CHAPTER IXCONCERNING A GREAT MAN'S VEXATION
When the carriage containing the Great Man rolled up to the door on the south side of Downing Street the constable stationed there stiffened himself preparatory to saluting. But his salute passed unnoticed. The door swung open, but the commissionaire got not so much as a glance.
"There's trouble brewing in China," said the worthy hall porter to his circle of cronies that same evening in the private bar of the "Lord Palmerston," "you mark my words if there isn't."
"More likely to be with Germany. That's the right place to look for trouble," asserted one of the listeners.
"Of course, you would know better than me," replied the worthy janitor. "You read the papers every day, so you can't be wrong." There was unutterable scorn in his tone as he referred to the press.
"And what's wrong with the papers?" enquired the interlocutor in an aggrieved voice. "I suppose they know as much about things as you do, any day."
The commissionaire pursed his lips, blew his nose, and finished his beer before he found words to convey his answer.
"The newspapers! The newspapers are common liars!" he answered, "and ought to be hanged as such.No—don't you go for to speak up for 'em—George Jenkins—we know all about the papers in our department."
Jenkins did not subside immediately.
"I presume Sir Gadsby takes you into 'is confidence—not to say asks your advice occasional?" he asked sarcastically.
"He might do worse than ask the advice of a man who's fought in h'all four quarters of the globe and 'as the right to wear six medals and twelve bars," interrupted another listener propitiatingly.
"So he might," replied the commissionaire smiling genially, "but that's neither here nor there. If you want to know why I say it's China, I don't mind telling you." He glanced round to see that no outsiders were within earshot and dropped his voice into a confidential whisper.
"Four secretaries have I known since I went to our place, and I studies 'em until I comes to read 'em like books, and Sir Gadsby Dimbleby is one of the easiest volumes I've ever had to study. I know 'is German face an' 'is Russian face as well as I know my own. This morning when he come in I could read China in 'is heye as plain as if it were in the biggest print. You mark my words there's trouble brewin' in China."
The oracle had spoken, and as is often the case with oracles which have not been primed with facts, the utterance was as wide of the mark as it could well be.
Sir Gadsby Dimbleby's brain had not been occupied in the least degree with Chinese affairs as he passed the portals of the Foreign Office. He was troubling about something which had happened much nearer home, a subject which had been pigeonholed in one of the compartmentsof his brain until the crisis in the relations with Germany caused by the premature disclosure of the unfortunate incident in the South Seas should have passed. That storm had been safely weathered, and H. M. Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs bethought himself of the promise he had made to himself to discover how the information had leaked out. To him it seemed uncommonly like treachery on the part of someone, and being by birth, education, and natural instinct a thorough English gentleman, the idea even of having to suspect anyone in the great department of which he was the head of treachery was odious to him. So the Great Man passed, heedless of the salutes of officials, to the uttermost sanctum where the Permanent Secretary sat with his fingers on the strings which directed British policy all over the world, peacefully enjoying a matutinal cigar while glancing over the précis of a verbose despatch, prepared by his own secretary, from the Governor of a wind-swept rock in the South Atlantic concerning the deadly damage likely to be done to British interests by ceasing to imprison a garrison in such an out-of-the-way spot.
The Permanent Secretary looked up as the Great Man entered and wondered. He was at a loss to understand the reason for the knitted brow. The political horizon was clear and nothing could happen without his knowledge. He guessed that the reason was domestic. He knew that Lady Gadsby had a will of her own, and that even Great Men are human enough to be annoyed by feminine displeasure.
But Sir Gadsby soon undeceived him. He fidgetted about uncomfortably for a minute or two, irritably asking questions about minor matterswhich had recently engaged his attention before he plunged into the subject which filled his thoughts.
"Look here, Markham," he said, "that German business in the South Pacific is still worrying me."
The Permanent Secretary looked at him in surprise. "There's no need to worry, Dimbleby," he answered, "that storm's blown over all right."
"That's not the point," snapped Sir Gadsby. "What I want to know is how that information leaked out in the newspapers. Have you any suspicions?"
The Great Man frowned at the Permanent Secretary, and the Permanent Secretary frowned at the Great Man. The Permanent Secretary was silent so long that the Great Man continued, "I hate to think that any of our people can have been so lost to all sense of decency and honour, yet what on earth can I think? You have told me yourself that our despatch must have been tapped somehow."
"I have puzzled over the matter as much as yourself," said the Permanent Secretary slowly, "and am as much at a loss as yourself to account for the information leaking out. It seems to me that there are only two persons whom it is possible to suspect."
"And those?" queried the Great Man eagerly.
"Are our own two selves," was the answer.
Despite his irritation the Great Man laughed at the whimsicality of the idea, but he became grave again rapidly.
"If that's the case, we must bring a different order of intelligence to bear upon the problem. What do you say to asking the assistance of Scotland Yard, Markham?
"I've not much belief in Scotland Yard," replied the Permanent Secretary, "but still there can be no harm in our giving them the opportunity of investigating the affair. They may discover a clue which will assist us in coming to some conclusion."
"Then send over a messenger at once, Markham," said the Great Man energetically. "I shall never feel safe if the contents of despatches are to leak out in this manner. Ask the Commissioner to send over his most intelligent officer—no, ask them to send Kenly. I know he's got common sense—to make a delicate investigation. We will see him together." Then he stalked off to his own room and worked off his irritation in preparing sarcastic answers to inconvenient questions in Parliament, of which notice had been given him by members of the Opposition Party. Consequently he had recovered his accustomed urbanity when the Permanent Secretary, accompanied by Detective Inspector Kenly, was ushered into his presence. He greeted the newcomer heartily.
"Glad the Commissioner could spare you, Kenly. There's nothing like having a man to undertake confidential work whom one knows from experience one can trust. I suppose Sir Everard Markham has told you what we want you to do?"
The Permanent Secretary interrupted with a hasty negation.
"Oh, well, the matter will not take long to explain," continued the Great Man. "Correct me if I am wrong, Markham."
The Permanent Secretary nodded and handed a cigar case to the chief.
"Not before lunch," said the Great Man. He turnedto the detective. "On the face of it the matter should prove a simple one, Kenly, but just at present it is beyond our combined intelligence to fathom it. Late on the fifteenth—a Tuesday, wasn't it, Markham?—a cypher cablegram containing important information came into this office. The despatch was de-coded——"
"By myself," interrupted the Permanent Secretary.
"Placed in a despatch case which was sealed in the usual way and forwarded by King's Messenger to me," continued Sir Gadsby. "I received the case, broke the seals myself, and retained the despatch in my own possession."
"Yes," said the detective, as the Great Man paused.
"The despatch related to the recent trouble in the South Pacific, the German affair," remarked the Permanent Secretary, "and next morning there was wild excitement on the Stock Exchange, and later in the day the newspapers published full details of the trouble, much to our embarrassment."
"H—m," said the detective, "I suppose you want me to find out who gave the show away?"
"Your perspicacity is wonderful, Kenly," remarked the Great Man drily and the Permanent Secretary smiled. "At present, Markham, I know, suspects me of 'giving the show away,' as you put it, and if I didn't know Markham I should be compelled to suspect him. We are really the only two possible suspects."
"H—m," said the detective a second time before remarking deprecatingly, "The despatch passed through the hands of a third person. I think you mentioned a King's Messenger?"
"I sealed the despatches with my own hands," remarkedthe Permanent Secretary. "And the seals were intact when I took the case from Captain Marven's hands," added the Great Man.
The detective hazarded another suggestion.
"Is it quite impossible that the information might not have reached the Stock Exchange and the newspapers from an external source?"
"So far as we can ascertain, quite impossible," replied the Permanent Secretary. "We have ascertained that no cable was received in London which could in any way have related to the affair before the publication of the news."
"It seems to me," said the Great Man briskly, "that even if we cannot get direct evidence as to the source through which the information leaked out, we should at least be able to come to some sort of conclusion if we knew the names of the parties who must have benefited by the Stock Exchange operations."
"I see," said the detective. "Well, Sir Gadsby, I'll do my best to find that out for you."
"I know you will, Kenly," said the Great Man. "But not a word to anyone; and, while I think of it, I'll write a note to the Commissioner and ask him to allow you to report directly to Markham here, and to devote your whole time and attention to this business."
"Very good, Sir Gadsby," said the detective, and the interview ended.
When alone with the Permanent Secretary, Inspector Kenly asked every question which occurred to his active brain, but he elucidated nothing more than the very simple facts with which he had already been made acquainted, and when he left the Foreign Office it was with no veryhopeful feeling of being able to lay his hand on the culprit. It is true that there had occurred to him the glimmering of a possibility as to who might have been responsible for the disclosure. The despatches had been in the possession of a third party, in the possession of Captain Marven, the King's Messenger, for seven or eight hours; and Inspector Kenly had no particular reason for believing that official locks and seals were more inviolable than any other locks and seals if submitted to the gentle manipulation of an expert. But he had met Captain Marven in the course of his official life, and what he had seen of him led him to credit the reputation for perfect probity and honour which the King's Messenger held in the eyes of the world.
"I should have liked an easier job," grumbled Inspector Kenly to himself. "Another failure to find out anything coming on top of my failure to get the slightest clue to the mystery of the Flurscheim affair will make the Chief think that I am getting past my work. However, it's no use worrying because I'm not possessed of the gift of divination. What is, was to be," with which philosophic reflection he stepped aboard a 'bus bound Citywards, and, while engaged there in his investigations, the Great Man, having finished preparing his list of answers for the day's sitting of Parliament, carried off the Permanent Secretary to lunch with him. They enjoyed their meal none the less because they had unloaded the cause of their vexation upon the broad shoulders of Detective Inspector Kenly.