Flowering Death

by Angus MacVicar

  What was Justice, thought Spike?

  He remembered the emaciated body of Dr. McIntee, lying stark in the flower-strewn library at Arundel House. He remembered Nan Li-San, her sweet little body tortured and dying in the Limehouse flat. He remembered the Hon. Nancy, the gallant wanton, clutching the bloodstained white fur to her breast in Harpagon’s. He thought of Mrs. Parkinson, the Rank person, the Rev. Alfred Davidson, Archibald Tyrone ... those others.

  He turned slowly to his companions. In a vivid flash of lightning they saw his lean face pale and drawn. They saw his eyes blaze beneath black brows.

  “McGonagle!” he said. “Spring! If he gives you an excuse — and I think he will — shoot him dead.”

  They were aware to whom he referred.

  The silence on Wallace Common, between the coughs of thunder, was heavy and unrelieved.

  Spring stirred.

  “It’s twenty-five minutes to twelve, Spike.”

  “Scarcely, old lad ... Twenty-eight minutes, I make it.”

  “Maybe,” muttered McGonagle, “he won’t —”

  “Listen!” said Spike.

  There was a scrape and a rustic on the fringe of the ruin. In a flash of lightning Spring saw a dark shadow flit behind an upright boulder. The sergeant was stifled. He swallowed and his teeth ground on each other.

  “Probably the bright lad himself,” continued Spring, in a voice surprisingly cool after the passionate ring which it had held before. “Panicking after all ... You know what to do, McGonagle. Spring! You’d better crawl out to the left. I hope that plain-clothes man is coming up behind ... ”

  The thunder was echoing over the low hills in the western countryside. The lightning flickered almost constantly about the Common. Spike’s jaw jutted.

  He peered around the block of limestone. Again he saw the shadow, this time closer to the patch of turf upon which he crouched. He laid hands on the long bundle. Finally he gripped the bottom part of the queer object.

  Again he glanced out over the cluster of stones.

  And then in a vivid gleam he saw “Black and White” standing not ten paces from him. He saw the tall man, clad in a voluminous black coat which gave him an appearance of thinness. He saw the black soft hat and the lined cadaverous face beneath it. He saw the straggly black beard, the flimsy black gloves. The face shone in the blaze of light.

  In the gloom which followed the lightning flash, the figure of Spike Dorrance rose in a jerky manner from behind the stone. The voice of Spike Dorrance sounded strangely disembodied in the quick silence.

  “That you, ‘Black and White’? Have you the directions for the cure?”

  And then the lightning shone once more. Stranger whisked a revolver from beneath his cloak. He fired twice. The bullets entered the grey-clad figure of Spike Dorrance. There was a strange coughing sound and a thud.

  As if the firing of “Black and White” had been a signal, there sounded almost simultaneously two other shots, one from the right, another from the left. But the sudden dark, descending again after the lightning, rendered ineffective the practice of McGonagle and Spring.

  They came rushing forward, tripping among the boulders, and blundered into one another’s arms.

  They separated.

  There was a gasp to the right. And as another flash of lightning came, they saw the cloaked figure flying down the slope towards the glare of the city. About thirty yards behind Stranger ran two men. The shorter, stockier of the pair lifted his arm and fired; but “Black and White” did not falter.

  There were two other stabs of light in the mirk. Someone shrieked with pain.

  “Hell!” roared McGonagle as he blundered downhill in Spring’s wake. “Damn this lightning!”

  He came upon the limp body of a man. He peered down and saw that it was Henryson, one of the detectives who had been watching Arundel House. The man was bleeding from the bullet wound in the shoulder; but the inspector saw that the injury was scarcely serious. He went on again.

  The sound of a motor-car engine burst into the quiet. Another pistol-shot cut across the steady whine. Then another ...

  “Lord!” groaned the inspector to himself. “The Bentley!”

  He reached the workman’s house. He found Spike there and Spring. Both men were panting. Spike’s face was like chalk. The sergeant was cursing — childishly, feebly.

  “I didn’t expect him to take the Bentley,” remarked the head of Department Q7 quietly. “Bad work, McGonagle. What a hell of a mess I’m makin’ of this case ... We’ll have to blame the lightning. Henryson and I were on his heels; but Stranger turned and winged the detective. I hesitated. Then I saw the lad wasn’t badly hurt. I went on again. But ‘Black and White’ was off with the Bentley before I could catch up on him. I tried to pot one of the tyres. So did Spring ... No good.”

  “By heavens!” muttered the sergeant. “I’m sorry, Spike ... ”

  “Rats! You and McGonagle are not to blame for the getaway. No one is to blame, I guess ... Luck was on his side. And there’s not the slightest good calling up the Yard from the police-box yonder. Before the Flying Squad came into action ‘Black and White’ would have reached his destination, would have abandoned the car ... He’ll be there in about five minutes from now ... But he’s making one big mistake, the bold bad Stranger. He thinks he killed me ... That was a damned fine dummy Jock MacLaren made for us. In daylight I didn’t think it flattered me; but the lightning made it look pretty stout.”

  The three men retraced their steps towards the place where Henryson was lying.

  “Begorra,” said McGonagle, “the dummy was a good idea if it had come off, Spike. We knew at once that he didn’t mean to trade the cure. We knew at once that he came to commit another murder ... ”

  “He’s a slippery beggar,” muttered Spring. “You think you know who he is, Spike?”

  “I think I know who he is, old lad ... Don’t you worry. We’ll have definite proof as to his identity to-morrow. If not I’ll offer my services to Henry Hall as a crooner ... The darned thing is that he’ll probably escape hanging because he’s mad. I may arrange to kill him before British Justice can spare his life ... I’ll kill that devil! His madness is the madness of wickedness ...”

  The voice in the dark became so cold and cruel that Spring shivered. McGonagle said nothing. He was disturbed by Spike’s mood; but he hoped that by next day the young doctor would be able to face his problems without harshness. But the inspector remembered Spike’s treatment of the Hon. Nancy. He remembered the queer death of Signor Marconi, whose ward had died of meningitis. And he was afraid ...

  They came upon Henryson, now sitting up and groaning.

  “Cut over to the ruin, Spring,” said Spike, “and rescue S. Dorrance the second.”

  With McGonagle supporting the wounded detective in his arms, the head of Department Q7 bound up the injury with his handkerchief.

  Henryson seemed a little awed that he should be treated in so friendly a fashion by the man whose name had become a legend in the Yard. He had expected recriminations, following the escape of his quarry; but the great Spike was actually in an even humour.

  “Don’t suppose you’ve any idea who it was you were following?” inquired Spike. “Have you, Henryson?”

  The detective shook his big blond head. He was obviously in some pain; but he answered steadily enough.

  “Sorry, sir. All evening I was watching Arundel House — under orders. At six o’clock the Daw girl went out. She returned with a parcel of groceries just on the heels of Fayne. My pal — who’d been watching St. Clement’s Hospital — reported Fayne’s movements unsuspicious and stayed on with me outside Arundel House. Believe he’s still there ... Lancaster rushed off to the theatre about seven with another detective behind him. Fayne went out again about ten o’clock. My pal went after him. When they returned shortly before eleven I was told that the doctor had apparently been having a constitutional, though my pal had not kept him in sight all the time ... About elev
en o’clock Lancaster returned from the Paternoster Theatre. The detective who’d been watching him reported everything O.K. and cleared off home.”

  McGonagle’s voice came heavily out of the dark.

  “What about Seale?”

  “There was a light in His room all night from nine o’clock. It was still there at ten minutes past eleven when I happened to take a turn round the back of the building ... It was then that I noticed a dark shadow moving off down the lane towards Clarges Street. I hadn’t time to warn my pal. He was in the Square. And I wasn’t quite sure whether the stranger had come from the house or not. But I decided to follow him ... Hope I did right, sir?”

  Spike patted the man’s sound shoulder.

  “You certainly did, Henryson.”

  Encouraged, the detective continued:

  “He got a ’bus right away which took him in the direction of Wallace Common. I missed it by the skin of my teeth; but I got another three minutes later. We were on the tail of the first ’bus by the time we reached the terminus at the bottom of the road down there ... That’s all, sir.”

  Spring returned, again carrying a long bundle. Henryson’s brows furrowed when he examined the model made by Jock MacLaren, the make-up expert at the Yard. He was shown two tiny bullet-holes in the material of the effigy, close to where the heart of a human being would have been situated.

  “Feel fit to walk to the ’bus-stop, Henryson?” Spike rose and dusted elegantly the knees of his grey trousers.

  “Certainly, sir.”

  Helped by McGonagle, the detective scrambled to his feet. He stifled a grunt of pain. The four men began slowly to descend the hill.

  As they waited for the arrival of a ’bus at midnight, McGonagle expounded his reflections.

  “And I expect ‘Black and White’ will drive down into London and abandon the Bentley somewhere near Arundel House. Henryson’s pal will probably be keeping guard in the Square — in front of the building. ‘Black and White’ will slip inside from the back; same way as he came out. No one will see him.”

  The inspector’s theory proved to coincide with the evidence. About one o’clock in the morning a constable found the Bentley abandoned in Clarges Street. There were, of course, no suspicious fingerprints on any part of it. Henryson’s colleague had seen no one re-enter Arundel House, during or after the summer storm of thunder and lightning.

  PART IV

  CHAPTER XXII

  Friday

  THE final day of the McIntee investigation will always be remembered by the leading participants — save one, who is now dead — not only for the increasing tensity, which exploded finally into a dramatic and puzzling climax, but also for its brilliant weather, perhaps the finest of that summer.

  The thunderstorm of the previous night had banished the sultry atmosphere, and though the sun shone down brightly the air was fresh. Even in Regent Street, Bond Street and Piccadilly early pedestrians basked in the heat, pleasantly and without fatigue; while in Hyde Park the air was like that on the Sussex Downs. The quiet flat water of the Serpentine glistened like a sheet of molten brass. Birds carolled in the bushes and played hide-and-seek around the trees.

  In the afternoon, as was inevitable, the traffic began to send up dust-clouds in the streets; but the memory of a perfect morning seemed to linger with those bent on business, and the flying grime was scarcely noticed.

  And all through the day, in the midst of the lovely weather, the police were gradually closing in upon one individual. Slowly but surely, under the direction of Spike Dorrance, the net was being spread around this person, until, between seven and eight o’clock in the evening, there was no loophole for his escape.

  And all through the day twenty sick people held up their heads and hope shot bright streaks through the dull black of their pain; for a confident young man with a ready smile had told them that during the evening, at the latest, there would be brought to them a cure for the strange flower-disease. They did not hope in vain.

  And all through the day Detective Walsh laboured in a highland village, poring over musty volumes and presenting the villagers with carefully worded questions. The result of his labours reached Scotland Yard about five o’clock.

  And while he remained doggedly at his task, other detectives, in Bombay and Burma, were putting the finishing touches to certain cablegrams. Those were received in the Information Room of Scotland Yard some time before Walsh’s message.

  And all through the day Sir Percival Merridew sat in his room, polishing his eyeglass and biting his little sandy moustache. When the Home Secretary telephoned — an event which occurred almost hourly — he would reply to the statesman’s question in a loud, snappy voice.

  “The case,” he would say, “is drawing to a close ... There is no need for anxiety.”

  When news reached him at three o’clock in the afternoon that the Naval Pact might be signed the following morning, in order to dissipate in the mind of the Soviet a certain growing doubt as to Britain’s good faith, he smiled slantwise at the messenger.

  “Tell Mr. Dunglass,” he said, “that Scotland Yard will not fail. To-morrow all threats to the Pact will be innocuous. Tell Lord Eustace Sanders not to fear.”

  The Assistant Commissioner turned his gaze once more to the black and silver clock, of chaste design, which stood upon the mantelpiece.

  And all through the day Peter Todd of the Daily Star was thinking of the brilliant article which he would write for his paper late that night. He knew now, after a talk with “Jimmy” Ram-Singh, of the legend regarding “The Pink Flowers of Solomon.” One hour before midnight, at a prearranged rendezvous, he was given all the details of the case by Spike Dorrance.

  And all through the day Joan and Aunt Margaret waited for news from Spike of the final stages of the case. But the news was late in coming. Aunt Margaret’s face was lined and grey when it did arrive and Joan was struggling to keep back her tears.

  And in the pleasant warmth Spike, Inspector McGonagle and Sergeant Spring went from place to place, working constantly, except when they snatched hurried meals.

  After lunch the formula for the cure was in the hands of Simpson, the chemist, and his young doctors. They did not sigh and take rest. Though their bodies were so weary that they scarcely noted the fall of their feet on the laboratory floor, they began at once to prepare little double phials of liquid. They studied the sheet of paper given to them by Spike. They weighed out the ingredients for a certain poison, the basic one of which came from the bark of one of fifty “rare African trees” — acornus solis. They exhausted their own small supply of bark and received more from the London Hospital for Tropical Diseases. They manufactured the antidote from similar ingredients, adding quinine and a tiny quantity of arsenic.

  By nine o’clock in the evening they had sent the phials to St. Clement’s Hospital and to the Cambridge Hospital, where doctors, outwardly cool, performed the final operations on the feet, necks and faces of their patients. Afterwards the sufferers were given diluted draughts of the poison. On Saturday morning — just as the Naval Pact was being signed in Whitehall — Mrs. Parkinson, Miss Elizabeth Rank, the Rev. Alfred Davidson, Mr. Archibald Tyrone and the others were asked to drink another cup of foul-tasting liquid. When they had done so each fell into a heavy slumber, to waken twelve hours later, physically weaker than before, but actually on the way to recovery.

  And all through the day, while his evil work was steadily being destroyed, the murderer chuckled insanely to himself. He thought that Spike Dorrance was dead and that soon, alone, he would demand all the money that existed in the world. He did not know that his enemy, far from being dead, was debating constantly in his mind the manner in which the day should end.

  Spike was thinking of the madman. He was thinking of justice. He was wondering how long he could delay the arrest ...

  And in the Square which confronted Arundel House children played around the iron fence which circled the trees.

  CHAPTER XXIII


  THE morning of Friday Spike woke quickly. He was a heavy sleeper, and, as a rule, he had to struggle for some minutes before he became completely conscious of his surroundings. He had to pass through a muffled state of semi-coma before his mind grasped realities.

  On this occasion, however, he was asleep one moment and wide awake the next.

  There is no one who has failed to experience the sudden transition. It may happen on the day you are to have a dozen teeth removed. It may happen on the day you are to have an audience with your banker about an overdraft. It may happen on the day you are to receive a knighthood.

  In Spike’s case it happened on the day in which he knew the McIntee business would cease to be a problem. It happened on the day in which he was going to revenge Dr. Abraham McIntee, Nan Li-San, the Hon. Nancy and the unknown girls of Bombay ...

  For ten minutes he lay quite still beneath the coverlet.

  In the depression of morning he told himself that he had, by reason of errors, made bad going in the case. He had been led into side-tracks. He had allowed his attention to wander from an original and correct inspiration regarding the identity of the murderer. He had for long imagined the case to be the work of a man engaged by some foreign power inimical to Britain. He had been distracted from an obvious suspect by illogical dreaming. He had been tempted to bring off a dramatic coup on Wallace Common, when his reason had told him that such an effort was uncertain to bring about the proper results.

  He realized that for the first time in any case he had allowed sentiment to interfere with reason. His love for Joan had caused a psychological upheaval in his personality which ought never to have occurred in the midst of the investigation. He had allowed her abduction, then the death of Nan Li-San and the murder of the Hon. Nancy, to obscure the real issues.

  In previous cases he had brushed aside the sorrows of women and the blurring effect of their beauty and apparent helplessness. He had reached his goal unswervingly. This time his method of arriving at a conclusion to the affair had possessed an opposite character. His new-found tenderness and pity had caused him to make mistakes.