Читать книгу The Sinister Man - Edgar Wallace - Страница 12

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MR. TARN was not at breakfast the next morning; she would have been surprised if he had been. His door was still locked, and only after repeated hammerings did his sleepy voice growl an intimation that he would be out in a few minutes. Elsa hurried her breakfast and was successful in leaving the house before Tarn made an appearance.

She was anxious to get to the office, and curious as to what explanation Amery would offer. She might have guessed that he would offer none. When, at half-past nine, his bell summoned, her, she went to a man who certainly bore no appearance of having spent the night out of bed. He met her with his characteristic lack of greeting, and plunged straight away into his letters, firing across the table magazine after magazine of words, to be caught and recorded. It was not until she was leaving that he made any reference to their conversation of the early morning.

"Didn't you call me up in the night? I have a dim recollection of the circumstances."

"I had almost forgotten," she said coolly, and his face twitched.

"Possibly you were dreaming," he said. "But it is a dream which will never come true—again. When Feng Ho comes, ask him to tell you the story of his finger."

"His finger?" she repeated, surprised in spite of herself.

"His little finger. You broke yours at school, playing hockey. Ask him how he lost his."

"I didn't know he'd lost a finger."

"Ask him," he said, and his head jerked to the door.

She wished he would find another way of telling her that she could go.

It was nearly lunch time when Feng Ho came, as dapper as ever, his coat spotless, his trousers even more rigidly creased, his white spats exchanged for articles of bright yellow leather; his umbrella and his hat were in one hand, and in the other the gilded cage with a dignified canary balancing himself on the central perch.

He greeted the girl with a grin.

"My unworthy little bird has been sick all night. I have been sitting by his side, feeding him with sugar—from midnight till six o'clock this morning. And now he is better and will sing for us. Pi"—he addressed the yellow songster—"open your hideous little beak and emit unmusical noises for this honourable lady."

"Feng, you are not telling the truth," said Elsa severely. "You weren't sitting up all night with your bird."

The little man looked at her, blandly innocent. Then he turned his melancholy eyes to the bird.

"Little Pi, if I sin lying, do not sing; but if I am speaking the truth, then let your ugly little throat produce contemptible melody."

And as though he understood, the loyal little bird burst into a torrent of sunny song. Mr. Feng Ho smiled delightedly.

"It is a peculiar and noteworthy fact," he said, with his best European manner, "that has been observed by every seeker after truth, from Confucius to Darwin, that the animal world—by which I refer to the world of vertebrate mammals—are the living embodiment of truth and the chief exponents of veracity. I will now, with your gracious permission, sit down and watch your vivacious fingers manipulate the keyboard of your honourable typewriter—to employ the idiom of our neighbours, but not friends, the Nipponese."

He sat patiently, practically without a movement, except to turn his eyes from time to time to the bird, and there seemed some strange understanding between these two, for no sooner did Feng Ho's slit of a mouth open in a smile than the bird seemed to rock with musical laughter.

Miss Dame came in while she was typing, dropped her jaw at the first view of the Chinaman, but graciously admitted that the canary was the best song-bird she had ever heard.

"It must be a gentleman bird," she said. "Gentlemen birds always sing better than lady birds. And why shouldn't they? They've got less responsibility, if you understand me."

She glanced coldly at the Chinaman as he nodded his agreement. "If you've got to lay eggs, you can't find time for keeping up your singing. Excuse me, do you know Sessuekawa?" This to Feng Ho, who expressed his grief that he had never heard of the gentleman.

"He's the model of you," said Miss Dame, glaring at him. "Slightly better looking, if you'll excuse my rudeness, but that's probably the paint and powder he puts on his face. You've never seen him in 'The Bride of Fuji Yama'—that's a mountain?"

The explanation was necessary because Miss Dame pronounced it "fujjy yammer."

"You've missed a treat," she said regretfully when he shook his head. "He was simply marvellous, especially when he committed—what's the word?—haki raki?"

Elsa refused to assist her, and paused in her work with such point that Miss Dame was conscious of the interruption she had produced, and retired.

"A very pretty young lady," said Feng Ho, and Elsa, who thought he was being sarcastic, was prepared to snub him, but his next words demonstrated his sincerity. "The Eastern view differs considerably from the Western view. I can tell you that, speaking with authority as a bachelor of science."

She wondered what special authority this particular bachelorhood conferred when it came to a question of judging looks, but wisely did not pursue the topic.

When she got to the office she had found a note from Mrs. Trene Hallam. It would have been a letter from anybody else, for it occupied two sheets of notepaper; but Mrs. Hallam's calligraphy was not her strong point. The lettering was enormous, and ten words a page was a generous average.

"You will come to-night at seven. I will have dinner ready for you, and I will drive you every morning to your ofice." (She spelt "office" with one "f" Elsa noted.)

There was a postscript:

"Please don't tell Major Amery that you are staying with me. He may think I have some reason."

The postscript annoyed her, though why she did not know. Perhaps it was the assumption that she would tell Major Amery anything about her private affairs.

She saw her uncle only for a few minutes. Coming in from luncheon, she had to pass his door, which was open, and she saw him sitting at his table and would have gone on if he had not called her back.

"Shut the door," he growled. "I've been to see my lawyer on a certain matter—and I've made my will."

This was rather surprising news. She had never thought of her uncle as a man of means, or having property to dispose, and she could only utter a commonplace about the wisdom of taking such a precaution.

"He's a shrewd fellow is Nigitts," he said, "very shrewd. And remarkably well up in the matter of"—he cleared his throat—"criminal law. The most one can get in this country for a certain offence is two years, and Nigitts says one would probably get away with less—if a statement was made voluntarily."

She wondered what on earth he was talking about. Had he been drinking? His face was flushed, his eyes heavy with want of sleep, but from her own experience she thought he was sober.

"I've had to give the matter a whole lot of thought—there are other people besides me involved in this... business," he said; "but I thought you'd like to know that I'd improved the shining hour"—his attempt to be jovial was pathetic—"and I've left you a little bit of money, although I don't suppose you will touch it for years. Would you like to be rich, Elsa?"

He looked at her from between his narrowed eyes.

"I suppose everybody would like to be rich," smiled the girl.

"You'd like to be good and happy, eh? Like the girl in the story-book?" he sneered. And then: "What has Amery been doing all the morning?"

"Working," she said.

"Nothing unusual?"

She shook her head.

"I'd like to take a look at some of his letters, Elsa. Anyway, I'm in the business, and Major Amery has no secrets from me. Where do you keep the copy file?"

"Major Amery keeps his own copies in the safe," she said.

He played with a blotter.

"I don't see why you shouldn't slip in a second carbon?" he suggested.

There was no profit in discussing the matter with him.

"I can't do that—you know very well I can't. It would be dishonest and mean, and I'd rather leave Amery's than do it."

"You like him, eh?"

"I loathe him," she said frankly, and his face brightened.

"That's the kind of talk I like to hear, little girl. He's a swine, that fellow! There's nothing anybody could do to him that could be called mean."

"I am the 'anybody' concerned, and there are some things I will not do," she said, and walked out.