by Sax Rohmer
“Gee! but it’s a fact!” declared his informant. “They all had moderate fair hair, worn short and parted left-centre, neat blonde moustaches, and fresh complexions, and the whole thirty were like as beans!”
Two other interesting facts Sheard elicited from Adeler, who wore a white bandage about his damaged skull. The whole of the guests victimised were compatriots of their host.
“It is from those who are of my nation that they have taken all their booty,” he said, smiling. “This daring robber has evidently strong racial prejudices! Then, each of the victims had received, during the past month threatening letters demanding money for various charities. These letters did not emanate from the institutions named, but were anonymous appeals. The point seems worth notice.”
And so, armed with the usual police assurance that several sensational arrests might be expected in the morning, Sheard departed with this enthralling copy hot for the machines that had been stopped to take it.
When, thoroughly tired, he again quitted the Gleaner office, it was to direct his weary footsteps towards the Embankment and the all-night car that should bear him home.
Crossing Tallis Street, he became aware of a confused murmur proceeding from somewhere ahead, and as he approached nearer to the river this took definite form and proclaimed itself a chaotic chorus of human voices.
As he came out on to the Embankment an extraordinary scene presented itself.
Directly in his path stood a ragged object — a piece of social flotsam — a unit of London’s misery. This poor filthy fellow was singing at the top of his voice, a music-hall song upon that fertile topic, “the girls,” was dancing wildly around a dilapidated hat which stood upon the pavement at his feet, and was throwing sovereigns into this same hat from an apparently inexhaustible store in his coat pocket!
Seeing Sheard standing watching him, he changed his tune and burst into an extempore lyric, “The quids! The quids! The golden quids — the quids!” and so on, until, filled with a sudden hot suspicion, he snatched up his hat, with its jingling contents, hugged it to his breast, and ran like the wind!
Following him with his eyes as he made off towards Waterloo Bridge, the bewildered pressman all but came to the conclusion that he was the victim of a weird hallucination.
For the night was filled with the songs, the shouts, the curses, the screams, of a ragged army of wretches who threw up gold in the air — who juggled with gold — who played pitch-and-toss with gold — who ran with great handfuls of gold clutched to their bosoms — who pursued one another for gold — who fought to defend the gold they had gained — who wept for the gold they had lost.
One poor old woman knelt at the kerb, counting bright sovereigns into neat little piles, and perfectly indifferent to the advice of a kindly policeman, who, though evidently half dazed with the wonders of the night, urged her to get along to a safer place.
Two dilapidated tramps, one of whom wore a battered straw hat, whilst his friend held an ancient green parasol over his bare head, appeared arm-in-arm, displaying much elegance of deportment, and, hailing a passing cab, gave the address, “Savoy,” with great aplomb.
Fights were plentiful, and the available police were kept busy arresting the combatants. Two officers passed Sheard, escorting a lean, ragged individual whose pockets jingled as he walked, and who spoke of the displeasure with which this unseemly arrest would fill “his people.”
Presently a bewildered Salvation Army official appeared. Sheard promptly buttonholed him.
“Don’t ask me, sir!” he said, in response to the obvious question. “Heaven only knows what it is about! But I can tell you this much: no less than forty thousand pounds has been given away on the Embankment to-night! And in gold! Such an incredible example of ill-considered generosity I’ve never heard of! More harm has been done to our work to-night than we can hope to rectify in a twelvemonth!
“Of course, it will do good in a few, a very few, cases. But, on the whole, it will do, I may say, incalculable harm. How was it distributed? In little paper bags, like those used by the banks. It sent half the poor fellows crazy! Just imagine — a broken-down wretch who’d lived on the verge of starvation for, maybe, years, suddenly has a bag of sovereigns put into his hand! Good heavens! what madness!”
“Who did the distributing?”
“That’s the curious part of it! The bags were distributed by a number of men wearing the dark overcoats and uniform caps of the Salvation Army! That’s how they managed to get through with the business without arousing the curiosity of the police. I don’t know how many of them there were, but I should imagine twenty or thirty. They were through with it and gone before we woke up to what they had done!”
Sheard thanked him for his information, stood a moment, irresolute; and turned back once more to the Gleaner office.
Thus, then, did a strange personality announce his coming and flood the British press with adjectives.
The sensation created, on the following day, by the news of the Park Lane robbery was no greater than that occasioned by the news of the extraordinary Embankment affair.
“What do we deduce,” demanded a talkative and obtrusively clever person in a late City train, “from the circumstance that all thirty of the Park Lane brigands were alike?”
“Obviously,” replied a quiet voice, “that it was a ‘make-up.’ Thirty identical wigs, thirty identical moustaches, and the same grease-paint!”
A singularly handsome man was the speaker. He was dark, masterful, and had notably piercing eyes. The clever person became silent.
“Being all made up as a very common type of man-about-town,” continued this striking-looking stranger, “they would pass unnoticed anywhere. If the police are looking for thirty blonde men of similar appearance they are childishly wasting their time. They are wasting their time in any event — as the future will show.”
Everyone in the carriage was listening now, and a man in a corner asked: “Do you think there is any connection between the Park Lane and Embankment affairs, sir?”
“Think!” smiled the other, rising as the train slowed into Ludgate Hill. “You evidently have not seen this.”
He handed his questioner an early edition of an evening paper, and with a terse “Good morning,” left the carriage.
Glaringly displayed on the front page was the following:
WHO IS HE?
“We received early this morning the following advertisement, prepaid in cash, and insert it here by reason of the great interest which we feel sure it will possess for our readers:
“‘On Behalf of the Poor Ones of the Embankment, I thank the following philanthropists for their generous donations:”
(Here followed a list of those guests of Mrs. Rohscheimer’s who had been victimised upon the previous night, headed with the name of Julius Rohscheimer himself; and beside each name appeared an amount representing the value of the article, or articles, appropriated.)
“‘They may rest assured that not one halfpenny has been deducted for working expenses. In fact, when the donations come to be realised the Operative may be the loser. But no matter. “Expend your money in pious uses, either voluntarily or by constraint.”
“‘(Signed) Séverac Bablon.’”
The paper was passed around in silence.
“That fellow seemed to know a lot about it!” said someone.
None of the men replied; but each looked at the other strangely — and wondered.
CHAPTER III
MIDNIGHT — AND THE MAN
The next two days were busy ones for Sheard, who, from a variety of causes — the chief being his intimacy with the little circle which, whether it would or not, gathered around Mr. Julius Rohscheimer — found himself involved in the mystery of Séverac Bablon. He had interviewed this man and that, endeavouring to obtain some coherent story of the great “hold up,” but with little success. Everything was a mysterious maze, and Scotland Yard was without any clue that might lead to the solution. All the Fleet St
reet crime specialists had advanced theories, and now, on the night of the third day after the audacious robbery, Sheard was contributing his theory to the Sunday newspaper for which he worked.
The subject of his article was the identity of Séverac Bablon, whom Sheard was endeavouring to prove to be not an individual, but a society; a society, so he argued, formed for the immolation of Capital upon the altars of Demos.
The course of reasoning that he had taken up proved more elusive than he had anticipated.
His bundle of notes lay before him on the table. The news of the latest outrage, the burning of the great Runek Mills in Ontario, had served to convince him that his solution was the right one; yet he could make no headway, and the labours of the last day or so had left him tired and drowsy.
He left his table and sank into an arm-chair by the study fire, knocking out his briar on a coal and carefully refilling and lighting that invaluable collaborator. With his data presently arranged in better mental order, he returned to the table and covered page after page with facile reasoning. Then the drowsiness which he could not altogether shake off crept upon him again, and staring at the words “Such societies have existed in fiction, now we have one existing in fact,” he dropped into a doze — as the clock in the hall struck one.
When he awoke, with his chin on his breast, it was to observe, firstly, that the MS. no longer lay on the pad, and, secondly, on looking up, that a stranger sat in the arm-chair, opposite, reading it!
“Who — —” began Sheard, starting to his feet.
Whereupon the stranger raised a white, protesting hand.
“Give me but one moment’s grace, Mr. Sheard,” he said quietly, “and I will at once apologise and explain!”
“What do you mean?” rapped the journalist. “How dare you enter my house in this way, and — —” He broke off from sheer lack of words, for this calm, scrupulously dressed intruder was something outside the zone of things comprehensible.
In person he was slender, but of his height it was impossible to judge accurately whilst he remained seated. He was perfectly attired in evening-dress, and wore a heavy, fur-lined coat. A silk hat, by an eminent hatter, stood upon Sheard’s writing-table, a pair of gloves beside it. A gold-mounted ebony walking-stick was propped against the fireplace. But the notable and unusual characteristic of the man was his face. Its beauty was literally amazing. Sheard, who had studied black-and-white, told himself that here was an ideal head — that of Apollo himself.
And this extraordinary man, with his absolutely flawless features composed, and his large, luminous eyes half closed, lounged in Sheard’s study at half-past one in the early morning and toyed with an unfinished manuscript — like some old and privileged friend who had dropped in for a chat.
“Look here!” said the outraged pressman, stepping around the table as the calm effrontery of the thing burst fully upon him. “Get out! Now!”
“Mr. Sheard,” said the other, “if I apologise frankly and fully for my intrusion, will you permit me to give my reasons for it?”
Sheard again found himself inarticulate. He was angrily conscious of a vague disquiet. The visitor’s suave courtesy under circumstances so utterly unusual disarmed him, as it must have disarmed any average man similarly situated. For a moment his left fist clenched, his mind swung in the balance, irresolute. The other turned back a loose page and quietly resumed his perusal of the manuscript.
That decided Sheard’s attitude, and he laughed.
Whereat the stranger again raised the protestant hand.
“We shall awake Mrs. Sheard!” he said solicitously. “And now, as I see you have decided to give me a hearing, let me begin by offering you my sincere apology for entering your house uninvited.”
Sheard, his mind filled with a sense of phantasy, dropped into a chair opposite the visitor, reached into the cabinet at his elbow, and proffered a box of Turkish cigarettes.
“Your methods place you beyond the reach of ordinary castigation,” he said. “I don’t know your name and I don’t know your business; but I honestly admire your stark impudence!”
“Very well,” replied the other in his quiet, melodious voice, with its faint, elusive accent. “A compliment is intended, and I thank you! And now, I see you are wondering how I obtained admittance. Yet it is so simple. Your front door is not bolted, and Mrs. Sheard, but a few days since, had the misfortune to lose a key. You recollect? I found that key! Is it enough?”
“Quite enough!” said Sheard grimly. “But why go to the trouble? What do you want?”
“I want to insure that one, at least, of the influential dailies shall not persistently misrepresent my actions!”
“Then who — —” began Sheard, and got no farther; for the stranger handed him a card —
Séverac Bablon
“You see,” continued the man already notorious in two continents, “your paper, here, is inaccurate in several important particulars! Your premises are incorrect, and your inferences consequently wrong!”
Sheard stared at him, silent, astounded.
“I have been described in the Press of England and America as an incendiary, because I burned the Runek Mills; as a maniac, because I compensated men cruelly thrown out of employment; as a thief, because I took from the rich in Park Lane and gave to the poor on the Embankment. I say that this is unjust!”
His eyes gleamed into a sudden blaze. The delicate, white hand that held Sheard’s manuscript gripped it so harshly that the paper was crushed into a ball. That Séverac Bablon was mad seemed an unavoidable conclusion; that he was forceful, dominant, a power to be counted with, was a truth legible in every line of his fine features, in every vibrant tone of his voice, in the fire of his eyes. The air of the study seemed charged with his electric passion.
Then, in an instant, he regained his former calm. Rising to his feet, he threw off the heavy coat he wore and stood, a tall, handsome figure, with his hands spread out, interrogatively.
“Do I look such a man?” he demanded.
Despite the theatrical savour of the thing, Sheard could not but feel the real sincerity of his appeal; and, as he stared, wondering, at the fine brow, the widely-opened eyes, the keen nostrils and delicate yet indomitable mouth and chin, he was forced to admit that here was no mere up-to-date cracksman, but something else, something more. “Is he mad?” flashed again through his mind.
“No!” smiled Séverac Bablon, dropping back into the chair; “I am as sane as you yourself!”
“Have I questioned it?”
“With your eyes and the left corner of your mouth, yes!” Sheard was silent.
“I shall not weary you with a detailed exculpation of my acts,” continued his visitor; “but you have a list on your table, no doubt, of the people whom I forced to assist the Embankment poor?”
Sheard nodded.
“Mention but one whose name has ever before been associated with charity; I mean the charity that has no relation to advertisement! You are silent! You say” — glancing over the unfinished article— “that ‘this was a capricious burlesque of true philanthropy.’ I reply that it served its purpose — of proclaiming my arrival in London and of clearly demonstrating the purpose of my coming! You ask who are my accomplices! I answer — they are as the sands of the desert! You seek to learn who I am. Seek, rather, to learn what I am!”
“Why have you selected me for this — honour?”
“I overheard some remarks of yours, contrasting a restaurant supper-room with the Embankment which appealed to me! But, to come to the point, do you believe me to be a rogue?”
Sheard smiled a trifle uneasily.
“You are doubtful,” the other continued. “It has entered your mind that a proper course would be to ring up Scotland Yard! Instead, come with me! I will show you how little you know of me and of what I can do. I will show you that no door is closed to me! Why do you hesitate? You shall be home again, safe, within two hours. I pledge my word!”
Possessing the true jou
rnalistic soul, Sheard was sorely tempted; for to the passion of the copy-hunter such an invitation could not fail in its appeal. With only a momentary hesitation, he stood up.
“I’ll come!” he said.
A smart landaulette stood waiting outside the house; and, without a word to the chauffeur, Séverac Bablon opened the door and entered after Sheard. The motor immediately started, and the car moved off silently. The blinds were drawn.
“You will have to trust yourself implicitly in my hands,” said Sheard’s extraordinary companion. “In a moment I shall ask you to fasten your handkerchief about your eyes and to give me your word that you are securely blindfolded!”
“Is it necessary?”
“Quite! Are you nervous?”
“No!” — shortly.
There was a brief interval of silence, during which the car, as well as it was possible to judge, whirled through the deserted streets at a furious speed.
“Will you oblige me?” came the musical voice.
The journalist took out his pocket-handkerchief, and making it into a bandage, tied it firmly about his head.
“Are you ready?” asked Séverac Bablon.
“Yes.”
A click told of a raised blind.
“Can you see?”
“Not a thing!”
“Then take my hand and follow quickly. Do not speak; do not stumble!”
Cautiously feeling his way, Sheard, one hand clasping that of his guide, stepped out into the keen night air, and was assisted by some third person — probably the chauffeur — on to the roof of the car!
“Be silent!” from Séverac Bablon. “Fear nothing! Step forward as your feet will be directed and trust implicitly to me!”
As a man in a dream Sheard stood there — on the roof of a motor-car, in a London street — and waited. There came dimly to his ears, and from no great distance, the sound of late traffic along what he judged to be a main road. But immediately about him quiet reigned. They were evidently in some deserted back-water of a great thoroughfare. A faint scuffling sound arose, followed by that of someone lightly dropping upon a stone pavement.