The Thirty-Nine Steps rh-1

by John Buchan

  A fisherman, came up from the water-side, and as he neared me he too began to whistle. The tune was infectious, for he followed my suit. He was a huge man in untidy old flannels and a wide-brimmed hat, with a canvas bag slung on his shoulder. He nodded to me, and I thought I had never seen a shrewder or better-tempered face. He leaned his delicate ten-foot split-cane rod against the bridge, and looked with me at the water.

  “Clear, isn’t it?” he said pleasantly. “I back our Kennet any day against the Test. Look at that big fellow. Four pounds if he’s an ounce. But the evening rise is over and you can’t tempt ’em.”

  “I don’t see him,” said I.

  “Look! There! A yard from the reeds just above that stickle.”

  “I’ve got him now. You might swear he was a black stone.”

  “So,” he said, and whistled another bar of “Annie Laurie.”

  “Twisdon’s the name, isn’t it?” he said over his shoulder, his eyes still fixed on the stream.

  “No,” I said. “I mean to say, Yes.” I had forgotten all about my alias.

  “It’s a wise conspirator that knows his own name,” he observed, grinning broadly at a moorhen that emerged from the bridge’s shadow.

  I stood up and looked at him, at the square, cleft jaw and broad, lined brow and the firm folds of cheek, and began to think that here at last was an ally worth having. His whimsical blue eyes seemed to go very deep.

  Suddenly he frowned. “I call it disgraceful,” he said, raising his voice. “Disgraceful that an able-bodied man like you should dare to beg. You can get a meal from my kitchen, but you’ll get no money from me.”

  A dog-cart was passing, driven by a young man who raised his whip to salute the fisherman. When he had gone, he picked up his rod.

  “That’s my house,” he said, pointing to a white gate a hundred yards on. “Wait five minutes and then go round to the back door.” And with that he left me.

  I did as I was bidden. I found a pretty cottage with a lawn running down to the stream, and a perfect jungle of guelder-rose and lilac flanking the path. The back door stood open, and a grave butler was awaiting me.

  “Come this way, sir,” he said, and he led me along a passage and up a back staircase to a pleasant bedroom looking towards the river. There I found a complete outfit laid out for me—dress clothes with all the fixings, a brown flannel suit, shirts, collars, ties, shaving things and hair-brushes, even a pair of patent shoes.

  “Sir Walter thought as how Mr Reggie’s things would fit you, sir,” said the butler. “He keeps some clothes ’ere, for he comes regular on the week-ends. There’s a bathroom next door, and I’ve prepared a ’ot bath. Dinner in ’alf an hour, sir. You’ll ’ear the gong.”

  The grave being withdrew, and I sat down in a chintz-covered easy-chair and gaped. It was like a pantomime to come suddenly out of beggardom into this orderly comfort. Obviously Sir Walter believed in me, though why he did I could not guess. I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a wild, haggard brown fellow, with a fortnight’s ragged beard, and dust in ears and eyes, collarless, vulgarly shirred, with shapeless old tweed clothes, and boots that had not been cleaned for the better part of a month. I made a fine tramp and a fair drover; and here I was ushered by a prim butler into this temple of gracious ease. And the best of it was that they did not even know my name.

  I resolved not to puzzle my head, but to take the gifts the gods had provided. I shaved and bathed luxuriously, and got into the dress clothes and clean crackling shirt, which fitted me not so badly. By the time I had finished the looking-glass showed a not unpersonable young man.

  Sir Walter awaited me in a dusky dining-room where a little round table was lit with silver candles. The sight of him—so respectable and established and secure, the embodiment of law and government and all the conventions—took me aback and made me feel an interloper. He couldn’t know the truth about me, or he wouldn’t treat me like this. I simply could not accept his hospitality on false pretences.

  “I’m more obliged to you than I can say, but I’m bound to make things clear,” I said. “I’m an innocent man, but I’m wanted by the police. I’ve got to tell you this, and I won’t be surprised if you kick me out.”

  He smiled. “That’s all right. Don’t let that interfere with your appetite. We can talk about these things after dinner.”

  I never ate a meal with greater relish, for I had had nothing all day but railway sandwiches. Sir Walter did me proud, for we drank a good champagne and had some uncommon fine port afterwards. It made me almost hysterical to be sitting there, waited on by a footman and a sleek butler, and remember that I had been living for three weeks like a brigand, with every man’s hand against me. I told Sir Walter about tiger-fish in the Zambesi that bite off your fingers if you give them a chance, and we discussed sport up and down the globe, for he had hunted a bit in his day.

  We went to his study for coffee, a jolly room full of books and trophies and untidiness and comfort. I made up my mind that if ever I got rid of this business and had a house of my own I would create just such a room. Then when the coffee-cups were cleared away, and we had got our cigars alight, my host swung his long legs over the side of his chair and bade me get started with my yarn.

  “I’ve obeyed Harry’s instructions,” he said, “and the bribe he offered me was that you would tell me something to wake me up. I’m ready, Mr Hannay.”

  I noticed with a start that he called me by my proper name.

  I began at the very beginning. I told of my boredom in London, and the night I had come back to find Scudder gibbering on my doorstep. I told him all Scudder had told me about Karolides and the Foreign Office conference, and that made him purse his lips and grin. Then I got to the murder, and he grew solemn again. He heard all about the milkman and my time in Galloway, and my deciphering Scudder’s notes at the inn.

  “You’ve got them here?” he asked sharply, and drew a long breath when I whipped the little book from my pocket.

  I said nothing of the contents. Then I described my meeting with Sir Harry, and the speeches at the hall. At that he laughed uproariously.

  “Harry talked dashed nonsense, did he? I quite believe it. He’s as good a chap as ever breathed, but his idiot of an uncle has stuffed his head with maggots. Go on, Mr Hannay.”

  My day as roadman excited him a bit. He made me describe the two fellows in the car very closely, and seemed to be raking back in his memory. He grew merry again when he heard of the fate of that ass Jopley.

  But the old man in the moorland house solemnized him. Again I had to describe every detail of his appearance.

  “Bland and bald-headed and hooded his eyes like a bird . . . He sounds a sinister wild-fowl! And you dynamited his hermitage, after he had saved you from the police. Spirited piece of work, that!”

  Presently I reached the end of my wanderings. He got up slowly, and looked down at me from the hearthrug.

  “You may dismiss the police from your mind,” he said. “You’re in no danger from the law of this land.”

  “Great Scot!” I cried. “Have they got the murderer?”

  “No. But for the last fortnight they have dropped you from the list of possibles.”

  “Why?” I asked in amazement.

  “Principally because I received a letter from Scudder. I knew something of the man, and he did several jobs for me. He was half crank, half genius, but he was wholly honest. The trouble about him was his partiality for playing a lone hand. That made him pretty well useless in any Secret Service—a pity, for he had uncommon gifts. I think he was the bravest man in the world, for he was always shivering with fright, and yet nothing would choke him off. I had a letter from him on the 31st of May.”

  “But he had been dead a week by then.”

  “The letter was written and posted on the 23rd. He evidently did not anticipate an immediate decease. His communications usually took a week to reach me, for they were sent under cover to Spain and then to Newcastle. He had a ma
nia, you know, for concealing his tracks.”

  “What did he say?” I stammered.

  “Nothing. Merely that he was in danger, but had found shelter with a good friend, and that I would hear from him before the 15th of June. He gave me no address, but said he was living near Portland Place. I think his object was to clear you if anything happened. When I got it I went to Scotland Yard, went over the details of the inquest, and concluded that you were the friend. We made inquiries about you, Mr Hannay, and found you were respectable. I thought I knew the motives for your disappearance—not only the police, the other one too—and when I got Harry’s scrawl I guessed at the rest. I have been expecting you any time this past week.”

  You can imagine what a load this took off my mind. I felt a free man once more, for I was now up against my country’s enemies only, and not my country’s law.

  “Now let us have the little note-book,” said Sir Waiter.

  It took us a good hour to work through it. I explained the cipher, and he was jolly quick at picking it up. He attended my reading of it on several points, but I had been fairly correct on the whole. His face was very grave before he had finished, and he sat silent for a while.

  “I don’t know what to make of it,” he said at last. “He is right about one thing—what is going to happen the day after to-morrow. How the devil can it have got known? That is ugly enough in itself. But all this about war and the Black Stone,—it reads like some wild melodrama. If only I had more confidence in Scudder’s judgment. The trouble about him was that he was too romantic. He had the artistic temperament, and wanted a story to be better than God meant it to be. He had a lot of odd biases too. Jews, for example, made him see red. Jews and the high finance.

  “The Black Stone,” he repeated. “Der Schwarzestein. It’s like a penny novelette. And all this stuff about Karolides. That is the weak part of the tale, for I happen to know that the virtuous Karolides is likely to outlast us both. There is no State in Europe that wants him gone. Besides, he has just been playing up to Berlin and Vienna and giving my Chief some uneasy moments. No! Scudder has gone off the track there. Frankly, Hannay, I don’t believe that part of his story. There’s some nasty business afoot, and he found out too much and lost his life over it. But I am ready to take my oath that it is ordinary spy work. A certain great European Power makes a hobby of her spy system, and her methods are not too particular. Since she pays by piecework her blackguards are not likely to stick at a murder or two. They want our naval dispositions for their collection at the Marineamt; but they will be pigeon-holed—nothing more.”

  Just then the butler entered the room.

  “There’s a trunk call from London, Sir Walter. It’s Mr ’Eath, and he wants to speak to you personally.”

  My host went off to the telephone.

  He returned in five minutes with a whitish face. “I apologize to the shade of Scudder,” he said. “Karolides was shot dead this evening at a few minutes after seven.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Coming of the Black Stone

  I came down to breakfast next morning, after eight hours of blessed dreamless sleep, to find Sir Walter decoding a telegram in the midst of muffins and marmalade. His fresh rosiness of yesterday seemed a thought tarnished.

  “I had a busy hour on the telephone after you went to bed,” he said. “I got my Chief to speak to the First Lord and the Secretary for War, and they are bringing Royer over a day sooner. This wire clinches it. He will be in London at five. Odd that the code word for a Sous-chef d’État Major-Général should be ‘Porker.’ ”

  He directed me to the hot dishes and went on.

  “Not that I think it will do much good. If your friends were clever enough to find out the first arrangement, they are clever enough to discover the change. I would give my head to know where the leak is. We believed there were only five men in England who knew about Royer’s visit, and you may be certain there were fewer in France, for they manage these things better there.”

  While I ate he continued to talk, making me to my surprise a present of his full confidence.

  “Can the dispositions not be changed?” I asked.

  “They could,” he said. “But we want to avoid that if possible. They are the result of immense thought, and no alteration would be as good. Besides, on one or two points change is simply impossible. Still, something could be done, I suppose, if it were absolutely necessary. But you see the difficulty, Hannay. Our enemies are not going to be such fools as to pick Royer’s pocket or any childish game like that. They know that would mean a row and put us on our guard. Their aim is to get the details without any one of us knowing, so that Royer will go back to Paris in the belief that the whole business is still deadly secret. If they can’t do that they fail, for, once we suspect, they know that the whole thing must be altered.”

  “Then we must stick by the Frenchman’s side till he is home again,” I said. “If they thought they could get the information in Paris they would try there. It means that they have some deep scheme on foot in London which they reckon is going to win out.”

  “Royer dines with my Chief, and then comes to my house, where four people will see him—Whittaker from the Admiralty, myself, Sir Arthur Drew, and General Winstanley. The First Lord is ill, and has gone to Sherringham. At my house he will get a certain document from Whittaker, and after that he will be motored to Portsmouth, where a destroyer will take him to Havre. His journey is too important for the ordinary boat-train. He will never be left unattended for a moment till he is safe on French soil. The same with Whittaker till he meets Royer. That is the best we can do, and it’s hard to see how there can be any miscarriage. But I don’t mind admitting that I’m horribly nervous. This murder of Karolides will play the deuce in the chancelleries of Europe.”

  After breakfast he asked me if I could drive a car.

  “Well, you’ll be my chauffeur to-day and wear Hudson’s rig. You’re about his size. You have a hand in this business and we are taking no risks. There are desperate men against us, who will not respect the country retreat of an overworked official.”

  When I first came to London I had bought a car and amused myself with running about the south of England, so I knew something of the geography. I took Sir Walter to town by the Bath Road and made good going. It was a soft breathless June morning, with a promise of sultriness later, but it was delicious enough swinging through the little towns with their freshly watered streets, and past the summer gardens of the Thames Valley. I landed Sir Walter at his house in Queen Anne’s Gate punctually by half-past eleven. The butler was coming up by train with the luggage.

  The first thing he did was to take me round to Scotland Yard. There we saw a prim gentleman, with a clean-shaven, lawyer’s face.

  “I’ve brought you the Portland Place murderer,” was Sir Walter’s introduction.

  The reply was a wry smile. “It would have been a welcome present, Bullivant. This, I presume, is Mr Richard Hannay, who for some days greatly interested my department.”

  “Mr Hannay will interest it again. He has much to tell you, but not to-day. For certain grave reasons his tale must wait for twenty-four hours. Then, I can promise you, you will be entertained and possibly edified. I want you to assure Mr Hannay that he will suffer no further inconvenience.”

  This assurance was promptly given. “You can take up your life where you left off,” I was told. “Your flat, which probably you no longer wish to occupy, is waiting for you, and your man is still there. As you were never publicly accused, we considered that there was no need of a public exculpation. But on that, of course, you must please yourself.”

  “We may want your assistance later on, Macgillivray,” Sir Walter said as we left.

  Then he turned me loose.

  “Come and see me to-morrow, Hannay. I needn’t tell you to keep deadly quiet. If I were you I would go to bed, for you must have considerable arrears of sleep to overtake. You had better lie low, for if one of your Black Stone fr
iends saw you there might be trouble.”

  I felt curiously at a loose end. At first it was very pleasant to be a free man, able to go where I wanted without fearing anything. I had only been a month under the ban of the law, and it was quite enough for me. I went to the Savoy and ordered very carefully a very good luncheon, and then smoked the best cigar the house could provide. But I was still feeling nervous. When I saw anybody look at me in the lounge, I grew shy, and wondered if they were thinking about the murder.

  After that I took a taxi and drove miles away up into North London. I walked back through fields and lines of villas and terraces and then slums and mean streets, and it took me pretty nearly two hours. All the while my restlessness was growing worse. I felt that great things, tremendous things, were happening or about to happen, and I, who was the cog-wheel of the whole business, was out of it. Royer would be landing at Dover, Sir Walter would be making plans with the few people in England who were in the secret, and somewhere in the darkness the Black Stone would be working. I felt the sense of danger and impending calamity, and I had the curious feeling, too, that I alone could avert it, alone could grapple with it. But I was out of the game now. How could it be otherwise? It was not likely that Cabinet Ministers and Admiralty Lords and Generals would admit me to their councils.