Читать книгу Ambrose Lavendale, Diplomat - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 4

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The two young men stood side by side before the window of the Milan smoke-room—Ambrose Lavendale, the American, and his friend Captain Merrill from the War Office. Directly opposite to them was a narrow street running down to the Embankment, at the foot of which they could catch a glimpse of the river. A little to the left was a dark and melancholy building with a number of sightless windows.

'Wonder what sort of people live in that place?' Merrill asked curiously. 'Milan Mansions they call it, don't they?'

The other nodded.

'Gloomy sort of barracks,' he remarked. 'I've never seen even a face at the window.'

'There's a new experience for you, then,' Merrill observed, pointing a little forward—'a girl's face, too.'

Lavendale was stonily silent, yet when the momentarily raised curtain had fallen he gave a little gasp. It could have been no hallucination. The face, transfigured though it was, in a sense, by its air of furtiveness, was, without a doubt, the face of the girl who had been constantly in his thoughts for the last three weeks. He counted the windows carefully from the ground, noted the exact position of the room and passed his arm through his friend's.

'Come along, Reggie,' he said.

'Where to?'

'Don't ask any questions,' Lavendale begged. 'Just wait.'

They left the hotel by an unfrequented way, Lavendale half a dozen paces ahead. Merrill ventured upon a mild protest.

'Look here, old chap,' he complained, 'you might tell me where we are off to?'

Lavendale slackened his speed for a moment to explain.

'To that room,' he declared. 'Didn't you recognize the girl's face?'

Merrill shook his head.

'I scarcely noticed it.'

'It was the girl whom we found unconscious, half poisoned by that fellow Hurn's diabolical invention,' Lavendale explained. 'She wasn't there by accident, either. I caught her listening in the Milan Grill-room when Hurn was talking to me, and the day after the inquest she disappeared.'

Merrill laid a hand upon his friend's arm.

'Even if this is so, Lavendale,' he expostulated, 'she probably doesn't want us bothering over here. What are you going to say to her? Pretty sort of asses we shall look if we blunder in upon her like this.'

Lavendale continued to climb the stairs. By this time they had reached the second landing.

'If you feel that way about it, Merrill,' he said, 'you can wait for me—or clear out altogether, if you like. I want to have a few words with this young lady, and I am going to have them.'

Merrill sighed.

'I'll see you through it, Ambrose,' he grumbled. 'All the same, I'm not at all sure that we are not making fools of ourselves.'

They mounted yet another flight. A crazy lift went lumbering past them up to the top of the building. Lavendale paused outside a door near the end of the passage.

'This should be the one,' he announced.

He rang a bell. They could hear it pealing inside, but there was no response. Once more he pressed the button. This time it seemed to them both that its shrill summons was ringing through empty spaces. There was no sound of any movement within. The door of the next flat, however, opened. A tall, rather stout man, very untidily dressed, with pale, unwholesome face and a mass of ill-arranged hair, looked out.

'Sir,' he said, 'it is no use ringing that bell. The only purpose you serve is to disturb me at my labours. The flat is empty.'

'Are you quite sure about that?' Lavendale asked.

'Absolutely!'

'How was it, then, that I saw a face at one of the windows a quarter of an hour ago?' Lavendale demanded.

'You are mistaken, sir,' was the grim reply. 'The thing is impossible. The porter who has the letting of the flat is only on duty in the afternoon, and, as a special favour to the proprietors, I have the keys here.'

'Then with your permission I will borrow them,' Lavendale observed. 'I am looking for rooms in this neighbourhood.'

The man bowed and threw open the door.

'Come in, sir,' he invited pompously. 'I will fetch the keys for you. My secretary,' he added, with a little wave of his hand, pointing to a florid, over-buxom and untidy-looking woman who was struggling with an ancient typewriter. 'You find me hard at work trying to finish a play I have been commissioned to write for my friend Tree. You are aware, perhaps, of my—er—identity?'

'I am sorry,' Lavendale replied. 'You see, I am an American, not a Londoner.'

'That,' the other declared, 'accounts for it. My name is Somers-Keyne—Hamilton Somers-Keyne. My work, I trust, is more familiar to you than my personality?'

'Naturally,' Lavendale assented, a little vaguely.

The dramatist, who had been searching upon a mantelpiece which seemed littered with cigarette ends, scraps of letters and an empty tumbler or so, suddenly turned around with the key in his hand.

'It is here,' he pronounced. 'Examine the rooms for yourself, Mr.——?'

'Lavendale.'

'Mr. Lavendale. They are furnished, I believe, but as regards the rent I know nothing except that the myrmidon who collects it is unpleasantly persistent in his attentions. If you will return the key to me, sir, when you have finished, I shall be obliged.'

'Certainly,' Lavendale promised.

The two young men opened the door and explored a dusty, barely-furnished, gloomy, conventional little suite, consisting of a single bedroom, a boxlike sitting-room, and a bathroom in the last stages of dilapidation. The rooms were undoubtedly empty, nor was there anywhere any sign of recent habitation. Lavendale stood at the window, leaned over and counted. When he drew back his face was more than ever puzzled. He looked once more searchingly around the unprepossessing rooms.

'This was the window, Reggie,' he insisted.

Merrill had lost interest in the affair and did not hesitate to show it.

'Seems to me you must have counted wrongly,' he declared. 'In any case, there's no one here now, and it's quite certain that no one has been in during the last hour or so.'

Lavendale said nothing for a moment. He examined the flat once more carefully, locked it up, and took the key back to Mr. Somers-Keyne's room. The dramatist opened the door himself.

'You were favourably impressed, I trust, with the rooms?' he inquired, holding out his hand for the key.

'I am not sure,' Lavendale replied. 'Tell me, how long is it since any one occupied them?'

'They are dusted and swept once a week,' Mr. Somers-Keyne told him, looking closely at his questioner from underneath his puffy eyelids, 'and they may have been shown occasionally to a prospective tenant. Otherwise, no one has been in them for nearly a month.'

'No one could have been in them this morning, then?'

'Absolutely impossible,' was the confident answer. 'The keys have not been off my shelf.'

'We must not interrupt you further,' Lavendale declared. 'I shall apply for a first night seat when your production is presented, Mr. Somers-Keyne.'

'You are very good, sir,' the other acknowledged. 'Your face, I may say, is familiar to me as a patron of the theatre. What are the chances, may I inquire, of your taking up your residence in this building?'

'I have not made up my mind,' Lavendale replied. 'There are some other particulars I must have. I shall call and interview the hall-porter this afternoon.'

'If a welcome, sir, from your nearest neighbour is any inducement,' Mr. Somers-Keyne pronounced, 'let me offer it to you. My secretary, too, Miss Brown—I think I mentioned Miss Brown's name?—is often nervous with an empty flat next door. I am out a great deal in the evening, Mr. Lavendale. My work demands a constant study of the most modern methods of dramatic production. You follow me, I am sure?'

'Absolutely,' Lavendale assured him. 'By the by, sir, we are returning for a moment or two to the bar at the Milan. If you will accompany us——'

Mr. Somers-Keyne was already reaching out for his hat.

'With the utmost pleasure, my dear young friends,' he consented. 'The Milan bar was at one time a hallowed spot to me. Misfortunes of various sorts—but I will not weary you with a relation of my troubles. If Tree rings up, Flora, say that I shall have finished the second act to-night. You can tell him that it is wonderful. Now, gentlemen!'

They left the building together and a few moments later were ensconced in a corner of the bar with a bottle of whisky and some tumblers before them. Lavendale helped his guest bountifully. He had hard work, however, to keep the trend of the conversation away from the subject of Mr. Somers-Keyne's early triumphs upon the stage, which it appeared were numerous and remarkable. With every tumblerful of whisky and soda, indeed, he seemed to grow more forgetful of his home across the way. As he expanded he grew more untidy. His tie slipped, his collar had flown open, his waistcoat was spotted with the liquid which had fallen from the glass in his unsteady efforts to lift it to his lips. His pasty face had become mottled. Lavendale, who had been watching his guest closely, fired a sudden question at him.

'You don't happen to know a Miss de Freyne, do you?' he inquired innocently.

The change in the man was wonderful. From a state of maudlin amiability he seemed to be stricken with an emotion of either fear or anger. His eyes narrowed. He set his glass down almost steadily, although he was obliged to breathe heavily several times before he spoke.

'Miss de Freyne,' he repeated. 'What about her?'

Lavendale pointed towards the window behind them.

'Nothing except that when I was in here an hour ago I saw Miss de Freyne's face at the window of that empty suite next to yours,' he said.

Mr. Somers-Keyne rose to his feet. A splendid dignity guided his footsteps and kept his voice steady.

'Sir,' he pronounced, 'I am able to surmise now the reason for your excessive hospitality. I wish you good morning!'

He turned towards the door.

'Mr. Somers-Keyne,' Lavendale began, rising hastily to his feet——

The dramatist waved him away. His gesture, if a little theatrical, was final. The honours remained with him. …

Lavendale, a few minutes later, on his way to his luncheon-table in the grill-room, threw his accustomed glance across the room towards the corner which was still possessed of a peculiar interest for him. He paused in the act of taking his place. At her same table, with a little pile of manuscript propped up in front of her, Miss de Freyne was seated, studying the luncheon menu. For a moment he hesitated. Then he rose to his feet and, crossing the room, addressed her.

'Miss de Freyne!'

She glanced up in some surprise. She seemed, indeed, scarcely to recognize him.

'You have not forgotten me, I hope?' he continued. 'My name is Lavendale.'

'Of course,' she assented slowly. 'You were the friend of that strange little creature with the marvellous invention, weren't you?'

'I was scarcely his friend,' Lavendale corrected, 'but I did my best to help him.'

She made a pencil mark in the margin of the manuscript and laid it face downwards upon the table. Then she leaned back in her chair and looked at him.

'Tell me what happened?' she begged. 'I was obliged to leave London the next day and I have only just returned. Was it suicide or murder?'

'The man was murdered, without a doubt,' Lavendale replied.

'Is that so, really?' she asked gravely. 'Tell me, had he given over his formula to the War Office?'

Lavendale sighed.

'Unfortunately no! He was to have handed it over at eleven o'clock the next morning.'

'Was it found amongst his effects?'

'Not a written line of any sort.'

'Is any one suspected?' she inquired, dropping her voice a little.

Lavendale hesitated and glanced cautiously around.

'Scarcely that,' he answered, 'but you remember the man Jules, the maîtres d'hôtel here?'

She nodded.

'A Swiss, wasn't he? I was just wondering what had become of him.

'During the investigations the next day,' Lavendale continued, 'it was discovered that his papers were forged and that he was in reality an Austrian. He was interned at once, of course, and I believe there was a certain amount of secrecy about his movements on that night. So far as I know, though, nothing has been discovered.'

She raised her eyebrows deprecatingly.

'The detective system over here,' she remarked, 'is sometimes hopeless, isn't it?'

'Yet in one respect,' Lavendale pointed out, 'they certainly were prompt on that night. I understand that Jules was interned within an hour of the discovery of the murder.'

Miss de Freyne drew her manuscript towards her with a little shrug of the shoulders.

'They failed to find the formula, though,' she reminded him.

Lavendale, accepting his dismissal, returned to his place, finished his lunch and made his way round to the Milan Mansions. A caretaker was established now in his office in the hall. He was a small and rather melancholy-looking man, who hastily concealed a blackened pipe as Lavendale entered.

'I understand that you have a suite to let,' the latter began, 'upon the third floor?'

The man pulled out a list.

'We have several suites to let, sir,' he replied; 'nothing upon the third floor, though.'

'What about number thirty-two?'

The caretaker shook his head.

'Number thirty-two is let, sir.'

'Are you sure?' Lavendale persisted. 'I called this morning and was allowed to look over it by Mr. Somers-Keyne, who had the keys.'

'It was taken by a young lady just before one o'clock, at our head office,' the man told him. 'With regard to the other suites, sir——'

'Could you tell me the young lady's name?' Lavendale interrupted.

'I haven't heard it yet,' the man answered shortly. 'With regard to the other suites——'

Lavendale slipped a coin into his hand.

'Thank you,' he said, 'there is no other suite in which I am interested for the moment.'

He stepped out. Almost on the threshold he met Miss de Freyne, face to face.

'Are you coming,' he asked, raising his hat, 'to take possession of your new abode?'

She was entirely at her ease. She looked at him, however, a little curiously. It was as though she were trying to make an appreciative estimate of him in her mind.

'I suppose,' she observed, with a little sigh, 'that we are playing at cross-purposes. You are an American, are you not, Mr. Lavendale?'

'I am,' he answered.

'German-American?'

'No!'

'English-American?'

'No!'

'What then?'

'American.'

'Tell me exactly what that means?' she insisted.

'It means that my sympathies are concentrated upon my own country,' he answered. 'Those prefixes—German-American or English-American—are misnomers. Wherever my personal sympathies may be, my patriotism overshadows them. Now you know the truth about me. I am an American for America.'

She sighed.

'Yes,' she murmured, 'I had an idea that was your point of view. I am a Frenchwoman, you see, for France.'

'Our interests,' he remarked, 'should not be far apart.'

'If I were sure of that,' she declared, 'the rest would be easy. I am for France and for France only. You are for America, and, I am afraid, for America only.'

'Chance, in this instance,' he ventured, 'has at any rate made us allies.'

'I should like to feel quite sure about that,' she said. 'If you are not busy, will you walk with me on to the Embankment?'

They strolled down the narrow street and found a seat in the gardens.

'Between thieves,' she continued, looking him in the face, 'there is sometimes honour. Why not amongst those who are engaged upon affairs which, if not nefarious, are at least secret? Let us see whether we can be allies, and, if not, where our interests clash. You know perfectly well, as I do, that Jules murdered that little chemist from Chicago and stole the formula. You know very well that the suite in which you take so much interest in the Milan Mansions, belongs to Jules. You know very well that he was arrested there a quarter of an hour after he left the hotel, and that he had had no time to dispose of the formula. You know that the place has been searched, inch by inch, but that the formula has not been found.'

'I have just arrived exactly as far as that myself,' Lavendale assented mendaciously.

'You are some time behind me, but it is true that we have arrived at the same point,' she continued. 'Now the question is, can we work together? What should you do with the formula if ever it came into your possession?'

His lips tightened.

'I cannot tell you that,' he said firmly.

'I believe that I know,' she went on. 'Well, let me put you to the test.'

She opened a black silk bag which she was carrying, a little trifle with white velvet lining and turquoise clasp. From a very dainty pocket-book in the interior she drew out a crumpled sheet of paper, covered with strange, cabalistic signs. She smoothed it out upon her knee and handed it to him.

'Well,' she exclaimed, 'there it is! Now you shall tell me what you are going to do with it?'

His hand had closed over the piece of paper. He gripped it firmly. Before she could stop him he had transferred it to his own pocket. She shrugged her shoulders.

'You had better return it to me,' she advised.

'I shall not,' he replied. 'Forgive me. I did not ask you for the formula—I did not know you had discovered it—but since I have it, I want you to remember that it was the discovery of an American and I shall keep it for my country.'

'But your country is not in need of anything of the sort,' she protested.

'I will be so far frank with you as to explain my motive,' he said. 'A few months ago I was attached to the American Embassy here. I have been attached to the Embassy in Paris, and for two months I was in Berlin. I have come to certain conclusions about America, in which I differ entirely from the popular opinion and the popular politics of my country. England has been living for many years in great peril, but there have been many who have recognized that. The peril of America is at least as great, and has remained almost altogether unrecognized. We have no army, a small navy, an immense seaboard, wealth sufficient to excite the cupidity of any nation. And we have no allies. We make the grave and serious mistake of ignoring world politics, of believing ourselves outside them and yet imagining ourselves capable of protecting the interests of American citizens in foreign countries. That is where I know we are wrong. I have resigned from the Diplomatic Service of America but I remain her one secret agent. I intend to keep this formula for her. She will need it.'

Suzanne de Freyne shook her head.

You will not be able to leave the gardens alive with it,' she assured him.

He glanced at her incredulously. Her smooth face was unwrinkled. She had the air of looking at him as though he were a child.

'You are in the kindergarten stage of your profession,' she observed. 'Now watch. You see those two men seated on the bench a little way further down?'

'Well?'

She rose from her seat, shook out her skirt and sat down again. The two men, also, had risen and were advancing towards them. She held up her hand—they seemed somehow to drift away.

'I repeat,' she went on, 'that you would not leave this garden alive. But, my friend, we will not quarrel over a worthless scrap of paper, for that is precisely what you have carefully buttoned up in your pocket-book. I have failed to find the formula. That is a dummy. Keep it, if you will. There isn't a single intelligible sign upon it.'

He drew it from his pocket and glanced at it. Even with his slight knowledge of chemistry he was compelled to admit that her words were truth.

'Keep it or give it me back, as you like,' she continued. 'It has no value. The fact remains that in his brief journey from the service room at the Milan Grill-room to his rooms in the Milan Mansions, Jules managed to conceal somewhere or other the paper which he has taken from Hurn. If he passed it on to some one else, it is by this time in Germany, but we have reason to know that he did not. The paper is still in concealment. It is still to be found.'

'And the means?' he asked.

She shrugged her shoulders lightly.

'Alas!' she exclaimed, 'how can I tell you now? How can I even engage your help? You have disclosed your hand.'

He sat gazing gloomily out at the river.

'Very well,' he decided at last, 'let me help and I will be content with a copy of the formula.'

She smiled.

'That is rather sensible of you,' she said. 'To tell you the truth, I require your help. For reasons which I need not explain, we do not wish this matter to be dealt with in any way officially. I am in perfect accord with the English Secret Service, but we do not wish to have their men seen about the Milan Mansions. To-night, Jules re-enters into possession of his rooms. I offer you an adventure. It is what you wish?'

'But I thought Jules was interned?'

'He was and is,' she told him, 'but the greater powers are working. This afternoon he will be permitted to escape—he thinks through the agency of friends. He will come to London in a motor-car, he will come at once to his rooms, and, although every inch of them has been searched, I am perfectly convinced that somewhere in them or between them and the Milan, he will lay his hands upon the formula. You care about this adventure?'