The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation, J. S. Fletcher [best fiction books of all time TXT] 📗

he had of getting hold of some of the fifty thousand, if not all. And," continued Chettle with a laugh, "I'd a lot of talking and explaining and wheedling to do before he'd tell anything."

"Had he aught to tell?" asked Allerdyke. "So many of 'em think they have, and then they haven't."

"Oh, he'd something to tell!" replied Chettle. "Right enough, he'd a good deal to tell. This—he told me at last, as if every word he let out was worth a ransom, that he was a parcels office clerk in the North Eastern Railway Station at Hull, and that since the 13th of May until the day before yesterday he'd been away in the North of Scotland on his holidays—been home to his people, in fact—he is a Scotsman, which, of course, accounts for his keenness about the money. Now, then—on the night of May 12th—the night, as you know, Mr. Allerdyke, of your cousin's supposed murder, but anyway, of his arrival at Hull—this young man Martindale was on duty in the parcels office till a very late hour. About ten to a quarter past ten, as near as he could recollect, a gentleman came into the parcels office, carrying a small, square parcel, done up in brown paper and sealed in several places with black wax. He wanted to know when the next express would be leaving for London, and if he could send the parcel by it. Martindale told him there would be an express leaving for Selby very shortly, and there would be a connection there for a Great Northern express to King's Cross. The gentleman then wanted to know what time his parcel would be likely to be delivered in London if he sent it by that train. Martindale told him that as near as he could say it would be delivered by noon on the next morning, and added that he could, by paying an extra fee, have it specially registered and delivered. The gentleman at once acceded to this, handed the parcel over, paid for it, and left. And in a few minutes after that, Martindale himself gave the parcel to the guard of the outgoing train."

Chettle paused for a moment, and took a reflective pull at his glass.

"Now, then," he went on, after an evident recollecting of his facts, "Martindale, of course, never saw the gentleman again, and dismissed such a very ordinary matter from his mind. Early next morning he went off on his holiday—where he went, right away up in Sutherland, papers were few and far between. He only heard mere bits of news about all this affair. But when he got back he turned up the Hull newspapers, and became convinced that the man who sent that parcel was—your cousin!"

"Aye!" said Allerdyke, nodding his head. "Aye! I expected that."

"He was sure it was your cousin," continued Chettle, "from the description of him in the papers, and from one or two photos of him that had appeared, though, as you know, Mr. Allerdyke, those were poor things. But to make sure, I showed him the photo which is inside Lydenberg's watch-case. 'That's the man!' he said at once. 'I should have known him again anywhere—I'd a particularly good look at him.' Very well—that established who the sender of the parcel was. Now then, the next thing was—to whom was it sent. Well, this Martindale had copied down the name and address from the station books, and he handed me the slip of paper. Can you make any guess at it, Mr. Allerdyke?"

"Damn guess-work!" replied Allerdyke. "Speak out!"

Chettle leaned nearer, with an instinctive glance at the door. He lowered his voice to a whisper.

"That parcel was addressed to Franklin Fullaway, Esq., The Waldorf Hotel,
Aldwych, London," he said. "There!"

Allerdyke slowly rose from his seat, stared at his visitor, half-moved across the floor, as if he had some instinctive notion of going somewhere—and then suddenly sat down again.

"Aye!" he said. "Aye!—but was it ever delivered?"

"I'm coming to that," replied Chettle. "That, of course, is the big thing—the prime consideration. I heard all this young fellow Martindale had to tell—nothing much more than that, except small details as to what would be the likely progress of the parcel, and then I gave him strict instructions to keep his own counsel until I saw him again—after which I caught the afternoon train to town. Martindale had told me where the parcel would be delivered from, so as soon as I arrived at King's Cross I went to the proper place. I had to tell 'em, of course, who I was, and what I was after, and to produce my credentials before they turned up their books and papers to trace the delivery of the parcel. That, of course, wasn't a long or difficult matter, as I had the exact date—May 13th. They soon put the delivery sheet of that particular morning before me. And there it all was—"

"And—it was delivered to and received by—who?" broke in Allerdyke eagerly. "Who, man?"

"Signed for by Mary Marlow for Franklin Fullaway," answered Chettle in the same low tones. "Delivered—here—about half-past twelve. So—there you are! That is—if you know where we are!"

Allerdyke, whose cigar had gone out, relighted it with a trembling hand.

"My God!" he said in a fierce, concentrated voice as he flung the match away. "This is getting—you're sure there was no mistaking the signature?" he went on, interrupting himself. "No mistake about it?"

"It was a woman's writing, and an educated woman's writing, anyway," said Chettle. "And plain enough. But there was one thing that rather struck me and that they couldn't explain, though they said I could have it explained by inquiry of the clerk who had the books in charge on May 13th and the boy who actually delivered the parcel—neither of 'em was about this evening."

"What?" demanded Allerdyke.

"Why, this," answered Chettle. "The parcel had evidently been signed for twice. The line on which the signatures were placed had two initials in pencil on it—scribbled hurriedly. The initials were 'F.F.' Over that was the other in ink—what I tell you: Mary Marlow for Frank Fullaway."

Allerdyke let his mind go back to the events of May 13th.

"You say the parcel was delivered here at twelve-thirty noon on May 13th?" he said presently. "Of course, Fullaway wasn't here then. He'd set off to me at Hull two or three hours before that. He joined me at Hull soon after two that day. And what I'm wondering is—does he know of that parcel's arrival here in his absence. Did he ever get it? If he did, why has he never mentioned it to me? Coming, as it did, from—James!"

"There's a much more important question than that, Mr. Allerdyke," said
Chettle. "This—what was in that parcel?"

Allerdyke started. So far he had been concentrating on the facts given him by the detective—further he had not yet gone.

"Why!" he asked, a sudden suspicion beginning to dawn on him. "Good
God!—you don't suggest—"

"My belief, Mr. Allerdyke," said Chettle, quietly and emphatically, "is that the parcel contained the Russian lady's jewels! I do believe it—and I'll lay anything I'm right, too."

Allerdyke shook his head.

"Nay, nay!" he said incredulously. "I can't think that James would send a quarter of a million pounds' worth of jewels in a brown paper parcel by train! Come, now!"

Chettle shook his head, too—but in contradiction, "I've known of much stranger things than that, Mr. Allerdyke," he said confidently. "Very much stranger things. Your cousin, according to your account of him, was an uncommonly sharp man. He was quick at sizing up things and people. He was the sort—as you've represented him to me—that was what's termed fertile in resource. Now, I've been theorizing a bit as I came up in the train; one's got to in my line, you know. Supposing your cousin got an idea that thieves were on his track?—supposing he himself fancied that there was danger in that hotel at Hull? What would occur to him but to get rid of his valuable consignment, as we'll call it? And what particular danger was there in sending a very ordinary-looking parcel as he did? The thing's done every day—by train or post every day valuable parcels of diamonds, for instance, are sent between London and Paris. The chances of that parcel being lost between Hull and this hotel were—infinitesimal! I honestly believe, sir, that those jewels were in that parcel—sent to be safe."

"In that case you'd have thought he'd have wired Fullaway of their dispatch," said Allerdyke.

"How do we know that he didn't intend to, first thing in the morning?" asked Chettle. "He probably did intend to—but he wasn't there to do it in the morning, poor gentleman! No—and now the thing is, Mr. Allerdyke—prompt action! What do you think, sir?"

"You mean—go and tell everything to your people at headquarters?" asked
Allerdyke.

"I shall have to," answered Chettle. "There's no option for me—now. What
I meant was—are you prepared to tell them all you know?"

"Yes!" replied Allerdyke. "At least, I will be in the morning—first thing. I'll just tell you how things have gone to-day. Now," he continued, when he had given Chettle a full account of the recent happenings, "you stay here to-night—you can have my chauffeur's room, next to mine—and in the morning I'll telephone to Appleyard to meet us outside of New Scotland Yard, and after a word or two with him, we'll see your chief, and then—"

Chettle shook his head.

"If that woman got a night's start, Mr. Allerdyke—" he began.

"Can't help it now," said Allerdyke decisively. "Besides, you don't know what Appleyard mayn't have learned during the night."

But when Appleyard met them in Whitehall next morning, in response to
Allerdyke's telephone summons, his only news was that neither Rayner nor
Miss Slade had returned to the Pompadour, and without another word
Allerdyke motioned Chettle to lead the way to the man in authority.

CHAPTER XXX THE PACKET IN THE SAFE

It was to a hastily called together gathering of high police officials that the three visitors told all they knew. One after another they related their various stories—Chettle of his doings and discoveries at Hull, Allerdyke of what had gone on at the hotel, Appleyard of the mysterious double identity of the woman who was Miss Slade in one place and Mrs. Marlow in another. The officials listened quietly and absorbedly, rarely interrupting the narrators except to ask a searching question. And in the end they talked together apart, after which all went away except the man who had kept his hands on the reins from the beginning. He turned to his visitors with an air of decision.

"Well, of course, there's but one thing to be done, now," he said. "We must get a warrant for this woman's arrest at once. We must also get a search warrant and examine her belongings at that private hotel you've told us of, Mr. Appleyard. All that shall be done immediately. But first I want you to tell me one or two things. What are those two men you spoke of doing—the Gaffneys?"

"One of them, the chauffeur, is hanging about the Pompadour," replied Appleyard. "The other—Albert—has gone down to Cannon Street to see if he can trace the driver of the taxi-cab in which Rayner and Miss Slade drove away from there last night."

"He'll do no harm in trying to find that out," observed the chief. "But I should like to see him—I want to ask some questions about the man who joined those two after dinner at Cannon Street last night, and the other man whom he saw them take up near Liverpool Street Station. Will he keep himself in touch with your warehouse in Gresham Street?"

"Sure to," answered Appleyard.

"Then just telephone to your people there, and tell them to tell him, if he comes in asking for you, to come along and seek you here," said the chief. "I'm afraid I can't spare either you or Mr. Allerdyke, for your joint information'll be wanted presently for these warrants, and when we've got them I want you to go with me—both of you—to the Pompadour."

"You're going to search?" asked Allerdyke when Appleyard had gone to the telephone. "You think you may find something—there?"

"There's enough evidence to justify a search," answered the chief. "Naturally we want to know all we can. But I should say that if she's mixed up with a gang, and if they've got those jewels through her—as seems uncommonly likely—she'll have been ready for a start at any minute, and the probability is we'll find nothing to help us. The