Title: The Brigand (1928)
Author: Edgar Wallace
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Language:  English
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Title: The Brigand (1928)
Author: Edgar Wallace




CHAPTER 1 - A MATTER OF NERVE


Anthony Newton was a soldier at eighteen; at twenty-eight he was a
beggar of favours, a patient waiter in outer offices, a more or less meek
respondent to questionnaires which bore a remarkable resemblance one to
the other.

'What experience have you?'

'What salary would you require?'

There were six other questions, all more or less unimportant, but all
designed to prove that a Public School education and a record of minor
heroisms were poor or no qualification for any job that produced a living
wage and the minimum of interest, unless the applicant was in a position
to deposit fabulous sums for the purchase of partnerships, secretaryships
and agencies.

And invariably:

'I am afraid, Mr Newton, we haven't a place for you at the moment, but if
you will leave your address, we will communicate with you just as soon as
something comes along.'

Tony Newton struggled through eight years of odd jobs. His gratuity had
been absorbed in a poultry farm which as everybody knows, is a very
simple method of making money. In theory. And at the end of the eighth
year he discussed the situation with himself and soberly elected for
brigandage of a safe and more or less unobjectionable variety. His final
decision was taken on a certain morning.

Mrs Cranboyle, his landlady, presented a bill and an ultimatum. The bill
was familiar--the ultimatum, not altogether unexpected, was both novel
and alarming.

He looked at his landlady thoughtfully, and his good-looking face wore
an unaccustomed expression of doubt. As for Mrs Cranboyle, a solid, stout
woman with a flinty eye and a large, determined chin, she was very
definitely beyond any kind of doubt whatever.

Anthony heaved a sigh, and his gaze wandered from his landlady's face to
the various features of his small and comfortless room. From the knobbly
bed to the 'What is home without a mother?' (a masterpiece of German
lithographic art) above the bed board, to the 'All we like sheep have
gone astray' above the mantelpiece, to the two china dogs thereon, to the
skimpy little hearth-rug before the polished and fireless grate, and
then back to Mrs Cranboyle.

'You can't expect me to keep you, Mr Newton,' she said significantly, not
for the first time that morning.

'Hush,' said Anthony testily. 'I am thinking.'

Mrs Cranboyle shivered.

'I have worked very hard for all I've got,' she went on, 'and a young man
like you should know better than to impose upon a widow who doesn't know
where her next pound is coming from--'

'You've got seven hundred and fifty pounds in Government Bonds, two
hundred and fifty in the Post Office, and a deposit account at the London
and Manchester Bank of nearly five hundred pounds,' said Anthony calmly,
and Mrs Cranboyle gasped.

'What--how--' she stammered.

'I was looking through your passbook,' explained Anthony without shame.
'You left it in the drawing-room one day, and I spent a very pleasant
afternoon examining it.'

For a moment Mrs Cranboyle was incapable of speech.

'Well, you've got a cheek!' she gasped at last. 'And that settles it! You
leave my house today.'

'Very good,' said Anthony with a shrug. 'I'll go along and find other
rooms, and I'll send a man for my luggage.'

'Send the six weeks' rent you owe,' said Mrs Cranboyle, 'or don't trouble
to send at all. If you think I'm going to keep a house open for a
gambling, good-for-nothing--'

Anthony raised his hand with some dignity.

'You are speaking to one of your country's defenders,' he said, loftily,
'one who has endured the terrific strain of war, one who, whilst you
slept snug in your bed, was dithering through the snow, the sleet, the
slush, the fog and the gunfire. Always remember that, Mrs Cranboyle. You
can't be sufficiently thankful to men like me.' He glared at her. 'Where
would you be if the Germans had won?'

Mrs Cranboyle was quite incapable of speech. She wanted to remind him,
for the third time, of the manner in which he had wasted his substance,
but he saved her the trouble.

'You tell me I am a gambler,' he said. 'It is true that I backed Hold
Tight for the Sheppey Handicap; how true it is, you, who spend your spare
time in rummaging amongst my papers, know only too well. Your curiosity
will be your ruin.'

He looked out of the window and picked up his hat. Mrs Cranboyle was
incapable of comment. She met his stern gaze with the stare of a
hypnotised rabbit.

'The least you can do for me, Mrs Cranboyle,' he said sternly, 'is to
lend me ten shillings, which will be repaid in the course of the next few
hours.'

The landlady came out of her trance, violently.

'Not ten pence--not ten farthings!'

'Your country's defender,' murmured Anthony. 'People like you turn us
ex-soldiers into anarchists.'

'If you threaten me, I'll send for the police,' bawled Mrs Cranboyle.

He walked back to the dressing-table, brushed his hair carefully, took
up his hat again and put it firmly on his head.

'I will send for my luggage this afternoon,' he said soberly.

She was muttering incoherent and menacing sounds as he walked slowly down
the stairs; he realised that the crisis of his life was at hand.

That he was going forth into a hard and unsympathetic world, with six
copper coins in his pocket, and the knowledge that he had yet to earn his
board and his bed, worried Anthony not at all. He stepped forth into the
spring sunlight with a joyous sense of physical well-being and strolled
up the suburban street with the carefree air of one who has no worries.

An ex-lieutenant in the Blitheshire Fusiliers, ex-secretary to the
veritable Mr Hoad, of Hoad and Evans (Anthony invariably referred to them
as 'Odds and Evens', and cherished no malice in his heart against the
spluttering and apoplectic Mr Hoad, who had fired him), he knew that the
normal sources of income which, at the best, had produced but a trickling
stream, were now dried up. He had been fighting when he should have been
receiving training and his succession of odd jobs demonstrated the
futility of a public school training and a military career as a means of
acquiring steady or lucrative employment.

And as Anthony swung on to a bus and paid three of those six remaining
coppers of his to the conductor, he had thoroughly made up his mind that
the oyster of life was not to be opened either by sword or song.

He spent the morning at the National Gallery, which had ever been a
source of inspiration to him, and came out at the hunger hour, singularly
deficient in ideas. He was famished, for he was healthy and young and his
breakfast had consisted of two hard slices of bread, meagrely buttered
and a cup of Mrs Cranboyle's impossible tea.

A policeman saw him standing about on the corner of Trafalgar Square and
decided, from his air of indecision, that he was a country or colonial
visitor, for Anthony affected soft felt hats, grey and large-brimmed,
and he invariably appeared to be well dressed. 'Are you looking for
something, sir?' asked the constable.

'I want to know where I can get a good lunch,' said Anthony, truthfully.

'You ought to go to the Pallaterium. A gentleman told me yesterday that
that was the best place in London.'

'Thank you, constable,' said Anthony gratefully, and to the Pallaterium
he went, for Anthony had faith. He strolled carelessly into the broad
vestibule which was crowded with people, the majority of whom were
waiting either for guests or hosts, and seated himself in a deep
armchair, stretching his legs luxuriously. And from the swing door of the
restaurant came a fragrant aroma of food. He watched the greetings
between apologetic late arrivals and hypocritical and patient guests; he
saw the little family parties drift in and pass into the gilded heaven
beyond the glass doors, but he saw nobody that he knew.

Presently four stout people came in, two men and two women. They were
expensively dressed, and they were obviously ladies and gentlemen who
would not lie awake on hard beds that night, wondering how they might
scrounge a good breakfast. He watched them as they, too, went past into
the restaurant, and sighed.

'Now, if I were only--' he began, and suddenly an idea occurred to him.

He waited for another ten minutes then, rising slowly, he handed his hat
to the cloakroom attendant and passed into the restaurant. He saw the
four stout people at a table at the far end of the long room; next to
them was a small unoccupied table. The elder of the two men looked up at
the sight of a very respectable figure.

'Yes, sir?' he asked.

Anthony bent down and lowered his voice, but it was not so low that all
four members of the party could not hear.

'Lord Rothside says he is awfully sorry he can't come, but will you lunch
with him instead, at Berkeley Square?'

'Eh?' said the staggered recipient of this invitation.

'You are Mr Steiner, aren't you?' said Anthony, in a tone of
apprehension, as though it were beginning to dawn upon him that he had
made a mistake.

'No, sir,' said the fat and smiling Hebrew, 'my name is Goldheim. I am
afraid you've made a mistake.'

Anthony uttered a 'tut' of impatience.

'I'm awfully sorry, but the fact is I have never met Mr Steiner, and I
knew he was lunching here, and--' He broke off in confusion.

'No offence, I'm sure,' said the nattered gentleman. 'I don't know Mr
Steiner myself, or I would point him out.' He chuckled round at his
companions. 'I've only been mistaken for a friend of Lord Rothside's,
that's all,' he said, not without enjoyment.

'I'll wait for him,' smiled Anthony, apologetically. 'I can't tell you
how sorry I am to have interrupted you.'

He sat down at the next table; and when the waiter bustled up:

'I am not ordering anything, yet,' he said. 'I am expecting a gentleman.'

At the next table the lunch proceeded and Anthony writhed in agony.
Presently one of the party looked round.

'Mr Steiner hasn't come yet, has he?' he asked unnecessarily.

Anthony shook his head.

'I'll wait,' he said, 'though it is rather a nuisance. I am losing my
lunch.' There was another interregnum of clattering knives and forks, and
then: 'Won't you join us, Mr--?'

'Newton is my name,' said Anthony, 'and really, I don't think it is fair
to impose myself upon you.'

But before he had finished the sentence, he was sitting with them, and in
five minutes had given his opinion on an excellent Niersteiner.

'Are you Lord Rothside's secretary?'

'Not exactly his secretary,' said Anthony, with a little smile.

He conveyed the impression that the question had been in the nature of a
faux pas, and that the position he occupied was something infinitely
superior to secretaryship. So might Napoleon have looked if, in the days
of the directorate, he had been asked if he was a member of the
Government.

The two women were nice-looking motherly ladies, with that sense of
humour which Anthony was best able to titillate. He set the table in
chuckles as he struggled manfully to overtake them. By the time the
coffee stage was reached he was level: he smoked one of Mr Goldheim's
cigars with the air of a connoisseur.

'It is strange meeting you like this,' said Anthony reminiscently. 'I
shall never forget the first time I dined with the Duke of Minford. I
dropped in most unexpectedly, had never met him before, never been
introduced, didn't know him from Adam.'

Here, Anthony spoke nothing but the truth, for he had 'dropped in' when
His Grace was lying at the bottom of a shell-hole in France, and they
had dined upon a biscuit and a bar of chocolate.

'You're in the City, I suppose Mr Newton?'

'I'm everywhere,' said Anthony, vaguely. 'I have a place in the City, of
course, but I have only recently returned from abroad.'

Mr Goldheim smiled at him slyly.

'Made a lot of money, eh?'

'Yes, I've made a lot of money.'

'South Africa?'

It was Anthony's turn to smile, but Anthony smiled cryptically. It
neither admitted nor denied South Africa. It was a smile which stood as
well for the Argentine, Chicago or South America.

'The truth is, I don't know London very well,' he admitted.

All the time he was wondering who were the three quiet, middle-aged men
at the next table, who spoke a little, but who gave him the impression
that they were listening intently. The first time he noticed them, he
realised that they had heard almost every word he had spoken, from his
first mention of the great master of finance; and he felt a momentary
discomfort. And yet they did not appear to be listening. The man with the
big red face, who was nearest to him, seemed utterly absorbed in the meal
he was eating. They might have been prosperous farmers in London for the
day, or successful north country mill owners.

Soon after, Mr Goldheim called for the bill, tipped the waiter
extravagantly (Anthony's palm itched to take back one of the
half-crowns), and the party strolled back into the vestibule.

Anthony was the first to hand his check to the cloakroom attendant; and
the official accepted Mr Goldheim's tip as for the whole of the party.

'Can we drop you anywhere?' asked that gentleman.

'If you could put me down at the Ritz-Carlton,' Anthony hesitated,
'that is, if it is not out of your way.'

It was not out of their way, for the theatre where they were spending the
afternoon was next door to the hotel.

He stood for a moment in the entrance of the hotel waving farewell to his
benefactors and then strolled into the reception hall.

'I want a bedroom and a sitting-room,' said Anthony.

He had not the slightest intention of going to the Ritz or to any other
hotel; but it seemed such an hotel as a brigand, at sudden war with
society, would choose for his headquarters.

'I will bring my baggage in later,' he said, 'but remember, I must have a
room overlooking The Mall.'

'What name, sir?'

Anthony signed the book with a flourish, and before the reception clerk
could hint gently that rooms could not be reserved for baggageless
visitors without a deposit, Anthony was enquiring the exact location of
the nearest branch of the Hardware Trust Bank, of New York.

 'If you turn to the right when you go out of the entrance, sir, and then
 turn to the right again, you will find the Trust Company on the left,'
 said the clerk. 'It is customary in engaging rooms--' and then came a
 welcome interruption.

A hand fell on Anthony's shoulder, and he turned to look into the smiling
eyes of a big jovial man, whose tanned face spoke of an open air life.

'Isn't this Mr Newton?' he asked, wonder and hope in his voice.

Anthony took a step back, and then thrust out his hand.

'By Jove, I don't know your name, but I remember you so well.'

'John Frenchan, of Frenchan and Carter. You remember my store in Cape
Town?'

'Remember!' said Anthony ecstatically, and shook the man's hand. 'As if I
could forget it! I can't quite recall where I met you, but I know your
name as well as my own.'

He turned from the desk; the clerk's face bore a look of resignation.
Automatically he placed a room number against Mr Newton's name; in his
private register he wrote 'No baggage. OK? The question mark against 'OK'
was more than justified.

Anthony's new friend led the way to the lounge, where the coffee and
cigar parties were sitting. A waiter came forward expectantly, and spun a
chair.

'You've had your lunch? Join me in a cup of coffee,' said Mr Frenchan.
'Did you come over by boat?'

'Yes, on the Balmoral Castle,' said Anthony.

In his capacity of secretary to Hoad and Evans, a firm which conducted an
extensive shipping business, he was acquainted not only with the ships of
the Castle line, but knew by repute the name of Frenchans. They were
amongst the biggest agricultural implement importers at the Cape. Also he
was interested in shipping news, and he had noted the arrival of the
mail.

'I thought I recognised you in the restaurant,' nodded Mr Frenchan; 'In
fact I was sure!'

'Huh?' said Anthony. Now he remembered the three men who had sat at the
next table. 'Why, of course! I spotted you and couldn't place you.'

'I suppose you made a lot of money in South Africa, like the rest of us?'
Mr Frenchan resented his own share of good fortune if his tone meant
anything. 'It's easy enough to make--I was happier when I was earning a
few pounds a week. Money? Bah!'

Anthony, who had never had enough money to 'bah!' at, was a little
shocked.

'Yes, I made about forty thousand pounds'--he shrugged his shoulders to
intimate the absurdity of describing so insignificant a sum as 'money'.
'But I wasn't in Africa very long.'

Mr Frenchan looked at him with a new interest. As the representative of
capital, Tony was a possibility--as a capitalist, he was a proposition.

'Do you know the Goldheims very well? I saw you were lunching with them.'

'I don't know them very well,' said Tony, realising that this was a
moment for candour. 'In fact, I met them more or less by accident.'

'Smart fellow, Goldheim,' meditated the other, examining his cigar. 'He's
in oil--worth a million. Maybe two millions.'

'Dear Me!' said Tony, and to make conversation and at the same time
secure a little data, he asked: 'Are you in London for long?'

'For three or four months,' said the other with a grimace of
dissatisfaction. 'I shouldn't be here at all if my poor foolish brother
hadn't died.'

Anthony wondered whether it was the folly or the poverty of the departed
Mr Frenchan which so ruffled his host. Certainly one or the other annoyed
him, for he was scowling.

'A man has no right,' he exploded suddenly, 'no right whatever to indulge
in eccentric charities. When a man makes a will he should dispose of his
property so that it does not hold his relatives up to ridicule, contempt
or malice. Envy--yes. But not contempt.'

Anthony agreed.

The hard faced man was blinking indignantly. The memory of his brother's
folly apparently stirred all that was uncharitable in his nature. His
underlip thrust out aggressively.

'If he wants to leave a thousand to the Stockwell Orphanage, and a
thousand to the London Hospital, and ten thousand to the Home for
Providing Babies with False Teeth, let him do it! Personally, I never
wanted a farthing of his money, neither I nor my family.'

From which lofty declaration of disinterestedness, Anthony gathered that
the late Mr Frenchan had not left his brother anything.

'What Church do you attend, Mr Newton?' he asked unexpectedly, and
Anthony, for a moment, was taken aback.

'Primitive Methodist,' he said. If Anthony was attached to any sect at
all, it was towards Primitive Methodism, the church to which he had been
dragged every Sunday morning as a child.

The effect upon Mr Frenchan was electrical. He sat back in his chair and
stared at the young man for fully a minute.

'Well, that's a most remarkable coincidence,' he said, slowly. 'You're
the first Primitive Methodist I have met in this country!'

Anthony was more than a little astonished. Primitive Methodism acquired a
new importance. Never had he imagined this sect of his could provide
anything in the nature of a sensation.... Almost his heart warmed to the
brick chapel of his youth.

What particular significance lay in the fact, Mr Frenchan went on to
explain.

'My brother Walter was a bit of a crank. I am not saying that Primitive
Methodism is a cranky kind of religion, but Walter carried it to an
extreme. He employed nearly two thousand hands in his business, and, if
you believe me, sir, nobody had a chance of a job with Walter unless he
was a Primitive Methodist. It is a fine religion, I daresay; personally I
don't know very much about it. But you might say that Walter lived for
the church, and was so bigoted that he could see no good in any other
kind of worship. Now, I am sure, Mr Newton, that you, as a man of the
world, do not agree that that was an intelligent view to take?'

Anthony murmured his complete disagreement.

'And because he held these eccentric views,' Mr Frenchan went on
bitterly, 'he has put me to more trouble than anybody else has ever put
me to in my life. I said to my lawyer: "Am I to sit here in London, year
after year, looking out for cases of poverty amongst Primitive
Methodists, in order to carry out the provisions of Walter's will? I'll
be dashed if I do!"'

He grew almost choleric, swallowed the remainder of his coffee savagely.
There was a peculiar glitter in his eyes that at first alarmed and then
encouraged his companion.

'Will you have a liqueur?' he asked suddenly.

Anthony nodded.

'I should like you to meet my lawyer: he is a man after your own heart, a
shrewd man of the world, a little suspicious, but I don't think that any
harm in a lawyer. You probably know the firm, Whipplewhite, Summers and
Soames.'

Anthony nodded. He had never heard of a firm of lawyers called
Whipplewhite, Summers and Soames, but it sounded very much like a firm of
lawyers. He knew there was a firm called Bennett, Wilson, Moss, Bennett
and Wilson, and he had heard of another firm called Jones, Higgins,
Marsh, Walter, Johnson, dark and Higgins, and he was quite prepared to
accept so simple a thing as a triple alliance.

Mr Frenchan looked at his watch.

'I wonder if I could catch him?' he said. 'You'd be delighted with him. A
dour Scotsman, mind you, but a man with a heart of gold. He looks upon
everybody as a potential criminal.' He chuckled to himself, and shook his
head. 'I don't know that that is a bad thing in a lawyer,' he reflected.

'It is a very excellent quality, and very much resembles the attitude of
my own solicitor towards humanity,' said Anthony sedately. 'After all,
lawyers are cautious souls, and the first element of caution is
suspicion.'

Mr Frenchan got up.

'Come along. Let us see if we can find him. He is usually to be run to
earth in the neighbourhood of the Law Courts about this time and I'd like
you to meet him.'

The reception clerk, who looked at him with pleading eyes as he passed,
Anthony ignored. It was not desirable that the sordid question of
deposits should be mentioned before his opulent friend.

Mr Frenchan called a cab, and they drove down the Strand, halting at the
broad entrance of the Royal Courts of Justice.

 'Here he is!' cried Mr Frenchan. 'What a bit of luck!'

A thin, cadaverous man, wearing a worried look and a black homburg, was
standing on the steps of the Courts in a meditative attitude. He had an
expression of profound melancholy and nodded curtly to Mr Frenchan. It
was easy to imagine that he regarded the world as a sinful place. He
reviewed the throng that hurried past the gates with the basilisk glare
of a thwarted executioner.

'I want you to meet my friend Newton, Whipplewhite,' said Frenchan, and
the lawyer extended a cold hand. 'Can you come along somewhere? I want to
have a talk.'

Mr Whipplewhite shook his sad head.

'I am afraid I can't,' he said shortly. 'I have a case in Court No. 6 in
half an hour.'

'Rubbish!' said Mr Frenchan loudly. 'You've got a counsel or whatever you
call the fellow, haven't you? Come along.'

Still Mr Whipplewhite was reluctant. 'I'd much rather not,' he said, and
looked at his watch. 'I can spare you five minutes, but I can't go very
far from the Court.'

'We'll find a teashop, somewhere; a cup of tea won't hurt us, eh, Mr
Newton?'

Anything to eat or drink would have hurt Anthony very much at that
moment, but he acquiesced, and in a dimly lighted, pokey little teashop,
to which the grumbling Mr Whipplewhite led them, Anthony's introduction
was continued.

'This is a young gentleman I knew very well in South Africa.
Newton--you've heard me speak of him.'

Anthony was still considerably puzzled. That he was being mistaken for
somebody else, he had no doubt, but he was patient. The problem of lunch
had been settled, dinner seemed a certainty, although he had less
inclination for food than he had had for a long time. On one matter he
was perfectly satisfied; he would have to produce large and pretentious
quantities of baggage before the sloe-eyed reception clerk would hand
him the key of his suite. That was a fact. Mr Frenchan was a potential
host--though he would not have guessed it.

'By the way, Frenchan, I've taken probate of your brother's will. The net
personalty is not six hundred and forty thousand, but five hundred and
twelve, six and nine-pence.'

Mr Frenchan made a snarling noise.

'I wish it were six and ninepence,' he said savagely, and the lawyer
grunted impatiently. 'I know you think I'm daft,' Mr Frenchan went on,
'but Walter and I were very good pals and, eccentric though his wishes
are I intend carrying them out.'

'Why not hand the money over to the church and let them dispose of it?'
suggested the lawyer. 'It is the simplest way, and will save you a lot of
trouble. Besides, they know more about their own people than you do.'

Mr Frenchan shook his head.

'That would not be carrying out Walter's wishes,' he said firmly. 'How
does the will run? "On the first day of January in every year, one-fifth
of the residue of my estate shall be placed in the hands of some
responsible person for the purpose of distribution."'

'"On the second of January,"' corrected the lawyer. 'But you've got the
will a little wrong, Mr Frenchan--it says that "one fifth of my estate
shall immediately--"'

'Of course, of course. And then the second fifth to be paid over on the
2nd January; I had forgotten that,' said Mr Frenchan.

The lawyer leant back and chewed a toothpick, his eyes gazing into
vacancy.

'What I want to know is,' he said slowly, 'where are you going to find a
respectable and responsible person to whom you can entrust these large
sums of money? There is no sense in beating about the bush, Frenchan. If
you're going to undertake the distribution, all well and good, but how do
you know that this money is not going to pass into the hands of some
common swindler? I know what you are going to say,' he said, raising a
protesting hand, 'that I shall always be around to see that the money is
not being put to an improper use: but I am a very busy man and I couldn't
undertake the responsibility of guaranteeing that every penny of your
brother's money goes to indigent Primitive Methodists. It is absurd to
expect me to do so. What you want is a substantial man who can be trusted
implicitly, who has money of his own, and some sort of position. In those
circumstances I should say go ahead, but unless you find that man, my
dear Frenchan, you must remain in England for the next five years--you
may groan, but I am talking practical common sense--and undertake the
disbursement of the money yourself.'

'That I cannot do,' said Mr Frenchan, emphatically. 'Besides, I'm not a
Primitive--by George!' He looked at Anthony. 'This gentleman is a
Primitive Methodist.'

'You are not suggesting that you can place this heavy responsibility upon
a young man who is probably making his way in the world, and either has
not the, time or the inclination towards philanthropic enterprises?'

Anthony listened in silence, wondering... amazed... comprehending.

'Now, look here, Whipplewhite,' said Frenchan sharply. 'I can't allow you
to speak in any way disparagingly of Mr Newton. You have known me for
many years, and you are aware that my judgment is never at fault so far
as human nature is concerned. I know Mr Newton's character almost as well
as I know yours.'

'I agree that you are a pretty shrewd judge of men,' said the other
reluctantly, 'but here we are dealing with a fantastic, if I may say so,
a stupid will, the provisions of which can only be carried out--'

'Can only be carried out by a man of honour,' said Mr Frenchan shortly.

The lawyer shook his head.

'Honour is all very well,' he said doggedly, 'but it is money that
counts. If this gentleman has money--if he can show me ten thousand
pounds--'

The heart of Anthony Newton was singing a hymn of thankfulness, but his
voice was a little husky when he spoke.

'If you will step round to my bankers--' he began, and then: 'I don't
know that I want to undertake such a mission, and please, Mr Frenchan, do
not insist, but if you are in any doubt as to my financial stability, and
if you will come with me to my bank and see the manager, I have no doubt
he will put your mind at rest.'

'What did I say?' said Mr Frenchan triumphantly. 'Will you oblige Mr
Newton by walking round to his bank?'

'I haven't time to go to any banks,' snarled the lawyer. 'I told you I
had a case.' He rose as he spoke. 'But if Mr Newton can, between now and
this evening, produce five thousand pounds, and can show me that sum in
his possession, then I, as one of the trustees of your brother's estate,
will agree.'

'You are too damned particular,' said Frenchan angrily, 'and I am not
going to ask my friend Newton to do anything so absurd.'

'Not at all,' said Anthony politely. 'I quite understand Mr
Whipplewhite's objection, and if you will name a time and a place, I
shall be most happy to bring you five thousand pounds, though of course I
am not prepared to hand it over to you.'

'I don't want you to hand it to me,' said Mr Whipplewhite sharply. 'I
merely want to see it.'

Anthony breathed deeply.

'There is just time to get to the bank,' he said. 'Now, where shall I
meet you?'

'Meet me at the Cambrai Restaurant, Regent Street, at half-past seven.
I can't get away before. Will that suit you, Frenchan?'

'I object to the whole proceeding,' said Mr Frenchan, who appeared to be
considerably ruffled. 'But if Mr Newton in his generosity agrees to your
plan which is to my mind almost as eccentric as my poor brother's will,
it is not for me to object.'

It was a quarter to three when Anthony hurried from the coffee house. He
could have wished that he might, within view of his new-found friend,
leap upon a taxi and give spectacular orders, but the truth was that he
had not even a bus fare. He made his way on foot to the park, and
strolled along the path looking for discarded newspapers. He found two,
and, discovering a secluded seat, he sat down and carefully tore the
newspapers into uniform oblong slips, stacking them one after the other
into both sides of his faded wallet until it was swollen.

He was so intent upon his work that he did not notice the presence of a
man who had approached across the grass, and now stood watching him.

'Making a collection of press cuttings?' asked the voice and Anthony
looked round.

There was no reason for him to doubt the profession of his interrupter.
Anthony nodded cheerfully. 'I am indeed,' he said.

'What is the idea?' said the man, in a more official tone.

'Each of these is a ten pound banknote,' said Anthony.

The man sat down on a seat beside him.

'It almost sounds as if you and I were going to get better acquainted,'
he said.

'I admit it. You're an officer from Scotland Yard, aren't you?'

'I don't know how you guessed it, but you're nearer the truth than you're
ever likely to be.'

'Are there many confidence gangs working in London just now?'

'There are about four,' said the officer. 'How people get taken in by
them I don't know. Is somebody after you?'

Anthony nodded.

'Then you're a fellow to keep under observation,' said the detective with
amusement.

'For the Lord's sake, don't,' replied Anthony in alarm. 'Tell me, what is
their modus operandi?'

'Come again?' said the detective as a matter of principle.

'What is their method of working?'

'They've only got one method,' said the other, 'and if you've met them
you ought to know all about them. They are generally people who have got
money to distribute to the poor and needy. Somebody leaves money for that
purpose and they are looking for an honest, respectable lad without
brains to whom they can hand the money, without fear that he will blue it
on champagne and girls.'

'They are very unoriginal,' smiled Anthony.

'As unoriginal as greed,' said the other, 'and it is the greed in human
nature that they work on. Have they got you for a sucker?'

Anthony nodded.

'I am a young man from South Africa with great possessions,' he said,
simply. 'This evening I am going to show them five thousand pounds in
order to prove my bona fides.'

The detective glanced at the pocket book.

'Sic 'em!' he said, preparing to go. 'And if they give you any trouble
afterwards, here's my card.'

At half past seven that night, Anthony kept his appointment. He found the
lawyer already waiting for him, reading the evening newspaper, a small
glass of absinthe before him.

'A pernicious drink, Mr Newton,' he said, 'but I find it is very
beneficial. I suffer from indigestion. I suppose you haven't seen Mr
Frenchan?'

Anthony shook his head.

'A strange man, a very trusting man, and how he ever keeps out of scrapes
heaven only knows,' said the lawyer in despair. 'He would trust anybody.
He would trust a tramp in the street. I hope, Mr Newton, that you are not
feeling very sore with me, but a lawyer has to be a little inhuman.'

'That I understand,' said Anthony heartily, and at that moment Frenchan
came in.

They talked for a while on an item of news which was being advertised on
all newspaper bills and placards, and then Mr Frenchan, with a sigh,
said: 'Well, let us to business, and get it over.'

He produced a heavy wallet and took out a wad of notes.

'What on earth did you bring that for?' asked the lawyer.

'Because,' said Mr Frenchan emphatically, 'I thought if you could not
trust Mr Newton, there was no reason why Mr Newton should trust us. I do
trust Mr Newton, I trust him implicitly.'

'Don't raise your voice,' said the lawyer. 'There is no need to make a
disturbance.'

'And Mr Newton trusts me.'

'Have you brought the money?' asked the lawyer practically.

Anthony produced his heavy wallet.

'What did I tell you?' said Frenchan, for the second time that day. 'A
man of substance and a man of honour, Whipplewhite. Will you do me a
favour?'

He leant across the table and spoke earnestly to Anthony.

'Certainly, Mr Frenchan.'

Mr Frenchan tossed his wallet into Anthony's lap.

Take that wallet and go outside for five minutes, and then return,'

'But why?' asked Anthony, raising his eyebrows.

 'To show that I trust you. And I daresay you would do the same for me?'

'Most certainly I would,' said Anthony.

He picked up the wallet.

'But there is a lot of money here, isn't there? I wish you would count
it.'

'There is no necessity to count it,' said the other, loftily.
Nevertheless, he pulled open the flap and took out a wad of notes. He
turned over the first batch of notes and Anthony saw that they were each
for ten pounds. Beneath were sham 'Bank of Engraving' notes, he guessed,
but those on top were genuine enough.

'I don't like doing it,' he said, as he took the wallet from the other.
'After all, you don't know me.'

'I think I should accede to Mr Frenchan's rather remarkable request,'
said the lawyer gently, and Anthony slipped the case into his pocket, and
went slowly from the restaurant. A taxi cab was passing.

'Don't stop,' he said, as he ran up to the slowing vehicle. 'Drive me to
Victoria.'

As the cab flashed through the darkening streets, he took the wallet and
extracted its contents. The twenty top notes were gloriously genuine.

In the restaurant Mr Whipplewhite and Frenchan waited.

'A bright kid,' said Mr Frenchan.

'Ain't they all bright?' said the other contemptuously. 'Ain't they all
clever? It is only the clever ones that fall. Hullo!' He looked up with a
start to meet the eyes of a soldierly looking man.

'Hullo, Dan, waiting for a mug?'

'I don't know what you mean, sergeant,' said Frenchan. 'We are waiting
for a friend of ours.'

'You'll wait a long time, that's my opinion,' said Sergeant Maud, of
Scotland Yard. 'I have been watching that lad all the afternoon.'

He clicked his teeth cheerfully, and viewed with great joy the
consternation and horror that was dawning on the faces of his victims.

'It is occasions like these, Dan, that make all the policemen in heaven
rise up and sing hallelujah,' he added.



CHAPTER 2 - ON GETTING AN INTRODUCTION


Polite brigandage has its novel aspects and its moments of fascination.
Vulgar men, crudely furnished in the matter of ideas, may find profit in
violence, but the more subtle and the more delicate nuances of the art of
gentle robbery had an especial attraction for one who, in fulfilment of
the poet's ambition, could count the game before the prize.

So it came about that Mr Newton found himself in an awkward situation.
The two near wheels of his car were in a ditch; he with some difficulty
had maintained himself at the steering wheel, though the branches of the
overhanging hedge were so close to him that he had to twist is head on
one side. Nevertheless, he maintained an attitude of supreme dignity as
he climbed out of his car, and the eyes that met the girl's alarmed gaze
were full of gentle reproach.

She sat bolt upright at the wheel of her beautiful Daimler, and for a
while was speechless.

'You were on the wrong side of the road,' said Tony gently.

'I'm awfully sorry,' she gasped. 'I sounded my horn, but these wretched
Sussex lanes are so blind....'

'Say no more about it,' said Anthony. He surveyed the ruins of his car
gravely.

'I thought you would see me as you came down the hill,' she said in
excuse. 'I saw you and I sounded my horn.'

'I didn't hear it,' said Anthony, 'but that is beside the question. The
fault is entirely mine, but I fear my poor car is completely ruined.'

She got out and stood beside him, the figure of penitence, her eyes fixed
upon the drunken wreck.

'If I had not turned immediately into the ditch,' said Anthony, 'there
would have been a collision. And it is better that I should ruin my car
than I should occasion you the slightest apprehension.'

She drew a quick sigh.

'Thank goodness it is only an old car,' she said. 'Of course, Daddy
will--'

Anthony could not allow the statement to pass unchallenged.

'It looks old now,' he said gently; 'it looks even decrepit. It has all
the appearance of ruin which old age, alas, brings, but it is not an old
car.'

'It is an old model,' she insisted. 'Why, that's about twenty years
old--I can tell from the shape of the wing.'

'The wings of my car,' said Anthony, 'may be old fashioned. I am an old
fashioned man, and I like old fashioned wings. In fact, I insisted upon
having those old fashioned wings put on this perfectly new car. You have
only to look at the beautiful coach work--the lacquer--'

'You lacquered it yourself,' she accused him. 'Anybody can see that that
has been newly done.' She touched the paint with her finger, and it left
a little black stain. 'There,' she said triumphantly, 'It has been done
with "Binko", you can see the advertisements in all the papers: "Binko
dries in two hours."' She touched the paint again and looked at the
second stain on her finger. 'That means you painted it a fortnight ago,'
she said, 'it always takes a month to dry.'

Anthony said nothing. He felt that her discovery called for silence.
Moreover, he could not, for the moment, think of any appropriate
rejoinder.

'Of course,' she went on more warmly, 'it was very fine of you to take
such a dreadful risk. My father, I know, will be very grateful.'

She looked at the car again.

'You don't think you could get it up,' she said.

Anthony was very sure he could not restore the equilibrium of his car. He
had bought it a week before for thirty pounds. The owner had stuck out
for thirty-five, and Anthony had tossed him thirty pounds or forty, and
had won. Anthony always won those tosses. He kept a halfpenny in his
pocket which had a tail on each side, and since ninety-nine people out
of a hundred say 'heads' when you flip a coin in the air, it was money
for nothing.

'Shall I drive you into Pilbury?' she said.

'Is there anywhere I can find a telephone?' asked Anthony.

'I'll take you back to the house,' said Jane Mansar suddenly. 'It's quite
near, you can telephone from there, and I'd like you to have a talk with
father. Of course, we will not allow you to lose by your unselfish
action, though I did sound my horn as I came round the corner.'

'I didn't hear it,' said Anthony gravely.

He climbed in, and she backed the car into a gateway, turned and sped at
a reckless pace back the way she had come. She turned violently from the
road, missed one of the lodge gates by a fraction of an inch and
accelerated up a broad drive to a big white house that showed sketchily
between the encircling elms. She braked suddenly and Anthony got out with
relief.

Mr Gerald Mansar was a stout, bald man, whose fiery countenance was
relieved by a pure white moustache and bristling white eyebrows. He
listened with thunderous calm whilst his pretty daughter told the story
of her narrow escape.

'You sounded your horn?' he insisted.

'Yes, father, I am sure I sounded the horn.'

'And you were going, of course, at a reasonable pace,' said Mr Mansar.

In his early days he had had some practice at the law in the County
Courts. Anthony Newton recognised the style and felt it was an
appropriate moment to step in.

'You quite understand, Mr Mansar, that I completely exonerate Miss Mansar
from any responsibility,' he interjected. 'I am perfectly sure she
sounded the horn, though I did not hear it. I am completely satisfied and
can vouch for the fact that she was proceeding at a very leisurely pace,
and whatever fault there was, was mine.'

Anthony Newton was a very keen student of men, particularly of rich men.
He had studied them from many angles, and one of the first lessons he
learnt in presenting a claim, was to exonerate these gentlemen from any
legal responsibility. The rich hate and loathe the onus of legal
responsibility. They will spend extravagant sums in law costs to
demonstrate to the satisfaction of themselves and the world that they are
not legally responsible for the payment of a boot-black's fee. The joy
of wealth is generosity. There was never a millionaire born who would not
prefer to give a thousand than to pay a disputed penny.

 Mr Mansar's puckered face relaxed.

'I shall certainly not allow you to be the loser, Mr--'

'Newton is my name.'

'Newton. You are not in the firm of Newton, Boyd and Wilkins, are you,
the rubber people?'

'No,' said Anthony. 'I never touch rubber.'

'You are not the pottery Newton, are you?' asked Mr Mansar hopefully.

'No,' said Anthony gravely, 'we have always kept clear of pots.'

After Mr Mansar had, by cross-examination, discovered that he wasn't
one of the Warwickshire Newtons, or Monmouth Newtons, or a MacNewton of
Ayr, or one of those Irish Newtons, or a Newton of Newton Abbot, but was
just an ordinary London Newton, his interest momentarily relaxed.

'Well, my dear,' he said, 'what shall we do?'

The girl smiled.

'I think at least we ought to ask Mr Newton to lunch,' she said and the
old man, who seemed at a loss as to how the proceedings might reasonably
be terminated or developed, brightened up at the suggestion.

'I noticed that you mentioned me by name. Of course, my daughter told
you--' he said.

Anthony smiled.

'No, sir,' he replied, 'but I know the city rather well and, of course,
your residence in this part of the world is as well known as--'

'Naturally,' said Mr Gerald Mansar. He had no false ideas as to his fame.
The man who had engineered the Nigerian oil boom, the Irish linen boom,
who floated the Milwaukee paper syndicate for two millions, could have no
illusions about his obscurity.

'You are in the city yourself, Mr Newton?'

'Yes,' admitted Anthony.

He was in the city to the extent of hiring an office on a first floor of
a city building; and it was true he had his name painted on the door. It
was an office not big enough to swing a cat, as one of his acquaintances
had pointed out. Anthony however, did not keep cats. And if he had kept
them, he would certainly have never been guilty of such cruelty.

The lunch was not an unpleasant function, for a quite unexpected factor
had come into his great scheme. Nobody knew better than Anthony Newton
that it was Mr Mansar himself who every Saturday morning drove the
Daimler into Pullington, and when Anthony had purchased his racketty car,
spending many hours in the application of 'Binko' to endow it with a more
youthful complexion, he had not dreamt that the adventure would end so
pleasantly. He knew that Mr Millionaire Mansar had a daughter--he had a
vague idea that somebody had told him she was pretty. He did not
anticipate when he engineered his accident so carefully, that it would be
at her expense.

For, whatever else he was, Anthony Newton was an honest adventurer. He
had decided that there was money in honest adventure; he had reached this
conclusion after he had made a careful study of the press. There were
other adventurers whose names figured conspicuously in the police court
reports. They were all ingenious and painstaking men, but their ingenuity
and foresight were employed in ways which made no appeal to one who had
strict, but not too strict, views on the sacredness of property.

Some of these adventurers had walked into isolated post offices, a mask
over their faces and a revolver in their hands and had carried off the
contents of the till, amidst the loud protests of postal officials who
were on the spot. Others had walked into banks similarly disguised and
had drawn out balances which were certainly not due to them.

And Anthony, thinking out the matter, decided that it was quite possible,
by the exercise of his mental talent, to secure quite a lot of money
without taking the slightest risks.

He wished to know Mr Mansar. Mr Mansar, in ordinary circumstances,
was unapproachable. To step into his office and demand an interview
was almost as futile as stepping up to the stamp counter in St
Martin's-le-Grand, and asking to see the Postmaster-General. Mr Mansar was
surrounded by guards, inner and outer, by secretaries, by heads of
departments, by general managers and managing directors, to say nothing
of commissionaires, doorkeepers, messengers and plain clerks.

There are two ways of getting acquainted with the great. One is to
discover their hobbies, which is the weakest side of their defence, and
the other is to drop in upon them on their holidays. The man you cannot
meet in the City of London is very accessible in the Hotel de la Paix.

But apparently Mr Mansar never took a holiday, and his only hobby was
keeping alive an illusion of his profound genius.

Lunch over, and Anthony's object achieved, there seemed no excuse for his
lingering. He awaited, with some confidence, the grave intimation that a
car was ready to take him to the station, and that Mr Mansar would be
glad if he would dine with him at his London house on Thursday. Maybe it
would be Wednesday. Possibly, thought Anthony, the function might be
deferred for a week or two. But the intimation did not come. He was
treated as though he had arrived for a permanent stay.

Mr Mansar showed him the library, and told him to make himself
comfortable, pointing out certain books which had amused him (Mr Mansar)
in his moments of leisure.

Anthony Newton cooed and settled himself, not perhaps to read, but to
think large and beautiful thoughts of great financial coups which he
might engineer with this prince of financiers, of partnerships maybe,
certainly of profits.

There was a big window looking out upon a marble terrace and as he read,
or pretended to read, Mr and Miss Mansar paced restlessly along the paved
walk. They were talking in a low voice and Anthony, having surrendered
all sense of decorum, crept nearer to the window and listened as they
passed.

'He is much better looking than the last one,' murmured Jane, and he saw
Mr Mansar nod.

Much better looking than the last one? Anthony scratched his head.

Presently they came back.

'He has a very clever face,' said Jane, and Mr Mansar grunted.

Anthony had not the slightest doubt as to whom they were talking about.
When she said 'clever face' he knew it was himself.

They did not return again, and Anthony waited on, a little impatient, a
little curious; he had decided that he himself would make a move to go,
when Mr Mansar came into the library and carefully closed the door behind
him.

'I want a little talk with you, Mr Newton,' he said solemnly. 'It has
occurred to me that you might be of the very greatest service to my
firm.'

Anthony cleared his throat. The same thought had occurred to him also.

'Do you know Brussels at all?'

'Intimately,' said Anthony promptly. He had never been to Brussels, but
he knew that he could get a working knowledge of the city from any guide
book.

Mr Mansar stroked his chin, pursed his lips, frowned, and then:

'It is providential your arriving,' he said. 'I have a very confidential
mission which I have been looking for somebody to undertake. In fact, I
thought of going to town this afternoon to find a man for the purpose
but, as I say, your arrival has been miraculously providential. I have
been discussing it with my daughter, I hope you will forgive that little
impertinence,' he said, courteously.

Anthony Newton forgave him there and then.

'My daughter, who is a judge of character, is rather impressed by you.'

It was clear to Anthony now that he had been the subject of the
conversation he had overheard. He was tingling with curiosity to discover
exactly the nature of the mission which was to be entrusted to him. Mr
Mansar did not keep him waiting long.

'I want you to go by tonight's train to Brussels. You will arrive on
Sunday morning, and remain there until Wednesday morning. Have you
sufficient money for your journey?'

'Oh, yes,' said Anthony, airily.

'Good.' Mr Mansar nodded gravely, as though he had never had any doubt
upon the matter. 'You will carry with you a sealed envelope, which you
will open on Wednesday morning in the presence of my Brussels agent,
Monsieur Lament, of the firm of Lament and Lament, the great financiers,
of whom you must have heard.'

'Naturally,' said Anthony.

'I want you to keep your mission a secret, tell nobody, you understand?'

Anthony understood perfectly.

 'I leave the method of travel to you. There is a train to London in half
 an hour; here is the letter.'

He took it from his inside pocket. It was addressed to Mr Anthony Newton,
and marked 'To be opened in the presence of Monsieur Cecil Lament, 119,
Rue Partriele, Brussels.'

T do not promise you that you will be paid very well or even be paid at
all, for undertaking this mission,' said the millionaire. 'But I rather
fancy this experience will be useful to you in more ways than one.'

Anthony detected a certain significance in this cautious promise and
smiled happily.

'I think I'll go along now, sir,' he said briskly. 'When I carry out
these missions--and as you may guess, this is not the first time that I
have been--entrusted with important errands--I prefer that I should
lose no time.'

'I think you're wise,' said Mr Mansar soberly.

Anthony hoped to see the girl before he went, but here he was
disappointed. It was a very ordinary chauffeur who drove him to the
station and, passing the wreckage of his car stranded in the ditch,
Anthony did not regret one single penny of his expenditure. Anyway, the
car would still sell for the price of old iron.

He reached Brussels in time for breakfast on Sunday morning, and on the
Monday he made a call at Monsieur Lament's office. Monsieur Lament was a
short, stout man, with a large and bushy beard, and seemed surprised at
the advent of this spruce and mysterious young Englishman.

'From M'sieur Mansar,' he said with respect, even veneration. 'M'sieur
Mansar did not tell me he was sending anybody. Is it in connection with
the Rentes?'

'I am not at liberty to say,' said Anthony discreetly, 'In fact, sir, I
am, so to speak, under sealed orders.'

Monsieur Lament heard the explanation and nodded.

'I honour your discretion, M'sieur,' he said. 'Now is there anything I
can do for you while you are in Brussels? Perhaps you would dine with me
tonight at my club.'

Anthony was very happy to dine with him at his club, because he had
brought with him a grossly insufficient sum to pay his expenses.

Over the dinner that nigh, Monsieur Lament spoke reverently of the great
English financier.

'What a wonderful man?' he said, with an expressive gesture. 'You are a
friend of his, M'sieur Newton?'

'Not exactly a friend,' said Anthony carefully, 'how can one be a friend
of a monument? One can only stand at a distance and admire.'

'True, true,' said the thoughtful Monsieur Lament. 'He is indeed, a
remarkable character. And his daughter--' he kissed the tips of his
fingers, 'what charm, what intelligence, what beauty!'

'Ah!' said Anthony, 'what!'

So charming a companion was he, that Monsieur Lament asked him to lunch
with him the next day, and this time the Belgian showed some curiosity as
to the object of Anthony's visit.

'Is it in connection with the Turkish loan?' he asked.

Anthony smiled.

'You will, I am sure, agree with me that I must maintain the utmost
secrecy,' he said firmly.

'Naturally! Of course! Certainly!' said Monsieur Lament hastily. 'I
honour your discretion. But if it is in connection with the Turkish loan,
or the Viennese Municipal loan--'

Anthony raised his hand with a gesture of gentle insistence.

Monsieur Lament dissolved into apologies.

Anthony was himself curious and he attended M. Lament's office on
Wednesday morning with a joyous sense of anticipation.

In that rosewood-panelled room standing with his back to the white
marble fireplace, he tore the flap of the envelope with fingers that
shook, for he realized that he might be at the very crisis of his career;
and that his good plan to drop into financial society had succeeded
beyond his wildest hope.

To his amazement, the letter was from Jane Mansar, and he read it,
open-mouthed.

'DEAR MR NEWTON:

'Daddy wants to hand you over to the police or have you ducked in the
pond. I chose this method of giving you a graceful exit from the scene,
because I feel that such a man of genius and valour should not be
subjected to so ignominious a fate. You are the thirty-fourth person
who has secured an introduction to my father by novel, and in some cases,
painful, methods. I have been rescued from terrifying tramps (who have
been hired by my rescuer) some six times. I have been pushed into the
river and rescued twice. Daddy has had three people accidentally wounded
by him when he has been shooting rabbits, and at least five who have got
into the way of his car when he has been driving between the house and
the station.

'We do recognize and appreciate the novelty of your method, and I confess
that for a moment I was deceived by the artistic wreckage of your poor
little car. To make absolutely sure that I was not doing you an
injustice, I telephoned the local garage, and found, as I expected, that
you had kept the car there for a fortnight before the 'accident'. Poor Mr
Newton, better luck next time.

'Yours sincerely,

'JANE MANSAR.'

Anthony read the letter three times, and then looked mechanically at the
slip of paper which was enclosed. It ran:

'To MONSIEUR LAMONT,

'Pay Mr Anthony Newton a sum sufficient to enable him to reach London,
and to support him on the journey.

'GERALD MANSAR.'

Monsieur Lament was watching the dazed young man.

'Is it important?' he asked eagerly. 'Is it to be communicated to me?'

Anthony was never wholly overcome by the most tremendous circumstances.
He folded the letter, put it in his pocket, looked at the slip again.

'I regret that I cannot tell you all that this contains,' he said. 'I am
leaving immediately for Berlin. From Berlin I go to Vienna, from Vienna
to Istanbul; from there I must make a hurried journey to Rome, and from
Rome I have to get to Tangier. Then I shall reach Gibraltar in a month's
time, and fly to England.'

He handed the slip to Monsieur Lament.

'Pay Mr Anthony Newton a sufficient sum to enable him to reach London and
support him on the journey.'

Monsieur Lament looked at Anthony. 'How much will you require, M'sieur?'
he asked respectfully.

'About nine hundred pounds, I think,' said Anthony softly.

Monsieur Lament gave him the money then and there and when Mansar got the
account he was justifiably annoyed.

He came into Jane, storming.

'That... that...' he spluttered, 'rascal...'

'Which rascal, Daddy, you know so many,' she was half smiling.

'Newton... as you know, I gave Lament an order to pay his expenses to
London?'

She nodded.

'Well, he drew nine hundred pounds.'

The girl opened her eyes with joyous amazement.

'He told Lament that he was coming home by way of Berlin, Vienna,
Istanbul and Rome,' groaned Mr Mansar. 'Thank God the trans-Siberian
railway isn't working!' he added. It was the one source of comfort he
had.



CHAPTER 3 - BURIED TREASURE


Mr Tony Newton threw up the window of his sitting-room and looked
across the chimney tops of Bloomsbury with a critical eye.

It was a sunny day, and even chimney stacks and gaunt dead-ends have a
poetry in the golden light of an early morning in summer to a young man
plentifully endowed with faith in his own capabilities.

Big Bill Farrel was his companion, and Bill had just finished at his
leisure a large plateful of ham and eggs, and now, with a pipe between
his teeth, was at peace with the world.

'Voila!' said Anthony gravely, and with a wave of his hand indicated a
number of portraits (mainly cut from newspapers) which decorated one wall
of his room.

He walked to the wall where his picture gallery offended the unities, and
stabbed with his finger portrait after portrait, as he reeled off their
titles and biographies.

'That's William O. McNeal, real name Adolph Bernsteiner, the Meat King;
that is Harry V. Teckle, the Steel King; that is Theodore Match, the
Shipping King; that is Montague G. Flake, the Provision King; this fellow
with the funny nose is Michael O. Blogg, the Jam King--and that fellow
with the glasses is the Cotton King; and that lad with the dyspeptic eye
and the diamond pin is the Hardware King--bow to Their Majesties, Bill.
They are going to make us rich!'

'Eh?' said the startled and baffled Mr Farrel.

They are our little Eldorados,' said Tony calmly, 'our Pay Cash or
Bearers; our Money from Home!'

'Do you mean they're relations of yours?' asked Bill, in tones of awe.

'God forbid!' said Mr Newton piously. 'Sit you down and I'll expound the
Plan of Operations and the General Idea.'

For an hour he expounded his scheme, and comprehension came very slowly
to Bill, but it came.

'And now,' said Tony, getting up, 'we will go to the little office which
I have rented in Theobald's Road.'

Painted on the uncleanly glass panel was the inscription:

'NEWTON'S DETECTIVE AGENCY'

From a drawer in the one table of the room, he took a large card,
similarly painted.

'You will find two nails outside the door,' said Tony, 'and your job will
be to hang it out every morning and take it in every night, providing the
youth of Bloomsbury does not pinch it.'

When Bill returned, his friend was reading a newspaper cutting.

'Listen to this. It is a description of a sale at Floretti's. "A small
box of miscellaneous manuscript went to the bid of Mr Montague Flake at
120 guineas. The box is of carved Spanish mahogany," etc., etc. I will
not bother you with the details. The point is that Mr Flake is a great
collector of old manuscript and a great hog.'

From his wallet he took another and a smaller cutting.

'Listen,' he said, and read: '"A bargain: Small cottage with one acre.
Cottage could be made a comfortable weekend residence. Price £1000 for
quick sale."' He took a time table from his desk and turned the leaves.
'Here is the place: the train leaves at twelve.'

'I am to buy this property?' said Big Bill, open-mouthed. Tony nodded.

That is your job,' he said. 'It will interest you to know that I have
already inspected it, and have an architect's plan in my bedroom.
Nevertheless, don't close the deal until you get a telegram from me. You
are not to communicate with me except through this office, and under no
circumstances are you to disclose the fact that you know me or have any
business dealings with me.'

An hour later Big Bill left and Anthony returned to his little hotel,
took off his coat and set to work. In a box in his bedroom were half a
dozen sheets of age-stained parchment. He spent the rest of the morning
and the greater part of the afternoon covering these with fine writing.

There is no more highly respected figure in financial and business
circles than Mr Montague Flake, for Mr Flake controlled the butter
markets of London, Copenhagen, Rotterdam and many others. From which it
may be gathered that Mr Flake was a considerable personage even before
the time he managed to corner the butter supplies, to say nothing of the
cold storage butter and the butter in transit and the butter of unborn
generations of cows.

Officially, Mr Flake did not control the market. Officially he had
nothing to do with the cornering of margarine. In all his stores--and
there were 631 branches of Flake U.P. Stores throughout the United
Kingdom--the 'U.P.' standing for 'Universal Provisions'--there was a
large notice respectfully informing customers that the management was
doing its best to get supplies of butter and margarine, but that the
failure of the hay crop in Denmark, and the root crop in Ireland, was
causing much embarrassment, whilst the extra cost of freights (which
really worked out at an additional farthing per pound), compelled the
reluctant directors to raise the price of butter 3d per pound, and
margarine 2d.

And the customers were duly impressed, and, what is more to the point,
they paid, and millions of tuppence--ha'pennies went into Mr Flake's
pocket, for he was the company, the directors and the shareholders.

Mr Flake had a large house in St John's Square, in the most fashionable
part of London. He had a model farm in Norfolk, an estate in Kent, a
shoot in Yorkshire and a salmon river in Scotland. He could neither farm,
shoot nor fish, but these were the correct things to own, so he owned
them.

It is said that his own idea of happiness was to sit in a secluded spot
on the edge of the lake on his estate, dabbling his bare feet in the
water and smoking a clay pipe, whilst he read the divorce cases in the
Sunday newspapers.

He was a harsh-faced man, wholly unsuggestive of butter or anything
oleaginous or suave. He was a widower, and lived alone, save for a
housekeeper, three secretaries, four chauffeurs, twelve menservants and a
small army of white-capped cooks, housemaids and the like.

Mr Flake sat in his magnificent library at a table much larger than the
room in which the majority of his customers slept, and he was nibbling
his pen, for he was in the agony of composition. He had scratched out
twenty lines when a visitor was announced. He took up the card that lay
on the silver plate and read the inscription without any show of
interest. It read:

'THE NEWTON PRIVATE DETECTIVE AGENCY Captain Anthony Newton, DSO, MC,
late Blitheshire Fusiliers'

He glared up at his secretary, who had followed the footman into the
room.

'What does he want? Tell him to write.'

'He insists upon seeing you, sir,' said the footman. 'I told him you were
busy.'

'Show him in,' growled Mr Flake.

Tony was ushered in, very grave, very business--like and very well
dressed.

'Sit down. Captain--er--Newton,' said Mr Flake, waving his lordly hand
to a chair. 'What can I do for you?'

Mr Newton removed his gloves slowly, laid them beside his hat, took out
his pocket-book and consulted the interior.

'A few days ago,' he said, 'you purchased a number of miscellaneous
manuscripts at Floretti's sale.'

Mr Flake nodded.

'They were the property,' Tony went on, 'of the late Lord Witherall, who
was a collector, and they comprised a number of more or less important
documents--'

'More or less worthless,' interrupted Mr Flake brusquely. 'As a matter of
fact, I bought that lot for the box more than for the manuscripts. I
haven't had time to look through them yet.' Tony's eyes gleamed. 'And I
don't suppose the manuscripts are worth tuppence.'

'It was on the subject of the manuscripts I wanted to see you,' said
Tony. 'I have been employed by a client to interview you under peculiar
circumstances. A former confidential servant of Lord Witherall gave into
his lordship's custody certain documents, the particulars of which I am
not at liberty to give, and these, according to the man's relatives--he
has been dead some years, by the way--were kept by his lordship in that
particular box. The man's name was Samuels, though that was not the name
he was known by to Lord Witherall. If that document is in your
possession--it is in the form of a letter addressed to Samuels--my client
is willing to pay you £200 for its return.'

Now Mr Flake was, above all things, a good business man, and a good
business man knows instinctively that a first offer of £100 for anything
means that it is worth much more. And a good business man, moreover, has
ever an eye to the main chance.

Mr Flake pressed a bell, and, when his secretary appeared:

'Bring me that box I bought at Floretti's the other day,' he said. 'I can
tell you this,' he said, when the girl had gone, 'that I do not promise
that I can return any document which may be in this box. A deal's a deal.
Captain Newton, and I am a business man.'

Tony nodded.

'I can only remind you,' he said gently, 'that the relatives of Samuels
are very poor people, and from what I gather that document may be of the
greatest value to them.'

'And to me,' said Mr Flake pleasantly. 'I am poor, too. We are all
poor--it is a relative term, as we are on the subject of relatives,'
he added humorously.

'I don't think you can compare your condition with theirs, sir,' said
Anthony with dignity, 'and I feel sure that you would not attempt to
benefit at the expense of poor people--'

'Rubbish!' snapped Montague Flake. 'There is no sentiment in my
composition, sir. I am a self-made man, and I have made my money
without worrying very much about the people who have had to part. A
bargain is a bargain. If I pay 120 guineas for a poke, I'm entitled to
the pig I find in it. That's fair, ain't it--isn't it, I mean? Mind you,
I'm not going to say I won't sell it,' he added, as the secretary placed
the box on the big table before him, 'and I'm not going to say I will.'

He cut the sealed cords which bound the box, and threw open the lid. It
was filled to the top with yellow manuscripts. Some were bound together
in vellum books, and there were a large number of loose sheets.

Mr Flake hesitated and, lifting out the first stratum, laid it on the
desk.

'You say it is a letter?' he said.

Tony nodded.

'This is evidently the manuscript of an old play,' said Mr Flake; 'and
this'--he lifted another weighty pile--'seems to be the original
manuscript of a story of some kind. Here are the letters.' He picked one
up, turned it over to read the signature, and laid it on the table.

Tony turned to the waiting secretary, and then to Mr Flake with an air of
indecision.

'I wonder if your secretary would be good enough to look up the telephone
number of Sir John Howard and Sons.'

He named the greatest of the London solicitors, a name which carried
respect even to Mr Flake.

'Are you acting for Howard?' he asked quickly.

Anthony smiled.

'For the moment I cannot disclose my principals,' he said.

He looked round and waited until the door closed behind the girl; then he
sidled close to Mr Flake.

'I can tell you this in confidence,' he said in a low voice. I am acting
for--'

He whispered a name in Mr Flake's ear. To reach the financier he had to
come round to the corner of the table. As he whispered, he obscured for a
moment Mr Flake's view of the box. With somebody whispering in your ear,
it is difficult to detect the rustle of parchment.

Tony's hand shot into the open box, and was out again before Mr Flake
could recover from his surprise.

'Tup?' said Mr Flake irritably. 'Who the dickens is Tup?'

'That,' said the suave young man, 'I will reveal at some later stage of
the enquiry. I thought you knew.'

Mr Flake looked at him searchingly, but the eyes of Tony Newton did not
falter.

'Anyway,' said the financier, as he bundled the documents back into the
box, 'I haven't time to go through these things now, and I shan't be able
to give you an answer for a few days.'

'But it is urgent.' Tony was earnest again. 'If it is a question of money
we shall not quarrel over a few hundreds. It is absolutely necessary that
we should get this document back immediately.'

'And it is absolutely necessary,' said Mr Flake good-humouredly, 'that
I should have my afternoon tea and that I should have time to examine the
contents. I will give you your answer tomorrow.'

With this the visitor had to be content. He left the house, curiously
enough, without discovering the telephone number he had enquired for, and
made his way to the nearest post office. He sent a telegram addressed to
'Smith, Bull Hotel, Little Wenson, Kent,' and the message was: 'Close the
deal.'

Four days later a large car drew up before a very small cottage a mile
from the village of Little Wenson, and Mr Flake descended.

The cottage was a poor sort of dwelling; the garden was neglected and the
windows uncurtained; but he was less interested in the house than in the
acre of kitchen garden, equally neglected, which stood at its rear.

Fortunately, he was able to make his reconnaissance without effort, for
the cottage stood at the corner of a lane and the western limit of the
garden ran flush with the hedge. There were two apple trees, and beyond
the broken wall of a well with its crazy windlass.

Mr Flake walked slowly back to the front of the cottage, pushed open the
gate, walked along the garden path and knocked at the door. A man in his
shirt sleeves answered: a tall, solemn-looking man, who answered Mr
Flake's cheery 'Good morning!' with a non-committal nod.

'Is this your house?' asked Mr Flake pleasantly.

'Yes, sir,' said Big Bill Farrel, the cottager.

'Rather nice situation,' said Mr Flake.

'It's not so bad,' said the other, cautiously.

'Been here long?'

'About a week,' said the occupant. 'I haven't been out of the army long,
and I thought of starting a poultry farm.'

'Oh, so you were in the army?' said Mr Flake, patronisingly. 'Well, it
doesn't seem the right kind of place to raise chickens. Who owned it
before you?'

'I forget the name,' said the cottager, 'but it's been in the same family
for hundreds of years.'

'H'm!' said Mr Flake. Then, carelessly: 'Can't you recall the name?'

'Something like Samson,' said the cottager, with an effort of memory.

'Was it Samuels?' asked Mr Flake, eagerly.

'Ah, that's the name, Samuels. They weren't the last tenants, but they
were the people who owned it years ago.'

'H'm!' said Mr Flake again. 'If it isn't asking you a rude question, what
did you pay for it?'

'All the money I had,' parried the other skilfully. 'And as the song
says--'

'Yes, yes,' said Mr Flake. I know what the song says, but now, tell
me--what would you sell this little property for?'

'I wouldn't sell it,' said the cottager.

'Come, come, you'd sell it for a hundred pounds' profit, surely?' said Mr
Flake.

'Not for a thousand pounds' profit,' said the other, determinedly. 'Not
for ten thousand pounds' profit. There's some funny tales going about
this property. I had a lawyer down here the other day and a private
detective.'

'The devil you did!' said Mr Flake. 'Come, now, let's talk business. I am
a business man, and I will give you two thousand pounds for this
property.'

'If you offered me twenty thousand pounds I wouldn't take it,' said the
cottager, with greater determination than ever. 'I am satisfied with it,
and, as Socrates says: "Contentment is natural wealth; luxury is
artificial poverty."'

'Never mind about Socrates,' said the impatient Mr Flake. 'I will give
you--'

'"If man knew what felicity dwells in the cottage of a godly man," says
Jeremy Taylor,' the cottager insisted.

'Now look here.' Mr Flake was aroused. 'Will you take a reasonable price
for this property? I've got a fancy for it and I will pay anything in
reason.'

'Come inside,' said the cottager opening the door. An hour later Mr
Farrel shook the dust of Little Wenson from his feet. He was accompanied
to London by Mr Flake, and together they journeyed to a bank in Lombard
Street, for Mr Farrel admitted to a wholesome horror of cheques, and not
until he had received large bundles of banknotes did he affix his
signature to the deed which transferred his property to Mr Flake.

It was a long time since Mr Flake had done a day's hard digging, but he
felt that he was being well repaid for his labours when, at six o'clock
the next morning, he began his excavations. A line drawn at right angles
from the centre of the two apple trees passed the well on the right hand
side. This was exactly as the document in his possession said it should
pass.

Those three sheets of parchment written in a crabbed hand, described how
one William Samuels had in the year 1826 stolen from the strong rooms of
Cheals Bank, at which he was employed as a porter, 'brilliant stones to
the value of £120,000, the property of the French emigre, the Marquis du
Thierry', and of how he had hidden that same in the garden of his
brother, Henry Frederick Samuels, in the parish of Little Wenson. Mr
Flake consulted them again and again. The directions worked out with
magnificent accuracy. Nine feet three inches at the right angle from a
line drawn between the two apple trees brought the seeker after stolen
wealth to the centre of a newly dug garden plot. Four feet down Mr
Flake's heart leapt when he came to the 'square flat stone which I have
put atop of the Hole in which said Box is Hidden'.

The said box was there. A perspiring Mr Flake discovered it after three
hours' strenuous digging and brought it to the light. It looked strangely
new. Indeed an ordinary person might have confused it with one of those
solid boxes which farmers employ to send eggs by rail. It was heavy, but
Mr Flake did not feel its weight as he carried it to the seclusion of the
cottage and prized off its top.

It was heavy because it was half-filled with sand. He ran his hand
through the sand, and his fingers encountered a square piece of
cardboard, which he took out and carried to the light, for he was a
thought near-sighted.

There was one line of writing, and that in the same crabbed calligraphy
as the letter he had found in his box of manuscript--though, if he had
examined that box before Mr Newton had whispered in his ear, he might
have saved himself a great deal of labour and no small amount of money.

The inscription ran:

'TUP means The Unfortunate People, on whose behalf I am acting.'

The next morning Mr Flake waited upon Mr Newton. 'You and your gang have
swindled me out of twelve thousand pounds,' he said. 'You can either hand
the money back or be prosecuted.'

'Thank you very kindly,' said Tony. 'I will be prosecuted.'

'You are a common swindler,' stormed Mr Flake.

'There are two ways out of this room,' said Tony. 'One is out of the
window and one is out of the door. You have paid your money, so you can
take your choice.'

'I shall go to the police,' fumed Mr Flake, taking up his hat. He was on
the point of apoplexy.

'Now listen to me,' said Tony kindly. 'You got the worst of a deal. You
thought you were going to make a lot of money at the expense of a poor
family. You have spent your life getting fat on the money you have
twisted from the public. You have scraped something from every slice of
bread and butter in the kingdom. That you should get rich and have your
shooting boxes and your country estates, quite a lot of people have gone
hungry. The law cannot touch you. You are one of the thieves who keep
within the law. I have taken twelve thousand pounds from you on a square
deal and I tell you this'--he shook his finger in the purple face of the
speechless financier--'that twelve thousand pounds will be 120 thousand
before I have done with you.'

'You are a common thief!' spluttered Mr Flake.

'Bill,' called Tony sternly, and the big man appeared in the doorway,
'chuck this blighter out.'

Bill, the whilom cottager, opened the door and jerked his thumb.



CHAPTER 4 - A CONTRIBUTION TO CHARITY


Tony Newton was not given to indiscriminate charity. He believed in that
variety which began at home and stayed there, for he had a profound lack
of faith in the bona fides of charity organisers. He was not intensely
interested in the Mercantile Marine, nor had he the slightest intention
of founding cottage houses for disabled sailors--until he met Mr Match.

Tony always said that the affair of the shipowner was his greatest
exploit--the greater perhaps since he gained no personal benefit from
his ingenuity.

It must not be supposed that Scotland Yard could tolerate the existence
and operations of a conscienceless brigand. But Scotland Yard is
powerless without the support of a complainant who may develop into a
prosecutor. Mr Newton owed his immunity partly to the shyness of certain
wronged men to take action, and partly (and this was the greater part) to
the inability of his victims to offer an interpretation of their own
conduct that would look well in the printed report of an Old Bailey
trial.

Tony and his brigands enjoyed a wider reputation than he guessed: this
much he discovered one day when a 'case' took him to Newcastle.

He and Big Bill Farrel had sat for an hour in the fading light, smoking
in silence. The evening sky was still bright, and through the open window
came the shrill voices of children at play. For in London the street is
still the Coliseum of childhood, the course and arena of its Roman game,
the very college where it graduates in the bitter science of life.

'Who is Theodore Match?' asked Anthony unexpectedly, and Bill started.

His friend had the bland tone of a schoolmaster extracting information
from a nervous pupil.

'The Shipping King,' said Farrel, remembering.

'And what is a Shipping King?' demanded Tony.

'A Shipping King?' hesitated the other. 'Well, he's a fellow who owns
ships.'

Tony smiled sadly.

'A Shipping King,' he explained, 'is a man who sees trouble ahead. He's
always on the point of being ruined next year. If trade is good, he's
going to be ruined through the shortage of shipping. If there are lots of
ships he's ruined by the shortage of freights. Sometimes he's ruined by
the charter rates, sometimes by the price of coal. He gets so ruined in
one way and another, what with income tax and surtax and excess profits
tax, that he doesn't know what to do with the money he can't spend.'

'Good Lord!' said Bill, who was brave but not bright.

'Anyway, Theodore Match, Esquire, who has never given a ha'penny
to charity, is going to provide a start in life for the
great-great-grandson of a man who fought at Trafalgar. That's
me! My great-great-grandfather was a sailor--we kept his wooden
leg for years as a souvenir.'

Bill knocked the ashes from his pipe.

'Match isn't a bad old stick,' he said, unconscious of his humour. 'He
gave a new library--'

'You needn't praise Mr Match,' interrupted Tony. 'He'll be Sir Theodore
Match in the next Honours List. Anyway, he doesn't know how generous he
is going to be. Bill, is your tea dearer than it used to be? Is meat
dearer--is bread dearer--is everything dearer that comes from overseas?
Who do you think has got the extra ha'pence? The planter and the farmer
have got a bit--they worked for it and good luck to them. But Theodore
Match has got more than his whack. He's had a ha'penny of yours for tea
and a farthing for your loaf of bread and something out of everything you
eat or drink. He's raised his freights. Coal is dear, labour is
dearer--everything's dear. But he's the dearest thing of all. There's
nothing cheap about Theodore except the souls he sends to sea and the men
he employs and his charitable subscriptions. To cut short my introduction,
I have put him down on the subscription list to Anthony Newton's Happy
Evening Fund for the sum of twelve thousand pounds--and I'll get it.'

Mr Farrel nodded slowly, and there was admiration in his eyes.

'I bet you will,' he said enthusiastically.

The Theodore Steamship Line, as everybody knows, is one of the most
important cargo lines in the United Kingdom. It had a fleet of 25 ships,
it traded with South America, with the China seas and with the two
coasts, and with India and Africa. Its head offices were in Newcastle;
and to Newcastle Tony Newton journeyed next day, accompanied by his
trusty lieutenant. They arrived late in the evening and went at once to
the Station Hotel.

Early in the morning Anthony set forth on a voyage of discovery. The
Theodore Steamship Line possessed an unpretentious block of offices not
very far from the hotel, and by the energy of the clerks and the number
of clients who waited in the various departments. Tony gathered that
business was extensively brisk.

He passed into the office, handed his card to a clerk and presently was
shown into the private room of Mr Theodore Match. It was a large room,
half-panelled in oak and hung about with photographs of ships. Mr Match
was a middle-aged man with one of those jovial, bearded countenances
and those easily laughing eyes which are the possession of men upon whom
the cares and worries of this world sit lightly.

He beamed at his visitor through gold-rimmed glasses.

'Glad to meet you, Mr Newton,' he said, to that adventurer's surprise.
'Sit you down and make yourself at home. Have a cigar.' He handed a
silver box to the visitor and Tony slowly selected one. 'Now what is it
you want?' smiled Mr Match. 'Ten thousand pounds for some buried treasure
or a million pound partnership?'

For a second, but only for a second. Tony was surprised to silence.

'I think I'll take the partnership,' he said, 'though, as a matter of
fact, I don't want anything like that sum.'

Mr Match leant back in his chair, shaking with laughter and rubbing his
hands together as though he were a participant in the greatest joke in
the world.

'You see, I know you, Newton. As a matter of fact, I've been warned about
you. I'll tell you frankly, I know all about the little office you had in
Theobald's Road. I know all about your portrait gallery--I sent a
private detective there the other day to have a look round--I know all
about your adventures with Mr Montague Flake, who is an old friend and
client of ours, and Mr Gerald Mansar is another. I know how you diddled
Flake out of twelve thousand pounds--I've been laughing over that ever
since. Now let us come down to plain speaking, Mr Newton,' he said,
leaning forward and resting his elbows on the arms of his chair. 'You
imagine you have a mission in life to relieve rich men of their unearned
surpluses. Am I right?'

Tony was now at his ease. He recognised the situation and his mind was
working rapidly.

'That is perfectly true,' he said. 'I have.'

Now Tony had had no desire to help anybody but himself. But at that
moment was born a righteous and philanthropic resolve.

'Good!' said Mr Match heartily. 'You have marked down a dozen
disgustingly rich people to contribute to your comfort.'

'That also is true,' said Tony.

'Good again!' said Mr Match. 'You regard me as a profiteer and you have
come to Newcastle with a grand little scheme in your head to make me
contribute to--what?'

'I have been settling soldiers on the land,' said Tony. 'I want to
provide a few homes for wives and children of the men of the Mercantile
Marine,' he said slowly.

'Admirable philanthropist!'

The eyes of Mr Theodore Match were beaming with benevolent fun. He
stroked his little beard thoughtfully.

'Admirable philanthropist!' he repeated. 'And how much am I supposed to
contribute to this very interesting experiment of yours?'

'I have put you down for twelve thousand pounds,' said Tony.

'Why not twelve million pounds? I am as willing to give one as the other.
And I suppose you have some little scheme to get it. Now be a sportsman,
Newton,' he said banteringly. 'What shall it be? A grand confidence
trick, buried treasure--won't you enlighten me as to the little trick
you intended employing to extract my hard-won wealth?'

Tony laughed.

'I will give you frankness for frankness,' he said. 'I hadn't quite made
up my mind.'

'Come,' said the other, 'be friendly.'

The door opened at that moment and a young man came in, a tall, stoutly
built young man, red and puffy of face.

'This is my son; this is Mr Newton, about whom I was speaking to you,
Tom,' said Theodore Match.

'Tell me, before we go any farther,' said Tony, 'will you contribute
anything to my scheme?'

'Not a bean,' smiled the other, 'not half a bean, not the very dust that
lies at the bottom of a bag of beans. Why should I? Am I sitting here
making money for my servants or for myself? Do I devote the whole of my
day and the greater part of my night to working out schemes for
increasing my surtax in order to bring trade and custom to a hundred
local public-houses? No, sir!' He thumped his desk furiously. 'The
welfare of my men does not interest me. What they do with their money
does not interest me either. What I do with my own is no concern of
theirs or yours or anybody else's in the world.'

'Do you want me, governor?' asked the young man.

'No, Tom, I merely wanted you to come in to see Mr Newton.'

With a nod to the visitor and a meaning grin to his parent Tom Match left
the room.

'I make more money than the able seaman because I am cleverer than the
able seaman. It is the triumph of intellect over brute strength. Show me
anybody who is cleverer than I and let him take it out of me, and I am
perfectly willing that he shall get away with it. If you'--he pointed a
pencil at Tony and spoke more slowly--'or your military attache, who I
understand bears the name of Farrel, can by any trick or dodge or act of
artfulness, short of forgery or burglary or robbery, extract from, me
twelve thousand pounds or twenty thousand pounds, you are at liberty to
do so. I tell you this frankly, and as man to man, Newton, that the
welfare of the seaman is of no interest to me. I don't for one moment
imagine that it is of much interest to you. That Mercantile Marine Home
was an inspiration. You came here to carry out a private swindle--but
we'll let that go. If you can find a way of getting the better of me, if
you can trap me in an unguarded moment by any trick you may choose into
giving you the money you require, I promise you that I will not prosecute
you even though the act by which you extract the money may be a criminal
one in the eyes of the law.'

He stood up, still smiling, and thrust out his big hand, and Tony was
smiling as he gripped it. There was something about this Philistine that
he liked. If he were a brute, he was an honest brute.

'I accept your challenge,' he said. 'Within a week you will have
contributed twelve thousand pounds to an unexpected charity.'

'You can't do it,' said Mr Match decidedly. 'Why, my dear man, I have
successfully resisted an appeal of the highest people in the land. Look
here!' He walked back to his desk, pulled open a drawer and flung out
half a dozen printed documents, attached by a fastener. 'It came this
morning--the Prince's Appeal for Merchant Seamen. That's one better than
yours. They want a million,' he chuckled. 'Did I refuse it? No, sir, I
ignored it. If I refused I should get into bad odour--you realize we are
speaking in confidence as men of honour. If the Prince comes to Newcastle
I shall dodge him. If he writes me a personal letter I shall be on a bed
of sickness and unable to reply. I have never given a ha'porth of charity
in my life and, please heaven, I never shall! When I die I shall leave
nothing to build hospitals or found churches, nothing for the indigent
poor, nothing for anybody who hasn't the right to it.'

He was a shrewd man, in many ways brilliant. He had one of those
extraordinarily nimble minds which are the peculiar possession of the
accountant and the bookmaker. There was no need for him to take any extra
precautions. He had sized up Tony and knew that he had a foe worthy of
his steel, but felt quite competent to meet all the machinations which
the most ingenious and most unscrupulous philanthropist could devise. If
he scrutinised a little more closely the documents which came before him
in the ordinary course of business for his signature, if he watched with
a little more care the companions of his son, if he was a little more
suspicious of all the business proposals which came before him from
outside sources, and read into them some sinister scheme of Newton to
secure his subscription, it was not an unusual care for an unprecedented
suspicion, nor a particularly remarkable scrutiny which he exercised, for
he was by nature careful.

Of Tony he saw nothing for the first three days. A private detective whom
he had employed to shadow the philanthropist reported that he spent most
of his time in the private sitting-room of his hotel with his
companion, the tall, solemn soldier with whom he occasionally went
abroad.

He met Tony in the street by accident on the fourth day and crossed the
road to greet him.

'Well,' demanded Mr Match boisterously, his eyes agleam, 'how goes the
robbery under arms--the Great-Turf-Fraud--the Jim-the-Penman-Ship?'

Tony laughed.

'Fine,' he said. 'I reckon your money is as good as in my pocket.'

Match roared his merriment.

'Have you found a scheme?'

Tony shook his head.

'Not really--but I'm picking it up little by little. Watts invented the
steam engine through seeing a kettle boil--I'm watching the
extraordinary effect of large self-confidence upon the security of
wealth.'

'Watch!' said the other, and put out his hand. 'You're going to get
eyestrain.'

He was going on, but Tony laid his hand on his arm.

'Wait--there's one thing I want to tell you,' he said. 'There are a
dozen ways I could get the money from you, but they're all dishonest. I
could forge your name as easily as anything--I should have made a most
successful criminal--I could burgle your stately mansion at Morpeth--I've
reconnoitered the ground and it's dead easy to get through the window
above the portico--'

'Try it,' said the other significantly.

'Oh, I know all about the burglar alarms, but I could make them
inoperative with a gimlet and a wire in a matter of moments. I could
impersonate you so that your own son would be deceived. But none of these
things appeal to me. There isn't any art in them--I should just hate to
take the money. But you're a difficult proposition. You're too
big--there's nothing really mean about you.'

'Flatterer,' smiled Mr Match.

'It's a fact. I could never get you to buy a share in buried treasure, or
bluff you into believing that I know all about your past life. You're
just an honest rascal making a fortune out of people's necessity and so
far as I can see you have only one weak spot.'

Mr Match looked at him quizzically.

'Let me know that and I am fortified,' he said.

'You are too confident of yourself,' said Tony. 'That's where your
undoing lies.'

'Prove it.'

'I can prove it all right,' said Tony.

They were near his hotel and the hour was one.

'Come and lunch with me, if I promise you that I will neither dope,
sandbag nor hypnotise you.'

'Done!' said Mr Match heartily. 'We will discuss this matter
further--you amuse me.'

It was not until the lunch was over that Mr Match again approached the
subject. Throughout the meal Tony kept up a light, continuous flow of
amusing reminiscence and Mr Match found him an agreeable companion.

'You were talking about my self-confidence and how it might ruin me. I
am interested. Please elucidate.'

Mr Newton shrugged his shoulders.

'What I mean is that you have confidence in the processes of business and
in your own ability to handle any situation which has to do with the
transference of money. For example, if I asked you for a cheque for
twelve thousand pounds at this moment and you gave me that cheque, you
would be quite satisfied in your mind that you would be able to prevent
that money from going to charity.'

The shipper thought for a moment.

'Yes,' he said. 'I think I can say with confidence--it may be
over-confidence but I don't think it is--that I could give you--in
fact, I am quite willing to give you at this moment--a crossed cheque
for twelve thousand pounds.'

'You think that you could stop it.'

The other nodded.

'You would probably post-date it till tomorrow.'

Match nodded again.

'And such is your confidence in the etiquette and practice of banking
that you would not be one penny the worse off.'

'Exactly,' said the other, 'though it might put you in rather a hole, my
friend.'

'Whether it would or not,' said Tony, offering his cigarette case, 'I
challenge you to do so, and I promise you that if I do not get the value
of that cheque applied to the purpose I design it, I will not bother you
again.'

For a moment the shipping man looked at him and then, with a little grin
and with that quickness which characterised all his movements, he slipped
a chequebook from one pocket and a fountain pen from another, and wrote.
Tony, looking across the table, saw that the cheque was dated for the
following day. He noted that under the amount Mr Match wrote:

'This cheque must only be passed on the personal authorisation of the
payer.'

He signed it with a flourish, crossed it with two heavy strokes and
handed it to his companion with a smile. Tony drew a long sigh of relief.

'Thank you,' he said. 'I see you have made it payable to bearer.'

'The bearer will have some difficulty in getting it,' said Mr Match.

Mr Match drove straight back to his office and without a moment's delay
called up his bank on the telephone.

'That you, Gilbert? It's Theodore Match speaking. I have just given a
cheque for twelve thousand pounds, payable to bearer--got that? The
number of the cheque is A.B.714312--got that? I stop payment of that
cheque and it is not to be cashed or debited to my account under any
circumstances. I will give you confirmation in writing.'

It may be said of Theodore Match that his pleasures were mainly
intellectual. He had found his principal joy in life in pitting his wits
against wits as shrewd or nearly as shrewd as his own, and it is true
that he accounted success less by the money that that success brought to
him than by the satisfaction of having outwitted his opponent. Whether or
not Tony knew his man before he came to Newcastle, it is certain that he
understood him now.

Match did not regard the money as of any great consequence. He took a
keen pleasure in the game for the game's sake and it was in this spirit
of eager interest that he awaited the culmination of his enemy's plan.

His watcher brought him two items of news that afternoon, one that Big
Bill Farrel had gone to London by the first train, the second that Tony
had hired the window of a small confectioner's shop in the main street
for two days, and that the contents of that window were being hurriedly
removed to make way for an interesting exhibit. No other happening marked
that afternoon. Having secured his window, Tony did not fill it. It was
not until the following afternoon that he showed his hand, simultaneously
with the issue of the evening papers.

At half past two Mr Match received a telegram from London.

'Heartiest congratulations and thanks for your help.'

It was signed 'Farrel'.

'Now who the dickens is Farrel?' asked Match with a frown.

He was cogitating when Tom, his young hopeful, burst into the room.

'I say, father,' he gasped, 'you didn't tell me you were going to do it!'

'Do what?' asked Mr Match, suspiciously.

'Why,' said the young hopeful, 'that Prince's Fund; you told me you would
not contribute a cent!'

Mr Match was on his feet.

'And how much have I contributed?' he asked quietly.

'Twelve thousand pounds. It's in the evening papers. That fellow Newton
has got a window in High Street pasted round with appeals for the
Prince's Fund, and a photographic enlargement of your cheque in the
centre.'

Mr Match collapsed into his chair. 'Good lord!' he said. Then: 'What do
the papers say?'

The young man took a paper and read:

'We understand that the Prince's Fund for Merchant Seamen is the richer
by 12,000 through the generosity of Mr Theodore Match of this city, a
cheque for this amount having been given by our patriotic
fellow-citizen.'

'Good lord!' said Match again. 'So that was his dodge! He couldn't get it
for himself, and so he got it for the fund.'

'Did you give him a cheque?'

Mr Match nodded. 'But I stopped it,' he said. 'That fellow's too clever
for me.'

'But you aren't going to let it go through?' said his agitated hopeful.

'Don't be a fool, Tom,' said Mr Match calmly. 'Stopping a cheque for one
of Newton's infernal schemes and stopping a cheque for a big national
fund are two different matters. He's got me all right. Don't you see what
would happen if I repudiated my gift? I should be pilloried from one end
of the country to the other.'

With a deep sigh he reached for the telephone and gave the number.

'That you, Gilbert? With reference to that cheque I stopped
yesterday--yes, the one for twelve thousand pounds. It is now in order.
Let it go through.'

He pressed a bell, summoned his secretary, and dictated a confirmation.
He went home that night a silent, thoughtful man, and answered the
congratulations of the few privileged friends who could approach him on
the subject somewhat absently.

The next morning when he got to his office, he found his banker waiting
for him.

'That cheque was cleared very quickly,' said Gilbert.

'Cleared?' said Mr Match in surprise.

The other nodded.

'It was cleared soon after I got your message yesterday afternoon,
through the London and Midland Bank of Newcastle. By the way, I see that
there is a contradiction about your gift in this morning's paper.'

Mr Match took the paper in his hand without a word.

We find we were in error in describing the charity which benefited by Mr
Match's munificence as the Prince's Fund. This error was due to the fact
that a facsimile of the cheque was shown in the High Street amidst a
number of appeals to support the Prince's charity. The money has been
devoted to Captain Newton's Cottage Homes for Seamen's Families.

Mr Match put down the paper.

'I gave the cheque,' he said, talking aloud to himself, 'I stopped the
cheque and then I authorised its payment, just as he said I would. It was
clever. He took the cheque, paid it into the London and Midland--he must
have opened a special account in Newcastle for some such purpose--and
started the story about my having subscribed to the Prince's Fund knowing
that the first thing I would do would be to cancel the stoppage of the
cheque--clever! Yes, I was overconfident, all right!'

He picked up the telephone.

'Give me the Station Hotel.' Then after a pause: 'Is Mr Anthony Newton
there? Put him through, please. Is that you, Newton?

'Yes,' said the cheerful voice of Tony.

'When you get tired of your career of crime,' said Mr Match, 'I can give
you a partnership in this firm.'

'Not on your life,' said Tony. 'You're not going to get your money back
that way!'

When Mr Match put down the telephone he was laughing softly to himself.



CHAPTER 5 - A LADY IN GREY


During the hectic days of war, Anthony Newton had met Sybil Martin. He
called her 'The Lady in Grey', and was a little terrified of her. It was
not that she was haughty, or that she was of herself terrifying. Hers was
a peculiar loveliness; a patrician type of beauty which awed without
inspiring.

The daughter of a poor nobleman, she possessed the qualities of the grand
dame to this extent, that, without effort on her own part, she impressed
people with a sense of their inferiority.

Jim Martin was Tony's colonel. Anthony was always puzzled when he met
people of Martin's position. He never knew whether they were rich or
poor. They seemed to have been born to the use of great houses and the
rights of perambulating vast estates, carrying under their arms guns of
costly make, wherewith to shoot expensively-reared partridges. They had
the entree to other great houses, and were free of shootings and
fishings. They called one another by their Christian names, and had a
host of mutual friends. Jim Martin was fatally wounded in the second year
of the war.

'Do what you can for the missus,' he said, just before he died.

At the first opportunity, Anthony had sought her out in her little house
in Curzon Street. She was disconcertingly cool and unemotional. Anthony
was hot and stammering before he had been with her ten minutes. Was there
anything he could do? Oh, no, nothing at all. She thanked him very much,
asked him to stay to lunch, and discussed air raids and a new war book
that was creating a sensation at the moment.

Anthony crawled out of her presence.

He had seen her three times since. Once, in the direst days of his
poverty, he had been loafing in Hyde Park and she passed in a beautiful
car. He raised his hat and she stared past him. Perhaps she had not seen
him? She was in grey, as usual, a silvery dove-like grey that suited
her.

The second time was after his excellent encounter with certain confidence
tricksters. It was in the vestibule of a theatre and she was waiting for
somebody. This time she smiled an acknowledgment to his bow and moved
toward him.

'I have an idea I saw you in the park a month ago, Mr Newton. My mind was
so occupied that I did not remember you until I had passed. Won't you
come and see me some day?'

'I shall be delighted,' said Anthony, sincerely. At any rate, his mind
was relieved as to her financial status. He sometimes wondered exactly
what he would have done if it had been less satisfactory.

At the moment he was engineering a coup, and it came in the nature of an
unpleasant shock to see the 'objective' hurrying to meet the girl he had
just left.

'Oh. blow!' said Anthony.

The squat, bald figure that sidled up to his queen in grey had been the
object of his very earnest study.

Mr Jepburn had not been born with that name. There had been a 'ski and a
'vitch' in it somewhere before he had left his native Poland, and he had
acquired 'Jepburn' from a packing-case he had seen lying on the quay at
Dover, when he landed as a third-class passenger with exactly twenty
roubles in his pocket and a passionate antipathy to the land of his
birth.

So 'Mr Jepburn' he became in those lax days, when men could change their
names with greater facility than they could change their shirts, and in
course of time he became rich. Many and interesting were the methods he
employed to acquire his wealth.

An East End Club, with a polyglot membership, started him on the road to
prosperity. Then his fortune took a sudden rise as a result of judicious
contracts placed by the Government. Later he formed what was subsequently
known as the 'Jepburn Circle'. In various parts of the West End, he
either acquired or rented houses, furnished or unfurnished, staffed them
with compatriot men and women upon whom he could rely, roped in a few
impecunious members of the nobility and gentry to act as hosts and touts,
and in an amazingly short time had seven gambling hells in full swing.

The name of Jepburn was associated with none of these. When you went to
Mrs Keluer Buizan's Belgian dances, you could not guess that Mrs Keluer
Buizan owned not a stick of the handsome furniture at 43, Flowerview
Gardens, S.W.; that she was neither the lessee nor the proprietor of the
house in which she lived, and that her household expenses, plus a
thousand a year, were paid for by a stout little man with a bald head,
who lived in a modest Bloomsbury flat.

People came to the dance and stayed to play, and the usual game was
trente-et-quarante. The croupiers were Mr Jepburn's own, the profits
of the game were also Mr Jepburn's, and they were invariably large, for
his croupiers were even better paid than his hostesses, and the gentlemen
who dealt the pack could, by the transposition of one card from the
bottom to the top, decide whether black or red would win. And that colour
won which was supported for the least amount.

Despite his enormous expenses, Mr Jepburn made thirty thousand pounds a
year out of each of his seven houses, and it was an awkward matter for
the police to deal with him, because the hostesses were people whose
names were known, the game was, to all appearances, a friendly game, and
the law is peculiarly respectful to the rights of individuals, especially
when those individuals are in their own houses.

Anthony mentioned Jepburn's name casually when he made his promised call.

'Jepburn?' said the lady in grey carelessly. 'Yes, I know him slightly.
He is rather amusing, and he knows all the best people. I suppose you
thought it was strange that he should be my escort?'

Anthony smiled.

'I never think about such things,' he said, untruthfully, 'He is not a
friend of yours?'

'No!'

The answer was instant, and the vehemence in her tone was unusual. She
evidently realised this, for she went on in her languid voice.

'Oh, no. There was to have been a big party, and really Lady Mambury was
my hostess, only three of the people, including Lady Mambury, had
influenza--it was rather tiresome.' He was relieved and she was quick to
notice. 'You don't like him?'

'I don't like or dislike,' said the diplomatic young man, 'but he has
rather a reputation.'

'What sort of a reputation?' she asked.

Anthony was in a quandary. He had no wish that Mr Jepburn should hear at
second-hand that he was suspect.

'Well... one hears things. About his gambling clubs?'

She was silent. 'Is that... a fact? I mean, is it generally believed that
he is... that kind of person?'

 'I shouldn't say "generally believed,"' he said, 'but that is the
 impression I received.'

There was another silence.

'How perfectly dreadful,' she said at last. 'Does Mr Jepburn know you?'
Mr Jepburn did not know him, confessed Anthony. He might have added his
gratification, for it was essential to his happiness and well-being
that Mr Jepburn should be ignorant of his identity.

Three nights later Anthony Newton came into contact with that gentleman.
Jepburn dined always at a famous restaurant and had a table reserved for
himself.

To this table one night came Anthony Newton, to all appearances, a young
man slightly drunk. And because he doggedly refused to rise from the
reserved table, and seemed willing and able to create a scene, Mr Jepburn
signalled to the head waiter to let him remain.

'You seem a particularly determined young man,' said Mr Jepburn, beaming
over his gold-rimmed glasses.

'You bet I am,' replied Anthony, with a certain shrill accent which was
foreign to him. 'Say! I'm a democrat! I don't stand for any of this
reservation business. In my country all men are equal. Get that!'

'You are an American?' said Mr Jepburn.

'I surely am,' replied Anthony, 'and I'll be mighty glad to get back home
again, for this is certainly the dullest little village I have ever
struck. Gee, it is about as bright as Gopher Prairies! I guess you've
read that book, mister?'

Mr Jepburn had never read any books except his passbook.

'You can't spend money in this little burg,' complained Anthony. 'I'm
going to Paris next week to see if I can't get one small piece of gaiety
into my system.'

Mr Jepburn was interested.

'It all depends upon what you call gaiety, hein? Some people call one
thing gay, some another. You can get anything if you pay for it. Perhaps
you cannot afford to pay, my frient.'

Anthony snorted.

'Can't afford to pay? Look here.' He thrust his hand into his pocket and
pulled out a great roll of notes, which Mr Jepburn observed with peculiar
interest. 'No, sir, this city is certainly Deadville all right,' said
Anthony. 'Why, I tried to get some guys into a game at my hotel, and they
thought I was a burglar when I wanted to make it twenty pounds to open a
jack-pot! They surely did!'

Mr Jepburn's faded eyes wandered round the room, and presently he saw one
of his men. He beckoned him across.

'Meet my friend Mr--?'

'Swashbuck--Arthur B. Swashbuck, from Kansas City,' said Anthony.

'My friend's name is Smith,' said Mr Jepburn. 'Maybe he can show you
round town, there are plenty of things to see, hey?'

He glanced significantly at Mr Smith. Mr Smith agreed that there were
many things that ought to be seen.

'I will leave you two young men to talk,' said Mr Jepburn, and shook
hands sedately. 'Perhaps you will come and sit here whenever you wish.'

'You bet I will,' said Anthony.

Mr Smith was a small-featured young man, immaculately dressed.

'Who's that guy, anyway?' asked Anthony, looking after the departing
Jepburn.

'Oh, he's an old gentleman I have met several times, quite a nice man,'
said Smith, carelessly. 'How long are you staying in London, Mr
Swashbuck?'

'Well, it depends what London can give me,' said Anthony. 'It is a blank
city to me, so far.'

'It will not be blank after this night,' said Mr Smith with conviction,
and he led forth his victim to the slaughter.

Mr Smith was evidently a person of some social standing. His car was
small but beautiful to look upon. He had a chauffeur excellently arrayed.

'There are a lot of places here that people know nothing about,' said
Smith, as they drove through the brightly lighted streets, 'and a man
could search without success from year in to year out and never hit upon
the bright spots. I am taking you now to the house of a friend of mine,
Mr Westbury Vach.'

'It is very kind of you,' said Anthony warmly.

'Not a bit,' replied the other. 'I have had so many kindnesses shown to
me by Americans that it is a pleasure to pay back something I owe.'

Mr Westbury Vach's house was a large mansion in Cadogan Gardens, and
there was apparently a dance in progress. The big saloon on the ground
floor was crowded with prettily dressed women and young and reputable
men. Later, Anthony was introduced into a saloon on the next floor, which
was not so crowded.

'They play a little game here,' said Mr Smith carelessly.
'Trente-et-quarante. It is rather amusing to watch, but I wouldn't
advise you to play, although it is the straightest game in London.'

It was also the smallest game that was played in any of Mr Jepburn's
houses. His establishments were graduated according to the means of his
victims...--

'Yes, it is a small game,' said Mr Smith apologetically. 'Come along,
I'll show you another place.'

He had some friends, he explained in the car, a Mr and Mrs Cresslewaite.
Their house was in a street off Berkeley Square. A footman admitted them
and again Anthony found a dance in progress; on the next floor, however,
seated round a large green table, were about fifty men and women, and
here the game was certainly more exciting.

'Yes, it is trente-et-quarante,' said Mr Smith, 'with a fifty pound
limit.'

At three o'clock that morning Anthony took leave of his new-found
friend. He was a hundred pounds poorer than he had been when he started
out, but he was more than a hundred pounds richer in experience. He had
seen four of Mr Jepburn's houses.

Anthony Newton had a small city office. It served less as a place of
business than a rendezvous for certain poverty-stricken young
ex-officers of infantry, for now that Anthony had become semi-prosperous
there was always a whisky and soda for callers. Here they forgathered,
smoking until the air was thick and blue, talking less of old battles
than of new struggles; and on the Monday morning following his exploits,
Anthony, coming into the office, found the room in the possession of five
bright young men who had shone on the battlefield, but whose glories were
now somewhat diminished.

'The fact is. Tony,' said Big Bill Farrel, 'there isn't a ghost of a
chance for us respectable murderers.'

Anthony surveyed the crowd in their shabby gratuity suits, relics of
those halcyon days when subalterns with a hundred pounds' worth of bank
notes in their pockets were as common as blackberries in September, and
he wondered and he grinned.

'I am rather glad to see you fellows here this morning,' he said, 'and if
you hadn't been here, I should have written to most of you.'

'What's the idea, Tony?' asked Bill.

'Brigandage,' said Tony.

Bill sighed.

'I've got to the stage now,' he said, 'where I find myself cutting black
masks out of old socks and polishing up my Webley in odd moments.'

There was a murmur of agreement.

'Nobody expects preferential treatment because one has been through the
war,' said Farrel. 'The only thing we ask is, that it shouldn't be
regarded as a drawback. I'm thinking seriously of holding up the bank in
my neighbourhood. It is run by three conscientious objectors and a
spiritualist!'

'You can cut that out,' said Tony promptly, 'and listen to your uncle's
new system of ethics. Smouching is an ancient and honourable practice
recognised in the best army circles, but it can only be carried out in a
gentlemanly manner if operations are directed against a sap-headed
government, a quartermaster-general, or a recognised tyrant. Don't you
fellows recognise that the surplus of wealth is in the hands of two
classes--the honourable and the dishonourable--the honest and the
thief? And as there are quite a large surplus of thieves to operate upon,
you needn't worry about holding up a post office or busting a bank! The
thing is to find a man with ill-gotten gains. If he is a murderer, too,
so much the better. We, being soldiers of considerable merit and valour,
find ourselves still at war with the enemies of honest finance and lawful
behaviour!'

'That is the line, Tony,' said Bob. 'But where is the victim?'

'The victim is on view daily from seven until eight at Parent's
Restaurant. He is a bloodsucker, a blackmailer, a man of no country, an
eater-up of gratuities, and he is other things as well.'

He looked round the crowded room at the youthful and eager faces.

'Boys,' he said solemnly, 'my several names are Ali Baba,
Chu-Chin-Chow and Robin Hood, and I am getting together a band for
one performance only. The path of glory may lead you to Wandsworth
Gaol but it is unlikely. You will have the sympathies of the public
if you are pinched, though that might not prevent your doing time.
Are you with me?'

The yell they raised was very much resented by the indent firm of
solicitors that occupied the suite below.

'Go down and tell your boss,' said Anthony to the clerk who was sent up
to expostulate, 'that we are extremely sorry to have inconvenienced him,
and that if the worst comes to the worst he is retained for the defence.'

The bewildered clerk went down with the message, which did not enlighten
his employer to any great extent.

On the following Wednesday night, when the street was practically
deserted, a large car drew up to the door of 903, Cadogan Gardens. It was
an old car, and it made wheezy noises. It was entitled to utter some
protest, for it was grossly overloaded. From a body designed to hold four
people, or five at a squeeze, eight men descended.

Tony knocked at the door and it was opened by the liveried servant.
Before he could shout, before he could reach the little bell in the
wainscoting. Big Bill Farrel's hand was over his mouth, he was jerked to
the floor, and a voice whispered horrific threats in his ear.

One man took his station at the door of the saloon where dancing was in
progress; the remainder, led by Anthony, raced up the stairs into the
gambling saloon.

'Keep quiet!' shouted Anthony in an authoritative voice, 'you are all
under arrest. Take that man, sergeant.' He pointed to the shrinking
croupier.

Instantly there was a babel of sound, a shriek, and a woman fainted, but
these were casualties which could not be avoided. Anthony produced a
large canvas bag from his pocket, swept all the stock of money at the
croupier's side into its depth, while Bill Farrel marshalled the
servants, and marching them into a small adjoining room locked them in.

'I know all your names and addresses,' said Anthony, 'and I do not intend
arresting you tonight. You will remain here in this room until my
sergeant, who will be on guard outside, allows you to go.'

Five minutes later the car was driving wildly to the house off Berkeley
Square. Here the procedure was the same, except that the liveried man at
the door made less resistance. Anthony ran up the stairs and burst into
the gambling room and stopped dead.

For the first two people he saw were Jepburn and the lady in grey. She
sprang to her feet in alarm at the sight of the men who crowded the
doorway. Jepburn, less energetic, glared around and rose more slowly.

'What is the meaning of this?' he asked, but Anthony did not answer. He
was looking at the girl, whose wide-eyed horror was pathetic to see.

'The police,' she breathed and then Anthony woke from his trance.

'All the players stand against the wall,' he commanded, and in three
strides he was at the croupier's side, and swept a huge pile of bank
notes into the open mouth of his bag. This done, he rejoined the girl.

'I want to speak to you,' he said quietly.

He took her outside to the deserted landing.

'What are you doing here, Mrs Martin?' he asked quietly.

'I'm--I'm the new hostess,' she faltered.

'The new hostess?' repeated Anthony, unable to believe his ears, 'what do
you mean?'

'I'm in Jepburn's debt. He holds three thousand pounds' worth of IOUs of
mine,' she said and avoided his eyes.

'But I thought--' he began.

'You thought I was rich,' she said bitterly, 'but I'm not. Poor Jim left
very little money, and that I have--spent.'

'This way?' he jerked his head to the room and she nodded.

'Just wait.'

'He went back to Jepburn, expostulating in strange and excited tones in a
language which was half French and half Polish, to the imperturbable
Farrel. He turned a glance of hate on Anthony.

'So you were the police all the time, eh? You were very clever, hein! By
God, if I had known who you were, I'd have--'

'Shut up,' said Anthony. 'You've got some IOUs of Mrs Martin's--where
are they?'

The man's eyes narrowed.

'Why do you want them?' he said.

'It comes to this, Jepburn--I either put you where I can find you and
have you deported to your own country, or I withdraw my men and say no
more about this business, on condition that you hand me Mrs Martin's
IOUs.'

Mr Jepburn was a quick thinker.

'You shall have them,' he said, 'if you will accompany me to my house.
But what of the money you have taken--?'

'That is going to a charity,' said Anthony virtuously. 'The
Ex-Officers' Subsistence Fund.'



CHAPTER 6 - ANTHONY THE BOOKMAKER


'Human nature,' said Anthony Newton, 'is dominated by two
vices--credulity and stupidity. It is said that a fool is born every
minute, which is true, but it takes a long time for him to grow up,
and the chances are that somebody will skin him before you meet him.'

'Spoken like a heartless criminal,' said Big Bill Farrel lazily.

They were at dinner at the Empress Hotel, and they were dining on the fat
of the land.

'I make these few remarks,' said Anthony, looking at his cigar
thoughtfully, 'because I have just come from an interview with the
amiable Inspector Parrit of Scotland Yard. Something of an exploit,
carried out apparently by persons with no particular regard for the law,
has come to the ears of the police. In other words, the story is going
around official circles than an unofficial police force raided two
gambling houses, got away with eight thousand pounds, and added to the
infamy of their conduct by robbing Mr Jepburn, the noble proprietor, of
certain objects of art which took their fancy when they visited him in
his flat.'

'I didn't take the gold snuff box,' said Bill Farrel.

'I did,' admitted Anthony calmly. 'I have a passion for gold snuff boxes
set with rubies. Besides, it has an historical interest. I believe it
came down from one of the Czars. It was a gift of Peter the Great to Mr
Jepburn's ancestor. Not that Mr Jepburn ever had an ancestor worth
mentioning, but it is a weakness of rich men to acquire ancestry at his
time of life.'

'What did the police say?' asked Farrel, interested.

'They knew I was the villain,' said Anthony coolly, 'and that they hoped
I wouldn't make a practice of impersonating the constabulary. I asked
whether it had been stated that the raiders had described themselves as
police at all, and he admitted that they hadn't, and that it was the
guilty consciences of the ladies and gentlemen who patronised Mr
Jepburn's establishments, which led them to believe that the eight
stalwart and good looking men, who had marched so sternly, who had
interrupted so rudely their little game, had some association with
Scotland Yard.'

He chuckled softly.

'It isn't a laughing matter,' said the serious Bill. 'I'm sure that that
crazy Greek who attacked you the other night in the street was set on the
job by Jepburn.'

'You are not surer than I am,' said Anthony, carefully removing the ashes
of his cigar. In fact, I saw Jepburn this morning, and told him that if
it happened again, that a lunatic foreigner tried to knife me on the
King's highway, I should come round to his flat with my confederates, tie
him to a bed and tickle the soles of his feet with feathers until he went
mad.'

Farrel gasped.

That's a pretty blood-thirsty threat.'

'He wouldn't understand any other,' said Anthony. 'These eastern people
are not to be dealt with in any other way. Where is the gang?'

Bill grinned.

'The gang is enjoying its ill gotten gain according to its several
temperaments. Dinky Brown is opening a hat shop off Regent Street. Tommy
Barlow is working a new racing system. Foreman has bought a pub.'

Anthony nodded.

'You didn't make much out of the job yourself,' said Farrel.

'I got my whack,' replied Anthony, 'and quite enough for my little
investment.'

'Your investment?' said the puzzled Bill.

Anthony nodded, felt in his waistcoat pocket, and produced a small
newspaper cutting.

Bill took it from his hand and read:

'Sleeping partner wanted with a thousand pounds. Huge profit; no risks.
Apply Box 943 Daily Megaphone.'

'The gentleman's name is Yarrow,' explained Anthony, between puffs at his
cigar, 'and he is a bookmaker--'

'A bookmaker,' said the incredulous Bill.

Anthony nodded.

'A bookmaker with a fairly strange record. He has had other partners who
have put in a thousand pounds, only this time he is not going to get a
sleeping partner.'

'But what sense is there in investing a thousand pounds in a shady
bookmaker's business,' said Bill, 'besides, he won't have any clients.'

'Oh yes he will,' said Anthony. 'He will have at least one client.
Yarrow's father,' he explained, 'is something big on the Stock Exchange.
He's big but he's a crook. In fact, he is as much of a rascal as his son.
But don't forget that, Bill,' he emphasised his point with his cigar,
'that Yarrow senior is a man of substance.'

'Mind you don't get stung,' warned Bill, and Anthony smiled.

He had his interview with Mr Silvester Yarrow the following morning. Mr
Yarrow occupied two rooms on the third floor of a building off
Piccadilly. It was handsomely furnished and equipped with the usual tape
machine and telephone.

Mr Yarrow himself was a sleek, perfectly dressed young man, whose hair
was heavily brilliantined. He brought to the outer office, to where he
came to meet the newcomer, a delicate fragrance of some exotic scent, and
he offered a white, well manicured hand to his caller.

'Good morning, Mr Newton,' he said with a smile. 'Will you come into my
office?'

Anthony followed him into a room which might more fittingly and
accurately have been described as a boudoir. Mr Yarrow liked pretty
things, hangings, heavy carpets of a peculiarly aesthetic hue, heavy
notepaper and purple sealing wax.

He was a thin, sallow-faced young man, with bright black eyes, and his
voice was gentle, even languorous.

'I don't keep a clerk. One can never trust those fellows,' he explained.
'Now, Mr Newton, you have read my proposition: will you come into the
business?'

'That is my intention,' said Anthony, 'except--' Mr Yarrow shot a swift
glance at him. 'Except that I do not like the idea of being just an
investor; I should like to play some active part.'

Mr Yarrow's eyes went down to the desk.

'Do you know anything about bookmaking--it is a perfectly horrid
profession and I am awfully ashamed of being associated with it,' he
said, 'but one must live.'

'I don't know anything about it at all,' said Anthony, 'except that
people send you money to put on horses. If they win, you pay them: and if
they lose, they pay you.'

Mr Yarrow's smile was beatific.

'It is interesting, I admit it, devilishly interesting,' he said. 'Very
well, if you wish to work and if you do not mind taking the desk at the
outer office, I shall be happy for you to play an active part. As I say,
I have no clerk, and you will be able to answer the telephone, open the
telegrams, and make a note upon a voucher form of all the bets which are
made.'

It seemed a rather dull business to Anthony. The whole of the afternoon
nobody telephoned, no telegrams came.

'It is the first day of Newmarket,' explained Mr Yarrow, 'there is very
little betting.' He looked at his watch. 'Go out and have a cup of tea
like a good chap, and when you come back, I'll go.'

Anthony thought it an excellent idea. He was gone a quarter of an hour
and when he returned, the face of Mr Yarrow was long and lugubrious.

 'A perfectly vexing thing has happened,' he said. 'Just after you went,
 a fellow named Bertie Feener called up and had fifty on "Merriboy" and
 the infernal thing has won at six to one!'

'Fine,' said Anthony, watching him rise and disappear.