SAIDEE ISAACS
Chester Fay felt the grip of a London night as he dodged in and out of
the neatly boxed trees that lined the street upon which was the quiet
house of the Two Lions.
He did not glance back. He knew that only amateurs did things like that.
The five years in Dartmoor had taught him that liberty was a priceless
thing. There were guards and constables on that dark street. Some turned
and watched his fleeting form with suspicion. Any moment one might call
a halt. Every second, he expected to hear a shout from MacKeenon.
The high tower of Westminster loomed over the housetops. Beyond this
tower was the House of Parliament. At its base ran the sullen flood of
the Thames. Over the river a bridge arched, strangely pale in the night
light.
Gripping his palms, and somewhat surprised to find the overcoat over his
arm, he turned at the Embankment and there swept the street with the
corner of his eye. No man followed him. A single constable, half
curious, had stepped out on the asphalt. He stood like a post, his hands
on his bent knees.
“Adieu, sir,” Fay laughed lightly. “Adieu, you there, and you Keenon and
you, Richard. You both would have let me rot in that hell on earth if
you hadn’t needed me. From now on, I’m a free agent! And the world is
wide.”
Breathing the night air, Fay hurried toward the east. His shoulders were
squared and his heels and toes clicked over the hard stone without
visible effort.
He walked in the same swinging gait until he reached the place where the
black shadow of Cleo’s Needle lifted against the leaden vault of the
London sky.
Here he turned and leaned over the Embankment’s rail, The tide flowed
slowly toward the city and the sea. Bridges arched from shore to shore.
Great caravansaries loomed with their staring windows arranged in
shelf-like tiers. Beyond them sounded the roar of midnight traffic.
A sudden loneliness came over him. He was without home or friends. The
years at Dartmoor had effaced many memories. They left one which was
overpowering. How little was human effort. There had been a time when
flash thieves with international reputations had pointed him out at the
St. James and Alhambra Lounge, as the king of cracksmen. The time was
gone. The old crew had either been caught or had died overseas on the
red fields of Flanders. Few served or continued their profession.
Saidee Isaacs loomed before him. He searched the Thames and found her
face there. He closed his eyes and marked her flashing presence. He saw
her dark hair, her lashes, her olive cheeks and Madonna smile. That same
smile could change between the time of seconds to hate and rage. Dutch
Gus, who should have known, had called her the Mona Lisa of the
underworld.
Fay wondered where she was living, as he tore his glance away from the
river and turned with his back to the wall. He had last seen her on that
eventful day when a cage had shot up in the court of Assizes, a judge
had pronounced the sentence, and the cage, with him in it, had dropped
down to the waiting van which had started for the prison with both
horses on a gallop.
Her mouth had formed one word: “Courage!”
He recalled all this as he struck the wall with his right heel. There
was little enough honor in the best of thieves. The stool-pigeons had
made squealing a profitable vocation. Men who traveled with golf-bags
filled with highly tempered tools of the safe-breaking profession, and
who sported small black motor cars of marvelous speed, were proper
marks. The pigeons or carelessness or something had dragged him down.
Fay often wondered, in those Dartmoor years, if Saidee Isaacs had a hand
in his conviction.
MacKeenon would not give him Saidee’s address. Sir Richard had told him
to forget her. He decided, with a sudden start as Big Ben struck the
quarters, that the day that had been ushered in would be devoted to
finding Saidee Isaacs. She had some things to answer for—chief of which
was her reason for not writing to Dartmoor.
He straightened, hung the coat over his arm, fished out a cigarette from
the case, and struck a match upon the damp stone and hurried away from
the river.
Suddenly, and specter-like, a form blocked his way. It was an American
soldier clad in a well-fitting olive-drab uniform, upon the sleeves of
which was a wound-stripe.
“Say, mister,” Fay heard. “Say, will you show me the way to my hotel?
It’s the Huntington, I guess. You guys in this burg call it different.
You call it the ’Untin’don, or something like that. D’ye know where it
is, Chappie?”
“Surest thing you know, old pal,” said Fay, shifting the coat and
linking his arm under the soldier’s. “Come along with me—I’m going right
that way!”
It was at the square, where the red mass of the Huntington Temperance
Hotel juts out into the Strand, that the soldier disengaged Fay’s arm
and stared at him.
“Say,” he said, “are you a bloody Britisher?”
“Surest thing you know.”
“You don’t look like one.”
“Looks are skin deep, my friend.”
The soldier accepted a proffered cigarette from Fay’s gold case, glanced
at the tip, then declared as he reached for a match:
“They may be skin deep, Chappie, but you remind me of the States—New
York! If you’re a Yank, why didn’t you get in the fight?”
Fay had no ready answer for the thrust which most certainly went home.
He covered his confusion by accepting the half-burnt match, then he
laughed lightly.
“Why didn’t I go to the fight?” he temporized. “I’ve got a good reason—a
very good one. I was never invited.”
“Ah, go on!”
“Besides,” said Fay, “I guess the fight is over.”
The soldier glanced at the black band on his arm. “You’re an American?”
he insisted.
“Well, suppose I am?”
“And you came over here without a uniform?”
“I’ve worn a uniform for five years,” said Fay truthfully.
“What service?”
“The King’s own!”
“Gawan!”
“Surest thing you know. And now, my friend,” he added, stepping back,
“I’m going to leave you at the Huntington—not ’Untin’don! Some day, when
you go back to the States and to Broadway, just drop into the Café
Ponsardine and tell the chap at the desk, in front, that you saw Chester
Fay. Tell him—you’ll know him by a bald spot, and a scar on his
chin—that I’m working for Scotland Yard. He may drop over when you tell
him that. He may buy you a drink!”
“Ah, say!”
Fay was gone with a finishing laugh. He turned into the Strand and
hurried eastward. He knew of a place where often he had spent the night
when the Yard was close on his heels in days gone by. This lodging for a
night was run by an ex-fence who bought only diamonds out of their
settings or large Bank of England notes. Clanson was his name.
Fay turned a corner, leaned against the wall and lighted a cigarette in
the shadow of a doorway, within which was a deep, blue light. A
constable stood across the street in an attitude of resignation. There
was no other name for it.
The cracksman shifted his coat from his right arm to his left, dropped
the cigarette to his feet and stepped briskly toward the same corner he
had rounded. It was an old trick of a man who feared a shadow. He saw
none. A “growler” or four wheeler, drawn by a decrepit nag, rattled over
the asphalt, going toward the West End.
Assured, Fay turned and hurried up the side street until he reached a
small temperance hotel, at the side of which was a shop bearing the
ancient and honorable title of: “M. Clanson, Dealer in Antiques and
Foreign Monies.”
Fay found a handle which he pulled twice, then twice more after a
five-second wait. He repeated the signal, known of old. A light showed
at the back of the shop. It came toward the front. Clanson, in night cap
and with a candle held over his head, pressed his bloated face to the
dusty pane of the door. His nose grew white on the tip, as he stared at
Fay. He drew back with a smirk and started removing two chains and
rattling at least one key. The door opened on a third chain.
“A passenger from the west,” said Fay, using an old countersign.
Clanson growled and closed the door. The last chain was guided from its
channel. The door opened wide. Fay stepped in briskly. He did not look
back of him.
“From the west,” he said as Clanson locked the door. “I’ve a scratch or
two I want changed.”
“Let’s see,” said the ex-fence, staring at Fay and then at the drippings
from the candle. “It’s been six, no five years, since you were in here.
Much water has flowed through the Thames since then.”
“And some blood,” said Fay, laying his coat on the top of a dusty
show-case within which was a collection of Japanese and Javanese daggers
with wicked-looking points and yellow ivory handles. “Some blood,” he
added, turning and reaching in his pocket.
Clanson nodded his gray head. He stared at the front of the shop, then
at Fay’s hand, which came out with the ten-pound notes Sir Richard had
given to him.
“Two and six off the pound,” he said craftily.
“Then,” said Fay, peeling off one half the notes, “I’ll keep a few!
Funny, too, these happen to be good.”
Clanson blinked and counted the sheath. “Five,” he said, dryly. “That’s
makes six pun and five bobs—off. How’ll you have it, Edward? Let’s see,
wasn’t it Edward? You had so many.”
Fay watched Clanson and the candle vanish into the gloom of the shop.
Minutes passed wherein he could have obtained a collection of daggers
and jade paper-knives. Clanson was opening his strong-box. The old
rogue, who once said, “If there were no receivers there would be no
thieves,” evidently thought the Bank of England notes were stolen
property. Fay had no other way in all London to change them. Besides, it
would be possible for the Yard to trail him by the numbers on the notes.
Clanson came back, deposited the candle on the showcase near Fay’s tweed
coat, and started counting out newly minted sovereigns with fingers that
were loth to see them go.
He finished the count with two one-pound Bank of Ireland notes and a
stack of bright shillings.
“There’s forty-three, fifteen,” he said. “All nice new money. Times was
when you brought me more than that, Edward.”
Fay pocketed the coins and bills without counting them. He thrust his
right hand under his coat, wheeled and stepped briskly to the door.
“So long!” he drawled as Clanson peered out, then turned the key. “Oh,”
he added as a subtle afterthought, “what have you heard of Saidee
Isaacs?”
The ex-fence coughed before he answered: “Little, lad! A gentleman was
in from the west the other day—a fortnight ago, who asked the same
question. Stout gentleman who used to come with you, Edward.
Dutch—Dutch—”
“Dutch Gus!” snarled Fay, with his eyes flashing. “That rat?”
“He asked about little Saidee Isaacs. I told him the same as I tell you.
I know nothing. A lady like her—with her motor car and her slavy or two,
don’t happen this way often.”
“Motor car?” asked Fay blankly.
“The same, lad. Twice I saw it. Once in Cockspur Street, once in
Piccadilly, at Berkeley Street.”
Fay fastened upon the old man a glance which flamed white fire. “Open
the door!” he said, swinging his coat. “Let me out! Me rotting in that
hell-on-earth and she in a—”
Clanson stared after the form of Fay as he darted over the street and
swung westward. Then the ex-fence closed and chained the door.
There is a cab-stand where Regent Street leaves Piccadilly. To this
stand Fay hurried, sprang into a two-wheeler, and said very distinctly
to an ancient driver:
“Park Lane!”
“’Ow?” asked the driver.
“To Park Lane, very quickly.”
“Certainly, sir,” mumbled the driver, climbing up the back and tilting
the shafts to a dangerous angle. “Gee-up!” he added, cracking the whip.
Fay stopped the cab at the corner of Hyde Park where Oxford Street is
joined by Park Lane. He sprang out, tossed the leaning driver two bright
shillings and started south toward the looming shadows of many mansions.
Reaching Hyde Park Corner he struck westward in a long swinging glide.
The hour was after two. The night was a black pocket, blurred here and
there with blue jewels from the arcs.
He had planned to take a night’s rest at the hotel which flanked
Clanson’s Antique Shop. The dealer’s statement concerning Dutch Gus,
and, moreover, Saidee Isaacs, changed this plan. He wanted to walk in
the wide places. No trace of drowsiness weighed his eye-lids. Shepherd
Bush—the Thames—Richmond and Hammersmith, were ahead of him. There was
no law in England that prevented a man taking the road. Fay went on,
with his oakum-stained nails gripping his palms, his eyes set ahead and
slightly upward where the yellow vault of the London sky pressed down on
his throbbing temples.
He came, but not by design, to hedge-ensconced villas and the many
winding lanes of Richmond Hill!
“Number 4, Rose Crescent,” flashed through his brain. This was the
address given to him by Sir Richard Colstrom.
He glanced under the long shelf of boughs which stretched toward the
south and the river. The sight was a pleasing one, despite the night’s
dew. Smart driveways, box-hedges, clumps of well trimmed trees and the
ghostly outlines of Queen Anne cottages and villas showed that he was in
one of the better parts of London.
He glided along the grass, momentarily expecting to be accosted by a
constable. The hour was almost three. The chimes of Big Ben were
somewhat distant. The roar of the city was far away. The smug dwellers
of Richmond Hill were wrapped in slumber.
Rose Crescent proved to be a circular drive, bordered by plane trees
whose trunks were encased in iron-grilled railings. Neat curb-steps bore
the names of the owners. A lodge-house was passed with the gates closed
and barred.
The numbers on the curb-stones or on top of the steps started running
down as Fay hurried toward a cross road and the barrier of a high hedge
which enclosed some vast estate.
He stopped as he reached Number 6. The next villa would be the address
mentioned by Sir Richard. Fay stepped to the curb and glanced up and
down from under the shelter of an overhanging bough. No one was in
sight!
Turning swiftly, he darted through the shrubbery of Number 6 and tiptoed
along the driveway. The gravel crunched slightly as he worked toward the
back of a stately villa. He stepped to the grass, listened a moment,
then dropped to his hands and knees and crawled through an opening in a
hedge. He rose, strained his eyes, and stared up at the wall before him.
A mansard roof, gables on the corners, well-curtained bays and wide
porches, denoted one of the smartest of London houses. A small garage at
the end of the driveway had room for two motor cars. A side house, well
hidden in shrubbery, probably contained the servants. The all, in the
night’s gloom, was a picture to charm most any prowler.
Fay studied the lower windows, with a professional glance. He drew
himself back into the hedge as he heard a click and then the sound of
somebody moving at the front of the villa.
Steeled and alert, he waited with every nerve tingling. The first sound
was followed by the slight grating of feet upon a porch. A blurred and
well muffled head was thrust around the edge of a white post. Sharp eyes
searched the shrubbery and the hedge. Fay remained motionless. He held
his breath.
Then and shrillingly, there came a signal from the other side of the
villa. The head on the porch was jerked back. A burly form leaped to the
grass where the driveway turned about the house. This form rebounded,
stood erect, then came lumbering toward Fay and the back of the villa.
The shrill cry of warning was repeated. Fay drew himself into the
smallest possible shadow. A man lunged past him. This man’s face was
revealed for a moment like a flash seen on a picture screen. It was
unmistakable. It was memory haunting.
“Dutch Gus,” breathed Fay, hardly daring to move. “That’s Dutch Gus.” He
heard the crash of glass as the prowler stepped through a low
greenhouse. A fence broke under a man’s weight in the back of the
garage. Afterwards came profound silence, until a far-off dog barked and
signaled the man’s passing.
Fay waited. It was barely possible that things would quiet down. He had
heard no sound from the villa.
The mystery of the affair gripped him in a passive vise. Dutch Gus was
the last man he had expected to see in that part of London. MacKeenon or
even Sir Richard might have visited the villa. A King’s courier lived in
the house, from all information. Then, asked Fay to himself, what was
the connection between Dutch Gus, the lookout, Sir Richard and the owner
of the villa? The entire matter was bound up in some manner with his
quest after the cipher’s key.
Fay had lived alone too long to believe that the presence of the crook
in that neighborhood could be laid to chance. He had often studied the
law of chances. They were infinite in the matter of meeting a friend or
enemy in a strange locality. The police never caught their quarry
through the chance meeting. It was always by a lead or a given
direction.
He turned the problem over in his quick way as he waited for some
development from the villa. He had no fear for himself. The night was
too dark for pursuit. There were innumerable side lanes and turns and
twists to that part of London. The constables were either asleep or
dozing in sheltered nooks.
Glancing upward, after emerging from the hedge, Fay studied the windows
on the side of the villa. No light shone from any of them. A light would
have been an indication that Dutch Gus and his lumbering get-away had
aroused the occupants.
The absence of any light was disconcerting, however. It would be equally
easy for someone inside to keep watch without revealing his presence. In
fancy he saw a lower curtain move. He dismissed this notion as time
passed. He waited, realizing that nothing would be gained by a retreat.
He was on the grounds of the villa he had been told to prowl. His coming
there had frightened Dutch Gus into a bungling get-a-way, which was some
satisfaction after all.
The warp and woof of the cipher affair would very likely prove a tangle
of many lives. Fay had not yet decided that he would go to that country
north and east of London and open the strong-box in the embassy. He had
not felt a call for patriotism in the enterprise. Rather, the matter
would have to shape itself. He distrusted the police and Scotland Yard
from bitter experience. And now, despite his efforts to the contrary,
fate or chance had brought him to the very house that Sir Richard had
wanted him to prowl.
He dropped to one knee, finally. Swiftly rolling the coat into a small
bundle he pressed it under a bush. Rising and listening with his senses
alert, he poised upon his toes, then started toward the nearest window,
which was the rear one of a huge bay.
Reaching this, after avoiding the gravel walk by stepping over it, he
crouched beneath the sill and pressed his ear to the frame-work of the
wall. His hearing was cell-matured and acute. The presence of anybody
above him, or any movement in the house, would be instantly detected. He
heard no one.
Working swiftly, he tried the window. It was locked, as he expected.
Reaching upward, after pulling on a pair of gloves which had been in the
pocket of the coat, he climbed by means of a vine and a ledge to the
sill, where he cupped his hands and studied the lock.
It was the ordinary kind he knew so well. There was a thin-bladed knife
on the end of his watch-chain. He drew this out and ran its blade
between the sashes. He struck the upper sash with the palm of his hand.
He pressed the lower sash and found the catch moving on stiff pivots.
One more try and the lock was in the off position. He waited then, ready
to spring to the ground or raise the window.
No sound came from the house. Fay bent his back, reached down with his
left fingers and slowly raised the window. The opening he made was not
over a foot in height.
Stooping and grasping the sill, he thrust his feet through, turned his
body and squirmed inside. He straightened swiftly and waited. Nothing
happened.
Soft curtains barred his way to the room. He reached out and pressed
these aside with cool fingers. The scent of a Japanese perfume greeted
his keen nostrils. Within this scent was another—the faint odor of
heliotrope.
Frowning slightly, he wondered at this. It brought memories with its
fragrant essence. Years before, somewhere, he had known that peculiar
sweetness. It lifted him, and brought to his mind what he had missed in
life’s great game.
Stepping forward, he moved amid the furniture of the room, caught his
directions by instinct, which is given to animals and prowlers, and
passed through a double door whose panels, down to the rugs, were tiny
crystals of glass.
He reached the opposite side of the villa from which he had entered. He
opened a catch and raised a window so that a hand-hold was between the
sash and sill. Satisfied that he had two avenues of escape, he went back
through the door of cut-glass and stood in the center of the first room.
Gradually, his eyes brought out the splendid details of the furnishings.
Soft pillows mounded box-couches and cozy nooks. Tapestries and
portières hung along the walls. A dark-wood stand was at his right hand.
Upon this was a cloisonné tea set and a lacquer tray. The gold
arabesques of the tray came through the gloom. A dragon stared at him.
“Nice place,” he thought. “One of these hundred pounds a year affairs.”
He felt then, rather than heard, the movement of a curtain at the front
of the room. A slight chill swept through the air. It was as if someone
had swished by.
Fay, alert and crouching, blinked his eyes in the direction of the
danger. He lowered his hands and half turned toward the window by which
he had entered the room. It was too late. A switch snapped upon the
wall. A blinding glare sprang from a score of frosted bulbs. The cluster
overhead seemed to explode with light. The room and all its details were
revealed within the time of two seconds.
A woman stood between the portières which separated the front parlor
from the room with the bay. A pair of very determined eyes flashed over
the blue-steel of a medium-calibre revolver of superior make. Above the
eyes was a pink night cap. Beneath the extended arm, which was as steady
as a marksman’s, Fay saw the soft sheen of a pair of pajamas which were
partly hidden by a belted bathrobe.
He neither backed away nor changed color. He never had feared a gun. He
stood, half turned away from the menace of the revolver. His eyes
accustomed themselves to the blinding light. His hand raised and bunched
his plaid cap from his silver-gray hair. He bowed as the woman lowered
the revolver and let it dangle at her side.
“Chester Fay!” she exclaimed.
The cracksman’s manner might have been Chesterfield’s as he swept the
floor with his cap.
The little lady with the business-like revolver was Saidee Isaacs!