Part 20

“On Wednesday last, after taking Evensong at the church, I was leaving the vestry when a lady stepped forward and asked if she might speak to me privately. It is a request which a clergyman cannot refuse, Mr Carrados, but I endeavoured first to find out what she required, because people frequently come to one or another of us on business that really has to do with the clerk, or the organist, or something of that sort.

“She assured me that it was a personal matter and that no other official would do.

“The lights had by this time been extinguished in the church, and doubtless the apparitor had left. I gave her my address here and asked her if she would call in ten or twenty minutes. I preferred that she should present herself in the ordinary way.

“There is no need to go into extraneous details. The unhappy lady wished to unburden her conscience by making explicit confession, and she had come to me in consequence of a sermon which she had heard me preach on the Sunday before.

“It is not expedient to weigh considerations of time or circumstance in such a case. I allowed her to proceed, and she made her confession under the seal of inviolable confidence. It involved other persons besides herself. I besought her to undo as far as possible the great harm she had done by making a full statement to the authorities, but this she was too weak--too terrified--to do. This clumsy warning of mine”--he pointed to the paper now lying on the table between them--“was the utmost concession that I could wring from her.”

He stopped and looked at his visitor with a troubled face that seemed to demand some sort of assent to the dilemma.

“You are an Englishman, Mr Hosier, and you know what this might mean in a conflict--you know that one of our most formidable weapons has been annexed.”

“My dear sir!” rapped out the distressed curate, “don’t you think that I haven’t worried about that? But behind the Englishman stands something more primitive, more just--the man. I gave my assurance as a man, and the Admiralty can go hang!”

“Besides,” he added, in petulant reaction, “the poor woman is dying, and then everyone can know. Of course it may be too late.”

“Do you mind telling me if the lady gave you the names of her accomplices?”

“How can I tell you, Mr Carrados? It may identify her in some way. I am too confounded by your unexpected appearance in the affair to know what is important and what is not.”

“It will not implicate her. I have no concern there.”

“Then, yes, she did. She gave me every detail.”

“I ask because a man is suspected and on the point of arrest. He may be innocent. I have no deeper motive, but if the one for whom she is working is not a German called, or passing as, Muller, you might have some satisfaction in exonerating him.”

The curate reflected a moment.

“He is not, Mr Carrados,” he replied decidedly. “But please don’t ask me anything more.”

“Very well, I won’t,” said Carrados, rising. “Our numismatic conversation has taken a strange turn, Mr Hosier. There is a text for you--Money at the root of everything! By the way, I can do you one trifling service.” He picked up the anonymous letter, tore it across and held it out. “You have done all you could. Burn this and then you are clear of the matter.”

“Thanks, thanks. But won’t it get you into trouble with the Admiralty?”

“I make my own terms,” replied Carrados. “Now Mr Hosier, I have been an ill-omened bird, but I had no suspicion of this when I came. The ‘long arm’ has landed us this time. Will you come and dine with me one day this week, and I promise you not a single reference to this troublesome business?”

“You are very good,” assented Hosier.

“I am at Cliffhurst----”

“Cliffhurst?” was Hosier’s quick exclamation.

“Yes, at the Rose and Plumes.”

“I--I am very sorry, Mr Carrados,” stammered the curate, “but, after all, I am afraid that I must cry off. This week----”

“If the distance takes up too much of your time, may I send a car?”

“No, no, it isn’t that--at least, of course, one has to consider time and work. Thank you, Mr Carrados; you are very kind, but, really, if you don’t mind----”

Carrados courteously accepted the refusal without further pressure. He turned the momentary embarrassment by hoping that Hosier would not fail to call on him when next in London, and the curate availed himself of the compromise to protest the pleasure that it would afford him. Parkinson was summoned and the strangely developed visit came to an end.

Parkinson doubtless found his master a dull companion on the way back. Carrados had to rearrange his ideas from the preconception which he had so far tentatively based on Inspector Tapling’s report, and he was faced by the necessity of discovering whose presence made the Rose and Plumes Hotel inexplicably distasteful to Mr Hosier just then. Only two flashes of conversation broke the journey, both of which may be taken as showing the trend of Max Carrados’s mind, and demonstrating the sound common sense exhibited by his henchman.

“It is a mistake they often make, Parkinson, to begin looking with a fixed idea of what they are going to find.”

“Yes, sir.”

And, ten minutes later:

“But I don’t know that it would be safe yet to ignore the obvious altogether.”

“No, sir,” replied Parkinson.

* * * * *

“Not guilty, my lord!”

That was the link for which Carrados had been waiting patiently each day since his visit to Kingsmouth; or, more exactly, since the sound of a voice heard in the hotel on his return had stirred a memory that he could not materialise. Parkinson had described the man with photographic exactness and still recognition was balked. Tapling, who found himself at a deadlock before the furnished villa, both by reason of his want of progress and at Carrados’s recommendation, contributed his observation, which was guardedly negative. Everyone about knew Mr Slater--“a pleasant, open-handed gentleman, with a word and a joke for all”--but no one knew anything of him, as, indeed, who should know of a leisurely bird of passage staying for a little time at a seaside hotel?

Then across the lounge rang the mock-serious repartee, and enlightenment cut into the patient listener’s brain like a flash of inspiration.

These were the three telegrams which immediately came into existence as a result of that ray, deciphered here from their code obscurity:

“_To_ GREATOREX, TURRETS, RICHMOND, SURREY.

“Extract _Times_ full report trial Henry Frankworth, convicted embezzlement early 1906, and forward express.--CARRADOS.”

“_To_ WRATTESLEY, HOME OFFICE, WHITEHALL, S.W.

“Will you please have Lincoln authorities instructed to send me confidential report antecedents Henry Frankworth, embezzler, native Trudstone that county. Urgent.--WYNN CARRADOS.”

“_To_ CARLYLE, 72A BAMPTON ST., W.C.

“MY DEAR LOUIS,--Why not come down week-end talk things over? Meanwhile make every effort discover subsequent history Henry Frankworth convicted embezzlement Central Criminal Court early 1906. Beedel will furnish police records. Pressing.--MAX.”

On his way upstairs a few hours later Carrados looked in at the reception office to inquire if there were any letters.

“By the by,” he remarked, after he had turned to leave, “I wonder if you happen to have a room a little--just a little--farther away from the drawing-room?”

“Certainly, sir,” replied the clerk. “Does the playing annoy you? They do keep it up rather late sometimes, don’t they?”

“No, it doesn’t annoy me,” admitted Carrados; “on the contrary, I am passionately fond of it. But it tempts me into lying awake listening when I ought to be asleep.”

The young lady laughed pleasantly. It was her business to be agreeable.

“You are considerate!” she rippled. “Well, there’s the further corridor; or, of course, a floor above----”

“The floor above would do nicely. Not on the front if possible. The sea is rather noisy.”

“Second floor, west corridor.” She glanced at her keyboard. “No. 15?”

“Is that the side overlooking the----?”

“The High Street,” she prompted.

“I am such a poor sleeper,” he apologised.

“No. 21 on the other side, overlooking the gardens?” she suggested.

“I am sure that will do admirably,” he said, with the gratitude that is always so touching from the blind. “Thank you for taking so much trouble to pick it for me. Good-night.”

“I will have your things transferred to-morrow,” she nodded after him.

An hour later Mr Slater, generally the last man to leave the lounge, strolled across to the office for his key.

“No. 22, sir, isn’t it?” she hazarded, unhooking it without waiting for the number.

“Good little girl,” he assented approvingly. “What a brain beneath that fascinating aureola. Eh bien, au revoir, petite! You ought to be about snuffing the candle yourself, my dear.”

The young lady laughed just as pleasantly. It was her business to be equally agreeable to all.

* * * * *

Mr Carrados was sitting in an alcove of the lounge on the following morning when Parkinson brought him a letter. It proved to be the extract from _The Times_, written on the special typewriter. The day was bright and inviting and the room was deserted. On his master’s instruction Parkinson sat down and waited while the blind man rapidly deciphered the half-dozen sheets of typewriting.

“You have been with me to the Old Bailey several times,” remarked Carrados, as he slowly replaced the document. “Do you remember an occasion in February 1906?”

Parkinson looked unnecessarily wise, but was unable to acquiesce. Carrados gave him another guide.

“A man named Frankworth was sentenced to eighteen months’ imprisonment for an ingenious system of theft. He had also fraudulently disposed of information to trade rivals of his employer.”

“I apprehend the circumstances now, sir.”

“Can you recall the appearance of the prisoner?”

Parkinson thought that he could, but he did not rise to the suggestion and Carrados was obliged to follow the direct line.

“Have you seen anyone lately--here in the hotel--who might be Frankworth?”

“I can’t say that I have, sir.”

“Take Mr Slater now. Shave off his beard and moustache.”

Parkinson began to look respectfully uncomfortable.

“Do you mean, sir----”

“By an effort of the imagination, Parkinson. Close your eyes and picture Mr Slater as a clean-shaven man, some years younger, standing in the dock----”

“Yes, sir. There is a distinct resemblance.”

With this Max Carrados had to be satisfied for the time. Long memory was not Parkinson’s strong point, but he had his own pre-eminent gift, and of this his master was to have an immediate example that outweighed every possible deficiency.

“Speaking of Mr Slater, sir, I noticed a curious thing that I intended to mention, as you told me to be particularly observant.”

Carrados nodded encouragingly.

“I was talking to Herbert early this morning as he cleaned the boots. He is a very bigoted Free Trader, sir, and is thinking of becoming a Mormon, and I was speaking to him about it. Presently he came to No. 22’s--Mr Slater’s. They were muddy, for Mr Slater went out for a walk last night--I saw him as he returned. But the boots that Mr Slater put out to be cleaned last night were not the boots that he went out in and got wet, although they were exactly the same make.”

“That is certainly curious,” admitted Carrados slowly. “There was only one pair put out?”

“That is all, sir; and they were not the boots that Mr Slater has worn every day since I began to notice him particularly. He always does wear the same pair, morning, noon and night.”

“Wait,” said Carrados briskly. An idea bordering on the fantastic flashed between a sentence in the report which he had just been reading and Parkinson’s discovery. He took out the sheets, ran his finger along the lines and again read--“stated that the prisoner was the son of a respectable bootmaker, and had followed the occupation himself.” “I know how accurate you are, Parkinson, but this may be of superlative importance. You see that?”

“I had not contemplated it in that light, sir.”

“But what did the incident suggest to you?”

“I inferred, sir, that Mr Slater must have had some reason for going out again after the hotel was closed.”

“Yes, that might explain half; but what if he did not?” persisted Carrados.

Parkinson wisely dismissed the intellectual problem as outside his sphere.

“Then I am unable to suggest why the gentleman cleaned his muddy boots himself and muddied his clean boots, sir.”

“Yes, that is what it comes to. He is wearing the same pair again this morning?”

“Yes, sir. The boots that were dirty at ten o’clock last night.”

“Pay particular attention to Mr Slater’s boots in future. I have transferred to No. 21, so you will have every opportunity. Talk to Herbert about Tariff Reform to-morrow morning. In the meanwhile--Are they any particular make?”

“‘Moorland hand-made waterproof,’ a heavy shooting boot, sir. Size 7. Rossiter, of Kingsmouth, is the maker.”

“In the meanwhile go to Kingsmouth and buy an identical pair. Before you go cut the sole off one of your oldest boots and bring me a piece about three inches square. Buy yourself another pair. Here is a note. Do you know which chamber-maid has charge of No. 21?”

“I could ascertain, sir.”

“It would be as well. You might buy her a bangle out of the change--if you have no personal objection to the young lady’s society. And, Parkinson----”

“Yes, sir?”

“I know you to be discreet and reliable. The work we are engaged on here is exceptionally important and equally honourable. A mistake might ruin it. That is all.”

“Thank you, sir.” Parkinson marched away with his head a little higher for the guarded compliment. It was the essence of the man’s extraordinary value to his master that while on some subjects he thought deeply, on others he did not think at all; and he contrived automatically to separate everything into its proper compartment.

“Here is what you require, sir,” he said, returning with the square of leather.

“Come across to the fireplace,” said Carrados. “There is still no one else in the lounge?”

“No, sir.”

“Who would be the last servant to see to this room at night--to leave the fire safe and the windows fastened?”

“The hall porter, sir.”

“Where is he now?”

“In the outer hall.”

Carrados bent towards the fire. “It’s a million-to-one chance,” he thought, “but it’s worth trying.” He dropped the leather on to the red coals, waited until it began to smoke fiercely, and then, lifting it out with the tongs, he allowed the pungent aromatic odour to diffuse into the air for a few seconds. A minute later the charred fragment had lost its identity among the embers.

“Go now, and on your way tell the hall porter that I want to speak to him.”

The hall porter came, a magnificent being, but full of affable condescension.

“You sent for me, sir?”

Carrados was sitting at a table near the fire.

“Yes. I am a little nervous. Do you smell anything burning?”

The porter sniffed the air--superfluously but loudly, so that the blind gentleman should hear that he was not failing in his duty. Then he looked comprehensively around.

“There certainly is a sort of hottish smell somewhere, sir,” he admitted.

“It isn’t any woodwork about the fireplace scorching? We blind are so helpless.”

“That’s all right, sir.” He laid a broad hand on the mantelpiece and then rapped it reassuringly. “Solid marble that, sir. You needn’t be afraid; I’ll give a look across now and then.”

“Thank you, if you will,” said Carrados, with relief in his voice. “And, by the way, will you ring for Maurice as you go?”

A distant bell churred. Across the room, like a strangely balancing bird, skimmed a waiter.

“Sair?”

“Oh, is that you, Maurice? I want----By the way, what’s that burning?”

“Burning, sair?”

“Yes; don’t you smell anything?”

“There is an odour of smell,” admitted Maurice sagely, “but it is nothing to see.”

“You don’t know the smell?”

The waiter shook his head and looked vague. Carrados divined perplexity.

“Oh, I dare say it’s nothing,” he declared carelessly. “Will you get me a sherry and khoosh?”

The million-to-one chance had failed.

“Sherry and bittaire, sair.”

Maurice deposited the glass with great precision, regarded it sadly and then moved it three inches to the right.

“I ’ave recollect this odour, sair,” he remarked, “although I cannot give actuality. I ’ave met him here before, but--less--less forcefully.”

“When?”

“Oh, one week since, perhaps.”

“Something in the coals?” suggested Carrados.

“I imagine yes,” pondered Maurice conscientiously. “I was ‘brightening up,’ you say, for the night, and the fire was low down. I squash it with the poker still more for safety.”

“Oh, then the lounge would be empty?”

“Yes--of people. Only Mr Slataire already departing.”

Carrados indicated that he did not want the change and dismissed the subject.

“So long as nothing’s on fire,” he said with indifference.

“Thank you, sair.”

The million-to-one chance had come off after all.

* * * * *

Two days later, walking beyond the usual limit of the conventional promenade, Carrados reached a rough wooden hut such as contractors erect during the progress of their work. Having accompanied his master to the door, Parkinson returned towards the promenade and sat down to admire the seascape from the nearest bench.

Inside the hut three men had been waiting. One of the trio, a tall, military-looking man with the air of a personage, had been sitting on a whitewash-splashed trestle reading _The Times_. Of the others, one was Inspector Tapling, and the third a dwarfish, wizened creature with the air of a converted ostler. He had passed the time by watching the Cliffhurst side through a knot-hole in a plank. With the entrance of Carrados the tall man folded his newspaper and a period of expectancy seemed to have come to an end.

“Good-morning, Colonel, Inspector and you there, Bob.”

“You found your way, Mr Carrados?” remarked the Colonel.

“Yes; it is not really I who am late. I had a letter this morning from Wrattesley holding me up for a wire at 10.30. It did not arrive till 10.45.”

“Ah, it did come! Then we may regard everything as settled?”

“No, Colonel. On the contrary, we must accept everything as upset.”

“What, sir?”

Carrados took out the slim pocket-book, extracted a telegram and held it out.

“What is this?” demanded the Colonel, peering through his glasses in the indifferent light. “‘Laburnum edifice plaster dark dark late herald same dome aurora dark vitiate camp encase.’ I don’t know the code.”

“Oh, it’s Westneath’s arrangement,” explained Carrados. “‘The individual with whom we are concerned must not be arrested on charge, but it is of the gravest importance that the papers in question be recovered. There must be no public proceedings even if conviction assured.’”

There was a moment of stupefaction.

“This--this is a bombshell!” exclaimed the Colonel. “What does it mean?”

“Politics,” replied Carrados tersely.

“Ah!” soliloquised Tapling, walking to the door and looking sympathetically out at the gloomy prospect of sea and sky.

“But I’ve had no notification,” protested the Colonel. “Surely, Mr Carrados----”

“The wire is probably at the station.”

“True; you said 10.45. Well, what do you propose doing now?”

“Scrapping all our arrangements and recovering the papers without arresting Slater.”

“In what way?”

“At the moment I have not the faintest idea.”

The Inspector left the door and came back moodily to his old position.

“We have reason to think that he is becoming suspicious, Mr Carrados,” he remarked. “He may decide to go any hour.”

“Then the sooner we act the better.”

The stunted pigmy in the background had been listening to the conversation with rapt attention, fastening his eyes unwinkingly on each face in turn. He now glided forward.

“Listen to me, gents,” he said, throwing round a cunning leer; “how does this sound? This afternoon....”

* * * * *

That afternoon Mr Slater had been for what he termed “a blow of the briny,” as his custom was on a fine day. He was returning in the dusk and had crossed the spacious promenade when, at a corner, he almost ran into the broad figure of a policeman who stood talking to a woman on the path.

“That’s the man!” exclaimed the woman with almost vicious certainty.

Mr Slater fell back a step in momentary alarm; then, recovering his self-control, he went forward with admirable composure.

“Beg pardon, sir,” explained the constable, “but this young lady has just lost her purse. She says she was sitting next to you on a seat----”

“And the minute after he had gone--the very minute--my bag was open like you see it now and my purse vanished,” interposed the lady volubly.

“On the seat by the lifeboat where I passed you, sir,” amplified the constable.

“This is ridiculous,” said Mr Slater with a breath of relief. “I am a gentleman and I have no need to steal purses. My name is Slater, and I am staying at the Rose and Plumes.”

“Yes, sir,” assented the policeman respectfully. “I know you by sight, sir, and have seen you go there. You hear what the gentleman says, miss?”

“Gentleman or no gentleman, I know my purse has gone,” snapped the girl. “If he hasn’t got it why did it vanish--where is it now? That’s all I ask--where is it now?”

“You’ve seen nothing of it, I take it, sir?”

“No, of course I haven’t,” retorted the gentleman contemptuously. “I was sitting on a seat. The woman may have sat next to me--someone reading certainly did. Then I got up, walked once or twice up and down and came across. That’s all.”

“What was in the purse, miss?” inquired the constable.

“A postal order for a sovereign--and, thank the Lord, I’ve got the tag of it--a half-crown, two shillings and a few coppers, a Kruger sixpence with a hole through, a gold gipsy ring with pearls, the return half of my ticket, some hairpins and a few recipes, a book of powder papers, a pocket mirror----”

“That ought to be enough to identify it by,” said the constable, catching Mr Slater’s eye in humorous sympathy. “Well, miss, you’d better come to the station and report the loss. Perhaps you’ll look in as well, sir?”

“Does that mean,” demanded Mr Slater with a dark gleam, “that I am to be charged with theft?”

“Bless you, no, sir,” was the easy reassurance. “We couldn’t take a charge in the circumstances--not with a gentleman of respectable position and known address. But it might save you some inquiry and bother later, and if it was myself I should like to get it done with while it was red-hot, so to speak.”

“I will go now,” decided Mr Slater. “Do I walk with----?”

“Just as you like, sir. You can go before or follow on. It’s only just down Bank Street.”

The two went on and the gentleman followed at a few yards’ interval. Three minutes and a blue lamp indicated their destination. No other pedestrian was in sight; the door stood hospitably open and Mr Slater walked in.

The station Inspector was seated at a desk when they entered and a couple of other officials stood about the room. The policeman explained the circumstances of the loss, the Inspector noting the details in the record-book.

“This gentleman voluntarily accompanied us as he had been brought into the case,” concluded the policeman.

“Here is my card, Superintendent,” said Mr Slater with some importance. He had determined to be agreeable, but dignified, and to enlist the Inspector on his side. “I am staying at the Rose and Plumes. It’s deuced unpleasant, you know, for a gentleman in my position to have to answer to a charge like this. That’s why I came at once to clear the matter up.”

“Quite so, sir,” replied the Inspector; “but there is no charge at present.” He turned to the girl. “You understand that if you sign the charge-sheet and it turns out that you are mistaken it may be a serious matter?”

“I only want my purse and money back,” replied the young woman mulishly.