I
MISS MARGARET WARREN, severely exquisite as to dress, golden hair as sleek as if she were about to begin rather than finish the day’s work, sat at her table in Hastings’s room.
Before her was the pad on which, ten minutes ago, she had written Anthony’s message. She knew it by heart. As the minutes passed she grew more troubled at her employer’s absence. Here—it was obvious—was something which ought to be done without waste of time; and time had already been wasted. She knew Colonel Gethryn well enough to be sure that the talk about a ‘great joke’ had been camouflage. No, this was all something to do with the murder. Had he not said with emphasis that Ja—Mr Hastings was to ring him up as soon as he had found this man Masterson? He had, and all had to know, it seemed, where this man Masterson had been on Thursday night, the night Hoode had been killed.
‘I don’t believe,’ thought Margaret, ‘that either of them know this man Masterson at all. That’s all part of the camouflage, that is. And then there’s that bit of terrible Latin. I thought better of Colonel Gethryn, I did. Still, there it is: “This matter is of the greatest importance. Obey immediately.” Cicero indeed!’
She glanced at her watch. A quarter of an hour wasted already!
An idea came to her. Hastings had gone out for food. In that case he might, if he had indeed gone there, still be at that pseudo-Johnsonian haunt, The Cock. Thither she sent a messenger, hot-foot. He was back within five minutes. No, the boss wasn’t there.
‘Damn!’ said Miss Warren.
She looked again at her watch. Twenty past ten. She put on her hat—the little black hat which played such havoc with the emotions of the Editor. The copy of Anthony’s message she placed on Hastings’s table, together with another hastily scribbled note. Then she went down the stairs and out into Fleet Street.
After three attempts, she found a taxi whose driver was willing to take her so far afield as Forest Road, NW5.
The journey, the driver said, would take ’arfenar or thereabouts. Margaret employed the time constructing two stories, one to be used if this man Masterson turned out to be over fifty, the other if he were under. They were good tales, and she was pleased with them. The ‘under-fifty’ one involved an Old Mother, Mistaken Identity, and an Ailing Fiancée. The ‘over-fifty’ one was, if anything, better, dealing as it did with A Maiden from Canada, A Times ‘Agony’, Tears, A Lost Kitten, and A Railway Journey. Both tales were ingeniously devised to provide ample opportunity for innocently questioning this man Masterson as to his whereabouts on the night of Thursday.
The taxi pulled up. The driver opened the door. ‘’Ere y’are, miss. Number fourteen.’
As she paid the fare, Miss Warren discovered her heart to be misbehaving. This annoyed her. She strove to master this perturbation, but met with little enough success.
The taxi jolted away down the hill. The road was quiet; too quiet, Margaret thought. Also it was dismal; too dismal. There were too few lamps. There was not even a moon. There didn’t seem to be any lighted windows. A nasty, inhospitable road.
She perceived No. 14 to be a ‘converted’ house. A great black building that might once have housed a merchant prince, but was now the warren of retired grocers, oddities, solicitors, and divorcees.
Margaret mounted the steps, slowly. The porter’s lobby in the hall was empty. From one of a series of brass plates she divined that Flat 6B was the burrow of one James Masterson. Flat 6B, it seemed, was on the first floor. The lift was unattended. She walked up the stairs.
Frantically she reviewed her stories, testing them at every point. She wished she hadn’t come, had waited till Hastings had got back!
Facing the door of Flat 6B, Miss Margaret Warren took herself in hand, addressed rude remarks to herself, and applied firm pressure to the bell-push.
There was no sound of footsteps; there was no hand on the latch—but the door swung open.
Margaret fell back, stifling a scream. A small squeak broke from her lips. It was such a funny squeak that it made her laugh.
‘Don’t be a fool, Margaret,’ she told herself sternly. ‘Haven’t you ever heard of contraptions to open doors? Hundred per cent labour-saving.’
But her heart was thudding violently as she entered the little hall. From a room on her right came a man’s voice, querulous, high-pitched.
‘Who’s that?’ it said. ‘Come in, damn you! Come in!’
She turned the handle, and entered a bedroom well furnished but in a state of appalling disorder. A dying fire—the temperature that day had been over ninety in the shade—belched out from the littered grate occasional puffs of black smoke. The bed-clothes were tossed and rumpled; half of them lay on the floor. A small table sprawled on its side in the middle of the room. Crumpled newspapers were everywhere, everywhere. Huddled in an arm-chair by the fireplace was a man.
His hair was wild, his eyes bright, burning with fever. A stubble of black beard was over the thin face. Over his cheek-bones was spread a brilliant flush. A man obviously ill, with temperature running high.
One must sympathise with Margaret. She had expected any scene but this. Again fear seized her. What a fool she had been to come! What a fool! This man Masterson was ill; yet she couldn’t feel sorry for him. Those over-bright eyes fixed on hers were so malevolent somehow.
She stammered something. Her mouth was so dry that coherent speech seemed impossible.
Then the man got out of his chair. Dully, she noticed how great was the tax on his strength. He clutched at the mantel for support. Dislodged by his elbow, a bottle crashed down and splintered on the tiles of the hearth. The smell of whisky, which always made her feel sick, combined with apprehension and the heat of the room, to set Margaret’s senses dancing a fantastic reel.
Clutching the mantelpiece, the man attempted a bow. ‘You must pardon my appearance,’ he said, and his voice made the girl shrink back, ‘but I am—am at your service. Oh, yes, believe me. What can I have the great pleasure of—of doing for you? Eh?’
He started to move towards her, aiding his trembling legs by scrabbling at the wall. Margaret felt a desire to scream; choked the scream back. She tried to burst into speech, to say something, anything, to tell one of her little stories that she had been so proud of. She failed utterly.
The man continued his spider-like approach.
‘Go back! Go back!’ Margaret whispered. She was shaking, shaking all over.
But the man had left the wall, and without its support had fallen to his knees. His head lolling with every movement, he crawled to the overturned table and searched among the litter of newspaper beside it.
Margaret cast longing eyes at the door. She tried to move, but her legs would not obey her. Fascinated by the horror of the thing she looked down at the man. Her eye caught heavy headlines on the tumbled papers.
‘ABBOTSHALL MURDER! CABINET MINISTER ASSASSINATED! HORRIBLE ATROCITY! IS IT BOLSHEVISM?’ they shrieked in letters two inches high.
And the man—this man Masterson—had found what he wanted. He sat grotesquely on the carpet, holding in both hands the butt of a heavy automatic pistol. The barrel pointed straight at Margaret’s head. A queer, sick feeling came over her. She felt her knees grow weak beneath her.
‘Sit down. Sit down, will you!’ The man’s tones were harsh, cracked—the voice of one ill to the point of collapse.
II
Spencer Hastings stood disconsolate on the threshold of the editorial chamber. He had supped with a friend who was an artist. The artist had talked. Spencer Hastings had been later than he had intended in returning to the office. When he did—she had gone.
‘Damn it! Oh, damn it!’ he said fervently.
One must sympathise with him. He was ashamed, bitterly ashamed, of himself. For the ten thousandth time he thought it all over. Hell! He was badly in love with the woman, why didn’t he grab hold of her and tell her so? Why was it that he couldn’t? Because he was afraid. Afraid of her aloof beauty, her completeness, her thrice-to-be-damned efficiency—how he loathed that word beloved of Babbitts! If only she weren’t quite so—so infernally and perpetually equal to the situation!
Yes, he was afraid, that’s what it was! He, Spencer Sutherland Hastings, sometime the fastest three-quarter in England, sometime something of an ace in the Flying Corps, renowned in old days for his easy conquest of Woman, he was afraid! Afraid forsooth of a little slip of a thing he could almost hang on his watch-chain! Disgusting, he found himself!
He flitted dejectedly about the room. Should he go home? No, he’d better do some work; there’d be an easy time coming soon.
He crossed the room and sat down at his table. Two slips of paper, both covered with Margaret’s clear, decisive handwriting, stared up at him.
He read and re-read. Here was more Efficiency! Undoubtedly she had put its real meaning to Anthony’s message. In his mind alarm replaced that mixture of irritation and reverence. ‘I thought this should be attended to at once, so have gone to the address given by Colonel Gethryn,’ she had written. Aloud, Hastings heaped curses upon the loquacity of the artist with whom he had supped.
He read the message and the note a third time, then jumped to his feet. That little white darling to go, alone and at such a time, to the house of a man who might be—well, a murderer! Of course, Anthony might only be after a possible witness, but—
He seized his hat and made for the stairs and Fleet Street.
III
Margaret lay huddled in the uncomfortable chair. For perhaps the hundredth time she choked back the scream which persisted in rising to her lips. Every suppression was more difficult than its predecessor.
Still, though she seemed to have been looking down it for an eternity, the black ring which was the muzzle of the automatic stared straight into her eyes.
The man had not moved. He was crouched upon the floor, no part of him steady save the hands which held the pistol. And he went on talking. Margaret felt that the rest of her life was a dream; that always, in reality, he had been talking and she listening.
And the talk—always the same story. ‘You’re clever, aren’t you? Very clever, eh? “Who killed Hoode?” you said to yourselves—you and your friends. I don’t know you, but you’re Scotland Yard, that’s what you are. Well, if you want to know, I did! See? But, my golden child, I’m not going to tell anyone! Oh, no! Oh, no!’
There was much more of words but none of sense. He went on talking, and always the burden of his whispering, his half-shouting, his mumbling, was the same. ‘I killed Hoode! But I’m not going to tell anyone, oh, no! Thought he could play about with me, did he? Get rid of the man who was helping him, eh? Fool!’
Once she had tried to rise, intending a wild dash for the front door she knew had not shut behind her. But the pistol had been thrust forward with such menace that ever since she had been as still as stone. Her right leg, twisted beneath her, was agony. Her head seemed bursting.
At last there came a pause in the babbling talk. The man began to struggle to his feet. Margaret shrank back still farther into her chair. Even as he heaved himself upright the gun never wavered from her.
Another scream rose in her throat, only to be fought back. He was up now, and coming towards her with wavering steps. Even in her terror she could see that his fever had increased. She prayed for his collapse as she had never prayed before.
He was close, close! Margaret shut her eyes, screwing up the lids.
She heard a rush of feet outside the door. Someone burst into the room. Slowly, unbelieving, she opened the blue eyes. Hastings stood in the doorway.
A black mist flickered before her. Through it, as if she were looking through smoked glass, she saw him walk swiftly, his right hand outstretched as if in greeting, up to the unsteady, malevolent figure in the dressing-gown.
The mist before her eyes grew thicker, darker. When it had cleared again, Hastings had the pistol in his hand. As she watched, the numbness of fear still upon her, the man Masterson crumpled to the floor.
With a great effort she rose from the chair. On her feet, she stumbled. She felt herself falling, gave a piteous little cry, and was caught up in Hastings’s arms.
Now that safety had come she broke down. Her body shook with sobs. Then came tears and more tears. She burrowed her face into Hastings’s shoulder, rubbing her cheek up and down against the smooth cloth of his coat.
Hastings, his heart beating too fast for comfort, looked down. All he could see was the little black hat. The shaking of her body in his arms, the very fact that in his arms she was, deprived him of speech. They remained locked together. From the floor behind them came a hoarse, delirious babbling. Neither man nor woman heard it.
The sobbing grew quieter. A great resolve swelled in Hastings’s bosom.
‘I w-want a—a hanky,’ said a small voice from his shoulder.
From his breast pocket he whipped a square foot of white silk. A little hand snatched at it. Its work completed, she smiled up at him, then endeavoured to withdraw from his arms. Hastings held on.
‘Please,’ said the small voice, ‘will you let me go?’
‘No!’ roared Hastings. ‘No! Never any more!’
Slowly, she raised her head to look at him again. Immediately, thoroughly, satisfyingly, he kissed her. For a moment, a fleeting fraction of time, it seemed to him that the soft lips had answered the pressure of his.
But then she broke free. ‘Mr Hastings!’ She stamped her foot. ‘How dare—’
A grin of delight was on his face. ‘’Sno use,’ he murmured. ‘’Sno use any more. I’m not frightened of you now, you darling!’ He snatched at her again.
From the floor there came again that hoarse mutter. Again they didn’t hear it.
‘And you know you’ve been in love with me for years,’ said Hastings.
‘Oh! I have not!’ She was all indignation. Suddenly it went. ‘Yes, I have, though—for months, anyway. Oh. Jack, Jack, why didn’t you do this before?’
‘Frightened,’ said Hastings. ‘Wind up.’
‘But—but whatever of?’
‘You—and your damned sufficient efficiency. Yesterday I swore to myself I’d pluck up the nerve to tell you as soon as I caught you, red-handed, making a mistake. And you see I have—’
Her eyes flashed. ‘What d’you mean? Mistake! I like that! When I’ve caught the murderer—’
They both swung round, remembrance flooding back. The owner of the flat lay beside the over-turned table, a shapeless heap in the dark dressing-gown.
Margaret shivered. ‘Mistake, indeed!’ she began.
‘Well, you did. This is a man’s job. You ought to’ve waited till I came back. God! how you frightened me!’ Suppose this outer door here hadn’t been ajar.’
‘But, Jack—’
Hastings forgot murders. ‘Why d’you call me that?’ he asked.
‘’Cause I couldn’t always be saying “Spencer”. I’d feel like a heroine in a serial. And don’t interrupt. I was going to say: Never mind, we’ve got the man. Won’t Colonel Gethryn be pleased?’
Hastings came back to earth. ‘By God!’ he said. ‘So that’s the murderer, is it? So it was that Gethryn was after. Well, he’s a very ill criminal. How d’you know he is one, by the way?’
‘He confessed. He was sort of delirious. Kept saying he’d done it, but wasn’t going to tell anyone. Horrid it was!’
Hastings rubbed his chin. ‘I wonder,’ he said. ‘I wonder. Come on, we’re going to have a nice diplomatic talk with that porter I saw downstairs. And don’t forget we mustn’t let him get a line on what we’re after.’
IV
The hands of the clock in Mrs Lemesurier’s drawing-room stood at five minutes to midnight.
There came a lull in the conversation which Anthony had kept flowing since he had sent his message to Hastings. A wandering talk it had been, but he had achieved his object. Save for the harassed look about her eyes, there was now nothing to tell of the strain the woman had been under. She had even laughed, not once but many times. She was, in fact, almost normal. And Anthony rejoiced, for he had found her to possess humour, wit and wisdom to support her beauty. She was, he thought sleepily to himself, almost too good to be true.
For a moment his eyes closed. Behind the lids there rose a picture of her face—a picture strangely more clear than any given by actual sight.
‘You,’ said Lucia, ‘ought to be asleep. Yes, you ought! Not tiring yourself out to make conversation for an hysterical woman who can’t keep her emotions under control.’
‘The closing of the eyes,’ Anthony said, opening them, ‘merely indicates that the great detective is what we call thrashing out a knotty problem. He always closes his eyes, you know. He couldn’t do anything with ’em open.’
She smiled. ‘I’m afraid I don’t believe you, you know. I think you’ve done so much today that you’re simply tired out.’
‘Really, I assure you, no. We never sleep until a case is finished. Never. It’s rather sad in this one, because I can see it going on for ever.’ He saw her mouth contract with the pain of fear, and went on: ‘I mean, I don’t believe we’re ever going to catch the Sparrow.’
‘The Sparrow?’
‘Yes. Don’t you remember “Who killed Cock Robin”? It must have been the first detective story you ever read. You know, it was the Sparrow who did the dirty work. “And here, in a manner of speaking, we all are.” All at sixes and sevens, that is. Here am I, come to the decision that either A. R. Gethryn or the rest of the world is mad. There are the police with entirely the wrong bird.
‘The only real bit of work I’ve done today,’ he went on, ‘has led me to find, not an answer, but another problem. The question is: was a certain thing done genuinely, or was it done to look as if it had been done genuinely, or was it done in the way it was on purpose to look ungenuine? The answer, at present, is a lemon.’
Again she smiled. ‘It sounds awful,’ she said. Then, with a change of tone: ‘But—but my brother? You were saying—’
Piercing, blaring, came the angry ring of the telephone.
Lucia leapt to her feet with a cry. Before she could move again Anthony was at the instrument. As he lifted the receiver she reached his side, pleading with eyes and hands for permission to use the extra earpiece.
‘Carry on,’ he said; and into the transmitter: ‘Hallo!’
She snatched at the black disc, to hear: ‘That you, Gethryn?’
‘Yes. Hastings?’
‘Yes. I’ve done that job—’
‘What did you find?’ Anthony snapped, laying a reassuring hand on the white shoulder beside him. He felt that her whole body was shaking.
The telephone made meaningless cackles.
‘What?’
‘I said,’ came in a squeak of a voice, ‘that the man your message referred to—er—said that it was he who had pulled off that deal you were asking about.’
Anthony flashed a glance at the woman beside him. With surprise and admiration he saw that there were no signs of collapse. The hand which held the extra receiver was steady as his own, the head was held erect. Only the pallor of the face, extending even to the lips, told of the shock.
The telephone had again relapsed into mere cackling and buzzing.
Anthony gave vent to his feelings. ‘Blast you! Speak more clearly. Go on from where he said that it was his deal.’
‘And blast ye, too, scum!’ came in a hilarious wheeze. ‘I said that the extraordinary part of the business was that I found out that the merchant must have—cackle—cackle—bahk-bahk—’
‘Hell! Repeat! What did you find out?’
‘I said that the chap must have dreamed it all. I found out that he couldn’t possibly have had anything to do with the thing. Why on earth he thought he’d—er—put this deal through, I can’t say—unless the explanation is that he got the idea that he would do it when he began to be so ill, put in a goodish bit of brooding, and then, when it was done and he heard about it, got all mixed and thought he was really the—er—manipulator of the business. Anyway, it’s certain he couldn’t’ve had anything to do with it at all. Take it from me.’
Lucia staggered, then sank weakly into a chair, still clasping the black disc to her ear. Anthony glanced at her; saw that the colour had come flooding back to her face.
‘You’re sure about this?’ he asked the telephone.
‘See it wet, see it dry. The man lives by himself. He’s been ill for five days. I got that from the porter of the flats. This porter told me that J.M. hasn’t been outside his front door for a week. The story’s right enough. You’ve only got to look at the chap to see he’s too ill to have been trotting about. There’s not a doubt. You disappointed?’
‘God, no! Hastings, my brother, I kiss your hands. And I congratulate you. From what I know, your explanation of why J.M. thought what he did is right. But tell me, how ill is he?’
‘Baddish, but by no means dying. Er—as a matter of fact, the doctor’s with him now. Severe flu, I think it is, plus old-standing shell-shock or something like that probably.’
Lucia stirred uneasily in her chair.
‘Oh, the doctor’s with him, is he? Now, what doctor?’ Anthony said.
‘Well—er—as a matter of fact—er’—bubbled the telephone in embarrassed accents—‘I—we—have taken him back to my place. D’you know the man?’
‘I’m, well, interested in him.’
‘Well, he’s all right now, you know. You see, we—I felt rather sorry—fellow’s seedy and no one to look after him. We felt rather that we owed him something for false suspicion, what? Hope you don’t mind my taking charge.’
‘Mind? I’m very grateful! You’re an excellent man. But why the hesitancy, the embarrassment? Why all this we—I—us—me? I become aware of a rat.’
‘Because I’ve done it!’ roared the telephone ecstatically. ‘I’ve asked her. I’m going to be married. She—’
‘One moment. Miss Warren, I gather?’
‘Yes!’ cried the telephone. ‘Congratulate me!’
‘I pound your spirit on the back. Tell Miss Warren this is the only mistake I’ve ever known her make. I’ll offer my felicitations in person tomorrow. Now, listen.’
‘Right.’
‘I want you,’ said Anthony, ‘to come down here—you’ll find it best to do it by car—tomorrow and attend the inquest. It’s being held at the house—Abbotshall—and it begins at eleven o’clock in the morning. If you bring Miss Warren with you please ask her whether she will take a complete shorthand note of the proceedings. If she can’t come, get an ordinary shorthand person. I’d rather she did it, of course. After the inquest go to the Bear and Key in Marling and ask for me. I shall want to pump you. Got that?’
‘Very good, sergeant.’
‘If you see me at the house during the inquest don’t speak to me or do anything to attract attention to me. Got it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right. Good-bye, and again congratulations.’ Anthony hung up the receiver.
He turned to Lucia. She lay limply in the chair. After the first wild surge of relief had come reaction. The spare receiver had fallen from her hand. Her breast heaved as if she fought for breath.
Anthony poured whisky into a tumbler; added a little soda-water. He forced the glass into her hand. ‘Drink that,’ he said.
Obediently, like a child, she drank, looking up at him over the rim of the glass.
When she had finished, ‘Feeling better?’ he asked.
Her eyes flashed gratitude. ‘Ever so much. Oh! you don’t know how—what a horrible, awful day I’ve had!’
‘I can guess,’ Anthony said.
‘Oh, I know; I know you can! I didn’t mean that you— How can I ever thank you enough?’
‘Thank me? Why, you know, it seems I’ve done nothing much yet except make a fool of myself running down blind alleys.’
She sprang to her feet. ‘Done nothing! Done nothing!’ she blazed at him. ‘How dare you say such a thing! Why, if it hadn’t been for you and—and your cleverness I would never have known Jimmy was safe. I’d just have gone on and on thinking horrors to myself.’ Suddenly all the fire died out of her. ‘And I think I should have died,’ she added quietly.
Anthony said: ‘You overwhelm me. You can reward me best by allowing me to hope our acquaintance isn’t ended.’
Her eyes opened in amazement. ‘Why, of course!’ she said. ‘But we’re friends already, aren’t we? At least, I am.’
Anthony was silent. The only answer he wanted to make were best unsaid. He rose to his feet.
‘I must go,’ he said. ‘May I suggest that I get my friend Hastings to drive you up to town tomorrow to see your brother. That’ll be some time in the afternoon, after the inquest.’
‘Mr Gethryn, you think of everything, everything! May I? I love Mr Hastings already—for taking such care of Jimmy, poor darling, when he didn’t know him from Adam.’ She smiled; and Anthony caught his breath.
He made a move in the direction of the door; then paused. ‘Mrs Lemesurier,’ he said, ‘you can’t, I suppose, tell me anything I haven’t already picked up about the Abbotshall ménage?’ Business seemed safer ground when his emotions were so hard to repress.
She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry: I can’t. Except Sir Arthur—and he’s only a guest—I hardly know anything about them. Mr Hoode I met twice. I’ve never seen his sister. I dare say I should have known them quite well by this time if Jim hadn’t left Mr Hoode in that funny way. But after that—well, it was rather awkward somehow, and we just haven’t mixed.’
‘D’you know this Mrs Mainwaring at all?’
‘Not at all except from the illustrated papers.’
‘Oh. So she’s what Zenith might call a Society Snake, is she? Well, well. Not a tennis champion or a plus-four person as well, is she?’
‘Oh, no. I’m sure she isn’t. Mr Gethryn, why all this curiosity?’
Anthony smiled. ‘Now don’t get scenting murderers in everything I say, will you. Merely my ’satiable curtiosity. I shall be punished for it one day. “And his tall aunt the ostrich spanked him with her hard, hard claw.” That was for ’satiable curtiosity, you remember.’ He turned to the door. ‘I really must go now.’
She stopped him, laying a hand on his arm. ‘Mr Gethryn, one minute. Now that—owing to you—I’m happy again, I’m like the elephant’s child, too, simply bursting with curtiosity. Who did do it?’
Anthony laughed. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea—yet. On the subject of who didn’t do it I could talk for hours. “But whose the dastard hand that held the knife I know not; nor the reason for the strife.”’
‘But you’re going to find out, aren’t you?’
‘I have hope, lady.’
The black eyes held the green ones for a long moment. ‘I think,’ she said at last, ‘that you’re the most extraordinary man I’ve ever met. Some day, you must tell me how you knew everything I did last night. I believe you were watching me; only you couldn’t have been.’
‘I,’ said Anthony, opening the door, ‘I am Dupont, I am Lecoq, I’m Fortune, Holmes and Rouletabille. Good-night.’
She was left staring at the closed door. When she opened it to peer into the hall, he had gone.