The Stolen Statesman: Being the Story of a Hushed Up Mystery
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stout, pleasant-faced woman, whom he at once discoveredto be Millington's niece and housekeeper.
"My uncle is not very well this morning," she told him; "he suffers agood deal from asthma. But if you'll come into the parlour, I'll takeyour card in. He likes to see people when he can, for it's terriblydull down here."
A moment later she reappeared. "My uncle will be glad to see you, sir.I was afraid he was a bit too poorly, but a visitor brightens him up atonce. Please step this way."
Mr Millington was seated in a small room overlooking a somewhat roughand uncultivated piece of garden at the back. He was a bright-lookingold man, of small stature, with a wonderfully pink complexion, and smalltwinkling eyes. He was dressed in a nondescript sort of attire, a longfrock-coat, a skullcap, and a pair of carpet slippers.
"Sit down, sir, please," he said, in a voice that was cordial, if atrifle wheezy. "I see by your card you are from Scotland Yard--eh?What can I do for you?"
Smeaton went to the point at once.
"I heard of you from Morgan, of Grimmel and Grice. I went there to makea few inquiries, and he recommended me to you."
Mr Millington nodded his head.
"A very good fellow, Morgan; he always put as much business in my way ashe could."
"He directed me to you," Smeaton said, and he pulled out the envelopeand handed it to Millington. "This kind of cipher Mr Morgan tells mewas in great vogue between twenty and twenty-five years ago. He thinksthat you cut it. Will you kindly examine it, and tell me if yourecognise it as your handiwork?"
The answer came readily: "It's mine, sure enough."
"Good. The envelope itself is quite an ordinary one, as you see. Now,can you carry your mind back, and give me any particulars of thetransaction? Can you tell for whom those letters were cut, and whatthey stand for?"
Mr Millington put his hand to his forehead. "Let me think a moment,"he said in the quavering voice of old age. "Let me think for a moment,and something will come back to me. At my time of life it's a good wayto go back."
Smeaton waited in silence for some little time, and then it seemed theold man had struck some chord of memory.
Suddenly he sat upright in his easy-chair, and his eyes sparkled. "Itis coming back by degrees," he said in his thin, husky voice; "it iscoming back."
There was another pause, in which it seemed he was trying to arrange hisideas clearly. Then he spoke slowly but distinctly.
"I remember I had a lot of trouble over the job. The order was firstgiven to some stationers in the City, but the gentleman was so fussy andconfused in his instructions that they sent him down straight to me. Ithought I understood what he wanted, but I had to engrave it three timesbefore he was satisfied. That's why I happen to remember it so well."
"Now, do you remember, or did you ever know, the name of this fussyperson who was so hard to please?"
"I ought to remember it," said Millington plaintively. "It was not anuncommon name either; I should recall it in a moment if I heard it. Butit has escaped me."
Smeaton's face clouded. "That's unfortunate, but it may come back toyou presently. Proper names are the hardest things to remember as weget on in life."
Millington struggled for a little time longer with the ebbing tide ofreminiscence, but to no purpose.
Smeaton went on another tack.
"Did you bring away from your business any documents or memoranda thatwould throw light upon this particular transaction?"
The old man reflected for a little while.
"I'm afraid I was a very poor man of business, sir," he said at length."I made rough notes from time to time as I received and executed orders,but that was all. I trusted to my memory, which in those days was agood one."
"Have you any of those old note-books left?"
"Yes, I've got some of them upstairs in a couple of boxes which havenever been opened since I left the Clerkenwell Road. Would you like meto run through them? It would only mean half-a-day's work, or less."
"I should be infinitely obliged if you would, Mr Millington. I willrun down here about the same time to-morrow morning. Just one thingmore before I go. Were you acquainted with your customer's handwriting?Did you ever receive any letters from him?"
"He wrote me several times with regard to the work I did for him, but Ishouldn't be able to recognise his hand, even if I saw it."
Smeaton left, very much chagrined at the result of his visit.
Next morning he, however, presented himself at Beech Cottage.Millington received him with an apologetic air. He explained that hehad searched his note-books diligently, but he could find nothing thatreferred to the cipher letters, the two C's entwined, or the man who hadordered them.
"I've a notion," he said, when he had finished his rather ramblingstatement, "that the gentleman who gave the order came from Manchesteror Liverpool. But there I may be mixing it up with something else."
And Smeaton left, knowing that nothing more could be got out of him.The identity of the writer of the threatening letter had yet to bediscovered.
Another point had suddenly occurred to him. Was the man who had had thecipher engraved the actual writer of the letter? And the greatest pointof all was the whereabouts of the Stolen Statesman: was he dead, or washe still living?
Smeaton ascended in the lift to his room at Scotland Yard, where asurprise awaited him, in the shape of a telegram from Varney, handed inat a village five miles from Horsham, in Sussex, three hours before. Itread:
"Come down here at once. Something unexpected.--Varney."
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
THE ROOM OF SECRETS.
Smeaton at once hunted up the time-table. There was a fast train toHorsham in twenty minutes and he could just catch it.
He ordered a telegram to be despatched to Varney at the inn which he hadgiven as a rendezvous, stating the time at which he would arrive, andlater found the young man at the door, awaiting him.
"Thought I had better stop here till you arrived," he said as they shookhands, "otherwise I would have come to Horsham Station. But the ForestView people know me now, and I didn't want one of them to see me talkingto a stranger. They might put two and two together."
The two men ordered some refreshment, and adjourned to the snug littleparlour, which was empty.
"No fear of being disturbed here, Smeaton, at this time of day; I knowthe place well. There will be nobody near for hours, except a passingcarter for a glass of beer, and he won't disturb us."
"I was glad to have your wire," said the detective, "for I was beginningto get a bit anxious. For several hours now I have been on the track ofwhat I thought was a warm scent, only to find it a cold one. I'll tellyou about it when you have had your say."
Varney plunged at once into his narrative. And certainly the story hehad to tell was a very thrilling one. The main points were these.
Having been in the neighbourhood for some time, and being of agregarious disposition, he had picked up a few acquaintances, with whomhe indulged in an occasional chat when the opportunity offered.
All these people, he was sure, accepted his own explanation of hispresence there, and did not for a moment suspect in the _soi-disant_artist who rambled about with his sketching materials the youngjournalist so well-known in Fleet Street.
He had become acquainted with a local doctor, Mr Janson, a man a fewyears older than himself, who had bought a practice in the neighbourhoodquite recently. They had met, in the first instance, at the inn whereVarney was staying, the doctor having been called in by the landlady toprescribe for some trifling ailment from which she was suffering.
The two men had exchanged a few commonplace remarks, and bidden eachother good-bye. Next day Varney overtook him on the road, and theywalked into Horsham together. In the course of their journey a littlepersonal history was exchanged, of course utterly fictitious on the sideof the pretended artist.
From the casual conversation there emerged certain facts. Mr Jansonwas a man of considerable c
ulture, and of strong artistic leanings.More especially was he an ardent worshipper of the Old Masters. Forseveral years his annual holiday had been spent in Italy, for whichcountry, its galleries, and its associations he expressed the mostfervent admiration.
Varney, little knowing what was to come out of this chance acquaintance,soon established common grounds of interest. His mother had been anItalian, and he had spent ten years of his boyhood in that delightfulland. He could speak the language like a native. Janson, who was apoor linguist, expressed his envy of the other's accomplishment.
"I can read any Italian book you put before me, and I can make themunderstand what I want," he had told Varney. "But when they talk to me,I am lost. I can't catch the words, because the accent