PROMOTION FOR BALDER
A WEEK had passed, and the explosion at headquarters was ancient
history. The injured detective was making fair progress toward recovery,
and in some respects the situation was stagnant.
Elk apparently accepted failure as an inevitability, and seemed, even to
his greatest admirer, to be hypnotized into a fatalistic acceptance of
the situation. His attitude was a little deceptive. On the sixth day
following the explosion, headquarters made a raid upon the cloak-rooms,
and again, as Elk had expected, produced from every single terminus
parcels office, a brand-new bag with exactly the same equipment as the
others had had, except that the Paddington find differed from none of
its fellows.
The bags were opened by an Inspector of Explosives, after very careful
preliminary tests; but they contained nothing more deadly than the
Belgian pistols and the self-same passports, this time made out in the
name of “Clarence Fielding.”
“These fellows are certainly thorough,” said Elk with reluctant
admiration, surveying his haul.
“Are you keeping the bags in your office?” asked Dick, but Elk shook his
melancholy head.
“I think not,” said he.
He had had the bags immediately emptied, their contents sent to the
Research Department; the bags themselves were now stripped of leather
and steel frames, for they had been scientifically sliced, inch by inch.
“My own opinion,” said Balder oracularly, “is that there’s somebody at
police headquarters who is working against us. I’ve been considering it
for a long time, and after consulting my wife——”
“You haven’t consulted your children, too, have you?” asked Elk
unpleasantly. “The less you talk about headquarters’ affairs in your
domestic circle, the better will be your chance of promotion.”
Mr. Balder sniffed.
“There’s no fear of that, anyway,” he said sourly. “I’ve got myself in
their bad books. And I did think there was a chance for me—it all comes
of your putting me in with Hagn.”
“You’re an ungrateful devil,” said Elk.
“Who’s this Number Seven, sir?” asked Balder. “Thinking the matter over,
and having discussed it with my wife, I’ve come to the conclusion that
he’s one of the most important Frogs, and if we could only get him, we’d
be a long way towards catching the big fellow.”
Elk put down his pen—he was writing his report at the time—and
favoured his subordinate with a patient and weary smile.
“You ought to have gone into politics,” he said, and waved his
subordinate from the room with the end of his penholder.
He had finished his report and was reading it over with a critical eye,
when the service ’phone announced a visitor.
“Send him up,” said Elk when he had heard the name. He rang his bell for
Balder. “This report goes to Captain Gordon to initial,” he said, and as
he put down the envelope, Joshua Broad stood in the doorway.
“Good morning, Mr. Elk.” He nodded to Balder, although he had never met
him. “Good morning,” he said.
“Good morning,” said Elk. “Come right in and sit down, Mr. Broad. To
what do I owe the pleasure of this call?—excuse my politeness, but in
the early morning I’m that way. All right, Balder, you can go.”
Broad offered his cigar-case to the detective. “I’ve come on a curious
errand,” he said.
“Nobody ever comes to headquarters on any other,” replied Elk.
“It concerns a neighbour of mine.”
“Lola Bassano?”
“Her husband,” said the other, “Lew Brady.”
Elk pushed up his spectacles.
“You don’t tell me that she’s properly married to Lew Brady?” he asked
in surprise.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt about that,” said Broad, “though I’m
perfectly certain that her young friend Bennett is not aware of the
fact. Brady has been staying at Caverley House for a week, and during
that time he has not gone out of doors. What is more, the boy hasn’t
called; I don’t think there’s a quarrel—I have a notion there’s
something much deeper than that. I saw Brady by accident as I was coming
out of my door. Bassano’s door also happened to be open: the maid was
taking in the milk: and I caught a glimpse of him. He has the finest
crop of whiskers I’ve seen on a retired pugilist and their ambitions do
not as a rule run to hair! That made me pretty curious,” he said,
carefully knocking the ash of his cigar into a tray that was on the
table, “and I wondered if there was any connection between this sudden
defiance of the barber and Ray Bennett’s actions. I made a call on
him—I met him the other day at the club and had, as an excuse, the fact
that I have also managed to meet Miss Ella Bennett. His servant—he has
a man in by the day to brush his clothes and tidy up the place—told me
that he was not well and was not visible.”
Mr. Broad blew out a ring of smoke and watched it thoughtfully.
“If you want a servant to be faithful, he must live on the premises,” he
said. “These occasional men aren’t with you long enough to get
trustworthy. It cost me, at the present rate of exchange, two dollars
and thirty-five cents to discover that Mr. Ray Bennett is also in the
hair-restoring business. If there were an election on, these two fellows
might be political cranks who had vowed a vow that they wouldn’t touch
their razors until their party was returned to power. And if Lew Brady
were a real sportsman, I should guess that they were doing this for a
bet. As it is, I’m rather intrigued.”
Elk rolled his cigar from one corner of his mouth to the other.
“I’m not well acquainted with the Statute Book,” he said, “but I’m under
the impression there is no law preventing people from cultivating
undergrowth. The—what’s the word?—psych——”
“Psychology,” suggested Mr. Broad.
“That’s it. The psychology of whiskers has never quite reached me.
You’re American, aren’t you, Mr. Broad?”
“I have the distinction,” said the other with that half-smile that came
so readily to his eyes.
“Ah!” said Elk absently, as he stared through the window. “Ever heard of
a man called Saul Morris?”
He brought his eyes back to the other’s face. Mr. Joshua Broad was
frowning in an effort of thought.
“I seem to remember the name. He was a criminal of sorts, wasn’t he—an
American criminal, if I remember rightly? Yes, I’ve heard of him. I seem
to remember that he was killed a few years ago.”
Elk scratched his chin irritably.
“I’d like to meet somebody who was at his funeral,” he said, “somebody I
could believe on oath.”
“You’re not suggesting that Lew Brady——”
“No. I’m not suggesting anything about Lew Brady, except that he’s a
very poor boxer. I’ll look into this distressing whisker competition,
Mr. Broad, and thank you for telling me.”
He wasn’t especially interested in the eccentric toilet of Ray Bennett.
At five o’clock Balder came to him and asked if he might go home.
“I promised my wife——” he began.
“Keep it,” said Elk.
After his subordinate’s departure there came an official letter to
Inspector Elk, and, reading its contents, Mr. Elk beamed. It was a
letter from the Superintendent who controlled the official careers of
police officers at headquarters.
“Sir,” it ran, “I am directed by the Chief Commissioner of
Police to inform you that the promotion of Police-Constable J.
J. Balder to the rank of Acting-Sergeant has been approved. The
appointment will date as from the 1st May.”
Elk folded up the paper and was genuinely pleased. He rang the bell for
Balder before he remembered that he had sent his assistant home. Elk’s
evening was free, and in the kindness of his heart he decided upon
conveying the news personally.
“I’d like to see this wife of his,” said Elk, addressing nobody, “and
the children!”
Elk turned up the official pass register, and found that Balder lived at
93, Leaford Road, Uxbridge. The names of his wife and children were not
entered, to Elk’s disappointment. He would like to have addressed the
latter personally, but no new entry had been made on the sheet since
Balder’s enlistment.
His police car took him to Leaford Road; 93 was a respectable little
house—such a house as Elk always imagined his assistant would live in.
His knock was answered by an elderly woman who was dressed for going
out, and Elk was surprised to see that she wore the uniform of a nurse.
“Yes, Mr. Balder lives here,” she said, apparently surprised to see the
visitor. “That is to say, he has two rooms here, though he very seldom
stays here the night. He usually comes here to change, and then I think
he goes on to his friends.”
“Does his wife live here?”
“His wife?” said the woman in surprise. “I didn’t know that he was
married.”
Elk had brought Balder’s official record with him, to procure some dates
which it was necessary he should certify for pension purposes. In the
space against Balder’s address, he noticed for the first time that there
were two addresses given, and that Leaford Road had been crossed out
with ink so pale that he only noticed it now that he saw the paper in
daylight. The second address was one in Stepney.
“I seem to have made a mistake,” he said. “His address here is Orchard
Street, Stepney.” But the nurse smiled.
“He was with me many years ago,” she said, “then he went to Stepney, but
during the war he came here, because the air raids were rather bad in
the East End of London. I am under the impression he has still a room in
Stepney.”
“Oh?” said Elk thoughtfully.
He was at the gate when the nurse called him back.
“I don’t think he goes to Stepney, though I don’t know whether I ought
to talk about his business to a stranger; but if you want him
particularly, I should imagine you would find him at Slough. I’m a
monthly nurse,” she said, “and I’ve seen his car twice going into Seven
Gables on the Slough Road. I think he must have a friend there.”
“Whose car?” asked the startled Elk.
“It may be his or his friend’s car,” said the nurse. “Is he a friend of
yours?”
“He is in a way,” said Elk cautiously.
She stood for a moment thinking.
“Will you come in, please?”
He followed her into the clean and tidy little parlour.
“I don’t know why I told you, or why I’ve been talking so freely to
you,” she said, “but the truth is, I’ve given Mr. Balder notice. He
makes so many complaints, and he’s so difficult to please, that I can’t
satisfy him. It isn’t as though he paid me a lot of money—he doesn’t. I
make very little profit out of his rooms, and I’ve a chance of letting
them at a better rent. And then he’s so particular about his letters.
I’ve had a letter-box put on the door, but even that is not big enough
to hold them some days. What his other business is, I don’t know. The
letters that come here are for the Didcot Chemical Works. You probably
think that I am a very difficult woman to please, because, after all,
he’s out all day and seldom sleeps here at night.”
Elk drew a long breath.
“I think you’re nearly the finest woman I’ve ever met,” he said. “Are
you going out now?”
She nodded.
“I’ve an all night case, and I shan’t be back till eleven to-morrow. You
were very fortunate in finding anybody at home.”
“I think you said ‘his car’; what sort of a car is it?” asked Elk.
“It’s a black machine—I don’t know the make; I think it is an American
make. And he must have something to do with the ownership because once I
found a lot of tyre catalogues in his bedroom, and some of the tyres he
had marked with a pencil, so I suppose he’s responsible to an extent.”
One last question Elk asked.
“Does he come back here at night after you’ve gone?”
“Very rarely, I imagine,” replied the woman. “He has his own key, and as
I’m very often out at night I’m not sure whether he returns or not.”
Elk stood with one foot on the running-board of his car.
“Perhaps I can drop you somewhere, madam?” he said, and the elderly
woman gratefully accepted.
Elk went back to headquarters, opened a drawer of his desk and took out
a few implements of his profession, and, after filing a number of urgent
instructions, returned to the waiting car, driving to Harley Terrace.
Dick Gordon had an engagement that night to join a theatre party with
the members of the American Embassy, and he was in one of the boxes at
the Hilarity Theatre when Elk opened the door quietly, tapped him on the
shoulder, and brought him out into the corridor, without the remainder
of the party being aware that their guest had retired.
“Anything wrong, Elk?” asked Gordon.
“Balder’s got his promotion,” said Elk solemnly, and Dick stared at him.
“He’s an Acting-Sergeant,” Elk went on, “and I don’t know a better rank
for Balder. When this news comes to him and his wife and children,
there’ll be some happy hearts, believe me.”
Elk never drank: this was the first thought that came to Dick Gordon’s
mind; but there was a possibility that the anxieties and worries of the
past few weeks might have got on top of him.
“I’m very glad for Balder,” he said gently, “and I’m glad for you too,
Elk, because I know you tried hard to get this miserable devil a step in
the right direction.”
“Go on with what you were thinking,” said Elk.
“I don’t know that I was thinking anything,” laughed Dick.
“You were thinking that I must be suffering from sunstroke, or I
shouldn’t take you out of your comfortable theatre to announce Balder’s
promotion. Now will you get your coat, Captain Gordon, and come along
with me? I want to break the news to Balder.”
Mystified, but asking no further questions, Gordon went to the
cloak-room, got his coat, and joined the detective in the vestibule.
“We’re going to Slough—to the Seven Gables,” he added. “It’s a fine
house. I haven’t seen it, but I know it’s a fine house, with a carriage
drive and grand furniture, electric light, telephone and a modern
bathroom. That’s deduction. I’ll tell you something else—also
deduction. There are trip wires on the lawn, burglar alarms in the
windows, about a hundred servants——”
“What the devil are you talking about?” asked Dick, and Elk chuckled
hysterically.
They were running through Uxbridge when a long-bodied motor-car whizzed
past them at full speed. It was crowded with men who were jammed into
the seats or sat upon one another’s knees.
“That’s a merry little party,” said Dick.
“Very,” replied Elk laconically.
A few seconds later, a second car flashed past, going much faster than
they.
“That looks to me like one of your police cars,” said Dick.
This, too, was crowded.
“It certainly looks like one of my police cars,” agreed Elk. “In America
they’ve got a better stunt. As you probably know, they’ve a fine patrol
wagon system. I’d like to introduce it into this country; it’s very
handy.”
As the car slowed to pass through the narrow, crooked street of
Colnebrook, a third of the big machines squeezed past, and this time
there was no mistaking its character. The man who sat with the driver,
Dick knew as a detective inspector. He winked at Elk as he passed, and
Elk winked back with great solemnity.
“What is the idea?” asked Dick, his curiosity now thoroughly piqued.
“We’re having a smoking concert,” said Elk, “to celebrate Balder’s
promotion. And it will be one of the greatest successes that we’ve had
in the history of the Force. There will be the brothers Mick and Mac,
the trick cyclists, in their unrivalled act . . .” He babbled on
foolishly.
At Langley the fourth and fifth police cars came past. Dick had long
since realized that the slow pace at which his own car was moving was
designed to allow these laden machines to overtake them. Beyond Langley,
the Windsor road turned abruptly to the left, and, leaning over the
driver, Elk gave new instructions. There was no sign of the police cars:
they had apparently gone on to Slough. A solitary country policeman
stood at the cross-roads and watched them as they disappeared in the
dusk with a certain languid interest.
“We’ll stop here,” said Elk, and the car was pulled from the road on to
the green sidewalk.
Elk got down.
“Walk a little up the road while I talk to Captain Gordon,” he said to
the chauffeur, and then he talked, and Dick listened in amazement and
unbelief.
“Now,” said Elk, “we’ve got about five minutes’ walk, as far as I can
remember. I haven’t been to Windsor races for so long that I’ve almost
forgotten where the houses are.”
They found the entrance to the Seven Gables between two stiff yew
hedges. There was no gateway; a broad, gravelled path ran between a
thick belt of pine trees, behind which the house was hidden. Elk went a
little ahead. Presently he stopped and raised his hand warningly. Dick
came a little nearer, and, looking over the shoulder of the detective,
had his first view of Seven Gables.
It was a large house, with timbered walls and high, twisted
chimney-stacks.
“Pseudo-Elizabethan,” said Dick admiringly.
“1066,” murmured Elk, “or was it 1599? That’s _some_ house!”
It was growing dusk, and lights were showing from a broad window at the
farther end of the building. The arched doorway was facing them.
“Let us go back,” whispered Elk, and they retraced their steps.
It was not until darkness had fallen that he led the way up the carriage
drive to the point they had reached on their earlier excursion. The
light still showed in the window, but the cream-coloured blinds were
drawn down.
“It is safe up as far as the door,” whispered Elk; “but right and left
of that, watch out!”
He had pulled a pair of thick stockings over his shoes, and handed
another pair to Dick; and then, with an electric torch in his hand, he
began to move along the path which ran parallel with the building.
Presently he stopped.
“Step over,” he whispered.
Dick, looking down, saw the black thread traversing the path, and very
cautiously avoided the obstacle.
A few more paces, and again Elk stopped and warned Dick to step high,
turning to show his light upon the second of the threads, almost
invisible even in the powerful glare of the electric lamp. He did not
move from where he stood until he had made a careful examination of the
path ahead; and it was well that he did so, for the third trip wire was
less than two feet from the second.
They were half-an-hour covering the twenty yards which separated them
from the window. The night was warm, and one of the casements was open.
Elk crept close under the window-sill, his sensitive fingers feeling for
the alarm which he expected to find protecting the broad sill. This he
discovered and avoided, and, raising his hand, he gently drew aside the
window blind.
He saw a large, oaken-panelled room, luxuriously furnished. The wide,
open stone fireplace was banked with flowers, and before it, at a small
table, sat two men. The first was Balder—unmistakably Balder, and
strangely good-looking. Balder’s red nose was no longer red. He was in
evening dress and between his teeth was a long amber cigarette-holder.
Dick saw it all, his cheek against Elk’s head, heard the quick intake of
the detective’s breath, and then noticed the second man. It was Mr.
Maitland.
Mr. Maitland sat, his face in his hands, and Balder was looking at him
with a cynical smile.
They were too far away to hear what the men were saying, but apparently
Maitland was being made the object of reproof. He looked up after a
while, and got on to his feet and began talking. They heard the rumble
of his excited voice, but again no word was intelligible. Then they saw
him raise his fist and shake it at the smiling man, who watched him with
a calm, detached interest, as though he were some strange insect which
had come into his ken. With this parting gesture of defiance, old
Maitland shuffled from the room and the door closed behind him. In a few
minutes he came out of the house, not through the doorway, as they
expected, but apparently through a gateway on the other side of the
hedge, for they saw the gleam of the headlights of his car as it passed.
Left alone, Balder poured himself a drink and apparently rang for one of
the servants. The man who came in arrested Dick’s attention instantly.
He wore the conventional uniform of a footman, the dark trousers and the
striped waistcoat, but it was easy to see, from the way he moved, that
he was not an ordinary type of servant. A big man, powerfully built, his
every action was slow and curiously deliberate. Balder said something to
him, and the footman nodded, and, taking up the tray, went out with the
same leisurely, almost pompous, step that had distinguished his entry.
And then it flashed upon Dick, and he whispered into the detective’s ear
one word.
“Blind!”
Elk nodded. Again the door opened, and this time three footmen came in,
carrying a heavy-looking table with a canvas cover. At first Gordon
thought that it was Balder’s meal that was being brought, but he was
soon to discover the truth. Above the fireplace, hanging on a single
wire, was a large electric lamp, which was not alight. Standing on a
chair, one of the footmen took out the lamp and inserted a plug from the
end of which ran a wire connecting with the table.
“They’re all blind,” said Elk in a whisper. “And that is Balder’s own
broadcasting apparatus, and the aerial is attached to the lamp.”
The three servants went out, and, rising, Balder walked to the door and
locked it.
There were another set of windows in the room, looking out upon the side
of the house, and one by one Balder closed and shuttered them. He was
busy with the second of the three, when Elk put his foot upon a ledge of
brick, and, tearing aside the curtain, leapt into the room.
At the sound, Balder spun round.
“Evening, Balder,” said Elk.
The man made no reply. He stood, watching his sometime chief, with eyes
that did not waver.
“Thought I’d come along and tell you that you’ve got your promotion,”
said Elk, “as Acting-Sergeant from the 1st of May, in recognition of the
services you’ve rendered to the State by poisoning Frog Mills, loosing
Frog Hagn, and blowing up my office with a bomb that you planted
overnight.”
Still the man did not speak, nor did he move; and here he was discreet,
for the long-barrelled Browning in Elk’s hand covered the lower button
of his white piqué waistcoat.
“And now,” said Elk—there was a ring of triumph in his voice—“you’ll
take a little walk with me—I want you, _Number Seven_!”
“Haven’t you made a mistake?” drawled Balder, so unlike his usual voice
that Elk was for a moment taken aback.
“I never have made a mistake except about the date when Henry the Eighth
married,” said Elk.
“Who do you imagine I am?” asked this debonair man of the world.
“I’ve ceased imagining anything about you, Balder—I know!”
Elk walked with a quick movement toward him and thrust the muzzle of the
pistol in his prisoner’s diaphragm.
“Put up your hands and turn round,” he said.
Balder obeyed. Slipping a pair of handcuffs from his pocket, Elk snapped
them on to the wrists. Deftly the detective strapped the arms from
behind, drawing them tight, so that the manacled hands had no play.
“This is very uncomfortable,” said Balder. “Is it usual for you to make
mistakes of this character, Mr. Elk? My name is Collett-Banson.”
“Your name is Mud,” said Elk, “but I’m willing to listen to anything you
like to say. I’d rather have your views on cyanide of potassium than
anything. You can sit down.”
Dick saw a gleam come to the man’s eye; it flashed for a second and was
gone. Evidently Elk saw it too.
“Don’t let your hopes rest upon any monkey tricks that might be played
by your attendants,” he said, “because fifty C.I.D. men, most of whom
are known personally to you, are disposed round this house.”
Balder laughed.
“If they were round the house and on top of the house, they wouldn’t
worry me,” he said. “I tell you, inspector, you’ve made a very grave
error, and one which will cost you dear. If a gentleman cannot sit in
his own drawing-room”—he glanced at the table—“listening to a wireless
concert at The Hague without interfering policemen—then it is about
time the police force was disbanded.”
He walked across to the fireplace carelessly and stood with his back to
it; then, lifting his foot, he kicked back one of the steel fire-dogs
which stood on either side of the wide hearth, and the “dog” fell over
on its side. It was a nervous act of a man who was greatly worried and
was not quite conscious of what he was doing. Even Elk, who was all
suspicion, saw nothing to excite his apprehension.
“You think my name is Balder, do you?” the man went on. “Well, all I can
say is——”
Suddenly he flung himself sideways on to the hearthrug, but Elk was
quicker. As an oblong slip of the floor gave way beneath the man’s
weight, Elk gripped him by the collar and together they dragged him back
to the room.
In a second the three were struggling on the floor together, and in his
desperation Balder’s strength was unbelievable. His roaring cry for help
was heard. There came a heavy blow on the door, the babble of angry
voices without, and then, from the ground outside, a series of sharp
explosions, as the army of detectives raced across the lawn, oblivious
to the presence of the alarm-guns.
The fight was short and sharp. The six blind men who comprised the
household of No. 7 were hustled away, and in the last car travelled
Acting-Sergeant Balder, that redoubtable No. 7, who was the right hand
and the left hand of the terrible Frog.