The Bulldog Drummond Megapack

by H. C. McNeile

  “It’s the only possible chance,” he said to himself, “and if it’s you or me, laddie, I guess it’s got to be you.”

  With a quick heave he jerked the man off his feet, and lifted him up till his head was above the level of his own. Then clutching him tight, he commenced to climb. His own head was bent down, somewhere in the regions of the man’s back, and he took no notice of the feebly kicking legs.

  Then at last he reached the fourth step, and gave a final adjustment to his semiconscious burden. He felt that the hall below was full of men, and suddenly Peterson’s voice came to him out of the darkness.

  “That is four, Captain Drummond. What about the fifth step?”

  “A very good-looking one as far as I remember,” answered Hugh. “I’m just going to get on to it.”

  “That should prove entertaining,” remarked Peterson. “I’m just going to switch on the current.”

  Hugh pressed his head even lower in the man’s back and lifted him up another three inches.

  “How awfully jolly!” he murmured. “I hope the result will please you.”

  “I’d stand quite still if I were you,” said Peterson suavely. “Just listen.”

  As Hugh had gambled on, the performance was designed to frighten. Instead of that, something hit the neck of the man he was holding with such force that it wrenched him clean out of his arms. Then came the clang beside him, and with a series of ominous thuds a body rolled down the stairs into the hall below.

  “You fool.” He heard Lakington’s voice, shrill with anger. “You’ve killed him. Switch on the light…”

  But before the order could be carried out Hugh had disappeared, like a great cat, into the darkness of the passage above. It was neck or nothing; he had at the most a minute to get clear. As luck would have it the first room he darted into was empty, and he flung up the window and peered out.

  A faint, watery moon showed him a twenty-foot drop on to the grass, and without hesitation he flung his legs over the sill. Below a furious hubbub was going on; steps were already rushing up the stairs. He heard Peterson’s calm voice, and Lakington’s hoarse with rage, shouting inarticulate orders. And at that moment something prompted him to look upwards.

  It was enough—that one look; he had always been mad, he always would be. It was a dormer window, and to an active man access to the roof was easy. Without an instant’s hesitation he abandoned all thoughts of retreat; and when two excited men rushed into the room he was firmly ensconced, with his legs astride of the ridge of the window, not a yard from their heads.

  Securely hidden in the shadow he watched the subsequent proceedings with genial toleration. A raucous bellow from the two men announced that they had discovered his line of escape; and in half a minute the garden was full of hurrying figures. One, calm and impassive, his identity betrayed only by the inevitable cigar, stood by the garden door, apparently taking no part in the game; Lakington, blind with fury, was running round in small circles, cursing everyone impartially.

  “The car is still there.” A man came up to Peterson, and Hugh heard the words distinctly.

  “Then he’s probably over at Benton’s house. I will go and see.”

  Hugh watched the thick-set, massive figure stroll down towards the wicket gate, and he laughed gently to himself. Then he grew serious again, and with a slight frown he pulled out his watch and peered at it. Half-past one…two more hours before dawn. And in those two hours he wanted to explore the house from on top; especially he wanted to have a look at the mysterious central room of which Phyllis had spoken to him—the room where Lakington kept his treasures. But until the excited throng below went indoors, it was unsafe to move. Once out of the shadow, anyone would be able to see him crawling over the roof in the moonlight.

  At times the thought of the helpless man for whose death he had in one way been responsible recurred to him, and he shook his head angrily. It had been necessary, he realised: you can carry someone upstairs in a normal house without him having his neck broken—but still… And then he wondered who he was. It had been one of the men who sat round the table—of that he was tolerably certain. But which…? Was it the frightened bunny, or the Russian, or the gentleman with the bloodshot eye? The only comfort was that whoever it had been, the world would not be appreciably the poorer for his sudden decease. The only regret was that it hadn’t been dear Henry… He had a distaste for Henry which far exceeded his dislike of Peterson.

  “He’s not over there.” Peterson’s voice came to him from below. “And we’ve wasted time enough as it is.”

  The men had gathered together in a group, just below where Hugh was sitting, evidently awaiting further orders.

  “Do you mean to say we’ve lost the young swine again?” said Lakington angrily.

  “Not lost—merely mislaid,” murmured Peterson. “The more I see of him, the more do I admire his initiative.”

  Lakington snorted.

  “It was that damned fool Ivolsky’s own fault,” he snarled; “why didn’t he keep still as he was told to do?”

  “Why, indeed?” returned Peterson, his cigar glowing red. “And I’m afraid we shall never know. He is very dead.” He turned towards the house. “That concludes the entertainment, gentlemen, for tonight. I think you can all go to bed.”

  “There are two of you watching the car, aren’t there?” demanded Lakington.

  “Rossiter and Le Grange,” answered a voice.

  Peterson paused by the door.

  “My dear Lakington, it’s quite unnecessary. You underrate that young man…”

  He disappeared into the house, and the others followed slowly. For the time being Hugh was safe, and with a sigh of relief he stretched his cramped limbs and lay back against the sloping roof. If only he had dared to light a cigarette…

  III

  It was half an hour before Drummond decided that it was safe to start exploring. The moon still shone fitfully through the trees, but since the two car watchers were near the road on the other side of the house, there was but little danger to be apprehended from them. First he took off his shoes, and tying the laces together, he slung them round his neck. Then, as silently as he could, he commenced to scramble upwards.

  It was not an easy operation; one slip and nothing could have stopped him slithering down and finally crashing into the garden below, with a broken leg, at the very least, for his pains. In addition, there was the risk of dislodging a slate, an unwise proceeding in a house where most of the occupants slept with one eye open. But at last he got his hands over the ridge of the roof, and in another moment he was sitting straddle-wise across it.

  The house, he discovered, was built on a peculiar design. The ridge on which he sat continued at the same height all round the top of the roof, and formed, roughly, the four sides of a square. In the middle the roof sloped down to a flat space from which stuck up a glass structure, the top of which was some five or six feet below his level. Around it was a space quite large enough to walk in comfort; in fact, on two sides there was plenty of room for a deck chair. The whole area was completely screened from view, except to anyone in an aeroplane. And what struck him still further was that there was no window that he could see anywhere on the inside of the roof. In fact, it was absolutely concealed and private. Incidentally, the house had originally been built by a gentleman of doubtful sanity, who spent his life observing the spots in Jupiter through a telescope, and having plunged himself and his family into complete penury, sold the house and observatory complete for what he could get. Lakington, struck with its possibilities for his own hobby, bought it on the spot; and from that time Jupiter spotted undisturbed.

  With the utmost caution Hugh lowered himself to the full extent of his arms; then he let himself slip the last two or three feet on to the level space around the glass roof. He had no doubt in his mind that he was actually above the secret room, and, on tip-toe, he stole round looking for some spot from which he could get a glimpse below. At the first inspection he thought
his time had been wasted; every pane of glass was frosted, and in addition there seemed to be a thick blind of some sort drawn across from underneath, of the same type as is used by photographers for altering the light.

  A sudden rattle close to him made him start violently, only to curse himself for a nervous ass the next moment, and lean forward eagerly. One of the blinds had been released from inside the room, and a pale, diffused light came filtering out into the night from the side of the glass roof. He was still craning backwards and forwards to try and find some chink through which he could see, when, with a kind of uncanny deliberation, one of the panes of glass slowly opened. It was worked on a ratchet from inside, and Hugh bowed his thanks to the unseen operator below. Then he leant forward cautiously, and peered in…

  The whole room was visible to him, and his jaw tightened as he took in the scene. In an arm-chair, smoking as unconcernedly as ever, sat Peterson. He was reading a letter, and occasionally underlining some point with a pencil. Beside him on a table was a big ledger, and every now and then he would turn over a few pages and make an entry. But it was not Peterson on whom the watcher above was concentrating his attention; it was Lakington—and the thing beside him on the sofa.

  Lakington was bending over a long bath full of some light-brown liquid from which a faint vapour was rising. He was in his shirt sleeves, and on his hands he wore what looked like rubber gloves, stretching right up to his elbows. After a while he dipped a test-tube into the liquid, and going over to a shelf he selected a bottle and added a few drops to the contents of the tube. Apparently satisfied with the result, he returned to the bath and shook in some white powder. Immediately the liquid commenced to froth and bubble, and at the same moment Peterson stood up.

  “Are you ready?” he said, taking off his coat and picking up a pair of gloves similar to those the other was wearing.

  “Quite,” answered Lakington abruptly. “We’ll get him in.”

  They approached the sofa; and Hugh, with a kind of fascinated horror, forced himself to look. For the thing that lay there was the body of the dead Russian, Ivolsky.

  The two men picked him up and, having carried the body to the bath, they dropped it into the fuming liquid. Then, as if it was the most normal thing in the world, they peeled off their long gloves and stood watching. For a minute or so nothing happened, and then gradually the body commenced to disappear. A faint, sickly smell came through the open window, and Hugh wiped the sweat off his forehead. It was too horrible, the hideous deliberation of it all. And whatever vile tortures the wretched man had inflicted on others in Russia, yet it was through him that his dead body lay there in the bath, disappearing slowly and relentlessly…

  Lakington lit a cigarette and strolled over to the fire-place.

  “Another five minutes should be enough,” he remarked. “Damn that cursed soldier!”

  Peterson laughed gently, and resumed the study of his ledger.

  “To lose one’s temper with a man, my dear Henry, is a sign of inferiority. But it certainly is a nuisance that Ivolsky is dead. He could talk more unmitigated drivel to the minute than all the rest of ’em put together… I really don’t know who to put in the Midland area.”

  He leaned back in his chair and blew out a cloud of smoke. The light shone on the calm, impassive face; and with a feeling of wonder that was never far absent from his mind when he was with Peterson, Hugh noted the high, clever forehead, the firmly moulded nose and chin, the sensitive, humorous mouth. The man lying back in the chair watching the blue smoke curling up from his cigar might have been a great lawyer or an eminent divine; some well-known statesman, perhaps, or a Napoleon of finance. There was power in every line of his figure, in every movement of his hands. He might have reached to the top of any profession he had cared to follow… Just as he had reached the top in his present one… Some kink in the brain, some little cog wrong in the wonderful mechanism, and a great man had become a great criminal. Hugh looked at the bath: the liquid was almost clear.

  “You know my feelings on the subject,” remarked Lakington, taking a red velvet box out of a drawer in the desk. He opened it lovingly, and Hugh saw the flash of diamonds. Lakington let the stones run through his hands, glittering with a thousand flames, while Peterson watched him contemptuously.

  “Baubles,” he said scornfully. “Pretty baubles. What will you get for them?”

  “Ten, perhaps fifteen thousand,” returned the other. “But it’s not the money I care about; it’s the delight in having them, and the skill required to get them.”

  Peterson shrugged his shoulders.

  “Skill which would give you hundreds of thousands if you turned it into proper channels.”

  Lakington replaced the stones, and threw the end of his cigarette into the grate.

  “Possibly, Carl, quite possibly. But it boils down to this, my friend, that you like the big canvas with broad effects; I like the miniature and the well-drawn etching.”

  “Which makes us a very happy combination,” said Peterson, rising and walking over to the bath. “The pearls, don’t forget, are your job. The big thing”—he turned to the other, and a trace of excitement came into his voice—“the big thing is mine.” Then with his hands in his pockets he stood staring at the brown liquid. “Our friend is nearly cooked, I think.”

  “Another two or three minutes,” said Lakington, joining him. “I must confess I pride myself on the discovery of that mixture. Its only drawback is that it makes murder too easy…”

  The sound of the door opening made both men swing round instantly; then Peterson stepped forward with a smile. “Back, my dear? I hardly expected you so soon.”

  Irma came a little way into the room, and stopped with a sniff of disgust.

  “What a horrible smell!” she remarked. “What on earth have you been doing?”

  “Disposing of a corpse,” said Lakington. “It’s nearly finished.” The girl threw off her opera cloak, and coming forward, peered over the edge of the bath.

  “It’s not my ugly soldier?” she cried.

  “Unfortunately not,” returned Lakington grimly; and Peterson laughed.

  “Henry is most annoyed, Irma. The irrepressible Drummond has scored again.”

  In a few words he told the girl what had happened, and she clapped her hands together delightedly.

  “Assuredly I shall have to marry that man,” she cried. “He is quite the least boring individual I have met in this atrocious country.” She sat down and lit a cigarette. “I saw Walter tonight.”

  “Where?” demanded Peterson quickly. “I thought he was in Paris.”

  “He was this morning. He came over especially to see you. They want you there for a meeting at the Ritz.”

  Peterson frowned.

  “It’s most inconvenient,” he remarked with a shade of annoyance in his voice. “Did he say why?”

  “Amongst other things I think they’re uneasy about the American,” she answered. “My dear man, you can easily slip over for a day.”

  “Of course I can,” said Peterson irritably; “but that doesn’t alter the fact that it’s inconvenient. Things will be shortly coming to a head here, and I want to be on the spot. However—” He started to walk up and down the room, frowning thoughtfully.

  “Your fish is hooked, mon ami,” continued the girl to Lakington. “He has already proposed three times; and he has introduced me to a dreadful-looking woman of extreme virtue, who has adopted me as her niece for the great occasion.”

  “What great occasion?” asked Lakington, looking up from the bath.

  “Why, his coming of age,” cried the girl. “I am to go to Laidley Towers as an honoured guest of the Duchess of Lampshire.”

  “What do you think of that, my friend? The old lady will be wearing pearls and all complete, in honour of the great day, and I shall be one of the admiring house party.”

  “How do you know she’ll have them in the house?” said Lakington.

  “Because dear Freddie has told
me so,” answered the girl. “I don’t think you’re very bright tonight, Henry. When the young Poohba comes of age, naturally his devoted maternal parent will sport her glad rags. Incidentally, the tenants are going to present him with a loving cup, or a baby giraffe, or something. You might like to annex that too.” She blew two smoke rings and then laughed.

  “Freddie is really rather a dear at times. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who is so nearly an idiot without being one. Still,” she repeated thoughtfully, “he’s rather a dear.”

  Lakington turned a handle underneath the bath, and the liquid, now clear and still, commenced to sink rapidly. Fascinated, Hugh watched the process; in two minutes the bath was empty—a human body had completely disappeared without leaving a trace. It seemed to him as if he must have been dreaming, as if the events of the whole night had been part of some strange jumbled nightmare. And then, having pinched himself to make sure he was awake, he once more glued his eyes to the open space of the window.

  Lakington was swabbing out the bath with some liquid on the end of a mop; Peterson, his chin sunk on his chest, was still pacing slowly up and down; the girl, her neck and shoulders gleaming white in the electric light, was lighting a second cigarette from the stump of the first. After a while Lakington finished his cleaning operations and put on his coat.

  “What,” he asked curiously, “does he think you are?”

  “A charming young girl,” answered Irma demurely, “whose father lost his life in the war, and who at present ekes out a precarious existence in a government office. At least, that’s what he told Lady Frumpley—she’s the woman of unassailable virtue. She was profoundly sentimental and scents a romance, in addition to being a snob and scenting a future duke, to say nothing of a future duchess. By the mercy of Allah she’s on a committee with his mother for distributing brown-paper under-clothes to destitute Belgians, and so Freddie wangled an invite for her. Voilà tout.”