The Green Rust. Wallace Edgar
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Doctor van Heerden. I say further, that he would have come to you and been very sympathetic, and would have ordered you to remain in bed for four or five days. I think, too," he said, looking up at the ceiling and speaking slowly, as though he were working out the possible consequence in his mind, "that he would have given you some very palatable medicine."
"What are you insinuating?" she asked quietly.
He did not reply immediately.
"If you will get out of your mind the idea that I have any particular grievance against Doctor van Heerden, that I regard him as a rival, a business rival let us say, or that I have some secret grudge against him, and if in place of that suspicion you would believe that I am serving a much larger interest than is apparent to you, I think we might discuss"—he smiled—"even Doctor van Heerden without such a discussion giving offence to you."
She laughed.
"I am really not offended. I am rather distressed, if anything," she said, knitting her brows. "You see, Doctor van Heerden has always been most kind to me."
Beale nodded.
"He got you your rooms at the flats," he replied quietly; "he was also ready to give you employment the moment you were providentially discharged from Punsonby's. Does it not strike you, Miss Cresswell, that every kind act of Doctor van Heerden's has had a tendency to bring you together, into closer association, I mean? Does it not appear to you that the net result of all the things that might have happened to you in the past few days would have been to make you more and more dependent upon Doctor van Heerden? For example, if you had gone into his employ as he planned that you should?"
"Planned!" she gasped.
His face was grave now and the laughter had gone out of his eyes.
"Planned," he said quietly. "You were discharged from Punsonby's at Doctor van Heerden's instigation."
"I will not believe it!"
"That will not make it any less the fact," said Mr. Beale. "You were nearly arrested—again at Doctor van Heerden's instigation. He was waiting for you when you came back from Punsonby's, ready to offer you his job. When he discovered you had already engaged yourself he telephoned to White, instructing him to have you arrested so that you might be disgraced and might turn to him, your one loyal friend."
She listened speechless. She could only stare at him and could not even interrupt him. For her shrewd woman instinct told her so convincingly that even her sense of loyalty could not eject the doubt which assailed her mind, that if there was not truth in what he was saying there was at least probability.
"I suggest even more," Beale went on. "I suggest that for some purpose, Doctor van Heerden desires to secure a mental, physical and moral ascendancy over you. In other words, he wishes to enslave you to his will."
She looked at him in wonder and burst into a peal of ringing laughter.
"Really, Mr. Beale, you are too absurd," she said.
"Aren't I?" he smiled. "It sounds like something out of a melodrama."
"Why on earth should he want to secure a mental ascendancy over me? Do you suggest–" She flushed.
"I suggest nothing any longer," said Beale, slipping off from the end of the table. "I merely make a statement of fact. I do not think he has any designs on you, within the conventional meaning of that phrase, indeed, I think he wants to marry you—what do you think about that?"
She had recovered something of her poise, and her sense of humour was helping her out of a situation which, without such a gift, might have been an embarrassing one.
"I think you have been seeing too many plays and reading too many exciting books, Mr. Beale," she said, "I confess I have never regarded Doctor van Heerden as a possible suitor, and if I thought he was I should be immensely flattered. But may I suggest to you that there are other ways of winning a girl than by giving her nettle-rash!"
They laughed together.
"All right," he said, swinging up his hat, "proceed with the good work and seek out the various domiciles of Mr. Scobbs."
Then she remembered.
"Do you know–?"
He was at the door when she spoke and he stopped and turned.
"The name of Mr. Scobbs gives me a cold shiver."
"Why?"
"Answer me this," she said: "why should I who have never heard of him before until yesterday hear his name mentioned by a perfect stranger?"
The smile died away from his face.
"Who mentioned him! No, it isn't idle curiosity," he said in face of her derisive finger. "I am really serious. Who mentioned his name?"
"A visitor of Doctor van Heerden's. I heard them talking through the ventilator when I was bolting my door."
"A visitor to Doctor van Heerden, and he mentioned Mr. Scobbs of Red Horse Valley," he said half to himself. "You didn't see the man?"
"No."
"You just heard him. No names were mentioned?"
"None," she said. "Is it a frightfully important matter?"
"It is rather," he replied. "We have got to get busy," and with this cryptic remark he left her.
The day passed as quickly as its predecessor. The tabulation at which she was working grew until by the evening there was a pile of sheets in the left-hand cupboard covered with her fine writing. She might have done more but for the search she had to make for a missing report to verify one of her facts. It was not on the shelf, and she was about to abandon her search and postpone the confirmation till she saw Beale, when she noticed a cupboard beneath the shelves. It was unlocked and she opened it and found, as she had expected, that it was full of books, amongst which was the missing documentation she sought.
With a view to future contingencies, she examined the contents of the cupboard and was arrested by a thin volume which bore no inscription or title on its blank cover. She opened it, and on the title page read: "The Millinborn Murder." The author's name was not given and the contents were made up of very careful analysis of evidence given by the various witnesses at the inquest, and plans and diagrams with little red crosses to show where every actor in that tragedy had been.
She read the first page idly and turned it. She was half-way down the second page when she uttered a little exclamation, for a familiar name was there, the name of Dr. van Heerden.
Fascinated, she read the story to the end, half-expecting that the name of Mr. Beale would occur.
There were many names all unknown to her and one that occurred with the greatest frequency was that of James Kitson. Mr. Beale did not appear to have played any part. She read for an hour, sitting on the floor by the cupboard. She reached the last page, closed the book and slipped it back in the cupboard. She wondered why Beale had preserved this record and whether his antagonism to the doctor was founded on that case. At first she thought she identified him with the mysterious man who had appeared in the plantation before the murder, but a glance back at the description of the stranger dispelled that idea. For all the reputation he had, Mr. Beale did not have "an inflamed, swollen countenance, colourless bloodshot eyes," nor was he bald.
She was annoyed with herself that she had allowed her work to be interrupted, and in penance decided to remain on until six instead of five o'clock as she had intended. Besides, she half expected that Mr. Beale would return, and was surprised to discover that she was disappointed that he had not.
At six o'clock she dismissed the boy, closed and locked the office, and made her way downstairs into the crowded street.
To her surprise she heard her name spoken, and turned to face Dr. van Heerden.
"I have been waiting for you for nearly an hour," he said with good-humoured reproach.
"And your patients are probably dying like flies," she countered.
It was in her mind to make some excuse and go home alone, but curiosity got the better of her and impelled her to wait to discover the object of this unexpected visitation.
"How