Chapter Nine
Foiled by the Work of a Modern Detective
The sunlit day that followed the breakfast at the little table laid for three, was full of happiness for Raife. He rapidly planned a motor-car ride. There were many details to be arranged. Lady Remington must be propitiated. The conventionalities of the South are less exacting than those of the North, but some of them must be observed. Lady Remington accepted the specious circumstances invented by Raife, and Doctor Malsano and his niece, Gilda Tempest, were duly introduced to her ladyship. The presentation was a characteristic presentment of difficulties overcome by an astuteness that youth can assume when love is the guide to the occasion. Il dottore displayed a suavity that was charming to Lady Remington, and Raife snatched the opportunity for those small attentions that accompany a youthful courtship. All that had savoured of mystery disappeared when the car bounded over the white roads that clamber over the hill and mountain sides of the sunny Mediterranean shore. To those two young hearts it was Elysium. A discreet Italian chauffeur paid those few attentions necessary to the well-ordered mechanism of a modern motor-car, and smiled once or twice when it occurred to him that so much happiness could not exist without a tragedy – somewhere-sometime. A bend in the steep road, a precipitous declivity with a loose stone wall on either side, and a glorious prospect of blue sea, and rich coloured landscape, brought the happy party to one of those meeting grounds, where perfectly trained waiters and caterers for human comfort assort themselves.
Joyously they alighted, and Raife proceeded to plan the arrangements for an al-fresco entertainment. Happiness was the keynote of the pleasure jaunt, and the stately Lady Remington seemed pleased with the companionship of the dignified doctor. The details of an entertainment are rendered easy in a land where men, women, and children are trained through the centuries to the refinements of pleasure.
Raife and Gilda found themselves wandering alone in a grove of trees, those dark-hued olives with leaf and branch in silhouette against a cerulean sky. This was the first occasion when opportunity had served for the display of a pent-up passion. With a fierceness that belongs to the madness of a love that has been controlled, almost discomforted, by circumstances Raife caught Gilda in his arms! Love may be blind, but love is alert. Crumpling leaves and a footstep brought Raife to his more complete sense. Turning, he saw the uncanny form of the Apache person, the forbidding creature who had spoken to him outside the café, on the night when Gilda had sent the little Italian girl to fetch him to her. With a gesture of impatience, that expressed thwarted opportunity, he said: “Who is that fellow, Gilda? Why is he here? How did he get here?”
Gilda trembled, and held her head between her hands. “I don’t know,” she stammered. “Don’t ask me. I don’t know!”
Brief is the life of golden opportunity, and Raife’s happiness had been broken by this phantom person of the forbidding aspect. A Saxon can love, but a Saxon can sulk. All that was Saxon in Sir Raife Remington induced him to sulk at this moment. They returned to where the tables were laid with that tempting display of napery and polished silver which is so well understood by the continental caterers. Lady Remington and Doctor Malsano were conversing agreeably. Gilda was evidently distressed, and Raife remained sulky. As they met again, the doctor was saying: “Your son was telling me, Lady Remington, that the Baroness von Sassniltz is a friend of yours. She is staying, I understand, at the same hotel with us?”
“Oh, yes, Doctor Malsano, I know the baroness. She visits us at Aldborough Park, my son’s place, you know, near Tunbridge Wells.”
“How very interesting. I have often felt I would like to meet the baroness. They tell me she is a very brilliant lady.” This was said with much unction.
The day that had opened so brightly, and with so much pleasure to Raife, was no longer pleasing to him. He was haunted by that Apache-looking fellow, whose hateful appearance in the olive grove had robbed him of the gratification that he felt should have been his. The course of true love is rarely smooth. It is often very rough. The weird happenings, since Raife and Gilda had met and talked, the brief love way into their souls on the front at Southport, had crowded their lives with mixed joy and sorrow. In these charming al-fresco surroundings, where the daintiness of human service blended with nature’s choicest gifts, there should have been peace and quietude of spirit. It was not to be. The haunting thought of his father’s dying words recurred again and again. “The trap – . She – that woman.”
His whole life’s blood should go out to this woman, whom he loved with a passion that belonged to a fierce nature. Yet at every pace or revolution in the progress of their intimacy there was a dark passage, a sinister obstacle.
The dignified uncle repelled him, although he, apparently, was fascinating his stately and severely exclusive mother. The forbidding figure of the Apache had completed, for a while, his sense of depression. The happiest people were, apparently, Lady Remington, the doctor – and the chauffeur – who had found companionship with a soft-eyed, brainless, dark-skinned maid, of the type that serves, and is happy in serving.
When the hired car bowled merrily around on the return journey and pulled up at the hotel, and a smiling group of servants assisted them in their entrance to the hotel, the Baroness von Sassniltz greeted Lady Remington. The opportunity and all the circumstances were of such a nature that it was almost necessary that Lady Remington should make the presentation. Thus Doctor Malsano and Gilda Tempest met the Baroness von Sassniltz.
It is necessary to talk of the Baroness von Sassniltz. She was rich, and of ancient lineage, but not of that old-world type which belonged to middle and eastern Europe, when the most exalted lady was little more than the ordinary frau or housewife. The baroness was brilliant and accomplished, and she was endowed with a commanding presence. She was handsome rather than beautiful, and as for her age – what does it matter so long as she remained attractive, and commanded the admiration of most, and the devotion of many, men.
Modern travel is so easy and it is so frequent that there is a closer intercourse in the society of nations. Switzerland and the Riviera are the acknowledged playgrounds where, by international accord, the crook may jostle the noble, and the conventions of the capitals of the world are allowed a licence and freedom undreamt of a decade ago.
Lady Remington first met the baroness at the Angst Hotel, Bordighera. The frigid bows which are grudgingly given by the highly-born in such circumstances, melted somewhat when, next season, mutual recognition was forced on them by an untimely jostle at the gaming tables of Monte Carlo. Of course those tables were never really fashionable, but they have always been fascinating. They possess the requisite diablerie to amuse the most exclusive and bored aristocracy of the countries of Europe. A further chance meeting at San Moritz completed the essentials necessary to break down the hidebound conventions that surround women’s introductions to one another.
Lady Remington and the Baroness von Sassniltz thus became friends. The baroness, so much younger than Lady Remington, possessed a vivacity and sense of initiative in the matter of social entertainment, which were very pleasing to her ladyship. The arduous nature of the late Sir Henry’s political life had been responsible for much that was almost drab in his wife’s career, which had been beautifully devoted to her husband.
The baroness’s jewels were a frequent topic of conversation in most of the capitals of Europe. The joy of possession is very great to the woman who owns jewellery, and the joy seems to increase with the risk that is attached to travel. The hairbreadth escapes, the thrills, and the states of panic attending the conveyance of the baroness’s jewels from one spa to another, were worth more than the cost of those expensive baubles. Her maid lived in a constant state of dread and apprehension in her efforts to protect the precious trinkets. There was not a crook in Europe who was not striving to outwit that poor woman and rob the baroness at the same time. Every variety of human emotion followed in their train, and the alert little Fräulein Schneider was the custodian of the priceless baubles, and ever on her guard to confuse the common enemy. Humanity is frail, and the most austere have a weak spot. Fräulein Schneider’s vigilance had become so much a part of her character that there were very few who detected the weak point in her armour. Coiled in a shapeless bunch at the back of her head there were long plaited strands of yellow hair. No one ever knew just how much of that hair there was, but the strands seemed interminable. This yellow hair was the one weak spot through which she could be approached. It was combed and pomaded, and plaited with scrupulous care. Everything about Fräulein Schneider was characterised by extreme care, from the guarding of the baroness’s jewels to the setting of the miniature black and white bonnet that surrounded the mighty monument of yellow hair.
“What beautiful hair, Fräulein!” was sufficient to extract a gratified smile, which was the first step towards relaxed vigilance. Doctor Malsano knew this weakness, and he watched and waited for the opportunity to apply the knowledge for his profit. A polished criminal is liable to take long chances when a big haul of booty appears probable. The doctor had shown himself rather indiscreet these last few days. Crossing the foyer of the hotel, after a long chat with the charming Lady Remington, he stumbled and almost fell into the arms of a little Englishman, who protested in such a ludicrous voice that the incident raised a titter among the guests at the hotel. There was no desire for laughter on the doctor’s part. In that brief, short while he had recognised Detective-Inspector Herrion of Scotland Yard. This immaculate little gentleman, with his fair hair parted in the middle, and a waxed moustache, was none other than the famous Herrion. A detective to-day, to be successful on the continent of Europe, must combine the qualities of an Admirable Crichton, with the cunning of a stoat. Detective-Inspector Herrion excelled these attributes, and, under alternating masks that varied from the superficial inanity of a Scarlet Pimpernel to the repellance of a viper, he did society much daring service. The apparent young sprig of aristocracy, with the deliciously insipid drawl and the grotesque monocle, was none other than Herrion, the one man of all others whom Doctor Malsano dreaded. This dainty little gentleman presented a very different appearance a few minutes later as he stripped before the mirror of the hotel washstand he revealed to himself the sinewy and fibrous muscles of the well-trained athlete.
Herrion was an athlete trained in that lithe school that embodies every active form of sport, from football to fencing, from la savate to the modern savage form of fighting and boxing. Equally deadly with a Browning revolver, a rifle at 800 yards, or a right and left among the birds in stubble or turnips.
This was the form and frame hidden behind such a mask of bored manner and faultless attire as could only be assumed by a Scarlet Pimpernel in his leisure moments. He was truly a man to be feared, and Doctor Malsano had learnt by bitter experience to run when his little, astute enemy loomed on the horizon. The recognition had been mutual at the time of the stumble, and Herrion knew the doctor was not staying in the Hôtel Royal for the cause of philanthropy. When the incident that produced the recognition had ceased to attract attention, the detective dodged through a service door used by the staff, and, making his way along corridors, knocked at an office door. Responding to the invitation to enter, he said to the rotund, bald-headed little man, ensconced in a big chair and surrounded by a maze of books and papers, “Forgive me, signor, for my brusque intrusion. Have you the Baroness von Sassniltz staying in your hotel?”
“Ah, inspector! It is you. I thought it was what you call ze greased lightning. I don’t know whether the baroness you speak of is staying in the hotel, but I will inquire,” and, ringing a bell, the jovial little manager continued: “You see at Nice we have so many barons, counts, ze English lords and people with titles, and at the Royal,” – this he said with a whimsical smile – “you see, Mr Inspector, we have the crème de la crème of what you call the haut-ton, the best society.”
In response to a bell a man in livery entered, and, with the deference of an inferior, asked for instructions. The manager, with an austere manner that contrasted with his previous geniality, ordered: “Go to the bureau and ask whether the baroness – what is the name, Mr Herrion?” The man started and looked surreptitiously at the detective. Herrion frowned and said, “The Baroness von Sassniltz, signor.”
As the man closed the door to go on his errand, the inspector said: “I’m sorry you disclosed my identity to that man. Who is he? Has he been long in the service of the hotel?”
“Ah, I’m very sorry, Mr Herrion. I did not think it would matter down here in this old office of mine. Again, Mr Herrion, I see my mistake. I am sorry.”
The messenger returned, and said, “The Baroness von Sassniltz is staying in the hotel, signor, with her maid, the Fräulein Schneider.”
“Thank you,” and, as the man glared at the detective again, the manager repeated, “You can go.”
Herrion followed him to the door and proceeded to talk to the manager. Suddenly wheeling, the officer opened the door and hauled from without the messenger.
“You were listening to our talk outside,” he said to the man, and turning to the manager, asked: “Do you know this man, signor? I don’t think you will find him a very good servant for such an aristocratic hotel as the Royal.”
The little manager rose from his chair and said furiously: “Go! go at once, this hotel is no place for a man like you. Go! I tell you, go, and I will see to it that you do not stay in Nice.”
The man attempted to explain, but the manager of a Riviera hotel is a despot in such matters, and the good name of a hotel must not be smirched by an inferior servant.
When the man had gone, Herrion continued his talk: “The Baroness von Sassniltz is very wealthy, signor, and she carries with her jewellery that is almost priceless. These people who will carry jewellery around with them are a great trouble to us. Before I intruded in your office I saw a man in the foyer, who is one of the most accomplished thieves in Europe. He is not here for a good purpose. That messenger whom I hauled, sans cérémonie, into the room, is, I have reason to believe, in league with this other criminal. I have seen a man skulking around at night in the costume of what might be the Quartier Latin of Paris, but he looks more like an Apache, and I strongly suspect this is the same man.”
“Ma foi! Mr Herrion, but if that is so, I and my proprietors are profoundly grateful to you.”
“Well it is, in some sense, my duty to prevent crime as well as to hunt down criminals and bring them to justice. I am not in Nice for this particular piece of work, but I saw a chance of nipping this man’s plans, and I hope I have done it. The rest of the work I leave to you. Good day, signor!”
When Herrion had left, the rotund little man leant back in his chair and laughed to himself.
“Ma foi! But when I was in London the crooks of Soho, Hatton Garden, and the other quarters used to laugh at the English detectives, with their big boots, pipe, and what they call a skull cap. But, this man Herrion, he’s what they call ‘in another class.’”
Chapter Ten
The Mystery of some Disappearances
The doctor, after his encounter with Herrion, hastily ascended the main staircase and made his way to his room. Gilda was in the foyer talking to Sir Raife Remington. With a surprising agility, the doctor flung his belongings into his valises and then scribbled a note. Ringing the bell he called for his bill, at the same time instructing the waiter to hand the note to Miss Tempest, whom he would find in the foyer. “Call Miss Tempest,” he added, “by saying that I wish to speak to her. Don’t hand her the note in the presence of Sir Raife.”
The waiter, with a profound bow, withdrew to obey the instructions, slightly elevating his eyebrows.
A few more instructions and Doctor Malsano left the hotel, ostensibly for a stroll along the Promenade des Anglais. He soon doubled his tracks and secured a motor-car. Seated in this he donned motor goggles of the mask type, attached to a jaunty looking cap. A gaily-coloured silk muffler from his overcoat pocket, with the other alterations he had effected in his room, completed a transformation that had converted the sombre personality into a somewhat flashy-looking tourist. The modest luggage was easily negotiated, and a trail of white dust was all that remained of the courtly old doctor.
Gilda’s conversation with Raife was interrupted by the arrival of the discreet waiter, who invited Miss Tempest to meet Doctor Malsano upstairs. Raife looked lovingly at her retreating figure. As she disappeared behind a marble pillar he saw the waiter hand her a note, which she hastily secreted in her bodice.
His heart gave a desponding throb. What was this fresh mystery? Why was the progress of their strange courtship to be jarred by a series of uncanny surprises?
He rose from his seat and crossing the foyer glanced up as her transcendingly beautiful but fragile form swept with a stately grace along the landing. She stood for a moment and started to read the note. Then, catching sight of Raife, she lowered it to her side and continued her journey upwards. More torture. Why did she disguise the note? What can have been the cryptic contents? Raife was enthralled with the subtle charms of this wonderful woman creature. Yet all his judgment kept telling him that their course could only lead to tragedy. A score of times a day he tore his soul in shreds by asking himself fatuous questions, to which he could find no answer. He was impelled with the fascination of a will-o’-the-wisp, and Gilda was the spirit that danced before him night and day.
Gilda reached the retirement of her room, and then read the note, which said:
“H of S Y is here. I have gone. Join me as soon as you can at C – . If we fail to meet there or at B – , meet L in a week or two.”
Haunted and hunted, deprived of all real companionship save that of this conspirator criminal who called himself her uncle, Gilda’s courage failed for a brief while.
Falling on to the lounge, covered with dainty dimity, which was at the foot of the bed she must soon vacate, this fragile girl, whose nerves had stood her in good stead so many times, sobbed.
Yes! hunted from place to place. Hunted by fear of a Nemesis that pursued unrelentingly. When the entrance hall was practically deserted and the dining halls were crowded, a tall figure, cloaked and shrouded in a motor veil, crept down the stairs and entered a car in waiting. Into the mysterious night, quite slowly and silently, the car forged its way. Gilda did not know where she was going and had merely said to the chauffeur: “Drive on slowly until I tell you to turn.”
The fiendish malignity of an accomplished criminal has formed the subject of much moralising. Criminals of the type of Doctor Danilo Malsano are, fortunately, rare. Their astounding gifts, which they use in a distorted form, make detection difficult, and escape easy.
To his mind it did not appear brutal to involve a beautiful young girl in a nest of criminal intrigue. A day or two after the sudden disappearance of uncle and niece, the quiet little town of Bordighera was made more attractive by the figure of a wistful-looking girl, who gazed across the deep-blue sea. Bordighera does not possess the fashionable and extravagantly gowned appearance of Nice. There is less of glitter, less of glare than in most of the towns of the Riviera. Gilda had come here hoping to attract no attention by reason of the comparative obscurity of the place. Instead of staying at an hotel, she had found lodgings in an obscure street.
For the first time she felt a sense of peace in her life and, away from her uncle’s baneful influence, a restored freshness was entering her very being. She sat gazing across that beautiful sea with its blue surface flecked by rippling streaks of turquoise, or purple, or deep emerald, as its wondrous depths were affected by a brilliant sun. Distant smoke trailed in the wake of some steamer that may have “tramped” the world around, or of an Orient liner that was conveying white rulers to the far-away portions of our Eastern Empire.
Gilda thought of Raife and his mad passion for her. She wished to tell him all – at least all she knew. She felt that she could hardly tell how much she knew, nor did she know how much she could tell. She did realise that she had treated him badly, but why had he followed and discovered her? Should she put an end to her perplexities by a short, sharp road to death? Rousing herself from this reverie, Gilda left the seat, with the wonderful view, and sauntered along a winding path embowered with foliage. As she turned the bend of the pathway she saw in front of her, on a jutting headland, an elderly lady and a young man. They, in turn, were gazing seaward.
The young man of to-day is more daring in his costume and displays more individuality than those of a generation ago. It was not hard, even at this distance of a few hundred yards, for Gilda to recognise Raife Remington standing on the jutting rock with his mother.
This young man, who had just inherited large estates and a handsome income, in tragic circumstances, was easy to identify. With a lineage dating from Henry the Seventh, and the later period when Sir Henry Reymingtoune was Chancellor to Queen Elizabeth, and men’s fashions rivalled in costliness those of the women, it was natural that Raife should possess judgment in such matters.
Queen Elizabeth has been counted the most extravagantly dressed woman of all time, unless it may be believed that the Queen of Sheba affected a similar extravagance. The pictorial souvenirs of the costumes of Elizabeth are more reliable than those of the days of Sheba, but it is not an important point to decide.
The centuries that have elapsed since the brave days of Drake, Frobisher and Hawkins, and the other bold admirals who founded the British empire, have induced a comparative drabness in men’s clothing, and a severity in style.
Much of this has been altered in these later years by imaginative young Americans, who have learnt to deck themselves out more elaborately in cravaterie, hosiery, and general lingerie, whilst newspapers devote columns to the cut of suitings, and the latest form of shoe string, or the brim and feathered tuft that should rule the form of an Alpine hat. These despised and minor considerations now, concern the youth of Britain and the continent of Europe.
Sir Raife Remington, Bart., possessed always the correct judgment in such matters. He allowed his tailor, hatter, hosier, bootmaker, and what not, just the correct latitude. They should, and did, only supply him with clothing that conformed sufficiently with the fashion of the moment, without displaying an outre taste.
If coloured socks were de rigueur, and a variety of tints in shirts and cravats were the order of the day, the general effect should be conformable to the fiat of his tradesmen, without being conspicuous. In short, Raife Remington was a well-dressed man, and his fine, athletic figure, displayed to perfection the clothes he adorned.
Gilda Tempest saw Raife’s form in the distance, and the old spirit of dread and unrest returned to her with an added fury.
Where should she go? How could she leave Bordighera without being discovered by Raife or his mother? Where also was the dreaded H of S Y? Turning in the beautiful pathway, she hastened, with drooping form, back over the cliffs, and sought the seclusion of her obscure lodgings in the back part of the quaint and quiet old town.
Long she schemed and planned for a way out of the difficulty. All the soothing reflections of the afternoon had gone, and in place was the renewal of trouble, unrest and danger.
The darkest hours of night and trouble precede the dawn.
Gilda, in the throes of her anxiety, gazed into space. She was awakened from her half-dazed thoughts by a discreet tap at the door. Her buxom, beaming-faced landlady entered and asked the young ‘mees’ the signorina, “Would she like an automobile ride in the beautiful evening time? The signorina looked pale and tired and it might do her good. The chauffeur of the Count Lyonesse had invited her and her husband for a ride, and if the young ‘mees’ would accompany them all would be well. The Count had gone away for a week and all was safe.”
This was the streak of dawn which rapidly became daylight, as Gilda saw her chance to escape from Bordighera in the guise of a peasant and accompanied, nay, safely chaperoned, by these good, simple folk, who saw no harm in a joy-ride in the automobile of the absent count. She must persuade them to take the route by the Col di Tenda through the long tunnel north into Italy, then to Cuneo. If she could induce them to “fetch” Cuneo, how should she give them the slip? She had left the bulk of her trunks at Nice. She must dispose of papers; but folks who live like Doctor Malsano and Gilda Tempest don’t preserve incriminating documents. How could she give them the slip at Cuneo? “H of S Y” would not follow her. He would follow her uncle – if he could.