She was beginning to grow a trifle weary of the Professor’s selfish nature, and wondered how her mother had put up with it for so long.
Next day Braddock did not go with Don Pedro to Pierside, as he was very busy in his museum.
The Peruvian went alone, and Archie, after a morning’s work at his easel, sought out Widow Anne to ask questions.
Lucy and Donna Inez paid an afternoon visit to Mrs. Jasher and found her in bed, as she had caught a mild sort of influenza.
They expected to find Sir Frank here, but it seemed that he had not called.
Thinking that he was detained by military business, the girls thought nothing more of his absence, although Donna Inez was somewhat downcast.
But Random was detained in his quarters by a letter which had arrived by the mid-day host, and which surprised him not a little.
The postmark was London, and the writing, evidently a disguised hand, was almost illegible in its crudeness.
The contents ran as follows, and it will be noticed that there is neither date nor address, and that it is written in the third person:
“If Sir Frank Random wants his character to be cleared and all suspicion of murder to be removed from him, he can be completely exonerated by the writer, if he will pay the same five thousand pounds.
If Sir Frank Random is willing to do this, let him appoint a meeting-place in London, and the writer will send a messenger to receive the money and to hand over the proofs which will clear Sir Frank Random.
If Sir Frank Random plays the writer false, or communicates with the police, proofs will be forthcoming which will prove him to be guilty of Sidney Bolton’s death, and which will bring him to the scaffold without any chance of escape.
A couple of lines in the Agony Column of The Daily Telegraph, signed `Artillery,’ and appointing a meeting-place, will suffice; but beware of treachery.”
CHAPTER XXI.
A STORY OF THE PAST
Mrs. Jasher’s influenza proved to be very mild indeed.
When Donna Inez de Gayangos and Lucy paid a visit to her on the afternoon of the day succeeding the explanations in the museum, she was certainly in bed, and explained that she had been there since the Professor’s visit on the previous day.
Lucy was surprised at this, as she had left Mrs. Jasher perfectly well, and Braddock had not mentioned any ailment of the widow.
But influenza, as Mrs. Jasher observed, was very rapid in its action, and she was always susceptible to disease from the fact that in Jamaica she had suffered from malaria.
Still, she was feeling better and intended to rise from her bed on that evening, if only to lie on the couch in the pink drawing-room.
Having thus detailed her reasons for being ill, the widow asked for news.
As no prohibition had been placed upon Lucy with regard to Hervey’s visit and as Mrs. Jasher would be one of the family when she married the Professor, Miss Kendal had no hesitation in reporting all that had taken place.
The narrative excited Mrs. Jasher, and she frequently interrupted with expressions of wonder.
Even Donna Inez grew eloquent, and told the widow how she had defended Sir Frank against the American skipper.
“What a dreadfully wicked man!” said Mrs. Jasher, when in possession of all the facts. “I really believe that he did kill poor Sidney.”
“No,” said Lucy decisively, “I don’t think that.
He would have murdered him on board had he intended the crime, as he could have done so with more safety.
He is as innocent as Sir Frank.”
“And no one dare say a word against him,” cried Donna Inez with flashing eyes.
“He has a good defender, my dear,” said the widow, patting the girl’s hand.
“I love him,” said Donna Inez, as if that explained everything, and perhaps it did, so far as she was concerned.
Mrs. Jasher smiled indulgently, then turned for further information to Lucy.
“Can it be possible,” she said, “that Widow Anne is guilty?”
“Oh, I don’t think so.
She would not murder her own son, especially when she was so very fond of him.
Archie told me, just before we came here, that he had called to see her. She still insists that Sidney borrowed the clothes, saying that Archie wanted them.”
“What do you make of that, my dear?”
“Well,” said Miss Kendal, pondering, “either Widow Anne herself was the woman who talked to Sidney through the Sailor’s Rest window, and has invented this story to save herself, or Sidney did get the clothes and intended to use them as a disguise when he fled with the emeralds.”
“In that case,” said Mrs. Jasher, “the woman who talked through the window still remains a problem. Again, if Sidney Bolton intended to steal the emeralds, he could have done so in Malta, or on board the boat.”
“No,” said Lucy decisively. “The mummy was taken directly from the seller’s house to the boat, and perhaps Sidney did not find the manuscript until he looked at the mummy.
Then Captain Hervey kept an eye on Sidney, so that he could not open the mummy to steal the emeralds.”
“Still, according to your own showing, Sidney looked at the actual mummy—he opened the mummy case, that is, else he could not have got the manuscript.”
Lucy nodded.
“I think so, but of course we cannot be sure.
But the packing case in which the mummy was stowed was placed in the hold of the steamer, and if Sidney had wished to steal the emeralds, he could not have done so without exciting Captain Hervey’s suspicions.”
“Then let us say that Sidney robbed the mummy when in the Sailor’s Rest, and took the clothes he borrowed from his mother in order to fly in disguise.
But what of the woman?”
Lucy shook her head.
“I cannot tell.
We may learn more later.