Beyond the town of Jerez and on the road that runs westward to San Lucar, there is a hill. Once upon a time, a grey old watch-tower stood upon its steepest place, but one day there came an eccentric American who purchased the land on which it stood, demolished the tower, and erected a castellated mansion. Rumour had it that he was mad, but no American would be confined on a Spaniard's appreciation of sanity.
The American consul at Jerez, of his charity and kindliness of heart, journeyed out to call upon him, and received a cold welcome. A message came to him that the proprietor was in bed with gout, and neither then or at any time desired visitors, which so enraged the well-meaning consul that he never called again. The American's visits were of a fleeting character. He was in residence less than a month in the year. Then one day he came and remained. His name was registered as Señor Walter G. Brown, of New York. The English police sought him as George T. Baggin, an absconding promoter, broker, bucket-shop keeper, and all-round thief. After a time he began to receive visitors, who stayed on also.
Then came a period when Mr. Walter G. Brown became aggressively patriotic.
He caused to be erected on the topmost tower of his mansion an enormous flagstaff, from which flew on rare occasions a ridiculously small Stars and Stripes.
At night, the place of the flag was taken by a number of thick copper strands, and simple-minded villagers in the country about reported strange noises, for all the world like the rattling of dried peas in a tin canister.
On the evening of a wintry day, many people journeyed up the steep pathway that led to the mansion on the hill. They came singly and in pairs, mostly riding, although one stout man drove up in a little victoria drawn by two panting mules.
The last to come was Mr. Baggin, an unpleasant smile on his square face.
By the side of his horse trotted a breathless man in a tattered coat, his cropped head bare.
"I will show you where to stand," Baggin said. "There is a curtain that covers a door. The man will pass by that curtain, and I shall be with him. I will hold his arm—so. Then I will say, 'Count Poltavo, I do not trust you,' and then——"
The ragged man swept the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, for the path was steep.
"And then," he grunted, "I will strike."
"Surely," warned the other.
The man grinned.
"I shall not fail," he said significantly.
They disappeared into the great house—it is worthy of note that Baggin opened the door with a key of his own—and darkness fell upon the hill and upon the valley.
Far away, lights twinkling through the trees showed where Jerez lay.
The room in which the Nine Men sat was large, even as rooms go in Spain. It had the appearance of a small lecture hall. Heavy curtains of dark blue velvet hid the tall windows, and electric lights, set at intervals in the ceiling, provided light.
The little desks at which the men sat were placed so as to form a horseshoe.
Of the nine, it is possible that one knew the other, and that some guessed the identity of all. It was difficult to disguise Grayson, who in his life of inactivity had grown exceedingly stout, and yet with all the trickery of the black cloaks they wore and the crêpe masks that hid their faces, it was hard enough to single even him from his fellows.
The last man had reached his seat when one who sat at the extreme end of the horseshoe on the president's right, rose and asked: "What of Poltavo, brother?"
"He has not yet arrived," was the muffled reply.
"Perhaps, then, it is well that I should say what I have to say before his return," said the first speaker.
He rose to his feet, and eight pairs of eyes turned towards him.
"Gentlemen," he began, "the time has come when our operations must cease."
A murmur interrupted him, and he stopped.
"What is it?" he asked sharply.
"Let us have more light," said a mask at the end of the horseshoe, and pointed to the ceiling where only half of the lights glowed.
Baggin nodded, and the man rose and made his way to the curtained recess where the switches were.
"No, no, no!" said Baggin quickly—for he suddenly realised that there was something hidden by the curtain, a sinister figure of a man in convict shirt, fingering the edge of a brand-new knife. So Baggin pictured him.
The masked man halted in surprise.
"No, no," repeated Baggin, and beckoned him back. "For what I have to say I need no light; you interrupt me, brother."
With a muttered apology the man resumed his seat.
"I have said," continued Baggin, "that the time has come when we must seriously consider the advisability of dispersing."
A murmur of assent met these words.
"This organisation of ours has grown and grown until it has become unwieldy," he went on. "We are all business men, so there is no need for me to enlarge upon the danger that attends the house that undertakes responsibilities which it cannot personally attend to.
"We have completed a most wonderful organisation. We have employed all the ingenuities of modern science to further our plans. We have agents in every part of Europe, in India, Egypt, and America. So long as these agents have been ignorant of the identity and location of their employers, we were safe. To ensure this, we have worked through Count Poltavo, a gentleman who came to us some time ago—under peculiar conditions.
"We have employed, too, and gratefully employed, Catherine Dominguez, a charming lady, as to whose future you need have no fear. Some time ago, as you all know, we established wireless stations in the great capitals, as being the safest method by which our instructions might be transmitted without revealing to our agents the origin of these commands. A code was drawn up, certain arrangements of letters and words, and this code was deciphered and our secret revealed through the ingenuity of one man. We were prepared to meet him on a business basis. We communicated with him by wireless, and agreed to pay a sum not only to himself, but to two others, if he kept our secret and agreed to make no written record of their discovery. They promised, but their promise was broken, and it was necessary to employ other methods.
"I am fully prepared to accept responsibility for my share of the result, just as I am prepared to share responsibility for any other act which circumstances may have rendered necessary.
"And now, gentlemen, I come to the important part in my speech. By sharing the result of our operations we may each go our way, in whatever guise we think most suitable, to the enjoyment of our labours.
"In a short time for many of us the statute of limitations will have worked effectively; and for others there are States in South America that would welcome us and offer us every luxury that money can buy or heart desire.
"Yet I would not advise the scattering of our forces. Rather, I have a scheme which will, I think, enable us to extract the maximum of enjoyment from life, at a minimum of risk. With that end in view, I have expended from our common fund a sum equal to half-a-million English pounds. I have completed elaborate arrangements, which I shall ask you to approve of; I have fashioned our future." He threw out his hands with a gesture of pride. "It is for you to decide whether we shall go our several ways, each in fear of the weakness of the other, our days filled with dread, our nights sleepless with doubt, or whether in new circumstances we shall live together in freedom, in happiness, and in unity."
Again the murmured applause.
"But there is an element of danger which must be removed," Baggin went on; "between freedom and us there lies a shadow."
He stopped and looked from mask to mask.
"That shadow," he said slowly, "is Count Ivan Poltavo, the man who knows our secrets, who has done our work, the one man in the world who holds our lives in the hollow of his——"
Before he had finished he saw their eyes leave his face and seek the door, and he turned to meet the calm scrutiny of the subject of his discourse. He had entered the room whilst Baggin was speaking and stood listening.
For a few moments there was silence.
Over Baggin's face came a startling change.
The flush of excitement died out of his cheeks, leaving him ghastly pale and overcome with confusion. His mouth, opened to conclude his sentence, hung gaping, as if it had suddenly been frozen in that position. His eyes glared with rage and terror.
Count Poltavo advanced, hat in hand, and bowed gravely to the masked company.
"Monsieur Baggin does me an honour that I do not deserve," he said.
Baggin, recovering himself, shot a swift side glance at a curtained recess behind which stooped a crop-haired man in a convict shirt, fingering a brand-new knife.
"Monsieur Baggin," Count Poltavo went on, "is wrong when he says I am the only man who stands between the Nine Bears of Cadiz and freedom—there is another, and his name is T. B. Smith."
"T. B. Smith is dead, or dying," said Baggin angrily; "we have your word for it."
His antagonist favoured him with the slightest bow.
"Even I may fall into an error," he said magnanimously. "T. B. is neither dead nor dying."
"But he fell?"
The count smiled.
"It was clever, and for the moment even I was deceived," he confessed.
He walked forward until he was opposite the curtain where the assassin waited.
"He is in Jerez, messieurs—with an assistant. I saw them upon the street this morning. Mr. Smith," he concluded, smiling, "wore his arm in a sling."
"It's a lie!" shouted Baggin. "Strike, Carlos!"
He wrenched the curtain aside, revealing the sinister figure behind.
Poltavo fell back with an ashen face, but the convict made no move.
Baggin sprang at him in a fury, and struck madly, blindly, but Poltavo's arm caught his, and wrenched him backward.
In the count's other hand was a revolver, and the muzzle covered the convict.
"Gentlemen," he said, and his eyes blazed with triumph, "I have told you that T. B. Smith was here with an assistant—behold the assistant!"
And Cord Van Ingen, in his convict shirt, standing with one hand against the wall of the recess, and the other on his hip, smiled cheerfully.
"That is very true," he said.
Under his hand were the three switches that controlled the light in the room.
"It is also true, my young friend," said Poltavo softly, "that you have meddled outrageously in this matter—that you are virtually dead."
Van Ingen nodded.
"Wasn't it a Polish philosopher," he began, with all the hesitation of one who is beginning a long discourse, "who said——"
Then he switched out the light and dropped flat on the floor. The revolvers cracked together, and Poltavo uttered an oath.
There was a wild scramble in the dark. A knot of men swayed over a prostrate form; then a trembling hand found the switch, and the room was flooded with light.
Poltavo lay flat on his back with a bullet through his leg, but the man they sought, the man in the striped shirt and with a three days' growth of beard, was gone.
That night at nine o'clock, Cord Van Ingen paced with beating heart the length of the tiny enclosed garden upon which the side-door of the hotel opened, and glanced up eagerly at every sound of footsteps. There may be men who can go to a lover's appointment with an even pulse, but Cord Van Ingen was not one of them. His heart sang a pæan of joy and praise. He was going to see Doris! A broad shaft of yellow light streaming from an unshuttered window in the second story, told him that the detective was still busy writing reports and preparing despatches. That he regarded the expedition as a failure the young man knew, but he was indifferent since he had learned the one great fact. Doris was in Jerez!
An old woman, with a face like a withered apple, and her eyes under the fringe of her black head-shawl shining like bright beads, had delivered the message. At the conclusion of his adventure with the Nine, he had made his way back to the hotel, and after a few words to the detective, had mounted to his bare little room, bathed, shaved, and descended to supper.
The meal was an unsocial one, for Smith, in an execrable temper over the miscarriage of his plans, glowered blackly through the scant courses, and at their close vanished promptly into his room.
Van Ingen lighted a cigarette, and sauntered out upon the narrow street. He meant to stroll toward the plaza, and have a look at the cathedral. As he stood for a moment in front of the hotel, uncertain of the direction, an old crone, such as haunt the steps of churches with trinkets and sacred relics for sale, hobbled up to him, scanned his face sharply, and dropped a courtesy.
"Señor Van Eenge?" she asked, in a clear soft whisper.
The young man fell back a pace in amazement. "Yes," he admitted curtly. On the instant he thought of Poltavo, and his hand went into his coat pocket. "But how did you know?"
She shook her head with a mysterious smile, and held out her hand. "From the señorita," she murmured.
"Eh?" Cord stared blankly.
But he took the missive, scenting a romance, and laughingly struck a match. It contained but a single pencilled line, written, evidently, in great agitation, for the characters were scarcely legible. The match burned down and scorched his fingers. He lit another unsteadily, and stared again, his face in the small circle of light pallid with excitement.
"I will see you in the garden at nine.
"DORIS."
Doris, whom he had believed to be with Lady Dinsmore on the Riviera, in this desolate, wind-raked little Spanish town? What was the meaning of it? He turned to question the old crone, but she had slid noiselessly into the gloom whence she had come, and he was left standing before the hotel with only the scrap of white paper to show that the entire incident was not the wild imagining of an overwrought brain.
He bent his eyes to it again, and especially to the signature. There could be no mistake. That funny little D of Doris, with its childish curl at the end, he would know the world around. It smote him with a strong emotion and gave him a sense of reality. Doris, then, was actually near at hand, breathing the same warm night air, watching the same moon, high and pale, sailing across the sky.
He turned back to the house, and after a casual word with his host, a tall, spare-looking man, with a drooping moustache and a face as sour as the vintages he sold to his guests, he went down the short flight of steps into the garden. The bell of the campanile somewhere in the distance struck the four quarters, and then chimed eight silver strokes. An hour to wait. He flung himself upon a bench at the extreme end of the garden, beneath a pomegranate tree. As he leaned back, a shower of the scarlet flowers fell about him. Not far down the street, perhaps beneath some window, a youth's voice could be heard, sweetened by distance, singing "La Paloma." Cord wondered idly if it were another tryst.
He sprang up, mastered by impatience, and walked about, whistling the same air softly. Minutes passed. Cord wondered how she would come. The only entrance to the enclosed garden which he had remarked lay through the lobby of the hotel. He frowned at the thought of her meeting the cold, leering stare of his host, and decided to meet her upon the street. With a foot upon the lower step, he paused and lifted his head, alert, listening. Behind him, at the end of the garden, coming from the neighbourhood of the bench, he had heard the sound of an unmistakable click. He sprang toward the sound, his blood racing tumultuously through his veins.
Two shadows detached themselves from the deeper gloom of the garden wall, and stood forth uncertainly. One of the shadows held out a hand.
"Cord!" she murmured. She pushed back the enveloping folds of the lace mantilla about her head. It fell away upon her shoulders, and the pale beams of the moon shone full upon her face. It was Doris.
At sight of her, the exclamation of joy died on Van Ingen's lips. He stood rooted to the spot by the startling change in her countenance. Her blue eyes, once so laughing, looked out from black hollows, her cheeks were pale and slightly drawn, and her mouth colourless. Fear, depression, misery, spoke in every drooping line of her figure. "Well?" she said at last, tremulously. "You—are not glad to see me?"
With a hoarse little cry, he took her into his arms, and held her close.
"My Doris!" he whispered. "What have they done to you?"
She trembled in the close embrace, and clung to him.
"I—I have been afraid," she said simply, "for so many endless days! So many long white nights I I thought at times I should go mad at the horror of it! And when I heard that you were here, near me, in Jerez, I decided to risk all. And so I—I came with Maria, who knows the way," she nodded toward the other figure which had withdrawn into the shadows, "to—to see you."
"To see me?" he repeated in a low voice, as one cons a difficult lesson. "You risked all, to see me?"
She nodded, and raised her eyes to his. "But if you are not glad to see me?" She strove gently to disengage herself.
He held her fast. At the moment, as if the heavens had opened wide, a great light broke in upon him. He stared at the face lying against his shoulder, flushed, eager, incredulous. Her soft eyelids were closed. Love lay upon them like a dream, and upon the faintly smiling lips. Her breath mounted to his nostrils like delicate incense. He bent lower and lower.
"Open your eyes, darling!" he entreated.
She obeyed—their lips met. He kissed her again.
A slight sound came from the shadows.
Doris broke from him, breathless, but unashamed, a new-found joy in her eyes.
"I had almost forgot!" she exclaimed. "I came to tell you something—something important."
Cord laughed.
"You have told it already!" he said. "You have been chanting wonderful, thrilling, cosmic things to me the last ten minutes!"
He sat down and drew her beside him on the bench.
"Tell me—everything," he said gravely.
She eased herself within the circle of his arm.
"First, I wish you to take a message to my aunt. Tell her I am well and happy—now!"
"Lady Dinsmore?" he asked in surprise. "Is she not with you?"
She shook her head. "Aunt Patricia is in Biarritz," she replied in a low tone. "I—I am with my father." Fear had crept into her voice again. "That is what I came to tell you," she continued. "My aunt does not understand—she would have me desert my father. But I shall stay with him to the end."
"And—Poltavo?" Van Ingen recalled her letter, and jealousy started up within him.
"Count Poltavo is with us—at present," she answered in a constrained voice. "How long he will remain——"
"Tell me everything, darling!" he pleaded.
"I can tell you—nothing!" she said passionately, her breast heaving. "Save only that I shall be glad, glad, when this terrible search is completed. So many lives——" For the first time, she broke down completely, and turning from him, sobbed bitterly, her face hidden in her hands. She rocked back and forth in a paroxysm of grief.
He bent over her, in an agony of distress, and put his arms about her.
"Cord!" The voice came to him, strangled with sobs.
"Darling?" his mouth was close to her lips.
"Promise me that you will give it up?"
"No."
"But they will kill you—too!" she moaned.
"Not me!" he said cheerfully. "Not after this!" He raised her tearful face to his. "Tell me, at least, where a letter may find you."
"I shall be with my father," she replied evasively. "Count Poltavo and Mr. Baggin are in open rupture," she hurried on. "Each is fighting for mastery. Count Poltavo has the brains, but Baggin has the money. Between them, they tear my poor father to pieces."
"And you!" he cried in a choked, angry voice. "They are killing you, too."
"I am a pawn in the game," she said listlessly. "Each side plays me off against the other." She rose. "It is late. Maria."
The old woman materialised out of the gloom, and held open the gate. Cord arose also.
"You are not to come with me!" she whispered urgently. "Good-night!"
He held her closely. "You love me?"
"Forever!" she said simply.
She rearranged the lace mantilla about her head, and held out her hand.
"I am coming with you," he said composedly.
Something in his tone checked the protest on her lips.
Something in his tone checked the protest on her lipsSomething in his tone checked the protest on her lips
They walked quietly along the narrow street, the duenna behind, climbed a slight ascent, and stopped in front of a house standing apart, and surrounded by a large garden.
She turned to him, laying one hand upon a small wicket gate.
"One moment," he implored. "Count Poltavo—— Your promise——"
"I gave my pledge to him if he would save my father," she said sadly. "That he has not done." She opened the gate.
"But if he should——" he insisted.
She lifted her head proudly. "Then I should redeem my pledge."
She vanished into the darkness of the garden, and the young man retraced his steps to the hotel.
The next morning he mounted the steep little street with hope in his heart, and hung about, watching anxiously. No sign of life exhibited itself. The windows, with their close-drawn shades, stared at him blankly. Presently an old woman hobbled out of the little wicket gate.
Van Ingen approached her eagerly. "The young lady——" he began in a low tone.
"Gone, señor!" She threw out her hands with an expressive gesture, to indicate illimitable distances. "They departed, in mad haste, in the night."
"And she left no message?" he cried, in bitter disappointment.
She shrugged her shoulders. "Nothing more than she told the senor last night."
Van Ingen tossed her a silver piece, and turned slowly back to the hotel.
In red, blue, and green; in type varying in size according to the temperament of the newspaper; in words wild or sedate, as the character of the journal demanded, the newspaper contents bills gave London its first intimation of the breaking up of the Nine Bears.
As a sensation scarcely less vivid came the astounding exposé of Count Ivan Poltavo. Society rocked to its foundations by this news of its favourite. From every dinner-table in London arose the excited clamour of discussion. Lady Angela defended him stoutly, declaring that as an artist, and ignorant of money, he had been misled by bad, clever rascals. Men who had been forced to take second place in his presence, now came forward, boldly, and stated that they had always suspected him to be a rogue.
One brilliant young man achieved a week-long fame by looking up his record at Scotland Yard. It appeared that the count was indeed a black-hearted villain. Five years ago he had been deported as an undesirable alien.
"But how did he escape recognition?" asked a guest.
The famous one smirked. "He parted his hair on one side, and wore a moustache!"
Ah! Into the mind of every feminine diner arose the vivid picture of the count—with mustachios! They sighed.
That the Nine Bears were dispersed was hailed as a triumph for the English police. Unfortunately, the popular view is not always the correct view, and T. B. Smith came back to London a very angry man.
It had been no fault of his that the majority of the band had escaped.
"The Civil Guard was twenty minutes late in taking up its position," wrote T. B. in his private report.
"No blame attached to the Guard, which is one of the finest police forces in the world, but to the local police authorities, who at the eleventh hour detected some obscurity in their instructions from Madrid, and must needs telegraph for elucidation. So that the ring about the House on the Hill which I commanded was not completed until long after the whole lot had escaped. We caught François Zillier, who has been handed over to the French police, but the remainder of the gang got clean away. Apparently they have taken Count Poltavo with them; Van Ingen declares he shot him and such indications as we have point to his having been badly hurt. How the remainder managed to carry him off passes my comprehension. We have secured a few documents. There is one mysterious scrap of paper discovered in Baggin's private room which is incoherent to a point of wildness, and apparently the rough note of some future scheme; it will bear re-examination."
"Thanks to the industry and perseverance of the English police," said theLondon Morning Journal, commenting on the affair, "the Nine Men of Cadiz are dispersed, their power destroyed, their brilliant villainies a memory. It is only a matter of time before they will fall into the hands of the police, and the full measure of Society's punishment be awarded them. Scattered as they are——"
T. B. Smith put down his paper when he came to this part, and smiled grimly.
"Scattered, are they!" he said. "I doubt it."
For all the praise that was lavished upon him and upon his department, he was not satisfied with himself. He knew that he had failed. To break up the gang had always been possible. To arrest them and seize the huge fortune they had amassed would have been an achievement justifying the encomia that were being lavished upon him.
"The only satisfaction I have," he said to the Chief Commissioner, "is that we are so often cursed for inefficiency when we do the right thing, that we can afford to take a little credit when we've made a hash of things."
"I wouldn't say that," demurred the Chief. "You did all that was humanly possible."
T. B. sniffed.
"Eight men and Poltavo slipped through my fingers," he answered briefly; "that's a bad best."
He rose from the chair and paced the room, his head sunk on his breast.
"If Count Poltavo had delayed his entrance another ten minutes," he said, stopping suddenly, "Baggin would have told Van Ingen all that I wanted to know. This wonderful scheme of his that was to secure them all ease and security for the rest of their lives."
"He may have been boasting," suggested the other, but T. B. shook his head.
"It was no boast," he said with assurance, "and if it were he has made it good, for where are the Nine? One of them is on Devil's Island, because he had the misfortune to fall into our hands. But where are the others? Vanished! Dissolved into the elements—and their money with them! I tell you, sir, there is not even the suspicion of a trace of these men. How did they get away from Cadiz? Not by rail, for all northward trains were stopped at Boadilla and searched. Not by sea, for the only ship that left that night was the Brazilian man-o'-war,Maria Braganza."
"Airship," suggested his chief flippantly, as he moved towards the door.
"It is unlikely, sir," replied T. B. coldly.
The Chief Commissioner stood with his hand on the edge of the open door.
"At any rate, they are finished," he said, "their power for further mischief is destroyed."
"I appreciate your optimism, sir," said T. B. impertinently, "which I regret to say I do not share."
"One thing is evident, and must be remembered," T. B. went on, as his chief still lingered. "Outside of the Nine Men there must be in Europe hundreds of agents, who, without being aware of their principals, have been acting blindly for years in their interest. What of the men who went to the length of murder at Poltavo's orders? What of the assassins in Europe and America who 'arranged' the suicide of the bank president and the wreck of the Sud Express? Not one of these men have we been able to track down. I tell you, sir, that outside of the inner council of this gang, Poltavo organised as great a band of villains as the world has ever seen. They remain; this is an indisputable fact; somewhere in the world, scattered materially, but bound together by bonds of Poltavo's weaving, are a number of men who formed the working parts of the Nine Men's great machine. For the moment the steam is absent—— Yes?"
A constable was at the door.
"A message for you, sir."
T. B. took the envelope and tore it open mechanically. It was a note from Van Ingen.
"Saw Poltavo ten minutes ago in a hansom. Positive—no disguise. C.V.I."
Smith sat suddenly erect. "Poltavo in London!" he breathed. "It is incredible!"
He stood up, busily engaged in speculation.
* * * * * * *
The little telegraph instrument near the Chief Inspector's desk began to click. In every police station throughout the metropolis it snapped forth its message. In Highgate, in Camberwell, in sleepy Greenwich, in Ladywell, as in Stoke Newington. "Clickerty, clickerty, click," it went, hastily, breathlessly. It ran:
"To ALL STATIONS: Arrest and detain Count Ivan Poltavo. [Here the description followed.] All reserves out in plain clothes."
All reserves out!
That was a remarkable order.
London did not know of the happening; the homeward-bound suburbanite may have noticed a couple of keen-faced men standing idly near the entrance of the railway station, may have seen a loiterer on the platform—a loiterer who apparently had no train to catch. Curious men, too, came to the hotels, lounging away the whole evening in the entrance hall, mildly interested in people who came or went. Even the tram termini were not neglected, nor the theatre queues, nor the boarding-houses of Bloomsbury. Throughout London, from east to west, north to south, the work that Scotland Yard had set silent emissaries to perform was swiftly and expeditiously carried out.
T. B. sat all that evening in his office waiting. One by one little pink slips were carried in to him and laid upon the desk before him.
As the evening advanced they increased in number and length.
At eight o'clock came a wire:
"Not leaving by Hook of Holland route."
Soon after nine:
"Continental mail clear."
Then in rapid succession the great caravanserais reported themselves. Theatres, bars, restaurants, every place in London where men and women gather together, sent, through the plain-clothes watchers, their messages.
At eleven o'clock T. B. was reading a telegram from Harwich when the telephone at his elbow buzzed.
He took up the receiver.
"Hullo," he said curtly.
For a second there was no reply, and then, very clear and distinct, came a voice.
"T. B. Smith, I presume."
It was the voice of Count Poltavo.
If there had been anybody in the room but T. B., he might have imagined it was a very ordinary call the detective was receiving. Save for the fact that his face twitched, as was a characteristic of his when labouring under any great excitement, he gave no sign of the varied emotions Poltavo's voice had aroused.
"Yes, I am T. B. Smith; you are, of course, Count Poltavo?"
"I am, of course, Count Poltavo," said the voice suavely, "and it is on the tip of your tongue to ask me where I am."
"I am hardly as foolish as that," said T. B. drily, "but wherever you are—and I gather from the clearness of your voice that you are in London—I shall have you."
There was a little laugh at the other end of the wire.
T. B.'s hand stole out and pressed a little bell-push that rested on the table.
"Yes," said Poltavo's voice mockingly, "I am in London. I am desirous of knowing where my friends have hidden."
"Your friends?" T. B. was genuinely astonished.
"My friends," said the voice gravely, "who so ungenerously left me to die on the salt plains near Jerez whilst they were making their escape."
A constable entered the room whilst Poltavo was talking, and T. B. raised his hand warningly.
"Tell me," he said carelessly, "why you have not joined them."
Then, like a flash, he brought his hand down over the transmitter and turned to the waiting constable.
"Run across to Mr. Elk's room," he said rapidly; "call the Treasury Exchange and ask what part of London—what office—this man is speaking to me from."
Poltavo was talking before T. B. had finished giving his instructions.
"Why have I not joined them?" he said, and there was a little bitterness in his voice,—"because they do not wish to have me. Poltavo has served his purpose! Where are they now?—that is what I wish to know. More important still, I greatly desire a piece of information which you alone, monsieur, can afford me."
The sublime audacity of the man brought a grin to T. B.'s face.
"And that is?" he asked.
"There was," said Poltavo, "amongst the documents you found at our headquarters in Jerez a scrap of paper written somewhat unintelligibly, and apparently—I should imagine, for I have not seen it—without much meaning."
"There was," said T. B. cheerfully.
"So much I gathered from Baggin's agitation on our retreat," said Poltavo. "Where, may I ask, is this interesting piece of literature deposited?"
The cool, matter-of-fact demand almost took T. B.'s breath away.
"It is at present at Scotland Yard," he said.
"With my—er—dossier?" asked the voice, and a little laugh followed.
"Rather with the dossier of your friend Baggin," said T. B.
"In case I should ever want to—how do you say—burgle Scotland Yard," said the drawling voice again, "could you give me explicit instructions where to find it?"
T. B.'s anxiety was to keep Poltavo engaged in conversation until the officer he had despatched to the telephone returned.
"Yes," he said, "at present it is in the cabinet marked 'Unclassified Data,' but I cannot promise you that it will remain there. You see, count, I have too high an opinion of your enterprise and daring."
He waited for a reply, but no reply came, and at that moment the door opened and the constable he had sent on the errand appeared.
T. B. covered the transmitter again.
"The Treasury say that you are not connected with anybody, sir," he said.
"What?"
T. B. stared at him.
He moved his hand from the transmitter and called softly, "Poltavo!"
There was no reply, and he called again.
He looked up with the receiver still at his ear.
"He's rung off."
Then a new voice spoke.
"Finished, sir?"
"No—who are you?" demanded T. B. quickly.
"Exchange, sir—Private Exchange, Scotland Yard."
"Who was talking to me then? Where was he talking from?"
"Why, from the Record Office."
T. B., his face white, leapt to his feet.
"Follow me," he said, and went racing down the long corridor. He went down the broad stairs three at a time.
A constable on duty in the hall turned in astonishment.
"Has anybody left here recently?" asked T. B. breathlessly.
"A gentleman just gone out, sir," said the man; "went away in a motor-car."
"Is Mr. Elk in the building?"
"In the Record Office, sir," said the man.
Up the stairs again flew the detective. The Record Office was at the far end of the building.
The door was ajar and the room in darkness, but T. B. was in the room and had switched on the light.
In the centre of the room was stretched the unfortunate Elk in a pool of blood. A preserver lay near him. T. B. leant over him; he was alive, but terribly injured; then he shot a swift glance round the room. He saw the telephone with the receiver off; he saw an open cabinet marked "Unclassified Data," and it was empty.
Poltavo had escaped. There was pother enough—eight of the Nine Bears had melted into nothingness. No official feather came to T. B.'s cap for that, whatever praise the mistaken public might award. Worst of all, and most shocking outrage of all, the Record Office at Scotland Yard had been burgled and important documents had been stolen. But Elk had not been killed, so the incident did not come before the public.
The contents of the documents were not lost to the police, for Scotland Yard does not put all its eggs into one basket, even when the basket is as secure a one as the Record Office. There were photographs innumerable of the scrap of paper, and one of these was on T. B. Smith's desk the morning after the robbery.
The memorandum, for such it was, was contained in less than a hundred words. Literally, and with all its erasures written out, it ran:
"Idea [crossed out]. Ideas [written again]. Suppose we separated; where to meet; allowing for accidental partings; must be some spot; yet that would be dangerous; otherwise, must be figures easily remembered; especially as none of these people have knowledge [crossed out and rewritten]; especially as difficult for non-technical [word undecipherable] to fix in mind, and one cipher makes all difference. LOLO be good, accessible, unfrequented. Suggest on first Ju every year we rendezvous at Lolo.
"(Mem.—Lolo would indeed be nowhere!)
"So far have only explained to Zillier."
That was all, and T. B. read and reread the memorandum. Zillier was the only man who knew. By the oddest of chances, Baggin had confided his plans to the one man who might have found them useful if Providence had given him one chance of escape. But the French Government had him safe enough on Devil's Island.
For the rest, the "note" needed much more explanation than he could give it.
He took a pen and began to group the sentences he could not understand.
"Must be some spot; yet that would be dangerous; otherwise, must be figures easily remembered."
A spot would be dangerous? He was perplexed and showed it. What was meant by "spot"?
"On the 1st of Ju we rendezvous at Lolo—nowhere!"
"This is absolute nonsense!" The detective threw down his pen and jumped up.
He called in the Chief Commissioner's office and was received cordially.
"Any news, T. B.; what do you make of your puzzle?"
T. B. made a little grimace.
"Nothing," he said, "and if the original had not been stolen I should not have troubled to study it."
He gained the Strand by a short cut.
A contents bill attracted his attention, and he stopped to buy an evening newspaper.
"LOSS OF A WARSHIP."
He turned the paper before he discovered the small paragraph that justified so large a bill.
"The Brazilian Government has sent another cruiser to search for the Brazilian man-of-war,Maria Braganza, which is a month overdue. It is feared that the warship foundered in the recent cyclone in the South Atlantic."
"Maria Braganza?" thought T. B., and remembered where he had seen the vessel.
The ship and her fate passed out of his mind soon afterward, for he had a great deal of routine work requiring his attention, but the name cropped up again in the course of the day and in a curious manner.
* * * * * * *
A drunken sailor, obviously of foreign extraction, was ejected, fighting, from a small public-house in the Edgware Road. He rose from the ground slowly, and stood apparently debating in his mind whether he should go away quietly or whether he should return to the attack. It is not too much to say that had he decided upon the pacific course, the mystery of the whereabouts of the Nine Bears might never have been elucidated. In that two seconds of deliberation hung the fates of Baggin and his confederates, and the reputation of Scotland Yard.
The foreign sailor made up his mind. Back to the swing-doors of the tavern he staggered, pushed them open, and entered.
A few minutes later a police-whistle blew, and a commonplace constable strolled leisurely to the scene of the disturbance and took into custody the pugnacious foreigner on a charge of "drunk and disorderly."
This was the beginning of the final fight with the "Bears," a fight which cost Europe over a million of money and many lives, but which closed forever the account of the Nine Bears of Cadiz.
"Here is a case that will amuse you, T. B.," said the Chief, strolling into his bureau; "a man, giving the name of Silva, who has been taken to the police-station on the prosaic charge of 'D. and D.,' is found to be a walking cash deposit. Twelve hundred pounds in Bank of England notes and 26,000 francs in French money was found in his possession. He speaks little or no English, has the appearance of being a sailor—will you go down and see what you can make of him?"
In a quarter of an hour the Assistant-Commissioner was at the police-station.
"Yes, sir," said the station sergeant, "he's quiet now. I don't think he's so very drunk, only pugilistically so."
"What do you make of him?"
"He's a sailor; a deserter from some foreign navy, I should say. He has underclothes of a uniform type, and there's a sort of device on his singlet—three stars and a number."
"Brazilian Navy," said T. B. with promptness. "Talkative?"
The sergeant smiled.
"In his own language, very," he said drily. "When I searched him, he said a great number of things which were probably very rude."
T. B. nodded.
"I'll see him," he said.
A gaoler led him down a long corridor.
On either side were long stone-painted doors, each with a little steel wicket.
Stopping before one door, he inserted his bright key in the lock, snapped back a polished bolt, and the door swung open.
A man who was sitting on a wooden bench with his head in his hands, jumped to his feet as the Assistant-Commissioner entered, and poured forth a volume of language.
"Softly, softly," said T. B. "You speak French, my friend."
"Oui, monsieur," said the man. "Though I am Spanish."
"You are a deserter from a Brazilian warship," said T. B.
The man stared at him defiantly.
"Is not that so, friend?"
The prisoner shrugged his shoulders.
"I should like to smoke," was all that he said.
T. B. took his gold case from an inside pocket and opened it.
"Many thanks," said the sailor, and took the lighted match the gaoler had struck.
If he had known the ways of the English police, he would have grown suspicious. Elsewhere, a man might be bullied, browbeaten, frightened into a confession. In France, Juge d'Instruction and detective would combine to wring from his reluctant lips a damaging admission. In America, the Third Degree, most despicable of police methods, would have been similarly employed.
But the English police do most things by kindness, and do them very well.
The sailor puffed at his cigarette, from time to time looking up from the bench on which he sat at the detective's smiling face.
T. B. asked no questions; he had none to ask; he did not demand how the man came by his wealth; he would not be guilty of such a crudity. He waited for the sailor to talk. At last he spoke.
"Monsieur," he said, "you wish to know where I got my money?"
T. B. said nothing.
"Honestly," said the sailor loudly, and with emphatic gesture; "honestly, monsieur;" and he went on earnestly, "By my way of reckoning, a man has a price."
"Undoubtedly," agreed T. B.
"A price for body and soul." The sailor blew a ring of smoke and watched it rising to the vaulted roof of the cell.
"Some men," continued the man, "in their calm moments set their value at twenty million dollars—only to sell themselves in the heat of a foolish moment for——" He snapped his fingers.
"I have never," thought T. B., "come into contact with so many philosophical criminals in my life."
"Yet I would beg you to believe," said the sailor, "it is a question of opportunity and need. There are moments when I would not risk my liberty for a million pesetas—there have been days when I would have sold my soul for ten mil-reis."
He paused again, for he had all the Latin's appreciation of an audience; all the Latin's desire for dramatic effect.
"Sixty thousand pesetas is a large sum, monsieur; it amounts to more than £2,000 in your money—that was my price!"
"For what?"
"I will set you a riddle: on theMaria Braganzawe had one hundred officers and men——"
T. B. saw light.
"You are a deserter from theMaria Braganza," he said—but the man shook his head smilingly.
"On the contrary I have my discharge from the navy, properly attested and signed by my good captain. You will find it at my lodgings, in a tin trunk under a picture of the blessed Saint Teresa of Avila, or, as some say, Sergovia. No, monsieur officer, I am discharged honourably. Listen."
His cigarette was nearly finished, and T. B. opened his case again, and the man, with a grateful inclination of his head, helped himself. Slowly, he began his story, a story which, before all others, helps the mind to grasp the magnitude of a combination which made the events he described possible.
"I was a sub-officer on theMaria Braganza," he began, and went on to narrate the history of the voyage of that remarkable battleship from the day it left Rio until it steamed into the roadstead off Cadiz.
"We stayed at Cadiz much longer than we expected, and the men were grumbling—because our next port was to have been Rio. But for some reason our Captain Lombrosa did not wish to sail. Then one day he came on board—he spent most of his time ashore—looking extremely happy. Previous to this he had lived and walked in gloom, as though some matter were preying on his mind. But this was all changed now. Whatever troubles he had were evaporated. He walked about the deck, smiling and cracking jokes, and we naturally concluded that he had received his orders to sail back to Brazil at once.
"That same day we were ordered to take on board stores which the Government had purchased. Whatever stores these were, they were extremely heavy. They were packed in little square boxes, strongly made and clamped with steel. Of these boxes we took two hundred and fifty, and the business of transporting them occupied the greater part of a whole day."
"What was the weight of them?" asked T. B.
"About fifty kilos," said the man, "and," he added with an assumption of carelessness, "they each contained gold."
T. B. did a little sum in his head.
"In fact a million and a half of English pounds," he said half to himself.
"As to that I do not know," said the other, "but it was enormous; I discovered the gold by accident, for I and another officer had been chosen to store the boxes in one of the ammunition flats, and, owing to the breaking of a box, I saw—what I saw.
"However, to get back to the captain. In the evening he came aboard, having first given orders for steam to be ready and every preparation made for slipping.
"Then it was I told him that I had seen the contents of one of the boxes, and he was distressed.
"'Who else has seen this?' he asked, and I informed him of the sub-officer who had been with me.
"'Do not speak of this matter, as you value your soul,' he said, 'for this is a high Government secret—send sub-officer Alverez to me'—that was the name of my companion. I obeyed and sent Alverez aft. He too received similar injunctions, and was dismissed.
"At ten o'clock that night, the quartermasters went to their stations, and all stood ready for dropping our mooring.
"As the hours wore on, the captain began to show signs of impatience. I was on the bridge with the officer of the watch, and the captain was pacing up and down, now looking at his watch and swearing, now training his binocular on a portion of the land to the north of the town.
"I had forgotten to say that at 8.30 the ship's steam pinnace had been sent away, and that it had not returned.
"It was for the coming of the pinnace, and whoever was coming with it, that our captain displayed so much anxiety.
"It was eleven o'clock before the boat came alongside. We heard it racing across the water—for the night was very still. Then it drew alongside, and a number of gentlemen came on board. They were all talking excitedly, and seemed as though they had walked a long distance, for, by the light of the branch lamp that lit the gangway, I saw that their boots and trousers were white with dust, such as I believe lies on the road outside Cadiz. One was in a state of great fear; he was very stout. Another, and he was the leader, spoke to our captain, and soon after I heard the order given—'Quartermaster, stand by for going out of harbour,' and the captain gave the navigating officer his course. We went out at full speed, steering a course due west.
"It was a perfectly calm night, with stars, but no moon. When (as near as I can guess) we were twenty miles from the coast, the captain sent for me and Alverez to his cabin.
"'My friends,' he said, 'I have a proposition to make to you, but first let me ask you if you are good patriots.'
"We said that we were.
"'What,' said the captain, addressing himself to me, 'do you value your patriotism at?'
"I was silent.
"Monsieur," said the prisoner earnestly, "I assure you I was not considering the insult offered to me, because we had got to a point outside of abstract morality. In my mind was a dilemma—if I ask too much I might lose an opportunity, if I ask too little I should assuredly lose money. Such was also the consideration in Alverez's mind. 'Señor Capitan,' I said, 'as an honest man——'
"'We will leave that out of the question,' said the captain. 'Name a price.'
"And so, at random, I suggested a sum equal to £3,000, and Alverez, not a man of any originality, repeated '£3,000.'
"The captain nodded; 'This sum I will pay you,' he said. 'Moreover, I will give you your discharge from the Navy of Brazil, and you may leave the ship to-night.'
"I did not ask him why. I realised he had some high scheme which it was not proper I should know, besides which I had not been ashore for a month—and there was the £3,000.
"'Before you go,' said the captain, 'I will explain to you, that my honour and my reputation may not suffer. In a few days' time, when we are at sea, the comrades you leave behind will be offered a new service, a service under a new and wealthier government, a government that will offer large and generous rewards for faithful service and obedience.'"
The prisoner chuckled softly, as at some thought which amused him.
"We went ashore in the steam pinnace; the captain himself superintending our landing. It was a remarkable journey, señor.
"You may imagine us in the open sea, with nothing but the 'chica clucka, clucka!' of the engine of our little boat! Alverez and myself sat at the bow with our hands on the butts of our revolvers—we knew our captain—and he himself steered us for the lights that soon came up over the horizon. We landed at Cadiz, and were provided with papers to the Brazilian consul, should our return be noticed. But none saw us, or if they did, thought nothing of the spectacle of two Brazilian seamen walking through the streets at that hour of the night; remember that none but the port authorities were aware that theMaria Braganzahad sailed. The next morning we procured some civilian clothing, and left by the afternoon train for Seville. By easy stages we came first to Madrid, then to Paris. Here we stayed some time."
He chuckled again.
"Alverez," he resumed, "is a man of spirit, but, as I have said, of no great originality. In Paris a man of spirit may go far, a man of money farther, always providing that behind the spirit and the wealth there is intelligence. My poor Alverez went his own way in Paris. He made friends."
Again he smiled thoughtfully.
"Alverez I left," he explained; "his ways are not my ways. I came to England. I do not like this country," he said frankly. "Your lower classes are gross people, and very quarrelsome."
A few more questions were asked, and answered, and ten minutes later T. B. was flying back to Scotland Yard with the story of the stolen battleship.
Once more were the Nine Men in the bill of every newspaper in London. Once more the cables hummed from world's end to world's end, and slowly, item by item, came fragmentary scraps of news which Scotland Yard pieced together.
"Of all extraordinary developments," said theLondon Journal, "in any great criminal case, nothing has ever equalled, in its improbability, the present phase of this remarkable case.
"And now we have reached the stage which we confidently hope will be a final one. It is clear that these men, having command of enormous riches, gained at the sacrifice of life, and by the ruin of thousands of innocent people, secured to their service the Captain of the Brazilian warship,Maria Braganza. So that somewhere in the wide seas of the world is a stolen battleship, having on board a congregation of the world's worst rascals, Napoleonic in the largeness of their crimes.
"Many and fantastic are the suggestions that have been put forward as to the whereabouts of the Nine Men of Cadiz. One of our contemporaries draws a fanciful picture of life on some gorgeous Southern Pacific isle, out of the track of steamers, and pictures the Nine Men living in a condition of Oriental splendour, an existence ofdolce far niente. Such a supposition is, of course, on the face of it absurd. Such an island exists only in the fancy of the romantic writer. The uninhabited portions of the globe are few, and are, in the main, of the character of the Sahara desert. Wherever life can be sustained, wherever comfort and freedom from disease wait the newcomer, be sure the newcomer has already arrived."
This much is quoted from theJournalbecause it approaches near enough to truth and actuality to merit quotation.
That Baggin had based all his plans on the supposition that such an island existed, and could be discovered, we now know. He was the possessor of an imagination, but his geographical knowledge was faulty.
The "idea," that scrap of paper which Count Poltavo had risked his neck to obtain, was simple enough now—up to a point.