CHAPTER THREE
THE SHADOW THAT LAY BEHIND
It had but just gone midnight when the car slowed down before the housein Clarges Street. Here in company with his faithful henchman, Dollops,and attended upon by an elderly housekeeper and a deaf-and-dumb maid ofall work, there dwelt--under the name and guise of "Captain HoratioBurbage," a superannuated seaman--that strange and original genius whochose to call himself "Hamilton Cleek," but who was known to the policeof two continents by the sobriquet of "The Man of the Forty Faces."
In the merest fraction of a minute Narkom was out of the limousine, hadcrossed the narrow pavement, mounted the three shallow steps, and wasstanding in the shadow of a pillared porch, punching a signal on thebutton of an electric bell. In all he could not have been kept waitingmore than a minute, but it seemed forty times that length when he atlast heard a bolt slip, and saw, in the gap of the open door, the figureof a slim, red-headed youth arrayed in a bed quilt, a suit of pinkflannelette pajamas, and a pair of white canvas tennis shoes.
"Come in, sir, come in quick!" this young man whispered, in thebroadest of Cockney accents, as he opened the door just wide enough forNarkom to sidle into the semi-dark passage.
"Where's your master, Dollops?" put in the superintendent. "Speak up! Ishe in? I've got to see him at once!"
The voice which answered came, not from Dollops, but from the dark topof the dim staircase.
"Come up, Mr. Narkom," it said. "I thought that young beggar had gone tobed ages ago and was just coming down myself to let you in. Come alongup. You know the way."
Narkom acted upon the invitation so promptly that he was up the stairsand in the cozy, curtained, and lamp-lit room which Cleek called his denalmost as quickly as his host himself. In fact, Cleek had scarcely timeto sweep into the drawer of his writing table a little pile of somethingwhich looked like a collection of odds and ends of jewellery, bits offaded ribbon, and time-stained letters, and turn the key upon them,before the police official was at the door.
"Hullo!" said Cleek in a tone of surprise and deep interest as thesuperintendent came fairly lurching into the room. "What's in the wind,Mr. Narkom? You look fairly bowled. Whisky and soda there--at yourelbow--help yourself. I presume it is a case--nothing else would bringyou here at this time and in such a state. What kind is it? And forwhom? Some friend of yours or for the Yard?"
"For both, I'm afraid," replied Narkom, pouring out a stiff peg ofwhisky and nervously gulping it down between words. "God knows I hope itmay be only for the Yard, but considering what I know----Get your hatand coat. Come with me at once, Cleek. It's a murder--a mystery afteryour own heart. Lennard's below with the limousine. Come quickly, do,there's a dear chap. I'll tell you all about it on the way. The thing'sonly just been done--within the hour--out Wimbledon way."
"I might have guessed that, Mr. Narkom, considering that you were tomingle duty with pleasure and spend the evening at Wimbledon with yourold friend, Sir Philip Clavering," replied Cleek, rising at once."Certainly I will go with you. Did you ever know the time when Iwouldn't do all that I could to help the best friend I everhad--yourself? And if it is, as you hint, likely to be in the interestof the friend of _my_ friend----"
"I'm not so sure of that, Cleek. God knows I hope it's a mistaken ideaof mine; but when you have heard, when you have seen, how abominablythings point to that dear boy of Clavering's and to the girl that deadfellow was conspiring with her father to take away from him----"
"Oho!" interjected Cleek, with a strong rising inflection. "So there isthat element in the case, eh?--love and a woman in distress! Give me aminute to throw a few things together and I am with you, my friend."
"Thanks, old chap, I knew I could rely upon you! But don't stop tobother about a disguise, Cleek, it's too dark for anybody to see that itisn't 'the Captain' that's going out; and besides, there's everything ofthat sort in the limousine, you know. The street is as dark as a pocket,and there's nobody likely to be on the watch at this hour."
The curious one-sided smile so characteristic of the man looped up thecorner of Cleek's mouth; his features seemed to writhe, a strange,indefinable change to come over them as he put into operation hispeculiar birth gift; and an instant later, but that he had not stirredone step and his clothing was still the same, one might have thoughtthat a totally different man was in the room.
"Will it matter _who_ watches?" he said, with just a suspicion of vanityover the achievement. "It will be--let us see--yes, a French gentlemanwhom we shall call 'Monsieur Georges de Lesparre' to-night, Mr. Narkom.A French gentleman with a penchant for investigating criminal affairs,and who comes to you with the strong recommendation of the Parisianpolice department. Now cut down to the limousine and wait for me, I'lljoin you presently. And, Mr. Narkom?"
"Yes, old chap?"
"As you go out, give Dollops directions where and how to get to thescene of the tragedy, and tell him to follow us in a taxi asexpeditiously as possible."
"Oh, Molly 'Awkins! There ain't no rest for the wicked and no feedin'for the 'ungry this side of Kensal Green--and precious little on theother!" sighed Dollops when he received this message. "Not four weeks itain't since I was drug off in the middle of my lunch to go Cingaleehuntin' in Soho for them bounders wot was after Lady Chepstow's 'SacredSon,' and now here I am pulled out of my blessed pajamas in the middleof the night to go 'Tickle Tootsying' in the bally fog at Wimbledon!Well, all right, sir. Where the gov'ner goes, I goes, bless his 'eart;so you can look for me as soon as I can get out of these Eytalianpants."
Narkom made no comment; merely went down and out to the waitinglimousine and took his seat in it, full of a racking, nervous impatiencethat was like a consuming fire; and there Cleek found him, ten minuteslater, when he jumped in with his kit bag and gave the signal which setLennard to speeding the car back on its way to the scene of themysterious tragedy.
"Pull down the blinds and turn up the light, Mr. Narkom, so I can make afew necessary changes on the way," he said, opening the locker andgroping round in the depths of it as the limousine scudded around thecorner and tore off up Picadilly. "You can give me the particulars ofthe case while I'm making up. Come on--let's have them. How did theaffair begin, and where?"
Narkom detailed the occurrences of the night with the utmost clearness,from the moment when the shot and the cry attracted Lennard's attentionto that when the ghastly discovery was made in the semi-ruined cottage.
"Oho!" said Cleek, with one of his curious smiles. "So our friend themysterious assassin disappeared in the middle of a sort of tunnel didhe--and with a man at either end? Hum-m-m! I see, I see!"
"Do you? Well, I'm blest if I do, then. There wasn't a place as big asyour hand to hide anything in, much less shelter a man; and the fellowwho could do a diabolical thing like that----"
"That is a question which simply remains to be seen," interposed Cleek."The thing is not so supernatural as it appears at first blush. Once--inthe days that lie behind me, when I was the hunted and not thehunter--in that old 'Vanishing Cracksman' time of mine, I myself didthat 'amazing disappearance' twice. Once in an alley in New York whenthere was a night watchman and a patrolman to be eluded; and once inParis when, with Margot's lot, I was being hunted into a trap whichwould have been the end of one of the biggest coups of my career had Ibeen nabbed that night."
"Margot?" repeated Narkom. "Yes, I remember the Queen of theApaches--the woman with whom you used to consort. Said she'd get evenwith you when you turned down the old life and took sides with the lawinstead of against it, I recollect. And you tell me that in those olddays you practised a trick such as this fellow did to-night?"
"Yes. Beat him at it--if you will pardon the conceit--for I vanished inthe middle of a narrow passage with a sergeant de ville chasing me atone end and a concierge accompanied by a cabman and a commissionaireracing in at the other, I always fancied that that trick was originalwith me. I know of no one but Margot and her crew who were aware of theexploit, and if any man has borrowed a leaf from t
he book of those oldtimes---- Oh, well, it will be the end of all your fears regarding anyfriend of ours, Mr. Narkom, for the fellow will stand convicted as amember of the criminal classes and, possibly, of Margot's crew. We shallknow the truth of that when we get to the scene of this mysteriousvanishment, my friend."
"Yes, but how was it done, Cleek? Where did he go? How did he elude thechasing keeper and the waiting constable? A man can't vanish into thinair, and I tell you there wasn't a place of any sort for him to hide in.Yet you speak of the trick as if it were easy."
"It _is_ easy, provided he had the same cause and adopted the same meansas I did, my friend. Wait until we come to investigate that railway archand you will see. Now tell me something, Mr. Narkom: How came you to bein the neighbourhood of Mulberry Lane at all to-night? It is nowherenear Clavering Close; and it was decidedly out of your way if, as youtell me, you were on the way back to town. It is peculiar that youshould have chosen to go out of your way like that."
"I didn't choose to do it. As a matter of fact I was executing acommission for Lady Clavering. It appears that a jewel had been found bythe maid-in-attendance lying upon the floor of the ladies' room, and asLady Clavering recollected seeing that jewel upon Miss Ailsa Lorne'sperson to-night, she asked me to stop at Wuthering Grange and return itto her."
"Ailsa Lorne!" A light flashed into Cleek's face as he repeated thename, and rising into his eyes, made them positively radiant. "AilsaLorne, Mr. Narkom? You surely do not mean to tell me that Ailsa Lorne isin Wimbledon?"
"Yes, certainly I do. My dear fellow, how the name seems to interestyou. But I remember: you know the lady, of course."
Know her? Know the woman whose eyes had lit the way back from those olddays of crime to the higher and the better things, the woman who hadbeen his redemption in this world, and would, perhaps, be his salvationin the one to come? Cleek's very soul sang hymns of glory at the barethought of her.
"I did not know Miss Lorne would be in Wimbledon," he said quietly, "oranywhere in the neighbourhood of London. I thought she had accepted atemporary position down in Suffolk as the companion of an old schoolfriend, Lady Katharine Fordham."
"So she did," replied Narkom. "And it is as that unhappy young lady'scompanion that she was at Clavering Close to-night. Lady Katharine, asyou doubtless know, is Lord St. Ulmer's only child."
"Lord St. Ulmer?" repeated Cleek, gathering up his brows thoughtfully."Hum-m-m! Ah-h-h! I seem to remember something about a Lord St. Ulmer.Let me see! Lost his wife when his daughter was a mere baby, didn't he,and took the loss so much to heart that he went out to Argentina andleft the girl to the care of an aunt? Yes, I recall it now. Story was inall the papers some months ago. Got hold of a silver mine out there;made a pot of money, and came home after something like fifteen years ofabsence; bought in the old family place, Ulmer Court, down in Suffolk,after it had been in the hands of strangers for a generation or two, andtook his daughter down there to live. That's the man, isn't it?"
"Yes, that's the man. He's worth something like half a million sterlingto-day--lucky beggar."
"Then why do you allude to his daughter and heiress as an 'unhappy younglady'? Surely with unlimited wealth at her command----"
"Which I dare say she would gladly give up to get back other things thatshe has lost," interposed Mr. Narkom. "Her hopes of becoming young GeoffClavering's wife for one!"
"Young Geoff Clavering? The chap whose coming of age was celebratedto-day?"
"Yes, the son and heir of my friend, Sir Philip Clavering, as fine a boyas ever stood in shoe leather. He and Lady Katharine have almost grownup together, as her uncle and aunt, General and Mrs. Raynor, are closeneighbours at Wuthering Grange. They were engaged at seventeen, aregular idyllic love match, old chap. Sir Philip and Lady Clavering wereimmensely fond of her and heartily approved the match. So apparently didher father, to whom she wrote, although she had not seen him since shewas a baby. Even when he returned to England with a fortune big enoughto warrant his daughter wedding a duke, he still appeared to approve ofthe engagement, and suggested that the wedding should be celebrated onthe young man's twenty-first birthday."
"Which, as to-day is that day, and you still speak of her as LadyKatharine Fordham, I presume did not take place?"
"No, it did not. Some three months ago, a certain Count de Louvisan, anAustrian, appeared on the scene, claiming acquaintance with St. Ulmer;and it seems that after a subsequent interview, Lord St. Ulmer informedhis daughter that her engagement with Geoff Clavering must come to anend, and that it was her father's intention that she should become thewife of Count de Louvisan."
"Oho!" said Cleek, in two different tones. "All of which goes to suggestthat the count had some hold over the old gentleman and was using it tofeather his own nest. Of course the girl couldn't be compelled to marrythe man against her will, so if she consented to the breaking of theengagement----Did she?"
"Yes."
"Then something must have been told her--something which was either alie or an appalling truth--to make her take a step like that, for awoman does not break with the man she loves unless something more thanlife is at stake. And it is this Count de Louvisan, you tell me, thathas been murdered? Hum-m-m!"
"Yes, the worst of it is," said Mr. Narkom gloomily, "there was a scenebetween him and young Clavering but a couple of hours before the murderwas discovered."
"What's that?" rapped out Cleek. "A 'scene'! A quarrel do you mean? Howand where? Or perhaps you don't know?"
"As it happens, I do," said Narkom, "for I happened to be at ClaveringClose when it took place. You see, Lord St. Ulmer is laid up with asprained ankle at Wuthering Grange, where he has been staying with hissister and brother-in-law, the Raynors. Lady Katharine seized theopportunity to say farewell to Geoff, and came over at about eighto'clock; and I hope, Cleek, I may never in my life again see anything soheartbreaking as was made those last few minutes of parting."
"Few? Why few, pray?"
"Because they had not been together half an hour when the Count deLouvisan came over, posthaste, after his fiancee. Lady Katharine'sabsence had been discovered from the Grange, and naturally he was theone who would come after her. You can guess what followed, Cleek. YoungClavering fairly flew at the fellow, and would have thrashed him butthat his father and I got hold of him, and Hammond and Petrie hustledthe count out of the room. But even so, nobody could prevent that wild,impetuous, excited boy from challenging the man, then and there. To thatthe count merely threw back a laugh and said, as Petrie and Hammondhustled him out of the room: 'Monsieur, one does not fight a fallenfoe--one merely pities him!' And it took all his father's strength andmine to hold the boy in check. 'Pity yourself if ever I meet you!' heshouted. 'There'll be one blackguard the less in the world if ever Icome within reach of you again, damn you! I had nine years of hope untilyou came, and I'll put a mark on you for every one of them that you'vespoilt!"
"'A mark'!" repeated Cleek, with some slight show of agitation. "A markfor every year? It is true that the barking dog is the last to bitebut---- What were those figures that you tell me were smeared on thedead man's shirt bosom--2-4-1-2, were they not? And that sum equalsnine!"
"Yes," said Narkom, with a sort of groan. "Just nine, Cleek, justexactly nine. That's what cut the heart out of me when I saw that deadman spiked to the cottage wall, bearing the very mark he had sworn thathe should bear."
"I see," murmured Cleek thoughtfully. "Of course, the wisest of men aresometimes mistaken, but somehow I took those numerals to stand for asign of a secret society; but, as you say, the numbers do indeed totalnine--the years of young Clavering's threat, but----"
His voice trailed off; he sat for a moment deep in thought.
"Then there is the 'spike,' that is an old Apache punishment. Theyspiked Lanisterre to the wall when he went over to the police. Which isit? The Apaches or this foolish, hot-headed boy lover?"
Narkom wisely refrained from comment. He knew the ways and methods ofhis famous ally only too well, and he
sat silent therefore till Lennardpulled up the limousine sharply in front of Gleer Cottage.
"Here we are at the cottage--unless you would like to see the archfirst?"
"Oh, no," Cleek smiled softly. "That part of the mystery, my friend, isquite simple. Lead the way, please."
They alighted without further remark, and Narkom was followed by ascomplete a specimen of a French dandy as could be found in Paris, fromthe gardens of the Tuileries to the benches of the Luxembourg.