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- Herausgeber: Musaicum Books
- Kategorie: Krimi
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017
This carefully edited collection has been designed and formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices. Mr. J. G. Reeder Series is a collection of novels and short stories about a former police officer working for the Director of Public Prosecutions. The stories have been adapted for film, television and radio. Edgar Wallace (1875 - 1932) was an English writer. As well as journalism, Wallace wrote screen plays, poetry, historical non-fiction, 18 stage plays, 957 short stories and over 170 novels, 12 in 1929 alone. More than 160 films have been made of Wallace's work. Table of Contents: Room 13 The Mind of Mr. J. G. Reeder Terror Keep Red Aces Kennedy the Con Man The Case of Joe Attymar The Guv'nor The Shadow Man The Treasure House
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Mr. J. G. Reeder Collection: 5 Mystery Novels & 4 Detective Stories
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Table of Contents
Room 13 (1924)
Chapter I
Over the grim stone archway was carved the words:
PARCERE SUBJECTIS
In cold weather, and employing the argot of his companions Johnny Gray translated this as “Parky Subjects” – it certainly had no significance as “Spare the Vanquished” for he had been neither vanquished nor spared.
Day by day, harnessed to the shafts, he and Lal Morgon had pulled a heavy handcart up the steep slope, and day by day had watched absently the red-bearded gate-warder put his key in the big polished lock and snap open the gates. And then the little party had passed through, an armed warder leading, an armed warder behind, and the gate had closed.
And at four o’clock he had walked back under the archway and waited whilst the gate was unlocked and the handcart admitted.
Every building was hideously familiar. The gaunt “halls,” pitch painted against the Dartmoor storms, the low-roofed office, the gas house, the big, barnlike laundry, the ancient bakery, the exercise yard with its broken asphalt, the ugly church, garishly decorated, the long, scrubbed benches with the raised seats for the warders… and the graveyard where the happily released lifers rested from their labours.
One morning in spring, he went out of the gate with a working-party. They were building a shed, and he had taken the style and responsibility of bricklayer’s labourer. He liked the work because you can talk more freely on a job like that, and he wanted to hear all that Lal Morgon had to say about the Big Printer.
“Not so much talking to-day,” said the warder in charge, seating himself on a sack-covered brick heap.
“No, sir,” said Lal.
He was a wizened man of fifty and a lifer, and he had no ambition, which was to live long enough to get another “lagging.”
“But not burglary. Gray,” he said as he leisurely set a brick in its place; “and not shootin’, like old Legge got his packet. And not faking Spider King, like you got yours.”
“I didn’t get mine for faking Spider King,” said Johnny calmly. “I didn’t know that Spider King had been rung in when I took him on the course, and was another horse altogether. They framed up Spider King to catch me. I am not complaining.”
“I know you’re innocent – everybody is,” said Lal soothingly. “I’m the only guilty man in boob. That’s what the governor says. ‘Morgon,’ he says, ‘it does my heart good to meet a guilty man that ain’t the victim of circumstantiality. Like everybody else is in boob,’ he says.”
Johnny did not pursue the subject. There was no reason why he should. This fact was beyond dispute. He had known all about the big racecourse swindles that were being worked, and had been an associate of men who backed the “rung in” horses. He accepted the sentence of three years’ penal servitude that had been passed without appeal or complaint. Not because he was guilty of the act for which he was charged – there was another excellent reason.
“If they lumbered you with the crime, it was because you was a mug,” said old Lal complacently. “That’s what mugs are for – to be lumbered. What did old Kane say?”
“I didn’t see Mr. Kane,” said Johnny shortly.
“He’d think you was a mug, too,” said Lal with satisfaction – “hand me a brick. Gray, and shut up! That nosey screw’s coming over.” The “nosey screw” was no more inquisitive than any other warder. He strolled across, the handle of his truncheon showing from his pocket, the well-worn strap dangling. “Not so much talking,” he said mechanically.
“I was asking for a brick, sir,” said Lal humbly. “These bricks ain’t so good as the last lot.”
“I’ve noticed that,” said the warder, examining a half-brick with a professional and disapproving eye.
“Trust you to notice that, sir,” said the sycophant with the right blend of admiration and awe. And, when the warder had passed:
“That boss-eyed perisher don’t know a brick from a gas-stove,” said Lal without heat. “He’s the bloke that old Legge got straightened when he was in here – used to have private letters brought in every other day. But then, old Legge’s got money. Him and Peter Kane smashed the strongroom of the Orsonic and got away with a million dollars. They never caught Peter, but Legge was easy. He shot a copper and got life.”
Johnny had heard Legge’s biography a hundred times, but Lal Morgon had reached the stage of life when every story he told was new.
“That’s why he hates Peter,” said the garrulous bricklayer. “That’s why young Legge and him are going to get Peter. And young Legge’s hot! Thirty years of age by all accounts, and the biggest printer of slush in the world! And it’s not ord’nary slush. Experts get all mixed up when they see young Legge’s notes – can’t tell ’em from real Bank of England stuff. And the police and the secret service after him for years – and then never got him!”
The day was warm, and Lal stripped off his red and blue striped working jacket. He wore, as did the rest of the party, the stained yellow breeches faintly stamped with the broad arrow. Around his calves were buttoned yellow gaiters. His shirt was of stout cotton, white with narrow blue stripes, and on his head was a cap adorned with mystic letters of the alphabet to indicate the dates of his convictions. A week later, when the letters were abolished, Lal Morgon had a grievance. He felt as a soldier might feel when he was deprived of his decorations.
“You’ve never met young Jeff?” stated rather than asked Lal, smoothing a dab of mortar with a leisurely touch.
“I’ve seen him – I have not met him,” said Johnny grimly, and something in his tone made the old convict look up.
“He ‘shopped’ me,” said Johnny, and Lal indicated his surprise with an inclination of his head that was ridiculously like a bow.
“I don’t know why, but I do know that he ‘shopped ‘me,” said Johnny. “He was the man who fixed up the fake, got me persuaded to bring the horse on to the course, and then squeaked. Until then I did not know that the alleged Spider King was in reality Boy Saunders cleverly camouflaged.”
“Squeaking’s hidjus,” said the shocked Lal, and he seemed troubled. “And Emanuel Legge’s boy, too! Why did he do it – did you catch him over money?”
Johnny shook his head.
“I don’t know. If it’s true that he hates Peter Kane he may have done it out of revenge, knowing that I’m fond of Peter, and… well, I’m fond of Peter. He warned me about mixing with the crowd I ran with—”
“Stop that talking, will you?” They worked for some time in silence. Then: “That screw will get somebody hung one of these days,” said Lal in a tone of quiet despair. “He’s the feller that little Lew Morse got a bashing for – over clouting him with a spanner in the blacksmith’s shop. He was nearly killed. What a pity! Lew wasn’t much account, an’ he’s often said he’d as soon be dead as sober.”
At four o’clock the working-party fell in and marched or shuffled down the narrow road to the prison gates. Parcere Subjectis. Johnny looked up and winked at the grim jest, and he had the illusion that the archway winked back at him. At half-past four he turned into the deep-recessed doorway of his cell, and the yellow door closed on him with a metallic snap of a lock.
It was a big, vaulted cell, and the colour of the folded blanket ends gave it a rakish touch of gaiety. On a shelf in one corner was a photograph of a fox terrier, a pretty head turned inquiringly toward him. He poured out a mugful of water and drank it, looking up at the barred window. Presently his tea would come, and then the lock would be put on for eighteen and a half hours. And for eighteen and a half hours he must amuse himself as best he could. He could read whilst the light held – a volume of travel was on the ledge that served as a table. Or he could write on his slate, or draw horses and dogs, or work out interminable problems in mathematics, or write poetry… or think. That was the worst exercise of all. He crossed the cell and took down the photograph. The mount had worn limp with much handling, and he looked with a half-smile into the big eyes of the terrier.
“It is a pity you can’t write, old Spot,” he said. Other people could write, and did, he thought as he replaced the photograph. But Peter Kane never once mentioned Marney, and Marney had not written since… a long time. It was ominous, informative, in some ways decisive. A brief reference, “Marney is well,” or “Marney thanks you for your inquiry,” and that was all.
The whole story was clearly written in those curt phrases, the story of Peter’s love for the girl, and his determination that she should not marry a man with the prison taint. Peter’s adoration of his daughter was almost a mania – her happiness and her future came first, and must always be first. Peter loved him – Johnny had sensed that. He had given him the affection that a man might give his grown son. If this tragic folly of his had not led to the entanglement which brought him to a convict prison, Peter would have given Marney to him, as she was willing to give herself. “That’s that,” said Johnny, in his role of philosopher. And then came tea and the final lock-up, and silence… and thoughts again.
Why did young Legge trap him? He had only seen the man once; they had never even met. It was only by chance that he had ever seen this young printer of forged notes. He could not guess that he was known to the man he “shopped,” for Jeff Legge was an illusive person. One never met him in the usual rendezvous where the half-underworld foregather to boast and plot or drink and love.
A key rattled in the lock, and Johnny got up. He forgot that it was the evening when the chaplain visited him. “Sit down. Gray.” The door closed on the clergyman, and he seated himself on Johnny’s bed. It was curious that he should take up the thread of Johnny’s interrupted thoughts.
“I want to get your mind straight about this man Legge… the son, I mean. It is pretty bad to brood on grievances, real or fancied, and you are nearing the end of your term of imprisonment, when your resentment will have a chance of expressing itself. And, Gray, I don’t want to see you here again.”
Johnny Gray smiled.
“You won’t see me here!” he emphasised the word. “As to Jeff Legge, I know little about him, though I’ve done some fairly fluent guessing and I’ve heard a lot.”
The chaplain shook his head thoughtfully.
“I have heard a little; he’s the man they call the Big Printer, isn’t he? Of course, I know all about the flooding of Europe with spurious notes, and that the police had failed to catch the man who was putting them into circulation. Is that Jeff Legge?”
Johnny did not answer, and the chaplain smiled a little sadly. “Thou shalt not squeak – the eleventh commandment, isn’t it?” he asked good-humouredly. “I am afraid I have been indiscreet. When does your sentence end?”
“In six months,” replied Johnny, “and I’ll not be sorry.”
“What are you going to do? Have you any money?”
The convict’s lips twitched.
“Yes, I have three thousand a year,” he said quietly. “That is a fact which did not come out at the trial, for certain reasons. No, padre, money isn’t my difficulty. I suppose I shall travel. I certainly shall not attempt to live down my grisly past.”
“That means you’re not going to change your name,” said the chaplain with a twinkle in his eye. “Well, with three thousand a year, I can’t see you coming here again.” Suddenly he remembered. Putting his hand in his pocket, he took out a letter. “The Deputy gave me this, and I’d nearly forgotten. It arrived this morning.”
The letter was opened, as were all letters that came to convicts, and Johnny glanced carelessly at the envelope. It was not, as he had expected, a letter from his lawyer. The bold handwriting was Peter Kane’s – the first letter he had written for six months. He waited until the door had closed upon the visitor, and then he took the letter from the envelope. There were only a few lines of writing.
‘Dear Johnny, I hope you are not going to be very much upset by the news I am telling you. Marney is marrying Major Floyd, of Toronto, and I know that you’re big enough and fine enough to wish her luck. The man she is marrying is a real good fellow who will make her happy.
Johnny put down the letter on to the ledge, and for ten minutes paced the narrow length of his cell, his hands clasped behind him. Marney to be married! His face was white, tense, his eyes dark with gloom. He stopped and poured out a mugful of water with a hand that shook, then raised the glass to the barred window that looked eastward.
“Good luck to you, Marney!” he said huskily, and drank the mug empty.
Chapter II
Two days later, Johnny Gray was summoned to the Governor’s office and heard the momentous news.
“Gray, I have good news for you. You are to be released immediately. I have just had the authority.”
Johnny inclined his head.
“Thank you, sir,” he said.
A warder took him to a bathroom, where he stripped, and, with a blanket about him, came out to a cubicle, where his civilian clothes were waiting. He dressed with a queer air of unfamiliarity, and went back to his cell. The warder brought him a looking-glass and a safety-razor, and he completed his toilet.
The rest of the day was his own. He was a privileged man, and could wander about the prison in his strangely-feeling attire, the envy of men whom he had come to know and to loathe; the half madmen who for a year had been whispering their futilities into his ear.
As he stood there in the hall at a loose end, the door was flung open violently, and a group of men staggered in. In the midst of them was a howling, shrieking thing that was neither man nor beast, his face bloody, his wild arms gripped by struggling warders.
He watched the tragic group as it made its way to the punishment cells.
“Fenner,” said somebody under his breath. “He coshed a screw, but they can’t give him another bashing.”
“Isn’t Fenner that twelve-year man, that’s doing his full time?” asked Johnny, remembering the convict. “And he’s going out tomorrow, too!”
“That’s him,” said his informant, one of the hall sweepers. “He’d have got out with nine, but old Legge reported him. Game to the last, eh? They can’t bash him after tomorrow, and the visiting justices won’t be here for a week.”
Johnny remembered the case. Legge had been witness to a brutal assault on the man by one of the warders, who had since been discharged from the service. In desperation the unfortunate Fenner had hit back, and had been tried. Legge’s evidence might have saved him from the flogging which followed, but Legge was too good a friend of the warders – or they were too good friends of his – to betray a “screw.” So Fenner had gone to the triangle, as he would not go again.
He could not sleep the last night in the cell. His mind was on Marney. He did not reproach her for a second. Nor did he feel bitter toward her father. It was only right and proper that Peter Kane should do what was best for his girl. The old man’s ever-present fear for his daughter’s future was almost an obsession. Johnny guessed that when this presentable Canadian had come along, Peter had done all in his power to further the match.
Johnny Gray walked up the steep slope for the last time. A key turned in the big lock, and he stood outside the gates, a free man. The red-bearded head warder put out his hand.
“Good luck to you,” he said gruffly. “Don’t you come over the Alps again.”
“I’ve given up mountain climbing,” said Johnny.
He had taken his farewell of the Governor, and now the only thing to remind him of his association with the grim prison he had left was the warder who walked by his side to the station. He had some time to wait, and Johnny tried to get some information from another angle.
“No, I don’t know Jeff Legge,” said the warder, shaking his head. “I knew the old man: he was here until twelve months ago – you were here, too, weren’t you, Gray?”
Johnny nodded.
“Mr. Jeff Legge has never been over the Alps, then?” he asked sardonically.
“No, not in this prison, and he wasn’t in Parkhurst or Portland, so far as I can remember. I’ve been at both places. I’ve heard the men talking about him. They say he’s clever, which means that he’ll be putting out his tins one morning. Goodbye, Gray, and be good!”
Johnny gripped the outstretched hand of the man, and, when he was in the carriage, took out his silk handkerchief and wiped his hand of the last prison contact.
His servant was waiting for him at Paddington when he arrived that afternoon, and with him, straining at a leash, a small, lop-eared fox terrier, who howled his greeting long before Johnny had seen the group. In another second the dog was struggling in his arms, licking his face, his ears and his hair, and whining his joy at the reunion. There were tears in Johnny’s eyes when he put the dog down on the platform.
“There are a number of letters for you, sir. Will you dine at home?”
The excellent Parker might have been welcoming his master from a short sojourn at Monte Carlo, so very unemotional was he.
“Yes, I’ll dine at home,” said Johnny. He stepped into the taxicab that Parker had hired, and Spot leapt after him.
“There is no baggage, sir?” asked Parker gravely through the open window.
“There is no baggage,” said Johnny as gravely. “You had better ride back with me, Parker.”
The man hesitated.
“It would be a very great liberty, sir,” he said.
“Not so great a liberty as I have had taken with me during the past year and nine months,” said Johnny.
As the cab came out into dismal Chapel Street, the greatly daring Parker asked:
“I hope you have not had too bad a time, sir?”
Johnny laughed.
“It has not been pleasant, Parker. Prisons seldom are.”
“I suppose not, sir,” agreed Parker, and added unnecessarily: “I have never been in prison, sir.”
Johnny’s flat was in Queen’s Gate, and at the sight of the peaceful luxury of his study he caught his breath.
“You’re a fool,” he said aloud to himself.
“Yes, sir,” said the obliging Parker.
That night many men came furtively to the flat in Queen’s Gate, and Johnny, after admitting the first of these, called Parker into his small diningroom.
“Parker, I am told that during my absence in the country even staid men have acquired the habit of attending cinema performances?”
“Well, sir, I like the pictures myself,” admitted Parker.
“Then go and find one that lasts until eleven o’clock,” said Johnny.
“You mean, sir — ?”
“I mean I don’t want you here tonight.”
Parker’s face fell, but he was a good servant.
“Very good, sir,” he said, and went out, wondering sorrowfully what desperate plans his master was hatching.
At half-past ten the last of the visitors took his leave.
“I’ll see Peter tomorrow,” said Johnny, tossing the end of his cigarette into the hall fireplace. “You know nothing of this wedding, when it is to take place?”
“No, Captain. I only know Peter slightly.”
“Who is the bridegroom?”
“A swell, by all accounts – Peter is a plausible chap, and he’d pull in the right kind. A major in the Canadian Army, I’ve heard, and a very nice man. Peter can catch mugs easier than some people can catch flies—”
“Peter was never a mug-catcher,” said John Gray sharply.
“I don’t know,” said the other. “There’s one born every minute.”
“But they take a long time to grow up, and the women get first pluck,” said Johnny good-humouredly.
Parker, returning at 11.15, found his master sitting before a fireplace which was choked with burnt paper.
Johnny reached Horsham the next afternoon soon after lunch, and none who saw the athletic figure striding up the Horsham Road would guess that less than two days before he had been the inmate of a convict cell.
He had come to make his last desperate fight for happiness. How it would end, what argument to employ, he did not know. There was one, and one only, but that he could not use.
As he turned into Down Road he saw two big limousines standing one behind the other, and wondered what social event was in progress.
Manor Hill stood aloof from its suburban neighbours, a sedate, redbrick house, its walls gay with clematis. Johnny avoided the front gates and passed down a side path which, as he knew, led to the big lawn behind, where Peter loved to sun himself at this hour.
He paused as he emerged into the open. A pretty parlourmaid was talking to an elderly man, who wore without distinction the livery of a butler. His lined face was puckered uncomfortably, and his head was bent in a listening attitude, though it was next to impossible for a man totally deaf to miss hearing all that was said.
“I don’t know what sort of houses you’ve been in, and what sort of people you’ve been working for, but I can tell you that if I find you in my room again, looking in my boxes, I shall tell Mr Kane. I won’t have it, Mr. Ford!”
“No, miss,” said the butler, huskily.
It was not, Johnny knew, emotion which produced the huskiness. Barney Ford had been husky from his youth – probably squawked huskily in his cradle.
“If you are a burglar and trying to keep your hand in, I understand it,” the girl continued hotly, “but you’re supposed to be a respectable man! I won’t have this underhand prying and sneaking. Understand that! I won’t have it!”
“No, miss,” said the hoarse Barney. John Gray surveyed the scene with amusement. Barney he knew very well. He had quitted the shadier walks of life when Peter Kane had found it expedient to retire from his hazardous calling. Exconvict, ex-burglar and ex-prizefighter, his seamy past was in some degree redeemed by his affection for the man whose bread he ate and in whose service he pretended to be, though a worse butler had never put on uniform than Barney.
The girl was pretty, with hair of dull gold and a figure that was both straight and supple. Now her face was flushed with annoyance, and the dark eyes were ablaze. Barney certainly had prying habits, the heritage of his unregenerate days. Other servants had left the house for the same reason, and Peter had cursed and threatened without wholly reforming his servitor.
The girl did not see him as she turned and flounced into the house, leaving the old man to stare after her. “You’ve made her cross,” said John, coming up behind him. Barney Ford spun round and stared. Then his jaw dropped. “Good Lord, Johnny, when did you come down from college?” The visitor laughed softly.
“Term ended yesterday,” he said. “How is Peter?”
Before he replied the servant blew his nose violently, all the time keeping his eye upon the newcomer. “How long have you bin here?” he asked at length. “I arrived at the tail-end of your conversation,” said Johnny, amused. “Barney, you haven’t reformed!” Barney Ford screwed up his face into an expression of scorn. “They think you’re a hook even if you ain’t one,” he said. “What does she know about life? You ain’t seen Peter? He’s in the house; I’ll tell him in a minute. He’s all right. All beans and bacon about the girl. That fellow adores the ground she walks on. It’s not natural, being fond of your kids like that. I never was.” He shook his head despairingly. “There’s too much lovey-dovey and not enough strap nowadays. Spare the rod and spoil the child, as the good old poet says.”
John Grey turned his head at the sound of a foot upon a stone step. It was Peter, Peter radiant yet troubled. Straight as a ramrod, for all his sixty years and white hair. He was wearing a morning coat and pearl-grey waistcoat – an innovation. For a second he hesitated, the smile struck from his face, frowning, and then he came quickly his hand outstretched.
“Well, Johnny boy, had a rotten time?”
His hand fell on the young man’s shoulder, his voice had the old pleasure of pride and affection.
“Fairly rotten,” said Johnny; “but any sympathy with me is wasted. Personally, I prefer Dartmoor to Parkhurst – it is more robust, and there are fewer imbeciles.”
Peter took his arm and led him to a chair beneath the big Japanese umbrella planted on the lawn. There was something in his manner, a certain awkwardness which the newcomer could not understand.
“Did you meet anybody… there… that I know, Johnny boy?”
“Legge,” said the other laconically, his eyes on Peter’s face.
“That’s the man I’m thinking of. How is he?”
The tone was careless, but Johnny was not deceived. Peter was intensely interested.
“He’s been out six months – didn’t you know?”
The other’s face clouded.
“Out six months? Are you sure?”
Johnny nodded.
“I didn’t know.”
“I should have thought you would have heard from him,” said John quietly. “He doesn’t love you!”
Peter’s slow smile broadened.
“I know he doesn’t; did you get a chance of talking with him?”
“Plenty of chances. He was in the laundry, and he straightened a couple of screws so that he could do what he liked. He hates you, Peter. He says you shopped him.”
“He’s a liar,” said Peter calmly. “I wouldn’t shop my worst enemy. He shopped himself. Johnny, the police get a reputation for smartness, but the truth is, every other criminal arrests himself. Criminals aren’t clever. They wear gloves to hide fingerprints, and then write their names in the visitors book. Legge and I smashed the strongroom of the Orsonic and got away with a hundred and twenty thousand pounds in American currency – it was the last job I did. It was dead easy getting away, but Emanuel started boasting what a clever fellow he was; and he drank a bit. An honest man can drink and wake up in his own bed. But a crook who drinks says good morning to the gaoler.”
He dropped the subject abruptly, and again his hand fell on the younger man’s shoulder.
“Johnny, you’re not feeling sore, are you?”
Johnny did not answer.
“Are you?”
And now the fight was to begin. John Gray steeled himself for the forlorn hope.
“About Marney? No, only—”
“Old boy, I had to do it.” Peter’s voice was urgent, pleading. “You know what she is to me. I liked you well enough to take a chance, but after they dragged you I did some hard thinking. It would have smashed me, Johnny, if she’d been your wife then. I couldn’t bear to see her cry even when she was quite a little baby. Think what it would have meant to her. It was bad enough as it was. And then this fellow came along – a good, straight, clean, cheery fellow – a gentleman. And well, I’ll tell you the truth – I helped him. You’ll like him. He’s the sort of man anybody would like. And she loves him, Johnny.”
There was a silence.
“I don’t bear him any ill-will. It would be absurd if I did. Only, Peter, before she marries I want to say—”
“Before she marries?” Peter Kane’s voice shook. “John, didn’t Barney tell you? She was married this morning.”
Chapter III
“Married?”
Johnny repeated the word dully.
Marney married… ! It was incredible, impossible to comprehend. For a moment the stays and supports of existence dissolved into dust, and the fabric of life fell into chaos.
“Married this morning, Johnny. You’ll like him. He isn’t one of us, old boy. He’s as straight as… well, you understand, Johnny boy? I’ve worked for her and planned for her all these years; I’d have been rotten if I took a chance with her future.”
Peter Kane was pleading, his big hand on the other’s shoulder, his fine face clouded with anxiety and the fear that he had hurt this man beyond remedy.
“I should have wired…”
“It would have made no difference,” said Peter Kane almost doggedly. “Nothing could have been changed, Johnny, nothing. It had to be. If you had been convicted innocently – I don’t say you weren’t – I couldn’t have the memory of your imprisonment hanging over her; I couldn’t have endured the uncertainty myself. Johnny, I’ve been crook all my life – up to fifteen years ago. I take a broader view than most men because I am what I am. But she doesn’t know that. Craig’s here to-day—”
“Craig – the Scotland Yard man?”
Peter nodded, a look of faint amusement in his eyes.
“We’re good friends; we have been for years. And do you know what he said this morning? He said, ‘Peter, you’ve done well to marry that girl into the straight way,’ and I know he’s right.”
Johnny stretched back in the deep cane chair, his hand shading his eyes, as though he found the light too strong for him.
“I’m not going to be sorry for myself,” he said with a smile, and stretching out his hand, gripped Kane’s arm. “You’ll not have another vendetta on your hands, Peter. I have an idea that Emanuel Legge will keep you busy—”
He stopped suddenly. The ill-fitted butler had made a stealthy appearance.
“Peter,” he began in his husky whisper, “he’s come. Do you want to see him?”
“Who?”
“Emanuel Legge – uglier than ever.”
Peter Kane’s face set, mask-like.
“Where is Miss Marney – Mrs. Floyd?”
“She’s gettin’ into her weddin’ things and falderals for the photogrypher,” said Barney. “She had ’em off once, but the photogrypher’s just come, and he’s puttin’ up his things in the front garden. I sez to Marney—”
“You’re a talkative old gentleman,” said Peter grimly. “Send Emanuel through. Do you want to see him, Johnny?”
John Gray rose.
“No,” he said. “I’ll wander through your alleged rosary. I want nothing to remind me of The Awful Place, thank you.”
Johnny had disappeared through an opening of the box hedge at the lower end of the lawn when Barney returned with the visitor.
Mr. Emanuel Legge was a man below middle height, thin of body and face, grey and a little bald. On his nose perched a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles. He stood for a second or two surveying the scene, his chin lifted, his thin lips drawn in between his teeth. His attire was shabby, a steel chain served as a watchguard, and, as if to emphasise the rustiness of his wrinkled suit, he wore boots that were patently new and vividly yellow. Hat in hand, he waited, his eyes slowly sweeping the domain of his enemy, until at last they came to rest upon his host.
It was Peter Kane who broke the deadly silence.
“Well, Emanuel? Come over and sit down.”
Legge moved slowly toward his host. “Quite a swell place, Peter. Everything of the best, eh? Trust you! Still got old Barney, I see. Has he reformed too? That’s the word, ain’t it – ‘reformed’?”
His voice was thin and complaining. His pale blue eyes blinked coldly at the other.
“He doesn’t go thieving any more, if that is what you mean,” said Peter shortly, and a look of pain distorted the visitor’s face.
“Don’t use that word; it’s low—”
“Let me take your hat.” Peter held out his hand, but the man drew his away.
“No, thanks. I promised a young friend of mine that I wouldn’t lose anything while I was here. How long have you been at this place, Peter?”
“About fourteen years.”
Peter sat down, and the unwelcome guest followed his example, pulling his chair round so that he faced the other squarely.
“Ah!” he said thoughtfully. “Living very comfortable, plenty to eat, go out and come in when you like. Good way of spending fourteen years. Better than having the key on you four o’clock in the afternoon. Princetown’s the same old place – oh, I forgot you’d never been there.”
“I’ve motored through,” said Peter coolly, deliberately, and knew that he had touched a raw place before the lips of the man curled back in a snarl.
“Oh, you’ve motored through!” he sneered. “I wish I’d known; I’d have hung my flags out! They ought to have decorated Princetown that day. Peter. You drove through!” he almost spat the words.
“Have a cigar?”
Emanuel Legge waved aside the invitation.
“No, thanks. I’ve got out of the habit – you do in fifteen years. You can get into some, too. Fifteen years is a long time out of a life.”
So Emanuel had come to make trouble, and had chosen his day well. Peter took up the challenge.
“The man you shot would have been glad of a few – he died two years after,” he said curtly, and all the pent fury of his sometime comrade flamed in his eyes.
“I hope he’s in hell,” he hissed, “the dirty flattie!” With an effort he mastered himself. “You’ve had a real good time, Peter? Nice house, that wasn’t bought for nothing. Servants and whatnot and motoring through the moor! You’re clever!”
“I admit it.”
The little man’s hands were trembling, his thin lips twitched convulsively.
“Leave your pal in the lurch and get away yourself, eh? Every man for himself – well, that’s the law of nature, ain’t it? And if you think he’s going to squeak, send a line to the busies in charge of the case and drop a few hundred to ’em and there you are!” He paused, but no reply came. “That’s how it’s done, ain’t it, Peter?”
Kane shrugged his shoulders indifferently.
“I don’t know – I’m never too old to learn.”
“But that’s the way it’s done?” insisted the man, showing his teeth again. “That’s the way you keep out of boob, ain’t it?”
Peter looked at his tormentor, outwardly untroubled.
“I won’t argue with you,” he said.
“You can’t,” said the other. “I’m logical.” He gazed around. “This house cost a bit of money. What’s half of two hundred thousand? I’m a bad counter!” Peter did not accept the opening. “It’s a hundred thousand, ain’t it? I got sixty thousand – you owe me forty.”
“We got less than a hundred and twenty thousand pounds, if you’re talking about the ship job. You got sixty thousand, which was more than your share. I paid it into your bank the day you went down.”
Legge smiled sceptically.
“The newspapers said a million dollars,” he murmured.
“You don’t believe what you read in the newspapers, do you? Emanuel, you’re getting childish.” Then suddenly: “Are you trying to put the ‘black’ on me?”
“Blackmail?” Emanuel was shocked. “There’s honour amongst – friends surely, Peter. I only want what’s right and fair.”
Peter laughed softly, amusedly.
“Comic, is it? You can afford to laugh at a poor old fellow who’s been in ‘stir’ for fifteen years.”
The master of Manor Hill snapped round on him.
“If you’d been in hell for fifty I should still laugh.”
Emanuel was sorry for himself. That was ever a weakness of his; he said as much.
“You wouldn’t, would you? You’ve got a daughter, haven’t you? Young? Married to-day, wasn’t she?
“Yes.”
“Married money – a swell?”
“Yes. She married a good man.”
“He doesn’t know what you are, Peter?” Emanuel asked the question carelessly, and his host fixed him with a steely glance.
“No. What’s the idea? Do you think you’ll get forty thousand that way?”
“I’ve got a boy. You’ve never sat in a damp cell with the mists of the moor hanging on the walls and thought and thought till your heart ached? You can get people through their children.” He paused. “I could get you that way.”
In a second Peter Kane was towering above him, an ominous figure.
“The day my heart ached,” he said slowly, “yours would not beat! You’re an old man, and you’re afraid of death! I can see it in your eyes. I am afraid of nothing. I’d kill you!”
Before the ferocity of voice and mien, Legge shrank farther into his chair.
“What’s all this talk about killing? I only want what’s fair. Fond of her, ain’t you, Peter? I’ll bet you are. They say that you’re crazy about her. Is she pretty? I don’t suppose she takes after you. Young Johnny Gray was sweet on her too. Peter, I’ll get you through her—”
So far he got, and then a hand like a steel clamp fell on his neck, and he was jerked from his chair.
Peter spoke no word but, dragging the squirming figure behind him, as if it had neither weight nor resistance, he strode up the narrow pathway by the side of the house, across the strip of garden, through the gate and into the road. A jerk of his arm, and Emanuel Legge was floundering in the dusty road.
“Don’t come back, Emanuel,” he said, and did not stop to listen to the reply.
John Gray passed out of sight and hearing of the two men, being neither curious to know Legge’s business nor anxious to renew a prison acquaintance.
Below the box hedge were three broad terraces, blazing with colour, blanketed with the subtle fragrance of flowers. Beyond that, a sloping meadow leading to a little river. Peter had bought his property wisely. A great cedar of Lebanon stood at the garden’s edge; to the right, massed bushes were patched with purple and heliotrope blooms.
He sat down on a marble seat, glad of the solitude which he shared only with a noisy thrush and a lark invisible in the blue above him.
Marney was married. That was the beginning and the end of him. But happy. He recognised his very human vanity in the instant doubt that she could be happy with anybody but him.
How dear she was! And then a voice came to him, a shrill, hateful voice. It was Legge’s – he was threatening the girl, and Johnny’s blood went cold. Here was the vulnerable point in Peter Kane’s armour; the crevice through which he could be hurt.
He started to his feet and went up the broad steps of the terrace, three at a time. The garden was empty, save for Barney setting a table. Kane and his guest had disappeared. He was crossing the lawn when he saw something white shining in the gloom beyond the open French windows of a room. Something that took glorious shape. A girl in bridal white, and her hands were outstretched to him. So ethereal, so unearthly was her beauty, that at first he did not recognise her.
“Johnny!”
A soldierly figure was at her side, Peter Kane was behind her, but he had no eyes for any but Marney.
She came flying toward him, both his hands were clasped in her warm palm.
“Oh, Johnny… Johnny!”
Then he looked up into the smiling face of the bridegroom, that fine, straight man to whom Peter had entrusted his beloved girl. For a second their eyes met, the debonair Major Floyd and his. Not by a flicker of eyelash did Johnny Gray betray himself.
The husband of the woman he loved was Jeff Legge, forger and traitor, the man sworn with his father to break the heart of Peter Kane.
Chapter IV
Had he betrayed himself, he wondered? All his willpower was exercised to prevent such a betrayal. Though a tornado of fury swept through and through him, though he saw the face of the man distorted and blurred, and brute instinct urged his limbs to savage action, he remained outwardly unmoved. It was impossible for the beholder to be sure whether he had paled, for the sun and wind of Dartmoor had tanned his lean face the colour of mahogany. For a while so terrific was the shock that he was incapable of speech or movement.
“Major Floyd” was Jeff Legge! In a flash he realised the horrible plot. This was Emanuel’s revenge – to marry his crook son to the daughter of Peter Kane.
Jeff was watching him narrowly, but by no sign did Johnny betray his recognition. It was all over in a fraction of a second. He brought his eyes back to the girl, smiling mechanically. She seemed oblivious to her surroundings. That her new husband stood by, watching her with a gleam of amusement in his eyes, that Peter was frowning anxiously, and that even old Barney was staring openmouthed, meant nothing. “Johnny, poor Johnny! You aren’t hating me, are you?”
John smiled and patted the hand that lay in his. “Are you happy?” he asked in a low voice.
“Yes, oh yes, I’m happily married – that’s what you mean, isn’t it? I’m very happy… Johnny, was it terrible? I haven’t stopped thinking about you, I haven’t. Though I didn’t write… after… Don’t you think I was a beast? I know I was. Johnny, didn’t it hurt you, old boy?”
He shook his head.
“There’s one thing you mustn’t be in Dartmoor – sorry for yourself. Are you happy?”
She did not meet his eyes.
“That is twice you’ve asked in a minute! Isn’t it disloyal to say that I am? Don’t you want to meet Jeffrey?”
“Why, of course, I want to meet Jeffrey.”
He crossed to the man, and Jeff Legge watched him.
“I want you to meet Captain Gray, a very old friend of mine,” she said with a catch in her voice.
Jeffrey Legge’s cold hand gripped his.
“I’m glad to meet you, Captain Gray.”
Had he been recognised? Apparently not, for the face turned to him was puckered in an embarrassed smile.
“You’ve just come back from East Africa, haven’t you? Get any shooting?”
“No, I didn’t do any shooting,” said Johnny.
“Lots of lions, aren’t there?” said Jeff.
The lips of the exconvict twitched.
“In that part of the country where I was living, the lions are singularly tame,” he said dryly.
“Marney, darling, you’re glad to see Gray on your wedding day, aren’t you? – it was good of you to come, Gray. Mrs. Floyd has often spoken about you.”
He put his arm about the girl, his eyes never leaving Johnny’s face. He designed to hurt – to hurt them both. She stood rigidly, neither yielding nor resisting, tense, breathless, pale. She knew! The realisation came to John Gray like a blow. She knew that this man was a liar and a villain. She knew the trick that had been played upon her father!
“Happy, darling?”
“Very – oh, very.”
There was a flutter in her voice, and now Johnny was hurt and the fight to hold himself in became terrific. It was Peter who for the moment saved the situation.
“Johnny, I want you to know this boy. The best in the world. And I want you to think with me that he’s the best husband in the world for Marney.”
Jeff Legge laughed softly. “Mr. Kane, you embarrass me terribly. I’m not half good enough for her – I’m just an awkward brute that doesn’t deserve my good luck.”
He bent and kissed the white-faced girl. Johnny did not take his eyes from the man. “Happy, eh? I’ll bet you’re happy; you rascal,” chuckled Kane.
Marney pulled herself away from the encircling arm. “Daddy, I don’t think this is altogether amusing Johnny.”
Her voice shook. The man from Dartmoor knew that she was on the verge of tears.
“It takes a lot to bore me.” John Gray found his voice. “Indeed, the happiness of young people – I feel very old just now – is a joy. You’re a Canadian, Major Floyd?”
“Yes – a French Canadian, though you wouldn’t guess that from my name. My people were habitant and went west in the ‘sixties – to Alberta and Saskatchewan, long before the railway came. You ought to go to Canada; you’d like it better than the place you’ve been to.”
“I’m sure I should.”
Peter had strolled away, the girl’s arm in his.
“No lions in Canada, tame or wild,” said Jeff, regarding him from under his drooped eyelids. Gray had lit a cigarette. He was steady now, steady of nerve and hand.
“I should feel lonely without lions,” he said coolly, and then: “If you will forgive my impertinence. Major Floyd, you have married a very nice girl.”
“The very, very best.”
“I would go a long way to serve her – a long way. Even back to the lions.” Their eyes met. In the bridegroom’s was a challenge; in Johnny Gray’s cold murder. Jeff Legge’s eyes fell and he shivered. “I suppose you like – hunting?” he said. “Oh, no, you said you didn’t. I wonder why a man of your – er – character went abroad?”
“I was sent,” said Johnny, and he emphasised every word. “Somebody had a reason for sending me abroad – they wanted me out of the way. I should have gone, anyhow, but this man hurried the process.”
“Do you know who it was?”
The East African pretence had been tacitly dropped. Jeff might do so safely, for he would know that the cause of John Gray’s retirement from the world was no secret.
“I don’t know the man. He was a stranger to me. Very few people know him personally. In his set – our set – not half a dozen people could identify him. Only one man in the police knows him—”
“Who is that?” interrupted the other quickly.
“A man named Reeder. I heard that in prison – of course you knew I had come from Dartmoor?”
Jeff nodded with a smile.
“That is the fellow who is called The Great Unknown,” he said, striving to thin the contempt from his voice. “I’ve heard about him in the club. He is a very stupid person of middle age, who lives in Peckham. So he isn’t as much unknown as your mystery man.”
“It is very likely,” said the other. “Convicts invest their heroes and enemies with extraordinary gifts and qualities. I only know what I have been told. At Dartmoor they say Reeder knows everything. The Government gave him carte blanche to find the Big Printer—”
“And has he found him?” asked Jeff Legge innocently.
“He’ll find him,” said Johnny. “Sooner or later there will be a squeak.”
“May I be there to hear it,” said Jeff Legge, and showed his white teeth in a mirthless smile.
Chapter V
Johnny was alone in the lower garden, huddled up on a corner of the marble bench, out of sight but not out of hearing of the guests who were assembling on the lawn. He had to think, and think quickly. Marney knew! But Marney had not told, and Johnny guessed why.
When had Jeff Legge told her? On the way back from the church, perhaps. She would not let Peter know – Peter, who deemed her future assured, her happiness beyond question. What had Jeff said? Not much, Johnny guessed. He had given her just a hint that the charming Major Floyd she had married was not the Major Floyd with whom she was to live.
Johnny was cool now – icy cold was a better description. He must be sure, absolutely sure, beyond any question of doubt. There might be some resemblance between Jeff Legge and this Major Floyd. He had only seen the crook once, and that at a distance.
He heard the rustle of skirts and looked round quickly. It was the maid he had seen quarrelling with Barney.
“Mr. Kane says, would you care to be in the group that is being photographed. Captain Gray?” she asked.
He did not immediately reply. His eyes were scanning her with a new interest.
“Tell him I’d rather not, and come back.”
“Come back, sir?” she repeated in astonishment.
“Yes, I want to talk to you,” said Johnny with a smile. “Have mercy on a disgruntled guest, who can find nobody to entertain him.”
She stood, hesitating. He could see the indecision in her face.
“I don’t know if Mr. Kane would like that,” she said, and a smile trembled at the corner of her mouth. “Very well, I’ll come back.”
It was not till ten minutes later, when he judged the photograph had been taken and the guests had gone again to the house, that she appeared, demure but curious.
“Sit down,” said Johnny. He threw away his cigarette and moved to the end of the stone bench.
“Don’t stop smoking for me, Captain Gray,” she said.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
“With Mr. Kane? About six months,” she said.
“Pretty good job?” he asked carelessly.
“Oh, yes, sir, very.”
“What is your name?”
“My name is Lila. Why do you ask?”
“I think you and I ought to get better acquainted, Lila,” he said, and took her unresisting hand.
Secretly she was amused; on the surface she showed some sign of being shocked.
“I didn’t know you were that type of flirting man, Mr. Gray – you’re a Captain, though, aren’t you?”
“‘Captain’ is a purely honorary title, Lila,” said Johnny. “I suppose you’ll miss your lady?”
“Yes, I shall miss her,” said Lila.
“A nice girl, eh?” bantered Johnny.
“And a very nice husband,” she said tartly.
“Do you think so?”
“Yes, I suppose he is a nice fellow. I don’t know much about him.”
“Goodlooking?” suggested Johnny.
The woman shrugged her shoulders.
“I suppose he is.”
“And very much in love with Miss Kane. That fellow adores her,” said Johnny. “In fact, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a man so much in love with a woman.”
She suppressed a sigh.
“Oh, yes, I suppose he is,” she said impatiently. “Do you want me any more, Captain Gray, because I’ve a lot of work to do?”
“Don’t run away,” said Johnny in his most gentle voice, “Weddings always make me romantic.” He took up the thread where it was interrupted. “I don’t expect the Major will have eyes for any other girl for years,” he said. “He’s head over heels in love, and why shouldn’t he be? I suppose,” he said reminiscently, avoiding her eyes, “he is the sort of man who would have had many love affairs in the past.” He shrugged his shoulders. “With the kind of girls that one picks up and puts down at pleasure.”
Now a flush, deep and even, had come to her face, and her eyes held a peculiar brightness.
“I don’t know anything about Major Floyd,” she said shortly, and was rising, but his hand fell upon her arm.
“Don’t run away, Lila.”
“I’m not going to stay,” she said with sudden vehemence. “I don’t want to discuss Major Floyd or anybody else. If you want me to talk to you—”
“I want to talk to you about the honeymoon. Can’t you picture them, say, on Lake Como, in a bower of roses? Can’t you imagine him forgetting all that’s past, all the old follies, all the old girls — ?”
She wrenched her arm from his grip and stood up, and her face was deadly white.
“What are you getting at. Gray?” she asked, all the deference, all the demureness, gone from her voice.
“I’m getting at you, Miss Lila Sain,” he said, “and if you attempt to get away from me, I’ll throttle you!”
She stared at him, her breath coming quickly. “You were supposed to be a gentleman, too,” she said.
“I’m supposed to be Johnny Gray from Dartmoor. Sit down. What’s the graft, Lila?”
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”
“What’s the graft?” asked Johnny with deadly calm. “Jeff Legge put you here to nose the house for him, and keep him wise as to what was going on.”
“I don’t know Jeff Legge,” she faltered.
“You’re a liar,” said Johnny ungently. “I know you, Lila. You run with Legge and you’re a cheap squeak. I’ve seen you a dozen times. Who is Major Floyd?”
“Go and ask him,” she said defiantly.
“Who is Major Floyd?”
The grip on her arm tightened.
“You know,” she said sullenly. “It’s Jeff Legge.”
“Now listen, Lila. Come here.” He had released her, and now he crooked his finger. “Go and blow to Jeff, and I’ll squeak on you both – you understand that? I’ll put Jeff just where I want him to be – there’s a vacant cell at Dartmoor, anyway. That gives you a twinge, doesn’t it? You’re keen on Jeff?”
She did not reply.
“I’ll put him where I want him to be,” he repeated slowly and deliberately, “unless you do as I tell you.”
“You’re going to put the ‘black’ on him?” she said, her lips curling.
“‘Black’ doesn’t mean anything in my young life,” said Johnny. “But I tell you this, that I’ll find Reeder and squeak the whole pageful unless I have my way.”
“What do you want?” she asked.
“I want to know where they’re going, and where they’re staying. I want to know their plans for the future. Are you married to him, by any chance?”
A glance at her face gave him the answer.
“You’re not? Well, you may be yet, Lila. Aren’t you tired of doing his dirty work?”
“Perhaps I am and perhaps I’m not,” she replied defiantly. “You can do nothing to him now, anyway, Johnny Gray. He’s got your girl, and if you squeaked like a garden of birds you couldn’t undo what that old God-man did this morning! Jeff’s too clever for you. He’ll get you, Gray—”
“If he knows,” said Johnny quietly. “But if he knows, Reeder knows too. Do you get that?”
“What are you going to do?” she asked after a silence.
“I’m having one of my little jokes,” said Johnny between his teeth. “A real good joke! It is starting now. I can’t tell Peter, because he’d kill your young man, and I have a particular objection to Peter going to the drop. And you can’t tell Jeff, because there’d be a case for a jury, and when Jeff came out you’d be an old woman. That’s not a good prospect, eh? Now tell me all you’ve got to tell, and speak slowly, because I don’t write shorthand.”
He whipped a small notebook from his pocket, and as she spoke, reluctantly, sulkily, yet fearfully, he wrote rapidly. When he had finished: “You can go now, my gentle child,” he said, and she stood up, her eyes blazing with rage.
“If you squeak, Johnny Gray, I’ll kill you. I never was keen on this marriage business – naturally. I knew old Legge wanted him to marry Peter’s daughter, because Legge wanted to get one back on him. But Jeff’s been good to me; and the day the busies come for Legge I’ll come for you, and I’ll shoot you stone dead, Johnny, as God’s my judge!”
“Beat it!” said Johnny tersely.
He waited till she was gone through one of the openings in the box hedge, then passed along to the other and stopped. Peter Kane was standing in the open, shielded from view by the thin box bush, and Peter’s face was inscrutable.
Chapter VI
“Hallo, Johnny! Running for the compensation stakes?”
Johnny laughed.
“You mean the maid? She is rather pretty, isn’t she?”
“Very,” said the other.
Had he heard? That was a question and a fear in Johnny’s mind. The marble bench was less than six feet from the bush where Peter Kane stood. If he had been there any time –
“Been waiting long for me, Peter?” he asked.
“No! I just saw you take a farewell of Lila – very nice girl, that, Johnny – an extraordinarily nice girl. I don’t know when I’ve seen a nicer. What did you find to talk about?”
“The weather, dicky-birds and the course of true love,” said Johnny, as Kane took his arm and led him across the lawn.
“Everything variable and flighty, eh?” said Peter with a little smile. “Come and eat, Johnny. These people are going away soon. Marney is changing now. What do you think of my new son-in-law, eh?”
His old jovial manner held. When they came into the big reception-room, and Peter Kane’s arm went round his son-in-law’s shoulder, Johnny breathed a sigh of relief. Thank God he did not know! He had sweated in his fear of what might follow a discovery.
Thirty-six people sat down in the diningroom, and, contrary to convention, Marney, who sat at the head of the table, was wearing her going-away dress. John shot a quick glance at her as he came in, but she averted her eyes. Her father sat on her left; next to him was the clergyman who had performed the ceremony. Next came a girl friend, and then a man, by whose side Johnny sat.
He recognised the leathery features instantly.
“Been away, Johnny?” Detective-Superintendent Craig asked the question in a voice so carefully pitched that it did not reach any farther than the man to whom he spoke.
The chatter and buzz of conversation, the little ripples of laughter that ran up and down the table, did something to make the privacy of their talk assured.
As Old Barney bent over to serve a dish, Craig gave a sidelong glance at his companion.
“Peter’s got old Barney still – keeping honest, Barney?”
“I’m naturally that way,” said Barney sotto voce. “It’s not meeting policemen that keeps me straight.”
The hard features of the detective relaxed.
“There are lots of other people who could say that, Barney,” he said, and when the man had passed to the next guest: “He’s all right. Barney never was a bad man. I think he only did one stretch – he wouldn’t have done that if he’d had Peter’s imagination, Johnny.”
“Peter’s imagination?”
“I’m not referring to his present imagination, but the gift he had fourteen – fifteen years ago. Peter was the cleverest of them all. The brilliant way his attack was planned, the masterly line of retreat, the wonderful alibis, so beautifully dovetailed into one another that, if we had pinched him, he’d not only have been discharged, but he would have got something from the poor box! It used to be the life ambition of every young officer to catch him, to find some error of judgment, some flaw in his plan. But it was police-proof and foolproof.”
“He’d blush to hear you,” said the other dryly.
“But it’s true, Johnny! The clever letters he used to write, all to fool us. He did a lot of work with letters – getting people together, luring ’em to the place he wanted ’em and where their presence served him best. I remember how he got my chief to be at Charing Cross under the clock at ten-past nine, and showed up himself and made him prove his alibi!” He laughed gently.
“I suppose,” said Gray, “people would think it remarkable that you and he are such good friends?”
“They wouldn’t say it was remarkable; they’d say it was damned suspicious!” growled the other. “Having a drink?” he said suddenly, and pulled a wine bottle across the table.
“No, thanks – I seldom drink. We have to keep a very clear head in our business. We can’t afford to dream.”
“We can’t afford anything else,” said Craig. “Why ‘our business,’ old man? You’re out of that?”
Johnny saw the girl look toward him. It was only a glance – but in that brief flash he saw all that he feared to see – the terror, the bewilderment, the helplessness. He set his teeth and turned abruptly to the detective.
“How is your business?” he asked.
“Quiet.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” said John Gray with mock concern, “But trade’s bad everywhere, isn’t it?”
“What sort of time did you have – in the country?” asked Craig, and his companion grinned.
“Wonderful! My bedroom wanted papering, but the service was quite good.”
Craig sighed.
