The Missing Million E-Book

Edgar Wallace

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

"YOU'VE dropped a flower, sir," said the beef-eater. Detective-Inspector James Sepping blushed and looked down guiltily at the three violets that lay on the gravelled parade ground.
He did not look like a detective, and seemed too youthful to hold any such exalted rank. He had the appearance of an athletic young man about town.
"No— don't pick them up, unless it is against the regulations of the Tower of London to drop flowers around. They look good there."
The burly Yeoman of the Guard, in his quaint sixteenth century dress, fingered his grey beard and looked suspiciously at the visitor. Jimmy Sepping appeared to be perfectly sober.

Leseprobe

THE MISSING MILLION

Edgar Wallace

1923 

 © 2021 Librorium Editions

ISBN :9782383830863

Contents

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

Chapter 3 | Chapter 4

Chapter 5 | Chapter 6

Chapter 7 | Chapter 8

Chapter 9 | Chapter 10

Chapter 11 | Chapter 12

Chapter 13 | Chapter 14

Chapter 15 | Chapter 16

Chapter 17 | Chapter 18

Chapter 19 | Chapter 20

Chapter 21 | Chapter 22

Chapter 23 | Chapter 24

Chapter 25 | Chapter 26

Chapter 27 | Chapter 28

Chapter 29 | Chapter 30

Chapter 31 | Chapter 32

Chapter 33 | Chapter 34

Chapter 35 | Chapter 36

Chapter 37 | Chapter 38

Chapter 39 | Chapter 40

Chapter 41

___________________

Chapter 1

"YOU'VE dropped a flower, sir," said the beef-eater. Detective-Inspector James Sepping blushed and looked down guiltily at the three violets that lay on the gravelled parade ground.

He did not look like a detective, and seemed too youthful to hold any such exalted rank. He had the appearance of an athletic young man about town.

"No— don't pick them up, unless it is against the regulations of the Tower of London to drop flowers around. They look good there."

The burly Yeoman of the Guard, in his quaint sixteenth century dress, fingered his grey beard and looked suspiciously at the visitor. Jimmy Sepping appeared to be perfectly sober.

"You're not supposed to drop paper, but there's nothing about flowers— thank you, sir."

Jimmy slipped a coin into the man's hand.

"I've an idea I've seen you in the Tower before, sir," said the beef- eater.

"I have been here before," drawled Jimmy vaguely.

He had brought that drawl from Oxford to the Metropolitan Police, and it had been the stock joke of the division to which he was drafted in the days when Officer Sepping wore uniform and walked a beat, reciting the Iliad to keep himself awake.

He stood by the flowers until the yeoman strolled away, for he was a sentimentalist, and every year on a certain day he came to the Tower of London to drop a flower on the spot where Fritz Haussman had smiled into a smiling sky. Fritz was a German and a spy. Jimmy had run him to earth and arrested him. Jimmy's evidence had procured his doom. And then one fine morning in May they had brought him out to shoot him, and he came gaily.

"May I smoke a cigarette?" he asked, and the Provost-Marshal gave him permission. He took the cigarette from his case and was returning it to the waistcoat pocket just above his heart, when he stopped and laughed softly.

"That will rather be in your way," he smiled, and, finishing his cigarette, he had walked, clear-eyed and still smiling, to the house of death, dying as Jimmy would wish to die, like a gentleman.

So every year came Jimmy to the place where Fritz had stood, and paid homage to manhood.

"Jimmy!"

He turned quickly at the sound of the voice. A girl was looking at him, amusement in her deep blue eyes, a slight figure of a girl.

"Hallo!" he said awkwardly. "You've got your hair up!"

She shook her head reproachfully.

"It is very bad manners to make comments upon a lady's appearance," she said severely. "Of course I've got my hair up. I'm eighteen! What are you doing here?"

He had not seen Joan Walton for two years, and the change in her was amazing. He had never realised before how pretty she was; her self-possession had always been a dominant characteristic, but it had taken the form of a gawky self-assertiveness which had been rather amusing. Joan had suddenly acquired a poise and a dignity which did not seem at all odd or amusing.

"I've come to see the Crown Jewels and the dungeons," he said glibly; "also the tower where the little princes were murdered, and Lady Jane Grey's initials carved on the wall. I'm a born sightseer."

She shook her head.

"I don't believe you. Rex says you are the busiest man in town."

"Is he here?" he asked quickly.

"He is here— and Dora. He is dining with you, on the night of nights."

Jimmy chuckled.

"Thursday, isn't it? Yes, I've seen a lot of him lately. What is the matter with him, Joan?"

They were strolling across the quad, and she half turned, making for one of the benches that faced the railed-off space where so many illustrious characters had paid the penalty for treason.

"Sit down— it is an act of providence meeting you. Jimmy, I owe you so much penitence— I won't say apologies. I used to be horrid to you about your being a policeman. It seemed so funny at the time—"

"Woman, you are forgiven," said Jimmy magnificently. "The jibes of childhood pass me by, and the pertness of adolescent pulchritude is as the droppings of the gentle rain."

"You are being rude— and I hate those long words... Jimmy, do you think Rex should marry so soon after Edie's death?"

The smile left Jimmy's face.

"I don't know..." he said slowly. "It is nearly two years, and it would hardly be fair to expect Rex to remain all his life faithful to her memory."

The girl's brows knit, and he saw the little hands clench more tightly about the handle of her parasol.

"Why cannot you find this horrible man?" she demanded vehemently. "It is disgraceful that he should be at large, Jimmy! Oh, it was wicked, wicked!"

Jimmy Sepping did not answer. The anonymous letter writer was a difficult proposition in any circumstances, but "Kupie" was no ordinary criminal. The day before Edith Branksome's marriage, she had been found dead, with a phial of prussic acid in her hand and a letter lying on the floor by the side of the bed. It had been a typical Kupie letter, setting forth cold-bloodedly an escapade of the dead girl that none suspected.

"We have done our best," said Jimmy quietly.

"Kupie is something more than a spiteful letter writer. There is a big business end to him. He has blackmailed half the prominent men and women in town, and poor Edie is only one whom he has sent to a suicide's grave." And then, to change the subject: "You like Dora, don't you?"

She nodded.

"I'm being a cat even to suggest that the wedding should be postponed. Rex is madly in love with her, and he is very fond of Mr. Coleman. But Rex is worried, Jimmy."

She shot a warning glance at him and, turning his head, he saw Rex Walton coming toward them.

With him was a girl whose arresting beauty never failed to arouse in the heart of Jimmy Sepping a new admiration. She was tall and fair. Her hair was of that rich golden tint that mothers strive to retain in their children, the live gold of youth. Grey eyes that held the graveness of wisdom, a complexion untouched by artifice. She smiled and waved her hand in greeting, and Jimmy rose to meet her.

Rex Walton was dark, broad-shouldered, and a little sombre of countenance. He was eight years the girl's senior— exactly Jimmy's age— and the two men had been at Charterhouse together, had gone up to Oxford in the same term, and had remained fast friends in spite of Rex Walton's enormous wealth and Jimmy's comparative poverty.

"What on earth are you doing here, Jimmy?" demanded the new-comer.

"Don't ask him," pleaded his sister. "Jimmy has the habit of evasion strongly developed."

"He'll tell me the truth," said the other girl as she sat down. "I think the Tower is wonderful, but it is a little tiring— and there are the dungeons to see."

"See them with Joan," said Rex Walton quickly. "I want to talk to Jimmy."

When Rex was worried, he was brusque and almost uncouth in his manner. Apparently his fiancee had already suffered from his mood, for she accepted his suggestion without question.

"I've been a brute this morning," said Rex when they were left alone, "and if Dora hadn't the sweetest temper in the world, she would have gone home. Jimmy, I'm rattled! I wish to heaven I could tell you everything!"

"About Kupie?" asked the other quietly.

"Yes... that and more. I've been a fool... yet perhaps I haven't. If I thought I had been a fool I shouldn't be asking your advice. And I can't even ask you now without breaking a confidence."

Rex Walton was a queer mixture of strength and weakness. His simplicity was proverbial, his physical courage had won him a colonelcy in the war, and there was hardly room on his broad chest for the string of decorations he had earned. The only son of a steel magnate, he had inherited a fortune running to the proximity of a million sterling, and his wealth, as Jimmy knew, was one of the principal sources of his worry. Rex had inherited the fortune without a scrap of his father's business quality. He was a mark for every swindling company promoter, a shining target which no begging-letter writer ever missed. Any plausible scoundrel was assured of his sympathy and help— any man who served with him in the war took money automatically.

"Have you had another letter?" asked Jimmy. For answer, Rex took forth his pocket-case and drew out a grey-tinted sheet of notepaper.

"This morning," he said tersely.

Jimmy smelt the paper. It had the smoky fragrance which was characteristic of all Kupie's epistles, and bore neither date nor address. It ran:

If you marry Dora Coleman, I will reduce you to beggary. However secure your money may be, you cannot keep it from me. This is the last time I shall warn you.

K.

Jimmy handed the letter back.

"He has said nothing about Dora... no rakings up from the past?" he asked.

"No— what do you think of it?"

"Twiff," said Jimmy contemptuously. "How can they take your money?"

Rex shifted uneasily in his seat.

"He took Pelmar's," he said. "I had a talk with— with a man who knows a great deal about this scoundrel, and he takes a more serious view than you."

"Who was that?" asked the detective curiously.

"It wouldn't be fair to say— in fact, I promised I would not mention that I had spoken. He advised me—" He stopped.

"Was it somebody important— an official?"

"Yes— somebody big at Scotland Yard."

Jimmy whistled, and the other went on hurriedly. "I should have spoken to you, but I met this other man in peculiar circumstances. He wasn't very keen on discussing the matter because he's scared of Kupie too."

"Who was it?" insisted Jimmy, but here Rex was obstinately silent.

"Take no notice of the letters," said Jimmy. "That's about the tenth you've received since your engagement was announced, isn't it? Kupie is clever, but not all-powerful. There are some things he cannot do. Does Dora know?"

He nodded.

"She takes the same view as you, but sometimes she gets very frightened, and that hurts me. Jimmy, can't the police get this swine?"

Jimmy did not reply for some time, and then:

"I'd give a lot of money to know the police officer who advised you to take Kupie seriously," he said.

Chapter 2

IN Room 375, at two o'clock punctually, the Big Three met in committee to discuss the profit and loss of the week. And invariably Bill Dicker was in the chair, and as invariably Jimmy Sepping acted as secretary, for he was the junior of the three. Miller, a dark, unemotional man, was the third.

Every week between the hours of two and four the Big Three discussed the week's "trading," examined profit and loss, compared plans for the coming week and passed under review the reports of subordinates.

No. 375 was not a very large office, and in spite of opened windows and electric fans the atmosphere was usually blue, for these men were great smokers of pipes— all except Sepping, who had a weakness for the brown cylinders of peace which Havana produces in large quantities.

On this bright May afternoon the sun was shining through the oriel windows, and there was a disposition on the part of the committee to let their eyes wander to the glittering river and the leisurely stream of traffic which passed up and down; to the vivid green of the spring foliage which fringed the broad boulevard of the Embankment; to the sweep of the County Council's gay new palace on the other side of the river— to anything except the trivialities which occupied or were designed to occupy their attention.

Only Bill Dicker, huddled up in his big chair at the head of the table, a picture of gloomy thought, never allowed his eyes to wander.

"What about that job at Greenwich?" asked the round-headed Miller, making a laudable attempt to galvanise the assembly into life.

"Harry Feld did that," replied Dicker sombrely. "By the way, Jimmy, you might mark the officer who sent the account to head-quarters; recommend him for promotion— he has probably got the necessary certificate. A smart man; the report he sent was a model of its kind. Yes, Feld did the robbery; he was pulled in this afternoon. Queer how these fellows specialise— Feld, I mean. He has never stolen anything in his life but bolts of cloth. I suppose he knows where to 'fence' it."

"The Hertford murder hasn't come on to our books?" asked Jimmy.

Dicker shook his head.

"They haven't asked for assistance. The Hertford police never call in head-quarters until they've let the trail get all trodden up."

Miller rose and stretched himself.

"That's about all, chief?" he asked. "By the way, we've located the factory where those American bills are made— but you had that in my report."

Bill Dicker nodded.

"I'm hoping we'll get this crowd, anyway. When Tony Frascati got away with a hundred thousand sterling we didn't shine, Joe. I still think that somebody at central office tipped him off."

There was no significance in his words; they were addressed to the room; it was almost as though he was speaking his thoughts aloud. But the dark face of Chief Inspector Miller flushed a deep red.

"I was in charge of the case, sir," he said stiffly, and when any of the Big Three addressed one another as "sir," there was trouble brewing. "We made every effort to catch Tony— I myself was at Dover watching the cross- Channel boats—"

"Surely," said Bill with one of his infrequent smiles. "It might have happened to any of us. Tony, being a forger on the grand scale, must have got one of our men squared. You couldn't help that, Joe. Anyway, Tony's dead— and it's seven years ago."

"I offered my resignation—" began Miller, but the other stopped him with a gesture.

"Forget it. We all have our failures. There is only one other matter," he said slowly, "and, Jimmy, you're interested in this: Kupie!"

"Lord, Bill, I forgot that you were going," said Jimmy in dismay. "And I wanted to talk to you about Kupie."

"And that was the one matter I wished to speak about," said Bill Dicker, rubbing his nose thoughtfully. "Kupie has to be stopped. You read what the Westminster coroner said about the Shale case? That's the second suicide this year, and there will be others. We can't have any idea how many people Kupie is after. I've been forty-three years in the police service, and I could count my failures on one hand. That sounds like boasting, but it isn't. There isn't a crook living that I've been after and haven't got. The four I didn't get are dead, anyway."

Chief Superintendent William Dicker spoke no more than the truth. Wherever convict met convict, they testified to his genius, his cunning, his ruthlessness. Men had walked dazed to the death house, the memory of his dour face present in their minds, even with the dangling rope before their eyes, his last grim jest overriding the whispered exhortations of the surpliced minister who attended them.

It was to Bill Dicker, who served before the mast of a windjammer for nine hellish months before rounding the Horn on the homeward trip, that Charles Barser, the bos'n, confided his share in the Telmark murder. Barser was drunk, and it was in the middle watch, when men are not normal— but he went to the gallows on Bill Dicker's evidence. "But Kupie has me rattled," he went on in his slow way. "It is a reproach to the police that this should be so, even though only a few of his victims have squealed."

"There won't be so many more squealing either," said Jimmy, lighting his cigar again. "Do you remember that City man that came here and wanted us to get back the letters he'd written to a chorus girl?"

"He hasn't been since— what happened?" asked Dicker.

"Kupie had the letters reproduced and printed. Every pal of his had a copy— his wife, his mother, his business associates, banker— everybody that counted. Kupie only circularised one of the letters— the City man paid. I had Collett up here to-day— Lawford Collett, the lawyer who had the case in hand. He says he advised the fellow not to pay a cent, but he's settled: cost him eight thousand. That is the new terror which he has introduced."

"Are there any fresh cases?" asked Dicker.

"Walton— but that isn't fresh," said Jimmy. "He has my poor friend rattled too. By the way, Miller," he turned suddenly to the dark-visaged man on his right, "you don't know Walton, do you?"

"Slightly," said the other.

"Have you ever spoken to him?"

"I may have done— why?"

There was resentment in his tone.

"He was telling me that somebody had advised him to take Kupie seriously. Somebody who seems to have pitched a ghost story about Kupie's omnipotence."

Miller's face was dark.

"I don't know what you mean by 'ghost story,'" he said sharply. "I certainly advised Mr. Walton to take a certain action which had been suggested to him. If you think Kupie—"

"Now, you fellows, don't snarl at one another," Bill Dicker interrupted. "I've a great respect for the power of Kupie: he has surely a fund of information about people—"

He stopped as the door opened and a uniformed constable came in, a letter in his hand.

"For me?" said Miller. He tore open the envelope and took out two sheets of typewritten matter. Dicker was talking to Jimmy when he heard the cry, and spun round. Miller was standing by the window, one hand at his throat, the other grasping the letter. His saturnine face was dead white, his eyes staring wildly.

"For God's sake!" said Bill Dicker, springing to the man's side. "What's wrong, Miller?"

Miller shook his head.

"Nothing... nothing," he said huskily. "Excuse me..."

He went out quickly; they heard the door of his room close, and the two men looked at one another.

"What's the matter with Miller— bad news?" Jimmy shook his head helplessly.

"I don't know. He isn't married, so it can't be family trouble. You know what he is; he never takes you into his—"

He stopped. The sound of the shot came distinctly, and in another second he was across the passage and was at Miller's door. It was locked. "Pass- key," said Dicker tersely, and Jimmy fled down the corridor. He was back almost immediately and Dicker unlocked the door and threw it wide open.

A thin blue wisp of smoke hung in the air, moving slowly. On the hearthrug lay Miller, a revolver clenched in his hand.

Jimmy saw the burning paper in the grate, and, stooping, blew out the flame. Only one particle of the paper remained.

"He's dead," said Dicker. "What's that? Break off the unburnt bit— we'll have the ashes photographed."

Jimmy Sepping laid the charred scrap on the desk, and in seven words and a half-burnt picture it told its story.

Fifty thousand  

Tony Fra  

Escape  

Banked  

Norwich  

Beneath was a part of the letter K.

"He banked at Norwich— I know that," said Dicker, and put his foot on the ashes in the grate. "And he let Tony go for half the loot; I guessed that too. And Kupie knew it."

He struck a match and burnt the scrap of paper. When it was ashes he dropped it into the grate.

"Never mind about that photographer, Jimmy," he said. "We'd better say he'd been strange in his manner lately— the service must come first."

He stooped and patted the dead man's shoulder.

"Poor fellow!" he said gently. "I'll get Kupie, Miller, and get him good!"

Chapter 3

"IF the detection of crime was as simple as the average detective story, I should solve all the mysteries of the world before I got out of bed," said Jimmy Sepping. "It is a pretty simple business, once all the characters have been introduced and you've had an opportunity of studying their various peculiarities, to narrow your suspicions down to two or three people. Obviously, the villain of the piece cannot be the open-faced hero with the curly hair, however damning the evidence may be against him. As obviously it cannot be the pure, blue-eyed heroine, or the inevitable friend of the family."

Rex Walton laughed softly and filled his glass from the long-necked bottle. He was dining at Jimmy's flat, and he was very ready to find life amusing, for it was the last night of his bachelorhood. Jimmy went on.

"If all villains were tall, dark men, who wore cloaks and sombreros and a sinister expression, and blue eyes were invariably a proof of innocence, life would run very smoothly— wait!"

He got up from the table and went out of the room, returning with a bulky volume under his arm. Clearing a space by the side of his guest, he laid the book down and opened it. It was a scrap-book in which were pasted photographs of men and women, interiors and exteriors of houses, letters, scraps of pencilled writings, rough plans, and, on one page, a few pressed flowers.

"Look at that man."

His finger touched the portrait of a smiling young man with deep-set, intelligent eyes.

"That is Ballon, the Gateshead murderer. He killed four women and disposed of their bodies so cleverly that we never found one. Who would you say that was?"

He touched another portrait. It was that of a man, broad-faced, menacing.

"Notice the small eyes, the irregular-shaped nose, the loose lower lip?"

"Another murderer," suggested Rex, and Jimmy chuckled.

"Chief Inspector Carter, who arrested Ballon. Carter is a bachelor who spends all his money on running a creche for poor children!"

He turned a leaf.

"Is that a good woman or a bad woman?" He pointed to another picture.

Rex shook his head.

"She looks a commonplace, middle-class woman to me," he said. "I should think it was a portrait of an old housekeeper or a faithful family retainer."

"Jessie Heinz— baby farmer," said the other briefly. "She killed seven children and was hanged at Cardiff."

He closed the book with a bang.

"When the police arrive on the scene in a murder case, they come into contact with the body of somebody unknown to them. All that body stands for, all its hates and fears and loves, all the complex of its life, are unknown. The strings that bound it to the world are cut. You have to work back and reconstitute its associations."

Rex Walton looked thoughtfully at the end of his cigar and gently tapped the ash into the coffee saucer.

"I wish to heaven you could reconstruct Kupie— and kill him," he said savagely.

Jimmy looked up quickly.

"I have tried, and so far failed. If you are normal you can never get into the mind of an anonymous letter writer. Kupie is more than that, I admit. He is a most expert blackmailer, but not all his letters are written for profit. Sheer wicked malice is behind half his letters."

"Go on," said Rex Walton quietly. "It always hurts, and to-night, of all nights, I should keep the matter out of my mind."

"I'm sorry; I had forgotten," said Jimmy, and tried to turn the subject.

"It was malice that made him kill Miller—"

Rex jumped from his chair as though he had been shot.

"Miller— which Miller? Not the Scotland Yard man? Good God!"

The terror in his blanched face was a revelation to Jimmy.

"You knew him? He was the man you consulted about this villain's warning?"

Rex nodded.

"Do you think... he was killed for that? How did they—"

"He committed suicide. I tell you this in confidence, Rex, because the part that Kupie played is not public property and never will be. They found something about him, something discreditable."

Rex shook his head wildly.

"It wasn't that," he cried, "it wasn't that! He was killed because he helped me. Because..."

"Well?" asked Jimmy as the man paused. Rex Walton took out his pocket- handkerchief and wiped his streaming forehead.

"I shall be glad when to-morrow is over," he said as he poured out another glass of wine (his hand was shaking, Jimmy noted and wondered). "Zero hour never got me like this, though I've seen men paralysed with fear. But we knew what was on the other side of No-Man's-Land. Kupie is unknown."

Then suddenly he laughed.

"I'm a fool," he said. "The thing I am afraid of can't happen— now."

Jimmy was instantly alert.

"Why not now'?" he asked.

At that instant there was a knock at the door, and his manservant came in.

"Miss Coleman and Miss Walton," he announced.

Dora looked lovely in a wrap of crimson velvet; pretty Joan Walton, with her bobbed hair and her virile face, almost suffered by contrast.

"This is not my idea of a bachelors' dinner," said Dora, a smile in her eyes. "Yet I'm sure you have not been dull, Rex."

Walton helped her out of the crimson theatre wrap she was wearing.

"No, I'm never dull with old Jim," he said, and there was nothing in his voice that would betray the strain he endured.

"What have you been talking about? Crime and murder, and things of that kind?" asked Joan. "Nobody ever helps me with my wrap— don't trouble, Jimmy."

She flung her cloak on to the sofa and pulled up a chair.

"The play was bad, and Dora was so full of her own thoughts that I couldn't even get her to say unpleasant things about the leading actor," she said. "What is that?"

She made to open the book on the table, but Jimmy stopped her.

"Not for little girls," he said. "It is my little book of horrors."

"Do let me see it," pleaded Joan, her eyes dancing. "There can't be anything more tragical in it than 'Sundered Lives.'"

"I thought 'Sundered Lives' was a comedy?"

"It is supposed to be," said Joan, and helped herself to a cigarette. "I feel in harmony with the criminal classes to-night. Observe the pained look in Dora's eyes!"

Dora Coleman laughed quietly.

"I'm not at all pained. You've been trying to shock me all the evening, but I absolutely refuse to so much as raise an eyebrow."

"My dear Joan," said Walton, with a little touch of irritation in his voice, "I do wish that you wouldn't bother Dora."

"It's good for Dora to be shocked," said Joan calmly.

She glanced over the table, picked up the wine bottle and read the label with a grimace.

"Dr. Budsteiner? How very dull!" she said. "I thought on such occasions as these the good yellow wine of Champagne was the only admissible drink. Jimmy, have you been giving him good advice?"

"I never offer advice to young married people, or young about-to-be-married people," said Jimmy. "It does not come within the province of a police officer."

Dora had taken a grape from the table and was nibbling it thoughtfully.

"Did Rex tell you his secret?"

Jimmy's eyebrows rose.

"I didn't know that he had a secret," he said truthfully.

"He has secret plans for the honeymoon," interrupted Joan with an extravagant flourish of her cigarette. "It is to be a honeymoon like no other honeymoon ever was! Nothing so commonplace as a journey to Venice; no flying off to the wilds of Scotland; no disappearance to Paris." She turned to her brother, laughter in her eyes. "Tell us now, Rex; you're amongst friends. I swear—" She wetted her finger and drew it with a suggestive gesture across her throat.

"You can swear until your eyes grow green," said her brother complacently. "That is my own mystery, which I share with nobody. It is a secret I shall tell my bride immediately after we leave the registrar. Now, young people, I'll take you home. You'll be at Portland Place to-morrow? We're having the wedding breakfast beforehand— I've told you that about three times. Then we go on to the registrar's office. No wedding presents, Jimmy." He raised a warning finger.

"Even the wedding present to the bride is a mystery," said Joan. "Personally, I insist upon giving a silver-plated cruet. It is an invariable practice of mine, and one from which I will not depart. People aren't properly married unless they have silver cruets— it's part of the ceremony."

Jimmy escorted them to the entrance of Halliwell House, the block of flats in which he lived, and watched on the sidewalk until the car had disappeared. As he stood there a man passed hurriedly and, stepping back, Jimmy came into collision.

"Sorry," said Jimmy, but the man hurried on without a word.

Jimmy went back to the deserted dining-room. Putting his hand into the pocket of his dinner-jacket to find his match-box, his fingers touched something unusual and he drew it out. It was a tiny celluloid doll of familiar pattern, a "Kupie" with staring eyes and smirking lips. About its little middle was a white ribbon sash on which had been written:

Keep out and stay out.

He looked at the tiny doll in amazement.

"Where the devil did that come from?" he demanded.

Chapter 4

MR. THEOPHILUS COLEMAN stood at one of the windows of his handsome dining-room overlooking Portland Place, and he was not in the best of humours. He was (as he told his associates at the Treasury) a creature of habit, due largely to his long association with a Government office. He rose at seven every morning of his life and walked the length of Portland Place four times. It mattered not whether the weather was fair or foul, snowing or lightning, blowing or sweltering. He took his constitutional, wearing, in the summer, a thin alpaca coat, and, in the winter, a very yellow jumper, which interested such milkmen, policemen and members of the working classes as were abroad at that hour.

At nine o'clock he breakfasted, having disposed of his meagre mail and read the first leader in The Times, that his views on the political situation might be brought up to date. Mr. Coleman never played golf, and remained (he confessed) a devotee to whist. In conversation he favoured a high tariff, a big navy and long skirts; his chief detestations were Socialism, Popular Education and America. To these causes, he argued, all the ills and evils of life and circumstance might be traced, and indeed were traced by Mr. Coleman.

He was a man of few inches, stout and very bald.

He wore fluffy grey side-whiskers, until one day, seeing by chance the portrait of a film star similarly, though more tidily, adorned, he was seized with misgiving. On learning that the screen artist was American, Mr. Coleman summoned his valet and peremptorily ordered the removal of the hateful appendage.

His face was rosy, his skin clear, and his many chins added to his appearance of comfort. During the war he had passed to the sinecure of an assistant secretaryship in the Treasury. And here, from ten o'clock in the morning until four o'clock in the afternoon, he initialled documents and passed them on to a superior, who also initialled them. Somewhere between Mr. Coleman and the chief of his department was a person who actually read them. Mr. Coleman had never been sufficiently interested to discover who was this painstaking individual.

Passing into the Treasury as a voluntary worker in the strenuous days of war, his services had not been dispensed with, and for an excellent reason. His salary was small. He had the manner and style of the prosperous Civil Servant, and there were many who thought he had been born in the Treasury.

This morning his habits were broken by the unusual event of a wedding. The small table at which he and his daughter would usually have sat and discussed a stately breakfast with stately views on the political situation and the movements of Canadian Pacific Railway stock, was replaced with a very much larger table smothered with flowers and glittering with glass and silver. Mr. Coleman felt he had been tricked out of his breakfast.

"Have Mr. Walton's trunks arrived?" he asked the grey-haired servitor.

"Yes, sir; they came early this morning. I have taken the liberty of laying out Mr. Walton's going-away suit."

Mr. Coleman eyed him disapprovingly.

"Gentlemen do not have going-away suits, Parker. They have morning suits and dress suits and lounge suits. You have laid out Mr. Walton's lounge suit?"

"Yes, sir."

"When Mr. Walton returns after the ceremony you will assist him to change, Parker. I have no doubt he will tip you liberally. He is a gentleman of extravagant habits— good morning, my dear."

He addressed his daughter, who had come into the room at that moment.

Few women look their best in the morning, but Dora Coleman was one of them. She looked very young and childlike as she crossed to her father and kissed him.

"Slept well, eh? Happy is the bride that the sun shines on, and it's raining, by gad!"

"I shall be happy," she said as she smiled into his eyes.

Lawford Collett arrived at that moment. A successful lawyer, he had the additional distinction of being Mr. Coleman's legal adviser. The fact that he was also Mr. Coleman's only nephew and Dora's cousin, was less important. As Mr. Coleman's legal adviser he had an importance which transcended all other distinctions in Mr. Coleman's eyes.

Rex Walton and his sister, with Jimmy Sepping, came together, and Rex was obviously nervous and distrait. His face lightened as he went to meet his bride, and for a while they stood together in the window recess, talking.

"Ah, Captain Sepping." Outside of Scotland Yard, only Mr. Coleman ever remembered Jimmy's military title. "Come to look after the wedding presents, eh?"

When Mr. Coleman jested, he jested ponderously and supplied his own subdued laughter. Jimmy smiled politely. "I understand there are no wedding presents," he said, and Mr. Coleman nodded gravely.

"Very wise, very wise indeed," he said. "Walton is a very rich man. Why rob his friends? What could we give him that he could not buy himself?"

"Fish knives," said Joan calmly. "Nobody ever buys their own fish knives. I've brought 'em with me."

Mr. Coleman did not like Joan. He never attempted to disguise his antipathy. She represented all that was modern, all that was vulgar in womanhood. She smoked cigarettes, she played games, she danced, not the stately dances that Mr Coleman's grandmother danced, but violent and indelicate jazzes, and she was pert.

"Everybody is here— Parker!"

He nodded significantly, and walking to where Dora and Rex Walton were standing, he led her by the hand to her chair.

Jimmy was on Joan's right, Lawford Collett on his left.

"Have you wheedled out of Rex the honeymoon route?" he asked, turning to the girl.

She shook her head.

"He's as dumb as an oyster. I don't even know the bridegroom-to-bride present. It is something awfully rich and rare, because the jewellers have been living at Cadogan Square for the past month, and I know that Rex rejected a pearl necklace worth thousands because it wasn't good enough."

She looked at the bride and sighed, and Jimmy guessed the reason.

"You are thinking of somebody— I don't think I should if I were you," he said in a low voice, and she nodded her agreement.

"I'm very fond of Dora— she's lovely and so sweet. But Edie was a very dear friend of ours. I wish Rex hadn't married... so soon after. I know he is still fond of her, and I'm really glad he is marrying." She changed the subject abruptly and was her old gay self in a few minutes.

The programme of the morning was a simple one. The marriage ceremony was to be performed at the Marylebone Register Office, after which the bride and bridegroom were to return to Portland Place and change. Walton's big sports car, laden with their baggage, would be waiting, and the happy couple would drive away to their unknown destination.

Jim caught his friend's eye and Rex smiled. He was happy in spite of his overnight fears. He could hardly take his eyes from the radiant girl who sat at Mr. Coleman's right hand.

And then that worthy man rose, glass in hand.

"I bet he'll start My dear friends,'" whispered Joan.

"I'll take that bet," said Jimmy, in the same tone, and lost instantly.

"My dear friends," said Mr. Coleman, "on this occasion, when two— er— loving hearts are to be united in the holy bonds of— er— matrimony, it behoves us to wish them the prosperity and happiness which— er—"

He finished at last to a murmur of applause. The deferential Parker bent over Rex Walton's chair and whispered something in his ear.

"Why is Rex going out?" asked Joan in surprise, as Walton went out of the room.

Apparently neither Mr. Coleman nor the bride thought his retirement unusual. Jim saw Mr. Coleman beckon Parker to him, and there was a brief exchange of question and answer. Mr. Coleman nodded his head and spoke to Dora, who said something inaudible to Jimmy, but which Joan heard.

"He asked Parker to remind him when it was ten minutes past ten," she said uneasily. "I wish he wouldn't do these things. He has a passion for surprising people— I suppose that he has gone to get his wedding present."

Five minutes passed... ten minutes, and Rex Walton had not returned. Mr. Coleman looked at his watch.

"Our young friend should be reminded that he has an important engagement at ten-thirty," he said jocularly.

Another five minutes went by, and then Parker went out of the room, to return almost immediately.

"Mr. Walton is not in the house, sir," he said.

And the search that followed failed to discover Rex Walton. He had vanished, and nobody had seen him go.

Chapter 5

JIM followed Parker up the stairs to the room which had been set aside for Rex Walton to change. A glance told him that the change had been effected, for the morning coat and striped trousers which Walton had worn were lying over the back of a chair.

"His overcoat has gone, sir," said Parker suddenly, "and his hat."

"What is the next room to this?" asked Jim, coming outside.

"That is Miss Coleman's own room, sir." The butler opened the door and showed a large and pretty bedroom. On the floor were two suit-cases, packed, and evidently ready for the contemplated trip. On the bed was a large dressing-bag, which was closed.

"Did you bring him up, or did he come by himself?"

"I showed him the way up, sir. He asked me to remind him when it was ten minutes past ten, because he wanted to go upstairs for something."

"Not to change?"

The butler shook his head.

"No, sir; Mr. Walton was changing on his return."

"Could he come downstairs without being seen by any of the servants?"

The butler hesitated.

"I don't know, sir; I will inquire."

Whilst Jim was conducting a search of the apartment, the butler went to make his investigations and returned with the news that no sign of the bridegroom had been seen in the lower hall.

"He could not very well have come down, sir, because two of the chauffeurs were waiting in the porch outside, and they have seen nothing of him."

"Is there any other way out?"

"There's a servants' stairway," said the butler, and led him to a corner at the end of the passage, where a narrow, circular stairway led to the basement kitchen. On the level of the first floor was a door. Jim tried the handle, and it opened. Outside was a small courtyard and another door.

"Where does that lead?" asked Jim

"To the mews, sir. There are garages and stables at the back."

Sepping crossed the flagged yard and found that this second door was also open. It was raining heavily now, and the mews was deserted. In spite of the downpour, Jim walked to the end of the thoroughfare without, however, discovering anybody who had seen the missing bridegroom. He returned to the dining-room. Dora looked white and ill, but if Joan Walton was pale, she was self-possessed. "What has happened, Jimmy?" she asked.

"I can't understand it," he said, shaking his head. "Had Rex any money with him?"

She nodded.

"He had a very large sum— three or four thousand pounds in notes," she said. "He told me that this morning, but wouldn't tell me why such a large sum was necessary."

"Are you perfectly sure he has left the house?" asked Mr. Coleman incredulously. "It is impossible! I've always thought of Mr. Walton as a man of honour, who would—"

"There is no need to alter your opinion of Mr. Walton," said Jim quietly. "He has not left the house of his own free will; of that I am sure."