Inspector French and the Cheyne Mystery

by Freeman Wills Crofts

  ‘Splendid, Mr Cheyne,’ he cried warmly, holding out his hand. ‘Shake hands, won’t you? You’ll not repent your action, I promise you.’

  But this was too much for Cheyne.

  ‘No,’ he declared. ‘Not yet. You haven’t satisfied me of your bona fides. I’m sorry, but you have only yourselves to thank. When I find Miss Merrill at liberty and see Schulz’s cipher, I’ll be satisfied, and then I will join with you and give you all the help I can.’

  Dangle seemed rather dashed, but he laughed shortly as he answered: ‘I suppose we deserve that after all. But you will soon be convinced. There is just a formality to be gone through before we start. Though you may not believe my word, we believe yours, and we have agreed that all that we want before taking you further into our confidence, is that you swear an oath of loyalty to us. You won’t object to that, I presume?’

  Cheyne hesitated, then he said:

  ‘I swear on my sacred honour that I will loyally abide by the spirit of the agreement which you have outlined in so far as you and your friends act loyally to me and to Miss Merrill, and to that extent only.’

  ‘That’s reasonable, and good enough,’ Dangle commented. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll go and ’phone to the others. You will understand,’ he explained on his return, ‘that my friends are some distance away from Wembley, and it will therefore take them a little time to get in. If they start now they will be there as soon as we are.’

  It was getting on towards ten o’clock when Cheyne and Dangle turned into the gateway of Earlswood. A yellow car stood at the footpath, on sight of which Dangle exclaimed: ‘See, they’ve arrived.’ His ring brought Blessington to the door, and the latter greeted Cheyne apologetically, but with the same charm of manner that he had displayed in the Edgecombe Hotel at Plymouth.

  ‘I do hope, Mr Cheyne,’ he declared, ‘that even after all that has passed, we may yet be friends. We admire the way you have fought your corner, and we feel that what we both up to the present have failed to do may well be accomplished if we unite our forces. Come in and see if you can make friends with Sime.’

  ‘I came to see Miss Merrill,’ Cheyne answered shortly. ‘If Miss Merrill is not produced and allowed to go without restraint our agreement is non est.’

  ‘Naturally,’ Blessington returned smoothly. ‘We understand that that is a sine qua non. And so Miss Merrill will be produced. She is not here; she is at our house in the country in charge of Miss Dangle, and that for two reasons. The first is this. She met with, as doubtless you know, a trifling accident last night, and her ankle being a little painful, she was kept awake for some time. This morning when we left she was still asleep. We did not therefore disturb her. That you will appreciate, Mr Cheyne, and the other reason you will appreciate equally. We had to satisfy ourselves by a personal interview that you really meant to give us a square deal.’ He raised his hand as Cheyne would have spoken. ‘There’s nothing in that to which you need take exception. It is an ordinary business precaution—nothing more nor less.’

  ‘And when will Miss Merrill be set at liberty?’

  ‘While I don’t admit the justice of the phrase, I may say that as soon as we have all mutually pledged ourselves to play the game I will take the car back to the other house, and when Miss Merrill has taken the same oath will drive her to her studio. Perhaps you would write her a note that you have sworn it, as she mightn’t believe me. There are a few preliminaries to be arranged which Dangle and Sime can fix up with you. If you are at the studio at midday you will be in time to welcome Miss Merrill.’

  This did not meet with Cheyne’s approval. He wished to go himself to the mysterious house with Blessington, but the latter politely but firmly conveyed to him that he had not yet irrevocably committed himself on their side, and until he had done so they could not give away their best chance of escape should the police become interested in their movements. Cheyne argued with some bitterness, but the other side held the trumps, and he was obliged to give way.

  This point settled, nothing could have exceeded the easy friendliness of the trio. If Arnold Price were alive he would share equally with the rest. Would Mr Cheyne come to the study while the formalities were got through? Did he consider this oath—typewritten—would meet the case? Well, they would take it first, binding themselves individually to each other and to him. Each of the three swore loyalty to the remaining quintet, the oaths of Joan Merrill and Susan being assumed for the moment. Then Cheyne swore and they all solemnly shook hands.

  ‘Now that’s done, Mr Cheyne, we’ll prove our confidence in you by showing you the cipher. But first perhaps you would write to Miss Merrill. Also if any point is not quite clear to you please do not hesitate to question us.’

  Cheyne was by no means enamoured of the way things had turned out. He had been forced into an association with men with whom he had little in common and whom he did not trust. Had it not been for the trump card they held in the person of Joan Merrill nothing would have induced him to throw in his lot with them. But now, contingent on their good faith to him, he had pledged his word, and though he was not sure how far an enforced pledge was binding, he felt that as long as they kept their part of the bargain, he must keep his. He therefore wrote his letter, and then turning to Blessington, answered him civilly:

  ‘There is one thing I should like to know; I have thought about it many times. How did you drug me in that hotel in Plymouth without my knowledge and without leaving any traces in the food?’

  Blessington smiled.

  ‘I’ll tell you that with pleasure, Mr Cheyne,’ he answered readily, ‘but I confess I am surprised that a man of your acumen was puzzled by it. It depended upon pre-arrangement, and given that, was perfectly simple. I provided myself with the drug—if you don’t mind I won’t say how, as I might get someone else into trouble—but I got a small phial of it. I also took two other small bottles, one full of clean water, the other empty, together with a small cloth. Also I took my Extra Special Flask. Sime, like a good fellow, get my flask out of the drawer of my wrecked escritoire.’ He smiled ruefully at Cheyne. ‘Then I prepared for our lunch: the private room, the menu and all complete. I told them at the hotel we had some business to arrange, and that we didn’t want to be disturbed after lunch. You know, of course, that I got all details of your movements from Miss Dangle?’

  ‘Yes, I understand that.’

  As Cheyne spoke Sime re-entered the room, putting down on the table the flask which had figured in the scene at the hotel. Blessington handed it to Cheyne.

  ‘Examine that flask, Mr Cheyne,’ he invited. ‘Do you see anything remarkable about it?’

  It seemed an ordinary silver pocket flask, square and flat, and with a screw-down silver stopper. It was chased on both sides with a plain but rather pleasing design, and the base was flat so that it would stand securely. But Cheyne could see nothing about it in any way unusual.

  ‘Open it,’ Blessington suggested.

  Cheyne unscrewed the stopper and looked down the neck, but except that there was a curious projection at one side, which reduced the passage down to half the usual size, it seemed as other flasks. Blessington laughed.

  ‘Look here,’ he said, and seizing a scrap of paper, he drew the two sketches which I reproduce. ‘The flask is divided down the middle by a diaphragm C so as to form two chambers, A and B. In these chambers are put two liquids, of which one is drugged and the other isn’t. E and F are two half diaphragms, and D is a very light and delicately fitted flap valve which will close the passage to either chamber. When you invert the flask, the liquid in the upper or B chamber runs out along diaphragm C, and its weight turns over valve D so that the passage to A chamber is closed. The liquid from B then pours out in the ordinary way. The liquid in A, however, cannot escape, because it is caught by the diaphragm F. If you want to pour out the liquid from A you simply turn the flask upside down, when the conditions as to the two liquids are reversed. You probably didn’t notice that I used the flask, in
this way at our lunch. You may remember that I poured out your liqueur first—it was drugged, of course. Then I got a convenient fit of coughing. That gave me an excuse to set down the flask and pick it up again, but when I picked it up I was careful to do so by the other side, so that undrugged liqueur poured into my own cup. I drank my coffee at once to reassure you. Simple, wasn’t it?’

  ‘More than simple,’ Cheyne answered with unwilling admiration in his tone. ‘A dangerous toy, but, I admit, deuced ingenious. But I don’t follow even yet. That would have left the drugged remains in the cup.’

  ‘Quite so, but you have forgotten my other two bottles and my cloth. I poured the dregs from your cup into the empty bottle, washed the cup with water from the other, wiped it with my cloth, poured out another cup of coffee and drank it, leaving harmless grounds for any inquisitive analyst to experiment with.’

  ‘By Jove!’ said Cheyne, then adding regretfully: ‘If we had only tried the handle of the cup for fingerprints!’

  ‘I put gloves on after you went over.’

  Cheyne smiled.

  ‘You deserved to succeed,’ he admitted ruefully.

  ‘I succeeded in drugging you,’ Blessington answered, ‘but I did not succeed in getting what I wanted. Now, Mr Cheyne, you would like to see the tracing. Show it to him, Dangle, while I go back to the other house for Miss Merrill.’

  Dangle left the room, returning presently with the blue-gray sheet which had been the pivot upon which all the strange adventures of the little company had turned. Cheyne saw at a glance it was the tracing which he had secured in the upper room in the house in Hopefield Avenue. There in the corners were the holes made by the drawing-pins which had fixed it to the door while it was being photographed. There were the irregularly spaced circles, with their letters and numbers, and there, written clockwise in a large circle, the words: ‘England expects every man to do his duty.’ Cheyne gazed at it with interest, while Dangle and Sime sat watching him. What on earth could it mean? He pondered awhile then turned to his companions.

  ‘Have you not been able to read any of it?’ he queried.

  Dangle shook his head.

  ‘Not so much as a single word—not a letter even!’ he declared. ‘I tell you, Mr Cheyne, it’s a regular sneezer! I wouldn’t like to say how many hours we’ve spent—all of us—working at it. And I don’t think there’s a book on ciphers in the whole of London that we haven’t read. And not a glimmer of light from any of them! Blessington had a theory that each of these circles was intended to represent one or more atoms, according to the number it contained, and that certain circles could be grouped to make molecules of the various substances that were to be mixed with the copper. I never could quite understand his idea, but in any case all our work hasn’t helped us to find them. The truth is that we’re stale. We want a fresh brain on it, and particularly a woman’s brain. Sometimes a woman’s intuition will lead her to a lucky guess. We hope it may in this case.’

  He paused, then went on again: ‘Another thing we tried was this. Suppose that by some system of numerical substitution each of these numbers represents a letter. Then groups of these letters together with the letters already in the circles should represent words. Of course it is difficult to group them, though we tried again and again. At first the idea seemed promising, but we could make nothing of it. We couldn’t find any system either of substitution or of grouping which would give a glimmering of sense. No, we’re up against it and no mistake, and when we think of the issues involved we go nearly mad from exasperation. Take the thing, Mr Cheyne, and see what you and Miss Merrill can do. That is the original, but I have made a tracing of it, so that we can continue our work simultaneously.’

  Cheyne felt himself extraordinarily thrilled by this recital, and the more he examined the mysterious markings on the sheet the more interested he grew. He had always had a penchant for puzzles, and ciphers appealed to him as being perhaps the most alluring kind of puzzles extant. Particularly did this cipher attract him because of the circumstances under which it had been brought to his notice. He longed to get to grips with it, and he looked forward with keen delight to a long afternoon and evening over it with Joan Merrill, whose interest in it would, he felt sure, be no whit less than his own.

  Certainly, he thought, his former enemies had made a good beginning. So far they were playing the game, and he began to wonder if he had not to some extent misjudged them, and if the evil characters given them by the gloomy Speedwell were not tinged by that despondent individual’s jaundiced outlook on life in general.

  Dangle had left the room and he now returned with a bottle of whisky and a box of cigars.

  ‘A drink and a cigar to cement our alliance, Mr Cheyne,’ he proposed, ‘and then I think our business will be done.’

  Cheyne hesitated, while a vision of the private room in the Edgecombe Hotel rose in his memory. Dangle read his thoughts, for he smiled and went on:

  ‘I see you don’t quite trust us yet, and I don’t know that I can blame you. But we really are all right this time. Examine these tumblers and then pour out the stuff yourself, and we’ll drink ours first. We must get you convinced of our goodwill.’

  Cheyne hesitated, but Dangle insisting, he demonstrated to his satisfaction that his companions drank the same mixture as himself. Then Dangle opened the cigar box.

  ‘These are specially good, though I say it myself. The box was given to Blessington by a rich West Indian planter. We only smoke them on state occasions, such as the present. Won’t you take one?’

  Cheyne felt it would be churlish to refuse, and soon the three were puffing such tobacco as Cheyne at all events had seldom before smoked. Sime then excused himself, explaining that though business might be neglected it could not be entirely ignored, and Cheyne, thereupon taking the hint, said that he too must be off.

  ‘Tomorrow we shall be kept late in town,’ Dangle explained, as they stood on the doorstep, ‘but the next evening we shall be here. Will you and Miss Merrill come down and report progress, and let us have a council of war?’

  Cheyne agreed and was turning away, when Dangle made a sudden gesture.

  ‘By George! I was forgetting,’ he cried. ‘Wait a second, Mr Cheyne.’

  He disappeared back into the house, returning a moment later, with a small purse, which he handed to Cheyne.

  ‘Do you happen to know if that is Miss Merrill’s?’ he inquired. ‘It was found beside the chair in which we placed her last night when we carried her in.’

  Cheyne recognised the article at once. He had frequently seen Joan use it.

  ‘Yes, it’s hers,’ he answered, to which Dangle replied asking if he would take it for her.

  Cheyne slipped the purse into his pocket, and next moment he was walking along Dalton Road toward the station, free, well, and with the tracing in his pocket. Until that moment, in the inner recesses of his consciousness doubt of the bona fides of the trio had lingered. Until then the fear that he was to be the victim of some plausible trick had dwelt in his heart. But now at last he was convinced. Had the men desired to harm him they had had a perfect opportunity. He had been for the last hour entirely in their power. No one knew where he had gone, and they could with the greatest ease have murdered him, and either hidden his body about the house or garden or removed it in the car during the night. Yes, this time he believed their story. It was eminently reasonable, and as a matter of fact, it had been pretty well proved by their actions, as well as by the facts that he had learnt at the Admiralty and elsewhere. They were at a standstill because they couldn’t read the cipher, and they really did want, as they said, the help of his and Joan’s fresh brains. From their point of view they had done a wise thing in thus approaching him—indeed, a masterly thing. Cheyne was not conceited and he did not consider his own mental powers phenomenal, but he knew he was good at puzzles, and at the very least, he and Joan were of average intelligence. Moreover, they were the only other persons who knew of the cipher, and it was the sounde
st strategy to turn their antagonism into co-operation.

  He reached Wembley Park to find a steam train about to start for town. It ran in without stopping and in a few minutes he was walking up the platform at Marylebone. He looked at his watch. It was barely eleven. An hour would elapse before Joan would reach her rooms, and that meant that he had more than half an hour to while away before going to meet her. It occurred to him that in his excitement he had forgotten to breakfast, and though he was not hungry, he thought another cup of coffee would not be unacceptable. Moreover, he could at the same time have a look over the cipher. He therefore went to the refreshment room, gave his order, and sat down at a table in a secluded corner. Then drawing the mysterious sheet from his pocket, he began to examine it.

  As he leant forward over his coffee he felt Joan’s purse in his pocket, and suddenly fearful lest in his eagerness to tell her his experiences he should forget to give it to her, he took it out and laid it on the table, intending to carry it in his hand until he met her. Then he returned to his study of the tracing.

  There are those who tell us that in this world there are no trifles: that every event, however unimportant it may appear, is preordained and weighty as every other. On this bright spring morning in the first-class refreshment room at Marylebone, Cheyne was to meet with a demonstration of the truth of this assertion which left him marvelling and humbly thankful. For there took place what seemed to be a trifling thing, and yet that trifle proved to be the most important event that had ever taken place, or was to take place, in his life.

  When he took his first sip of coffee he found that he had forgotten to put sugar in it, and when he looked at the sugar bowl he saw that by the merest chance it was empty An empty sugar bowl. A trifle that, if ever there was one! And yet nothing of more supreme moment had ever happened to Cheyne than the finding of that empty bowl on his table at that moment.

  The sugar bowl, then, being empty, he picked it up with his free hand and carried it across to the counter to ask the barmaid to fill it. Scarcely had he done so when there came from behind him an appalling explosion. There was a reverberating crash mingled with the tinkle of falling glass, while a sharp blast of air swept past him, laden with the pungent smell of some burnt chemical. He wheeled round, the shrill screams of the barmaids in his ears, to see the corner of the room where he had been sitting, in complete wreckage. Through a fog of smoke and dust he saw that his table and chair were non-existent, neighbouring tables and chairs were overturned, the window was gone, hat-racks, pictures, wall advertisements were heaped in broken and torn confusion, while over all was spread a coat of plaster which had been torn from the wall. On the floor lay a man who had been seated at an adjoining table, the only other occupant of that part of the room.