Kitabı oku: «The Place of Dragons: A Mystery», sayfa 7

CHAPTER XIII
RELATES A STRANGE STORY

I stood before Lola, grieved at her distress.

Too well I knew, alas! how deeply she had suffered, of all the bitterness and remorse with which her young life was filled, blighted by an ever-present terror, her youth sapped and her ideas warped by living in an atmosphere of criminality.

Rapidly, as I took her little hands in unspoken sympathy, recollections of our strangely-made acquaintanceship ran through my memory, and before me arose a truly dramatic and impressive scene.

I had first seen Lola, two years before, seated alone at luncheon in the pretty salle-à-manger of the Hôtel d'Angleterre in Copenhagen. Many eyes were upon her because of her youth and beauty, and many men sitting at the various tables cast admiring glances at her.

I was with my friend, Jack Bellairs, and we were breaking our journey for a few days in the Danish capital, before going up to Norway salmon-fishing.

Jack first noted her, and drew my attention to the fact that she was alone. At the time, I knew nothing of the two men who were lunching together at another table at the further end of the room, and that the name of one of them was Jules Jeanjean.

The girl, we discovered from the concierge, had been living alone in the hotel for a month, and had become on very friendly terms with a certain very wealthy Hungarian lady, the Baroness Függer, of Budapest. She accompanied the Baroness everywhere, but the reason she was lunching alone that morning was because the Baroness was absent for the day at Elsinore.

During the next day or two we saw the stately old lady, whose chief delight seemed to be the ostentatious display of jewellery, constantly in Lola's company. The girl, though admired everywhere, treated all the men about her with utter unconcern, being most modest and reserved.

On the fourth morning of our stay, at about ten o'clock, the hotel was thrown into the greatest commotion by an amazing report that the Baroness's bedroom had been entered during the night and the whole contents of her jewel-case stolen. The police were at once called, and were mystified by the fact that the Baroness had locked her door before retiring, and that it was still locked when she awoke in the morning. Therefore, it seemed that the jewels had been abstracted immediately before she had entered the room on the previous night – stolen by some one well acquainted with their hiding-place – for the jewel-case was kept for safety at the bottom of a trunk full of soiled linen.

Naturally the police inquired if any of the visitors had left the hotel since the previous night, but no person had left. All the visitors who had been in the hotel the previous day at noon were still there. The night-porter had not noticed anything suspicious, and nobody had heard any unusual sound during the night.

All of us in the hotel were closely interrogated, including Lola, who preserved an air of deepest regret that her dear friend, the Baroness, should have been so ingeniously robbed. Indeed, it was during that interrogation that I had first exchanged words with her.

"I can't understand it," she had declared to me in French. "I was in the Baroness's room until she returned at a quarter to twelve, and I am quite sure the jewels were there because, when she took off her diamond necklet, I got out the case, and placed it with the other jewels."

"The case might then have been already empty," said the Commissary of Police, who was making the investigation.

"It might have been, of course," replied the girl. "But the diamond necklet is no longer there!"

Well, to go into the whole details of the inquiry is unnecessary. Suffice it to say that, though the police searched everywhere, and the Baroness indignantly invoked the aid of her Legation, nothing was ever recovered, and at last I departed for Norway, leaving the Baroness still enjoying the bright companionship of the young and pretty Lola.

The two sedate visitors, one of whom I knew later on as Jules Jeanjean, also remained idling their days in the pleasant city, awaiting the conclusion of a business deal, but, of course, holding no communication with the fair-haired young girl.

After that, quite a year passed, and I found myself, in the course of my erratic wanderings, guest of Lord Bracondale at a shooting-party at Balmaclellan Castle, up in Kirkcudbrightshire – in that wild, lonely, heather-clad land which lies between New Galloway and the Solway Firth.

As is well known, the Earl and Countess of Bracondale surround themselves with a very smart set, and the party in question was a big one. Indeed, most of the rooms in the historic Scottish Castle were occupied, and while there was good sport by day, there was at night much dancing in the fine old ball-room, and much bridge-playing.

In the midst of all the gaiety came the County Ball at Dumfries, to which the whole party went over, the ladies eclipsing each other with their jewels, as the function is always one of the smartest in Scotland.

My room at the castle, a big oak-panelled one, was in the east wing, at the top of a steep flight of spiral stairs set in a corner tower, and on the night following that of the ball, at about half-past two in the morning, I awoke, and lay thinking, when I fancied I heard somebody moving about, outside my door.

I strained my ears to listen.

The room next mine, further along the corridor, was occupied by a Mrs. Forbes Wilson, the widow of the well-known American millionaire, while further beyond slept Lady Oxborough, and beyond these were several other visitors' rooms.

I suppose I must have listened for nearly a quarter of an hour, drowsily wondering who could be on the move, when suddenly I was thoroughly roused by hearing a sharp click. The door of the room adjoining mine had been closed!

This struck me as distinctly curious, because, only at six o'clock the previous evening, Mrs. Forbes Wilson had been called away suddenly to the bedside of her little daughter, who had been taken ill at Wigton, where she was stopping with friends. The widow had taken her maid with her, and left very hurriedly, leaving her luggage behind, and promising to return next day if there was nothing seriously wrong with her child.

Some one was moving about in her room!

I lay there wondering. But as the minutes passed, and I heard no further sound, I began to believe that my imagination had deceived me. I had almost dozed off to sleep again when suddenly a brilliant ray of electricity shot across my room – the light of a small electric torch – and I was immediately aware that my own door had been opened noiselessly, and an intruder had entered.

Quick as thought I sprang out of bed in my pyjamas, but, as I did so, I heard a woman's light scream, while the torch was instantly extinguished.

I was at the door, behind the intruder, and when, next moment, I switched on the light, to my astonishment I found myself confronted with Lola Sorel!

"You!" I gasped, as the girl shrank from me against the wall, her face white as death. "You – Mademoiselle! What is the meaning of this visit – eh?"

"Will you – will you close the door, M'sieur?" she begged in a low whisper, in broken English. "Some one may overhear."

I did as she bade, and slipped on my dressing-gown, which was hanging over the foot-rail of the bed.

"Well?" I asked, with a good deal of severity, for I saw by her manner that she was there for some nefarious purpose. She was dressed in plain black, with a neat little velvet cap, and wore slippers with rubber soles. Her hands were covered with india-rubber gloves, such as surgeons often wear when operating or making post-mortem examinations. Her electric torch was attached to her wrist, while, beneath her dark golf-coat, which fell open, I saw that she wore around her waist a capacious bag of black silk.

"I – I never dreamed that this was your room, M'sieur," the girl declared, terrified. "I – I – "

But she did not conclude her sentence, for she realized how completely she had been trapped. Her pretty countenance betrayed terror in every line, her eyes were staring and haggard, and her hands were trembling.

"I – I – know there is no escape," she said with her pleasing French accent. "You are aware of the truth, M'sieur – of what occurred in Copenhagen. Ah, yes. It is Fate that you and I should again meet – and in these circumstances."

"Please be seated, Mademoiselle," I said. "You have no cause for alarm. Naturally, this encounter has upset you."

I feared that she might faint, therefore I went to the table where, on the previous night, the valet had placed some brandy and a siphon of soda. Mixing a little, I gave it to her to drink.

"This will do you good," I said.

Then, when she had swallowed it, I asked her to explain the reason of her nocturnal visit to the castle.

She looked a pale, pathetic little figure, seated there before me, her fair head bowed with shame and confusion, her terrified eyes staring into space.

"I – I – am entirely in your hands, M'sieur," she stammered at last. "I came here to thieve, because – because I am forced to do so. It was work of peril for all three of us – for me most of all. This room was the last I intended to visit – and in it I found the very last person I wished to meet – you!"

"Tell me more about yourself," I urged. "I'm greatly interested."

"What is there to tell you?" she cried, her eyes filling with bitter tears. "I am a thief – that's all. You are a guest here – and it is your duty to your host to keep me here, and call the police. Jules was watching on the stairs below. By this time he knows you have trapped me, and they have both escaped – without a doubt – escaped with the stuff I handed to them ten minutes ago."

"Jules? Who is he?" I asked quickly.

"Jules Jeanjean – my uncle," she replied.

"Jules Jeanjean!" I ejaculated, "that man!" for the name was synonymous for all that was audacious and criminal.

"Yes, M'sieur."

"And he is your uncle?"

"Yes. At his instigation I am forced to do these things against my will," she declared in a hard, bitter voice. "Ah, if only you knew – if you knew everything, M'sieur, I believe you would have pity and compassion for me – you would allow me one more chance – a chance to escape – a chance to try once more to break away from these hateful men who hold me in the hollow of their hands!"

She spoke so fervently, so earnestly, that her appeal sank deeply into my heart. By her despairing manner I saw that she hoped for no clemency, for no sympathy, especially from me, who had actually been suspected of the robbery in Copenhagen which she and her confederates had committed.

"What have you in that bag?" I asked, indicating the black silk bag beneath her coat.

She placed her small hand into it and slowly and shamefacedly drew forth a splendid collar of large pearls.

"I took it from the next room," she said briefly. "I will replace it if – if only you would allow me to get away," she added wistfully.

"And the other stuff you have stolen?"

"Ah! My uncle has it. He has already gone – carrying it with him!"

"Deserted you – and left you to your fate – as soon as he realized the danger," I remarked. "The coward!"

"Yes. But it was fortunate that you did not come out of this room – upon the stairs," she said.

"Why?"

"Because he would have killed you with as little compunction as he would kill a fly," she replied slowly.

"I quite believe that. His reputation is known all over Europe," I said. "Mine was, no doubt, a fortunate escape."

"Will you let me put these pearls back?" she asked eagerly.

"No. Leave them on the table. I will replace them," I said.

"Then, what do you intend doing with me?" she asked very seriously. "Only allow me to go, and I shall always be grateful to you, M'sieur – grateful to you all my life."

And with a sudden movement she took my hand in hers, and looked so earnestly into my eyes, that I stood before her fascinated by her wonderful beauty.

The scene was indeed a strange one. She pleaded to me for her liberty, pleaded to me, throwing herself wildly upon her knees, covering her face with her hands, and bursting into a torrent of hot, bitter tears.

My duty, both towards my host and towards the guests whose jewellery had been stolen by that silent-footed, expert little thief, was to raise the alarm, and hand her over to the police.

Yet so pitiful was her appeal, so tragic the story she had briefly related to me, so earnest her promise never to offend again, that I confess I could not bring myself to commit her to prison.

I saw that she was but the unwilling cat's-paw of the most dangerous criminal in Europe. Therefore, I gently assisted her to rise to her feet and began to further question her.

In confidence she told me her address in Paris – a flat in the Boulevard Pereire – and then, after nearly half an hour's further conversation, I said —

"Very well, Lola. You shall leave here, and I hope to see you in Paris very shortly. I hope, too, that you will succeed in breaking away from your uncle and his associates and so have a chance to live a life of honesty."

"Ah!" she sighed, gripping my hand with heartfelt thanks, as she turned to creep from the room, and down the stairs. "Ah! If I could! If I only could. Au revoir, M'sieur. You are indeed generous. I – I owe my life to you —au revoir!"

And, then? Well, she had slipped noiselessly down the winding stair, while I had taken the pearl necklace and replaced it in the room of Mrs. Forbes Wilson.

Imagine the consternation next morning, when it was discovered that burglars had entered the place, and had got clean away with jewellery worth in all about thirty thousand pounds.

I watched the investigations made by the police, who were summoned from Dumfries by telephone.

But I remained silent, and kept the secret of little Lola Sorel to myself.

And here she was, once again – standing before me!

CHAPTER XIV
WHEREIN CONFESSION IS MADE

"Well, Lola," I said at last, still holding her little hand in mine, "and why cannot you reveal to me the truth regarding the mystery of the death of Edward Craig?"

"For a very good reason – because I do not myself know the exact circumstances," was her prompt response, dropping into French. "I know that you have made an investigation. What have you discovered?"

"If you will be frank with me," I said, also in French, "I will be equally frank with you."

"But, have I not always been frank?" she protested. "Have I not always told you the truth, ever since that night in Scotland when you trapped me in your room. Don't you remember?"

"Yes," I replied in a low voice. "I remember, alas! too well. You promised in return for your liberty that you would break away from your uncle."

"Ah, I did – but I have been utterly unable, M'sieur Vidal," she cried quickly in her broken English. "You don't know how much I have suffered this past year – how terrible is my present position," she added in a tone of poignant bitterness.

"Yes, I quite understand and sympathize with you," I said, taking out a cigarette and lighting it, while she sat back in the big old-fashioned horse-hair arm-chair. "For weeks I have been endeavouring to find you – after you came to Cromer to call upon me. You have left the Boulevard Pereire."

"Yes. I have been travelling constantly of late."

"After the affair of the jeweller, Benoy – eh? Where were you at that time?"

"In Marseilles, awaiting my uncle. We crossed to Algiers together. Thence we went along to Alexandria, and on to Cairo, where we met our friends."

"It was a dastardly business. I read of it in the Matin," I said.

"Brutal – horrible!" declared the girl. "But is not my uncle an inhuman brute – a fearless, desperate man, who carries out, with utter disregard of human life, the amazing plots which are formed by one who is the master of all the criminal arts."

"Then he is not the prime mover of all these ingenious thefts?" I exclaimed in some surprise, for I had always believed Jules Jeanjean to be the head of that international band.

"No. He acts under the direction of another, a man of amazing ingenuity and colossal intellect. It is he who cleverly investigates, and gains knowledge of those who possess rare jewels; he who watches craftily for opportunities, who so carefully plans the coups, and who afterwards arranges for the stones to be re-cut in Antwerp or Amsterdam."

"Who is he?" I asked eagerly. "You may tell me in confidence. I will not betray your secret."

"He poses as a dealer in precious stones in London."

"In London?"

"Yes. He has an office in Hatton Garden, and is believed by other dealers in precious stones to be a most respectable member of that select little coterie that deals in gems."

"What is his name?"

The girl was silent for a few seconds. Then she said —

"In Cromer he has been known under the name of Vernon Gregory."

"Gregory!" I gasped in astonishment. "What, to that quiet old man is due the conception of all these great and daring robberies committed by Jules Jeanjean?"

"Yes. My uncle acts upon plans and information which the old man supplies," Lola replied. "Being in the trade, the crafty old fellow knows in whose hands lie the most valuable stones, and then lays his cunningly-prepared plans accordingly – plans that my uncle desperately carries out to the very letter."

This statement much surprised me, for I had always regarded Jeanjean as the instigator of the plots. But now, it appeared, old Gregory was the head of Europe's most dangerous association of criminals.

"Then the jewels found in Gregory's rooms at Cromer were all stolen property?"

"Yes. We were surprised that the police did not discover the real owners," Lola replied. "The greater part of the jewels were taken from the castle of the Grand Duke Alexander of Russia, just outside Kiev, about nine months ago."

"By you?" I asked with a grim smile.

"Not all. Some," admitted the girl with a light laugh. Then she continued: "We expected that when the old gentleman made such a hurried flight from Cromer, the police would recognize the property from the circulated description. But, as they did not, Uncle determined to regain possession of it – which he did."

"Who aided him?"

"Egisto – a man who is generally known as Egisto Bertini."

"The man who rode the motor-cycle?"

She nodded.

"And you assisted," I said. "Why did you leave your shoe behind?"

"By accident. I thought I heard some of the occupants of the house stirring, so fled without having an opportunity of recovering it. I suppose it has puzzled the local police – eh?" she laughed merrily.

"It did. You were all very clever, and my man, Rayner, was rendered insensible."

"Because he was a trifle too inquisitive. He was watching, and did not know that my uncle, in such expeditions, has eyes in the back of his head," she answered. "It was fortunate for him that he was not killed outright, for, as you know, my uncle always, alas! believes in the old maxim that dead men tell no tales."

"The assassin!" I cried in fierce anger. "He will have many crimes to answer for when at last the police lay hands upon him."

"He will never be taken alive," she said. "He will denounce me, and then kill himself. That is what he constantly threatens."

"And because of that you fear to hold aloof and defy him?" I asked. "You live in constant terror, Lola."

"Yes. How can I act – how can I escape them? Advise me," she urged, her face pale and intensely in earnest.

I hesitated. It was certainly a difficult matter upon which to give advice. The pretty girl before me had for several years been the unwilling tool of that scoundrelly gang of bandits, whose organization was so perfect that they were never arrested, nor was any of their booty ever traced.

The four or five men acting under the direction of the master-mind of old Gregory were, in private life, all of them affluent and respected citizens, either in England or in France, while Jules Jeanjean, I afterwards learned, occupied a big white villa overlooking the blue sea three miles out of Algiers. It was a place with wonderful gardens filled with high date-palms and brilliant tropical flowers. There, in his hours of retirement, Jules Jeanjean lived amid the most artistic and luxurious surroundings, with many servants, and a couple of motor-cars, devoting himself to experiments in wireless telegraphy, having fitted up a powerful station for both receiving and transmitting.

The science of wireless telegraphy was indeed his chief hobby, and he spent many hours in listening to the messages from Pold, Poldhu, Clifden, Soller, Paris, Port Said, or Norddeich on the North Sea, in communicating with ships in the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, the Levant, or on the Atlantic.

I was wondering how to advise my little friend. Ever since our first meeting my heart had been full of sympathy and compassion for her, so frail seemed her frame, so tragic her life, and so fettered did she seem to that disreputable gang. Yet, had she not pointed out to me, on the several occasions on which we had met in Paris, the impossibility of breaking the bonds which bound her to that detestable life? Indeed she had, more than once, declared our meetings to be filled with peril for myself.

Her uncle knew me by repute as an investigator of crime, and if he ever suspected me of prying into any affair in which he might be concerned, then my life would most certainly be in jeopardy. Jules Jeanjean never did things by halves. It was, I found, for that reason she had now sought me – to beseech me to relinquish my efforts to fathom the mystery of the death of Edward Craig.

"Do heed what I say, M'sieur Vidal," she exclaimed with deep earnestness. "My uncle knows that you are still in Cromer, and that you have been investigating. In Algiers, a fortnight ago, he mentioned it to me, and declared that very shortly you would cease to trouble him."

"He intends foul play – eh?" I remarked with a grim smile, lighting another cigarette.

"He means mischief," she assured me. "He knows, too well, of your success in other cases in which you have interested yourself," she remarked quickly. "And he fears – fears lest you may discover the secret of the young man's death."

"And if I do?" I asked, looking straight into her face.

"He does not intend that you shall," she replied very earnestly, adding: "Ah! M'sieur Vidal, do heed my words – I beg you. Be warned by me!"

"But, why?" I queried. "I am not afraid of Jules Jeanjean. I have never done him an evil turn. Therefore, why should he conspire to take my life? Besides, I already know of his connexion with the Cromer mystery, the Benoy affair, and others. Could I not easily have sent a telegram to the Prefecture of Police in Paris, when I recognized him in Cromer? But I did not."

"Why?"

"For two reasons. First, I wished to stand aside and watch, and, secondly, I feared to betray him for your sake, Lola."

"Ah!" she exclaimed. "But you are always so generous. You know quite well that he already believes that I have told you the truth. Therefore, he suspects us both and is determined to put an end to your inquisitiveness."

"Unless I act swiftly – eh?" I suggested.

"But think – what would then become of me?" she exclaimed, her eyes open in quick alarm.

"I can't see what you really have to fear," I said. "It is true, Lola, that you live, like your friends, by dishonest methods, but have you not been forced into it by your uncle? Even if you were arrested, the law would treat you with the greatest leniency. Indeed, if necessary, I would come forward and tell the Court all I have known and discovered concerning the baneful influence which has been exercised upon you by the man Jeanjean."

She shook her head mournfully.

"Alas! That would be of no avail," she declared in a low, strained voice.

"Why?"

"Because – because, ah! – you do not know the truth," she faltered, her face pale to the lips.

"Cannot you explain it to me?" I asked, bending down to her, and placing my hand tenderly upon her shoulder.

I felt her shudder beneath my touch, while her big blue eyes were downcast – downcast in shame.

"No. I cannot explain," she replied. "If you knew, M'sieur Vidal, how horrible, how terrible all this is for me, you would not press your question."

"But I do – in your interests," I said with deep earnestness. "I want to help you to escape from these scoundrels – I want to stand as your friend."

"My friend!" she exclaimed blankly. "My friend – ah! that you can never be."

"Why not?"

"You would not wish to cultivate my acquaintance further, M'sieur Vidal, if – if you were aware of the actual truth. Besides, this friendship which you have shown to me may, in itself, prove fatal to you. If you do not exercise the greatest precaution, your reward for saving me, as you did that night at Balmaclellan, will be death!"

"You are apprehensive on my account?" I asked, wondering whether she were really in earnest – or whether beneath her strange warning there lay some subtle motive.

"Yes," was her frank response. "Take great care, or death will come to you at a moment when you least expect it."

For an instant I was silent. Her warning was truly a curious and disconcerting one, for I knew the dangerous character of Jules Jeanjean. That if he threatened, he meant action.

"I do not care for myself, Lola," I said at last. "I am thinking how I can protect you, and rescue you from the hands of these unscrupulous men."

"You cannot," she declared, with a hard, fixed look of desperation. "No, only be careful of yourself, and, at the same time, dismiss me from your thoughts. I – I am unworthy of your regard," she murmured, her voice choked by a sob. "Alas, entirely unworthy!"

"No, no," I urged. "I will not allow you to speak like that, Lola. Ever since you entered my room, on that well-remembered night in Scotland, I have wondered how best I could assist you to lead an honest life; how I could – "

"I can accept no further assistance from you, M'sieur Vidal," she interposed, in a quivering voice. "I repeat that I am utterly unworthy," she cried, and shivered with despair, as she stood erect before me. "And – and – if you only knew the truth – the terrible truth of the past – you would at once, I know, turn and discard me – nay, you would probably ring for the waiter and hand me over to the police without either compunction or regret."

And the girl, known as "The Nightingale," stood before me, her face white and hard, her eyes with a strange light in them, staring straight before her, her breast heaving and falling with emotion which she was trying in vain to suppress.