Frederick Bartlett - The Web of the Golden Spider

Coming out of here, he next began a systematic examination of every room on that floor. In the boudoir where he had found clothes for the girl, he discovered her old garments still hanging where she had placed them to dry. Her dress was spread across the back of a chair, her stockings were below them, and her tiny mud-bespattered shoes on the floor. They made him start as though he had suddenly come upon the girl herself. He crossed the room and almost timidly placed his hands upon the folds of the gown. These things were so intimate a part of her that it was almost like touching her hand. It brought up to him very vividly the picture of her as she stood shivering with the cold, all dripping wet before the flames. His throat ached at the recollection. It had never occurred to him that she might vanish like this unless, as he had half feared, he might return to find Sorez dead. This new turn left him more bewildered than ever. He went into every room of the house from attic to cellar and returned again to the study with only this fact of her disappearance to reward him for his efforts of the last three hours.

Had this early morning intruder abducted them both, or had they successfully hidden themselves until after he left and then, in a panic, fled? Had the priest, fearing for Wilson’s life, thrown him into the carriage rather than have on his hands a possible murder? Or after the priest had gone did Sorez find him and take this way to rid himself of an influence that might destroy his power over the girl? This last would have been impossible of accomplishment if the girl herself knew of it. The other theories seemed improbable. At any rate, there was little use in sitting here speculating, when the problem still remained of how to locate the girl.

He made his way back to the safe and examined some of the torn letters; they were all in Spanish. A large part of them bore the same postmark, “Bogova, Republic of Carlina.” The sight of the safe again recalled to him the fact that he still had in his possession the parchment which had dropped from the interior of the idol. It was possible that this might contain some information which would at any rate explain the value which these two men evidently placed upon it. He took it out of his pocket and looked at it with some curiosity. It was very tightly rolled in a covering of what appeared to be oilskin. He cut the threads which held it together and found a second covering sewed with sinew of some sort. This smelled musty. Cutting this, he found still a third covering of a finely pounded metal looking like gold-foil. This removed revealed a roll of parchment some four inches long and of about an inch in thickness. When unrolled Wilson saw that there were two parchments; one a roughly drawn map, and the other a document covered with an exceedingly fine script which he could not in this light make out at all. Without a strong magnifying glass, not a word was decipherable. He thrust it back in his pocket with a sense of disappointment, when he recalled that he could take it to the Public Library which was not far from there and secure a reading glass which would make it all clear. He would complete his investigation in the house and then go to the reading room where he had spent so much of his time during the first week he was in Boston.

He picked up several fragments of the letters scattered about, in the hope of obtaining at least some knowledge of Sorez. The fact that the man had stopped to tear them up seemed to prove that he had made plans to depart for good, sweeping everything from the safe and hastily destroying what was not valuable. Wilson knew a little Spanish and saw that most of the letters were of recent date and related to the death of a niece. Others mentioned the unsettled condition of government affairs in Carlina. At one time Sorez must have been very close to the ruling party, for several of the letters were from a man who evidently stood high in the ministry, judged by the intimacy which he displayed with affairs of state. He spoke several times of the Expedition of the Hills, in which Sorez had apparently played a part. But the most significant clause which Wilson found in his hasty examination of the remnants was this reference:

“There is still, I hear, a great bitterness felt among the Mountain tribes over the disappearance of the idol of their Sun God. They blame this on the government and more than half suspect that you were an important factor in its vanishing. Have a care and keep a sharp lookout. You know their priest is no ordinary man. They have implicit faith that he will charm it back to them.”

This was dated three months before. Wilson put the few remaining bits of this letter in his pocket. Was it possible that this grinning idol which already had played so important a part in his own life was the one mentioned here? And the priest of whom Sorez spoke–could it be he who ruled these tribes in the Andes? It was possible–Lord, yes, anything was possible. But none of these things hinted as to where the girl now was.

He came back into the study and took a look into the small room to the left. He saw his own clothes there. He had forgotten all about them. They were wrinkled and scarcely fit to wear–all but his old slouch hat. He smiled as he recalled that at school it was thought he showed undue levity for a theological student in wearing so weather-beaten and rakish a hat. He was glad of the opportunity to exchange for it the one he now wore. He picked it up from the chair where it lay. Beneath the rim, but protruding so as to be easily seen, was a note. He snatched it out, knowing it was from her as truly as though he had heard her voice. It read:

“Dear Comrade:

I don’t know what has become of you, but I know that if you’re alive you’ll come back for me. We are leaving here now. I haven’t time to tell you more. Go to the telephone and ring up Belmont 2748.

Wilson caught his breath. With the quick relief he felt almost light-headed. She was alive–she had thought of him–she had trusted him! It deepened the mystery of how he had come to be carried from the house–of where they succeeded in hiding themselves–but, Lord, he was thankful for it all now. He would have undergone double what he had been through for the reward of this note–for this assurance of her faith in him. It cemented their friendship as nothing else could. For him it went deeper. The words, “You’ll come back here for me,” tingled through his brain like some sweet song. She was alive–alive and waiting for him to come back. There is nothing finer to a man than this knowledge, that some one is waiting his return. It was an emotion that Wilson in his somewhat lonely life had never experienced save in so attenuated a form as not to be noticeable. He lingered a moment over the thought, and then, crushing the old hat–now doubly dear–over his bandaged head, hurried out of this house in which he had run almost the gamut of human emotions. He went out by the laundry window, closing it behind him, across the courtyard, and made the street without being seen. That was the last time, he thought, that he would ever set foot within that building. He didn’t find a public telephone until he reached Tremont Street. He entered the booth with his heart beating up in his throat. It didn’t seem possible that when a few minutes ago he didn’t know whether she was dead or alive, that he could now seat himself here and hope to hear her voice. His hand trembled as he took down the receiver. It seemed an eternity before he got central; another before she connected him with Belmont. He grew irritable with impatience over the length of time that elapsed before he heard,

“A dime, please.”

He was forced to drop the receiver and go out for change. Every clerk was busy, but he interrupted one of them with a peremptory demand for change. The clerk, taken by surprise, actually obeyed the command without a word. When Wilson finally succeeded in getting the number, he heard a man’s voice, evidently a servant. The latter did not know of a Miss Manning. Who did live there? The servant, grown suspicious and bold, replied,