The Grand Babylon Hôtel
The luggage clerk, with an aggrieved expression, explained to him that
it was the luggage of nobody in particular, that it belonged to various
guests, and was bound for various destinations; that it was, in fact,
‘expressed’ luggage despatched in advance, and that a similar quantity
of it left the hotel every morning about that hour.
Theodore Racksole walked away, and breakfasted upon one cup of tea and
half a slice of toast.
At ten o’clock he was informed that the inspector of police desired to
see him. The inspector had come, he said, to superintend the removal of
the body of Reginald Dimmock to the mortuary adjoining the place of
inquest, and a suitable vehicle waited at the back entrance of the
hotel.
The inspector had also brought subpoenas for himself and Prince Aribert
of Posen and the commissionaire to attend the inquest.
‘I thought Mr Dimmock’s remains were removed last night,’ said Racksole
wearily.
‘No, sir. The fact is the van was engaged on another job.’
The inspector gave the least hint of a professional smile, and Racksole,
disgusted, told him curtly to go and perform his duties.
In a few minutes a message came from the inspector requesting Mr
Racksole to be good enough to come to him on the first floor. Racksole
went. In the ante-room, where the body of Reginald Dimmock had
originally been placed, were the inspector and Prince Aribert, and two
policemen.
‘Well?’ said Racksole, after he and the Prince had exchanged bows. Then
he saw a coffin laid across two chairs. ‘I see a coffin has been
obtained,’ he remarked. ‘Quite right’ He approached it. ‘It’s empty,’ he
observed unthinkingly.
‘Just so,’ said the inspector. ‘The body of the deceased has
disappeared.
And his Serene Highness Prince Aribert informs me that though he has
occupied a room immediately opposite, on the other side of the corridor,
he can throw no light on the affair.’
‘Indeed, I cannot!’ said the Prince, and though he spoke with sufficient
calmness and dignity, you could see that he was deeply pained, even
distressed.
‘Well, I’m--’ murmured Racksole, and stopped.
Chapter Seven NELLA AND THE PRINCE
IT appeared impossible to Theodore Racksole that so cumbrous an article
as a corpse could be removed out of his hotel, with no trace, no hint,
no clue as to the time or the manner of the performance of the deed.
After the first feeling of surprise, Racksole grew coldly and severely
angry. He had a mind to dismiss the entire staff of the hotel. He
personally examined the night-watchman, the chambermaids and all other
persons who by chance might or ought to know something of the affair;
but without avail. The corpse of Reginald Dimmock had vanished utterly--
disappeared like a fleshless spirit.
Of course there were the police. But Theodore Racksole held the police
in sorry esteem. He acquainted them with the facts, answered their
queries with a patient weariness, and expected nothing whatever from
that quarter. He also had several interviews with Prince Aribert of
Posen, but though the Prince was suavity itself and beyond doubt
genuinely concerned about the fate of his dead attendant, yet it seemed
to Racksole that he was keeping something back, that he hesitated to say
all he knew. Racksole, with characteristic insight, decided that the
death of Reginald Dimmock was only a minor event, which had occurred, as
it were, on the fringe of some far more profound mystery. And,
therefore, he decided to wait, with his eyes very wide open, until
something else happened that would throw light on the business. At the
moment he took only one measure--he arranged that the theft of Dimmock’s
body should not appear in the newspapers. It is astonishing how well a
secret can be kept, when the possessors of the secret are handled with
the proper mixture of firmness and persuasion. Racksole managed this
very neatly. It was a complicated job, and his success in it rather
pleased him.
At the same time he was conscious of being temporarily worsted by an
unknown group of schemers, in which he felt convinced that Jules was an
important item. He could scarcely look Nella in the eyes. The girl had
evidently expected him to unmask this conspiracy at once, with a single
stroke of the millionaire’s magic wand. She was thoroughly accustomed,
in the land of her birth, to seeing him achieve impossible feats. Over
there he was a ‘boss’; men trembled before his name; when he wished a
thing to happen--well, it happened; if he desired to know a thing, he
just knew it. But here, in London, Theodore Racksole was not quite the
same Theodore Racksole. He dominated New York; but London, for the most
part, seemed not to take much interest in him; and there were certainly
various persons in London who were capable of snapping their fingers at
him--at Theodore Racksole. Neither he nor his daughter could get used to
that fact.
As for Nella, she concerned herself for a little with the ordinary
business of the bureau, and watched the incomings and outgoings of
Prince Aribert with a kindly interest. She perceived, what her father
had failed to perceive, that His Highness had assumed an attitude of
reserve merely to hide the secret distraction and dismay which consumed
him. She saw that the poor fellow had no settled plan in his head, and
that he was troubled by something which, so far, he had confided to
nobody. It came to her knowledge that each morning he walked to and fro
on the Victoria Embankment, alone, and apparently with no object. On the
third morning she decided that driving exercise on the Embankment would
be good for her health, and thereupon ordered a carriage and issued
forth, arrayed in a miraculous putty-coloured gown. Near Blackfriars
Bridge she met the Prince, and the carriage was drawn up by the
pavement.
‘Good morning, Prince,’ she greeted him. ‘Are you mistaking this for
Hyde Park?’
He bowed and smiled.
‘I usually walk here in the mornings,’ he said.
‘You surprise me,’ she returned. ‘I thought I was the only person in
London who preferred the Embankment, with this view of the river, to the
dustiness of Hyde Park. I can’t imagine how it is that London will never
take exercise anywhere except in that ridiculous Park. Now, if they had
Central Park--’
‘I think the Embankment is the finest spot in all London,’ he said.
She leaned a little out of the landau, bringing her face nearer to his.
‘I do believe we are kindred spirits, you and I,’ she murmured; and
then, ‘Au revoir, Prince!’
‘One moment, Miss Racksole.’ His quick tones had a note of entreaty.
‘I am in a hurry,’ she fibbed; ‘I am not merely taking exercise this
morning. You have no idea how busy we are.’
‘Ah! then I will not trouble you. But I leave the Grand Babylon to-
night.’
‘Do you?’ she said. ‘Then will your Highness do me the honour of
lunching with me today in Father’s room? Father will be out--he is
having a day in the City with some stockbroking persons.’
‘I shall be charmed,’ said the Prince, and his face showed that he meant
it.
Nella drove off.
If the lunch was a success that result was due partly to Rocco, and
partly to Nella. The Prince said little beyond what the ordinary rules
of the conversational game demanded. His hostess talked much and talked
well, but she failed to rouse her guest. When they had had coffee he
took a rather formal leave of her.
‘Good-bye, Prince,’ she said, ‘but I thought--that is, no I didn’t.
Good-bye.’
‘You thought I wished to discuss something with you. I did; but I have
decided that I have no right to burden your mind with my affairs.’
‘But suppose--suppose I wish to be burdened?’
‘That is your good nature.’
‘Sit down,’ she said abruptly, ‘and tell me everything; mind,
everything. I adore secrets.’
Almost before he knew it he was talking to her, rapidly, eagerly.
‘Why should I weary you with my confidences?’ he said. ‘I don’t know, I
cannot tell; but I feel that I must. I feel that you will understand me
better than anyone else in the world. And yet why should you understand
me? Again, I don’t know. Miss Racksole, I will disclose to you the whole
trouble in a word. Prince Eugen, the hereditary Grand Duke of Posen, has
disappeared. Four days ago I was to have met him at Ostend. He had
affairs in London. He wished me to come with him. I sent Dimmock on in
front, and waited for Eugen. He did not arrive. I telegraphed back to
Cologne, his last stopping-place, and I learned that he had left there
in accordance with his programme; I learned also that he had passed
through Brussels. It must have been between Brussels and the railway
station at Ostend Quay that he disappeared. He was travelling with a
single equerry, and the equerry, too, has vanished. I need not explain
to you, Miss Racksole, that when a person of the importance of my nephew
contrives to get lost one must proceed cautiously. One cannot advertise
for him in the London Times. Such a disappearance must be kept secret.
The people at Posen and at Berlin believe that Eugen is in London, here,
at this hotel; or, rather, they did so believe. But this morning I
received a cypher telegram from--from His Majesty the Emperor, a very
peculiar telegram, asking when Eugen might be expected to return to
Posen, and requesting that he should go first to Berlin. That telegram
was addressed to myself. Now, if the Emperor thought that Eugen was
here, why should he have caused the telegram to be addressed to me? I
have hesitated for three days, but I can hesitate no longer. I must
myself go to the Emperor and acquaint him with the facts.’
‘I suppose you’ve just got to keep straight with him?’ Nella was on the
point of saying, but she checked herself and substituted, ‘The Emperor
is your chief, is he not? “First among equals”, you call him.’
‘His Majesty is our over-lord,’ said Aribert quietly.
‘Why do you not take immediate steps to inquire as to the whereabouts of
your Royal nephew?’ she asked simply. The affair seemed to her just then
so plain and straightforward.
‘Because one of two things may have happened. Either Eugen may have
been, in plain language, abducted, or he may have had his own reasons
for changing his programme and keeping in the background--out of reach
of telegraph and post and railways.’
‘What sort of reasons?’
‘Do not ask me. In the history of every family there are passages--’ He
stopped.
‘And what was Prince Eugen’s object in coming to London?’
Aribert hesitated.
‘Money,’ he said at length. ‘As a family we are very poor--poorer than
anyone in Berlin suspects.’
‘Prince Aribert,’ Nella said, ‘shall I tell you what I think?’ She
leaned back in her chair, and looked at him out of half-closed eyes. His
pale, thin, distinguished face held her gaze as if by some fascination.
There could be no mistaking this man for anything else but a Prince.
‘If you will,’ he said.
‘Prince Eugen is the victim of a plot.’
‘You think so?’
‘I am perfectly convinced of it.’
‘But why? What can be the object of a plot against him?’
‘That is a point of which you should know more than me,’ she remarked
drily.
‘Ah! Perhaps, perhaps,’ he said. ‘But, dear Miss Racksole, why are you
so sure?’
‘There are several reasons, and they are connected with Mr Dimmock. Did
you ever suspect, your Highness, that that poor young man was not
entirely loyal to you?’
‘He was absolutely loyal,’ said the Prince, with all the earnestness of
conviction.
‘A thousand pardons, but he was not.’
‘Miss Racksole, if any other than yourself made that assertion, I would-
-I would--’
‘Consign them to the deepest dungeon in Posen?’ she laughed, lightly.
‘Listen.’ And she told him of the incidents which had occurred in the
night preceding his arrival in the hotel.