The Crevice Part 20

"Won't you come in and have supper with me?" she suggested shyly.

"Caliban and I will be all alone. My father will not be home until late to-night. He telephoned to me at the club and told me that he had closed the shop for the day and gone down-town on business."

A shadow crossed her face as she spoke, the faint shadow of hidden trouble which he had noticed before. It was an auspicious moment, and Morrow seized upon it.

"I will, gladly, if you will let me wash the dishes," he replied, with alacrity.

"We will do them together." The brightness which but an instant before had been blotted from her face returned in a warm glow, and side by side they entered the door.

With Caliban, the black kitten, upon his knees, Morrow watched as she moved deftly about the cheerful, spotless kitchen preparing the simple meal. He made no mention of the subject which lay nearest his heart and mind, and they chattered as gaily and irresponsibly as children.

But when supper was over, and they settled themselves in the little sitting-room, a curious constraint fell upon them both. She sat stroking the kitten, which had curled up beside her, while he gazed absently at the rosy gleam of the glowing coals behind the isingla.s.s door of the little stove, and for a long time there was silence between them.

At length he turned to her and spoke. "Emily," he began, "I told you out there by your gate to-night that I had something to ask of you, something to tell you. I want to tell you now, but I don't know how to begin. It's something I've never told any girl before."

Her hands paused, resting with sudden tenseness upon Caliban's soft fur, and slowly she averted her face from him. He swallowed hard, and then the words came in a swift, tender rush.

"Dear, I love you! I've loved you from the moment I first saw you coming down the street! You--you know nothing of me, save the little I have told you, and I came here a stranger. Some day I will tell you everything, and you will understand. You and your father admitted me to your friends.h.i.+p, made me welcome in your home, and I shall never forget it. It may be that some time I shall be able to be of service to you, but remember that whatever happens, no matter how you reply to me now, I shall never forget your goodness to me, and I shall try to repay it. I love you with all my heart and soul; I want you to be my wife, dear! I never knew before that such love could exist in the world! You have your father, I know, but, oh, I want to protect you and care for you, and keep all harm from you forever."

"Guy!" Her voice was a mere breathless whisper, and her eyes blurred with sudden tears, but he slipped his arm about her, and drew her close.

"Emily, won't you look at me, dear? Won't you tell me that you care, too? That at least there is a chance for me? If I have spoken too soon, I will await patiently and serve you as Jacob served for Rebecca of old. Only tell me that you will try to care, and there is nothing on this earth I cannot do for you, nothing I will not do! Oh, my darling, say that you care just a little!"

There was a pause and then very softly a warm arm stole about his neck, and a strand of rippling brown hair brushed his cheek lightly as her gentle head drooped against his shoulder.

"I--I do care--now," she whispered. "I knew that I cared when you--went away!"

The minutes lengthened into an hour or more while Morrow in the thrall of his exalted mood forgot for the second time in the girl's sweet presence his battle between love and duty: forgot the reason for his coming, the mission he was bound to fulfill--the letter he had promised his employer to obtain.

For many minutes Guy Morrow and Emily forgot all else but the new-found happiness of the love they had just confessed for each other. Morrow had even forgotten that most-important letter which, after many misgivings, he had solemnly promised his employer to obtain from Emily. It was a phrase which fell from her own lips that recalled him to the stern reality of the situation.

"My father!" she exclaimed, starting from Morrow's arms in sudden confusion. "What do you suppose Father will say?"

"We will tell him when he returns." Morrow spoke with rea.s.suring confidence, but a swift feeling of apprehension came over him. What indeed would Jimmy Brunell say? The thought of lying to Emily's father was repugnant beyond expression, and yet what account could he give of himself, of his profession and earlier career? What credentials, what proof of his integrity and clean, honest life could he present to the man whose daughter he sought to marry? At the first hint of "detective" the old forger would inevitably suspect his motive and turn him from the house, forbidding Emily to speak to or even look upon him again. There was an alternative, and although he shrank from it as unworthy of her faith and trust in him, Morrow was forced to accept it as the only practicable solution to the problem confronting him.

"Oh, no, don't let us tell him--yet!" Unconsciously Emily smoothed the way for him. "I don't mean to deceive him, of course, or keep anything from him which it is really necessary that he know at once, but it seems too wonderful to discuss, even with Father, just now. It is like a fairy promise, like moons.h.i.+ne, which would be dispelled if we breathed a word of it to anyone."

"Of course, dearest, if it is your wish, we will say nothing now," he returned slowly. In his heart a fierce wave of self-contempt at his own hypocrisy surged up once more, but he forced it doggedly down. He had promised his chief to play the game, and after all it was for the sake of the girl beside him, that he might be able, when the inevitable moment of disclosure came, to be of real service to her and her unfortunate father, and to s.h.i.+eld her from the brunt of the blow.

"I should not like your father to think that we deceived him, but perhaps it would be as well if we kept our secret for a little time.

Later, when I have succeeded in landing a good, permanent position with a prospect of advancement, I can go to him with greater a.s.surance, and ask him for you."

"Poor Father!" sighed Emily, with a wistful, tremulous little smile.

"We have been inseparable ever since I can remember. He has lived only for me, and I cannot bear to think of leaving him--especially now, when he seems weighed down with some secret anxiety, which he will share with no one, not even me. I feel that he needs me, more than ever before. It wrings my heart, Guy, to see him age before my very eyes, and to know that he will not confide in me, I may not help him!

He seems to lean upon me, upon my presence near him, as if somehow I gave him strength. Although he maintains a steadfast silence, his eyes never leave me, and such a sad, hungry expression comes into them sometimes, almost as if he were going away from me forever, as if he were trying to say farewell to me, that I have to turn away to hide my tears from him."

"Poor little girl! It must make you terribly unhappy." Morrow paused, and then added, as if in afterthought: "Perhaps when we tell your father that we care for each other, that when I have proved myself you are going to be my wife, he may confide in me--that is, if he is willing to give you to me. You know, dear, it is easier sometimes for a man to talk to another of his private worries, than to a woman, even the one nearest and dearest to him in all the world. I may possibly be of a.s.sistance to him. You told me last night that the change in him had been coming on gradually for several months. When did it first occur to you that he was in trouble?"

"I don't know. I can't remember. You see, I didn't realize it until that letter came, and then I began to think back, and the significance of little things which I had not noticed particularly when they occurred, was borne in upon me. Although I have no reason for connecting the two happenings beyond the fact that they coincided, I cannot help feeling that Mr. Pennold--the young man whom you have observed when he called to see my father--has something to do with the state of things, for it was with his very first appearance, more than two years ago, that my father became a changed man."

"Tell me about it," Morrow urged, gently. "Can you remember, dear, when he first came?"

"Oh, yes. We have so few visitors--Father doesn't, as a rule, encourage new acquaintances, you know, Guy, although he did seem to like you from the very beginning--that the reception of a perfect stranger into our home as a constant caller puzzled me. It occurred on a Sunday afternoon in summer. I was sitting out on the porch reading, when a strange young man came up the path from the gate, and asked to see my father. I called to him--he was weeding the flowerbed around the corner of the house--and when he came, I went up to my room, leaving them alone together. I didn't go, though, until I had seen their meeting, and one thing about it seemed strange to me, even then.

The stranger, Mr. Pennold, evidently did not know my father, had never even seen him before, from the way he greeted him, but when Father first caught sight of his face, his own went deathly white and he gripped the porch railing for a moment, as if for support.

"'You wished to see me?' he said, and his voice sounded queer and hollow and dazed, like a person awaking from sleep. 'What can I do for you?'

"'This is Mr. James Brunell?' the young man asked. 'You are a map-maker, I understand. I have come to ask for your estimate on a large contract for wall-maps for suburban schools. If you can spare a half-hour, we can talk it over now, sir, in private. I have a letter of introduction to you from an old acquaintance. My name is Pennold.'

"'I know.' My father smiled as he spoke, an odd, slow smile which somehow held no mirth or welcome. 'I noted the family resemblance at once. A relative of yours was at one time a.s.sociated with me in business.'

"The young man laughed shortly.

"You mean my uncle, I guess. He's retired now. Well, Mr. Brunell, shall we get to business?'

"I left them then, and when I came downstairs from my room, the young man had gone. Father was standing in the window over there, with a letter crushed in his hand. He turned when I spoke to him, and, oh, Guy, if you had seen his face at that moment! I almost cried out in fear! It was like one of the terrible, despairing faces in Dante's description of the Inferno. He looked at me blankly as if he scarcely recognized me; then gradually that awful expression was blotted out, and his old sweet, sunny smile took its place.

"'Well, little girl!' he said. 'Our Sunday together was spoiled, wasn't it, by that young fellow's intrusion?'

"'Not spoiled,' I replied, 'if he brought you work.'

"The smile faded from Father's face, and he responded very gravely, with a curious, halting pause between the words:

"'Yes. He has brought me--work.'

"I forgot all about that episode, in the weeks and months which followed. Charley Pennold called irregularly. Sometimes he would come three or four times a week, then again we would not see him for two or three months. Father was busier than ever in the shop, and, Charley Pennold's orders must have been very profitable, for we've had more money in the last two years than ever before, that I can remember. And yet Father has been melancholy and morose at times, as if he were brooding over something, and his disposition has changed steadily for the worse, although in the last few months the difference in his moods has become more marked. Then, when that letter came he seemed to give himself wholly up to whatever it is which has obsessed him."

"Emily, will you let me see the letter again?" Morrow asked suddenly.

"If you really care for me, and will be my wife some day, your troubles and vexations are mine. I want you to let me take the letter home with me to-night. I feel that if I can study it for a few hours undisturbed, I shall be able to read the cipher. I'll promise, dear, to bring it back the very first thing in the morning."

"Of course, you may have it, Guy!" The young girl rose impulsively, and went to the little desk in the corner. "I hid it last night after you had gone, among some old receipts; here it is. You need not return it to-morrow. Keep it for several days, if you like, until you have studied it thoroughly. I don't see how you or any one could solve it without possessing the key, but I should feel as if a load were taken off my shoulders if you will try."

She gave him the letter, and after a long, tender farewell, he took his departure. Going straight to his room at Mrs. Quinlan's, he lighted the lamp, so that if Emily chanced to look over the way, she would fancy him at work upon the cryptogram. Morrow waited until the little house opposite was plunged in darkness; then very stealthily he crept down the stairs and let himself out, the precious letter carefully tucked into an inside pocket.

Morrow proceeded at once to Blaine's office and found his chief awaiting him.

"Here's the letter, sir," he announced, as he placed the single sheet of paper on the desk before the detective. "I can't make anything out of it, but you probably will. It's curious, isn't it! Why, for instance, are those little dots placed near some of the crazy figures, and not others?"

Blaine picked the letter up, and examined it with eager interest.

"It's comparatively simple," he remarked, as he spread it flat upon the desk, and taking up pen and paper, copied it rapidly. "Symbolic cryptograms are usually decipherable, with the expenditure of a little time and effort. There is a method which is universally followed, and has been for ages. For instance, the letter _e_ is recognized as being the most frequently used, in ordinary English, of the whole alphabet; after that the vowels and consonants in an accepted rotation which I will not take up our valuable time in discussing with you now, since we will not even need to use it, in this case.--Here, take this copy, and see if you can follow me."

He pa.s.sed the sheet of paper across to his operative and Morrow gazed again upon the curiously shaped characters which from close scrutiny had become familiar, yet still remained maddeningly baffling to him:

[Ill.u.s.tration: An image of a coded message is shown here in the text.]

"Now," resumed Blaine, "presupposing that in an ostensibly friendly message beginning with a word of four letters, that word is _dear_, and we've two important vowels to start with. We know the letter was addressed to Brunell, from an old partner in crime. We will a.s.sume, therefore, that the two words of three letters each, following _dear_ are either _old Jim_, _old man_, or _old boy_. Let us see how it works out."

The detective scribbled hastily on a pad for several minutes, then leaned back in his chair, with a sigh of satisfaction.

"It can only be _boy_," he announced. "That gives us a working start of eight letters. Add to that the fact that this character is printed twice consecutively in three different places"--he pointed to the figure =[.= as he spoke--"which confirms the supposition that it is _l_, and you have this result immediately."