by Sapper
“I trust that now you have heard what we have to say you will consider – like Mr Freyder – that the matter is sufficiently big to warrant your attention. You must, Mr Blackton; you really must.” He leaned forward in his excitement. “Think of it: millions and millions of money depending on the caprice of an old fool, who is really far more interested in his wretched albumen food. Why – it’s intolerable.”
For a while there was silence, broken at length by Blackton.
“And so,” he remarked calmly, “if I understand you aright, Sir Raymond, your proposal is that I should interest myself in the – shall we say – removal of Professor Goodman? Or, not to mince words, in his death.”
Sir Raymond shivered, and into Blackton’s eyes there stole a faint contempt.
“Precisely, Mr Blackton,” he muttered. “Precisely. In such a way of course that no shadow of suspicion can rest on us, or on – or on – anyone.”
Mr Blackton rose: the interview was over.
“I will let you know my decision after lunch,” he remarked. “Shall we drink coffee together here at two o’clock? I expect my daughter will be in by then.”
He opened the door and bowed them out; then he returned to the table and picked up the bottle of champagne. It was empty, as was the plate of sandwiches. He looked at his own unused glass, and with a faint shrug of his shoulders he crossed to his dispatch-case and opened it. But when the girl came in he was making a couple of entries in his book.
The first was under the heading “Blantyre” and consisted of a line drawn through the word “Vice”; the second was under the heading “Leibhaus”, and consisted of the one word “Glutton” written in red. He was thorough in his ways.
“You heard?” he said, as he replaced the book.
“Every word,” she answered, lighting a cigarette. “What do you propose to do?”
“There is only one possible thing to do,” he remarked. “Don’t you realise, my dear, that had I heard of this discovery I should have been compelled to interfere, even if they had not asked me to. In my position I could not allow a diamond slump; as you know, we have quite a few ourselves. But there is no reason why they shouldn’t pay me for it…” He smiled gently. “I shall cross to England by the Orient express tonight.”
“But surely,” cried the girl, “over such a simple matter you needn’t go yourself.”
He smiled even more gently, and slipped his arm round her shoulders.
“Do you remember what we were talking about this morning?” he said.
“The big coup? Don’t you see that even if this is not quite it, it will fill in the time?”
She looked a little puzzled.
“I’m damned if I do,” she cried tersely. “You can’t ask ’em more than half a million.”
“Funnily enough, that is the exact figure I intended to ask them,” he replied. “But you’ve missed the point, my love – and I’m surprised at you. Everything that Blantyre said this morning was correct with regard to the impossibility of letting such a discovery become known to the world at large.
“I have no intention of letting it become known; but I have still less intention of letting it be lost. That would be an act of almost suicidal folly. Spread abroad, the knowledge would wreck everything; retained by one individual, it places that individual in a position of supreme power. And needless to say, I propose to be that individual.”
He was staring thoughtfully over the lake, and suddenly she seized his left hand.
“Ted – stop it.”
For a moment he looked at her in surprise; then he laughed.
“Was I doing it again?” he asked. “It’s a good thing you spotted that trick of mine, my dear. If there ever is a next time with Drummond” – his eyes blazed suddenly – “ if there ever is – well, we will see. Just at the moment, however, let us concentrate on Professor Goodman.
“A telling picture that – wasn’t it? Can’t you see the old man, blinking behind his spectacles, absorbed in calculations on proteins for infants, with a ring of men around him not one of whom but would have murdered him then and there if he had dared!”
“But I still don’t see how this is going to be anything out of the ordinary,” persisted the girl.
“My dear, I’m afraid that the balmy air of the Lake of Geneva has had a bad effect on you.” Mr Blackton looked at her in genuine surprise. “I confess that I haven’t worked out the details yet, but one point is quite obvious. Before Professor Goodman departs this life he is going to make several hundred diamonds for me, though it would never do to let the two anxious gentlemen downstairs know it. They might say that I wasn’t earning my half-million.
“Those diamonds I shall unload with care and discretion during the years to come, so as not to cause a slump in prices. So it really boils down to the fact that the Metropolitan Diamond Syndicate will be paying me half a million for the express purpose of putting some five or ten million pounds’ worth of stones in my pocket. My dear! it’s a gift; it’s one of those things which make strong men consult a doctor for fear they may be imagining things.”
The girl laughed.
“Where do I come in?”
“At the moment I’m not sure. So much will depend on circumstances. At any rate, for the present you had better stop on here, and I will send for you when things are a little more advanced.”
A waiter knocked and began to lay the table for lunch; and when at two o’clock the coffee and liqueurs arrived, closely followed by his two visitors, Mr Blackton was in a genial mood. An excellent bottle of Marcobrunner followed by a glass of his own particular old brandy had mellowed him to such an extent that he very nearly produced the bottle for them, but sanity prevailed.
It was true that they were going to pay him half a million for swindling them soundly, but there were only three bottles of that brandy left in the world.
The two men looked curiously at the girl as Blackton introduced them – Baron Vanderton had told them about the beauty of this so-called daughter who was his constant and invariable companion. Only she, so he had affirmed, knew what the man who now called himself Blackton really looked like when shorn of his innumerable disguises into which he fitted himself so marvellously.
But there were more important matters at stake than that, and Sir Raymond Blantyre’s hand shook a little as he helped himself to a cigarette from the box on the table.
“Well, Mr Blackton,” he said as the door closed behind the waiter. “Have you decided?”
“I have,” returned the other calmly. “Professor Goodman’s discovery will not be made public. He will not speak or give a demonstration at the Royal Society.”
With a vast sigh of relief Sir Raymond sank into a chair.
“And your – er – fee?”
“Half a million pounds. Two hundred and fifty thousand paid by cheque made out to Self – now; the remainder when you receive indisputable proof that I have carried out the job.”
It was significant that Sir Raymond made no attempt to haggle. Without a word he drew his chequebook from his pocket, and going over to the writing-table he filled in the required amount.
“I would be glad if it was not presented for two or three days,” he remarked, “as it is drawn on my private account, and I shall have to put in funds to meet it on my return to England.”
Mr Blackton bowed.
“You return tonight?” he asked.
“By the Orient Express. And you?”
Mr Blackton shrugged his shoulders.
“The view here is delightful,” he murmured.
And with that the representatives of the Metropolitan Diamond Syndicate had to rest content for the time – until, in fact, the train was approaching the Swiss frontier. They had just finished their dinner, their zest for which, though considerably greater than on the previo
us night in view of the success of their mission, had been greatly impaired by the manners of an elderly German sitting at the next table.
He was a bent and withered old man with a long hook nose and white hair, who, in the intervals of querulously swearing at the attendant, deposited his dinner on his waistcoat.
At length he rose, and having pressed ten centimes into the outraged hand of the head waiter, he stood for a moment by their table, swaying with the motion of the train. And suddenly he bent down and spoke to Sir Raymond.
“Two or three days, I think you said, Sir Raymond.”
With a dry chuckle he was gone, tottering and lurching down the carriage, leaving the President of the Metropolitan Diamond Syndicate gasping audibly.
Chapter 2
In which Professor Goodman realises that there are more things in life than chemistry
When Brenda Goodman, in a moment of mental aberration, consented to marry Algy Longworth, she little guessed the result. From being just an ordinary, partially wanting specimen he became a raving imbecile. Presumably she must have thought it was natural as she showed no signs of terror, at any rate in public, but it was otherwise with his friends.
Men who had been wont to forgather with him to consume the matutinal cocktail now fled with shouts of alarm whenever he hove in sight. Only the baser members of that celebrated society, the main object of which is to cultivate the muscles of the left arm when consuming liquid refreshment, clung to him in his fall from grace. They found that his mental fog was so opaque that he habitually forgot the only rule and raised his glass to his lips with his right hand.
And since that immediately necessitated a further round at his expense, they gave great glory to Allah for such an eminently satisfactory state of affairs. And when it is further added that he was actually discovered by Peter Darrell reading the poems of Ella Wheeler Wilcox on the morning of the Derby, it will be readily conceded that matters looked black.
That the state of affairs was only temporary was, of course, recognised; but while it lasted it became necessary for him to leave the councils of men. A fellow who wants to trot back to the club-house from the ninth green in the middle of a four-ball foursome to blow his fiancée a kiss through the telephone is a truly hideous spectacle.
And so the sudden action of Hugh Drummond, one fine morning in June, is quite understandable. He had been standing by the window of his room staring into the street, and playing Beaver to himself, when with a wild yell he darted to the bell. He pealed it several times; then he rushed to the door and shouted: “Denny! Where the devil are you, Denny?”
“Here, sir.”
His trusted body-servant and erstwhile batman appeared from the nether regions of the house, and regarded his master in some surprise.
“The door, Denny – the front door. Go and bolt and bar it; put the chain up; turn all the latchkeys. Don’t stand there blinking, you fool. Mr Longworth is tacking up the street, and I know he’s coming here. Blow at him through the letterbox, and tell him to go away. I will not have him about the house at this hour of the morning. Tell him I’m in bed with housemaid’s knee. Not the housemaid’s knee, you ass: it’s a malady, not a dissecting-room in a hospital.”
With a sigh of relief he watched Denny bar the door; then he returned to his own room and sank into an armchair.
“Heavens!” he muttered, “what an escape! Poor old Algy!”
He sighed again profoundly, and then, feeling in need of support, he rose and crossed to a cask of beer which adorned one corner of the room. And he was just preparing to enjoy the fruits of his labours, when the door opened and Denny came in.
“He won’t go, sir – says he must see you, before you dine with his young lady tonight.”
“Great Scott! Denny – isn’t that enough?” said Drummond wildly. “Not that one minds dining with her, but it’s watching him that is so painful. Have you inspected him this morning?”
“I kept the door on the chain, sir, and glanced at him. He seems to me to be a little worried.”
Drummond crossed to the window and looked out. Standing on the pavement outside was the unfortunate Algy, who waved his stick wildly as soon as he saw him.
“Your man Denny has gone mad,” he cried. “He kept the door on the chain and gibbered like a monkey. I want to see you.”
“I know you do, Algy: I saw you coming up Brook Street. And it was I who told Denny to bar the door. Have you come to talk to me about love?”
“No, old man, I swear I haven’t,” said Algy earnestly. “I won’t mention the word, I promise you. And it’s really most frightfully important.”
“All right,” said Drummond cautiously. “Denny shall let you in; but at the first word of poetry – out you go through the window.”
He nodded to his servant, and a moment or two later Algy Longworth came into the room. The newcomer was arrayed in a faultless morning coat, and Hugh Drummond eyed him noncommittally. He certainly looked a little worried, though his immaculate topper and white spats seemed to show that he was bearing up with credit.
“Going to Ranelagh, old bird,” said Algy. “Hence the bathing suit. Lunching first, don’t you know, and all that – so I thought I’d drop in this morning to make sure of catching you. You and Phyllis are dining, aren’t you, this evening?”
“We are,” said Hugh.
“Well, the most awful thing has happened, old boy. My prospective father-in-law to be – Brenda’s dear old male parent – has gone mad. He’s touched; he’s wanting; he’s up the pole.”
He lit a cigarette impressively, and Drummond stared at him.
“What’s the matter with the old thing?” he demanded. “I met him outside his club yesterday and he didn’t seem to me to be any worse than usual.”
“My dear boy, I didn’t know anything about it till last night,” cried Algy. “He sprang it on us at dinner, and I tell you I nearly swooned. I tried to register mirth, but I failed, Hugh – I failed. I shudder to think what my face must have looked like.” He was pacing up and down the room in his agitation.
“You know, don’t you, old man, that he ain’t what you’d call rolling in boodle. I mean, with the best will in the world you couldn’t call him a financial noise. And though, of course, it doesn’t matter to me what Brenda has – if we can’t manage, I shall have to do a job of work or something – yet, I feel sort of responsible for the old parent.
“And when he goes and makes a prize ass of himself, it struck me that I ought to sit up and take notice. I thought it over all last night, and decided to come and tell you this morning, so that we could all have a go at him tonight.”
“What has he done?” demanded Hugh with some interest.
“You know he’s got a laboratory,” continued Algy, “where he goes and plays games. It’s a perfect factory of extraordinary smells, but the old dear seems to enjoy himself. He’ll probably try his new albumenised chicken food on you tonight, but that’s a detail. To get to the point – have you ever noticed that big diamond Brenda wears as a brooch?”
“Yes, I have. Phyllis was speaking about it the other night.”
“You know he made it,” said Algy quietly, and Hugh stared at him. “It is still supposed to be a secret: it was to be kept dark till the next meeting of the Royal Society – but after what has happened I decided to tell you. About a fortnight ago a peculiar-looking bloke called Sir Raymond Blantyre came and dined.
“He’s made his money in diamonds, and he was on to that diamond like a terrier on to a rat. And when he heard old Goodman had made it, I thought he was going to expire from a rush of blood to the head. He’d just offered Brenda a cheque for ten thousand for it, when he was told it had cost a little over a fiver to make.
“As I say he turned a deep magenta and dropped his eyeglass in the sauce tartare. That was the first spasm; the next we heard last ni
ght. Apparently the old man agreed to give a demonstration to this bloke and some of his pals, and the result of the show was – great heavens! when I think of it, my brain comes out in a rash – the result, Hugh, was that they offered him a quarter of a million pounds to suppress his discovery.
“Two hundred and fifty thousand acidulated tablets – and he refused. One supreme glorious burst on fifty thousand of the best, and an income from the remaining two hundred for the rest of his life. We worked it out after dinner, my boy – Brenda and I. Two hundred thousand at five per cent. We couldn’t quite make out what it would come to, but whatever it is he has cast it from him. And then you wonder at my anguish.”
With a hollow groan Algy helped himself to beer and sank into a chair.
“Look here, Algy,” said Hugh, after a pause, “you aren’t playing the fool, are you? You literally mean that Professor Goodman has discovered a method by which diamonds can be made artificially?”
“Exactly; that is what I literally mean. And I further literally mean that he has turned down an offer of a quarter of a million thick ’uns to keep dark about it. And what I want you and Phyllis to do this evening…”
“Dry up,” interrupted Hugh. He was staring out of the window, and his usual look of inane good temper had completely vanished. He was thinking deeply, and after a few moments he swung round on the disconsolate Algy.
“This is a pretty serious affair, Algy,” he remarked.
“You bet your life it is,” agreed his friend. “Quarter…”
“Cut it out about the boodle. That’s bad, I admit – but it’s not that I’m thinking of.”
“I don’t know what the deuce else there is to think about. Just because he wants to spout out his footling discovery to a bunch of old geysers at the Royal Society…”
Hugh regarded him dispassionately.