“Ah! I fear not,” replied the widow with a slight sigh. “I dare say the diamonds which poor Tubby gave me are as good as any worn by the other women, but as for smartness – well, Prince, a woman’s mirror does not lie,” and she sighed again. “Youth is but fleeting, and a woman’s life is, alas! a long old age.”
“Oh, come!” he laughed, lounging back in his chair. “You haven’t yet arrived at the regretful age. Life is surely still full of youth for you!”
She was much gratified at that little speech of his, and showed it.
He continued to flatter her, and with that cunning innate within him he slowly drew from her the fact that she would not be averse to a second marriage. He was fooling her, yet with such cleverness that she, shrewd woman that she was, never dreamed that he was laughing at her in his sleeve.
So earnest, so sensible, so perfectly frank and straightforward was he, that when after half an hour’s tête-à-tête she found him holding her hand and asking her to become Princess, she became utterly bewildered. What she replied she hardly knew, until suddenly, with an old-fashioned courtliness, he raised her fat, bejewelled hand gallantly to his lips and said:
“Very well. Let it be so, Mrs Edmondson. We are kindred spirits, and our souls have affinity. You shall be my princess.”
“And then the old crow started blubbering,” as he forcibly described the scene afterwards to the Parson.
For a few moments he held her in his embrace, fearful every moment that the ferret-eyed Italian should enter. Indeed, his every movement seemed to be watched suspiciously by that grave, silent servant.
They mutually promised, for the present, to keep their secret. He kissed her upon the lips, which, as he declared to the Parson, were “sticky with some confounded face-cream or other.” Then Ferrini suddenly appeared, and his mistress dismissed him for the night. The Prince, however, knew that he would not retire, but lurk somewhere in the corridor outside.
He stood before the old Jacobean fireplace, with its high overmantel of carved stone and emblazoned arms, a handsome man who would prove attractive to any woman. Was it therefore any wonder that the ambitious widow of the shipbuilder should have angled after him?
He had entirely eclipsed the Parson.
First their conversation was all of affection; then it turned upon something akin, money. Upon the latter point the Prince was utter careless. He had sufficient, he declared. But the widow was persistent in telling him the state of her own finances. Besides the estate of Milnthorpe, which produced quite a comfortable income, she enjoyed half the revenue from the great firm her husband had founded, and at that moment, besides other securities, she had a matter of seventy thousand pounds lying idle at her bank, over which she had complete control.
She expected this would interest him, but, on the contrary, he merely lit a fresh cigarette, and having done so, said:
“My dear Mrs Edmondson, this marriage of ours is not for monetary interest. My own estates are more than sufficient for me. I do not desire to touch one single penny of your money. I wish you to enjoy your separate estate, and remain just as independent as you are to-day.”
And so they chatted on until the chimes of the stable clock warned them it was two in the morning. Then having given him a slobbery good-night kiss, they separated.
Before his Highness turned in, he took from his steel despatch-box a small black-covered book, and with its aid he constructed two cipher telegrams, which he put aside to be despatched by Charles from the Whitby post office in the morning.
The calm, warm summer days went slowly by. Each afternoon the widow – now perfectly satisfied with herself – accompanied her two guests on runs on the Prince’s “forty” – one day to Scarborough, the next over the Cleveland Hills to Guisborough, to Helmsley on to the ruins of Rievaulx, and to other places.
One afternoon the Parson made an excuse to remain at home, and the widow took the Prince in to York in her own Mercédès. Arrived there, they took tea in the coffee-room of the Station Hotel, then, calling at a solicitor’s office in Coney Street, appended their joint names to a document which, at the widow’s instigation, had already been prepared.
A quarter of an hour later they pulled up before the West Riding Bank in Stonegate, and though the offices were already closed, a clerk on duty handed to the widow a box about eighteen inches square, tied with string, and sealed with four imposing red seals. For this she scribbled her name to a receipt, and placing it in the car between them, drove back by way of Malton, Pickering, and Levisham.
“This is the first time I’ve had my tiara out, my dear Albert, since the burglars tried to get in,” she remarked when they had gone some distance, and the Mercédès was tearing along that level open stretch towards Malton.
“Well, of course, be careful,” answered her companion. Then after a pause he lowered his voice so the chauffeur could not overhear, and said: “I wonder, Gertrude, if you’ll permit me to make a remark – without any offence?”
“Why, certainly. What is it?”
“Well, to tell the truth, I don’t half like the look of that foreign servant of yours. He’s not straight. I’m sure of it by the look in his eyes.”
“How curious! Do you know that the same thought has occurred to me these last few days,” she said. “And yet he’s such a trusty servant. He’s been with me nearly two years.”
“Don’t trust him further, Gertrude, that’s my advice,” said his Highness pointedly. “I’m suspicious of the fellow – distinctly suspicious. Do you know much of him?”
“Nothing, except that he’s a most exemplary servant.”
“Where was he before he entered your service?”
“With Lady Llangoven, in Hertford Street. She gave him a most excellent character.”
“Well, take my warning,” he said. “I’m sure there’s something underhand about him.”
“You quite alarm me,” declared the widow. “Especially as I have these,” and she indicated the sealed parcel at her side.
“Oh, don’t be alarmed. While I’m at Milnthorpe I’ll keep my eyes upon the fellow, never fear. I suppose you have a safe in which to keep your jewels?”
“Yes. But some of the plate is kept there, and he often has the key.”
His Highness grunted suspiciously, thereby increasing the widow’s alarm.
“Now you cause me to reflect,” she said, “there were several curious features about this recent attempt of thieves. The police from York asked me if I thought that any one in the house could have been in league with them. They apparently suspected one or other of the servants.”
“Oh!” exclaimed the Prince. “And the Italian was at that time in your service?”
“Yes.”
“Then does not that confirm our suspicions? Is he not a dangerous person to have in a house so full of valuable objects as Milnthorpe?”
“I certainly agree. After the dinner-party on Wednesday, I’ll give him notice.”
“Rather pay the fellow his month’s money, and send him away,” her companion suggested. Then in the same breath he added: “Of course it is not for me to interfere with your household arrangements. I know this is great presumption. But my eyes are open, and I have noted that the man is not all he pretends to be. Therefore I thought it only my duty to broach the subject.”
“My interests are yours,” cooed the widow at his side. “Most decidedly Ferrini shall go. Or else one morning we may wake up and find that thieves have paid us a second visit.”
Then, the chauffeur having put on a “move,” their conversation became interrupted, and the subject was not resumed, for very soon they found themselves swinging through the lodge-gates of Milnthorpe.
Wednesday night came. Milnthorpe Hall was aglow with light, the rooms beautifully decorated by a well-known florist, the dinner cooked by a chef from London, the music played by a well-known orchestra stationed on the lawn outside the long, oak-panelled dining-room; and as one guest after another arrived in carriages and cars they declared that the widow had certainly eclipsed herself by this entertainment in honour of his Highness Prince Albert of Hesse-Holstein.
Not a word of their approaching marriage was allowed to leak out. For the present, it was their own secret. Any premature announcement might, he had told her, bring upon him the Kaiser’s displeasure.
Four
In the long drawing-room, receiving her guests, stood the widow, handsome in black and silver, wearing her splendid tiara and necklet of diamonds, as well as a rope of fine, well-matched pearls, all of which both the Parson and his Highness duly noted. She certainly looked a brilliant figure, while, beside her, stood the Prince himself, with the miniature crosses of half a dozen of his decorations strung upon a tiny gold chain across the lappel of his dress-coat.
Several guests had arrived earlier in the day to dine and sleep, while the remainder, from the immediate neighbourhood, included several persons of title and social distinction who had accepted the invitation out of mere curiosity. Half the guests went because they were to meet a real live prince, and the other half in order to afterwards poke fun at the obese tuft-hunter.
The dinner, however, was an unqualified success, the thanks being in a great measure due to his Highness, who was full of vivacity and brilliant conversation. Everybody was charmed with him, while of course later on, in the corner of the drawing-room, the Bayswater parson sang his friend’s praises in unmeasured terms.
The several unmarried women set their caps pointedly at the hero of the evening, and at last, when the guests had left and the visitors had retired, he, with the Parson and two other male visitors, Sir Henry Hutton, and a certain Lionel Meyer, went to the billiard-room.
It was two o’clock when they went upstairs. The Bayswater vicar had to pass the Prince’s room, in order to get to his own, but he did not enter further than the threshold. Both men looked eagerly across at the dressing-table, upon which Charles had left two candles burning.
That was a secret sign. Both men recognised it, and the Prince instantly raised his finger with a gesture indicative of silence. Then he exclaimed aloud: “Well, good-night, Clayton. We’ll go for a run in the morning,” and closed his door noisily, while the Parson went along to his own room.
The Prince, always an early riser, was up at eight o’clock, and was already dressed when Charles entered his room.
“Well?” he inquired, as was his habit.
“There’s a rare to-do below,” exclaimed the valet. “The whole house has been ransacked in the night, and a clean sweep made of all the jewellery. The old woman is asking to see you at once.”
Without ado, his Highness descended, sending Charles along to alarm the Parson.
In the morning-room he found the widow, with the two male guests and two ladies, assembled in excited conclave. As he entered, his hostess rushed towards him, saying:
“Oh, Prince! A most terrible thing has happened! Every scrap of jewellery, including my tiara and necklet, has been stolen!”
“Stolen!” he gasped, pretending not to have heard the news.
“Yes. I placed them myself in the safe in the butler’s pantry, together with several cases the maids brought me from my guests. I locked them up just after one o’clock and took the key. Here it is. It has never left my possession. I – ”
She was at that moment interrupted by the entrance of the Parson, who, having heard of the robbery from the servants, began:
“My de-ah Mrs Edmondson. This is really a most untoward circumstance – most – ”
“Listen,” the widow went on excitedly. “Hear me, and then advise me what to do. I took this key,” – and she held it up for their inspection – “and hid it beneath the corner of the carpet in my room. This morning, to my amazement, my maid came to say that the safe-door had been found ajar, and that though the plate had been left, all the jewellery had disappeared. Only the empty cases remain!”
“How has the safe been opened?” asked the Prince, standing amazed.
Was it possible that some ingenious adventurer had got ahead of him? It certainly seemed so.
“It’s been opened by another key, that’s evident,” replied the widow.
“And where’s Ferrini?” inquired his Highness quickly.
“He’s missing. Nobody has seen him this morning,” answered the distressed woman. “Ah, Prince, you were right – quite right in your surmise. I believed in him, but you summed him up very quickly. I intended to discharge him to-morrow, but I never dreamed he possessed a second key.”
“He has the jewels, evidently,” remarked Sir Henry Hutton, himself a county magistrate. “I’ll run into Whitby, and inform the police, Mrs Edmondson. We have no idea which direction the fellow has taken.”
At that moment the door opened, and Garrett, cap in hand, stood on the threshold.
“Well, what’s the matter?” asked his master.
“Please, your Highness, our car’s gone. It’s been stolen from the garage in the night!”
The announcement caused an electrical effect upon the assembly.
“Then this man could also drive a car, as well as wait at table!” exclaimed Sir Henry. “Myself, I always distrust foreign servants.”
“Ferrini had one or two lessons in driving from my chauffeur, I believe,” remarked the widow, now in a state of utter collapse.
“Never mind, Mrs Edmondson,” said his Highness cheerily. “Allow Sir Henry and myself to do our best. The fellow is bound to be caught. I’ll give the police the number of my car, and its description. And what’s more, we have something very valuable here.” And he drew out his pocket-book. “You recollect the suspicions of Ferrini which I entertained, and which I explained in confidence to you? Well, my valet has a pocket camera, and with it three days ago I took a snap-shot of your exemplary servant. Here it is!”
“By Jove. Excellent!” cried Sir Henry. “This will be of the greatest assistance to the police.”
And so it was arranged that the police of Whitby should be at once informed.
At breakfast – a hurried, scrappy meal that morning – every one condoled with the Prince upon the loss of his car. Surely the whole affair had been most cleverly contrived by Ferrini, who had got clear away.
Just as the meal had concluded and the Parson had promised to accompany Sir Henry over to Whitby to see the police, he received a telegram calling him to his brother, who had just landed in Liverpool from America, and who wished to see him at the Adelphi Hotel that evening.
To his hostess he explained that he was bound to keep the appointment, for his brother had come from San Francisco on some important family affairs, and was returning to New York by the next boat.
Therefore he bade adieu to Mrs Edmondson – “de-ah Mrs Edmondson,” he always called her – and was driven in the dog-cart to Grosmont station, while a few minutes later, the Prince and Sir Henry set out in the widow’s Mercédès for Whitby.
The pair returned about one o’clock, and at luncheon explained what they had done.
In the afternoon, the widow met his Highness out in the tent upon the lawn, and they sat together for some time, he enjoying his eternal “Petroff.” Indeed, he induced her to smoke one, in order to soothe her nerves.
“Don’t upset yourself too much, my dear Gertrude,” he urged, placing his hand upon hers. “We shall catch the fellow, never fear. Do you know, I’ve been wondering whether, if I went up to town and saw them at Scotland Yard, it would not be the wisest course. I know one of the superintendents. I met him when my life was threatened by anarchists, and the police put me under their protection. The Whitby police seem very slow. Besides, by this time Ferrini is far afield.”
“I really think, Albert, that it would be quite a good plan,” exclaimed the widow enthusiastically. “If you went to Scotland Yard they would, no doubt, move heaven and earth to find the thief.”
“That’s just what I think,” declared his Highness. “I’ll go by the six-twenty.”
“But you’ll return here to-morrow, won’t you?” urged the widow. “The people I have here will be so disappointed if you don’t – and – and as for myself,” she added, her fat face flushing slightly – “well, you know that I am only happy when you are near me.”
“Trust me, Gertrude. I’ll return at once – as soon as ever I’ve set the machinery of Scotland Yard in motion. I have the negative of the photo I took, and I’ll hand it to them.”
And so that evening, without much explanation to his fellow guests, he ran up to town, leaving Charles and most of his baggage behind.
Next day, Mrs Edmondson received a long and reassuring telegram from him in London.
Two days passed, but nothing further was heard. Garrett, without a car, and therefore without occupation, decided to go up to London. The theft of the car had utterly puzzled him. Whatever coup his master and his friends had intended had evidently been effected by the man Ferrini. All their clever scheming had been in vain.
They had been forestalled.
Chapter Twelve
Conclusion
A week later.
The soft summer afterglow flooded the pretty pale-blue upholstered sitting-room in the new Palast Hotel, overlooking the Alster at Hamburg, wherein the Prince, the Parson, and the pale-faced Englishman, Mason, were seated together at their ease.
The Prince had already been there two days, but Clayton was staying over at the Hamburgerhof, while Mason, who had arrived via Copenhagen only a couple of hours before, had taken up his quarters at the Kronprinzen, a smaller establishment in the Jungfernstieg.
The trio had been chatting, and wondering. Mason had just shown them a telegram, which apparently caused them some apprehension.
Suddenly, however, a waiter entered with a card for Herr Stoltenberg, as the Prince was there known.
“Show the gentleman in,” he ordered in German.
A moment later a well-dressed gentlemanly-looking young Englishman in light travelling overcoat and dark-green felt hat entered. It was the valet Charles.
“By Jove!” he exclaimed, as soon as the door had closed, “I had a narrow squeak – a confoundedly narrow squeak. You got my wire from Amersfoort?” he asked of Mason.
“Yes. I’ve just been explaining to the Prince what happened on the night of the dinner-party,” replied the pale-faced man.
“Tell me. I’m all anxiety to know,” urged the valet. “I left Garrett in Rosendaal. He’s utterly puzzled.”
“I expect he is,” Mason responded. “The fact is that he’s just as much puzzled as the wily Italian himself. It’s a good job I was able to locate that fellow as one of old Blair-Stewart’s servants up at Glenblair Castle. You remember – when we met ‘Le Bravache’ on his own ground,” Mason went on. “Well, I played the part of detective, and wrote to him secretly, asking him to meet me in Whitby. He did so, and to him I confided my suspicions of you all, promising him a police reward of two hundred pounds if he kept his eye on you, watched, and informed me of all that was in progress. Of course I bound him to the most complete secrecy. He tumbled into the trap at once. The Prince had, of course, previously got wax-impressions of the widow’s safe-key, for she had one day inadvertently given her key to him to go and unlock a cabinet in the library. Three times the suspicious butler met me, and made secret reports on your doings. He watched you like a cat. Then, on the night of the dinner-party, I had an appointment with him at one o’clock in the morning. I stole our car, and ran it noiselessly by the back road through the park to the spot where he was to meet me. He came punctually, and got in the car at my side to be driven into Whitby, where he supposed three detectives were in waiting. My story was that we were to pick them up at the hotel, drive back to the Hall, and arrest the lot of you. He was delighted with the project, and on joining me had a nip of whisky from my flask just to keep out the night air. Ten minutes later he was hors de combat. I’d doctored the whisky, so, pulling up, I bound and gagged him, and deposited him in a disused cow-house on the opposite side of a field on the edge of Roxby High Moor – a place I’d previously prospected. Having thus got rid of him, I turned the car back again to a spot within a mile of Milnthorpe lodge-gates – previously arranged with the Prince – and there, close by a stile, I found a biggish packet wrapped hurriedly in brown paper. Its feel was sufficient to tell me that it was the boodle. The Prince and the Parson had secured it after Ferrini had absented himself, and having placed it there in readiness for me, had quietly returned to their beds. With it under the seat I drove south as hard as I could by Driffield into Hull. Before I got there I changed the identification plate, obliterated the coronets on the panels with the enamel I found in readiness, and leaving the car in a garage, got across to Bergen, in Norway, and thence by train down to Christiania, Copenhagen, and here.”
“Well, you put me into a fine hole, Prince,” protested the valet good-humouredly. “I waited, expecting to hear something each day. The old woman telegraphed frantically to London a dozen times at least, but got no reply. She was just about to go up to town herself to see what had become of you, and I was beginning to feel very uneasy, I confess, when an astounding thing happened. The Italian on the morning of the third day turned up, dirty, dazed, and in a state of terrible excitement. I saw him in the hall where he made a long rambling statement, mostly incoherent. The old woman and Sir Henry, however, would hear no explanation, and, calling the village constable, had him arrested at once. An hour later they carted him off to Whitby. Then I made an excuse, cleared out, and here I am! But I tell you,” he added, “I had a narrow shave. He made an allegation that I was in the swindle, but every one thought he’d either gone mad, or was trying to bluff them.”
“It was unavoidable, my dear Charles. I couldn’t communicate with you,” the Prince explained. “Never mind, my boy. There’s a good share coming to you. The sparklers are worth at least ten thousand to our old friend the Jew, and they’ll be in his hands and out of their settings by this time to-morrow. Besides, the silly old crow who thought she’d got a mug, and was going to marry me, has put up twenty thousand pounds in cash to get into the St. Christopher car deal. I got the money out of my bank safely yesterday, and it’s now paid into a new account in the Dresdener Bank, in the name of Karl Stoltenberg.”
“Well, you absolutely misled me,” Charles declared.
“Because it was imperative,” replied Herr Stoltenberg, as he said he wished to be known in the immediate future. “The old crow was a fool from the very first. She was too ambitious, and never saw through our game or how the record at Brooklands was faked entirely for her benefit. The Parson’s first idea was mere vulgar burglary. If we’d brought it off we should have found only a lot of worthless electro. But I saw a little farther. She had money, and with a little working would no doubt part. She did. I suppose by this time the poor vain old woman has given up all idea of becoming Princess Albert of Hesse-Holstein.”
“Well, my dear Prince,” exclaimed the Parson, “my own idea is that we should separate and all lie doggo for at least a year, now that we have so successfully touched the widow’s mite.”
And this course was at once unanimously agreed.
I happen, as an intimate friend of his audacious Highness, to know his whereabouts at the present moment, and also the snug and unsuspected hiding-places of each of his four accomplices. But to reveal them would most certainly put my personal friends at New Scotland Yard upon their track.
As a matter of fact, I am pledged to absolute secrecy. If I were not, my old college chum would never have dared to furnish me with the details of these stirring adventures of a romantic life of daring and subterfuge – adventures which I have here recounted, and in which perhaps the most prominent if sadly-deceived character has always been “The Lady in the Car.”
The End.