“My head,” said Reggie Fortune. “Oh, my head! Kuyper’s a Bolshevik agent and Kuyper employs a man to put Wilton out of the way. It’s a bad dream.”
“Yes, it’s not plausible. Not one of your more lucid cases, Fortune.”
“I had thought,” said Bell diffidently, “if Dr. Wilton happened to get to know of some Bolshevik plot, Mr. Fortune, they would be wanting to put him out.”
“They would—in a novel,” Reggie shook his head. “But hang it all, Wilton don’t know that he ever knew anything.”
“P’r’aps he’s a bit of a Bolshevik himself, sir,” said Bell.
Lomas laughed. “Bell has a turn for melodrama.”
“Yes. Yes, there is a lot of melodrama in the world. But somehow I don’t fancy Kuyper, Witt and Co. play it. I think I’ll go and have a little talk with the firm.”
“You?” Lomas stared at him.
“Not alone, I reckon, sir.” Bell stood up.
“Well, you come and chaperon me. Yes, I want to look at ’em, Lomas. Wilton’s a medical man, you know. I want to see the patients, too.”
“You can try it,” Lomas said dubiously. “You realize we have nothing definite against Witt, and nothing at all against Kuyper. And I’m not sure that Kuyper hasn’t smelt a rat. He’s been staying at the Olympian. He was there on Tuesday night, but last night our men lost him.”
“Come on, Bell,” said Mr. Fortune.
Outside the big new block in Mawdleyn Lane Superintendent Bell stopped a moment and looked round. A man crossed the road and made a sign as he vanished into a doorway
“He’s in, sir,” Bell said, and they went up to the offices of Mr. Julius Kuyper.
A pert young woman received them. They wanted to see Mr. Kuyper? By appointment? Oh, Mr. Kuyper never saw anyone except by appointment.
“He’ll see me,” said Bell, and gave her a card. She looked him over impudently and vanished. Another young woman peered round the glass screen at them.
“Sorry.” The first young woman came briskly back. “Mr. Kuyper’s not in. Better write and ask for an appointment.”
“That won’t do. Who is in?” said Bell heavily.
“Don’t you bully me!” she cried.
“You don’t want to get into trouble, do you?” Bell frowned down at her. “You go in there and say Superintendent Bell is waiting to see Mr. Witt.”
“We haven’t got any Mr. Witt.”
“You do as you’re told.”
She went. She was gone a long time. A murmur of voices was audible. She came out again, looking flustered. “Well, what about it?” said Bell.
“I don’t know anything about it,” she said. A door slammed, a bell rang. She made a nervous exclamation and turned to answer it. Bell went first and Reggie on his heels.
In the inner room an oldish man stood smoothing his hair. He was flushed and at the sight of Bell he cried out: “But you intrude, sir.”
“Ah, here’s our old friend, Mr. Witt,” Bell smiled. “I should——”
“There is some mistake. You are wrong, sir. What is your name? Mr. Superintendent—my name is Siegel.”
“I dare say it is. Then why did you call yourself Witt?”
“I do not know what you mean.”
“I don’t forget faces. I should know you anywhere. You’re the Mr. Witt who prosecuted Dr. Horace Wilton. Come, come, the game’s up now.”
“What do you mean by that, sir?”
“Time to tell the truth,” said Reggie sweetly, “time you began to think of yourself, isn’t it? We know all about the evidence in the Wilton burglary. Why did you do it, Mr. Witt? It wasn’t safe, you know.”
“What do you want?”
“Well, where’s your friend Mr. Kuyper? We had better have him in.”
“Mr. Kuyper has gone out, sir.”
Reggie laughed. “Oh, I don’t think so. You’re not doing yourself justice. I don’t suppose you wanted to trap Dr. Wilton. You’d better consider your position. What is Mr. Kuyper’s little game with you?”
Mr. Witt looked nervously round the room. “You—you mustn’t—I mean we can’t talk here,” he said. “The girls will be listening.”
“Oh, send the girls out to tea,” said Bell.
“No. I can’t do that. I had rather come with you, Mr. Superintendent. I would rather indeed.”
“Come on then.”
Mr. Witt, who was shaking with nervous fear, caught up his hat and coat. The farther door of the room was flung open. Two pistol shots were fired. As Reggie sprang at the door it was slammed in his face and locked. Mr. Witt went down in a heap. Bell dashed through the outer office into the corridor. Reggie knelt by Mr. Witt.
“Kuyper,” Mr. Witt gasped. “Kuyper.”
“I know. I know. We’ll get him yet. Where’s he gone?”
“His yacht,” Mr. Witt gasped. “Yacht at Gravesend. He had it ready.” He groaned and writhed. He was hit in the shoulder and stomach.
Reggie did what he could for the man, and went to the telephone. He had finished demanding an ambulance when Bell came back breathless, with policemen in uniform at his heels.
“The swine,” Bell gasped. “He’s off, sir. Must have gone down the other staircase into Bull Court. We had a man there but he wouldn’t know there was anything up, he’d only follow. Pray God he don’t lose him. They lost him last night.”
“Send these girls away,” said Mr. Fortune. “Let the constables keep the door. I want to use the telephone.” And when the ambulance had come and taken Mr. Witt, happily unconscious at last, to hospital, he was still talking into the telephone. “Is that clear?” he concluded. “All right. Goodbye.” He hung up the receiver. “Come on, Bell. It’s Gravesend now. This is our busy day.”
“Gravesend?” The superintendent stared.
But it was into a teashop that Reggie plunged when they reached the street. He came out with large paper bags just as a big car turned painfully into Mawdleyn Lane. “Good man,” he smiled upon the chauffeur. “Gravesend police station. And let her out when you can.” With his mouth full he expounded to Superintendent Bell his theory of the evasion of Mr. Kuyper.
As the car drew up in Gravesend a man in plain clothes came out of the police station. “Scotland Yard, sir?” Bell pulled a card out. “Inspector’s down on the beach now. I was to take you to him.”
By the pier the inspector was waiting. He hurried up to their car. “Got him?” said Bell.
“He’s off. You didn’t give us much time. But he’s been here. A man answering to your description hired a motor yacht—cutter with auxiliary engine—six weeks ago. It was rather noticed, being an unusual time of year to start yachting. He’s been down odd times and slept aboard. He seems to have slept aboard last night. I can’t find anyone who’s seen him here to-day. But there’s a longshoreman swears he saw a Tilbury boat go alongside theCyrilla—that’s his yacht—a while since, and theCyrilla’saway.”
“Have you got a fast boat ready for us?”
“At the pier head, sir. Motor launch.”
“Good work,” Reggie smiled. And they hurried on board.
“What’s the job, sir?” The captain of the launch touched his cap.
“Dig out after theCyrilla. You know her, don’t you?”
“I do so. But I reckon she ain’t in sight. What’s the course?”
“Down stream. She’ll be making for the Dutch coast. Are you good for a long run?”
“Surely. And I reckon it will be a long run. She’s fast, isCyrilla. Wind her up, Jim,” and the launch began to throb through the water.
Mr. Fortune retired under the hood and lit his pipe, and Bell followed him. “He’s smart, isn’t he, sir, our Mr. Kuyper? His yacht at Gravesend and he comes down by Tilbury. That’s neat work.”
“Don’t rub it in, Bell. I know I ought to have thought of Tilbury.”
Bell stared at him. “Good Lord, Mr. Fortune, I’m not blaming you, sir.”
“I am,” said Reggie. “It’s an untidy case, Bell. Well, well. I wonder if I’ve missed anything more?”
“I don’t know what you’ve missed, sir. I know I wouldn’t like to be on the run if you were after me.”
Reggie looked at the large, man with a gleam of amusement. “It would be rather joyful, Bell,” he chuckled, and was solemn again. “No. I am not happy.Je n’ai pas de courage. I want Mr. Kuyper.”
It was a grey day. The Essex flats lay dim and sombre. The heights on the southern shore were blurred. Yet they could see far out to the Nore. An east wind was whipping the flood tide into tiny waves, through which the launch clove, making, after the manner of her kind, a great show of speed, leaving the tramps that chunked outward bound as though they lay at anchor.
“Do you see her yet?” Reggie asked the captain.
“Maybe that’s her,” he pointed to a dim line on the horizon beyond the lightship, a sailless mast, if it was anything. “Maybe not.” He spat over the side.
“Are you gaining on her?”
“I reckon we’re coming up, sir.”
“What’s that thing doing?” Reggie pointed to a long low black craft near the Nore.
“Destroyer, sir. Engines stopped.”
“Run down to her, will you? How does one address the Navy, Bell? I feel shy. Ask him if he’s the duty destroyer of the Nore Command, will you?”
“Good Lord, sir,” said Bell.
The captain of the launch hailed. “Duty destroyer, sir?”
“Aye, aye. Scotland Yard launch? Come alongside.”
“Thank God for the Navy, as the soldier said,” Mr. Fortune murmured. “Perhaps it will be warmer on board her.”
“I say, sir, did you order a destroyer out?”
“Oh, I asked Lomas to turn out the Navy. I thought we might want ’em.”
Superintendent Bell gazed at him. “And you say you forget things,” he said. “Witt’s shot and all in a minute you have all this in your head.”
They climbed a most unpleasant ladder. A young lieutenant received them. “You gentlemen got a job of work for us?”
“A motor yacht, cutter rig, nameCyrilla, left Gravesend an hour or two ago, probably making for the Dutch coast. There’s a man on board that’s badly wanted.”
“Can do,” the lieutenant smiled and ran up to the bridge. “Starboard five. Half ahead both.” He spoke into a voice pipe. “You’d better come up here,” he called to them. “We’ll whack her up as we go.”
The destroyer began to quiver gently to the purr of the turbines. Reggie cowered under the wind screen. The speed grew and grew and the destroyer sat down on her stern and on either side white waves rushed from the high sharp bow. “Who is your friend on the yacht?” the lieutenant smiled.
“His last is attempted murder. But that was only this morning.”
“You fellows don’t lose much time,” said the lieutenant with more respect. “You seem to want him bad.”
“I could bear to see him,” said Reggie. “He interests me as a medical man.”
“Medical?” the lieutenant stared at him.
“Quite a lot of crime is medical,” said Reggie.
The lieutenant gave it up and again asked for more speed and began to use his binoculars. “There’s a cutter rig,” he pointed at something invisible. “Not under sail. Laying a course for Flushing. That’s good enough, what?”
The destroyer came up fast. A white hull was revealed to the naked eye. The lieutenant spoke to his signalman and flags fluttered above the bridge. “Not answered. D’ye think your friend’ll put up a scrap?”
“I dare say he will, if his crew will stand for it.”
“Praise God,” said the lieutenant. “Will they have any arms?”
“Pistols, likely,” said Bell.
“Well! She isCyrilla.” He picked up a megaphone and roared through it. “The cutter!Cyrilla!Stop your engine!”
There was some movement on the yacht’s deck. She did stop her engine or slow. A shot was heard. She started her engine again and again stopped. A man ran aft and held up his hand. The destroyer drew abeam and the lieutenant said what occurred to him of yachts which did not obey Navy signals. There was no answer. A little knot of men on theCyrillagazed at the destroyer.
“You fellows going aboard her? Got guns? I’ll give you an armed boat’s crew.”
Behind the destroyer’s sub-lieutenant Bell and Reggie came to the yacht’s deck. “Where’s the captain? Don’t you know enough to read signals?” Thus the sub-lieutenant began.
“Where’s Mr. Kuyper?” said Bell.
“We didn’t understand your signals, sir.” The captain licked his lips. “Don’t know anything about a Mr. Kuyper. We’ve got a Mr. Hotten, a Dutch gentleman. He’s my owner, as you might say.”
“Where is he?”
“Down the engine-room. It was him fired at the engineer to make him start her up again when I ’ad stopped. I laid him out with a spanner.”
“Bring him up,” Bell said.
A slim spruce body was laid on the deck, precisely the Julius Kuyper of Tommy Owen’s description. Reggie knelt down beside him.
“He ain’t dead, is he?” said the yacht’s captain anxiously.
But the stertorous breath of Mr. Kuyper could be heard. “My only aunt,” Reggie muttered.
“What’s the matter, sir?”
“Man hasn’t got a heart. This is very unusual. Good Lord! Heart well over on the right side. Heterotaxy very marked. Quite unusual. Ah! That’s more to the point. He’s had an operation on the thyroid gland. Yes. Just so.” He smiled happily.
“What was that word you said, sir?”
“Heterotaxy? Oh, it only means he’s got his things all over on the wrong side.”
“Then I know him!” Bell cried. “I thought I knew the look of him, as old as he is now. It’s Lawton, sir, Lawton of the big bank frauds. He went off with fifty thousand or more. Before your time, but you must have heard of it. Did a clear getaway.”
“And that’s that,” said Reggie. “Now we know.”
* * * * * *
Some days afterwards the Hon. Sidney Lomas called on Mr. Fortune, who was at the moment making a modest supper of devilled sole. “Did you clear it up?” he said.
“Try that champagne. It’s young but has distinction. Oh yes. Dr. Wilton quite agrees with me. A faulty thyroid gland is the root of the trouble.”
“I don’t want to hear about Mr. Kuyper Lawton’s diseases. I——”
“My dear fellow! But that is the whole case. Mr. Kuyper-Lawton is undoubtedly a man of great ability. But there was always a cachexis of the thyroid gland. This caused a certain mental instability. Unsound judgment. Violence of temper. It’s quite common.”
“Is it though?” said Lomas. “And why was he violent to poor Wilton?”
“Well, Lawton got clean away after his bank frauds, as you know——”
“I know all about Lawton. He lived on the plunder in Holland as Adrian Hotten and flourished till the war. Then he lost most of his money backing Germany to win. In the end of 1917 he went off to Russia. This year he turned up in London as Julius Kuyper, talking about Russian finance and selling Russian jewels.”
“Quite so. Well, in February he was in a motor accident in Cavendish Square. A lorry hit his car and he was thrown out and stunned. The unfortunate Wilton was passing and gave him first-aid, and discovered that his heart was on the wrong side. He came to under Wilton’s hands. I suppose Wilton showed a little too much interest. Anyhow, Mr. Kuyper saw that the malformation which would identify him with Lawton of the bank frauds was known to the young doctor. Well, he kept his head then. He was very grateful. He asked for Wilton’s card. And Wilton never heard any more of him. But Wilton was interested in this striking case of heterotaxy. He noted the number of the car, found the garage from which it was hired and went round to ask who the man was. They wouldn’t tell him, but the chauffeur, I suppose, told Mr. Kuyper the doctor was asking after him. He sent Witt to take a flat over Wilton’s and find out what Wilton was up to. I take it Mr. Kuyper was doing mighty good business in London and didn’t want to run away. He needn’t have bothered—but that’s the man all over, brilliantly ingenious and no judgment. That thyroid of his! Wilton had come to know the local detective-inspector, that poor chap who committed suicide. I’m mighty sorry for that fellow, Lomas. He was so keen against Wilton because he was afraid of not doing his duty when he liked the man—and then he found he’d blundered into giving false evidence against his friend. I don’t wonder he chose to die.”
“Conscience makes fools of us all,” said Lomas.
“Yes. Yes. Poor beggar. And no wonder Wilton was bitter against him. Well, Kuyper decided that Wilton with his curiosity and his friend in the police wasn’t safe at large. First they tried to ship him out of the country and he wouldn’t go. So they put up the burglary. I suppose Witt or Witt’s friend the sham Dutch journalist is a Hun. That accounts for the Rauch-tabak and the German keys.”
“Lawton-Kuyper has done a lot of business with Germany himself.”
“Yes. He ought to have been on the great General Staff. The right type of mind. One of our native Prussians. An able man—a very able man. If his thyroid had been healthy!”
CASE IV
ANIGHTINGALE began to sing in the limes. Mr. Fortune smiled through his cigar smoke at the moon and slid lower into his chair. In the silver light his garden was a wonderland. He could see fairies dancing on the lawn. The fine odour of the cigar was glorified by the mingled fragrance of the night, the spicy scent of the lime flowers borne on a wind which came from the river over meadowsweet and hay. The music of the nightingale was heard through the soft murmur of the weir stream.
The head of the Criminal Investigation Department was arguing that the case of the Town Clerk of Barchester offered an example of the abuse of the simple poisons in married life.
Mr. Reginald Fortune, though his chief adviser, said no word.
The head of the Criminal Investigation Department came at last to an end. “That’s the case, then.” He stood up and knocked over his coffee cup: a tinkling clatter, a profound silence and then only the murmur of the water. The nightingale was gone. “Well, Fortune?”
Mr. Fortune sighed and raised himself. “Dear me, Lomas,” he said sadly, “why don’t you find something to do?”
The Hon. Sidney Lomas suffered from a sense of wrong and said so. It was a difficult and complex case and had given him much anxiety and he wanted Fortune’s advice and——
“She did him in all right,” said Reggie Fortune succinctly, “and you’ll never find a jury to hang her. Why don’t you bring me something interesting?”
Lomas then complained of him, pointing out that a policeman’s life was not a happy one, that he did not arrange or even choose the crimes of his country. “Interesting? Good Gad, do you suppose I am interested in this female Bluebeard? I know my job’s not interesting. Work’s work.”
“And eggs is eggs. You have no soul, Lomas.” Reggie Fortune stood up. “Come and have a drink.” He led the way from the dim veranda into his study and switched on the light. “Now that,” he pointed to a pale purple fluid, “that is a romantic liqueur: it feels just like a ghost story: I brought it back from the Pyrenees.”
“Whisky,” said Lomas morosely.
“My dear chap, are we down-hearted?”
“You should go to Scotland Yard, Fortune.” Lomas clung to his grievance. “Perhaps you would find it interesting. What do you think they brought me this afternoon? Some poor devil had an epileptic fit in the British Museum.”
“Well, well”—Reggie Fortune sipped his purple liqueur—“the British Museum has made me feel queer. But not epileptic. On the contrary. Sprightly fellow. This is a nice story. Go on Lomas.”
“That’s all,” Lomas snapped. “Interesting, isn’t it?”
“Then why Scotland Yard? You’re not an hospital for nervous diseases. Or are you, Lomas?”
“I wonder,” said Lomas bitterly. “Why Scotland Yard? Just so. Why? Because they’ve lost an infernal pebble in the fray. And will I find it for them please? Most interesting case.”
Reggie Fortune took another cigar and composed himself for comfort. “Begin at the beginning,” he advised, “and relate all facts without passion or recrimination.”
“There are no facts, confound you. It was in the Ethnological Gallery of the British Museum—where nobody ever goes. Some fellow did go and had a fit. He broke one of the glass cases in his convulsions. They picked him up and he came round. He was very apologetic, left them a fiver to pay for the glass and an address in New York. He was an American doing Europe and just off to France with his family. When they looked over the case afterwards they found one of the stones in it was gone. The epilept couldn’t have taken it, poor devil. Anybody who was in the gallery might have pocketed it in the confusion. Most likely a child. The thing is only a pebble with some paint on it. A pundit from the Museum came to me with his hair on end and wanted me to sift London for it. I asked him what it was worth and he couldn’t tell me. Only an anthropologist would want the thing, he said. It seems an acquired taste. I haven’t acquired it. I told him this was my busy day.”
Reggie Fortune smiled benignly. “But this is art,” he said. “This is alluring, Lomas. Have you cabled to New York?”
“Have I——?” Lomas stopped his whisky on the way to his mouth. “No, Fortune, I have not cabled New York. Nor have I sent for the military. The British Museum is still without a garrison.”
“Well, you know, this gentleman with the fit may be a collector.”
“Oh, Lord, no. It was a real fit. No deception. They had a doctor to him.”
Reggie Fortune was much affected. “There speaks the great heart of the people. The doctor always knows! I love your simple faith, Lomas. It cheers me. But I’m a doctor myself. My dear chap, has no one ever murmured into the innocence of Scotland Yard that a fit can be faked?”
“I dare say I am credulous,” said Lomas. “But I draw the line somewhere. If you ask me to believe that a fellow shammed epilepsy, cut himself and spent a fiver to pick up a pebble, I draw it there.”
“That’s the worst of credulity. It’s always sceptical in the wrong place. What was this pebble like?”
Lomas reached for a writing-pad and drew the likeness of a fat cigar, upon which parallel to each other were two zigzag lines. “A greenish bit of stone, with those marks in red. That’s the Museum man’s description. If it had been old, which it isn’t, it would have been agalet coloré. And if it had come from Australia, which it didn’t, it would have been a chu-chu something——”
“Churinga.”
“That’s the word. The pundit from the Museum says it came from Borneo. They don’t know what the marks mean, but the thing is a sort of mascot in Borneo: a high-class insurance policy. The fellow who holds it can’t die. So the simple Bornese don’t part with their pebbles easily. There isn’t another known in Europe. That’s where it hurts the Museum pundit. He says it’s priceless. I told him marbles were selling thirty a penny. Nice round marbles, all colours.”
“Yes. You have no soul, Lomas.”
“I dare say. I’m busy.”
“With toxic spouses!” said Reggie reproachfully. “Green, was it? Green quartz, I suppose, or perhaps jade with the pattern in oxide of iron.”
“And I expect some child has swopped it for a green apple.”
“Lomas dear,” Mr. Fortune expostulated, “this is romance. Ten thousand years ago the cave men in France painted these patterns on stones. And still in Borneo there’s men making them for magic. Big magic. A charm against death. And some bright lad comes down to Bloomsbury and throws a fit to steal one. My hat, he’s the heir of all the ages! I could bear to meet this epilept.”
“I couldn’t,” said Lomas. “I have to meet quite enough of the weak-minded officially.”
But Reggie Fortune was deaf to satire. “A magic stone,” he murmured happily.
“Oh, take the case by all means,” said Lomas. “I’m glad I’ve brought you something that really interests you. Let me know when you find the pebble,” and announcing that he had a day’s work to do on the morrow, he went with an air of injury to bed.
It was an enemy (a K.C. after a long and vain cross-examination) who said that Mr. Fortune has a larger mass of useless knowledge than any man in England. Mr. Fortune has been heard to explain his eminence in the application of science to crime by explaining that he knows nothing thoroughly but a little of everything, thus preserving an open mind. This may account for his instant conviction that there was something for him in the matter of the magic stone. Or will you prefer to believe with Superintendent Bell that he has some singular faculty for feeling other men’s minds at work, a sort of sixth sense? This is mystical, and no one is less of a mystic than Reggie Fortune.
To the extreme discomfort of Lomas he filled the time which their car took in reaching London with a lecture on the case. He found that three explanations were possible. The stone might have been stolen by some one who believed in its magical power, or by some one who coveted it for a collection, or by some one who meant to sell it to a collector.
“Why stop?” Lomas yawned. “It might have been snapped up by a kleptomaniac or an ostrich or a lunatic. Or perhaps some chap wanted to crack a nut. Or a winkle. Does one crack winkles?”
Reggie went on seriously. He thought it unlikely that the thing was stolen as a charm.
“Oh, don’t lose heart,” said Lomas. “Why not put it down to a brave from Borneo? The original owner comes over in his war paint to claim his long lost magic stone. Malay runs amuck in Museum. That would go well in the papers. Very plausible too. Compare the mysterious Indians who are always hunting down their temple jewels in novels.”
“Lomas, you have a futile mind. Of course some fellow might want it for an amulet. It’s not only savages who believe in charms. How many men carried a mascot through the war? But your epileptic friend with the New York address don’t suggest this simple faith. I suspect a collector.”
“Well, I’ll believe anything of collectors,” Lomas admitted. “They collect heads in Borneo, don’t they? I know a fellow who collects shoes. Scalps or stamps or press-cuttings, it’s all very sad.”
“I want you to cable to New York and verify this epilept. Which I do not think. I’m going to look about for him here.”
“My dear Fortune!” Lomas sat up and put up an eyeglass to examine him. “Are you well? This is zeal. But what exactly are you looking for?”
“That’s what I want to find out,” said Reggie, and having left Lomas at Scotland Yard made a round of calls.
It is believed that there is no class or trade, from bargees to bishops, in which Reggie Fortune has not friends. The first he sought was a dealer in exotic curiosities. From him, not without diplomatic suppression of the truth, Mr. Fortune made sure that magic stones from Borneo were nothing accounted of in the trade, seldom seen and never sought. It was obvious that the subject did not interest his dealer, who could not tell where Mr. Fortune would find such a thing. Old Demetrius Jacob was as likely a man as any.
“Queer name,” said Mr. Fortune.
“Queer fish,” he was informed. “Syrian, you know, with a bit of Greek. A lot of odd small stuff goes his way.”
Mr. Fortune filed Demetrius Jacob for reference and visited another friend, a wholesale draper, whose real interest in life was his collection of objects of savage art. A still more diplomatic economy of the truth brought out the fact that the draper did not possess a magic stone of Borneo, and would do and pay a good deal to obtain one. He was excited by the mere thought. And Reggie Fortune watching him as he expanded on the theme of magic stones, said to himself: “Yes, old thing, a collector is the nigger in this wood pile.” The draper returning to the cold reality mourned that his collection lacked this treasure, and cheered up again at the thought that nobody else had it.
“Nobody?” said Reggie Fortune. “Really?”
The draper was annoyed. “Well, I know old Tetherdown hasn’t. And he has the best collection in England. Of course with his money he can do anything.”
Reggie Fortune neatly diverting the conversation to harmless subjects, consulted his encyclopædic memory about old Tetherdown.
Lord Tetherdown was a little gentleman of middle age, reputed by connoisseurs to be the shabbiest in London. He inherited great wealth and used it by living like a hermit and amassing an anthropological collection. That afternoon saw Reggie Fortune knocking at a little house in a back street of Mayfair. The door was opened by an old woman in an overall. Lord Tetherdown was not at home. Reggie Fortune exhibited great surprise. “Really? But I counted on seeing him. Can you tell me when he’ll be back?”
“No, I can’t; he’s away.”
It appeared to Reggie that she was ill at ease. “Away?” he repeated. “Oh, that’s absurd. When did he go?”
“He was off last night.”
“Really? But didn’t he say when he’d be back?”
“No, he didn’t, young man.”
“It’s amazing.”
“I don’t know what call you have to be amazed, neither,” she cried.
“But I counted on seeing him to-day,” Reggie explained. “I had better come in and write a note.”
The old woman did not seem to think so, but she let him in and took him to a little room. Reggie Fortune caught his breath. For the place was ineffably musty. It was also very full. There was hardly space for both him and the woman. Cabinets lined the walls; and in the corners, in between the cabinets, on top, on the mantel and the window sill were multitudes of queer things. A large and diabolical mask of red feathers towered above him, and he turned from it to see a row of glittering little skulls made of rock crystal and lapis lazuli and carved with hideous realism. On the door hung a cloak made of many coloured bird skins and a necklace of human teeth with the green image of a demon as pendant. A golden dragon with crystal eyes gaped on the sideboard over the whisky decanter.
Reggie showed no surprise. He slid into a chair by the table and looked at the old woman. “I don’t know what you want that you can’t say,” she grumbled, unlocked a desk and put before him one sheet of paper, one envelope, pen and ink.
“Well, it’s about a curio,” Reggie smiled upon her.
“The good Lord knows we’ve enough of them,” she cried. “That’s what took him away now.”
Reggie showed no interest and naturally, while he went on writing that Mr. Fortune was anxious to consult Lord Tetherdown on a matter of anthropology, she went on talking. He learnt that it was a gentleman coming about a curio who took Lord Tetherdown away the night before, and she made it plain that she thought little of gentlemen who came about curios.
“Didn’t he say when he would be back?” Reggie asked as he stood up to go.
“Not a word, I tell you.”
“Well, that’s strange.”
“Strange, is it? It’s plain you don’t know the master, young man. He’d go to the end of kingdom come for his pretties.”
“I hope he hasn’t gone as far as that,” said Reggie. He saw as he turned the corner of the street that she was still looking after him. “She knows more than she says,” he told himself, “or she’s more rattled than she’ll let on.” He went to Scotland Yard.
Lomas was pleased to see him. “And how do you like marbles, Fortune?” he said genially. “An intellectual game, I’m told. The glass ones are the trumps now, Bell says. I’m afraid you’re old-fashioned. Stone isn’t used by the best people.”
“Breakin’ upon this merry persiflage,” said Reggie, “have you heard from New York?”
“New York is silent. Probably stunned by your searching question. But the American Embassy speaks. Where’s that report, Bell?”
Superintendent Bell, with an apologetic smile, for he always liked Mr. Fortune, read out: “James L. Beeton is a well-known and opulent citizen now travelling in Europe for his health. Present address not known.”
“For his health, mark you,” Lomas added.
“Yes. There is some good intelligence work in this business. But not at Scotland Yard.”
“He is very harsh with us, Bell. I fear he has had a bad day. The marbles ran badly for him. My dear Fortune, I always told you there was nothing in it.”
“You did,” said Reggie grimly. “I’ll forgive you, but I won’t promise to forget. Do you know Lord Tetherdown?”
“The little rag bag who collects rags and bones? He has been a joke this ten years.”
“Lord Tetherdown is a very wealthy man,” said Superintendent Bell with respect.
“Yes. He’s gone. Now Lomas, stemming your cheery wit, apply your mind to this. Yesterday morning a rare specimen was stolen from the British Museum. Yesterday evening Lord Tetherdown, who collects such things, who hasn’t got that particular thing and would pay through the nose to get it, was called on by a man about a curio. Lord Tetherdown went out and vanished.”
“My dear fellow!” Lomas put up his eyeglass. “I admire your imagination. But what is it you want me to believe? That Tetherdown arranged for this accursed stone to be stolen?”
“I doubt that,” said Reggie thoughtfully.
“So do I. He’s a meek shy little man. Well then, did the thief try to sell it to Tetherdown? Why should that make Tetherdown run away?”
“It might decoy him away.”
Lomas stared at him, apparently trying to believe that he was real. “My dear fellow!” he protested. “Oh, my dear fellow! This is fantastic. Why should anyone suddenly decoy little Tetherdown? He never made an enemy. He would have nothing on him to steal. It’s an old joke that he don’t carry the worth of a shilling. He has lived in that hovel with his two old fogeys of servants for years and sometimes he goes off mysteriously and the fellows in his club only notice he has been away when he blows in again.”
“You’re a born policeman, Lomas,” Reggie sighed. “You’re so commonplace.”
“Quite, quite,” said Lomas heartily. “Now tell me. You’ve been to Tetherdown’s place. Did his servants say they were surprised he had gone off?”
“The old dame said he often went off on a sudden,” Reggie admitted, and Lomas laughed. “Well, what about it? You won’t do anything?”
“My dear Fortune, I’m only a policeman, as you say. I can’t act without some reason.”
“Oh, my aunt!” said Reggie. “Reasons! Good night. Sleep sound.”
In comfortable moments since he has been heard to confess that Lomas was perfectly right, that there was nothing which the police could have done, but he is apt to diverge into an argument that policemen are creatures whose function in the world is to shut the stable door after the horse is stolen. A pet theory of his.
He went to the most solemn of his clubs and having soothed his feelings with muffins, turned up Lord Tetherdown in the peerage. The house of Tetherdown took little space. John William Bishop Coppett was the seventh baron, but his ancestors were not distinguished and the family was dwindling. John William Lord Tetherdown had no male kin alive but his heir, who was his half-brother, the Hon. George Bishop Coppett. The Hon. George seemed from his clubs to be a sportsman. Mr. Fortune meditated.
On his way home he called upon the Hon. George, whose taste in dwellings and servants was different from his half-brother’s. Mr. Coppett had a flat in a vast, new and gorgeous block. His door was opened by a young man who used a good tailor and was very wide awake. But Mr. Coppett, like Lord Tetherdown, was not at home. His man, looking more knowing than ever, did not think it would be of any use to call again. Oh, no, sir, Mr. Coppett was not out of town: he would certainly be back that night: but (something like a wink flickered on the young man’s face) too late to see anyone. If the gentleman would ring up in the morning—not too early—Reggie Fortune said that it didn’t much matter.
He went off to dine with her whom he describes as his friskier sister: the one who married a bishop. It made him sleep sound.
Thus the case of the magic stone was left to ferment for some fifteen hours. For which Mr. Fortune has been heard to blame himself and the conjugal bliss of bishops.
Over a devilled sole at breakfast—nature demanded piquant food—his mind again became active. He rang for his car. Sam, his admirable chauffeur, was told that he preferred to drive himself, which is always in him a sign of mental excitement. “Country work, sir?” Sam asked anxiously, for he holds that only on Salisbury Plain should Mr. Fortune be allowed to drive. Mr. Fortune shook his head, and Sam swallowed and they came down upon Oxford Street like the wolf on the fold. The big car was inserted, a camel into the eye of a needle, into the alleyway where Lord Tetherdown’s house lurks.
Again the old woman in the overall was brought to the door. She recognized Reggie Fortune and liked him less than ever. “There’s no answer,” she cried. “The master’s not back.”
“Really?”
“You heard what I said.”
“He’s not let you know when he’s coming back?”
“No, he hasn’t, nor I’ve no call to tell you if he had. You and your curios!” The door slammed.
Reggie went back to his car. When it stopped again in a shabby street by Covent Garden, Sam allowed himself to cough, his one protest from first to last: a devoted fellow. Reggie Fortune surveyed the shop of Demetrius Jacob, which displayed in its dirty window shelves sparsely covered with bad imitations of old pewter. Reggie frowned at it, looked at the name again and went in. The place was like a lumber room. He saw nothing but damaged furniture which had never been good and little of that until he found out that the dusty thing on which he was standing was an exquisite Chinese carpet. Nobody was in the shop, nobody came, though the opening door had rung a bell. He made it ring again and still had to wait. Then there swept through the place a woman, a big woman and handsome in her dark oriental way. She did not see Reggie, she was too hurried or too angry, if her flush and her frown were anger. She banged the door and was gone.
Reggie rapped on a rickety desk. After a moment an old man shuffled into the shop, made something like a salaam and said: “You want, Yes?” Not so old after all, Reggie decided on a second glance. He shuffled because his slippers were falling off, he was bent because he cringed, his yellow face was keen and healthy and his eyes bright under black brows, but certainly a queer figure in that tight frock coat which came nearly to his heels, and his stiff green skull cap.
“Mr. Jacob?” Reggie said.
“I am Demetrius Jacob,” he pronounced it in the Greek way.
“Well, I am interested in savage religions and cults you know, and I’m told you are the man for me.” Mr. Jacob again made salaam. “What I’m after just now is charms and amulets.” He paused and suddenly rapped out: “Have you got anything from Borneo?”
Demetrius Jacob showed no surprise or any other emotion. “Borneo? Oh, yes, I t’ink,” he smiled. “Beautiful t’ings.” He shuffled to a cupboard and brought out a tray which contained two skulls and a necklace of human teeth.
Reggie Fortune was supercilious. He demanded amulets, stone amulets and in particular a stone amulet like a cigar with zigzag painting.
Demetrius Jacob shook his head. “I not ’ave ’im,” he said sadly. “Not from Borneo. I ’ave beautifulgalets colorésfrom France, yes, and Russia. But not the east. I never see ’im from the east but in the Museum.”
Reggie Fortune went away thinking that it took a clever fellow to be as guileless as that.
The car plunged through Piccadilly again to the flat of the Hon. George Coppett. Mr. Coppett’s man received him with a smile which was almost a leer. “I’ll see, sir,” he took Reggie’s card. “I’m afraid Mr. Coppett’s partic’larly busy.” As Reggie was ushered in he heard a bell ring and a woman’s voice high and angry, “Oh, yes, I will go. But I do not believe you, not one word.” A door was flung open and across the hall swept the big woman of Demetrius Jacob’s shop. Reggie looked into the crown of his hat. She stopped short and stared hard at him. Either she did not recognize him or did not care who he was. She hurried on and the door banged behind her.
The Hon. George Coppett was a little man who walked like a bird. “Damn it, damn it,” he piped, jumping about, “what the devil are you at, Brown?” He stared at Mr. Fortune, and Brown gave him Mr. Fortune’s card. “Hallo, don’t know you, do I? I’m in the devil of a hurry.”
“I think you had better see me, Mr. Coppett,” said Reggie. Mr. Coppett swore again and bade him come in.
Mr. Coppett gave himself some whisky. “I say, women are the devil,” he said as he wiped his mouth. “Have one?” he nodded to the decanter. “No? Well, what’s your trouble, Mr.—Mr. Fortune?”
“I am anxious to have some news of Lord Tetherdown.”
“Well, why don’t you ask him?” Mr. Coppett laughed.
“He’s not to be found.”
“What, gone off again, has he? Lord, he’s always at it. My dear chap, he’s simply potty about his curios. I don’t know the first thing about them, but it beats me how a fellow can fall for that old junk. One of the best and all that don’t you know, but it’s a mania with him. He’s always running off after some queer bit of tripe.”
“When do you expect him back?”
“Search me,” Mr. Coppett laughed. “My dear chap, he don’t tell me his little game. Old Martha might know.”
“She doesn’t.”
Mr. Coppett laughed again. “He always was a close old thing. He just pushes off, don’t you know, on any old scent. And after a bit he blows in again.”
“Then—you don’t know—when you’ll see him again?” Reggie said slowly.
“Give you my word I don’t,” Mr. Coppett cried. “Sorry, sorry.”
“So am I,” said Reggie. “Good morning, Mr. Coppett.”
Mr. Coppett did not try to keep him. But he was hardly beyond the outer door of the flat when he heard Mr. Coppett say, “Hallo, hallo!” He turned. The door was still shut. Mr. Coppett was using the telephone. He heard “Millfield, double three” something and could not hear anything more. Millfield, as you know, is a quiet middle-class suburb. Mr. Fortune went down stairs pensively.
Pensive he was still when he entered Scotland Yard and sought Lomas’s room. “Well, how goes the quest for the holy stone?” Lomas put up his eyeglass. “My dear Fortune, you’re the knight of the rueful countenance.”
“You’re confused, Lomas. Don’t do it,” Reggie complained. “You’re not subtle at Scotland Yard, but hang it, you might be clear.”
“What can we do for you?”
“One of your largest cigars,” Reggie mumbled and took it. “Yes. What can you do? I wonder.” He looked at Lomas with a baleful eye. “Who lives at Millfield? Speaking more precisely who lives at Millfield double three something?” Lomas suggested that it was a large order. “It is,” Reggie agreed gloomily, “it’s a nasty large order.” And he described his morning’s work. “There you are. The further you go the queerer.”
“Quite, quite,” Lomas nodded. “But what’s your theory, Fortune?”
“The workin’ hypothesis is that there’s dirty work doin’ when a magic stone gets stolen and the man who wants the magic stone vanishes on the same day: which is confirmed when a female connected with a chap who knows all about magic stones is found colloguin’ with the vanished man’s heir: and further supported when that heir being rattled runs to telephone to the chaste shades of Millfield—the last place for a sporting blood like him to keep his pals. I ask you, who lives at Millfield double three something?”
Lomas shifted his papers. “George Coppett stands to gain by Tetherdown’s death, of course,” he said. “And the only man so far as we know. But he’s not badly off, he’s well known, there’s never been anything against him. Why should he suddenly plan to do away with his brother? All your story might be explained in a dozen ways. There’s not an ounce of evidence, Fortune.”
“You like your evidence after the murder. I know that. My God, Lomas, I’m afraid.”
“My dear fellow!” Lomas was startled. “This isn’t like you.”
“Oh, many thanks. I don’t like men dying, that’s all. Professional prejudice. I’m a doctor, you see. What the devil are we talking for? Who lives at Millfield double three something?”
“We might get at it,” Lomas said doubtfully and rang for Superintendent Bell. “But it’s a needle in a bundle of hay. And if Tetherdown was to be murdered, it’s done by now.”
“Yes, that’s comforting,” said Mr. Fortune.
Superintendent Bell brought a list of the subscribers to the Millfield exchange and they looked over the names of those in the thirty-fourth hundred. Most were shopkeepers and ruled out. “George Coppett don’t buy his fish in Millfield,” said Reggie Fortune. Over the doctors he hesitated.
“You think it’s some fellow in your own trade?” Lomas smiled. “Well, there’s nothing like leather.”
“Brownrigg,” Reggie Fortune muttered. “I know him. 3358 Dr. Jerdan, The Ferns, Chatham Park Road. Where’s a medical directory? 3358 Dr. Jerdan is not in the medical directory. Ring up the divisional inspector and ask him what he knows about Dr. Jerdan.”
There was nothing, Superintendent Bell announced, known against Dr. Jerdan. He had been at the Ferns some time. He didn’t practise. He was said to take in private patients.
“Come on,” said Reggie Fortune, and took the Superintendent’s arm.
“My dear Fortune,” Lomas protested. “This is a bow at a venture. We can’t act, you know. Bell can’t appear.”
“Bell’s coming to be a policeman and appear when it’s all over. I’m going in to Dr. Jerdan who isn’t on the register. And I don’t like it, Lomas. Bell shall stay outside. And if I don’t come out again—well, then you’ll have evidence, Lomas.”
Neither Reggie Fortune nor his chauffeur knew the way about in Millfield. They sat together and Mr. Fortune with a map of London exhorted Sam at the wheel and behind them Superintendent Bell held tight and thought of his sins.
The car came by many streets of little drab houses to a road in which the houses were large and detached, houses which had been rural villas when Victoria was queen. “Now go easy,” Reggie Fortune said. “Chatham Park Road, Bell. Quiet and respectable as the silent tomb. My God, look at that! Stop, Sam.”
What startled him was a hospital nurse on a doorstep.
“Who is she, sir?” Bell asked.
“She’s Demetrius Jacob’s friend and George Coppett’s friend—and now she’s Dr. Jerdan’s friend and in nurse’s rig. Keep the car back here. Don’t frighten them.”
He jumped out and hurried on to the Ferns. “I don’t like it, young fellow, and that’s a fact,” said Bell, and Sam nodded.
The woman had been let in. Mr. Fortune stood a moment surveying the house which was as closely curtained as all the rest and like them stood back with a curving drive to the door. He rang the bell, had no answer, rang again, knocked and knocked more loudly. It sounded thunderous in the heavy quiet of the Chatham Park Road.
At last the door was opened by a man, a lanky powerful fellow who scowled at Mr. Fortune and said, “We ain’t deaf.”
“I have been kept waiting,” said Reggie. “Dr. Jerdan, please.”
“Not at home.”
“Oh, I think so. Dr. Jerdan will see me.”
“Don’t see anyone but by appointment.”
“Dr. Jerdan will see me. Go and tell him so.” The door was shut in his face. After a moment or two he began knocking again. It was made plain to all the Chatham Park Road that something was happening at the Ferns and here and there a curtain fluttered.
Superintendent Bell got out of the car. “You stay here, son,” he said. “Don’t stop the engine.”
But before he reached the house, the door was opened and Reggie Fortune saw a sleek man who smiled with all his teeth. “So sorry you have been waiting,” he purred. “I am Dr. Jerdan’s secretary. What can I do for you?”
“Dr. Jerdan will see me.”
“Oh, no, I’m afraid not. Dr. Jerdan’s not at home.”
“Why say so?” said Reggie wearily. “Dr. Jerdan, please.”
“You had better tell me your business, sir.”
“Haven’t you guessed? Lord Tetherdown.”
“Lord who?” said the sleek man without a check. “I don’t know anything about Lord Tetherdown.”
“But then you’re only Dr. Jerdan’s secretary,” Reggie murmured.
Something of respect was to be seen in the pale eyes that studied him, and, after a long stare, “I’ll see what I can do. Come in, sir. What’s your name?” He thrust his head forward like an animal snapping, but still he smiled.
“Fortune. Reginald Fortune.”
“This way.” The sleek man led him down a bare hall and showed him into a room at the back. “Do sit down, Mr. Fortune. But I’m afraid you won’t see Dr. Jerdan.” He slid out. Reggie heard the key turn in the lock. He glanced at the window. That was barred.
“Quite so,” said Reggie. “Now how long will Bell wait?”
He took his stand so that he would be behind the door if it were opened, and listened. There was a scurry of feet and some other sound. The feet fell silent, the other sound became a steady tapping. “Good God, are they nailing him down?” he muttered, took up a chair and dashed it at the lock again and again. As he broke out he heard the beat of a motor engine.
Superintendent Bell drawing near saw a car with two men up come out of the coach-house of the Ferns. He ran into the road and stood in its way. It drove straight at him, gathering speed. He made a jump for the footboard, and being a heavy man missed. The car shot by.
The respectability of Chatham Park Road then heard such a stream of swearing as never had flowed that way. For Sam has a mother’s love of his best car. But he was heroic. He swung its long body out across the road, swearing, but nevertheless. The fugitives from the Ferns took a chance which was no chance. Their car mounted the pavement, hit a gate-post and crashed.
Superintendent Bell arrived to find Sam backing his own car to the kerb while he looked complacently at its shining sides. “Not a scratch, praise God,” he said.
Superintendent Bell pulled up. “You’re a wonder, you are,” he said, and gazed at the ruins. The smashed car was on its side in a jumble of twisted iron and bricks. The driver was underneath. They could not move him. There were reasons why that did not matter to him. “He’s got his,” said Sam. “Where’s the other? There were two of them.”
The other lay half hidden in a laurel hedge. He had been flung out, he had broken the railings with his head, he had broken the stone below, but his head was a gruesome shape.
In the hall of the Ferns Reggie Fortune stood still to listen. That muffled tapping was the only sound in the house. It came from below. He went down dark stairs into the kitchen. No one was there. The sound came from behind a doorway in the corner. He flung it open and looked down into the blackness of a cellar. He struck a light and saw a bundle lying on the ground, a bundle from which stuck out two feet that tapped at the cellar steps. He brought it up to the kitchen. It was a woman with her head and body in a sack. When he had cut her loose he saw the dark face of the woman of the shop and the flat. She sprang at him and grasped his arms.
“Who are you?” she cried. “Where is Lord Tetherdown?”
“My name is Fortune, madame. And yours?”
“I am Melitta Jacob. What is that to you? Where have you put Lord Tetherdown?”
“I am looking for him.”
“You! Is he not here? Oh, you shall pay for it, you and those others.”
But Reggie was already running upstairs. One room and another he tried in vain and at last at the top of the house found a locked door. The key was in the lock. Inside on a pallet bed, but clothed, lay a little man with some days’ beard. The woman thrust Reggie away and flung herself down by the bedside and gathered the man to her bosom moaning over him. “My lord, my lord.”
“Oh, my aunt!” said Reggie Fortune. “Now, Miss Jacob, please,” he put his hand on her shoulder.
“He is mine,” she said fiercely.
“Well, just now he’s mine. I’m a doctor.”
“Oh, is he not dead?” she cried.
“Not exactly,” said Reggie Fortune. “Not yet.” He took the body from quivering arms.
“What is it, then?”
“He is drugged, and I should say starved. If you——” a heavy footstep drew near. She sprang up ready for battle, and in the doorway fell upon Superintendent Bell.
“Easy, easy,” he received her on his large chest and made sure of her wrists. “Mr. Fortune—just got in by the window—what about this?”
“That’s all right,” Reggie mumbled from the bed. “Send me Sam.”
“Coming, sir.” Sam ran in. “Those fellows didn’t do a getaway. They’re outed. Car smash. Both killed. Some smash.”
“Brandy, meat juice, ammonia,” murmured Mr. Fortune, who was writing, “and that. Hurry.”
“Beg pardon, ma’am,” Bell detached himself from Melitta Jacob. He took off his hat and tiptoed to the bed. “Have they done for him, sir,” he muttered.
Mr. Fortune was again busy over the senseless body. One of its hands was clenched. He opened the fingers gently, and drew out a greenish lump painted with a zigzag pattern in red. “The magic stone,” he said. “A charm against death. Well, well.”
* * * * * *
On his lawn which slopes to the weir stream Reggie Fortune lay in a deck chair, and a syringa, waxen white, shed its fragrance about him. He opened his eyes to see the jaunty form of the Hon. Sidney Lomas tripping towards him. “Stout fellow,” he murmured. “That’s cider cup. There was ice in it once,” and he shut his eyes again.
“I infer that the patient is out of your hands.”
“They’re going for their honeymoon to Nigeria.”
“Good Gad,” said Lomas.
“Collecting, you see. The objects of art of the noble savage. She’s rather a dear.”
“I should have thought he’d done enough collecting. Does he understand yet what happened?”
“Oh, he’s quite lucid. Seems to think it’s all very natural.”
“Does he though?”
“Only he’s rather annoyed with brother George. He thinks brother George had no right to object to his marrying. That’s what started it, you see. Brother George came round to borrow his usual hundred or so and found him with the magnificent Melitta. It occurred to brother George that if Tetherdown was going to marry, something had to be done about it. And then I suppose brother George consulted the late Jerdan.” Mr. Fortune opened his eyes, and raised himself. “By the way, who was Jerdan? I saw you hushed up the inquest as a motor smash.”
“Bell thinks he was the doctor who bolted out of the Antony case.”
“Oh, ah. Yes, there was some brains in that. I rather thought the late Jerdan had experience. I wonder what happened to his private patients at the Ferns. Creepy house. I say, was it Jerdan or his man who threw the fit at the Museum?”
“Jerdan himself, by the description.”
“Yes. Useful thing, medical training. Well, Jerdan saw he could get at Tetherdown through his hobby. He came with tales of anthropological treasures for sale. The old boy didn’t bite at first. Jerdan couldn’t hit on anything he wanted. But he found out at last what he did want. Hence the fit in the Museum. That night Jerdan turned up with the Borneo stone and told Tetherdown a friend of his had some more of the kind. Tetherdown fell for that. He went off to the Ferns with Jerdan. The last thing he remembers is sitting down in the back room to look at the stone. They chloroformed him, I think, there was lots of stuff in the place. Then they kept him under morphia and starved him. I suppose the notion was to dump his dead body somewhere so that the fact of his death could be established and George inherit. There could be no clear evidence of murder. Tetherdown is eccentric. It would look as if he had gone off his head and wandered about till he died of exhaustion. That was the late Jerdan’s idea. Melitta always thought George was a bad egg. He didn’t like her, you see, and he showed it. When Tetherdown vanished she went off to George one time. He laughed at her, which was his error. She put on that nurse’s rig for a disguise and watched his rooms. When I rattled him and he rang up Jerdan, Jerdan came to the flat and she followed him back to the Ferns and asked for Tetherdown. Jolly awkward for Jerdan with me knocking at the door. He was crude with her, but I don’t know that I blame him. An able fellow. Pity, pity. Yes. What happened to brother George?”
“Bolted. We haven’t a trace of him. Which is just as well, for there’s no evidence. Jerdan left no papers. George could have laughed at us if he had the nerve.”
Reggie Fortune chuckled. “I never liked George. I rang him up that night: ‘Mr. George Coppett? The Ferns speaking. It’s all out’ and I rang off. I thought George would quit. George will be worrying quite a lot. So that’s that.”
“Yes, you have your uses, Fortune,” said Lomas. “I’ve noticed it before.”
Reggie Fortune fumbled in his pocket and drew out the magic stone. “Tetherdown said he would like me to have it. Cut him to the heart to give it up, poor old boy. Told me it saved his life.” He smiled. “I don’t care for its methods, myself. Better put it back in a glass case, Lomas.”
“What did Melitta give you?”
“Melitta is rather a dear,” said Mr. Fortune.
CASE V