Читать книгу Ask Miss Mott - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 6

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Miss Mott, engaged in her usual Wednesday afternoon task of answering the inevitable crop of letters demanding her advice in next week's Home Talks, paused in perplexity before one of the last she opened. She read it slowly, and, as she read, the delicate pink colour mounted almost to her temples. Her eyes shone—deep-set, grey eyes, Miss Mott possessed, with silky lashes, the eyes of a beauty, notwithstanding her demure appearance. Her fingers distinctly shook. Yet the letter in itself seemed harmless enough. It was written on what appeared to be Club stationery of expensive quality, but the address at the top had been carefully cut out:—

Dear Miss Mott—it began—

Give me your advice, please, in the next issue of your paper. I have recently met and been immensely attracted by a young lady whose friendship and affection I should much like to gain. Unfortunately I have not, up to now, led what is termed a respectable life, and I am afraid if she became aware of the nature of my profession she would not grant me the privilege of her acquaintance. Should I be justified, under the circumstances, bearing in mind the fact that my intentions are what are termed "strictly honourable," in seeking her friendship under an assumed name, and endeavouring to secure her interest in me before I divulged my profession?

Please reply to

V.J.

Miss Mott placed this epistle on one side, and answered all the others first. Then she turned back to the waiting letter, lifted it for one moment to her dainty nostrils, and half closed her eyes. Afterwards, with no further display of sentiment, she thrust a sheet of paper into her typewriter, and dealt with it:

V.J. I am surprised that you should ask me such an unintelligent question. Under no circumstances would you be justified in approaching the young lady until you have entirely changed the manner of your life, and are prepared to live according to accepted standards.

Miss Mott, whose touch upon her typewriter was usually both light and delicate, thumped out these few lines with unaccustomed force and energy. Afterwards she rang the bell for the tall, bespectacled young girl who acted as her secretary.

"Ring up Scotland Yard for me, Amy," she instructed, "and enquire whether Superintendent Detective Wragge is in. If so, put me through to him on the telephone."

"Superintendent Detective Wragge. Yes, Miss Mott."

"My uncle," the latter continued. "And afterwards, Amy, take this package of manuscript round to the Home Talks office."

The girl accepted a bulky envelope and retreated to her own den. Presently the telephone bell rang. Miss Mott exchanged a few words with her uncle and arranged to lunch with him at one-fifteen that day at the Milan Grill Room.

Superintendent Detective Wragge was a big, loosely built man, whose success in his profession could not have depended in any way upon his ability to disguise himself from his prospective victims, for he was a person of unusual appearance. He was over six feet tall and his face was large, creased and lined. His eyes were shrewd and penetrating, his mouth sensitive and humorous. He might more easily have been taken for a Cabinet Minister, or a barrister, than a detective. He was known at the Yard, and to a certain section of the criminal world, as "Rags", and he enjoyed a thoroughly well-earned popularity with both. His successes had mostly been achieved from the armchair behind his desk and were owing in large measure to his amazing memory of and insight into the ways and habits of the criminal world. He was commonly reported to be able to tell you offhand the favourite haunts and habits of any well-known evil-doer, together with his chosen brand of cigarettes, and any other personal details. He seldom stirred from his room in Scotland Yard, but, on the few occasions when he sallied out professionally, either eastwards or westwards, things usually happened. He was very fond of his only niece, and it was, to a certain extent, under his auspices, that she had combined her present venture with her newspaper activities.

"Is it true, Uncle," Miss Mott asked him, during the course of their lunch, "that you know the names and nicknames of every one of the principal criminals in London?"

"Perfectly true, my dear," he assented. "Nothing much in that. There aren't more than twenty or thirty of what we call 'big shots.' The remainder work under them in gangs."

"Do you know of a criminal I read about in the papers once, whose nickname is Violet Joe?" she enquired artlessly.

"Why, do you?"

She was a little disconcerted by the swiftness of the rejoinder, but she adroitly concealed the fact.

"I heard him spoken of the other day, quite by accident," she confided. "I haven't any information about him, if that's what you were hoping."

"No, I don't suppose you would have," her uncle mused. "Violet Joe doesn't give himself away like some of the others do. If you were in a position to do anything about him, it would be the biggest send-off your show could possibly have."

"He's—bad?"

"I wouldn't say that he's bad, but he's terribly clever," Superintendent Wragge replied, with an unusual note of seriousness in his tone. "He and his chief—Boss Meredith—are about the only two of the big five I couldn't lay my hands on at any time, if there was any object in it. Violet Joe's too clever for the ordinary police brain. All we can hope is that some day he makes just one slip. Then, by God, we'll have a look into his past."

"That doesn't sound very pleasant," Miss Mott shivered.

"Crime isn't pleasant," was her uncle's dry response. "It's all right to read and write about, but it's a nasty business to live amongst. Don't let's talk about it. Have an ice before your coffee?"

"I will have a chocolate and vanilla ice mixed," Miss Mott announced—"and, in the meanwhile, why shouldn't we talk of it? In my new department, I might be mixed up with criminals at any moment. Crime fascinates me. I'm tired of giving advice about these courtship and domestic matters. I should like to be drawn into a really serious affair."

"Then you're a little fool and I'm sorry I ever encouraged you to start your intelligence agency," Superintendent Wragge growled. "Crime—real crime—is an ugly and beastly thing. I don't suppose you'll ever come in touch with it and I sincerely hope you won't."

Their conversation was broken into in somewhat abrupt fashion. A good-looking, exceedingly well-turned out young man, who was passing their table, paused, and, with a courteous bow, held out his hand to the Superintendent. He was moderately tall, with clean-cut features, a pleasant mouth, shrewd eyes, and brown hair which had a distinct wave in it where it was brushed back behind his ears. He wore a blue serge suit, with a tie of elusive purple, and a bunch of violets in his buttonhole.

"Superintendent Wragge, isn't it?" he remarked, with an ingratiating smile. "I am afraid you don't remember me."

"Not entirely," the Superintendent admitted, as he shook hands. "To say that your face is familiar wouldn't be exactly a compliment, as you seem to know my profession."

"About two months ago," the newcomer reminded him, "you came to Amberley Square—wedding reception, you know—Lady Hoskinson's. You had a man there already, watching over the wedding presents, but you thought you might spot a pet thief you were after."

"I remember the circumstance, but not you," the Superintendent meditated.

The young man sighed.

"Lady Hoskinson is my aunt," he confided. "Victor Jones is my name. I asked you to have a drink and you wouldn't."

The Superintendent shook his head.

"It doesn't sound like me," he objected. "All the same, there was a—what did you say your name was?"

"Victor Jones," the young man repeated. "Might I have the pleasure—"

He glanced towards Miss Mott. Her uncle accepted the hint.

"Mr. Victor Jones—my niece, Miss Mott."

The young man took Miss Mott's somewhat timidly proffered hand in his. She looked into his eyes and fear came.

"I am delighted," he murmured.

There was a moment's somewhat curious silence. For some reason or other, Miss Mott, not usually a shy young woman, seemed incapable of speech.

"You hadn't the best of luck that night, had you, Superintendent Wragge?" Mr. Victor Jones continued easily. "Your man was there. You knew that. You couldn't spot him and the diamond pendant was stolen. Never been recovered to this day, my aunt tells me."

"You seem to have the events of that evening at your finger ends," Superintendent Wragge remarked, "but, curiously enough, even now I don't seem to remember you."

He frowned, as though in a further effort of memory, gazing intently at the young man. Suddenly his eyes narrowed. Mr. Victor Jones was bending over Miss Mott, and she was trying hard to take no note of the appeal in his eyes, to be unaware of the scent of violets creeping once more into her nostrils. Her heart was beating fast. Furthermore, she was somehow conscious of the sense of drama closing in upon her.

"You, too, they tell me, are, in a small way, a follower in your uncle's profession," he remarked.

"A very small way indeed," she assented deprecatingly.

She raised her eyes and looked at him, and what he saw in those grey depths was quite sufficient warning to him. He smiled back a message of reassurance and left her swiftly. She herself had heard nothing, but she had seen her uncle's urgent summons to the maître d'hôtel, the whispered replies, the man's hurried departure and egress through the door. Then she heard a disappointed exclamation. Mr. Victor Jones had swung away from the door, crossed the Grill Room, and plunged into the Restaurant, disappearing almost at once amongst the incoming crowd. Superintendent Wragge, with an agility little short of marvellous, followed him, and Miss Mott was left alone with her thoughts....

It was at least a quarter of an hour before Superintendent Wragge reappeared. He resumed his seat very much as though nothing had happened, but he pushed on one side the glass of very mild white wine, a bottle of which he was sharing with his niece, and ordered a double whisky and soda.

"Sorry to leave you, my dear," he apologised. "I had an idea—merely an idea—but one can't afford in my profession to neglect even the semblance of one. That young man now! What the mischief made him come to this table and tell me a deliberate falsehood?"

"Did he?" Miss Mott asked simply.

"You heard him tell me that his name was Victor Jones, and that he had met me at his aunt's the afternoon the old lady persuaded me to go in there and superintend the arrangements for guarding her daughter's wedding presents. That was a distinct untruth. I never met him there or any one like him. The only young man who approached me was a fair, insignificant little chap, with an eyeglass, who was a brother of the bride's, and even he didn't ask me to have a drink. What this fellow's object was in telling me that rigmarole, I cannot imagine."

"Perhaps," Miss Mott suggested modestly, "he wanted an introduction to me. I am afraid—he had been looking at me a good deal and every one knows who you are, so I daresay he tried a bluff."

Superintendent Detective Wragge stroked his chin and regarded his niece thoughtfully.

"That never occurred to me," he acknowledged. "You are, I suppose, personable. It may have been that, after all."

"Tell me about your idea," she begged. "What made you send for the maître d'hôtel and afterwards follow the young man?"

Her uncle leaned forward in his place. He satisfied himself that there was no one else within hearing distance.

"I will tell you," he confided. "We have information that Violet Joe is in town and that there is something doing almost at once. That young man had to pass my table. He is notorious for doing impudent things. It would have been just like him to try to establish a false identity with me. Then look at his name. Probably invented on the spur of the moment—Victor Jones—Violet Joe. Look at the clever way he disappeared too. There was a touch of the habitual criminal there."

"He could have passed our table without your seeing him," she pointed out. "He needn't have come to such a public place, either, unless he had chosen."

"Quite so," her uncle agreed, "but we know that Violet Joe will take big risks to frequent the best places and he always prefers offence to defence. If I had looked up as he passed, he might have been forced into the defensive. As it was, he chose the offensive, and, provided there is anything in my idea, he got away with it."

Miss Mott looked at her vis-à-vis very earnestly.

"Do you really believe that that was Violet Joe who stopped at this table and to whom I was introduced?" she asked him point-blank.

"It might have been," was as far as her uncle would commit himself.

Two dreary weeks! February weeks too, of snow and slush, frost and swift thaw! Outside the weather was filthy. Inside her little office, Miss Mott was depressed. Her volume of correspondence had been as large as ever. She had written two articles for her paper, which had been most favourably received. She had installed a service of electric bells in her office—one under her foot, which would bring her prompt help in case of unwanted callers—and she had purchased the smallest revolver made, which would go into her hand bag and which she had learned to use with some skill. Not a caller, however, legitimate or otherwise, had disturbed the serenity of her days. No perplexed husband or anxious wife had called to solicit her aid. Her connection with the criminal world seemed to have ended as suddenly as it had begun. Then, about five o'clock on an impossible afternoon, the crash came. Miss Mott began to be very busy indeed.

The telephone started the riot. She was told that her uncle wished to speak to her from his room at Scotland Yard. When they were connected, however, he seemed to have curiously little to say. He asked a few family questions, added his own to a million other daily curses upon the weather, talked vaguely on various matters, and only once broke into adventurous ground.

"Seen or heard anything more about that young man who disturbed our luncheon party?" he enquired.

"The young man who might have been Violet Joe? I was just going to ask you that. Not a thing. Have you?" Miss Mott rejoined innocently.

"Indirectly. I believe he is about, though. We must have another luncheon one day next week."

"I should love to. I have no engagements."

He still held on. Whilst she was wondering what on earth he had rung her up about, he coughed uneasily.

"By-the-bye, Lucie," he said, "while I think of it, if ever anything should happen to me suddenly—foul weather this for elderly people, and I've got a bit of a cough—my will is at Wyman's the solicitor, 18 Holborn Row. Got that?"

"Why, of course, Uncle, but what's the matter?" she enquired, suddenly alarmed. "You're not ill, are you?"

"Not I," he assured her, his voice suddenly more natural now that he had got rid of what he had really rung up to say. "Just occurred to me, that's all. I am perfectly well, but—there's no reason why you shouldn't know—"

"Shouldn't know what?"

"I'm going out to-night after Violet Joe's crowd."

There was nothing Miss Mott could do. No good ringing up hysterically, and begging him to go safely home, and get to bed before the snow came on again. Her uncle was Superintendent Detective Wragge, and if it was his duty to go out after a famous gang of criminals, he had to go. She was sensible enough to know that and not to dream of interfering. All the same, she was sorry that this one particular person was concerned in the affair.... She told herself that her little romance was a thing thinner than air, that it was already melting away before the hot fire of blazing reality. Yet it hurt her very badly to know that before to-morrow Violet Joe might be arrayed in the manacles of shame, or her uncle—she was fond of him too—for his sake, she might have to make that little journey to Holborn Row.

Footsteps upon the stairs—just as she was putting on her hat! Soft, swift footsteps, mounting through the darkness of the two upper flights of stairs. She felt the quickening of her pulses. She had plenty of time to get to her newly installed electric bell beneath her chair. She had plenty of time to get to the telephone. She did neither. She let her coat slip back from her shoulders, leaving her slim and straight, flowerlike in her one-piece frock. Then she waited. To others it might have seemed long—Miss Mott had lost count of time—the footsteps at the door, the masked face peering through the aperture, the cautious, furtive entrance, the figure of her former visitor, lithe, alert, the flashing eyes, pinpricks of fire darting round the room.

"You are alone?" he snapped out.

"Absolutely," she assured him. "Look under my desk, if you like."

He seated himself coolly in her clients' chair as she glided into her own place. Her alarm bell was under her foot, the telephone instrument at her elbow. In the drawer at her right hand was her miniature revolver—and something else she would have hated him to have found—a torn, purple silk mask, with a few spots of blood upon it, and a withered bunch of violets.

"Miss Mott," he began, "I don't want to seem sentimental, but I do want to save your uncle's life. Tell me where he is or how to get in touch with him."

She tried her best to steady her voice, and, on the whole, she was fairly successful.

"My uncle has gone after you, if you are Violet Joe," she replied.

"But where?" he demanded. "Where am I supposed to be?"

"I have not the slightest idea."

"Don't be a fool," he enjoined sharply. "Didn't you hear what I said? I want to save your uncle's life, if I can. If you won't tell me how to get at him—he's finished."

"Why should you want to save his life?" she persisted. "You are Violet Joe, aren't you?"

"I suppose so. I am not the only criminal in the world, though. There are others more anxious to get rid of your uncle than I am, and with more cause. I think he's a very nice old gentleman and perfectly harmless if left alone. All the same, I can't save his life without your help."

"What can I do?" she faltered.

"Do you know any one at Scotland Yard?" he asked. "What I mean is, do you know any one who knows that you're Wragge's niece?"

"Several people."

"Get in touch with them as quick as you can then," he begged. "My car is waiting downstairs—a small black coupé. Tell the man to drive you to Scotland Yard. Mr. Grant's orders, say. Not my name. Code word. Go to one of your friends. Tell him of your business here. You have a client whose confidence you must respect. You can't mention names, but you've been given a word of warning about your uncle. You want to know where he is. I'm the nameless client, mind. Don't mention me, unless you want to give me away. The telephone's no use. They might answer you, but they wouldn't tell you the truth, unless they saw you."

"All right," she promised. "I'll go. What about you?"

"I'll wait here till you come back."

He helped her on with her coat. He had drawn off his gloves and she caught a glimpse of a fine, strong hand—a man's hand, although the nails were carefully manicured. She caught also more strongly than ever a wave of the perfume of violets and shrank from their fragrance. He threw open the door. His eyes flashed down upon her through the slits in his mask and again there was a gleam in them of something personal and appealing.

"God, how pretty you are!" he muttered.... "Hurry, hurry!"

Miss Mott fled down the stairs to the lift, tingling from head to foot. Perhaps she was angry; perhaps she was sorry; perhaps she was glad. Many a time afterwards she asked herself that question, but at the moment she certainly did not know.

It was exactly thirty-two minutes later when the man who had been left behind in Miss Mott's room heard her footsteps upon the stairs and threw open the door. She was looking distinctly relieved.

"False alarm!" she announced cheerfully. "They didn't hesitate about telling me for a moment. There are no flying squad orders for to-night and Uncle had to have his evening clothes sent down to the office. He is dining with Mr. Anthony Durban, who has something to do with the Stock Exchange, at 11-B, Manchester Square. Uncle's rather fond of the Stock Exchange, you know, and he knows heaps of brokers."

Her visitor groaned. Already he was buttoning up his coat. He glanced at the platinum and gold watch upon his wrist.

"Look here," he said, "this is all you can do now. Ring up Scotland Yard and ask if they can find any Mr. Anthony Durban living in Manchester Square, or anywhere else, for that matter. When they've discovered that there isn't such a person, they'd better order out the flying squad in case they get a summons."

"Do you mean that Uncle is in danger, that he didn't go to Manchester Square?" she gasped.

Her visitor looked back from the door. His fingers were already toying with the fastenings of his mask.

"Little Miss Mott," he explained, "in Chicago, when a man who has been selling secrets is asked by another whom he may suspect of being a gangster to take an automobile ride with him, he orders a drink and knows it's the last he's going to have on earth. It's pretty well the same thing here."

"What do you mean?" she shrieked.

"I mean that when any one in the criminal world is asked to dine with Mr. Anthony Durban in Manchester Square, he knows very well that it's his finish."

She wrung her hands.

"But we must do something."

He reflected for a moment, but he only shook his head.

"Ring up Scotland Yard. It's all you can do."

"But where shall I tell them to go?" she asked breathlessly.

He hesitated for a suspiciously long time.

"I can't tell you that," he sighed. "You see, after all, although I'm only in with them on certain occasions, I'm nevertheless one of the gang. I'll do what I can, but I'm afraid it won't be worth a snap of the fingers. It's heaven or hell, according to his past life, for your lamented uncle."

The door swung to and closed. The footsteps of Miss Mott's departing visitor, swift and muffled, were still audible upon the stairs. Miss Mott was not listening. She was studying intently the oblong purple card, fallen apparently from his clothing as he had left the room.

Superintendent Detective Wragge, a little earlier in the evening, descended from his taxicab in front of a handsome mansion in Belgrave Square and presented his hat and coat to a pompous-looking butler. Any slight misgiving he might have felt at the somewhat unusual conditions of his visit should certainly have been allayed by a brief study of his surroundings. The family portraits upon the walls were without a doubt valuable and authentic. The butler might have served in ducal households from the moment of his first escape from the pantry. The furniture was heavy and ponderously Victorian, the carpets soft to the feet. Everywhere was an atmosphere of complete and unassailable respectability.

"Has Mr. Thornton arrived?" Superintendent Wragge asked. "He was taking me to Manchester Square to dine with Mr. Durban, but telephoned me at the last moment to come here instead."

"That is quite all right, sir," the butler replied. "Mr. Thornton will be here in a few minutes and Mr. Durban is expecting you. Mr. Durban being a bachelor, sir," he confided, "the drawing-room is seldom used. We receive in the lounge."

He threw open the door of a spacious library in which five men were seated in various attitudes of ease.

"Mr. Wragge, sir," he announced.

A tall, thin man of apparently early middle age slipped from the edge of a heavy mahogany table, dropped his eyeglass and threw down the evening paper which he had been reading.

"Good evening, Mr. Wragge," he said, holding out his hand. "Glad you were able to join us. Not sure whether you know everybody. Hartigan—Dick Hartigan—you must have met, I think. Ponsford, Bill Cheyne, and Bolton. There they are! Terrible lot of fellows, but they'll tell you all you want to know about the Stock Exchange and they are just as anxious to meet you as I am. Meredith, my name is, by-the-bye, not Durban."

"Mr. Thornton, I presume," the Superintendent remarked, after a brief but hectic silence, "will not be coming."

"Mr. Thornton is not dining to-night," Meredith acknowledged. "As a matter of fact, he never dines with us and we're only slightly acquainted. He told one of us of your weakness for the Stock Exchange and we paid him five thousand pounds to bring you here. You see how highly we value you—or your absence—whichever way you care to put it."

Superintendent Wragge shook hands with everybody, and, although he knew now that he was face to face with death, he addressed a pleasantly indifferent word to each one of the men whom he had been hunting so assiduously. Syd Bolton! How they had combed the East End, and even parts of the West End, for the famous international jewel robber. They had never thought of looking for him, though, in Belgrave Square! One little link, one slip in his statement, and the Haxelly murderer was found. Meredith, his gracious host, smiling so imperturbably, would surely take that one-minute walk at eight o'clock if only the handcuffs could be fastened upon his wrists....

A footman handed cocktails around.

"Success to crime!" Meredith remarked, raising his glass.

"Rather a discourteous toast under present conditions," Cheyne drawled.

"Make it crime and all connected with crime," Meredith amended.

"The idea merits a second cocktail," Bolton declared, helping himself.

"And a response from me," Superintendent Detective Wragge added boldly. "I represent the law. You are under arrest, Meredith. You are all under arrest."

There was a roar of laughter, yet Wragge had his moment. He sprang backwards towards the door, and out came his two automatics, one in each hand. It was in this fashion that he had captured Bob Perrigon and the Perrigon gang, and earned his first stripe. But to-night he had cleverer people to deal with. The men in front of him cowered back, or seemed to cower, and threw up their hands readily enough. Then from behind came a terrible exhibition of force—just that pompous-looking butler, who had once been within an ace of winning the middle-weight championship, and one footman—footsteps, as though on wool, a grip of steel, and back went those automatics. Away they went clattering on to the carpet and Superintendent Wragge was unarmed. The tension was over. There was a fresh outburst of laughter. Every one took another cocktail,—and this time with Wragge.

"Success to the prevention of crime," they toasted, knowing that they had escaped death by inches.

"I am with you, gentlemen," Wragge declared, accepting his second glass. "An excellent toast! To the prevention of crime! I think that if I had been of a more bloodthirsty temperament in the few seconds at my disposal, I would have done something towards it just now."

"Etiquette, my dear fellow!" Meredith murmured. "One must follow the rules."

They all drank. They were inclined to like Wragge, but they closed in upon him, and he knew that death was not far off. Then there came an unexpected, an almost ludicrous interruption. The butler threw wide open the connecting doors, showing beyond the vista of a round dinner table, flower adorned, with servants standing behind the chairs.

"Dinner is served, sir," he announced.

There was a queer hesitation while they all glanced towards their guest. He set down his empty cocktail glass.

"Excellent!" he acclaimed. "I am hungry and Thornton assured me that you had a first-rate chef."

There was admiration in their eyes as they looked at him—cold eyes, avaricious eyes, lascivious eyes, murderous eyes. All the world, though, loves a brave man.

"Lead on, Meredith," Bolton called out. "We are a quarter of an hour late already."

"And it's up to us," Cheyne put in, "to see that our guest dines well."

Superintendent Detective Wragge did dine exceedingly well. He ate caviare and, looking over his shoulder to be sure that it was being offered, waited for the vodka. He was even a little peevish at the late arrival of the lemon. His turtle soup he tasted first before he permitted the wineglassful of Amontillado. Of the turbot he thoroughly approved, but asked twice for sauce—he had missed the lobster at first. Conversation swung round to the doings of the Stock Exchange, with which institution it seemed they were all in some way connected, and Wragge himself contributed one or two pertinent observations. Once, even, he ventured to ask for advice upon a certain matter of taking up a new issue—a gesture which brought a smile to the lips of every one of them. They all appreciated his sang-froid, for they themselves were brave men, but they had looked forward to this occasion for a long time and planned it most carefully, and they never for one moment intended him to study the quotations in the next morning's papers. With dessert, came port in heavy cut-glass decanters, and a single bottle of Château Yquem. It was then that silence fell upon the little company and Meredith leaned forward.

"Wragge," he said, "I suppose you realise the position?"

"I imagine," the Superintendent replied, "that as you have allowed me to see you all face to face, you mean to kill me."

Meredith nodded.

"As a man of common sense," he pointed out, "you must see that we have no other alternative. For years, you have been the only man in Scotland Yard whom we have feared, and latterly you have shown signs of vision which, to be frank, have alarmed us. We are engaged in a species of warfare, but we can't take prisoners. We have come unmasked to meet you to-night. To our guest that means death."

"I understand the position perfectly," Wragge admitted. "If I lived, there isn't one of you I shouldn't be after in the morning, working backwards from this, I must confess, unsuspected rendezvous."

"Precisely," Meredith murmured. "Now, to prove that we are in earnest, let me run through a few names. Inspector Lowden. Now, you recollect Lowden?"

"Died from a stroke in Hyde Park Square," Wragge reflected.

"He dined with us," Meredith confided. "Detective Simpson."

"He was found dead in the Metropolitan Hotel—no evidence," Wragge observed.

"Precisely. He dined with us. Inspector Holmes."

"Found dead in Kensington Gardens, no signs of violence," Wragge remembered.

"Exactly. He too dined with us. There have been others. There will be you."

"You are not helping me towards the enjoyment of my dinner," Superintendent Wragge grumbled.

"The time for that sort of pleasantry has passed," Meredith pronounced, with a note of almost tragic irritability in his tone. "My butler is now serving the port. With it, he offers a bottle of Château Yquem, 1870—a really priceless wine. No one else, Mr. Wragge, will take the Château Yquem. It will save time and trouble if you do."

The Superintendent made a grimace.

"Why not study my tastes," he complained. "I hate sweet wine, and I love port. From the colour, I am sure that is vintage wine. Jubilee, perhaps, or even better—'90."

They looked at him steadfastly—that little vicious circle, each one prepared with a readier means of death. Then, into the silence, there broke a strange voice—the voice of the one other man who had the entrée. They all stared at him in amazement. He passed through the folding doors, which were immediately closed behind him. Meredith stood up. The two faced one another—the newcomer in the purple mask, and—Meredith.

"Sorry I'm late," the former observed. "Don't bother about dinner. I've already dined. Why are you having a meeting to which I haven't been invited?"

Meredith regarded him with cold disapproval.

"This isn't your show," he declared. "You're not with us when it comes to this sort of thing and we don't want you around."

"What kind of a show is it then?" the other insisted. "And what does it mean?"

"Take the truth, if you will have it, and be done with it," Meredith replied. "We've got Wragge here and we're going to kill him. Damned well time, too! He'd have had us by next week."

"You're going to kill him, are you?" the man in the purple mask repeated blandly. "Well, I'm here to see that you don't."

"What the hell have you to do with it?" Meredith expostulated. "You're not in the inner circle. You've no right here. Since you are here, though, look around. Can't you see—it's an unmasked dinner. What's to happen to us if Wragge lives?"

"A problem, I admit," the latest arrival acknowledged, subsiding on to the arm of an easy-chair. "Let us devote a few minutes to thinking it out. Have you any suggestions to make, Superintendent?"

"Can't think of any, except that I damned well won't drink that sweet wine," Wragge rejoined. "I'd sooner die some other way. I came here to take Meredith. I never expected to run into the whole gang, or I should have had the G.F.S. around the corner. I might have suspected Thornton, though," he concluded, after a moment's pause. "I knew that he was in a devilish tight corner for money."

"One has to take a risk sometimes, in your profession as well as in ours," Meredith remarked soothingly. "This time you happen to have lost. It might have been worse. I do wish you'd drink a glass of that wine, Wragge. It would save us so much trouble, and I hate an absolutely fruitless discussion."

"Don't touch the stuff, Wragge," the man in the purple mask advised. "You'd be dead in two minutes and carted off to Kensington Gardens or somewhere in five."

Meredith scowled—a lean, melancholy-looking man, he was, with a scar on one side of his cheek and deep lines in his face. He addressed the man in the purple mask.

"Look here," he said, "we don't want to quarrel with you. You don't belong here any longer and you've no right to interfere in anything we choose to do. If Wragge doesn't drink a glass of that wine, in thirty seconds he's going out another way."

"Better hear my proposition first," the other suggested. "You came here, Superintendent, after Meredith. You didn't expect to meet these other gentlemen."

"I certainly did not," Wragge admitted. "I have a fair amount of self-confidence, but I should scarcely have ventured to tackle five such illustrious gunmen single-handed."

"Very well then," his questioner continued, "what about Violet Joe?"

"I want him too."

"Well, here's a sporting offer for you. These men mean business and you cannot possibly handle the crowd. I am Violet Joe. Will you blot this little party out of your mind and forget every one else you have seen in this room, if I give myself up?"

There was a moment's stupefied silence; then, from around the table, a chorus of disapproval. Meredith shook his head.

"You're mad, Joe," he admonished. "How the devil could he make such a promise, or, if he made it, keep it?... Tie him up," he ordered curtly. "That's right," he added, as Cheyne and Bolton flung themselves upon the Superintendent from behind. "He's going out. Fill a glass of the wine, Hartigan. If he won't drink, I'll shoot him my—what the hell's this?"

"This," was Miss Mott, very savage and very determined, after all she had overheard through the chink between the folding doors. She stood in the open space between the two doors which he had just thrown back and she proceeded forthwith to action. She seldom read detective stories and was completely ignorant of the etiquette of a hold-up. She issued no invitation nor gave any warning to her prospective victims. She simply stood where she was and plugged the small bullets from her miniature revolver into every one. Cheyne, who was engaged in tying up Wragge's wrists, dropped the cord with a yell of pain. Bolton rolled over, with a bullet in his shoulder blade. Hartigan, on the further side of the table, collapsed momentarily, with a shriek of pain. Meredith she missed, and, as she saw him leap towards her, she kept her last two bullets to save her own life. She felt a grip upon her shoulder. Some one—the man in the purple mask, who had announced himself as Violet Joe—swung her behind the sheltering door, just as a bullet whistled between them. Then—a new pandemonium seemed to break out. From down below came the beating of a gong, electric bells were ringing throughout the house. Every one who could stand on his feet seemed to be rushing towards a distant corner of the dining room, while, to complete the confusion, all the lights in the place went out. There was the roar of an automatic fired at close quarters, a shout of anger, and the slamming of a trapdoor. Miss Mott, left to herself, was very much afraid, until from the middle of that pool of darkness she heard her uncle's voice.

"Are you all right, Lucie?"

"Quite," she answered. "Are you?"

"That devil Meredith missed me from half a dozen yards," he grunted. "Try to find a switch. I've got one of the fellows you shot to look after. The G.F.S. are breaking in."

Miss Mott found the switch, and when the police made sudden and violent appearance, streaming in from every door, they discovered Cheyne, who was badly wounded, handcuffed upon the floor, Miss Mott staunching with a white napkin the blood from a gash upon her uncle's forehead, a bolted trapdoor underneath the dining table and not another soul.

"Do you know which way they have gone?" Superintendent Wragge snapped.

"I think so, sir," the Inspector, who had brought in the men, replied. "There's a passage comes out of the area next door. We've got it surrounded, anyway. I'll take another gun and be off," he added, snatching one up from the table.

Superintendent Wragge rose unsteadily to his feet and poured himself out a glass of champagne. To the Inspector's amazement, his superior was shaking with suppressed laughter.

"What's the joke, sir?" he asked in astonishment.

Her uncle held out Miss Mott's weapon. In his huge hand it looked like a child's first popgun.

"She's broken up the toughest gang in London with this," he guffawed.

The Inspector grinned, as he hurried out.... Superintendent Wragge, although he stood on guard with a real gun in his hand, was still shaking with uncontrollable laughter. Miss Mott's terrified eyes were searching everywhere for Violet Joe.

But Violet Joe, by that time, was a long way off.