'Likewise,' said Samson blithely, 'you might cut a caper my way.'
"ow's that, then?'
'Smile sweet on a couple o' resurrection coves and have 'is lordship up and about, ready for inspection, without a by-your-leave.'
'Mr Samson,' said Verity sternly, 'I got trouble enough already. It ain't the way I should've chose to make Lord William's acquaintance, but ask him I will.'
Samson rubbed his hands briskly in the pre-dawn chill. He said,
'It ain't no business o' mine, I daresay, but why might you be so desirous to see Lord Henry?' Verity scowled again.
'Simple, ain't it? I never seen Lord Henry and I only know what I'm told about his scars and his rings. And I never saw the wound the bullet made, only from a steel copy of a photograph. He ain't been in the ground more than a month, so there can't be much alteration.'
'You never mean to have him out of his shroud?' said Samson in dismay.
'That ain't all I mean to do, Mr Samson,' said Verity primly. 'That ain't even the half of it. So far I took everyone's word for what happened, and look where I am! Now I'm going to see for myself.'
They stood on the verge of Covent Garden Market, the sky red and golden from the newly risen sun, the long rows of carts and donkey-barrows loading. Under the dark Piazza bright little dots of gaslight were burning in the shops, while shoeless girls on the steps of the Theatre tied up flowers in penny and halfpenny bundles. Samson looked at Verity's round face as it glowed with plump self-confidence at the thought of seeing for itself.
'God save us all!' he said with faint exasperation.
Verity turned to him with studied dignity.
'Much obliged, Mr Samson, and I ain't a man that takes kindly to profanities.’
Then, in a gentler tone, he bid Samson a good-day and began his slow lumbering walk, north to the thieves' rookery of the Seven Dials, west down Oxford Street, and thence to Portman Square and Upper Berkeley Street. At five o'clock the boy who slept in the kitchen roused himself to attend to the laying of fires, and the chains were taken off the doors.
Captain Lord William Jervis had for many years maintained an appearance of indeterminate early middle-age. He seemed not the least out of place chaffing a group of young men in Dubourg's or the Beargarden, nor in serious debates among senior officers at the Board of Admiralty on the comparative advantages of iron-clad warships and the lighter wooden vessels. It was this last subject which chiefly preoccupied him as he strode up the steps of Portman Square in company with Captain Lord Edward Clay, the two men in the royal blue frock-coats and white ducks of their naval uniform. Lord William bore the same clear-cut features as his brother Richard Jervis, but the older man's face was set more aggressively, the cheeks flushed and the trim whiskers jet black.
'If a ship were to roll heavy,' he said a little breathlessly, 'then of course she must ship water through the gun ports and can't fight her guns. But they need only ask Yelverton. When his squadron was caught in the Portsmouth gale, every ship rolled like a skittle. The iron-clads rolled over so far that a little water was shipped through the ports and made the guns difficult to fight. But, damme, the wooden hulls rolled so far that the ports must be closed tight to stop them shipping every sea that came.'
The two men strode through the open doorway. But for the death of Lord Henry Jervis so shortly before, this would have been the evening of 'Lord Jervis' summer dance', the single event of the London season by which the family distinguished itself. This year it had been decided to substitute a mere private dinner-party, as a token of family mourning, but it was an event which obliged Lord William, as head of his house, to leave the diversions provided for him by a succession of street-girls at the White Bear.
Unobtrusively, the Jervis house had been transformed into a brighter and more agreeable setting for the guests, as though the summer dance had not, after all, been cancelled. The wrought-iron balcony was glassed in and had become a conservatory stocked with orchids and bright, tropical flowers. Every alcove of the hall and stairway had grown a green arbour among fine pilasters, which were in fact no more than painted wood with daubs of heavy gilding. Incense was still being burnt by the servants to kill the smell of paint. A score of additional footmen, kitchen-girls and maids had been temporarily employed, for even a private dinner-party in the Jervis town house required places for thirty or forty couples. Lord William and Lord Edward Clay climbed the stairs together and then separated to the two dressing-rooms set aside for them.
Lord William, in his habitual manner, threw open the door.
'Anstey!' he shouted, looking round for his valet, 'Anstey, damn you!'
There was no reply. His lordship drew a silver-engraved spirit flask from his pocket, poured a full measure and drained it off. He put the flask on the dressing-table. Just then there was a movement from the small adjoining bedroom which formed part of the dressing suite. Lord William, who had drawn off his blue frock-coat and thrown it on the sofa, opened the communicating door. There was Elaine. Having now finished making the bed, she tossed her hair into place and straightened up. Lord William's mouth twisted in a half-formed sardonic smile.
'Well, little madam!' he said, 'why so quiet and secret in here? Did you mean to spy on a gentleman dressing himself?'
Elaine knew how to type a customer from his first words. In Lord William's case, she looked him full in the face with all her snub-nosed impudence, her narrow dark eyes with their tint of bronze-green scanning his features. And then her mouth opened in a slack grin.
'Take off those damned weeds,' said Lord William imperiously, and. he went to lock the door through which the absent valet might otherwise come. When he returned, Elaine had cast off the long skirts and petticoats of her servant's livery. She stood revealingly in a white blouse and a grey pleated petticoat, obviously part of her professional wardrobe, so short that it reached no lower than the tops of her thighs.
‘I’m not la-di-da about it,' she said, as though the words were a challenge. Lord William surveyed the broad hips, the sturdy legs and thighs of the young tomboy. Then he sat on the edge of the bed and pulled her towards him, running his hand up and down her bare legs as she stood there. Under the skirt, she was wearing tight pants in white cotton. Lord William began where the waist of the material touched the base of her spine and let his fingers travel over her body, through the warm cotton, running down between the cheeks of Elaine's bottom, between her thighs, finding the sensitive lap of flesh and working it skilfully with his Fingers. The girl squirmed her bare legs restlessly, and presently pulled away from him. But Lord William's protests were cut short as he saw that she was freeing the little skirt so that it dropped to her ankles and she stepped out of it. Elaine slipped a pair of fingers where his own had been, as though out of curiosity, and watched him with amusement. She pulled the front of the pants down and showed a little cleft of fair hair. Lord William's colour deepened and his eyes widened. She turned and pulled the knickers down a little way again. Lord William stared intently at the broad pale cheeks of Elaine's backside, the faded marks of Mrs Rouncewell's attentions just visible.
'Damme!' he said with a tone of awe.
Naked but for her blouse, the girl returned to him, kneeling so that her soft young breasts brushed his knees. She busied herself with him for a moment, then lowered her face. Lord William's features were drawn as though by some inner spasm. He tried to free himself from her but she held on with such determination that he could hardly move her head from his lap. He quivered suddenly.
'Curse it,' he said softly, 'you've spoilt the game.'
Elaine looked up at him and grinned. 'Never,' she said, and went back to her previous occupation.
Lord William was bowled over by the youngster's determination. When his vigour was restored, and he drew her on to the bed, she climbed upon him. Then she paused.
'You got three looking-glasses,' she said. 'It's best to turn 'em so you can see me.'
With this done, she resumed her position, drew her
hair into a tail and fastened it with a silk band, and then began to exercise upon her lover. During the episode she kissed Lord William as though she intended to smother him, her agile little tongue moving determinedly in his mouth. Lord William, in turn, was moved to a degree of frenzy he had not known for years. In the urgency of desire his teeth found her throat and shoulders, leaving cherry-red blotches. His hands raked her back, as many a woman's had scored his own, and incredible as it seemed to him, Elaine's cries were entirely of pleasure, as though welcoming even the violence of his lust.
At length it was over and after a brief dallying, the girl dressed herself and left him. Lord William pondered on his good fortune in finding such a chambermaid as Elaine, passionate and adaptable at an age when most girls would have been clumsy and nervous. He had never had a girl in his rooms at the White Bear or Dubourg's who had matched such passion. Thoughtfully he rang for Anstey and turned his mind to the dinner-party.
An hour and a half later, Lord William, his medals and sash gleaming and glowing upon his evening clothes, stood in the fine hall with its marble floor, welcoming the guests. At first he had been unable to concentrate on his duties as host for the memory of Elaine kept on interfering. Now he had repressed this until it was merely a permanent awareness of the girl and her capabilities. As soon as the guests had departed again, he thought, he would stoke the little bitch hot and strong, damned if he wouldn't.
Presently, General Lord Bruce was announced, and Lord William collected his thoughts. The elderly General with his air of silver-haired distinction had been a friend of old Lord Samuel Jervis, and was now no less than Governor to the Prince of Wales during the Prince's undergraduate year at Oxford. Lord William saw the figure of the dapper Grenadier Guardsman on the threshold.
It was just then that a footman approached Lord William, bowed and cleared his throat. Lord William looked at the man in his silk knee-breeches and silver buckles.
'My lord,' said the servant, 'a detective person insists upon seeing you as a matter of the gravest urgency.'
Lord William looked further round and saw a portly figure in shabby coat and baggy trousers, red-faced and black-moustached.
'Sergeant Verity of the Whitehall police office,' said the footman mournfully.
'What the devil have I to do with you?' asked Lord William, not daring to express his anger at the intrusion more loudly for fear of being overheard by General Bruce and the other guests.
'It ain't what you got to do with me, Lord William Jervis,' said Verity quietly, 'it's what I gotta say to you. And said in private is best. Just think o' the young person that was in your dressing-room an hour or two ago.'
Lord William looked about him quickly. It was unthinkable that the discussion should continue in the presence of such guests, equally unthinkable that he should have the fat sergeant carried struggling from the hall.
"This way,' he said sharply.
The two men stood face to face in the little steward's room with its counting-house atmosphere where Verity had first encountered Richard Jervis at Portman Square.
'Sir,' said Verity at once, 'you must be told that the person you was with in your room, and 'oo you spent a considerable time in there with, according to your servant, is a Miss Elaine that 'as already admitted to me trying to blackmail your late brother Lord Henry. It ain't my business what you choose to do with her in your own 'ouse, sir, but it's my duty to tell you the truth. She been party to getting gentlemen into compromising positions and then having photographic plates done of same to extort money from them."
'Has she?' said Lord William enigmatically, as though he might equally believe or disbelieve the story. 'And what business might it be of yours to set my servant spying on me?'
'He never spied, sir. He found the dressing-room locked and barred. After half an hour, the young person Elaine come out and you was still in there. But you ain't to blame 'im, sir. It was only me seeing the girl in the scullery and saying what a bad lot she was that made the honest fellow tell me in confidence of his fears for you. He's a good, loyal servant, sir, the best you could 'ave.'
'So you say.' Lord William turned, as though about to leave.
'Sir!' said Verity, 'I don't have to say how sorry I am for taking you from your guests but I should wish to ask where Mr Richard Jervis might be and when I might see him.'
'Mr Jervis is ill,' said Lord William airily, 'not you nor anyone else is to see him. Orders have been given to all the servants. The least disturbance might increase his malady,'
'And sorry I am to 'ear it, sir,' said Verity, puzzled. 'But p'raps I might speak fair with you, then, sir, as head of your house. You ain't unaware I suppose of the evil being said about the late Lord Henry?'
'Evil, sergeant?'
"Them that says he made away with himself on account of dealings with young persons, and them that hints at him being foully murdered.'
Lord William drew himself up tall and brushed his dark whiskers with the edge of one hand.
'Who says so?'
'Persons of an evil mind, sir.'
'Dammit, man,' said Lord William with a breathless growl, 'what persons?'
'Ain't at liberty to say, sir.'
'Then to the devil with you and them!’
'I might silence such slander, sir.'
'Then silence it, blast your eyes, and have done with me!' 'In that case, sir, I only got to ask for you to authorise a police medical man to examine Lord Henry's injury and make his impartial report.'
Lord William, his face deepening to a weatherbeaten maroon colour, stared at the fat sergeant, who now shifted uneasily.
'Disinter my brother's body?'
'Only for the eyes of one constabulary medical man, sir. Might stop a lot of tongues wagging, sir."
Lord William looked at the plump, self-satisfied face with its waxed moustaches.
'You drivelling idiot!' he said, his voice quivering slightly. 'It would start every tongue in the country wagging! Dig him up? This is Mr Richard's doing, no doubt! A pair of madcaps, the two of you!'
As though about to engage in some other business, Lord William strode to the little desk, drew out a sheet of paper, dipped a newly-sharpened quill in the ink-well, and wrote furiously. He sanded the paper, folded it and sealed it in an envelope which he addressed. Then he rang for a footman and handed it to him.
'See this taken at once,' he said sharply, 'Whitehall Place for the immediate attention of the commissioner of police.'
The footman bowed and withdrew. Lord William looked up at Verity.
'By noon tomorrow, Sergeant Verity, you and your possessions will be out of this house. The house is mine, Bole Warren is mine, and every servant upon the estate is mine. I, sir, am the head of this family, not Mr Richard Jervis. What he has, I pay for. Damme, sir, but for me he is a pauper. And now, sir, your Mr Commissioner has my solemn word that if you ever set foot in my house or on my land again, I will prosecute you in every court of the realm. Yes, damme, every court of the kingdom!’
Verity swallowed apprehensively.
'And the duties I was hired for, sir?'
'Your duties are terminated, sir! You are dismissed, damn you! Dismissed!'
With a glare of irresistible rage, Lord William straightened his coat and stormed back to his waiting guests.
The stair creaked a little as Verity eased his large boot on to it. Deeply perturbed by the interview with Lord William, not least by the uncontrolled fury of the man, he had determined on finding Richard Jervis before he was dismissed from Portman Square. Lord William had spoken accurately in saying that strict orders had been given to the servants that Richard Jervis was to be held incommunicado. Even Mrs Butcher had answered with a refusal, followed by long resolute silence, when Verity suggested that she might care to open the door from the back stairs to the second-floor landing of the house with the key on her chatelaine. He had watched his chance for half an hour, but there was no possibility of purloining a key for the purpose and no way of enter
ing the main rooms of the house otherwise. While the dinner-party continued, the attention of the servants was directed towards it. Once it was over, Verity's chance of moving about the house unobserved in the time remaining to him was very slight indeed.
'A man what's seen as much of cracksmen as I have can't help picking up a dodge or two,' he said to himself philosophically, and moved casually towards the back stairs, as though going to his attic room to pack. At the second landing, the door which communicated with the main part of the house was impressively solid. The panelled oak was unpolished and massive. The lock, too, was resplendent with brass furniture.
'It ain't a Chubb nor a Bramah, 'owever,' said Verity softly. Humming a little tune to himself, he drew a tin from his pocket and a slender metal rod, thinner than a pencil. The tin contained a yellowish wax which smelt of cobblers' shops. With great care, Verity smeared a thin coating of this on the little rod and stood so that the gaslight on the bare stairway fell full on the keyhole of the door. He inserted the rod, as though it had been the barrel of a key, revolved it gently and withdrew it. At three points along the rod the wax had been scraped away.
'Why,' he said to himself, 'it's no more than three sliders.'
Pocketing the wax, he produced three slender metal probes and inserted the first in the lock. After a certain amount of juggling with it, he felt something yield and lift. Holding the probe exactly in this place with the heel of his right palm, he began to juggle the second. When two were in place it was child's play to lift the third and turn the lock. The heavy door opened without a sound.
Verity stepped through on to the richly-carpeted floor of the handsome landing, the sounds of the dinner-party carrying up faintly from below through the airy ovals of the fine staircase. Keeping close to the wall to minimize the risk of being seen from the lower levels, he edged towards the door of Richard Jervis' apartments. The young man might be alone or he might not, but that was a risk to be taken. Indeed, he might not be there at all. Verity reached the door and listened. He thought he could hear the sound of a man breathing deeply, as though in sleep, but he could not be sure. Preparing himself for rapid concealment behind the corner of the wall, he tapped sharply on the panel of the door. There was a movement as though of a sleeper stirring.
Sergeant Verity Presents His Compliments Page 13