contemplative than during that brief space when he is lathering his face
preparatory to shaving. Flying the brush, Jimmy reviewed the situation.
He was perhaps a little too optimistic. Not unnaturally he was inclined
to look upon his luck as a sort of special train which would convey him
without effort to Paradise. Fate had behaved so exceedingly handsomely
up till now. By a series of the most workmanlike miracles it had brought
him to the point of being Molly’s fellow-guest at a country-house. This,
as Reason coldly pointed out a few moments later, was merely the
beginning; but to Jimmy, thoughtfully lathering, it seemed the end. It
was only when he had finished shaving and was arranging his tie that he
began to perceive that there were obstacles in his way—and sufficiently
big obstacles at that.
In the first place, Molly did not love him. And, he was bound to admit,
there was no earthly reason why she ever should. A man in love is seldom
vain about his personal attractions. Also, her father firmly believed
him to be a master-burglar.
“Otherwise,” said Jimmy, scowling at his reflection in the glass,
“everything’s splendid.”
He brushed his hair sadly.
There was a furtive rap at the door.
“Halloa?” said Jimmy. “Yes?”
The door opened slowly. A grin, surmounted by a mop of red hair,
appeared round the edge of it.
“Halloa, Spike! Come in. What’s the matter?”
The rest of Mr. Mullins entered the room.
“Gee, boss, I wasn’t sure dis was your room. Say, who do you t’ink I
nearly bumped me coco against out in de corridor downstairs? Why, old
man McEachern, de cop. Dat’s right!”
“Yes?”
“Sure. Say, what’s he doin’ on dis beat? I pretty near went down and out
when I seen him. Dat’s right. Me breath ain’t got back home yet.”
“Did he recognise you?”
“Did he! He starts like an actor on top de stoige when he sees he’s up
against de plot to ruin him, an’ he gives me de fierce eye.”
“Well?”
“I was wondering was I on Third Avenue, or was I standing on me coco, or
what was I doin’ anyhow. Den I slips off and chases meself up here. Say,
boss, what’s de game? What’s old man McEachern doin’ stunts dis side
for?”
“It’s all right, Spike. Keep calm. I can explain. He has retired—like
me. He’s one of the handsome guests here.”
“On your way, boss! What’s dat?”
“He left the Force just after that merry meeting of ours when you
frolicked with the bulldog. He came over here and butted into society.
So here we are again, all gathered together under the same roof, like a
jolly little family party.”
Spike’s open mouth bore witness to his amazement.
“Den——” he stammered.
“Yes?”
“Den what’s he goin’ to do?”
“I couldn’t say. I’m expecting to hear shortly. But we needn’t worry
ourselves. The next move’s with him. If he wants to comment on the
situation he won’t be backward. He’ll come and do it.”
“Sure. It’s up to him,” agreed Spike.
“I’m quite comfortable. Speaking for myself, I’m having a good time. How
are you getting along downstairs?”
“De limit, boss. Honest, it’s to de velvet. Dere’s old gazebo, de
butler, Saunders his name is, dat’s de best ever at handing out long
woids. I sits and listens. Dey calls me Mr. Mullins down dere,” said
Spike with pride.
“Good. I’m glad you’re all right. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t
have an excellent time here. I don’t think that Mr. McEachern will try
to have us turned out, after he’s heard one or two little things I have
to say to him—just a few reminiscences of the past which may interest
him. I have the greatest affection for Mr. McEachern—I wish it was
mutual—but nothing he can say is going to make me stir from here.”
“Not on your life,” agreed Spike. “Say, boss, he must have got a lot of
plunks to be able to butt in here. And I know how he got dem, too. Dat’s
right. I comes from little old New York meself.”
“Hush, Spike; this is scandal!”
“Sure!” said the Bowery boy, doggedly, safely started now on his
favourite subject. “I knows, and youse knows, boss. Gee! I wish I’d bin
a cop. But I wasn’t tall enough. Dey’s de fellers wit de big bank-rolls!
Look at dis old McEachern. Money to boin a wet dog wit he’s got, and
never a bit of woik for it from de start to de finish. An’ look at me,
boss.”
“I do, Spike; I do.”
“Look at me. Getting busy all de year round, woiking to beat de band——”
“In prisons oft,” said Jimmy.
“Sure t’ing. And chased all roun’ de town. And den what? Why, to de bad
at de end of it all. Say, it’s enough to make a feller——”
“Turn honest!” said Jimmy. “That’s it, Spike—reform. You’ll be glad some
day.”
Spike seemed to be doubtful. He was silent for a moment; then, as if
following up a train of thought, he said:
“Boss, dis is a fine big house.”
“I’ve seen worse.”
“Say, couldn’t we——?”
“Spike!” said Jimmy warningly.
“Well, couldn’t we?” said Spike doggedly. “It ain’t often youse butts
into a dead easy proposition like dis one. We shouldn’t have to do a
t’ing excep’ git busy. De stuff’s just lying about, boss.”
“I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Aw, it’s a waste to leave it.”
“Spike,” said Jimmy. “I warned you of this. I begged you to be on your
guard, to fight against your professional instincts. Be a man! Crush
them. Try to occupy your mind. Collect butterflies.”
Spike shuffled in gloomy silence.
“’Member dose jools you swiped from de Duchess?” he said, musingly.
“The dear Duchess!” murmured Jimmy. “Ah, me!”
“And de bank you busted?”
“Those were happy days, Spike.”
“Gee!” said the Bowery boy.
He paused. “Dat was to de good,” he said wistfully.
Jimmy arranged his tie at the mirror.
“Dere’s a loidy here,” continued Spike, addressing the chest of drawers,
“dat’s got a necklace of jools what’s worth a hundred t’ousand plunks.
Honest, boss—a hundred t’ousand plunks. Saunders told me that—de old
gazebo dat hands out de long woids. I says to him ‘Gee!’ and he says,
‘Surest t’ing you know.’ A hundred t’ousand plunks!”
“So I understand,” said Jimmy.
“Shall I rubber around and find out where is dey kept, boss?”
“Spike,” said Jimmy, “ask me no more. All this is in direct
contravention of our treaty respecting keeping our fingers off the
spoons. You pain me. Desist.”
“Sorry, boss. But dey’ll be willy-wonders, dem jools. A hundred t’ousand
plunks! Dat’s going some, ain’t it? What’s dat dis side?”
“Twenty thousand pounds.”
“Gee! Can I help you wit de duds, boss?”
“No, thanks, Spike. I’m through now. You might just give me a brush
down, though. No, not that. That’s a hair-brush. Try the big black one.”
“Dis is a boid of a dude suit,” observed Spike, pausing in his labours.
“Glad you like it, Spike. Rather _chic_, I think.”
“It’s de limit. Excuse me, how much did it set you back, boss?”
“Something like twelve guineas, I believe. I could look up the bill and
let you know.”
“What’s dat—guineas? Is that more dan a pound?”
“A shilling more. Why these higher mathematics?”
Spike resumed his brushing.
“What a lot of dude suits youse could get,” he observed meditatively,
“if you had dem jools.” He became suddenly animated. He waved the
clothes-brush. “Oh, you boss!” he cried. “What’s eatin’ you? Aw, it’s a
shame not to. Come along, you boss. Say, what’s doin’? Why ain’t you
sittin’ in at de game? Oh, you boss!”
Whatever reply Jimmy might have made to this impassioned appeal was
checked by a sudden bang on the door. Almost immediately the handle
turned.
“Gee!” cried Spike. “It’s de cop.”
Jimmy smiled pleasantly.
“Come in, Mr. McEachern,” he said, “come in. Journeys end in lovers
meeting. You know my friend Mr. Mullins, I think? Shut the door and sit
down, and let’s talk of many things.”
★ 14 ★
_Check, and a Counter Move_
Mr. McEachern stood in the doorway, breathing heavily. As the result of
a long connection with evildoers, the ex-policeman was somewhat prone to
harbour suspicions of those round about him, and at the present moment
his mind was aflame. Indeed, a more trusting man might have been excused
for feeling a little doubtful as to the intentions of Jimmy and Spike.
When McEachern had heard that Lord Dreever had brought home a casual
London acquaintance, he had suspected as a possible drawback to the
visit the existence of hidden motives on the part of the unknown. Lord
Dreever, he had felt, was precisely the sort of youth to whom the
professional bunco-steerer would attach himself with shouts of joy.
Never, he had assured himself, had there been a softer proposition than
his lordship since bunco-steering became a profession.
When he found that the strange visitor was Jimmy Pitt, his suspicions
had increased a thousandfold.
And when, going to his room to get ready for dinner, he had nearly run
into Spike Mullins in the corridor, his frame of mind had been that of a
man to whom a sudden ray of light reveals the fact that he is on the
brink of a black precipice. Jimmy and Spike had burgled his house
together in New York; and here they were, together again, at Dreever
Castle. To say that the thing struck McEachern as sinister is to put the
matter badly. There was once a gentleman who remarked that he smelt a
rat and saw it floating in the air. Ex-Constable McEachern smelt a
regiment of rats, and the air seemed to him positively congested with
them.
His first impulse had been to rush to Jimmy’s room there and then; but
he had learned society’s lessons well. Though the heavens might fall, he
must not be late for dinner, so he went and dressed, and an obstinate
tie put the finishing touches to his wrath.
Jimmy regarded him coolly, without moving from the chair in which he had
seated himself. Spike, on the other hand, seemed embarrassed; he stood
first on one leg and then on the other, as if he were testing the
respective merits of each and would make a definite choice later on.
“You scoundrels!” growled McEachern.
Spike, who had been standing for a few moments on his right leg, and
seemed at last to have come to a decision, hastily changed to the left,
and grinned feebly.
“Say, youse won’t want me any more, boss?” he whispered.
“No; you can go, Spike.”
“You stay where you are, you red-headed devil!” said McEachern tartly.
“Run along, Spike,” said Jimmy.
The Bowery boy looked doubtfully at the huge form of the ex-policeman,
which blocked access to the door.
“Would you mind letting my man pass?” said Jimmy.
“You stay——” began McEachern.
Jimmy got up and walked round him to the door, which he opened. Spike
shot out like a rabbit released from a trap. He was not lacking in
courage, but he disliked embarrassing interviews, and it struck him that
Jimmy was the man to handle a situation of this kind. He felt that he
himself would only be in the way.
“Now we can talk comfortably,” said Jimmy, going back to his chair.
McEachern’s deep-set eyes gleamed and his forehead grew red, but he
mastered his feelings.
“And now——” he said.
He stopped.
“Yes?” asked Jimmy.
“What are you doing here?”
“Nothing at the moment.”
“You know what I mean. Why are you here—you and that red-headed devil,
Spike Mullins?”
He jerked his head in the direction of the door.
“I am here because I was very kindly invited to come by Lord Dreever.”
“I know you.”
“You have that privilege. Seeing we only met once, it’s very good of you
to remember me.”
“What’s your game? What do you mean to do?”
“To do? Well, I shall potter about the garden, you know, and shoot a
bit, perhaps, and look at the horses, and think of life, and feed the
chickens— I suppose there are chickens somewhere about—and possibly go
for an occasional row on the lake. Nothing more. Oh, yes, I believe they
want me to act in some theatricals.”
“You’ll miss those theatricals. You’ll leave here to-morrow.”
“To-morrow? But I’ve only just arrived, dear heart.”
“I don’t care about that. Out you go to-morrow. I’ll give you till
to-morrow.”
“I congratulate you,” said Jimmy. “One of the oldest houses in England.”
“What do you mean?”
“I gathered from what you said that you had bought the castle. Isn’t
that so? If it still belongs to Lord Dreever, don’t you think you ought
to consult him before revising his list of guests?”
McEachern looked at him steadily. His manner became quieter.
“Oh! you take that tone, do you?”
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘that tone’. What tone would you take if
a comparative stranger ordered you to leave another man’s house?”
McEachern’s massive jaw protruded truculently in the manner which had
scared good behaviour into brawling East Siders.
“I know your sort,” he said. “I’ll call your bluff. And you won’t get
till to-morrow, either—it’ll be now.”
“‘Why should we wait for the morrow? You are queen of my heart
to-night,’” murmured Jimmy encouragingly.
“I’ll expose you before them all. I’ll tell them everything.”
Jimmy shook his head.
“Too melodramatic,” he said. “Sort of ‘I call on Heaven to judge between
this man and me’ kind of thing. I shouldn’t. What do you propose to
tell, anyway?”
“Will you deny that you were a crook in New York?”
“I will. I was nothing of the kind.”
“What?”
“If you’ll listen, I can explain.”
“Explain!” The other’s voice rose again. “You talk about explaining, you
scum, when I caught you in my own parlour at three in the morning,
you——”
The smile faded from Jimmy’s face.
“Half a minute,” he said.
It might be that the ideal course would be to let the storm expend
itself and then to explain quietly the whole matter of Arthur Mifflin
and the bet which had led to his one excursion into burglary. But he
doubted it. Things—including his temper—had got beyond the stage of
quiet explanations. McEachern would most certainly disbelieve his story.
What would happen after that he did not know. A scene, probably—a
melodramatic denunciation, at the worst, before the other guests; at the
best, before Sir Thomas alone. He saw nothing but chaos beyond that. His
story was thin to a degree, unless backed by witnesses, and his
witnesses were three thousand miles away. Worse, he had not been alone
in the policeman’s parlour. A man who is burgling a house for a bet does
not usually do it in the company of a professional burglar well known to
the police.
No; quiet explanations must be postponed. They could do no good, and
would probably lead to his spending the night and the next few nights at
the local police-station. And even if he were spared that fate, it was
certain that he would have to leave the castle.
Leave the castle and Molly! He jumped up. The thought had stung him.
“One moment,” he said.
McEachern stopped.
“Well?”
“You’re going to tell them that?” asked Jimmy.
“I am.”
“Are you also going to tell them why you didn’t have me arrested that
night?” he said.
McEachern started. Jimmy planted himself in front of him and glared up
into his face. It would have been hard to say which of the two was the
angrier. The policeman was flushed, and the veins stood out on his
forehead. Jimmy was in a white heat of rage. He had turned very pale,
and his muscles were quivering. Jimmy in this mood had once cleared a
Los Angeles bar-room with the leg of a chair in the space of two and a
quarter minutes by the clock.
“Are you?” he demanded. “Are you?”
McEachern’s hand, hanging at his side, lifted itself hesitatingly. The
fingers brushed against Jimmy’s shoulder. Jimmy’s lips twitched.
“Yes,” he said, “do it! Do it, and see what happens! By God! if you put
a hand on me I’ll finish you. Do you think you can bully me? Do you
think I care for your size?”
McEachern dropped his hand. For the first time in his life he had met a
man who, instinct told him, was his match and more. He stepped back a
pace.
Jimmy put his hands in his pockets and turned away. He walked to the
mantelpiece and leaned his back against it.
“You haven’t answered my question,” he said. “Perhaps you can’t!”
McEachern was wiping his forehead and breathing quickly.
“If you like,” said Jimmy, “we’ll go down to the drawing-room now, and
you shall tell your story and I’ll tell mine. I wonder which they will
think the more interesting? Damn you!” he went on, his anger rising once
more, “what do you mean by it? You come into my room and bluster and
talk big about exposing crooks. What do you call yourself, I wonder? Do
you realise what you are? Why, poor Spike’s an angel compared with you!
He did take chances. He wasn’t in a position of trust. You——”
He stopped.
“Hadn’t you better get out of here, don’t you think?” he said curtly.
Without a word McEachern walked to the door and went out.
Jimmy dropped into a chair with a deep breath. He took up his
cigarette-case, but before he could light a match the gong sounded from
the distance.
He rose and laughed rather shakily. He felt limp. “As an effort to
conciliating papa,” he said, “I’m afraid that wasn’t much of a success.”
It was not often that Mr. McEachern was visited by ideas—he ran rather
to muscle than to brain—but he had one that evening during dinner. His
interview with Jimmy had left him furious, but baffled. He knew that his
hands were tied. Frontal attack was useless; to drive Jimmy from the
castle would be out of the question. All that could be done was to watch
him while he was there, for he had never been more convinced of anything
in his life than that Jimmy had wormed his way into the house-party with
felonious intent. The appearance of Lady Julia at dinner wearing the
famous rope of diamonds supplied an obvious motive. The necklace had an
international reputation. Probably there was not a prominent thief in
England or on the Continent who had not marked it down as a possible
prey. It had already been tried for once. It was big game—just the sort
of lure which would draw the type of criminal he imagined Jimmy to be.
From his seat at the farther end of the table he looked at the jewels as
they gleamed on their wearer’s neck. They were almost too ostentatious
for what was, after all, an informal dinner. It was not a rope of
diamonds—it was a collar. There was something Oriental and barbaric in
the overwhelming display of jewellery. It was a prize for which a thief
would risk much.
The conversation becoming general with the fish, was not of a kind to
remove from his mind the impression made by the sight of the gems. It
turned on burglary. Lord Dreever began it.
“Oh, I say,” he said. “I forgot to tell you, Aunt Julia; No. 6 was
burgled the other night.”
No. 6A Eaton Square was the family’s London house.
“Burgled!” said Sir Thomas.
“Well, broken into,” said his lordship, gratified to find that he had
got the ear of his entire audience. Even Lady Julia was silent and
attentive. “Chap got through the scullery window about one o’clock in
the morning.”
“And what did you do?” inquired Sir Thomas.
“Oh, I—er— I was out at the time,” said Lord Dreever. “But something
frightened the feller,” he went on hurriedly, “and he made a bolt for it
without taking anything.”
“Burglary,” said a young man whom Jimmy subsequently discovered to be
the drama-loving Charteris, leaning back and taking advantage of a
pause, “is the hobby of the sportsman and the life-work of the
avaricious.”
He took a little pencil from his waistcoat pocket and made a rapid note
on his cuff.
Everybody seemed to have something to say on the subject. One young lady
gave it as her opinion that she would not like to find a burglar under
her bed. Somebody also had heard of a fellow whose father had fired at
the butler under the impression that he was a house-breaker, and had
broken a valuable bust of Socrates. Lord Dreever had known a man at
college whose brother wrote lyrics for musical comedy, and had done one
about a burglar’s best friend being his mother.
“Life,” said Charteris, who had had time for reflection, “is a house
which we all burgle. We enter it uninvited, take all that we can lay
hands on, and go out again.”
He scribbled “Life—house—burgle” on his cuff and replaced the pencil.
“This man’s brother I was telling you about,” said Lord Dreever, “says
there’s only one rhyme in the English language to ‘burglar,’ and that’s
‘gurgler’—unless you count ‘pergola.’ He says——”
“Personally,” said Jimmy, with a glance at McEachern, “I have rather a
sympathy for burglars. After all, they are one of the hardest-working
classes in existence. They toil while everybody else is asleep. Besides,
a burglar is only a practical Socialist. People talk a lot about the
redistribution of wealth. The burglar goes out and does it. I have found
burglars some of the decentest criminals I have ever met.”
“I despise burglars!” ejaculated Lady Julia, with a suddenness which
stopped Jimmy’s eloquence as if a tap had been turned off. “If I found
one coming after my jewels and I had a pistol I’d shoot him.”
Jimmy met McEachern’s eye, and smiled kindly at him. The ex-policeman
was looking at him with the gaze of a baffled but malignant basilisk.
“I take very good care no one gets a chance at your diamonds, my dear,”
said Sir Thomas, without a blush. “I have had a steel box made for me,”
he added to the company in general, “with a special lock—a very
ingenious arrangement, quite unbreakable, I imagine.”
Jimmy, with Molly’s story fresh in his mind, could not check a rapid
smile. Mr. McEachern, watching him intently, saw it. To him it was fresh
evidence, if any had been wanted, of Jimmy’s intentions, and of his
confidence of success. McEachern’s brow darkened. During the rest of the
meal tense thought rendered him more silent even than was his wont at
the dinner-table. The difficulty of his position was, he saw, great.
Jimmy, to be foiled, must be watched, and how could he watch him?
It was not until the coffee arrived that he found an answer to the
question. With his first cigarette came the idea. That night, in his
room, before going to bed, he wrote a letter. It was an unusual letter,
but singularly enough, almost identical with one Sir Thomas Blunt had
written that very morning.
It was addressed to the Manager of Dodson’s Private Inquiry Agency, of
Bishopsgate Street, E.C., and ran as follows:
“Sir,— On receipt of this, kindly send down one of your smartest men.
Instruct him to stay at the village inn in the character of American
seeing sights of England and anxious to inspect Dreever Castle. I will
meet him in the village and recognise him as old New York friend, and
will then give him further instructions.— Yours faithfully, J.
McEachern.
“P.S.— Kindly not send a rube, but a really smart man.”
This brief but pregnant letter cost him some pains in its composition.
He was not a ready writer, but he completed it at last to his
satisfaction. There was a crisp purity in the style which pleased him.
He sealed up the envelope and slipped it into his pocket. He felt more
at ease now. Such was the friendship that had sprung up between Sir
Thomas Blunt and himself as the result of the jewel episode in Paris
that he could count with certainty on the successful working of his
scheme. The grateful knight would not be likely to allow any old New
York friend of his preserver to languish at the village inn. The
sleuth-hound would at once be installed at the castle, where,
unsuspected by Jimmy, he would keep an eye on the course of events. Any
looking after that Mr. James Pitt might require might safely be left in
the hands of this expert.
With considerable fervour Mr. McEachern congratulated himself on his
astuteness. With Jimmy above stairs and Spike below, the sleuth-hound
would have his hands full.
★ 15 ★
_Mr. McEachern Intervenes_
Life at the castle during the first few days of his visit filled Jimmy
with a curious blend of emotions, mainly unpleasant. Fate, in its
pro-Jimmy capacity, seemed to be taking a rest. In the first place, the
part allotted to him was not that of Lord Herbert, the character who
talked to Molly most of the time. The instant Charteris learned from
Lord Dreever that Jimmy had at one time actually been on the stage
professionally, he decided that Lord Herbert offered too little scope
for the new man’s talents.
“Absolutely no good to you, my dear chap,” he said. “It’s just a small
dude part. He’s simply got to be a silly ass.”
Jimmy pleaded that he could be a sillier ass than anybody living; but
Charteris was firm.
“No,” he said. “You must be Captain Browne—true acting part, the biggest
in the piece, full of fat lines. Spennie was to have played it, and we
were in for the worst frost in the history of the stage. Now you’ve come
it’s all right. Spennie’s the ideal of Lord Herbert. He’s simply got to
be himself. We’ve got a success now, my boy. Rehearsal after lunch.
Don’t be late.”
And he had gone off to beat up the rest of the company.