by Sapper
“You are absolutely certain about this peculiar thing you saw in the wood?” he said. “But, of course, you must be. You couldn’t both have imagined it. Very strange: very strange indeed.”
He lit a cigarette thoughtfully.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if you are not right, Scott,” he went on, “and it is not our friend from Spragge’s Farm.”
“Whose name would seem, from what Vandali said, to be Marillard,” I put in. “But my impression of the thing we saw in the wood was that it was considerably taller.”
“Anyway,” said Hugh, “whether it is him or not, we’ve arrived at two definite conclusions. Granger is frightened of it, and he is not frightened of the Vandalis. Therefore it would seem that it and Vandalis are working separately. Am I right or wrong?”
“Don’t ask me,” grunted Freckles. “The whole thing at the present moment is completely above my form. But there is one point that sticks out a bit, and that is the fact that the Vandalis know about Marillard, and that Granger is frightened of him. So that if the ‘it’ is Marillard, even though they may be working separately, the Vandalis are using him as a weapon for their own ends.”
“Life is certainly a trifle complicated,” murmured Hugh. “However, let us hear what your perfectly good girl has to say on the matter.”
“Great Scott! She has written a three volume novel,” said Freckles as he opened the letter. “Er – and the first paragraph, chaps, does not seem to bear directly on the subject.”
“You surprise me,” said Hugh gravely. “The first paragraph may therefore be omitted.”
“It certainly will be,” laughed the other. “Here is where she really gets going.”
He settled himself comfortably in his chair.
“This is the most amazing household,” [he began.] “I’ll start at the beginning and try not leave out anything. The first excitement occurred the instant the gate was shut – and you heard it. The dog, I mean, if such an animal can be called a dog. It is the size of a calf, and I suppose it saw a stranger. Instantly it hurled itself against the bars of its cage, roaring – there is no other word for it – with rage. Its eyes were red, its great fangs were showing, and the front of the cage shook so much that I feared it might give way.
“‘What an awful brute,’ I said to the man who had opened the gate. His name is Gaspard, and he and the dog are a pretty pair.
“‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘And he runs loose at night. Don’t forget that.’
“He flung open the front door, and then I really thought for a moment or two I had come to a madhouse. A nasty-looking little man, who subsequently turned out to be my employer, was coming downstairs as I stepped into the hall. The instant he saw me he started shouting, ‘Who’s that woman? Who’s that woman?’ at the top of his voice. I stood there wondering whether to laugh or be angry, while the servant man said something to him which seemed to reassure him. At any rate, he came shambling forward, and muttered some sort of an apology.
“‘You must excuse me, my dear young lady,’ he said, ‘but I am a great recluse. My nerves are not all they might be.’
“‘So I see,’ I answered. ‘I presume you are expecting me.’
“‘Of course, of course,’ he muttered. ‘Just for the moment I had forgotten you were coming – that is all. Let me see – you come from Miss Mudge’s bureau, don’t you? Now you would like to see your room, I’m sure. Gaspard – tell your wife to show this young lady to her room. And then later we will go into your duties. Tell me, as you came in, did you see anyone outside in the road?’
“‘I came with my fiancé,’ I said. ‘And there were two gentlemen who told us which the house was.’
“I could hardly get the sentence out before he was shouting for Gaspard.
“‘Did you see the men?’ he stuttered. ‘The two men outside?’
“‘Only Drummond and a friend of his,’ said Gaspard.
“‘Who was the friend?’ he cried.
“‘If you want to know,’ I said coldly, ‘his name was Darrell.’
“He stared at me suspiciously, and I suppose he noticed I was looking a bit surprised. Anyway, he made an attempt to pull himself together.
“‘I don’t encourage strangers, Miss…’
“I told him my name.
“‘Ah! yes, of course. I remember now. No, Miss Verney, I don’t encourage strangers. As I told you, I am a recluse, and I keep myself to myself.’
“I forbore to make the obvious retort that no one was likely to object, and he went rambling on, evidently trying to put me at my ease. And then at last the woman arrived, and I escaped upstairs.
“‘Mr Granger seems in a very nervous condition,’ I said to her.
“She was a furtive-eyed creature and very uncommunicative.
“‘So would you be if you never stirred outside the house,’ she muttered morosely. ‘Here’s your room.’
“She flung open a door, and walked in in front of me. And then Gaspard brought in my box, and the pair of them went out and left me alone. The room was quite comfortable, though the furniture was very plain. And like every other room in the house, there were steel bars over the window.
“I got unpacked, and shortly afterwards the woman brought me some tea.
“‘When you’ve finished, ring the bell and I’ll take you to Granger,’ she said.
“I noticed the omission of the ‘mister,’ but said nothing. As a matter of fact, it only confirmed what I’d thought ever since I got into the house, that they were all of much the same class. However, I finished my tea and went off to interview the gentleman. His room is at the top of the house, and is, if possible, more heavily barricaded than the rest. The door is about three inches thick, and you can hardly see out of the window for bars. He was sitting at his desk when I came in, and I took a pew opposite, from which I could study him more fully than I’d been able to up to date. He is the most terrible little man, Tom: perfectly frightful. He is like some kind of insect with a rash on it, and but for the fifty quid I think I should have left then and there.
“However, he started explaining what he wanted me to do. And after a time I had to stop him: he was so incoherent and rambling that I could not make head or tail of what he was saying. In addition to which he kept popping up to have a look out of the window, until I could have shied the inkpot at his head.
“‘You must forgive me, Miss Verney,’ he said several times, ‘but I have had a great shock just lately.’
“I said nothing, of course, but presumably he was alluding to the signals Captain Drummond was talking about. And quite obviously the man is in a pitiful condition of nerves. However, to get back to the point. After he had hummed and hawed for some time, and told me that he would want me to write letters and that sort of thing for him, he suddenly asked me if I knew anything about jewellery and precious stones. I said I knew very little.
“‘I have one or two beautiful bits of stuff,’ he rambled on. ‘I have been an ardent collector for years.’
“Which, of course, was very nice, but what it had to do with my duties as his secretary was a little obscure. So I brought him back to the point.
“‘I should like to know, Mr Granger,’ I said, ‘what will be the arrangement over going out. There seemed to be a great deal of difficulty over getting in: I hope it won’t apply to getting out.’
“‘That we will arrange,’ he cried. ‘Just at present it would be better, I think, for you to take your walk in the grounds. There are reasons, important reasons. But one thing, as you value your life, you must not forget – do not go out after dusk.’
“‘You mean the dog?’ I said.
“‘Yes – and other things, too. Soon I hope the danger will be over, but for the next few days do not forget my warning.’
“And then I could not help it:
I just had to ask him:
“‘Why have you got your house barricaded like a prison?’ I said.
“‘I have an enemy,’ he answered; ‘an unscrupulous enemy. He believes I did him a wrong – years ago. As if one could do such as he a wrong. But I’ll beat him, I’ll beat him.’
“He was literally jibbering in his excitement, and for some time I thought he was going to have a fit. Then the upheaval passed.
“‘A vile criminal, Miss Verney: a man debased beyond words.’
“Bearing in mind the speaker, I thought that a bit rich.
“‘Do not be alarmed,’ he continued, ‘if you hear things at night, out in the grounds. You will be quite safe. Well, well, we will finish our talk tomorrow. A letter or two, and your outings. We must discuss them: we must certainly discuss them.’
“And with that I left him. Honestly I do not think the man is quite all there, and as for his remarks about the criminal outside, the man is as crooked as a corkscrew himself. However, it is past eleven now, and I am going to bed. My dinner was sent up to my room, and I have not seen Mr Granger again. But an hour ago I heard the most frightful quarrel going on between him and Gaspard, and it sounded to me as if Gaspard was drunk. Anyway, I have locked my door, though, to give the devil his due, neither of them has given me any trouble at all. Good night: I’ll finish this effusion tomorrow, though whether I will ever get it to you or not remains to be seen.”
CHAPTER 6
In which we come to Temple Tower
“By Gosh! the old thing has spread herself,” said Freckles. “There is a further vast instalment.”
“Get on with it,” cried Hugh. “It strikes me Miss Verney has her head screwed on in exactly the right way.”
“She is not too dusty,” conceded her fiancé‚ graciously. “Now this whack of stuff is headed Midday.”
“Had a perfectly good night,” [she begins,] “though I woke up once with that beastly dog baying at something outside. However, I soon fell asleep again, and did not wake till after eight. All of which matters not: I’ll get on with it. I received his majesty’s command to wait on him at ten o’clock. Now you know my watch has never been quite itself again since it fell in the river at Henley, and sure enough it had apparently gained about twenty minutes this morning. The result was that little Patricia, with pencil and paper complete, fresh and radiant in the morning sunshine, popped into the sacred room at twenty to ten instead of ten. Not, you would have thought, a very frightful crime, but you should have seen the result. His lordship was kneeling by the side of the fireplace, holding something in his hand. As soon as he heard the door open he thrust whatever it was back into a recess, which he closed. Then he scrambled to his feet in a fury.
“‘I said ten,’ he stormed.
“‘I thought it was ten,’ I remarked amiably. ‘My watch must have gained.’
“Then I sat down with paper and pencil, and waited for him to start. After a bit he calmed down and took a seat at his desk.
“‘You must make allowances for me, Miss Verney,’ he mumbled. ‘My health is not very good.’
“‘That’s all right,’ I said. ‘It was my fault for coming too soon.’
“And once more I waited for him to begin. At last he got under way, and dictated three short letters – all of them business, and all of them trivial to a degree. Then he stopped.
“‘Is that all?’ I said.
“‘All for this morning,’ he answered. ‘As a matter of fact, Miss Verney, my correspondence is very small. Being the recluse I am, I know but few people.’
“‘If this is a fair sample of a day’s job,’ I remarked, ‘I shall certainly not be overworked. I will go and type these now, and bring them to you to sign.’
“I got up and went to the door and just as I was opening it I heard him muttering in his beard again: there are times when he talks exactly like a man with his mouth full of fish-bones. So I waited for him to get it off his chest, and if you can explain it I shall be glad, for I certainly can’t.
“He first of all started on the question of outings. He mumbled and he grunted, and repeated his warning of last night about the immediate future. Then without a word of warning he suddenly asked me if I’d like to go to London. I stared at him blankly and asked him if he meant alone, or was he going, or what.
“‘Alone,’ he said. ‘All alone in a nice first-class carriage.’
“Honestly, Tom, I don’t think the man is all there. I half expected him to go on and say something about the pretty puff-puff. However I waited, and let him get on with it in his own way.
“‘You see, Miss Verney,’ he said for the twenty-fourth time, ‘I am a recluse. I dislike intensely going outside my own grounds. And one of the things that I shall wish you to do for me will be to make frequent trips to London on very confidential business.’
“‘That seems quite clear,’ I said. ‘But what sort of business? Because I have got no knowledge of anything except typing and shorthand.’
“‘You won’t require any knowledge,’ he assured me. ‘All that I want is a nice-looking young lady whom I can trust implicitly.’
“And suddenly I remembered a thing which Miss Mudge had said when she told me of my being engaged. At the time I didn’t think about it, but now it came back. One absolute proviso was that I must look a lady.
“‘You see, Miss Verney,’ he went on, ‘my one hobby all through my life has been acquiring beautiful things. And recently a relative of mine has died, and left me a wonderful collection of old jewellery. Now this big place, as you will understand, costs a lot of money to keep up, and I fear that, much as I regret it, I shall have to sell some of my things. And that is where I want you to help me.’
“‘You mean,’ I said, ‘that you want me to take them up to London and sell them for you?’
“‘That’s it,’ he cried. ‘That is just what I want.’
“‘But why not send for a good man from Christies,’ I said, ‘or a first-class jeweller to come here? I should probably be badly swindled.’
“He shook his head cunningly.
“‘No, you won’t,’ he said. ‘Not if you do it the way I say. You see,’ he went on confidentially, ‘it is like this. If I send for a first-class jeweller to come to me here, and he sees all my collection or even half of it, it stands to reason that he won’t give me as good a price as if I sold each article separately. At the same time I obviously cannot ask a man to make fifty different journeys down here and show him the things one at a time. So I want you to make the fifty different journeys up to London. There are scores of first-class jewellers either there or in the big towns like Birmingham and Manchester, and if you go to a different one each time you will get the maximum price for each article. Look, for instance, at that.’
“He produced from his desk a small box, and opened it. Inside was the most lovely pearl and diamond pendant I have ever seen. The setting was old-fashioned, but even I could realise how valuable it was.
“‘Now,’ he went on, ‘if you took that to a good man, and told him it had been left you by your mother or a relative, I am sure he would give you a thousand pounds for it.’
“‘I should think it more than likely,’ I said. ‘But why bring in the bit about it having been left me? Why not simply say that I want to sell it?’
“‘He might want to know how you got it,’ he explained. ‘And the one important thing, Miss Verney, is that the news should not be passed round among them that a big collection is being disposed of piecemeal. Once that is known, down will go the prices.’
“I suppose he is right, though I don’t know much about these things.
“‘I had intended,’ he went on, ‘when I first engaged you for you to start on that side of your duties at once. But now certain things have occurred which render it necessary for you to postpone it a little. So t
hat for a few days, my dear young lady – just for a few days – your duties will not be very onerous.’
“With that I left him, and went and typed the letters. What is the meaning of it, Tom? One thing is perfectly clear: it is not for any secretarial work that I have been engaged. The main part of my job is obviously to sell his stuff for him. But it all seems so peculiar. Incidentally when I took him back the letters to sign, he was down again on his knees by the fireplace, and he had completely forgotten all about them. Moreover he was furious at my walking in, though I had knocked twice.
“Lunch time – so I will stop. What do you think? It all seems very funny to me.”
“And to me,” said Hugh thoughtfully, as Freckles folded up the letter. “But not inexplicable, once one thing is granted.”
“And that is?” I asked.
“That the stuff to be disposed of is stolen,” he answered. “If this collection he talks of was honestly come by, the simplest method by far of disposing of it would be to do what Miss Verney suggests, and have a really good man down from London. Obviously he dare not. So he has hit on this distinctly clever method. If Miss Verney walked into a shop with an ornament such as she mentions, it would arouse no suspicions. It is just the sort of thing she might have been left by a relative. And a good man would give her a fair price for it. If Granger walked into a shop with it they would probably ring up Scotland Yard after one look at his face. And if he took it to an ordinary fence he would get a third of its value.”
He rose and began to stroll up and down.
“We are on the line,” he said: “I am sure of it, though we are the deuce of a long way from spotting the whole thing. Our friend at Temple Tower is obviously in possession of a big lump of stolen property which he intends to sell. For that purpose he engages a lady secretary, who without suspicion can get a good price for it. Then suddenly along comes the bird at Spragge’s Farm who puts the fear of God into Granger. He is probably a man whom Granger double-crossed, and who is entitled to his share of the swag. So that necessitates Miss Verney’s activities being postponed until he is disposed of one way or the other. Does that sound feasible?”