Читать книгу The Massingham Butterfly and Other Stories - J. S. Fletcher - Страница 6

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In that quiet little room of his behind the shop I told Penkfether the result of my investigations in Paris, and Penkfether’s face grew longer and longer, and his expression gloomier and gloomier, and finally he shook his head.

“Oh, well, Campenhaye,” he said, “there’s only one thing to be done. I shall have to tell all this to Lord Massingham, and the Marchioness will have to come in too. There’s no use in further secrecy and concealment. Of course, the real butterfly has been stolen, and by a remarkably clever thief. Now, who on earth could the man have been? You can’t think?”

“The description given me by Roubiaux doesn’t fit in with that of any crook of my acquaintance,” I answered. “But I am not sure that this has been a professional affair.”

Penkfether looked at me in surprise.

“Smart work, anyhow!” he exclaimed. “Couldn’t be much smarter, I should think.”

“That’s just why I feel sure that it wasn’t the work of a professional thief,” I remarked. “I don’t think we have a professional thief in London who is capable of quite so much cleverness. Hasn’t it struck you, Penkfether, that of late years our criminal aristocracy has been distinguished for paucity of ideas, lack of resource, striking unfertility?”

“What’s the best thing to be done?” asked Penkfether irrelevantly. “We can discuss the ethics of crime on another occasion; this is a serious business. I want to know—and Lord Massingham will want to know when he’s heard this story—where the original butterfly is. But I reckon it’s been broken up and the stones sold—long since!”

“Very well,” I said. “Then you had better put the two facsimiles in your pocket and go to Lord Massingham’s house. And I will go with you—to tell the Roubiaux story.”

We found the marquis in what I suppose he called his study—a small room given up to sporting prints, sporting books, a gun or two, a collection of old fishing rods in one corner, of battered cricket bats in another. He was busily reading Ruff’s Guide To the Turf! when we entered, and he pushed it and various sheets of figures aside as he rose to welcome my companion. Penkfether immediately introduced me and the marquis gave me a sharp, scrutinising look.

“I’ve heard of you, Mr. Campenhaye,” he said quietly. Then he turned to Penkfether. “Nothing wrong, I hope?” he went on. “Surely your haven’t had to engage Mr. Campenhaye’s professional services?”

Penkfether told his story. He had to bring the marchioness into it. As soon as her name was mentioned, Lord Massingham excused himself and left the room. When he came back the marchioness was with him, and I saw at once that there was a perfect understanding between the two—if she had told a small fib to Penkfether about the marquis knowing of her proposed pledging of the butterfly, she had already accounted satisfactorily for it to her husband. And I saw, too, that both were wondering why he had come, and that both believed that Penkfether held both original and duplicate.

“I think I see things,” said the marquis cheerfully. “My wife evidently brought you the replica, and I brought you the original. That’s it, isn’t it?”

Penkfether shook his head, and producing the two butterflies, laid them on the marquis’ table. Lord and Lady Massingham looked at them casually, as if at very familiar objects.

“Neither of these things is the original,” said Penkfether. “Neither! They are both imitations. Counterfeits, my lord!”

Lady Massingham started; her husband let out a sharp exclamation.

“Nonsense!” he said. “Neither of them the original? Neither the Massingham Butterfly? Impossible!”

Penkfether, who was standing close to me, gave a slight dig with his elbow.

“Let me put a pertinent question to your lordship,” he said. “Do you think you have ever—at any time—been able to tell which was the original and which was the duplicate? Could you ever, for instance, had the two been placed side by side, have said off-hand which was which?”

The marquis showed decided uncertainty and bewilderment.

“By Jove!” he exclaimed. “Now you put it to me, Penkfether, I don’t think I could.”

“Supposing, for instance, that this original had been put into the counterfeit’s case and the counterfeit into the original’s case,” said Penkfether, “what then?”

“I couldn’t have said which was which,” admitted Lord Massingham frankly.

“Which of these would you have said was the original?” asked Penkfether.

But the marquis shook his head; he was obviously puzzled and beaten.

“Can’t say for the life of me!” he replied. “But, then, you say——”

“I say,” interrupted Penkfether smiling, “I say—and I know—that neither is the original. This is the duplicate butterfly made for your lordship’s father some years ago; this is a second duplicate—made quite recently.”

I was watching Lord and Lady Massingham keenly, and I knew at once that neither knew anything about the making of that second counterfeit. They were as innocent as I was. And their exclamations and questions were as obviously ingenuous.

“I will let Mr. Campenhaye tell the rest,” said Penkfether. “I put the matter in his hands as soon as ever I discovered that these things are—what they are.”

“I should like to ask a question or two,” I said, as they both turned to me. “Has the Massingham Butterfly—the undoubted original—ever been out of your lordship’s possession?”

“Never!” answered the marquis.

“You have never, for instance, deposited it in a bank or at your solicitors’ or in a safe deposit?” I inquired.

“No,” he said, “never! I’ve often thought of doing something of the sort, but it never came to anything. No, it’s never been out of my possession since I inherited it—six years ago.”

“And where has it usually been kept?” I asked.

The marquis looked at his wife and smiled as he shook his head.

“I’m afraid we may have been careless about it,” he said, a little ruefully. “I may as well tell you, Mr. Campenhaye, that we were both naturally careless. Oh, well, sometimes, I suppose, it was in my wife’s jewel case and sometimes it was in that drawer of my desk there. I’m afraid I have a trick of leaving things about, and——”

“I think I will tell my story,” I said. “It may suggest something to you.”

I told everything that Roubiaux had told me, but I reserved to the last the description of the mysterious Mr. White. Eventually I gave it—carefully watching my hearers. And suddenly both uttered sharp and surprised exclamations.

“Gracious!” cried the marchioness.

“Good lord!” said the marquis.

“You recognise somebody in this description?” I said, with a glance at Penkfether.

The marquis looked at his wife, and they both laughed. Then he rose, picked up the two counterfeit butterflies and signed to us to follow him.

“Come this way, gentlemen,” he said.

We all four went through the house to a door at the rear of a long and quiet corridor. The marquis tapped; a querulous, rather irascible voice answered. The marquis opened the door, and motioned us, with a sly smile, to enter. And as we crossed the threshold, in rear of the marchioness, I saw, as I looked over her shoulder, an oldish gentleman, who sat in a book-lined room, half buried amongst books and papers, who was certainly the Mr. White described by Roubiaux, and who glanced at us in anything but a friendly fashion.

“What is it, Massingham?” said this elderly gentleman. “I’m just deep in——”

“My dear uncle,” said the marquis soothingly. “I’m sorry to break in upon your learned studies, but this is a matter of importance. Allow me to introduce Mr. Penkfether and Mr. Campenhaye—my uncle, Lord Stephen White-Domville. Uncle Stephen,” he went on, giving us a look, “we want to see you about the Massingham Butterfly. I was under the impression that I held the original and a replica, but I find that I have two replicas—here they are. And—I should like to know where the original is?”

The old gentleman—a shrewd, ready old man as ever I set eyes on—put up his glasses and stared hard at Penkfether and then at me.

“I know who you are,” he said bluntly to Penkfether. “I’ve seen your shop. And I suppose you’re this sort of a detective that I’ve heard of, eh?” he went on, turning to me. “Been poking your nose into this, Mr. Campenhaye, have you?”

“I have had a little conversation with one Roubiaux in Paris,” I answered in my suavest manner.

“Have you now?” he retorted. “Ah! Oh, well,” here he turned to his nephew, and pointed to a safe which was let into the wall. “The Massingham Butterfly,” he went on quite unconcernedly, “is in that safe, my dear fellow, and if you take an old stager’s advice, you’ll either let it remain there or you’ll take it to your banker’s. The truth is, neither you nor your wife are fit guardians of it. You, Massingham, used to leave it in an unlocked drawer in your desk, and your wife used to let it lie about on her dressing table. And as that got on my nerves and as I didn’t choose to see family heirlooms exposed to the chances of theft and burglary, I took the liberty of employing M. Roubiaux and of substituting for the real thing a counterfeit with which you have been quite as well satisfied. Understand? Anything more? Then please go away, all of you—I am at a very interesting point in my paper on the reason why the early Britons wore no clothes.”

We all went out in silence and the marquis closed the door carefully upon his learned relative. And once in the corridor, he looked at us and laughed.

“Penkfether,” he said, “I think I’d better square up with you. My agents found me a lot of money unexpectedly yesterday, and I think you’d better have yours. Come along and I’ll write you a cheque.”

“If your lordship pleases,” answered Penkfether.