Dusty Death

by Clifton Robbins

  “Well—”

  “I don’t want to offend you, and if you are really Clay Harrison I know you won’t be offended, but I must be convinced somehow. You see, if anyone wanted to impersonate you—and they might, you never know—how simple to announce in the French press—which you would not see in London yourself, I expect—that Clay Harrison was coming to Geneva, and then present his card.”

  “Very simple, I agree,” said Harrison. “And I congratulate you on your caution, Mr. Dawnay. But what proofs will satisfy you?”

  “Assuming that you are Mr. Harrison and that the French press episode was a very unfortunate indiscretion,” Dawnay half-smiled as Harrison looked towards him, with a slight grimace of annoyance. “You say you have been asked to trace this Mr. Twining. Who by?”

  “By Miss Graham—Mr. Twining’s fiancée.”

  “That proves nothing,” answered Dawnay. “Your enemies, as you call them, knew her name, and what more obvious than they should say she sent them. Anything else?”

  “Yes, a telegram.”

  “That’s better.”

  “Or worse. It’s a telegram from Twining to Miss Graham from Geneva, and it’s because of that telegram I’m here.”

  “Have you got it with you?”

  “Yes, here it is.”

  From his pocket book, Harrison produced the telegram which Miss Graham had given him bearing the words “Aunt Sarah ill” and handed it to Dawnay.

  Dawnay took the small sheet of paper and glanced at it.

  “My God,” he exclaimed. “Has she had this long?”

  “Too long,” said Harrison. “Can you help me now?”

  “Of course I can,” said Dawnay, getting up from the table and pacing about the room. “You will forgive me for making you go through all this but one has to be frightfully careful at this game and to have used your name would have been absurdly easy.”

  “I quite understand, Mr. Dawnay.”

  “But this is terrible,” said Dawnay, looking at the telegram again.

  “You knew Twining then?”

  “Knew him? He was one of my dearest friends. One of the best men who ever walked—and then this.”

  Harrison sat respectfully silent as he studied this sudden change from cold calmness to strong emotion.

  “I knew about this code, too, and I knew he would never send this telegram unless he was in the most terrible straits.”

  “Then you are satisfied with my identity?” asked Harrison,

  “Of course I am,” answered Dawnay. “I was all along but I had to make certain, especially after that extraordinary announcement in the papers. I couldn’t believe you came out here on business like this.” He turned quickly to Harrison. “By jove, you’re not, either.”

  “What on earth does that mean?” asked Harrison.

  “You’re out here on a League committee on passport identification. It’s sitting for the first time this morning and I’ll fix you up as a British expert. Most important committee, you know, detectives and police officials from all over the world on it. Interesting fellows to meet.”

  “Yes, I know, Mr. Dawnay,” exclaimed Harrison. “But really my time—”

  “But you must have a reason for coming to Geneva,” said Dawnay. “A real, sound, official reason and this is so obvious. Then we publish it straight away and everybody’s satisfied—except certain people who may be puzzled by it.”

  “Then you think this is a serious business?”

  “Serious, my God, Mr. Harrison, it’s terribly serious. Twining would not have sent that telegram without the danger being pretty close upon him. I knew him too well for that. Poor old Twining—”

  “You knew him too well?” queried Harrison, sympathetically.

  “Yes, I know what you mean,” answered Dawnay, quickly. “I said it purposely. Twining knew too much and they meant to get him if they could. That’s why I want to help you all I can, Mr. Harrison. If I can save you in details like this, then you can get ahead so much more quickly.”

  “I am extraordinarily grateful,” said Harrison. “It will be helpful, I agree, but we are in the middle of things, rather, aren’t we? Now I want the beginning. What was Twining doing?”

  “I’m afraid that’s rather a long story,” answered Dawnay. “And I can’t tell you everything, right away. I will do so—as quickly as I can—but it can’t be done now. First of all, I have a great deal of work to do and secondly, there are any number of eyes watching this place. You appreciate that, of course?”

  “Certainly, since I have been followed here from London.”

  “That’s interesting,” said Dawnay. “They are paying you the greatest compliment by watching your movements. They take you seriously, at any rate.”

  “They, Mr. Dawnay?”

  “It’s the easiest way to speak of them,” was the guarded reply.

  “It’s no good fencing round each other, is it?” said Harrison. “You mean the drug people, don’t you?”

  “I suppose I do,” answered Dawnay, with a smile. “There are such queer people hanging around in Geneva and such queer things happening that one wonders sometimes what on earth one means at all. Still, it’s the drug people I’m up against and so was Twining too. I’ll give you details, when I can, but I think it will be enough for you to know that Twining was giving us his services voluntarily to root out the drug traffic. What he did exactly I do not know. I have really only seen him in this room. But for two or three years he has been amazingly successful, quite on his own, in spotting where large consignments were going to turn up. He must have been a long and very sharp thorn in their sides but I thought he kept his own movements too well covered for them to fix anything on him.”

  “But they did?”

  “They must have done,” said Dawnay. “When he came to see me this time. He always comes about Assembly time—”

  “How long ago was this?”

  “Oh, he came first about a fortnight ago and on and off since then. But on his first visit he said he thought they had found something out about him. He wasn’t really worried. He was a man of remarkable courage, or lack of fear, or whatever you like to call it. Danger did not frighten him but he thought it might mean the alteration of some of his plans which would have been a great nuisance. Especially at this moment when he said he had nearly completed a line of evidence which would shake the whole organisation of the drug traffic to bits.”

  “He said that, did he?”

  “Yes, he was positive he was going to make some really big stroke.”

  “So they had good reason for wanting him out of the way?”

  “According to Twining himself, very good reason indeed. That’s why I think it is so serious. If they had spotted him, they would have done all they could to stop him.”

  “And when did you see him last?”

  “Just a moment,” answered Dawnay. “I’ll look at the diary.” He pulled out a drawer about an inch so that the eye of the most inquisitive caller could not have gleaned any information. “On Monday, September 15th, at eleven in the morning. That’s five days ago.”

  “How long did he stay?”

  “Nearly an hour.”

  “And he sent this telegram soon afterwards. Twelve-twenty on September 15th. Did he talk about the danger that day?”

  “No, I don’t think he did, particularly. He seemed much more optimistic. Quite cheery, in fact. He seemed to think his job would soon be over and he could get back to England.”

  “Then between the time he left you and the sending of the telegram something important must have happened?”

  “That’s so.”

  “You can’t imagine what it was?”

  “Not at all. I knew nothing of Twining outside the office. That was our arrangement but I’ll explain that to you later.”

  “Do you know any woman connected with them?”

  “The drug people, you mean. No, I don’t think I do.”

  “Miss de Marplay, for example?”

>   “I can’t say recall the name. They have so many, you know.”

  “It was she who followed me. I think she would keep the same name. It wouldn’t be clever to have a different one over here.”

  “I might have heard it,” said Dawnay. “But it hasn’t lingered.”

  “Anything else?” asked Harrison.

  “Not now, I think,” replied Dawnay. “You see it’s rather a long story and, apart from the fact that I propose to do some work this morning, you must be punctual for your meeting, which opens in a few minutes. Don’t think I’m trying to put you off—”

  “I don’t,” said Harrison.

  “It will be much more helpful if you get the thing quietly and as fully as I know it. It’s a complicated business, in a way, Mr. Harrison, and yet it’s rather unpleasantly simple. Now about our next meeting. Where are you staying?”

  “The des Montagnes.”

  “I thought so; quite the best place for you. You might have liked one of the smaller places better, but it is easier to go in and out when there is a crowd about, and a delegate from Great Britain to the passport committee should stay there.”

  “Are they likely to trail you?”

  “I expect so. They might be too suspicious if we see too much of each other. Still, that’s easily arranged. There’s a reception at the des Montagnes to-night. It’s a terrible sort of show, but the nations will do it. During the Assembly and during the International Labour Conference too, there are these remarkable entertainments—an orgy of gaiety, I suppose, the popular papers would call it. Each nation invites the delegates of the other nations to some kind of feast or reception or lake trip or what not. When a delegate is hideously tired with his day’s work, he has to spend his evenings at that sort of thing and well into the night. The next war will be a war to avoid official receptions, I’m certain of that. There will have to be some international conventions about the little-known horrors of peace if the world isn’t to start fighting again. Still, it suits our purpose. It’s a great thought that an official reception has at last been responsible for one useful happening. You’ll come down to the reception when it’s in full swing. I will turn up, formally and officially. The Castanovian Government, which is giving it, will be delighted to see us both. In fact, it will very possibly be delighted to see about two hundred more people than it has invited. It isn’t ‘gate-crashing’ in Geneva, it’s a ‘levee en masse’ at a show of this kind. We will shake hands most politely as very recent acquaintances. You will tell me the number of your room, and soon after we will independently and quietly slip away from the mad gaiety and have our gossip there.”

  “Very excellent, Mr. Dawnay,” said Harrison, delighted at the business-like way in which matters had been worked out.

  “And now for your meeting,” exclaimed Dawnay, and led Harrison along a number of corridors to a committee-room where a number of the members of the passport committee had already gathered.

  Leaving Harrison to his own devices, Dawnay interviewed members of the secretariat who were in charge of the committee, and also Signor Corazzi, the Italian police chief, who was likely to be chairman. Having obviously settled matters in the most cordial and pleasant manner possible, Dawnay took Harrison across to the group and introduced him. Flattering remarks passed from one side to the other and, for the moment, Harrison almost believed that his present mission in life was the settling of the difficult problems of passport identification.

  The room was gradually filling up, and at first Harrison was puzzled by the number of people who arrived. Surely they could not all be experts on this particular subject. He questioned Dawnay, who explained that the first session of a committee of this kind was a public one to which press and general public were admitted. After that, the committee decided for itself.

  “It won’t help me much if it’s public all through,” said Harrison. “Except to give me an excuse for being here.”

  “I had thought of that,” said Dawnay. “And so I’ve suggested that, at any rate, the first few sessions shall be private and the general public shall certainly be given no opportunity of knowing whether you’re really here or not.”

  “You think of most things, Mr. Dawnay,” said Harrison.

  “I’m thinking mainly of Twining,” answered Dawnay, “and I want to give you every chance. I’ll stay with you a little while here to see things go all right.”

  The time for the opening of the meeting had now arrived, and the delegates settled themselves down. In a business-like way the formal preliminaries were gone through and Signor Corazzi elected chairman, unanimously.

  In a flowing speech the Italian police chief expressed his very grateful thanks for the honour. It was, of course, to his great country rather than to himself that the honour was paid, but he felt that he, personally, with all modesty, had contributed his small quota to the improvement of police methods in Europe. One country could learn from another on every subject. Italy was never too old to learn, but he felt that they had also something to teach, and so on and so on. He also appreciated the honour because there were so many present who could have filled the same position with so much greater distinction. Experts from all over the world were there. They might not all be household names, but their names were a guarantee of peace to the householder. And they were particularly delighted to welcome Mr. Clay Harrison, the distinguished English private investigator—since Sherlock Holmes, England had been the home of private investigators. If such a man as he could spare the time to come to Geneva, and he assumed that Mr. Harrison was as busy in his own way as an Italian police chief, then the labours of such a committee must be of value to the world, and so on, and so on, and so on. Dawnay smiled. “Good stuff,” he said. “Just what we want, and the press seems to be lapping it up, too.” He pointed to a table at the side of the room where a number of men of different nationalities were busily writing. “That’ll just polish off that French paragraph nicely.”

  Harrison looked vaguely in the direction of the table Dawnay had indicated and was about to remark that really journalists did not look very different from other men, even when seen in a variety of nationalities, when he saw Jeanne de Marplay, looking as charmingly fresh as ever, sail into the room and go straight to the press table. She seated herself at a place which seemed to have been reserved for her, and having given Harrison the most brazenly bewitching smile, proceeded to pull off her gloves, jerk by jerk, as she talked in animated undertones to the man seated next to her.

  By this time the French interpretation of the chairman’s speech was well under way, and Harrison had the new experience of hearing his own praises sung in another language.

  “Just look quietly round to the press table,” said Harrison to Dawnay, “and tell me who the girl is?”

  Dawnay looked cautiously round and then answered: “I have no idea. They come and they go, you know. Rather attractive, almost too attractive for a journalist, and yet I have seen some quite pleasant looking ones.”

  “Who is she talking to, then?”

  Dawnay looked round again. “The Baron, of course,” he replied. “Sorry, I forgot you were a stranger, for everybody in Geneva knows the Baron. Baron Meyerling, one of the most important people in world journalism—one might almost say, world politics. I don’t know what particular paper he represents, but he certainly is a power in the land. Knows everybody and almost everything, and, withal, is extremely popular. Charming man, speaks any number of languages with great competence. Can walk into any room in any office in Geneva and be really welcome.”

  “You’re very enthusiastic.”

  “I don’t know about that. One can’t help liking him. Anybody else will say the same. Very helpful and great charm, you know.”

  Harrison looked round again and saw the Baron looking intently at him. The Baron did not turn his eyes away but seemed to smile at Harrison as he looked. “I wonder if he is a friend of hers,” thought Harrison. “Maybe only a journalistic acquaintance. And yet the seat next to
him was kept for her. He seems a specially good character, and yet I have to be suspicious over everything. I must certainly find out something more about him.”

  Harrison looked around again but this time the Baron and Miss de Marplay seemed quite oblivious of his presence and were busily engaged with their writing.

  The committee decided, after some rather heated argument, to hold private sessions for the present. Harrison noticed a somewhat indignant buzz at the press table, and Dawnay hinted that there was a possibility of trouble.

  The committee then pursued the even tenor of its way and, Dawnay having departed, Harrison, deciding that he had already done a good morning’s work, settled down to profound interest in passport identification and forgot, for the time being, what had really brought him to Geneva.

  Chapter VII

  The Baron’s Handshakes

  The Castanovian reception was in full swing. The reception rooms of the Hotel des Montagnes were unbearably crowded and the atmosphere intolerably hot. Dawnay’s estimate of the unofficial attendance must have been correct. The rooms obviously were not designed to accommodate the numbers which filled them. This, however, had not upset the equanimity of the head of the Castanovian delegation who, with his very charming wife, greeted all and sundry with the same cordiality.

  In fact, an air of genuine cordiality pervaded the reception. Dawnay had looked at the affair with somewhat prejudiced eyes. He had seen too many official receptions to approve of them in any way and yet, in different parts of the room, one could see delegates who had been greatly in opposition at meetings during the day chatting very cheerfully together on pleasantly neutral matters. The spirit of neutrality was a boon to many of them and only a reception of this kind could have provided it.

  Harrison, followed by Henry, shook hands with the Castanovian representative and found that a reception was a much more serious business than he had expected. All the guests, a large number of whom had chairs, the rest leaning on every part of the walls for some relief, were hushed in solemn silence while a recital of music was being given. The Castanovian representative liked music and, being proud of the musicians of his country, had been at pains to gather an orchestra together to play selections from Castanovian composers. Harrison liked music, too, and thoroughly enjoyed the performance while Henry made careful study of the feminine portion of the assembly.