They return at evening A book of ghost stories
Mr. Clinton had returned from abroad. A little later he got a Sloane
number and arranged to lunch with Mr. Solan at the United Universities
Club. And then he made a conscientious effort to estimate the chances
in Rex v. Tipwinkle.
But soon he was restless and pacing the room. He could not exorcise the
jeering demon which told him sniggeringly that he had failed Philip. It
wasn’t true, but it pricked and penetrated. But the game was not yet
played out. If he had failed to save he might still avenge. He would
see what Mr. Solan had to say.
That personage was awaiting him in the smoking room. Mr. Solan was
an original and looked it. Just five feet and two inches--a tiny
body, a mighty head with a dominating forehead studded with a pair
of thrusting frontal lobes. All this covered with a thick, greying
thatch. Veiled, restless little eyes, a perky, tilted, little nose and
a very thin-lipped, fighting mouth from which issued the most curious,
resonant, high and piercing voice. This is a rough and ready sketch
of one who is universally accepted to be the greatest living Oriental
Scholar--a mystic--once upon a time a Senior Wrangler, a philosopher of
European repute, a great and fascinating personality, who lived alone,
save for a brace of tortoise-shell cats and a housekeeper, in Chester
Terrace, Sloane Square. About every six years he published a masterly
treatise on one of his special subjects; otherwise he kept himself to
himself with the remorseless determination he brought to bear upon any
subject which he considered worth serious consideration, such as the
Chess Game, the works of Bach, the paintings of Van Gogh, the poems of
Housman, and the short stories of P. G. Wodehouse and Austin Freeman.
He entirely approved of Bellamy, who had once secured him substantial
damages in a copyright case. The damages had gone to the Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
“And what can I do for you, my dear Bellamy?” he piped, when they were
seated.
“First of all, have you ever heard of a person called Oscar Clinton?
Secondly, do you know anything of the practice of sending an enemy a
painted paper pattern?”
Mr. Solan smiled slightly at the first question, and ceased to smile
when he heard the second.
“Yes,” he said, “I have heard of both, and I advise you to have nothing
whatsoever to do with either.”
“Unfortunately,” replied Bellamy, “I have already had to do with both.
Two nights ago my best friend died--rather suddenly. Presently I
will tell you how he died. But first of all, tell me something about
Clinton.”
“It is characteristic of him that you know so little about him,”
replied Mr. Solan, “for although he is one of the most dangerous and
intellectually powerful men in the world he gets very little publicity
nowadays. Most of the much-advertised Naughty Boys of the Nineties
harmed no one but themselves--they merely canonised their own and
each other’s dirty linen, but Clinton was in a class by himself. He
was--and no doubt still is--an accomplished corrupter, and he took,
and no doubt still takes, a jocund delight in his hobby. Eventually
he left England--by request--and went out East. He spent some years
in a Tibetan Monastery, and then some other years in less reputable
places--his career is detailed very fully in a file in my study--and
then he applied his truly mighty mind to what I may loosely call
magic--for what I loosely call magic, my dear Bellamy, most certainly
exists. Clinton is highly psychic, with great natural hypnotic power.
He then joined an esoteric and little-known sect--Satanists--of which
he eventually became High Priest. And then he returned to what we call
civilisation, and has since been ‘moved on’ by the Civil Powers of many
countries, for his forte is the extraction of money from credulous and
timid individuals--usually female--by methods highly ingenious and
peculiarly his own. It is a boast of his that he has never yet missed
his revenge. He ought to be stamped out with the brusque ruthlessness
meted out to a spreading fire in a Californian forest.
“Well, there is a short inadequate sketch of Oscar Clinton, and now
about these paper patterns.”
* * * * *
Two hours later Bellamy got up to leave. “I can lend you a good many of
his books,” said Mr. Solan, “and you can get the rest at Lilley’s. Come
to me from four till six on Wednesdays and Fridays, and I’ll teach you
all I think essential. Meanwhile, I will have a watch kept upon him,
but I want you, my dear Bellamy, to do nothing decisive till you are
qualified. It would be a pity if the Bar were to be deprived of your
great gifts prematurely.”
“Many thanks,” said Bellamy. “I have now placed myself in your hands,
and I’m in this thing till the end--some end or other.”
Mr. Plank, Bellamy’s clerk, had no superior in his profession, one
which is the most searching test of character and adaptability. Not one
of the devious and manifold tricks of his trade was unpractised by him,
and his income was £1,250 per annum, a fact which the Inland Revenue
Authorities strongly suspected but were quite unable to establish.
He liked Mr. Bellamy, personally well enough, financially very much
indeed. It was not surprising, therefore, that many seismic recording
instruments registered sharp shocks at four p.m. on June 12th, 192-, a
disturbance caused by the precipitous descent of Mr. Plank’s jaw when
Mr. Bellamy instructed him to accept no more briefs for him for the
next three months. “But,” continued that gentleman, “here is a cheque
which will, I trust, reconcile you to the fact.”
Mr. Plank scrutinised the numerals and was reconciled.
“Taking a holiday, sir?” he asked.
“I rather doubt it,” replied Bellamy. “But you might suggest to any
inquisitive enquirers that that is the explanation.”
“I understand, sir.”
From then till midnight, with one short pause, Bellamy was occupied
with a pile of exotically bound volumes. Occasionally he made a note on
his writing pad. When his clock struck twelve he went to bed and read
_The Wallet of Kai-Lung_ till he felt sleepy enough to turn out the
light.
At eight o’clock the next morning he was busy once more with an
exotically bound book, and making an occasional note on his writing
pad.
Three weeks later he was bidding a temporary farewell to Mr. Solan,
who remarked, “I think you’ll do now. You are an apt pupil; pleading
has given you a command of convincing bluff, and you have sufficient
psychic insight to make it possible for you to succeed. Go forth and
prosper! At all times I shall be fighting for you. He will be there at
nine to-night.”
At a quarter past that hour Bellamy was asking the door-keeper of the
Chorazin Club to tell Mr. Clinton that a Mr. Bellamy wished to see him.
Two minutes later the official reappeared and led him downstairs
into an ornate and gaudy cellar decorated with violence and
indiscretion--the work, he discovered later, of a neglected genius who
had died of neglected cirrhosis of the liver. He was led up to a table
in the corner, where someone was sitting alone.
Bellamy’s first impression of Oscar Clinton remained vividly with him
till his death. As he got up to greet him he could see that he was
physically gigantic--six foot five at least, with a massive torso--the
build of a champion wrestler. Topping it was a huge, square, domed
head. He had a white yet mottled face, thick, tense lips, the lower one
protruding fantastically. His hair was clipped close, save for one
twisted and oiled lock which curved down to meet his eyebrows. But what
impressed Bellamy most was a pair of the hardest, most penetrating and
merciless eyes--one of which seemed soaking wet and dripping slowly.
Bellamy “braced his belt about him”--he was in the presence of a power.
“Well, sir,” said Clinton in a beautifully musical voice with a slight
drawl, “I presume you are connected with Scotland Yard. What can I do
for you?”
“No,” replied Bellamy, forcing a smile, “I’m in no way connected with
that valuable institution.”
“Forgive the suggestion,” said Clinton, “but during a somewhat
adventurous career I have received so many unheralded visits from more
or less polite police officials. What, then, is your business?”
“I haven’t any, really,” said Bellamy. “It’s simply that I have long
been a devoted admirer of your work, the greatest imaginative work of
our time in my opinion. A friend of mine mentioned casually that he
had seen you going into this Club, and I could not resist taking the
liberty of forcing, just for a moment, my company upon you.”
Clinton stared at him, and seemed not quite at his ease.
“You interest me,” he said at length. “I’ll tell you why. Usually I
know decisively by certain methods of my own whether a person I meet
comes as an enemy or a friend. These tests have failed in your case,
and this, as I say, interests me. It suggests things to me. Have you
been in the East?”
“No,” said Bellamy.
“And made no study of its mysteries?”
“None whatever, but I can assure you I come merely as a most humble
admirer. Of course, I realise you have enemies--all great men have; it
is the privilege and penalty of their pre-eminence, and I know you to
be a great man.”
“I fancy,” said Clinton, “that you are perplexed by the obstinate
humidity of my left eye. It is caused by the rather heavy injection of
heroin I took this afternoon. I may as well tell you I use all drugs,
but am the slave of none. I take heroin when I desire to contemplate.
But tell me--since you profess such an admiration for my books--which
of them most meets with your approval?”
“That’s a hard question,” replied Bellamy, “but _A Damsel with a
Dulcimer_ seems to me exquisite.”
Clinton smiled patronisingly.
“It has merits,” he said, “but is immature. I wrote it when I was
living with a Bedouin woman aged fourteen in Tunis. Bedouin women
have certain natural gifts”--and here he became remarkably obscene,
before returning to the subject of his works; “my own opinion is that I
reached my zenith in _The Songs of Hamdonna_. Hamdonna was a delightful
companion, the fruit of the raptures of an Italian gentleman and a
Persian lady. She had the most naturally--the most brilliantly vicious
mind of any woman I ever met. She required hardly any training. But she
was unfaithful to me, and died soon after.”
“The Songs are marvellous,” said Bellamy, and he began quoting from
them fluently.
Clinton listened intently. “You have a considerable gift for reciting
poetry,” he said. “May I offer you a drink? I was about to order one
for myself.”
“I’ll join you on one condition--that I may be allowed to pay for both
of them--to celebrate the occasion.”
“Just as you like,” said Clinton, tapping the table with his thumb,
which was adorned with a massive jade ring curiously carved. “I always
drink brandy after heroin, but you order what you please.”
It may have been the whisky, it may have been the pressing nervous
strain or a combination of both, which caused Bellamy now to regard the
mural decorations with a much modified sang-froid. Those distorted and
tortured patches of flat colour, how subtly suggestive they were of
something sniggeringly evil!
“I gave Valin the subject for those panels,” said Clinton. “They are
meant to represent an impression of the stages in the Black Mass,
but he drank away his original inspiration, and they fail to do that
majestic ceremony justice.”
Bellamy flinched at having his thoughts so easily read.
“I was thinking the same thing,” he replied; “that unfortunate cat
they’re slaughtering deserved a less ludicrous memorial to its fate.”
Clinton looked at him sharply and sponged his oozing eye.
“I have made these rather flamboyant references to my habits purposely.