The Symbol Seekers

by A. A. Glynn

  General Vavasour had stipulated that this meeting should be held as soon as possible after his representatives reached London. He wanted every minute of their time in London taken up with the work of promoting the league and organising its tasks for the future.

  Consulting the written schedule supplied by the general, they saw they were faced with an almost insurmountable set of duties. Furthermore, overshadowing all else, were the weighty burdens laid on their backs by occurrences after their arrival in England that were still unknown to the old warrior back in Georgia.

  They had to somehow find the unknown Mr. O, make every effort to recover the box then track down Ned Grandon and find out why he deserted his travelling companions, apparently to pursue some affair of his own.

  CHAPTER 4

  DISRUPTION ON THE HOO

  One thing Septimus Dacers found irksome in the unorthodox life he had chosen was the associated paperwork. If there was a private inquiry agent in London who could afford a secretary or even an office boy, Dacers had never heard of him. As a “one-man band”, he had to attend to his accounts and correspondence himself. None of it was particularly difficult or time consuming but Dacers had an active itch that made him want to be on the move rather than sitting at his desk, writing. One of his chores in the one-man band was the mailing of his own letters.

  This he quite enjoyed and he tried to accomplish it as early in the morning as he could, even before breakfast, It entailed walking along one side of the square to the busy road at the further end where there were shops and a pillar box, one of the stylish public postal boxes designed by Mr. Anthony Trollope, the novelist and Postal officer.

  As ardent a Londoner as Dr Johnson, he always found the streets fascinating as they came to vigorous life soon after dawn. The workers of both sexes and every age, shape and size, filled the square and surrounding streets, rushing to earn their daily bread. Dacers was grateful that the world of commerce did not claim him as a youth and shackle him to a tall counting house stool for a life of drudgery, such as was endured by so many of these earnestly hurrying people.

  His own immediate streets had not reached their full weight of pedestrian traffic as, carrying his few letters to be mailed, he turned out of his square and into the broader neighbouring street. He almost walked into a horse and rider standing still in the gutter. The horseman was tall and rangy with a thin face, hollow cheeks and eyes with an intense glow that warned Dacers of trouble.

  He was dressed in the style of an English country gentleman with a billycock hat, a Norfolk jacket and riding breeches and boots. The lower half of his face was covered with a thick, pointed black beard.

  Dacers, as a Victorian detective, working in a bearded age, had worn false whiskers in his time and he noted certain signs, including a whiff of the pungent gum that secured the beard, all showing it to be false. Curiously, the rider held his right arm behind his back.

  As Dacers drew a little closer to him, the horseman leaned forward and his face came near enough for Dacers to notice a large wart over his left eyebrow.

  ‘Are you Dacers?’ he asked.

  ‘I am,’ said Dacers.

  At once, the rider swung his arm from behind his back and the bright sunshine of the winter morning glinted off a long-barrelled revolver in his hand.

  He aimed it directly at Dacers who, instinctively ducked down and, in desperation, lunged out with both fists, smiting the horse in the ribs with some force, causing it to snort and rear its forelegs in the air at the very moment the rider fired. The weapon had been aimed point blank at Dacers but, with the pistol jerked off target, the bullet went spinning into the air.

  At the report, the horse plunged around nervously while the rider, holding his smoking gun, tried to control it with one hand. Then, a violent jerk from the animal unhorsed the rider and he was sent sprawling on the cobbles.

  Dacers, doubled up in the gutter, watched him scramble around then he became aware that a commotion had arisen along the street some distance behind the rider, Women screamed and several male voices shouted panicky warnings.

  ‘Hey! Clear the street!’

  ‘Watch out yonder!’

  ‘Get that horse out of the way!’

  Down the street, coming at gathering speed was one of the worst hazards of early morning in the streets of London: a cattle stampede. In many respects, the city still had a rural face and what would become inner suburbs were still villages or small towns with farms surrounding them. Every day, cattle and flocks of sheep were driven into central London to Smithfield and other markets. Quite frequently, there would be an entanglement of vehicles and animals on a principal street, causing exchanges of blistering language between carters, cabbies and drovers and frantic attempts to restore order by frustrated policemen.

  Worst of all was a stampede when some sudden noise frightened a herd of cattle or a flock of sheep. The creatures, already unnerved by being in the unfamiliar confines of a city, would run wild, mounting the pavements and knocking pedestrians over. Sheep were given to running in aimless, swirling circles all over the roadways and pavements.

  There was a full scale stampede building up down the road, beyond the point where the horseman had tried to shoot Dacers. Possibly panic caused by the report of the pistol sent the animals charging onward, towards the corner where the rider was trying to control his mount, Dacers was attempting to scoot back into the square where he resided to escape the hooves of the cattle, now spread out from pavement to pavement. At any second, one or more police officers would appear on the scene, a point clearly realised by the downed horseman now scrambling to his feet. He still had his weapon in his hand but he had no time to risk another shot at Dacers before the frenzied beasts were upon him.

  He came fully to his feet and, for an instant, stood as if paralysed full in the face of the charging creatures, staring at them as though hypnotised by them. Then he came to life and ran for the side of the street opposite Dacers. He progressed speedily though Dacers noticed that he had a lame foot which caused him to trail the toe of his boot along the ground with every step.

  Dacers, shaken and bewildered crouched in the gutter, still holding his unmailed letters. He suddenly saw red. A surge of uncontrollable fury came over him. He wanted to cross the street and get his hands on the man who had almost put a bullet into him. He crammed the letters into the pocket of his top-coat as he came to his feet and, paying no heed to the mass of animals now almost level with him, he ran across the face of the torrent of drumming hooves, rolling eyes and snorting nostrils.

  Mid-way across the road, he came to his senses and, with his heart in his mouth, realised the lunacy of charging directly under the noses of the frenzied creatures. Within the merest fragment of time, he would be pounded under their hooves. If he did not summon every breath in his lungs and pump his legs like pistons, he would never reach the opposite pavement which swam in his vision, seeming to be so far away as to be totally unattainable.

  Then, he was suddenly there and striving to jump on to the opposing kerb at which point he came into contact with the far fringe of the stampede.

  A panic stricken cow struck his side and sent him cannoning over the kerb and, going almost head over heels, he landed in a gasping heap on the far pavement.

  With the breath knocked out of his lungs, he lay spreadeagled on the paving, acutely aware of the roiling sea of animal flesh and horns charging along only inches from his head. Summoning all his strength, he rolled close to the buildings on the inner side of the pavement and managed to sit up. He looked around for some sign of the limping horseman, but could not see him. He must been nearly as shaken as Dacers because of his own encounter with the runaway beasts but, in spite of his lame foot, he must have made off into the tangle of smaller streets lying beyond this side of the major street. There was a positive warren of them with associated alleyways and even a man with impaired movement would have no t
rouble in scooting into them and quickly getting out of sight.

  Snorting with disgust, Dacers found his feet, leaned against a wall and watched the last of the runaway beasts go past him, followed by a squad of running drovers, waving their sticks and bellowing hoarsely. The stampede seemed not to have attracted the attention of any constables for which Dacers was grateful. He did not want to face the ponderous questioning of the average beat peeler as to why he should be targeted by the rider whose shot sparked off the charge of the market-bound animals. If the police were to be brought into it, he’d attend to it in his own way in consultation with his trusted friend, Inspector Amos Twells, of Scotland Yard.

  As his nerves settled and his breathing became normal, he thought of venturing into the neighbouring side streets to search for the gunman but then he realised the limping man had too good a start on him and, by now, would have faded into obscurity. He thought of the man’s horse which, animal like, had probably caught the panic of the cattle and was swept into the stampede. If it was found, its trappings might reveal something of the rider’s identity but the efficiency of the man’s attempt at murder suggested that he would have taken precautions against that.

  Even as he thought of the shot that was fired at him, Dacers’ eye fell on an object lying on the pavement. It was the long-barrelled pistol which the would-be assassin had obviously dropped in his scramble to escape the charging animals. Picking it up quickly, he thought that if the attempt on his life did come under police scrutiny, the pistol could be an invaluable clue.

  The weapon was handsomely designed and, on a length of metal under the long barrel were the moulded letters: “Remington New Model Army Pattern 1858”. Then, on one of the hardwood facings of the butt, he found a set of faintly scratched letters. Most were difficult to read. A top line was totally undecipherable but it could have been a name. Below it was a worn scratch which had probably been a numeral and this was followed by blurred scratches decipherable as: “Georgia Volunteer Infantry.”

  So, once again, echoes of a faraway conflict that ended two years before were sounding in Dacers’ life.

  The blood-curdling incident of the murderous rider who seemed to be an orthodox English type from his billycock hat to his spurs had set his morning awry. He had never seen the man before although there was something about him that struck a chord of familiarity. Then he recalled that the man’s voice momentarily carried him back to his tangles with the confidence tricksters known as the Dixie Ghosts; it also reminded him of Roberta Van Trask whose accent bore witness to her time spent in Washington, so close to Virginia. For all his style as an English country gentleman, the fellow’s speech betrayed his origins. They were plainly in the Southern States of America.

  Dacers felt like a man tied up by knotty problems and when he tried to unfasten some of the knots, he constantly discovered that he was entangled in something to do with the tragedy of the American Civil War. Somebody wanted him dead—but who? It was clearly somebody connected with the Southern States. Of anyone from that region who had cause to want his assassination, the Dixie Ghosts, whose criminal schemes he had a major hand in wrecking, had the most obvious grudge—but they were all in prison. Perhaps there were more involved in it than the handful who came to England, although they were certainly leaders in the great swindle and the crafty little man who went by the name of Fortune was certainly its originator.

  The curious newspaper announcement which brought echoes of the Dixie Ghosts came to mind although there was nothing in it to suggest a direct link between the advertisers and the Dixie Ghosts. Nevertheless, it was odd that the mounted gunman, almost certainly from the Ghosts, should arrive just as the announcement showed up in the press.

  It was plain that the attempt on his life was well planned. Dacers realised that his address and habits must have been watched for some time. The bearded, armed horseman must have monitored his morning trips to the post box, probably from some distance along the street, to know where to place himself to ambush Dacers at the precise point at which he crossed the road every morning.

  Then there was the timing and style of his murder attempt. It was early morning on a crowded street where a shot was bound to be heard. Whoever fired it was sure to be noticed and his beard would be remembered. Very likely the horseman placed much confidence in both the beard and his smart countryman’s outfit. If he left Dacers a corpse in the gutter and made a speedy getaway to some readily prepared refuge, quickly changed his clothing and got rid of the beard he could appear as a working man, a clerk or anybody but the stylish, bearded rider who killed a man in a street crowded with witnesses.

  The audacious murder attempt was obviously coolly worked out. The man’s costume and style gave him a certain persona that he could shed like an actor stripping off the trappings of a part. So long as he remained in his saddle, his most noticeable characteristic, his toe-dragging limp, remained hidden. However, that subterfuge was blown when the stampeding chaos he caused by his shot unhorsed him.

  The Remington pistol, an American weapon, which had once been owned by someone in a Georgia regiment in the Civil War—possibly the gunman himself—heightened the emphasis of the Southern States in the riddle.

  Dacers could not shake off the feeling that the announcement in the newspaper was of some significance in the attack on his life and every throw of the dice brought up the Dixie Ghosts.

  The chilling indications were that the Dixie Ghosts were not done for, were hunting vengeance—and Septimus Dacers was in their sights.

  CHAPTER 5

  MISS VAN TRASK SHOWS HER METTLE

  Richard, Theodore Van Trask’s coachman, a large man who had once been a soldier, had a deft touch with the reins and he brought the family’s open brougham into the square, halted it outside Mrs. Slingsby’s address where he vacated his seat, stepped back to the door of the passenger compartment. He dutifully handed down Miss Roberta Van Trask, who was without her usual chaperone, Esther, and appeared to be as brisk and bright as the morning itself. She carried a large bag of raffia work.

  Richard accompanied her up the steps to the door of the house and yanked the bell-pull then stood back with soldierly dignity until the door was opened by Emma, the maidservant.

  ‘Miss Van Trask, calling on Mr. Dacers,’ he announced.

  Emma curtsied to Roberta. ‘Good morning, mum. Please come in,’ she said. After the visitor had entered and as she was closing the door, Emma said to Richard: ‘Coachman, please take your coach around to the mews and wait.’ She raised a hand to her lips and mimed someone drinking from a cup, conveying the message that he would receive some refreshment while waiting in the mews, the stable area at the rear of the house.

  ‘Thank you, Mary,’ he said, employing the name commonly used when addressing strange maidservants. Then he winked, betraying the waggish nature cloaked by his large frame and martial demeanour. Such exchanges were all part of the secret social lives lived by servants.

  Mrs. Slingsby came bustling out of the innards of the house, beamed at Roberta and thought there must be a strengthening of affection between the two when Miss Van Trask was calling on Septimus Dacers so early in the morning without the usual formality of prior notice.

  ‘Good morning, Miss Van Trask, you are very welcome,’ she said, with a curtsey.

  ‘Good morning, Mrs. Slingsby, Please excuse my lack of courtesy in calling without sending a prior card,’ said the visitor.

  ‘Don’t mention it. If I may say so, you brighten this drab old house every time you call.’ It was an apt comment for the American girl was looking particularly bright-eyed and was certainly elated, ‘Please take a seat in the reception room while Emma brings Mr. Dacers from upstairs.’

  Dacers found Roberta settled in the little reception room with the bag on her lap and was immediately aware of her high spirits. She looked as if she was concealing a great secret and could not wait to blurt it out.

/>   This was the morning after his encounter with the bearded gunman and he was concealing his own great secret. He had not told Mrs. Slingsby or Emma how the mounted man lay in wait for him for fear that they might be frightened of his returning to the vicinity of the house and putting them in danger.

  When he first met Theodore Van Trask to accompany him to Liverpool as bodyguard while investigating the secret building of Confederate ships for the war then raging, the US Embassy insisted that he carry a revolver, though British inquiry agents usually scorned firearms. When that assignment was ended, the Americans presented Dacers with the pistol and a small quantity of ammunition as souvenirs. On the night after the attempt on his life, he slept with the loaded weapon under his pillow and he resolved to go about his daily business armed since his life was no longer safe on the streets.

  This morning, sight of Roberta drove considerations such as assassination on the street from his mind.

  ‘Miss Van Trask, it is a joy to see you and in the very best of humours, too,’ he greeted. ‘I perceive the signs of spring are having a marked effect on you.’

  ‘Indeed they are and they are making me bold enough to claim that at least one member of the female gender—namely myself—can demonstrate her fitness to be a detective.’

  Dacers chuckled, remembering the morning a few days before when she effectively defeated him on that subject.

  Then, from her raffia bag, she drew a folded page taken from a newspaper. She handed it to him and he saw that it was the page from the issue of a few days before carrying the notice addressed to someone, or perhaps a body of people, under the initials, LUB. Sight of it brought back the feeling he had when he first spotted it—that it was somehow connected with the case of the Dixie Ghosts. Since then he had totally forgotten about the announcement until it returned to mind after the encounter with the mounted gunman.