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+The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Yellow Streak, by Valentine Williams
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
+will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
+using this eBook.
+
+Title: The Yellow Streak
+
+Author: Valentine Williams
+
+Release Date: November 5, 2003 [eBook #9974]
+[Most recently updated: October 14, 2021]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+Produced by: Juliet Sutherland, Dave Morgan and the PG Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YELLOW STREAK ***
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+The Yellow Streak
+
+by Valentine Williams
+
+
+Contents
+
+ CHAPTER I. THE MASTER OF HARKINGS
+ CHAPTER II. AT TWILIGHT
+ CHAPTER III. A DISCOVERY
+ CHAPTER IV. BETWEEN THE DESK AND THE WINDOW
+ CHAPTER V. IN WHICH BUDE LOOKS AT ROBIN GREVE
+ CHAPTER VI. THE LETTER
+ CHAPTER VII. VOICES IN THE LIBRARY
+ CHAPTER VIII. ROBIN GOES TO MARY
+ CHAPTER IX. MR. MANDERTON
+ CHAPTER X. A SMOKING CHIMNEY
+ CHAPTER XI. “... SPEED THE PARTING GUEST!”
+ CHAPTER XII. MR. MANDERTON IS NONPLUSSED
+ CHAPTER XIII. JEEKES
+ CHAPTER XIV. A SHEET OF BLUE PAPER
+ CHAPTER XV. SHADOWS
+ CHAPTER XVI. THE INTRUDER
+ CHAPTER XVII. A FRESH CLUE
+ CHAPTER XVIII. THE SILENT SHOT
+ CHAPTER XIX. MR. MANDERTON LAYS HIS CARDS ON THE TABLE
+ CHAPTER XX. THE CODE KING
+ CHAPTER XXI. A WORD WITH MR. JEEKES
+ CHAPTER XXII. THE MAN WITH THE YELLOW FACE
+ CHAPTER XXIII. TWO’S COMPANY ...
+ CHAPTER XXIV. THE METAMORPHOSIS OF MR. SCHULZ
+ CHAPTER XXV. THE READING OF THE RIDDLE
+ CHAPTER XXVI. THE FIGURE IN THE DOORWAY
+ CHAPTER XXVII. AN INTERRUPTION FROM BEYOND
+ CHAPTER XXVIII. THE DEATH OF HARTLEY PARRISH
+
+
+
+
+THE YELLOW STREAK
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+THE MASTER OF HARKINGS
+
+
+Of all the luxuries of which Hartley Parrish’s sudden rise to wealth
+gave him possession, Bude, his butler, was the acquisition in which he
+took the greatest delight and pride. Bude was a large and
+comfortable-looking person, triple-chinned like an archdeacon,
+bald-headed except for a respectable and saving edging of dark down,
+clean-shaven, benign of countenance, with a bold nose which to the
+psychologist bespoke both ambition and inborn cleverness. He had a
+thin, tight mouth which in itself alone was a symbol of discreet
+reticence, the hall-mark of the trusted family retainer.
+
+Bude had spent his life in the service of the English aristocracy. The
+Earl of Tipperary, Major-General Lord Bannister, the Dowager
+Marchioness of Wiltshire, and Sir Herbert Marcobrunner, Bart., had in
+turn watched his gradual progress from pantry-boy to butler. Bude was a
+man whose maxim had been the French saying, “_Je prends mon bien où je
+le trouve_.”
+
+In his thirty years’ service he had always sought to discover and draw
+from those sources of knowledge which were at his disposal. From
+MacTavish, who had supervised Lord Tipperary’s world-famous gardens, he
+had learnt a great deal about flowers, so that the arrangement of the
+floral decorations was always one of the features at Hartley Parrish’s
+_soigné_ dinner-parties. From Brun, the unsurpassed _chef_, whom Lord
+Bannister had picked up when serving with the Guards in Egypt, he had
+gathered sufficient knowledge of the higher branches of the cuisine to
+enable Hartley Parrish to leave the arrangement of the menu in his
+butler’s hands.
+
+Bude would have been the first to admit that, socially speaking, his
+present situation was not the equal of the positions he had held. There
+was none of the staid dignity about his present employer which was
+inborn in men like Lord Tipperary or Lord Bannister, and which Sir
+Herbert Marcobrunner, with the easy assimilative faculty of his race,
+had very successfully acquired. Below middle height, thick-set and
+powerfully built, with a big head, narrow eyes, and a massive chin,
+Hartley Parrish, in his absorbed concentration on his business, had no
+time for the acquisition or practice of the Eton manner.
+
+It was characteristic of Parrish that, seeing Bude at a dinner-party at
+Marcobrunner’s, he should have engaged him on the spot. It took Bude a
+week to get over his shock at the manner in which the offer was made.
+Parrish had approached him as he was supervising the departure of the
+guests. Waving aside the footman who offered to help him into his
+overcoat, Parrish had asked Bude point-blank what wages he was getting.
+Bude mentioned the generous remuneration he was receiving from Sir
+Herbert Marcobrunner, whereupon Parrish had remarked:
+
+“Come to me and I’ll double it. I’ll give you a week to think it over.
+Let my secretary know!”
+
+After a few discreet enquiries, Bude, faithful to his maxim, had
+accepted Parrish’s offer. Marcobrunner was furiously angry, but, being
+anxious to interest Parrish in a deal, sagely kept his feelings to
+himself. And Bude had never regretted the change. He found Parrish an
+exacting, but withal a just and a generous master, and he was not long
+in realizing that, as long as he kept Harkings, Parrish’s country place
+where he spent the greater part of his time, running smoothly according
+to Parrish’s schedule, he could count on a life situation.
+
+The polish of manner, the sober dignity of dress, acquired from years
+of acute observation in the service of the nobility, were to be seen
+as, at the hour of five, in the twilight of this bleak autumn
+afternoon, Bude moved majestically into the lounge-hall of Harkings and
+leisurely pounded the gong for tea.
+
+The muffled notes of the gong swelled out brazenly through the silent
+house. They echoed down the softly carpeted corridors to the library
+where the master of the house sat at his desk. For days he had been
+immersed in the figures of the new issue which Hornaway’s, the vast
+engineering business of his creation, was about to put on the market.
+They reverberated up the fine old oak staircase to the luxurious Louis
+XV bedroom, where Lady Margaret Trevert lay on her bed idly smiling
+through an amusing novel. They crashed through the thickly padded baize
+doors leading to the servants’ hall, where, at sixpence a hundred,
+Parrish’s man, Jay, was partnering Lady Margaret’s maid against Mrs.
+Heever, the housekeeper, and Robert, the chauffeur, at a friendly game
+of bridge. And they even boomed distantly into the far-away
+billiard-room and broke into the talk which Robin Greve was having with
+Mary Trevert.
+
+“Damn!” exclaimed Greve savagely, as the distant gonging came to his
+ears.
+
+“It’s the gong for tea,” said Mary demurely.
+
+She was sitting on one of the big leather sofas lining the long room.
+Robin, as he gazed down at her from where he stood with his back
+against the edge of the billiard-table, thought what an attractive
+picture she made in the half-light.
+
+The lamps over the table were lit, but the rest of the room was almost
+dark. In that lighting the thickly waving dark hair brought out the
+fine whiteness of the girl’s skin. There was love, and a great desire
+for love, in her large dark eyes, but the clear-cut features, the
+well-shaped chin, and the firm mouth, the lips a little full, spoke of
+ambition and the love of power.
+
+“I’ve been here three whole days,” said Robin, “and I’ve not had two
+words with you alone, Mary. And hardly have I got you to myself for a
+quiet game of pills when that rotten gong goes ...”
+
+“I’m sorry you’re disappointed at missing your game,” the girl replied
+mischievously, “but I expect you will be able to get a game with Horace
+or one of the others after tea ...”
+
+Robin kicked the carpet savagely.
+
+“You know perfectly well I don’t want to play billiards ...”
+
+He looked up and caught the girl’s eye. For a fraction of a second he
+saw in it the expression which every man at least once in his life
+looks to see in the eyes of one particular woman. In the girl’s
+dark-blue eyes fringed with long black lashes he saw the dumb appeal,
+the mute surrender, which, as surely as the white flag on the
+battlements in war, is the signal of capitulation in woman.
+
+But the expression was gone on the instant. It passed so swiftly that,
+for a second, Robin, seeing the gently mocking glance that succeeded
+it, wondered whether he had been mistaken.
+
+But he was a man of action—a glance at his long, well-moulded head, his
+quick, wide-open eye, and his square jaw would have told you that—and
+he spoke.
+
+“It’s no use beating about the bush,” he said. “Mary, I’ve got so fond
+of you that I’m just miserable when you’re away from me ...”
+
+“Oh, Robin, please ...”
+
+Mary Trevert stood up and remained standing, her head turned a little
+away from him, a charming silhouette in her heather-blue shooting-suit.
+
+The young man took her listless hand.
+
+“My dear,” he said, “you and I have been pals all our lives. It was
+only at the front that I began to realize just how much you meant to
+me. And now I know I can’t do without you. I’ve never met any one who
+has been to me just what you are. And, Mary, I must have you as my wife
+...”
+
+The girl remained motionless. She kept her face averted. The room
+seemed very still.
+
+“Oh, Robin, please ...” she murmured again.
+
+Resolutely the young man put an arm about her and drew her to him.
+Slowly, reluctantly, she let him have his way. But she would not look
+at him.
+
+“Oh, my dear,” he whispered, kissing her hair, “don’t you care a
+little?”
+
+She remained silent.
+
+“Won’t you look at me, Mary?”
+
+There was a hint of huskiness in his voice. He raised her face to his.
+
+“I saw in your eyes just now that you cared for me,” he whispered; “oh,
+my Mary, say that you do!”
+
+Then he bent down and kissed her. For a brief instant their lips met
+and he felt the caress of the girl’s arm about his neck.
+
+“Oh, Robin!” she said.
+
+That was all.
+
+But then she drew away.
+
+Reluctantly the man let her go. The colour had faded from his cheeks
+when she looked at him again as he stood facing her in the twilight of
+the billiard-room.
+
+“Robin, dear,” she said, “I’m going to hurt you.”
+
+The young man seemed to have had a premonition of what was coming, for
+he betrayed no sign of surprise, but remained motionless, very erect,
+very pale.
+
+“Dear,” said the girl with a little despairing shrug, “it’s hopeless!
+We can’t afford to marry!”
+
+“Not yet, I know,” said Robin, “but I’m getting on well, Mary, and in
+another year or two ...”
+
+The girl looked down at the point of her little brogue shoe.
+
+“I don’t know what you will think of me,” she said, “but I can’t accept
+... I can’t face ... I ...”
+
+“You can’t face the idea of being the wife of a man who has his way to
+make. Is that it?”
+
+The voice was rather stern.
+
+The girl looked up impulsively.
+
+“I can’t, Robin. I should never make you happy. Mother and I are as
+poor as church-mice. All the money in the family goes to keep Horace in
+the Army and pay for my clothes.”
+
+She looked disdainfully at her pretty suit.
+
+“All this,” she went on with a little hopeless gesture indicating her
+tailor-made, “is Mother’s investment. No, no, it’s true ... I can tell
+you as a friend, Robin, dear, we are living on our capital until I have
+caught a rich husband ...”
+
+“Oh, my dear,” said Robin softly, “don’t say things like that ...”
+
+The girl laughed a little defiantly.
+
+“But it’s true,” she answered. “The war has halved Mother’s income and
+there’s nothing between us and bankruptcy but a year or so ... unless I
+get married!”
+
+Her voice trembled a little and she turned away.
+
+“Mary,” said the young man hoarsely, “for God’s sake, don’t do that!”
+
+He moved a step towards her, but she drew back.
+
+“It’s all right,” she said with the tears glistening wet on her face,
+and dabbed at her eyes with her tiny handkerchief, “but, oh, Robin boy,
+why couldn’t you have held your tongue?”
+
+“I suppose I had no right to speak ...” the young man began.
+
+The girl sighed.
+
+“I oughtn’t to say it ... now,” she said slowly, and looked across at
+Robin with shining eyes, “but, Robin dear, I’m ... I’m glad you did!”
+
+She paused a moment as though turning something over in her mind.
+
+“I’ve ... I’ve got something to tell you, Robin,” she began. “No, stay
+where you are! We must be sensible now.”
+
+She paused and looked at him.
+
+“Robin,” she said slowly, “I’ve promised to marry somebody else ...”
+
+There was a moment’s silence.
+
+“Who is it?” Robin asked in a hard voice.
+
+The girl made no answer.
+
+“Who is it? Do I know him?”
+
+Still the girl was silent, but she gave a hardly perceptible nod.
+
+“Not ...? No, no, Mary, it isn’t true? It can’t be true?”
+
+The girl nodded, her eyes to the ground.
+
+“It’s a secret still,” she said. “No one knows but Mother. Hartley
+doesn’t want it announced yet!”
+
+The sound of the Christian name suddenly seemed to infuriate Greve.
+
+“By God!” he cried, “it shan’t be! You must be mad, Mary, to think of
+marrying a man like Hartley Parrish. A fellow who’s years older than
+you, who thinks of nothing but money, who stood out of the war and made
+a fortune while men of his own age were doing the fighting for him!
+It’s unthinkable ... it’s ... it’s damnable to think of a gross,
+ill-bred creature like Parrish ...”
+
+“Robin!” the girl cried, “you seem to forget that we’re staying in his
+house. In spite of all you say he seems to be good enough for you to
+come and stay with ...”
+
+“I only came because you were to be here. You know that perfectly well.
+I admit one oughtn’t to blackguard one’s host, but, Mary, you must see
+that this marriage is absolutely out of the question!”
+
+The girl began to bridle up,
+
+“Why?” she asked loftily.
+
+“Because ... because Parrish is not the sort of man who will make you
+happy ...”
+
+“And why not, may I ask? He’s very kind and very generous, and I
+believe he likes me ...”
+
+Robin Greve made a gesture of despair.
+
+“My dear girl,” he said, trying to control himself to speak quietly,
+“what do you know about this man? Nothing. But there are beastly
+stories circulating about his life ...”
+
+Mary Trevert laughed cynically.
+
+“My dear old Robin,” she said, “they tell stories about every bachelor.
+And I hardly think you are an unbiassed judge ...”
+
+Robin Greve was pacing up and down the floor.
+
+“You’re crazy, Mary,” he said, stopping in front of her, “to dream you
+can ever be happy with a man like Hartley Parrish. The man’s a ruthless
+egoist. He thinks of nothing but money and he’s out to buy you just
+exactly as you ...”
+
+“As I am ready to sell myself!” the girl echoed. “And I _am_ ready,
+Robin. It’s all very well for you to stand there and preach ideals at
+me, but I’m sick and disgusted at the life we’ve been leading for the
+past three years, hovering on the verge of ruin all the time, dunned by
+tradesmen and having to borrow even from servants ... yes, from old
+servants of the family ... to pay Mother’s bridge debts. Mother’s a
+good sort. Father spent all her money for her and she was brought up in
+exactly the same helpless way as she brought up me. I can do absolutely
+nothing except the sort of elementary nursing which we all learnt in
+the war, and if I don’t marry well Mother will have to keep a
+boarding-house or do something ghastly like that. I’m not going to
+pretend that I’m thinking only of her, because I’m not. I can’t face a
+long engagement with no prospects except castles in Spain. I don’t mean
+to be callous, Robin, but I expect I am naturally hard. Hartley Parrish
+is a good sort. He’s very fond of me, and he will see that Mother lives
+comfortably for the rest of her life. I’ve promised to marry him
+because I like him and he’s a suitable match. And I don’t see by what
+right you try and run him down to me behind his back! If it’s jealousy,
+then it shows a very petty spirit!”
+
+Robin Greve stepped close up to Mary Trevert. His eyes were very angry
+and his jaw was set very square.
+
+“If you are determined to sell yourself to the highest bidder,” he
+said, “I suppose there’s no stopping you. But you’re making a mistake.
+If Parrish were all you claim for him, you might not repent of his
+marriage so long as you did not care for somebody else. But I know you
+love me, and it breaks my heart to see you blundering into everlasting
+unhappiness ...”
+
+“At least Hartley will be able to keep me,” the girl flashed out.
+Directly she had spoken she regretted her words.
+
+A red flush spread slowly over Robin Greve’s face.
+
+Then he laughed drily.
+
+“You won’t be the first woman he’s kept!” he retorted, and stamped out
+of the billiard-room.
+
+The girl gave a little gasp. Then she reddened with anger.
+
+“How dare he?” she cried, stamping her foot; “how dare he?”
+
+She sank on the lounge and, burying her face in her hands, burst into
+tears.
+
+“Oh, Robin, Robin, dear!” she sobbed—incomprehensibly, for she was a
+woman.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+AT TWILIGHT
+
+
+There is a delicious snugness, a charming lack of formality, about the
+ceremony of afternoon tea in an English country-house—it is much too
+indefinite a rite to dignify it by the name of meal—which makes it the
+most pleasant reunion of the day. For English country-house parties
+consist, for the most part, of a succession of meals to which the
+guests flock the more congenially as, in the interval, they have
+contrived to avoid one another’s companionship.
+
+And so, scarcely had the last reverberation of Bude’s measured gonging
+died away than the French window leading from the lounge-hall on to the
+terrace was pushed open and two of Hartley Parrish’s guests emerged
+from the falling darkness without into the pleasant comfort of the
+firelit room.
+
+They were an oddly matched pair. The one was a tubby little man with
+short bristly grey hair and a short bristly grey moustache to match.
+His stumpy legs looked ridiculous in his baggy golf knickers of rough
+tweed, which he wore with gaiters extending half-way up his short,
+stout calves. As he came in, he slung off the heavy tweed
+shooting-cloak he had been wearing and placed it with his Homburg hat
+on a chair.
+
+This was Dr. Romain, whose name thus written seems indecently naked
+without the string of complementary initials indicative of the honours
+and degrees which years of bacteriological research had heaped upon
+him. His companion was a tall, slim, fair-haired young man, about as
+good a specimen of the young Englishman turned out by the English
+public school as one could find. He was extremely good-looking with a
+proud eye and finely chiselled features, but the suggestion of youth in
+his face and figure was countered by a certain poise, a kind of latent
+seriousness which contrasted strangely with the general cheery
+_insouciance_ of his type.
+
+A soldier would have spotted the symptoms at once, “Five years of war!”
+would have been his verdict—that long and strange entry into life of so
+many thousands of England’s manhood which impressed the stamp of
+premature seriousness on all those who came through. And Captain Sir
+Horace Trevert, Bart., D.S.O., had gone from his famous school straight
+into a famous regiment, had won his decoration before he was
+twenty-one, and been twice wounded into the bargain.
+
+“Where’s everybody?” queried the doctor, rubbing his hands at the
+blazing log-fire.
+
+“Robin and Mary went off to play billiards,” said the young man, “and I
+left old Parrish after lunch settling down for an afternoon’s work in
+the library ...”
+
+He crossed the room to the fire and stood with his back to the flame.
+
+“What a worker that man is!” ejaculated the doctor. “He had one of his
+secretaries down this morning with a car full of portfolios,
+blue-prints, specifications, and God knows what else. Parrish polished
+the whole lot off and packed the fellow back to London before mid-day.
+Some of Hornaway’s people who were waiting went in next, and he was
+through with them by lunch-time!”
+
+Trevert wagged his head in admiration.
+
+“And he told me he wanted to have a quiet week-end!” he said. “That’s
+why he has no secretary living in the house.”
+
+“A quiet week-end!” repeated Romain drily. “Ye gods!”
+
+“He’s a marvel for work,” said the young man.
+
+“He certainly is,” replied the doctor. “He’s done wonders with
+Hornaway’s. When he took the place over at the beginning of the war,
+they were telling me, it was a little potty concern making toy air guns
+or lead soldiers or something of the sort. And they never stop coining
+money now, it seems. Parrish must be worth millions ...”
+
+“Lucky devil!” said Trevert genially.
+
+“Ah!” observed the doctor sententiously, “but he’s had to work for it,
+mark you! He’s had the most extraordinary life, they tell me. He was at
+one period of his career a bartender on the Rand, a man was saying at
+the club the other day. But most of his life he’s lived in Canada, I
+gather. He was telling us the other evening, before you and Mary came
+down, that he was once a brakeman on the Canadian Pacific Railway. He
+said he invested all his savings in books on engineering and read them
+in his brakeman’s van on his trips across the Dominion. Ah! he’s a fine
+fellow!”
+
+He lowered his voice discreetly.
+
+“And a devilish good match, eh, Horace?”
+
+The young man flushed slightly.
+
+“Yes,” he said unwillingly.
+
+“A dam’ good match for somebody,” urged the doctor with a malicious
+twinkle in his eye.
+
+“Here, Doc,” said Horace, suddenly turning on him, “you stick to your
+bugs and germs. What do you know about matchmaking, anyway?”
+
+Dr. Romain chuckled.
+
+“We bacteriologists are trained observers. One learns a lot watching
+the life and habits of the bacillus, Horace, my boy. And between
+ourselves, Parrish would be a lucky fellow if ...”
+
+Trevert turned to him. His face was quite serious, and there was a
+little touch of hauteur in his voice. He was the 17th Baronet.
+
+“My dear Doc,” he said, “aren’t you going a bit fast? Parrish is a very
+good chap, but one knows nothing about him ...”
+
+Sagely the doctor nodded his grizzled head.
+
+“That’s true,” he agreed. “He appears to have no relatives and nobody
+over here seems to have heard of him before the war. A man was saying
+at the Athenaeum the other day ...”
+
+Trevert touched his elbow. Bude had appeared, portly, imperturbable,
+bearing a silver tray set out with the appliances for tea.
+
+“Bude,” cried Trevert, “don’t tell me there are no tea-cakes again!”
+
+“On the contrairey, sir,” answered the butler in the richly sonorous
+voice pitched a little below the normal register which he employed
+abovestairs, “the cook has had her attention drawn to it. There are
+tea-cakes, sir!”
+
+With a certain dramatic effect—for Bude was a trifle theatrical in
+everything he did—he whipped the cover off a dish and displayed a
+smoking pile of deliciously browned scones.
+
+“Bude,” said Trevert, “when I’m a Field Marshal, I’ll see you get the
+O.B.E. for this!”
+
+The butler smiled a nicely regulated three-by-one smile, a little
+deprecatory as was his wont. Then, like a tank taking a corner, he
+wheeled majestically and turned to cross the lounge. To reach the green
+baize door leading to the servants’ quarters he had to cross the outer
+hall from which led corridors on the right and left. That on the right
+led to the billiard-room; that on the left to the big drawing-room with
+the library beyond.
+
+As Bude reached the great screen of tooled Spanish leather which
+separated a corner of the lounge from the outer hall, Robin Greve came
+hastily through the glass door of the corridor leading from the
+billiard-room. The butler with a pleasant smile drew back a little to
+allow the young man to pass, thinking he was going into the lounge for
+tea.
+
+“Tea is ...” he began, but abruptly ended the sentence on catching
+sight of the young man’s face. For Robin, habitually so self-possessed,
+looked positively haggard. His face was set and there was a weary look
+in his eyes. The young man appeared so utterly different from his
+wonted self that Bude fairly stared at him.
+
+But Robin, without paying the least attention either to the butler or
+to the sound of voices in the lounge, strode across the outer hall and
+disappeared through the glass door of the corridor leading to the great
+drawing-room and the library.
+
+Bude stood an instant gazing after him in perplexity, then moved across
+the hall to the servants’ quarters.
+
+In the meantime in the lounge the little doctor snapped the case of his
+watch and opined that he wanted his tea.
+
+“Where on earth has everybody got to? What’s become of Lady Margaret? I
+haven’t seen her since lunch....”
+
+That lady answered his question by appearing in person.
+
+Lady Margaret was tall and hard and glittering. Like so many
+Englishwomen of good family, she was so saturated with the traditions
+of her class that her manner was almost indistinguishable from that of
+a man. Well-mannered, broadminded, wholly cynical, and absolutely
+fearless, she went through life exactly as though she were following a
+path carefully taped out for her by a suitably instructed Providence.
+Somewhere beneath the mask of smiling indifference she presented so
+bravely to a difficult world, she had a heart, but so carefully did she
+hide it that Horace had only discovered it on a certain grey November
+morning when he had started out for the first time on active service.
+For ever afterwards a certain weighing-machine at Waterloo Station, by
+which he had had a startling vision of his mother standing with heaving
+bosom and tear-stained face, possessed in his mind the attributes of
+some secret and sacred shrine.
+
+But now she was cool and well-gowned and self-contained as ever.
+
+“What a perfectly dreadful day!” she exclaimed in her pleasant,
+well-bred voice. “Horace, you must positively go and see Henry
+What’s-his-name in the Foreign Office and get me a passport for Cannes.
+The weather in England in the winter is incredibly exaggerated!”
+
+“At least,” said the doctor, rubbing his back as he warmed himself at
+the fire, “we have fuel in England. Give me England, climate and all,
+but don’t take away my fire. The sun doesn’t shine on the Riviera at
+night, you know!”
+
+Lady Margaret busied herself at the tea-table with its fine Queen Anne
+silver and dainty yellow cups. It was the custom at Harkings to serve
+tea in the winter without other illumination than the light of the
+great log-fire that spat and leaped in the open hearth. Beyond the
+semi-circle of ruddy light the great lounge was all in darkness, and
+beyond that again was the absolute stillness of the English country on
+a winter’s evening.
+
+And so with a gentle clatter of teacups and the accompaniment of
+pleasantly modulated voices they sat and chatted—Lady Margaret, who was
+always surprising in what she said, the doctor who was incredibly
+opinionated, and young Trevert, who like all of the younger generation
+was daringly flippant. He was airing his views on what he called “Boche
+music” when he broke off and cried:
+
+“Hullo, here’s Mary! Mary, you owe me half a crown. Bude has come up to
+scratch and there are tea-cakes after ... but, I say, what on earth’s
+the matter?”
+
+The girl had come into the room and was standing in the centre of the
+lounge in the ruddy glow of the fire. Her face was deathly pale and she
+was shuddering violently. She held her little cambric handkerchief
+crushed up into a ball to her lips. Her eyes were fixed, almost glazed,
+like one who walks in a trance.
+
+She stood like that for an instant surveying the group—Lady Margaret, a
+silver tea-pot in one hand, looking at her with uplifted brows. Horace,
+who in his amazement had taken a step forward, and the doctor at his
+side scrutinizing her beneath his shaggy eyebrows.
+
+“My dear Mary “—it was Lady Margaret’s smooth and pleasant voice which
+broke the silence—“whatever is the matter? Have you seen a ghost!”
+
+The girl swayed a little and opened her lips as if to speak. A log,
+crashing from the fire into the grate, fell upon the silence of the
+darkening room. It seemed to break the spell.
+
+“Hartley!”
+
+The name came hoarsely from the girl. Everybody, except Lady Margaret,
+sprang to his feet It was the doctor who spoke first.
+
+“Miss Mary,” he said, “you seem frightened, what ...”
+
+His voice was very soothing.
+
+Mary Trevert made a vague gesture towards the shadows about the
+staircase.
+
+“There ... in the library ... he’s got the door locked ... there was a
+shot ...”
+
+Then she suddenly screamed aloud.
+
+In a stride both the doctor and her brother were by her side. But she
+motioned them away.
+
+“I’m frightened about Hartley,” she said in a low voice, “please go at
+once and see what ... that shot ... and he doesn’t answer!”
+
+“Come on, Doctor!”
+
+Horace Trevert was halfway to the big screen separating the lounge from
+the outer hall. As he passed the bell, he pressed it.
+
+“Send Bude to us, Mother, when he comes, please!” he called as he and
+the doctor hurried away.
+
+Lady Margaret had risen and stood, one arm about her daughter, on the
+Persian rug spread out before the cheerful fire. So the women stood in
+the firelight in Hartley Parrish’s house, surrounded by all the
+treasures which his wealth had bought, and listened to the footsteps
+clattering away through the silence.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+A DISCOVERY
+
+
+Harkings was not a large house. Some three hundred years ago it had
+been a farm, but in the intervening years successive owners had so
+altered it by pulling down and building on, that, when it passed into
+the possession of Hartley Parrish, little else than the open fireplace
+in the lounge remained to tell of the original farm. It was a queer,
+rambling house of only two stories whose elongated shape was
+accentuated by the additional wing which Hartley Parrish had built on.
+
+For the decoration of his country-house, Parrish had placed himself
+unreservedly in the hands of the firm entrusted with the work. Their
+architect was given _carte blanche_ to produce a house of character out
+of the rather dingy, out-of-date country villa which Harkings was when
+Hartley Parrish, attracted by the view from the gardens, first
+discovered it.
+
+The architect had gone to his work with a zest. He had ripped up walls
+and ceilings and torn down irrational matchwood partitions, discovering
+some fine old oak wainscot and the blackened roof-beams of the original
+farmstead. In the upshot he transformed Harkings into a very fair
+semblance of a late Jacobean house, fitted with every modern
+convenience and extremely comfortable. Furnished throughout with
+genuine “period” furniture, with fine dark oak panelling and parquet
+floors, it was altogether picturesque. Neither within nor without, it
+is true, would a connoisseur have been able to give it a date.
+
+But that did not worry Hartley Parrish. He loved a bargain and he had
+bought the house cheap. It was situated in beautiful country and was
+within easy reach by car of his town-house in St. James’s Square where
+he lived for the greater part of the week. Last but not least Harkings
+was the casket enshrining a treasure, the realization of a lifelong
+wish. This was the library, Parrish’s own room, designed by himself and
+furnished to his own individual taste.
+
+It stood apart from the rest of the house at the end of the wing which
+Parrish had constructed. The wing consisted of a single ground floor
+and contained the drawing-room—which was scarcely ever used, as both
+Parrish and his guests preferred the more congenial surroundings of the
+lounge—and the library. A long corridor panelled in oak led off the
+hall to the new wing. On to this corridor both the drawing-room and the
+library gave. Halfway down the corridor a small passage ran off. It
+separated the drawing-room from the library and ended in a door leading
+into the gardens at the back of the house.
+
+It was to the new wing that Horace Trevert and Dr. Romain now hastened.
+They hurried across the hall, where the big lamp of dulled glass threw
+a soft yellow light, and entered the corridor through the heavy oak
+door which shut it off from the hall. The corridor was wrapt in
+silence. Halfway down, where the small passage ran to the garden door,
+the electric light was burning.
+
+Horace Trevert ran down the corridor ahead of the doctor and was the
+first to reach the library door. He knocked sharply, then turned the
+handle. The door was locked.
+
+“Hartley!” he cried and rapped again. “Ha-a-artley! Open the door! It’s
+me, Horace!”
+
+Again he knocked and rattled the handle. Not a sound came from the
+locked room. There was an instant’s silence. Horace and the doctor
+exchanged an interrogatory look.
+
+From behind the closed door came the steady ticking of a clock. The
+silence was so absolute that both men heard it.
+
+Then the door at the end of the corridor was flung open and Bude
+appeared. He was running at a quick ambling trot, his heavy tread
+shaking the passage.
+
+“Oh? sir,” he cried, “whatever is it? What has happened?”
+
+Horace spoke quickly, incisively.
+
+“Something’s happened to Mr. Parrish, Bude,” he said. “The door’s
+locked and he doesn’t answer. We’ll have to break the door down.”
+
+Bude shook his head.
+
+“It’s solid oak, sir,” he began.
+
+Then he raised his hand.
+
+“Pardon me, gentlemen,” he said, as though an idea had struck him. “If
+we were to go out by the garden door here, we might get in through the
+window. We could break the glass if needs be!”
+
+“That’s it!” exclaimed Horace. “Come on, Doctor!”
+
+He dashed down the corridor towards the little passage. The doctor laid
+a hand on Bude’s arm.
+
+“One of us had better stay here,” he said with a meaning glance at the
+closed door.
+
+The butler raised an affrighted face to his.
+
+“Go with Sir Horace, Bude,” said the doctor. “I’ll stay!”
+
+Outside in the gardens of Harkings it was a raw, damp evening,
+pitch-black now, with little gusts of wind which shook the naked bushes
+of the rosery. The garden door led by a couple of shallow steps on to a
+gravel path which ran all along the back of the house. The path
+extended right up to the wall of the house. On the other side it
+flanked the rosery.
+
+The glass door was banging to and fro in the night wind as Bude, his
+coat-collar turned up, hurried out into the darkness. The library,
+which formed the corner of the new wing, had two windows, the one
+immediately above the gravel path looking out over the rosery, the
+other round the corner of the house giving on the same path, beyond
+which ran a high hedge of clipped box surrounding the so-called
+Pleasure Ground, a plot of smooth grass with a sundial in the centre.
+
+A glow of light came from the library window, and in its radiance Bude
+saw silhouetted the tall, well-knit figure of young Trevert. As the
+butler came up, the boy raised something in his hand and there was a
+crash of broken glass.
+
+The curtains were drawn, but with the breaking of the window they began
+to flap about. With the iron grating he had picked up from the drain
+below the window young Trevert smashed the rest of the glass away, then
+thrust an arm through the empty window-frame, fumbling for the
+window-catch.
+
+“The catch is not fastened,” he whispered, and with a resolute thrust
+he pushed the window up. The curtains leapt up wildly, revealing a
+glimpse of the pleasant, book-lined room. Both men from the darkness
+without saw Parrish’s desk littered with his papers and his habitual
+chair beyond it, pushed back empty.
+
+Trevert turned an instant, a hand on the window-sill.
+
+“Bude,” he said, “there’s no one there!”
+
+“Best look and see, sir,” replied the butler, his coat-tails flapping
+in the wind.
+
+Trevert hoisted himself easily on to the window-sill, knelt there for
+an instant, then thrust his legs over the sill and dropped into the
+room. As he did so he stumbled, cried aloud.
+
+Then the heavy grey curtains were flung back and the butler saw the
+boy’s face, rather white, at the open window.
+
+“My God,” he said slowly, “he’s dead!”
+
+A moment later Dr. Romain, waiting in the corridor, heard the key turn
+in the lock of the library door. The door was flung open. Horace
+Trevert stood there, silhouetted in a dull glow of light from the room.
+He was pointing to the open window, beneath which Hartley Parrish lay
+on his back motionless.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+BETWEEN THE DESK AND THE WINDOW
+
+
+Hartley Parrish’s library was a splendid room, square in shape, lofty
+and well proportioned. It was lined with books arranged in shelves of
+dark brown oak running round the four walls, but sunk level with them
+and reaching up to a broad band of perfectly plain white plasterwork.
+
+It was a cheerful, comfortable, eminently modern room, half library,
+half office. The oak was solid, but uncompromisingly new. The great
+leather armchairs were designed on modern lines—for comfort rather than
+for appearance. There were no pictures; but vases of chrysanthemums
+stood here and there about the room. A dictaphone in a case was in a
+corner, but beside it was a little table on which were set out some
+rare bits of old Chelsea. There was also a gramophone, but it was
+enclosed in a superb case of genuine old black-and-gold lacquer. The
+very books in their shelves carried on this contrast of business with
+recreation. For while one set of shelves contained row upon row of
+technical works, company reports, and all manner of business reference
+books bound in leather, on another were to be found the vellum-bound
+volumes of the Kelmscott Press.
+
+A sober note of grey or mole colour was the colour scheme of the room.
+The heavy pile carpet which stretched right up to the walls was of this
+quiet neutral shade: so were the easy-chairs, and the colour of the
+heavy curtains, which hung in front of the two high windows, was in
+harmony with the restful decorative scheme of the room.
+
+The massive oaken door stood opposite the window overlooking the
+rosery—the window through which Horace Trevert had entered. Parrish’s
+desk was in front of this window, between it and the door in
+consequence. By the other window, which, as has been stated, looked out
+on the clipped hedge surrounding the Pleasure Ground, was the little
+table with the Chelsea china, the dictaphone, and one of the
+easy-chairs. The centre of the room was clear so that nothing lay
+between the door and the carved mahogany chair at the desk. Here, as
+they all knew, Parrish was accustomed to sit when working, his back to
+the door, his face to the window overlooking the rosery.
+
+The desk stood about ten feet from the window. On it was a large brass
+lamp which cast a brilliant circle of light upon the broad flat top of
+the desk with its orderly array of letter-trays, its handsome
+silver-edged blotter and silver and tortoise-shell writing
+appurtenances. By the light of this lamp Dr. Romain, looking from the
+doorway, saw that Hartley Parrish’s chair was vacant, pushed back a
+little way from the desk. The rest of the room was wrapt in unrevealing
+half-light.
+
+“He’s there by the window!”
+
+Horace was whispering to the doctor. Romain strode over to the desk and
+picked up the lamp. As he did so, his eyes fell upon the pale face of
+Hartley Parrish. He lay on his back in the space between the desk and
+the window. His head was flung back, his eyes, bluish-grey,—the narrow,
+rather expressionless eyes of the successful business man,—were wide
+open and fixed in a sightless stare, his rather full mouth, with its
+clean-shaven lips, was rigid and stern. With the broad forehead, the
+prominent brows, the bold, aggressive nose, and the square bony jaw, it
+was a fighter’s face, a fine face save for the evil promise of that
+sensuous mouth. So thought the doctor with the swift psychological
+process of his trade.
+
+From the face his gaze travelled to the body. And then Romain could not
+repress an involuntary start, albeit he saw what he had half expected
+to see. The fleshy right hand of Hartley Parrish grasped convulsively
+an automatic pistol. His clutching index finger was crooked about the
+trigger and the barrel was pressed into the yielding pile of the
+carpet. His other hand with clawing fingers was flung out away from the
+body on the other side. One leg was stretched out to its fullest extent
+and the foot just touched the hem of the grey window curtains. The
+other leg was slightly drawn up.
+
+The doctor raised the lamp from the desk and, dropping on one knee,
+placed it on the ground beside the body. With gentle fingers he
+manipulated the eyes, opened the blue serge coat and waistcoat which
+Parrish was wearing. As he unbuttoned the waistcoat, he laid bare a
+dark red stain on the breast of the fine silk shirt. He opened shirt
+and under-vest, bent an ear to the still form, and then, with a little
+helpless gesture, rose to his feet.
+
+“Dead?” queried Trevert.
+
+Romain nodded shortly.
+
+“Shot through the heart!” he said.
+
+“He looked so ... so limp,” the boy said, shrinking back a little, “I
+thought he was dead. But I never thought old Hartley would have done a
+thing like that ...”
+
+The doctor pursed up his lips as if to speak. But he remained silent
+for a moment. Then he said:
+
+“Horace, the police must be informed. We can do that on the telephone.
+This room must be left just as it is until they come. I can do nothing
+more for poor Hartley. And we shall have to tell the others. I’d better
+do that myself. I wonder where Greve is? I haven’t seen him all the
+afternoon. As a barrister he should be able to advise us about—er, the
+technicalities: the police and all that ...”
+
+Rapid footsteps reverberated down the corridor. Robin Greve appeared at
+the door. The fat and frightened face of Bude appeared over his
+shoulder.
+
+“Good God, Doctor!” he cried, “what’s this Bude tells me?”
+
+The doctor cleared his throat.
+
+“Our poor friend is dead, Greve,” he said.
+
+“But how? How?”
+
+Greve stood opposite the doctor in the centre of the library. He had
+switched on the light at the door as he had come in, and the room was
+flooded with soft light thrown by concealed lamps set around the
+cornice of the ceiling.
+
+“Look!” responded the doctor by way of answer and stepped aside to let
+the young man come up to the desk. “He has a pistol in his hand!”
+
+Robin Greve took a step forward and stopped dead. He gazed for an
+instant without speaking on the dead face of his host and rival.
+
+“Suicide!”
+
+It was an affirmation rather than a question, and the little doctor
+took it up. He was not a young man and the shock and the excitement
+were beginning to tell on his nerves.
+
+“I am not a police surgeon,” he said with some asperity; “in fact, I
+may say I have not seen a dead body since my hospital days. I ... I ...
+know nothing about these things. This is a matter for the police. They
+must be summoned at once. Where’s Bude?”
+
+Robin Greve turned quickly.
+
+“Get on to the police station at Stevenish at once, Bude,” he ordered.
+“Do you know the Inspector?”
+
+“Yessir,” the butler answered in a hollow voice. His hands were
+trembling violently, and he seemed to control himself with difficulty.
+“Mr. Humphries, sir!”
+
+“Well, ring him up and tell him that Mr. Parrish ... Hullo, what do all
+these people want?”
+
+There was a commotion at the door. Frightened faces were framed in the
+doorway. Outside there was the sound of a woman whimpering. A tall,
+dark young man in a tail coat came in quickly. He stopped short when he
+saw the solemn faces of the group at the desk. It was Parrish’s man,
+Jay. He stepped forward to the desk and in a frightened sort of way
+peered at the body as it lay on the floor.
+
+“Oh, sir,” he said breathlessly, addressing Greve, “what ever has
+happened to Mr. Parrish? It can’t be true ...”
+
+Greve put his hand on the young man’s shoulder.
+
+“I’m sorry to say it is true, Jay,” he answered.
+
+“He was very good to us all,” the valet replied in a broken voice. He
+remained by the desk staring at the body in a dazed fashion.
+
+“Who is that crying outside?” Greve demanded. “This is no place for
+women ...”
+
+“It’s Mrs. Heever, the housekeeper,” Bude answered.
+
+“Well, she must go back to her room. Send all those servants away. Jay,
+will you see to it? And take care that Lady Margaret and Miss Trevert
+don’t come in here, either.”
+
+“Sir Horace is with them, sir, in the lounge,” said Jay and went out.
+
+“I’ll go to them. I think I’d better,” exclaimed the doctor. “I shall
+be in the lounge when they want me. A dreadful affair! Dreadful!”
+
+The little doctor bustled out, leaving Greve and the butler alone in
+the room with the mortal remains of Hartley Parrish lying where he had
+fallen on the soft grey carpet.
+
+“Now, Bude,” said Greve incisively, “get on to the police at once.
+You’d better telephone from the servant’s hall. I’ll have a look round
+here in the meantime!”
+
+Bude stood for an instant irresolute. He glanced shrewdly at the young
+man.
+
+“Go on,” said Robin quickly; “what are you waiting for, man? There’s no
+time to lose.”
+
+Slowly the butler turned and tiptoed away, his ungainly body swaying
+about as he stole across the heavy pile carpet. He went out of the
+room, closing the door softly behind him. He left Greve sunk in a
+reverie at the desk, gazing with unseeing eyes upon the dead face of
+the master of Harkings.
+
+That sprawling corpse, the startled realization of death stamped for
+ever in the wide, staring eyes, was indeed a subject for meditation.
+There, in the midst of all the evidences of Hartley Parrish’s meteoric
+rise to affluence and power, Greve pondered for an instant on the
+strange pranks which Fate plays us poor mortals.
+
+Parrish had risen, as Greve and all the world knew, from the bottom
+rung of the ladder. He had had a bitter fight for existence, had made
+his money, as Greve had heard, with a blind and ruthless determination
+which spoke of the stern struggle of other days. And Robin, who, too,
+had had his own way to make in the world, knew how the memory of
+earlier struggles went to sweeten the flavour of ultimate success.
+
+Yet here was Hartley Parrish, with his vast financial undertakings, his
+soaring political ambitions, his social aims which, Robin realized
+bitterly, had more than a little to do with his project for marrying
+Mary Trevert, stricken down suddenly, without warning, in the very
+heyday of success.
+
+“Why should he have done it?” he whispered to himself, “why, my God,
+why?”
+
+But the mask-like face at his feet, as he bent to scan it once more,
+gave no answer to the riddle. Determination, ambition, was portrayed on
+the keen, eager face even in death.
+
+With a little hopeless gesture the young barrister glanced round the
+room. His eye fell upon the desk. He saw a neat array of letter-trays,
+costly silver and tortoise-shell writing appointments, a couple of
+heavy gold fountain pens, and an orderly collection of pencils. Lying
+flat on the great silver-edged blotter was a long brown envelope which
+had been opened. Propped up against the large crystal ink-well was a
+letter addressed simply “Miss Mary Trevert” in Hartley Parrish’s big,
+vigorous, and sprawling handwriting.
+
+The letter to Mary Trevert, Robin did not touch. But he picked up the
+long brown envelope. On the back it bore a printed seal. The envelope
+contained a document and a letter. At the sight of it the young man
+started. It was Hartley Parrish’s will. The letter was merely a
+covering note from Mr. Bardy, of the firm of Jerringham, Bardy and
+Company, a well-known firm of solicitors, dated the previous evening.
+Robin replaced letter and document in their envelope without reading
+them.
+
+“So that’s it!” he murmured to himself. “Suicide? But why?”
+
+All the letter-trays save one were empty. In this was a little heap of
+papers and letters. Robin glanced through them. There were two or three
+prospectuses, a notice of a golf match, a couple of notes from West End
+tradesmen enclosing receipts and an acknowledgement from the bank.
+There was only one personal letter—a business communication from a
+Rotterdam firm. Robin glanced at the letter. It was typewritten on
+paper of a dark slatey-blue shade. It was headed, “ELIAS VAN DER SPYCK
+& Co., GENERAL IMPORTERS, ROTTERDAM,” and dealt with steel shipments.
+
+Robin dropped the letter back into the tray and turned to survey the
+room. It was in perfect order. Except for the still form lying on the
+floor and the broken pane of glass in the window, there was nothing to
+tell of the tragedy which had been enacted there that afternoon. There
+were no papers to hint at a crisis save the prosaic-looking envelope
+containing the will, and Parrish’s note for Mary. The waste-paper
+basket, a large and business-like affair in white wicker, had been
+cleared.
+
+Robin walked across to the fireplace. The flames leapt eagerly about a
+great oak log which hissed fitfully on top of the glowing coals
+contained in the big iron fire-basket. The grate was bare and tidy. As
+the young man looked at the fire, a little whirl of blue smoke whisked
+out of the wide fireplace and eddied into the room. Robin sniffed. The
+room smelt smoky. Now he remembered he had noticed it as he came in.
+
+He stood an instant gazing thoughtfully at the blazing and leaping
+fire. He threw a quick glance at the window where the curtains tossed
+fitfully in the breeze coming through the broken pane. Suddenly he
+stepped quickly across the room and, lifting the reading-lamp from the
+table, bore it over to the window which he scrutinized narrowly by its
+light. Then he dropped on one knee beside the dead body, placing the
+lamp on the floor beside him.
+
+He lifted the dead man’s left hand and narrowly examined the nails.
+Without touching the right hand which clasped the revolver, he studied
+its nails too. He rose and took the gold-mounted reading-glass from the
+desk and scrutinized the nails of both hands through the glass.
+
+Then he rose to his feet again and, having replaced lamp and
+reading-glass on the desk, stood there thoughtfully, his brown hands
+clasped before him. His eyes wandered from the desk to the window and
+from the window to the corpse. Then he noticed on the carpet between
+the dead body and the desk a little ball of slatey-blue paper. He bent
+down and picked it up. He had begun to unroll it when the library door
+was flung open. Robin thrust the scrap of paper in his pocket and
+turned to face the door.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+IN WHICH BUDE LOOKS AT ROBIN GREVE
+
+
+The library door opened. A large, square-built, florid man in the
+braided uniform of a police inspector stood on the threshold of the
+room. Beside him was Bude who, with an air of dignity and respectful
+mourning suitably blended, waved him into the room.
+
+“The—ahem!—body is in here, Mr. Humphries, sir!”
+
+Inspector Humphries stepped quickly into the room. A little countryfied
+in appearance and accent, he had the careful politeness, the measured
+restraint, and the shrewd eye of the typical police officer. In thirty
+years’ service he had risen from village constable to be Inspector of
+county police. Slow to anger, rather stolid, and with an excellent
+heart, he had a vein of shrewd common sense not uncommonly found in
+that fast disappearing species, the English peasant.
+
+He nodded shortly to Greve, and with a tread that shook the room strode
+across to where Hartley Parrish was lying dead. In the meantime a
+harassed-looking man with a short grey beard, wearing a shabby frock
+coat, had slipped into the room behind the Inspector. He approached
+Greve.
+
+“Dr. Romain?” he queried, peering through his gold spectacles, “the
+butler said ...”
+
+“No, my name is Greve,” answered Robin. “I am staying in the house.
+This is Dr. Romain.”
+
+He motioned to the door. Dr. Romain came bustling into the room.
+
+“Glad to see you here so promptly, Inspector,” he said. “A shocking
+business, very. Is this the doctor? I am Dr. Romain ...”
+
+Dr. Redstone bowed with alacrity.
+
+“A great privilege, sir,” he said staidly. “I have followed your
+work....”
+
+But the other did not let him finish.
+
+“Shot through the heart ... instantaneous death ... severe haemorrhage
+... the pistol is there ... in his hand. A man with everything he
+wanted in the world ... I can’t understand it. ’Pon my soul, I can’t!”
+
+The Inspector, who had been kneeling by the corpse, motioned with his
+head to the village doctor. Dr. Redstone went to him and began a
+cursory examination of the body. The Inspector rose.
+
+“I understand from the butler, gentlemen,” he said, “that it was Miss
+Trevert, a lady staying in the house, who heard the shot fired. I
+should like to see her, please. And you, sir, are you a relation of
+...”
+
+Greve, thus addressed, hastily replied.
+
+“Only a friend, Inspector. I am staying in the house. I am a barrister.
+Perhaps I may be able to assist you ...”
+
+Humphries shot a slow, shrewd glance at him from beneath his shaggy
+blond eyebrows.
+
+“Thank you, sir, much obliged, I’m sure. Now”—he thrust a hand into his
+tunic and produced a large leather-bound notebook—“do you know anything
+as would throw a light on this business?”
+
+Greve shook his head.
+
+“He seemed perfectly cheerful at lunch. He left the dining-room
+directly after he had taken his coffee.”
+
+“Where did he go?”
+
+“He came here to work. He told us at lunch that he was going to shut
+himself up in the library for the whole afternoon as he had a lot of
+work to get through.”
+
+The Inspector made a note or two in his book. Then he paused
+thoughtfully tapping the end of his pencil against his teeth.
+
+“It was Miss Trevert, you say, who found the body?”
+
+“No,” Greve replied. “Her brother, Sir Horace Trevert. It was Miss
+Trevert who heard the shot fired.”
+
+“The door was locked, I think?”
+
+“On the inside. But here is Sir Horace Trevert. He will tell you how he
+got through the window and discovered the body.”
+
+Horace Trevert gave a brief account of his entry into the library.
+Again the Inspector scribbled in his notebook.
+
+“One or two more questions, gentlemen, please,” he said, “and then I
+should wish to see Miss Trevert. Firstly, who saw Mr. Hartley Parrish
+last: and at what time?”
+
+Horace Trevert looked at Greve.
+
+“It would be when he left us after lunch, wouldn’t it?” he said.
+
+“Certainly, certainly,” Dr. Romain broke in. “He left us all together
+in the dining-room, you, Horace and Robin and Lady Margaret and Mary
+... Miss Trevert and her mother, you know,” he added by way of
+explanation to the Inspector.
+
+“And he went straight to the library?”
+
+“Straight away, Mr. Humphries, sir,” broke in Bude. “Mr. Parrish
+crossed me in the hall and gave me particular instructions that he was
+not to be disturbed.”
+
+“That was at what time?”
+
+“About two-thirty, sir.”
+
+“Then you were the last person to see him before ...”
+
+“Why, no ... that is, unless ...”
+
+The butler hesitated, casting a quick glance round his audience.
+
+“What do you mean?” rapped out the Inspector, looking up from his
+notebook. “Did anybody else see Mr. Parrish in spite of his orders?”
+
+Bude was silent. He was looking at Greve.
+
+“Come on,” said Humphries sternly. “You heard my question? What makes
+you think anybody else had access to Mr. Parrish before the shot was
+heard?”
+
+Bude made a little resigned gesture of the hands.
+
+“Well, sir, I thought ... I made sure that Mr. Greve ...”
+
+There was a moment’s tense silence.
+
+“Well?” snapped Humphries.
+
+“I was going to say I made certain that Mr. Greve was going to Mr.
+Parrish in the library to tell him tea was ready. Mr. Greve passed me
+in the hall and went down the library corridor just after I had served
+the tea.”
+
+All eyes turned to Robin.
+
+“It’s perfectly true,” he said. “I went out into the gardens for a
+mouthful of fresh air just before tea. I left the house by the side
+door off the corridor here. I didn’t go to the library, though. It is
+an understood thing in this house that no one ever disturbs Mr. Parrish
+when he ...”
+
+He broke off sharply.
+
+“My God, Mary,” he cried, “you mustn’t come in here!”
+
+All turned round at his loud exclamation. Mary Trevert stood in the
+doorway. Dr. Romain darted forward.
+
+“My dear,” he said soothingly, “you mustn’t be here ...”
+
+Passively she let him lead her into the corridor. The Inspector
+continued his examination.
+
+“At what time did you come along this corridor, sir?” he asked Robin.
+
+“It was not long after the tea gong went,” answered Robin, “about ten
+minutes past five, I should say ...”
+
+“And you heard nothing?”
+
+Robin shook his head.
+
+“Absolutely nothing,” he replied. “The corridor was perfectly quiet. I
+stepped out into the grounds, went for a turn round the house, but it
+was raining, so I came in almost at once.”
+
+“At what time was that?”
+
+“When I came in ... oh, about two or three minutes later, say about a
+quarter past five.”
+
+Humphries turned to Horace Trevert.
+
+“What time was it when Miss Trevert heard the shot?”
+
+Horace puckered up his brow.
+
+“Well,” he said, “I don’t quite know. We were having tea. It wasn’t
+much after five—I should say about a quarter past.”
+
+“Then the shot that Miss Trevert heard would have been fired just about
+the time that you, sir,” he turned to Robin, “were coming in from your
+stroll.”
+
+“Somewhere about that time, I should say!” Robin answered rather
+thoughtfully.
+
+“Did you hear it?” queried the Inspector.
+
+“No,” said Robin.
+
+“But surely you must have been at or near the side door at the time as
+you were coming in ...”
+
+“I came in by the front door,” said Robin, “on the other side of the
+house ...”
+
+Very carefully the Inspector closed his notebook, thrust the pencil
+back in its place along the back, fastened the elastic about the book,
+and turned to Horace Trevert.
+
+“And now, sir, if I might speak to Miss Trevert alone for a minute ...”
+
+“I say, though,” expostulated Horace, “my sister’s awfully upset, you
+know. Is it absolutely necessary?”
+
+“Aye, sir, it is!” said the Inspector. “But there’s no need for me to
+see her in here. Perhaps in some other room ...”
+
+“The drawing-room is next to this,” the butler put in; “they’d be nice
+and quiet in there, Sir Horace.”
+
+The Inspector acquiesced. Dr. Redstone drew him aside for a whispered
+colloquy.
+
+The Inspector came back to Robin and Horace.
+
+“The doctor would like to have the body taken upstairs to Mr. Parrish’s
+room,” he said. “He wishes to make a more detailed examination if Dr.
+Romain would help him. If one of you gentlemen could give orders about
+this ... I have two officers outside who would lend a hand. And this
+room must then be shut and locked. Sergeant Harris!” he called.
+
+“Sir!”
+
+A stout sergeant appeared at the library door.
+
+“As soon as the body has been removed, you will lock the room and bring
+the key to me. And you will return here and see that no one attempts to
+get into the room. Understand?”
+
+“Yessir!”
+
+“Inspector!”
+
+Robin Greve called Inspector Humphries as the latter was preparing to
+follow Bude to the drawing-room.
+
+“Mr. Parrish seems to have written a note for Miss Trevert,” he said,
+pointing at the desk. “And in that envelope you will find Mr. Parrish’s
+will. I discovered it there on the desk just before you arrived!”
+
+Again the Inspector shot one of his swift glances at the young man. He
+went over to the desk, shook the document and letter from their
+envelope, glanced at them, and replaced them.
+
+“I don’t rightly know that this concerns me, gentlemen,” he said
+slowly. “I think I’ll just take charge of it. And I’ll give Miss
+Trevert her letter.”
+
+Taking the two envelopes, he tramped heavily out of the room.
+
+Then in a little while Bude and Jay and two bucolic-looking policemen
+came to the library to move the body of the master of Harkings. Robin
+stood by and watched the little procession pass slowly with silent feet
+across the soft pile carpet and out into the corridor. But his thoughts
+were not with Parrish. He was haunted by the look which Mary Trevert
+had given him as she had stood for an instant at the library door, a
+look of fear, of suspicion. And it made his heart ache.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+THE LETTER
+
+
+The great drawing-room of Harkings was ablaze with light. The cluster
+of lights in the heavy crystal chandelier and the green-shaded electric
+lamps in their gilt sconces on the plain white-panelled walls coldly
+lit up the formal, little-used room with its gilt furniture, painted
+piano, and huge marble fireplace.
+
+This glittering Louis Seize environment seemed altogether too much for
+the homely Inspector. Whilst waiting for Mary Trevert to come to him,
+he tried several attitudes in turn. The empty hearth frightened him
+away from the mantelpiece, the fragile appearance of a gilt settee
+decided him against risking his sixteen stone weight on its silken
+cushions, and the vastness of the room overawed him when he took up his
+position in the centre of the Aubusson carpet. Finally he selected an
+ornate chair, rather more solid-looking than the rest, which he drew up
+to a small table on the far side of the room. There he sat down, his
+large red hands spread out upon his knees in an attitude of singular
+embarrassment.
+
+But Mary Trevert set him quickly at his ease when presently she came to
+him. She was pale, but quite self-possessed. Indeed, the effort she had
+made to regain her self-control was so marked that it would have
+scarcely escaped the attention of the Inspector, even if he had not had
+a brief vision of her as she had stood for that instant at the library
+door, pale, distraught, and trembling. He was astonished to find her
+cool, collected, almost business-like in the way she sat down, motioned
+him to his seat, and expressed her readiness to tell him all she knew.
+
+The phrases he had been laboriously preparing—“This has been a bad
+shock for you, ma’am”; “You will forgive me, I’m sure, ma’am, for
+calling upon you at a moment such as this”—died away on his lips as
+Mary Trevert said:
+
+“Ask me any questions you wish, Inspector. I will tell you everything I
+can.”
+
+“That’s very good of you, ma’am, I’m sure,” answered the Inspector,
+unstrapping his notebook, “and I’ll try and not detain you long. Now,
+then, tell me what you know of this sad affair ...”
+
+Mary Trevert plucked an instant nervously at her little cambric
+handerchief in her lap. Then she said:
+
+“I went to the library from the billiard-room ...”
+
+“A moment,” interposed the Inspector. “What time was that?”
+
+“A little after five. The tea gong had gone some time. I was going to
+the library to tell Mr. Parrish that tea was ready ...”
+
+Mr. Humphries made a note. He nodded to show he was listening.
+
+“I crossed the hall and went down the library corridor. I knocked on
+the library door. There was no reply. Then I heard a shot and a sort of
+thud.”
+
+Despite her effort to remain calm, the girl’s voice shook a little. She
+made a little helpless gesture of her hands. A diamond ring she was
+wearing on her finger caught the light and blazed for an instant.
+
+“Then I got frightened. I ran back along the corridor to the lounge
+where the others were and told them.”
+
+“When you knocked at the door, you say there was no reply. I suppose,
+now, you tried the handle first.”
+
+“Oh, yes ...”
+
+“Then Mr. Parrish would have heard the two sounds? The turning of the
+handle and then the knocking on the door? That’s so, isn’t it?”
+
+“Yes, I suppose so ...”
+
+“Yet you say there was no reply?”
+
+“No. None at all.”
+
+The Inspector jotted a word or two in his notebook as it lay open flat
+upon the table.
+
+“The shot, then, was fired immediately after you had knocked? Not while
+you were knocking?”
+
+“No. I knocked and waited, expecting Mr. Parrish to answer. Instead of
+him answering, there came this shot ...”
+
+“I see. And after the shot was fired there was a crash?”
+
+“A sort of thud—like something heavy falling down.”
+
+“And you heard no groan or cry?”
+
+The girl knit her brows for a moment.
+
+“I ... I ... was frightened by the shot. I ... I ... don’t seem able to
+remember what happened afterwards. Let me think ... let me think ...”
+
+“There, there,” said the Inspector paternally, “don’t upset yourself
+like this. Just try and think what happened after you heard the shot
+fired ...”
+
+Mary Trevert shuddered, one slim white hand pressed against her cheek.
+
+“I do remember now,” she said, “there _was_ a cry. It was more like a
+sharp exclamation ...”
+
+“And then you heard this crash?”
+
+“Yes ...”
+
+The girl had somewhat regained her self-possession. She dabbed her eyes
+with her handkerchief quickly as though ashamed of her weakness.
+
+“Now,” said Humphries, clearing his throat, as though to indicate that
+the conversation had changed, “you and Lady Margaret Trevert knew Mr.
+Parrish pretty well, I believe, Miss Trevert. Have you any idea why he
+should have done this thing?”
+
+Mary Trevert shook her dark head rather wearily.
+
+“It is inconceivable to me ... to all of us,” she answered.
+
+“Do you happen to know whether Mr. Parrish had any business worries?”
+
+“He always had a great deal of business on hand and he has had a great
+deal to do lately over some big deal.”
+
+“What was it, do you know?”
+
+“He was raising fresh capital for Hornaway’s—that is the big
+engineering firm he controls ...”
+
+“Do you know if he was pleased with the way things were shaping?”
+
+“Oh, yes. He told me last night that everything would be finished this
+week. He seemed quite satisfied.”
+
+The Inspector paused to make a note.
+
+Then he thrust a hand into the side-pocket of his tunic and produced
+Hartley Parrish’s letter.
+
+“This,” he said, eyeing the girl as he handed her the letter, “may
+throw some light on the affair!”
+
+Open-eyed, a little surprised, she took the plain white envelope from
+his hand and gazed an instant without speaking, on the bold sprawling
+address—
+
+_“Miss Mary Trevert.”_
+
+
+“Open it, please,” said the Inspector gently.
+
+The girl tore open the envelope. Humphries saw her eyes fill, watched
+the emotion grip her and shake her in her self-control so that she
+could not speak when, her reading done, she gave him back the letter.
+
+Without asking her permission, he took the sheet of fine, expensive
+paper with its neat engraved heading and postal directions, and read
+Hartley Parrish’s last message.
+
+My dear [it ran], I signed my will at Bardy’s office yesterday, and he
+sent it back to me to-day. Just this line to let you know you are
+properly provided for should anything happen to me. I wanted to fix
+things so that you and Lady Margaret would not have to worry any more.
+I just had to _write_. I guess you understand why.
+
+
+H.
+
+
+There was a long and impressive silence while the Inspector
+deliberately read the note. Then he looked interrogatively at the girl.
+
+“We were engaged, Inspector,” she said. “We were to have been married
+very soon.”
+
+A deep flush crept slowly over Mr. Humphries’s florid face and spread
+into the roots of his tawny fair hair.
+
+“But what does he mean by ‘having to write’?” he asked.
+
+The girl replied hastily, her eyes on the ground.
+
+“Mr. Parrish was under the impression that ... that ... without his
+money I should not have cared for him. That is what he means ...”
+
+“You knew he had provided for you in his will?”
+
+“He told me several times that he intended to leave me everything. You
+see, he has no relatives!”
+
+“I see!” said the Inspector in a reflective voice.
+
+“Had he any enemies, do you know? Anybody who would drive him to a
+thing like this?”
+
+The girl shook her head vehemently.
+
+“No!”
+
+The monosyllable came out emphatically. Again the Inspector darted one
+of his quick, shrewd glances at the girl. She met his scrutiny with her
+habitual serene and candid gaze. The Inspector dropped his eyes and
+scribbled in his book.
+
+“Was his health good?”
+
+“He smoked far too much,” the girl said, “and it made him rather nervy.
+But otherwise he never had a day’s illness in his life.”
+
+Humphries ran his eye over the notes he had made.
+
+“There is just one more question I should like to ask you, Miss
+Trevert,” he said, “rather a personal question.”
+
+Mary Trevert’s hands twisted the cambric handkerchief into a little
+ball and slowly unwound it again. But her face remained quite calm.
+
+“About your engagement to Mr. Parrish ... when did it take place?”
+
+“Some days ago. It has not yet been announced.”
+
+The Inspector coughed.
+
+“I was only wondering whether, perhaps, Mr. Parrish was not quite ...
+whether he was, maybe, a little disturbed in his mind about the
+engagement ...”
+
+The girl hesitated. Then she said firmly:
+
+“Mr. Parrish was perfectly happy about it. He was looking forward to
+our being married in the spring.”
+
+Mr. Humphries shut his notebook with a snap and rose to his feet.
+
+“Thank you very much, ma’am,” he said with a little formal bow. “If you
+will excuse me now. I have the doctor to see again and there’s the
+Coroner to be warned ...”
+
+He bowed again and tramped towards the door with a tread that made the
+chandelier tinkle melodiously.
+
+The door closed behind him and his heavy footsteps died away along the
+corridor. Mary Trevert had risen to her feet calm and impassive. But
+when he had gone, her bosom began to heave and a spasm of pain shot
+across her face. Again the tears welled up in her eyes, brimmed over
+and stole down her cheeks.
+
+“If I only _knew!_” she sobbed, “if I only _knew!_”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+VOICES IN THE LIBRARY
+
+
+The swift tragedy of the winter afternoon had convulsed the
+well-organized repose of Hartley Parrish’s household. Nowhere had his
+master grasp of detail been seen to better advantage than in the
+management of his country home. Overwhelmed with work though he
+constantly was, accustomed to carry his business and often part of his
+business staff to Harkings with him for the week-ends, there was never
+the least confusion about the house. The methodical calm of Harkings
+was that of a convent.
+
+Hartley Parrish was wont to say that he paid his butler and housekeeper
+well to save himself from worry. It was rather to ensure his orders
+being punctiliously and promptly carried out. His was the mind behind
+the method which ensured that meals were punctually served and trains
+at Stevenish Station never missed.
+
+But it was into a house in turmoil that Mary Trevert stepped when she
+left the drawing-room and passed along the corridor to go to her room.
+Doors slammed and there was the heavy thud of footsteps on the floor
+above. The glass door leading into the gardens was open, as Mary passed
+it, swinging in the gusts of cold rain. In the gardens without there
+was a confused murmur of voices and the flash of lanterns.
+
+In the hall a knot of servants were gossiping in frightened whispers
+with a couple of large, rather bovine country constables who,
+bareheaded, without their helmets, which they held under their arms,
+looked curiously undressed.
+
+The whispers died away as Mary crossed the hall. All eyes followed her
+with interest as she went. It was as though an echo of her talk with
+the Inspector had by some occult means already spread through the
+little household. Through the half-open green baize door leading to the
+servants’ quarters some unseen person was bawling down the telephone in
+a heated controversy with the exchange about a long-distance call to
+London. And but an hour since, the girl reflected sadly, as she mounted
+the oaken staircase, the house had been wrapt in its wonted evening
+silence in response to that firm and dominating personality who had
+passed out in the gloom of the winter twilight.
+
+When, about six months before, Mary and her mother had begun to be
+regular visitors at Harkings, Hartley Parrish had insisted on giving
+Mary a boudoir to herself. This, in response to a chance remark of
+Mary’s in admiration of a Chinese room she had seen at a friend’s
+house, Parrish had had decorated in the Chinese style with black walls
+and black-and-gold lacquer furniture. The room had been transformed
+from a rather prosaic morning-room with old oak and chintz in the space
+of three days as a surprise for Mary. She remembered now how Parrish
+had left her to make the discovery of the change for herself. She loved
+colour and line, and the contrast between this quaint and delightful
+room with her rather shabby bedroom in her mother’s small house in
+Brompton had made this surprise one of the most delightful she had ever
+experienced.
+
+She rang the bell and sat down listlessly in a charmingly lacquered
+Louis Seize armchair in front of the log-fire blazing brightly in the
+fireplace. She was conscious that a great disaster had overtaken her,
+but only dimly conscious. For more poignantly than this dull sense of
+tragedy she was aware of a great aching at her heart, and her thoughts,
+after hovering over the events of the afternoon, settled down upon her
+talk that afternoon ... already how far off it seemed ... with Robin
+Greve in the library.
+
+Robin had always been her hero. She could see him now in the glow of
+the fire as he had been when in the holidays he had come and snatched
+her away from a home already drab and difficult for a matinée and an
+orgy of cream cakes at Gunter’s afterwards. He was then a long, slim,
+handsome boy of irrepressible spirits and impulsive generosity which
+usually left him, after the first few days of his holidays, in a state
+of lamentable impecuniosity. All their lives, it seemed to her, they
+had been friends, but with no stronger feeling between them until
+Robin, having joined the Army on the outbreak of war, had come to say
+good-bye on being ordered to France.
+
+But by that time money troubles at home with which, as it seemed to
+her, she had been surrounded all her life, had grown so pressing that,
+apart from Lady Margaret’s reiterated counsels, she herself had come to
+recognize that a suitable marriage was the only way out of their
+ever-increasing embarrassment.
+
+She and Robin, she recalled with a feeling of relief, had never
+discussed the matter. He, too, had understood and had sailed for France
+without seeking to take advantage of the circumstance.
+
+Outside in the black night a car throbbed. Footsteps crunched the
+gravel beneath her window. The sounds brought her back to the present
+with a sudden pang. She began to think of Hartley Parrish. All her life
+she had been so very poor that, until she had met this big, vigorous,
+intensely vital man, she had never known what a lavish command of money
+meant. Hartley Parrish did things in a big way. If he wanted a thing he
+bought it, as he had bought Bude, as he had bought a car he had seen
+standing outside a Pall Mall club and admired. He had rooted the owner
+out, bade him name his price, and had paid it, there and then, by
+cheque, and driven Mary off to a lawn tennis tournament at Queen’s,
+hugely delighted by her bewilderment.
+
+She did not love him. She could never have learnt to love him. There
+was a gleeful zest in his enjoyment of his money, an ostentatious
+parade of his riches which repelled her. And there was a look in his
+face, those narrow eyes, that hard mouth, which revealed to her womanly
+intuition a ruthlessness which she guessed he kept for his business.
+But she liked him, especially his reverent and chivalrous devotion to
+her, and the thought that his dominating and vital personality was
+extinguished for ever made her conscious of a great void in her life.
+
+And now she was rich. Hartley Parrish’s idea of “proper provision” for
+her, she knew, meant wealth for her beyond anything she had ever
+dreamed. The perpetual debasing struggle with poverty which she and her
+mother had carried on for years was a thing of the past. Money meant
+freedom, freedom to live ... and to love.
+
+She stretched her hands out to the blaze. Was she free to love? What
+had driven Hartley Parrish to suicide? Or who? She went over in her
+mind her interview with Robin Greve in the billiard-room. He had spoken
+of other women in connection with Hartley Parrish. Had he used that
+knowledge to threaten his rival? What had Robin done after he had left
+her that afternoon with his final taunt?
+
+She felt the blood rise to her cheeks as she thought of it. Mary
+Trevert had all the pride of her ancient race. The recollection of that
+taunt galled her. Her loyalty to the man from whom she had received
+nothing but chivalry, whose fortune was to banish a hideous nightmare
+from her life, rose up in arms. What had Robin done? She must know the
+truth ...
+
+A tap came at the door. Bude appeared.
+
+“I think you rang, Miss,” he said in his quiet, deep voice. “I was with
+the Inspector, Miss, and I couldn’t come before. Was there
+anything?...”
+
+The girl turned in her chair.
+
+“Come in and shut the door, Bude,” she said. “I want to speak to you.”
+
+The butler obeyed and came over to where she sat. He seemed ill at ease
+and rather apprehensive.
+
+“Bude,” said the girl, “I want you to tell me why you were certain that
+Mr. Greve was going to Mr. Parrish in the library when he passed you in
+the hall this afternoon!”
+
+The butler smoothed his hands down his trousers in embarrassment.
+
+“I thought he ... Mr. Greve ... would be sure to be going to fetch Mr.
+Parrish in to tea, Miss ...” he replied, eyeing the girl anxiously.
+
+Mary Trevert continued gazing into the fire.
+
+“You know it is a rule in this house, Bude,” she said, “that Mr.
+Parrish is never disturbed in the library ...”
+
+The butler changed his position uneasily.
+
+“Yes, Miss, but I thought ...”
+
+Slowly Mary Trevert turned and looked at the man.
+
+“Bude,”—her voice was very calm,—“I want you to tell me the truth. You
+know that Mr. Greve went in to Mr. Parrish ...”
+
+Bude looked uneasily about him.
+
+“Oh, Miss,” he answered, almost in a whisper, “whatever are you
+saying?”
+
+“I want your answer, Bude,” the girl said coldly.
+
+Bude did not speak. He rubbed his hands up and down his trousers in
+desperation.
+
+“I wish to know why Mr. Parrish did this thing, Bude. I mean to know.
+And I think you are keeping something back!”
+
+The challenge resounded clearly, firmly.
+
+“Miss Trevert, ma’am,” the butler said in a low voice, “I wouldn’t take
+it upon me to say anything as would get anybody in this house into
+trouble....”
+
+“You saw Mr. Greve go into Mr. Parrish?”
+
+The butler raised his hands in a quick gesture of denial.
+
+“God forbid, Miss!” he ejaculated in horror.
+
+“What, then, do you know that is likely to get anybody here into
+trouble?”
+
+The butler hesitated an instant. Then he spoke.
+
+“That Inspector Humphries has been asking me questions, Miss, in a
+nasty, suspicious sort o’ way. I told him, what I told him already,
+that just after I’d done serving the tea Mr. Greve crossed the hall and
+went down the library corridor....”
+
+“You didn’t tell him everything, Bude?”
+
+The butler took a step nearer.
+
+“Oh, Miss,” he said, lowering his voice, “if you’ll pardon my
+frankness, but I know as how you and Mr. Greve are old friends, and I
+wouldn’t take it upon me to tell the police anything as might ...”
+
+Mary Trevert stood up and faced the man.
+
+“Bude,” said she, “Mr. Parrish was your master, a kind and generous
+master as he was kind and generous to every one in this house. We must
+clear up the mystery of his ... of his death. Neither you nor I nor Mr.
+Greve nor anybody must stand in the way. Now, tell me the truth!”
+
+She dropped back into her chair. She gave the order imperiously like
+the mistress of the house. The butler, trained through life to receive
+orders, surrendered.
+
+“There’s nothing much to tell, Miss. When Mr. Humphries asked me if I
+were the last person to see Mr. Parrish alive, I made sure that Mr.
+Greve would say he had been in to tell him tea was ready. But Mr.
+Greve, who heard the Inspector’s question and my answer, said nothing.
+So I thought, maybe, he had his reasons and I did not feel exactly as
+how it was my place ...”
+
+Mary Trevert tapped with her foot impatiently.
+
+“But what grounds have you for saying that Mr. Greve went in to Mr.
+Parrish? Mr. Greve declared quite positively that he went out by the
+side door and did not go into the library at all.”
+
+“But, Miss, I heard him speaking to Mr. Parrish ...”
+
+The girl turned round and the man saw fear in her wide-open eyes.
+
+The butler put his hand on the back of her chair and leaned forward.
+
+“Better leave things where they are, Miss,” he said in a low voice.
+“Mr. Parrish, I dare say, had his reasons. He’s gone to his last
+account now. What does it matter why he done it ...”
+
+The man was agitated, and in his emotion his carefully studied English
+was forsaking him.
+
+But the girl broke in incisively.
+
+“Please explain what you mean!” she commanded.
+
+“Why, Miss,” replied the butler, “we know that Mr. Greve had no call to
+like Mr. Parrish seeing how things were between you and the master ...”
+
+“You mean the servants know that Mr. Parrish and I were engaged ...”
+
+Bude made a deprecatory gesture.
+
+“Know, Miss? I wouldn’t go so far as to say ‘know.’ But there has been
+some talk in the servants’ ’all, Miss. You know what young female
+servants are, Miss ...”
+
+“And you think that Mr. Greve went to Mr. Parrish to talk about ...
+me?”
+
+Mary Trevert’s voice faltered a little. She looked eagerly at the
+other’s fat, smooth face.
+
+“I presoomed as much, Miss, I must confess!”
+
+“But what did you hear Mr. Greve say?”
+
+“I heard nothing, Miss, except just only the sound of voices. After Mr.
+Greve had crossed me in the hall, I took the salver I was carrying into
+the butler’s pantry. I stayed there a minute or two, and then I
+remembered I had not collected the letters from the box in the hall for
+the chauffeur to take to the post, the same as he does every evening. I
+went back to the hall, and just as I opened the green baize door I
+heard voices from the library ...”
+
+“Was it Mr. Greve’s voice?”
+
+“I cannot say, Miss. It was just the sound of voices, rather loud-like.
+I caught the sound because the door leading from the hall to the
+library corridor was ajar. Mr. Greve must have forgotten to shut it.”
+
+“What did you do?”
+
+“Well, Miss, I closed the corridor door ...”
+
+“Why did you do that?”
+
+“Well, Miss, seeing the voices sounded angry-like, I thought perhaps it
+would be better not to let any one else hear.... And Mr. Greve looked
+upset-like when he passed me. He gave me quite a turn, he did, when I
+saw his face under the hall lamp....”
+
+“Did you stay there ... and listen?”
+
+Bude drew himself up.
+
+“That is not my ’abit, Miss, not ’ere nor in hany of the ’ouses where I
+’ave seen service....”
+
+The butler broke off. The _h_’s were too much for him in his
+indignation.
+
+“I didn’t mean to suggest anything underhand,” the girl said quickly.
+“I mean, did you hear any more?”
+
+“No, Miss. I emptied the letter-box and took the letters to the
+servants’ hall.”
+
+“But,” said Mary in a puzzled way, “why do you say it was Mr. Greve if
+you didn’t hear his voice?”
+
+Bude spread out his hands in bewilderment.
+
+“Who else should it have been, Miss? Sir Horace and the doctor were in
+the lounge at tea. Jay and Robert were in the servants’ hall. It could
+have been nobody else....”
+
+The girl’s head sank slowly on her breast. She was silent. The butler
+shifted his position.
+
+“Was there anything more, Miss?” he asked after a little while.
+
+“There is nothing further, thank you, Bude,” replied Mary. “About Mr.
+Greve, I am sure there must be some mistake. He cannot have understood
+Mr. Humphries’s question. I’ll ask him about it when I see him. I don’t
+think I should say anything to the Inspector about it, at any rate, not
+until I’ve seen Mr. Greve. He’ll probably speak to you about it
+himself....”
+
+Bude made a motion as though he were going to say something. Then
+apparently he thought better of it, for he made a little formal bow and
+in his usual slow and dignified manner made his exit from the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+ROBIN GOES TO MARY
+
+
+The house telephone, standing on the long and gracefully designed desk
+with its elaborately lacquered top, whirred. Mary started from her
+reverie in her chair by the fire. By the clock on the mantelshelf she
+saw that it was a quarter past eight. She remembered that once her
+mother had knocked at her door and bidden her come down to dinner. She
+had refused the invitation, declining to unlock the door.
+
+She lifted the receiver.
+
+“That you, Mary?”
+
+Robin was speaking.
+
+“May I come up and see you? Or would you rather be left alone?”
+
+His firm, pleasant voice greatly comforted her. Only then she realized
+how greatly she craved sympathy. But the recollection of Bude’s story
+suddenly interposed itself like a barrier between them.
+
+“Yes, come up,” she said, “I want to speak to you!”
+
+Her voice was dispirited,
+
+“I don’t want to see him,” she told herself as she replaced the
+receiver, got up, and unlocked the door, “but I must _know_!”
+
+A gentle tap came at the door. Robin came in quickly and crossed to
+where she stood by the fire.
+
+“My dear!” he said and put out his two hands.
+
+Her hands were behind her back, the fingers nervously intertwining. She
+kept them there and made no sign that she had observed his gesture.
+
+He looked at her in surprise.
+
+“This has been terrible for you, Mary,” he said. “I wish to God I could
+make you realize how very, very much I feel for you in what you must be
+going through....”
+
+The phrase was formal and he brought it out irresolutely, chilled as he
+was by her reception. She was looking at him dispassionately, her
+forehead a little puckered, her eyes a trifle hard.
+
+“Won’t you sit down,” she said. “There is something I wanted to say!”
+
+He was looking at her now in a puzzled fashion. With rather feigned
+deliberation he chose a chair and sat down facing the fire. A lamp on
+the mantelpiece—the only light in the room—threw its rays on his face.
+His chin was set rather more squarely than his wont and his eyes were
+shining.
+
+“Mary,”—he leant forward towards her,—“please forget what I said this
+afternoon. It was beastly of me, but I hardly knew what I was
+doing....”
+
+She made a little gesture as if to wave his apology aside. Then, with
+her hands clasped in front of her, scanning the nails, she asked,
+almost casually:
+
+“What did you say to Hartley Parrish in the library this afternoon?”
+
+Robin stared at her in amazement.
+
+“But I was not in the library!” he answered.
+
+The girl dropped her hands sharply to her side.
+
+“Don’t quibble with me, Robin,” she said. “What did you say to Hartley
+Parrish after you left me this afternoon in the billiard-room?”
+
+He was still staring at her, but now there was a deep furrow between
+his brows. He was breathing rather hard.
+
+“I did not speak to Parrish at all after I left you.”
+
+His answer was curt and incisive.
+
+“Do you mean to tell me,” Mary said, “that, after you left me and went
+down the corridor towards the library, you neither went in to Hartley
+nor spoke to him!”
+
+“I do!”
+
+“Then how do you account for the fact that, almost immediately after
+you had crossed Bude in the hall, he heard the sound of voices in the
+library?”
+
+Robin Greve stood up abruptly.
+
+“Bude, you say, makes this statement?”
+
+“Certainly!”
+
+“To whom, may I ask?”
+
+He spoke sharply and there was a challenging ring in his voice. It
+nettled the girl.
+
+“Only to me,” she said quickly, and added: “You needn’t think he has
+told the police!”
+
+Very deliberately Robin plucked his handkerchief from his sleeve, wiped
+his lips, and replaced it. The girl saw that his hands were trembling.
+
+“Why do you say that to me?” he demanded rather fiercely.
+
+Mary Trevert shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“This afternoon,” she said, “when I told you of my engagement to
+Hartley, you began by abusing him to me, you rushed from the room
+making straight for the library where we all know that Hartley was
+working, and a few minutes after Bude hears voices raised in anger
+proceeding from there. The next thing we know is that Hartley has ...”
+
+She broke off and looked away.
+
+“Mary,”—Robin’s voice was grave, and he had mastered all signs of
+irritation,—“you and I have known one another all our lives. You ought
+to know me well enough by now to understand that I don’t tell you lies.
+When I say I haven’t seen or spoken to Hartley Parrish since lunch this
+afternoon, that is the truth!”
+
+“How can it be the truth?” the girl insisted. “Horace and Dr. Romain
+were both in the lounge-hall, Bude was in the hall, the other
+menservants were in the servants’ hall. You are the only man in the
+house not accounted for, and a minute before Bude heard these voices
+you go down the corridor towards the library. I can understand you
+wanting to keep it from the police, but why do you want to deceive
+_me_?”
+
+“Mary,” answered the young man sternly, “I know you’re upset, but
+that’s no justification for persisting in this stupid charge against
+me. I tell you I never saw Parrish or spoke to him, either, between
+lunch and when I saw him lying dead in the library. I am not going to
+repeat the denial. But you may as well understand now that I am not in
+the habit of allowing my friends to doubt my word!”
+
+Mary flamed up at his tone.
+
+“If you are my friend,” she cried, “why can’t you trust me? Why should
+I find this out from Bude? Why should I be humiliated by hearing from
+the butler that he kept this evidence from the police in order to
+please me because you and I are friends? I am only trying to help you,
+to shield you ...”
+
+“That will do, Mary,” he said. “No, you must hear what I have to say.
+If you insist on disbelieving me, you must. But I don’t want you to
+help me. I don’t want you to shield me. I shall make it my business to
+see that Bude’s evidence is brought before the detective inspector from
+Scotland Yard who is being brought down here to handle the case ...”
+
+“A detective from Scotland Yard?” the girl repeated.
+
+“Yes, a detective. Humphries is puzzled by several points about this
+case and has asked for assistance from London. He is right. Neither the
+circumstances of Parrish’s death nor the motive of his act are clear.
+Bude’s evidence is sufficient proof that somebody did gain access to
+the library this afternoon. In that case....”
+
+“Yes....”
+
+“In that case,” said Greve slowly, “it may not be suicide....”
+
+Mary put one hand suddenly to her face as women do when they are
+frightened. She shrank back.
+
+“You mean....”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“Murder!”
+
+The girl gave a little gasp. Then she stretched out her hand and
+touched his arm.
+
+“But, Robin,” she spoke in quick gasps,—“you can’t give the police this
+evidence of Bude’s. Don’t you see it incriminates _you?_ Don’t you
+realize that every scrap of evidence points to you as being the man
+that visited Mr. Parrish in the library this afternoon? You’re a
+lawyer, Robin. You understand these things. Don’t you see what I mean?”
+
+He nodded curtly.
+
+“Perfectly,” he replied coldly.
+
+“Bude will do what I tell him,” the girl hurried on. “There is no need
+for the police to know....”
+
+“On the contrary,” said the other imperturbably, “it is essential they
+should be told at once.”
+
+The girl grasped the lapels of his coat in her two hands. Her breath
+came quickly and she trembled all over.
+
+“Are you mad, Robin?” she cried. “Who could have wanted to kill poor
+Hartley? Why should you put these ideas into the heads of the police?
+Bude may have imagined everything. Now, you’ll be sensible, promise
+me....”
+
+Very gently he detached the two slim hands that held his coat. His
+mouth was set in a firm line.
+
+“We are going to sift this thing to the bottom, Mary,” he said, “no
+matter what are the consequences. You owe it to Parrish and you owe it
+to me....”
+
+The telephone trilled suddenly.
+
+Robin picked up the receiver,
+
+“Yes, Bude,” he said.
+
+There was a moment’s silence in the room broken as the clock on the
+mantelpiece chimed nine times. Then Robin said into the telephone:
+
+“Right! Tell him I’ll be down immediately!”
+
+He put down the receiver and turned to Mary.
+
+“A detective inspector has arrived from London. He is asking to see me.
+I must go downstairs.”
+
+Mary, her elbows on the mantelpiece, was staring into the fire. At the
+sound of his voice she swung round quickly.
+
+“Robin!” she cried.
+
+But she spoke too late.
+
+Robin Greve had left the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+MR. MANDERTON
+
+
+A quality which had gone far to lay the foundations of the name which
+Robin Greve was rapidly making at the bar was his strong intuitive
+sense. He had the rare ability of correctly ‘sensing’ an atmosphere, an
+uncanny _flair_ for driving instantly at the heart of a situation,
+which rendered him in the courts a dexterous advocate and a redoubtable
+opponent.
+
+Now, as he came into the lounge from the big oak staircase, he
+instantly realized that he had entered an unfriendly atmosphere. The
+concealed lights which were set all round the cornice of the room were
+turned on, flooding the pleasantly snug room with soft reflected light.
+A little group stood about the fire, Bude, Jay, Hartley Parrish’s man,
+and a stranger. Jay was engaged in earnest conversation with the
+stranger. But at the sound of Greve’s foot upon the staircase, the
+conversation ceased and a silence fell on the group.
+
+Greve’s attention was immediately attracted towards the stranger, whom
+he surmised to be the detective from Scotland Yard. He was a big, burly
+man with a heavy dark moustache, straight and rather thin black hair,
+and coarse features. He looked a full-blooded, plethoric person with
+reddish-blue veins on his florid face, and a heavy jowl which
+over-feeding, Robin surmised, had made fullish. He was very neatly
+dressed in his black overcoat with velvet collar carefully brushed, his
+natty black tie with its pearl pin, and well-polished boots. His black
+bowler hat, with a pair of heavy dogskin gloves, neatly folded, lay on
+the table.
+
+“This Mr. Greve?”
+
+Bude and Jay fell back as Robin joined the group. The detective bent
+his gaze on the young barrister as he put his question, and Robin for
+the first time noticed his eyes. Keen and clear, they were ill-suited,
+he thought, to the rather gross features of the man. By right he should
+have had either the small and roguish or the pale and expressionless
+eyes which are habitually found in individuals of the sanguine
+temperament.
+
+The detective had a trick of dropping his eyes to his boots. When he
+raised them, the effect was to alter his whole expression. His eyes,
+well-open, keenly observant, in perpetual motion, lent an air of
+alertness, of shrewdness, to his heavy, florid countenance.
+
+“That is my name,” said Robin, answering his question. “I am a
+barrister. I have met some of your people at the Yard, but I don’t
+think....”
+
+“Detective-Inspector Manderton,” interjected the big man, and paused as
+though to say, “Let that sink in!”
+
+Robin knew him well by repute. His qualities were those of the
+bull-dog, slow-moving, obstinately brave, and desperately tenacious.
+His was a name to conjure with among the criminal classes, and his
+career was starred with various sensational tussles with desperate
+criminals, for Detective-Inspector Manderton, when engaged on a case,
+invariably “took a hand himself,” as he phrased it, when an arrest was
+to be made. A bullet-hole in his right thigh and an imperfectly knitted
+right collar-bone remained to remind him of this propensity of his. His
+motto, as he was fond of saying, was, “What I have I hold!”
+
+“Well, Mr. Greve,” said the detective in a loud, hectoring voice,
+“perhaps you will be good enough to tell me what you know of this
+affair?”
+
+Robin flushed angrily at the man’s manner. But there was no trace of
+resentment in his voice as he replied. He told Manderton what he had
+already told Humphries: how he had gone from the billiard-room across
+the hall and down the library corridor to the side-door into the
+grounds, intending to have a stroll before tea, but, finding that it
+was threatening rain, had returned to the house by the front door.
+
+The detective scanned the young man’s face closely as he spoke. When
+Robin had finished, the other dropped his eyes and seemed to be
+examining the brilliant polish of his boots. He said nothing, and again
+Robin became aware of the atmosphere of hostility towards him which
+this man radiated.
+
+“It is dark at five o’clock?”
+
+Manderton turned to Bude.
+
+“Getting on that way, sir,” the butler agreed.
+
+“Are you in the habit, sir,”—the detective turned to Robin now,—“of
+going out for walks in the dark?”
+
+Greve shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“I had been sitting in the billiard-room. It was rather stuffy, so I
+thought I’d like some air before tea!”
+
+“You left Miss Trevert in the billiard-room?”
+
+“Yes!”
+
+“Why?”
+
+Greve put a hand to his throat and eased his collar.
+
+“The gong had sounded for tea,” the detective went on imperturbably;
+“surely it would have been more natural for you to have brought Miss
+Trevert with you?”
+
+“I didn’t wish to!”
+
+Mr. Manderton cleared his throat.
+
+“Ah!” he grunted. “You didn’t wish to. I should like you to be frank
+with me, Mr. Greve, please. Was it not a fact that you and Miss Trevert
+had words?”
+
+He looked up sharply at him with contracted pupils.
+
+“You took a certain interest in this young lady?”
+
+“Mr. Manderton,”—Robin spoke with a certain _hauteur_,—“don’t you think
+we might leave Miss Trevert’s name out of this?”
+
+“Mr. Greve,” replied the detective bluntly, “I don’t!”
+
+Robin made a little gesture of resignation.
+
+“Before the servants....”
+
+“Come, come, sir,” the detective broke in, “with all respect to the
+young lady and yourself, it was a matter of common knowledge in the
+house that she and you were ... well, old friends. It was remarked, Mr.
+Greve, I may remind you, that you looked very upset-like when you left
+the billiard-room to”—he paused perceptibly—“to go for your stroll in
+the dark.”
+
+Robin glanced quickly round the group. Jay averted his eyes. As for
+Bude, he was the picture of embarrassment.
+
+“You seem to be singularly well posted in the gossip of the servants’
+hall, Mr. Manderton!” said Robin hotly.
+
+It was a foolish remark, and Robin regretted it the moment the words
+had left his mouth.
+
+“Well, yes,” commented the detective slowly, “I am. I shall be well
+posted on the whole of this case, presently, I hope, sir!”
+
+His manner was perfectly respectful, but reserved almost to a tone of
+menace.
+
+“In that case,” said Robin, “I’ll tell you something you don’t know,
+Mr. Manderton. Has Bude told you what he heard after I had passed him
+in the hall?”
+
+Interest flashed at once into the detective’s face. He turned quickly
+to the butler. Robin felt he had scored.
+
+“What did you hear?” he said sharply.
+
+Bude looked round wildly. His large, fish-like mouth twitched, and he
+made a few feeble gestures with his hands.
+
+“It was only perhaps an idea of mine, sir,” he stammered,—“just a sort
+of idea ... I dare say I was mistaken. My hearing ain’t what it was,
+sir....”
+
+“Don’t you try to hoodwink me,” said Manderton, with sudden ferocity,
+knitting his brows and frowning at the unfortunate butler. “Come on and
+tell us what you heard. Mr. Greve knows and I mean to. Out with it!”
+
+Bude cast a reproachful glance at Robin. Then he said:
+
+“Well, sir, a minute or two after Mr. Greve had passed me, I went back
+to the hall and through the open door of the corridor leading to the
+library, I heard voices!”
+
+“Voices, eh? Did you recognize them?”
+
+“No, sir. It was just the sound of talking!”
+
+“You told Miss Trevert they were loud voices, Bude!” Robin interrupted.
+
+“Yes, sir,” replied the butler, “they were loudish in a manner o’
+speaking, else I shouldn’t have heard them!”
+
+“Why not?”
+
+The detective rapped the question out sharply.
+
+“Why, because the library door was locked, sir!”
+
+“How do you know that?”
+
+“Because Miss Trevert and Dr. Romain both tried the handle and couldn’t
+get in!”
+
+“Ah!” said Manderton, “you mean the door was locked _when the body was
+found!_ Now, as to these voices. Were they men’s voices?”
+
+“Yes, sir, I should say so.”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“Because they were deep-like!”
+
+“Was Mr. Hartley Parrish’s voice one of them?”
+
+The butler spread out his hands.
+
+“That I couldn’t say! I just heard the murmur-like, then shut the
+passage door quickly ...”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“Well, sir, I thought ... I didn’t want to listen....”
+
+“You thought one of the voices was Mr. Greve’s, eh? Having a row with
+Mr. Parrish, eh? About the lady, isn’t that right?”
+
+“Aren’t you going rather too fast?” said Robin quietly.
+
+But the detective ignored him.
+
+“Come on and answer my question, my man,” he said harshly. “Didn’t you
+think it was Mr. Hartley Parrish and Mr. Greve here having a bit of a
+dust-up about the young lady being engaged to Mr. Parrish?”
+
+“Well, perhaps I did, but....”
+
+Like a flash the detective turned on Robin.
+
+“What do you know about this?” he demanded fiercely.
+
+“Nothing,” said Greve. “As I have told you already, I did not see Mr.
+Parrish alive again after lunch, nor did I speak to him. What I would
+suggest to you now is that upon this evidence of Bude’s depends the
+vitally important question of how Mr. Parrish met his death. Though he
+was found with a revolver in his hand, none of us in this house know of
+any good motive for his suicide. I put it to you that the man who can
+furnish us with this motive is the owner of the voice heard by Bude in
+conversation with Mr. Parrish, since obviously nobody other than Mr.
+Parrish and possibly this unknown person was in the library block at
+the time. And I would further remark, Mr. Manderton, that, until the
+bullet has been extracted, we do not know that Mr. Parrish killed
+_himself_...”
+
+“No,” said the detective significantly, “we don’t!”
+
+He had dropped his eyes to the ground now and was studying the pattern
+of the hearth-rug.
+
+“You say you heard no shot?” he suddenly asked Robin.
+
+“No!”
+
+“No one other than Miss Trevert, I gather, heard the shot?”
+
+“That is so!”
+
+Mr. Manderton consulted a slip of paper which he drew from his pocket.
+
+“Inspector Humphries,” he said, “has drawn up a rough time-table of
+events leading up to Mr. Parrish’s death, based on the evidence he has
+taken here this evening. You will tell me if it tallies.”
+
+He read from the slip:
+
+5 P.M. Bude sounds the gong for tea.
+
+
+5.10 Mr. Greve passes Bude in the hall and goes down the corridor
+leading to the library. Mr. Greve states he went straight out by the
+side door into the gardens.
+
+
+The detective looked up from his reading.
+
+“At 5.12, let us say, Bude comes back from the servants’ quarters to
+the hall and hears voices from the library. He closes the passage door.
+Is that right?”
+
+Bude nodded.
+
+“It would be about two minutes after I saw Mr. Greve the first time,”
+he agreed.
+
+“Very well!”
+
+The detective resumed his reading.
+
+5.15 P.M. Miss Trevert goes to fetch Mr. Parrish in to tea. She finds
+the library door locked. Tries the handle and hears a shot.
+
+
+5.18 (say) Miss Trevert comes into the lounge hall and gives the alarm.
+
+
+“Now, sir,” said Mr. Manderton briskly, “I should like to ask you one
+or two further questions. Firstly, how long were you out on your stroll
+in the dark?”
+
+“I should think about two or three minutes.”
+
+“That is to say, if you left the house by the side door at 5.10, you
+were back in the house by 5.13.”
+
+“Yes, that would be right,” Robin agreed.
+
+“And what did you do when you came in?”
+
+“I went up to my room to fetch a letter for the post.”
+
+“Miss Trevert heard the shot fired at 5.15. Where were you at that
+time?”
+
+“In my bedroom, I should say. I was there for a few minutes as I had to
+write a cheque....”
+
+“And where is your bedroom?”
+
+“In the other wing above the billiard-room.”
+
+“Hm! A pistol shot makes a great deal of noise. It seems strange that
+nobody in the house should have heard it.”
+
+Here Bude interposed.
+
+“Mr. Parrish, sir, was very particular about noise. He had the library
+door and the door leading from the front hall to the library corridor
+specially felted so that he should not hear any sounds from the house
+when he was working in the library. That library wing was absolutely
+shut off from the rest of the house. It was always uncommon quiet....”
+
+But the detective, ignoring him, turned to Robin again.
+
+“I have been round the house,” he said. “It does not seem to me it
+ought to take you three or even two minutes to walk from the side door
+to the front door. I should say it would be a matter of about thirty
+seconds!”
+
+“Excuse me,” Robin answered quickly, “I didn’t say I went straight from
+the side to the front door. I went through the gardens following the
+path that leads to the main drive. There I turned and came back to the
+front door.”
+
+“And you assert that you heard nothing?”
+
+“I heard nothing.”
+
+“Neither the ‘loud voices’ which the butler heard within two minutes of
+your leaving the house nor the shot fired five minutes later?”
+
+“I heard nothing.”
+
+Mr. Manderton examined the toes of his boots carefully.
+
+“You heard nothing!” he repeated.
+
+The door opened suddenly and Dr. Romain appeared. With him was the
+village practitioner and Inspector Humphries.
+
+Dr. Redstone carried in his hand a little pad of cotton wool. He bore
+it over to the fireplace and unwrapping the lint showed a twisted
+fragment of lead lying on the bloodstained dressing.
+
+“Straight through the heart and lodged in the spine,” he said. “Death
+was absolutely instantaneous.”
+
+The detective picked up the bullet and scrutinized it closely.
+
+“Browning pistol ammunition,” observed Humphries; “it fits the gun he
+used. There’s half a dozen spare rounds in one of the drawers of his
+dressing-room upstairs.”
+
+Mr. Manderton drew Inspector Humphries and Dr. Redstone into a corner
+of the room where they conversed in undertones. Bude and Jay had
+vanished. Dr. Romain turned to Robin Greve, who stood lost in a
+reverie, staring into the fire.
+
+“A clear case of suicide,” he said. “The medical evidence is conclusive
+on that point. A most amazing affair. I can’t conceive what drove him
+to it. Why _did_ he do it?”
+
+“Ah! why?” said Robin.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+A SMOKING CHIMNEY
+
+
+A Red sun glowed dully through a thin mist when, on the following
+morning, Robin Greve emerged from the side door into the gardens of
+Harkings. It was a still, mild day. Moisture from the night’s rain yet
+hung translucent on the black limbs of the bare trees and glistened
+like diamonds on the closely cropped turf of the lawn. In the air was a
+pleasant smell of damp earth.
+
+Robin paused an instant outside the door in the library corridor and
+inhaled the morning air greedily. He had spent a restless, fitful
+night. His sleep had been haunted by the riddle which, since the
+previous evening, had cast its shadow over the pleasant house. The
+mystery of Hartley Parrish’s death obsessed him. If it was suicide,—and
+the doctors were both positive on the point—the motive eluded him
+utterly.
+
+His mind, trained to logical processes of reasoning by his practice of
+the law, baulked at the theory. When he thought of Hartley Parrish as
+he had seen him at luncheon on the day before, striding with his quick,
+vigorous step into the room, boyishly curious to know what the _chef_
+was giving them to eat, devouring his lunch with obvious animal
+enjoyment, brimful of energy, dominating the table with his forceful,
+eager personality....
+
+The sound of voices in the library broke in upon his thoughts. Robin
+raised his head and listened. Some one appeared to be talking in a loud
+voice ... no, not talking ... rather declaiming.
+
+Stepping quietly on the hard gravel path, Robin turned the corner of
+the house and came into view of the library window. The window-pane
+gaped, shattered where Horace Trevert had broken the glass on the
+previous evening when effecting an entrance into the room. Framed in
+the ragged outline of the splintered glass, bulked the large form of
+Sergeant Harris. He stood half turned from the window so as to catch
+the light on a copy of _The Times_ which he held in his red and
+freckled hands. He was reading aloud in stentorian tones from a leading
+article.
+
+“While this country,” he bawled sonorously, “cannot ... in h’our belief
+... hevade ... er ... responsibility ... er ... h’m disquieting
+sitwation ...”
+
+“Dear me!” thought Robin to himself, “what a very extraordinary morning
+pursuit for our police!”
+
+Suddenly the reading was interrupted.
+
+Robin heard the library door open. Then Manderton’s voice cried:
+
+“That’ll do, thank you, Sergeant!”
+
+“Did you ’ear me, sir?” asked the sergeant, who seemed very much
+relieved to be quit of his task.
+
+“Not a word!” was the reply. “But we’ll try with the library door open!
+I’ll go back to the hall and you start again!”
+
+A thoughtful look on his face, Robin turned quickly and, hurrying round
+the side of the house, entered by the front door. Standing by the door
+leading to the library corridor he found Manderton.
+
+The detective did not seem particularly glad to see him.
+
+“Good-morning, Inspector,” said Robin affably, “you’re early to work, I
+see. Having a little experiment, eh?”
+
+Manderton nodded without replying. Then the stentorian tones of
+Sergeant Harris proclaiming the views of “The Thunderer” on the
+Silesian situation rolled down the corridor and struck distinctly on
+the ears of the listeners in the hall.
+
+Presently Manderton closed the corridor door, shutting off the sound
+abruptly.
+
+“I think you said you could not hear the sergeant with the library door
+shut?” queried Robin suavely.
+
+“With the door shut—no,” answered the detective shortly. “But with the
+door open ...”
+
+He broke off significantly and dropped his eyes to his boots.
+
+“Would it be troubling you,” Robin struck in, “if we pushed your
+experiment one step farther?”
+
+Manderton lifted his eyes and looked at the young man, Robin met his
+gaze unflinchingly.
+
+“Well?”
+
+There was no invitation in his voice, but Robin affected to disregard
+the other’s coldness.
+
+“Let the library door be shut,” said Robin, “but leave the glass door
+leading into the garden open. Then give Sergeant Harris another trial
+at his reading....”
+
+The detective smiled rather condescendingly.
+
+“With the library door shut, you’ll hear nothing,” he remarked.
+
+“The library window is open,” Robin retorted, “or rather it is as good
+as open, as one of the two big panes is smashed....”
+
+His voice vibrated with eagerness. The detective looked at him
+curiously.
+
+“Oh, try if you like,” he said carelessly.
+
+Without waiting for his assent, Robin had already plucked open the
+corridor door and was halfway down the passage as the other replied. He
+was back again almost at once and, motioning the detective to silence,
+took his place at his side by the open door. Then the sound of the
+policeman’s voice was heard from the corridor. It was muffled and
+indistinct so that the sense of his words could not be made out. But
+the voice was audible enough.
+
+Robin turned to the detective.
+
+“Bude could make out no words,” he said.
+
+“But how do we know that the glass door was open?” queried the
+detective sceptically.
+
+“Because I left it open myself,” Robin countered promptly, “when I went
+out for my walk before tea. Sir Horace told me that he found the door
+banging about in the wind when he went out to get into the library by
+the window.”
+
+Mr. Manderton allowed his fat, serious face to expand very slowly into
+a broad, superior smile.
+
+“Doesn’t it seem a little curious,” he said, “that Mr. Hartley Parrish
+should choose to sit and work in the library on a gusty and dark winter
+evening with the window wide open? You’ll allow, I think, that the
+window was not broken until after his death ...”
+
+Robin’s nerves were ragged. The man’s tone nettled him exceedingly. But
+he confined himself to making a little gesture of impatience.
+
+“No, no, sir,” said Mr. Manderton, very decidedly, “I prefer to think
+that the library door was open, left open by the party who went in to
+speak to Mr. Parrish yesterday afternoon ... and who knows more about
+the gentleman’s suicide than he would have people think ...”
+
+Robin boiled over fairly at this.
+
+“Good God, man!” he exclaimed, “do you accept this theory of suicide as
+blandly as all that? Have you examined the body? Don’t you use your
+eyes? I tell you ... bah, what’s the use? I’m not here to do your work
+for you!...”
+
+“No, sir,” said the detective, quite unruffled, “you are not. And I
+think I’ll continue to see about it myself!”
+
+With that he opened the corridor door and vanished down the passage.
+
+With great deliberation Robin selected a cigarette from his case, lit
+it, and walked out through the front door into the fresh air again.
+More than ever he felt the riddle of Hartley Parrish’s death weighing
+upon his mind.
+
+His intuitive sense rebelled against the theory of suicide, despite the
+medical evidence, despite the revolver in the dead man’s hand, despite
+the detective’s assurance. And floating about in his brain, like the
+gossamer on the glistening bushes in the gardens, were broken threads
+of vague suspicions, of half-formed theories, leading from his hasty
+observations in the death chamber ...
+
+In itself the death of Hartley Parrish left him cold. Yes, he must
+admit that. But the look in Mary Trevert’s eyes, as she had urged him
+to shield himself from the suspicion of having driven Hartley Parrish
+to his death, haunted him. Already dimly he was beginning to realize
+that Hartley Parrish in death might prove as insuperable a bar between
+him and Mary Trevert as ever he had been in life ...
+
+She was now a wealthy woman. Hartley Parrish’s will had ensured that,
+he knew. But it was not the barrier of riches that Robin Greve feared.
+He had asked Mary Trevert to be his wife before there was any thought
+of her inheriting Parrish’s fortune. He derived a little consolation
+from that reflection. At least he could not appear as a fortune-hunter
+in her eyes. But, until he could clear himself of the suspicion lurking
+in Mary Trevert’s mind that he, Robin Greve, was in some way implicated
+in Hartley Parrish’s death, the dead man, he felt, would always stand
+between them. And so ...
+
+Robin pitched the stump of his cigarette into a rose bush with a little
+gesture of resignation. Almost without knowing it, he had strolled into
+the rosery up a shallow flight of steps cut into the bank of green
+turf, which ran along the side of the house facing the library window
+to the corner of the house where it met the clipped box-hedge of the
+Pleasure Ground.
+
+The rosery was a pleasant rectangle framed in a sort of rustic bower
+which in the summer was covered with superb roses of every hue and
+variety. Gravel paths intersected rose-beds cut into all manner of
+fantastic shapes where stood the slender shoots of the young rose-trees
+each with its tag setting forth its kind, for Hartley Parrish had been
+an enthusiastic amateur in this direction.
+
+Robin turned round and faced the house. From his elevation he could
+look down into the library through the window with its shattered pane.
+He could see the gleaming polish on Hartley Parrish’s big desk and the
+great arm-chair pushed back as Hartley Parrish had pushed it from him
+just before his death.
+
+The bare poles of the woodwork festooned with the black arms of the
+creeping roses, standing out dark in the fast falling winter evening,
+must, he reflected, have been the last view that Hartley Parrish had
+had before ...
+
+But then he broke off his meditations abruptly. His eye had fallen on a
+narrow white patch standing out on one of the uprights supporting the
+clambering roses.
+
+It was a stout young tree, the light brown bark left adhering to its
+surface. It was a long blaze on the bark on the side of the trunk which
+had caught his eye. Robin walked round the gravel path until he was
+within a foot of the pole to get a better view.
+
+The pole stood almost exactly opposite the library window. The scar in
+the bark was high up and diagonal and quite freshly made, for the wood
+was dead white and much splintered.
+
+The young man put a hand on the upright for support and leant forward,
+carefully refraining from putting his foot on the soft brown mould of
+the flower-bed which fringed the path between it and the rustic
+woodwork. Then he ran lightly down the steps until he stood with his
+back to the library window. From here he carefully surveyed the upright
+again, then, returning to the rosery, began a careful scrutiny of the
+gravel paths and the beds.
+
+Apparently his search gave little result, for he presently abandoned it
+and turned his attention to the wooden framework on the other side of
+the rectangular rose-garden. He plunged boldly in among the rose-bushes
+and examined each upright in turn. He spent about half an hour in this
+meticulous investigation, and then, his boots covered with mould, his
+rough shooting-coat glistening with moisture, he walked slowly down the
+steps and reentered the house.
+
+As he was wiping the mud off his boots on the great mat in the front
+hall, Bude came out of the lounge hall with a pile of dishes on a tray.
+
+“Bude,” said Robin, “can you tell me if the fire in the library has
+been smoking of late?”
+
+“Well, sir,” replied the butler, “we’ve always had trouble with that
+chimdy when the wind’s in the southwest.”
+
+“Has it been smoking lately?” The young man reiterated his question
+impatiently.
+
+The man looked up in surprise.
+
+“Well, sir, now you come to mention it, it has. As a matter o’fact,
+sir, the sweep was ordered for to-day ...”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“Well, sir, Mr. Parrish had mentioned it to me ...”
+
+“When?”
+
+The question came out like a pistol shot.
+
+“Yesterday, sir,” answered the butler blandly. “Just before luncheon,
+it was, sir. Mr. Parrish told me to have that chimdy seen to at once.
+And I telephoned for the sweep immediately after luncheon, sir ...”
+
+“Did Mr. Parrish say anything else, Bude?”
+
+Robin eagerly scanned the butler’s fat, unimpressive countenance. Bude,
+his tray held out stiffly in front of him, contracted his bushy
+eyebrows in thought.
+
+“I don’t know as he did, sir ...”
+
+“Think, man, think!” Robin urged.
+
+“Well, sir,” said Bude, unmoved, “I believe, now I come to think of it,
+that Mr. Parrish did say something about the wind blowing his papers
+about ...”
+
+“That is to say, he had been working with the window open?”
+
+Robin Greve’s question rang out sharply. It was an affirmation more
+than a question.
+
+“Yes, sir, leastways I suppose so, sir ...”
+
+“Which window?”
+
+“Why, the one Mr. Parrish always liked to have open in the warm
+weather, sir, ... the one opposite the desk. The other window was never
+opened, sir, because of the dictaphone as stands in front of it. The
+damp affects the mechanism ...”
+
+“Thank you, Bude,” said the young man.
+
+With his accustomed majesty the butler wheeled to go. In the turn of
+his head as he moved there was a faint suggestion of a shake ... a
+shake of uncomprehending pity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+“... SPEED THE PARTING GUEST!”
+
+
+Dr. Romain was just finishing his breakfast as Robin Greve entered the
+dining-room, a cosy oak-panelled room with a bow window fitted with
+cushioned window-seats. Horace Trevert stood with his back to the fire.
+There was no sign of either Lady Margaret or of Mary. Silence seemed to
+fall on both the doctor and his companion as Robin came in. They wore
+that rather abashed look which people unconsciously assume when they
+break off a conversation on an unexpected entry.
+
+“Morning, Horace! Morning, Doctor!” said Robin, crossing to the
+sideboard. “Any sign of Lady Margaret or Mary yet?”
+
+The doctor had risen hastily to his feet.
+
+“I rather think Dr. Redstone is expecting me,” he said rapidly; “I half
+promised to go over to Stevenish ... think I’ll just run over. The
+walk’ll do me good ...”
+
+He looked rather wildly about him, then fairly bolted from the room.
+
+Robin, the cover of the porridge dish in his hand, turned and stared at
+him.
+
+“Why, whatever’s the matter with Romain?” he began.
+
+But Horace, who had not spoken a word, was himself halfway to the door.
+
+“Horace!” called out Robin sharply.
+
+The boy stopped with his back towards the other. But he did not turn
+round.
+
+Robin put the cover back on the porridge dish and crossed the room.
+
+“You all seem in the deuce of a hurry this morning ...” he said.
+
+Still the boy made no reply.
+
+“Why, Horace, what’s the matter?”
+
+Robin put his hand on young Trevert’s shoulder. Horace shook him
+roughly off.
+
+“I don’t care to discuss it with you, Robin!” he said.
+
+Robin deliberately swung the boy round until he faced him.
+
+“My dear old thing,” he expostulated. “What does it all mean? _What_
+won’t you discuss with me?”
+
+Horace Trevert looked straight at the speaker. His upper lip was pouted
+and trembled a little.
+
+“What’s the use of talking?” he said. “You know what I mean. Or would
+you like me to be plainer ...”
+
+Robin met his gaze unflinchingly.
+
+“I certainly would,” he said, “if it’s going to enlighten me as to why
+you should suddenly choose to behave like a lunatic ...”
+
+Horace Trevert leant back and thrust his hands into his pockets.
+
+“After what happened here yesterday,” he said, speaking very clearly
+and deliberately, “I wonder you have the nerve to stay ...”
+
+“My dear Horace,” said Robin quite impassively, “would you mind being a
+little more explicit? What precisely are you accusing me of? What have
+I done?”
+
+“Done?” exclaimed the young man heatedly. “Done? Good God! Don’t you
+realize that you have dragged my sister into this wretched business?
+Don’t you understand that her name will be bandied about before a lot
+of rotten yokels at the inquest?”
+
+Robin Greve’s eyes glittered dangerously.
+
+“I confess,” he said, with elaborate politeness, “I scarcely understand
+what it has to do with me that Hartley Parrish should apparently commit
+suicide within a few days of becoming engaged to your sister ...”
+
+“Ha!”
+
+Horace Trevert snorted indignantly.
+
+“You don’t understand, don’t you? We don’t understand either. But, I
+must say, we thought _you_ did!”
+
+With that he turned to go. But Robin caught him by the arm.
+
+“Listen to me, Horace,” he said. “I’m not going to quarrel with you in
+this house of death. But you’re going to tell here and now what you
+meant by that remark. Do you understand? I’m going to know!”
+
+Horace Trevert shook himself free.
+
+“Certainly you shall know,” he answered with _hauteur_, “but I must say
+I should have thought that, as a lawyer and so on, you would have
+guessed my meaning without my having to explain. What I mean is that,
+now that Hartley Parrish is dead, there is only one man who knows what
+drove him to his death. And that’s yourself! Do you want it plainer
+than that?”
+
+Robin took a step back and looked at his friend. But he did not speak.
+
+“And now,” the boy continued, “perhaps you will realize that your
+presence here is disagreeable to Mary ...”
+
+“Did Mary ask you to tell me this?” Robin broke in.
+
+His voice had lost its hardness. It was almost wistful. The change of
+tone was so marked that it struck Horace. He hesitated an instant.
+
+“Yes,” he blurted out. “She doesn’t want to see you again. I don’t want
+to be offensive, Robin..”
+
+“Please don’t apologize,” said Greve. “I quite understand that this is
+your sister’s house now and, of course, I shall leave at once. I’ll ask
+Jay to pack my things if you could order the car ...”
+
+The boy moved towards the door. Before he reached it Robin called him
+back.
+
+“Horace,” he said pleasantly, “before you go I want you to answer me a
+question. Think before you speak, because it’s very important. When you
+got into the library yesterday evening through the window, you smashed
+the glass, didn’t you?”
+
+Horace Trevert nodded.
+
+“Yes,” he replied, looking hard at Robin.
+
+“Why?”
+
+“To get into the room, of course!”
+
+“Was the window bolted?”
+
+The boy stopped and thought.
+
+“No,” he said slowly, “now I come to think of it, I don’t believe it
+was. No, of course, it wasn’t. I just put my arm through the broken
+pane and shoved the window up. But why do you ask?”
+
+“Oh, nothing,” answered Robin nonchalantly. “I just was curious to
+know, that’s all!”
+
+Horace stood and looked at him for an instant. Then he went out.
+
+A quarter of an hour later, Hartley Parrish’s Rolls-Royce glided
+through the straggling main street of Stevenish. A chapel bell tinkled
+unmusically, and on the pavements, gleaming with wet, went a procession
+of neatly dressed townsfolk bound, prayer-book in hand, for their
+respective places of worship. A newsboy, sorting out the Sunday
+newspapers which had just come down by train from London, was the only
+figure visible on the little station platform. Robin bought a
+selection.
+
+“There’s all about Mr. Parrish,” said the boy, “’im as they found dead
+up at ’Arkings las’ night. And the noospapers ’asn’t ’arf been sendin’
+down to-day ... reporters and photographers ... you oughter seen the
+crowd as come by the mornin’ train ...”
+
+“I wonder what they’ll get out of Manderton,” commented Robin rather
+grimly to himself as his train puffed leisurely, after the habit of
+Sunday trains, into the quiet little station.
+
+In the solitude of his first-class smoker he unfolded the newspapers.
+None had more than the brief fact that Hartley Parrish had been found
+dead with a pistol in his hand, but they made up for the briefness of
+their reports by long accounts of the dead man’s “meteoric career.”
+And, Robin noted with relief, hitherto Mary Trevert’s name was out of
+the picture.
+
+He dropped the papers on to the seat, and, as the train steamed
+serenely through the Sunday calm of the country towards London’s outer
+suburbs, he reviewed in his mind such facts as he had gleaned regarding
+the circumstances of his late host’s death.
+
+He would, he told himself, accept for the time being as _facts_ what,
+he admitted to himself, so far only seemed to be such. Hartley Parrish,
+then, had been seated in his library at his desk with the door locked.
+The fire was smoking, and therefore he had opened the window. According
+to Horace Trevert, the window had not been bolted when he had entered
+the library, for, after smashing the pane in the assumption that the
+bolt was shot, he had had no difficulty in pushing up the window.
+Hartley Parrish had opened the window himself, for on the nail of the
+middle finger of his left hand Robin had seen, with the aid of the
+magnifying-glass, a tiny fragment of white paint.
+
+Who had closed it? He had no answer ready to _that_ question.
+
+Now, as to the circumstances of the shooting. The suicide theory
+invited one to believe that Hartley Parrish had got up from his desk,
+pushing back his chair, had gone round it until he stood between the
+desk and the window, and had there shot himself through the heart. Why
+should he have done this?
+
+Robin had no answer ready to this question either. He passed on again.
+Bude had heard loud voices a very few minutes before Mary had heard the
+shot. That morning’s experiments had shown that Bude could have heard
+these sounds only by way of the open window of the library and the open
+doors of the garden and the library corridor. Additional proof, if Bude
+had heard aright, that the library window was open.
+
+Leaning back in his seat, his finger-tips pressed together, Robin Greve
+resolutely faced the situation to which his deductions were leading
+him.
+
+“The voice heard at the open window,” he told himself, “was the voice
+of the man who murdered Parrish and who closed the window, that is, of
+course, if the murder theory proves more conclusive than that of
+suicide.”
+
+This brought him back to his investigations in the rosery. The abrasure
+he had discovered on the timber upright was the mark of a bullet and a
+mark freshly made at that. Moreover, it had almost certainly been fired
+from the library window—from the window which Parrish had opened; the
+angle at which it had struck and marked the tree showed that almost
+conclusively.
+
+Yet there had been but one shot! If only he had been able to find that
+bullet in the rosery! Robin thought ruefully of his long hunt among the
+sopping rose-bushes.
+
+Yes, there had been only one shot. Mary Trevert had stated it
+definitely. Besides, the bullet that had killed Hartley Parrish had
+been fired from his own revolver and had been found in the body. Robin
+Greve felt the murder theory collapsing about him. But the suicide
+theory did not stand up, either. What possible, probable motive had
+Hartley Parrish for taking his own life?
+
+“He wasn’t the man to do it!”
+
+The wheels of the train took up the rhythm of the phrase and dinned it
+into his ears.
+
+“He wasn’t the man to do it!”
+
+The riddle seemed more baffling than ever.
+
+Robin thrust one hand into his right-hand pocket to get his pipe, his
+other hand into his left-hand pocket to find his pouch. His left hand
+came into contact with a little ball of paper.
+
+He drew it out. It was the little ball of slatey-blue paper he had
+found on the floor of the library beside Hartley Parrish’s dead body.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+MR. MANDERTON IS NONPLUSSED
+
+
+Horace Trevert walked abruptly into Mary’s Chinese boudoir. Lady
+Margaret and the girl were standing by the fire.
+
+“Well,” said Horace, dropping into a chair, “he’s gone!”
+
+“Who?” said Lady Margaret.
+
+“Robin,” answered the boy, “and I must say he took it very well ...”
+
+“You don’t mean to tell me, Horace,” said his mother, “that you have
+actually sent Robin Greve away ...?”
+
+Mary Trevert put her hand on her mother’s arm.
+
+“I wished it, Mother. I asked Horace to send him away ...”
+
+“But, my dear,” protested Lady Margaret.
+
+Mary interrupted her impatiently.
+
+“Robin Greve was impossible here. I had to ask him to go. I suppose he
+can come back if ... if they want him for the inquest ...”
+
+Lady Margaret was looking at her daughter in a puzzled way. She was a
+woman of the world and had brought her daughter up to be a woman of the
+world. She knew that Mary was not impulsive by nature. She knew that
+there was a wealth of good sense behind those steady eyes.
+
+In response to a look from his mother, Horace got up and left the room.
+
+“Mary, dear,” said the older woman, “don’t you think you are making a
+mistake?”
+
+The girl turned away, one slim shoe tapping restlessly against the
+brass rail of the fireplace.
+
+“My dear,” her mother went on, “remember I have known Robin Greve all
+his life. His father, the Admiral, was a very old friend of mine. He
+was the very personification of honour. Robin is very fond of you ...
+no, he has told me nothing, but I _know_. Don’t you think it is rather
+hard on an old friend to turn him away just when you most want him?”
+
+There was a heightened colour in the girl’s face as she turned and
+looked her mother in the face.
+
+“Robin has not behaved like a friend, Mother,” she answered. “He knows
+more than he pretends about ... about this. And he lets me find out
+things from the servants when he ought to have told me himself. If he
+is suspected of having said something to Hartley which made him do this
+dreadful thing, he has only himself to thank. I _did_ try to shield
+him—before I knew. But I’m not going to do so any more. If he stays I
+shall have the police suspecting me all the time. And I owe something
+to Hartley ...”
+
+Her mother sighed a soft little sigh. She said nothing. She was a very
+wise woman.
+
+“Robin left me to go to the library ... I am sure of that ...” Mary
+went on breathlessly.
+
+“Why?” her mother asked.
+
+The girl hesitated.
+
+Then she said slowly:
+
+“You and I have always been good pals, Mother, so I may as well tell
+you. Robin had just asked me to marry him. So I told him I was engaged
+to Hartley. He went on in the most awful way, and said that I was
+selling myself and that I would not be the first girl that Hartley had
+kept ...”
+
+She broke off and raised her hands to her face. Then she put her elbows
+on the mantel-shelf and burst into tears.
+
+“Oh, it was hateful,” she sobbed.
+
+Her mother put her arm round her soothingly.
+
+“Well, my dear,” she said, “Robin was always fond of you, and I dare
+say it was a shock to him. When men feel like that about a girl they
+generally say things they don’t mean ...”
+
+Mary Trevert straightened herself up and dropped her hands to her side.
+She faced her mother, the tear-drops glistening on her long lashes.
+
+“He meant it, every word of it. And he was perfectly right. I _was_
+selling myself, and you know I was, Mother. Do you think we can go on
+for ever like this, living on credit and dodging tradesmen? I meant to
+marry Hartley and stick to him. But I never thought ... I never guessed
+... that Robin ...”
+
+“I know, my dear,” her mother interposed, “I know. Perhaps it doesn’t
+sound a very proper thing to say in the circumstances, but now that
+poor Hartley is gone, there is no reason whatsoever why you and Robin
+...”
+
+The Treverts were a hot-tempered race. Lady Margaret’s unfinished
+sentence seemed to infuriate the girl.
+
+“Do you think I’d marry Robin Greve as long as I thought he knew the
+mystery of Hartley’s death!” she cried passionately. “I was willing to
+give up my self-respect once to save us from ruin, but I won’t do it
+again. I’m not surprised to find you thinking I am ready to marry Robin
+and live happy ever after on poor Hartley’s money. But I’ve not sunk so
+low as that! If you ever mention this to me again, Mother, I promise
+you I’ll go away and never come back!”
+
+“My dear child,” temporized Lady Margaret, eyebrows raised in protest
+at this outburst, “of course, it shall be as you wish. I only thought
+...”
+
+But Mary Trevert was not listening. She leant on the mantel-shelf, her
+dark head in her hands, and she murmured:
+
+“The tragedy of it! My God, the tragedy of it!”
+
+Lady Margaret twisted the rings on her long white fingers.
+
+“The tragedy of it, my dear,” she said, “is that you have sent away the
+man you love at a time when you will never need him so badly again ...”
+
+There was a discreet tapping at the door.
+
+“Come in!” said Lady Margaret.
+
+Bude appeared.
+
+“Mr. Manderton, the detective, my lady, was wishing to know whether he
+might see Miss Trevert ...”
+
+“Yes. Ask him to come up here,” commanded Lady Margaret.
+
+“He is without—in the corridor, my lady!”
+
+He stepped back and in a moment Mr. Manderton stepped into the room,
+big, burly, and determined.
+
+He made a little stiff bow to the two ladies and halted irresolute near
+the door.
+
+“You wished to see my daughter, Mr. Manderton,” said Lady Margaret.
+
+The detective bowed again.
+
+“And you, too, my lady,” he said. “Allow me!”
+
+He closed the door, then crossed to the fireplace.
+
+“After I had seen you and Miss Trevert last night, my lady,” he began,
+“I had a talk with Mr. Jeekes, Mr. Parrish’s principal secretary, who
+came down by car from London as soon as he heard the news. My lady, I
+think this is a fairly simple case!”
+
+He paused and scanned the carpet.
+
+“Mr. Jeekes tells me, my lady,” he went on presently, “that Mr. Parrish
+had been suffering from neurasthenia and a weak heart brought on by too
+much smoking. It appears that he had consulted, within the last two
+months, two leading specialists of Harley Street about his health. One
+of these gentlemen, Sir Winterton Maire, ordered him to knock off all
+work and all smoking for at least three months. He will give evidence
+to this effect at the inquest. Mr. Parrish disregarded these orders as
+he was wishful to put through his scheme for Hornaway’s before taking a
+rest. Mr. Jeekes can prove that. In these circumstances, my lady....”
+
+“Well?”
+
+Lady Margaret, in her black crêpe de chine dress, setting off the
+silvery whiteness of her hair, was a calm, unemotional figure as she
+sat in her lacquer chair.
+
+“Well?” she asked again.
+
+“Well,” said the detective, “the verdict will be one of ‘Suicide whilst
+of unsound mind,’ and in my opinion the medical evidence will be
+sufficient to bring that in. There will not be occasion, I fancy, my
+lady, to probe any farther into the motives of Mr. Parrish’s
+action....”
+
+“And are you personally satisfied”—Mary’s voice broke in clear and
+unimpassioned—“are you personally satisfied, Mr. Manderton, that Mr.
+Parrish shot himself?”
+
+The detective cast an appealing glance at the tips of his
+well-burnished boots.
+
+“Yes, Miss, I think I may say I am....”
+
+“And what about the evidence of Bude, who said he heard voices in the
+library....”
+
+Mr. Manderton gave his shoulders the merest suspicion of a shrug,
+raised his hands, and dropped them to his sides.
+
+“I had hoped, my lady,” he said, throwing a glance at Lady Margaret,
+“and you, Miss, that I had made it clear that in the circumstances we
+need not pursue that matter any further....”
+
+Lady Margaret rose. Her dominating personality seemed to fill the room.
+
+“We are extremely obliged to you, Mr. Manderton,” she said, “for the
+able and discreet way in which you have handled this case. I sometimes
+meet the Chief Commissioner at dinner. I shall write to Sir Maurice and
+tell him my opinion.”
+
+Mr. Manderton reddened a little.
+
+“Your ladyship is too good,” he said.
+
+Lady Margaret bowed to signify that the interview was at an end. But
+Mary Trevert left her side and walked to the door.
+
+“Will you come downstairs with me, Mr. Manderton,” she said. “I should
+like to speak to you alone for a minute!”
+
+She led the way downstairs through the hall and out into the drive. A
+pale sun shone down from a grey and rainy sky, and the damp breeze
+blowing from the sodden trees played among the ringlets of her dark
+hair.
+
+“We will walk down the drive,” she said to the detective, who, rather
+astonished, had followed her. “We can talk freely out of doors.”
+
+They took a dozen steps in silence. Then she said:
+
+“Who was it speaking to Mr. Parrish in the library?”
+
+“Undoubtedly Mr. Greve,” replied the man without hesitation.
+
+“Why undoubtedly?” asked the girl.
+
+“It could have been no one else. We know that he left you hot to get at
+Mr. Parrish and have words with him. Bude heard them talking with
+voices raised aloud....”
+
+“But if the door were locked?”
+
+“Mr. Parrish may have opened it and locked it again, Mr. Greve getting
+out by the window. But there are no traces of that ... one would look
+to find marks on the paint on the inside. Besides, a little test we
+made this morning suggests that Mr. Greve spoke to Mr. Parrish through
+the window....”
+
+“Was the window open?”
+
+“Yes, Miss, it probably was. The fire had been smoking in the library.
+Mr. Parrish had complained to Bude about it. Besides, we have found Mr.
+Parrish’s finger-prints on the inside of the window-frame. Outside we
+found other finger-prints ... Sir Horace’s. Sir Horace was good enough
+to allow his to be taken.”
+
+The girl looked at the detective quickly.
+
+“Were there any other finger-prints except Horace’s on the outside?”
+she asked.
+
+Mr. Manderton shook his head.
+
+“No, Miss,” he answered.
+
+They had reached the lodge-gates at the beginning of the drive and
+turned to retrace their steps to the house.
+
+“Then we shall never know exactly why Mr. Parrish did this thing?”
+hazarded Mary.
+
+Mr. Manderton darted her a surreptitious glance.
+
+“We shall see about that,” he said.
+
+There was menace in his voice.
+
+Mary Trevert stopped. She put her hand on the detective’s arm.
+
+“Mr. Manderton,” she said, “if you are satisfied, then, believe me, I
+am!”
+
+The detective bowed.
+
+“Miss Trevert,” he said,—and he spoke perfectly respectfully though his
+words were blunt,—“I can well believe that!”
+
+The girl looked up quickly. She scanned his face rather apprehensively.
+
+“What do you mean?” she asked, “I don’t understand....”
+
+“I mean,” was the detective’s answer, given in his quiet, level voice,
+“that when you attempted to mislead Inspector Humphries you did nobody
+any good!”
+
+The girl bent her head without replying, and in silence they regained
+the house. At the house door they parted, Mary going indoors while the
+detective remained standing on the drive. Very deliberately he produced
+a short briar pipe, cut a stub of dark plug tobacco from a flat piece
+he carried in his pocket, crammed the tobacco into his pipe, and lit
+it. Reflectively he blew a thin spiral of smoke into the still air.
+
+“_He_ told me about that fat butler’s evidence,” he said to himself;
+“_he_ put me wise about that window being open; _he_ gave me the office
+about the paint on the finger-nails of Mr. H.P.”
+
+He ticked off each point on his fingers with the stem of his pipe.
+
+“Why?” said Mr. Manderton aloud, addressing a laurel-bush.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+JEEKES
+
+
+Mr. Albert Edward Jeekes, Hartley Parrish’s principal private
+secretary, lunched with Lady Margaret, Mary and Horace. Dr. Romain
+seemed not to have got over his embarrassment of the morning, for he
+did not put in an appearance.
+
+Mr. Jeekes was an old young man who supported bravely the weight of his
+Christian names, a reminder of his mother having occupied some small
+post in the household of Queen Victoria the Good. He might have been
+any age between 35 and 50 with his thin sandy hair, his myopic gaze,
+and his habitual expression of worried perplexity.
+
+He was a shorthand-writer and typist of incredible dexterity and speed
+which, combined with an unquenchable energy, had recommended him to
+Hartley Parrish. Accordingly, in consideration of a salary which he
+would have been the first to describe as “princely,” he had during the
+past four years devoted some fifteen hours a day to the service of Mr.
+Hartley Parrish.
+
+He was unmarried. When not on duty, either at St. James’s Square,
+Harkings, or Hartley Parrish’s palatial offices in Broad Street, he was
+to be found at one of those immense and gloomy clubs of indiscriminate
+membership which are dotted about the parish of St. James’s, S.W., and
+to which Mr. Jeekes was in the habit of referring in Early-Victorian
+accents of respect.
+
+“When I heard the news at the club, Miss Trevert,” said Jeekes, “you
+could have knocked me down with a feather. Mr. Parrish, as all of us
+knew, worked himself a great deal too hard, sometimes not knocking off
+for his tea, even, and wore his nerves all to pieces. But I never
+dreamed it would come to this. Ah! he’s a great loss, and what we shall
+do without him I don’t know. There was a piece in one of the papers
+about him to-day—perhaps you saw it?—it called him ‘one of the captains
+of industry of modern England.’”
+
+“You were always a great help to him, Mr. Jeekes,” said Mary, who was
+touched by the little man’s hero-worship; “I am sure you realized that
+he appreciated you.”
+
+“Well,” replied Mr. Jeekes, rubbing the palms of his hands together,
+“he did a great deal for _me_. Took me out of a City office where I was
+getting two pound five a week. That’s what he did. It was a shipping
+firm. I tell you this because it has a bearing, Miss Trevert, on what
+is to follow. Why did he pick me? I’ll tell you.
+
+“He was passing through the front office with one of our principals
+when he asked him, just casually, what Union Pacific stood at. The boss
+didn’t know.
+
+“‘A hundred and eighty-seven London parity,’ says I. He turned round
+and looked at me. ‘How do you know that?’ says he, rather surprised,
+this being in a shipping office, you understand.
+
+“‘I take an interest in the markets,’ I replied. ‘Do you?’ he says.
+‘Then you might do for me,’ and tells me to come and see him.”
+
+“I went. He made me an offer. When I heard the figure ... my word!”
+
+Mr. Jeekes paused. Then added sadly:
+
+“And I had meant to work for him to my dying day!”
+
+They were in the billiard-room seated on the selfsame settee, Mary
+reflected, on which she and Robin had sat—how long ago it seemed,
+though only yesterday! Mary had carried the secretary off after
+luncheon in order to unfold to him a plan which she had been turning
+over in her mind ever since her conversation with the detective.
+
+“And what are you going to do now, Mr. Jeekes?” she asked.
+
+The little man pursed up his lips.
+
+“Well,” he said, “I’ll have to get something else, I expect. I’m not
+expecting to find anything so good as I had with Mr. Parrish. And
+things are pretty crowded in the City, Miss Trevert, what with all the
+boys back from the war, God bless ’em, and glad we are to see ’em, I’m
+sure. I hope you’ll realize, Miss Trevert, that anything I can do to
+help to put Mr. Parrish’s affairs straight....”
+
+“I was just about to say,” Mary broke in, “that I hope you will not
+contemplate any change, Mr. Jeekes. You know more about Mr. Parrish’s
+affairs than anybody else, and I shall be very glad if you will stay on
+and help me. You know I have been left sole executrix....”
+
+“Miss Trevert,”—the little man stammered in his embarrassment,—“this is
+handsome of you. I surely thought you would have wished to make your
+own arrangements, appoint your own secretaries....”
+
+Mr. Jeekes broke off and looked at her, blinking hard.
+
+“Not at all,” said Mary. “Everything shall be as it was. I am sure that
+Mr. Bardy will approve. Besides, Mr. Jeekes, I want your assistance in
+something else....”
+
+“Anything in my power....” began Jeekes.
+
+“Listen,” said Mary.
+
+She was all her old self-composed self now, a charming figure in her
+plain blue serge suit with a white silken shirt and black tie—the best
+approach to mourning her wardrobe could afford. Already the short
+winter afternoon was drawing in. Mysterious shadows lurked in the
+corners of the long and narrow room.
+
+“Listen,” said Mary, leaning forward. “I want to know why Mr. Parrish
+killed himself. I mean to know. And I want you, Mr. Jeekes, to help me
+to find out.”
+
+Something stirred ever so faintly in the remote recesses of the
+billiard-room. A loose board or something creaked softly and was
+silent.
+
+“What was that?” the girl called out sharply. “Who’s there?”
+
+Mr. Jeekes got up and walked over to the door. It was ajar. He closed
+it.
+
+“Just a board creaking,” he said as he resumed his seat.
+
+“I want your aid in finding out the motive for this terrible
+deed,”—Mary Trevert was speaking again,—“I can’t understand.... I don’t
+see clear....”
+
+“Miss Trevert,” said Mr. Jeekes, clearing his throat fussily, “I fear
+we must look for the motive in the state of poor Mr. Parrish’s nerves.
+An uncommonly high-strung man he always was, and he smoked those long
+black strong cigars of his from morning till night. Sir Winterton Maire
+told him flatly—Mr. Parrish, I recollect, repeated his very words to me
+after Sir Winterton had examined him—that, if he did not take a
+complete rest and give up smoking, he would not be answerable for the
+consequences. Therefore, Miss Trevert....”
+
+“Mr. Jeekes,” answered the girl, “I knew Mr. Parrish pretty well. A
+woman, you know, gets to the heart of a man’s character very often
+quicker than his daily associates in business. And I know that Mr.
+Parrish was the last man in the world to have done a thing like that.
+He was so ... so undaunted. He made nothing of difficulties. He relied
+wholly on himself. That was the secret of his success. For him to have
+killed himself like this makes me feel convinced that there was some
+hidden reason, far stronger, far more terrible, than any question of
+nerves....”
+
+Leaning forward, her hands clasped tightly in front of her, Mary
+Trevert raised her dark eyes to the little secretary’s face.
+
+“Many men have a secret in their lives,” she said in a low voice. “Do
+you know of anything in Mr. Parrish’s life which an enemy might have
+made use of to drive him to his death?”
+
+Her manner was so intense that Mr. Jeekes quite lost his
+self-composure. He clutched at his _pince-nez_ and readjusted them upon
+his nose to cover his embarrassment. The secretary was not used to
+gazing at beautiful women whose expressive features showed as clearly
+as this the play of the emotions.
+
+“Miss Trevert,” he said presently, “I know of no such secret. But then
+what do I—what does any one—know of Mr. Parrish’s former life?”
+
+“We might make enquiries in South Africa?” ventured the girl.
+
+“I doubt if we should learn anything much through that,” said the
+secretary. “Of course, Mr. Parrish had great responsibilities and
+responsibility means worry....”
+
+A silence fell on them both. From somewhere in the dark shadows above
+the fire glowing red through the falling twilight a clock chimed once.
+There was a faint rustling from the neighborhood of the door. Mr.
+Jeekes started violently. A coal dropped noisily into the fireplace.
+
+“There was something else,” said Mary, ignoring the interruption, and
+paused. She did not look up when she spoke again.
+
+“There is often a woman in cases like this,” she began reluctantly.
+
+Mr. Jeekes looked extremely uncomfortable.
+
+“Miss Trevert,” he said, “I beg you will not press me on that
+score....”
+
+“Why?” asked the girl bluntly.
+
+“Because ... because”—Mr. Jeekes stumbled sadly over his
+words—“because, dear me, there are some things which really I couldn’t
+possibly discuss ... if you’ll excuse me....”
+
+“Oh, but you can discuss everything, Mr. Jeekes,” replied Mary Trevert
+composedly. “I am not a child, you know. I am perfectly well aware that
+there’s a woman somewhere in the life of every man, very often two or
+three. I haven’t got any illusions on the subject, I assure you. I
+never supposed for a moment that I was the first woman in Mr. Parrish’s
+life....”
+
+This candour seemed to administer a knock-out blow to the little
+secretary’s Victorian mind. He was speechless. He took off his
+_pince-nez_, blindly polished them with his pocket-handkerchief and
+replaced them upon his nose. His fingers trembled violently.
+
+“I have no wish to appear vulgarly curious,” the girl went on,—Mr.
+Jeekes made a quick gesture of dissent,—“but I am anxious to know
+whether Mr. Parrish was being blackmailed ... or anything like
+that....”
+
+“Oh, no, Miss Trevert, I do assure you,” the little man expostulated in
+hasty denial, “nothing like that, I am convinced. At least, that is to
+say ...”
+
+He rose to his feet, clutching the little _attaché_ case which he
+invariably carried with him as a kind of emblem of office.
+
+“And now, if you’ll excuse me, Miss Trevert,” he muttered, “I should
+really be going. I am due at Mr. Bardy’s office at five o’clock. He is
+coming up from the country specially to meet me. There is so much to
+discuss with regard to this terrible affair.”
+
+He glanced at his watch.
+
+“With the roads as greasy as they are,” he added, “it will take me all
+my time in the car to ...”
+
+He cast a panic-stricken glance around him. But Mary Trevert held him
+fast.
+
+“You didn’t finish what you were saying about Mr. Parrish, Mr. Jeekes,”
+she said impassively. The secretary made no sign. But he looked a
+trifle sullen.
+
+“I don’t think you realize, Mr. Jeekes,” she said, “that other people
+besides myself are keenly interested in the motives for Mr. Parrish’s
+suicide. The police profess to be willing to accept the testimony of
+the specialists as satisfactory medical evidence about his state of
+mind. But I distrust that man, Manderton. He is not satisfied, Mr.
+Jeekes. He won’t rest until he knows the truth.”
+
+The secretary cast her a frightened glance.
+
+“But Mr. Manderton told me himself, Miss Trevert,” he affirmed, “that
+the verdict would be, ‘Suicide while temporarily insane,’ on Sir
+Winterton Maire’s evidence alone ...”
+
+Mary Trevert tapped the ground impatiently with her foot.
+
+“Manderton will get at the truth, I tell you,” she said. “He’s that
+kind of man. Do you want me to find out from them? At the inquest,
+perhaps?”
+
+The secretary put his _attaché_ case down on the lounge again.
+
+“Of course, that would be most improper, Miss Trevert,” he said. “But
+your question embarrasses me. It embarrasses me very much ...”
+
+“What are you keeping back from me, Mr. Jeekes?” the girl demanded
+imperiously.
+
+The secretary mopped his forehead with his handkerchief. Then, as
+though with an effort, he spoke.
+
+“There is a lady, a French lady, who draws an income from Mr. Parrish
+...”
+
+The girl remained impassive, but her eyes grew rather hard.
+
+“These payments are still going on?” she asked.
+
+Jeekes hesitated. Then he nodded,
+
+“Yes,” he said.
+
+“Well? Was she blackmailing ... him?”
+
+“No, no,” Mr. Jeekes averred hastily. “But there was some
+unpleasantness some months ago ... er ... a county court action, to be
+precise, about some bills she owed. Mr. Parrish was very angry about it
+and settled to prevent it coming into court. But there was some talk
+about it ... in legal circles ...”
+
+He threw a rather scared glance at the girl.
+
+“Please explain yourself, Mr. Jeekes,” she said coldly. “I don’t
+understand ...”
+
+“Her lawyer was Le Hagen—it’s a shady firm with a big criminal
+practice. They sometimes brief Mr. Greve ...”
+
+Mary Trevert clasped and unclasped her hands quickly.
+
+“I quite understand, Mr. Jeekes,” she said. “You needn’t say any more
+...”
+
+She turned away in a manner that implied dismissal. It was as though
+she had forgotten the secretary’s existence. He picked up his _attaché_
+case and walked slowly to the door.
+
+A sharp exclamation broke from his lips.
+
+“Miss Trevert,” he cried, “the door ... I shut it a little while back
+... look, it’s ajar!”
+
+The girl who stood at the fire switched on the electric light by the
+mantelpiece.
+
+“Is ... is ... the door defective? Doesn’t it shut properly?”
+
+The little secretary forced out the questions in an agitated voice.
+
+The girl walked across the room and shut the door. It closed perfectly,
+a piece of solid, well-fitting oak.
+
+“What does it mean?” said Mr. Jeekes in a whisper. “You understand, I
+should not wish what I told you just now about Mr. Parrish to be
+overheard ...”
+
+They opened the door again. The dusky corridor was empty.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+A SHEET OF BLUE PAPER
+
+
+The sight of that crumpled ball of slatey-blue paper brought back to
+Robin’s mind with astonishing vividness every detail of the scene in
+the library. Once more he looked into Hartley Parrish’s staring,
+unseeing eyes, saw the firelight gleam again on the heavy gold signet
+ring on the dead man’s hand, the tag of the dead man’s bootlace as it
+trailed from one sprawling foot across the carpet. Once more he felt
+the dark cloud of the mystery envelop him as a mist and with a little
+sigh he smoothed out the crumpled paper.
+
+It was an ordinary quarto sheet of stoutish paper, with a glazed
+surface, of an unusual shade of blue, darker than what the stationers
+call “azure,” yet lighter than legal blue. At the top right-hand corner
+was typewritten a date: “Nov. 25.” Otherwise the sheet was blank.
+
+The curious thing about it was that a number of rectangular slits had
+been cut in the paper. Robin counted them. There were seven. They were
+of varying sizes, the largest a little over an inch, the smallest not
+more than a quarter of an inch, in length. In depth they measured about
+an eighth of an inch.
+
+Robin stared at the paper uncomprehendingly. He remembered perfectly
+where he had found it on the floor of the library at Harkings, between
+the dead body and the waste-paper basket. The basket, he recalled,
+stood out in the open just clear of the desk on the left-hand side.
+From the position in which it was lying the ball of paper might have
+been aimed for the waste-paper basket and, missing it, have fallen on
+the carpet.
+
+Robin turned the sheet over. The back was blank. Then he held the paper
+up to the light. Yes, there was a water-mark. Now it was easily
+discernible. “EGMONT FF. QU.” he made out.
+
+The train was slowing down. Robin glanced out of the window and saw
+that they were crossing the river in the mirky gloom of a London winter
+Sunday. He balanced the sheet of paper in his hands for a moment. Then
+he folded it carefully into four and stowed it away in his
+cigarette-case. The next moment the train thumped its way into Charing
+Cross.
+
+A taxi deposited him at the Middle Temple Gate. He walked the short
+distance to the set of chambers he occupied. On his front door a piece
+of paper was pinned. By the rambling calligraphy and the phonetic
+English he recognized the hand of his “laundress.”
+
+Dere sir [it ran], mr rite call he want to see u pertikler i tole im as
+you was in country & give im ur adress hope i dun rite mrs bragg
+
+
+Robin had scarcely got his key in the door of his “oak” when there was
+a step on the stair. A nice-looking young man with close-cropped fair
+hair appeared round the turn of the staircase.
+
+“Hullo, Robin,” he exclaimed impetuously, “I _am_ glad to have caught
+you like this. Your woman gave me your address, so I rang up Harkings
+at once and they told me you had just gone back to town. So I came
+straight here. You remember me, don’t you? Bruce Wright ... But perhaps
+I’m butting in. If you’d rather see me some other time....”
+
+“My dear boy,” said Robin, motioning him into the flat, “of course I
+remember you. Only I didn’t recognize you just for the minute. Shove
+your hat down here in the hall. And as for butting in,”—he threw open
+the door of the living-room,—“why! I think there is no other man in
+England I would so gladly see at this very moment as yourself.”
+
+The living-room was a bright and cheery place, tastefully furnished in
+old oak with gay chintz curtains. It looked out on an old-world paved
+court in the centre of which stood a solitary soot-laden plane-tree.
+
+“What’s this rot about Parrish having committed suicide?” demanded the
+boy abruptly.
+
+Robin gave him in the briefest terms an outline of the tragedy.
+
+“Poor old H.P., eh?” mused young Wright; “who’d have thought it?”
+
+“But the idea of suicide is preposterous,” he broke out suddenly. “I
+knew Parrish probably better than anybody. He would never have done a
+thing like that. It must have been an accident....”
+
+Robin shook his head.
+
+“That possibility is ruled out by the medical evidence,” he said, and
+stopped short.
+
+Bruce Wright, who had been pacing up and down the room, halted in front
+of the barrister.
+
+“I tell you that Parrish was not the man to commit suicide. Nothing
+would have even forced him to take his own life. You know, I was
+working with him as his personal secretary every day for more than two
+years, and I am sure!”
+
+He resumed his pacing up and down the room.
+
+“Has it ever occurred to you, Robin,” he said presently, “that
+practically nothing is known of H.P.’s antecedents? For instance, do
+you know where he was born?”
+
+“I understand he was a Canadian,” replied Robin with a shrewd glance at
+the flushed face of the boy.
+
+“He’s lived in Canada,” said Wright, “but originally he was a Cockney,
+from the London slums. And I believe I am the only person who knows
+that....”
+
+Robin pushed an armchair at his companion.
+
+“Sit down and tell me about it,” he commanded.
+
+The boy dropped into the chair.
+
+“It was after I had been only a few months with him,” he began,
+“shortly after I was discharged from the army with that lung wound of
+mine. We were driving back in the car from some munition works near
+Baling, and the chauffeur took a wrong turning near Wormwood Scrubs and
+got into a maze of dirty streets round there....”
+
+“I know,” commented Robin, “Notting Dale, they call it....”
+
+“H.P. wasn’t noticing much,” Wright went on, “as he was dictating
+letters to me,—we used to do a lot of work in the Rolls-Royce in those
+rush days,—but, directly he noticed that the chauffeur was uncertain of
+the road, he shoved his head out of the window and put him right at
+once. I suppose I seemed surprised at his knowing his way about those
+parts, for he laughed at me and said: ‘I was born and brought up down
+here, Bruce, in a little greengrocer’s shop just off the Latimer Road.’
+I said nothing because I didn’t want to interrupt his train of thought.
+He had never talked to me or Jeekes or any of us like that before.
+
+“‘By Gad,’ he went on, ‘how the smell of the place brings back those
+days to me—the smell of decayed fruit, of stale fish, of dirt! Why, it
+seems like yesterday that Victor Marbran and I used to drive round
+uncle’s cart with vegetables and coal. What a life to escape from,
+Bruce, my boy! Gad, you can count yourself lucky!’
+
+“He was like a man talking to himself. I asked him how he had broken
+away from it all. At that he laughed, a bitter, hard sort of laugh. ‘By
+having the guts to break away from it, boy,’ he said. ‘It was I who
+made Victor Marbran come away with me. We worked our passages out to
+the Cape and made our way up-country to Matabeleland. That was in the
+early days of Rhodes and Barney Barnato—long before I went to Canada. I
+made Victor’s fortune for him and mine as well. But I made more than
+Victor and he never forgave me. He’d do me a bad turn if he could ...’
+
+“Then he broke off short and went on with his dictating ...”
+
+“Did he ever come back to this phase of his life?”
+
+“Only when we got out of the car that morning. He said to me: ‘Forget
+what I told you to-day, young fellow. Never rake up a man’s past!’ And
+he never mentioned the subject again. Of course, I didn’t either ...”
+
+Stretched full length in his chair, his eyes fixed on the ceiling,
+Robin remained lost in thought.
+
+“The conversation came back to me to-day,” said the boy, “when I read
+of Parrish’s death. And I wondered ...”
+
+“Well?”
+
+“Whether the secret of his death may not be found somewhere in his
+adventurous past. You see he said that Victor Marbran was an enemy.
+Then there was something else. I never told you—when you took all that
+trouble to get me another job after Parrish had sacked me—the exact
+reason for my dismissal. You never asked me either. That was decent of
+you, Robin ...”
+
+“I liked you, Bruce,” said Robin shortly.
+
+“Well, I’ll tell you now,” he said. “When I joined H.P.’s staff after I
+got out of the Army, I was put under old Jeekes, of course, to learn
+the work. One of the first injunctions he gave me was with regard to
+Mr. Parrish’s letters. I suppose you know more or less how secretaries
+of a big business man like Hartley Parrish work. They open all letters,
+lay the important ones before the big man for him to deal with
+personally, make a digest of the others or deal with them direct ...”
+
+Robin nodded.
+
+“Well,” the boy resumed, “the first thing old Jeekes told me was that
+letters arriving in a blue envelope and marked ‘Personal’ were never to
+be opened ...”
+
+“In a blue envelope?” echoed Robin quickly.
+
+“Yes, a particular kind of blue—a sort of slatey-blue—Jeekes showed me
+one as a guide. Well, these letters were to be handed to Mr. Parrish
+unopened.”
+
+Robin had stood up.
+
+“That’s odd,” he said, diving in his pocket.
+
+“I say, hold on a bit,” protested the boy, “this is really rather
+important what I am telling you. I’ll never finish if you keep on
+interrupting.”
+
+“Sorry, Bruce,” said Robin, and sat down again.
+
+But he began to play restlessly with his cigarette case which he had
+drawn from his pocket.
+
+“Well, of course,” Bruce resumed, “I wasn’t much of a private secretary
+really, and one day I forgot all about this injunction. Some days old
+H.P. got as many as three hundred letters. I was alone at Harkings with
+him, I remember, Jeekes was up at Sheffield and the other secretaries
+were away ill or something, and in the rush of dealing with this
+enormous mail I slit one of these blue envelopes open with the rest. I
+discovered what I had done only after I had got all the letters sorted
+out, this one with the rest. So I went straight to old H.P. and told
+him. By Jove!”
+
+“What happened?” said Robin.
+
+“He got into the most paralytic rage,” said Bruce. “I have never seen a
+man in such an absolute frenzy of passion. He went right off the hooks,
+just like that! He fairly put the wind up me. For a minute I thought he
+was going to kill me. He snatched the letter out of my hand, called me
+every name under the sun, and finally shouted: ‘You’re fired, d’ye
+hear? I won’t employ men who disobey my orders! Get out of this before
+I do you a mischief! I went straight off. And I never saw him again
+...”
+
+Robin Greve looked very serious. But his face displayed no emotion as
+he asked:
+
+“And what was in the letter for him to make such a fuss about?”
+
+The boy shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“That was the extraordinary part of it. The letter was perfectly
+harmless. It was an ordinary business letter from a firm in Holland
+...”
+
+“In Holland?” cried Greve. “Did you say in Holland? Tell me the name!
+No, wait, see if I can remember. ‘Van’ something—‘Speck’ or ‘Spike’
+...”
+
+“I remember the name perfectly,” answered Bruce, rather puzzled by the
+other’s sudden outburst; “it was Van der Spyck and Co. of Rotterdam. We
+had a good deal of correspondence with them ...”
+
+Robin Greve had opened his cigarette-case and drawn from it a creased
+square of blue paper folded twice across. Unfolding it, he held up the
+sheet he had found in the library at Harkings.
+
+“Is that the paper those letters were written on?” he asked.
+
+Bruce took the sheet from him. He held it up to the light.
+
+“Why, yes,” came the prompt answer. “I’d know it in a minute. Look,
+it’s the same water-mark. ‘Egmont.’ Where did you get hold of it?”
+
+“Bruce,” said Robin gravely, without answering the question, “we’re
+getting into deep water, boy!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+SHADOWS
+
+
+Robert Greve stood for an instant in silence by the window of his
+rooms. His fingers hammered out a tattoo on the pane. His eyes were
+fixed on the windows of the chambers across the court. But they did not
+take in the pleasant prospect of the tall, ivy-framed casements in
+their mellow setting of warm red brick. He was trying to fix a mental
+photograph of a letter—typewritten on paper of dark slatey blue—which
+he had seen on Hartley Parrish’s desk in the library at Harkings on the
+previous afternoon.
+
+Prompted by Bruce Wright, he could now recall the heading clearly.
+“ELIAS VAN DER SPYCK & Co., GENERAL IMPORTERS, ROTTERDAM,” stood
+printed before his eyes as plainly as though he still held the
+typewritten sheet in front of him. But the mind plays curious tricks.
+Robin’s brain had registered the name; yet it recorded no impression of
+the contents of the letter. Beyond the fact that it dealt in plain
+commercial fashion with some shipments or other, he could recall no
+particular whatever of it.
+
+“But where did you get hold of this sheet of paper?” Bruce Wright’s
+voice broke in impatiently behind him. “I’m most frightfully interested
+to know ...”
+
+“Found it on the floor beside Parrish’s body,” answered Robin briefly.
+“There was a letter, too, on the same paper ...”
+
+“By Gad!” exclaimed the boy eagerly, “have you got that too?”
+
+Robin shook his head.
+
+“It was only your story that made me think of it. I had the letter. But
+I left it where I found it—on Parrish’s desk in the library ...”
+
+“But you read it ... you know what was in it?”
+
+Robin shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“It was a perfectly straightforward business letter ... something about
+steel shipments ... I don’t remember any more ...”
+
+“A straightforward business letter,” commented the boy. “Like the
+letter I read, eh?...”
+
+“Tell me, Bruce,” said Robin, after a moment’s silence, “during the
+time you were with Hartley Parrish, I suppose these blue letters came
+pretty often?”
+
+Young Wright wrinkled his brow in thought.
+
+“It’s rather difficult to say. You see, there were three of us besides
+old Jeekes, and, of course, these letters might have come without my
+knowledge anything about it. But during the seven months I worked with
+H.P. I suppose about half a dozen of these letters passed through my
+hands. They used to worry H.P., you know, Robin ...”
+
+“Worry him?” exclaimed Robin sharply; “how do you mean?”
+
+“Well,” said Bruce, “Parrish was a very easygoing fellow, you know. He
+worked every one—himself included—like the devil, of course. But he was
+hardly ever nervy or grumpy. And so I was a bit surprised to find—after
+I had been with him for a time—that every now and then he sort of
+shrivelled up. He used to look ... well, careworn and ... and haggard.
+And at these times he was pretty short with all of us. It was such an
+extraordinary change from his usual cheery, optimistic self that
+sometimes I suspected him of dope or some horror like that ...”
+
+Robin shook his head. He had a sudden vision of Hartley Parrish, one of
+his long, black Partagas thrust at an aggressive angle from a corner of
+his mouth, virile, battling, strong.
+
+“Oh, no,” he said, “not dope ...”
+
+“No, no, I know,” the boy went on quickly. “It wasn’t dope. It was fear
+...”
+
+Robin swung round from the window.
+
+“Fear? Fear of what?”
+
+The boy cast a frightened glance over his shoulder rather as if he
+fancied he might be overheard.
+
+“Of those letters,” he replied. “I am sure it was that. I watched him
+and ... and I _know_. Every time he got one of those letters in the
+bluish envelopes, these curious fits of gloom came over him. Robin ...”
+
+“What, Bruce?”
+
+“I think he was being blackmailed!”
+
+The barrister nodded thoughtfully.
+
+“Don’t you agree?”
+
+The boy awaited his answer eagerly.
+
+“Something very like that,” replied the other.
+
+Then suddenly he smashed his fist into the open palm of his other hand.
+
+“But he wouldn’t have taken it lying down!” he cried. “Hartley Parrish
+was a fighter, Bruce. Did you ever know a man who could best him? No,
+no, it won’t fit! Besides ...”
+
+He broke off and thought for an instant.
+
+“We must get that letter from Harkings,” he said presently. “Jeekes
+will have it. We can do nothing until ...”
+
+His voice died away. Bruce, sunk in one of the big leather armchairs,
+was astonished to see him slip quickly away from the window and
+ensconce himself behind one of the chintz curtains.
+
+“Here, Bruce,” Robin called softly across the room. “Just come here.
+But take care not to show yourself. Look out, keep behind the curtain
+and here ... peep out through this chink!”
+
+Young Wright peered through a narrow slit between the curtain and the
+window-frame. In the far corner of the courtyard beneath the windows,
+where a short round iron post marked a narrow passage leading to the
+adjoining court, a man was standing. He wore a shabby suit and a blue
+handkerchief knotted about his neck served him as a substitute for the
+more conventional collar and tie. His body was more than half concealed
+by the side of the house along which the passage ran. But his face was
+clearly distinguishable—a peaky, thin face, the upper part in the
+shadow of the peak of a discoloured tweed cap.
+
+“He’s been there on and off all the time we’ve been talking,” said
+Robin. “I wasn’t sure at first. But now I’m certain. He’s watching
+these windows! Look!”
+
+Briskly the watcher’s head was withdrawn to emerge again, slowly and
+cautiously, in a little while.
+
+“But who is he? What does he want?” asked Bruce.
+
+“I haven’t an idea,” retorted Robin Greve. “But I could guess. Tell me,
+Bruce,” he went on, stepping back from the window and motioning the boy
+to do the same, “did you notice anybody following you when you came
+here?”
+
+Bruce shook his head.
+
+“I’m pretty sure nobody did. You see, I came in from the Strand, down
+Middle Temple Lane. Once service has started at Temple Church there’s
+not a mouse stirring in the Inn till the church is out. I think I
+should have noticed if any one had followed me up to your chambers ...”
+
+Robin set his chin squarely.
+
+“Then he came after me,” he said. “Bruce, you’ll have to go to Harkings
+and get that letter!”
+
+“By all means,” answered the boy. “But, I say, they won’t much like me
+butting in, will they?”
+
+“You’ll have to say you came down to offer your sympathy, ... volunteer
+your services ... oh, anything. But you _must_ get that letter! Do you
+understand, Bruce? _You must get that letter_—if you have to steal it!”
+
+The boy gave a long whistle.
+
+“That’s rather a tall order, isn’t it?” he said.
+
+Robin nodded. His face was very grave.
+
+“Yes,” he said presently, “I suppose it is. But there is something ...
+something horrible behind this case, Bruce, something dark and ... and
+mysterious. And I mean to get to the bottom of it. With your help. Or
+alone!”
+
+Bruce put his hand impulsively on the other’s arm.
+
+“You can count on me, you know,” he said. “But don’t you think ...”
+
+He broke off shyly.
+
+“What?”
+
+“Don’t you think you’d better tell me what you know. And what you
+suspect!”
+
+Robin hesitated.
+
+“Yes,” he said, “that’s fair. I suppose I ought. But there’s not much
+to tell, Bruce. Just before Hartley Parrish was found dead, I asked
+Miss Trevert to marry me. I was too late. She was already engaged to
+Hartley Parrish. I was horrified ... I know some things about Parrish
+... we had words and I went off. Five minutes later Miss Trevert went
+to fetch Parrish in to tea and heard a shot behind the locked door of
+the library. Horace Trevert got in through the window and found Parrish
+dead. Every one down at Harkings believes that I went in and threatened
+Parrish so that he committed suicide ...”
+
+“Whom do you mean by every one?”
+
+Robin laughed drily. “Mary Trevert, her mother, Horace Trevert ...”
+
+“The police, too?”
+
+“Certainly. The police more than anybody!”
+
+“By Jove!” commented the boy.
+
+“You ask me what I suspect,” Robin continued. “I admit I have no
+positive proof. But I suspect that Hartley Parrish did not die by his
+own hand!”
+
+Bruce Wright looked up with a startled expression on his face.
+
+“You mean that he was murdered?”
+
+“I do!”
+
+“But how? Why?”
+
+Then Robin told him of the experiment in the library, of the open
+window and of the bullet mark he had discovered in the rosery.
+
+“What I want to know,” he said, “and what I am determined to find out
+beyond any possible doubt, is whether the bullet found in Hartley
+Parrish’s body was fired from _his_ pistol. But before we reach that
+point we have to explain how it happened that only one shot was heard
+and how a bullet which _apparently_ came from Parrish’s pistol was
+found in his body ...”
+
+“If Mr. Parrish was murdered, the murderer might have turned the gun
+round in Parrish’s hand and forced him to shoot himself ...”
+
+“Hardly,” said Robin. “Remember, Mary Trevert was at the door when the
+shot was fired. Your theory presupposes the employment of force, in
+other words, a struggle. Miss Trevert heard no scuffling. No, I’ve
+thought of that.. it won’t do ...”
+
+“Have you any suspicion of who the murderer might be?”
+
+Robin shook his head decidedly.
+
+“Not a shadow of an idea,” he affirmed positively. “But I have a notion
+that we shall find a clue in this letter which, like a blithering fool,
+I left on Parrish’s desk. It’s the first glimmer of hope I’ve seen yet
+...”
+
+Bruce Wright squared his shoulders and threw his head back.
+
+“I’ll get it for you,” he said.
+
+“Good boy,” said Robin. “But, Bruce,” he went on, “you’ll have to go
+carefully. My name is mud in that house. You mustn’t say you come from
+me. And if you ask boldly for the letter, they won’t give it to you.
+Jeekes might, if he’s there and you approach him cautiously. But, for
+Heaven’s sake, don’t try any diplomacy on Manderton ... that’s the
+Scotland Yard man. He’s as wary as a fox and sharp as needles.”
+
+Bruce Wright buttoned up his coat with an air of finality.
+
+“Leave it to me,” he said, “I know Harkings like my pocket. Besides
+I’ve got a friend there ...”
+
+“Who might that be?” queried the barrister.
+
+“Bude,” answered the boy and laid a finger on his lips.
+
+“But,” he pursued, jerking his head in the direction of the window,
+“what are we going to do about him out there?”
+
+Robin laughed.
+
+“Him?” he said. “Oh, I’m going to take him out for an airing!”
+
+Robin stepped out into the hall. He returned wearing his hat and
+overcoat. In his hand were two yale keys strung on a wisp of pink tape.
+
+“Listen, Bruce,” he said. “Give me ten minutes’ start to get rid of
+this jackal. Then clear out. There’s a train to Stevenish at 3.23. If
+you get on the Underground at the Temple you ought to be able to make
+it easily. Here are the keys of the chambers. I can put you up here
+to-night if you like. I’ll expect you when I see you ... with that
+letter. Savvy?”
+
+The boy stood up.
+
+“You’ll have that letter to-night,” he answered. “But in the
+meantime,”—he waved the blue sheet with its mysterious slots at
+Robin,—“what do you make of this?”
+
+Robin took the sheet of paper from him and replaced it in his
+cigarette-case.
+
+“Perhaps, when we have the letter,” he replied, “I shall be able to
+answer that question!”
+
+Then he lit a cigarette, gave the boy his hand, and a minute later
+Bruce Wright, watching through the chink of the curtain from the window
+of Robin Greve’s chambers, saw a lanky form shuffle across the court
+and follow Robin round the angle of the house.
+
+Robin strode quickly through the maze of narrow passages and tranquil,
+echoing courts into the Sabbath stillness of the Strand. An occasional
+halt at a shop-window was sufficient to assure him that the watcher of
+the Temple was still on his heels. The man, he was interested to see,
+played his part very unobtrusively, shambling along in nonchalant
+fashion, mostly hugging the sides of the houses, ready to dart out of
+sight into a doorway or down a side turning, should he by any mischance
+arrive too close on the heels of his quarry.
+
+As he walked along, Robin turned over in his mind the best means for
+getting rid of his shadow. Should he dive into a Tube station and
+plunge headlong down the steps? He rejected this idea as calculated to
+let the tracker know that his presence was suspected. Then he reviewed
+in his mind the various establishments he knew of in London with double
+entrances, thinking that he might slip in by the one entrance and
+emerge by the other.
+
+In Pall Mall he came upon Tony Grandell, whom he had last seen playing
+bridge in the company dugout on the Flesquieres Ridge. Then he had been
+in “battle order,” camouflaged as a private soldier, as officers were
+ordered to go over the top in the latter phases of the war. Now he was
+resplendent in what the invitation cards call “Morning Dress” crowned
+by what must certainly have been the most relucent top-hat in London.
+
+“Hullo, hullo, hullo!” cried Tony, on catching sight of him; “stand to
+your kits and so forth! And how is my merry company commander? Robin,
+dear, come and relieve the medieval gloom of lunch with my aunt at
+Mart’s!”
+
+He linked his arm affectionately in Robin’s.
+
+Mart’s! Robin’s brain snatched at the word. Mart’s! most respectable of
+“family hotels,” wedged in between two quiet streets off Piccadilly
+with an entrance from both. If ever a man wanted to dodge a sleuth,
+especially a grimy tatterdemalion like the one sidling up Pall Mall
+behind them ...
+
+“Tony, old son,” said Robin, “I won’t lunch with you even to set the
+board in a roar at your aunt’s luncheon-party. But I’ll walk up to
+Mart’s with you, for I’m going there myself ...”
+
+They entered Mart’s together and parted in the vestibule, where Tony
+gravely informed his “dear old scream” that he must fly to his
+“avuncular luncheon.” Robin walked quickly through the hotel and left
+by the other entrance. The street was almost deserted. Of the man with
+the dingy neckerchief there was no sign. Robin hurried into Piccadilly
+and hopped on a ’bus which put him down at his club facing the Green
+Park.
+
+He had a late lunch there and afterwards took a taxi back to the
+Temple. The daylight was failing as he crossed the courtyard in front
+of his chambers. In the centre the smoke-blackened plane-tree throned
+it in unchallenged solitude. But, as Robin’s footsteps echoed across
+the flags, something more substantial than a shadow seemed to melt into
+the gathering dusk in the corner where the narrow passage ran.
+
+Robin stopped to listen at the entrance to his chambers. As he stood
+there he heard a heavy tread on the stone steps within. He turned to
+face a solidly built swarthy-looking man who emerged from the building.
+
+He favoured Robin with a leisurely, searching stare, then strode
+heavily across the courtyard to the little passage where he disappeared
+from view.
+
+Robin looked after him. The man was a stranger: the occupants of the
+other chambers were all known to him. With a thoughtful expression on
+his face Robin entered the house and mounted to his rooms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+THE INTRUDER
+
+
+“D——!” exclaimed Bruce Wright.
+
+He stood in the great porch at Harkings, his finger on the electric
+bell. No sound came in response to the pressure, nor any one to open
+the door. Thus he had stood for fully ten minutes listening in vain for
+any sound within the house. All was still as death. He began to think
+that the bell was out of order. He had forgotten Hartley Parrish’s
+insistence on quiet. All bells at Harkings rang, discreetly muted, in
+the servants’ hall.
+
+He stepped out of the porch on to the drive. The weather had improved
+and, under a freshening wind, the country was drying up. As he reached
+the hard gravel, he heard footsteps, Bude appeared, his collar turned
+up, his swallow-tails floating in the wind.
+
+“Now, be off with you!” he cried as soon as he caught sight of the trim
+figure in the grey overcoat; “how many more of ye have I to tell
+there’s nothing for you to get here! Go on, get out before I put the
+dog on you!”
+
+He waved an imperious hand at Bruce.
+
+“Hullo, Bude,” said the boy, “you’ve grown very inhospitable all of a
+sudden!”
+
+“God bless my soul if it isn’t young Mr. Wright!” exclaimed the butler.
+“And I thought it was another of those dratted reporters. It’s been
+ring, ring, ring the whole blessed morning, sir, you can believe me, as
+if they owned the place, wanting to interview me and Mr. Jeekes and
+Miss Trevert and the Lord knows who else. Lot of interfering
+busybodies, _I_ call ’em! I’d shut up all noospapers by law if I had my
+way ...”
+
+“Is Mr. Jeekes here, Bude?” asked Bruce.
+
+“He’s gone off to London in the car, sir ... But won’t you come in, Mr.
+Wright? If you wouldn’t mind coming in by the side door. I have to keep
+the front door closed to shut them scribbling fellows out. One of them
+had the face to ask me to let him into the library to take a photograph
+...”
+
+He led the way round the side of the house to the glass door in the
+library corridor.
+
+“This is a sad business, Bude!” said Bruce.
+
+“Ah, indeed, it is, sir,” he sighed. “He had his faults had Mr.
+Parrish, as well _you_ know, Mr. Wright. But he was an open-handed
+gentleman, that I will say, and we’ll all miss him at Harkings ...”
+
+They were now in the corridor. Bude jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
+
+“It was in there they found him,” he said in a low voice, “with a hole
+plumb over the heart.”
+
+His voice sank to a whisper. “There’s blood on the carpet!” he added
+impressively.
+
+“I should like just to take a peep at the room, Bude,” ventured the
+boy, casting a sidelong glance at the butler.
+
+“Can’t be done, sir,” said Bude, shaking his head; “orders of
+Detective-Inspector Manderton. The police is very strict, Mr. Wright,
+sir!”
+
+“There seems to be no one around just now, Bude,” the young man
+wheedled. “There can’t be any harm in my just going in for a
+second?...”
+
+“Go in you should, Mr. Wright, sir,” said the butler genially, “if I
+had my way. But the door’s locked. And, what’s more, the police have
+the key.”
+
+“Is the detective anywhere about?” asked Bruce.
+
+“No, sir,” answered Bude. “He’s gone off to town, too! And he don’t
+expect to be back before the inquest. That’s for Toosday!”
+
+“But isn’t there another key anywhere?” persisted the boy.
+
+“No, sir,” said Bude positively, “there isn’t but the one. And that’s
+in Mr. Manderton’s vest pocket!”
+
+Young Wright wrinkled his brow in perplexity. He was very young, but he
+had a fine strain of perseverance in him. He was not nearly at the end
+of his resources, he told himself.
+
+“Well, then,” he said suddenly, “I’m going outside to have a look
+through the window. I remember you can see into the library from the
+path round the house!”
+
+He darted out, the butler, protesting, lumbering along behind him.
+
+“Mr. Wright,” he panted as he ran, “you didn’t reelly ought ... If any
+one should come ...”
+
+But Bruce Wright was already at the window. The butler found him
+leaning on the sill, peering with an air of frightened curiosity into
+the empty room.
+
+“The glazier from Stevenish”—Bude’s voice breathed the words hoarsely
+in Wright’s ear—“is coming to-morrow morning to put the window in. He
+wouldn’t come to-day, him being a chapel-goer and religious. It was
+there we found poor Mr. Parrish—d’you see, sir, just between the window
+and the desk!”
+
+But Bruce Wright did not heed him. His eyes were fixed on the big
+writing-desk, on the line of black japanned letter-trays set out in
+orderly array. Outside, the short winter afternoon was drawing in fast,
+and the light was failing. Dusky shadows within the library made it
+difficult to distinguish objects clearly.
+
+A voice close at hand cried out sharply:
+
+“Mr. Bude! Mr. Bu-u-ude!”
+
+“They’re calling me!” whispered the butler in his ear with a tug at his
+sleeve; “come away, sir!”
+
+But Bruce shook him off. He heard the man’s heavy tread on the gravel,
+then a door slam.
+
+How dark the room was growing, to be sure! Strain his eyes as he might,
+he could not get a clear view of the contents of the letter-trays on
+the desk. But their high backs hid their contents from his eyes. Even
+when he hoisted himself on to the window-sill he could not get a better
+view.
+
+He dropped back on to the gravel path and listened. The wind soughed
+sadly in the bare tree-tops, somewhere in the distance a dog barked
+hoarsely, insistently; otherwise not a sound was to be heard. He cast a
+cautious glance round the side of the house. The glass door was shut;
+the lamp in the corridor had not been lit.
+
+Hoisting himself up to the window-sill again, he crooked one knee on
+the rough edge and thrusting one arm through the broken pane of glass,
+unbolted the window. Then, steadying himself with one hand, with the
+other he very gently pushed up the window, threw his legs across the
+sill, and dropped into the library. Very deliberately, he turned and
+pushed the window softly down behind him.
+
+Some unconscious prompting, perhaps an unfamiliar surface beneath his
+feet, made him look down. Where his feet rested on the mole-grey carpet
+a wide dark patch stood out from the delicate shade of the rug. For a
+moment a spasm of physical nausea caught him.
+
+“How beastly!” he whispered to himself and took a step towards the
+desk.
+
+Hartley Parrish’s desk was arranged just as he always remembered it to
+have been. All the letter-trays save one were empty. In that was a
+little pile of papers held down by a massive marble paper-weight.
+Quickly he stepped round the desk.
+
+He had put out his hand to lift the weight when there was a gentle
+rattle at the door.
+
+Bruce Wright wheeled instantly round, back to the desk, to face the
+door, which, in the gathering dusk, was now but a squarer patch of
+darkness among the shadows at the far end of the library. He stood
+absolutely still, rooted to the spot, his heart thumping so fast that,
+in that silent room, he could hear the rapid beats.
+
+Some one was unlocking the library door. As realization came to the
+boy, he tiptoed rapidly round the desk, the sound of his feet muffled
+by the heavy pile carpet, and reached the window. There was a click as
+the lock of the door was shot back. Without further hesitation Bruce
+stepped behind the long curtains which fell from the top of the window
+to the floor.
+
+The curtains, of some heavy grey material, were quite opaque. Bruce
+realized, with a sinking heart, that he must depend on his ears to
+discover the identity of this mysterious interloper. He dared not look
+out from his hiding-place—at least not until he could be sure that the
+newcomer had his back to the window. He remained, rigid and vigilant,
+straining his ears to catch the slightest sound, scarcely daring to
+breathe.
+
+He heard the door open, heard it softly close again. Then ... silence.
+Not another sound. The boy remembered the heavy pile carpet and cursed
+his luck. He would have to risk a peep round the curtains. But not yet!
+He must wait ...
+
+A very slight rustling, a faint prolonged rustling, caught his ear. It
+came nearer, then stopped. There was a little rattling noise from
+somewhere close at hand, a small clinking sound.
+
+Then silence fell again.
+
+The wind whooshed sadly round the house, the window clattered dismally
+in its frame, the curtains tugged fretfully before the cold breeze
+which blew in at the broken pane. But the silence in the room was
+absolute.
+
+It began to oppress the boy. It frightened him. He felt an
+uncontrollable desire to look out into the room and establish the
+identity of the mysterious entrant. He glided his hand towards the
+window-frame in the hope that he might find a chink between curtain and
+wall through which he might risk a peep into the room. But the curtain
+was fastened to the wall.
+
+The room was almost entirely dark now. Only behind him was a patch of
+grey light where the lowering evening sky was framed in the window. He
+began to draw the curtain very slowly towards him, at the same time
+leaning to the right. Very cautiously he applied one eye to the edge of
+the curtain.
+
+As he did so a bright light struck him full in the face. It streamed
+full from a lamp on the desk and almost blinded him. It was a
+reading-lamp and the bulb had been turned up so as to throw a beam on
+the curtain behind which the boy was sheltering.
+
+Behind the desk, straining back in terror, stood a slim, girlish
+figure. The details of her dress were lost in the gathering shadows,
+but her face stood out in the gloom, a pale oval. Bruce could see the
+dark line made by the lashes on her cheek.
+
+At the sight of her, he stepped boldly forth from his hiding-place,
+shielding his eyes from the light with his hand.
+
+“It’s Bruce Wright, Miss Trevert,” he said, “don’t you remember me?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+A FRESH CLUE
+
+
+“Oh!” cried the girl, “you frightened me! You frightened me! What do
+you want here ... in this horrible room?”
+
+She was trembling. One slim hand plucked nervously at her dress. Her
+breath came and went quickly.
+
+“I saw the curtain move. I thought it was the wind at first. But then I
+saw the outline of your fingers. And I imagined it was he ... come back
+...”
+
+“Miss Trevert,” said the boy abashed, “I must have frightened you
+terribly. I had no idea it was you!”
+
+“But why are you hiding here? How did you get in? What do you want in
+this house?”
+
+She spoke quickly, nervously. Some papers she held in her hand shook
+with her emotion. Bruce Wright stepped to the desk and turned the bulb
+of the reading-lamp down into its normal position.
+
+“I must apologize most sincerely for the fright I gave you,” he said.
+“But, believe me, Miss Trevert, I had no idea that anybody could gain
+access to this room. I climbed in through the window. Bude told me that
+the police had taken away the key ...”
+
+The girl made an impatient gesture.
+
+“But why have you come here?” she said. “What do you want?”
+
+The boy measured her with a narrow glance. He was young, but he was
+shrewd. He saw her frank eyes, her candid, open mien, and he took a
+rapid decision.
+
+“I think I have come,” he answered slowly, “for the same purpose as
+yourself!”
+
+And he looked at the papers in her hand.
+
+“I used to be Mr. Parrish’s secretary, you know,” he said.
+
+The girl sighed—a little fluttering sigh—and looked earnestly at him.
+
+“I remember,” she said. “Hartley liked you. He was sorry that he sent
+you away. He often spoke of you to me. But why have you come back? What
+do you mean by saying you have come for the same purpose as myself?”
+
+Bruce Wright looked at the array of letter-trays. The marble
+paper-weight had been displaced. The tray in which it had lain was
+empty. He looked at the sheaf of papers in the girl’s hand.
+
+“I wanted to see,” he replied, “whether there was anything here ... on
+his desk ... which would explain the mystery of his death ...”
+
+The girl spread out the papers in her hand on the big blotter.
+
+She laid the papers out in a row and leant forward, her white arms
+resting on the desk. From the other side of the desk the boy leant
+eagerly forward and scanned the line of papers.
+
+At the first glimpse his face fell. The girl, eyeing him closely,
+marked the change which came over his features.
+
+There were seven papers of various kinds, both printed and written, and
+they were all on white paper.
+
+The boy shook his head and swept the papers together into a heap.
+
+“It’s not there?” queried the girl eagerly.
+
+“No!” said Bruce absent-mindedly, glancing round the desk.
+
+“What isn’t?” flashed back the girl.
+
+Bruce Wright felt his face redden with vexation. What sort of a
+confidential emissary was he to fall into a simple trap like this?
+
+The girl smiled rather wanly.
+
+“Now I know what you meant by saying you had come for the same purpose
+as myself,” she said. “I suppose we both thought we might find
+something, a letter, perhaps, which would explain why Mr. Parrish did
+this dreadful thing, something to relieve this awful uncertainty about
+... about his motive. Well, I’ve searched the desk ... and there’s
+nothing! Nothing but just these prospectuses and receipts which were in
+the letter-tray here. They must have come by the post yesterday
+morning. And there’s nothing of any importance in the drawers ... only
+household receipts and the wages book and a few odd things like that!
+You can see for yourself ...”
+
+The lower part of the desk consisted of three drawers flanked on either
+side by cupboards. Mary Trevert pulled out the drawers and opened the
+cupboards. Two of the drawers were entirely empty and one of the
+cupboards contained nothing but a stack of cigar boxes. One drawer held
+various papers appertaining to the house. There was no sign of any
+letter written on the slatey-blue paper.
+
+The boy looked very hard at Mary.
+
+“You say there was nothing in the letter-tray but these papers here?”
+he asked.
+
+“Nothing but these,” replied the girl.
+
+“You didn’t notice any official-looking letter on bluish paper?” he
+ventured to ask.
+
+“No,” answered the girl. “I found nothing but these.”
+
+The boy thought for a moment.
+
+“Do you know,” he asked, “whether the police or anybody have been
+through the desk?”
+
+“I don’t know at all,” said Mary, smoothing back a lock of hair from
+her temple; “I daresay Mr. Jeekes had a look round, as he had a meeting
+with Mr. Parrish’s lawyer in town this afternoon!”
+
+She had lost all trace of her fright and was now quite calm and
+collected.
+
+“Do you know for certain whether Mr. Jeekes was in here?” asked Bruce.
+
+“Oh, yes. The first thing he did on arriving last night was to go to
+the library.”
+
+“I suppose Jeekes is coming back here to-night?”
+
+No, she told him. Mr. Jeekes did not expect to return to Harkings until
+the inquest on Tuesday.
+
+Bruce Wright picked up his hat.
+
+“I must apologize again, Miss Trevert,” he said, “for making such an
+unconventional entrance and giving you such a fright. But I felt I
+could not rest until I had investigated matters for myself. I would
+have presented myself in the ordinary way, but, as I told you, Bude
+told me the police had locked up the room and taken away the key ...”
+
+Mary Trevert smiled forgivingly.
+
+“So they did,” she said. “But Jay—Mr. Parrish’s man, you know—had
+another key. He brought it to me.”
+
+She looked at Bruce with a whimsical little smile.
+
+“You must have been very uncomfortable behind those curtains,” she
+said. “I believe you were just as frightened as I was.”
+
+She walked round the desk to the window.
+
+“It was a good hiding-place,” she remarked, “but not much good as an
+observation post. Why! you could see nothing of the room. The curtains
+are much too thick!”
+
+“Not a thing,” Bruce agreed rather ruefully. “I thought you were the
+detective!”
+
+He held out his hand to take his leave with a smile. He was a
+charming-looking boy with a remarkably serene expression which went
+well with close-cropped golden hair.
+
+Mary Trevert did not take his hand for an instant. Looking down at the
+point of her small black suede shoe she said shyly:
+
+“Mr. Wright, you are a friend of Mr. Greve, aren’t you?”
+
+“Rather!” was the enthusiastic answer.
+
+“Do you see him often?”
+
+The boy’s eyes narrowed suddenly. Was this a cross-examination?
+
+“Oh, yes,” he replied, “every now and then!”
+
+Mary Trevert raised her eyes to his.
+
+“Will you do something for me?” she said. “Tell Mr. Greve not to trust
+Manderton. He will know whom I mean. Tell him to be on his guard
+against that man. Say he means mischief. Tell him, above all things, to
+be careful. Make him go away ... go abroad until this thing has blown
+over ...”
+
+She spoke with intense earnestness, her dark eyes fixed on Bruce
+Wright’s face.
+
+“But promise me you won’t say this comes from me! Do you understand?
+There are reasons, very strong reasons, for this. Will you promise?”
+
+“Of course!”
+
+She took Bruce’s outstretched hand.
+
+“I promise,” he said.
+
+“You mustn’t go without tea,” said the girl. “Besides,”—she glanced at
+a little platinum watch on her wrist,—“there’s not another train until
+six. There is no need for you to start yet. I don’t like being left
+alone. Mother has one of her headaches, and Horace and Dr. Romain have
+gone to Stevenish. Come up to my sitting-room!”
+
+She led the way out of the library, locking the door behind them, and
+together they went up to the Chinese boudoir where tea was laid on a
+low table before a bright fire. In the dainty room with its bright
+colours they seemed far removed from the tragedy which had darkened
+Harkings.
+
+They had finished tea when a tap came at the door. Bude appeared. He
+cast a reproachful look at Bruce.
+
+“Jay would be glad to have a word with you, Miss,” he said.
+
+The girl excused herself and left the room. She was absent for about
+ten minutes. When she returned, she had a little furrow of perplexity
+between her brows. She walked over to the open fireplace and stood
+silent for an instant, her foot tapping the hearth-rug.
+
+“Mr. Wright,” she said presently, “I’m going to tell you something that
+Jay has just told me. I want your advice ...”
+
+The boy looked at her interrogatively. But he did not speak.
+
+“I think this is rather important,” the girl went on, “but I don’t
+quite understand in what way it is. Jay tells me that Mr. Parrish had
+on his pistol a sort of steel fitting attached to the end ... you know,
+the part you shoot out of. Mr. Parrish used to keep his automatic in a
+drawer in his dressing-room, and Jay has often seen it there with this
+attachment fitted on. Well, when Mr. Parrish was discovered in the
+library yesterday, this thing was no longer on the pistol. And Jay says
+it’s not to be found!...”
+
+“That’s rather strange!” commented Bruce. “But what was this steel
+contraption for, do you know? Was it a patent sight or something?”
+
+“Jay doesn’t know,” answered the girl.
+
+“Would you mind if I spoke to Jay myself?” asked the young man.
+
+In reply the girl touched the bell beside the fireplace. Bude answered
+the summons and was despatched to find Jay. He appeared in due course,
+a tall, dark, sleek young man wearing a swallow-tail coat and striped
+trousers.
+
+“How are you, Jay?” said Bruce affably.
+
+“Very well, thank you, sir,” replied the valet.
+
+“Miss Trevert was telling me about this appliance which you say Mr.
+Parrish had on his automatic. Could you describe it to me?”
+
+“Well, sir,” answered the man rather haltingly, “it was a little sort
+of cup made of steel or gun-metal fitting closely over the barrel ...”
+
+“And you don’t know what it was for?”
+
+“No, sir!”
+
+“Was it a sight, do you think?”
+
+“I can’t say, I’m sure, sir!”
+
+“You know what a sight looks like, I suppose. Was there a bead on it or
+anything like it?”
+
+“I can’t say, I’m sure, sir. I never gave any particular heed to it. I
+used to see the automatic lying in the drawer of the wardrobe in Mr.
+Parrish’s room in a wash-leather case. I noticed this steel appliance,
+sir, because the case wouldn’t shut over the pistol with it on and the
+butt used to stick out.”
+
+“When did you last notice Mr. Parrish’s automatic?”
+
+“It would be Thursday or Friday, sir. I went to that drawer to get Mr.
+Parrish an old stock to go riding in as some new ones he had bought
+were stiff and hurt him.”
+
+“And this steel cup was on the pistol then?”
+
+“Oh, yes, sir!”
+
+“And you say it was not on the pistol when Mr. Parrish’s body was
+found?”
+
+“No, sir!”
+
+“Are you sure of this?”
+
+“Yes, sir. I was one of the first in the room, and I saw the pistol in
+Mr. Parrish’s hand, and there was no sign of the cup, sir. So I’ve had
+a good look among his things and I can’t find it anywhere!”
+
+Bruce Wright pondered a minute.
+
+“Try and think, Jay,” he said, “if you can’t remember anything more
+about this steel cup, as you call it. Where did Mr. Parrish buy it?”
+
+“Can’t say, I’m sure, sir. He had it before ever I took service with
+him!”
+
+Jay put his hand to his forehead for an instant.
+
+“Now I come to think of it,” he said, “there was the name of the shop
+or maker on it, stamped on the steel. ‘Maxim,’ that was the name, now I
+put my mind back, with a number ...”
+
+“Maxim?” echoed Bruce Wright. “Did you say Maxim?”
+
+“Yes, sir! That was the name!” replied the valet impassively.
+
+“By Jove!” said the boy half to himself. Then he said aloud to Jay:
+
+“Did you tell the police about this?”
+
+Jay looked somewhat uncomfortable.
+
+“No, sir.”
+
+“Why not?”
+
+Jay looked at Mary Trevert.
+
+“Well, sir, I thought perhaps I’d better tell Miss Trevert first. Bude
+thought so, too. That there Manderton has made so much unpleasantness
+in the house with his prying ways that I said to myself, sir ...”
+
+Bruce Wright looked at Mary.
+
+“Would you mind if I asked Jay not to say anything about this to
+anybody just for the present?” he asked.
+
+“You hear what Mr. Wright says, Jay,” said Mary. “I don’t want you to
+say anything about this matter just yet. Do you understand?”
+
+“Yes, Miss. Will that be all, Miss?”
+
+“Yes, thank you, Jay!”
+
+“Thanks very much, Jay,” said the boy. “This may be important. Mum’s
+the word, though!”
+
+“I _quite_ understand, sir,” answered the valet and left the room.
+
+Hardly had the door closed on him than the girl turned eagerly to
+Bruce.
+
+“It _is_ important?” she asked.
+
+“It may be,” was the guarded reply.
+
+“Don’t leave me in the dark like this,” the girl pleaded. “This
+horrible affair goes on growing and growing, and at every step it seems
+more bewildering ... more ghastly. Tell me where it is leading, Mr.
+Wright! I can’t stand the suspense much more!”
+
+Her voice broke, and she turned her face away.
+
+“You must be brave, Miss Trevert,” said the boy, putting his hand on
+her shoulder. “Don’t ask me to tell you more now. Your friends are
+working to get at the truth ...”
+
+“The truth!” cried the girl. “God knows where the truth will lead us!”
+
+Bruce Wright hesitated a moment.
+
+“I don’t think you have any need to fear the truth!” he said presently.
+
+The girl took her handkerchief from her face and looked at him with
+brimming eyes.
+
+“You know more than you let me think you did,” she said brokenly. “But
+you are a friend of mine, aren’t you?”
+
+“Yes,” said Bruce, and added boldly:
+
+“And of his too!”
+
+She did not speak again, but gave him her hand. He clasped it and went
+out hurriedly to catch his train back to London.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+THE SILENT SHOT
+
+
+That faithful servitor of Fleet Street, the Law Courts clock, had just
+finished striking seven. It boomed out the hour, stroke by stroke,
+solemnly, inexorably, like a grim old judge summing up and driving
+home, point by point, an irrefutable charge. The heavy strokes broke in
+upon the fitful doze into which Robin Greve, stretched out in an
+armchair in his living-room, had dropped.
+
+He roused up with a start. There was the click of a key in the lock of
+his front door. Bruce Wright burst into the room.
+
+The boy shut the door quickly and locked it. He was rather pale and
+seemed perturbed. On seeing Robin he jerked his head in the direction
+of the courtyard.
+
+“I suppose you know they’re still outside?” he said.
+
+Robin nodded nonchalantly.
+
+“There are three of them now,” the boy went on. “Robin, I don’t like
+it. Something’s going to happen. You’ll want to mind yourself ... if
+it’s not too late already!”
+
+He stepped across to the window and bending down, peered cautiously
+round the curtain.
+
+Robin Greve laughed.
+
+“Bah!” he said, “they can’t touch me!”
+
+“You’re wrong,” Bruce retorted without changing his position. “They can
+and they will. Don’t think Manderton is a fool, Robin. He means
+mischief ...”
+
+Robin raised his eyebrows.
+
+“Does he?” he said. “Now I wonder who told you that ...”
+
+“Friends of yours at Harkings asked me to warn you ...” began Bruce
+awkwardly.
+
+“My friends are scarcely in the majority there,” retorted Robin. “Whom
+do you mean exactly?”
+
+But the boy ignored the question.
+
+“Three men watching the house!” he exclaimed; “don’t you think that
+_this_ looks as though Manderton meant business?”
+
+He returned to his post of observation at the curtain.
+
+Robin laughed cynically.
+
+“Manderton doesn’t worry me any,” he said cheerfully. “The man’s the
+victim of an _idée fixe_. He believes Parrish killed himself just as
+firmly as he believes that I frightened or bullied Parrish into doing
+it ...”
+
+“Don’t be too sure about that, Robin,” said the boy, dropping the
+curtain and coming back to Robin’s chair. “He may want you to think
+that. But how can we tell how much he knows?”
+
+Robin flicked the ash off his cigarette disdainfully.
+
+“These promoted policemen make me tired,” he said.
+
+Bruce Wright shook his head quickly with a little gesture of
+exasperation.
+
+“You don’t understand,” he said. “There’s fresh evidence ...”
+
+Robin Greve looked up with real interest in his eyes. His bantering
+manner had vanished.
+
+“You’ve got that letter?” he asked eagerly.
+
+Bruce shook his head.
+
+“No, not that,” he said. Then leaning forward he added in a low voice:
+
+“Have you ever heard of the Maxim silencer?”
+
+“I believe I have, vaguely,” replied Robin. “Isn’t it something to do
+with a motor engine?”
+
+“No,” said Bruce. “It’s an extraordinary invention which absolutely
+suppresses the noise of the discharge of a gun.”
+
+Robin shot a quick glance at the speaker.
+
+“Go on,” he said.
+
+“It’s a marvelous thing, really,” the boy continued, warming to his
+theme. “A man at Havre had one when I was at the base there, during the
+war. It’s a little cup-shaped steel fitting that goes over the barrel.
+You can fire a rifle fitted with one of these silencers in a small room
+and it makes no more noise than a fairly loud sneeze ...”
+
+“Ah!”
+
+Robin was listening intently now.
+
+“Parrish had a Maxim silencer,” Bruce went on impressively.
+
+“_Parrish_ had?”
+
+“It was fitted on his automatic pistol, the one he had in his hand when
+they found him ...”
+
+“There was no attachment of any kind on the gun Parrish was holding
+when he was discovered yesterday afternoon,” declared Robin positively;
+“I can vouch for that. I was there almost immediately after they found
+him. And if there had been anything of the kind Horace Trevert would
+certainly have mentioned it ...”
+
+“I know. Jay, who came in soon after you, was surprised to see that the
+silencer was not on the pistol. And he made a point of looking for it
+...”
+
+“But how do you know that Parrish had it on the pistol?...”
+
+“Well, we don’t know for certain. But we do know that it was
+permanently fitted to his automatic. Jay has often seen it. And if
+Parrish did remove it, he didn’t leave it lying around any where. Jay
+has looked all through his things without finding it ...”
+
+“When did Jay see it last?”
+
+“On Thursday!”
+
+“But are you sure that this is the same pistol as the one which Jay has
+been in the habit of seeing?”
+
+“Jay is absolutely sure. He says that Parrish only had the one
+automatic which he always kept in the same drawer in his dressing-room
+...”
+
+Robin was silent for a moment. Very deliberately he filled his pipe,
+lit it, and drew until it burned comfortably. Then he said slowly:
+
+“This means that Hartley Parrish was murdered, Bruce, old man. All
+through I have been puzzling my mind to reconcile the unquestionable
+circumstance that two bullets were fired—I told you of the bullet mark
+I found on the upright in the rosery—with the undoubted fact that only
+one report was heard. We can therefore presume, either that Hartley
+Parrish first fired one shot from his pistol with the silencer fitted
+and then removed the silencer and fired another shot without it,
+thereby killing himself, or that the second shot was fired by the
+person whose interest it was to get rid of the silencer. There is no
+possible or plausible reason why Parrish should have fired first one
+shot with the silencer and then one without. Therefore, I find myself
+irresistibly compelled to the conclusion that the shot heard by Mary
+Trevert was fired by the person who killed Parrish. Do I make myself
+clear?”
+
+“Perfectly,” answered Bruce.
+
+“Now, then,” the barrister proceeded, thoughtfully puffing at his pipe,
+“one weak point about my deductions is that they all hang on the
+question as to whether, at the time of the tragedy, Parrish actually
+had the silencer on his pistol or not. That is really the acid test of
+Manderton’s suicide theory. You said, I think, that a rifle fired with
+the silencer attachment makes no more noise than the sound of a loud
+sneeze!”
+
+“That’s right,” agreed Bruce; “a sort of harsh, spluttering noise. Not
+so loud either, Robin. Ph ... t-t-t! Like that!”
+
+“Loud enough to be heard through a door, would you say?”
+
+“Oh, I think so!”
+
+Robin thought intently for a moment.
+
+“Then Mary is the only one who can put us right on that point. Assuming
+that two shots were fired—and that bullet mark in the rosery is, I
+think, conclusive on that head—and knowing that she heard the loud
+report of the one, presumably, if Parrish had the silencer on his
+automatic, Mary must have heard the _muffled_ report of the other. What
+it comes to is this, Mary heard the shot fired that killed Parrish. Did
+she hear the shot he fired at his murderer?”
+
+“By Gad!” exclaimed Bruce Wright impressively, “I believe you’ve got
+it, Robin! Parrish fired at somebody at the window—a silent shot—and
+the other fellow fired back the shot that Mary Trevert heard, the shot
+that killed Parrish. Isn’t that the way you figure it out?”
+
+“Not so fast, young man,” remarked Robin. “Let’s first find out whether
+Mary actually heard the muffled shot and, if so, _when ... before_ or
+_after_ the loud report.”
+
+He glanced across at the window and then at Bruce,
+
+“I suppose this discovery about the silencer is responsible for the
+deputation waiting in the courtyard,” he said drily.
+
+“The police don’t know about it yet,” replied Bruce; “at least they
+didn’t when I left.”
+
+Robin shook his head dubiously.
+
+“If the servants know it, Manderton will worm it out of them. Hasn’t he
+cross-examined Jay?”
+
+“Yes,” said Bruce. “But he got nothing out of him about this. Manderton
+seems to have put everybody’s back up. He gets nothing out of the
+servants ...”
+
+“If Parrish had had this silencer for some time, you may be sure that
+other people know about it. These silencers must be pretty rare in
+England. You see, an average person like myself didn’t know what it
+was. By the way, another point which we haven’t yet cleared up is this:
+supposing we are right in believing Parrish to have been murdered, how
+do you explain the fact that the bullet removed from his body fitted
+his pistol?”
+
+“That’s a puzzler, I must say!” said Bruce.
+
+“There’s only one possible explanation, I think,” Robin went on, “and
+that is that Parrish was shot by a pistol of exactly the same calibre
+as his own. For the murderer to have killed Parrish with his own weapon
+would have been difficult without a struggle. But Miss Trevert heard no
+struggle. For murderer and his victim to have pistols of the same
+calibre argues a rather remarkable coincidence, I grant you. But then
+life is full of coincidences! We meet them every day in the law.
+Though, I admit, this is a coincidence which requires some explaining
+...”
+
+He fell into a brown study which Bruce interrupted by suddenly
+remembering that he had had no lunch.
+
+For answer Robin pointed at the sideboard.
+
+“There’s a cloth in there,” he said, “also the whisky, if my laundress
+has left any, and a siphon and there should be some claret—Mrs. Bragg
+doesn’t care about red wine. Set the table, and I’ll take a root round
+in the kitchen and dig up some tinned stuff.”
+
+They supped off a tinned tongue and some _pâté de foie gras_. Over
+their meal Bruce told Robin of his adventure in the library at
+Harkings.
+
+“Jeekes must have collected that letter,” Bruce said. “Before I came to
+you, I went to Lincoln’s Inn Fields to see if he was still at
+Bardy’s—Parrish’s solicitor, you know. But the office was closed, and
+the place in darkness. I went on to the Junior Pantheon, that’s
+Jeekes’s club, but he wasn’t in. He hadn’t been there all day, the
+porter told me. So I left a note asking him to ring you up here ...”
+
+“The case reeks of blackmail,” said Robin thoughtfully, “but I am
+wondering how much we shall glean from this precious letter when we do
+see it. I am glad you asked Jeekes to ring me up, though. He should be
+able to tell us something about these mysterious letters on the blue
+paper that used to put Parrish in such a stew ... Hullo, who can that
+be?”
+
+An electric bell trilled through the flat. It rang once ... twice ...
+and then a third time, a long, insistent peal.
+
+“See who’s there, will you, Bruce?” said Robin.
+
+“Suppose it’s the police ...” began the boy.
+
+Robin shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“You can say I’m at home and ask them in,” he said.
+
+He heard the heavy oaken door swing open, a murmur of voices in the
+hall. The next moment Detective-Inspector Manderton entered the
+sitting-room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+MR. MANDERTON LAYS HIS CARDS ON THE TABLE
+
+
+The detective’s manner had undergone some subtle change which Robin,
+watching him closely as he came into the room, was quick to note. Mr.
+Manderton made an effort to retain his old air of rather patronizing
+swagger; but he seemed less sure of himself than was his wont. In fact,
+he appeared to be a little anxious.
+
+He walked briskly into the sitting-room and looked quickly from Bruce
+to Robin.
+
+“Mr. Greve,” he said, “you can help me if you will by answering a few
+questions ...”
+
+With another glance at Bruce Wright he added:
+
+“... in private.”
+
+Bruce, obedient to a sign from Robin, said he would ring up in the
+morning and prepared to take his leave. Robin turned to the detective.
+
+“There are some of your men, I believe,” he said coldly, “watching this
+house. Would it be asking too much to request that my friend here might
+be permitted to return home unescorted?”
+
+“He needn’t worry,” replied Manderton with a significant smile.
+“There’s no one outside now!...”
+
+They watched Bruce Wright pass into the hall and collect his hat and
+coat. As the front door slammed behind him, the detective added:
+
+“I took ’em off myself soon after seven o’clock!”
+
+“Why?” asked Robin bluntly.
+
+Mr. Manderton dropped his heavy form into a chair.
+
+“I’m a plain man, Mr. Greve,” he said, “and I’m not above owning to it,
+I hope, when I’m wrong. For some little time now it has struck me that
+our lines of investigation run parallel ...”
+
+“Instead of crossing!”
+
+“Instead of crossing—exactly!”
+
+“It’s a pity you did not grasp that very obvious fact earlier,”
+observed Robin pointedly.
+
+Mr. Manderton crossed one leg over the other and, his finger-tips
+pressed together, looked at Robin.
+
+“Will you help me?” he asked simply.
+
+“Do you want my help?”
+
+Mr. Manderton nodded.
+
+“Allies, then?”
+
+“Allies it is!”
+
+Robin pointed to the table.
+
+“It’s dry work talking,” he said. “Won’t you take a drink?”
+
+“Thanks, I don’t drink. But I’ll have a cigar if I may. Thank you!”
+
+The detective helped himself to a cheroot from a box on the table and
+lit up. Then, affecting to scan the end of his cigar with great
+attention, he asked abruptly:
+
+“What do you know of the woman calling herself Madame de Malpas?”
+
+Robin pursed up his lips rather disdainfully.
+
+“One of the late Mr. Parrish’s lady friends,” he replied. “I expect you
+know that!”
+
+“Do you know where she lives?” pursued the detective, ignoring the
+implied question.
+
+“She’s dead.”
+
+A flicker of interest appeared for an instant in Mr. Manderton’s keen
+eyes.
+
+“You’re sure of that?”
+
+“Certainly,” answered Robin.
+
+“Who told you?”
+
+“Le Hagen—the solicitor, you know. He acted for this Malpas woman on
+one or two occasions.”
+
+“When did she die?”
+
+“Six or seven months ago ...”
+
+“Did Jeekes know about it?”
+
+“Jeekes? Do you mean Parrish’s secretary?
+
+“It’s funny your asking that. As a matter of fact, it was through
+Jeekes that I heard the lady was dead. I was in Le Hagen’s office one
+day when Jeekes came in, and Le Hagen told me Jeekes had come to pay in
+a cheque for the cost of the funeral and the transport of the body to
+France.”
+
+“This was six or seven months ago, you say? I take it, then, that any
+allowance that Parrish was in the habit of making to this woman has
+ceased?”
+
+“I tell you the lady is dead!”
+
+“Then what would you say if I informed you that Mr. Jeekes had declared
+that these payments were still going on ...”
+
+Robin shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“I should say he was lying ...”
+
+“I agree. But why?”
+
+“Whom did he tell this to?”
+
+“Miss Trevert!”
+
+“Miss Trevert?”
+
+Robin repeated the name in amazement.
+
+“I don’t understand,” he said. “Why on earth should Jeekes blacken his
+employer’s character to Miss Trevert? What conceivable motive could he
+have had? Did she tell you this?”
+
+“No,” said Manderton; “I heard him tell her myself.”
+
+“Do you mean to tell me,” protested Robin, growing more and more
+puzzled, “that Jeekes told Miss Trevert this offensive and deliberate
+lie in your presence!”
+
+“Well,” remarked Mr. Manderton slowly, “I don’t know about his saying
+this in my presence exactly. But I heard him tell her for all that.
+Walls have ears, you know—particularly if the door is ajar!”
+
+He looked shrewdly at Robin, then dropped his eyes to the floor.
+
+“He also told her that Le Hagen and you were in business relations ...”
+
+Robin sat up at this.
+
+“Ah!” he said shortly. “I see what you’re getting at now. Our friend
+has been trying to set Miss Trevert against me, eh? But why? I don’t
+even know this man Jeekes except to have nodded ‘Good-morning’ to him a
+few times. Why on earth should he of all men go out of his way to
+slander me to Miss Trevert, to throw suspicion ...”
+
+He broke off short and looked at the detective.
+
+Mr. Manderton caressed his big black moustache.
+
+“Yes,” he repeated suavely, “you were saying ‘to cast suspicion’ ...”
+
+The eyes of the two men met. Then the detective leaned back in his
+chair and, blowing a cloud of smoke from his lips, said:
+
+“Mr. Greve, you’ve been thinking ahead of me on this case. What you’ve
+told me so far I’ve checked. And you’re right. Dead right. And since
+you’re, in a manner of speaking, one of the parties interested in
+getting things cleared up, I’d like you to tell me just simply what
+idea you’ve formed about it ...”
+
+“Gladly,” answered the barrister. “And to start with let me tell you
+that the case stinks of blackmail ...”
+
+“Steady on,” interposed the detective. “I thought so, too, at first.
+I’ve been into all that. Mr. Parrish made a clean break with the last
+of his lady friends about two months since; and, as far as our
+investigations go, there has been no blackmail in connection with any
+of his women pals. Vine Street knows all about Master Parrish. There
+were complaints about some of his little parties up in town. But I
+don’t believe there’s a woman in this case ...”
+
+“I didn’t say there was,” retorted Robin. “The blackmail is probably
+being levied from Holland. A threat of violence was finally carried
+into effect on Saturday evening between 5 and 5.15 P.M. by some one
+conversant with the lie of the land at Harkings. This individual, armed
+with an automatic Browning of the same calibre as Mr. Parrish’s, shot
+at Parrish through the open window of the library and killed
+him—probably in self-defence, after Parrish had had a shot at him ...”
+
+“Steady there, whoa!” said Mr. Manderton in a jocular way clearly
+expressive of his incredulity; “there was only one shot ...”
+
+“There were _two_,” was Robin’s dispassionate reply. “Though maybe only
+one was heard. Parrish had a Maxim silencer on his gun ...”
+
+Mr. Manderton was now thoroughly alert.
+
+“How did you find that out?” he asked.
+
+“Jay, Parrish’s man, came forward and volunteered this evidence ...”
+
+“He said nothing about it when I questioned him,” grumbled the
+detective.
+
+Robin laughed.
+
+“You’re a terror to the confirmed criminal, they tell me, Manderton,”
+he said, “but you obviously don’t understand that complicated mechanism
+known as the domestic servant. No servant at Harkings will voluntarily
+tell _you_ anything ...”
+
+Mr. Manderton, who had stood up, shook his big frame impatiently.
+
+“Explain the rest of your theories,” he said harshly. “What’s all this
+about blackmail being levied from Holland?”
+
+Then Robin Greve told him of the letters written on the slatey-blue
+paper and of their effect upon Parrish, and of the letter headed,
+“Elias van der Spyck & Co., General Importers, Rotterdam,” which had
+lain on the desk in the library when Parrish’s dead body had been
+found.
+
+Manderton nodded gloomily.
+
+“It was there right enough,” he remarked. “I saw it. A letter about
+steel shipments and the dockers’ strike, wasn’t it? As there seemed
+nothing to it, I left it with the other papers for Jeekes, the
+secretary chap. But what evidence is there that this was blackmail?”
+
+“This,” said Robin, and showed the detective the sheet of blue paper
+with its series of slits. “Manderton,” he said, “these letters written
+on this blue paper were in code, I feel sure. Why should not this be
+the key? You see it bears a date—‘Nov. 25.’ May it not refer to that
+letter? I found it by Parrish’s body on the carpet in the library. I
+would have given it to you at Harkings, but I shoved it in my pocket
+and forgot all about it until I was in the train coming up to town this
+morning.”
+
+Mr. Manderton took the sheet of paper, turned it over, and held it up
+to the light. Then, without comment, he put it away in the pocket of
+his jacket.
+
+“If Parrish killed himself,” Robin went on earnestly, “that letter
+drove him to it. If, on the other hand, he was murdered, may not that
+letter have contained a warning?”
+
+“I should prefer to suspend judgment until we’ve seen the letter, Mr.
+Greve,” said the detective bluntly. “We must get it from Jeekes. In the
+meantime, what makes you think that the murderer (to follow up your
+theory) was conversant with the lay of the land at Harkings?”
+
+“Because,” answered Robin, “the murderer left no tracks on the grass or
+flower-beds. He stuck to the hard gravel path throughout. That path,
+which runs from the drive through the rosery to the gravel path round
+the house just under the library window, is precious hard to find in
+the dark, especially where it leaves the drive, as at the outset it is
+a mere thread between the rhododendron bushes. And, as I know from
+experience, unless you are acquainted with the turns in the path, it is
+very easy to get off it in the dark, especially in the rosery, and go
+blundering on to the flower-beds. And I’ll tell you something else
+about the murderer. He—or she—was of small stature—not much above five
+foot six in height. The upward diagonal course of the bullet through
+Parrish’s heart shows that ...”
+
+Mr. Manderton shook his head dubiously.
+
+“Very ingenious,” he commented. “But you go rather fast, Mr. Greve. We
+must test your theory link by link. There may be an explanation for
+Jeekes’s apparently inexplicable lie to the young lady. Let’s see him
+and hear what he says. The grounds at Harkings must be searched for
+this second bullet, if second bullet there is, the mark on the tree
+examined by an expert. And since two bullets argue two pistols in this
+case, let us see what result we get from our enquiries as to where Mr.
+Parrish bought his pistol. He may have had two pistols ...”
+
+“If Parrish used a silencer,” remarked Robin, quite undisconcerted by
+the other’s lack of enthusiasm, “and my theory that two shots were
+fired is correct, there must have been two reports, a loud one and a
+muffled one. Miss Trevert heard one report, as we know. Did she hear a
+second?”
+
+“She said nothing about it,” remarked the detective.
+
+“She was probably asked nothing about it. But we can get this point
+cleared up at once. There’s the telephone. Ring up Harkings and ask her
+now.”
+
+“Why not?” said Mr. Manderton and moved to the telephone.
+
+There is little delay on the long-distance lines on a Sunday evening,
+and the call to Harkins came through almost at once. Bude answered the
+telephone at Harkings. Manderton asked for Miss Trevert. The butler
+replied that Miss Trevert was no longer at Harkings. She had gone to
+the Continent for a few days.
+
+This plain statement, retailed in the fortissimo voice which Bude
+reserved for use on the telephone, produced a remarkable effect on the
+detective. He grew red in the face.
+
+“What’s that?” he cried assertively. “Gone to the Continent? I should
+have been told about this. Why wasn’t I informed? What part of the
+Continent has she gone to?”
+
+Mr. Manderton’s questions, rapped out with a rasping vigour that
+recalled a machine-gun firing, brought Robin to his feet in an instant.
+He crossed over to the desk on which the telephone stood.
+
+Manderton placed one big palm over the transmitter and turned to Robin.
+
+“She’s gone to the Continent and left no address,” he said quickly.
+
+“Ask him if Lady Margaret is there,” suggested Robin.
+
+Mr. Manderton spoke into the telephone again. Lady Margaret had gone to
+bed, Bude answered, and her ladyship was much put out by Miss Trevert
+gallivanting off like that by herself with only a scribbled note left
+to say that she had gone.
+
+Had Bude got the note?
+
+No, Mr. Manderton, sir, he had not. But Lady Margaret had shown it to
+him. It had simply stated that Miss Trevert had gone off to the
+Continent and would be back in a few days.
+
+Again the detective turned to Robin at his elbow.
+
+“These country bumpkins!” he said savagely. “I must go to the Yard and
+get Humphries on the ’phone. He may have telegraphed me about it. You
+stay here and I’ll ring you later if there’s any news. What do you make
+of it, Mr. Greve?”
+
+“It beats me,” was Robin’s rueful comment. “And what about the inquest?
+It’s for Tuesday, isn’t it? Miss Trevert will have to give evidence, I
+take it?...”
+
+“Oh,” said Mr. Manderton, picking up his hat and speaking in an offhand
+way, “I’m getting _that_ adjourned for a week!”
+
+“The inquest adjourned! Why?”
+
+There was a twinkle in the detective’s eye as he replied.
+
+“I thought, maybe, I might get further evidence ...”
+
+Robin caught the expression and smiled.
+
+“And when did you come to this decision, may I ask?”
+
+“After our little experiment in the garden this morning,” was the
+detective’s prompt reply.
+
+Robin looked at him fixedly.
+
+“But, see here,” he said, “apparently it was to the deductions you
+formed from the result of that experiment that I owe the attentions of
+your colleagues who have been hanging round the house all day. And yet
+you now come to me and invite my assistance. Mr. Manderton, I don’t get
+it at all!”
+
+“Mr. Greve,” replied the detective, “Miss Trevert tried to shield you.
+That made me suspicious. You tried to force my investigations into an
+entirely new path. That deepened my suspicions. I believed it to be my
+duty to ascertain your movements after leaving Harkings. But then I
+heard Jeekes make an apparently gratuitously false statement to Miss
+Trevert with an implication against you. That, to some extent, cleared
+you in my eyes. I say ‘to some extent’ because I will not deny that I
+thought I might be taking a risk in coming to you like this. You see I
+am frank!...”
+
+The smile had left Greve’s face and he looked rather grim.
+
+“You’re pretty deep, aren’t you?” was his brief comment.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+THE CODE KING
+
+
+Major Euan MacTavish was packing. A heavy and well-worn leather
+portmanteau, much adorned with foreign luggage labels, stood in the
+centre of the floor. From a litter of objects piled up on a side table
+the Major was transferring to it various brown-paper packages which he
+checked by a list in his hand.
+
+The Major always packed for himself. He packed with the neatness and
+rapidity derived from long experience of travel. As a matter of fact,
+he could not afford a manservant any more than he could allow himself
+quarters more luxurious than the rather grimy bedroom in Bury Street
+which housed him during his transient appearances in town. The
+remuneration doled out by the Foreign Office to the quiet and
+unobtrusive gentlemen known as King’s messengers is, in point of fact,
+out of all proportion to the prestige and glamour surrounding the
+silver greyhound badge, an example of which was tucked away in a pocket
+of the Major’s blue serge jacket hanging over the back of a chair.
+
+“Let’s see,” said the Major, addressing a large brown-paper covered
+package standing in the corner of the room, “you’re the bird-cage for
+Lady Sylvia at The Hague. Two pounds of candles for Mrs. Harry Deepdale
+at Berlin; the razor blades for Sir Archibald at Prague; the Teddy bear
+for Marjorie; polo-balls for the Hussars at Constantinople—there! I
+think that’s the lot! Hullo, hullo, who the devil’s that?”
+
+With a groaning of wires a jangling bell tinkled through the hall (the
+Major’s bedroom was on the ground floor). Sims, the aged ex-butler,
+who, with his wife, “did for” his lodgers in more ways than one, was
+out and the single servant-maid had her Sunday off. Euan MacTavish
+glanced at his wrist watch. It showed the hour to be ten minutes past
+nine. A flowered silk smoking-coat over his evening clothes and a briar
+pipe in his mouth, he went out into the hall and opened the front door.
+
+It was a drenching night. The lamps from a taxi which throbbed dully in
+the street outside the house threw a gleaming band of light on the
+shining pavement. At the door stood a taxi-driver.
+
+“There’s a lady asking for Major MacTavish,” he said, pointing at the
+cab. The Major stepped across to the cab and opened the door.
+
+“Oh, Euan,” said a girl’s voice, “how lucky I am to catch you!”
+
+“Why, Mary,” exclaimed the Major, “what on earth brings you round to me
+on a night like this? I only came up from the country this afternoon
+and I’m off for Constantinople in the morning!”
+
+“Euan,” said Mary Trevert, “I want to talk to you. Where can we talk?”
+
+The Major raised his eyebrows. He was a little man with grizzled hair
+and finely cut, rather sharp features.
+
+“Well,” he remarked, “there’s not a soul in the house, and I’ve only
+got a bedroom here. Though we’re cousins, Mary, my dear, I don’t know
+that you ought to....”
+
+“You’re a silly old-fashioned old dear,” exclaimed the girl, “and I’m
+coming in. No, I’ll keep the cab. We shall want it!”
+
+“All right,” said the Major, helping her to alight. “I tell you what.
+We’ll go into Harry Prankhurst’s sitting-room. He’s away for the
+week-end, anyway!”
+
+He took Mary Trevert into a room off the hall and switched on the
+electric light. Then for the first time he saw how pale she looked.
+
+“My dear,” he said, “I know what an awful shock you’ve had....”
+
+“You’ve heard about it?”
+
+“I saw it in the Sunday papers. I was going to write to you.”
+
+“Euan,” the girl began in a nervous, hasty way, “I have to go to
+Holland at once. There is not a moment to lose. I want you to help me
+get my passport viséed.”
+
+“But, my dear girl,” exclaimed the Major, aghast, “you can’t go to
+Holland like this alone. Does your mother know about it?”
+
+The girl shook her head.
+
+“It’s no good trying to stop me, Euan,” she declared. “I mean to go,
+anyway. As a matter of fact, Mother doesn’t know. I merely left word
+that I had gone to the Continent for a few days. Nobody knows about
+Holland except you. And if you won’t help me I suppose I shall have to
+go to Harry Tadworth at the Foreign Office. I came to you first because
+he’s always so stuffy ...”
+
+Euan MacTavish pushed the girl into a chair and gave her a cigarette.
+He lit it for her and took one himself. His pipe had vanished into his
+pocket.
+
+“Of course, I’ll help you,” he said. “Now, tell me all about it!”
+
+“Before ... this happened I had promised Hartley Parrish to marry him,”
+began the girl. “The doctors say his nerves were wrong. I don’t believe
+a word of it. He was full of the joy of life. He was very fond of me.
+He was always talking of what we should do when we were married. He
+never would have killed himself without some tremendously powerful
+motive. Even then I can’t believe it possible ...”
+
+She made a little nervous gesture.
+
+“After he ... did it,” she went on, “I found this letter on his desk.
+It came to him from Holland. I mean to see the people who wrote it and
+discover if they can throw any light on ... on ... the affair ...”
+
+She had taken from her muff a letter, folded in four, written on paper
+of a curious dark slatey-blue colour.
+
+“Won’t you show me the letter?”
+
+“You promise to say nothing about it to any one?”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“Of course.”
+
+Without a word the girl gave him the letter. With slow deliberation he
+unfolded it. The letter was typewritten and headed: “Elias van der
+Spyck & Co. General Importers, Rotterdam.”
+
+This was the letter:
+
+ELIAS VAN DER SPYCK & CO.
+GENERAL IMPORTERS
+ROTTERDAM Rotterdam 25th Nov.
+
+
+_Codes_
+A.B.C.
+Liebler’s
+
+
+_Personal_
+Dear Mr. Parrish,
+
+
+Your favor of even date to hand and contents noted. The last delivery
+of steel was to time but we have had warning from the railway
+authorities that labour troubles at the docks are likely to delay
+future consignments. If you don’t mind we should prefer to settle the
+question of future delivery by Nov. 27 as we have a board meeting on
+the 30th inst. While we fully appreciate your own difficulties with
+labour at home, you will understand that this is a question which we
+cannot afford to adjourn _sine die_.
+
+
+Yours faithfully,
+pro ELIAS VAN DER SPYCK & CO.
+
+
+The signature was illegible.
+
+Euan MacTavish folded the letter again and handed it back to Mary.
+
+“That doesn’t take me any farther,” he said. “What do the police think
+of it?”
+
+“They haven’t seen it,” was the girl’s reply. “I took it without them
+knowing. I mean to make my own investigations about this ...”
+
+“But, my dear Mary,” exclaimed the little Major in a shocked voice,
+“you can’t do things that way! Don’t you see you may be hindering the
+course of justice? The police may attach the greatest importance to
+this letter ...”
+
+“You’re quite right,” retorted the girl, “they do!”
+
+“Then why have you kept it from them?”
+
+Mary Trevert dropped her eyes and a little band of crimson flushed into
+her cheeks.
+
+“Because,” she commenced, “because ... well, because they are trying to
+implicate a friend of mine ...”
+
+The Major took the girl’s hand.
+
+“Mary,” he said, “I’ve known you all your life. I’ve knocked about a
+good bit and know something of the world, I believe. Suppose you tell
+me all about it ...”
+
+Mary Trevert hesitated. Then she said, her hands nervously toying with
+her muff:
+
+“We believe that Robin Greve—you know whom I mean—had a conversation
+with Hartley just before he ... he shot himself. That very afternoon
+Robin had asked me to marry him, but I told him about my engagement. He
+said some awful things about Hartley and rushed away. Ten minutes later
+Hartley Parrish committed suicide. And there _was_ some one talking to
+him in the library. Bude, the butler, heard the voices. This afternoon
+I went down to the library alone ... to see if I could discover
+anything likely to throw any light on poor Hartley’s death. This was
+the only letter I could find. It was tucked away between two
+letter-trays. One tray fitted into the other, and this letter had
+slipped between. It seems to have been overlooked both by Mr. Parrish’s
+secretary and the police ...”
+
+“But I confess,” argued the Major, “that I don’t see how this letter,
+which appears to be a very ordinary business communication, implicates
+anybody at all. Why shouldn’t the police see it?...”
+
+“Because,” said Mary, “directly after discovering it I found Bruce
+Wright, who used to be one of Mr. Parrish’s private secretaries, hiding
+behind the curtains in the library. Now, Bruce Wright is a great friend
+of Robin Greve’s, and I immediately suspected that Robin had sent him
+to Harkings, particularly as ...”
+
+“As what?...”
+
+“As he practically admitted to me, that he had come for a letter
+written on slatey-blue official-looking paper.”
+
+The girl held up the letter from Rotterdam.
+
+“All this,” the girl continued, “made me think that this letter must
+have had something to do with Hartley’s death ...”
+
+“Surely an additional reason for giving it to the police!...”
+
+Mary Trevert set her mouth in an obstinate line.
+
+“No!” she affirmed uncompromisingly. “The police believe that, as the
+result of a scene between Hartley and Robin, Hartley killed himself.
+Until I’ve found out for certain whether this letter implicates Robin
+or not, I sha’n’t give it to the police ...”
+
+“But, if Greve really had nothing to do with this shocking tragedy, the
+police can very easily clear him. Surely they are the best judges of
+his guilt ...”
+
+Again a touch of warm colour suffused the girl’s cheeks. Euan MacTavish
+remarked it and looked at her wistfully.
+
+“Well, well,” he observed gently, “perhaps they’re not, after all!”
+
+The girl looked up at him.
+
+“Euan, dear,” she said impulsively, “I knew you’d understand. Robin and
+Hartley may have had a row, but it was nothing worse. Robin is
+incapable of having threatened—blackmailed—Hartley, as the police seem
+to imagine. I am greatly upset by it all; I can’t see things clear at
+all; but I’m determined not to give the police a weapon like this to
+use against Robin until I know whether it is sharp or blunt, until I
+have found out what bearing, if any, this letter had on Hartley
+Parrish’s death ...”
+
+Euan MacTavish leant back in his chair and said nothing. He finished
+his cigarette, pitched the butt into the fender, and turned to Mary. He
+asked her to let him see the letter again. Once more he read it over.
+Then, handing it back to her, he said:
+
+“It’s all so simple-looking that there may well be something behind it.
+But, if you do go to Holland, how are you going to set about your
+enquiries?”
+
+“That’s where you can help me, Euan, dear,” answered the girl. “I want
+to find somebody at Rotterdam who will help me to make some
+confidential enquiries about this firm. Do you know any one? An
+Englishman would be best, of course ...”
+
+But Euan MacTavish was halfway to the door.
+
+“Wait there,” he commanded, “till I telephone the one man in the world
+who can help us.”
+
+He vanished into the hall where Mary heard him at the instrument.
+
+“We are going round to the Albany,” he said, “to see my friend, Ernest
+Dulkinghorn, of the War Office. He can help us if any one can. But,
+Mary, you must promise me one thing before we go ... you must agree to
+do what old Ernest tells you. You needn’t be afraid. He is the most
+unconventional of men, capable of even approving this madcap scheme of
+yours!”
+
+“I agree,” said Mary, “but how you waste time, Euan! We could have been
+at the Albany by this time!”
+
+In a first-floor oak-panelled suite at the Albany, overlooking the
+covered walk that runs from Piccadilly to Burlington Gardens, they
+found an excessively fair, loose-limbed man whose air of rather
+helpless timidity was heightened by a pair of large tortoise-shell
+spectacles. He appeared excessively embarrassed at the sight of
+MacTavish’s extremely good-looking companion.
+
+“You never told me you were bringing a lady, Euan,” he said
+reproachfully, “or I should have attempted to have made myself more
+presentable.”
+
+He looked down at his old flannel suit and made an apologetic gesture
+which took in the table littered with books and papers and the sofa on
+which lay a number of heavy tomes with marked slips sticking out
+between the pages.
+
+“I am working at a code,” he explained.
+
+“Ernest here,” said MacTavish, turning to Mary, “is the code king. Your
+pals in the Intelligence tell me, Ernest, that you’ve never been beaten
+by a code ...”
+
+The fair man laughed nervously.
+
+“They’ve been pullin’ your leg, Euan,” he said.
+
+“Don’t you believe him, Mary,” retorted her cousin. “This is the man
+who probably did more than any one man to beat the Boche. Whenever the
+brother Hun changed his code, Brother Ernest was called in and he
+produced a key in one, two, three!...”
+
+“What rot you talk, Euan!” said Dulkinghorn. “Working out a code is a
+combination of mathematics, perseverance, and inspiration with a good
+slice of luck thrown in! But isn’t Miss Trevert going to sit down?”
+
+He cleared the sofa with a sweep of his arm which sent the books flying
+on to the floor.
+
+“Ernest,” said MacTavish, “I want you to give Miss Trevert here a
+letter to some reliable fellow in Rotterdam who can assist her in
+making a few enquiries of a very delicate nature!”
+
+“What sort of enquiries?” asked Dulkinghorn bluntly.
+
+“About a firm called Elias van der Spyck,” replied Euan.
+
+“Of Rotterdam?” enquired the other sharply.
+
+“That’s right! Do you know them?”
+
+“I’ve heard the name. They do a big business. But hadn’t Miss Trevert
+better tell her story herself?”
+
+Mary told him of the death of Hartley Parrish and of the letter she had
+found upon his desk. She said nothing of the part played by Robin
+Greve.
+
+“Hmph!” said Dulkinghorn. “You think it might be blackmail, eh? Well,
+well, it might be. Have you got this letter about you? Hand it over and
+let’s have a look at it.”
+
+His nervous manner had vanished. His face seemed to take on a much
+keener expression. He took the letter from Mary and read it through.
+Then he crossed the room to a wall cupboard which he unlocked with a
+key on a chain, produced a small tray on which stood a number of small
+bottles, some paint-brushes and pens, and several little open dishes
+such as are used for developing photographs. He bore the tray to the
+table, cleared a space on a corner by knocking a pile of books and
+papers on the floor, and set it down.
+
+“Just poke the fire!” he said to Euan.
+
+From a drawer in the table he produced a board on which he pinned down
+the letter with a drawing-pin at each corner. Then he dipped a
+paint-brush into one of the bottles and carefully painted the whole
+surface of the sheet with some invisible fluid.
+
+“So!” he said, “we’ll leave that to dry and see if we can find out any
+little secrets, eh? That little tray’ll do the trick if there’s any
+monkey business to this letter of yours, Miss Trevert. That’ll do the
+trick, eh, what?”
+
+He paced the room as he talked, not waiting for an answer, but running
+on as though he were soliloquizing. Presently he turned and swooped
+down on the board.
+
+“Nothing,” he ejaculated. “Now for the acids!”
+
+With a little piece of sponge he carefully wiped the surface of the
+letter and painted it again with a substance from another bottle.
+
+“Just hold that to the fire, would you, Euan?” he said, and gave
+MacTavish the board. He resumed his pacing, but this time he hummed in
+the most unmelodious voice imaginable:
+
+She was bright as a butterfly, as fair as a queen,
+Was pretty little Polly Perkins, of Paddington Green.
+
+
+“It’s dry!”
+
+MacTavish’s voice broke in upon the pacing and the discordant song.
+
+“Well?”
+
+Dulkinghorn snapped out the question.
+
+“No result!” said Euan. He handed him the board.
+
+Dulkinghorn cast a glance at it, swiftly removed the letter, held it
+for an instant up to the electric light, fingered the paper for a
+moment, and handed the letter back to Mary.
+
+“If it’s code,” he said, “it’s a conventional code and that always
+beats the expert ... at first. Go to Rotterdam and call on my friend,
+Mr. William Schulz. I’ll give you a letter for him and he’ll place
+himself entirely at your disposition. Euan will take you over. Holland
+is on your beat, ain’t it, Euan? When do you go next?”
+
+“To-morrow,” said the King’s Messenger. “The boat train leaves
+Liverpool Street at ten o’clock.”
+
+“You’ll want a passport,” said Dulkinghorn, turning to the girl.
+“You’ve got it there? Good. Leave it with me. You shall have it back
+properly viséed by nine o’clock to-morrow morning. Where are you
+stayin’? Almond’s Hotel. Good. I’ll send the letter for Mr. William
+Schulz with it!”
+
+“But,” Euan interjected mildly, after making several ineffectual
+efforts to stem the torrent of speech, “do you really think that Miss
+Trevert will be well advised to risk this trip to Holland alone? Hadn’t
+the police better take the matter in hand?”
+
+“Police be damned!” replied Dulkinghorn heartily. “Miss Trevert will be
+better than a dozen heavy-handed, heavy-footed plain-clothes men. When
+you get to Rotterdam, Miss Trevert, you trot along and call on William
+Schulz. He’ll see you through.”
+
+Then, to indicate without any possibility of misunderstanding, that his
+work had been interrupted long enough, Dulkinghorn got up, and, opening
+the sitting-room door, led the way into the hall. As he stood with his
+hand on the latch of the front door, Mary Trevert asked him:
+
+“Is this Mr. Schulz an Englishman?”
+
+“I’ll let you into a secret,” answered Bulkinghorn; “he _was_. But he
+isn’t now! No, no, I can’t say anything more. You must work it out for
+yourself. But I will give you a piece of advice. The less you say about
+Mr. William Schulz and about your private affairs generally when you
+are on the other side, the better it will be for you! Good-night—and
+good luck!”
+
+Euan MacTavish escorted Mary to Almond’s Hotel.
+
+“I’m very much afraid,” he said to her as they walked along, “that
+you’re butting that pretty head of yours into a wasps’ nest, Mary!”
+
+“Nonsense!” retorted the girl decisively; “I can take care of myself!”
+
+“If I consent to let you go off like this,” said Euan, “it is only on
+one condition ... you must tell Lady Margaret where you are going ...”
+
+“That’ll spoil everything,” answered Mary, pouting; “Mother will want
+to come with me!”
+
+“No, she won’t,” urged her cousin, “not if I tell her. She’ll worry
+herself to death, Mary, if she doesn’t know what has become of you.
+You’d better let me ring her up from the club and tell her you’re
+running over to Rotterdam for a few days. Look here, I’ll tell her
+you’re going with me. She’ll be perfectly happy if she thinks I’m to be
+with you ...”
+
+On that Mary surrendered.
+
+“Have it your own way,” she said.
+
+“I’ll pick you up here at a quarter-past nine in the morning,” said
+Euan as he bade the girl good-night at her hotel, “then we’ll run down
+to the F.O. and collect my bags and go on to the station!”
+
+“Euan,” the girl asked as she gave him her hand, “who is this man
+Schulz, do you think?”
+
+The King’s messenger leant over and whispered:
+
+“Secret Service!”
+
+“Secret Service!”
+
+The girl repeated the words in a hushed voice.
+
+“Then Mr. Dulkinghorn ... is he ... that too?”
+
+Euan nodded shortly.
+
+“One of their leadin’ lights!” he answered.
+
+“But, Euan,”—the girl was very serious now,—“what has the Secret
+Service to do with Hartley Parrish’s clients in Holland?”
+
+The King’s messenger laid a lean finger along his nose.
+
+“Ah!” he said, “what? That’s what is beginning to interest me!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+A WORD WITH MR. JEEKES
+
+
+Life is like a kaleidoscope, that ingenious toy which was the delight
+of the Victorian nursery. Like the glass fragments in its slide,
+different in colour and shape, men’s lives lie about without seeming
+connection; then Fate gives the instrument a shake, and behold! the
+fragments slide into position and form an intricate mosaic....
+
+Mark how Fate proceeded on the wet and raw Sunday evening when Bruce
+Wright, at the instance of Mr. Manderton, quitted Robin Greve’s
+chambers in the Temple, leaving his friend and the detective alone
+together. To tell the truth, Bruce Wright was in no mood for facing the
+provincial gloom of a wet Sunday evening in London, nor did he find
+alluring the prospect of a suburban supper-party at the quiet house
+where he lived with his widowed mother and sisters in South Kensington.
+So, in an irresolute, unsettled frame of mind, he let himself drift
+down the Strand unable to bring himself to go home or, indeed, to form
+any plan.
+
+He crossed Trafalgar Square, a nocturne in yellow and black—lights
+reflected yellow in pavements shining dark with wet—and by and by found
+himself in Pall Mall. Here it was that Fate took a hand. At this moment
+it administered a preliminary jog to the kaleidoscope and brought the
+fragment labelled Bruce Wright into immediate proximity with the piece
+entitled Albert Edward Jeekes.
+
+As Bruce Wright came along Pall Mall, he saw Mr. Jeekes standing on the
+steps of his club. The little secretary appeared to be lost in thought,
+his chin thrust down on the crutch-handle of the umbrella he clutched
+to himself. So absorbed was he in his meditations that he did not
+observe Bruce Wright stop and regard him. It was not until our young
+man had touched him on the arm that he looked up with a start.
+
+“God bless my soul!” he exclaimed, “if it isn’t young Wright!”
+
+Now the sight of Jeekes had put a great idea into the head of our young
+friend. He had been more chagrined than he had let it appear to Robin
+Greve at his failure to recover the missing letter from the library at
+Harkings. To obtain the letter—or, at any rate, a copy of it—from
+Jeekes and to hand it to Robin Greve would, thought Bruce, restore his
+prestige as an amateur detective, at any rate in his own eyes.
+Moreover, a chat with Jeekes over the whole affair seemed a Heaven-sent
+exit from the _impasse_ of boredom into which he had drifted this wet
+Sunday evening.
+
+“How are you, Mr. Jeekes?” said Bruce briskly. (“Mr.” Jeekes was the
+form of address always accorded to the principal secretary in the
+Hartley Parrish establishment and Bruce resumed it instinctively.) “I
+was anxious to see you. I called in at the club this afternoon. Did you
+get my message?”
+
+The little secretary blinked at him through his _pince-nez_.
+
+“There have been so many messages about this shocking affair that
+really I forget ...”
+
+He sighed heavily.
+
+“Couldn’t I come in and have a yarn now?”
+
+Bruce spoke cajolingly. But Mr. Jeekes wrinkled his brow fussily.
+
+There was so much to do; he had had a long day; if Wright would excuse
+him ...
+
+“As a matter of fact,” explained Bruce with an eye on his man, “I
+wanted to see you particularly about a letter ...”
+
+“Some other time ... to-morrow ...”
+
+“Written on dark-blue paper ... you know, one of those letters H.P.
+made all the fuss about.”
+
+Mr. Jeekes took his _pince-nez_ from his nose, gave the glasses a hasty
+rub with his pocket-handkerchief, and replaced them. He slanted a long
+narrow look at the young man.
+
+Then, “What letter do you mean?” he asked composedly.
+
+“A letter which lay on H.P.’s desk in the library at Harkings when they
+found the body ...”
+
+“There _was_ a letter there then ...?”
+
+“Haven’t _you_ got it?”
+
+Jeekes shook his head.
+
+“Come inside for a minute and tell me about this,” he said.
+
+He led Bruce into the vast smoking-room of the club. They took seats in
+a distant corner near the blazing fire. The room was practically
+deserted.
+
+Now, Mr. Jeekes’s excessive carefulness about money had been a
+long-standing joke amongst his assistants when Bruce Wright had
+belonged to Hartley Parrish’s secretarial staff. Thrift had become with
+him more than a habit. It was a positive obsession. It revealed itself
+in such petty meannesses as a perpetual cadging for matches or small
+change and a careful abstention from any offer of hospitality. Never in
+the whole course of his service had Bruce Wright heard of Mr. Jeekes
+taking anybody out to lunch or extending any of the usual hospitalities
+of life. He was not a little surprised, therefore, to hear Jeekes ask
+him what he would take.
+
+Bruce said he would take some coffee.
+
+“Have a liqueur? Have a cigar?” said Jeekes, turning to Bruce from the
+somnolent waiter who had answered the bell.
+
+There was a strange eagerness, a sort of over-done cordiality, in the
+invitation which contrasted so strongly with the secretary’s habits
+that Robin felt dimly suspicious. He suddenly formed the idea that Mr.
+Jeekes wanted to pump him. He refused the liqueur, but accepted a
+cigar. Jeekes waited until they had been served and the waiter had
+withdrawn silently into the dim vastness of the great room before he
+spoke.
+
+“Now, then, young Wright,” he said, “what’s this about a letter? Tell
+me from the beginning ...”
+
+Bruce told him of the letter from Elias van der Spyck & Co. which Robin
+had seen upon the desk in the library at Harkings, of his (Bruce’s)
+journey down to Harkings that afternoon and of his failure to find the
+letter.
+
+“But why do you assume that I’ve got it?”
+
+There was an air of forced joviality about Mr. Jeekes as he put the
+question which did not in the least, as he undoubtedly intended it
+should, disguise his eagerness. On the contrary, it lent his rather
+undistinguished features an expression of cunning which can only be
+described as knavish. Bruce Wright, who, as will already have been
+seen, was a young man with all his wits about him, did not fail to
+remark it. The result was that he hastily revised an intention
+half-formed in his mind of taking Jeekes a little way into his
+confidence regarding Robin Greve’s doubts and suspicions about Hartley
+Parrish’s death.
+
+But he answered the secretary’s question readily enough.
+
+“Because Miss Trevert told me you went to the library immediately you
+arrived at Harkings last night. I consequently assumed that you must
+have taken away the letter seen by Robin Greve ...”
+
+Mr. Jeekes drew in his breath with a sucking sound. It was a little
+trick of his when about to speak.
+
+“So you saw Miss Trevert at Harkings, eh?”
+
+Bruce laughed.
+
+“I did,” he said. “We had quite a dramatic meeting, too—it was like a
+scene from a film!”
+
+And, with a little good-humoured exaggeration, he gave Mr. Jeekes a
+description of his encounter with Mary. And lest it should seem that
+young Wright was allowing Mr. Jeekes to pump him, it should be stated
+that Bruce was well aware of one of the secretary’s most notable
+characteristics, a common failing, be it remarked, of the small-minded,
+and that was an overpowering suspicion of anything resembling a leading
+question. In order, therefore, to gain his confidence, he willingly
+satisfied the other’s curiosity regarding his visit to Harkings hoping
+thereby to extract some information as to the whereabouts of the letter
+on the slatey-blue paper.
+
+“There was no letter of this description on the desk, you say, when you
+and Miss Trevert looked?” asked Jeekes when Bruce had finished his
+story.
+
+“Nothing but circulars and bills,” Bruce replied.
+
+Mr. Jeekes leaned forward and drank off his coffee with a swift
+movement. Then he said carelessly:
+
+“From what you tell me, Miss Trevert would have been perhaps a minute
+alone in the room without your seeing her?”
+
+Bruce agreed with a nod.
+
+Adjusting his _pince-nez_ on his nose the secretary rose to his feet.
+
+“Very glad to have seen you again, Wright,” he said, thrusting out a
+limp hand; “must run off now—mass of work to get through ...”
+
+Then Bruce risked his leading question.
+
+“If you haven’t got this letter,” he observed, “what has become of it?
+Obviously the police are not likely to have taken it because they know
+nothing of its significance ...”
+
+“Quite, quite,” answered Mr. Jeekes absently, but without replying to
+the young man’s question.
+
+“Why,” asked Bruce boldly, “did old H.P. make such a mystery about
+these letters on the slatey-blue paper, Mr. Jeekes?”
+
+The secretary wrinkled up his thin lips and sharp nose into a cunning
+smile.
+
+“When you get to be my age, young Wright,” he made answer, “you will
+understand that every man has a private side to his life. And, if you
+have learnt your job properly, you will also know that a private
+secretary’s first duty is to mind his own business. About this letter
+now—it’s the first I’ve heard of it. Take my advice and don’t bother
+your head about it. _If_ it exists ...”
+
+“But it _does_ exist,” broke in Bruce quickly. “Mr. Greve saw it and
+read it himself ...”
+
+Mr. Jeekes laughed drily.
+
+“Don’t you forget, young Wright,” he said, jerking his chin towards the
+youngster in a confidential sort of way, “don’t you forget that Mr.
+Greve is anxious to find a plausible motive for Mr. Parrish’s suicide.
+People are talking, you understand! That’s all I’ve got to say! Just
+you think it over ...”
+
+Bruce Wright bristled up hotly at this.
+
+“I don’t see you have any reason to try and impugn Greve’s motive for
+wishing to get at the bottom of this mysterious affair ...”
+
+Mr. Jeekes affected to be engrossed in the manicuring of his nails.
+Very intently he rubbed the nails of one hand against the palm of the
+other.
+
+“No mystery!” he said decisively with a shake of the head: “no mystery
+whatsoever about it, young Wright, except what the amateur detectives
+will try and make it out to be. Or has Mr. Greve discovered a mystery
+already?”
+
+The question came out artfully. But in the quick glance which
+accompanied it, there was an intent watchfulness which startled Bruce
+accustomed as he was to the mild and unemotional ways of the little
+secretary.
+
+“Not that I know of,” said Bruce. “Greve is only puzzled like all of us
+that H.P. should have done a thing like this!”
+
+Mr. Jeekes was perfectly impassive again.
+
+“The nerves, young Wright! The nerves!” he said impressively. “Harley
+Street, not Mr. Greve, will supply the motive to this sad affair,
+believe me!”
+
+With that he accompanied the young man to the door of the club and from
+the vestibule watched him sally forth into the rain of Pall Mall.
+
+Then Mr. Jeekes turned to the hall porter.
+
+“Please get me Stevenish one-three-seven,” he said, “it’s a trunk call.
+Don’t let them put you off with ‘No reply.’ It’s Harkings, and they are
+expecting me to ring them. I shall be in the writing room.”
+
+When, twenty minutes later, Mr. Jeekes emerged from the trunk call
+telephone box in the club vestibule, his mouth was drooping at the
+corners and his hands trembled curiously. He stood for an instant in
+thought tapping his foot on the marble floor of the deserted hall dimly
+lit by a single electric bulb burning over the hall porter’s box. Then
+he went back to the writing-room and returned with a yellow telegram
+form.
+
+“Send a boy down to Charing Cross with that at once, please,” he said
+to the night porter.
+
+Fate which had brought Bruce Wright face to face with Mr. Jeekes gave
+the kaleidoscope another jerk that night. As Bruce Wright entered the
+Tube Station at Dover Street to go home to South Kensington, it
+occurred to him that he would ring up Robin Greve at his chambers in
+the Temple and give him an outline of his (Bruce’s) talk with Jeekes.
+Bruce went to the public callbox in the station, but the rhythmic
+“Zoom-er! Zoom-er! Zoom-er!” which announces that a number is engaged
+was all the satisfaction he got. The prospect of waiting about the
+draughty station exit did not appeal to him, so he decided to go home
+and telephone Robin, as originally arranged, in the morning.
+
+Just about the time that he made this resolve, Robin in his rooms in
+the Temple was hanging up the receiver of his telephone with a dazed
+expression in his eyes. Mr. Manderton had rung him up with a piece of
+intelligence which fairly bewildered him. It bewildered Mr. Manderton
+also, as the detective was frank enough to acknowledge.
+
+Mary Trevert had gone to Rotterdam for a few days in company with her
+cousin, Major Euan MacTavish. Mr. Manderton had received this
+astonishing information by telephone from Harkings a few minutes
+before.
+
+“It bothers me properly, Mr. Greve, sir,” the detective had added.
+
+“There’s only one thing for it, Manderton,” Robin had said; “I’ll have
+to go after her ...”
+
+“The very thing I was about to suggest myself, Mr. Greve. You’re
+unofficial-like and can be more helpful than if we detailed one of our
+own people from the Yard. And with the investigation in its present
+stage I don’t reely feel justified in going off on a wild-goose chase
+myself. There are several important enquiries going forward now,
+notably as to where Mr. Parrish bought his pistol. But we certainly
+ought to find out what takes Miss Trevert careering off to Rotterdam in
+this way ...”
+
+“It seems almost incredible,” Robin had said, “but it looks to me as
+though Miss Trevert must have found out something about the letter ...”
+
+“Or found it herself ...”
+
+“By Jove! She was in the library when Bruce Wright was there. This
+settles it, Manderton. I must go!”
+
+“Then,” said the detective, “I’m going to entrust you with that slotted
+sheet of paper again. For I have an idea, Mr. Greve, that you may get a
+glimpse of that letter before I do. I’ll send a messenger round with it
+at once.”
+
+Then a difficulty arose. Manderton had not got the girl’s address. They
+had no address at Harkings. Nor did he know what train Miss Trevert had
+taken. She might have gone by the 9 P.M. that night. Had Mr. Greve got
+a passport? Yes, Robin had a passport, but it was not viséed for
+Holland. That meant he could not leave until the following evening.
+Then Robin had a “brain wave.”
+
+“There’s an air service to Rotterdam!” he exclaimed. “It doesn’t leave
+till noon. A pal of mine went across by it only last week. That will
+leave me time to get my passport stamped at the Dutch Consulate, to
+catch the air mail, and be in Rotterdam by tea-time! And, Manderton, I
+shall go to the Grand Hotel. That’s where my friend stopped. Wire me
+there if there’s any news ...”
+
+Air travel is so comfortably regulated at the present day that Robin
+Greve, looking back at his trip by air from Croydon Aerodrome to the
+big landing-ground outside Rotterdam, acknowledged that he had more
+excitement in his efforts to stir into action a lethargic Dutch
+passport official in London, so as to enable him to catch the air mail,
+than in the smooth and uneventful voyage across the Channel. He reached
+Rotterdam on a dull and muggy afternoon and lost no time in depositing
+his bag at the Grand Hotel. An enquiry at the office there satisfied
+him that Mary Trevert had not registered her name in the hotel book.
+Then he set out in a taxi upon a dreary round of the principal hotels.
+
+But fate, which loves to make a sport of lovers, played him a scurvy
+trick. In the course of his search it brought Robin to that very hotel
+towards which, at the selfsame moment, Mary Trevert was driving from
+the station. By the time she arrived, Robin was gone and, with despair
+in his heart, had started on a tour of the second-class hotels,
+checking them by the Baedeker he had bought in the Strand that morning.
+It was eight o’clock by the time he had finished. He had drawn a blank.
+
+The sight of a huge, plate-glass-fronted café reminded him that in the
+day’s rush he had omitted to lunch. So he paid off his taxi and dined
+off succulent Dutch beefsteak, pounded as soft as velvet and swimming
+with butter and served in a bed of deliciously browned ‘earth apples,’
+as the Holländers call potatoes. The café was stiflingly hot; there was
+a large and noisy orchestra in the front part and a vast
+billiard-saloon in the back—a place of shaded lights, clicking balls,
+and guttural exclamations. The heat of the place, the noise and the
+cries combined with the effect of his long journey in the fresh air to
+make him very drowsy. When he had finished dinner he was content to
+postpone his investigations until the morrow and go to bed. Emerging
+from the café he found to his relief that his hotel was but a few
+houses away.
+
+As he sat at breakfast the next morning, enjoying the admirable Dutch
+coffee, he reviewed the situation very calmly but very thoroughly. He
+told himself that he had no indication as to Mary Trevert’s business in
+Rotterdam save the supposition that she had found the van der Spyck
+letter and had come to Rotterdam to investigate the matter for herself.
+He realized that the hypothesis was thin, for, in the first place, Mary
+could have no inkling as to the hidden significance of the document,
+and, in the second place, she was undoubtedly under the impression that
+Hartley Parrish was driven to suicide by his (Robin’s) threats.
+
+But, in the absence of any other apparent explanation of the girl’s
+extraordinary decision to come to Rotterdam, Robin decided he would
+accept the theory that she had come about the van der Spyck letter. How
+like Mary, after all, he mused, self-willed, fearless, independent, to
+rush off to Holland on her own on a quest like this! Where would her
+investigations lead her? To the offices of Elias van der Spyck & Co.,
+to be sure! Robin threw his napkin down on the table, thrust back his
+chair, and went off to the hotel porter to locate the address of the
+firm.
+
+The telephone directory showed that the offices were situated in the
+Oranien-Straat, about ten minutes’ walk from the hotel, in the business
+quarter of the city round the Bourse. Robin glanced at the clock. It
+was twenty minutes to ten. The principals, he reflected, were not
+likely to be at the office before ten o’clock. It was a fine morning
+and he decided to walk. The hotel porter gave him a few simple
+directions: the gentleman could not miss the way, he said; so Robin
+started off, hope high in his breast of getting a step nearer to the
+elucidation of the mystery of the library at Harkings.
+
+A brisk walk of about ten minutes through the roaring streets of the
+city brought him to a big open square from which, he had been
+instructed, the Oranien-Straat turned off. He was just passing a large
+and important-looking post-office—he remarked it because he looked up
+at a big clock in the window to see the time—when a man came hastily
+through the swing-door and stopped irresolutely on the pavement in
+front, glancing to right and left as a man does who is looking for a
+cab.
+
+At the sight of him Robin could scarcely suppress an expression of
+amazement. It was Mr. Jeekes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+THE MAN WITH THE YELLOW FACE
+
+
+In a narrow, drowsy side street at Rotterdam, bisected by a somnolent
+canal, stood flush with the red-brick sidewalk a small clean house.
+Wire blinds affixed to the windows of its ground and first floors gave
+it a curious blinking air as though its eyes were only half open. To
+the neat green front door was affixed a large brass plate inscribed
+with the single name: “Schulz.”
+
+A large woman, in a pink print dress with a white cloth bound about her
+head, was vigorously polishing the plate as, on the morning following
+her departure from London, Mary Trevert, Dulkinghorn’s letter of
+introduction in her pocket, arrived in front of the residence of Mr.
+William Schulz. Euan MacTavish had, on the previous evening, seen her
+to her hotel and had then—very reluctantly, as it seemed to
+Mary—departed to continue his journey to The Hague, his taxi piled high
+with white-and-green Foreign Office bags, heavily sealed with scarlet
+wax.
+
+Mary Trevert approached the woman, her letter of introduction, which
+Dulkinghorn, being an unusual person, had fastened down, in her hand.
+
+“Schulz?” she said interrogatively.
+
+“_Nicht da_,” replied the woman without looking up from her rubbing.
+
+“Has he gone out?” asked Mary in English.
+
+“_Verstehe nicht_!” mumbled the woman.
+
+But she put down her cleaning-rag and, breathing heavily, mustered the
+girl with a leisurely stare.
+
+Mary repeated the question in German whereupon the woman brightened up
+considerably.
+
+The _Herr_ was not at home. The _Herr_ had gone out. On business,
+_jawohl_. To the bank, perhaps. But the _Herr_ would be back in time
+for _Mittagessen_ at noon. There was beer soup followed by
+_Rindfleisch_ ...
+
+Mary hesitated an instant. She was wondering whether she should leave
+her letter of introduction. She decided she would leave it. So she
+wrote on her card: “Anxious to see you as soon as possible” and the
+name of her hotel, and gave it, with the letter, to the woman.
+
+“Please see that Herr Schulz gets that directly he comes in,” she said.
+“It is important!”
+
+“_Gut, gut_!” said the woman, wiping her hands on her apron. She took
+the card and letter, and Mary, thanking her, set off to go back to her
+hotel.
+
+About twenty yards from Mr. Schulz’s house a narrow alley ran off. As
+Mary turned to regain the little footbridge across the canal to return
+to the noisy street which would take her back to the hotel, she caught
+sight of a man disappearing down this alley.
+
+She only had a glimpse of him, but it was sufficient to startle her
+considerably. He was a small man wearing a tweed cap and a tweed
+travelling ulster of a vivid brown. It was not these details, however,
+which took her aback. It was the fact that in the glimpse she had had
+of the man’s face she had seemed to recognize the features of Mr.
+Albert Edward Jeekes.
+
+“What an extraordinary thing!” Mary said to herself. “It _can’t_ be Mr.
+Jeekes. But if it is not, it is some one strikingly like him!”
+
+To get another view of the stranger she hurried to the corner of the
+alley. It was a mere thread of a lane, not above six yards wide,
+running between the houses a distance of some sixty yards to the next
+street. But the alley was empty. The stranger had disappeared.
+
+Mary went a little way down the lane. A wooden fence ran down it on
+either side, with doors at intervals apparently giving on the back
+yards of the houses in the street. There was no sign of Mr. Jeekes’s
+double, so she retraced her steps and returned to her hotel without
+further incident.
+
+She had not been back more than half an hour when a waiter came in to
+the lounge where she was sitting.
+
+“Miss Trevert?” he said. “Zey ask for you at ze delephone!”
+
+He took her to a cabin under the main staircase.
+
+“This is Miss Trevert speaking!” said Mary.
+
+“I am speaking for Mr. Schulz,” a man’s voice answered—rather a nasal
+voice with a shade of foreign inflexion—“he has had your letter. He is
+very sorry he has been detained in the country, but would be very glad
+if you would lunch with him to-day at his country-house.”
+
+“I shall be very pleased,” the girl replied. “Is it far?”
+
+“Only just outside Rotterdam,” the voice responded. “Mr. Schulz will
+send the car to the hotel to pick you up at 11.45. The driver will ask
+for you. Is that all right?”
+
+“Certainly,” said Mary. “Please thank Mr. Schulz and tell him I will
+expect the car at a quarter to twelve!”
+
+Punctually at the appointed hour an open touring-car drove up to the
+hotel. Mary was waiting at the entrance. The driver was a young
+Dutchman in a blue serge suit. He jumped out and came up to Mary.
+
+“Mees Trevert?” he said.
+
+Mary nodded, whereupon he helped her into the car, then got back into
+the driving-seat and they drove away.
+
+A run of about twenty minutes through trim suburbs brought them out on
+a long straight road, paved with bricks and lined with poplars. The day
+was fine with a little bright sunshine from time to time and a high
+wind which kept the sails of the windmills dotting the landscape
+turning briskly. They followed the road for a bit, then branched off
+down a side turning which led to a black gate. It bore the name “Villa
+Bergendal” in white letters. The gate opened into a short drive fringed
+by thick laurel bushes which presently brought them in view of an ugly
+square red-brick house.
+
+The car drew up at a creeper-hung porch paved in red tiles. The
+chauffeur helped Mary to alight and, pushing open a glass door, ushered
+the girl into a square, comfortably furnished hall. Some handsome
+Oriental rugs were spread about: trophies of native weapons hung on the
+walls, and there were some fine specimens of old Dutch chests and blue
+Delft ware.
+
+The chauffeur led the way across the hall to a door at the far end. As
+Mary followed him, something bright lying on one of the chests caught
+her eye. It was a vivid brown travelling ulster and on it lay a brown
+tweed cap.
+
+Mary Trevert was no fool. She was, on the contrary, a remarkably
+quick-witted young person. The sight of that rather “loud” overcoat
+instantly recalled the stranger so strikingly resembling Mr. Jeekes who
+had disappeared down the lane as she was coming away from Mr. Schulz’s
+house. Mr. Jeekes _was_ in Rotterdam then, and had, of course, been
+sent by her mother to look after her. What a fool she had been to allow
+Euan MacTavish to persuade her to tell her mother of her plans!
+
+Mary suddenly felt very angry. How dare Mr. Jeekes spy on her like
+this! She was quite capable, she told herself, of handling her own
+affairs, and she intended to tell the secretary so very plainly. And
+if, as she was beginning to believe, Mr. Schulz were acting hand in
+glove with Mr. Jeekes, she would let him know equally plainly that she
+had no intention of troubling him, but would make her own
+investigations independently. With a heightened colour she followed the
+chauffeur and passed through the door he held open for her.
+
+She found herself in a small, pleasant room with a bright note of
+colour in the royal blue carpet and window-curtains. A log-fire burned
+cheerfully in the fireplace before which a large red-leather
+Chesterfield was drawn up. On the walls hung some good old Dutch
+prints, and there were a couple of bookcases containing books which, by
+their bindings at least, seemed old and valuable.
+
+At the farther end of the room was another door across which a curtain
+of royal blue was drawn. Mary had scarcely entered the room when this
+door opened and a man appeared.
+
+He was carefully dressed in a well-cut suit of some dark material and
+wore a handsome pearl pin in his black tie. He was a dark, sallow type
+of man, his skin yellowed as though from long residence in the tropics.
+A small black moustache, carefully trained outwards from the lips,
+disclosed, as he smiled a greeting at his visitor, a line of broken
+yellow teeth. His hair, which was grizzled at the temples, was black
+and oily and brushed right back off the forehead. With his coarse black
+hair, his sallow skin, and his small beady eyes, rather like a snake’s,
+there was something decidedly un-English about him. As Mary Trevert
+looked at him, somewhat taken aback by his sudden appearance, she
+became conscious of a vague feeling of mistrust welling up within her.
+
+The man closed the door behind him and advanced into the room, his hand
+extended. Mary took it. It was dank and cold to the touch.
+
+“A thousand apologies, my dear Miss Trevert,” he said in a soft, silky
+voice, a trifle nasal, with a touch of Continental inflexion, “for
+asking you to come out here to see me. The fact is I had an important
+business conference here this morning and I have a second one this
+afternoon. It was materially impossible for me to come into Rotterdam
+... But I am forgetting my manners. Let me introduce myself. I am Mr.
+Schulz ...”
+
+Mary Trevert looked at him thoughtfully. Was this the friend of Ernest
+Dulkinghorn, the man of confidence to whom he had recommended her? A
+feeling of great uneasiness came over her. She listened. The house was
+absolutely still. From the utter silence enveloping it—for aught she
+knew—she and her unsavoury-looking companion might be the only persons
+in it. And then she realized that, on the faith of a telephone call,
+she had blindly come out to a house, the very address of which was
+utterly unknown to her.
+
+She fought down a sudden sensation of panic that made her want to
+scream, to bolt from the room into the fresh air, anywhere away from
+those snake eyes, that soft voice, that clammy hand. She collected her
+thoughts, remembered that Jeekes must be somewhere in the house, as his
+outdoor things were in the hall. The recollection reminded her of her
+determination to tolerate no interference from Jeekes or her mother.
+
+So she merely answered: “It was no trouble to come,” and waited for the
+man to speak again.
+
+He pulled forward the Chesterfield and made her sit down beside him.
+
+“I had the letter of introduction,” he said, “and I want you to know
+that my services are entirely at your disposal. Now, what can I do for
+you?”
+
+He looked at the girl intently—rather anxiously, she thought.
+
+“That was explained in the letter,” she answered, meeting his gaze
+unflinchingly.
+
+“Yes, yes, of course, I know. I meant in what way do you propose to
+make use of my ... my local knowledge?”
+
+“I will tell you that, Mr. Schulz,” Mary Trevert said in a measured
+voice, “when you tell me what you think of the mission which has
+brought me here ...”
+
+The snake’s eyes narrowed a little.
+
+“For a young lady to have come out alone to Holland on a mission of
+this description speaks volumes for your pluck and self-reliance, Miss
+Trevert ...”
+
+“I asked you what you thought of my mission to Holland, Mr. Schulz,”
+Mary interposed coldly.
+
+It was beginning to dawn on her that Mr. Schulz did not seem to know
+anything about the object of her visit, but, on the contrary, was
+seeking to elicit this from her by a process of adroit
+cross-examination. She was rather puzzled, therefore, but also somewhat
+relieved when he said:
+
+“I can give my opinion better after you have shown me the letter ...”
+
+“What letter?” said the girl.
+
+“The letter from Elias van der Spyck and Company, to be sure,” retorted
+the other quickly.
+
+Mary dipped her hand into her black fox muff. Then she hesitated. She
+could not rid herself of the suspicion that this man with the sallow
+face and the yellow fangs was not to be trusted. She withdrew her hand.
+
+“This is a very delicate matter, Mr. Schulz,” she said. “Our
+appointment was made by telephone, and I think therefore I should ask
+you to show me Mr. Dulkinghorn’s letter of introduction before I go any
+further, so that I may feel quite sure in my mind that I am dealing
+with one in whom I know Mr. Dulkinghorn to have every confidence ...”
+
+Mr. Schulz’s yellow face went a shade yellower. His mouth twisted
+itself into a wry smile, his thin lips fleshing his discoloured teeth.
+He stood up rather stiffly.
+
+“You are a guest in my house, Miss Trevert,” he said with offended
+dignity, “I scarcely expected you to impugn my good faith. Surely my
+word is sufficient ...”
+
+He turned his back on her and took a couple of paces into the room in
+apparent vexation. Then he returned and stood at the back of the
+Chesterfield behind her. His feet made no sound on the thick carpet,
+but some vague instinct made Mary Trevert turn her head. She saw him
+standing there, twisting his hands nervously behind his back.
+
+“Surely my word is sufficient ...” he repeated.
+
+“In business,” said Mary boldly, “one cannot be too careful.”
+
+“Besides,” Mr. Schulz urged, “this was a private letter which Mr. ...
+Mr. Dulkinghorn certainly did not expect you to see. That makes it
+awkward ...”
+
+“I think in the circumstances,” said Mary, “I must insist, Mr. Schulz!”
+
+She was now feeling horribly frightened. She strained her ears in vain
+for a sound. The whole house seemed wrapped in a grave-like quiet. The
+smile had never left Mr. Schulz’s face. But it was a cruel, wolfish
+grin without a ray of kindliness in it. The girl felt her heart turn
+cold within her every time her eyes fell on the mask-like face.
+
+Mr. Schulz shrugged shoulders.
+
+“Since you insist ...” he remarked. “But I think it is scarcely fair on
+our friend Dulkinghorn. The letter is in the safe in my office next
+door. If you come along I will get it out and show it to you ...”
+
+He spoke unconcernedly, but stiffly, as though to emphasize the slight
+put upon his dignity. One hand thrust jauntily in his jacket pocket, he
+stepped across the carpet to the door with the blue curtain. He opened
+it, then stood back for the girl to pass in before him.
+
+“After you!” he said.
+
+He had placed himself so close to the doorway that the black fox about
+her neck brushed his face as she passed. Suddenly a warm, sickly whiff
+of some sweet-smelling odour came to her. She stopped on the instant,
+irresolute, alarmed. Then a dank hand was clapped on her face, covering
+nostrils and mouth with a soft cloth reeking with a horrible cloying
+drug. An arm with muscles like steel was passed round her waist and
+held her in a vice-like grip against which she struggled in vain. She
+felt her senses slipping, slipping ...
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+TWO’S COMPANY ...
+
+
+On the pavement opposite the post-office stood one of those high
+pillars which are commonly used in Continental cities for the display
+of theatre and concert advertisements. Robin instantly stepped behind
+it. It was not that he wished to avoid being seen by Jeekes as much as
+that he had not decided in his mind what course he had best pursue.
+From behind the cover of the pillar he mustered his man.
+
+The little secretary looked strange and unfamiliar in a sporting sort
+of travelling ulster of a tawny brown hue and a cap of the same stuff.
+But there was no mistaking the watery eyes, the sharp nose, the
+features. He had obviously not seen Robin. His whole attention was
+rivetted on the street. He kept peering nervously to right and left as
+though expecting some one.
+
+Suddenly he stepped forward quickly to the kerb. Then Robin saw an open
+car detach itself from the press of traffic in the square and, driven
+very fast, approach the post-office. It was a large car with a grey
+body; a sallow man wearing a black felt hat sat at the wheel. The car
+drew up at the kerb and halted within a few feet of the advertisement
+pillar. Robin backed hastily round it to escape observation. He had
+resolved to do nothing until he had ascertained who Jeekes’s friend was
+and what business the secretary had with him.
+
+“It’s all right,” Robin heard the man in the car say in English; “I
+telephoned the girl and she’s coming. What a piece of luck, eh?”
+
+Robin heard the click of the car door as it swung open.
+
+“... better get along out there at once,” he heard the man in the car
+say, “I’m sending Jan in the car for her at ...”
+
+Then Robin stepped out unexpectedly from behind his pillar and cannoned
+into Mr. Jeekes, who was just entering the car.
+
+“Good-morning,” said Robin with easy assurance; “I’m delighted to hear
+that you’ve found Miss Trevert, Jeekes, for, to tell the truth, I was
+feeling somewhat uneasy about her ...”
+
+The secretary’s face was a study. The surprise of seeing Robin, who had
+dropped, it seemed to him, out of the clouds into the city of
+Rotterdam, deprived him of speech for an instant. He blinked his eyes,
+looked this way and that, and finally, with a sort of blind gesture,
+readjusted his _pince-nez_ and glared at the intruder.
+
+Then, without a word, he got into the car. But Robin, with a firm hand,
+stayed the door which Jeekes would have closed behind him.
+
+“Excuse me,” Robin remarked decidedly, “but I’m coming with you if your
+friend”—at this he looked at the man in the driving-seat—“has no
+objection ...”
+
+Mr. Jeekes cast a frightened glance at the sallow man.
+
+The latter said impatiently:
+
+“We’re wasting time, Jeekes. Who is this gentleman?”
+
+“This is Mr. Greve,” said the little secretary hurriedly, “a friend of
+Mr. Parrish and Miss Trevert. He was staying in the house at the time
+of the tragedy. He has, I understand, taken a prominent part in the
+investigations as to the motive of our poor friend’s sad end ...”
+
+Mr. Jeekes looked to Robin as he said this as though for confirmation.
+The man at the driving-wheel turned and gave the little secretary a
+quick glance. Then he mustered Robin with a slow, insolent stare. He
+had a yellow face and small black eyes quick and full of intelligence.
+
+Then he bowed.
+
+“My name is Victor,” he said. “The sad news about Mr. Parrish was a
+great shock to me. I met him several times in London. Were you anxious
+to see Miss ... er ... Trevert? She has come to Rotterdam (so my friend
+Jeekes tells me) to look into certain important business transactions
+which the late Mr. Parrish had in hand at the time of his death. Did I
+understand you to say that you were uneasy about this lady? Is there
+any mystery about her journey?...”
+
+For the moment Robin felt somewhat abashed. The question was rather a
+poser. Was there, in effect, any mystery about Mary’s trip to Rotterdam
+accompanied by her cousin? She had acquainted her people at Harkings
+with her plans. What if, after all, everything was open and
+above-board, and she had merely come to Rotterdam on business? It
+seemed difficult to believe. Surely in such a case the solicitor,
+Bardy, would have been the more suitable emissary ...
+
+“You’ll forgive us, I’m sure,” the yellow-faced man remarked suavely,
+“but we’re in a great hurry. Would you mind closing that door?...”
+
+Robin closed the door. But he got into the car first. As he had stood
+on the pavement in doubt, the recollection of Jeekes’s inexplicable lie
+about the payments made by Parrish for the French lady in the Mayfair
+flat came back to him and deepened the suspicion in his mind. It would
+in any case, he told himself, do no harm to find out who this rather
+unsavoury-looking Rotterdam friend of Jeekes’s was ...
+
+So Robin jumped into the car and sat down on the back seat next to the
+secretary.
+
+“It happens,” he said, “that I am particularly anxious to see Miss
+Trevert. As I gather you are going to meet her, I feel sure you won’t
+mind my accompanying you ...”
+
+The yellow-faced man turned with an easy smile.
+
+“Sorry,” he said, “but we are having a meeting with Miss Trevert on
+private business and I’m afraid we cannot take you along. Jeekes here,
+however, could take a message to Miss Trevert and if she _wanted_ to
+see you ...”
+
+He broke off significantly and smiled slily at the secretary. Robin
+felt himself flush. So Jeekes had been telling tales out of school to
+Mr. Victor, had he? The young man squared his jaw. That settled it. He
+would stay.
+
+“I promise not to butt in on your private business,” he replied, “but I
+simply must see Miss Trevert before I go back to London. So, if you
+don’t mind, I think I’ll come along ...”
+
+The yellow-faced man glanced at his wrist watch.
+
+“I can’t prevent you!” he exclaimed. Then he rapped out something in
+Dutch to Jeekes. The secretary leaned forward to catch the remark. The
+yellow-faced man threw in the clutch.
+
+“Goed!” (good), answered Jeekes in the same language, and resumed his
+seat as the car glided smoothly away from the kerb into the traffic of
+the busy square. Robin settled himself back in the seat with an
+inaudible sigh of satisfaction. He did not like the look of Jeekes’s
+companion, he told himself, and Mr. Victor, whoever he was, had
+certainly manifested no great desire for Robin’s company. But he was
+going to see Mary. That was all that counted for the moment.
+
+They threaded their way through the streets in silence. It passed
+through Robin’s mind to start a discussion with Jeekes about the death
+of Hartley Parrish. But in the circumstances he conceived it might
+easily assume a controversial character, and he did not want to take
+any risk of jeopardizing his chance of meeting Mary again. And no other
+subject of conversation occurred to him. He did not know Jeekes at all
+well, knew him in fact only as a week-end guest knows the private
+secretary of his host, a shadowy personality, indispensable and part of
+the household, but scarcely more than a name ...
+
+The car had put on speed as they left the more crowded streets and
+emerged into the suburbs. Now they were running over a broad straight
+main road lined with poplars. Robin wondered whither they were bound.
+He was about to put the question to the secretary when the man Victor
+turned his head and said over his shoulder:
+
+“_Nu_!”
+
+At the same moment the speed of the car sensibly diminished.
+
+Jeekes put his arm across the young man at his side.
+
+“That door,” he said, touching his sleeve, “doesn’t seem to be properly
+shut. Would you mind ...”
+
+Robin pushed the door with his hand.
+
+“It seems all right,” he said.
+
+“Permit me ...”
+
+The secretary stretched across and pulled back the latch, releasing the
+door. It swung out.
+
+“Now close it,” said Mr. Jeekes.
+
+The door was flapping to and fro with the swaying of the car over the
+rough road and Robin had to half rise in order to comply with the
+request. He was leaning forward, steadying himself with one hand
+grasping the back of the driving-seat, when he received a tremendous
+shove in the back. At the same moment the car seemed to leap forward:
+he made a desperate effort to regain his balance, failed, and was
+whirled out head foremost on to the side of the road.
+
+Fortunately for himself he fell soft. The road ran here through a
+little wood of young oak and beech which came right down to the edge of
+the _chaussée_. The ground was deep in withered leaves which, with the
+rain and the water draining from the road’s high camber, were soft and
+soggy. Robin went full length into this muss with a thud that shook
+every bone in his body. His left leg, catching in a bare gorse-bush,
+acted as a brake and stopped him from rolling farther. He sat up, his
+mouth full of mud and his hair full of wet leaves, and felt himself
+carefully over. He contemplated rather ruefully a long rent in the left
+leg of his trousers just across the knee.
+
+“Jeekes!” he murmured; “he pushed me out! The dirty dog!”
+
+Then he remembered that, with the men in the car gone, he had lost
+trace again of Mary Trevert. His forcible ejection from the car was
+evidence enough of their determination to deal with Mary without
+interference from outside. It looked ominous. Robin sprang to his feet
+and rushed to the middle of the road.
+
+The _chaussée_ was absolutely empty. About a hundred yards from where
+he stood in the direction in which the car had been travelling the road
+made a sharp bend to the right, thus curtailing his view. Robin did not
+hesitate. Not waiting to retrieve his hat or even to wipe the mud from
+his face, he started off at a brisk run along the road in the direction
+in which the car had disappeared. He had not gone far before he found
+that his heavy overcoat was seriously impeding him. He stripped it off
+and, folding it, hid it beneath a bush just inside the plantation. Then
+he ran on again.
+
+Fresh disappointment awaited him when he rounded the bend in the road.
+A few hundred yards on the road turned again. There was no sign of the
+car. A cart piled high with manure was approaching, the driver, wearing
+wooden shoes and cracking at intervals a huge whip, trudging at the
+side.
+
+Robin stopped him.
+
+“Motor-car? Automobile?” he asked pointing in the direction from which
+the cart had come. The driver stared at him with a look of owlish
+stupidity.
+
+“Automobile?” repeated Robin. “Tuff-Tuff?”
+
+Very slowly a grin suffused the carter’s grimy face. He showed a row of
+broken black teeth. A tiny stream of saliva escaped from the corner of
+his mouth and trickled over the reddish stubble on his chin. Then he
+continued his way, turning his head every now and then to display his
+idiot’s grin.
+
+“Damnation!” exclaimed Robin, starting to run again. “Not a soul to ask
+in this accursed desert except the village idiot! Oh! that Jeekes! I’ll
+wring his blinking neck when I get hold of him!”
+
+He was furious with himself for the abject way in which he had been
+fooled. The man Victor had given Jeekes his orders in Dutch and had
+purposely picked a soft spot on the roadside and slowed down the car in
+order that the unwelcome intruder might be ejected as safely as
+possible. And to think that Robin had blandly allowed Jeekes to open
+the door and throw him out on the road!
+
+He was round the second bend now. The sun was shining with a quite
+respectable warmth and the steamy air made him desperately hot. The
+perspiration rolled off his face. But he never slackened his gait.
+Robin knew these Continental roads and their habit of running straight.
+He reckoned confidently on presently coming upon a long stretch where
+he might discern the car.
+
+He was not deceived. After the second bend the _chaussée_, just as he
+anticipated, straightened out and ran clear away between an
+ever-narrowing double line of poplars to become a bluish blob on the
+horizon. But of the car nothing was to be seen.
+
+For the second time Robin pulled up. He took serious counsel with
+himself. He estimated that he could see for about three miles along the
+road. Less than three minutes had elapsed since his misadventure, and
+therefore he was confident that the car should yet be in sight, unless
+it had left the road, for it could not have warmed up to a speed
+exceeding sixty miles an hour in the time. There was no sign of the car
+on the road, consequently it must have left it. Robin had passed no
+side roads between the scene of the accident and the second bend;
+therefore, he argued, he had the car before him still. He would go on.
+
+When he started off for the third time, it was at a brisk walking pace.
+As he went he kept a sharp lookout to right and left of the road for
+any trace of the car. It never occurred to him that to follow on foot a
+swift car bound for an unknown destination was the maddest kind of
+wild-goose chase. He was profoundly uneasy about Mary, but at the same
+time immeasurably angered by the trick played upon him—angered not so
+much against Jeekes as against the sallow-faced man whom he recognized
+as its inceptor. He had no thought for anything else.
+
+The flat Dutch landscape stretched away on either side of the road. A
+windmill or two, the inevitable irrigation canals with their little
+sluices, and an occasional tree alone broke the monotony of the scene.
+But away to the right Robin noticed a clump of trees which, he
+surmised, might conceivably enclose a house.
+
+As he walked, he scrutinized the roadway for any track of a car. But on
+the hard brick _pavé_ wheels left no mark. The first side road he came
+to was likewise paved in brick. In grave perplexity Robin came to a
+halt.
+
+Then his eye fell upon a puddle. It lay on the edge of the footpath
+bordering the _chaussée_ about five yards beyond the turning. The soft
+mud which skirted it showed the punched-out pattern of a studded tyre!
+The car had not taken this side road, at any rate. It had probably
+pulled over on to the footpath to pass the manure cart which Robin had
+met. He pushed on again valiantly.
+
+Another hundred yards brought him to a second side road. There was no
+_pavé_ here, but a soft sandy surface. And it bore, clearly imprinted
+in the mud, the fresh tracks of a car as it had turned off the road.
+
+Breaking into a run Robin followed the track down the turning. It led
+him to a black gate beyond which was a twisting gravel drive fringed
+with high laurels. And the gravel showed the same tyre marks as the
+road.
+
+He vaulted the gate lightly and ran up the drive. He was revolving in
+his head what his next move should be. Should he walk boldly into the
+house and confront Jeekes and his rascally looking companion or should
+he first spy out the ground and try to ascertain whether Mary had
+arrived? He decided on the latter course.
+
+Accordingly, when an unexpected turn of the drive brought him in view
+of a white porch, he left the avenue and took cover behind the laurel
+bushes. Walking softly on the wet grass and keeping well down behind
+the laurels, he went forward parallel with the drive. It ran into a
+clean courtyard with a coachhouse or garage on one side and a small
+green door, seemingly a side entrance into the house, on the other.
+
+There was no one in the courtyard and the house seemed perfectly quiet.
+From his post of observation behind the laurels, Robin observed that a
+tall window beside the green door commanded the view across the
+courtyard. He therefore retraced his steps by the way he had come. When
+he was past the corner of the house, he returned to the drive and
+keeping close to the bushes walked quietly into the courtyard. There,
+hugging the wall, he crept round past the closed doors of the garage
+until he found himself beside the tall window adjoining the green door.
+
+The window was open a few inches at the top. From within the sound of
+voices reached him. Jeekes was speaking. Robin recognized his rather
+grating voice at once.
+
+“... no more violence,” he was saying; “first Greve and now the girl. I
+don’t like your methods, Victor ...”
+
+Very cautiously Robin dropped on one knee and shuffled forward in this
+position until his eyes were on a level with the window-sill. He found
+himself looking into a narrow room, well lighted by a second window at
+the farther end. It was apparently an office, for there was a high desk
+running down the centre and a large safe occupied a prominent place
+against the wall.
+
+Jeekes and the man Victor stood chatting at the desk. The yellow-faced
+man was grinning sardonically.
+
+“Parrish don’t like your methods, I’ll be bound,” he retorted. “Don’t
+you worry about the little lady, Jeekes! Bless your heart, I won’t hurt
+her unless ...”
+
+The loud throbbing of a car at the front of the house made Robin duck
+his head hastily. The car, he guessed, might be round at the garage any
+moment and it would not do for him to be discovered. He got clear of
+the window, rose to his feet, and tiptoed round the house by the way he
+had come. Then he crossed the drive and regained the shelter of the
+laurels. Crawling along until he came level with the porch, he peeped
+through.
+
+Mary Trevert was just entering the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+THE METAMORPHOSIS OF MR. SCHULZ
+
+
+As the girl collapsed, the yellow-faced man, with an adroit movement,
+whisked the handkerchief off her face and crammed it into his pocket.
+Then, while he supported her with one arm, with the other he thrust at
+the door to close it. Without paying further attention to it, he turned
+and, bending down, lifted the girl without an effort off her feet and
+carried her across the room to the Chesterfield, upon which he laid her
+at full length. Then he seized her muff, which dangled from her neck by
+a thin platinum chain.
+
+Suddenly he heard the door behind him creak. In a flash he remembered
+that he had not heard the click of the lock as he had thrust the door
+to. He was springing erect when a firm hand gripped him by the back of
+the collar and pulled him away from the couch. He staggered back,
+striving to regain his balance, but then a savage shove flung him head
+foremost into the fireplace. He fell with a crash among the fire-irons.
+But he was on his feet again in an instant.
+
+He saw a tall, athletic-looking young man standing at the couch. He had
+a remarkably square jaw; his eyes were shining and he breathed heavily.
+He wore a blue serge suit which was heavily besmeared with white
+plaster and the trousers were rent across one knee. Straight at his
+throat sprang the yellow-faced man.
+
+Something struck him halfway. The young man had waited composedly for
+his coming, but as his assailant advanced, had shot out his left hand.
+There was a sharp crack and the yellow-faced man, reeling, dropped face
+downwards on the carpet without a sound. In his fall his foot caught a
+small table on which a vase of chrysanthemums stood, and the whole
+thing went over with a loud crash. He made a spasmodic effort to rise,
+hoisted himself on to his knees, swayed again, and then collapsed full
+length on the floor, where he lay motionless.
+
+The sound of the fall seemed to awaken the girl. She stirred uneasily
+once or twice.
+
+“What ... what is it?” she muttered, and was still again.
+
+Bending down, the young man gathered her up in his arms and bore her
+out through the door with the blue curtain, through a plainly furnished
+sort of office with high desks and stools, and out by a side door into
+a paved yard. There an open car was standing. The fresh air seemed to
+revive the girl further. As the young man laid her on the seat, she
+struggled up into a sitting position and passed her hand across her
+forehead.
+
+“What is the matter with me?” she said in a dazed voice; “I feel so
+ill!”
+
+Then, catching sight of the young man as he peered into her face, she
+exclaimed:
+
+“Robin!”
+
+“Thank God, you’re all right, Mary,” said Robin. “We’ve not got a
+moment to lose. We must get away from here quick!”
+
+He was at the bonnet cranking up the car. But the engine, chilled by
+the cold air, refused to start. As he was straining at the handle, a
+man dashed suddenly into the yard by the office door.
+
+It was Jeekes. The little secretary was a changed man. He still wore
+his _pince-nez_. But his mild air had utterly forsaken him. His face
+was livid, the eyes bulged horribly from his head, and his whole body
+was trembling with emotion. In his hand he held an automatic pistol. He
+came so fast that he was at the car and had covered Robin with his
+weapon before the other had seen him come.
+
+Mr. Jeekes left Robin no time to act. He called out in a voice that
+rang like a pistol shot:
+
+“Hands up, Mr. Smartie! Quick, d’you hear? Put ’em up, damn you!”
+
+Slowly, defiantly the young man raised his arms above his head.
+
+Mr. Jeekes stood close to the driver’s seat, having prudently put the
+car between himself and Robin. As he stood there, his automatic
+levelled at the young man, a remarkable thing happened. A black, soft
+surface suddenly fell over his face and was pulled back with a brisk
+tug. Mary Trevert, standing up in the back seat of the car, had flung
+her fur over the secretary’s head from behind and caught him in a
+noose. Before Mr. Jeekes could disentangle himself, Robin was at his
+throat and had borne him to the ground. The pistol was knocked
+skilfully from his hand and fell clattering on the flags. Robin pounced
+down on it. Then for the first time he smiled, a sunny smile that lit
+up his blue eyes.
+
+“Bravo, Mary!” he said. “That _was_ an idea! Now, then, Jeekes,” he
+ordered, “crank up that car. And be quick about it! We want to be off!”
+
+The little secretary was a lamentable sight. He was bleeding from a cut
+on the forehead, his clothes were covered with dust, and his glasses
+had been broken in his fall. Peering helplessly about him, he walked to
+the bonnet of the car and sullenly grasped the handle. The smile had
+left Robin’s face, and Mary noticed that he looked several times
+anxiously at the office door.
+
+And then suddenly the engine bit. Handing the pistol to the girl, Robin
+warned her to keep the secretary covered and, leaping into the
+driving-seat, turned the car into the avenue which curved round the
+house.
+
+Mr. Jeekes made no further show of fight. He remained standing in the
+centre of the courtyard, a ludicrous, rather pathetic, figure. As the
+tyres of the car gritted on the gravel of the drive, the office door
+was flung open and the yellow-faced man ran out, brandishing a big
+revolver.
+
+“Stop!” he shouted and levelled his weapon. The car seemed to leap
+forward and took the sharp turn on two wheels just as the man fired.
+The bullet struck the wall of the house and sent up a shower of
+plaster. Before he could fire again the car was round the house and out
+of sight. But as the car whizzed round the turn an instant before the
+yellow-faced man fired, the girl heard a sharp cry from Jeekes:
+
+“Don’t, Victor ...!”
+
+The rest of the sentence was lost in the roar of the engine as the car
+raced away down the drive.
+
+They left the avenue in a splutter of wet gravel. The gate still stood
+open. They wheeled furiously into the side road and regained the
+_chaussée_. As yet there was no sign of pursuit. The car rocked
+dangerously over the broken _pavé_, so Robin, after a glance behind,
+steadied her down to an easier pace. Mary, who looked very pale and
+ill, was lying back on the back seat with her eyes closed.
+
+They ran easily into Rotterdam as, with a terrific jangle of tunes
+played jerkily on the chimes, the clocks were striking two. Robin
+slowed down as they approached the centre of the city.
+
+“Where are you staying, Mary?” he asked.
+
+He had to repeat the question several times before she gave him the
+address. Then he found himself in a quandary. He was in a strange town
+and did not know a word of the language so as to be able to ask the
+way. However, he solved the difficulty without great trouble. He
+beckoned to a newspaper boy on the square outside the Bourse and,
+holding up a two-gulden piece, indicated by signs that he desired him
+as a guide. The boy comprehended readily enough and, springing on the
+footboard of the car, brought them safely to the hotel.
+
+Robin left Mary and the car in charge of the boy and went to the office
+and asked to see the manager. He had decided upon the story he must
+tell.
+
+“Miss Trevert,” he said, when the manager, a blond and suave Swiss, had
+presented himself, “has been to the dentist and has been rather upset
+by the gas. Would you get one of the maids to help her up to her room
+and in the meantime telephone for a doctor. If there is an English
+doctor in Rotterdam, I should prefer to have him!”
+
+The manager clicked in sympathy. He despatched a lady typist and a
+chambermaid to help Mary out of the car.
+
+“For a doctor,” he said, “it ees fortunate. We ’ave an English doctor
+staying in ze hotel now—a sheep’s doctor. He is in ze lounge. Eef you
+come, _hein?_”
+
+The “sheep’s doctor” proved to be a doctor off one of the big liners, a
+clean-shaven, red-faced, hearty sort of person who readily volunteered
+his services. As Robin was about to follow him into the lift, the
+manager stopped him.
+
+“Zere was a shentleman call to see Mees Trevert,” he said, “two or
+three time ’e been ’ere ... a Sherman shentleman. ’E leave ’er a note
+... will you take it?”
+
+Greatly puzzled, Robin Greve balanced in his hands the letter which the
+manager produced from a pigeon-hole. Then he tore open the envelope.
+
+DEAR MISS TREVERT [he read], I was extremely sorry to miss you this
+morning. Directly I received your message I called at your hotel, but,
+though I have been back twice, I have not found you in. Circumstances
+have arisen which make it imperative that I should see you as soon as
+possible. This is _most urgent_. I will come back at four o’clock, as I
+cannot get away before. Do not leave the hotel _on any pretext_ until
+you have seen me and Dulkinghorn’s letter as identification. You are in
+_grave danger_.
+
+
+The note was signed “W. Schulz.”
+
+“H’m,” was Robin’s comment; “he writes like an Englishman, anyway.”
+
+He ascertained the number of Mary Trevert’s room and went up to her
+floor in the lift. He waited in the corridor outside the room for the
+doctor to emerge, and lit a cigarette to while away the time. It was
+not until he had nearly finished his second cigarette that the doctor
+appeared.
+
+The doctor hesitated on seeing Robin. Then he stepped close up to him.
+Robin noticed that his red face was more flushed than usual and his
+eyes were troubled.
+
+“What’s this cock-and-bull story about gas you’ve put up to the
+manager?” he said bluntly in a low voice. “The girl’s been doped with
+chloroform, as well you know. You’ll be good enough to come downstairs
+to the manager with me ...”
+
+Robin took out his note-case and produced a card.
+
+“That’s my name,” he said. “You’ll see that I’m a barrister ...”
+
+“Well?” said the doctor in a non-committal voice after he had read the
+card.
+
+“I’m not surprised to hear you say that Miss Trevert has been doped,”
+Robin remarked. “I found her here in a house on the outskirts of
+Rotterdam in the hands of two men, one of whom is believed to be
+implicated in a mysterious case of suspected murder in England. Through
+the part he played this morning, he has probably run his head into the
+noose. But he’ll have it out again if we delay an instant. I told the
+manager that yarn about the dentist to avoid enquiries and waste of
+time. I have here a note from some man I don’t know, addressed to Miss
+Trevert, warning her of a grave danger threatening her. It corroborates
+to some extent what I have told you. Here ... read it for yourself!”
+
+He handed the doctor the note signed “W. Schulz.”
+
+The doctor read it through carefully.
+
+“What I would propose to you,” said Robin, “is that we two should go
+off at once to this Herr Schulz and find out exactly what he knows.
+Then we can decide what action there is to be taken ...”
+
+He paused for the doctor’s reply. The latter searched Robin’s face with
+a glance.
+
+“I’m your man,” he said shortly. “And, by the way, my name’s
+Collingwood ... Robert Collingwood.”
+
+“There’s a car downstairs,” said Robin, “and a guide to show us the
+way. Shall we go?”
+
+Five minutes later, under the newsboy’s expert guidance, the car drew
+up in front of the small clean house with the neat green door bearing
+the name of “Schulz.” Leaving the boy to mind the car, they rang the
+bell. The door was opened by the fat woman in the pink print dress.
+
+Robin gave the woman his card. On it he had written “About Miss
+Trevert.” Speaking in German the woman bade them rather roughly to bide
+where they were, and departed after closing the front door in their
+faces. She did not keep them waiting long, however, for in about a
+minute she returned. Herr Schulz would receive the gentlemen, she said.
+
+Within, the house was spotlessly clean with that characteristic German
+house odour which always seems to be a compound of cleaning material
+and hot grease. Up a narrow staircase, furnished in plain oil-cloth
+with brass stair-rods, they went to a landing on the first floor. Here
+the woman motioned them back and, bending her head in a listening
+attitude, knocked.
+
+“_Herein_!” cried a guttural German voice.
+
+The room into which they entered would have been entitled to a place in
+any museum for showing the mode of life of the twentieth-century
+Germans. With its stuffy red rep curtains, its big green majolica
+stove, its heavy mahogany furniture, its oleographs of Bismarck, Roon,
+and Moltke, it might have been lifted bodily from a bourgeois house in
+the Fatherland.
+
+A man was sitting at a mahogany roll-top desk as they entered. The air
+in the room was thick with the fumes of the cheap Dutch cigar he was
+smoking. He was a sturdily built fellow with blond hair shaven so close
+to the skull that at a distance he seemed to be bald.
+
+At the sound of their entrance, he rose and faced them. When he stood
+erect the sturdiness of his build became accentuated, and they saw he
+was a man of medium height, but so muscular that he looked much
+shorter. A pair of large tortoise-shell spectacles straddled a big
+beak-like nose, and he wore a heavyish blond moustache with its points
+trained upwards and outwards rather after the fashion made famous in
+the Fatherland by William Hohenzollern. In his ill-cut suit of
+cheap-looking blue serge, which he wore with a pea-green tie, Robin
+thought he looked altogether a typical specimen of the German of the
+non-commissioned officer class.
+
+“You ask for me?” he said in deep guttural accents, looking at Robin;
+“I am Herr Schulz!”
+
+The German’s manner was cold and formal and Robin felt a little dashed.
+
+“My name is Greve,” he began rather hurriedly. “I understand you
+received a visit to-day from a young English lady, a Miss Trevert ...”
+
+The German let his eyes travel slowly from Robin to the doctor and back
+again. He did not offer them a chair and all three remained standing.
+
+“Ye-es, and what if I did?”
+
+Robin felt his temper rising.
+
+“You wrote a note to Miss Trevert at her hotel warning her that she was
+in danger. I want to know why you warned her. What led you to suppose
+that she was threatened?”
+
+Herr Schulz made a little gesture of the hand.
+
+“Wass I not right to warn her?”
+
+“Indeed, you were,” Robin asserted with conviction. “She was spirited
+away and drugged.”
+
+The German started. A frowning pucker appeared just above the bridge of
+his big spectacles and he raised his head quickly.
+
+“Drugged?” he said.
+
+“Certainly,” said Robin. “This gentleman with me is a doctor ... Dr.
+Robert Collingwood, of the Red Lion Line. He has examined Miss Trevert
+and can corroborate my statement.”
+
+“By Gad!” exclaimed Herr Schulz—and this time his English was faultless
+and fluent—“Shut that door behind you, Mr. Greve, and shoot the
+bolt—that’s it just below the knob! Sit down, sit down, and while I mix
+you a drink, you shall tell me about this!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+THE READING OF THE RIDDLE
+
+
+In uttering those words Herr Schulz seemed suddenly to become
+loose-limbed and easy. His plethoric rigidity of manner vanished, and,
+though he spoke with a brisk air of authority, there was a jovial ring
+in his voice which instantly inspired confidence. With the change the
+illusion supported by his appalling clothes was broken and he looked
+like a man dressed up for charades.
+
+“Are you—English?” asked Robin in astonishment.
+
+“Only in this room,” was the dry reply, “and don’t you or our friend,
+the doctor, here forget it. You’ll both take whisky? Three fingers will
+do you good, Mr. Greve, for I see you’ve had a roughish time this
+morning. Say when!”
+
+He spurted a siphon into three glasses.
+
+“Before we go any farther,” he went on, “perhaps I had better identify
+myself—to save any further misunderstandings, don’t you know? Do either
+of you gentlemen happen to know a party called Dulkinghorn? You may
+have heard of him, Mr. Greve, for I can see you have been in the army
+...”
+
+“Not Ernest Dulkinghorn, of the War Office?” asked Robin.
+
+“The identical party!”
+
+“I never met him,” said Robin. “But I was at the War Office for a bit
+before I was demobilized and I heard fellows speak of him.
+Counter-espionage, isn’t he?”
+
+“That’s right,” nodded Herr Schulz. “You can read his letter to me
+introducing Miss Trevert.”
+
+He handed a sheet of paper to Robin.
+
+DEAR SCHULZ [it ran], Victor Marbran’s push appear to be connected with
+Hartley Parrish, who has just met his death under suspicious
+circumstances. You will have read about it in the English papers. Miss
+Trevert was engaged to H.P. and has a letter from Elias van der Spyck
+and Company which she found on Parrish’s desk after his death. I should
+say that the Marbran-Parrish connection would repay investigation.
+
+
+Yours
+E. DULKINGHORN
+
+
+P.S. The letter is, of course, in conventional code.
+
+
+P.P.S. Don’t frighten the life out of the Trevert girl, you
+unsympathetic brute!
+
+
+Robin read the letter through to the end.
+
+“Then Mary Trevert has this letter from Rotterdam which we have been
+hunting for!” he cried. “Have you seen it?”
+
+Herr Schulz shook his head.
+
+“Miss Trevert called here this morning,” he said, “when I was out. She
+gave her letter to Frau Wirth, my housekeeper, with her card and
+address. Frau Wirth was cleaning the plate on the front door and, a
+moment after Miss Trevert had gone, a fellow appeared and said he was a
+friend of Miss Trevert who had made a mistake and left the wrong
+letter. My housekeeper is well trained and wouldn’t give the letter up.
+But she made the fatal mistake of telling the fellow exactly what he
+wanted to know, and that was who the letter was addressed to. ‘The
+letter is addressed to Herr Schulz,’ said this excellent woman, ‘and if
+there’s any mistake he will find it out when he opens it.’ And with
+that she told him to clear out. Which, having got all he wanted, he was
+glad enough to do!”
+
+“What was this chap like?” asked Robin.
+
+The big man shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“I can teach my servants discretion,” he replied whimsically, “but I
+can’t teach ’em to use their eyes. Frau Wirth could remember nothing
+about this fellow except that he wasn’t tall and wore a brown overcoat
+...”
+
+“Jeekes!” cried Robin, slapping his thigh. “He must have been actually
+coming away from your place when I met him ...”
+
+“And who,” asked the big man, reflectively contemplating the amber
+fluid in his glass, “who is Jeekes?”
+
+In reply Robin told him the story of Hartley Parrish’s death, his
+growing certainty that the millionaire had been murdered, the
+mysterious letters on slatey-blue paper, and Jeekes’s endeavor to burke
+the investigations by throwing on Robin the suspicion of having driven
+Parrish to suicide by threats. He told of his chance meeting with
+Jeekes in Rotterdam that morning, his adventure at the Villa Bergendal,
+his finding and rescue of Mary Trevert, and their escape.
+
+Herr Schulz listened attentively and without interruption until Robin
+had reached the end of his story.
+
+“There’s one thing you haven’t explained,” he said, “and that’s how
+Miss Trevert came to walk into the hands of these precious ruffians
+...”
+
+“There, perhaps, I can help you,” said the doctor from behind one of
+Herr Schulz’s rank cigars; “I have it from Miss Trevert herself. Some
+one impersonating you Mr.—er, ahem,—Schulz—telephoned her this morning,
+after she had left her letter of introduction here, asking her to come
+out to lunch at your country-house. She suspected nothing and went off
+in the car they sent for her ...”
+
+“By George!” said the big man thoughtfully; “I suspected some game of
+this kind when I heard of the attempt to get at that letter of
+introduction. If I only could have got hold of Marbran this morning
+...”
+
+“Marbran!” said Robin thoughtfully. “When I read Dulkinghorn’s letter
+just now I thought I had heard that name before. Of course—Victor
+Marbran! That was it! I remember now! He knew Hartley Parrish in the
+old days. Parrish once said that Marbran would do him an injury if he
+could. Who is Marbran, sir?”
+
+All unconsciously he paid the tribute of ‘sir’ to Herr Schulz’s
+undoubted habit of command.
+
+“Victor Marbran,” replied the big man, “is Elias van der Spyck & Co., a
+firm which made millions in the war by trading with the enemy. In every
+neutral country there were, of course, firms which specialized in
+importing contraband for the use of the Germans, but van der Spyck &
+Co. brought the evasion of the blockade to a fine art. They covered up
+their tracks, however, with such consummate art that we could never
+bring anything home to them. In fact, it was only after the armistice
+that we began to learn something of the immense scope of their
+operations. There was a master brain behind them. But it was never
+discovered. It strikes me, however, that we are on the right track at
+last ...”
+
+“By Jove ...!” exclaimed Robin impressively. “Hartley Parrish!...”
+
+The big man raised a hand.
+
+“_Attentions!_” he interposed suavely. “The chain is not yet complete.
+I wonder what this van der Spyck letter of Miss Trevert’s contained
+that made Victor Marbran and the secretary chap so desperately anxious
+to get hold of it. For you understand, don’t you?” he said briskly,
+turning to Robin, “that they were after that and that alone. And they
+risked penal servitude in this country to get it ...”
+
+Robin nodded.
+
+“To save their necks in another,” he said.
+
+“I have the letter here,” mildly remarked the doctor from his corner of
+the room. “Miss Trevert gave it to me!”
+
+He produced a white envelope and drew from it a folded square of
+slatey-blue paper. In great excitement Robin sprang forward.
+
+“You’re a downy bird, Doctor, I must say,” he remarked, “fancy keeping
+it up your sleeve all this time!”
+
+He eagerly took the letter, spread it out on the table, and read it
+through whilst Herr Schulz looked over his shoulder.
+
+“Code, eh?” commented the big man, shaking his head humorously. “If it
+beats Dulkinghorn, it beats me!”
+
+From his note-case Robin now drew a folded square of paper identical in
+colour with the letter spread out before them.
+
+“I found this on the carpet beside Parrish’s body,” he said. “Look,
+it’s exactly the same paper ...”
+
+Behind the tortoise-shell spectacles the big man’s eyes narrowed down
+to pin-points as he caught sight of the sheet which Robin unfolded and
+its series of slits.
+
+“Aha!” he cried—and his voice rang out clear through the room—“the
+grill, eh? Well, well, to think of that!”
+
+He took the slotted sheet of paper from Robin’s hands and laid it over
+the letter so that it exactly covered it, edge to edge and corner to
+corner. In this way the greater part of the typewriting in the letter
+was covered over, and only the words appearing in the slots could be
+read. And thus it was that Robin Greve, Herr Schulz, and Dr.
+Collingwood, leaning shoulder to shoulder, read the message that came
+to Hartley Parrish in the library at Harkings....
+
+ELIAS VAN DER SPYCK & CO.
+
+
+GENERAL IMPORTERS
+
+
+ROTTERDAM Rotterdam 25th Nov.
+
+
+_Codes_
+A.B.C.
+Liebler’s
+
+
+_Personal_
+
+
+Dear Mr. Parrish,
+
+
+Your favour of even date to hand and contents noted. _The last_
+delivery of steel was to time but we have had _warning_ from the
+railway authorities that labour troubles at the docks are likely to
+delay future consignments. _If you don’t_ mind we should prefer to
+_settle_ the question of future delivery _by Nov. 27_ as we have a
+board meeting on the 30th inst. While we fully appreciate your own
+difficulties with labour at home, _you_ will understand that this is a
+question which we cannot afford to adjourn _sine_ _die._
+
+
+Yours faithfully,
+pro ELIAS VAN DER SPYCK & CO.
+
+
+“‘The last ... warning,’” Robin read out, “‘if you don’t ... settle ...
+by Nov. 27 ... you ... die ...!’”
+
+He looked up. “Last Saturday,” he said, “was the 27th, the day that
+Parrish died ...”
+
+“The grill,” remarked the big man authoritatively, “is one of the
+oldest dodges known to the Secret Service. It renders a conventional
+code absolutely undecipherable as long as it is skilfully worded, as it
+is in this case. You send your conventional code by one route, your key
+by another. I make no doubt that this was the way in which van der
+Spyck & Co. transacted their business with Hartley Parrish. They simply
+posted their conventional code letters through the post in the ordinary
+way, confident that there was nothing in them to catch the eye of the
+Censor’s Department. The key might be sent in half a dozen different
+ways, by hand, concealed in a newspaper, in a parcel ...”
+
+“So this,” said Robin, pointing at the letter, “was what caused Hartley
+Parrish to make his will. It would lead one to suppose that it was what
+induced him to commit suicide were not the presumption so strong that
+he was murdered. But who killed him? Was it Jeekes or Marbran?”
+
+Herr Schulz pitched his cigar-stump into an ash-tray.
+
+“That,” he said, “is the question which I am going to ask you gentlemen
+to help me answer. You will realize that legally we have not a leg to
+stand on. We are in a foreign country where, without first getting a
+warrant from London, we can take no steps whatever to run these fellows
+in. To get the Dutch police to move against these gentry in the matter
+of the assault upon Miss Trevert would waste valuable time. And we have
+to move quickly—before these two lads can get away. I therefore propose
+that we start this instant for the Villa Bergendal and try, if we are
+not too late, to force Marbran or Jeekes or both of them to a
+confession. That done, we can hold them if possible until we can get
+the Dutch police to apprehend them at the instance of Miss Trevert.
+Then we can communicate with the English police. It’s all quite
+illegal, of course! You have a car, I think, Mr. Greve! You will come
+with us, Dr. Collingwood? Good! Then let us start at once!”
+
+Robin intervened with a proposal that they should call _en route_ at
+his hotel to see if there were any telegrams for him.
+
+“Manderton knows I am in Rotterdam,” he explained, “and he promised to
+wire me the latest developments in the enquiry he is conducting.”
+
+“Miss Trevert should be fully recovered by this,” put in the doctor;
+“apart from a little sickness she is really none the worse for her
+disagreeable experience. If there was anything you wanted to ask her
+...”
+
+“There is,” said Robin promptly. “Her reply to one question,” he
+explained, turning to Herr Schulz, “will give us the certainty that
+Parrish was murdered and did not commit suicide. It will not delay us
+more than five minutes to stop at her hotel in passing, We will then
+call in at my place. We should be at the Villa within half an hour from
+now ...”
+
+“Gentlemen,” said Herr Schulz as they prepared to go, “I know my Mr.
+Victor Marbran. You should all be armed.”
+
+Robin produced the pistol he had taken from Jeekes. Herr Schulz slipped
+a Browning pistol into the breast-pocket of his jacket and, producing a
+long-barrelled service revolver, gave it to the doctor.
+
+“There are three of them, I gather, counting the chauffeur,” commented
+the big man, pulling on his overcoat, “so we shall be equally matched.”
+
+Darkness had fallen upon Rotterdam and the lights from the houses made
+yellow streaks in the water of the canal as the car, piloted by Robin,
+drove the party to Mary Trevert’s hotel.
+
+They found the girl, pale and anxious, in the lounge.
+
+“Well, now,” cried the doctor breezily, “and how are you feeling? Did
+you take my advice and have some tea?”
+
+“What has happened?” asked the girl; “I have been so anxious about you
+...”
+
+Her words were addressed to the doctor, but she looked at Robin.
+
+“Mary,” said Robin, “we are very near the truth now. But there is one
+thing you can tell us. It is very important. When you heard the shot in
+the library at Harkings, did you notice any other sound—before or
+after?”
+
+The girl paused to think.
+
+“There was a sort of sharp cry and a thud ...”
+
+“I know. But was there anything else? Do try and remember. It’s so
+important!”
+
+The girl was silent for a moment. Then she said slowly:
+
+“Yes, there was, now I come to think of it. Just as I tried the door—it
+was locked, you know—there was a sort of hiss, harsh and rather loud,
+from the room ...”
+
+“A sort of hiss, eh? Something like a sneeze?”
+
+“Yes. Only louder and ... and ... harsher!”
+
+“Now, answer me carefully! Was this before or after the shot?”
+
+“Oh, before! Just as I was rattling the doorhandle. The shot broke in
+upon it....”
+
+Robin turned to Herr Schulz, who stood with a grave face by his side.
+
+“The silencer, you see, sir!” he said. Then to Mary he added: “Mary, we
+are going off now. But we will be back within the hour and....”
+
+“Oh, Robin,” the girl broke in, “don’t leave me alone! I don’t feel
+safe in this place after this morning. I’d much rather come with
+you....”
+
+“Mary, it’s quite impossible....” Robin began.
+
+But the girl had turned to a table and taken from it her hat and fur.
+
+“I don’t care!” she exclaimed wilfully; “I’m coming anyhow. I refuse to
+be left behind!”
+
+She smiled at Herr Schulz as she spoke, and that gentleman’s rather
+grim face relaxed as he looked at her.
+
+“I’m not sure I wouldn’t say the same!” he remarked.
+
+The upshot of it was that, despite Robin’s objections, Mary Trevert
+accompanied the party. She sat on the back seat, rather flushed and
+excited, between Herr Schulz and the doctor, while Robin took the wheel
+again. A few minutes’ drive took them to the big hotel where Robin had
+booked a room. They all waited in the car whilst he went to the office.
+
+He was back in a minute, an open telegram in his hand.
+
+“I believe I’ve got in my pocket,” he cried, “the actual weapon with
+which Hartley Parrish was killed!”
+
+And he read from the telegram:
+
+“Mastertons gunsmiths sold last July pair of Browning automatics
+identical with that found on Parrish to Jeekes who paid with Parrish’s
+cheque.”
+
+The message was signed “Manderton.”
+
+At that moment a man wearing a black bowler hat and a heavy frieze
+overcoat came hurrying out of the hotel.
+
+“Mr. Greve!” he cried as Robin, who was back in the driving-seat, was
+releasing the brake. “Did you have the wire from the Yard saying I was
+coming?” he asked. “Probably I beat the telegraph, though. I came by
+air!”
+
+Then he tipped his hat respectfully at Herr Schulz.
+
+“This is Detective-Inspector Manderton, of Scotland Yard, sir,” said
+Robin.
+
+The big man beamed a smile of friendly recognition.
+
+“Mr. Manderton and I are old friends,” he said. “How are you,
+Manderton? I didn’t expect you to recognize me in these duds ...”
+
+“I’d know you anywhere, sir,” said the detective with unwonted
+cordiality.
+
+“Have you got your warrant, Manderton?” asked Herr Schulz.
+
+“Aye, I have, sir,” replied the detective. “And I’ve a colleague from
+the Dutch police who’s going along with me to effect the arrest ...”
+
+“Jeekes, eh?”
+
+“That’s the party, sir, charged with wilful murder.... This is
+Commissary Boomjes, of the Rotterdam Criminal Investigation
+Department!”
+
+A tall man with a short black beard had approached the car. It was
+decided that the whole party should proceed to the Villa Bergendal
+immediately. Manderton sat next to Robin and the Dutch police officer
+perched himself on the footboard.
+
+“And where did you pick _him_ up, I’d like to know?” whispered
+Manderton in Robin’s ear with a backward jerk of the head, as they
+glided through the brightly lit streets.
+
+“D’you mean the doctor?” asked Robin.
+
+“No, your other friend!”
+
+“Miss Trevert had a letter to him. Something in the Secret Service,
+isn’t he?”
+
+Mr. Manderton snorted.
+
+“‘Something in the Secret Service,’” he repeated disdainfully. “Well, I
+should say he was. If you want to know, Mr. Greve, he’s the head!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+THE FIGURE IN THE DOORWAY
+
+
+The rain was coming down in torrents and the night was black as pitch
+when, leaving the lights of Rotterdam behind, the car swung out on to
+the main road leading to the Villa Bergendal. Thanks to a powerful
+headlight, Robin was able to get a good turn of speed out of her as
+soon as they were clear of the city. As they slowed down at the gate in
+the side road Herr Schulz tapped him on the shoulder.
+
+“Better leave the car here and put the lights out,” he counselled. “And
+Miss Trevert should stay if the doctor here would remain to look after
+her ...”
+
+“You think there’ll be a scrap?” whispered the doctor.
+
+“With a man like Marbran,” returned the Chief, “you never know what may
+happen ...”
+
+“Zere will be no faight,” commented the Dutch police officer in
+lugubrious accents, “my vriends, ve are too laite ...”
+
+But the Chief insisted that Mary should stay behind and the doctor
+agreed to act as her escort. Then in single file the party proceeded up
+the drive, Robin in front, then the Dutchman, after him the Chief, and
+Mr. Manderton in the rear.
+
+They walked on the grass edging the avenue. On the wet turf their feet
+made no sound. When they came in view of the house, they saw it was in
+darkness. No light shone in any window, and the only sound to be heard
+was the melancholy patter of the rain drops on the laurel bushes. When
+they saw the porch looking black before them, they left the grass and
+stepped gently across the drive, the gravel crunching softly beneath
+their feet. Robin led the way boldly under the porch and laid a hand on
+the doorknob. The door opened easily and the next moment the four men
+were in the hall.
+
+As Robin moved to the wall to find the electric light switch, a torch
+was silently thrust into his hand.
+
+“Better have this, sir,” whispered Manderton. “I have my finger on the
+switch now, but we’d best wait to put the light up until we know where
+they are. Where do we go first?”
+
+“Into the sitting-room,” Robin returned.
+
+Switching the torch on and off only as he required it, he crept
+silently over the heavy carpet to the door of the room in which that
+morning he had come upon Mary. Manderton remained at the switch in the
+hall whilst the other two men followed Robin through the door.
+
+The room was in darkness. It struck chill; for the fire had gone out.
+The beam of the torch flitting from wall to wall showed the room to be
+empty.
+
+“I don’t believe there’s a soul in the house,” whispered the Chief to
+Robin.
+
+“Ve are too laite; I have said it!” muttered the Dutchman.
+
+“There is another room leading out of this,” replied Robin, turning the
+torch on to the blue curtain covering the door leading into the office.
+“We’ll have a look in there and then try upstairs. Manderton will give
+us warning if anybody comes down ...”
+
+So saying he drew the curtain aside and pushed open the door. Instantly
+a gush of cold air blew the curtain back in his face. Before he could
+disentangle himself the door slammed to with a crash that shook the
+house.
+
+“That’s done it!” muttered the Chief.
+
+The three men stood and listened. They heard the dripping of the rain,
+the soughing of the wind, but no sound of human kind came to their
+ears.
+
+“The place is empty,” whispered the Chief. “They’ve cleared ...”
+
+“It is too laite; I have said it.” The Dutchman spoke in a hoarse bass.
+
+“We’ll go in here, anyway,” answered Robin, lifting up the curtain
+again. “They may have heard us and be hiding ...”
+
+He opened the door, steadying it with his foot. The curtain flapped
+wildly round them as they crossed the threshold. The broad white beam
+of the electric torch swung from window to desk, from desk to safe.
+
+“The door over there is open,” exclaimed the Chief; “that’s the way
+they’ve gone.”
+
+Suddenly he clutched Robin’s arm.
+
+“Steady,” he whispered, “look there ... in the doorway ... there’s
+somebody moving ... quick, the torch!”
+
+The light flashed across the room, blazed for an instant on a
+window-pane, then picked out a man’s form swaying in the doorway. He
+had his back to the room and was rocking gently to and fro with the
+wind which they felt cold on their faces.
+
+“It’s only a coat and trousers hanging in the door ...” began Robin.
+
+Then, with a suddenness which pained the eyes, the room was flooded
+with light. The Dutch detective stepped from the electric light switch
+and moved to the open door.
+
+“Too laite!” he cried, shaking his head; “have I not tell you?”
+
+Suspended by a strip of coloured stuff, the body of Mr. Jeekes dangled
+from the cross-beam of the door. The corpse oscillated in the breeze,
+silhouetted against an oblong of black sky, turning this way and that,
+loose, unnatural, horrible, and, as the body, twisting gently, faced
+the room, it gave a glimpse of startling eyes, swollen, empurpled
+features, protruding tongue.
+
+Without the least trace of emotion the black-bearded detective picked
+up a rush-bottom chair and gathering up the corpse by its collar
+hoisted it up without an effort so that the feet rested on the chair.
+Then, producing a clasp-knife, he mounted the chair and, with a
+vigorous slash, cut the coloured strip which had been fastened to a
+staple projecting from the brickwork above the door on the outside of
+the house.
+
+He caught the body in his arms and laid it face upwards on the matting
+which covered the floor. He busied himself for an instant at the neck,
+then rose with a twisted strip of coloured material in his hand.
+
+“His braces,” he remarked, “very common. The stool what he has stood
+upon and knocked avay, she lies outsaide! My vriends, ve are too
+laite!”
+
+The doctor, fetched in haste by Manderton, examined the body. The man
+had been dead, he said, for several hours. Mary remained in the hall
+with Manderton while Robin and the Dutch detective went over the house.
+There was no trace either of Marbran or of the chauffeur. In the two
+bedrooms which showed signs of occupation the beds had been made up,
+but the ward-robes were empty.
+
+“Marbran’s made a bolt for it,” said Robin, coming into the office
+where he had left the Chief, “and taken everything with him ...”
+
+“I gathered as much,” answered that astute gentleman, pointing at the
+fireplace. A pile of charred paper filled the grate. “There’s nothing
+here, and I think we can wipe Mr. Victor Marbran off the slate. I doubt
+if we shall see him again. At any rate we can leave him to the tender
+mercies of our black-bearded friend here. As for us, I don’t really see
+that there is anything more to detain us here ...”
+
+“But,” remarked Robin, looking at the still figure on the floor, the
+face now mercifully covered by the doctor’s white handkerchief, “surely
+this is a confession of guilt. Has he left nothing behind in writing?
+No account of the crime?”
+
+“Not a thing,” responded the Chief, “and I’ve been through every
+drawer. Even the safe is open ... and empty!”
+
+“But how does it happen then,” asked Robin, “that Marbran has legged it
+while Jeekes here ...”
+
+“Marbran left him in the lurch,” the Chief broke in decisively. “I
+think that’s clear. While you were upstairs with our Dutch friend, I
+went through the dead man’s pockets. He had no money, Greve, except a
+few coppers and a little Dutch change. He had not even got a return
+ticket to London. Which makes me think that Master Jeekes had left old
+England for good.”
+
+“Another thing that puzzles me,” remarked Robin, “is how Jeekes knew
+that Miss Trevert had a letter to you, sir? Or, for a matter of that,
+how he knew that she had gone to Rotterdam at all?”
+
+“That’s not hard to answer,” said Mr. Manderton, who had just entered
+the room. “On Sunday night Jeekes rang up Harkings from his club and
+asked to speak to Miss Trevert. Bude told him she had gone away. Jeekes
+then asked to speak to Sir Horace Trevert, who told him that his sister
+had gone to Rotterdam. Jeekes takes the first available train in the
+morning, recognizes Miss Trevert on the way across, and tags her to her
+hotel in Rotterdam. The next morning he follows her again, shadows her
+to Sir ... to this gentleman’s rooms, and there, as we know, contrived
+by a trick to see to whom she had a letter.”
+
+“But why did he not attempt to get the letter away from her as soon as
+she arrived? Miss Trevert never suspected Jeekes. She might have shown
+him the letter if he’d asked her for it ...”
+
+The detective shook his head sagely.
+
+“Jeekes was pretty ’cute,” he said. “Before letting the girl know he
+was in Rotterdam, he wanted to find out what she wanted here and whom
+she knew. Remember, he had no means of knowing if the girl suspected
+him or not ...”
+
+“So he devised this trick of impersonating Mr. Schulz on the telephone,
+eh?”
+
+“Bah!” broke in the Chief; “I bet that was Marbran’s idea. Look at
+Jeekes’s face and tell me if you see in it any feature indicating the
+bold, ingenious will to try a bluff like that. I never knew this fellow
+here. But I know Marbran, a resolute, undaunted type. You can take it
+from me, Marbran directed—Jeekes merely carried out instructions. What
+do you say, Manderton?”
+
+But the detective had retired into his shell again.
+
+“If you will come to Harkings with me the day after to-morrow, sir, I
+shall hope to show you exactly how Mr. Parrish met his death ...”
+
+“No, no, Manderton,” responded the Chief; “I can’t leave here for a
+bit. There are bigger murderers than Jeekes at liberty in Holland
+to-day ...”
+
+The detective slapped his thigh.
+
+“I’d have laid a shade of odds,” he cried merrily, “that you were
+watching the gentleman at Amerongen, sir ...”
+
+“Tut, tut, Manderton,” said the Chief, raising his hand to silence the
+other; “you run on too fast, my friend! I wish,” he went on, changing
+the subject, “I could be with you at Harkings to-morrow to witness your
+reconstruction of the crime, Manderton. You’ll go, I suppose, Greve?”
+
+“I certainly shall,” answered the barrister, “I have had some
+experience of criminals, but I must say I never saw one less endowed
+with criminal characteristics than little Jeekes. A strange
+character!...”
+
+The Chief laughed sardonically.
+
+“Anyway,” he remarked, “he had a damn good notion of the end that
+befitted him ...”
+
+It was a still, starry night. The Flushing boat stood out of harbour on
+a calm sea. The high arc lamps threw a blue gleam over the deserted
+moles and glinted in the oily swell lapping the quays. From the
+fast-receding quayside the rasping of a winch echoed noisily across the
+silent water. On the upper deck of the mail-boat Robin Greve and Mary
+Trevert stood side by side at the rail. They had the deck to
+themselves. Above their heads on the bridge the captain stood immobile,
+a square black figure, the helmsman at his elbow. Otherwise, between
+the stars and the sea, the man and the girl were alone.
+
+Thus they had stood ever since the mail-boat had cast off from the
+quay. Robin had made some banal attempt at conversation, urging (but
+without much sincerity) that, after her experiences of the day, the
+girl should go to her cabin and rest. But Mary Trevert had merely
+shaken her head impatiently, without speaking.
+
+Presently he put his arm through hers. He felt against his wrist the
+warm softness of her travelling-coat, and it seemed to him that, though
+the girl made no sign, some slight answering pressure met his touch. So
+they leaned upon the rail for a space watching the water fall hissing
+from the vessel’s side as the steamer, jarring and quivering, met the
+long steady roll from the open sea.
+
+Then Mary Trevert spoke.
+
+“Robin,” she said gently, “I owe you an apology ...”
+
+Robin Greve looked at her quickly. But Mary had her eyes fixed seaward
+in contemplation of a distant light that flared and died with
+persistent regularity.
+
+“My dear,” he answered, “I’ve only myself to blame. When you told me
+you were going to marry Hartley Parrish, I should have known that you
+had your reasons and that those reasons were good. I should have held
+my tongue ...”
+
+This time the girl stole a glance at him. But now he was gazing away to
+the horizon where the light came and went.
+
+“All this misunderstanding between us,” he went on, “came about because
+of what I said in the billiard-room that afternoon ...”
+
+The girl shook her head resolutely.
+
+“No,” she answered, “it was my fault. I’m a proud devil, Robin, and
+what you said about Hartley and ... and ... other women, Robin, hurt
+and ... and made me angry. No, no, don’t apologize again. You and I are
+old enough friends, my dear, to tell one another the truth. You made me
+angry because what you said was true. I _was_ selling myself, selling
+myself with my eyes open, too, and you’ve got a perfect right never to
+speak to me again ...”
+
+She did not finish the sentence but broke off. Her voice died away
+quaveringly. Robin took her hand in his.
+
+“Dear,” he said, “don’t cry! It’s over and done with now ...”
+
+Mary shook herself with an angry gesture.
+
+“What’s the good of telling me not to cry?” she protested tearfully;
+“I’ve disgraced myself in my own eyes as well as in yours. If you can’t
+forget what I was ready to do, I never shall ...”
+
+Very gently the young man turned the girl towards him.
+
+“I’m not such a prig as all that,” he said. “We all make mistakes. You
+know I understand the position you were in. Parrish is dead. I shall
+forget the rest ...”
+
+Slowly the girl withdrew her hands from his grasp.
+
+“Yes,” she said wearily, “you will find it easy to forget!”
+
+She drew her fur closer about her neck and turned her back on the sea.
+
+“I must go down,” she said. And waited for the man to stand aside. He
+did not move and their eyes met. Suddenly, like a child, she buried her
+face in her arm flung out across his chest. She began to sob bitterly.
+
+“That afternoon ... in the billiard-room ...” she sobbed, “you will
+forget ... that ... too ... I suppose ...”
+
+Robin took her face in his hands, a hot, tear-stained face, and
+detached it from the sheltering arm.
+
+“My dear,” he said, “I shall have to try to forget it. But I know I
+shan’t succeed. To the end of my life I shall remember the kiss you
+gave me. But we are farther apart than ever now!”
+
+There was a great sadness in his voice. It arrested the girl’s
+attention as he dropped his hands and turned back to the rail.
+
+“Why?” she said in a low voice, without looking up.
+
+“Because,” replied the young man steadily, “you’re rich now, Mary ...”
+
+The girl looked up quickly.
+
+“Will men ever understand women?” she cried, a new note in her voice.
+She stepped forward and, putting her two hands on the young man’s
+shoulders, swung him round to face her.
+
+“I’m as poor as ever I was,” she said, “for Hartley Parrish’s money is
+not for me ...”
+
+“Mary!” exclaimed the young man joyfully.
+
+“Robin Greve,” cried the girl, “do you mean to tell me you’d stand
+there thinking I’d accept money made like that ...”
+
+But now she was in his arms. With a little fluttering sigh she yielded
+to his kiss.
+
+“Oh, the man on the bridge!...” she murmured with her woman’s instinct
+for the conventions.
+
+“Come behind the boat, then!” commanded Robin.
+
+And in the shadow of a weather-stained davit he kissed her again.
+
+“So you’ll wait for me, after all, Mary?”
+
+“No,” retorted the girl firmly. “We’ll read the Riot Act to Mother and
+you must marry me at once!”
+
+The wind blew cold from the North Sea. It rattled in the rigging,
+flapped the ensign standing out stiffly at the stern, and whirled the
+black smoke from the steamer’s funnels out into a dark aerial wake as
+far as the eye could reach. With a gentle rhythmic motion the vessel
+rose and fell, while the stars began to pale and faint grey shadows
+appeared in the eastern sky. Still the man and the girl stood by the
+swaying lifeboat and talked the things that lovers say. Step by step
+they went over their thoughts for one another in each successive phase
+of the dark tragedy through which they had passed.
+
+“And that van der Spyck letter,” asked Robin; “how did you get hold of
+it? I’ve been wanting to ask you that ever since this afternoon ...”
+
+“I found it in the library,” replied the girl, “on the desk. It had got
+tucked away between two letter-trays—one fits into the other, you
+know.”
+
+“I wondered how Jeekes had come to miss it,” said Robin. “But when was
+this?” he added.
+
+“On Sunday afternoon.”
+
+“But what were you doing in the library?”
+
+The girl became a little embarrassed.
+
+“I knew Mr. Manderton was suspicious of you. I heard him telephoning
+instructions to London to have you watched. So I thought I’d go to the
+library to see if I could find anything which would show what they had
+against you exactly. And I found this letter. Then I noticed some one
+hiding behind the curtains, and, as I had the letter in my hand, I hid
+it in my dress. When I discovered that Bruce Wright was after it too, I
+pretended I had found nothing ...”
+
+“But, darling, why?”
+
+“I wanted to make sure for myself why you had sent Bruce Wright, for I
+guessed he had come from you, to look for this letter. So I thought I’d
+go to Rotterdam to investigate ...”
+
+Robin laughed affectionately.
+
+“Surely it would have been simpler to have given the letter to the
+police ...”
+
+Mary gave him a look of indignant surprise.
+
+“But it might have incriminated you!” she exclaimed.
+
+At that Robin kissed her again.
+
+“Will men _ever_ understand women?” he asked, looking into her tranquil
+grey eyes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+AN INTERRUPTION FROM BEYOND
+
+
+Sudden frost had laid an icy finger on the gardens of Harkings. The
+smooth green lawns were all dappled with white and wore a pinched and
+chilly look save under the big and solemn firs where the ground, warmed
+by its canopy of branches and coverlet of cones, had thawed in dark
+patches. The gravel walks were firm and dry; and in the rosery the bare
+skeleton of the pergolas stood out in clear-cut silhouette against a
+white and woolly sky.
+
+Overnight the frost had come. It had taken even the birds by surprise.
+They hopped forlornly about the paths as though wondering where they
+would get their breakfast. Robin Greve, idly watching them from the
+library window, found himself contrasting the cheerful winter landscape
+with the depressing conditions of the previous day. In wind and rain
+the master of Harkings had been laid to rest in the quiet little
+churchyard of Stevenish. The ceremony had been arranged in haste, as
+soon as the coroner’s jury had viewed the body. Robin Greve, that
+morning arrived from Rotterdam, Bude, and Mr. Bardy the solicitor, had
+been the only mourners. As Robin looked out upon the wintry scene, his
+mind reverted to the hurried funeral with its depressing accompaniment
+of gleaming umbrellas, mud from the freshly turned clay, and dripping
+trees.
+
+Beneath the window of the library, its shattered pane now replaced, a
+cluster of starlings whistled gaily, darting bright-eyed glances, full
+of anticipation, at the closed window.
+
+“_He_ used to give them crumbs every morning after breakfast,” said
+Mary. “See, Robin, how they are looking up! It seems a shame to
+disappoint them....”
+
+As though relieved to be quit of his dark thoughts, Robin, with a glad
+smile, turned to the girl. Dipping his hand into his pocket, he
+produced a hunk of bread and put it in her hand.
+
+“You think of everything!” she said, smiling back at him prettily.
+
+He pushed up the window and she crumbled the bread for the birds. He
+rested one hand on her shoulder.
+
+“He thought of everything, too,” was his comment, “even down to the
+birds. It’s extraordinary! No detail was too small for him!...”
+
+“He _was_ remarkable, Robin,” answered the girl soberly; “there was
+something magnetic about his personality that made people like him.
+Even now that he is dead, even in spite of what we know, I can feel his
+attraction still. And the whole house is impregnated with his
+personality. Particularly this room. Don’t you feel it? I don’t mind
+being here with you, Robin, but I shouldn’t like to be here alone. I
+was dreadfully frightened on Sunday evening when I came here. And when
+I saw the curtains move ... oh! I thought my heart would stop beating!
+Dear, I’m glad we are giving this place up. I don’t feel that I could
+ever be happy here ... even with you!”
+
+“Poor devil!” said Robin. And then again he said: “Poor devil!”
+
+“It was terrible ... to die like that!” replied Mary.
+
+“It was terrible for him to lose _you_!” answered the young man.
+
+She gave his hand a little, tender squeeze, but relinquished it quickly
+as the door opened.
+
+Mr. Manderton was there, broad-shouldered and burly. Behind came Dr.
+Romain with a purple nose and eyes watering with the cold, Horace
+Trevert in plain clothes, Mr. Bardy, the solicitor, plump, middle-aged,
+and prim, with a broad, smooth-shaven face and an eyeglass on a black
+silk riband. In the background loomed the large form of Inspector
+Humphries, ruddy of cheek as of hair. Lady Margaret did not appear.
+
+Mr. Manderton slapped his bowler hat briskly on a side table and with a
+little bow to Mary walked to the desk.
+
+“Now,” said Mr. Manderton with a long, shrewd look that comprehended
+the company, individually and collectively, and the entire room, “if
+Inspector Humphries will kindly close the door, we will reconstruct the
+crime in the light of the evidence we have collected.”
+
+He turned round to the desk and pulled back the chair ... Hartley
+Parrish’s empty chair.
+
+“It is just on five o’clock on Saturday evening, November 27,” he
+began, “and growing dark outside. Mr. Parrish is sitting here”—he
+tapped the chair—“with all the lights in the room turned off except
+this one on the desk.”
+
+Here he put a large hand on the reading-lamp.
+
+“The assumption that Mr. Parrish spent the afternoon, as he had spent
+the morning, over papers in connection with the business of Hornaway’s
+in which he was interested is not correct. Mr. Archer, one of Mr.
+Parrish’s secretaries who brought down a number of papers and letters
+for Mr. Parrish to sign in the morning, states that as far as
+Hornaway’s or any other office business was concerned, Mr. Parrish was
+through with it by lunch. This is corroborated by the fact that no
+business papers of this description, with the exception of one, which I
+am coming to directly, were found on the desk here after Mr. Parrish’s
+death. Nor were there any traces of burnt paper in or about the fire.
+These two facts were established by my colleague, Inspector Humphries.”
+
+At this everybody turned and looked at the Inspector, who blushed until
+the tint of his hair positively paled by comparison with that of his
+face.
+
+“What Mr. Archer _did_ leave with Mr. Parrish, however,” Mr. Manderton
+resumed, looking round the group and emphasising the “did,” “was his
+will and this letter ...”—he held up a typewritten sheet of slatey-blue
+paper—“which, a straightforward business communication in appearance,
+was in reality a threat against his life. It was with these two
+documents that Mr. Parrish spent the last few hours before he was found
+dead in this room. A few odd papers found lying on the desk have
+nothing to do with the case and may therefore be dismissed.”
+
+Mr. Manderton paused and then, with the deliberation which
+distinguished his every movement, walked round the desk to the window.
+
+“The fire in this room,” he said, turning and facing his audience, “was
+smoking. The butler will testify to this and state that Mr. Parrish
+complained about it to him with the result that the sweep was ordered
+for Monday morning. Owing to the smoke in the room Mr. Parrish opened
+the window. His finger-prints were on the inside of the window-frame
+and a small fragment of white paint was still adhering to one of his
+finger-nails.
+
+“The window, then, was open as it is now. Mr. Parrish sat at his desk,
+read through his will, and wrote a letter to Miss Trevert informing her
+that, under the will, she was left sole legatee. This letter, with the
+will, was found on the desk after Mr. Parrish’s death. Presumably in
+view of the threat against his life contained in this letter,”—the
+detective held up the slatey-blue paper,—“Mr. Parrish had either in his
+pocket or, as I am more inclined to think, lying on the desk in front
+of him, his Browning automatic pistol. This pistol was fitted with a
+Maxim silencer, an invention for suppressing the report of a firearm,
+which was sent to Mr. Parrish by a friend in America some years ago and
+which he kept permanently attached to the weapon.”
+
+Mr. Manderton came to an impressive full stop and glanced round his
+circle of listeners. He gave his explanations easily and fluently, but
+in a plain, matter-of-fact tone such as a police constable employs in
+the witness-box. He had marshalled his facts well, and his measured
+advance towards his _dénouement_ was not without its effect on his
+audience. Dr. Romain, nursing his knee on a leather settee, Horace
+Trevert, a tall slim figure eagerly watching the detective from his
+perch on the arm of the Chesterfield, and Robin and Mary, standing,
+very close together, behind the empty chair at the desk—each and every
+one was listening with rapt attention. Inspector Humphries, propping
+his big bulk uneasily against the wall near the door, was the only one
+who appeared to be oblivious of the strain.
+
+The detective walked round the desk and seated himself in the chair.
+
+“Mr. Parrish is seated at the desk here,” he resumed, “when his
+attention is directed to the window.”
+
+And here Mr. Manderton raised his head and looked out towards the
+frost-strewn gardens.
+
+“Maybe he hears a step, more probably he sees a face staring at him out
+of the dark. Very much to his surprise he recognizes Jeekes, his
+principal private secretary—I say to his surprise because he must have
+believed Jeekes, who had the week-end free, to be in London. And at
+that, perhaps because he thinks he has made a mistake—in any case to
+make sure—he gets up....”
+
+The detective suited the action to the word. He pushed back the chair
+and rose to his feet. They saw he held a large automatic pistol in his
+hand.
+
+“He has had this threatening letter, remember, so he takes his pistol
+with him. And he reaches the window ...”
+
+The detective was at the window now, his back to the room.
+
+“He speaks to Jeekes, angrily, maybe—the butler heard the sound of loud
+voices—they have words. And then ...”
+
+There came a knock at the library door. It was not a loud knock. It was
+in reality scarcely more than a gentle tap. But it fell upon a silence
+of Manderton’s own creating, a rapt silence following a pause which
+preceded the climax of his narrative. So the discreet knocking
+resounded loud and clear through the library.
+
+“Who is that? What is it?” rapped out Dr. Romain irritably.
+
+“Don’t let any one disturb us, Inspector!” called out Horace Trevert to
+Inspector Humphries, who had opened the door.
+
+Bude’s face appeared in the doorway. He had a short altercation with
+the Inspector, who resolutely interposed his massive form between the
+butler and the room.
+
+“What is it, Bude?” asked Robin, going to the door.
+
+“It’s a letter for Miss Trevert, sir!” said Bude.
+
+“Well, leave it in the hall. Miss Trevert can’t be disturbed at present
+...”
+
+“But ... but, sir,” the butler protested. Then Robin noticed that he
+was trembling with excitement and that his features were all
+distraught.
+
+“What’s the matter with you, Bude?” Robin demanded.
+
+Humphries had stood on one side and Robin now faced the butler.
+
+“It’s a letter from ... that Jeekes!” faltered Bude, holding out a
+salver. “I know his writing, sir!”
+
+“For Miss Trevert?”
+
+Robin gathered up the plain white envelope. It bore a Dutch stamp. The
+postmark was Rotterdam. He gave the letter to Mary. It was bulky and
+heavy.
+
+“For you,” he said, and stood beside her while she broke the seal. By
+this they had all gathered round her.
+
+The envelope fluttered to the floor. Mary was unfolding a wad of sheets
+of writing-paper folded once across. She glanced at the topmost sheet,
+then handed the bundle to Robin.
+
+“It’s a confession!” she said.
+
+From beyond the grave the little secretary had spoken and spoiled Mr.
+Manderton’s _dénouement_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+THE DEATH OF HARTLEY PARRISH
+
+
+“For Miss Trevert.”
+
+Thus, in Jeekes’s round and flowing commercial hand, the document
+began:
+
+Last Statement of Albert Edward Jeekes, made at Rotterdam, this
+twenty-first Day of January, in the Year of Our Lord One Thousand Nine
+Hundred and...
+
+
+Mr. Bardy, the solicitor, to whom, by common consent, the reading of
+the confession had been entrusted, raised his eyebrows, thereby letting
+his eyeglass fall, and looked round at the company.
+
+“Pon my soul,” he remarked, “for a man about to take his own life, our
+friend seems to have been the coolest customer imaginable. Look at it!
+Written in a firm hand and almost without an erasure. Very remarkable!
+Very remarkable, indeed!...”
+
+“Hm!” grunted Mr. Manderton, “not so uncommon as you suppose, Mr.
+Bardy, sir. Hendriks, the Palmers Green poisoner, typed out his
+confession on cream inlaid paper before dosing himself. But let’s hear
+what the gentleman has to tell us....”
+
+This was the last digression. Thenceforth Mr. Bardy read out the
+confession to the end without interruption.
+
+_For Miss Trevert_:
+
+
+_Madam_,
+
+
+I slew, but I am not a murderer: I Killed, but without deliberation.
+
+Victor Marbran has gone and left me to meet a shameful death. But I
+cannot face the scaffold. As men go, I do not believe I am a coward and
+I am not afraid to die. But the inexorable deliberation of justice
+appals me. When I have written what I have to write, I shall be hangman
+to myself. My pistol they have taken away.
+
+Victor Marbran has abandoned me. He had prepared everything for his
+flight. Even if the law can indict him as the virtual murderer of
+Hartley Parrish, the law will never lay hands on him. Victor Marbran
+neglects no detail. He will never be caught. But from the Great Unknown
+for which I shall presently set out, I shall stretch forth my hand and
+see that, here or there, he does not escape the punishment he merits
+for bringing down shame and disgrace upon me.
+
+Just now he bade me stay in the office and finish burning the papers in
+his desk. He promised he would take me with him to a secure
+hiding-place which he had made ready for some such emergency as this. I
+believed him and, unsuspecting, stayed. And now he has slipped away. He
+is gone and the house is empty. I cannot follow him even did I know
+where he has gone. I have only a very little money left and I am tired.
+Very tired. I feel I cannot support the hue-and-cry they will raise.
+Everything is still about me. The quiet of the country is very
+soothing. To die like this, with darkness falling and no sound but the
+rustling rain, is the better way ...
+
+Hartley Parrish was the man behind the great syndicate which
+systematically ran the British blockade of Germany in the war. He
+financed Marbran and the international riff-raff of profiteers with
+whom Marbran worked. Parrish supplied the funds, often the goods as
+well,—at any rate, until they tightened up the blockade,—while Marbran
+and the rest of the bunch in neutral countries did the trading with the
+enemy.
+
+Parrish was a deep one. I say nothing against him. He was a kind
+employer to me and I played him false, for which I have been bitterly
+punished. To have swindled Victor Marbran—I count it as nothing against
+him, for that heartless, cruel man is deserving of no pity ...
+
+Parrish was the heart and soul, brains and muscle of the syndicate. He
+lurked far in the background. Any and every trail which might possibly
+lead back to him was carefully effaced. He was secure as long as
+Marbran and one or two other big men in the business kept faith with
+him. Now and then, when the British Intelligence were too hot on the
+trail, Parrish and Marbran would give away one of the small fry
+belonging to the organization and thus stave off suspicion. They could
+do this in complete safety, for so perfect was their organization that
+the small fry only knew the small fry in the shallows and never the big
+fish in the deep ...
+
+But Hartley Parrish was in Marbran’s hands. They stood or fell
+together. Parrish knew this. But he was a born gambler and insanely
+self-confident. He took a chance with Marbran. It cost him his life.
+
+All payments were made to Parrish. He was treasurer and banker of the
+syndicate. Money came in by all sorts of devious routes, sometimes from
+as far afield as South or Central America. Parrish distributed the
+profits. Everything was in his hands.
+
+By the time the armistice came, the game had got too hot. All the big
+fish except Marbran had cleared out with their pile. But Marbran, like
+Parrish, was a gambler. He stuck it out and stayed on.
+
+Parrish played fair until the war was over. The armistice, of course,
+put an end to the business. But some months after the armistice a sum
+of £150,000 was paid to Parrish through a Spanish bank in settlement,
+Marbran told me, for petrol indirectly delivered to the German
+Admiralty. Parrish pouched the lot. Not a penny did Marbran get.
+
+Parrish and Marbran were old friends. They were young men together on
+the Rand gold-fields in the early days. In fact, I believe they went
+out to South Africa together as penniless London lads. But Marbran
+hated Parrish, though Parrish had, I believe, been his benefactor in
+many ways. Marbran was fiercely envious of the other because he
+realized that, starting with an equal chance, Parrish had left him far
+behind. Everything that Parrish touched prospered, while Marbran was in
+perpetual financial straits. He was Parrish’s equal in courage, but not
+in judgment.
+
+Parrish calculated that Marbran would not dare to denounce him. He had
+always taken the lead in their schemes and he affected to disregard
+Marbran altogether. So he left the latter’s letters unanswered and
+laughed at his threats. He was quite sure that Marbran would never risk
+losing his pile by giving Parrish away, for they were, of course, both
+British subjects and both in it together ...
+
+Marbran always distrusted Parrish, and long before the breach came, he
+picked on me to act the spy on my employer. I, too, was born a gambler,
+but, like Marbran, I lacked the lucky touch which made Parrish a
+millionaire. Speculation proved my ruin. I have often thanked my God on
+my bended knees—as I shall do again to-night before I pass over—that my
+insane folly has ruined no one but myself ...
+
+Already, when Hartley Parrish engaged me, I was up to the neck in
+speculation. Up to that time, however, I had managed to keep my head
+above water, but the large salary on which Parrish started me dazzled
+me. I tried a flutter in oil on a much larger scale than anything I had
+hitherto attempted, with the result that one day I found myself with a
+debt of nine hundred pounds to meet and no assets to meet it with. And
+I was two hundred pounds in debt to Hartley Parrish’s petty cash
+account, which I kept.
+
+It was Victor Marbran who came to my rescue. Parrish had sent me over
+to Rotterdam to fetch some papers from Marbran. At this time I knew
+nothing of Parrish’s blockade-running business. Parrish never took me
+into his confidence about it and the whole of the correspondence went
+direct to him through a number of secret channels with which I only
+gradually became acquainted behind his back.
+
+I had met Marbran several times in London and also at Rotterdam. It had
+struck me that he had formed a liking for me. On this particular visit
+to Rotterdam Marbran took me out to dinner and encouraged me to speak
+about myself. He was very sympathetic, and this, coupled with the wine
+I had taken, led me to open my heart to him. Without giving myself
+away, I let him understand that I was in considerable financial
+difficulties, which I set down to the high cost of living as the result
+of the war.
+
+Without a word of warning Marbran pulled out his cheque-book.
+
+“How much do you want,” he asked, “to put you straight?”
+
+Nine hundred pounds, I told him.
+
+He wrote the cheque at once there at the table. He would advance me the
+money, he said, and put me down for shares in a business in which he
+was interested. It was a safe thing and profits were very high. I could
+repay him at my leisure.
+
+In this way I became a shareholder in Parrish’s blockade-running
+syndicate. The return I was to make was to spy on my employer and to
+report to Marbran the letters which Parrish received and the names of
+the people whom he interviewed.
+
+Of course, Marbran did not propose this plan at once. When I took leave
+of him that night, I remember, I all but broke down at the thought of
+his unsolicited generosity. I have had a hard life, Miss Trevert, and
+his seeming kindness broke me all up. But I might have known.
+
+I cashed Marbran’s cheque and put back the two hundred pounds I had
+taken from the petty cash account. But I went on speculating. You see,
+I did not believe Marbran’s story about the shares he said he would put
+me down for. I thought it was a charitable tale to spare my feelings.
+So I plunged once more in the confident hope of recovering enough to
+repay my debt to Marbran.
+
+A month later Marbran sent me a cheque for one hundred pounds. He said
+it was the balance of fifteen hundred pounds due to me as profits on my
+shares less the nine hundred pounds I owed him and five hundred pounds
+for my shares. But my speculations had by this time gone wrong again,
+and I was heartily glad presently to receive a further cheque for two
+hundred pounds from Marbran. From that time on I got from Marbran sums
+varying between one hundred and fifty pounds and five hundred pounds a
+month.
+
+When Marbran made me his shameful offer, I rejected it with
+indignation. But I was fast in the trap. Marbran explained to me in
+great detail and with the utmost candour the working of the Parrish
+syndicate. He let me know very plainly that I was as deeply implicated
+as Parrish and he. I was a shareholder; I had received and was
+receiving my share of the profits. In my distress and shame I
+threatened to expose the pair of them. Had I known the source of his
+money, I told him, I should never have accepted it. At that Marbran
+laughed contemptuously.
+
+“You tell that yarn to the police,” he sneered, “and hear what they
+say!”
+
+And then I realized that I was in the net.
+
+I make no excuses for myself. I shall make none to the Great Judge
+before whom in a little while I shall appear. I had not the moral force
+to resist Marbran. I did his bidding: I continued to take his money and
+I held my peace.
+
+And then came the breach between Parrish and Marbran. I was the cause
+of it. But for me, his trusty spy, Marbran would have known nothing of
+this payment of £150,000 which Parrish received from Spain, and this
+tragedy would not have happened. God forgive me ...
+
+Marbran appealed to Parrish in vain. What he wrote I never knew, for,
+shortly after, Parrish quietly and without any explanation took the
+confidential work out of my hands. I believe he suspected then who
+Marbran’s spy was. But he said nothing to me of his suspicions at that
+time ...
+
+Finally, Marbran came to London. It was on Tuesday of last week. I had
+been up in Sheffield on business, and on my return I found Marbran
+waiting for me at my rooms.
+
+He was like a man possessed. Never before have I witnessed such an
+outburst of ungovernable rage. Parrish, it appears, had declined to see
+him. He swore that Parrish should not get the better of him if he had
+to kill him first. I can see Marbran now as he sat on my bed, his livid
+face distorted with fury.
+
+“I’ll give him a last chance,” he cried, “and then, by God, let our
+smart Alec look out!”
+
+This sort of talk frightened me. I knew Marbran meant mischief. He was
+a bad man to cross. I was desperately afraid he would waylay Parrish
+and bring down disaster on the three of us. I did my utmost to put the
+idea of violence out of his mind. I begged him to content himself with
+trying to frighten Parrish into paying up before trying other means.
+
+My suggestion seemed to awaken some old memory in Marbran’s mind.
+
+“By Gad, Jeekes,” he said, after a moment’s thought, “you’ve given me
+an idea. Parrish has a yellow streak. He’s scared of a gun. I saw it
+once, years ago, in a roughhouse we got into at Krugersdorp on the
+Rand. Damn it, I know how to bring the yellow dog to heel, and I’ll
+tell you how we’ll do it ...”
+
+He then unfolded his plan. He would send Parrish a last demand for a
+settlement, threatening him with death if he did not pay up. The
+warning would reach Parrish on the following Saturday. Marbran would
+contrive that he should receive it by the first post. As soon as
+possible thereafter I was to go to Parrish boldly and demand his
+answer.
+
+“And you’ll take a gun,” Marbran said, peering at me with his cunning
+little eyes, “and you’ll show it. And if at the sight of it you don’t
+get the brass, then I don’t know my old pal, Mister Hartley Parrish,
+Esquire!”
+
+The proposal appalled me. I knew nothing of Hartley Parrish’s “yellow
+streak.” I knew him only as a hard and resolute man, swift in decision
+and ruthless in action. Whatever happened, I argued, Parrish would
+discharge me and there was every prospect of his handing me over to the
+police as well.
+
+Marbran was deaf to my reasoning. I had nothing to fear, he protested.
+Parrish would collapse at the first sign of force. And as for my losing
+my job, Marbran would find me another and a better one in his office at
+Rotterdam.
+
+Still I held out. The chance of losing my position, even of being sent
+to gaol, daunted me less, I think, than the admission to Parrish of the
+blackly ungrateful role I had played towards him. In the end I told
+Marbran to do his dirty work himself.
+
+But I spoke without conviction. I realized that Marbran held me in a
+cleft stick and that he realized it, too. He wasted no further time in
+argument. I knew what I had to do, he said, and I would do it.
+Otherwise ...
+
+He left me in an agony of mental stress. At that time, I swear to
+Heaven, Miss Trevert, I was determined to let Marbran do his worst
+rather than lend myself to this odious blackmailing trick, my own
+suggestion, as I bitterly remembered. But for the rest of the week his
+parting threat rang in my ears. Unless he heard by the following Sunday
+that I had confronted Parrish and called his bluff, as he put it, the
+British police should have word, not only of Parrish’s activities in
+trading with the enemy, but of mine as well.
+
+It was no idle threat. Parrish and Marbran had put men away before. I
+could give you the names ...
+
+It is quite dark now. It must be an hour since Greve took you away.
+Soon he will be back with the police to arrest me and I must have
+finished by then, finished with the story, finished with life ...
+
+Last week I worked at Parrish’s city office. I told you how he kept me
+off his confidential work. On Saturday morning I went round to the
+house in St. James’s Square to see whether Marbran had really sent his
+warning. Archer, my colleague, who was acting as confidential secretary
+in my stead, was there. Parrish was at Harkings, he told me. Archer was
+going down by car that morning with his mail. It included two “blue
+letters” which Archer would, according to orders, hand to Parrish
+unopened.
+
+These “blue letters,” as we secretaries used to call them, written on a
+striking bluish paper, were the means by which all communications
+passed between Parrish and Marbran on the syndicate’s business. They
+were drafted in conventional code and came to Parrish from all parts of
+Europe and in all kinds of ways. No one saw them except himself. By his
+strict injunctions, they were to be opened only by himself in person.
+
+When Archer told me that two “blue letters” had come, I knew that
+Marbran had kept his word. Though my mind was not made up, instinct
+told me I was going to play my part ...
+
+I could not face the shame of exposure. I was brought up in a decent
+English home. To stand in the dock charged with prolonging the
+sufferings of our soldiers and sailors in order to make money was a
+prospect I could not even contemplate.
+
+I thought it all out that Saturday morning as I stood at the
+dressing-table in my bedroom by the open drawer in which my automatic
+pistol lay. It was one given me by Parrish some years before at a time
+when he thought we might be going on a trip to Rumania ...
+
+I slipped the pistol into my pocket. I felt like a man in a dream. I
+believe I went down to Harkings by train, but I have no clear
+recollection of the journey. I seemed to come to my senses only when I
+found myself standing on the high bank of the rosery at Harkings,
+looking down upon the library window.
+
+Outside in the gardens it was nearly dark, but from the window fell a
+stream of subdued light. The curtains had not been drawn and the window
+was open at the bottom. Parrish sat at the desk. Only the desk-lamp was
+lit, so that his face was in shadow, but his two hands, stretched out
+on the blotter in front of him, lay in a pool of light, and I caught
+the gleam of his gold signet ring.
+
+He was not writing or working. He seemed to be thinking. I watched him
+in a fascinated sort of way. I had never seen him sit thus idly at his
+desk before ...
+
+My brain worked quite lucidly now. As I looked at him, I suddenly
+realised that I had a golden opportunity for speaking to him
+unobserved. The gardens were absolutely deserted: the library wing was
+very still. If he were a man to be frightened into submission, my
+sudden appearance, following upon the receipt of the threatening
+letter, would be likely to help in achieving this result.
+
+I walked softly down the steps to the window. I stood close up to the
+sill.
+
+“Mr. Parrish,” I said, “Victor Marbran has sent me for his answer.”
+
+In a flash he was on his feet.
+
+“Who’s there?” he cried out in alarm.
+
+His voice shook, and I could see his hand tremble in the lamplight as
+he clutched at the desk. Then I knew that he was badly frightened, and
+the discovery gave me courage.
+
+“Are you going to settle with Marbran or are you not?” I said.
+
+At that he peered forward. All of a sudden his manner changed.
+
+“What in hell does this mean, Jeekes?”
+
+His voice quavered no longer. It was hard and menacing.
+
+But I had burnt my boats behind me now.
+
+“It means,” I answered boldly, “that you’ve got to pay up. And you’ve
+got to pay up now!”
+
+In a couple of quick strides he was round the desk and coming at me as
+I stood with my chest pressing against the window-sill. His hands were
+thrust in his jacket pockets. His face was red with anger.
+
+“You dawggorn dirty little rathole spy,”—he spat the words at me in a
+low, threatening voice,—“I guessed that lowdown skunk Marbran had been
+getting at some of my people!”
+
+His voice rose in a sudden gust of passion.
+
+“You rotten little worm! You’d try and bounce me, would you? You’ve
+come to the wrong shop for that, Mr. Spying Jeekes ...”
+
+His manner was incredibly insulting. So was the utter contempt with
+which he looked at me. This man, who had trembled with fear at the
+unknown, recovered his self-control on finding that the menace came
+from the menial, the hireling, he despised. I felt the blood rush in a
+hot flood to my head. I lost all self-control. I screamed aloud at him.
+
+“There’s no bounce about it this time! If you don’t pay up, you know
+what to expect!”
+
+I had been holding my pistol out of his sight below the window-ledge,
+but on this I swung it up and levelled it at him.
+
+He sprang back a pace, the colour fading on the instant from his face,
+his mouth twisted awry in a horrid paroxysm of fear. Even in that
+subdued light I could see that his cheeks were as white as paper.
+
+But then in a flash his right hand went up. I saw the pistol he held,
+but before I could make a movement there was a loud, raucous hiss of
+air and a bullet whistled past my ear into the darkness of the gardens.
+How he missed me at that range I don’t know, but, seeing me standing
+there, he came at me again with the pistol in his hand ...
+
+And then you, Miss Trevert, cried out, “Hartley,” and rattled the
+handle of the door. Your cry merged in a deafening report. Parrish, who
+was quite close to me, and advancing, stopped short with a little
+startled exclamation, his eyes reproachful, full of surprise. He stood
+there and swayed, looking at me all the time, then crashed backwards on
+the floor. And I found myself staring at the smoking pistol in my hand
+...
+
+It was your scream that brought me to my senses. My mind cleared
+instantly. I knew I must act quickly. The house would be alarmed
+directly, and before that happened, I must be clear of the grounds. Yet
+I knew that before I went I must do something to make myself safe ...
+
+I stood at the window staring down at the dead man. His eyes were
+terrible. Like a suicide he looked, I thought. And then it flashed
+across my mind that only one shot had been heard and that our pistols
+were identical and fired the same ammunition. The silencer! The
+silencer could save me. With that removed, the suicide theory might
+pass muster: at any rate, it would delay other investigations and give
+me a start ...
+
+In a matter of a second or two I believe I thought of everything. I did
+not overlook the danger of leaving finger-prints or foot-marks about. I
+had not taken off my gloves, and my boots were perfectly dry. In
+climbing into the room I was most careful to see that I did not mark
+the window-sill or scratch the paintwork ...
+
+I stood beside the body and I caught the dead man’s hand. It was fat
+and soft and still warm. The touch of it made me reel with horror. I
+turned my face away from his so as not to see his eyes again....
+
+I got the silencer. Parrish had shown it to me and I knew how to detach
+it....
+
+I went back through the window as carefully as I had come in. And I
+pushed the window down. Parrish would have done that, I thought, if he
+had meant to commit suicide. And then my nerve went. The window
+frightened me. The blank glass with the silent room beyond;—it reminded
+me of Parrish’s sightless gaze. I turned and ran....
+
+I did not mean to kill. As there is a God in ...
+
+On that unfinished sentence the confession ended.
+
+
+Mr. Bardy put the bundle of manuscript down on the desk and, dropping
+his eyeglass from his eye, caught it deftly and began to polish it
+vigorously with his pocket handkerchief. As no one spoke, he said:
+
+“That’s all. It ends there!”
+
+He looked round the circle of earnest faces. Then Horace Trevert
+crossed to the desk.
+
+“Robin,” he said, and held out his hand, “I want to apologize. I ... we
+... behaved very badly ...”
+
+Robin grasped the boy’s hand.
+
+“Not a word about that, Horace, old boy,” he said. “Besides, Mary is
+putting all that right, you know!”
+
+“She told me,” replied Horace; “and, Robin, I’m tremendously glad!”
+
+“Mr. Greve!”
+
+Robin turned to find Mr. Manderton, large and impressive, at his elbow.
+
+“Might I have a word with you?”
+
+Robin followed the detective across the room to the window.
+
+Mr. Manderton seemed a trifle embarrassed.
+
+“Er—- Mr. Greve,” he said, clearing his throat rather nervously, “I
+should like to—er,—offer you my congratulations on the remarkably
+accurate view you took of this case. I should have been able to prove
+to you, I believe, but for this curious interruption, that your view
+and mine practically coincided. It has been a pleasure to work with
+you, sir!”
+
+He cast a hasty glance over his shoulder at the other occupants of the
+room, who were gathered round the desk.
+
+“I’m not a society man, Mr. Greve,” he added, “and I have a lot of work
+on my hands regarding the case. So I think I’ll run off now ...”
+
+He broke off, gave Robin a large hand, and, looking neither to right
+nor to left, made a hurried exit from the room, taking Inspector
+Humphries with him.
+
+“Now that we are just among ourselves”—the solicitor was speaking—“I
+think I may seize the opportunity of saying a word about Mr. Parrish’s
+will. Miss Trevert, as you know, is made principal legatee, but I
+understand from her that she does not propose to accept the
+inheritance. I will not comment on this decision of hers, which does
+her moral sense, at any rate, infinite credit, but I should observe
+that Mr. Parrish has left directions for the payment of an allowance—I
+may say, a most handsome allowance—to Lady Margaret Trevert during her
+ladyship’s lifetime. This is a provision over which Miss Trevert’s
+decision, of course, can have no influence. I would only remark that,
+according to Mr. Parrish’s instructions, this allowance will be paid
+from the dividends on a percentage of his holdings in Hornaway’s under
+the new scheme. I have not yet had an opportunity of looking further
+into Mr. Parrish’s affairs in the light of the information which Mr.
+Greve obtained in Rotterdam, but I have reason to believe that he kept
+his interest in Hornaway’s and his—ahem!—other activities entirely
+separate. If this can be definitely established to my own satisfaction
+and to yours, my dear Miss Trevert, I see no reason why you should not
+modify your decision at least in respect of Mr. Parrish’s interest in
+Hornaway’s.”
+
+Mary Trevert looked at Robin and then at the solicitor.
+
+“No!” she said; “not a penny as far as I am concerned. With Mother the
+case is different. I told her last night of my decision in the matter.
+She disapproves of it. That is why she is not here to-day. But my mind
+is made up.”
+
+Mr. Bardy adjusted his eyeglass in his eye and gazed at the girl. His
+face wore an expression of pain mingled with compassion.
+
+“I will see Lady Margaret after lunch,” he said rather stiffly.
+
+Then the door opened and Bude appeared.
+
+“Luncheon is served, Miss!”
+
+He stood there, a portly, dignified figure in sober black, solemn of
+visage, sonorous of voice, a living example of the triumph of
+established tradition over the most savage buffetings of Fate. His
+enunciation was, if anything, more mellow, his demeanour more
+pontifical than of yore.
+
+Bude was once more in the service of a County Family.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
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