Читать книгу The Ex-Detective - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 4

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Ex-detective Malcolm Gossett stood upon the edge of a crumbling and rudely constructed wooden dock and decided that with infinite pains, skids, misdirections and discomforts he had found his way into the most God-forsaken and dreary hole upon the face of the earth. Behind him, mist-ridden and rain-soaked, stretched many acres of marshland, across which wound the narrow track by which he had come. Facing him on the fog-hung horizon was the sombre glow of the East End lights. The curve of the river, marked by the gaunt buildings, factories and warehouses which rose here and there in stark and portentous ugliness, stretched to the limits of his obscured vision. The stink of some chemical works poisoned the air. Between him and the river itself was nothing but a blank sea of mud. Immediately below him was his destination—a miserable inlet or backwater of the river—and secured to some iron rings at his feet was a dirty and ill-looking ketch, with untidily furled sails and sloppy deck. Nothing but the reflection that it had cost him an hour and a half to get here, and that if he returned with his mission unaccomplished he might be compelled to make the journey again, kept Gossett from turning his back upon the whole inferno and hurrying back to the corner beyond which his taxicab driver had refused to attempt further progress.

There was a sound of movement below, a flash of light. Presently a head only half seen presented itself from the cabin below. Even then Gossett had to struggle with the inclination towards prompt and undignified retreat. He held his ground unwillingly.

“Who the mischief are you and what do you want?” asked the presumed owner of the ketch.

The voice startled Gossett almost as much as the hideousness of the place had chilled and depressed him. A torrent of oaths and threats would have seemed in keeping with the surroundings and with so much of the man as was visible; the slow Oxford drawl, the gentle weariness came as an incredible shock.

“My name is Gossett—Malcolm Gossett. I came down to have a few words with you on business.”

“What sort of business? Who sent you?” was the startled enquiry.

Gossett leaned down. He was about four or five feet above the level of the deck.

“A stranger to me, I must confess,” he acknowledged. “A lady called Truslove.”

“Bella Truslove! Like her damned cheek. I don’t know who you are, sir, but do I look like receiving visitors here?”

“You appear to me,” Gossett admitted, “to be in a thoroughly unsuitable place for anything, except perhaps to commit suicide.”

“Or murder,” the other laughed unpleasantly.

“Precisely,” Gossett agreed. “With your permission, I shall make my apologies for disturbing you and take my leave.”

“You will do nothing of the sort,” was the unexpectedly firm reply. “Since you are here, you will remain long enough at any rate to tell me your business.”

“I do not find your reception encouraging,” Gossett observed.

“Any other criticisms?”

“Since you invite me to be frank, I find your environment disgusting and your boat, to say the least of it, uninviting. Good night.”

“Oh, no, I can’t part with you just yet,” the mocking voice replied. “You may change your opinion before you go. You haven’t seen my cabin yet.”

“If it is as filthy as the rest of the boat, I haven’t any desire to,” Gossett said. “Good night or no good night, I’m off.”

A tall figure, a man in rough, blue serge trousers, a fisherman’s jersey and without tie or collar, suddenly loomed into shape. His hair was unkempt but his features matched his voice. What kept Gossett for the moment motionless, however, was the fact that he was looking into the barrel of a shotgun.

“This, my friend,” the tenant of the ketch confided, “is chiefly for show. I do shoot a duck sometimes, at this hour of the night, and I was, in fact, just loading my gun when you arrived. It would pain me to use my weapon for any less lawful purpose. I cannot endure curiosity, however, so I am compelled to ask you to descend into my cabin and, so long as you have found your way here, to tell me why you came and what you want.”

Gossett considered the situation for a moment. In a loosely hanging little pocket easily accessible through the slit in his mackintosh, he possessed a much deadlier lethal weapon than the carelessly held shotgun which he was convinced the man on the ketch had no intention of using. He shrugged his shoulders, therefore, and gave in.

“If you will give me a hand,” he suggested.

The man kicked some steps into position. Carelessly though he held his gun, he evidently had no intention of parting with his apparent advantage. Gossett scrambled down and followed his host into the cabin. The latter inspected him curiously under the hanging oil lamp.

“Well,” he decided, “you look a bit of an athlete, but I daresay I could deal with you if you proved troublesome. I have an inherited aversion to a loaded sporting gun.”

He broke it and, extracting the cartridges, slipped them into his pocket and stood the gun up in a corner. Then he seated himself opposite his visitor and leaned across the strip of table.

“Well, my mysterious friend,” he asked, “now what do you think of my temporary habitation?”

Gossett’s eyes wandered round the place in a curiosity which he took no trouble to hide. The ketch had evidently been used as a yacht, for the cupboards were of thick mahogany and had been kept in decent repair. On one side were bottles, mostly whisky and brandy bottles and unopened; on the other side were books, books of extraordinary variety and quality. There was an exquisitely bound copy of Verlaine’s poems, half a dozen volumes of Alfred de Musset, a rare edition of Shelley and a Chiswick Press Shakespeare. On the table itself was the Times, the Fortnightly Review and the Nineteenth Century. Sprawling across them, half-opened, was an outrageous copy of Le Sourire.

“Time you answered my question, isn’t it?” the owner of this megalomaniacal abode demanded. “What do you think of my habitation? What do you think of me? What made you take account of the possibly idle words of a somewhat passé streetwalker and risk your life in such an entourage?”

“To tell you the truth,” Gossett observed, “I think your abode is horrible and you are probably mad. However, the fact remains that, whatever her profession may be, the lady whose name you recognised managed to rake together ten pounds, which she handed over to me as a fee to come down here and see if I could help you out of your troubles. I have already, I must confess, lost my desire to do so. You probably don’t deserve help and don’t want it.”

The owner of the ketch leaned forward. His mouth had lost its half-humorous curve, his expression was somewhat more unpleasant.

“Before we go any further,” he insisted, “tell me precisely who you are and what your profession is.”

Gossett reflected for a moment.

“It is perhaps a reasonable enquiry,” he admitted. “I was once employed as a detective at Scotland Yard.”

The other man’s muscles seemed to stiffen and there was an ugly glitter in his eyes. Gossett continued, however, indifferently:

“For various reasons, I found the limitations of my position irksome. I decided that the suspected criminal, or even the actual criminal, if he become so through no fault of his own, deserved some measure of help in the world and could probably afford to pay for it. I struck out a profession of my own. I have not found a suitable name for it yet, but outside my office, Number Seventeen, Macadam Street, you will find a brass plate bearing the name of Malcolm Gossett and nothing else.”

The owner of the ketch appeared to relax.

“You’re a quaint bird, anyway,” he observed. “Take a spot of anything?”

“Another two minutes without such an invitation,” Gossett replied, “I should have considered a breach of hospitality. You seem to be very well supplied. I should like a whisky and soda.”

Gossett’s host produced a bottle of a choice brand, a syphon, and two glasses. He sneered at his visitor’s modest portion, filled a tumbler half full of whisky for himself and splashed in a little soda water.

“There is no one in the world who could help me,” he declared, “but that isn’t your fault. Here’s how!”

“If you drink whisky like that for long,” Gossett remarked, as his host set down the glass empty, “no one will have a chance of helping you.”

“Don’t be rude to me—you streetwalker’s tout,” was the sullen retort.

Gossett half rose to his feet.

“If you say that again,” he threatened, “I’ll give you such a hiding that you’ll be glad to jump into your own filthy little backwater.”

There was a moment’s silence. From outside came the gurgling from the backwash of a passing steamer. There was no other sound. The two men seemed equally tense, their eyes fixed on each other. It was the owner of the ketch who relaxed.

“All right,” he said. “Bella isn’t a bad sort, after all. She has a conscience. Earn your ten pounds.”

“I can only earn my ten pounds,” Gossett explained, “if you can tell me of any way in which you require help. Otherwise, I shall deduct my expenses and hand back the balance of my fee to—your lady friend.”

“Touché,” the owner of the ketch acknowledged. “You can’t help me, Mr. Gossett, if that is your name. You’ve got the smell of the policeman about you still. You’d be off to Scotland Yard if I told you my story.”

“That is precisely where you are wrong,” Gossett said firmly. “I am in no way connected with the Yard or the police. You can tell me your story, if you have one, as you would to a lawyer. If I can help you, I shall tell you so. If I can’t, not a word of what you have said will ever be repeated.”

“New sort of game this, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

The owner of the ketch reflected.

“Bella’s no fool,” he soliloquised. “I expect she knew what she was up to. Ever hear the name of Alexander Hurlby?”

“It’s a name that’s pretty nearly driven Scotland Yard mad,” Gossett confided. “The Alexander Hurlby murder was our bête noir for months. It was one of the reasons why I left the Yard.”

“That’s flattering, at any rate,” the other observed. “Well, that’s my name.”

“What do you mean?” Gossett demanded. “Hurlby was the name of the man who was murdered.”

“Captain Alexander Hurlby, Dragoon Guards,” his opposite neighbour put in quickly. “Here I am. I am dead enough. This is my burial place and you’re sitting in my coffin. Have a drop more whisky?”

Gossett rose to his feet and swung the chain-hung oil lamp so that the light shone full into his neighbour’s face, then he resumed his seat.

“My God!” he murmured. “That may be the truth of it, after all. Yes, I’ll have a drop more whisky. On one condition, though. Drink like a human being—two fingers and not more.”

The man opposite laughed bitterly as he filled the glasses.

“Why should I drink like a human being?” he demanded, serving himself, however, to only a reasonable portion. “Haven’t I told you that I’m not a human being? I’m a corpse and this is my coffin. Nothing left for me in life but to get drunk here or to steal out in one of those back streets, on the other side of the river where the police don’t come, and look for my fun there. Much more respectable to get drunk like a gentleman here.”

“You won the Newdigate Prize at Oxford,” Gossett reflected. “You have published three volumes of verse and one of criticism. In the war, you got your D.S.O. and several foreign decorations. When you retired—”

“Soon afterwards, anyway, I was murdered,” the owner of the ketch interrupted. “Since then I’ve solved the mystery of purgatory—just a little worse than hell, that’s all.”

“Listen,” Gossett said earnestly. “You’re worth helping. When I was at the Yard, I was assistant to the man who had your case in hand. I know all about you. I’m rather glad I took Bella Truslove’s ten pounds.”

“You forget,” the other remarked, with a sudden flame of despair in his tone. “You forget one thing.”

“What’s that?”

Captain Alexander Hurlby rose to his feet. He leaned across the table which the flat of his hands were clutching. There was something portentous in his face, as there was in his tone.

“If I’m not the murdered man,” he shouted, “I must be the murderer!”

Gossett’s office boy came into his master’s private room to make his announcement, a few mornings later, with a subdued chuckle.

“There’s that dame again that was here Tuesday, sir,” he announced.

“Show her in and mind your manners,” was the severe reply.

Bella Truslove in her halcyon days had been called a flaming blonde. Nowadays the light had faded from her eyes and from her hair, and she had acquired the patient, drab humility of the partially submerged. She was dressed as quietly as she knew how, and she had reduced to the last possible degree the perfumes and cosmetics on which she relied. Nevertheless, she entered Gossett’s plain little office almost shyly and she was obviously ill at ease when he rose to his feet and himself placed her chair. As soon as the door was closed, however, a certain eagerness came into her face.

“You have been to see him?” she asked.

“I was there the day before yesterday,” he told her.

“He wasn’t too—fierce?”

Gossett smiled.

“Well,” he replied, “at one time I think I had a narrow escape from coming away with a few slugs in my legs. Afterwards we got on all right, though.”

“Can you do anything to help?”

Gossett’s expression was very grave. The Alexander Hurlby case was already beginning to trouble him.

“It is difficult,” he admitted. “I shall try, of course, but it seems to me there is one insurmountable barrier.”

A spot of colour burned through the pallor of her cheeks, the light in her faded eyes was almost of fear. She had drawn off her gloves and her thin veiny hands, overladen with sham jewellery, were clenched nervously together.

“Is there nothing to be done?” she pleaded.

“Is it for you to ask me that?” he ventured. “I think we both know that there is only one person who can set him free.”

Something of the old hopelessness was back in her face. Gossett sighed as he counted out a little packet of notes which he had drawn from his pocket.

“In any case,” he told her, “there was no need for this money. I did not understand when I took it. Everything that can be done will be done without that.”

He passed it into her trembling fingers.

“You are sure?” she asked wistfully.

“Absolutely.”

She opened her bag and slipped in the money. The packet found its place amongst three sixpences, a few ha’pence and an overperfumed but none too clean handkerchief.

“If the money really isn’t necessary,” she said, “for me it will be wonderful. I stole some of it,” she added faintly, “and God, how I struggled for the rest! Mr. Gossett,” she went on, her voice suddenly hysterical, “they told me you were such a clever man. Can’t you help? Can’t you drag him out of all that? Don’t tell me there is only one way. He never did anything wrong. He was too great a gentleman.”

Gossett moved uneasily in his chair. He felt that the words which he should have spoken would have been the last refinement of torture. He rose to his feet and led her to the door, his hand upon her shoulder in friendly fashion.

“Come in and see me again soon,” he begged. “You shall know then how I’m getting on.”

“Next week,” she promised.

Bella Truslove made no further appearance, however, at Gossett’s office, and in the Sunday papers, which seem to have a flair for hitting upon such items of news, he learnt the reason. He came upon the following paragraph quite by accident.

Woman of bad character ejected from Cabinet Minister’s house. Attempts to fight her way in to study of well-known peer. Given into custody by Lord Hurlby.

There followed a brief report of the case, in the course of which it was stated that a woman giving the name of Bella Truslove, whom the police described as being of bad character, was brought before the magistrate and remanded. Gossett’s face darkened as he read. The next morning he sought an interview with the Chief Commissioner at Scotland Yard.

“Sir Henry,” he said, “during the last week when I was in the Service you expressed yourself very forcibly on the subject of several undiscovered murders. The Alexander Hurlby affair was one of them. I believe I have a chance from outside of bringing you information which would clear that matter up.”

Sir Henry nodded.

“I’ll look after you, Gossett, if you’re able to do that,” he promised.

“What I want from you at the present moment, sir, is just a bald letter of introduction to Lord Hurlby. Just tell him that I am a respectable man who has left the Service here of my own accord. I want an interview with him. He can please himself if he sees me, of course, but a letter from you will give me the chance I require.”

Sir Henry nodded and summoned his secretary. Gossett left the building with the letter in his pocket. Even then there were difficulties. It was a week’s time before Gossett was ushered into the magnificent library of Lord Hurlby’s town house in Grosvenor Place. The secretary who had escorted him in advanced to his master’s desk with a few explanatory words.

“Mr. Gossett, sir,” he announced. “He sent us a letter from Sir Henry Holmes last week and you agreed to see him this afternoon at half-past six.”

Lord Hurlby looked up from his desk.

“Come directly I ring, Chaplin,” he directed. “I’m hoping that Mr.—er—Gossett will not keep me very long.”

The secretary passed into the shadows of the great room and out of the door. Gossett, his purpose gained at last, was in no hurry to begin. He found himself studying with avid curiosity the grey, masklike face of the man whom the illustrated press of the country had made so familiar. A long face with straight hard features, sombre grey eyes and immobile expression. Not in the least like the man in the shabby ketch on that filthy backwater.

“You are not going to keep me for very long, I trust, Mr. Gossett,” Hurlby said, with the faintest note of impatience in his tone. “I gathered that your business was personal, not political.”

“My business is personal,” Gossett admitted. “Until recently I have been a junior detective at Scotland Yard. I was assistant to Inspector Grinan who took charge of the investigations concerning your brother’s murder case.”

“Investigations which scarcely reflected much credit upon Scotland Yard,” Lord Hurlby said coldly.

“I am not concerned to defend their methods,” Gossett replied, “because I am no longer connected with them. I might remark, however, that they were perhaps unduly handicapped.”

“In what respect?”

“Insufficient information.”

“Is your business with me connected with the circumstances of that tragedy?” Lord Hurlby asked. “If so, let me tell you at once that I do not choose to discuss it. It is a painful subject and closed forever, so far as I am concerned.”

Gossett shook his head.

“I can understand, Lord Hurlby,” he said, “that you are unwilling to reopen the subject. It has, however, become necessary.”

There was a brief silence. A solemn grandfather’s clock, a chef d’oeuvre of one of the famous makers of the Georgian epoch, ticked ponderously. From outside all sounds of traffic, almost the honkings of the motor horns, were smothered by those closely drawn curtains.

“Is this,” Lord Hurlby asked quietly, “an affair of blackmail?”

Gossett made no indignant denial. He appeared to be considering the matter.

“You might perhaps look upon it as such,” he acknowledged. “Blackmail in kind, perhaps. I’m not here to demand money or anything that money could buy.”

“Who is your principal? In other, words, who is your inspiration for this visit? Are you acting for yourself or for some one else?”

“I am acting for the woman who forced her way in to see you the other day and whom you sent to prison,” Gossett confided. “Courageous but a little risky, don’t you think?”

Lord Hurlby tapped lightly with his finger tips upon the desk. His indifference was magnificent.

“I suppose you know what happened to the other blackmailer?” he asked.

“I can guess,” Gossett assented. “The conditions, though, were different.”

“Not so different as you might think. However, will you forgive me if I suggest a little more directness? My time, as you probably know, is not wholly my own.”

“I will put the situation before you.” Gossett promised, “in as few words as possible. Eighteen years ago, Lord Hurlby, when you were second secretary in the Embassy at Berlin and known as the Honourable Philip Hurlby, there was some trouble concerning a very large sum of money which it was understood had come into your possession in a very questionable manner.”

“That will do,” Hurlby said calmly. “You are so well-informed that you doubtless also know that there was a secret enquiry as a result of which I was completely exonerated.”

“Owing,” Gossett reminded him, “to the absence of the principal witness. That principal witness has since had from you about fifty thousand pounds in blackmail. Two years ago he travelled down to one of your country homes in Cornwall with the usual demand. You confided in your brother, who was staying with you. Whose idea it was I don’t know, who did the actual killing I don’t know, but between you, you murdered George Passiter.”

“A very logical way of dealing with blackmailers,” Hurlby remarked.

“You got rid of Passiter, all right, but the situation had its dangers. There were members of Passiter’s household who also knew your secret and who knew that Passiter had come to see you. Naturally his disappearance would make them suspicious. However you disposed of the body, they were likely to discover it, and you were still more than ever liable to blackmail. The scheme you hit upon for getting out of the trouble was quite ingenious. This Passiter seems to have been a man of about your brother’s height and build. Your brother and he exchanged clothes and identities. Your brother, as George Passiter, made a successful disappearance. Passiter was buried as Captain Alexander Hurlby. A hospital nurse who was in attendance on your wife, but who was also a particular friend of your own, helped you with the details. She was the Bella Truslove you sent to prison the other day. There was no trouble about the death certificate. The body was practically unrecognisable and your local doctor who signed it was over seventy years old. It was an excellent scheme for you, because Passiter’s family, who naturally believe him the murderer, dare not come near you and, in fact, have all left the country. What you didn’t seem to have taken sufficiently into account was the very terrible position in which your brother was placed. He cannot go to his clubs, he cannot mix with his friends, he cannot indulge in the usual sports which men in his position enjoy. The whole civilised world is closed to him. I don’t know which of you killed Passiter, but it is very clear which one of you is paying for it.”

“Where did you hear this amazing but interesting narrative, Mr.—er—Gossett?” Hurlby asked.

“To be quite frank with your lordship,” Gossett replied, “it is very largely a matter of reconstruction. I have heard a part of the truth, of course, and I have seen your brother. I may have made mistakes in the story, but on the whole I believe it to be very near the truth.”

Lord Hurlby reflected for several moments, then he looked up suddenly.

“There are inaccuracies, Mr. Gossett,” he remarked, “in your—what did you call it?—your reconstruction, but on the whole the salient facts are true. What are you here to say to me? Did my brother send you?”

“He does not even know of my coming.”

“Where is he?”

The tone was callous, almost indifferent. It seemed to Gossett in those few seconds that the whole ugly story was flung out before his eyes in black and white. The brutal selfishness of the man seated a few yards away from him, with a suppressed sneer hovering always around the corners of his lips, was mercilessly apparent.

“Your brother is living alone in supreme misery and discomfort in a ramshackle ketch, tied up in a backwater of one of the foulest stretches of the river. He is drinking too much and I should say that if he is allowed to remain where he is, under the same conditions, he will probably go mad before many months are past.”

“And what business is all this of yours, Mr. Gossett?”

Gossett restrained himself with an effort. He could almost realise the thought, not to say the hope, which was framing in his companion’s brain. Madness! Not a bad way out of the situation. Death, of course, would be better.

“I have been paid a fee,” Gossett confided, “to study the existing situation with a view to changing it.”

“Really! And what do you suggest?”

“First of all, I think that you should go down and see your brother and see how he is living. If he is to bear the whole brunt of this affair, it seems to me that he should at least be allowed to do it in comfort.”

“Are you proposing,” Lord Hurlby asked, “to take what you call your reconstruction to Scotland Yard?”

“I certainly am not,” Gossett declared. “When I enter into investigations for a private client, I forget that I ever was a policeman.”

“Very proper,” the other murmured. “There is just one of your suggestions which seems to me practical. You say that the spot which my brother has selected for his temporary abode is a lonely one?”

“Hellishly.”

“Write down the address and the means of getting there. I will pay him a visit.”

Gossett did as he was asked. Then he rose to his feet.

“If I might presume to make a further suggestion, Lord Hurlby,” he said, “it would be that you have the prosecution of this unfortunate woman stopped.”

“Your friend and client, eh?” the other sneered, “From what you have told me, I should think the safest place for her was in prison.”

“Safest for you perhaps,” Gossett retorted. “That seems to be the only thing you think of in life.”

Lord Hurlby smiled slowly, as though he had been paid a compliment. His finger was upon the bell.

“Indifferent health and the exigencies of public life,” he remarked, “may have made something of an egoist of me. In the characters of any one of us there is always likely to be one defect.... Parkins, the door for Mr. Gossett.”

Into the somewhat chaotic field of Malcolm Gossett’s reflections and theories came, towards the end of the fourth day after his visit to Lord Hurlby, light from an unexpected quarter. At the sound of the latchkey in the door of his Medlar’s Row villa, Cynthia came into the little square hall, a whirl of draperies and flashing feet.

“Malcolm,” she exclaimed breathlessly, “the most wonderful young man is in the study, waiting to see you. So impatient that he scarcely looked at me. He came in a most marvellous car, too.”

“I saw something that looked like a pantechnicon outside,” Gossett remarked, as he allowed himself to be helped out of his overcoat and duly embraced his wife. “Lead on, my dear. Let me deal with this prodigy of my sex, who scarcely looked at you. I have only just left the office and I didn’t know any one had my private address.”

Cynthia led him into the small room at the back of the house which they called the study. A young man of distinguished presence rose eagerly at their entrance. Gossett recognised him at once. It was Lord Hurlby’s private secretary.

“You perhaps don’t remember me, Mr. Gossett,” the visitor said. “You called by appointment to see Lord Hurlby last Tuesday. I am Lord Hurlby’s private secretary—his social secretary, perhaps I ought to say. Sinclair looks after him in the House, of course. My name is Wilfred Chaplin.”

“I remember you quite well,” Gossett acknowledged, with a quick thrill of interest. “Sit down, won’t you? What can I do for you?”

The young man glanced at Cynthia, who was hesitating in the background.

“I should be glad, Mr. Gossett,” he said, “if you could spare me five minutes upon a strictly private matter.”

Gossett nodded to Cynthia, who was already on her way to the door, which the young man had hastened to open for her.

“So sorry,” the latter murmured. “A little matter of business. I shall not detain your husband long.”

She bowed pleasantly and passed out. Chaplin closed the door with care and returned to the chair which he had vacated.

“You must forgive my looking you up here, Mr. Gossett,” he begged, “but I felt that I wanted to see you at once. You will remember your visit to Lord Hurlby the other afternoon.”

“I remember it quite well,” Gossett acknowledged. “I found his lordship a trifle difficult.”

“Scarcely so difficult as the position I find myself in at the present moment,” the young man groaned, leaning forward in his chair with clasped hands and speaking with unusual earnestness. “Let me try and explain. I had some matters to discuss with Lord Hurlby directly after your departure and I couldn’t help noticing that he was far from being his usual self. He is so precise in his statements and habits of thought that I became convinced something had happened to upset him very much. In the House that night, my colleague Sinclair told me that he very nearly broke down in the midst of a very simple speech. I know that he had no sleep that night, and Tuesday and Wednesday his manner was so unlike his usual self that I ventured to persuade him to see a doctor.”

“Is he ill?” Gossett asked.

“The doctor said not. Found nothing the matter with him at all. He gave him a sleeping draught and prescribed a tonic. The next day, however, Thursday—yesterday morning—his lordship went down to Downing Street, where he transacted some business with Sinclair. Afterwards he sent the car home and left Downing Street on foot. Since then, no one has seen a thing of him.”

“Do you mean that he didn’t return home at all last night?” Gossett demanded.

“He neither came home nor telephoned nor sent any message,” the young man declared. “I am forced to take you into my confidence in this matter, Mr. Gossett, but I do beg for your entire discretion. I beg that you will have nothing whatever to say to any member of the press.”

“I can promise you that,” Gossett consented. “But where am I concerned?”

“I wish to God I knew,” Chaplin replied with emphasis. “All I do know is that you asked for an interview with his lordship on private business, and since that interview he has not been himself for a single moment. Last night he was due at a dinner party with his wife, at the house of some private friends, the Duke and Duchess of Lechester, which he neither attended nor did he send any excuse. There were a good many papers waiting for his signature at his room in the House, and he had three appointments for this morning, not one of which did he keep. In fact, we have none of us seen him. We don’t know where he is. All the telephones are going continually, her ladyship is in great distress and we are beginning to receive enquiries from the newspapers. So far as I am aware, his lordship had nothing on his mind nor any business on hand likely to afford him anxiety. I come to you, therefore, hoping that you can give me a hint. In plain words—did you bring him any disquieting news?”

“I brought him nothing which could be regarded as news,” Gossett said gravely. “The subject on which I came to see him, however, was a serious one.”

“Then can I beg for your confidence?” the young man asked eagerly. “Tell me at least the nature of it and I shall have something to work on. We are all in the dark and I cannot keep Lord Hurlby’s disappearance a secret any longer.”

Gossett rose to his feet and paced the room restlessly. Already a sinister foreboding was forcing itself into his mind. He pushed it back. There was the present to be dealt with. Hurlby had challenged action by his disappearance. This young man must be told a measure of the truth.

“How long have you been with Lord Hurlby?” he asked abruptly.

“About a year and a half.”

“You came to him, then, after the tragedy in which his brother, Captain Alexander Hurlby, was concerned?”

“I know nothing about that, except by hearsay,” Chaplin admitted. “There was a great deal, of course, that never came out. We understood that the police were holding back information until they had found the man Passiter, who was suspected of being the murderer.”

“My visit to Lord Hurlby concerned that case,” Gossett confided. “You may remember a woman who tried to force herself into the house a few days ago. Well, she was connected with it too.”

The young man’s eyebrows contracted. His pleasant expression for the moment left him.

“Were you trying to blackmail the Chief?” he demanded.

“Don’t be an ass,” was the curt reply. “I am an ex-Scotland Yard officer and when I was in the Force I was engaged in a junior capacity upon the Hurlby case. I brought Lord Hurlby some information concerning it. When you speak of his disappearance, I can imagine it possible that he may have decided upon a course of action which would induce him to pay a visit to a certain place.”

“To discover the murderer?” Chaplin asked eagerly.

“That,” Gossett replied, “is for later on. I did suggest to his lordship that he should visit a certain person. He may have done so and it may have led to trouble.”

“Don’t waste time,” the young man begged. “Who is this person and where can I find him?”

Gossett reflected for several seconds.

“I shall offer myself as your guide,” he decided.

A still night, dark with drifting mists. In the distance was the yellow halo of blurred lights on the river way, beyond a blanket of hazy red, where the lights of the great city struggled against the everlasting fog. Beneath the feet of the two men was black and oozy mud.

“Take care,” Gossett warned his companion, drawing him away from the edge of the rotting quay.

“What particular corner of hell is this?” Chaplin demanded. “You’re not going to tell me that Lord Hurlby came here to pay a visit of his own choice—of his own free will.”

“I don’t know whether he did or not,” Gossett answered. “I only know that he announced his intention of doing so.”

“What brought you here before?”

“The woman whom Lord Hurlby locked up sent me,” Gossett confided briefly. “Don’t waste your breath. You may want it later on.”

“But there are no houses here: nothing out this filthy backwater from the river,” the young man pointed out.

“Half a dozen steps farther,” Gossett grunted.

The tall mast of the ketch loomed up out of the darkness. She was unlit. There was no sign of any human presence on board. This time, too, she was not lying flush with the dock. She was attached by ropes to the same ring but she was drawn a couple of yards away and fastened on the other side to what seemed to be a floating buoy. As she lay, there was no method of boarding her. Chaplin looked around him, aghast.

“You’re not going to tell me,” he protested, “that the Chief—that Lord Hurlby ever came down to this loathsome spot to visit any one on a foul craft like that!”

“That’s what we’re here to find out,” was the grim reply.

Gossett walked alongside the ketch, upon the quay, peering down and trying to look in from every point of vantage. There was no sign of any light, no indication of any human presence; neither was there any sound except the soft gurgle of the water lapping up against the mouldering woodwork.

“There’s no one on board,” Chaplin declared.

“I am not so sure,” his companion muttered.

The latter lowered himself on to his stomach and stretched out toward the ketch. He was just able to reach the rail but the fastening on the other side was too secure and he could draw her no nearer. Suddenly he saw, lying a few yards farther down, an old dinghy with a punt pole. He lowered himself into it as silently as possible, followed by Chaplin.

“We’ll board her from the other side,” Gossett whispered, pushing the pole into the mud.

They made dangerous progress, but finally scrambled on board. Gossett laid a restraining hand upon his companion’s arm and pointed downwards. There was a thin line of light underneath the cabin door below.

“There’s some one there,” he muttered.

They made their way cautiously down the steps. With a sudden jerk Gossett opened the door. Both men stood on the threshold aghast. On the settee before the fixed table was seated the Right Honourable Lord Hurlby, his pen in his hand. Before him was a cunningly shaded light and there were at least a dozen sheets of paper, scattered about, covered with his thin, decisive handwriting. He showed no surprise at the entrance of his visitors, but he dropped his eyeglass and frowned.

“I don’t remember giving you instructions to come down here, Chaplin,” he said coldly.

The young man was completely taken aback.

“I—well, no, sir. I don’t suppose you did, but I thought—this man Gossett too—”

Lord Hurlby replaced his eyeglass and contemplated the latter.

“So you have turned up again, have you?” he remarked. “Well, since you are here, you may as well both make yourselves useful. Chaplin, fold up these sheets, place them in an envelope and address them to the Home Secretary. Gossett, grope about behind you there and see if you can find me another bottle of whisky. I finished the last one in twelve hours.”

Both men stared at him. A terrible conviction was creeping into Chaplin’s mind. He reached for the papers with trembling fingers. Gossett, on the other hand, dragged down a bottle of whisky, drew the cork and filled the glass by Lord Hurlby’s side.

“Any soda water,” he asked quietly, “or water?”

“Not for me, thank you,” Lord Hurlby answered politely. “In the days when I used to drink whisky, we thought it a mistake to dilute it.”

He raised the tumbler to his lips and drank nearly half of its contents without flinching. The two men looked at him in amazement. Gossett was all the time on his guard. His companion was trembling.

“I hope you were not ill-advised enough to bring the Rolls Royce down here, Chaplin?” Lord Hurlby said. “The most disgraceful road I have ever been on in my life. Alick—”

He stopped short. There was a puzzled look in his face. Gossett drank a liqueur glass full of the neat whisky.

“Where is your brother, Lord Hurlby?” he asked.

The latter coughed.

“Rather unfortunate,” he acknowledged. “Alexander and I used to agree so well. Yesterday I’m sorry to say we couldn’t hit it off. I don’t know why, but he has become peevish. After all we have been through together, that is foolish. Listen to him now.”

The two visitors held their breath. Distinctly they heard from the cabin behind a low groan as though of a man in deadly pain. Gossett took a quick backward step and opened the door. Stretched upon the small bedstead was Alexander Hurlby, a ghastly sight. Blood had congealed upon his face from a wound at the side of the head. His arms were bound to the bedstead with stout cords, his legs were tied together. His eyes were glazed and bloodshot. His breath came with difficulty.

“Water!” he faltered.

They found a pail standing outside and Chaplin held some to his lips whilst Gossett cut his bonds. Even when he was free he was unable to move. They fetched him some whisky, which he drank cautiously. Strength came back to his voice. He began to move his limbs slowly. He thrust his fingers into the pail of water and bathed his eyes. Suddenly terror flashed back into them.

“Look out,” he muttered. “He’s coming—and he’s mad!”

The warning was just in time. Lord Hurlby, who had lounged into the cabin with a cigarette between his lips, suddenly flung himself savagely upon Gossett, bore him down on to the floor with his hand upon his throat and shook him like a rat. Chaplin dragged the aggressor off from behind, his arms linked around his neck, but it took the two of them to hold him. As soon as Hurlby felt himself overpowered, he ceased to struggle. A cunning gleam came into his eyes.

“Chaplin,” he remonstrated severely, “you forget yourself. I came down to pay my brother a friendly little visit. What do you mean by following me here and bringing this ex-detective with you? I don’t like him. He’s got hold of some cock-and-bull story. Keep him away from the newspapers.”

The man upon the bed had struggled now to a sitting posture. He touched Gossett on the arm.

“He went off like that—raving mad—yesterday afternoon. He hit me with a hammer when I wasn’t looking and tied me up when I was unconscious.”

“All for the best, my dear Alick,” his brother said, in almost his old tone. “You were reminding me how I killed Passiter. You shouldn’t have done that. Blackmailers were made to be killed. I’m not so sure about you,” he went on, with a snarl in his tone again, struggling to get free and with murder in his eyes, as he leaned towards Gossett.

They were obliged to tie him up, and even then they had to call for the chauffeur before they could get him into the dinghy. In the car, he rolled over to face the mirror.

“I don’t like my collar,” he complained. “Am I speaking to-night, Chaplin? It’s the Holdings Bill, isn’t it? You must get me another collar.”

“Everything is in your lordship’s room,” Chaplin assured him, with a little break in his voice.

One of the marvels of the whole affair, as it crept into the knowledge of a certain limited number of men and women in privileged official circles, was the beautiful accuracy, the unerring logic contained in those seventeen pages of foolscap which were duly perused by the Chief Commissioner of Scotland Yard, the Home Secretary and an even higher official. In those moments of incipient lunacy, Hurlby had recorded his exact sensations as he had killed the blackmailer who had tormented him for ten years, and accepted his brother’s sacrifice. His brother’s career, as he incisively pointed out, brilliant though it had been, had no future. He himself, in a few years’ time, already the leader of his party, was bound to become Prime Minister. All might have gone according to plan if the hospital nurse on her downward path had not felt that mortal affection of pity and sought out first Gossett and afterwards Hurlby himself. The latter, with his concentrated selfishness, would never have given another thought to his brother. Alexander, having passed his word, whatever depths he might have sunk to through the slow growth of debasing instincts, would never break it, and the Right Honourable Lord Hurlby, whose peerage was fortunately an Irish one, would, without a doubt, have become Prime Minister of England. As it was, the Press, Scotland Yard and the Home Secretary between them had to exercise all their cunning to bring back to life and reputation Captain Alexander Hurlby, D.S.O., to demonstrate the existence of Passiter, the blackmailer, in his coffin, and to draw a veil over the mental breakdown of one of England’s great statesmen, now an inmate of a private asylum. Shell shock accounted more or less plausibly for Captain Hurlby’s flight into hiding, and anyway, the year of his reappearance was a busy one, and the tendency of the world is to talk the most sensational event threadbare in twenty-four hours. The man who had to keep his tongue the stillest was ex-detective Gossett, but that, after all, was his job.