“Gee whiz! You’ve got it! Say, that idea of yours was great. It never occurred to me.”
Tommy held the paper in position some minutes longer until he judged the heat had done its work. Then he withdrew it. A moment later he uttered a cry.
Across the sheet in neat brown printing ran the words:
WITH THE COMPLIMENTS OF MR. BROWN.
Twenty-one
TOMMY MAKES A DISCOVERY
For a moment or two they stood staring at each other stupidly, dazed with the shock. Somehow, inexplicably, Mr. Brown had forestalled them. Tommy accepted defeat quietly. Not so Julius.
“How in tarnation did he get ahead of us? That’s what beats me!” he ended up.
Tommy shook his head, and said dully:
“It accounts for the stitches being new. We might have guessed. . . .”
“Never mind the darned stitches. How did he get ahead of us? We hustled all we knew. It’s downright impossible for anyone to get here quicker than we did. And, anyway, how did he know? Do you reckon there was a dictaphone in Jane’s room? I guess there must have been.”
But Tommy’s common sense pointed out objections.
“No one could have known beforehand that she was going to be in that house—much less that particular room.”
“That’s so,” admitted Julius. “Then one of the nurses was a crook and listened at the door. How’s that?”
“I don’t see that it matters anyway,” said Tommy wearily. “He may have found out some months ago, and removed the papers, then—No, by Jove, that won’t wash! They’d have been published at once.”
“Sure thing they would! No, someone’s got ahead of us today by an hour or so. But how they did it gets my goat.”
“I wish that chap Peel Edgerton had been with us,” said Tommy thoughtfully.
“Why?” Julius stared. “The mischief was done when we came.”
“Yes—” Tommy hesitated. He could not explain his own feeling—the illogical idea that the K.C.’s presence would somehow have averted the catastrophe. He reverted to his former point of view. “It’s no good arguing about how it was done. The game’s up. We’ve failed. There’s only one thing for me to do.”
“What’s that?”
“Get back to London as soon as possible. Mr. Carter must be warned. It’s only a matter of hours now before the blow falls. But, at any rate, he ought to know the worst.”
The duty was an unpleasant one, but Tommy had no intention of shirking it. He must report his failure to Mr. Carter. After that his work was done. He took the midnight mail to London. Julius elected to stay the night at Holyhead.
Half an hour after arrival, haggard and pale, Tommy stood before his chief.
“I’ve come to report, sir. I’ve failed—failed badly.”
Mr. Carter eyed him sharply.
“You mean that the treaty—”
“Is in the hands of Mr. Brown, sir.”
“Ah!” said Mr. Carter quietly. The expression on his face did not change, but Tommy caught the flicker of despair in his eyes. It convinced him as nothing else had done that the outlook was hopeless.
“Well,” said Mr. Carter after a minute or two, “we mustn’t sag at the knees, I suppose. I’m glad to know definitely. We must do what we can.”
Through Tommy’s mind flashed the assurance: “It’s hopeless, and he knows it’s hopeless!”
The other looked up at him.
“Don’t take it to heart, lad,” he said kindly. “You did your best. You were up against one of the biggest brains of the century. And you came very near success. Remember that.”
“Thank you, sir. It’s awfully decent of you.”
“I blame myself. I have been blaming myself ever since I heard this other news.”
Something in his tone attracted Tommy’s attention. A new fear gripped at his heart.
“Is there—something more, sir?”
“I’m afraid so,” said Mr. Carter gravely. He stretched out his hand to a sheet on the table.
“Tuppence—?” faltered Tommy.
“Read for yourself.”
The typewritten words danced before his eyes. The description of a green toque, a coat with a handkerchief in the pocket marked P.L.C. He looked an agonized question at Mr. Carter. The latter replied to it:
“Washed up on the Yorkshire coast—near Ebury. I’m afraid—it looks very much like foul play.”
“My God!” gasped Tommy. “Tuppence! Those devils—I’ll never rest till I’ve got even with them! I’ll hunt them down! I’ll—”
The pity on Mr. Carter’s face stopped him.
“I know what you feel like, my poor boy. But it’s no good. You’ll waste your strength uselessly. It may sound harsh, but my advice to you is: Cut your losses. Time’s merciful. You’ll forget.”
“Forget Tuppence? Never!”
Mr. Carter shook his head.
“So you think now. Well, it won’t bear thinking of—that brave little girl! I’m sorry about the whole business—confoundedly sorry.”
Tommy came to himself with a start.
“I’m taking up your time, sir,” he said with an effort. “There’s no need for you to blame yourself. I daresay we were a couple of young fools to take on such a job. You warned us all right. But I wish to God I’d been the one to get it in the neck. Good-bye, sir.”
Back at the Ritz, Tommy packed up his few belongings mechanically, his thoughts far away. He was still bewildered by the introduction of tragedy into his cheerful commonplace existence. What fun they had had together, he and Tuppence! And now—oh, he couldn’t believe it—it couldn’t be true! Tuppence—dead! Little Tuppence, brimming over with life! It was a dream, a horrible dream. Nothing more.
They brought him a note, a few kind words of sympathy from Peel Edgerton, who had read the news in the paper. (There had been a large headline: EX-V.A.D. FEARED DROWNED.) The letter ended with the offer of a post on a ranch in Argentine, where Sir James had considerable interests.
“Kind old beggar,” muttered Tommy, as he flung it aside.
The door opened, and Julius burst in with his usual violence. He held an open newspaper in his hand.
“Say, what’s all this? They seem to have got some fool idea about Tuppence.”
“It’s true,” said Tommy quietly.
“You mean they’ve done her in?”
Tommy nodded.
“I suppose when they got the treaty she—wasn’t any good to them any longer, and they were afraid to let her go.”
“Well, I’m darned!” said Julius. “Little Tuppence. She sure was the pluckiest little girl—”
But suddenly something seemed to crackin Tommy’s brain. He rose to his feet.
“Oh, get out! You don’t really care, damn you! You asked her to marry you in your rotten cold-blooded way, but I loved her. I’d have given the soul out of my body to save her from harm. I’d have stood by without a word and let her marry you, because you could have given her the sort of time she ought to have had, and I was only a poor devil without a penny to bless himself with. But it wouldn’t have been because I didn’t care!”
“See here,” began Julius temperately.
“Oh, go to the devil! I can’t stand your coming here and talking about ‘little Tuppence.’ Go and look after your cousin. Tuppence is my girl! I’ve always loved her, from the time we played together as kids. We grew up and it was just the same. I shall never forget when I was in hospital, and she came in in that ridiculous cap and apron! It was like a miracle to see the girl I loved turn up in a nurse’s kit—”
But Julius interrupted him.
“A nurse’s kit! Gee whiz! I must be going to Coney Hatch! I could swear I’ve seen Jane in a nurse’s cap too. And that’s plumb impossible! No, by gum, I’ve got it! It was her I saw talking to Whittington at that nursing home in Bournemouth. She wasn’t a patient there! She was a nurse!”
“I daresay,” said Tommy angrily, “she’s probably been in with them from the start. I shouldn?
??t wonder if she stole those papers from Danvers to begin with.”
“I’m darned if she did!” shouted Julius. “She’s my cousin, and as patriotic a girl as ever stepped.”
“I don’t care a damn who she is, but get out of here!” retorted Tommy also at the top of his voice.
The young men were on the point of coming to blows. But suddenly, with an almost magical abruptness, Julius’s anger abated.
“All right, son,” he said quietly, “I’m going. I don’t blame you any for what you’ve been saying. It’s mighty lucky you did say it. I’ve been the most almighty blithering darned idiot that it’s possible to imagine. Calm down,”—Tommy had made an impatient gesture—“I’m going right away now—going to the London and North Western Railway depot, if you want to know.”
“I don’t care a damn where you’re going,” growled Tommy.
As the door closed behind Julius, he returned to his suitcase.
“That’s the lot,” he murmured, and rang the bell.
“Take my luggage down.”
“Yes, sir. Going away, sir?”
“I’m going to the devil,” said Tommy, regardless of the menial’s feelings.
That functionary, however, merely replied respectfully:
“Yes, sir. Shall I call a taxi?”
Tommy nodded.
Where was he going? He hadn’t the faintest idea. Beyond a fixed determination to get even with Mr. Brown he had no plans. He had re-read Sir James’s letter, and shook his head. Tuppence must be avenged. Still, it was kind of the old fellow.
“Better answer it, I suppose.” He went across to the writing table. With the usual perversity of bedroom stationery, there were innumerable envelopes and no paper. He rang. No one came. Tommy fumed at the delay. Then he remembered that there was a good supply in Julius’s sitting room. The American had announced his immediate departure. There would be no fear of running up against him. Besides, he wouldn’t mind if he did. He was beginning to be rather ashamed of the things he had said. Old Julius had taken them jolly well. He’d apologize if he found him there.
But the room was deserted. Tommy walked across to the writing table, and opened the middle drawer. A photograph, carelessly thrust in face upwards, caught his eye. For a moment he stood rooted to the ground. Then he took it out, shut the drawer, walked slowly over to an armchair, and sat down still staring at the photograph in his hand.
What on earth was a photograph of the French girl Annette doing in Julius Hersheimmer’s writing table?
Twenty-two
IN DOWNING STREET
The Prime Minister tapped the desk in front of him with nervous fingers. His face was worn and harassed. He took up his conversation with Mr. Carter at the point it had broken off.
“I don’t understand,” he said. “Do you really mean that things are not so desperate after all?”
“So this lad seems to think.”
“Let’s have a look at his letter again.”
Mr. Carter handed it over. It was written in a sprawling boyish hand.
Dear Mr. Carter,
Something’s turned up that has given me a jar. Of course I may be simply making an awful ass of myself, but I don’t think so. If my conclusions are right, that girl at Manchester was just a plant. The whole thing was prearranged, sham packet and all, with the object of making us think the game was up—therefore I fancy that we must have been pretty hot on the scent.
I think I know who the real Jane Finn is, and I’ve even got an idea where the papers are. That last’s only a guess, of course, but I’ve a sort of feeling it’ll turn out right. Anyhow, I enclose it in a sealed envelope for what it’s worth. I’m going to ask you not to open it until the very last moment, midnight on the 28th, in fact. You’ll understand why in a minute. You see, I’ve figured it out that those things of Tuppence’s are a plant too, and she’s no more drowned than I am. The way I reason is this: as a last chance they’ll let Jane Finn escape in the hope that she’s been shamming this memory stunt, and that once she thinks she’s free she’ll go right away to the cache. Of course it’s an awful risk for them to take, because she knows all about them—but they’re pretty desperate to get hold of that treaty. But if they know that the papers have been recovered by us, neither of those two girls’ lives will be worth an hour’s purchase. I must try and get hold of Tuppence before Jane escapes.
I want a repeat of that telegram that was sent to Tuppence at the Ritz. Sir James Peel Edgerton said you would be able to manage that for me. He’s frightfully clever.
One last thing—please have that house in Soho watched day and night.
Yours, etc.,
Thomas Beresford.
The Prime Minister looked up.
“The enclosure?”
Mr. Carter smiled dryly.
“In the vaults of the Bank. I am taking no chances.”
“You don’t think”—the Prime Minister hesitated a minute—“that it would be better to open it now? Surely we ought to secure the document, that is, provided the young man’s guess turns out to be correct, at once. We can keep the fact of having done so quite secret.”
“Can we? I’m not so sure. There are spies all round us. Once it’s known I wouldn’t give that”—he snapped his fingers—“for the life of those two girls. No, the boy trusted me, and I shan’t let him down.”
“Well, well, we must leave it at that, then. What’s he like, this lad?”
“Outwardly, he’s an ordinary clean-limbed, rather blockheaded young Englishman. Slow in his mental processes. On the other hand, it’s quite impossible to lead him astray through his imagination. He hasn’t got any—so he’s difficult to deceive. He worries things out slowly, and once he’s got hold of anything he doesn’t let go. The little lady’s quite different. More intuition and less common sense. They make a pretty pair working together. Pace and stamina.”
“He seems confident,” mused the Prime Minister.
“Yes, and that’s what gives me hope. He’s the kind of diffident youth who would have to be very sure before he ventured an opinion at all.”
A half smile came to the other’s lips.
“And it is this—boy who will defeat the master criminal of our time?”
“This—boy, as you say! But I sometimes fancy I see a shadow behind.”
“You mean?”
“Peel Edgerton.”
“Peel Edgerton?” said the Prime Minister in astonishment.
“Yes. I see his hand in this.” He struck the open letter. “He’s there—working in the dark, silently, unobtrusively. I’ve always felt that if anyone was to run Mr. Brown to earth, Peel Edgerton would be the man. I tell you he’s on the case now, but doesn’t want it known. By the way, I got rather an odd request from him the other day.”
“Yes?”
“He sent me a cutting from some American paper. It referred to a man’s body found near the docks in New York about three weeks ago. He asked me to collect any information on the subject I could.”
“Well?”
Carter shrugged his shoulders.
“I couldn’t get much. Young fellow about thirty-five—poorly dressed—face very badly disfigured. He was never identified.”
“And you fancy that the two matters are connected in some way?”
“Somehow I do. I may be wrong, of course.”
There was a pause, then Mr. Carter continued:
“I asked him to come round here. Not that we’ll get anything out of him he doesn’t want to tell. His legal instincts are too strong. But there’s no doubt he can throw light on one or two obscure points in young Beresford’s letter. Ah, here he is!”
The two men rose to greet the newcomer. A half whimsical thought flashed across the Premier’s mind. “My successor, perhaps!”
“We’ve had a letter from young Beresford,” said Mr. Carter, coming to the point at once. “You’ve seen him, I suppose?”
“You suppose wrong,” said the lawyer.
“Oh!
” Mr. Carter was a little nonplussed.
Sir James smiled, and stroked his chin.
“He rang me up,” he volunteered.
“Would you have any objection to telling us exactly what passed between you?”
“Not at all. He thanked me for a certain letter which I had written to him—as a matter of fact, I had offered him a job. Then he reminded me of something I had said to him at Manchester respecting that bogus telegram which lured Miss Cowley away. I asked him if anything untoward had occurred. He said it had—that in a drawer in Mr. Hersheimmer’s room he had discovered a photograph.” The lawyer paused, then continued: “I asked him if the photograph bore the name and address of a Californian photographer. He replied: ‘You’re on to it, sir. It had.’ Then he went on to tell me something I didn’t know. The original of that photograph was the French girl, Annette, who saved his life.”
“What?”
“Exactly. I asked the young man with some curiosity what he had done with the photograph. He replied that he had put it back where he found it.” The lawyer paused again. “That was good, you know—distinctly good. He can use his brains, that young fellow. I congratulated him. The discovery was a providential one. Of course, from the moment that the girl in Manchester was proved to be a plant everything was altered. Young Beresford saw that for himself without my having to tell it him. But he felt he couldn’t trust his judgment on the subject of Miss Cowley. Did I think she was alive? I told him, duly weighing the evidence, that there was a very decided chance in favour of it. That brought us back to the telegram.”
“Yes?”
“I advised him to apply to you for a copy of the original wire. It had occurred to me as probable that, after Miss Cowley flung it on the floor, certain words might have been erased and altered with the express intention of setting searchers on a false trail.”
Carter nodded. He took a sheet from his pocket, and read aloud:
Come at once, Astley Priors, Gatehouse, Kent. Great developments—Tommy.
“Very simple,” said Sir James, “and very ingenious. Just a few words to alter, and the thing was done. And the one important clue they overlooked.”