ALLINFORD rubbed the end of a penholder against the bald patch at the back of his head and played a heel-and-toe tattoo with his boot on the floor. For a second time he compared the paragraph in ‘Printed Informations’ with the written document in his hand.
‘It’s a nightmare,’ he declared aloud. ‘I shall wake up presently. You can’t tell me that on the same day two people are going to lose two distinct diamond necklaces, each with the same number of stones set in the same way, of exactly the same description, and with the same value. It’s ridiculous; it’s beyond reason.’ And he reached for the telephone.
For ten minutes he held an animated conversation with the chief of the Criminal Investigation Department. At last he replaced the receiver, thoughtfully folded the documents, and put them in the breast-pocket of his morning coat. Two minutes he spent with a velvet pad polishing his silk hat, which he finally adjusted on his head at the fashionable angle, picked up a pair of lavender-coloured gloves, and with a glance at himself in the glass, went out into the sunlit morning.
As a divisional detective-inspector, in charge of an important district of the West End, he always made it a point to dress well. In the department he was known as ‘Beau Allinford.’ His carefully kept grey moustache, his square shoulders and well-tailored clothes on his tall figure, gave him the appearance of a retired military officer.
His way led him to the Durbar Hotel, and the manager of that caravanserai greeted him with a handshake of relief. ‘Come into my private office,’ he invited. ‘Have you been able to make anything of it yet? I needn’t tell you that the hotel will be grateful if it can be cleared up without any unnecessary publicity—though, of course, we’re not strictly responsible, as Mr Verndale kept the diamonds in his own rooms.’
He was a rotund little man. His bright little inquiring eyes were fixed with some anxiety on the detective. A robbery at an hotel is apt to have serious results on its patronage.
‘You don’t expect me to touch a button and produce the thief and the gems, do you?’ inquired Allinford irritably. ‘It’s not an hour ago since I was here and first heard of the robbery.’
‘No, no; of course not,’ said the manager soothingly. ‘I’m quite sure you’ll do your best.’
The ruffled Allinford sat down. ‘Let me tell you my trouble, Mr Lanton,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you can help. Here’s Mr Rex Verndale, a customer of your hotel—’
‘Shall we say a client?’ interrupted the little manager, with dignity.
‘Very well, a client, if you prefer that. Between six o’clock last evening and nine o’clock this morning Mr Verndale lost from his room a diamond necklace valued at five thousand pounds sterling. Now,’—he took ‘Informations’ from his pocket and tapped it with a white forefinger,—‘this morning it was reported to headquarters that a burglary was committed at Sir Rupert Helton’s town house in Mount Street, and that the thieves got away with Lady Helton’s jewel-case, which contained, among other things, a diamond necklace worth five thousand pounds sterling.’
‘You don’t say so!’ exclaimed the manager, with astonishment. ‘What an extraordinary coincidence!’
‘I believe you,’ said Allinford grimly. ‘What’s more extraordinary is that the descriptions of the two necklaces tally, even to the weight of each individual diamond. Now I’m going up to see Mr Verndale again, but I wanted to ask you what you know about him beforehand.’
The manager thought he saw a subtle suggestion in the question. He made a gesture deprecatory of suspicion. ‘He’s undoubtedly a gentleman,’ he said, laying a slight stress on the second word. ‘He’s stayed with us for three months or more in every year for more than five years now. He’s travelled a great deal, I believe. He is very well known among some good people, and has a private income of his own. He’s extremely well-off, I should judge. You don’t believe’—with a recollection of a scheme of which he had heard—‘that he’s trying to work an insurance fraud?’
‘That’s one of the points,’ said Allinford. ‘The jewels were not insured. First time I’ve heard of anyone with a valuable heirloom—which he says it was—which was not insured. You don’t know where he gets his income? No? Well, it doesn’t matter. I think I’ll go up and see him now. I’ll look in later on you.’
Mr Rex Verndale occupied a suite of rooms on the first floor of the by-no-means-inexpensive Durbar Hotel, in itself a proof of ample means, if, as the manager said, he had occupied them for long terms over a period of years.
His manner, as he received Allinford, was loftily austere and patronising. He was a young man of thirty or thereabouts, tow-headed, with a clean-shaven face, alert eyes, and an overpowering odour of scent. The detective detested a man who used scent.
He raised his eyebrows languidly as the official explained the coincidence that had arisen. ‘That’s very extraordinary—very extraordinary indeed!’ he drawled. ‘How do you account for it?’
‘I can’t!’ said Allinford bluntly. ‘Do you know Sir Rupert Helton or Lady Helton?’
‘My good man’—Verndale stretched out a well-fitting boot and rocked to and fro as he admired it—‘I’m not sure whether I do or not. I may have met them—I can’t say. One sees so many people.’
‘There’s one other point—you’ll forgive me for mentioning it. You told me those diamonds had been your mother’s. Do you know where she got them?’
Verndale sighed wearily, as one patiently tolerating a bore. ‘They were given her by my father, on their wedding-day,’ he said. ‘My father was the second son of the eighth Earl of Mulchester. I don’t believe he stole them.’
Allinford stolidly ignored the sarcasm. ‘It isn’t clear to me, either, why you had them here. Surely they’d have been safer in the bank.’
‘Perhaps they would,’ agreed Verndale, still as if talking to a persistent child. ‘That idea had occurred to me, Mr—er—Allinford—thank you. In point of fact, they were in Chancery Lane Safe Deposit up to yesterday morning, when I took them out. I am suffering from—ah—a temporary financial stress at the moment, and it was my intention—you understand?’
‘Thank you. I think I do. Now, Mr Verndale, you said you had a few friends in to bridge last evening. I should be obliged if you would let me have a list of their names.’
Verndale sat up. ‘But they are people quite above suspicion,’ he said stiffly. ‘I can’t have them annoyed. I would rather drop the whole thing. Really, Mr—ah—er—yes, Allinford.’ He shook his head reprovingly.
‘I assure you they shall not be annoyed. It is necessary or I would not ask you.’
Verndale moved to an inlaid writing-desk. ‘Oh, well, in that case—’ He scribbled a few minutes and handed the list to Allinford. ‘And now perhaps you will excuse me,’ he said.
As Allinford went out, he noticed something on the floor, half hidden under the curtain. He stooped to pick it up; it was a playing card—the seven of hearts.
There is always a certain sameness in the steps taken to investigate a crime. Indeed, a great part of the work of the investigator is usually done before the actual commission of crime—done by an organisation which compiles every ascertainable fact about a probable criminal, from, his finger-prints to the state of his finances, his methods of working to his latest address.
For the time being, Allinford was too busy to devote much thought to the coincidence of the second robbery. It was his duty to find how Verndale’s jewels had disappeared, and to that end it was an obvious step to find out which of the known jewel thieves could have committed the theft and then to eliminate them, one by one, until the right person—if it really was a professional thief—was known.
He had twenty men under his immediate command, and the case afforded, work for all. To each man he indicated a line of inquiry, and then he caught a bus for Scotland Yard. He was wishful to find out exactly what had happened on the parallel inquiry of Lady Helton’s necklace.
It was on the narrow stone flight of stairs, leading upwards from the back door of the Metropolitan Police Office—which is the official name for Scotland Yard—that he met the burly familiar figure of Weir Menzies, one of the chief inspectors of the department.
Menzies grabbed him by the elbow. ‘That you, Allinford? I’ve been expecting you this last hour. You’re handling the Durbar Hotel jewel case, aren’t you? I’ve got the Lady Helton end. What’s the latest?’
‘The latest, sir,’ said Allinford, slowly and deliberately, ‘is nothing. We’ve not got fairly started yet. I was hoping you’d be able to help.’
‘Come inside,’ said Menzies. He pushed his colleague into the chief inspector’s room and dragged forward a chair. ‘I may help or I may mix things up. I’ve finished my job. That part of it was simple.’
‘Finished?’ repeated Allinford.
‘Yes, finished. Tell me—is your man—Verndale—a friend of the Heltons?’
‘I asked him. He isn’t even sure that he knows ’em.’
Menzies looked meaningly across at the other. ‘Sure to say that. What I mean is, he didn’t know the lady before her marriage—old flame, and that sort of thing?’
‘I don’t know.’ Allinford glanced at his watch. ‘I may be able to tell in three or four hours’ time. I’ve got two men collecting all they can about him. How about the Helton case?’
‘It didn’t take long to burst that up. I got down to Mount Street early and saw the lady—a fine woman she is, too! You may have seen her picture in the society papers. She was in tears, and Sir Rupert was raving up and down, cursing burglars and police and servants indiscriminately. It seems he had asked her to wear the necklace at the ball he is giving tonight. She got it out of the bank yesterday, according to her story. One of the lower windows had been left open, and it was through that that the burglar entered. Her bedroom is on the first floor and adjoined by a dressing-room. She had left her jewel-case on the dressing-table. She woke up early this morning, heard a noise in the dressing-room, and raised an alarm. The thief got clear away—with the jewel-case. The household theory was that he’d gone through the open window.
‘Sir Rupert fixed the time of the robbery. He had looked at his watch; it was ten-past five. I of course, went and had a talk with the constable on the beat. Now here was a curious thing. He had placed a private mark on that window when he went on duty. He had gone by the house at five o’clock and it was undisturbed. About thirty yards along he met his section sergeant, and they were there talking when the alarm was raised.’
‘Fake?’ asked Allinford.
‘Fake, all right! I didn’t beat about the bush. I put it to Sir Rupert and Lady Helton. She denied it, of course; he took her side, and you can take my word for it he didn’t gloss over any defects he could find in my character. I was ordered out of the house—he told me to go before I was kicked out—and he’s going to get me hounded out of the service.’ Menzies grinned as though the prospect did not greatly daunt him.
‘Then it comes to this,’ said Allinford thoughtfully, ‘the necklace that has been stolen from Verndale was originally Lady Helton’s, and it must have passed out of her hands to him, directly or indirectly.’
‘That’s how I make it!’
‘She faked the robbery because she didn’t want to tell her husband what she had done with the jewels. You’re thinking of blackmail, Mr Menzies, of course?’
Menzies nodded. ‘That’s the drift. How do we know he hasn’t been bleeding her? I’d look into it from that point of view, if I were you—though, after all, it doesn’t much matter how he came by the necklace if you can’t prove anything. If it’s blackmail, Lady Helton, who’s the only possible witness, won’t speak. No, take it all around, Allingford, I’d stick to safe lines. All that ought to worry you is—who stole the jewels from Verndale?’
‘H’m—yes! About your own affair, sir,—the necklace was insured?’
‘Yes, I was talking to Lloyd’s assessors just before you came in. No claim has been put in yet. If it is’—his jaw became grim—‘there’ll be trouble for Lady Helton. But it’s not likely. She won’t be such a fool.’ Wherein Menzies, for once, showed himself no prophet, for by four o’clock that afternoon a representative of Lloyd’s had informed him that a formal claim of the loss of the necklace had been put in.
Menzies had insisted that the coincidence of the two necklaces was a side issue, with which Allinford need not concern himself. If the robbery from Mount Street had been faked—and of this the detective had no doubt—the claim on the insurance companies was an attempt to obtain money by fraud. It might be possible to prove this on the facts known to Menzies. But to clinch the matter beyond doubt, it became necessary to show that Verndale’s stolen necklace was actually identical with that that had belonged to Lady Helton.
Allinford heard of the claim by telephone. He sat back, took out the seven of hearts which he had picked up in Verndale’s rooms, and examined it minutely. He could not rid his mind of the thought that the card held the key to the mystery. It was pure intuition—and intuition is often more likely to mislead than to guide in most investigations. Presently he shrugged his shoulders and pressed the bell. A broad-shouldered young man, whose face and bearing were those of a City clerk of athletic possibilities, answered.
‘Ah, Swain!’ said the inspector, ‘I’ve got a little job for you. You had Verndale under observation till four o’clock, hadn’t you? Ah, good! Tell me where he was when you were relieved.’
‘He was at 704 Granville Street, Piccadilly. Been there since twelve o’clock. Must have lunched there.’
Allinford smashed his open hand down on his thigh, and his eyes narrowed. ‘That’s it!’ he exclaimed. ‘I’ll be dashed if that isn’t it.’ But he volunteered no explanation. ‘Look here, Swain,’ he went on, ‘I want you to go to the Durbar Hotel and see if you can get hold of a pack of cards out of Mr Verndale’s room. I’m relying on you not to do anything foolish. You needn’t go to the manager—understand? I want this done quietly. Bring ’em to me as soon as you can.’
The young man gave a business-like assent and disappeared. In half an hour he was back. He laid a pack of cards on the desk, and the inspector picked them up with a word of thanks. He asked no questions.
For half an hour Allinford went through the cards with a steady scrutiny; then he carried them nearer to the window and examined them in pairs and threes, by what photographers call ‘transmitted light.’ A little chuckle broke from his lips.
‘What a Dutchman I was not to think of it before. This begins to explain things.’
The door pushed open and Menzies entered. The usually smooth forehead of the chief was corrugated into a frown. ‘What’s the game?’ he asked. ‘Are you taking up conjuring tricks?’
‘Something of that sort,’ smiled Allinford. He replaced the cards in their case and put the case in his pocket. ‘If all goes well, as I think it will, we’ll know where we are by tonight.’
‘That’s all right! You got my telephone message?’
‘About Lady Helton—yes. The woman must be mad!’
‘It’s not the woman so much; I imagine she would be pleased enough to let the whole thing drop. It’s Sir Rupert. You see, technically, the necklace is his, it’s insured in his name and he’s put in a claim. He’s one of that honest, mutton-headed, obstinate, fiery kind of men, and he’s not going to be dictated to by any blessed common policeman—that’s me—from Scotland Yard. I thought I’d call in, as this was on my way back, and let you know how things are.’
‘What are you going to do?’
Menzies spread his hands out hopelessly. ‘What can I do? Sir Rupert’s honest enough. He believes in his wife. Of course I might charge them both with an attempt to defraud, but it could never be brought home against him—and as it would have to be brought against both of them together, the charge against her would naturally fail, too. If it had been her own necklace and she had put in the claim in her own name, it would have been different. The insurance company will have to fight, I expect; it’s none of our funeral.’
He yawned and stood up. ‘Well, I thought you’d like to know how things are. I’m going on to the Yard and then home. Good-night!’
Allinford sighed as he reflected that his own connection with the case gave no promise of immediate leisure. He had formulated an idea, but if that fell through it might be days or weeks before he would be able to settle things. He called Swain again, and gave that intelligent young man long and earnest instructions. Then he went out to a frugal meal of weak tea and dry toast. He was troubled with his digestion at times. He ate abstractedly. At last, with the air of an idle man who was not quite sure what to do with himself, he sauntered out and strolled towards Shaftesbury Avenue.
There is a famous theatrical outfitter in one of the side streets of that thoroughfare. And the urbane, frock-coated proprietor came forward, rubbing his hands.
‘Good-evening, Mr Allinford. Been a beautiful day, hasn’t it? You’re looking very fit.’
‘Yes, it’s grand weather,’ admitted the detective, and with that concession to conversation he got to business. ‘Say, can you turn me out as a doctor in half an hour? That’s all the time I can give you. I want something weather-proof and fool-proof—something that isn’t obvious. I won’t have a false beard. You know the kind of thing I mean.’
The costumier measured him with a professional glance. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘I can make you so that your own mother won’t know you.’
The art of disguise—especially facial disguise—is one that is very rarely used by officers attached to the Criminal Investigation Department. There is indeed a make-up room at Scotland Yard where men may transform themselves into anything from coal-heavers to guardsmen, but it is used only when the ordinary attire and manner of the detective would be so entirely out of keeping with his surroundings as to attract attention. A dirty muffler, unshaven face, and corduroys work a transformation more difficult of detection than the most cunning use of grease-paint and wigs.
It is only when an officer is to be brought into personal contact with some who knows him, and by whom it is essential he should not be recognised, that he goes to the extreme and very risky length of altering his face.
Allinford was critical and exacting while expert hands transformed him. When the disguise was complete, he examined himself with the mirror and gave a grunt of approval. His grey, drooping moustache had become well waxed and auburn, with pointed ends. His scanty hair also had a tinge of the same colour, and had been brushed so that it appeared twice as luxuriant as it was in reality. A razor and dye had worked wonders with his eyebrows. He wore his own clothes and was as neat as ever, but it would have needed keen eyes to detect any likeness to the man who had entered the establishment.
‘Yes; I think that ought to do,’ he commented.
Unless a person were keenly observant or suspicious, he would be very unlikely to guess that the front door of 704 Granville Street, Piccadilly, had not been out of sight of officers of police for six or seven days.
It was a quiet house, solid-looking and respectable—a residence which would not have shamed a Cabinet Minister. A luxurious motor-brougham had just driven away when Allinford walked briskly up the broad stone steps and pressed the bell. The door swung smoothly back, and a ponderous footman, in olive-green livery, confronted him.
The detective fingered a card. ‘Will you take this to Mr Glenston, please. Mr Roberts, a friend of mine, suggested I might call.’
Now Roberts is a fairly common name. That is why Allinford had used it. He knew that the house had many visitors, and it was possible that a Roberts might be among them, or, alternately, that the occupant might not feel certain that he had not a client named Roberts. On the card the footman read:
AUDREY LATIMER, M.D.
GREAT SOUTHERN HOSPITAL
His eyes wandered from the card to its owner, in a measured scrutiny that might have seemed offensive had not Allinford been prepared for it. He met the look with bland arrogance.
‘Very good, sir,’ said the man. ‘Will you come this way?’
He ushered the detective into a reception-room furnished in keeping with the solid character of the house, and left him. For ten minutes Allinford waited, drumming his fingers on his knee. He knew very well what was happening, but he had taken precautions. When he had assumed the name and title of a hospital doctor, he had arranged that the hospital authorities should not betray him. If the muscular footman with the inquisitive eyes was ringing up the Great Southern Hospital to verify the visitor’s identity, he would soon be satisfied.
He returned in a little. ‘It is all right, sir. Will you walk upstairs—the first door on the right. It’s rather early now. Most people drop in after dinner or during the afternoon.’
‘I expect I shall find something to amuse me,’ said Allinford, and while the man held open the door, he passed out and up the thickly-carpeted stairway.
There were a dozen or more people in the room which the servant had indicated. It was a big apartment, and its furniture and fittings were rather those of a club than of a private house. Prominent at one end was a kind of bar partly shielded by curtains, and with two or three small tables in front of it. Some of them were occupied. One woman—she was scarcely more than a girl—with delicate tinted complexion was drinking tea with an older companion of her own sex, a soft-faced woman with a heavy jaw.
A little group of men were clustered around another table, laughing and chatting, but their drink was not tea. In the body of the room was a large roulette table at which the croupier sat idle in his high-backed chair. Nearer the window half a dozen men and women were seated round a chemin-de-fer table, watching the dealer.
Decidedly it was a slack time of day. There was none of that hectic excitement which the picturesque writer about West End gambling dens loves to depict. It was all very decorous. As Allinford moved up to the baccarat, one man signalled to the waiter and scribbled a cheque. The detective noted the amount with an inward gasp. It was for five hundred pounds.
He observed Verndale among the group at the bar and moved towards them. Refreshments—even to the most costly of wines—were free. But he contented himself with a modest cup of tea. He wanted to keep his head clear.
‘Yes,’ Verndale was saying, in his arrogant, dogmatic way, ‘baccarat’s all very well to a point, but I’d nearly as soon play pitch-and-toss. It’s a children’s game. Give me poker—or auction bridge, for that matter—something with more life in it.’
One of the group—a tall young man with a weak chin and a scrubby tooth-brush moustache—grinned feebly. ‘There’s life in your poker, Verndale.’
‘You ought to know,’ chuckled a second man. ‘For my part, I’d sooner buck against him at poker than auction. There’s a little woman who’s paid for her bridge lessons—eh, Verndale?’
Verndale frowned. The last hint seemed to have touched a sore point. ‘That’s enough, Devine!’ he said curtly. Then, more amiably: ‘You can’t afford to be chivalrous in a card-game, you know; there’s a difference between sportsmanship and quixotry. Most women are fools. If they had the sense to stick to a pure gamble—something where no skill is required—they would sometimes win. Talking about poker, I’m willing to sit in. But we can’t play here. Suppose you people come up to my rooms. How many of us are there—four? Five would make a better game.’
His gaze rested on Allinford only for a moment. The detective was quick to see the invitation. ‘I should be happy to sit in, if you will allow me,’ he said. ‘My name is Latimer.’ He proffered a card.
Verndale bowed. ‘Pleased to know you, Dr Latimer. My name is Verndale. Let me introduce Lord Tiverley, Sir Richard Hopville, Mr Granger. Well, we might as well have some taxies.’
‘He thinks he’s roped a new mug,’ meditated Allinford.
Verndale indeed seemed to have taken a fancy to the stranger. He insisted on the doctor’s sharing his cab, while the other three took a second vehicle. By the time they reached the Durbar Hotel, the two might have been, judging from their manner, the friends of a lifetime.
The game began slowly enough, but Allinford had fears that the ten pounds with which he had provided himself would not go far. He played cautiously. Hopville, the weak-chinned young man, was the plunger of the party. His futile attempts at bluff, at times, awoke the derision of the others. Verndale seemed to be feeling his feet. The detective judged him to be measuring the game of the others. He was winning a trifle.
He was a lavish host too, for a servant was continually filling up glasses at a side-table; but it was noticeable that he himself drank little.
Allinford had lost five pounds, and he was still no further advanced than when they had begun. He bit his lip. All his plans depended upon his proving Verndale to be a cheat, and yet, to all appearances, the man was playing honestly enough. The worst of it was that he might go on playing honestly. The skilled cheat most often only falls upon unfair methods in a game like poker when luck runs against him. While it holds he is content with his expert knowledge of the straight game.
As the game warmed up, Hopville’s luck turned. He took risks; he broke every law of the safe game. Yet he won. He seemed able to do nothing wrong. The stack of chips in front of him mounted higher and higher, and he grinned inanely over his cards. Verndale too was losing. Allinford’s small capital ebbed away until only a sovereign was left. He sat tense and watchful.
‘Now, Doctor,’ said Verndale, smiling as he picked up the cards, ‘I am going to give you a real royal flush. Just keep your eye on me.’ He dealt slowly.
As the last card fell from his fingers, Allinford suddenly rose, reached across the table, and wrenched away the pack. ‘One moment, gentlemen!’ he cried. ‘Hold your hands!’
Verndale’s chair overturned with a crash, as he leaped to his feet. ‘What the devil do you mean?’ he demanded. His white hands were opening and shutting, and his face was flushed. ‘Are you making any suggestion against anyone present?’
‘I am!’ said the detective sharply. ‘Sit down!’
‘You’re a liar!’ stormed Verndale. ‘Get out of my house or I’ll have you thrown out.’
‘I think not,’ said Allinford quietly. ‘I should advise you to sit still till I have finished. Gentlemen, the cards are marked! You, Mr Granger, hold a pair of aces, a pair of fours, and the king of diamonds. You, Lord Tiverley, have the four of clubs, one knave, four, three, and the deuce of spades. Sir Richard Hopville has three queens. Mr Verndale, I observe, has dropped his hand on the floor, and as I am not quite expert enough to have read them, except slowly, I can’t tell you what they were. My own are a pair of knaves, the three of diamonds, six of spades, and the seven of hearts.’
‘We’ve got a blessed conjurer!’ laughed Sir Richard Hopville.
No one paid him any attention. Granger and Tiverley turned their cards face upwards and looked gravely from Allinford to Verndale. The latter was breathing heavily. He tried to laugh.
‘You know me, Granger,’ he said; ‘so do you, Tiverley, and you, Hopville. I don’t quite know what this man’s idea is, but it looks like blackmail. If the cards are marked, he has managed to introduce them himself. Why,’—he brought his fist down on the table to emphasise his remark,—‘I’ve lost money myself.’
‘That’s true!’ said Hopville. ‘A pot!’
‘Before we go any further,’ said Allinford, ‘I may explain that I am a police officer. That will dispose of any question of blackmail. Perhaps you will hold a card to the light, Lord Tiverley. Thank you. You will notice a small spot near the top left-hand corner. Now put the card down. That spot has gone. It looks like an optical illusion, doesn’t it? You could be told the cards were marked and search for a week if you didn’t know what to look for. You will find that spot in a different position on each card, according to the suit and value. The person who marked them had a full acquaintance with the virtues of aniline dye. An expert could read them as they were dealt as easily as though they were face upwards. He could do more than that, with a little experience. He could deal any hand he wished to any person at the table.’
Tiverley towered over Verndale.
‘I think I’ve heard enough,’ he said. ‘I ought to have been less simple. I am obliged to you, Mr—er—er—?’
‘Allinford,’ said the detective.
‘Thank you, Mr Allinford. I assume—ah’—he paused, embarrassed—‘I assume you are not acting in your professional capacity—that is, I shall not be required to give evidence.’
‘I hope not, my lord. Indeed, I may say I think it unlikely.’
Verndale pushed out a detaining hand. ‘You don’t really believe this preposterous thing? It’s so utterly ridiculous.’
Lord Tiverley brushed by him, with head erect, and Granger followed. Hopville sprawled, with his arms over the card-table. ‘’Pon my soul,’ he ejaculated, ‘it’s like a scene out of a melodrama. A stage detective and all!’
‘Including the wicked baronet,’ retorted Allinford quickly. ‘You may drop your pose, if you please, Sir Richard. This is serious, and you will be wise to recognise it. Do you think your change of luck was not noticeable directly a new pack of cards was introduced?’
Hopville sat upright. ‘So he’s in it too, is he?’ sneered Verndale. ‘Look here, Mr Detective, we’ve had quite enough. I don’t suppose you’re a rich man but it will take every penny you’ve got when I commence an action for slander. You’ve wormed your way in here in disguise, and you’ve accused me of card-sharping. Now go—if you’ve finished!’
Allinford moved to the door, turned the key, and thrust it in his pocket. ‘I haven’t quite,’ he said coolly. ‘Now listen to me.’ He pulled out his watch. ‘It’s now ten minutes to nine. At nine o’clock a police raid will be made on 704 Granville Street, and certain people will be charged with assisting to run a gambling-house. Now there’s nothing on earth that can prevent you two being charged as proprietors. Don’t trouble to deny it. There will be plenty of evidence. The place has been watched for days. I don’t suppose a fine of a few hundreds—which is what it will probably amount to—will affect you much but if you’re wise you’ll come off your pedestals and listen to plain sense. There’s another charge it may be in my power to prefer—receiving stolen goods.’
‘Go on!’ laughed Verndale. ‘Accuse us of murder while you’re at it.’
‘Oh, very well,’ said Allinford nonchalantly, ‘only you may as well know that the jewels you had from Lady Helton were not her property. They were stolen from her husband, and a bogus robbery arranged to account for their absence.’
To casual observers, Verndale’s appearance remained unchanged, but a slight distension of the nostrils showed Allinford that his shot had told. ‘I do not admit that I had the necklace from Lady Helton,’ he said.
‘Come,’ said Allinford bluntly, ‘you’re not such a fool as you’d wish me to think. Would you expect a jury to believe that? Lady Helton has been at Granville Street day after day for weeks on end. She had an ample allowance for all ordinary purposes. She made over the jewels to you either as a payment or as security for a gambling debt. If she didn’t, it’s worse for you, for you had stolen goods in your possession for which you can’t account. You must remember you signed an exact description of the jewels.’
Hopville whistled a tune. Verndale laid his head on his hands and stared thoughtfully into space. ‘You’ve got me in a corner,’ he admitted. ‘What is it you want me to do?’
‘I want you to return the necklace,’ said Allinford. ‘No,’—as Verndale would have spoken,—‘don’t trouble to put up another bluff. It’s easy enough to see what’s happened. Lady Helton wanted the jewels returned so that she might wear them tonight. You refused, and, fearful that she would become a nuisance in the future, arranged that they should be apparently stolen. Unluckily for you, she had the same idea of a bogus robbery. Now—’
‘If I give it up, will you promise me nothing further shall be done?’
‘I can’t promise. The gambling-house prosecution will go forward in any case. If the necklace is returned, however, I doubt if Sir Rupert Helton will prosecute.’
Verndale rose, crossed the room, and, unlocking the secretary, took out a red morocco case which he placed in the hands of the detective.
‘Yes, sir,’—Allinford was speaking to Menzies,—‘luck and bluff carried it through. When I heard that the Helton robbery was bogus, I began to get a glimmering, because I had picked up a marked card in Verndale’s rooms. Then, when I heard he had gone to Granville Street, I began to be sure, more especially as Lady Helton had been seen there. The games in the gambling-house were straight enough—it wouldn’t have paid to run anything crooked—but Hopville and Verndale used to pick up likely young fools there and carry them off to Verndale’s rooms.
‘I’ll own Hopville had me guessing, at first. He looked a regular pigeon—instead of which he was a rook. Of course, it wouldn’t have done for Verndale to have won heavily at his own place. But no one was likely to suppose him in with Hopville. As soon as I was sure, I shook them up with my composure. After that I bluffed for all I was worth, and they fell into it.’
‘I see by the papers,’ said Menzies inconsequently, ‘that Sir Rupert and Lady Helton are going abroad for a protracted period.’
‘Exactly!’ smiled Allinford.