Page:Richard Marsh--The joss, a reversion.djvu/309

Rh “You’re forgetting that Pollie’s lying perhaps worse than dead in Camford Street.”

Mr. Paine gave a jump.

“I had forgotten it!—upon my honour!”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Miss Blyth—to whom Miss Purvis refers as Pollie—is the niece of the Mr. Batters of whom we have been speaking. She’s his heiress, in fact.”

“His heiress?”

“Yes; his sole residuary legatee. Among other things he left her a house in Camford Street—No 84—on somewhat mysterious conditions. For instance, she was to allow no man to enter it.”

“No man?”

“No; only she and one feminine friend were ever to be allowed to put their feet inside the door.”

“Oh?”

I began to smell a rat. Mr. Paine waved his hand towards the young lady the cursing gentleman had been about to practise on.

“This is Miss Purvis, the feminine friend whom Miss Blyth chose to be her sole companion. Other conditions were attached to the bequest equally mysterious. Indeed, it would really seem as if there was something in that house in Camford Street the existence of which the late Mr. Batters was particularly anxious should be concealed from the world. Miss Blyth only entered on the occupation of her property yesterday. Yet Miss Purvis came at an early hour this morning to tell me that something extraordinary had happened in the middle of the night. Something, she doesn’t quite know what, but fancies it was some wild animal, made a savage attack upon Miss Blyth without the slightest provocation. And when Miss Purvis recovered from the shock which the occurrence gave her, she found that she herself had been thrown into the street.”

“Mr. Paine!” I laid my hand upon the lawyer’s