'How was I to know that you would see my message?'
She opened her closed left hand and smoothed out a scrap of torn paper which she held there. It was from the 'Agony' column of that day's Times.
N. November 23, 1913. N. B. See Telephone Directory.
'I told you long, long ago that I would come if ever you wanted me.'
'Long, long ago,' echoed Nicol Brinn. 'To me it has seemed a century; to-night it seems a day.'
He watched her with a deep and tireless content. Presently her eyes fell. 'Sit here beside me,' she said. 'I have not long to be here. Put your arms round me. I have something to tell you.'
He seated himself beside her on the settee, and held her close. 'My Naida!' he breathed softly.
'Ah, no, no!' she entreated. 'Do you want to break my heart?'
He suddenly released her, clenched his big hands, and stared down at the carpet. 'You have broken mine.'
Impulsively Naida threw her arms around his neck, coiling herself up lithely and characteristically beside him.
'My big sweetheart,' she whispered, crooningly. 'Don't say it—don't say it.'
'I have said it. It is true.'
Turning, fiercely he seized her. 'I won't let you go!' he cried, and there was a strange light in his eyes. 'Before I was helpless, now I am not. This time you have come to me, and you shall stay.'
She shrank away from him terrified, wild-eyed. 'Oh, you forget, you forget!'
'For seven years I have tried to forget. I have been mad, but to-night I am sane.'
'I trusted you, I trusted you!' she moaned.
Nicol Brinn clenched his teeth grimly for a moment, and then, holding her averted face very close to his own, he began to speak in a low, monotonous voice. 'For seven years,' he said, 'I have tried to die, because without you I did not care to live. I have gone into the bad lands of the world and into the worst spots of those bad lands. Night and day your eyes have watched me, and I have wakened from dreams of your kisses and gone out to court murder. I have earned the reputation of being something more than human, but I am not. I had everything that life could give me except you. Now I have got you, and I am going to keep you.'
Naida began to weep silently. The low, even voice of Nicol Brinn ceased. He could feel her quivering in his grasp; and, as she sobbed, slowly, slowly the fierce light faded from his eyes.
'Naida, my Naida, forgive me,' he whispered.
She raised her face, looking up to him pathetically. 'I came to you, I came to you,' she moaned. 'I promised long ago that I would come. What use is it, all this? You know, you know! Kill me if you like. How often have I asked you to kill me. It would be sweet to die in your arms. But what use to talk so? You are in great danger or you would not have asked me to come. If you don't know it, I tell you—you are in great danger.'
Nicol Brinn released her, stood up, and began slowly to pace about the room. He deliberately averted his gaze from the settee. 'Something has happened,' he began, 'which has changed everything. Because you are here I know that—someone else is here.'
He was answered by a shuddering sigh, but he did not glance in the direction of the settee.
'In India I respected what you told me. Because you were strong, I loved you the more. Here in England I can no longer respect the accomplice of assassins.'
'Assassins? What, is this something new?'
'With a man's religion, however bloodthirsty it may be, I don't quarrel so long as he sincerely believes in it. But for private assassination I have no time and no sympathy.' It was the old Nicol Brinn who was speaking, coldly and incisively. 'That—something we both know about ever moved away from those Indian hills was a possibility I had never considered. When it was suddenly brought home to me that you, you, might be here in London, I almost went mad. But the thing that made me realize it was a horrible thing, a black, dastardly thing. See here.'
He turned and crossed to where the woman was crouching, watching him with wide-open, fearful eyes. He took both her hands and looked grimly into her face. 'For seven years I have walked around with a silent tongue and a broken heart. All that is finished. I am going to speak.'
'Ah, no, no!' She was on her feet, her face a mask of tragedy. 'You swore to me, you swore to me!'
'No oath holds good in the face of murder.'
'Is that why you bring me here? Is that what your message means?'
'My message means that because of—the thing you know about—I am suspected of the murder.'
'You? You?'
'Yes, I, I! Good God! when I realize what your presence here means, I wish more than ever that I had succeeded in finding death.'
'Please don't say it,' came a soft, pleading voice. 'What can I do? What do you want me to do?'
'I want you to release me from that vow made seven years ago.'
Naida uttered a stifled cry. 'How is it possible? You understand that it is not possible.'
Nicol Brinn seized her by the shoulders. 'Is it possible for me to remain silent while men are murdered here in a civilized country?'
'Oh,' moaned Naida, 'what can I do, what can I do?'
'Give me permission to speak and stay here. Leave the rest to me.'
'You know I cannot stay, my Nicol,' she replied, sadly.
'But,' he said with deliberate slowness, 'I won't let you go.'
'You must let me go. Already I have been here too long.'
He threw his arms around her and crushed her against him fiercely. 'Never again,' he said. 'Never again.'
She pressed her little hands against his shoulders.
'Listen! Oh, listen!'
'I shall listen to nothing.'
'But you must—you must! I want to make you understand something. This morning I see your note in the papers. Every day, every day for seven whole long years, wherever I have been, I have looked. In the papers of India. Sometimes in the papers of France, of England.'
'I never even dreamed that you left India,' said Nicol Brinn, hoarsely. 'It was through the Times of India that I said I would communicate with you.'
'Once we never left India. Now we do—sometimes. But listen. I prepared to come when—he—'
Nicol Brinn's clasp of Naida tightened cruelly.
'Oh, you hurt me!' she moaned. 'Please let me speak. He gave me your name and told me to bring you!'
'What! What!'
Nicol Brinn dropped his arms and stood, as a man amazed, watching her.
'Last night there was a meeting outside London.'
'You don't want me to believe there are English members?'
'Yes. There are. Many. But let me go on. Somehow—somehow I don't understand—he finds you are one —'
'My God!'
'And you are not present last night! Now, do you understand? So he sends me to tell you that a car will be waiting at nine o'clock to-night outside the Cavalry Club. The driver will be a Hindu. You know what to say. Oh, my Nicol, my Nicol, go for my sake! You know it all! You are clever. You can pretend. You can explain you had no call. If you refuse—'
Nicol Brinn nodded grimly. 'I understand! But, good God! How has he found out? How has he found out?'
'I don't know!' moaned Naida. 'Oh, I am frightened—so frightened!'
A discreet rap sounded upon the door.
Nicol Brinn crossed and stood, hands clasped behind him, before the mantelpiece. 'In,' he said.
Hoskins entered. 'Detective Sergeant Stokes wishes to see you at once, sir.'
Brinn drew a watch from his waistcoat pocket. Attached to it was a fob from which depended a little Chinese Buddha. He consulted the timepiece and returned it to his pocket.
'Eight-twenty-five,' he muttered, and glanced across to where Naida, wide-eyed, watched him. 'Admit Detective Sergeant Stokes at eight-twenty-six, and then lock the door.'
'Very good, sir.'
