“No doubt.” Duff smiled. “I’m sorry, Peter.”
“We’re all sorry, sir. We all feel it quite keenly. Henry!” He summoned a youngster of seventy who was feeling it keenly on a near-by bench. “Henry will take you wherever you wish to go, Inspector. If I may say so, it is most reassuring to have the inevitable investigation in such hands as yours.”
“Thanks,” Duff answered. “Has Inspector Hayley arrived?”
“He is above, sir, in the - in the room in question.”
Duff turned to Henry. “Please take these men up to room 28,” he said, indicating the photographer and the fingerprint man who had entered with him. “I should like a talk first with Mr. Kent, Peter. Don’t trouble - he’s in his office, I presume?”
“I believe he is, sir. You know the way.”
Kent, the managing director of Broome’s, was resplendent in morning coat, gray waistcoat and tie. A small pink rose adorned his left lapel. For all that, he appeared to be far from happy. Beside his desk sat a scholarly-looking, bearded man, wrapped in gloomy silence.
“Come in, Mr. Duff, come in,” the manager said, rising at once. “This is a bit of luck, our first this morning. To have you assigned here - that’s more than I hoped for. It’s a horrible mess, Inspector, a horrible mess. If you will keep it all as quiet as possible, I shall be eternally -“
“I know,” Duff cut in. “But unfortunately murder and publicity go hand in hand. I should like to learn who the murdered man was, when he got here, who was with him, and any other facts you can give me.”
“The chap’s name was Hugh Morris Drake,” answered Kent, “and he was registered from Detroit - a city in the States, I understand. He arrived on last Monday, the third, coming up from Southampton on a boat train after crossing from New York. With him were his daughter, a Mrs. Potter, also of Detroit, and his granddaughter. Her name - it escapes me for the moment.” He turned to the bearded man. “The young lady’s name, Doctor Lofton?”
“Pamela,” said the other, in a cold, hard voice.
“Ah, yes - Miss Pamela Potter. Oh, by the way, Doctor Lofton - may I present Inspector Duff, of Scotland Yard?” The two men bowed. Kent turned to Duff. “The doctor can tell you much more about the dead man than I can. About all the party, in fact. You see, he’s the conductor.”
“The conductor?” repeated Duff, puzzled.
“Yes, of course. The conductor of the tour,” Kent added.
“What tour? You mean this dead man was traveling in a party, with a courier?” Duff looked at the doctor.
“I should hardly call myself a courier,” Lofton replied. “Though in a way, of course I am. Evidently, Inspector, you have not heard of Lofton’s Round the World Tours, which I have been conducting for some fifteen years, in association with the Nomad Travel Company.”
“The information had escaped me,” Duff answered dryly. “So Mr. Hugh Morris Drake had embarked on a world cruise, under your direction -“
“If you will permit me,” interrupted Lofton, “it is not precisely a world cruise. That term is used only in connection with a large party traveling the entire distance aboard a single ship. My arrangements are quite different - various trains and many different ships - and comparatively a very small group.”
“What do you call a small group?” Duff inquired.
“This year there are only seventeen in the party,” Lofton told him. “That is - there were last night. Today, of course, there are but sixteen.”
Duff’s stout heart sank. “Plenty,” he commented. “Now, Doctor Lofton - by the way, are you a medical doctor?”
“Not at all. I am a doctor of philosophy. I hold a large number of degrees -“
“Ah, yes. Has there been any trouble on this tour before last night? Any incident that might lead you to suspect an enmity, a feud -“
“Absurd!” Lofton broke in. He got up and began to pace the floor. “There has been nothing, nothing. We had a very rough crossing from New York, and the members of the party have really seen very little of one another. They were all practically strangers when they arrived at this hotel last Monday. We have made a few excursions together since, but they are still - Look here, Inspector!” His calmness had vanished, and his face was flushed and excited beneath the beard. “This is a horrible position for me. My life work, which I have built up by fifteen years of effort - my reputation, my standing - everything is likely to be smashed by this. In heaven’s name, don’t begin with the idea that some member of the party killed Hugh Drake. It’s possible. Some sneak thief - some hotel servant -“
“I beg your pardon,” cried the manager hotly. “Look at my servants. They’ve been with us for years. No employee of this hotel is involved in any way. I’d stake my life on it.”
“Then some one from outside,” Lofton said. His tone was pleading. “I tell you it couldn’t have been any one in my group. My standards are high - the best people, always.” He laid his hand on Duff’s arm. “Pardon my excitement, Inspector. I know you’ll be fair. But this is a serious situation for me.”
“I know,” Duff nodded. “I’ll do all I can for you. But I must question the members of your party as soon as possible. Do you think you could get them together for me in one of the parlors of the hotel?”
“I’ll try,” Lofton replied. “Some of them may be out at the moment, but I’m certain they’ll all be in by ten o’clock. You see, we are taking the ten-forty-five from Victoria, to connect with the Dover-Calais boat.”
“You were taking the ten-forty-five from Victoria,” Duff corrected him.
“Ah, yes, of course we were leaving at that hour, I should have said. And now - what now, Inspector?”
“That’s rather difficult to say,” Duff answered. “We shall see. I’ll go upstairs, Mr. Kent, if I may.”
He did not wait for an answer, but went quickly out. A lift operator who was wont to boast of his great-grandchildren took him up to the third floor. In the doorway of room 28, he encountered Hayley.
“Oh, hello, Duff,” the man from Vine Street said. “Come in.”
Duff entered a large bedroom in which the odor of flashlight powder was strong. The room was furnished in such fashion that, had Queen Victoria entered with him, she would have taken off her bonnet and sat down in the nearest rocking-chair. She would have felt at home. The bed stood in an alcove at the rear, far from the windows. On it lay the body of a man well along in years - the late sixties, Duff guessed. It did not need the luggage strap, still bound about the thin throat of the dead man, to tell Duff that he had died by strangulation, and the detective’s keen eyes saw also that the body presented every evidence of a frantic and fruitless struggle. He stood for a moment looking down at his newest puzzle. Outside, the fog was lifting, and from the pavement below came the notes of Silver Threads among the Gold, played by one of the innumerable street orchestras that haunt this section of London.
“Divisional surgeon been here?” Duff inquired.
“Yes - he’s made his report and gone,” Hayley replied. “He tells me the chap’s been dead about four hours.”
Duff stepped forward and removed, with his handkerchief, the luggage strap, which he handed to the fingerprint man. Then he began a careful examination of all that was mortal of Mr. Hugh Morris Drake, of Detroit. He lifted the left arm, and bent back the clenched fingers of the hand. As he prepared to do the same with the right, an exclamation of interest escaped him. From between the lean stiff fingers something glittered - a link from a slender, platinum watch chain. Duff released the object the right hand was clutching, and it fell to the bed. Three links of the chain, and on the end, a small key.
Hayley came close, and together they studied the find as it lay on Duff’s handkerchief. On one side of the key was the number “3260” and on the other, the words: “Dietrich Safe and Lock Company, Canton, Ohio.” Duff glanced at the blank face on the pillow.
“Good old boy,” he remarked softly. “He tried to help us. Tore off the end of his assailant’
s watch-chain - and kept it, by gad.”
“That’s something,” Hayley commented.
Duff nodded. “Perhaps. But it begins to look too much American for my taste, old chap. I’m a London detective, myself.”
He knelt beside the bed for a closer examination of the floor. Some one entered the room, but Duff was for the moment too engrossed to look up. When he finally did so, what he saw caused him to leap to his feet, giving the knees of his trousers a hasty brush in passing. A slender and attractive American girl was standing there, looking at him with eyes which, he was not too busy to note, were something rather special in that line.
“Ah - er - good morning,” the detective said.
“Good morning,” the girl answered gravely. “I’m Pamela Potter, and Mr. Drake - was my grandfather. I presume you’re from Scotland Yard. Of course you’ll want to talk to one of the family.”
“Naturally,” Duff agreed. Very composed and sure of herself, this girl was, but there were traces of tears about those violet eyes. “Your mother, I believe, is also with this touring party?”
“Mother is prostrated,” the girl explained. “She may come round later. But just at present I am the only one who can face this thing. What can I tell you?”
“Can you think of any reason for this unhappy affair?”
The girl shook her head. “None whatever. It’s quite unbelievable, really. The kindest man in the world - not an enemy. It’s preposterous, you know.”
Up from Clarges Street came the loud strains of There’s a Long, Long Trail A-Winding. Duff turned to one of his men. “Shut that window,” he ordered sharply. “Your grandfather was prominent in the life of Detroit?” he added, to the girl. He spoke the name uncertainly, accenting the first syllable.
“Oh, yes - for many years. He was one of the first to go into the automobile business. He retired from the presidency of his company five years ago, but he kept a place on the board of directors. For the past few years he has been interested in charitable work - gave away hundreds of thousands. Everybody honored and respected him. Those who knew him loved him.”
“He was, I take it, a very wealthy man?”
“Of course.”
“And who -” Duff paused. “Pardon me, but it’s a routine question. Who will inherit his money?”
The girl stared at Duff. “Why, I hadn’t thought of that at all. But whatever isn’t left to charity will, I suppose, go to my mother.”
“And in time - to you?”
“To me and my brother. I fancy so. What of it?”
“Nothing, I imagine. When did you last see your grandfather? Alive, I mean.”
“Just after dinner, last evening. Mother and I were going to the theater, but he didn’t care to go. He was tired, he said, and besides he couldn’t, poor dear, enjoy a play.”
Duff nodded. “I understand. Your grandfather was deaf.”
The girl started. “How did you know - oh -” Her eyes followed those of the inspector to a table where an earphone, with a battery attached, was lying. Suddenly she burst into tears, but instantly regained her self-control. “Yes - that was his,” she added, and reached out her hand.
“Do not touch it, please,” Duff said quickly.
“Oh, I see. Of course not. He wore that constantly, but it didn’t help a lot. Last night he told us to go along, that he intended to retire early, as he expected to-day would be tiring - we were all starting for Paris, you know. We warned him not to oversleep - our rooms are on the floor below. He said he wouldn’t, that he had arranged with a waiter to wake him every morning just before eight. We were down in the lobby expecting him to join us for breakfast at eight-thirty, when the manager told us - what had happened.”
“Your mother was quite overcome?”
“Why not - such horrible news? She fainted, and I finally got her back to her room.”
“You did not faint?”
The girl looked at Duff with some contempt. “I don’t belong to a fainting generation. I was naturally terribly shocked.”
“Naturally. May I step out of character to say that I’m frightfully sorry?”
“Thank you. What else can I tell you?”
“Nothing now. I hope very much that you can arrange for me to see your mother a moment before I go. I must, you understand. But we will give her another hour or so. In the meantime, I am meeting the other members of your travel party in a parlor below. I won’t ask you to come -“
“Nonsense,” cried the girl. “Of course I’ll come. I’m no weakling, and besides, I want a good look at the members of this party. We haven’t had time to get acquainted - the trip across was rather trying. Yes, I’ll be there. This thing is too meaningless, too cruel. I shan’t rest until I know what is behind it. Anything I can do, Mr. -“
“Inspector Duff,” he answered. “I’m glad you feel that way. We’ll hunt the answer together, Miss Potter.”
“And we’ll find it,” she added. “We’ve got to.” For the first time she glanced at the bed. “He was so - so kind to me,” she said brokenly, and went quickly out.
Duff stood looking after her. “Rather a thoroughbred, isn’t she?” he commented to Hayley. “Amazing how many American girls are. Well, let’s see. What have we? A bit of chain and a key. Good as far as it goes.”
Hayley looked rather sheepish. “Duff, I have been an ass,” he said. “There was something else. The surgeon picked it up from the bed - it was lying beside the body. Just carelessly thrown there, evidently.”
“What?” Duff asked tersely.
“This.” Hayley handed over a small, worn-looking bag of wash leather, fastened at the top with a slip cord. It was heavy with some mysterious contents. Duff stepped to a bureau, unloosed the cord, and poured the contents out on the bureau top. For a time he stared, a puzzled frown on his face.
“What - what should you say, Hayley?”
“Pebbles,” Hayley remarked. “Little stones of various shapes and sizes. Some of them smooth - might have been picked up from a beach.” He flattened out the pile with his hand. “Worthless little pebbles, and nothing else.”
“A bit senseless, don’t you think?” murmured Duff. He turned to one of his men. “I say - just count these, and put them back in the bag.” As the officer set about his task, Duff sat down in an old-fashioned chair, and looked slowly about the room. “The case has its points,” he remarked.
“It has indeed,” Hayley answered.
“A harmless old man, making a pleasure trip around the world with his daughter and granddaughter, is strangled in a London hotel. A very deaf, gentle old soul, noted for his kindnesses and his benefactions. He rouses from sleep, struggles, gets hold of part of his assailant’s watch-chain. But his strength fails, the strap draws tighter, and the murderer, with one final gesture, throws on to the bed a silly bag of stones. What do you make of it, Hayley?”
“I’m rather puzzled, I must say.”
“So am I. But I’ve noted one or two things. You have too, no doubt?”
“I was never in your class, Duff.”
“Rot. Don’t be modest, old chap. You haven’t used your eyes, that’s all. If a man stood beside a bed, engaged in a mortal struggle with another man, his shoes would disturb the nap of the carpet to some extent. Especially if it were an old thick carpet such as this. There is no indication of any such roughing of the carpet, Haley.”
“No?”
“None whatever. And - take a look at the bed, if you please.”
“By Jove!” The eyes of the Vine Street man widened. “I see what you mean. It’s been slept in, of course, but -“
“Precisely. At the foot and at one side, the covers are still tucked into place. The whole impression is one of neatness and order. Was there a struggle to the death on that bed, Hayley?”
“I think not, Duff.”
“I’m sure there was not.” Duff gazed thoughtfully about him. “Yes - this was Drake’s room. His property is all about. His earphone is on the table. His clothes a
re on that chair. But something tells me that Hugh Morris Drake was murdered elsewhere.”
Chapter III
THE MAN WITH A WEAK HEART
After this surprising statement, Duff was silent for a moment, staring into space. Kent, the hotel manager, appeared in the doorway, his round face still harassed and worried.
“I thought perhaps I might be of some help here,” he remarked.
“Thank you,” Duff replied. “I should like to interview the person who first came upon this crime.”
“I rather thought you might,” the manager answered. “The body was found by Martin, the floor waiter. I have brought him along.” He went to the door and beckoned.
A servant with a rather blank face, much younger than most of his fellows, entered the room. He was obviously nervous.
“Good morning,” said Duff, taking out his notebook. “I am Inspector Duff, of Scotland Yard.” The young man’s manner became even more distressed. “I want you to tell me everything that happened here this morning.”
“Well, sir, I - I had an arrangement with Mr. Drake,” Martin began. “I was to rouse him every morning, there being no telephones in the rooms. He preferred to breakfast below, but he was fearful of oversleeping. A bit of a job it was, sir, to make him hear, him being so deaf. Twice I had to go to the housekeeper for a key, and enter the room.
“This morning, at a quarter before eight, I knocked at his door. I knocked many times, but nothing happened. Finally I went for the housekeeper’s key, but I was told it had disappeared yesterday.”
“The housekeeper’s key was lost?”
“It was, sir. There was another master key below-stairs, and I went for that. I had no thought of anything wrong - I had failed to make him hear me on those other mornings. I unlocked the door of this room and came in. One window was closed, the curtain was down all the way. The other was open and the curtain was up, too. The light entered from there. Everything seemed to be in order - I saw the ear-telephone on the table, Mr. Drake’s clothes on a chair. Then I approached the bed, sir - and it was a case of notifying the management immediately. That - that is all I can tell you, Inspector.”
Charlie Chan [5] Charlie Chan Carries On Page 2
