Читать книгу Harvey Garrard's Crime - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 9

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At nine o'clock on the following morning Harvey descended from his very handsome limousine, bade the chauffeur wait, and entered his warehouse. It was immediately obvious that some unusual event had occurred. The warehousemen stood about in little knots, talking. In the counting-house, business seemed to have become suspended, and on the first floor, to which Harvey swiftly mounted, a policeman was standing outside the waiting-room. Greatorex, who had been engaged in conversation with him, hurried towards his employer.

"You've heard of what happened here last night, sir?" he asked breathlessly.

"I have heard nothing at all," was the prompt reply. "Happened here, you say?"

"A most unfortunate, a most tragic, occurrence, sir," the other declared. "I have to blame myself, too, for one circumstance connected with it."

Harvey led him into the office and pointed to a chair.

"Sit down, Greatorex," he invited kindly. "That's right. Now tell me about it quietly."

The manager recovered his breath. He dabbed his forehead with a white silk handkerchief.

"Thank you very much, sir," he said. "The facts are simply these. Towards evening yesterday a Mr. Ebenezer Swayle, a tanner from America, with whom the firm has had many highly satisfactory transactions, called to see you. In your absence I interviewed him and sent for our buyer of sole leather. We talked of business for some time and he professed himself very anxious, as old friend of your father's, to make your acquaintance. We were expecting you back shortly and he elected to wait. I showed him up into the waiting-room and—this is where I am so much to blame, sir—when you returned I completely forgot to tell you about him."

"Well, I don't see that that amounts to a tragedy," Harvey observed. "Are you going to tell me that he was locked in and had to spend the night here?"

"That is just what happened, sir. But it isn't the terrible part of it. He, he—forgive me, sir, but I am very much upset—he died in the night."

"Died! Here in the waiting-room?"

"Yes, sir. It seems that the watchman didn't enter the waiting-room during his rounds, and he wasn't discovered until this morning."

"What a terrible thing!" Harvey exclaimed gravely. "You have taken all the necessary steps, I hope?"

"I have done everything that I can think of, sir. They have taken the body away to a mortuary, but the doctor says there will have to be an inquest, although he hasn't the slightest doubt but that the man was suffering from heart disease."

"Where was he staying in London?"

"At the Savoy, sir. There was nothing in his papers to tell us anything at all, but one of our buyers knew that he always used to stay there, so we rang up and found that he had engaged a room for a fortnight. He was expecting a young lady from Paris within the next few days, for whom he had also engaged a room—his grand-daughter, I believe."

"A young lady from Paris," Harvey murmured, with a sudden sinking of the heart. "A grand-daughter, eh?"

"That is what they told us at the Hotel. They told us too, that, although he had only been there for a few nights, he had been obliged to have a doctor in twice."

"Poor fellow!"

"By-the-bye, sir, the police inspector is waiting to ask you a few questions."

"Show him in by all means," Harvey directed.

The inspector revealed himself as true to type: solemn, impressed with a profound sense of his own importance, and civil. He saluted Harvey with the respect due to the principal of a great firm.

"A very unfortunate affair, this, Inspector," Harvey remarked. "My manager tells me that there are one or two questions you would like to ask me."

"Nothing of very much moment, sir. Your manager has already told us that he showed the gentleman into the waiting-room at about half-past five o'clock yesterday afternoon and forgot to announce him to you."

"It was unlike Greatorex," Harvey commented. "We had had a very busy day, however."

"You were here until later than the others, I believe, sir?"

"A great deal later. I was here, indeed, until half-past ten o'clock. I have been out of the business for a good many years, and I was trying to pick up the threads of one or two matters quietly."

"Just so, sir. You didn't hear any cry or call from the waiting-room?"

"Nothing."

"You didn't notice any light burning when you left?"

"I didn't look in that direction," Harvey confessed, "but I think that if there had been one I should have noticed it."

"Just so, sir. The deceased, I believe, was personally unknown to you?"

"I had never met him," Harvey acknowledged. "I understand that it was with a view to making my acquaintance he elected to wait."

"That is in accordance with my information," the inspector admitted, a little ponderously. "I am very much obliged to you, sir."

The man took his leave. Harvey touched the bell and sent once more for Greatorex.

"Greatorex," he said, "this is a very unfortunate thing to have happened, but we must not allow it to weigh upon our minds longer than necessary. There are various matters of business to be attended to. In the first place, what about these bills of exchange?"

"I have the advice upon my desk, sir," was the anxious reply.

"You had better let me have it," Harvey instructed. "At what time is it necessary that it should be handed in to the Bank?"

"Provided the funds are there or some arrangement has been made, any time before four."

"I will go there immediately after lunch, then."

The cashier fidgeted for a moment nervously. One hand which was gripping the back of a chair showed white about the knuckles. With the other he was continually smoothing the lapel of the worn front of his frock coat.

"If you will excuse the liberty, sir," he ventured, "do you anticipate being able to make any arrangement with the Bank concerning the bills?"

"I fancy there will be no difficulty," Harvey assured him. "I was not, of course, able to put my hand upon such a large amount of cash at a minute's notice, but I have some satisfactory securities which I am prepared to offer them."

"Thank God, sir!"

Harvey leaned back in his chair and looked at his manager with a new curiosity.

"Sit down, Greatorex," he invited.

The cashier obeyed promptly. He was a wan figure of a man, thin and lanky, but there was a certain strength in his face. He had a shrewd, firm mouth and a good forehead.

"Greatorex," his employer continued, "you seem relieved to find that we are likely to tide over our immediate difficulties. Let me ask you a plain question. This business is, without a doubt, in a bad way. Do you think it is possible to re-establish it?"

The man hesitated.

"Not under the present conditions, sir," he acknowledged, sorrowfully.

"What I want to get at," Harvey persisted, "is just what is wrong in those conditions."

Greatorex still hesitated.

"Mr. Armitage used to tell me, sir, that I had no vision," he said, diffidently, "that I was a book-keeper and couldn't see further than my ledgers. He may have been right, sir, but at least I have been able to see some of the mistakes this firm has made during the last seven years. We have entrusted all our buying to agents, sir, for one thing, and if I might venture upon a little latitude of speech, I should say that our buying has been automatic rather than inspired. We have bought just when stocks were low and not when a good opportunity presented itself.

"I follow you," Harvey admitted briefly. "Now about our selling?"

"Our travellers lack a free hand," Greatorex continued, earnestly. "They have to sell at one price, and our principle seems to have been—Mr. Armitage's principle—to lose the business rather than ever make a cut. As markets are at present our values are all too high, our travellers are tired of making offers which are always refused, and we lose prestige as well as the business itself."

"You are giving me some excellent ideas," Harvey assured him. "Now during the next hour or so kindly prepare for me a list of the monthly sales for the past three years. Let me also have your latest stock list at cost and selling prices. How many travellers do we employ?"

"Seven, sir. One for Scotland and the north of England, two for the Midlands, one for the Eastern Counties, one for Bristol and the West of England, and two for London."

"Are any of them on the premises?"

"The three most important ones are here to-day, sir, and our London men are within call. Mr. Newton is our best man. He came home from Leicester yesterday in a most depressed state."

"At five o'clock," Harvey directed, "I shall be glad if you would bring to this office the travellers, the heads of the departments, and come yourself. In the meantime kindly prepare those figures I asked you for. I will change my plans for the day. I will go to the Bank at once, and you can have the particulars I want ready for me when I return. Don't forget the stock list with the cost and selling prices."

"Everything shall be in readiness, sir," the manager promised.

"In less than an hour, then," Harvey announced, rising to his feet and reaching for his hat, "I shall be back."

There was no suggestion of the impecunious client about Harvey when he descended from his Rolls-Royce, threw away his cigarette and entered the Bank with an assured air. His demand to see the Manager was, if anything, on the peremptory side. He was ushered without delay into the private office, and immediately made himself comfortable in an easy-chair.

"I have brought you back the advice for these bills, Mr. Poulton," he announced, passing the slip of paper across the table. "I haven't been able in this very short time to realise much in the shape of cash for you, but I am proposing to deposit a million dollars' worth of American Treasury Bonds, which I presume you will consider adequate security."

It was not Mr. Poulton's policy or habit to exhibit surprise, but on this occasion he was taken aback and showed it.

"A million dollars' worth, did you say, Mr. Garrard?" he exclaimed.

"At to-day's exchange," Harvey continued, as he produced the packets of bonds, "this should be more than sufficient to meet the bills and wipe out the overdraft. So far as I can see we have no acceptances due at all until the fourth of next month. We shall require these met and to perhaps overdraw to a moderate extent."

"That is quite in order, Mr. Garrard," the manager admitted, turning over the bonds. "A reasonable amount of accommodation to a firm of the standing of yours it has always been the Bank's pleasure to afford."

"No doubt," was the somewhat curt reply. "On the other hand nothing but very careless management has rendered the overdraft necessary. I intend to remodel the business within the next few months."

Mr. Poulton was tactless.

"God bless my soul!" he exclaimed.

Harvey looked at him with slightly upraised eyebrows.

"I think," he confided, "that my father's instincts for a commercial career are developing themselves in me rather late in the day. I am tired of the things which have hitherto gone to make up my life. I am going to settle down to work here in the City for the next few years at any rate."

"You have a wonderful opportunity, Mr. Garrard," the Bank Manager assured him. "Yours is still the leading firm in the trade—a name to conjure with, if one might say so."

"We grew a little too opulent, I think," Harvey observed, "too satisfied with holding just what we had. I imagine that business is very much like life—one must go backwards or forwards. A stationary position is impossible. . . . Well, I won't detain you any longer, Mr. Poulton. I have a busy day before me. Send the usual note to my cashier that you are holding these bonds as collateral security. Good-morning!"

Harvey sauntered out of the Bank in leisurely fashion, escorted to the steps by the Manager, a smiling, distinguished presentment of a class a little alien to the neighbourhood. In every respect, as he nodded a good-humoured farewell to Mr. Poulton and, lighting a cigarette, entered his limousine, he presented the appearance of a man at peace with himself and the world. Nevertheless when the car had started, he leaned back in his corner and there was for a moment a haggard look in his face. He had burnt his boats. Henceforth the visionary hand of the law would rest always upon his shoulders.