be safely delivered, Sir Digby's spirits seemed somewhat to revive.
He chatted in his old, good-humoured style, drank a whisky and soda, and, just before one o'clock, let me out, urging me to descend the stairs noiselessly lest the hall-porter should know that he had had a visitor.
Time after time I had questioned him regarding his strange reference to his successor, but to all my queries he was entirely dumb. He had, I recollected, never been the same since his return from a flying visit to Egypt.
"The future will, no doubt, astound you, but I know, Royle, that you are a man of honour and of your word, and that you will keep your promise at all hazards," was all he would reply.
The secrecy with which I had entered and left caused me considerable curiosity. Kemsley was one of those free, bluff, open-hearted, open-handed, men. He was never secretive, never elusive. I could only account for his curious, mystifying actions by the fact that the reputation of a woman was at stake that he was acting for her protection.
And I was to meet that woman face to face in eight days' time!
As I walked towards Gloucester Road Station where I hoped to find a taxi all was silence. At that hour the streets of South Kensington are as deserted as a graveyard, and as I bent towards the cutting wind from the east, I wondered who could be the mysterious woman who had broken up my dear friend's future plans. Yet he bore her no malice. Some men's temperaments are really curious.
Beneath a street-lamp I paused and looked at the superscription upon the envelope. It ran:
"For E. P. K."
The initial K! Was the lady Digby's wife? That was the suspicion which at once fell upon me, and by which I became convinced.
At half-past one o'clock I let myself into my own flat in Albemarle Street. The faithful Haines, who had been a marine wardroom servant in the navy before entering my employ, was awaiting me.
"The telephone bell rang ten minutes ago, sir," he said. "Sir Digby Kemsley wishes to speak to you."
"Very well!" I replied. "You can go to bed."
The man placed my tray with whisky and soda upon the little table near my chair, as was his habit, and, wishing me good-night, retired.
I went to the telephone, and asked for Digby's number.
After a few seconds a voice, which at first I failed to recognise, replied to mine:
"I say, Royle; I'm so sorry to disturb you, old chap, but could you possibly come back here at once?"
"What?" I asked, very surprised. "Is it so very important? Can't it wait till to-morrow?"
"No, unfortunately it can't. It's most imperative that I should see you. Something has happened. Do come!" he begged. "But don't attract attention you understand!"
"Something happened!" I echoed. "What?"
"That woman. Come at once do, there's a good fellow. Will you for my sake and hers?"
The mention of the woman decided me, so I replied "All right!" and hung up the receiver.
Within half an hour I alighted in Courtfield Gardens and walked up Harrington Gardens to the door of my friend's house, which I saw was already ajar in anticipation of my arrival.
Closing the door noiselessly, in order not to attract the attention of the alert porter who lived in the basement, I crept up the carpeted stairs to the door of the flat, which I found also ajar.
Having closed the door, I slipped into the hall and made my way to the warm, cosy room I had left earlier that night.
The door was closed, and without ceremony I turned the handle.
I threw it open laughingly in order to surprise my friend, but next instant halted in amazement upon the threshold.
I stood there breathless, staring in speechless wonder, and drawing back.
"I'm really very sorry!" I exclaimed. "I thought Sir Digby was here!"
The man who had risen from his chair and bowed when I opened the door was about the same build, but, apparently, a trifle younger. He had iron-grey hair and a pointed beard, but his face was more triangular, with higher cheek-bones, and eyes more brilliant and deeper set.
His thin countenance relaxed into a pleasant smile as he replied in a calm, suave voice:
"I am Sir Digby Kemsley, and you I believe are Mr. Edward Royle my friend my very intimate friend are you not?"
"You!" I gasped, staring at him.
And then, for several seconds I failed to articulate any further words. The imposture was so utterly barefaced.
"You are not Sir Digby Kemsley," I went on angrily at last. "What trick is this?"
"No trick whatever, my dear Royle," was the man's quiet reply as he stood upon the hearthrug in the same position in which my friend had stood an hour before. "I tell you that my name is Kemsley Sir Digby Kemsley."
"Then you assert that this flat is yours?"
"Most certainly I do."
"Bosh! How can you expect me to believe such a transparent tale?" I cried impatiently. "Where is my friend?"
"Bosh! How can you expect me to believe such a transparent tale?" I cried impatiently. "Where is my friend?"
"I am your friend, my dear Royle!" he laughed.
"You're not."
"But did you not, only an hour ago, promise him to treat his successor in the same manner in which you had treated himself?" the man asked very slowly, his high, deep-set eyes fixed upon me with a crafty, almost snake-like expression, an expression that was distinctly one of evil.
"True, I did," was my quick reply. "But I never bargained for this attempted imposture."
"I tell you it is no imposture!" declared the man before me. "You will, perhaps, understand later. Have a cigar," and he took up Digby's box and handed it to me.
I declined very abruptly, and without much politeness, I fear.
I was surveying the man who, with such astounding impudence, was attempting to impose upon me a false identity. There was something curiously striking in his appearance, but what it was I could not exactly determine. His speech was soft and educated, in a slightly higher pitch than my friend's; his hands white and carefully manicured, yet, as he stood, I noted that his left shoulder was slightly higher than the other, that his dress clothes ill-fitted him in consequence; that in his shirt-front were two rare, orange-coloured gems such as I had never seen before, and, further, that when I caught him side face, it much resembled Digby's, so aquiline as to present an almost birdlike appearance.
"Look here!" I exclaimed in anger a few moments later. "Why have you called me over here? When you spoke to me your voice struck me as peculiar, but I put it down to the distortion of sound on the telephone."
"I wanted to see if you recognised my other self," he answered with a smile.
"At this late hour? Couldn't you have postponed your ghastly joke till the morning?" I asked.
"Joke!" he echoed, his face suddenly pale and serious. "This is no joke, Royle, but a very serious matter. The most serious that can occur in any man's life."
"Well, what is it? Tell me the truth."
"You shall know that later."
"Where is Sir Digby?"
"Here! I am Sir Digby, I tell you."
"I mean my friend."
"I am your friend," was the man's response, as he turned away towards the writing-table. "The friend you first met on the Lake of Garda."
"Now, why all this secrecy?" I asked. "I was first called here and warned not to show myself, and, on arrival, find you here."
"And who else did you expect to find?" he asked with a faint smile.
"I expected to find my friend."
"But I am your friend," he asserted. "You promised me only an hour ago that you would treat my successor exactly as you treated me. And," he added, "I am my own successor!"
I stood much puzzled.
There were certain features in his countenance that were much like Digby's, and certain tones in his voice that were the same. His hands seemed the same, too, and yet he was not Digby himself.
"How can I believe you if you refuse to be frank and open with me?" I asked.
"You promised me, Royle, and a good deal depends upon your promise," he replied, looking me squarely in the face. "Perhaps even your own future."
"My future!" I echoed. "What has that to do with you, pray?" I demanded angrily.
"More than you imagine," was his low response, his eyes fixed upon mine.
"Well, all I know is that you are endeavouring to make me believe that you are what you are not. Some evil purpose is, no doubt, behind it all. But such an endeavour is an insult to my intelligence," I declared.
The man laughed a low, harsh laugh and turned away.
"I demand to know where my friend is!" I cried, stepping after him across the room, and facing him again.
"My dear Royle," he replied, in that curious, high-pitched voice, yet with a calm, irritating demeanour. "Haven't I already told you I am your friend?"
"It's a lie! You are not Sir Digby!" I cried angrily. "I shall inform the police that I've found you usurping his place and name, and leave them to solve the mystery."
"Act just as you think fit, my dear old fellow," he laughed. "Perhaps the police might discover more than you yourself would care for them to know."
His words caused me to ponder. At what could he be hinting?
He saw my hesitancy, and with a sudden movement placed his face close to me, saying:
"My dear fellow look look into my countenance, you surely can penetrate my disguise. It cannot be so very perfect, surely."
I looked, but turned from him in disgust.
"No. Stop this infernal fooling!" I cried. "I've never seen you before in my life."
He burst out laughing laughed heartily, and with genuine amusement.
His attitude held me in surprise.
"You refuse to be my friend, Royle but I desire to be yours, if you will allow me," he said.
"I can have no friend whom I cannot trust," I repeated.
"Naturally. But I hope you will soon learn to trust me," was his quiet retort. "I called you back to-night in order to see if you my most intimate friend would recognise me. But you do not. I am, therefore, safe safe to go forth and perform a certain mission which it is imperative that I should perform."
"You are fooling me," I declared.
For a second he looked straight and unflinchingly into my eyes, then with a sudden movement he drew the left cuff of his dress shirt up to the elbow and held out his forearm for me to gaze upon.
I looked.
Then I stood dumbfounded, for half-way up the forearm, on the inside, was the cicatrice of an old knife wound which long ago, he had told me, had been made by an Indian in South America who had attempted to kill him, and whom he had shot in self-defence.
"You believe me now?" he asked, in a voice scarce above a whisper.
"Of course," I said. "Pardon me, Digby but this change in your personality is marvellous almost superhuman!"
"So I've been told before," he replied lightly.
"But, really, didn't you penetrate it?" he asked, resuming his normal voice.
"No. I certainly did not," I answered, and helping myself to a drink, swallowed it.
"Well?" I went on. "What does this mean?"
"At present I can't exactly tell you what I intend doing," he replied. "To-night I wanted to test you, and have done so. It's late now," he added, glancing at the clock, which showed it to be half-past two o'clock in the morning. "Come in to-morrow at ten, will you?" he asked. "I want to discuss the future with you very seriously. I have something to say which concerns your own future, and which also closely concerns a friend of yours. So come in your own interests, Royle now don't fail, I beg of you!"
"But can't you tell me to-night," I asked.
"Not until I know something of what my own movements are to be," he replied. "I cannot know before to-morrow," he replied with a mysterious air. "So if you wish to be forewarned of an impending peril, come and see me and I will then explain. We shall, no doubt, be on closer terms to-morrow. Au revoir," and he took my hand warmly and then let me out.
The rather narrow, ill-lit staircase, the outer door of which had been shut for hours, was close and stuffy, but as I descended the second flight and was about to pass along the hall to the door, I distinctly heard a movement in the shadow where, on my left, the hall continued along to the door of the ground-floor flat.
I peered over the banisters, but in the darkness could distinguish nothing.
That somebody was lurking there I instantly felt assured, and next moment the truth became revealed by two facts.
The first was a light, almost imperceptible noise, the jingle of a woman's bangles, and, secondly, the faint odour of some subtle perfume, a sweet, intoxicating scent such as my nostrils had never greeted before.