“I wish there was more to it,” he had confessed, “but there can’t be … I’ve quite put that idea out of my mind … Frankly—she hates the sight of me!”
It hadn’t required much feminine intuition to discover that Bobby’s estimate of Helen Hudson’s attitude toward him was exactly wrong … How she could delight him, if she wished, with an impressionistic report of today’s conversation … But that wouldn’t be fair … Precisely where was her allegiance in this matter? … It was traitorous enough to extract Helen’s confidence about her money difficulties—but that would be ultimately to her advantage. When she learned—if she ever did—how her financial anxieties were relieved, she would not question the method … But she would never forgive a breach of confidence about her interest in Bobby … Really, it was most unpleasant—being a spy.
All afternoon they had been together, rambling in and out of the crooked little streets; at four, grinding laboriously up the hill in the ancient fiacre with the high, steel-tired wheels; at seven, tarrying over their dinner in the arbour—each conscious of a friendship destined, they felt, to become very valuable. Helen had insisted upon her having a room next her own, on the south side where the big balconied windows looked out upon the bay … Tomorrow they were having an early breakfast so they could catch the little steamer on its first trip of the day to Como.
“I’d flick this job tonight,” wrote Marion, “and come straight home, if it wasn’t that I knew my detective work would benefit her. She’s been terribly lonely, awfully troubled; and she’s going to tell me all about it in the next few days. I won’t have to ask her a single question. She’s going to tell me of her own accord. But I do feel so mean, Bobby, with this deception. What an adorable creature she is! I never met anybody to whom I was so quickly drawn. Please don’t ever let her find out about my part in this. I don’t believe I could bear it if she learned I had cultivated her for a purpose!”
The shopkeepers in little Bellagio became quite accustomed to the sight of two remarkably attractive young American women on their streets, and the skippers of the pleasure craft, plying Lake Como, were proud to have them for frequent passengers. Every morning they breakfasted together in the arbour, every evening they strolled, arm in arm, through the lovingly tended gardens of the hotel.
There was very little about each other’s story that they did not know now. Their confidences had been tender, girlish, unreserved. It was no ordinary friendship. From the first moment, they had been irresistibly attracted, and made no effort to sustain the reticence each would have felt, naturally, toward a stranger.
All forenoon of that tragic Tuesday, which they were to remember with agony, they had hiked along a tortuous mountain road above Menaggio. Helen had laid bare her whole dilemma in the case of her business dealings with Monty, and was strongly counselled to wait a while and do nothing until her return to the States, seeing that her income was assured for the present … With the bars all down, she talked freely about Bobby too, confessing by her tone all that she hesitated to put into words.
It began to rain after luncheon. They agreed upon a siesta, and went to their rooms … An hour later, Helen, having wakened, decided to write some letters. She remembered she had left her guidebook in Marion’s room. Quietly turning the knob and finding the door unlocked, she tiptoed across the room, smiling at the sleeping face on the pillow, and took up her Baedeker from the writing-desk. Beside it, stamped and ready for mailing, was a bulky letter addressed to Dr. Robert Merrick, Brightwood Hospital, Detroit, Michigan, U.S.A.
She was stunned … as if someone had dealt her a blow over the heart. Scarcely able to breathe, she groped her way blindly out of the room, so fearful of rousing Marion that she left the door ajar rather than risk rattling the latch. For a long time she sat on the edge of her bed, shoulders bowed, hands listless on her knees. The world had caved in. With hot cheeks, she recalled some of the things she had whispered to Marion Dawson—confidences no Inquisition machinery could have twisted out of her … Doubtless all these impulsive confessions had been spread on paper to satisfy the curiosity of Bobby Merrick. It was clear enough now! … What an odd coincidence they had thought it—she and Marion—that they had been brought together in this accidental way, and found the dearest friendship either of them had ever known! … Coincidence—indeed!
Marion slept heavily until five and roused with the uneasy sensation that something unpleasant had occurred. It was raining torrents. The room was dark. A strong draught was blowing through. The door was open. She distinctly remembered having closed it.
Suddenly she gasped and clutched at her throat with both hands. She walked with short, reluctant steps to the desk. Helen’s Baedeker was gone! It would have been impossible for her to recover it without noticing the letter. She flung herself across the bed, swept with remorse.
A half hour later, frantically drumming on her temples with her fingers, she resolved to take the letter to Helen and beg her to read it. She would tell the whole story, and try to explain how she came to be involved in this benevolent treachery.
Heart pounding, face flushed, she tapped gently at Helen’s door and received no response; tried the latch and found it locked.
Returning to her room, she nervously dressed for dinner, and went slowly down the winding staircase; searched the lounge, glanced into the dining-room; finally summoned her courage to approach the desk of the concierge.
“Has Mrs. Hudson come down?” she asked, with a dry throat.
“She is gone, madame … You did not know?”
“Gone? … You mean she has left the hotel?”
“About four o’clock, madame.”
“But—where?”
“She left no address, madame …
