21 Greatest Spy Thrillers in One Premium Edition (Mystery & Espionage Series)

by E. Phillips Oppenheim

  Chicotin shivered once more. He was sure of himself but he was at heart a sentimentalist.

  “Is there anything to keep you here?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she assured him. “I come to all these places on the chance. There are ten francs owing to me for the song and dance to-night. My room I pay for by the day. My clothes are only fit to be destroyed.”

  They rose and he took her arm.

  “I have a small car,” he said. “Shall it be Nice or Juan?”

  They passed out of the garden café into the shadow-hung street. She clung to his arm.

  “Where you wish—where you wish,” she breathed so softly that the words almost died away before they reached his ears. She clung to his arm, however. She followed his guidance.

  CHAPTER XII

  Table of Contents

  Louise, arm in arm with Perissol, walked in the pine-hung gardens of the villa, on the lighthouse hill, and breathed in happiness with the sunlight and the fragrant breeze.

  “My dear beloved,” she murmured, as they paused for a moment to look down upon the bay, “if only this dark cloud could pass away. If only we could be happy here together, and feel that France was herself again.”

  His stern face relaxed slightly for the moment, as he pressed her arm.

  “It is the uncertainty of it all that is so nerve racking,” he declared. “Action I never fear. It may be ugly, it may be dangerous, but it is movement. Here we live in a state of suspended animation. I used to say that I feared nothing in life. To-day I am afraid of making a mistake. I might find myself at any moment in such a position that, if I were to do the right and honourable thing, men might point to me in days to come as having been the man who was responsible for the ruin of his country.”

  “Some day or other,” she told him, “you will have to come to a woman for advice.”

  “I know very well what yours would be,” he admitted, “but then, probably, even you do not grasp all the side issues.”

  “As, for instance?”

  “If I were to make the discovery which I am dimly beginning to apprehend, do you realise to whom I should have to make my report?”

  She shook her head.

  “I imagine to the Chamber of Deputies.”

  “Not at all. I should have to make my report to the person who is responsible for my appointment, the man who, in the absence of the Premier, is the leader of the House Edouard Mermillon.”

  “That gives you ideas?” He smiled bitterly.

  “It gives me ideas as to why I received the unique appointment I hold.”

  “Figure me now, beloved, as a living note of interrogation.”

  He looked around. They were in the loneliest part of the grounds. Their solitude was absolute.

  “Edouard Mermillon is probably at the present moment the most brilliant politician France has possessed for years. I do not think that there is his equal for astuteness in Europe. He has confided to me his ideas as to what the foreign policy of France should be. To my mind they were inspired. If he is able to carry them out France will never have anything more to fear from Germany or any other foreign nation.”

  “Marvellous,” she whispered.

  “He knows very well that I did not seek office,” Perissol continued. “He knows very well that I do not care for personal advancement or honours I seek only to serve my country with all my heart and soul. He throws down the gage to me and he smiles. If by any chance what one is driven dimly to suspect turned out to be true and he was found to be implicated in these recent horrible events, should I be the man, he asks himself, to expose him? He knows very well that I would rather shield him, because no one else in the world could carry out his marvellous policy and because without him France would at once drift into the hands of the Communists.”

  Louise was more than a little startled. She betrayed it, perhaps, in her manner.

  “You see a long way,” she ventured.

  “Further than my critics will allow,” he said smiling. “But you, dear, I want you to understand the peculiar nature of the problem all this presents, even though fate should place in my hands the knowledge of the truth. How am I to use that knowledge? Picture me rising in the Chamber and denouncing the one man upon whom the safety of the country depends. Picture me alternately going to him privately and saying, ‘Send in your portfolio and disappear or I disclose the truth.’ In either case the wound to France would be mortal.”

  “Then if you were a perfectly logical being,” she decided, “you would join the malefactors.”

  “I suppose I should,” he admitted. “The only thing is that this is an illogical world and an illogical position. I must carve my own way out. The trouble is that the light comes slowly. See what would happen, Louise, if I did what I more than once felt inclined to do. I would not mind,” he added, with a grim smile, “making a serious wager with you that if I were to go down to the ‘Aigle Noir‘ to-day and close myself in with Edouard Mermillon and the Baron de Brett and tell them all I know, tell them what I suspect but cannot prove, the Baron would light a cigar, Edouard Mermillon one of his precious cigarettes, and he would ask me with that wonderful smile of his and that gentle voice, ‘What are you going to do about it, General?’ I could not answer him.”

  “I can understand what you say about Mermillon,” she said, thoughtfully. “He has already created an entirely different atmosphere in two of the countries where we were becoming highly unpopular. He has just that mesmeric gift that the English Jew of the last century, Disraeli, is reputed to have had. But de Brett—I cannot follow you there.”

  “De Brett, of course, personally counts for nothing,” Perissol admitted, “but anything serious that happened to him would disorganise the whole banking world of Europe. Finance plays far too important a role in sound government nowadays. De Brett has been a good friend to France and we should be face to face with a terrible financial crisis if we impeached him and if he retaliated.”

  “I am glad I am not a man,” Louise exclaimed. “The study of all these possibilities is almost maddening.”

  “I share your thankfulness, dearest,” he assured her tenderly. “If I hadn’t a companion with a plastic mind like yours to come to these days life would be utterly unendurable. I seem to have turned into a sort of super-detective since I took up my new office. I see before me the promised land of accomplishment but my heart and judgment fail me.”

  Perissol and his companion continued their walk through the woods. In sheltered places the perfume of the pines, sweet and aromatic, was almost overpowering. There were barer spots, however, where the east wind, warmed by the tropical sun, was like a breath of Paradise. She clung to his arm passionately.

  “If this were my last word to you I would say it,” she declared. “At all costs preserve your confidence in yourself. Others have said it—not I alone—that the time must come when one man will save France. You will be that man. You have the will, you have the power, you have just that touch of genius which is necessary. Other countries have yielded to the inspiration of one-man government. France has nothing to lose by following suit.”

  “I lack one quality,” he told her a little sadly, “amongst many others, of course. I fear that I lack ambition.”

  “But think of the wonder of it,” she urged. “If one could revive France and live. Our country is too beautiful to be brought to the threshold of ruin by all these plots and counter plots.”

  “The plots and counter plots,” he reminded her, “are all the result of the evil underneath. It is this eager desire to enjoy, this foolish passion for luxury, which has created the fantastic hankering after wealth even in the minds of some of our finest citizens. That honest bourgeois class that Balzac taught us to appreciate, who were content with a simple house and a simple life, seems to have passed out of existence.”

  “I am afraid,” Louise sighed, “my sex is largely to blame. It is the women who goad men on, always wanting more and more money nowadays.”

 
“French women were always extravagant,” he agreed, “but in my younger days their menkind were strong enough to keep them within bounds. To-day the world is suffering—Paris goes on spending. Neither the conscience nor the will of man is strong enough to bear the strain. Communism,” he wound up, “Is an infernal creed, but if ever the time existed or could exist which might seem to justify some of its principles it is to-day.”

  “Communism! Horrible!” she shivered.

  “There is something good in every creed if it be honest,” he declared. “All the same, the triumph of Communism in France to-day would mean her ruin. Listen—”

  There were footsteps to be heard through the undergrowth. Raymond appeared suddenly before them. He had descended the slope by one of the narrow paths which intersected the broader avenues, and he was a little breathless.

  “Mon General,” he announced. “The Chef de la Surete of Marseilles is anxious to speak to you.”

  “On the telephone?”

  “No, monsieur. He came to Cannes by ‘plane, and has motored over here. He would like to return in half an hour, if possible.”

  “I will mount to the house at once. You will excuse?” he added, turning to Louise. “Come yourself, I beg of you, by the easier way. I am interested to hear what Monsieur Boyer has to say.”

  He waved his hand in farewell and climbed the steep hillside with giant strides, leaving his secretary breathless far in the rear. In less than ten minutes he was on the terrace where a stiff-looking little man with military bearing, black moustache and imperial, in strictly conventional clothes, was awaiting him.

  “Mon General,” he said, saluting. Perissol took him by the arm.

  “Come into my study,” he invited. “We shall be quite alone. You can disclose your news there.”

  Boyer was a man renowned, in the circles amongst which he moved, for his precise manner of dress, of speech, and of deportment. On this occasion, however, it was easy to see that he was suffering from some sort of shock. He found it difficult to remain seated quietly in the chair which his host had designated.

  “My chief,” he began, “you will understand that I am in a state of some disturbance. Early this morning I found occasion to dismiss from the service of the country two members of the detective staff of my bureau, two men who have held for many years important positions connected with the Port of Marseilles.”

  General Perissol stiffened into sudden attention. He glanced towards the door to be sure that it was closed and out on to the terrace, which was entirely deserted.

  “You have further news concerning the Bird of Paradise?” he asked, as he stepped back again.

  “News which should have been yours twenty-four hours after the first inquiry you put in, General,” was the regretful reply. “Amongst my faults the worst, perhaps, is that I am too much inclined to trust my subordinates. Figure to yourself, General, for twenty years these two men have served me and served the State. They have been heavily bribed—even now I am not sure by whom—but that may transpire. For the moment they remain in the cells. The Bird of Paradise was built to the order and instructions of a man who gave the name of Dupont. It was in his possession for one month, and, from the information I possess, I have no doubt whatever that the man Dupont was no other than the man whose name is forbidden in France—the man who was shot at Geneva.”

  “He sailed the boat?” the General demanded.

  “For one month. He cruised about Toulon, Bandol, and as far as Sainte Maxime. Either his wife or some other woman was on board with him.”

  “You have the plans of the boat?”

  “General, the story of my humiliation continues. The plans have been stolen—when or how no one in the bureau has the slightest idea. These two miscreants who lie in the cells are of course responsible.”

  “The ship’s builders?”

  “Partrout et Fils—a well-known firm—but every single man employed was an Englishman. They seem to have come over for the sole purpose of building the Bird of Paradise. Afterwards they returned home again and it is curious that in no single case have I been able to discover one who left an address. My subordinate has already telephoned to London. We shall, of course, in time, trace down one or two of them.”

  “Was the present purchase of the boat a genuine one?” the General asked.

  “Of that, I think, there seems to be no reasonable doubt,” was the eager reply. “The young man’s name as on the charter has been confirmed. It is, as he had announced, Hamer Wildburn. He is an American and a contributor to the Paris edition of an American newspaper. His record is perfectly clean and the purchase seems to have been an ordinary legitimate one. It took place through an agent, who has since given up business, and it appears that the price paid was in the neighbourhood of sixteen hundred pounds.”

  “This is all the information you have been able to collect?”

  “For the moment, General, I regret that it is all.”

  Perissol paced the room thoughtfully for a moment.

  “Monsieur Boyer,” he said. “We are always, to a certain extent, at the mercy of our subordinates, and fifteen to twenty years is a long period of service. When, however, false reports are accompanied by the theft of the plans of a suspected boat the matter presents itself in a serious light.”

  “Mon General,” Boyer pleaded. “I offer no excuse. I have a wife and family. I have been in the service for forty years. Some of the most dangerous of the felons that haunted Marseilles have been brought to the scaffold in my time. It was I, with a revolver in my hand, who took Berthold.”

  “That is all to the good,” the General admitted. “The arrest of Berthold and his execution was good work. It is not my custom to act harshly. It would influence my opinion very much if during the next week the plans of the Bird of Paradise were discovered.”

  “Everything that is humanly possible shall be done,” Boyer promised. “There is another matter, General, concerning which I should like to speak. It is not directly connected with the affair of the Bird of Paradise, but it might turn out to be of some consequence.

  “Proceed,” his chief invited.

  “The little friend and mistress of Berthold, the anarchist, who passed as his sister, and who was with him during his last few minutes, bears the name of Tanya Vizille. His last words bequeathed to her some money in his rooms, and recommended her to come to these parts. The recommendation may have had no significance, but one wonders. The money was less than three hundred francs, but the girl is living in a luxurious flat at Juan, dancing at nights and spending money freely. She has been the companion of Communists and anarchists all her days, and is herself suspected of being a member of what they call The Circle. She is associated at the present moment with a man named Chicotin, a Russian, who is now employed by Edouard Mermillon, the Cabinet Minister, on his yacht. He is supposed to be a sort of super-engineer, but he is under strong suspicion of having been at various times in his career a manufacturer of—bombs.”

  “I should continue to have the young woman watched,” the General advised. “At present, I can connect her in no way with our immediate anxieties, but one cannot tell. Now permit me to offer you some refreshment, Monsieur Boyer.”

  “A glass of wine in haste, with pleasure,” the other accepted. “My great anxiety now is to return. I am expecting a report on the matter of the missing plans of the Bird of Paradise this evening.”

  “Compose yourself, my dear Boyer,” his chief begged, after the wine had been served. “The more I think of this affair the less I am inclined to blame you. You may be sure that it would not be a light thing that would cause me to exercise extreme measures in the case of such an official as you, with such a period of long service behind him.”

  “Your words inspire me with the deepest gratitude, my General,” the other said fervently.

  “Tell me now,” Perissol went on. “I shall not detain you, I understand your haste. But in a few words—how do you find things in Marseilles? We have our own great
and special anxieties in Paris just now, I can assure you, but Marseilles is often in our thoughts.”

  “Marseilles, until the coming of the millennium or the day of doom,” Boyer declared, “will be one of the hotbeds of crime in France. There is one thing to be borne in mind, however. Political crime does not flourish to the same extent as personal vice and lawlessness. We have to deal chiefly with subtle and daring acts of robbery and violence by bands of criminals associated only for the purpose of gain. There are many places in France to-day of little note where Communism and even anarchy flourish more than with us. Berthold was an exception. His fate has terrified many.”

  Boyer rose to his feet and the General saw him to his car.

  “I wish you a successful flight home, and have no anxieties,” were the latter’s last words. “Solve the mystery of the Bird of Paradise for me and there shall be something for your buttonhole.”

  CHAPTER XIII

  Table of Contents

  Chicotin, a little sulky, obeyed his employer’s unexpected summons a few mornings later, and presented himself in the latter’s suite just before noon. He was wearing a mauve silk shirt, which came from a Paris chemisier, blue trousers from St. Tropez, and blue espadrilles, with a red handkerchief knotted around his neck. The whole effect was exceedingly chic according to the summer fashions of the moment. His master looked at him from head to foot with a faint smile of amusement upon his lips.

  “Very nice, indeed, Chicotin,” he observed. “The costume of Juan-les-Pins, without a doubt.”

  “Monsieur did not send for me to discuss my clothes, I presume,” the man rejoined sullenly.

  “Certainly not. They happen to amuse me, that’s all. I sent for you, Chicotin, to inquire as to why you are neglecting your duties.”

  “Duties? My task is finished.”