The Secret of Chimneys (Superintendent Battle 1)

“Careful man. What’s your motto? Plenty of rope, eh? I’ve taken a leaf out of your book. I’ve given M. Lemoine plenty of rope. I’ve not denied his accusations. But, all the same, I’m afraid he’s going to be disappointed. You see I always believe in having something up one’s sleeve. Anticipating that some little unpleasantness might arise here, I took the precaution to bring a trump card along with me. It—or rather he—is upstairs.”

“Upstairs?” said Lord Caterham, very interested.

“Yes, he’s been having rather a trying time of it lately, poor fellow. Got a nasty bump on the head from someone. I’ve been looking after him.”

Suddenly the deep voice of Mr. Isaacstein broke in: “Can we guess who he is?”

“If you like,” said Anthony, “but—”

Lemoine interrupted with sudden ferocity:

“All this is foolery. You think to outwit me yet again. It may be true what you say—that you were not in America. You are too clever to say it if it were not true. But there is something else. Murder! Yes, murder. The murder of Prince Michael. He interfered with you that night as you were looking for the jewel.”

“Lemoine, have you ever known King Victor do murder?” Anthony’s voice rang out sharply. “You know as well—better than I do, that he has never shed blood.”

“Who else but you could have murdered him?” cried Lemoine. “Tell me that!”

The last word died on his lips, as a shrill whistle sounded from the terrace outside. Anthony sprang up, all his assumed nonchalance laid aside.

“You ask me who murdered Prince Michael?” he cried. “I won’t tell you—I’ll show you. That whistle was the signal I’ve been waiting for. The murderer of Prince Michael is in the library now.”

He sprang out through the window, and the others followed him as he led the way round the terrace, until they came to the library window. He pushed the window, and it yielded to his touch.

Very softly he held aside the thick curtain, so that they could look into the room.

Standing by the bookcase was a dark figure, hurriedly pulling out and replacing volumes, so absorbed in the task that no outside sound was heeded.

And then, as they stood watching, trying to recognize the figure that was vaguely silhouetted against the light of the electric torch it carried, someone sprang past them with a sound like the roar of a wild beast.

The torch fell to the ground, was extinguished, and the sounds of a terrific struggle filled the room. Lord Caterham groped his way to the lights and switched them on.

Two figures were swaying together. And as they looked the end came. The short sharp crack of a pistol shot, and the small figure crumbled up and fell. The other figure turned and faced them—it was Boris, his eyes alight with rage.

“She killed my master,” he growled. “Now she tries to shoot me. I would have taken the pistol from her and shot her, but it went off in the struggle. St. Michael directed it. The evil woman is dead.”

“A woman?” cried George Lomax.

They drew nearer. On the floor, the pistol still clasped in her hand, and an expression of deadly malignity on her face, lay—Mademoiselle Brun.

Twenty-eight

KING VICTOR

“I suspected her from the first,” explained Anthony. “There was a light in her room on the night of the murder. Afterwards, I wavered. I made inquiries about her in Brittany, and came back satisfied that she was what she represented herself to be. I was a fool. Because the Comtesse de Breteuil had employed a Mademoiselle Brun and spoke highly of her, it never occurred to me that the real Mademoiselle Brun might have been kidnapped on her way to her new post, and that it might be a substitute taking her place. Instead I shifted my suspicions to Mr. Fish. It was not until he had followed me to Dover, and we had had a mutual explanation, that I began to see clearly. Once I knew that he was a Pinkerton’s man, trailing King Victor, my suspicions swung back again to their original object.

“The thing that worried me most was that Mrs. Revel had definitely recognized the woman. Then I remembered that it was only after I had mentioned her being Madame de Breteuil’s governess. And all she had said was that that accounted for the fact that the woman’s face was familiar to her. Superintendent Battle will tell you that a deliberate plot was formed to keep Mrs. Revel from coming to Chimneys. Nothing more nor less than a dead body, in fact. And though the murder was the work of the Comrades of the Red Hand, punishing supposed treachery on the part of the victim, the staging of it, and the absence of the Comrade’s sign manual, pointed to some abler intelligence directing operations. From the first, I suspected some connexion with Herzoslovakia. Mrs. Revel was the only member of the house party who had been to the country. I suspected at first that someone was impersonating Prince Michael, but that proved to be a totally erroneous idea. When I realized the possibility of Mademoiselle Brun’s being an imposter, and added to that the fact that her face was familiar to Mrs. Revel, I began to see daylight. It was evidently very important that she should not be recognized, and Mrs. Revel was the only person likely to do so.”

“But who was she?” said Lord Caterham. “Someone Mrs. Revel had known in Herzoslovakia?”

“I think the Baron might be able to tell us,” said Anthony.

“I?” The Baron stared at him, then down at the motionless figure.

“Look well,” said Anthony. “Don’t be put off by the makeup. She was an actress once, remember.”

The Baron stared again. Suddenly he started.

“God in heaven,” he breathed, “it is not possible.”

“What is not possible?” asked George. “Who is the lady? You recognize her, Baron?”

“No, no, it is not possible.” The Baron continued to mutter. “She was killed. They were both killed. On the steps of the palace. Her body was recovered.”

“Mutilated and unrecognizable,” Anthony reminded him. “She managed to put up a bluff. I think she escaped to America, and has spent a good many years lying low in deadly terror of the Comrades of the Red Hand. They promoted the revolution, remember, and, to use an expressive phrase, they always had it in for her. Then King Victor was released, and they planned to recover the diamond together. She was searching for it that night when she came suddenly upon Prince Michael, and he recognized her. There was never much fear of her meeting him in the ordinary way of things. Royal guests don’t come in contact with governesses, and she could always retire with a convenient migraine, as she did the day the Baron was here.

“However, she met Prince Michael face to face when she least expected it. Exposure and disgrace stared her in the face. She shot him. It was she who placed the revolver in Isaacstein’s suitcase, so as to confuse the trail, and she who returned the letters.”

Lemoine moved forward.

“She was coming down to search for the jewel that night, you say,” he said. “Might she not have been going to meet her accomplice, King Victor, who was coming from outside? Eh? What do you say to that?”

Anthony sighed.

“Still at it, my dear Lemoine? How persistent you are! You won’t take my hint that I’ve got a trump card up my sleeve?”

But George, whose mind worked slowly, now broke in.

“I am still completely at sea. Who was this lady, Baron? You recognize her, it seems?”

But the Baron drew himself up and stood very straight and stiff.

“You are in error, Mr. Lomax. To my knowledge I have not this lady seen before. A complete stranger she is to me.”

“But—”

George stared at him—bewildered.

The Baron took him into a corner of the room, and murmured something into his ear. Anthony watched with a good deal of enjoyment, George’s face turning slowly purple, his eyes bulging, and all the incipient symptoms of apoplexy. A murmur of George’s throaty voice came to him.

“Certainly . . . certainly . . . by all means . . . no need at all . . . complicate situation . . . utmost discretion.”

“Ah!” Lemoine

hit the table sharply with his hand. “I do not care about all this! The murder of Prince Michael—that was not my affair. I want King Victor.”

Anthony shook his head gently.

“I’m sorry for you, Lemoine. You’re really a very able fellow. But, all the same, you’re going to lose the trick. I’m about to play my trump card.”

He stepped across the room and rang the bell. Tredwell answered it.

“A gentlemen arrived with me this evening, Tredwell.”

“Yes, sir, a foreign gentleman.”

“Quite so. Will you kindly ask him to join us here as soon as possible?”

“Yes, sir.”

Tredwell withdrew.

“Entry of the trump card, the mysterious Monsieur X,” remarked Anthony. “Who is he? Can anyone guess?”

“Putting two and two together,” said Herman Isaacstein, “what with your mysterious hints this morning, and your attitude this afternoon, I should say there was no doubt about it. Somehow or other you’ve managed to get hold of Prince Nicholas of Herzoslovakia.”

“You think the same, Baron?”

“I do. Unless yet another impostor you have put forward. But that I will not believe. With me, your dealings most honourable have been.”

“Thank you, Baron. I shan’t forget those words. So you are all agreed?”