The girl from Scotland Yard
care if you’re a princess or if you’re the Queen of Sheba. When Miss
Maughan’s engaged, nobody can----!”
“That will do, Lucretia. Come in, Princess.”
The big woman strode into the apartment without a word of thanks, not
even deigning to look at the defiant maid.
“Where is----” she began, and then she saw Lady Raytham at the desk.
“What are you writing, Jane?” she demanded loudly. “You’re not being
such a fool as to make a statement to the police, are you?”
“Lady Raytham is merely telling me as much as I already know,” said
Leslie.
“Jane, you must not sign it. I forbid it!”
There was a tremor of anger in the hard voice, and, looking at the
woman, Leslie saw how deeply the tragedy must have affected her. She
seemed ten years older. The big slit of a mouth was turned down at the
ends, the eyes red and inflamed.
Very calmly Lady Raytham affixed her signature.
“Don’t be foolish, Anita,” she said quietly. “The police are entitled
to know certain things about Druze.”
“What have you told them? Can I see this precious document?”
She reached out her hand, but Leslie was before her.
“Let me read it to you, Princess,” she said, and placed the desk
between herself and her furious visitor. That Princess Bellini was in
a cold tremble of rage was patent.
She read without interruption to the end.
“Jane Raytham, you’re a fool to sign a thing like that!” stormed the
woman. “Let them find things out without committing yourself to paper.
This girl has tricked you into a confession----”
“Confession?” said Leslie, with a smile. “How absurd! Lady Raytham
knew that Druze was a woman; it was impossible that she should not.
And, as she says, she has only told us what we already knew, and what
you already knew.”
“I knew nothing,” said Anita Bellini harshly, her baleful eyes fixed
on the girl, “except that you have tricked Lady Raytham into making a
statement which will involve her in considerable trouble.”
Leslie faced her squarely, and for the first time Anita Bellini became
dimly and uncomfortably conscious of the strength of this
inconsiderable person. They had met before, and the honours of that
meeting had not rested with the princess. But she had thought of
Leslie as a girl with a certain glibness of tongue, a gift of smart
repartee, but without any of the especial qualities that she might
expect in a foe worthy of her heaviest metal. But now it had dawned
upon her that, whether she was “Coldwell’s pretty typist,” as she had
contemptuously referred to her, or whether she was “a Scotland Yard
underling,” she was certainly a factor to be considered and
forestalled. And if she had had any doubt on the subject, Leslie
Maughan’s first words would have dispelled it.
“Lady Raytham has made a statement, and you also will make a
statement, Princess,” she said, “either before or after the inquest.”
The woman surveyed her with an oddly sly look that was unnatural in
her.
“I don’t know how you can bring me in,” she began, and her tone was
milder than it had been.
“You employed Druze. Apparently you knew she was a woman, and are
acquainted with her early history,” said Leslie quietly. “That is
quite sufficient to bring you into any inquiry which the police set
afoot.”
Anita Bellini took out her monocle, polished it on her handkerchief
and returned it to her eye.
“Possibly I was rather precipitate,” she said. “But I think you should
make allowance for my--whatever I have said. I have been awfully upset
by Druze’s death. Would you read the statement again?”
It was a very simple record of the information which Lady Raytham had
given to the girl, and, when she had finished reading:
“No, there is nothing in that,” said the princess. “I suppose this
evidence has to come out. Does it mean that we shall be called at the
inquest? I couldn’t stand that, I couldn’t!”
In that instant Leslie detected a tremor in the woman’s voice. Anita
Bellini, the formidable, had a weak spot, after all. But she recovered
herself very quickly.
“If everybody had his due, Peter Dawlish would be under arrest,” she
said, and, ignoring the protests of Jane: “The man hated Druze; you
know that quite well, Jane. He threatened her; I can prove it!”
And then, in a conciliatory tone:
“I hope we’re not going to be bad friends, Miss Maughan. If I can help
you I will. Is there any more you can tell me than appears in the
evening newspaper?”
“Nothing,” said Leslie shortly.
They left together soon after, but before they departed, Leslie found
an opportunity of speaking a few words to Jane Raytham.
“I don’t want you to tell anybody about the necklace,” she said in a
low voice, as she accompanied her down the stairs. “Especially about
the emerald that was found in Druze’s hand. You promise me? Or have
you already told?”
Jane Raytham shook her head.
“I wondered why you hadn’t put that in the statement,” she suggested.
“But you may trust me. I shall not speak about it, even to Anita.”
At that moment the voice of the princess hailed her from the foot of
the stairs and further conversation became impossible.
Leslie arrived at Scotland Yard just before twelve, and was mounting
the stone stairs as Peter Dawlish came down.
“A clean bill,” he said with a smile. “At any rate, that is the
impression Coldwell gives me. It seems that your detective man’s
search was a very thorough one; I suppose you know that he searched me
also? And, by the way, Belinda sends her love.”
“Belinda?” Leslie was momentarily bewildered. “Oh, you mean that
little child, Elizabeth. How wicked! I had almost forgotten her!”
“She hasn’t forgotten you,” said Peter, and with a cheery wave of his
hand went on.
She found Mr. Coldwell in his big, comfortable office, the stub of a
cigar between his teeth, his bristling brows gathered in thought.
“Just going to phone you,” he mumbled. “I’ve seen that man of yours,
and I’m satisfied that he had nothing to do with the crime.”
“‘That man of mine’ being Peter Dawlish?” she said calmly. “You give
me quite a proprietorial feeling!”
From her bag she took the statement that Lady Raytham had signed and
laid it on the table before him. He read it through carefully, folded
it up and slipped it into a drawer.
“Did you tell Anita Bellini about the emerald we found in Druze’s
hand?” he asked.
“No,” she said. “That’s the last thing in the world I should have told
her; I asked Lady Raytham not to tell either. Why?”
He smiled grimly.
“Thought you hadn’t,” he said. “Her Serenity called me on the phone
five minutes ago, and said she’d read in one of the newspapers that
something very valuable had been found on Druze’s person. I haven’t
seen all the newspapers, but those I’ve read make no mention of the
emerald, and I don’t see why they should, unless they are psychic. The
princess suggested, rather than said, that you had confirmed this
mythical newspaper report.”
Leslie shook her head in admiration.
“That woman is certainly a quick worker,” she said. “What did you tell
her?”
Mr. Coldwell relit his cigar with the exasperating deliberation of his
age.
“I told her that we _had_ found something valuable--a packet of money.
She seemed kind of disappointed.”
The telephone bell shrilled; he picked up the receiver, listened in
silence for a time, and then:
“All right, I’ll come down,” he said.
“The Lambeth police have got a quaint clue--a kind of ready-made one,
but it should be investigated, as it has to do with your Peter. Would
you like to come along?”
She looked at him steadily.
“If you refer to him as my Peter again, I shall be very offensive to
you, Mr. Coldwell,” she said, and Coldwell scratched his chin.
“Somehow he seems to belong to you; I don’t know why I get that
impression.”
Her eyes wandered to a corner of the room and for the first time she
saw the two big travelling trunks. They were new and bore the label of
the Cunard Steamship Company.
“Druze’s,” he said laconically. “We’ll go through those when we come
back.”
It was at the corner of Severall Street that the taxicab stopped. The
local subdivisional inspector was waiting, and with him a detective.
“Let me have a look at that paper,” said Coldwell immediately, and
Leslie, who had not heard the one-sided conversation on the telephone,
wondered what was coming next.
The inspector took a dirty slip of paper from his pocketbook and
placed it in Coldwell’s hand. He fixed his glasses and read, then
passed the slip to the girl. The message was written in pencil and in
an illiterate hand:
Dawlish keeps his gun under a loose board in his bedroom just as you
go inside the door.
“Where did this come from?” asked Coldwell.
“It was delivered at the station just before I telephoned to you. A
street lad brought it along. He said it had been handed to him by a
man, who gave him a few coppers for his trouble. I thought it best
that you should know.”
They walked down the street toward Mrs. Inglethorne’s house and the
door was opened immediately by that lady, who was surprisingly clean
and spruce. She seemed surprised, but was certainly not agitated by
the appearance of the police officers.
“Yes, sir, Mr. Dawlish has just come in. Shall I call him down?”
“No, thank you; we’ll go up.”
Coldwell mounted the stairs and knocked at the door of the front room,
and a voice bade him come in. Over the inspector’s shoulder, Leslie
saw that Peter was sitting at a deal table, pen in hand, a stack of
addressed envelopes before him. He shifted his chair round and his
eyebrows rose in astonishment.
“Hello!” he said, obviously taken aback by the character of the call.
“Do you want to see me again, Inspector?”
Coldwell took in the room at a glance.
“I have information that you’ve a gun concealed under this floor,” he
said. “If you don’t mind I’ll make another search.”
“Fire ahead,” said Peter, without a moment’s hesitation.
Coldwell turned back to the door, lifted a corner of the faded carpet
and saw the loose board immediately. To lift it up was the work of a
second. Thrusting in his hand, he pulled out a long black Browning
pistol. Peter’s face went white; his jaw dropped in an amazement that
could not have been simulated.
“Anything more here?” asked Coldwell, and, kneeling, thrust in his
hand and groped about. Presently he found a small package wrapped in
cloth and brought it to the light. He unwrapped it slowly.
“My stars!” gasped out a hollow voice.
Mrs. Inglethorne had crept up the stairs and was an interested
spectator. There was reason enough for her astonishment, for in the
centre of that dirty rag lay three large diamond rings, the least
valuable of which must have been worth a hundred pounds.
“Do you know anything about these, Dawlish?”
Peter shook his head.
“No, I’m not a burglar,” he said, with a return of his old good
spirits. “That branch of the profession is not my forte, and that
little find has every appearance of being the proceeds of a very old
burglary.”
Coldwell looked at the wrapper; it was thick with dust. Even as he
turned back one corner of the rag, a fine cloud arose.
“Do you know anything about these, Mrs. Inglethorne?”
She shook her head.
“Or the pistol?”
The woman was paralyzed; her face had gone a ghastly gray as she
realized the enormous significance of that find. There they had lain
month after month, at least five hundred pounds’ worth of jewellery,
the results of one of her lodger’s little coups, and she none the
wiser.
“Never--seen--it!” Mrs. Inglethorne found a difficulty in breathing.
“This has been used as a hiding place before,” said the inspector, as
he laid the pistol and rings upon the deal table.
He examined the Browning, noted its make and number, and, having