The devils mountain, p.16
The Devil's Mountain, page 16
“None at all, chief, we have searched nearly all of them,” answered Brown, “and that sort of people don’t rob big things.”
“I am sure you are right,” said Major Fellspar, and Brown’s eyes brightened at this word of praise.
“I think,” continued the Inspector General deliberately, “that Miss Braeme’s brother has had a great deal more to do with this robbery than we have thought.”
“Yes, chief,” replied Brown without hesitation; “he and the young lady, and Mr. Phipps.”
Major Fellspar looked keenly at his detective. “Did you suspect Mr. Braeme?” he asked.
“No,” answered Detective Brown truthfully, “I didn’t, sir: but seeing as he is the young lady’s brother, and that she and the old gentleman, her friend, knew about the necklaces, it is to be supposed that Mr. Braeme knew about them too. All these foreign people are not too honest chief.”
“That may be so,” returned Major Fellspar, “but I do not think that Mr. Phipps has had anything to do with the robbery, or does more than know who is the thief. And he is trying to shield the thief—either Miss Braeme herself, or her brother, because he is her brother. Do you understand?”
“Yes, chief.”
“So there hardly seems anything to be gained by watching Mr. Phipps. It is on the other man that we have to keep a sharp and wary eye; we must find out all about his movements on the night of the big dance at the Myrtle Bank Hotel, and since then: as a matter of fact he ought to have been watched from the moment the robbery was discovered. You will therefore watch Mr. Braeme very closely, and you will make all possible but cautious enquiries as to what he did and where he went on the night of Thursday last.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Mr. Phipps we’ll leave alone.”
“Yes, chief… but, begging your pardon, chief—”
“Well?”
“I was just wondering why, if he had nothing at all to do with this business, Mr. Phipps so quickly slipped out of the hotel last Friday morning. He was the only one to do it, and his action was very funny.”
“He probably wished to divert suspicion to himself,” said Major Fellspar. “That is what I am now convinced he has been endeavouring to do all the time. He knew”—Major Fellspar paused at the beginning of his sentence. If Mr. Phipps really knew anything on the morning of which they were speaking, his knowledge must have concerned Marian Braeme. There was no getting away from that. So it was probable that she was the thief and her brother merely an accessory! Secretly, Major Fellspar wished that it was he other way about; yet that Marian was implicated he had no doubt at all. As to Lawrence Beaman, there was really nothing against him. His being in Mr. Phipps’s room before midnight could not be any possibility account for thefts which, quite obviously, must have taken place two or three hours after. With Phipps and Lawrence eliminated, there were only Marian and Stephen left. He would arrest them both the moment he had one really damaging fact to produce against them!
“Chief!”
“Yes, Brown?”
“Begging your pardon, sir, but I would just like to say a word to you before I leave.”
“Go on, Brown.”
“Begging your pardon, sir, I would like to say that nothing can get it out of my mind that when Mr. Phipps walked out of the Myrtle Bank Hotel on Friday morning, he went away with the jewellery. I don’t know where he managed to hide it; Sampson said he only went to his lawyers, but there are other people in the same building with his lawyers. Mr. Phipps had the jewellery, chief. I feel that I could swear to it.”
Detective-Sergeant Brown spoke with the utmost conviction. Ordinarily, had the matter been of trifling importance, Major Fellspar would not have permitted this implicit criticism of his theory to pass without severe rebuke; nor, indeed, in such circumstances, would Detective Brown have ventured to offer it. But this matter was serious, and the detective knew that Major Fellspar had a high opinion of him. “Then where does Mr. Braeme come in, Brown?” asked Major Fellspar quietly.
“That’s what I can’t tell, Chief; but three of them know about the jewellery, and Mr. Phipps is one.”
Major Fellspar thought deeply for a moment. “Very well Brown; I am glad that you have told me just what is in your mind. Carry out my instructions with regard to Mr. Braeme.”
“Yes, sir,” said Brown respectfull, saluted, and withdrew.
“Brown has a conviction that Mr. Phipps is one of the culprits,” said the Inspector General, thoughtfully, “and his insistence on that tends to complicate the issue. And he has more, at this moment, to urge in favour of his belief than I have in favour my conviction that Braeme is the man we want to law our hands on.”
“It is the most baffling case I have ever had to do with,” said Harmsworth. “I agree with you, sir, that Braeme is in it: but he does not live in the hotel… that puts us off somewhat.”
“We want to find out where he was between one and three o’clock on Friday morning,” said Major Fellspar. “When we have done that, we shall really be on his track. Enquiries must be made, Harmsworth. Someone at the place where he lodges must surely know, at least approximately, the time at which he came home on the night of the dance. We must find that out.”
“I will do my best, sir.”
“Very well. Report to me tomorrow morning.”
Both the Detective Inspector and his subordinate made the most of that afternoon. Inspector Harmsworth went himself to the house at which Stephen lodged, ostensibly to call upon a lodger there, and had a talk with the landlady, an intelligent widow lady of middle age who was fairly well-known in the city. The house was one of the best of its kind, the lodgers were given private keys if they desired them, consequently anyone could let himself in at night without disturbing the rest of the household by ringing or knocking, and no one need know who came in and at what time of the night. Brown, on his part, found opportunity of questioning the two servants who lived on the premises. They knew nothing of the movements of the lodgers after nine o’clock at night. His enquiry was therefore fruitless.
Inspector Harmsworth, thanks to an apparently casual question, learnt the location of Stephen’s room; it was on the first floor, with two large sash windows opening to the north. It required no particular knowledge of Jamaica houses of that type to know that any man who wanted to enter the room at night by either of those windows could easily do so, if they did not happen to be fastened, without any fear of being seen from the street. The high brick wall and the darkness would effectually screen him. The report that was handed in to Major Fellspar on the following morning was therefore of a highly discouraging nature; it led absolutely nowhere. “We are in a blind ally,” confessed the Inspector General dismally. “We must keep on watching carefully, but—” he shook his head, discouraged.
“Suppose this man Braeme, or anyone else whom we suspect tries to leave the island shortly,” said Harmsworth; “what are we to do in that case?”
“I have thought of that and arranged for it,” answered Major Fellspar. “No one can leave without a passport, and, in the circumstances, it will not be possible for Braeme to obtain a passport without delay. I understand too that these actors and actresses are engaged for sometime; so it would be a highly suspicious circumstance for any of them to want to quit before their work was finished. If any did manage to go, he or she would be met by detectives on landing in the United States.”
“You have it all nicely fixed, sir!” Inspector Harmsworth desired to show his loyalty to his Chief, and to hearten him.
Major Fellspar was sensible of the compliment, but his face expressed nothing. He felt that he was training this young man to his work. He also felt that the Governor did not adequately appreciate his efforts.
“We must keep our eyes open,” he said. “Of course, the public and press will say that we have failed utterly. There are suggesting it already.”
With what had been written in that morning’s papers in his mind, it was impossible for Inspector Harmsworth not to agree with his superior officer. The papers still expressed a belief that the thief or thieves would be discovered, but they did so in a very lukewarm and unconvincing manner. Major Fellspar and Inspector Harmworth knew what would shortly follow. They did not appreciate the prospect.
“We can’t prevent the newspapers from saying what they please,” said the former, looking very much as though he wished he could prevent them. “If we arrested anybody in mistake, if we failed to secure a conviction, those same papers would be the first to hound us down!”
“They have no principle, sir,” agreed Inspector Harmsworth.
“Nor any intelligence. They are not concerned with helping justice, but with selling their miserable rags. They are a curse to this country.”
Inspector Harmsworth thought that, very soon, the newspapers were likely to prove a curse to the Police, but he kept this reflexion to himself.
“Yet,” continued Major Fellspar, “it might actually be an advantage if, for some little time, it got about that we had entirely failed. That will be rather unpleasant for us, but it may help.”
Inspector Harmsworth agreed.
XIX
LAWRENCE AND MR. PHIPPS
By the end of the week the local press and the public had openly come to the conclusion that if Lady Rosedale’s jewellery were ever found it would be by the merest of accidents and in no wise due to the ability and activity of the police. Such a view was vastly consoling to newspaper writers and correspondents who, having nothing to lose, professed to be frightened by their insecurity from terrible loss and by the risk they ran of having imaginary valuables subtracted from their places and persons at anytime of night or day. One nervous gentleman even wrote anonymously to one of the papers describing his arrangements for protecting himself and detecting the advent of a thief. Not only had he placed innumerable bells on all his gates and doors, with wire netting over the windows, and bars where bars could scarcely be an advantage, but he had employed a watchman to sleep in a room on his premises, the leg of this watchman being attached to a stout cord which led from his habitation into his employer’s bedroom. A tug at this cord was supposed to be an effective awakener of the soundest sleeper, and the man so awakened would spring up ready to fare forth silently and to attack and capture the most daring rogue. On the very night of the day this device was described, the cord was vigorously pulled by the gentleman in question, he being under the impression that he had heard distinctly suspicious sounds in the backyard. Unfortunately the watchman forgot that his cue was perfect silence at such a thrilling conjuncture, and, at the first tug, which threatened to dislocate his leg, he fell violently from his bed, broke loudly into blasphemous execrations, and challenged all the thieves in the neighbourhood to await his coming and then see what horrible punishment he would inflict upon their miserable bodies. The thieves, if any, refused this invitation, and when the story found its way into the press it caused philanthropists to abandon their efforts to instruct other persons as to how they might render their houses burglar-proof.
During the first few days of all this heated correspondence and scathing editorial rebuke, Major Fellspar and his lieutenants suffered greatly in temper, especially as they were permitted no reply. One reporter even had the temerity to approach the Inspector General for an interview on the robbery and on the efforts at discovery put forth by the Police; he subsequently declared that if ever a man looked assault and battery it was the Inspector General. Then, after a week of much ink-spilling and excitement, the press and the public gave up the jewels for lost and offered their sincerest condolences to Lady Rosedale.
She was now, of course, the most talked of person in the country. No social gathering but mentioned her name; at every dinner table everything that was known about her was amply discussed, with details invented for the purpose of making such discussion piquant and interesting.
She received innumerable callers. All the grandees of the official, professional, planter and mercantile world felt that they owed it to themselves to make the acquaintance of so remarkable a woman. By the popular imagination she was endowed with extraordinary qualities. No one troubled to ask himself this simple question: “what has this lady done, and in what way has she benefited art, religion, science, or anything or anyone indeed except herself?” Such a question would have been deemed irrelevant impertinent, if not indeed almost impious; for, after all, anyone might do something for art or religion—that sort of thing depends upon an accident of mind or temperament. But how many persons could afford to lose a splendid diamond necklace? It was generally admitted that Lady Rosedale bore her loss, not only with Christian fortitude, but with patrician calm. “Her manners,” remarked one enthusiastic lady admirer, “have all the repose that stamps the case of Vere de Vere.” This being said in Mr. Phipps’s presence, he observed that he didn’t know the de Veres, but supposed that they were quite nice and respectable people: did they often come up to the city? A remark which was regarded as purposely offensive, and so a coolness sprang up between the enthusiastic lady and Mr. Phipps.
To know Lady Rosedale was a very great privilege. It had always been a privilege—she had taken good care to make it so. But not it was a greater privilege than ever, for now her acquaintanceship was more sedulously sought than ever. Her afternoon teas were receptions. She required a small army of the Myrtle Bank Hotel’s waiters to attend on her guests alone. On these occasions she sat in the midst of her admirers, saying kindly but condescending things about the police and local matters in general, and introducing Marian and her brother, when these happened to be back from work in time to meet her guests. She still patronised the director of the moving picture company and his leading lady, and these were happy in the knowledge that they were moving in the very best social circles of the colony. But Lawrence Beaman was father off from grace than before, while even Mr. Phipps, though he did sometimes enter the charmed circle of Lady Rosedale’s acquaintance, was not regarded by her as belonging to it by right.
Lady Rosedale, if her wish had merely been to have Marian about her for her own convenience, could surely have dispensed with Marian now. That is what Mr. Phipps pointed out one afternoon to Lawrence, when the latter was again reproaching Lady Rosedale with arch-selfishness where Marian was concerned. But Lady Rosedale showed no desire to drop her young friend: “she’s genuine where the girl is concerned, sure thing!” said Mr. Phipps; “it’s the one redeeming feature in a character and career otherwise reprehensible.” And Mr. Phipps did nothing in these days to prevent Lady Rosedale from monopoloising Marian, a circumstance which Lawrence was not slow to perceive.
It was about ten days after the picnic at Triton, and Lawrence by then had realised beyond the shadow of a doubt that Phipps had ranged himself amongst those whose object was to keep Marian away from him. He had hinted at this on one or two previous occasions, and Mr. Phipps had dismissed the subject as trifling; but Lawrence had become imbued with the belief that Marian was avoiding him, not only because she herself thought it best to do so but because Mr. Phipps had in some way, by speech or manner, suggested to her that she ought to do so. Phipps, he decided, was not quite candid with him; there was some reason for this decided change on his part, and he was keeping that reason secret. Phipps actually avoided him now, whenever he could do so without appearing rude; the old spontaneous cordiality that had existed between them—did it any longer exist? Ever since that Sunday night when, on their return from Triton, Marian had said that Phipps was his friend and knew that it would be best for him and her that they should be apart, Lawrence believed that he had seen some constraint in her manner when in the company of the older man. Once or twice what she had told him about her being suspected of stealing the necklaces flashed across his mind, and the question framed itself: did Phipps suspect her of being connected with the robbery? He dismissed the idea as impossible. But what was the true explanation of Phipps’s change of manner?
On this afternoon, ten days after the picnic, and while Lady Rosedale was entertaining some friends, with Marian among them and he entirely outside of the circle, Lawrence was at the hotel, whither he had gone determined to have a talk with Phipps about Marina. He had seen neither of them during the previous four days. Marian had been away with some members of the moving picture company who had been taking pictures in a little town to the east of the island, some thirty miles away; Mr. Phipps had left the hotel within one hour of her departure, and had only returned this afternoon, his return synchronising with hers. Lawrence concluded that there was deliberate intention in the coincidence of Phipps’s movements with those of Marian. So this afternoon he would have with Phipps what that gentleman himself would call, “a heart to heart talk.”
Mr. Phipps was among Lady Rosedale’s guests. Lawrence deliberately sent a bellboy to ask him for an interview. When she heard the message Lady Rosedale’s eyebrows went up in astonishment at this impertinence; some of her guests, observing her look, glanced in Lawrence’s direction, then glanced away as though he were of no importance. Marian kept her eyes steadily from him; but Mr. Phipps rose at once. Lady Rosedale did not particularly desire Mr. Phipps to remain, but she objected to anyone being so unceremoniously summoned from her party. “Can’t you send and tell him that you will see him later on?” she suggested to Mr. Phipps.
“I can, Lady Rosedale,” he replied; “but I gather from the attitude of that young man that he means to see me just as soon as he can: so I might as well go now. If needs be, he’s going to fight on these lines all summer.”
“Fight on these lines?” questioned Lady Rosedale, puzzled.
“Merely an amiable remark made by an American general during our civil war when he didn’t know what else to do,” explained Mr. Phipps to the further mystification of Lady Rosedale. “Our young friend wants to have a conversation with me, and he intends to have that conversation. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll trot over right now and hear what he has to say.” And Mr. Phipps left the group and went towards Lawrence.
