CHAPTER XV
WHO killed Sir John Maxell and his wife?
Where had their bodies been hidden? These were the two questions which were to agitate England for the traditional space of nine days. For one day, at any rate, they formed the sole topic of speculation amongst the intelligent section of fifty million people.
The first question was easier to answer than the second. It was obvious to the newsmen that the murderer was Cartwright, whose threats of vengeance were recalled and whose appearance at Bournemouth had been described at second-hand by the detective in charge of the case. First-hand information was for the moment denied the pressmen, for Timothy, fully dressed, lay on his bed in a sound sleep. Happily for him, neither then nor later did any of the enterprising newspaper men associate the “A. C.” in his name with the wanted criminal. He was at least spared that embarrassment.
But the story of his vigil as “a friend of Sir John’s” was in print long before he woke up to find a small and impatient army of reporters waiting to interview him. He answered the reporters’ interrogations as briefly as possible, bathed and changed and made his way to the hotel where the girl was. She was leaving as he arrived, and the warmth of her greeting almost banished the depression which lay upon him. She put her arm through his so naturally that he did not realise his wonderful fortune.
“I’ve got something to tell you,” she said, “unless you know already. All my money has gone.”
He stopped with a gasp.
“You don’t mean that?” he said seriously.
“It is true,” she replied. “I believe it was very little and my loss is so insignificant compared with the other awful affair that I am not worrying about it.”
“But Sir John had money?”
She shook her head.
“I have just seen his lawyers,” she said, “they have been to the bank and there is not a hundred pounds to his credit, and that amount will be absorbed by the cheques he has drawn. He drew a very, very large sum, including my money, from the bank two days ago. You know,” she went on, “I think that Sir John contemplated leaving for America? He had already given me a hint, asking me how long it would take me to pack my belongings, and I fancy that had something to do with the telegram he received——”
“Announcing Cartwright’s escape,” nodded Timothy.
“He was so kind and so gentle,” said the girl, her eyes filling with tears, “that to me he was more like a father. Oh, it is awful, awful!”
“But you?” asked the agitated Timothy. “What are you going to do? Good heavens! It is dreadful!”
“I shall have to work,” said the girl practically and with a little smile. “I do not think that will kill me. Hundreds of thousands of girls have to work for their living, Timothy, and I shall have to work for mine.”
Timothy drew a long breath.
“Not if I can help it, you won’t,” he said. “I am sure I shall make a lot of money. I can feel it in my bones. If a man takes a job——”
“You mustn’t talk like that,” she said, pressing his arm, “and anyway, how could I let you help me or keep me? That sort of thing isn’t done—not by nice girls.”
She laughed, but became sober again.
“Do you know that Sir John was very much interested in you?”
“In me?” said Timothy.
She nodded.
“I told you so the other day. I think he liked you, because he was saying how uncomfortable you must be at Vermont House, living in that queer little room of yours.”
Timothy was startled.
“How did he know I was living at Vermont House?” he said.
She smiled.
“Vermont House happens to be Sir John’s property,” she said. “In fact, I think it is the only realisable piece of property he has, now that the money has gone.”
“What shall you do immediately?” asked Timothy.
She shook her head.
“I don’t know,” she replied. “I think the first step is to get out of this hotel, which is much too expensive for me. I have a few pounds in the bank, but that won’t last very long.”
At his earnest entreaty she agreed to see a solicitor and appoint him to save whatever was possible from the wreckage of Sir John’s estate. Two hours passed like as many minutes, until Timothy remembered that he had an appointment with a London reporter—one Brennan. Brennan he had known in his cinema days, and Timothy literally fell upon his neck.
“I’ve nothing to tell the boys that hasn’t already been told,” he said, putting down the newspaper which Brennan handed to him. “I am as anxious for news as you are. Have there been any developments?”
“None,” said the reporter, “except that Sir John had no money at the bank and no money could be found in the house.”
Timothy nodded.
“That I know,” he said, “all his securities were drawn out two days ago. That was the stuff that Cartwright was after.”
“Does Miss Maxell know——” Brennan began.
“She does know and she took it like a brick.”
“It was about twenty thousand pounds,” Brennan went on. “The only other clue the police have is that the safe was opened by Maxell’s duplicate key. The old man had two sets made, one of which he used to keep in his combination safe in his bedroom and the other he carried around with him. Miss Maxell told a story that the night before the murder Lady Maxell asked her to secure possession of the keys in order to open a bureau.”
Timothy nodded.
“I see. Is it suggested that Lady Maxell detached the key of the safe and that it was she who opened it?”
“That is one theory,” said the other, “the police have miles of ’em! They’ve got everything except the bodies and the murderer. Now come out with that story, Anderson! You must know a great deal more than you’ve told, and I’m simply without a new fact that these evening papers haven’t got, to hang my story on. Why did Cartwright come to your room, anyway? Do you know him?”
“He was an acquaintance of my father’s,” said Timothy diplomatically, “and perhaps he thought I knew Maxell better than I did.”
“That sounds pretty thin,” said the reporter. “Why should he come to you?”
“Suppose I am the only person he knew or knew about,” said Timothy patiently. “Suppose he’d been all round Bournemouth trying to find a familiar name.”
“There’s something in that,” admitted the reporter.
“Anyway,” said Timothy, “I was a kid when he went to gaol. You don’t imagine I knew him at all, do you?”
He had gone out to meet the girl, forgetting to take his watch, and now he was looking round for it.
“Here is a theory,” said Brennan suddenly. “Suppose Lady Maxell isn’t dead at all.”
“What do you mean?” asked the other.
“Suppose Cartwright killed Maxell and Lady Maxell witnessed the murder. Suppose this fellow had to decide whether he would kill the witness or whether he would go away with her? You said the motor-car which came to the house in the middle of the night was the same as that in which Lady Maxell came home. Isn’t it likely that she should have told the murderer, for some reason or other, that the car was coming, because evidently she had arranged for it to come, and that they went away together? Isn’t it likely, too, that she was in the plot, and that, so far from being a victim, she was one of the criminals? We know her antecedents. There was some trouble over her stabbing a young American, Reggie van Rhyn. In fact, most of the evidence seems to incriminate her. There is the key, for example. Who else but she could have taken the duplicate key? Doesn’t it look as though she planned the whole thing, and that her accomplice came in at the last moment to help her get away and possibly to settle Sir John?
“Take the incident of the two locked bedrooms. Obviously somebody who lived in the house and who knew the family routine must have done that. Both Sir John and Lady Maxell were in the habit of fastening their doors at night, and the servants did not go into the bedrooms unless they were rung for. It seems to me fairly clear that Lady Maxell locked the doors so that the suspicions of the servants should not be aroused in the morning.”
“If I had your powers of deduction,” said the admiring Timothy, “I should never miss a winner. Where the blazes is my watch?”
“Try under the pillow,” said Brennan.
“I never put it there,” replied Timothy, but nevertheless turned the pillow over and stood gaping.
For beneath the pillow was a long, stout envelope with a tell-tale blood stain in one corner.
“For heaven’s sake!” breathed Timothy, and took up the package.
It bore no address and was sealed.
“What on earth is this?” he asked.
“I can tell you what those stains are,” said the practical Brennan. “Is there any name on it?”
Timothy shook his head.
“Open it,” suggested the reporter, and the other obeyed.
The contents were even more astonishing, for they consisted of a thick pad of money. They were new Bank of England notes and were bound about by a tight band of paper. On the band was written in Sir John’s handwriting:
“Proceeds of the sale of stocks held in trust for Miss Mary Maxell. £21,300.”
“Proceeds of the sale of stocks held in trust for Miss Mary Maxell. £21,300.”
The detective in charge of the case was a man of many theories. But his new theory was an uncomfortable one for Timothy Anderson.
“This puts a new light upon the case,” said the detective, “and I’m being perfectly frank with you, Mr. Anderson, that the new light isn’t very favourable to you. Here you are, outside the building when the crime is committed. You are seen by a policeman a few minutes after the shots are fired, and a portion of the money stolen from the house is discovered under your pillow.”
“Discovered by me,” said Timothy, “in the presence of a witness. And are you suggesting that, whilst I was with your policeman, I was also driving the car, or that I was wearing Cartwright’s cap which was found in the grounds? Anyway, you’ve the finger-print of your man and you’re at liberty to compare it with mine.”
“It isn’t a finger-print anyway,” said the detective, “it is the print of a knuckle and we do not keep a record of knuckles. No, I admit that the motor-car conflicts a little bit with my theory. Have you any suggestion to offer?”
Timothy shook his head.
“The only suggestion I can make,” he said, “is that Cartwright, in a hurry to get away and knowing the position of my room, hid the money there for fear he should be caught with the goods. At any rate, if I were the criminal I would not hide a bloodstained envelope under my pillow. I should at least have the intelligence to burn the envelope and put the money where the servants of this house could not find it. Why, don’t you see,” he said vigorously, “that any of the servants at this boarding-house would have found the envelope if I hadn’t?”
The detective scratched his head.
“There’s something in that,” he said. “It is a very queer case.”
“And it is being investigated by very queer people,” said Timothy irritably.
A little further investigation, however, relieved Timothy of all suspicion. He had not returned to the house until ten o’clock that morning. The maid, who had taken him a cup of tea at eight, noticing that he had been out all night, thought it was an excellent opportunity to straighten the room to “get it off her mind,” as she said. She did not remake the bed, but had tidied it. Whilst sweeping she had seen the envelope lying on the floor near the open window and had picked it up and, for want of a better place, thinking “it was private” had slipped it under Timothy’s pillow.
As Timothy had not been out of sight of the police since the tragedy until his return to his lodgings, there could be no suggestion that he had any part in hiding the envelope. Whatever irritation he felt was dispelled by his large and generous satisfaction when the poverty which threatened Mary was averted. But why should Cartwright hide the money there? Why should he stop in his headlong flight to come to the window, as evidently he did, and throw the package into the room? There were a hundred places where he might have left it.
“That cousin stuff doesn’t work,” thought Timothy, “and if you think he’s going to rely upon his relationship with me and can use me to look after his money, he’s made one large mistake.”
He saw the girl again at the official inquiry, and met her on the day after. She was going to Bath where she had some distant relations, and they had met to say good-bye.
It was a gloomy occasion—less gloomy for Timothy than for the girl, because he was already planning a move to the town in which she was taking up her quarters. This cheerful view was banished, however, when she explained that her stay in Bath was merely a temporary expedient.
“Mrs. Renfrew has wired asking me to come—and it seems as good a place as any for a few months. I don’t think I shall stay here any longer,” she said. “I want a change of air and a change of scene. Timothy, I feel that I shall never get over Sir John’s death.”
“Never is a very long time, my dear,” said Timothy gently, and she could only wonder at the tender kindness in his voice.
She had little time to wonder, however, for she had a proposition to make to him and she hardly knew how to reduce it to words.
“Are you—are you—working?” she asked.
Timothy’s broad smile answered her plainly that he was not.
“The fact is,” he said airily, “I haven’t quite decided what I am going to do. If you were going down to Bath for good, I was going down to Bath also. Maybe I could start a druggist’s or buy a store, or run errands for somebody. I am the most accommodating worker.”
“Well——” she began and stopped.
“Well?” he repeated.
“I had an idea that maybe you would like to go on and conduct an independent search—independent of the police, I mean—and find something about the man who killed Sir John, and perhaps bring him to justice. You know, I think you are clever enough,” she went on hurriedly, “and it would be work after your own heart.”
He was looking at her steadily.
“Quite right, Mary,” he said quietly, “but that involves spending a whole lot of money. What misguided person do you suggest would send me out on that kind of job?”
“Well, I thought——” She hesitated, and then a little incoherently, “You see, I have the money—mainly through you—my own money, I mean. I feel I have a duty to my poor uncle and I could trust you to do your very best. I could afford it, Timothy”—she laid her hand on his arm and looked up at him almost beseechingly—“indeed I can afford it. I have more money than I shall ever spend.”
He patted her hand softly.
“Mary,” he said, “it is just the kind of job I should like, and with anybody’s money but yours, why, I’d be out of the country in two shakes, looking for Mr. Cartwright in the most expensive cities of the world. But, my dear, I cannot accept your commission, because I know just what lies behind it. You think I’m a restless, rather shiftless sort of fellow, and you want to give me a good time—with your money.”
He stopped and shook his head.
“No, my dear,” he said, “thank you, but, no!”
She was disappointed and for a moment a little hurt.
“Would two hundred pounds——” she suggested timidly.
“Not your two hundred,” he said. “That lawyer of yours should take better care of your money, Mary. He shouldn’t allow you to make these tempting offers to young men,” he was smiling now. “Will you go abroad?”
“Perhaps—some day,” she said vaguely. “Sir John wanted me to go—and I feel that I should be pleasing him. Some day, yes, Timothy.”
He nodded.
“Maybe I’ll go over at the same time as you,” he said. “I thought of taking a chance in Paris for a while—you can make big money in Paris.”
“In—a while?” she smiled.
“In a minute,” said Timothy grimly, “if the horse and the jockey are of the same way of thinking. I know a fellow who races pretty extensively in France. He has a horse called Flirt——”
She held out her hand for the second time.
“Timothy, you’re incorrigible,” she said.
She did not see him again for twelve months, not indeed until, after a winter spent in Madeira, she put her foot over the gangway of the s.s.Tigilanesand met the quizzical smile of the youth who was waiting to receive her.
For Timothy had been in Funchal a month, seeing but unseen, since Mary was generally in bed before the Casino woke up and play reached any exciting level.
CHAPTER XVI
TIMOTHY sat now on an upturned trunk, his elbows on the rails of the s.s.Tigilanesand his speculative eye roving the river front of Liverpool.
It was the last hour of the voyage, and Timothy, who had left Funchal with four hundred pounds in his pocket-book, had exactly three genuine shillings and a five-milreis piece of dubious quality.
A man strolled along the deck and fell in at his side.
“Cleaned you out last night, didn’t they?” he asked sympathetically.
“Eh? Oh, yes, I believe they did. That red-haired man had all the luck and most of the cards.”
He smiled and Timothy had a swift, happy smile that brought tired little ridges under his eyes. He was not only good-looking and young, but he was interesting.
The man at his side took the cigar from his teeth and looked at it before he spoke.
“Of course, you know they were crooks—they work this coast line regularly.”
“Eh?”
Timothy looked round, shocked and pained.
“You don’t say? Crooks! What, that little red-haired fellow who has been trying to pick a quarrel with me all the voyage, and the tall, nice-looking Englishman?”
His companion nodded.
“Don’t you remember the Captain warned us not to play cards——”
“They always do that to be on the safe side,” said Timothy, but he was obviously uneasy. “Of course, if I knew they were crooks——”
“Knew! Good lord! Anybody will tell you. Ask the purser. Anyway, you’ve been stung and you can do nothing. The best thing to do is to grin and bear your losses. It is experience.”
Timothy felt the three honest shillings in his pocket and whistled dismally.
“Of course, if I were sure——”
He turned abruptly away and raced down the main companion-way to the purser’s little office under the stairs.
“Mr. Macleod, I want to see you.”
“Yes, sir,”—all pursers are a little suspicious,—“anything wrong with your bill?”
“No—not unless his name’s Bill. Shall I come in?”
The purser opened the half-door and admitted him to the sanctuary.
“There are two fellows aboard this packet—a red-haired fellow named Chelwyn and a disguised duke named Brown—what do you know about ’em?”
The purser made a face. It was intended to convey his lack of real interest in either.
“I’ll put it plainly,” said the patient Timothy. “Are they crooks?”
“They play cards,” said the purser diplomatically.
He desired at this the eleventh hour to avoid scandal, explanations, and such other phenomena which he associated in his mind with the confrontation of the wise men and their dupes. That sort of thing brought the Line into disrepute, and indirectly reflected upon the ship’s officers. Besides, the ship was making port, and, like all pursers, he was up to his eyes in work and frantically anxious to clear it off in a minimum time so that he could take a train to his little villa at Lytham, where his family was established.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Anderson, if you’ve been stung,” he said, “but the captain gives fair warning the first night out of Cape Town and Madeira—that’s where you came aboard, isn’t it?—and there were notices posted up, both in the saloon and in the smoking-room. Have you lost much?”
He looked up with some sympathy at the tall, athletic figure with the tired, smiling eyes.
“I cleared up £500 at the Funchal Casino,” said Timothy, “and I reckon I have spent £100 legitimately.”
“The rest is gone, eh?” said the purser. “Well, Mr. Anderson, I am afraid I can do nothing. The best thing to do is to mark it down against ‘Experience’.”
“I’ll forgive you for being philosophical about my losses,” said Timothy. “Will you be kind enough to tell me the number of Mr. Chelwyn’s cabin?”
“Two seventy-four,” said the purser. “I say, Mr. Anderson, if I were you I’d let the matter drop.”
“I know you would, dear old thing,” said Timothy, shaking him warmly by the hand, “and if I were you I should let it drop too. But, as I am me—274, I think you said?”
“I hope you’re not going to make any trouble, Mr. Anderson,” said the alarmed purser. “We’ve done our best to make you comfortable on the voyage.”
“And I did my best to pay for my ticket, so we’re quits,” and with a wave of his hand Timothy strode out of the cabin, dodged down past the steward carrying up the luggage to the next deck, and walked swiftly along the carpeted corridor till he found a little number-plate bearing the figures “274.” He knocked at the cabin door, and gruff voice said, “Come in!”
Chelwyn, the red-haired man, was in his shirt sleeves, fastening his collar. Brown was sitting on the edge of his bunk, smoking a cigarette, and Chelwyn, who had seen Timothy reflected in the mirror as he came in, was first to recognise him.
“Hullo, Mr. Anderson, do you want anything?” he asked politely. “Sorry you’ve had such bad luck—what the devil are you doing?”
Timothy had shut the door and slipped the bolt.
“Yes, I want something,” he said. “I want four hundred pounds.”
“You want——”
“Listen. I thought you were playing straight, you fellows, or I wouldn’t have played with you. I’m willing to take a chance, for that’s my motto in life, dear lads, but there isn’t a chance to take when you’re playing with crooks.”
“Look here,” said the red-haired man, walking over to him and emphasising his words with his forefinger against Timothy’s chest, “that kind of stuff doesn’t amuse me. If you lose your money, lose it like a sportsman and a gentleman, and don’t squeal.”
Timothy grinned.
“Boys,” he said, “I want four hundred pounds from you, so step lively.”
The suave Mr. Brown, who had been watching the scene with bored eyes, stroking his drooping moustache the while, made a gentle entrance into the conversation.
“I’m rather surprised, in fact, I am shocked, Mr. Anderson, that you should take this line,” he said. “You’ve lost your money fairly and squarely——”
“That’s where you’re lying,” said Timothy pleasantly. “Now, I’m telling you this. We’re very near the shore. Somewhere at the back of those warehouses there’s certain to be a police organisation and a well-paid magistrate. You are going to have a grand opportunity of appearing in the respectable part of the court as a prosecutor, for I’m going to beat you up—first you,” he pointed to the red-haired Chelwyn, “and then you.”
“You’re going to beat me up, are you?” said the red-haired man and made a quick dive.
It was not pretty to watch, unless you took an interest in fighting. They closed for a second and something jolted twice under Chelwyn’s jaw. He fell back against the cabin partition. He leapt again, but Timothy’s fist met him half-way, and he never really felt what hit him.
“I’ve won this fight,” said Timothy, “and I award myself a purse of four hundred pounds. Do you take any interest in these proceedings. Brown?”
The other man had not moved from his bunk, but now he rose and lifted his dazed companion to his feet.
“We’d better pay this fellow.”
“I’ll see him——” mumbled the other, but Brown was apparently the brains of the organisation and had merely mentioned his intention of paying out of sheer politeness to his companion.
He took a thick pocket-book from his hip pocket and counted out the notes, and Timothy picked them up.
“I’ll fix you for this,” said Chelwyn, mopping his bleeding lip. “You’ve taken this from me—not him.”
“Don’t frighten me,” said Timothy as he unbolted the door and stepped out.
“Some day I’ll get you,” said the livid man, and the finger he pointed at Timothy was shaking with anger.
“I’ll take a chance on that,” said Timothy.
He ascended the companion-way feeling remarkably cheerful, and met the purser coming down. That officer regarded him even more suspiciously than ever. But as there were no signs of the fray upon him, the purser went to his cabin relieved, and Timothy passed out to relieve his feelings by the side of the rail. So he sat whilst the big liner was brought alongside the wharf, and then he heard his name spoken and jumped up, hat in hand.
“I just wanted to tell you, Timothy, in case I did not see you on the train,” she remarked, “that Mrs. Renfrew has decided not to go back to Bath but to go on to Paris almost immediately.”
“Good for Mrs. Renfrew,” said Timothy. “Bath or Paris will find me hanging around. I nearly came down to you just now to borrow my fare to Bath.”
“Timothy,” she said in a shocked voice, “did you lose all the money you won in Funchal?”
Timothy rubbed his nose.
“I didn’t exactly lose it,” he said. “I lent it and it has just been repaid.”
“Mrs. Renfrew doesn’t think it proper your travelling on the same boat. She thinks you ought not to have come to Madeira after me—us.”
There was mischief in Mary’s eyes, in spite of the solemnity of her tone.
“I shouldn’t worry about what Mrs. Renfrew thinks,” said Timothy. “Why, you’re almost as badly off for cousins as I am.”
“As you are?” she said in surprise. “Have you any cousins?”
“Hundreds of ’em,” said Timothy glibly.
“Who are they?” she asked, interested.
She had reached a stage in their friendship when his relatives were immensely interesting.
“I don’t know their names,” lied Timothy. “I don’t give ’em names but numbers—one, two, three, four, etc.—just at that moment I was thinking of number seventy-nine—good morning, Mrs. Renfrew.”
Mrs. Renfrew was severe and thin, with a yellow face and hooked nose. She was a member of one of the best, if not the best, families in Bath, and it was an unfailing source of pride that she did not know the people that other people knew.
Mary watched the encounter with dancing eyes.
“Shall I have the pleasure of your company to London?” asked Mrs. Renfrew.
She invariably made a point of leaving Mary out, and indeed sustained the pleasant fiction that Mary had no existence on board the ship.
“The pleasure will be mine,” said Timothy. “I am not travelling with you to London.”
He said this so innocently that Mrs. Renfrew was in the middle of her next observation before she had any idea that the remark had an offensive interpretation.
“You seem to have had a very unfortunate experience—what do you mean?”
Happily a very hot-looking steward made his appearance at that moment and called Mrs. Renfrew away. She gathered up her charge and with a withering glance at Timothy departed.
“Take A Chance” Anderson, feeling particularly happy, was one of the first to land and strolled along the quay-side waiting within view of the gangway for Mary to disembark. Immediately above him towered the high decks of theTigilanes—a fact of which he was reminded when, with a crash, a heavy wooden bucket dropped so close to his head that it grazed his shoulder. It was a large bucket, and, dropped from that height, might have caused him considerable physical distress.
He looked up.
The two card-players with whom he had had some argument were lolling over the rail, their faces turned in quite another direction and talking earnestly.
“Hi!” said Timothy.
They were deaf, it appeared, for they still continued their discussion. A deck hand was passing with a crate load of oranges; one fell out and Timothy picked it up. The attention of Messrs. Chelwyn and Brown was still directed elsewhere, and with a little swing of his arm Timothy sent the orange upon its swift and unerring course. It caught the red-haired man square in the side of the face and burst, and he jumped round with an oath.
“You’ve dropped your bucket,” said Timothy sweetly. “Shall I throw it at you or will you come down and get it?”
The man said something violent, but his companion pulled him away, and Timothy went to look for a seat with peace in his heart.
CHAPTER XVII
THE train was crowded, but he secured a corner seat in one of the cell-like compartments. It was empty when he entered, but immediately after, to his surprise, Brown and Chelwyn followed him in and deposited their goods upon three seats that they might in the manner of all experienced travellers, occupy breathing space for three at the cost of two tickets.
They took no notice of Timothy until the train drew out and he wondered what their game was. It was hardly likely that they would start any rough work with him after their experience of the morning and less likely because these boat trains were well policed.
Clear of the Riverside Station the smooth Englishman leant forward.
“I hope, Mr. Anderson,” he said, “that you will forget and forgive.”
“Surely,” said Timothy, “I have nothing to forgive.”
“My friend,” said Mr. Brown with a smile, “is very precipitate—which means hasty,” he explained.
“Thank you,” said Timothy, “I thought it meant crooked.”
A spasm contorted the features of Mr. Chelwyn, but he said nothing. As for Brown, he laughed. He laughed heartily but spuriously.
“That’s not a bad joke,” he said, “but to tell you the truth, we mistook you for—one of us, and my friend and I thought it would be a good joke to get the better of you.”
“And was it?” asked Timothy.
“It was and it wasn’t,” said Mr. Brown, not easily nonplussed. “Of course, we intended restoring the money to you before you left the ship.”
“Naturally,” said Timothy. “I never thought you would do anything else.”
“Only you know you rather spoilt our littleesprit.”
“If the conversation is to develop in a foreign language,” said Timothy, “I would only remark:Honi soit qui mal y pense,” and the polite Mr. Brown laughed again.
“You do not mind if my friend and I have a little quiet game by ourselves, if,” he said humorously, “we swindle one another.”
“Not at all,” said Timothy. “I have no objection to watching, but if,” he said cheerfully, “you should suddenly draw my attention whilst your friend’s head is turned, to the ease with which I could win a hundred pounds by picking the lady, or discovering the little pea under the little shell, or show me a way of getting rich from any of the other devices which the children of the public schools find so alluring at the country fair, I shall be under the painful necessity of slapping you violently on the wrist.”
Thereafter the conversation languished until the train had run through Crewe and was approaching Rugby. It was here that Mr. Brown stopped in the midst of a long, learned discussion on English politics to offer his cigarette-case to Timothy. Timothy chose a cigarette and put it in his pocket.
“That is one of the best Egyptian brands made,” said Mr. Brown casually.
“Best for you or best for me?” asked Timothy.
“Bah!” It was the red-haired Chelwyn who addressed him for the first time. “What have you to be afraid of? You’re as scared as a cat! Do you think we want to poison you?”
Mr. Brown produced a flask and poured a modicum of whisky into the cup and handed it to his companion, then he drank himself. Then, without invitation he poured a little more into the cup and offered it to Timothy.
“Let bygones be bygones,” he said.
“I have no desire to be a bygone,” said Timothy, “I would much rather be a herenow.”
Nevertheless, he took the cup and smelt it.
“Butyl chloride,” he said, “has a distinctive odour. I suppose you don’t call it by its technical name, and to you it is just vulgarly ‘a knock-out drop.’ Really,” he said, handing back the cup, “you boys are so elementary. Where did you learn it all—from the movies?”
The red-haired man half rose from his seat with a growl.
“Sit down,” said Timothy sharply, and with a jerk of his hand he flung open the carriage door.
The men shrank back at the sight of the rapidly running line, and at the certainty of death which awaited any who left the train on that side of the carriage.
“Start something,” said Timothy, “and I’ll undertake to put either one or both of you on to the line. We’re going at about sixty miles an hour, and a fellow that went out there wouldn’t be taking a chance. Now is there going to be a rough house?”
“Close the door, close the door,” said Mr. Brown nervously. “What a stupid idea, Mr. Anderson!”
Timothy swung the door to and the man moved up towards him.
“Now, I’m just going to put it to you plainly,” said Brown. “We’ve made the voyage out to the Cape and the voyage back and the only mug we met was you. What we won from you just about paid our expenses, and I’m putting it to you, as a sportsman and a gentleman, that you should let us have half of that stuff back.”
“The sportsman in me admires your nerve,” said Timothy, “but I suppose it is the gentleman part that returns an indignant ‘No!’ to your interesting observation.”
Brown turned to his companion.
“Well, that’s that, Len,” he said, “you’ll just have to let the money go. It is a pity,” he said wistfully and his companion grunted.
That ended the conversation so far as the journey was concerned, and Timothy heard no more until he was in the gloomy courtyard at Euston Station and stepping into his taxi.
To his surprise it was the red-haired man who approached him, and something in his manner prevented Timothy from taking the action which he otherwise would have thought necessary.
“Look here, young fellow,” he said, “you watch Brown—he’s wild.”
“You’re not exactly tame,” smiled Timothy.
“Don’t take any notice of me,” said the man a little bitterly. “I am engaged in the rough work. I should have got two hundred out of your money—that’s what made me so wild. Brown paid all my expenses and gives me ten pound a week and a commission. It sounds funny to you, doesn’t it, but it is the truth,” and somehow Timothy knew that the man was not lying.
“He’s finished with me—says I am a hoodoo,” said the little man. “Do you know what I’ve got out of five weeks’ work? Look!”
He held out his hand and disclosed two ten-pound notes.
“Brown’s dangerous,” he warned Timothy. “Don’t you make any mistake about that. I was only wild because I was losing my money, but he’s wild because you’ve got fresh with him and caught him out every time. Good night!”
“Here, wait,” said Timothy.
He felt in his pocket.
“If you’re lying, it is a plausible lie and one that pleases me,” he said. “This will salve my conscience.”
He slipped two notes into the man’s hands.
Chelwyn was speechless for a moment. Then he asked:
“And where are you staying in London, Mr. Anderson?”
“At the Brussell Hotel.”
“At the Brussell Hotel,” repeated the other, “I’ll remember that. I shall hear if anything is going on and I’ll ’phone you. You’re a gentleman, Mr. Anderson.”
“So Mr. Brown said,” remarked Timothy and drove off, feeling unusually cheerful.
If Timothy could be cheerful under the depressing conditions which prevailed on the night of his arrival in London, he was a veritable pattern of cheer. A drizzling rain was falling as the taxi squeaked its way through a labyrinth of mean streets. He had glimpses of wretched-looking people, grotesque of shape and unreal, through the rain-blurred window of the cab.
Then suddenly the character of the streets changed, and he was in a broad street twinkling with light. There was a glimpse of trees, wide open spaces, dotted with light. The street grew busier and the traffic thicker, then suddenly the cab turned again into semi-darkness and pulled up before the hotel.
A porter opened the door.
“What do I think of Madeira?” asked Timothy of the astonished man. “I haven’t had time to think. Will I be staying long in London? No. What are my opinions of the political crisis which has arisen in my absence? I would rather not say.”
It takes a great deal to upset the equilibrium of a well-conducted hall man.
“Have you booked your room?” he asked.
Timothy meekly admitted that he had.
He woke to a London much more beautiful, to a vista of old-world buildings such as Cruikshank loved to draw, to a green square and glimpses of greener trees.
Mary was staying at the Carlton, but he had arranged to meet her for lunch. He had not arranged to meet her dragon, but he knew she would be there. He had breakfasted, and was on the point of leaving the hotel, when Chelwyn came.
To say that Timothy regretted his generosity of the night before would be to do him an injustice. Nevertheless, he had some misgivings as to whether he had not been a little too generous. The appearance of Mr. Chelwyn, early in the morning, looking so spruce and confident, was in itself a suspicious happening, though events proved that the suspicion was unfounded.
“Can I see you alone for a moment, Mr. Anderson?” asked the red-haired man.
Timothy hesitated.
“Come along to the drawing-room,” he said.
It was the one public room which would be empty at that time of the morning. Mr. Chelwyn deposited his hat and stick and brand-new yellow gloves before he spoke.
“Now, Mr. Anderson, I’ve come to tell you a few facts which will surprise you.”
“You haven’t had a gold brick sent to you by your Uncle George in Alaska, have you?” asked Timothy dubiously. “Because I’m not buying that kind of fact.”
The man smiled and shook his head.
“It is hardly likely I should try that stuff on you, sir,” he said. “No, this is a much more serious matter. Before I go any farther I’ll tell you that I am not asking for money. I am grateful to you for what you did to me last night, Mr. Anderson. A crook has a wife and children the same as anybody else. I have been in this funny business for ten years, but now I’m out of it for good.” He looked round and dropped his voice, “Mr. Anderson, I told you last night that we’ve been five or six weeks away from England. Didn’t that sound strange to you?”
“Not to me,” said Timothy.
“That is because you don’t know the game,” said the man. “As a rule, when we’re working these liners, we go out to Cape Town and come back by the next ship that sails. What do you think we stayed at Funchal for—there’s no money in short voyages—it’s all on the long run from Madeira to Cape Town.”
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” said Timothy wearily. “I don’t even remember seeing you in Funchal——”
“We laid low,” interrupted the man.
“That may be, but if you’ve come to tell me the interesting story of your life, Ginger, I beg that you will cut it short—the history, I mean, not necessarily your life.”
“Well, I’ll tell it to you as quickly as possible,” said the man. “I don’t always work with Brown. In fact, I’ve only worked with him about three times before. I’m not as good a man with the broads——”
“The broads?” said the puzzled Timothy.
“With the cards,” corrected the man. “I say that I’m not as good a man with the broads as some of the others. I’ve got a bit of a reputation for scrapping. I’ve never left a pal in the lurch and I’ve always been ready for any ‘rough house’ that came along. About two months ago Brown sent for me—he’s got a flat off Piccadilly and lives like a lord. He told me he was going to Madeira on a special job, that he’d been employed by a lady in Paris—a Madame Serpilot (you’d better write that down in your pocket-book)—to shepherd a young lady who was coming over. Mind you, there was no harm intended to the young lady, but the general idea was that she might be accompanied by a man, and he was the fellow who had to be looked after.”
“What was the lady’s name?” asked Timothy quickly.
“Miss Maxell,” said the man without hesitation, “and you were the fellow we were asked to put out of business. Brown’s idea was to break you; then, when you got to London, one of his pals would have met you and offered to lend you money. They’d have framed up a charge against you of obtaining money by false pretences, and you would have been pinched.”
Timothy’s eyebrows rose.
“Was this Mrs. Serpilot’s plan?” he asked, but the man shook his head.
“No, sir, she gave just the details to Brown. She never said what was to be done to you, according to him, but you were to be stopped going around with the young lady.”
“Who is Madame Serpilot?”
“There you’ve got me,” said Chelwyn. “I believe she’s an old widow, but Brown never told me much about her. He got instructions from her while he was in Paris, but I never discovered how. I went to Madeira with him because he knew I was tough—but I wasn’t tough enough,” he added with a dry smile.
Timothy held out his hand.
“Ginger,” he said solemnly, “please forgive the orange!”
“Oh, I didn’t mind that,” said the man, “that’s all in the day’s work. It made me a bit wild, and my eye’s feeling sore, but don’t let that worry you. What you’ve got to do now is to look out for Brown, because he’ll have you as sure as death.”
“I’ll look out for Madame Serpilot, too,” said Timothy. “I think I’ll go to Paris.”
“She’s not in Paris now, I can tell you that,” said the man. “The wire Brown got at Liverpool was from Monte Carlo.”
“Monte Carlo,” said Timothy, “is even more attractive than Paris.”