The Secret of Chimneys (Superintendent Battle 1)

“Who found it?”

Battle jerked his head over his shoulder.

“Lemoine. Clever chap. They think no end of him at the Sûreté.”

“But doesn’t this upset all your ideas?”

“No,” said Superintendent Battle very slowly. “I can’t say it does. It was a bit of a surprise, I admit, at first. But it fits in very well with one idea of mine.”

“Which is?”

But the superintendent branched off on to a totally different subject.

“I wonder if you’d mind finding Mr. Eversleigh for me, sir? There’s a message for him from Mr. Lomax. He’s to go over to the Abbey at once.”

“All right,” said Anthony. The car had just drawn up at the great door. “He’s probably in bed still.”

“I think not,” said the detective. “If you’ll look, you’ll see him walking under the trees there with Mrs. Revel.”

“Wonderful eyes you have, haven’t you, Battle?” said Anthony as he departed on his errand.

He delivered the message to Bill, who was duly disgusted.

“Damn it all,” grumbled Bill to himself, as he strode off to the house, “why can’t Codders sometimes leave me alone? And why can’t these blasted Colonials stay in their Colonies? What do they want to come over here for, and pick out all the best girls? I’m fed up to the teeth with everything.”

“Have you heard about the revolver?” asked Virginia breathlessly, as Bill left them.

“Battle told me. Rather staggering, isn’t it? Isaacstein was in a frightful state yesterday to get away, but I thought it was just nerves. He’s about the one person I’d have pitched upon as being above suspicion. Can you see any motive for his wanting Prince Michael out of the way?”

“It certainly doesn’t fit in,” agreed Virginia thoughtfully.

“Nothing fits in anywhere,” said Anthony discontentedly. “I rather fancied myself as an amateur detective to begin with, and so far all I’ve done is to clear the character of the French governess at vast trouble and some little expense.”

“Is that what you went to France for?” inquired Virginia.

“Yes, I went to Dinard and had an interview with the Comtesse de Breteuil, awfully pleased with my own cleverness, and fully expecting to be told that no such person as Mademoiselle Brun had ever been heard of.

Instead of which I was given to understand that the lady in question had been the mainstay of the household for the past seven years. So, unless the Comtesse is also a crook, that ingenious theory of mine falls to the ground.”

Virginia shook her head.

“Madame de Breteuil is quite above suspicion. I know her quite well, and I fancy I must have come across Mademoiselle at the château. I certainly knew her face quite well—in that vague way one does know governesses and companions and people one sits opposite to in trains. It’s awful, but I never really look at them properly. Do you?”

“Only if they’re exceptionally beautiful,” admitted Anthony.

“Well, in this case—” she broke off. “What’s the matter?”

Anthony was staring at a figure which detached itself from the clump of trees and stood there rigidly at attention. It was the Herzoslovakian, Boris.

“Excuse me,” said Anthony to Virginia, “I must just speak to my dog a minute.”

He went across to where Boris was standing.

“What’s the matter? What do you want?”

“Master,” said Boris, bowing.

“Yes, that’s all very well, but you mustn’t keep following me about like this. It looks odd.”

Without a word, Boris produced a soiled scrap of paper, evidently torn from a letter, and handed it to Anthony.

“What’s this?” said Anthony.

There was an address scrawled on the paper, nothing else.

“He dropped it,” said Boris. “I bring it to the master.”

“Who dropped it?”

“The foreign gentleman.”

“But why bring it to me?”

Boris looked at him reproachfully.

“Well, anyway, go away now,” said Anthony. “I’m busy.”

Boris saluted, turning sharply on his heel, and marched away. Anthony rejoined Virginia, thrusting the piece of paper into his pocket.

“What did he want?” she asked curiously. “And why do you call him your dog?”

“Because he acts like one,” said Anthony, answering the last question first. “He must have been a retriever in his last incarnation, I think. He’s just brought me a piece of a letter which he says the foreign gentleman dropped. I suppose he means Lemoine.”

“I suppose so,” acquiesced Virginia.

“He’s always following me round,” continued Anthony. “Just like a dog. Says next to nothing. Just looks at me with his big round eyes. I can’t make him out.”

“Perhaps he meant Isaacstein,” suggested Virginia. “Isaacstein looks foreign enough, heaven knows.”

“Isaacstein,” muttered Anthony impatiently. “Where the devil does he come in?”

“Are you ever sorry that you’ve mixed yourself up in all this?” asked Virginia suddenly.

“Sorry? Good Lord, no. I love it. I’ve spent most of my life looking for trouble, you know. Perhaps, this time, I’ve got a little more than I bargained for.”

“But you’re well out of the wood now,” said Virginia, a little surprised by the unusual gravity of his tone.

“Not quite.”

They strolled on for a minute or two in silence.

“There are some people,” said Anthony, breaking the silence, “who don’t conform to the signals. An ordinary well-regulated locomotive slows down or pulls up when it sees the red light hoisted against it. Perhaps I was born colour-blind. When I see the red signal—I can’t help forging ahead. And in the end, you know, that spells disaster. Bound to. And quite right really. That sort of thing is bad for traffic generally.”

He still spoke very seriously.

“I suppose,” said Virginia, “that you have taken a good many risks in your life?”

“Pretty nearly everyone there is—except marriage.”

“That’s rather cynical.”

“It wasn’t meant to be. Marriage, the kind of marriage I mean, would be the biggest adventure of the lot.”

“I like that,” said Virginia, flushing eagerly.

“There’s only one kind of woman I’d want to marry—the kind who is worlds removed from my type of life. What would we do about it? Is she to lead my life, or am I to lead hers?”

“If she loved you—”

“Sentimentality, Mrs. Revel. You know it is. Love isn’t a drug that you take to blind you to your surroundings—you can make it that, yes, but it’s a pity—love can be a lot more than that. What do you think the King and his beggarmaid thought of married life after they’d been married a year or two? Didn’t she regret her rags and her bare feet and her carefree life? You bet she did. Would it have been any good his renouncing his crown for her sake? Not a bit of good, either. He’d have made a damned bad beggar, I’m s

ure. And no woman respects a man when he’s doing a thing thoroughly badly.”

“Have you fallen in love with a beggarmaid, Mr. Cade?” inquired Virginia softly.

“It’s the other way about with me, but the principle’s the same.”

“And there’s no way out?” asked Virginia.

“There’s always a way out,” said Anthony gloomily. “I’ve got a theory that one can always get anything one wants if one will pay the price. And do you know what the price is, nine times out of ten? Compromise. A beastly thing, compromise, but it steals upon you as you near middle age. It’s stealing upon me now. To get the woman I want I’d—I’d even take up regular work.”

Virginia laughed.

“I was brought up to a trade, you know,” continued Anthony.

“And you abandoned it?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“A matter of principle.”

“Oh!”

“You’re a very unusual woman,” said Anthony suddenly, turning and looking at her.

“Why?”

“You can refrain from asking questions.”

“You mean that I haven’t asked you what your trade was?”

“Just that.”

Again they walked on in silence. They were nearing the house now, passing close by the scented sweetness of the rose garden.

“You understand well enough, I daresay,” said Anthony, breaking the silence. “You know when a man’s in love with you. I don’t suppose you care a hang for me—or for anyone else—but, by God, I’d like to make you care.”

“Do you think you could?” asked Virginia, in a low voice.

“Probably not, but I’d have a damned good try.”

“Are you sorry you ever met me?” she said suddenly.

“Lord, no. It’s the red signal again. When I first saw you—that day in Pont Street, I knew I was up against something that was going to hurt like fun. Your face did that to me—just your face. There’s magic in you from head to foot—some women are like that, but I’ve never known a woman who had so much of it as you have. You’ll marry someone respectable and prosperous, I suppose, and I shall return to my disreputable life, but I’ll kiss you once before I go—I swear I will.”

“You can’t do it now,” said Virginia softly. “Superintendent Battle is watching us out of the library window.”