Knock Out

by Sapper

  “This is Captain Drummond,” said Darrell with a smile. “Miss Frensham, Hugh. And the half-wit with the eyeglass is Algy Longworth.”

  “Oh! I’m so glad,” she cried. “When Mr Darrell told me that you’d actually gone to the Old Hall I was afraid it would be too late.”

  For a moment or two Drummond looked at her keenly. Most certainly, if appearances were anything to go by, this girl was all right. But he was moving in deep waters, and he was far too old a soldier to take any chances.

  “From the little that Peter has told me, Miss Frensham,” he said quietly, “I gather you know Corinne Moxton.”

  “Why not tell him everything just as you told me,” suggested Darrell.

  “It’s all so muddled and confusing, Captain Drummond,” she cried. “I hardly know where to begin. Sometimes I feel the whole thing is some ghastly nightmare. You see, when Miss Moxton advertised for a secretary-companion I applied for the post, and much to my surprise I got it. I was overjoyed: I’ve always admired her on the films, and I thought it was going to be the greatest fun. The salary was very good, and it looked the most wonderful opportunity. I even wondered if, through her influence, I might perhaps get a job on the films.”

  “Take it easy, Miss Frensham,” said Drummond gently. “We’ve got plenty of time: the night is yet young.”

  “It’s four o’clock,” she said with a shaky little laugh. “Well, my first shock came when Miss Samuelson – she was my predecessor – came back to the flat one day. She had forgotten something when she packed and had returned to get it. Miss Moxton was out, and Miss Samuelson and I had a talk. I thought she was looking at me rather queerly, and at last I asked her if anything was the matter.

  “‘You’ll soon find out what’s the matter,’ she said. ‘I’m surprised you haven’t done so already.’

  “‘What do you mean?’ I cried in amazement.

  “‘What do you think of my late and your present employer?’ she said.

  “‘I’ve only been here a few days,’ I reminded her, ‘and I really don’t know. She seems very nice so far.’

  “‘Nice,’ cried Miss Samuelson. ‘Nice. My dear! there is no fiend in hell who is quite so fiendish as that she-devil in some of her moods.’

  “At the time I didn’t believe her. As you know, Captain Drummond, jobs are not easy to come by, and I thought she was jealous of me having taken hers. But a few days later I had reason to change my mind. I was sitting doing some work for her when there suddenly came a yelp of pain from the room next door, followed by a pitiful sort of moaning. Now, she has two dogs: one is a Pekingese, and the other is a dreadful little beast of a type I loathe. I rushed in to find out what had happened: evidently one of them had hurt itself somehow.

  “I found Miss Moxton sitting in a chair by the window with the Pekingese on her lap. The sun was shining into the room, and from under the bed there came a little whimpering noise.

  “‘I thought I heard one of the dogs crying out,’ I said.

  “And as I spoke I glanced at her face. Captain Drummond, I find it almost impossible to describe to you what her expression was like. Moreover, I watched it change: watched the mask that conceals her real nature replace the truth. And what was the truth? It was something so horrible, so diabolical that I almost cried out. It was a mixture of gloating joy and vindictive cruelty: it was dreadful, terrible, utterly evil. But when she spoke her voice was quite normal.

  “‘Poor little Toto,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t thinking what I was doing, and quite accidentally I burnt him with this.’

  “And I saw that she was holding one of those big magnifying glasses in her hand.”

  Daphne Frensham paused for a moment, but none of the three men spoke.

  “I pulled the poor little brute out from under the bed,” she continued, “and there, on his head, was a nasty burn.

  “‘I’ll put some butter on it,’ I said, and took the dog out of the room.

  “Now all this may sound very trivial to you, but the thing I am getting at is this. I am as certain as I can be about anything that it was not an accident at all. You know how difficult it is to focus the heat spot from one of those glasses accurately, and that even when it is in the right place it takes some little time before a bit of paper catches fire. And this was quite a deep burn. I am convinced that she held that dog in some way and deliberately burned it in order to gratify some beastly side of her nature. I am convinced that she has in her some abnormal streak which can only be satisfied by the infliction of cruelty to something or someone. I do hope I’m not boring you,” said the girl anxiously.

  “I have seldom been so interested in my life, Miss Frensham,” said Drummond quietly. “Please go on.”

  “Well, that happened about a month ago,” she continued. “I tried to get it out of my mind, and persuade myself I’d been mistaken. And I’d almost succeeded when another incident happened. I was in her room one morning before she got up, andshe was going through her letters. Suddenly we heard a commotion in the street, and I looked out of the window. There had been an accident: some man working on the house opposite had slipped and fallen on the pavement. The poor fellow was writhing with pain, and there was blood all over the place. It was a sickening sight, and instinctively I called out – ‘Don’t look: don’t look.’

  “In a flash she was out of bed with her nose glued to the window. And there she remained watching greedily till an ambulance arrived and took the injured man away. And it wasn’t just morbid curiosity: it was something more fundamental. She enjoyed every moment of it: it satisfied that vile side of her nature. Can you believe it possible, Captain Drummond, that there are people like that?”

  “Quite easily,” said Drummond gravely. “I don’t profess to be up in such matters, but I gather it is a well-known fact that cases of a similar description are by no means rare. If a person is abnormal anything may happen: it’s only when it gets too bad or is dangerous to others that they push the bloke off to an asylum.”

  “And you don’t think I’m exaggerating?”

  “Far from it,” Drummond assured her. “In fact, things are becoming considerably clearer.”

  “You see,” she went on without asking him what he meant, “what I want to do is to try to show you Corinne Moxton as she really is and not as her public believe her to be. Otherwise you would think I was mad when you hear what comes next.”

  “Fire right ahead,” cried Drummond cheerfully. “Your sanity is above suspicion.”

  “You met her yesterday afternoon, didn’t you.”

  It was not a question but a statement, and Drummond nodded.

  “I did.”

  “And Sir Richard Pendleton was with her.”

  “He was,” said Drummond.

  “And further, you were mixed up in the Sanderson murder.”

  “As a spectator only, I assure you.”

  His voice was lazy, but now his eyes were fixed like gimlets on the girl.

  “Yesterday evening,” she continued, “she came back with Sir Richard to her flat after the cocktail party you met her at. There is a small sort of closet place that leads out of her drawing-room, and I’d fallen asleep. It’s becoming a habit with me, I’m afraid,” she added with a smile. “Anyway, they didn’t know I was there, and the first remark I heard as I woke up so dumbfounded me that my legs literally seemed incapable of movement. Corinne Moxton was speaking.

  “‘You bore me, Richard,’ she said. ‘He was the first man I’ve ever seen murdered, and I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. And anyway, that’s all over. What you’ve got to concentrate your young life on is that big boy Drummond. I’m just crazy to see that guy up against it.’”

  “Mother-love sure oozes from her,” said Drummond with a grin. “And what did our Richard answer to that?”

  “‘I’ll fix that
for you,’ he said, ‘but for God’s sake, Corinne, be careful. Sanderson had to go, but don’t forget bumping off isn’t as easy in this country as it is in yours. And his death is going to raise hell all round.’

  “‘Cut it out,’ she cried contemptuously. ‘His house is burned down: what shadow of evidence have they got? No, Richard, your life’s work is Drummond. I’m not interested in the rest of your schemes, but that great stiff has me tickled to death. He’s got to be put on the spot, and I’ve got to see it done.’

  “‘He’ll give us a run for our money, I assure you,’ answered Pendleton. ‘I felt his muscles last night. He’s not as dangerous as that man Standish, but they’ll both have to go. And if you like we’ll go down to the Old Hall tonight and fix things up. Then I’ll have to leave you to get him there.’

  “‘Trust me,’ she said. ‘Now you get along, and come back later. We’ll see about Sussex then.’

  “And with that he left, and I sat on trying to think things out. I felt completely stunned. That she was cruel and had a horrible nature I already knew, but not in my wildest dreams had it occurred to me that she was as vile as that. And Sir Richard Pendleton! I hated him from the first moment I saw him, but that he, with his reputation, should be like it too simply knocked me flat. Of course, I’d read all about the murder of Mr Sanderson, and to find suddenly that my own employer was implicated in it was almost incredible. But there was no getting away from the evidence of my own ears, and I had to decide what I was going to do.

  “One thing was clear: I should only be signing my own death-warrant if either of them had an inkling that I had overheard their conversation. So I waited till she was in her bath: then I crept along the passage and banged the front door as if I had just come in. She called out to me and I answered: all was well and good so far. But what to do next: that was the point.

  “My first thought was the police, but I sort of funked it. I don’t know anything about Scotland Yard, and I thought that if I went up to a policeman in the street and told him what I’d heard he’d think I was mad. And it was then that I had the idea of coming to see you, Captain Drummond. Your full name was in the papers, and I got your address from the telephone book. But I had to wait till Corinne Moxton had gone out.

  “Sir Richard came back about an hour later to take her out to dinner, and from their remarks in the hall I gathered she had decided to go down to Sussex afterwards. So the instant they left I flew round here, never dreaming that I shouldn’t find you. And then your servant rang up Mr Darrell.”

  “I got the message, Hugh, about five minutes after yours,” said Darrell. “And when I heard what Miss Frensham had to say, I roped in the warriors and followed you.”

  “For which relief much thanks to all concerned,” said Drummond. “Well, Miss Frensham, I’m most extraordinarily grateful to you. You completely saved the situation as far as I am concerned.”

  “But what do you make of it all, Captain Drummond?” she cried. “I mean, you don’t seem as surprised as I thought you would be.”

  “Because, bless you, you haven’t told me much that I didn’t know already,” he said with a grin. “What you say about the fair Corinne’s character is most interesting: it explains a lot. Also you have confirmed the fact that it was they who were at the Old Hall tonight, and further, that they had no idea when they started that they would find me there. And it is interesting to know thatshe was actually in the room when they did in poor old Sanderson.”

  “But what are you going to do about it?” she cried. “We can’t let the vile beast go free.”

  “She won’t,” Drummond assured her. “Life is going to be full of thrills for little Corinne before she’s much older. But things are a bit deeper than even you think, Miss Frensham, and it isn’t going to help matters if we rush our fences. Now in the course of your wanderings with your fair employer have you ever met a man with a head as bald as a billiard ball called Demonico?”

  The girl shook her head.

  “Never,” she said decidedly.

  “Because he is the bird who up till this evening presided at the Old Hall and who, unless I am much mistaken, is the principal noise on the other side. You’ve never heard her mention him?”

  “No,” she answered. “That conversation I overheard tonight is the only time I’ve ever even guessed that anything like this was happening.”

  “Well, chaps, we’re up against something pretty big, and something that, at the moment, is mighty hard to get to the bottom of.”

  Briefly he recounted what had taken place at the Old Hall.

  “Now, in view of what Miss Frensham has told us,” he continued, “it seems pretty clear that the performance in the squash court was staged on the spur of the moment to please dear Corinne. And I’m sure I hope it did. But as she herself admitted, when she was talking to Pendleton, she’s not interested in the rest of his schemes. I am, and so is Standish, far more interested than in that damned wench, much as she loves me. The whole of this elaborate organisation which killed Sanderson, burned his house down, and whose headquarters are, or at any rate were, at the Old Hall has not been got together for the sole object of letting Corinne see me killed. And so, people, it behoves us to take stock of our surroundings and see where we stand. Algy, you flat-footed son of Belial, take a piece of paper and stand by to make notes.”

  Algy Longworth roused himself from a slight doze and obeyed resignedly.

  “Now,” went on Drummond, “let’s take points in our favour. First – Standish has got away with it: that message to Denny must mean that. We don’t know where he is, but neither do the opponents. Second – we know about the fair Corinne’s little peculiarities, but do she and the boy friend know that we know? I am inclined to think not, even after the episode of the squash court. Neither of them spoke – only Demonico did that. Their faces were in deep shadow: except that I could just make out that one of them was a woman I saw nothing at all.”

  He paused, struck by a sudden thought.

  “By the way, Miss Frensham, won’t Corinne smell a rat when she finds that you’re not in the flat?”

  “Oh no,” said the girl. “I don’t sleep there.”

  “That’s good,” said Drummond. “Very well then – point two: we know and they don’t know we know. Point three: two celebrated financiers, Julian Legrange, a Frenchman, and Jim Daly, an Irish-American, are mixed up in the business, of whom the latter is known to be hostile to England. Any more points in our favour?”

  “One, old boy,” said Darrell. “Tonight’s performance will have definitely put the Old Hall out of commission as far as they are concerned. That earth has been stopped all right.”

  Drummond nodded.

  “That’s so, Peter. Though, ’pon my soul, I don’t know if that is in our favour or not. There are advantages in knowing where you can find your fox. Mark that as neutral, Algy, you chump. Now then – points against. One: they have at their disposal a mysterious weapon of the nature of which we have, at the moment, absolutely no idea save that it is some form of gun. Two: they evidently have plenty of money and a large and well-disciplined organisation. Three: orders are sent to members of that organisation by means of a cipher in the agony column of the newspapers, and we don’t know the key to the cipher.”

  “Cipher,” interrupted Daphne Frensham. “In the agony column? Wait a moment, Captain Drummond. About a week ago Pendleton was in the flat, and he had The Times on his knee. He was writing on a piece of paper as he studied it, and I thought he was doing a crossword or something. I noticed he was frowning as if he couldn’t get it right, and then he suddenly said – ‘Damn! I thought it was Tuesday,’ tore up the paper, and began all over again quite happily. It sounds ridiculous, I know, but now you’ve said that about the cipher I’m sure he was decoding a message.”

  “Nothing is ridiculous in this show, believe me, Miss Frensham,”
said Drummond quietly. “Peter, I wonder if we’ve advanced a step farther. I wonder if that’s why we couldn’t read that message in yesterday’s paper.”

  “Don’t quite follow, Hugh.”

  “He said – ‘Damn! I thought it was Tuesday.’ From what Miss Frensham says he was frowning when he thought it was Tuesday, but as soon as he realised it wasn’t, all was sunshine again. So I wonder if they have a different cipher for different days.”

  “There’s a distinct air of possibility about that,” said Darrell, “though I don’t see that it’s going to help us much. The messages are so short that unless one has the key it’s hopeless to solve ’em. And if you’re right we shall want seven different keys.”

  “Still, it’s a point to bear in mind. Standish might make something out of it even if we can’t. Because if we could read their orders we’ve got ’em cold. However, there’s no use building on it. Well, chaps, any more points strike you?”

  “Only one,” said the girl, “and that’s a small one. What excuse am I to make for leaving her?”

  “But, my angel woman,” cried Drummond, aghast, “you aren’t going to leave her. It would be fatal. You’ll be invaluable to us where you are: simply invaluable. Right in the heart of the enemy’s camp. You mustn’t go: you really mustn’t.”

  “But she’s practically a murderess, Captain Drummond.”

  Drummond waved a vast hand soothingly.

  “I know; I know,” he said. “Her habits place her lower in the scheme of things than a carnivorous slug. Nevertheless, you must suffer in the good cause, Miss Frensham. It’s not pleasant, I know, to take someone’s money and spy on them at the same time, but when that someone is a woman like Corinne Moxton it puts a different complexion on things. Of course, I wouldn’t suggest it if I thought you were going to be in the slightest danger, but so far as I can see there can’t be a breath of suspicion against you. And if you go on absolutely normally there never will be.”

  “All right,” said the girl a shade doubtfully. “But what is it particularly that you want me to do?”