NICK EXPLAINS HIMSELF
For a while they drove in silence. Jerry seemed supremely content,
dreamily watching the green fields slide by. Nick was far from happy.
This thing he had got to say was becoming more terrifying every minute.
He'd chased her halfway across England to tell her the truth, and now
he'd got her he didn't know how to begin. Surreptitiously he glanced at
her. She looked so young, so unused to fear and tragedy.
Then suddenly Jerry spoke, and he was conscious of a guilty sense of
relief at this temporary reprieve.
'_Very_ nice bus, Nick.'
'Not too bad, is she?'
'By the way,' she looked at him inquiringly, 'how many cars have you
got?'
'Only one. What d'you take me for--Rockefeller?'
'No; but last time I saw you in a car, it was a Bentley.'
'She wasn't mine. I'd borrowed her.'
'Oh!' There was a pause. 'From Michael?'
'Got it in one.'
A worried little frown wrinkled her brow, and she looked straight
ahead. Nick smiled at her.
'What is it?' he asked.
'I was only wondering ...' the sentence trailed off.
'About Michael?'
'Yes.'
'He doesn't love me awfully,' said Nick, at a venture.
She glanced at him swiftly, and looked away, as if he had guessed her
thoughts too closely.
'It's because I've butted in and kidnapped you, and left him to drive
home with Manvers. Who shall blame him?'
'Nonsense!' said Jerry. 'It's something much deeper than that, but I
don't know what it is. I wish I did. Do you?'
'I can guess.'
'Then tell me. It's all very odd. I should have said you were just the
sort of man he _would_ like.'
Nick laughed aloud at her serious face.
'Oh, he doesn't disapprove of me from his own point of view, but I
shrewdly suspect him of thinking I'm not the sort of man for you to
like.'
'Why not?'
'Largely because of my profession.'
'What _is_ your profession?'
Nick glanced round with exaggerated caution, and then said in an
impressive undertone: 'I'm a burglar!'
Jerry bubbled with laughter.
'Nick, you idiot! Do be serious.'
'My dear, I was never more serious in my life. One of the penalties I
have to pay for being a successful liar is that when I tell the cold
truth no one believes me. Of course I'm a burglar, but don't tell Sir
Toby. He might have me up.'
'Not he! He'd love it. Isn't he a dear?'
'He's a great soul. Have you known him long?'
'Met him for the first time to-day.'
'Heavens! What was Bobby about not to have introduced you years ago?'
'I can't imagine. And, incidentally, it wasn't Bobby that brought me
here to-day. It was Michael's brain-wave.'
'Good for Michael! How did he meet ... oh, but Sir Toby's his family
lawyer, isn't he? He's known Michael since he was in crawlers and all
that.'
'Metaphorically, if not actually. Michael was never in England until a
month or two ago.'
'Wasn't he? I didn't know that. I like Michael. Tell me about him.'
Nick had his own reasons for wanting to know about Michael, and he
watched the girl's face keenly, but Jerry, serenely unconscious, talked
on.
'I don't know much about him myself. Michael isn't given to
confidences. Beyond the fact that he's spent his life between Australia
and one of the Western Pacific islands, I know nothing of his personal
history.'
'But I want to know a lot more,' said Nick. 'Why did he inhabit a
Pacific island? I can't see him with flowers in his hair, dancing
_hula-hulas_ on the beach.'
'Neither can I,' agreed Jerry, with a chuckle. 'Must he necessarily
have done that, if he lived there?'
'The best people do, I believe, but I admit I don't know very much
about it. Why did he live there? Do go on, Jerry. Don't interrupt the
story with these irrelevancies.'
'Grr! You...!'
'Our friendship progresses,' said Nick. 'Very soon you'll attack me
with a spanner.'
'Not while you're driving at sixty. Self-preservation is my long suit.
To continue, in spite of your quite fatuous interruptions, Michael's
father practically owned this island. He was an Irishman, and a poet,
and was frightfully keen on sailing. He married an Australian girl, and
they had some marvellous voyages. They both hated civilization, and
never bothered about the rest of the world. It accounts for lots of
Michael's peculiarities, I think. He's rather a darling, though, and a
born brother. When and where did you first meet him, Nick?'
'Three weeks ago, and about thirty miles from here, at a
very society-society dance, given by a dear good lady called
Hamilton-Browne.'
'Heavens! It doesn't sound in Michael's line.'
'I don't think it was, but I didn't get much chance to talk to him,
because he was a guest, whereas I was a waiter.'
Jerry clapped her hands to her ears in despair.
'Nick, this is exactly like a conversation out of "Alice in
Wonderland." I'm sorry, but you must explain. I can't bear it any
longer.'
Nick bit his lip, and prepared to take the plunge, but once more Jerry
forestalled him.
'First of all, suppose you explain this burglary business,' she
suggested.
'All right, I'll try. That takes us a long way back. Back to the year
of Grace 1920, when I first took to crime.'
'Why did you?'
Nick considered.
'It's rather hard to explain truthfully, because there were so many
reasons all working together. In the first place, I had come out of
the army with no people, no settled career, and no money beyond my war
bonus. I was rather better off than most fellows, because I didn't
spend very much leave at home. I used to wander round, you know, poking
my nose into other people's business. Spent five days in Brussels once.
That was rather exciting.'
'Secret Service, Nick?'
'Sort of. Unofficially. Of course, I was only a "pore blooming
infantryman" really, but I knew some fellows in the intelligence,
and they were kind to me.' He laughed. 'I've never grown out of
pretending, you know. I love dressing-up and being someone else just as
much now as I did when I was six.'
Jerry chuckled. 'Go on, Nick.'
'Well, as I was saying, I had more money than most of 'em when I was
demobbed, and I meant to have a holiday, and I jolly well had it. Then
the others--fellows like me, who'd gone straight from school into the
war--began to look for jobs. They didn't find 'em, of course. They
were untrained; they'd had four years or so in a position of some
responsibility, and employers didn't feel like puttin' 'em to lick
stamps. It was far better to get eighteen-year-old boys just starting,
with a proper appreciation of the importance of office life. So my pals
found themselves in the soup, most of 'em. Some were lucky and got
jobs, and tried to like it. Some drifted from doss-house to doss-house,
slipping farther down the hill with every move. Some saw that coming,
and turned the gas on in the oven--with their heads inside.
'Then I began to get angry. Not for myself exactly--I always had a
curious conceit about my ability to survive--but because of all the rot
that had been talked in those four years. Here they were, our heroes,
our saviours of the world, our gallant defenders, and nobody gave a
hoot what happened to them. I was very young then; I couldn't see any
explanation in it. Worst of all--and this still makes me unreasonably
angry--the men themselves were in an awful way. My batman had been a
dockyard matey, and I met him, by accident, one day. He was dying,
of sheer starvation. He wasn't the only one, either. They were the
salt of the earth, those fellows, and they were starving, while the
fat profiteers bought more Rolls-Royces. As I say, I was young and
foolish, and it made me angry. I swore I wasn't going to be driven
out of England, and at the same time I wasn't going to work like a
galley-slave in an office to add to the blighters' peace-time profits.
I'd done my whack of slaving, I thought. Still less did I mean to
starve. I'd kept their dinners safe for them for four years, and now
they could provide me with mine. And they've done it, royally, ever
since. The work entailed in collecting the cash was pure fun, and added
just that spice of excitement that makes bread-winning worth while. I
made quite a lot of money, enough to live on for the rest of my life,
if I wanted to stop work, but I don't think I should have given it up
if I hadn't found an even more amusing game. I may say that I haven't
burgled for over two years now.'
'But weren't you burgling that night at Barton, when you were
pretending to be a waiter?'
'Not that time, though Michael thought I was. I went down there to try
and get some information.'
'Did you get what you wanted?'
'No; but I overheard a telephone conversation that concerned me
rather closely. Then I realised that if I was going to make use of
the information my eavesdropping had given me, I would have to be in
London before 5 A.M., and as it was past midnight by then, I
thought I'd better be going. Unfortunately, the sudden departure of
a hired waiter in a fast car looks a bit suspicious. Michael saw me
go, and followed in his Bentley. I think he was bored and wanted a
bit of sport. Anyway, he jolly nearly caught me--damned good driver,
Michael!--but luckily I managed to swop cars with him.'
'How on earth ...' began Jerry, and then another thought struck her,
wiping the first question out of her mind.
'_Nick!_ That's why you had been driving all night!'
'Yes.'
'And because of me you had all that for nothing. Oh, Nick, I'm so
sorry. I remember you looked at your watch, and seemed in a hurry. And
then quite suddenly you weren't in a hurry any longer. Nick, was it
frightfully important? I couldn't know, could I?'
'Sweet child, of course you couldn't. And you don't think I regret it,
do you?'
'Nick, you--you saved my sanity that morning. I simply don't know what
I should have done without you. And they tried to make me think you
were the murderer!' Her eyes flashed. 'I never believed it. If they
only knew....'
'O God!' Nick's voice was sharp with pain. 'Jerry, darling, for
Heaven's sake hear me out. In a way, I am. I've been chasing all over
England to find you to-day, to tell you about it, but I don't know how
I'm going to do it, now I've got you.'
'I don't understand,' said Jerry, bewildered.
'Tell me this. Do you know why your father was murdered?'
Jerry hesitated for a moment.
'Yes,' she said at last.
'That makes it easier to explain. I am the man who gave him that letter
at the club. Will you believe me when I say that I never dreamt I'd be
putting him in danger?'
'But....' Jerry stared blankly.
'I told you just now that I gave up burglary for a better game,' said
Nick.
'Yes. But what has that to do with it?'
He told her, quietly and without much detail. He told her of the
railway smash and the impersonation of Davies. A sparkle of excitement
lit her eyes when he described his escape from the meeting of the
Fraternity; but when he told of how he had seen her father, and decided
to trust him, Nick kept his gaze on the road ahead. It didn't seem
quite fair to watch her face just then.
'It was my fault,' he concluded, 'and I shall never forgive myself. I
underrated the Chief. But I never dreamt that he would be able to trace
your father, and ... Jerry, for God's sake, say you believe me!'
She spoke quietly, but with a curious certainty:
'Of course I do.'
Nick was silent. He could not trust himself to speak. Jerry glanced at
him, puzzled by his expression. He realised her perplexity, and made a
colossal effort.
'The bus _is_ running well this evening.'
'Pretty poor,' he reflected, with a sardonic smile at his own expense.
But Jerry jumped at it.
'She's a lamb, Nick. Will you teach me how to drive, some day?'
'Rather! Would you like to steer? Here's a good straight bit of road.'
'Oh, _may_ I?'
Nick relinquished the wheel, and flung his left arm along the back
of the seat, watching her glowing, childlike face. It was dangerous,
but he could not resist it. She was so near now, leaning against his
shoulder. So near and so lovable, and so utterly unconscious. She did
not speak, being entirely absorbed in steering. Nick was silent too,
but for other reasons.
At last....
'Nick, here's a car coming. You'd better take her.'
He dropped one hand onto the wheel, and Jerry let it go.
'Oh, Nick, it's heavenly! Do teach me to drive, and then I'll come and
fetch you next time you burgle a house, and help you get away quickly.
I'd love to be a burglar too. Can't you teach me the trade, and take me
into partnership?'
Nick bit his lip.
'The idea doesn't appeal to him,' said Jerry to the speedometer.
'Doesn't.... Good Lord! Jerry, will you marry me?'
She slid away from him, staring wide-eyed.
'My _dear_ Nick!'
Her startled face made him take refuge for them both in nonsense.
'Why not? I'd be an exemplary husband. I'd give up burglary and only
rob on the Stock Exchange. I'd catch the nine-fifteen every morning,
and be home punctually at half-past six. I'd never swear, and----Gosh!
we nearly hit that hen!'
'You ought to have seen it coming. The first thing to cultivate when
driving a car is psychic insight into the ways of hens and push-bikes.'
'Very true. As a general rule I have it to a marked degree, but to-day
I'm not in the best of form. I'm thinking of something else.'
Jerry looked straight ahead. Nick had a twinkle in his eye as he
watched her. He had recovered his balance. As for Jerry, she'd got to
get used to the idea, so one had better chaff about it.
'It's extraordinary how falling in love puts one's eye out.'
'It must be a distressing state. I hope I shall remain immune.'
'Oh, but that's worse. It's like not seeing a play that everyone else
has seen. They're all discussing it, and you can't.'
He could see her trying not to smile.
'You're talking nonsense, Nick. There's no need for the subject to
arise at all.'
'Isn't there? Do you think I'm the sort of chap who suffers in silence?'
The smile broke into a chuckle.
'Nick, you're unique. Let's talk about your crimes. Whom do you burgle?'
'Profiteers, mostly.'
'Robin Hood up to date.'
'Exactly, except that Robin Hood was a bit luckier. Maid Marian----'
'Tell me, are you wanted--is that the word?--by Scotland Yard?'
'Oh, rather! Terribly badly. But, as a matter of fact, I've given up
burglary. My career of crime is a thing of the past from now on.'
'Won't life seem awfully tame without it?'
'I don't think so. You see, I took to burglary because I wanted variety
and excitement. When I marry you I shall have all I can deal with,
without going out to look for it.'
Jerry blinked.
'Did you say "When"?' she asked.
Nick grinned.
'That's one to you,' he admitted.
Jerry gave him a smile.
'Thank you,' she said. 'And now, do you mind awfully if we change the
subject?'
'Must we?'
'Please. Think of something else.'
'No--hang it, that's more than you can expect of me.'
'It was said deliberately,' explained Jerry. 'If I think of a topic,
you will consider that you have every right to side-track me. If _you_
do, you can't!'
Nick laughed outright.
'_Can't_ I?'
'Please, Nick!'
A Ford van close ahead of them suddenly swung to the right, without
warning, and made for a side road. Nick jammed on his brakes to avoid
a crash. There was a violent doubleway skid, the two-seater rocked for
one agonising moment on two wheels, and then righted herself and sped
on.
'Near thing, that,' said Jerry calmly.
Nick looked at her appreciatively.
'There's no doubt about it, you're a courageous child,' he said.
'William used to tell me it wasn't courage, but pure love of danger,'
said Jerry. 'As a matter of fact, he was just as bad himself. He
adored thrills.'
Nick hesitated.
'Did he ... did he tell you about me?'
'No. You asked him not to, didn't you?'
'Yes. I didn't know you existed; otherwise I shouldn't have put it like
that. But how do you know?'
'Because I found his diary. Nick, would you mind stopping for a minute?'
Obediently he pulled in to the side of the road.
'I want you to read this,' said Jerry, pulling some papers out of her
pocket. 'I found it yesterday.'
Nick took the crumpled pages in silence. Jerry watched his grave face
as he read. Finally he gave them back to her, and their eyes met.
'I wish to God I'd known him,' he said.
'So do I! You would have liked each other. Now, listen to me, Nick. I
am William's understudy. What are we going to do about it? By the way,
do you know Mr. Robertson?'
'Not personally. He is the Chief.'
'Do you know anything about him besides that?'
'No. That's what I've been trying to find out for the last six months.
Are you going to help me, Jerry?'
'Of course I am.'
'I warn you it may mean doing things you don't see a reason for at the
moment.'
'I'll obey orders. You're in charge of this show.'
Nick turned to her impulsively, and then pulled himself together and
started the car.
'It's safer driving,' he said grimly.
'I expect it is,' agreed Jerry. 'Michael and Bobby might catch us up if
we stopped much longer.'
Nick grinned rather wildly, and stood on the gas.
'In the first place,' he went on, 'how many people have you shown that
diary to?'
'Michael, Bobby, and Sir Toby.'
'Sir Toby? What made you tell him?'
'Well, Michael was with me when I found it, and later, when Bobby came
in, I showed it to him. He's been trying to find out clues and all
that sort of thing, you know.' Nick nodded. 'Bobby was frightfully
interested, of course, but he got a bit too domineering, and wanted
to take the whole thing out of my hands. That made me furious. I know
Bobby was only trying to help, but he irritated me. I ticked him off
pretty thoroughly, and then said rather pointedly that I wished I had
someone of some experience to advise me. Michael suggested Sir Toby; I
said I'd let him introduce me, and that if I liked him I'd ask for his
advice.'
'Poor Bobby! How did he take that suggestion?'
'Oh, he was all for it. Thought it an admirable plan. He's as fond of
Sir Toby as Michael is.'
'I see. Well, what advice did Sir Toby give you?'
'To my immense relief he didn't urge me to hand the matter over to the
police. In fact, he seemed to understand absolutely. He pointed out
that the bank will probably be watched--I'm certain William would have
told the man that the document was there--and asked if I would like him
to fetch the paper and keep it safe for me, and if the right man didn't
turn up for it before June 10th, he would post it himself.'
Jerry paused, a puzzled frown on her face.
'It seems rather pointless now,' she said, 'but somehow when Sir Toby
was talking about it, it seemed to solve all the problems. I wonder if
there was something else, some other reason I've forgotten?'
'Never mind,' said Nick reassuringly. 'What did you say?'
'I accepted gratefully. I had no idea I was going to meet the right man
so soon. But it doesn't matter. We can easily let him know, and tell
him not to fetch the paper, or let him get it for you, whichever you
prefer.'
'How was he going to get it?'
'I gave him a note for the bank manager.'
For a few minutes Nick drove in silence. Jerry waited for his decision.
Finally he spoke.
'Well, my child, I think somehow we won't let him know just yet, but
all the same, we'll fetch the paper first.'
'But he's bound to know as soon as he goes to the bank.'
'Not necessarily. Don't let's hurt old Toby's feelings. Let's get the
paper to-night, but leave the envelope, stuck down again. Then he'll be
none the wiser, if we tell the bank manager to keep his mouth shut. I'd
hate Sir Toby to feel he wasn't trusted.'
'As I said before, this is your show,' said Jerry, 'but there's one
flaw in the scheme. We can't get it to-night. The bank will have shut
ages ago.'
'Is it the Hampstead branch bank?'
'Yes.'
'Then it's a hundred to one the manager lives on the premises. I think
we'll wangle it somehow. Now listen, Jerry; I've got a plan, but you'll
have to forgive me if I can't explain much at this stage.'
'Go ahead, Nick. I'll agree to anything you like, on one condition.'
'And that is----?'
'That you'll let me be in at the death.'
Nick looked at her with some surprise. She faced him steadily, and he
saw the grim determination in her eyes.
'Right. If it's humanly possible, you shall be,' he said quietly.
'Now look here; after we've got this paper I want to take you to the
Stricklands' flat. They're friends of mine, and they're the only
other people in the world who know as much about me as you do. Jack
Strickland's a C.I.D. man, and the best friend I have. His twin sister
Jill is a darling, and I know they'll both understand. Will you come?'
'Rather; but can't I get some clothes from Quebec Street first?'
'Daren't risk it. The house may be watched. Jill will lend you all you
need for a day or two.'
'All right.'
'In the second place, I don't want you to communicate with anyone until
you see me again and I can tell you what's happening.'
'I don't like that, Nick. Michael and Bobby have been awfully good to
me, and they'll be worried.'
'I'll let Michael know. Will that do?'
'Of course.'
'Bless you, Jerry, you're a partner in a thousand! I wish I'd known you
eight years ago.'
Jerry laughed.
'You were in your cradle, of course,' went on Nick, 'but you must have
been a nice child.'
'William had a hard life with me,' she told him; and then, suddenly,
the smile faded out of her eyes and her mouth set hard.
'Well?' said Nick.
She looked up, her small face white through the dusk.
'Nick, are we going to get this man Robertson?'
'I think so,' said Nick quietly, and put out a large hand.
Jerry gripped it tightly.
'I'm glad it was you,' she said.
Nick drove on in silence. For the second time that evening he felt that
he could not trust himself to answer.