The Four Faces

W >> William le Queux >> The Four Faces

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21

When eleven such serious robberies, as we may rightly term them, are
committed in comparatively rapid succession, and our police and
detective force, in spite of their vaunted ability, prove themselves
unable to effect a single arrest, what, we have a right to ask, is amiss
with our police, or with their methods, or with both?

Questioned upon the subject, a well-known Scotland Yard Inspector
yesterday informed our representative that official opinion inclines to
the belief that the crimes mentioned have one and all been effected by a
group of amazingly clever criminals working in combination. "How many
members the gang consists of," he said, "how they obtained the special
information they must have possessed to enable them to locate so
accurately the exact whereabouts of the valuables they seized, and how
they succeeded in securing those valuables in broad daylight, we have
not the remotest notion. The theory held at present," he continued, "is
that a number of expert thieves have by some means succeeded in becoming
intimate with the owners of the houses that have been robbed. We
repudiate entirely the theory that servants in the different houses must
have been accomplices in the robberies either directly or indirectly."

The article then proceeded to advance a number of apparently plausible
theories to account for the non-discovery of the thieves, and finally
ended as follows:

If, then, our police and detectives would retain, or rather regain,
their prestige, it is incumbent upon them at once to take steps to
prevent any further outrages of this kind. Otherwise the police of Great
Britain will run a grave risk of becoming the laughing-stock of
Continental countries, where, we make bold to state, such a series of
robberies, all more or less of the same nature, and involving a loss of,
in the aggregate, approximately L50,000, would not thus have been
committed with impunity.

I handed Dick the paper. When he had carefully read the article right
through, he looked up abruptly.

"By Jove," he exclaimed, "I have an idea!"

I waited. For some moments he was silent. Then he continued:

"Do you remember the account of the robbery at Thatched Court, near
Bridport? It's one of the robberies mentioned in this list."

"I can't say I do," I answered. "I don't read the newspapers very
carefully. Why?"

"I happened to read that account, and remember it rather well. The
robbery took place about five weeks ago--the house was entered while
everybody, including some of the servants, was at a race-meeting. Among
the things stolen was a pair of shot-guns made by Holland and Holland."

"But what on earth has that to do with anything? Where does the 'idea'
come in?"

"It doesn't come in--there. It comes in later. You know that every
shot-gun has a number on it, and so can be identified. Now, if these
thieves are people who are pretending to be gentlemen--how do you put
it? There's a word you use for that, but I've forgotten it."

"Do you mean masquerading as gentlemen?"

"Masquerading--that's the word I was thinking of; if they are
masquerading as gentlemen they'll probably keep good guns like that to
shoot with--they can do that, or think they can, without running much
risk, whereas if they sold them they'd run rather a big risk of being
caught, because I happen to remember that the numbers of the stolen guns
were mentioned in the newspaper account of the robbery. They said the
guns were in a case, and almost new. Now, this is where my idea 'comes
in,' as you put it. I heard you tell Dulcie only the other day that you
wanted a pair of guns by a tip-top maker. Just afterwards I happened to
hear her talking to Mrs. Stapleton about her wedding--by the way, Mike,
have you fixed the date yet?"

"Not yet. But what about Mrs. Stapleton?"

"Well, Dulcie spoke about wedding presents, just casually in course of
conversation, and I heard her tell Mrs. Stapleton that you had said you
hoped among your wedding presents there would be a good gun, 'or, better
still, a pair,' I heard her say that you said. Mrs. Stapleton didn't
answer at once, but I noticed a queer sort of expression come on to her
face, as if she'd just thought of something, and presently she said: 'I
have a good mind, darling, to give him a pair of guns that belonged to
my poor husband. They are quite new--he can't have used them more than
once or twice, if that. They were made by a Bond Street gun-maker he
always went to, one of the best in London.' Mike, is Holland and
Holland's shop in Bond Street?"

"Yes," I answered, "at the top of Bond Street. Oh, but there are several
good gun-makers in Bond Street. Besides, why should Mrs. Stapleton give
me such a present as that? I really hardly know her."

"Wait until I've finished, Mike, you always jump at conclusions so.
Dulcie said almost at once: 'Oh, don't do that, Connie. Mike wouldn't
expect such a present as that from you. He mightn't like to take it; you
see, you hardly know him really'--just what you have this moment said.
Then Dulcie said: 'I tell you what I wish you would do, Connie--let me
buy them from you to give to him. What shall I give you for them?' I
believe that was what Mrs. Stapleton had been driving at all the
time--she wanted to sell the guns without running any risk, for of
course you would never think of noticing the numbers on them, and nobody
would ever suppose that guns given to you by Dulcie, apparently new
guns, were guns that had been stolen. In the end Dulcie said she would
give Mrs. Stapleton eighty pounds for the pair, and that was agreed
upon, so that Dulcie has practically bought them for you, in fact she
may have paid Mrs. Stapleton for them already. Now look here, I'll get
hold of that newspaper that gave the numbers of the guns, and I bet you
when Dulcie gives you those guns you'll find they're marked with the
numbers of the stolen guns."

"Dick," I said thoughtfully, after a moment's pause, "were you
eavesdropping when you heard all this?"

"Why, no, of course not!" he exclaimed indignantly. "I was in the room,
reading a book, and I couldn't help hearing all they said, though they
were talking in undertones."

I turned over in my bed, and looked into his eyes for an instant or two.

"Would you be surprised to hear, Dick," I said slowly, watching to see
what effect my words would have upon him, "would you be surprised to
hear that Dulcie gave me a pair of guns, as her wedding present, only
last week?"

Dick sprang up in the bed.

"Did she?" he cried out, clapping his hands. "Oh--Mike, tell me, are
they Holland guns?"

I nodded.

Dick jumped off the bed and began to caper about the room.

"Have you got them here?" he exclaimed at last, as his excitement began
to subside.

"They are in the next room. You shall see them after breakfast."

I had difficulty in calming Dick's excitement and inducing him to eat
his breakfast, and directly breakfast was over I took him into the next
room, produced the gun-case, pulled out the two pairs of barrels, and
together we examined the numbers stamped upon them. Dick wrote the
numbers down in the little notebook he always carried in his trousers
pocket, and a little later we drove down to Fleet Street to look up the
file of the newspaper in which Dick had, he declared, read the report of
the robbery at Thatched Court, near Bridport.

I confess that I had not placed much faith in Dick's theory about the
numbers. I had taken him down to Fleet Street chiefly because he had so
earnestly entreated me to. When, therefore, after turning up the report,
Dick discovered, with a shout of triumph, that the numbers on my guns
were actually identical with the numbers mentioned in the newspaper as
those of the stolen guns, I was not merely greatly astonished, but also
considerably perturbed.

"Dick," I said thoughtfully, when I had to some extent recovered from my
surprise, "I really think we shall have to make a private detective of
you. Would you like me to take you now to one of the most famous
detectives in London--a man who was connected with Scotland Yard for
twenty years, who is helping Mr. Osborne to try to discover who the
thieves are who robbed Holt Manor, and who it was who killed poor
Churchill?"

"Do you mean Mr. Preston?" the boy asked quickly, peering up at me out
of his intelligent brown eyes.

"Yes. I suppose you have heard Mr. Osborne and me speak of him."

"Of course I have, and I should love to see him. Are you going to see
him now?"

"I am going straight to him to tell him of your discovery of these
numbers. He already knows all about your having deciphered the newspaper
cyphers; in fact, he has the cuttings at this moment, and your
translation of them. He told me the other day that he would like to
meet you."

Preston was at home at his house in Warwick Street, off Recent Street.
In a few words I had explained everything to him, and at once he
grew serious.

"The unfortunate part," he said at last, "is that in spite of this young
man's sharpness in making this discovery, it really leaves us almost
where we were, unless--"

"Unless what?" I asked, as he paused, considering.

"Well, Mr. Berrington, it's like this," he said bluntly. "You are
engaged to be married to Miss Challoner, and she gives you a wedding
present--a pair of new guns; at least they are to all intents new, and
naturally she expects you to think they are, and might be vexed if she
thought you had found out that she picked them up as a bargain. Now, it
all turns on this: Have you the moral courage to tell your _fiancee_
that you believe the wedding present she has given you is part of the
plunder secured in a recent robbery, indeed that you know it is, and
that therefore you and she are unwittingly receivers of stolen goods? I
have never myself been in love, so far as I can recollect, but if I were
placed as you are I think I should hardly have the courage to
disillusion the young lady."

I am bound to admit that until he put this problem to me it had not
occurred to me to look at the matter in that light, and now I felt much
as Preston declared he would feel if he were in my place. Dulcie might
not mind my having discovered that she had picked up the guns as a
bargain--indeed, why should she? But when it came to hinting--as I
should have to do if I broached the matter at all--that I believed that
her great friend Connie Stapleton knew, when she sold the guns to her,
that they had been stolen--Connie Stapleton, who was about to become her
stepmother--

No, I shouldn't have the pluck to do it. I shouldn't have the pluck to
face the storm of indignation that I knew my words would stir up in
her--women are logical enough, in spite of all that the ignorant and
unthinking urge to the contrary, but in this particular case Dulcie
would, I felt perfectly certain, "round" upon me, and, in the face of
evidence, no matter how damning, declare that I was, to say the least,
mistaken. She would go at once to Connie Stapleton and tell her
everything, and immediately Connie Stapleton would invent some plausible
story which would entirely clear her of all responsibility, and from
that moment onward I should probably be her bitterest enemy. No, I
thought; better, far better, say nothing--perhaps some day circumstances
might arise which would of themselves lead to Mrs. Stapleton's, so to
speak, "giving herself away." Indeed, in face of the discovery, I now
decided not to make certain statements to Sir Roland that I had fully
intended to make. After all, he was old enough to be my father, and if a
man old enough to be my father could be so foolish as to fall in love
with an adventuress, let him take the consequences. I should not so much
have minded incurring Sir Roland's wrath, but, knowing him as well as I
did, I felt positive that anything I might say would only strengthen his
trust in and attachment to this woman he had decided to wed. He might
even turn upon me and tell me to my face that I was striving to oppose
his marriage because his marrying must, of course, affect my pecuniary
position--an old man who falls in love becomes for the time, I have
always maintained, mentally deranged.

Preston conversed at considerable length with Dick Challoner, and, by
the time I rose to leave--for I had to call at Willow Street for Dulcie
at noon--the two appeared to have become great friends.

"I shall take you with me to call for Dulcie," I said to Dick as we went
out. "Then we shall drive you to Paddington, put you in the train for
Windsor, and leave you to your own devices."

"I wish I hadn't lost my suit-case," Dick observed ruefully. "I bet
anything it's in that house in Cumberland Place where the taxi
stopped--unless the woman who met me at Paddington intentionally left it
in the taxi when she found I had jumped out and run away. We ought to
inquire at Scotland Yard, oughtn't we?"

We arrived at Willow Road, Hampstead, at ten minutes to twelve. Telling
Dick to remain in the taxi, I got out and rang the bell. The door was
opened by a maid I had not seen before, and when I inquired for Miss
Challoner she stared at me blankly--indeed, as I thought, suspiciously.

"Nobody of that name lives here," she said curtly. Quickly I glanced up
at the number on the door. No, I had not mistaken the house.

"She is staying here," I said, "staying with Mrs. Stapleton."

"With Mrs. who?"

"Mrs. Stapleton."

"You have mistaken the house. There's nobody of that name here."

"Well, Mr. Gastrell, then," I said irritably. "Ask Mr. Gastrell if I can
see him."

"I tell you, sir, you've come to the wrong house," the maid said
sharply.

"Then who does live here?" I exclaimed, beginning to lose my temper.

The maid looked me up and down.

"I'm not going to tell you," she answered; and, before I could speak
again, she had shut the door in my face.

CHAPTER XX

PRESTON AGAIN

I had seen Dick off at Paddington, after asking the guard to keep an eye
on him as far as Windsor, and was walking thoughtfully through the park
towards Albert Gate, when a man, meeting me where the paths cross, asked
if he might speak to me. Almost instantly I recognized him. It was the
man who had followed Preston, Jack, and myself on the previous night,
and been pointed out to us by Preston.

"I trust," he said, when I had asked him rather abruptly what he wanted
to speak to me about, "that you will pardon my addressing you, sir, but
there is something rather important I should like to say to you if you
have a few minutes to spare."

"Who are you?" I inquired. "What's your name?"

"I would rather not tell you my name," he answered, "and for the moment
it is inadvisable that you should know it. Shall we sit here?" he added,
as we came to a wooden bench.

I am rather inquisitive, otherwise I should not have consented to his
proposal. It flashed across me, however, that whereas there could be no
harm in my listening to what he wished to say, he might possibly have
something really of interest to tell me.

"You are probably not aware," he said, when we were seated, "that I
followed you last night from a house in Warwick Street, Regent Street,
to a restaurant in Gerrard Street, Soho; thence to Willow Road, near
Hampstead Station; and thence to South Molton Street Mansions. Two
gentlemen were with you."

"And may I ask why you did that?" I said carelessly, as I lit a
cigarette.

"That is my affair," he replied. "You have lately been associating with
several men and women who, though you may not know it, belong to a gang
of exceedingly clever criminals. These people, while mixing in Society,
prey upon it. Until last night I was myself a member of this gang; for a
reason that I need not at present mention I have now disassociated
myself from it for ever. To-day my late accomplices will discover that I
have turned traitor, as they will term it, and at once they will set to
work to encompass my death," he added. "I want you, Mr. Berrington, to
save me from them."

I stared at him in surprise.

"But how can I do that, and why should I do it?" I said shortly. "I
don't know who you are, and if you choose to aid and abet criminals you
have only yourself to thank when they turn upon you."

"Naturally," he answered, with what looked very like a sneer; "I don't
ask you to do anything in return for nothing, Mr. Berrington. But if you
will help in this crisis, I can, and will, help you. At this moment you
are at a loss to know why, when you called at Willow Road an hour or so
ago, the woman who opened the door assured you that you had come to the
wrong house. You inquired first for Miss Challoner, then for Mrs.
Stapleton, and then for Hugesson Gastrell--am I not right?"

"Well, you are," I said, astonished at his knowledge.

"I was in the hall when you called, and I heard you. Gastrell, Mrs.
Stapleton, and Miss Challoner were also in the house. They are there
now, but to-night they go to Paris--they will cross from Newhaven to
Dieppe. It was to tell you they were going to Paris that I wished to
speak to you now--at least that was one reason."

"And what are the other reasons?" I asked, with an affectation of
indifference that I was far from feeling.

"I want money, Mr. Berrington, that is one other reason," the stranger
said quickly. "You can afford to pay for information that is worth
paying for. I know everything about you, perhaps more than you yourself
know. If you pay me enough, I can probably protect myself against these
people who until yesterday were my friends, but are now my enemies. And
I can put you in possession of facts which will enable you, if you act
circumspectly, presently to get the entire gang arrested."

"At what time do the three people you have just named leave for Paris?"
I asked, for the news that Connie Stapleton and Dulcie were going to
France together had given me a shock.

"To-night, at nine."

"Look here," I exclaimed, turning upon him sharply, "tell me everything
you know, and if it is worth paying for I'll pay."

In a few minutes the stranger had put several startling facts into my
possession. Of these the most important were that on at least four
occasions Connie Stapleton had deliberately exercised a hypnotic control
over Dulcie, and thus obtained even greater influence over her than she
already possessed; that Jack Osborne, whom I had always believed to be
wholly unsusceptible to female influence, was fast falling in love, or,
if not falling in love, becoming infatuated with Jasmine Gastrell--the
stranger declared that Mrs. Gastrell had fallen in love with him, but
that I could not believe; that an important member of this notorious
gang of criminals which mixed so freely in Society was Sir Roland's
wastrel brother, Robert, of whom neither Sir Roland nor any member of
his family had heard for years; and that Mrs. Stapleton intended to
cause Dulcie to become seriously ill while abroad, then to induce Sir
Roland to come to France to see her, and finally to marry him on the
other side of the Channel in the small town where she intended that
Dulcie should be taken ill. There were reasons, he said, though he would
not reveal them then, why she wished to marry Sir Roland on the
Continent instead of in England, and she knew of no other way of
inducing him to cross the Channel but the means she intended to employ.

The man hardly stopped speaking when I sprang to my feet.

"How much do you want for the information you have given me?" I
exclaimed, hardly able to conceal the intense excitement I felt.

He named a high figure, and so reckless did I feel at that instant that
I told him I would pay the amount to him in gold--he had stipulated for
gold--if he would call at my flat in South Molton Street at five o'clock
on the following afternoon.

His expressions of gratitude appeared, I must say, to be most genuine.

"And may I ask," he said, "what you propose to do now?"

"Propose to do!" I cried. "Why, go direct to Willow Road, of course,
force an entrance, and take Miss Challoner away--by force, if need be."

"You propose to go there alone?"

"Yes. For the past fortnight I have somehow suspected there might be
some secret understanding between Mr. Osborne and Mrs. Gastrell--they
have been so constantly together, though he has more than once assured
me that his intimacy was only with a view to obtaining her confidence. I
don't know why I should believe your word, the word of a stranger, in
preference to his, but now you tell me what you have told me I remember
many little things which all point to the likelihood of your statement
that he is in love with Mrs. Gastrell being true."

"I wouldn't go alone, Mr. Berrington," the stranger said in a tone of
warning. "You don't know the people you have to deal with as I know
them. If you would like to come to Paris with me to-night I could show
you something that would amaze you--and you would come face to face
there with Connie Stapleton and Miss Challoner, and others. Be advised
by me, and do that. I am telling you to do what I know will be best for
you. I don't ask you to pay me until we return to England."

I paused, uncertain what to decide. Thoughts crowded my brain.
Supposing, after all, that this were a ruse to entrap me. Supposing that
Dulcie were not going to Paris. But no, the man's statements seemed
somehow to carry conviction.

"If we cross by the same boat as they do," I said suddenly, "we shall be
recognized."

He smiled grimly.

"Not if you disguise yourself as you did at Hugesson Gastrell's the
other night," he said.

"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, "how do you know that?"

He looked to right and left, then behind him. Nobody was near. Then,
raising his hat, like lightning he pulled off his wig, eyebrows and
moustache, whiskers and beard, crammed them into his jacket pocket, and,
with his hat on the back of his head, sat back looking at me with a
quiet smile of amusement.

"Preston!" I gasped. "Good heavens, man, how do you do it?"

Producing his cigarette case, in silence he offered me a cigarette. Then
he spoke--now in his natural voice.

"I always test my 'impersonations' when I get a chance of doing so," he
said, "upon people who know me well, because if one can completely
deceive one's friends it gives much confidence when one comes to serious
business. Mr. Berrington, all I have just told you is absolute truth. I
have found it all out within the last eleven hours. More than that, I am
myself now one of the gang, and if I 'turn traitor' I shall be done to
death by them just as certainly as I am sitting here. I flatter myself
that I have arranged it all rather cleverly--I have succeeded in placing
in confinement that man who shadowed you last night, without any member
of the gang's knowing anything about his arrest or in the least
suspecting it, and I have literally stepped into his shoes, for these
clothes and boots that I am wearing are his. I believe the end of this
abominable conspiracy is now within sight. To-night you must come with
me to Paris on the boat that Miss Challoner, the woman Stapleton,
Gastrell, and one or two others will cross by. I shall assume the
disguise I have just removed. You will become once more Sir Aubrey
Belston, we shall travel from Victoria in separate compartments, and on
board the boat I shall casually mention to my 'friends' that Sir Aubrey
Belston is on board. In Paris we ought to find out a lot--I have a
friend there named Victor Albeury, who already knows a lot about this
affair--and we shall, unless I am greatly mistaken. Now I must go home
and get some hours of sleep, for I have been busy since we parted in the
'Tube' at Oxford Circus at midnight last night."

"But tell me," I exclaimed, my brain a whirl, "is what you told me
really true: that Osborne has become a victim to the wiles of Jasmine
Gastrell?"

"Absolutely. I have suspected as much for several weeks, and last night
I discovered it to be an absolute fact. Mr. Berrington, when Osborne
left us last night at Russell Square station he didn't return to his
hotel. Would you believe it, he had an assignation with the woman, and
kept it? But what is more curious still is what you wouldn't believe
when I told it to you some minutes ago--Jasmine Gastrell has fallen
madly in love with Osborne! Isn't it astonishing? To think that an
amazingly clever woman like that should let her heart get the better of
her head. But it's not the first case of the sort that I have known. I
could tell you of several similar instances of level-headed women of the
criminal class letting their hearts run away with them, and some day I
will. But now I really must leave you. Go back to your place, pack as
much luggage as you will need for a week or ten days--for we may be away
that long--write Sir Aubrey Belston's name on the luggage labels in a
disguised handwriting; send it to Victoria by messenger--not by your own
man, as we must take no risks whatever--and come to me not later than
six, and I will then again disguise you as Sir Aubrey Belston. You won't
be followed by any member of the gang, for the man I am impersonating
is supposed to be shadowing you. Connie Stapleton expects Alphonse
Furneaux--that's the man who followed you last night, and whom I am now
impersonating--to meet her at Victoria at a quarter past eight to-night.
You will get there a little later, and of course we must appear to be
total strangers. Keep out of sight of the woman, and of Gastrell, and of
anyone else you may see whom you remember seeing at Cumberland Place the
other night. You can speak to anybody you like once we are on board the
boat, but not before. The train leaves at nine. My! I am disappointed
with Osborne, more disappointed and disgusted than I can tell you. And
to think that if I had not made this discovery about him he might
unwittingly have brought about some fearful tragedy so far as you and I
are concerned! But I must really go," and, with a friendly nod, he rose
and strolled away.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21