CHAPTER XX.THE ODD MANDesmond and Francis Okewood sat in the dining-room of the Mill House finishing an excellent breakfast of ham and eggs and coffee which old Martha had prepared for them.Francis was still wearing Mr. John Hill’s greasy jacket and moleskins, but the removal of the sandy whiskers and a remarkable wig, consisting of a bald pate with a fringe of reddish hair, had gone far to restore him to the semblance of his former self.Desmond was feeling a good deal better. His head had escaped the full force of the smashing blow dealt at him by Strangwise with the butt of his pistol. He had instinctively put up his arm to defend his face and the thickly padded sleeve of Bellward’s jacket had broken the force of the blow. Desmond had avoided a fractured skull at the price of an appalling bruise on the right forearm and a nasty laceration of the scalp.Francis had resolutely declined to enlighten him as to the events of the night until both had breakfasted. After despatching the corporal of military police to hurry the housekeeper on with the breakfast, Francis had taken his brother straight to the dining-room, refusing to let him ask the questions which thronged his brain until they had eaten and drunk. Only when all the ham and eggs had disappeared, did Francis, lighting one of Mr. Bellward’s cigars, consent to satisfy his brother’s curiosity.“It was only yesterday morning,” he said, “that I landed at Folkstone from the Continent. How I got the Chief’s message recalling me and how I made my escape through the Turkish lines to Allenby’s headquarters is a long story which will keep. The Chief had a car waiting for me at Folkstone and I reached London in time to lunch with him. We had a long talk and he gave me carte blanche to jump into this business now, when and where I thought I could best help you.”Desmond smiled bitterly.“The Chief couldn’t trust me to make good on my own, I suppose,” he said.“The Chief had a very good idea of the character of the people you had to deal with, Des.,” retorted Francis, “and he was a trifle apprehensive that the role you were playing might lead to complications, supposing the gang were to see through your impersonation. He’s a wonderful man, that, Des., and he was dead right—as he always is.”“But how?” asked Desmond. “Did the crowd spot me?”“No,” answered the other; “but it was your disguise which was responsible for the escape of Strangwise—”“What?” cried Desmond. “He’s escaped after all!”Francis nodded.“Yes,” he said, “got clear away and left no trace. Wait a minute and you shall hear! When I have told my story, you shall tell yours and between us, we’ll piece things together!“Well, when I left the Chief yesterday, I came down here. The description of Mr. John Hill, your odd man, rather tickled my fancy. I wanted badly to get at you for a quiet chat and it seemed to me that if I could borrow Mr. Hill’s appearance for a few hours now and then I might gain access to you without rousing any suspicion. You see, I knew that old Hill left here about dusk every afternoon, so I guessed the coast would be clear.“Clarkson’s fitted me out with the duds and the make-up and I got down to Wentfield by half-past six. The fog was so infernally thick that it took me more than an hour to get here on foot. It must have been close on eight o’clock when I pushed open your front gate. I thought of going boldly into the kitchen and asking for you, but, fortunately, I decided to have a preliminary prowl round the place. Through a chink in the curtains of the library I saw you and a stranger talking together. The stranger was quite unknown to me; but one thing about him I spotted right off. I saw that he was disguised; so I decided to hang about a bit and await developments.“I loafed around in the fog for about half an hour. Then I heard a car coming up the drive. I hid myself in the rhododendron bush opposite the front door and saw two men and a woman get out. They hurried into the house, so that I didn’t have a chance of seeing their faces. But I got a good, glimpse of the chauffeur as he bent down to turn out the headlights. And, yes, I knew him!”“Max, they called him,” said Desmond.“His name was Mirsky when last I saw him,” answered Francis, “and mine was Apfelbaum, if you want to know. He was a German agent in Russia and as ruthless and unscrupulous a rascal as you’ll find anywhere in the German service. I must say I never thought he’d have the nerve to show his face in this country, though I believe he’s a Whitechapel Jew born and bred. However, there he was and the sight of his ugly mug told me that something was doing. But like a fool I decided to hang on a bit and watch, instead of going right off in that car and fetching help from Stanning.”“It was just as well you waited,” said Desmond, “for if you’d gone off at once they must have heard the car and the fat would have been in the fire straight away!”And he told Francis of the loud dispute among the confederates in the library, the noise of which had effectually covered the sound of the departing ear.Francis laughed.“From my observation post outside,” he said, “I could only see you, Des, and that blackguard, Mug, as you two were sitting opposite the window. I couldn’t see more than the feet of the others. But your face told me the loud voices which reached me even outside meant that a crisis of some sort was approaching, so I thought it was time to be up and doing. So I sneaked round to the front of the house, got the engine of the car going and started off down the drive.“I had the very devil of a job to get to Stanning. Ever since you’ve been down here, the Chief has had special men on duty day and night at the police-station there. I didn’t dare stop to light the head-lamps and as a result the first thing I did was to charge the front gate and get the back wheel so thoroughly jammed that it took me the best part of twenty minutes to get the blooming car clear. When at last I got to the station, I found that Matthews, the Chief’s man, you know, had just arrived by car from London with a lot of plain-clothes men and some military police. He was in the very devil of a stew. He told me that Bellward had escaped, that the Chief was out of town for the night and ungetatable, and that he (Matthews) had come down on his own to prevent the gaff being blown on you and also to recapture Mr. Bellward if he should be mad enough to make for his old quarters.“I told Matthews of the situation up at the Mill House. Neither of us was able to understand why you had not telephoned for assistance—we only discovered later that the telephone had been disconnected—but I went bail that you were up against a very stiff proposition. I told Matthews that, by surrounding the house, we might capture the whole gang.“Matthews is a cautious cuss and he wanted a good deal of persuading, so we lost a lot of time. In the end, he wouldn’t take my advice to rush every available man to the scene, but only consented to take two plainclothes men and two military police. He was so precious afraid of upsetting your arrangements. The Chief, it appears, had warned everybody against doing that. So we all piled into the car and I drove them back to the Mill House.“This time I left the car at the front gate and we went up to the house on foot. We had arranged that Matthews and one of the military police, both armed, should stay and guard the car, while the two plainclothes men and the other military policeman, the corporal here, should accompany me to the house. Matthews believed my yarn that we were only going to ‘investigate.’ What I intended to do in reality was to round up the whole blessed lot.“I put one of the plain-clothes men on the front door and the other round at the back of the house. Their orders were to stop anybody who came out and at the same time to whistle for assistance. The corporal and I went to our old observation post outside the library window.“The moment I glanced into the room I knew that matters had reached a climax. I saw you—looking pretty blue, old man—facing that woman who seemed to be denouncing you. Max stood beside you with a pistol, and beside him was our friend, Mortimer, with a regular whopper of an automatic. Before I had time to move, the plain-clothes man at the back of the house whistled. He had found the secret door with Bellward and the woman coming out of it.“Then I saw Mortimer fire point-blank at you. I had my gun out in a second, but I was afraid of shooting, for fear of hitting you as you went for the other man.“But the corporal at my side wasn’t worrying much about you. Just as you jumped he put up his gun and let fly at Mortimer with a sense of discrimination which does him infinite credit. He missed Mortimer, but plugged Max plumb through the forehead and my old friend dropped in his tracks right between you and the other fellow. On that we hacked our way through the French window. The corporal found time to have another shot and laid out a tall, odd-looking man...”“No. 13,” elucidated Desmond.“... When we got inside we found him dead across the threshold of the door leading into the hall. Behrend we caught hiding in a brush cupboard by the back stairs. As for the others—”“Gone?” queried Desmond with a sudden sinking at his heart.Francis nodded.“We didn’t waste any time getting through that window,” he said, “but the catch was stiff and the broken glass was deuced unpleasant. Still, we were too late. You were laid out on the floor; Mortimer, Bellward and the lady had made their lucky escape. And the secret door showed us how they had gone...”“But I thought you had a man posted at the back?”“Would you believe it? When the shooting began, the infernal idiot must rush round to our assistance, so, of course, Mortimer and Co., nipping out by the secret door, got clear away down the drive. But that is not the worst. Matthews gave them the car!”“No!” said Desmond incredulously.“He did, though,” answered Francis. “Mind you, Mortimer had had the presence of mind to throw off his disguise. He presented himself to Matthews as Strangwise. Matthews knows Strangwise quite well: he has often seen him with the Chief.“‘My God, Captain Strangwise,’ says Matthews, as the trio appeared, ‘What’s happened?’“‘You’re wanted up at the house immediately, Matthews,’ says Strangwise quite excitedly. ‘We’re to take the car and go for assistance.’“Matthews had a look at Strangwise’s companions, and seeing Bellward, of course, takes him for you. As for the lady, she had a black lace muffler wound about her face.“‘Miss Mackwayte’s coming with us, Matthews,’ Strangwise says, seeing Matthews look at the lady. That removed the last of any lurking suspicions that old Matthews might have had. He left the military policeman at the gate and tore off like mad up the drive while Strangwise and the others jumped into the car and were away before you could say ‘knife.’ The military policeman actually cranked up the car for them!“When Matthews burst into the library with the story of you and Strangwise and Miss Mackwayte having gone off for help in our only car, I knew we had been sold. You were there, knocked out of time on the floor, in your disguise as Bellward, so I knew that the man with Strangwise was the real Bellward and I consequently deduced that Strangwise was Mortimer and consequently the very man we had to catch.“We were done brown. If we had had a little more time to think things out, we should have found that motor-bike and I would have gone after the trio myself. But my first idea was to summon aid. I tried to telephone without success and then we found the wire cut outside. Then I had the idea of pumping Behrend. I found him quite chatty and furious against Mortimer, whom he accused of having sold them. He told us that the party would be sure to make for the Dyke Inn, as Nur-el-Din was there.“By this time Strangwise and his party had got at least an hour clear start of us. I had set a man to repair the telephone and in the meantime was thinking of sending another on foot to Stanning to fetch one of our cars. Then I found the motor-bike and despatched one of the military policemen on it to Stanning.“In about half an hour’s time he was back with a car in which were Gordon and Harrison and some more military police. I put Matthews in charge of the party and sent them off to the Dyke Inn, though I felt pretty sure we were too late to catch the trio. That was really the reason I stayed behind; besides, I wanted to look after you. I got a turn when I saw you spread out all over the carpet, old man, I can tell you.”Desmond, who had listened with the most eager attention, did not speak for a minute. The sense of failure was strong upon him. How he had bungled it all!“Look here,” he said presently in a dazed voice, “you said just now that Matthews mistook Mrs. Malplaquet for Miss Mackwayte. Why should Matthews think that Miss Mackwayte was down here? Did she come down with you?”Francis looked at him quickly.“That crack on the head makes you forget things,” he said. “Don’t you remember Miss Mackwayte coming down here to see you yesterday afternoon? Matthews thought she had stayed on...”Desmond shook his head.“She’s not been here,” he replied. “I’m quite positive about that!”Francis sprang to his feet.“Surely you must be mistaken,” he said in tones of concern. “The Chief sent her down yesterday afternoon on purpose to see you. She reached Wentfield Station all right; because the porter told Matthews that she asked him the way to the Mill House.”An ominous foreboding struck chill at Desmond’s heart. He held his throbbing head for an instant. Someone had mentioned Barbara that night in the library but who was it? And what had he said?Ah! of course, it was Strangwise. “So that’s what she wanted with Nur-el-Din!” he had said.Desmond felt it all coming back to him now. Briefly he told Francis of his absence from the Mill House in response to the summons from Nur-el-Din, of his interview with the dancer and her story of the Star of Poland, of his hurried return just in time to meet Mortimer, and of Mortimer’s enigmatical reference to the dancer in the library that night.Fancis looked graver and graver as the story proceeded. Desmond noted it and reproached himself most bitterly with his initial failure to inform the Chief of the visits of Nur-el-Din and Mortimer to the Mill House. When he had finished speaking, he did not look at Francis, but gazed mournfully out of the window into the chilly drizzle of a sad winter’s day.“I don’t like the look of it at all, Des,” said his brother shaking his head, “but first we must make sure that there has been no misunderstanding about Miss Mackwayte. You say your housekeeper was already here when you came back from the Dyke Inn. She may have seen her. Let’s have old Martha in!”Between fright, bewilderment and indignation at the invasion of the house, old Martha was, if anything, deafer and more stupid than usual. After much interrogation they had to be satisfied with her repeated assertion that “she ’adn’t seen no young lady” and allowed her to hobble back to her kitchen.The two brothers stared at one another blankly. Francis was the first to speak. His eyes were shining and his manner was rather tense.“Des,” he asked; “what do you make of it? From what Strangwise let fall in the library here tonight, it seems probable that Miss Mackwayte, instead of coming here to see you as she was told—or she may have called during your absence—went to the Dyke Inn and saw Nur-el-Din. The muffed cry you heard at the inn suggests foul play to me and that suspicion is deepened in my mind by the fact that Matthews found Nur-el-Din at the Dyke Inn, as he reported to me by telephone just now; but he says nothing about Miss Mackwayte. Des, I fear the worst for that poor girl if she has fallen into the hands of that gang!”Desmond remained silent for a moment. He was trying to piece things together as best as his aching head would allow. Both Nur-el-Din and Strangwise were after the jewel. Nur-el-Din believed that afternoon that Strangwise had it, while Strangwise, on discovering his loss, had seemed to suggest that Barbara Mackwayte had recovered it.“Either Strangwise or Nur-el-Din, perhaps both of them,” said Desmond, “must know what has become of Miss Mackwayte.”And he explained his reasoning to Francis. His brother nodded quickly.“Then Nur-el-Din shall tell us,” he answered sternly.“They’ve arrested her?” asked Desmond with a sudden pang.“Yes,” said Francis curtly. But too late to prevent a crime being committed. When Matthews and his party arrived, they found Nur-el-Din in the very act of leaving the inn. The landlord, Rass, was lying dead on the floor of the tap-room with a bullet through the temple. That looks to me, Des, as though Nur-el-Din had recovered the jewel!”“But Rass is a compatriot of hers,” Desmond objected.“But he was also an inconvenient witness of her dealings with Strangwise,” retorted Francis. “If either Nur-el-Din or Strangwise have regained possession of the Star of Poland, Des, I fear the worst for Barbara Mackwayte. Come in!”The corporal stood, saluting, at the door.“Mr. Matthews on the telephone, sir!”Francis hurried away, leaving Desmond to his thoughts, which were not of the most agreeable. Had he been wrong in thinking Nur-el-Din a victim? Was he, after all, nothing but a credulous fool who had been hoodwinked by a pretty woman’s play-acting? And had he sacrificed Barbara Mackwayte to his obstinacy and his credulousness?Francis burst suddenly into the room.“Des,” he cried, “they’ve found Miss Mackwayte’s hat on the floor of the tap-room... it is stained with blood...”Desmond felt himself growing pale:“And the girl herself,” he asked thickly, “what of her?”Francis shook his head.“Vanished,” he replied gravely. “Vanished utterly. Desmond,” he added, “we must go over to the Dyke Inn at once!”
Desmond and Francis Okewood sat in the dining-room of the Mill House finishing an excellent breakfast of ham and eggs and coffee which old Martha had prepared for them.
Francis was still wearing Mr. John Hill’s greasy jacket and moleskins, but the removal of the sandy whiskers and a remarkable wig, consisting of a bald pate with a fringe of reddish hair, had gone far to restore him to the semblance of his former self.
Desmond was feeling a good deal better. His head had escaped the full force of the smashing blow dealt at him by Strangwise with the butt of his pistol. He had instinctively put up his arm to defend his face and the thickly padded sleeve of Bellward’s jacket had broken the force of the blow. Desmond had avoided a fractured skull at the price of an appalling bruise on the right forearm and a nasty laceration of the scalp.
Francis had resolutely declined to enlighten him as to the events of the night until both had breakfasted. After despatching the corporal of military police to hurry the housekeeper on with the breakfast, Francis had taken his brother straight to the dining-room, refusing to let him ask the questions which thronged his brain until they had eaten and drunk. Only when all the ham and eggs had disappeared, did Francis, lighting one of Mr. Bellward’s cigars, consent to satisfy his brother’s curiosity.
“It was only yesterday morning,” he said, “that I landed at Folkstone from the Continent. How I got the Chief’s message recalling me and how I made my escape through the Turkish lines to Allenby’s headquarters is a long story which will keep. The Chief had a car waiting for me at Folkstone and I reached London in time to lunch with him. We had a long talk and he gave me carte blanche to jump into this business now, when and where I thought I could best help you.”
Desmond smiled bitterly.
“The Chief couldn’t trust me to make good on my own, I suppose,” he said.
“The Chief had a very good idea of the character of the people you had to deal with, Des.,” retorted Francis, “and he was a trifle apprehensive that the role you were playing might lead to complications, supposing the gang were to see through your impersonation. He’s a wonderful man, that, Des., and he was dead right—as he always is.”
“But how?” asked Desmond. “Did the crowd spot me?”
“No,” answered the other; “but it was your disguise which was responsible for the escape of Strangwise—”
“What?” cried Desmond. “He’s escaped after all!”
Francis nodded.
“Yes,” he said, “got clear away and left no trace. Wait a minute and you shall hear! When I have told my story, you shall tell yours and between us, we’ll piece things together!
“Well, when I left the Chief yesterday, I came down here. The description of Mr. John Hill, your odd man, rather tickled my fancy. I wanted badly to get at you for a quiet chat and it seemed to me that if I could borrow Mr. Hill’s appearance for a few hours now and then I might gain access to you without rousing any suspicion. You see, I knew that old Hill left here about dusk every afternoon, so I guessed the coast would be clear.
“Clarkson’s fitted me out with the duds and the make-up and I got down to Wentfield by half-past six. The fog was so infernally thick that it took me more than an hour to get here on foot. It must have been close on eight o’clock when I pushed open your front gate. I thought of going boldly into the kitchen and asking for you, but, fortunately, I decided to have a preliminary prowl round the place. Through a chink in the curtains of the library I saw you and a stranger talking together. The stranger was quite unknown to me; but one thing about him I spotted right off. I saw that he was disguised; so I decided to hang about a bit and await developments.
“I loafed around in the fog for about half an hour. Then I heard a car coming up the drive. I hid myself in the rhododendron bush opposite the front door and saw two men and a woman get out. They hurried into the house, so that I didn’t have a chance of seeing their faces. But I got a good, glimpse of the chauffeur as he bent down to turn out the headlights. And, yes, I knew him!”
“Max, they called him,” said Desmond.
“His name was Mirsky when last I saw him,” answered Francis, “and mine was Apfelbaum, if you want to know. He was a German agent in Russia and as ruthless and unscrupulous a rascal as you’ll find anywhere in the German service. I must say I never thought he’d have the nerve to show his face in this country, though I believe he’s a Whitechapel Jew born and bred. However, there he was and the sight of his ugly mug told me that something was doing. But like a fool I decided to hang on a bit and watch, instead of going right off in that car and fetching help from Stanning.”
“It was just as well you waited,” said Desmond, “for if you’d gone off at once they must have heard the car and the fat would have been in the fire straight away!”
And he told Francis of the loud dispute among the confederates in the library, the noise of which had effectually covered the sound of the departing ear.
Francis laughed.
“From my observation post outside,” he said, “I could only see you, Des, and that blackguard, Mug, as you two were sitting opposite the window. I couldn’t see more than the feet of the others. But your face told me the loud voices which reached me even outside meant that a crisis of some sort was approaching, so I thought it was time to be up and doing. So I sneaked round to the front of the house, got the engine of the car going and started off down the drive.
“I had the very devil of a job to get to Stanning. Ever since you’ve been down here, the Chief has had special men on duty day and night at the police-station there. I didn’t dare stop to light the head-lamps and as a result the first thing I did was to charge the front gate and get the back wheel so thoroughly jammed that it took me the best part of twenty minutes to get the blooming car clear. When at last I got to the station, I found that Matthews, the Chief’s man, you know, had just arrived by car from London with a lot of plain-clothes men and some military police. He was in the very devil of a stew. He told me that Bellward had escaped, that the Chief was out of town for the night and ungetatable, and that he (Matthews) had come down on his own to prevent the gaff being blown on you and also to recapture Mr. Bellward if he should be mad enough to make for his old quarters.
“I told Matthews of the situation up at the Mill House. Neither of us was able to understand why you had not telephoned for assistance—we only discovered later that the telephone had been disconnected—but I went bail that you were up against a very stiff proposition. I told Matthews that, by surrounding the house, we might capture the whole gang.
“Matthews is a cautious cuss and he wanted a good deal of persuading, so we lost a lot of time. In the end, he wouldn’t take my advice to rush every available man to the scene, but only consented to take two plainclothes men and two military police. He was so precious afraid of upsetting your arrangements. The Chief, it appears, had warned everybody against doing that. So we all piled into the car and I drove them back to the Mill House.
“This time I left the car at the front gate and we went up to the house on foot. We had arranged that Matthews and one of the military police, both armed, should stay and guard the car, while the two plainclothes men and the other military policeman, the corporal here, should accompany me to the house. Matthews believed my yarn that we were only going to ‘investigate.’ What I intended to do in reality was to round up the whole blessed lot.
“I put one of the plain-clothes men on the front door and the other round at the back of the house. Their orders were to stop anybody who came out and at the same time to whistle for assistance. The corporal and I went to our old observation post outside the library window.
“The moment I glanced into the room I knew that matters had reached a climax. I saw you—looking pretty blue, old man—facing that woman who seemed to be denouncing you. Max stood beside you with a pistol, and beside him was our friend, Mortimer, with a regular whopper of an automatic. Before I had time to move, the plain-clothes man at the back of the house whistled. He had found the secret door with Bellward and the woman coming out of it.
“Then I saw Mortimer fire point-blank at you. I had my gun out in a second, but I was afraid of shooting, for fear of hitting you as you went for the other man.
“But the corporal at my side wasn’t worrying much about you. Just as you jumped he put up his gun and let fly at Mortimer with a sense of discrimination which does him infinite credit. He missed Mortimer, but plugged Max plumb through the forehead and my old friend dropped in his tracks right between you and the other fellow. On that we hacked our way through the French window. The corporal found time to have another shot and laid out a tall, odd-looking man...”
“No. 13,” elucidated Desmond.
“... When we got inside we found him dead across the threshold of the door leading into the hall. Behrend we caught hiding in a brush cupboard by the back stairs. As for the others—”
“Gone?” queried Desmond with a sudden sinking at his heart.
Francis nodded.
“We didn’t waste any time getting through that window,” he said, “but the catch was stiff and the broken glass was deuced unpleasant. Still, we were too late. You were laid out on the floor; Mortimer, Bellward and the lady had made their lucky escape. And the secret door showed us how they had gone...”
“But I thought you had a man posted at the back?”
“Would you believe it? When the shooting began, the infernal idiot must rush round to our assistance, so, of course, Mortimer and Co., nipping out by the secret door, got clear away down the drive. But that is not the worst. Matthews gave them the car!”
“No!” said Desmond incredulously.
“He did, though,” answered Francis. “Mind you, Mortimer had had the presence of mind to throw off his disguise. He presented himself to Matthews as Strangwise. Matthews knows Strangwise quite well: he has often seen him with the Chief.
“‘My God, Captain Strangwise,’ says Matthews, as the trio appeared, ‘What’s happened?’
“‘You’re wanted up at the house immediately, Matthews,’ says Strangwise quite excitedly. ‘We’re to take the car and go for assistance.’
“Matthews had a look at Strangwise’s companions, and seeing Bellward, of course, takes him for you. As for the lady, she had a black lace muffler wound about her face.
“‘Miss Mackwayte’s coming with us, Matthews,’ Strangwise says, seeing Matthews look at the lady. That removed the last of any lurking suspicions that old Matthews might have had. He left the military policeman at the gate and tore off like mad up the drive while Strangwise and the others jumped into the car and were away before you could say ‘knife.’ The military policeman actually cranked up the car for them!
“When Matthews burst into the library with the story of you and Strangwise and Miss Mackwayte having gone off for help in our only car, I knew we had been sold. You were there, knocked out of time on the floor, in your disguise as Bellward, so I knew that the man with Strangwise was the real Bellward and I consequently deduced that Strangwise was Mortimer and consequently the very man we had to catch.
“We were done brown. If we had had a little more time to think things out, we should have found that motor-bike and I would have gone after the trio myself. But my first idea was to summon aid. I tried to telephone without success and then we found the wire cut outside. Then I had the idea of pumping Behrend. I found him quite chatty and furious against Mortimer, whom he accused of having sold them. He told us that the party would be sure to make for the Dyke Inn, as Nur-el-Din was there.
“By this time Strangwise and his party had got at least an hour clear start of us. I had set a man to repair the telephone and in the meantime was thinking of sending another on foot to Stanning to fetch one of our cars. Then I found the motor-bike and despatched one of the military policemen on it to Stanning.
“In about half an hour’s time he was back with a car in which were Gordon and Harrison and some more military police. I put Matthews in charge of the party and sent them off to the Dyke Inn, though I felt pretty sure we were too late to catch the trio. That was really the reason I stayed behind; besides, I wanted to look after you. I got a turn when I saw you spread out all over the carpet, old man, I can tell you.”
Desmond, who had listened with the most eager attention, did not speak for a minute. The sense of failure was strong upon him. How he had bungled it all!
“Look here,” he said presently in a dazed voice, “you said just now that Matthews mistook Mrs. Malplaquet for Miss Mackwayte. Why should Matthews think that Miss Mackwayte was down here? Did she come down with you?”
Francis looked at him quickly.
“That crack on the head makes you forget things,” he said. “Don’t you remember Miss Mackwayte coming down here to see you yesterday afternoon? Matthews thought she had stayed on...”
Desmond shook his head.
“She’s not been here,” he replied. “I’m quite positive about that!”
Francis sprang to his feet.
“Surely you must be mistaken,” he said in tones of concern. “The Chief sent her down yesterday afternoon on purpose to see you. She reached Wentfield Station all right; because the porter told Matthews that she asked him the way to the Mill House.”
An ominous foreboding struck chill at Desmond’s heart. He held his throbbing head for an instant. Someone had mentioned Barbara that night in the library but who was it? And what had he said?
Ah! of course, it was Strangwise. “So that’s what she wanted with Nur-el-Din!” he had said.
Desmond felt it all coming back to him now. Briefly he told Francis of his absence from the Mill House in response to the summons from Nur-el-Din, of his interview with the dancer and her story of the Star of Poland, of his hurried return just in time to meet Mortimer, and of Mortimer’s enigmatical reference to the dancer in the library that night.
Fancis looked graver and graver as the story proceeded. Desmond noted it and reproached himself most bitterly with his initial failure to inform the Chief of the visits of Nur-el-Din and Mortimer to the Mill House. When he had finished speaking, he did not look at Francis, but gazed mournfully out of the window into the chilly drizzle of a sad winter’s day.
“I don’t like the look of it at all, Des,” said his brother shaking his head, “but first we must make sure that there has been no misunderstanding about Miss Mackwayte. You say your housekeeper was already here when you came back from the Dyke Inn. She may have seen her. Let’s have old Martha in!”
Between fright, bewilderment and indignation at the invasion of the house, old Martha was, if anything, deafer and more stupid than usual. After much interrogation they had to be satisfied with her repeated assertion that “she ’adn’t seen no young lady” and allowed her to hobble back to her kitchen.
The two brothers stared at one another blankly. Francis was the first to speak. His eyes were shining and his manner was rather tense.
“Des,” he asked; “what do you make of it? From what Strangwise let fall in the library here tonight, it seems probable that Miss Mackwayte, instead of coming here to see you as she was told—or she may have called during your absence—went to the Dyke Inn and saw Nur-el-Din. The muffed cry you heard at the inn suggests foul play to me and that suspicion is deepened in my mind by the fact that Matthews found Nur-el-Din at the Dyke Inn, as he reported to me by telephone just now; but he says nothing about Miss Mackwayte. Des, I fear the worst for that poor girl if she has fallen into the hands of that gang!”
Desmond remained silent for a moment. He was trying to piece things together as best as his aching head would allow. Both Nur-el-Din and Strangwise were after the jewel. Nur-el-Din believed that afternoon that Strangwise had it, while Strangwise, on discovering his loss, had seemed to suggest that Barbara Mackwayte had recovered it.
“Either Strangwise or Nur-el-Din, perhaps both of them,” said Desmond, “must know what has become of Miss Mackwayte.”
And he explained his reasoning to Francis. His brother nodded quickly.
“Then Nur-el-Din shall tell us,” he answered sternly.
“They’ve arrested her?” asked Desmond with a sudden pang.
“Yes,” said Francis curtly. But too late to prevent a crime being committed. When Matthews and his party arrived, they found Nur-el-Din in the very act of leaving the inn. The landlord, Rass, was lying dead on the floor of the tap-room with a bullet through the temple. That looks to me, Des, as though Nur-el-Din had recovered the jewel!”
“But Rass is a compatriot of hers,” Desmond objected.
“But he was also an inconvenient witness of her dealings with Strangwise,” retorted Francis. “If either Nur-el-Din or Strangwise have regained possession of the Star of Poland, Des, I fear the worst for Barbara Mackwayte. Come in!”
The corporal stood, saluting, at the door.
“Mr. Matthews on the telephone, sir!”
Francis hurried away, leaving Desmond to his thoughts, which were not of the most agreeable. Had he been wrong in thinking Nur-el-Din a victim? Was he, after all, nothing but a credulous fool who had been hoodwinked by a pretty woman’s play-acting? And had he sacrificed Barbara Mackwayte to his obstinacy and his credulousness?
Francis burst suddenly into the room.
“Des,” he cried, “they’ve found Miss Mackwayte’s hat on the floor of the tap-room... it is stained with blood...”
Desmond felt himself growing pale:
“And the girl herself,” he asked thickly, “what of her?”
Francis shook his head.
“Vanished,” he replied gravely. “Vanished utterly. Desmond,” he added, “we must go over to the Dyke Inn at once!”