The Grell Mystery

by Frank Froest

  ‘Mac was horror-struck. He stared at Brashton as though he had taken leave of his senses.

  ‘”Good God, man,” he cried, “why did you let them leave it here? It might have died of the plague or something.” And, stepping back into the corridor, he yelled for a boy. “Take that thing away,” he ordered. “Get rid of it. Put it in the furnace.”

  ‘Well, they took it down and cremated it. Today, a fine, old, crusty police sergeant rolled up to the office. He wanted to see someone, he said, about the find of a body in Piccadilly.

  ‘Brashton received him suavely. “Very good of you to come, sergeant,” he said. “We’re always grateful for any information about matters of interest.”

  ‘The sergeant fidgeted with his helmet. “That’s all right, sir,” he said. “As a matter of fact, though, I’ve come to you for information this time. You see, I’m a coroner’s officer, and we’ve got to hold an inquest, but we ain’t got no body to hold it on!”

  ‘For a moment Brashton was flabbergasted, but he recovered himself almost immediately. “I’m very sorry,” he apologised, “but the fact is, although we had the skeleton here it has—er—been mislaid.”

  ‘That coroner’s officer,’ went on Jerrold gravely, ‘is now looking over the excavations to see if it’s possible to find a few odds and ends to hold the inquest on. But I see Mr Green’s getting impatient. Don’t let me keep you.’

  The boats had been brought up to the quay and, as the detectives stepped aboard, slipped downstream, hugging the Embankment. Foyle turned a speculative eye on the pier they had just quitted. A steam launch had just brought up, but Jerrold had vanished. The superintendent swore softly.

  ‘So that’s why he kept us talking,’ he said. ‘He suspects something, and wanted to keep us till he could send for a boat himself. We shall be a regular procession if we don’t stop that.’ He leaned over and spoke to Green in the second boat. Immediately it slackened speed, and as the launch came alongside the chief inspector swung deftly aboard.

  ‘Where’s Mr Jerrold?’ he demanded of the man at the wheel.

  ‘Who’s he?’ was the gruff response.

  ‘Come, you know who he is well enough. He’s the man who’s borrowed or hired this craft, and he got on board just now. I want to speak to him. If he has ordered you to follow us, let me tell you that I am a police officer, and shall be justified in arresting you for obstructing me in the execution of my duty if you are not careful.’

  ‘Hello, Mr Green. Threatening the skipper? What’s wrong?’ said the equable voice of Jerrold, emerging with cigarette between his teeth through the sliding door of the saloon.

  The detective swung round upon him angrily. ‘This isn’t the game, Mr Jerrold. We can’t have you following us like this.’

  The journalist gave a shrug. ‘Really? Do you object to me having a blow on the river? Because I’m going on, in any case. I can’t help it if you’re going the same way.’

  Green was helpless, and he knew it. Although he raged inwardly, he knew that it would be unwise to arrest the journalist, though such a course might be justified. Apart from the bad feeling such procedure might create, there was the difficulty of establishing a case without disclosing the object of their journey. It was a dilemma where diplomacy might with advantage be employed. He smiled at the reporter.

  ‘Mr Jerrold, can’t we settle this without quarrelling? We’re on a queer job, and you might spoil it all by hanging around. Leave us to it, and if there’s anything fit for publication you shall have first pull. Don’t ask me anything else and I’ll promise you that.’

  ‘Honour?’ queried Jerrold.

  ‘Honour,’ repeated Green.

  ‘Right you are. Slip off and we’ll go back. Ring me up at the office.’

  The steam launch wheeled about as Green took his place in his own boat. Both men were satisfied. Each knew that the other would not go back on his word. The chief inspector’s boat caught up with that which carried Foyle and Wrington just below Waterloo Bridge. They were threading the tiers of barges moored on the southern side. The group of detectives, with eyes ceaselessly watchful, passed comments in a low voice. They were not hopeful of finding their quarry yet. The search was merely one of precaution. Now and again one of the boats stopped and a man clambered aboard a barge, dropping back in a few minutes with a shake of the head. Foyle and Green left all this to the river men. They knew the work.

  But, swift as they were, they made slow progress. Foyle glanced uneasily at his watch. It was already growing dusk, and the lights on the bridges were reflected in fantastic shapes from the dark waters. The superintendent spoke in a low voice to Wrington, who jerked his head in sharp assent.

  ‘You’re right, sir. If we take the likely one now we can leave the others till we’ve finished. We’ll get on. Let her out, boys.’

  The two boats leapt forward, unobtrusively stealing a course in the shadow of the barges. It was delicate work in the gathering darkness, for many times a lighter swinging at its moorings threatened to crush them; but always they avoided the danger, though to the untrained faculties of Foyle it seemed that the margin of safety was no more than the breadth of a knife blade.

  At London Bridge they crossed to the northern side, and here the real hunt began. Wrington signalled for the lights to be put out, and they stole forward, two black blotches on the dark water. Once they narrowly escaped running down a Customs’ patrol boat, and voices cursed them with vigour out of the gloom. Again, as they were about to pass under a mooring rope, someone yelled to Foyle to duck. The warning came too late, and he would have been swept into the water but that a ready knife severed the rope. Then there was a halt for a little, while the barge was secured again.

  ‘There’s a new caretaker on a tier of barges just above Tower Bridge,’ whispered Wrington tensely. ‘We’ll try there first. Keep your voice low if you want to speak, sir. Sound travels a long way on the water. Ah, there it is.’

  Foyle had got good eyesight, but he could make out nothing but a smudge where Wrington pointed—a smudge emphasised by a tiny point of twinkling light. The two motor-boats slowed down and approached, as it were, on tiptoe one on either side of the vessel. As they came nearer a barge took shape at the head of a long string.

  ‘Stop her,’ ordered Wrington. ‘Now, sir, will you board her with me? Get ready.’

  As they lurched against the sides of the craft the two leapt aboard. Green and Jones had come up from the other side. The superintendent gave a whispered order, and the other three ranged themselves around a small deck cabin, while he thrust open the door and entered. It was quite dark within, and a smell of stale tobacco smoke met his nostrils.

  He stood still and lit a match, holding himself in readiness for anything. A figure was dozing in a chair at the other side of the cabin. Foyle crossed stealthily and quietly encircled the man around the waist, pressing his arms to his side with all his strength. The man, suddenly awakened, struggled vigorously.

  ‘Keep still,’ ordered Foyle, doggedly maintaining his hold. ‘Hi, Green, Wrington! Give me a hand here, will you?’

  CHAPTER XXXIV

  POWERFUL as he was and with his prisoner at a disadvantage, Foyle found it all he could do to maintain his hold until his companions broke through to his help. Even then it was no easy task, and the fight raged over the tiny cabin with the police hanging on to their prisoner like dogs to a wounded bear. No one spoke a word; there was only the quick panting of struggling men, the shuffling of their footsteps, and now and again a sharp crash as some piece of furniture overturned. Their very numbers handicapped the police in that confined space. Hands sometimes tore at Foyle, sometimes at the prisoner. The superintendent hung on with the tenacity of a bulldog, until a sudden lurch against the side brought his head sharply in contact with the boarding. Half dazed, he involuntarily relaxed his grip. The prisoner tore himself away and struck out viciously. A man fell heavily. For the fraction of a second a shadowy figure was indistinctly outlined in the do
orway. Almost simultaneously Foyle, Green, and Wrington flung themselves in pursuit. They were too late. A soft splash told that the man had taken the only possible avenue of escape.

  ‘Look lively with those boats. He’s gone overboard,’ yelled Wrington. ‘Light up and get close in to the bank.’

  With the alacrity of men well used to sudden emergencies those detectives in the boats were at work on the word. One darted to cut off retreat to the northern bank, though the forbidding parapet of the Tower made it impossible for any man to land for a hundred yards or more. The other cruised cautiously among the strings of barges, watching for any attempt to land on one of them.

  The superintendent had dashed to the stern of the barge and dropped into a small dinghy tethered there. At his word the others came running, and with Wrington at the oars they also crept about in determined search.

  ‘It’s hopeless,’ growled Green, in an undertone. ‘On a night like this we might as well look for a needle in a haystack.’

  ‘We won’t give up yet, anyway,’ retorted Foyle, and there was an unwonted irritability in his tone. ‘We’ve mucked it badly enough, but I’m not going to fling it up while there’s a sporting chance of finding him. Do you think he’ll be able to swim across the river, Wrington?’

  ‘It would need a good man to do it in his clothes. The tide’s running pretty strong. More likely he’s let himself drop down below the bridge, and will try to pull himself aboard one of these craft.’

  Heldon Foyle rubbed his chin. Every moment their chances of catching the fugitive lessened. In the darkness, which the lights from the bridge and from adjacent boats only made more involved, there was little hope of finding the man they wanted. He had not been seen from the moment of the first plunge, and there were a score of places on which he might have taken refuge, and where, now that he was warned, he could dodge the searchers. He might have committed suicide, it was true, but somehow Foyle did not think that likely.

  For two hours the search continued, and then Foyle, chilled to the bone, decided that it was hopeless. Wrington hailed the other boats, and the detectives returned to the barge. A light thrown into the tiny cabin disclosed amid the disorder an open kit-bag full of linen. Green pulled out the top shirt and felt its texture between thumb and finger. Then he pointed to the name of a West-end maker on the collar.

  ‘Yes, it’s hardly the kind of thing a barge watchman would wear,’ commented Foyle. ‘We’d better take the bag along, and you can go through it at your leisure. The laundry marks will tell whose they are. You had better stop here, Wrington, and take charge. Find out whom the barge belongs to, and make what inquiries you can. Better have it thoroughly searched, and report to me in the morning. Use your discretion in detaining anyone who comes aboard.’

  One of the motor-boats took Foyle and Green back to Scotland Yard. Both were glum and silent: Foyle because his plan had miscarried at the very moment that he had reached the keystone of the problem; Green because it was his natural habit. It was easy enough to realise now that the whole question was one of light. Had someone thought to strike a match while the struggle was going on there would have been no confusion, and the man would have been unable to get away.

  Nor did the news that awaited Foyle at his office tend to make him more pleased with the progress of the investigation. A telephone message had come through from the chief of the Liverpool detective force:

  ‘Man found drugged in first-class compartment of express from London, bears warrant card and other documents identifying him as Inspector Robert Blake, C.I.D., London. Is now under care of our surgeon, and has not yet recovered consciousness. In no danger. He travelled from London with a woman fashionably dressed, dark hair, dark blue eyes. Am now endeavouring to find her. Can you suggest any steps we can take?’

  Foyle banged his fist viciously on his desk. ‘There! We’re not the only people who have made blunders today, Green. Look at that. Wire to them a full description of this woman Petrovska, and tell ’em to detain her if they come across her. We charge her with administering a noxious drug, and that’ll hold her safe till we get the business cleared up. If she’s trying to slip out of the country, they’re pretty safe to get her in one of the liners. Wire over our men at Liverpool to the same effect.’

  Green slipped away. In a little he returned with a slip of paper in his hand. ‘Wire’s gone to Liverpool. I’ve drafted this out for Mr Jerrold, if you’ll just look at it. I promised him he should know anything there was to tell.’

  The sheet of paper read:

  ‘In connection with the investigation into the murder of Mr Robert Grell, Superintendent Heldon Foyle, accompanied by Chief Detective-Inspector Green, Divisional Detective-Inspector Wrington, and other detectives, examined the body of a man found in the river, whom it was supposed might be the man Goldenburg, for whom search is being made. The police are of the opinion that the drowned man is not Goldenburg.’

  A light of amusement twinkled in Foyle’s blue eyes.

  ‘Don’t you think he’ll discover that to be a deliberate lie, Mr Green?’

  ‘Well,’ said Green doggedly, ‘we can’t tell him what has happened, and we’ve got to satisfy him somehow. I promised to let him know something, and it’s true that a body has been found. I asked Wrington. And it’s true that it’s not Goldenburg.’

  ‘Oh, all right, let it go. You’d better arrange the laundry inquiry first thing in the morning. Now let me alone. I want to think.’

  CHAPTER XXXV

  SIR HILARY THORNTON had come to Heldon Foyle’s stocktaking. The superintendent, with a mass of papers on the desk in front of him, talked swiftly, now and again referring to the typewritten index of reports and statements in order to verify some point. The Assistant Commissioner occasionally interpolated some question, but for the most part he remained gravely silent. Foyle recapitulated the events of the preceding day.

  ‘It was sheer foolishness, Sir Hilary,’ he admitted bitterly. ‘If we hadn’t blundered Grell would have been in our hands now. As it is, we have to begin the search for him all over again.’

  Through the open window came the rumble of a motor-omnibus used by the police to test applicants for licences. Thornton swung the window close.

  ‘You still think that Grell had a hand in it?’

  ‘I’m never positive, Sir Hilary, when it is a question of circumstantial evidence. But there can be no question that if he is not guilty himself he knows who is. I am so certain that I had a schedule of witnesses made out for the Treasury. Here they are.’

  He selected a sheet of paper and passed it to the other. Thornton read it and handed it back without comment.

  ‘There are gaps in it, of course,’ went on Foyle. ‘As a matter of evidence, though, practically all we want is to identify the finger-prints. They of themselves would determine the investigation. But we can’t tell whether they are Grell’s or not until we get hold of him. We’ve identified the linen found in the bag on the barge as having been bought for Grell, but there is no name or initials on the bag itself. I have not yet heard from Wrington. He may have something further to report. About Goldenburg. I got Pinkerton’s to look into his career in America. They have discovered that five years ago he was in San Francisco for three months, and at that time he was apparently well supplied with money. Grell arrived there a month before he left, and they left the city within a day of each other.’

  ‘A coincidence.’

  ‘It may be or may not. Grell’s movements were pretty well chronicled in the American Press at that time, and it is at any rate conceivable that Goldenburg went there with the express intention of meeting him. More than that, Grell was staying at the Waldorf Astoria in New York two years ago. Goldenburg went straight there from India—which he had made too hot to hold him—stayed at the same hotel, and left within three days for Cape Town. Why should he go to Cape Town via New York? I may be right or wrong in the opinion I have formed, but at any rate we have established a point of contact between the two
men.’

  ‘There is something in that,’ agreed Sir Hilary, with a jerky nod of the head.

  ‘More than that, on the New York visit Goldenburg was accompanied by a woman whose description in every particular corresponds with that of the Princess Petrovska—though she called herself the Hon. Katherine Balton. There is material enough in that information, Sir Hilary, to draw a number of conclusions from. At any rate, they go to confirm my opinions at present. I know very well that there is sometimes smoke without fire, but my experience is that you can usually safely lay odds that there is a fire somewhere when you do see smoke.’

  The elliptic form of speech was sometimes adopted by Heldon Foyle in discussing affairs with one whose alertness of brain he could depend upon. Thornton twisted his grey moustache and his eye twinkled appreciatively.

  ‘That’s all right,’ he said. ‘But how do you account for Grell finding people ready to his hand in London to help him disappear at the very moment he needs them? There are several people mixed up in it, we know; but how is it that they are all loyal to him? We know that criminals will not keep faith with each other unless there is some strong inducement. How do you account for it?’

  ‘There may be a dozen reasons. Purely as an hypothesis, Grell may have a hold on these people by threatening them with exposure for some crime they have committed. Self-interest is the finest incentive I know to silence.’

  ‘All the same, it’s queer,’ said Sir Hilary, with a little frown. ‘What do you propose to do?’

  Heldon Foyle’s lips became dogged. ‘Break ’em up piecemeal as we lay our hands on ’em now. We’ve got one—the man we roped in with Red Ike. He’s as tight as an oyster; but while we’ve got him he can’t do anything to help his pals. Then there’s the Princess. She’s as slippery as an eel; but if the Liverpool people can get hold of her we may reckon she’ll be kept safe for a few weeks on the charge of drugging Blake. Then there’s Ivan Abramovitch. We may be able to lay our fingers on him. If there’s any more in this business I don’t know ’em; but every one of the gang we take means so much less help for Grell.’