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THE BLACK GANG (1922) [Part 1]

I

In Which Things Happen Near Barking Creek

The wind howled dismally round a house standing by itself almost on the shores of Barking Creek. It was the grey dusk of an early autumn day, and the occasional harsh cry of a sea-gull rising discordantly above the wind alone broke the silence of the flat, desolate waste.

The house seemed deserted. Every window was shuttered; the garden was uncared for and a mass of weeds; the gate leading on to the road, apparently feeling the need of a deficient top hinge, propped itself drunkenly on what once had been a flower-bed. A few gloomy trees swaying dismally in the wind surrounded the house and completed the picture—one that would have caused even the least imaginative of men to draw his coat a little tighter round him, and feel thankful that it was not his fate to live in such a place.

But then few people ever came near enough to the house to realise its sinister appearance. The road—it was little better than a cart track—which passed the gate, was out of the beaten way; only an occasional fisherman or farm labourer ever used it, and that generally by day when things assumed their proper proportion, and it was merely an empty house gradually falling to pieces through lack of attention. At night they avoided it if possible; folks did say that twelve years ago some prying explorer had found the bones of a skeleton lying on the floor in one of the upstair rooms with a mildewed rope fixed to one of the beams in the ceiling. And then it had been empty for twenty years.

Even now when the wind lay in the east or north-east and the tide was setting in, there were those who said that you could see a light shining through the cracks in the shutters in that room upstairs, and that, should a man climb up and look in, he’d see no skeleton, but a body with purple face and staring eyes swinging gently to and fro, and tied by the neck to a beam with a rope which showed no trace of mildew. Ridiculous, of course; but then so many of these local superstitions are. Useful, too, in some cases; they afford a privacy from the prying attentions of local gossips far more cheaply and effectively than high walls and bolts and bars.

So, at any rate, one of the two men who were walking briskly along the rough track seemed to think.

“Admirable,” he remarked, as he paused for a moment at the entrance of the weed-grown drive. “Quite admirable, my friend. A house situated as this one is, is an acquisition, and when it is haunted in addition it becomes a godsend.”

He spoke English perfectly with a slight foreign accent, and his companion nodded abruptly.

“From what I heard about it I thought it would do,” he answered. “Personally I think it’s a damnable spot, but since you were so set against coming to London, I had to find somewhere in this neighbourhood.”

The two men started to walk slowly up the drive. Branches dripping with moisture brushed across their faces, and involuntarily they both turned up the collars of their coats.

“I will explain my reasons in due course,” said the first speaker shortly. “You may take it from me that they were good. What’s that?”

He swung round with a little gasp, clutching his companion’s arm.

“Nothing,” cried the other irritably. For a moment or two they stood still, peering into the dark undergrowth. “What did you think it was?”

“I thought I heard a bush creaking as if—as if someone was moving,” he said, relaxing his grip. “It must have been the wind, I suppose.”

He still peered fearfully into the gloomy garden, until the other man dragged him roughly towards the house.

“Of course it was the wind,” he muttered angrily. “For heaven’s sake, Zaboleff, don’t get the jumps. If you will insist on coming to an infernal place like this to transact a little perfectly normal business you must expect a few strange noises and sounds. Let’s get indoors; the others should be here by now. It oughtn’t to take more than an hour, and you can be on board again long before dawn.”

The man who had been addressed as Zaboleff ceased looking over his shoulder, and followed the other through a broken-down lattice-gate to the rear of the house. They paused in front of the back door, and on it the leader knocked three times in a peculiar way. It was obviously a prearranged signal, for almost at once stealthy steps could be heard coming along the passage inside. The door was cautiously pulled back a few inches, and a man peered out, only to throw it open wide with a faint sigh of relief.

“It’s you, Mr. Waldock, is it?” he muttered. “Glad you’ve got ’ere at last. This place is fair giving us all the ’ump.”

“Evening, Jim.” He stepped inside, followed by Zaboleff, and the door closed behind them. “Our friend’s boat was a little late. Is everyone here?”

“Yep,” answered the other. “All the six of us. And I reckons we’d like to get it over as soon as possible. Has he “—his voice sank to a hoarse undertone—”has he brought the money?”

“You’ll all hear in good time,” said Waldock curtly. “Which is the room?”

“’Ere it is, guv’nor.” Jim flung open a door. “And you’ll ’ave to sit on the floor, as the chairs ain’t safe.”

Two candles guttered on a square table in the centre of the room, showing up the faces of the five men who sat on the floor, leaning against the walls. Three of them were nondescript specimens of humanity of the type that may be seen by the thousand hurrying into the City by the early business trains. They were representative of the poorer type of clerk—the type which Woodbines its fingers to a brilliant orange; the type that screams insults at a football referee on Saturday afternoon. And yet to the close observer something more might be read on their faces: a greedy, hungry look, a shifty untrustworthy look—the look of those who are jealous of everyone better placed than themselves, but who are incapable of trying to better their own position except by the relative method of dragging back their more fortunate acquaintances; the look of little men dissatisfied not so much with their own littleness as with the bigness of other people. A nasty-faced trio with that smattering of education which is the truly dangerous thing; and—three of Mr. Waldock’s clerks.

The two others were Jews; a little flashily dressed, distinctly addicted to cheap jewellery. They were sitting apart from the other three, talking in low tones, but as the door opened their conversation ceased abruptly and they looked up at the newcomers with the keen, searching look of their race. Waldock they hardly glanced at; it was the stranger Zaboleff who riveted their attention. They took in every detail of the shrewd, foreign face—the olive skin, the dark, piercing eyes, the fine-pointed beard; they measured him up as a boxer measures up his opponent, or a business-man takes stock of the second party in a deal; then once again they conversed together in low tones which were barely above a whisper.

It was Jim who broke the silence—Flash Jim, to give him the full name to which he answered in the haunts he frequented.

“Wot abaht getting on with it, guv’nor?” he remarked with an attempt at a genial smile. “This ’ere ’ouse ain’t wot I’d choose for a blooming ’oneymoon.”

With an abrupt gesture Waldock silenced him and advanced to the table.

“This is Mr. Zaboleff, gentlemen,” he said quietly. “We are a little late, I am afraid, but it was unavoidable. He will explain to you now the reason why you were asked to come here, and not meet at our usual rendezvous in Soho.”

He stepped back a couple of paces and Zaboleff took his place. For a moment or two he glanced round at the faces turned expectantly towards him, then resting his two hands on the table in front of him, he leaned forward towards them.

“Gentlemen,” he began, and the foreign accent seemed a little more pronounced, “I have asked you to come here tonight through my good friend, Mr. Waldock, because it has come to our ears—no matter how—that London is no longer a safe meeting-place. Two or three things have occurred lately the significance of which it is impossible to disregard.”

“Wot sort of things?” interrupted Flash Jim harshly.

“I was about to tell you,” remarked the speaker suavely, and Flash Jim subsided, abashed. “Our chief, with whom I spent last evening, is seriously concerned about these things.”

“You spent last night with the chief?” said Waldock, and his voice held a tremor of excitement, while the others leaned forward eagerly. “Is he, then, in Holland?”

“He was at six o’clock yesterday evening,” answered Zaboleff with a faint smile. “Today—now—I know no more than you where he is.”

“Who is he—this man we’re always hearing about and never seeing?” demanded one of the three clerks aggressively.

“He is—the Chief,” replied the other, while his eyes seemed to bore into the speaker’s brain. “Just that—and no more. And that is quite enough for you.” His glance travelled round the room, and his audience relaxed. “By the way, is not that a chink in the shutter there?”

“All the safer,” grunted Flash Jim. “Anyone passing will think the ghost is walking.”

“Nevertheless, kindly cover it up,” ordered Zaboleff, and one of the Jews rose and wedged his pocket-handkerchief into the crack. There was silence in the room while he did so, a silence broken only by the mournful hooting of an owl outside.

“Owls is the only things wot comes to this damned museum,” said Flash Jim morosely. “Owls and blinkin’ fools like us.”

“Stow it, Jim,” snarled Waldock furiously. “Anyone would think you wanted a nurse.”

“Gentlemen—please.” Zaboleff held up a protesting hand. “We do not want to prolong matters, but one or two explanations are necessary. To return, then, to these things that have happened recently, and which necessitated a fresh rendezvous for this evening—one which our friend Mr. Waldock so obligingly found. Three messengers sent over during the last three weeks bearing instructions and—what is more important—money, have disappeared.”

“Disappeared?” echoed Waldock stupidly.

“Absolutely and completely. Money and all. Two more have been abominably ill-treated and had their money taken from them, but for some reason they were allowed to go free themselves. It is from them that we have obtained our information.”

“Blimey!” muttered Flash Jim; “is it the police?”

“It is not the police, which is what makes it so much more serious,” answered Zaboleff quietly, and Flash Jim breathed a sigh of relief. “It is easy to keep within the law, but if our information is correct we are up against a body of men who are not within the law themselves. A body of men who are absolutely unscrupulous and utterly ruthless, a body of men who appear to know our secret plans as well as we do ourselves. And the difficulty of it is, gentlemen, that though, legally speaking, on account of the absurd legislation in this country we may keep within the law ourselves, we are hardly in a position to appeal to the police for protection. Our activities, though allowed officially, are hardly such as would appeal even to the English authorities. And on this occasion particularly that is the case. You may remember that the part I played in stirring up bloodshed at Cowdenheath a few months ago, under the name of MacTavish, caused me to be deported. So though our cause is legal—my presence in this country is not. Which was why tonight it was particularly essential that we should not be disturbed. Not only are we all up against this unknown gang of men, but I, in addition, am up against the police.”

“Have you any information with regard to this gang?” It was the Jew who had closed the chink in the shutters, speaking for the first time.

“None of any use—save that they are masked in black, and cloaked in long black cloaks.” He paused a moment as if to collect his thoughts. “They are all armed, and Petrovitch—he was one of the men allowed to escape—was very insistent on one point. It concerned the leader of the gang, whom he affirmed was a man of the most gigantic physical strength; a giant powerful as two ordinary strong men. He said…Ah! Mein Gott—!”

His voice rose to a scream as he cowered back, while the others, with terror on their faces, rose hurriedly from their seats on the floor and huddled together in the corners of the room.

In the doorway stood a huge man covered from head to foot in black. In each hand he held a revolver, with which he covered the eight occupants during the second or two which it took for half a dozen similarly disguised men to file past him, and take up their positions round the walls. And Waldock, a little more educated than the remainder of his friends, found himself thinking of old tales of the Spanish Inquisition and the Doges of Venice even as he huddled a little nearer to the table. “Stand by the table, all of you.”

It was the man at the door who spoke in a curiously deep voice, and like sheep they obeyed him—all save Flash Jim. For that worthy, crook though he was, was not without physical courage. The police he knew better than to play the fool with, but these were not the police.

“Wot the—” he snarled, and got no farther. Something hit him behind the head, a thousand stars danced before his eyes, and with a strangled grunt he crashed forward on his face.

For a moment or two there was silence, and then once again the man at the door spoke. “Arrange the specimens in a row.”

In a second the seven remaining men were marshalled in a line, while behind them stood six motionless black figures. And then the big man walked slowly down in front of them, peering into each man’s face. He spoke no word until he reached the end of the line, and then, his inspection concluded, he stepped back and leaned against the wall facing them.

“A nauseating collection,” he remarked thoughtfully. “A loathsome brood. What are the three undersized and shivering insects on the right?”

“Those are three of my clerks,” said Waldock with an assumption of angry bravado. “And I would like to know—”

“In good time you will,” answered the deep voice. “Three of your clerks, are they; imbued with your rotten ideas, I suppose, and yearning to follow in father’s footsteps? Have we anything particular against them?”

There was no answer from the masked men, and the leader made a sign. Instantly the three terrified clerks were seized from behind and brought up to him, where they stood trembling and shaking in every limb.

“Listen to me, you three little worms.” With an effort they pulled themselves together: a ray of hope was dawning in their minds—perhaps they were going to be let off easily. “My friends and I do not like you or your type. You meet in secret places and in your slimy minds you concoct foul schemes which, incredible though it may seem, have so far had more than a fair measure of success in this country. But your main idea is not the schemes, but the money you are paid to carry them out. This is your first and last warning. Another time you will be treated differently. Get out of here. And see you don’t stop.”

The door closed behind them and two of the masked men; there was the sound as of a boot being used with skill and strength, and cries of pain; then the door reopened and the masked men returned.

“They have gone,” announced one of them. “We helped them on their way.”

“Good,” said the leader. “Let us continue the inspection. What are these two Hebrews?”

A man from behind stepped forward and examined them slowly; then he came up to the leader and whispered in his ear.

“Is that so?” A new and terrible note had crept into the deep voice. “My friends and I do not like your trade, you swine. It is well that we have come provided with the necessary implement for such a case. Fetch the cat.”

In silence one of the men left the room, and as his full meaning came home to the two Jews they flung themselves grovelling on the floor, screaming for mercy.

“Gag them.”

The order came out sharp and clear, and in an instant the two writhing men were seized and gagged. Only their rolling eyes and trembling hands showed the terror they felt as they dragged themselves on their knees towards the impassive leader.

“The cat for cases of this sort is used legally,” he remarked. “We merely anticipate the law.”

With a fresh outburst of moans the two Jews watched the door open and the inexorable black figure come in, holding in his hand a short stick from which nine lashes hung down.

“Heavens!” gasped Waldock, starting forward. “What are you going to do?”

“Flog them to within an inch of their lives,” said the deep voice. “It is the punishment for their method of livelihood. Five and six—take charge. After you have finished remove them in Number 3 car, and drop them in London.”

Struggling impotently, the Jews were led away, and the leader passed on to the remaining two men.

“So, Zaboleff, you came after all. Unwise, surely, in view of the police?”

“Who are you?” muttered Zaboleff, his lips trembling.

“A specimen hunter,” said the other suavely. “I am making a collection of people like you. The police of our country are unduly kind to your breed, although they would not have been kind to you tonight, Zaboleff, unless I had intervened. But I couldn’t let them have you; you’re such a very choice specimen. I don’t think somehow that you’ve worked this little flying visit of yours very well. Of course I knew about it, but I must confess I was surprised when I found that the police did too.”

“What do you mean?” demanded the other hoarsely.

“I mean that when we arrived here we found to our surprise that the police had forestalled us. Popular house, this, tonight.”

“The police!” muttered Waldock dazedly.

“Even so—led by no less a personage than Inspector McIver. They had completely surrounded the house, and necessitated a slight change in my plans.”

“Where are they now?” cried Waldock.

“Ah! Where indeed? Let us trust at any rate in comfort.”

“By heaven!” said Zaboleff, taking a step forward. “As I asked you before—who are you?”

“And as I told you before, Zaboleff, a collector of specimens. Some I keep; some I let go—as you have already seen.”

“And what are you going to do with me?”

“Keep you. Up to date you are the cream of my collection.”

“Are you working with the police?” said the other dazedly.

“Until tonight we have not clashed. Even tonight, well, I think we are working towards the same end. And do you know what that end is, Zaboleff?” The deep voice grew a little sterner. “It is the utter, final overthrow of you and all that you stand for. To achieve that object we shall show no mercy. Even as you are working in the dark—so are we. Already you are frightened; already we have proved that you fear the unknown more than you fear the police; already the first few tricks are ours. But you still hold the ace, Zaboleff—or shall we say the King of Trumps? And when we catch him you will cease to be the cream of my collection. This leader of yours—it was what Petrovitch told him, I suppose, that made him send you over.”

“I refuse to say,” said the other.

“You needn’t; it is obvious. And now that you are caught—he will come himself. Perhaps not at once—but he will come. And then…But we waste time. The money, Zaboleff.”

“I have no money,” he snarled.

“You lie, Zaboleff. You lie clumsily. You have quite a lot of money brought over for Waldock so that he might carry on the good work after you had sailed tomorrow. Quick, please; time passes.”

With a curse Zaboleff produced a small canvas bag and held it out. The other took it and glanced inside.

“I see,” he said gravely. “Pearls and precious stones. Belonging once, I suppose, to a murdered gentlewoman whose only crime was that she, through no action of her own, was born in a different sphere from you. And, you reptile “—his voice rose a little—”you would do that here.”

Zaboleff shrank back, and the other laughed contemptuously. “Search him—and Waldock too.”

Two men stepped forward quickly. “Nothing more,” they said after a while. “Except this piece of paper.”

There was a sudden movement on Zaboleff’s part—instantly suppressed, but not quite soon enough.

“Injudicious,” said the leader quietly. “Memory is better. An address, I see—No. 5, Green Street, Hoxton. A salubrious neighbourhood, with which I am but indifferently acquainted. Ah! I see my violent friend has recovered.” He glanced at Flash Jim, who was sitting up dazedly, rubbing the back of his head. “Number 4—the usual.”

There was a slight struggle, and Flash Jim lay back peacefully unconscious, while a faint smell of chloroform filled the room.

“And now I think we will go. A most successful evening.”

“What are you going to do with me, you scoundrel?” spluttered Waldock. “I warn you that I have influential friends, who—who will ask questions in—in Parliament if you do anything to me; who will go to Scotland Yard.”

“I can assure you, Mr. Waldock, that I will make it my personal business to see that their natural curiosity is gratified,” answered the leader suavely. “But for the present I fear the three filthy rags you edit will have to be content with the office boy as their guiding light. And I venture to think they will not suffer.”

He made a sudden sign, and before they realised what was happening the two men were caught from behind and gagged. The next instant they were rushed through the door, followed by Flash Jim. For a moment or two the eyes of the leader wandered round the now empty room taking in every detail: then he stepped forward and blew out the two candles. The door closed gently behind him, and a couple of minutes later two cars stole quietly away from the broken-down gate along the cart track. It was just midnight, behind them the gloomy house stood up gaunt and forbidding against the darkness of the night sky. And it was not until the leading car turned carefully into the main road that anyone spoke.

“Deuced awkward, the police being there.”

The big man who was driving grunted thoughtfully. “Perhaps,” he returned. “Perhaps not. Anyway, the more the merrier. Flash Jim all right?”

“Sleeping like a child,” answered the other, peering into the body of the car.

For about ten miles they drove on in silence: then at a main cross-roads the car pulled up and the big man got out. The second car was just behind, and for a few moments there was a whispered conversation between him and the other driver. He glanced at Zaboleff and Waldock, who appeared to be peacefully sleeping on the back seat, and smiled grimly.

“Good night, old man. Report as usual.”

“Right,” answered the driver. “So long.”

The second car swung right-handed and started northwards, while the leader stood watching the vanishing tail lamp. Then he returned to his own seat, and soon the first beginnings of outer London were reached. And it was as they reached Whitechapel that the leader spoke again with a note of suppressed excitement in his voice.

“We’re worrying ’em; we’re worrying ’em badly. Otherwise they’d never have sent Zaboleff. He was too big a man to risk, considering the police.”

“It’s the police that I am considering,” said his companion.

The big man laughed.

“Leave that to me, old man, leave that entirely to me.”

CHAPTER II

In Which Scotland Yard Sits Up and Takes Notice

Sir Bryan Johnstone leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling with a frown. His hands were thrust deep into his trouser pockets; his long legs were stretched out to their full extent under the big roll-top desk in front of him. From the next room came the monotonous tapping of a typewriter, and after a while Sir Bryan closed his eyes.

Through the open window there came the murmur of the London traffic—that soothing sound so conducive to sleep in those who have lunched well. But that did not apply to the man lying back in his chair. Sir Bryan’s lunch was always a frugal meal, and it was no desire for sleep that made the Director of Criminal Investigation close his eyes. He was puzzled, and the report lying on the desk in front of him was the reason.

For perhaps ten minutes he remained motionless, then he leaned forward and touched an electric bell. Instantly the typewriter ceased, and a girl secretary came quickly into the room.

“Miss Forbes,” said Sir Bryan, “I wish you would find out if Chief Inspector McIver is in the building. If so, I would like to see him at once; if not, see that he gets the message as soon as he comes in.”

The door closed behind the girl, and after a moment or two the man rose from his desk and began to pace up and down the room with long, even strides. Every now and then he would stop and stare at some print on the wall, but it was the blank stare of a man whose mind is engrossed in other matters.

And once while he stood looking out of the window, he voiced his thoughts, unconscious that he spoke aloud. “Dash it, McIver’s not fanciful. He’s the least fanciful man we’ve got. And yet…”

His eyes came round to the desk once more, the desk on which the report was lying. It was Inspector McIver’s report—hence his instructions to the secretary. It was the report on a very strange matter which had taken place the previous night, and after a while Sir Bryan picked up the typed sheets and glanced through them again. And he was still standing by the desk, idly turning over the pages, when the secretary came into the room.

“Chief Inspector McIver is here. Sir Bryan,” she announced.

“Tell him to come in, Miss Forbes.”

Certainly the Inspector justified his Chief’s spoken thought—a less fanciful looking man it would have been hard to imagine. A square-jawed, rugged Scotchman, he looked the type to whom Holy Writ was Holy Writ only in so far as it could be proved. He was short and thick-set, and his physical strength was proverbial. But a pair of kindly twinkling eyes belied the gruff voice. In fact, the gruff voice was a pose specially put on which deceived no one; his children all imitated it to his huge content, though he endeavoured to look ferocious when they did so. In short, McIver, though shrewd and relentless when on duty, was the kindest-hearted of men. But he was most certainly not fanciful.

“What the dickens is all this about, McIver?” said Sir Bryan with a smile, when the door had shut behind the secretary.

“I wish I knew myself, sir,” returned the other seriously. “I’ve never been so completely defeated in my life.”

Sir Bryan waved him to a chair and sat down at the desk. “I’ve read your report,” he said, still smiling, “and frankly, McIver, if it had been anyone but you, I should have been annoyed. But I know you far too well for that. Look here “—he pushed a box of cigarettes across the table—”take a cigarette and your time and let’s hear about it.”

McIver lit a cigarette and seemed to be marshalling his thoughts. He was a man who liked to tell his story in his own way, and his chief waited patiently till he was ready. He knew that when his subordinate did start he would get a clear, concise account of what had taken place, with everything irrelevant ruthlessly cut out. And if there was one thing that roused Sir Bryan to thoughts of murder and violence, it was a rambling, incoherent statement from one of his men.

“Well, sir,” began McIver at length, “this is briefly what took place. At ten o’clock last night as we had arranged, we completely surrounded the suspected house on the outskirts of Barking. I had had a couple of good men on duty there lying concealed the whole day, and when I arrived at about nine-thirty with Sergeant Andrews and half a dozen others, they reported to me that at least eight men were inside, and that Zaboleff was one of them. He had been shadowed the whole way down from Limehouse with another man, and both the watchers were positive that he had not left the house. So I posted my men and crept forward to investigate myself. There was a little chink in the wooden shutters of one of the downstairs rooms through which the light was streaming. I took a glimpse through, and found that everything was just as had been reported to me. There were eight of them there, and an unpleasant-looking bunch they were, too. Zaboleff I saw at the head of the table, and standing next to him was that man Waldock who runs two or three of the worst Red papers. There was also Flash Jim, and I began to wish I’d brought a few more men.”

McIver smiled ruefully. “It was about the last coherent wish I remember. And,” he went on seriously, “what I’m going to tell you now, sir, may seem extraordinary and what one would expect in detective fiction, but as sure as I am sitting in this chair, it is what actually took place. Somewhere from close to, there came the sound of an owl hooting. At that same moment I distinctly heard the noise of what seemed like a scuffle, and a stifled curse. And then, and this is what beats me, sir.” McIver pounded a huge fist into an equally huge palm. “I was picked up from behind as if I were a baby. Yes, sir, a baby.”

Involuntarily Sir Bryan smiled. “You make a good substantial infant, McIver.”

“Exactly, sir,” grunted the Inspector. “If a man had suggested such a thing to me yesterday I’d have laughed in his face. But the fact remains that I was picked up just like a child in arms, and doped, sir, doped. Me—at my time of life. They chloroformed me, and that was the last I saw of Zaboleff or the rest of the gang.”

“Yes, but it’s the rest of the report that beats me,” said his chief thoughtfully.

‘”So it does me, sir,” agreed McIver. “When I came to myself early this morning I didn’t realise where I was. Of course my mind at once went back to the preceding night, and what with feeling sick as the result of the chloroform, and sicker at having been fooled, I wasn’t too pleased with myself. And then I rubbed my eyes and pinched myself, and for a moment or two I honestly thought I’d gone off my head. There was I sitting on my own front door step, with a cushion all nicely arranged for my head and every single man I’d taken down with me asleep on the pavement outside. I tell you, sir, I looked at those eight fellows all ranged in a row for about five minutes before my brain began to act. I was simply stupefied. And then I began to feel angry. To be knocked on the head by a crew like Flash Jim might happen to anybody. But to be treated like naughty children and sent home to bed was a bit too much. Dammit, I thought, while they were about it, why didn’t they tuck me up with my wife.”

Once again Sir Bryan smiled, but the other was too engrossed to notice.

“It was then I saw the note,” continued McIver. He fumbled in his pocket, and his chief stretched out his hand to see the original. He already knew the contents almost by heart, and the actual note itself threw no additional light on the matter. It was typewritten, and the paper was such as can be bought by the ream at any cheap stationer’s.

“To think of an old bird like you, Mac,” it ran, “going and showing yourself up in a chink of light. You must tell Mrs. Mac to get some more cushions. There were only enough in the parlour for you and Andrews. I have taken Zaboleff and Waldock, and I dropped Flash Jim in Piccadilly Circus. I flogged two of the others whose method of livelihood failed to appeal to me; the remaining small fry I turned loose. Cheerio, old son. The fellow in St. James makes wonderful pick-me-ups for the morning after. Hope I didn’t hurt you.”

Idly Sir Bryan studied the note, holding it up to the light to see if there was any water-mark on the paper which might help. Then he studied the typed words, and finally with a slight shrug of his shoulders he laid it on the desk in front of him.

“An ordinary Remington, I should think. And as there are several thousands in use it doesn’t help much. What about Flash Jim?”

McIver shook his head. “The first thing I did, sir, was to run him to ground. And I put it across him good and strong. He admitted everything: admitted he was down there, but over the rest of the show he swore by everything that he knew no more than I did. All he could say was that suddenly the room seemed full of men. And the men were all masked. Then he got a clip over the back of the head, and he remembers nothing more till the policeman on duty at Piccadilly Circus woke him with his boot just before dawn this morning.”

“Which fact, of course, you have verified,” said Sir Bryan.

“At once, sir,” answered the other. “For once in his life Flash Jim appears to be speaking the truth. Which puts a funny complexion on matters, sir, if he is speaking the truth.”

The Inspector leaned forward and stared at his chief.

“You’ve heard the rumours, sir,” he went on after a moment, “the same as I have.”

“Perhaps,” said Sir Bryan quietly. “But go on, McIver. I’d like to hear what’s on your mind.”

“It’s the Black Gang, sir,” said the Inspector, leaning forward impressively. “There have been rumours going round, rumours which our men have heard here and there for the past two months. I’ve heard ’em myself; and once or twice I’ve wondered. Now I’m sure—especially after what Flash Jim said. That gang is no rumour, it’s solid fact.”

“Have you any information as to what their activities have been, assuming for a moment it is the truth?” asked Sir Bryan.

“None for certain, sir; until this moment I wasn’t certain of its existence. But now—looking back—there have been quite a number of sudden disappearances. We haven’t troubled officially, we haven’t been asked to. Hardly likely when one realises who the people are who have disappeared.”

“All conjecture, McIver,” said Sir Bryan. “They may be lying doggo, or they’ll turn up elsewhere.”

“They may be, sir,” answered McIver doggedly. “But take the complete disappearance of Granger a fortnight ago. He’s one of the worst of the Red men, and we know he hasn’t left the country. Where is he? His wife, I happen to know, is crazy with anxiety, so it doesn’t look like a put-up job. Take that extraordinary case of the Pole who was found lashed to the railings in Whitehall with one half of his beard and hair shaved off and the motto ‘Portrait of a Bolshevist’ painted on his forehead. Well, I don’t need to tell you, sir, that that particular Pole, Strambowski, was undoubtedly a messenger, between—well, we know who between and what the message was. And then take last night—”

“Well, what about last night?”

“For the first time this gang has come into direct contact with us.”

“Always assuming the fact of its existence.”

“Exactly, sir,” answered McIver. “Well, they’ve got Zaboleff and they’ve got Waldock, and they laid eight of us out to cool. I guess they’re not to be sneezed at.”

With a thoughtful look on his face Sir Bryan rose and strolled over to the window. Though not prepared to go quite as far as McIver, there were certainly some peculiar elements in the situation—elements which he, as head of a big public department, could not officially allow for an instant, however much it might amuse him as a private individual.

“We must find Zaboleff and Waldock,” he said curtly, without turning round. “Waldock, at any rate, has friends who will make a noise unless he’s forthcoming. And…”

But his further remarks were interrupted by the entrance of his secretary with a note.

“For the Inspector, Sir Bryan,” she said, and McIver, after a glance at his chief, opened the envelope. For a while he studied the letter in silence, then with an enigmatic smile he rose and handed it to the man by the window.

“No answer, thank you. Miss Forbes,” he said, and when they were once more alone, he began rubbing his hands together softly—a sure sign of being excited. “Curtis and Samuel Bauer, both flogged nearly to death and found in a slum off Whitechapel. The note said two of ’em had been flogged.”

“So,” said Sir Bryan quietly. “These two were at Barking last night?”

“They were, sir,” answered the Inspector.

“And their line?” queried the Chief.

“White Slave Traffic of the worst type,” said McIver. “They generally drug the girls with cocaine or some dope first. What do you say to my theory now, sir?”

“It’s another point in its favour, McIver,” conceded Sir Bryan cautiously: “but it still wants a lot more proof. And, anyway, whether you’re right or not, we can’t allow it to continue. We shall be having questions asked in Parliament.”

McIver nodded portentously. “If I can’t lay my hands on a man who can lift me up like a baby and dope me, may I never have another case. Like a baby, sir. Me—”

He opened his hands out helplessly, and this time Sir Bryan laughed outright, only to turn with a quick frown as the door leading to the secretary’s office was flung open to admit a man. He caught a vague glimpse of the scandalised Miss Forbes hovering like a canary eating bird-seed in the background: then he turned to the newcomer. “Confound it, Hugh,” he cried. “I’m busy.”

Hugh Drummond grinned all over his face, and lifting a hand like a leg of mutton he smote Sir Bryan in the back, to the outraged amazement of Inspector McIver.

“You priceless old bean,” boomed Hugh affably. “I gathered from the female bird punching the what-not outside that the great brain was heaving—but, my dear old lad, I have come to report a crime. A crime which I positively saw committed with my own eyes: an outrage: a blot upon this fair land of ours.”

He sank heavily into a chair and selected a cigarette. He was a vast individual with one of those phenomenally ugly faces which is rendered utterly pleasant by the extraordinary charm of its owner’s expression. No human being had ever been known to be angry with Hugh for long. He was either moved to laughter by the perennial twinkle in the big man’s blue eyes, or he was stunned by a playful blow on the chest from a fist which rivalled a steam hammer. Of brain he apparently possessed a minimum: of muscle he possessed about five ordinary men’s share.

And yet unlike so many powerful men his quickness on his feet was astounding—as many a good heavyweight boxer had found to his cost. In the days of his youth Hugh Drummond—known more familiarly to his intimates at Bulldog—had been able to do the hundred in a shade over ten seconds. And though the mere thought of such a performance now would have caused him to break out into a cold sweat, he was still quite capable of a turn of speed which many a lighter-built man would have envied.

Between him and Sir Bryan Johnstone existed one of those friendships which are founded on totally dissimilar tastes. He had been Bryan Johnstone’s fag at school, and for some inscrutable reason the quiet scholarship of the elder boy had appealed to the kid of fourteen who was even then a mass of brawn. And when one day Johnstone, going about his lawful occasions as a prefect, discovered young Drummond reducing a boy two years older than himself to a fair semblance of a jelly, the appeal was reciprocated.

“He called you a scut,” said Drummond a little breathlessly when his lord and master mildly inquired the reason of the disturbance. “So I scutted him.”

It was only too true, and with a faint smile Johnstone watched the “scutted” one depart with undignified rapidity. Then he looked at his fag.

“Thank you, Drummond,” he remarked awkwardly.

“Rot. That’s all right,” returned the other, blushing uncomfortably.

And that was all. But it started then, and it never died, though their ways lay many poles apart. To Johnstone a well-deserved knighthood and a high position in the land: to Drummond as much money as he wanted and a life of sport.

“Has someone stolen the goldfish?” queried Sir Bryan with mild sarcasm.

“Great Scott! I hope not,” cried Hugh in alarm. “Phyllis gave me complete instructions about the brutes before she toddled off. I make a noise like an ant’s egg, and drop them in the sink every morning. No, old lad of the village, it is something of vast import: a stain upon the escutcheon of your force. Last night—let us whisper it in Gath—I dined and further supped not wisely but too well. In fact I deeply regret to admit that I became a trifle blotto—not to say tanked. Of course it wouldn’t have happened if Phyllis had been propping up the jolly old home, don’t you know: but she’s away in the country with the nightingales and slugs and things. Well, as I say, in the young hours of the morning I thought I’d totter along home. I’d been with some birds—male birds, Tumkins”—he stared sternly at Sir Bryan, while McIver stiffened into rigid horror at such an incredible nickname—”male birds, playing push halfpenny or some such game of skill or chance. And when I left it was about two a.m. Well, I wandered along through Leicester Square, and stopped just outside Scott’s to let one of those watering carts water my head for me. Deuced considerate driver he was too: stopped his horse for a couple of minutes and let one jet play on me uninterruptedly. Well, as I say, while I was lying in the road, steaming at the brow, a motor-car went past, and it stopped in Piccadilly Circus.”

McIver’s air of irritation vanished suddenly, and a quick glance passed between him and Sir Bryan.

“Nothing much you observe in that, Tumkins,” he burbled on, quite unconscious of the sudden attention of his hearers. “But wait, old lad—I haven’t got to the motto yet. From this car there stepped large numbers of men: at least, so it seemed to me, and you must remember I’d recently had a shampoo. And just as I got abreast of them they lifted out another warrior, who appeared to me to be unconscious. At first I thought there were two, until I focused the old optics and found I’d been squinting. They put him on the pavement and got back into the car again just as I tottered alongside.

“‘What ho! souls,’ I murmured, ‘what is this and that, so to speak?’

“‘Binged, old bean, badly binged,’ said the driver of the car. ‘We’re leaving him there to cool.’

“And with that the car drove off. There was I, Tumkins, in a partially binged condition alone in Piccadilly Circus with a bird in a completely binged condition.

“‘How now,’ I said to myself. ‘Shall I go and induce yon water merchant to return?’—as a matter of fact I was beginning to feel I could do with another whack myself—’ or shall I leave you here—as your pals observed—to cool?’

“I bent over him as I pondered this knotty point, and as, I did so, Tumkins, I became aware of a strange smell.”

Hugh paused dramatically and selected another cigarette, while Sir Bryan flashed a quick glance of warning at McIver, who was obviously bursting with suppressed excitement.

“A peculiar and sickly odour, Tumkins,” resumed the speaker with maddening deliberation. “A strange and elusive perfume. For a long while it eluded me—that smell: I just couldn’t place it. And then suddenly I got it: right in the middle, old boy—plumb in the centre of the windpipe. It was chloroform: the bird wasn’t drunk—he was doped.”

Completely exhausted Hugh lay back in his chair, and once again Sir Bryan flashed a warning glance at his exasperated subordinate.

“Would you be able to recognise any of the men in the car if you saw them again?” he asked quietly.

“I should know the driver,” answered Hugh after profound thought. “And the bird beside him. But not the others.”

“Did you take the number of the car?” snapped McIver.

“My dear old man,” murmured Hugh in a pained voice, “who on earth ever does take the number of a car? Except your warriors, who always get it wrong. Besides, as I tell you, I was partially up the pole.”

“What did you do then?” asked Sir Bryan.

“Well, I brought the brain to bear,” answered Hugh, “and decided there was nothing to do. He was doped, and I was bottled—so by a unanimous casting vote of one—I toddled off home. But Tumkins, while I was feeding the goldfish this morning—or rather after lunch—conscience was gnawing at my vitals. And after profound meditation, and consulting with my fellow Denny, I decided that the call of duty was clear. I came to you, Tumkins, as a child flies to its mother. Who better, I thought, than old Tum-tum to listen to my maidenly secrets? And so…”

“One moment, Hugh,” Sir Bryan held up his hand. “Do you mind if I speak to Inspector McIver for a moment?”

“Anything you like, old lad,” murmured Drummond. “But be merciful. Remember my innocent wife in the country.”

And silence settled on the room, broken only by the low-voiced conversation between McIver and his chief in the window. By their gestures it seemed as if Sir Bryan was suggesting something to his subordinate to which that worthy officer was a little loath to agree. And after a while a strangled snore from the chair announced that Drummond was ceasing to take an intelligent interest in things mundane.

“He’s an extraordinary fellow, McIver,” said Sir Bryan, glancing at the sleeper with a smile. “I’ve known him since we were boys at school. And he’s not quite such a fool as he makes himself out. You remember that extraordinary case over the man Peterson a year or so ago. Well, it was he who did the whole thing. His complete disability to be cunning utterly defeated that master-crook, who was always looking for subtlety that wasn’t there. And of course his strength is absolutely phenomenal.”

“I know, sir,” said McIver doubtfully, “but would he consent to take on such a job—and do exactly as he was told?”

They were both looking out of the window, while in the room behind them the heavy breathing of the sleeper rose and fell monotonously. And when the whole audience is asleep it ceases to be necessary to talk in undertones. Which was why Sir Bryan and the Inspector during the next ten minutes discussed certain matters of import which they would not have discussed through megaphones at the Savoy. They concerned Hugh and other things, and the other things particularly were of interest. And they continued discussing these other things until, with a dreadful noise like a racing motor back-firing, the sleeper sat up in his chair and stretched himself.

“Tumkins,” he cried. “I have committed sacrilege. I have slept in the Holy of Holies. Have you decided on my fate? Am I to be shot at dawn?”

Sir Bryan left the window and sat down at his desk. For a moment or two he rubbed his chin thoughtfully with his left hand, as if trying to make up his mind: then he lay back in his chair and stared at his erstwhile fag.

“Would you like to do a job of work, old man?”

Hugh started as if he had been stung by a wasp, and Sir Bryan smiled.

“Not real work,” he said reassuringly. “But by mere luck last night you saw something which Inspector McIver would have given a good deal to see. Or to be more accurate, you saw some men whom McIver particularly wants to meet.”

“Those blokes in the car you mean,” cried Hugh brightly.

“Those blokes in the car,” agreed the other. “Incidentally, I may say there was a good deal more in that little episode than you think: and after consultation with McIver I have decided to tell you a certain amount about it, because you can help us, Hugh. You see you’re one up on McIver: you have at any rate seen those men and he hasn’t. Moreover, you say you could recognise two of them again.”

“Good heavens! Tumkins,” murmured Hugh aghast, “don’t say you want me to tramp the streets of London looking for them.”

Sir Bryan smiled. “We’ll spare you that,” he answered. “But I’d like you to pay attention to what I’m going to tell you.”

Hugh’s face assumed the look of intense pain always indicative of thought in its owner. “Carry on, old bird,” he remarked. “I’ll try and last the course.”

“Last night,” began Sir Bryan quietly, “a very peculiar thing happened to McIver. I won’t worry you with the full details, and it will be enough if I just give you a bare outline of what occurred. He and some of his men in the normal course of duty surrounded a certain house in which were some people we wanted to lay our hands on. To be more accurate there was one man there whom we wanted. He’d been shadowed ever since he’d landed in England that morning, shadowed the whole way from the docks to the house. And sure enough when McIver and his men surrounded the house, there was our friend and all his pals in one of the downstairs rooms. It was then that this peculiar thing happened. I gather from McIver that he heard the noise of an owl hooting, also a faint scuffle and a curse. And after that he heard nothing more. He was chloroformed from behind, and went straight out of the picture.”

“Great Scott!” murmured Hugh, staring incredulously at McIver. “What an amazing thing!”

“And this is where you come in, Hugh,” continued Sir Bryan.

“Me!” Hugh sat up abruptly. “Why me?”

“One of the men inside the room was an interesting fellow known as Flash Jim. He is a burglar of no mean repute, though he is quite ready to tackle any sort of job which carries money with it. And when McIver, having recovered himself this morning, ran Flash Jim to ground in one of his haunts he was quite under the impression that the men who had doped him and the other officers were pals of Flash Jim. But after he’d talked to him he changed his mind. All Flash Jim could tell him was that on the previous night he and some friends had been discussing business at this house. He didn’t attempt to deny that. He went on to say that suddenly the room had been filled with a number of masked men, and that he’d had a clip over the back of the head which knocked him out. After that presumably he was given a whiff of chloroform to keep him quiet, and the next thing he remembers is being kicked into activity by the policeman at—” Sir Bryan paused a moment to emphasise the point—”at Piccadilly Circus.”

“Good Lord!” said Hugh dazedly. “Then that bird I saw last night sleeping it off on the pavement was Flash Jim.”

“Precisely,” answered Sir Bryan. “But what is far more to the point, old man, is that the two birds you think you would be able to recognise and who were in the car, are two of the masked men who first of all laid out McIver and subsequently surrounded Flash Jim and his pals inside.”

“But what did they want to do that for?” asked Hugh in bewilderment.

“That is just what we want to find out,” replied Sir Bryan. “As far as we can see at the moment they are not criminals in the accepted sense of the word. They flogged two of the men who were there last night, and there are no two men in England who more richly deserved it. They kidnapped two others, one of whom was the man we particularly wanted. Then to wind up, they planted Flash Jim as I’ve told you, let the others go, and brought McIver and all his men back to McIver’s house, where they left them to cool on the pavement.”

For a moment there was silence, and then Hugh began to shake with laughter.

“But how perfectly priceless!” he spluttered when he was able to speak once more. “Old Algy will burst a blood-vessel when I tell him: you know, Algy, Tumkins, don’t you—that bird with the eye-glass, and the funny-looking face?”

Inspector McIver frowned heavily. All along he had doubted the wisdom of telling Drummond anything: now he felt that his misgivings were confirmed. What on earth was the good of expecting such an obvious ass to be of the smallest assistance? And now this raucous hilarity struck him as being positively indecent. But the Chief had insisted: the responsibility was his. One thing was certain, reflected McIver grimly. Algy, whoever he was, would not be the only one to whom the privilege of bursting a blood-vessel would be accorded. And before very long it would be all round London—probably in the papers. And McIver particularly did not want that to happen. However, the next instant Sir Bryan soothed some of his worst fears.

“Under no circumstances, Hugh,” he remarked gravely, “is Algy to be given a chance of bursting any blood-vessel. You understand what I mean. What I have said to you this afternoon is for you alone—and no one else. We know it: Flash Jim and Co. know it.”

“And the jolly old masked sportsmen know it,” said Hugh.

“Quite,” remarked Sir Bryan. “And that’s a deuced sight too many already. We don’t want any more.”

“As far as I am concerned, my brave Tumkins,” cried the other, “the list is closed. Positively not another participator in the State secret. But I still don’t see where I leap in and join the fray.”

“This way, old boy,” said Sir Bryan. “McIver is a very strong man, and yet he was picked up last night as he himself says as if he was a baby, by one of these masked men who, judging from a note he wrote, is presumably the leader of the gang. And so we deduce that this leader is something exceptional in the way of strength.”

“By Gad! that’s quick, Tumkins,” said Hugh admiringly. “But then you always did have the devil of a brain.”

“Now you are something very exceptional in that line, Hugh,” continued the other.

“Oh! I can push a fellah’s face if it’s got spots and things,” said Hugh deprecatingly.

“And what I want to know is this. If we give you warning would you care to go with McIver the next time he has any job on, where he thinks it is likely this gang may turn up? We have a pretty shrewd idea as to the type of thing they specialise in.”

Hugh passed his hand dazedly over his forehead. “Sort of mother’s help you mean,” and McIver frowned horribly. “While the bird biffs McIver, I biff the bird. Is that the notion?”

“That is the notion,” agreed Sir Bryan. “Of course you’ll have to do exactly what McIver tells you, and the whole thing is most unusual. But in view of the special features of the case…What is it, Miss Forbes?” He glanced up at his secretary, who was standing in the doorway, with a slight frown.

“He insists on seeing you at once. Sir Bryan.” She came forward with a card, which Sir Bryan took.

“Charles Latter.” The frown deepened. “What the deuce does he want?”

The answer was supplied by the gentleman himself, who appeared at that moment in the doorway. He was evidently in a state of great agitation and Sir Bryan rose.

“I am engaged at the moment, Mr. Latter,” he said coldly.

“My business won’t take you a minute. Sir Bryan,” he cried. “But what I want to know is this. Is this country civilised or is it not? Look at what I received by the afternoon post.”

He handed a sheet of paper to the other, who glanced at it casually. Then suddenly the casual look vanished, and Sir Bryan sat down at his desk, his eyes grim and stem. “By the afternoon post, you say.”

“Yes. And there have been too many disappearances lately!”

“How did you know that?” snapped the chief, staring at him.

For a moment Latter hesitated and changed colour. “Oh! everyone knows it,” he answered, trying to speak casually.

“Everyone does not know it,” remarked Sir Bryan quietly. “However, you did quite right to come to me. What are your plans during the next few days?”

“I am going out of London tomorrow to stay with Lady Manton near Sheffield,” answered Latter. “A semi-political house party. Good heavens! What’s that?” With a snort Hugh sat up blinking.

“So sorry, old lad,” he burbled. “I snored: know I did. Late hours are the devil, aren’t they?” He heaved himself out of his chair, and grinned pleasantly at Latter, who frowned disapprovingly.

“I don’t go in for them myself. Well, Sir Bryan.”

“This matter shall be attended to, Mr. Latter. I will see to it. Good afternoon. I will keep this note.”

“And who was that little funny-face?” said Hugh as the door closed behind Mr. Latter.

“Member of Parliament for a north country constituency,” answered Sir Bryan, still staring at the piece of paper in his hand. “Lives above his income. Keenly ambitious. But I thought he was all right.”

The other two stared at him in surprise. “What do you mean, sir?” asked McIver at length.

“Our unknown friends do not think so, Mac,” answered the chief, handing his subordinate the note left by Latter. “They are beginning to interest me, these gentlemen.”

“You need a rest, Charles Latter,” read McIver slowly. “We have established a home for people like you where several of your friends await you. In a few days you will join them.”

“There are two things which strike one, McIver,” remarked Sir Bryan thoughtfully, lighting cigarette. “First and most important: that message and the one you found this morning were written on the same typewriter—the letter ‘s’ is distorted in each case. And, secondly, Mr. Charles Latter appears to have inside information concerning the recent activities of our masked friends which it is difficult to see how he came by. Unless “—he paused and stared out of the window with a slight frown—”unless they are far more conversant with his visiting list than I am.”

McIver’s great jaw stuck out as if made of granite. “It proves my theory, sir,” he grunted, “but if these jokers try that game on with Mr. Latter they won’t catch me a second time.”

A terrific blow on the back made him gasp and splutter. “There speaks my hero—boy,” cried Hugh. “Together we will outwit the knaves. I will write and cancel a visit: glad of the chance. Old Julia Manton—face like a horse: house at Sheffield: roped me in, Tumkins—positively stunned me with her verbosity. Ghastly house—but reeks of boodle.”

Sir Bryan looked at him surprised. “Do you mean to say you are going to Lady Manton’s?”

“I was. But not now. I will stick closer than a brother to Mr. McIver.”

“I think not, old man. You go. If you’d been awake you’d have heard Latter say that he was going there too. You can be of use sooner than I thought.”

“Latter going to old Julia?” Hugh stared at him amazed. “My dear old Tum-tum, what a perfectly amazing coincidence.”

CHAPTER III

In Which Hugh Drummond Composes A Letter

Hugh Drummond strolled slowly along Whitehall in the direction of Trafalgar Square. His face wore its habitual look of vacuous good humour, and at intervals he hummed a little tune under his breath. It was outside the Carlton that he paused as a car drew up by his side, and a man and a girl got out.

“Algy, my dear old boy,” he murmured, taking off his hat, “are we in good health today?”

“Passable, old son,” returned Algy Longworth, adjusting his quite unnecessary eye-glass. “The oysters wilted a bit this morning, but I’m trying again tonight. By the way, do you know Miss Farreydale?”

Hugh bowed. “You know the risk you run, I suppose, going about with him?”

The girl laughed. “He seems harmless,” she answered lightly.

“That’s his guile. After a second cup of tea he’s a perfect devil. By the same token, Algy, I am hibernating a while in the country. Going to dear old Julia Manton’s for a few days. Up Sheffield way.”

Miss Farreydale looked at him with a puzzled frown. “Do you mean Lady Manton—Sir John’s wife?”

“That’s the old dear,” returned Hugh. “Know her?”

“Fairly well. But her name isn’t Julia. And she won’t love you if you call her old.”

“Good heavens! Isn’t it? And won’t she? I must be mixing her up with someone else.”

“Dorothy Manton is a well-preserved woman of—shall we say—thirty-five? She was a grocer’s daughter: she is now a snob of the worst type. I hope you’ll enjoy yourself.”

“Your affection for her stuns me,” murmured Hugh. “I appear to be in for a cheerful time.”

“When do you go, Hugh?” asked Algy.

“Tomorrow, old man. But I’m keeping you from your tea. Keep the table between you after the second cup, Miss Farreydale.”

He lifted his hat and walked on up the Haymarket, only to turn back suddenly.

“‘Daisy,’ you said, didn’t you?”

“No. Dorothy,” laughed the girl. “Come on, Algy, I want my tea.”

She passed into the Carlton, and for a moment the two men were together on the pavement.

“Lucky she knows the Manton woman,” murmured Hugh.

“Don’t you?” gasped Algy.

“Not from Eve, old son. Don’t fix up anything in the near future. We shall be busy. I’ve joined the police and shall require help.”

With a cheery nod he strolled off, and after a moment’s hesitation Algy Longworth followed the girl into the Carlton.

“Mad, isn’t he—your friend?” she remarked as he came up.

“Absolutely,” he answered. “Let’s masticate an eclair.”

A quarter of an hour later Hugh let himself into his house in Brook Street. On the hall table were three telegrams which he opened and read. Then, having torn them into tiny fragments, he went on into his study and rang the bell.

“Beer, Denny,” he remarked, as his servant came in. “Beer in a mug. I am prostrate. And then bring me one of those confounded books which people have their names put in followed by the usual lies.”

“Who’s Who, sir,” said Denny.

“You’ve got it,” said his master. “Though who is who in these days, Denny, is a very dark matter. I am rapidly losing my faith in my brother man—rapidly. And then after that we have to write a letter to Julia—no, Dorothy Manton—erstwhile grocer’s daughter with whom I propose to dally for a few days.”

“I don’t seem to know the name, sir.”

“Nor did I, Denny, until about an hour ago. But I have it on reliable authority that she exists.”

“But how, sir…” began the bewildered Denny.

“At the moment the way is dark,” admitted Drummond. “The fog of war enwraps me. Beer, fool, beer.”

Accustomed to the little vagaries of his master, Denny left the room to return shortly with a large jug of beer which he placed on a small table beside Drummond’s chair. Then he waited motionless behind his chair with a pencil and writing-block in his hand.

“A snob, Denny; a snob,” said Drummond at length, putting down his empty glass. “How does one best penetrate into the life and home of a female snob whom one does not even know by sight? Let us reason from first principles. What have we in our repertoire that would fling wide the portals of her house, revealing to our awestruck gaze all the footmen ranged in a row?” He rose suddenly. “I’ve got it, Denny; at least some of it. We have old Turnip-top. Is he not a cousin of mine?”

“You mean Lord Stavely, sir,” said Denny diffidently.

“Of course I do, you ass. Who else?” Clasping his replenished glass of beer, Hugh strode up and down the room. “Somehow or other we must drag him in.”

“He’s in Central Africa, sir,” reminded Denny cautiously.

“What the devil does that matter? Julia—I mean Dorothy—won’t know. Probably never heard of the poor old thing. Write, fool; take your pen and write quickly.

“‘Dear Lady Manton,

“‘I hope you have not forgotten the pleasant few days we spent together at Wiltshire Towers this spring.’”

“But you didn’t go to the Duke’s this spring, sir,” gasped Denny.

“I know that, you ass—but no more did she. To be exact, the place was being done up, only she won’t know. Go on, I’m going to overflow again.”

“‘I certainly have not forgotten the kind invitation you gave to my cousin Staveley and myself to come and stop with you. He, at the moment, is killing beasts in Africa: whereas I am condemned to this unpleasant country. Tomorrow I have to go to Sheffield…’”

He paused. “Why, Denny—why do I have to go to Sheffield? Why in Heaven’s name does anyone ever go to Sheffield?”

“They make knives there, sir.”

“Do they? But you needn’t go there to buy them. And anyway, I don’t want knives.”

“You might just say on business, sir,” remarked his servant.

“Gad! you’re a genius, Denny. Put that in. ‘Sheffield on business, and I wondered if I might take you at your word and come to…’ Where’s the bally woman live? Look it up in Who’s Who.”

“Drayton House, sir,” announced Denny.

“‘To Drayton House for a day or two. Yours very sincerely.’ That’ll do the trick, Denny. Give it to me, and I’ll write it out. A piece of the best paper with the crest and telephone number embossed in blue, and the victory is ours.”

“Aren’t you giving her rather short notice, sir?” said Denny doubtfully.

Drummond laid down his pen and stared at him sadly.

“Sometimes, Denny, I despair of you,” he answered. “Even after four years of communion with me there are moments when you relapse into your pristine brain wallow. If I gave her any longer it is just conceivable—though I admit not likely—that I might get my answer from her stating that she was completely unaware of my existence, and that she’d sent my letter to the police. And where should we be then, my faithful varlet? As it is, I shall arrive at Drayton House just after the letter, discover with horror that I have made a mistake, and be gracefully forgiven by my charming hostess as befits a man with such exalted friends. Now run away and get me a taxi.”

“Will you be in to dinner, sir?”

“Perhaps—perhaps not. In case I’m not, I shall go up to Sheffield in the Rolls tomorrow. See that everything is packed.”

“Will you want me to come with you, sir?”

“No, Denny—not this time. I have a sort of premonition that I’m going to enjoy myself at Drayton House, and you’re too young for that sort of thing.”

With a resigned look on his face, Denny left the room, closing the door gently behind him. But Drummond, left to himself, did not at once continue his letter to Lady Manton. With his pen held loosely in his hand he sat at his desk staring thoughtfully at the wall opposite. Gone completely was his customary inane look of good humour: in its place was an expression of quiet, almost grim, determination. He had the air of a man faced with big decisions, and to whom, moreover, such an experience was no novelty. For some five minutes he sat there motionless; then with a short laugh he came out of his reverie.

“We’re getting near the motto, my son,” he muttered—”deuced near. If we don’t draw the badger in a few weeks, I’ll eat my hat.”

With another laugh he turned once more to his half-finished letter. And a minute or two later, having stamped and addressed the envelope, he slipped it into his pocket and rose. He crossed the room and unlocked a small safe which stood in the corner. From it he took a small automatic revolver which he dropped into his coat pocket, also a tiny bundle of what looked like fine black silk. Then, having relocked the safe he picked up his hat and stick and went into the hall.

“Denny,” he called, pausing by the front door.

“Sir,” answered that worthy, appearing from the back premises.

“If Mr. Darrell or any of them ring up I shall be tearing a devilled bone tonight at the Savoy grill at eleven o’clock.”

CHAPTER IV

In Which Count Zadowa Gets a Shock

Number 5, Green Street, Hoxton, was not a prepossessing abode. A notice on one of the dingy downstair windows announced that Mr. William Atkinson was prepared to advance money on suitable security: a visit during business hours revealed that this was no more than the truth, even if the appearance of Mr. Atkinson’s minion caused the prospective borrower to wonder how he had acquired such an aggressively English name.

The second and third floors were apparently occupied by his staff, which seemed unduly large considering the locality and quality of his business. Hoxton is hardly in that part of London where large sums of money might be expected to change hands, and yet there was no doubt that Mr. William Atkinson’s staff was both large and busy. So busy indeed were his clerks that frequently ten and eleven o’clock at night found them still working hard, though the actual business of the day downstairs concluded at six o’clock—eight Saturdays.

It was just before closing time on the day after the strange affair down at Barking that a large, unkempt-looking individual presented himself at Mr. Atkinson’s office. His most pressing need would have seemed to the casual observer to be soap and water, but his appearance apparently excited no surprise in the assistant downstairs. Possibly Hoxton is tolerant of such trifles.

The clerk—a pale, anaemic-looking man with an unhealthy skin and a hook nose—rose wearily from his rest.

“What do you want?” he demanded morosely.

“Wot d’yer think!” retorted the other. “Cat’s meat?”

The clerk recoiled, and the blood mounted angrily to his sallow face. “Don’t you use that tone with me, my man,” he said angrily. “I’d have you to know that this is my office.”

“Yus,” answered the other. “Same as it’s your nose sitting there like a lump o’ putty stuck on to a suet pudding. And if I ’ave any o’ your lip, I’ll pull it off—see. Throw it outside, I will, and you after it—you parboiled lump of bad tripe. Nah, then—business.” With a blow that shook the office he thumped the desk with a huge fist. “I ain’t got no time to waste—even if you ’ave. ’Ow much?” He threw a pair of thick hobnailed boots on to the counter, and stood glaring at the other.

“Two bob,” said the clerk indifferently, throwing down a coin and picking up the boots.

“Two bob!” cried the other wrathfully. “Two bob, you miserable Sheenie.” For a moment or two he spluttered inarticulately as if speech was beyond him; then his huge hand shot out and gripped the clerk by the collar. “Think again, Archibald,” he continued quietly, “think again and think better.”

But the assistant, as might be expected in one of his calling, was prepared for emergencies of this sort. Very gently his right hand slid along the counter towards a concealed electric bell which communicated with the staff upstairs. It fulfilled several purposes, that bell: it acted as a call for help or as a warning, and according to the number of times it was pressed, the urgency of the matter could be interpreted by those who heard it. Just now the clerk decided that two rings would meet the case: he disliked the appearance of the large and angry man in whose grip he felt absolutely powerless, and he felt he would like help—very urgently. And so it was perhaps a little unfortunate for him that he should have allowed an ugly little smirk to adorn his lips a second or two before his hand found the bell. The man facing him across the counter saw that smirk and lost his temper in earnest. With a grunt of rage he hit the other square between the eyes, and the clerk collapsed in a huddled heap behind the counter with the bell still unrung.

For a few moments the big man stood motionless, listening intently. From upstairs came the faint tapping of a typewriter; from outside the usual street noises of London came softly through the two closed doors. Then, with an agility remarkable in one so big, he vaulted the counter and inspected the recumbent assistant with a professional eye. A faint grin spread over his face as he noted that gentleman’s condition, but after that he wasted no time. So quickly and methodically in fact did he set about things, that it seemed as if the whole performance must have been cut and dried beforehand, even to the temporary indisposition of the clerk. In half a minute he was bound and gagged and deposited under the counter. Beside him the big man placed the pair of boots, attached to which was a piece of paper which he took from his pocket. On it was scrawled in an illiterate hand—

“Have took a fare price for the boots, yer swine.” Then quite deliberately the big man forced the till and removed some money, after which he once more examined the unconscious man under the counter.

“Without a hitch,” he muttered. “Absolutely according to Cocker. Now, old lad of the village, we come to the second item on the programme. That must be the door I want.”

He opened it cautiously, and the subdued hum of voices from above came a little louder to his ears. Then like a shadow he vanished into the semi-darkness of the house upstairs.

It was undoubtedly a house of surprises, was Number 5, Green Street. A stranger passing through the dingy office on the ground floor where Mr. Atkinson’s assistant was wont to sit at the receipt of custom, and then ascending the stairs to the first story would have found it hard to believe that he was in the same house. But then, strangers were not encouraged to do anything of the sort.

There was a door at the top of the flight of stairs, and it was at this door that the metamorphosis took place. On one side of it the stairs ran carpetless and none too clean to the ground floor, on the other side the picture changed. A wide passage with rooms leading out of it from either side confronted the explorer—a passage which was efficiently illuminated with electric lights hung from the ceiling, and the floor of which was covered with a good plain carpet. Along the walls ran rows of bookshelves stretching, save for the gaps at the doors, as far as a partition which closed the further end of the passage. In this partition was another door, and beyond this second door the passage continued to a window tightly shuttered and bolted. From this continuation only one room led off—a room which would have made the explorer rub his eyes in surprise. It was richly, almost luxuriously, furnished. In the centre stood a big roll-top writing-desk, while scattered about were several arm-chairs upholstered in green leather. A long table almost filled one side of the room; a table covered with every imaginable newspaper. A huge safe flush with the wall occupied the other side, while the window, like the one outside, was almost hermetically sealed. There was a fireplace in the corner, but there was no sign of any fire having been lit, or of any preparations for lighting one. Two electric heaters attached by long lengths of flex to plugs in the wall comprised the heating arrangements, while a big central light and half a dozen movable ones illuminated every corner of the room.

In blissful ignorance of the sad plight of the clerk below, two men were sitting in this room, deep in conversation. In a chair drawn up close to the desk was no less a person than Charles Latter, M.P., and it was he who was doing most of the talking. But it was the other man who riveted attention: the man who presumably was Mr. Atkinson himself. He was seated in a swivel chair which he had slewed round so as to face the speaker, and it was his appearance which caught the eye and then held it fascinated.

At first he seemed to be afflicted with an almost phenomenal stoop, and it was only when one got nearer that the reason was clear. The man was a hunchback, and the effect it gave was that of a huge bird of prey. Unlike most hunchbacks, his legs were of normal length, and as he sat motionless in his chair, a hand on each knee, staring with unwinking eyes at his talkative companion, there was something menacing and implacable in his appearance. His hair was grey; his features stern and hard; while his mouth reminded one of a steel trap. But it was his eyes that dominated everything—grey-blue and piercing, they seemed able to probe one’s innermost soul. A man to whom it would be unwise to lie—a man utterly unscrupulous in himself, who would yet punish double dealing in those who worked for him with merciless severity. A dangerous man.

“So you went to the police, Mr. Latter,” he remarked suavely. “And what had our friend Sir Bryan Johnstone to say on the matter?”

“At first, Count, he didn’t say much. In fact he really said very little all through. But once he looked at the note his whole manner changed. I could see that instantly. There was something about the note which interested him.…”

“Let me see it,” said the Count, holding out his hand.

“I left it with Sir Bryan,” answered the other. “He asked me to let him keep it. And he promised that I should be all right.”

The Count’s lips curled.

“It would take more than Sir Bryan Johnstone’s promise, Mr. Latter, to ensure your safety. Do you know whom that note was from?”

“I thought, Count,” said the other a little tremulously—”I thought it might be from this mysterious Black Gang that one has heard rumours about.”

“It was,” replied the Count tersely.

“Heavens!” stammered Latter. “Then it’s true; they exist.”

“In the last month,” answered the hunchback, staring fixedly at his frightened companion, “nearly twenty of our most useful men have disappeared. They have simply vanished into thin air. I know, no matter how, that it is not the police: the police are as mystified as we are. But the police, Mr. Latter, whatever views they may take officially, are in all probability unofficially very glad of our friends’ disappearance. At any rate until last night.”

“What do you mean?” asked the other.

“Last night the police were baulked of their prey, and McIver doesn’t like being baulked. You know Zaboleff was sent over?”

“Yes, of course. That is one of the reasons I came round tonight. Have you seen him?”

“I have not,” answered the Count grimly. “The police found out he was coming.”

Mr. Latter’s face blanched: the thought of Zaboleff in custody didn’t appeal to him. It may be mentioned that his feelings were purely selfish—Zaboleff knew too much.

But the Count was speaking again. A faint sneer was on his face; he had read the other’s mind like an open book.

“And so,” he continued, “did the Black Gang. They removed Zaboleff and our friend Waldock from under the very noses of the police, and, like the twenty others, they have disappeared.”

“My God!” There was no doubt now about Mr. Latter’s state of mind. “And now they’ve threatened me.”

“And now they’ve threatened you,” agreed the Count. “And you, I am glad to say, have done exactly what I should have told you to do, had I seen you sooner. You have gone to the police.”

“But—but,” stammered Latter, “the police were no good to Zaboleff last night.”

“And it is quite possible,” returned the other calmly, “that they will be equally futile in your case. Candidly, Mr. Latter, I am completely indifferent on the subject of your future. You have served our purpose, and all that matters is that you happen to be the bone over which the dogs are going to fight. Until last night the dogs hadn’t met—officially; and in the rencontre last night, the police dog, unless I’m greatly mistaken, was caught by surprise. McIver doesn’t let that happen twice. In your case he’ll be ready. With luck this cursed Black Gang, who are infinitely more nuisance to me than the police have been or ever will be, will get bitten badly.”

Mr. Latter was breathing heavily.

“But what do you want me to do, Count?”

“Nothing at all, except what you were going to do normally,” answered the other. He glanced at a notebook on his desk. “You were going to Lady Manton’s near Sheffield, I see. Don’t alter your plans—go. In all probability it will take place at her house.” He glanced contemptuously at the other’s somewhat green face, and his manner changed abruptly. “You understand, Mr. Latter,” his voice was deadly smooth and quiet, “you understand, don’t you, what I say? You will go to Lady Manton’s house as arranged, and you will carry on exactly as if you had never received this note. Because if you don’t, if you attempt any tricks with me, whatever the Black Gang may do or may not do to you, however much the police may protect you or may not protect you—you will have us to reckon with. And you know what that means.”

“Supposing the gang gets me and foils the police,” muttered Latter through dry lips. “What then?”

“I shall deal with them personally. They annoy me.”

There was something so supremely confident in the tone of the Count’s voice, that the other man looked at him quickly.

“But have you any idea who they are?” he asked eagerly.

“None—at present. Their leader is clever—but so am I. They have deliberately elected to fight me, and now I have had enough. It will save trouble if the police catch them for me: but if not…”

The Count shrugged his shoulders, and with a gesture of his hand dismissed the matter. Then he picked up a piece of paper from the desk and glanced at it.

“I will now give you your orders for Sheffield,” he continued. “It has been reported to me that in Sir John Manton’s works there is a red-hot madman named Delmorlick. He has a good job himself, but he spends most of his spare time inciting the unemployed—of which I am glad to say there are large numbers in the town—to absurd deeds of violence. He is a very valuable man to us, and appears to be one of those extraordinary beings who really believe in the doctrines of Communism. He can lash a mob, they tell me, into an absolute frenzy with his tongue. I want you to seek him out, and give him fifty pounds to carry on with. Tell him, of course, that it comes from the Great Master in Russia, and spur him on to renewed activity.

“You will also employ him, and two or three others whom you must leave him to choose, to carry out a little scheme of which you will find full details in this letter.” He handed an envelope to Latter, who took it with a trembling hand. “You personally will make arrangements about the necessary explosives. I calculate that, if successful, it should throw at least three thousand more men out of work. Moreover, Mr. Latter, if it is successful your fee will be a thousand pounds.”

“A thousand!” muttered Latter. “Is there much danger?”

The Count smiled contemptuously. “Not if you do your work properly. Hullo! What’s up?”

From a little electric bell at his elbow came four shrill rings, repeated again and again.

The Count rose and with systematic thoroughness swept every piece of paper off the desk into his pocket. Then he shut down the top and locked it, while the bell, a little muffled, still rang inside.

“What’s the fool doing?” he cried angrily, stepping over to the big safe let into the wall, while Latter, his face white and terrified, followed at his side. And then abruptly the bell stopped.

Very deliberately the Count pressed two concealed knobs, so sunk into the wall as to be invisible to a stranger, and the door of the safe swung open. And only then was it obvious that the safe was not a safe, but a second exit leading to a flight of stairs. For a moment or two he stood motionless, listening intently, while Latter fidgeted at his side. One hand was on a master switch which controlled all the lights, the other on a knob inside the second passage which, when turned, would close the great steel door noiselessly behind them.

He was frowning angrily, but gradually the frown was replaced by a look of puzzled surprise. Four rings from the shop below was the recognised signal for urgent danger, and everybody’s plan of action was cut and dried for such an emergency. In the other rooms every book and paper in the slightest degree incriminating was hurled pell-mell into secret recesses in the floor which had been specially constructed under every table. In their place appeared books carefully and very skillfully faked, purporting to record the business transactions of Mr. William Atkinson. And in the event of surprise being expressed at the size of Mr. Atkinson’s business considering the sort of office he possessed below, and the type of his clientele, it would soon be seen that Hoxton was but one of several irons which that versatile gentleman had in the fire. There were indisputable proofs in indisputable ledgers that Mr. Atkinson had organised similar enterprises in several of the big towns of England and Scotland, to say nothing of a large West End branch run under the name of Lewer Brothers. And surely he had the perfect right, if he so wished, to establish his central office in Hoxton…Or Timbuctoo…What the devil did it matter to anyone except himself?

In the big room at the end the procedure was even simpler. The Count merely passed through the safe door and vanished through his private bolt-hole, leaving everything in darkness. And should inconvenient visitors ask inconvenient questions—well, it was Mr. Atkinson’s private office, and a very nice office too, though at the moment he was away.

Thus the procedure—simple and sound; but on this occasion something seemed to have gone wrong. Instead of the industrious silence of clerks working overtime on affairs of financial import in Edinburgh and Manchester, a perfect babel of voices became audible in the passage. And then there came an agitated knocking on the door.

“Who is it?” cried the Count sharply. It may be mentioned that even the most influential members of his staff knew better than to come into the room without previously obtaining permission.

“It’s me, sir—Cohen,” came an agitated voice from outside.

For a moment the Count paused: then with a turn of the knob he closed the safe door silently. With an imperious hand he waved Latter to a chair, and resumed his former position at the desk.

“Come in,” he snapped.

It was a strange and unwholesome object that obeyed the order, and the Count sat back in his chair.

“What the devil have you been doing?”

A pair of rich blue-black eyes, and a nose from which traces of blood still trickled had not improved the general appearance of the assistant downstairs. In one hand he carried a pair of hobnail boots, in the other a piece of paper, and he brandished them alternately while a flood of incoherent frenzy burst from his lips.

For a minute or two the Count listened, until his first look of surprise gave way to one of black anger.

“Am I to understand, you wretched little worm,” he snarled, “that you gave the urgency danger signal, not once but half a dozen times, merely because a man hit you over the nose?”

“But he knocked me silly, sir,” quavered the other. “And when I came to, and saw the boots lying beside me and the till opened, I kind of lost my head. I didn’t know what had happened, sir—and I thought I’d better ring the bell—in case of trouble.”

He retreated a step or two towards the door, terrified out of his wits by the look of diabolical fury in the hunchback’s eyes. Three or four clerks, who had been surreptitiously peeping through the open door, melted rapidly away, while from his chair Mr. Latter watched the scene fascinated. He was reminded of a bird and a snake, and suddenly he gave a little shudder as he realised that his own position was in reality much the same as that of the unfortunate Cohen.

And then just as the tension was becoming unbearable there came the interruption. Outside in the passage, clear and distinct, there sounded twice the hoot of an owl. To Mr. Latter it meant nothing; to the frightened little Jew it meant nothing; but on the Count the effect was electrical. With a quickness incredible in one so deformed he was at the door, and into the passage, hurling Cohen out of his way into a corner. His powerful fists were clenched by his side: the veins in his neck were standing out like whipcord. But to Mr. Latter’s surprise he made no movement, and rising from his chair he too peered round the door along the passage, only to stagger back after a second or two with a feeling of sick fear in his soul, and a sudden dryness in the throat. For twenty yards away, framed in the doorway at the head of the stairs leading down to the office below, he had seen a huge, motionless figure. For a perceptible time he had stared at it, and it had seemed to stare at him. Then the door had shut, and on the other side a key had turned. And the figure had been draped from head to foot in black.…

CHAPTER V

In Which Charles Latter, M.P., Goes Mad

Drummond arrived at Drayton House just as the house-party was sitting down to tea in the hall. A rapid survey of the guests as the footman helped him out of his coat—convinced him that, with the exception of Latter, he didn’t know a soul: a second glance indicated that he could contemplate the fact with equanimity. They were a stodgy-looking crowd, and after a brief look he turned his attention to his hostess.

“Where is Lady Manton?” he asked the footman. “Pouring out tea, sir,” returned the man surprised. “Great Scott!” said Drummond, aghast. “I’ve come to the wrong house.”

“The wrong house, sir?” echoed the footman, and the sound of their voices made Lady Manton look up.

In an instant that astute woman spotted what had happened. The writer of the strange letter she had received at lunch-time had arrived, and had realised his mistake. Moreover, this was the moment for which she had been waiting ever since, and now to add joy to joy it had occurred when her whole party was assembled to hear every word of her conversation with Drummond. With suitable gratitude she realised that such opportunities are rare.

With a charming smile she advanced towards him, as he stood hesitating by the door. “Mr. Drummond?” she inquired.

“Yes,” he murmured, with a puzzled frown. “But—but I seem to have made some absurd mistake.”

She laughed, and drew him into the hall. “A perfectly natural one, I assure you,” she replied, speaking so that her guests could hear. “It must have been my sister-in-law that you met at Wiltshire Towers. My husband was not very fit at the time and so I had to refuse the Duchess’s invitation.” She was handing him a cup of tea as she spoke. “But, of course, I know your cousin. Lord Staveley, well. So we really know one another after all, don’t we?”

“Charming of you to put it that way, Lady Manton,” answered Drummond, with his infectious grin. “At the same time I feel a bit of an interloper—what! Sort of case of fools toddling in where angels fear to tread.”

“A somewhat infelicitous quotation,” remarked an unctuous-looking man with side whiskers, deprecatingly.

“Catches you too, does it, old bird?” boomed Hugh, putting down his empty cup.

“It was the second part of your quotation that I was alluding to,” returned the other acidly, when Lady Manton intervened.

“Of course, Mr. Drummond, my husband and I insist on your remaining with us until you have completed your business in Sheffield.”

“Extraordinarily kind of you both, Lady Manton,” answered Hugh.

“How long do you think you will be?”

“Three or four days. Perhaps a little more.” As he spoke he looked quite casually at Latter. For some minutes that worthy pillar of Parliament had been staring at him with a puzzled frown: now he gave a slight start as recognition came to him. This was the enormous individual who had snored in Sir Bryan Johnstone’s office the previous afternoon. Evidently somebody connected with the police, reflected Mr. Latter, and glancing at Drummond’s vast size he began to feel more reassured than he had for some time. A comforting sort of individual to have about the premises in the event of a brawl: good man—Sir Bryan. This man looked large enough to cope even with that monstrous black apparition, the thought of which still brought a shudder to his spine.

Drummond was still looking at him, but there was no trace of recognition in his eyes. Evidently they were to meet as strangers before the house-party: quite right too, when some of the guests themselves might even be members of this vile gang.

“It depends on circumstances outside my control,” Drummond was saying. “But if you can do with me for a few days…”

“As long as you like, Mr. Drummond,” answered Lady Manton. “And now let me introduce you to my guests.”

It was not until just before dinner that Mr. Latter had an opportunity of a few private words with Drummond. They met in the hall, and for the moment no one else was within earshot.

“You were in Sir Bryan Johnstone’s office yesterday,” said the M.P. hoarsely. “Are you connected with the police?”

“Intimately,” answered Hugh. “Even now, Mr. Latter, you are completely surrounded by devoted men who are watching and guarding you.”

A gratified smile spread over the other’s face, though Drummond’s remained absolutely expressionless.

“And how did you get here, Mr. Drummond?”

“By car,” returned Hugh gravely.

“I mean into the house-party,” said Mr. Latter stiffly.

“Ah!” Hugh looked mysterious. “That is between you and me, Mr. Latter.”

“Quite: quite. I am discretion itself.”

“Until two hours ago I thought I was the biggest liar in the world: now I know I’m not. Our hostess has me beat to a frazzle.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” cried Latter, amazed.

“There are wheels within wheels, Mr. Latter,” continued Hugh still more mysteriously. “A network of intrigue surrounds us. But do not be afraid. My orders are never to leave your side.”

“Good God, Mr. Drummond, do you mean to say…?”

“I mean to say nothing. Only this one thing I will mention.” He laid an impressive hand on Latter’s arm. “Be very careful what you say to that man with the mutton-chop whiskers and the face like a sheep.”

And the startled M.P. was too occupied staring suspiciously at the worthy Sheffield magnate and pillar of nonconformity who had just descended the stairs with his hostess to notice a sudden peculiar shaking in Drummond’s shoulders as he turned away.

Mr. Charles Latter was not a pleasant specimen of humanity even at the best of times, and that evening he was not at his best. He was frightened to the core of his rotten little soul, and when a constitutional coward is frightened the result is not pretty. His conversational efforts at dinner would have shamed a boy of ten, and though he made one or two feeble efforts to pull himself together, it was no good. Try as he would his mind kept reverting to his own position. Over and over again he went on weighing up the points of the case until his brain was whirling. He tried to make out a mental balance sheet where the stock was represented by his own personal safety, but there was always that one unknown factor which he came up against—the real power of this mysterious gang.

Coming up in the train he had decided to curtail his visit as much as possible. He would carry through what he had been told to do, and then, having pocketed his thousand, he would leave the country for a few months. By that time the police should have settled matters. And he had been very lucky. It had proved easy to find the man Delmorlick, and once he had been found, the other more serious matter had proved easy too. Delmorlick had arranged everything, and had brought three other men to meet him in a private room at one of the smaller hotels.

Like all the Count’s schemes, every detail was perfect, and once or twice exclamations of amazement interrupted him as he read on. Every possible eventuality was legislated for, and by the time he had finished reading Delmorlick’s eyes were glowing with the enthusiasm of a fanatic.

“Magnificent,” he had cried, rising and going to the window. “Another nail in the coffin of Capital. And, by heaven! a big one.”

He had stood there, his head covered with a shock of untidy hair, staring with sombre eyes at the street below. And beside him had stood one of the other men. After a while Latter joined them, and he too for a moment had looked down into the street where little knots of men lounged round doorways with their hands in their pockets, and the apathy of despair on their faces. A few women here and there mingled with them, but there was no laughing or jesting—only the sullenness of lost hope. The hope that had once been theirs of work and plenty was dead; there was nothing for them to do—they were just units in the vast army of unemployed. Occasionally a man better dressed and more prosperous than the others would detach himself from one group and go to another, where he would hold forth long and earnestly. And his listeners would nod their heads vigorously or laugh sheepishly as he passed on.

For a few moments Delmorlick had watched in silence. Then with a grave earnestness in his voice he had turned to Latter.

“We shall win, Mr. Latter, I tell you. That,” with a lean forefinger he pointed to the man outside, “is going on all over England, Scotland and Ireland. And the fools in London prate of economic laws and inflated currencies. What does an abstract cause matter to those men; they want food.”

He had glanced at Delmorlick, to find the eyes of the other man fixed on him gravely. He had hardly noticed it at the time—he had been too anxious to get away; now, as he sat at dinner, he found strangely enough that it was the other man’s face which seemed to have made the biggest impression on his mind. A new arrival in the place, so Delmorlick had told him—but red-hot for the cause of freedom and anarchy.

He made some vague remark to his neighbour and once more relapsed into moody silence. So far, so good; his job was done—he could leave tomorrow. He would have left that afternoon but for the fact that he had sent his baggage up to Drayton House, and it would have looked strange. But he had already arranged for a wire to be sent to him from London the following morning, and for the night—well, there were Drummond and the police. Decidedly, on points he appeared to be in a winning position—quite a comfortable position. And yet—that unknown factor…Still, there was always Drummond; the only trouble was that he couldn’t quite place him. What on earth had he meant before dinner? He glanced across the table at him now: he was eating salted almonds and making love to his hostess.

“A fool,” reflected Mr. Latter, “but a powerful fool. If it was necessary, he’d swallow anything I told him.”

And so, towards the end of dinner, aided possibly by his host’s very excellent vintage port, Mr. Charles Latter had more or less soothed his fears. Surely he was safe in the house, and nothing would induce him to leave it until he went to the station next morning. No thought of the abominable crime he had planned only that afternoon disturbed his equanimity; as has been said, he was not a pleasant specimen of humanity.

Charles Latter was unmoral rather than immoral: he was a constitutional coward with a strong liking for underhand intrigue, and he was utterly and entirely selfish. In his way he was ambitious: he wanted power, but, though in many respects he was distinctly able, he lacked that essential factor—the ability to work for it. He hated work: he wanted easy results. And to obtain lasting results is not easy, as Mr. Latter gradually discovered. A capability for making flashy speeches covered with a veneer of cleverness is an undoubted asset, but it is an asset the value of which has been gauged to a nicety by the men who count. And so as time went on, and the epoch-making day when he had been returned to Parliament faded into the past, Mr. Latter realised himself for what he was—a thing of no account. And the realisation was as gall and wormwood to his soul. It is a realisation which comes to many men, and it takes them different ways. Some become resigned—some make new and even more futile efforts: some see the humour of it, and some don’t. Mr. Latter didn’t: he became spiteful. And a spiteful coward is a nasty thing.

It was just about that time that he met Count Zadowa. It was at dinner at a friend’s house, and after the ladies had left he found himself sitting next to the hunchback with the strange, piercing eyes. He wasn’t conscious of having said very much: he would have been amazed had he been told that within ten minutes this charming foreigner had read his unpleasant little mind like a book, and had reached a certain and quite definite decision. In fact, looking back on the past few months, Mr. Latter was at a loss to account as to how things had reached their present pass. Had he been told when he stood for Parliament, flaunting all the old hackneyed formula, that within two years he would be secretly engaged in red-hot Communist work, he would have laughed the idea to scorn. Anarchy, too: a nasty word, but the only one that fitted the bomb outrage in Manchester, which he had himself organised. Sometimes in the night, he used to wake and lie sweating as he thought of that episode.…

And gradually it had become worse and worse. Little by little the charming Count Zadowa, realising that Mr. Latter possessed just those gifts which he could utilise to advantage, had ceased to be charming. There were many advantages in having a Member of Parliament as chief liaison officer.

There had been that first small slip when he signed a receipt for money paid him to address a revolutionary meeting in South Wales during the coal strike. And the receipt specified the service rendered. An unpleasant document in view of the fact that his principal supporters in his constituency were coal-owners. And after that the descent had been rapid.

Not that even now Mr. Latter felt any twinges of conscience: all he felt was occasional twinges of fear that he might be found out. He was running with the hare and hunting with the hounds with a vengeance, and at times his cowardly little soul grew sick within him. And then, like a dreaded bolt from the blue, had come the letter of warning from the Black Gang.

Anyway, he reflected, as he turned out his light after getting into bed that night, the police knew nothing of his double life. They were all round him, and there was this big fool in the house…For a moment his heart stopped beating: was it his imagination or was that the figure of a man standing at the foot of the bed?

The sweat poured off his forehead as he tried to speak: then he sat up in bed, plucking with trembling hands at the collar of his pyjamas. Still the shape stood motionless: he could swear there was something there now—he could see it outlined against the dim light of the window. He reached out fearfully for the switch: fumbled a little, and then with a click the light went on. His sudden scream of fear died half-strangled in his throat: a livid anger took the place of terror. Leaning over the foot of the bed and regarding him with solicitous interest, lounged Hugh Drummond.

“All tucked up and comfy, old bean,” cried Drummond cheerfully. “Bed socks full of feet and all that sort of thing?”

“How dare you,” spluttered Latter, “how dare you come into my room like this.…”

“Tush, tush,” murmured Drummond, “don’t forget my orders, old Latter, my lad. To watch over you as a crooning mother crooneth over the last batch of twins. By the way, my boy, you skimped your teeth pretty badly tonight. You’ll have to do better tomorrow. Most of your molars must be sitting up and begging for Kolynos if that’s your normal effort.”

“Do you mean to tell me that you were in here while I was undressing?” said Latter angrily. “You exceed your instructions, sir: and I shall report your unwarrantable impertinence to Sir Bryan Johnstone when I return to London.”

“Exactly, Mr. Latter. But when will you return to London?” Drummond regarded him dispassionately. “To put some, if not all, of the cards on the table, the anonymous letter of warning which you received was not quite so anonymous as you would have liked. In other words, you know exactly whom it came from.”

“I don’t,” replied the other. “I know that it came from an abominable gang who have been committing a series of outrages lately. And that is why I applied for police protection.”

“Quite so, Mr. Latter. And as—er—Fate would have it, I am here to help carry out that role.”

“What did you mean when you gave me that warning before dinner? That man is one of the leading citizens of Sheffield.”

“That was just a little jest, Mr. Latter, to amuse you during the evening. The danger does not lie there.”

“Where does it lie?”

“Probably where you least expect it,” returned Drummond with an enigmatic smile.

“I shall be going tomorrow,” said Latter with attempted nonchalance. “Until then I rely on you.”

“Precisely,” murmured Drummond. “So you have completed your business here quicker than you anticipated.”

“Yes. To be exact, this afternoon before you arrived.”

“And was that the business which brought you to Sheffield?”

“Principally. Though I really don’t understand this catechism, Mr. Drummond. And now I wish to go to sleep.…”

“I’m afraid you can’t, Mr. Latter. Not quite yet.” For a moment or two Charles Latter stared at the imperturbable face at the foot of his bed: it seemed to him that a strange tension was creeping into the conversation—a something he could not place which made him vaguely alarmed.

“Do you think this mysterious Black Gang would approve of your business this afternoon?” asked Drummond quietly.

Mr. Latter started violently.

“How should I know of what the scoundrels would approve?” he cried angrily. “And anyway, they can know nothing about it.”

“You feel quite confident in Mr. Delmorlick’s discretion with regard to the friends he selects?”

And now a pulse was beginning to hammer in Mr. Latter’s throat, and his voice when he spoke was thick and unnatural.

“How do you know anything about Delmorlick?”

Drummond smiled. “May I reply by asking a similar question, Mr. Latter? How do you?”

“I met him this afternoon on political business,” stammered the other, staring fascinated at the man opposite, from whose face all trace of buffoonery seemed to have vanished, to be replaced by a grim sternness the more terrifying because it was so utterly unexpected. And he had thought Drummond a fool.…

“Would it be indiscreet to inquire the nature of the business?”

“Yes,” muttered Latter. “It was private.”

“That I can quite imagine,” returned Drummond grimly. “But since you’re so reticent I will tell you. This afternoon you made arrangements, perfect in every detail, to blow up the main power station of the Greystone works.” The man in the bed started violently. “The result of that would have been to throw some three thousand men out of work for at least a couple of months.”

“It’s a lie,” said Latter thickly.

“Your object in so doing was obvious,” continued Drummond. “Money. I don’t know how much, and I didn’t know who from—until last night.” And now Latter was swallowing hard, and clutching the bedclothes with hands that shook like leaves.

“You saw me last night, Mr. Latter, didn’t you? And I found out your headquarters.…”

“In God’s name—who are you?” His voice rose almost to a scream. “Aren’t you the police?”

“No—I am not.” He was coming nearer, and Latter cowered back, mouthing. “I am not the police, you wretched thing: I am the leader of the Black Gang.”

Latter felt the other’s huge hands on him, and struggled like a puny child, whimpering, half sobbing. He writhed and squirmed as a gag was forced into his mouth: then he felt a rope cut his wrists as they were lashed behind his back. And all the while the other went on speaking in a calm, leisurely voice.

“The leader of the Black Gang, Mr. Latter: the gang that came into existence to exterminate things like you. Ever since the war you poisonous reptiles have been at work stirring up internal trouble in this country. Not one in ten of you believe what you preach: your driving force is money and your own advancement. And as for your miserable dupes—those priceless fellows who follow you blindly because—God help them, they’re hungry and their wives are hungry—what do you care for them, Mr. Latter? You just laugh in your sleeve and pocket the cash.”

With a heave he jerked the other on to the floor, and proceeded to lash him to the foot of the bed.

“I have had my eye on you, Mr. Latter, since the Manchester effort when ten men were killed, and you were the murderer. But other and more important matters have occupied my time. You see, my information is very good—better than Delmorlick’s selection of friends. The new devoted adherent to your cause this afternoon happens to be an intimate, personal friend of mine.”

He was busying himself with something that he had taken from his pocket—a thick, square slab with a hole in the centre.

“I admit that your going to the police with my note surprised me. And it really was extraordinarily lucky that I happened to be in the office at the time. But it necessitated a slight change of plan on my part. If dear old McIver and his minions are outside the house, it’s much simpler for me to be in. And now, Mr. Latter—to come to business.”

He stood in front of the bound man, whose eyes were rolling horribly.

“We believe in making the punishment fit the crime. This afternoon you planned to destroy the livelihood of several thousand men with explosive, simply that you might make money. Here,” he held up the square slab, “is a pound of the actual gun-cotton, which was removed from Delmorlick himself before he started on a journey to join my other specimens. I propose to place this slab under you, Mr. Latter, and to light this piece of fuse which is attached to it. The fuse will take about three minutes to burn. During that three minutes if you can get free, so much the better for you; if not—well, it would be a pity not to have any explosion at all in Sheffield, wouldn’t it?”

For a moment or two Drummond watched the struggling, terrified man, and his eyes were hard and merciless. Then he went to the door, and Latter heard it opened and shut and moaned horribly. His impotent struggles increased: out of the corner of his eye he could see the fire burning nearer and nearer. And then all of a sudden something seemed to snap in his brain.…

Four minutes later Drummond came out from the screen behind which he had been standing. He picked up the burnt-out fuse and the block of wood to which it had been attached. Then he undid the ropes that bound the other man, removed the gag and put him back into bed. And after a while he nodded thoughtfully.

“Poetic justice,” he murmured. “And it saves a lot of trouble.”

Then, after one searching look round the room, he turned out the light and stepped quietly into the passage.

“An extraordinary thing, McIver,” said Sir Bryan Johnstone, late on the afternoon of the following day. “You say that when you saw Mr. Latter this morning he was mad.”

“Mad as a hatter, sir,” answered McIver, turning for confirmation to Drummond, who was sprawling in a chair.

“Absolutely up the pole. Tum-tum,” agreed Drummond.

“Gibbered like a fool,” said McIver, “and struggled wildly whenever he got near the foot of the bed. Seemed terrified of it, somehow. Did you notice that, Mr. Drummond?”

“My dear old lad, it was only ten o’clock, and I was barely conscious,” yawned that worthy, lighting a cigarette.

“Well, anyway, you had no trouble with the gang, McIver,” said his chief.

“None, sir,” agreed the Inspector. “I thought they wouldn’t try it on with me twice. I heard some fool story just before I caught the train, about one of the night-watchmen at a big works who swears he saw a sort of court-martial—he was an old soldier—being held on three men by a lot of black-masked figures. But a lot of these people have got this yarn on the brain. Sir Bryan. It’s spread a good deal farther than I thought.”

Sir Bryan nodded thoughtfully. “I must say I’d like to know what sent Charles Latter mad!”

Drummond sat up lazily. “Good heavens! Tumkins, don’t you know? The house-party, old son—the house-party, they had to be seen to be believed.”

CHAPTER VI

In Which an Effusion Is Sent to the Newspapers

Take a garrulous night-watchman and an enterprising journalist; mix them together over one, or even two glasses of beer, and a hard-worked editor feels safe for a column every time. And since the night-watchman at Greystone’s Steel Works was very garrulous, and the journalist was young and ambitious, the result produced several columns of the sort of stuff that everybody likes to read, and pretends he doesn’t.

Mr. Day was the night-watchman’s name, and Mr. Day was prepared to tell his story at a pint a time to anyone who cared to listen. It differed in detail, the difference depending entirely on the number of payments received during the day, but the essential part remained the same. And it was that essential part that was first published in one of the local Sheffield papers, and from there found its way into the London Press.

Mr. Day, it appeared, had, according to his usual custom, been making his hourly tour of the works. It was about midnight, or perhaps a little after, that he thought he heard the sound of voices coming from the central power-station. As he approached, it had seemed to him that it was more lit up than it had been on his previous round, when only one electric light had been burning. He was on the point of opening the door to go in and investigate, when he heard at least half a dozen voices speaking angrily, and one in particular had stood out above the others. It was loud and convulsed with passion, and on hearing it Mr. Day, remembering his wife and four children, had paused.

“You damned traitor, as sure as there’s a God above, I’ll kill you for this some day.”

Such were the words which it appeared had given Mr. Day cause for reflection. At any time, and in any place, they would be apt to stand out from the ordinary level of bright chat; but as Mr. Day remarked succinctly, “they fair gave me the creeps, coming out o’ that there place, which was hempty, mind you, not ’alf an hour before.”

And there are few, I think, who can blame him for his decision not to open the door, but to substitute for such a course a strategic move to a flank. There was an outside flight of steps leading to a door which opened on to the upstairs platform where stood the indicator board. And half-way up that flight of stairs was a window—a window through which Mr. Day was peering a few seconds afterwards.

It was at this point in the narrative that Mr. Day was wont to pause, while his listeners drew closer. Standing between the four huge dynamos which supplied the whole of the power necessary for the works were ten or a dozen men. Three of them had their hands lashed behind their backs, and these were the only three whose faces he could see. The others—and here came a still more impressive pause—were completely covered in black from head to foot. Black masks—black cloaks, the only difference between them being in height. He couldn’t hear what was being said: ever since the Boer War Mr. Day had been a little hard of hearing. But what it reminded him of was a drum-head court-martial. The three men whose hands were lashed behind them were the prisoners; the men in black, standing motionless round them, their judges. He heard vaguely the sound of a voice which went on speaking for some time. And since the three bound men seemed to be staring at one of the masked figures, he concluded that that must be the speaker. Then he saw the masked men surround the other three closely, and when they stood back again Mr. Day noticed that the prisoners had been gagged as well as bound. It was at this moment, apparently, that a hazy idea of going for the police penetrated his brain for the first time, but it was too late. Powerless in the hands of their captors, the three men were forced to the door, and shortly afterwards Mr. Day affirmed that he heard the sound of a car driving off. But he was unable to swear to it; he was still flattening a fascinated nose against the window; for two of the masked men had remained behind, and Mr. Day wasn’t going to miss anything.

These two gathered together into bundles a lot of things that looked like wooden slabs—also some stuff that looked like black cord. Then they walked carefully round the whole power station, as if to make sure that nothing had been left behind. Apparently satisfied with their inspection, they went to the door, carrying the bundles they had collected. They turned out all the lights except the one which had originally been burning, took one final look round to make certain that everything was as it should be, and then they, too, vanished into the night, leaving Mr. Day to scratch his head and wonder if he had been dreaming.

In fact, but for one indisputable certainty, it is very doubtful whether Mr. Day’s story would have been received with the respect which it undoubtedly deserved. When he first recounted it there were scoffers of the most incredulous type; scoffers who cast the most libellous reflections on the manner in which Mr. Day had spent the evening before going on duty, and it was not until the fact became established two or three days later that three men who should have come to work the next morning at their different jobs not only failed to appear, but had completely disappeared, leaving no trace behind them, that the scoffers became silent. Moreover, the enterprising journalist came on the scene, and Mr. Day became famous, and Mr. Day developed an infinite capacity for beer. Was not he, wildly improbable though his story might be, the only person who could throw any light at all on the mysterious disappearance of three workmen from Sheffield? Certainly the journalist considered he was, and proceeded to write a column of the most convincing journalese to proclaim his belief to the world at large, and Sheffield in particular.

Thus was the ball started. And no sooner had it commenced to move than it received astonishing impetus from all sorts of unexpected directions. The journalist, in his search for copy to keep his infant alive, discovered to his astonishment that he had unearthed a full-grown child. The activities of the Black Gang were not such a profound mystery as he had at first thought. And though he failed to get the slightest clue as to the identity of the men composing it, he was soon absolutely convinced of the truth of Mr. Day’s story. But there he stuck; the whole matter became one of conjecture in his mind. That there was a Black Gang, he was certain, but why or wherefore was beyond him.

Men he encountered in odd places were non-committal. Some obviously knew nothing about it; others shrugged their shoulders and looked wise.

There was one group of youngish men he approached on the matter. They were standing at the corner of the long street which led from Greystone’s Works, muttering together, and their conversation ceased abruptly as he sauntered up.

“Journalist, are you?” said one. “Want to know about this ’ere Black Gang? Well, look ’ere, mister, I’ll tell you one thing. See them furnaces over there?”

He pointed to the ruddy, orange light of Greystone’s huge furnaces, glowing fiercely against the evening sky.

“Well, if me and my mates ever catch the leader of that there gang, or anybody wot’s connected with it, they goes in them furnaces alive.”

“Shut up, yer blasted fool!” cried one of the others.

“Think I’m afraid of that bunch!” snarled the first speaker. “A bunch wot’s frightened to show their faces…”

But the journalist had passed on.

“Don’t you pay no attention to them young fools, mate,” said an elderly, quiet-looking man, who was standing smoking in a doorway a few yards on. “They talks too much and they does too little.”

“I was asking them about this so-called Black Gang,” said the searcher after news.

“Ah!” The elderly man spat thoughtfully. “Don’t profess to know nothing about them myself; but if wot I’ve ’eard is true, we could do with a few more like ’em.”

And once more the journalist passed on.

The police refused point-blank to make any communications on the matter at all. They had heard Mr. Day’s story, and while not disposed to dismiss it entirely, they would not say that they were prepared to accept it completely; and since it was a jolly day outside, and they were rather busy, the door was along the passage to the left.

Such were the ingredients, then, with which one, and sometimes two columns daily were made up for the edification of the inhabitants of Sheffield. Brief notices appeared in one or two of the London dailies, coupled with the announcement that Mr. Charles Latter had suffered a nervous breakdown, and that this well-known M.P. had gone into a nursing-home for some weeks. But beyond that the matter was too local to be of importance, until a sudden dramatic development revived the flagging interest in Sheffield, and brought the matter into the national limelight.

It was nothing more nor less than an announcement purporting to come from the leader of the Black Gang himself, and sent to the editor of the Sheffield paper. It occupied a prominent position in the centre page, and was introduced to the public in the following words:

“The following communication has been received by the editor. The original, which he has handed over to the proper authorities, was typewritten; the postmark was a London one. The editor offers no comment on the genuineness of the document, beyond stating that it is printed exactly as it was received.”

The document ran as follows:

In view of the conflicting rumours started by the story of Mr. Day, the night-watchman at Greystone’s Works, it may be of interest to the public to know that his story is true in every detail. The three men whom he saw bound were engaged at the instigation of others in an attempt to wreck the main power station, thereby largely increasing unemployment in Sheffield, and fomenting more unrest. The driving force behind this, as behind other similar activities, is international. The source of it all lies in other countries; the object is the complete ruin of the great sober majority of workers in England by a loud-voiced, money-seeking minority which is composed of unscrupulous scoundrels and fanatical madmen. For these apostles of anarchy a home has been prepared, where the doctrines of Communism are strictly enforced. The three men who have disappeared from Sheffield have gone to that home, but there is still plenty of room for others. Mr. Charles Latter has gone mad, otherwise he would have accompanied them. The more intelligent the man, the more vile the scoundrel. Charles Latter was intelligent. There are others more intelligent than he. It is expressly for their benefit that the Black Gang came into being.

THE LEADER OF THE GANG.

The reception of this remarkable document was mixed. On the strength of the first sentence Mr. Day’s price rose to two pints; but it was the rest of the communication which aroused public interest. For the first time some tangible reason had been advanced to account for the presence of the three bound men and their masked captors in the power-station at Greystones. Inquiries revealed the fact that all three of them were men educated above the average, and of very advanced Socialistic views. And to that extent the document seemed credible. But it was the concluding sentences that baffled the public.

True, Mr. Charles Latter, M.P., had been staying on the night in question at Lady Manton’s house a few miles out of the town. Equally true he had had a nervous breakdown which necessitated his removal to a nursing-home in London. But what connection there could possibly be between him and the three men it was difficult to see. It was most positively asserted that the well-known Member of Parliament had not left Drayton House during the night on which the affair took place; and yet, if credence was to be attached to the document, there was an intimate connection between him and the affair at the steel works. Callers at the nursing-home came away none the wiser; his doctor had positively forbidden a soul to be admitted save his brother, who came away frowning after the first visit, and returned no more. For Charles Latter not only had not recognised him, but had shrunk away, babbling nonsense, while continually his eyes had sought the foot of the bed with a look of dreadful terror in them.

And so speculation continued. No further communication emanated from the mysterious Black Gang. Mr. Latter was insane; the three men had disappeared, and Mr. Day, even at two pints, could say no more than he had said already. There were people who dismissed the entire thing as an impudent and impertinent hoax, and stated that the editor of the Sheffield paper should be prosecuted for libel. It was obvious, they explained, what had occurred. Some irresponsible practical joker had, for reasons of his own, connected together the two acts, whose only real connection was that they had occurred about the same time, and had maliciously sent the letter to the paper.

But there were others who were not so sure—people who nodded wisely at one another from the corners of trains, and claimed inside knowledge of strange happenings unknown to the mere public. They affirmed darkly that there was more in it than met the eye, and relapsed into confidential mutterings.

And then, when nothing further happened, the matter died out of the papers, and speculation ceased amongst the public. The general impression left behind favoured a hoax; and at that it was allowed to remain until the events occurred which were to prove that it was a very grim reality.

But whatever the general public may have thought about the matter, there were two people in London who viewed the sudden newspaper notoriety with rage and anger. And it is, perhaps, needless to say that neither of them concurred in the impression that it was a hoax; only too well did they know that it was nothing of the kind.

The first of these was Count Zadowa, alias Mr. William Atkinson. He had duly received from Latter a telegram in code stating that everything was well—a telegram dispatched from Sheffield after the meeting with Delmorlick in the afternoon. And from that moment he had heard nothing. The early editions of the evening papers on the following day had contained no reference to any explosion at Sheffield; the later ones had announced Mr. Latter’s nervous breakdown. And the Count, reading between the lines, had wondered, though at that time he was far from guessing the real truth. Then had come strange rumours—rumours which resulted in the summoning post-haste from Sheffield of a man who was alluded to in the archives at 5, Green Street, as John Smith, commission agent. And, though he may have fully deserved the description of commission agent, a glance at his face gave one to wonder at his right to the name of John Smith.

“Tell me exactly what has happened,” said the Count quietly, pointing to a chair in his inner office. “Up to date I have only heard rumours.”

And John Smith, with the accent of a Polish Jew, told. Mr. Latter had called on him early in the afternoon, and, in accordance with his instructions, he had arranged a meeting between Mr. Latter and Delmorlick at an hotel. Delmorlick had taken three other men with him, and he presumed everything had been arranged at that meeting. No, he had not been present himself. For two of Delmorlick’s companions he could vouch; in fact—and then, for the first time, Count Zadowa heard the story so ably spread abroad by Mr. Day. For it was those two men and Delmorlick who had disappeared.

“Then it was the fourth man, who gave it away,” snapped the Count. “Who was he?”

“He called himself Jackson,” faltered the other. “But I haven’t seen him since.”

Thoughtfully the Count beat a tattoo with his fingers on the desk in front of him; no one looking at him would have guessed for an instant the rage that was seething in his brain. For the first time he realised fully that, perfect though his own organisation might be, he had come up against one that was still better.

“And what about this nervous breakdown of Mr. Latter’s?” he demanded at length.

But on that subject John Smith knew nothing. He had no ideas on the subject, and, after a few searching questions, he found himself curtly dismissed, leaving the Count to ponder over the knotty point as to the connection between Latter’s breakdown and the affair at the power-station. And he was still pondering over it three days later when the bombshell exploded in the form of the document to the Press. That the concluding sentences were evidently directed against him did not worry him nearly as much as the publicity afforded to activities in which secrecy was essential. And what worried him even more was the fact that others on the Continent—men whose names were never mentioned, but who regarded him almost as he regarded Latter—would see the English papers, and would form their own conclusions. Already some peremptory letters had reached him, stating that the activities of the Black Gang must cease—how, it was immaterial. And he had replied stating that he had the thing well in hand. On top of which had come this damnable document, which was published in practically every paper in the country, and had produced a sort of silly-season discussion from “Retired Colonel” and “Maiden Lady.” Of no importance to him that “Common Sense” decreed that it was a stupid hoax: he knew it was not. And so did those others, as he very soon found out. Two days after the appearance of the document, he received a letter which bore the postmark of Amsterdam. It stated merely: “I am coming,” and was signed X. And had anyone been present when Count Zadowa opened that letter in his private office, he would have seen an unexpected sight. He would have seen him tear the letter into a thousand pieces, and then wipe his forehead with a hand that trembled a little. For Count Zadowa, who terrified most men, was frightened himself.

The second person who viewed this sudden notoriety with dislike was Inspector McIver. And in his case, too, the reason was largely personal. He was caught on the horns of a dilemma, as Sir Bryan Johnstone, who was not too pleased with the turn of events, pointed out to him a little caustically. Either the entire thing was a hoax, in which case why had McIver himself taken such elaborate precautions to prevent anything happening? or it was not a hoax, in which case McIver had been made a complete fool of.

“I’ll stake my reputation on the fact that no one got into or left the house that night. Sir Bryan,” he reiterated again and again. “That the Black Gang was at work in the town, I admit; but I do not believe that Mr. Latter’s condition is anything more that a strange coincidence.”

It was an interview that he had with Mr. Latter’s brother that caused him to go round to Drummond’s house in Brook Street. Much as he disliked having to do so, he felt he must leave no stone unturned if he was to get to the bottom of the affair, and Mr. Latter’s brother had said one or two things which he thought might be worth following up. If only Hugh Drummond wasn’t such a confounded fool, he reflected savagely, as he turned into Bond Street, it would have been possible to get some sane information. But that was his chief’s fault; he entirely washed his hands of the responsibility of roping in such a vast idiot; And it was at that stage in his meditations that a Rolls-Royce drew silently up beside him, and the cheerful voice of the subject of his thoughts hailed him delightedly.

“The very man, and the very spot!”

McIver turned round and nodded briefly. “Morning, Captain Drummond! I was just going round to your house to see you.”

“But, my dear old top,” cried Hugh, “don’t you see where you are? The portals of the Regency positively beckon us. Behind those portals a cocktail apiece, and you shall tell me all your troubles.” He gently propelled the Inspector through the doors of the celebrated club, still babbling cheerfully.

“After profound experience, old lad,” he remarked, coming to anchor by the bar, “I have come to the conclusion that there is only one thing in this world better than having a cocktail at twelve o’clock.”

“What’s that?” said McIver perfunctorily.

“Having two,” answered Drummond triumphantly.

The Inspector smiled wanly. After his profound experience he had come to the conclusion that there could exist no bigger ass in the world than Drummond, but he followed a trade where at times it is necessary to suffer fools gladly. And this was one of them.

“Is there any place where we could have a little private talk, Captain Drummond?” he asked, as the other pushed a Martini towards him.

“What about that corner over there?” said Drummond, after glancing round the room.

“Excellent!” agreed the Inspector, and, picking up his cocktail, he crossed over to it and sat down. It took his host nearly five minutes to do the same short journey, and McIver chafed irritably at the delay. He was a busy man, and it seemed to him that Drummond knew everyone in the room. Moreover, he insisted on talking to them at length. And once again a feeling of anger against his chief filled his mind. What had Drummond except his great strength to distinguish him from this futile crowd of cocktail-drinking men? All of them built on the same pattern; all of them fashioned along the same lines. Talking a strange jargon of their own—idle, perfectly groomed, bored. As far as they were concerned, he was non-existent save as the man who was with Drummond. He smiled a little grimly; he, who did more man’s work in a week than the whole lot of them put together got through in a year. A strange caste, he reflected, as he sipped his drink; a caste which does not aim at, because it essentially is, good form; a caste which knows only one fetish—the absolute repression of all visible emotion; a caste which incidentally pulled considerably more than its own weight in the war. McIver gave them credit for that.

“Sorry to be so long.” Drummond lowered himself into a chair. “The place is always crowded at this hour. Now, what’s the little worry?”

“It’s about the affair up at Sheffield,” said the Inspector. “I suppose you’ve seen this communication in the papers, purporting to come from the leader of the Black Gang.”

“Rather, old lad,” answered Drummond. “Waded through it over the eggs the other morning. Pretty useful effort, I thought.”

“The public at large regard it as a hoax,” continued McIver. “Now, I know it isn’t! The typewriter used in the original document is the same as was used in their previous communications.”

“By Jove, that’s quick!” said Drummond admiringly. “Deuced quick.”

McIver frowned. “Now please concentrate. Captain Drummond. The concluding sentence of the letter would lead one to suppose that there was some connection between the activities of this gang and Mr. Charles Latter’s present condition. I, personally, don’t believe it. I think it was mere coincidence. But whichever way it is, I would give a great deal to know what sent him mad.”

“Is he absolutely up the pole?” demanded Drummond.

“Absolutely! His brother has seen him, and after he had seen him he came to me. He tells me that the one marked symptom is an overmastering terror of something which he seems to see at the foot of the bed. He follows this thing round with his eyes—I suppose he thinks it’s coming towards him—and then he screams. His brother believes that someone or something must have been in his room that night—a something so terrifying that it sent him mad. To my mind, of course, the idea is wildly improbable, but strange things do occur.”

“Undoubtedly!” agreed Drummond.

“Now you were in the house,” went on the Inspector; “you even examined his room, as you told Sir Bryan. Now, did you examine it closely?”

“Even to looking under the bed,” answered Drummond brightly.

“And there was nothing there? No place where anybody or anything could hide?”

“Not a vestige of a spot. In fact, my dear old police hound,” continued Drummond, draining his glass, “if the genial brother is correct in his supposition, the only conclusion we can come to is that I sent him mad myself.”

McIver frowned again.

“I wish you’d be serious. Captain Drummond. There are other things in life beside cocktails and—this.” He waved an expressive hand round the room. “The matter is an important one. You can give me no further information? You heard no sounds during the night?”

“Only the sheep-faced man snoring,” answered Drummond with a grin. And then, of a sudden, he became serious and, leaning across the table, he stared fixedly at the Inspector.

“I think we must conclude, McIver, that the madness of Mr. Latter is due to the ghosts of the past, and perhaps the spectres of the present. A punishment, McIver, for things done which it is not good to do—a punishment which came to him in the night. That’s when the ghosts are abroad.” He noted McIver’s astonished face and gradually his own relaxed into a smile. “Pretty good, that—wasn’t it, after only one cocktail. You ought to hear me after my third.”

“Thanks very much. Captain Drummond,” laughed the Inspector, “but that was quite good enough for me. We don’t deal in ghosts in my service.”

“Well, I’ve done my best,” sighed Drummond, waving languidly at a waiter to repeat the dose. “It’s either that or me. I know my face is pretty bad, but—”

“I don’t think we need worry about either alternative,” said McIver, rising.

“Right oh, old lad,” answered Drummond. “You know best. You’ll have another?”

“No more, thanks. I have to work sometimes.”

The inspector picked up his hat and stick, and Drummond strolled across the room with him. “Give my love to Tum-tum.”

“Sir Bryan is not at the office today. Captain Drummond,” answered McIver coldly. “Good morning.”

With a faint smile Drummond watched the square, sturdy figure swing through the doors into Bond Street, then he turned and thoughtfully made his way back to the table.

“Make it seven, instead of two,” he told the waiter, who was hovering round.

And had McIver returned at that moment he would have seen six of these imperturbable, bored men rise unobtrusively from different parts of the room, and saunter idly across to the corner where he had recently been sitting. It would probably not have struck him as an unusual sight—Drummond and six of his pals having a second drink; in fact, it would have struck him as being very usual. He was an unimaginative man, was the Inspector.

“Well,” said Peter Darrell, lighting a cigarette. “And what had he got to say?”

“Nothing of interest,” answered Drummond. “I told him the truth, and he wouldn’t believe me. Algy back yet?”

“This morning,” said Ted Jerningham. “He’s coming round here. Had a bit of trouble, I gather. And, talk of the devil—here he is.”

Algy Longworth, his right arm in a sling, was threading his way towards them.

“What’s happened, Algy?” said Hugh as he came up.

“That firebrand Delmorlick stuck a knife into me,” grinned Algy. “We put him on a rope and dropped him overboard, and towed him for three hundred yards. Cooled his ardour. I think he’ll live all right.”

“And how are all the specimens?”

“Prime, old son—prime! If we leave ’em long enough, they’ll all have murdered one another.”

Drummond put down his empty glass with a laugh.

“The first British Soviet. Long life to ’em! Incidentally, ten o’clock tonight. Usual rendezvous. In view of your arm, Algy—transfer your instructions to Ted. You’ve got ’em?”

“In my pocket here. But, Hugh, I can easily—”

“Transfer to Ted, please. No argument! We’ve got a nice little job—possibly some sport. Read ’em, Ted—and business as usual. So long, boys! Phyllis and I are lunching with some awe-inspiring relatives.”

The group broke up as casually as it had formed, only Ted Jerningham remaining behind. And he was reading what looked like an ordinary letter. He read it through carefully six or seven times; then he placed it in the fire, watching it until it was reduced to ashes. A few minutes later he was sitting down to lunch with his father. Sir Patrick Jerningham, Bart., at the latter’s club in Pall Mall. And it is possible that that worthy and conscientious gentleman would not have eaten such a hearty meal had he known that his only son was detailed for a job that very night which, in the event of failure, would mean either prison or a knife in the back—probably the latter.

CHAPTER VII

In Which a Bomb Bursts at Unpleasantly Close Quarters

It was perhaps because the thought of failure never entered Hugh Drummond’s head that such a considerable measure of success had been possible up to date—that, and the absolute, unquestioning obedience which he demanded of his pals, and which they accorded him willingly. As they knew, he laid no claims to brilliance; but as they also knew, he hid a very shrewd common sense beneath his frivolous manner. And having once accepted the sound military truism that one indifferent general is better than two good ones, they accepted his leadership with unswerving loyalty. What was going to be the end of their self-imposed fight against the pests of society did not worry them greatly; all that mattered was that there should be a certain amount of sport in the collection of the specimens. Granted the promise of that, they willingly sacrificed any engagements and carried out Hugh’s orders to the letter. Up to date, however, the campaign, though far from being dull, had not produced any really big results. A number of sprats and a few moderate-sized fish had duly been caught in the landing-net, and been sent to the private pool to meditate at leisure. But nothing really large had come their way. Zaboleff was a good haul, and the madness of Mr. Latter was all for the national welfare. But the Black Gang, which aimed merely at the repression of terrorism by terrorism, had found it too easy. The nauseating cowardice of the majority of their opponents was becoming monotonous, their strong aversion to soap and water, insanitary. They wanted big game—not the rats that emerged from the sewers.

Even Drummond had begun to feel that patriotism might be carried too far until the moment when the address in Hoxton had fallen into his hands. Then, with the optimism that lives eternal in the hunter’s breast, fresh hope had arisen in his mind. It had been held in abeyance temporarily owing to the little affair at Sheffield. Yet now that that was over he had determined on a bigger game. If it failed—if they drew blank—he had almost decided to chuck the thing up altogether. Phyllis, he knew, would be overjoyed if he did.

“Just this one final coup, old girl,” he said, as they sat waiting in the Carlton for the awe-inspiring relatives. “I’ve got it cut and dried, and it comes off tonight. If it’s a dud, we’ll dissolve ourselves—at any rate, for the present. If only—”

He sighed, and his wife looked at him reproachfully. “I know you want another fight with Petersen, you old goat,” she remarked. “But you’ll never see him again, or that horrible girl.”

“Don’t you think I shall, Phyl?” He stared despondently at his shoes. “I can’t help feeling myself that somewhere or other behind all this that cheery bird is lurking. My dear, it would be too ghastly if I never saw him again.”

“The next time you see him, Hugh,” she answered quietly, “he won’t take any chances with you.”

“But, my angel child,” he boomed cheerfully. “I don’t want him to. Not on your life! Nor shall I. Good Lord! Here they are. Uncle Timothy looks more like a mangel-wurzel than ever.”

And so at nine-thirty that evening, a party of five men sat waiting in a small sitting-room of a house situated in a remote corner of South Kensington. Some easels stood round the walls covered with half-finished sketches, as befitted a room belonging to a budding artist such as Toby Sinclair. Not that he was an artist or even a budding one, but he felt that a man must have some excuse for living in South Kensington. And so he had bought the sketches and put them round the room, principally to deceive the landlady. The fact that he was never there except at strange hours merely confirmed that excellent woman’s opinion that all artists were dissolute rascals. But he paid his rent regularly, and times were hard, especially in South Kensington. Had the worthy soul known that her second best sitting-room was the rendezvous of this Black Gang whose letter to the paper she and her husband had discussed over the matutinal kipper, it is doubtful if she would have been so complacent. But she didn’t know, and continued her weekly dusting of the sketches with characteristic zeal.

“Ted should be here soon,” said Drummond, glancing at his watch. “I hope he’s got the bird all right.”

“You didn’t get into the inner room, did you, Hugh?” said Peter Darrell.

“No. But I saw enough to know that it’s beyond our form, old lad. We’ve got to have a skilled cracksman to deal with one of the doors—and almost certainly anything important will be in a safe inside.”

“Just run over the orders again.” Toby Sinclair came back from drawing the blinds even more closely together.

“Perfectly simple,” said Hugh. “Ted and I and Ginger Martin—if he’s got him—will go straight into the house through the front door. I know the geography of the place all right, and I’ve already laid out the caretaker clerk fellow once. Then we must trust to luck. There shouldn’t be anybody there except the little blighter of a clerk. The rest of you will hang about outside in case of any trouble. Don’t bunch together, keep on the move; but keep the doors in sight. When you see us come out again, make your own way home. Can’t give you any more detailed instructions because I don’t know what may turn up. I shall rig myself out here, after Ted arrives. You had better go to your own rooms and do it, but wait first to make sure that he’s roped in Ginger Martin.”

He glanced up as the door opened and Jerry Seymour—sometime of the R.A.F.—put his head into the room.

“Ted’s here, and he got the bird all right. Unpleasant-looking bloke with a flattened face.”

“Right.” Drummond rose, and crossed to a cupboard. “Clear off, you fellows. Zero—twelve midnight.”

From the cupboard he pulled a long black cloak and mask, which he proceeded to put on, while the others disappeared with the exception of Jerry Seymour, who came into the room. He was dressed in livery like a chauffeur, and he had, in fact, been driving the car in which Ted had brought Ginger Martin.

“Any trouble?” asked Drummond.

“No. Once he was certain Ted was nothing to do with the police he came like a bird,” said Jerry. “The fifty quid did it.” Then he grinned. “You know Ted’s a marvel. I’ll defy anybody to recognise him.”

Drummond nodded, and sat down at the table facing the door.

“Tell Ted to bring him up. And I don’t want him to see you, Jerry, so keep out of the light.”

Undoubtedly Jerry Seymour was right with regard to Jerningham’s make-up. As he and Martin came into the room, it was only the sudden start and cry on the part of the crook that made Drummond certain as to which was which.

“Blimey!” muttered the man, shrinking back as he saw the huge figure in black confronting him. “Wot’s the game, guv’nor?”

“There’s no game, Martin,” said Drummond reassuringly. “You’ve been told what you’re wanted for, haven’t you? A little professional assistance tonight, for which you will be paid fifty pounds, is all we ask of you.”

But Ginger Martin still seemed far from easy in his mind. Like most of the underworld he had heard strange stories of the Black Gang long before they had attained the notoriety of print. Many of them were exaggerated, doubtless, but the general impression left in his mind was one of fear. The police were always with him: the police he understood. But this strange gang was beyond his comprehension, and that in itself was sufficient to frighten him.

“You’re one of this ’ere Black Gang,” he said sullenly, glancing at the door in front of which Jerningham was standing Should he chance it and make a dash to get away? Fifty pounds are fifty pounds, but—He gave a little shiver as his eyes came round again to the motionless figure on the other side of the table.

“Quite correct, Martin,” said the same reassuring voice. “And it’s only because I don’t want you to recognise me that I’m dressed up like this. We don’t mean you any harm.” The voice paused for a moment, and then went on again. “You understand that, Martin. We don’t mean you any harm, unless “—and once again there came a pause—”unless you try any monkey tricks. You are to do exactly as I tell you, without question and at once. If you do you will receive fifty pounds. If you don’t—well, Martin, I have ways of dealing with people who don’t do what I tell them.”

There was silence while Ginger Martin fidgeted about, looking like a trapped animal. How he wished now that he’d had nothing to do with the thing at all. But it was too late to bother about that; here he was, utterly ignorant of his whereabouts—trapped.

“What do yer want me to do, guv’nor?” he said at last.

“Open a safe amongst other things,” answered Drummond. “Have you brought your tools and things?”

“Yus—I’ve brought the outfit,” muttered the other. “Where is the safe? ’Ere?”

“No, Martin, not here. Some distance away in fact. We shall start in about an hour. Until then you will stop in this room. You can have a whisky-and-soda, and my friend here will stay with you. He has a gun, Martin, so remember what I said. No monkey tricks.”

With fascinated eyes the crook watched the speaker rise and cross to an inner door. Standing he seemed more huge than ever, and Martin gave a sigh of relief as the door closed behind him.

“I reckon ’e wouldn’t win a prize as a blinking dwarf,” he remarked hoarsely to Jerningham. “I say, mister, wot abaht that there whisky-and-soda?”

The entrance to Number 5, Green Street, proved easier than Drummond had expected—so easy as to be almost suspicious. No lights shone in the windows above: the house seemed completely deserted. Moreover, the door into the street was unbolted, and without a moment’s hesitation Drummond opened it and stepped inside, followed by Martin and Ted Jerningham. The long black cloak had been discarded; only the black mask concealed his face, as the three men stood inside the door, listening intently. Not a sound was audible, and after a moment or two Drummond felt his way cautiously through the downstairs office towards the flight of stairs that led to the rooms above. And it was just as his foot was on the first stair that a sudden noise behind made him draw back sharply into the darkness behind the counter, with a warning whisper to the other two to follow his example.

The front door had opened again; someone else had come in. They could see nothing, and the only sound seemed to be the slightly quickened breathing of Ted Jerningham, whose nerve was not quite as good as the others at affairs of this sort. Then came the sound of bolts being shot home, and footsteps coming into the office.

With a whispered “Stay there,” Drummond glided across towards the door like a shadow, moving with uncanny silence for such a big man. And a moment or two afterwards someone came into the office. Jerningham, crouching against the crook behind the counter, could see the outline of a figure framed in the faint light that filtered in from a street lamp through the fanlight over the door. Then there was a click, and the electric light was switched on.

For a second the newcomer failed to see them; then, with a sudden gasp he stiffened, and stood staring at them rigidly. It was Cohen, the unpleasant little clerk, returning from an evening out, which accounted for the front door having been unbolted. And undoubtedly his luck was out. Because, having seen the two of them there behind the counter, he somewhat naturally failed to look for anybody else. It would not have made any great difference if he had, but the expression on his face as he felt two enormous hands close gently but firmly round his throat from behind caused even the phlegmatic Ginger to chuckle grimly.

“Out with the light,” snapped Drummond, “then help me lash him up and gag him.”

It was done quickly and deftly, and for the second time in a week the wretched Cohen was laid under his own counter to cool. It had been carried out as noiselessly as possible, but it was five minutes before Drummond again led the way cautiously up the stairs. And during that five minutes the three men listened with every sense alert, striving to differentiate between the ordinary street noises and anything unusual in the house above them. But not even Drummond’s ears, trained as they had been for many nights in No Man’s Land, could detect anything. All seemed as quiet as the grave.

“It probably is empty except for that little rat,” he whispered to Jerningham. “But we’ll take no chances.”

In single file they crept up the stairs, Drummond leading. The door at the top was ajar, and for a while they stood in the carpeted passage above listening again.

“Along this passage are the clerks’ offices,” he explained in a low voice to the other two. “At the far end is another door which we shall probably find locked. Beyond that is the inner office, which we want.”

“Well, let’s get on wiv it, guvnor,” muttered Ginger Martin hoarsely. “There’s no good in ’anging abaht.”

Drummond switched on his electric torch, and flashed it cautiously round. Doors leading off the passage were open in most cases, and all the rooms were empty; it was obvious that none of the staff were about. And yet he felt an indefinable sense of danger, which he tried in vain to shake off. Somehow or other, he felt certain that they were not alone—that there were other people in the house, besides the trussed-up clerk below. But Ginger Martin had no such presentiments, and was rapidly becoming impatient. To open the door at the end of the passage, if it should prove to be locked, was child’s play as to be absolutely contemptible. He wanted to get on with the safe, which might take time, instead of fooling round in a passage listening for mice.

At last Drummond moved slowly forward with the other two just behind him. Whatever he may have thought, he had every intention of going through with the job, and delay in such cases only tends to turn vague fears into certain realities. Gently he tried the door at the end of the passage; as he had anticipated it was locked.

“’Old the light, guv’nor, so that it shines on the blinkin’ key-’ole!” said Ginger Martin impatiently. “I’ll get this open as easy as kiss yer ’and.”

Without a sound, the cracksman set to work; his coarse features outlined in the circle of the torch, his ill-kept fingers handling his instruments as deftly as any surgeon. A little oil here and there; a steady pressure with a short pointed steel tool; a faint click.

“There you are, guv’nor,” he muttered, straightening up. “Easy as kiss yer ’and. And if yer waits till I find me glove I’ll open it for yer; but Ginger Martin’s fingerprints are too well known to run any risks.”

Still no sound came from anywhere, though the click as the lock shot back had seemed horribly loud in the silence. And then, just as Martin cautiously turned the handle and pushed open the door, Drummond stiffened suddenly and switched off his torch. He could have sworn that he heard the sound of voices close by.

Only for a second—they were instantly silenced; but just for that fraction of time as the door opened he felt certain he had heard men speaking.

“Wot’s the matter?” he heard Martin’s hoarse whisper come out of the darkness.

“Did you hear voices?” he breathed in reply. “I thought I did as you opened the door.”

Once again the three men stood motionless, listening intently, but the sound was not repeated. Absolute silence reigned, broken only by the noise of their own breathing. And at last, after what seemed an interminable pause, Drummond switched on his torch again. The passage was empty; the door of the inner office was just in front of them. Almost he was persuaded that he must have made a mistake—that it had been his imagination. He peered through the keyhole: the room was in darkness. He turned the handle cautiously; the door gave to him; and still with his torch held well in front of him, he stepped into the room, turning the light into every corner. Not a trace of anyone; the inner office was absolutely empty. He flashed the light all round the walls, as far as he could see there was no other door—not even a window. Consequently the only way out was by the door through which they had just entered, which was obviously impossible for anyone to have done without his knowledge.

“It is all right!” he muttered, turning round to the other two. “Must have been my mistake. Let’s get on with it.”

“There’s a mighty strong smell of cigar smoke,” said Jerningham dubiously.

“No ventilation, old man,” returned Drummond. “Hangs about for hours. No other door, no window. Now then. Ginger, let’s tackle the big desk first. It looks pretty easy, even to me.”

As he spoke he moved into the centre of the room, his torch lighting up the big roll-top desk.

“Right-ho, guv’nor. Keep the beam on the keyhole—”

The crook bent over his task, only to straighten up suddenly as all the lights went on.

“Yer damned fool!” he snarled. “Switch ’em off! It ain’t safe.”

“I didn’t put ’em on!” snapped Drummond.

“Nor I,” said Jerningham.

For a moment or two no one spoke; then Ginger Martin made a wild dive for the door. But the door which had opened so easily a few moments before now refused to budge, though he tugged at it, cursing horribly. And after a while he gave it up, and turned on Drummond like a wild beast.

“You’ve trapped me, yer—swine. I’ll get even with you over this if I swing for it!”

But Drummond, to whom the presence of actual danger was as meat and drink, took not the slightest notice. His brain, ice-cold and clear, was moving rapidly. It had not been a mistake, he had heard voices—voices which came from that very room in which they now were. Men had been there—men who had got out by some other way. And Ginger Martin was trapped—all of them. More out of thoughtlessness than anything else, he brushed the swearing crook aside with the back of his hand—much as one brushes away a troublesome fly. And Martin, feeling as if he’d been kicked in the mouth by a horse, ceased to swear.…

It was uncanny—devilish. The room was empty, save for them, suddenly flooded with light. But by whom? Drummond felt they were being watched. But by whom? And then suddenly he heard Ted Jerningham’s voice, low and tense.

“There’s a man watching us, Hugh. I can see his eyes. In that big safe door.”

Like a flash, Drummond swung round, and looked at the safe. Ted was right; he could see the eyes himself, and they were fixed on him with an expression of malignant fury through a kind of opening that looked like the slit in a letter box. For a moment or two they remained there, staring at him, then they disappeared, and the opening through which he had seen them disappeared also, and seemed to become part of the door. And it was just as he was moving towards this mysterious safe to examine it closer that with a sudden clang, another opening appeared—one much larger than the first. He stopped involuntarily as something was thrown through into the room—something which hissed and spluttered.

For a moment he gazed at it uncomprehendingly as it lay on the floor; then he gave a sudden, tense order.

“On your faces—for your lives!” His voice cut through the room like a knife. “Behind the desk, you fools! It’s a bomb!”

CHAPTER VIII

In Which the Bag of Nuts Is Found by Accident

It was the desk that saved Drummond, and with him Ted Jerningham. Flat on their faces, their arms covering their heads, they lay on the floor waiting, as in days gone by they had waited for the bursting of a too-near crump. They heard Ginger Martin, as he blundered round the room, and then—suddenly it came.

There was a deafening roar, and a sheet of flame which seemed to fill the room. Great lumps of the ceiling rained down and the big roll-top desk, cracked in pieces and splintered into matchwood, fell over on top of them. But it had done its work: it had borne the full force of the explosion in their direction. As a desk its day was past; it had become a series of holes roughly held together by fragments of wood.

So much Drummond could see by the aid of his torch. With the explosion all the lights had gone out, and for a while he lay pressed against Ted Jerningham trying to recover his wits. His head was singing like a bursting kettle: his back felt as if it was broken where a vast lump of ceiling had hit him. But after moving his legs cautiously and then his arms, he decided that he was still alive. And having arrived at that momentous conclusion the necessity for prompt action became evident. A bomb bursting in London is not exactly a private affair.

“Are you all right, Ted?” he muttered hoarsely, his mouth full of plaster and dust.

“I think so, old man,” answered Jerningham, and Drummond heaved a sigh of relief. “I got a whack on the back of the head from something.”

Drummond scrambled to his feet, and switched on his torch. The wreckage was complete, but it was for the third member of the party that he was looking. And after a moment or two he found him, and cursed with a vigorous fury that boded ill for the person who had thrown the bomb, if he ever met him.

For Ginger Martin, being either too frightened or too ignorant, had not done as he was told. There had been no desk between him and the bomb when it burst, and what was left of him adorned a corner. There was nothing to be done: the unfortunate crook would never again burgle a safe. And the only comfort to Drummond was that death must have been absolutely instantaneous.

“Poor devil,” he muttered. “Someone is going to pay for this.”

And then he felt Ted Jerningham clutching his arm.

“It’s blown a hole in the wall, man. Look.”

It was true: he could see the light of a street lamp shining through a great jagged hole.

“Some bomb,” he muttered. “Let’s clear.”

He gave a final flash of his torch round the floor, as they moved towards the shattered wall, and then suddenly stopped.

“What’s that?”

Right in the centre of the beam, lying in the middle of the floor, was a small chamois-leather bag. It seemed unhurt, and, without thinking, Hugh picked it up and put it in his pocket. Then, switching off the torch, they both clambered through the hole, dropped on to a lean-to roof, and reached the ground.

They were at the back of the house in some deserted mews, and rapidity of movement was dearly indicated. Already a crowd was hurrying to the scene of the explosion, and slipping quietly out of the dark alley, they joined in themselves.

“Go home, Ted,” said Drummond. “I must get the others.”

“Right, old man.” He made no demur, but just vanished quietly, while his leader slouched on towards the front door of Number 5, Green Street. The police were already beating on it, while a large knot of interested spectators giving gratuitous advice stood around them. And in the crowd Drummond could see six of his gang: six anxious men who had determined—police or no police—to get upstairs and see what had happened. In one and all their minds was a sickening fear, that the man they followed had at last bitten off more than he could chew—that they’d find him blown to pieces in the mysterious room upstairs.

And then, quite clear and distinct above the excited comments of the crowd, came the hooting of an owl. A strange sound to hear in a London street, but no one paid any attention. Other more engrossing matters were on hand, more engrossing that is to all except the six men who instantaneously swung half round as they heard it. For just a second they had a glimpse of a huge figure standing in the light of a lamp-post on the other side of the street—then it disappeared. And with astonishing celerity they followed its example. Whoever had been hurt it was not Drummond; and that, at the moment, was all they were concerned with.

By devious routes they left the scene of the explosion—each with the same goal in his mind. The owl had only hooted once, which meant that they were to reassemble as soon as possible: the second call, which meant disperse, had not been given. And so within an hour six young men, shorn of all disguise and clad in immaculate evening clothes, were admitted to Drummond’s house in Brook Street by a somewhat sleepy Denny.

They found Hugh arrayed in a gorgeous dressing-gown with a large tankard of beer beside him, and his wife sitting on the arm of his chair.

“Beer, souls,” he grunted. “In the corner, as usual.”

“What happened, old lad?” asked Peter Darrell.

“I got handed the frozen mitten. I asked for bread, and they put across a half-brick. To be absolutely accurate we got into the room all right, and having got in we found we couldn’t get out. Then someone switched on the light, and bunged a bomb at us through a hole in the door. Quite O.K., old girl “—he put a reassuring arm round Phyllis’s waist—”I think we’d be still there if they hadn’t.”

“Is Ted all right?” asked Toby Sinclair.

“Yes. Ted’s all right. Got a young load of bricks in his back when the ceiling came down—but he’s all right. It’s the other poor devil—Ginger Martin.” His face was grim and stern, and the others waited in silence for him to continue.

“There was a big desk in the room, and the bomb fell on one side of it. Ted and I gave our well-known impersonation of an earthworm on the other, which saved us. Unfortunately, Ginger Martin elected to run round in small circles and curse. And he will curse no more.”

“Dead?” Peter Darrell’s voice was low.

“Very,” answered Drummond quietly. “In fact, he’s now giving his well-known impersonation of a wallpaper. The poor blighter was blown to pieces. If he’d done what I told him he wouldn’t have been, but that’s beside the point. He was working for me, and he was killed while he was doing so. And I don’t like that happening.”

“Oh! my dear,” said Phyllis. “I do wish you’d give it up. You’ve escaped this time, but sooner or later they’ll get you. It isn’t worth it.”

Drummond shook his head, and again encircled his wife’s waist with his arm.

“You wouldn’t like me to let that poor devil’s death go unavenged, would you?” He looked up at her, and she shrugged her shoulders resignedly. A year of marriage with this vast husband of hers had convinced her of the futility of arguing with him once his mind was made up. “Not that the country will be appreciably worse off for his departure, but that’s not the point. He was doing a job for me when it happened, and I don’t stand for that at all.”

“What do you propose to do?” demanded Jerry Seymour, thoughtfully refilling his glass.

“Well, there, old son, at the moment you have me beat,” conceded Hugh. “I sort of figured it out this way. Whoever the bird is who bunged that bomb, he recognised me as being the leader of our little bunch. I mean it was me he was staring at through the door, with eyes bubbling over with tenderness and love. It was me that bally bomb was intended for—not Ginger Martin, though he was actually doing the work. And if this cove is prepared to wreck his own office just to get me out of the way—I guess I must be somewhat unpopular.”

“The reasoning seems extraordinary profound,” murmured Peter.

“Now the great point is—does he know who I am?” continued Hugh. “Is the little treasure now saying to himself, what time he lowers the evening cup of bread-and-milk, ‘That has settled the hash of one Hugh Drummond,’ or is he merely saying, ‘I have nastily disintegrated the leader of the Black Gang’?”

“But what’s it matter anyway?” demanded Toby. “He hasn’t disintegrated you, and he’s smashed up his own office—so I fail to see where he wins the grand piano.”

“That, old Toby, is where you show yourself incapable of grasping the finer points of the situation.” Hugh thoughtfully lit a cigarette. “Our great difficulty before Zaboleff was kind enough to present us with the address of their headquarters was to get in touch with the man at the top. And now the headquarters are no more. No man can work in an office with periodical boulders falling on his head from the roof, and a large hole in the wall just behind him. I mean there’s no privacy about it. And so—unless he knows me—he won’t be able to carry on the good work when he finds that neither of my boots has reached the top of St. Paul’s. We shall be parted again—which is dreadful to think of. There’s no cheery little meeting-ground where we can foregather for the matutinal Martini or even Manhattan. Why, we might even pass one another in the street as complete strangers.”

“I get you,” said Peter. “And you don’t know him.”

“Not well enough to call him Bertie. There’s a humpbacked blighter up there who calls himself a Count, and on whom I focused the old optic for about two seconds the other evening. But whether he’s the humorist who bunged the bomb or not is a different matter.” He glanced up as the door opened. “What is it, Denny?”

“I found this bag, sir, in the pocket of the coat you were wearing tonight.”

His servant came into the room carrying the chamois-leather bag, which he handed to Drummond.

“Will you be wanting anything more tonight, sir?”

“No, thank you, Denny. You toddle off to bye-bye. And give Mrs. Denny a chaste salute from Mr. Darrell.”

“Very good, sir!”

The door closed behind him, and Hugh stared thoughtfully at the bag in his hand.

“I’d forgotten about this. Saw it lying on the floor, just before we hopped it. Hullo! it’s sealed.”

“For goodness’ sake be careful, boy!” cried Phyllis. “It may be another bomb.”

Hugh laughed and ripped open the bag; then his eyes slowly widened in amazement as he saw the contents.

“Great Scott!” he cried. “What the devil have we got here?”

He emptied the bag out on to the table, and for a moment or two the others stared silently at half a dozen objects that flashed and glittered with a thousand fires. Five of them were white; but the sixth—appreciably larger than the others, and they were the size of walnuts—was a wonderful rose pink.

“What on earth are they? Lumps of glass?”

With a hand that shook a little, Toby Sinclair picked one of them up and examined it.

“No, you fellows,” he muttered, “they’re diamonds!”

“Rot!” cried Hugh incredulously.

“They’re diamonds,” repeated Toby. “I happen to know something about precious stones. These are diamonds.”

“But they must be worth a lot,” said Phyllis, picking up the pink one.

“Worth a lot,” said Toby dazedly. “Worth a lot! Why, Mrs. Hugh, they are literally worth untold gold in the right market. They are absolutely priceless. I’ve never even thought of such stones. That one that you’re holding in your hand would be worth over a quarter of a million pounds, if you could get the right buyer.”

For a moment no one spoke; then Hugh laughed cheerily.

“Bang goes next month’s dress allowance, old thing!” He swept them all into the bag, and stood up. “I’m laying even money that the bomb-thrower is coughing some and then again over his bread-and-milk. This bag must have been in the desk.” His shoulders began to shake. “How frightfully funny!”

CHAPTER IX

In Which There Is a Stormy Supper Party at the Ritz

It was just about the time that Ginger Martin’s wife became, all unconsciously, a widow, that the sitting-room bell of a certain private suite in the Ritz was rung. The occupants of the room were two in number—a man and a woman—and they had arrived only that morning from the Continent. The man, whose signature in the register announced him to be the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor—looked a splendid specimen of the right sort of clergyman. Tall, broad-shouldered, with a pair of shrewd, kindly eyes and a great mass of snow-white hair, he was the type of man who attracted attention wherever he went, and in whatever society he found himself. A faint twang in his speech betrayed his nationality, and, indeed, he made no secret of it. He was an American born and bred, who had been seeing first hand for himself some of the dreadful horrors of the famine which was ravaging Central Europe.

And with him had gone his daughter Janet—that faithful, constant companion of his, who since her mother’s death had never left him. She was a good-looking girl, too—though perhaps unkind people might have said girlhood’s happy days had receded somewhat into the past. Thirty, perhaps—even thirty-five—though her father always alluded to her as “My little girl.”

There was something very sweet and touching about their relationship; his pride in her and her simple, loving adoration for Dad. Only that evening before dinner they had got into conversation in the lounge with a party of American globe-trotters, who had unanimously voted them quite charming.

“I feel,” had said the Reverend Theodosius, “that it is almost wicked our staying in such an hotel as this, after the dreadful things we’ve seen. How my little girl stood it at all I don’t know.” He took his daughter’s hand and patted it lovingly.

“I guess,” said Janet with her faint, sweet smile. “I guess the Dad deserves it. Why he nearly worked himself ill doing relief work and things out there in Vienna and places.”

“Is there any lack of funds, Mr. Longmoor?” asked one lady. “One feels one ought to do something to help.”

The Reverend Theodosius gave her one of his rare sweet smiles.

“There was when I left,” he murmured. “You’d never believe how money goes out there, and really the poor children have very little to show for it.”

“Too bad—too bad.” A square-jawed man who was a member of the party beckoned to a passing waiter. “Say, Mr. Longmoor, will you drink a cocktail with me? And your daughter, too?”

“It is very good of you, sir,” answered the clergyman, with a courteous bow. “My little girl has never even tasted one and I think perhaps she had better not. What do you think, my child?”

“I’d love to try. Daddy, dear,” she said coaxingly. “Do you think I might? Or would it make my head go funny?”

They all laughed.

“That settles it. Miss Longmoor,” cried the man. “I’ve ordered one for you, and if you don’t drink it your father will have to drink two.”

Undoubtedly a charming couple had been the verdict of these chance acquaintances—so simple, so fresh, so unassuming in these days of complexity and double-dealing. The only pity of it was, as the square-jawed man remarked to his wife at dinner, that the very quality of child-like simplicity which made them so charming was the one which laid them open to the most barefaced swindling if they ever came up against blackguards.

After dinner they had all drunk coffee together, and then, because his little Janet was tired, the Reverend Theodore and his daughter had retired after accepting an invitation to dinner the next day.

“Who are they?” asked Janet, as they entered their sitting-room.

“That square-jawed man is John Pendel,” answered her father, thoughtfully lighting a cigar. “Worth about three million. He’s good for dining with, though I’m not over here on any sideshows.”

And then for two hours until he got up and rang the bell, the Reverend Theodosius remained engrossed in work; while his little Janet, lying on the sofa, displayed considerably more leg than one would have expected a vicar’s daughter even to possess. And occasional gurgles of laughter seemed to prove that Guy de Maupassant appeals to a more catholic audience than he would have suspected.

She was knitting decorously when the waiter came in, and her father ordered a little supper to be sent up.

“Some chicken, please, and a little foie gras. I am expecting a friend very soon—so lay for three. Some champagne—yes. Perrier Jouet ’04 will do. I’m afraid I don’t know much about wine. And a little Vichy water for my daughter.”

The waiter withdrew, and the Reverend Theodosius chuckled.

“There’s a very good bath you can empty it down, my dear,” he said. “But I don’t think my little Janet should drink champagne so late. It might make her head go funny.”

She smiled and then grew serious.

“What time do you expect Zadowa?”

“He should have been here by now. I don’t know why he’s late.”

“Did you see him this afternoon?”

“No. I was down at the office, but only for a short while.” The sound of voices outside the door caused Janet to resume her knitting, and the next moment Count Zadowa was announced. For an appreciable time after the waiter had withdrawn he stood staring at them: then a smile crossed his face.

“Magnificent,” he murmured. “Superb. Madame, I felicitate you. Well though I know your powers, this time you have excelled yourself.”

“Cut that out, and get to business,” returned little Janet shortly, “I’m tired.”

“But should we be interrupted,” remarked the Reverend Theodosius, “we have just returned from an extensive tour in the famine-stricken area round Vienna.” The Count bowed and smiled again.

“C’est entendu,” he said quietly. “And now we will certainly get to business. For I have the most wonderful news for you, mes amis.”

A warning gesture from the girl announced the arrival of supper, and for a while the conversation turned on the rival merits of different types of soup kitchen. And it was not until the outer door finally closed behind the waiter that the Reverend Theodosius bit the end off another cigar and stared at his visitor with eyes from which every trace of kindliness had vanished.

“It’s about time you did have some good news, Zadowa,” he snapped. “Anything more damned disgraceful than the way you’ve let this so—called Black Gang do you in, I’ve never heard of.”

But the other merely smiled quietly.

“I admit it,” he murmured. “Up to date they have scored a faint measure of success—exaggerated, my friends, greatly exaggerated by the papers. Tonight came the reckoning, which incidentally is the reason why I am a little late. Tonight “—he leaned forward impressively—”the leader of the gang himself honoured me with a visit. And the leader will lead no more.”

“You killed him,” said the girl, helping herself to champagne.

“I did,” answered the Count. “And without the leader I think we can ignore the gang.”

“That’s all right as far as it goes,” said the Reverend Theodosius in a slightly mollified tone. “But have you covered all your traces? In this country the police get peevish over murder.”

The Count gave a self-satisfied smile. “Not only that,” he remarked, “but I have made it appear as if he had killed himself. Listen, my friends, and I will give you a brief statement of the events of the past few days. It was the day before the affair at Sheffield which caused such a commotion in the papers that I suddenly found out that the leader of this gang had discovered my headquarters in Hoxton. I was actually talking to that wretched man Latter in my office at the time, when I heard outside the call of an owl. Now from information I had received, that was the rallying call of their gang, and I dashed into the passage. Sure enough, standing by the door at the end was a huge man covered from head to foot in black. Whether it was bravado that made him give the cry, or whether it was a ruse to enable him to see me, is immaterial now. As I say—he is dead. But—and this is the point—it made me decide that the office there, convenient though it was, would have to be given up. There were far too many incriminating documents to allow me to run the risk of a police raid; and since I frankly admit now that I was not at all sure what were the relations between this gang and the police, I decided to move my headquarters.”

Count Zadowa helped himself to a sandwich before continuing, with a pleasant feeling that the motionless attention of the Reverend Theodosius was a compliment to his powers as a raconteur. And as the hunchback reflected complacently, there was no falling off in this story—no anticlimax.

“Tonight,” he continued, sipping his glass, “I was completing the final sorting out of my papers with my secretary, when the electric warning disc on my desk glowed red. Now the office was empty, and the red light meant that someone had opened the door outside. I heard nothing, which only made it all the more suspicious. So between us we gathered up every important paper, switched off all lights, and went out through the secret door. Then we waited.”

He turned to the clergyman, still motionless save for a ceaseless tapping of his left knee with his hand.

“As you know, monsieur,” he proceeded, “there is an opening in that door through which one can see into the room. And through that opening I watched developments. After a while a torch was switched on at the farther door, and I heard voices. And then the man holding the torch came cautiously in. He was turning it into every corner, but finally he focused it on the desk. I heard him speak to one of his companions, who came into the beam of light and started to pick the lock. And it was then that I switched on every light, and closed the door electrically. They were caught—caught like rats in a trap.”

The hunchback paused dramatically, and drained his champagne. If he was expecting any laudatory remarks on the part of his audience he was disappointed. But the Reverend Theodosius and his little Janet might have been carved out of marble, save for that ceaseless tapping by the man of his left knee. In fact, had Count Zadowa been less pleased with himself and less sure of the effect he was about to cause he might have had a premonition of coming danger. There was something almost terrifying in the big clergyman’s immobility.

“Like rats in a trap,” repeated the hunchback gloatingly. “Two men I didn’t know, and—well, you know who the other was. True he had his mask on by way of disguise, but I recognised him at once. That huge figure couldn’t be mistaken—it was the leader of the Black Gang himself.”

“And what did you do, Zadowa?” The Reverend Theodosius’s voice was very soft. “How did you dispose of one or all those men so that no suspicion is likely to rest on you?”

The hunchback rubbed his hands together gleefully.

“By an act which, I think you will agree, is very nearly worthy of yourself, monsieur. To shoot was impossible—because I am not sufficiently expert with a revolver to be sure of killing them. No—nothing so ordinary as that. They saw me watching them: ‘I can see his eyes, Hugh,’ said one of them to the leader, and I remember suddenly that in the passage not far from where I stood were half a dozen bombs—What is it, monsieur?”

He paused in alarm at the look on the clergyman’s face as he slowly rose.

“Bombs!” he snarled. “Bombs! Tell me what you did, you dreg!”

“Why,” stammered the frightened hunchback, “I threw one into the room. I no longer wanted it as an office, and…Ah, heaven, don’t murder me!…What have I done?”

His words died away in a dreadful gurgle, as the clergyman, his face diabolical with fury, sprang on him and gripped him by the throat. He shook the hunchback as a terrier shakes a rat, cursing horribly under his breath—and for a moment or two it seemed as if the other’s fear was justified. There was murder in the big man’s face, until the touch of the girl’s hand on his arm steadied him and brought him to his senses. With a last spasm of fury he hurled the wretched Zadowa into a corner, and left him lying there; then his iron self-control came back to him.

“Get up,” he ordered tensely, “and answer some questions.”

Trembling all over, the hunchback staggered to his feet, and came into the centre of the room. “Monsieur,” he whined, “I do not understand. What have I done?”

“You don’t need to understand!” snarled the clergyman. “Tell me exactly what happened when the bomb burst.”

“It killed the three men, monsieur,” stammered the other.

“Curse the three men!” He lifted his clenched fist, and Zadowa shrank back. “What happened to the room?”

“It was wrecked utterly. A great hole was blown in the wall.”

“And what happened to the desk?”

“I don’t know exactly, monsieur,” stammered the other. “I didn’t go back to see. But it must have been blown to matchwood. Only as there was nothing inside of importance it makes no odds.”

“Did you look in the secret drawer at the back of the centre opening? You didn’t know there was one, did you? Only I knew of its existence, and short of taking the desk to pieces no one would be able to find it. And you took the desk to pieces, Zadowa, didn’t you? You blew it to pieces, Zadowa, didn’t you? Just to kill the leader of this trumpery gang, Zadowa, you cursed fool!”

Step by step the hunchback was retreating before the other, terror convulsing his face, until the wall brought him to an abrupt stop.

“You blew the desk to pieces, Zadowa,” continued the Reverend Theodosius, standing in front of him, “a desk that contained the six most perfect diamonds in the world, Zadowa. With your wretched bomb, you worm, you destroyed a fortune. What have you got to say?”

“I didn’t know, monsieur,” cringed the other. “How could I know? When were they put there?”

“I put them there this afternoon for safety. Not in my wildest imagination did I dream that you would start throwing bombs about the place.”

“Perhaps they are not destroyed,” stammered the hunchback hopefully.

“In which case they are now in the hands of the police. You have one chance, Zadowa, and only one. It is that those diamonds are in the hands of the police. If they are and you can get them—I will say no more.”

“But if they have been destroyed, monsieur?” muttered the other.

“Then, Zadowa, I am afraid you will share their fate.”

Almost indifferently the clergyman turned back into the room, taking no notice whatever of the wretched man who followed him on his knees begging for mercy. And then after a while the hunchback pulled himself together and stood up.

“It was a mistake, monsieur,” he said quietly, “which I deeply regret. It was, however, you must admit, hardly my fault. I will do my best.”

“Let us hope, then, for your sake, Zadowa, that your best will be successful. Now go.”

He pointed to the door, and without another word the hunchback went.

“I’m glad you were here tonight, my dear,” remarked the Reverend Theodosius. “I don’t often lose my temper, but I very nearly killed that man this evening.” The girl rose and came over to where he was standing.

“I don’t understand, mon cheri,” she said quietly. “What diamonds are these you talk about?”

The man gave a short, hard laugh.

“I didn’t tell you,” he answered. “There was no object in your knowing for a time. I know your weakness where jewels are concerned too well, my dear; I got them the night before last in Amsterdam. Do you remember that Russian—Stanovitch? That wasn’t his real name. He was the eldest son of the Grand Duke Georgius, and he had just arrived from Russia.”

“The man who took that overdose of his sleeping-draught?” whispered the girl barely above her breath.

The Reverend Theodosius smiled grimly.

“So they decided,” he remarked. “He confided in me the night before he came to his sad end what he had been doing in Russia. His father had hidden the family heirlooms from the Bolshevists, and our young friend went over to retrieve them. Most ingenious—the way he got them out of Russia. Such a pity he had a lapse with his sleep dope.”

And now the Reverend Theodosius was snarling like a mad dog.

“By heavens, girl—do you wonder that I nearly killed that fool Zadowa? The coup of a lifetime—safely brought off. Not a trace of suspicion on me—not a trace. I know I said I wasn’t over here on side-shows, but I couldn’t have been expected to let such a chance slip by. And then, after having got them safely into his country to lose them like that. Why, do you know that one of them was the rose diamond of the Russian Crown jewels?”

The girl’s eyes glistened, then she shrugged her shoulders.

“They would have been unsaleable, mon ami,” she said quietly.

“Don’t you believe it,” snapped the other. “There are markets for anything in the world, if one takes the trouble to look for them.”

He was pacing up and down the room, and for a while she stood watching him in silence.

“I’m glad I didn’t know about them till now,” she said at length. “I might not have stopped you killing him, if I had. And it would have been rather awkward.”

He gave a short laugh, and threw the end of his cigar into the grate.

“No good crying over spilt milk, my dear. Let’s go to bed.”

But little Janet still stood by the table watching him thoughtfully.

“What are you thinking about?”

“I was thinking about a rather peculiar coincidence,” she answered quietly. “You were too worried over the diamonds to notice it—but it struck me instantly. The leader of this gang—this huge man whom Zadowa killed tonight. Did you notice what his Christian name was?”

The Reverend Theodosius shook his head.

“It was Hugh—Zadowa heard one of the others call him by name. Hugh, mon ami; Hugh—and a huge man. A coincidence, I think.”

The man gave a short laugh. “A very long one, my dear. Too long to bother about.”

“It would be a pity if he was dead,” she went on thoughtfully. “I would have liked to see my Hugh Drummond again.”

“If he has been killed, if your supposition is correct,” returned the man, “it will do something towards reconciling me to the loss of the diamonds. But I don’t think it’s likely. And incidentally he is the only side-show I am going to allow myself during this trip.”

Little Janet laughed softly.

“I wonder,” she said, “I wonder. Let us, as you say, go to bed.”

CHAPTER X

In Which Hugh Drummond Makes A Discovery

The prospect in front of Count Zadowa alias Mr. Atkinson was not a very alluring one, and the more he thought about it the less he liked it. Either the diamonds were blown to dust, or they were in the hands of the authorities. In the first event he had the Reverend Theodosius to reckon with; in the second the police. And for preference the police won in a canter.

He was under no delusions was the hunchback. This mysterious man who signed all his communications by the enigmatic letter X, and whose real appearance was known probably only to the girl who was his constant companion, so wonderful and varied were his disguises, was not a person whom it paid to have any delusions about He paid magnificently, even lavishly, for work well done: for failure he took no excuse. Even long association did not mitigate the offence. With a shudder Count Zadowa remembered the fate of certain men he had known in the past, men who had been employed, even as he was now employed, on one of the innumerable schemes of their chief. No project, from the restoration of a monarchy to the downfall of a business combine, was too great for the man who now called himself the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor. All that mattered was that there should be money in it. Why he should be interesting himself in the spread of Communism in England it was not for Count Zadowa to inquire, even though he was the head of that particular activity. Presumably he was being paid for it by others; it was no business of Count Zadowa’s.

And as he undressed that night in the quiet hotel in Bloomsbury where he lived the hunchback cursed bitterly under his breath. It was such a cruel stroke of luck. How much he had dreaded that first interview with his chief he had hardly admitted even to himself. And then had come the heaven-sent opportunity of killing the leader of the Black Gang in perfect safety; of making it appear that the three men inside the room, and who had no business to be inside the room, had blown themselves up by mistake. How was he to know about the diamonds: how could he possibly be expected to know? And once again he cursed, while the sweat glistened on his forehead as he realised his predicament.

He had already decided that his only method lay in going down to the office next morning as usual. He would find it, of course, in the possession of the police, and would be told what had happened. And then he would have to trust to luck to discover what he could. Perhaps—and at the thought of it he almost started to dress again—perhaps the desk was not utterly ruined. Perhaps the diamonds were there, even now, in the secret drawer. And then he realised that if he went to his office at two o’clock in the morning, it must look suspicious. No; waiting was the only possibility, and Count Zadowa waited. He even went so far as to get into bed, but Count Zadowa did not sleep.

Punctually at half-past nine the next morning he arrived at 5, Green Street. As he had expected, a constable was standing at the door.

“Who are you, sir?” The policeman was barring his entrance.

“My name is Atkinson,” said the Count, with well-feigned surprise. “May I ask what you’re doing here?”

“Haven’t you heard, sir?” said the constable. “There was a bomb outrage here last night. In your office upstairs.”

“A bomb outrage?” Mr. Atkinson gazed at the constable in amazement, and a loafer standing by began to laugh.

“Not ’arf, guv’nor,” he remarked cheerfully. “The ’ole ruddy place is gone to blazes.”

“You dry up,” admonished the policeman. “Move along, can’t you?”

“Orl rite, orl rite,” grumbled the other, shambling off. “Not allowed to live soon, we won’t be.”

“You’d better go up, sir,” continued the constable. “The Inspector is upstairs.”

Mr. Atkinson needed no second invitation. Taking no notice of the half-dozen clerks who had gathered in a little group discussing the affair, he passed along the passage into his own room. And the scene that met his eyes reflected credit on the manufacturer of the bomb. Viewed by the light of day which came streaming in through the great hole in the wall the ruin was complete. In the centre—and it was there Mr. Atkinson’s eyes strayed continuously even while he was acknowledging the greetings of the Inspector—stood the remnants of the desk. And as he looked at it any faint hope he may have cherished vanished completely. It was literally split to pieces in every direction; there was not left a hiding-place for a pea, much less a bag of diamonds.

“Not much in the office, sir, which was lucky for you.”

The Inspector was speaking and Mr. Atkinson pulled himself together. He had a part to play, and whatever happened no suspicions must be aroused.

“I feel quite staggered, Inspector.” His glance travelled to a sinister-looking heap in the corner—a heap roughly covered with an old rug. The wall above it was stained a dull red, and from under the rug stretched out two long streams of the same colour—streams which were not yet dry.

“What on earth has happened?”

“There seems very little doubt about that, sir,” remarked the Inspector. “I have reconstructed the whole thing with the help of your clerk here, Mr. Cohen. It appears that last night about twelve o’clock three men entered your office downstairs. They bound and gagged Cohen—and then they came on up here. Evidently their idea was burglary. What happened, then, of course, it is hard to say exactly. Presumably they started using explosive to force your safe, and explosive is funny stuff even for the expert.”

The Inspector waved a hand at the heap in the corner.

“And he—poor devil, was quite an expert in his way. One of the three men, Mr. Atkinson—or what’s left of him. Ginger Martin—an old friend of mine.”

For a moment Mr. Atkinson’s heart stood still. One of the three men! Then, where in Heaven’s name, were the other two?

“One of the three. Inspector,” he said at length, steadying his voice. “But what happened to the others?”

“That is the amazing thing, sir,” answered the Inspector. “I can but think that though three men entered the office downstairs, only Martin can have been in here at the time of the explosion.” He pulled back the bloodstained rug, and with a shudder Mr. Atkinson contemplated what was underneath. He recognised the face, sure enough it was the man who had run round the room when he found himself trapped. But there was no trace of anyone else. The mangled remnants had formed one man and one man only. Then what, he reflected again—what had become of the other two? He knew they had been in there at the time of the explosion, and as he vaguely listened to the Inspector’s voice his mind was busy with this new development.

They had been in there—the leader of the Black Gang and one of his pals. There was no trace of them now. Wherefore, somehow, by some miraculous means they must have escaped, and the soul of Count Zadowa grew sick within him. Not only had the whole thing been useless and unnecessary, not only had he incurred the wrath of his own leader, and unwelcome attention from the police, but, in addition, this mysterious being whom he had thought to kill was not dead but very much alive. He had two people up against him now, and he wasn’t quite sure which of the two he feared most.

Suddenly he became aware that the Inspector was asking him a question.

“Why, yes,” he said, pulling himself together, “that is so. I was leaving this office here, and had removed almost everything of value. Only some diamonds were left. Inspector—and they were in that desk. I have somewhat extensive dealings in precious stones. Was there any trace of them found?”

The Inspector laughed grimly. “You see the room for yourself, sir. But that perhaps supplies us with the motive for the crime. I am afraid your diamonds are either blown to pieces, or in the hands of the other two men, whom I have every hope of laying my hands on shortly. There is no trace of them here.”

In the hands of the other two men! The idea was a new one which had not yet come into his calculations, so convinced had he been that all three men were dead. And suddenly he felt a sort of blinding certainty that the Inspector—though in ignorance of the real facts of the case—was right in his surmise. Diamonds are not blown to pieces by an explosion; scattered they might be—disintegrated, no. He felt he must get away to consider this new development. Where did he stand if the diamonds were indeed in the possession of the Black Gang? Would it help him or would it not, with regard to that implacable man at the Ritz?

He crossed over to the jagged hole in the wall and looked out.

“This has rather upset me. Inspector,” he said, after a while. “The South Surrey Hotel in Bloomsbury will always find me.”

“Right, sir!” The Inspector made a note, and then leaned out through the hole, with a frown. “Get out of this, you there! Go on, or I’ll have you locked up as a vagrant!”

“Orl rite, orl rite! Can’t a bloke ’ave a bit o’ fun when ’e ain’t doing no ’arm?”

The loafer, who had been ignominiously moved on from the front door, scrambled down from the lean-to roof behind, and slouched away, muttering darkly. And he was still muttering to himself as he opened the door of a taxi a few minutes later, into which Mr. Atkinson hurried stepped. For a moment or two he stood on the pavement until it had disappeared from view; then his prowling propensities seemed to disappear as if by magic. Still with the same shambling gait, but apparently now with some definite object in his mind, he disappeared down a side street, finally coming to a halt before a public telephone-box. He gave one rapid look round, then he stepped inside.

“Mayfair 12345.” He waited, beating a tattoo with his pennies on the box. Things had gone well that morning—very well.

“Hullo, is that you, Hugh? Yes, Peter speaking. The man Atkinson is the hunchback. Stopping South Surrey Hotel, Bloomsbury. He’s just got into a taxi and gone off to the Ritz. He seemed peeved to me…Yes, he inquired lovingly about the whatnots…What’s that? You’ll toddle round to the Ritz yourself. Right ho! I’ll come, too. Cocktail time. Give you full details then.”

The loafer stepped out of the box and shut the door. Then, still sucking a filthy clay pipe, he shambled off in the direction of the nearest Tube station. A slight change of attire before lining up at the Ritz seemed indicated.

And it would, indeed, have been a shrewd observer who would have identified the immaculately-dressed young gentleman who strolled into the Ritz shortly before twelve o’clock with the dissolute-looking object who had so aroused the wrath of the police a few hours previously in Hoxton. The first person he saw sprawling contentedly in an easy chair was Hugh Drummond, who waved his stick in greeting.

“Draw up, Peter, old lad,” he boomed, “and put your nose inside a wet.”

Peter Darrell took the next chair, and his eyes glanced quickly round the lounge.

“Have you seen him, Hugh?” he said, lowering his voice. “I don’t see anything answering to the bird growing about the place here.”

“No,” answered Hugh. “But from discreet inquiries made from old pimply-face yonder I find that he arrived here about ten o’clock. He was at once shown up to the rooms of a gent calling himself the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor, where, as far as I can make out, he has remained ever since. Anyway, I haven’t seen him trotting up and down the hall, calling to his young; nor have either of the beadles at the door reported his departure. So here I remain like a bird in the wilderness until the blighter and his padre pal break cover. I want to see the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor, Peter.”

A ball of wool rolled to his feet, and Hugh stooped to pick it up. The owner was a girl sitting close by, busily engaged in knitting some obscure garment, and Hugh handed her the wool with a bow.

“Thank you so much!” she said, with a pleasant smile. “I’m afraid I’m always dropping my wool all over the place.”

“Don’t mention it,” remarked Hugh politely. “Deuced agile little thing—a ball of wool. Spend my life picking up my wife’s. Everybody seems to be knitting these jumper effects now.”

“Oh, this isn’t a jumper,” answered the girl a little sadly. “I’ve no time for such frivolities as that. You see, I’ve just come back from the famine stricken parts of Austria—and not only are the poor things hungry, but they can’t get proper clothes. So just a few of us are knitting things for them—stock sizes, you know—big, medium, and small.”

“How fearfully jolly of you!” said Hugh admiringly. “Dashed sporting thing to do. Awful affair, though, when the small size shrinks in the wash. The proud proprietor will burst out in all directions. Most disconcerting for all concerned.”

The girl blushed faintly and Hugh subsided abashed in his chair.

“I must tell my wife about it,” he murmured in confusion. “She’s coming here to lunch, and she ought to turn ’em out like bullets from a machine-gun—what?”

The girl smiled faintly as she rose.

“It would be very good of her if she would help,” she remarked gently, and then, with a slight bow, she walked away in the direction of the lift.

“You know, old son,” remarked Hugh, as he watched her disappearing, “it’s an amazing affair when you really come to think of it. There’s that girl with a face far superior to a patched boot and positively oozing virtue from every pore. And yet, would you leave your happy home for her? Look at her skirts—five inches too long; and yet she’d make a man an excellent wife. A heart of gold probably, hidden beneath innumerable strata of multi-coloured wools.”

Completely exhausted he drained his cocktail, and leaned back in his chair, while Peter digested the profound utterance in silence. A slight feeling of lassitude was beginning to weigh on him owing to the atrocious hour at which he had been compelled to rise, and he felt quite unable to contribute any suitable addition to the conversation. Not that it was required: the ferocious frown on Drummond’s face indicated that he was in the throes of thought and might be expected to give tongue in the near future.

“I ought to have a bit of paper to write it all down on, Peter,” he remarked at length. “I was getting it fairly clear when that sweet maiden put me completely in the soup again. In fact, I was just going to run over the whole affair with you when I had to start chasing wool all over London. Where are we, Peter? That is the question. Point one: we have the diamonds—more by luck than good management. Point two: the hunchback gentleman who has a sufficiently strong constitution to live at the South Surrey Hotel in Bloomsbury has not got the diamonds. Point three: he, at the present moment, is closeted with the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor upstairs. Point four: we are about to consume another cocktail downstairs. Well—bearing that little lot in mind, what happens when we all meet?”

“Yes, what!” said Peter, coming out of a short sleep.

“A policy of masterly inactivity seems indicated,” continued Hugh thoughtfully. “We may even have to see them eat. But I can’t buttonhole Snooks, or whatever the blighter’s name is, and ask him if he bunged a bomb at me last night, can I? It would be so deuced awkward if he hadn’t. As I said before, a brief survey of the devil-dodger’s face might help. And, on the other hand, it might not. In fact, it is all very obscure, Peter—very obscure.”

A slight snore was his only answer, and Hugh continued to ponder on the obscurity of the situation in silence. That several rays of light might have been thrown on it by a conversation then proceeding upstairs was of no help to him: nor could he have been expected to know that the fog of war was about to lift in a most unpleasantly drastic manner.

“Coincidence? Bosh!” the girl with the heart of gold was remarking at that very moment. “It’s a certainty. Whether he’s got the diamonds or not, I can’t say, but your big friend of last night Zadowa, is sitting downstairs now drinking a cocktail in the lounge.

“And your big friend of last night is a gentleman with whom he and I “—she smiled thoughtfully at the Reverend Theodosius—”have a little account to settle.”

“My account is not a little one,” said the hunchback viciously.

“Amazing though it is, it certainly looks as if you were right, my dear,” answered her father thoughtfully.

“Of course I’m right!” cried the girl. “Why, the darned thing is sticking out and barking at you. A big man, Christian name Hugh, was in Zadowa’s office last night. Hugh Drummond is downstairs at the moment, having actually tracked Zadowa here. Of course, they’re the same; an infant in arms could see it.”

“Granted you’re right,” said the Reverend Theodosius, “I confess at the moment that I am a little doubtful as to how to turn the fact to our advantage. The fact is an interesting one, my dear, more than interesting; but it don’t seem to me to come within the range of practical politics just at present.”

“I wonder,” said the girl. “His wife is coming here to lunch. You remember her—that silly little fool Phyllis Benton? And they live in Brook Street. It might be worth trying. If by any chance he has got the diamonds—well, she’ll be very useful. And if he hasn’t “—she shrugged her shoulders—”we can easily return her if we don’t want her.”

The Reverend Theodosius smiled. Long-winded explanations between the two of them were seldom necessary. Then he looked at his watch.

“Short notice,” he remarked; “but we’ll try. No harm done if we fail.”

He stepped over to the telephone, and put through a call. And having given two or three curt orders he came slowly back into the room.

“Chances of success very small, I’m afraid; but as you say, my dear, worth trying. And now I think I’ll renew my acquaintance with Drummond. It would be wiser if you had your lunch sent up here, Janet; just for the time our friend had better not connect us together in any way. And as for you, Zadowa “—his tone became curt—”you can go. Let us hope for your sake that Drummond has really got them.”

“There’s only one point,” put in the girl; “his departure will be reported at once to Drummond. He’s tipped both the men at the doors.”

“Then in that case you’d better stop here,” said the Reverend Theodosius. “I shall probably come up to lunch, but I might have it in the restaurant. I might “—he paused by the door—”I might even have it with Drummond and his friend.”

With a short chuckle he left the room, and a minute or two later a benevolent clergyman, reading the Church Times, was sitting in the lounge just opposite Hugh and Peter. Through half-closed eyes Hugh took stock of him, wondering casually if this was the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor. If so, assuredly nothing more benevolent in the line of sky-pilots could be well imagined. And when a few minutes later the clergyman took a cigarette out of his case, and then commenced to fumble in his pockets for matches which he had evidently forgotten, Hugh rose and offered him one.

“Allow me, sir,” he murmured, holding it out.

“I thank you, sir,” said the clergyman, with a charming smile. “I’m so terribly forgetful over matches. As a matter of fact I don’t generally smoke before lunch, but I’ve had such a distressing morning that I felt I must have a cigarette just to soothe my nerves.”

“By Jove! that’s bad,” remarked Hugh. “Bath water cold, and all that?”

“Nothing so trivial, I fear,” said the other. “No; a poor man who has been with me since ten has just suffered the most terrible blow. I could hardly have believed it possible here in London, but the whole of his business premises were wrecked by a bomb last night.”

“You don’t say so,” murmured Hugh, sinking into a chair, and at the table opposite Peter Darrell opened one eye.

“All his papers—everything—gone. And it has hit me, too. Quite a respectable little sum of money—over a hundred pounds, gathered together for the restoration of the old oak chancel in my church—blown to pieces by this unknown miscreant. It’s hard, sir, it’s hard. But this poor fellow’s loss is greater than mine, so I must not complain. To the best of my poor ability I have been helping him to bear his misfortune with fortitude and strength.”

The clergyman took off his spectacles and wiped them, and Drummond stole a lightning glance at Darrell. The faintest shrug of his shoulders indicated that the latter had heard, and was as much in the dark as Hugh. That this was the Reverend Theodosius Longmoor was now obvious, but what a charming, courteous old gentleman! It seemed impossible to associate guilt with such a delightful person, and, if so, they had made a bad mistake. It was not the hunchback who had thrown the bomb; they were up another blind alley.

For a while Hugh chatted with him about the outrage, then he glanced at his watch.

“Nearly time for lunch, I think,” said the clergyman. “Perhaps you would give a lonely old man the pleasure of your company.”

“Very nice of you, but I’m expecting my wife,” said Hugh. “She said she’d be here at one, and now it’s a quarter past. Perhaps you’ll lunch with us?”

“Charmed,” said the clergyman, taking a note which a pageboy was handing to him on a tray. “Charmed.” He glanced through the note and placed it in his pocket. “The ladies, bless them! so often keep us waiting.”

“I’ll just go and ring up,” said Drummond. “She may have changed her mind.”

“Another prerogative of their sex,” beamed his companion, as Drummond left him. He polished his spectacles and once more resumed his perusal of the Church Times, bowing in old-world fashion to two or three acquaintances who passed. And more and more was Peter Darrell becoming convinced that a big mistake had been made somewhere, when Hugh returned looking a little worried.

“Can’t make it out, Peter,” he said anxiously. “Just got through to Denny, and Phyllis left half an hour ago to come here.”

“Probably doing a bit of shopping, old man,” answered Peter reassuringly. “I say, Hugh, we’ve bloomered over this show.”

Hugh glanced across at the table where the clergyman was sitting, and suddenly Peter found his arm gripped with a force that made him cry out. He glanced at Hugh, and that worthy was staring at the clergyman with a look of speechless amazement on his face. Then he swung round, and his eyes were blazing.

“Peter!” he said tensely. “Look at him. The one trick that gives him away every time! Bloomered, have we? Great heavens above, man, it’s Carl Peterson!”

A little dazedly Darrell glanced at the clergyman. He was still reading the Church Times, but with his left hand he was drumming a ceaseless tattoo on his knee.