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CHAPTER I. A CRY FOR HELP
OUTSIDE Hampstead Tube Station Peter Hastings stood a moment looking up at the sky. Just as he had expected, the clouds hung heavy over the Heath and, as he watched, a flicker of sheet lightning contended with the electric lights which were beginning to gleam out below. It was past nine o'clock on a sultry July evening.
Peter walked slowly up the hill. He wore a blue serge suit, his brown shoes were old but well-polished and his soft grey-felt hat was just like a hundred others. If anyone had taken the trouble to watch him they would have taken him for a city clerk enjoying a quiet stroll to get what little fresh air was moving on this wickedly hot night.
Peter turned to the right and came presently into a region of big houses, each standing in its own walled garden. These roads were not so well lighted as the street he had left and the lightning which flickered along the ragged edges of the storm clouds overhead showed plainer than before. Peter reached a tall wall built of mellow, old bricks. The drive gates stood open and in the dim light he saw the drive bordered by thick rhododendrons, and behind them two rows of clipped yews. His clean-cut face hardened, and after one glance round to make sure that no one was in sight he stepped through the gate and instantly vanished into the shrubbery. As he stood, hidden beneath the thick shadow of the yews he found that his knees were trembling slightly.
"Natural, I suppose," he said grimly. "I've heard of burglars dying of heart failure. I don't know that I blame 'em."
For long minutes he stood watching the house. The tall, straight Georgian front was in darkness. Not a light showed from any of the high, many-paned windows. In this yew-shadowed garden all was quiet. The only sound was a faint rumble of traffic from distant streets. Peter took a pair of old gloves from his pocket and drew them on, then went softly towards the house. The front was open, with a broad flower-bed between the wall and the gravel sweep, but to the right the solemn yews grew close to the house to which they gave their name. Yew Court it was called and the name suited the dim old place.
Not a sound came from the house as Peter approached a window, but that was as he had expected. Judith Vidal, the owner, was leaving for Cranham, her place in Herefordshire, next day, and had sent most of the servants on ahead. According to Peter's information, there should be no one in the house but Mrs. Forrest, the deaf old housekeeper. Daisy Newton, Judith's maid, had, he knew, gone out to keep tryst with her young man.
Peter slipped a long, flexible blade between the sashes and worked away. At last came a click. In the intense silence the small noise sounded loud as a pistol shot and with a quick breath Peter drew back into the shadow. Nothing happened, no dangerous light sprang into being and presently Peter came forward again, pushed open the window and clambered in over the sill.
Curtains hung across the window, and as he stood behind them he was still breathing faster than usual and was unpleasantly conscious that his forehead was damp with sweat. He shook his head angrily. The job was fool-proof. Then pushing aside the curtains he stepped out into the room.
It was dark but that did not matter. This had been his father's study in those happy days which now seemed so long ago, and he knew every foot of it. Even the faint, musty scent from the old oak panelled walls was familiar. He took from his pocket a tiny electric torch, no bigger than a fountain pen, and switched it on. The thin pencil of light fell upon an unfamiliar carpet and on furniture he had never before seen, yet the room itself was the same. How well he remembered that queer beast, half bird, half dragon, carved on the marble mantel opposite! For a moment he stood quite still, memories crowding on him, then with an impatient movement of the head he shook himself free of the spell, and crossed softly to the door.
Switching off his torch, he cautiously turned the handle. The door opened quietly enough, but a board groaned beneath him as he stepped into the dark hall, and again he felt a nasty quiver run through him. It did not last. Those stones-he had to have them, and it was easy now. They were in the smoking-room to the right, and next moment he had opened that door, passed through and closed it behind him.
Again he switched on the torch and a thin, white beam circled the tall, handsome room. Yes, there was the book case on the north wall, just as it hat always been, the same tarnished gilt on the covers of the old volumes. Only they were not real books but just camouflage and the small keyhole of the safe was between Pohlman on Chess and Hawker's Instructions to Sportsmen.
Peter drew the key from his pocket. Curious that he should have kept it all these years, but it was just the fact that he had done so which made his burglary possible. In fact, it was this which had made him first think of the way of getting even with those who had robbed him.
A tight-lipped smile crossed his face Judith Vidal's emeralds would do something to set him on his feet again, though he felt that no amount of money could make up for the miseries he had endure during the past six months.
The key was actually in the lock, he was on the point of turning it when the silence of the old house was cracked by a scream. The scream of a woman in deadly pain or terror.
