TANTROY EARNS HIS WAGE
"I think," observed Salt reflectively, soon after his return, "that you
had better take a short holiday now, Miss Lisle."
Miss Lisle looked up from her work--she was not addressing circulars, it
may be stated--with an expression not quite devoid of suspicion.
"I will, if you wish me to do so, sir," she replied meekly. "But,
personally, I do not require one."
"You have been of great use to us while I was away," he explained
kindly, but with official precision, "and now that I am back again you
have the opportunity."
Miss Lisle coloured rather rapturously at the formal praise, but the
astute young woman did not allow her exaltation to beguile her senses.
"A week's holiday?" she asked.
"I would suggest a fortnight," he replied.
"That would be until the end of June?"
Salt agreed.
"Then nothing is likely to happen before the end of June?"
He laughed frankly. There was no trace of the mystery and restraint, of
the electric tension in the air, that forerun portentous events, as we
are told, to be noticed about the office of the League.
"A great deal may happen before that time, but nothing, I think I can
assure you, that comes within your meaning."
"Is there any particular place that you would like me to go to?"
"Oh, not at all. Forget Trafalgar Chambers and business entirely for the
time."
Possibly Miss Lisle had looked for some hidden meaning behind the simple
suggestion of a holiday: had anticipated "another secret process down
another little lane." At any rate, she did not rejoice at the prospect;
on the contrary, she declined it.
"Thank you, sir," she replied, "but unless it is for your convenience, I
should prefer to go on addressing circulars."
Salt frowned slightly and smiled slightly, and inwardly admitted to
himself that he had probably expected worse things when he had first
accepted Miss Lisle's services.
"I am a very plain, straightforward person in all my dealings," he
remarked, "and you, outside the strict line of work here, have an
oblique vein that taxes the imagination. Further, it carries the sting
that with all you generally arrive at the same conclusion as I do, only
a little earlier."
"I have a loathsome, repulsive nature, I know," admitted Irene
cheerfully. "Trivial, ill-mannered, suspicious. I require strict
discipline. That is why I am better here."
"So far I have not been inconvenienced by the two first characteristics.
It is a mistake, perhaps, to be over-suspicious."
"Yes," agreed the lady with a level glance. "It only ends in you finding
people out, when otherwise you might have gone on believing in them to
the last."
Salt had only known Miss Lisle for a few months, and for a third of the
period he had not seen her. But he knew that when she showed a
disposition to take up his time something more than the amenities of
conversation lay behind her words. He remembered that level glance. It
foreshadowed another "long pointless tale."
"For instance?" he suggested encouragingly.
"If I left this office locked when I went out to lunch, for instance,
and found it still locked but the papers slightly disarranged on my
return," she replied.
"Anything more?"
"It is very unpleasant to set traps, of course, but if I put a little
dab of typewriter ink on the inner handle of the door when I next went
out, and subsequently found a slight stain of a similar colour on my
white glove after shaking hands with some one, the suspicion would be
deepened."
"I think that the matter is of sufficient importance for you to tell me
all you know," he said gravely. "If you hesitate to be definite for fear
of making a mistake, I will take pains to verify your suspicions and I
will accept all responsibility."
"Then I accuse Mr Tantroy of being a paid spy in the service of the
Government."
"Tantroy!" exclaimed Salt with a momentary feeling of incredulity.
"Tantroy! It seems impossible, but, after all, it is possible enough.
You know, of course, that he has a room here now, and might even think
in his inexperience that he was at liberty to come into this office at
any time."
"But not to take impressions of my keys and have duplicates made; nor to
copy extracts in my absence; nor to open and examine the cipher
typewriter."
"Has that been left unlocked?" he demanded sharply.
"No," she replied. "You have the only key that I know of. But it _has_
been unlocked, and I infer that the code has been copied."
For quite three minutes there was silence. Salt was thinking, not idly,
but estimating exactly the effect of what had happened. Miss Lisle was
waiting, with somewhat rare perception, until he was ready to continue.
"Sooner or later something of the sort was bound to come," he summed up
quietly, without a trace of discomfiture. "It is only the personality
that is surprising. His interests are identical with ours; he has
everything to gain by our success. Why; why on earth?"
"I think that I can explain that in three words," suggested Miss Lisle.
"Velma St Saint."
Salt looked enquiringly. He had forgotten the Hon. Freddy's deity for
the moment.
"Of the Vivarium," added Irene.
"Oh, the lady who hangs by her toes," he remarked with enlightenment.
"'The World's Greatest Inverted Cantatrice'!" quoted Miss Lisle. "That
is her celebrated 'Upside Down' song that the organ is playing in the
street below. A few years ago she got a week's engagement at the Elysium
at a salary of eighty pounds. She calculated from that that she could
afford to spend four thousand a year, and although all theatrical
incomes have steadily declined ever since until she only gets ten pounds
a week now, she has never been able to make any difference in her style
of living.... Of course there is a deficit to be made up."
"It is just as well. If it had not been Tantroy it would have been some
one abler. Now what has he done, what has he learned?"
"Duplicate keys of this door and of my desk have been made. The lock of
the cipher typewriter case is not of an elaborate pattern, and any one
bringing a quantity of keys of the right size would probably find one to
answer. I don't think that either your desk or the safe has been opened;
certainly not since I began to notice. The papers to which he would have
access are consequently not highly important."
"Letters?" suggested Salt. "For instance, my letters lying here until
you forwarded them. There is a post in at eight o'clock in the morning;
others after you have left up to ten at night. There would be every
opportunity for abstracting some, opening them at leisure, and then
dropping them into the letter-box again a little later."
"No," said Miss Lisle. "I took precautions against that."
"How?" he demanded, and waited very keenly for her answer.
"Simply by arriving here before eight and remaining until ten."
"Thank you." It was all he said, but it did not leave Miss Lisle with
the empty feeling that virtue had merely been its own reward.
"Perhaps I ought to add that Mr Tantroy tried to get information from
me," she remarked distantly. "He--he came here frequently and wished me
to accept presents; boxes of chocolate at first, I think, and jewellery
afterwards. It was a mistake he made."
"Yes," assented Salt thoughtfully, "I think it was. There is one other
thing, Miss Lisle. You could scarcely know with whom he was negotiating
on the other side?"
"No," she admitted regretfully; "I had not sufficient time. That was why
I did not wish to go away just now."
"I do not think that you need hesitate to leave it now. I am not taking
it out of your hands, only carrying on another phase that you have made
possible. It will simplify matters if I have the office to myself. Could
you find an opportunity for telling Tantroy casually that you are taking
a fortnight's holiday?"
Her answer hung just a moment. Had he known Tantroy better he might have
guessed. "Yes, certainly," she replied hastily, with a little stumble in
her speech.
Perhaps he guessed. "No," he corrected himself. "On second thoughts, it
does not matter."
"I do not mind," she protested loyally.
"If it were necessary I should not hesitate to ask you," he replied half
brusquely. "It is not."
"Very well. I will go to-morrow."
That evening, when he was alone. Salt unlocked the typewriter case to
which Miss Lisle had alluded, took out the machine, and seating himself
before it proceeded to compose a letter upon which he seemed to spend
much consideration. As his fingers struck the keys, upon the sheet of
paper in the carrier there appeared the following mystifying
composition:
kbeljsl
wopmjvsjxkivslilscalkwespljkjscwecsspssp
fxfejsloxmjcneoeqjdncs----
It was, in fact, as Miss Lisle had said, a code typewriter. The letters
which appeared on the paper did not correspond with the letters on the
keys. According to the keyboard the writing should have been:
mydrstr
nwhvsltscmpltrprtbfrmndthrsmstbndbtthtth
prpslhvfrmltdsfsblndth----
and signified, to resolve it into its ultimate form:
MY DEAR ESTAIR,--I now have Salt's complete report before me,
and there seems to be no doubt that the proposal I have
formulated is feasible, and the----
Written without vowels, stops, capitals, or spaces, this gave a very
serviceable cryptograph, but there was an added safeguard. After
completing the first line the writer moved a shift-key and brought
another set of symbols into play--or, rather, the same symbols under a
different arrangement. The process was repeated for the third line, and
then the fourth line returned to the system of the first. Thus three
codes were really in operation, and the danger of the key being found by
the frequent recurrence of certain symbols (the most fruitful cause of
detection) was almost overcome. Six identical machines were in
existence. One has been accounted for; Sir John Hampden had another; and
a third was in the possession of Robert Estair, the venerable titular
head of the combined Imperial party. A sociable young publican, who had
a very snug house in the neighbourhood of Westminster Abbey, could have
put his hand upon the fourth; the fifth was in the office of a
super-phosphate company carrying on an unostentatious business down a
quiet little lane about ten or a dozen miles out of London; and the
sixth had fallen to the lot of a busy journalist, who seemed to have the
happy knack of getting political articles and paragraphs accepted
without demur by all the leading newspapers by the simple expedient of
scribbling "Urgent" and some one else's initials across the envelopes he
sent them in. Communications of the highest importance never reached the
stage of ink and paper, but the six machines were in frequent use. In
_bona fide_ communications the customary phraseology with which letters
begin and end was not used, it is perhaps unnecessary to say. So obvious
a clue as the short line "kbeljsl" at the head of a letter addressed to
Estair would be as fatal to the secrecy of any code as the cartouched
"Cleopatra" and "Ptolemy" were to the mystery of Egyptian hieroglyphics.
That Salt wrote it may be taken as an indication that he had another end
in view; and it is sometimes a mistake to overrate the intelligence of
your opponents. When the letter was finished he put it away in his
pocket-book, arranged the fastenings of both safe and desk so that he
could tell if they had been disturbed, and then went home.
The next morning his preparations advanced another step. He brought with
him a new letter copying-book, a silver cigarette-case with a plain
polished surface, and a small jar of some oily preparation. With a
little of the substance from the jar he smeared the cigarette-case all
over, wiped away the greater part again until nothing but an almost
imperceptible trace remained, and then placed it carefully within his
desk. The next detail was to write a dozen letters with dates extending
over the last few days. All were short; all were quite unimportant; they
were chiefly concerned with appointments, references to future League
meetings, and the like. Some few were written in cipher, but the
majority were plain reading, and Salt signed them all in Sir John's
name, appending his own initials. To sign the long letter which he had
already written he cut off from a note in the baronet's own handwriting
the signature "John Hampden," fastened it lightly at the foot of the
typewritten sheet, and then proceeded to copy all the letters into the
new book. The effect was patent: one letter and one alone stood out
among the rest as of pre-eminent importance. The completion was reached
by gumming upon the back of the book a label inscribed "Hampden.
Private," treating the leather binding with a coating of the preparation
from the jar, and finally substituting it in the safe in place of the
genuine volume. Then he burned his originals of all the fictitious
letters and turned to other matters.
It was not until two days later that Mr Tantroy paid Salt a passing
visit. He dropped in in a friendly way with the plea that the burden of
his own society in his own room, where he apparently spent two hours
daily in thinking deeply, had grown intolerable.
"You are always such a jolly busy, energetic chap, Salt, that it quite
bucks me up to watch you," he explained.
Salt, however, was not busy that afternoon. He only excused himself to
ring for a note, which was lying before him already addressed, to be
taken out, and then gave his visitor an undivided attention. He was
positively entertaining over his recent journeyings. Freddy Tantroy had
never thought that the chap had so much in him before.
"Jolly quaint set of beggars you must have had to do with," he remarked.
"Thought that you were having gilded flutter Monte Carlo, or Margate, or
some of those places where crowds people go."
Salt looked across at him with a smile. "I think that there was an
impression of that sort given out," he replied. "But, between ourselves,
it was strictly on a matter of business."
"We League Johnnies do get most frightfully rushed," said Freddy
sympathetically. "Bring it off?"
"Better than I had expected. I don't think it will be long before we
begin to move now. You would be surprised if I could tell you of the
unexpected form it will take."
"Don't see why you shouldn't," dropped Tantroy negligently.
Salt allowed the moment to pass on a note of indecision.
"Perhaps I am speaking prematurely," he qualified. "Things are only
evolving at the moment, and I don't suppose that there will be anything
at all doing during the next few weeks. I have even sent Miss Lisle off
on a holiday."
"Noticed the fair Irene's empty chair," said Freddy. "For long?"
"I told her to take a fortnight. She can have longer if she wants."
"Wish Sir John could spare me; but simply won't hear of it. Don't fancy
you find girl much good, though."
"Oh, she is painstaking," put in her employer tolerantly.
"No initiative," declared Tantroy solemnly. "No idea of rising to the
occasion or of making use of her opportunities."
"You noticed that?" To Freddy's imagination it seemed as though Salt was
regarding him with open admiration.
He wagged his head judicially. "I knew you'd like me to keep eye on
things while you were away," he said, "so I looked in here occasionally
as I passed. Don't believe she had any idea what to do. Invariably found
her sitting here in gilded idleness at every hour of the day. If I were
you, should sack her while she is away."
Salt thought it as well to change the subject.
"By the way," he remarked, "I came across what seemed to me a rather
good thing in cigarettes at Cardiff, and I wanted to ask your opinion
about them. It's a new leaf--Bolivian with a Virginian blend, not on the
market yet. I wish you'd try one now."
There was nothing Freddy Tantroy liked better than being asked to give
his opinion on tobacco from the standpoint of an expert. He took the
case held out to him, selected a cigarette with grave deliberation, and
leaned back in his chair with a critical air, preparing to deliver
judgment. Salt returned the case to its compartment in the desk.
"It has a very distinctive aroma," announced Freddy sagely, after he had
drawn a few whiffs, held the cigarette under his nose, waved it slowly
in the air before him, and resorted to several other devices of
connoisseurship.
"I thought so too," agreed Salt. He had bought a suitable packet of some
obscure brand in a side street, as he walked to the office two days
before.
"Cardiff," mused Tantroy. "Variety grotesque holes you seem to have
explored, Salt."
"Oh, I had to see a lot of men all over the place. I got a few packets
of these from a docker who had them from a South American merchant in a
roundabout way. Smuggled, of course." All along, his conversation had
touched upon labourers, mill-hands, miners, and other sons of toil.
Apparently, as Tantroy noted, he had scarcely associated with any other
class. He was lying deliberately, and in a manner calculated to alienate
the sympathy of many excellent people; for there is a worthy and not
inconsiderable class with an ineradicable conviction that although in a
just cause the sixth commandment may be suspended, as it were by Act of
Parliament, and the killing of your enemy become an active virtue, yet
in no case is it permissible to tell him a falsehood. If it is necessary
to deceive him the end must be gained by leading him to it by inference.
But Salt belonged to a hard-grained school which believed in doing
things thoroughly, and when on active service he swept the sophistries
away. He had to mislead a man whose very existence he believed to be
steeped in treachery and falsehood, and, as the most effectual way, he
lied deliberately to him.
"Frantic adventure," drawled Tantroy. "Didn't know League dealt in
people that kind."
"Of course, I saw all sorts," corrected Salt hastily, as though he
feared that he had indicated too closely the trend of his business;
"only it happened that those were the most amusing," and to emphasise
the fact he launched into another anecdote. At an out-of-the-way village
there was neither hotel nor inn. His business was unfinished, and it was
desirable that he should stay the night there. At last he heard of a
small farm-house where apartments were occasionally let, and, making his
way there, he asked if he could have a room. The woman seemed doubtful.
"Of course, as I am a stranger, I should wish to pay you in advance,"
said Salt. "It isn't that, sir," replied the hostess, "but I like to be
sure of making people comfortable." "I don't think that we shall
disagree about that," he urged. "Perhaps not," she admitted, "but the
last gentleman was very hard to please. Everything I got him he'd had
better somewhere else till he was sick of it. But," she added in a burst
of confidence, "look what a swell _he_ was! I knew that nothing would
satisfy him when I saw him come in a motor-car puffed out with rheumatic
tyres, and wearing a pair of them _blase_ kid boots."
Tantroy contributed an appreciative cackle, and Salt, leaning back in
his chair, pressed against a pile of books standing on his desk so that
they fell to the ground with a crash.
By the time he had picked them up again a telegram was waiting at his
elbow. He took it, opened it with a word of apology, and with a sharp
exclamation pulled out his watch. Before Tantroy could realise what was
happening, Salt had caught up his hat and gloves, slammed down his
self-locking desk, and, after a single hasty glance round the room, was
standing at the door.
"Excuse me, won't you?" he called back. "Most important. Can just catch
a train. Pull my door to after you, please," and the next minute he was
gone.
Left to himself, Tantroy's first action was not an unnatural one in the
circumstance. He picked up the telegram which Salt had left in his wild
hurry and read it. "_Come at once, if you wish to see Vernon alive_,"
was the imperative message, and it appeared to have been handed in at
Croydon half an hour before. He stepped to the window, and from behind
the curtains he saw Salt run down the steps into the road, call a hansom
from the rank near at hand, and disappear in the direction of Victoria
at a gallop.
Mr Tantroy sat down again, and his eyes ran over the various objects in
the room in quick succession. The code typewriter. He had all he wanted
from that. Salt's desk. Locked, of course. The girl's desk. Locked, and,
as he knew, not worth the trouble of unlocking with his duplicate key.
The safe----His heart gave a bound, his eyes stood wide in incredulous
surprise, and he sprang to his feet and stealthily crossed the room to
make sure of his astounding luck. The safe was unlocked! The door stood
just an inch or so ajar, and Salt, having failed to notice it in his
hurried glance, was on his way to Croydon!
Living in a pretentious, breathless age, drawn into a social circle
beside whose feverish artificiality the _natural_ artificiality
inseparable from any phase of civilisation stood comparable to a sturdy,
healthy tree, badly brought up, neglected, petted, the Honourable
Frederick Tantroy had grown to the form of the vacuous pose which he had
adopted. Beneath it lay his real character. A moderately honest man
would not have played his part, but an utterly weak one could not have
played it. It demanded certain qualities not contemptible. There were
risks to be taken, and he was prepared to take them, and in their
presence his face took on a stronger, even better, look. He bolted the
door on the inside, picked up a few sheets of paper from the desk-top,
and without any sign of nervousness or haste began to do his work.
It was fully three hours later when Salt returned; for with that extreme
passion for covering every possible contingency that marked his career,
he had been to Croydon. Many a better scheme has failed through the
neglect of a smaller detail. The room, when he entered it and secured
the door, looked exactly as when he left, three hours before. For all
the disarrangement he had caused, Tantroy might have melted out of it.
On the top of his desk, at the side nearest to the safe, lay a packet of
octavo scribbling paper. He took out the sheets and twice counted them.
Thirty-one, and he had left thirty-four. His face betrayed no emotion.
Satisfaction at having outwitted a spy was merged in regret that there
must need be one, and pain on Hampden's account that his nephew should
be the traitor. He unlocked his desk and carefully lifted out the
cigarette-case, pulled open the safe door, and took up the fictitious
letter-book. To the naked eye the finger-prints on each were scarcely
discernible, but under the magnifying lenses of the superimposing glass
all doubt was finally dispelled. They were there, they corresponded,
they were identical. Thumb to thumb, finger to finger, and line to line
they fitted over one another without a blur or fault. It was, as it
often proved to be in those days, hanging evidence.
Salt relocked the safe, tore out the used pages of the letter-book, and
reduced them to ashes on the spot. The less important remains of the
book he took with him to his chambers, and there burned them from cover
to cover before he went to bed.
It had served its purpose, and not a legitimate trace remained. Around
the stolen copy the policy of the coming strife might crystallise, and
towards any issue it might raise Salt could look with confidence.
Finally, if the unforeseen arose, the way was clear for Sir John to
denounce a shameless forgery, and who could contradict his indignant
word?