Chapter XV.
Thalia Joins the Gang
Thalia Drummond was almost the last of the staff to leave the bank that night, and she stood on the steps looking idly from left to right as she pulled on her gloves. If she saw the man who was watching her from the opposite side of the road she did not reveal the fact by so much as a glance. Presently her eyes lighted upon Milly waiting a few yards up the street, and she walked toward her.
“You’ve been a long time, Drummond,” grumbled Miss Macroy. “You mustn’t keep my friend waiting, you know. He doesn’t like it.”
“He’ll get over that,” said Thalia. “I do not run to time-table where men are concerned.”
She fell in by Milly’s side and they walked a hundred yards along the busy thoroughfare before they turned into Reeder Street.
The restaurants in Reeder Street have taken to themselves names which are designed to suggest the gaiety and epicurean wonders of Paris. The “Moulin Gris” was a small, deep shop which, with the aid of numerous mirrors and the application of gold leaf, had managed to create an atmosphere of cramped splendour.
The tables were set for dinner and empty, for it was two hours before the meal, and to the proprietors of the “Moulin Gris” such a function as afternoon tea was unknown. They went up a narrow stairway to another dining-room on the first floor, and a man who was seated at one of the tables rose briskly to meet them. He was a sleek, dark, young man, his beautifully brilliantined hair was brushed back from his forehead, and he was dressed, if not in the height of fashion, at least in the height of the fashion which he favoured.
A faint odour of l’origan, a soft large hand, a pair of bright unwinking eyes, were the first impressions which Thalia received.
“Sit down, sit down, Miss Drummond,” he said brightly. “Waiter, bring that tea.”
“This is Thalia Drummond,” said Miss Macroy, unnecessarily it seemed.
“We needn’t be introduced,” laughed the young man. “I’ve heard a lot about you, Miss Drummond. My name’s Barnet.”
“ ‘Flush’ Barnet,” said Thalia, and he seemed surprised and not ill-pleased.
“You’ve heard of me, have you?”
“She’s heard of everything,” said Miss Macroy in resignation, “and what’s more,” she added significantly, “she knows Marl, and is dining with him to-night.”
Barnet looked sharply from one to the other, then back again at Milly Macroy.
“Have you told her anything?” he asked. There was a note of menace in his voice.
“You don’t have to tell her anything,” said Miss Macroy recklessly. “She knows it all!”
“Did you tell her?” he repeated.
“About Marl? No, I thought you’d tell her that.”
The waiter brought the tea at that moment and there was a silence until he had gone.
“Now, I’m a plain-spoken man,” said “Flush” Barnet. “And I’m going to tell you what I call you.”
“This sounds interesting,” said the girl, never taking her eyes from his face.
“I call you Thorough-Bad Thalia. How’s that? Good, eh?” said Mr. Barnet, leaning back in his chair and surveying her. “Thorough-Bad Thalia! You’re a naughty girl! I was in court the day old Froyant charged you with pinching!”
He shook his head waggishly.
“You’re as full of information as last year’s almanac,” said Thalia Drummond coolly. “I suppose you didn’t bring me here to exchange compliments?”
“No, I didn’t,” admitted “Flush” Barnet, and the jealous Miss Macroy recognised, by certain signs, the fascination that the girl was casting over her lover. “I brought you here to talk business. We’re all friends here, and we’re all in the same old business. I want to tell you straight away that I’m not one of your little thieving crooks, who lives from hand to mouth.”
He spoke very correctly, but aspirated his “h’s” just a trifle heavily Thalia duly remarked.
“I have people behind me who can find money to any amount if the job is good enough, and you’re spoiling a good pitch, Thalia.”
“Oh, I am, am I?” said Thalia. “Admitting I am all you think I am, in what way do I spoil the pitch?”
Mr. Barnet rolled his head from side to side with a smile.
“My dear girl,” he said with good-natured reproach. “How long do you think you’re going to last, taking money from envelopes and sending on old bits of paper? Eh? If my friend Brabazon hadn’t got the idea into his silly head that the fraud was worked in the post, you’d have had the police in your office in no time. And when I say my friend Brabazon, I’m not being funny, see?”
Here, he evidently thought he had said too much, though he found it very difficult indeed to leave the question of his friendship with the austere banker. Challenged, he might have said more, but Thalia offered no comment.
“Now, I’m going to tell you something,” he leant over the table and regulated his voice. “Milly and me have been working Brabazon’s bank for two months. There’s a big lot of money to be got, but not out of the bank—Brabazon is a friend of mine—but it can be done through one of the clients, and the man with the biggest balance is Marl.”
Her lips curled for the second time that day.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” she said quietly. “Marl’s balance wouldn’t buy a row of beans.”
He stared at her incredulously, then looked at Milly Macroy with a frown.
“You told me that he had the best part of a hundred thousand——”
“So he has,” said the girl.
“He had until to-day,” replied Thalia. “But this afternoon Mr. Brabazon went out—I think he went to the Bank of England, because the notes were all new. He sent for me and I saw them stacked up on his desk. He told me he was closing Marl’s account, and that he was not the kind of man he wanted as a client. Then he took the money and called on Marl, I think, for when he came back just before the bank closed he handed me Marl’s cheque.”
“ ‘I’ve settled that account, Miss Drummond,’ he said. ‘I don’t think we’ll be troubled with that blackguard again.’ ”
“Did he know about Marl asking you out to dinner?” asked Milly, but the girl shook her head.
Mr. Barnet said nothing. He was sitting back in his chair, fondling his chin, with a faraway look in his eyes.
“A big amount, was it?” he asked.
“Sixty-two thousand,” replied the girl.
“And it is in his house?” said Barnet, his face pink with excitement. “Sixty-two thousand! Did you hear that, Milly? And you’re dining with him to-night?” said “Flush” Barnet slowly and significantly. “Now, what about it?”
She met his gaze without flinching.
“What about what?” she asked.
“Here’s the chance of a lifetime,” he said, husky with emotion. “You’re going to the house. You’re not above stringing the old man along, are you, Thalia?”
She was silent.
“I know the place,” said “Flush” Barnet, “one of those quaint little houses in Kensington that cost a fortune to keep up. Marisburg Place, Bayswater Road.”
“I know the address pretty well,” said the girl.
“He keeps three menservants,” said “Flush” Barnet, “but they’re usually out any night he happens to be entertaining a lady friend. Do you get me?”
“But he’s not entertaining me in his house,” said the girl.
“What’s the matter with a little bit of supper after the show, eh?” asked Barnet. “Suppose he puts it up to you, and you say yes. There’ll be no servants in the house when you get back. That I’ll take my oath. I’ve studied Marl.”
“What do you expect me to do? Rob him?” asked Thalia. “Stick a gun under his nose and say, ‘Deliver your pieces of eight’?”
“Don’t be a fool,” said Mr. Barnet, startled out of his pose of elegant gentleman. “You’re to do nothing but have your supper and come away. Keep him amused, make him laugh. You needn’t be frightened because I’ll be in the house soon after you, and if there’s any trouble I’ll be on hand.”
The girl was playing with her teaspoon, her eyes fixed on the tablecloth.
“Suppose he doesn’t send his servants away?”
“You can bank on that,” interrupted Mr. Barnet. “Moses! There never was such a wonderful opportunity! Do you agree?”
Thalia shook her head.
“It is too big for me. Maybe you’re right and I’m likely to get into trouble, but it seems to me that petty pilfering is my long suit.”
“Bah!” said Barnet in disgust. “You’re mad! Now’s your time to make a harvest, my dear. You’re not known to the police. You’re not under the limelight like me. Are you going to do it?”
She dropped her eyes again to the cloth and again fidgeted with her spoon nervously.
“All right,” she said with a sudden shrug, “I might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.”
“Or for a good share of sixty thousand as for a miserable couple of hundred, eh?” said Barnet jovially, and beckoned the waiter.
Thalia left the restaurant and turned homeward. She had to pass the bank, and it was not good policy, she thought, to hail a taxicab until she had left the neighbourhood, where Mr. Brabazon’s grave eyes might observe her extravagance. She had turned into the stream of pedestrians that thronged Regent Street at this hour when she felt a touch on her arm, and turned.
A young man was walking by her side, a good-looking, keen-faced young man who did not smile ingratiatingly as others had done who had nudged her arm in Regent Street, nor did he inquire if she were going the same way as he.
“Thalia!”
She turned quickly at the sound of the voice, and for a second her self-possession failed her.
“Mr. Beardmore!” she faltered.
Jack’s face was flushed and he was obviously embarrassed.
“I only wanted to speak to you for a moment. I have waited for a week for the opportunity,” he said hurriedly.
“You knew I was at Brabazon’s—who told you?”
He hesitated.
“Inspector Parr,” he said, and when he saw the smile curl on the girl’s lips, he went on: “Old Parr isn’t a bad sort, really. He has never said another word against you, Thalia.”
“Another!” she quoted, “but does it really matter? And now, Mr. Beardmore, I really must go. I have a very important engagement.”
But he held fast to her hand.
“Thalia, won’t you tell me why you did it?” he asked quietly. “Who is behind you?”
She laughed.
“There is a reason for your keeping this extraordinary company,” he went on, when she stopped him.
“What extraordinary company?” she demanded.
“You have just come from a restaurant,” he said. “You have been there with a man called ‘Flush’ Barnet, a notorious crook and a man who has served a term of penal servitude. The woman with you was Milly Macroy, a confederate of his who was concerned in the Darlington Co-Operative robbery and has also served a term of imprisonment. At present she is engaged at Brabazon’s Bank.”
“Well?” said the girl again.
“Surely you don’t know the character of these people?” urged Jack.
“And how do you know them?” she asked calmly. “Am I wrong in supposing that you were not alone in your—vigil? Were you accompanied by the admirable Mr. Parr? I see you were. Why, you are almost a policeman yourself, Mr. Beardmore.”
Jack was staggered.
“Do you realise that it is Parr’s duty to inform your employer that you keep that kind of company?” he asked. “For heaven’s sake, Thalia, take a sane view of your position.”
But she laughed.
“Heaven forbid that I should interfere with the duty of a responsible police officer,” she said, “but on the whole I’d rather Mr. Parr didn’t. That at least is a sign of grace,” she smiled. “Yes, I’d much rather he didn’t. I don’t mind the police speaking to me for my good because it is only right and proper that they should try to lead the weak from their sinful ways. But an employer who attempts to reform an erring girl might be a bit of a nuisance, don’t you think?”
In spite of himself he laughed.
“Really, Thalia, you’re much too clever for the kind of company you’re keeping and for the kind of life you’re drifting to,” he added earnestly. “I know I have no right to interfere, but perhaps I could help you. Particularly,” he hesitated, “if you have done something which places you in the power of these people.”
She put out her hand with a rare smile.
“Good-bye,” she said sweetly, and left him feeling something of a fool.
The girl walked quickly through Burlington Arcade to Piccadilly and entered a taxi. The block of mansions at which she alighted was situated in the Marylebone Road and was a distinct improvement on Lexington Street.
The liveried porter took her up in the elevator to the third floor, and she let herself into a flat which was both prettily and expensively furnished.
She pressed a bell, and it was answered by a staid middle-aged woman.
“Martha,” she said, “I shan’t want any tea, thank you. Lay out my blue evening gown and telephone to Waltham’s Garage and tell them that I shall want a car to be here at five minutes before half past seven.”
Miss Drummond’s wages from the bank were exactly £4 a week.
Chapter XVI.
Mr. Marl Goes Out
“So you’ve come, eh?” said Mr. Marl, rising to greet the girl. “My word, but you look smart! And you look lovely, my dear, too!”
He took both her hands in his and led her into the little gold and white drawing-room.
“Lovely!” he repeated in an almost hushed voice. “I can tell you I was a little bit scared about taking you to the Ritz-Carlton. You don’t mind my frankness, do you—have a cigarette?”
He fumbled in the tail-pocket of his dress coat, produced a large gold case and opened it.
“You thought I’d turn up in one of Morne & Gillingsworth’s six guinea models, eh?” she laughed as she lit the cigarette.
“Well, I did, my dear. I’ve had a lot of unhappy experiences,” explained Marl as he seated himself heavily in an arm-chair. “I’ve had ’em turn up in queer clothes, I can tell you!”
“Do you make a practice of entertaining the young and the fair?” Thalia had seated herself on the big padded fireguard and was looking down at him under her half-closed lids.
“Well,” said Mr. Marl complacently, rubbing his hands. “I’m not so old that I don’t get some pleasure out of ladies’ society. But you’re stunning!”
He was a blonde, red-faced man with suspiciously brown hair, suspiciously even teeth, and for this evening he had acquired a waist which seemed wholly unreal.
“We’re going to dinner and then we’ll go on and see ‘The Boys and the Girls’ at the Winter Palace,” he said, “and then,” he hesitated, “what do you say to a little supper?” he asked.
“A little supper? I don’t take supper,” said the girl.
“Well, you can peck a bit of fruit, I suppose?” suggested Mr. Marl.
“Where?” asked the girl steadily. “Most of the restaurants are closed before the theatres are out, aren’t they?”
“There’s no reason why you shouldn’t come back here? You’re not a prude, my dear, are you?”
“Not much,” she confessed.
“I can see you home in my car,” he said.
“I’ve got my own car, thank you,” said the girl, and Mr. Marl’s eyes opened. Then he began to laugh steadily at first, and his laughter ended in an asthmatical paroxysm. Presently he gasped: “Oh, you wicked little devil!”
The evening was an interesting one for Thalia, more interesting by reason of the fact that she caught a glimpse of Mr. “Flush” Barnet in the hall of the hotel as she passed through.
It was after the theatre was over and they were standing in the vestibule, waiting for the lift-man to call their car, that Thalia showed some symptom of hesitation, but the eloquent Mr. Felix Marl overcame whatever reluctance she felt, and as the clock was striking the half hour after eleven she passed into the hall, not failing to notice that Mr. Marl did not ring for his servants, but let himself in with his own latchkey.
The supper was laid in a rose-panelled dining-room.
“I will help you, my dear,” said Mr. Marl. “We won’t bother about the servants.” But she shook her head.
“I can eat nothing, and I think I’ll go home now,” she said.
“Wait, wait,” he begged. “I want to have a little talk with you about your boss. I can do you a lot of good in that firm—at the bank, Thalia. Who called you Thalia?”
“My godfathers and godmothers, M. or N.” said Thalia solemnly, and Mr. Marl squeaked his delight at her humour.
He was passing behind her, ostensibly to reach one of the dishes which were set on the table, when he stooped and, had she not slipped from his grasp, would have kissed her.
“I think I’ll go home,” said Thalia.
“Rubbish!” Mr. Marl was annoyed, and when Mr. Marl was annoyed he forgot that he made any pretensions to gentle birth. “Come and sit down.”
She looked at him long and thoughtfully, and then, turning suddenly, went to the door, and turned the handle. It was locked.
“I think you had better open this door, Mr. Marl,” she said quietly.
“I think not,” chuckled Mr. Marl. “Now, Thalia, be the dear, good little girl I thought you were.”
“I should hate to dissipate any illusions you may have about my character,” said Thalia coolly. “You’ll open that door, please.”
“Certainly.”
He ambled toward the door, feeling in his pocket, then before she could realise his intention he had seized her in his arms. He was a powerful man, a head taller than she, and his big hands gripped her arms like steel clamps.
“Let me go,” said Thalia steadily. She did not lose her nerve nor show the least sign of fear.
Suddenly he felt her tense muscles relax. He had conquered.
With a quick intake of breath he released his hold of the sullen girl.
“Let me have some supper,” she said, and he beamed.
“Now, my dear, you are being the little girl I—what’s that?”
The last was a squeak of terror.
She had strolled slowly to the table and had taken up the brocade bag. He had watched her and thought she was seeking a handkerchief. Instead she had produced a small, black, egg-shaped thing, and with a flick of her left hand had pulled out a small pin and dropped the pin on to the table. He knew what it was—he had dabbled in army supplies and had seen many Mills bombs.
“Put it down—no, no, put the pin in, you young fool!” he whimpered.
“Don’t worry,” she said coolly. “I have a spare pin in my bag—open that door!”
His hand shook like a man with palsy as he fumbled at the keyhole. Then he turned and blinked at her.
“A Mills bomb!” he mumbled, and fell back an obese mass of quivering flesh against the delicate panelling.
Slowly she nodded.
“A Mills bomb,” she said softly, and went out, still gripping the lever of the deadly egg-like thing. He followed her to the door and slammed it after her, then went shakily up the stairs to his bedroom.
“Flush” Barnet, standing in the shadow of a clothes-press, heard the click of locks and the snap of a bolt as Mr. Marl entered his room.
The house was still. Through the thick door of Mr. Marl’s bedroom no sound came. There was no transom to the door, and the only evidence that there was somebody in his room was afforded by a fret of light in the ceiling of the passage, which came through a ventilator in the wall of the bedroom.
During the war this house had been used as an officers’ convalescent home, and certain hygienic arrangements had been introduced, which were more useful than beautiful.
“Flush” crept softly in his stockinged feet to the door and listened. He thought he heard the man talking to himself and looked around for some means by which he could obtain a view of the room. There was a small oaken table in the corridor and he placed this against the wall and mounted. His eyes came to the level of the ventilator and he looked down upon Mr. Marl pacing the room in his shirt-sleeves, obviously disturbed. Then “Flush” Barnet heard a sound. Just a faint “hush-hush” of feet on a carpet, and he slipped down, walked quickly along the corridor, passing the head of the stairs.
The hall below was in darkness, but he felt rather than saw a figure on the stairway. Whether it was man or woman he could not say, and did not stop to discover. It might be one of the servants returning furtively—servants did not always stay away when they were bidden. “Flush” passed to the farther end of the corridor and from an angle in the wall watched. He saw nobody pass the head of the stairs, but there was no background. After a while he crept back again. There was nothing to be gained by forcing the door of Marl’s bedroom, even if it were possible. He had had time to inspect the house at his leisure, and he had already decided upon investigating the little safe in the library, for Mr. Marl’s own room had drawn blank.
The “investigation,” which took two hours and the employment of one of the best sets of tools in the profession, was not unprofitable. But it did not reveal the huge sum of money which he anticipated. He hesitated. The night was too far through to make an attempt on the bedroom, even if he had not already searched it from wall to wall. He folded his kit and slipped it into one pocket, his loot into another, and went upstairs again. There was no sound from Marl’s room, but the light was still on. He tried to look through the keyhole, but the key was still there. The only inducement there was for him to enter the room was the possibility that the money was in the man’s clothes. This likelihood was remote, he thought. Possibly Marl had taken it to some safe deposit—a contingency which Barnet had foreseen.
He went slowly down the stairs, through the hall and the butler’s pantry to the side door, where he had left his boots, his overcoat and his shiny silk hat, for he was in evening dress. Then he stole softly forth along the covered passage-way running by the side of the house. Here a door opened into the little forecourt of Marl’s house. He reached the garden and his hand was on the gate when somebody touched him and he spun round.
“I want you ‘Flush,’ ” said a well-remembered voice. “Inspector Parr. You may remember me?”
“Parr!” gasped the bewildered Barnet, and with an oath wrenched himself free and leapt through the gate, but the three policemen who were waiting for him were not so easy to dispose of, and they marched “Flush” Barnet to the nearest police station, a worried man.
In the meantime Parr conducted a search of his own. Accompanied by a detective he made his way to the hall of the house and up the stairs.
“This is the only room occupied apparently,” he said, and knocked at the door.
There was no reply.
“Go along and see if you can rouse any of the servants,” said Parr.
The man came back with the startling information that there were no servants in the house.
“There’s somebody here,” said the old inspector, and flashing his lamp along the corridor he saw the table, and with an agility remarkable in one of his age, he leapt up and peered through the ventilator.
“I can just see somebody asleep,” he said. “Hi! Wake up!” he called, but there was no reply.
Hammering on the door did not produce any response.
“Go down and see if you can find a hatchet, we’ll break open the door,” said Parr. “I don’t like this.”
Hatchet there was none, but they found a hammer.
“Can you show a light, Mr. Parr?” asked the man, and the inspector flashed his lamp on the door. It was a white door—white except for the Crimson Circle affixed to a panel as by a rubber stamp.
“Break in the door,” said Parr, breathing heavily.
For five minutes they smashed at a panel before they finally hammered it through, and the sleeper within gave no sign of consciousness.
Parr reached his hand through the door, turned the key and, by dint of stretching, found the bolt at the top. He slipped into the room. The light was still burning and its rays fell across the man on the bed, who lay upon his back, a twisted smile on his face, most obviously dead.
Chapter XVII.
The Blower of Bubbles
It was long after midnight and Derrick Yale was sitting in his pretty little study—he lived in a flat overlooking the park—when the knock came to the door and he rose to admit Inspector Parr.
Parr related the incident of the evening.
“But why didn’t you tell me?” asked Derrick a little reproachfully, and then laughed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I always seem to be butting in on your affairs. But how came the murderer to escape? You say you had had the house surrounded for two hours. Did the girl come out?”
“Undoubtedly; she came out and drove home.”
“And nobody else went in?”
“I wouldn’t like to swear that,” said Parr. “Whoever was in the house had probably arrived long before Marl returned from the theatre. I have since discovered that there was a way out through the garage at the back of the house. When I said the house was surrounded that was an exaggeration. There was a way through the back garden which I did not know. I didn’t even suspect there were gardens there. Undoubtedly he went through the garage door.”
“Do you suspect the girl at all?”
Parr shook his head.
“But why were you surrounding Marl’s house at all?” asked Derrick Yale seriously.
The answer was as unexpected as it was sensational.
“Because Marl has been under police observation ever since he came back to London,” said Parr. “In fact, ever since I discovered that he was the man who wrote the letter, the scrap of which I found and which I compared last week with his writing—I asked him for the address of his tailor.”
“Marl?” said the other incredulously.
Inspector Parr nodded.
“I don’t know what there was between old man Beardmore and Marl, or what brought him to the house. I’ve been trying to reconstruct the scene. You may remember that when Marl came to the house on a visit he was suddenly seized with a panic.”
“I remember,” nodded Yale. “Jack Beardmore told me about it. Well?”
“He refused to stay at the house, said he was going back to London,” said Parr. “As a matter of fact, he went no farther than Kingside, which is a station some eight or nine miles away. He sent his bag on to London and came back by road. He was probably the person whom the murderer saw in the wood that night. Now why had he come back if he was so scared that he ran away in the first place? And why did he write that letter for delivery in the night when he had every opportunity to tell James Beardmore by day, when he was with him?”
There was a long silence.
“How was Marl killed?” asked Yale.
The other shook his head.
“That is a mystery to me. The murderer could not possibly have entered the room. I had an interview with ‘Flush’ Barnet—as yet he knows nothing about the murder—and he admits he broke in for the purpose of burglary. He says he heard the sound of somebody moving about the house, and very naturally hid himself. He also says he heard a strange hissing sound, like air escaping from a pipe. Another remarkable clue was a round wet patch on the pillow, within a few inches of the dead man’s hand. It was exactly circular. At first I thought it was a symbol of the Crimson Circle, until I discovered another patch on the counterpane. The doctor has not been able to diagnose the cause of death, but the motive is clear. According to his banker—I’ve just been talking to Brabazon on the telephone—he drew a large sum of money from the bank yesterday. In fact, Brabazon closed his account. They had a quarrel over something or other. The safe was of course opened by ‘Flush’ Barnet, but there was no money found on him when he was searched at the police station. Curiously enough, we did discover several little oddments that ‘Flush’ had picked up—now, who took the money?”
Derrick Yale paced the floor, his hands behind him, his chin on his breast.
“Do you know anything of Brabazon?” he asked.
The other did not reply immediately.
“Only that he is a banker and does a lot of foreign work.”
“Is he solvent?” asked Derrick Yale bluntly, and the inspector raised his dull eyes slowly until they were on a level with the other’s.
“No,” he said, “and I don’t mind telling you that we’ve had one or two complaints about his methods.”
“Were they good friends—Marl and Brabazon?”
“Fairly good,” was the hesitating reply. “The impression I have from reports is that Marl had some hold over Brabazon.”
“And Brabazon was insolvent,” mused Derrick Yale. “And this afternoon Marl closes his account. In what circumstances? Did he come to the bank?”
Briefly the detective explained what had happened. It seemed that there was precious little that did happen at Brabazon’s bank that he did not know.
Derrick Yale was beginning to respect this man, whom at first he had regarded, with a good-natured scorn, as a little stupid.
“I wonder if it would be possible for me to go to Marl’s house to-night?”
“I came to suggest that,” said the other. “In fact, I kept a cab waiting at the door with that idea.”
Derrick Yale did not speak during the journey to Bayswater, and it was not until he stood in the hall of the house in Marisburg Place that he broke the silence.
“We ought to find a small steel cylinder somewhere,” he said slowly.
The policeman standing on duty in the hall came forward and saluted the inspector.
“We found an iron bottle in the garage, sir?” he said.
“Ah!” cried Derrick Yale triumphantly. “I thought so!”
He almost ran up the stairs ahead of the detective and paused in the passage, which was now lighted. The little oak table stood against the ventilator and toward that he moved. Then he went down on his hands and knees and sniffed the carpet. Presently he choked and coughed and got up, red in the face.
“Let me see that cylinder,” he said.
They brought it to him. The policeman’s description of it as a bottle was nearer the truth. It was an iron bottle, at the end of which was a small pipe to which was attached a tiny turn-key.
“And now there ought to be a cup somewhere,” he said, looking round, “unless he brought it in a bottle.”
“There was a small glass bottle in the garage near this, sir,” said the policeman who had found it, “it is broken, though.”
“Bring it to me quickly,” said Yale. “And I can only hope that it isn’t so completely smashed that none of its contents are left.”
The stout Mr. Parr was regarding him sombrely.
“What is all this about?” he asked, and Derrick Yale chuckled.
“A new way of committing a murder, my dear Mr. Parr,” he said airily, “now let us go into the room.”
The body of Marl lay on the bed covered by a sheet and the circular patch of wet on the pillow had not dried. The windows were open and a fitful wind kept the curtains fluttering.
“Of course you can’t smell it here,” said Yale speaking to himself, and again went on his knees and nosed the carpet. And again he coughed and rose hurriedly.
By this time they had returned with the lower half of a glass bottle. It contained a few drops of liquid, and this Yale poured into his hand.
“Soap and water,” he said; “I thought it would be. And now I’ll explain how Marl was killed. Your thief, ‘Flush’ Barnet, heard a hissing sound. It was the sound of a heavy gas escaping from this cylinder. I may be wrong, but I should imagine there is enough poison gas in that little iron bottle to settle your account and mine. It is still lying on the floor, by the way. It is one of those heavy gases which descend.”
“But how did it kill Marl? Did they pump it through the grating on to his head?”
Derrick Yale shook his head.
“It is a much simpler and a much more deadly method which the Crimson Circle employed,” he said quietly. “They blew bubbles.”
“Bubbles!”
Derrick Yale nodded.
“The end of this cylinder—you can still feel the slime of the soap upon it—was first dipped into the soap solution, then thrust through the grating. The tap was turned down and a bubble formed, which was shaken off. From the ventilator,” he ran outside and jumped on to the table, “yes, I thought so,” he said, “he could see Marl’s head. Two or three of the bubbles must have been failures. One struck the pillow, but I should imagine that that was blown after his death; one struck the wall, you will find the wet patch, but one, and probably more, burst on his face. He must have been killed almost instantaneously.”
Parr could only gape.
“I thought it all out on the way here. The circular patch on the pillow reminded me of my own boyish exploits and their disastrous effect when I started blowing bubbles in the bedroom. And then when you mentioned the ventilator and the hissing noise, I was perfectly certain that my theory was right.”
“But we smelt no gas when we came into the room,” said Parr.
“The wind may have blown away the fumes,” said Derrick Yale. “But apart from that, the weight of the gas would send it to the floor, and by its own density it would spread evenly—look!” He struck a match, shielded it for a moment until it caught light, and then slowly brought it down to the floor level. An inch from the carpet the match was suddenly extinguished.
“I see,” said Inspector Parr.
“Now what about searching the place? Perhaps I can be of use,” suggested Yale, but his offer of help did not meet with any very gracious response.
A small police audience, which had listened awe-stricken whilst Yale had developed his theory, could understand the inspector’s feelings. Apparently Yale did, too, for with a good-humoured laugh he made his excuses and went home. There are moments when the head-quarters police should be left alone with their own emotions. Nobody realised this more than Derrick Yale.
Chapter XVIII.
“Flush” Barnet’s Story
Inspector Parr, after a further search, proceeded to the nearest police station to interview Mr. “Flush” Barnet.
“Flush,” a depressed and weary man, had no illuminating information to give.
The proceeds of his robbery lay upon the station-sergeant’s table, a miscellaneous collection of rings and watches, a perfectly valueless bank-book—valueless to “Flush,” at any rate—and a silver flask. But the most surprising circumstance was that in “Flush” Barnet’s pocket were two brand new bank-notes for a hundred pounds, which he insisted stoutly were his own property.
Now burglars, and particularly the type of burglar that “Flush” Barnet was, are notoriously improvident people. They do not work whilst they have money, and with two hundred pounds in his possession, it is certain that “Flush” Barnet would not have attempted to break into Marisburg Place.
“They’re my own, I tell you, Mr. Parr,” he protested, “would I tell you a lie?”
“Of course you would,” said Inspector Parr without heat. “If they are your own, where did you get them?”
“They were given to me by a friend.”
“Why did you light a fire in the library?” asked Parr unexpectedly, and “Flush” Barnet started.
“Because I was cold,” he said after a pause.
“H’m,” said Inspector Parr, and then as though speaking his thoughts aloud, “he has two hundred of his own, he breaks into a house, he burgles a safe and lights a fire. Now, why did he light the fire? Why did he light the fire? To burn something he’d found in the safe!”
“Flush” Barnet listened without offering any comment, but he was visibly distressed.
“Therefore,” said Parr, “you were paid to break into Marl’s house and you got two hundred for pinching something from his safe and burning it. Am I right?”
“If I died this moment——” began “Flush” Barnet.
“You’d go to hell,” said the inspector dispassionately, “where all liars go. Who is your pal, Barnet? You’d better tell me, because I’m in two minds whether I shall charge you with the murder——”
“Murder!” almost screamed “Flush” Barnet, as he sprang to his feet. “What do you mean? I haven’t committed a murder!”
“Marl’s dead, that’s all; found dead in his bed.”
He left the prisoner in a state of mental prostration, and when he returned in the early hours of the morning to renew his inquisition, “Flush” Barnet told him all.
“I don’t know anything about Crimson Circles, Mr. Parr,” he said, “but this is the truth.”
He added a pious wish that Providence would deal hardly with him if he departed from veracity.
“I’m keeping company with a young lady at Brabazon’s bank. One night when she was working late, I was waiting for her when a gentleman came out of the side entrance of the bank and called me. I was surprised to hear him mention my name, and I nearly dropped dead when I saw his face.”
“It was Mr. Brabazon?” suggested Parr.
“That’s right, sir. He asked me into his private office. I thought he’d got something against Milly.”
“Go on,” said Parr, when the man paused.
“Well, I’ve got to save myself, haven’t I? And I suppose I’d better speak the whole truth. He told me that Marl was blackmailing him, and that Marl had some letters of his which he kept in his private safe, and offered me a thousand if I’d get them. That’s the truth. And then he gave me an idea that Marl kept a lot of money in the house. He didn’t exactly say so, but that is what he hinted. He knew I’d been inside for burglary, he’d made inquiries about me, and said that I was the right kind of man. Well, sir, I went round and took a squint at the place, and it seemed to me that it was a bit difficult. There were always men servants in the house, except when Mr. Marl was entertaining ladies to supper,” he grinned. “I’d have given up the job, only there’s a young lady in the office that Marl was sweet on.”
“Thalia Drummond?” suggested Parr.
“That’s right, sir,” nodded “Flush.” “It was what you might call an act of Providence, him being sweet on her, and when I found that he’d invited her to dinner, I thought that was a good opportunity to get in. It seemed money for nothing when I found out that he’d drawn his bank balance. I opened the safe—that was easy—and I found the envelope, but it had no papers, only a photograph of a man and a woman on a rock. I think it was a photograph of some place abroad, for there were lots of mountains in the background, and he seemed to be pushing her over and she was holding on to a bit of tree. Maybe it was one of those cinema pictures. Anyway, I burnt it.”
“I see,” said Inspector Parr. “And that is all?”
“That’s all, sir. I never found any money.”
At seven o’clock, with a warrant in his pocket, and accompanied by two detectives, Inspector Parr made a call at the block of flats where Brabazon had his residence.
A servant in night attire opened the door to them and indicated the banker’s room. The door was locked, but Parr kicked it open without ceremony. The room, however, was empty. An open window and a fire escape suggested the method by which the eminent banker had made his get-away, and the fact that the bed had not been slept in and that there was no sign of disorder in the room, showed that he had gone hours before the detective’s arrival.
By the side of the bed there was a telephone, and Parr called the exchange.
“Can you find if any message came through to this number during the night?” he asked. “I am Inspector Parr, of police head-quarters.”
“Two,” was the reply. “I put them through myself. One from Bayswater——”
“That was mine,” said the Inspector. “What was the other?”
“From the Western Exchange—at 2.30.”
“Thank you,” said the inspector grimly, and hung up the telephone.
He looked at his companions and rubbed his big nose irritably.
“Thalia Drummond is going to get another job,” he said.
Chapter XIX.
Thalia Accepts an Offer
It took over a week to settle the preliminaries of Brabazon’s insolvency, and at the end of that time, Thalia walked from the bank with a week’s salary in her little leather bag, and no immediate prospects of employment.
Inspector Parr had not minced his words, which he had addressed to her before an impressed audience.
“Only the fact that I saw you come out of Marl’s house and saw him close the door on you, saves you from a serious charge,” he said.
“If it had only saved me from a lecture also, I should have been pleased,” said Thalia coolly.
“What do you make of her?” asked Parr, as the girl disappeared through the swing doors of the office.
“She rather puzzles me,” it was Derrick Yale to whom he had addressed his question. “And the more I think of her, the more I am puzzled. The woman Macroy says that she has been engaged in pilfering since she has been at the bank, but there is no proof of that. In fact, the only person who could supply the proof is our absent friend, Brabazon. Why didn’t you call her as a witness in the prosecution of Barnet?”
“It would be a case of Barnet’s word against hers,” said the detective, shaking his head, “and the case against Barnet was so clear that I didn’t want any further evidence than my own eyes.”
Yale was frowning thoughtfully.
“I wonder,” he said, half to himself.
“What do you wonder?”
“I wonder if this girl could give us a little more information about the Crimson Circle than we have at present. I’m half inclined to engage her.”
Parr muttered something under his breath.
“I know you think I’m mad, but really I have method in my madness. There is nothing to steal in my office; she would be under my eye all the time, and if she were in communication with the Circle, I should certainly know all about it. Besides, she interests me.”
“Why did you shake hands with her?” asked Parr curiously, and the other laughed.
“That is why she interests me. I wanted to get an impression, and the impression I had was of some dark, sinister force in the background of her life. That girl is not working independently. She has behind her——”
“The Crimson Circle?” suggested Parr, and there was the suggestion of a sneer in his tone.
“Very likely,” said the other seriously. “Anyway, I’m going to see her.”
He called at Thalia’s flat that afternoon, and her servant showed him into the pretty little drawing-room. A minute after Thalia came in, and there was a smile in her fine eyes as she recognised her visitor.
“Well, Mr. Yale, have you come to give me a few words of warning?”
“Not exactly,” laughed Yale. “I’ve come to offer you a job.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“Do you want an assistant,” she asked ironically, “acting on the principle that to catch a thief you must employ a thief? Or have you views about my reformation? Several people want to reform me,” she said.
She sat down on the piano stool, her hands behind her, and he knew that she was mocking him.
“Why do you steal, Miss Drummond?”
“Because it is my nature to,” she said without hesitation. “Why should kleptomania be confined to the ruling classes?”
“Do you get any satisfaction out of it?” he demanded. “I’m not asking out of idle curiosity, but as a student of human man and woman.”
She waved her hand round the apartment.
“I have the satisfaction of a very comfortable home,” she said. “I have a good servant, and I am not likely to starve. All these things are particularly satisfying to me. Now tell me about the job, Mr. Yale. Do you want me to be a policewoman?”
“Not exactly,” he smiled, “but I want a secretary, somebody upon whom I can rely. My work is increasing at a tremendous rate; my correspondence is much more than I can cope with. I will add, that there is little opportunity in my office for the exercise of your pet vice,” he added good-humouredly, “and anyway, I’ll take that risk.”
She considered a moment, looking at him steadily.
“If you’re willing to take the risk, so am I,” she said at last. “Where is your office?”
He gave her the address.
“I shall be with you at ten o’clock in the morning. Lock up your cheque-book and clear away your loose change,” she said.
“A remarkable girl,” he thought as he was going back to the city.
He spoke no more than the truth when he had told Parr that she puzzled him, and yet he had met with every type of criminal, and probably knew more of criminal psychology than did Parr with all his experience.
His mind strayed to Parr, that unhappy individual whom he knew was in disgrace. How much longer would police head-quarters tolerate him after this third failure to deal with the Crimson Circle, he wondered.
Mr. Parr was thinking on the same lines that night. A brief official memo, had awaited him on his arrival at head-quarters, and he read it with a grimace of pain. And there was worse to follow, he guessed, and he had good reason for that fear.
The next morning he was summoned to the house of Mr. Froyant, and found Derrick Yale already there.
For all their good relationship, the chase of the Crimson Circle had developed into a duel between these strangely different personalities. It was an open secret in newspaper land that Parr’s impending ruin was due less to the unchecked villainies of the Crimson Circle, than to the superhuman brilliancy of this unofficial rival. To do him justice, Yale did his best to discredit this view, but it was held.
Froyant, for all his meanness and his knowledge of Yale’s heavy fees, had commissioned him immediately after he had received the warning. His faith in the police had evaporated, and he made no attempt to disguise his scepticism.
“Mr. Froyant has decided to pay,” were the words which greeted the inspector.
“Eh, of course I shall pay!” exploded Mr. Froyant.
He had aged ten years in the past few days, thought Parr; his face was whiter, and thinner, and he seemed to have shrunk within himself.
“If police head-quarters allow this dastardly association to threaten respectable citizens, and cannot even protect their lives, what else is there to be done, but to pay? My friend Pindle has had a similar threat, and he has paid. I cannot stand the strain of this any longer.”
He paced up and down the library floor like a man demented.
“Mr. Froyant will pay,” said Derrick Yale slowly. “But this time I think the Crimson Circle have been just a little too venturesome.”
“What do you mean?” asked Parr.
“Have you the letter, sir?” demanded Yale, and Froyant pulled open a drawer savagely and slammed down the familiar card upon his blotting-pad.
“When did this arrive?” asked Parr as he took it up, noting the Crimson Circle.
“By this morning’s post.”
Parr read the words inscribed in the centre:
“We shall call for the money at the office of Mr. Derrick Yale at 3.30 on Friday afternoon. The notes must not run in series. If it is not there for us, you will die the same night.”
Three times the inspector read the short message, and then he sighed.
“Well, that simplifies matters,” he said. “Of course, they will not call——”
“I think they will,” said Yale quietly; “but I shall be prepared for them, and I should like you to be on hand, Mr. Parr.”
“If there is one thing more certain than another,” said the inspector phlegmatically, “it is that I shall be on hand. But I don’t think they will come.”
“There I can’t agree with you,” said Yale. “Whoever the central figure of the Crimson Circle is, he or she does not lack courage. And, by the way,” he lowered his voice, “you will meet an old acquaintance at my office.”
Parr shot a quick, suspicious glance at the detective, and saw that he was mildly amused.
“Drummond?” he asked.
Yale nodded.
“You are engaging her?”
“She rather interests me, and I fancy that she is going to be a real help in the solution of this mystery.”
Froyant came in at that moment, and the conversation was tactfully changed.
Chapter XX.
The Key of River House
It was arranged that Froyant should draw the necessary money from his bank on the Thursday morning to pay the demand, and that Yale should call for it and meet Parr at the former’s office in ample time to make the necessary preparations for the visitor’s reception.
Mr. Parr’s way to head-quarters took him past the big house where Jack Beardmore was living in solitude.
The events of the past few weeks had wrought an extraordinary change in the youth. From a boy he had suddenly become a man, with all a man’s balance and understanding. He had inherited an enormous fortune, but with its coming the incentive of life had, for the most part, fallen away. He could never escape the memory of Thalia Drummond; her face was before him, sleeping or waking, and though he called himself a fool, and could, as he did, argue the matter to a logical conclusion, the sum of all his reasoning faded before the image he carried in his heart.
Between Inspector Parr and he there had grown a curious friendship. There was a time when he was near to hating the stout little man, but his good sense had told him that however large a part sentiment had played in his own life, and in the direction of his own actions, it could have no place in a police officer’s moral equipment.
The inspector stopped before the door of the house, and was for passing on, but, obeying an impulse, he walked slowly up the steps and rang the bell. The footman who admitted him was one of the dozen servants who accentuated the emptiness of the mansion.
Jack was in the dining-room, pretending to be interested in a late breakfast.
“Come in, Mr. Parr,” he said, rising. “I suppose you breakfasted hours ago. Is there anything new?”
“Nothing,” said Parr, “except that Mr. Froyant has decided to pay.”
“He would,” said Jack contemptuously, and then, for the first time in a long while, he laughed. “I shouldn’t like to be the Red or Crimson Circle, or whatever it calls itself.”
“Why not?” asked Mr. Parr, with a little light of amusement in his eyes, but he could guess the answer.
“My poor father used to say that Froyant fretted over every cent that was taken from him and never rested until he got it back. When Harvey’s panic is over he will go after the Crimson Circle, and will never leave it until every bank-note he has handed to them is repaid.”
“Very likely,” agreed the inspector, “but they aren’t holding the money yet.”
He told Jack the contents of the letter which Froyant had received that morning, and his young host was visibly astonished.
“They’re taking a big risk, aren’t they? It would be a clever man who got the better of Derrick Yale.”
“So I think,” said the inspector, crossing his legs comfortably. “I must take my hat off to Yale. There are things about him that I admire tremendously.”
“His psychometrical powers, for example,” smiled Jack, but the inspector shook his head.
“I don’t know enough about those to admire them. They seem uncanny to me, yet in a certain way I can understand them. No, I am thinking of other of his qualities.”
He was suddenly silent, and Jack sensed his depression.
“You’re having a pretty bad time at head-quarters, aren’t you?” he asked. “I don’t suppose they are particularly pleased with the immunity of the Crimson Circle?”
Parr nodded.
“I’m not exactly in a bed of roses just now,” he admitted. “But that doesn’t worry me a bit.” He looked steadily at Jack. “By the way, your young friend is in a new job.”
Jack started.
“My young friend?” he stammered. “You mean Miss——”
“Miss Drummond, I mean. Derrick Yale has engaged her,” he chuckled softly at Jack’s astonishment.
“Engaged Miss Thalia Drummond? You’re joking, surely?” said Jack.
“I thought he was joking when he suggested it. He’s a queer bird, is Yale.”
“He ought to be at head-quarters, a lot of people think,” said Jack, and realised that he had made a faux pas before the words were out.
But if Mr. Parr was hurt he did not show it.
“They don’t take them in from outside,” he said with a smile, and the inspector very rarely smiled. “Otherwise, Mr. Beardmore, we should have taken you! No, our friend is clever. I suppose you don’t expect a head-quarters’ man to admit that what we call a ‘fancy’ detective can be anything but an interfering fool? But Yale is clever.”
They had strolled together to the window, and were looking out into the sedate street in which Jack Beardmore’s residence was situated.
“Isn’t that Miss Drummond?” he asked suddenly.
Parr had already seen her. She was walking slowly along the other side of the road, looking at the numbers of the houses. Presently she crossed.
“She’s coming here,” gasped Jack. “I wonder what——” He did not wait to finish what he had to say, but rushed out of the room and opened the hall door to her whilst her finger was lingering on the bell push.
“It is good to see you, Thalia,” he said, gripping her warmly by the hand. “Won’t you come in? An old acquaintance of yours is in the dining-room.”
She raised her eyebrows.
“Not Mr. Parr?”
“You’re a wonderful guesser,” laughed Jack as he closed the door behind her. “Did you want to see me alone?” he asked suddenly.
She shook her head.
“No; I’ve only a message for you from Mr. Yale. He wanted you to let him have the key of your riverside house.”
By this time they were in the dining-room, and the girl, meeting the expressionless gaze of Mr. Parr, nodded curtly.
“You evidently do not love my friend, Mr. Parr,” thought Jack.
He explained the object of the girl’s visit.
“My poor father had a derelict property by the riverside,” he said. “It has not been tenanted for years, and the surveyors tell me it will cost almost as much as the property is worth to put it into repair. For some reason Yale thinks that Brabazon will use this as a hiding-place. Brabazon had it in his hands for some time, trying to sell it. He looked after some of my father’s property. But is he at all likely to be there?”
Mr. Parr pursed his large lips and blinked meditatively.
“The only thing I know about him is that so far he has not left the country,” he said at last. “I should not think he’d go to a house which he must know would be searched.” He stared absently at Thalia. “Yet he might,” he mused. “I suppose he has a key to the place. What is it, a house?”
“It is half house and half warehouse,” said Jack. “I have never seen it, but I believe it is one of those dwellings which the old merchants favoured two hundred years ago, in the days when they lived in the places where they carried on business.”
He unlocked his desk and pulled out a drawer full of keys, each bearing a label.
“This is the one, I think, Miss Drummond,” he said, handing the key to her. “How do you like your new job?”
It required some courage to ask the question, for he was almost awestricken in her presence.
She smiled faintly.
“It is amusing,” she said, “without being in any way tempting! I cannot tell you very much about it, because I only started this morning.” She turned to the detective. “No, I shan’t trouble you very much, Mr. Parr,” she said. “The only thing of value in the office is a silver paper-weight—I don’t even have to post the letters,” she went on mockingly. “The office is built on the American plan, and there is a little shute in Mr. Yale’s private office that drops the letters straight away into the box in the hall below. It is very disappointing!”
Solemn though she was, her eyes were dancing with merriment.
“You’re a queer woman, Thalia Drummond,” said Parr, “and yet I’m sure there is some good in you.”
The remark seemed to cause her unbounded amusement. She laughed until the tears were in her eyes, and Jack grinned sympathetically.
Parr, on the other hand, showed no sign of amusement.
“Be careful,” he said ominously, and the smile faded from her lips.
“You may be sure I shall be very careful, Mr. Parr,” she said, “and if I am in any kind of trouble, you can be equally sure that I shall send immediately for you!”
“I hope you will,” said Parr, “though I have my doubts.”