"That can hardly be correct--because there are proofs," remarked the
tall, fair, quick-eyed man, who sat in the cold, official-looking room
at Bow Street Police Station at half-past three o'clock that same
morning.
Jack Sainsbury was standing in defiance before the table, while, in the
room, stood the two plain-clothes men who had effected his arrest.
The fair-haired man at the table was Inspector Tennant, of the Special
Department at New Scotland Yard, an official whose duty since the
outbreak of war was to make inquiry into the thousand-and-one cases of
espionage which the public reported weekly to that much-harassed
department. Tennant, who had graduated, as all others had graduated,
from the rank of police-constable on the streets of London, was a
reliable officer as far as patriotism and a sense of duty went. But it
was impossible for a man born in a labourer's cottage on the south side
of Dartmoor, and educated at the village school, to possess such a
highly trained brain as that possessed by say certain commissaires of
the Paris Surete.
Thomas Tennant, a highly popular man as far as the staff at "the
Yard" went, and trusted implicitly by his superiors from the
Assistant-Commissioner downwards, worked with an iron sense of the
red-taped duty for which he received his salary.
"I'm sorry," said Tennant, looking at the young man; "but all these
denials will not, I fear, help you in the least. As I warned you, they
are being taken down in writing, and may be used in evidence against
you," and he indicated a clerk writing shorthand at a side-table.
Jack Sainsbury grew furious.
"I don't care a brass button what evidence you can give against me," he
cried. "I only know that my conscience is perfectly clear. I have
tried, since the war, to help my friend Dr Jerome Jerrold of Wimpole
Street, to inquire into spies and espionage. We acted together, and
Jerrold reported much that was unknown to Whitehall. He--"
"Doctor Jerrold is the gentleman who committed suicide--if my memory
serves me correctly," interrupted the police official, speaking very
quietly.
"Perhaps he did. I say perhaps--remember," exclaimed the young man
under arrest. "But I don't agree with the finding of the Coroner's
jury."
"People often disagree with a Coroner's jury," was the dry reply of the
hide-bound official, seated at the table. "But now, let us get along,"
he added persuasively. "You admit that you are John James Sainsbury;
that you were, until lately, clerk in the employ of the Ochrida Copper
Corporation, in Gracechurch Street, from the service of which you were
recently discharged. Is that so?"
"Most certainly. I have nothing to deny."
"Good. Then let us advance a step further. You were, I believe, an
intimate friend of Dr Jerome Jerrold, who lived in Wimpole Street, and
who, for no apparent reason, committed suicide."
"Yes."
"You do not know, I presume, that Dr Jerrold was suspected of a very
grave offence under the Defence of the Realm Act, and that, rather than
face arrest and prosecution by court-martial as a spy--he took his own
life!"
"It's a lie--_an infernal lie_!" shouted young Sainsbury. "Who alleges
such an outrageous lie as that?"
The fair-haired detective smiled, and in that suave manner he usually
adopted towards prisoners, with clasped hands he said:
"I fear I cannot tell you that."
"But it's a confounded lie! Jerome Jerrold was no spy. He and I were
the firmest friends, and I know how he devoted his time and his money to
investigating the doings of the enemy in our midst. Did you not read
the words of the Lord Chancellor the other day?"
"I'm afraid I didn't."
"Well, speaking in the House of Lords, he admitted that we have not only
to fight a foe in the open field, but that their spies are in every land
and that the webs of their intrigue enmesh and entangle every
Government. It was in order to assist the authorities--your own
department indeed--that Dr Jerome, two friends of his, and myself
devoted our time to watching at nights, and investigating."
The official's lips curled slightly.
"I know that, full well. But how do you explain away the fact that your
friend, the doctor, committed suicide rather than face a prosecution?"
"He had nothing to fear. Of that I am quite confident. No braver, more
loyal, or more patriotic man ever existed than he, poor fellow."
"I'm afraid the facts hardly bear out your contention."
"But what are the facts?" demanded the young man fiercely.
"As I have already said, it is not within my province to tell you."
"But I've been arrested to-night upon a false charge--a charge trumped
up against me perhaps by certain officials who may be jealous of what I
have done, and what I have learnt. I am discredited in the eyes of my
friends at the house where I was arrested. Surely I should be told the
truth!"
"I, of course, do not know what truths may be forthcoming at your trial.
But at present I am not allowed to explain anything to you, save that
the charge against you is that you have attempted to communicate with
the enemy."
"What!" shouted Jack, astounded: "am I actually charged, then, with
being a German spy?"
"I'm afraid that is so."
"But I have no knowledge of any other of the enemy's agents, save those
which were discovered by Jerrold and reported to Whitehall by him."
"Ah! the evidence, I think, goes a little further--documentary evidence
which has recently been placed in the hands of the War Office."
"By whom, pray?"
"You surely don't think it possible for me to reveal the name of the
informant in such a case?" was the cold reply.
Jack Sainsbury stood aghast and silent at the grave charge which had
been preferred against him. It meant, he knew, a trial _in camera_. He
saw how entirely he must be discredited in the eyes of the world, who
could never know the truth, or even the nature of his defence.
He thought of Elise. What would she think? What did she think when
Littlewood told her--as he had told her, no doubt--of how he had been
mysteriously hustled into a taxi, and driven off?
For the first time a recollection of that strange anonymous warning
which his well-beloved had received crossed his memory. Who had sent
that letter? Certainly some friend who had wished his, or her, name to
remain unknown.
"The whole thing is a hideous farce," he cried savagely, at last.
"Nobody can prove that I am not what I here allege myself to be--an
honest, loyal and patriotic Englishman."
"You will have full opportunity of proving that, and of disproving the
documentary evidence which is in the hands of the Director of Public
Prosecutions."
"Public Prosecutions! Mine will be _in camera_," laughed Jack grimly.
"I suppose I shall be tried by a kind of military inquisition. I hope
they won't wear black robes, with slits for the eyes, as they did in the
old days in Spain!" he laughed.
"I fail to see much humour in your present position, Mr Sainsbury,"
replied Tennant rather frigidly.
"I see a lot--even though I'm annoyed that your men should have called
at Fitzjohn's Avenue, instead of going to my place in Heath Street. If
you know so much about me, you surely knew my address."
"The warrant was issued for immediate arrest, sir," exclaimed one of the
detectives to his superior. "Therefore we went to Fitzjohn's Avenue."
"I suppose I shall have an opportunity of knowing the name of my enemy--
of the person who laid this false information against me--and also that
I can see my counsel?"
"The latter will certainly be allowed to-morrow."
"May I write to Miss Shearman--my fiancee?"
"No. But if you wish to give her any message--say by telephone--I will
see that it is sent to her, if you care to write it down."
A pencil was handed to him, whereupon he bent and scribbled a couple of
lines.
"To Miss Elise Shearman, from the prisoner, John Sainsbury.--Please tell
Miss Shearman that I have been arrested as a spy, and am at Bow Street
Police Station. Tell her not to worry. I have nothing to fear, and
will be at liberty very soon. Some grave official error has evidently
been made." Then, handing the slip to the Detective Inspector, he
said--
"If they will kindly ring up Mr Shearman's in Hampstead"--and he gave
the number--"and give that message, I shall be greatly obliged."
"It shall be done," replied the police official. "Have you anything
else to say?"
"Only one thing, and of this statement I hope you will make a careful
note: namely, that on the night when Dr Jerome Jerrold died so
mysteriously, I was on my way to give him some most important
information that I had gathered in the City only a few hours before--
information which, when I reveal it, will startle the Kingdom--but he
died before I could tell him. He died in my arms, as a matter of fact."