lady dressed in the same manner as Mrs. Leroux (this is arranged)
will be waiting. Mrs. Leroux will walk straight up the court, into the
corridor of Bank Chambers by the back entrance, and from thence out into
the Strand. YOU will escort the second lady into the manager's office,
and she will sign 'Mira Leroux' instead of the real Mira Leroux.”...
Soames became aware that he was changing color. This was a superior
felony, and as such it awed his little mind. It was tantamount to
burning his boats. Missing silver spoons and cooked petty cash were
trivialities usually expiable at the price of a boot-assisted dismissal;
but this--!
“You understand?” Gianapolis was not smiling, now. “There is not the
slightest danger. The signature of the lady whom you will meet will be
an exact duplicate of the real one; that is, exact enough to deceive a
man who is not looking for a forgery. But it would not be exact enough
to deceive the French banker--he WILL be looking for a forgery. You
follow me? The signature on the checks drawn against the Credit Lyonnais
will be the SAME as the specimen forwarded by the London County and
Suburban, since they will be written by the same lady--the duplicate
Mrs. Leroux. Therefore, the French bank will have no means of detecting
the harmless little deception practised upon them, and the English bank,
if it should ever see those checks, will raise no question, since the
checks will have been honored by the Credit Lyonnais.”
Soames finished his whisky-and-soda at a gulp.
“Finally,” concluded Gianapolis, “you will escort the lady out by the
front entrance to the Strand. She will leave you and walk in an easterly
direction--making some suitable excuse if the manager should insist upon
seeing her to the door; and the real Mrs. Leroux will come out by the
Strand end of Bank Chambers' corridor, and walk back with you around the
corner to where the car will be waiting. Perfect?”
“Quite,” said Soames, huskily....
But when, some twenty minutes later, he returned to Palace Mansions,
he was a man lost in thought; and he did not entirely regain his wonted
composure, and did not entirely shake off the incubus, Doubt, until in
his own room he had re-counted the contents of the brown paper envelope.
Then:--
“It's safe enough,” he muttered; “and it's worth it!”
Thus it came about that, on the following morning, Leroux called him
into the study and gave him just such instructions as Gianapolis had
outlined the evening before.
“I am--er--too busy to go myself, Soames,” said Leroux, “and--er--Mrs.
Leroux will shortly be paying a visit to friends in--er--in Paris.
So that I am opening a credit there for her. Save so much
trouble--and--such a lot of--correspondence--international money
orders--and such worrying things. Mr. Smith, the manager, knows you
and you will take this letter of authority. The draft I understand has
already been purchased.”
Mr. Soames was bursting with anxiety to learn the amount of this draft,
but could find no suitable opportunity to inquire. The astonishing
deception, then, was carried out without anything resembling a hitch.
Mrs. Leroux went through with her part in the comedy, in the dreamy
manner of a somnambulist; and the duplicate Mrs. Leroux, who waited
at the appointed spot, had achieved so startling a resemblance to her
prototype, that Mr. Soames became conscious of a craving for a peg
of brandy at the moment of setting eyes upon her. However, he braced
himself up and saw the business through.
As was to be expected, no questions were raised and no doubts
entertained. The bank manager was very courteous and very reserved, and
the fictitious Mrs. Leroux equally reserved, indeed, cold. She avoided
raising her motor veil, and, immediately the business was concluded,
took her departure, Mr. Smith escorting her as far as the door.
She walked away toward Fleet Street, and the respectful attendant,
Soames, toward Charing Cross; he rejoined Mrs. Leroux at the door of
Bank Chambers, and the two turned the corner and entered the waiting
car. Soames was rather nervous; Mrs. Leroux quite apathetic.
Shortly after this event, Soames learnt that the date of Mrs. Leroux's
departure to Paris was definitely fixed. He received from her hands a
large envelope.
“For Mr. King,” she said, in her dreamy fashion; and he noticed that she
seemed to be in poorer health than usual. Her mouth twitched strangely;
she was a nervous wreck.
Then came her departure, attended by a certain bustle, an appointment
with Mr. Gianapolis; and the delivery of the parcel into that
gentleman's keeping.
Mrs. Leroux was away for six days on this occasion. Leroux sent her
three postcards during that time, and re-addressed some ten or twelve
letters which arrived for her. The address in all cases was:
c/o Miss Denise Ryland,
Atelier 4, Rue du Coq d'Or,
Montmartre,
Paris.
East 18642 was much in demand that week; and there were numerous
meetings between Soames and Gianapolis at the corner of Victoria
Street, and numerous whiskies-and-sodas in the Red Lion; for Gianapolis
persisted in his patronage of that establishment, apparently for no
other reason than because it was dangerously near to Scotland Yard, and
an occasional house of call for members of the Criminal Investigation
Department.
Thus did Mr. Soames commence his career of duplicity at the flat of
Henry Leroux; and for some twelve months before the events which so
dramatically interfered with the delightful scheme, he drew his double
salary and performed his perfidious work with great efficiency and
contentment. Mrs. Leroux paid four other visits to Paris during that
time, and always returned in much better spirits, although pale and
somewhat haggard looking. It fell to the lot of Soames always to meet
her at Charing Cross; but never once, by look or by word, did
she proffer, or invite, the slightest exchange of confidence. She
apathetically accepted his aid in conducting this intrigue as she would
have accepted his aid in putting on her opera-cloak.
The curious Soames had read right through the telephone directory from
A to Z in quest of East 18642--only to learn that no such number was
published. His ingenuity not being great, he could think of no means
to learn the address of the mysterious Mr. King. So keenly had he been
impressed with the omniscience of that shadowy being who knew all his
past, that he feared to inquire of the Eastern Exchange. His banking
account was growing handsomely, and, above all things, he dreaded to
kill the goose that laid the golden eggs.
Then came the night which shattered all. Having rung up East 18642 and
made an appointment with Gianapolis in regard to some letters for
Mrs. Leroux, he had been surprised, on reaching the corner of Victoria
Street, to find that Gianapolis was not there! He glanced up at the face
of Big Ben. Yes--for the first time during their business acquaintance,
Mr. Gianapolis was late!
For close upon twenty minutes, Soames waited, walking slowly up and
down. When, at last, coming from the direction of Westminster, he saw
the familiar spruce figure.
Eagerly he hurried forward to meet the Greek; but Gianapolis--to the
horror and amazement of Soames--affected not to know him! He stepped
aside to avoid the stupefied butler, and passed. But, in passing, he
hissed these words at Soames:--
“Follow to Victoria Street Post Office! Pretend to post letters at next
box to me and put them in my hand!”
He was gone!
Soames, dazed at this new state of affairs, followed him at a discreet
distance. Gianapolis ran up the Post Office steps briskly, and Soames,
immediately afterwards, ascended also--furtively. Gianapolis was taking
out a number of letters from his pocket.
Soames walked across to the “Country” box on his right, and affected
to scrutinize the addresses on the envelopes of Mrs. Leroux's
correspondence.
Gianapolis, on the pretense of posting a country letter, reached out and
snatched the correspondence from Soames' hand. The gaze of his left eye
crookedly sought the face of the butler.
“Go home!” whispered Gianapolis; “be cautious!”
XIV
EAST 18642
In a pitiable state of mind, Soames walked away from the Post Office.
Gianapolis had hurried off in the direction of Victoria Station.
Something was wrong! Some part of the machine, of the dimly divined
machine whereof he formed a cog, was out of gear. Since the very nature
of this machine--its construction and purpose, alike--was unknown to
Soames, he had no basis upon which to erect surmises for good or ill.
His timid inquiries into the identity of East 18642 had begun and
terminated with his labored perusal of the telephone book, a profitless
task which had occupied him for the greater part of an evening.
The name, Gianapolis, did not appear at all; whereas there proved to be
some two hundred and ninety Kings. But, oddly, only four of these
were on the Eastern Exchange; one was a veterinary surgeon; one a
boat-builder; and a third a teacher of dancing. The fourth, an engineer,
seemed a “possible” to Soames, although his published number was not
18642; but a brief--a very brief--conversation, convinced the butler
that this was not his man.
He had been away from the flat for over an hour, and he doubted if even
the lax sense of discipline possessed by Mr. Leroux would enable that
gentleman to overlook this irregularity. Soames had a key of the outer
door, and he built his hopes upon the possibility that Leroux had not
noticed his absence and would not hear his return.
He opened the door very quietly, but had scarcely set his foot in the
lobby ere the dreadful, unforgettable scene met his gaze.
For more years than he could remember, he had lived in dread of the
law; and, in Luke Soames' philosophy, the words Satan and Detective
were interchangeable. Now, before his eyes, was a palpable, unmistakable
police officer; and on the floor...
Just one glimpse he permitted himself--and, in a voice that seemed to
reach him from a vast distance, the detective was addressing HIM!...
Slinking to his room, with his craven heart missing every fourth beat,
and his mind in chaos, Soames sank down upon the bed, locked his hands
together and hugged them, convulsively, between his knees.
It was come! He had overstepped that almost invisible boundary-line
which divides indiscretion from crime. He knew now that the voice within
him, the voice which had warned him against Gianapolis and against
becoming involved in what dimly he had perceived to be an elaborate
scheme, had been, not the voice of cowardice (as he had supposed) but
that of prudence.
And it was too late. The dead woman, he told himself--he had been unable
to see her very clearly--undoubtedly was Mrs. Leroux. What in God's name
had happened! Probably her husband had killed her... which meant? It
meant that proofs--PROOFS--were come into his possession; and who should
be involved, entangled in the meshes of this fallen conspiracy, but
himself, Luke Soames!
As must be abundantly evident, Soames was not a criminal of the daring
type; he did not believe in reaching out for anything until he was
well assured that he could, if necessary, draw back his hand. This last
venture, this regrettable venture--this ruinous venture--had been
a mistake. He had entered into it under the glamour of Gianapolis'
personality. Of what use, now, to him was his swelling bank balance?
But in justice to the mental capacity of Soames, it must be admitted
that he had not entirely overlooked such a possibility as this; he had
simply refrained, for the good of his health, from contemplating it.
Long before, he had observed, with interest, that, should an emergency
arise (such as a fire), a means of egress had been placed by the kindly
architect adjacent to his bedroom window. Thus, his departure on the
night of the murder was not the fruit of a sudden scheme, but of one
well matured.
Closing and locking his bedroom door, Soames threw out upon the bed the
entire contents of his trunk; selected those things which he considered
indispensable, and those which might constitute clues. He hastily packed
his grip, and, with a last glance about the room and some seconds of
breathless listening at the door, he attached to the handle a long piece
of cord, which at some time had been tied about his trunk, and, gently
opening the window, lowered the grip into the courtyard beneath. The
light he had already extinguished, and with the conviction dwelling in
his bosom that in some way he was become accessory to a murder--that he
was a man shortly to be pursued by the police of the civilized world--he
descended the skeleton lift-shaft, picked up his grip, and passed out
under the archway into the lane at the back of Palace Mansions and St.
Andrew's Mansions.
He did not proceed in the direction which would have brought him out
into the Square, but elected to emerge through the other end. At exactly
the moment that Inspector Dunbar rushed into his vacated room, Mr.
Soames, grip in hand, was mounting to the top of a southward bound 'bus
at the corner of Parliament Street!
He was conscious of a need for reflection. He longed to sit in some
secluded spot in order to think. At present, his brain was a mere
whirligig, and all things about him seemingly danced to the same tune.
Stationary objects were become unstable in the eyes of Soames, and the
solid earth, burst free of its moorings, no longer afforded him a safe
foothold. There was a humming in his ears; and a mist floated before his
eyes. By the time that the motor-'bus was come to the south side of the
bridge, Soames had succeeded in slowing down his mental roundabout in
some degree; and now he began grasping at the flying ideas which
the diminishing violence of his brain storm enabled him, vaguely, to
perceive.
The first fruits of his reflections were bitter. He viewed the events
of the night in truer focus; he saw that by his flight he had sealed his
fate--had voluntarily outlawed himself. It became frightfully evident
to him that he dared not seek to draw from his bank, that he dared not
touch even his modest Post Office account. With the exception of some
twenty-five shillings in his pocket, he was penniless!
How could he hope to fly the country, or even to hide himself, without
money?
He glanced suspiciously about the 'bus; for he perceived that an old
instinct had prompted him to mount one which passed the Oval--a former
point of debarkation when he lived in rooms near Kennington Park.
Someone might recognize him!
Furtively, he scanned his fellow passengers, but perceived no
acquaintance.
What should he do--where should he go? It was a desperate situation.
The inspector who had cared to study that furtive, isolated figure,
could not have failed to mark it for that of a hunted man.
At Kennington Gate the 'bus made a halt. Soames glanced at the clock on
the corner. It was close upon one A. M. Where in heaven's name should he
go? What a fool he had been to come to this district where he was known!
Stay! There was one man in London, surely, who must be almost as
keenly interested in the fate of Luke Soames as Luke Soames himself ...
Gianapolis!
Soames sprang up and hurried off the 'bus. No public telephone box would
be available at that hour, but dire need spurred his slow mind and also
lent him assurance. He entered the office of the taxicab depot on the
next corner, and, from the man whom he found in charge, solicited and
obtained the favor of using the telephone. Lifting the receiver, he
asked for East 18642.
The seconds that elapsed, now, were as hours of deathly suspense to
the man at the telephone. If the number should be engaged!... If the
exchange could get no reply!...
“Hullo!” said a nasal voice--“who is it?”
“It is Soames--and I want to speak to Mr. King!”
He lowered his tone as much as possible, almost whispering his own name.
He knew the voice which had answered him; it was the same that he always
heard when ringing up East 18642. But would Gianapolis come to the
telephone? Suddenly--
“Is that Soames?” spoke the sing-song voice of the Greek.
“Yes, yes!”
“Where are you?”
“At Kennington.”
“Are they following you?”
“No--I don't think so, at least; what am I to do? Where am I to go?”
“Get to Globe Road--near Stratford Bridge, East, without delay. But
whatever you do, see that you are not followed! Globe Road is the
turning immediately beyond the Railway Station. It is not too late,
perhaps, to get a 'bus or tram, for some part of the way, at any rate.
But even if the last is gone, don't take a cab; walk. When you get to
Globe Road, pass down on the left-hand side, and, if necessary, right to
the end. Make sure you are not followed, then walk back again. You will
receive a signal from an open door. Come right in. Good-by.”
Soames replaced the receiver on the hook, uttering a long-drawn sigh of
relief. The arbiter of his fortunes had not failed him!
“Thank you very much!” he said to the man in charge of the office, who
had been bending over his books and apparently taking not the slightest
interest in the telephone conversation. Soames placed twopence, the
price of the call, on the desk. “Good night.”
“Good night.”
He hastened out of the gate and across the road. An electric tramcar
which would bear him as far as the Elephant-and-Castle was on the point
of starting from the corner. Grip in hand, Soames boarded the car and
mounted to the top deck. He was in some doubt respecting his mode of
travel from the next point onward, but the night was fine, even if he
had to walk, and his reviving spirits would cheer him with visions of a
golden future!
His money!--That indeed was a bitter draught: the loss of his hardly
earned savings! But he was now established--linked by a common
secret--in partnership with Gianapolis; he was one of that mysterious,
obviously wealthy group which arranged drafts on Paris--which could
afford to pay him some hundreds of pounds per annum for such a trifling
service as juggling the mail!
Mr. King!--If Gianapolis were only the servant, what a magnificent man
of business must be hidden beneath the cognomen, Mr. King! And he
was about to meet that lord of mystery. Fear and curiosity were oddly
blended in the anticipation.
By great good fortune, Soames arrived at the Elephant-and-Castle in time
to catch an eastward bound motor-'bus, a 'bus which would actually carry
him to the end of Globe Road. He took his seat on top, and with greater
composure than he had known since his dramatic meeting with Gianapolis
in Victoria Street, lighted one of Mr. Leroux's cabanas (with which he
invariably kept his case filled) and settled down to think about the
future.
His reflections served apparently to shorten the journey; and Soames
found himself proceeding along Globe Road--a dark and uninviting
highway--almost before he realized that London Bridge had been
traversed. It was now long past one o'clock; and that part of the
east-end showed dreary and deserted. Public houses had long since
ejected their late guests, and even those argumentative groups,
which, after closing-time, linger on the pavements, within the odor
Bacchanalian, were dispersed. The jauntiness was gone, now, from Soames'
manner, and aware of a marked internal depression, he passed furtively
along the pavement with its long shadowy reaches between the islands
of light formed by the street lamps. From patch to patch he passed, and
each successive lamp that looked down upon him found him more furtive,
more bent in his carriage.
Not a shop nor a house exhibited any light. Sleeping Globe Road, East,
served to extinguish the last poor spark of courage within Soames'
bosom. He came to the extreme end of the road without having perceived
a beckoning hand, without having detected a sound to reveal that his
advent was observed. In the shadow of a wall he stopped, resting his
grip upon the pavement and looking back upon his tracks.
No living thing moved from end to end of Globe Road.
Shivering slightly, Soames picked up the bag and began to walk back.
Less than half-way along, an icy chill entered into his veins, and his
nerves quivered like piano wires, for a soft crying of his name came,
eerie, through the silence, and terrified the hearer.
“SOAMES!... SOAMES!”...
Soames stopped dead, breathing very rapidly, and looking about him right
and left. He could hear the muted pulse of sleeping London. Then, in the
dark doorway of the house before which he stood, he perceived, dimly, a
motionless figure. His first sensation was not of relief, but of fear.
The figure raised a beckoning hand. Soames, conscious that his course
was set and that he must navigate it accordingly, opened the iron gate,
passed up the path and entered the house to which he thus had been
summoned....
He found himself surrounded by absolute darkness, and the door was
closed behind him.
“Straight ahead, Soames!” said the familiar voice of Gianapolis out of
the darkness.
Soames, with a gasp of relief, staggered on. A hand rested upon his
shoulder, and he was guided into a room on the right of the passage.
Then an electric lamp was lighted, and he found himself confronting the
Greek.
But Gianapolis was no longer radiant; all the innate evil of the man
shone out through the smirking mask.
“Sit down, Soames!” he directed.
Soames, placing his bag upon the floor, seated himself in a cane
armchair. The room was cheaply furnished as an office, with a roll-top
desk, a revolving chair, and a filing cabinet. On a side-table stood
a typewriter, and about the room were several other chairs, whilst the
floor was covered with cheap linoleum. Gianapolis sat in the revolving
chair, staring at the lowered blinds of the window, and brushing up the
points of his black mustache.
With a fine white silk handkerchief Soames gently wiped the perspiration
from his forehead and from the lining of his hat-band. Gianapolis began
abruptly:--
“There has been an--accident” (he continued to brush his mustache, with
increasing rapidity). “Tell me all that took place after you left the
Post Office.”
Soames nervously related his painful experiences of the evening, whilst
Gianapolis drilled his mustache to a satanic angle. The story being
concluded:
“Whatever has happened?” groaned Soames; “and what am I to do?”
“What you are to do,” replied Gianapolis, “will be arranged, my dear
Soames, by--Mr. King. Where you are to go, is a problem shortly settled:
you are to go nowhere; you are to stay here.”...
“Here!”
Soames gazed drearily about the room.
“Not exactly here--this is merely the office; but at our establishment
proper in Limehouse.”...
“Limehouse!”
“Certainly. Although you seem to be unaware of the fact, Soames,
there are some charming resorts in Limehouse; and your duties, for the
present, will confine you to one of them.”
“But--but,” hesitated Soames, “the police”...
“Unless my information is at fault,” said Gianapolis, “the police have
no greater chance of paying us a visit, now, than they had formerly.”...
“But Mrs. Leroux”...
“Mrs. Leroux!”
Gianapolis twirled around in the chair, his eyes squinting
demoniacally:--“Mrs. Leroux!”
“She--she”...
“What about Mrs. Leroux?”
“Isn't she dead?”
“Dead! Mrs. Leroux! You are laboring under a strange delusion, Soames.
The lady whom you saw was not Mrs. Leroux.”
Soames' brain began to fail him again.
“Then who,” he began....
“That doesn't concern you in the least, Soames. But what does concern
you is this: your connection, and my connection, with the matter cannot
possibly be established by the police. The incident is regrettable, but
the emergency was dealt with--in time. It represents a serious deficit,
unfortunately, and your own usefulness, for the moment, becomes nil; but
we shall have to look after you, I suppose, and hope for better things
in the future.”
He took up the telephone.
“East 39951,” he said, whilst Soames listened, attentively. Then:--
“Is that Kan-Suh Concessions?” he asked. “Yes--good! Tell Said to bring
the car past the end of the road at a quarter-to-two. That's all.”
He hung up the receiver.