Red Aces

by Edgar Wallace

  “They’ve asked me to rejoin the board as chairman. What is the matter, Kenny?”

  Kenneth was sitting on the opposite side of the table, and his father had seen his face.

  Briefly he told his story, and George McKay listened without comment until he had finished.

  “Wentford, eh? He is going to be a curse to me to the end of my days.”

  Kenneth gasped his amazement.

  “Did you know him?”

  Old George nodded.

  “I knew him all right!” he said grimly. “Reeder was here this morning–”

  “About me?” asked the other quickly.

  “About me,” said his father. “I rather gathered that he suspected me of the murder.”

  Kenneth came to his feet, horrified.

  “You? But he’s mad! Why should you–”

  Mr McKay smiled dourly.

  “There was quite a good reason why I should murder him,” he said calmly; “such a good reason that I have been expecting the police all the afternoon.”

  Then abruptly he changed the subject.

  “Tell me about these banknotes. Of course I knew that you had borrowed the money from Stuart, my boy. I was a selfish old fellow to let you do it – how did the money come to you?”

  Kenneth’s story was a surprising one.

  “I had it a couple of days ago,” he said. “I came down to breakfast and found a letter. It was not registered and the address was hand-printed. I opened it, never dreaming what it contained. Just then I was terribly rattled over Stuart – I thought head office might get to know about my borrowing money. And when I found inside the letter twenty ten-pound notes you could have knocked me out.”

  “Was there any letter?”

  “None. Not even ‘from a friend.’”

  “Who knew about your being in debt?”

  One name came instantly to Kenneth’s mind.

  “You told your Margot, did you…Wentford’s niece? His real name was Lynn, by the way. Could she have sent it?”

  “It was not she who drew the money, I’ll swear! I should have known her. And though she was veiled, I could recognize her again if I met her. Kingfether’s line is that no woman came; he is suggesting that the cheque was cashed by me. He even says that the cheque was out of a book which I keep in my drawer for the use of customers who come to the bank without their cheque books.”

  George McKay fingered his chin, his keen eyes on his son.

  “If you were in any kind of trouble you’d tell me the truth, my boy, wouldn’t you? All this worry has come through me. You’re telling me the truth now, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, father.”

  The older man smiled.

  “Fathers have the privilege of asking ‘Are you a thief?’ without having their heads punched! And most young people do stupid things – and most old people too! Lordy! I once carried a quarter of a million bank at baccarat! Nobody would believe that, but it’s true. Come and eat, then go along and see your Margot.”

  “Father, who killed that man Wentford?”

  There was a twinkle in McKay’s eyes when he answered: “J G Reeder, I should think. He knows more about it than any honest man should know!”

  8

  When her visitor was gone, Ena opened the letter he had left with her, read a few lines of it, then threw letter and envelope into the fire. Funny, the sameness of men…they all wrote the same sort of stuff… raw stuff dressed up poetically…yet they thought they were being different from all other men. She did not resent these stereotypes of passion, nor did she feel sorry for those who used them. They were just normal experiences. She sat clasping her knees, her eyes alternately on the fire and the sleeping dog. Then she got up, dressed quickly, and, going into Gower Street, found a cab.

  She was set down at a house in a fashionable Mayfair street, and a liveried footman admitted her and told her there was company. There usually was in the early evening. She found twenty men and women sitting round a green table, watching a croupier with a large green shade over his eyes. He was turning up cards in two rows, and big monies, staked in compartments marked on the green table, went into the croupier’s well or was pushed, with additions, to the fortunate winner.

  The usual crowd, she noted. One pretty girl looked up and smiled, then turned her eyes quickly and significantly to the young man by her side.

  Ena found the governor in his room. He was smoking alone and reading the evening newspaper when she came in.

  “Shut the door,” he ordered. “What is wrong?”

  “Nothing much. Only Feathers is a bit worried.” She told him why.

  Mr Machfield smiled.

  “Don’t you worry, my pet,” he said kindly. “There has been a murder down his way – did he tell you anything about that? I’ve just been reading about it. I should be surprised if old Reeder didn’t get to the bottom of it – clever fellow, Reeder.”

  He picked up his newspaper from the floor and his cigar from the ash-tray where he had laid it.

  “Rather a coincidence, wasn’t it, Ena? Feathers pickin’ on that account – Wentford’s?”

  She looked at him thoughtfully.

  “Was it a coincidence?” she asked. “That is what is worrying me. Did he pick on this poor man’s account because he knew that he was going to be dead in a few days? I got a horrible creepy feeling when he was sitting beside me. I kept looking at his hands and wondering if there was blood on them!”

  “Shuh!” said Mr Machfield contemptuously. “That rabbit!” He opened a panel in the wall – it was nothing more romantic than a serving hatch when it was built – and glanced at the gamesters.

  “They’re playing for marbles!” he said in fine scorn. “But they never do play high in the afternoon. Look at Lamontaine: he’s bored sick!”

  And certainly the croupier did not look happy. He closed the panel.

  “I suppose you’ll be raided one of these days?” she said.

  “Sure!” he answered easily. “But I’ve got another couple of houses ready for starting.”

  “What do you think about Feathers? Will he squeal when they find him out?”

  “Like a stuck pig,” said Mr Machfield. “He’ll go down for nine months and get religion. That’s the kind of fellow who gives the prison chaplain an interest in life. Ena, I’ve got a little job for you.”

  She was alert, suspicious.

  “Nothing much. I’ll tell you all about it. Shall I open a bottle?”

  “Yes, if it’s milk,” she said. “What’s the little job and how much does it carry?”

  “Would you faint if I said a thousand?” he asked, and opened the hatch again, looking through and closing it.

  “Who are you expecting?” she asked. “…all right, don’t be rude. No, thousands never make me faint. Especially when they’re talked about–”

  “Now listen.”

  Mr Machfield was too good a talker to be brief. He led from a preamble to sections, into subsections…

  “One minute.”

  He interrupted his explanation to lift the hatch. She saw him bringing it down; then unexpectedly he raised it again. Was it the effect of odd lighting, or had his face changed colour? He dropped the hatch softly and gaped round at her.

  “Who let him in? That doorman has ‘shopped’ me–”

  “Who is it?” she asked.

  He beckoned her to his side, lifting the panel an inch. “Stoop!” he hissed. “Look…that fellow with the side-whiskers.”

  “Oh – is he anybody?” She did not recognize the visitor. Possibly he was a bailiff; he looked hopelessly suburban, like the people who serve writs. They always wear ready-to-wear ties and coloured handkerchiefs that stick out of their breast pockets.

  “Reeder… J G Reed
er!”

  She wanted to raise the hatch and look, but he would not allow this.

  “Go out and see what you can do…wait a bit.”

  He lifted a house telephone and pressed a knob.

  “Who was that fellow…the old fellow with side-whiskers?… Got a card…what name…Reeder?”

  He put down the ’phone unsteadily. Mr Machfield gave small membership cards to the right people. They were issued with the greatest care and after elaborate enquiries had been made as to the antecedents of the man or woman so honoured.

  “Go and get acquainted…he doesn’t know you. Go round through the buffet room and pretend you’ve just come in.”

  When she reached the gaming room, Ena found Mr Reeder was sitting opposite the croupier. How he got that favoured chair was a mystery. His umbrella was between his knees. In front of him was a pile of Treasury notes. He was “punting” gravely, seemingly absorbed in the game.

  “Faites vos jeux, messieurs et mesdames,” said the croupier mechanically.

  “What does he mean by that?” asked Mr Reeder of his nearest neighbour.

  “He means ‘Make your bet,’” said the girl, who had drawn up a chair by his side.

  Mr Reeder made ten coups and won six pounds. With this he got up from the table and recovered his hat from beneath his chair.

  “I always think that the time to – um – stop playing cards is when you’re winning.” He imparted this truth to the young lady, who had withdrawn from the table at the same time.

  “What a marvellous mind you have!” she said enthusiastically.

  Mr Reeder winced.

  “I’m afraid I have,” he said.

  She shepherded him into the buffet room; he seemed quite willing to be refreshed at the expense of the house.

  “A cup of tea, thank you, and a little seed cake.”

  Ena was puzzled. Had the whole breed of busies undergone this shattering deterioration?

  “I prefer seed to fruit cake,” he was saying. “Curiously enough, chickens are the same. I had a hen once – we called her Curly Toes – who could eat fruit and preferred it…”

  She listened – she was a good listener. He offered to see her home.

  “No – if you could drop me at the corner of Bruton Street and Berkeley Square – I don’t live far from there,” she said modestly.

  “Dear me!” said Mr Reeder, as he signalled to a cab. “Do you live in a mews too? So many people do.”

  This was disconcerting.

  “Perhaps you will come and see me one day – I am Mrs Coleforth–Ebling, and my ’phone number – do write this down–”

  “My memory is very excellent,” murmured Mr Reeder.

  The cab drove up at that moment and he opened the door.

  “Ena Burslem – I will remember that – 907, Gower Mansions.”

  He waved his hand in farewell as he got into the cab.

  “I’ll be seeing you again, my dear – toodle-oo!”

  Mr Reeder could on occasions be outrageously frivolous. “Toodle-oo!” was the high-water mark of his frivolity. It was not remarkable that Ena was both alarmed and puzzled. Brighter intellects than hers had been shaken in a vain effort to reconcile Mr Reeder’s appearance and manner with Mr Reeder’s reputation.

  She went back into the house and told Mr Machfield what had happened.

  “That man’s clever,” said Machfield admiringly. “If I were the man who had killed Wentworth or whatever his name is, I’d be shaking in my shoes. I’ll walk round to the Leffingham and see if I can pick up a young game-fish. And you’d better dine with me, Ena – I’ll give you the rest of the dope on that business I was discussing.”

  The Leffingham Club was quite useful to Mr Machfield. It was a kind of potting shed where likely young shoots could be nurtured before being bedded out in the gardens of chance. Even Kenneth McKay had had his uses.

  When Mr Reeder reached Scotland Yard, where they had arranged to meet, he found Inspector Gaylor charged with news.

  “We’ve had a bit of luck!” he said. “Do you remember those banknotes? You took their numbers…you remember? They were paid out on Wentford’s account!”

  “Oh, yes, yes, yes,” said Mr Reeder. “To the veiled lady–”

  “Veiled grandmother!” said Gaylor. “We have traced two hundred pounds’ worth to a moneylender. They were paid by Kenneth McKay, the bank clerk who cashed the cheque – and here is the cheque!”

  He took it from a folder on his desk.

  “The signature is a bad forgery; the cheque itself was not torn from Wentford’s cheque-book but from a book kept at the bank under McKay’s charge!”

  “Astounding!” said Mr Reeder.

  “Isn’t it?” Mr Gaylor was smiling. “So simple! I had the whole theory of the murders given to me tonight. McKay forged and uttered the note, and to cover up his crime killed Wentford.”

  “And you instantly arrested him?”

  “Am I a child in arms?” asked Gaylor reproachfully. “No, I questioned the lad. He doesn’t deny that he paid the moneylender, but says that the money came to him from some anonymous source. It arrived at his house by registered post. Poor young devil, he’s rattled to blazes! What are we waiting for now?”

  “A Gentleman Who Wants to Open a Box,” said Mr Reeder mysteriously.

  (“Reeder releases his mysteries as a miser pays his dentist,” said Gaylor to the superintendent. “He knows I know all about the case – I admit he is very good and passes on most of the information he gets, but the old devil will keep back the connecting links!”

  “Humour him,” said the superintendent.)

  9

  Margot Lynn had spent a wretched and a weary day. The little city office which she occupied, and where she had conducted most of her uncle’s business, had become a place of bad dreams.

  She had never been very fond of her tyrannical relative, who, if he had paid her well, had extracted the last ounce of service from her. He was an inveterate speculator, and had made considerable monies from his operations on the Stock Exchange. It was she who had bought and sold on his telephoned instructions, she who put his money into a London bank. Over her head all the time he had held one weapon: she had an invalid mother in Italy dependent on his charity.

  All day long, people had been calling at the office. A detective had been there for two hours, taking a new statement; reporters had called in battalions, but these she had not seen. Mr Reeder had supplied her with an outer guard, a hard-faced woman who held the pressmen at bay. But the police now knew everything there was to know about “Wentford’s” private affairs – except one thing. She was keeping faith with the dead in this respect, though every time she thought of her reservation her heart sank.

  She finished up her work and went home, leaving the building by a back door to avoid the patient reporters. They were waiting for her at her flat, but the hard-faced Mrs Grible swept them away.

  Once safely in the flat, a difficulty arose. How could she tactfully and delicately dismiss the guard which Mr Reeder had provided? She offered the woman tea, and Mrs Grible, who said very little, embarrassed her by making it.

  “I’m greatly obliged to you and Mr Reeder,” she said after the little meal. “I don’t think I ought to take up any more of your time–”

  “I’m staying until Mr Reeder comes,” said the lady.

  Very meekly the girl accepted the situation.

  Mr Reeder did not come until ten o’clock. Margot was half dead with weariness, and would have given her legacy to have undressed and gone to bed.

  For his part, he was in the liveliest mood, an astounding circumstance remembering that he had had practically no sleep for thirty-six hours. In an indefinable way he communicated to her some of his own vitality. She found herself suddenly v
ery wide awake.

  “You have seen the police, of course?” Mr Reeder sat on a chair facing her, leaning on the handle of his umbrella, his hat carefully deposited on the floor by his side. “And you have told them everything? It is very wise. The key, now – did you tell them about the key?”

  She went very red. She was (thought Mr Reeder) almost as pretty when she was red as when she was white.

  “The key?” She could fence, a little desperately, with the question, although she knew just what he meant.

  “At the cottage last night you showed me two keys – one the key of the house, the other, from its shape and make, the key of a safe deposit.”

  Margot nodded.

  “Yes. I suppose I should have told them that. But Mr Wentford–”

  “Asked you never to tell. That is why he had two keys, one for you and one for himself.”

  “He hated paying taxes – ” she began.

  “Did he ever come up to town?”

  “Only on very wet days and foggy days. I have never been to the safe deposit, Mr Reeder. Anything that is there he placed himself. I only had the key in case of accidents.”

  “What was he afraid of – did he ever tell you?”

  She shook her head.

  “He was terribly afraid of something. He did all his own housework and cooking – he would never have anybody in. A gardener used to come every few days and look after the electric light plant, and Mr Wentford used to pay him through the window. He was afraid of bombs – you’ve seen the cage round the window in his bedroom? He had that put there for fear somebody should throw in a bomb whilst he was asleep. I can’t tell you what precautions he took. Except myself and the policeman, and once Mr Enward the lawyer, nobody has ever entered that house. His linen was put outside the door every week and left at the door. He had an apparatus for testing milk and he analysed every drop that was left at the house before he drank it – he practically lived on milk. It wasn’t so bad when I first went to him – I was sixteen then – but it got worse and worse as the years went on.”

  “He had two telephones in the house,” said Mr Reeder. “That was rather extravagant.”