Chapter Thirteen
What the Watchers Saw
Though utterly fagged out, I hailed a passing cab and drove back to the corner of Harpur Street, where, in the shadow, about half-way along the short thoroughfare, I discovered the young Italian keeping a watchful eye upon the house with the sign of the bear.
“No one has emerged, signore,” he said to me in Italian. “I was here a few minutes after you spoke to me.”
The blind was still up, and the signal still exhibited, the inmates evidently being unaware of the secret visit of the strange pair.
What connection could Father Bernardo and the old hunchback Graniani, away in Italy, have with that mysterious household?
“Has anyone passed up the street during my absence?” I asked the merry-eyed Enrico.
“Several people, signore. One man, well-dressed, like a gentleman, stood for a moment looking up at the window yonder as though he expected to see someone there. But he was apparently disappointed, and passed on.”
“What kind of man?” I inquired eagerly. “Describe him.”
“A signore with small, fair moustache, about forty. He carried an umbrella, so I could not see his face very well. He was tall, and walked erectly, almost like an officer. A four-wheeled cab waited for him up at the corner.”
“He didn’t actually pass the house?”
“No, signore. He merely walked down here sufficiently far to obtain a view of the window; then, having satisfied himself, turned back again.” In reply to my question, Enrico told me that he lived with his mother in Kirby Street, Hatton Garden, the thoroughfare running parallel with Saffron Hill. They have been five years in London: five sad, despairing years. Ah, the English! they were not cattiva. Oh, no! It was their amazing climate that made them what they were. He pitied London people. How happy they would all be if they only lived under the blue sky of rural Tuscany! And so he went on, just as every poor Italian does who is doomed to the struggle and semi-starvation of life in our grey metropolis.
I read the young fellow’s character like a book. He had served his military service at Bologna, and had been waiter in the officers’ mess. Then he and his mother emigrated to London from Genoa, attracted by the proverbial richness of the Inglese and the report that waiters in restaurants were well paid. On arrival, however, he had soon discovered that the supply of Italian waiters was much in excess of the demand; therefore, he had been compelled to invest the ten pounds he had in a second-hand organ, and he and his mother picked up a living as best they could in the unsympathetic streets of London.
He seemed a good fellow, quite frank, and possessing that easy-going, careless manner of the true Tuscan, which never deserts him even when in circumstances of direst poverty. Your true son of the Tuscan mountains looks at the bright side of everything; a child in love, a demon in hatred, over-cautious with strangers, but easy and tractable in everything. I chatted to him for some twenty minutes, at the end of which time I resolved that he should assist me further in my investigations.
I told him how I had only arrived from Italy a few hours ago, and he grew at once excited. My train had actually passed across the rippling Serchio within a few miles of Ponte Moriano, his own village! I told him of my long residence in Tuscany, a fact which attracted him towards me; for seldom your poor Italian of the curb becomes acquainted with an Englishman who understands his ways and his language. And when I explained that I wished him to assist me in a very important and secret undertaking he at once announced his readiness to do so.
“Very well,” I said, giving him the half-sovereign I had promised. “Go across to the public-house in Theobald’s Road and get some supper quickly, for I want you to remain on watch here all night. I must rest and sleep for a few hours; but we must ascertain who goes and comes here. Above all, we must follow anyone carrying a parcel. A book was stolen from me in Italy, and it has been taken there.”
“I quite understand,” was his response; and a few moments later he left me alone while he went to obtain something to eat.
During his absence I took out a card and wrote upon it the name of the hotel to which I had decided to go because it was in the vicinity and he could call me, if necessary – the Hotel Russell.
When he returned a quarter of an hour later I gave him instructions, telling him that if he wished to call me urgently during the night he might run round to the hotel, where I would leave instructions with the night porter, who would without a moment’s delay bring up to my room the card he held in his hand.
Then, jaded, wet, and hungry, I took a cab to the hotel, and sent down to Charing Cross for my bag, which I had left in the cloak-room there. In half an hour I had a welcome change of clothes and sat down to a hearty supper.
In a flash, as it were, I had returned from the charm of Tuscany into my own circle – the complex little world of literary London. That night I sat over a cigar prior to turning in, thinking and wondering. Yes, since that moment when I had bought the poisoned manuscript the world had used me very roughly. That there was a plot against me I felt certain.
Midnight came, and from my balcony on the third floor I stood watching the falling rain and the hansoms coming up from the theatres and crossing the square on their way northward. My presence in London again seemed like a dream, sick as I was of the sun-glare of the Mediterranean. My natural intuition told me that I should never return to Italy. My old friend Hutchinson would see that my collection of pictures, china, old furniture, and other antiques was packed and sent to me. He had rendered me many kindnesses in the past, and would do so again, I felt sure, for he was one of my most intimate friends.
I was soundly asleep when, of a sudden, I heard a loud rapping at the door.
“A man wants to see you, sir. He’s sent up your card,” exclaimed a voice in response to my sleepy growl.
I rubbed my eyes, and recollected that the voice was the night porter’s.
“Very well,” I replied. “I’ll be down at once;” and, rising, I slipped on my things hastily, glancing at my watch and finding it to be five o’clock – four o’clock in English time, as I had not altered my watch since leaving Italy.
In the grey of dawn at the door below I met Enrico, who, speaking excitedly in Italian, said:
“Something has happened, signore. I do not know what it is; but half an hour ago a little old lady came out of the house hurriedly, and called a doctor named Barton, who has a surgery in Theobald’s Road, next the fire-engine station. She seemed greatly excited, and the doctor hurried back with her. He’s there now, I expect.”
In an instant the truth became apparent. Someone had attempted to open The Closed Book as I had done, and had become envenomed.
I explained but little to Enrico; but together we hurried back through the dim, silent thoroughfares to Harpur Street.
I felt a certain amount of satisfaction that the thieves should suffer as I had suffered. Like myself, they had opened The Closed Book at their own risk and peril.
The house, like its neighbours, was in total darkness, save a flickering candle-flame showing through the dingy fanlight, denoting that Doctor Barton was still within. I asked the young Italian how he knew the doctor’s name, and he replied that it was engraved on the brass plate on the door.
Within myself I reconstructed the whole story. An unknown inmate of the house had been poisoned, and the doctor – a friend most probably – had been hurriedly summoned. Was he aware of the antidote, as Pellegrini in Leghorn had been? Poisoning is not the usual recreation of the law-abiding Londoner, and few general practitioners, even Harley Street specialists, would care to undergo an examination upon Tanner’s “Memoranda on Poisons,” nearly out of date as it may be.
My chief object was to regain possession of my property. I had discovered at least two persons interested in it – namely the old gentleman and the sweet-faced young woman who had entered that smart house in Grosvenor Street. There only remained for me to fix the identity of the unknown person within that dingy old house in Harpur Street.
The doctor emerged at last when near five o’clock, and it was quite daylight. He was shown out by my fellow-passenger from Calais, who thanked him profusely for his efforts, evidently successful.
For an hour or two I saw nothing could be done; therefore we both relinquished our vigil: Enrico returning to his home behind Saffron Hill to snatch an hour’s sleep and some breakfast, and I back to the hotel.
In thinking over all the curious events, I resolved that it was necessary to confide in one or other of my friends in London. At present no one knew that I was back in town; but when they did I knew that a flood of invitations would pour upon me.
As I have already said, it was now my intention to settle down in England, and I was eager to begin house-hunting, so as to have a fitting place ready to receive my antiquarian collection when it arrived from Italy. Some months must elapse before I could be settled in a country house, which I intended; therefore, on reflection, I resolved to accept the hospitality of one of my best friends of the old London days, Captain Walter Wyman, the well-known traveller and writer. He was about my own age, and had earned success and popularity by dint of perseverance and intrepid exploration. Inheriting an ample income from his father, the late Sir Henry Wyman, Knight, the great Wigan ironmaster, he had after a bitter disappointment in love devoted himself to the pursuit of geographical knowledge, and as a result of his travels in Asia and Africa the world had been considerably enriched by information. Fever, however, had seriously impaired his health, and he was at present back in his comfortable chambers in Dover Street, where he had only a few weeks ago invited me to stay if I came to town.
I decided to accept his hospitality in preference to the comfortless hotel life, which, after some years of it in various places on the Continent, I abominate. Of all men in whom I might confide, Walter Wyman would be the best. He lived for adventure, and as the world is well aware had had a considerable amount of it during his travels.
At ten o’clock that morning his white-headed old valet Thompson admitted me.
“Why, my dear Allan!” my friend cried, jumping from his chair, where he was enjoying his after-breakfast cigarette, “this is a surprise! You’re back, then?”
“Yes,” I replied. “I came back suddenly last night, and am going to accept your invitation to stay.”
“Of course. You know we wouldn’t be friends any longer if you went elsewhere. How long are you over for?”
“For good. I’m going to look out for a cottage or something in the country. I’m sick of Italy at last.”
Wyman smiled, offered me a cigarette, and ordered Thompson to bring brandy and soda. Careless, easy-going cosmopolitan that he was, it never struck him that strong drink so early in the morning was unusual.
He was dark, with a rather reddish complexion, tall, well-groomed, well-dressed in a suit of dark-blue, and well set-up altogether. Although several touches of fever had played havoc with him, he nevertheless looked the pink of condition – a fine specimen of English manhood.
When I had lit my cigarette I spoke to him confidentially, and he listened to my story with the utmost attention. In that cozy room, the walls of which were hung with savage arms and trophies of the chase, and the floor covered with the skins of animals that had fallen to his gun, I told him the whole of the strange circumstances, relating briefly the incomplete story as written in The Closed Book and the remarkable conspiracy that was apparently in progress.
When I had described the mysterious visit of the tall old gentleman and the young woman to Harpur Street, and had related how I had followed them to the Earl of Glenelg’s house in Grosvenor Street, he jumped up, exclaiming:
“Why, from your description, my dear fellow, he must have been the Earl himself, and the girl was evidently his daughter, Lady Judith Gordon! They’ve been abroad this two years, and to half London their whereabouts has been a mystery. I had no idea they had returned. By Jove! what you tell me is really most puzzling. It seems to me that you ought to get back that book at any cost.”
Chapter Fourteen
The Counsel of Friends
We discussed the best mode of regaining possession of the book, but our conclusions were not very clear.
My friend Walter set about giving old Thompson orders to prepare my room, for he was one of the few bachelors who could afford to keep a spare guest-chamber in his flat. It was a hobby of his that his chambers should remain in just the same order during his absence as when at home. He had been travelling sometimes for two years at a stretch, and yet when I had called there I found old Thompson just as prim as usual, merely replying to callers, “Captain Wyman is not at home, sir.” Thompson was a wonderful servant, and had been old Sir Henry’s right hand until his death. Indeed, he had been in the service of the Wymans for a trifle over fifty years, and appeared to treat Walter more as a son than as master.
My friend fully agreed with me that I had done right in engaging Enrico as watcher. He would be useful, and could act as spy in places where we could not afford to be seen. That there was some remarkable conspiracy in progress Wyman was, like myself, convinced; but what it was he failed to comprehend.
We carefully discussed the curious affair, and after an hour of anxious discussion formed a plan of campaign which we promptly proceeded to carry out.
While I remained there resting, he took a cab and called on the doctor named Barton.
When he returned, he explained that he consulted the doctor, and feigning the symptoms of poisoning which I had explained, the unsuspecting medico had at once remarked that only a few hours before he had been called to a similar case. He suggested to Wyman that perhaps both had eaten something unsound purchased at a shop in the neighbourhood.
Then, after receiving a dose, and being compelled to swallow it in order to keep up the fiction, my friend had commenced to chat with the doctor, and learned that the patient he had been called to was a clean-shaven, middle-aged man who had apparently about nine months ago come to live in Harpur Street. The name he gave was Selby, no profession – at least as far as the doctor knew. He had been struck by his rather mysterious bearing. The little old lady was probably a relation, but of that he was not quite sure. The name I had found in the Directory was that of the present tenant. Wyman had also approached the subject of The Closed Book; but it was apparent that neither Selby nor the doctor suspected that its leaves were envenomed. The patient had made no remark to the doctor about the book. Barton had found him suffering acutely, and betraying all the symptoms of poisoning; but beyond that he knew nothing.
Yet Wyman’s visit had cleared up one or two points, and had given us the name of the man into whose possession The Closed Book had passed.
Presently we went forth again in company, and at the corner of Theobald’s Road found the young Italian still vigilant, although palpably worn out and very hungry. Nothing had transpired, we learned. No one had come out of the house; but the little old lady had come to the door and taken in the milk and bread from the baker. She apparently acted as housekeeper.
We dismissed Enrico for four hours, and I took his place, while Walter Wyman went down to the Naval and Military Club, where he declared he was certain to meet a friend of his who was intimate with Lord Glenelg, and from whom he might obtain some information.
“What connection they have with this affair is a profound mystery,” he remarked; “just as much of a mystery as the fact they are in London when believed to be abroad. Colonel Brock, my friend, only told me the night before last that they were with friends up at Mussooree, in the north of India.”
“Well, it seems they’re back again now,” I remarked.
“So it appears,” was his reply, and he stepped into a hansom and drove down to the club to gather information, leaving me to lounge in the vicinity of that rather dark and cheerless London street.
The weather was damp and muggy, and the continuous traffic in Theobald’s Road jarred upon my nerves. Even in the broad daylight the exterior of the house in Harpur Street was dingy, with an air of distinct mystery. The shutters of the area window remained closed; but the stuffed bear cub had now been removed from the upper window, having served its purpose, whatever that might be.
Soon after noon Wyman met me again. He had been active every moment, had seen his friend, and had moreover called at Grosvenor Street under some pretext, only to discover that the Earl and his daughter, having returned unexpectedly from abroad two days ago, had left again that very morning.
Was it that inexplicable signal that had caused the pair to flee from London again?
The reason why they had been both dressed shabbily was now obvious. They were in London in secret, and feared recognition. Walter Wyman’s interest was now thoroughly aroused, and he declared his intention of sifting the matter to the bottom.
The question now arose as to the means by which we should get back the book stolen from me. In the bar of the public-house where I had taken refreshment on the previous night we further discussed the matter. To attempt to regain it by interviewing the man Selby would, we felt assured, be in vain, for of such value was it and so widespread the conspiracy that he would probably either deny that it was in his possession or openly defy us. On the other hand, it would be a dangerous matter to commit a burglary there, and more dangerous still to enter forcibly and demand my property. Even Doctor Barton had confessed that there was something puzzling and forbidding about the blustering man’s manner and antecedents.
Therefore, we found ourselves at a complete deadlock.
I wished heartily that I had ordered the old woman to be stopped on landing at Dover pier.
Could the police assist us? Wyman thought not, at least not in their official capacity. We should frighten this Mr Selby, and if so would probably lose the precious volume altogether.
We both saw that it was a matter in which there must be no bungling. My friend Wyman was as shrewd a man as any in London, and this fighting with conspirators was work just to his liking. He was one of those men who, in whatever tight corner they find themselves, either at home or abroad, always managed to wriggle out of it.
In the first place, we had no knowledge of the character of the man with whom we had to deal; while, in the second, we were utterly in the dark as to the motive of the conspiracy against me from the moment when the rare Arnoldus had passed into my hand.
That we should act promptly and with firm determination was imperative; but what line to take we knew not.
The more we discussed it the more determined I became to act fearlessly and go straight to the point by going to the police station and demanding the little old woman’s arrest. Such a course would bring matters to a head, and yet I still hesitated to show our enemies our hand. At present they were unaware of my presence in London, and surely their ignorance of this would be to our advantage, inasmuch as the looker-on sees most of the game.
I felt that I wanted an expert opinion, and suddenly recollected that in the old days, when I had lived in London before, I had been on friendly terms with a detective-sergeant of the Criminal Investigation Department named Noyes, who had been attached to the Hunter Street Police Station. I had several acquaintances in the Metropolitan police, as most literary men have; but to Noyes I had been indebted more than once for showing me certain phases of unknown London. Therefore I knew that if I sought his advice he would willingly give it.
Leaving Wyman to watch, I therefore took a cab to Hunter Street, and inquired of the inspector on duty for my friend, who, I was informed, had been promoted to the rank of inspector, and was posted at the chief station of the T Division at Hammersmith.
I returned in the cab to Wyman, and then lost no time in following out my quest by going out to Hammersmith.
I found my friend, a loosely built, heavy-jawed man of middle-age, sitting in his upstairs office; and when I entered he rose to welcome me warmly. Then, on telling him that I had come to seek his advice, he settled himself at his plain writing-table to listen.
The story I related interested him just as much as it had Wyman; but now and then he pencilled a note upon the sheet of paper he had instinctively placed before him. I related the whole facts from first to last, concealing nothing. The secret poisoning appealed to him, clever detective that he was, for every man attached to Scotland Yard will tell you that a good many more people die in London of poison annually than ever doctors or coroner’s juries suspect.
“Now, what I want is to get my property back again without these people knowing,” I explained at last.
“I quite see,” he said. “If they knew you had followed them up so quickly it might put an end to their game without you ever knowing what their motive has been. Yes, you want that book back at all costs, but in a secret way. You can easily lay information before the magistrate; and I could, on that, go and search for the stolen property. But that’s hardly your game, Mr Kennedy. We must use methods a trifle more – well, artistic, shall we call it?” and his big face broadened into a grin.
“Well now, what do you suggest?” I asked.
But, instead of responding, he asked me for a detailed description of the rare and interesting volume. Then, when I had given it to him, he raised his eyes from the paper whereon he had made some memoranda, and with a mysterious smile asked:
“Would you be willing to leave the affair entirely in my hands, Mr Kennedy? I have an idea that I might, with the assistance of a friend, be able to get hold of the book without this person Selby knowing that it has gone back into your possession. If I attempt it, however, you must not be seen anywhere in the vicinity. Any observation kept upon the old lady or upon this fellow Selby must be done by your friend, Captain Wyman. Would you be inclined to act under my directions and lie low until I communicate with you?”
“Certainly,” I answered, although not yet understanding his point.
“If there is a conspiracy, you’ll very quickly be spotted if you remain hanging about Harpur Street,” he said. “I think, if you’re prepared to pay a sovereign or two, that I can get hold of the book for you. Only it will have to be done secretly; and, in order that you should not be suspected of regaining possession of it, you must go away into the country and wait until you hear from me. We don’t want them to suspect anything, otherwise we may not be able to solve the mystery of it all.”
“I’ll leave the whole affair in your hands, Noyes, of course,” I responded. “When shall I go into the country?”
“Today. Go where you like, to some place within easy reach of town, and stay there till you hear from me. Don’t go back to Harpur Street, because it’s too dangerous. You must be recognised sooner or later. I’ll find Captain Wyman and explain matters to him. Why not run down to somewhere on the Great Northern, to Peterborough, for instance. It’s on the main line, and the first stop of the expresses to the north – an hour and a half from King’s Cross. You see I could get down quickly if I wanted to see you, or you could run up if necessary. There’s a good old-fashioned hotel – the ‘Angel.’ I stopped there once when I was after a German bank-note forger, and was very comfortable.”
“Very well. I’ll go there. That will be my address till I hear from you. Tell it to Captain Wyman, as he may want to write to me.”
After some discussion, in which he steadily refused to enlighten me further upon his scheme for getting hold of The Closed Book, we returned together by the underground railway to Charing Cross, where we parted, he to seek my friend Wyman, and I to hide myself in the small provincial town of Peterborough, where I arrived that afternoon about half-past four.
As Noyes had declared, the “Angel” was replete with old-fashioned comfort, a relic of the bygone posting-days and a centre of agricultural commerce on market-days. Except the cathedral, there is very little of interest in the town of Peterborough; for of late years it has been modernised out of all recognition. In itself it is ugly, although situated in the centre of the rich green pasturage of the Nene Valley, a busy place, where the hand of the vandal has been at work everywhere save perhaps in Narrow Street, the small, old-fashioned thoroughfare wherein the “Angel” is situated.
I spent the evening examining the interior of the cathedral, afterwards taking a stroll as far as the village of Longthorpe, and after dinner retired early, for I had not yet recovered from my swift journey across Europe.
The following day passed, and still the next, yet I could only idle there, chafing and anxious regarding the success of Noyes’s undertaking. Letters from Wyman showed that, aided by Enrico, he was still keeping observation upon the house, although he had seen nothing further of my friend the detective after his announcement of my departure.
I began to wonder if Noyes had broken faith with me. Yet we had been the best of friends in the old days when I had lived and worked in London; and I thought I knew him well enough to be confident that he would assist me in every way within his power.
Therefore I wandered the streets of Peterborough or lounged in the bar of my hotel, in hourly expectation of some message from him.
His silence was ominous, and my uneasiness increased until, on the third day, I determined to remain inactive no longer.