“Good Lord, Yeh Ling, you gave me a fright! What a creeping old devil
you are.”
“I came to see whether the dinner was successful,” said Yeh Ling
softly. His hands were covered in his wide sleeves, a little black
skull cap was pushed on the back of his head, his shabby silk suit and
white soled slippers seemed remarkably out of place in that very modern
setting.
“It was a great success, Yeh Ling,” said Tab, “wasn’t it?”
He turned to the girl and she nodded and her eyes met Yeh Ling’s and
for the fraction of a second, held them.
“I think I’ll go,” said Rex awkwardly and gripped the girl’s hand
again. “Goodnight, old man, you are a lucky old thief.” He wrung Tab’s
hand and was gone.
“Was the wine to your liking?” said Yeh Ling’s soft voice.
“Everything was beautiful,” said Ursula. There was a touch of colour in
her cheeks that had not been there before. “Thank you, Yeh Ling, you
gave us a wonderful feast. We shall be late for the theatre, Tab,” she
said, getting up hurriedly.
She was very silent in the car that drove them to the Athenæum and
Tab felt a little of the gloom which had suddenly come into their
festivity.
“Yeh Ling is a creepy sort of fellow, isn’t he?” he said.
“Yes, I suppose he is,” was her reply and that was all she said.
Ten minutes later she was sitting in a box, intent upon a stage which
she had once adorned and seemingly oblivious to everything except the
play. Tab decided that she was a little temperamental and loved her for
it.
Going out to smoke between the first two acts (she insisted upon his
going) he saw Carver standing by a tape machine in the vestibule of the
theatre. His attention was concentrated on a very prose account of a
yacht race which was coming through, but he saw Tab out of the corner
of his eye and signalled him.
“I am going home with you tonight,” he said surprisingly. “What time
will you leave Miss Ardfern?”
“I am seeing her to her hotel immediately after the show.”
“You are not going to supper anywhere?” asked the other carelessly.
“No,” said Tab, “why do you ask?”
“Then I will be waiting at the Central Hotel for you. I wish to see
you about a nephew of mine who wants to become a newspaper reporter.
Perhaps you can give me a few hints.”
Tab glanced at him suspiciously.
“I have suspected you of many weaknesses, but never of nepotism!” he
said. “You told me a few weeks back that you hadn’t a relation in the
world.”
“I have acquired a nephew since then,” said Carver calmly, his eyes
still upon the tape, “it is a poor kind of detective who can’t discover
a nephew or two. I may fall down on a murderer, but when it comes to
unearthing distant relations, I am at the top of my class. You will
find me somewhere in the shadows of the Central,” he added.
Tab did not see the detective again until he had left the girl in the
vestibule of her hotel. Coming out into the street, Carver, true to his
word, appeared from the night and took his arm.
“We will walk home. You don’t take enough exercise,” he said. “Lack of
exercise is bad for the old, but it is fatal for the young.”
“You are very chatty this evening,” said Tab. “Tell me something about
your little nephew.”
“I haven’t a nephew,” said the detective shamelessly, “but I am feeling
kind of lonely tonight. I have had a very disappointing day, Tab, and I
want to pour my woes into a sympathetic ear.”
“Faugh!” said Tab.
Carver showed no inclination to find a sympathetic listener, even when
they were back at the flat, and he had a modest whiskey and soda before
him.
“The truth is,” he said at last, in answer to a direct question, “I
have reason to believe that I am being most carefully watched.”
“By whom?” asked the startled Tab.
“By the murderer of Trasmere,” said the detective quietly. “It is a
humiliating confession for a man of my experience and proved courage
to make, but I am afraid to go home tonight, for I have a large
premonition that our unknown friend is preparing something particularly
startling in the way of trouble for me.”
“Then you really want to stay the night here?” said Tab as the fact
dawned upon him.
Carver nodded.
“Your instinct is marvellously developed,” said he. “That is just what
I want to do, if it is not inconvenient. The fact is, I had not the
moral courage to ask you before. It isn’t very pleasant to admit----”
“Oh shush!” said Tab scornfully. “You are no more scared of the
murderer than I am.”
“I am more accessible to him in my own lodgings,” said the detective
and that sounded fairly true. “If I stayed in a hotel I should be even
more accessible, so I am going to make use of you, Tab. How do you feel
about it?”
“You can bring your belongings and stay here until the case is over,”
invited Tab. “I don’t think that Rex’s old bed is made up.”
“I prefer the sofa, anyway. Luxury enfeebles and vitiates a man as it
enfeebles and vitiates a nation----”
“If you are going to be oracular, I am retiring to bed,” said Tab.
He went into his room, brought out a rug and a pillow and threw them on
to the broad settee.
“I’d like to say,” said Carver, as Tab was leaving him for the last
time, “how surprisingly good you look in evening kit. The difficulties
of making a reporter look like a gentleman must be almost insuperable,
but you have succeeded beyond my most sanguine expectations.”
Tab chuckled.
“You’re indecently humorous tonight,” he said.
He hadn’t been in bed five minutes before the light went out of the
sitting-room. Mr. Carver was apparently settling himself to sleep.
Tab’s dreams were happy, but they were strangely mixed. Within five
minutes of his head touching the pillow, he was carrying Ursula through
her scented garden and his heart was full of gratitude to providence
that this great and wonderful prize had come to him. And then in his
dream he began to feel uncomfortable. Glancing over his shoulder he saw
the sinister figure of Yeh Ling watching him and he was in the garden
no longer, but on the slope of a hill flanked by two huge pillars, and
Yeh Ling stood at the entrance of his queer house arrayed in dull gold
brocade.
“_Bang.... Bang!_”
Two shots in rapid succession.