CHAPTER XIX

NCl3

Joe Blaythwayt waddled into the sitting-room. He turned and gaped at the detective.

"Loud Speaking Telephones?" he repeated in an awed whisper. "My dear sir--my Very Dear Sir--I--er--I--I--I----" His fishlike mouth closed with a smack. "Why, what a coincidence! Finding you here, I mean. I didn't know you were friends of Jimmy's."

A gargantuan grin overspread Teal's homely features with the slow ponderous momentum of an incoming tide. Jimmy; James Norman Mattock. The connection with Joan Sands had eluded Mr. Teal, but now it had been suggested to him his mind invested it with all the immutable actuality of proven fact. The truth sounds almost sacrilegious, but it is that Claud Eustace Teal, flushed with the joy of discovery, was composing a little song on the lines of a well-known nursery rhyme. It ran something like this--

Mattock had a little Joan Whose soul was blushing poor, And everywhere lamb Mattock went His Joan went on before.

Mr. Teal was not a great poet, but he had a wonderful knack of getting a stranglehold on axioms.

"Funny that Jimmy never occurred to me," he said. "Let's take another look at that flat."

A novel lay on one chair, and when Storm picked it up to read the title a thin yellow envelope fell out. It was addressed to J.N. Mattock, and the postmark showed that it had been mailed in Putney at 2 p.m. the previous day. Storm smoothed put the slip of expensive creamy notepaper which it contained.

Raegenssen having disappeared, the office can probably dispense with your services for a few hours.

You and Sands will take the Torbay Limited from Paddington on the morning you receive this. You will go to Torquay and stay at the Spa Hotel. You will return to London by the noon express the next day.

£15 is enclosed for your expenses.

The signature was the device of the Alpha Triangle.

Storm passed the letter over to Teal, and when the detective had read it he pursed his lips.

"He's the sort of snake who would have an alibi handy," was Mr. Teal's sour comment.

The voice they had heard over the telephone was certainly that of a man--but whose? Mattock's? Blaythwayt's? Teal could arrive at no plausible solution. And an odd dozen little Triangles had slithered through their fingers that night, winning clear on the blindest, most hopeless bluff that had ever been put up in the history of New Scotland Yard. The detective was anything but satisfied with his evening's work, and proceeded to vent his spleen on the unhappy Joe.

"Who told you to come butting in here?" he wanted to know. "I'll tell you, Joe, you dillytanty bloodhounds rile me. Now, just you warble me that little fairy tale I asked you for--and put in an opening chorus saying why you come rubing round this manor at twenty to midnight."

"Really, there's no need for you to be so offensive, Teal," Blaythwayt protested miserably. "I happened to be in court when Mattock was brought up after the Triangle got Mecklen away from the station--I go round the police courts when I've got any time to spare. It's the best method of seeing Life in the Raw." Joe's tone suggested the suppression of nameless horrors witnessed in the metropolitan courts of summary jurisdiction. "And I'm interested in this case, as you know, so I shadowed Mattock home. Then I had to hurry away, but I wanted to ask him a few questions, so I came along to-night."

"What questions?"

Blaythwayt waggled a podgy hand.

"Material for Writing," he explained unctuously. "One should strive for Accuracy. I wanted to know what it felt like to be set upon by two scoundrels, how it was to be up before a magistrate, and so on. I have never been before a magistrate, nor have I ever been molested by armed desperados, and so I resolved to get my sensations at least at second hand."

Storm lounged into a settee and put his feet up. His glance commanded Teal to cut short the persecution, for Storm had his own idea of the right way to deal with _l'affaire Blaythwayt_.

"You go steady, uncle!" he warned. "If you aren't careful you'll be sampling sensations at first hand. Teal loves arresting people--if I wasn't here, I'll bet he'd pull you in on the spot!" he added, to the detective's annoyance.

"Arrest _me_?" gasped Blaythwayt as though he could not believe his ears.

"You!"

Storm's manner differed from Teal's as much as the attack of a tiger differs from the onslaught of an elephant. Storm's voice was buttered and honeyed. His words came guilelessly, but there were little knobs and spikes sticking out all over them under the glossy varnish.

"You! Blaythwayt, you're playing around with matches in a gunpowder factory! I'll speak to you plainly, because you're the uncle of a very great friend of mine. And my advice to you is--slide! Light out over the horizon and stay lit until this Triangle cyclone has gone past. You'll be safer. Mess about with yeggs and kiters, if you like. Even plain ornery murderers are fairly safe. But steer wide of Triangles! Triangles have got death dope on every point; they've got edges like Kropps; and there's a big bomb packed up in the Alpha. I don't want any dead uncles-in-law--it kind of pancakes the marriage festivities, to go off on your honeymoon hung round with black crepe. I'll tell you something: you're next on the list! You know too much. Now, be a sensible fellow, and pass on what you know, and then vamoose for the duration. Why did you go to Billingsgate?"

Blaythwayt twiddled his fingers round his umbrella uneasily. Once or twice his mouth opened, and then gold-fished shut again. Storm's tone had been very gentle, disarmingly so, but even the innocent Joe had felt the tang of one or two of those tiny needle-points that prickled through the velvet.

"I--er--well, I'll tell you. Teal told me that Raegenssen was under suspicion. At least, he was mixed up in the business somehow; and even if that 'somehow' was only being one of the men the Triangle was out to kill, finding out more about him might have given me a line on the Apex himself."

"And how did you hear of Billingsgate?"

Joe hesitated, sucking the crook of his umbrella. One podgy hand went up and tilted his pot hat back from his forehead.

"Can I speak without prejudice?" he compromised.

"More or less."

"Er--um!" Blaythwayt scratched his head. "Um!" He caught Teal's dissecting eye upon him, and dithered. "To tell you the truth, I was the second burglar at Raegenssen's," he blurted.

Storm was tapping a cigarette on his thumbnail. Teal was probing for a piece of gum which had lodged in one of his molars. The effect of the revelation was that Teal bit his finger.

"And did you recognise anyone at Billingsgate?" asked Storm calmly, and Joe shook his head.

"Only Susan," he confessed.

"And you didn't get your line on the Big Triangle?"

"No. But I learnt something else, and you know what it was. Susan saw it--I only heard of it from her," Blaythwayt dropped his voice impressively. "The Tunnel!"

Storm looked up.

"Oh, yes! Into the Tube. Did either of you find out where it left the Tube again?"

"No."

"Just by the Bank of England!" said Storm coolly, and the Teal and Blaythwayt jaws sagged limply. "The Alpha Triangle was going to smash the Bank of England--they'd got it all mapped out to a hair! But there was just one place where they got snookered. Tell me that one, Joe."

Blaythwayt nodded sagely.

"The vaults are flooded at night."

Storm struck a match and applied it to his cigarette. He looked at the other two through a long wisp of blue smoke.

"Yeh!" he murmured. "They ought to have tried an easier crib. It must have been ... peeving to have a bloomer like that in your calculations--even if it does compensate for having the whole balloon burst by a police raid!"

He climbed off the settee and stretched himself. His face was reserve itself.

"Just one other thing," he remembered. "How did you find out that 'Raegenssen' was 'Sud-Scandinavia Wood'?"

Blaythwayt smiled.

"That was easy. I mean to say, I couldn't be sure, but I Had My Ideas. Susan told me that you had been talking about a mysterious sawmill, and, as Raegenssen's banker, I knew that he had frequently passed cheques made payable to the Sud-Scandinavia. So I knew he had some connection. I found the address in the street directory."

"Thanks very much," said Storm casually. "I think that's all. Are you going to take my tip?"

"Er--um!" Joe looked mournful.

Storm flicked a short cylinder of ash into a flower-pot. His cigarette twirled skywards, his shoulders squared, his hands went deep into his trouser pockets. He looked down at Blaythwayt with a metallic hardness in his eyes, and the other shuffled his feet uncertainly.

"That's my last word--skid!" drawled Storm in a friendly tone under which only an ear attuned to his mood would have detected the cast-iron core. "Give her the gun, prospective uncle-in-law, and hit her up on all six. Chase yourself, and touch the ground in spots. Go rubbering round Canada, or hunt butterflies in Peru--go any place where they never see Triangles except in geometry books or on beer-labels or the rear wings of autos! Don't forget that warning. I'm serious! During the next two days there're going to be special trains running to Gehenna for everyone who's got a line on the Big Triangle, or who's ever had the chance to get a line on him. The Big Triangle himself included--that's my contribution. You come right into that catalogue, Blaythwayt. Give Sherlock II a rest. I guess he needs it."

Never for one moment had that undercurrent of command broken surface; but Joe felt rather than heard it, and a flush of half-hearted obstinacy stole into his plump cheeks.

"Now, when do you leave?" said Storm.

"I--er--um!" Blaythwayt was dubious. "I really don't see, Captain Arden, that you've----"

_Zzzzzzing! ... Zzzzzzing! ... Zzzzzzing!_

For the second time that evening the clarion summons of the hall bell jazzed into insistence, and Teal ceased mastication for a couple of seconds to frown. Followed the clattering thump of a knocker plied by no patient hand, and then a short pause....

_Zzzzzzing! ... Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzing!_

Something quite unrelated to any surmise about the identity of the testy one outside prodded the conscience of Mr. Teal, to his discomfort. The foundation of the fact in his misgivings was not long in receiving demonstration.

"More callers!" murmured Storm. "I wonder who this is."

He opened the front door.

"Thank you," said Joan Sands coldly, and marched past him into the sitting-room.

She stood aside to allow Storm to enter, and then placed herself across the threshold.

"Inspector Teal, I believe?" she said, looking straight at the portly detective.

"That's right," said Teal.

Flabbergasted as he was, he could not deny her dignity. She stood with her legs slightly astride, her white hands loosely holding the belt of her simple tweed costume, and a glacial inclemency had come into her baby blue eyes.

"Captain Arden, I presume?"

"Sure!" Storm bowed.

Her gaze shifted to Joe Blaythwayt, who had suddenly become conspicuous by his efforts to efface himself.

"Who's this, Arden?" she demanded. "Is he a split too?"

Storm smiled.

"He'll bless you in his prayers if you call him that. Let me introduce you," he said easily. "Mr. Blaythwayt--Miss Sands. I expect he knows your name. He's Teal's father confessor."

She looked at him suspiciously.

"What's he here for?"

"I think he dropped in for a chat with Jimmy. Isn't that it, Joe?"

"I--er--um!" began Joe confusedly. "The fact is, Miss Sands, I was especially anxious to have a Private Conversation with your--your--um!"

He broke off and looked about him wretchedly, as though his mind was clawing round desperately for a straw of assistance. His embarrassment, which increased with every second of that awkward hiatus, was positively painful. He almost wriggled in his distress, and for the first time Joan smiled.

"My lover?--I suppose that's the word you're jibbing at?" she prompted without a tremor. "You're unlucky."

"We thought you were away, too," said Storm brazenly, and she swung round on him.

"So that's why you came?"

"Hardly! We didn't think you were away until we'd come."

She looked at him with a frown, as if she thought he was being facetious. He appreciated the genuineness of her scepticism, and took the yellow envelope from his pocket and gave it to her. She read it through, and then opened her bag and took out a telegram.

"I've been spending the last two days at Hindhead," she said. "I got this wire this afternoon, and that's all I knew of Jimmy going away. Read it."

"Thank you."

Sorry dear shan't be home when you return sent Torquay important business back to-morrow.

JIMMY.

Storm folded the flimsy and handed it back.

"I see. The Apex must have thought you were in town." Storm whistled out a long jet of smoke. "Who knew you were going?"

"Only Jimmy," she replied, and then once more she was on her high horse. "But I'm not here to be cross-examined. I take it you've been searching my flat. That being so, I'd like to see your warrant."

There was an interlude of silence. Joe had succeeded in retiring to the ample background afforded by Mr. Teal. The detective, having had the guiltiness of his conscience materialised, chewed stolidly and was tongue-tied. Arden coaxed his cigarette to the other corner of his mouth and met the girl's imperious gaze levelly.

"We haven't got one," he said. "Like Mr. Blaythwayt, Teal and I were going to pay a little call on Jimmy, only we got in the wrong door and found a little mothers' meeting in progress. We were in time for the agenda, and stopped to--er--vote upon the motion."

"Don't be funny," she snapped.

"I'm as serious as double pneumonia," he assured her gravely. "Joan, don't pretend to be dense!"

"I'm only Joan to my friends, Arden," she cut him, but he refused to be high-handed.

"I'm your friend, Joan," he said imperturbably. "Whether you call me Captain Arden or plain Arden doesn't bother me any, because I'm not talking for myself--there's every mite of every law in this country, and all the power behind the Law, concentrated in my two hands! You may or may not be as innocent as you seem. We'll argue that later. But come a little tour of inspection and learn things!"

He led her into the outer sitting-room, and she followed impatiently. He pointed to the chairs drawn up round the long table, and the marks of recent occupation in the ash-trays and scattered cards. He exhibited the loud-speaking telephone, and then indicated the wire which ran into her private flat. He took her back and traced for her its route across the floor, under the rugs, to the ornate bookcase.

She did no more than cast a bored glance at each of the damning beacons of incrimination he picked out for her enlightenment. Her lips were tightened up, her face a mask, her bearing inscrutable.

Then he made her look at the bookcase. She obeyed pettishly, and turned to him again with a mutinous tilt to her small chin.

"Well?" she said. "Is that all?"

"Not quite! You've seen the loud-speaking telephone and you've seen the tapped wires. You've seen how anyone knowing the secret of that bookcase could speak through to the other room. Teal and I arrived in that other room in time to hear two men detailed to murder our one and only Inspector Teal. We think those orders were given from your flat. So we're healthily curious!"

"Well?"

"Anything but! It isn't every day you hear the order given for your own execution!"

She faced him boldly.

"Do you think I was the speaker?"

"I don't," said Storm. "For one thing, the voice I heard was too deep for the best woman mimic on earth to have produced. For another, you hadn't a key--you had to ring for us to let you in. Why did you come back if you knew Jimmy was away? Who was going to let you in?"

"I forgot I hadn't a key. Jimmy lost his the other day, and as I was going away I left him mine. He was going to have another key cut."

"Uh-huh. Rather absent-minded of you! What'd you have done--slept on the doorstep?"

She pulled off her hat and shook out her hair. Walking over to a side table, she helped herself to a cigarette from a silver box. She turned round with the lighted match in her hand.

"My God--are you _still_ here?" she exclaimed.

"That's real Mattock," Teal said, addressing Storm. "He tried that on me the other day."

"I'm sorry--we are," said Storm. "Now hear me, Joan! Who else had keys besides you and Jimmy?"

"No one that I know of."

Storm took a promenade up and down the room. She had rested against the table, and he stopped in front of her, eyeing her steadily and forcing her to meet his gaze. He said nothing, simply riveted her with that thoughtful stare. And he saw that tense silence rasp her nerves--saw her go a little paler under the paint and powder, and saw the quick straining heave of her bosom. Saw her mouth twitch ever so slightly, and saw the reflex, spasmodic jerk of her hand.

He smashed through her barricade of haughtiness by the sheer relentless battering of his will, and at last she turned her head away with a short shaky laugh and put a little distance between them, placing herself on the opposite side of the table as though to break away from that intangible attack.

"I hate talking like a detective story," Kit Arden said slowly, "but--if you've told me the truth--it looks ... bad ... for Jimmy, doesn't it?"

The blow that her intuition had sensed, namelessly and without logic, had fallen. He saw her wince and grip the edge of the table for support.

"I don't ... understand..."

"I'm sorry." Storm relaxed. The bombardment was lifted. His smile was as light and care-free as if there had never been an Alpha Triangle mentioned in that room. "That's all there is to be said, then. Except that I'll ask you to pass on to Jimmy the advice I gave Blaythwayt just before you came in. And that advice is, let up! Play with fire if you must get a kick out of life, but never do acrobatics on the chute of a blast furnace!... We'll move along now--I expect you're tired."

Blaythwayt, squirming and panting for relief from those taut surroundings into which he had stumbled, was in the van of that withdrawal. He made for the door as a scared rabbit scuttles to its burrow. Inspector Teal, more phlegmatically constituted, followed him with less speed and more self-possession.

Kit was the last to go, and he stayed behind for half a minute. He went up to Joan and held out his hand. She looked up at his face in uncomprehending surprise, and saw that the hard lines had gone and the flinty glitter was no longer in his eyes.

She put her hand in his, and he gave it a little squeeze.

"Kid," he said, "there's a lot of good in you. And one hell of a big brick of courage. I won't preach--I know you'd hate that. But you know what I mean."

How infinitely sweet and gentle his voice could be!

"I am sorry--honest!" said Storm. "But there's quite a way to go between saying you're sorry and coming round with a wreath. In a very few days the Triangle's going to smash, and you don't want to be part of the bang. So don't be silly. Get Jimmy away.... Good luck!"

From the doorway she watched him stride down the corridor. She was conscious of a vague, indescribable feeling deep within her. Something that troubled her, that she could not understand and yet was on the brink of understanding, seemed to have awakened against her volition. Something pleasant and yet rather frightening. Something that kindled up with the promise of a sweeping flame ... something that had died, was reborn.

"Captain Arden!" she called, and he stopped.

"Hullo?"

"Captain Arden." Her speech was a little faltering, a little tremulous. "You--you're the only busy I've ever met who was--pure white--all the way through."

He smiled and waved his hand cheerily; and then he turned to the stairs and ran down.

He found Teal and Blaythwayt waiting for him in the street, and the detective had his friend's arm in an ominously professional grip.

"Joe and me," said Teal, oblivious of grammar, "is going to have words!"

"I hope you won't be rude to each other!" said Storm piously.

They walked down Piccadilly together, and they had almost reached Burlington House when all three of them saw an amazing sight.

Down in Piccadilly Circus, where the statue of Eros once stood, there flickered into being for an instant a terrific blinding blaze of violet light. It seemed to lurch up from the roadway in one colossal wave of whirling, jagged, eye-tormenting luminance--a Cyclopean flood of flaring amethyst which stunned vision and paralysed the brain. In a thousandth of a second it was gone, splintering into a star-searing burst of intolerable dazzling white radiance shot with zigzagging streaks of orange fire. And right in the flash of that fearful disintegration came a shattering, detonating thunder that rocked the very earth under their feet and pounded and pulverised the senses into an agony of quivering helplessness. And then, on the heels of the awful reverberation, followed a mighty rushing wind which reeled them out of all equilibrium and hurled them dazed and breathless to the ground.