Room 13
“Mrs. Floyd will have to be told. Good God! Peter Kane’s daughter!
Peter didn’t know that he’d married her to Legge’s son?”
“I don’t know whether he knew or not,” said Stevens, “but if I know
old Peter, he’d as soon know that she’d gone to the devil as marry her
to a son of Emanuel Legge’s. I’m squeaking in a way,” he said
apologetically, “but you’ve got to know--Emanuel will tell you as soon
as he gets the news.”
“Come here,” said Craig. He took the man’s arm and led him to the
passage where the detectives were listening, opened the door of a
private room, the table giving evidence of the hasty flight of the
diners. “Now,” he said, closing the door, “what’s the strength of this
story?”
“I don’t know it all, Mr. Craig, but I know they were putting a point
on Peter Kane a long time ago. Then one night they brought Peter along
and kidded him into thinking that Jeff was a sucker in the hands of
the boys. Peter had never seen Jeff before--as a matter of fact, _I_
didn’t know he was Jeff at the time; I’d heard a lot about him, but,
like a lot of other people, I hadn’t seen him. Well, they fooled Peter
all right. He took the lad away with him. Jeff was wearing a Canadian
officer’s uniform, and, of course, Jeff told the tale. He wouldn’t be
the son of his father if he didn’t. That’s how he got to know the
Kanes, and was taken to their home. When I heard about the marriage, I
thought Peter must have known. I never dreamt they were playing a
trick on him.”
“Peter didn’t know,” said Craig slowly. “Where’s the girl?”
“I can’t tell you. She’s in London somewhere.”
“At the Charlton,” nodded the other. “Now, you’ve got to tell me,
Stevens, who is Mr. Brown of Toronto? It’s written differently from
your usual hand--written by a man who has had a bad scare. In other
words, it was written after you’d found the body.”
Stevens said nothing.
“You saw him come out: who was he?”
“If I die this minute----” began Stevens.
“You might in a few months, as ‘accessory after,’” said the other
ominously; “and that’s what you’ll do if you conceal a murderer. Who
is Mr. Brown?”
Stevens was struggling with himself, and after a while it came out.
“Johnny was here to-night,” he said huskily. “Johnny Gray.”
Craig whistled.
There was a knock at the door. A police officer, wanting instructions.
“There’s a woman down below, pretty nigh mad. I think you know her,
sir.”
“Not Lila?” blurted Stevens.
“That’s the girl. Shall I let her come up?”
“Yes,” said Craig. “Bring her in here.”
She came in a minute, distracted, incoherent, her hair dishevelled,
her hands trembling.
“Is he dead?” she gasped. “For God’s sake tell me. I see it in your
face--he’s dead. Oh, Jeff, Jeff!”
“Now you sit down,” said the kindly Craig. “He’s no more dead than you
or I are. Ask Stevens. Jeff’s doing very well indeed. Just a slight
wound, my dear--nothing to worry about. What was the trouble? Do you
know anything about it?”
She could not answer him.
“He’s dead,” she moaned. “My God, I killed him! I saw him and followed
him here!”
“Give her a glass of wine, Stevens.”
The porter poured out a glass of white wine from one of the many
deserted bottles on the table, and put it to her chattering teeth.
“Now, Lila, let’s get some sense out of you. I tell you, Jeff’s not
dead. What is he to you, anyway?”
“Everything,” she muttered. She was shivering from head to foot. “I
married him three years ago. No, I didn’t,” she said in a sudden
frenzy.
“Go on; tell us the truth,” said Craig. “We’re not going to pull him
for bigamy, anyway.”
“I married him three years ago,” she said. “He wasn’t a bad fellow to
me. It was the old man’s idea, his marrying this girl, and there was a
thousand for me in it. He put me down in Horsham to look after her,
and see that there were no letters going to Johnny. There wasn’t any
need of that, because she never wrote. I didn’t like the marriage
idea, but he swore to me that it was only to get Peter’s money, and I
believed him. Then to-night he told me the truth, knowing I wouldn’t
squeak. I wish to God I had now, I wish I had! He is dead, isn’t he? I
know he’s dead!”
“He’s not dead, you poor fish,” said Craig impatiently. “I might be
congratulating you if he was. No, he’s got a bit of a wound.”
“Who shot him?”
“That’s just what I want to know,” said Craig. “Was it you?”
“Me!” Her look of horror supplied a satisfactory answer to his
question. “No, I didn’t. I didn’t know he was here, or coming here. I
thought he was at the hotel, till I saw him. Yet I had a feeling that
he was coming here to-night, and I’ve been waiting about all evening.
I saw Peter and dodged him.”
“Peter? Has he been near the club?”
She shook her head.
“I don’t know. He was on his way. I thought he was going to the
Highlow. There’s nowhere else he’d go in this street--I saw him
twice.”
Craig turned his bright, suspicious eyes upon the porter.
“Peter been here? I didn’t see anything about Mr. Brown of Montreal?”
he asked sarcastically.
“No, he hasn’t. I haven’t seen Peter since the Lord knows when,” said
the porter emphatically. “That’s the truth. You can give the elevator
boy permission to tell you all he knows, and if Peter was here
to-night you can hang me.”
Craig considered for a long time.
“Does Peter know his way in by the easy route?” he asked.
“You mean the fire-escape? Yes, Peter knows that way, but members
never come in by the back nowadays. They’ve got nothing to hide.”
Craig went out of the room and walked down the passage, stopping at
No. 13. Immediately opposite the door was a window, and it was wide
open. Beyond was the grille of the fire-escape landing. He stepped out
through the window and peered down into the dark yard where the escape
ended. By the light of a street lamp he saw a stout gate, in turn
pierced by a door, and this led to the street. The door was open, a
fact which might be accounted for by the presence in the yard of two
uniformed policemen, the flash of whose lanterns he saw. He came back
into the corridor and to Stevens.
“Somebody may have used the fire-escape to-night, and they may not,”
he said. “What time did Gray come in? Who came in first?”
“Jeff came first, about five minutes before Gray.”
“Then what happened?”
“I had a chat with Captain Gray,” said the porter, after a second’s
hesitation. “He went round into the side passage----”
“The same way that Jeff had gone?”
The porter nodded.
“About a minute later--in fact, it was shorter than a minute--I heard
what I thought was a door slammed. I remarked upon the fact to the
elevator man.”
“And then?”
“I suppose four or five minutes passed after that, and Captain Gray
came out. Said he might look in later.”
“There was no sign of a struggle in Captain Gray’s clothes?”
“No, sir. I’m sure there was no struggle.”
“I should think not,” agreed Craig. “Jeff Legge never had a chance of
showing fight.”
The girl was lying on the sofa, her head buried in her arms, her
shoulders shaking, and the sound of her weeping drew the detective’s
attention to her.
“Has she been here before to-night?”
“Yes, she came, and I had to throw her out--Emanuel told me she was
not to be admitted.”
Craig made a few notes in his book, closed it with a snap and put it
in his pocket.
“You understand, Stevens, that, if you’re not under arrest, you’re
under open arrest. You’ll close the club for to-night and admit no
more people. I shall leave a couple of men on the premises.”
“I’ll lock up the beer,” said Stevens facetiously.
“And you needn’t be funny,” was the sharp retort. “If we close this
club you’ll lose your job--and if they don’t close it now they never
will.”
He took aside his assistant.
“I’m afraid Johnny’s got to go through the hoop to-night,” he said.
“Send a couple of men to pull him in. He lives at Albert Mansions.
I’ll go along and break the news to the girl, and somebody’ll have to
tell Peter--I hope there’s need for Peter to be told,” he added
grimly.
CHAPTER XVI
A surprise awaited him when he came to the Charlton. Mrs. Floyd had
gone--nobody knew whither. Her husband had followed her some time
afterwards, and neither had returned. Somebody had called her on the
telephone, but had left no name.
“I know all about her husband not returning,” said Craig. “But haven’t
you the slightest idea where the lady is?”
The negative reply was uncompromising.
“Her father hasn’t been here?”
His informant hesitated.
“Yes, sir; he was on Mrs. Floyd’s floor when she was missing--in fact,
when Major Floyd was down here making inquiries. The floor waiter
recognised him, but did not see him come or go.”
Calling up the house at Horsham he learnt, what he already knew, that
Peter was away from home. Barney, who answered him, had heard nothing
of the girl; indeed, this was the first intimation he had had that all
was not well. And a further disappointment lay in store for him. The
detective he had sent to find Johnny returned with the news that the
quarry had gone. According to the valet, his master had returned and
changed in a hurry, and, taking a small suit-case, had gone off to an
unknown destination.
An inquiry late that night elicited the fact that Jeff was still
living, but unconscious. The bullet had been extracted, and a hopeful
view was taken of the future. His father had arrived early in the
evening, and was half mad with anxiety and rage.
“And if he isn’t quite mad by the morning, I shall be surprised,” said
the surgeon. “I’m going to keep him here and give him a little bromide
to ease him down.”
“Poison him,” suggested Craig.
When the old detective was on the point of going home, there arrived a
telephone message from the Horsham police, whom he had enlisted to
watch Peter’s house.
“Mr. Kane and his daughter arrived in separate motor-cars at a quarter
past twelve,” was the report. “They came within a few minutes of one
another.”
Craig was on the point of getting through to the house, but thought
better of it. A fast police car got him to Horsham under the hour, the
road being clear and the night a bright one. Lights were burning in
Peter’s snuggery, and it was he himself who, at the sound of the motor
wheels, came to the door.
“Who’s that?” he asked, as Craig came up the dark drive, and, at the
sound of the detective’s voice, he came half-way down the drive to
meet him. “What’s wrong, Craig? Anything special?”
“Jeff’s shot. I suppose you know who Jeff is?”
“I know, to my sorrow,” said Peter Kane promptly. “Shot? How? Where?”
“He was shot this evening between a quarter to ten and ten o’clock, at
the Highlow Club.”
“Come in. You’d better not tell my girl--she’s had as much as she can
bear to-night. Not that I’m worrying a damn about Jeff Legge. He’d
better die, and die quick, for if I get him----”
He did not finish his sentence, and the detective drew the man’s arm
through his.
“Now, listen, Peter, you’ve got to go very slow on this case, and not
talk such a darned lot. You’re under suspicion too, old man. You were
seen in the vicinity of the club.”
“Yes, I was seen in the vicinity of the club,” repeated Peter,
nodding. “I was waiting there--well, I was waiting there for a
purpose. I went to the Charlton, but my girl had gone--I suppose they
told you--and then I went on to the Highlow, and saw that infernal
Lila--by the way, she’s one of Jeff’s women, isn’t she?”
“To be exact,” said the other quietly, “she’s his wife.”
Peter Kane stopped dead.
“His wife?” he whispered. “Thank God for that! Thank God for that! I
forgive her everything. Though she is a brute--how a woman could
allow--but I can’t judge her. That graft has always been dirty to me.
It is hateful and loathsome. But, thank God she’s his wife, Craig!”