Detective Sergeant Brown had no vices and only two virtues—a conscientious regard for duty and a love of fresh air. For the last two hours he had been able to gratify neither of those virtues. Seated in his superior’s private room at the “Red Lion” he reflected coldly on Superintendent Kaye’s lack of either of the virtues referred to.
To sit in a chair and smoke for three solid hours was not Brown’s idea of a conscientious regard for duty and neither did it betray any particular love of fresh air. But no one had ever accused Superintendent Kaye of an overwhelming desire for fresh air. Both his doctor and his insurance company had advised him against taking it in the daytime or in excessive quantities—both with the object of prolonging his life.
He was fond of saying that he had reached the age of forty-seven because he had never made a move in broad daylight when there was the slightest possibility of making the same move by night. And there was a certain amount of truth in the statement. The gentlemen who had waited for him with airguns were legion.
All of which Detective Sergeant Brown appreciated, but none the less it irked him. So much so that his irritation became apparent to his superior. Kaye grinned whimsically across at his tall and rather good looking assistant.
“‘They also serve who only stand and wait’,” he said and added “even if they only sit. The quotation is Milton’s—the amendment, mine.”
Brown was not interested either in the quotation or the amendment. The only amendment that he could think of was that they should adjourn forthwith.
“Well, I can’t see any point in hanging about this beastly hotel, sir,” he said defensively. “If you’ve got it all nicely wrapped up for the Poacher, why not let him have it where it’ll do him most good? The odds are if you stick round here he’ll smell a rat and sheer off.”
“Not he. He thinks he’s secure, and so he is up to a point, but ‘prosperity engenders sloth,’ as Livy has it. When our friend becomes slothful I shall step in and his little game will be up.”
“So will your number,” grunted Brown. “The Poacher’s a gunman and you offer a pretty good mark.”
Kaye dreamily watched a smoke ring dissolve. “ ‘He who fears death has already lost the life he covets’,” he quoted lightly. “You ought to read Cato, Brown, he elevates.”
“I don’t want elevation, I want air,” said Brown.
Chin in hand, he pondered his grievances, and having arranged them in chronological order was about to fire them at his superior when a knock on the door dislocated the opening speech for the plaintiff. Crossing the room, he opened the door with unnecessary violence.
The waiter who stood outside backed a trifle before Brown’s scowl and some of the expectancy vanished from his expression.
“Mr. Crale, sir?” he asked proffering a letter.
Brown took the letter and tossed it surlily to Kaye.
“Will that be all, sir?” ventured the waiter and “Yes it will,” snarled Brown and slammed the door.
Kaye, an amused spectator, slit the envelope and disclosed a smaller one addressed to himself under his correct name. Opening that in turn he read the brief note it contained.
“Dear Kaye,
“This is where I come out strong. Our friend Larry has gone north and I’m interested. I’ll write when there’s some definite news, from
“Yours
“S.K.”
Superintendent Kaye laughed softly.
“Poor old Sam. I must tell Storm to stop forwarding Sam’s letters. They make me laugh too much, which is bad for the waist line. Read that, Brown.”
Brown took the letter disinterestedly but speedily forgot his grouch.
“Looks as though the Inspector had got a line on Wade, sir,” he offered. “In which case we can’t do much good down here—stuck in this darn hotel.”
“No you don’t,” retorted Kaye. “We’re staying here, but it certainly looks as if I can’t rely on Inspector Keating’s assistance. Which is a pity, because Sam, if a very much misunderstood man, is a very useful person.”
He rose to his feet. So did Brown, hopefully.
“Going for a breather?”
“Yes, alone,” Kaye answered. “I want to punt round Ian Teyst’s house for a bit. Go out if you like. Try and get in by ten. I may have something for you to do.”
Gathering up his hat he sauntered out and went down to the lounge.
At the booking clerk’s desk he asked for a copy of the “Reigate Courier” and running a finger down the advertisements allowed his finger to rest finally on one that appeared to interest him.
It was the advertisement that Barbara had inserted the day before, and turning, Kaye surveyed himself in a glass over the desk. He came to the conclusion that Keating had not been far out in his statement that he, Kaye, was absolutely “cut out for a butler.” The reflection seemed to cause him some amusement, but he continued to be amused for some moments after the original cause had passed from his mind.
He strolled to the door, taking care that his sidelong glance in passing did not rest too long on the figure of the gentleman in a brown suit lounging in front of the small electric fire.
Larry, stroking his newly-acquired beard, was unaware of that brief scrutiny. At the moment he was rather wrapped up in himself. His identity was very effectively concealed and there was nothing to suggest that he was anything but the artist that he posed as. Nothing except his eyes—and who was interested in a man’s eyes?
Nobody but Superintendent Kaye. It was his trade. He had caught but one glimpse of the “artist’s” face, but it had been sufficient. For while he could not remember the beard, he could not forget the eyes. Superintendent Kaye specialized in eyes. Nothing was hidden from his own.
The passing of Kaye had not interested Larry. As a matter of fact he was not interested in any of his immediate surroundings—always excepting his beard. It was a peculiarly good specimen of its kind and Larry fingered it frequently and almost lovingly.
It was one of these self-congratulatory caresses that Detective Sergeant Brown noticed as he descended to the lounge in his quest of fresh air. Effeminacy was a trait that Brown had no use for and something like a sneer crossed his face as he halted to fill his pipe.
He had reached that unfortunate stage when he was looking for a quarrel and did not particularly care what means he employed to insure that end.
And Larry would have been only too pleased to have accommodated the belligerent Brown had he suspected the antagonism that he had aroused in that worthy arm of the law. Fortunately, or unfortunately, he was not, but more unfortunately he became aware of the fact that Brown was searching for matches. And that fact was directly responsible for all the discomfort that entered Brown’s existence in the following days.
It was the merest chance that in search of something to light his pipe Brown should have lighted on the letter that Kaye had recently given him to read. Normally he would have reserved it and found another means of lighting his pipe. Today the using of it was little less than a gesture of defiance, with Kaye as the person defied.
How long Larry stared at the piece of folded paper extended to the fire before he became aware of the phrase “friend Larry has gone north,” he did not know, but once he had seen it he recognized his own handwriting and the words. He had considered them rather a neat touch when he had penned them. Immediately he saw them his attention was focused on Brown, but his regard, if just as hostile, was infinitely more veiled.
The letter he himself had sent a few hours ago, in this man’s hand meant one thing only—that the man was Kaye. That he could be any one else never entered Larry’s head. Neither was he concerned with the coincidence of their sharing the same hotel. At that moment he thought of only one thing—that he was for the first time face to face with Superintendent Kaye.
He had frequently speculated on his ultimate meeting with the elusive Superintendent Kaye and now that he had met him the fact that he had penetrated the Superintendent’s identity, without betraying his own, held a distinct touch of humor. Nevertheless his face remained perfectly devoid of expression as Brown passed him on his way out.
It was at that point that Larry also felt the need of fresh air. His jaunty bearing as he got into his car and followed leisurely in the wake of “Superintendent Kaye” would have given his quarry further cause for grievance had he been aware of it. So would Larry’s intentions.
It was all so simple for Larry. As a solution it left nothing to be desired. His one aim till then had been to find a safe means of entrance to Ian Teyst’s house. Now the difficulty had been solved for him. And the solution of one difficulty was the solution of another. His treatment of Keating had placed him definitely amongst the hares, but up till then he had only eliminated one of the hounds.
He lighted a cigarette and smiled contentedly. The second was due to be eliminated.
It was not until Brown had climbed the ridge and turned off into the wood to enjoy the magnificent view, that he found that Larry had parked his car and was following on foot. Even then it had no particular significance for Brown and he walked on for some time before turning and perceiving that Larry’s taste for rural walks still coincided with his own.
In the next ten minutes Brown turned three times and each time found the effeminate intruder a little closer. It was after the third turn that Brown’s thoughts began to revolve on rather more suspicious lines. He halted suddenly and realized for the first time that dusk was falling. Leaning against a tree trunk he waited for Larry to come up.
Larry, entirely unperturbed, sauntered slowly toward his quarry.
“Nice evening,” he commented as he drew abreast.
It was, but Brown was not interested in the weather.
“Look here,” he demanded bluntly, “are you following me?”
“In a sense I suppose I am,” Larry answered pleasantly, “but the view is free to all, and I believe the Town Council allow more than one person to enjoy it at a time.”
Detective Sergeant Brown stuck out his chin belligerently.
“Cut out the funny business,” he snapped. “What’s the idea?”
“This!”
Brown never discovered what the idea was, because “this” took the form of a vicious and unexpected uppercut. Then the sky fell in—at least that was his impression. Actually he struck his head against a tree as he fell.
Larry glanced swiftly round him and then took something from his pocket. Something damp with a pungent smell which, when pressed to the unfortunate Brown’s nose, considerably diminished his chances of regaining consciousness for some time.
When he did regain consciousness he was lying on a bed—in an upper room of the lodge at Marske House—only he did not know that. The room was uncarpeted and save for a chair, unfurnished, and the light of the moon provided the only illumination.
A tentative effort to move made him realize that he was strapped to the bed. He also discovered that he was gagged—which did nothing to improve the situation. Nor did the sight of Larry standing in the center of the room, calmly smoking.
Brown mouthed angrily and Larry, carefully extinguishing his cigarette, produced an automatic pistol.
“This,” he said, “as you see is fitted with a silencer. If it has to justify its name you won’t be able to appreciate it.”
The hint had its effect. Brown made no outcry when Larry removed the gag.
“Now we can talk,” continued Larry. “And when I say ‘we’, I mean myself. For the next few days you aren’t going to do any talking except with my permission. You’re going to sit in large quantities and think in even larger—but you aren’t going to talk much.”
He tossed his cigarette away and pulled up a dusty chair, which he flicked with a handkerchief before sitting down on it.
“I suppose we owe your charming presence in Reigate to the fact that you had tumbled to our dear Ian’s presence here, Kaye,” he suggested conversationally.
For a moment Brown gaped. The unfamiliar appellation had startled him, but he realized instantly what had happened. He had been a victim of one of the frequent attacks on Kaye’s liberty and safety.
“Yes, I tumbled all right,” he said truthfully. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, and who the devil are you anyway?”
“Oh come, that’s not very inspired,” gibed Larry. “Have we worshipped a myth all these years, or is the subtle Kaye baffled for once?”
And then Brown had a brain wave. There were only two people connected with the case on which Kaye was then engaged who could have any possible interest in the holding of the Superintendent—the Poacher or Larry Wade. He took a long shot and it found a billet.
“You look better without a beard, Larry,” he said.
“Much better,” Larry approved. “You’ve had the advantage for years. I suppose I’m right in saying that you know me although I have never set eyes on you before.”
Brown thought hard, and had another brain wave. While Larry thought his captive was Kaye there was a chance for Kaye himself to move with reasonable immunity and there was one way to convince Larry that it was Kaye that he held captive. Kaye was famed for his quotations and the use of one of them ought to be conclusive proof of the user’s identity.
“Yes, you’ve got the advantage,” Brown said slowly, “but don’t forget this, Larry. ‘They also serve who only stand and wait’—even if they sit.”
“Who thought that one out for you?” Larry jeered.
“Milton. Know him?”
“Yes, I know people who put their false teeth in a glass of him every night.”
Brown grunted and racked his brain furiously for a further quotation. But it was not forthcoming.
“What’s the idea of dumping me here?” he asked suddenly.
“Ideas,” corrected Larry. “Plural, old soul, for there are many. One of them is that you shan’t be free to crab anything I start. Another is that I shall shortly assume your divine personality. Naturally a battalion of Kayes drifting round would create unpleasant doubts in the minds of the innocent—hence your retirement to cloistered seclusion.”
Brown stared round the darkened room and remembered another of Kaye’s quotations.
“Abandon ye all hope who enter here,’” he said somberly, and added considerately “From Dante’s ‘Inferno.’”
“Yes, make a bad break and try and get out of this and you’ll taste it,” Larry said.
“I shan’t get out of it,” Brown retorted philosophically. “I’m very much bound up in this place.”
Larry rose to his feet and took up the gag.
“This is where your gas gets turned off at the main,” he grinned and in two minutes Brown was mouthing inarticulately again.
“I shall drop in occasionally,” said Larry as he walked to the door, “and feed you with my own lily-white hands. If you get lonely, try counting the cockroaches. Quite a thrilling game. Ten points for each and twenty if they get down your neck.”
He smiled pleasantly and withdrawing, descended to the hall and let himself out. From where he stood he had a clear view of the drive and he waited for some moments to assure himself that no one was in the vicinity before he made for the gates.
Arrived there he looked back at the house that was Brown’s prison. Ingress had presented no difficulty and the dust he had found there made it seem unlikely that any one had visited the place or was likely to. The lodge of Marske House was admirably situated as a prison for his captive, particularly as Larry himself would be staying at the house.
He had little fear that his prisoner would free himself or attract attention—there were few people living who could teach Larry anything in the matter of ropes and their uses. The more he thought of the idea the more it appealed to him. For an effective and convenient prison it was unequaled and enabled him to keep Kaye under his eye without having to go far to do it.
That of course was an error which Larry was not aware that he had made. Neither was he aware that as he passed out of the gate a shadow detached itself from the still deeper shadow of the trees further up the drive and crossed to the porch of the lodge.
The “Shadow” was Superintendent Kaye who had been an interested spectator to the evening’s happenings.