Daredevil
memorising their contents, and then he tore out the pages which bore
his scrawling handwriting, added the other papers to the pile, and
carried the whole over to the fireplace. He watched them burn until
every least scrap was reduced to brittle black flakes, and then with
the poker he stirred and powdered the ash to a fine dust. Even this,
to make doubly sure, he swept up into the shovel and threw from the
window.
He was left with three photographs, and these he placed in the wallet
he carried in an inside pocket.
Then he resumed his seat and sat through the time it took him to
smoke another cigar, motionless except for the regular monotonous
twisting of the pencil in his strong hands. It was nearing
eleven-thirty when with a sudden movement of decision he snapped the
pencil in half, pitched it into the waste-paper basket and rose. He
picked up his battered hat, unlocked the door, and passed again
through the outer office without a word or a glance to either side,
and Mattock watched his departure with a puzzled frown.
He went to the City and Continental, drew some money, and made
certain arrangements.
"I see you've had a burglar," remarked Blaythwayt when they had
concluded their business.
"Yess. He debarted away!" The Swede's voice was lifeless.
"So the police haven't caught him yet?"
Raegenssen glowered.
"No!" he snapped. "Der bolice are fools! Why hof they nod ter
Driangle abbrehented?"
He usually stayed for a short chat with his bank manager, but this
morning he seemed curiously disinclined to be conversational. Joe
Blaythwayt himself opened the door to his customer, and that simple
soul was almost personally apologetic, for Raegenssen's comments on
the Force seemed a direct slight on the lethargic officer who was
wont on occasion to brighten the Finchley Nights Entertainments.
That same Teal, driving down Lombard Street in a taxi with a couple
of unsuccessful jargoon sellers, saw the Swede leaving the bank and
chuckled.
"You boys want to aim high," he said. "Fifteen million pounds for a
few murders is better than a hundred for a white sapphire!"
Things happened to Mr. Teal in those days with the well-oiled
precision of a detective story from a master pen. He was chatting
downstairs in Scotland Yard that afternoon when a vast young man of
incredible ugliness came hurtling down the steps three at a time.
"I want you, Teal," he crisped. "Where's Captain Arden?"
Teal came to attention.
"I don't know, sir. He hasn't been in all day. He said he'd be here
about dinner-time."
"Get him on the phone."
Teal called the number, and was answered by the voice of Cork. He
snapped out a curt demand, listened, and then snicked back the
receiver.
"No good, sir," he said. "Captain Arden's been out since eleven this
morning and his man doesn't know where he is."
"Hell!" snarled the Assistant Commissioner. "You'd better come
along, then."
Bill Kennedy led the way to the waiting taxi, Teal following
obediently, and it was not until they were turning out into the
Embankment that the Commissioner explained.
"The Triangle's on the war-path again," he said. "Marker was shot
this afternoon as he was leaving his house."
"Dead?" drawled the callous Teal, and Kennedy shrugged.
"The message didn't say. Did Captain Arden give you any idea what he
was doing this afternoon?"
"He said he was going to commit another felony to-day. I wonder if
he is the Triangle?" suggested Mr. Teal lusciously.
His inspiration being received with scorn, he maintained a dignified
silence until the taxi drew up in Queen's Gate, where the Home
Secretary lived. The usual crowd was gaping about the entrance, only
restrained from closer investigation by the presence of two burly
constables. The two detectives pushed their way through the mob and
were instantly admitted.
The doctor who had been summoned was already preparing for an
impromptu operation, and was inclined to be brusque.
"The bullet glanced off a rib and tore up his right lung," he said
shortly. "I may be able to save his life, but it's very chancy."
The most coherent narrative was supplied by the chauffeur, who had
been actually holding the door for his master at the time of the
shooting.
"There were three cars close together--a Navarre limousine, a
Carillon cabriolet, and a Hirondel sports. I couldn't be sure which
it was, as I had my back to the street and didn't turn until I heard
the report. I should say it was either the Navarre or the
Hirondel--they were nearest when I looked round."
"Did you get any numbers?" asked Kennedy.
"No. They all put on speed immediately the shot was fired, and I was
too busy attending to my master to look at them closely. Oh--I
remember the Hirondel was very battered--looked as if it had been in
an air-raid. ZY-something. There was a '2' in it, anyway."
"ZY 28822?" murmured Teal, and the man nodded.
"Something like that. It was the last car of the three, and they all
raced into Cromwell Road, so that's the only number I got a glimpse
of."
Kennedy dismissed the man and glanced at Teal.
"Captain Arden on duty," he said. "That looks like a thin time for
Morini. It was the gentle Gat, of course."
"How're you going to prove it?" Teal wanted to know.
"Your business!" Bill Kennedy took his cigar-case from his pocket
and offered it. "This isn't my case at all, really, only Marker's so
deuced important."
"What about Hannassay?"
The Assistant Commissioner carefully charred the end of his cigar and
then placed it in his mouth and lighted it meticulously.
"Hannassay's was his own fault," he said. "The man refused
protection---said he could look after himself, and that he wouldn't
have his holiday messed up with a lot of detectives hanging round.
He had a compartment to himself--I saw him off--and it was a corridor
train. He must have been easy."
They waited to hear the result of the doctor's operation, for there
was clearly nothing they could do for the moment. An all-station
call for Morini had been out for days without result, and unless
their luck changed the only hope was that Storm would be able to hold
up the gunman.
A butler came in with a tray of sandwiches and offered them the use
of the syphon and decanter in the corner. They talked on odd
subjects, and it was just before they received their report that Bill
Kennedy opened up a new line of thought to Mr. Teal.
"What we really need in a case like this is the German Razzia," he
remarked. "If a wanted man's patient and really ingenious, he's as
hard to find as water in the desert. All he has to do is to retire
to the house of a friend, or to a fairly big residential hotel, and
never budge out of doors. By simply lying doggo instead of trying to
make a bolt for it, he could have the police rubbering till all's
blue, and never be in danger."
A few minutes later the doctor arrived.
There was a hope--yes. Marker was a healthy man in good condition,
and stood as much chance of pulling round as anyone. It had been a
nasty wound, and the illness would be a ticklish business, but it
would not necessarily be fatal.
"Well, that's a relief," Kennedy said as they returned to the street.
"But it don't let us out, laddie. Morini must have been
rattled--according to Captain Arden, that dago's one of the slickest
gunmen in the world."
Towards eight o'clock that evening, when Storm had failed to put in
his promised appearance, Inspector Teal huddled into his mackintosh
and set out to walk down the Embankment towards the restaurant in New
Bridge Street where he occasionally fed. He was a man who never
complained of the vilest weather, seeming even to revel in it; which
was fortunate for him, for the rain was pouring down in stinging
clouds, drumming on the macadam like a stage effect. The sky was
black and thunderous, and from time to time a crackling reverberation
omened the continuation of the downpour. Such few pedestrians as
there were scurried along under umbrellas with stifled curses and a
drowned-rat-like aspect, but Teal plodded along with his shoulders
squared and his face defiantly thrust out to meet the lash of the
storm.
He was within sight of Blackfriars Bridge when he first noticed the
tail lamp of a stationary car, and wondered that anyone provided with
such a luxury should dally by the way on such a night. As he came
abreast he saw that the driver was poring over a map, and as Teal
passed he was hailed.
"Can you tell me the way----" began the man, and then the flickering
light of a street lamp swaying in the wind fell across his face, and
Teal let out an exclamation.
"You're Carl Schwesen," he said, "and you were deported six months
ago for----"
So far he got before the driver's fist shot out and ripped into his
face. Half-stunned with pain, the detective staggered back, tripped
on the kerb, and fell. As he did so the car jumped forward.
He was fumbling for his whistle when he saw it had slowed up again,
and he struggled to regain his feet. And then a heavy-calibre
revolver thundered from the interior, and his hat went flying.
He got out his whistle and blew a piercing blast, but the driver of
the car accelerated and dashed up the empty road into the obscurity
of the streaming rain. He saw the car speed over the bridge, and
knew that he had no hope of catching it, but the number was firmly
imprinted on his memory.
Inspector Teal continued towards his dinner with a furrowed brow, for
he well knew the brilliance and unscrupulousness of the erstwhile
deported Austrian chemist. Without being able to give any logical
reason for his suspicion, he had more than an idea that Schwesen's
return was not unconnected with the sudden inrush of other dangerous
men into London, and he wondered what this fresh activity of the
Triangle might mean.
CHAPTER XI
EZRA SURCON DIGS
There was a man named Ezra Surcon who owned much land in London. He
did not court publicity; there were no paragraphs about him in the
gossip columns of the newspapers, and as a matter of fact his name
was never mentioned, even in whispers, among the Real Estate Kings of
the metropolis. He made his purchases quickly and without
ostentation, and the fact remains that in the space of three days he
acquired the freehold of no less than seven properties. There was a
gloomy house in Buckingham Gate, and another, equally gloomy, in
College Street. For a large sum he secured a vacant building in
Great Windmill Street; the imposing mansion in Queen's Gate cost him
less; and a modest erection in Orange Street was comparatively cheap.
He paid reasonable prices for No. 94, Carter Lane and No. 53,
Montague Street. In all, he must have expended five considerable
figures of hard cash, but since he transacted his business under
seven different aliases no one was startled by the magnitude of his
investments.
He was a tall loose-limbed man of rising sixty, yet the elasticity of
his gait as he walked down Constitution Hill that evening showed that
the years had made only superficial inroads on his physique. The
benevolence of his expression was emphasised by the large horn-rimmed
spectacles he wore, and contradicted by the tightness of his mouth
and the angularity of his jaw. A studious stoop took some inches off
his height and the shabbiness of his clothes gave no indication of
the wealth to which his lavish expenditures in other directions
testified.
He passed behind the Victoria Memorial and entered Buckingham Gate.
The residence of which he was the proud landlord stood only a short
distance down the road--a gaunt and grimy affair having about it that
indescribable air of forbidding unkemptness which is a seal upon the