“Lodging at a farm, is he? What’s he doing that for? Did he tell you?”
“No, I didn’t see him. I only saw his hat.”
“A sort of cowboy’s hat, bought at the beginning of the century. Why, that’s ‘Poker’ all right. I’ll go down to Portsmouth right away, but what shall I do with him when I’ve found him, I wonder. The man’s out for blood.”
“You might have a straight talk to him on the journey up—tell him the difference between London and Chicago in the matter of shooting people.”
“I can see that you don’t know Poker Moore if you think that talking would knock sense into him. When he’s fixed his mind on a thing, there’s no turning him by any amount of talking, and he’s got his mind fixed on shooting a long-haired blighter of a politician. Anyway, I’ll run down by an early train to-morrow morning and bring him back with me if I can.”
Jim Milsom lunched early in a Portsmouth hotel, ordered a taxi, and drove out to Thornhill Farm at half-past one. Telling the taxi to wait in the lane, he rapped loudly at the door, and brought Mrs. Manton to it at a run. At the sight of a young, well-dressed Londoner she assumed a kittenish demeanour and asked what she could do for him.
“I’m told that you have a friend of mine staying here, madam—a gentleman named Moore. I should like to see him.”
“You are just too late. Mr. Moore left me yesterday morning, and I was very sorry to lose him. He was a charming man.”
“You found him charming? A brilliant talker? What did he do all day?”
“He sat in his room mostly—practising card-tricks, I think.”
“Aha! That’s my friend all right. Practising card-tricks? Did he ever show you some of his conjuring tricks? When he does them professionally it is apt to come expensive for the audience. Where has he gone?”
“To Germany, I understood. He had a telegram the morning he left, and he came downstairs with his bag and said, ‘Good-bye, Mrs. Manton. I’m sorry I can’t stay longer. I’m off.’ ‘You haven’t had any bad news, I hope?’ I said. ‘No, I’ve had good news. There’s a man I want to see badly, and he’s in Germany. What is there to pay for my board and lodging?’ I told him, and he paid up like a gentleman. Perhaps you’d like to see his room.”
Jim Milsom had no burning desire to see his room, but he reflected that there was always the possibility of picking up something left behind. “I should like to see it very much,” he said.
The room she conducted him to almost shouted “Poker Moore” at him. It was a tiny room, barely furnished. The bed had not been made; cigarette-ends littered the floor; a dirty pack of cards had been dropped in confusion in the corner. Milsom looked about him with distaste, and his eye lighted upon a pink-coloured ball of paper—a crumpled telegram. He slipped it into his pocket, unnoticed by his hostess, who was profuse in her apologies for the state of the room.
“That girl is a lazy slut,” she was saying. “Fancy her going off without tidying the room. I shall have to scold her properly. I suppose you wouldn’t care to take the room for a few days. I should do my best to make you comfortable. With my poor husband in hospital, and the farm and all to run, a paying guest would make all the difference.”
“I wish I could,” said Jim Milsom mendaciously, “but I’ve got to get back to town. I’m real sorry to have missed my friend. Good-bye!”
Safe from observation in the taxi he smoothed out the telegram and read:
“Address of man you seek Hotel Astoria Stuttgart Germany.”
The message was unsigned, but the office of issue was Charing Cross.
So, someone who was in Poker’s confidence had thought it worth while to telegraph the whereabouts of Ralph Lewis, knowing, of course, that this would at once remove Poker from the farm in the wilds of Portsmouth, where he spent his days practising card-tricks! But that was not the only mystery. What arguments could have been used to prevail upon Poker to immure himself in that ghastly little farm-house for a week or more? He could not have been frightened into it, for Poker was a man who did not know what fear was.
Finding no solution of these problems in the familiar English landscape racing past the window of his compartment, Jim Milsom decided that the man to see was the pleasant-spoken detective-sergeant who had broken up his bridge-party at the club on the previous day. His first act on getting back to his flat was to look up the telephone number of New Scotland Yard and ask for Detective-Sergeant Richardson. Some moments passed before that functionary could be found; the instrument clicked and he heard the competent and soothing voice he knew.
“Who’s speaking?”
“James Milsom. Is that you, Sergeant Richardson? Look here, I’m just back from Portsmouth. I went down there on a fool’s errand.”
“You mean that the man who was there wasn’t your friend, sir?”
“There was no one there. My friend left the place yesterday morning in response to a telegram.”
“Indeed, sir?” There was a note of deep concern in the tone.
“I have the telegram here to show you. Hadn’t you better come along to my flat right now?” He gave the address.
“I’ll start right away, sir.”
Ten minutes later the two men were seated in Milsom’s luxuriously furnished sitting-room with the telegram before them. Richardson had declined any liquid refreshment, but had accepted one of Milsom’s excellent cigarettes.
“You see where the telegram was sent from—Charing Cross?”
“Yes, sir, I do.”
“I guess that you know who sent it, but you wouldn’t tell me if I asked you. But why Stuttgart?”
“I understand that Mr. Vance, the gentleman who interests himself in prisons, is now in Stuttgart, and that Mr. Ralph Lewis intended to join him there.”
“Oh, then the blighter who sent that wire must have known that. Look here, sergeant. Something must be done about this at once or we shall be having paragraphs in the papers headed, ‘Shooting of an English M.P. by an American in Germany.’ I suppose that if you were to go out to Stuttgart and put the German police wise about Poker Moore, you could get them to put him over the frontier.”
“Perhaps, sir; but if I may suggest it, I think that it would be better if you went. This man, Moore, knows you and would be more inclined to listen to you than he would to a police officer. He might tell you how he came to be at Thornhill Farm and who sent that telegram. It would help us a great deal.”
“Oh, well, I don’t know that I mind going. I should have to cut one or two engagements, but nothing that really matters. I’ll have to go round to Cooks’ and find out about the ticket and the trains, and all that.”
“I can do all that for you, sir, this evening, and ring you up. Would you be ready to start to-morrow morning?”
“To-night if you like.”
“Very good, sir. I’ll let you know the best evening and morning boat-trains in less than an hour. May I take this telegram away with me?”
“Yes. I don’t want it.”
‘And if you are in time, and you find Moore at the hotel, will you send a telegram to Superintendent Foster at the Yard? Good night, sir.”
Richardson found the tourist office in the process of putting on its curl-papers for the night, but on explaining to one of the seniors who he was and what he wanted, a clerk was kept back to attend to him. He used the firm’s telephone to communicate the time-table to Jim Milsom. It was then too late to trace the sender of the telegram to Moore: that part of the inquiry had to stand over until the morning. He returned to the office to make his report to Foster and to write up his diary.
Superintendent Foster was not alone: a gentleman was sitting in a chair with its back to the door a gentleman whose back looked familiar.
“Oh, there you are, Richardson! I’ve been trying to get hold of you for the last half-hour.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I had to leave the office on an urgent call.”
“You can tell me about that presently. You know this gentleman—Mr. Meredith
, who defended Lieutenant Eccles in that case in Somersetshire.” The occupant of the chair turned round and greeted Richardson.
Foster continued, “Mr. Meredith has received information to the effect that Mr. Ralph Lewis is not in Stuttgart and has very kindly come down to tell us so, though I must confess that personally I don’t know that the information concerns us at all.”
“Yes, sir, it does. The man they call Poker Moore has just gone to Stuttgart to meet him there.”
“The deuce he has!” exclaimed Meredith.
“Yes, sir, and your friend, Mr. Milsom, is starting this evening to try to bring him back.”
“You take my breath away. I saw Mr. Milsom yesterday morning and he said nothing about it.”
“It all happened rather suddenly, sir. May I ask how you know that Mr. Lewis is not in Stuttgart?”
“Mr. Vance’s lady secretary—I think you know her—told me that she had had a telegram from Mr. Vance to that effect. It seems that letters addressed to Lewis had been sent to his care—I suppose on Mr. Lewis’s own instructions—and Mr. Vance was put to the trouble of having them sent back. He telegraphed to her to stop it if she could.”
“Does she know where he is, sir?”
“No; that is her difficulty. He seems to have told the servant at his flat that he was going straight out to Mr. Vance. He had his luggage labelled to Stuttgart. He must have changed his plans on the way.”
“All the better, sir, as things have turned out. Mr. Milsom has promised to telegraph to my super-intendent when he gets out there.”
“Well, Mr. Foster, I must be going. Let me know at once if I can be of any use to you.”
When the two police officers were alone Foster stared at his subordinate in mock severity. “Well, young man, you seem to have been making the pace.”
“I couldn’t help it, sir. You were out of the office when Mr. Milsom telephoned to me to come to his flat. He was just back from Portsmouth. He had been down there, but his friend, Poker Moore, had already left for Stuttgart in response to a telegram, his landlady said. Fortunately he found the telegram in his room, crumpled up on the floor. This is it.”
Foster looked first at the date and the office of issue before reading the text. “We’ll have to get to the bottom of this. I suppose you didn’t have time to trace the telegram in the Central Office?”
“No, sir; it was too late. I thought of doing it the first thing to-morrow morning.
“Yes, the sooner the better. And now, I’ve a bit of news for you. Our registry have had a reply from the Paris police. They say that if an officer will go over and point out the man we want they will send an officer with him to the place frequented by Englishmen of the criminal class, and they will take the usual steps for pushing him out of the country. I’ve never known them so obliging.”
Chapter Fifteen
SUPERINTENDENT FOSTER’S first concern was to secure Lieutenant Eccles as a travelling companion to Paris, for he alone was in a position to identify the man who had posed as a detective and carried him away in a stolen car. He called early at the house in Hampstead, and was relieved to hear that the gentleman had not yet gone out. “He has to rejoin his ship to-morrow, sir,” whispered the maid as she showed him into the library.
This threatened to be a complication if it was true, but Foster knew ways of bringing gentle pressure to bear on the naval authorities in such cases.
“Hullo, superintendent, good morning,” said Eccles, bursting into the room. “Come to say goodbye to me before my leave is up?”
“No, Mr. Eccles. I’ve called to ask you how you would like a trip to Paris at the public expense.”
“To Paris? You’re too late. My leave is up to-morrow.”
“We might get it extended if you’d like to come to Paris.”
“Now you’re talking. What do you want me to do there?”
“Identify that bogus detective who carried you off in a stolen car.”
“I’d cross the world at my own expense to do that, provided that I was left alone with him for five minutes.”
“I can’t promise you that satisfaction, I’m afraid, but wouldn’t it be worth your while to know that he had been laid by the heels through your identification? In any case, you would have time to look round Paris a bit while I’m arranging things with the Paris police.”
“Right! You may count me in. When do we go?”
“By the boat-train to-morrow if I can arrange for the extension of your leave in time.”
Like most of his colleagues, Foster knew how to proceed with the Admiralty. Armed with a letter addressed to the Secretary by Sir William Lorimer, the head of his department, he called on the Director of Personal Services and explained that the matter was urgent in the interests of justice; that Lieutenant Eccles, who was due to rejoin his ship, the Dauntless, at Portsmouth on the following day, was wanted in Paris as a witness for the Crown to identify a prisoner who was to be arrested by the French police, and that no other witness was available. He asked for an extension of his leave for four days, and that he might be permitted to leave for Paris by the boat-train on the following morning. The Director kept the letter to be fed into the big machine, and gave covering authority.
Ronald Eccles proved to be a lively travelling companion. He had never been in France before, but he spoke a schoolboy French which fell somewhat short of Foster’s. Everything he saw on the rather dreary journey to Rouen amused him, but he was eager to know exactly what they were to do on reaching Paris.
“We will take rooms at the Hotel Terminus, St. Lazare,” said Foster. “Then, having deposited our luggage, I shall take you to the Prefecture de Police on the Quai where we will get hold of our man, and then we’ll be guided by him. He knows the haunts of the man we are looking for. You’ll see some of the seamy side of night-life in Paris.”
“Where shall we dine? I’m getting hungry.”
“At a little restaurant I know of in the Boulevard. I shall have to ask the French Commissaire to dine with us.”
“That’s all right, but I don’t suppose that your little pub goes in for decent cooking. Why shouldn’t we do ourselves well for once—at my expense, of course? Where can we go where they do you well?”
“There are hundreds of places to suit every pocket. I think that our best plan would be to let our Commissaire choose for us.”
In the gloomy old building attached to the Palais de Justice, where Fouché founded the organization which became famous in serving many masters—Royal, Imperial and Republican—Foster presented his letter addressed to the Police Judiciaire to the huissier in dress-clothes, and they were shown into a waiting-room.
“They’ll keep us waiting for half an hour, Mr. Eccles, if I know them,” said Foster gloomily. “They seem to have no method of filing papers; the wonder is that they ever get anything done, but they do. Of course you’ve never seen a French law court. I’ll speak to the huissier.”
That official seemed quite indifferent to what they chose to do, and Foster led Ronald Eccles through a swing door into a lofty corridor where briefless barristers of both sexes were wandering up and down in conversation. Both sexes wore the black biretta and gown of the French Bar. The Englishmen peeped into one of the assize courts where a criminal case was in progress, and three judges were sitting in a row on a high dais, wearing much the same head-dress as the counsel who sat in rows below them. Ronny Eccles pronounced the effect as far gloomier than the British courts, where the wigs and the judges’ robes imparted a touch of colour.
They returned to their waiting-room in the Police Judiciaire and found the huissier impatiently awaiting them.
“The second door on the left, messieurs. Ask for Commissaire Bigot.” And he returned to his perusal of Paris Soir.
“Are these blighters always like this?” inquired Eccles, thinking of the contrast to the manners of officers from Scotland Yard.
“Generally. It depends on what public office you go to, but the French functionary is p
oorly paid, and he gives as little for his pay as he can.”
Peter knocked at the door indicated and pushed it open. Three or four plain-clothes officers were sitting at a long, bare table, with files of papers stacked on the dirty floor beside their chairs.
“Commissaire Bigot?” inquired Foster.
A burly, good-natured-looking ruffian rose from his seat and came forward smiling. “Bigot, monsieur, at your service.”
They shook hands.
“You are perhaps the Commissaire charged with the supervision of foreigners in Paris, monsieur?”
“Yes, monsieur. I have had the pleasure of seeing Monsieur before, but not this gentleman. Is he too a police officer from your famous Scotland Yard?”
“No, monsieur. He is a naval officer who has come over to identify the man we are seeking, in case we find him. We do not even know his name, or indeed that he is in Paris at all, but we have reason to think that he may be.”
M. Bigot seemed a little surprised at this announcement, but he said, “Messieurs, this evening I shall take you to a certain bar which is the meeting-place of all the doubtful foreigners in Paris—particularly the English. It is an amusing place, but one in which it is wise to button up one’s pockets.”
“At what hour ought we to visit it?”
“At any hour after nine. We shall not visit it twice, for after they have seen me the bar empties itself.”
“Good! Then there is time for us to dine together before our visit. My friend here desires to offer us his hospitality for dinner, and desires to taste the cooking for which Paris is so famous. What restaurant do you recommend?”
“There are restaurants and restaurants, monsieur. I do not recommend the most expensive. In them your money goes in paying for the uniforms of the staff, but I know one where the charges are moderate, but the chef is an artist. In days gone by he was chef to the Cardinal Rampolla, and cardinals are good judges of what is good for the stomach. Shall I take you there?”
Foster translated the proposal to Eccles, who voted for the cardinal’s ex-artist. It being nearly seven o’clock, they took a taxi, which landed them on an ill-lighted quai scarce a stone’s-throw from Notre Dame.
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