Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 42).djvu/468

"He was dead before they reached him—killed by conscience." and in each case the owner was found to have died in circumstances which had never been adequately explained. This man seemed to have been carrying on for years, with perfect impunity, a hideous traffic in robbery and murder—and the victim was always a woman. His true name was never ascertained. It was clear, from certain papers which were found in his flat, that he had spent several years of his youth in the East. He seemed to have been a solitary creature—a savage beast alone in its lair. Nothing was found out about his parents or his friends; nor about two acquaintances of whom I might have supplied some particulars. Personally, I never saw nor heard anything of either of them again.

I went on from Euston station by that train to the north. Just as we were about to start, a girl came bundling into my compartment whom I knew very well.

"That was a close shave," she said, as she took her seat. "I thought I should have missed it; my taxi-cab burst a tyre. What's this I heard them saying about someone having committed suicide on the platform? Is it true?"

"I believe there was something of the kind; in fact, I know there was. It has quite upset me."

"Poor dear! You do look out of sorts. A thing like that would upset anyone." She glanced at me with sympathetic eyes. "I was talking about you only yesterday. I was saying that a person with your power of what practically amounts to reading people's thoughts ought to be able to do a great deal of good in the world. Do you think you ever do any good?"

The question was asked half laughingly. We were in a corridor carriage. Two women at the other end of it suddenly got up and went, apparently, in search of another. I had been in no state to notice anything when I had got in; now I realized that one of the women who had risen was the one who had worn the grey dress at Buxton. She had evidently recognized me on the instant. I saw her whisper to her companion in the corridor, before they moved off:—

"I couldn't possibly remain in the same compartment with that half-bred gipsy-looking creature. I've had experience of her before."

I was the half-bred gipsy-looking creature. The experience she had had of me was when I saved her life at Buxton. That I did save her life I am pretty sure. I said to my friend, when they had gone:—

"I hope that sometimes I do do a little good; but even when I do, for the most part it's done by stealth, and not known to fame; and sometimes, even, it's not recognized as good at all."

"Is that so?" replied my friend. "What a very curious world it is."

When I thought of what had happened on the platform which we were leaving so rapidly behind, I agreed with her with all my heart and soul.