The Woman in the Alcove Read online

  Produced by Steve Crites

  THE WOMAN IN THE ALCOVE

  By Anna Katharine Green

  CONTENTS

  I THE WOMAN WITH THE DIAMOND II THE GLOVES II ANSON DURAND IV EXPLANATIONS V SUPERSTITION VI SUSPENSE VII NIGHT AND A VOICE VIII ARREST IX THE MOUSE NIBBLES AT THE NET X I ASTONISH THE INSPECTOR XI THE INSPECTOR ASTONISHES ME XII ALMOST XIII THE MISSING RECOMMENDATION XIV TRAPPED XV SEARS OR WELLGOOD XVI DOUBT XVII SWEETWATER IN A NEW ROLE XVIII THE CLOSED DOOR XIX THE FACE XX MOONLIGHT--AND A CLUE XXI GRIZEL! GRIZEL! XXII GUILT XXIII THE GREAT MOGUL

  I. THE WOMAN WITH THE DIAMOND

  I was, perhaps, the plainest girl in the room that night. I was also thehappiest--up to one o'clock. Then my whole world crumbled, or, at least,suffered an eclipse. Why and how, I am about to relate.

  I was not made for love. This I had often said to myself; very often oflate. In figure I am too diminutive, in face far too unbeautiful, for meto cherish expectations of this nature. Indeed, love had never enteredinto my plan of life, as was evinced by the nurse's diploma I had justgained after three years of hard study and severe training.

  I was not made for love. But if I had been; had I been gifted withheight, regularity of feature, or even with that eloquence of expressionwhich redeems all defects save those which savor of deformity, I knewwell whose eye I should have chosen to please, whose heart I should havefelt proud to win.

  This knowledge came with a rush to my heart--(did I say heart? I shouldhave said understanding, which is something very different)--when, atthe end of the first dance, I looked up from the midst of the bevyof girls by whom I was surrounded and saw Anson Durand's fine figureemerging from that quarter of the hall where our host and hostess stoodto receive their guests. His eye was roaming hither and thither and hismanner was both eager and expectant. Whom was he seeking? Some oneof the many bright and vivacious girls about me, for he turned almostinstantly our way. But which one?

  I thought I knew. I remembered at whose house I had met him first, atwhose house I had seen him many times since. She was a lovely girl,witty and vivacious, and she stood at this very moment at my elbow. Inher beauty lay the lure, the natural lure for a man of his gifts andstriking personality. If I continued to watch, I should soon see hiscountenance light up under the recognition she could not fail to givehim. And I was right; in another instant it did, and with a brightnessthere was no mistaking. But one feeling common to the human heart lendssuch warmth, such expressiveness to the features. How handsome it madehim look, how distinguished, how everything I was not except--

  But what does this mean? He has passed Miss Sperry--passed her witha smile and a friendly word--and is speaking to me, singling me out,offering me his arm! He is smiling, too, not as he smiled on MissSperry, but more warmly, with more that is personal in it. I took hisarm in a daze. The lights were dimmer than I thought; nothing was reallybright except his smile. It seemed to change the world for me. I forgotthat I was plain, forgot that I was small, with nothing to recommendme to the eye or heart, and let myself be drawn away, asking nothing,anticipating nothing, till I found myself alone with him in the fragrantrecesses of the conservatory, with only the throb of music in our earsto link us to the scene we had left.

  Why had he brought me here, into this fairyland of opalescent lights andintoxicating perfumes? What could he have to say--to show? Ah in anothermoment I knew. He had seized my hands, and love, ardent love, camepouring from his lips.

  Could it be real? Was I the object of all this feeling, I? If so, thenlife had changed for me indeed.

  Silent from rush of emotion, I searched his face to see if thisParadise, whose gates I was thus passionately bidden to enter, wasindeed a verity or only a dream born of the excitement of the dance andthe charm of a scene exceptional in its splendor and picturesquenesseven for so luxurious a city as New York.

  But it was no mere dream. Truth and earnestness were in his manner, andhis words were neither feverish nor forced.

  "I love you I! I need you!" So I heard, and so he soon made me believe."You have charmed me from the first. Your tantalizing, trusting, loyalself, like no other, sweeter than any other, has drawn the heart from mybreast. I have seen many women, admired many women, but you only have Iloved. Will you be my wife?"

  I was dazzled; moved beyond anything I could have conceived. I forgotall that I had hitherto said to myself--all that I had endeavoredto impress upon my heart when I beheld him approaching, intent, asI believed, in his search for another woman; and, confiding in hishonesty, trusting entirely to his faith, I allowed the plans andpurposes of years to vanish in the glamour of this new joy, and spokethe word which linked us together in a bond which half an hour before Ihad never dreamed would unite me to any man.

  His impassioned "Mine! mine!" filled my cup to overflowing. Somethingof the ecstasy of living entered my soul; which, in spite of all I havesuffered since, recreated the world for me and made all that went beforebut the prelude to the new life, the new joy.

  Oh, I was happy, happy, perhaps too happy! As the conservatory filledand we passed back into the adjoining room, the glimpse I caught ofmyself in one of the mirrors startled me into thinking so. For had itnot been for the odd color of my dress and the unique way in which Iwore my hair that night, I should not have recognized the beaming girlwho faced me so naively from the depths of the responsive glass.

  Can one be too happy? I do not know. I know that one can be tooperplexed, too burdened and too sad.

  Thus far I have spoken only of myself in connection with the evening'selaborate function. But though entitled by my old Dutch blood to acertain social consideration which I am happy to say never failed me,I, even in this hour of supreme satisfaction, attracted very littleattention and awoke small comment. There was another woman presentbetter calculated to do this. A fair woman, large and of a bountifulpresence, accustomed to conquest, and gifted with the power of carryingoff her victories with a certain lazy grace irresistibly fascinating tothe ordinary man; a gorgeously appareled woman, with a diamond on herbreast too vivid for most women, almost too vivid for her. I noticedthis diamond early in the evening, and then I noticed her. She was notas fine as the diamond, but she was very fine, and, had I been in a lessecstatic frame of mind, I might have envied the homage she received fromall the men, not excepting him upon whose arm I leaned. Later, there wasno one in the world I envied less.

  The ball was a private and very elegant one. There were some notableguests. One gentleman in particular was pointed out to me as anEnglishman of great distinction and political importance. I thoughthim a very interesting man for his years, but odd and a trifleself-centered. Though greatly courted, he seemed strangely restlessunder the fire of eyes to which he was constantly subjected, and onlyhappy when free to use his own in contemplation of the scene about him.Had I been less absorbed in my own happiness I might have noted soonerthan I did that this contemplation was confined to such groups asgathered about the lady with the diamond. But this I failed to observeat the time, and consequently was much surprised to come upon him, atthe end of one of the dances, talking With this lady in an animated andcourtly manner totally opposed to the apathy, amounting to boredom, withwhich he had hitherto met all advances.

  Yet it was not admiration for her person which he openly displayed.During the whole time he stood there his eyes seldom rose to her face;they lingered mainly-and this was what aroused my curiosity--on thegreat fan of ostrich plumes which this opulent beauty held againsther breast. Was he desirous of seeing the great diamond she thusunconsciously (or was it consciously) shielded from his gaze? It waspossible, for, as I continued to note him,
he suddenly bent towardher and as quickly raised himself again with a look which was quiteinexplicable to me. The lady had shifted her fan a moment and his eyeshad fallen on the gem.

  The next thing I recall with any definiteness was a tete-a-teteconversation which I held with my lover on a certain yellow divan at theend of one of the halls.

  To the right of this divan rose a curtained recess, highly suggestive ofromance, called "the alcove." As this alcove figures prominently in mystory, I will pause here to describe it.

  It was originally intended to contain a large group of statuary whichour host, Mr. Ramsdell, had ordered from Italy to adorn his new house.He is a man of original ideas in regard to such matters, and in thisinstance had gone so far as to have this end of the house constructedwith a special view to an advantageous display of this promised workof art. Fearing the ponderous effect of a pedestal large enough to holdsuch a considerable group, he had planned to raise it to the level ofthe eye by having the alcove floor built a few feet higher than the mainone. A flight of low, wide steps connected the two, which, following thecurve of the wall, added much to the beauty of this portion of the hall.

  The group was a failure and was never shipped; but the alcove remained,and, possessing as it did all the advantages of a room in the way ofheat and light, had been turned into a miniature retreat of exceptionalbeauty.

  The seclusion it offered extended, or so we were happy to think, to thesolitary divan at its base on which Mr. Durand and I were seated. Withpossibly an undue confidence in the advantage of our position, we werediscussing a subject interesting only to ourselves, when Mr. Durandinterrupted himself to declare: "You are the woman I want, you and youonly. And I want you soon. When do you think you can marry me? Within aweek--if--"

  Did my look stop him? I was startled. I had heard no incoherent phrasefrom him before.

  "A week!" I remonstrated. "We take more time than that to fit ourselvesfor a journey or some transient pleasure. I hardly realize my engagementyet."

  "You have not been thinking of it for these last two months as I have."

  "No," I replied demurely, forgetting everything else in my delight atthis admission.

  "Nor are you a nomad among clubs and restaurants."

  "No, I have a home."

  "Nor do you love me as deeply as I do you."

  This I thought open to argument.

  "The home you speak of is a luxurious one," he continued. "I can notoffer you its equal Do you expect me to?"

  I was indignant.

  "You know that I do not. Shall I, who deliberately chose a nurse's lifewhen an indulgent uncle's heart and home were open to me, shrink frombraving poverty with the man I love? We will begin as simply as youplease--"

  "No," he peremptorily put in, yet with a certain hesitancy which seemedto speak of doubts he hardly acknowledged to himself, "I will not marryyou if I must expose you to privation or to the genteel poverty I hate.I love you more than you realize, and wish to make your life a happyone. I can not give you all you have been accustomed to in your richuncle's house, but if matters prosper with me, if the chance I havebuilt on succeeds--and it will fail or succeed tonight--you will havethose comforts which love will heighten into luxuries and--and--"

  He was becoming incoherent again, and this time with his eyes fixedelsewhere than on my face. Following his gaze, I discovered what haddistracted his attention. The lady with the diamond was approaching uson her way to the alcove. She was accompanied by two gentlemen, bothstrangers to me, and her head, sparkling with brilliants, was turningfrom one to the other with an indolent grace. I was not surprised thatthe man at my side quivered and made a start as if to rise. She was agorgeous image. In comparison with her imposing figure in its trailingrobe of rich pink velvet, my diminutive frame in its sea-green gown musthave looked as faded and colorless as a half-obliterated pastel.

  "A striking woman," I remarked as I saw he was not likely to resume theconversation which her presence had interrupted. "And what a diamond!"

  The glance he cast me was peculiar.

  "Did you notice it particularly?" he asked.

  Astonished, for there was something very uneasy in his manner so thatI half expected to see him rise and join the group he was so eagerlywatching without waiting for my lips to frame a response, I quicklyreplied:

  "It would be difficult not to notice what one would naturally expect tosee only on the breast of a queen. But perhaps she is a queen. I shouldjudge so from the homage which follows her."

  His eyes sought mine. There was inquiry in them, but it was an inquiry Idid not understand.

  "What can you know about diamonds?" he presently demanded. "Nothing buttheir glitter, and glitter is not all,--the gem she wears may be a verytawdry one."

  I flushed with humiliation. He was a dealer in gems--that was hisbusiness--and the check which he had put upon my enthusiasm certainlymade me conscious of my own presumption. Yet I was not disposed to takeback my words. I had had a better opportunity than himself for seeingthis remarkable jewel, and, with the perversity of a somewhat ruffledmood, I burst forth, as soon as the color had subsided from my cheeks:

  "No, no! It is glorious, magnificent. I never saw its like. I doubt ifyou ever have, for all your daily acquaintance with jewels. Its valuemust be enormous. Who is she? You seem to know her."

  It was a direct question, but I received no reply. Mr. Durand's eyes hadfollowed the lady, who had lingered somewhat ostentatiously on thetop step and they did not return to me till she had vanished withher companions behind the long plush curtain which partly veiled theentrance. By this time he had forgotten my words, if he had ever heardthem and it was with the forced animation of one whose thoughts areelsewhere that he finally returned to the old plea:

  When would I marry him? If he could offer me a home in a month--and hewould know by to-morrow if he could do so--would I come to him then? Hewould not say in a week; that was perhaps to soon; but in a month? WouldI not promise to be his in a month?

  What I answered I scarcely recall. His eyes had stolen back to thealcove and mine had followed them. The gentlemen who had accompaniedthe lady inside were coming out again, but others were advancing to taketheir places, and soon she was engaged in holding a regular court inthis favored retreat.

  Why should this interest me? Why should I notice her or look that wayat all? Because Mr. Durand did? Possibly. I remember that for all hisardent love-making, I felt a little piqued that he should divide hisattentions in this way. Perhaps I thought that for this evening, atleast, he might have been blind to a mere coquette's fascinations.

  I was thus doubly engaged in listening to my lover's words and inwatching the various gentlemen who went up and down the steps, when aformer partner advanced and reminded me that I had promised him a waltz.Loath to leave Mr. Durand, yet seeing no way of excusing myself to Mr.Fox, I cast an appealing glance at the former and was greatly chagrinedto find him already on his feet.

  "Enjoy your dance," he cried; "I have a word to say to Mrs.Fairbrother," and was gone before my new partner had taken me on hisarm.

  Was Mrs. Fairbrother the lady with the diamond? Yes; as I turned toenter the parlor with my partner, I caught a glimpse of Mr. Durand'stall figure just disappearing from the step behind the sage-greencurtains.

  "Who is Mrs. Fairbrother?" I inquired of Mr. Fox at the end of thedance.

  Mr. Fox, who is one of society's perennial beaux, knows everybody.

  "She is--well, she was Abner Fairbrother's wife. You know Fairbrother,the millionaire who built that curious structure on Eighty-sixth Street.At present they are living apart--an amicable understanding, I believe.Her diamond makes her conspicuous. It is one of the most remarkablestones in New York, perhaps in the United States. Have you observed it?"

  "Yes--that is, at a distance. Do you think her very handsome?"

  "Mrs. Fairbrother? She's called so, but she's not my style." Here hegave me a killing glance. "I admire women of mind and heart. They do notneed to wear jewels
worth an ordinary man's fortune."

  I looked about for an excuse to leave this none too desirable partner.

  "Let us go back into the long hall," I urged. "The ceaseless whirl ofthese dancers is making me dizzy."

  With the ease of a gallant man he took me on his arm and soon we werepromenading again in the direction of the alcove. A passing glimpse ofits interior was afforded me as we turned to retrace our steps in frontof the yellow divan. The lady with the diamond was still there. A foldof the superb pink velvet she wore protruded across the gap made by thehalf-drawn curtains, just as it had done a half-hour before. But itwas impossible to see her face or who was with her. What I could see,however, and did, was the figure of a man leaning against the wall atthe foot of the steps. At first I thought this person unknown to me,then I perceived that he was no other than the chief guest of theevening, the Englishman of whom I have previously spoken.

  His expression had altered. He looked now both anxious and absorbed,particularly anxious and particularly absorbed; so much so that I wasnot surprised that no one ventured to approach him. Again I wondered andagain I asked myself for whom or for what he was waiting. For Mr. Durandto leave this lady's presence? No, no, I would not believe that. Mr.Durand could not be there still; yet some women make it difficult fora man to leave them and, realizing this, I could not forbear castinga parting glance behind me as, yielding to Mr. Fox's importunities, Iturned toward the supper-room. It showed me the Englishman in the actof lifting two cups of coffee from a small table standing near thereception-room door. As his manner plainly betokened whither he wasbound with this refreshment, I felt all my uneasiness vanish, andwas able to take my seat at one of the small tables with which thesupper-room was filled, and for a few minutes, at least, lend an earto Mr. Fox's vapid compliments and trite opinions. Then my attentionwandered.

  I had not moved nor had I shifted my gaze from the scene before me theordinary scene of a gay and well-filled supper-room, yet I found myselflooking, as if through a mist I had not even seen develop, at somethingas strange, unusual and remote as any phantasm, yet distinct enough inits outlines for me to get a decided impression of a square of lightsurrounding the figure of a man in a peculiar pose not easily imaginedand not easily described. It all passed in an instant, and I sat staringat the window opposite me with the feeling of one who has just seena vision. Yet almost immediately I forgot the whole occurrence in myanxiety as to Mr. Durand's whereabouts. Certainly he was amusing himselfvery much elsewhere or he would have found an opportunity of joiningme long before this. He was not even in sight, and I grew weary of theendless menu and the senseless chit chat of my companion, and, findinghim amenable to my whims, rose from my seat at table and made my way toa group of acquaintances standing just outside the supper-room door. AsI listened to their greetings some impulse led me to cast another glancedown the hall toward the alcove. A man--a waiter--was issuing from it ina rush. Bad news was in his face, and as his eyes encountered those ofMr. Ramsdell, who was advancing hurriedly to meet him, he plunged downthe steps with a cry which drew a crowd about the two in an instant.

  What was it? What had happened?

  Mad with an anxiety I did not stop to define, I rushed toward this groupnow swaying from side to side in irrepressible excitement, when suddenlyeverything swam before me and I fell in a swoon to the floor.

  Some one had shouted aloud

  "Mrs. Fairbrother has been murdered and her diamond stolen! Lock thedoors!"