Kitabı oku: «The Red Room», sayfa 11
Chapter Twenty One
I Make a Bold Move
For a moment I lost the two men in the excited crowd of alighting passengers, but when I gained another sight of them, my heart stood still.
Talking with the pair was a well set-up, alert man whose back was turned to me – a man in a soft grey felt hat and heavy travelling coat with beaver collar. Both men were speaking quickly, eagerly, telling the new-comer something of an urgent nature, being hustled at the same time by the bustling passengers eager to claim their luggage from the Customs barriers, and get away.
I moved a little distance along, recognising in the man just returned from the Continent the grey, thin, sinister face of Kershaw Kirk.
My first impulse was to rush forward and demand of him the truth; indeed, to charge him with a secret crime, and to insist on knowing the whereabouts of my beloved Mabel. But it struck me at that instant that the two men who had met him had agreed between themselves upon a course of secrecy, and that they were therefore misleading him. Had not Ethelwynn already told me of Langton’s suspicion of this man, who was to me and mine such a mystery?
Therefore I held back for the moment, awaiting my opportunity.
Standing beyond the barrier where the baggage was being sorted, ready for the Customs examinations, I watched the trio from my unseen point of vantage. I doubt that either would have recognised me in those greasy mechanic’s clothes of mine.
Within myself I felt a sense of complete satisfaction. Kirk had returned to England, and was therefore now within the jurisdiction of the law, however much he might pretend to be immune from its penalties.
What Flynn was saying evidently caused him to hesitate. He was thoughtful for a single moment, but next second shrugged his shoulders, with a gesture of disregard.
A taxi drew up close to where I stood, and I engaged him, telling him to wait. To my satisfaction I saw it was the same driver who had brought me along from Piccadilly.
Then, as I watched, I saw something which caused me to reflect. A porter, quickly recognising Kirk, took from him his baggage ticket and foraged out a big, battered kit-bag which had been placed upon the bench ready for the argus eye of his Majesty’s Customs. The porter uttered a word to the revenue officer and pointed to the bag, whereupon the officer chalked it without opening it.
Kirk’s name, it seemed, was as a laisser-passer at Charing Cross. Who was this man that his belongings should be exempt from Customs’ examination?
He looked much travel-worn, yet presented the same active, alert figure that I had seen passing and repassing before my house. No longer shabby or down-at-heel, however, he had, on the contrary, looked beaming and prosperous until those two men had imparted the information which had, in an instant, caused his brow to cloud, and he became serious and pensive.
The old brown kit-bag bearing many hotel labels was placed upon a taxi, which the three men entered and drove away, I following close upon them.
Half-way up St. James’s Street they pulled up at Boodle’s, where all three entered. Which of the three, I wondered, was a member of that most exclusive and old-fashioned institution?
They remained there nearly half an hour, when Kirk emerged, and, bidding good night to his friends at the kerb, re-entered the taxi and drove to Whitehall Court, that large block of flats which overlooks the embankment close to Northumberland Avenue. Here the liveried porter saluted him respectfully and carried his bag to the lift, up which a few minutes later he disappeared.
In my mechanic’s attire I was now placed at a great disadvantage. Any inquiry I might make of the gorgeous attendant would, I knew, only arouse suspicion, but a thought instantly occurred to me. The friendly driver of my taxi, believing that I, a motor man, had been swindled, might perhaps help me. We had pulled up at the corner where, in a few brief sentences, I now explained to him that I was anxious to know whether Kirk resided there in his own name.
“I’ll inquire for you, mate, if you like,” declared the taxi-driver cheerily. “You just wait here.”
And while I mounted guard over his cab, the red-moustached driver went along to the entrance to the flats. I saw him in conversation with the lift man, and when presently he returned he said:
“The gentleman just gone in is Mr Seymour, who lives on the third floor. He’s abroad very often, it seems, and is only just back. He’s lived there a couple of years.”
Now I recollected that Kirk, when we had sat together that first night in Bedford Park, had told me that he possessed another home, and I had now run him to earth.
Whitehall Court is an expensive place of residence. Apartments there seemed far beyond his income as he appeared when he passed my house, shabby, broken-down, and often hungry-looking.
I gave my friend the taxi-man half a crown beyond his legal fare and dismissed him, afterwards walking as far as the entrance to the National Liberal Club, trying to decide how next to act.
To face the fellow boldly and unflinchingly was, I recognised, the only way in which to gain the knowledge I sought. Yet in the garb of a mechanic, was I not much handicapped? Nevertheless, I walked back, and, finding the hall-porter, gave my name as Flynn, and asked to see Mr Seymour upon important business.
After a wait of nearly ten minutes a man in uniform came and ushered me up in the lift to the third floor, where, having traversed a long, thickly-carpeted corridor, he opened a door and allowed me to pass across the small well-furnished hall of the flat into a sitting-room, where I found myself again face to face with my mysterious neighbour.
He started at sight of me, but so perfect an actor was he that in a second he had recovered himself, and inquired with affected friendliness:
“Why, my dear Holford, why in the name of Fate did you send up your name as Flynn?”
“Because I wished to see you, Mr Kirk,” was my hard response, for we were now alone together in that cosy, sumptuously-furnished sitting-room, through the windows of which I could see the dark flowing Thames and the row of gleaming lights on the Surrey shore beyond. “I knew,” I added, “that if I had sent up my own name I should not be received.”
“Why?” he asked, opening his eyes widely. “I don’t follow you. Surely you have acted as a good friend to me, therefore why shouldn’t I receive you? I’ve only this very moment returned from abroad. Who told you I was back again?”
“No one. I obtained the knowledge for myself,” I said, “and I have come here, Mr Kirk, for several reasons, the chief being to ask you a simple and pointed question: who killed Professor Greer?”
“My dear sir,” he exclaimed, looking straight at me with unwavering gaze, a slight change, however, showing in his thin, grey countenance, “that is the very problem that I myself am trying to solve – but in vain.”
“An impostor is passing himself off as Greer,” I declared.
“Is he?” asked Kirk quietly. “I was not aware of that.”
“Not aware of it!” I cried in angry dismay. “Do you actually deny, then, that you are acquainted with this man who has taken the personality and honours of Professor Greer upon himself in order to preserve the secret of the unfortunate scientist’s death?”
“I deny being aware of any person attempting to pass himself off as Greer,” was my mysterious neighbour’s bold and unflinching reply.
Had I not sent that telegram from Broadstairs and signed it Kirk, and had not its receipt caused the false Professor quickly to change his quarters? Kirk’s reply staggered me.
“Look here,” I exclaimed again, raising my voice in anger at this open denial of what I knew to be the truth, “on the night of your escape from Sussex Place, the house was searched, and I found evidences of all traces of the crime having been effaced in the furnace of the laboratory.”
“I know,” was his simple response. “I was quite well aware of that. I hope, however, Holford, that you have kept your promise and kept a still tongue.”
“To a certain extent, yes.”
“You told Langton nothing, I trust?” he asked anxiously.
“Why are you in such mortal fear of Langton?” I demanded hotly, halting before him as he stood on the hearthrug coolly surveying me, with his back to the fire.
“My dear fellow,” he answered, “pray calm yourself. Have a drink, and let’s discuss this matter amicably from a purely business-like standpoint. Surely when I invoked your aid I did not commit a grave error of judgment? You have been judicious throughout, I hope? You have not forgotten the great issues which I explained depended upon your silence?”
“My silence you shall command no longer, Mr Kirk!” I cried, suddenly interrupting him. “I’ve been silent far too long.”
“Ah!” he remarked, still unruffled. “I see. Well, your attitude is quite justifiable, my dear sir – quite. You have lost your wife, I understand.”
“Yes,” I said, advancing towards him a couple of paces in a manner which I now believe must have appeared threatening. “And you know more about the trap into which my poor wife has been led than anybody else. That is why I’m here to-night – to compel you to speak – you crafty old cur!”
“My dear Holford, why – what’s the matter?” he asked, even then quite unperturbed. “Now if I did not know you so well I might easily be annoyed, but I’m not. No doubt the loss of Mrs Holford has seriously upset you.” And the fellow actually smiled at this.
I grew furious. The mysterious man’s eyes gleamed with a triumphant light, and his pale lips parted, revealing his pointed teeth.
“You make pretence of ignorance!” I cried. “You think that I believe you when you say you know nothing of where she is, but – ”
“I assure you, Holford, that these suspicions of myself are entirely groundless. I have no knowledge whatever of the lady. I have seen her once or twice at her dining-room window, it is true.”
“And yet I’ve been out to Florence, to the Grand Bretagne, where I was informed that you had been in her company!” was my hasty reply.
“I can’t help what cock-and-bull story you’ve been told by an Italian hotel-keeper. They are notorious for their untruths, as you would discover if you travelled as much up and down Italy as I do,” he said with an evil grin. “I can only tell you, once and for all, that I have no knowledge whatever of your wife’s present whereabouts.”
“Then who has?”
“How can I tell, my dear sir? You ask me a riddle. On my arrival at Charing Cross an hour ago one of my friends who met me told me of Mrs Holford’s sudden journey abroad and her disappearance into space. The story set me wondering as to the motive of the plot – for plot it undoubtedly must be. Mrs Holford and yourself, I am told, are devoted to each other. There is no reason for her leaving you, is there?”
“Understand this, Kirk,” I said. “I’ve been fooled quite long enough. As my wife has been enticed away, and is held aloof in some unknown place, I give you full and ample warning of my intention. It is to go straight to the police, and while invoking their aid to try and find her, at the same time to tell them the whole story of the affair at Sussex Place, just as I know it.”
The man half turned from me and bit his thin under-lip. His grey, furrowed countenance had become even more grey and more determined, while in his eyes I saw an evil glitter.
“Ah! You’ve been trying to seek solution of the mystery for yourself. I know all about that!” He laughed hollowly. “But, as you are aware of only half the tangled skein of mysterious facts, it is hardly likely that you’ll succeed, do you think? Did I not tell you to remain silent and inactive? Instead of that, you’ve been chattering and trying to act the part of amateur detective. It was fatal. Because of that – and for that reason alone – the misfortune has been placed upon you.”
“What misfortune?”
“The loss of your wife. It has occupied your mind in another way, just as it was intended by your enemies it should do.”
“And yours is the master mind, Mr Kirk, which has planned this subtle revenge,” I exclaimed, my eager hands clenched in frantic desperation. “Because I disobeyed your extraordinary injunctions Mabel has been taken from me. You may as well admit the whole truth now at once.”
“I admit nothing,” he answered, drawing himself up defiantly.
“Then, by Heaven, I’ll force you to speak – to tell me where she is!” I shouted, as I raised my hands with a sudden movement. And then, before he could ward me off, my fingers closed upon his hard, bony throat.
I was desperate. Nay, in the presence of that sphinx-like, taciturn adventurer whom I now knew to be my enemy, I was mad.
Yes, mad, or surely I would never have dared to lay hands upon him.
Chapter Twenty Two
Defiance Proves Defence
I had, I confess, allowed my anger to rise above my gorge. That action of mine in attacking Kirk was both ill-timed and very injudicious, for in an instant – before even those frantic words had left my lips – I found myself looking down the ugly black barrel of a big Browning revolver, that most effective and deadly of all man-killing weapons.
“Kindly release me, Holford,” he said, rather hoarsely and with some difficulty, as my muscular fingers had closed upon his scraggy throat. “Come, this is all very foolish! Let me go! I have no desire to harm you,” he added, quite calmly.
“Then tell me where I can find my wife,” I repeated.
“I would – if I could.”
“Tell me who can!” I demanded fiercely, my fingers still closed upon his throat, so that he breathed only with great difficulty.
“Give me time – time to make – inquiry!” he gasped. “I’ve only just returned, and am in ignorance of a great deal of what has transpired.”
“Upon your own admission, Mabel has fallen a victim of a plot merely because I became too active and too inquisitive. You feared lest I might discover something.”
“I have admitted nothing, my dear sir!” he cried. “One day you will withdraw all these malicious words – mark me,” he added, in a hard voice, lowering his weapon and replacing it in his hip-pocket as I released my convulsive grip.
“I’ve lost my wife, Mr Kirk, and you know where she is,” I said.
“In that you are quite mistaken,” he declared. “As I’ve already explained, I’ve not yet had opportunity for making inquiry. I believed,” he added in reproach, “that you would assist me in this strange affair concerning Professor Greer. Yet my confidence in you, Holford, has been sadly misplaced. Recall for one moment what I told you – of the seriousness of what was at stake, and of the absolute necessity for complete secrecy. Yet to-night you threaten to bungle the whole affair by going to the police.”
“I’ve lost my wife!” I interrupted. “She’s the victim of some plot or other, and it is to find her that I intend to invoke the aid of Scotland Yard.”
“Well, by adopting that course, you would not find her – but you’d lose her,” was the old fellow’s brief response.
“Antonio told me the very same thing when we met in Rome!” I exclaimed. “Your threat shows me that you are in league in this conspiracy of silence.”
Kershaw Kirk burst out laughing, as though he considered my anger a huge joke. It annoyed me that he did not take me seriously, and that he regarded the loss of Mabel so lightly.
“Look here, Mr Holford,” he said at last, looking straight into my face. “It’s plain that you suspect me of being the assassin of Professor Greer. That being so, I’ve nothing more to say. Yet I would ask you to regard the present situation both logically and calmly. Do you for one moment suppose that were I guilty I would have taken you to Sussex Place and explained the whole affair in detail? Is it, indeed, to be supposed that I would place myself so entirely and completely in the hands of a stranger?”
I shook my head dubiously.
“Well,” he went on, “I repeat to you now all that I told you that night, and assert that all I told you was the truth.”
“But how do you account for Ethelwynn being still alive?” I interrupted quickly.
“There is an explanation of that,” he declared; “one that you will probably be told very shortly. Fortunately, the poor girl was not dead, though I confess I was entirely deceived by the symptoms. You will remember that the mirror remained unclouded by her breath?”
“I remember every incident, alas! only too vividly,” was my slow, distinct reply. “But,” I asked very pointedly, “pray tell me, Mr Kirk, what was your object in calling upon me and inducing me to go to Sussex Place?”
He thrust his hands into his trousers pockets and smiled.
“An ulterior one – as you may imagine. But one which was as much in your interests as in ours.”
“Ours!” I echoed. “You mean you and your accomplices?”
“Call them so, if you wish,” he laughed. “I, unfortunately, am not in a position to enlighten you upon the actual reason I invoked your aid.”
“And your action has only brought upon me a great misfortune – bitter despair, and the loss of the woman I loved!” I cried, dismayed.
“Ah!” he said. “You judge me a little too hastily, Mr Holford. It is your failing, Mr Holford, that you are given to rushing to premature conclusions. That is always fatal in any delicate negotiation. When you’ve had my experience – that of a traveller and thorough-going cosmopolitan – you will learn how to repress your own opinions until they are fully and entirely corroborated.”
I looked into the grey face of the clever adventurer, and there saw craft, cunning, and an ingenuity that was superhuman. A look was in his eyes such as I had never before seen in those of any human being.
“But I am in search of my wife!” I cried frantically. “I am in no mood to hear this philosophy of yours.”
“Well – how do you know she is not here – in London?” he asked, waving his thin hand towards the window where showed the glimmering lights of the Thames bank.
To the right, where I stood, I could see the gleam of electric light from the summit of Big Ben, showing that the House, which had assembled only a few days before, was sitting late after the Christmas recess.
“I suppose you wish to mislead me into the idea that she is back again in London, hiding from me, eh?” I exclaimed resentfully. “No, Mr Kirk, I tell you plainly that I’ve had enough of this tragic-comedy of yours, I’ve watched you this evening with your precious friends, Flynn and Langton.”
“And, pray, why should I not possess friends?” he asked, looking at me with some surprise.
“To me Langton denied all knowledge of you.”
“Well – and am I to be blamed for Langton’s pretended ignorance?”
“No; but it shows me that you are not dealing with me in a straightforward manner!” I declared, without mincing words.
But the strange old fellow only laughed. “My dear sir,” he said a few moments afterwards, “I can quite understand your distrust of me, therefore it is as well that I hesitated to place a further confidence in you. You might have betrayed it.”
“Betrayed it!” I echoed angrily. “Have you not betrayed me? Is it not due to you, and you alone, that my wife is missing?”
“That I emphatically deny, my dear sir,” he replied, still quite unperturbed. “But why let us discuss it? Any denial of mine you’ll regard as false. It’s a great pity that my judgment led me to seek your aid. Had you carried out my request and refrained from prying into matters which did not concern you, you might have found it to your distinct advantage.”
“You mean that I should have profited pecuniarily by concealing the fact that Professor Greer is dead and that an impostor has assumed his identity? You intended that I also should be an accomplice of the assassin!”
“No – not exactly,” he replied with an evil, triumphant grin. “But, really, my dear sir,” he added, “I’ve had a very long journey, and I’m tired. Is it any use prolonging this argument?”
“Not unless you wish!” I snapped. “I have given you full warning of my intention to reveal the whole affair to the police.”
“Ah! Then that will be very unfortunate – for you,” replied the queer old man; “and for your wife most of all.”
“Yes, I know. You intend to bring disaster upon me and upon her if I dare to go to Scotland Yard!” I cried.
In my ignorance of the truth I believed my threats would be of avail. Ah, had I but known the actual facts, how differently would I have acted! But surely that enigma was one that was beyond human power to elucidate. Upon every hand I found complications. Plot lay within plot – all directed against myself and against poor innocent Mabel, who had flown to me on receipt of what she had believed to be my urgent telegram.
“My intentions, Mr Holford, entirely depend upon your actions,” said Kirk, very plainly. “If you are foolish – well, then I cannot guarantee the safety of your wife. My advice to you, however, is to recall all I told you, believe in the truth of my statements, and act with slow discretion.”
“But my wife?” I cried. “I must – I will save her. She is in peril, I am sure of that!”
“She may be in grave peril if you go to the police,” he said enigmatically; “and, believe me, they cannot assist us in the least to discover who killed Professor Greer.”
“Why?”
Kirk hesitated. In that pause I scented an intention further to prevent me from speaking.
“Well, regard the matter calmly and without prejudice,” he said at last. “As a matter of fact, what evidence is there that the Professor is dead?”
“Evidence!” I cried. “Why, did not you and I see him dead? Did not his daughter stand before his lifeless body?”
“Ah, she would never tell what she saw!” he said, with a mysterious smile.
“Why not?” I asked, much surprised at his remark.
But my mysterious neighbour only shrugged his shoulders vaguely, answering:
“There is a reason why she will never admit his death – a strong reason.”
“Well,” I said, “I recovered from the ashes of the furnace certain remains – coat buttons and other scraps of clothing.”
“And you think they would be accepted as evidence that Professor Greer was done to death?” he laughed. “You are evidently unaware of the great caution exercised by the Criminal Investigation Department in accepting any evidence such as that which you could furnish. No,” he added, “only Antonio and Ethelwynn were the actual witnesses, in addition to ourselves, of the Professor’s tragic end. And as they refuse to admit that he is dead, any information you may lodge at Scotland Yard must only reflect upon yourself and bring greater peril upon Mrs Holford. I simply tell you the truth – believe me, or believe me not.”
“Well,” I exclaimed, “I disbelieve you, Mr Kirk.”
“Then I wish you good evening!” he exclaimed abruptly. “Act as you think proper!” he added defiantly, as, turning from me in disregard he walked to his large writing-table, where he took up some letters, at the same time singing, with that careless cosmopolitan air of his, Lucien Fugere’s popular chanson, which at the moment one heard everywhere in the streets of Paris.
“Then that’s your last word, eh, Mr Kirk?”
I asked when he had concluded the verse.
“It is,” he replied determinedly. “If you must act as a fool, then I can’t assist you further. Good night!” And he sat down and busied himself with his accumulated correspondence.
I now realised that he was utterly defiant, and thoughts of my loss of Mabel caused my blood to boil within me. His light, careless manner irritated me beyond measure.
“Very well,” I cried. “Good night, Mr Kirk!” And turning swiftly upon my heel, I left the room and found my way down the great staircase and out into Whitehall.
Too late at that hour to call at New Scotland Yard, close by, I hailed a hansom and drove straight home, almost beside myself with rage at the calm, unruffled, defiant attitude with which the adventurer had met me.
Next morning, after writing some letters, I went round to the garage, where I found Pelham, somewhat excited.
“This morning, when I arrived at eight o’clock,” he said. “I found awaiting me a rather shabbily-dressed old man who said he wanted to see an Eckhardt tyre. Recollecting my previous experiences of people who’ve come in to handle them, I told him that if he wished to buy one I could sell him one, but I hadn’t time to waste on sightseers. Whereupon the old fellow promptly paid for a cover before seeing it, and took it away on a cab which he had waiting.”
“Well?” I asked, rather, surprised. “And who was he?”
“That’s the curious point. He was an old chap I’ve seen about the neighbourhood many times – thin, rather shabby and disreputable, grey hair and moustache – lives in your road, I think. Drake says you know him.”
“Kershaw Kirk!” I gasped.
“Yes; that’s the name Drake said before he went out with the ‘sixty,’” replied my manager.
“What does he want with a tyre when he hasn’t got a car?”
I stood in silence. What, indeed, did that man want with one of the new tyres? Had he merely come down there to have further words with me, or did he require a cover for some specific purpose?
My mind, however, was made up. I had resolved to go to New Scotland Yard, and, even though tardily, to place the whole of the facts before the Criminal Investigation Department. Therefore I got out the “forty-eight” and drove along the Hammersmith Road and Knightsbridge, across St. James’s Park, and through Storey’s Gate to Whitehall. I alighted in the big courtyard of the police headquarters, where a number of motor-’buses were drawn up for inspection, and entered the large stone hall, when a constable came forward to inquire my business.
I handed him my card, explaining that I wished to see one of the detective inspectors upon a confidential matter, and was shown upstairs and along a wide corridor to a bare waiting-room.
For some ten minutes I remained there, when the door opened, and I found myself face to face with a middle-aged, pleasant-faced man, who was one of the most noted and experienced officers of the department.
For a moment I held my breath. I recollected all the threats that had been made of Mabel’s peril if I dared to speak the truth.
The detective-inspector closed the door behind him, and, wishing me a polite “Good morning,” inquired my business.
I told him. Yes; I blurted forth the truth, and made a clean breast of the whole matter.
But the instant I had done so I bitterly repented it.
I realised something which I had not before recognised.
I saw that, even though my dear wife were missing and in peril, I was a fool – an utter idiot – for having dared to breathe a word.
My injudicious statement had only rendered the enigma still more complicated than hitherto.
