Brood of the Witch-Queen Part 5

"She has recovered, sir. Mrs. Hume has taken her to another bedroom."

Cairn hesitated, then walked into the deserted library, where a light was burning. He began to pace up and down, clenching and unclenching his fists. Presently Felton knocked and entered. Clearly the man was glad of the chance to talk to someone.

"Mr. Antony has been 'phoned at Oxford, sir. I thought you might like to know. He is motoring down, sir, and will be here at four o'clock."

"Thank you," said Cairn shortly.

Ten minutes later his father joined him. He was a slim, well-preserved man, alert-eyed and active, yet he had aged five years in his son's eyes. His face was unusually pale, but he exhibited no other signs of emotion.

"Well, Rob," he said, tersely. "I can see you have something to tell me. I am listening."

Robert Cairn leant back against a bookshelf.

"I _have_ something to tell you, sir, and something to ask you."

"Tell your story, first; then ask your question."

"My story begins in a Thames backwater--"

Dr. Cairn stared, squaring his jaw, but his son proceeded to relate, with some detail, the circ.u.mstances attendant upon the death of the king-swan. He went on to recount what took place in Antony Ferrara's rooms, and at the point where something had been taken from the table and thrown in the fire--

"Stop!" said Dr. Cairn. "What did he throw in the fire?"

The doctor's nostrils quivered, and his eyes were ablaze with some hardly repressed emotion.

"I cannot swear to it, sir--"

"Never mind. What do you _think_ he threw in the fire?"

"A little image, of wax or something similar--an image of--a swan."

At that, despite his self-control, Dr. Cairn became so pale that his son leapt forward.

"All right, Rob," his father waved him away, and turning, walked slowly down the room.

"Go on," he said, rather huskily.

Robert Cairn continued his story up to the time that he visited the hospital where the dead girl lay.

"You can swear that she was the original of the photograph in Antony's rooms and the same who was waiting at the foot of the stair?"

"I can, sir."

"Go on."

Again the younger man resumed his story, relating what he had learnt from Myra Duquesne; what she had told him about the phantom hands; what Felton had told him about the strange perfume perceptible in the house.

"The ring," interrupted Dr. Cairn--"she would recognise it again?"

"She says so."

"Anything else?"

"Only that if some of your books are to be believed, sir, Trois Ech.e.l.le, D'Ancre and others have gone to the stake for such things in a less enlightened age!"

"Less enlightened, boy!" Dr. Cairn turned his blazing eyes upon him.

"_More_ enlightened where the powers of h.e.l.l were concerned!"

"Then you think--"

"_Think_! Have I spent half my life in such studies in vain? Did I labour with poor Michael Ferrara in Egypt and learn _nothing_? Just G.o.d! what an end to his labour! What a reward for mine!"

He buried his face in quivering hands.

"I cannot tell exactly what you mean by that, sir," said Robert Cairn; "but it brings me to my question."

Dr. Cairn did not speak, did not move.

"_Who is Antony Ferrara_?"

The doctor looked up at that; and it was a haggard face he raised from his hands.

"You have tried to ask me that before."

"I ask now, sir, with better prospect of receiving an answer."

"Yet I can give you none, Rob."

"Why, sir? Are you bound to secrecy?"

"In a degree, yes. But the real reason is this--I don't know."

"You don't know!"

"I have said so."

"Good G.o.d, sir, you amaze me! I have always felt certain that he was really no Ferrara, but an adopted son; yet it had never entered my mind that you were ignorant of his origin."

"You have not studied the subjects which I have studied; nor do I wish that you should; therefore it is impossible, at any rate now, to pursue that matter further. But I may perhaps supplement your researches into the history of Trois Ech.e.l.les and Concini Concini. I believe you told me that you were looking in my library for some work which you failed to find?"

"I was looking for M. Chabas' translation of the _Papyrus Harris_."

"What do you know of it?"

"I once saw a copy in Antony Ferrara's rooms."

Dr. Cairn started slightly.

"Indeed. It happens that my copy is here; I lent it quite recently to--Sir Michael. It is probably somewhere on the shelves."