“One hears scandal on every hand in Monte Carlo.”
“Yes. I suppose so,” replied the elder woman, and then the subject was
dropped.
So the ugly affair was being rumoured. It caused Hugh a good deal of
apprehension, for he feared that his name would be associated with that
of the mysterious Mademoiselle. Evidently one or other of the servants
at the Villa Amette had been indiscreet.
At that moment, in his private room at the bureau of police down
in Monaco, Superintendent Ogier was carefully perusing a dossier of
official papers which had been brought to him by the archivist.
Between his thin lips was a long, thin, Swiss cigar--his favorite
smoke--and with his gold-rimmed pince-nez poised upon his aquiline
nose he was reading a document which would certainly have been of
considerable interest to Hugh Henfrey and his friend Walter Brock could
they have seen it.
Upon the pale yellow paper were many lines of typewriting in French--a
carbon copy evidently.
It was headed: “Republique Francaise. Department of Herault. Prefecture
of Police. Bureau of the Director of Police. Reference Number 20197.B.,”
and was dated nearly a year before.
It commenced:
“Copy of an ‘information’ in the archives of the Prefecture of the
Department of Herault concerning the woman Marie Mignot, or Leullier,
now passing under the name of Yvonne Ferad and living at the Villa
Amette at Monte Carlo.
“The woman in question was born in 1884 at Number 45 Rue des Etuves,
in Montpellier, and was the daughter of one Doctor Rigaud, a noted
toxicologist of the Faculty of Medicine, and curator of the University
Library. At the age of seventeen, after her father’s death, she became
a school teacher at a small school in the Rue Morceau, and at nineteen
married Charles Leullier, a good-looking young scoundrel who posed
as being well off, but who was afterwards proved to be an expert
international thief, a member of a gang of dangerous thieves who
committed robberies in the European express trains.
“This fact was unknown to the girl, therefore at first all went
smoothly, until the wife discovered the truth and left him. She then
joined the chorus of a revue at the Jardin de Paris, where she met a
well-to-do Englishman named Bryant. The pair went to England, where she
married him, and they resided in the county of Northampton. Six months
later Bryant died, leaving her a large sum of money. In the meantime
Leullier had been arrested by the Italian police for a daring robbery
with violence in a train traveling between Milan and Turin and been
sentenced to ten years on the penal island of Gorgona. His wife, hearing
of this from an Englishman named Houghton, who, though she was unaware
of it, was following the same profession as her husband, returned to
France. She rented an apartment in Paris, and afterwards played at Monte
Carlo, where she won a considerable sum, with the proceeds of which she
purchased the Villa Amette, which she now occupies each season.”
“Extracts of reports concerning Marie Leullier, alias Yvonne Ferad, are
herewith appended:
“Criminal Investigation Department, New Scotland Yard, London--to the
Prefecture of Police, Paris.
“Mademoiselle Yvonne Ferad rented a furnished house at Hove, near
Brighton, in June, 1918. Afterwards moved to Worthing and to Exeter,
and later took a house in the Cromwell Road, London, in 1919. She was
accompanied by an Italian manservant named Cataldi. Her conduct was
suspicious, though she was undoubtedly possessed of considerable
means. She was often seen at the best restaurants with various
male acquaintances, more especially with a man named Kenworthy. Her
association with this person, and with another man named Percy Stendall,
was curious, as both men were habitual criminals and had served several
terms of penal servitude each. Certain suspicions were aroused, and
observation was kept, but nothing tangible was discovered. It is agreed,
however, that some mystery surrounds this woman in question. She left
London quite suddenly, but left no debts behind.”
“Information from the Borough Police Office, Worthing, to the Prefecture
of Police, Department of Herault.
“Mademoiselle Yvonne Ferad has been identified by the photograph sent as
having lived in Worthing in December, 1918. She rented a small furnished
house facing the sea, and was accompanied by an Italian manservant and a
French maid. Her movements were distinctly mysterious. A serious
fracas occurred at the house on the evening of December 18th, 1918. A
middle-aged gentleman, whose name is unknown, called there about seven
o’clock and a violent quarrel ensued between the lady and her visitor,
the latter being very seriously assaulted by the Italian. The constable
on duty was called in, but the visitor refused to prosecute, and after
having his injuries attended to by a doctor left for London. Three days
later Mademoiselle disappeared from Worthing. It is believed by the
Chief Constable that the woman is of the criminal class.”
Then Charles Ogier, inspector of the detective police of Monaco, smiled,
laid down his cigar, and took up another and even more interesting
document.
FIFTH CHAPTER
ON THE HOG’S BACK
Three days later. On a cold afternoon just as the wintry light was
fading a tall, dark, middle-aged, rather handsome man with black hair
and moustache, and wearing a well-cut, dark-grey overcoat and
green velour hat, alighted from the train at the wayside station of
Wanborough, in Surrey, and inquired of the porter the way to Shapley
Manor.
“Shapley, sir? Why, take the road there yonder up the hill till you
get to the main road which runs along the Hog’s Back from Guildford to
Farnborough. When you get on the main road, turn sharp to the left past
the old toll-gate, and you’ll find the Manor on the left in among a big
clump of trees.”
“How far?”
“About a mile, sir.”
The stranger, the only passenger who had alighted, slipped sixpence
into the man’s hand, buttoned his coat, and started out to walk in the
direction indicated, breasting the keen east wind.
He was well-set-up, and of athletic bearing. He took long strides as
with swinging gait he went up the hill. As he did so, he muttered to
himself:
“I was an infernal fool not to have come down in a car! I hate these
beastly muddy country roads. But Molly has the telephone--so I can ring
up for a car to fetch me--which is a consolation, after all.”
And with his keen eyes set before him, he pressed forward up the steep
incline to where, for ten miles, ran the straight broad highway over
the high ridge known as the Hog’s Back. The road is very popular with
motorists, for so high is it that on either side there stretches a wide
panorama of country, the view on the north being towards the Thames
Valley and London, while on the south Hindhead with the South Downs in
the blue distance show beyond.
Having reached the high road the stranger paused to take breath, and
incidentally to admire the magnificent view. Indeed, an expression of
admiration fell involuntarily from his lips. Then he went along for
another half-mile in the teeth of the cutting wind with the twilight
rapidly coming on, until he came to the clump of dark firs and presently
walked up a gravelled drive to a large, but somewhat inartistic,
Georgian house of red brick with long square windows. In parts the ivy
was trying to hide its terribly ugly architecture for around the deep
porch it grew thickly and spread around one corner of the building.
A ring at the door brought a young manservant whom the caller addressed
as Arthur, and, wishing him good afternoon, asked if Mrs. Bond were at
home.
“Yes, sir,” was the reply.
“Oh! good,” said the caller. “Just tell her I’m here.” And he proceeded
to remove his coat and to hang it up in the great flagged hall with the
air of one used to the house.
The Manor was a spacious, well-furnished place, full of good pictures
and much old oak furniture.
The servant passed along the corridor, and entering the drawing-room,
announced:
“Mr. Benton is here, ma’am.”
“Oh! Mr. Benton! Show him in,” cried his mistress enthusiastically.
“Show him in at once!”
Next moment the caller entered the fine, old-fashioned room, where a
well-preserved, fair-haired woman of about forty was taking her tea
alone and petting her Pekinese.
“Well, Charles? So you’ve discovered me here, eh?” she exclaimed,
jumping up and taking his hand.
“Yes, Molly. And you seem to have very comfortable quarters,” laughed
Benton as he threw himself unceremoniously into a chintz-covered
armchair.
“They are, I assure you.”
“And I suppose you’re quite a great lady in these parts--eh?--now that
you live at Shapley Manor. Where’s Louise?”
“She went up to town this morning. She won’t be back till after dinner.
She’s with her old school-fellow--that girl Bertha Trench.”
“Good. Then we can have a chat. I’ve several things to consult you about
and ask your opinion.”
“Have some tea first,” urged his good-looking hostess, pouring him some
into a Crown Derby cup.
“Well,” he commenced. “I think you’ve done quite well to take this
place, as you’ve done, for three years. You are now safely out of the
way. The Paris Surete are making very diligent inquiries, but the Surrey
Constabulary will never identify you with the lady of the Rue Racine. So
you are quite safe here.”
“Are you sure of that, Charles?” she asked, fixing her big grey eyes
upon him.
“Certain. It was the wisest course to get back here to England, although
you had to take a very round-about journey.”
“Yes. I got to Switzerland, then to Italy, and from Genoa took an Anchor
Line steamer across to New York. After that I came over to Liverpool,
and in the meantime I had become Mrs. Bond. Louise, of course, thought
we were travelling for pleasure. I had to explain my change of name by
telling her that I did not wish my divorced husband to know that I was
back in England.”
“And the girl believed it, of course,” he laughed.
“Of course. She believes anything I tell her,” said the clever,
unscrupulous woman for whom the Paris police were in active search,
whose real name was Molly Maxwell, and whose amazing career was well
known to the French police.
Only recently a sum of a quarter of a million francs had fallen into
her hands, and with it she now rented Shapley Manor and had set up as
a country lady. Benton gazed around the fine old room with its Adams
ceiling and its Georgian furniture, and reflected how different were
Molly’s present surroundings from that stuffy little flat _au troisieme_
in the Rue Racine.
“Yes,” he said. “You had a very narrow escape, Molly. I dared not come
near you, but I knew that you’d look after the girl.”
“Of course. I always look after her as though she were my own child.”
Benton’s lip curled as he sipped his China tea, and said:
“Because so much depends upon her--eh? I’m glad you view the situation
from a fair and proper stand-point. We’re now out for a big thing,
therefore we must not allow any little hitch to prevent us from bringing
it off successfully.”
“I quite agree, Charles. Our great asset is Louise. But she must be
innocent of it all. She must know absolutely nothing.”
“True. If she had an inkling that we were forcing her to marry Hugh she
would fiercely resent it. She’s a girl of spirit, after all.”
“My dear Charles, I know that,” laughed the woman. “Ever since she came
home from school I’ve noticed how independent she is. She certainly
has a will of her own. But she likes Hugh, and we must encourage it.
Recollect that a fortune is at stake.”
“I have not overlooked that,” the man said. “But of late I’ve come
to fear that we are treading upon thin ice. I don’t like the look of
affairs at the present moment. Young Henfrey is head over ears in love
with that girl Dorise Ranscomb, and--”
“Bah! It’s only a flirtation, my dear Charles,” laughed the woman.
“When just a little pressure is put upon the boy, and a sly hint to Lady
Ranscomb, then the affair will soon be off, and he’ll fall into Louise’s
arms. She’s really very fond of him.”
“She may be, but he takes no notice of her. She told me so the other
day. He’s gone to the Riviera--followed Dorise, I suppose,” Benton said.
“Yvonne wrote me a few days ago to say that he was there with a friend
of his named Walter Brock. Who’s he?”
“Oh! a naval lieutenant-commander who served in the war and was
invalided out after the Battle of Jutland. He got the D.S.O. over the
Falklands affair, and has now some post at the Admiralty. He was
in command of a torpedo boat which sank a German cruiser, and was
afterwards blown up.”
“They are both out at Monte Carlo, Yvonne says. And Henfrey is with
Dorise daily,” remarked the woman.
“Yvonne is always apprehensive lest young Henfrey should learn the
secret of the old fellow’s end,” said Benton. “But I don’t see how the
truth of the--well, rather ugly affair can ever come out, except by an
indiscretion by one or other of us.”
“And that is scarcely likely, Charles, is it?” his hostess laughed
as she pushed across to him a big silver box of cigarettes and then
reclined lazily among her cushions.
“No. It would certainly be a very sensational affair if the newspapers
got hold of the facts, my dear Molly. But don’t let us anticipate such a
thing. Fortunately Louise, in her girlish innocence, knows nothing. Old
Henfrey left his money to his son upon certain conditions, one of which
is that Hugh shall marry Louise. And that marriage must, at all hazards,
take place. After that, we care for nothing.”
The handsome woman who was rolling a cigarette between her
well-manicured fingers hesitated. Her countenance assumed a strange
look as she reflected. She was far too clever to express any off-hand
opinion. She had outwitted the police of Paris, Brussels, and Rome in
turn. Her whole career had been a criminal one, punctuated by periods of
pretended high respectability--while the funds to support it had lasted.
And upon her hands had been placed Louise Lambert, the child Charles
Benton had adopted ten years before.
“We shall have to exercise a good deal of discretion and caution in
regard to Louise,” she declared. “The affair is not at all so plain
sailing as I at first believed.”
“No. It is a serious contretemps that you had to leave Paris, Molly,”
agreed her well-dressed visitor. “The young American was a fool, of
course, but I think--”
“Paris was flooded by rich young men from the United States who came
over to fight the Boche and to spend their money like water when on
leave in Paris. Frank was only one of them.”
Benton was silent. The affair was a distinctly unsavoury one. Frank van
Geen, the son of the Dutch-American millionaire cocoa manufacturer of
Chicago, had, by reason of his association with Molly, found himself the
poorer by nearly a quarter of a million francs, and his body had been
found in the Seine between the Pont d’Auteuil and the Ile St. Germain.
At the inquiry some ugly disclosures were made, but already the lady
of the Rue Racine and her supposed niece had left Paris; and though
the affair was one of suicide, the police raised a hue and cry, and the
frontiers had been watched, but the pair had disappeared.
That was several months ago. And now Molly Maxwell the adventuress in
Paris had been transformed into the wealthy and highly respectable widow
Mrs. Bond, who having presented such excellent references had become
tenant of that well-furnished mansion, Shapley Manor, and the beautiful
grounds adjoining. For nearly two centuries it had been the home of the
Puttenhams, but Sir George Puttenham, Baronet, the present owner, had
found himself ruined by war-taxation, and as one of the new poor he had
been glad to let the place and live upon the rent obtained for it. His
case, indeed, was only one of thousands of others in England, where
adventurers and war-profiteers were ousting the landed gentry.
“Yvonne is evidently keeping a good watch upon young Hugh,” remarked
Benton presently, as he blew a ring of cigarette smoke towards the
ceiling.
“Yes,” replied the woman, her eyes fixed out of the big window which
commanded a glorious view of Gibbet Hill, at Hindhead, and the blue
South Downs towards the English Channel. But all was dark and lowering
in the winter twilight, now fast darkening into night.
In old-world Guildford, the county town of Surrey, with its steep High
Street containing many seventeenth-century houses, its old inns, and its
balconied Guildhall--the scene of so many unseemly wrangles among the
robed and cocked-hatted borough councillors who are, _par excellence_,
outstanding illustrations of the provincial petty jealousies of
bumbledom--Mrs. Bond was welcomed by the trades-people who vied with
each other to “serve her.” Almost daily she went up and down the High
Street in her fine Rolls-Royce driven by Mead, an ex-soldier and a
worthy fellow whom she had engaged through an advertisement in the
_Surrey Advertiser_. He had been in the Queen’s West Surrey, and his
home being in Guildford, Molly knew that he would serve as a testimonial
to her high respectability. Molly Maxwell was an outstandingly
clever woman. She never let a chance slip by that might be taken
advantageously.
Mead, who went on his “push-bike” every evening along the Hog’s Back
to Guildford, was never tired of singing the praises of his generous
mistress.
“She’s a real good sort,” he would tell his friends in the bar of the
Lion or the Angel. “She knows how to treat a man. She’s a widow, and
good-looking. I suppose she’ll marry again. Nearly all the best people
about here have called on her within the last week or two. Magistrates
and their wives, retired generals, and lots of the gentry. Yes, my job
isn’t to be sneezed at, I can tell you. It’s better than driving a lorry
outside Ypres!”
Mrs. Bond treated Mead extremely well, and paid him well. She knew
that by so doing she would secure a good advertisement. She had done so
before, when four or five years ago she had lived at Keswick.
“Do you know, Charles,” she said presently, “I’m really very
apprehensive regarding the present situation. Yvonne is, no doubt,
keeping a watchful eye upon the young fellow. But what can she do if
he has followed the Ranscomb girl and is with her each day? Each day,
indeed, must bring the pair closer together, and--”
“That’s what we must prevent, my dear Molly!” exclaimed the lady’s
visitor. “Think of all it means to us. You are quite safe here--as safe
as I am to-day. But we can’t last out without money--either of us. We
must have cash-money--and cash-money always.”
“Yes. That’s so. But Yvonne is wonderful--amazing.”
“She hasn’t the same stake in the affair as we have.”
“Why not?” asked the woman for whom the European police were in search.
“Well, because she is rich--she’s won pots of money at the tables--and
we--well, both of us have only limited means. Yours, Molly, are larger
than mine--thanks to Frank. But I must have money soon. My expenses in
town are mounting up daily.”
“But your rooms don’t cost you very much! Old Mrs. Evans looks after
things as she has always done.”
“Yes. But everything is going up in price, and remember, I dare not
cross the Channel just now. At Calais, Boulogne, Cherbourg, and other
places, they have my photograph, and they are waiting for me to fall
into the trap. But the rat, once encaged, is shy! And I am very shy just
now,” he added with a light laugh.
“You’ll stay and have dinner, won’t you?” urged his hostess.
Benton hesitated.
“If I do Louise may return, and just now I don’t want to meet her. It is
better not.”
“But she won’t be back till the last train to Guildford. Mead is meeting
her. Yes--stay.”
“I must get a car to take me back to town. I have to go to Glasgow by
the early train in the morning.”
“Well, we’re order one from one of the garages in Guildford. You really
must stay, Charles. There’s lots we have to talk over--a lot of things
that are of vital consequence to us both.”
At that moment there came a rap at the door and the young manservant
entered, saying:
“You’re wanted on the telephone, ma’am.”
Mrs. Bond rose from the settee and went to the telephone in the library,
where she heard the voice of a female telephone operator.
“Is that Shapley Manor?” she asked. “I have a telegram for Mrs.
Bond. Handed in at Nice at two twenty-five, received here at four
twenty-eight. ‘To Bond, Shapley Manor, near Guildford. Yvonne shot by
some unknown person while with Hugh. In grave danger.--S.’ That is the
message. Have you got it please?”
Mrs. Bond held her breath.
“Yes,” she gasped. “Anything else?”
“No, madam,” replied the telephone operator at the Guildford Post
Office. “Nothing else. I will forward the duplicate by post.”
And she switched off.
SIXTH CHAPTER
FACING THE UNKNOWN
That the police were convinced that Hugh Henfrey had shot Mademoiselle
was plain.
Wherever he went an agent of detective police followed him. At the Cafe
de Paris as he took his aperitif on the _terrasse_ the man sat at a
table near, idly smoking a cigarette and glancing at an illustrated
paper on a wooden holder. In the gardens, in the Rooms, in the Galerie,
everywhere the same insignificant little man haunted him.
Soon after luncheon he met Dorise and her mother in the Rooms. With them
were the Comte d’Autun, an elegant young Frenchman, well known at the
tables, and Madame Tavera, a very chic person who was one of the most
admired visitors of that season. They were only idling and watching the
players at the end table, where a stout, bearded Russian was making some
sensational coups _en plein_.
Presently Hugh succeeded in getting Dorise alone.
“It’s awfully stuffy here,” he said. “Let’s go outside--eh?”
Together they descended the red-carpeted steps and out into the
palm-lined Place, at that hour thronged by the smartest crowd in Europe.
Indeed, the war seemed to have led to increased extravagance and daring
in the dress of those gay Parisiennes, those butterflies of fashion who
were everywhere along the Cote d’Azur.
They turned the corner by the Palais des Beaux Arts into the Boulevard
Peirara.
“Let’s walk out of the town,” he suggested to the girl. “I’m tired of
the place.”
“So am I, Hugh,” Dorise admitted. “For the first fortnight the unceasing
round of gaiety and the novelty of the Rooms are most fascinating, but,
after that, one seems cooped up in an atmosphere of vicious unreality.
One longs for the open air and open country after this enervating,
exotic life.”
So when they arrived at the little church of Ste. Devote, the patron
saint of Monaco, that little building which everyone knows standing at
the entrance to that deep gorge the Vallon des Gaumates, they descended
the steep, narrow path which runs beside the mountain torrent and were
soon alone in the beautiful little valley where the grey-green olives
overhang the rippling stream. The little valley was delightfully quiet
and rural after the garish scenes in Monte Carlo, the cosmopolitan
chatter, and the vulgar display of the war-rich. The old habitue of
pre-war days lifts his hands as he watches the post-war life around the
Casino and listens to the loud uneducated chatter of the profiteer’s
womenfolk.
As the pair went along in the welcome shadows, for the sun fell strong
upon the tumbling stream, Hugh was remarking upon it.
He had been at Monte Carlo with his father before the war, and realized
the change.
“I only wish mother would move on,” Dorise exclaimed as they strolled
slowly together.
She presented a dainty figure in cream gabardine and a broad-brimmed
straw hat which suited her admirably. Her clothes were made by a certain
famous _couturiere_ in Hanover Square, for Lady Ranscomb had the art of
dressing her daughter as well as she did herself. Gowns make the lady
nowadays, or the fashionable dressmakers dare not make their exorbitant
charges.
“Then you also are tired of the place?” asked Hugh, as he strolled
slowly at her side in a dark-blue suit and straw hat. They made a
handsome pair, and were indeed well suited to each other. Lady Ranscomb
liked Hugh, but she had no idea that the young people had fallen so
violently in love with each other.