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Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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"I DON'T mind saying that if I'd only known the kind of garbage they cooked and called food at this hotel, I would have seen Harromouth in Hades before ever I risked my digestion by coming here for a holiday," complained Mr. Smiler Bunn to his partner, once Lord Fortworth, now Mr. Henry Black, as the two crooks sat one morning on the terrace of the very large and very new hotel which had just been opened at Harromouth, that said-to-be rising seaside resort on the South Coast. Lord Fortworth did not answer—he seemed sullen.
"Those red mullet tasted more like bad bloaters painted pale pink," continued Mr. Bunn. Then, as though pleased and slightly surprised at the pat alliteration, he repeated it. "That's it—like bad bloaters painted pale pink," he said.
Lord Fortworth stirred impatiently.
"The soles were carrion—cooked carrion," he remarked antagonistically, obviously believing himself as much injured as Mr. Bunn, who nodded thoughtfully.
"Yes, they looked a bit carriony," he agreed. "I'm glad you slung 'em at the waiter—thoroughly glad. The man ought to have known better than to have doped it out to us that way. It seems to me that we can't do better than to take that little furnished place down by the cliff-end for a month. We shall either starve, get poisoned, or have to make a habit of downing a liqueur of 'Jeyes' Fluid' after every meal if we stop here."
Fortworth nodded and rose.
"You're right. Flood," he said with more enthusiasm. Mr. Bunn's usual name was Wilton Flood, when he was not using any other.
Smiler rang for a waiter, and ordered the motor round. But as the man went to ring up the garage at the back a look of doubt suddenly crept into Mr. Bunn's eyes.
"After all," he said, "hadn't we better walk it? Sir Donald sent us here for exercise, and it's only about a quarter of a mile."
Fortworth nodded, and they left the terrace.
It was the old trouble—weight— that had brought them to Harromouth. Vaguely disturbed by the rather noticeable increase of personal adipose tissue which had obtruded itself upon them during the past winter, they had consulted Sir Donald MacRee, the expensive specialist, who, recognising, after a short conversation, that the age of miracles was past, and that, therefore, it was folly to suggest their maintaining a more frugal table, had recommended the burly partners to go to Harromouth for a month, there to play golf and otherwise take exercise. Carefully ascertaining that the golf-links were flat and without any of the miniature cliff climbing which is a feature of so many courses, the Bunn-Fortworth Combine had followed the advice, and from a land of plenty had, a day or two before, motored down apparently into a land of what Mr. Bunn was pleased to term "garbage."
So they decided, rather reluctantly, to walk out and inspect a furnished house which the day before they had noticed was offered to be let.
"If I didn't feel pretty sure that Sir Donald knows his job, and when he said 'Harromouth for you two,' he meant Harromouth for some blame good reason of his own, I'd sooner have put in my month's fat-cure at Brighton," said Fortworth frankly as they strolled along. "This place is too much like a half-built beehive for me. Look at 'em! Like a lot of cockroaches in corduroys—swarms of 'em!" He pointed with his stick to the long strip of beach where hundreds of stalwart British working-men were building a new esplanade and pier in that quiet, old-fashioned, leisurely style for which the British workman is so justly renowned.
Mr. Bunn regarded the toiling multitude with an air of mild benevolence.
"Yes," he said at last. "There's a lot of 'em there." He paused thoughtfully. "They represent a pretty tidy sum in wages every week. What would they draw, do you reckon? Ten shillings a head?"
Lord Fortworth laughed—a hard laugh, for in his day he had employed the British working-man in large quantities.
"Ten shillings!" he said. "You're thinking of Indian coolies, Flood. Those gents with the pickaxes over there would despise anything under the average of about twenty-five shillings a week, eight hour day, double for overtime, if not more, and so on. This esplanade and pier and breakwater business is a 'rush' business, too, I've heard somewhere, and I expect they charge another few shillings each week for that."
Mr. Bunn surveyed them musingly.
"You surprise me, Fortworth," he said. "Why, their wages bill all told must add up to—what? Two thousand a week, paid out in ready money, I suppose."
"Quite that," replied Fortworth.
Mr. Bunn sighed.
"Seems a lot of money," he said. "It's a pity we couldn't pinch it one week."
Fortworth nodded.
"True," he said, "so it is."
Mr. Bunn smiled pleasantly, and continued to watch the corduroyed crowd.
"It wouldn't interfere with our holiday to any extent," he remarked presently. "Let's talk it over."
With this end in view they sat down on a bench close by, a bench that was placed a few yards back from the edge of the cliff, which at this point was not higher than some ten feet. Mr. Bunn had opened his mouth to speak when the voice of some unseen person on the narrow step strip of beach below the cliff struck suddenly on their ears.
"If yeh think yeh can work it better than me yeh'd better do it ,"said the voice rather shrilly. "But yeh can't. And yeh know yeh can't. And yeh can shut up. I put it to him straight. 'Mr. Fairbrass,' I says, 'take it from me that the men'll come out in a week if they ain't squared one way or the other way. I can square 'em,' I says, 'cheaper than you can. I ain't been Honest Jim Walcher, chief travellin' representative of the South of England Navvies' Union for five years, without learning about navvies,' I says. 'It'll cost a good five 'undred pound to do it, though,' I says. 'Things have gone too far. They're beginning to reckon that another three ha'pence an hour's their rights,' I says. 'And yeh knows what these great big buck navvies are when they start talking about their rights. So, if you're wise, we'll call it five 'undred, and I'll square the men with it unofficially.' He said he'd think it over, and let me know this afternoon."
"Well, you made a fool of yourself, Walcher," snapped another voice in reply—obviously the voice of a better-class man. "That's the worst of dealing with little stiffs like you;you can only think in hundreds. Why didn't you ask five thousand? A serious strike would cost Fair-brass and Co. twice that, and even the potty little half-hearted strike that you could engineer would lose 'em thousands. Haven't you got into your armour-plated skull yet that Fairbrass and Co. have got to finish the work here by June 1st or pay a penalty of something like three hundred quid a day for every day they take after the first of June?"
"Well, captain, I thought"—began the first voice—that of "Honest Jim" Walcher—in much milder tones, but broke off suddenly as a third person spoke—a woman this time.
"Think, dear Mr. Walcher? That is exactly where you went wrong," she said cuttingly. "If you intend to begin thinking we may as well drop the whole scheme while we're safe. What you have to do is what you're told—just that, no more. Please, please don't begin to think. Your tongue is the asset in this affair. Your brains, dear Mr. Walcher, are a liability. Keep them under control."
The partners on the bench glanced at each other as the woman finished her bitter comments, and Fortworth leaned to Smiler.
"Who is she? I've heard that voice before," he whispered. Mr. Bunn nodded.
"It's Echo—Echo Paley, the girl who got the jewels off that horn we restored to the Rajah,"*he said softly. Indeed, they had met the lady before. She was an adventuress of unusual ability, and had administered quite a severe jolt to them on the occasion of their first meeting with her.
* See story "The Horn of Plenty" in the Grand Magazine for January.
They waited, listening.
But, evidently subdued by the razor-edged irony of Miss. Paley, Mr. Walcher had lowered his voice, and the partners could hear no more than a slight rumble.
"Let's have a look at them,"-suggested Smiler. "It sounds as though there's money in this."
They rose, and walking some two hundred yards along the cliff, descended a flight of steps to the beach, and strolled quietly along towards the point from which the voices had risen to them. In their tweeds they looked exactly like two prosperous middle-aged bankers taking a quiet stroll with cigars preparatory to adjourning to the golf links.
As they expected, there were three people at the spot towards which they were advancing so casually—a lady, very smartly got up in the spring seaside style, sitting on a big block of sandstone, with a military-looking man in chessboard checks, and, standing facing these two, was a short, fat person in a cinnamon-hued soft felt sombrero, fawn-coloured clothes, and a fierce tie—evidently Mr. Walcher.
The representative of the South of England Navvies' Union seemed to have finished his business, for he jauntily pinched his hat at Echo as the partners drew nearer, and hurried past, lighting a cigar that at close range smelt as though it were made of nineteen-nought-nine seaweed.
Chatting casually, and apparently ignoring the couple on the sandstone, the Bunn-Fortworth Combine strolled past, staring seawards. For their part Miss Paley and the gentleman Walcher had addressed as "Captain" seemed too interested in the rather brisk conversation they were carrying on to pay much attention to the two passers-by.
When the Combine returned from their stroll the couple were gone.
Mr. Bunn stood and stared with a puzzled expression at the block of sandstone.
"What I can't make out is how Echo's got time to waste over a third share of five hundred quid. There must be more in it than that," he said.
"More!" replied Fortworth. "There's tanks of money in the scheme if we can get hold of Walcher —and if Walcher has got the influence with those shovel-pushers back at the works that he says he's got. Let's get over and have a look at 'em."
They moved away to the swarm that were working on the esplanade. There was a small crowd collecting at a spot where a little steam crane was hoisting big blocks of granite up to the level of the esplanade, and towards this crowd the two crooks proceeded. They saw Mr. Walcher was the centre of the group, and that he was talking loudly to a person who seemed to be a sort of foreman. It appeared that the foreman was straining the crane cable beyond its capacity, to the risk of the navvies working below.
"Yeh say it ain't none of my business," shouted "Honest Jim" Walcher; "and I say it's the business of any 'uman being to protest on behalf of these honest toilers around me, when I sees their lives being risked every minute of the day so as yeh can squeeze a few extra shillin's out of it for yer bloated capitalist employers. These honest workers whose Union I 'ave the privilege to represent ain't beasts of burden—no, nor no slaves neither. They're 'uman flesh and blood, as good as any duke or any other of yer idle rich, and I demand their rights."
The foreman stood back, gladly making way for a smart, dapper man, who had come up quickly—a keen-looking, hard-faced, capable sort of person, and evidently a manager or someone in authority. He went close up to the agitator.
"Now, get out of this!" he said crisply. "The cable's tested up to a ton and a half more than she's lifting. I know you, and I know what you're after, you strike-maggot. Now get out, or must I boot you out?"
"Men—comrades!" yelled Mr. Walcher. "This is threats and violence. Will yeh stand this, comrades?"
A low but rather ominous murmur broke out from the gang.
"Let 'im alone;he ain't done no harm. Not so much boot. He's a man from the Union—only taking care of our rights," they grumbled. The manager moderated his tone a little. Every minute was precious if the work was going to be finished according to the contract, and the one thing the contractors could not afford was any discontent on the part of the workmen, to say nothing of a definite strike.
"All right, men. We'll have the inspector over this afternoon and retest the cable. How's that?"
"That's all I arsk," said "Honest Jim," replying for the men, and slowly withdrew.
Messrs. Bunn and Fortworth followed him.
"We ought to make his acquaintance," said Fortworth. Smiler nodded, and they overtook the agitator.
"I should like to congratulate you, sir, on the fine and plucky stand you made on behalf of those working-men," said Lord Fortworth. "It was the act of a man—a brave man— and I admire it."
"And," chimed in Mr. Bunn, "and we hope you'll join us in a bottle of wine at the hotel to celebrate it."
Mr. Walcher, surprised and flattered, agreed with a swiftness that hinted at an expensive thirst, and the three started off towards the hotel.
"HONEST JIM" got on wonderfully well with his new acquaintances and their champagne. He put them down in his own mind as a pair of rather simple-minded "toffs," and proceeded to deal with them as such. It was clear to him that they admired him tremendously, and the skilfully gross flattery they administered with the champagne he wolfed as hungrily as he did the wine. By the time he had finished the first quart the "Navvies' Pal," vaguely striving to live up to the almost hopeless standard of power which the partners seemed to believe he possessed, had admitted that he fancied he could bring the two thousand odd workmen employed by Fairbrass and Co. out on strike any day he liked.
By the time the second quart had passed down what Mr. Bunn had described afterwards as his "crater" he had become amazingly frank and confidential, and when, the third quart of wine being soaked up, Mr. Walcher quietly slid off his chair and pillowed his unbeautiful head upon the claw-foot of the table, the partners knew as much about the scheme for squeezing good red money out of Fairbrass and Co. as "Honest Jim" himself did.
It was quite simple—painfully so. It amused the partners tremendously. They laughed very heartily indeed at the ingenuity and simplicity of it all—laughter which, if heard in public, would cause most people with money on them to button up their pockets and take a cab home.
It- seemed, briefly, that Fairbrass Senior, the grim old grindstone who had built up the big contracting business, was on a yachting cruise for his health, with strict medical orders to forget all business, and that his son Percival was temporarily monarch of the firm.
Now, Percival was a master of the technicalities of the building and contracting business, but beyond that was "easy." The scheme, allowing for the champagne kinks in Walcher's tongue, was, roughly, as follows :
First, Walcher would "urge" five hundred pounds or so out of Fairbrass and Co., as represented by Percival, with which to jolly the workmen along and keep them from striking.
Then the engagement of Walcher to Miss Paley—or the Baroness de Bonbleuton, English relict of a French nobleman, as she was thought to be by people who believed what they were told and what they read in the visitors' list of the local paper —would be announced, and a feast provided for the workmen by the Baroness to celebrate the occasion. This was the initial stage to making the Baroness extremely popular with the men—a step which she proposed to follow up indefatigably for a week or so. Meantime, however, "Honest Jim" and Captain Fitzair, the "brother" of the Baroness (otherwise, as Mr. Bunn had instantly recognised, City Joe, one of the eeliest crooks that London had ever produced), intended to "pinch" a week's wages from the clerk that brought them to the works pay office from the bank. This being successfully carried out, "Honest Jim" would bring about the strike he had been paid to avert. At the end of the first week he and Fitzair would grab the thousand pounds odd strike pay which would be brought to Harromouth by a representative of the Navvies' Union. On the same day the Baroness expected to get a cheque for anything from a hundred upwards from Percival Fairbrass, upon guaranteeing that by judicious bribery therewith in the right place she and her fiancé could get the men back to work at once;the word "hundred" on the cheque she proposed altering to "thousand," and, adding a modest "0" to the figure line, she would cash it, and step from the kerb outside the bank into the motor which, containing Walcher and Fitzair and their accumulation of plunder, would be waiting to convey them out of Harromouth without delay.
This was the plan which the partners gradually pieced together from the "honest" blackguard's vinous incoherence, and there appeared to be nothing much wrong with it—from the crooks' point of view.
They rang for Sing Song, Smiler's peerless though kleptomaniacal Chinese man-servant, and indicated the fallen agitator to him.
"See that, Sing?" said Smiler, pointing to Walcher's body.
"Yes, mastel." The Chinaman's usual impassive air disappeared as his vulturine wits seized on the fact that his masters were once more on the trail.
"Tanked," said Smiler briefly. "Remove it. Take care of him. Sober him up as soon as you can. By dinner-time at least."
"Yes, mastel." Sing Song bent down and, lifting Mr. Walcher as easily as a feather pillow, the Canton Lemon—as Smiler in his more frivolous moods sometimes addressed the Chink—carted the "tanked" one out to a bedroom which the partners, in view of such a contingency, had engaged for their guest.
Then they strolled across and took the furnished house which they had discussed—or, rather, an optimistic house agent fancied he had let it to them for the season, on the strength of a ten-pound note in advance, and a few cubic feet of tall talk from the wealthy-looking pair.
This done, they returned to- the hotel and sent for the manager and chef. Breakfast had been a failure, but that, as Mr. Bunn remarked, had been the hotel's fault. If lunch was a failure it would be their own fault.
"In a place this size we don't expect to have to bring our food or lend our own cook to the management," explained Fortworth; "but if you don't feel competent to turn out an eatable lunch for once in a way, then say so, and the Chink can come down and do it."
But the management decided that a special effort should be made, and made it to the entire satisfaction of the partners.
On the other hand, Mr. Walcher's lunch was a barbarous hell-broth composed and blended by Sing Song (an expert in pick-me-ups), containing among other things a large bottle of lukewarm soda-water and a stiff three-fingers of Worcester sauce. True, it knocked the agitator down before it picked him up, but desperate evils require desperate remedies, and, whatever it tasted like, it tightened up the nerves of Mr. Walcher's body till he felt that at the least touch he would twang like a harp.
Then Sing Song escorted him into Messrs. Bunn and Fortworth, 'who had just enjoyed their customary half-hour's nap after lunch, and who proceeded to parade the whole of his horrid past (of the previous five hours) before the dazed and pallid agitator's bloodshot vision.
"You sort of gave the whole game away, Walcher, and as far as we can see," concluded Mr. Bunn, "you're guilty of conspiracy with this fake Baroness and imitation Captain to commit fraud, forgery, theft, blackmail, assault and battery, and, in fact, every kind of crime there is. And now what we want to know is, what are you going to do about it?"
The "Navvies' Pal" tried to think;he realised that he had given himself away pretty thoroughly, but he decided that a head like a hornless gramophone playing military band records at full pressure was not the sort of thing to think with.
So he threw himself on the mercy of the two bland bandits, who were waiting for their answer—and then they had him where they wanted him.
WHEN, two hours later, Mr. Walcher retired to his lodgings he went without uneasiness. Indeed, he was inclined to glow with a certain righteous enthusiasm. As he reflected, it is not every day that an agitator of his meagre influence is called upon to assist two highly-placed Government officials—-Secret Service men—-to balk a couple of adventurers who have been guilty of attempting to corrupt a respectable Trade Union representative with a view to putting the power of the said representative to base uses. Especially unusual was it that such officials should be so broad-minded and generous as the parting speech of the smoother-spoken of the two hinted they would be.
"You've got to remember, Walcher," Mr. Bunn had said in his blandest style, "that we have not been sent down here to interfere with you. We know that you are all right if you are only left alone. The pair we are after are this Baroness and Captain Fitzair. They have played this sort of game all over England— and this time we want to get them red-handed. You needn't look nervous; we aren't detectives. We shall arrest nobody. We are the men behind the scenes — diplomats — political power—you know. What we say, Scotland Yard does. Understand? Home Office. Don't be afraid—we'll look after you. But you've got to help us get that couple red-handed. See?"
Mr. Walcher, rather pale, but reassured by the friendly tone of these two "diplomats" from the Home Office, nodded nervously.
"Your instructions — from us direct—are to go ahead with your plans, but to do nothing without first consulting us. D'ye understand? Don't back out of any arrangement with the Baroness, but just keep us advised. See?"
"Honest Jim" saw.
"But couldn't yeh gimme a pass or a permit or something to show the police in case they happened to drop on us when we're doing the trick?" he asked.
The partners stared at each other.
"What do you think?" asked Smiler.
Fortworth appeared to hesitate.
"I really doubt if Mr. Walcher is important enough to justify our issuing a Protection Pass to him," he said very seriously.
Mr. Walcher turned paler.
"In the ordinary way I agree with you," said Mr. Bunn. "But we've got to remember that—" Smiler crossed over and began to speak in low tones to his partner. Walcher caught a few words, such as "Labour unrest"—"Asquith"—"military"—"Great Britain"—"Royal"—"crisis"—and his spine went chilly as he realised (or thought he realised) that inadvertently he had collided with Great Forces. He watched the consultation anxiously. Eventually Mr. Bunn seemed to persuade Fortworth, who nodded reluctantly.
"Very well, I agree. I think, perhaps, we should be justified. I'll prepare it."
He went to a writing-table, and on a sheet of notepaper wrote a few words, signed it with a completely unintelligible scrawl, and added at the foot the words "One month." Then he gave the sheet to Smiler, who added a number and initial, and handed it on to Walcher, who read it, as follows :—
Walcher folded the "pass" almost reverently.
"Merely show that to any detective or police-inspector at any time you are in danger of arrest—but only at the last moment, and in private," said Fortworth heavily. "Remember there are hundreds of men in this country who would murder you for that pass."
The agitator nodded respectfully and put the paper carefully away.
Then he had received his instructions and had left.
The partners smiled at each other and took a little refreshment.
"These half-honest crooks are as simple in the head as bull-calves," said Smiler gaily, and looked at his watch. "It's about time you pulled out for Purdston."
Fortworth rose reluctantly and rang for the car. Ten minutes later he was on his way to Purdston, a remote village on the Surrey-Hants border, where the partners possessed a quiet, secluded country retreat, in charge of one Ferdinand Bloom, an ex-butler who had once been an actor. Mr. Bloom, during the butler era, had officiated for Lord Fortworth, tried to steal money from him, failed badly, and now, not unnaturally, preferred to work for the partners rather than experience the imprisonment which Fortworth could arrange for him by the simple process of exposing Ferdinand's attempted forgery.
Left alone, Mr. Bunn pottered about the raw, brand-new town in an innocent, aimless sort of way.
He went first to the local bank, and, standing just outside it, inquired the shortest way to the new works at the esplanade. Then he strolled along the cliff—having ascertained that this was the shortest way. He appeared to be considerably interested in a miniature valley or ravine which intersected the path at right angles half-way along the cliff, evidently the long-dried bed of a stream. The cliff path ran to the edge of this little valley, dipped sharply down a flight of steps and up another flight on the other side, whence it continued straight to the esplanade. Smiler nodded cheerfully as he realised that any person taking the shortest way from the bank to the works must necessarily use these steps on the way—and, using them, be momentarily invisible to anyone out of the valley.
"Very useful—very useful place, indeed," he murmured. "City Joe knows his job. Probably Echo's idea, though. Well, well! "
He shook his head.
"This world is full of crooks," he said sorrowfully, smiled blandly, and resumed his way.
At the esplanade the work was proceeding a little less steadily than in the morning. The men seemed glum and sullen, and the foreman looked uneasy. While Smilerwatched, a big navvy, hammering at a spike, struck a glancing blow, which slipped off from the spike-head and landed on his foot. He shouted an oath, dropped his hammer, and, nursing the injured foot, yelled, "That's what we get twenty-two bob a week for."
Smiler noted the undisguised approval with which the workmen who heard greeted the exclamation, and moved on.
"Ripe as red apples for a strike!" he told himself. "They'd come out for next to nothing. Not that we shall be here to see it! "
Then, lighting a cigar with the air of a man who had done a good day's work, he went on to the furnished house—a new, white-and-red detached villa standing alone on the cliff not far from the valley—where Sing Song should be engaged in getting things ready for the partners' occupation that evening.
The Chink was there, working with his customary efficiency. He grinned at Smiler like an affectionate dog.
"Evelysing velly nice, mastel," he said. "Comflable—plitty nice dinnel gettee leady cookee fol nightee."
"That's right, my lad," said Mr. Bunn encouragingly. "You stick to your work and I'll stick to you. You'd better lay for three — Mr. Walcher will be coming. Dinner at nine;Lord Fortworth will be back by then. And don't leave anything lying about—see? When we leave this place we shall leave quick. We shall probably hop it at a sixty-mile-an-hour clip—and there won't be time to go over the place with a fine-tooth comb. So leave nothing about. Have you brought the old brandy round from the hotel? You have. Then kindly heft it along here, there's a good lad."
THE clock was chiming eleven that night when the partners and Mr. Walcher finished their liqueurs-and-coffee and withdrew into the drawing-room.
"And now to business," said Mr. Bunn, eyeing the agitator severely.
"Yes, sir."
Since receiving his valuable immunity pass Mr. Walcher had become astonishingly humble.
"Well, come on, then," repeated Smiler impatiently. "To business— the cheque, my man, the cheque."
Mr. Walcher produced a cheque and deferentially handed it to Mr. Bunn, who scrutinised it and passed it to Lord Fortworth.
"Five hundred—dated to-day— payable to bearer—signed Fairbrass and Co.—No. K 290232," muttered Fortworth. "It seems in order."
He touched a bell and a burly person entered—a big, fleshy man with a heavy face and bloodshot eyes. He was dressed in the uniform of a police-inspector. Few would have recognised in this overpoweringly official-looking person Mr. Ferdinand Bloom, butler-handyman at Purdston. Mr. Walcher quailed as Ferdinand ran a light grey eye over him.
"Inspector!" snapped Fortworth. The inspector saluted smartly. "Sir! "
"Kindly witness that this cheque is handed to us by Mr. Walcher, who has received it this afternoon, in confidence, from Messrs. Fairbrass and Co., to pay expenses Walcher is likely to incur in urging the workmen down at the new pier and esplanade not to strike."
"Yes, sir." The inspector examined the cheque and made an entry in his notebook.
"Good," continued Fortworth. "We have issued an immunity pass to Mr. Walcher—you understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"You may go."
The inspector saluted and went— back to the kitchen to help Sing Song wash up.
The partners turned to Walcher again, Fortworth folding the cheque and putting it in his notecase.
"Now, Walcher," said Smiler, "be very careful what you say;do you understand? Be very careful." His manner was an admirable imitation of a prosecuting counsel. "Tell us exactly what the plans of this so-called Baroness and imitation Captain are for to-morrow?"
Walcher, nervous, but sustained by the recollection of his immunity pass, explained at some length. The partners listened attentively to the end, nodding reflectively.
"Very clever," said Fortworth finally in his harsh voice. "Very clever—clever enough to get the Baroness and her Captain ten years each. Now, clear out."
Walcher cleared out, with a certain air of relief. The partners waited until the footsteps of the cowed agitator died out, and then said simultaneously:
"Easy as eating apples."
Laughing gaily, they rang for Sing Song and Mr. Bloom, and spent the next half-hour in giving them their instructions.
They were good at most things, the Bunn-Fortworth Combine, but what they most enjoyed, and what they were best at, was "giving instructions." They were no fonder of risk and work than the next man. They preferred to do the superintending and organising. At the end of the instructions Mr. Bunn gave the other two a word of encouragement.
"Now, you know what you have to do, my lads, and let's see how well you can do it. You needn't look so damned miserable, Bloom of Roses;you won't get pinched to-morrow. It's ten to one against you're getting pinched. You want to brighten up and enter into the spirit of the thing, like that yellow-looking little banana of a Sing Song does. Look at him— he's happy. You be happy, too, and do your duty to-morrow. If you do your duty you'll be happy. See what I mean? You can clear out now and get on with your work. Be good lads, and we'll take care of you—that's what."
He smiled affably and waved them away.
"What I like about us, Fort- worth," he said, "is our neatness. We don't steal—hardly ever, I mean. We just hike off with stuff that has been stolen by some real first-hand thieves. And that's what I call neatness. Look at that five hundred. Walcher bullied that out of Fairbrass and Co. by threatening 'em with a strike. Yet he's glad to give it to us—you and me. D}ring to hand it over. Neat—that's what I call it. Nothing but neatness "
But if the diverting to themselves of the Fairbrass cheque was "neat," the next day's work was considerably neater.
At precisely ten minutes past ten on the following morning a middle-aged clerk of highly respectable appearance might have been seen walking along the cliff-path carrying a weighty bag. With the sole exception of a smartly-dressed lady who had alighted from a long, olive-green, fast-looking motor at the end of a new and as yet unbuilt-upon road, and was strolling towards the low cliffs—evidently an intending visitor taking a preliminary look at Harromouth—the clerk was the only person to be seen on the cliff at that hour. It was too early in the season for promenaders, and, in any case, the fine drizzle that was falling did little to tempt any stray strollers out.
Humming a cheerful tune to himself, the clerk with the heavy bag—which contained the wages of the men working on the esplanade— went down the steps by which the little water-worn valley was crossed, and stepping out buoyantly was about to ascend the steps on the opposite side when he heard a swift footfall behind him. He half turned, and as he turned his hat—a soft felt —was jammed down over his eyes, and before he was able to raise his hands a thick sack was drawn down over his head, a rope run round his chest, outside the sack, effectually binding his hands, and he was neatly tripped, landing quietly on the sand. It was all done with a precision and despatch that spoke of careful planning. And, indeed, "Captain" Fitzair had drilled Mr. Walcher very thoroughly in his part of the business, from the lying in wait behind a near-by bend of the valley to passing the rope round the clerk.
"That's got him," said the "Captain" hoarsely, knotting another rope round the legs of the man. "Where's his bag? Look out! Jump for it! Cops!"
The Captain leaped to his feet, and not stopping to pick up the bag, which had fallen some feet away, bounded up the steps, using hideous language. For a burly police-inspector was hurrying into the valley from the beach end of it, and racing down from the other end of the gorge was a constable. The Captain and Walcher were caught between two fires. Their only hope of escape was up the steps, which the Captain as he topped them saw, with a wild hope in his heart, were not yet guarded. He heard the sound of a struggle behind him as the police seized Walcher, and he flew towards the olive-green motor, in which the lady who looked like an intending visitor was already seated. Evidently she was a confederate, for as the Captain ran towards her she backed the motor to him. Within three seconds lie was in the car, and the woman had roared up her engine, dropped in the clutch on the second speed with a brutal jar that sent the road dirt flying from under the skidding, steel-studded driving wheels, changed into top, and was shooting away down the lonely new road. Even so she was only just in time, for a white car, furiously driven, came racing out of another road, swung round the corner, and tore after the olive-green car. The second motor was occupied by two men in peaked caps, like the caps of police inspectors.
The woman in the fugitive car glanced behind her.
"What is it?" she snapped.
"Twenty-horse kite, looks like," gasped the Captain.
Echo Paley laughed, an acid, biting laugh.
"We can lose 'em," she snapped, and steered out on to the main London road.
But it was not until two hours later that she finally shook off the pursuit, some seventy-five miles north-east of Harromouth. And she never knew that if Mr. Bunn and Lord Fortworth, the peak-capped occupants of the white car, had wished to they could have overhauled her at almost any moment they liked. But they only wanted to frighten the couple away from the loot; the last thing in the world they desired to do was to come up with Miss Paley and her "Captain."
Meantime Ferdinand Bloom and the invaluable Sing Song, back in the valley, had taken possession of the bag, slipped on the long macintoshes which hid their police uniforms, changed their hats, and left the valley by the upper end. Mr. Walcher had "made himself scarce" in the same direction in obedience to "Inspector" Bloom's curt order to that effect, given him the instant Captain Fitzair disappeared up the steps.
The two quickly made their way to the furnished house taken "for one night only" by the Bunn-Fortworth Combine, where the big, high-powered Limousin car of the partners was waiting, already packed, and ten minutes later, Sing Song at the wheel, were sliding smoothly and tranquilly out of Harromouth "for ever and for aye," as the song writer so feelingly observes.
That evening Sing Song, duly arrived at Purdston, handed over the bag to Messrs. Bunn and Fortworth, who had reached home early in the afternoon.
It contained just over two thousand pounds, in small one-pound notes of the local bank, and gold.
Mr. Bunn sunned the big pile of money thoughtfully.
"Fair," he said, "very fair. Not a fortune, but fair."
He slid a sovereign towards Sing Song and one towards Bloom.
"Here you are, my lads. Take your share. You've been very good lads, and although we don't intend to spoil you, at the same time we don't grudge a sweetener for you. Now hook it and see about dinner."
The pair pensively "hooked" it, and Smiler turned to Fortworth.
"Wonder what happened to ' Honest Jim'?" he said.
Lord Fortworth remarked that he did not know—nor, he added, did he care. Which was correct.
"About two thousand four hundred, counting the cheque I changed this morning," said Mr. Bunn thoughtfully. "Not bad for holiday money, but I'm not sure it wouldn't have paid us to have waited. If we'd waited we might have got the lot when Echo had carried out her plans."
Lord Fortworth eyed his partner.
"How should we have separated Echo from all that money?" he asked. "Even supposing she and Fitzair had pulled it off. It was too risky. After all, two thousand odd in hand is worth five thousand odd in Echo's hooks. Yes, sir. But you always were a bit of a human wolf, old man," he added friendlily.
"Who—me? Me a wolf?" said Smiler quickly, looking a little shocked. "Not me—I'm no wolf. I only ask for my own."
"Well, you've got it, haven't you?" replied Fortworth sarcastically.
Mr. Bunn gave up the argument.
"Well, some of it, perhaps," he confessed reluctantly. Then, as he reached for the whisky, he laughed.
"I suppose you're right, Fortworth," he said. "It doesn't do to be greedy. It's a mistake. I shouldn't like to get greedy. Say when."
The syphon hissed. Lord Fortworth said "when," and they settled down to enjoy a quiet hour before dinner.
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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