He made a sweep with his arm towards the gravel path. Mr. Ricardo himself was carried away by the conviction and the fire of his friend. He did not doubt that his was the real true explanation. Joyce Whipple had flown in terror up that avenue. He began to piece together the facts which he knew with this conjecture of which he was confident; and suddenly such a load of remorse bowed him down that all his companions were concerned for him. He turned pale, he stood trembling, a man aghast.
“What is it?” asked Hanaud, running to his side and supporting him by the arm. “You are ill? No, no!”
“No, I am not ill, I am ashamed,” Mr. Ricardo stammered. “You see, it might have been Joyce Whipple who whipped past me on the terrace—after she had fled from here up the avenue. Suppose that it was! Suppose that it was she who slipped into the turret-room? Suppose that for some reason we don’t know the room was empty when she did! Suppose that it was Joyce who locked the door and waited in terror with her fingers on the switch! Suppose that after she had turned the light out, she crept upstairs to her room! You remember the tumbled bed and the question you asked: ‘Was she taken away from that room against her will?’ Well, then—I could have saved her. Yes, I could. I had but to come straight out of the library on to the terrace when she flashed past, and show her who I was.”
“She would not have waited to see,” argued Hanaud.
“I might have spoken through the glass door after the light went out. But I didn’t! I let her think that I was one of the hunters. … I was nervous and—” he broke off suddenly and stood erect. “Nervous! No! I was afraid. I could have saved Joyce last night, but I was afraid.”
Mr. Ricardo’s outburst made everyone uncomfortable. Hanaud patted him gently on the shoulder.
“But Joyce—she is not lost yet,” he said.
Mr. Ricardo would not be consoled. In a minute or two he would have made a luxury out of his cowardice, but happily Corbie, the gendarme, at this moment discovered yet another perplexity to add to this tangled affair.
“Monsieur Hanaud,” he cried, his eyes starting out of his head and his voice one hoarse note of excitement. “Look! Look!”
He was standing in the open space at the end of the avenue, a few yards from the others of that party, and with an outstretched shaking arm, he pointed to the lower branches of a tree.
XII
The Mask
The cry had a sound so imperative that the delicate question of Mr. Ricardo’s conduct was clean forgotten. There was a rush to Victor Corbie, but not until they stood behind his shoulders could they see what he was seeing. The sight gave a queer little shock to everyone and begat an uneasiness, as things which are odd and bizarre are likely to do. Perhaps, too, they were all now rather ready to be startled and to see miracles at each turn of their road. They were confounded to observe amongst the leaves of the branch at which Corbie pointed, bending down towards them as though it watched them, a face and head. By some chance a spray had blown across the eyes and hid them, but the rest of the face was revealed. It was quite livid in colour with full lips, not so much red in colour as a dark purple. The hair, on the other hand, was a bright red. The contour of the face was quite beautiful, but the whole effect was evil—abominably evil.
They were still contemplating this extraordinary spectacle when some breath of wind blew aside the spray which hid the eyes; and it was at once visible that though there were long black eyelashes, as silken as the lashes of a lovely girl, there were no eyes. The face was a mask, but of an artistry which was exquisite and astounding.
“We must have that down,” said Hanaud.
It was not so high above their heads but that his crook-handled stick could fetch it down. It fell on to the grass and he picked it up. It was just a papier-mâché mask—nothing more. But he handed it to Victor Corbie and said:
“Put it on!”
Victor Corbie dropped his képi on the ground, and with a grin of delight overspreading his bucolic face, slipped the mask over his face and head; and at once from a good-humoured, grinning yokel, he became a thing of horror, a thing to fly from in a panic. Mr. Ricardo could not believe that so complete a transformation was possible. The mask, fixed though the features were, lived—yes, lived. The bright red hair gave to it a final touch of uncanny force. Whichever way Corbie turned, the mask never leered. On the contrary, it was beautiful and very sad—the long black fine lashes gave to even Corbie’s staring eyes the sadness of all the ages. It would have been a fit mask for the Wandering Jew, but for one attribute it had. It was wicked—beautiful and sad and abominably wicked—a mask, in a word, for Satan. Such was its effect that, even when Corbie had removed it from his head, one at all events of the men watching him wondered for a time whether he was not some demon
