He paused reflectively as he tried to piece together the jumbled events in his mind. ‘Oh well, then,’ he said at last, ‘– curse this headache, it’s blinding me – then I got a crack over the skull, but not before I’d caught a glimpse of the fellow who swatted me. I recognized him. When I was down and out,’ he added awkwardly, ‘I went into all sorts of low eating houses. And there was one off Berwick Street, in Soho, just by the market, you know, where I used to see a whole lot of odd fishy characters going in and out. I think they had a room at the back. Well, this chap who hit me was a man I’d seen there often. I spotted him at once. He’d got a most obvious sort of face with a curious lumpy nose.’
He stopped again and the Professor nodded comprehendingly.
‘Then you were knocked out?’ he suggested.
‘That’s right,’ Val agreed. ‘But I don’t think I was out more than a couple of minutes at the most. I remember getting in a hell of a temper and charging downstairs; the only thing clear in my mind was that dirty little dive off Berwick Street. Outside there was still a young battle going on, and I charged through it. I think I sent a bobby flying in the process. Of course, I ought to have taken a few of them with me, but that didn’t occur to me at the time. They had their hands full, anyhow.’
‘And when you got to Berwick Street?’ said Beth, who had listened to this recital of her hero’s with wide-eyed enthusiasm.
‘Well, that was about all,’ said Val. ‘I charged into the place like a roaring bull and asked the proprietor chap for the man I wanted. He took me into the back room, where I waited, fuming, until a great lout of a fellow came in and before I knew what had happened I got a towel full of ether or chloroform or something in my face. That’s all I remember, until I found myself sitting in the hedge in the field outside here, feeling like a half resuscitated corpse.
‘I say,’ he added suddenly, ‘what’s today? I mean –?’
‘You’re twenty-five tomorrow,’ said the Professor. ‘By the look of you you’ve been lying in that hedge since early this morning. Thank goodness it’s dry weather.’
‘How did I get there?’ said Val in bewilderment. ‘I tell you, I was laid out in a filthy little dive off Berwick Market last night – no, it couldn’t have been last night. The night before, then. I suppose they injected something. Chloroform wouldn’t have kept me under all that time. Here – where’s Campion? I must let him know. Although,’ he added morosely, ‘I suppose he’s heard all about it from the police by now.’
‘Albert’s gone,’ wailed Penny. ‘And we’ve lost the Chalice. And yet,’ she added, suddenly sitting up, ‘that accounts for it. Someone was phoning Albert up all day yesterday. I was in bed at the time, but Mary told me this morning. That’s why he went off. He didn’t want to scare Father or me, I suppose.’
She was interrupted by the arrival of Mrs Cairey, who put her head round the door.
‘Papa dear,’ she said, ‘the postman’s here. There’s that special mail you’ve got to pay for, and I wondered if you’d like your letters too, Penny, my dear. He’ll give them to you if you come. Lands above!’ she added, coming into the room, all her motherly instincts aroused, ‘you do look ill, Mr Gyrth. Is there anything I can do for you?’
Penny went out with the Professor almost mechanically. Her brain was whirling with the complications of this new and apparently final development. Why on earth could no one realize that the Chalice had gone?
The postman, a scarlet-faced and perspiring East Anglian, was standing at the front door leaning gratefully on his bicycle.
‘Two letters for you, miss,’ he remarked, as he completed his transaction with the Professor. ‘Your brother ain’t ’ere by any chance, is ’e?’ he added, raising a hopeful blue eye in her direction.
‘He is, as a matter of fact,’ said Penny, considerably startled by the coincidence of such a question.
‘Ain’t that lucky? The only other thing for the Tower is this parcel for ’im. If you wouldn’t mind, miss –?’ The man was already unbuckling the prodigious canvas bag on his carrier, and the next moment he had dumped a large and heavy parcel in her arms. ‘It’s lucky you got it,’ he said. ‘It feels like it’s over the regulation weight to me. Good morning, miss.’
He touched his ridiculous hat and swung on to the bicycle.
Penny, with the parcel in her arms, walked slowly back to the study. Just as she entered the room something about the weight and size of her burden sent a curious thrill through her.
‘Val,’ she said breathlessly, ‘open this. I think – oh, I don’t know – anyhow, open it.’
There was something so imperative in her tone that the boy’s interest was roused.
‘What in the name of –’ he began. ‘Oh, it’s my birthday tomorrow. It’s probably something stupid from one of the relations.’
Nevertheless he accepted the knife Beth handed him and ripped up the cords, displaying a stout cardboard box of the type usually used to pack large bottles. Something of his sister’s excitement seemed to be conveyed to him, for the hand that unfastened the slotted end of the carton shook violently.
Next moment he had pulled out a wad of straw packing and an exclamation escaped him. The Professor, Mrs Cairey and Beth bent forward, and very gently he drew out the long, slender golden cup that Mr Melchizadek’s great grandfather had made.
‘The Chalice!’ said Penny, a sob in her voice. ‘Oh, Val, it’s all right.’
The faces of the other two women reflected her delight, but the Professor and Val exchanged glances.
‘How –?’ said Val breathlessly. ‘This is incredible. Is there any message? Who addressed it?’
A frenzied search revealed that there was no other enclosure, and that the address was printed in block capitals. The postmark was illegible.
The Professor cleared his throat. ‘I guess I can understand this,’ he said, tapping the relics of the parcel. ‘But how you arrived in that field this morning is completely beyond my comprehension. Who set you there, and why? It doesn’t make sense.’
Penny, who had been staring at her brother during the last few minutes, suddenly stretched out her hand.
‘Val!’ she said. ‘Your buttonhole!’
Instinctively the boy put up his hand to the lapel of his collar and an expression of astonishment came into his face as he detached a drooping wild flower bud from the slit and stared at it.
‘Funny,’ he said. ‘I certainly don’t remember putting it there. It’s fairly fresh, too.’
Penny snatched it from him. ‘Don’t you see what it is?’ she said, her voice rising. ‘There’s hundreds of them in that field where you woke up. It’s a white campion. There’s only one person on earth who would think of that.’
CHAPTER 22
The Three-Card Trick
—
MR CAMPION stopped his car among the high broom bushes on Heronhoe Heath that evening and sniffed the air appreciatively. He seemed if anything a little more inane than usual, and in spite of his evident anxiety, there was something about him which conveyed that he was definitely pleased with himself.
Although he had been driving most of the day there was no trace of weariness in his tall loose-limbed figure. He locked the car, slipped the key into his pocket, and stood for a moment with his hand on the bonnet. ‘The highwayman’s farewell to his horse,’ he remarked aloud to the empty air, and then, turning abruptly, strode off across the springy turf.
Behind him the lights of the Gypsy camp glowed in the dusk, and for a moment he hesitated, half drawn by their inviting friendliness. He turned away resolutely, however, and contented himself by hailing them with a long drawn-out whistle that might easily have come from one of the myriad seabirds on the creek. He paused to listen, the heath whispering and rustling around him. Almost immediately the cry was returned, two melodious whistles that sounded pleasantly reassuring. Mr Campion appeared satisfied and strode on his way almost jauntily.
Mrs Dick’s stables were only just disc
ernible, a dark rectangular patch in the greyness. He had miscalculated the distance a little, and the walk was longer than he had anticipated. When he reached the buildings at last he stood for a moment in the shadow of a high wall listening intently. There was no sound from within, and, convinced that his approach had not been observed, he began to work slowly round the walls, moving silently and using his torch at intervals.
The building was much as he had expected. A high red wall enclosed the whole of the establishment, forming a large rectangular block, only one side of which was skirted by the rough private track which he had been so careful to avoid in his journey from the main road.
The large iron gates which formed the entrance from the track were locked. Peering cautiously through them, he was relieved to find the place in darkness. The dwelling-house and garden took up the western third of the rectangle. Directly in front of him was a square court with a cottage on his left, while the stables occupied the remaining portion of the whole block. They were built on all four sides of a square, two storeys high, with big wooden gates to the courtyard and a second entrance giving on to the heath on the eastern side, at right-angles to the creek. The drive led on a gentle curve past the front door of the house to the wooden gates of the stable yard.
Alone in the darkness, Mr Campion became suddenly intensely alert. Somewhere in the house he fancied he could hear the murmur of voices. He made no attempt to enter until he had been all round the buildings, however, and by the time he had returned to the front gates once more he was considerably wiser.
The place was in appalling repair and many of the bricks had begun to fluke badly under the influence of the salt air. Mr Campion put his spectacles in his pocket, and, having chosen a suitable spot by the kitchens of the house where an overgrown creeper hung down, began to climb. It was by no means an easy ascent, for the wall was high, and it was surmounted by broken glass which the creeper only just masked. He accomplished it, however, and slid noiselessly to the ground on the other side. Once again he paused to listen, holding his breath. Still there was no noise but the continued murmur of voices somewhere on the opposite side of the house.
Having replaced his spectacles, he set off once more on his perambulation. There were no dogs nor grooms to be seen, and after careful inspection of the stable yard, the wooden doors of which stood ajar, Mr Campion was convinced that the information which he had gathered on one of his many visits that afternoon in London was substantially correct. Mrs Dick’s racing stables could hardly be regarded as a going concern. Although there were boxes for twenty horses, only one of them appeared to be occupied.
The cottage by the stable gates was empty also, and evidences of decay were on all sides. Only the lawn and the courtyard were trim. The garden was a wilderness.
Very cautiously he approached the one lighted aperture in the whole establishment; two glass doors giving out on to the lawn. He had been careful to avoid the beam of light which they shed on to the lawn, but now he ventured up to it, the grass deadening his footsteps.
There was a thin net curtain over the windows, but the light inside rendered it transparent as he came nearer. In the relics of what had once been a fine room, five men and a woman were grouped round a table at which a hand of poker was in progress.
‘Not a nice lot,’ Mr Campion reflected as he glanced from face to face. There was Matthew Sanderson, looking more astute than ever as he dealt the cards; the horse-faced ‘Major’, and Fingers Hawkins, who had held him up on the road, a little ill at ease among his social superiors, but nevertheless in shirt-sleeves. Then there was a grey-headed, narrow-eyed man he did not recognize, and a little insignificant Japanese half-caste that he did, and whose presence bewildered him.
Mrs Dick dominated the group by sheer force of personality. As usual, she was strikingly smart; her black and white dress contrived to be almost theatrical in its extreme yet austere fashionableness. Her white face was twisted in a half-smile. Her hair was close-cropped like a man’s, displaying her curiously lobeless ears. A heavy rope of barbaric crimson beads was coiled round her throat, and the feminine touch looked bizarre upon her angular, masculine form.
‘Not staying, Major?’ she said, as the red-faced man threw down his cards. ‘You never have the courage to see a thing through. Sandy, I’ve been watching you. You’re playing all you know.’
Sanderson threw down his cards. ‘I wonder someone hasn’t strangled you, Daisy,’ he said, with more admiration than resentment in his tone.
Mrs Dick was unabashed. ‘My husband tried,’ she observed.
‘You got him first, I suppose?’ said the Major, laughing.
The woman fixed him with her peculiarly insolent stare. ‘He used to say the whisky wasn’t strong enough,’ she said. ‘I often think it was the methylated spirits we used to pep it up with that killed him.’
Sanderson turned away. ‘You put the wind up me,’ he said. ‘The way you talk I wonder you’re not afraid of the “Blacking”.’
Mrs Dick laughed. ‘I’d like to see any man who’s got the guts to blackmail me,’ she said. ‘Make it five, Tony.’
‘No “Blacking”,’ said Fingers Hawkins from the other side of the table. ‘But we’ll get our do’s.’
‘You’ll get your dues and more.’ Mrs Dick was inclined to be contemptuous. ‘I’ll make it the limit, Tony. You won’t stay? Thanks. Mine.’
She threw down her hand as Mr Campion tapped on the window.
The gentle noise startled everyone save Mrs Dick, who hardly looked up from the cards she was collecting. ‘Open that window, Fingers,’ she murmured. ‘There’s something scratching on it.’
The big man went forward cautiously, and, raising the catch, jerked the half-door open, jumping smartly sideways as he did so.
Mr Campion, pale, smiling and ineffably inane, was revealed on the threshold.
‘Good evening, everybody,’ he said, coming into the room. ‘Anybody got a good tip for the Ascot Gold Cup?’
Fingers Hawkins side-stepped behind him and passed out into the darkness. ‘’E’s alone,’ he remarked, and coming back into the room, relocked the window.
At this piece of information the spirits of the company, which had been momentarily uncertain, now became almost uproarious. Sanderson began to laugh.
‘All on his own,’ he said. ‘Isn’t that sweet and confiding? We were telling Daisy she ought to invite you for a nice quiet rest until the fun was over, and here you are.’
‘Look out. P’raps there’s a cartload of busies outside,’ said the half-caste nervously.
Sanderson turned on him. ‘Shut up, Moggie,’ he said viciously. ‘How many times have I told you the police aren’t in this business? What d’you think they’re going to get you for – being alive?’
‘Well, I could understand that,’ remarked Mr Campion affably. ‘Still, everyone to his taste, eh, Mrs Shannon?’
Mrs Dick did not deign to look in his direction. ‘What have you come here for?’ she said, reshuffling the cards. ‘I don’t think I know you.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Mr Campion. ‘We met at the dear Vicar’s. You must remember. I was passing round the biscuits. You took two. Then we both laughed heartily.’
Mrs Dick raised her eyes and regarded him coldly. ‘You seem to be even more of a fool than I took you for at first,’ she said, her stentorian tones blaring at him across the card table. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Calling,’ said Mr Campion firmly. ‘That must be obvious to the meanest intelligence.’
‘Sandy,’ said Mrs Shannon, ‘put this creature out.’
‘Not on your life.’ Sanderson spoke with enthusiasm. ‘Daisy under-estimates you, Campion. I shall feel all the safer with you as a guest here for the next few days. Got a gun?’
‘No,’ said Mr Campion. ‘I don’t like firearms. Even pea-shooters are dangerous in my opinion.’
‘No fooling. I’ve got mine trained on you.’
Mr Campion shrugged his shoulders and t
urned to Fingers.
‘Do your stuff,’ he said, raising his arms above his head. ‘I love to see a professional at work.’
‘You stow it,’ said the pickpocket uneasily. Nevertheless he complied with Mr Campion’s request, and stood back a moment or so later shaking his head.
Sanderson’s amusement increased.
‘Well, this is friendly,’ he said. ‘What d’you think you’re doing? You’ve done some balmy things in your life, but now you’ve stepped clean over the edge. What’s the idea?’
‘You look out for ’im,’ said the gentleman addressed as Moggie. ‘’E’s as slippery as an eel. ’E’s got something up his sleeve, you betcher life. Probably that great bull pup Lugg’s about somewhere.’
‘Write that down, sign it, send it to our head office, and we present you with a magnificent fountain pen absolutely free,’ said Mr Campion. ‘Every testimonial, however humble, is docketed and on view at any time.’
Mrs Dick stacked the cards up neatly and turned in her chair to survey her visitor once more. ‘Why have you come here, young man?’ she said. ‘You’re beginning to bore me.’
‘Just you wait,’ said Mr Campion. ‘Wait till I get my personality over. I do hope you don’t mind. I’ve been looking over your stables. There’s one thing I didn’t quite get. So many boxes but only ‘a’ horse’s. I suppose the pretty creature has a different home each day, like Alice at the mad tea party.’
The woman’s expression did not change, but her strong bony hands ceased to play with the cards.
‘Perhaps you had better stay here for a day or two,’ she said. ‘Lock him up in one of the boxes, Sandy, and then for Heaven’s sake stick to the game.’
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