Inspector French’s

Greatest Case

By FREEMAN WILLS CROFTS

AUTHOR OF

“The Cheyne Mystery,” etc.

A. L. BURT COMPANY

Published by arrangement with Albert and Charles Boni

Printed in U. S. A.

Copyright, 1925, by

THOMAS SELTZER, Inc.

All rights reserved

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
MURDER!

The back streets surrounding Hatton Garden, in the City of London, do not form at the best of times a cheerful or inspiring prospect. Narrow and mean, and flanked with ugly, sordid-looking buildings grimy from exposure to the smoke and fogs of the town and drab from the want of fresh paint, they can hardly fail to strike discouragement into the heart of any one eager for the uplift of our twentieth century civilisation.

But if on a day of cheerful sunshine the outlook is thus melancholy, it was vastly more so at ten o’clock on a certain dreary evening in mid-November. A watery moon, only partially visible through a damp mist, lit up pallidly the squalid, shuttered fronts of the houses. The air was cold and raw, and the pavements showed dark from a fine rain which had fallen some time earlier, but which had now ceased. Few were abroad, and no one whose business permitted it remained out of doors.

Huckley Street, one of the narrowest and least inviting in the district, was, indeed, deserted save for a single figure. Though the higher and more ethical side of civilisation was not obtrusive, it was by no means absent. The figure represented Law and Order, in short, it was that of a policeman on his beat.

Constable James Alcorn moved slowly forward, glancing mechanically but with practised eye over the shuttered windows of the shops and the closed doors of the offices and warehouses in his purview. He was not imaginative, the constable, or he would have rebelled even more strongly than he did against the weariness and monotony of his job. A dog’s life, this of night patrol in the City, he thought, as he stopped at a cross roads, and looked down each one in turn of the four dingy and deserted lanes which radiated from the intersection. How deadly depressing it all was! Nothing ever doing! Nothing to give a man a chance! In the daytime it was not so bad, when the streets were alive and fellow creatures were to be seen, if not spoken to, but at night when there was no one to watch, and nothing to be done but wait endlessly for the opportunity which never came, it was a thankless task. He was fed up!

But though he didn’t know it, his chance was at hand. He had passed through Charles Street and had turned into Hatton Garden itself, when suddenly a door swung open a little way down the street, and a young man ran wildly out into the night.

The door was directly under a street lamp, and Alcorn could see that the youth’s features were frozen into an expression of horror and alarm. He hovered for a moment irresolute, then, seeing the constable, made for him at a run.

“Officer!” he shouted. “Come here quickly. There’s something wrong!”

Alcorn, his depression gone, hurried to meet him.

“What is it?” he queried. “What’s the matter?”

“Murder, I’m afraid,” the other cried. “Up in the office. Come and see.”

The door from which the young man had emerged stood open, and they hastened thither. It gave on a staircase upon which the electric light was turned on. The young man raced up and passed through a door on the first landing. Alcorn, following, found himself in an office containing three or four desks. A further door leading to an inner room stood open, and to this the young man pointed.

“In there,” he directed; “in the Chief’s room.”

Here also the light was on, and as Alcorn passed in, he saw that he was indeed in the presence of tragedy, and he stood for a moment motionless, taking in his surroundings.

The room was small, but well proportioned. Near the window stood a roll-top desk of old-fashioned design. A leather-lined clients’ arm-chair was close by, with behind it a well-filled bookcase. In the fireplace the remains of a fire still glowed red. A table littered with books and papers and a large Milner safe completed the furniture. The doors of this safe were open.

Alcorn mechanically noted these details, but it was not on them that his attention was first concentrated. Before the safe lay the body of a man, hunched forward in a heap, as if he had collapsed when stooping to take something out. Though the face was hidden, there was that in the attitude which left no doubt that he was dead. And the cause of death was equally obvious. On the back of the bald head, just above the fringe of white hair, was an ugly wound, as if from a blow of some blunt but heavy weapon.

With an oath, Alcorn stepped forward and touched the cheek.

“Cold,” he exclaimed. “He must have been dead some time. When did you find him?”

“Just now,” the young man answered. “I came in for a book, and found him lying there. I ran for help at once.”

The constable nodded.

“We’d best have a doctor anyway,” he decided. A telephone stood on the top of the desk, and he called up his headquarters, asking that an officer and a doctor be sent at once. Then he turned to his companion.

“Now, sir, what’s all this about? Who are you, and how do you come to be here?”

The young man, though obviously agitated and ill at ease, answered collectedly enough.

“My name is Orchard, William Orchard, and I am a clerk in this office—Duke & Peabody’s, diamond merchants. As I have just said, I called in for a book I had forgotten, and I found—what you see.”

“And what did you do?”

“Do? I did what any one else would have done in the same circumstances. I looked to see if Mr. Gething was dead, and when I saw he was I didn’t touch the body, but ran for help. You were the first person I saw.”

“Mr. Gething?” the constable repeated sharply. “Then you know the dead man?”

“Yes. It is Mr. Gething, our head clerk.”

“What about the safe? Is there anything missing from that?”

“I don’t know,” the young man answered. “I believe there were a lot of diamonds in it, but I don’t know what amount, and I’ve not looked what’s there now.”

“Who would know about it?”

“I don’t suppose any one but Mr. Duke, now Mr. Gething’s dead. He’s the chief, the only partner I’ve ever seen.”

Constable Alcorn paused, evidently at a loss as to his next move. Finally, following precedent, he took a somewhat dog’s-eared notebook from his pocket, and with a stumpy pencil began to note the particulars he had gleaned.

“Gething, you say the dead man’s name was? What was his first name?”

“Charles.”

“Charles Gething, deceased,” the constable repeated presently, evidently reading his entry. “Yes. And his address?”

“12 Monkton Street, Fulham.”

“Twelve—Monkton—Street—Fulham. Yes. And your name is William Orchard?”

Slowly the tedious catechism proceeded. The two men formed a contrast. Alcorn calm and matter of fact, though breathing heavily from the effort of writing, was concerned only with making a satisfactory statement for his superior. His informant, on the other hand, was quivering with suppressed excitement, and acutely conscious of the silent and motionless form on the floor. Poor old Gething! A kindly old fellow, if ever there was one! It seemed a shame to let his body lie there in that shapeless heap, without showing even the respect of covering the injured head with a handkerchief. But the matter was out of his hands. The police would follow their own methods, and he, Orchard, could not interfere.

Some ten minutes passed of question, answer, and laborious caligraphy, then voices and steps were heard on the stairs, and four men entered the room.

“What’s all this, Alcorn?” cried the first, a stout, clean-shaven man with the obvious stamp of authority, in the same phrase that his subordinate had used to the clerk, Orchard. He had stepped just inside the door, and stood looking sharply round the room, his glance passing from the constable to the body, to the open safe, with inimical interest to the young clerk, and back again to Alcorn.

The constable stiffened to attention, and replied in a stolid, unemotional tone, as if reciting formal evidence in court.

“I was on my beat, sir, and at about ten-fifteen was just turning the corner from Charles Street into Hatton Garden, when I observed this young man,” he indicated Orchard with a gesture, “run out of the door of this house. He called me that there was something wrong up here, and I came up to see, and found that body lying as you see it. Nothing has been touched, but I have got some information here for you.” He held up the notebook.

The newcomer nodded and turned to one of his companions, a tall man with the unmistakable stamp of the medical practitioner.

“If you can satisfy yourself the man’s dead, Doctor, I don’t think we shall disturb the body in the meantime. It’ll probably be a case for the Yard, and if so we’ll leave everything for whoever they send.”

The doctor crossed the room and knelt by the remains.

“He’s dead all right,” he announced, “and not so long ago either. If I could turn the body over I could tell you more about that. But I’ll leave it if you like.”

“Yes, leave it for the moment, if you please. Now, Alcorn, what else do you know?”

A few seconds sufficed to put the constable’s information at his superior’s disposal. The latter turned to the doctor.

“There’s more than murder here, Dr. Jordan, I’ll be bound. That safe is the key to the affair. Thank the Lord, it’ll be a job for the Yard. I shall ’phone them now, and there should be a man here in half an hour. Sorry, Doctor, but I’m afraid you’ll have to wait.” He turned to Orchard. “You’ll have to wait, too, young man, but the Yard inspector probably won’t keep you long. Now, what about this old man’s family? Was he married?”

“Yes, but his wife is an invalid, bedridden. He has two daughters. One lives at home and keeps house, the other is married and lives somewhere in town.”

“We shall have to send round word. You go, Carson.” He turned to one of the two other members of his quartet, constables in uniform. “Don’t tell the old lady. If the daughter’s not there, wait until she comes in. And put yourself at her disposal. If she wants her sister sent for, you go. You, Jackson, go down to the front door and let the Yard man up. Alcorn, remain here.” These dispositions made, he rang up the Yard and delivered his message, then turned once more to the young clerk.

“You say, Mr. Orchard, that no one could tell what, if anything, is missing from the safe, except Mr. Duke, the sole active partner. We ought to have Mr. Duke here at once. Is he on the ’phone?”

“Gerard, 1417b,” Orchard answered promptly. The young man’s agitation had somewhat subsided, and he was following with interest the actions of the police, and admiring the confident, competent way in which they had taken charge.

The official once again took down the receiver from the top of the desk, and put through the call. “Is Mr. Duke there? . . . Yes, say a superintendent of police.” There was a short silence, and then the man went on. “Is that Mr. Duke? . . . I’m speaking from your office in Hatton Garden. I’m sorry, sir, to tell you that a tragedy has taken place here. Your chief clerk, Mr. Gething, is dead. . . . Yes, sir. He’s lying in your private office here, and the circumstances point to murder. The safe is standing open, and—Yes, sir, I’m afraid so—I don’t know, of course, about the contents. . . . No, but you couldn’t tell from that. . . . I was going to suggest that you come down at once. I’ve ’phoned Scotland Yard for a man. . . . Very good, sir, we shall be here when you come.” He replaced the receiver and turned to the others.

“Mr. Duke is coming down at once. There is no use in our standing here. Come to the outer office and we’ll find ourselves chairs.”

It was cold in the general office, the fire evidently having been out for some time, but they sat down there to wait, the Superintendent pointing out that the furniture in the other room must not be touched. Of the four, only the Superintendent seemed at ease and self-satisfied. Orchard was visibly nervous and apprehensive and fidgeted restlessly, Constable Alcorn, slightly embarrassed by the society in which he found himself, sat rigidly on the edge of his chair staring straight in front of him, while the doctor was frankly bored and anxious to get home. Conversation languished, though spasmodic attempts were made by the Superintendent to keep it going, and none of the quartet was sorry when the sound of footsteps on the stairs created a diversion.

Of the three men who entered the room, two, carrying black leather cases, were obviously police constables in plain clothes. The third was a stout man in tweeds, rather under middle height, with a cleanshaven, good-humoured face and dark blue eyes which, though keen, twinkled as if at some perennially fresh private joke. His air was easy-going and leisurely, and he looked the type of man who could enjoy a good dinner and a good smoke-room story to follow.

“Ah, Superintendent, how are you?” he exclaimed, holding out his hand cordially. “It’s some time since we met. Not since that little episode in the Limehouse hairdresser’s. That was a nasty business. And now you’ve some other scheme for keeping a poor man from his hard-earned rest, eh?”

The Superintendent seemed to find the other’s easy familiarity out of place.

“Good-evening, Inspector,” he answered with official abruptness. “You know Dr. Jordan?—Inspector French of the C.I.D. And this is Mr. Orchard, a clerk in this office, who discovered the crime.”

Inspector French greeted them genially. Behind his back at the Yard they called him “Soapy Joe” because of the reliance he placed on the suavity of his manners. “I know your name, of course, Doctor, but I don’t think we have ever met. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mr. Orchard.” He subsided into a chair and went on: “Perhaps, Superintendent, you would just give me a hint of what this is all about before we go any further.”

The facts already learned were soon recited. French listened carefully, and annexing the constable’s notebook, complimented that worthy on his industry. “Well,” he beamed on them, “I suppose we’d better have a look round inside before Mr. Duke turns up.”

The party moved to the inner room, where French, his hands in his pockets, stood motionless for some minutes, surveying the scene.

“Nothing has been touched, of course?” he asked.

“Nothing. From what they tell me, both Mr. Orchard and Constable Alcorn have been most circumspect.”

“Excellent; then we may go ahead. Get your camera rigged, Giles, and take the usual photos. I think, gentlemen, we may wait in the other room until the photographs are taken. It won’t be long.”

Though French had tactfully bowed his companions out, he did not himself follow them, but kept prowling about the inner office, closely inspecting its contents, though touching nothing. In a few minutes the camera was ready, and a number of flashlight photographs were taken of the body, the safe, every part of both offices, and even the stairs and hall. In the amazing way in which tales of disaster travel, news of the crime had already leaked out, and a small crowd of the curious hung, open-mouthed, about the door.

Scarcely had the camera been put away, when the proceedings were interrupted by a fresh arrival. Hurried steps were heard ascending the stairs, and a tall, thin, extremely well-dressed old gentleman entered the room. Though evidently on the wrong side of sixty, he was still a handsome man, with strong, well-formed features, white hair, and a good carriage. Under normal circumstances he would have presented a dignified and kindly appearance, but now his face was drawn into an expression of horror and distress, and his hasty movements also betokened his anxiety. On seeing so many strangers, he hesitated. The Inspector stepped forward.

“Mr. Duke, sir? I am Inspector French of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard. I very much regret to confirm the news which you have already heard, that your head clerk, Mr. Gething, has been murdered, and I fear also that your safe may have been burgled.”

It was evident that the old gentleman was experiencing strong emotion, but he controlled it and spoke quietly enough.

“This is terrible news, Inspector. I can hardly believe that poor old Gething is gone. I came at once when I heard. Tell me the details. Where did it happen?”

French pointed to the open door.

“In here, sir, in your private office. Everything is still exactly as it was found.”

Mr. Duke moved forward, then on seeing the body, stopped and gave a low cry of horror.

“Oh, poor old fellow!” he exclaimed. “It’s awful to see him lying there. Awful! I tell you, Inspector, I’ve lost a real friend, loyal and true and dependable. Can’t he be lifted up? I can’t bear to see him like that.” His gaze passed on to the safe. “And the safe! Merciful heavens, Inspector! Is anything gone? Tell me at once, I must know! It seems heartless to think of such a thing with that good old fellow lying there, but after all I’m only human.”

“I haven’t touched the safe, but we’ll do so directly,” the Inspector answered. “Was there much in it?”

“About three-and-thirty thousand pounds’ worth of diamonds were in that lower drawer, as well as a thousand in notes,” groaned the other. “Get the body moved, will you, and let us look.”

French whistled, then he turned to his men.

“Get that table cleared outside there, and lift the body on to it,” he ordered; then to the doctor he added, “Perhaps, Doctor, you could make your examination now?”

The remains were lifted reverently and carried from the room. Mr. Duke turned impatiently to the safe, but the Inspector stopped him.

“A moment, sir, if you please. I am sorry to ask you to stretch your patience a little longer, but before you touch the safe I must test it for finger prints. You see the obvious necessity?”

“I would wait all night if it would help you to get on the track of the scoundrels who have done this,” the old gentleman answered grimly. “Go on in your own way. I can restrain myself.”

With a word of approval, Inspector French fetched one of the cases brought by his assistants, and producing little boxes of French chalk and of lampblack, he proceeded to dust over the smooth portions of the safe, using white powder on a dark background and vice versa. On blowing off the surplus powder, he pointed triumphantly to a number of finger prints, explaining that the moisture deposited from the skin held the powder, which otherwise dropped off. Most of the marks were blurred and useless, but a few showed clearly the little loops and whorls and ridges of thumbs and fingers.

“Of course,” French went on, “these may all be quite useless. They may be those of persons who had a perfect right to open the safe—your own, for instance. But if they belong to the thief, if there was one, their importance may be incalculable. See here now, I can open this drawer without touching any of them.”

Mr. Duke was clearly at the end of his patience, and he kept fidgeting about, clasping and unclasping his hands, and showing every sign of extreme impatience and uneasiness. As the drawer opened, he stepped forward and plunged in his hand.

“Gone!” he cried hoarsely. “They’re all gone! Thirty-three thousand pounds’ worth! Oh, my God! It means ruin.” He covered his face with his hands, then went on unsteadily. “I feared it, of course. I thought it must be the diamonds when the officer rang me up. I have been trying to face it ever since. I shouldn’t care for myself. It’s my daughter. To think of her exposed to want! But there. It is wicked of me to speak so who have only lost money, while poor old Gething has lost his life. Don’t mind me, Inspector. Carry on. What I want most now is to hear of the arrest of the murderer and thief. If there is anything I can do to help in that, command me.”

He stood, a little stooped and with haggard face, but dignified even in his grief. French in his pleasant, kindly way tried to reassure him.

“Now, you don’t need to give up heart, sir,” he advised. “Diamonds are not the easiest things to dispose of, and we’re right on to the loss at once. Before the thief can pass them on we shall have all the channels under observation. With any ordinary luck, you’ll get them back. They were not insured?”

“Part of them only. About nineteen thousand pounds’ worth were insured. It was my cursed folly that the rest were not. Gething advised it, but I had never lost anything, and I wanted to save the money. You understand our trade has been difficult since the war, and our profits were not the same as formerly. Every little has counted, and we have had to economise.”

“At worst, then, that is £14,000 gone?”

“If the insurance companies pay in full, that is all, besides the thousand in notes. But, Inspector, it is too much. To meet my share of the loss will beggar me.” He shook his head despondently. “But never mind my affairs in the meantime. Don’t, I beg of you, lose any time in getting after the criminal.”

“You are right, sir. If, then, you will sit down there for a few minutes I’ll get rid of the others, and then I shall ask you for some information.”

The old gentleman dropped wearily into a chair while French went to the outer office. The policeman who had been sent to inform Gething’s family of the tragedy had just returned. French looked at him inquiringly.

“I called, sir, at the address you gave me,” he reported. “Miss Gething was there, and I told her what had occurred. She was considerably upset, and asked me if I could get a message to her sister and brother-in-law at 12 Deeley Terrace, Hawkins Street, in Battersea. I said I would fetch them for her. The brother-in-law, name of Gamage, was from home in Leeds, being a traveller for a firm of fur dealers, but Mrs. Gamage was there and I took her across. It seemed the old lady had wanted to know what was up, and Miss Gething had told her, and she had got some kind of stroke. They asked me to call a doctor, which I did. The two daughters say they can’t get across here on account of being occupied with the mother.”

“So much the better,” French commented, and having added the names and addresses of Mr. and Mrs. Gamage to his list, he turned to the doctor.

“Well, Doctor,” he said pleasantly, “how do you get on?”

The doctor straightened himself up from his position over the corpse.

“I’ve done all I can here,” he answered. “I don’t think there’s any doubt the man was killed instantaneously by the blow on the head. The skull is fractured, apparently by some heavy, blunt weapon. I should think it was done from behind while the old fellow was stooping, possibly working at the safe, though that, perhaps, is your province.”

“I’m glad of the hint anyway. Now, gentlemen, I think that’s all we can do to-night. Can your men remove the body, Superintendent? I want to stay for a moment to take a few measurements. You’ll let me know to-morrow about the inquest? Mr. Orchard, you might stay a moment also; there is a question or two I want to ask you.”

The Superintendent had sent one of his men for a stretcher, and the remains were lifted on and carried slowly down to the waiting taxi. With an exchange of good-nights, the local men withdrew, leaving Inspector French, Mr. Duke, Orchard, and the two plain-clothes men from the Yard in charge of the premises.

CHAPTER II
THE FIRM OF DUKE AND PEABODY

When Inspector French ushered the clerk, Orchard, into the inner office, they found Mr. Duke pacing the floor with an expression of utter mystification imprinted on his features.

“I say, Inspector, here’s a puzzle,” he cried. “I happened to look behind the safe door, and I find it has been opened with a key. I thought at first it had been broken or forced or the lock somehow picked. But I see it is unlocked.”

“Yes, I noticed that, sir,” French answered. “But I don’t follow you. What is the mystery about that?”

“Why, the key, of course. To my certain knowledge there were only two keys in existence. One I keep on my ring, which is chained to my belt and never leaves me day nor night. There it is. The other is lodged with my bankers, where no one could possibly get at it. Now, where did the thief get the key that is now in the lock?”

“That is one of the things we have to find out,” French replied. “You may perhaps think it strange, but a point of that kind, which at first seems to deepen the mystery, often proves a blessing in disguise. It provides another point of attack, you understand, and frequently it narrows down the area of inquiry. You haven’t touched the key, I hope?”

“No. I remembered what you said about finger prints.”

“Good. Now, gentlemen, if you will please sit down, I want to ask you a few questions. I’ll take you first, Mr. Orchard. I have your name, and your address is Bloomsbury Square. Now tell me, is that your home?”

The young fellow answered the questions without hesitation, and French noted approvingly his direct glance and the evident candour with which he spoke. The Bloomsbury Square address, it appeared, was that of a boarding house, the clerk’s home being in Somerset. He had left the office at about half-past five that afternoon, Mr. Gething being then almost ready to follow. Mr. Gething was usually the last out of the office. Orchard had noticed nothing unusual in his manner that day, though for the last two or three weeks he had seemed somewhat moody and depressed. Orchard had gone from the office to Liverpool Street, where he had caught the 5.52 to Ilford. There he had had supper with a friend, a man called Forrest, a clerk in a shipping office in Fenchurch Street. He had left about 9.30, getting back to town a little before 10.00. The rain had stopped, and as he did not get as much exercise as he could have wished, he resolved to walk home from the station. Hatton Garden was but little out of his way, and as he approached it he remembered that he had left in his desk a book he had changed at the library at lunch time. He had decided to call in and get it, so as to read for a while before going to sleep. He had done so, and had found Mr. Gething’s body, as he had already explained. The outer street door had been closed, and he had opened it with his latch key. Both the office doors were open, that between the landing and the outer office and that of Mr. Duke’s room. The lights were on everywhere, except that in the outer office only the single central bulb was burning, the desk lamps being off. He had seen no one about the offices.

French, having complimented the young fellow on his clear statement, bade him good-night and sent him home. But as he passed out of the room he whispered to one of his men, who promptly nodded and also disappeared. French turned to Mr. Duke.

“That seems a straightforward young fellow,” he observed. “What is your opinion of him?”

“Absolutely straightforward.” The acting partner spoke with decision. “He has been with me for over four years, and I have always found him most conscientious and satisfactory. Indeed. I have been very fortunate in my whole staff. I think I could say the same of them all.”

“I congratulate you, Mr. Duke. Perhaps now you would tell me something about your firm and your various employees.”

Mr. Duke, though still extremely agitated, was controlling his emotion and answered in calm tones.

“The business is not a large one, and at the present time is virtually controlled by myself. Peabody, though not so old as I am, has been troubled by bad health and has more or less gone to pieces. He seldom comes to the office, and never undertakes any work. The junior partner, Sinnamond, is travelling in the East, and has been for some months. We carry on the usual trade of diamond merchants, and have a small branch establishment in Amsterdam. Indeed, I divide my own time almost equally between London and Amsterdam. We occupy only these two rooms which you have seen. Our staff in the outer office consists, or rather consisted, of five, a chief and confidential clerk, the poor man who has just been killed, a young man called Harrington, who is qualifying for a partnership, Orchard, a girl typist, and an office boy. Besides them, we employ an outside man, a traveller, a Dutchman named Vanderkemp. He attends sales and so on, and when not on the road works in the Amsterdam branch.”

Inspector French noted all the information Mr. Duke could give about each of the persons mentioned.

“Now this Mr. Gething,” he resumed. “You say he has been with you for over twenty years, and that you had full confidence in him, but I must ask the question, Are you sure that your confidence was not misplaced? In other words, are you satisfied that he was not himself after your diamonds?”

Mr. Duke shook his head decisively.

“I am positive he was not,” he declared warmly and with something of indignation showing in his manner. “I should as soon accuse my own son, if I had one. No, I’d stake my life on it, Gething was no thief.”

“I’m glad to hear you say that, Mr. Duke,” the other returned smoothly. “Now, then, your office staff eliminated, tell me is there any one that you suspect?”

“Not a creature!” Mr. Duke was equally emphatic. “Not a single creature! I can’t imagine any one who would have done such a thing. I wish I could.”

The Inspector hesitated.

“Of course, sir, you understand that if you were to mention a name it would not in any way bias me against that person. It would only mean that I should make inquiries. Don’t think you would be getting any one into trouble.”

Mr. Duke smiled grimly.

“You needn’t be afraid. If I had any suspicion I should be only too glad to tell you, but I have none.”

“When, sir, did you last see your late clerk?”

“About half-past four this evening. I left the office at that time, about an hour earlier than usual, because I had a business appointment for a quarter to five with Mr. Peters, of Lincoln’s Inn, my solicitor.”

“And you did not return to the office?”

“No. I sat with Mr. Peters for about half an hour, then as my business was not finished and he wanted to square up for the night, we decided to dine together at my club in Gower Street. It was not worth while going back to my own office, so I went straight from Peters’ to the club.”

“And you did not notice anything peculiar about Mr. Gething?”

“Not specially on that night. He seemed absolutely as usual.”

“How do you mean, not specially on that night?”

“He had been, I thought, a little depressed for two or three weeks previously, as if he had some trouble on his mind. I asked when first I noticed it if there was anything wrong, but he murmured something about home troubles, about his wife not being so well—she is a chronic invalid. He was not communicative, and I did not press the matter. But he was no worse this afternoon than during the last fortnight.”

“I see. Now, what brought him back to the office to-night?”

Mr. Duke made a gesture of bewilderment.

“I have no idea,” he declared. “There was nothing! Nothing, at least, that I know of or can imagine. We were not specially busy, and as far as I can think, he was well up to date with his work.”

“Is there a postal delivery between half-past four and the time your office closes?”

“There is, and of course there might have been a telegram or a caller or a note delivered by hand. But suppose there had been something important enough to require immediate attention, Gething would never have taken action without consulting me. He had only to ring me up.”

“He knew where you were, then?”

“No, but he could have rung up my home. They knew there where I was, as when I had decided to dine at the club, I ’phoned home to say so.”

“But were you in your club all the evening? Excuse my pressing the matter, but I think it’s important to make sure the man did not try to communicate with you.”

“I see your point. Yes, I stayed chatting with Mr. Peters until almost 9.30. Then, feeling tired from a long day’s thought about business, I decided a little exercise would be pleasant, and I walked home. I reached my house a minute or two after ten.”

“That seems conclusive. All the same, sir, I think you should make sure when you reach home that no call was made.”

“I shall do so certainly, but my parlourmaid is very reliable in such matters, and I am certain she would have told me of any.”

Inspector French sat for a few seconds lost in thought, and then began on another point.

“You tell me that you had £33,000 worth of diamonds in the safe. Is not that an unusually large amount to keep in an office?”

“You are quite right; it is too large. I consider myself very much to blame, both for that and in the matter of the insurance. But I had not meant to keep the stones there long. Indeed, negotiations for the sale of the larger portion were actually in progress. On the other hand, it is due to myself to point out that the safe is of a very efficient modern pattern.”

“That is so, sir. Now can you tell me who, besides yourself, knew of the existence of those stones?”

“I’m afraid,” Mr. Duke admitted despondently, “there was no secret about it. Gething knew, of course. He was entirely in my confidence about such matters. Vanderkemp, my outdoor man, knew that I had made some heavy purchases recently, as he not only conducted the negotiations, but personally brought the stones to the office. Besides, there were letters about them, accessible to all the staff. I am afraid you may take it that every one in the office knew there was a lot of stuff there, though probably not the exact amount.”

“And the staff may have talked to outsiders. Young people will brag, especially if they are ‘keeping company,’ as the Irish say.”

“I fear that is so,” Mr. Duke agreed, as if deprecating the singular habits of the young.

The Inspector changed his position uneasily, and his hand stole to his pipe. But he checked himself and resumed his questioning. He obtained from Mr. Duke a detailed list of the missing stones, then turned to a new point.

“About that thousand pounds in notes. I suppose you haven’t got the numbers?”

“No, unfortunately. But the bank might know them.”

“We shall inquire. Now, Mr. Duke, about the key. That is another singular thing.”

“It is an amazing thing. I absolutely cannot understand where it came from. As I said, this one never leaves, nor has left, my personal possession, and the other, the only other one, is equally inaccessible in my bank.”

“You always personally opened or closed the safe?”

“Always, or at least it was done by my instructions and in my presence.”

“Oh, well, that is not quite the same thing, you know. Who has ever opened or closed it for you?”

“Gething; and not once or twice, but scores, I suppose I might say hundreds of times. But always in my presence.”

“I understand that, sir. Any one else besides Mr. Gething?”

Mr. Duke hesitated.

“No,” he said slowly, “no one else. He was the only one I trusted to that extent. And I had reason to trust him,” he added, with a touch of defiance.

“Of course, sir. I recognise that,” French answered smoothly. “I am only trying to get the facts clear in my mind. I take it, then, that the deceased gentleman was the only person, other than yourself, who ever handled your key? It was not within reach of any one in your house; your servants, for example?”

“No, I never let it lie about. Even at night I kept it attached to me.”

The Inspector rose from his chair.

“Well, sir,” he said politely, “I’m sorry to have kept you so long. Just let me take your finger prints to compare with those in the safe, and I have done. Shall I ring up for a taxi for you?”

Mr. Duke looked at his watch.

“Why, it is nearly one,” he exclaimed. “Yes, a taxi by all means, please.”

Though Inspector French had said that everything possible had been done that night, he did not follow Mr. Duke from the building. Instead, he returned to the inner office and set himself unhurriedly to make a further and more thorough examination of its contents.

He began with the key of the safe. Removing it by the shank with a pair of special pincers, he tested the handle for finger prints, but without success. Looking then at the other end, a slight roughness on one of the wards attracted his attention, and on scrutinising it with his lens, a series of fine parallel scratches was revealed on all the surfaces. “So that’s it, is it?” he said to himself complacently. “Manufacturers don’t leave keys of valuable safes half finished. This one has been cut with a file, and probably,”—he again scrutinised the workmanship—“by an amateur at that. And according to this man Duke, old Gething was the only one that had the handling of the key—that could have taken a wax impression. Well, well; we shall see.”

He locked the safe, dropped the key into his pocket, and turned to the fireplace, soliloquising the while.

The fire had still been glowing red when the crime was discovered shortly after ten o’clock. That meant, of course, that it had been deliberately stoked up, because the fire in the outer office was cold and dead. Some one, therefore, had intended to spend a considerable time in the office. Who could it have been?

As far as French could see, no one but Gething. But if Gething were going to commit the robbery—a matter of perhaps ten minutes at the outside—he would not have required a fire. No, this looked as if there really was some business to be done, something that would take time to carry through. But then, if so, why had Gething not consulted Mr. Duke? French noted the point, to be considered further in the light of future discoveries.

But as to the identity of the person who had built up the fire there should be no doubt. Finger prints again! The coal shovel had a smooth, varnished wooden handle, admirably suited for records, and a short test with the white powder revealed thereon an excellent impression of a right thumb.

The poker next received attention, and here French made his second discovery. Picking it up with the pincers in the same careful way in which he had handled the key, he noticed on the handle a dark brown stain. Beside this stain, and sticking to the metal, was a single white hair.

That he held in his hand the instrument with which the crime was committed seemed certain, and he eagerly tested the other end for prints. But this time he was baffled. Nothing showed at the places where finger marks might have been expected. It looked as if the murderer had worn gloves or had rubbed the handle clean, and he noted that either alternative postulated a cold-blooded criminal and a calculated crime.

He continued his laborious search of the room, but without finding anything else which interested him. Finally, while his men were photographing the prints he had discovered, he sat down in the leather-covered arm-chair and considered what he had learned.

Certainly a good deal of the evidence pointed to Gething. Gething knew the stones were there. According to Duke, no one else could have got hold of the key to the safe to make an impression. Moreover, his body was found before the safe with the latter open. All circumstantial evidence, of course, though cumulatively strong.

However, whether or not Gething had contemplated robbery, he had not carried it through. Some one else had the diamonds. And here the obvious possibility recurred to him which had been in his mind since he had heard the Superintendent’s first statement. Suppose Orchard was the man. Suppose Orchard, visiting the office in the evening, arrived to find the safe open and the old man stooping over it. Instantly he would be assailed by a terrible temptation. The thing would seem so easy, the way of escape so obvious, the reward so sure. French, sitting back in the arm-chair, tried to picture the scene. The old man bending over the safe, the young one entering, unheard. His halt in surprise; the sudden overwhelming impulse to possess the gems; his stealthy advance; the seizing of the poker; the blow, delivered perhaps with the intention of merely stunning his victim. But he strikes too hard, and, horrified by what he has done, yet sees that for his own safety he must go through with the whole business. He recalls the danger of finger prints, and wipes the handles of the poker and of the drawer in the safe from which he has abstracted the diamonds. With admirable foresight he waits until the body grows cold, lest an examination of it by the policeman he intends to call might disprove his story. Then he rushes out in an agitated manner and gives the alarm.

Though this theory met a number of the facts, French was not overpleased with it. It did not explain what Gething was doing at the safe, nor did it seem to fit in with the personality of Orchard. All the same, though his instruction to his man to shadow Orchard had been given as an obvious precaution inevitable in the circumstances, he was glad that he had not overlooked it.

Another point occurred to him as he sat thinking over the affair in the leather-lined chair. If Orchard had stolen the stones, he would never have risked having them on his person when he gave the alarm. He would certainly have hidden them, and French could not see how he could have taken them out of the building to do so. A thorough search of the offices seemed therefore called for.

The Inspector was tired, but, late as it was, he spent three solid hours conducting a meticulous examination of the whole premises, only ceasing when he had satisfied himself beyond possibility of doubt that no diamonds were concealed thereon. Then, believing that he had exhausted the possibilities of the scene of the crime, he felt himself free to withdraw. Dawn was appearing in the eastern sky as he drew the door after him and set off in the direction of his home.

CHAPTER III
GATHERING THE THREADS

The fact that he had been out all the previous night was not, in Inspector French’s eyes, any reason why he should be late at his work next day. At his usual time, therefore, he reached New Scotland Yard, and promptly engaged himself in the compilation of a preliminary report on the Hatton Garden crime. This completed, he resumed direct work on the case.

There were still several obvious inquiries to be made, inquiries which might almost be called routine, in that they followed necessarily from the nature of the crime. The first of these was an interview with the other members of the Duke & Peabody staff.

An Oxford Street bus brought him to the end of Hatton Garden, and soon he was once more mounting the staircase to the scene of his last night’s investigation. He found Mr. Duke standing in the outer office with Orchard and the typist and office boy.

“I was just telling these young people they might go home,” the principal explained. “I am closing the office until after the funeral.”

“That will be appreciated by poor Mr. Gething’s family, sir. I think it is very kind of you and very proper too. But before this young lady and gentleman go I should like to ask them a question or two.”

“Of course. Will you take them into my office? Go in, Miss Prescott, and tell Inspector French anything he wants to know.”

“I’m afraid you won’t be able to do quite so much as that, Miss Prescott,” French smiled, continuing to chat pleasantly in the hope of allaying the nervousness the girl evidently felt.

But he learned nothing from her except that Mr. Duke was a very nice gentleman of whom she was somewhat in awe, and that Mr. Gething had always been very kind to her and could be depended on to let her do whatever she wanted. Neither about the clerk, Orchard, nor the pupil, Harrington, was she communicative, and the office boy, Billy Newton, she dismissed as one might a noxious insect, a negligible, if necessary, evil. Mr. Gething had been, as far as she could form a conclusion, in his usual health and spirits on the previous day, but she thought he had seemed worried and anxious for the past two or three weeks. As to herself, she liked the office, and got on well with her work, and was very sorry about poor Mr. Gething. On the previous day she had gone straight from the office, and had remained at home with her mother during the entire evening. French, satisfied she had told him all that she knew, took her finger prints and let her go.

From Billy Newton, the precocious office boy, he learned but one new fact. Newton, it seemed, had been the last to leave the office on the previous evening, and before Mr. Gething had gone he had instructed him to make up the fire in the chief’s office, as he, Gething, was coming back later to do some special work. The boy had built up a good fire and had then left.

When French returned to the outer office, he found a new arrival. A tall, good-looking young man was talking to Mr. Duke, and the latter introduced him as Mr. Stanley Harrington, the clerk-pupil who was qualifying for a partnership. Harrington was apologising for being late, saying that on his way to the office he had met an old schoolfellow of whom he had completely lost sight, and who had asked him to accompany him to King’s Cross, whence he was taking the 9.50 a.m. train for the north. The young man seemed somewhat ill at ease, and as French brought him into the inner office and began to talk to him, his nervousness became unmistakable. French was intrigued by it. From his appearance, he imagined the man would have, under ordinary circumstances, a frank, open face and a pleasant, outspoken manner. But now his look was strained and his bearing furtive. French, with his vast experience of statement makers, could not but suspect something more than the perturbation natural under the circumstances, and as his examination progressed he began to believe he was dealing with a normally straightforward man who was now attempting to evade the truth. But none of his suspicions showed in his manner, and he was courtesy itself as he asked his questions.

It seemed that Harrington was the nephew of that Mr. Vanderkemp who acted as traveller for the firm. Miss Vanderkemp, the Dutchman’s sister, had married Stewart Harrington, a prosperous Yorkshire stock-broker. Stanley had been well educated, and had been a year at college when a terrible blow fell on him. His father and mother, travelling on the Continent, had both been killed in a railway accident near Milan. It was then found that his father, though making plenty of money, had been living up to his income, and had made no provision for those who were to come after him. Debts absorbed nearly all the available money, and Stanley was left practically penniless. It was then that his uncle, Jan Vanderkemp, proved his affection. Out of his none too large means he paid for the boy’s remaining years at Cambridge, then using his influence with Mr. Duke to give him a start in the office.

But shortly after he had entered on his new duties an unexpected complication, at least for Mr. Duke, had arisen. The principal’s daughter, Sylvia, visiting her father in the office, had made the acquaintance of the well-mannered youth, and before Mr. Duke realised what was happening the two young people had fallen violently in love, with the result that Miss Duke presently announced to her horrified father that they were engaged. In vain the poor man protested. Miss Duke was a young lady who usually had her own way, and at last her father was compelled to make a virtue of necessity. He met the situation by giving the affair his blessing, and promising to take Harrington into partnership if and when he proved himself competent. In this Harrington had succeeded, and the wedding was fixed for the following month, the partnership commencing on the same date.

French questioned the young fellow as to his movements on the previous evening. It appeared that shortly after reaching his rooms on the conclusion of his day’s work in the office, he had received a telephone message from Miss Duke saying that her father had just called up to say he was detained in town for dinner, and, being alone, she wished he would go out to Hampstead and dine with her. Such an invitation from such a source was in the nature of a command to be ecstatically obeyed, and he had reached the Dukes’ house before seven o’clock. But he had been somewhat disappointed as to his evening. Miss Duke was going out after dinner; she intended visiting a girls’ club in Whitechapel, run by a friend of hers, a Miss Amy Lestrange. Harrington had accompanied her to the East End, but she would not allow him to go in with her to the club. He had, however, returned later and taken her home, after which he had gone straight to his rooms.

Skilful interrogation by French had obtained the above information, and now he sat turning it over in his mind. The story hung together, and, if true, there could be no doubt of Harrington’s innocence. But French was puzzled by the young man’s manner. He could have sworn that there was something. Either the tale was not true, or it was not all true, or there was more which had not been told. He determined that unless he got a strong lead elsewhere, Mr. Harrington’s movements on the previous night must be looked into and his statements put to the test.

But there was no need to let the man know he was suspected, and dismissing him with a few pleasant words, French joined Mr. Duke in the outer office.

“Now, sir, if you are ready we shall go round to your bank about the key.”

They soon obtained the required information. The manager, who had read of the robbery in his morning paper, was interested in the matter, and went into it personally. Not only was the key there in its accustomed place, but it had never been touched since Mr. Duke left it in.

“A thousand pounds in notes was also stolen,” French went on. “Is there any chance that you have the numbers?”

“Your teller might remember the transaction,” Mr. Duke broke in eagerly. “I personally cashed a cheque for £1000 on the Tuesday, the day before the murder. I got sixteen fifties and the balance in tens. I was hoping to carry off a little deal in diamonds with a Portuguese merchant whom I expected to call on me. I put the money in my safe as I received it from you, and the merchant not turning up, I did not look at it again.”

“We can but inquire,” the manager said doubtfully. “It is probable we have a note of the fifties, but unlikely in the case of the tens.”

But it chanced that the teller had taken the precaution to record the numbers of all the notes. These were given to French, who asked the manager to advise the Yard if any were discovered.

“That’s satisfactory about the notes,” French commented when Mr. Duke and he had reached the street. “But you see what the key being there means? It means that the copy was made from the key which you carry. Some one must therefore have had it in his possession long enough to take a mould of it in wax. This, of course, is a very rapid operation; a couple of seconds would do the whole thing. A skilful man would hold the wax in the palm of his hand, ‘palmed’ as the conjurers call it, and the key could be pressed into it in so natural a way that no unsuspecting person would be any the wiser. Now I want you to think again very carefully. If no one but Mr. Gething handled the key, he must have taken the impression. There is no other way out. I would like you, then, to be sure that no one else ever did get his hands upon it, even for a moment. You see my point?”

“Of course I see it,” Mr. Duke returned a trifle testily, “but, unanswerable as it seems, I don’t believe Gething ever did anything of the kind. It would seem the likely thing to you, Inspector, because you didn’t know the man. But I’ve known him too long to doubt him. Some one else must have got hold of the key, but I confess I can’t imagine who.”

“Some one at night, while you were asleep?”

Mr. Duke shrugged his shoulders.

“I can only say, it is unlikely.”

“Well, consider the possibilities at all events. I must go back to headquarters.”

“And I to the Gethings,” Mr. Duke returned. “I hear the wife is very ill. The shock has completely broken her down. You’ll let me know how things go on?”

“Certainly, sir. Immediately I have anything to report, you shall hear it.”

The police station was not far away, and soon French was bending over all that was mortal of Charles Gething. He was not concerned with the actual remains, except to take prints from the dead fingers, to compare with those found in the office. But he went through the contents of the pockets, among which he had hoped to gain some clue as to the nature of the business which had brought the dead man to the office. Unfortunately there was nothing to give the slightest indication.

The inquest had been fixed for five o’clock that evening, and French spent some time with the Superintendent going over the evidence which was to be put forward by the police. Of the verdict, there could, of course, be no doubt.

Believing that by this time Mr. Duke would have left the Gethings, French thought that he might himself call there. The more he could learn about the old man the better.

He hailed a taxi, and some fifteen minutes later reached Monkton Street, a narrow and rather depressing side street off the Fulham Road. The door of No. 37 was opened by a brown-haired woman of some five-and-thirty, with a pleasant and kindly, though somewhat worn expression. French took off his hat.

“Miss Gething?” he inquired.

“No, I am Mrs. Gamage. But my sister is in, if you wish to see her.” She spoke with a sort of plaintive softness which French found rather attractive.

“I’m afraid I must trouble you both,” he answered with his kindly smile, as he introduced himself and stated his business.

Mrs. Gamage stepped back into the narrow passage.

“Come in,” she invited. “We are naturally anxious to help you. Besides, the police have been very kind. Nothing could have been kinder than that constable who came round last night with the news. Indeed every one has been more than good. Mr. Duke has just been round himself to inquire. A time like this shows what people are.”

“I was sorry to hear that Mrs. Gething is so unwell,” French observed, and he followed his guide into the tiny front parlour. He was surprised to find the house far from comfortably furnished. Everything, indeed, bore the stamp of an almost desperate attempt to preserve decency and self-respect in the face of a grinding poverty. The threadbare carpet was worn into holes and had been neatly darned, and so had the upholstery of the two rather upright easy chairs. The leg of the third chair was broken and had been mended with nails and wire. Everything was shabby, though spotlessly clean and evidently looked after with the utmost care. Though the day was bitter, no spark of fire burned in the grate. Here, the Inspector thought, was certainly a matter to be inquired into. If Gething was really as poor a man as this furniture seemed to indicate, it undoubtedly would have a bearing on the problem.

“My mother has been an invalid for many years,” Mrs. Gamage answered, unconsciously supplying the explanation French wanted. “She suffers from a diseased hip bone and will never be well. My poor father spent a small fortune on doctors and treatment for her, but I don’t think any of them did her much good. Now this news has broken her down altogether. She is practically unconscious, and we fear the end at any time.”

“Allow me to express my sympathy,” French murmured, and his voice seemed to convey quite genuine sorrow. “What you tell me makes me doubly regret having to force my unpleasant business on your notice. But I cannot help myself.”

“Of course I understand.” Mrs. Gamage smiled gently. “Ask what you want and I shall try to answer, and when you have finished with me I’ll relieve Esther with mother and send her down.”

But there was not a great deal that Mrs. Gamage could tell. Since her marriage some four years previously she had seen comparatively little of her father. That she idolised him was obvious, but the cares of her own establishment prevented her paying more than an occasional visit to her old home. French therefore soon thanked her for her help, and asked her to send her sister down to him.

Esther Gething was evidently the younger of the two. She was like Mrs. Gamage, but better looking. Indeed, she was pretty in a mild, unobtrusive way. She had the same brown eyes, but so steadfast and truthful that even French felt satisfied that she was one to be trusted. Her expression was equally kindly, but she gave the impression of greater competence than her sister. He could imagine how her parents leaned on her. A good woman, he thought, using an adjective he did not often apply to the sex, and the phrase, in its fullest significance, seemed only just adequate.

Under the Inspector’s skilful lead she described the somewhat humdrum existence which she and her parents had led for some years past. Her mother’s illness seemed to have been the ruling factor in their lives, everything being subordinated to the sufferer’s welfare, and the expenses in connection with it forming a heavy drain on the family exchequer. From Mr. Duke’s records, French had learned that the dead man’s salary had been about £400 per annum, though quite recently it had been increased to £450, following a visit the merchant had paid to the house during a short illness of his head clerk. Mr. Duke, Miss Gething said, had always acted as a considerate employer.

Asked if her father had continued in his usual health and spirits up to the end, she said no, that for some three weeks past he had seemed depressed and worried. On different occasions she had tried to find out the cause, but he had not enlightened her except to say that he had been having some trouble at the office. Once, however, he dropped a phrase which set her thinking, though she was unable to discover his meaning, and he had refused to explain. He had asked her did she believe that a man could ever be right in doing evil that good might come, and when she had answered that she could not tell, he had sighed and said, “Pray God you may never be called on to decide.”

On the evening of his death it had been arranged that he would sit with Mrs. Gething, in order to allow his daughter to attend a social connected with the choir of the church to which she belonged. But that evening he came home more worried and upset than she had ever seen him, and he had told her with many expressions of regret that some unexpected work which had just come in would require his presence that evening in the office, and that unless she was able to get some one else to look after her mother, she would have to give up her social. He had been too nervous and ill at ease to make a good meal, and had gone off about eight o’clock, saying he did not know at what hour he would be back. That was the last time she had seen him alive, and she had heard nothing of him until the policeman had come with his terrible news about half-past eleven.

Miss Gething was clearly at one with her sister in her admiration and affection for her father, and French recognised that she was as mystified as to his death as he was himself. Seeing that he could learn no more, he presently took his leave, with renewed expressions of sympathy for her trouble.

When he reached the Yard he found that enlarged photographs of the various finger prints he had discovered were ready, and he sat down with some eagerness to compare the impressions with those on his cards. He spent some time counting and measuring lines and whorls, and at last reached the following conclusions. All the finger marks on the safe, both inside and out, belonged either to Mr. Duke or to Mr. Gething, the majority being the latter’s; the mark on the handle of the coal shovel was Mr. Gething’s, and the remaining prints were those of various members of the office staff. His hopes of help from this source were therefore dashed.

With a sigh he looked at his watch. There would be time before the inquest to make some inquiries as to the truth of Orchard’s statement of his movements on the previous evening. Half an hour later he had found the man with whom the clerk had dined in Ilford, and he fully substantiated the other’s story. Orchard was therefore definitely eliminated from the inquiry.

The proceedings before the Coroner were practically formal. Orchard, Mr. Duke, and Constable Alcorn told their stories, and with very little further examination were dismissed. French and the local superintendent watched the case on behalf of the police, but did not interfere, and the next of kin of the deceased were not legally represented. After half an hour, the Coroner summed up, and the jury without retiring brought in the obvious verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown.

That evening, when French had dined and had settled himself before the fire in his sitting-room with a pipe between his lips and his notebook on the table at his elbow, he set himself to take mental stock of his position and get a clear grasp of his new problem.

In the first place, it was obvious that this Charles Gething had been murdered for the sake of the diamonds in Mr. Duke’s safe. It was certain from the position of the wound that it could not have been accidental, nor could it by any chance have been self-inflicted. Moreover, a planned robbery was indicated by the cutting of the duplicate key. But the stones were not on old Gething’s body. It therefore followed that some one else had taken them, though whether Gething had abstracted them from the safe in the first instance was not clear.

So far French had no trouble in marshalling his facts, but when he attempted to go further he found himself in difficulties.

There was first of all Gething’s poverty. Though his salary was not unreasonable for his position, the drain of his wife’s illness had kept him continually struggling to make ends meet. French let his imagination dwell on the wearing nature of such a struggle. To obtain relief a man would risk a good deal. Then there was his knowledge of the wealth which lay within his reach, provided only that he made a spirited effort to obtain it. Had the man fallen before the temptation?

That he had had something on his mind for two or three weeks before his death was obvious, and it was equally clear that this was something secret. When Mr. Duke inquired as to the cause of the trouble, Gething had mentioned family matters and his wife’s health, but when his daughter had asked the same question he had said it was due to business worries. The old man had therefore carried his efforts at concealment to direct lying to one or other.

It seemed evident also that this worry or trouble had become intensified on the evening of his death. He had told his daughter that special business required his presence at the office. But Mr. Duke knew of no such business, nor was any record of it obtainable.

But all these mysterious contradictions fell into line and became comprehensible if some two or three weeks back Gething had decided to rob the safe, and his special agitation on the evening of his death was accounted for if that were the date he had selected to make the attempt.

On the other hand, several considerations did not support such a view. The first was the man’s known character. He had worked for the firm for over twenty years, and after all that experience of him Mr. Duke absolutely refused to believe in his guilt. His daughters also evidently had the warmest feelings towards him, and from what French had seen of the latter he felt that would have been impossible had Gething been a man of bad or weak character. Such other evidence as French had been able to obtain tended in the same direction.

Next, there was the open way in which Gething returned to the office. Had he intended to burgle the safe, would he not have kept the fact of his visit a secret? Yet he told the office boy he was returning when instructing him to keep up the fire in the inner office, and he also mentioned it to his daughter when discussing her proposed choir meeting.

Further, there was this matter of the fire in the private office. If Gething was going to rob the safe, what was the fire for? It was not merely that he had instructed the office boy to keep it up. He had himself afterwards put coal on, as was evidenced by his finger marks on the handle of the shovel. The robbing of the safe would have been a matter of minutes only. Did the episode of the fire not look as if Gething really was employed at some exceptional work, as he had stated to his daughter?

On the whole, French thought, the evidence for Gething’s guilt was stronger than that against it, and he began to form a tentative theory somewhat as follows: That Gething, finding the conditions of his home life onerous beyond further endurance, and realising the unusually valuable deposit in the safe, had decided to help himself, probably to a quite small portion, knowing that the loss would fall, not on Mr. Duke, but on the insurance company; that he had obtained an impression of the key from which he had had a duplicate made; that he had invented the business in the office as a safeguard should he be accidentally found there during the evening; that he had been found there, probably accidentally, by some one who, seeing the possibilities opening out in front of him, had been swept off his feet by the sudden temptation and had killed the old man and made off with the swag.

This theory seemed to meet at least most of the facts. French was not pleased with it, but it was the best he could produce, and he decided to adopt it as a working hypothesis. At the same time he kept an open mind, recognising that the discovery of some fresh fact might put a different complexion on the whole affair.

Next morning he put some obvious investigations in train. By astute indirect inquiries, he satisfied himself that neither Mr. Gething nor any other worker in the Duke & Peabody office had the technical skill to have cut the key, and he put a man on to try and trace the professional who had done it. He issued a description of the stolen diamonds to the British and Dutch police, as well as to certain dealers from whom he hoped to obtain information of attempted sales. He saw that a general advice was sent to the banks as to the missing notes, and he searched, unsuccessfully, for any person who might have known of the treasure and who was unable satisfactorily to account for his movements on the night of the murder.

But as the days slipped by without bringing any news, French grew seriously uneasy and redoubled his efforts. He suspected every one he could think of, including the typist, the office boy, and even Mr. Duke himself, but still without result. The typist proved she was at home all the evening, Billy Newton was undoubtedly at a Boy Scouts’ Rally, while guarded inquiries at the principal’s club and home proved that his statement as to how he had passed his evening was correct in every particular. Stanley Harrington’s movements he had already investigated, and though the young man’s alibi could not be absolutely established he could find nothing to incriminate him.

Baffled in every direction, French began to lose heart, while his superiors asked more and more insistent and unpleasant questions.

CHAPTER IV
MISSING

About ten o’clock on the morning of the tenth day after the murder of Charles Gething, Inspector French sat in his room at New Scotland Yard wondering for the thousandth time if there was no clue in the affair which he had overlooked, no line of research which he had omitted to follow up.

He had seldom found himself up against so baffling a problem. Though from the nature of the case, as he told himself with exasperation, a solution should be easily reached, yet he could find nothing to go on. The clues he had obtained looked promising enough, but—they led nowhere. None of the stolen notes had reached the bank, nor had any of the diamonds come on the market; no one in whom he was interested had become suddenly rich, and all his possible suspects were able more or less satisfactorily to account for their time on the fatal evening.

French had just taken up his pen to write out a statement of what he had done, in the hope of discovering some omission, when his telephone rang. Absent-mindedly he took up the receiver.

“I want to speak to Inspector French,” he heard in a familiar voice. “Say that Mr. Duke of Duke & Peabody is on the ’phone.”

There was a suggestion of eagerness in the voice that instantly roused the Inspector’s interest.

“Inspector French speaking,” he answered promptly. “Good-morning, Mr. Duke. I hope you have some news for me?”

“I have some news,” the distant voice returned, “but I don’t know whether it bears on our quest. I have just had a letter from Schoofs, you remember, the manager of our Amsterdam branch, and from what he tells me it looks as if Vanderkemp had disappeared.”

“Disappeared?” French echoed. “How? Since when?”

“I don’t know exactly. I am having the files looked up to try and settle dates. It appears that he has been absent from the Amsterdam office for several days, and Schoofs thought he was over here. But we’ve not seen him. I don’t understand the matter. Perhaps if you’re not too busy you could come round and I’ll show you Schoofs’ letter.”

“I’ll come at once.”

Half an hour later French was mounting the stairs of the Hatton Garden office. With a face wreathed in smiles, Billy Newton ushered him into the private office. Mr. Duke seemed nervous and a trifle excited as he shook hands.

“The more I think over this affair, Inspector, the less I like it,” he began immediately. “I do hope there is nothing wrong. I will tell you all I know, but before I show you Schoofs’ letter I had better explain how it came to be written.”

He looked up interrogatively, then as French nodded, continued:

“As I think I already mentioned, Vanderkemp is my travelling agent. He attends sales and auctions in all the countries of Europe. He has carried through some very large deals for me, and I have every confidence both in his business acumen and in his integrity. I told you also that amongst others he had purchased and brought to London the greater part of the missing stones.”

“You told me that, sir.”

“Of late years, when Vanderkemp is not on the road, he has been working in the Amsterdam branch. Some three or four days before poor Gething’s death he had returned from a tour through southern Germany where he had been buying jewels from some of the former nobility who had fallen on evil days since the revolution. Three days ago, on last Monday to be exact, I learnt that a very famous collection of jewels was shortly to be sold in Florence, and I wrote that evening to Schoofs telling him to send Vanderkemp to Italy to inspect and value the stones with a view to my purchasing some of them. This is Schoofs’ reply which I received this morning. You see what he says: ‘I note your instructions re sending Vanderkemp to Florence, but he had not yet returned here from London, where I presumed he was staying with your knowledge and by your orders. When he arrives I shall send him on at once.’ What do you make of that, Inspector?”

“Vanderkemp did not come to London, then?”

“Not to my knowledge. He certainly did not come here.”

“I should like to know why Mr. Schoofs thought he had, and also the date he was supposed to start.”

“We can learn that by wiring to Schoofs.”

Inspector French remained silent for a few moments. It seemed to him now that he had neglected this Dutch office. It was at least another line of inquiry, and one which might easily bear fruitful results.

The staff there, Mr. Duke had stated, consisted of four persons, the manager, a typist, and an office boy. There was also at times this traveller, Vanderkemp, the same Vanderkemp who was uncle to Stanley Harrington. It was more than likely that these persons knew of the collection of diamonds. The manager would certainly be in Mr. Duke’s confidence on the matter. Vanderkemp had actually purchased and brought to London a large number of the stones, which he had seen put into the safe, though, of course, it did not follow that he knew that they had been retained there. Besides, in the same way as in the London office, leakage of the information to outside acquaintances might easily occur. Inquiries in Amsterdam seemed to French to be indicated.

“I think I shouldn’t wire,” he said at last. “There is no use in starting scares unless we’re sure something is wrong. Probably the thing is capable of the most ordinary explanation. But I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll slip across to Amsterdam and make a few inquiries. If anything is wrong I’ll get to know.”

“Good. I’d be very pleased if you did that. I’ll write Schoofs and tell him to help you in every way that he can.”

French shook his head.

“I shouldn’t do that either, if you don’t mind,” he declared. “I’ll just go over and have a look round. There is no need to mention it to any one.”

Mr. Duke demurred, pointing out that a note from him would enlist Mr. Schoof’s help. But French maintained his ground, and the merchant agreed to carry out his wishes.

French crossed by the night service from Harwich, and at half-past eight o’clock next day emerged from the Central Station into the delightful, old world capital. Though bent on sordid enough business, he could not but feel the quaint charm of the city as he drove to the Bible Hotel in the Damrak, and again as, after breakfast, he sauntered out to reconnoitre.

Messrs. Duke & Peabody’s office was close by in the Singelgracht, a semi-business street with a tree-lined canal down its centre, and crouching at one corner, a heavily-gabled church with a queer little wooden tower not unlike a monstrous candle extinguisher. French had opposed Mr. Duke’s offer to write to the manager introducing him, as he did not wish any of the Amsterdam staff to be aware beforehand of his visit. He had on many occasions obtained a vital hint from the start or sudden look of apprehension which an unexpected question had produced, and he was anxious not to neglect the possibility of a similar suggestion in this case. He therefore pushed open the swing door, and without giving a name, asked for the manager.

Mr. Schoofs was a dapper little man with a pompous manner and an evident sense of his own value. He spoke excellent English, and greeted his caller politely as he motioned him to a chair. French lost no time in coming to the point.

“I have called, sir,” he began in a harsh tone, not at all in accord with his usual “Soapy Joe” character, while he transfixed the other with a cold and inimical stare, “with reference to the murder of Mr. Gething. I am Inspector French of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard.”

But his little plot did not come off. Mr. Schoofs merely raised his eyebrows, and with a slight shrug of his shoulders contrived to produce a subtle suggestion that he was surprised not with the matter, but with the manner, of his visitor’s announcement.

“Ah yes!” he murmured easily. “A sad business truly! And I understand there is no trace of the murderer and thief? It must be disquieting to Londoners to have deeds of violence committed with such impunity in their great city.”

French, realising that he had lost the first move, changed his tone.

“It is true, sir, that we have as yet made no arrest, but we are not without hope of doing so shortly. It was to gain some further information that I came over to see you.”

“I am quite at your disposal.”

“I needn’t ask you if you can give me any directly helpful news, because in that case you would have already volunteered it. But it may be that you can throw light upon some side issue, of which you may not have realised the importance.”

“Such as?”

“Such, for example, as the names of persons who were aware of the existence of the diamonds in Mr. Duke’s safe. That is one of many lines.”

“Yes? And others?”

“Suppose we take that one first. Can you, as a matter of fact, tell me if the matter was known of over here?”

“I knew of it, if that is what you mean,” Mr. Schoofs answered in a slightly dry tone. “Mr. Duke told me of his proposed deal, and asked me to look out for stones for him. Mr. Vanderkemp also knew of it, as he bought a lot of the stones and took them to London. But I do not think any one else knew.”

“What about your clerk and office boy?”

Mr. Schoofs shook his head.

“It is impossible that either could have heard of it.”

French, though he had begun inauspiciously, continued the interrogation with his usual suavity. He asked several other questions, but without either learning anything of interest, or surprising Schoofs into showing embarrassment or suspicious symptoms. Then he turned to the real object of his visit.

“Now about your traveller, Mr. Schoofs. What kind of man is Mr. Vanderkemp?”

Under the genial and deferent manner which French was now exhibiting, Schoofs had thawed, and he really seemed anxious to give all the help he could. Vanderkemp, it appeared, was a considerable asset to the firm, though owing to his age—he was just over sixty—he was not able to do so much as formerly. Personally he was not very attractive; he drank a little too much, he gambled, and there were discreditable though unsubstantiated tales of his private life. Moreover, he was of morose temper and somewhat short manners, except when actually negotiating a deal, when he could be suave and polished enough. But he had been known to perform kind actions, for instance, he had been exceedingly good to his nephew Harrington. Neither Schoofs nor any one else in the concern particularly liked him, but he had one invaluable gift, a profound knowledge of precious stones and an accuracy in valuing them which was almost uncanny. He had done well for the firm, and Mr. Duke was glad to overlook his shortcomings in order to retain his services.

“I should like to have a chat with him. Is he in at present?”

“No, he went to London nearly a fortnight ago. He has not returned yet. But I’m expecting him every day, as I have instructions from Mr. Duke to send him to Florence.”

French looked interested.

“He went to London?” he repeated. “But I can assure you he never arrived there, or at least never reached Mr. Duke’s office. I have asked Mr. Duke on several occasions about his staff, and he distinctly told me that he had not seen this Mr. Vanderkemp since two or three weeks before the murder.”

“But that’s most extraordinary,” Schoofs exclaimed. “He certainly left here to go to London on—what day was it?—it was the very day poor Gething was murdered. He left by the day service via Rotterdam and Queenborough. At least, he was to do so, for I only saw him on the previous evening.”

“Well, he never arrived. Was it on business he was going?”

“Yes, Mr. Duke wrote for him.”

“Mr. Duke wrote for him?” French echoed, at last genuinely surprised. “What? To cross that day?”

“To see him in the office on the following morning. I can show you the letter.” He touched a bell and gave the necessary instructions. “There it is,” he continued, handing over the paper which the clerk brought in.

It was an octavo sheet of memorandum paper with the firm’s name printed on the top, and bore the following typewritten letter:

“20th November.

“H. A. Schoofs, Esq.

“I should be obliged if you would please ask Mr. Vanderkemp to come over and see me here at 10.00 a.m. on Wednesday, 26th inst., as I wish him to undertake negotiations for a fresh purchase. He may have to go to Stockholm at short notice.”

The note was signed “R. A. Duke,” with the attendant flourish with which French had grown familiar.

He sat staring at the sheet of paper, trying to fit this new discovery into the scheme of things. But it seemed to him an insoluble puzzle. Was Mr. Duke not really the innocent, kindly old gentleman he had fancied, but rather a member, if not the author, of some deep-seated conspiracy? If he had written this note, why had he not mentioned the fact when Vanderkemp was being discussed? Why had he shown surprise when he received Schoofs’ letter saying that the traveller had crossed to London? What was at the bottom of the whole affair?

An idea struck him, and he examined the letter more closely.

“Are you sure this is really Mr. Duke’s signature?” he asked slowly.

Mr. Schoofs looked at him curiously.

“Why, yes,” he answered. “At least, it never occurred to me to doubt it.”

“You might let me see some of his other letters.”

In a few seconds half a dozen were produced, and French began whistling below his breath as he sat comparing the signatures, using a lens which he took from his pocket. After he had examined each systematically, he laid them down on the table and sat back in his chair.

“That was stupid of me,” he announced. “I should have learnt all I wanted without asking for these other letters. That signature is forged. See here, look at it for yourself.”

He passed the lens to Schoofs, who in his turn examined the name.

“You see, the lines of that writing are not smooth; they are a mass of tiny shakes and quivers. That means that they have not been written quickly and boldly; they have been slowly drawn or traced over pencil. Compare one of these other notes and you will see that while at a distance the signatures look identical, in reality they are quite different. No, Mr. Duke never wrote that. I am afraid Mr. Vanderkemp has been the victim of some trick.”

Schoofs was visibly excited. He hung on the other’s words and nodded emphatically at his conclusions. Then he swore comprehensively in Dutch. “Good heavens, Inspector!” he cried. “You see the significance of all that?”

French glanced at him keenly.

“In what way?” he demanded.

“Why, here we have a murder and a robbery, and then we have this, occurring at the very same time. . . . Well, does it not look suggestive?”

“You mean the two things are connected?”

“Well, what do you think?” Mr. Schoofs replied with some impatience.

“It certainly does look like it,” French admitted slowly. Already his active brain was building up a theory, but he wanted to get the other’s views. “You are suggesting, I take it, that Vanderkemp may have been concerned in the crime?”

Schoofs shook his head decidedly.

“I am suggesting nothing of the kind,” he retorted. “That’s not my job. The thing merely struck me as peculiar.”

“No, no,” French answered smoothly, “I have not expressed myself clearly. Neither of us is making any accusation. We are simply consulting together in a private, and, I hope, a friendly way, each anxious only to find out the truth. Any suggestion may be helpful. If I make the suggestion that Mr. Vanderkemp is the guilty man in order to enable us to discuss the possibility, it does not follow that either of us believes it to be true, still less that I should act on it.”

“I am aware of that, but I don’t make any such suggestion.”

“Then I do,” French declared, “simply as a basis for discussion. Let us suppose then, purely for argument’s sake, that Mr. Vanderkemp decides to make some of the firm’s wealth his own. He is present when the stones are being put into the safe, and in some way when Mr. Duke’s back is turned, he takes an impression of the key. He crosses to London, either finds Gething in the office or is interrupted by him, murders the old man, takes the diamonds, and clears out. What do you think of that?”

“What about the letter?”

“Well, that surely fits in? Mr. Vanderkemp must leave this office in some way which won’t arouse your suspicion or cause you to ask questions of the London office. What better way than by forging the letter?”

Mr. Schoofs swore for the second time. “If he has done that,” he cried hotly, “let him hang! I’ll do everything I can, Inspector, to help you to find out, and that not only on general grounds, but for old Gething’s sake, for whom I had a sincere regard.”

“I thought you would feel that way, sir. Now to return to details. I suppose you haven’t the envelope that letter came in?”

“Never saw it,” Mr. Schoofs replied. “The clerk who opened it would destroy it.”

“Better have the clerk in, and we’ll ask the question.”

Mr. Schoofs made a sudden gesture.

“By Jove!” he cried. “It was Vanderkemp himself. He acts as head clerk when he is here.”

“Then we don’t get any evidence there. Either the letter came through the post, in which case he destroyed the envelope in the usual way, or else he brought the letter to the office and slipped it in among the others.”

French picked up the letter again. Experience had taught him that typescript could be extremely characteristic, and he wondered if this in question could be made to yield up any of its secrets.

It certainly had peculiarities. The lens revealed a dent in the curve of the n, where the type had evidently struck something hard, and the tail of the g was slightly defective.

French next examined the genuine letters, and was interested to find their type showed the same irregularities. It was therefore certain that the forged letter had been typed in the London office.

He sat thinking deeply, unconsciously whistling his little tune through his closed teeth. There was another peculiarity about the forged note. The letters were a trifle indented, showing that the typewriter keys had been struck with rather more than the usual force. He turned the sheet over, and he saw that so much was this the case that the stops were punched almost through. Picking up the genuine letters, he looked for the same peculiarity, but the touch in these cases was much lighter and even the full stop barely showed through. This seemed to justify a further deduction—that the writer of the forged note was unskilled, probably an amateur, while that of the others was an expert. French felt he could safely assume that the forged note had been typed by some unauthorised person, using the machine in the London office.

But, so far as he could see, these deductions threw no light on the guilt or innocence of Vanderkemp. The letter might have come from some other person in London, or Vanderkemp might have typed it himself during one of his visits to the metropolis. More data was wanted before a conclusion could be reached.

Though from what he had seen of Schoofs, the Inspector thought it unlikely that he was mixed up in what he was beginning to believe was a far-reaching conspiracy, he did not mention his discoveries to him, but continued trying to pump him for further information about the missing traveller. Vanderkemp, it seemed, was a tall man, or would have been if he held himself erect, but he had stooped shoulders and a slouching way of walking which detracted from his height. He was inclining to stoutness, and had dark hair and a sallow complexion. His chin was cleanshaven, but he wore a heavy dark moustache. Glasses covered his short-sighted eyes.

French obtained some samples of his handwriting, but no photograph of him was available. In fact, Mr. Schoofs did not seem able to supply any further information, nor did an interrogation of the typist and office boy, both of whom spoke a little English, produce any better results.

“Where did Mr. Vanderkemp live?” French asked, when he thought he had exhausted the resources of the office.

It appeared that the traveller was unmarried, and Mr. Schoofs did not know if he had any living relatives other than Harrington. He boarded with Mevrouw Bondix, in the Kinkerstraat, and thither the two men betook themselves, French begging the other’s company in case he should be needed as interpreter. Mevrouw Bondix was a garrulous little old lady who had but little English, and upon whom Schoofs’ questions acted as a push button does on an electric bell. She overwhelmed them with a flood of conversation of which French could understand not one word, and from which even the manager was hard put to it to extract the meaning. But the gist of the matter was that Vanderkemp had left her house at half-past eight on the night before the murder, with the expressed intention of taking the 9.00 train for London. Since then she had neither seen him nor heard from him.

“But,” French exclaimed, “I thought you told me he had crossed by the daylight service on the day of the murder?”

“He said he would,” Schoofs answered with a somewhat puzzled air. “He said so most distinctly. I remember it particularly because he pointed out that Mr. Duke would probably ask him, after the interview, to start by the afternoon Continental train on his new journey, and he preferred to travel during the previous day so as to insure a good night’s sleep in London. He said that in answer to a suggestion of mine that he would be in time enough if he went over on the night before his interview.”

“What time do these trains get in to London?”

“I don’t know, but we can find out at the office.”

“I’d like to go to the Central Station next, if you don’t mind coming along,” French declared, “so we could look them up there. But before I go I want you to tell me if Mr. Vanderkemp figures in any of these?” He pointed to a number of photographic groups which adorned the chimneypiece and walls.

It happened that the missing traveller appeared in one of the groups, and both Mr. Schoofs and Mevrouw Bondix bore testimony to the excellence of the portrait.

“Then I’ll take it,” French announced, as he slipped the card into his pocket.

The two men next went to the Central Station and looked up the trains. They found that the day service did not reach Victoria until 10.05 p.m. The significance of this was not lost upon French. Orchard stated he had reached the office in Hatton Garden at 10.15, and that it could not have been later was established by the evidence of Constable Alcorn. The body at that time was cold, so that the crime must have taken place some considerable time earlier. A man, therefore, who had crossed by the daylight service from Amsterdam could not possibly have had time to commit the murder. Had Vanderkemp lied deliberately to Schoofs when he told him he was using that daylight service? If so, was it in order to establish an alibi? Had he a secret appointment with Gething for an earlier hour on the fatal evening, and had he crossed the night before with the object of keeping it? French felt these were questions which required satisfactory answers, and he made a mental note not to rest until he had found them.

With his new friend’s aid he began to interrogate the staff of the Central Station, in the hope of ascertaining whether or not the missing man had actually left by the train in question. But of this he could learn nothing. None of the employees appeared to know Vanderkemp’s appearance, nor after that lapse of time could any one recall having seen a passenger of his description.

That day and the next French spent in the charming old city, trying to learn what he could of the missing man’s life and habits. He came across a number of persons who were acquainted with the traveller, but no one with whom he had been really intimate. None of these people could give him much information, nor did any of them seem to care whether or no Vanderkemp should ever be heard of again. From all he heard, French concluded that Vanderkemp’s character was such as might be expected in the guilty man, but there was but little evidence of motive, and none at all of guilt.

He returned to London by the night service, and having ascertained that the steamer he crossed by was the same that had run on the date of Vanderkemp’s assumed journey, he made exhaustive inquiries as to the latter from the staff on board, unfortunately with negative results.

Next day his efforts were equally fruitless. He spent most of it in discussing the situation with Mr. Duke, and trying to make a list of the persons who could have had access to the typewriter, but nowhere could he get a gleam of light. The authorship of the letter remained as inscrutable a mystery as the murder of Gething.

Having circulated a description of Vanderkemp containing a copy of the photograph, French went home that night a worried and disconsolate man. But though he did not know it, further news was even at the moment on the way to him.

CHAPTER V
FRENCH TAKES A JOURNEY

Inspector French had not quite finished supper that evening when his telephone bell rang. He was wanted back at the Yard immediately. Some information about the case had come in.

Cheerful and hopeful, he set off and in a few minutes was once more seated in his office. There a note was awaiting him, which had been delivered by hand a short time previously. He eagerly tore it open, and read:

“City of London Banking Co.,

“Reading Branch, 11th December.

“Sir,—With reference to your inquiry re certain bank-notes, I beg to inform you that Bank of England ten-pound notes numbers A/V 173258 W and N/L 386427 P were paid into this Branch just before closing time to-day. Our teller fortunately noticed the numbers almost immediately, and he thinks, though is not positive, they were paid in by a Colonel FitzGeorge of this town, whose address is Oaklands, Windsor Road.

“I am sending this note by one of our clerks, who is going to town this afternoon.

“Yours faithfully,

“Herbert Hinckston,

“Manager.”

French received this information with a feeling of delight which speedily changed to misgiving. At first sight what could be more valuable to his quest than the discovery of some of the stolen notes? And yet when he considered that these had been passed in by an army man residing in Reading, the doubt immediately insinuated itself that here also might be a promising clue which would lead to nothing. Obviously, if this Colonel FitzGeorge had indeed paid in the notes, it did not at all follow that he was the thief, or even that he had obtained them from the thief. Before they reached the bank in Reading they might have passed through a dozen hands.

But, be this as it might, French’s procedure was at least clear. A visit to Colonel FitzGeorge was undoubtedly his next step.

He picked up a Bradshaw. Yes, there would be time to go that night. A train left Paddington at 8.10 which would bring him to Reading before 9.00.

He ran down through the great building, and hailing a taxi, was driven to the terminus. He caught the train with a minute to spare, and shortly before nine he was in conversation with a taxi driver outside the Great Western Station in Reading.

“Yessir,” the man assured him, “I know the ’ouse. Ten minutes drive out along the Windsor Road.”

The night was dark, and French could not take minute stock of his surroundings, but he presently learnt from the sounds of his car’s wheels that Oaklands was reached from the road by an appreciable drive coated with fine gravel, and the bulk of the house, looming large above him as he stood before the porch, indicated an owner well endowed with this world’s goods. The impression was confirmed when in answer to his inquiry a venerable butler conducted him through a hall of imposing dimensions to a luxurious sitting-room. There the man left him, returning in a few minutes to say his master was in the library and would see Mr. French.

Colonel FitzGeorge was a tall, white-haired man, with an erect carriage and excessively courteous manners. He bowed as French entered, and indicated a deep leather-lined arm-chair drawn up opposite his own before the blazing fire of pine logs.

“A chilly evening, Inspector,” he said pleasantly. “Won’t you sit down?”

French thanked him, and after apologising for the hour of his call, went on:

“My visit, sir, is in connection with certain bank-notes which I am trying to trace. Some time ago there was a robbery in the City in which a number of Bank of England notes were stolen. The owner fortunately was able to find out their numbers from his bank. When the matter was reported to us, we naturally asked the banks generally to keep a lookout for them. Nothing was heard of them until to-day, but this afternoon, just before closing time, two of them were paid into the Reading Branch of the City of London Bank. The teller, though not certain, believed that you had paid them in. You can see, therefore, the object of my call. It is to ask you if you can possibly help me to trace the thief by telling me where you received the notes. There were two, both for ten pounds, and the numbers were A/V 173258 W and N/L 386427 P.”

Colonel FitzGeorge looked interested.

“I certainly called at the bank this afternoon and lodged some money,” he answered. “It was mostly in the form of dividend warrants, but there were a few notes. Now where did I get those? I should be able to tell you off-hand, but I’m not at all sure that I can. Let me think, please.”

For some moments silence reigned in the luxuriously-furnished room. French, always suspicious, surreptitiously watched his new acquaintance, but he had to admit that he could discern none of the customary signs of guilt. But he reminded himself that you never knew, and determined that unless he was completely satisfied by the coming reply, he would make an investigation into Colonel FitzGeorge’s movements on the night of the murder.

“I believe,” said the Colonel suddenly, “I know where I got those notes. I am not by any means certain, but I think I can tell you. Unless I am very much mistaken, it was from the manager of the Hotel Beau-Sejour in Chamonix.”

“Chamonix?” French repeated in surprise. This was by no means what he had expected to hear.

“Yes. I have been for the last six weeks in Switzerland and Savoy, and two days ago, on last Tuesday afternoon, to be exact, I left Chamonix. I caught the night train from Geneva, was in Paris next morning, and reached Charing Cross yesterday, Wednesday, afternoon. To-day I went through my correspondence, and after lunch took in my dividends and some spare cash to lodge in the bank.”

“And the two ten-pound notes, sir?”

“The two ten-pound notes, as I say, I believe I received at the Chamonix hotel. I found I had to return home sooner than I had intended, and as I was leaving the country I wanted to change back all but a small amount of my foreign money. It was convenient to do it at the hotel, and besides, you can’t always be sure of getting enough change at Calais or on the boat. I asked the manager of the Beau-Sejour to give me English money for my francs, and he did so at once.”

“Why do you think these particular notes were handed over by him?”

“He paid me in ten-pound notes only. He gave me five of them—I changed fifty pounds’ worth of francs altogether. It is true that I had some other English notes, and there were some at home here, but so far as I can remember, there were no tens among them—only fives and Treasury notes.”

With this, French had to be content. Though he asked many other questions he could learn nothing further to help him. But on the pretext that the notes might have been received at some other place, he obtained a note of the Colonel’s itinerary while abroad. According to this, it appeared that on the night of Charles Gething’s murder, the traveller had slept in the Bellevue Hotel at Kandersteg, prior to walking over the Gemmi Pass on the following day. This French noted as a point capable of being checked, should checking become desirable.

He had kept his taxi, and after a little trouble he found the address of the teller of the City of London Bank, and paid him a late call. But from him he learnt nothing new, except that the man seemed much more certain that Colonel FitzGeorge had really handed in the notes than the letter of his manager had led French to believe. He admitted that he was relying on memory alone, but said he had checked over his money just before the Colonel’s visit, and he was positive the stolen notes were not then there.

Inspector French was in a distinctly pessimistic frame of mind as he sat in the corner of a smoking compartment of the last train from Reading to town, and next morning as he put the facts he had learnt before his chief, he was but slightly more sanguine. Two of the stolen notes had been discovered; that was really all that could be stated with certainty. That Colonel FitzGeorge had paid them into the bank was by no means sure, still less that he really had received them from a hotel manager in Chamonix. But even assuming the Colonel’s recollection was accurate, it did not greatly help. It was unlikely that the manager could state from whom he in his turn had received those particular notes. Indeed, even were he able to do so, and by some miracle were French able to trace the giver, in all probability the latter also would turn out to be innocent, and the goal would be no nearer. The whole episode seemed to French, as he expressed it to his chief, a wash-out.

But the great man took a different view. He replied in the same words which French himself had used in another connection.

“You never know,” he declared. “You miss this chance and you’re down and out, so far as I can see. But if you go over and see the manager you don’t know what you mayn’t light on. If the thief stayed in that hotel, he must have registered. You might get something from that. Mind you, I agree that it’s a thin chance, but a thin chance is better than none.”

“Then you think, sir, I ought to go to Chamonix?”

“Yes. It won’t cost a great deal, and you may get something. Have you ever been there?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, you’ll enjoy it. I’d give a good deal to take your place.”

“Oh, I shall enjoy it right enough, sir. But I’m not hopeful of the result.”

The chief gave a dry but kindly smile.

“French, you’re not usually such a confounded pessimist. Get along, and hope for the best.”

French had looked up the positions of Chamonix and Kandersteg on the previous evening, and he had seen that by taking a comparatively slight detour it would be possible for him to visit the latter place on his way to the former. He decided, therefore, that he might as well set his mind at rest on the question of Colonel FitzGeorge’s whereabouts on the night of the murder. He did not suspect the man, but it would be better to be sure.

But to do this, some further information was necessary. He must, if possible, obtain a photograph of the Colonel and a sample of his signature. It was not yet ten o’clock, and he thought it would be possible to get these and catch the afternoon train for the Continent.

By half-past eleven he was back in Reading. There he handed a taxi man a note which he had written during the journey, telling him to take it to Colonel FitzGeorge’s, and to bring the answer back to him at the station. The note, he admitted to himself, was clumsy, but it was the best he could think of at the moment. In it he regretted troubling his new acquaintance so soon again, but he had most stupidly lost the memorandum he had taken of the name of the hotel in Chamonix at which the stolen notes were obtained, and would Colonel FitzGeorge be so kind as to let him have it again.

The note despatched, he turned to the second portion of his business. With his usual detailed observation, he had seen on the chimneypiece of the Colonel’s library a photograph of the gentleman himself, and noted that it was the work of Messrs. Gale & Hardwood, of Reading. An inquiry from the taxi driver had given him the address of the studio, and he now set off there in the hope of obtaining a copy.

In this he was unexpectedly successful. Messrs. Gale & Hardwood had a print in one of their showcases, which in five minutes was transferred to the Inspector’s pocket, and he was back at the station before his taxi man turned up with the reply to his note.

In this also his luck was in. The man had found Colonel FitzGeorge just about to start for Reading. He handed French back his own note, across which was written in a firm, masculine hand: “Beau-Sejour. B. L. FitzGeorge.”

Stowing the photograph and the note away in his pocketbook, French returned to town, and the same afternoon at 2.00 he left Victoria on his second trip to the Continent. He had been to France and Germany on a previous occasion, but never to Switzerland, and he was looking forward to getting a glimpse of some of the wonderful mountain scenery of that country.

He disembarked at Calais, passed through the customs, and took his seat in the Lötschberg-Simplon express with true British disapproval of all that he saw. But later the excellent dinner served while the train ran through the pleasant country between Abbeville and Amiens brought him to a more acquiescent mood, and over a good cigar and a cup of such coffee as he had seldom before tasted, he complacently watched day fade into night. About half-past six o’clock next morning he followed the example of his countless British predecessors, and climbed down on the long platform at Bale to drink his morning coffee. Then again on through scenery of growing interest, past Bern to Spiez, where he found the Lake of Thun really had the incredible colouring he had so often scoffed at, but secretly admired, in the Swiss posters he had seen in London. Finally, after crawling round the loops on the side of the Frütigen valley, the train stopped at Kandesteg, and bag in hand he descended to the platform. A porter with the name “Bellevue” on his cap caught his eye, and a short drive brought him to the hotel.

After déjeuner he sought the manager, a suave functionary whose English accent was a trifle suggestive of New York. No, it was not the matter of his room. French regretted that on that occasion he could not remain overnight in the hotel—he hoped he would soon be free to return and to do so—but for the moment he was on business. He would take the manager into his confidence. He was a detective . . . in short, could the manager help him? That was the gentleman’s photograph.

“But, of course! Yes,” the manager answered promptly on glancing at the portrait. “It is the Colonel FitzGeorge, the English gentleman from London. He was here, let me see, two—three weeks ago. I will look up the register.”

Further inquiries elicited the information that the Colonel had stayed for three nights at the hotel, and had left early on the day after the murder with the intention of walking to Leukerbad over the Gemmi Pass.

His business at Kandersteg completed, French conscientiously looked up the next train to Chamonix. But he found he could not get through that day, and being tired from his journey, he decided to remain where he was until the next morning. He spent the afternoon lost in admiration of the charming valley, and that night slept to the murmur of a mountain stream which flowed beneath his window.

Next morning he took the southbound train, and having passed through the nine miles of the Loetschberg tunnel, he gazed with veritable awe into the dreary waste of the Loetschenthal and the great gulf of the Rhone Valley, marvelling as the train raced along the side of the stupendous cliff. He changed at Brigue, passed down the Rhone Valley, and changing again at Martigny, spent another four hours on what a fellow-traveller with a nasal drawl described as “the most elegant ride he’d struck,” through Vallorcine and Argentiere to Chamonix. On crossing the divide, the panorama which suddenly burst on his view of the vast mass of the Mont Blanc massif hanging in the sky above the valley, literally took away his breath, and he swore that his next holidays would certainly be spent in the overwhelming scenery of these tremendous mountains.

At Chamonix history tended to repeat itself. He reached his hotel, dined excellently, and then sought the manager. M. Marcel, like his confrère in Kandersteg, was courtesy personified, and listened carefully to French’s statement. But when he realised the nature of the problem he was called upon to solve, he could but shake his head and shrug his shoulders.

“Alas, monsieur,” he wailed, “but with the best will in the world, how can I? I change so many English notes. . . . I recall giving those ten-pound notes to a gentleman from England, because it is comparatively seldom that I am asked to change French money into English, but I am constantly receiving English notes. No, I am sorry, but I could not tell you where those came from.”

Though French had scarcely hoped for any other reply, he was nevertheless disappointed. He showed Colonel FitzGeorge’s photograph to the manager, who instantly recognised it as that of the Englishman for whom he had exchanged the notes. But he could give no further help.

This clue having petered out, French determined to call for the register and make a search therein in the hope of recognising the handwriting of some entry. But before he did so he asked about Vanderkemp. Had any one of that name been a recent visitor?

The manager could not recall the name, but he had a thorough search made of the records. This also drew blank. French then handed him the photograph of Vanderkemp which he had obtained in Amsterdam, asking if he had even seen the original.

With that the luck turned. M. Marcel beamed. “But yes, monsieur,” he exclaimed, with a succession of nods, “your friend was here for several days. He left about a fortnight ago. M. Harrison from one of your great Midland towns, is it not? He told me which, but I have forgotten.”

“That’s the man,” cried French heartily, delighted beyond words at this new development. “I have been following him round. Might I see his entry in the register?”

Again the records were brought into requisition, and as he looked French felt wholly triumphant. On comparing the “J. Harrison, Huddersfield, England,” to which the manger pointed, with the samples of Vanderkemp’s handwriting which he had obtained from Mr. Schoofs, he saw that unquestionably they were written by the same hand. So Vanderkemp was his man! After this there could be no further doubt of his guilt.

For a moment he remained silent, considering what this discovery meant. It was now evident that Vanderkemp, under the alias Harrison, had arrived at the Beau-Sejour Hotel about midday on the second day after the crime, and after staying a week, had departed for an unknown destination. But the matter did not end there. With a sudden, theatrical gesture the manager indicated that he had more to say.

“You have recalled something to my mind, monsieur,” he announced. “That M. Harrison asked me to change notes for him. In fact, I remember the whole thing clearly. His bill came to between four and five hundred francs, and he paid with an English ten-pound note. With the exchange as it is at present, he should have had about 300 francs change. But I now remember he asked me at the same time to change a second ten-pound note. I did so, and gave him about 1000 francs. So it is possible, I do not say certain, but it is possible. . . .” He shrugged his shoulders and threw out his hands, as if to indicate that Fate and not he was responsible for the possibility, and looked inquiringly at his visitor.

Inspector French was exultant. This news seemed to him to complete his case. When in Amsterdam he had found cause to suspect Vanderkemp of the crime, and now here was corroborative evidence of the most convincing character. Rapidly he ran over in his mind the salient points of the case against the traveller.

Vanderkemp possessed all the special knowledge necessary to commit the crime. He knew of the collection of diamonds, and was familiar with the London office and the characters and habits of the workers there. As he was by no means well-off, this knowledge would have constituted a very real temptation. So much on general grounds.

Then as to details. A forged letter calling the man to London, or some similar device, would be a necessary feature of the case. But this letter existed; moreover Vanderkemp had access to the machine on which it had been typed. While telling Mr. Schoofs that he was crossing by a certain train, which arrived in town after the murder had been committed, he had in reality gone by an earlier service, which would have brought him there in time to carry out the crime. Such evidence, though circumstantial, was pretty strong. But when was added to it the facts that Vanderkemp had disappeared without explanation from his firm, had arrived in Chamonix on the second day after the murder, had registered under a false name and address, and most important of all, had paid out two of the notes stolen from Mr. Duke’s safe, the case became overwhelming. It was impossible not to believe in his guilt; in fact, seldom had the Inspector known so clear a case. When he had found and arrested Vanderkemp his work would be done.

But just in the flush of victory, his luck again turned. The man had left the Beau-Sejour a week previously, and the manager had no idea what direction he had taken. In vain French asked questions and made suggestions, hoping to say something which might recall the information to the other’s mind. But the manager readily gave his help in interviewing the whole of the staff who had in any way come in contact with the wanted man. And here, thanks again to his persistent thoroughness, he obtained just the hint that was needed.

He had worked through the whole staff without result, and he was about to give up, when it occurred to him that none of those to whom he had spoken had admitted having brought down Vanderkemp’s luggage from his room on the day of his departure. French then asked directly who had done this, and further inquiries revealed the fact that in the absence of the usual man, an under porter, usually employed about the kitchen, had been called upon. This man stated he had noticed the label on Vanderkemp’s suitcase. It was to a hotel in Barcelona. He could not recall the name of the hotel, but he was sure of the city.

When French had thanked the manager, distributed backsheesh among the staff, and with the help of the head porter worked out his journey from Chamonix to Barcelona, he felt his work in Savoy was done. He went exultantly to bed, and next morning left by an early train on his way to Spain.

CHAPTER VI
THE HOTEL IN BARCELONA

To a comparative stay-at-home like Inspector French, who considered a run to Plymouth or Newcastle a long journey, the trailing of Jan Vanderkemp across south-west France opened up a conception of the size of the globe whereon he moved and had his being, which left him slightly awestruck. The journey from Savoy to Spain seemed endless, the distances incredible, the expanse of country between himself and home illimitable. Hour after hour he sat in the train, while elms and oaks gave place to cypresses and olives, apples to vines, and corn to maize, and it was not until daylight had gone on the evening of the second day that the train rolled into the Estacion de Francia in Barcelona.

The porter at the Beau-Sejour at Chamonix had written down the names of two or three hotels at which he thought English would be spoken, and passing out of the station, French showed the paper to a taxi driver. The man at first ogled it distrustfully, then with a smile of comprehension he emitted a rapid flood of some unknown language, opened the taxi door, bowed his fare in, and rapidly cranking his engine, set off into the night. French was conscious of being whirled down a great avenue wider than any he had yet seen, brilliantly lighted, and with rows of palms down the centre; they turned through a vast square with what looked like a commemorative column in the middle, then up a slightly narrower, tree-lined boulevard, where presently the vehicle swung into the curb and French found himself at his destination—the Hôtel d’Orient.

To his extreme relief, the head porter spoke English. He got him to settle with the taxi man, and soon he began to forget the fatigues of the journey with the help of a luxurious bath and dinner.

He decided that he had done enough for one day, and presently, soothed by a cigar, he went out into the great street in front of the hotel, with its rows of trees and brilliant arc lamps. He did not know then that this gently-sloping boulevard was one of the famous streets of the world—the Rambla, known as is Piccadilly in London, the Champs Élysées in Paris, or Fifth Avenue in New York. For an hour he roamed, then, tired out, he returned to the Orient, and a few minutes later was sunk in dreamless slumber.

Early next morning he was seated with the manager, who also spoke English. But neither the manager nor any of his staff could help him, and French recognised that so far as the Orient was concerned he had drawn blank. He therefore set to work on the other hotels, taking the larger first, the Colon, in the Plaza de Cataluna, the Cuatro Naciones, and such like. Then he went on to the smaller establishments, and at the fourth he paused suddenly, thrilled by an unexpected sight.

The hotel was in a side street off the Paseo de Colon, the great boulevard through which he had been driven on the previous evening. The entrance door led into a kind of lounge in which were seated half a dozen people, evidently waiting for déjeuner. With one exception these were obviously Spaniards, but that exception, French felt he could swear, was the original of the photograph.

In spite of such a meeting being what he was hoping for, the Inspector was taken aback. But his hesitation was momentary. Passing immediately on to the little office at the back of the lounge, he said in English:

“Can I have lunch, please? Will it soon be ready?”

A dark-eyed, dark-haired girl came forward, smiling but shaking her head regretfully, and murmuring what was evidently that she couldn’t understand.

“You don’t speak English, miss?” the detective went on, speaking loudly and very clearly. “I want to know can I have lunch, and if it will soon be ready?”

As the girl still shook her head, French turned back into the lounge.

“Excuse me,” he addressed the company generally, “but might I ask if any of you gentlemen speak English? I can’t make this young lady understand.”

The little ruse succeeded. The man resembling Vanderkemp rose.

“I speak English,” he answered. “What is it you want?”

“Lunch,” French returned, “and to know if it will soon be ready.”

“I can answer that for you,” the other declared, after he had explained the situation to the girl. “Lunch will be ready in exactly five minutes, and visitors are usually welcome.”

“Thank you.” French spoke in a leisurely, conversational way. “I am staying at the Orient, where one or two of them speak English, but business brought me to this part of the town, and I did not want to go all that way back to lunch. A confounded nuisance this language business! It makes you feel pretty helpless when you want to talk to people.”

“That’s true,” the stranger admitted. “In most of the larger hotels they speak French and English, but at practically none of the smaller. In this one, for example, one waiter has a few words of French only. No English or Italian or German. Some of the staff don’t even speak Spanish.”

French was interested in spite of the larger question which was occupying his mind.

“Not Spanish?” he repeated. “How do you mean? What do they speak?”

“Catalan. This is Catalonia, you know, and both the race and the language are different from the rest of Spain. They are more go-ahead and enterprising than the people farther south.”

“That sounds a bit like Ireland,” French remarked. “I’ve been both in Belfast and in the south, and the same things seems to hold good. Though Dublin is a fine city, and no mistake.”

They continued discussing peoples and languages and the northerly concentration of energy to be found in most countries, until the hands of the clock pointed to noon and lunch time. Then French caught what he had been angling for. The stranger asked him to share his table.

The Inspector continued to make himself agreeable, and after they had finished invited the other to have coffee and a cigar with him in a deserted corner of the lounge. Then thinking his companion was by this time off his guard, he introduced a new subject after a lull in the conversation.

“It’s strange the different businesses people are engaged on,” he remarked ruminatively, as he poured himself out a second cup of coffee. “Now, I wouldn’t mind betting a ten-pound note you wouldn’t guess what I am, and what my business here is.”

The other laughed.

“I confess I was wondering,” he admitted. “I am afraid I should lose my money. I won’t guess.”

“Well, I’ll tell you, though our business is not a thing we speak of as a rule. I am a detective inspector from Scotland Yard.”

As he spoke French watched the other’s face. If this were the man of whom he was in search, he could swear he would make him exhibit some emotion.

But so far he did not succeed. His new acquaintance merely laughed again.

“Then I should have lost. I admit I never thought of that.”

French continued to observe, and he went on with more seriousness in his manner.

“Yes, and I’m on rather important business, too. Man wanted for murder and robbery in the City. A bad affair enough. He murdered the confidential clerk of a diamond merchant in Hatton Garden and rifled the safe and got off with I don’t know how many thousand pounds’ worth of stuff.”

At the commencement of French’s reply the stranger had listened with but little more than a conventional interest, but at the mention of a diamond merchant in Hatton Garden he figuratively sat up and began to take notice.

“Hatton Garden?” he repeated. “That’s an extraordinary coincidence. Why, I belong to a firm of diamond merchants in Hatton Garden. I know them all. Who was the man?”

Inspector French was puzzled. Either Vanderkemp—for there could no longer be any doubt of his identity—was innocent, or he was an almost incredibly good actor. Anxious to observe the man further, he fenced a little in his reply.

“Is it possible you haven’t heard?” he asked in apparent surprise. “How long is it since you have heard from home?”

“Haven’t had a line of any kind since I left, and that’s nearly three weeks ago; on the night of the 25th of last month to be exact.”

“The 25th! Well, that’s a coincidence, too. That’s the very night poor old Mr. Gething was killed.”

Vanderkemp stiffened suddenly and his hands closed on the arms of his chair.

“What?” he cried. “Not Charles Gething of Messrs. Duke & Peabody?”

French, now keenly observing him without any attempt at concealment, nodded.

“That’s the man. You knew him then?”

“Of course I knew him. Why, it’s my own firm. Good God, to think of poor old Gething! And you say the safe was rifled? You don’t tell me Mr. Duke’s collection of stones is gone?”

“All of it, and money as well. The murderer made a clean sweep.”

Vanderkemp whistled and then swore.

“Tell me about it.”

French was more than ever puzzled. The traveller’s manner, his evident emotion, his questions—all seemed those of an innocent man. He felt doubts arising in his mind; possibly there might be an explanation. . . . He did not at once reply, as he turned over in his mind how he could best surprise the other into an admission of the truth.

But Vanderkemp also was evidently thinking, and suddenly an expression of deeper concern showed on his face. He made as if to speak, then hesitated and a wary look appeared in his eyes. He cleared his throat, then in a changed voice asked, “At what time did it happen?”

French leaned forward swiftly and fixed his eyes on his companion as he said in a low, tense tone, “That’s what I want to ask you, Mr. Vanderkemp.”

The man started. He did not answer, and the wary look in his eyes changed into definite anxiety, which deepened as the moments passed. At last he spoke.

“It had just dawned on me from what you said, Inspector, that our meeting here was not such a coincidence as I at first imagined. I see that you suspect me of the crime. What has happened I don’t know, what you have against me I don’t know either, but I can tell at once that I am not only absolutely innocent, but until you told me just now I was ignorant that a crime had been committed. I will tell you my whole story and answer any questions you may like to ask, whether you believe me or not.”

French nodded. Certainly, if guilty, this man was a consummate actor. There was at least the chance that he might be innocent, and he answered accordingly.

“I don’t accuse you of anything, Mr. Vanderkemp. But there are certain suspicious circumstances which require an explanation. You may be able to account for all of them—I hope you will. At the same time it is fair to warn you that, failing an explanation, your arrest is not impossible, and in that case anything that you may say now may be used against you in evidence.”

Vanderkemp was by this time extremely ill at ease. His face had paled and had already taken on a somewhat drawn and haggard expression. For a while he remained silent, buried in thought, then with a sudden gesture as of throwing further caution to the winds, he began to speak.

“I’ll tell you what I know, Inspector,” he said earnestly. “Whether, if you are going to arrest me, I am wise or foolish, I don’t know. But I can at least assure you that it is the literal truth.”

He looked at the Inspector, who nodded approval.

“Of course I can’t advise you, Mr. Vanderkemp,” he remarked, “but all the same I believe you are doing the wise thing.”

“I am in a difficulty,” Vanderkemp went on, “as I don’t know how much of the circumstances you are familiar with. It would therefore be better if you would ask me questions.”

“I shall do so, but first I should like your own statement. I am aware of your name and position in the firm. Also that Mr. Schoofs received a letter on the 21st of last month, asking him to send you to London to undertake an important commission in Sweden. Also that you left your lodgings in the Kinkerstraat at 8.30 on the evening of the 24th. I have since learned certain other facts as to your subsequent movements, which I need not mention at the moment. What I want you now to do is to let me have a detailed account of your experiences from the moment of your leaving your lodgings until the present time.”

“I will do so.” Vanderkemp spoke eagerly, as if now anxious to get through with the matter. “But there is one thing which comes earlier in point of time which I must mention. You have probably heard of it from Mr. Duke, but I shall tell you anyway. I mean about my further instructions as to my London visit—the private instructions. You have seen a copy of them?”

French, always cautious, was not giving away information. He wondered to what the other was referring, but merely said, “Assume I have not, Mr. Vanderkemp. It is obvious that I must check your statement by the information in my possession.”

“Well, then, though you probably know it already, I may tell you I received additional instructions about my visit. Mr. Duke wrote me a private letter, addressed to my lodgings, in which he told me—but I have it here, and you can see it for yourself.”

He took an envelope from his pocketbook and passed it across. It contained a note almost identical in appearance with the forged one which Mr. Schoofs had received. It was typewritten on a sheet of the firm’s cheaper memorandum paper, with the same kind of type and the same coloured ribbon. Examination with the lens showed the same defects in the n and the g, the signature was obviously forged, and the back of the sheet was marked from a heavy touch. Evidently both letters had been written by the same person, and on the Hatton Garden machine. The note read:

“Dear Vanderkemp,—Further to my note to Mr. Schoofs re your call here on Wednesday morning, 26th inst., the business on which I wish to see you has turned out to be more urgent than I at first believed, and I shall therefore have to ask you to advance the hour of your interview, and also to leave London for Paris—not Stockholm—immediately after it. I shall return to the office after dinner on Tuesday evening, 25th inst., and shall be glad if you will call there at 8.30 p.m., when I shall give you your instructions. This will enable you to catch the 9.30 p.m. for Paris, via Southampton and Havre.

“I wish to impress on you that as the business in question is exceptionally confidential, you will oblige me by keeping your change of plans to yourself.

“Yours truly,

“R. A. Duke.”

Inspector French was keenly interested, but he recognised with exasperation how inconclusive the letter was as evidence. Either it had been sent to Vanderkemp as he stated, in which case he might be innocent, or the man had written it himself, in which case he certainly was guilty, it was true that in this instance an envelope was forthcoming which bore a London E.C. postmark and the correct date, but here again there was no proof that this was really the covering in which the letter had come. These points passed through the Inspector’s mind, but he banished them as matters to be thought out later, and turned once more to his companion.

“I shall keep this, if you don’t mind,” he declared. “Please proceed.”

“I carried out the instructions in the letter,” Vanderkemp resumed. “The change of hours necessitated my leaving Amsterdam by the night train on the 24th, and I spent the following day at my hotel in London, and in doing a matinee. At 8.30, with my luggage, I reached Hatton Garden. I found the outer office was in darkness, but a light shone out of the doorway of the inner office. Mr. Gething was there alone. He told me to come in and shut the door, and I did so, and sat down in the clients’ arm-chair. Mr. Gething was seated at Mr. Duke’s desk, which was open.”

“Was the safe open?”

“No, nor was it opened while I was there. Mr. Gething told me that Mr. Duke had intended to be present to give me my instructions in person, but at the last moment he had been prevented coming down, and that he had asked him, Mr. Gething, to do it instead. It seemed that Mr. Duke had got information from a confidential agent at Constantinople that a member of the old Russian aristocracy had escaped with his family jewels from the clutches of the Bolsheviks, and that he now wished to dispose of the whole collection for what it would bring. He was at one time Duke Sergius of one of the Ural provinces—I have the name in my book upstairs—but was now passing himself off as a Pole under the name of Francisko Loth. The collection was one of extraordinary excellence, and Mr. Duke believed it could be purchased for a third, or even less, of its real value. He had approached the duke through the agent, and had offered to deal. The trouble, however, was that the Soviet Government had learned of the duke’s escape, and were displaying immense energy in the hope of recapturing him. Their agents were scouring the whole of Europe, and Loth was in mortal terror, for discovery meant certain death. Mr. Gething told me straight also, that should I succeed in purchasing, my life would not be worth a tinker’s curse until I had handed over the stuff. He said that, recognising this, Mr. Duke considered that my commission should be substantially increased, and he asked me was I willing to take on the job.”

“And you agreed?”

“Well, what do you think? Of course I agreed. I asked for further details, and he let me have them. For both my own safety and Loth’s, I was to take extraordinary precautions. My name is pretty well known in dealers’ circles over Europe, and therefore would be known to the Soviet emissaries, so I was to take another. I was to become John Harrison, of Huddersfield, a tinplate manufacturer. I was not to write to the office direct, but to send my reports, if any were necessary, to Mr. Herbert Lyons, a friend of Mr. Duke’s, who lived not far from him at Hampstead. If I had to write, I was to be most careful to phrase my letter so that were I suspected and my correspondence tampered with, it would not give the affair away. Instructions to me would be sent to Harrison and written on plain notepaper, and would be worded in a similar careful way. Mr. Gething gave me a code by which I could wire the amount agreed on, when the money would be sent me by special messenger; that is, if we could come to terms.”

Vanderkemp paused and glanced at the Inspector, but the latter not speaking, he continued:

“Loth was hidden in Constantinople, but was trying to come west. He was not sure whether he could do so best by land or sea. If he could get out of Turkey by land, he would work his way up the Danube to Austria and Switzerland, and would stop eventually at the Beau-Sejour Hotel in Chamonix. If that proved impossible, he would try to leave by sea, and would travel by one of the Navigazione Generale Italiana boats to Genoa, and thence to Barcelona, where he would put up at the Gomez Hotel, that is, this one. He had let Mr. Duke know through his Constantinople friend that if he didn’t turn up at Chamonix by the 4th, it would mean either that the Bolsheviks had caught him, or that he was making for Barcelona. My instructions, therefore, were to go to Chamonix, put up at the Beau-Sejour, and look out until the 4th for a tall, white-complexioned, dark-haired man named Francisko Loth. If by that time he had not turned up, I was to move on here. I was to wait here for a fortnight, at the end of which time, if I had still heard nothing of him, I was to go on to Constantinople, look up Mr. Duke’s agent, and try for news of Loth’s fate.”

“And you carried out the instructions?”

“Yes. I went to Chamonix, and stayed there for a week. Seeing no one who could possibly be the man, I came on here, and have been waiting here ever since. To-morrow I proposed to leave for Constantinople.”

French threw away the butt of his cigar and selected another.

“Such a trip could not be accomplished without money,” he said slowly. “How were you equipped in that way?”

“Mr. Gething handed me a hundred pounds in ten-pound notes. I changed two in Chamonix and I have the remaining eight in my pocket.”

“You might let me see them.”

Vanderkemp readily complied, and the Inspector found, as he expected, that the eight notes were among those stolen from the safe. He resumed his interrogation.

“You say you reached the office in Hatton Garden about half-past eight?”

“Yes, and left about nine. My business occupied only half an hour.”

“And you saw no one except Mr. Gething?”

“No one.”

French, having offered his possible future prisoner another cigar, sat silent, thinking deeply. He had no doubt that the story of the escaped Russian was a fabrication from beginning to end. Besides being an unlikely tale in itself, it broke down on the point of its authorship. Vanderkemp’s statement was that Gething had been told the story by Mr. Duke, and that Mr. Duke would have been present to tell it to him, Vanderkemp, in person, were he not prevented by some unexpected cause. This also was an obvious fabrication, but the reason of its insertion into the tale was clear enough. Without it, the story would have no authority. The use of Mr. Duke’s name was an essential part of any such scheme, just as the forging of Mr. Duke’s signature had been necessary for the letters of instruction to Schoofs and Vanderkemp.

But though French felt sure enough of his ground so far, on trying to take a further step he was held up by the same difficulty with which he had been faced in considering the forged letters. Was Gething guilty, and had he invented this elaborate plan to throw suspicion on to Vanderkemp, or was Vanderkemp the criminal, and the story his scheme for accounting for his actions since the murder? That was a real difficulty, and French sat wondering if there was no test he could apply, no way in which he could reach certainty, no trap which the victim would be unable to avoid?

For some time he could think of none, but presently an idea occurred to him which he thought might be worth while following up. Some information might be gained through the typewriting of the two forged letters. Could Vanderkemp type, and if so, was his work done with a light or heavy touch? He turned to his companion.

“I wish you would write me a short statement of your movements in London on the night of the crime, stating the times at which you arrived at and left the various places you visited. I should prefer it typed—that is, if you can type. Can you?”

Vanderkemp smiled wanly.

“I think so,” he answered. “I type and write shorthand in four languages. But I’ve no machine here.”

“Borrow one from the office,” French suggested, as he expressed his admiration of the other’s prowess.

It took a personal visit to the office, but Vanderkemp, anxious to defer to the Inspector’s whims, managed to overcome the scruples of the languorous, dark-eyed beauty who reigned therein, and returned triumphant with the machine. Ten minutes later French had his time-table.

Instantly he saw that Vanderkemp typed as an expert—with a light, sure touch that produced a perfect impression, but did not dint the paper. It was a point in the man’s favour. By no means conclusive, it was still by no means negligible.

Inspector French was puzzled. His experience told him that in this world the ordinary, natural and obvious thing happened. A man who secretly visited the scene of a crime at about the hour at which the crime was known to be committed, and who then left the country on a mysterious and improbable mission, the reality of which was denied by its alleged author, a man, further, who had in his pocket bank-notes stolen from the scene of the crime, such a man in ordinary, prosaic, everyday life was the criminal. Such, French thought, was common sense, and common sense, he considered, was right ninety-nine times out of a hundred.

But there was always the hundredth chance. Improbabilities and coincidences did occasionally happen. He would have given a good deal at that moment to know if this case was the exception that proves the rule.

He saw clearly that his second explanation, if somewhat more far-fetched, was still quite possibly true. It certainly might be that Vanderkemp had been duped, that he had been sent on this wild goose chase by the murderer, with the object of drawing on himself just that suspicion which he had attracted, and thus allowing the real scent to cool. A good many of the facts tended in that direction, the forged letters, the keeping of the alleged deal from Schoofs, the fact that no Russian nobleman had turned up at either of the rendezvous named, the travelling under a false name, the warning against communications with the office, and last, but not least, Vanderkemp’s manner during the interview, all these undoubtedly supported the view that the traveller had been used to lay a gigantic false clue.

If so, it was a fiendish trap to set for the unfortunate dupe. French thought he could see how it was intended to pan out. Vanderkemp, while on these mysterious journeys—certainly when he reached Mr. Duke’s agent in Constantinople—would learn of the murder, and he would at once see how he had been victimised. The more he learned of the details, the more he would realise how completely he was in the toils. He would recognise that if he went home and told his story he would not have a dog’s chance of clearing himself, and he would turn his apparent flight into a real one, and so permanently fasten upon himself a tacit admission of guilt. It was an ingenious scheme, and if it really were the explanation of these mysterious happenings, it gave an indication of the character and mentality of the man who had devised it.

French was by no means decided as to the truth of the matter, but on the whole he thought that though he undoubtedly had evidence to justify him in applying for the arrest and extradition of the traveller, he would prefer to avoid this step if possible. If the man tried to give him the slip, the local police would get him in no time. Accordingly he turned once more to Vanderkemp.

“Mr. Vanderkemp,” he began, “I am strongly inclined to believe your story. But as a man of the world you will readily see that it must be more completely examined before it can be fully accepted. Now the question is, Are you willing to come back with me to London and give me your assistance towards finding out the truth? I can make you no promise that you will not be arrested on reaching British ground, but I can promise you that you will be fairly dealt with and get every chance and assistance to prove your innocence.”

Vanderkemp did not hesitate in his reply.

“I will go,” he said promptly. “I am aware that you can have me arrested here, if you want to, by applying to the Spanish authorities, so I have no choice. But I think I should go in any case. I have done nothing contrary to the law, and I have done nothing to be ashamed of. I cannot now rest until my innocence is admitted.”

French nodded gravely.

“Once again, sir, I think you are doing the wise thing. Let us go to-night by the Paris express. In the meantime come with me to the post office and help me to send a wire to the Yard.”

Two mornings later they reached London. Mr. Duke was naturally amazed at his subordinate’s story, and on hearing the evidence, gave it as his opinion that Vanderkemp was the dupe of some person or persons unknown. What was more to the point, Chief Inspector Mitchell, French’s immediate superior, took the same view, and Vanderkemp, therefore, was not arrested, though he was shadowed night and day. French undertook an investigation into his life and circumstances, which showed that these had been painted in somewhat darker colours than appeared justifiable, but which revealed no evidence about the crime. Furthermore, none of the jewels could be traced to him, nor any of the stolen notes other than those he had spoken of.

Once more the days began to slip past without bringing to light any fresh fact, and as time passed French grew more worried and despondent, and his superior officers more querulous. And then something occurred to turn his attention to a completely different side of the case, and send him off with fresh hope and energy on a new clue.

CHAPTER VII
CONCERNING A WEDDING

When Inspector French felt really up against it in the conduct of a case, it was his invariable habit to recount the circumstances in the fullest detail to his wife. She, poor woman, haled from the mysterious household employments in which her soul delighted, would resignedly fetch her sewing and sit placidly in the corner of the Chesterfield while her lord and master strode up and down the room stating his premises, arguing therefrom with ruthless logic and not a few gestures, sifting his facts, grouping them, restating them. . . . Sometimes she interjected a remark, sometimes she didn’t; usually she warned him to be careful not to knock over the small table beside the piano, and invariably she wished he would walk on the less worn parts of the carpet. But she listened to what he said, and occasionally expressed an opinion, or, as he called it, “took a notion.” And more than once it had happened that these notions had thrown quite a new light on the point at issue, a light which in at least two cases had indicated the line of research which had eventually cleared up the mystery.

On the second evening after his return from Spain, the Inspector was regaling her with a by no means brief résumé of the Hatton Garden crime. She had listened more carefully than usual, and presently he found she had taken a notion.

“I don’t believe that poor old man was out to do anything wrong,” she declared. “It’s a shame for you to try to take away his character now he’s dead.”

French, stopping his pacing of the room, faced round.

“But I’m not trying to take away his character, Emily dear,” he protested, nettled by this unexpected attack in the rear. “I’m only saying that he’s the only person we know of who could have got an impression of the key. If so, it surely follows he was out to rob the safe.”

“Well, I believe you’re wrong,” the lady affirmed, continuing with a logic as relentless as his own, “because if he was out to rob the safe, he wasn’t the sort of man that you described, and if he was the sort of man that you described, why, then, he wasn’t out to rob the safe. That’s what I think about it.”

French was a trifle staggered. The difficulty he had recognised from the beginning, but he had not considered it serious. Now, put to him in the downright, uncompromising language in which his wife usually clothed her thoughts, it suddenly seemed to him overwhelming. What she said was true. There was here a discrepancy. If Gething really bore the character he was given by all who had known him, he was not a thief.

He ceased his restless movement, and sitting down at the table, he opened his notebook and began to look up what he had actually learned about the dead man. And the more he did so, the more he came to believe that his wife was right. Unless all this cloud of witnesses were surprisingly mistaken, Gething was innocent.

His mind reverted to the other horn of the dilemma. If Gething were innocent, who took the impression of the key? It was not obtained from that in the bank, therefore it was copied from that in Mr. Duke’s possession. Who had done it?

No one at the office, at least not unless Mr. Duke was greatly mistaken. And he did not believe the principal could be mistaken on such a point. The breaking through of his regular custom in a matter of such importance would almost certainly be noted and remembered. No, French felt that he might rely on Mr. Duke’s statement so far.

But with regard to his assertion that no one in his house could have tampered with the key, the Inspector saw that he was on more shaky ground. In the nature of the case, the diamond merchant would be less alert in dealing with the members of his own household than with his business acquaintances. Believing he was surrounded by friends, he would subconsciously be more ready to assume his precautions adequate. Was Mr. Duke’s belief that no one would touch the key not the real basis of his statement that no one had done so?

It seemed to French that here was a possibility that he had overlooked, and it was in the nature of the man that the moment he reached such a conclusion he began to consider a way of retrieving his error.

At first he thought of taking Mr. Duke into his confidence and asking him to assist him in some subterfuge by which he could enter the house. But presently he saw that it would be better if the old gentleman knew nothing of his plan, lest he might inadvertently warn a possible criminal.

For the same reason—that Mr. Duke might get to know of it—he decided he would be wiser not to undertake the business in person. But he knew the man for the job—a certain detective-sergeant named Patrick Nolan. This man was something of a Don Juan in his way, and had a positive genius for extracting confidences from the fair sex. If he could scrape acquaintance with the maids of the establishment, it would not be long before he knew all they had to tell.

Accordingly next morning he sent for Sergeant Nolan and explained his idea, and Nolan, who, where his superiors were concerned, was a man of few words, said, “Yes, sir,” and withdrew.

The following day he returned with his first report. It seemed that, changing into the garb of a better-class mechanic and taking a small kit of tools with him, he had called at Mr. Duke’s in the character of an electrician who had been sent to overhaul the light fittings.

Miss Duke happened to be out, and the rather pretty housemaid who opened the door, charmed with the newcomer’s manner, admitted him without hesitation. He had gone all over the house, paying particular attention to Mr. Duke’s bedroom. In the middle of the day he had asked and been granted leave to heat his can of soup at the kitchen fire, and to such purpose had he used the opportunities thus gained that before he left he had prevailed on the pretty housemaid to go with him to supper and the pictures on her next evening out. “Once I get a drop of spirits into her I’ll get all she knows,” he concluded, “though I doubt if it’ll be much.”

“That’s all right so far as it goes,” French admitted, “but what have you actually found out?”

“Well, there’s first of all the family. It’s a small one; there’s only the father and the daughter, Miss Sylvia. The mother’s alive, but she has been in a lunatic asylum for years, quite incurable, they said. Miss Sylvia is a nice-looking young lady and well liked, by what Rachael says—that’s the housemaid. Then there’s the servants; this Rachael, and another girl, Annie, and Sarah, the cook, and there’s a shover they call Manley. I didn’t see him, but the girls seem all right—not the kind that would be after the keys of jewel safes anyway.”

“What’s the house like?”

“It’s a middling big house, and the furniture’ll have been good when it was bought, though it’s getting a trifle shabby now. Mr. Duke’s bedroom is at the end of the left wing, and Miss Duke’s is in the front of the house, so anybody could go through Mr. Duke’s room without being seen. Anybody could get a mould of that key if he left it in his room, say, while he was having his bath.”

“Did you find out any possibilities; any tradesmen in, like yourself, or any one staying in the house?”

The Sergeant shook his head.

“I did not, sir,” he admitted. “I thought I had maybe done enough for one day. I didn’t want to be after starting them wondering about me. But I’ll get that out of Rachael to-morrow night.”

“Better see that Manley, the chauffeur—or no, I shall see him myself. You stick to what you’re at. Anything else?”

“No, sir, I think not. What the girls talked most about was Miss Sylvia’s engagement. It seems she was engaged to some friend in the City and they were to have been married at the end of the month, and now they’ve had some bust up and the whole thing’s postponed, if not off altogether.”

“That so? They didn’t tell you the reason?”

“They did not, sir. But I can likely find out from Rachael if you want to know.”

“I don’t suppose I do,” French returned, “but you might as well find out what you can—on spec. You know who the young man is?”

“No, sir. They didn’t say.”

French looked up his notebook.

“I seem to know a deal more about it than you do,” he grumbled. “He is a clerk in Mr. Duke’s office, name of Harrington—Stanley Harrington. I interviewed him with the others in the office on the day after the murder, and he told me about the engagement. It seemed to be going strong then. When did they postpone it?”

“They didn’t say that either, sir.”

“Well, find that out, too. That’ll do for the present.”

That evening French, in the guise of an out-of-work mechanic, took up his stand near Mr. Duke’s house, and presently saw the old gentleman arrive back from business in his car. An hour later he followed the chauffeur from the garage to a house in a small street off Esther Road. There French hung about for perhaps another hour, when he had the satisfaction of seeing the quarry emerge again, pass down the street, and disappear into the Rose and Thistle bar. This was just what the Inspector had hoped for, and after a few minutes he followed him in.

To scrape acquaintance was easy enough. French, as a motor mechanic out of work, was provided with a ready introduction to any chauffeur, and over a couple of glasses of beer he learned first of the chances of jobs in the district, and secondly, by skilful pumping, many details of his new companion’s work and of the Duke menage. But he heard nothing that seemed in the slightest degree suspicious or interesting. The man himself, moreover, seemed of an honest, harmless type, and much too stupid to be concerned personally in enterprises with keys of safes.

For a day the inquiry hung fire, and then Sergeant Nolan brought in a report which turned the Inspector’s thoughts into still another channel. Nolan had, it appeared, taken the pretty housemaid, Rachael, first to the pictures and then to supper at a popular restaurant. The girl had what the Sergeant called “the gift of the gab,” and it had only been necessary for him judiciously to supply an occasional topic, to have a continuous stream of more or less relevant information poured into his receptive ears.

First he had tried to ascertain whether any one had recently had access to Mr. Duke’s dressing-room during the night or early morning, and he soon learned that, prior to his own visit, no tradesmen had been in the house for many months. Moreover, the only visitor who had stayed overnight for a considerable time was Mr. Stanley Harrington, Miss Duke’s fiancée. The two young people had been feverishly engaged in rehearsals for a play given by a local amateur dramatic society, and for the four nights previous to the entertainment Miss Duke had refused to allow her swain to waste time in going to and from his rooms, and had insisted on his putting up with them. This occurred about a month before the murder, and Harrington had slept in a room just opposite to Mr. Duke’s. It was obvious, therefore, that had the key been left in the dressing-room at any time, Harrington could easily have taken the necessary impression.

Nolan then went on to tell what he had found out as to the postponed wedding, and in this French felt he had food for thought. It appeared that the trouble, whatever it was, had come suddenly, and it had taken place on the day after the murder. On the evening of the crime, so Rachael had said, Mr. Duke was not at home for dinner, but Mr. Harrington had turned up. He and Miss Duke had dined together, and then everything was couleur de rose. They had gone out together after dinner. About ten, Miss Duke had returned and had gone straight to bed. Almost certainly, therefore, she had not known that night of Mr. Duke’s call to the office. Next morning she had breakfasted with her father, and had presumably then learned of the tragedy. But not five minutes after breakfast began she had slipped out of the room and had made a telephone call, and directly Mr. Duke had left the house she had put on her things and followed him. She had been absent for about twenty minutes, and had then gone direct to her bedroom, where, on the plea of a headache, she had spent the day. When Rachael had had occasion to enter, she found her lying down, but the girl had heard her hour after hour pacing the room, and in her opinion, her mistress’s indisposition was more mental than physical. About four o’clock that afternoon Mr. Harrington had called. Miss Duke saw him in her own sitting-room, and during the interview some terrible quarrel must have taken place. Mr. Harrington left in about half an hour, and Rachael, who had opened the door to let him out, said that he looked as if he had received his death warrant. His face wore an expression of the most acute consternation and misery, and he seemed like a man in a dream, stupefied by some terrible calamity. He usually spoke pleasantly to the girl when leaving, but on this occasion he did not appear to notice her presence, but stumbled blindly out of the house and crept off like a broken man. Later the same evening she had seen Miss Duke, and she noticed that her eyes were red and swollen from crying. Since then, the young lady had changed out of all knowing. She had become silent, melancholy, and depressed. She had grown thin and old looking, and was eating nothing, and, Rachael had opined, if something were not done, they would soon see her in a decline.

Inspector French was not a little intrigued by all this information. That there was a connection between the murder of Charles Gething and the postponed wedding he could scarcely believe, and yet some of the facts seemed almost to point in that direction.

If Miss Duke had first learned of the tragedy from her father at breakfast, was this knowledge the cause of her telephone call? To whom was the call made? What had she done during her twenty-minute absence from the house? What had taken place at the interview between Miss Duke and Harrington, and, most important of all, why had the wedding been postponed? French felt that he could not rest until he had obtained answers to all these questions, and it seemed to him that the only way he could do so would be to trace the girl’s movements in detail during the whole period in question.

For a long time he continued sitting at his desk as he considered ways and means. At last he telephoned once more for Sergeant Nolan.

“Look here,” he began, when the man presented himself, “I want you to get something more out of that girl. When can you see her again?”

“Sunday, sir,” said the charmer. “I left an opening for meeting her for fear it would maybe be wanted.”

“And this is Friday. Well, I suppose I shall have to wait. Better see her on Sunday and find out these things in this order. First, in what vehicle Miss Duke drove to her friend’s girls’ club on the night of the crime; secondly, what vehicle she came back in, and thirdly, whether she received any note or message between the time she returned that night and Mr. Harrington’s call next day, other than what she might have learned during her telephone call and absence from the house after breakfast. Got that?”

Nolan, signifying that he had, left the room, and French turned his attention to his routine work, which had got sadly behind.

On the following Monday morning, Sergeant Nolan made his report. He had taken his fair quarry up the river on Sunday afternoon, and there he had got his information.

Miss Duke and Mr. Harrington had left in Mr. Duke’s car shortly before eight. Manley, the chauffeur, had mentioned to Rachael that his young mistress had told him he need not wait for her, as she expected that Mr. Duke would want him later in the evening to take him home from his club. She had returned about ten in a taxi, and had come in quickly and gone to her room. So far as Rachael knew, she had received no caller, note or other message from then until Mr. Harrington arrived next day, other than those excepted in the question.

French was anxious to keep secret the fact that he was looking into Miss Duke’s doings, and he was therefore unwilling to question Manley on the matter. He had learned from Harrington the address of the girls’ club, and he thought inquiries there might give him his information. Accordingly an hour later saw him standing before a somewhat dilapidated church school-house in a narrow street of drab and depressing houses in the Shadwell district. The school was closed, but inquiries next door produced the information that the caretaker lived in No. 47.

He betook himself to No. 47, and there found a pale, tired-looking young woman with a baby in her arms, who, when he asked for a few moments’ conversation, invited him into an untidy and not overclean kitchen. She told him, in reply to his questions, that the club was run by a number of ladies, headed by a Miss Amy Lestrange. It was open each evening, but she, the speaker, was not present, her duty being only to keep the rooms clean. But her husband, the caretaker, was there off and on every evening. He might have been there when the young lady in question arrived, she did not know. But he worked in the factory near by, and would be in for his dinner in half an hour, if the gentleman liked to wait.

French said he would call back presently, and strolled out through the depressing neighbourhood. In forty-five minutes he was back at No. 47, where the caretaker had just arrived. French told him to go on with his dinner, and sat beside him as he ate. The man, evidently hoping the affair would have its financial side, was anxious to tell everything he knew.

It seemed that he had been present at the club on the evening in question, and when French had described his young couple, he remembered their arrival. It was not usual for so fine a motor to penetrate the fastnesses of that dismal region, and its appearance had fixed the matter in his memory. The gentleman had got out first and asked him if this was the Curtis Street Club, and had then assisted his companion to alight. The lady had called to the chauffeur that he need not either wait or return for her. She had then gone into the club, leaving the gentleman standing on the pavement. About half-past nine a taxi had driven up, and the same gentleman had got out and sent him, the caretaker, in to say that Mr. Harrington was waiting for Miss Duke. The young lady had presently come down with Miss Lestrange, the head of the club. The three had talked for a few minutes, and then the strangers had got into the taxi and driven off.

“She’s a fine girl, Miss Duke,” French observed, as he offered the caretaker a fill from his pouch. “I never have seen her anything but smiling and pleasant all the years I’ve known her.”

“That’s right,” the man returned, gloatingly loading his pipe. “She’s a peach and no mistake.”

French nodded in a satisfied way.

“I should have laid a quid on it,” he declared, “that she would have been as smiling and pleasant going away as when she came. She always is.”

“Well, you’d ha’ pulled it off. But, lor, guv’nor, it’s easy for lydies as wot ’as lots o’ money to be pleasant. W’y shouldn’t they be?”

French rose.

“Ah, well, I expect they’ve their troubles like the rest of us,” he said, slipping half a crown into the man’s eager hand.

If the caretaker was correct and Miss Duke was in good spirits on leaving the club, it followed that the upset, whatever it had been, had not up to then taken place. The next step, therefore, was obviously to find the taxi in which the two young people had driven to Hampstead, so as to learn whether anything unusual had occurred during the journey.

He returned to the Yard, and sending for some members of his staff, explained the point at issue. But, as he would have been the first to admit, it was more by luck than good guidance that on the very first day of the inquiry he gained his information. Taximan James Tomkins had driven the young couple on the evening in question, and by five o’clock he was at the Yard awaiting French’s pleasure.

CHAPTER VIII
SYLVIA AND HARRINGTON

Taximan Tomkins was a wizened-looking man with a surly manner and the air of having a constant grievance, but he was evidently overawed by the situation in which he found himself, and seemed anxious to do his best to answer the Inspector’s questions clearly.

He remembered the evening in question. He had been hailed by a gentleman near Liverpool Street, and told to drive to the Curtis Street Girls’ Club. There, after some delay, they had picked up a young lady.

“What address did you get?” French asked.

“I don’t just remember,” the man said slowly scratching his head. “Somewhere in Hampstead it was, but I’m blest if I could tell you where.”

“The Cedars, Hampstead, perhaps?”

“That’s right guv’nor. That was it.”

“And the two started off together?”

“Yes, the other young lydie just saw them off.”

“Now tell me, did they meet any one else on the way home?”

“Not while they were in the keb, they didn’t.”

“Or buy a paper, or stop for any purpose whatever?”

“They stopped and got out for a ’arf a mo’, but I can’t say if it was to buy a paper.”

“Oh, they stopped, did they? Where was that?”

“In Holborn, just past the end of Hatton Garden.”

“What?” cried French, surprised out of his usual calm superiority. “Tell me about that.”

The driver was stupid and suspicious, but in time the details came out. The most direct route led along Holborn, and he had taken it, but when he reached the point in question the young man had hailed him through the speaking tube. “Hold on a minute, driver,” he had called. “Look sharp, please.” He had pulled over to the kerb, but almost before he had come to a stand the young man had jumped out and had hurried across the street. The lady had then alighted, had told Tomkins to wait, and had followed him. Tomkins had at first feared he was going to lose his money, but after a couple of minutes they had both returned and the girl had got in. She had bidden good-night to her friend, and he, Tomkins, had driven her off, leaving the man standing on the pavement. On arrival at Hampstead, the lady had paid him and entered the house. As far as the driver had noticed neither of the young people was excited or upset.

This information gave French cause for thought. On obtaining Harrington’s statement on the morning after the murder, he had imagined the young man was keeping something back. And now he found that he had been right. The young fellow had not mentioned the fact that he had been within a few yards of the scene of the crime at the time at which it had taken place. He had stated that he had seen Sylvia home, and now it appeared he had not done so, but had accompanied her only half-way. French reminded himself with satisfaction that his instinct on such a point was seldom far astray.

Furthermore, this news confirmed his growing suspicion that Miss Duke also knew something about the affair. It seemed too far-fetched a coincidence that this unexpected stop near the scene of the crime, the mental upset of both herself and Harrington, and the postponing of the wedding, were unconnected with the tragedy. What the connection might be he could not imagine but he could not but believe it existed.

Determined to put the matter to the test without further delay, he drove to the Hatton Garden office and asked for Harrington. The young fellow received him politely, though French thought he could sense an air of strain in his manner. After the briefest greeting he came directly to the point.

“Mr. Harrington,” he began, “I want to ask you one question. In our conversation on the morning after the crime you told me you had seen Miss Duke home on the previous night. Why did you state this when you had only seen her as far as Hatton Garden?”

The young man paled somewhat. He did not seem taken aback, rather he gave French the impression of feeling that he was now face to face with a crisis he had long expected. He answered without hesitation and with an evident attempt at dignity.

“I quite admit that I left Miss Duke near the end of Hatton Garden, but I don’t admit that that was in any way inconsistent with what I told you. Certainly I had no intention of deceiving you.”

“I don’t appreciate your point, Mr. Harrington,” French said sternly. “There is a very considerable difference between seeing Miss Duke home and not doing so.”

The young man flushed.

“I got a cab, drove to the club to meet Miss Duke, picked her up, and accompanied her a considerable part of the way home. I consider I was perfectly justified in saying I saw her home.”

“Then our ideas of the meanings of words are strangely different. I shall be glad if you will now tell me why you both alighted from your taxi near this street, and why you then allowed Miss Duke to proceed alone.”

This time Harrington seemed taken aback, but in a moment he pulled himself together, and he answered coherently enough:

“Certainly, there is no secret or mystery about it. As we were driving along, Miss Duke suddenly pointed to a tall girl in one of those glossy blue waterproofs, and told me to stop the cab, as she wished to speak to her. I shouted to the driver, and when he drew in to the kerb I jumped out and ran after the girl. Unfortunately she had disappeared, and though I searched round I could not find her. When I came back I found that Miss Duke had also alighted. I explained that I had missed her friend, but she only said, ‘Never mind, it can’t be helped.’ She got into the cab again, and I was about to follow, but she said No, that there was no use in taking me farther out of my way, and that she would go home alone.”

“Did you know the girl?”

“No, Miss Duke did not tell me who she was.”

“You might describe her.”

“I really could not, except that she was tall and wearing the blue waterproof and carrying an umbrella. You see, it was dark, and I only got a glimpse of her by the street lamps. She was swinging along quickly towards Oxford Street.”

“What did you do after Miss Duke drove off?”

“I went home, as I have already told you.”

And that was all Inspector French could get out of him. In spite of all his questions, the young man stuck absolutely to his story.

It was obvious to French that he must next get Miss Duke’s statement, and with this in view he drove out to The Cedars. He asked Harrington to accompany him, so as to prevent his telephoning to the young lady to put her on her guard, and on reaching the house he bade him good-day with a somewhat sardonic smile.

Miss Duke was at home, and presently joined him in the breakfast-room to which he had been shown.

She was a comely maiden, slightly given to plumpness, perhaps, but pretty and kindly and wholesome looking, a sight indeed to warm a man’s heart. But she looked pale and worried, and French felt that her experience, whatever it was, had hit her hard.

“I am sorry to trouble you, Miss Duke, but I am inquiring into the recent crime at your father’s office, and I find I require to ask you a few questions.”

As he spoke he watched her sharply, and he was intrigued to notice a flash of apprehension leap into her clear eyes.

“Won’t you sit down?” she invited, with a somewhat strained smile.

He seated himself deliberately, continuing:

“My questions, I am afraid, are personal and impertinent, but I have no option but to ask them. I will go on to them at once, without further preamble. The first is, What was it that upset you so greatly on the day after the crime?”

She looked at him in evident surprise, and, he imagined, in some relief also.

“Why, how can you ask?” she exclaimed. “Don’t you think news like that was enough to upset any one? You see, I had known poor Mr. Gething all my life, and he had always been kind to me. I sincerely liked and respected him, and to learn suddenly that he had been murdered in that cold-blooded way, why, it was awful—awful. It certainly upset me, and I don’t see how it could have done anything else.”

French nodded.

“Quite so, Miss Duke, I fully appreciate that. But I venture to suggest that there was something more in your mind than the tragic death of your old acquaintance; something of more pressing and more personal interest. Come now, Miss Duke, tell me what it was.”

The flash of apprehension returned to her eyes, and then once again the look of relief.

“You mean the loss of the diamonds,” she answered calmly. “I deplored that, of course, particularly on my father’s account. But it was Mr. Gething’s death that really, as you call it, upset me. The diamonds we could do without, but we could not give the poor old man back his life.”

“I did not mean the loss of the diamonds, Miss Duke. I meant something more personal than that. I’m afraid you must tell me about it.”

There was now no mistaking the girl’s uneasiness, and French grew more and more hopeful that he was on the track of something vital. But she was not giving anything away.

“You must be mistaken,” she said in a lower tone. “It was the news of the murder, and that alone, which upset me.”

French shook his head.

“I would rather not take that answer from you. Please reconsider it. Can you tell me nothing else?”

“Nothing. That is all I have to say.”

“Very well. I trust it may not be necessary to reopen the matter. Now I want you to tell me why you postponed your wedding with Mr. Harrington.”

Miss Duke flushed deeply.

“I will tell you nothing of the sort, Mr. Inspector!” she declared with some show of anger. “What right have you to ask me such a question? That is a matter between Mr. Harrington and myself alone.”

“I hope you are right, Miss Duke, but I fear there is a chance that you may be mistaken. Do you absolutely decline to answer me?”

“Of course I do! No girl would answer such a question. It is an impertinence to ask it.”

“In that case,” French said grimly, “I shall not press the matter—for the present. Let me turn to another subject. I want you next to tell me why you stopped at Hatton Garden on your way home from the Curtis Street Girls’ Club on the night of the crime.”

For a moment the girl seemed too much surprised to reply, then she answered with a show of indignation: “Really, Mr. French, this is too much! May I ask if you suspect me of the crime?”

“Not of committing it,” French returned gravely, “but,” he leaned forward and gazed keenly into her eyes, “I do suspect you of knowing something about it. Could you not, Miss Duke, if you chose, put me on the track of the criminal?”

“Oh, no, no, no!” the girl cried piteously, motioning with her hands as if to banish so terrible a thought from her purview. “How can you suggest such a thing? It is shameful and horrible!”

“Of course, Miss Duke, I can’t make you answer me if you don’t want to. But I put it to you that it is worth your while thinking twice before you attempt to keep back information. Remember that if I am not satisfied, you may be asked these same questions in court, and then you will have to answer them whether you like it or not. Now I ask you once again, Why did you leave your taxi at Hatton Garden?”

“I think it is perfectly horrible of you to make all these insinuations against me without any grounds whatever,” she answered a little tremulously. “There is no secret about why I stopped the taxi, and I have never made any mystery about it. Why it should have any importance I can’t imagine.” She paused, then with a little gesture as if throwing discretion to the winds, continued: “The fact is that as we were driving home I suddenly saw a girl in the street whom I particularly wished to meet. I stopped the cab and sent Mr. Harrington after her, but he missed her.”

“Who was she?”

“I don’t know; that is why I was so anxious to see her. I suppose you want the whole story?” She tossed her head and went on without waiting for him to reply. “Last summer I was coming up to town from Tonbridge, where I had been staying, and this girl and I had a carriage to ourselves. We began to talk, and became quite friendly. When they came to collect the tickets found I had lost mine. The man wanted to take my name, but the girl insisted on lending me the money to pay my fare. I wrote down her name and address on a scrap of paper so that I could return the money to her, but when I reached home I found I had lost the paper, and I stupidly had not committed the address to memory. I could not send her the money, and I don’t know what she must have thought of me. You can understand, therefore, my anxiety to meet her when I saw her from the cab.”

“But why did you pay your fare a second time? You must have known that all you had to do was to give your name and address to the ticket collector.”

“I suppose I did,” she admitted, “but I preferred to pay rather than have the trouble of explanations and probably letters to the head office.”

Inspector French was chagrined. Instinctively he doubted the story, but Miss Duke had answered his question in a reasonable way, and if she stuck to the tale, he did not see how he could break her down. After this lapse of time it would be quite impossible to obtain confirmation or otherwise of the details, especially as Miss Duke’s hypothetical fellow-traveller could not be produced. He pointedly made no comment on the statement as he resumed his investigation.

“To whom did you telephone after breakfast on the morning after the murder?”

That Miss Duke was amazed at the extent of the Inspector’s knowledge was evident, but she answered immediately.

“To Mr. Harrington.”

“To say what?”

“If I must repeat my private conversations to my future husband, it was to ask him to meet me at once as I had something to say to him.”

“What was the nature of the communication?”

Miss Duke flushed again.

“Really,” she exclaimed, “I protest against this. What possible connection can our private affairs have with your business?”

“It is your own fault, Miss Duke. You are not telling me the whole truth, and I am therefore suspicious. I want to find out what you are keeping back, and I may tell you that I am going to do so. What did you want to see Mr. Harrington about so urgently?”

The girl seemed terribly distressed.

“If you will have it, it was about the postponement of the wedding,” she said in a low voice. “You understand, we had been discussing the matter on the night before, when no conclusion had been come to. But on sleeping on it I had made up my mind in favour of the postponement, and I wanted to tell Mr. Harrington at once.”

“But why was it so urgent? Could you not have waited until later in the day?”

“I felt I couldn’t wait. It was so important to us both.”

“And you refuse to give the reason of the postponement?”

“I do. You have no right to ask it.”

“You did meet Mr. Harrington that morning?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“At the entrance to the Finchley Road tube station.”

“Why did you not tell him to call on you instead of yourself going out?”

“In order as far as possible to prevent him from being late at the office.”

French suddenly remembered that Harrington had entered the office during his visit there on the morning after the crime, and had apologised to Mr. Duke for his late arrival. It had not struck French at the time, but now he recalled that when Mr. Duke had spoken to him of the tragedy he had stated he had heard of it already. Where? French now wondered. Was it merely from the morning paper, or was it from Miss Duke? Or, still more pressing question, had they both known of it on the previous night?

Suddenly a possible theory flashed into his mind, and he sat for a few moments in silence, considering it. Suppose that on the stop near Hatton Garden, Harrington had mentioned that he wanted for some purpose to call at the office, or suppose Miss Duke had asked him to do so, and that he had left her for that purpose. Next morning at breakfast she hears from her father of the murder, and is at once panic stricken about Harrington. She sees that if he admits his visit he may be suspected of the crime, and she sends for him before he reaches the office in order to warn him. Or could it be that, knowing of this hypothetical visit, Miss Duke had herself suspected Harrington, and had sent for him at the earliest possible moment to hear his explanation? French was not satisfied with these suggestions, but he felt more than ever certain these two young people had conspired to hide vital information.

He left the house profoundly dissatisfied, and returning to Hatton Garden, had another interview with Harrington. He pressed the young man as hard as he could, taxing him directly with having been present in the office on the fatal night. This Harrington strenuously denied, and French could get nothing further out of him. He went again into the man’s movements on the night of the crime, but without getting any further light thrown thereon. Harrington said he had walked to his rooms after parting from Miss Duke, but no direct evidence was forthcoming as to the truth or falsehood of his statement.

Suddenly another theory leaped into the detective’s mind, but after careful thought he felt he must reject it. If Vanderkemp were guilty, the whole of these mysterious happenings would be cleared up. Harrington was under a deep debt of gratitude to his uncle, and appeared attached to him. Whether Miss Duke shared, or was endeavouring to share, his feelings, French did not know, but it was certainly possible. Suppose he and Miss Duke, driving home from the East End, had seen Vanderkemp at the end of Hatton Garden. Suppose, moreover, something in the man’s appearance had attracted their attention, something furtive or evil, something unlike his usual expression. This, coupled with the fact that the traveller was supposed to be in Amsterdam, might easily have impelled Harrington to stop the cab to have a word with his uncle. But by the time he had reached the pavement, Vanderkemp had disappeared. The incident would have been dismissed by both as trivial, until next morning at breakfast, when Miss Duke learned of the murder, its significance would become apparent. She might not believe the traveller guilty, but she would recognise that the circumstances required some explanation. Immediately the paramount importance of communicating with Harrington would appear, lest he might incautiously mention that he had seen his uncle virtually on the scene of the murder. She would instantly telephone in the hope of catching her lover before he left his rooms. She could not give her message over the telephone, so she would arrange the meeting. She would instruct Harrington to return to her as soon as possible, so as to hear what had taken place at the office. He would therefore call in the afternoon, and at the interview they would decide that in the uncertainty of the situation, the wedding should be postponed. The supposed flight of Vanderkemp would confirm their suspicions, and would account for the perturbed state of mind which both exhibited.

The theory was so fascinating that next day French once more interviewed Harrington and Miss Duke and put the question directly to them, Had they seen Vanderkemp? But both denied having done so, and baffled and irritated, he wrathfully watched another promising clue petering out before him. He had the two young people shadowed, and spent a considerable time in investigating their past life, but without result.

So the days began to draw out into weeks, and the solution of the mystery seemed as far off as ever.

CHAPTER IX
MRS. ROOT OF PITTSBURG

One morning about six weeks after the murder in Hatton Garden, Inspector French was summoned to the presence of his chief.

“Look here, French,” he was greeted, “you’ve been at that Gething case long enough. I can’t have any more time wasted on it. What are you doing now?”

French, his usual cheery confidence sadly deflated, hesitatingly admitted that at the moment he was not doing very much, embellishing this in the course of a somewhat painful conversation with the further information that he was doing nothing whatever, and that he was severally up against it and down and out.

“I thought so,” the chief declared. “In that case you’ll have time to go and see Williams & Davies, of Cockspur Street, the money-lenders. I have just had a ’phone from them, and they say that some diamonds recently came into their possession which they are told resemble those stolen from Duke & Peabody. You might look into the matter.”

It was a rejuvenated French that fifteen minutes later ascended the stairs of Straker House, Cockspur Street, to the office of Messrs. Williams & Davies. Gone was the lassitude and the dejection and the weary brooding look, and instead there was once again the old cheery optimism, the smiling self-confidence, the springy step. He pushed open a swing door, and with an air of fatherly benevolence demanded of a diminutive office boy if Mr. Williams was in.

The senior partner was disengaged, and two minutes later French was ushered into a small, rather dark office, in which sat a tall, well-groomed man with graying hair, and a precise, somewhat pedantic manner.

“They ’phoned me from the Yard that you were coming across, Inspector,” he announced, when French had introduced himself. “I can only say I hope I have not brought you on a wild goose chase. But the affair should certainly be looked into.”

“I have not heard the circumstances yet, sir,” French reminded him. “I shall naturally be glad if you can give me some helpful information.”

“I did not care to give details over the ’phone,” Mr. Williams explained. “You can never tell who overhears you. I once heard a girl declining what was evidently a proposal of marriage. The circumstances in this case are very simple. About six weeks ago a lady, giving her name as Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, and evidently an American, called and asked if she could see one of the principals of my firm. She was shown in to me, and she explained that she was the wife of a Mr. Chauncey S. Root, a rich steel manufacturer of Pittsburg. She had just crossed by the Olympic for a holiday in Europe, reaching London on the previous evening. She said a series of misfortunes had brought her into a somewhat awkward predicament, and she wondered if I could do anything to assist her. In the first place she had been foolish enough to get into a gambling set on the way over, and had lost, as she expressed it, ‘the hell of a lot of money.’ She spoke in a very racy and American way, but she gave me the impression of being thoroughly competent and efficient. Her losses ran into several hundred pounds—she did not tell me the exact amount—but all her ready money was gone and in addition she had given several I.O.U.’s. This, however, she would not have thought twice about, as she had letters of credit for many times the amount, had it not been that a further calamity befell her in Southampton. There, in the crush on the quays, the small despatch case in which she kept her ready money and papers had been snatched from her, and she was left practically penniless, as well as without her letters of credit and her passport or other means of identification. She had, of course, reported the matter to the police authorities, but they had rather shaken their heads over it, though promising to do everything possible. She had had, indeed, to borrow a twenty-pound note from one of her travelling acquaintances to get her to London, and now she was practically without money at all. She wished, therefore, to borrow £3000, which would enable her to pay her gambling debts and to carry on in London until fresh letters of credit could be sent. Fortunately, she had with her a collection of unmounted diamonds, which she intended to have set by London jewellers, of whose skill she had heard great accounts. These diamonds she proposed to deposit as security, and she would agree to pay whatever rate of interest was customary. She asked me if my firm would be prepared to lend the money on these terms.”

“Why did she not cable to her husband?”

“I asked her that, and she explained that she did not wish to tell Mr. Root, as he had an inveterate dislike to gambling, and they had had several disagreements about her betting proclivities. In fact, relations had been seriously strained until she had promised amendment, and a confession might easily lead to a serious breach. She could not, either, attribute the loss to the theft, as it ran to so great a figure that she could not possibly be carrying the amount in her despatch case. She said she would prefer to borrow the money until she could write to her man of business to realise some of her own stocks.

“I said that her proposition, as such, was acceptable, as we frequently took stones and jewellery as security for loans, but that as she was a stranger to us, before we could do business we should obviously require some evidence of her bona fides. She replied that that was all right, that she quite recognised that owing to the loss of her papers and particularly of her passport something of the kind would be necessary. She said we could make what inquiries we liked, provided only we were quick about them, for she wanted the money as soon as possible. She asked how long we should take, and when I said twenty-four hours, she admitted that was reasonable. She suggested that if we did business we should take the stones to be valued to one of the best-known London jewellers. I agreed to this, and rang up Mr. Stronge, of Hurst & Stronge, of Bond Street, to ask him if he would undertake the valuation. He is, as you probably know, one of the most famous experts in the world. He consented, and I settled with him the amount of his fee. Finally it was arranged that, provided our inquiries were satisfactory, I should meet Mrs. Root at Hurst & Stronge’s at half-past ten on the following morning, she with the stones and I with my cheque book. I was to pay her five-sixths of the value of the diamonds. She said she expected to pay back the loan in about four weeks, and suitable terms of interest were arranged.”

Mr. Williams paused and glanced at his companion, as though to assure himself that his story was receiving the attention he evidently felt it deserved. But French’s air of thrilled interest left him no room for doubt, and he continued:

“I made my inquiries, and all appeared satisfactory. I called up Mrs. Root at the Savoy, told her I was prepared to deal, and at the hour named met her at Hurst & Stronge’s. Mr. Stronge took us to his private room, and there Mrs. Root produced a bag of stones, mostly diamonds, though there were a few emeralds and a large ruby, all unmounted. There were sixteen stones ranging in value from £40 to £400, but averaging about £200 or £220. Mr. Stronge valued them very carefully, and after a long wait we got his opinion. The whole were worth about £3300, and in accordance with our bargain I proposed to hand Mrs. Root a cheque for £2750. She admitted the correctness of this, but said she wanted the £3000, and after some conversation I agreed to meet her wishes and filled the cheque for the latter sum. She then objected that no bank would pay her without inquiring as to her identity, which would mean another delay, and asked me if I would go with her to the bank to certify that she was the person for whom I intended the money. I agreed to this, and we went to the Piccadilly branch of the London and Counties Bank. There we saw the manager, and there I left her. I returned here and lodged the stones in my safe.”

“The manager took your identification, I suppose?”

“Oh, yes. I know him personally and there was no difficulty. That ended the matter as far as I was concerned, and for four weeks I thought no more of it. But as the fifth and sixth week passed and the lady made no sign, I began to wonder. I telephoned to the Savoy, but it appeared she had left on the day of our deal. I assumed, however, that she was on the Continent, and no suspicion that all was not right occurred to me.”

“Then what roused your suspicion?”

“I am coming to that,” Mr. Williams answered in a slightly frigid tone. “This morning I happened to show the stones—without saying how they came into my possession, of course—to a personal friend of my own, a diamond merchant named Sproule, who had called with me on other business. When he saw them he grew very much excited, and asked me where I had got them from. I pressed him for an explanation, and he said they fitted the description circulated of those stolen from Messrs. Duke & Peabody. He was emphatic that I should inform the firm, but I thought it better to ring you up instead.”

“Very wise, sir,” French approved. “That was certainly your proper course. Now, I take it the first thing we have to do is to see if your friend, Mr. Sproule, is correct in his supposition. I have a list of the missing stones in my pocket, but I don’t know that I’m expert enough to identify them. I think we’ll have Mr. Duke over. May I use your ’phone?”

Mr. Duke was naturally eager to learn details of the new development, and in less than half an hour he joined the others in Mr. Williams’s office. French explained the situation, ending up, “Now we want you, Mr. Duke, to tell us if these were among the stones you lost.”

The diamond merchant, obviously much excited, began at once to make his examination. He inspected the stones minutely through a lens, weighed them on a delicate balance he had brought, and put them to other tests which greatly interested his companions. As he put each down he gave his judgment. One after another were identified. All were among those stolen from him. They were the sixteen smallest and least valuable stones of the collection.

The fact was learned by the three men with very different emotions. Mr. Duke’s gain was Mr. Williams’s loss, and resulting satisfaction and consternation showed on their respective faces, while French’s countenance wore an expression of the liveliest delight, not unmixed with mystification.

“Good heavens!” Mr. Williams cried, his voice trembling with agitation and excitement. “Then I’ve been swindled! Swindled out of three thousand pounds!” He glared at the Inspector as if he were at fault. “I suppose,” he continued, “that if this gentleman establishes his claim, the loss will fall on me? God knows, I can ill afford it.”

“We shall hope not, sir,” French said sympathetically. “We shall hope that with luck you’ll recover your money. But we must not waste any more time. I shall start by going to the bank to see if all the money has been withdrawn. I’d be obliged, Mr. Williams, if you would come also. I’ll keep you advised, Mr. Duke, how things go on, and of course you’ll get back your stones after the usual formalities have been carried out.”

Mr. Williams had recovered his composure, and, the gems having been locked in his safe, the three men left the office and descended to the street. There French said good-day to Mr. Duke, who somewhat reluctantly took his leave, the other two continuing to the bank. After a few moments’ wait they were shown into the manager’s room.

“I am afraid, Mr. Scarlett, I have had a serious misfortune,” Mr. Williams began, almost before they were seated. “I have just learned that I have been swindled out of £3000. This is Inspector French of Scotland Yard, and we both want your help in the matter.”

Mr. Scarlett, a well-groomed, middle-aged gentleman of fashionable appearance and suave manners, looked suitably concerned. He shook hands with French, and expressed his commiseration with his client’s loss in a few easy words, declaring also his desire to be of service.

“Do you remember,” Mr. Williams went on eagerly, “my coming to see you one morning about six weeks ago with a lady whom I introduced as Mrs. Root, of Pittsburg, U. S. A.? She held my cheque for £3000, and I came to introduce her to you.”

The manager recalled the incident.

“That money was a loan, for which she deposited with me a number of diamonds. The diamonds were valued by Mr. Stronge of Hurst & Stronge’s, and I gave her less than their value. I thought I had taken all reasonable precautions, but now,” Mr. Williams made a faint gesture of despair, “now it seems that they were stolen.”

“Stolen?” Mr. Scarlett repeated in a shocked voice. “My dear sir! Allow me to say how extremely sorry I am to have to tell you that I fear your discovery has come too late. Your cheque had been paid practically in full.”

Mr. Williams gave a little groan, though he had evidently been expecting the bad news. He would have spoken, but French broke in with, “Is that so, sir? That is really what we came to ask. Now I want you please to give me as detailed an account of the whole business as you can.”

“I will do so, of course,” Mr. Scarlett returned, “but I fear my story will not help you much.” He raised his desk telephone. “Ask Mr. Plenteous to come here,” he directed, and when a young, fair-haired man had entered he resumed, “This is Mr. Plenteous who carried out the details of the transaction. As Mr. Williams has said, he and the lady called on me,” he turned over the leaves of a diary, “about midday on Thursday, 26th November. He introduced the lady as a Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, of Pittsburg, and stated he had called to certify that she was the person referred to in a cheque he had made out. She produced a cheque for £3000, and Mr. Williams identified it as his. She thanked him and he withdrew. She then said that she wished to open a temporary account, and that she would like cash for £1500, and to lodge the remainder. I sent for Mr. Plenteous, and asked him to arrange the matter, and he showed the lady out to his counter. Next day the balance was withdrawn except for a few shillings, which I believe we still hold. Is not that correct, Plenteous?”

“Yes, sir,” the fair-haired young man answered, “quite correct. I can turn you up the exact balance in a moment.”

“Presently, thank you, Mr. Plenteous,” French interposed. “In the meantime perhaps you would tell us what took place between you and the lady after you left this office.”

After a glance at his chief, the clerk answered:

“Mrs. Root handed me the cheque for £3000, and said she wished to lodge half. I filled the customary forms, took her signature, and gave her a passbook, all in the usual way. Then she told me she would like the other £1500 cashed in notes of small value. She said she was a stranger to London, but that already she had discovered the difficulty of changing Bank of England notes. Being short of ready money, she had proffered a twenty-pound note in a shop. It was refused, and on asking for change in a bank which happened to be next door, the cashier politely informed her he was not permitted to change notes for strangers. She had, indeed, to go back to her hotel before she could get it done. She said she therefore wanted nothing larger than ten pounds, and at her further request I counted her out a hundred tens and a hundred fives. She stowed them away in a despatch case she was carrying. I pointed out that that was not a very safe way to carry so large a sum, but she laughed and said she guessed it was all right, that no one would know she had money in it. She said good-day and went out, and that was the last I saw of her.”

“You noticed nothing in any way suspicious about her manner or actions?”

“Nothing whatever.”

“You say the lodgment was subsequently withdrawn? You might tell me about that.”

“It was withdrawn in the sense that cheques were issued for almost the whole amount. The lady did not herself call again, nor was the account closed. There is still a small balance.”

French nodded.

“Yes, I understood you to say so. Could you let me see the ledger, and also the cheques that were issued?”

In a few seconds the clerk returned with a ponderous tome, which he opened at the name of Mrs. Helen Sadie Root. The account possessed but few items. On the debit side there was but the single entry of £1500, but on the other side there were six entries, varying from £210 10s. to £295, and totalling £1495 7s. 9d. Six cancelled cheques corresponded with the entries. As French examined these, he was interested to see that all were made out on fashionable London jewellers.

“Can you lend me these?” he asked, pointing to the cheques.

The clerk hesitated, but Mr. Scarlett intervened.

“Certainly,” he answered readily, “but you will have to give us a receipt for our auditors.”

This was soon arranged, and after French had asked a few more questions, he and Mr. Williams left the bank.

“Now,” he said briskly, before his companion could frame a remark, “I am going round to these six jewellers, but first I want some further information from you. Shall we go back to your office?”

Mr. Williams assented eagerly. He had lost his air of detached precision, and, like a somewhat spoiled child, plied the other with questions as to his probable chances of success. French answered in his usual cheery, optimistic way, and it was not until they were once more seated in Mr. Williams’s sanctum that he dropped his air of fatherly benevolence and became once more the shrewd and competent officer of Scotland Yard.

“In the first place,” he began, as he took out his notebook, “I want your description of the lady. I gather she was a good-looking woman, attractive both in appearance and manner. Did you find her so?”

Mr. Williams hesitated.

“Well, yes, I did,” he admitted, somewhat apologetically, as French thought. “She certainly had a way with her—something different from my usual clients. From her manner I never should have suspected she was other than all right.”

“Most women crooks are attractive looking,” French declared smoothly. “It’s part of their stock in trade. Just let me have as detailed a description of her as you can.”

It seemed she was of middle height, and dark, very dark as to hair and eyelashes, but less so as to eyes. They were rather a golden shade of brown. She had a somewhat retroussé nose, and a tiny mouth set in an oval face, with a complexion of extreme, but healthy, pallor. She wore her hair low over her ears, and her smile revealed an unexpected dimple. Mr. Williams had remarked these details so thoroughly that French smiled inwardly, as he solemnly noted them in his book. The money-lender had not particularly observed what she was wearing, but this did not matter as Mr. Scarlett had, and a detailed description of her dress was already entered up.

“Tell me next, please, Mr. Williams, what identification the lady gave of herself, and what inquiries you made to test her statement. She had lost her passport?”

“Yes, I told you how, or rather I told you what she said about it. She gave me her card, and showed me the envelopes of several letters addressed to her at Pittsburg. She also showed me some photographs of groups in which she appeared which had been taken on board the Olympic, as well as a dinner menu dated for the third day out. She explained that her return ticket had been stolen with the passport, so that she could not let me see it.”

“Not very conclusive, I’m afraid,” French commented. “All that evidence might have been faked.”

“I quite see that, and saw it at the time,” declared the money-lender. “But I did not rest there. I applied to Dashford’s, you know, the private inquiry people. I asked them to cable their agents in Pittsburg for a description of Mrs. Root, and to know if she had left for England on the Olympic. There is the reply.”

He took a paper from a file and handed it across. It was headed, “J. T. Dashford & Co., Private Inquiry Agents,” and read:

“Dear Sir,

“Mrs. Chauncey S. Root.

“In reply to your inquiry of yesterday, we beg to inform you that we have cabled our agents in Pittsburg on the matter in question, and have received the following reply:

“ ‘Chauncey S. Root, partner local steel firm, wealthy, wife handsome, height middle, hair dark, complexion pale, face oval, mouth small, manner bright and attractive. Left for Europe by Olympic. Family O. K.’

“We trust this information will meet your requirements.

“Yours faithfully,

“J. T. Dashford & Co.,

“M.S.”

French whistled thoughtfully.

“That seems right enough,” he said slowly. “I know something about Dashford’s people, and they are reliable enough about a thing like this. It’s beginning to look like impersonation.”

“Ah,” Mr. Williams ejaculated. “Impersonation! I hadn’t thought of that.” He paused in his turn, then continued, “But yet I don’t see how it could be. I didn’t stop with an application to Dashford’s. I rang up the White Star offices, and they told me there that Mrs. Root had actually made the journey. I also rang up the Savoy, and they told me there that she had arrived at the hour she had told me, with trunks bearing Olympic labels. Finally, to make the matter, as I thought, sure, I ’phoned the Southampton police and found out from them that the story of the stolen despatch case was true. It had happened just as Mrs. Root described. When I got all this information I felt absolutely satisfied.”

“I’m not surprised at that, sir,” French admitted. “It would have satisfied most people. You see, it’s quite different with us now, because our suspicions have been aroused. There was nothing in the circumstances of this lady’s call to make you doubt her story. I quite sympathise with you, though I’m afraid that doesn’t help the situation much. . . . But you see now, of course, that none of the information you collected is really conclusive. I have no doubt that there is a Mrs. Chauncey S. Root of Pittsburg who travelled to Europe in the Olympic, and that, generally speaking, she resembles your friend, but I very gravely doubt that she was the lady who negotiated the loan. You see, the real identifications, the passport, the return ticket, on which her name would be inscribed, were missing. Moreover, she refused to allow Mr. Root to be consulted. No, I think we may take it that the woman who came here was not Mrs. Root. But, on the other hand, she must either have been acquainted with Mrs. Root personally or have known a thundering lot about her. How does that strike you, sir?”

“It sounds right, it certainly sounds right, Inspector. I fear it must be as you say. But if so, what chance is there of getting back my money?”

French shook his head.

“I’m afraid the prospects are not very rosy,” he admitted. “But you never know. We’ll try to get our hands on the woman, of course, and we may find she has not spent the money. Now, sir, if there is nothing more than you can tell me, I think I shall get along to the Savoy and to those shops where she paid the cheques.”

Inspector French walked slowly down Cockspur Street, his brain bemused by this unexpected development. The impersonation of Mrs. Root was easy—or, at least, comparatively easy—to understand. He could see that it would present no serious difficulties to a resourceful woman, though the application to the Southampton police was certainly staggering. But what he could not form the slightest idea of was how this woman could possibly have got hold of Mr. Duke’s diamonds. The impersonation must have actually been arranged before the robbery took place, and if this were so, it pointed to a much more far-reaching crime than he had had any conception of. And there must have been more than one in it, too—unless this mysterious woman had actually committed the murder, which he found hard to believe. He smiled with satisfaction as he thought of the vistas of possible information which were opening out before him, and by which he might hope to retrieve the loss of prestige which he had suffered.

Suddenly he thought of Miss Duke. Was there a connection between her and this mysterious woman? Was Mrs. Root the woman in the waterproof? Was she Miss Duke herself? Here were far-reaching questions. As he considered them, he saw that his work for the next few days was cut out for him.

CHAPTER X
SOME PAIRS OF BLANKETS

During Inspector French’s brief lunch hour he continued turning over in his mind the immediate problem which Mr. Williams’s story had raised for him, namely, at what point he had best attack his new inquiry.

The facts postulated a good deal of obvious detailed investigation, and he felt he should carry this through in his usual systematic way before attempting to evolve a comprehensive theory of the crime. He had first to learn what he could of the mysterious Mrs. Root, and in this connection he foresaw inquiries at Pittsburg, from the White Star people, from the Southampton police at the Savoy, and at the various firms of jewellers to whom the cheques had been made out. He had, if possible, to find the lady, or her impersonator. These things accomplished, he could turn his attention to an attempt to connect the person found with Miss Duke, or at all events with Mr. Duke’s jewels, and subsequently with the murder of Charles Gething.

By the time his meal was ended he had decided that he would commence operations at the Savoy, and ten minutes later he turned into the courtyard, and making his way to the office, inquired for the manager.

In due course he explained his business to the great man, but the latter shook his head when he heard what was required of him, and asked French for suggestions as to how he could help.

“First I should like to see the register,” French explained.

“That, at least, is easily done.”

The manager led the way to the office and introduced French to the radiant young woman who presided at the reception counter. Then turning over the pages of the register, he presently exclaimed, “That looks like it, Inspector, I fancy.”

The entry read: “Nov. 24. Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, Pittsburg, U. S. A. 137.”

French drew out the cheques he had obtained from Mr. Scarlett and carefully compared the signatures. “That’s it,” he declared. “There’s not a doubt those are in the same handwriting. Now the question is, Can this young lady remember the woman?”

The clerk hesitated.

“We had a lot of Americans in that day,” she said slowly, as she ran her eyes down the list of names. “It is not easy to keep track of them all. And this is six weeks ago.” She paused again, then shook her head. “I’m afraid I can’t just place her.”

“It was the day the Olympic got to Southampton,” French prompted. “There would no doubt have been a number of people off the steamer special.” He glanced once more at the book. “See, here is a crowd of Americans all together. New York, Boston, New York, New York, Philadelphia, and so on. That represents the special. But——” He paused and ran his finger down the column. “Now, this is really rather interesting. Mrs. Root’s name is not among them. Here it is, down near the end of the list. That means that she came in late in the evening, doesn’t it? Does that help you at all, Miss Pearson?” He waited, but the girl not replying, he continued, “Or the room? Does No. 137 bring anything to your mind?”

The girl shook her pretty head.

“Turn up the account, Miss Pearson,” the manager suggested.

The girl produced another huge book, and all three went through the items. Mrs. Root, it appeared, had paid for the rooms—No. 137 was a suite consisting of one bedroom, bathroom and sitting-room—for the three nights, the 24th, 25th, and 26th of November. She had had seven meals in the hotel, dinner on the night of arrival, and breakfast, lunch, and dinner on the next two days. All these meals she had had served in her private room.

“Avoiding publicity,” French thought, continuing aloud, “Then she didn’t breakfast on the morning she left?”

At his remark Miss Pearson gave an exclamation.

“I remember her now,” she cried. “It was your saying that brought her to my mind. No, she didn’t breakfast the morning you mean because she left on the previous night. I remember the whole circumstances now. She came in on the night”—she glanced at the register—“of the 24th—pretty late—it was between seven and eight, I should think—and asked for a suite for three or four weeks. She was dark-haired and pale complexion and very American in her speech. I fixed her up with No. 137, and she said she wanted dinner sent up to her room. Two evenings later, shortly before eight o’clock, she came back to the office and said she had had an urgent wire from Paris, and that she had to go over that night. She hoped to be back in about a week, but she would not keep the rooms on, as she was not certain of her plans. I made out the bill, and what brings the thing back to my mind is that I had to charge her for that night in accordance with our rule. She didn’t seem to mind, the way some people do in such a case. She left then, and I never saw her since.”

This being all the pretty clerk could tell him, French asked next to see the chambermaid who had attended No. 137 on the night in question.

From this woman he at first learned nothing. For a quarter of an hour he prompted fruitlessly, then, just as in the case of the clerk, a chance word brought a ray of light. Asked if she could remember having seen luggage with Olympic labels and the name Mrs. Root, she suddenly admitted that she could. Her attention had been attracted by the name Root, as she had been reading in the papers of a distinguished American of the same name, and she had wondered if the owner of the luggage was any connection. She remembered the luggage distinctly. There were two big, new-looking American trunks, labelled on steamer labels, Mrs. Something Root. Yes, she thought it was Chauncey. Something like that anyway, some queer, foreign name that only an American would bear. But though she remembered the luggage, the chambermaid could not recall anything about the lady herself.

After fruitlessly interrogating several other of the hotel servants, French retreated into a deserted corner of the lounge and set himself to think the thing out. And presently it occurred to him that the trunks might represent a clue. Did their removal not involve a taxi, and if so, could he find it?

He went back to the head porter to make inquiries. Vehicles were usually obtained from the rank in the street adjoining. Of course it frequently happened that a driver looking for a fare would pass at the critical moment and be employed, but seven out of ten were obtained from the rank.

French left the hotel, and, sauntering down to the cab rank, engaged the driver of the leading car in conversation. All the taxis on the rank, the man stated, were the property of one firm, Metropolitan Transport, Ltd. The men returned the runs they had made on their daily journals, and French could, if he chose to apply to the office in Victoria Street, learn all there was to be known about it.

French did choose, and a quarter of an hour later was in conversation with the manager. But that gentleman was dubious that he could supply the desired information. It was true they kept a pretty complete record of the runs made and these had to balance with the readings of the meters and with the money handed in, but obviously no note was made of the names or descriptions of the fares. He could find out if a car had gone from the Savoy to Victoria about 7.45 p.m. on the night of the 26th November, but he could not say who might have travelled in it.

“If you could let me have a note of the cars which left the hotel between 7.40 and 8.10, irrespective of their destinations, I should be obliged,” French declared. “I could see all the drivers, and possibly some one of them might remember the woman.”

“I can give you that,” the manager assented, “but it will take a little time to get out.” He rang for a clerk and gave the necessary instruction, then leaned back in his chair and went on conversationally, “What’s the trouble? Is it indiscreet to ask?”

French smiled benevolently.

“Certainly not,” he assured the other. “I’ll tell you the whole thing. We believe that the lady I’m after is a crook—a diamond thief. She gave out that she was the wife of a wealthy American steel magnate, but we believe she’s no more that than you are. She left the hotel that night with two trunks and some small luggage, to go to Paris by the 8.20 from Victoria, and has vanished. I’m trying now to trace her.”

The manager seemed interested.

“Well,” he said, “that’s a useful hint you have given just now. Our drivers record the luggage, that is, outside luggage for which there is a charge. It’ll narrow the thing down a bit if we’ve only to count vehicles with two packages outside.”

“That’s a point,” French admitted, “and a good one. But I only know that there were two large trunks besides hand luggage. There might have been more than two packages outside.”

“It’s not likely. If there was only one lady she would have taken the hand stuff in with her. Ah, here’s the list.”

From the tabulated sheet handed to the manager, it appeared that between the hours of 7.40 and 8.10 on the night in question, no less than twenty-eight taxis had left the Savoy. Of these, twenty had gone to theatres. Of the remaining eight, two had gone to Euston, one to King’s Cross, one to Hampstead, one to Kensington, and three to Victoria.

“There you are,” said the manager, pointing to the second to Victoria. “See under extras, ‘Two packages.’ That’s what you want.”

It looked as if the manager was right. The first of the three vehicles to Victoria had no outside luggage, and the third was for a party of five. No. 2 had left at 7.55 with one passenger and two outside packages.

“It’s promising enough,” French admitted. “If you could tell me where to find the driver of that car I should be much obliged.”

“John Straker.” The manager picked up his desk telephone. “Where is John Straker at present?” he called, and in a moment to French, “He’s out at work. He’s on the stand beside the Savoy, and if you go there now, and don’t mind waiting, you’ll see him. I’ll give you a note to him. It will make him more ready to talk. He’s a peculiar-looking man, cleanshaven, with a thin white face and hooked nose and very black eyes; you’ll recognise him at once. Better take his time-book also. It may bring the trip back to his memory.”

French, having thanked the manager, returned to the cab rank. As he walked down it glancing at the drivers, a taxi drove up and took its place at the tail of the line. Its driver answered the description, and when he had switched off his engine and seemed at liberty, French accosted him and explained his business.

For some seconds the man pondered, scratching his head and turning over the leaves of his time-book. At last he looked at French.

“I remember the trip,” he said. “It’s a strange thing, but that was the only trip I made to Victoria that week. It’s a place we’re at pretty often, as you’ll understand. But I remember going that night. It was with a lady, and she had two big boxes; I remember them because they were rather big for the space on the car. But I got them fixed up all right.”

“Where did you go to?”

“I believe the main line departure side of Victoria, though I’m not just certain.”

“Good!” said French heartily. “Now, could you describe the lady?”

This, however, was beyond the driver’s powers. He had not noticed her specially, nor could he describe the porter who had taken the luggage. But French had not expected that, indeed, he was surprised and delighted at having got so much.

The rest of that day and most of the next he spent at Victoria, interviewing porters, inspectors, ticket collectors, and any other officials he could find, who might by chance have seen the quarry. But nowhere had he any luck. The unknown remained unknown.

As he continued turning the matter over in his mind, a further possible clue in connection with the trunks occurred to him. They were large; they could not be taken in the carriage. It was nearly certain, therefore, that they must have been registered through. Were there records, he wondered, of such registration?

He went to the registration office and saw the clerk in charge. Yes, there were records; they were kept for a while and then destroyed. He could with a little trouble turn up those for the Newhaven boat train on the 26th November, and he would certainly do so to oblige the Inspector.

But the records, when at last they were produced, revealed neither the name of Mrs. Root nor the fact that any one had registered two large trunks by that train.

French discussed the possibility of those in question having been taken unregistered. It seemed that this was possible, but most unlikely. In any case, had it been done, the clerk believed the Customs people would have noted it. But it would take some time to find out.

“Don’t trouble about it,” French told him; “at least, not in the meantime.”

Suppose this woman crook was impersonating Mrs. Root, as he believed she was, would she not, as soon as she had disposed of the diamonds, seek to vanish and to resume her real personality? If so, did this not involve getting rid of the trunks? Did she really require them, or had they served their purpose when they reached Victoria?

As a forlorn hope, he decided he would act on this idea. Suppose she wanted to get rid of them, how would she do it?

There were several ways, but he felt satisfied that the easiest and best would be simply to leave them in the left luggage office. A considerable time would elapse before any question would arise about them, and it would then probably only take the form of their being opened by the railway company, and their contents sold for what they would bring.

He went round to the left luggage office and propounded his inquiry. And immediately he received a pleasant surprise. The clerk to whom he was referred smiled, and turning over some papers, pointed to an item. It read, “Two large American trunks: White Star labels, S. S. Olympic. Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, passenger to Southampton.”

“Bit of luck for you, sir,” the clerk remarked. “I was looking over the list only to-day, and I noticed the item. Boxes were left in on 26th of last month, and have not been claimed.”

“I want to open them and perhaps take them to the Yard.”

The necessary authority was soon obtained, and French followed the clerk to a huge room stored with luggage of all descriptions. Calling the porter in charge, they were conducted to a corner in which stood two large boxes, and French, looking at the labels, found they were those of which he was in search.

“Pull those out, George,” the clerk directed, “so as this gentleman can open them, and let him take them away if he wants to. That all you want, sir?”

French, left to himself, began by satisfying himself that the handwriting on the labels was the same as that of the cheques. Then, taking a bunch of skeleton keys from his pockets, he set to work on the locks. In a few moments both stood open.

For a space he stood staring down in amazement at their contents. They were full of blankets! Just new, thin blankets of a poor cheap quality. They were fairly tightly packed, and completely filled the trunks.

He took out the blankets, and opening each out, shook it to make sure that no small article was concealed in the folds. But there was nothing.

Nor was there any smooth surface within the empty trunks upon which finger impressions might have been left. They were lined with canvas, fine as to quality, but still too rough to carry prints.

Inspector French felt more puzzled and baffled than ever. What, under the sun, were the blankets for? And where was the woman who had carried them about?

He was certainly no further on as to finding her, whether she had crossed to France, or travelled to some other point on the Southern system, or had simply walked out of the station and been swallowed up in the wilderness of London, she was just as completely lost to him as ever. Hard luck that so unexpected a lift as the finding of the trunks should have led to so little.

But there was one thing it had led to. It settled the question of the impersonation. On no other hypothesis could the abandonment of the trunks be explained.

A point of which he had already thought recurred to him. If the unknown had impersonated Mrs. Root she either knew her or knew a great deal about her. The chances, therefore, were that Mrs. Root knew the unknown. It also seemed pretty certain that Mrs. X, as he began to call the unknown in his mind, had really crossed in the Olympic. How else would she obtain the labels and the dinner menu? Granted these two probabilities, it almost certainly followed that the real Mrs. Root and Mrs. X had met on board. If so, would it not be worth while interviewing Mrs. Root in the hope that she might by the method of elimination suggest the names of one or more persons who might have carried out the trick, and thus provide French with another point of attack.

Thinking it would be worth while to investigate the matter, he returned to the Yard and sent a cable to the Pittsburg police asking them to obtain Mrs. Root’s present address.

He glanced at his watch. It was not yet five o’clock, and he saw that he would have time to make another call before going off duty. Fifteen minutes later he pushed open the door of Dashford’s Inquiry Agency in Suffolk Street, off the Strand.

“Mr. Parker in?” he demanded of the bright young lady who came to the counter, continuing in response to her request for his name, “Inspector French from the Yard, but Mr. Parker’s an old friend and I’ll just go right in.”

The girl eyed him doubtfully as he passed through the counter, and, crossing the office, tapped at a door in the farther wall. Without waiting for a reply, he pushed the door open and passed within, shutting it behind him.

Writing at a desk in the centre of the room was an enormously stout man. He did not look up, but grunted impatiently “Well?”

“Well yourself,” French grunted, mimicking the other’s tone.

The fat man looked up, then a smile dawned on his rubicund countenance, and he got heavily to his feet and held out a huge hand. “Why, Joe, old son, I’m glad to see you. It’s a long time since you blew in. Bring the chair around to the fire and let’s hear the news.”

French did as he was told, as he answered, “All’s well, Tom? Busy?”

“Not too busy for a chat with you. How’s the Yard?”

“The Yard’s going strong; same old six and eightpence. I often think you did wisely to chuck it up and start in here. More your own boss, eh?”

The fat man shook his head.

“I don’t know,” he said slowly, handing a tobacco pouch to his visitor. “I don’t know. More your own boss, perhaps; but more worry. If you don’t get jobs here, you don’t get your pay, and no pension at the end except the interest on what you save up. I’ve thought of that pension many a time since I left.”

“Rubbish!” French exclaimed genially as he filled his pipe. “You’re too young to be talking of pensions. I was here looking for you about a week ago, but you were in Scotland.”

“Yes, I was at that Munro case. Acting for old Munro. I think he’ll pull it off.”

“I dare say.” The talk drifted on, then French turned it to the object of his call.

“I’m on a case that you people have had a finger in. I wish you’d tell me what you can about it. It’s that business of Mrs. Root of Pittsburg that Williams & Davies of Cockspur Street put you on to six weeks ago. They wanted you to find out what she was like, and if she crossed by the Olympic.”

“Huh,” said the fat man. “Well, we told ’em. I handled it myself.”

“Did they tell you why they wanted to know?”

“Nope. Only asked the question.”

“That’s where they made the mistake. A woman called on Williams, saying she was Mrs. Root and had crossed by the Olympic. She said she had lost her despatch case with her passport and tickets and money, and she wanted a loan of £3000 on the security of diamonds she had in her trunk.”

“Well? Was it not right?”

“It was perfectly right so far. Williams was satisfied from what you told him that she was the woman, and he lent the money.”

French paused, smiling, and his friend swore.

“Confound it, man! Can’t you get on? Were the stones paste?”

“Not at all. They took them to Stronge, of Hurst & Stronge’s, and he valued them. They were perfectly all right, worth £3300 odd, but”—French paused and became very impressive—“they were all stolen from Duke & Peabody the night before!”

The fat man was visibly impressed. He stared fixedly at French, as he might had that philosopher turned into Mrs. Root before his eyes. Then heavily he smote his thigh.

“Je—hosaphat!” he observed slowly. “The night before! Some crook that! Tell me.”

“That’s about all there is to tell,” French declared. “The woman arrived at the Savoy about eight o’clock, the night before, ostensibly from the Olympic, and she left next night and has vanished. No clue so far. I traced her to Victoria and there lost the trail.”

The fat man thought profoundly.

“Well, if Williams & Davies want to blame us for it, they can look elsewhere,” he presently announced. “They asked us a question, and we gave them a correct and immediate reply.”

“I know that,” French agreed. “Williams asked you the wrong question. Mrs. Root was impersonated; at least, that’s my theory. But what I wanted to know from you was how you got your information. Between ourselves, are you satisfied about it?”

The fat man shook his fist good-humouredly.

“Now, young man,” he advised, “don’t you get fresh with me. But I’ll tell you,” he went on, suddenly grave. “It was through Pinkerton’s. We have an arrangement with them. I cabled their New York depot and they got the information.”

“I knew it would be all right,” French answered, “but I was curious to know how you worked.”

The two men chatted for some time, then French said he must go. Half an hour later he reached his house, and with a sigh of relief at the thought of his slippers and his arm-chair, let himself in.

CHAPTER XI
A DEAL IN JEWELLERY

Inspector French’s cheery self-confidence was never so strongly marked as when his mind was free from misgiving as to his course of action in the immediate future. When something was obviously waiting to be done he invariably went straight in and did it, shrinking neither from difficulty nor unpleasantness, provided only he could carry through his task to a successful conclusion. It was only when he did not see his way clear that he became depressed, and then he grew surly as a bear with a sore head, and his subordinates kept at as great a distance from him as their several activities would permit.

On the morning following his conversation with the stout representative of the inquiry agency, he was in great form, signifying that not only were his plans for the day satisfactorily in being, but that no doubt of their super-excellence clouded his mind. He had decided first to call on the jewellers to whom Mrs. X had paid the cheques, after which, if these visits indicated no fresh line of attack, he would prosecute inquiries at the White Star company’s office. By that time a reply from Pittsburg should have arrived.

When he had made his usual report at the Yard, he took out the cheques and made a note of the places to be visited. The first two were in Piccadilly, and he began his quest by taking a bus thither.

By one o’clock he had been round the whole six, and as he sat lunching in a small French restaurant off Cranbourne Street, he thought over what he had learned. In each shop, after more or less delay, he had found the salesman who had served Mrs. X. All six men remembered her, and her proceedings with each seemed to have been the same. In each case she had asked for a piece of jewellery for a dear friend who was going to be married—something plain, but good; a diamond ring or a jewelled bangle or some costly trifle which would please a young girl’s fancy. In each shop her purchases came to somewhere between two and three hundred pounds, and in each case she had proffered a cheque. She had volunteered to wait while a messenger was sent to the bank, as she had admitted that she couldn’t expect the shop people to take her cheque when they didn’t know her. The salesmen had all protested that this was unnecessary, and had politely kept her talking while they took the precaution. Finally, a telephone from the bank having reassured them, they had handed her her purchase and bowed her out. None of them had either noticed or suspected anything unusual in the transactions, and all were satisfied everything about them was O. K.

French was considerably puzzled by the whole business, but under the stimulus of a cup of coffee, a possible theory flashed into his mind.

Was it not probable that this purchase of costly but commonplace articles of jewellery at six different shops was simply a part of the plan to transform Mr. Duke’s sixteen stones into money? As he thought over it, French thought he could dimly grasp that plan as a whole. First, the minds of Mr. Williams and of Mr. Hurst were prepared for what was coming by a previous visit. It was impossible that any suspicion could attach to that first visit, as when it was paid the robbery had not taken place. And now French saw that, but for the accident of the clerk, Orchard, visiting the office, these two gentlemen would not have known anything about the robbery when the second call was made, a distinctly clever achievement from the criminal’s point of view. However, be that as it might, Mrs. X’s bluff carried her through, and she exchanged her stones, or rather Mr. Duke’s, for Mr. Williams’s cheque. But she was evidently afraid to cash the whole of the cheque, and French saw her point, namely, that the opening of an account and the lodging of £1500 was an astute move, calculated to prevent the suspicion that might possibly be caused by the cashing of £3000 in small notes. But this safeguard left her with the necessity of devising a plan for cashing her deposit, and here, in the purchase of the jewellery, French saw the plan. Would she not sell what she had just bought? If she could do so, there was the whole £3000 changed into untraceable notes.

Of course there would be a loss at every step of the operation. There was first of all a loss in disposing of the jewels. Mr. Stronge had valued them at £3300, and she had received only £3000 from Mr. Williams. She would lose even more heavily if she really had sold the jewellery she bought in Piccadilly and Regent Street, and she had lost a small deposit which she had left in her bank. But in spite of this, her scheme was well worth while. By it she would obtain perhaps seventy to eighty per cent. of the value of the stones, whereas, if she had dealt with one of the recognised fences she would not have received more than from fifteen to twenty per cent. Moreover, her plan was safe. Up to the present she had succeeded in concealing her identity, but application to a fence would have left her either in his power to blackmail, or in that of the intermediary she employed to reach him. No, the plan was clear enough and good enough, too, and in spite of all French’s optimism there remained at the back of his mind the sinking fear that she might yet pull it off.

But if this theory were true, it followed that if he could trace these sales he would be furnished with another jumping-off place or places from which to resume his quest of the elusive Mrs. X. His next problem therefore became, had Mrs. X sold the trinkets, and if so, could he trace the sales?

He went back to the six jewellers, and obtained a detailed description of the articles bought. Then he returned to the Yard, and with the help of a directory and his knowledge of the City, drew up a list of dealers who might be expected to handle such business. Half a dozen plain-clothes men were then impressed into the service, with orders to call on these persons and find out if any of the articles in question had fallen into their hands.

Inspector French had just completed these arrangements when a cable was handed to him. It was in reply to his of the previous night, and read:

“Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, Hotel Bellegarde, Mürren, till end of month.”

Mürren? That was in Switzerland, wasn’t it? He sent for an atlas and a Continental Bradshaw, and looked it up. Yes, it was in Switzerland; moreover, it was close to where he had already been, past that lake with the marvellous colouring—the Lake of Thun, and so to Interlaken and the far-famed Bernese Oberland, places which he had long desired to visit. It was with more than a little eagerness that he once more ran over his reasons for wanting to see Mrs. Root, and then, satisfied, went to his chief’s room. The great man listened and was convinced, and French, jubilant, went to prepare for his departure on the following evening.

On his way to the Yard next morning, he called at the White Star offices and got a copy of the Olympic’s passenger list of the trip in question. The ship, they told him, was in New York, but would be sailing in another three days. She would therefore be due in Southampton on the following Wednesday week.

He learned also that specimens of the handwriting of each traveller were available. Forms were filled and declarations signed both in connection with the purchase of the ticket and with the passing of the luggage through the customs. If French was anxious to examine these, he could do so by applying to their Southampton office or to the customs authorities in the same city.

French decided that if his interview with Mrs. Root led to nothing, he would follow this advice, and he resolved that in this case he would go to Southampton when the Olympic was in, so as to interview the ship’s staff as well.

When he returned to the Yard, he found that some information had already come in about the jewellery. One of his six plain-clothes men had had a stroke of luck. At his very first call, Robsons’ of Oxford Street, he had found a ring which answered the description of one of the purchased articles, and which had been bought from a lady on the afternoon of the day after that on which Mrs. X had opened her bank account. He had taken the ring to Messrs. Lewes & Tottenham, who had made the sale in question, and they identified it as that sold to Mrs. X and paid for by a Mrs. Root’s cheque. Robson had paid £190 for it, while Messrs. Lewes & Tottenham had charged £225, so the lady had lost rather badly over the transaction. She had taken her money in notes of small value, the numbers of which had not been observed.

The assistant at Robsons’ who had served Mrs. X could not recall her appearance; in fact, it was only when confronted with the records of the purchase that he remembered the matter at all. But he was satisfied the client was an American lady, and he thought she was neither very old nor very young, nor in any way remarkable looking.

Inspector French was delighted with his news. It proved to him beyond possibility of doubt that his theory was correct. The purchase of these jewels was simply part of the plan to turn the stolen diamonds into money in a form which could not be traced. Further, it showed that he had also been right in assuming the lady had not gone to France on the evening she drove to Victoria; on the following day she was still in London.

But so far as he could see, the discovery brought him no nearer to finding the mysterious woman. The dealer’s assistant could not describe her, nor had she left any traces which could be followed up. In fact, here was another promising clue which bade fair to vanish in smoke, and as he thought over the possibility, some measure of chagrin began to dull the keenness of his delight.

During the forenoon another of the plain-clothes men struck oil, and by lunch time a third transaction had come to light. Unfortunately, both of these cases was as unproductive as the original discovery. None of the shop people could remember who had sold the trinket. French went himself to each shop, but his most persistent efforts failed to extract any further information.

That night he left for Mürren. In due time he reached Berne, and changing trains, travelled down past Spiez, under the great conical hill of Niesen, along the shores of the lake of Thun and into Interlaken. There he slept the night, and next morning took the narrow gauge line that led south into the heart of the giants of the Bernese Oberland. He felt overpowered by the towering chain of mountains, the Matterhorn, the Eiger, the Mönch, the Jungfrau, and as they wound their way up the narrow valley he felt as if the overwhelming masses were closing down on him from either side. Reaching Lauterbrunnen, he went up by the funiculaire to the Mürren plateau, and continued his way by the electric tramway to the famous resort. There, as he walked to the Bellegarde, he gazed fascinated across the valley at the mighty buttresses of the Jungfrau, one summit of dazzling white succeeding another, up and up and up into the clear, thin blue of the sky. It took more to bring him to earth than a fellow-traveller’s gratified suggestion that at last they would be able to get a decent drink after all that travelling through the snow. He and his new friend went to the bar of the Bellegarde and had two of Scotch, and gradually the magic of the mountains faded, and the interview with Mrs. Root began to reassume its former importance.

An examination of the register revealed the name, Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, Pittsburg, U. S. A., same as at the Savoy, but here it was written in quite a different hand. The real Mrs. Root this time, French thought, as he turned away from the office.

He decided to wait until after lunch before tackling the lady, but he got the head waiter to point her out as she entered the restaurant. She undoubtedly answered the description given by the American detectives as well as by Mr. Williams, but on looking at her he recognized more than ever the vague and unsatisfactory nature of that description. It was one that would apply to hundreds of women.

In the lounge after lunch he spoke to her. He apologised for intruding, explained who he was, and begged that she would give him an interview, and, if possible, some information.

“Why certainly,” she agreed. “We’ll go right to my sitting-room,” and French told himself that from nowhere on earth save the United States of America could that voice have come.

“You are Mrs. Chauncey S. Root?” he began, when they were settled in the private room of the best suite the hotel contained. “I should be glad if, before we begin to talk, you would be good enough to let me see your passport. I shall explain why later.”

“I guess you’d better tell me first,” she returned, leaning back in her arm-chair and lighting a cigarette.

French smiled.

“As you will, madam. The fact is that two ladies, each calling herself Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, of Pittsburg, U. S. A., crossed by the Olympic to Southampton. I have been sent from Scotland Yard to find out which is the real one.”

The lady looked incredulous.

“Say, now, what started you on to that yarn? I crossed by the Olympic, but there was no one else of that name aboard.”

“Nevertheless a Mrs. Chauncey S. Root, who had just crossed by the Olympic, turned up at the Savoy Hotel on the day the ship reached Liverpool, and put through a fraud on a man in London to the tune of £3000. I know, madam, it was not you, but I have to get some proof of it that will convince my superiors.”

With little ejaculations of interest and astonishment the lady arose, and unlocking a despatch case, took from it a book.

“You can have that passport right now,” she declared. “You have interested me quite a lot. Start right in and tell me the story.”

French examined the document, and as he did so his last doubt vanished. The lady before him was Mrs. Root. Mrs. X remained—Mrs. X.

Asking her to keep the story to herself, he told her in considerable detail all that he knew of Mr. Williams’s mysterious visitor, continuing:

“Now, Mrs. Root, you will see where I want your help. Some one has impersonated you, some one who more than probably crossed with you from New York. I want you to think whom it might have been. Here’s a copy of the passenger list. Please take your time, and go over the people you met on the trip. Eliminate those you are sure of, and put a mark opposite the others. You follow what I mean?”

“I follow you all right, but it isn’t as easy as you seem to think. I couldn’t remember all the people I came across between New York and London.”

“I suppose not. But, after all, the thing isn’t so big as that. Only a very few of the women would fill the bill. First, she must be roughly of your height and your figure—not very like, of course, but approximately. You need not mind her colouring, for she could make that up—except her eyes; her eyes are a light golden brown. Can you remember any one with eyes like that?”

The lady shook her head, and French went on:

“Then she must be a clever woman; clever and courageous and determined, and something of an actress also. She must be all those things to have carried such a deal off successfully.”

French paused to allow his words to sink in, then continued once more:

“And she knows quite a lot about you. Not only has she observed your appearance, but she would obviously try to find out all she could about you, so that she might answer questions she might be asked. Do none of these points bring any one to your mind? Please, Mrs. Root, try to help me. If you cannot give me some ideas I may as well confess I don’t know where to turn next.”

“Well, I’ll do what I can, but I don’t see any light so far.” She crossed the room and once more hunted through the despatch case. “Here are some pictures I took with my kodak. Maybe they’ll suggest some one.”

There were two dozen or more photographs of groups of passengers, taken on board the liner. Mrs. Root began with systematic precision to go through them. As she pointed to each individual she repeated to the Inspector what she knew about her.

“Mrs. Jelfs—guess she wouldn’t do—too fat. Miss—Miss——I just don’t recall that young woman’s name. But she’s too tall anyway; half a head taller’n me. Next is Haidee Squance, daughter of Old Man Squance of Consolidated Oil. I’ve known her since I’ve known anything. Then this one is—say now, who is this one? I’ve got it; a little girl called Dinsmore: Irish, I think. She’s no good either—eyes of the lightest blue I ever saw. Next is Mrs. Purce,” and so on for five-and-twenty minutes by the electric clock on the mantelpiece.

French was highly delighted with the efficient way in which his hostess had tackled the job, but when all was said and done the result was disappointingly small. Eight persons in the photographs had been marked as possibles, of whom Mrs. Root remembered the names of five. Of these five, one, a Mrs. Ward, whom Mrs. Root had met for the first time on board, seemed the most likely for several reasons. She was about Mrs. Root’s height, though stouter, had, Mrs. Root believed, light brown eyes, and had been friendly, and, Mrs. Root now remembered, just a trifle inquisitive. But she was ruled out by her nationality. That she really was English, as she claimed, Mrs. Root had no doubt whatever. French showed her the cheques, but she could not recall ever having seen the handwriting in which they were filled out.

But she did give him one hint that he felt might prove valuable. She said that the stewardess who had looked after her cabin was a peculiarly intelligent and observant woman. Mrs. Root had been surprised on different occasions by the intimate knowledge of herself and her fellow travellers which this stewardess exhibited. She did not exactly accuse her of spying, but she thought she would be more likely to answer French’s inquiries than any one else he could find. She did not remember the woman’s name, but she was rather striking-looking, with dark eyes, a young face, and perfectly white hair, and he would have no difficulty in identifying her.

Mrs. Root was extremely interested in the whole affair, and begged the Inspector to keep her posted as to developments. This he promised to do, as he took his leave.

He had now more reason than ever for visiting Southampton when the Olympic was next in, and he set out on the following morning on his return journey, reaching London on the Tuesday afternoon.

At the Yard he found that three more of the transactions of the mysterious lady had come to light, but unfortunately in each case without supplying any clue which might lead to her identification. These discoveries accounted for some £1200 worth of the jewellery Mrs. X had bought, and for this she had received £1090, making a loss on the transaction of only about nine per cent.

He took an early opportunity of visiting Mr. Williams, to ask him if he could identify his mysterious caller in Mrs. Root’s group. But the money-lender was not illuminative. He did not reply for some time, turning the cards over as if uncertain, but finally he pointed to Mrs. Ward’s figure.

“That’s like the lady,” he said doubtfully, “but I confess I am not sure of her. If it is she, it is an uncommonly bad photograph.” He continued staring at the picture. “You know,” he went on slowly, “I’ve seen that woman before; that woman that you say is Mrs. Ward. I’ve certainly seen her somewhere. It’s a curious thing, but I had the same impression when my visitor called here with the diamonds; I thought vaguely that I had seen her before. But I wasn’t so sure as I am about this Mrs. Ward. Somewhere, at some time, I’ve seen her. I wish to heaven I could remember where.”

“I wish to heaven you could,” French agreed in somewhat aggrieved tones. “It would make things a lot easier for me.”

“If I can’t remember to help find my £3000, it’s not likely I shall be able to do it to ease your job,” the other declared dryly. “I can’t place her. I’ve thought and thought, and it’s no good. Some one I’ve seen in a train or a restaurant most likely. I don’t think it’s any one I’ve ever met.”

French next called at the Piccadilly branch of the London and Counties Bank, and saw Mr. Scarlett and the clerk, Plenteous. Both these gentlemen hesitatingly selected Mrs. Ward’s photograph as being like that of their mysterious client, though neither believed it was she. As in the case of Mr. Williams, the manager thought the lady’s features were familiar, though he was sure he had never met her before. With this, French had to be content.

He spent his afternoon in driving round the shops and agents with whom the elusive Mrs. X had dealt. Of the eleven assistants who had served her, seven thought she was like Mrs. Ward, and four could not recall her appearance.

All this testimony was very unsatisfactory to French, but he thought the balance of probability was in favour of Mrs. Ward being the woman he sought, and more hopeful than he had been for some time, he travelled down to Southampton on the Wednesday evening, so as to be there for the arrival of the Olympic on the following day.

CHAPTER XII
THE ELUSIVE MRS. X

Inspector French put up at a small hotel near the town station, and next morning was early at the White Star offices. There he learned that the Olympic was even at that moment coming in, and he went down to the quays and watched the berthing of the monster vessel. It was an impressive experience to see her creep up to her place, manœuvre into position, and make fast. Then from her gangways began to stream the travellers who, for the better part of a week, had journeyed aboard her. Some were hurrying, already intent on business or anxious to catch trains, others leisurely awaiting taxis and motorcars, some smilingly greeting friends or waving farewells to voyage acquaintances, all drifting gradually away, their places taken by others—and still others. . . . French began to think the exodus would never cease, but at last the crowd diminished, and he pushed his way on board and began a search for the purser. Urgent work in connection with the arrival prevented that busy official from attending to him at once, but he sent a steward to show French to his cabin, and presently joined him there.

“Sorry for keeping you waiting, Inspector,” he apologised. “You want some information about our home trip in late November?”

“Yes,” French answered, and he explained his business and produced Mrs. Root’s marked photographs, concluding, “I want to find out the names and addresses of these eight women, and as much information as possible about them.”

“I’m afraid I could scarcely give you that,” the purser answered. “The records of each trip go ashore at the end of the trip, and I have only those of this present run. But some of the staff might remember the names of the ladies, and if so, you could get their addresses at the office ashore.”

“That would do excellently. I have a copy of the passenger list here, if it would be of any use.”

“Yes, it would be a reminder. Let me see now if I can help you myself, and if not, I think I can put you in the way of getting to know.” He began to scrutinise the photographs.

“That’s Mrs. Root,” French indicated, moving round and looking over the other’s shoulder. “She gave me the names of five, but I should like to check her recollection. The other three she couldn’t remember.”

The purser nodded as he turned the pictures over. “That’s a Mrs. Forbes,” he pointed, “and I rather think that is a Miss Grayson or Graves or some name like that. I remember most of these other faces, but not the people’s names.”

“Mrs. Forbes and Miss Grayson are correct according to Mrs. Root.”

The purser laid down the photographs with the air of quiet decision which seemed characteristic.

“I’m afraid that’s my limit.” He touched a bell. “Ask Mrs. Hope to come here,” he ordered, continuing to French, “Mrs. Hope is the chief stewardess. You can go round with her, and I expect she’ll get you what you want all right.”

Mrs. Hope was an efficient-looking woman, who quickly grasped what was required of her. She asked French to accompany her to her sanctum, and there looked over the photographs. She was herself able to identify six of the portraits, and on calling on some of her underlings, the names of the remaining two were speedily forthcoming.

French was glad to find that Mrs. Root’s recollection of the names of her fellow travellers had been correct as far as it had gone, and as he left the great vessel he devoutly hoped that she might have been correct also in her belief that Mrs. X was among the eight women she had indicated. If so, he was well on his way to identify that elusive lady.

He returned to the White Star office and explained that he wanted to know the Christian names, addresses, and other available particulars of the eight women whose names were marked on the passenger list which he handed in, as well as to see a specimen of the handwriting of each.

He realised that the only conclusive test was the handwriting. If one of the eight women wrote the hand of the Mrs. X cheques, he had reached his goal. If not, he determined to go through the declarations of every woman who had crossed on the trip in question in the hope of finding what he sought.

The clerk who had been instructed to attend to him brought out a mass of papers. “I wonder,” he said apologetically, “if you would mind looking through these yourself? It is our busy day, and I’ve an awful lot to get through. You see, it’s quite simple. These are the embarkation declarations for the trip, and you can turn up any one you want quite easily. They are arranged in alphabetical order in the different classes. They’ll give you what you want to know straight off.”

“Right you are,” French declared, delighted thus to get a free hand. “Don’t you bother about me. I’ll peg away, and come and ask you if I get into trouble.”

He “pegged away,” looking up the declaration of each of the eight women, noting the name, address, nationality, and other particulars, and then comparing the handwriting with the signatures on the Mrs. X cheques.

He was not a handwriting expert, but he knew enough about the science to recognise the characteristics which remain unchanged when the writing is disguised. He was, therefore, very patient and thorough in his search, never passing a signature because it looked unlike the model at first sight, but testing each by the rules he had learned, and satisfying himself that it really had been written by a different hand.

He went on without incident until he reached the eighth name on his list. But when he turned to the declaration of Mrs. Ward, the lady whom Mrs. Root had thought the most likely of the lot, he gave a sudden little chuckle of delight. There was the hand of the cheques, the same hand unquestionably, and written without any attempt at disguise! There it was! Mrs. Elizabeth Ward, aged 39, British subject, etc., etc., of Oaklands, Thirsk Road, York. He had reached his goal!

But immediately he was assailed by misgivings, Mrs. Root had thought of Mrs. Ward, but had ruled her out because of her nationality. Mrs. Ward, she had said, was English, while all the people who had seen Mrs. X, seventeen or eighteen persons at least, had agreed she was an American. He would have assumed that Mrs. Root had made a mistake, but for the fact that the declaration said English also. French was puzzled, and he decided that he would go back to the ship and ascertain the views of the staff on the point.

But they all supported Mrs. Root. Mrs. Ward was English; undoubtedly and unquestionably English. The stewards and the stewardesses had some experience on the point, and they guessed they knew. Also he came across the doctor, who, it appeared, had spoken on several occasions to Mrs. Ward, and he was equally positive.

It chanced that as he was leaving the ship he encountered the woman to whom Mrs. Root had advised him to apply, the striking-looking stewardess with dark eyes and white hair, and he stopped and spoke to her.

Unfortunately, she could not tell him very much. She remembered Mrs. Ward, both by name and appearance, though she had not attended to her. But it chanced, nevertheless, that her attention had been specially directed to her because of a certain incident which had taken place towards the end of the voyage. Passing down the corridor while lunch was being served, she had seen the door of one of the cabins in her own charge, open slightly, and a lady appear and glance quickly round, as if to see if she was unobserved. The cabin was occupied by a Mrs. Root, an American, but the lady was this Mrs. Ward. Something stealthy and furtive in her appearance had excited the stewardess’s suspicion, and she had drawn back into another cabin to await developments. Mrs. Ward, evidently satisfied that she was unnoticed, had turned to the dining saloon, and taken her place. The stewardess had kept her eye on her, and after the meal she had seen her go up to Mrs. Root and speak to her, as if reporting the result of her mission. This action had lulled the stewardess’s suspicion, but she had returned to Mrs. Root’s cabin and had had a look round to see if anything had been disturbed. So far as she could see, nothing had, nor had Mrs. Root made any complaint about her things having been interfered with.

If further confirmation of his suspicions were needed, French felt that this episode supplied it. Doubtless Mrs. Ward was amassing information as to the other’s clothes and belongings to assist her in her impersonation. Perhaps also she was photographing envelopes or other documents of which to prepare forgeries in case of need.

There still remained the difficulty of her nationality. Obviously it is easy to mimic the accent and manner of a foreigner, but French found it hard to believe that such mimicry could be so perfect as to deceive a large number of persons, many of whom were experts on that particular point. This, however, was only a small part of the general problem, and did not affect his next business, to find Mrs. Elizabeth Ward, Thirsk Road, York.

He went ashore, and, turning into a telegraph office, sent a wire to the chief of police at York, asking him if a lady of that name lived at the address in question and, if so, to wire was she at home.

His next business was at police headquarters, and thither he was directing his steps when a thought struck him, and he turned aside to the sheds in which the transatlantic luggage is examined. Several of the customs officers were still there, and he went up and spoke to one of them.

“Now,” the young fellow answered in surprise, “it’s a darned queer thing that you came to me about that. Quite a coincidence, that is. I know the man who went through those trunks. He told me about it at the time. It seemed a darned silly thing that any one should want to bring trunks of blankets from America. If you come along I’ll find him for you. And so the lady’s wanted, is she? Say, Jack!” he called a colleague, another clean, efficient young fellow of the same type, “here’s some one wants you. He wants to know about those trunks of blankets you were telling me about two or three trips of the Olympic back. A darned queer coincidence that he should come to me about them. That’s what I call it!”

“Yes, you’ve made a lucky shot, haven’t you?” the second man said to French. “I remember the trunks and the lady they belonged to, because I couldn’t understand why any one should want to bring trunks of blankets across the Atlantic. I’ve never known any one do it before.”