CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Grewgus did not pay his visit the next day as arranged. In the morning he received a wire from Newcombe, asking him for a respite of another twenty-four hours. It was evident the Colonial wanted to think the matter well over, in other words to consider which course would be the most beneficial to his own interests.

On the second day the detective presented himself with the seven hundred pounds in his pocket, the money which he devoutly hoped would soon pass from his keeping.

Newcombe was much better, had recovered marvellously in that couple of days. His lean face had filled out; there were no longer about him the signs of a deadly and wasting illness. He greeted his visitor with a rough good-humour. Grewgus, a shrewd judge of men, put him down as a good-tempered fellow in the main, inclined to be quarrelsome and vindictive when the drink overtook him, rather a man of moods and apt to act on impulse.

“Come along, mister, glad to see you. The doctor says I have made a marvellous rally. I’m a different man from what I was when you last saw me. A lot of fight yet left in old Tom Newcombe.”

Grewgus paid him handsome compliments on his changed appearance and laid on a little flattery. “Even now you look as if you could knock spots off some of the young ones. I should say you would be as fit as a fiddle in another week or ten days.”

The Colonial laughed his loud, hoarse laugh. “I guess a certain person will be bitterly disappointed to find his old pal is so tough. Ha ha! he’s wondering what has become of me. His money has come right enough, but I haven’t acknowledged it yet. I don’t quite know what I’m going to do about that. It depends.”

Grewgus did not answer. He was fairly confident he had won the day, but he did not wish to spoil matters by hurrying them unduly. He smiled agreeably and waited for Newcombe to speak again. “Well, mister, I’ve decided to accept your offer. Have you brought the ‘boodle’? If you haven’t we can adjourn this meeting till to-morrow. Another day will make no difference to me.”

Grewgus drew out a bulky pocket-book and flourished it invitingly in front of his companion. “I’m a man of my word, Newcombe. I wasn’t, of course, absolutely sure of what your decision might be, but I brought the money on the off-chance. You would like me to hand it over to you at once, eh?”

The man’s eyes had an avaricious gleam at this invitation. The detective thought it was a long time since he had handled such a sum. “What do _you_ think?” he said with a chuckle. “The money first, the information after. You would do the same in my place now, wouldn’t you, if you had the brains of a mouse?”

Grewgus could be as frank as anybody, when there was no necessity to beat about the bush. “I trust you more than you trust me, Newcombe. Here is the money. Count it over before you start.”

Newcombe began to count over the money. Suddenly he looked up at his companion with a rather aggrieved air. “I say, you didn’t answer that question. Wouldn’t you do the same in my place? It’s a matter of business, ain’t it, pure and simple?”

“Of course, my good fellow, I am not complaining. If I were you I would certainly have the money before I opened my mouth.”

Mollified by this rejoinder, the Colonial stuffed the notes in his pocket, and again burst into his loud laugh.

“Now, you’re a clever man, mister--a darned sight cleverer than I am, I expect--and I suppose you haven’t overlooked the fact that I might take the money and give you practically nothing for it.”

Grewgus intimated in his suavest manner that such a contingency had not escaped his intelligence. In some cases he would have taken greater precautions. He ended with a handsome compliment. “I don’t know much of you, Newcombe, but I’m pretty sure you’re not one of that sort.”

The Colonial looked pleased. “You’re right, Mr. Grewgus, I don’t pretend to be much, but if people play fair and square with me, I play fair and square with them. I’ve never rounded on a pal yet; I shouldn’t round on this swine if he hadn’t played the dirty on me. Why, a week or two ago I would have been cut into little bits before I would have given Howard Stormont away. That was when I believed him to be a pal, not a too generous one perhaps, but still a pal. Have you got me?”

“Perfectly,” answered Grewgus smoothly. “You would be a bit of a soft, I think, if you showed Stormont any quarter.”

The man’s eyes flashed with sudden fury, it was evident his hatred of his old friend was very intense, and that once having made up his mind, he rejoiced in getting even with him.

“Yes, that was a bad evening’s work for him, cleverly as he thought he had managed it. He was always very keen on the poisoning business, although mind you, I can’t honestly say that I ever knew of any case in which he had given it. But he was always fond of reading books on the subject. He used to laugh when he told me how people in the old days used to polish off their enemies with a poisoned glove or flower. He dropped a little drop of something into my drink that night, you bet--something that this fool of a doctor could not detect anyway.”

“And if you don’t get yourself out of this neighbourhood he’ll try it again. I shouldn’t say he is the sort of man to be baffled by a first failure,” commented Grewgus, whose object it was to keep the Colonial’s indignation at white heat. “And now, Newcombe, let’s get to business. You’ve counted the money and found it right. It’s for you to carry out your part of the bargain.”

There was just a touch of shamefacedness in the man’s expression, hardened character as he was, as he began his story.

“I’m not going to say more about myself than I can help, Mr. Grewgus. You won’t blame me for that, I’m sure.”

“Not in the least. To be quite frank, I’m not interested in your career, Newcombe. Stormont’s is the only one that concerns me.”

“Right-o! And if anything comes of it, you’re not going to drag me in. You promised that at the beginning, didn’t you?”

“Practically I did, and I repeat that promise now,” confirmed Grewgus.

“Well, mister, I’ll start with the days when I first came across Howard Stormont, when we both were young men. No need to tell you I wasn’t a model youth. If I had been, I shouldn’t have picked up with him, or rather he with me. Upon my word of honour, Mr. Grewgus, I never had much of a chance. My mother, I know, was a good woman, she died when I was a kid, I should say of a broken heart. My father was a ne’er-do-well, drunken, callous, dishonest. Unfortunately I took after him, but never in my life have I had decent luck. If I went straight for a bit, misfortune dogged me, and on the crook I didn’t fare much better.”

Proceeding with his narrative, the Colonial explained that at this period he was associated with a set of men who were not particular as to how they got their living, although they could not boast of being scientific or high-class criminals. The one thing to which they had definitely made up their minds was that they would not work, except under the direst compulsion. They preferred to beg, borrow, or, when necessary, cheat and steal.

Stormont, then quite a young man, a little while before was introduced to this promising association, and in spite of his youth soon evinced qualities that marked him out for leadership. It was whispered about presently that he had got into some trouble at home and that his relatives had insisted on his going abroad.

“I never knew precisely what the trouble was,” Newcombe explained, “but from all I could gather from a few things dropped by him when he had a little--for he was a heavy drinker in those days--it was about money. His people--he always used to boast that he came of a highly respectable family--paid his passage out and gave him a few pounds over. I understood he was not to go back to England till he could return with a clean bill of health.

“Him and me took a great fancy to each other. I don’t quite know what he saw in me, for I was rather a dull, plodding sort of chap compared with most of the men I associated with, who told me I wasn’t quite clever enough for the game. What I admired in him was his high spirits, and first and foremost his wonderful cunning and cleverness: he was always alert and up to every move on the board. He was also very generous, spent money like water when he had it, and most popular with his mates. They thought a wonderful lot of his abilities and prophesied that he would one day become a crook of the first water.”

“I take it, these associates of yours were not in the front rank of their profession?” interjected Grewgus.

The Colonial shook his head. “Certainly not; with the exception of Stormont they had neither the nerves nor the brains. A great deal of card-sharping, plucking raw young pigeons who had just come out, a little bit of easy swindling here and there, that was as far as they could go. Stormont was altogether on a higher plane. He had the brain to invent and elaborate big things.”

“And of course, he joined you in these agreeable pursuits, the card-sharping, the plucking of young pigeons, even although they did not give full scope for the exercise of his superior talents.”

“That is so, mister, and in a minute I’m coming to what you want to know. I take it, you’ve been making a lot of inquiries, but up to the present you haven’t been able to prove definitely he is the criminal you believe him to be. That goes without saying. If you could have got that information yourself, you wouldn’t chuck away seven hundred pounds on me.”

The Colonial, when he could keep off the drink, was evidently a clear thinker. With great modesty he had spoken of himself as a dull and plodding fellow, but Grewgus did not consider him as dull as he pretended to be. Probably intemperance had stood in his way: prevented him from being a successful crook and reduced him to his present position of subsisting on Stormont’s bounty.

“Well, the game wasn’t fast enough for him; the profits out of this petty kind of roguery were too small for a man of his ambitious nature and expensive tastes. Three or four times he launched out on things of his own--things that the others were too timid or too slow-witted to join in. And the last one brought him to grief.”

Grewgus leaned forward in an attitude of expectation. At last he was going to get something definite about the apparently prosperous owner of Effington Hall.

“It was rather a neat little bit of forgery. He had laid his plans well too, thought it all out very carefully, almost succeeded in fixing the guilt upon another chap, a perfectly honest man.”

“As big a scandal as that, eh?” was the detective’s surprised comment.

Newcombe indulged in a sardonic laugh. “Stormont wasn’t the sort of man to think of anybody but himself. As long as he could swim he didn’t care who sank. An innocent man sacrificed didn’t weigh heavily on his conscience. But clever as he was, the police just went one better. The other fellow’s innocence was proved and the guilt clearly fastened on the right person. I forgot to tell you that when he began to launch out on these dangerous _coups_ he changed his name from Stormont to Manvers. Under the name of Manvers he was convicted and sentenced to a pretty tidy term of imprisonment. Now, I’ve kept all the papers describing the trial and evidence. I shan’t give them up, of course; but if you give me your solemn word of honour to return them to me, I’ll lend them to you to make copies of.”

“Thanks very much; I’ll take them away with me when I leave. Does the name of Stormont occur in them?”

“Yes, they discovered he had been passing under the two, but they inclined to the belief that Manvers was the real one, and as Manvers he was convicted. Of course his old pals knew better.”

“And what became of him after he came out of prison?”

“He went back to England; I expect that sharp dose of imprisonment sickened him of Australia. He had been clever enough to put away the swag somewhere; it was quite a nice little sum. I’ve a notion he had a confederate, although I’m sure it was not one of the old lot, somebody much cleverer than we could turn out. He came to say good-bye to me and one or two others who had been his particular pals. He bluffed us that when he got back to his own country he was going to lead an honest life. For my part, I never believed it. Howard Stormont was a crook by instinct and he’d never do a bit of honest work if he could get money by any other means.”

“What do you know of his career between the time he left England and when you paid him that surprise visit at Effington Hall?”

“Practically nothing,” was the answer. “In the rough and ready life out there, one soon forgets things, anyway you don’t think continually of them. I had a lot of bad luck and after many years I worked my way back to the old country. As I was looking about for any kind of job that would keep my head above water, I began to think a good deal about him and wondered what he was doing, if he had struck oil or not.

“By the merest accident I got on his track, saw him coming out of some city offices unseen by him. A telegraph boy was passing at the time, and I asked him if he knew anything of the gentleman, slipping into his hand a shilling which I could ill afford. He seemed to know a good deal about him. He was a Mr. Howard Stormont--that of course I was sure of as, with the exception of growing stouter, he had not altered since the Australian days--that he was engaged in business, and lived in a fine house in Surrey at a place called Effington. I smartened myself up as well as I could, for I had very nearly come to the end of my tether, and went down there. Lord, he was struck all of a heap when he saw me, so was the flunkey who opened the door.

“He was always a quick-witted fellow, so as soon as he had recovered from the shock, he made the best of it, and took me into his study, where we had a long jaw. He told me he had gone in for finance--perfectly straight business, he swore--but it was terribly hazardous, and he owned he was living up to the hilt. Knowing his extravagance of old, I thought it very likely, but he might be pretending this in order to choke me off, as he could be pretty certain I hadn’t called upon him merely to inquire after the state of his health. He was devilish civil all through, of course; he knew I was acquainted with that nasty little episode, and he didn’t dare to ride the high horse.”

“And in the end you came to some little financial arrangement?”

“Why, naturally. But he made a hard bargain. When he had money, he was generous in a spasmodic sort of way; he would stand you any amount of food and drink, but he was never fond of parting with actual cash. The sort of man that would give you a dinner costing five pounds, and button up his pockets when you asked him for the loan of a quid. He said he’d try and find me a good job, and in the meantime he would allow me four pounds a week.”

“I should say you found it a tight fit,” remarked Grewgus, thinking of his companion’s fondness for liquid refreshment.

“You never spoke a truer word. But I couldn’t get him higher. He pretended that he was frightfully hard up, and that any moment he might have to give up his fine house. Of course, he knew I wasn’t in a position to bargain.”

A smile of reminiscence stole over the Colonial’s face as he continued: “I’m afraid I didn’t behave very well on that visit. He had on a swell dinner-party that night, which of course I didn’t expect to be present at, I wasn’t dressed for the part. I had a fine dinner by myself, and after his guests had gone, he came in and chatted with me for a few minutes, and set a bottle of whisky in front of me before he left.

“I’d been going very much on the teetotal lately, through lack of the ready, and when I saw that tempting bottle before me, I went at it with a vengeance. When I take a drop too much, I get quarrelsome, the stuff brings the worst of me to the surface. I began to think he wasn’t treating me too courteously, and I followed him into the billiard-room to have it out with him.

“He smoothed me down after a bit, and I had some more drink--there was plenty of it about--and I got from the quarrelsome into the stupid stage. I made a silly reference to a little prank of ours when we followed up a young greenhorn with a view to relieving him of some of his money. Luckily, he stopped me in time; his niece and her young man were there, but of course it was a silly thing to do. I think he was afraid of me from that moment, was never sure of what I might let out when I was in the same condition.”

Grewgus interrupted the flow of reminiscences relating to that embarrassing visit to Effington Hall. “Now tell me, please, all that took place on that day when Stormont took you to the restaurant.”

The Colonial’s face darkened at the allusion. “The scoundrel showed his usual cunning. You know of that little scene that occurred outside the house in that street, the name of which I never can remember. Ah, yes, Curzon Street. You remember how upset I was about it, how very near I was to giving him away on the evening you came across me. Well, I suppose Stormont had been thinking it over too, and came to the conclusion he had gone too far, offended me beyond forgiveness. Well, the next day, while I was brooding over it, he walks into my room, with his hand outstretched, and smiling all over his red face.

“‘Tom, old man, we’ve been too good friends in the past to quarrel now,’ he says. ‘Let us forget and forgive, and shake hands on it. I was so riled when you came up to me in that state, before all the crowd too, that I lost my head. I’m sorry if I spoke too harshly, but you must allow it was a bit rough on me. Let us both bury the hatchet.’

“I don’t think I’m a very vindictive man, except when somebody plays the real dirty on me,” urged Newcombe in his own defence. “And I was forced to admit to myself it was a trifle rough on him, as he said. Well, after a bit, we made it up and agreed to be friends again. He seemed awfully relieved, and proposed I should go out to dinner with him, not to one of the swagger places, which he knew I shouldn’t care for, but to a quiet little restaurant in Soho.

“We went there, and I had a splendid dinner, and as much drink as I cared to take. He drank plenty too, but his head was always harder than mine, and he would be sitting up in his chair when I was under the table. When I got home, I felt a bit muddled, and when I woke in the morning I knew I had had a warm night. But it wasn’t till the middle of the day that I began to feel really queer. I heard the doctor whispering to the landlady, and I caught the word ‘poisoned.’ When I was able to think things over, I began to tumble to what had happened. I understood why he had been so devilish civil. I had given him away in a sense twice. He was afraid of me, and thought there would be no peace for him till I was out of the way. The dirty dog! The dirty dog! I must try and not think of it more than I can help. It makes me see red when I do.”

There was a long silence after this rather furious outburst. Grewgus broke it with the question: “And have you any ideas as to what he has been doing all these years in England?”

Newcombe indulged in a rather cunning smile. “That’s not quite in the contract, is it, mister? I ought to ask a bit more for that, but still you have played fair and square with me, I don’t mind answering you. Mark you, I have never been able to get a word out of Stormont; he swears through thick and thin he’s on the square. But I’ve done a little spying on my own account, and I’ve come to the conclusion he’s after the same old game, but much bigger game. There’s no legitimate business done in that tinpot office in the city. There’s nobody there but himself and a man named Whitehouse, a solemn-looking sort of cove who puts in an appearance about three or four times a week. Have you come across Whitehouse?”

The detective nodded. “Yes, I know a little about him, not very much. A very old friend of Stormont’s, according to Stormont’s account.”

He did not tell him that the man carried on a solicitor’s business also, under the name of Glenthorne. It was a fixed policy with him to obtain confidences, not to make them.

“And I am pretty sure he _is_ a very old friend,” observed the Colonial. “The first time I spotted him coming out of that office in the City--I had placed myself where he wasn’t likely to see me--his face seemed familiar. There was a young chap, not one of ours, whom I’ve seen several times with Stormont in the old Australian days. He wasn’t known to any of our lot, and Stormont never said much about him, never mentioned his name, but I always had a notion they were in some jobs together. When Stormont went to quod under the name of Manvers, this chap disappeared altogether. Now, I’m not prepared to swear to it, but I’ve got more than a notion that this fellow--he was a young man then--and Whitehouse are one and the same person.”

Grewgus left presently, very satisfied with his day’s work, taking with him the papers which contained a full account of the trial and conviction of Manvers, otherwise Stormont. The next day he had a long interview with Lydon.

“Well, I don’t begrudge the money,” said the young man, after listening to what had passed between the two men. “We have now proved absolutely that the man is a criminal, and a pretty desperate one at that.”

The thing that was worrying him was this--had things now come to such a pass that he ought to pass on the information he had acquired to Jasper Stormont? Was it right that Gloria should ever return to her uncle’s custody?

Without mentioning his exact relations with the girl, relations which Grewgus already knew of from Newcombe, he put this question.

“Let’s wait a bit, something else of a confirmatory nature may turn up,” answered the detective. “You still want me to watch the little game going on at Curzon Street. Something may come to light there.”

And so it was left. Lydon would not approach Jasper Stormont just yet. There was still some time before he would return to China, and until then Gloria was safe from further association with her criminal uncle.

A week later there came to Grewgus a telephone call from the offices of Messrs. Shelford and Taylor, the solicitors.

“Is that you, Grewgus? Good morning.” It was Mr. Shelford speaking. “I am sending a client of mine, Lord Wraysbury, round to confer with you. A very serious business, I fear. He will explain it all to you. Divorce proceedings are threatened, but I think blackmail is the real object. You might know something or find out something about the people. Will twelve o’clock suit you?”

At the mention of Wraysbury’s name, Grewgus had a premonition of what was in the air.

“Perfectly, Mr. Shelford, I will be in,” he said. “What are the names of the parties?”

The reply was what he expected. “A young married couple of the name of Edwards. They live in Curzon Street.”