Читать книгу The Complete Detective Sgt. Elk Series (6 Novels in One Edition) - Edgar Wallace - Страница 47

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“Get Hyatt or the man on the Eiffel Tower!”

It sounded like the raving of a dying man, and T.B. shook his head as he walked back to his chambers in the early hours of the morning.

“Hyatt — the man on the Eiffel Tower — the Wady Barrage — the mysterious bears — what connection was there one with another”

“I want a private room,” he informed the proprietor, who came to meet him, with a bow.

“I’m ver’ sorry, Mr. Smith, but I have not—”

“But you have three,” said T.B. indignantly.

“I offer a thousand regrets,” said the distressed restaurateur; “they are engaged. If you had only—”

“But, name of dog! name of a sacred pipe!” expostulated T.B. unscrupulously. Was it not possible to pretend that there had been a mistake; that one room had already been engaged?

“Impossible, m’sieur! In No. 1 we have no less a person than the Premier of SouthWest Australia, who is being dined by his fellow-colonists; in No. 2 a family party of Lord Redlands; in No. 3 — ah! in No. 3—”

“Ah, in No. 3!” repeated T.B. cunningly, and the proprietor dropped his voice to a whisper.

“La Belle Espagna!” he murmured. He named the great Spanish dancer with relish. “She, and her fiance’s friend, eh?”

“Her fiancé’s?” I didn’t know—”

“It is a secret “ he looked round as if he were fearful of eavesdroppers, “but it is said that La Belle Espagna is to be married to a rich admirer.”

“Name?” asked T.B. carelessly.

The proprietor shrugged his shoulders.

“I do not inquire the name of my patrons,” he said, “but I understand that it is to be the young Lord Carleby.”

The name told T.B. nothing.

“Well,” he said easily, “I will take a table in the restaurant. I do not wish to interrupt a tête-à-tête.”

“Oh, it is not Carleby tonight,” the proprietor hastened to assure him. “I think mamzelle would prefer that it was — not; it is a stranger.”

T.B. sauntered into the brilliantly lighted room, having handed his hat and coat to a waiter. He found a deserted table. Luck was with him to an extraordinary extent; that Sir George should have chosen Meggioli’s was the greatest good fortune of all

At that time Count Menshikoff was paying one of his visits to England. The master of the St. Petersburg secret police was a responsibility. For his protection it was necessary that a small army of men should be detailed, and since Meggioli’s was the restaurant he favoured, at least one man of the Criminal Investigation Department was permanently employed at that establishment.

T.B. called a waiter, and the man came swiftly. He had a large white face, big unwinking black eyes, and heavy bushy eyebrows, that stamped his face as one out of the common. His name — which is unimportant — was Vellair, and foreign notabilities his specialty.

“Soup — consommé, crème de—”

T.B., studying his menu, asked quietly, “is it possible to see and hear what is going on in No. 3?”

“The private room?”

“Yes.”

The waiter adjusted the table with a soft professional touch. “There is a small anteroom, and a ventilator, a table that might be pushed against the wall, and a chair,” said the waiter, concisely. “If you remain here I will make sure.”

He scribbled a mythical order on his little pad and disappeared.

He came back in five minutes with a small tureen of soup. As he emptied its contents into the plate before T.B. he said, “All right; the key is on the inside. The door is numbered 11.”

T.B. picked up the wine list. “Cover me when I leave,” he said.

He had finished his soup when the waiter brought him a note. He broke open the envelope and read the contents with an expression of annoyance.

“I shall be back in a few minutes,” he said rising; “reserve this table.”

The waiter bowed.