THE SHADOWING OF DUNCOMBE
For three days Duncombe saw nothing of Spencer. Three long days devoid
of incident, hopelessly dull, aimless, and uninteresting. On the fourth
the only change in the situation was scarcely a reassuring one. He
became aware that he was being watched.
There was no particular secrecy about it. Even in the hotel itself some
one was always on his heels. The absence of any attempt at concealment
convinced him that it was the authorized police who had thus suddenly
showed their interest in him. The suspicion was soon to be confirmed.
The manager called him on the fourth morning into his private office.
"Monsieur will pardon me, I trust," he said, "if I take the liberty of
asking him a question."
"Certainly!" Duncombe answered. "Go ahead!"
"Monsieur is aware that he has been placed under the surveillance of the
police?"
"The fact," Duncombe said, "has been borne in upon me during the last
few hours. What of it?"
The manager coughed.
"This is a cosmopolitan hotel, Sir George," he said, "and we make no
pretence at ultra-exclusiveness, but we do not care to see the police on
the premises."
"Neither do I," Duncombe answered. "Can you suggest how we may get rid
of them?"
"Monsieur does not quite understand," the manager said smoothly.
"Clearly he has done something to bring him under the suspicion of the
law. Under these circumstances it would be more agreeable to the
management of the hotel if Monsieur would depart."
Duncombe did not wish to depart. The hotel at which Phyllis Poynton's
trunks were still awaiting her return was the hotel at which he wished
to stay.
"Look here, Monsieur Huber," he said. "I give you my word of honor that
I have broken no law, nor engaged in any criminal action whatever since
I came to Paris. This game of having me watched is simply a piece of
bluff. I have done nothing except make inquiries in different quarters
respecting those two young English people who are still missing. In
doing this I seem to have run up against what is nothing more nor less
than a disgraceful conspiracy. Every hand is against me. Instead of
helping me to discover them, the police seem only anxious to cover up
the tracks of those young people."
The manager looked down at his desk.
"We hotel-keepers," he said, "are very much in the hands of the police.
We cannot judge between them and the people whom they treat as suspected
persons. I know very well, Sir George, that you are a person of
respectability and character, but if the police choose to think
otherwise I must adapt my views to theirs. I am sorry, but we must
really ask you to leave."
Sir George turned on his heel.
"Very good!" he said. "I will go and take rooms elsewhere."
He left the hotel, and walked towards the Ritz. At the corner of the
Place Vendôme an automobile was pulled up with a jerk within a few feet
of him. A tired-looking boy leaned over wearily towards him from the
front seat.
"Sir George," he said, "can you give me five minutes?"
"With pleasure!" he answered. "I was going into the Ritz. Come and have
something."
"To Maxim's, if you don't mind," the Vicomte said. "It will take us only
a moment."
Sir George stepped in. The Vicomte, in whose fingers the wheel seemed
scarcely to rest, so light and apparently careless was his touch,
touched a lever by his side, released the clutch, and swung the great
car round the corner at a speed which made Duncombe grasp the sides. At
a pace which seemed to him most ridiculous, they dashed into the Rue de
Rivoli, and with another sharp turn pulled up before Maxim's. The
Vicomte rose with a yawn as though he had just awoke from a refreshing
dream. His servant slipped off his fur coat, and he descended to the
pavement faultlessly dressed and quite unruffled. The commissionaire
preceded them, hat in hand, to the door. A couple of waiters ushered
them to the table which the Vicomte intimated by a gesture.
"I myself," he remarked, drawing off his gloves, "take nothing but
absinthe. What may I have the pleasure of ordering for you?"
Duncombe ordered a whisky and soda.
"I think," he said, "there is one thing which I ought to tell you at
once. I am being shadowed by the police. The man who has just arrived,
and who seems a little breathless, is, I believe, the person whose duty
it is to dog my footsteps in the daytime."
"What a pity!" the Vicomte murmured. "I would at least have taken you a
mile or so round the boulevards if I had known. But wait! You are
sure--that it is the police by whom you are being watched?"
"Quite," Duncombe answered. "The manager of the hotel has spoken to me
about it. He has asked me, in fact, to leave."
"To leave the hotel?"
"Yes! I was on my way to the Ritz to secure rooms when I met you."
The Vicomte sipped his absinthe gravely.
"I should not take those rooms," he said. "You will in all probability
not occupy them."
"Why not?"
"It has been decided," the Vicomte said, "that you are to be driven out
of Paris. In the end you will have to go. I think if I were you I would
not wait. The train de luxe to Calais is more comfortable than a wet
bench in the Morgue or a French prison."
"Who has decided this?" Duncombe asked. "What Emperor has signed the
decree of my banishment?"
"There have been worse served Emperors," the Vicomte remarked, "than
the, shall we say person, who bids you go!"
"What is my offence?" Duncombe asked.
"I know nothing," the Vicomte answered slowly, pouring himself out some
absinthe.
"Who are my judges, then? What secret authorities have I incensed? I am
an honest man, engaged in an honest mission. Why should I not be allowed
to execute it?"
The Vicomte half closed his eyes. Duncombe was a little angry. The
Vicomte regarded him with reproachful wonder.
"You ask me so many questions," he murmured, "and I tell you that I know
nothing. I have asked you to come here with me because I had just this
to say. I can answer no questions, offer no explanations. I have no
particular liking for you, but I am afflicted with a cursedly sensitive
disposition, and--there are things which I find it hard to watch with
equanimity. There is a train for England at nine o'clock this evening,
Sir George. Take it!"
Duncombe rose from his seat.
"I am very much obliged to you," he said. "I believe that you are giving
me what you believe to be good advice. Whether I can follow it or not is
a different matter."
The Vicomte sighed.
"You Englishmen," he said, "are so obstinate. It is the anxiety
concerning your friends, I suppose, which keeps you here?"
"Yes!"
The Vicomte hesitated. He looked up and down the room, and especially at
the man whom Duncombe had pointed out to him. He had edged nearer and
nearer till he was almost within earshot. The Vicomte's voice, always
low, became a whisper.
"I can tell you this much, at any rate," he said. "Whatever their
present condition may be, it is more likely to be improved than made
worse by your departure. You are a well-meaning person, Monsieur, but
you do nobody any good here, and you risk--more than I dare tell you."
The Vicomte turned away to greet a little party of friends who had just
entered. Duncombe strolled back to the hotel, and found Spencer walking
restlessly up and down the hall waiting for him.
"At last!" he exclaimed, with a sigh of relief. "Come up into my room,
Spencer. We can talk there."
He rang for the lift, and as they ascended he watched the other
anxiously. Spencer was looking pale and disturbed. His eyes showed signs
of sleeplessness, and he had not the air of a man who has good news to
impart. As soon as they were inside the room he locked the door.
"Duncombe," he said, "there is a train which leaves Paris for London at
four o'clock. You must catch it--if you are allowed to. Don't look like
that, man. I tell you you've got to do it. If you are in Paris to-night
you will be in prison."
"For what offence?" Duncombe asked.
"For the murder of Mademoiselle Flossie. They are training the witnesses
now. The whole thing is as easy as A B C. They can prove you so guilty
that not even your best friend would doubt it. Pack your clothes, man,
or ring for the valet."
Duncombe hesitated, but he, too, was pale.
"Are you serious, Spencer?" he asked.
"I am so serious," Spencer answered, "that unless you obey me I will not
move another finger in this matter. You lose nothing by going. All that
a human being can do I will do! But you lose your life, or, at any rate,
your liberty if you stay."
Duncombe bowed his head to fate.
"Very well!" he said. "I will go!"