“How do you know?”
“I’ll tell you. It seems the lead roofs are being repaired at the Admiralty, and the plumbers are walking about where they like. Now I needn’t tell you I’ve had a man or two fishing about among the doorkeepers and so on at the Admiralty, and one of them found a plumber he knew slightly, working on the roof. That plumber happens to be no fool — a bit smarter than the detective-constable, it seems to me, in fact. Anyhow, he seems to have got more out of my man than my man got out of him; and soon after I reached the Yard he turned up, asking to see me. He said he’d heard that a valuable paper was missing (he didn’t know what) from the room with the skylight in the top floor, where the gentleman with the single eye-glass was, and where the safe was let in the wall; and he wanted to know what would be the reward for anybody giving information about it. Of course I couldn’t make any promise, and I gave him to understand that he would have to leave the amount of the reward to the authorities, if his information was worth anything; also, that we were getting to work fast, and that if he wished to be first to give information he’d better be quick about it; but I promised to make a special report of his name and what he had to say if it were useful. And it will be, or I’m vastly mistaken! For just you see here. Our friend, Mr. Telfer, says he put that code safely away at 10.20 in the safe, and that he never went to the safe again till 12.20, when the Controller’s secretary was with him; never went to it for anything whatever, observe. Well, the plumber happened to be near the skylight at half-past eleven, and he is prepared to swear that he saw Mr. Telfer— ‘the gent with the eye-glass,’ as he calls him — go to the safe, unlock it, take out a grey paper, folded lengthwise, with red tape round it, re-lock the safe, and carry that paper out into the corridor! The plumber was kneeling by a brazier, it seems, which was close by the skylight, and he is so certain of the time because he was regulating his watch by Westminster Hall clock, and compared it when the half-hour struck, which was just while Telfer was absent in the corridor with the paper. He was only gone a second or two, and you will remember that Corder saw Mayes leaving the premises within two minutes of that time!”
“Yes!”
“Well, Telfer was back in a second or two, without the paper, and went on with his affairs as before. That’s pretty striking, eh?”
“Yes,” Hewitt answered thoughtfully, “it is.”
“It was a sort of shot in the dark on the part of the plumber, for he knew nothing else — nothing about Telfer legitimately having the keys of the safe, nor any of the particulars we have been told. He merely knew that a paper was missing, and having seen a paper taken out of the safe he got it into his head that he had possibly witnessed the theft; and he kept his knowledge to himself till he could see somebody in authority. Mighty keen, too, about a reward!”
“And now you are having Telfer supervised?”
“I am. Not that we’re likely to get the code from him; that’s passed out, sure enough, in Mayes’s hands — or else his pockets.”
To this confident expression of opinion Hewitt offered no reply, and presently we alighted at his office, eager to learn if Peytral had given the information Hewitt so much desired. Sure enough a telegram was there, and it ran thus:
“On the night you know of, Mayes went first to 37 Raven Street, Blackfriars, then to 8 Norbury Row, Barbican. Message follows.”
“Now we’re at work,” Hewitt said, briskly, “and for a while we part. I shall make a few changes of dress, and go to take a look at 37 Raven Street, Blackfriars. Will you two go on to Norbury Row? You’ll have to be careful, Plummer, and not show yourself. That is where Brett will be useful, since he isn’t known; if anybody is to be seen let it be him. I shall be very careful myself — though I shall have some little disguise; and I fancy I shall not be so likely to be seen as you.”
“What are we to do?” I asked.
“Well, of course, if you see Mayes in the open, grab him instantly. I needn’t tell Plummer that. I think Plummer would naturally seize him on the spot, rush him off to the nearest station and go back with enough men to clear out No. 8 Norbury Row. If you don’t see him you’ll keep an observation, according to Plummer’s discretion. But, unless some exceptional chance occurs, I hope you won’t go rushing in till we communicate with each other — we must work together, and I may have news. My instinct seems to tell me that yours is the right end of the stick, at Barbican. But we must neglect nothing, and that is why I want you to hold on there while I make the necessary examination at the other end. Do you know this Norbury Row, Plummer?”
“I think I know every street and alley in the City,” Plummer answered. “There is a very good publican at the corner of Norbury Row, who’s been useful to the police a score of times. He keeps his eyes open, and I shall be surprised if he can’t give us some information about No. 8, anyhow. Moon’s his name, and the house is ‘The Compasses.’ I shall go there first. And if you’ve any message to send, send it through him. I’ll tell him.”
On the stairs Plummer and I encountered another of his assistants. “I’ve got the cab, sir,” he reported. “Waiting outside now. Took up a fare in Whitehall, opposite the Admiralty, and drove him to Charterhouse Street; got down just by the Meat Market. That’s all the man seems to know.”
Plummer questioned the cabman, and found that as a matter of fact that was all he did know. So, telling him to wait to take us our little journey, we returned and reported his information to Hewitt.
“Just as I expected,” he said, quietly. “He stopped the cab a bit short of his destination, of course, — just as you will, no doubt. There’s not a great deal in the evidence, but it confirms my idea.”
II
We followed Mayes’s example by stopping the cab in Charterhouse Street, and walking the short remaining distance to Barbican. Norbury Row was an obscure street behind it, at the corner of which stood “The Compasses,” the public-house which Plummer had mentioned. We did not venture to show ourselves in Norbury Row, but hastened into the nearest door of “The Compasses,” which chanced to be that of the private bar.
A stout, red-faced, slow-moving man with one eye and a black patch, stood behind the bar. Plummer lifted his finger and pointed quickly toward the bar-parlour; and at the signal the one-eyed man turned with great deliberation and pulled a catch which released the door of that apartment, close at our elbows. We stepped quickly within, and presently the one-eyed man came rolling in by the other door.
“Well, good art’noon, Mr. Plummer, sir,” he said, with a long intonation and a wheeze. “Good art’noon, sir. You’ve bin a stranger lately.”
“Good afternoon, Mr. Moon,” Plummer answered, briskly. “We’ve come for a little information, my friend and I, which I’m sure you’ll give us if you can.”
“All the years I’ve been knowed to the police,” answered Mr. Moon, slower and wheezier as he went on, “I’ve allus give ‘em all the information I could, an’ that’s a fact. Ain’t it, Mr. Plummer?”
“Yes, of course, and we don’t forget it. What we want now — —”
“Allus tell ‘em what — ever I knows,” rumbled Mr. Moon, turning to me, “allus; an’ glad to do it, too. ‘Cause why? Ain’t they the police? Very well then, I tells ‘em. Allus tells ‘em!”
Plummer waited patiently while Mr. Moon stared solemnly at me after this speech. Then, when the patch slowly turned in my direction and the eye in his, he resumed, “We want to know if you know anything about No. 8 Norbury Row?”
“Number eight,” Mr. Moon mused, gazing abstractedly out of the window; “num — ber eight. Ground-floor, Stevens, packing-case maker; first-floor, Hutt, agent in fancy-goods; second-floor, dunno. Name o’ Richardson, bookbinder, on the door, but that’s bin there five or six year now, and it ain’t the same tenant. Richardson’s dead, an’ this one don’t bind no books as I can see. I don’t even remember seein’ him very often. Tallish, darkish sort o’ gent he is, and don’t seem to have many visitors. Well, then there’s the top-floo
r — but I s’pose it’s the same tenant. Richardson used to have it for his workshop. That’s all.”
“Have you got a window we can watch it from?”
Mr. Moon turned ponderously round and without a word led the way to the first floor, puffing enormously on the stairs.
“You can see it from the club-room,” he said at length, “but this ‘ere little place is better.”
He pushed open a door, and we entered a small sitting-room. “That’s the place,” he said, pointing. “There’s a new packing-case a-standing outside now.”
Norbury Row presented an appearance common enough in parts of the city a little way removed from the centre. A street of houses that once had sheltered well-to-do residents had gradually sunk in the world to the condition of tenement-houses, and now was on the upward grade again, being let in floors to the smaller sort of manufacturers, and to such agents and small commercial men as required cheap offices. No. 8 was much like the rest. A packing-case maker had the ground-floor, as Moon had said, and a token of his trade, in the shape of a new packing-case, stood on the pavement. The rest of the building showed nothing distinctive.
“There y’are, gents,” said Mr. Moon, “if you want to watch, you’re welcome, bein’ the p’lice, which I allus does my best for, allus. But you’ll have to excuse me now, ‘cos o’ the bar.”
Mr. Moon stumped off downstairs, leaving Plummer and myself watching at the window.
“Your friend the publican seems very proud of helping the police,” I remarked.
Plummer laughed. “Yes,” he said, “or at any rate, he is anxious we shan’t forget it. You see, it’s in some way a matter of mutual accommodation. We make things as easy as possible for him on licensing days, and as he has a pretty extensive acquaintance among the sort of people we often want to get hold of, he has been able to show his gratitude very handsomely once or twice.”
The house on which our eyes were fixed was a little too far up the street for us to see perfectly through the window of the second-floor, though we could see enough to indicate that it was furnished as an office. We agreed that the unknown second-floor tenant was more likely to be our customer, or connected with him, than either of the others. Still, we much desired a nearer view, and presently, since the coast seemed clear, Plummer announced his intention of taking one.
He left me at the post of observation, and presently I saw him lounging along on the other side of the way, keeping close to the houses, so as to escape observation from the upper windows. He took a good look at the names on the door-post of No. 8, and presently stepped within.
I waited five or six minutes, and then saw him returning as he had come.
“It’s the top floors we want,” he said, when he rejoined me in Mr. Moon’s sitting-room. “The packing-case maker is genuine enough, and very busy. So is the fancy-goods agent. I went in, seeing the door wide open, and found the agent, a little, shop-walkery sort of chap, hard at work with his clerk among piles of cardboard boxes. I wouldn’t go further, in case I were spotted. Do you think you’d be cool enough to do it without arousing suspicion? Mayes doesn’t know you, you see. What do you think? We don’t want to precipitate matters till we hear from Hewitt, but on the other hand I don’t want to sit still as long as anything can be ascertained. You might ask a question about book-binding.”
“Of course,” I said. “If you will let me I’ll go at once — glad of the chance to get a peep. I’ll bespeak a quotation for binding and lettering a thousand octavos in paste grain, on behalf of some convenient firm of publishers. That would be technical enough, I think?”
I took my hat and walked out as Plummer had done, though, of course, I approached the door of No. 8 with less caution. The packing-case maker’s men were hammering away merrily, and as I mounted the stairs I saw the little fancy-goods agent among his cardboard boxes, just as Plummer had said. The upper part of the house was a silent contrast to the busy lower floors, and as I arrived at the next landing I was surprised to see the door ajar.
I pushed boldly in, and found myself alone in a good-sized room plainly fitted as an office. There were two windows looking on the street, and one at the back, more than half concealed behind a ground glass partition or screen. I stepped across and looked out of this window. It looked on a narrow space, or well, of plain brick wall, containing nothing but a ladder, standing in one corner. And the only other window giving on this narrow square space was in the opposite wall, but much lower, on the ground level.
I saw these things in a single glance, and then I turned — to find myself face to face with a tallish, thin, active man, with a pale, shaven, ascetic face, dark hair, and astonishingly quick glittering black eyes. He stood just within the office door, to which he must have come without a sound, looking at me with a mechanical smile of inquiry, while his eyes searched me with a portentous keenness.
“Oh,” I said, with the best assumption of carelessness I could command, “I was looking for you, Mr. Richardson. Do you care to give a quotation for binding at per thousand crown octavo volumes in paste grain, plain, with lettering on back?”
“No,” answered the man with the eyes, “I don’t; I’m afraid my carelessness has led you into a mistake. I am not Richardson the bookbinder. He was my predecessor in this office, and I have neglected to paint out his name on the door-post.”
I hastened to apologise. “I am sorry to have intruded,” I said. “I found the door ajar and so came in. You see the publishing season is beginning, and our regular binders are full of work, so that we have to look elsewhere. Good-day!”
“Good-day,” the keen man responded, turning to allow me to pass through the door. “I’m sorry I cannot be of service to you — on this occasion.”
From first to last his eyes had never ceased to search me, and now as I descended the stairs I could feel that they were fixed on me still.
I took a turn about the houses, in order not to be observed going direct to “The Compasses,” and entered that house by way of the private bar, as before.
“That is Mayes, and no other,” said Plummer, when I had made my report and described the man with the eyes. “I’ve seen him twice, once with his beard and once without. The question now is, whether we hadn’t best sail in straight away and collar him. But there’s the window at the back, and a ladder, I think you said. Can he reach it?”
“I think he might — easily.”
“And perhaps there’s the roof, since he’s got the top floor too. Not good enough without some men to surround the house. We must go gingerly over this. One thing to find out is, what is the building behind? Ah, how I wish Mr. Hewitt were here now! If we don’t hear from him soon we must send a message. But we mustn’t lose sight of No. 8 for a moment.”
There was a thump at the sitting-room door, and Mr. Moon came puffing in and shouldered himself confidentially against Plummer. “Bloke downstairs wants to see you,” he said, in a hoarse grunt that was meant for a low whisper. “Twigged you outside, I think, an’ says he’s got somethink partickler to tell yer. I believe ‘e’s a ‘nark’; I see him with one o’ your chaps the other day.”
“I’ll go,” Plummer said to me hurriedly. “Plainly somebody’s spotted me in the street, and I may as well hear him.”
I knew very well, of course, what Moon meant by a ‘nark.’ A ‘nark’ is an informer, a spy among criminals who sells the police whatever information he can scrape up. Could it be possible that this man had anything to tell about Mayes? It was scarcely likely, and I made up my mind that Plummer was merely being detained by some tale of a petty local crime.
But in a few minutes he returned with news of import. “This fellow is most valuable,” he said. “He knows a lot about Mayes, whom, of course, he calls by another name; but the identity’s certain. He saw me looking in at No. 8, he says, and guessed I must be after him. He seems to have wondered at Mayes’s mysterious movements for a long time, and so kept his eye on him and made inquiries. It seems that Mayes sometimes uses a ba
ck way, through the window you saw on the opposite side of the little area, by way of that ladder you mentioned. It’s quite plain this fellow knows something, from the particulars about that ladder. He wants half a sovereign to show me the way through a stable passage behind and point out where our man can be trapped to a certainty. It’ll be a cheap ten shillingsworth, and we mustn’t waste time. If Hewitt comes, tell him not to move till I come back or send a message, which I can easily do by this chap I’m going with. And be sure to keep your eye on the front door of No. 8 while I’m gone.”
The thing had begun to grow exciting, and the fascination of the pursuit took full possession of my imagination. I saw Plummer pass across the end of the street in company with a shuffling, out-at-elbows-looking man with dirty brown whiskers, and I set myself to watch the door of the staircase by the packing-case maker’s with redoubled attention, hoping fervently that Mayes might emerge, and so give me the opportunity of capping the extraordinary series of occurrences connected with the Red Triangle by myself seizing and handing him over to the police.
So I waited and watched for something near another quarter of an hour. Then there came another thump at the door, and once more I beheld Mr. Moon.
“Man askin’ for you in the bar, sir,” he said.
“Asking for me?” I asked, a little astonished. “By name?”
“Mr. Brett, ‘e said, sir. He’s the same chap, you know. He’s got a message from Inspector Plummer, ‘e says.”
“May he come up here?” I asked, mindful of maintaining my watch.
“Certainly, sir, if you like. I’ll bring him.”
Presently the shuffling man with the dirty whiskers presented himself. He was a shifty, villainous-looking fellow of middle height, looking a “nark” all over. He pulled off his cap and delivered his message in a rum-scented whisper. “Inspector Plummer says the front way don’t matter now,” he said. “‘E can cop ‘im fair the other way if you’ll go round to him at once. If Mr. Martin Hewitt’s here ‘e’d rather ‘ave ‘im, but on’y one’s to come now.”
Delphi Complete Works of Arthur Morrison Page 68