CHAPTERXXX.BLENKIRON’S NARRATIVE.
London was now almost full again, after its two months of social stagnation, for October was close at hand. Already announcements were appearing in the newspapers of balls and dances, receptions and dinner parties, and other forms of entertainment with which people with money to spend and no work to do endeavor to kill time. And among the social receptions largely “featured” was one to be given by Mrs. Mervyn-Robertson at her house in Cavendish Place in the third week in October.
Johnson and Mrs. Hartsilver were back in town, so were Captain Preston and Yootha Hagerston, and George Blenkiron was staying at Cox’s Hotel, but none of the five had been invited to Jessica’s reception. The leading London newspapers had been asked to send representatives, however, and at his request Harry Hopford had been detailed by his chief to attend.
Among the visitors at Morley’s Hotel, in Trafalgar Square, was a dark man, obviously a foreigner, with black, rather oily hair and a carefully waxed moustache, a florid complexion and a tendency to obesity. Hopford noticed his name in the visitors’ book when he went to inquire for Major Guysburg who, Preston had told him, had just arrived therefrom America. The foreigner’s name was Alphonse Michaud.
“Major Guysburg is dining out,” Hopford was told.
He lit a cigarette, paused in the hall for a moment, then decided to look up Blenkiron, whom he had not seen since his return to town, but who was staying at Cox’s Hotel in Jermyn Street. On his way he called at a flat in Ryder Street, and found a friend of his at home and hard at work writing. It was the friend who had, at his request, watched Stapleton’s “cottage,” The Nest, near Uckfield, while he, Hopford, had been in Paris.
“I am on my way to see a friend at Cox’s Hotel,” Hopford said, when the two had conversed for some moments, “quite a good fellow, name of Blenkiron. Would you care to come along? You might run across the person you shadowed from The Nest to Cox’s that day, you never know.”
Blenkiron was in, Hopford was told, and a messenger took his card. A few minutes afterwards he was asked “please to come up.”
“’Evening, Blenkiron,” he said, as he was shown in. “Hope I am not disturbing you, eh? Tell me if I am, and I’ll go away. I have brought a friend I should like to introduce,” and he stepped aside to let his friend advance.
Silence followed. In evident astonishment Hopford’s friend and Blenkiron stared at each other.
“Haven’t we met before?” the latter said at last. “Surely on the road from The Nest to Uckfield——”
The other smiled.
“Yes,” he replied. “And I followed you back to town, and to this hotel. Afterwards I tried to find out your name, and who you were, but failed. I hope you will forgive me, Mr. Blenkiron; but I should like you to know I followed you at Hopford’s request.”
The three burst out laughing.
“So you, Blenkiron,” Hopford exclaimed, “are the rascal whose identity has so puzzled us! Really, this is amusing.”
Whisky was produced, and soon all three were on the best of terms.
“Have you heard the latest about the house with the bronze face?” Blenkiron asked presently.
“No, what?” Hopford answered eagerly.
“Alix Stothert, Camille Lenoir, and a girl of quite good family, and well-known in Society—I am not at liberty to tell you her name—and several others were arrested there about six o’clock this evening for being accomplices in attempted blackmail. In connection with the blackmail charge any number of people we know are likely to be involved. The names of three you will, I expect, guess at once.”
“J. and Co.”
Blenkiron nodded.
“By Jove, how splendid!” Hopford exclaimed. “Who told you all this, George?”
“The Commissioner of Police himself, so the information is accurate enough.”
Hopford sprang to his feet.
“May I use your telephone?” he asked, as he walked quickly towards the door. “Come and stand by me and I’ll dictate the whole story through right away!”
“Hopford, sit down!” Blenkiron shouted imperatively, pointing to the chair from which the lad had just risen. “Not a word of what I have told you is to appear in the press until I authorize it. Not a word! Do you understand?”
“But the other papers will get it,” Hopford exclaimed, with his hand on the door handle.
“They won’t. That I promise you. The Commissioner of Police, an intimate friend of mine, told me while I was dining with him to-night that the whole affair is to be kept out of the papers until the entire gang has been arrested. If you print a line now you will defeat the ends of justice by warning the unarrested accomplices, and so, probably, enabling them to escape. I mean what I say, Hopford. Preston, Miss Hagerston, Johnson and Mrs. Hartsilver will be here soon—I telephoned asking them to come as I had, I said, something important to tell them. There will be supper, so you and your friend had better stay.”
Hopford reflected.
“Have you room for yet one more at supper?” he asked suddenly. “Major Guysburg, a friend of Preston’s, is at Morley’s—just come from America. He knows a lot about a man, Alphonse Michaud, who is the mainspring of the Metropolitan Secret Agency, and is also at Morley’s. I have not yet met Guysburg, but Preston has explained to himwho I am, and the major is greatly interested in the movements of J.’s gang. He should, in fact, be able to throw further light on some of the curious happenings of the last two years.”
“Then by all means ring him up and ask him to come along,” Blenkiron answered. “But you are mistaken about Michaud’s being at Morley’s, Hopford, because he was one of those arrested this evening at the house with the bronze face.”
“Michaud arrested? Good again! But what was he arrested for?”
“Attempted blackmail—same as the others. But in Michaud’s case there is a second charge. Michaud, the Commissioner tells me, turns out to be a regular importer, on a big scale, of a remarkable drug you have already heard about, which is made and only procurable in Shanghai, Canton, and Hankau. The secret of this drug belongs to one man—a Chinaman.
“Now, sixteen years ago Michaud served a sentence of five years’ imprisonment in a French penitentiary for attempted blackmail; became, on his release, a greater scoundrel than ever, and finally succeeded in becoming naturalized as an Englishman. Then he went out to the East, set up in business in Canton, and eventually scraped acquaintance with a Shanghai wine merchant named Julius Stringborg, who introduced him to Fobart Robertson, Timothy Macmahon, Levi Schomberg, Alix Stothert, Stapleton, and several others, including, of course, Angela Robertson.
“Months passed, and then one day Michaudturned up in London again. None suspected, however, that he was now engaged in secretly importing the strange drug, for which he soon found a ready sale at a colossal profit. Some of the properties of the drug you already know, but it has other properties. Then, after a while he started systematically blackmailing many of his clients, for to be in possession of the drug, without authority, is in England a criminal offense. Not content with that, however, he now decided, in order to be able to extend his operations, to take into his confidence one or two of his friends. Among those friends were Marietta Stringborg and her husband, Angela Robertson and Timothy Macmahon. Those four formed the nucleus of a little gang of criminals which has since increased until——”
The arrival of Preston and Yootha Hagerston, followed almost immediately by Johnson and Cora Hartsilver, put an end to Blenkiron’s narrative. All were now greatly excited, and eager for information concerning the house with the bronze face and what had happened there; so that when Major Guysburg was announced he found himself ushered into a room where everybody seemed to be talking at once.