Murder in Wax

by Peter Baron

  “If my poor hypothesis will assist you,” said Sir Marcus with dignity, “it is entirely at your service. Beyond aimless guesswork, I cannot help you. I do not know where Mr. Leicester is, neither——”

  “Marcus,” interjected His Grace reprovingly, “you were about to say, ‘Neither do I care.’ I am ashamed of you. Think of the agony that tears at an uncle’s heart.”

  “Neither,” continued Loseley, ignoring the facetious remark, “should I disclose Freddie’s whereabouts, if I did know.”

  He stared at the Inspector and raised his glass defiantly to his lips.

  Leslie, white to the lips, looked on uncomprehendingly.

  “But why should you suspect my guardian?” she asked, with a puzzled expression.

  “Possibly,” suggested Elveden, courteously, “Sir Marcus will be less reticent where you are concerned, Miss Richmond.”

  His glance clashed with that of the Baronet.

  “You will hear more from me, Sir Marcus,” he said.

  “I trust not,” retorted the Baronet and turned to his ward.

  “More wine, my dear?” he asked, apparently oblivious of the Inspector’s existence.

  Elveden bowed again and, turning, made his way to the door.

  “Apparently our friend the Inspector still harbors unworthy suspicions, Marky,” said Framlingham placidly, watching the Inspector’s retreat with interested eyes. “The man seems to think we are a nest of criminals. The workings of the Yard are distorted and beyond the reach of our feeble imaginations, for which,” he added piously, “God be thanked.”

  But a gloom had descended on the party that not even the Duke’s cheerfulness could dissipate.

  A few moments later Leslie rose, pleading a headache, and, declining Jimmy’s offer of escort, took her guardian’s arm and left the restaurant.

  For five minutes Jimmy and the Duke sat and stared blankly at each other, and then by mutual consent they parted to go their respective ways, His Grace to retire and sleep, Jimmy to ponder and lie awake.

  He remained awake until the first gray light of morning had given place to bright sunlight. Then it was too late for sleep.

  Dressing slowly and leaving his breakfast untouched, to the amazement of his landlady, he made his way to the “Evening Mail” offices in a disgruntled frame of mind.

  The events of the previous night spoiled what might otherwise have been an enjoyable morning.

  Entering the reporters’ room, he dropped into his chair to ponder the surpassing foulness of an exceedingly foul existence in a still fouler world.

  It was not to be. His reverie was interrupted by the advent of a diminutive messenger.

  “His High and Mightiness wants you, Mr. Craven,” announced the small one. “Tearing his hair out in handfuls, he is, sir.”

  “All right, Billy,” nodded Jimmy dispiritedly. He made his way slowly to the sanctum of the news editor and entered in response to the curt “Come in.”

  Bagshaw, the law of the “Mail,” looked up quickly.

  “This ‘Should Married Women Wear Bed Socks?’ stunt,” he said curtly. “Ring up Shaw, Sybil Thorndike and Dean Inge, and get their views. I want the story before the second edition goes to bed. Then do the anti-vivisection meeting at Queen’s Hall. That’s all.”

  Jimmy trailed away dejectedly. Life wasn’t worth living at this rate. Bed socks and vivisection! He scowled. Crowland, the star man, had probably been given the Squid story. With a rueful countenance, the reporter settled down to pester the three notables and after an hour on the telephone he left the office and sauntered in the direction of Charing Cross on his way to Queen’s Hall.

  Turning into Piccadilly, he made his way to the Circus.

  Arrived there, he stood eyeing the traffic morosely and then started to cross the road.

  Half-way across he paused abruptly, to the profane annoyance of a bus driver, to stare at another figure moving at right angles and heading for Shaftesbury Avenue—Jerry the Lag.

  Jimmy changed his course and his tactics at the same moment. All thoughts of Shaw and vivisection vanished from his mind and, bounding in pursuit of the Lag, he was conscious of a sense of relief.

  Since the mysterious disappearance of Freddie on the eve of the robbery at the Trust Company’s office, Jimmy had been aching for a few minutes’ conversation with the Lag. He was convinced that Jerry knew the solution of the mystery.

  Jimmy could not forget that he had seen his friend leaving the flat that Jerry had entered a few minutes previously.

  He came up with his quarry as Jerry was entering the “Shaftesbury” public house, but forbore to attract his attention until he had reached the bar.

  “Just the man I want to see,” he said cheerfully, tapping the Lag on the arm. “What’ll you have, Jerry?”

  Jerry grunted and turned round with a weary expression.

  “I never wanted ter see no one less,” he scowled. “Still, if there’s a free swill goin’ beggin’——”

  He signaled to the barman with assumed indifference that caused Jimmy much secret amusement.

  “The usual, Jerry?” asked that fat and worthy man, breathing on a glass and polishing diligently.

  “No, a pint,” retorted Jerry swiftly, and, seeing the other’s look of surprise, “All right, fatty, this bloke’s payin’.”

  Jimmy placed his own glass on the counter untouched and waited while the Lag drank. Then: “Jerry,” he said, “play the game and tell me what you know about Freddie Leicester’s disappearance.”

  Jerry’s face remained devoid of any expression save acute boredom.

  “‘Oo is Freddie What-you-said, when ‘e’s at home?” he asked wearily, rubbing his mouth with a dirty hand.

  “He’s not,” said Jimmy. “He’s vanished.”

  Jerry raised his eyes piously and then lowered them to his glass.

  “I can never think when I’m dry,” he said suggestively.

  Jimmy pushed his own untasted drink across the counter to the old Lag.

  “Not that this ‘ere Gov’ment ale is much o’ a stimoolant,” said Jerry, taking up the glass amiably. “Ain’t drunk arf of it, ‘ave yer?”

  He replaced the glass two seconds later, empty.

  “Well, what do you know?” prompted Jimmy, watching the other keenly.

  “Swift and Sure for the three-fifteen,” said Jerry at once, religiously avoiding the issue.

  Jimmy made an impatient gesture. “Be a pal and cut that out,” he pleaded.

  “Be a pal,” groaned Jerry. “I knew I’d have to stand a round.”

  He looked round plaintively.

  Jimmy bit his lip. The Lag was not in a communicative mood and Jimmy silently wondered if another glass might melt him.

  “You’re holding something back, Jerry,” he accused.

  “Only a helluva thirst,” complained the Lag. In the hope of further benefits, he leant forward and became confidential.

  “Strite, Mister Craven, I don’t know nuthin’ about this bloke, Freddie What’s-’is-name. Never ‘eard on ‘im in me natcheral. What is this Johnny? One o’ them crooks you’re always diggin’ about for?”

  “No, he’s a friend of mine,” answered Jimmy, pandering to the Lag’s assumed ignorance.

  “Same thing,” grunted Jerry. “Wot kind of bloke? One o’ these ‘ere haristocrats or sich-like?”

  Jimmy sighed. They were not getting very far.

  “He is an aristocrat,” he said patiently, “and rich.”

  “Don’t repeat yerself. You said ‘e was a pal o’ yourn,” said the Lag, refusing to be drawn.

  Jimmy smiled in spite of himself. Plainly Jerry was keeping whatever he knew to himself. The old Lag’s “stalling” was proverbial and Jimmy decided that it was useless trying to break down his defenses.

  He changed his tactics and played the only trump card he held.

  “Been up to the flat in Prince of Wales Terrace lately, Jerry?” he asked with assumed indifference, but watchin
g for signs.

  Was it imagination or did the Lag’s eyes flicker a trifle? He could not tell.

  He waited patiently for the answer. Not a muscle of Jerry’s face moved.

  “I only been near one flat lately,” he said definitely, “an’ you’re ‘im.”

  “Nevertheless, I saw you enter it myself a few days ago,” pursued the reporter coolly.

  “Before or arter eleven o’clock?” demanded his companion suspiciously.

  “After,” answered Jimmy. “Why?”

  The Lag pulled at his mustache and laughed hoarsely.

  “I fort so,” he growled. “They don’t open afore, do they?”

  Jimmy stood by his guns. Jerry was doing his utmost to change the subject and that was a good sign. Jimmy pressed further.

  “And five minutes later I saw Freddie Leicester leave the same flat,” he said. “And you say that you don’t know him, Jerry?”

  “I knows there’s a dude what calls at one o’ the flats where I cleans the winders,” said Jerry slowly. “Got a glass eye, ‘e has. ‘Angs on a bit o’ string rahnd ‘is neck. The glass, not the eye. Jer mean ‘im?”

  “Exactly,” said Jimmy eagerly. “Tall fellow, fair hair, wearing gray.”

  “Yus, an’ you’re enough ter mike anyone’s ‘air wear gray,” grunted Jerry. “So ‘e’s bin an’ gorn an’ lorst ‘isself, ‘as ‘e? You don’t say! Nice young feller, too. Gimme a two-bob bit once fer somethink or other.”

  “I might, too, if you could tell me something useful about him,” said Jimmy with an engaging smile.

  “Yus, an’ ast fer one-an’-eleven change,” retorted Jerry. “I knows you reporters. Well, yer can spare yerself the two bob. I can’t tell yer anythin’.”

  “That’s final?”

  “Abso-bloomin’—lootely. An’ now gimme a bit o’ peace. Fair worritin’, you coves are. Astin’, astin’, always astin’ somethink or other. You gimme the pip!”

  Jimmy gave it up. The interview had turned out less profitable than he had anticipated.

  He turned slowly on his heel and left Jerry at the bar.

  The Lag watched him with a gleam of amusement in his eyes. He signaled to the barman.

  “Thinks theirselves everybody,” he confided, jerking a thumb in the direction of the retreating reporter. “Comes from the Press, ‘e does. Wants me photer fer ‘is daily, I don’t fink.”

  “Pint?” asked the barman, collecting the empty glasses. “No,” snarled Jerry, “I’m payin’! An’ not too much froth!”

  XIX. THE TRAP

  His Grace of Framlingham tottered weakly into the morning room and sank gingerly into a chair. The movement wracked his face with pain and he placed a trembling hand to his aching head.

  Reaching out, he touched a bell-push set in the wall close to his elbow.

  In response, Masters the butler appeared in the doorway, with a deferential smile.

  “Good morning, your Grace.”

  “Is it?” asked his master, with a shudder. “Remove the sun, will you, Masters?”

  With a faint smile the butler crossed the room and pulled the curtains across the windows.

  “Shall I have your breakfast brought up, your Grace?” he enquired respectfully, stationing himself at his master’s elbow.

  Another convulsive shudder shook the ducal frame. He sat up abruptly and the movement contorted his face with pain.

  “Masters,” he said coldly, “you are a good butler. I should hate to lose you, but if the subject of food is broached again, despite my enfeebled state I shall massacre you.”

  The butler maintained an apologetic silence.

  “I am under the impression,” said His Grace after a pause, during which he had lain back in his chair to ease his bandaged and aching head, “that someone is striving to batter in the top of my head with a mallet. Is that so?”

  Masters, repressing a smile, assured him that it was not.

  His master appeared relieved.

  “At what time did I arrive home last night?” he asked after another pause.

  “At two o’clock in the morning, your Grace.”

  “How,” asked the noble peer painfully, “did I enter? Vertically sober or horizontally blotto?”

  “You entered in the first footman’s arms, sir,” was the respectfully non-committal reply.

  “H’m. Was I——?”

  “A little, sir,” said Masters, coughing apologetically.

  “Ah!”

  The Duke lay back again and placed his hand to his forehead.

  “Is there any ice in the house?” he asked at length.

  “How much does your Grace require?”

  “A small berg will suffice,” murmured the invalid weakly and Masters prepared to retire.

  “Oh, Masters,” said His Grace, motioning him to stay, “I seem to retain a hazy impression of a most unpleasant scene.”

  “Indeed, sir?”

  “Something connected with a motor car, a policeman and a damaged lamp-post, I fancy. The policeman was offensive, I think. I am not sure. It may have been the lamp-post. One or the other answered me back.”

  The butler nodded gravely.

  “Your Grace was involved in a slight accident,” he said diplomatically.

  “Accident?” The Duke sat up suddenly. “Where am I hurt?”

  “You are not, sir,” Masters assured him. “The policeman, unfortunately, was. Your car hurled him into the road and collided with a lamp-post.”

  “Was it damaged?”

  “The car, the policeman, or the lamp-post, your Grace?” asked Masters, patiently.

  “The car, fool!” snarled the other. “Who cares about lampmen or policeposts?”

  “Neither the lamp-post nor the policeman was damaged, sir,” said the butler. “Your car sustained a few dents.”

  He coughed again and added cautiously: “The summons was issued against you this morning, sir.”

  “On what charge?” demanded Framlingham furiously.

  “Being intoxicated while in charge of a car and driving to the public danger, sir.”

  “Bah!” snorted His Grace, bringing his hand down on the arm of his chair. He winced slightly and pointed dramatically to the door.

  “The congealed fluid,” he commanded, “with expedition.” Masters bowed and departed, to return almost at once.

  The Duke looked up as he recrossed the room and sighed with satisfaction.

  “Quick work,” he said approvingly.

  “I have not brought the ice, your Grace,” Masters answered. “Then prepare your will,” snarled the Duke wrathfully. “We are going to have a quiet hour together with a cutthroat razor!”

  The butler backed away hastily, as his lord and master rose and glowered angrily.

  “The Inspector has called, sir,” he said, and His Grace sank back wearily into his chair.

  “He asked for an ice and they brought him an Inspector,” he complained with bitterness. “Inspector of what, man? Drains?”

  “Police, sir,” corrected Masters.

  The Duke waved a violently protesting hand.

  “I will not see him,” he declared irritably. “I am in no condition to talk to Inspectors. Tell him to go to—no, tell him I admit anything; agree to pay the fine, whatever he likes, only let me die undisturbed.”

  “Good morning, your Grace,” said a cool voice from the doorway and, turning, he saw Inspector Elveden.

  “On the contrary,” said Framlingham feelingly, “it’s the very devil of a morning. Leave me in peace, curse you. I admit everything. I am willing to erect a new lamp-post—a whole street of ‘em, if necessary, but go away now and get run over or something jolly. My time is near.”

  He groaned and clasped his head.

  Elveden smiled, and, dismissing the butler, drew a chair up to the Duke’s and sat down.

  “My visit has nothing to do with lamp-posts, your Grace. I am here on business.”

  The aristocrat closed his eyes.

 
; “Have you no respect for the death bed?” he asked weakly. “Well, go on. I suppose you have found Freddie. I knew this was going to be a foul week.”

  “On the contrary,” answered Elveden, “I have no idea where Mr. Leicester is. I want to see him rather urgently myself, but I believe only Sir Marcus can help us in that direction. However, that is beside the point.”

  The Duke decided to allow the allusion to his friend to pass unchallenged.

  Nevertheless, he glared at his companion.

  “If,” he said distinctly, “you have not come here to advise me of the demise of that jelly-livered incumbrance, or his arrest on a charge of rifling the Trust Company’s offices, what have you come for? Be brief, or I shall do you an injury.”

  The Inspector listened patiently until his companion had finished.

  “I need your assistance, your Grace,” he said.

  His host nodded resignedly and motioned him to proceed.

  “Your Grace is interested in diamonds.”

  “Did you come here to tell me that?” demanded the Duke, ferociously.

  Elveden bit his lip and breathed deeply.

  “Sufficiently interested to buy them,” he proceeded.

  “If I can’t steal them,” agreed the Duke, weakly humorous.

  “Good. Your Grace is a wealthy man——”

  “If this is an appeal to retrieve the Russian crown jewels,” interrupted the other, with kindling eyes, “you’re in the wrong shop, my friend.”

  “It is not,” rejoined the Inspector smoothly. “It is a bait to land a Squid.”

  The Duke regarded his visitor with rather more interest. He even sat up in his chair, unmindful of an agonizing twinge that wracked his forehead.

  “An expensive lure?” he said shrewdly.

  “Your Grace understands?”

  “Imperfectly,” said his lordship. “Elucidate.”

  “The idea is that you should purchase from an Indian potentate a necklace valued, say, at eight thousand pounds.”

  “Eight thousand pounds!” scoffed the Duke. “What do you think I am, a retired milkman or a Cabinet Minister?”

  The Inspector raised a protesting hand.

  “If your Grace will allow me. There will be no money involved in the transaction. You will merely notify the papers of your intention to enter into negotiations with the owner for the purchase of the necklace and on a specified date you will send another announcement to the effect that the transaction is completed.”