Four Square Jane

by Edgar Wallace

  He was told, and a page piloted him to the door. Without troubling to knock, he turned the handle and walked in. Jamieson Steele was sitting before a little fire, smoking a cigarette, and looked up at the intruder.

  “Hullo, Mr Dawes,” he said calmly.

  “You know me, eh?” said Peter. “May I have a few words with you?”

  “You can have as many as you like,” said Steele. “Take a chair, won’t you? This is not a bad little sitting-room, but it is rather draughty. To what am I indebted for this visit? Is our wicked uncle pressing his charge of forgery?”

  Peter Dawes smiled.

  “I don’t think that is likely,” he said. “I have made a call upon you for the purpose of seeing your hands.”

  “My hands?” said the other in a tone of surprise. “Are you going in for a manicure?”

  “Hardly,” said Peter dryly, as the other spread out his hands

  before him. “What is the matter with your little finger?” he asked, after a moment’s scrutiny.

  Jamieson Steele examined the finger and laughed.

  “He is not very big, is he?” he laughed. “Arrested development, I suppose. It is the one blemish on an otherwise perfect body.”

  “Where have you been tonight?” asked Peter quietly.

  “I have been to various places, including Scotland Yard,” was the staggering reply.

  “To Scotland Yard?” asked Peter incredulously, and Jamieson Steele nodded.

  “The fact is, I wanted to see you about the curious charge which Lord Claythorpe brings forward from time to time; and also I felt that some explanation was due to you as you are in charge of a case which nearly affects my wife, as to the reason I did a bolt when Claythorpe brought this charge of forgery against me.”

  “What time did you leave the Yard?”

  “About half an hour ago,” said Steele.

  Peter looked at him closely. He was wearing an ordinary lounge suit, and a soft shirt. The hand which had come upon the table had undoubtedly been encased in a stiff cuff and a black sleeve.

  “Why, what is the matter?” asked Steele.

  “There has been a robbery at the Ritz Canton tonight,” Peter explained. “A man dressed as a waiter has stolen an emerald necklace.”

  “And naturally you suspect me,” he said ironically. “Well, you’re at liberty to search this apartment.”

  “May I see your dress clothes?” said Peter. For answer, the other led him to his bedroom, and his dress suit was discovered at the bottom of a trunk, carefully folded and brushed.

  “Now,” said Peter, “if you don’t mind, I’ll conduct the search you suggest. You understand that I have no authority to do so, and I can only make the search with your permission.”

  “You have my permission,” said the other. “I realise that I am a suspected person, so go ahead, and don’t mind hurting my feelings.”

  Peter’s search was thorough, but revealed nothing of importance.

  “This is my wife’s room,” said Steele. “Perhaps you would like to search that?”

  “I should,” said Peter Dawes, without hesitation, but again his investigations drew blank.

  He opened all the windows of the room, feeling along the windowsills for a tape, cord or thread, from which an emerald necklace might be suspended. It was an old trick to fasten a stolen article to a black thread, and the black thread to some stout gummed paper fastened to the windowsill; but here again he discovered nothing.

  “Now,” said the cheerful young man, “you had better search me.”

  “I might as well do the job thoroughly,” agreed Peter, and ran his hands scientifically over the other’s body.

  “Not guilty, eh?” said Steele, when he had finished. “Now perhaps you’ll sit down, and I’ll tell you something about Lord Claythorpe that will interest you. You know, of course, that Claythorpe has been living on the verge of bankruptcy. Won’t you sit down?” he said again, and Peter obeyed. “Here is a cigar which will steady your nerves.”

  “I can’t stay very long,” said Peter, “but I should like your end of the serial very much indeed.”

  He took the proffered cigar, and bit off the end.

  “As I was saying,” Steele went on, “Claythorpe has been living for years on the verge of bankruptcy. He is a man who, from his youth up, has been dependent on his wits. His early life was passed in what the good books called dissolute living. I believe there was a time when he was so broke he slept on the Embankment.”

  Peter nodded. He also had heard something to this effect.

  “This, of course, was before he came into the title. He is a clever and unscrupulous man with a good address. And knowing that he was up against it, he set himself to gain powerful friends. One of these friends was my wife’s uncle – a good-natured innocent kind of man, who had amassed a considerable fortune in South Africa. I believe Claythorpe bled him pretty considerably, and might have bled him to death, only the old fellow died naturally, leaving a handsome legacy to his friends and the residue of his property to my wife. Claythorpe was made the executor, and given pretty wide powers. Amongst the property which my wife inherited – or rather, would inherit on her wedding day, was a small coalmine in the North of England, which at the time of the old man’s death was being managed by a very brilliant young engineer, whose name modesty alone prevents my revealing.”

  “Go on,” said Peter, with a smile.

  “Claythorpe, finding himself in control of such unlimited wealth, set himself out to improve the property. And the first thing he did was to project the flotation of my coal mine – I call it mine, and I always regarded it as such in a spiritual sense – for about six times its value.”

  Peter nodded.

  “In order to bring in the public, it was necessary that a statement should be made with regard to the quantity of coal in the mine, the extent of the seams, etc., and it was my duty to prepare a most glowing statement, which would loosen the purse-strings of the investing public. Claythorpe put the scheme up to me, and I said, ‘No.’ I also told him,” the young man went on, choosing his words carefully, “that, if he floated this company, I should have something to, say in the columns of the financial Press. So the thing was dropped, but Claythorpe never forgave me. There was a certain work which I had done for him outside my ordinary duties and, summoning me to his St James’s Street office, he gave me a cheque. I noticed at the time that the cheque was for a much larger amount than I had expected, and thought his lordship was trying to get into my good books. I also noticed that the amount inscribed on the cheque had the appearance of being altered, and that even his lordship’s signature looked rather unusual. I took the cheque and presented it to my bank a few days later, and was summoned to the office, where I was denounced as a forger,” said the young man, puffing a ring of smoke into the air reflectively, “but it gives you a very funny feeling in the pit of the stomach. The heroic and proper and sensible thing to do was to stand on my ground, go up to the Old Bailey, make a great speech which would call forth the applause and approbation of judge and jury, and stalk out of the court in triumph. Under these circumstances, however, one seldom does the proper thing. Remington it was – the man who is now dead – who suggested that I should bolt; and, like a fool, I bolted. The only person who knew where I was was Joyce. I won’t tell you anything about my wife, because you probably know everything that is worth knowing. I’ll only say that I’ve loved her for years, and that my affection has been returned. It was she who urged me to come back to London and stand my trial, but I put this down to her child-like innocence – a man is always inclined to think that he’s the cleverer of the two when he’s exchanging advice with women. That’s the whole of the story.”

  Peter waited.

  “Now, Mr Steele,” he said, “perhaps you will explain why you were at the Ritz-Canton Hotel tonight disguised as a waiter.”

  Steele looked at him with a quizzical smile. “I think I could explain it if I’d been there,” he said
. “Do you want me to invent an explanation as well as to invent my presence?”

  “I am as confident that you were there,” said Peter, “as I am that you are sitting here. I am also certain that it will be next to impossible to prove that you were in the room.” He rose from his seat. “I am going back to the hotel,” he said, “though I do not expect that any of our bloodhounds have discovered the necklace.”

  “Have another cigar,” said Steele, offering the open box.

  Peter shook his head.

  “No thank you,” he said.

  “They won’t hurt you, take a handful.”

  Peter laughingly refused.

  “I think I am nearly through with this Four Square Jane business,” he said, “and I am pretty certain that it is not going to bring kudos or promotion to me.”

  “I have a feeling that it will not, either,” said Steele. “It’s a rum case.”

  Peter shook his head.

  “Rum, because I’ve solved the mystery of Four Square Jane. I know who she is, and why she has robbed Claythorpe and his friends.”

  “You know her, do you?” said Steele thoughtfully, and the other nodded.

  Jamieson Steele waited till the door closed upon the detective, and then waited another five minutes before he rose and shot the bolt. He then locked the two doors leading from the sitting-room, took up the box of cigars and placed it on the table. He dipped into the box, and pulled out handful after handful of cigars, and then he took out something which glittered and scintillated in the light – a great collar of big emeralds – and laid it on the table. He looked at it thoughtfully, then wrapped it in a silk handkerchief and thrust it into his pocket, replacing the cigars in the box. He passed into his bedroom, and came out wearing a soft felt hat, and a long dark blue trench coat.

  He hesitated before he unbolted the door, unbuttoned the coat, and took out the handkerchief containing the emerald collar, and put it into his overcoat pocket. If he had turned his head at that moment, and looked at the half-opened door of his bedroom, he might have caught a glimpse of a figure that was watching his every movement. Peter Dawes had not come alone, and there were three entrances to the private suite which Mr and Mrs Steele occupied.

  Then Jamieson Steele stepped out so quickly that by the time the watcher was in the corridor, he had disappeared down the lift, which happened to be going down at that moment. The man raced down the stairs three at a time. The last landing was a broad marble balcony which overlooked the hall, and, glancing down, he saw Peter waiting. He waved his hand significantly, and at that moment the elevator reached the ground floor, and Jamieson Steele stepped out of it.

  He was half way across the vestibule when Peter confronted him.

  “Wait a moment, Mr Steele. I want you,” said Peter.

  It was at that second that the swing doors turned and Joyce Steele came in.

  “Want me?” said Steele. “Why?”

  “I am going to take you into custody on the charge of being concerned in the robbery tonight,” said the detective.

  “You’re mad,” said Steele, with an immovable face.

  “Arrest him? Oh no, no!” It was the gasping voice of the girl. In a second she had flung herself upon the man, her two arms about him. “It isn’t true, it isn’t true!” she sobbed.

  Very gently Steele pushed her back.

  “Go away, my dear. This is no place for you,” he said. “Mr Dawes has made a great mistake, as he will discover.”

  The watcher had joined the group now.

  “He’s got the goods, sir,” he said triumphantly. “I watched him. The necklace was in a cigar box. He has got it in his pocket.”

  “Hold out your hands,’’ said Peter, and in a second Jamieson Steele was handcuffed.

  “May I come?” said the girl.

  “It is better you did not,” said Peter. “Perhaps your husband will be able to prove his innocence. Anyway, you can do nothing.”

  They left her, a disconsolate figure, standing in the hall, and carried their prisoner to Lannon Row.

  “Now we’ll search you, if you don’t mind?” asked Peter.

  “Not at all,” said the other coolly.

  “Where did you say he put it?”

  “In his pocket, sir,” said the spy.

  Peter searched the overcoat pockets.

  “There’s nothing here,” he said.

  “Nothing there?” gasped the man in astonishment. “But I saw him put it there. He took it out of his hip pocket and–”

  “Well, let’s try his hip pocket. Take off your coat, Steele.”

  The young man obeyed, and again Peter’s deft fingers went over him, but with no better result. The two detectives looked at one another in consternation.

  “A slight mistake on your part, my friend,” said Peter, “I’m sorry we’ve given you all this trouble.”

  “Look in the bottom of the cab,” the second detective pleaded, and Peter laughed.

  “I don’t see what he could do. He had the bracelets on his hands, and I never took my eyes off them once. You can search the cab if you like – it’s waiting at the door.”

  But the search of the cab produced no better result.

  And then an inspiration dawned upon Peter, and he laughed, softly and long.

  “I’m going to give up this business,” he said. “I really am, Steele. I’m too childishly trustful.”

  Their eyes met, and both eyes were creased with laughter.

  “All right,” said Peter. “Let him go.”

  “Let him go?” said the other detective in dismay.

  “Yes. We’ve no evidence against this gentleman, and we’re very unlikely to secure it.”

  For in that short space of time, Peter had realized exactly the kind he was up against; saw as clearly as daylight what had happened to the emeralds, and knew that any attempt to find them now would merely lead to another disappointment.

  “If you don’t mind, Steele, I think I’ll go back with you to your hotel. I hope you’re not bearing malice.”

  “Not at all,” replied Steele. “It’s your job to catch me, and my job to–” he paused.

  “Yes?” said Peter curiously.

  “My job to get caught, obviously,” said Steele with a laugh.

  They did not speak again until they were in the cab on the way back to the hotel.

  “I’m afraid my poor wife is very much upset.”

  “I’m not worrying about that,” said Peter dryly. “Steele, I think you are a wise man; and, being wise, you will not be averse to receiving advice from one who knows this game from A to Z.”

  Steele did not reply.

  “My advice to you is, get out of the country just as soon as you can, and take your wife with you,” said Peter. “There is an old adage that the pitcher goes often to the well – I need not remind you of that.”

  “Suppose I tell you I do not understand you,” said Steele.

  “You will do nothing so banal,” replied Peter. “I tell you I know your game, and the thing that is going to stand against you is the robbery of the mail. That is your only bad offence in my eyes, and it is the one for which I would work night and day to bring you to justice.”

  Again a silence.

  “Nothing was stolen from the mail, that I know,” said Peter. “It was all returned. Your principal offence is that you scared a respectable servant of his Majesty into fits. Anyway, it is a felony of a most serious kind, and would get you twenty years if we could secure evidence against you. You held up his Majesty’s mail with a loaded revolver–”

  “Even that you couldn’t prove,” laughed Steele. “It might not have been any more than a piece of gas pipe. After all, a hardened criminal, such as you believe I am, possessed of a brain which you must know by this time I have, would have sufficient knowledge of the law to prevent his carrying lethal weapons.”

  “We are talking here without witnesses,” said Peter.

  “I’m not so sure,” said Steele quickly. “I
thought I was talking to you in my little sitting-room without witnesses.”

  “Anyway, you can be sure there are no witnesses here,” smiled Peter, as the cab turned into the street where the hotel was situated. “And I am asking you confidentially, and man to man, if you can give me any information at all regarding the murder in St James’s Street.”

  Steele thought awhile.

  “I can’t,” he said. “As a matter of fact, I was in Falmouth at the time, as you know. Obviously, it was not the work of the lady who calls herself Four Square Jane, because my impression of that charming creature is that she would be scared to death at the sight of a revolver. The card which was found in the dead man’s hand–”

  “How did you know that?” asked Peter quickly.

  “These things get about,” replied the other unabashed. “Has it occurred to you that it was a moist night, that the murderer may have been hot, and that on the card may be his fingerprints?”

  “That did occur to me,” said Peter. “In fact, it was the first thing I thought about. And, if it is any interest to you, I will tell you that there was a fingerprint upon that card, which I have been trying for the past few days to–” He stopped. “Here we are at your hotel,” he said. “There’s a good detective lost in you, Steele.”

  “Not lost, but gone before,” said the other flippantly. “Good night. You won’t come up and have a cigar?”

  “No thanks,” said a grim Peter.

  He went back to Scotland Yard. It was curious, amazingly curious, that Steele should have mentioned the card that night. It was not into an empty office that he went, despite the lateness of the hour. There was an important police conference, and all the heads of departments were crowded into the room, the air of which was blue with tobacco smoke. A stout, genial man nodded to Peter as he came in.

  “We’ve had a devil of a job getting it, Peter, but we’ve succeeded.”

  Before him was a small visiting card, bearing the name of Jamieson Steele. In the very centre was a violet fingerprint. The fingerprint had not been visible to the naked eye until it had been treated with chemicals, and its present appearance was the result of the patient work of three of Scotland Yard’s greatest scientists.