Collected works of j s f.., p.677
Collected Works of J S Fletcher, page 677
Jennison threw a peculiar emphasis on his last words, and he saw Lady Cheale start and the colour deepen in her cheeks. She gave Jennison an angry look.
“Leave Sir John Cheale out of it!” she said.
“With pleasure,” answered Jennison. “I hope he may never come into it. But — what have you to say to me, Lady Cheale? It was you, you know, who wrote that note to Alfred Jakyn; you who either slipped it into his hand or dropped it near him as you left the smoking-room; you who met him a short time afterwards at the west corner of Endsleigh Gardens; you who went with him into the saloon-bar of the Cat and Bagpipe. Now why?”
“What’s that got to do with you?” demanded Lady Cheale. “What business is it of yours? What — —”
Jennison stopped her with a look and tapped the breast of his smart overcoat.
“Don’t forget that I’ve got that bit of paper in here, Lady Cheale!” he said warningly. “If I hand it over to the police — —”
Lady Cheale’s momentary flash of anger changed to a look of sullenness.
“What?” she asked resentfully.
“Goodness knows!” answered Jennison, with a deep sigh. “But that chap Womersley, who has this case in hand, and who firmly believes that Alfred Jakyn was murdered, by poison, is one of those fellows who don’t allow sentiment to interfere with their professional duties. Hard chap! I think. He’s not like me. I’d hate to cause pain or annoyance to a lady. Especially,” he added, with a grimace and a bow, “to a young and charming one, Lady Cheale!”
Lady Cheale’s lips curled.
“How can I rely on your word that you’ve never told any one of this?” she asked, almost contemptuously. “I mean — of that note?”
“You can believe me or not, as you please,” retorted Jennison, quietly. “But it’s a positive fact that I haven’t. I repeat — nobody knows anything about it!”
Lady Cheale looked down on the path on which they were standing, and began to make holes in its gravelly surface with the point of her walking-stick. She was evidently thinking, and Jennison knew she was, and he waited.
“Well,” she said at last, still looking down, “I did meet Alfred Jakyn. I knew him — some time ago. I wanted to discuss a business matter with him — privately. But I know nothing whatever about the cause of his death — nothing! And I do not want my name to be dragged into any proceedings. I don’t want to be brought into the affair at all!”
“Of course not, Lady Cheale!” said Jennison heartily. “Of course not! That’s precisely why I came down here to see you. Remember, you only could be drawn in through me!”
“That barmaid?” suggested Lady Cheale.
“She knows nothing of the note — and never will,” asserted Jennison. “And it’s a million to one against her ever setting eyes on you again!”
“The waiter?” she asked.
“He, too, knows nothing of the note,” replied Jennison. “And, of course, he hasn’t the slightest suspicion that anything occurred between you and Alfred Jakyn. The note, Lady Cheale, the note is the thing! And that it exists at all will never be known to anybody if — —”
Jennison stopped. He knew now, had known ever since an early stage of the conversation, what he was really after, but he had still some diffidence that was really akin to a constitutional delicacy of feeling in actually saying it.
“If — what?” asked Lady Cheale.
“Well, if — if you and I could come to an understanding — terms, you know,” he answered. “It’s a — a secret! And secrets are worth — something!”
Lady Cheale gave him a calm, searching look.
“You want money?” she asked quietly.
“I could do with money,” answered Jennison. Then, gathering courage, he added. “You see, Lady Cheale, it’s this way. I’m a clerk. A clerk in a London warehouse — been there years — dull, dreary years! In reality, though I’m pretty well paid, as things go, I hate it! I want adventure! I want to travel, to see things — abroad — —”
Lady Cheale interrupted him, almost eagerly.
“You’d go abroad? if you had money?”
“I would do!” exclaimed Jennison.
“At once?”
“As soon as — yes, it would be at once. Immediately — nothing to stop me.”
Lady Cheale hesitated a moment and then took a step nearer to Jennison.
“Listen!” she said. “If I give you money, will you hand over that piece of paper to me, and give me your solemn word that you’ll never speak a word of all this as long as you live?”
“I will!” exclaimed Jennison. “Honour bright!”
“What part of the world are you thinking of?” asked Lady Cheale.
“Oh!” said Jennison, almost rapturously. “If you want to know that — Italy! The fact is, Lady Cheale, I’m poetic! If I could have a year or two in Italy, and perhaps in Greece — —”
“Listen to me again,” said Lady Cheale. “On the conditions I’ve laid down, I’ll find you in money. You give me that paper, you hold your tongue, and you leave England at once. I’ll give you a thousand pounds in cash, and I’ll send you another thousand on hearing from you that you have an address in, say, Rome.”
“Done! — and immensely, greatly obliged to you, Lady Cheale,” exclaimed Jennison. “I hope, I sincerely hope, you’ll feel I’ve done you some little service? I’ll keep my part of the bargain to the letter, and I assure you — —”
“I don’t want any protestation, if you please,” interrupted Lady Cheale icily. “This is a business matter. Now, are you staying in Chester? Very well — to-morrow morning, about eleven o’clock, go into Bolland’s, the confectioners; everybody knows Bolland’s. Go upstairs to the tea-rooms and sit down in a quiet corner and order a cup of coffee. I shall come to you there — and that’s all!”
Before Jennison could say another word, she had turned, whistled to her dogs, and marched swiftly away. And Jennison watched her for a minute or two before he went off — and his first thought was not one of elation, but of regret, that Lady Cheale hadn’t said good-bye to him.
“She might have shaken hands with me!” he murmured, as he watched Lady Cheale’s graceful figure out of sight. “By George, sir, she’s a damn fine woman! — a prettier woman than I’d expected. And — two thousand pounds! Her own terms! Generous! And it means that she doesn’t want her name to come out, anyhow. Well, it won’t! Not me! with two thousand pounds and Italy and Greece in front. And all because of a scrap of paper!”
He walked back to Chester in a whirl of jumbled ideas. Of course, there was going to be no more warehouse; he’d chuck that without ever going back there; there’d be nothing to do but resign his post. And he’d take no further interest in the Cartwright Gardens affair; indeed, so that Womersley and the police couldn’t come worrying him about it, he’d leave his present lodgings and go elsewhere, somewhere in a more fashionable part, say a West End hotel or boarding-house, until he went abroad, and he’d forget to leave any address with his old landlady. Of course, he couldn’t go abroad immediately: he’d want an outfit, and he’d have to consider where to go first. Well, it was certainly an ill wind that blew nobody any good, and if that eventful Monday midnight had brought death, swift and sudden, to Alfred Jakyn, it had also brought good fortune to yours truly, Albert Jennison — rather! Two thousand of the best! The figure, fat, rotund, impressive, shaped itself before him in the midst of rose-tinted clouds all the way to Chester, and during the whole of the evening, and when he retired to bed, he dreamed of it.
Eleven o’clock next morning found Jennison in a quiet corner of the fashionable tea-shop which Lady Cheale had mentioned, and there, a few minutes later, Lady Cheale, very elegant in expensive furs, joined him. Everything about her manner that morning betokened a business-like attitude, and after a greeting which Jennison considered unnecessarily chilly, she went straight to the point.
“You have that note with you?” she demanded.
“Precisely so, Lady Cheale!” replied Jennison. “In my pocket-book, where it’s always been.”
“You can hand it to me in a few minutes, and I will give you the promised money, in bank-notes,” she said. “But first, a question or two.” She leaned nearer to him across the tea-tray which had just been put before her. “Can you tell me this — have the police, has that detective you spoke of yesterday afternoon, found out anything more about Alfred Jakyn?”
“Not to my knowledge,” declared Jennison promptly.
“You have heard nothing of that sort?”
“Nothing!”
“Another question. Do you know whether they have had any news of him, or concerning him, from New York?”
“I don’t know that, either.”
“I read in the papers that there was a bank draft for some thousands of dollars found in his suit-case, payable to an American bank in the city. Do you know if the police made any inquiries there?”
Jennison smiled, and lowered his voice, though, as a matter of fact, no one was near them.
“I don’t know!” he answered. “But I did!”
“You?” she exclaimed.
“Yes — out of curiosity. They knew nothing whatever about him.”
Lady Cheale hesitated a moment. Then she leaned still nearer.
“Do you know if the police have found out where he was between ten-thirty and eleven-thirty that Monday night?” she asked.
“No, by George!” exclaimed Jennison. “I don’t! I believe they’ve found out nothing — I’m sure they haven’t. I wish I knew that particular thing — where he was, at that time.”
“You!” she said. “You have nothing to do with it — now! You are to take no further interest in it — you’re to know nothing. Now, give me that paper!”
Jennison handed over the treasured scrap, and Lady Cheale having carefully examined it and put it in her bag, gave him an envelope full of crisp bank-notes.
“That is the first instalment I promised you,” she said. “Send me an address in Rome, and the second will be sent to you at once. And now — silence! That’s all — you’d better go away — I’m staying here awhile.”
Jennison felt himself dismissed. He had to go, and he saw that his polite adieux were not wanted. He turned and looked back when he had reached the door of the room — Lady Cheale was calmly pouring out her tea and had not even a glance for him.
“And yet I ain’t such a bad-looking fellow, either!” mused Jennison. “And I’ve done her a good turn! These high-and-mighties! — manners like icebergs. However, the money’s all right. And now for Italy — eh!”
He went back to his hotel, and in the privacy of his bedroom counted his bank-notes. Then he packed his suit-case, paid his bill, and went away. Instead of going straight back to London, he travelled across country to his native place, and spent a day or two there, swaggering. He told all and sundry that he had just had a stroke of luck — done a wonderful deal — business deal — but nobody got any particulars from him. Eventually he started out for London again — and within five minutes of getting into his express found himself staring at two big black headlines in the morning newspaper:
The Cartwright Gardens Mystery:
Sensational Development!
CHAPTER VIII. THE AMERICAN CABLEGRAM
IT WAS CHARACTERISTIC of Jennison that before reading further he glanced at his fellow-passengers. There were only two of them: smart-looking, keen-faced men. Some indefinable quality in their appearance made him think them to be connected with the law — solicitors or barristers. Inspecting them more closely, his conviction was strengthened; in the rack above one man reposed one of those curious bags — this one coloured red — of the material called repp, in which barristers carry their wigs, gowns, and papers; on the seat by the side of the other was one of those long, narrow, leather valises known as brief bags. Jennison, as a commercial man, knew these things by sight; clearly, their owners were limbs of the law, and he looked them over more narrowly still. But neither took any notice of Jennison: each man was deep in his newspaper. And Jennison turned to his, and beneath the staring headlines which had already caught his attention, read what followed, in bold conspicuous type, double-leaded, and here and there set in capitals or italics:
“We have received the following communication from the authorities at Scotland Yard, with a request to give it a prominent place in our issue of this morning:
‘The Commissioner of Police received, on Monday, by cable from New York, a request from the President of the Western Lands Development Corporation of Northern America to cable him at once information as to the details in the case of Alfred Jakyn, who died suddenly in Cartwright Gardens, London, about midnight, on October 25, and whose death is believed to have been caused by poison. This information was duly cabled to the inquirer, and the following reply has just been received:
‘ ”President, Western Lands Development Corporation of Northern America, to Commissioner of Police, New Scotland Yard, London. Your information concerning death of Alfred Jakyn duly received. Jakyn was sent over to London by us on secret financial mission of utmost importance. We believe him to have been murdered in order to prevent this being carried out or even begun. We consider critical questions to be settled are: — where was he, and with what person or persons, between ten o’clock and eleven forty-five o’clock on evening of his death? We will pay five thousand pounds to any one giving accurate information to your police on these points. Please communicate this offer to every principal London and English Provincial newspaper. Our accredited representative leaves on personal investigation by to-day’s boat for Southampton.” ’
“Any person or persons able to give information on the points referred to above should communicate personally with the authorities at New Scotland Yard, or at any Police Station.”
Jennison read all this over two or three times, considering it. One part of it stood out from all the rest — to him. We will pay five thousand pounds to any one giving accurate information to your police! — well, he was the person, he only, who could give such information. But he already had a thousand pounds in his pocket, received on account from Lady Cheale, who was to send him another thousand. He began to wonder which would be the most profitable cow to milk — Lady Cheale, who, to be sure, was the wife of an enormously wealthy man, a millionaire or a multi-millionaire, and who, obviously enough, had some reason for keeping her name out of this affair, or this American financial company with the long name? Yet, if he approached the police with the idea of getting the five thousand pounds reward, could he tell enough? Would they, or this chap who was already on the Atlantic on his way to make personal investigation, consider his information sufficient? For, after all, he said to himself, he knew a lot, but he didn’t know everything — worse luck! He knew where Alfred Jakyn was between ten o’clock and ten-thirty: he was with Lady Cheale at the ‘Cat and Bagpipe.’ But where was he between ten-thirty and eleven-thirty? If he only knew that. . . . One of his fellow-passengers threw down his paper and glanced at the other.
“Queer development in that Cartwright Gardens affair!” he remarked. “This American company seems remarkably keen about getting a solution. A reward like that — five thousand pounds — ought to bring somebody forward.”
But the other man shook his head.
“Doubtful!” he said. “If Jakyn really was poisoned — murdered — for the reason they suggest in their cablegram, it would almost certainly be done in such a fashion that no one but the people concerned would know anything of it.”
“Just so, but he must have been somewhere — somewhere in London — between the times mentioned,” replied the first man. “I read the account of the inquest carefully, for it’s a deeply interesting case. Alfred Jakyn left the Euston Hotel smoking-room just before ten o’clock, according to the evidence of the waiter on duty in that room. Nothing more is known of him until he falls dead in Cartwright Gardens an hour and three-quarters or so later. He must have been somewhere in the interval!”
“I, too, read the evidence,” answered the second man. “The waiter said that Jakyn left the smoking-room; he didn’t say that he left the hotel. Jakyn may have gone to another part of the hotel to meet somebody with whom he’d an appointment. Hotels are favourite places for business meetings. Why haven’t the police made some inquiry as to his movements in the hotel?”
“They may have, for anything we know,” observed the first man. “Anyhow, it’s certain he was outside the hotel, and, according to the evidence of the witness who saw him fall and die, marching right away from it, just before midnight. No! — I think he left the hotel when he left the smoking-room. And in any case, the senders of the cablegram have got the bull by the horns — the thing to be discovered is — where and with whom was Alfred Jakyn between ten and eleven forty-five that evening? That’s it!”
“More may come out at the adjourned inquest,” remarked the second man. “That’s about due, I think.”
“It was yesterday,” said the first man, nodding towards his paper. “It’s in this paper — you’ll find it in yours. Nothing much — except that the experts are convinced that the man was poisoned, only they’re not quite certain by what. Another adjournment, of course.”
