by Sax Rohmer
“Ah, Friar Tuck, my old! but how wet you are! Come in, my friend. I have some good Scotch here!”
Mr. Bernstein was Gaston Max.
18
“Who Is This Limping Man?”
“Name of a name, Sergeant Bluett, it is annoying! But do not blame me, for I think our old friend the Chief Inspector has been somewhat headlong.”
Sergeant Bluett, seated on a gilt chair, smoking a cigarette and from time to time sampling whisky and soda of a quality with which of late he had become painfully unfamiliar, was in many respects a man chastened and changed.
“That’s right,” he said.
“I, myself, have been not headlong enough — and so I have the misfortune to kill a thousand men—”
Sergeant Bluett, who was swallowing appreciatively, almost choked: he set his glass down. “What did you say?”
“I said that I was one hour too late to save I cannot tell, yet, how many poor fellows. Not by my own wit, oh, no, but by a divine accident, I found a clue I was looking for — an hour too late. Listen, my friend: Sir Giles Loeder, who has been murdered, was a German spy. I have known it for ever so long, but I could not prove it. Now that I have proved it, he is killed.” He extended his hands. “Ma’lêsh!”
“Sir Giles Loeder ... a spy?”
“But exactly.”
Seating himself before the dressing table, Max dipped a small brush in some liquid which he had poured into a saucer, and began to remove gold paint and yellow paint from his teeth. Sergeant Bluett had been reduced to awed silence by that singular revelation: he watched the Frenchman, as, once, audiences were wont to watch Houdini; astounded. Cleaning off the preparation with cotton wool, Max crossed to a washbowl and rinsed his mouth, previously extracting certain pads, attached with gold wire.
This operation resulted in the fat face of Mr. Bernstein becoming the leaner face of Gaston Max. He had already discarded collar, tie and shirt, and now, returning, he dipped his fingers in cream and proceeded to deal with his complexion, talking to Bluett as he worked.
“Grease paint is useless except for the stage, and this watercolor is so difficult to get off. I make my colors with pastel which I crush myself: French pastel, pre-war — very good.”
With a towel he removed final facial traces of Mr. Bernstein, including the brief moustache, blinking his lids as if his eyes were smarting.
“Those spectacles—” he indicated them where they lay upon the table— “are slightly tinted. The effect is to change the color of the eyes, but it is very trying to see through them. With spectacles (I have many) I can make my eyes to seem of any color. It is more difficult for the characters which wear no spectacles. And look at my hair!”
“Very limp,” commented Bluett.
“But, of course! It is a kind of flat varnish. I must wash it out before I go to bed.”
He removed his prominent abdomen, revealing the torso of an athlete. From an elastic girdle, his artificial corpulence extended down somewhere below the trouser band. Bluett watched with wide open ingenuous eyes, whilst Gaston Max detached this singular object, the lower end of which proved to be fastened to his thighs. This accomplished, all that now remained of Mr. Bernstein were his red hands, his baggy trousers and his lank hair.
“You see—” Max extended his fingers— “it might be necessary to wash in public and so this color and that on the nails call for special treatment.”
He poured another preparation into a saucer, took some cotton wool, and patiently reduced his hands to their characteristic whiteness, finally returning to the bowl and washing them. He rapidly recombed his hair.
“You are a disbeliever, my old, but no matter. I will show you all the tricks of my trade.” He removed his shoes. “Finch, the taximan with whom you are acquainted, is a thin, short fellow. He wears thin clothes, my Bluett, and there are no heels to his shoes. He is an inch shorter than Gaston Max. Mr. Bernstein is a big fellow; he is an inch taller than Gaston Max. How is this, I demand. Regard the shoes of Mr. Bernstein.”
Sergeant Bluett regarded the shoes. They were specially made to accommodate elevators. He heaved a sigh and finished his whisky and soda.
“Tiring to the feet,” Max commented, “but what does it matter.” He laughed gaily, showing glittering teeth. “I love this game. I make of it an art. Mr. Bernstein’s coats are padded. Mr. Bernstein’s blue handkerchief has oil on it, to make Mr. Bernstein sweat. Help yourself, my friend. The bottle and the syphon are on the side table. One for me also, if you will be so good.”
And whilst Sergeant Bluett, dumbfounded, as he was always dumbfounded by this man, acted as butler, Gaston Max went on talking.
“To-night you were clever. I confess that, to this present moment, I do not know how you succeeded in tracking me to Buckingham Gate and back.” Sergeant Bluett handed him a sizzling tumbler and chinked it against another which he had prepared for himself. “My compliments, my old, and your very good health.”
“Thank you,” said Bluett, and flushed like a schoolboy. “The same to you.”
“I detected no sign of you until you actually followed me into the yard. Therefore, I left the door open in order to learn if you would come in.”
“Oh, I see. It isn’t open as a rule?”
“My faith, no! Too many of me use this address. Peter Finch has a small room, and Sales Transport Company is also myself. Mr. Bernstein occupies an office, and below is Paolo Moroni. This rascal is in the wardrobe cupboard, there, with the rest of them. Paolo I consider to be one of my best characters.”
Opening the cupboard in question (an exceptionally large one) he hung up the garments of Mr. Bernstein and selected a blue suit with red stripes, which he particularly favored.
“You’re a knock-out,” said Sergeant Bluett. “You might tell me, by the by, what you were doing in the Salvation Army hostel.”
“Ah! name of a good little man!” Gaston Max, who was buttoning a blue shirt, displayed something which vaguely resembled embarrassment. “To-night, you understand, I had won at roulette — over a hundred pounds—”
“Phew!”
“Yes, indeed. This money I do not wish to keep. I am particular. Very well. It is all in notes, and so I go to the only Salvation Army depot which I think is open all night, and make them a present of it. You see, Sergeant Bluett, my dear, I sometimes pick up these illicit profits: it is unavoidable; and what am I to do with them, eh?”
“Well, I’ll be damned!”
“No, no — you do not deserve to be. True, I am always hard up, for my pittance from Scotland Yard would not suffice. But the Fighting French make up my salary to that which I formerly received from the Service de Sûreté. In other words, I am like your London hospitals: entirely supported by voluntary contributions! Colonel O’Halloran is my Scotland Yard godfather, and I enjoy many privileges. I am almost a freelance.”
“But you surely don’t live here?”
“No, no, I do not live here. An old friend, so beautiful and so fervent a patriot, but, alas, a prisoner in her villa at Cap Martin, permits me to occupy her charming flat in Sloane Street.”
He had dressed with the speed of a quick-change artiste. Now, draping the monocle cord about his neck, he sat down and lighted a cigarette.
“You’re a knock-out,” Sergeant Bluett reaffirmed with conviction. “I suppose we butted in on you, coming to Destrée’s flat?”
“No, no. I butted in on you. When I heard what the Chief Inspector had arranged, I rushed to a friend of Mr. Bernstein and asked to be taken to play roulette. But how fortunate! The good Inspector nearly trod on a ball which had been lost. I recovered it in the chink of time.”
“Oh, did you?”
“But of course! I do not wish those people to be arrested. They are part of my fishery. Myself, I care not who killed this Loeder. He was what you call a twirp.”
“That’s right,” murmured Bluett admiringly. “I got the same idea myself. But I didn’t know he was a dirty spy. That beats me!”<
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“But, yes, undoubtedly. We shall find out who killed him, all in good time. Let us not by hurry disturb my beautiful case.”
“There’s something very big in the wind?”
“But, yes, something very big. Name of a name! larger than all other cases put together! The good Lord Marcus seeks for a great truth to help everybody: so likewise do I. A little murder—” he snapped his fingers— “is no more than that. Besides, he was a twirp.”
“It’s a miracle to me,” said Bluett, emboldened, perhaps, by the merit of his second whisky, “how you can talk English slang. You almost deceived me as a taxi driver.”
“Almost?” smiled Max. “My friend, it was a case of quite.”
“Well—” Bluett hesitated— “that’s right. I must hand it to you. But if you can talk like that when you want to, how is it that you speak English like a Frenchman — or a sort of Frenchman?”
“Ha, ha!” Max’s teeth glittered brilliantly. “Ha, ha, ha!” He roared with laughter. “Again, this is the artist in me. Even the Gaston Max you know, my old, is only another character; one of my many rôles. For who in the criminal world, having spoken to me, could suppose that he would not detect my French accent under any disguise?”
“You mean you can really talk straight English if you want to?”
“One day I shall endeavor to convince our old friend, the Chief Inspector, that I can talk straight Scotch!” Again Gaston Max roared with laughter. “But Bluett, my old, how is the little girl to-day?”
“Eh!” Bluett ejaculated; “do you mean my kid? Who told you she’d been sick?”
Gaston Max’s mobile lips twitched. “I am the magician. I know all.”
“Well, thank you kindly, Mr. Max; she’s bucked up no end. All’s well. A bit dull eyed, but nearly her old chirpy self again.”
Max stood up, crossed to a large and ornate cabinet, opened it and revealed to the reproachful gaze of Bluett, rows of bottles, boxes of cigars and cigarettes, jars of preserves, and stacks of festive looking candies, chocolates and other sweetmeats. One of these he took out, and reclosed the cupboard.
“This will make her eyes to sparkle. Black market, but good chocolate. Tell her it is from her Uncle Barney ... ss!”
Abruptly, on that warning hiss, he fell silent, grasping Bluett’s arm. He stepped to the dressing-table and pressed a switch. The room became plunged in darkness. “Listen!” he whispered.
Sergeant Bluett, aware of a hastened pulse, stood up and listened; indeed, he held his breath. From Gaston Max, somewhere near him in the blackness, no sound came. And, as he waited there, nerves taut, Bluett became conscious of, rather than heard, some presence outside on the landing — and he remembered that the door below was open. He remembered something else: the taximan’s impression that a car had followed his cab from Buckingham Gate. He was about to speak, when Max, as if divining this intention, grasped his arm again in warning.
Their conjoint efforts seemed to impose a sort of super-stillness on the room; and then it was that both detected that faint sound which had first arrested Max’s attention.
Creaking ... and Sergeant Bluett knew immediately what occasioned it: someone who groped on the stair, and clutched the handrail, that handrail which Bluett had so urgently avoided. This sound receded.
“Stealing down,” whispered Gaston Max. “I wonder what he heard. I, as myself, must not be discovered here.”
“What about me?”
“Rush, my old! Try to capture this stealthy prowler!”
He flashed a ray momentarily, throwing open the door, and Sergeant Bluett, welcoming action, went out like something expelled from a mortar. “Who’s there?” he shouted, directing light down the stair. “I want a word with you!”
No response came; only a sort of padded scuffle. Bluett went recklessly down all three flights. He found the door wide open, and sprang into the yard. A southwesterly wind drove clouds across the face of a waning moon, and a rent in the flying vapor allowed light to spill out for a period of seconds. In this brief light he saw the fugitive.
A bent, indefinite figure scudded around the corner into Great Windmill Street. Bluett raced to that point and stood stock still, listening. Darkness had fallen again: he could see nothing — nor could he hear a sound until a heavy truck laden with milk churns came roaring and rattling along. When it had passed, he remained there, listening. But, excepting a vague murmur, which he knew to come from Covent Garden, Soho had no message for him.
“My old, he has escaped!”
Sergeant Bluett physically jumped. Gaston Max stood at his elbow.
“Phew! that gave me a start! Did you see him?”
“I saw him. What did you note?”
“He ran like a sprinter — but he had a funny run.”
“He is as active as a cat, although he has some injury, some deformity. He is a limping man, my respected — he is one who limps ... Who is this limping man?”
19
Counsel’s Opinion
In the gray light of a misty morning, William Sawby’s coffee-stall glittered like a beacon. Enshrined in that backwater of shattered masonry beside the main stream of Bond Street, it issued a cheery invitation to early travellers, urns shining, cups rattling, with the beaming countenance of Sawby, a rosy sunrise, to bestow benediction upon all.
Tom Wilkins, the milkman, was there, and his pony, white forefeet on the broken paving, had his head overhanging the counter, inspiring visions of Bottom the Weaver. Mrs. Ryley, the charlady, another “regular,” occupied her usual place; and now, up came Michael Corcoran, K.C., the warden, his steel helmet slung on his back.
“Good morning, everybody! that alert kept me out all night, although I never once heard a Jerry.”
“Good morning, sir,” Sawby replied, and automatically filled a cup with steaming coffee. “They brought one down on the coast, I’m told.”
“Good morning, Mr. Corcoran, sir,” said Mrs. Ryley.
“I didn’t ‘ear neither the warnin’ nor yet the all-clear, meself. Got quite out of the ‘abit of expectin’ ’em.”
“Beginnin’ to form them habits in Germany now,” remarked Tom Wilkins, sharing a slice of bread and jam with the pony. “Ain’t half koppin’ it from the R.A.F., bless ’em.”
“Bless ’em indeed,” said the K.C. “My boy’s with Fighter Command, you know.”
“We all know Squadron Leader Dan Corcoran, sir,” Sawby assured him. “You’ve good cause to be proud of a boy like that. How’s he getting on, sir?”
“A. 1, Sawby, thank you. First day I can tear myself away from the Courts I’m going down to see him.”
Tom Wilkins, his mouth full of bread and jam, was understood to mumble something about “another bar.”
“That’s correct, Wilkins,” Corcoran nodded. “Second bar to his D.F.C. The young devil’s a killer right enough!”
A taxi crept out of the mist, was pulled up, and its driver crossed to the stall, rubbing mittened hands.
“Hullo, Fred,” said Sawby. “You’re an early bird. Chucked night work?”
“Yes.” The man, whose purple face wore an expression of permanent disapproval, scowled darkly. “Don’t pay for the petrol. Our gov’nor’s laid us off it. Too many pirates at the game.”
“What, exactly,” inquired Michael Corcoran, in his well known cross-examination manner, “is a pirate?”
“A driver that don’t belong to no garage,” Fred replied promptly. “A bloke that runs his own taxi and can get hold of more petrol than what we can.”
“But he is properly licensed no doubt?”
“Oh, he’d have to be licensed.”
“Therefore, I would suggest, the term ‘pirate’ is less suitable than, shall we say, ‘privateer’?”
“Give ’em any name you like, sir. They don’t do us no good.”
“One of ’em done me a bit o’ good the other night,” said Mrs. Ryley reminiscently. “I’d been over to see me daughter, what’s in munitions, and some’o
w I missed me last bus. I admit she ‘ad a nice drop o’ gin, and that may ‘ave ‘ad something to do with it. But ‘ere was me in the black-out let in for a walk from Battersea to South Kensington. I got as far as Chelsea and wasn’t feelin’ any too spry, when a taxi draws up alongside me and the driver says, ‘Which way you goin’, ma?’”
Michael Corcoran experienced some difficulty in swallowing a mouthful of coffee, but overcame it, and winked at Sawby.
“I should ‘ave took it up with ‘im pretty sharp, callin’ me ma, if I’d been meself, and told ‘im which way ‘e could go; but I was that whacked I answered ‘im civil. ‘Jump in, ma,’ ‘e says. ‘‘Ave you there in two ticks!’ which ‘e done. I says, ‘Thank you kindly, mister—’ ‘Finch,’ ‘e says, ‘Mister Finch—’”
“Oh, him!” spluttered Fred, whose mouth, also, was full. “He’s barmy! You can’t tell me nothing about Finch.”
The conversation was interrupted by Sawby, who switched on the radio in order that patrons might listen to the seven o’clock news bulletin. It was an unwritten law that no one should interrupt this ritual; therefore, Fred reserved any further remarks which may have occurred to him relative to Peter Finch, and listened with the rest.
There were two items of news which provoked some interest. One was a War Office announcement that Combined Operations units had landed in force at a French port, destroying valuable installations and blowing up stores and workshops. “All objectives were achieved,” said the communique. The other related to the death of Sir Giles Loeder. “Scotland Yard is working upon a new clue which points to the probability that robbery was the motive of the crime.”
A swift, light footstep attracted Michael Corcoran’s attention, and he turned as a tall man whose tweed suit created an impression that it had shrunk, walked up to the stall, his tawny eyes rapidly taking stock of Sawby’s customers. “Good morning, Inspector,” he murmured.
The bulletin being ended, Sawby switched off and nodded to the newcomer.
“Coffee, please,” said Firth.