The Case of Naomi Clynes

by Basil Thomson

  “Don’t build too much upon it, Mr. Hudson. In every difficult case there are a dozen false clues which end in a dead wall, but the point is that one can’t afford to neglect any of them.”

  But Hudson had so touching a confidence in his fellow-traveller’s flair that he refused to be discouraged. In his imagination the boy had already been found. “We’ll put the little fella between us here on the back seat,” he muttered, shifting himself into the corner to make room. “Gee! But he’ll have a lot to tell us.”

  As the morning went on all became hungry. They passed through many towns and villages, but Adolphe ignored all the placards restricting the speed of cars to ten kilometres an hour and tore through them all. Once indeed Milsom ventured to call his uncle’s attention to a promising-looking restaurant by the wayside, and suggested a halt for lunch, but the old man shook his head. “We’ll get lunch at this place with the double name,” he said; “we’ve gotta push on.”

  And now they began the long ascent to the central massif on the crest of which lay Clermont-Ferrand. The car took it in its stride without changing speed, even at the sharp turns of the road, without any perceptible anxiety in the features of its owner. When Adolphe shaved a two-horse hay-wagon which was imprudently taking the middle of the road and a wisp of hay was scraped off through the open window on to their knees, Milsom observed to the roof of the car, “I wonder what my Uncle James would have said if that had happened when I was at the wheel,” but Mr. Hudson took no notice. The demon of speed had him in its grip. “We’ve gotta get on.”

  And now they were approaching the town. Adolphe turned in his seat to ask where they would stop for lunch.

  “Any place,” shouted his employer.

  As Richardson expected, Adolphe took this to be an intimation that he was free to choose the best hotel in the place, and he pulled up at the Grand where the meals cost thirty-five francs and the garage ten.

  So keen was Mr. Hudson on the quest of the postage-stamp that his nephew declared that he would have skipped his lunch if Adolphe had not assured him that nothing could be done in French towns during the hours sacred to the midday meal.

  During lunch Richardson broke it to his hosts that he must visit the local office of the Sûreté Générate alone, with Adolphe as his interpreter. “You see, sir,” he explained to Mr. Hudson, “I shall have to introduce myself as a police colleague from London, and if there are four of us the police commissaire may take you for journalists and shut up like an oyster, but there is no reason why you should not wait outside in the car. Besides, it may all lead to nothing.”

  “Is that so?” commented Mr. Hudson dryly. “I guess that you’ll come out waving an address in our faces; Adolphe will drive us to the house and you’ll come out leading a little English boy by the hand.”

  Milsom pronounced half-past one to be the magic hour when French officials might be trusted to receive inquisitive foreigners with a tolerant eye. “Besides, their men, who have to go off on cycles to make their inquiries, will be found in the office, full-fed and at peace with the world.”

  Armed with the address and a plan of the town, Adolphe drove them straight to the door of the commissariat, and he and Richardson went in and asked the Sûreté officer in the outer room to take Richardson’s card to his chief. “You might tell him that I have come straight from Scotland Yard, the head-quarters of the London police, to ask for the aid of the Sûreté in bringing a murderer to justice,” added Richardson. The officer returned and beckoned to the two to follow him.

  They found themselves in a little room in which the floor space was restricted by cupboards and a large writing-table encumbered with papers. The officer at the table rose and came forward to shake hands with Richardson as a colleague. He brought two chairs up to the table for his guests and asked what he could do for them.

  “You do not speak French, monsieur? You have brought your chauffeur to interpret for you?”

  Richardson assented, regretting more than ever that he lacked the linguistic accomplishments of his colleagues in the Special Branch. Adolphe interpreted what he said, sentence by sentence.

  “The President of Police in London has sent me out to France in connection with the murder of a lady in London, monsieur, and one branch of the inquiry concerns an English boy who was injured in the accident at Lagny on Christmas Eve. There is some reason for believing that he may be in Clermont-Ferrand.”

  “What was his age?”

  “About nine.”

  “Then he cannot be alone here.”

  “No, monsieur. If he is here he must be in some French family. This advertisement that appeared in the Paris-Soir of January 6th produced this reply from a Frenchman living in a different part of the country, but the advertiser had already left his hotel when this letter arrived for him.”

  “You think that he may have had another reply from Clermont-Ferrand?”

  “Yes, monsieur, that is why we are here.”

  The officer pursed his lips doubtfully. “Sit still, gentlemen, while I make inquiries of my subordinates whether any of them have heard of an English boy being in the town.”

  In less than five minutes he returned with a young, smart-looking police officer in breeches and gaiters, who was about to start off on his bicycle.

  “Happily, messieurs, I was just in time. This officer was already on his bicycle when I stopped him. He will be able to tell you something of interest. Speak, Commissaire Bigot.”

  Bigot stood to attention while he rattled off his report. “A bicycle repairer in rue de Serbie has an English boy living with him. One day I stopped to inquire how he came by him. He told me that an English milord had advertised for a family to take charge of the boy and he replied to the advertisement; that the English milord brought the boy in a large touring car, but the boy was ill and the man hesitated to accept him in that condition. The boy had bandage round his head. A month later I was passing the shop and I stopped to ask whether the boy had recovered, whether he had an identity card, and whether he was attending school. While I was putting these questions the boy himself ran out of the workshop. Already he could speak a few words of French.”

  “Would you allow this officer to guide us to the shop?” asked Richardson.

  “Certainly; he can go ahead on his bicycle and your car can follow him. Do you propose to leave the boy here or to take him back with you?”

  “Probably we shall take him back to England if his evidence proves to be of any value, monsieur.”

  Richardson took his leave with the feeling that fortune was smiling on him and with warm appreciation of the efficiency of the Sûreté Générate.

  “Well, what luck?” asked Milsom, when he returned to the car; “and who’s this brigand armed to the teeth on a bicycle?”

  “Hush, Mr. Milsom; he may understand English. He’s to act as our guide.”

  “What’s that?” inquired his uncle. “You mean to say that we’ve found that boy?”

  “I hope, sir, that you will be talking to him in five minutes.”

  The “brigand” in blue breeches mounted his cycle and Adolphe followed him, towards the north-west part of the town. He rode fast and made a signal to Adolphe at each corner. They came soon to a tramway crossing and a narrow ill-paved street. This was the rue de Serbie. The officer slowed down, holding up his hand to Adolphe, swung his leg over the saddle of his machine and entered the door of the little two-storeyed cycle shop. Richardson and Adolphe were close upon his heels. The cycle repairer, an alert little man with grubby hands, came forward to meet them.

  “Where’s that English boy?” asked the commissaire.

  “He’s at school, monsieur. He won’t be back until after five. Which school? Why, the school in the Avenue des États Unis.”

  “I want you to tell these gentlemen how the boy came to you. It is the Brigadier’s orders that you tell them everything. And now, messieurs, if you will excuse me, I will leave you and attend to my other duties. You will no doubt report to
my Brigadier what steps you have taken as regards the boy.” He saluted and rode away on his bicycle.

  The little cycle-repairer scratched his head. “Did I do wrong in accepting the boy, monsieur? I read the advertisement and talked things over with my wife. With your leave I will call her. She knows more about the little boy than I do.” He stamped on the lowest step of the staircase and shouted, “Louise.”

  “J’arrive,” came the reply from the upper regions.

  “You see, messieurs, we have no children of our own and you know what women are—always they want children.” Louise, a buxom lass in the early twenties, made her appearance and stood smiling at her husband’s side.

  “You are talking about little Jean. He is getting on well now, but of course at first he was lonely. He could not speak our language, poor boy, and no one could understand him, but now he is beginning and he has boys to play with at school.”

  “After you replied to the advertisement what happened?” asked Richardson.

  “Two days later a big car drove up to the door and a milord, who spoke French very well, lifted the little boy out of the car and carried him into this workshop. Louise insisted on taking him into her kitchen where it was clean and there were chairs to sit on. There the Englishman told us the little boy’s story. His father had been condemned in England and was in prison; that they did not want little Jean ever to know of this and so they brought him to France to be brought up as a French child. I do not hide the truth from you, monsieur, the gentleman made us a very generous offer—an offer that will enable me to move into a larger workshop and engage hands to extend my business. It was a great temptation to a poor mechanic like myself. I told him that I would accept the charge of the boy and adopt him as my son, but that it would be necessary for us both to sign an agreement as regards the adoption and have it certified at the Mairie. If you will wait a moment I will go and fetch my copy of the agreement.”

  While he was gone, Richardson asked his wife whether she had grown fond of the boy.

  “It was difficult at first, monsieur. The poor child was ailing, and we could not understand each other’s language. He seemed to be suffering with his head. He talked in his sleep a great deal. He must have had terrible dreams, poor child, but gradually he got better. Since he has been at school and mixing with other children he has made great progress in French.”

  The husband returned with the deed of adoption. Adolphe ran his eye over it. “This must have been drafted by a lawyer,” he said.

  “Yes,” replied the husband; “it was drafted by Maître Delage in the Avenue Maréchal Joffre, and as you see we both signed it before the mayor. You will observe the stamp of the Maine.”

  Adolphe handed it back to him and Richardson asked, “Can I see the little boy?”

  The man turned to his wife. “Run up to the school, Louise, and tell them that some English people are passing through the town and desire to see Jean. Bring him back with you.”

  The woman trotted off without a hat, and Richardson turned to Adolphe. “I’m going off to consult my friends in the car. While I’m gone will you find out from the husband whether he and his wife would mind very much if we took the boy away with us?”

  He went out to the car and found its owner beaming with anticipation.

  “You’ve found the boy, then?”

  “Yes, Mr. Hudson; he’s at school at the moment, but his foster-mother has gone off to fetch him. I find myself in some difficulty because I’m not conversant with French law. These people were told that the boy’s father was in prison, and they have legally adopted this little boy as their son; and I can’t represent myself to them as an English relative who wants to take the boy away from them, I might be committing an offence against French law.”

  “Don’t ask me about French law and French lawyers. I’m a property owner in the country, and I hate the very sight of them.”

  Jim Milsom broke in. “Look here, Inspector, don’t waste time by splitting straws. Leave it to me. I’ll kidnap the boy and have done with it. What I don’t know about kidnapping isn’t worth knowing.”

  “No doubt, Mr. Milsom, but then we should have sensational paragraphs in the French newspapers, and perhaps questions in the House of Commons, and I might find myself in serious trouble.”

  “Well, then, a little lying wouldn’t come amiss. You, of course, as a public official must tell nothing but the truth, but I’m free as a fiction editor to tell them anything that’ll go. I’ll say that the boy’s father isn’t in prison; that on the contrary he’s in heaven, and that the guy who brought him here had no rights over him—that he stole him, in fact; that you are his nearest relative, his paternal uncle, and you want him back.”

  “And you might add,” said Mr. Hudson, “that if a small sum of money would be of any use to them…If I was in your place, Inspector, I should just tell them who I was—an inspector from Scotland Yard. I should say, ‘See here, now, Scotland Yard has sent me to bring that boy back to England, and no guy in blue breeches is going to stop me doing it.’ And if they grumbled a bit I should say, ‘If it’s a bit of money you want, I’ll pay you a bit of compensation if you don’t open your mouths too wide.’“

  Adolphe approached them at a quick walk and addressed Richardson. “It’s all right, Inspector. The missus is fond of the boy, but the doctor has given her a bit of good news. She’s expecting—is that what you say in English? When they wanted to adopt a child it was because they thought she couldn’t have one of her own.”

  “Well, then, everything’s okay,” said Mr. Hudson. “I’m eager to see that little fellow and hear what he has to tell us.”

  Adolphe was looking up the road. “They’re coming, sir.”

  The three jumped out of the ear and stood waiting. They saw Louise pointing at them. The little boy broke from her and came running towards them. In spite of his deplorable French clothing, he was manifestly an English boy.

  “Maman tells me you are English. Are you really English?” His candid blue eyes looked from one to the other.

  “I should jolly well think we are,” said Jim Milsom, who had a way with little boys. “What’s your name, old man?”

  “Well, here they call me Jean Godfrey, but Godfrey’s my first name. My real name is Godfrey Maze.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  LOUISE, WITH the hospitable instinct of the French peasant, insisted that they all go into her kitchen and taste her coffee. There were to be no refusals. Chairs were fetched from other rooms until there were sufficient for all. The hostess busied herself about her kitchen range: Jim Milsom put his arm round little Godfrey Maze and asked him how he would like to go with them to England.

  The boy’s eyes blazed with excitement. “Wouldn’t I just! But what will Maman say?”

  “Oh, we’re going to make it all right with Maman. Don’t you worry.’’

  Meanwhile, Richardson suggested to Adolphe that while the coffee was being made they should take the adopted father into his workshop and have a talk with him. The three left the room together.

  “Tell him,” said Richardson, “that the gentleman who brought the boy here had no right to sign that deed of adoption; that he lied when he told him that that boy’s father was in prison—that, in fact, the father is dead and the boy is heir to a considerable fortune in England. All this can easily be proved in a French court, but that would cost time and money, and there would be publicity in the newspapers which we are anxious to avoid. Ask him whether he would object to the boy leaving with us, and consider the deed of adoption as null and void?”

  Adolphe translated all this to the astonished mechanic.

  “Messieurs,” he replied, “my wife has grown attached to that boy, but we have both realized that he is not happy with us; that he is not of our class. We ought, of course, to let him go back to his own folks, but it is a question of the money we have had. Happily it has not yet been spent, but I have been in treaty for new premises, and they may hold me to pay the law expenses.�
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  “Tell him that there is no question of asking him to refund any of the money. All that is required is that he should tear up that deed of adoption and allow us to take the child away.”

  There was intense relief in the man’s features when he heard the statement about the money, but Richardson detected an expression of fear when he understood that he was being asked to tear up a document with an official seal on it. “But suppose, messieurs, that the Maire requires me to produce this document. He may say, ‘What proof had you that the gentleman who called upon you had more right to the boy than the gentleman who signed that deed?’”

  There was no answer to that question. Not one of them had a better claim to the boy than his guardian, John Maze.

  “Tell him, then, that he can keep the document to produce if he is required to do so, but that the child must come back with us to England, as he is required to give evidence against the man who signed that document in a false name, and to enable him to claim the property that was left to him by his father.”

  “You mean that little Jean has inherited property, messieurs?” He spoke in a tone of new respect for his adopted son.

  “Yes, a very considerable property, we believe, and the boy’s evidence will be required to enable him to claim it.”

  “I am content, messieurs, to let him go. I will tell my wife to pack his valise. And now I hear her calling us. The coffee and the goûter must be ready.”

  In spite of the approaching parting, it was a gay little meal. Jim Milsom’s sallies kept little Godfrey in gurgles of laughter: Louise herself found it infectious as she pressed biscuits and coffee on her guests. When all except the little boy showed that they could eat and drink no more, the cycle-mechanic signalled to his wife and they left the room together. Mr. Hudson seized the opportunity for a whispered colloquy with Richardson.