The Man of Dangerous Secrets

by Maxwell March

  Jennifer stood very close to him.

  He suddenly bent forward and, taking her in his arms, kissed her lips. He felt her stiffen for a moment, and then she sighed, an intoxicating little sound of surrender.

  Before either of them could speak, voices sounded outside the door, and the next moment it was thrown open and they had just time to spring apart before Sir Henry, followed by the two inspectors, came into the room.

  The old man was flushed. There were an unusual brightness in his eyes and a nervousness about his walk and gestures which might have passed for the ordinary mannerisms of a different man, but which on his part were clearly, Robin reflected, the outcome of extreme nervous tension.

  He nodded to Robin graciously enough, however, and shot an almost pathetic smile at his daughter.

  “Well, my dear,” he said with forced joviality, “here are Inspectors Whybrow and Mowbray to see you. They haven’t come to arrest us, yet.”

  He laughed at his own heavy joke, and the girl, shaken from her recent emotional experience and naturally unnerved a little by the sudden appearance of the two Yard men, bowed to them stiffly, a faint, scared little smile on her lips.

  Inspector Mowbray took the lead.

  “We haven’t much to ask you, Miss Fern,” he said. “Just one or two formal questions. How well did you know Mr. Tony Bellew?”

  “I knew him very well,” she said stiffly. “He was one of a party of us who spent a holiday on the Riviera. We all came back together a few days ago.”

  “You were not engaged to him?”

  “Certainly not. I—I’m engaged to Mr. Grey.”

  “Oh, yes, so I see.” Mowbray looked a little discomfited. “Well, then, I think that’ll be all for the present. Oh, by the way, there’s one other thing. On Waterloo Station when the boat train came in from the south, Mr. Bellew had an accident and all but lost his life on the electric rails. Isn’t that so?”

  She nodded, the old scared expression returning to her eyes.

  The inspector said slowly: “You’re sure it was an accident, Miss Fern? I mean,” he went on ponderously, “you had no reason for thinking there could be any foul play connected with his fall upon the suburban line?”

  “Why, no. I—I—” the girl lied with difficulty. “Robin could tell you better than I,” she went on. “It was he who saved him. Why, that was the first time I saw Robin——”

  She bit her lip as the fatal admission slipped out, and recovered herself awkwardly.

  “The first time I saw Robin after we came back,” she corrected herself.

  The lie served, but Robin, catching a glimpse of Sir Henry’s face, saw a half-wistful smile appear and vanish. It was as though he had been convinced of something which he had more than suspected already.

  The two inspectors remained stolid. There was nothing on their wooden faces to show how much of the story they believed, or how little.

  Mowbray flapped over the pages of his ragged book.

  “Thank you, Miss Fern,” he said. “Now, Sir Henry, there’s nothing you’d like to add to your statement, is there?”

  “Nothing at all, Inspector.” The old man seemed anxious to talk, however, for he went on: “I repeat I did go up to Tony Bellew’s flat yesterday, but I called just before lunch. I imagine about half-past twelve or a quarter to one, and not, as you seem to think, about four or half-past in the afternoon.”

  There was an unmistakable ring of truth in his voice, and while he was talking he seemed to have regained confidence.

  “I got no reply from the flat, so I came down again,” he went on. “I may have met the janitor on the stairs; I can’t remember. But certainly I carried no paper parcel. Frankly, Inspector,” he went on with a little grimace at Mowbray, “am I the sort of man to be seen carrying a bulky brown-paper parcel?”

  “No, sir, I can’t say you are,” said Mowbray, shaking his head gravely. “Still, we have to check up on everything, you know. There’s just one other thing, sir, while we’re on the subject: Had you any particular reason for going to call on Mr. Bellew?”

  Sir Henry took a deep breath. It was evident that he had been expecting this question.

  “Well, yes, as it happens I had. I didn’t see any reason for mentioning it until I was asked, and even now I shall expect you to regard the information confidentially. Young Bellew’s father is an old friend of mine, and when the boy came to London he told me to keep an eye on him. I’d heard one or two things about the youngster, don’t you know—nothing greatly to his discredit, but enough to make me feel that I’d take him out to lunch at my club and have a chat with him. As it happened, I had no engagement for lunch yesterday, so I went round to see if I could catch him. I was unlucky, and there you are. Now, poor young fellow, no advice of mine can help him.”

  Inspector Mowbray, who had been writing busily, glanced up.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said. “That’ll be all now. I’m sorry to have bothered you, but you understand, sir, in an affair of this sort every avenue must be explored.”

  “Oh, yes, that’s all right, Inspector.” Sir Henry smiled wearily at the man. “I’ve given you a detailed account of my movements during the afternoon. If you take the trouble to go around to my club—the Junior Greys, Pall Mall—I think you’ll be able to find someone there who’ll tell you that during the hours between three and five-thirty I was in the smokeroom. The doorkeeper will certainly have my name on the book. But I’ve told you that once already, haven’t I, in the other room?”

  Mowbray nodded again, and there was a pause which indicated quite plainly that the interview was at an end.

  Sir Henry turned to Robin.

  “Well, my boy,” he said, “I hear the dinner party last night was a great success.”

  This deliberate changing of the subject was so obvious that Robin felt in duty bound to respond to it.

  “Well, yes, I think so, sir,” he said. “I enjoyed it, for one. Which reminds me,” he went on, as the topic showed signs of flagging, “a Mr. Caithby Fisher, an interesting-looking man in a wheeled chair, invited me to go and see him at his office this afternoon. He hinted he had some proposition to make.”

  “Really?” drawled a voice from the background. “You’re a lucky young man, Mr. Grey. Let me congratulate you.”

  The little group turned to find Sir Ferdinand Shawle standing in the doorway.

  “I hope you don’t mind, Sir Henry,” he smiled. “I told your butler I’d find my way.”

  This strange, tall figure with its cadaverous face and cold, penetrating eyes brought an entirely new atmosphere into the room. Robin was aware of it instantly. Sir Henry was plainly apprehensive, while the inspectors became instantly on the alert.

  The newcomer went on, speaking lightly to Robin.

  “You’re certainly in luck, young man,” he said. “I can’t imagine any greater good fortune for a youngster who has to make his way in the world than to be taken up by Caithby Fisher. He is a strange personality, and his very name works like a charm in the City. I suppose he’s one of the greatest financial geniuses of our time.”

  “Really?” said Robin with just a touch of stiffness in his tone. “I had no idea. I shall certainly look forward to my interview.”

  Inspector Mowbray took a heavy step forward.

  “Well, I think we’ll go now, Sir Henry,” he said. “Thank you very much for all you’ve told us.”

  Whybrow laid a hand on Robin’s arm.

  “You’d better come along with us, my lad,” he murmured.

  There was authority in the whisper, and Robin signified his assent with a feeling of dismay. He had hoped to stay behind and catch at least a few words with the one girl in the world.

  He turned to look at her now and caught her unawares. She was smiling, a curious expression of secret understanding with someone on the other side of the room.

  He turned his head sharply, expecting to find her father signalling to her behind the inspector’s back. But what he did see
sent a thrill of horrified amazement down his spine.

  The man at whom Jennifer was smiling with that look of complete understanding, that expression that told more plainly than any words could have done of some mutual secret, and who was smiling back at her with just the same expression, was Sir Ferdinand Shawle.

  Robin walked out of the house between the two inspectors, his mind in a daze.

  CHAPTER 8

  Strange Meeting

  “THANK you. If you put me down here it will do very well.”

  The woman in the long fur coat and the tiny fashionable hat with the veil which half obscured her pale, still beautiful face, tapped on the window of the taxicab, and as the man drew up at the side of the crowded curb she stepped out on to the pavement with a half-frightened, half-shrewd glance about her.

  It was the heart of the City in the crowded lunch hour on a foggy November day, and the busy throng were much too interested in their own affairs to take much notice of this fashionably dressed woman who looked as though she had strayed out of Bond Street rather than a City office.

  Only the driver looked at her curiously as she slipped double his fare into his hand and sped off down a dark alleyway, always gloomy, but now almost lightless in the foggy atmosphere.

  Madame Julie pulled the collar of her fur coat so high round her face that only her eyes peering through her half-veil were visible to the casual passer-by.

  She walked swiftly, with the furtive speed of one who is desperately anxious not to be seen. No sneak thief escaping from the police could have moved more purposefully, more unobtrusively.

  She passed through the alley and turned down a side street where only the great blank walls of warehouses flanked the narrow thoroughfare. These gave place eventually to a row of houses, dingy, forgotten little City offices in which it seemed incredible that any business could still take place.

  Before the door of one of these she paused, and, with a swift glance to right and left to make certain that she was unobserved, stepped quickly into the narrow stuffy passage within.

  The place seemed to be deserted, but the woman was completely familiar with her surroundings. She hurried up a flight of stairs and pushed open a door on her left as she reached the first landing.

  She passed through another corridor, and, ignoring the rooms on either side, paused before a tiny door in the wall directly ahead of her.

  Here she knocked softly two or three times.

  It was opened immediately, and she stepped into the blackness beyond. The door closed behind her.

  It was a mysterious entrance, and the uninitiated might well have been afraid. But Madame Julie had come this way often enough before.

  She waited until the faint outlines of a huge figure showed dimly in the gloom before her and then followed it silently down a short staircase to yet another door.

  The man who led her thrust back the bolts and stood aside to let her pass. As the door swung open, a very different atmosphere met her nostrils. Here was scented warmth and elegance and the faint pleasing fragrance of cigar smoke.

  Madame Julie stepped into a big, brilliantly lit apartment whose walls were lined with glistening furniture and hung with choice prints. The carpet on which she trod was yielding, and her feet sank into it.

  The man who had admitted her closed the door behind him, and it swung perfectly into place, so that it appeared no more than part of the walnut panelling with which the room was lined. He surveyed her gravely.

  “If you will wait here a moment, Madame, the master will be with you in a moment.”

  She watched him striding out of the room, a magnificently proportioned figure with the shoulders of a giant and the grace of an athlete. It was typical of his master, she reflected, to employ such a man.

  She had not long to wait. Almost at once the rumbling of wheels sounded from the corridor without and the main door of the room was again thrown open to readmit the young giant, now propelling an invalid chair in which reposed the twisted body and shrewd face of Mr. Caithby Fisher.

  As soon as the cripple was in the room he turned on his attendant savagely and ordered him out as if he were a slave. The magnificent figure moved obediently, and the next moment Madame Julie faced the man alone.

  He sat for some moments smiling at her, and even her sophisticated calm became ruffled by the intensity and malignant humour in his eyes.

  “You sent for me?” she said at last.

  “Yes, Madame. Won’t you sit down?”

  The harsh, unpleasant voice was softened to a travesty, and the woman, who knew the symptom, trembled.

  She sat down in one of the big chairs by the roaring fire in the grate and regarded her host with as much calm as she could muster.

  The man in the wheeled chair came closer until his face was within a foot of her own.

  “Now, Madame,” he said, “have you anything to report?”

  She shook her head. “No,” she said faintly. “Nothing at all.”

  One skinny hand seized her own, and the gnarled fingers bit into her flesh with intentional cruelty in their grip.

  “You’re lying to me again.”

  The voice was still pleasant, but there was an underlying note of sheer savagery which made her shrink back from him, a huddled figure in her furs.

  “You think I am a fool,” he went on, the grip on her hand tightening until she could have cried out with pain. “But you are wrong. Why did you go to see Robin Grey last night? Ah, that surprises you, doesn’t it? Why did you buy two reservations for the Orestes? Don’t look so uncomfortable, Madame. I don’t imagine that you were trying to persuade this boy to elope with you. You tried to get him to take the girl away. You tried to persuade him to get married immediately, didn’t you? Didn’t you? If you were not so stupid, I should be very, very angry with you.”

  He threw her numbed, bruised hand down with a gesture and shot back in his wheeled chair until he was within some little distance of her on the other side of the hearthrug.

  “If you were not so stupid, Madame, you would be dangerous and I should have to get rid of you,” he continued. “As it is, I shall give you one more chance. Let me explain a little.”

  The woman stretched out a hand appealingly, and her lips opened as though she were about to speak. The terrifying figure in the invalid chair laughed.

  “Do not interrupt! Let me remind you: I placed you in Sir Ferdinand’s house not to interfere with matters which are too deep for you to fathom, but to collect information for me, information which would help both me and you. Now, how much do you know?”

  The woman cowered. Her big dark eyes filled with tears, and her lips trembled.

  “Nothing,” she said wretchedly. “Nothing. I am grateful for what you have done to help me.”

  He swept the words aside with an impatient gesture.

  “Speak the truth, or I shall expose you to Sir Ferdinand and you will be back where you started two years ago. Or perhaps you are not interested in the fate of——”

  “Don’t! You’re torturing me!”

  The words broke from the woman explosively. She bent forward. Her face had become dark with passion, and her eyes were terrible in their anguished sincerity.

  “I think of him always. Always only of him. To secure his freedom I would do anything. I am where I am because of him. I would do anything—anything, I tell you. You know that.”

  Her voice trailed away, and the cripple sat looking at her, an indefinable expression on his twisted face.

  “Well, then,” he said at last, his voice adopting once again the unnatural softness which lent it so much power, “you must trust me implicitly. Remember, I am your only friend. How much do you know?”

  The last words were uttered in little more than a whisper.

  The woman looked round her helplessly. It was evident that she realized that she had nowhere else to turn. She was here alone in Mr. Fisher’s ancient house, one of the last of the great residences of the City. Her position seemed to he
r to be symbolical of her whole life.

  “I know,” she said softly, “very little, but in the two years I have worked for you I have realized that if Jennifer Fern marries, some sort of information will be released which will incriminate Sir Ferdinand himself. Don’t you see,” she went on with sudden ingenuousness born of her despair, “it seemed to me that these two young people are in love and that if they married Sir Ferdinand would fall? And if he fell, surely the whole story of that terrible business ten years ago might come out. Then, surely, Jim would be released.”

  The cripple echoed her words. “Might come out? Might? You must be very desperate if you are catching at straws. Don’t you see, you pathetic fool, if Sir Ferdinand is exposed before I am ready, your only hope of saving your husband will be gone for ever? You must be patient. You must trust me. Fortunately young Grey treated your extravagant proposal with the contempt it deserved. What else do you know?”

  The woman shot a penetrating glance at him beneath her lashes.

  “Nothing.”

  “Is that the whole substance of your conversation with Robin Grey last night?”

  An inflection in his tone told her that he was ignorant of the final warning she had given the boy. She took the risk.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  To her intense relief the cripple seemed satisfied.

  “Very well, then. You have been indiscreet, Madame, dangerously indiscreet. But on this occasion, because you are useful to me, I shall overlook it. Now, what report?”

  The woman glanced furtively over her shoulder as if she feared that even in this windowless sanctuary she might be overheard.

  “There is very little. Life has been going on much as usual. Sir Ferdinand is an inscrutable person. He never seems to lose his temper, never seems to show any sign of nerves. It is only in the things he does that one can gather what is going on in that strange, cold mind of his.”