AT THE PALACE--AND LATER
How self-centred is man, and how darkly do his own petty interests
overshadow the giant things of life. Thrones may totter and fall,
monarchs pass to the limbo of memories, whilst we wrestle with an
intractable collar-stud. Had another than Inspector Sheffield been
driving to Buckingham Palace that day, he might have found his soul
attuned to the martial tone about him; for "War! War!" glared from
countless placards, and was cried aloud by countless newsboys. War was
in the air. Nothing else, it seemed, was thought of, spoken of, sung of.
But Sheffield at that time was quite impervious to the subtle influences
which had inspired music-hall song writers to pour forth patriotic
lyrics; which had adorned the button-holes of sober citizens with
miniature Union Jacks. For him the question of the hour was: "Shall I
capture Séverac Bablon?"
He reviewed, in the space of a few seconds, the whole bewildering case,
from the time when this incomprehensible man had robbed Park Lane to
scatter wealth broadcast upon the Embankment up to the present moment
when, it would appear, having acted as best man at a Society wedding, he
now was within the precincts of Buckingham Palace.
It was the boast of Séverac Bablon, as Sheffield knew, that no door was
closed to him. Perhaps that boast was no idle one. Who was Séverac
Bablon? Inspector Sheffield, who had asked himself that question many
months before, when he stood in the British Museum before the empty
pedestal which once had held the world-famed head of Cæsar, asked it
again now. Alas! it was a question to which he had no answer.
The cab stopped in front of Buckingham Palace.
Sheffield paid the man and walked up to the gates. He was not unknown to
those who sat in high places, having been chosen to command the secret
bodyguard of Royalty during one protracted foreign tour. An unassuming
man, few of his acquaintances, perhaps, knew that he shared with the
Lord Mayor of London the privilege of demanding audience at any hour of
the day or night.
It was a privilege which hitherto he had never exercised. He exercised
it now.
Some five minutes later he found himself in an antechamber, and by the
murmur of voices which proceeded from that direction he knew a draped
curtain alone separated him from a hastily summoned conference. A smell
of cigar smoke pervaded the apartment.
Suddenly, he became quite painfully nervous. Was it intended that he
should hear so much? Short of pressing his fingers to his ears, he had
no alternative.
"We had all along desired that amicable relations be maintained in this
matter, Baron."
That was the Marquess of Evershed. Sheffield knew his voice well.
"It has not appeared so from your attitude, Marquess!"
Whom could that be? Probably Baron Hecht.
"Your intense patriotism, your admirable love of country, Baron, has led
you to misconstrue, as affronts, actions designed to promote our
friendly relations."
Only one man in England possessed the suave, polished delivery of the
last speaker--the Right Honourable Walter Belford.
"I have misconstrued nothing; my instructions have been explicit."
"Fortunately, no further occasion exists for you to carry them out."
Sheffield knew that voice too.
"A Foreign Service Messenger, Mr. Maurice Anerly, left for my capital
this morning----"
"Captain Searles has been instructed to intercept him. His dispatch will
not be delivered."
Inspector Sheffield, who had been vainly endeavouring to become
temporarily deaf, started. Whose voice was that? Could he trust his
ears?
There followed the sound as of the clapping of hands upon someone's
shoulders.
"Baron Hecht, I hold a most sacred trust--the peace of nations. No one
shall rob me of it. Believe me, your great master already is drafting a
friendly letter----"
The musical voice again, with that vibrant, forceful note.
"In short, Baron" (Sheffield tried not to hear; for he knew this voice
too), "there is a power above the Eagle, a power above the Lion: the
power of wealth! Lacking her for ally, no nation can war with another!
The king of that power has spoken--and declared for peace! I am glad of
it, and so, I know, are you!"
Following a short interval, a shaking of hands, as the unwilling
eavesdropper divined. Then, by some other door, a number of people
withdrew, amid a hum of seemingly friendly conversation.
A gentleman pulled the curtain aside.
"Come in, Sheffield!" he said genially.
Chief Inspector Sheffield bowed very low and entered a large room,
which, save for the gentleman who had admitted him, now was occupied
only by the Right Hon. Walter Belford, Home Secretary.
"How do you do, Inspector?" asked Mr. Belford affably.
"Thank you, sir," replied the detective with diffidence; "I am quite
well, and trust you are."
"I think I know what has brought you here," continued the Home
Secretary. "You have been following----"
"Séverac Bablon! Yes, sir!"
"As I supposed. Well, it will be expedient, Inspector, religiously to
keep that name out of the Press in future! Furthermore--er--any warrant
that may be in existence must be cancelled! This is a matter of policy,
and I am sending the necessary instructions to the Criminal
Investigation Department. In short--drop the case!"
Chief Inspector Sheffield looked rather dazed.
"No doubt, this is a surprise to you," continued Mr. Belford; "but do
not allow it to be a disappointment. Your tactful conduct of the case,
and the delicate manner in which you have avoided compromising
anyone--in which you have handicapped yourself, that others might not be
implicated--has not been overlooked. Your future is assured, Inspector
Sheffield."
The gentleman who had admitted Sheffield had left the apartment almost
immediately afterwards. Now he returned, and fastened a pin in the
detective's tie.
"By way of apology for spoiling your case, Sheffield!" he said.
What Sheffield said or did at that moment he could never afterwards
remember. A faint recollection he had of muttering something about
"Séverac Bablon----!"
"Ssh!" Mr. Belford had replied. "There is no such person!"
It was at the moment of his leave-taking that his eyes were drawn to an
ash-tray upon the big table. A long tongue of bluish-grey smoke licked
the air, coiling sinuously upward from amid cigar ends and ashes. It
seemingly possessed a peculiar and pungent perfume.
And it proceeded from the smouldering fragment of a yellow cigarette.
* * * * *
When Inspector Sheffield fully recovered his habitual composure and
presence of mind, he found himself proceeding along Piccadilly. War was
in the breeze; War was on all the placards. Would-be warriors looked out
from every club window. "Rule, Britannia" rang out from every street
organ.
Then came running a hoarse newsboy, aproned with a purple contents-bill,
a bundle of _Gleaners_ under his arm. His stock was becoming depleted at
record speed. He could scarce pass the sheets and grab the halfpence
rapidly enough.
For where all else spoke of war, his bill read and his blatant voice
proclaimed:
"PEACE! _Official!_"
Again the power of the Seal had been exercised in the interests of the
many, although popularly it was believed, and maintained, that Britain's
huge, efficient, and ever-growing air-fleet contributed not a little to
this peaceful conclusion.
The _Gleaner_ assured its many readers that such was indeed the case. To
what extent the _Gleaner_ spoke truly, and to what extent its statements
were inspired, you are as well equipped to judge as I.
And unless some future day shall free my pen, I have little more to tell
you of Séverac Bablon. Officially, as the Holder of the Seal, his work,
at any rate for the time, in England was done. Some day, Sheard may
carry his history farther, and he would probably begin where I leave
off.
This, then, will be at a certain pier-head, on a summer's day, and at a
time when, far out near the sky-line, grey shapes crept
southward--battleships--the flying squadron which thirty-six hours
earlier had proceeded to a neighbour's water-gate to demonstrate that
the command of the seas had not changed hands since the days of Nelson.
The squadron was returning to home waters. It was a concrete message of
peace, expressed in terms of war.
Nearer to the shore, indeed at no great distance from the pier-head, lay
a white yacht, under steam. A launch left her side, swung around her
stern, and headed for the pier.
In a lower gallery, shut off from the public promenades, where thousands
of curious holiday-makers jostled one another for a sight of the great
yacht, or for a glimpse of those about to join her, a tall man leaned
upon the wooden rail and looked out to sea. A girl in while drill, whose
pretty face was so pale that fashionable New York might have failed to
recognise Zoe Oppner, the millionaire's daughter, stood beside him.
"Though I have been wrong," he said slowly, "in much that I have done,
even you will agree that I have been right in this."
He waved his hand towards the fast disappearing squadron.
"Even I?" said Zoe sharply.
"Even you. For only you have shown me my errors."
"You admit, then, that your----!"
"Robberies?"
"Not that, of course! But your----"
"Outrages?"
"I did not mean that either. The means you have adopted have often been
violent, though the end always was good. But no really useful reform can
be brought about in such a way, I am sure."
The man turned his face and fixed his luminous eyes upon hers.
"It may be so," he said; "but even now I see no other way."
Zoe pointed to the almost invisible battleships.
"Ah!" continued Séverac Bablon, "that was a problem of a different kind.
In every civilised land there is a power above the throne. Do you think
that, unaided, Prussia ever could have conquered gallant France? The
people who owe allegiance to the German Emperor are a great people, but,
in such an undertaking as war, without the aid of that people who owe
allegiance to _me_, they are helpless as a group of children! Had I been
in 1870 what I am to-day, the Prussian arms had never been carried into
Paris!"
"You mean that a nation, to carry on a war, requires an enormous sum of
money?"
"Which can only be obtained from certain sources."
"From the Jews?"
"In part, at least. The finance of Europe is controlled by a group of
Jewish houses."
"But they are not all----"
"Amenable to my orders? True. But the outrages with which you reproach
me have served to show that when my orders are disobeyed I have power to
enforce them! Where I am not respected I am feared. I refused my consent
to the loan by aid of which Great Britain's enemies had designed to
prosecute a war against her. None of those theatrical displays with
which sometimes I have impressed the errant vulgar were necessary. The
greatest name in European finance was refused to the transaction--and
the Great War died in the hour of its birth!"
His eyes gleamed with almost fanatic ardour.
"For this will be forgotten all my errors, and forgiven all my sins!"
"I am sure of that," said Zoe earnestly. "But--whatever you came to
do----"
"I have not done--you would say? Only in part. Where I made my home in
London, you have seen a curtained recess. It held the Emblem of my
temporal power."
He moved his hand, and the sunlight struck green beams from the bezel of
the strange ring upon his finger. Zoe glanced at it with something that
was almost like fear.
"This," he said, replying, as was his uncanny custom to an unspoken
question, "is but the sign whereby I may be known for the holder of that
other Emblem. My house is empty now; the Emblem returns to the land
where it was fashioned."
"You are abandoning your projects--your mission? Why?"
"Perhaps because the sword is too heavy for the wielder. Perhaps because
I am only a man--and lonely."
The launch touched the pier, below them.
"You are the most loyal friend I have made in England--in Europe--in the
world," said Séverac Bablon. "Good-bye."
Zoe was very pale.
"Do you mean--for--always?"
"When you have said 'Good-bye' to me I have nothing else to stay for."
Zoe glanced at him once and looked away. Her charming face suddenly
flushed rosily, and a breeze from the sea curtained the bright eyes with
intractable curls.
"But if I _won't_ say 'Good-bye'?" she whispered.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Sins of Séverac Bablon, by Sax Rohmer