A HOT SCENT
INSPECTOR FRENCH had now so many points of attack in his inquiry that he
felt somewhat at a loss as to which he should proceed with first. The
tracing of Mrs. Vane was the immediate goal, but it was by no means
clear which particular line of inquiry would most surely and rapidly
lead to that end. Nothing would be easier than to spend time on side
issues, and in this case a few hours might make all the difference
between success and failure. The lady had already had five days’ start,
and he could not afford to allow her to increase her lead by a single
unnecessary minute.
He considered the matter while he lunched, eventually concluding that
the first step was the discovery of the maid, Susan Scott. The
preliminary spadework of this required no skill and could be done by an
assistant, leaving himself free for other inquiries.
Accordingly he returned to the Yard and set two men to work, one to make
a list of all the registry offices in the Edgware Road district, the
other to ring up those agencies one by one and inquire if the girl’s
name was on their books. Then he went in to see his chief, told him of
his discoveries, and obtained the necessary authority to interrogate the
manager of Mrs. Vane’s bank on the affairs of that lady.
He reached the bank just before closing time and was soon closeted with
the manager. Mr. Harrod, once satisfied that his usual professional
reticence might in this case be set aside, gave him some quite
interesting information. Mrs. Vane had opened an account with him some
five years earlier, about the same time, French noted, as the house in
St. John’s Wood Road had been leased. Her deposit had not been large,
seldom amounting to and never exceeding a thousand pounds. It had stood
at from four to eight hundred until comparatively recently, but within
the past few months it had dwindled until some ten weeks earlier it had
vanished altogether. Indeed, the payment of a cheque presented at this
period had involved an overdraft of some fifteen pounds, and the teller
had consulted Mr. Harrod before cashing it. Mr. Harrod, knowing Crewe
Lodge and the scale on which the Vanes lived, had not hesitated in
giving the necessary authority, and his judgment had proved correct, for
some three days later Mrs. Vane had personally lodged over £100. This
had since been drawn upon, and there remained at the present time a
balance of eleven pounds odd in the lady’s favour.
All this information seemed to French to work in with the case he was
endeavouring to make. The Vanes had apparently been living beyond their
income, or at least Mrs. Vane had been living beyond hers, and she was
finding it increasingly difficult to make ends meet. He did not see that
any other interpretation of the dwindling balance and the overdraft
could be found. That overdraft represented, he imagined, part of the
lady’s ticket to America. Then a hundred pounds was paid in on the very
next day, as he soon saw, to that on which Mr. Williams had paid Mrs. X
her £3000. Here was at least a suggestion of motive for the robbery, and
also the first fruits of its accomplishment. Moreover the subsequent
withdrawal of all but a small balance, left doubtless to disarm
suspicion, would unquestionably work in with the theory of flight. On
the whole, French was well pleased with the results of his call.
But he was even more pleased to find on his return to the Yard that his
assistants had located a registry office whose books included the name
of Susan Scott. By some extraordinary chance, the very first call they
made struck oil. The men, of course, had realised that there must be
many Susan Scotts in London, but when they found that this one had
placed her name on the firm’s books on the day after Mrs. Vane’s
departure, they felt sure that they were on the right track. They had
not, therefore, proceeded further with their inquiry, but had spent
their time trying to locate the Inspector with the object of passing on
the information with the minimum of delay.
The address was Mrs. Gill, 75 Horsewell Street, Edgware Road, and
thither before many minutes had passed Inspector French was wending his
way. The registry office was a small concern, consisting of only two
rooms in a private house in a quiet street running out of Edgware Road.
In the outer were two young women of the servant class, and these eyed
French curiously, evidently seeing in him a prospective employer. Mrs.
Gill was engaged with a third girl, but a few seconds after French’s
arrival she took her departure and he was called into the private room.
The lady was not at first inclined to be communicative. But when French
revealed his profession and threatened her with the powers and majesty
of the law, she became profusely apologetic and anxious to help. She
looked up her books and informed him that the girl was lodging at No. 31
Norfolk Terrace, Mistletoe Road.
As it was close by, French walked to the place. Here again his luck held
in a way that he began to consider almost uncanny. A tall, coarsely
good-looking blonde opened the door and announced in answer to his
inquiry that she herself was Miss Scott. Soon he was sitting opposite to
her in a tiny parlour, while she stared at him with something
approaching insolence out of her rather bold eyes.
French, sizing her up rapidly, was courteous but firm. He began by
ostentatiously laying his notebook on the table, opening it at a fresh
page, and after saying, “Miss _Susan_ Scott, isn’t it?” wrote the name
at the head of the sheet.
“Now, Miss Scott,” he announced briskly, “I am Inspector French from
Scotland Yard, and I am investigating a case of murder and robbery.” He
paused, and seeing the girl was duly impressed, continued, “It happens
that your recent mistress, Mrs. Vane, is wanted to give evidence in the
case, and I have come to you for some information about where to find
her.”
The girl made an exclamation of surprise, and a look, partly of fear and
partly of thrilled delight, appeared in her blue eyes.
“I don’t know anything about her,” she declared.
“I’m sure you know quite a lot,” French returned. “All I want is to ask
you some questions. If you answer them truly, you have nothing to fear,
but, as you probably know, there are very serious penalties indeed for
keeping back evidence. You could be sent to prison for that.”
Having by these remarks banished the girl’s look of insolence and
reduced her to a suitable frame of mind, French got on to business.
“Am I right in believing that you have been until last Friday house and
parlourmaid to Mrs. Vane, of Crewe Lodge, St. John’s Wood Road?”
“Yes, I was there for about three months.”
French, to assist not only his own memory but the impressiveness of the
interview, noted the reply in his book.
“Three months,” he repeated deliberately. “Very good. Now, why did you
leave?”
“Because I had to,” the girl said sulkily. “Mrs. Vane was closing the
house.”
French nodded.
“So I understood. Tell me what happened, please; just in your own
words.”
“She came in that afternoon shortly before four, all fussed like and
hurrying, and said she was leaving immediately for New York. She said
she had just had a cable that Mr. Vane had had an accident there, and
they were afraid he wouldn’t get over it. She said for cook to get her
some tea while I helped her pack. She just threw her clothes in her
suitcases. My word, if I had done packing like that I shouldn’t half
have copped it! By the time she’d finished, cook had tea ready, and
while mistress was having it, cook and I packed. I started to clear away
the tea things, but mistress said there wasn’t time for that, for me
just to leave them and run out and get two taxis. She said there was a
special for the American boat that she must catch. So I got the taxis,
and she got into one and cook and I into the other, and we drove away
together, and that’s all I know about it.”
“What time was that?”
“About half-past four, I should think. I didn’t look.”
“Where did you get the taxis?”
“On the stand at the end of Gardiner Street.”
“Who gave Mrs. Vane’s taxi man his address?”
“I did. It was Euston.”
“It was rather hard lines on you and the cook, turning you out like that
at a moment’s notice. I hope she made it up to you?”
Miss Scott smiled scornfully.
“That was all right,” she answered. “We told her about it, and she gave
us a fiver apiece, as well as our month’s wages.”
“Not so bad,” French admitted. “Who locked up the house?”
“She did, and took the key.”
“And what happened to you and cook?”
“We drove on here and I got out. This is my sister’s house, you
understand. Cook went on to Paddington. She lives in Reading or
somewhere down that way. Mrs. Vane said that when she came back she
would look us up, and if we were disengaged we could come back to her.
But she said not to keep out of a place for her, as she didn’t know how
long she might have to stay in America.”
French paused in thought, then went on:
“Was Mrs. Vane much from home while you were with her?”
“No, she was only away once. But she stayed over three weeks that time.
It’s a bit strange that it was an accident, too. Her sister in Scotland
fell and broke her collar bone, so she told us, and she had to go to
keep house till she was better. Somewhere in Scotland, she said.”
“When was that?”
The girl hesitated.
“I don’t know that I could say exactly,” she answered at last. “She’s
back about six weeks or two months, and she left over three weeks before
that, about a couple of weeks after I went. Say about ten weeks
altogether.”
This was distinctly satisfactory. Mrs. Vane’s absence seemed to cover
the period of Mrs. X’s visit to America.
“I should like to fix the exact dates if I could,” French persisted, “or
at least the date she came back. Just think, will you, please. Is there
nothing you can remember by?”
The girl presumably thought, for she was silent for some moments, but
her cogitations were unproductive. She shook her head.
“Did you stay in the house while she was away?”
“No. I came here and cook went home.”
This was better. The attention of a number of people had been drawn to
the date, and some one of them should surely be able to fix it.
“On what day of the week did you go back?” French prompted.
The girl considered this.
“It was a Thursday,” she said at last. “I remember that now, because
Thursday is my night out, and I remembered thinking that that week I
shouldn’t get it.”
French was delighted with the reply. It was on a Thursday night, seven
weeks earlier, that Mrs. X had driven from the Savoy to Victoria, left
her boxes there, and vanished. The thing was working in.
“What time of the day did she arrive?”
“In the evening.” Miss Scott answered promptly this time. “It was about
half eight or a quarter to nine.”
Better and better! Mrs. X left the Savoy shortly before eight, and it
would take her about three-quarters of an hour to drive to Victoria,
leave her trunks in the left luggage office, and get out to St. John’s
Wood Road.
“Now,” French went on, “if you or your sister could just remember the
week that happened, I should be very much obliged.”
Susan Scott sat with a heavy frown on her rather pretty features.
Concentrated thought was evidently an unwonted exercise. But at last her
efforts bore fruit.
“I’ve got it now,” she said with something of triumph in her tone. “It
was the last week of November. I remember it because my brother-in-law
got his new job in the first week of December, and that was the
following Monday. I heard that much about his job that I ought to know.”
French had scarcely doubted that this would prove to be the date, but it
was most excellent to have it fixed in so definite a manner. He felt
that he was progressing in his weaving of the net round the elusive Mrs.
X.
“That’s very good,” he said approvingly. “Now will you tell me about Mr.
Vane?”
The girl sniffed.
“Him?” she said scornfully. “There ain’t much to tell about him. He
didn’t trouble us much with his company.”
“How was that? Did they not get on? Remember we’re speaking in
confidence.”
“Why, I never even saw him. He didn’t turn up all the three months I was
there. But I heard about him from cook. He was away all the time or next
thing to it. When he did come, it was generally for two days. He would
come late in the evening, so cook said, and stay for two days without
ever going so much as outside the door, and then go away again in the
evening.”
“You mean that if he came, say, on a Monday night, he would stay until
the following Wednesday night?”
“Yes; or sometimes for three days, so cook said.”
“What time in the evening would he come and go?”
“About half-past ten he always came, and a little before eight he left.”
“Do you mean that he arrived and left at the same time on each visit?”
“Yes, always about the same time.”
“After dark?”
“No. Just at those times. It was the same summer and winter. At least,
that’s all what cook told me. We talked about it many a time. She
thought he was balmy.”
French was somewhat puzzled by this information. The whole story had
what he called with a fine disregard for metaphorical purity, a “fishy
ring.” At first it had looked uncommonly like as if Mr. Vane were paying
clandestine visits to his own house, and, if so, he might well be the
man the old stage doorkeeper had spoken of, and still have another
establishment elsewhere. But this last answer seemed to suggest some
other explanation of Vane’s mysterious movements. After a pause, French
went on:
“Did it ever strike you he was trying to keep his visits secret?”
“I can’t say it did,” the girl answered with apparent regret. “Cook
never said that. But,” more hopefully, “it might have been that,
mightn’t it?”
“I don’t know,” French rejoined. “I’m asking you.”
Miss Scott didn’t know either, but in her opinion the Inspector’s
suggestion might well be the truth. French noted the matter as one for
future consideration as he continued his interrogation.
“What was Mr. Vane like in appearance? Did cook ever say?”
Cook, it appeared, had supplied information on this point also. Even
French, who knew the ways of servants, was amazed at the detailed
thoroughness with which these two had evidently discussed their
employers’ affairs. Mr. Vane was tall, but stooped, with a sallow
complexion, a heavy dark moustache, and glasses.
As French listened to this description an almost incredible idea flashed
into his mind. He seemed to see a vision of the Duke & Peabody office in
Amsterdam, and to hear again the voice of the dapper agent, Schoofs,
saying: “A tall man, but stooped, with a sallow complexion, a heavy dark
moustache, and glasses.” Could it be? Could this mysterious Mr. Vane be
none other than his old acquaintance, Vanderkemp?
For a time he sat motionless, lost in thought, as he considered the
possibility. It would certainly clear up a good deal that was mysterious
in the case. It would account for Vanderkemp’s actions previous to the
murder, as well as his bolt to Switzerland; it would supply a cause for
Sylvia Duke’s perturbation and for the postponement of the wedding; and
it would explain how Mrs. Vane received her warning, Mr. Duke having
stated he would, without delay, tell Vanderkemp of the discovery of
Cissie Winter. The choice of the name Vane even tended in the same
direction. There were advantages in an alias beginning with the same
letter as the real name, lest an inadvertent initial on clothing or
elsewhere should give the secret away. Moreover, the theory involved
nothing inherently impossible. Vanderkemp was then, and had been for
some time, ostensibly on an extended tour in the United States, so that,
as far as he could see at present an alibi was out of the question.
At first sight it seemed to French as if he had hit on the solution of
the mystery, but as he continued turning it over in his mind he became
less and less certain. Several important points were not covered by the
theory. First of all, it did not, in his opinion, square with
Vanderkemp’s personality. The Inspector had a very exalted opinion of
his own powers as a reader of character—with considerable
justification, it must be admitted—and the more he thought of
Vanderkemp’s bearing during their momentous interview at Barcelona, the
more satisfied he felt of the traveller’s innocence. He found it hard to
believe, further, that a man who had just benefited to the extent of
over £30,000 would be able to deny himself at least a very slight
betterment in his standard of living. But the real difficulty was to
connect Vanderkemp with Miss Winter’s escapade with the sixteen
diamonds. How did she receive them? She was in the Savoy building all
the time between the theft at Hatton Garden and the traveller’s
departure from London, and it was therefore impossible that they could
have met. Nor did French think it likely that so dangerous a package
would have been entrusted to other hands or to the post.
Here were undoubted objections to the theory, nevertheless French felt a
pleasurable glow of excitement as he wondered if they could not be met
and if he really had not reached the last lap of his long investigation.
He determined that his first action on reaching the Yard would be to put
the matter to the test.
Having arrived at this decision, he turned again to Miss Scott.
“I should like cook’s address, please.”
Miss Scott did not know cook’s address. She believed the woman lived
somewhere down near Reading, but more than that she could not say,
except that her name was Jane Hudson, and that she was small and stout
and lively.
French felt that if he wanted the woman he could find her from this
information. He scarcely hoped that she would be able to tell him more
than the parlourmaid, but thought that it might be worth while to have
her looked up on chance, and he decided to give the necessary
instructions, to one of his men on his return to the Yard.
By this time it was evident that Miss Scott had exhausted her stock of
information, and he presently took leave of her, having asked her to
ring him up if she heard or saw anything either of cook or of her former
employers.
Returning to the Yard he rang up the Hatton Garden office, and having
obtained Vanderkemp’s last known address, sent a cable to the United
States police, asking that inquiries should be made as to the man’s
whereabouts.
His next business was to find the man who had driven Mrs. Vane to
Euston. A few minutes’ walk took him to Gardiner Street, and he soon
reached the cab rank. Five vehicles were lined up, and he called the
drivers together and explained his business. He took a strong line,
demanding information as a right in his capacity of an officer of the
C.I.D. It had immediate effect.
One of the drivers said that he and the man next on the rank were called
to Crewe Lodge by a rather pretty girl about 4.30 on the afternoon in
question. It looked as if the house was being closed. A lady, apparently
the mistress, got into his friend’s taxi and was driven off, then the
girl who had called him and a friend—he took them to be
servants—entered his car and followed. He set the girl down at some
street off Maida Vale—Thistle Road or Mistletoe Road—he wasn’t just
sure, and took the other woman on to Paddington. The colleague who had
driven the lady was not then on the stand, but he had been gone a
considerable time and might turn up any moment. Would the Inspector
wait, or should the man be sent on to the Yard on his return?
French decided to wait, and in less than half an hour he was rewarded by
the appearance of the car. Taximan James Tucker remembered the evening
in question. He had followed his _confrère_ to Crewe Lodge, and a lady
whom he took to be the mistress of the house had entered his vehicle.
The girl who had called him from the stand had told him to drive to
Euston, and he had started off through North Gate and along Albert Road.
But when he had nearly reached the station the lady had spoken to him
through the tube. She had said that she had changed her mind, and would
go on to St. Pancras. He had accordingly driven to the latter station,
where the lady had paid him off.
“Had she any luggage?” French asked.
Yes, she had two or three—the man could not be quite sure—but either
two or three suitcases. No, there wouldn’t be any note of them on his
daily return as they were carried inside the vehicle. The lady got a
porter at St. Pancras, he believed, but he could not identify the man
now. No, she had spoken to no one during the journey, and he could not
suggest any reason why she should have changed her mind.
Inquiries at St. Pancras seemed to French to be the next item on his
programme, and entering Tucker’s vehicle, he was driven to the old
Midland terminus. Where, French wondered, had his quarry been going?
With Tucker’s help he fixed a few minutes before 5.00 as the hour of the
lady’s arrival, and then, after paying the man off, he went to the
time-tables to find out what trains left about that hour.
In the nature of the case—a woman making a hurried flight from the
attentions of the police—he thought it more than likely that the
journey would have been to some distant place. While a very clever
fugitive might recognise that a change to another part of London was
perhaps his safest policy, the mentality of the average criminal leaned
towards putting as many miles as possible between himself and the scene
of his crime. It was by no means a sound deduction, but in the absence
of anything better, he thought the main line trains should be first
considered.
He looked up the tables and was struck at once by the fact that an
important express left at 5.00 p.m. It called at Nottingham,
Chesterfield, Sheffield, and Leeds, and there were connections to
Harrogate, Bradford, Morecambe, and Heysham for the Belfast boat. But
any one of these places might be the starting-point of some further
journey, and unless he got a lead of some kind it was quite hopeless to
try to follow the traveller. Besides, she might not have gone by this
train. There was a 5.5 stopping train to Northampton, a 5.35 to
Nottingham, stopping at a number of intermediate places, and a 6.15
express to the north, not to mention local trains. No, he did not see
that much was to be gained from the time-tables.
He made what inquiries he could at the station, exhibiting the lady’s
photograph to officials who were on duty when the trains in question
were starting. It was, of course, a forlorn hope, and he was not greatly
disappointed when it led to nothing.
As another forlorn hope, he wired to the police at Nottingham,
Chesterfield, Sheffield, Leeds, Harrogate, Bradford, Morecambe, Heysham,
and Belfast, saying that the woman referred to in page four of the
previous week’s _Bulletin_ was believed to have gone to their respective
towns, and urging that a vigilant lookout be kept for her.
French once more felt baffled. Again in this exasperating case he was
left at a loose end. The information he gained always seemed to fail him
at the critical moment. In something very like desperation he sat down
that evening at his desk and spent a couple of hours going through his
notes of the case, wondering if by any chance he could find some further
clue which he had hitherto overlooked. After careful thought, he decided
that there was still one line of research unexplored—an unpromising
line, doubtless, but still a line. That list of dealings on the Stock
Exchange: could anything be made of that? Would, for example, the
secretaries of the various firms be able to tell him who had carried out
the transactions in question? If so, it should lead to Mrs. Vane or to
some one who knew her intimately. He was not hopeful of the result, but
he decided that if next day he had no other news he would look into it.