The Black Bag by Vance, Louis Joseph, 1879-1933

Its houses loomed tall, with many windows, mostly lightless--materially aggravating that air of isolate, cold dignity which distinguishes the Englishman's castle. Here and there stood one less bedraggled than its neighbors, though all, without exception, spoke assertively of respectability down-at-the-heel but fighting tenaciously for existence. Some, vanguards of that imminent day when the boarding-house should reign supreme, wore with shamefaced air placards of estate-agents, advertising their susceptibility to sale or lease. In the company of the latter was Number 9.

The American noted the circumstance subconsciously, at a moment when Miss Calendar's hand, small as a child's, warm and compact in its white glove, lay in his own. And then she was on the sidewalk, her face, upturned to his, vivacious with excitement.

"You have been so kind," she told him warmly, "that one hardly knows how to thank you, Mr. Kirkwood."

"I have done nothing--nothing at all," he mumbled, disturbed by a sudden, unreasoning alarm for her.

She passed quickly to the shelter of the pillared portico. He followed clumsily. On the door-step she turned, offering her hand. He took and retained it.

"Good night," she said.

"I'm to understand that I'm dismissed, then?" he stammered ruefully.

She evaded his eyes. "I--thank you--I have no further need--"

"You are quite sure? Won't you believe me at your service?"

She laughed uneasily. "I'm all right now."

"I can do nothing more? Sure?"

"Nothing. But you--you make me almost sorry I can't impose still further upon your good nature."

"Please don't hesitate ..."

"Aren't you very persistent, Mr. Kirkwood?" Her fingers moved in his; burning with the reproof, he released them, and turned to her so woebegone a countenance that she repented of her severity. "Don't worry about me, please. I am truly safe now. Some day I hope to be able to thank you adequately. Good night!"

Her pass-key grated in the lock. Opening, the door disclosed a dark and uninviting entry-hall, through which there breathed an air heavy with the dank and dusty odor of untenanted rooms. Hesitating on the threshold, over her shoulder the girl smiled kindly upon her commandeered esquire; and stepped within.

He lifted his hat automatically. The door closed with an echoing slam. He turned to the waiting cab, fumbling for change.

"I'll walk," he told the cabby, paying him off.

The hansom swept away to a tune of hammering hoofs; and quiet rested upon the street as Kirkwood turned the nearest corner, in an unpleasant temper, puzzled and discontented. It seemed hardly fair that he should have been dragged into so promising an adventure, by his ears (so to put it), only to be thus summarily called upon to write "Finis" beneath the incident.

He rounded the corner and walked half-way to the next street, coming to an abrupt and rebellious pause by the entrance to a covered alleyway, of two minds as to his proper course of action.

In the background of his thoughts Number 9, Frognall Street, reared its five-story facade, sinister and forbidding. He reminded himself of its unlighted windows; of its sign, "To be let"; of the effluvia of desolation that had saluted him when the door swung wide. A deserted house; and the girl alone in it!--was it right for him to leave her so?

IV

9 FROGNALL STREET, W. C.

The covered alleyway gave upon Quadrant Mews; or so declared a notice painted on the dead wall of the passage.