The Mayfair Mystery

by Frank Richardson

  He presented a deplorable figure of sorrow, this anaemic old man with thin hair, red eyes, and a semi-clerical frock-coat. Tragedy in the make-up of Farce.

  Harding walked towards the window, it seemed to him impossible that the colourless daughter of the grotesque Mingey could ever hope to embark successfully on the career of a ‘gay woman’. After a slight pause, he said:

  ‘What did you say to her?’

  ‘I’ll tell you what I said, sir. First of all, I went directly up to her. I stood in front of her. She looked at me, and I said, “Sarah!” That is all I said, and I held out my arms. And she looked at me: she looked right through me. She didn’t seem to see me, and I said “Sarah,” I said, “if only you will come back, I will forgive all.” The gentleman who was by her side heard my words. He looked at me. He seemed astonished, and, of course, he would be astonished at hearing a man like me saying what I did say. I didn’t care how he looked. But what killed me was the way she looked. As God is in Heaven, she didn’t seem to remember me. And she was my Sarah. There wasn’t any doubt about it. And just so sure as I recognised her, she must have recognised me. No matter how low a daughter has sunk, she can’t forget her father…in less than a month.’

  ‘What did she say?’

  ‘She said, in a voice that sent the chills through me, “I have really no idea who you are.” I shall never forget those words. Then a motor-car man comes up and salutes. The gentleman who is with her says to me, “Will you kindly get out of the way,” and bustles her, all silks and finery, into a motor-car.’

  Harding walked up to his clerk. He stood looking at him for a second or so; then he said:

  ‘Did your daughter absolutely decline to recognise you? How did she behave?’

  ‘Well, if you ask me, sir,’ he answered, ‘anybody who didn’t know that I was her father would have thought that she’d really forgotten me. She didn’t seem to know me, not from Adam, but,’ he said, with tight-clenched teeth, ‘that’s play-acting. When a girl has sunk to what she has sunk to, I don’t suppose it’s any trouble to be a play-actress. There’s no sort of iniquity that she can’t sink to.’

  ‘But look here, Mingey, are you quite sure you haven’t made some mistake? Are you absolutely convinced that this was your daughter?’

  It struck him as an extraordinary thing that the drab figure whose photograph he had seen—a bespectacled, blousy, untidy, though possibly attractive, woman—should suddenly have found favour in the sight of a man to an extent that enabled her to drive about in a motor-car with a groom. ‘Motorman’ he took to mean groom.

  The clerk negatived the possibility of doubt.

  ‘That’s not a thing, sir, you could be mistaken about. She was very much changed. Oh! so changed!’

  ‘For the better?’

  ‘For the better and the worse. She looked happy. She was beautifully dressed. I never saw a woman so beautifully dressed, not to speak to, outside the Divorce Court. But for the worse. Oh, my God, for the worse! It will kill her mother.’

  ‘What type of man was she with? What sort of man put her into the motor-car?’

  ‘He was more or less a young man, sir, with a shiny hat and white gloves, and a strange sort of white waistcoat. But I noticed that he had a moustache. It was only a sort of half moustache.’

  ‘Was she covered with jewels?’

  ‘No, sir, she was not covered with jewels, but she, well, I don’t know how to say it, but she gave you the idea of being very expensive. Everything that she had seemed to me to be the sort of thing which—God help me for saying it—a respectable girl oughtn’t to have. Besides that, there were lots of things in her hair.’

  ‘Look here, Mingey,’ answered Harding, ‘I’m afraid that you’ve come across a mare’s nest. I sincerely hope, of course, that your daughter is alive, but I think you’ve made a mistake. You have shown me a photograph of Miss Mingey, and I can scarcely credit that a girl whose appearance was practically a guarantee of her virtue, and who also wore spectacles, which are a sort of moral chastity belt, could have become what you call a gay woman. You call these people gay women, Mingey, because you know nothing about them. Believe me, there is very little of gaiety in their lives. But I am of opinion that no daughter of yours would ever dream of adopting this terrible career. I think you are over-worried, Mingey, I think you’ve made a great mistake.’

  ‘It was she, it was she, it was she!’ he cried.

  ‘She hadn’t got on spectacles, but I couldn’t make a mistake. How could a father make a mistake about his own daughter?’

  Earnestly the clerk stared at him.

  His eyes were starting out from their sockets. He spoke in a whisper.

  ‘There is more behind it than you think, sir. Last night, at the conclusion of our meeting, the members present, knowing of the distress I was in, proceeded to prayer on my account. It was silent prayer. But suddenly Brother James Potter, one of our greatest lights, rose from his knees and said, “Our brother Mingey will find his lost lamb tonight.”’

  ‘Brother Potter really said that, did he?’

  ‘As true as I’m standing here, sir.’

  ‘Well,’ commented Harding, ‘that settles it.’

  In his own mind the matter which the observation that Brother Potter had settled was that he (Harding) would have to get a new clerk.

  CHAPTER XXII

  THE CURE FOR CANCER

  THAT night Harding, having been to the Opera with a friend, went to the Gridiron. There had been a first night at His Majesty’s Theatre, and the Club room was full. The leitmotiv of the conversation was Clifford Oakleigh.

  ‘What has Clifford been doing now?’ he inquired of Lord Lashbridge as he ordered his supper.

  ‘You lawyers never seem to know anything! You live in a groove. You divide all humanity into plaintiffs and defendants, into petitioners, respondents and co-respondents. But really, really, George, I thought that you occasionally read the newspapers.’

  ‘I always read eight papers a day.’

  ‘Oh, no, nonsense,’ replied the other. ‘I believe you are getting into training for your approaching elevation to the Bench. You want to make a corner in universal ignorance. You want to be able to look down on some unfortunate junior and wither him with the question, “What is the Daily Mail?” or “Is Radium a breakfast food?”’

  Harding sat down by the side of Lashbridge.

  ‘Joking apart,’ he asked, ‘what has Clifford done now?’

  Lashbridge, imitating the intonation of a toastmaster, tapped the table with his knife and said:

  ‘My Lords and Gentlemen, pray silence for your Chairman. Mr George Harding, King’s Counsel. Mr George Harding has not heard that Sir Clifford Oakleigh has discovered a cure for cancer.’

  Everybody laughed.

  ‘What do you mean, Lashbridge?’ asked the K.C., testily.

  Lashbridge explained.

  Clifford Oakleigh had lately been treating two certified cases of incurable cancer at Guy’s Hospital. Today, the physicians appointed to report upon the patients had pronounced them completely cured.

  The men present had listened in silence to Lashbridge’s statement. Then a babel of chatter ensued. Clifford Oakleigh was the greatest man of the age. There had never been a man like Clifford Oakleigh. Something must be done for Clifford Oakleigh. Everything must be done for Clifford Oakleigh. They were all proud to know Clifford Oakleigh. A somewhat alcoholic sculptor suggested a public subscription for the erection of a statue of Clifford Oakleigh in the act of discovering the cure for cancer. Clifford Oakleigh. Clifford Oakleigh. Clifford Oakleigh.

  There was but one discordant note. That came from Frederick Robinson.

  He suggested that hypnotism had played a large part in the alleged cures.

  ‘Why,’ he asked, ‘had Oakleigh’s treatment been kept secret?’ Oakleigh was notoriously addicted to the practice of hypnotism.

  ‘And why not?’ came as a chorus.

  ‘Because,’ he answe
red, ‘all hypnotists are charlatans.’

  ‘Oh, stop it,’ cried Harding, ‘you believe in nothing except whiskers.’

  ‘Good Heavens!’ he answered, ‘I don’t believe in whiskers—that is in the utility of whiskers. I know they exist as a fact, or as facts, but I don’t believe they serve any useful purpose.’

  Shouts of ‘Turn him out!’

  But Robinson sat firm.

  For at least an hour Clifford Oakleigh was the sole topic of conversation. Nearly everybody had some item of news in connection with him. One said that, having made his discovery, he intended to retire from practice. Another contradicted him, having heard on good authority that Oakleigh intended to devote himself almost entirely to patients suffering from this terrible disease, and that he would treat them gratuitously at Guy’s Hospital. A third maintained that so curious was the great man’s character that it would give him great pleasure, having proved beyond question that he could cure cancer, to take his secret to the grave. When a man has suddenly become the topic of the moment, no story about him is too absurd to receive credence. For years Oakleigh had been regarded as one of the most striking figures in London. His marvellous cures, his multitudinous love-affairs, had caused him to loom large in the public eye. True, many people had regarded him as a quack. But in every walk of life, in art, literature or science, the successful man is liable to be accused of quackery. With regard to every man, however great, there is a pessimistic opinion. In the case of Oakleigh his avowed use of hypnotism had found little favour with many of the older members of the Faculty.

  He had never sought advertisement of any sort. But his intense vitality, his strenuous enjoyment of the good things of life, had taken him into many different strata of Society. Every man or woman whom he met was interested in him and talked of him and told anecdotes of him. In this way he multiplied his personality a thousand times. The ordinary Harley Street practitioner, the most ordinarily eminent Harley Street practitioner, is known, perhaps, to some few members of the Athenaeum Club and to the Royal Society and to the Royal College of Physicians and to certain moribund patients. That is all. He is an uninteresting individual, who sits in his consulting-room surrounded by his whiskers. In him, as a man, the public takes no interest. Clifford Oakleigh had always been a prominent figure. He was known by sight almost as well as a leading actor, infinitely better than most Cabinet Ministers.

  Now he had discovered the cure for cancer, a fact that was established, and it is scarcely exaggeration to say that on this day there was scarcely a household in the country where Clifford Oakleigh was not being energetically discussed. The strange stories that had been in circulation with regard to his mysterious disappearances were now accounted for. He could not attend his private patients because he was perfecting his great humanitarian discovery. All honour to him!

  There is always in the air some sort of telepathy whereby one feels instinctively that something of surpassing interest is occurring.

  Each man’s head turned towards the door. Clifford Oakleigh had entered.

  Members of the Gridiron felt that it was a great compliment to themselves that this genius—that was the word that sprang to their minds—had in the moment of his triumph come to their club.

  Although the members of the Gridiron are the least demonstrative of men, each considered that the occasion should be marked, if not in a suitable way, at any rate in a way as suitable as possible.

  He walked down the room with an air of triumphant modesty. He appeared ignorant of the silence that his entry had caused. His bright eyes were flashing with the vigour of health and a smile of perfect contentment played about his mouth. One could see that his goal was the empty seat by Harding’s side.

  Suddenly Lashbridge rose, a glass in his hand.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘I know I’m doing a thing that somebody ought to do, and I know that it’s the sort of thing that ought to be superbly done, or not done at all. But, however badly I do it, I shall be proud to have done it. I give you the health of Sir Clifford Oakleigh, the greatest man in the world!’

  Everybody rose and held their glasses in the direction of the physician.

  His face paled, and in contrast to his pallor his eyes shone more brightly.

  Evidently he was completely taken aback. After a pause he spoke, and his voice was vibrant with emotion.

  ‘I thank you,’ he said, ‘I thank you a thousand times.… Such a thing has never happened in the Gridiron.… I thank you from the bottom of my heart.… One does what one can. That is all one can do.… But that is the least one can do.’

  Then he sat down by Harding’s side. And as he did so he pressed the K.C.’s hand.

  The members of the club gazed proudly upon him as he talked to his old friend. Each felt that he had been present at an historical occasion, as though he had assisted at the supper given toast. George after the slaughter of the Dragon.

  Again there came a discordant note from Robinson. He, of course, found it necessary to interfere.

  ‘By the by, Sir Clifford,’ he said, ‘a curious thing happened last night. I had a box at the Prince of Wales’—a small theatre party—“Babs” Barton and Guy Jebb, and your tenant, Miss Clive. As we were coming out an extraordinary man, all wet and dripping, like an aquatic undertaker, suddenly came up to Miss Clive, called her Sarah, and said that if she came home, all would be forgiven. Deuced funny, wasn’t it? How could one possibly forgive anything to a woman who was called Sarah?’

  Neither Oakleigh nor Harding seemed interested in Robinson’s query.

  He stroked his lank hair and closed his eyes.

  ‘Sarah, Sarah,’ he repeated. ‘No one is ever called Sarah nowadays. Yet there has been a Sarah talked about a good deal in the papers lately.’

  He seemed to be racking his brains.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ he said suddenly, ‘I’ve got it. I say, Harding, your clerk’s daughter who disappeared was called Sarah Mingey, wasn’t she?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Harding. His eyes were fixed on the ceiling and he was blowing a cloud of cigar smoke from his mouth.

  CHAPTER XXIII

  THE MYSTERIOUS BEHAVIOUR OF SIR CLIFFORD OAKLEIGH

  BEYOND question, Clifford Oakleigh was the man of the moment. Every newspaper in the kingdom published paeans of praise. Throughout Europe and the United States he created an immense sensation. His consulting-rooms in Harley Street were besieged. Not only did sufferers from cancer seek his advice. Thinking that a man who could baffle this terrible disease could therefore cope with any other ailment, all sufferers sought an interview. Telegrams came from all parts of the world. His own secretary was powerless to cope with them. He could have fixed up appointments for the next three years without intermission. Immense offers were cabled from New York, from San Francisco, from Boston, from Philadelphia, if only the great doctor would go to the States. From his point of view money had lost all value. A thousand guineas meant nothing. He was the twentieth-century miracle-worker. And who shall assess the market-price of a miracle?

  It was impossible to answer the letters that flowed in upon him, even with the help of Reggie Pardell, who had been summoned to Harley Street to perform clerical functions. Reggie had to be on duty at eight-thirty in the morning: and from that time till midnight, with scanty intervals for meals, Clifford Oakleigh received patients…for three days.

  The cures that he effected were marvellous. People went into his consulting-room moribund wrecks and they emerged completely restored to health.

  But so great was the strain upon him that he maintained that he could not work for more than three days a week.

  Still, in those three days he reaped a golden—nay, a diamond—harvest. Yet there was somewhat of an outcry. There were many who complained that his charges were excessive, and indeed Reggie had started a sort of sliding scale. A shrewd judge of character, a man with a very considerable knowledge of the higher class of Society, he knew the maximum sum which could be wrung from a patient.… And he go
t that sum.

  Violent letters were written to the newspapers accusing Oakleigh of greed: in fact, a considerable newspaper war raged around him. Many claimed that a man who had been gifted with quasi-omnipotence in the healing of disease should not exact the uttermost farthing from the sufferer.

  One or two ungrateful patients actually wrote to the Times giving their experiences.

  ‘Paterfamilias’ complained that, on the authority of a well-known physician, he was suffering from an incurable form of diabetes. He had gone to Sir Clifford Oakleigh, he had been shown into the presence of that worthy by a secretary to whom he had paid a hundred guineas, he had entered into conversation with Sir Clifford Oakleigh. Clifford Oakleigh had asked him one or two questions. Within twenty minutes of his entry into the consulting-room he was shown out of it. Sir Clifford Oakleigh had said nothing to him of any great interest. He had certainly done nothing to him. He could not, in fact, recall accurately the details of his visit. The result, however, was that he had been completely cured of an incurable form of diabetes. Still, he maintained that the charge was excessive.

  Many people wrote to various journals in a like strain. Their cures had been so simple. They had not been compelled to spend large sums of money in foreign hotels. They had merely come into the consulting-room in Harley Street suffering from various ailments, and they had left entirely cured. They seemed to regard this as not being correct. They wanted to have value for their money. If you suffer, they argued, from a serious disease, you must be cured seriously or not at all.

  These were the carpers. They, however, stood in a vast minority.

  The bulk of Sir Clifford Oakleigh’s patients were delighted at the astonishing rapidity of his cures. They did not resent the fact that he did not give them medicine, that he did not send them to take ‘cures’. But one thing all resented, and that was the fact that they could never recall the method of his treatment. Any man or woman who at a dinner-party could have described the precise manner in which he or she had been healed would have been in great demand.