Читать книгу Cleek of Scotland Yard: Detective Stories - Thomas W. Hanshew - Страница 6

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At ten to the tick on the following night, he had said, and at ten to the tick he was there—the old red limousine whirling him up to the door in company with Mr. Narkom, there to be admitted by Miss Valmond’s brother.

“My dear Mr. Headland, I have been on thorns ever since I heard,” said he. “I hope and pray it is right, this assistance we are giving. But tell me, please—have you succeeded in your plans? Are you sure they will not fail?”

“To both questions, yes, Mr. Valmond. We’ll have our man to-night. Now, if you please, where is your sister?”

“Upstairs—in her own room—with my mother. We tried to get the mater to bed, but she is very fractious to-night and will not let Rose out of her sight for a single instant. But she will not hamper your plans, I’m sure. Come quickly, please—this way.” Here he led them on and up until they stood in Miss Valmond’s bedroom and in Miss Valmond’s presence again. She was there by the window, her imbecile mother sitting at her feet with her face in her daughter’s lap, that daughter’s solicitous hand gently stroking her tumbled hair, and no light but that of the moon through the broad window illuminating the hushed and stately room.

“I keep my word, you see, Miss Valmond,” said Cleek, as he entered. “And in five minutes’ time if you watch from that window you all shall see a thing that will amaze you.”

“You have run the wretched man down, then, Mr. Headland?”

“Yes—to the last ditch, to the wall itself,” he answered, making room for her brother to get by him and make a place for himself at the window. “Oh, it’s a pretty little game he’s been playing, that gentleman, and it dates back twenty years ago when he was kicked out of his regiment in Ceylon.”

“In Ceylon! I—er—God bless my soul, was he ever in Ceylon, Mr. Headland?”

“Yes, Mr. Valmond, he was. It was at a time when there was what you might call a sapphire fever raging there, and precious stones were being unearthed in every unheard-of quarter. He got the fever with the rest, but he hadn’t much money, so when he fell in with a lot of fellows who had heard of a Cingalese, one Bareva Singh, who had a reef to sell in the Saffragam district, they made a pool between them and bought the blessed thing, calling it after the man they had purchased it from, the Bareva Reef, setting out like a party of donkeys to mine it for themselves, and expecting to pull out sapphires by the bucketful.”

“Dear me, dear me, how very extraordinary! Of course they didn’t? Or—did they?”

“No, they didn’t. A month’s work convinced them that the ground was as empty of treasure as an eggshell, so they abandoned it, separated, and went their several ways. A few months ago, however, it was discovered that if they had had the implements to mine deeper, their dream would have been realized, for the reef was a perfect bed of sapphires—and eight men held an equal share in it. The scheme, then, was to get rid of these men, secretly, one by one; for one—perhaps two men—to get the deeds held by the others; to pretend that they had been purchased from the original owners, and to prevent by murder those original owners from——”