Книга - Inspector French’s Greatest Case

Inspector French’s Greatest Case
Freeman Wills Crofts


From the Collins Crime Club archive, the first Inspector French novel by Freeman Wills Crofts, once dubbed ‘The King of Detective Story Writers’.THE FIRST INSPECTOR FRENCH MYSTERYAt the offices of the Hatton Garden diamond merchant Duke and Peabody, the body of old Mr Gething is discovered beside a now-empty safe. With multiple suspects, the robbery and murder is clearly the work of a master criminal, and requires a master detective to solve it. Meticulous as ever, Inspector Joseph French of Scotland Yard embarks on an investigation that takes him from the streets of London to Holland, France and Spain, and finally to a ship bound for South America . . .























Copyright (#ulink_1307f33d-9e0d-5eb9-8905-7020c04e57f6)


Published by COLLINS CRIME CLUB

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)

First published in Great Britain by Wm Collins Sons & Co. Ltd 1924

Copyright © Estate of Freeman Wills Crofts 1924

Introduction © Estate of Freeman Wills Crofts 1937

Cover design by Mike Topping © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008190583

Ebook Edition © November 2016 ISBN: 9780008190590

Version: 2018-08-17


Contents

Cover (#ud3e9c4d9-4d5a-582f-944c-7b6fc4d72217)

Title Page (#u89d5f7bf-589e-5cf9-b5f7-71f39a4f5304)

Copyright (#u9377ab96-d3e6-594e-aabd-48610c4c4a68)

Introduction (#u346bda6b-8ee4-5b23-b870-12d04cec8fd4)

1. Murder! (#u29757015-0fbe-53c7-8609-ea993ae7698c)

2. The Firm of Duke and Peabody (#u83593670-b335-5c64-8c1c-d65096f52388)

3. Gathering the Threads (#u017e325c-d465-5fe2-9490-cbc49cd9fc0e)

4. Missing (#ubf1d3879-54c3-5d2b-834f-a0dc3b2ed9db)

5. French Takes a Journey (#ud5ee0efe-6e78-5b29-a4cb-dd58f508c56d)

6. The Hotel in Barcelona (#litres_trial_promo)

7. Concerning a Wedding (#litres_trial_promo)

8. Sylvia and Harrington (#litres_trial_promo)

9. Mrs Root of Pittsburg (#litres_trial_promo)

10. Some Pairs of Blankets (#litres_trial_promo)

11. A Deal in Jewellery (#litres_trial_promo)

12. The Elusive Mrs X (#litres_trial_promo)

13. Mrs French Takes a Notion (#litres_trial_promo)

14. Tragedy (#litres_trial_promo)

15. The House in St John’s Wood (#litres_trial_promo)

16. A Hot Scent (#litres_trial_promo)

17. A Deal in Stocks (#litres_trial_promo)

18. The S.S. ‘Enoch’ (#litres_trial_promo)

19. French Propounds a Riddle (#litres_trial_promo)

20. Conclusion (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Also in this Series (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)




INTRODUCTION (#ulink_33c40b4e-1665-5fcf-8e1e-c331aa089d6a)

Meet Chief-Inspector French (#ulink_33c40b4e-1665-5fcf-8e1e-c331aa089d6a)


I have been asked to tell you something about Chief-Inspector Joseph French of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard. I shall do my best, but I thought it would give you a better idea of him if I were to bring the man himself to the microphone. So with a good deal of trouble I have persuaded him to come, and he’ll speak to you himself. But I have put him in the next room for the moment, lest his ears should burn from my introduction.

As he’s not here, then, I may say that he’s really quite a good fellow at heart. He’s decent and he’s straight and he’s as kindly as his job will allow. He believes that if you treat people decently—you’ll be able to get more out of them; and he acts on his belief. Politeness is an obsession with him, and he has well earned his nickname of ‘Soapy Joe.’ He’s far from perfect, but I have known him now for many years, and I don’t wish for a better friend.

But I have to admit that he’s not very brilliant: in fact, many people call him dull. And here I’ll let you into secret history. Anyone about to perpetrate a detective novel must first decide whether his detective is to be brilliant and a ‘character,’ or a mere ordinary humdrum personality. When French came into being there seemed two good reasons for making him the second of these. One was that it represented a new departure; there were already plenty of ‘character’ detectives, the lineal descendants, most of them, of the great Sherlock. The other reason was much more important. Striking characteristics, consistently depicted, are very hard to do.

I tried therefore to make French a perfectly ordinary man, without peculiarities or mannerisms. Of course he had to have some qualities, but they were to be the ordinary qualities of ordinary fairly successful men. He was to have thoroughness and perseverance as well as a reasonable amount of intelligence: just the qualities which make for moderate success in any walk of life.

From this it follows that he does not leap to his conclusions by brilliant intuition. He begins a case by going and looking for information in those places in which he thinks information is most likely to be found. When he gets the information he swots over it until he grinds out some sort of theory to account for the facts. Very often this turns out to be wrong, but if so, he simply tries again till he thinks of something better.

French I made an inspector of the Yard rather than a private detective because I hoped in this way to gain realism. But at once a horrible difficulty loomed up: I knew nothing about Scotland Yard or the C.I.D. What was to be done? The answer was simple. I built on the great rock which sustains so many of my profession: if I knew nothing of my subject, well, few of my readers would know any more.

As a matter of fact I have found this rock not quite so steadfast as I had hoped. It has been pointed out to me that French has at times done things which would make a real inspector of the Yard shudder. He has consistently travelled first-class on railways, particularly in sleeping-cars. He has borrowed bicycles from local police-officers without paying for their hire. He has undertaken country inquiries without his attendant sergeant. And many other evil things has he done. Fortunately, now that he has become a chief-inspector he is seeing the error of at least some of his ways and being more careful to live up to his great traditions.

French is a home bird, and nothing pleases him more than to get into his slippers before the fire and bury himself in some novel of sea adventure. He is married, but unlike Dr Watson he is the husband of only one wife. On occasion his Emily helps him with his cases. But this is only when he is more utterly stuck than usual. Otherwise he doesn’t think it decent—or perhaps worthwhile—to worry her with shop. I have been wondering whether he has children. It’s like a dream to me that in one book children were mentioned, and that in another their existence was denied. But as I can’t find either reference, I can only note the point as one to be avoided.

French’s job at the Yard is distinctly comfortable, particularly since he was made a chief-inspector. His promotion was decided on for a somewhat unusual reason. It was not because of his work or of what his superiors thought of him, but because so many people mentioned in letters that his promotion was long overdue. The customer, of course, is always right.

Not only, indeed, is French’s job at the Yard comfortable, but he enjoys very considerable advantages over his colleagues. Two in particular are so striking as to give him an almost unique position.

The first is that he must necessarily succeed in his cases. He may become utterly discouraged and pessimistic—indeed, he does so at regular intervals. This, however, is merely a concession to the reader, who must often be feeling equally bored and wearied. But if French is discouraged it is his own fault. He knows very well—or he would know if he applied his own methods of reasoning—that he wouldn’t have been put into a book if he were going to fail. Success does not come at once—the value of suspense in a book cannot be overlooked—but that it will come, and that not later than about page three hundred, he is well aware.

His second great advantage over his colleagues really arises out of the first. It is that definitely he will find all the clues that he wants. He is bound to find them, because they have been laid down specially for that purpose, and he is led up to them in such a way that he could not avoid seeing them even if he wished to. These clues which he will find, moreover, are exactly those which lead to the solution of his problem, though naturally he does not see this at first. A decent interval always occurs between the picking up of the clue and the realization of its significance. This is necessary, as otherwise the book would run out too short.

This plan of finding just the clues necessary to lead the investigator to the correct conclusion seems to me such an extraordinarily good way of conducting an inquiry that I offer the idea, quite freely, to the heads of Scotland Yard.

I said that French had two advantages over his colleagues at the Yard, but really he has three. He cannot be killed. He cannot even be seriously injured. The reason, of course, is that he will be wanted for the next book. So if anyone fills the room with petrol vapour and attempts to light it, as was done at Newhaven, French will, if he thinks hard, know that either the person will not light the petrol, or that if he does it won’t burn. If the criminal he is attempting to arrest withdraws the pin from a Mills’s bomb he is carrying he will know, again if he thinks, that either he will be able to hold the lever down, or that the bomb will prove a dud. Of course, under such distressing circumstances he never does think, as otherwise he couldn’t register the amount of terror which is the reader’s right and proper due.

I’m afraid I’ve talked too much about French, but it’s really because I think a lot of him. However, with your permission I’ll call him now. I give a shout that would wake the dead, and he appears.

‘Yes, what is it?’ he asks.

‘Speak to these good folk, will you?’ I say.

He approaches the microphone in a hesitating way and, clearing his throat, begins deprecatingly: ‘Well, I’m very glad to be able to talk to all these kind friends, and to say it’s a proud day in my life when—’

I stop him. Goodness knows where he would otherwise get to. I ask him to tell how he solves his cases.

This is more in his line. He gives a little laugh, and starts off in his normal voice.

‘Huh, yes, I can do that. The answer is that I don’t—not always. But I’ll tell you ladies and gentlemen how I make things look pretty well: I just don’t mention the failures. Sir Mortimer and the boys at the Yard may know about them—as a matter of fact, they do; but you don’t. That’s my thoughtfulness for you, of course: I don’t want to worry you with anything that’s not just absolutely so.’

‘But,’ I tell him, ‘you know you usually do succeed. They would like to hear your methods.’

‘Well,’ he explains, ‘I have two principal ways. Either I get a good clue or I have a stroke of luck. And you may take it from me that the luck’s the best way. It saves endless trouble and difficulty.’

The stream of his inspiration seems to come to an end, and I start him off again.

‘You’ve been in one or two tight corners,’ I suggest. ‘You might tell them about your worst five minutes.’

He warms to it. ‘At the Yard we do get occasional nasty turns, but of course they’re all in the day’s work. Since you’ve asked me, I think my worst was in the case I just heard you speak of—Did you know the door wasn’t shut? I mean the case in which two financiers were murdered on an abandoned yacht off Newhaven, and a lot of diamonds were missing. You may remember it. Well, a man called Nolan was my suspect, though I couldn’t prove his guilt. But I thought there was just a chance that I might be able to make him commit himself. So I laid a trap for him. I pitched him a yarn that made him think he’d left a clue on his launch, in the hope that he’d try to destroy the launch and we could take him in the act.

‘The launch was lying in Newhaven Harbour, and the next night Sergeant Carter and I took cover on the wharf and settled down to watch. It was a wet night, and we got our fill of it. But it was worth it. About three in the morning we saw Nolan creeping down and slipping aboard. We followed him as close as we dared. He disappeared into the little engine-room. I crept after him to the door and peeped in. He was working with a torch, and you can imagine my feelings when I watched him take the missing diamonds from a hiding-place and put them in his pocket. This, of course, was all the proof I could have wanted. But then things grew nasty. He flooded the place with petrol and put a canister on the floor with a clock attached. So I thought it was about time to make a move.

‘As a matter of fact, it was past the time. Before I could do anything he had flashed his torch on me, and I found myself looking into the wrong end of a pistol. He spoke quite quietly. He said he had feared a trick, but that he had gone through with the thing on chance. He said that as long as I lived he was in danger of being hanged. Therefore he was going to kill me. If he could get away afterwards himself, he would; if not, we would die together.

‘You’ll understand that I could do nothing, for if I’d made a move he’d have fired, and if he’d fired, the whole place would have gone up in a sheet of flame. It was nasty, and no mistake.’

French pauses, and I prompt him again.

‘Tell them how you escaped.’

‘Ah, that was where my bit of luck came in. Carter was behind me, and Nolan didn’t see him. So Carter nipped on deck, lowered himself over the side, and shot Nolan through the porthole. He got him in the hand, but the flame from the gun didn’t get in, so there was no fire. But Nolan was desperate, and in spite of his wound he went for me all out. I tripped over a pipe and fell with my side against the motor. I broke some ribs, but managed to hold off Nolan till Carter got back and pulled him off.’

‘And after that you think you can be killed! French, my dear fellow, you’re a humbug!’

He grins, and indicates pointedly that he is now due at the Yard. So I have to let him go.

FREEMAN WILLS CROFTS

1935




1 (#ulink_3d73cdf0-3f66-54af-8b6c-a6cf74eb0392)

Murder! (#ulink_3d73cdf0-3f66-54af-8b6c-a6cf74eb0392)


The back streets surrounding Hatton Garden, in the City of London, do not form at the best of times a cheerful or inspiring prospect. Narrow and mean, and flanked with ugly, sordid-looking buildings grimy from exposure to the smoke and fogs of the town and drab from the want of fresh paint, they can hardly fail to strike discouragement into the heart of anyone eager for the uplift of our twentieth century civilisation.

But if on a day of cheerful sunshine the outlook is thus melancholy, it was vastly more so at ten o’clock on a certain dreary evening in mid-November. A watery moon, only partially visible through a damp mist, lit up pallidly the squalid, shuttered fronts of the houses. The air was cold and raw, and the pavements showed dark from a fine rain which had fallen some time earlier, but which had now ceased. Few were abroad, and no one whose business permitted it remained out of doors.

Huckley Street, one of the narrowest and least inviting in the district, was, indeed, deserted save for a single figure. Though the higher and more ethical side of civilisation was not obtrusive, it was by no means absent. The figure represented Law and Order, in short, it was that of a policeman on his beat.

Constable James Alcorn moved slowly forward, glancing mechanically but with practised eye over the shuttered windows of the shops and the closed doors of the offices and warehouses in his purview. He was not imaginative, the constable, or he would have rebelled even more strongly than he did against the weariness and monotony of his job. A dog’s life, this of night patrol in the City, he thought, as he stopped at a cross roads, and looked down each one in turn of the four dingy and deserted lanes which radiated from the intersection. How deadly depressing it all was! Nothing ever doing! Nothing to give a man a chance! In the daytime it was not so bad, when the streets were alive and fellow creatures were to be seen, if not spoken to, but at night when there was no one to watch, and nothing to be done but wait endlessly for the opportunity which never came, it was a thankless task. He was fed up!

But though he didn’t know it, his chance was at hand. He had passed through Charles Street and had turned into Hatton Garden itself, when suddenly a door swung open a little way down the street, and a young man ran wildly out into the night.

The door was directly under a street lamp, and Alcorn could see that the youth’s features were frozen into an expression of horror and alarm. He hovered for a moment irresolute, then, seeing the constable, made for him at a run.

‘Officer!’ he shouted. ‘Come here quickly. There’s something wrong!’

Alcorn, his depression gone, hurried to meet him.

‘What is it?’ he queried. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘Murder, I’m afraid,’ the other cried. ‘Up in the office. Come and see.’

The door from which the young man had emerged stood open, and they hastened thither. It gave on a staircase upon which the electric light was turned on. The young man raced up and passed through a door on the first landing. Alcorn, following, found himself in an office containing three or four desks. A further door leading to an inner room stood open, and to this the young man pointed.

‘In there,’ he directed; ‘in the Chief’s room.’

Here also the light was on, and as Alcorn passed in, he saw that he was indeed in the presence of tragedy, and he stood for a moment motionless, taking in his surroundings.

The room was small, but well proportioned. Near the window stood a roll-top desk of old-fashioned design. A leather-lined clients’ arm-chair was close by, with behind it a well-filled bookcase. In the fireplace the remains of a fire still glowed red. A table littered with books and papers and a large Milner safe completed the furniture. The doors of this safe were open.

Alcorn mechanically noted these details, but it was not on them that his attention was first concentrated. Before the safe lay the body of a man, hunched forward in a heap, as if he had collapsed when stooping to take something out. Though the face was hidden, there was that in the attitude which left no doubt that he was dead. And the cause of death was equally obvious. On the back of the bald head, just above the fringe of white hair, was an ugly wound, as if from a blow of some blunt but heavy weapon.

With an oath, Alcorn stepped forward and touched the cheek.

‘Cold,’ he exclaimed. ‘He must have been dead some time. When did you find him?’

‘Just now,’ the young man answered. ‘I came in for a book, and found him lying there. I ran for help at once.’

The constable nodded.

‘We’d best have a doctor anyway,’ he decided. A telephone stood on the top of the desk, and he called up his headquarters, asking that an officer and a doctor be sent at once. Then he turned to his companion.

‘Now, sir, what’s all this about? Who are you, and how do you come to be here?’

The young man, though obviously agitated and ill at ease, answered collectedly enough.

‘My name is Orchard, William Orchard, and I am a clerk in this office—Duke & Peabody’s, diamond merchants. As I have just said, I called in for a book I had forgotten, and I found—what you see.’

‘And what did you do?’

‘Do? I did what anyone else would have done in the same circumstances. I looked to see if Mr Gething was dead, and when I saw he was I didn’t touch the body, but ran for help. You were the first person I saw.’

‘Mr Gething?’ the constable repeated sharply. ‘Then you know the dead man?’

‘Yes. It is Mr Gething, our head clerk.’

‘What about the safe? Is there anything missing from that?’

‘I don’t know,’ the young man answered. ‘I believe there were a lot of diamonds in it, but I don’t know what amount, and I’ve not looked what’s there now.’

‘Who would know about it?’

‘I don’t suppose anyone but Mr Duke, now Mr Gething’s dead. He’s the chief, the only partner I’ve ever seen.’

Constable Alcorn paused, evidently at a loss as to his next move. Finally, following precedent, he took a somewhat dog’s-eared notebook from his pocket, and with a stumpy pencil began to note the particulars he had gleaned.

‘Gething, you say the dead man’s name was? What was his first name?’

‘Charles.’

‘Charles Gething, deceased,’ the constable repeated presently, evidently reading his entry. ‘Yes. And his address?’

‘12 Monkton Street, Fulham.’

‘Twelve—Monkton—Street—Fulham. Yes. And your name is William Orchard?’

Slowly the tedious catechism proceeded. The two men formed a contrast. Alcorn calm and matter of fact, though breathing heavily from the effort of writing, was concerned only with making a satisfactory statement for his superior. His informant, on the other hand, was quivering with suppressed excitement, and acutely conscious of the silent and motionless form on the floor. Poor old Gething! A kindly old fellow, if ever there was one! It seemed a shame to let his body lie there in that shapeless heap, without showing even the respect of covering the injured head with a handkerchief. But the matter was out of his hands. The police would follow their own methods, and he, Orchard, could not interfere.

Some ten minutes passed of question, answer, and laborious calligraphy, then voices and steps were heard on the stairs, and four men entered the room.

‘What’s all this, Alcorn?’ cried the first, a stout, cleanshaven man with the obvious stamp of authority, in the same phrase that his subordinate had used to the clerk, Orchard. He had stopped just inside the door, and stood looking sharply round the room, his glance passing from the constable to the body, to the open safe, with inimical interest to the young clerk, and back again to Alcorn.

The constable stiffened to attention, and replied in a stolid, unemotional tone, as if reciting formal evidence in court.

‘I was on my beat, sir, and at about ten-fifteen was just turning the corner from Charles Street into Hatton Garden, when I observed this young man,’ he indicated Orchard with a gesture, ‘run out of the door of this house. He called me that there was something wrong up here, and I came up to see, and found that body lying as you see it. Nothing has been touched, but I have got some information here for you.’ He held up the notebook.

The newcomer nodded and turned to one of his companions, a tall man with the unmistakable stamp of the medical practitioner.

‘If you can satisfy yourself the man’s dead, Doctor, I don’t think we shall disturb the body in the meantime. It’ll probably be a case for the Yard, and if so we’ll leave everything for whoever they send.’

The doctor crossed the room and knelt by the remains.

‘He’s dead all right,’ he announced, ‘and not so long ago either. If I could turn the body over I could tell you more about that. But I’ll leave it if you like.’

‘Yes, leave it for the moment, if you please. Now, Alcorn, what else do you know?’

A few seconds sufficed to put the constable’s information at his superior’s disposal. The latter turned to the doctor.

‘There’s more than murder here, Dr Jordan, I’ll be bound. That safe is the key to the affair. Thank the Lord, it’ll be a job for the Yard. I shall ’phone them now, and there should be a man here in half an hour. Sorry, Doctor, but I’m afraid you’ll have to wait.’ He turned to Orchard. ‘You’ll have to wait, too, young man, but the Yard inspector probably won’t keep you long. Now, what about this old man’s family? Was he married?’

‘Yes, but his wife is an invalid, bedridden. He has two daughters. One lives at home and keeps house, the other is married and lives somewhere in town.’

‘We shall have to send round word. You go, Carson.’ He turned to one of the two other members of his quartet, constables in uniform. ‘Don’t tell the old lady. If the daughter’s not there, wait until she comes in. And put yourself at her disposal. If she wants her sister sent for, you go. You, Jackson, go down to the front door and let the Yard man up. Alcorn, remain here.’ These dispositions made, he rang up the Yard and delivered his message, then turned once more to the young clerk.

‘You say, Mr Orchard, that no one could tell what, if anything, is missing from the safe, except Mr Duke, the sole active partner. We ought to have Mr Duke here at once. Is he on the ’phone?’

‘Gerard, 1417B,’ Orchard answered promptly. The young man’s agitation had somewhat subsided, and he was following with interest the actions of the police, and admiring the confident, competent way in which they had taken charge.

The official once again took down the receiver from the top of the desk, and put through the call. ‘Is Mr Duke there? … Yes, say a superintendent of police.’ There was a short silence, and then the man went on. ‘Is that Mr Duke? … I’m speaking from your office in Hatton Garden. I’m sorry, sir, to tell you that a tragedy has taken place here. Your chief clerk, Mr Gething, is dead … Yes, sir. He’s lying in your private office here, and the circumstances point to murder. The safe is standing open, and—Yes, sir, I’m afraid so—I don’t know, of course, about the contents … No, but you couldn’t tell from that … I was going to suggest that you come down at once. I’ve ’phoned Scotland Yard for a man … Very good, sir, we shall be here when you come.’ He replaced the receiver and turned to the others.

‘Mr Duke is coming down at once. There is no use in our standing here. Come to the outer office and we’ll find ourselves chairs.’

It was cold in the general office, the fire evidently having been out for some time, but they sat down there to wait, the superintendent pointing out that the furniture in the other room must not be touched. Of the four, only the superintendent seemed at ease and self-satisfied. Orchard was visibly nervous and apprehensive and fidgeted restlessly, Constable Alcorn, slightly embarrassed by the society in which he found himself, sat rigidly on the edge of his chair staring straight in front of him, while the doctor was frankly bored and anxious to get home. Conversation languished, though spasmodic attempts were made by the superintendent to keep it going, and none of the quartet was sorry when the sound of footsteps on the stairs created a diversion.

Of the three men who entered the room, two, carrying black leather cases, were obviously police constables in plain clothes. The third was a stout man in tweeds, rather under middle height, with a cleanshaven, good-humoured face and dark blue eyes which, though keen, twinkled as if at some perennially fresh private joke. His air was easy-going and leisurely, and he looked the type of man who could enjoy a good dinner and a good smoke-room story to follow.

‘Ah, Superintendent, how are you?’ he exclaimed, holding out his hand cordially. ‘It’s some time since we met. Not since that little episode in the Lime-house hairdresser’s. That was a nasty business. And now you’ve some other scheme for keeping a poor man from his hard-earned rest, eh?’

The superintendent seemed to find the other’s easy familiarity out of place.

‘Good-evening, Inspector,’ he answered with official abruptness. ‘You know Dr Jordan?—Inspector French of the C.I.D. And this is Mr Orchard, a clerk in this office, who discovered the crime.’

Inspector French greeted them genially. Behind his back at the Yard they called him ‘Soapy Joe’ because of the reliance he placed on the suavity of his manners. ‘I know your name, of course, Doctor, but I don’t think we have ever met. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mr Orchard.’ He subsided into a chair and went on: ‘Perhaps, Superintendent, you would just give me a hint of what this is all about before we go any further.’

The facts already learned were soon recited. French listened carefully, and annexing the constable’s notebook, complimented that worthy on his industry. ‘Well,’ he beamed on them, ‘I suppose we’d better have a look round inside before Mr Duke turns up.’

The party moved to the inner room, where French, his hands in his pockets, stood motionless for some minutes, surveying the scene.

‘Nothing has been touched, of course?’ he asked.

‘Nothing. From what they tell me, both Mr Orchard and Constable Alcorn have been most circumspect.’

‘Excellent; then we may go ahead. Get your camera rigged, Giles, and take the usual photos. I think, gentlemen, we may wait in the other room until the photographs are taken. It won’t be long.’

Though French had tactfully bowed his companions out, he did not himself follow them, but kept prowling about the inner office, closely inspecting its contents, though touching nothing. In a few minutes the camera was ready, and a number of flashlight photographs were taken of the body, the safe, every part of both offices, and even the stairs and hall. In the amazing way in which tales of disaster travel, news of the crime had already leaked out, and a small crowd of the curious hung, open-mouthed, about the door.

Scarcely had the camera been put away, when the proceedings were interrupted by a fresh arrival. Hurried steps were heard ascending the stairs, and a tall, thin, extremely well-dressed old gentleman entered the room. Though evidently on the wrong side of sixty, he was still a handsome man, with strong, well-formed features, white hair, and a good carriage. Under normal circumstances he would have presented a dignified and kindly appearance, but now his face was drawn into an expression of horror and distress, and his hasty movements also betokened his anxiety. On seeing so many strangers, he hesitated. The inspector stepped forward.

‘Mr Duke, sir? I am Inspector French of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard. I very much regret to confirm the news which you have already heard, that your head clerk, Mr Gething, has been murdered, and I fear also that your safe may have been burgled.’

It was evident that the old gentleman was experiencing strong emotion, but he controlled it and spoke quietly enough.

‘This is terrible news, Inspector. I can hardly believe that poor old Gething is gone. I came at once when I heard. Tell me the details. Where did it happen?’

French pointed to the open door.

‘In here, sir, in your private office. Everything is still exactly as it was found.’

Mr Duke moved forward, then on seeing the body, stopped and gave a low cry of horror.

‘Oh, poor old fellow!’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s awful to see him lying, there. Awful! I tell you, Inspector, I’ve lost a real friend, loyal and true and dependable. Can’t he be lifted up? I can’t bear to see him like that.’ His gaze passed on to the safe. ‘And the safe! Merciful heavens, Inspector! Is anything gone? Tell me at once, I must know! It seems heartless to think of such a thing with that good old fellow lying there, but after all I’m only human.’

‘I haven’t touched the safe, but we’ll do so directly,’ the inspector answered. ‘Was there much in it?’

‘About three-and-thirty thousand pounds’ worth of diamonds were in that lower drawer, as well as a thousand in notes,’ groaned the other. ‘Get the body moved, will you, and let us look.’

French whistled, then he turned to his men.

‘Get that table cleared outside there, and lift the body on to it,’ he ordered; then to the doctor he added, ‘Perhaps, Doctor, you could make your examination now?’

The remains were lifted reverently and carried from the room. Mr Duke turned impatiently to the safe, but the inspector stopped him.

‘A moment, sir, if you please. I am sorry to ask you to stretch your patience a little longer, but before you touch the safe I must test it for finger prints. You see the obvious necessity?’

‘I would wait all night if it would help you to get on the track of the scoundrels who have done this,’ the old gentleman answered grimly. ‘Go on in your own way. I can restrain myself.’

With a word of approval, Inspector French fetched one of the cases brought by his assistants, and producing little boxes of French chalk and of lampblack, he proceeded to dust over the smooth portions of the safe, using white powder on a dark background and vice versa. On blowing off the surplus powder, he pointed triumphantly to a number of finger prints, explaining that the moisture deposited from the skin held the powder, which otherwise dropped off. Most of the marks were blurred and useless, but a few showed clearly the little loops and whorls and ridges of thumbs and fingers.

‘Of course,’ French went on, ‘these may all be quite useless. They may be those of persons who had a perfect right to open the safe—your own, for instance. But if they belong to the thief, if there was one, their importance may be incalculable. See here now, I can open this drawer without touching any of them.’

Mr Duke was clearly at the end of his patience, and he kept fidgeting about, clasping and unclasping his hands, and showing every sign of extreme impatience and uneasiness. As the drawer opened, he stepped forward and plunged in his hand.

‘Gone!’ he cried hoarsely. ‘They’re all gone! Thirty-three thousand pounds’ worth! Oh, my God! It means ruin.’ He covered his face with his hands, then went on unsteadily. ‘I feared it, of course. I thought it must be the diamonds when the officer rang me up. I have been trying to face it ever since. I shouldn’t care for myself. It’s my daughter. To think of her exposed to want! But there. It is wicked of me to speak so who have only lost money, while poor old Gething has lost his life. Don’t mind me, Inspector. Carry on. What I want most now is to hear of the arrest of the murderer and thief. If there is anything I can do to help in that, command me.’

He stood, a little stooped and with haggard face, but dignified even in his grief. French in his pleasant, kindly way tried to reassure him.

‘Now, you don’t need to give up heart, sir,’ he advised. ‘Diamonds are not the easiest things to dispose of, and we’re right on to the loss at once. Before the thief can pass them on we shall have all the channels under observation. With any ordinary luck, you’ll get them back. They were not insured?’

‘Part of them only. About nineteen thousand pounds’ worth were insured. It was my cursed folly that the rest were not. Gething advised it, but I had never lost anything, and I wanted to save the money. You understand our trade has been difficult since the war, and our profits were not the same as formerly. Every little has counted, and we have had to economise.’

‘At worst, then, that is £14,000 gone?’

‘If the insurance companies pay in full, that is all, besides the thousand in notes. But, Inspector, it is too much. To meet my share of the loss will beggar me.’ He shook his head despondently. ‘But never mind my affairs in the meantime. Don’t, I beg of you, lose any time in getting after the criminal.’

‘You are right, sir. If, then, you will sit down there for a few minutes I’ll get rid of the others, and then I shall ask you for some information.’

The old gentleman dropped wearily into a chair while French went to the outer office. The policeman who had been sent to inform Gething’s family of the tragedy had just returned. French looked at him inquiringly.

‘I called, sir, at the address you gave me,’ he reported. ‘Miss Gething was there, and I told her what had occurred. She was considerably upset, and asked me if I could get a message to her sister and brother-in-law at 12 Deeley Terrace, Hawkins Street, in Battersea. I said I would fetch them for her. The brother-in-law, name of Gamage, was from home in Leeds, being a traveller for a firm of fur dealers, but Mrs Gamage was there and I took her across. It seemed the old lady had wanted to know what was up, and Miss Gething had told her, and she had got some kind of stroke. They asked me to call a doctor, which I did. The two daughters say they can’t get across here on account of being occupied with the mother.’

‘So much the better,’ French commented, and having added the names and addresses of Mr and Mrs Gamage to his list, he turned to the doctor.

‘Well, Doctor,’ he said pleasantly, ‘how do you get on?’

The doctor straightened himself up from his position over the corpse.

‘I’ve done all I can here,’ he answered. ‘I don’t think there’s any doubt the man was killed instantaneously by the blow on the head. The skull is fractured, apparently by some heavy, blunt weapon. I should think it was done from behind while the old fellow was stooping, possibly working at the safe, though that, perhaps, is your province.’

‘I’m glad of the hint anyway. Now, gentlemen, I think that’s all we can do tonight. Can your men remove the body, Superintendent? I want to stay for a moment to take a few measurements. You’ll let me know tomorrow about the inquest? Mr Orchard, you might stay a moment also; there is a question or two I want to ask you.’

The superintendent had sent one of his men for a stretcher, and the remains were lifted on and carried slowly down to the waiting taxi. With an exchange of good-nights, the local men withdrew, leaving Inspector French, Mr Duke, Orchard, and the two plain-clothes men from the Yard in charge of the premises.




2 (#ulink_a2ed4037-1709-5497-bd99-a006fcd4bd22)

The Firm of Duke and Peabody (#ulink_a2ed4037-1709-5497-bd99-a006fcd4bd22)


When Inspector French ushered the clerk, Orchard, into the inner office, they found Mr Duke pacing the floor with an expression of utter mystification imprinted on his features.

‘I say, Inspector, here’s a puzzle,’ he cried. ‘I happened to look behind the safe door, and I find it has been opened with a key. I thought at first it had been broken or forced or the lock somehow picked. But I see it is unlocked.’

‘Yes, I noticed that, sir,’ French answered. ‘But I don’t follow you. What is the mystery about that?’

‘Why, the key, of course. To my certain knowledge there were only two keys in existence. One I keep on my ring, which is chained to my belt and never leaves me day nor night. There it is. The other is lodged with my bankers, where no one could possibly get at it. Now, where did the thief get the key that is now in the lock?’

‘That is one of the things we have to find out,’ French replied. ‘You may perhaps think it strange, but a point of that kind, which at first seems to deepen the mystery, often proves a blessing in disguise. It provides another point of attack, you understand, and frequently it narrows down the area of inquiry. You haven’t touched the key, I hope?’

‘No. I remembered what you said about finger prints.’

‘Good. Now, gentlemen, if you will please sit down, I want to ask you a few questions. I’ll take you first, Mr Orchard. I have your name, and your address is Bloomsbury Square. Now tell me, is that your home?’

The young fellow answered the questions without hesitation, and French noted approvingly his direct glance and the evident candour with which he spoke. The Bloomsbury Square address, it appeared, was that of a boarding house, the clerk’s home being in Somerset. He had left the office at about half-past five that afternoon, Mr Gething being then almost ready to follow. Mr Gething was usually the last out of the office. Orchard had noticed nothing unusual in his manner that day, though for the last two or three weeks he had seemed somewhat moody and depressed. Orchard had gone from the office to Liverpool Street, where he had caught the 5.52 to Ilford. There he had had supper with a friend, a man called Forrest, a clerk in a shipping office in Fenchurch Street. He had left about 9.30, getting back to town a little before 10.00. The rain had stopped, and as he did not get as much exercise as he could have wished, he resolved to walk home from the station. Hatton Garden was but little out of his way, and as he approached it he remembered that he had left in his desk a book he had changed at the library at lunch time. He had decided to call in and get it, so as to read for a while before going to sleep. He had done so, and had found Mr Gething’s body, as he had already explained. The outer street door had been closed, and he had opened it with his latch key. Both the office doors were open, that between the landing and the outer office and that of Mr Duke’s room. The lights were on everywhere, except that in the outer office only the single central bulb was burning, the desk lamps being off. He had seen no one about the offices.

French, having complimented the young fellow on his clear statement, bade him good-night and sent him home. But as he passed out of the room he whispered to one of his men, who promptly nodded and also disappeared. French turned to Mr Duke.

‘That seems a straightforward young fellow,’ he observed. ‘What is your opinion of him?’

‘Absolutely straightforward.’ The acting partner spoke with decision. ‘He has been with me for over four years, and I have always found him most conscientious and satisfactory. Indeed, I have been very fortunate in my whole staff. I think I could say the same of them all.’

‘I congratulate you, Mr Duke. Perhaps now you would tell me something about your firm and your various employees.’

Mr Duke, though still extremely agitated, was controlling his emotion and answered in calm tones.

‘The business is not a large one, and at the present time is virtually controlled by myself. Peabody, though not so old as I am, has been troubled by bad health and has more or less gone to pieces. He seldom comes to the office, and never undertakes any work. The junior partner, Sinnamond, is travelling in the East, and has been for some months. We carry on the usual trade of diamond merchants, and have a small branch establishment in Amsterdam. Indeed, I divide my own time almost equally between London and Amsterdam. We occupy only these two rooms which you have seen. Our staff in the outer office consists, or rather consisted, of five, a chief and confidential clerk, the poor man who has just been killed, a young man called Harrington, who is qualifying for a partnership, Orchard, a girl typist, and an office boy. Besides them, we employ an outside man, a traveller, a Dutchman named Vanderkemp. He attends sales and so on, and when not on the road works in the Amsterdam branch.’

Inspector French noted all the information Mr Duke could give about each of the persons mentioned.

‘Now this Mr Gething,’ he resumed. ‘You say he has been with you for over twenty years, and that you had full confidence in him, but I must ask the question, Are you sure that your confidence was not misplaced? In other words, are you satisfied that he was not himself after your diamonds?’

Mr Duke shook his head decisively.

‘I am positive he was not,’ he declared warmly and with something of indignation showing in his manner. ‘I should as soon accuse my own son, if I had one. No, I’d stake my life on it, Gething was no thief.’

‘I’m glad to hear you say that, Mr Duke,’ the other returned smoothly. ‘Now, then, your office staff eliminated, tell me is there anyone that you suspect?’

‘Not a creature!’ Mr Duke was equally emphatic. ‘Not a single creature! I can’t imagine anyone who would have done such a thing. I wish I could.’

The inspector hesitated.

‘Of course, sir, you understand that if you were to mention a name it would not in any way bias me against that person. It would only mean that I should make inquiries. Don’t think you would be getting anyone into trouble.’

Mr Duke smiled grimly.

‘You needn’t be afraid. If I had any suspicion I should be only too glad to tell you, but I have none.’

‘When, sir, did you last see your late clerk?’

‘About half-past four this evening. I left the office at that time, about an hour earlier than usual, because I had a business appointment for a quarter to five with Mr Peters, of Lincoln’s Inn, my solicitor.’

‘And you did not return to the office?’

‘No. I sat with Mr Peters for about half an hour, then as my business was not finished and he wanted to square up for the night, we decided to dine together at my club in Gower Street. It was not worthwhile going back to my own office, so I want straight from Peters’ to the club.’

‘And you did not notice anything peculiar about Mr Gething?’

‘Not specially on that night. He seemed absolutely as usual.’

‘How do you mean, not specially on that night?’

‘He had been, I thought, a little depressed for two or three weeks previously, as if he had some trouble on his mind. I asked when first I noticed it if there was anything wrong, but he murmured something about home troubles, about his wife not being so well—she is a chronic invalid. He was not communicative, and I did not press the matter. But he was no worse this afternoon than during the last fortnight.’

‘I see. Now, what brought him back to the office tonight?’

Mr Duke made a gesture of bewilderment.

‘I have no idea,’ he declared. ‘There was nothing! Nothing, at least, that I know of or can imagine. We were not specially busy, and as far as I can think, he was well up to date with his work.’

‘Is there a postal delivery between half-past four and the time your office closes?’

‘There is, and of course there might have been a telegram or a caller or a note delivered by hand. But suppose there had been something important enough to require immediate attention, Gething would never have taken action without consulting me. He had only to ring me up.’

‘He knew where you were, then?’

‘No, but he could have rung up my home. They knew there where I was, as when I had decided to dine at the club, I ’phoned home to say so.’

‘But were you in your club all the evening? Excuse my pressing the matter, but I think it’s important to make sure the man did not try to communicate with you.’

‘I see your point. Yes, I stayed chatting with Mr Peters until almost 9.30. Then, feeling tired from a long day’s thought about business, I decided a little exercise would be pleasant, and I walked home. I reached my house a minute or two after ten.’

‘That seems conclusive. All the same, sir, I think you should make sure when you reach home that no call was made.’

‘I shall do so certainly, but my parlourmaid is very reliable in such matters, and I am certain she would have told me of any.’

Inspector French sat for a few seconds lost in thought, and then began on another point.

‘You tell me that you had £33,000 worth of diamonds in the safe. Is not that an unusually large amount to keep in an office?’

‘You are quite right; it is too large. I consider myself very much to blame, both for that and in the matter of the insurance. But I had not meant to keep the stones there long. Indeed, negotiations for the sale of the larger portion were actually in progress. On the other hand, it is due to myself to point out that the safe is of a very efficient modern pattern.’

‘That is so, sir. Now can you tell me who, besides yourself, knew of the existence of those stones?’

‘I’m afraid,’ Mr Duke admitted despondently, ‘there was no secret about it. Gething knew, of course. He was entirely in my confidence about such matters. Vanderkemp, my outdoor man, knew that I had made some heavy purchases recently, as he not only conducted the negotiations, but personally brought the stones to the office. Besides, there were letters about them, accessible to all the staff. I am afraid you may take it that everyone in the office knew there was a lot of stuff there, though probably not the exact amount.’

‘And the staff may have talked to outsiders. Young people will brag, especially if they are “keeping company,” as the Irish say.’

‘I fear that is so,’ Mr Duke agreed, as if deprecating the singular habits of the young.

The inspector changed his position uneasily, and his hand stole to his pipe. But he checked himself and resumed his questioning. He obtained from Mr Duke a detailed list of the missing stones, then turned to a new point.

‘About that thousand pounds in notes. I suppose you haven’t got the numbers?’

‘No, unfortunately. But the bank might know them.’

‘We shall inquire. Now, Mr Duke, about the key. That is another singular thing.’

‘It is an amazing thing. I absolutely cannot understand where it came from. As I said, this one never leaves, nor has left, my personal possession, and the other, the only other one, is equally inaccessible in my bank.’

‘You always personally opened or closed the safe?’

‘Always, or at least it was done by my instructions and in my presence.’

‘Oh, well, that is not quite the same thing, you know. Who has ever opened or closed it for you?’

‘Gething; and not once or twice, but scores, I suppose I might say hundreds of times. But always in my presence.’

‘I understand that, sir. Anyone else besides Mr Gething?’

Mr Duke hesitated.

‘No,’ he said slowly, ‘no one else. He was the only one I trusted to that extent. And I had reason to trust him,’ he added, with a touch of defiance.

‘Of course, sir. I recognise that,’ French answered smoothly. ‘I am only trying to get the facts clear in my mind. I take it, then, that the deceased gentleman was the only person, other than yourself, who ever handled your key? It was not within reach of anyone in your house; your servants, for example?’

‘No, I never let it lie about. Even at night I kept it attached to me.’

The inspector rose from his chair.

‘Well, sir,’ he said politely, ‘I’m sorry to have kept you so long. Just let me take your finger prints to compare with those in the safe, and I have done. Shall I ring up for a taxi for you?’

Mr Duke looked at his watch.

‘Why, it is nearly one,’ he exclaimed. ‘Yes, a taxi by all means, please.’

Though Inspector French had said that everything possible had been done that night, he did not follow Mr Duke from the building. Instead, he returned to the inner office and set himself unhurriedly to make a further and more thorough examination of its contents.

He began with the key of the safe. Removing it by the shank with a pair of special pincers, he tested the handle for finger prints, but without success. Looking then at the other end, a slight roughness on one of the wards attracted his attention, and on scrutinising it with his lens, a series of fine parallel scratches was revealed on all the surfaces. ‘So that’s it, is it?’ he said to himself complacently. ‘Manufacturers don’t leave keys of valuable safes half finished. This one has been cut with a file, and probably’—he again scrutinised the workmanship—‘by an amateur at that. And according to this man Duke, old Gething was the only one that had the handling of the key—that could have taken a wax impression. Well, well; we shall see.’

He locked the safe, dropped the key into his pocket, and turned to the fireplace, soliloquising the while.

The fire had still been glowing red when the crime was discovered shortly after ten o’clock. That meant, of course, that it had been deliberately stoked up, because the fire in the outer office was cold and dead. Someone, therefore, had intended to spend a considerable time in the office. Who could it have been?

As far as French could see, no one but Gething. But if Gething were going to commit the robbery—a matter of perhaps ten minutes at the outside—he would not have required a fire. No, this looked as if there really was some business to be done, something that would take time to carry through. But then, if so, why had Gething not consulted Mr Duke? French noted the point, to be considered further in the light of future discoveries.

But as to the identity of the person who had built up the fire there should be no doubt. Finger prints again! The coal shovel had a smooth, varnished wooden handle, admirably suited for records, and a short test with the white powder revealed thereon an excellent impression of a right thumb.

The poker next received attention, and here French made his second discovery. Picking it up with the pincers in the same careful way in which he had handled the key, he noticed on the handle a dark brown stain. Beside this stain, and sticking to the metal, was a single white hair.

That he held in his hand the instrument with which the crime was committed seemed certain, and he eagerly tested the other end for prints. But this time he was baffled. Nothing showed at the places where finger marks might have been expected. It looked as if the murderer had worn gloves or had rubbed the handle clean, and he noted that either alternative postulated a cold-blooded criminal and a calculated crime.

He continued his laborious search of the room, but without finding anything else which interested him. Finally, while his men were photographing the prints he had discovered, he sat down in the leather-covered arm-chair and considered what he had learned.

Certainly a good deal of the evidence pointed to Gething. Gething knew the stones were there. According to Duke, no one else could have got hold of the key to the safe to make an impression. Moreover, his body was found before the safe with the latter open. All circumstantial evidence, of course, though cumulatively strong.

However, whether or not Gething had contemplated robbery, he had not carried it through. Someone else had the diamonds. And here the obvious possibility recurred to him which had been in his mind since he had heard the superintendent’s first statement. Suppose Orchard was the man. Suppose Orchard, visiting the office in the evening, arrived to find the safe open and the old man stooping over it. Instantly he would be assailed by a terrible temptation. The thing would seem so easy, the way of escape so obvious, the reward so sure. French, sitting back in the arm-chair, tried to picture the scene. The old man bending over the safe, the young one entering, unheard. His halt in surprise; the sudden overwhelming impulse to possess the gems; his stealthy advance; the seizing of the poker; the blow, delivered perhaps with the intention of merely stunning his victim. But he strikes too hard, and, horrified by what he has done, yet sees that for his own safety he must go through with the whole business. He recalls the danger of finger prints, and wipes the handles of the poker and of the drawer in the safe from which he has abstracted the diamonds. With admirable foresight he waits until the body grows cold, lest an examination of it by the policeman he intends to call might disprove his story. Then he rushes out in an agitated manner and gives the alarm.

Though this theory met a number of the facts, French was not overpleased with it. It did not explain what Gething was doing at the safe, nor did it seem to fit in with the personality of Orchard. All the same, though his instruction to his man to shadow Orchard had been given as an obvious precaution inevitable in the circumstances, he was glad that he had not overlooked it.

Another point occurred to him as he sat thinking over the affair in the leather-lined chair. If Orchard had stolen the stones, he would never have risked having them on his person when he gave the alarm. He would certainly have hidden them, and French could not see how he could have taken them out of the building to do so. A thorough search of the offices seemed therefore called for.

The inspector was tired, but, late as it was, he spent three solid hours conducting a meticulous examination of the whole premises, only ceasing when he had satisfied himself beyond possibility of doubt that no diamonds were concealed thereon. Then, believing that he had exhausted the possibilities of the scene of the crime, he felt himself free to withdraw. Dawn was appearing in the eastern sky as he drew the door after him and set off in the direction of his home.




3 (#ulink_bcff810d-a282-5e37-bb01-cd995107309f)

Gathering the Threads (#ulink_bcff810d-a282-5e37-bb01-cd995107309f)


The fact that he had been out all the previous night was not, in Inspector French’s eyes, any reason why he should be late at his work next day. At his usual time, therefore, he reached New Scotland Yard, and promptly engaged himself in the compilation of a preliminary report on the Hatton Garden crime. This completed, he resumed direct work on the case.

There were still several obvious inquiries to be made, inquiries which might almost be called routine, in that they followed necessarily from the nature of the crime. The first of these was an interview with the other members of the Duke & Peabody staff.

An Oxford Street bus brought him to the end of Hatton Garden, and soon he was once more mounting the staircase to the scene of his last night’s investigation. He found Mr Duke standing in the outer office with Orchard and the typist and office boy.

‘I was just telling these young people they might go home,’ the principal explained. ‘I am closing the office until after the funeral.’

‘That will be appreciated by poor Mr Gething’s family, sir. I think it is very kind of you and very proper too. But before this young lady and gentleman go I should like to ask them a question or two.’

‘Of course. Will you take them into my office? Go in, Miss Prescott, and tell Inspector French anything he wants to know.’

‘I’m afraid you won’t be able to do quite so much as that, Miss Prescott,’ French smiled, continuing to chat pleasantly in the hope of allaying the nervousness the girl evidently felt.

But he learned nothing from her except that Mr Duke was a very nice gentleman of whom she was somewhat in awe, and that Mr Gething had always been very kind to her and could be depended on to let her do whatever she wanted. Neither about the clerk, Orchard, nor the pupil, Harrington, was she communicative, and the office boy, Billy Newton, she dismissed as one might a noxious insect, a negligible, if necessary, evil. Mr Gething had been, as far as she could form a conclusion, in his usual health and spirits on the previous day, but she thought he had seemed worried and anxious for the past two or three weeks. As to herself, she liked the office, and got on well with her work, and was very sorry about poor Mr Gething. On the previous day she had gone straight from the office, and had remained at home with her mother during the entire evening. French, satisfied she had told him all that she knew, took her finger prints and let her go.

From Billy Newton, the precocious office boy, he learned but one new fact. Newton, it seemed, had been the last to leave the office on the previous evening, and before Mr Gething had gone he had instructed him to make up the fire in the chief’s office, as he, Gething, was coming back later to do some special work. The boy had built up a good fire and had then left.

When French returned to the outer office, he found a new arrival. A tall, good-looking young man was talking to Mr Duke, and the latter introduced him as Mr Stanley Harrington, the clerk-pupil who was qualifying for a partnership. Harrington was apologising for being late, saying that on his way to the office he had met an old schoolfellow of whom he had completely lost sight, and who had asked him to accompany him to King’s Cross, whence he was taking the 9.50 a.m. train for the north. The young man seemed somewhat ill at ease, and as French brought him into the inner office and began to talk to him, his nervousness became unmistakable. French was intrigued by it. From his appearance, he imagined the man would have, under ordinary circumstances, a frank, open face and a pleasant, outspoken manner. But now his look was strained and his bearing furtive. French, with his vast experience of statement makers, could not but suspect something more than the perturbation natural under the circumstances, and as his examination progressed he began to believe he was dealing with a normally straightforward man who was now attempting to evade the truth. But none of his suspicions showed in his manner, and he was courtesy itself as he asked his questions.

It seemed that Harrington was the nephew of that Mr Vanderkemp who acted as traveller for the firm. Miss Vanderkemp, the Dutchman’s sister, had married Stewart Harrington, a prosperous Yorkshire stockbroker. Stanley had been well educated, and had been a year at college when a terrible blow fell on him. His father and mother, travelling on the Continent, had both been killed in a railway accident near Milan. It was then found that his father, though making plenty of money, had been living up to his income, and had made no provision for those who were to come after him. Debts absorbed nearly all the available money, and Stanley was left practically penniless. It was then that his uncle, Jan Vanderkemp, proved his affection. Out of his none too large means he paid for the boy’s remaining years at Cambridge, then using his influence with Mr Duke to give him a start in the office.

But shortly after he had entered on his new duties an unexpected complication, at least for Mr Duke, had arisen. The principal’s daughter, Sylvia, visiting her father in the office, had made the acquaintance of the well-mannered youth, and before Mr Duke realised what was happening the two young people had fallen violently in love, with the result that Miss Duke presently announced to her horrified father that they were engaged. In vain the poor man protested. Miss Duke was a young lady who usually had her own way, and at last her father was compelled to make a virtue of necessity. He met the situation by giving the affair his blessing, and promising to take Harrington into partnership if and when he proved himself competent. In this Harrington had succeeded, and the wedding was fixed for the following month, the partnership commencing on the same date.

French questioned the young fellow as to his movements on the previous evening. It appeared that shortly after reaching his rooms on the conclusion of his day’s work in the office, he had received a telephone message from Miss Duke saying that her father had just called up to say he was detained in town for dinner, and, being alone, she wished he would go out to Hampstead and dine with her. Such an invitation from such a source was in the nature of a command to be ecstatically obeyed, and he had reached the Dukes’ house before seven o’clock. But he had been somewhat disappointed as to his evening. Miss Duke was going out after dinner; she intended visiting a girls’ club in Whitechapel, run by a friend of hers, a Miss Amy Lestrange. Harrington had accompanied her to the East End, but she would not allow him to go in with her to the club. He had, however, returned later and taken her home, after which he had gone straight to his rooms.

Skilful interrogation by French had obtained the above information, and now he sat turning it over in his mind. The story hung together, and, if true, there could be no doubt of Harrington’s innocence. But French was puzzled by the young man’s manner. He could have sworn that there was something. Either the tale was not true, or it was not all true, or there was more which had not been told. He determined that unless he got a strong lead elsewhere, Mr Harrington’s movements on the previous night must be looked into and his statements put to the test.

But there was no need to let the man know he was suspected, and dismissing him with a few pleasant words, French joined Mr Duke in the outer office.

‘Now, sir, if you are ready we shall go round to your bank about the key.’

They soon obtained the required information. The manager, who had read of the robbery in his morning paper, was interested in the matter, and went into it personally. Not only was the key there in its accustomed place, but it had never been touched since Mr Duke left it in.

‘A thousand pounds in notes was also stolen,’ French went on. ‘Is there any chance that you have the numbers?’

‘Your teller might remember the transaction,’ Mr Duke broke in eagerly. ‘I personally cashed a cheque for £1000 on the Tuesday, the day before the murder. I got sixteen fifties and the balance in tens. I was hoping to carry off a little deal in diamonds with a Portuguese merchant whom I expected to call on me. I put the money in my safe as I received it from you, and the merchant not turning up, I did not look at it again.’

‘We can but inquire,’ the manager said doubtfully. ‘It is probable we have a note of the fifties, but unlikely in the case of the tens.’

But it chanced that the teller had taken the precaution to record the numbers of all the notes. These were given to French, who asked the manager to advise the Yard if any were discovered.

‘That’s satisfactory about the notes,’ French commented when Mr Duke and he had reached the street. ‘But you see what the key being there means? It means that the copy was made from the key which you carry. Someone must therefore had had it in his possession long enough to take a mould of it in wax. This, of course, is a very rapid operation; a couple of seconds would do the whole thing. A skilful man would hold the wax in the palm of his hand, “palmed” as the conjurers call it, and the key could be pressed into it in so natural a way that no unsuspecting person would be any the wiser. Now I want you to think again very carefully. If no one but Mr Gething handled the key, he must have taken the impression. There is no other way out. I would like you, then, to be sure that no one else ever did get his hands upon it, even for a moment. You see my point?’

‘Of course I see it,’ Mr Duke returned a trifle testily, ‘but, unanswerable as it seems, I don’t believe Gething ever did anything of the kind. It would seem the likely thing to you, Inspector, because you didn’t know the man. But I’ve known him too long to doubt him. Someone else must have got hold of the key, but I confess I can’t imagine who.’

‘Someone at night, while you were asleep?’

Mr Duke shrugged his shoulders.

‘I can only say, it is unlikely.’

‘Well, consider the possibilities at all events. I must go back to headquarters.’

‘And I to the Gethings,’ Mr Duke returned. ‘I hear the wife is very ill. The shock has completely broken her down. You’ll let me know how things go on?’

‘Certainly, sir. Immediately I have anything to report, you shall hear it.’

The police station was not far away, and soon French was bending over all that was mortal of Charles Gething. He was not concerned with the actual remains, except to take prints from the dead fingers, to compare with those found in the office. But he went through the contents of the pockets, among which he had hoped to gain some clue as to the nature of the business which had brought the dead man to the office. Unfortunately there was nothing to give the slightest indication.

The inquest had been fixed for five o’clock that evening, and French spent some time with the superintendent going over the evidence which was to be put forward by the police. Of the verdict, there could, of course, be no doubt.

Believing that by this time Mr Duke would have left the Gethings, French thought that he might himself call there. The more he could learn about the old man the better.

He hailed a taxi, and some fifteen minutes later reached Monkton Street, a narrow and rather depressing side street off the Fulham Road. The door of No. 37 was opened by a brown-haired woman of some five-and-thirty, with a pleasant and kindly, though somewhat worn expression. French took off his hat.

‘Miss Gething?’ he inquired.

‘No, I am Mrs Gamage. But my sister is in, if you wish to see her.’ She spoke with a sort of plaintive softness which French found rather attractive.

‘I’m afraid I must trouble you both,’ he answered with his kindly smile, as he introduced himself and stated his business.

Mrs Gamage stepped back into the narrow passage.

‘Come in,’ she invited. ‘We are naturally anxious to help you. Besides, the police have been very kind. Nothing could have been kinder than that constable who came round last night with the news. Indeed everyone has been more than good. Mr Duke has just been round himself to inquire. A time like this shows what people are.’

‘I was sorry to hear that Mrs Gething is so unwell,’ French observed, and he followed his guide into the tiny front parlour. He was surprised to find the house far from comfortably furnished. Everything, indeed, bore the stamp of an almost desperate attempt to preserve decency and self-respect in the face of a grinding poverty. The threadbare carpet was worn into holes and had been neatly darned, and so had the upholstery of the two rather upright easy chairs. The leg of the third chair was broken and had been mended with nails and wire. Everything was shabby, though spotlessly clean and evidently looked after with the utmost care. Though the day was bitter, no spark of fire burned in the grate. Here, the inspector thought, was certainly a matter to be inquired into. If Gething was really as poor a man as this furniture seemed to indicate, it undoubtedly would have a bearing on the problem.

‘My mother has been an invalid for many years,’ Mrs Gamage answered, unconsciously supplying the explanation French wanted. ‘She suffers from a diseased hip bone and will never be well. My poor father spent a small fortune on doctors and treatment for her, but I don’t think any of them did her much good. Now this news has broken her down altogether. She is practically unconscious, and we fear the end at any time.’

‘Allow me to express my sympathy,’ French murmured, and his voice seemed to convey quite genuine sorrow. ‘What you tell me makes me doubly regret having to force my unpleasant business on your notice. But I cannot help myself.’

‘Of course I understand.’ Mrs Gamage smiled gently. ‘Ask what you want and I shall try to answer, and when you have finished with me I’ll relieve Esther with mother and send her down.’

But there was not a great deal that Mrs Gamage could tell. Since her marriage some four years previously she had seen comparatively little of her father. That she idolised him was obvious, but the cares of her own establishment prevented her paying more than an occasional visit to her old home. French therefore soon thanked her for her help, and asked her to send her sister down to him.

Esther Gething was evidently the younger of the two. She was like Mrs Gamage, but better looking. Indeed, she was pretty in a mild, unobstrusive way. She had the same brown eyes, but so steadfast and truthful that even French felt satisfied that she was one to be trusted. Her expression was equally kindly, but she gave the impression of greater competence than her sister. He could imagine how her parents leaned on her. A good woman, he thought, using an adjective he did not often apply to the sex, and the phrase, in its fullest significance, seemed only just adequate.

Under the inspector’s skilful lead she described the somewhat humdrum existence which she and her parents had led for some years past. Her mother’s illness seemed to have been the ruling factor in their lives, everything being subordinated to the sufferer’s welfare, and the expenses in connection with it forming a heavy drain on the family exchequer. From Mr Duke’s records, French had learned that the dead man’s salary had been about £400 per annum, though quite recently it had been increased to £450, following a visit the merchant had paid to the house during a short illness of his head clerk. Mr Duke, Miss Gething said, had always acted as a considerate employer.

Asked if her father had continued in his usual health and spirits up to the end, she said no, that for some three weeks past he had seemed depressed and worried. On different occasions she had tried to find out the cause, but he had not enlightened her except to say that he had been having some trouble at the office. Once, however, he dropped a phrase which set her thinking, though she was unable to discover his meaning, and he had refused to explain. He had asked her did she believe that a man could ever be right in doing evil that good might come, and when she had answered that she could not tell, he had sighed and said, ‘Pray God you may never be called on to decide.’

On the evening of his death it had been arranged that he would sit with Mrs Gething, in order to allow his daughter to attend a social connected with the choir of the church to which she belonged. But that evening he came home more worried and upset than she had ever seen him, and he had told her with many expressions of regret that some unexpected work which had just come in would require his presence that evening in the office, and that unless she was able to get someone else to look after her mother, she would have to give up her social. He had been too nervous and ill at ease to make a good meal, and had gone off about eight o’clock, saying he did not know at what hour he would be back. That was the last time she had seen him alive, and she had heard nothing of him until the policeman had come with his terrible news about half-past eleven.

Miss Gething was clearly at one with her sister in her admiration and affection for her father, and French recognised that she was as mystified as to his death as he was himself. Seeing that he could learn no more, he presently took his leave, with renewed expressions of sympathy for her trouble.

When he reached the Yard he found that enlarged photographs of the various finger prints he had discovered were ready, and he sat down with some eagerness to compare the impressions with those on his cards. He spent some time counting and measuring lines and whorls, and at last reached the following conclusions. All the finger marks on the safe, both inside and out, belonged either to Mr Duke or to Mr Gething, the majority being the latter’s; the mark on the handle of the coal shovel was Mr Gething’s, and the remaining prints were those of various members of the office staff. His hopes of help from this source were therefore dashed.

With a sigh he looked at his watch. There would be time before the inquest to make some inquiries as to the truth of Orchard’s statement of his movements on the previous evening. Half an hour later he had found the man with whom the clerk had dined in Ilford, and he fully substantiated the other’s story. Orchard was therefore definitely eliminated from the inquiry.

The proceedings before the Coroner were practically formal. Orchard, Mr Duke, and Constable Alcorn told their stories, and with very little further examination were dismissed. French and the local superintendent watched the case on behalf of the police, but did not interfere, and the next of kin of the deceased were not legally represented. After half an hour, the Coroner summed up, and the jury without retiring brought in the obvious verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown.

That evening, when French had dined and had settled himself before the fire in his sitting room with a pipe between his lips and his notebook on the table at his elbow, he set himself to take mental stock of his position and get a clear grasp of his new problem.

In the first place, it was obvious that this Charles Gething had been murdered for the sake of the diamonds in Mr Duke’s safe. It was certain from the position of the wound that it could not have been accidental, nor could it by any chance have been self-inflicted. Moreover, a planned robbery was indicated by the cutting of the duplicate key. But the stones were not on old Gething’s body. It therefore followed that someone else had taken them, though whether Gething had abstracted them from the safe in the first instance was not clear.

So far French had no trouble in marshalling his facts, but when he attempted to go further he found himself in difficulties.

There was first of all Gething’s poverty. Though his salary was not unreasonable for his position, the drain of his wife’s illness had kept him continually struggling to make ends meet. French let his imagination dwell on the wearing nature of such a struggle. To obtain relief a man would risk a good deal. Then there was his knowledge of the wealth which lay within his reach, provided only that he made a spirited effort to obtain it. Had the man fallen before the temptation?

That he had had something on his mind for two or three weeks before his death was obvious, and it was equally clear that this was something secret. When Mr Duke inquired as to the cause of the trouble, Gething had mentioned family matters and his wife’s health, but when his daughter had asked the same question he had said it was due to business worries. The old man had therefore carried his efforts at concealment to direct lying to one or other.

It seemed evident also that this worry or trouble had become intensified on the evening of his death. He had told his daughter that special business required his presence at the office. But Mr Duke knew of no such business, nor was any record of it obtainable.

But all these mysterious contradictions fell into line and became comprehensible if some two or three weeks back Gething had decided to rob the safe, and his special agitation on the evening of his death was accounted for if that were the date he had selected to make the attempt.

On the other hand, several considerations did not support such a view. The first was the man’s known character. He had worked for the firm for over twenty years, and after all that experience of him Mr Duke absolutely refused to believe in his guilt. His daughters also evidently had the warmest feelings towards him, and from what French had seen of the latter he felt that would have been impossible had Gething been a man of bad or weak character. Such other evidence as French had been able to obtain tended in the same direction.

Next, there was the open way in which Gething returned to the office. Had he intended to burgle the safe, would he not have kept the fact of his visit a secret? Yet he told the office boy he was returning when instructing him to keep up the fire in the inner office, and he also mentioned it to his daughter when discussing her proposed choir meeting.

Further, there was this matter of the fire in the private office. If Gething was going to rob the safe, what was the fire for? It was not merely that he had instructed the office boy to keep it up. He had himself afterwards put coal on, as was evidenced by his finger marks on the handle of the shovel. The robbing of the safe would have been a matter of minutes only. Did the episode of the fire not look as if Gething really was employed at some exceptional work, as he had stated to his daughter?

On the whole, French thought, the evidence for Gething’s guilt was stronger than that against it, and he began to form a tentative theory somewhat as follows: That Gething, finding the conditions of his home life onerous beyond further endurance, and realising the unusually valuable deposit in the safe, had decided to help himself, probably to a quite small portion, knowing that the loss would fall, not on Mr Duke, but on the insurance company; that he had obtained an impression of the key from which he had had a duplicate made; that he had invented the business in the office as a safeguard should he be accidentally found there during the evening; that he had been found there, probably accidentally, by someone who, seeing the possibilities opening out in front of him, had been swept off his feet by the sudden temptation and had killed the old man and made off with the swag.

This theory seemed to meet at least most of the facts. French was not pleased with it, but it was the best he could produce, and he decided to adopt it as a working hypothesis. At the same time he kept an open mind, recognising that the discovery of some fresh fact might put a different complexion on the whole affair.

Next morning he put some obvious investigations in train. By astute indirect inquiries, he satisfied himself that neither Mr Gething nor any other worker in the Duke & Peabody office had the technical skill to have cut the key, and he put a man on to try and trace the professional who had done it. He issued a description of the stolen diamonds to the British and Dutch police, as well as to certain dealers from whom he hoped to obtain information of attempted sales. He saw that a general advice was sent to the banks as to the missing notes, and he searched, unsuccessfully, for any person who might have known of the treasure and who was unable satisfactorily to account for his movements on the night of the murder.

But as the days slipped by without bringing any news, French grew seriously uneasy and redoubled his efforts. He suspected everyone he could think of, including the typist, the office boy, and even Mr Duke himself, but still without result. The typist proved she was at home all the evening, Billy Newton was undoubtedly at a Boy Scouts’ Rally, while guarded inquiries at the principal’s club and home proved that his statement as to how he had passed his evening was correct in every particular. Stanley Harrington’s movements he had already investigated, and though the young man’s alibi could not be absolutely established he could find nothing to incriminate him.

Baffled in every direction, French began to lose heart, while his superiors asked more and more insistent and unpleasant questions.




4 (#ulink_12874e64-2dbb-5888-a569-2412e6951be9)

Missing (#ulink_12874e64-2dbb-5888-a569-2412e6951be9)


About ten o’clock on the morning of the tenth day after the murder of Charles Gething, Inspector French sat in his room at New Scotland Yard wondering for the thousandth time if there was no clue in the affair which he had overlooked, no line of research which he had omitted to follow up.

He had seldom found himself up against so baffling a problem. Though from the nature of the case, as he told himself with exasperation, a solution should be easily reached, yet he could find nothing to go on. The clues he had obtained looked promising enough, but—they led nowhere. None of the stolen notes had reached the bank, nor had any of the diamonds come on the market; no one in whom he was interested had become suddenly rich, and all his possible suspects were able more or less satisfactorily to account for their time on the fatal evening.

French had just taken up his pen to write out a statement of what he had done, in the hope of discovering some omission, when his telephone rang. Absent-mindedly he took up the receiver.

‘I want to speak to Inspector French,’ he heard in a familiar voice. ‘Say that Mr Duke of Duke & Peabody is on the ’phone.’

There was a suggestion of eagerness in the voice that instantly roused the inspector’s interest.

‘Inspector French speaking,’ he answered promptly. ‘Good-morning, Mr Duke. I hope you have some news for me?’

‘I have some news,’ the distant voice returned, ‘but I don’t know whether it bears on our quest. I have just had a letter from Schoofs, you remember, the manager of our Amsterdam branch, and from what he tells me it looks as if Vanderkemp had disappeared.’

‘Disappeared?’ French echoed. ‘How? Since when?’

‘I don’t know exactly. I am having the files looked up to try and settle dates. It appears that he has been absent from the Amsterdam office for several days, and Schoofs thought he was over here. But we’ve not seen him. I don’t understand the matter. Perhaps if you’re not too busy you could come round and I’ll show you Schoofs’ letter.’

‘I’ll come at once.’

Half an hour later French was mounting the stairs of the Hatton Garden office. With a face wreathed in smiles, Billy Newton ushered him into the private office. Mr Duke seemed nervous and a trifle excited as he shook hands.

‘The more I think over this affair, Inspector, the less I like it,’ he began immediately. ‘I do hope there is nothing wrong. I will tell you all I know, but before I show you Schoofs’ letter I had better explain how it came to be written.’

He looked up interrogatively, then as French nodded, continued:

‘As I think I already mentioned, Vanderkemp is my travelling agent. He attends sales and auctions in all the countries of Europe. He has carried through some very large deals for me, and I have every confidence both in his business acumen and in his integrity. I told you also that amongst others he had purchased and brought to London the greater part of the missing stones.’

‘You told me that, sir.’

‘Of late years, when Vanderkemp is not on the road, he has been working in the Amsterdam branch. Some three or four days before poor Gething’s death he had returned from a tour through southern Germany where he had been buying jewels from some of the former nobility who had fallen on evil days since the revolution. Three days ago, on last Monday to be exact, I learnt that a very famous collection of jewels was shortly to be sold in Florence, and I wrote that evening to Schoofs telling him to send Vanderkemp to Italy to inspect and value the stones with a view to my purchasing some of them. This is Schoofs’ reply which I received this morning. You see what he says: “I note your instructions re sending Vanderkemp to Florence, but he had not yet returned here from London, where I presumed he was staying with your knowledge and by your orders. When he arrives I shall send him on at once.” What do you make of that, Inspector?’

‘Vanderkemp did not come to London, then?’

‘Not to my knowledge. He certainly did not come here.’

‘I should like to know why Mr Schoofs thought he had, and also the date he was supposed to start.’

‘We can learn that by wiring to Schoofs.’

Inspector French remained silent for a few moments. It seemed to him now that he had neglected this Dutch office. It was at least another line of inquiry, and one which might easily bear fruitful results.

The staff there, Mr Duke had stated, consisted of four persons, the manager, a typist, and an office boy. There was also at times this traveller, Vanderkemp, the same Vanderkemp who was uncle to Stanley Harrington. It was more than likely that these persons knew of the collection of diamonds. The manager would certainly be in Mr Duke’s confidence on the matter. Vanderkemp had actually purchased and brought to London a large number of the stones, which he had seen put into the safe, though, of course, it did not follow that he knew that they had been retained there. Besides, in the same way as in the London office, leakage of the information to outside acquaintances might easily occur. Inquiries in Amsterdam seemed to French to be indicated.

‘I think I shouldn’t wire,’ he said at last. ‘There is no use in starting scares unless we’re sure something is wrong. Probably the thing is capable of the most ordinary explanation. But I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll slip across to Amsterdam and make a few inquiries. If anything is wrong I’ll get to know.’

‘Good. I’d be very pleased if you did that. I’ll write Schoofs and tell him to help you in every way that he can.’

French shook his head.

‘I shouldn’t do that either, if you don’t mind,’ he declared. ‘I’ll just go over and have a look round. There is no need to mention it to anyone.’

Mr Duke demurred, pointing out that a note from him would enlist Mr Schoofs’ help. But French maintained his ground, and the merchant agreed to carry out his wishes.

French crossed by the night service from Harwich, and at half-past eight o’clock next day emerged from the Central Station into the delightful, old world capital. Though bent on sordid enough business, he could not but feel the quaint charm of the city as he drove to the Bible Hotel in the Damrak, and again as, after breakfast, he sauntered out to reconnoitre.

Messrs Duke & Peabody’s office was close by in the Singelgracht, a semi-business street with a tree-lined canal down its centre, and crouching at one corner, a heavily-gabled church with a queer little wooden tower not unlike a monstrous candle extinguisher. French had opposed Mr Duke’s offer to write to the manager introducing him, as he did not wish any of the Amsterdam staff to be aware beforehand of his visit. He had on many occasions obtained a vital hint from the start or sudden look of apprehension which an unexpected question had produced, and he was anxious not to neglect the possibility of a similar suggestion in this case. He therefore pushed open the swing door, and without giving a name, asked for the manager.

Mr Schoofs was a dapper little man with a pompous manner and an evident sense of his own value. He spoke excellent English, and greeted his caller politely as he motioned him to a chair. French lost no time in coming to the point.

‘I have called, sir,’ he began in a harsh tone, not at all in accord with his usual ‘Soapy Joe’ character, while he transfixed the other with a cold and inimical stare, ‘with reference to the murder of Mr Gething. I am Inspector French of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard.’

But his little plot did not come off. Mr Schoofs merely raised his eyebrows, and with a slight shrug of his shoulders contrived to produce a subtle suggestion that he was surprised not with the matter, but with the manner, of his visitor’s announcement.

‘Ah yes!’ he murmured easily. ‘A sad business truly! And I understand there is no trace of the murderer and thief? It must be disquieting to Londoners to have deeds of violence committed with such impunity in their great city.’

French, realising that he had lost the first move, changed his tone.

‘It is true, sir, that we have as yet made no arrest, but we are not without hope of doing so shortly. It was to gain some further information that I came over to see you.’

‘I am quite at your disposal.’

‘I needn’t ask you if you can give me any directly helpful news, because in that case you would have already volunteered it. But it may be that you can throw light upon some side issue, of which you may not have realised the importance.’

‘Such as?’

‘Such, for example, as the names of persons who were aware of the existence of the diamonds in Mr Duke’s safe. That is one of many lines.’

‘Yes? And others?’

‘Suppose we take that one first. Can you, as a matter of fact, tell me if the matter was known of over here?’

‘I knew of it, if that is what you mean,’ Mr Schoofs answered in a slightly dry tone. ‘Mr Duke told me of his proposed deal, and asked me to look out for stones for him. Mr Vanderkemp also knew of it, as he bought a lot of the stones and took them to London. But I do not think anyone else knew.’

‘What about your clerk and office boy?’

Mr Schoofs shook his head.

‘It is impossible that either could have heard of it.’

French, though he had begun inauspiciously, continued the interrogation with his usual suavity. He asked several other questions, but without either learning anything of interest, or surprising Schoofs into showing embarrassment or suspicious symptoms. Then he turned to the real object of his visit.

‘Now about your traveller, Mr Schoofs. What kind of man is Mr Vanderkemp?’

Under the genial and deferent manner which French was now exhibiting, Schoofs had thawed, and he really seemed anxious to give all the help he could. Vanderkemp, it appeared, was a considerable asset to the firm, though owing to his age—he was just over sixty—he was not able to do so much as formerly. Personally he was not very attractive; he drank a little too much, he gambled, and there were discreditable though unsubstantiated tales of his private life. Moreover, he was of morose temper and somewhat short manners, except when actually negotiating a deal, when he could be suave and polished enough. But he had been known to perform kind actions, for instance, he had been exceedingly good to his nephew Harrington. Neither Schoofs nor anyone else in the concern particularly liked him, but he had one invaluable gift, a profound knowledge of precious stones and an accuracy in valuing them which was almost uncanny. He had done well for the firm, and Mr Duke was glad to overlook his shortcomings in order to retain his services.

‘I should like to have a chat with him. Is he in at present?’

‘No, he went to London nearly a fortnight ago. He has not returned yet. But I’m expecting him every day, as I have instructions from Mr Duke to send him to Florence.’

French looked interested.

‘He went to London?’ he repeated. ‘But I can assure you he never arrived there, or at least never reached Mr Duke’s office. I have asked Mr Duke on several occasions about his staff, and he distinctly told me that he had not seen this Mr Vanderkemp since two or three weeks before the murder.’

‘But that’s most extraordinary,’ Schoofs exclaimed. ‘He certainly left here to go to London on—what day was it?—it was the very day poor Gething was murdered. He left by the day service via Rotterdam and Queenborough. At least, he was to do so, for I only saw him on the previous evening.’

‘Well, he never arrived. Was it on business he was going?’

‘Yes, Mr Duke wrote for him.’

‘Mr Duke wrote for him?’ French echoed, at last genuinely surprised. ‘What? To cross that day?’

‘To see him in the office on the following morning. I can show you the letter.’ He touched a bell and gave the necessary instructions. ‘There it is,’ he continued, handing over the paper which the clerk brought in.

It was an octavo sheet of memorandum paper with the firm’s name printed on the top, and bore the following typewritten letter:

‘20th November.

‘H. A. SCHOOFS, ESQ.

‘I should be obliged if you would please ask Mr Vanderkemp to come over and see me here at 10.00 a.m. on Wednesday, 26th inst., as I wish him to undertake negotiations for a fresh purchase. He may have to go to Stockholm at short notice.’

The note was signed ‘R. A. Duke,’ with the attendant flourish with which French had grown familiar.

He sat staring at the sheet of paper, trying to fit this new discovery into the scheme of things. But it seemed to him an insoluble puzzle. Was Mr Duke not really the innocent, kindly old gentleman he had fancied, but rather a member, if not the author, of some deep-seated conspiracy? If he had written this note, why had he not mentioned the fact when Vanderkemp was being discussed? Why had he shown surprise when he received Schoofs’ letter saying that the traveller had crossed to London? What was at the bottom of the whole affair?

An idea struck him, and he examined the letter more closely.

‘Are you sure this is really Mr Duke’s signature?’ he asked slowly.

Mr Schoofs looked at him curiously.

‘Why, yes,’ he answered. ‘At least, it never occurred to me to doubt it.’

‘You might let me see some of his other letters.’

In a few seconds half a dozen were produced, and French began whistling below his breath as he sat comparing the signatures, using a lens which he took from his pocket. After he had examined each systematically, he laid them down on the table and sat back in his chair.

‘That was stupid of me,’ he announced. ‘I should have learnt all I wanted without asking for these other letters. That signature is forged. See here, look at it for yourself.’

He passed the lens to Schoofs, who in his turn examined the name.

‘You see, the lines of that writing are not smooth; they are a mass of tiny shakes and quivers. That means that they have not been written quickly and boldly; they have been slowly drawn or traced over pencil. Compare one of these other notes and you will see that while at a distance the signatures look identical, in reality they are quite different. No, Mr Duke never wrote that. I am afraid Mr Vanderkemp has been the victim of some trick.’

Schoofs was visibly excited. He hung on the other’s words and nodded emphatically at his conclusions. Then he swore comprehensively in Dutch. ‘Good heavens, Inspector!’ he cried. ‘You see the significance of all that?’

French glanced at him keenly.

‘In what way?’ he demanded.

‘Why, here we have a murder and a robbery, and then we have this, occurring at the very same time … Well, does it not look suggestive?’

‘You mean the two things are connected?’

‘Well, what do you think?’ Mr Schoofs replied with some impatience.

‘It certainly does look like it,’ French admitted slowly. Already his active brain was building up a theory, but he wanted to get the other’s views. ‘You are suggesting, I take it, that Vanderkemp may have been concerned in the crime?’

Schoofs shook his head decidedly.

‘I am suggesting nothing of the kind,’ he retorted. ‘That’s not my job. The thing merely struck me as peculiar.’

‘No, no,’ French answered smoothly, ‘I have not expressed myself clearly. Neither of us are making any accusation. We are simply consulting together in a private, and, I hope, a friendly way, each anxious only to find out the truth. Any suggestion may be helpful. If I make the suggestion that Mr Vanderkemp is the guilty man in order to enable us to discuss the possibility, it does not follow that either of us believe it to be true, still less that I should act on it.’

‘I am aware of that, but I don’t make any such suggestion.’

‘Then I do,’ French declared, ‘simply as a basis for discussion. Let us suppose then, purely for argument’s sake, that Mr Vanderkemp decides to make some of the firm’s wealth his own. He is present when the stones are being put into the safe, and in some way when Mr Duke’s back is turned, he takes an impression of the key. He crosses to London, either finds Gething in the office or is interrupted by him, murders the old man, takes the diamonds, and clears out. What do you think of that?’

‘What about the letter?’

‘Well, that surely fits in? Mr Vanderkemp must leave this office in some way which won’t arouse your suspicion or cause you to ask questions of the London office. What better way than by forging the letter?’

Mr Schoofs swore for the second time. ‘If he has done that,’ he cried hotly, ‘let him hang! I’ll do everything I can, Inspector, to help you to find out, and that not only on general grounds, but for old Gething’s sake, for whom I had a sincere regard.’

‘I thought you would feel that way, sir. Now to return to details. I suppose you haven’t the envelope that letter came in?’

‘Never saw it,’ Mr Schoofs replied. ‘The clerk who opened it would destroy it.’

‘Better have the clerk in, and we’ll ask the question.’

Mr Schoofs made a sudden gesture.

‘By jove!’ he cried. ‘It was Vanderkemp himself. He acts as head clerk when he is here.’

‘Then we don’t get any evidence there. Either the letter came through the post, in which case he destroyed the envelope in the usual way, or else he brought the letter to the office and slipped it in among the others.’

French picked up the letter again. Experience had taught him that typescript could be extremely characteristic, and he wondered if this in question could be made to yield up any of its secrets.

It certainly had peculiarities. The lens revealed a dent in the curve of the n, where the type had evidently struck something hard, and the tail of the g was slightly defective.

French next examined the genuine letters, and was interested to find their type showed the same irregularities. It was therefore certain that the forged letter had been typed in the London office.

He sat thinking deeply, unconsciously whistling his little tune through his closed teeth. There was another peculiarity about the forged note. The letters were a trifle indented, showing that the typewriter keys had been struck with rather more than the usual force. He turned the sheet over, and he saw that so much was this the case that the stops were punched almost through. Picking up the genuine letters, he looked for the same peculiarity, but the touch in these cases was much lighter and even the full stop barely showed through. This seemed to justify a further deduction—that the writer of the forged note was unskilled, probably an amateur, while that of the others was an expert. French felt he could safely assume that the forged note had been typed by some unauthorised person, using the machine in the London office.

But, so far as he could see, these deductions threw no light on the guilt or innocence of Vanderkemp. The letter might have come from some other person in London, or Vanderkemp might have typed it himself during one of his visits to the metropolis. More data was wanted before a conclusion could be reached.

Though from what he had seen of Schoofs, the inspector thought it unlikely that he was mixed up in what he was beginning to believe was a far-reaching conspiracy, he did not mention his discoveries to him, but continued trying to pump him for further information about the missing traveller. Vanderkemp, it seemed, was a tall man, or would have been if he held himself erect, but he had stooped shoulders and a slouching way of walking which detracted from his height. He was inclining to stoutness, and had dark hair and a sallow complexion. His chin was clean shaven, but he wore a heavy dark moustache. Glasses covered his shortsighted eyes.

French obtained some samples of his handwriting, but no photograph of him was available. In fact, Mr Schoofs did not seem able to supply any further information, nor did an interrogation of the typist and office boy, both of whom spoke a little English, produce any better results.

‘Where did Mr Vanderkemp live?’ French asked, when he thought he had exhausted the resources of the office.

It appeared that the traveller was unmarried, and Mr Schoofs did not know if he had any living relatives other than Harrington. He boarded with Mevrouw Bondix, in the Kinkerstraat, and thither the two men betook themselves, French begging the other’s company in case he should be needed as interpreter. Mevrouw Bondix was a garrulous little old lady who had but little English, and upon whom Schoofs’ questions acted as a push button does on an electric bell. She overwhelmed them with a flood of conversation of which French could understand not one word, and from which even the manager was hard put to it to extract the meaning. But the gist of the matter was that Vanderkemp had left her house at half-past eight on the night before the murder, with the expressed intention of taking the 9.00 train for London. Since then she had neither seen him nor heard from him.

‘But,’ French exclaimed, ‘I thought you told me he had crossed by the daylight service on the day of the murder?’

‘He said he would,’ Schoofs answered with a somewhat puzzled air. ‘He said so most distinctly. I remember it particularly because he pointed out that Mr Duke would probably ask him, after the interview, to start by the afternoon Continental train on his new journey, and he preferred to travel during the previous day so as to insure a good night’s sleep in London. He said that in answer to a suggestion of mine that he would be in time enough if he went over on the night before his interview.’

‘What time do these trains get in to London?’

‘I don’t know, but we can find out at the office.’

‘I’d like to go to the Central Station next, if you don’t mind coming along,’ French declared, ‘so we could look them up there. But before I go I want you to tell me if Mr Vanderkemp figures in any of these?’ He pointed to a number of photographic groups which adorned the chimneypiece and walls.

It happened that the missing traveller appeared in one of the groups, and both Mr Schoofs and Mevrouw Bondix bore testimony to the excellence of the portrait.

‘Then I’ll take it,’ French announced, as he slipped the card into his pocket.

The two men next went to the Central Station and looked up the trains. They found that the day service did not reach Victoria until 10.5 p.m. The significance of this was not lost upon French. Orchard stated he had reached the office in Hatton Garden at 10.15, and that it could not have been later was established by the evidence of Constable Alcorn. The body at that time was cold, so that the crime must have taken place some considerable time earlier. A man, therefore, who had crossed by the daylight service from Amsterdam could not possibly have had time to commit the murder. Had Vanderkemp lied deliberately to Schoofs when he told him he was using that daylight service? If so, was it in order to establish an alibi? Had he a secret appointment with Gething for an earlier hour on the fatal evening, and had he crossed the night before with the object of keeping it? French felt these were questions which required satisfactory answers, and he made a mental note not to rest until he had found them.

With his new friend’s aid he began to interrogate the staff of the Central Station, in the hope of ascertaining whether or not the missing man had actually left by the train in question. But of this he could learn nothing. None of the employees appeared to know Vanderkemp’s appearance, nor after that lapse of time could anyone recall having seen a passenger of his description.

That day and the next French spent in the charming old city, trying to learn what he could of the missing man’s life and habits. He came across a number of persons who were acquainted with the traveller, but no one with whom he had been really intimate. None of these people could give him much information, nor did any of them seem to care whether or no Vanderkemp should ever be heard of again. From all he heard, French concluded that Vanderkemp’s character was such as might be expected in the guilty man, but there was but little evidence of motive, and none at all of guilt.

He returned to London by the night service, and having ascertained that the steamer he crossed by was the same that had run on the date of Vanderkemp’s assumed journey; he made exhaustive inquiries as to the latter from the staff on board, unfortunately with negative results.

Next day his efforts were equally fruitless. He spent most of it in discussing the situation with Mr Duke, and trying to make a list of the persons who could have had access to the typewriter, but nowhere could he get a gleam of light. The authorship of the letter remained as inscrutable a mystery as the murder of Gething.

Having circulated a description of Vanderkemp containing a copy of the photograph, French went home that night a worried and disconsolate man. But though he did not know it, further news was even at the moment on the way to him.




5 (#ulink_9437d146-3389-5b13-994f-bf793cf93c00)

French Takes a Journey (#ulink_9437d146-3389-5b13-994f-bf793cf93c00)


Inspector French had not quite finished supper that evening when his telephone bell rang. He was wanted back at the Yard immediately. Some information about the case had come in.

Cheerful and hopeful, he set off and in a few minutes was once more seated in his office. There a note was awaiting him, which had been delivered by hand a short time previously. He eagerly tore it open, and read:

‘City of London Banking Co.,

‘Reading Branch, 11th December.

‘SIR,—With reference to your inquiry re certain bank-notes, I beg to inform you that Bank of England ten-pound notes numbers A/V 173258 W and N/L 386427 P were paid into this Branch just before closing time today. Our teller fortunately noticed the numbers almost immediately, and he thinks, though is not positive, they were paid in by a Colonel FitzGeorge of this town, whose address is Oaklands, Windsor Road.

‘I am sending this note by one of our clerks, who is going to town this afternoon.

‘Yours faithfully,

‘HERBERT HINCKSTON,

‘Manager.’

French received this information with a feeling of delight which speedily changed to misgiving. At first sight what could be more valuable to his quest than the discovery of some of the stolen notes? And yet when he considered that these had been passed in by an army man residing in Reading, the doubt immediately insinuated itself that here also might be a promising clue which would lead to nothing. Obviously, if this Colonel FitzGeorge had indeed paid in the notes, it did not at all follow that he was the thief, or even that he had obtained them from the thief. Before they reached the bank in Reading they might have passed through a dozen hands.

But, be this as it might, French’s procedure was at least clear. A visit to Colonel FitzGeorge was undoubtedly his next step.

He picked up a Bradshaw. Yes, there would be time to go that night. A train left Paddington at 8.10 which would bring him to Reading before 9.00.

He ran down through the great building, and hailing a taxi, was driven to the terminus. He caught the train with a minute to spare, and shortly before nine he was in conversation with a taxi driver outside the Great Western Station in Reading.

‘Yessir,’ the man assured him, ‘I know the ’ouse. Ten minutes drive out along the Windsor Road.’

The night was dark, and French could not take minute stock of his surroundings, but he presently learnt from the sounds of his car’s wheels that Oaklands was reached from the road by an appreciable drive coated with fine gravel, and the bulk of the house, looming large above him as he stood before the porch, indicated an owner well endowed with this world’s goods. The impression was confirmed when in answer to his inquiry a venerable butler conducted him through a hall of imposing dimensions to a luxurious sitting-room. There the man left him, returning in a few minutes to say his master was in the library and would see Mr French.

Colonel FitzGeorge was a tall, white-haired man, with an erect carriage and excessively courteous manners. He bowed as French entered, and indicated a deep leather-lined arm-chair drawn up opposite his own before the blazing fire of pine logs.

‘A chilly evening, Inspector,’ he said pleasantly. ‘Won’t you sit down?’

French thanked him, and after apologising for the hour of his call, went on:

‘My visit, sir, is in connection with certain bank notes which I am trying to trace. Sometime ago there was a robbery in the City in which a number of Bank of England notes were stolen. The owner fortunately was able to find out their numbers from his bank. When the matter was reported to us, we naturally asked the banks generally to keep a lookout for them. Nothing was heard of them until today, but this afternoon, just before closing time, two of them were paid into the Reading Branch of the City of London Bank. The teller, though not certain, believed that you had paid them in. You can see, therefore, the object of my call. It is to ask you if you can possibly help me to trace the thief by telling me where you received the notes. There were two, both for ten pounds, and the numbers were A/V 173258 W and N/L 386427 P.’





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