fearful fool. I tell you I’m sick of it. And always trying to make me
marry money! Dashed humiliating! If she hadn’t been a jolly sensible
girl you’d have spoiled Miss McEachern’s life as well as mine. You came
very near it. I tell you, I’ve had enough of it. I’m in love! I’m in
love with the rippingest girl in England. You’ve seen her, Pitt, old
top. Isn’t she a ripper?”
Jimmy stamped the absent lady with the seal of his approval.
“I tell you, if she’ll have me, I’m going to marry her.”
The dismay written on every inch of Sir Thomas’s countenance became
intensified at these terrific words. Great as had been his contempt for
the actual holder of the title considered simply as a young man, he had
always been filled with a supreme respect for the Dreever name.
“But, Spencer,” he almost howled, “consider your position! You cannot——”
“Can’t I, by Jove! if she’ll have me; and dash my position! What’s my
position got to do with it? Katie’s the daughter of a general, if it
comes to that. Her brother was at the House with me. If I had a penny to
call my own I’d have asked her to marry me ages ago. Don’t you worry
about my position!”
Sir Thomas croaked feebly.
“Now, look here,” said his lordship, with determination. “Here’s the
whole thing in a jolly old nutshell. If you want me to forget about this
little flutter in fake diamonds of yours you’ve got to pull your socks
up and start in to do things. You’ve got to get me attached to some
Embassy, for a beginning. It won’t be difficult. There’s dozens of old
boys in London who knew the governor when he was alive who will jump at
the chance of doing me a good turn. I know I’m a bit of an ass in some
ways, but that’s expected of you in the Diplomatic Service. They only
want you to wear evening clothes as if you were used to them, and be a
bit of a flier at dancing, and I can fill the bill all right as far as
that goes. And you’ve got to give your jolly old blessing to Katie and
me—if she’ll have me. That’s about all I can think of for the moment.
Now do we go? Are you on?”
“It’s preposterous,” began Sir Thomas.
Lord Dreever gave the door-handle a rattle. He stopped.
“It’s a hold-up all right,” said Jimmy soothingly. “I don’t want to butt
in on a family conclave, but my advice, if asked, would be to unbelt
before the shooting begins. You’ve got something worse than a pipe
pointing at you now. As regards my position in the business, don’t
worry. My silence is thrown in gratis. Give me one loving smile and my
lips are sealed.”
Sir Thomas turned on him.
“As for you——” he cried.
“Never mind about Pitt,” said his lordship. “He’s a dashed good fellow,
Pitt. I wish there were more like him. And he wasn’t pinching the stuff
either. If you had only listened when he tried to tell you, you mightn’t
be in such a frightful hole. He was putting the things back, as he said.
I know all about it. Well, what’s the answer?”
For a moment Sir Thomas seemed on the point of refusal. But just as he
was about to speak his lordship opened the door, and at the movement he
collapsed again.
“I will!” he cried. “I will!”
“Good,” said his lordship, with satisfaction. “That’s a bargain. Coming
downstairs, Pitt, old man? We shall be wanted on the stage in about half
a minute.”
“As an antidote to stage-fright,” said Jimmy, as they went along the
corridor, “little discussions of that kind may be highly recommended. I
shouldn’t mind betting that you feel fit for anything.”
“I feel like a two-year-old,” assented his lordship enthusiastically.
“I’ve forgotten all my part, but I don’t care. I’ll just go on and talk
to them.”
“That,” said Jimmy, “is the right spirit. Charteris will get heart
disease, but it’s the right spirit. A little more of that sort of thing
and amateur theatricals would be worth listening to. Step lively,
Roscius; the stage waits.”
★ 28 ★
_Spennie’s Hour of Clear Vision_
Mr. McEachern sat in the billiard-room smoking. He was alone. From where
he sat he could hear distant strains of music. The more rigorous portion
of the evening’s entertainment, the theatricals, was over, and the
nobility and gentry, having done their duty by sitting through the
performance, were now enjoying themselves in the ballroom. Everybody was
happy. The play had been quite as successful as the usual amateur
performance. The prompter had made himself a great favourite from the
start, his series of duets with Spennie having been especially admired,
and Jimmy, as became an old professional, had played his part with great
finish and certainty of touch, though, like the bloodhounds in the
performance of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” on tour, he had had poor support.
But the audience bore no malice.
No collection of individuals is less vindictive than an audience at
amateur theatricals. It was all over now. Charteris had literally
gibbered in the presence of eye-witnesses at one point in the second
act, when Spennie, by giving a wrong cue, had jerked the play abruptly
into Act III (where his colleagues, dimly suspecting something wrong,
but not knowing what, had kept it for some two minutes, to the
mystification of the audience); but now even he had begun to forget. As
he two-stepped down the room the lines of agony on his face were
softened. He even smiled.
As for Spennie, the brilliance of his happy grin dazzled all beholders.
He was still wearing it when he invaded the solitude of Mr. McEachern.
In every dance, however greatly he may be enjoying it, there comes a
time when a man needs a meditative cigarette apart from the throng. It
came to Spennie after the seventh item on the programme. The billiard
room struck him as admirably suitable in every way. It was not likely to
be used as a sitting out place, and it was near enough to the ballroom
to enable him to hear when the music of item No. 9 should begin.
Mr. McEachern was glad to see him. In the turmoil following the
theatricals he had been unable to get a word with any of the persons
with whom he most wished to speak. He had been surprised that no
announcement of the engagement had been made at the end of the
performance. Spennie would be able to supply him with information as to
when the announcement might be expected.
Spennie hesitated for an instant when he saw who was in the room. He was
not over-anxious for a _tête-à-tête_ with Molly’s father just then; but
reflecting that after all he, Spennie, was not to blame for any
disappointment that might be troubling the other, he switched on his
grin again and walked in.
“Came in for a smoke,” he explained, by way of opening the conversation.
“Not dancing the next.”
“Come in, my boy, come in,” said Mr. McEachern. “I was waiting to see
you.”
Spennie regretted his entrance. He had supposed that the other had heard
the news of the breaking-off of the engagement. Evidently, from his
manner, he had not. This was a nuisance.
He sat down and lit a cigarette, casting about the while for an
innocuous topic of conversation.
“Like the show?” he inquired.
“Fine,” said Mr. McEachern. “By the way—”
Spennie groaned inwardly. He had forgotten that a determined man can
change the conversation to any subject he pleases by means of those
three words.
“By the way,” said Mr. McEachern, “I thought Sir Thomas—wasn’t your
uncle intending to announce——?”
“Well, yes, he was,” said Spennie.
“Going to declare it during the dancing, maybe?”
“Well—er—no. The fact is, he’s not going to do it at all, don’t you
know.” He inspected the red end of his cigarette closely. “As a matter
of fact, it’s kind of broken off.”
The other’s exclamation jarred on him. Rotten, having to talk about this
sort of thing!
“Broken off?”
Spennie nodded.
“Miss McEachern thought it over, don’t you know,” he said, “and came to
the conclusion that it wasn’t good enough.”
Now that it was said he felt easier. It had merely been the awkwardness
of having to touch on the thing that had troubled him. That his news
might be a blow to McEachern did not cross his mind. He was a singularly
modest youth, and though he realised vaguely that his title had a
certain value in some people’s eyes, he could not understand anyone
mourning over the loss of him as a son-in-law. Katie’s father, the old
general, thought him a fool, and once, during an attack of gout, had
said so.
Oblivious, therefore, to the storm raging a yard away from him, he
smoked on with great contentment, till suddenly it struck him that, for
a presumably devout lover, jilted that very night, he was displaying too
little emotion. He debated swiftly within himself whether he should have
a dash at manly grief, but came to the conclusion that it could not be
done. Melancholy on this maddest, merriest day of all the glad New Year,
the day on which he had utterly routed the powers of evil, as
represented by Sir Thomas, was impossible.
“It wouldn’t have done, don’t you know,” he said. “We weren’t suited.
What I mean to say is, I’m a bit of a dashed sort of silly ass in some
ways, if you know what I mean. A girl like Miss McEachern couldn’t have
been happy with me. She wants one of those capable, energetic fellers.”
This struck him as a good beginning—modest but not grovelling. He
continued, tapping quite a respectably deep vein of philosophy as he
spoke.
“You see, dear old top—I mean sir—you see, it’s like this. As far as
women are concerned, fellers are divided into two classes. There’s the
masterful, capable Johnnies and the—er—the other sort. Now, I’m the
other sort. My idea of the happy married life is to be—well, not exactly
downtrodden, but—you know what I mean—kind of second fiddle. I want a
wife”—his voice grew soft and dreamy—“who’ll pet me a good deal, don’t
you know, stroke my hair a lot, and all that. I haven’t it in me to do
the master-in-my-own-house business. For me the silent-devotion
touch—sleepin’ on the mat outside her door, don’t you know, when she
wasn’t feeling well, and bein’ found there in the morning, and being
rather cosseted for my thoughtfulness. That’s the sort of idea. Hard to
put it quite OK, but you know the sort of thing I mean. A feller’s got
to realise his jolly old limitations if he wants to be happy though
married; what? Now, suppose Miss McEachern was to marry me! Great Scot,
she’d be bored to death in a week! Honest. She couldn’t help herself.
She wants a chap with the same amount of go in him that she’s got.”
He lit another cigarette. He was feeling pleased with himself. Never
before had ideas marshalled themselves in his mind in such long and
well-ordered ranks. He felt that he could go on talking like this all
night. He was getting brainier every minute. He remembered reading in
some book somewhere of a girl (or chappie) who had had her (or his)
“hour of clear vision”. This was precisely what had happened now.
Whether it was owing to the excitement of what had taken place that
night, or because he had been keeping up his thinking powers with
excellent dry champagne, he did not know. All he knew was that he felt
on top of his subject. He wished he had had a larger audience. “A girl
like Miss McEachern,” he resumed, “doesn’t want any of the hair-stroking
business. She’d simply laugh at a feller if he asked for it. She needs a
chappie of the Get On or Get Out type—somebody in the six-cylinder
class. And as a matter of fact, between ourselves, I rather think she’s
found him.”
“What?”
Mr. McEachern half rose from his chair. All his old fears had come
surging back.
“What do you mean?”
“Fact,” said his lordship, nodding. “Mind you, I don’t know for certain.
As the girl says in the song, I don’t know, but I guess. What I mean to
say is, they seemed jolly friendly and all that—calling each other by
their Christian names, and so on.”
“Who?”
“Pitt,” said his lordship. He was leaning back, blowing a smoke-ring at
the moment, so did not see the look on the other’s face and the sudden
grip of his fingers on the arms of his chair. He went on with some
enthusiasm.
“Jimmy Pitt!” he said. “Now, there’s a feller. Full of oats to the brim,
and fairly bursting with go and energy. A girl wouldn’t have a dull
moment with a chap like that. You know,” he proceeded confidentially,
“there’s a lot in this idea of affinities. Take my word for it, dear
old—sir. There’s a girl up in London, for instance. Now, she and I hit
it off most amazingly. There’s hardly a thing we don’t think alike
about. For instance, ‘The Merry Widow’ didn’t make a bit of a hit with
her; nor did it with me, yet look at the millions of people who raved
about it. And neither of us like oysters. We’re affinities—that’s why.
You see the same sort of thing all over the place. It’s a jolly queer
business. Sometimes makes me believe in re—in-what’s-its-name—you know
what I mean. All that in the poem, you know. How does it go? ‘When you
were a tiddley-om-pom and I was a thingummajig.’ Dashed brainy bit of
work. I was reading it only the other day. Well, what I mean to say is,
it’s my belief that Jimmy Pitt and Miss McEachern are by way of being
something in that line. Doesn’t it strike you that they are just the
sort to get on together? You can see it with half an eye. You can’t help
liking a feller like Jimmy Pitt. He’s a sport! I wish I could tell you
some of the things he’s done, but I can’t, for reasons; but you can take
it from me he’s a sport. You ought to cultivate him. You’d like him....
Oh, dash it! there’s the music! I must be off. Got to dance this one.”
He rose from his chair and dropped his cigarette into the ash-tray.
“So long,” he said, with a friendly nod. “Wish I could stop, but it’s no
go. That’s the last let-up I shall have to-night.”
He went out, leaving Mr. McEachern seated in his chair, a prey to many
and varied emotions.
★ 29 ★
_The Last Round_
He had only been gone a few minutes when Mr. McEachern’s meditations
were again interrupted. This time the visitor was a stranger to him—a
dark-faced, clean-shaven man. He did not wear evening clothes, so could
not be one of the guests; and Mr. McEachern could not place him
immediately. Then he remembered. He had seen him in Sir Thomas Blunt’s
dressing room. This was Sir Thomas’s valet.
“Might I have a word with you, sir?”
“What is it?” asked McEachern, staring heavily. His mind had not
recovered from the effect of Lord Dreever’s philosophical remarks. There
was something of a cloud on his brain. To judge from his lordship’s
words, things had been happening behind his back; and the idea of Molly
deceiving him was too strange to be assimilated in an instant. He looked
at the valet dully.
“What is it?” he asked again.
“I must apologise for intruding, but I thought it best to approach you
before making my report to Sir Thomas.”
“Your report?”
“I am employed by a private inquiry agency.”
“What?”
“Yes, sir—Wragge’s. You may have heard of us, in Holborn Bars; very old
established, divorce a speciality. You will have seen the
advertisements. Sir Thomas wrote asking for a man, and the governor sent
me down. I have been with the house some years. My job, I gathered, was
to keep my eyes open generally. Sir Thomas, it seemed, had no suspicions
of any definite person. I was to be on the spot just in case, in a
manner of speaking. And it’s precious lucky I was, or her ladyship’s
jewels would have been gone. I’ve done a fair cop this very night.”
He paused, and eyed the ex-policeman keenly. McEachern was obviously
excited. Could Jimmy have made an attempt on the jewels during the
dance? Or Spike?
“Say,” he said, “was it a red headed——?”
The detective was watching him with a curious smile.
“No, he wasn’t red headed. You seem interested, sir. I thought you would
be. I will tell you all about it. I had had my suspicions of this party
ever since he arrived. And I may say that it struck me at the time that
there was something mighty fishy about the way he got into the castle.”
McEachern started. So he had not been the only one to suspect Jimmy’s
motives in attaching himself to Lord Dreever.
“Go on,” he said.
“I suspected that there was some game on, and it struck me that this
would be the day for the attempt, the house being upside down, in a
manner of speaking, on account of the theatricals. And I was right. I
kept near those jewels on and off all day, and presently, just as I had
thought, along comes this fellow. He’d hardly got to the door when I was
on him.”
“Good boy! You’re no rube.”
“We fought for a while, but, being a bit to the good in strength, and
knowing something about the game, I had the irons on him pretty quick,
and took him off and locked him in the cellar. That’s how it was, sir.”
Mr. McEachern’s relief was overwhelming. If Lord Dreever’s statement was
correct, and Jimmy had really succeeded in winning Molly’s affection,
this would be indeed a rescue at the eleventh hour. It was with a _Nunc
Dimittis_ air he felt for his cigar case and extended it towards the
detective. A cigar from his own private case was with him a mark of the
supremest favour and good will—a sort of accolade which he bestowed only
upon the really meritorious few.
Usually it was received with becoming deference, but on this occasion
there was a somewhat startling deviation from routine, for, just as he
was opening the case, something cold and hard pressed against each of
his wrists; there was a snap and a click, and looking up, dazed, he saw
that the detective had sprung back, and was contemplating him with a
grim smile over the barrel of an ugly-looking little revolver.
Guilty or innocent, the first thing a man does, when he finds handcuffs
on his wrists, is to try to get them off. The action is automatic. Mr.
McEachern strained at the steel chain till the veins stood out on his
forehead. His great body shook with rage.
The detective eyed his efforts with some satisfaction. The picture
presented by the other, as he heaved and tugged, was that of a guilty
man trapped.
“It’s no good, my friend,” he said.
His voice brought McEachern back to his senses. In the first shock of
the thing the primitive man in him had led him beyond the confines of
self-restraint. He had simply struggled unthinkingly. Now he came to
himself again.
He shook his manacled hands furiously.
“What does this mean?” he shouted. “What the——”
“Less noise,” said the detective sharply. “Get back!” he snapped, as the
other took a step forward.
“Do you know who I am?” thundered McEachern.
“No,” said the detective. “And that’s just why you’re wearing those
bracelets. Come, now, don’t be a fool, the game’s up; can’t you see
that?”
McEachern leaned helplessly against the billiard-table. He felt weak.
Everything was unreal. Had he gone mad? he wondered.
“That’s right,” said the detective—“stay there. You can’t do any harm
there. It was a pretty little game, I’ll admit. You worked it
well—meeting your old friend from New York and all, and having him
invited to the castle. Very pretty. New York, indeed! Seen about as much
of New York as I have of Timbuctoo. I saw through him.”
Some inkling of the truth began to penetrate McEachern’s consciousness.
He had become so obsessed with the idea that, as the captive was not
Spike, it must be Jimmy, that the possibility of Mr. Galer being the
subject of discussion only dawned upon him now.
“What do you mean?” he cried. “Who is it that you have arrested?”
“Blest if I know. You can tell me that, I should think, seeing he’s an
old Timbuctoo friend of yours. Galer’s the name he goes by here.”
“Galer!”
“That’s the man. And do you know what he had the impudence, the gall, to
tell me? That he was in my own line of business. A detective! He said
you had sent for him to come here.”
He laughed amusedly at the recollection.
“And so he is, you fool. So I did.”
“Oh, you did, did you? And what business had you bringing detectives
into other people’s houses?”
Mr. McEachern started to answer, but checked himself. Never before had
he appreciated to the full the depth and truth of the proverb relating
to the frying-pan and the fire. To clear himself he must mention his
suspicions of Jimmy, and also his reasons for those suspicions. And to
do that would mean revealing his past. It was Scylla and Charybdis.
A drop of perspiration trickled down his temple.
“What’s the good?” said the detective. “Mighty ingenious idea, that,
only you hadn’t allowed for there being a real detective in the house.
It was that chap pitching me that yarn that made me suspicious of you. I
put two and two together. ‘Partners,’ I said to myself. I’d heard all
about you, scraping acquaintance with Sir Thomas and all. Mighty
ingenious. You become the old family friend, and then you let in your
pal. He gets the stuff and hands it over to you. Nobody dreams of
suspecting you, and there you are. Honestly, now, wasn’t that the game?”
“It’s all a mistake——” McEachern was beginning, when the door-handle
turned.
The detective looked over his shoulder. McEachern glared dumbly. This
was the crowning blow, that there should be spectators of his
predicament.
Jimmy strolled into the room.
“Dreever told me you were in here,” he said to McEachern. “Can you spare
me a—— Halloa!”
The detective had pocketed his revolver at the first sound of the
handle—to be discreet was one of the chief articles in the creed of the
young men from Wragge’s Detective Agency—but handcuffs are not easily
concealed. Jimmy stood staring in amazement at McEachern’s wrists.
“Some sort of a round game?” he inquired with interest.
The detective became confidential.
“It’s this way, Mr. Pitt. There’s been some pretty deep work going on
here. There’s a regular gang of burglars in the place. This chap here’s
one of them.”
“What, Mr. McEachern?”
“That’s what he calls himself.”
It was all Jimmy could do to keep himself from asking Mr. McEachern
whether he attributed his downfall to drink. He contented himself with a
sorrowful shake of the head at the fermenting captive. Then he took up
the part of counsel for the defence.
“I don’t believe it,” he said. “What makes you think so?”
“Why, this afternoon I caught this man’s pal—the fellow that calls
himself Galer——”
“I know the man,” said Jimmy. “He’s a detective really. Mr. McEachern
brought him down here.”
The sleuth’s jaw dropped limply, as if he had received a blow.
“What?” he said, in a feeble voice.
“Didn’t I tell you——” began Mr. McEachern; but the sleuth was occupied
with Jimmy. That sickening premonition of disaster was beginning to
steal over him. Dimly he began to perceive that he had blundered.
“Yes,” said Jimmy. “Why, I can’t say; but Mr. McEachern was afraid some
one might try to steal Lady Julia Blunt’s rope of diamonds, so he wrote
to London for this man Galer. It was officious, perhaps, but not
criminal. I doubt if, legally, you could handcuff a man for a thing like
that. What have you done with good Mr. Galer?”
“I’ve locked him in the coal-cellar,” said the detective dismally. The
thought of the interview in prospect with the human bloodhound he had so
mishandled was not exhilarating.
“Locked him in the cellar, did you?” said Jimmy. “Well, well, I dare say
he’s very happy there. He’s probably busy detecting black-beetles.
Still, perhaps you had better go and let him out. Possibly if you were
to apologise to him—— Eh? Just as you think—I only suggest. If you want
somebody to vouch for Mr. McEachern’s non-burglariousness, I can do it.
He is a gentleman of private means, and we knew each other out in New
York.”
“I never thought——”
“That,” said Jimmy, with sympathetic friendliness, “if you will allow me
to say so, is the cardinal mistake you detectives make. You never do
think.”
“It never occurred to me——”
He took the key of the handcuffs from his pocket and toyed with it. Mr.
McEachern emitted a low growl. It was enough.
“If you wouldn’t mind, Mr. Pitt,” said the detective obsequiously. He
thrust the key into Jimmy’s hands and fled. Jimmy unlocked the
handcuffs. Mr. McEachern rubbed his wrists.
“Ingenious little things,” said Jimmy.
“I’m much obliged to you,” growled Mr. McEachern, without looking up.
“Not at all—a pleasure. This circumstantial evidence business is the
devil, isn’t it? I knew a man who broke into a house in New York to win
a bet, and to this day the owner of the house thinks him a professional
burglar.”
“What’s that?” said Mr. McEachern sharply.
“Why do I say ‘a man’? Why am I so elusive and mysterious? You’re quite
right. It sounds more dramatic; but, after all, what you want is facts.
Very well. I broke into your house that night to win a bet. That’s the
limpid truth.”