most charming peculiarities that he had never forgotten how to blush. “I
was merely going to suggest that there’s a play running in London that
we ought to see. I didn’t know that ‘The Ringer’ was a play until this
morning, when I saw one of Oberzohn’s more genteel clerks go into the
theatre, and, being naturally of an inquisitive turn of mind, followed
him. A play that interests Oberzohn will interest me, and should
interest you, George,” he said severely, “and certainly should interest
Meadows—it is full of thrilling situations! It is about a criminal who
escapes from Dartmoor and comes back to murder his betrayer. There is
one scene which is played in the dark, that ought to thrill you—I’ve
been looking up the reviews of the dramatic critics, and as they are
unanimous that it is not an artistic success, and is, moreover, wildly
improbable, it ought to be worth seeing. I always choose an artistic
success when I am suffering from insomnia,” he added cruelly.
“Oberzohn is entitled to his amusements, however vulgar they may be.”
“But this play isn’t vulgar,” protested Leon, “except in so far as it is
popular. I found it most difficult to buy a seat. Even actors go to see
the audience act.”
“What seat did he buy?”
“Box A,” said Leon promptly, “and paid for it with real money. It is the
end box on the prompt side—and before you ask me whence I gained my
amazing knowledge of theatrical technique, I will answer that even a
child in arms knows that the prompt side is the left-hand side facing
the audience.”
“For to-night?”
Leon nodded.
“I have three stalls,” he said and produced them from his pocket. “If
you cannot go, will you give them to the cook? She looks like a woman
who would enjoy a good cry over the sufferings of the tortured heroine.
The seats are in the front row, which means that you can get in and out
between the acts without walking on other people’s knees.”
“Must I go?” asked Poiccart plaintively. “I do not like detective plays,
and I hate mystery plays. I know who the real murderer is before the
curtain has been up ten minutes, and that naturally spoils my evening.”
“Could you not take a girl?” asked Leon outrageously. “Do you know any
who would go?”
“Why not take Aunt Alma?” suggested Manfred, and Leon accepted the name
joyously.
Aunt Alma had come to town at the suggestion of the Three, and had
opened up the Doughty Court flat.
“And really she is a remarkable woman, and shows a steadiness and a
courage in face of the terrible position of our poor little friend,
which is altogether praiseworthy. I don’t think Mirabelle Leicester is
in any immediate danger. I think I’ve said that before. Oberzohn merely
wishes to keep her until the period of renewal has expired. How he will
escape the consequences of imprisoning her, I cannot guess. He may not
attempt to escape them, may accept the term of imprisonment which will
certainly be handed out to him, as part of the payment he must pay for
his millions.”
“Suppose he kills her?” asked Poiccart.
For a second Leon’s face twitched.
“He won’t kill her,” he said quietly. “Why should he? We know that he
has got her—the police know. She is a different proposition from
Barberton, an unknown man killed nobody knew how, in a public place. No,
I don’t think we need cross that bridge, only . . .” He rubbed his hands
together irritably. “However, we shall see. And in the meantime I’m
placing a lot of faith in Digby, a shrewd man with a sense of his
previous shortcomings. You were wise there, George.”
He was looking at the street through the curtains.
“Tittlemouse is at his post, the faithful hound!” he said, nodding
towards the solitary taxicab that stood on the rank. “I wonder whether
he expects——”
Manfred saw a light creep into his eyes.
“Will you want me for the next two hours?” Leon asked quickly, and was
out of the room in a flash.
Ten minutes later, Poiccart and George were talking together when they
heard the street door close, and saw Leon stroll to the edge of the
pavement and wave his umbrella. The taxi-driver was suddenly a thing of
quivering excitement. He leaned down, cranked his engine, climbed back
into his seat and brought the car up quicker than any taxicab driver had
ever moved before.
“New Scotland Yard,” said Leon, and got into the machine.
The cab passed through the forbidding gates of the Yard and dropped him
at the staff entrance.
“Wait here,” said Leon, and the man shifted uncomfortably.
“I’ve got to be back at my garage——” he began.
“I shall not be five minutes,” said Leon.
Meadows was in his room, fortunately.
“I want you to pull in this man and give him a dose of the third degree
you keep in this country,” said Leon. “He carries a gun; I saw that when
he had to get down to crank up his cab in Piccadilly Circus. The engine
stopped.”
“What do you want to know?”
“All that there is to be known about Oberzohn. I may have missed one or
two things. I’ve seen him outside the house. Oberzohn employs him for
odd jobs and occasionally he acts as the old man’s chauffeur. In fact,
he drove the machine the day Miss Leicester lunched with Oberzohn at the
Ritz-Carlton. He may not have a cabman’s licence, and that will make it
all the easier for you.”
A few minutes later, a very surprised and wrathful man was marched into
Cannon Row and scientifically searched. Leon had been right about the
revolver; it was produced and found to be loaded, and his excuse that he
carried the weapon as a protection following upon a recent murder of a
cab-driver, had not the backing of the necessary permit. In
addition—and this was a more serious offence—he held no permit from
Scotland Yard to ply for hire on the streets, and his badge was the
property of another man.
“Put him inside,” said Meadows, and went back to report to the waiting
Leon. “You’ve hit the bull’s-eye first time. I don’t know whether he
will be of any use to us, but I don’t despise even the smallest fish.”
Whilst he was waiting, Leon had been engaged in some quick thinking.
“The man has been at Greenwich lately. One of my men saw him there
twice, and I needn’t say that he was driving Oberzohn.”
“I’ll talk to him later and telephone you,” said Meadows, and Leon
Gonsalez went back to Curzon Street, one large smile.
“You have merely exchanged a spy you know for a spy you don’t know,”
said George Manfred, “though I never question these freakish acts of
yours, Leon. So often they have a trick of turning up trumps. By the
way, the police are raiding the Gringo Club in the Victoria Dock Road
to-night, and they may be able to pick up a few of Mr. Oberzohn’s young
gentlemen who are certain to be regular users of the place.”
The telephone bell rang shrilly, and Leon took up the receiver, and
recognized Meadows’ voice.
“I’ve got a queer story for you,” said the inspector immediately.
“Did he talk?” asked the interested Leon.
“After a while. We took a finger-print impression, and found that he was
on the register. More than that, he is a ticket-of-leave man. As an
ex-convict we can send him back to finish his unexpired time. I promised
to say a few words for him, and he spilt everything. The most
interesting item is that Oberzohn is planning to be married.”
“To be married? Who is this?” asked Manfred, in surprise. “Oberzohn?”
Leon nodded.
“Who is the unfortunate lady?” asked Leon.
There was a pause, and then:
“Miss Leicester.”
Manfred saw the face of his friend change colour, and guessed.
“Does he know when?” asked Leon in a different voice.
“No. The licence was issued over a week ago, which means that Oberzohn
can marry any morning he likes to bring along his bride. What’s the
idea, do you think?”
“Drop in this evening and either I or George will tell you,” said Leon.
He put the telephone on the hook very carefully.
“That is a danger I had not foreseen, although it was obviously the only
course Oberzohn could take. If he marries her, she cannot be called in
evidence against him. May I see the book, George?”
Manfred unlocked the wall safe and brought back a small ledger. Leon
Gonsalez turned the pages thoughtfully.
“Dennis—he has done good work for us, hasn’t he?” he asked.
“Yes, he’s a very reliable man. He owes us, amongst other things, his
life. Do you remember, his wife was——”
“I remember.” Leon scribbled the address of a man who had proved to be
one of the most trustworthy of his agents.
“What are you going to do?” asked Manfred.
“I’ve put Dennis on the doorstep of the Greenwich registrar’s office
from nine o’clock in the morning until half-past three in the afternoon,
and he will have instructions from me that, the moment he sees Oberzohn
walk out of a cab with a lady, he must push him firmly but gently under
the wheels of the cab and ask the driver politely to move up a yard.”
Leon in his more extravagantly humorous moods was very often in deadly
earnest.
_Chapter XXVII_ _Mr. Newton’s Dilemma_
THE most carefully guided streaks of luck may, in spite of all
precautions, overflow into the wrong channel, and this had happened to
Mr. Montague Newton, producing an evening that was financially
disastrous and a night from which sleep was almost banished. He had had
one of his little card parties; but whether it was the absence of Joan,
and the inadequacy of her fluffy-haired substitute, or whether the wine
had disagreed with one of the most promising victims, the result was the
same. They had played _chemin de fer_, and the gilded pigeon, whose
feathers seemed already to be ornamenting the head-dress of Monty
Newton, had been successful, and when he should have been signing
cheques for large amounts, he was cashing his counters with a reluctant
host.
The night started wrong with Joan’s substitute, whose name was Lisa. She
had guided to the establishment, via an excellent dinner at Mero’s, the
son of an African millionaire. Joan, of course, would have brought him
alone, but Lisa, less experienced, had allowed a young-looking friend of
the victim to attach himself to the party, and she had even expected
praise for her perspicacity and enterprise in producing two birds for
the stone which Mr. Newton so effectively wielded, instead of one.
Monty did not resent the presence of the new-comer, and rather took the
girl’s view, until he learnt that Lisa’s “find” was not, as she had
believed, an officer of the Guards, but a sporting young lawyer with a
large criminal practice, and one who had already, as a junior, conducted
several prosecutions for the Crown. The moment his name was mentioned,
Monty groaned in spirit. He was, moreover, painfully sober. His friend
was not so favourably situated.
That was the first of the awkward things to happen. The second was the
bad temper of the player, who, when the bank was considerably over
£3,000, had first of all insisted upon the cards being reshuffled, and
then had gone banquo—the game being baccarat. Even this contretemps
might have been overcome, but after he had expressed his willingness to
“give it,” the card which Monty had so industriously palmed, slipped
from his hand to the table, and though the fact was unnoticed by the
players, the lawyer’s attention being diverted at the moment, it was
impossible to recover that very valuable piece of pasteboard. And Monty
had done a silly thing. Instead of staging an artistic exhibition of
annoyance at remarks which the millionaire’s son had made, he decided to
take a chance on the natural run of the cards. And he had lost. On top
of that, the slightly inebriated player had decided that when a man had
won a coup of £3,000 it was time to stop playing. So Monty experienced
the mortification of paying out money, and accompanying his visitor to
the door with a smile that was so genial and so full of good-fellowship
that the young gentleman was compelled to apologize for his boorishness.
“Come along some other night and give me my revenge,” said Monty.
“You bet I will! I’m going to South Africa to-morrow, but I shall be
back early next year, and I’ll look you up.”
Monty watched him going down the steps and hoped he would break his
neck.
He was worried about Joan—more worried than he thought it was possible
for him to be about so light a girl. She was necessary to him in many
ways. Lisa was a bungling fool, he decided, though he sent her home
without hurting her feelings. She was a useful girl in many ways, and
nothing spoils a tout quicker than constant nagging.
He felt very lonely in the house, and wandered from room to room,
irritated with himself that the absence of this feather-brained girl,
who had neither the education nor the breed of his own class, should
make such a big difference. And it did; he had to admit as much to
himself. He hated the thought of that underground room. He knew
something of her temperament, and how soon her experience would get on
her nerves. In many respects he wished he did not feel that way about
her, because she had a big shock coming, and it was probably because he
foresaw this hurt, that he was anxious to make the present as happy as
he could for her.
After he had done what he was to do, there was no reason in the world
why they should be bad friends, and he would give her a big present.
Girls of that class soon forget their miseries if the present is large
enough. Thus he argued, tossing from side to side in his bed, and all
the time his thoughts playing about that infernal cellar. What she must
be feeling! He did not worry at all about Mirabelle, because—well, she
was a principal in the case. To him, Joan was the real victim.
Sleep did not come until daybreak, and he woke in his most irritable
frame of mind. He had promised the girl he would call and see her,
though he had privately arranged with Oberzohn not to go to the house
until the expiry of the five days.
By lunch-time he could stand the worry no longer, and, ordering his car,
drove to a point between New Cross and Bermondsey, walking on foot the
remainder of the distance. Mr. Oberzohn expected the visit. He had a
shrewd knowledge of his confederate’s mental outfit, and when he saw
this well-dressed man picking a dainty way across the littered ground,
he strolled out on the steps to meet him.
“It is curious you should have come,” he said.
“Why didn’t you telephone?” growled Newton. This was his excuse for the
visit.
“Because there are human machines at the end of every wire,” said
Oberzohn. “If they were automatic and none could listen, but you and I,
we would talk and talk and then talk! All day long would I speak with
you and find it a pleasure. But not with Miss This and Miss That saying,
‘One moment, if you please,’ and saying to the Scotland Yard man, ‘Now
you cut in’!”
“Is Gurther back?”
“Gurther is back,” said the doctor soberly.
“Nothing happened to that bird? At least, I saw nothing in the evening
papers.”
“He has gone to Lisbon,” replied the doctor indifferently. “Perhaps he
will get there, perhaps he will not—what does it matter? I should like
to see the letter, because it is data, and data has an irresistible
charm for a poor old scientist. You will have a drink?”
Monty hesitated, as he always did when Oberzohn offered him refreshment.
You could never be sure with Oberzohn.
“I’ll have a whisky,” he said at last, “a full bottle—one that hasn’t
been opened. I’ll open it myself.”
The doctor chuckled unevenly.
“You do not trust?” he said. “I think you are wise. For who is there in
this world of whom a man can say, ‘He is my friend. To the very end of
my life I will have confidence in him’?”
Monty did not feel that the question called for an answer.
He took the whisky bottle to the light, examined the cork and drove in
the corkscrew.
“The soda water—that also might be poisoned,” said Dr. Oberzohn
pleasantly.
At any other time he would not have made that observation. That he said
it at all, betrayed a subtle but ominous change in their relationships.
If Monty noticed this, he did not say a word, but filled his glass and
sat down on the sofa to drink. And all the time the doctor was watching
him interestedly.
“Yes, Gurther is back. He failed, but you must excuse failure in a good
man. The perfect agent has yet to be found, and the perfect principal
also. The American, Washington, had left Paris when I last heard of him.
He is to be congratulated. If I myself lived in Paris I should always be
leaving. It is a frivolous city.”
Monty lit a cigar, and decided to arrive at the object of his visit by
stages. For he had come to perform two important duties. He accounted as
a duty a call upon Joan. No less was it a duty, and something of a
relief also, to make his plan known to his partner.
“How are the girls?” he asked.
“They are very happy,” said Dr. Oberzohn, who had not resumed his seat,
but stood in an attitude somewhat reminiscent of Gurther, erect,
staring, motionless. “Always my guests are happy.”
“In that dog-hole?” said the other contemptuously. “I don’t want Joan to
be here.”
The Herr Doktor shrugged.
“Then take her away, my friend,” he said. “Why should she stay, if you
are unhappy because this woman is not with you? She serves no purpose.
Possibly she is fretting. By all means—I will bring her to you.” He
moved to the door.
“Wait a moment,” said Monty. “I’ll see her later and take her out
perhaps, but I don’t want her to be away permanently. Somebody ought to
stay with that girl.”
“Why? Am I not here?” asked Oberzohn blandly.
“You’re here, and Gurther’s here.” Monty was looking out of the window
and did not meet the doctor’s eyes. “Especially Gurther. That’s why I
think that Mirabelle Leicester should have somebody to look after her.
Has it ever struck you that the best way out of this little trouble
is—marriage?”
“I have thought that,” said the doctor. “You also have thought it? This
is wonderful! You are beginning to think.”
The change of tone was noticeable enough now. Monty snapped round at the
man who had hitherto stood in apparent awe of him and his judgments.
“You can cut that sarcasm right out, Oberzohn,” he said, and, without
preamble: “I’m going to marry that girl.”
Oberzohn said nothing to this.
“She’s not engaged; she’s got no love affairs at all. Joan told me, and
Joan is a pretty shrewd girl. I don’t know how I’m going to fix it, but
I guess the best thing I can do is to pretend that I am a real friend
and get her out of your cellar. She’ll be so grateful that maybe she
will agree to almost anything. Besides, I think I made an impression the
first time I saw her. And I’ve got a position to offer her, Oberzohn: a
house in the best part of London——”
“My house,” interrupted Oberzohn’s metallic voice.
“Your house? Well, _our_ house, let us say. We’re not going to quarrel
about terms.”
“I also have a position to offer her, and I do not offer her any other
man’s.”
Oberzohn was looking at him wide-eyed, a comical figure; his elongated
face seemed to stand out in the gloom like a pantomime mask.
“You?” Monty could hardly believe his ears.
“I, Baron Eruc Oberzohn.”
“A baron, are you?” The room shook with Monty’s laughter. “Why, you
damned old fool, you don’t imagine she’d marry you, do you?”
Oberzohn nodded.
“She would do anythings what I tell her.” In his agitation his English
was getting a little ragged. “A girl may not like a mans, but she might
hate somethings worse—you understand? A woman says death is not’ing,
but a woman is afeard of death, isn’t it?”
“You’re crazy,” said Monty scornfully.
“I am crazy, am I? And a damned old fool also—yes? Yet I shall marry
her.”
There was a dead silence, and then Oberzohn continued the conversation,
but on a much calmer note.
“Perhaps I am what you call me, but it is not a thing worthy for two
friends to quarrel. To-morrow you shall come here, and we will discuss
this matter like a business proposition, hein?”
Monty examined him as though he were a strange insect that had wandered
into his ken.
“You’re not a Swede, you’re German,” he said. “That baron stuff gave you
away.”
“I am from the Baltic, but I have lived many years in Sweden,” said
Oberzohn shortly. “I am not German: I do not like them.”
More than this he would not say. Possibly he shared Gurther’s repugnance
towards his sometime neighbours.
“We shall not quarrel, anyway,” he continued. “I am a fool, you are a
fool, we are all fools. You wish to see your woman?”
“I wish to see Joan,” said Monty gruffly. “I don’t like that ‘your
woman’ line of yours.”
“I will go get her. You wait.”
Again the long boots came from under the table, were dragged on to the
doctor’s awkward feet, and Monty watched him from the window as he
crossed to the factory and disappeared.
He was gone five minutes before he came out again, alone. Monty frowned.
What was the reason for this?
“My friend,” panted Oberzohn, to whom these exertions were becoming more
and more irksome, “it is not wise.”
“I want to see her——” began Monty.
“Gently, gently; you shall see her. But on the canal bank Gurther has
also seen a stranger, who has been walking up and down, pretending to
fish. Who can fish in a canal, I ask you?”
“What is he to do with it?”
“Would it be wise to bring her in daylight, I ask you again? Do not the
men think that your—that this girl is in Brussels?”
This had not occurred to Monty.
“I have an idea for you. It is a good idea. The brain of old fool
Oberzohn sometimes works remarkably. This morning a friend sent to me a
ticket for a theatre. Now you shall take her to-night. There is always a
little fog when the sun is setting and you can leave the house in a car.
Presently I will send a man to attract this watcher’s attention, and
then I will bring her to the house and you can call for her.”
“I will wait for her.” Monty was dogged on this point.
And wait he did, until an hour later a half-crazy girl came flying into
the room and into his arms.
Dr. Oberzohn witnessed the reunion unmoved.
“That is a pretty scene for me,” he said, “for one to be so soon
married,” and he left them alone.
“Monty, I can’t possibly go back to that beastly place to-night. She’ll
have to stay by herself. And she’s not a bad kid, Monty, but she doesn’t
know she’s worth a lot of money.”
“Have you been talking to her?” he asked angrily. “I told you——”
“No, I’ve only just asked her a few questions. You can’t be in a poky
hole like that, thrown together day and night, without talking, can you?
Monty, you’re absolutely sure nothing can happen to her?”
Monty cleared his throat.
“The worst thing that can happen to her,” he said, “is to get married.”
She opened her eyes at this.
“Does somebody want to marry her?”
“Oberzohn,” he said.
“That old thing!” she scoffed.
Again he found a difficulty in speaking.
“I have been thinking it over, honey,” he said. “Marriage doesn’t mean a
whole lot to anybody.”
“It’ll mean a lot to me,” she said quietly.
“Suppose I married her?” he blurted.
“You!” She stepped back from him in horror.
“Only just a . . . well, this is the truth, Joan. It may be the only way
to get her money. Now you’re in on this graft, and you know what you are
to me. A marriage—a formal marriage—for a year or two, and then a
divorce, and we could go away together, man and wife.”
“Is that what he meant?” She jerked her head to the door. “About
‘married so soon’?”
“He wants to marry her himself.”
“Let him,” she said viciously. “Do you think I care about money? Isn’t
there any other way of getting it?”
He was silent. There were too many other ways of getting it for him to
advance a direct negative.
“Oh, Monty, you’re not going to do that?”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do yet,” he said.
“But not that?” she insisted, clinging to him by his coat.
“We’ll talk about it to-night. The old man’s got us tickets for the
theatre. We’ll have a bit of dinner up West and go on, and it really
doesn’t matter if anybody sees us, because they know very well you’re
not in Brussels. What is that queer scent you’ve got?”
Joan laughed, forgetting for the moment the serious problem which faced
her.
“Joss-sticks,” she said. “The place got so close and stuffy, and I found
them in the pantry with the provisions. As a matter of fact, it was a
silly thing to do, because we had the place full of smoke. It’s gone
now, though. Monty, you do these crazy things when you’re locked up,”
she said seriously. “I don’t think I can go back again.”
“Go back to-morrow,” he almost pleaded. “It’s only for two or three
days, and it means a lot to me. Especially now that Oberzohn has ideas.”
“You’re not going to think any more about—about marrying her, are you?”
“We’ll talk of it to-night at dinner. I thought you’d like the idea of
the graft,” he added untruthfully.