Miss Baxter was early at the station before the Continental train left.
She walked up and down the platform, hoping to see Mr. Cadbury Taylor,
with whose face and form she was familiar. She secured a porter who
spoke French, and pretended to him that she knew no English.
“I desire,” she said, “to get into a first-class compartment with
a gentleman whom I shall point out to you. I shall give you five
shillings, so you must let me have your whole attention. My luggage has
been labelled and registered, therefore you will not need to bother
about it, but keep your eye on me and follow me into whatever carriage I
enter, bringing with you the hand-bag and this heavy package.”
The heavy package was a typewriter in its case. Shortly before the train
departed, there sauntered into the station the tall, thin, well-known
form of the celebrated detective. He wore a light ulster that reached
almost to his heels, and his keen, alert face was entirely without beard
or moustache. As he came up the platform, a short, stout man accosted
him.
“I was afraid you were going to be late,” said the detective’s friend,
“but I see you are just in time as usual.”
“A railway station,” said Mr. Cadbury Taylor, “is not the most inspiring
place in London for the spending of a spare half hour; besides, I had
some facts to get together, which are now tabulated in my note-book, and
I’m quite ready to go, if the train is.”
“I have secured a smoking compartment here where we shall be alone.”
“That’s right, Smith,” said Cadbury Taylor. “You are always so
thoughtful,” and the two men entered the compartment together.
Just as the guards were shouting, “Take your seats, please,” Miss Baxter
made a bolt for the compartment in which the detective and his friend
sat together in opposite corners.
“I beg your pardon,” said Smith, “this is a smoking compartment.” The
lady replied to him volubly in French, and next instant the porter
heaved the typewriter and hand-bag on the seat beside her. Smith seemed
to resent the intrusion, and appeared about to blame the porter, but the
man answered rapidly as he banged the door shut, “The lady doesn’t speak
any English,” and the next moment the train moved out of the station.
“There was no need,” said the detective, “my dear Smith, to depend upon
the porter for the information that the lady could not speak English.
She is the secretary to a very rich employer in Chicago, and came from
that city to New York, where she sailed on the _Servia_ alone, coming to
England to transact some special business, of which I could here give
you full particulars, if it were worth while. She came from Liverpool to
London over the Great Western Railway, and is now on her way to Paris.
All this, of course, is obvious to the most casual observer, and so, my
dear Smith, we may discuss our case with as much security as though we
were entirely alone.”
“But, good heavens, Cadbury!” cried Smith in amazement, “how can you
tell all that?”
“My dear fellow,” said the detective wearily, “no one travels with a
typewriting machine unless that person is a typewriter. The girl, if
you will notice, is now engaged in filling the leaves of her book with
shorthand, therefore that proves her occupation. That she is secretary
to a rich man is evidenced by the fact that she crossed in the _Servia_
first cabin, as you may see by glancing at the label on the case; that
she came alone, which is to say her employer was not with her, is
indicated by the typewriter being marked ‘Not Wanted,’ so it was put
down into the hold. If a Chicago business man had been travelling with
his secretary, the typewriter case would have been labelled instead,
‘Cabin, wanted,’ for a Chicago man of business would have to write some
hundreds of letters, even on the ocean, to be ready for posting the
moment he came ashore. The typewriter case is evidently new, and is
stamped with the name and address of its sellers in Chicago. That she
came by the Great Western is shown by the fact that ‘Chester’ appears
on still another label. That she has special business in England we may
well believe, otherwise she would have crossed on the French line direct
from New York to Havre. So you see, my dear boy, these are all matters
of observation, and quite patent to anyone who cares to use his eyes.”
“Yes, it all seems very simple now that you have explained it,” growled
Smith.
“I should be a much more mysterious person than I am,” remarked the
detective complacently, “if I did not explain so much. This explanation
habit is becoming a vice with me, and I fear I must abandon it.”
“I hope for my sake you won’t,” said Smith more good-naturedly, “for if
left to myself I never could find out how you arrive at your wonderful
conclusions. Do you expect the Austrian diamond mystery to prove
difficult?”
“Difficult? Oh, dear no! To tell the truth, I have solved it already,
but in order to give the American a run for his money--and surely he
ought not to object to that, because he is a millionaire who has made his
fortune by giving other people runs for their money, being a railway
man--I am now on my way to Vienna. If I solved the problem off-hand for
him in London, he would have no more appreciation of my talent than you
had a moment ago when I explained why I knew this French girl came from
Chicago.”
“You mustn’t mind that, Cadbury,” said Smith contritely. “I confess I
was irritated for a moment because it all seemed so simple.”
“My dear fellow, every puzzle in this world is simple except one, and
that is to find any problem which is difficult.”
“Then who stole the diamonds? The lieutenant?”
The detective smiled and gazed upwards for a few tantalizing moments at
the roof of the carriage.
“Here we have,” he said at last, “an impecunious prince who marries an
American heiress, as so many of them do. The girl begins life in Austria
on one million dollars, say two hundred thousand pounds, and a case
of diamonds said to be worth another two hundred thousand at
least--probably more. Not much danger of running through that very
speedily, is there, Smith?”
“No, I should think not.”
“So the average man would think,” continued the detective. “However, I
have long since got out of the habit of thinking; therefore I make sure.
The first problem I set to myself is this: How much money have the
Prince and Princess spent since they were married? I find that the
repairs on the Schloss Steinheimer, situated in the Tyrol, cost
something like forty thousand pounds. It is a huge place, and the
Steinheimers have not had an heiress in the family for many centuries.
The Prince owed a good deal of money when he was married, and it took
something like sixty thousand pounds to settle those debts; rather
expensive as Continental princes go, but if one must have luxuries, one
cannot save money. Not to weary you with details, I found that the two
hundred thousand pounds were exhausted somewhat more than two months
ago; in fact, just before the alleged robbery. The Prince is, of course,
without money, otherwise he would not have married a Chicago heiress,
and the Princess being without money, what does she naturally do?”
“Pawns her own diamonds!” cried Smith enthusiastically.
The detective smiled.
“I thought it much more probable she would apply to her father for
money. I asked him if this was the case, giving him the date, roughly
speaking, when such a letter had been sent. The old man opened his eyes
at this, and told me he had received such a letter. ‘But you did not
send the money?’ I ventured, ‘No,’ he said, ‘I did not. The fact is,
money is very tight in Chicago just now, and so I cabled her to run on
her debts for a while.’ This exactly bore out the conclusion at which I
had already arrived. So now, having failed to get money from her father,
the lady turns to her diamonds, the only security she possesses. The
chances are that she did so before her father’s cable message came, and
that was the reason she so confidently wished information to be given to
the police. She expected to have money to redeem her jewels, and being a
bright woman, she knew the traditional stupidity of the official police,
and so thought there was no danger of her little ruse being discovered.
But when the cable message came saying no money would be sent her, a
different complexion was put upon the whole affair, for she did not know
but if the police were given plenty of time they might stumble on the
diamonds.”
“But, my dear Cadbury, why should she not have taken the diamonds openly
and raised money on them?”
“My dear fellow, there are a dozen reasons, any one of which will
suffice where a woman is in the case. In the first place, she might fear
to offend the family pride of the von Steinheimers; in the second place,
we cannot tell what her relations with her husband were. She may not
have wished him to know that she was short of money. But that she has
stolen her own diamonds there is not the slightest question in my mind.
All that is necessary for me to do now is to find out how many persons
there are in Vienna who would lend large sums of money on valuable
jewels. The second is to find with which one of those the Princess
pawned her diamonds.”
“But, my dear Cadbury, the lady is in Meran, and Vienna is some hundreds
of miles away. How could a lady in the Tyrol pawn diamonds in Vienna
without her absence being commented on? or do you think she had an agent
to do it for her?” Again the detective smiled indulgently.
“No, she had no agent. The diamonds never left Vienna. You see, the ball
had been announced, and immediate money was urgently needed. She pawned
the diamonds before she left the capital of Austria, and the chances are
she did not intend anyone to know they were missing; but on the eve of
the ball her husband insisted that she should wear her diamonds, and
therefore, being a quick-witted woman, she announced they had been
stolen. After having made such a statement, she, of course, had to
stick to it; and now, failing to get the money from America, she
is exceedingly anxious that no real detective shall be employed in
investigation.”
At Dover Miss Baxter, having notes of this interesting conversation in
shorthand, witnessed the detective bid good-bye to his friend Smith, who
returned to London by a later train. After that she saw no more of Mr.
Cadbury Taylor, and reached the Schloss Steinheimer at Meran without
further adventure.