The Complete Four Just Men (72 page)

Chapter 11

Gurther

Monty Newton dragged himself home, a weary angry man, and let himself in with his key. He found the footman lying on the floor of the hall asleep, his greatcoat pulled over him, and stirred him to wakefulness with the toe of his boot.

‘Get up,’ he growled. ‘Anybody been here?’

Fred rose, a little dazed, rubbing his eyes.

‘The old man’s in the drawing-room,’ he said, and his employer passed on without another word.

As he opened the door, he saw that all the lights in the drawing-room were lit. Dr Oberzohn had pulled a small table near the fire, and before this he sat bolt upright, a tiny chess-board before him, immersed in a problem. He looked across to the newcomer for a second and then resumed his study of the board, made a move . . .

‘Ach!’ he said in tones of satisfaction. ‘Leskina was wrong! It is possible to mate in five moves!’

He pushed the chessmen into confusion and turned squarely to face Newton.

‘Well, have you concluded these matters satisfactorily?’

‘He brought up the reserves,’ said Monty, unlocking a tantalus on a side table and helping himself liberally to whisky. ‘They got Cuccini through the jaw. Nothing serious.’

Dr Oberzohn laid his bony hands on his knees.

‘Gurther must be disciplined,’ he said. ‘Obviously he has lost his nerve; and when a man loses his nerve also he loses his sense of time. And his timing – how deplorable! The car had not arrived; my excellent police had not taken position . . . deplorable!’

‘The police are after him: I suppose you know that?’ Newton looked over his glass.

Dr Oberzohn nodded.

‘The extradition so cleverly avoided is now accomplished. But Gurther is too good a man to be lost. I have arranged a hiding-place for him. He is of many uses.’

‘Where did he go?’

Dr Oberzohn’s eyebrows wrinkled up and down.

‘Who knows?’ he said. ‘He has the little machine. Maybe he has gone to the house – the green light in the top window will warn him and he will move carefully.’

Newton walked to the window and looked out. Chester Square looked ghostly in the grey light of dawn. And then, out of the shadows, he saw a figure move and walk slowly towards the south side of the square. ‘They’re watching this house,’ he said, and laughed.

‘Where is my young lady?’ asked Oberzohn, who was staring glumly into the fire.

‘I don’t know . . . there was a car pulled out of the mews as one of our men “closed” the entrance. She has probably gone back to Heavytree Farm, and you can sell that laboratory of yours. There is only one way now, and that’s the rough way. We have time – we can do a lot in six weeks. Villa is coming this morning – I wish we’d taken that idol from the trunk. That may put the police on to the right track.’

Dr Oberzohn pursed his lips as though he were going to whistle, but he was guilty of no such frivolity.

‘I am glad they found him,’ he said precisely. ‘To them it will be a scent. What shall they think, but that the unfortunate Barberton had come upon an old native treasure-house? No, I do not fear that.’ He shook his head. ‘Mostly I fear Mr Johnson Lee and the American, Elijah Washington.’

He put his hand into his jacket pocket and took out a thin pad of letters. ‘Johnson Lee is for me difficult to understand. For what should a gentleman have to do with this boor that he writes so friendly letters to him?’

‘How did you get these?’

‘Villa took them: it was one of the intelligent actions also to leave the statue.’

He passed one of the letters across to Newton. It was addressed ‘Await arrival, Poste Restante, Mosamedes.’ The letter was written in a curiously round, boyish hand. Another remarkable fact was that it was perforated across the page at regular intervals, and upon the lines formed by this perforation Mr Johnson Lee wrote –

Dear B, [the letter ran] ‘I have instructed my bankers to cable you £500. I hope this will carry you through and leave enough to pay your fare home. You may be sure that I shall not breathe a word, and your letters, of course, nobody in the house can read but me. Your story is amazing and I advise you to come home at once and see Miss Leicester.

Your friend,

Johnson Lee

The note-paper was headed ‘Rath Hall, January 13th’.

‘They came to me today. If I had seen them before, there would have been no need for the regrettable happening.’

He looked thoughtfully at his friend. ‘They will be difficult: I had that expectation,’ he said; and Monty knew that he referred to the Three Just Men. ‘Yet they are mortal also – remember that, my Newton: they are mortal also.’

‘As we are,’ said Newton gloomily

‘That is a question,’ said Oberzohn, ‘so far as I am concerned.’

Dr Oberzohn never jested; he spoke with the greatest calm and assurance. The other man could only stare at him.

Although it was light, a green lamp showed clearly in the turret room of the doctor’s house as he came within sight of the ugly place. And, seeing that warning, he did not expect to be met in the passage by Gurther. The man had changed from his resplendent kit and was again in the soiled and shabby garments he had discarded the night before.

‘You have come, Gurther?’

‘
Ja
, Herr Doktor.’

‘To my parlour!’ barked Dr Oberzohn, and marched ahead.

Gurther followed him and stood with his back to the door, erect, his chin raised, his bright, curious eyes fixed on a point a few inches above his master’s head.

‘Tell me now.’ The doctor’s ungainly face was working ludicrously.

‘I saw the man and struck, Herr Doktor, and then the lights went out and I went to the floor, expecting him to shoot . . . I think he must have taken the gracious lady. I did not see, for there was a palm between us. I returned at once to the greater hall, and walked through the people on the floor. They were very frightened.’

‘You saw them?’

‘Yes, Herr Doktor,’ said Gurther. ‘It is not difficult for me to see in the dark. After that I ran to the other entrance, but they were gone.’

‘Come here.’

The man took two stilted paces towards the doctor and Oberzohn struck him twice in the face with the flat of his hand. Not a muscle of the man’s face moved: he stood erect, his lips framed in a half-grin, his curious eyes staring straight ahead.

‘That is for bad time, Gurther. Nobody saw you return?’

‘No, Herr Doktor, I came on foot.’

‘You saw the light?’

‘Yes, Herr Doktor, and I thought it best to be here.’

‘You were right,’ said Oberzohn. ‘March!’

He went into the forbidden room, turned the key, and passed into the super-heated atmosphere. Gurther stood attentively at the door. Presently the doctor came out, carrying a long case covered with baize under his arm. He handed it to the waiting man, went into the room, and, after a few minutes’ absence, returned with a second case, a little larger.

‘March!’ he said.

Gurther followed him out of the house and across the rank, weed-grown ‘garden’ towards the factory. A white mist had rolled up from the canal, and factory and grounds lay under the veil.

He led the way through an oblong gap in the wall where once a door had stood, and followed a tortuous course through the blackened beams and twisted girders that littered the floor. Only a half-hearted attempt had been made to clear up the wreckage after the fire, and the floor was ankle-deep in charred shreds of burnt cloth. Near the far end of the building, Oberzohn stopped, put down his box and pushed aside the ashes with his foot until he had cleared a space about three feet square. Stooping, he grasped an iron ring and pulled, and a flagstone came up with scarcely an effort, for it was well counter-weighted. He took up the box again and descended the stone stairs, stopping only to turn on a light.

The vaults of the store had been practically untouched by the fire. There were shelves that still carried dusty bales of cotton goods. Oberzohn was in a hurry. He crossed the stone floor in two strides, pulled down the bar of another door, and, walking into the darkness, deposited his box on the floor.

The electric power of the factory had, in the old days, been carried on two distinct circuits, and the connection with the vaults was practically untouched by the explosion.

They were in a smaller room now, fairly comfortably furnished. Gurther knew it well, for it was here that he had spent the greater part of his first six months in England. Ventilation came through three small gratings near the roof. There was a furnace, and, as Gurther knew, an ample supply of fuel in one of the three cellars that opened into the vault.

‘Here will you stay until I send for you,’ said Oberzohn. ‘Tonight, perhaps, after they have searched. You have a pistol?’

‘
Ja
, Herr Doktor.’

‘Food, water, bedding – all you need.’ Oberzohn jerked open another of the cellars and took stock of the larder. ‘Tonight I may come for you – tomorrow night – who knows? You will light the fire at once.’ He pointed to the two baize-covered boxes. ‘Good morning, Gurther.’

‘Good morning, Herr Doktor.’

Oberzohn went up to the factory level, dropped the trap and his foot pushed back the ashes which hid its presence, and with a cautious look round he crossed the field to his house. He was hardly in his study before the first police car came bumping along the lane.

Chapter 12

Leon theorizes

Making inquiries, Detective-Inspector Meadows discovered that, on the previous evening at eight o’clock, two men had called upon Barberton. The first of these was described as tall and rather aristocratic in appearance. He wore dark, horn-rimmed spectacles. The hôtel manager thought he might have been an invalid, for he walked with a stick. The second man seemed to have been a servant of some kind, for he spoke respectfully to the visitor.

‘No, he gave no name, Mr Meadows,’ said the manager. ‘I told him of the terrible thing which had happened to Mr Barberton, and he was so upset that I didn’t like to press the question.’

Meadows was on his circuitous way to Curzon Street when he heard this, and he arrived in time for breakfast. Manfred’s servants regarded it as the one eccentricity of an otherwise normal gentleman that he invariably breakfasted with his butler and chauffeur. This matter had been discussed threadbare in the tiny servants’ hall, and it no longer excited comment when Manfred telephoned down to the lower regions and asked for another plate.

The Triangle were in cheerful mood. Leon Gonsalez was especially bright and amusing, as he invariably was after such a night as he had spent.

‘We searched Oberzohn’s house from cellar to attic,’ said Meadows when the plate had been laid.

‘And of course you found nothing. The elegant Gurther?’

‘He wasn’t there. That fellow will keep at a distance if he knows that there’s a warrant out for him. I suspect some sort of signal. There was a very bright green light burning in one of those ridiculous Gothic turrets.’

Manfred stifled a yawn. ‘Gurther went back soon after midnight,’ he said, ‘and was there until Oberzohn’s return.’

‘Are you sure?’ asked the astonished detective.

Leon nodded, his eyes twinkling. ‘After that, one of those infernal river mists blotted out observation,’ he said, ‘but I should imagine Herr Gurther is not far away. Did you see his companion, Pfeiffer?’

Meadows nodded. ‘Yes, he was cleaning boots when I arrived.’

‘How picturesque!’ said Gonzalez. ‘I think he will have a valet the next time be goes to prison, unless the system has altered since your days, George?’

George Manfred, who had once occupied the condemned cell in Chelmsford Prison, smiled.

‘An interesting man, Gurther,’ mused Gonsalez. ‘I have a feeling that he will escape hanging. So you could not find him? I found him last night. But for the lady, who was both an impediment and an interest, we might have put a period to his activities.’ He caught Meadows’s eye. ‘I should have handed him to you, of course.’

‘Of course,’ said the detective dryly.

‘A remarkable man, but nervous. You are going to see Mr Johnson Lee?’

‘What made you say that?’ asked the detective in astonishment, for he had not as yet confided his intention to the three men.

‘He will surprise you,’ said Leon. ‘Tell me, Mr Meadows: when you and George so thoroughly and carefully searched Barberton’s box, did you find anything that was suggestive of his being a cobbler, let us say – or a bookbinder?’

‘I think in his sister’s letter there was a reference to the books he had made. I found nothing particular except an awl and a long oblong of wood which was covered with pinpricks. As a matter of fact, when I saw it my first thought was that, living the kind of life he must have done in the wilderness, it was rather handy to be able to repair his own shoes. The idea of bookbinding is a new one.’

‘I should say he never bound a book in his life, in the ordinary sense of the word,’ remarked Manfred; ‘and as Leon says, you will find Johnson Lee a very surprising man.’

‘Do you know him?’

Manfred nodded gravely.

‘I have just been on the telephone to him,’ he said. ‘You’ll have to be careful of Mr Lee, Meadows. Our friend the snake may be biting his way, and will, if he hears a breath of suspicion that he was in Barberton’s confidence.’

The detective put down his knife and fork.

‘I wish you fellows would stop being mysterious,’ he said, half annoyed, half amused. ‘What is behind this business? You talk of the snake as though you could lay your hands on him.’

‘And we could,’ they said in unison.

‘Who is he?’ challenged the detective.

‘The Herr Doktor,’ smiled Gonsalez.

‘Oberzohn?’

Leon nodded.

‘I thought you would have discovered that by connecting the original three murders together – and murders they were. First – ’ he ticked the names off on his fingers – ‘we have a stockbroker. This gentleman was a wealthy speculator who occasionally financed highly questionable deals. Six months before his death he drew from the bank a very large sum of money in notes. By an odd coincidence the bank clerk, going out to luncheon, saw his client and Oberzohn driving past in a taxicab, and as they came abreast he saw a large blue envelope go into Oberzohn’s pocket. The money had been put into a blue envelope when it was drawn. The broker had financed the doctor, and when the scheme failed and the money was lost, he not unnaturally asked for its return. He trusted Oberzohn not at all; carried his receipt about in his pocket, and never went anywhere unless he was armed – that fact did not emerge at the inquest, but you know it is true.’

Meadows nodded.

‘He threatened Oberzohn with exposure at a meeting they had in Winchester Street, on the day of his death. That night he returns from a theatre or from his club, and is found dead on the doorstep. No receipt is found. What follows?

‘A man, a notorious blackmailer, homeless and penniless, was walking along the Bayswater Road, probably looking for easy money, when he saw the broker’s car going into Orme Place. He followed on the off-chance of begging a few coppers. The chauffeur saw him. The tramp, on the other hand, must have seen something else. He slept the next night at Rowton House, told a friend, who had been in prison with him, that he had a million pounds as good as in his hand . . . ’

Meadows laughed helplessly.

‘Your system of investigation is evidently more thorough than ours!’

‘It is complementary to yours,’ said George quietly. ‘Go on, Leon.’

‘Now what happened to our friend the burglar? He evidently saw somebody in Orme Place whom he either recognized or trailed to his home. For the next day or two he was in and out of public telephone booths, though no number has been traced. He goes to Hyde Park, obviously by appointment – and the snake bites!

‘There was another danger to the confederacy. The bank clerk, learning of the death of the client, is troubled. I have proof that he called Oberzohn on the ’phone. If you remember, when the broker’s affairs were gone into, it was found that he was almost insolvent. A large sum of money had been drawn out of the bank and paid to “X”. The certainty that he knew who “X” was worried this decent bank clerk, and he called Oberzohn, probably to ask him why he had not made a statement. On the day he telephoned the snake man, that day he died.’

The detective was listening in silent wonder. ‘It sounds like a page out of a sensational novel,’ he said, ‘yet it hangs together.’

‘It hangs together because it is true.’ Poiccart’s deep voice broke into the conversation. ‘This has been Oberzohn’s method all his life. He is strong for logic, and there is no more logical action in the world than the destruction of those who threaten your safety and life.’

Meadows pushed away his plate, his breakfast half eaten. ‘Proof,’ he said briefly.

‘What proof can you have, my dear fellow?’ scoffed Leon.

‘The proof is the snake,’ persisted Meadows. ‘Show me how he could educate a deadly snake to strike, as he did, when the victim was under close observation, as in the case of Barberton, and I will believe you.’

The Three looked at one another and smiled together. ‘One of these days I will show you,’ said Leon. ‘They have certainly tamed their snake! He can move so quickly that the human eye cannot follow him. Always he bites on the most vital part, and at the most favourable time. He struck at me last night, but missed me. The next time he strikes – ’ he was speaking slowly and looking at the detective through the veriest slits of his half-closed eyelids – ‘the next time he strikes, not all Scotland Yard on the one side, nor his agreeable company of gunmen on the other, will save him!’

Poiccart rose suddenly. His keen ears had heard the ring of a bell, and he went noiselessly down the stairs.

‘The whole thing sounds like a romance to me.’ Meadows was rubbing his chin irritably. ‘I am staring at the covers of a book whilst you are reading the pages. I suppose you devils; have the A and Z of the story?’

Leon nodded.

‘Why don’t you tell me?’

‘Because I value your life,’ said Leon simply. ‘Because I wish – we all wish – to keep the snake’s attention upon ourselves.’

Poiccart came back at that moment and put his head in the door.

‘Would you like to see Mr Elijah Washington?’ he asked, and they saw by the gleam in his eyes that Mr Elijah Washington was well worth meeting.

He arrived a second or two later, a tall, broad-shouldered man with a reddish face. He wore pince-nez, and behind the rimless glasses his eyes were alive and full of bubbling laughter. From head to foot he was dressed in white; the cravat which flowed over the soft silk shirt was a bright yellow; the belt about his waist as bright as scarlet.

He stood beaming upon the company, his white panama crushed under his arm, both huge hands thrust into his trousers pockets.

‘Glad to know you folks,’ he greeted them in a deep boom of a voice. ‘I guess Mr Barberton told you all about me. That poor little guy! Listen: he was a he-man all right, but kinder mysterious. They told me I’d find the police chief here – Captain Meadows?’

‘Mister,’ said the inspector, ‘I’m that man.’

Washington put out his huge paw and caught the detective’s hand with a grip that would have been notable in a boa constrictor.

‘Glad to know you! My name is Elijah Washington – the Natural History Syndicate, Chicago.’

‘Sit down, Mr Washington.’ Poiccart pushed forward a chair.

‘I want to tell you gentlemen that this Barberton was murdered. Snake? Listen, I know snakes – brought up with ’um! Snakes are my hobby: I know ’um from egg-eaters to “tigers” –
notechis sentatus
, moccasins, copperheads, corals, mamba,
fer de lance
– gosh! snakes are just common objects like flies. An’ I tell you boys right here and now, that there ain’t a snake in this or the next world that can climb up a parapet, bite a man and get away with it with a copper looking on.’

He beamed from one to the other: he was almost paternal.

‘I’d like to have shown you folks a worse-than-mamba,’ he said regretfully, ‘but carrying round snakes in your pocket is just hot dog: it’s like a millionaire wearin’ diamond ear-rings just to show he can afford ’em. I liked that little fellow; I’m mighty sorry he’s dead, but if any man tells you that a snake bit him, go right up to him, hit him on the nose, and say “Liar!” ’

‘You will have some coffee?’ Manfred had rung the bell.

‘Sure I will: never have got used to this tea-drinking habit. I’m on the wagon too: got scared up there in the back-lands of Angola – ’

‘What were you doing there?’ asked Leon.

‘Snakes,’ said the other briefly. ‘I represent an organization that supplies specimens to zoos and museums. I was looking for a flying snake – there ain’t such a thing, though the natives say there is. I got a new kinder cobra –
viperidae crotalinae
– and yet not!’

He scratched his head, bringing his scientific perplexity into the room. Leon’s heart went out to him.

He had met Barberton by accident. Without shame he confessed that he had gone to a village in the interior for a real solitary jag, and returning to such degree of civilization as Mossamedes represented, he found a group of Portuguese breeds squatting about a fire at which the man’s feet were toasting.

‘I don’t know what he was – a prospector, I guess. He was one of those what-is-its you meet along that coast. I’ve met his kind most everywhere – as far south as Port Nottosh. In Angola there are scores: they go native at the end.’

‘You can tell us nothing about Barberton?’

Mr Elijah Washington shook his head.

‘No, sir: I know him same as I might know you. It got me curious when I found out the why of the torturing: he wouldn’t tell where it was.’

‘Where what was?’ asked Manfred quickly, and Washington was surprised.

‘Why, the writing they wanted to get. I thought maybe he’d told you. He said he was coming right along to spill all that part of it. It was a letter he’d found in a tin box – that was all he’d say.’

They looked at one another.

‘I know no more about it than that,’ Mr Washington added, when he saw Gonsalez’ lips move. ‘It was just a letter. Who it was from, why, what it was about, he never told me. My first idea was that he’d been flirting round about here, but divorce laws are mighty generous and they wouldn’t trouble to get evidence that way. A man doesn’t want any documents to get rid of his wife. I dare say you folks wonder why I’ve come along.’ Mr Washington raised his steaming cup of coffee, which must have been nearly boiling, and drank it at one gulp. ‘That’s fine,’ he said, ‘the nearest to coffee I’ve had since I left home.’

He wiped his lips with a large and vivid silk handkerchief.

‘I’ve come along, gentleman, because I’ve got a pretty good idea that I’d be useful to anybody who’s snake-hunting in this little dorp.’

‘It’s rather a dangerous occupation, isn’t it?’ said Manfred quietly.

Washington nodded.

‘To you, but not to me,’ he said. ‘I am snake-proof.’

He pulled up his sleeve: the forearm was scarred and pitted with old wounds.

‘Snakes,’ he said briefly. ‘That’s cobra.’ He pointed proudly. ‘When that snake struck, my boys didn’t wait for anything, they started dividing my kit. Sort of appointed themselves a board of executors and joint heirs of the family estate.’

‘But you were very ill?’ said Gonsalez.

Mr Washington shook his head.

‘No, sir, not more than if a bee bit me, and not so much as if a wasp had got in first punch. Some people can eat arsenic, some people can make a meal of enough morphia to decimate a province. I’m snake-proof – been bitten ever since I was five.’