The Complete Four Just Men (9 page)

The detective stopped reading, with disappointment visible on every line of his face.

‘I thought, sir, by the way you were carrying on that you had discovered something new. I’ve read all this, a copy of the article was sent to the Yard as soon as it was received.’

The secretary thumped the desk impatiently.

‘But don’t you see!’ he cried, ‘don’t you understand that there is no longer any need to guard Sir Philip, that there is no reason to use him as a bait, or, in fact, to do anything if we are to believe these men – look at the time – ’

The detective’s hand flew to his pocket; he drew out his watch, looked at the dial, and whistled.

‘Half past eight, by God!’ he muttered in astonishment, and the three stood in surprised silence.

Sir Philip broke the silence.

‘Is it a ruse to take us off our guard?’ he said hoarsely.

‘I don’t think so,’ replied the detective slowly, ‘I feel sure that it is not; nor shall I relax my watch – but I am a believer in the honesty of these men – I don’t know why I should say this, for I have been dealing with criminals for the past twenty-five years, and never once have I put an ounce of faith in the word of the best of ’em, but somehow I can’t disbelieve these men. If they have failed to deliver their message they will not trouble us again.’

Ramon paced his room with quick, nervous steps.

‘I wish I could believe that,’ he muttered; ‘I wish I had your faith.’

A tap on the door panel.

‘An urgent telegram for Sir Philip,’ said a grey-haired attendant.

The Minister stretched out his hand, but the detective was before him.

‘Remember Pinkerton’s wire, sir,’ he said, and ripped open the brown envelope.

Just received a telegram handed in at Charing Cross 7.52. Begins:
We have delivered our last message to the Foreign Secretary, signed Four. Ends. Is this true? Editor, Megaphone.

‘What does this mean?’ asked Falmouth in bewilderment when he had finished reading.

‘It means, my dear Mr Falmouth,’ replied Sir Philip testily, ‘that your noble Four are liars and braggarts as well as murderers; and it means at the same time, I hope, an end to your ridiculous faith in their honesty.’

The detective made no answer, but his face was clouded and he bit his lips in perplexity.

‘Nobody came after I left?’ he asked.

‘Nobody.’

‘You have seen no person besides your secretary and myself?’

‘Absolutely nobody has spoken to me, or approached within a dozen yards of me,’ Ramon answered shortly.

Falmouth shook his head despairingly.

‘Well – I – where are we?’ he asked, speaking more to himself than to anybody in the room, and moved towards the door.

Then it was that Sir Philip remembered the package left in his charge.

‘You had better take your precious documents,’ he said, opening his drawer and throwing the package left in his charge on to the table.

The detective looked puzzled.

‘What is this?’ he asked, picking up the envelope.

‘I’m afraid the shock of finding yourself deceived in your estimate of my persecutors has dazed you,’ said Sir Philip, and added pointedly, ‘I must ask the Commissioner to send an officer who has a better appreciation of the criminal mind, and a less childlike faith in the honour of murderers.’

‘As to that, sir,’ said Falmouth, unmoved by the outburst, ‘you must do as you think best. I have discharged my duty to my own satisfaction; and I have no more critical taskmaster than myself. But what I am more anxious to hear is exactly what you mean by saying that I handed any papers into your care.’

The Foreign Secretary glared across the table at the imperturbable police officer.

‘I am referring, sir,’ he said harshly, ‘to the packet which you returned to leave in my charge.’

The detective stared.

‘I – did – not – return,’ he said in a strained voice. ‘I have left no papers in your hands.’ He picked up the package from the table, tore it open, and disclosed yet another envelope. As he caught sight of the grey-green cover he gave a sharp cry.

‘This is the message of the Four,’ said Falmouth.

The Foreign Secretary staggered back a pace, white to the lips.

‘And the man who delivered it?’ he gasped.

‘Was one of the Four Just Men,’ said the detective grimly. ‘They have kept their promise.’

He took a quick step to the door, passed through into the ante-room and beckoned the plain-clothes officer who stood on guard at the outer door.

‘Do you remember my going out?’ he asked.

‘Yes, sir – both times.’

‘Both times, eh!’ said Falmouth bitterly, ‘and how did I look the second time?’

His subordinate was bewildered at the form the question took.

‘As usual, sir,’ he stammered.

‘How was I dressed?’

The constable considered. ‘In your long dust-coat.’

‘I wore my goggles, I suppose?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I thought so,’ muttered Falmouth savagely, and raced down the broad marble stairs that led to the entrance-hall. There were four men on duty who saluted him as he approached.

‘Do you remember my going out?’ he asked of the sergeant in charge.

‘Yes, sir – both times,’ the officer replied.

‘Damn your “both times”!’ snapped Falmouth; ‘how long had I been gone the first time before I returned?’

‘Five minutes, sir,’ was the astonished officer’s reply.

‘They just gave themselves time to do it,’ muttered Falmouth, and then aloud, ‘Did I return in my car?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Ah! – ’ hope sprang into the detective’s breast – ‘did you notice the number?’ he asked, almost fearful to hear the reply.

‘Yes!’

The detective could have hugged the stolid officer.

‘Good – what was it?’

‘A 17164.’

The detective made a rapid note of the number.

‘Jackson,’ he called, and one of the men in mufti stepped forward and saluted.

‘Go to the Yard; find out the registered owner of this car. When you have found this go to the owner; ask him to explain his movements; if necessary, take him into custody.’

Falmouth retraced his steps to Sir Philip’s study. He found the statesman still agitatedly walking up and down the room, the secretary nervously drumming his fingers on the table, and the letter still unopened.

‘As I thought,’ explained Falmouth, ‘the man you saw was one of the Four impersonating me. He chose his time admirably: my own men were deceived. They managed to get a car exactly similar in build and colour to mine, and, watching their opportunity, they drove to Downing Street a few minutes after I had left. There is one last chance of our catching him – luckily the sergeant on duty noticed the number of the car, and we might be able to trace him through that – hullo.’ An attendant stood at the door.

Would the Superintendent see Detective Jackson?

Falmouth found him waiting in the hall below.

‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ said Jackson, saluting, ‘but is there not some mistake in this number?’

‘Why?’ asked the detective sharply.

‘Because,’ said the man, ‘A 17164 is the number of your own car.’

Chapter 8

The pocket-book

The final warning was brief and to the point.

We allow you until tomorrow evening to reconsider your position in the matter of the Aliens Extradition Bill. If by six o’clock no announcement is made in the afternoon newspapers of your withdrawing this measure we shall have no other course to pursue but to fulfil our promise. You will die at eight in the evening. We append for your enlightenment a concise table of the secret police arrangements made for your safety tomorrow. Farewell.

(Signed) Four Just Men

Sir Philip read this over without a tremor. He read too the slip of paper on which was written, in the strange foreign hand, the details that the police had not dared to put into writing.

‘There is a leakage somewhere,’ he said, and the two anxious watchers saw that the face of their charge was grey and drawn.

‘These details were known only to four,’ said the detective quietly, ‘and I’ll stake my life that it was neither the Commissioner nor myself.’

‘Nor I!’ said the private secretary emphatically.

Sir Philip shrugged his shoulders with a weary laugh.

‘What does it matter? – they know,’ he exclaimed; ‘by what uncanny method they learnt the secret I neither know nor care. The question is, can I be adequately protected tomorrow night at eight o’clock?’

Falmouth shut his teeth.

‘Either you’ll come out of it alive or, by the Lord, they’ll kill two,’ he said, and there was a gleam in his eye that spoke for his determination.

* * *

The news that yet another letter had reached the great statesman was on the streets at ten o’clock that night. It circulated through the clubs and theatres, and between the acts grave-faced men stood in the vestibules discussing Ramon’s danger. The House of Commons was seething with excitement. In the hope that the Minister would come down, a strong House had gathered, but the members were disappointed, for it was evident soon after the dinner recess that Sir Philip had no intention of showing himself that night.

‘Might I ask the right honourable the Prime Minister whether it is the intention of His Majesty’s Government to proceed with the Aliens Extradition (Political Offences) Bill,’ asked the Radical Member for West Deptford, ‘and whether he has not considered, in view of the extraordinary conditions that this Bill has called into life, the advisability of postponing the introduction of this measure?’

The question was greeted with a chorus of “hear-hears”, and the Prime Minister rose slowly and turned an amused glance in the direction of the questioner.

‘I know of no circumstance that is likely to prevent my right honourable friend, who is unfortunately not in his place tonight, from moving the second reading of the Bill tomorrow,’ he said, and sat down.

‘What the devil was he grinning at?’ grumbled West Deptford to a neighbour.

‘He’s deuced uncomfortable, is JK,’ said the other wisely, ‘deuced uncomfortable; a man in the Cabinet was telling me today that old JK has been feeling deuced uncomfortable. “You mark my words,” he said, “this Four Just Men business is making the Premier deuced uncomfortable,” ’ and the Hon. Member subsided to allow West Deptford to digest his neighbour’s profundities.

‘I’ve done my best to persuade Ramon to drop the Bill,’ the Premier was saying, ‘but he is adamant, and the pitiable thing is that he believes in his heart of hearts that these fellows intend keeping faith.’

‘It is monstrous,’ said the Colonial Secretary hotly; ‘it is inconceivable that such a state of affairs can last. Why, it strikes at the root of everything, it unbalances every adjustment of civilisation.’

‘It is a poetical idea,’ said the phlegmatic Premier, ‘and the standpoint of the Four is quite a logical one. Think of the enormous power for good or evil often vested in one man: a capitalist controlling the markets of the world, a speculator cornering cotton or wheat whilst mills stand idle and people starve, tyrants and despots with the destinies of nations between their thumb and finger – and then think of the four men, known to none; vague, shadowy figures stalking tragically through the world, condemning and executing the capitalist, the corner maker, the tyrant – evil forces all, and all beyond reach of the law. We have said of these people, such of us as are touched with mysticism, that God would judge them. Here are men
arrogating to themselves the divine right of superior judgment. If we catch them they will end their lives unpicturesquely, in a matter-of-fact, commonplace manner in a little shed in Pentonville Gaol, and the world will never realise how great are the artists who perish.’

‘But Ramon?’

The Premier smiled.

‘Here, I think, these men have just overreached themselves. Had they been content to slay first and explain their mission afterwards I have little doubt that Ramon would have died. But they have warned and warned and exposed their hand a dozen times over. I know nothing of the arrangements that are being made by the police, but I should imagine that by tomorrow night it will be as difficult to get within a dozen yards of Ramon as it would be for a Siberian prisoner to dine with the Czar.’

‘Is there no possibility of Ramon withdrawing the Bill?’ asked the Colonies.

The Premier shook his head.

‘Absolutely none,’ he said.

The rising of a member of the Opposition front bench at that moment to move an amendment to a clause under discussion cut short the conversation.

The House rapidly emptied when it became generally known that Ramon did not intend appearing, and the members gathered in the smoking-room and lobby to speculate upon the matter which was uppermost in their minds.

In the vicinity of Palace Yard a great crowd had gathered, as in London crowds will gather, on the off-chance of catching a glimpse of the man whose name was in every mouth. Street vendors sold his portrait, frowsy men purveying the real life and adventures of the Four Just Men did a roaring trade, and itinerant street singers, introducing extemporised verses into their repertoire, declaimed the courage of that statesman bold, who dared for to resist the threats of coward alien and deadly anarchist.

There was praise in these poor lyrics for Sir Philip, who was trying to prevent the foreigner from taking the bread out of the mouths of honest working men.

The humour of which appealed greatly to Manfred, who, with Poiccart, had driven to the Westminster end of the Embankment; having dismissed their cab, they were walking to Whitehall.

‘I think the verse about the “deadly foreign anarchist” taking the bread out of the mouth of the home-made variety is distinctly good,’ chuckled Manfred.

Both men were in evening dress, and Poiccart wore in his button-hole the silken button of a Chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur.

Manfred continued: ‘I doubt whether London has had such a sensation since – when?’

Poiccart’s grim smile caught the other’s eye and he smiled in sympathy.

‘Well?’

‘I asked the same question of the
maître d’hôtel
,’ he said slowly, like a man loath to share a joke; ‘
he
compared the agitation to the atrocious East-End murders.’

Manfred stopped dead and looked with horror on his companion.

‘Great heavens!’ he exclaimed in distress, ‘it never occurred to me that we should be compared with – him!’

They resumed their walk.

‘It is part of the eternal bathos,’ said Poiccart serenely; ‘even De Quincey taught the English nothing. The God of Justice has but one interpreter here, and he lives in a public-house in Lancashire, and is an expert and dexterous disciple of the lamented Marwood, whose system he has improved upon.’

They were traversing that portion of Whitehall from which Scotland Yard runs.

A man, slouching along with bent head and his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his tattered coat, gave them a swift sidelong glance, stopped when they had passed, and looked after them. Then he turned and quickened his shuffle on their trail. A press of people and a seeming ceaseless string of traffic at the corner of Cockspur Street brought Manfred and Poiccart to a standstill, waiting for an opportunity to cross the road. They were subjected to a little jostling as the knot of waiting people thickened, but eventually they crossed and walked towards St Martin’s Lane.

The comparison which Poiccart had quoted still rankled with Manfred.

‘There will be people at His Majesty’s tonight,’ he said, ‘applauding Brutus as he asks, “What villain touched his body and not for justice?” You will not find a serious student of history, or any commonplace man of intelligence, for the matter of that, who, if you asked, Would it not have been God’s blessing for the world if Bonaparte had been assassinated on his return from Egypt? would not answer without hesitation, Yes. But we – we are murderers!’

‘They would not have erected a statue of Napoleon’s assassin,’ said Poiccart easily, ‘any more than they have enshrined Felton, who slew a profligate and debauched Minister of Charles I. Posterity may do us justice,’ he spoke half mockingly; ‘for myself I am satisfied with the approval of my conscience.’

He threw away the cigar he was smoking, and put his hand to the inside pocket of his coat to find another. He withdrew his hand without the cigar and whistled a passing cab.

Manfred looked at him in surprise.

‘What is the matter? I thought you said you would walk?’

Nevertheless he entered the hansom and Poiccart followed, giving his direction through the trap, ‘Baker Street Station.’

The cab was rattling through Shaftesbury Avenue before Poiccart gave an explanation.

‘I have been robbed,’ he said, sinking his voice, ‘my watch has gone, but that does not matter; the pocketbook with the notes I made for the guidance of Thery has gone – and that matters a great deal.’

‘It may have been a common thief,’ said Manfred: ‘he took the watch.’

Poiccart was feeling his pockets rapidly.

‘Nothing else has gone,’ he said; ‘it may have been as you say, a pickpocket, who will be content with the watch and will drop the notebook down the nearest drain; but it may be a police agent.’

‘Was there anything in it to identify you?’ asked Manfred, in a troubled tone.

‘Nothing,’ was the prompt reply; ‘but unless the police are blind they would understand the calculations and the plans. It may not come to their hands at all, but if it does and the thief can recognise us we are in a fix.’

The cab drew up at the down station at Baker Street, and the two men alighted.

‘I shall go east,’ said Poiccart, ‘we will meet in the morning. By that time I shall have learnt whether the book has reached Scotland Yard. Goodnight.’

And with no other farewell than this the two men parted.

* * *

If Billy Marks had not had a drop of drink he would have been perfectly satisfied with his night’s work. Filled, however, with that false liquid confidence that leads so many good men astray, Billy thought it would be a sin to neglect the opportunities that the gods had shown him. The excitement engendered by the threats of the Four Just Men had brought all suburban London to Westminster, and on the Surrey side of the bridge Billy found hundreds of patient suburbanites waiting for conveyance to Streatham, Camberwell, Clapham, and Greenwich.

So, the night being comparatively young, Billy decided to work the trams.

He touched a purse from a stout old lady in black, a Waterbury watch from a gentleman in a top hat, a small hand mirror from a dainty bag, and decided to conclude his operations with the exploration of a superior young lady’s pocket.

Billy’s search was successful. A purse and a lace handkerchief rewarded him, and he made arrangements for a modest retirement. Then it was that a gentle voice breathed into his ear. ‘Hullo, Billy!’

He knew the voice, and felt momentarily unwell.

‘Hullo, Mister Howard,’ he exclaimed with feigned joy; ‘ ’ow are you, sir? Fancy meetin’ you!’

‘Where are you going, Billy?’ asked the welcome Mr Howard, taking Billy’s arm affectionately.

‘ ’Ome,’ said the virtuous Billy.

‘Home it is,’ said Mr Howard, leading the unwilling Billy from the crowd; ‘home, sweet home, it is, Billy.’ He called another young man, with whom he seemed to be acquainted: ‘Go on that car, Porter, and see who has lost anything. If you can find anyone bring them along’; and the other young man obeyed.

‘And now,’ said Mr Howard, still holding Billy’s arm affectionately, ‘tell me how the world has been using you.’

‘Look ’ere, Mr Howard,’ said Billy earnestly, ‘what’s the game? where are you takin’ me?’

‘The game is the old game,’ said Mr Howard sadly – ‘the same old game, Bill, and I’m taking you to the same old sweet spot.’

‘You’ve made a mistake this time, guv’nor,’ cried Bill fiercely, and there was a slight clink.

‘Permit me, Billy,’ said Mr Howard, stooping quickly and picking up the purse Billy had dropped.

At the police station the sergeant behind the charge desk pretended to be greatly overjoyed at Billy’s arrival, and the gaoler, who put Billy into a steel-barred dock, and passed his hands through cunning pockets, greeted him as a friend.

‘Gold watch, half a chain, gold, three purses, two handkerchiefs, and a red moroccer pocketbook,’ reported the gaoler.

The sergeant nodded approvingly.

‘Quite a good day’s work, William,’ he said.

‘What shall I get this time?’ inquired the prisoner, and Mr Howard, a plain-clothes officer engaged in filling in particulars of the charge, opined nine moons.

‘Go on!’ exclaimed Mr Billy Marks in consternation.

‘Fact,’ said the sergeant; ‘you’re a rogue and a vagabond, Billy, you’re a petty larcenist, and you’re for the sessions this time – Number Eight.’

This latter was addressed to the gaoler, who bore Billy off to the cells protesting vigorously against a police force that could only tumble to poor blokes, and couldn’t get a touch on sanguinary murderers like the Four Just Men.

‘What do we pay rates and taxes for?’ indignantly demanded Billy through the grating of his cell.

‘Fat lot you’ll ever pay, Billy,’ said the gaoler, putting the double lock on the door.