GRAHAM MONTAGUE JEFFRIES (1900–1982), pseudonym Bruce Graeme, was working as a young literary agent and submitted his own novel to a publisher. When it was rejected, he tried writing a short story, a ten-thousand-word Blackshirt adventure, which was immediately accepted by a magazine, with a commission to write seven more. The British publishing house T. Fisher Unwin used the eight Blackshirt stories to launch a series of cheap “novels” in 1925 and sold more than a million copies of Blackshirt over the next fifteen years. The sequel, The Return of Blackshirt (1927), sold just as well.
Richard Verrell is known as Blackshirt because of the costume he affects when on a safecracking job, dressing entirely in black, including his mask. By day Verrell is a wealthy member of high society; at night he is an audacious burglar. A bestselling author, he continues his life of crime in the name of adventure.
Secure in his anonymity, his tranquility is shattered when his identity is discovered by a beautiful young woman who anonymously calls him on the telephone. Threatening to expose him, she forces him to change from a mere thief to a kind of Robin Hood. He soon thinks of her as his “Lady on the Phone.” By the second volume in the series, they are married with a son, who has similar adventures.
“ ‘His Lady’ to the Rescue” was originally published in New Magazine in 1925; it was first collected in Blackshirt (London, T. Fisher Unwin, 1925).
RICHARD VERRELL, the author, suddenly realised that although at least two hours had elapsed since he had lain his head upon the pillow, he had not yet fallen asleep. He referred to his watch, and found that his imaginary two hours was in reality only a matter of forty to forty-five minutes. Nevertheless, this was unusual, because as a general rule he automatically dropped asleep as soon as he switched off the light of his reading-lamp. Up to the present time the fact that he, a well-known novelist, was at the same time Blackshirt, now of a sudden as equally notorious, had given him no undue qualms of conscience; but tonight he felt strangely stirred, moved by some new emotion which he found impossible to define.
Restless, sleepless, he lit a cigarette and gave his chaotic thoughts full play; analysed his individuality, dissected his personality. In this turmoil there comes to him flashes of his boyhood, memories of dismal surroundings, of cruel and hated foster-parents. He lives again the night when he became lost in a maze of streets, parted from parents of whom now he had no memory. He dares not ask the people who pass, who, to his terrified imagination, assume the stature of giants, whilst he runs helter-skelter from the one man who would have been his salvation—the man in blue, the policeman at the corner. This man to the childish imagination, instilled into it by a stupid seventeen-year-old nursemaid, is an ogre from whom all good boys who say their prayers properly every night should shrink, for is he not the punisher of sins?
He glimpses himself shrinking into the shadows, sick with fear; a hairy hand gripping his shoulder till he shrieks with pain, and a beery voice mumbling incoherently; then a whirlwind of motion, clattering horses, jostling people, yells and shouts, and countless ogres, from whom, too, the man of the hairy hand also shrinks.
Next, a broken-down hovel, a slatternly woman, high words, and, if he could have only understood it then, a dawning look of comprehension and admiration on the woman’s face as she whispers: “You aren’t ’alf a slick ’un, Alf, after all.”
Then a pseudo word of comfort to the trembling boy.
Follows then a faint, misty remembrance of brutal blows, of lessons in the art of picking pockets. With frequent practice his arms become quick and his fingers nimble. A turned back, a hasty dig from his tormentor, and the next moment an apple, a cake, a cheap piece of jewellery—anything upon which he can lay his hands—is transferred into his small pocket.
Through a hazy recollection of lessons and more lessons, of scaling walls, of slipping window-catches, he pictures himself growing taller and stronger. He remembers the pride with which he discovered one day that his head was actually level with the mantelpiece.
Then follows the period when his soul awakens from the emancipation of a shivering, nervous boy to a youth with a growing intuition of virile manliness, conscious also that his recent hatred of his unlawful escapades has turned to a joyful eagerness to embark more and more upon these nocturnal adventures, which inclination becomes emphasised as he grows older.
Even then, however, it was not for what he secured that he carried on, but for the thrill, the excitement, the risk in the obtaining thereof. Then the day that he is free of his tyrants, no more to witness with disgust the drunken orgies, to listen to their fights, their vile language. His finer feelings are urging him to escape his environment, to leave behind the sordid slums. He does so, and his finely keyed intelligence becomes aware that he is ignorant, uneducated, and uncouth.
Then years of study, with interludes of more thrills and more excitements, for which his soul craves, during which he becomes possessed of the wherewithal to live and carry on.
So the years pass until the transition is complete, and the slum-bred grub emerges into the polished, educated gentleman of the West End, perhaps, for all he knew, the ultimate position to which he had been predestined by virtue of his birth.
He stirred uneasily in his bed. Had he, however, achieved that ultimate end? Was he the man his birth demanded? As Richard Verrell, well-known author, decidedly yes; but as Blackshirt—Blackshirt, the mysterious man upon whom the detectives of Scotland Yard had long wished to lay hands; the man who robbed how, when, and where he could, matching his perfect solo-play against the team-work of the myrmidons of the law, and winning by the superiority of his wits, his subtlety, and his counter-play—Verrell shook his head. If he had been the natural-born son of the man and woman who were so long his foster-parents, and who were not even married, then, indeed, even as Blackshirt he had raised himself in life; for, though a criminal, he was at least better than the drunken, cringing sycophants that were his foster-parents.
He smiled sarcastically, and wondered why these twinges of conscience were suddenly inflicting themselves upon him, but his smile softened as he remembered a telephone conversation of a night or two before.
“Why do you do it?” had asked his Lady of the ’Phone.
He had thought and turned the matter over in his mind, but in the end he shrugged his shoulders, to confess weakly that he knew not why, which had been no more than the truth.
Why was he what he was? How was it that he lived a double life—on the one hand a gentleman, a respected member of society; and on the other an outlaw, a thief of the night?
He did not attempt to mince his language. He could not, for, whatever his faults, his sins of commission and omission, he abhorred hypocrisy—he that lived a life of hypocrisy, his one life a living lie to the other. He himself knew not why, why he was this, a man of dual personality; but one who could have known him well would have instantly laid his finger on the root of the trouble. His hidden life was nothing more or less than his excessive craving for excitement, an outlet of his dynamic forces, an opportunity to play a living game of chess. As a thief he was superb; as a detective he would have been prominent; but Fate had cast him on the wrong side of the law, and if any one person other than himself was to be blamed for his misdeeds, it was the seventeen-year-old nursemaid who had one day neglected her charge for the more amusing, if less onerous, distraction of a passing Grenadier Guardsman.
The throbbing boom of an adjacent church clock echoed twice through the quiet, still air, and still Verrell had not yet succeeded in sleeping; in fact, he was more wide awake than ever.
He switched on the reading-lamp, lit another cigarette, and picked up the book which he had been reading earlier in the evening; but, after having read two or three pages, and discovering that he had not consciously assimilated a single word, he threw the book away from him in disgust.
His nerves were tingling with a throbbing sensation, which he was too well aware was usually a prelude to one of his night excursions. The pounding of his heart seemed almost to call continually to him: “Come, come, come!”
Resolutely he attempted to ignore the call, and picked up an evening paper which lay folded and so far unread on the table next his bed. He opened it out, and as he did so his gaze was arrested by startling headlines, in which stood out one word—“Blackshirt.”
With a feeling of amusement, not unmixed with a tinge of anxiety, for the first time he commenced to read about himself in print; that is to say, his secret self:
“BLACKSHIRT”
“Mysterious Master Criminal at Large”
“Scotland Yard Admits Failure”“Through sources which it can command, and which have been the means more than once in the past of the Evening Star achieving some of the world’s greatest newspaper scoops, we have recently learned that there is at large, and has been for many years, a mysterious criminal, known to members of the C.I. Department at Scotland Yard as ‘Blackshirt,’ a sobriquet well chosen by reason of the fact that this criminal invariably wears a black shirt when engaged on his nefarious enterprises.
“Blackshirt has been engaged on a series of remarkable crimes, all of which have so far been of a burglarious nature, and, notwithstanding the vigilance of the Metropolitan Police, and the recognised efficiency of our detective force, has so far successfully evaded all attempts at his capture. It speaks well of our police force that up to the present moment no whisper of this fact has been allowed to reach the general public, who are prone, in their anxiety, to be of assistance to the police, to be the means of blocking their very worthy efforts, and thus helping the criminal to escape his well-earned deserts.
“On the first rumours of Blackshirt reaching the sensitive pulses of the Evening Star office our crime expert immediately got into touch with officials at Scotland Yard, who can, however, add little information to that contained above.
“Amongst the recent robberies of which no trace has been found of the perpetrator, and which are assumed to be the work of Blackshirt, are the theft of Lady Carrington’s diamond pendant, Mrs. Sylvester-ffoulkes’s ‘Study of the Infant Christ,’ by Michael Angelo, Sir George Hayes’s valuable stamp collection, and Lord Walker’s famous statue of Apollo, in malachite. It will be seen, therefore, that Blackshirt is extremely versatile in his choice of booty, but he is even more so in his method of attack. In one instance he was successful in his coup by impersonating a policeman, whilst in another case he made his appearance disguised as a Frenchman.”
There was much more to this effect, and by the time he had finished reading he was shaking in silent merriment. The Evening Star was the yellowest of the yellow journals, and the writer had not hesitated to draw upon his imagination.
For instance, it was the first time that Blackshirt became aware he had ever impersonated a policeman, though it was the truth that he had once taken the part of a foreigner—an Italian.
He flung the paper away in disgust. The Yellow Press could always be depended upon to make out the worst of a man and ignore the best.
An insidious, insistent voice was calling, and with a gesture of impotence he flung the bedclothes from him. He knew it was useless to struggle further.
A few minutes later Richard Verrell disappeared, and in his place stood Blackshirt. Outwardly he was dressed as a man about town, with the regulation silk hat, dress overcoat, and scarf, but this last-named article did more than keep his collar clean, for it hid his black shirt underneath, just as his shirt covered a broad elastic belt containing a complete outfit for opening any kind of door, window, or safe.
The next question which he had to consider was where to go, and as he stood hesitatingly at the window of his apartment the church clock struck the half-hour.
He grinned suddenly. He was still boyish enough to appreciate a joke, and he determined that he would walk aimlessly about until his wrist-watch showed three o’clock. Whichever house he should be nearest at that time he would enter. He was about to leave when he caught sight of the crumpled newspaper. Once again he smiled. He would tear out the columns about Blackshirt and leave it in place of whatever goods he should purloin, as a mute and poignant reminder that Blackshirt was still at large.
A clock near by struck the hour of three, and Blackshirt halted. He had wandered aimlessly up this road and down the next, caring not whether he went north, south, east, or west.
Relegating the fact that when three o’clock struck he had other work to do to the background, he had spent a happy half-hour in dreaming of his Lady of the ’Phone.
To him she was just a voice which was beginning to mean all the world to him; even now he hung upon every word she spoke, memorising every syllable, every intonation of the sweet music of her conversation.
For a full half-hour he had dreamed dreams in which appeared but two people, himself and his Lady of the Voice, as he imagined her to be—an unknown, mystical figure.
As the last stroke of the clock echoed away in the distance his dreams were banished, and he became once more his alert self, keen in his work, happy in its dangers.
He found himself in a short road, evidently an avenue, judging by the fact that plane trees lined it. There were but few houses, each one detached, standing in its own grounds. Obviously a rich neighbourhood.
Blackshirt chuckled to himself. He would have more pleasure in helping himself to a rich man’s goods.
He gave a quick, searching glance up and down the road, and noted with satisfaction that there was not a soul to be seen. With a quick athletic spring he vaulted the low brick wall, and emerged into the shadows of the other side.
He covered his face with a black silk mask, and encased his hands in a pair of black silk gloves, thus making himself more invisible than ever, so that he appeared merely a black blur which crept noiselessly across the small lawn.
At the edge of the lawn he paused a moment, memorising the geography of the front of the house, and then proceeded to the back, where he hoped he would be more secluded and less likely to be seen.
In this he was not disappointed, for the back of the house was hidden from the adjacent households by a ring of trees.
He noted several points of similarity between the back and the front of the house, and concluded from this that the lower rooms stretched the whole length of the house; one, which he surmised to be a reception-room, opened out on to a small balcony through long, handsome French windows.
He judged the balcony to be undoubtedly his best means of entry into the house, and before another twenty seconds had elapsed he was standing in front of one of the windows.
There was a slight click as the latch was forced back by an instrument which he pulled from his elastic waist-belt, but he was disappointed, for the window did not give way immediately. It was evident that it was bolted as well as latched.
Another tool came into play, and presently the windows opened noiselessly inwards, and the black shadow that was Blackshirt entered and closed them behind him.
For a time he stood there, his ears alert for the slightest sound, but the house seemed absolutely silent.
Next a tiny pin-prick of light from his pocket-torch travelled round the room, moving on from one object to another.
He was surprised to note that, notwithstanding the fact that the house was built apparently in the early Victorian era, it was scarcely typical of this country, and the furnishing seemed to Blackshirt to hint somewhat of the Continent; nothing tangible, nothing which he could positively say belonged to any other country than his own, yet, nevertheless, he was distinctly of the impression that he was in the residence of a foreigner.
His light came to rest eventually on a handsome, ornate secretaire, and the artist within him gazed with delight at its graceful lines, its exquisite inlaid pattern. Obviously an objet d’art, the possession of a connoisseur.
Blackshirt wished that he could have taken the desk away with him. He would cheerfully have left everything else could he have done this.
He tried to draw his attention away from the desk, but each time his eyes wandered glitteringly back to it, and at length he determined that he would at least glance within, not so much in search of anything that might be there—for he did not believe that it contained anything of any value—but more to taste of the splendid work which he knew would be carried out inside as well as externally.
He found it locked, but anticipated no difficulty in opening it, suspecting that it was kept closed by the usual type of lock.
To his surprise he discovered that the lock was of an unusually intricate pattern, and it was only after great difficulty that he was successful in forcing it, but he did not regret the waste of time. Undoubtedly the desk was one of the most beautiful he had seen.
Within were scattered papers and letters. With a smile he picked up one, as he thought to himself he might just as well know exactly where he was. The envelope was addressed to:
Count de Rogeri,
Versailles House,
Maddox Gardens.
Blackshirt raised his eyebrows. Maddox Gardens! Why, he had heard of this neighbourhood often, but, although he knew whereabouts it was, this was the first time he had actually set foot here.
He had indeed come to an affluent district.
What was wealth compared to the desk? If ever Blackshirt regretted having to leave anything behind he did so this time. His supple hands wandered lovingly over the carving, whilst his flashlight revealed its extravagant design.
His sensitive finger-tips came in contact with a slack panel, and he frowned. Evidently its owner was careless. He wondered how loose it was, and moved it slightly.
The next moment there was a click, and Blackshirt spun round, his light disappearing as he did so. He stood there, tense with nervous excitement, but could hear nothing; no voice was challenging him, no revolver threatening him, all was dark, still, and silent.
Uneasily he turned again towards the desk. He did not like mysterious sounds, but as he resumed his examination of the bureau the cause of the noise was revealed to him as, where before had been a plain piece of panelling, there was now an open drawer.
By the merest coincidence Blackshirt had discovered a secret recess.
With sparkling eyes, which were synonymic of the happy excitement he felt in this discovery, he noted that there were papers within.
Curiosity urged him to glance through them, but on opening the first one he was annoyed to find the contents in German. Of this language he knew a little, though not much, so he was about to thrust them back into the drawer when two or three stray words which he recognised caught his eye and arrested his attention.
For the next few minutes his puzzled brain was gradually translating the manuscript. When he had finished he remained motionless, unable to connect his thoughts together coherently, his discovery numbing his senses.
When Marshall retired from the C.I. Department of Scotland Yard he was fortunate in securing a small, self-contained flat over a greengrocer’s shop in Shepherd’s Bush, and here he settled down to finish the rest of his days. He was not entirely happy in his new occupation of a retired gentleman of leisure, for he was that type of man whose enjoyment was solely in his work, and this was particularly so where he was concerned, who considered his employment the spice of life.
He missed the routine, the discipline, and, above all, the interest. There was to him as much pleasure in capturing a criminal as there is in discovering a piece of Chippendale to an antique collector.
Every now and again he was fortunate in being engaged as a private detective, but cases in which he really took interest happened so few and far between that they were not nearly enough to keep him satisfied. Most of his undertakings seemed to be in connection with divorce, in which, apart from the simplicity of the work, he discovered that usually his sympathy was with the poor, misguided people he shadowed. Eventually he came to the conclusion that if all husbands and wives were all like the people who employed him, he would remain better off as he was—single.
He lived by himself, attended only by a housekeeper, who came every morning; but as he was usually out most of the day, and very often during the night as well, he did not suffer from loneliness.
This night, for once, he had found himself what he would have termed “at a loose end,” and when ten-thirty struck he went to bed in disgust, and very soon dropped into a heavy slumber.
Presently he dreamed—a weird, monstrous nightmare, in which the main plot was that everybody he knew would pick him up and throw him about, till he tired of this, and awoke to find himself looking into the muzzle of a revolver.
“Good God!” he muttered, and then glanced at the man who sat on the side of his bed, shaking him by the shoulder with his free hand.
There was no mistaking the black mask, the black shirt.
“Blackshirt!” he gasped involuntarily.
“At your service, Marshall,” mocked the other.
“What the hell are you doing here?” exploded the detective.
“My dear Marshall, that is precisely what I am about to explain; but in the meantime please do not make any movement, as I happen to be, as you will observe, covering you with a revolver, which, by the way, is your own, and which I took the liberty of borrowing from beneath your pillow. I hope you do not object?”
Marshall did not answer, but merely grunted with an amazed air.
“Thank you,” continued Blackshirt; “then I may take it you do not object. To continue, I have a great admiration for you, Marshall, and when I say this I want you to believe that I mean it sincerely; I am not just mocking you. I have several things about which I wish to speak to you, and I am not particularly keen to tire my arm out holding this gun out in this threatening attitude. Give me your word, Marshall, that you will make no attempt at my capture until I have left this building, and I will talk to you as man to man on a matter beside which my capture and your fame are as nothing, for it concerns what is more important to both of us—our own country.”
The detective thought rapidly. Should he or should he not give the required promise, and if he did, would he keep it? On this latter point he very soon made up his mind. He knew, come what might, he could not break his word to any man, not even to Blackshirt, for whose capture he would give his right hand. On the other hand, if he did not give the undertaking Blackshirt asked he might, by awaiting his opportunity, turn the tables.
Blackshirt read his mind. “It’s no good your thinking that, Marshall, for unless you agree I shall clear out now. I think you know me better than to give you the chance which you think might be yours if you don’t do as I wish.”
The detective shrugged his shoulders. “Well, I suppose you’re right. Yes, I give you my assurance.”
Blackshirt seemed relieved, and cast the revolver down on the bed beside Marshall.
“Thanks, Marshall; though I took the trouble to extract your ammunition beforehand.”
“Hang!” muttered the detective. “If I’d known that——”
“Yes, I dare say,” interrupted Blackshirt, not giving him time to finish, and smiled in his winning way, which even the black mask could not entirely cover. “I felt sure that I would arouse your curiosity sufficiently.”
Marshall gazed at him admiringly. “You’re a cool card, whatever else you may be. However, what is it you want to tell me, and will you have a whisky-and-soda while you are saying it?”
Blackshirt laughed. “Not for me; thanks all the same, though. It’s apt to spoil one’s work to imbibe in the middle of it. But now to business.
“Tonight I went to bed—for a change, you are no doubt thinking; but, nevertheless, I do sometimes act as any other law-abiding citizen.
“For some reason or other I was restless, and was not successful, as novelists say, in the wooing of Morpheus, so I picked up an evening newspaper, and, greatly to my delight and amusement, had the pleasure of reading all about myself.”
“Yes, I read all that, too. They made it a bit hot towards the end.” Marshall grinned.
“Ah, well, that’s the penalty of being famous, eh, Marshall? To continue. The article had an unfortunate effect upon me, I confess, for it roused me to action. So you can therefore imagine me, an hour or so back, getting inside this picturesque outfit of mine, which has its uses. It will be a boon to the cartoonist in tomorrow’s paper.
“Having no fixed destination in mind, I determined to wander around until a clock struck three, and then to break into the nearest mansion, help myself to the valuables in the accredited way, and go back home to bed a richer and more sleepy man.”
His voice suddenly dropped its bantering tone, and Marshall sensed that he was coming to the point to which he owed this unexpected visit.
“Marshall, by some stroke of Fate, when the clock struck three I was outside what I afterwards discovered to be the residence of Count de Rogeri, who lives at Versailles House, Maddox Gardens.
“A few minutes later I was inside and examining a wonderful desk, an example of Italian art in the sixteenth century. Whilst doing so, by pure accident I touched a hidden spring, and a secret drawer was exposed to my view. There were papers within, and my curiosity urged me to look through them, to find they were in German.”
He paused, and unconsciously Marshall uttered an impatient “Go on, man!” so intent was he upon the narrative which was slowly being unfolded.
“I read those papers, though my knowledge of German is none too good, but it was sufficient for me to realise that what I held in my hand were the plans and specifications of the latest R.A.F. machine.”
“Good heavens! A spy!”
“Precisely.”
Again the silence, whilst the two men revolved in their minds the sudden revelation.
Presently Marshall spoke. “Why have you come to me?” he asked curiously.
“For several reasons, one of which I have already explained to you—that I trust you. Secondly, this spy must be unmasked. Obviously, were I, as Blackshirt, to write and inform Scotland Yard of this fact, the probability is that they would give no credence to my accusation. On the other hand, if I were to sign the name by which I am known to the world at large—such few people as I do know—my identity would be revealed, and Blackshirt would promptly see the inside of a prison, which is the last thing I desire.
“Again, there is no knowing when the Count is likely to go to that desk again. Perhaps by the time Scotland Yard had made up its mind, and arrived at his house for the proof, these papers might be on the way to Germany, and then there would be just my accusations against Count de Rogeri’s word. I have, therefore, brought the papers with me.”
Marshall shook his head. “You were wrong to do that. As it happens I was on the Special Section of the C.I. Department during the war, which, as perhaps you may know, devoted itself to spies, so that I learned quite a lot of the methods of this country in dealing with foreign agents.
“During the war it was just a question of capture, trial and execution; but in peace-time, no. We play a far more subtle game than that. Once a man is identified as a spy to our certain knowledge, from that time forward he is watched day and night. Every letter he writes, every parcel he sends, is intercepted, whilst every communication to him is copied before he receives it. In this way, not only does our own Secret Service become aware of every scrap of information which may be sent out of the country, but it also discovers the names and addresses of other spies who may get into touch with the one who was originally watched.
“Blackshirt—for this is the only name I can call you—by hook or by crook you must return those papers, and leave everything as you found it, so that your presence there will be positively unsuspected.
“Tomorrow I shall go to the Yard. In the meantime, for heaven’s sake get them back again.”
Blackshirt glanced at his watch. The time was twelve minutes past four. He pursed his lips.
“It can’t be done, Marshall. It’s too late. For all we know some of the maids may already be astir.” But Marshall knew that, despite what he said, he had already determined in his mind to act as the detective suggested.
Like a shadow Blackshirt disappeared, and a few seconds later Marshall heard the whir of an electric starter. Evidently Blackshirt had a car. He felt tempted to rush to the window and note the number, but he resisted. He could not play the dirty on the other, as he so aptly put it to himself.
Meanwhile, Blackshirt was speeding back towards Maddox Gardens. The car was a borrowed one. At the end of Maddox Road was a garage, from which Blackshirt had helped himself.
It was still dark when he was back at Versailles House once more, having returned the automobile, but there was a suspicious greyness in the east, and he calculated that the first streaks of daylight would be showing within half an hour.
Once again he crept across the lawn and round to the back of the house, and once more climbed up on to the balcony and entered the room through the tall French windows.
He listened intently, but there was not a sound. The tiny pin-prick of light from his torch travelled slowly round the room, but nothing had been moved. He breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently his presence had not been discovered, so that it would be a simple matter to return the papers.
With a quick, silent step he crossed the room, and, opening the desk, which he had left unlocked, he returned the papers to their hiding-place.
This time he knew it would be necessary to re-lock the desk, and he knelt down before it. He brought his delicate little instruments to work, and presently a faint click informed him that he had been successful.
No sooner had this occurred when he experienced an extraordinary sensation. At the back of his brain he felt an intuition that something had gone wrong. This communicated itself to the rest of his body, and his sensitive nerves jumped in unison.
He could not define what it was, but he seemed to sense that someone was watching him, that there was somebody else present in the room besides himself.
He listened acutely; there was not a sound to be heard. The house was as silent as a graveyard; yet the feeling became more insistent, till at last he became positively assured that he was under observation.
He almost groaned, for, were this indeed the case, and the unseen watcher the Count himself, what Marshall feared most would probably happen. Undoubtedly the Count’s suspicions would be aroused on seeing a man before the desk, when there was more valuable booty in another part of the room.
What must he do to allay this supposition? Before he could act the room was suddenly flooded with light.
He whirled round; the room was still empty. Incredulous and bewildered, he gazed in every direction, and confirmed that fact that only he himself was present. Instinctively, as he realised this fact, he stepped towards the window, but——
“Ah, so you are not armed!”
The heavy portière was flung aside, to reveal a man in evening dress.
“Good evening,” he said, with a pleasant smile, which was contradicted by the glitter in his eyes, and the menacing revolver which he held in his hand, pointing with unpleasant directness at the pit of Blackshirt’s stomach.
Despite the seriousness of his position, it flashed through Blackshirt’s mind that it was not an entirely dissimilar situation to that in which he had been less than an hour ago, but then it was he who held the whip-hand.
He glanced at the newcomer, and gathered, as he had assumed, that he was Count de Rogeri himself. Dressed and groomed immaculately in the English style, there was to be recognised a faint soupçon of foreign blood, and Blackshirt wondered if he were not of mixed parentage, possibly French and German. A correct supposition, could he have known it, the Count’s mother being an Alsatian Frenchwoman, and his father a Prussian.
“Why, may I ask, have I the honour of this visit?” There was a fixed intensity in the Count’s voice, which confirmed the suspicion in his eyes.
Blackshirt turned over in his mind on what grounds he should meet the Count. Should he be an ignorant housebreaker, or should he remain just Blackshirt? He decided upon the latter course. With any luck the Count had read the papers.
Blackshirt shrugged his shoulders. “Why does one usually break into other people’s houses?”
The Count raised his eyebrows. “An educated voice, I observe. Forgive me if I smoke?” he asked with irony, and with his left hand he took out a handsome gold cigarette-case from his coat pocket, snapped it open, and placed a cigarette in his mouth, which he afterwards lit, never for a moment allowing his revolver to waver a hair’s breadth from the direction of Blackshirt’s body.
“I regret I cannot offer you one also,” he remarked presently, “but I prefer to see your hands remain where they are.” He paused. “Really, you look remarkably picturesque for an ordinary burglar.”
“But then, you see, my dear sir, I like to think that I am not an ordinary housebreaker.”
“Ah, I see. An Arsène Lupin!”
“And you, Ganimand!”
“Your choice of books is evidently picked with care, for I judge you have read the book.”
“In the original.”
“Ah, my admiration for you increases every moment! You are indeed worthy to be captured. If I talk much longer to you I shall almost regret having to call your big, flat-footed policemen.”
“There’s many a slip, my dear Count, many a slip.”
“Banal.” The Count paused, and then with startling suddenness he asked: “How did you know my name?”
If he thought to catch Blackshirt off his guard he was mistaken, for by this time the prisoner had planned his campaign, though with a sinking heart he realised that even if he were successful in persuading the Count that he was there only for a commonplace burglary, the more he did so the more likely it would be that the Count would have him arrested.
For a brief moment he thought of buying his liberty with his knowledge of the Count’s secret intrigues, but this he dismissed almost as soon as it occurred to him.
“An up-to-date and modern housebreaker plans his attack with as much care and foresight as a field-marshal directing his army. I have been watching this house for the last two or three weeks, so naturally I knew who you were directly you appeared so disconcertingly from behind the portière.”
The Count blew a swirling, eddying smoke-ring into the air, and, watching it, he inquired casually: “And the desk, monsieur—did you expect to find many Bank of England notes there?”
Blackshirt laughed scornfully.
“Scarcely. There are sometimes papers which are more valuable than banknotes.”
He was watching the Count intently, and saw him stiffen up with an infinitesimal start. For a moment his glance rested piercingly upon his unexpected visitor, only to look casually away again, and Blackshirt knew that the Count’s suspicions were now thoroughly aroused, a point to which he had been working.
“Papers!” asked the Count. “What kind of papers?”
“Letters, Count de Rogeri, letters! You are a woman’s man.”
It was a shot in the dark, but it hit home.
“Perhaps, and so——”
“Sometimes letters pass between a man and his mistress. Such letters are valuable.”
“Blackmail!” The Count laughed sneeringly, but Blackshirt detected the note of relief in his voice. His suspicions, roused to a point when they became almost certainties, were suddenly allayed. Even so he meant to take no chances.
“And may I ask whether you were successful?”
Blackshirt became suddenly despondent.
“I regret to say you arrived about five or ten minutes too soon. That pretty desk of yours has an unusually tough lock, and I had been unable to crack it when you made your appearance.”
Still keeping Blackshirt covered, the Count warily crossed to the desk and tried it, and notwithstanding his expressionless face, Blackshirt caught the relief which he could not keep from his eyes.
With the knowledge that he was safe he became instantly more domineering, more the man with the whip-hand. Before he had been merely fencing, not sure of his ground.
“Now we will quit fooling. What is your name?”
“That, Count de Rogeri, is a thing that many would like to know, which many have tried to discover. They have been singularly unsuccessful.”
“Perhaps they did not have you at the wrong end of a revolver, as have I.”
“A forcible argument, I admit. Under the circumstances I suppose it is necessary for me to tell you that my name is Blackshirt.”
“Ah, Blackshirt! I had the pleasure of reading about you in tonight’s paper. Well, well! Supposing you take off that mask! I remember now that the paper stated that you had never been seen without a mask.”
“I regret I must refuse, however much it might be my pleasure to do you the honour, Count de Rogeri, of being the first one of having that privilege.”
The Count thrust his chin a little forward. “You will take that mask off, or——” He patted his revolver significantly. “It would be quite easy for me to look at your face afterwards.”
“That would be murder, and murder is a hanging matter in England.”
The Count chuckled unpleasantly. “Not murder, my dear Blackshirt, but justifiable manslaughter. I have another revolver upstairs. It would be only necessary to put it in your hand to prove my point.”
Blackshirt felt tiny beads of perspiration forcing themselves through his skin, and despair took hold of him. Unfortunately he knew that what the Count had said was only too true. There would be no witnesses to prove that he had been deliberately murdered. In his own mind he believed the Count thoroughly capable of doing what he had threatened. Discovery seemed inevitable. His glance wandered desperately away from the penetrating gaze of his captor.
What was it he had just said to himself? “Discovery seemed inevitable!” Perhaps; but not this evening, for he had just seen a tiny, shapely hand creeping slowly round the edge of the portière and shake a warning to him.
At all costs he must delay the evil moment for unmasking for just a few seconds. Perhaps rescue was at hand, for otherwise why the stealthy attitude of the person behind the curtain?
“Count de Rogeri, I admit defeat. You have got the better of me.”
“Very kind of you to grant me that,” answered the other sarcastically, “but the mask—I am waiting.”
Whoever was behind the curtain was gradually advancing into view, and Blackshirt suddenly thrilled. It was a woman.
“Please give me half a minute,” he asked desperately, “while I explain my circumstances to you. Count de Rogeri, I am rich and wealthy. I move in your own circle. I, too, am a gentleman, and I carry on my midnight adventures for the sake of excitement only.”
The woman was heavily veiled. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed this fact, and saw, too, that she was still steadily moving forward. Another three yards—no, two and a half yards, and she would be behind the Count.
“You would not like to go to prison any more than I. It must be hateful! Think of it, seven years of torture; seven years of damnation, perhaps more, and it will be on your conscience that you have sent me there. Please, please,” he cried, in an agonised voice, “let me go!”
The woman was almost behind the Count now; another step or two, and the scarf which she was holding in both hands would be around her quarry.
“Bah! A coward!” The scorn in his voice was galling, and, acting up to his part, Blackshirt straightened up suddenly as if the moral blow had gone home, glanced despairingly at the revolver, and slumped again into a dejected attitude.
The Count sneered again, and relaxed the tension of the hand which was holding the weapon.
At that moment the mysterious new-comer stretched out her arms and enveloped the Count’s face with a scarf, and simultaneously Blackshirt sprang forward and wrested the revolver from the Count’s grasp. The tables were turned.
“You can let him go,” said Blackshirt to his unknown rescuer, and covered the Count with the pistol.
Trembling with rage and fury, the Count gazed evilly at him.
“Not quite such a coward, eh, Count de Rogeri?” mocked Blackshirt, and the Count realised that his late captive had been acting a part.
“I am sorry I can’t ask you to unmask or anything of that sort,” continued Blackshirt, “but I am afraid it will be necessary for me to request that you sit on one of those chairs, and perhaps my lady friend, as she has evidently come here to rescue me, will kindly tie your arms and legs securely. No, not that scarf. It doesn’t do to leave behind a possible clue. His own silk handkerchief will do quite well, whilst I can supply another one which is absolutely unmarked.”
In another few seconds, Count de Rogeri was trussed hand and foot to one of his own chairs, and gagged by one of his own cushion-covers.
Blackshirt gazed at their joint work admiringly. “I trust that you are perfectly comfortable, Count de Rogeri, for I am afraid you will be under the painful necessity of remaining in the same attitude until your servants awake to release you, and as you are a ladies’ man, and probably sleep late, it would not surprise me if they were not more or less later than the usual household.
“I am sorry that I was not able to unmask, but had I done so I should have felt more like Cinderella, who was changed from the belle of the ballroom, dressed in silks and jewellery, into a poor little scullery-maid. So should I have ceased to be unknown, and doubtless would have spent seven long years in prison through your instrumentality. Au revoir, Monsieur le Comte, or should I say ‘Adieu’?” The next moment Blackshirt and his rescuer disappeared.
In the front, securely hidden from prying eyes by a large elm tree, they stopped.
“Say, I’ll tell the world that that was the cutest piece of play I have ever seen!” said the woman suddenly.
Blackshirt started with delight. “My Lady of the ’Phone!” he muttered involuntarily.
“Say, is that what you call me? Well, now, isn’t that sweet?”
Blackshirt felt his cheeks flushing, and was glad of the protecting darkness.
“You may remove your mask, Mr. Verrell,” continued the other, “and we had best be on our way before any further unpleasant events transpire.”
“And if I do,” he whispered softly, “will you not lift your veil?”
“I should say not!” she answered decisively.
“Oh, won’t you, please?” he pleaded, but she shook her head.
“Then you will ’phone me up?”
“I will.”
“Very often?” he said, catching her hand within his own.
For a moment she left it there, and Blackshirt felt the warmth of her soft fingers stealing into his, even through his gloves; then she withdrew it.
“Perhaps,” she whispered, so softly that it sounded more like the sighing of the wind.
He swayed towards her, and the magic of the moment gripped them both. Shaking in every limb, his arms crept slowly towards and around her, and for one brief moment she stood there, a trembling, palpitating woman. Just then a distant church clock struck the hour of five.
She pushed him away sharply.
“Quick! You go along to the wall and see if the coast is clear, and I will follow you, and you can help me over.”
“Yes, yes, I will do that; but before we go tell me how did you know where I was, and that I was in such an awkward situation?”
“That is my secret,” she answered gaily. “Now go.”
“But you must tell me,” he commanded.
“I will—one day.” And she pushed him forward with her hands, and he knew her answer was final.
He crept towards the wall, and, observing that there was no one near, he leapt lightly over and turned round to assist his Lady of the ’Phone, but she had disappeared. He waited half a minute, but when there was still no sign of her he knew that she intended to remain the mystery that she was.
He tore off the mask from his face, and slipped off his black silk gloves, turned up the collar of his light rainproof, and sprung out his opera hat, which fitted into a special pocket of the coat. This he set rakishly upon his head, and became once again a gentleman of the world as he started home.
“Curse that clock!” he muttered savagely.
In the garage at the end of Maddox Gardens a bewildered chauffeur scratched his head and gazed, bewitched, at the car in front of him. “Well, I never!” he muttered, “but I could have swore that I cleaned the car last night!”