by G. A. Henty
“I will answer to any gentleman that calls me to account,” Mark said, in a ringing voice, “but I don’t meet a man who has been expelled from White’s for cheating, and who I have no doubt is well stocked with cards at the present moment, in readiness for the victim that he is next going to meet after the plucking of Mr. Cotter has been done. Now, gentlemen, search him and see if I am wrong; if I am I will apologize for that part of my accusation.”
Flash drew a pistol from his pocket, but in an instant his arm was seized by those standing round him, and it exploded harmlessly. Among those who seized Flash was the man who had played with him the previous evening. In spite of his struggles and curses, and the efforts of his friends to rescue him, he too was thrown down and eight court cards were found concealed in his sleeve. The uproar while this was going on had been tremendous, but it was suddenly stilled as four men in dark clothes entered the room. Each held in his hand the well known symbol of his office, the little ebony staff surmounted by a silver crown.
“I arrest all present in the name of the king,” one said, “for breaking the laws against gambling, and for brawling and the use of firearms. Now, gentlemen, resistance is useless; I must request that you each give me your card, and your word of honor that you will appear at Bow Street tomorrow morning.”
“What is all this about, sir?” he asked Mark, who was still standing on the table.
“Two fellows here have been caught cheating.”
“What is your name and address, sir?”
“My name is Mark Thorndyke, and I am a landed gentleman at Reigate; my friends Mr. Chetwynd and Mr. Boldero will bear this out.”
“Who are the two men?” the constable asked.
“The two fellows with torn clothes,” Mark said. “They are Mr. Emerson and Sir James Flash.”
“You are certain of the charge that you are making?”
“Quite certain; the cards have been found hidden upon them.”
“Yes, yes!” a score of voices shouted; “they have been caught in the act of cheating.”
“Take those two men into custody,” the constable said to two of his companions.
“Who fired that pistol?” he went on.
A number of voices shouted:
“Sir James Flash; he attempted to murder Mr. Thorndyke.”
The constable nodded to the man who had laid his hands on Sir James Flash, and in a moment a pair of handcuffs closed on his wrists.
“You shall repent this!” Flash exclaimed furiously.
“Calm yourself, Sir James,” the constable said calmly. “We know our duty, and do it whether a man is a peer or a peasant; you are accused of card sharping and an attempted murder.”
“What is your address in town, Mr. Thorndyke?” he asked.
“18 Villiers Street.”
“Is there any charge against anyone else here? A good many of you seem to have your clothes torn and disarranged.”
“Some fellows attempted to rescue Emerson and Flash while we were searching them; for what reason we can all pretty well imagine.”
“I shall require the names in the morning of your assailants,” the constable said; “it looks very much as if they were confederates of the two prisoners. Now, gentlemen, you can all leave. This house is closed, and will not be opened again until this affair is thoroughly investigated.”
In five minutes the house was deserted.
“How can I thank you, Mr. Thorndyke?” Cotter, who was one of those who had seized Flash’s arm, diverted his aim and searched him, said, when they got outside the house. “You have saved my life. It did not seem possible to me that you could succeed in showing that I was being cheated, and I had firmly resolved that, instead of allowing you to suffer loss, I would tomorrow morning make a clean breast of the whole affair to my father, as I had intended to have done this morning.”
“If I might advise you, Mr. Cotter, I should say, carry out your intention as far as making a clean breast of it is concerned. Happily, you are free from debt, as those IOUs are worthless, for they were obtained from you by cheating, therefore you have no demand to make upon his purse. The police will, I have no doubt, endeavor to keep this thing quiet, but your name may come out, and it would be far better that your father should hear this story from you than elsewhere; and your assurance that you will never touch a card again, and the heavy lesson that you have had, will doubtless induce him to look at the matter leniently. It will, no doubt, be a painful story to tell, but it will be far better told by you.”
“I will do it, sir; as you say, the lesson has been a heavy one, and henceforth my father shall have no reason to complain of me. May I call and see you tomorrow evening?”
“Certainly. I shall be at home from seven to eight, after which hour I have an engagement. Good night.”
Cotter walked on, and Mark fell back, and joined Dick and Boldero, who had fallen behind when they saw him speaking to Cotter.
“Well, Mark, I congratulate you,” Dick Chetwynd said. “You did it wonderfully, though how on earth you knew that fellow had a card in his hand is more than I can guess.”
“I felt sure he was going to cheat,” Mark said quietly; “I saw that Cotter’s hand was a very strong one, and knew that Emerson would be aware that it was so, because he would receive no signal from Flash, therefore this was the time, if any, that he would cheat. He had been playing with both hands upon the table. I saw him withdraw one, there was a little pause, and then it came up again, and I had not a doubt in the world that there was a card in it, and that it had been hidden somewhere in his breeches, which is one of the best places of concealment, for his hand being under the table while getting at the card, no one present who was not behind the scenes, as I was, could detect him doing it.”
“The wonder to me is,” Boldero said, “that while there were a number of men looking on closely, for Emerson has long been suspected of not playing fair, you, just fresh from the country, if I may say so, should have spotted him.”
“That is easily explained,” Mark said. “Not wishing to fall a victim, I have of late been put up to a great many of these sharpers’ tricks by a man who at one time had been in the trade himself.”
“That was a capital idea, Mark,” Dick said. “I wish you would introduce me to him.”
“I won’t do that, Dick, but I shall be very glad to teach you all I know myself about it; but I fancy that after this you will be in no great hurry to enter a gambling hell again.”
“That is so, Mark. I have never had any great inclination for play; but after this you may be quite sure that I will light shy of cards altogether. Still, I shall be glad if you will put me up to some of these tricks, for I may be able to some day save a victim of card sharpers, as you have done this evening.”
The next morning, when those who had been present at the scene of the previous evening arrived at the office of the detectives in Bow Street, they were shown into some private rooms, and asked to wait. Cotter, Mark, and his two friends first had an interview with the chief.
“You will understand,” the latter said, “that this is an altogether informal affair. I propose you first tell me your story as briefly as possible.”
This was done.
“Now, Mr. Cotter. I take it that you do not wish to prosecute?”
“Certainly not. I would, in fact, give anything rather than appear in it.”
“You have said that, in addition to the IOUs that you have given to the two men caught cheating, they hold others to the amount of some five or six thousand pounds, given by you to three other frequenters of the club. In fact, these papers have been found in Emerson’s pocketbook; he told you, I believe, that he had taken them up, so that you should not be inconvenienced by them. I understand, then, that you will be quite content if you get these IOUs back again; those given to Emerson and Flash are, of course, worthless. After what has happened, they could not be presented, but probably you might have trouble about the others, for, though I have no doubt that the whole
of the men were in league together, we have no means of absolutely proving it.”
“I shall be more than content, sir; I have no wish to prosecute.”
“We are glad,” the chief said, “to be able to close a dangerous place; and as the exposure will put a stop to the career of these two men, and no doubt alarm a good many others, we don’t care about taking the matter into court. Such gross scandals as this are best kept quiet, when there is no object in ventilating them. Therefore, gentlemen, as Mr. Cotter is willing to do so, we shall let the matter drop. I shall be obliged if you will step into the next room, however, until I have seen these three men.”
When they had left, the three were brought in.
“You have been concerned, sirs,” the chief said sternly, “in winning large sums of money from the Hon. William Denton, from Mr. James Carew, from Mr. William Hobson, and others; in all of these cases the two men caught cheating last night were also concerned. You all hold notes of hand of Mr. Hobson. I shall advise that gentleman’s father to refuse to pay those notes, and promise him that if any further request for payment is made I will furnish him with such particulars for publication as will more than justify him in the eyes of the world in refusing to honor them. You, as well as Mr. Emerson and Sir James Flash, have won large sums from Mr. Cotter, and the fact that the IOUs he gave you were found on Mr. Emerson points very strongly to their being in confederacy with you in the matter; at any rate, they point so strongly that, whether a jury would convict or not on the evidence that we shall be able to lay before them, there can be no question whatever as to what the opinion of men of honor will be. These IOUs are in our hands. Mr. Cotter does not desire to pursue the case; he will, however, refuse absolutely to pay those IOUs, and in doing so he will have the approval of all honorable men. That being so, the IOUs are absolutely useless to you, and if you will agree to my tearing them up now, he has most kindly consented to let the matter drop in your cases.”
The three men, who had all turned very white when he was speaking, now protested angrily against imputations being made on their honor.
“Well, sirs,” the officer said, “in that case the matter can, of course, go on. You know best what the feeling will be as to these IOUs. They will form an important item of evidence against you, you will see. As the matter stands, either you gave them to Emerson to collect for you, without any money passing between you—a very strange procedure, which you will find it difficult to explain—or else he gave you the coin for them, and you passed them over to him, and have, therefore, parted with all claim on Mr. Cotter on your own account. Of course I impound them with the other IOUs as proof of a conspiracy between you. Now, sirs, am I to tear them up or not?”
The three men looked at each other, and then one of them said:
“We protest altogether against the assertion, sir, but at the same time, as there can be little doubt that Emerson and Sir James Flash have played unfairly, and we do not wish any association of our names with theirs, we are perfectly willing that the IOUs, which, under the circumstances, we should never have dreamt of presenting, should be destroyed.”
“I think that you have chosen wisely,” the chief said dryly. “It is a pity that you did not do so at first. These are the IOUs he gave to one or other of you. Perhaps it would be pleasanter for you to destroy them yourselves.”
The three men took the papers with their names on them and tore them up.
“Thank you,” he went on sarcastically. “That will place you in a better position. You will be able to tell your friends that you felt so indignant at the manner in which Mr. Cotter had been swindled by Emerson and Flash that you at once destroyed his IOUs for the sums that you had won of him. But, gentlemen,”—he spoke sternly now,—“remember that we have a long list against you, and that the next victim, or let us say his father, might be more disposed to push matters to their full length than is Mr. Cotter. Remember, also, that we keep ourselves acquainted with what is going on, and that should trouble arise we shall produce all the complaints that have been made against you, and shall also mention your connection with this affair, in which, as I understand, you all did your best to prevent those two fellows from being searched.”
Without saying another word the three men went out of the room, too crestfallen to make even an attempt at keeping up their air of indignation. The others were then called in.
“I am sorry, gentlemen,” he said, “that you have had the trouble of coming here, for the gentleman swindled has declined to prosecute the swindlers, and you will understand that he is somewhat anxious that his name should not appear in the matter. Fortunately, as instead of paying in cash he gave IOUs for his losses, he will not be a loser to any large amount by these transactions. I may say that the proprietor of the hell has been there this morning, and to avoid trouble he has consented to close his place for good. I have only to remark that I should advise you, gentlemen, in future, only to indulge in gambling in places where you may be fairly assured of the character of the men you play with. I think, in conclusion, that you may all feel grateful to Mr. Cotter for refusing to prosecute. It has saved you from having to appear in court as witnesses in so utterly disreputable an affair.”
There was a general murmur of assent, and in a minute or two the room was clear. Flash and Emerson were then brought in, with a constable on each side of them.
“Mr. Cotter has, I regret to say, declined to prosecute, and Mr. Thorndyke has done the same with regard to Sir James Flash’s use of his pistol. You have, therefore, escaped the punishment due to swindlers at cards. It is the less matter, as you are not likely to have an opportunity of making fresh victims, for the story will be known by this afternoon in every club in London. These IOUs will be of no use to you—they are not worth the paper on which they are written. However, I shall take it upon myself to hand them back to Mr. Cotter, to prevent the possibility of their getting into other hands and giving him trouble.
“You can unlock those handcuffs, constable; these men are at liberty to go, and if they will take my advice they will lose no time in crossing the water and establishing themselves somewhere where their talents are likely to be better appreciated than they are here. They can go; one of you can call a hackney coach for them if they wish it. They will scarcely care to walk with their garments in their present condition.”
Then the chief went into the next room.
“There is an end of that affair, Mr. Cotter. Here are the IOUs you gave to those two swindlers. Those you gave to the other three men, who were no doubt their confederates, have been torn up by them in my presence. They declare that after seeing how shamefully you had been victimized they had not the slightest idea of ever presenting them.”
“I am sure that I am extremely grateful to you,” Cotter said. “I know that I have behaved like a madman, and that I don’t deserve to have got off as I have done. It will be a lesson to me for life, I can assure you.”
On leaving, Dick Chetwynd walked for some distance with Mark—as far as Gibbons’ place in St. Giles.
“There is one thing which I cannot understand,” he said, “and that is how it was that the constables happened to be so close at hand, just at the time they were wanted.”
“Well, you see, Dick, my relations with Bow Street are just at present of a somewhat close nature, for they are aiding me in the search that I told you that I was making for my father’s murderer. The consequence was that I had only to mention to the chief that I fancied I had detected cheating at that place, and that there was a likelihood of a row there last night, and he at once said he would send four men, to come in if they heard a rumpus; and he was, indeed, rather glad of an opportunity for breaking up the place, concerning which he had had several complaints of young men being plucked to the last feather. Well, it was lucky they came. I don’t say that it would have made any difference, because I think our side was a great deal stronger than they were, still it would have led to a nasty row, and perhaps to half a dozen duels afterwards. Well
, I will say goodby now. I am very glad that the affair has been dropped; it would not have mattered so much to me, as I am single and my own master, but there were a good many men there who would have been ready to have paid up handsomely rather than that their names should appear in connection with a row at a gambling house.”
At seven o’clock in the evening Philip Cotter called at Mark’s lodgings, accompanied by his father, who, as he came in with him, advanced at once to Mark and shook him warmly by the hand.
“My son has told me everything, Mr. Thorndyke,” he said, “and I cannot thank you sufficiently for the noble part you took in rescuing him from the terrible effects of his folly. I have been down here twice this afternoon, for I felt that I could not rest until I had shaken you by the hand. It is not the question of money so much, though that would have been a serious loss to me, but it is the saving of my son’s life, and the saving of the honor of our name.”
“I am glad indeed to have been of service, Mr. Cotter, and I trust that you have consented to forgive the folly that he has committed, and which I feel sure will never be repeated.”
“Yes. It was a heavy blow to me, Mr. Thorndyke, when Philip told me; but as he has sworn most solemnly never to touch a card again, and as I feel sure that the lesson cannot but be a useful one to him all his life, I have agreed to say no more about it, and let the matter drop altogether. He has been fortunate to have escaped so easily. He has told me of the noble offer you made to pay his losses if you should not be able to prove that he was being cheated.”
“I was not committing myself heavily,” Mark said with a smile. “I had seen enough to be absolutely certain, and was sure that I should be able to bring it home to them.”
“But it was at a considerable risk to yourself, Mr. Thorndyke. As it was, you had a narrow escape of being shot.”
“Not a very narrow escape,” Mark replied. “With so many men standing round him and their attention called to him, it was certain that he would be seized before he could take aim at me. I had pistols in my pocket, and was prepared to fire in an instant, but I saw at once that there was no occasion for that.”