Elk 01 The Fellowship of the Frog (17 page)

After seeing his subordinate safely caged, Elk went back to his room, locked the door, cut off his telephone and lay down to snatch a few hours’ sleep. It was a practice of his, when he was engaged in any work which kept him up at night, to take these intermediate siestas, and he had trained himself to sleep as and when the opportunity presented itself. It was unusual in him, however, to avail himself of the’ office sofa, a piece of furniture to which he was not entitled, and which, as his superiors had often pointed out, occupied space which might better be employed.

For once, however, he could not sleep. His mind ranged from Balder to Dick Gordon, from Lola Bassano to the dead man Mills. His own position had been seriously jeopardized, but that worried him not at all. He was a bachelor, had a snug sum invested. His mind went to the puzzling Maitland. His association with the Frogs had been proved almost up to the hilt. And Maitland was in a position to benefit by these many inexplicable attacks which had been made upon seemingly inoffensive people.

The old man lived a double life. By day the business martinet, before whom his staff trembled, the cutter of salaries, the shrewd manipulator of properties; by night the associate of thieves and worse than thieves. Who was the child? That was another snag.

“Nothing but snags!” growled Elk, his hands under his head, looking resentfully at the ceiling. “Nothing but snags.”

Finding he could not sleep, he got up and went across to Cannon Row. The gaoler told him that the new prisoner had been talking a lot to Hagn, and Elk grinned. He only hoped that the “new prisoner” would not be tempted to discuss his grievances against the police administration.

At a quarter to three he joined Dick Gordon in the instrument room at the Admiralty. An operator had been placed at their disposal; and after the preliminary instructions they took their place at the table where he manipulated his keys. Dick listened, fascinated, hearing the calls of far-off ships and the chatter of transmitting stations. Once he heard a faint squeak of sound, so faint that he wasn’t sure that he had not been mistaken.

“Cape Race,” said the operator. “You’ll hear Chicago in a minute. He usually gets talkative round about now.”

As the hands of the clock approached three, the operator began varying his wave lengths, reaching out into the ether for the message which was coming. Exactly at one minute after three he said suddenly:

“There is your L.V.M.B.”

Dick listened to the staccato sounds, and then:

The voice was clear and singularly sweet. It was a woman’s.

Dick’s heart was beating thunderously. He recognized the speaker, knew the soft cadences, the gentle intonations.

There could he no doubt at all: it was Ella Bennett’s voice! Dick felt a sudden sensation of sickness, but, looking across the table and seeing Elk’s eyes fixed upon him, he made an effort to control his emotions.

“There doesn’t seem to be any more coming through,” said the operator after a few minutes’ wait.

Dick took off the headpiece and rose.

“We must wait for the direction signals to come through,” he said as steadily as he could.

Presently they began to arrive, and were worked out by a naval officer on a large scale map.

“The broadcasting station is in London,” he said. “All the lines meet somewhere in the West End, I should imagine; possibly in the very heart of town. Did you find any difficulty in picking up the Frog call?” he asked the operator.

“Yes, sir,” said the man. “I think they were sending from very close at hand.”

“In what part of town would you say it would be?” asked Elk.

The officer indicated a pencil mark that he had ruled across the page.

“It is somewhere on this mark,” he said, and Elk, peering over, saw that the line passed through Cavendish Square and Cavendish Place and that, whilst the Portsmouth line missed Cavendish Place only by a block, the Harwich line crossed the Plymouth line a little to the south of the square.

“Caverley House, obviously,” said Dick.

He wanted to get out in the open, he wanted to talk, to discuss this monstrous thing with Elk. Had the detective also recognized the voice, he wondered? Any doubt he had on that point was set at rest. He had hardly reached Whitehall before Elk said:

“Sounded very like a friend of ours, Captain Gordon?” Dick made no reply.

“Very like,” said Elk as if he were speaking half to himself. “In fact, I’ll take any number of oaths that I know the young lady who was talking for old man Frog.

“Why should she do it?” groaned Dick. “Why, for the love of heaven, should she do it?”

“I remember years ago hearing her,” said Elk reminiscently.

Dick Gordon stopped, and, turning, glared at the other.

“You remember…what do you mean?” he demanded.

“She was on the stage at the time—quite a kid,” continued Elk. “They called her ‘The Child Mimic.’ There’s another thing I’ve noticed, Captain: if you take a magnifying glass and look at your skin, you see its defects, don’t you? That wireless telephone acts as a sort of magnifying glass to the voice. She always had a little lisp that I jumped at straight away. You may not have noticed it, but I’ve got pretty sharp ears. She can’t pronounce her ‘S’s’ properly, there’s a sort of faint ‘th’ sound in ‘um. You heard that?”

Dick had heard, and nodded.

“I never knew that she was ever on the stage,” he said more calmly. “You are sure, Elk?”

“Sure. In some things I’m…what’s the word?—infalli-able. I’m a bit shaky on dates, such as when Henry the First an’ all that bunch got born—I never was struck on birthdays anyway—but I know voices an’ noses. Never forget ‘um.”

They were turning into the dark entrance of Scotland Yard when Dick said in a tone of despair:

“It was her voice, of course. I had no idea she had been on the stage—is her father in this business?”

“She hasn’t a father so far as I know,” was the staggering reply, and again Gordon halted.

“Are you mad?” he asked. “Ella Bennett has a father—”

“I’m not talking about Ella Bennett,” said the calm Elk. “I’m talking about Lola Bassano.”

There was a silence.

“Was it her voice?” asked Gordon a little breathlessly.

“Sure it was Lola. It was a pretty good imitation of Miss Bennett, but any mimic will tell you that these soft voices are easy. It’s the pace of a voice that makes it—”

“You villain!” said Dick Gordon, as a weight rolled from his heart. “You knew I meant Ella Bennett when I was talking, and you strung me alone!”

“Blame me,” said Elk. “What’s the time?”

It was half-past three. He gathered his reserves, and ten minutes later the police cars dropped a party at the closed door of Caverley House. The bell brought the night porter, who recognized Elk.

“More gas trouble?” he asked.

“Want to see the house plan,” said Elk, and listened as the porter detailed the names, occupations and peculiarities of the tenants.

“Who owns this block?” asked the detective.

“This is one of Maitland’s properties—Maitlands Consolidated. He’s got the Prince of Caux’s house in Berkeley Square and—”

“Don’t worry about giving me his family history. What time did Miss Bassano come in?”

“She’s been in all the evening—since eleven.”

“Anybody with her?”

The man hesitated.

“Mr. Maitland came in with her, but he went soon after.”

“Nobody else?”

“Nobody except Mr. Maitland.”

“Give me your master-key.”

The porter demurred.

“I’ll lose my job,” he pleaded. “Can’t you knock?”

“Knocking is my speciality—I don’t pass a day without knocking somebody,” replied Elk, “but I want that key.”

He did not doubt that Lola would have bolted her door, and his surmise proved sound. He had both to knock and ring before the light showed behind the transom, and Lola in a kimono and boudoir cap appeared.

“What is the meaning of this, Mr. Elk?” she demanded. She did not even attempt to appear surprised.

“A friendly call—can I come in?”

She opened the door wider, and Elk went in, followed by Gordon and two detectives. Dick she ignored.

“I’m seeing the Commissioner to-morrow,” she said, “and if he doesn’t give me satisfaction I’ll get on to the newspapers. This persecution is disgraceful. To break into a single girl’s flat in the middle of the night, when she is alone and unprotected—”

“If there is any time when a single girl should be alone and unprotected, it is in the middle of the night,” said Elk primly. “I’m just going to have a look at your little home, Lola. We’ve got information that you’ve been burgled, Lola. Perhaps at this very minute there’s a sinister man hidden under your bed. The idea of leaving you alone, so to speak, at the mercy of unlawful characters, is repugnant to our feelin’s. Try the dining-room, Williams; I’ll search the parlour—
and
the bedroom.”

“You’ll keep out of my room if you’ve any sense of decency,” said the girl.

“I haven’t,” admitted Elk, “no false sense, anyway. Besides, Lola, I’m a family man. One of ten. And when there’s anything I shouldn’t see, just say ‘Shut your eyes’ and I’ll shut ‘um.”

To all appearances there was nothing that looked in the slightest degree suspicious. A bathroom led from the bedroom, and the bathroom window was open. Flashing his lamp along the wall outside, Elk saw a small glass spool attached to the wall.

“Looks to me like an insulator,” he said.

Returning to the bedroom, he began to search for the instrument. There was a tall mahogany wardrobe against one of the walls. Opening the door, he saw row upon row of dresses and thrust in his hand.

It was the shallowest wardrobe he had ever seen, and the backing was warm to the touch.

“Hot cupboard, Lola?” he asked.

She did not reply, but stood watching him, a scowl on her pretty face, her arms folded.

Elk closed the door and his sensitive fingers searched the surface for a spring. It took him a long time to discover it, but at last he found a slip of wood that yielded to the pressure of his hand.

There was a “click” and the front of the wardrobe began to fall.

“A wardrobe bed, eh? Grand little things for a flat.”

But it was no sleeping-place that was revealed (and he would have been disappointed if it had been) as he eased down the “bed.” Set on a frame were row upon row of valve lamps, transformers—all the apparatus requisite for broadcasting.

Elk looked, and, looking, admired.

“You’ve got a licence, I suppose?” asked Elk. He supposed nothing of the kind, for licences to transmit are jealously issued in England. He was surprised when she went to a bureau and produced the document. Elk read and nodded.

“You’ve got
some
pull,” he said with respect. “Now I’ll see your Frog licence.”

“Don’t get funny, Elk,” she said tartly. “I’d like to know whether you’re in the habit of waking people to ask for their permits.”

“You’ve been using this to-night to broadcast the Frogs,” Elk nodded accusingly; “and perhaps you’ll explain to Captain Gordon why?”

She turned to Dick for the first time.

“I’ve not used the instrument for weeks,” she said. “But the sister of a friend of mine—perhaps you know her—asked if she might use it. She left here an hour ago.”

“You mean Miss Bennett, of course,” said Gordon, and she raised her eyebrows in simulated astonishment.

“Why, how did you guess that?”

“I guessed it,” said Elk, “the moment I heard you giving one of your famous imitations. I guessed she was around, teaching you how to talk like her. Lola, you’re cooked! Miss Bennett was standing right alongside me when you started talking Frog-language. She was right at my very side, and she said ‘Now, Mr. Elk, isn’t she the artfullest thing!’ You’re cooked, Lola, and you can’t do better than sit right down and tell us the truth. I’ll make it right for you. We caught ‘Seven’ last night and he’s told us everything. Frog will be in irons to-day, and I came here to give you the last final chance of getting out of all your trouble.”

“Isn’t that wonderful of you?” she mocked him. “So you’ve caught ‘Seven’ and you’re catching the Frog! Put a pinch of salt on his tail!”

“Yes,” said the imperturbable Elk, untruthfully, “we caught Seven and Hagn’s split. But I like you, Lol—always did. There’s something about you that reminds me of a girl I used to be crazy about—I never married her; it was a tragedy.

“Not for her,” said Lola. “Now I’ll tell you something, Elk! You haven’t caught anybody and you won’t. You’ve put a flat-footed stool pigeon named Balder into the same cell as Hagn, with the idea of getting information, and you’re going to have a jar.”

In other circumstances Dick Gordon would have been amused by the effect of this revelation upon Elk. The jaw of the unhappy detective dropped as he glared helplessly over his glasses at the girl, smiling her triumph. Then the smile vanished.

“Hagn wouldn’t talk, because Frog could reach him, as he reached Mills and Litnov. As he will reach you when he decides you’re worth while. And now you can take me if you want. I’m a Frog—I never pretend I’m not. You heard all the tale that I told Ray Bennett—heard it over the detectaphone you planted. Take me and charge me!”

Elk knew that there was no charge upon which he could hold her. And she knew that he knew.

“Do you think you’ll get away with it, Bassano?”

It was Gordon who spoke, and she turned her wrathful eyes upon him.

“I’ve got a Miss to my name, Gordon,” she rapped at him.