Colonel Stanistreet put down the last of the papers and slapped his hand
upon it resoundingly.
"This is one of the most remarkable collections of data, I venture to
assert, that has ever come into the hands of the British Government. Have
you any idea of its value?"
Lanyard lifted a whimsical eyebrow. "Some," he admitted drily.
"And what do you ask for it, sir?"
"Nothing."
The gaze of the Englishman bored into his eyes; but he met their challenge
with an unshaken countenance, smiling.
"My dear sir," Stanistreet demanded--"who are you?"
"The name under which I sailed for New York on board the _Assyrian_,"
Lanyard announced quietly, "was André Duchemin."
Disturbed by a startled exclamation, together with a sound of shuffling and
a slight thump, he looked round in mild curiosity to see Blensop staggered
and astare, standing over a litter of documents which had slipped from his
grasp to the floor. Mastering his emotion quickly enough, the secretary
knelt with a mumbled apology and began to pick up the papers.
With no more notice of the incident Lanyard returned undivided attention to
Colonel Stanistreet.
"I had another name," he confessed, "and a reputation none too savoury,
as, I daresay, you know. Through the courtesy of the British Intelligence
Office I was permitted to disguise these; but on the _Assyrian_ I was
recognized--in short, ran afoul of German Secret Service agents who knew
me, but whom I did not know. On the sixth night out circumstances conspired
to make me seem a serious obstacle to their schemes. Consequently I was
waylaid, robbed, and thrown overboard. Within the next few minutes a
torpedo struck the ship and the submarine which fired it came up under me
as I struggled to keep afloat. By passing myself off as a Boche spy, I
succeeded in inducing the commander to take me below, and so reached the
Martha's Vineyard base. There chance played into my hands: I contrived to
sink the U-boat and escape, as reported in my telegram."
During a brief silence he found opportunity to observe that Mr. Blensop was
working with hands that trembled singularly.
"Incredible!" Stanistreet commented.
"Yet here is proof," Lanyard asserted, indicating the papers beneath
Stanistreet's hand.
"My dear sir, I didn't mean--"
"Pardon!" Lanyard smiled, with a lifted hand. "I never thought you did,
Colonel Stanistreet. But it is your duty to make sure you are not imposed
upon by plausible adventurers. Therefore--since my papers have been
stolen--I am glad to be able to prove my identity with André Duchemin by
referring to survivors of the _Assyrian_ disaster, among others Mr. Sherry,
the second officer, Mr. Crane of the United States Secret Service, and a
countrywoman of yours, a Miss Cecelia Brooke, whose acquaintance I was
fortunate enough to make."
Stanistreet nodded heavily, and consulted his watch. "Miss Brooke," he
said, "should be here shortly. Blensop made an appointment with her last
night, which I confirmed by telephone this morning."
"Then, with permission, I shall remain and ask her to vouch for me,"
Lanyard suggested in resignation, since it appeared he was not to be
permitted to escape this girl, that destiny was not yet finished with their
entanglement.
"I shall be glad if you will, sir.... Monsieur Duchemin," Stanistreet
began, but hesitated--"or do you prefer another style?"
"I am content with Duchemin."
"That is a matter for your own discretion, but I should warn you it may
already have acquired an evil odour on this side. To my knowledge it has
been used within the last twenty-four hours, and the pretensions of its
wearer supported by your stolen credentials."
"I am not surprised," Lanyard stated reflectively. "A chap with a beard,
perhaps?"
"Why, yes...."
"Anderson," the adventurer nodded: "that, at least, was his alias when he
jockeyed himself into the second steward's berth aboard the _Assyrian_."
He glanced idly across the room, discovered Blensop once more at pause in a
stare, and grinned amiably.
"He came here last night," Stanistreet volunteered deliberately--
"representing himself as André Duchemin--to sell me a certain paper, the
same which subsequently, I am convinced, he returned to steal."
"And did," Lanyard added.
"And did," the Briton conceded. "Now you have told me who he is, I promise
you every effort shall be made to apprehend him and prevent further misuse
of the name you have assumed."
"It has," Lanyard said tersely.
"I beg your pardon?"
"I say every effort has been made--and successfully--to accomplish the ends
you mention."
"What's that you say?" Blensop demanded shrilly, crossing to the desk.
"My secretary," Stanistreet explained, "was present at the interview, and
is naturally interested."
"And very good of him, I'm sure," Lanyard agreed. "I was about to explain,
Mr. Blensop, that Ekstrom, alias Anderson, was killed in the course of
a raid on the Prussian spy headquarters in Seventy-ninth Street this
morning."
"Amazing!" Blensop gasped. "I am glad to hear it," he added, and went
slowly back to his task.
"I may as well tell you, sir," Lanyard pursued, "I have every reason to
believe the document sold you last night was one of those stolen from me."
Stanistreet wagged a contentious head.
"I cannot conceive how it could have come into your possession, sir."
"Simply enough. Miss Brooke requested me to take care of it for her."
The eyes of the Englishman grew stony. "Miss Brooke!" he repeated testily.
"I don't understand."
"It was a document--I do not seek to know its nature from you, sir--of
vital importance in this present crisis, with the United States newly
entered into the war."
Stanistreet affirmed with an inclination of his head.
"I may tell you this much, Monsieur Duchemin: if it had not reached this
country safely.... What am I saying? If it be not recovered without delay,
the chances of America's early and efficient participation in the war will
suffer a tremendous setback ... Blensop, be good enough to call up the
American Secret Service at once and ask whether the document in question
was found on the body of this--ah--Ekstrom."
"Pardon," Lanyard interposed as Blensop hesitantly approached the
telephone. "It would be a waste of time. I happen to know, because I was
there, that no such document was found on Ekstrom's body."
"The devil!" Stanistreet grumbled. "What can have become of it? This
business grows only the blacker the deeper one seeks to fathom it. I
must own myself completely at a loss. How it came into the hands of Miss
Brooke--"
"I can explain that, I think. The document was in the care of two
gentlemen, Mr. Bartholomew and Lieutenant Thackeray. The former was
murdered by the Huns in search of it, Lieutenant Thackeray murderously
assaulted. But for Miss Brooke's intervention the assassins must have
succeeded. As it was, the young woman herself found it and, one presumes,
took charge of it because her fiancé was incapacitated, and possibly with
the notion that she might thereby prevent further mischief of the same
nature."
"Her fiancé?" Stanistreet echoed blankly.
"Lieutenant Thackeray--"
"Her brother, sir!" the Briton laughed. "Thackeray was his nom de service."
It was Lanyard's turn to stare. "Ah!" he murmured. "A light begins to
dawn...."
"Upon me as well," Stanistreet confessed. "Miss Brooke and her brother are
orphans and, before the war, were inseparable companions. I do not doubt
that, learning he had been commissioned with an uncommonly perilous errand,
she booked passage by the _Assyrian_ without his consent, in order to be
near him in event of danger."
"This explains much," Lanyard conceded--"much that perplexed more than one
can say."
"But in no way advances us on the trail of the purloined document."
"I am afraid, sir," Lanyard lied deliberately, "you may as well abandon all
hope of ever seeing it again. Ekstrom made away with it: no question about
that. There was time enough and to spare between his exploit here and his
death for him to deliver it to safe hands. It is doubtless decoded by this
time, a copy of it already well on the way to the Wilhelmstrasse."
"I am afraid," Stanistreet echoed--"I am very much afraid you are right."
His thick, spatulate fingers of an executive drummed heavily upon the desk.
Stone's figure darkened the windows.
"Colonel Stanistreet?" he called diffidently.
"Yes, Mr. Stone?"
"There's something here I'd like to consult you about, sir, if you can
spare a minute."
"Certainly." The Englishman rose. "If you will excuse me, Monsieur
Duchemin...." Half way to the windows he hesitated. "By the bye, Blensop, I
wish you'd call up Apthorp and ask after Howson's condition."
"Very good, sir," Blensop intoned cheerfully.
"And do it without delay, please. I don't like to think of the poor fellow
suffering."
"Immediately, sir."
As his employer passed out into the garden with Stone, the secretary
discontinued his checking and came over to the desk, drawing up a chair and
sitting down to telephone. At the same time Lanyard got up and began to
pace thoughtfully to and fro.
"Howson is the wounded night watchman, I take it, Mr. Blensop?"
"Yes--an excellent fellow.... Schuyler nine, three hundred," Blensop cooed
into the transmitter.
Conceivably that ostensible discomfiture whose symptoms Lanyard had
remarked had been a transitory humour. Mr. Blensop was now in what seemed
the most equable and blithe of tempers. His very posture at the telephone
eloquently betokened as much: he had thrown himself into the chair with
picturesque nonchalance, sitting with body half turned from the desk, his
right hand holding the receiver to his ear, his left thrust carelessly
into his trouser pocket, thus dragging back the lapel of that impeccable
morning-coat and exposing the bright cap of his gold-mounted fountain pen.
Something in that implement seemed to possess for Lanyard overpowering
fascination. His gaze yearned for it, returned again and again to it.
He changed his course to stroll up and down behind Blensop, between him and
the safe.
"I understood Colonel Stanistreet to say the watchman was not seriously
injured, I believe," he observed, with interest.
"Shot through the shoulder, that is all.... Schuyler nine, three hundred?
Dr. Apthorp, please. This is Mr. Blensop speaking, secretary to Colonel
Stanistreet.... Are you there, Dr. Apthorp?"
With professional dexterity Lanyard en passant dropped a hand over the
young man's shoulder and lightly lifted the pen from its place in the
pocket of Blensop's waistcoat; the even tempo of his step unbroken, he
tossed it toward the safe, where it fell without sound upon a heavy Persian
rug.
"Yes--about Howson," the musical accents continued, "Colonel Stanistreet is
most solicitous...."
Swiftly Lanyard moved toward the safe, glanced through the French windows
to assure himself that Stanistreet and Stone were safely preoccupied,
whipped out the envelope he had prepared, and thrust it into a file of
papers which did not crowd its pigeonhole; accomplishing the complete
manoeuvre with such adroitness that, like the business of the pen, it
passed utterly without the knowledge of the secretary.
"Thank you so much. _Good_ morning, Dr. Apthorp."
Lanyard was passing the desk when Blensop rose, and the footman was
entering with his salver.
"A lady to see Colonel Stanistreet, sir--by appointment, she says."
Blensop glanced at the card. At the same time Stanistreet came in from the
garden, leaving Stone to potter about visibly in the distance.
"Miss Brooke is here, sir," the secretary announced.
"Ask her to come in, please."
The footman retired.
"Howson is resting easily, Dr. Apthorp reports," Blensop added, going back
to the safe. "Has Stone turned up anything of interest, sir?"
"Footprints," Stanistreet replied with a snort of moderate impatience.
"He's quite upset since I've informed him the man who made them is--"
"_Good God_!"
The interruption was Blensop's in a voice strangely out of tune.
Stanistreet wheeled sharply upon him.
"What the deuce--!" he snapped.
By every indication the secretary had suffered the most severe shock of his
experience. His face was ghastly, his eyes vacant; his knees shook beneath
him; one hand pressed convulsively the bosom of his waistcoat. His
endeavours to reply evoked only a husky, rattling sound.
"What the devil has come over you?" Stanistreet insisted.