Читать книгу The Coat of Arms - Edgar Wallace - Страница 4

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LORD ARRANWAYS had not been fortunate in his first marriage. It had ended dramatically, almost tragically, when he was Governor of the Northern Provinces.

The Indian Secret Service is admirably efficient and can arrange most things, but it found it a little difficult to explain why one of the Governor's good-looking A.D.C.'s was found in his pyjamas in the Residency garden with a bullet through his shoulder, and why Lady Arranways had fled in her night things to the house of his military secretary, an hysterical woman, half mad with fear.

His lordship resigned his governorship; a divorce was arranged, with the wounded A.D.C. cited as co-respondent. Almost before the hurt was soothed Eddie Arranways met the Canadian beauty and was married again within two months.

He was a tall, rather faded man. He was good-looking, could be fascinating. Marie Mayford was flattered as well as fascinated. She too was caught on the rebound after an affair which had left her a little scared. She was very much in love with her husband at first. She discovered the second man in him almost before the honeymoon ended. He was querulous, suspicious, rather sorry for himself. He brooded over the humiliation of his first marriage, and too obviously anticipated no better result from his second. He questioned her every movement; called for an account of every hour of her time; left her, apparently to make long journeys, and arrived unexpectedly in the early hours of the morning. She was shocked, outraged, and once turned on him in a fury. If he had been penitent there might have been some hope for them, but he had a weakness for justifying himself.

"You've got to make allowances for me, my dear. I've had a pretty dreadful experience. Here was a woman I trusted—"

"I'm not interested in your first marriage," she said in a cold fury. "If I had an opportunity of meeting the first Lady Arranways and discussing the matter with her, I should probably find that she had received the same treatment as I am receiving."

He was hurt at this, and when he was hurt he sulked.

Dick Mayford, her brother, came down to Arranways and patched up the quarrel.

"She is a little unreasonable, Dick," Eddie Arranways complained. "You know the horrible time I went through in India—naturally it's left its mark, and it will be years before I get back to normal. I admit I'm suspicious. Why shouldn't I be, after my perfectly horrible experience? Marie is hard, a little unforgiving, and she absolutely refuses to take my point of view. The other day a fellow broke into the house—that old man—and I took a shot at him. She was furious with me."

Dick grinned.

"Of course she was furious with you. If you'd killed that poor old devil you'd have been the most unpopular man in England. Good lord, Eddie, you're a Justice of the Peace, and you know you're not allowed to shoot a man because he pinches a two-hundred-pound cup! You're mediaeval! You're living about three hundred years after your time. Your ancestors would of course have pinched the poor old man and put him in a dungeon with a large assortment of rats, or cut off his head or hung him on a gallows. But this is the twentieth century, old boy."

Eddie accepted much from his brother-in-law which was unacceptable from any other course. There was a reconciliation and very ceremoniously he marked the occasion by presenting Marie with an onyx and gold cigarette-lighter with her monogram in diamonds. She was touched by his awkward penitence, or the semblance of it.

Two months later, when Eddie was called to Washington to confer with an old colleague, she learned through her maid that he had commissioned a firm of detectives to watch her and prepare an account of her movements against his return. Dick Mayford's qualities as fixer were severely taxed in the weeks that followed.

It was Dick who suggested the trip to Egypt, and for the greater part of that holiday Eddie's behaviour was faultless, and the old pleasant relationships were revived. It was at the races in Cairo that his lordship met a very agreeable young man, Mr. Keith Keller, the son of a rich Australian. Keith had been educated in England. He was dapper, young, amusing, beautifully valeted, extraordinarily good-looking, but above all respectful. He did not seem greatly interested in Marie. He was, he confided to Lord Arranways, very much in love with a girl in Australia, who was coming to Europe in the fall. He knew a little about racing and a great deal about Lord Arranways, though his lordship was not aware of this. To all his excellent qualities add this, that he could listen without interruption and could express wonder and suggest admiration at the proper and appropriate moments.

He read the 360-page report which Eddie had written on the subject of Indian land tenure from cover to cover, and, what was more, understood it. He listened for three hours after dinner at Shepheard's Hotel whilst Eddie enlarged upon the irrigation scheme he had put before the Council, and which the Council had so summarily and so stupidly rejected. He had heard about the divorce, and, when Eddie touched on the matter, offered proper comment in a hushed tone.

Dick Mayford was rather amused. Lady Arranways was interested. One night, after a second-rate opera performance, Eddie asked the young man if he would escort her ladyship to the hotel. He had met a brother diplomat and they were going to the club together. Mr. Keller drove her home, one hand on the driving-wheel, the other in hers. She didn't know exactly why she was not annoyed. Perhaps she too was amused.

When, just before they reached the hotel, he kissed her, she did not protest. Eddie had been very trying that night.

He went up with her to their suite. He did not stay long. Before he left he kissed her again, and left her a little breathless.

They came home by easy stages, and Mr. Keller was a member of the party. They arrived in Rome at the height of the spring season. Venice was rather dull and silly; a white mist lay on the lagoon. They spent two nights at the Danielli and went on to Vienna.

One afternoon, when Marie left the Bristol, she saw a man standing on the sidewalk. He was chewing the unlighted stub of a cigar. A tall, rather stout man, with horn-rimmed spectacles. She only noticed him as she passed in the car, but later she saw him again, in the Ringstrasse, and pointed him out to Dick, who was with her.

"He looks like an American."

"What does an American look like?" asked Dick flippantly. And then, in a more serious tone; "How long is Keller staying with us?"

"Why?" she asked.

"Has he attached himself to the party?"

She shrugged one pretty shoulder.

"Eddie likes him, and he's rather amusing."

Then she changed the subject.

"I've had a letter from the Pursons, and it's all about the old man."

Dick frowned; he had forgotten the old man.

"Do you remember that detective who came down to Arranways? What's his name—Collett?"

Dick nodded.

"The fellow who expected the old man to do something tremendously eccentric?"

She nodded.

"He's done it," she said. "The Pursons' plate has been returned! When the servants came down one morning they found that a window had been forced and all the stolen property laid out neatly on the dining-room table. Somebody saw the old man walking on the edge of the wood that night, carrying a heavy bag. Isn't it the most amazing thing you ever heard! I hope to heaven he'll put back the Arranways cup. Eddie never lets a day pass without telling me that I'm responsible for its loss."

"Is Keller coming back with us to England?" asked Dick bluntly.

She half turned to look at him.

"Why?" Her voice was cold; those lovely eyes of hers were a little hard.

"I was just wondering." said Dick.

"Why don't you ask him? I don't know what he's going to do. For heaven's sake, Dick, leave all that nonsense to Eddie."

"Where did you go yesterday afternoon?" he persisted. "You went out with him."

"And the courier," she added. "We went to a restaurant on one of the hills. I don't know the name of it. There's an hotel there. Eddie knew all about it—in fact Eddie suggested it. We met him there."

Dick nodded.

"You met him at half past four; I heard him make the appointment. But you left the hotel soon after one, and you can get there in half an hour."

She sighed impatiently.

"We drove through the Prater. We stopped for coffee somewhere, and then we went on to Schonbrunn and saw the gardens. Have you any other questions to ask? We had the courier with us."

"You dropped the courier in the Prater and you picked him up there nearly two hours later," said Dick quietly. "Now don't look like that, darling I wasn't spying on you, only I happened to be in the Prater with a man from the American Embassy: I saw you drop the courier and spoke to him. Don't be a fool, Marie."

She did not answer.

Eddie was very difficult in Vienna; he was maddeningly unreasonable in Berlin. He quarrelled with everybody except Keith Keller.

He lived in a state of perpetual annoyance, and he had a certain justification, for in Berlin something happened. Marie lost a diamond bracelet, one of her wedding gifts. She had been to the theatre, had supped and danced at the Eden, and gone back to the hotel at one in the morning. She had put the bracelet with other articles of jewellery on her dressing-table, and in the morning it was gone. Her window was open at the top; the door was locked, and she was, as Eddie knew, a very light sleeper.

Three members of the criminal police came up from Alexanderplatz and conducted an investigation. There was no sign that the room had been entered from the outside, and the only possible way a thief could have got in was through the bathroom, the window of which opened into a deep well. There was also a door from the bathroom into the corridor, but this, so far as Marie could remember, was locked. Eddie was furious, although the wedding gift was not his but her father's.

"I can't understand it! I really can't understand it, Marie," he said. "You couldn't possibly have had the bracelet when you went to your room. Why should a burglar just choose that and leave all the other stuff?"

"I don't know. Ask the police." She was a little pale; her good-humour had momentarily failed her. "I won't swear that I remember taking it on, I was very tired. I may have dropped it while I was at the Eden."

But the police had already made inquiries in that direction. Eddie grumbled through every meal.

"Worth a couple of thousand pounds... sheer carelessness. Can't you remember, my dear?"

On the morning they left Berlin she went out to order some flowers to be sent to the ambassador's wife, and when she had concluded this errand she walked down Unter den Linden, turned into Wilhelmstrasse, having no definite objective, but desirous only of being alone.

Glancing idly across the road, she saw a man whom she instantly recognized. It was the tall, stout American she had noticed in Vienna. He still wore the same old brown suit, still clenched between his teeth the unlighted stub of a cigar. He was walking slowly, looking neither to left nor right, seemingly absorbed in thought. She stopped, watched him pass, and turned back towards the hotel. Glancing back over her shoulder as she turned into the Linden, she saw him. He had crossed the road and was following her at a distance.

She spoke to her brother about it. Dick Mayford was unimpressed.

"Americans are everywhere," he said. "Oh, by the way, Eddie has a new theory about your bracelet."

"I am getting a few theories about Eddie which I'm afraid are not as new as they should be," she said shortly.

Eddie's theory was, in reality, Keith Keller's theory. Keith had been down to the Alexanderplatz, and had inspected the criminal museum and had had a talk with its genial custodian, who was an encyclopaedia of information on criminal methods.

It was quite simple, explained Keith, for a clever thief to take a bracelet from a woman's arm. He had seen photographs and had had ocular demonstration performed for his benefit.

"I remember a fellow standing by you when we got up and danced at the Eden. A tall, rather dark-looking man. I thought he had coloured blood in him. Do you remember, when you took off your shawl—"

"I don't remember anything," she said, a little sharply.

Marie Arranways was worried. Though she could recall taking off her bracelet, she was not quite sure whether it was on the night it was lost or on some previous night. There is a certain timeless mechanism in the process of disrobing. When you do the same things night after night for years...

At dinner Eddie revived the hateful topic. "When you locked your door that night, do you remember where you left the key—"

"For God's sake talk about something else!" she said.

Eddie did not speak to her again until the day they arrived in England.