Читать книгу The Valley of Ghosts - Edgar Wallace - Страница 4

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With Scottie lodged in the adequate lock-up, Andy discovered that there were certain formalities that need be gone through before his prisoner could be transferred to the area where he must answer for his sins.

"Where can I find one?" asked Andy, when he was told that the transfer must be approved and ordered by the local justice.

"Well, sir," meditated the sergeant of police, "there's Mr. Staining, but he's ill; and there's Mr James Bolter, but he's on his holidays, and there's Mr Carrol, but, now I come to think of it, he's gone up to the horse show. He breeds—"

Andy interrupted him.

"There is something in the air of this place which makes people talkative, sergeant," he said patiently, "but perhaps I was a little obscure. I don't want the names of the men who aren't here. Is there anybody in the neighbourhood who is on the Commission of the Peace?"

"There is one gentleman," emphasised the sergeant. "Mr Boyd Salter. He'll sign the order." He added: "If he's at home."

Andy grinned, and went in search of Mr Boyd Salter.

He found that the nearest way to the house avoided Beverley Green; in fact, Mr Salter's demesne ran well into Beverley, and was reached through a pair of lodge gates at the end of the town. He had seen them before and wondered who lived beyond them.

Beverley Hall was a handsome mansion of the type that Inigo Jones had made famous.

It was a house of silence. The first sound he heard as he was taken into a spacious, stone-flagged hall was the ticking of a clock. The man-servant moved noiselessly to carry Andy's visiting card, and Andy saw that he wore rubber-soled shoes. He was a long time gone, and when he returned he beckoned the caller forward.

"Mr Salter is a martyr to nerve trouble, sir," he whispered. "If you would speak quietly to him he would be obliged, I am sure."

Andy expected to meet an invalid, and had a vision of a trembling figure propped in a cushioned chair. Instead, he found a healthy-looking man of fifty, who looked up quickly as, unannounced, Andy was shown into the room.

"Good afternoon, Mr Macleod. What can I do for you? I see you are on police business," he said, examining the card.

Andy explained the reason for his visit.

"You needn't lower your voice," smiled the other. "I suppose Tilling told you? Sometimes I am rather jumpy, but this is one of my good days." He looked at the document which Andy put before him and signed it. "Our friend is the jewel burglar, isn't he?" he said. "Where has he been hiding?"

"In your garden city," said Andy, and a frown puckered Mr Salter's handsome face.

"Beverley Green? At the guest-house, of course?"

Andy nodded. "Did you meet any of the citizens?"

"One; Mr Merrivan." There was nothing said for a little while, then: "A curious lot of people. Wilmot is a rum fish. I can't quite get the measure of him. I've often thought he was an aristocratic burglar. What is the name of that fellow in the book—Ruffles? Ah, Raffles, that's it! A queer fish, Wilmot. Then there's Nelson. There is a weird fellow! Drinks like the devil! He'd drink the sea dry."

It was then Andy remembered the story he had heard about the artist.

"He has a daughter," he suggested.

"Ah, yes. Nice girl; very pretty. Wilmot is engaged to her or something of the sort. My son is a great news-gatherer when he's at home. He ought to be in the police service—at school now. H'm."

He looked down at the warrant, blotted it, and passed it across to Andy.

"Mr Merrivan seems a very nice man," he suggested.

The justice shook his had.

"Know nothing about him whatever," he said. "I've just said 'How d'ye do' to him, nothing more. He appears an inoffensive gentleman. Rather a bore, but inoffensive. Talks too fluently; everybody does in Beverley."

To emphasise this local weakness he went on, without stopping, to give the history of Beverley and its people. Presently he spoke of the Hall.

"Yes, it's a beautiful little place, but the estate is a very expensive one to keep up. I've not been able to do what I should have done, if—"

He looked quickly away, as though he feared his visitor could read his thoughts. It was some time before he spoke again. "Have you ever associated with the devil, Mr Macleod?"

He was not joking. The look he shot at Andy was straight and stern.

"I have associated with a number of minor devils," smiled Andy, "but I cannot lay claim to knowing the father of them."

The eyes of Mr Salter did not waver. They fixed Andy absently, it is true, but steadfastly, for fully thirty seconds.

"There is a man in London called Abraham Selim," he said, speaking slowly, "who is a devil. I am not telling you this as a police officer. I don't know why I am telling you at all. I think it comes of a natural association of ideas. I have had to sign many orders of arrest, but never once have I put pen to paper without thinking of this greatest of criminals. He is a murderer—a murderer!"

Andy, startled, moved in his chair.

"He has killed men; broken their hearts; ground them into the earth. He had a friend of mine like that!" He clasped his hand tight until the knuckles showed white.

"Abraham Selim?" Andy could think of nothing else to say, and his host nodded.

"If, as I believe, he will one day make a slip and fall into your hands, send me word. No, no, I don't mean that; he will never be trapped!"

"Is he Semitic—or Turkish? His name suggests both origins."

Boyd Salter shook his head.

"I've never seen him. I've not met anybody who has," he said surprisingly. "Now off you go, Mr Macleod. What is your rank, by the way?"

"I've been trying to discover for years," said Andy. "I'm by way of being a medical."

"A doctor?"

Andy nodded.

"I do a lot of analytical work. I'm a sort of assistant pathologist."

Boyd Salter smiled.

"Then I should have called you 'Doctor'," he said. "Edinburgh, of course."

Andy agreed.

"I've a weakness for doctors. My nerves are—terrible. Is there any cure?"

"Psycho-analysis," said Andy promptly. "It enables you to take out your inhibited worries and stare 'em out of countenance. Goodbye, sir."

There was no more effectual way of giving Andy Macleod his conge than to talk medicines with him.

"Goodbye—er—Doctor. You look very young for such a position—thirty or thirty-one?"

"You suggested midway, sir," laughed Andy, and went out.