登陆注册
38578600000299

第299章

Closing her hand firmly on his, she led him along the first floor corridor to the room numbered Four. "Notice that room," she whispered. After a look over the stairs to see that they were alone, she retraced her steps with him to the opposite extremity of the corridor. Here, facing the window which lit the place at the other end, was one little room, with a narrow grating in the higher part of the door, intended for the sleeping apartment of the doctor's deputy. From the position of this room, the grating commanded a view of the bed-chambers down each side of the corridor, and so enabled the deputy-physician to inform himself of any irregular proceedings on the part of the patients under his care, with little or no chance of being detected in watching them. Miss Gwilt opened the door and led the way into the empty room.

"Wait here," she said, "while I go back upstairs; and lock yourself in, if you like. You will be in the dark, but the gas will be burning in the corridor. Keep at the grating, and make sure that Mr. Armadale goes into the room I have just pointed out to you, and that he doesn't leave it afterward. If you lose sight of the room for a single moment before I come back, you will repent it to the end of your life. If you do as I tell you, you shall see me to-morrow, and claim your own reward. Quick with your answer! Is it Yes or No?"He could make no reply in words. He raised her hand to his lips, and kissed it rapturously. She left him in the room. From his place at the grating he saw her glide down the corridor to the staircase door. She passed through it, and locked it. Then there was silence.

The next sound was the sound of the women-servants' voices. Two of them came up to put the sheets on the beds in Number Three and Number Four. The women were in high good-humor, laughing and talking to each other through the open doors of the rooms. The master's customers were coming in at last, they said, with a vengeance; the house would soon begin to look cheerful, if things went on like this.

After a little, the beds were got ready and the women returned to the kitchen floor, on which the sleeping-rooms of the domestic servants were all situated. Then there was silence again.

The next sound was the sound of the doctor's voice. He appeared at the end of the corridor, showing Allan and Midwinter the way to their rooms. They all went together into Number Four. After a little, the doctor came out first. He waited till Midwinter joined him, and pointed with a formal bow to the door of Number Three. Midwinter entered the room without speaking, and shut himself in. The doctor, left alone, withdrew to the staircase door and unlocked it, then waited in the corridor, whistling to himself softly, under his breath.

Voices pitched cautiously low became audible in a minute more in the hall. The Resident Dispenser and the Head Nurse appeared, on their way to the dormitories of the attendants at the top of the house. The man bowed silently, and passed the doctor; the woman courtesied silently, and followed the man. The doctor acknowledged their salutations by a courteous wave of his hand;and, once more left alone, paused a moment, still whistling softly to himself, then walked to the door of Number Four, and opened the case of the fumigating apparatus fixed near it in the corner of the wall. As he lifted the lid and looked in, his whistling ceased. He took a long purple bottle out, examined it by the gas-light, put it back, and closed the case. This done, he advanced on tiptoe to the open staircase door, passed through it, and secured it on the inner side as usual.

Mr. Bashwood had seen him at the apparatus; Mr. Bashwood had noticed the manner of his withdrawal through the staircase door.

Again the sense of an unutterable expectation throbbed at his heart. A terror that was slow and cold and deadly crept into his hands, and guided them in the dark to the key that had been left for him in the inner side of the door. He turned it in vague distrust of what might happen next, and waited.

The slow minutes passed, and nothing happened. The silence was horrible; the solitude of the lonely corridor was a solitude of invisible treacheries. He began to count to keep his mind employed--to keep his own growing dread away from him. The numbers, as he whispered them, followed each other slowly up to a hundred, and still nothing happened. He had begun the second hundred; he had got on to twenty--when, without a sound to betray that he had been moving in his room, Midwinter suddenly appeared in the corridor.

He stood for a moment and listened; he went to the stairs and looked over into the hall beneath. Then, for the second time that night, he tried the staircase door, and for the second time found it fast. After a moment's reflection, he tried the doors of the bedrooms on his right hand next, looked into one after the other, and saw that they were empty, then came to the door of the end room in which the steward was concealed. Here, again, the lock resisted him. He listened, and looked up at the grating. No sound was to be heard, no light was to be seen inside. "Shall I break the door in," he said to himself, "and make sure? No; it would be giving the doctor an excuse for turning me out of the house." He moved away, and looked into the two empty rooms in the row occupied by Allan and himself, then walked to the window at the staircase end of the corridor. Here the case of the fumigating apparatus attracted his attention. After trying vainly to open it, his suspicion seemed to be aroused. He searched back along the corridor, and observed that no object of a similar kind appeared outside any of the other bed-chambers. Again at the window, he looked again at the apparatus, and turned away from it with a gesture which plainly indicated that he had tried, and failed, to guess what it might be.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 将军寺的女人们

    将军寺的女人们

    在自己青春花季上被玷污的何久红,看淡人生生活,不成想婚后感情上不顺利,生活上也处处被别人算计,身处绝境的她拼死挣扎却又掉入黑道的圈套,在阴谋、利用、权势纷沓而来时候,且看何久红化险为夷,笑对人生。
  • 天行

    天行

    号称“北辰骑神”的天才玩家以自创的“牧马冲锋流”战术击败了国服第一弓手北冥雪,被誉为天纵战榜第一骑士的他,却受到小人排挤,最终离开了效力已久的银狐俱乐部。是沉沦,还是再次崛起?恰逢其时,月恒集团第四款游戏“天行”正式上线,虚拟世界再起风云!
  • 你若来,我不走

    你若来,我不走

    你若来,我不走在此静静地守候害怕转身错过了刹那永恒的幸福你来了,我长留只愿紧紧地拥抱唯恐放手失去是前世千年的情缘最后,你没来,我走了……
  • 不朽殿堂

    不朽殿堂

    来自不朽殿堂的神秘力量,冥冥中主宰一切。陈赫突然发现,自称是儿时伙伴的超级美女何碧晨,真实身份并不简单。要解开过往谜团,立足于乾坤破碎之时,他没有任何选择,只能将七尺之躯,投身于浩荡洪荒之流。QQ群:314371917
  • 民国演义·中

    民国演义·中

    《中国历史通俗演义》上迄秦汉,下至民国,两千年的中国历史栩栩如生地展现在我们面前。它是迄今为止唯一一部全面叙述中国历史的通俗演义。作者在写作的时候秉承“主本信史,旁征野史”的理念,取材审慎,观点平实,内容丰富,叙述有法,用语雅洁,自评自注,理趣兼备,洵为通俗史著的经典。
  • 封神双龙5

    封神双龙5

    商纣末年,妖魔乱政,两名身份卑贱的少年奴隶,于一次偶然的机会被卷进神魔争霸的洪流中,一个性格沉稳、温文尔雅,有着超凡的感悟力;另一个古灵精怪、活泼机智,满身的市井顽童气息,却聪明绝顶。
  • 重生之江湖饭店

    重生之江湖饭店

    第一次写书,求包含不对的地方请指出来我可以慢慢学
  • 特工女杀手:弃妃之花之魅

    特工女杀手:弃妃之花之魅

    她是一个商业女强人,更是一个异能杀手,意外穿越,醒来却在异世暗牢,恋人远离,又被迫加入皇家,最终却成弃妇。他们都当她是什么了,她岂会任他们摆布,现在的痛,她会让他们千倍奉还!
  • 武飞飞

    武飞飞

    连自己都不相信的事就不要指望别人会相信,哪怕前面路再黑,这个少年也能凭着心中那微弱的光亮点燃这片宏伟的黑暗,世界总会还你一个公平,只有相信自己才能再次拿起武器……
  • 穿到修真界成了种田大佬

    穿到修真界成了种田大佬

    (种田基建)莫名来到修真界,成了落魄城主,一穷二白,该如何发展城池?修缮城池、种田、养兽、锻器、开店……没有实力?没事,咱有钱!一不小心,成了修真界最大的资源商。(城主日夜沉迷种田,不想修仙怎么办?)