Red Aces

by Edgar Wallace

  “Oh, it’s you, is it?” said J G gently, and a little incongruously it sounded, even to himself. “Did you see my advertisement?”

  The young man made a dart through the door into the hall. Mr Reeder followed him, closed and bolted the door. He could almost hear his visitor trembling.

  “Which way do I go, sir?” he whimpered.

  J G led the way up the stairs into the study, and switched on the light.

  The red-haired youth was a pitiable sight: his face streaked with blood, the knuckles of his hands were bleeding. He had neither collar nor tie, and as he stood, his soaked clothes formed an ever-growing pool upon Mr Reeder’s shabby carpet.

  “I didn’t intend coming here, but after they tried to kill me–”

  “I think you had better have a hot bath,” interrupted Mr Reeder.

  Fortunately the bathroom was on the first floor, and by some miracle the water was really hot. He left the trembling youth to divest himself of his sodden clothes, and going upstairs, collected a few articles of wearing apparel.

  In his study he had a coffee-making machine and in the cupboard a large seed cake. He was partial to seed cake.

  The coffee was brewed and the young man came into the room. He was not an attractive young man. He was very pale, he had a very large nose and a long and bony chin. He was very thin, and Mr Reeder’s clothes did not so much fit as cover him.

  He drank the coffee eagerly, looked at the seed cake, shuddered, but betook of it, whilst Mr Reeder built up the dying fire.

  “Now, Mr–”

  “Edelsheim, Benny Edelsheim,” said the young man. “I live in Pepys Road, New Cross. Did the young ladies tell you about me? I wish I had not run away that night you chased me. She’s a stunning looking girl, isn’t she? I don’t mean the blonde – the other one.”

  “Have you wakened me up in the middle of the night to discuss the attractions of brunettes?” demanded Mr Reeder gently. “Who hit you?”

  The young man felt his head gingerly. He had tied about it a large handkerchief which Mr Reeder had supplied.

  “I don’t know, I think it was the fellow in the yellow coat… There were two of them. I was just going into my house – my father’s house, when a man asked me if I had a match. I didn’t like the look of him, but I was feeling for the match when he hit me. There was a car half-way down the hill – Pepys Road is built on a hill – it used to be called Red Hill once…”

  “The topography is familiar to me,” said Mr Reeder. “What did you do when he hit you?”

  “I ran,” said the other simply. “I tried to shout, but I couldn’t, and then the other fellow, who was standing by the car, tripped me up.”

  He looked at his knuckles. “That’s where I got that. I think there were three of them. The chauffeur was standing by the car and he made a dive at me, but I dodged and doubled up the hill – with the fellow in the yellow coat behind me.”

  “What time was this?” asked Mr Reeder.

  “About nine. I was coming to see you, in fact I had made up my mind to. I knew where you lived, but I thought I would go home first and talk to the old man – my father. We have got a jeweller’s shop in the Clerkenwell Road, but he has been ill for nearly a year, and I have been running the business.”

  “And you got away?” said Mr Reeder, hastening the narrative.

  “In a sense I did,” said Edelsheim. “I got over the top of the hill. I couldn’t see a policeman anywhere. It is disgraceful the rates we pay and no policemen! My God, it was awful. I didn’t see them for a bit, and thought I had slipped them, and then I saw the lights of the car coming. If I had any sense I would have knocked at the nearest house and gone in, and no policeman, Mr Reeder!” His voice was thin and hysterical. “That’s what we pay rates and taxes for, and no so-and-so policemen in sight!”

  He did not say “so-and-so”, but Mr Reeder thought his profanity was excusable.

  “As I saw the car, I got over the rails of a recreation ground or something. They must have seen me, because the car stopped right opposite the place where I had jumped. I didn’t see the man following, but I sort of felt him. Then I found I was in a cemetery. My God, it was awful dodging in and out the crosses and things! I climbed the wall and got out, and then I did meet a policeman. He thought I was drunk and wanted to take me to the hospital, so I bolted again.”

  “Did you see the man in the yellow coat?”

  “Not till I got here, it was nearer twelve than eleven. I was just thinking of calling you and of what you would say to me, when I saw them both. They were coming up from the Lewisham High Road, walking together. I dived into your front garden and hid behind the bush. One of them walked up the steps and tried the door. He had a lamp. I nearly died from fright. They were messing about here for an hour.”

  “And you were afraid to ring for fear that they saw you?”

  “That’s right. I waited until they had gone and I started chucking stones. I have broken two or three windows in this room, too.”

  Mr Reeder poured out another cup of coffee, and from the warming effect of the fire and the hot drink Mr Benny Edelsheim grew a little more confident.

  “Is she here?” he asked. “The dark-haired one?”

  “She is not here,” said Mr Reeder severely.

  Then suddenly the young man became plaintive again.

  “What’s it all about?” he demanded. “I saw your advertisement when I was reading tonight. I did not see how it could be anything to do with that, and yet when I was dodging in and out of the cemetery, the idea came to me that these fellows were after me because of that advertisement and the clasp and everything, and what I said to the young lady. Have I done anything wrong? I am sorry. I do not, as a rule, talk to young ladies without an introduction. I have been brought up as well as any man. If I have offended her relations – you are not her father, are you?”

  “I am not a father,” said Mr Reeder emphatically.

  “I didn’t think you were,” said Edelsheim, “because I knew about you. You are a detective. My old man – my father says you are the most wonderful detective of the age. I wanted to come and explain to you that I didn’t mean any harm.”

  Mr Reeder pushed forward the plate of seed cake.

  “You, my dear young friend,” he said, “are no more, as it were, than a cog in a wheel of a very complicated machine. I can quite understand how you had embarrassed the employers of those two ferocious men. Now let us get to the really important point – just tell me what you said, why you addressed those young ladies in the restaurant.”

  Benny munched the seed cake with an agonized expression; it was obvious he did not like seed cake, but his hunger had compelled him to overcome his scruples.

  “I recognized her the moment I saw her. She is in my thoughts night and day, Mr Reeder. There are some faces that hit you right in the eye, so to speak, that sort of make an impression upon you – she is not married, is she?” he asked anxiously.

  “Practically,” said Mr Reeder.

  The young man’s face assumed an expression of acute pain.

  “She is engaged,” explained Mr Reeder, in haste to remove any wrong impression he might have created.

  “I shall never see another face like that,” said Benny dismally. “I am romantic, Mr Reeder, I don’t mind admitting it. I fell in love with her the moment I saw her photograph. She was wearing plus-fours. Cute! You have no idea what I felt like when I saw that picture. I thought here is the woman for me, and I only saw it for half a tick. He opened his pocket-book on the counter, the gentleman who called at the shop, and he took out the photograph, because the clasp was in the same compartment, wrapped up in tissue paper, so I had a good look at the picture, and I said to myself–”

  “Yes, yes,” said Mr Reeder with a certain testiness, “Please don’t bother about your
emotions at the moment, Mr Edelsheim. Tell me something about the clasp.”

  “The clasp, oh, yes. You want to know about that? It was a very pretty thing, half a buckle of diamonds and emeralds. I know a lot about stones. I was in Hatton Garden for eighteen months. My old man – my father believed in starting me at the bottom of the ladder–”

  “Did he want to sell the clasp?”

  Benny shook his head.

  “No, he wanted it valued. We do a lot of valuation work, and I am supposed to be pretty good at it. We have got a very big business, half a dozen assistants, and we have a branch at Bristol.”

  “You valued it?” said Mr Reeder.

  “I valued it at £1,250, but I made a mistake. Even the best of us make mistakes. I remember, once–”

  “You have undervalued it by £100?”

  “That’s right. I told the young lady so when I met her. I thought she would tell her friend–”

  “Her father,” corrected Mr Reeder.

  “Oh, was that her father?” Benny was more interested in the parentage of his ideal than in the sordid question of a diamond and emerald clasp.

  “Yes, I undervalued it £100. What he really wanted to know was whether the stones were genuine, and, of course, I could tell him that. I don’t think he would have worried about the wrong valuation, and I should not have spoken about it, but I wanted a sort of introduction to the young lady – you are a man of the world, Mr Reeder–”

  “What time did he come into the shop?”

  Benny, his mouth full of seed cake, looked thoughtful.

  “About five o’clock in the evening.”

  “And when you valued the clasp, what happened?”

  “He wrapped it up and took it away with him. I asked him if he wanted to sell it, and he said no.”

  “You never saw him again?”

  Benny shook his head.

  “That was last Wednesday week?”

  “Tuesday,” said Benny promptly. “I happen to know that, because I had a date – an engagement to take a certain party to the pictures, and I was anxious to shut up the shop and get away.”

  Mr Reeder jotted down a few notes on his blotting-pad.

  “Have you ever valued that clasp before?”

  Benny Edelsheim looked at him with an open mouth.

  “It’s a curious thing that you should ask that, Mr Reeder. I haven’t, but my father has. I was describing the piece to him, and he said he was certain he had valued the same piece six months ago. Of course, he may have made a mistake, but he has got a marvellous memory.” He enlarged upon the memory of his parent, but Mr Reeder was not listening.

  “Why Clerkenwell,” murmured Mr Reeder. “Do you advertise?”

  “We are the best advertised valuers in London,” said Benny proudly. “That’s our speciality. I can’t tell you how upset the governor was when I made a mistake. It sort of reflected on the firm. Oh, yes, we carry big ads. in all papers. Valuation of jewellery. You must have seen our name.”

  Mr Reeder nodded.

  “That accounts for it,” he said.

  He looked at the clock. The minute hand pointed to half past two. Picking up the telephone, he called the nearest cab rank and gave his address.

  “I am going to take you home,” he said. “You’d better make a bundle of your wet clothes while I dress.”

  By the time the cab arrived, Mr Reeder, feeling very much awake, was ready. He went out first, but there was no need of his caution, less need for the Colt automatic that he held in his pocket.

  The journey to Pepys Road was uneventful. He waited until the young man had entered his house, then he drove to the nearest police station and had a consultation with the night officer.

  When Benny Edelsheim looked out of his window the next morning he found a uniformed policeman standing stolidly before the house, and felt that for the first time his rates and his taxes were justified.

  5

  The morning brought a surprise to Mr Reeder. When he arrived at his office he found Miss Gillette already on duty. That in itself was a notable event. She was entertaining in her room a very early caller in Dr Ingham, and from the solicitude in her tone it almost seemed that she was mothering him. Miss Gillette was one of those uncomfortable people whose maternal instinct was highly developed.

  As Mr Reeder paused at the half-opened door, he heard her speaking.

  “I shouldn’t worry about it, Dr Ingham. Reeder will put a stop to any of that sort of nonsense. He is much cleverer than he looks.”

  Her maligned employer passed softly into his room and rang the bell.

  “I didn’t hear you come in – you scare the life out of me sometimes,” she complained, and added: “Mr Ingham is here.”

  “Dr Ingham,” said Mr Reeder reproachfully. “You are – um – a little careless about – um – prefixes.”

  “He’s been attacked – somebody tried to break into his house last night,” said Miss Gillette. “Poor soul, he has a terrible face!”

  “Let me see it, please,” said J G.

  The clergyman had evidently passed a strenuous night. The bridge of his handsome nose bore a strip of sticking plaster. One eye, at the moment concealed behind a shade, was blue and swollen, and his lower lip was badly cut.

  “I’m afraid I look rather ghastly,” he said, as he shook hands with the detective.

  The undamaged portion of his face was white and drawn, and when he said that he had had no sleep that night Mr Reeder was not surprised.

  He had gone back to St Margaret’s on the previous night, and had driven himself from Dover, arriving at his house at ten o’clock.

  “Grayne Hall is built on the site of an old castle,” he said. “There was not enough of the original structure to restore, so I had the walls pulled down and erected a modern residence. Naturally it is very isolated, but there is some very excellent timber, and I have made a good garden. I returned before midnight, but I had hardly got to bed before my wife said that she heard a noise below. I went down, unarmed, of course, for I do not own so much as a shot gun. I had reached the hall and was feeling for the light switch, when somebody struck at me. I had a fearful blow on the face, but I managed to find an old battle-axe which hung on the wall – luckily for me. With this I defended myself. My wife, who had heard the fracas in the hall, screamed, and I heard one of my assailants say: ‘Run for it, Kennedy!’ Immediately after, the hall door was thrown open, and I saw two, or it may have been three, people run into the garden and vanish.”

  “Dear me,” said Mr Reeder. “One of them said: ‘Run for it, Kennedy!’ You are sure it was that?”

  “I could swear that was the name. Afterwards I remembered, or rather my dear wife remembered, that a man named Kennedy had been a member of the Pizarro gang.”

  Mr Reeder was examining the clergyman’s injuries thoughtfully.

  “No weapon was used?”

  Dr Ingham smiled painfully.

  “That’s a poor consolation!” he said with some acerbity. “No, I rather think that I was struck by a fist that was holding a weapon. In the darkness this rascal must have struck wildly.”

  He had not sent for the police. Apparently he had no exalted opinion about the Kentish constabulary, and he admitted a horror of figuring in newspapers. Mr Reeder could understand this: he also had a horror of publicity.

  “Whether these people were plain burglars who were disturbed at their work, or whether revenge for some fancied injury was at the bottom of their dastardly action, I cannot make up my mind. With Mrs Ingham the Pizarro case is an obsession. She is, by the way, looking forward with great eagerness to meeting you. Now tell me, Mr Reeder, what am I to do? I will be guided entirely by your advice. To go to the police now seems to be a fairly useless proceeding. I cannot describe the men – except for a
second when they were silhouetted in the open doorway, I never saw them. My butler and my gardener made enquiries this morning, but nobody else seems to have seen them. Not even the coastguard who has a cottage quite close.”

  Mr Reeder sat with half-closed eyes, his large hands folded on his lap.

  “It is very odd,” he murmured at last. “Kennedy, Casius Kennedy. A bad – um – egg. He inherited it from his mother, a lady with a very – um – unpleasant history.”

  He pursed his underlip, his eyes had drooped a little lower.

  “It is odd, extremely odd.”

  Dr Ingham drew a long breath.

  “What am I to do?” he demanded.

  “Ask for police protection,” said Mr Reeder. “Have an officer sleeping in the house and another stationed on the grounds. I hope to see you on Saturday.”

  He rose with startling abruptness and jerked out his hand.

  “Till Saturday,” he said, and Dr Ingham went out, a very dissatisfied man.

  Mr Reeder was no angel that morning. He was in a mood the like of which Miss Gillette could not remember. She discovered this very soon.

  “What did you tell the doctor?” she asked.

  “When I want you, I will ring for you, young lady,” he snapped.

  She went out, a little dazed by his mutiny. She heard the key turn in his lock and when she got through to him by telephone, he was most unpleasant.

  “I think I will go home, Mr Reeder,” she said.

  “I will send you your wages by post,” said he.

  She went out of the office, slamming the door behind her, which (apart from the slam) was exactly what he intended she should do.

  The door to the corridor he locked in the same fashion before he rang up Inspector Gaylor.

  “I want a couple of men,” he said. “I’m nervous, or, shall I say, apprehensive.”

  “I wondered when you’d start getting that way,” said Gaylor. “I’m having young Edelsheim shadowed. Thanks for your letter. Is there any other development?”

  Mr Reeder told him of the doctor’s unpleasant adventure.