Destruction

A deep-toned clock in the house struck twelve.

Rain began to fall. A few moments later the financier hurried across the lawns with his collar turned up. The danseuse followed him. She seemed a disappointed and indignant woman.

"It's almost an insult," she complained overtaking him.

"Noth a penny more," said the financier firmly.

They both turned quickly. Her hand gripped his arm convulsively. Wild shouting arose in the darkness, and the sound of someone forcing a headlong way through hedge and bush.

The Reverend Percival Delamere was rushing towards the house as if the entire penalties of sin were at his heels. "A corpse! A corpse by the river! Miss Manderson has been murdered!"

The danseuse uttered a terrified cry. The financier shook.

"Murderedth?" he gasped, shrinking back.

The clergyman was shattered by horror.

"By the river ... almost torn to pieces...."

The danseuse screamed loudly. A figure bounded up behind them, and a hand seized the clergyman's throat in a savage grip. The furious, distorted face of George Copplestone glared down at him. He struggled, freeing himself with all his strength.

"Copplestone," he choked, "something dreadful has happened to Miss Manderson. I found her by the river ... horribly torn...."

From another direction, Tranter reached them, breathless.

"What is the matter? What has happened?"

The financier clung to him.

"Mith Manderthon ... murderedth."

Tranter shook him off, and stood very still. The agony on his face passed unnoticed. As the theatrical manager and Mrs. Astley-Rolfe arrived at a run, Copplestone, with a sound like the cry of a raging animal, grasped the unhappy clergyman by the arm, and dashed off towards the river.

The others followed. They found her lying a few yards from the water's edge. The manager struck a match, and they looked down.

The danseuse shrieked, and fainted. Mrs. Astley-Rolfe sank on her knees, sobbing, and covered her face with her hands. The financier sickened, and turned away, trembling violently.

"God!" Tranter cried—"some one must have stamped on her!"

He bent down. "Thea...." he whispered.

Something like a sob shook him. But the others did not see.

"It must have been a wild beast," shuddered the clergyman.

"It is the work of a madman," said the manager hoarsely. "He has utterly destroyed her—as he threatened."

George Copplestone stood without a tremor. As he looked down at the broken form all his frenzy disappeared. The distortion of his first fury faded from his face, leaving it set in a pallid, lifeless mask. He contemplated the dreadful destruction at his feet without a sign of horror, or even of pity. He was perfectly steady. Not a quiver escaped him. Stooping down, he asked quietly for assistance to carry the body to the house.

"Wait a bit," said the manager, looking at him curiously. "She ought not to be moved before the police come."

Copplestone straightened himself, and remained silent.

"Let Gluckstein take the women in, and telephone to the Police Station," the manager suggested.

Mrs. Astley-Rolfe raised her bloodless face.

"Yes, yes," she sobbed. "Let me go. It's too horrible. I can't bear it."

Tranter raised her up. The danseuse had recovered consciousness, and was crying hysterically. Suddenly the financier startled them in a thin high voice, pointing a shaking finger into the darkness. "Someone ith moving! Out there behind uth! Whoth there? Whoth there?"

They swung round, straining their eyes into the blackness.

"Who's there?" the manager called.

An answering voice reached them. The manager struck another match. On the edge of the darkness they saw an enormous figure.

"It's Monsieur Dupont!" Tranter cried.

"My friends," exclaimed Monsieur Dupont, "at last I find you! What is the matter?"

Copplestone looked at him steadily.

"The matter," he said evenly, "is that Miss Manderson has been murdered."

Monsieur Dupont uttered an extraordinary exclamation. He was instantly galvanized into a condition of seething energy. With what was almost a snarl, he brushed the financier aside, and reached the white mangled form on the ground.

For a tense minute he knelt beside it. The others waited.

"Destroyed," they heard him mutter—"utterly destroyed...."

When he rose, his eyes were full of tears. "It is terrible. Who was with her last?"

"I was with her less than a quarter of an hour ago," Tranter replied. "She said she was going back to the house, and asked me to find Mr. Copplestone, and tell him that she was not feeling well."

"Where are your police?" asked Monsieur Dupont.

"Gluckstein is going to take the ladies back to the house, and telephone for them," the manager returned.

The financier departed with his charges. The four men remained, facing each other over the dead body. Rain was falling heavily.

"Poor girl," said the clergyman huskily.

"That such a brute should be at large," the manager added.

Copplestone's gaze again became rivetted to the ground. He seemed unconscious of their presence. He was like a man alone and dazed in a strange world.

Then the storm burst over them with all its fury. The rain poured down in torrents, the lightning was incessant. It was as if the elements themselves, in their rage, were seeking to complete the work of destruction.

"We can't leave her out in this—police or no police," the clergyman shivered.

Copplestone bent down again. The manager moved to assist, but Tranter put him aside, and assisted Copplestone to lift the ghastly burden in his arms. Then they picked their way slowly along the winding paths to the house.

When they entered the decorated room, Copplestone's strange immobility flashed upon him with startling suddenness. Uttering a oath, he placed what he had previously been carrying with dull indifference roughly on a couch, and hurled himself furiously upon the confusion of decorations, tearing and crushing everything into a smashed heap on the floor. So overwhelming was his violence that no one dared attempt to stop him. He dashed the lights to the ground, and rent the flags with appalling ferocity. In a few moments a shattered pile was all that remained of the medley of illumination. He stood on the pile and ground his heels into it.

Then all the energy was snuffed out of him like the switching off of an electric current. The dull heavy cloud descended on him again. He stared vacantly at the others, shrugged his shoulders slightly, and turned his back on them.

The silence remained unbroken until a loud ringing at the front door bell announced the arrival of the police.