William Le Queux - The Red Room

Yet I dare not leave the spot lest Kirk should come forth, so I stood leaning against the railings in patience, full of wonder and apprehension.

More than once I feared that the “dealer in secrets” might notice me from within if he chanced to look out. Hence from time to time I changed my position.

My impression was that he had entered with a latch-key, for scarce had he reached the top of the steps when he was inside, with the door closed behind him; either that, or else someone was waiting there to admit him.

Another hour had nearly passed, when suddenly I was startled by a loud scream – a woman’s piercing scream – which appeared to come from the first of the houses which lay in the darkness.

Twice was that cry repeated, and I sped to the house whence it emanated. The place was in complete darkness. No light shone from any window of the gloomy, dismal house.

A third time was the shriek repeated, coming from the room behind the railing on a level with the door. As I stood upon the pavement I was only a few feet from the window.

“Help! Help! For God’s sake, help! You brute! I thought I had escaped you. No! Ah! Don’t! I beg – I implore you! Ah!” shrieked a refined voice, the voice of a young woman. And then, in despairing tones that grew fainter with every syllable, I heard the words long drawn out. “Ah! You – you’ve – killed – me! Killed me! – just as you killed my – dear – father!”

I stood listening to that dying appeal, bewildered, utterly staggered.

What could I think? Place yourself in my position and ask yourself what you, in those circumstances, would have thought?

I was uncertain what to do. Was it best to ascend the steps, knock boldly at the door, and inquire the reason of that frantic appeal? Or should I remain silent and watch?

If Kirk had caused the Professor’s death, then why had he enlisted my aid? But was I not a complete novice, in the detection of crime, and might not all his protestations of friendship be a mere blind, a clever ruse to cover the truth?

I stood on the pavement, my ears strained to catch any sound within. But all was silent again.

Those final words of the woman’s desperate appeal for help rang in my ears: “ You’ve killed me, just as you killed my dear father !”

The woman who had shrieked could surely have no connection with the tragedy in Sussex Place, for, alas! Ethelwynn Greer was dead. I had, with my own eyes, seen her stiff and stark.

Then what did it all mean? Was this an additional phase of the already inscrutable problem?

I gazed at the window, where no light escaped through the lowered Venetian blinds. The very darkness struck me as strange, for either there were closed shutters upon the blinds, or some heavy curtains had been drawn carefully across to exclude any ray of light from being seen without.

In the neighbourhood wherein I was, I recollected there were many mysterious houses – secret clubs where waiters and foreigners of the lower class danced, drank, and played faro, and were often raided by the police. Those streets bore a very bad reputation.

After all, I was not exactly certain that the house whence emanated the shrieks was the actual house into which Kirk had entered. Hence I was both undecided and bewildered. For that reason I waited, my eyes glued upon the dark door and house-front.

Suddenly, above the fanlight, I saw the flickering light of a candle carried down the hall, and a moment later the door opened. In fear of recognition I sprang back into the roadway, where, at that distance, the fog obscured me.

Someone descended the steps, and, turning to the left, went in the direction whence I had come. I followed stealthily for some distance until I at last made out the figure in the weak light of a street-lamp.

It was not Kirk, only a forbidding-looking old woman in faded bonnet and shawl – a typical gin-drinking hag of a type one may see in hundreds in that neighbourhood. I had followed her down into Cleveland Street, where she turned to the left, when it suddenly occurred to me that, in my absence, Kirk might make his exit. Therefore I rather foolishly abandoned pursuit, and retraced my steps.

Judge my chagrin, my utter disgust with myself when, on returning, I failed to recognise from which house the woman had come! In that puzzling pall of fog, which grew thicker and more impenetrable every moment, I hesitated to decide which of three or four houses was the place whence the woman’s cries had emanated.

That hesitation was fatal to my success. In my excitement I had taken no notice of the number upon the door, and now I paced backwards and forwards before the railings of four houses, all almost exactly similar, all in darkness, all equally dingy and mysterious. Which of those houses held Kershaw Kirk I knew not, neither could I decide from which of the four had come those despairing cries.

I had been a fool, a very great fool, for not going boldly to the door and demanding an explanation, even though I might have received a rough handling, alone and unarmed as I was. So I returned to the street-lamp and tried to recognise the house from the point where I had stood when the first cry had fallen upon my ears. But, alas! again I could not decide.

My impulse to follow the woman had been my undoing, for I somehow felt a strong conviction that Kirk had escaped during my absence in Cleveland Street, for though I waited in that dense and choking blackness beneath the red lamp of a surgery at the further corner for still another hour, he came not.

Therefore I was compelled very reluctantly to grope my way back into the Tottenham Court Road, where at last I found a hansom, and with a man leading the horse, I fell asleep as we went westward, so fagged and exhausted was I by that long and unpleasant vigil.

The wife of a motorist like myself is used to her husband’s late hours, therefore I had little difficulty in excusing myself to Mabel, yet when I retired to bed no sleep came to my eyes.

That woman’s shrill, despairing cry rang ever in my ears. Those words of hers were so mysterious, so ominous.

“ You’ve killed me, just as you killed my dear father !”

Should I go to the police in the morning and make a clean breast of the whole affair?

At dawn I found the fog had lifted, therefore, after looking in at the garage, I called upon Kirk, resolved to pretend ignorance of his visit to the house off the Tottenham Court Road. But again I was disappointed, for he had been absent all night. His sister was ignorant of his whereabouts, but, as she explained, his movements were ever erratic.

This caused me to make another visit to the house, which, in the light of day, I found to be in Foley Street, an even more squalid neighbourhood than I had believed.

At the corner of Cleveland Street was the laundry, the windows of which were painted grey so that the passer-by could not peer within. The street seemed to be the play-ground of numberless dirty children, while the houses, all of which were let in tenements, were smoke-grimed and dismal.

At some of the windows the cheap lace curtains hung limp and yellow, and at others the windows had been white-washed to prevent people looking in. The neighbourhood was one that had sadly decayed, for even the public-house a little way up the street was closed and to let.

I stood outside the easily recognised surgery in order to take my bearings, and quickly discovered the three or four houses from one of which had come that cry in the night.

Yet which house it was, I knew not. Therefore what could I do? To remain there might attract Kirk’s attention if he were within. Hence I was afraid to loiter, so I passed on into Langham Street, and thus out into Portland Place.