Devlin the Barber

There were breaks, as I have said. Twice she left off, and went up-stairs to see Lemon, and give him something to eat and drink.

"He knows you're here, sir," she said, when she returned on the first occasion.

"Is he impatient to see me?" I asked.

"No, sir," she replied. "All he seems to want is to be left alone."

"But he will see me?"

"O, yes, sir! He'll keep his promise."

Once there was an interval of more than half-an-hour, during which I ate some cold meat and bread she brought me, and drank a pint bottle of stout.

There was another occasion when she suddenly paused, with her finger at her lips.

"What are you stopping for, Fanny?" I asked.

"Speak low, sir," she said. "Devlin!"

"Where?" I said, much startled.

"He has just opened the street-door, sir."

"I heard nothing, Fanny."

"No, sir, you wouldn't. You don't know his ways as I do. Don't speak for a minute or two, sir."

I waited, and strained my ears, but no footfall reached my ears. Presently Fanny said:

"He's gone up to his room. He waited outside Lemon's door, and tried it, I think. Have you any notion what you are going to do about him, sir?"

"My ideas are not yet formed, but I intend to see and speak with him."

"You do, sir?"

"I do, Fanny, A special providence has directed my steps here to-day. I knew the poor girl who has been murdered."

"Sir!"

"Her family and mine have been friends for years. The interest I take in the discovery of the murderer is no common interest, and I intend to bring him to justice."

"How, sir?" exclaimed Fanny, greatly excited.

"Through Mr. Devlin. The way will suggest itself. You have not heard him leave the house since he entered a little while since?"

"No, sir. He is in his room now."

"If," I said, "when I am with your husband-and I intend to remain with him but a short time-Devlin comes down-stairs, let me know immediately. Keep watch for him."

"I will, sir. O, how thankful I am that you're here-how thankful, how thankful!"

"I hope we shall all have reason to be thankful. And now, Fanny, I will go up to your husband."

"I'll go in first, and prepare him, sir."

"Let us have lights in the house. Don't leave Mr. Lemon in the dark. Put a candle in the passage also."

She followed my instructions, and then we went to her husband's bedroom. I waited outside while she "prepared" him. It did not take long to do so, and she came to the door and beckoned to me. I entered the room, and desired her to leave us alone.

"But don't lock us in," I added.

"No, sir," she said. "Lemon's safe now you're with him."

With that she retired, first smoothing the bedclothes and the pillow with a kind of pitying, soothing motion as though Lemon was about to undergo an operation.

I moved the candle so that its light fell upon Lemon's face. A scared, frightened face it was that turned towards me, the face of a man who had received a deadly shock.

It is unnecessary to say more than a few words about what passed between Mr. Lemon and myself. My purpose was to obtain from him confirmation of the strange mysterious story which Fanny had related. In this purpose I succeeded; it was correct in every particular. What I elicited from Lemon was elicited in the form of questions which I put to him and which he answered, sometimes readily, sometimes reluctantly. Had time not been so precious, my curiosity would have impelled me to go into matters respecting Devlin other than the murder of Lizzie Melladew, but I felt there was not a minute to waste; and at the termination of my interview with Lemon I went into the passage, where I found Fanny waiting for me. Whispering to her not to remain there, in order that Devlin might not be too strongly prejudiced against me-supposing him to be on the watch as well as ourselves-and receiving from her instructions as to the position of his room, I mounted the stairs with a firm, loud tread, and stood in the dark at the door which was to conduct me to the presence of the mysterious being.

CHAPTER XIX

FACE TO FACE WITH DEVLIN, I DEMAND AN EXPLANATION OF HIM

I rapped with my knuckles, and a voice which could have been none other than the voice of Devlin immediately responded, calling to me to enter. The next moment I stood face to face with the strange creature, concerning whom my curiosity was raised to the highest pitch. He was sitting in a chair upon my entrance, and he did not rise from it; therefore I looked down upon him and he looked up at me. As my eyes rested on his face, I saw in it the inspiration of the evil expression in the faces of Mr. Lemon's portrait, the stone monster, and the bird's beak, which had made so profound an impression upon me in the parlour on the ground-floor.

"You have been in the house some time," said Devlin.

"I have," I answered.

"And have had a long, a very long, conversation with my worthy landlady," he observed.

"Yes," I said.

"About me," he said, not in the form of a question but as a statement of fact.

"Partly about you."

"And about poor Lemon?"

"Yes, about him as well."

"Sit down," said Devlin, "I expected you."

There was only one other chair in the room besides the one he occupied, and I accepted his invitation, and drew it up to the table. And there we sat gazing at each other for what appeared to me a long time in silence.

The room was very poorly furnished. There were the two chairs, a small deal table, and a single iron bedstead in the corner. Off the room was a kind of closet, in which I supposed were a washstand and fittings. There was only one other article in view in addition to those I have mentioned, and that was a desk at which Devlin was writing.1 He did not put away his papers, and I was enabled to observe, without undue prying, that his writing was very fine and very close.

How shall I describe him? A casual observation of his face and figure would not suffice for the detection of anything uncanny about him, but it must be remembered that I was abnormally excited, and most strangely interested in him. He was tall and dark, his face was long and spare; his forehead was low; his eyes were black, with an extraordinary brilliancy in them; his mouth was large, and his lips thin. He wore a moustache, but no beard. In the order and importance of the impressions they produced upon me I should place first, his black eyes with their extraordinary brilliancy, and next, his hands, which were unusually small and white. They were the hands of a lady of gentle culture rather than those of a man in the class of life to which Devlin appeared to belong. Not alone was his social standing presumably fixed by the fact of his living in a room so poorly furnished at the top of a house so common as Mr. Lemon's, but his clothes were a special indication. They were shabby and worn; black frock-coat, black trousers and waistcoat, narrow black tie. Not a vestige of colour about them, and no sign of jewellery of any kind.

"Well?" he said.

I started. I had been so absorbed in my observance of him that I, who should have been the first to plunge into the conversation, had remained silent for a time so unreasonably long that the man upon whom I had intruded might have justly taken offence.

"I beg your pardon," I said; "did you not remark that you expected me?"

"Yes."

"May I inquire upon what grounds your expectation was based?"

He smiled; and here I observed, in the quality of this smile, a characteristic of which Mrs. Lemon had given me no indication. Devlin was evidently gifted with a touch of humour.

"I reason by analogy," he said. "My landlady has very few visitors. You are here for the first time, with an object. You remain closeted with her for hours. She probably sent for you. During the long interview down-stairs you have been told a great deal about me. You hear me open the street-door, and you know I am in the house. My landlady has a trouble on her mind, and mixes me up with it. You have been made acquainted with this trouble and with my supposed connection with it. Your curiosity has been aroused, and you determine to seek an interview with me before you take your leave of her. You come up uninvited, and here you are, as I expected. Am I logical?"

"Quite logical."

"In a common-sense view of commonplace matters-and everything in the world is commonplace-lies the ripest wisdom. Follow my example. Exercise your common sense."

But I did not immediately speak. Devlin's words were so different from what I had expected that I was for a moment at a loss. The prospect of my being able to bring the murderer of Lizzie Melladew to justice and of earning a thousand pounds did not appear so bright.

"I will assist you," he resumed; "I will endeavour to set you at your ease with me. Your scrutiny of me has been very searching; I ought to feel flattered. What anticipations of my appearance you may have entertained before you entered the room is your affair, not mine. How far they are realised is your affair, not mine. But allow me to assure you, my dear sir," and here he rose to his full height, and made me a half-humorous, half-mocking bow, "that I am a very ordinary person."

"That cannot be," I said, "after what I have heard."

"It is the destiny," he said, resuming his seat, "of greater personages than myself to be ranked much higher than they deserve. Proceed."

"I am here to speak to you about this murder," I said, plunging boldly into the subject.

"Ah, about a murder! But there are so many."

"You know to which one I refer. The murder of a young girl in Victoria Park, which took place the night before last."

"I have heard and read of it," said Devlin.

"You know also," I continued, "that the tragedy has produced in Mr. Lemon a condition of mind and body which may lead to dangerous results, probably to a despairing death."

"All men must die," he said cynically.

I was now thoroughly aroused. "I have come to you for an explanation," I said, "and it must be a satisfactory one."

"You speak like an inquisitor," said Devlin, with a quiet smile, and I seemed to detect in his altered manner a desire to irritate me and to drive me into an excess of passion. For this reason I kept myself cool, and simply said,

"I am resolved."

"Good. Keep resolved."

"I shall do so. By some devilish and mysterious means you were aware, before the poor girl left her home on Friday night, that her doom was sealed. You could have prevented it, and you did not raise a hand to save her. This knowledge I have gained from Mr. Lemon, to whom, through you, the impending tragedy was known."

"Then why did he not prevent it?"

"It was not in his power. He was not acquainted with the names of the murderer and his victim."

"Was I?"

"You must have been. I do not pretend to an understanding of the extraordinary power you exercise, but I am convinced that, in connection with you, there is a mystery which should be brought to light, and if I can be the agent to unmask you I am ready for the work. With all the earnestness of my soul, I swear it."

A low laugh escaped Devlin's lips. "Were a commissioner of lunacy here," he said, "you would be in peril. This young girl you speak of, is she in any way connected with you?"

"She was my friend; I knew her from childhood; she has sat at my table with her sister and parents, and I and mine have sat at theirs. Her family are plunged into the lowest depths of despair by the cruel, remorseless blow which has fallen upon them."

"And you have taken upon yourself the task of an avenger. It is chivalrous, but is it entirely unselfish? I am always suspicious of mere words; there is ever behind them a secret motive, hidden by a dark curtain. I speak in metaphor, but you will seize my meaning, for you are a man of nerve and intelligence, utterly unlike our friend in the room below, whose nature is servile and abject, and who is not, as you are, given to heroics. Calm yourself. I am ready to discuss this matter with you, but in your present condition I should have the advantage of you. You are heated; I am cool and collected. You have some self-interest at heart; I have none. Your words are so wild that any person but myself hearing them would take you for a madman. For your own sake-not for mine, for the affair does not concern me-I advise moderation of language. I suppose you will scarcely believe that the man upon whom you have unceremoniously intruded, and against whom you launch accusations, the very extravagance of which renders them unworthy of serious consideration-you will scarcely believe that this man is simply a poor barber who has not a second coat to his back, nor a second pair of shoes to his feet. But it is a fact-a proof of the injustice of the world, ever blind to merit. For I am not only a barber, sir, I am a capable workman, as I will convince you. Pray do not move; a cooling essence and a brush skilfully used effect wonders on an over-heated head."

It was not in my power to resist him. He had taken his place behind my chair, and before he had finished speaking had sprinkled a liquid over my head which was so overpoweringly refreshing that I insensibly yielded to its influence. With brush and comb he arranged my hair, his small white hands occasionally touching my forehead gently and persuasively. When I thought afterwards of this strange incident I called to mind that, for the two or three minutes during which he was engaged in the exercise of his art, I was in a kind of quiet dream, in which all the agitating occurrences of the previous day in connection with the murder of Lizzie Melladew were mentally repeated in proper sequence, closing with Mr. Portland's offer of a thousand pounds for the discovery of the murderer. It was, as it were, a kind of panorama which passed before me of all that occurred between morning and night. I looked up, inexpressibly refreshed, and with my mind bright and clear. Devlin stood before me, smiling.

"Confess, sir," he said, in a soft persuasive tone, "that I have returned good for evil. The fever of the brain is abated, or I am a bungler indeed. We will now discuss the matter."

CHAPTER XX

DEVLIN ASTONISHES ME

"I remarked to you just now," he said, seating himself comfortably in his chair, "that I am always suspicious of mere words, for the reason that there is ever a secret motive behind them. From what you have said I should be justified in supposing that your desire to discover the mystery in which the death of your poor young friend is involved springs simply from sympathy with her bereaved family. I will not set a trap for you, and pin you to that statement by asking questions which you would answer only in one way. You would argue with yourself probably as to the disingenuousness of those answers, but would finally appease your conscience by deciding that I, a perfect stranger to you and your affairs, cannot possibly have anything to do with the private motives by which you are influenced. Say, for instance, by such a motive as the earning of a reward which we will put down at a thousand pounds."

For the life of me I could not restrain a start of astonishment. It was the exact sum Mr. Portland had offered me. By what dark means had Devlin divined it?

"You need not be discomposed," said Devlin. "The thing is natural enough. You have credited me with so much that it will harm neither of us if you credit me with a little more-say, with a certain faculty for reading men's thoughts. The world knows very little as yet; it has much to learn; and I, in my humble way, may be a master in a new species of spiritual power. Now, I have a profound belief in Fate; what it wills must inevitably be. And, impressed by this article of faith, I, the master, may be willing to become the slave. Fate has led you to this house, and it may be that you are an instrument in discoveries yet to be made. I continue, you observe, to speak occasionally in metaphor. Be as frank with me as I have been with you. No, don't trouble yourself to speak immediately. In the words you were about to utter there is a subterfuge; you have not yet made up your mind to be entirely open with me. You and I meet now for the first time. Before this day I have never known of your existence, nor have you been aware of mine."

"If that be true," I said, interrupting him, "what made you mention the reward of a specific sum?"

"Of a thousand pounds?" he asked, smiling.

"Exactly."

"Do you deny that such a reward has been offered to you?"

"I do not deny it; but by what mysterious means did you come to the knowledge of it?"

"Because it is in your mind, my dear sir," he said.

"That is no answer."

"Is it not? I should have thought it would satisfy you, but you are inclined to be unreasonable. Come, now, I will show you how little I am concealing from you with respect to my knowledge of your movements." He shaded his eyes with his hand, and looked at me from beneath it.

"I do not know your name, nor in what part of London you reside, but certainly you and your wife-no doubt a most estimable lady-were sitting together at breakfast yesterday morning."

He paused, and waited for me to speak. "It is quite true," I said; "but there is nothing unusual in husband and wife partaking of that meal in company."

"Nothing in the least unusual if a man is master of his own time, as you were yesterday morning, for the first time for a long while past. The fact is, you had lost a situation in which you have been employed for years."

I sat spellbound. Devlin continued:

"The breakfast-things are on the table, and you and your lady are discussing ways and means. You are not rich, and you look forward with some fear to the future. Times are hard, and situations are not easy to obtain. In the midst of your consultation a man rushes into the room. He is a middle-aged man. Shall I describe him?"

"If you can," I said, my wonder growing.

He gave me a fairly faithful description of Mr. Melladew, and proceeded:

"A great grief has fallen upon this man. It is only within the last hour that he has discovered that his daughter had been murdered. He remains with you some time, and then other persons make their appearance, among them newspaper reporters and policemen, all doubtless drawn to your house by this business of the murder. You have also an interview with a young gentleman. The day passes. It is evening, and you are seated with another person. By this person you are offered one thousand pounds if you discover the murderer of the young girl, and another thousand if you find her sister, who has strangely disappeared. I do not wish to deprive you of such credit as belongs to a man who sympathises with a friend in trouble; but it is certainly a fact that the dim prospect of earning such a handsome sum of money is very strong within you. That is all."

I deliberated awhile in silence, and Devlin did not disturb my musings. All that he had narrated had passed through my mind while he was engaged in dressing my hair. Had he the power of reading thoughts by the mere action of his fingers upon a man's head? No other solution occurred to me, and had I not been placed in my present position I should instantly have rejected it; but now I was in the mood for entertaining it, wild and incredible as it appeared. During this interval of silence I made a strong endeavour to calm myself for what was yet to take place between me and Devlin, and I was successful. When I spoke I was more composed.

"You say you do not know where I live. Is it true?" I asked.

"Quite true," he answered.

"You do not really know my name?"

"I do not."

"Nor the names of my visitors?"

"Nor the names of your visitors."

"But you must be aware," I said, "admitting, for the sake of argument, that you are not romancing-"

"Yes," he said, laughing, "admitting that, for the sake of argument."

"You must be aware that the name of the first man who visited me-he being, as you have declared, the father of the murdered girl-is Melladew."

"I am aware of it, not from actual knowledge, but from what I have read in the newspapers."

"But of the name of the gentleman who, you say, offers the reward of a thousand pounds, you are ignorant."

"Quite ignorant. Now, having replied to your questions frankly, confess that you have forced yourself upon me with a distinct motive, in which I, a stranger to you, am interested."

"My object is to discover the murderer and bring him to justice."

"A very estimable design."

"And also to discover what has become of the murdered girl's sister."

"Exactly. How do you propose to accomplish your object?"

"Through you."

"Indeed! Through me?"

"As surely as we are in the same room together, through you. Receive what I am about to say as the fixed resolve of a man who sees before him a stern duty and will not flinch from it. Having come into association with you, I am determined not to lose sight of you. I put aside any further consideration of a strange and inexplicable mystery in connection with yourself as being utterly and entirely beyond my power to understand."

"My dear sir," said Devlin, with a glance at his shabby clothes, "you flatter me."

"All my energies now are bent to one purpose, which, through you, I shall carry to its certain end. You have made yourself plain to me. I hope up to this point I have made myself plain to you."

"You are the soul of lucidity," said Devlin, "but much remains yet to explain. For the sake of argument we have admitted an element of romance into this very prosaic matter; for it is really prosaic, almost commonplace. Life is largely made up of tragedies and mysteries, the majority of them petty and contemptible, a few only deserving to be called grand. As a matter of fact, my dear sir, existence, with all its worries, anxieties, hopes, and disappointments, is nothing better than a game of pins and needles. It is the littleness of human nature that magnifies a pin prick into a wound of serious importance. To think that some of these mortals should call themselves philosophers! It is laughable. Do you follow me?"

"Not entirely," I replied, "but I have some small glimmering of your meaning."

"Were your mind," said Devlin, shaking with internal laughter, "quite free from the influence of that thousand pounds, it would be clearer. In the grand Scheme of Nature, so far as mortals comprehend it, the potent screw is human selfishness. These speculations, however, are perhaps foreign to the point. Let us continue our amicable argument until we thoroughly understand each other upon the subject of this murder. You see, my dear sir, I wish to know exactly how I stand; for despite the extraordinary opinion you have formed of me, it is you who have assumed the rôle of Controller of Destinies. I am but a mere instrument in your hands." He measured me with his eyes. "You are well built, and are, I should judge, a powerful man."

"You are contemplating the probability of a physical struggle between us," I said. "Dismiss it; there will be none."

He made me a mocking bow. "My mind is, indeed, relieved. You do not intend violence, then. I am free to leave the house if I wish-at this moment, if I please. Have you taken that contingency into account?"

"I have."

"You will not attempt to detain me by force?"

"No."

"In such an event, how will you act?"

"I shall follow you, and to the first policeman I meet I shall say, 'Arrest that person. He is implicated in the murder of Lizzie Melladew.'"

Devlin cast upon me a look of admiration. "That would be awkward," he said.

"Decidedly awkward-for you."

"You would be asked to furnish evidence."

"Direct evidence it would be, at present, out of my power to supply," I said; I was on my mettle; my mental forces were never clearer, were never more resolutely set upon one object; "but there is such a thing as circumstantial evidence. Mr. Lemon and his wife should come forward, and relate all that they know concerning you. You and Mr. Lemon are carrying on a business somewhere; the place should be searched; it should be made food for the multitude who are ever on the hunt for the sensational. Your desk on the table here contains writings of yours; they may throw light upon the investigation. So we should go on, step by step, independent of your assistance, until we get the murderer-who may or may not be an accomplice of yours-into the clutches of the law."