It was a little past seven o’clock when Miss Baxter’s hansom drove up to
the two-storeyed house in Rupert Square numbered 17. She knocked at the
door, and it was speedily opened by a man with some trace of anxiety on
his clouded face, who proved to be Hazel himself, the clerk at the Board
of Public Construction. “You are Mr. Hazel?” she ventured, on entering.
“Yes,” replied the man, quite evidently surprised at seeing a lady
instead of the man he was expecting at that hour; “but I am afraid I
shall have to ask you to excuse me; I am waiting for a visitor who is a
few minutes late, and who may be here at any moment.”
“You are waiting for Mr. Alder, are you not?”
“Yes,” stammered the man, his expression of surprise giving place to one
of consternation.
“Oh, well, that is all right,” said Miss Jennie, reassuringly. “I have
just driven from the office of the _Daily Bugle_. Mr. Alder cannot come
to-night.”
“Ah,” said Hazel, closing the door. “Then are you here in his place?”
“I am here instead of him. Mr. Alder is on other business that he had to
attend to at the editor’s request. Now, Mr. Hardwick--that’s the editor,
you know----”
“Yes, I know,” answered Hazel.
They were by this time seated in the front parlour.
“Well, Mr. Hardwick is very anxious that the figures should be given
with absolute accuracy.”
“Of course, that would be much better,” cried the man; “but, you see, I
have gone thoroughly into the question with Mr. Alder already. He said
he would mention what I told him to the editor--put my position before
him, in fact.”
“Oh, he has done so,” said Miss Baxter, “and did it very effectively
indeed; in fact, your reasons are quite unanswerable. You fear, of
course, that you will lose your situation, and that is very important,
and no one in the _Bugle_ office wishes you to suffer for what you have
done. Of course, it is all in the public interest.”
“Of course, of course,” murmured Hazel, looking down on the table.
“Well, have you all the documents ready, so that they can be published
at any time?”
“Quite ready,” answered the man.
“Very well,” said the girl, with decision; “here are your fifty pounds.
Just count the money, and see that it is correct. I took the envelope as
it was handed to me, and have not examined the amount myself.”
She poured the sovereigns out on the table, and Hazel, with trembling
fingers, counted them out two by two.
“That is quite right,” he said, rising. He went to a drawer, unlocked
it, and took out a long blue envelope.
“There,” he said, with a sigh that was almost a gasp. “There are the
figures, and a full explanation of them. You will be very careful that
my name does not slip out in any way.”
“Certainly,” said Miss Jennie, coolly drawing forth the papers from
their covering. “No one knows your name except Mr. Alder, Mr. Hardwick,
and myself; and I can assure you that I shall not mention it to anyone.”
She glanced rapidly over the documents.
“I shall just read what you have written,” she said, looking up at him;
“and if there is anything here I do not understand you will, perhaps,
be good enough to explain it now,--and then I won’t need to come here
again.”
“Very well,” said Hazel. The man had no suspicion that his visitor was
not a member of the staff of the paper he had been negotiating with. She
was so thoroughly self-possessed, and showed herself so familiar with
all details which had been discussed by Alder and himself that not the
slightest doubt had entered the clerk’s mind.
Jennie read the documents with great haste, for she knew she was running
a risk in remaining there after seven o’clock. It might be that Alder
would come to Brixton to let the man know the result of his talk with
the editor, or Mr. Hardwick himself might have changed his mind, and
instructed his subordinate to secure the papers. Nevertheless, there was
no sign of hurry in Miss Jennie’s demeanour as she placed the papers
back in their blue envelope and bade the anxious Hazel good-bye.
Once more in the hansom, she ordered the man to drive her to Charing
Cross, and when she was ten minutes away from Rupert Square she changed
her direction and desired him to take her to the office of the _Evening
Graphite_, where she knew Mr. Stoneham would be busy with his leading
article, and probably impatiently awaiting further details of the
conspiracy he was to lay open before the public. A light was burning in
the editorial rooms of the office of the _Evening Graphite_, always a
suspicious thing in such an establishment, and well calculated to cause
the editor of any rival evening paper to tremble, should he catch a
glimpse of burning gas in a spot where the work of the day should be
finished at latest by five o’clock. Light in the room of the evening
journalist usually indicates that something important is on hand.
A glance at the papers Miss Baxter brought to him showed Mr. Stoneham
that he had at least got the worth of his fifty pounds. There would be a
fluttering in high places next day. He made arrangements before he
left to have the paper issued a little earlier than was customary,
calculating his time with exactitude, so that rival sheets could not
have the news in their first edition, cribbed from the _Graphite_,
and yet the paper would be on the street, with the newsboys shouting,
“‘Orrible scandal,” before any other evening journal was visible.
And this was accomplished the following day with a precision truly
admirable.
Mr. Stoneham, with a craft worthy of all commendation, kept back from
the early issue a small fraction of the figures that were in his
possession, so that he might print them in the so-called fourth edition,
and thus put upon the second lot of contents--bills sent out, in huge,
startling black type, “Further Revelations of the Board of Construction
Scandal;” and his scathing leading article, in which he indignantly
demanded a Parliamentary inquiry into the conduct of the Board, was
recognized, even by the friends of that public body, as having seriously
shaken confidence in it. The reception of the news by the other evening
papers was most flattering. One or two ignored it altogether, others
alluded to it as a rumour, that it “alleged” so and so, and threw doubt
on its truth, which was precisely what Mr. Stoneham wished them to do,
as he was in a position to prove the accuracy of his statement.
Promptly, at five o’clock that afternoon a hansom containing Miss Jennie
Baxter drove up to the side entrance of the _Daily Bugle_ office, and
the young woman once more accosted the Irish porter, who again came out
of his den to receive her.
“Miss Baxter?” said the Irishman, half by way of salutation, and half by
way of inquiry. “Yes,” said the girl.
“Well, Mr. Hardwick left strict orders with me that if ye came, or,
rather, that _whin_ ye came, I was to conduct ye right up to his room at
once.”
“Oh, that is very satisfactory,” cried Miss Jennie, “and somewhat
different from the state of things yesterday.”
“Indeed, and that’s very true,” said the porter, his voice sinking.
“To-day is not like yesterday at all, at all. There’s been great
ructions in this office, mum; although what it’s about, fly away with me
if I know. There’s been ruunin’ back and forrad, an’ a plentiful deal of
language used. The proprietor himself has been here, an’ he’s here now,
an’ Mr. Alder came out a minute ago with his face as white as a sheet of
paper. They do be sayin’,” added the porter, still further lowering his
voice, and pausing on the stairway, “that Mr. Hardwick is not goin’ to
be the editor any more, but that Mr. Alder is to take his place. Anyway,
as far as I can tell, Mr. Hardwick an’ Mr. Alder have had a fine fall
out, an’ one or other of them is likely to leave the paper.”
“Oh, dear, oh, dear!” said Miss Jennie, also pausing on the stairs. “Is
it so serious as all that?”
“Indeed it is, mum, an’ we none of us know where we’re standin’, at all,
at all.”
The porter led the way to Mr. Hardwick’s room, and announced the
visitor.
“Ask her to come in,” she heard the editor say, and the next instant the
porter left them alone together.
“Won’t you sit down, Miss Baxter?” said Mr. Hardwick, with no trace of
that anger in his voice which she had expected. “I have been waiting for
you. You said you would be here at five, and I like punctuality. Without
beating round the bush, I suppose I may take it for granted that the
_Evening Graphite_ is indebted to you for what it is pleased to call the
Board of Public Construction scandal?”
“Yes,” said the young woman, seating herself; “I came up to tell you
that I procured for the _Graphite_ that interesting bit of information.”
“So I supposed. My colleague, Henry Alder, saw Hazel this afternoon at
the offices of the Board. The good man Hazel is panic-stricken at the
explosion he has caused, and is in a very nervous state of mind, more
especially when he learned that his documents had gone to an unexpected
quarter. Fortunately for him, the offices of the Board are thronged
with journalists who want to get statements from this man or the other
regarding the exposure, and so the visit of Alder to Hazel was not
likely to be noticed or commented upon. Hazel gave a graphic description
of the handsome young woman who had so cleverly wheedled the documents
from him, and who paid him the exact sum agreed upon in the exact way
that it was to have been paid. Alder had not seen you, and has not the
slightest idea how the important news slipped through his fingers; but
when he told me what had happened, I knew at once you were the goddess
of the machine, therefore I have been waiting for you. May I be
permitted to express the opinion that you didn’t play your cards at all
well, Miss Baxter?”
“No? I think I played my cards very much better than you played yours,
you know.”
“Oh, I am not instituting any comparison, and am not at all setting
myself up as a model of strategy. I admit that, having the right cards
in my hands, I played them exceedingly badly; but then, you understand,
I thought I was sure of an exclusive bit of news.”
“No news is exclusive, Mr. Hardwick, until it is printed, and out in the
streets, and the other papers haven’t got it.”
“That is very true, and has all the conciseness of an adage. I would
like to ask, Miss Baxter, how much the _Graphite_ paid you for that
article over and above the fifty pounds you gave to Hazel?”
“Oh! it wasn’t a question of money with me; the subject hasn’t even been
discussed. Mr. Stoneham is not a generous paymaster, and that is why I
desire to get on a paper which does not count the cost too closely. What
I wished to do was to convince you that I would be a valuable addition
to the _Bugle_ staff; for you seemed to be of opinion that the staff was
already sufficient and complete.”
“Oh, my staff is not to blame in this matter; I alone am to blame in
being too sure of my ground, and not realizing the danger of delay in
such a case. But if you had brought the document to me, you would have
found me by far your best customer. You would have convinced me quite as
effectually as you have done now that you are a very alert young woman,
and I certainly would have been willing to give you four or five times
as much as the _Graphite_ will be able to pay.”
“To tell the truth, I thought of that as I stood here yesterday, but I
saw you were a very difficult man to deal with or to convince, and I
dared not take the risk of letting you know I had the news. You might
very easily have called in Mr. Alder, told him that Hazel had given up
the documents, and sent him flying to Brixton, where very likely the
clerk has a duplicate set. It would have been too late to get the
sensation into any other morning paper, and, even if it were not too
late, you would have had something about the sensation in the _Bugle_,
and so the victory would not have been as complete as it is now. No, I
could not take such a risk. I thought it all out very carefully.”
“You credit us with more energy, Miss Baxter, than we possess. I can
assure you that if you had come here at ten or eleven o’clock with the
documents, I should have been compelled to purchase them from you.
However, that is all past and done with, and there is no use in our
saying anything more about it. I am willing to take all the blame for
our defeat on my shoulders, but there are some other things I am not
willing to do, and perhaps you are in a position to clear up a little
misunderstanding that has arisen in this office. I suppose I may take it
for granted that you overheard the conversation which took place between
Mr. Alder and myself in this room yesterday afternoon?”
“Well,” said Miss Baxter, for the first time in some confusion, “I can
assure you that I did not come here with the intention of listening to
anything. I came into the next room by myself for the purpose of getting
to see you as soon as possible. While not exactly a member of the staff
of the _Evening Graphite_, that paper nevertheless takes about all the
work I am able to do, and so I consider myself bound to keep my eyes and
ears open on its behalf wherever I am.”
“Oh, I don’t want to censure you at all,” said Hardwick; “I merely wish
to be certain how the thing was done. As I said, I am willing to take
the blame entirely on my own shoulders. I don’t think I should have
made use of information obtained in that way myself; still, I am not
venturing to find fault with you for doing so.”
“To find fault with me!” cried Miss Jennie somewhat warmly, “that would
be the pot calling the kettle black indeed. Why, what better were you?
You were bribing a poor man to furnish you with statistics, which he
was very reluctant to let you have; yet you overcame his scruples with
money, quite willing that he should risk his livelihood, so long as you
got the news. If you ask me, I don’t see very much difference in our
positions, and I must say that if two men take the risk of talking aloud
about a secret, with a door open leading to another room, which may be
empty or may be not, then they are two very foolish persons.”
“Oh, quite so, quite so,” answered Hardwick soothingly. “I have already
disclaimed the critical attitude. The point I wish to be sure of is
this--you overheard the conversation between Alder and myself?”
“Yes, I did.”
“Would you be able to repeat it?”
“I don’t know that I could repeat it word for word, but I could
certainly give the gist of it.”
“Would you have any objection to telling a gentleman whom I shall call
in a moment, as nearly as possible what Alder said and what I said?
I may add that the gentleman I speak of is Mr. Hempstead, and he is
practically the proprietor of this paper. There has arisen between Mr.
Alder and myself a slight divergence of memory, if I may call it so, and
it seems that you are the only person who can settle the dispute.”
“I am perfectly willing to tell what I heard to anybody.”
“Thank you.”
Mr. Hardwick pressed an electric button, and his secretary came in from
another room.
“Would you ask Mr. Hempstead to step this way, if he is in his room?”
In a few minutes Mr. Hempstead entered, bowed somewhat stiffly towards
the lady, but froze up instantly when he heard that she was the person
who had given the Board of Public Construction scandal to the _Evening
Graphite_.
“I have just this moment learned, Mr. Hempstead, that Miss Baxter was in
the adjoining room when Alder and I were talking over this matter. She
heard the conversation. I have not asked her to repeat it, but sent for
you at once, and she says she is willing to answer any questions you may
ask.”
“In that case, Mr. Hardwick, wouldn’t it be well to have Henry Alder
here?”
“Certainly, if he is on the premises.” Then, turning to his secretary,
he said, “Would you find out if Mr. Alder is in his room? Tell him Mr.
Hempstead wishes to see him here.”
When Henry Alder came in, and the secretary had disappeared, Miss Baxter
saw at once that she was in an unenviable situation, for it was quite
evident the three men were scarcely on speaking terms with each other.
Nothing causes such a state of tension in a newspaper office as the
missing of a piece of news that is important.
“Perhaps it would be better,” suggested Hardwick, “if Miss Baxter would
repeat the conversation as she heard it.”
“I don’t see the use of that,” said Mr. Hempstead. “There is only one
point at issue. Did Mr. Alder warn Mr. Hardwick that by delay he would
lose the publication of this report?”
“Hardly that,” answered the girl. “As I remember it, he said, ‘Isn’t
there a danger that some other paper may get this?’ Mr. Hardwick
replied, ‘I don’t think so. Not for three days, at least’; and then Mr.
Alder said, ‘Very good,’ or ‘Very well,’ or something like that.”
“That quite tallies with my own remembrance,” assented Hardwick. “I
admit I am to blame, but I decidedly say that I was not definitely
warned by Mr. Alder that the matter would be lost to us.”
“I told you it would be lost if you delayed,” cried Alder, with the
emphasis of an angry man, “and it _has_ been lost. I have been on the
track of this for two weeks, and it is very galling to have missed it at
the last moment through no fault of my own.”
“Still,” said Mr. Hempstead coldly, “your version of the conversation
does not quite agree with what Miss Baxter says.”
“Oh, well,” said Alder, “I never pretended to give the exact words. I
warned him, and he did not heed the warning.”
“You admit, then, that Miss Baxter’s remembrance of the conversation is
correct?”
“It is practically correct. I do not ‘stickle’ about words.”
“But you did stickle about words an hour ago,” said Mr. Hempstead, with
some severity. “There is a difference in positively stating that the
item would be lost and in merely suggesting that it might be lost.”
“Oh, have it as you wish,” said Alder truculently. “It doesn’t matter in
the least to me. It is very provoking to work hard for two weeks, and
then have everything nullified by a foolish decision from the editor.
However, as I have said, it doesn’t matter to me. I have taken service
on the _Daily Trumpet_, and you may consider my place on the _Bugle_
vacant”--saying which, the irate Mr. Alder put his hat on his head and
left the room.
Mr. Hempstead seemed distressed by the discussion, but, for the first
time, Mr. Hardwick smiled grimly.
“I always insist on accuracy,” he said, “and lack of it is one of
Alder’s failings.”
“Nevertheless, Mr. Hardwick, you have lost one of your best men. How are
you going to replace him?” inquired the proprietor anxiously.
“There is little difficulty in replacing even the best man on any staff
in London,” replied Hardwick, with a glance at Miss Baxter. “As this
young lady seems to keep her wits about her when the welfare of her
paper is concerned, I shall, if you have no objection, fill Henry
Alder’s place with Miss Baxter?”
Mr. Hempstead arched his eyebrows a trifle, and looked at the girl in
some doubt.
“I thought you didn’t believe in women journalists, Mr. Hardwick,” he
murmured at last.
“I didn’t up till to-day, but since the evening papers came out I have
had reason to change my mind. I should much rather have Miss Baxter for
me than against me.”
“Do you think you can fill the position, Miss Baxter?” asked the
proprietor, doubtingly.
“Oh, I, am sure of it,” answered the girl. “I have long wanted a place
on a well-edited paper like the _Bugle_.” Again Mr. Hardwick smiled
grimly. The proprietor turned to him, and said, “I don’t quite see,
Mr. Hardwick, what a lady can do on this paper outside of the regular
departments.”
“I hardly think there will be any trouble about that, Mr. Hempstead. For
example, who could be better equipped to attempt the solution of that
knotty question about the Princess von Steinheimer’s diamonds?”
“By Jove!” cried Hempstead, his eyes glittering with excitement. “That
is an inspiration. I imagine that if anyone can unravel the mystery, it
is Miss Baxter.”