I was the half-bred gipsy-looking creature. The experience she had had of me was when I saved her life at Buxton. That I did save her life I am pretty sure. I said to my friend, when they had gone:
‘I hope that sometimes I do do a little good; but even when I do, for the most part it’s done by stealth, and not known to fame; and sometimes, even, it’s not recognised as good at all.’
‘Is that so?’ replied my friend. ‘What a very curious world it is.’
When I thought of what had happened on the platform which we were leaving so rapidly behind, I agreed with her with all my heart and soul.
LADY MOLLY OF SCOTLAND YARD
Created by Baroness Orczy (1865-1947)
Born in Budapest into the Hungarian aristocracy, Emmuska Orczy moved with her parents to England when she was in her teens. She studied at art schools in London, where she met her husband, an illustrator, and her first published works were versions of Hungarian fairy tales which she translated and he illustrated. Her first historical novel appeared at the end of the 1890s, as did her first detective story. Nearly all her later work was in those two genres. Much the most famous character she created is Sir Percy Blakeney, ‘The Scarlet Pimpernel’, who first appeared in a drama on the London stage and then in a series of novels and short stories. Blakeney is an apparently effete Englishman who, in reality, is none other than the Scarlet Pimpernel, the daring and mysterious saviour of French aristocrats from the revolutionary guillotine. Orczy also created two memorable detectives. The first was ‘The Old Man in the Corner’, who solves baffling crimes whilst barely stirring from his seat in a London teashop. He appeared in magazine stories from 1901 and his adventures were later collected in three volumes. The second was Lady Molly Robertson-Kirk, a fictional detective working for Scotland Yard some years before women in real life were able to join the police. The Lady Molly stories are narrated by her fervent, occasionally fawning, admirer and assistant, Mary Granard. First published in 1910, they reflect some of the more irritating assumptions of the period about class and gender but are written with much of the same energy and élan that Orczy demonstrated in her Pimpernel books.
THE MAN IN THE INVERNESS CAPE
I
I have heard many people say – people, too, mind you, who read their daily paper regularly –that it is quite impossible for anyone to ‘disappear’ within the confines of the British Isles. At the same time these wise people invariably admit one great exception to their otherwise unimpeachable theory, and that is the case of Mr Leonard Marvell, who, as you know, walked out one afternoon from the Scotia Hotel in Cromwell Road and has never been seen or heard of since.
Information had originally been given to the police by Mr Marvell’s sister Olive, a Scotchwoman of the usually accepted type: tall, bony, with sandy-coloured hair, and a somewhat melancholy expression in her blue-grey eyes.
Her brother, she said, had gone out on a rather foggy afternoon. I think it was the 3rd of February, just about a year ago. His intention had been to go and consult a solicitor in the City – whose address had been given him recently by a friend – about some private business of his own.
Mr Marvell had told his sister that he would get a train at South Kensington Station to Moorgate Street, and walk thence to Finsbury Square. She was to expect him home by dinnertime.
As he was, however, very irregular in his habits, being fond of spending his evenings at restaurants and music-halls, the sister did not feel the least anxious when he did not return home at the appointed time. She had her dinner in the table d’hôte room, and went to bed soon after ten.
She and her brother occupied two bedrooms and a sitting-room on the second floor of the little private hotel. Miss Marvell, moreover, had a maid always with her, as she was somewhat of an invalid. This girl, Rosie Campbell, a nice-looking Scotch lassie, slept on the top floor.
It was only on the following morning, when Mr Leonard did not put in an appearance at breakfast that Miss Marvell began to feel anxious. According to her own account, she sent Rosie in to see if anything was the matter, and the girl, wide-eyed and not a little frightened, came back with the news that Mr Marvell was not in his room, and that his bed had not been slept in that night.
With characteristic Scottish reserve, Miss Olive said nothing about the matter at the time to anyone, nor did she give information to the police until two days later, when she herself had exhausted every means in her power to discover her brother’s whereabouts.
She had seen the lawyer to whose office Leonard Marvell had intended going that afternoon, but Mr Statham, the solicitor in question, had seen nothing of the missing man.
With great adroitness Rosie, the maid, had made inquiries at South Kensington and Moorgate Street stations. At the former, the booking clerk, who knew Mr Marvell by sight, distinctly remembered selling him a first-class ticket to one of the City stations in the early part of the afternoon; but at Moorgate Street, which is a very busy station, no one recollected seeing a tall, red-haired Scotchman in an Inverness cape – such was the description given of the missing man. By that time the fog had become very thick in the City; traffic was disorganised, and everyone felt fussy, ill-tempered, and self-centred.
These, in substance, were the details which Miss Marvell gave to the police on the subject of her brother’s strange disappearance.
At first she did not appear very anxious; she seemed to have great faith in Mr Marvell’s power to look after himself; moreover, she declared positively that her brother had neither valuables nor money about his person when he went out that afternoon.
But as day succeeded day and no trace of the missing man had yet been found, matters became more serious, and the search instituted by our fellows at the Yard waxed more keen.
A description of Mr Leonard Marvell was published in the leading London and provincial dailies. Unfortunately, there was no good photograph of him extant, and descriptions are apt to prove vague.
Very little was known about the man beyond his disappearance, which had rendered him famous. He and his sister had arrived at the Scotia Hotel about a month previously, and subsequently they were joined by the maid Campbell.
Scotch people are far too reserved ever to speak of themselves or their affairs to strangers. Brother and sister spoke very little to anyone at the hotel. They had their meals in their sitting-room, waited on by the maid, who messed with the staff. But, in face of the present terrible calamity, Miss Marvell’s frigidity relaxed before the police inspector, to whom she gave what information she could about her brother.
‘He was like a son to me,’ she explained with scarcely restrained tears, ‘for we lost our parents early in life, and as we were left very, very badly off, our relations took but little notice of us. My brother was years younger than I am – and though he was a little wild and fond of pleasure, he was as good as gold to me, and has supported us both for years by journalistic work. We came to London from Glasgow about a month ago, because Leonard got a very good appointment on the staff of the Daily Post.’
All this, of course, was soon proved to be true; and although, on minute inquiries being instituted in Glasgow, but little seemed to be known about Mr Leonard Marvell in that city, there seemed no doubt that he had done some reporting for the Courier, and that latterly, in response to an advertisement, he had applied for and obtained regular employment on the Daily Post.
The latter enterprising halfpenny journal, with characteristic magnanimity, made an offer of £50 reward to any of its subscribers who gave information which would lead to the discovery of the whereabouts of Mr Leonard Marvell.
But time went by, and that £50 remained unclaimed.
II
Lady Molly had not seemed as interested as she usually was in cases of this sort. With strange flippancy – wholly unlike herself – she remarked that one Scotch journalist more or less in London did not vastly matter.
&nbs
p; I was much amused, therefore, one morning about three weeks after the mysterious disappearance of Mr Leonard Marvell, when Jane, our little parlour-maid, brought in a card accompanied by a letter.
The card bore the name ‘Miss Olive Marvell’. The letter was the usual formula from the chief, asking Lady Molly to have a talk with the lady in question, and to come and see him on the subject after the interview.
With a smothered yawn my dear lady told Jane to show in Miss Marvell.
‘There are two of them, my lady,’ said Jane, as she prepared to obey.
‘Two what?’ asked Lady Molly with a laugh.
‘Two ladies, I mean,’ explained Jane.
‘Well! Show them both into the drawing-room,’ said Lady Molly, impatiently.
Then, as Jane went off on this errand, a very funny thing happened; funny, because during the entire course of my intimate association with my dear lady, I had never known her act with such marked indifference in the face of an obviously interesting case. She turned to me and said:
‘Mary, you had better see these two women, whoever they may be; I feel that they would bore me to distraction. Take note of what they say, and let me know. Now, don’t argue,’ she added with a laugh, which peremptorily put a stop to my rising protest, ‘but go and interview Miss Marvell and Co.’
Needless to say, I promptly did as I was told, and the next few seconds saw me installed in our little drawing-room, saying polite preliminaries to the two ladies who sat opposite to me.
I had no need to ask which of them was Miss Marvell. Tall, ill-dressed in deep black, with a heavy crape veil over her face, and black cotton gloves, she looked the uncompromising Scotchwoman to the life. In strange contrast to her depressing appearance, there sat beside her an over-dressed, much behatted, peroxided young woman, who bore the stamp of the profession all over her pretty, painted face.
Miss Marvell, I was glad to note, was not long in plunging into the subject which had brought her here.
‘I saw a gentleman at Scotland Yard,’ she explained, after a short preamble, ‘because Miss – er – Lulu Fay came to me at the hotel this very morning with a story which, in my opinion, should have been told to the police directly my brother’s disappearance became known, and not three weeks later.’
The emphasis which she laid on the last few words and the stern look with which she regarded the golden-haired young woman beside her, showed the disapproval with which the rigid Scotchwoman viewed any connection which her brother might have had with the lady, whose very name seemed unpleasant to her lips.
Miss – er – Lulu Fay blushed even through her rouge, and turned a pair of large, liquid eyes imploringly upon me.
‘I – I didn’t know. I was frightened,’ she stammered.
‘There’s no occasion to be frightened now,’ retorted Miss Marvell, ‘and the sooner you try and be truthful about the whole matter, the better it will be for all of us.’
And the stern woman’s lips closed with a snap, as she deliberately turned her back on Miss Fay and began turning over the leaves of a magazine which happened to be on a table close to her hand.
I muttered a few words of encouragement, for the little actress looked ready to cry. I spoke as kindly as I could, telling her that if indeed she could throw some light on Mr Marvell’s present whereabouts it was her duty to be quite frank on the subject.
She ‘hem’-ed and ‘ha’-ed for a while, and her simpering ways were just beginning to tell on my nerves, when she suddenly started talking very fast.
‘I am principal boy at the Grand,’ she explained with great volubility; ‘and I knew Mr Leonard Marvell well – in fact – er – he paid me a good deal of attention and –’
‘Yes – and –?’ I queried, for the girl was obviously nervous.
There was a pause. Miss Fay began to cry.
‘And it seems that my brother took this young – er – lady to supper on the night of February 3rd, after which no one has ever seen or heard of him again,’ here interposed Miss Marvell, quietly.
‘Is that so?’ I asked.
Lulu Fay nodded, whilst heavy tears fell upon her clasped hands.
‘But why did you not tell this to the police three weeks ago?’ I ejaculated, with all the sternness at my command.
‘I – I was frightened,’ she stammered.
‘Frightened? Of what?’
‘I am engaged to Lord Mountnewte and –’
‘And you did not wish him to know that you were accepting the attentions of Mr Leonard Marvell – was that it? Well,’ I added, with involuntary impatience, ‘what happened after you had supper with Mr Marvell?’
‘Oh! I hope – I hope that nothing happened,’ she said through more tears; ‘we had supper at the Trocadero, and he saw me into my brougham. Suddenly, just as I was driving away, I saw Lord Mountnewte standing quite close to us in the crowd.’
‘Did the two men know one another?’ I asked.
‘No,’ replied Miss Fay; ‘at least, I didn’t think so, but when I looked back through the window of my carriage I saw them standing on the kerb talking to each other for a moment, and then walk off together towards Piccadilly Circus. That is the last I have seen of either of them,’ continued the little actress with a fresh flood of tears. ‘Lord Mountnewte hasn’t spoken to me since, and Mr Marvell has disappeared with my money and my diamonds.’
‘Your money and your diamonds?’ I gasped in amazement.
‘Yes; he told me he was a jeweller, and that my diamonds wanted re-setting. He took them with him that evening, for he said that London jewellers were clumsy thieves, and that he would love to do the work for me himself. I also gave him two hundred pounds, which he said he would want for buying the gold and platinum required for the settings. And now he has disappeared – and my diamonds – and my money! Oh! I have been very – very foolish –and –’
Her voice broke down completely. Of course, one often hears of the idiocy of girls giving money and jewels unquestioningly to clever adventurers who know how to trade upon their inordinate vanity. There was, therefore, nothing very out of the way in the story just told me by Miss – er – Lulu Fay, until the moment when Miss Marvell’s quiet voice, with its marked Scotch burr, broke in upon the short silence which had followed the actress’s narrative.
‘As I explained to the chief detective-inspector at Scotland Yard,’ she said calmly, ‘the story which this young – er – lady tells is only partly true. She may have had supper with Mr Leonard Marvell on the night of February 3rd, and he may have paid her certain attentions; but he never deceived her by telling her that he was a jeweller, nor did he obtain possession of her diamonds and her money through false statements. My brother was the soul of honour and loyalty. If for some reason which Miss – er – Lulu Fay chooses to keep secret, he had her jewels and money in his possession on the fatal February 3rd, then I think his disappearance is accounted for. He has been robbed and perhaps murdered.’
Like a true Scotchwoman she did not give way to tears, but even her harsh voice trembled slightly when she thus bore witness to her brother’s honesty, and expressed the fears which assailed her as to his fate.
Imagine my plight! I could ill forgive my dear lady for leaving me in this unpleasant position – a sort of peacemaker between two women who evidently hated one another, and each of whom was trying her best to give the other ‘the lie direct’.
I ventured to ring for our faithful Jane and to send her with an imploring message to Lady Molly, begging her to come and disentangle the threads of this muddled skein with her clever fingers; but Jane returned with a curt note from my dear lady, telling me not to worry about such a silly case, and to bow the two women out of the flat as soon as possible and then come for a nice walk.
I wore my official manner as well as I could, trying not to betray the ’prentice hand. Of course, the interview lasted a great de
al longer, and there was considerably more talk than I can tell you of in a brief narrative. But the gist of it all was just as I have said. Miss Lulu Fay stuck to every point of the story which she had originally told Miss Marvell. It was the latter uncompromising lady who had immediately marched the younger woman off to Scotland Yard in order that she might repeat her tale to the police. I did not wonder that the chief promptly referred them both to Lady Molly.
Anyway, I made excellent shorthand notes of the conflicting stories which I heard; and I finally saw, with real relief, the two women walk out of our little front door.
III
Miss – er – Lulu Fay, mind you, never contradicted in any one particular the original story which she had told me, about going out to supper with Leonard Marvell, entrusting him with £200 and the diamonds, which he said he would have reset for her, and seeing him finally in close conversation with her recognised fiancé, Lord Mountnewte. Miss Marvell, on the other hand, very commendably refused to admit that her brother acted dishonestly towards the girl. If he had her jewels and money in his possession at the time of his disappearance, then he had undoubtedly been robbed, or perhaps murdered, on his way back to the hotel, and if Lord Mountnewte had been the last to speak to him on that fatal night, then Lord Mountnewte must be able to throw some light on the mysterious occurrence.
Our fellows at the Yard were abnormally active. It seemed, on the face of it, impossible that a man, healthy, vigorous, and admittedly sober, should vanish in London between Piccadilly Circus and Cromwell Road without leaving the slightest trace of himself or of the valuables said to have been in his possession.
Of course, Lord Mountnewte was closely questioned. He was a young Guardsman of the usual pattern, and, after a great deal of vapid talk which irritated Detective-Inspector Saunders not a little, he made the following statement:
‘I certainly am acquainted with Miss Lulu Fay. On the night in question I was standing outside the Troc, when I saw this young lady at her own carriage window talking to a tall man in an Inverness cape. She had, earlier in the day, refused my invitation to supper, saying that she was not feeling very well, and would go home directly after the theatre; therefore I felt, naturally, a little vexed. I was just about to hail a taxi, meaning to go on to the club, when, to my intense astonishment, the man in the Inverness cape came up to me and asked me if I could tell him the best way to get back to Cromwell Road.’
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