Dusty Death

by Clifton Robbins

  The bell tinkled softly again and so he lifted the receiver.

  “Hullo, hullo,” came the voice of Jeanne de Marplay. “Is that you, Mr. Harrison? I’m sorry to trouble you at this time but I waited to dance with you again and you never reappeared.”

  “I’m so sorry,” answered Harrison, not being able to recall that he had ever asked the fascinating young woman for another dance.

  “That’s all right. I suppose you were tired with your journey and, anyhow, the reception’s over now. But I wanted to say how much I hoped we should see something more of each other in Geneva. I’m staying at the Hotel Voyage. Do ring me up and fix some time when we can meet again.”

  “Certainly,” said Harrison, rather taken aback by this frank proposition.

  “What about to-morrow?” asked Jeanne de Marplay.

  “Oh, no,” answered Harrison, hastily. “I’m so sorry, but I’m booked all to-morrow. I’ll ring you.”

  “I hope you will,” was the reply. “Now don’t forget. Good-bye.”

  Harrison hung up the receiver and sat down with a frown. Alice would have said “curiouser and curiouser”, he thought to himself. What does that mean?

  Henry soon returned with the second brew of tea and his invaluable notebook. Harrison poured out two cups and, handing one to Henry, bade him sit down and be as comfortable as possible.

  ‘You’re a good audience, Henry,” drinking his tea with great contentment. “And I think we’d better go through some of the ideas we’ve accumulated to-day. Take what notes you think necessary.”

  “Right, sir,” said Henry.

  “First of all, Henry, we’ve fixed the whole thing on the drug traffic. That should be a good enough day’s work for most people, but not for us.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Gilbert Twining disappeared—and, I should say, was murdered—because he had found out too much about their organisation. Before he disappeared, he said that the head of the show was in Geneva. Point one, he may still be here. Really, I think we may assume that he is still here.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “That means, Henry, that there is someone in Geneva who knows all that we want to know. All we have to do is to find him.”

  “Sounds simple, sir,” said Henry. “How are you going to do it?”

  “Wait a minute, Henry,” replied Harrison. “You will go so quickly. Why do we assume he is still here?”

  “You said you did, sir.”

  “That’s a poor answer for you, Henry. We can’t assume without a reason.”

  “No, sir.”

  “Well, Henry, suppose we do so because of the paragraph in the French paper saying I was coming.”

  “That would be a good reason, sir, and—”

  “I think it is the best possible reason,” said Harrison. “But what else were you going to say, Henry?”

  “It leads to that woman,” said Henry

  “You’re quite right, Henry,” answered Harrison. “That certainly is the next step. We’ve got to think a great deal about Miss de Marplay. She will be a great help.”

  “You surprise me, sir,” said Henry.

  “She doesn’t mean to be,” continued Harrison. “Far from it, but she must already have given a great deal away if we can only work it out. Now very broadly let us assume that the trail is just a bit too warm at present, the scent a bit too strong for the drug people. They didn’t think we should get on to it so quickly. I expect, first of all, they thought they would get a clear run of a week, at least, before anybody thought of Twining being really missing. Then they could not have expected that I should have linked it up so quickly with the drug traffic. Of course, I should have had to do so, in time, but, thanks to the help of Miss de Marplay, I was able to get on to it at once.”

  “After your warning, sir, about assumptions,” said Henry, “I should say that you are making rather a big one on the facts you have just given. Surely there must be some more reasons?”

  “Good for you, Henry,” answered Harrison. “Of course there must be. Let’s see what they are. Evidently she thought the trail was too warm and that’s why she followed me. I believe the Baron feels so, too—”

  “The Baron, sir?” asked Henry.

  “Of course you haven’t been introduced to the Baron, Henry,” said Harrison. “I’m so sorry. There is a certain Baron Meyerling in Geneva who is, according to what I hear, something rather unique as an international journalist. He knows everybody and everything and goes everywhere. As far as I can see, everybody likes him and everybody trusts him.”

  “Then why drag him in, sir?”

  “For a very good reason, Henry,” answered Harrison, with a twinkling eye. “And one which I know you will appreciate. Because he employs the said Jeanne de Marplay.”

  “One of the best of reasons, from my point of view, too, sir,” said Henry. “But prejudice apart—” this he enunciated with a very solemn and pompous air.

  “My dear Henry,” interposed Harrison. “Surely we have no prejudices.”

  “The fact is, sir, although it is quite wrong, I’m willing to believe anything of that woman. There’s something about her which makes me feel like that but, as I said, apart from that, why should we blame her employer?”

  “Because, Henry he made most elaborate excuses for her. Said that following us about was her idea of fun, that sort of thing. That she was a good journalist but inclined to be indiscreet and a lot more to that effect. In fact, he seemed to be doing anything and everything to make me forget what she had said and done since she first called on me.”

  “That’s good, sir,” exclaimed Henry. “He’s worried.”

  “Quite so,” said Harrison. “This happened to-night at the dance. They saw me with Dawnay at the committee this morning and, of course, put two and two together. The Baron is obviously worried as to what the woman may have unconsciously given away and I feel he is also worried because everything isn’t straight yet in Geneva.”

  “Yes, sir?” said Henry, waiting for the explanation.

  “There may be some people in Geneva who know what happened to Twining or who can give some helpful information and who may he made to talk. The Baron, I should say, realises that and hasn’t been able to clear up all his threads as he would have done, if he had been given a little longer. You’re right, Henry, he’s worried, clearly worried.”

  “Then you feel sure, sir, that the Baron’s in it?”

  “Absolutely sure, Henry, and well in it. Nothing else can explain all these excuses for de Marplay. It was so carefully done and regarded as so important by the Baron that I really feel we must be on the right track. It’s going to be a tough job because no one is going to believe us. So now we have the measure of Miss de Marplay we can get on a bit. She is going to be very useful because she does give things away. She has been our one guiding clue up to now. I suppose she is over-keen—a difficult quality in a game like this. It was she who rang up just now, Henry.”

  “At this time of night, sir?”

  “Yes, she said she had just left the reception and hoped we should meet again soon. You see she feels she must keep an eye on me and a kind of honesty about it seems to her to be the best policy. A bright idea, possibly, but it hasn’t succeeded up to the present. So I shall certainly keep in touch with her. Of course, she wanted to convey something else to me.”

  “She seems to convey a great deal, sir,” said Henry.

  “Oh, this wasn’t very important, really,” answered Harrison. “She just wanted me to know that she had seen Dawnay go out of the hotel and that she realised that he and I had been having a long and solemn conversation about Twining.”

  “She said that, sir?” asked Henry.

  “Of course she didn’t but she meant me to realise it. She wanted to show that she was watching, too, and as alert as I am. It may be a good method, Henry. I won’t definitely say it isn’t. One would say, of course, that it puts me on my guard and is therefore bad but it might put me so much o
n my guard as to confuse me and make me wonder if every move I made wasn’t spotted and countered directly I made it. There’s something in that for she’s no fool, that woman. But, Henry, we still have something up our sleeve against her.”

  “What’s that, sir?”

  “The alleged pot of face cream. She hasn’t told the Baron that and she doesn’t seem to want him to know. I can’t say why, at present. Whether it’s for her own use, whether she’s been forbidden to bring it into Geneva or whether just because she used me for smuggling it and the Baron might be really upset about that particular piece of idiocy I don’t know but I feel we’ve got a pull on her over that and we may have to use it, one never can tell.”

  “There’s no doubt she’s been helpful, sir,” said Henry.

  “Maybe,” answered Harrison. “But even then she may have an object in it. She may be helping us to our own disaster, Henry, we’ve certainly got to go very carefully. Now you go off to bed and I’ll sit about a bit. I’ve got to wait for a telephone call from Dawnay, at any rate, so off you go.”

  Henry cleared up the teacups and departed while Harrison sat smoking his cigar and wondering whether anything more could be extracted from the information he had already obtained.

  It was some time before the telephone bell rang and Harrison went eagerly to it.

  “Hullo, Harrison,” said a voice. “Dawnay here. The porter almost refused to put me through but I insisted.”

  “Right, Dawnay, go ahead,” replied Harrison.

  “That cupboard was the devil of a job to force,” said Dawnay. “Gilbert had put a very good lock on it and I had to work alone but I got it open at last.”

  “Good work,” said Harrison. “What did you find?”

  “Nothing much,” answered Dawnay. “The suit he comes to see me in at the office. Some shirts, underclothes and collars. Socks, too. That’s about all.”

  “No papers?”

  “Not a sign.”

  “Have you been through the pockets?”

  “Every one. Just a few Geneva tram tickets, that’s all.”

  “Do you mind going through them again while I hang on?”

  “Certainly,” answered Dawnay and left the telephone. He soon returned and stated that he had found nothing further.

  “That’s a pity,” said Harrison. “You definitely recognise the clothes?”

  “Oh, yes. I know them very well.”

  “Rather a blow, isn’t it?” said Harrison.

  “You didn’t expect any papers, did you?” asked Dawnay.

  “Of course not,” said Harrison. “It isn’t that. It’s the clothes.”

  “I don’t quite see,” answered Dawnay.

  “Don’t you see, Dawnay,” said Harrison. “This is making our job about ten times more difficult. We don’t know what Twining looked like when he disappeared. He was wearing his disguise.”

  Chapter X

  Harrison’s Day Of Rest

  “A trip on the lake would be rather pleasant, Henry, don’t you think?” said Harrison next morning after what must be regarded as a somewhat late breakfast. They were standing by the hotel windows looking out onto the lake. The town of Geneva, with its cathedral sitting well in its centre, was looking charming and peaceful in the morning sun. Sunday atmosphere seemed to brood over the place, strangely effective, thought Harrison, but due, as he was told afterwards by some realists, to the absence of cyclists across the Mont Blanc bridge.

  “It sounds pleasant enough,” answered Henry dubiously, “but haven’t we anything to do in Geneva, sir?”

  “I’ve had two telephone calls since I came down,” said Harrison. “Isn’t that enough?”

  “I suppose that’s what they call a continental Sunday, sir,” replied Henry.

  “You win,” said Harrison, laughing. “Indeed, Henry, you almost put me to shame with your wish to work. But seriously the telephone calls are all we can do in Geneva for the moment. We may do quite a lot of useful work on the boat.”

  “So it’s not really a pleasure trip, sir?”

  “From what I can see it will be far from it,” answered Harrison, with half a sigh. “You see it’s these journalists again. Very difficult, these journalists, Henry. And on the boat we’re going to be interviewed by the most difficult of them all—from what I am told—a man named Crill.”

  “Never heard of him,” said Henry

  “Nor had I until last night,” said Harrison. “But I’ve heard a lot of him now. I rang him up this morning—”

  “You rang him up?”

  “Yes, Henry. I rang him up and asked him to interview me. He seemed most indignant about it. He didn’t reckon to go interviewing private detectives on a Sunday anyhow. He even suggested that I was just looking for vulgar publicity.”

  “I’d like to meet the gentleman,” said Henry, pugnaciously.

  “You’re going to meet him,” answered Harrison, “but not in that mood.”

  “But a man who suggests a thing like that,” expostulated Henry. “Excuse my saying so, sir, but I should have thought you would have had enough of publicity after that woman’s efforts over your coming to Geneva.”

  “I’m really not very excited about publicity,” said Harrison, “but I want to talk to Mr. Crill. It may be interesting.”

  “Then why on the boat? Why can’t he come here?”

  “Oh, Henry, Henry,” said Harrison sadly. “Isn’t that the simplest precaution. We’re being watched in everything we do and whatever we do in Geneva will be studied by our friends from every point of view.”

  “But this man only wants an interview?”

  “I’m sorry, Henry, I should have told you that last night the Baron warned me against him. I must admit he was quite kind about it but the warning was definite. The Baron does not like Mr. Crill, he may have some real reason for disliking him. If he has, it may be very useful to us. So we have to see Mr. Crill in the most unsuspicious manner possible. So finally I got Mr. Crill to agree to meet me casually on the boat which goes very soon to Montreux.”

  “And the telephone call, sir?”

  “Really, Henry, you seem to be watching every one of my movements as well. As a matter of fact, I had to ring up Mr. Dawnay to see how he was after his late night.”

  Henry was not very much impressed by this remark but the rebuke implied by its manner decided him not to pursue his inquiries and a short time afterwards they wandered together down to the landing stage. They were in good time and Clay Harrison was quite alone when he booked their tickets to Montreux. He seemed to Henry to be excessively cautious over this proceeding for he pushed his face right up to the booking office window and whispered his destination most confidentially to the clerk within.

  Immediately they were on board Harrison found a seat where, without appearing too obstrusively curious, he could watch the booking office window.

  “I was right,” he said suddenly. “No secret can be kept from the magnificent drug organisation.” He indicated a man who had walked up to the office and seemed to be as confidential in his inquiries as Harrison had been.

  “There seem to be a lot of secrets on the landing stage to-day,” said Henry, superciliously. “Of course if anybody was watching and they saw you so very confidential about it they would want to find out, sir.”

  “Of course,” answered Harrison, with a huge smile, and Henry, for a moment, felt rather small.

  “Possibly he’s only booking a ticket,” said Henry, to re-establish himself. “He’s just put his hand up to the window. I should think he’s paying some money over—”

  “Henry, you mustn’t suggest things like that,” said Harrison solemnly. “That would be bribery. Payment for information received; for, see, he’s going away again.”

  “So he is,” said Henry, rather crestfallen.

  “And that, I hope, is that,” said Harrison, producing a cigar and lighting it.

  “You don’t think they’ll follow us on board?” asked Henry.

  �
�Why should they? Not even Miss de Marplay to while away our weary hours.”

  “Thank heaven for that,” said Henry, fervently.

  “They have discovered we are going to Montreux. A very natural thing for us to do on a Sunday in Geneva and we can’t do any harm there. All the harm we can do, as far as I know, is in Geneva, and, as far as they know, too. If we are out of Geneva for the day, all the better for them. No, I don’t think they’ll follow us—at any rate, I’m relying on it. By the way, Henry, did you notice our friend who made inquiries about us?”

  “Most of these foreigners seem alike to me,” said Henry. “But I did notice that he had a straggly moustache, bushy eyebrows and was rather short.”

  “Not bad, Henry, but did you see his eyes?”

  “No, I didn’t. He had his face in the window all the time.”

  “Not quite all the time, Henry. When he turned away to go, he looked quickly up at the boat to see if we were still here.”

  “So he did, sir,” said Henry. “But I’m afraid I didn’t notice anything.”

  “They were bright eyes, very bright eyes, Henry,” answered Harrison. “Too bright—in fact, dope. He was certainly our man. Now we can wait for Mr. Crill with a certain amount of composure, Henry.”

  The bustle increased and now a queue was waiting at the booking office. Very many people had had the same inspiration as Harrison and were making a trip on the lake. One or two people who had obviously had Harrison pointed out to them looked curiously at him as they passed but Harrison decided that none of them was the Mr. Crill he hoped to meet.

  Finally the boat started to move and Harrison was beginning to feel somewhat disappointed when a tall figure appeared on the deck obviously looking for a particular passenger. The stranger did not look in the best of tempers and this, coupled with what Harrison had already heard, decided him that this must be Mr. Crill and that it was certainly worth the risk of going up to him.

  “Mr. Crill, I hope?” said Harrison, holding out his hand.

  “Harrison, I’m afraid,” answered Crill, ungraciously, returning the handshake in a very perfunctory manner.

  Harrison looked intently at Crill and pigeon-holed him at once as a very interesting character. Tall and grey-haired, aesthetic and intellectual looking, he had the appearance of a man to whom everything in life had spelt disillusion.