Delphi collected works o.., p.421
Delphi Collected Works of Peter Cheyney Illustrated, page 421
There was a silence; then Isles said: “I don’t want to appear curious, but could I ask what is the next dish on the menu — this rather extraordinary and exciting menu?”
“My friend,” said Guelvada, “you may ask anything you like. If I wish to give you the answer I will do so. In this case it suits me to do so. I will tell you what the next dish is.” He looked at his watch. “It is now half-past two. You will finish your drink, after which you will get into your motor-car and you will drive out to the unhappy Mellin once again. Probably,” said Guelvada, with a smile, “he will not be overjoyed to see you. This Mellin, you understand, is a peculiar person. Nothing makes him happy. Always he looks at life through spectacles which are tinted, I think, with particularly gloomy tints. You will put him in your car. You will take him back to the quay. You will tell him to get his boat in readiness; see that there is gasolene in the tank, and you will wait. Sometime — I cannot tell you exactly what the time will be — I shall be with you. You understand?”
“I understand.” Isles leaned back in his chair. “You know, Ernie, believe it or not, I am beginning to enjoy working with you. I don’t know how this thing is going to end or whether I am going to find myself inside a gaol before I’ve finished, but I think it’s a lot of fun.”
An expression of surprise came over Guelvada’s face. “But of course! . . . How can there be any doubt about that?” He leaned forward. “To work with an artist like Guelvada must be fun. Why, goddam it, sometimes I think it’s fun myself — very funny! Remember . . . have the boat ready in an hour. Stand by till I come to you. Au revoir, my friend.” He got up. He disappeared through the door at the other end of the bar.
* * * * *
Major Falstead, the Commissioner of Police, found sleep a little difficult sometimes. Very often he wished that he was back at his old job as an assistant magistrate in India. That life he had found more simple, less involved, than the processes which surrounded him at the moment. First of all he was worried about the Gelert murder. Nothing had emerged. Isles had returned to the island and as far as the Commissioner could see, beyond the fact that he had discovered the body, there was nothing to link him to the murder. He thought, looking through the darkness at the ceiling above him, that the life of a police commissioner on Dark Bahama was not all cake. He thought there were too many flies on it. Already people were asking questions. Already people were suggesting that some murdering maniac was wandering about the island ready to shoot someone else.
Falstead sighed again. He leaned out of bed; switched on the electric light; took a cigarette from his bedside table and lighted it. Then the telephone rang.
The voice of Guelvada came softly over the telephone on Falstead’s ears. It said: “Good morning, Mr. Commissioner. May I have the pleasure of introducing myself to you? My name is Ernest Guelvada. I assure you I am not an unimportant person. Also it is necessary that I see you immediately.”
The Commissioner said: “Of course.” He had seen Guelvada’s name on the list of visitors to the island — the list which was brought to him daily. He had noticed it. That was all. He said: “I take it that your business is of the utmost urgency, Mr. Guelvada?”
“You’re telling me,” said Guelvada. “I assure you, Major, you don’t know the half of it. Goddam it, I am going to surprise you. I would like to see you about two murders.”
Falstead raised his eyebrows. He said: “Two murders?”
“Precisely,” said Guelvada. “You have had two murders on this island in the last six months. You think you have had one. I’m going to produce another one. So as to save time, my dear Commissioner, I am going to suggest that you make an immediate telephone call. I suggest that you get a government urgent priority telephone call through to Miami. You will ask to be connected to Mr. Willy Frim, who you will find is the Federal Bureau of Investigation field agent stationed at Miami — one of Mr. Hoover’s young men. You will talk to him. You will ask him about Mr. Ernest Guelvada. You will tell him that I am seeing you on an important matter. I think you will find,” Guelvada continued pleasantly, “that Mr. Frim will assure you that I am a person of responsibility who may be believed; that it might be a good thing for you to take such action as I advise.”
The Commissioner felt a little bewildered. He said: “Very well, Mr. Guelvada, if you wish it. May I ask exactly what is your official position in these matters?”
Guelvada said cheerfully: “Goddam it . . . no! . . . I suggest that after you have talked to Mr. Frim you will consider the question unnecessary.”
“Very well,” said Falstead coldly. “And when may I expect to see you?”
“Commissioner, I shall be with you in ten minutes,” said Guelvada. “Have no diffidence about seeing me in your pyjamas. I think they are the most comfortable form of clothing. I often see my best friends in pyjamas. They find the process sometimes very entertaining. Au revoir.”
The Commissioner put the receiver back in its cradle. He sighed. He said to himself: “Well, I’m damned . . . !”
He considered dressing. Then he thought that this might be unnecessary. After all, the Guelvada person had said he did not mind pyjamas. He picked up his uniform cap which was on top of his neatly-folded uniform on the chaise longue at the bottom of the bed. It was a nice, dark-blue, peaked cap, silver laced and almost new. He put it on and looked at himself in the glass. He thought he looked damned funny. The uniform cap with sky-blue pyjamas, frogged with darker blue fastenings, just didn’t go.
He sat down on the bed and picked up the telephone. He called the Inspector on duty at the Police Barracks.
He said: “Is that you, Bonaventura? Listen to me. Call Miami. You want to speak personally to the United States Marshal. Get the call through in a hurry. Urgent. . . . Government. . . . Priority. See? When you get the United States Marshal check that the Field Agent of the F.B.I. in Miami is a gentleman called Willy Frim. Have the Marshal get a cut-out connection with Frim, and put him through to me here, as soon as possible. Have you got that?”
The Inspector, who was colored, said in a gentle and soothing voice: “Yeah, Commissioner. Ah got it. Yes, sir. An urgent government priority call to the U.S. Marshal, Miami. Check on Mr. Frim — Mr. Willy Frim on the F.B.I. Field Office, Miami. Then Mr. Frim makes a direct cut-out call to you at yo’ house, sir. Ah got it, sir.”
The Commissioner sighed. He replaced the receiver. He walked over to the mirror and looked at himself again. He thought he looked damned silly. He threw the uniform hat into the corner of the room and put on a dressing-gown.
Then he went to the dining-room and poured himself an outsize whisky and soda, and cursed because there was no ice.
He sat down; waited for Guelvada.
It was three-thirty when Guelvada followed the Commissioner of Police into the dining-room. He sat down; took the whisky and soda that was offered him; drank a little; lighted a cigarette.
He said: “Major . . . here’s to your health. I am delighted to meet you. I am more than delighted to bring a little excitement and happiness into your — what is the word — prosaic existence. Yes, goddam it. You will agree with me that there is nothing like a couple of murders to stir the blood of a Police Commissioner at three-thirty in the morning. Have you spoken to Mr. Frim yet?”
Falstead shook his head. “Not yet. He’ll probably be through at any moment now. We have a very quick telephonic tie-up with Miami.”
“Good,” said Guelvada. “Excellent. Now I have some news for you” — he was grinning like a mischievous child— “because I have to tell you that on this island there is a young lady called Miss Viola Steyning who is beautiful and charming and very cockeyed all the time. Goddam it, she is permanently drunk and looks as if she is going to continue that way. Well . . . I regret to tell you that she has contracted an appalling disease which she has also communicated to her native maid — a particularly unintelligent Negress. These two people — for the safety of the other residents on this island — must immediately be removed to an isolation hospital. Your official doctor must see them immediately and order them away to the hospital. You understand, Commissioner?”
“My God!” said Falstead. “I understand all right. But what the devil has this to do with the murders you spoke of? I don’t understand. I — —”
The telephone rang. Falstead went to the instrument. He said: “This should be the Miami call.”
Guelvada got up. “Superb. . . . Everything works like clockwork. Behind everything can be seen the most superb organization of Guelvada. If that’s Frim, when you have finished I want to talk to him.”
Falstead took the call. After a few minutes he said: “All right, Mr. Guelvada. That’s good enough for me. Now . . . will you talk to him?”
Guelvada moved over to the telephone. He drew up a chair; sat down. For five minutes he talked softly, quickly. Watching him, Falstead thought that wonders would never cease; that anything could happen, even in a quiet place like Dark Bahama.
Guelvada put the receiver back in its cradle. He got up; sat down by the Commissioner.
He said: “Now, listen, my friend. Now that you know about me — now that you understand a little of the very arduous work which confronts me — I will be grateful if you will listen attentively. First of all let us consider the murder of the man Sandford. Mervyn Jacques, the skipper of the boat, was employed by some not-very-nice people who wished Sandford out of the way. So Jacques helped him overboard and a shark got him. And that was that! Just another fishing accident. Such things have been known to happen before.”
“So that was the story?” The Commissioner shrugged his shoulders. “No one would ever have suspected that. Jacques has been here for years. He has a very good reputation, but — —”
Guelvada interrupted. “Every man has a good reputation until he starts to lose it. This man Jacques, I think, is a vain man — very vain. I imagine he likes money. Men will do all sorts of things for money, especially if they are also scared of the people who employ them. The point is,” continued Guelvada, “Sandford was an operative employed by the same organization for which I work. His business on this island was to keep an eye on Miss Steyning, because the drunken Miss Steyning has some very important documents which she received from her brother just before he died. It is necessary that those documents fall into the right hands. You understand, Commissioner? That is” — he smiled— “into my hands.
“Now let us consider the second murder — the murder of the young man Gelert. You know what goes on on this island. It is your business to know. And, therefore, you will understand that there had been some sort of, shall we say, flirtation between Miss Steyning and the young man Gelert — that is before she got so frightened that she took badly to liquor. It is my belief that an appointment was made by Jacques to meet Miss Steyning at the house Evansley. He had a message for her. I imagine he lured her there under the pretence that he had some information about her dead brother. Actually, it is my opinion that he was endeavoring to force from her information of the whereabouts of this packet she had received from her brother. But I do not think she liked the idea of going to this place alone, so she telephoned Gelert.
“She asked him to go quickly to Evansley. He was probably in the middle of shaving at the time and hurriedly put on his collar and tie and his jacket, and went. Which would account for the fact that only half of his face was shaved when he was killed.
“Well, there was a showdown between the three of them at Evansley; then I think the girl left and went back to her home. Then probably Gelert threatened that he would take action against Jacques; that he would report the matter to the police. So Jacques killed him.”
Guelvada got up; lighted a cigarette; began to walk about the room. He went on: “Of course one has no direct evidence to this effect, Major, but when I was there wandering around the grounds of this house, searching vainly for some indication which might put me on the right track, I found something. I found a red and blue fishing cap that belonged to Jacques. His initials were in the lining. I found it in a coppice immediately opposite the french window — the window through which the murderer made his escape after he had killed Gelert.
“Now,” said Guelvada, “about the first murder. There is evidence. I have talked to the mate who was on the boat the night that Sandford died — the man Mellin — a white man. Mellin is prepared to make a deposition. He is prepared to inform you officially that he saw Jacques push Sandford out of the boat after the shark had struck.”
The Commissioner said: “That’s good enough for me, Mr. Guelvada. We’ll have Jacques brought in now.”
Guelvada put up his hand. “I’m afraid not. You see, I did not want Jacques to be arrested. I have been out in his boat with him tonight. I have been talking to him. Goddam it, we had a most interesting conversation! I made him an offer. I told him that if he agreed to give me the names of the people who were employing him I might be a little merciful, but if he did not I should come straight to you. When we returned I left him in his boat at the quay to think things over. A few minutes afterwards he took the boat out to sea. I do not think you will be troubled with Mr. Jacques any more. And I do not think if I were you I should worry much about him. I have an idea,” said Guelvada cheerfully, “that we shall have news of him soon.”
The Commissioner said: “I see. . . . Well, Mr. Guelvada, after my conversation with Frim I believe the least I can do is to give you your head for a day or two. Now, what is all this business about Miss Steyning’s illness?”
Guelvada smiled. “This is a little fable concocted by me. The story is that your medical officer here has reason to believe she has contracted some dangerous disease; also her maid. I would be grateful if you would get him out of bed immediately. He should be instructed to call on Miss Steyning. He will find that he believes her to be suffering from some disease. I have no doubt he can select a good one. Immediately, he orders that she and her maid be taken away and isolated in some hospital, or some place where they will both be safe from interference. Perhaps you will be good enough to have a police officer stationed there with them.”
The Commissioner nodded. “I can arrange that.”
“In two or three days’ time, when the situation is a little clearer,” continued Guelvada, “your good doctor can find he has made a mistake. He can discover that his diagnosis is wrong, and they can be released.”
Falstead said: “Very well. I don’t think we can do much harm in doing that.”
“There is one other thing,” said Guelvada. “The doctor must go to the house immediately.” He looked at his watch. “It’s getting very late — or very early, whichever you prefer — and I have a great deal to do. Immediately these two are taken away — and understand that Miss Steyning must not be allowed to pack anything, or leave the room once the doctor is there — immediately they have been taken away perhaps you will lend me two or three of your very efficient policemen.”
Falstead said: “You’re going to search the house?”
Guelvada nodded. “I’m going through it with a fine tooth comb. It is my belief that the documents are there. With Miss Steyning out of the way we have a chance to find them.”
Falstead said: “Very well.” He went to the telephone. As he picked up the receiver he looked over his shoulder. “You were perfectly right when you told me you were bringing a little excitement here.” He smiled. “I don’t know that I mind. I find it rather interesting.”
He began to talk into the telephone.
At four-fifteen in the morning a native policeman named Dalaras, searching in a dress cupboard in Viola Steyning’s bedroom, found beneath a pile of soiled linen a large, sealed and taped envelope. He took it to Guelvada.
Guelvada held it in his hands; read the address; examined it. He smiled.
He said: “My friends, our task is over. Put everything back as you found it, and go home to bed. Good night to you.”
He went out of the house, down the pathway to the gate, the envelope held under his arm beneath his coat. He walked quickly to his apartment; switched on the lights, put the packet on the table. He stood for a few moments looking at it. Then he mixed himself a drink. Then he sat down. He began to open the packet.
It was almost daylight when Guelvada left his apartment. He had shaved, bathed, changed his clothes. He looked immaculate as if he had just risen from a long sleep; also he looked extremely pleased with himself. He walked quickly down to the quay. Isles was walking up and down. Moored at the end of the jetty was Mellin’s boat, with Mellin smoking in the stern.
Guelvada said: “Good morning, my friend. Everything marches. Everything goes extremely well. I am beginning,” he went on, “to be very interested in life which, when you come to consider it, or even if you don’t, is always refreshingly amusing. Let us go.”
He got into the boat. Isles followed him.
Guelvada said: “My good Mellin, take us out to this cay where Jacques landed. Show me where his boat was sunk.”
Mellin said: “O.K. There’s going to be a lot of trouble gettin’ that boat up.”
Guelvada said: “Maybe it will be worth your while to get it up, even if it costs a little money and some trouble. Has Jacques any relatives?”
Mellin shook his head. “I wouldn’t know.”
Guelvada said: “Maybe one day the boat will be yours. Who knows?”
Mellin said nothing. He started the engine. The boat began to move away from the jetty.
Forty minutes afterwards Mellin cut the engine. Now it was daylight. There was a hint of sunlight on the water. Guelvada, leaning over the side of the boat, could see, twenty feet below, Jacques’s launch as she lay on her side on the sandy bottom. A fish swam out of the forrard cabin as he looked.
“Life,” said Guelvada, “is amusing. One day a launch is a fishing boat — the next a home for a very pleasant fish.” He sat there admiring the iridescent colors of the fish as it swam gracefully away. Then he said: “Get in as near as you can. I’m going ashore.”
