“Yes, it is a pitiless trade this of ours, and professional thief-catchers can’t afford to have much to do with mercy, and yet I tell you that as I watched that man day after day, with the fever growing hotter in his blood and the unbearable anxiety tearing ever harder and harder at his nerves, I pitied him—yes, I pitied him so much that I even found myself growing impatient for the end to come. Fancy that, a detective, a thief-catcher getting impatient to see his victim out of his misery!
“Well, I had to wait six months—that is to say, I had to wait until five o’clock this morning—for the end. Soon after four one of my men came and knocked me up; he brought a note into my bed-room and I read it in bed. It was from Philip Marsden asking me to go and see him at once and alone. I went, as you may be sure, with as little delay as possible. I found him in his sitting-room. The lights were burning. He was fully dressed, and had evidently been up all night.
“Even I, who have seen the despair that comes of crime in most of its worst forms, was shocked at the look of him. Still he greeted me politely and with perfect composure. He affected not to see the hand that I held out to him, but asked me quite kindly to sit down and have a chat with him. I sat down, and when I looked up I saw him standing in front of me, covering me with a brace of revolvers. My life, of course, was absolutely at his mercy, and whatever I might have thought of myself or the situation, there was obviously nothing to do but to sit still and wait for developments.
“He began very quietly to tell me why he had sent for me. He said: ‘I wanted to see you, Mr. Lipinzki, to clear up this matter about the big diamond. I have seen for a long time—in fact from that Sunday night—that you had worked out a pretty correct notion as to the way that diamond vanished. You are quite right; it did fly across the veld to the Barkly Hills. I am a bit of a chemist you know, and when I had once made up my mind to steal it—for there is no use in mincing words now—I saw that it would be perfectly absurd to attempt to smuggle such a stone out by any of the ordinary methods.
“ ‘I daresay you wonder what these revolvers are for. They are to keep you there in that chair till I’ve done, for one thing. If you attempt to get out of it or utter a sound I shall shoot you. If you hear me out you will not be injured, so you may as well sit still and keep your ears open.
“ ‘To have any chance of success I must have had a confederate, and I made young Lomas one. If you look on that little table beside your chair you will see a bit of closed lead piping with a tap in it and a piece of thin sheet india-rubber. That is the remains of the apparatus that I used. I make them a present to you; you may like to add them to your collection.
“ ‘Lomas, when he went on duty that Saturday night, took the bit of tube charged with compressed hydrogen and an empty child’s toy balloon with him. You will remember that that night was very dark, and that the wind had been blowing very steadily all day towards the Barkly Hills. Well, when everything was quiet he filled the balloon with gas, tied the diamond—’
“ ‘But how did he get the diamond out of the safe? The Secretary saw it locked up that evening!’ I exclaimed, my curiosity getting the better of my prudence.
“ ‘It was not locked up in the safe at all that night,’ he answered, smiling with a sort of ghastly satisfaction. ‘Lomas and I, as you know, took the tray of diamonds to the safe, and, as far as the Secretary could see, put them in, but as he put the tray into its compartment he palmed the big diamond as I had taught him to do in a good many lessons before. At the moment that I shut the safe and locked it, the diamond was in his pocket.
“ ‘The Secretary and his friends left the room, Lomas and I went back to the tables, and I told him to clean the scales as I wanted to test them. While he was doing so he slipped the diamond behind the box, and there it lay between the box and the corner of the wall until it was wanted.
“ ‘We all left the room as usual, and, as you know, we were searched. When Lomas went on night-duty there was the diamond ready for its balloon voyage. He filled the balloon just so that it lifted the diamond and no more. The lead pipe he just put where the diamond had been—the only place you never looked in. When the row was over on the Monday I locked it up in the safe. We were all searched that day; the next I brought it away and now you may have it.
“ ‘Two of the windows were open on account of the heat. He watched his opportunity, and committed it to the air about two hours before dawn. You know what a sudden fall there is in the temperature here just before daybreak. I calculated upon that to contract the volume of the gas sufficiently to destroy the balance and bring the balloon to the ground, and I knew that, if Lomas had obeyed my instructions, it would fall either on the veld or on this side of the hills.
“ ‘The balloon was a bright red, and, to make a long story short, I started out before daybreak that morning, as you know, to look for buck. When I got outside the camp I took compass bearings and rode straight down the wind towards the hills. By good luck or good calculation, or both, I must have followed the course of the balloon almost exactly, for in three hours after I left the camp I saw the little red speck ahead of me up among the stones on the hillside.
“ ‘I dodged about for a bit as though I were really after buck, in case anybody was watching me. I worked round to the red spot, put my foot on the balloon, and burst it. I folded the india-rubber up, as I didn’t like to leave it there, and put it in my pocket-book. You remember that when you searched me you didn’t open my pocket-book, as, of course, it was perfectly flat, and the diamond couldn’t possibly have been in it. That’s how you missed your clue, though I don’t suppose it would have been much use to you as you’d already guessed it. However, there it is at your service now.”
“ ‘And the diamond?’
“As I said these three words his whole manner suddenly changed. So far he had spoken quietly and deliberately, and without even a trace of anger in his voice, but now his white, sunken cheeks suddenly flushed a bright fever red and his eyes literally blazed at me. His voice sank to a low, hissing tone that was really horrible to hear.
“ ‘The diamond!’ he said. ‘Yes, curse it, and curse you, Mr. Inspector Lipinzki—for it and you have been a curse to me! Day and night I have seen the spot where I buried it, and day and night you have kept your nets spread about my feet so that I could not move a step to go and take it. I can bear the suspense no longer. Between you—you and that infernal stone—you have wrecked my health and driven me mad. If I had all the wealth of De Beers’ now it wouldn’t be any use to me, and to-night a new fear came to me—that if this goes on much longer I shall go mad, really mad, and in my delirium rob myself of my revenge on you by letting out where I hid it.
“ ‘Now listen. Lomas has gone. He is beyond your reach. He has changed his name—his very identity. I have sent him by different posts, and to different names and addresses, two letters. One is a plan and the other is a key to it. With those two pieces of paper he can find the diamond. Without them you can hunt for a century and never go near it.
“ ‘And now that you know that—that your incomparable stone, which should have been mine, is out yonder somewhere where you can never find it, you and the De Beers’ people will be able to guess at the tortures of Tantalus that you have made me endure. That is all you have got by your smartness. That is my legacy to you—curse you! If I had my way I would send you all out there to hunt for it without food or drink till you died of hunger and thirst of body, as you have made me die a living death of hunger and thirst of mind.”
“As he said this, he covered me with one revolver, and put the muzzle of the other into his mouth. With an ungovernable impulse, I sprang to my feet. He pulled both triggers at once. One bullet passed between my arm and my body, ripping a piece out of my coat sleeve; the other—well, I can spare you the details. He dropped dead instantly.”
“And the diamond?” I said.
“The reward
is £20,000, and it is at your service,” replied the Inspector, in his suavest manner, “provided that you can find the stone—or Mr. Lomas and his plans.”
Skip Notes
* The reference is to an earlier case of Inspector Lipinzki.
The Vanishing Diamonds
M. MCDONNELL BODKIN
It is a major achievement for an author to create a character with significance in the history of the detective story, but Matthias McDonnell Bodkin (1850–1933) managed to create two of them.
The first was Paul Beck (named Alfred Juggins when he first appeared in Pearson’s Magazine in 1897) in Paul Beck, the Rule of Thumb Detective (1898), a title selected by Ellery Queen for inclusion in Queen’s Quorum, a listing of the hundred and six most important volumes of short stories in the genre. Beck claims to be not very bright, saying “I just go by the rule of thumb, and muddle and puzzle out my cases as best I can.” He also appears in The Quests of Paul Beck (1908), in The Capture of Paul Beck (1909), in a minor role in Young Beck, a Chip off the Old Block (1911), in Pigeon Blood Rubies (1915), and in Paul Beck, Detective (1929).
Soon after his success with Beck, he began to write stories about the eponymous sleuth in Dora Myrl, The Lady Detective (1900), introducing a modern woman who works as a private inquiry agent, a highly unsavory job for a female in the Victorian age. Her arsenal as a crime fighter includes exceptional skill at disguise, the ability to ride a bicycle at high speeds, and a small revolver she carries in her purse. Young, pretty, witty, and smart (she graduated from Cambridge University, was expert at math, and had a medical degree), Dora meets Beck halfway through The Capture of Paul Beck.
He is twice her age and taken by her beauty, while she admires him as “the greatest detective in the world.” They are on opposite sides of a case, but both see that justice is done. They fall in love (Dora “captures” him) and have a son who stars in the stories collected as Young Beck; Dora makes a cameo appearance but her career has ended.
Bodkin, whose primary career was as a barrister, was appointed a judge in County Clare, Ireland, served as a Nationalist member of Parliament, and wrote of his courtroom episodes in Recollections of an Irish Judge (1914).
“The Vanishing Diamonds” was originally published in the January 23, 1897, issue of Pearson’s Weekly; it was first collected in Paul Beck, the Rule of Thumb Detective (London, C. A. Pearson,1898).
THE VANISHING DIAMONDS
M. McDonnell Bodkin
She was as bright as a butterfly in a flower garden, and as restless, quivering down to her fingertips with impatient excitement. That big room in the big house in Upper Belgrave Street was no bad notion of the flower garden.
There were just a few square yards of clear space where she sat alone—on a couch made for two—patting the soft carpet with a restless little foot. The rest of the room was filled with long tables, and oval tables, and round tables, all crowded, with the pretty trifles and trinkets that ladies love. It seemed as if half a dozen of the smartest jewelers and fancy shops of Regent Street had emptied their show windows into the room. The tables were all aglow with the gleam of gold and silver and the glitter of jewels, and the bright tints of rich silk and painted fans, and rare and dainty porcelain.
For Lilian Ray was to marry Sydney Harcourt in a week, and there was not a more popular couple in London. Her sweet face and winning ways had taken the heart of society by storm; and all the world knew that warm-hearted, hot-headed Harcourt was going hop, step, and jump to the devil when she caught and held him. So everybody was pleased, and said it was a perfect match, and for the last three weeks the wedding presents came pouring into the big house in Upper Belgrave Street, and flooded the front drawing-room. Lilian was impatient, but it was the impatience of delight.
No wonder she was excited, for her lover was coming, and with him were coming the famous Harcourt diamonds, which had been the delight and admiration and envy of fashionable London for half a century. The jewels had gone from the bank, where they had lain in darkness and safety for a dozen years, to the glittering shop of Mr. Ophir, of Bond Street. For the setting was very old, and the vigilance of the tiny silver points that guarded the priceless morsels of bright stone had to be looked to, and a brand-new case was ordered to set the precious sparklers off to the best advantage.
A sudden knock at the door starts her again to the window, the cobweb silk flying behind. But she turns away petulantly like a spoiled child.
“Only another traveling bag,” she says; “that makes seven—two with gold fittings. I wonder if this has gold fittings. I have set them all there in a row with their mouths open, and their gold or silver teeth grinning. There is not room for another one. I wonder do people think that——”
The sentence was never finished, for at this moment a hansom cab came sharply round the corner in full view of the window. She caught one glimpse of an eager young face and a flat parcel, then she dropped back into her couch, panting a little. There came a second knock, and a foot on the stairs mounting three steps at a spring. She heard it, and knew it, but sat quite still. Another moment and he was in the room. Her eyes welcomed him, though her lips pouted.
“You are ten minutes before your time, sir,” she said, “and I am terribly busy. What have you got there?”
“Oh! you little sly-boots. You know you have been longing for me and the diamonds, especially the diamonds, for the last hour. I’ve a great mind to carry them off again.”
He dropped into the seat beside her and his right arm stole round her waist, while he held the jewel-case away in his left hand. She blushed and laughed, and slipping from his encircling arm, made a dash for the diamonds. But he was too quick for her. He leaped to his feet and held the case aloft. Straining to the utmost of her tip-toes she could just reach one hand to his elbow; she placed the other among his brown curls, making ready for a leap. Her face was close to his and quite undefended. What happened was, under the circumstances, inevitable.
“Oh!” she exclaimed in quite a natural tone of surprise.
“Payment in advance,” he retorted, as the precious case came down to her desiring hands; “overpayment, I confess, but then I am ready to give change to any amount.”
But she fled from him, with her treasure, to the couch. “Now to be sensible for one short moment, if you can, and hand me the scissors out of that lady’s companion there beside the photograph frame on the table.”
The jewel-case was done up in whitey-brown paper with strong cord and sealed with broad patches of red sealing-wax. Quite excitedly she cut through the string, leaving the seals unbroken, and let paper and twine and wax go down in a heap on the carpet together.
There emerged from the inner wrapping of soft, white tissue-paper the jewel-case in its new coat of light brown morocco with the monogram L. H. in neat gold letters on it. She gave a little cry of pleasure as her eyes fell on the lettering which proclaimed the jewels her very own, and he, sitting close beside, watching lovingly as one watches a pretty child at play, made believe to snatch it from her fingers. But she held it tight. Like a bather on the water’s brim, she paused for one tantalizing moment, drew a deep breath to make ready for the coming cry of rapture, and opened the case.
It was empty!
The slope of the raised centre of violet velvet was just ruffled a little, like a bed that had been slept in. That was all.
She looked suddenly in his eyes, half amused, half accusingly, for she thought he had played her some trick. His face was grave and startled.
“What does it mean, Syd? Are you playing with me?” But she knew from his face he was quite serious even while she asked.
“I cannot make it out, Lil,” he said, in an altered voice. “I cannot make it out at all. I brought the case just as it was from Mr. Ophir’s. He told me he had put the diamonds in and sealed it up with his own hands. See, you have not even broken the seals,” and he mechanically
picked up the litter of paper and twine from the floor. “No one touched it since except myself and you, and the diamonds are gone. Old Ophir would no more dream of playing such a trick than an archbishop. Still it must be either that or——But that is too absurd. He’s as respectable as the Bank of England, and nearly as rich. It beats me, Lily. Why, the old boy warned me as he gave me the precious parcel. ‘We cannot be too careful, Mr. Harcourt,’ he said. ‘There is twenty thousand pounds in that little parcel; let no hand touch it except your own.’ And I did not, of course; yet the diamonds have vanished, through case and paper and seals, into space.”
He stared ruefully at the expanse of violet velvet.
“The first thing is to see Mr. Ophir,” he said.
“Oh, don’t leave me, Syd.”
“Well to write him then. There must be some ridiculous mistake somewhere. Perhaps he gave me the wrong case. He would never——No, that’s too absurd. Perhaps someone substituted the empty case when he looked aside for a moment. It may be necessary to employ a detective. I’ll tell him so at once. Can I write a line anywhere?”
“There are half a dozen writing-cases there in a row on that table.”
She sat him down to a pretty mother-of-pearl and tortoise-shell affair, with violet-scented ink in the silver-mounted bottles.
Then Harcourt showed a quick impatience, quite unlike his usual sunny manner, which Lilian thought nothing could disturb.
The Big Book of Victorian Mysteries Page 33