Читать книгу A King by Night - Richard Horatio Edgar Wallace - Страница 14

Selby Lowe came leisurely down the broad, shallow steps of his club in Pall Mall, buttoning a spotless yellow glove as he moved. A tall man under thirty, with a dark complexion and insolent brown eyes that stared irritatingly on the slightest provocation, his upper lip was covered with a small black moustache. His chin was rounded like a woman's, and there was a deceptive petulance in the shape and set of his mouth that emphasized the femininity.

The young American who waited on the opposite sidewalk chuckled, delighted, for Selby Lowe's immaculateness was a never-ceasing cause of joy. And this morning his raiment was unusually beautiful. His long-tailed morning coat fitted perfectly, the grey suede waistcoat, the white "slip," the geometrically creased trousers, the enamelled shoes and faultless top hat, were as they came from the makers.

Selby looked up and down Pall Mall, shifted his ebony walking-stick from his arm-pit to his hand, and stepped daintily into the roadway.

"I thought you hadn't seen me, and I was wondering whether I'd be arrested for shouting," said Bill Joyner. "My! You're all dolled up this morning, Sel—what is happening, a wedding?"

Selby Lowe did not answer, but, screwing a gold-rimmed monocle into his eye, he fell in step with his companion. Presently:

"Ascot, old top," he said laconically. "You weren't up when I left the house."

Bill Joyner looked round.

"I never knew that you played the races," he said in surprise.

"I don't—by the way, we never say 'played the races' here; we say 'go racing.' No, I'm not betting, and I hate going out of London even for six hours, but the Jam Sahib of Komanpour is at Ascot to-day—he's the big noise on the North-West Frontier—and my job is to see that nobody borrows his family pearls. He wears a million dollars' worth by day, and by night he'd make Tiffany's look like a Woolworth store—correct me if my illustrations are wrong, dear old thing. America is a strange land to me, and I've got my education from the coloured pages of the Sunday supplements. And here is the miserable Mr. Timms."

The miserable Mr. Timms was crossing the road to intercept them. Even had not Bill Joyner known him, he would have guessed his vocation, for Inspector Timms was so patently a police officer that nothing would have disguised him.

"I say, Lowe, they've seen that Terror again! Tried to break into the house of Judge Warren, the county court judge."

All Mr. Lowe's elaborate boredom fell from him like a cloak.

"When?" he asked quickly.

"Early the night before last. The Judge only reported it late last evening. I tried to 'phone you—but you were out. The local police have been on his track, but they've found nothing. Only car-tracks ... Mendip wheels and oil leakage showing the car must have been left standing for some time."

"Did the Judge see him?"

Timms pursed his lips.

"He says he did, but I guess the old man was scared, and imagined a lot of it. He was going to bed, and was, in fact, in his pyjamas. The night was warm, and one of the windows of his bedroom was open. He pushed open the other and looked out. There was a full moon, and he says that it was almost as light as day, and there, within a foot of him, he saw the Thing. Stripped to the waist and its face turned up to him ... climbing up the ivy. The Judge says he nearly dropped with the shock, and that sounds true. And he gave the same description as the other people have given. Head close-cropped, broad, white-nigger face, big mouth and little eyes, no forehead, and arms...! The Judge says they weren't human. More like the size of legs, all muscled up...."

"What did the Judge do?" asked Joyner, a fascinated audience.

"Picked up a water ewer from a washstand, and smashed it down on the face ... but of course the Thing dropped like a cat. He stood on the lawn and shook his fist at the window."

"Did he say anything?" asked Selby quickly.

"The usual stuff about the Judge being a traitor to Bonginda, He was half-way across the lawn before the old man could get his gun."

Selby was stroking his little moustache abstractedly.

"Judge Warren ... where does he live?" he asked.

"Taddington Close—near Winchester," replied Timms. "That's practically the first public man the Thing has attacked. It only shows——"

"Where does the Judge sit—at Winchester?"

Timms nodded.

"And the marks of the car wheels—as usual," Selby Lowe went on thoughtfully, "and the usual talk about Bonginda. Humph! Thank you, Mr. Timms. I suppose you've put some men to guard the Judge?"

"Three," said Timms, "though I don't expect he will be troubled again."

"No, I don't expect he will," said Selby absently, "not if ... but it is highly complicated, my dear old Timms, and my defective intellect grapples hopelessly with a problem which must be very simple to you."

"I wouldn't say that," said the gratified Timms. "Of course, it is clear that this is a corroboration of the Eastleigh farmer's story—Eastleigh is only about fifteen miles from Winchester."

"Wonderful!" breathed the beaming Selby. "The coincidence would never have occurred to me. Most amazing mind you've got, Timms! Good morning."

They walked in silence until they came within sight of the big Trust Buildings.

"Bill," said Selby suddenly, "this uncleanly aborigine—I am not referring to the pathetic Mr. Timms, but to Judge Warren's visitor—is getting on my nerves. An ordinary thug is neither spectacular nor alarming. But a seventy-two inch assassin of large proportions, who travels the country in a costly car, and who appears now in the north, now in the south, and always has a definite objective, is both abnormal and unnatural. I want to catch that man pretty badly, and I want an excuse. For the moment it doesn't belong to my department, because I only deal with foreign crooks, passport forgers, missing millionaires and other undesirables that come within the purview of the Foreign Office, whose jolly old slave I am. The police will never catch the Terror, because he doesn't belong to any category. You have to hold the union ticket of the Amalgamated Burglars' Association, and have your fingerprints registered at headquarters, before the regular police will take even a languid interest in you. But as I am one of these people who are happy only when I am doing somebody else's work, as soon as I have put the Jam Sahib into a safe deposit, I'm going down to Judge Warren in search of information."

"But, Sel," protested the other, "you know more about burglars and all criminals than anybody I know in town."

"I admit it," said the other. "But I'm not supposed to know. If you ever have the misfortune to find yourself at the head of a Government department, you will discover that the unforgivable crime is to know anything about things that don't concern you."

He glanced up at the classic facade of the Trust Buildings.

"To your warren, rabbit!" And, with a nod and a flourish of his cane, he took his leave.