# The Red Book Magazine/Volume 39/Number 2/Boxes of Gold

Extracted from Red Book Magazine, June 1922, pp. 80–83, 175, 176, 178. Accompanying illustrations by W. B. King may be omitted.
The greatest series of detective-mystery stories since “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes”
Boxes of Gold
By E. Phillips Oppenheim
This newest and most dramatic episode in the pursuit of an criminal and his wife by a master detective is described, at the start, by the criminal himself, Michael Sayers.
Illustrated by W. B. King
I WAS at St. Pancras Station to meet Gorty and Metzger on their arrival in England. I saw the seven black tin boxes with brass clamps, handed out of the guard's van and placed on the roof of a taxicab. I knew as though it were foredoomed that the contents of those boxes would be mine before the week was out. I felt certain, too, that one at least of the two men would fight to the death before I obtained possession of them. They were well worth it, however.
It was a foggy night, and I lingered with perfect safety on the outskirts of the little throng of people who had come to greet these two men. They were a rough lot, on the whole—men of the lowest type, swarthy and unclean. I saw hungry glances directed toward those black boxes, and I knew that, given sufficient cunning and address, I should not be the first by a long way to strike a blow for their acquisition. But of these others I had no fear. Gorty and Metzger knew their friends, knew them well enough not to trust them.
I walked back through the fog to my humble little flat in Adam Street. Those were gloomy days, even for me, who cared little about the physical comforts of life. I was passing as Mr. Arthur Younghusband, LL.D., a cousin of the well-known solicitor of Lincoln's Inn, in town to consult works of reference at the British Museum. Day by day I walked to that gloomy mausoleum of dead knowledge, spent an hour or so there, and back to my rooms. No one dogged my footsteps. By devious ways I had shaken off all pursuit and suspicion. Yet life was a wearisome thing. I am not a man with many human weaknesses, but I should have welcomed a visit from Janet—a little dinner, perhaps, at the Café Royal, a peep into the world of many-colored pleasures outside of which my path lay. These things, however, I knew were not for me. Janet was watched, as I knew beyond a doubt; even if she were not, she had failed me in my last demand. Janet presented a problem to be solved.
Illustration: Metzger bent toward her. I moved noiselessly, but he would not have heard me if I had worn hob-nailed boots.
On the third day after the arrival of Gorty and Metzger, I visited my solicitors, the firm of Younghusband, Nicholson and Younghusband, at Lincoln's Inn. My reputed cousin granted me an interview within a few minutes of my arrival. We spoke for a time of my studies and their progress. Then there was a pause. The door was closed; the walls of the room were thick.
“Things progress?” I demanded, leaning across his wide, untidy table.
Mr. Younghusband smiled benevolently. In these moments of direct speech I was accustomed to forget my assumed personality and to speak with all the quick incisiveness that was natural to me. My legal adviser, however never altered his manner of reply or deportment. He was always the same—unctuous legal, courtly.
“Your affairs are in excellent train,” he assured me. “Of the two people in whom we are interested, one leaves, as we have surmised, for Manchester tonight; the other remains alone.”
“They have made no arrangement with any bank yet?”
My companion shook his head.
“They are both, under the circumstances suspicious,” he said. “Their position, of course is—er—peculiar. They are the custodians of a hundred thousand pounds in gold, with which they hope to establish a few private credits in this country. On the other hand, the country to which they be long owes us something like a hundred times that amount. They have a somewhat natural fear that any bank with whom they might deposit their treasure might be disposed to hand it over to the Government, or that the Government, by some legal means might attach it.”
“Therefore,” I observed, “it remains in their rooms?”
“Precisely! They consider it the lesser risk.”
“And Gorty goes to Manchester tonight?”
“That is so,” the lawyer murmured.
“So far all seems well,” I said. “The great thing is that the gold has not been removed and that Metzger will be alone. There were other little details.”
“Just so!” Mr. Younghusband assented, leaning back in his chair with his finger-tips pressed together. “So far as regards the setting of the affair, I think you will find it in order. Metzger and Gorty occupy Suite 89 at the Milan Hotel, which suite consists, as you know, of two bedrooms, a bathroom and a sitting-room. The sitting-room is on the extreme right-hand side of the suite, and the gold is kept in Metzger's bedroom, which opens from the sitting-room. The bathroom is between the two bedrooms.”
“I have had the plan,” I interrupted a little impatiently.
Mr. Younghusband declined to be hurried. He had the air of giving difficult legal advice on a technical point.
“Suite 90,” he continued, “consists of a bedroom, bathroom and sitting-room only, and is occupied by Mr. and Mrs. José de Miguel, very rich South Americans. They are leaving tonight by motor-car for Southampton to catch the steamer there for Buenos Aires in the morning.”
“Their luggage is already packed?” I asked.
“Already packed,” Mr. Younghusband agreed. “The porters have commented upon its weight.”
“And Madam?”
“Appears to have fulfilled her task,” was the somewhat hesitating answer.
I detected signs of uneasiness in my companion's speech, and questioned him about it promptly.
“Have you doubts of the woman?” I asked.
“None whatever,” Mr. Younghusband assured me blandly. “At the same time, she is, without a doubt, the weakest link in the chain. She has temperament enough—Metzger seems to have been an easy victim; but I should have had more confidence in the lady who visited me the other day.”
“I can no longer put complete faith in my wife,” I replied coldly.
Illustration: A man entered unannounced and evidently in a state of some excitement.
Mr. Younghusband was startled out of his dignified serenity of manner. He leaned across the table.
“What do you mean by that?” he demanded harshly. “Do you know that she has been here, the one place in London you should have been careful to keep her away from, if you had any doubts?”
“I have no doubts whatever as to her fidelity,” I declared. “You know what I mean when I say that, in the parlance of our friends, she has gone soft. It is a pity.”
Mr. Younghusband seemed relieved but puzzled.
“A woman who could do what she did on the golf-links at Woking,” he murmured reminiscently, “must have changed very much if she merits your present criticism.”
The subject was by no means a pleasant one to me. I abandoned it.
“In any case,” I reminded him, “she is in touch with Greyes, and he knows too much.”
“Wonderful capacity for existence, that man,” Mr. Younghusband remarked suavely.
HARSH deeds—I am not a lover of them. I seldom go out of my way to kill, or allow my subordinates to do so, if my ends can be obtained otherwise. At that moment, however, I felt a sudden resurgence into my brain of that one bloodthirsty desire of my life.
“As soon as this affair is safely concluded,” I said, “and we are in funds once more, I shall take occasion to deal with Norman Greyes myself.”
“It occurs to me that you would be well advised,” my companion acquiesced. “The person in question possesses the one gift which might make him dangerous to us. He has imagination.”
I nodded. I was tracing figures upon the blotting-paper, debating with myself different methods of dealing with Norman Greyes.
“Every channel which might lead to the firm of Younghusband, Nicholson and Younghusband,” the lawyer continued meditatively, “seems, so far as human ingenuity could arrange it, permanently blocked, but a man with imagination who is not afraid to work on guesswork is always to be feared.”
“It will not be my fault,” I promised, as I took my leave, “if you have any cause to fear Norman Greyes after the next month or so.”
That night, in the language of those forgotten war communiqués, everything happened according to plan. At a quarter to nine Metzger, who was writing alone in his sitting-room, heard a soft knocking at the door which communicated with the adjoining suite. He rose promptly, locked the outside door of his own rooms, and softly withdrew the bolt of the door to the next suite. He stood there with an inviting smile upon his ugly face. Madam de Miguel laid a cautioning finger upon her somewhat over-painted lips as she stole over the threshold.
“There is one hour that my husband will be away,” she whispered, gliding past him. “You may kiss me.”
Metzger bent toward her. I moved noiselessly, but I think he would not have heard me if I had worn hobnailed boots. The rest was easy, for it was a trick I knew well. He collapsed with scarcely a gasp. I tightened the cord a little and the deed was done.
Sir Norman Greyes Takes Up the Story:
IT was entirely by accident that I had dined that night in the grill-room of the Milan Hotel with Rimmington. He had asked me for an interview that afternoon over the telephone, and being disengaged, I had suggested a little dinner at my club. We had arrived there to find the place packed and the best tables full. Sooner than wait, we had gone to the Milan. Rimmington was in the act of disclosing his reason for wishing to see me, when the manager, who was an old acquaintance, came across to us.
“I wonder whether you would mind coming upstairs with me for a moment, Sir Norman,” he begged. “And you too, Mr. Rimmington. I've just been sent for. Something wrong upstairs.”
We rose without hesitation and followed him out of the room, into the lift and up to the sixth floor. When we stepped out, several of the servants were gathered at the farther end of the corridor. The manager embarked upon an explanation.
“There may be nothing wrong at all,” he said. “This is just the position as it has been reported to me. Suite 89 was taken some days ago by Metzger and Gorty, and two emissaries from our eastern friends. They brought over some gold, as you know, in tin boxes, and greatly against my advice, they had it stored in their rooms. Gorty went to Manchester last night, leaving Metzger alone. Our telephone-operator reported that he refused to answer the telephone about half an hour ago. We sent up to his room and found it bolted on the inside. We rang and knocked without the slightest result. Finally we entered the suite through the adjoining room, which had just been vacated, and found that although the outer door was bolted on the inside, the suite was empty. Further, the tin boxes of gold had gone.”
“Interesting,” Rimmington murmured, “very!”
The manager led us along the corridor, through an empty bedroom which showed signs of recent vacation, into the suite which had been allotted to Messrs. Metzger and Gorty. There were no signs of any trouble, or disturbance of any sort. We walked through the sitting-room, the two bedrooms and the bathroom; and the floor waiter, who had now joined us, showed where the boxes had been stacked.
“Is there any reason to suppose,” I asked, “that this man Metzger has not taken away the gold himself?”
“In that case,” the manager pointed out, “some one would have had to carry the cases downstairs. No one has done so. No one has seen Metzger leave the place.”
“We are to presume,” I asked, “that he's still in the hotel?”
“Precisely!”
“You have had him searched for?”
“Half a dozen men have searched every corner of the place. No one in the hotel has even caught a glimpse of him.”
I went through the rooms again. When I came to the bedroom adjoining the sitting-room, and which the floor waiter told me was Metzger's, I noticed that the wardrobe was locked. Not only that, but there was a slight strain being exercised against the lock, bending the panel slightly! For the first time I began to look upon the matter as serious.
“This door must be broken open quickly,” I insisted, “or a spare key found.”
The key from the wardrobe in Gorty's room was tried with success. As it was turned, the door flew open. I was just in time to catch in my arms a crumpled mass of clothes and humanity. With a blackened face and protuberant eyes, his tongue lolling out on one side, it was still not difficult to recognize from his pictures the man who had refused to answer the telephone.
“My God!” Rimmington exclaimed. “He's dead!”
“He's very near it,” I replied, loosening the slip-knot of whip cord from around his neck. “Send for a doctor at once. —And Rimmington, you had better ring up the Yard and get to work quickly.”
Rimmington at that moment justified my confidence in him. He wasted no time in exclamations or idle questions. He pointed to the door of the room through which we had entered.
“How long ago did those people leave?” he asked. “And what luggage did they take with them?”
“They left an hour ago,” the floor waiter answered. “They had two very heavy trunks.”
“The affair appears to solve itself,” Rimmington muttered after he had spoken a few hasty words down the telephone.
The floor waiter, who was an intelligent fellow, followed us into the other room, to which we had withdrawn on the arrival of the doctor.
“There is one thing I ought to tell you, sir,” he said. “The porters tried to move those trunks several hours ago, while Mr Metzger was busy writing in his room. They were too heavy then—and at that time the tin cases were still in Mr. Gorty's room.”
“You are sure of that?” Rimmington asked.
“Absolutely, sir.”
Rimmington looked around. I could see that the same thought had occurred to him as to me. The briefest of searches confirmed our suspicions. The wardrobe was filled with lumps of heavy stone.
“There is only one point now remaining to be solved,” I observed, “and that is, did these two, Mr. and Mrs. José de Miguel carry out this little affair entirely alone, or had they accomplices?”
“They had a visitor about an hour before they leit, sir,” floor waiter told us.
Rimmington took out his notebook.
“Description, please,” he asked.
“I scarcely saw the gentleman myself, sir,” the man replied. “He seemed quite ordinary-looking. He wore glasses, and his hair was gray.”
“Well,” Rimmington said, as we descended to the ground floor to meet the men whom he had summoned from Scotland Yard. “we get it in the neck sometimes about our failures. This time if we don't get hold of De Miguel and his heavy trunks, I should think we deserve all the censure we get.”
“Nothing in it for me, I'm afraid,” I remarked as I bade him good night.
“It doesn't look like it,” he admitted. “However, one never knows.”
IT was the unexpected which happened. Although Mr. José de Miguel and his wife could have had barely an hour's start, and were handicapped by the possession of two trunks of enormous weight, a week passed without any news of their arrest or of the recovery of any part of the gold. Metzger remained in a state of partial unconsciousness and could give no coherent account of what had happened. Gorty returned from Manchester and behaved like a madman. He spent his time between Downing Street, where he boldly accused the Government of having taken the gold, and Scotland Yard, where he expressed his opinion of the English police system in terms which made him, to say the least of it, unpopular there. In the beginning the whole affair had seemed so simple. Mr. and Mrs. de Miguel, distributing gratuities in most lavish fashion, had driven calmly away from the Milan at the appointed hour, and had arrived at Waterloo in ample time for the train which they had planned to take to Southampton. When that train arrived at Southampton, however, there was no one in it in the least answering to their description; neither had any rooms been taken in the hotel, or passages booked on the steamer. Curiously enough, too, none of the porters could remember handling any particularly heavy luggage for that train, or attending upon any passengers answering to the description of the two missing people; yet the man who drove the hotel bus to the station—an old servant and a man of excellent character—gave unfaltering evidence as to his having driven there, and having left his two passengers waiting on the pavement while a porter went for a barrow.
I kept away from Rimmington for some time, for I thoroughly sympathized with his position. On the tenth day, however, he came to see me.
“Not so simple as we thought,” he remarked as he accepted a cigar and an easy-chair.
“Apparently not,” I assented. “What about the bus-driver?”
“He's been with the hotel company for seventeen years,” Rimmington replied, “has a wife and children and an excellent character. Besides, a score of people saw the bus in the station-yard.”
“And the man who visited them at the hotel at the last moment?”
“We're offering a hundred pounds reward for his discovery. Here's his description.”
I carefully read the typewritten sheet which Rimmington pushed across to me, and returned it in silence.
“Suggest anything to you?” my visitor asked.
“The description might apply to thousands,” I answered a little evasively.
Illustration: She passed something across the table. It was about the size and shape of an ordinary shotgun cartridge.
Rimmington stared gloomily into the fire.
“It might,” he admitted. “Do you know who I think it was?”
“No idea,” I answered mendaciously.
“Your friend Pugsley—Stanfield, or to go behind all his aliases and call him by his rightful name, Michael Sayers.”
“Do you really believe that that man is in England?” I asked.
“I do,” was the confident reply. “He was chased out of the States; we have granted an extradition warrant against him on the charge of manslaughter; we have watched every steamship at every port; yet I don't mind confessing to you that we have reason to believe that he is in London at the present moment and in touch with his old associates.”
“If that is so,” I declared, “I should imagine that the person who earns your hundred pounds will be able to solve the mystery of the disappearance of Mr. and Mrs. de Miguel.”
NOTWITHSTANDING Rimmington's conviction, I started on no mad quest of my enemy. Indeed, I had no inspiration as to where to begin my search. Janet had left Albemarle Court and had not replied to the various notes which I had written her. I had a vague idea that there was danger in prosecuting inquiries for her too closely. I had an idea, too, which was by no means vague, that I was being watched. There was always a loiterer of some sort or another in the street when I entered or left my rooms. I felt surreptitious eyes upon me often, when I lunched or dined or visited the theater. Once I walked home late through Lansdowne Passage, and heard the patter of rubber-shod feet behind me. I swung around, and my pursuer, whoever he was, a burly but agile figure, took refuge in flight. When I regained the entrance to the passage, he was nowhere to be seen. There were other and similar incidents. I had gone unarmed through the time of trouble in Ireland. I carried a revolver with me now, and I practiced getting at it quickly.
It was about three weeks after the attack upon Metzger and the disappearance of the gold, when I received a most unexpected visitor. I heard a shrill, foreign voice in the hall overriding my servant's objections, and a moment later a man entered unannounced and evidently in a state of some excitement. He was small and of exceedingly unprepossessing appearance. His face was pitted with smallpox; he had wicked-looking teeth, a stubbly black mustache, a head of black hair as thick and upright-growing as a porcupine's. He addressed me at once in broken English.
“You are Sir Norman Greyes?” he said. “I am Gorty. I came to this country of cutthroats with Metzger—with him who lies in the hospital. Will you listen to me?”
I motioned to Adams to leave us, and wheeled round an easy-chair for my visitor.
“Sit down,” I invited. “I am glad to see you, Mr. Gorty, although I think you are a little hard upon us over here.”
“What am I to think?” he demanded fiercely. “I come from a great but poor government. With much trouble we get together the gold with which to buy materials in this country and open credits. It is you who are supposed to be more civilized than any other country. I go to Manchester to speak at a meeting. I come back, and what do I find? My comrade brutally assaulted, my country's gold stolen! Yes, and that in the heart of your London—in the center of your civilization! What am I to think of you, then, as a people, I ask?”
“It was a most unusual crime,” I told him, “but you must remember that you were taking grave risks in having a large amount of gold like that unguarded in your room. The police, however, are doing—”
“The police?” he almost shrieked. “Your police? They are imbeciles—imbeciles or rascals, I know not which! And as to having the money unguarded, how could we help it? There are many banks in London who say we owe them money. What would have happened if I had deposited my gold there? They would surely have annexed it. And as it is, do you believe that it is an ordinary thief who has robbed us? No! I say no! Or if it is a thief, it is one whom your precious police can lay their hands on when they choose; and when they do so, what will happen? The gold will be claimed by your Government.”
“I am afraid,” I said, “that you are taking a very extreme view of things. However, under the circumstances I cannot blame you for feeling ill used. Tell me what brings you here.”
“Ten years ago,” he went on, suddenly calmer, “I was in the service of the police of my country. There was an anarchist plot. Three criminals escaped to London. You were at Scotland Yard, and I came to see you. You found me those criminals.”
“I remember it perfectly,” I answered. “But you have changed your name.”
“It was necessary,” he admitted. “In my country one changes one's name frequently. But you I remembered. Mr. Rimmington spoke of you. I found your address. I am here.”
“Tell me what can I do for you?” I asked.
“Find me my gold,” he demanded. “Find me the man who attacked Metzger.”
“If I could do that,” I told him, “I should have done it long ago. I am only too pleased when I can help the police in their duties.”
HE drew his easy-chair a little closer to mine. He eyed my box of cigarettes hungrily. I placed it by his side, and handed him a match. He smoked furiously.
“Listen,” he confided; “I have a piece of evidence. I will not take it to the police. I do not trust them. You shall find me my gold.”
“What is your piece of evidence?” I asked.
“The little gray man,” he answered, “the man whom they spoke of as visiting the South Americans in the next suite. Ah, those South Americans—I never trusted them! I saw Madam make eyes at Metzger. What need had she of Metzger! A woman like that has lovers enough.”
“About the little gray man?” I ventured,
“They speak of him in the evidence,” Gorty went on eagerly. “He was at the suite that night. I saw him with Madam the South American, two days before. I know where he is to be found now.”
“Why the devil haven't you told the police?” I exclaimed. “That is the one man they are looking for.”
My visitor narrowly escaped a paroxysm. He swept an ornament from the table by his side without noticing it. He gibbered for a moment like a madman.
“But have I not explained?” he expostulated. “I do not trust the police. Six of those solemn constables would march up in uniform to the place I spoke of, and the little gray man would slip away. I tell you. You must find him and see who he is. You must consider how to act. The assault upon Metzger was bad, but it is the gold I want.”
“Very well,” I said, “tell me where to find him.”
“Go to the reading-room at the British Museum between eleven and one o'clock,” Gorty told me. “You will find him there, reading. I myself am a student. Twice I have sat at the next table. He is reading from some rare volumes the 'History of the Rosicrucians.'”
“Between eleven and one,” I repeated.
“You will go?”
“Tomorrow morning,” I promised.
Gorty arose.
“Listen, Greyes,” he said, “—you, Sir Norman Greyes. Will you swear that if you recover my gold, it comes to me?”
“I swear it,” I answered.
“Then through that man you will find it,” he declared.
GORTY was right. The moment when, from my place of concealment, I saw him come shuffling into the reading-room and take his place nearly opposite to me at the great round table, I knew very well that this was Michael. He carried with him two or three books, a volume of reference and a notebook. He had the appearance of the most devout bibliophile, and indeed, having watched him for some time, I came to the conclusion that he was in earnest about his labors. It was in these little ways that Michael achieved real greatness. Detail was a passion with him. He not only appeared to be deeply interested in the Rosicrucian history. He had actually become so.
I was without doubt at fault not to have at once passed on my information to Rimmington and to have had my old adversary arrested on one of the many previous counts against him. It seemed to me, however, that this would bring to an end our chances of recovering the gold, and I could not ignore the fact that I was indebted to Gorty for the information which had delivered Michael into my hands. I therefore maintained a strict watch, and waited.
For three days and three nights I knew Michael's every movement. He made his own breakfast, lunched at a small restaurant near the Museum, and dined each night at the Monico, where he sometimes played dominoes for an hour afterward, if able to find an opponent. On the fourth night, however, he departed from his usual practices. The young woman whom I had been employing to watch him came to me in haste.
“Our friend,” she announced, “called at the Monico but took only an apéritif there. He walked across to Romano's and has ordered a table and dinner for two.”
“Whereabouts?” I asked quickly.
“Downstairs in the restaurant, on the right-hand side,” she replied.
I rang up Romano's and engaged one of the tables in the balcony. In a quarter of an hour I was ensconced there behind the curtain, with Miss Rose Weston, the young woman who had brought me the news of Michael's change of plans, as my companion. She had found time to change into evening clothes, and she played her part exceedingly well. We should have passed anywhere as a very ordinary couple, indulging in a somewhat pronounced dinner flirtation. I kept my eye, however, on the table at which Michael was seated below, and in due course I was rewarded. A very elegant, quietly dressed woman came into the restaurant and sank into the chair by his side. I saw at once that it was Janet.
“What you expected?” my companion asked quickly.
“In a sense,” I admitted. “Remember, when they leave, it is the woman you follow.”
I watched them closely from behind the curtain. There was no more distinguished-looking woman in the room than Janet, or more beautiful. She talked in a low tone to her companion, and her manner was often earnest. Nevertheless she never smiled. She was different in that respect from every one of the diners by whom she was surrounded. There was not a suggestion of festivity about her. She ate moderately, drank sparingly, and talked. All the time she gave one the impression of a great weariness. Toward the end of the meal, what I had been watching for happened. She opened her handbag and passed something across the table. It was about the size and shape of an ordinary shotgun cartridge, but I felt certain, from the way she handled it, that it was heavy. I knew then that we were on the right track.
“You are satisfied?” my companion asked.
“Perfectly,” I assured her. “I am going to run no further risk of being recognized. I shall pay the bill and go. You will remain. Remember, it is the woman you must watch. Engage as much help as you require. She must be watched unceasingly.”
My companion nodded.
“It will not be difficult,” she said.
I TOOK my departure, and at this stage of my search for the missing gold, I took Rimmington into my confidence. He agreed with me as to the advisability of allowing Michael to remain at large for the present; and so far as he was concerned, he satisfied himself with placing a strict watch upon the house in Adam Street where we had located him. I myself retired a little into the background, although I remained in the closest touch with Miss Weston. Her information was always interesting, always suggestive. The whole scheme gradually unwound itself. Rimmington and I found a certain delight in fitting the pieces together. He himself brought some valuable information, which he laid before me a few nights after the dinner at Romano's.
“One of the out-porters at Waterloo,” he announced, “seems to remember a small furniture van backed up against the pavement some distance away from where the majority of the taxicabs were unloading.”
“He didn't notice the name on it, I suppose?” I asked.
“No such luck! There's another thing, though. One of the old hands there told another of my fellows that he noticed several porters about, that night, whose faces were quite unfamiliar to him and whom he has not seen since. The driver of the bus from the Milan insists upon it, as you remember, that Madam de Miguel pushed away the first porter who accosted them, and insisted upon employing two of her own choosing.”
I nodded.
“We have got so far, then,” I pointed out, recapitulating items of information which had been brought us. “This pretended South American and his wife drove up to Waterloo with three heavy cases. They were met there by confederates dressed in the uniform of railway porters, who probably took the boxes into the station, and choosing their opportunity, brought them out again and got them into the furniture van. The inference is that the gold is still in London. To proceed: What have we learned about Janet? She is staying in a boarding-house in the Cromwell Road, frequented by artists. She spends an hour or two every day at the South Kensington Museum, studying statuary. It is exactly four days since she brought a little specimen of some sort of work to Michael, something that, unless I am mistaken, was of considerable weight, for I noticed that her handbag sagged as she walked up to the restaurant. Further—”
THE telephone-bell rang. I recognized Miss Weston's voice at the other end. I listened to what she had to say, and in ten minutes we were in my car and on the way to Twickenham. We picked up Miss Weston herself in Kensington.
“The woman whom I have been following,” she announced, “is only a few minutes ahead of us. She is in a private car, and there is a strange man seated in front with the chauffeur.”
“It looks well,” Rimmington admitted. “Our friend has ordered the same table for dinner tonight at Romano's.”
On our way I had a moment of uneasiness. A gray touring-car passed us at a great speed and shot down the Brentford Road, considerably ahead of us. Rimmington spoke for a moment through the tube, and we pulled up at the district police-station.
“We've given Michael rope enough,” he decided. “He may get the alarm at any moment now. I'm going to have him arrested.”
I drew a little breath. It was hard to think that I should not be present at the end for which I had worked so zealously, but I realized the risk of letting him remain at large any longer. I waited while Rimmington entered the police-station and spoke to headquarters. When he returned, he brought with him a couple of plain-clothes men, one of whom sat in the front and the other with us.
“There will probably be half a dozen of them,” Rimmington pointed out, “and from what I know of the gang that Michael generally employs, there may be a little trouble. We'll leave Miss Weston in the car.”
WE turned off the main road at Twickenham, and finally stopped before the gates of a large, old-fashioned villa, badly out of repair and apparently empty. The grounds sloped down to the river, and the gates were padlocked. We climbed over, leaving Miss Weston behind. She detained us for one moment.
“The house is called the Sanctuary,” she said. “Goodson, the sculptor, lived here once.”
We hurried off. The place showed every sign of desertion, but there were marks of recent wheels upon the avenues, and as we turned the last corner we saw a thin cloud of smoke curling upward from a long range of outbuildings which looked like a sort of annex to the kitchen. Rimmington quickened his pace. We all broke into a run. We avoided the front door, with its flight of stone steps, and went straight for the building which we now perceived to have been the studio. The door of a long outbuilding stood open. We paused to look inside. There was a furniture van there, and inside, some clothing of rusty corduroy. The uniforms of the pseudo-porters at Waterloo were accounted for.
Entrance to the studio itself was gained by means of a stout oak door, obviously barred and bolted. We went round to the back, crossing a lawn where the grass and weeds were up to our knees. We failed te discover any other door, but somehow or other we found our way through a smashed window into the great room with its dome-shaped ceiling. I think, even as we entered, we realized that we were too late.
The place was empty. A small forge was burning; there were several strange-looking vessels lying about the floor; the coffers, covered only by a piece of matting which Rimmington kicked aside, were ranged against the wall. There was not a sound to be heard, but the place smelled of tobacco smoke, and indeed there was a faint cloud of blue smoke still hanging about the roof.
“We've lost them!” Rimmington muttered.
I thought of Gorty as I thrust my hand down amongst the gold-pieces.
“We have the gold, though,” I reminded him.
“And Michael, I trust,” was the fervent rejoinder.
WE searched the house, which was empty and desolate. Then we sent to the local police-station and arranged for the gold to be removed. Afterward we called on the house agent. He made a little grimace when we mentioned the Sanctuary.
“Thought I'd let it to a lady sculptor,” he declared. “She paid for the house for a month, to see whether she could work there—wanted to do her own casting or something.”
“She paid you for the month, I hope?” Rimmington inquired.
“Oh, she paid that, all right,” the agent replied. “I wish these old places were all pulled down. They're more trouble than they're worth.”
“Did the lady bring you any references?” I asked.
“I didn't ask for any,” the house agent replied frankly. “I was only too glad to get anyone even to talk about the property. Besides, the lady put the money down.”
“Nevertheless,” Rimmington said quietly, “as a person who has had some experience in these matters—I am Inspector Rimmington of Scotland Yard—I should advise you to be a little careful how you deal with these large, old-fashioned houses. In the present case you may be interested to know that the little forge in the studio at the Sanctuary has been used for the purpose of melting down Russian gold.”
“God help us!” the agent cried. “What, the Gorty and Metzger gold?”
“Precisely,” Rimmington acquiesced. “They've only got rid of a little of it, as it happens, but to judge from the preparations, they were going into it more extensively in a day or two.”
We drove back to London, and I followed my friend into his private room with a rare thrill of excitement. I saw his face grow white and stern as he listened to the report of the man who rose to meet him. Then he turned a disconsolate face to me.
“The rooms in Adam Street are empty,” he said. “Stanfield has not visited the British Museum today. We've lost him again! I ought to have known better,” he added bitterly, “than to have let him remain at liberty for a single moment.”
“And the woman?” I asked, a little nervously.
Rimmington shook his head.
“We don't want her,” he said. “She's just the decoy who may some day whistle her mate to his cell. It's a knock for us, Greyes. Neither De Miguel nor his wife nor Michael Sayers!”
“But we have the gold,” I reminded him once more.
“Damn the gold!” Rimmington retorted profanely.
But Gorty thought otherwise. So, when he recovered consciousness, did Metzger.
(Another spirited episode in this greatest detective-story series since “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,” will appear in the forthcoming July issue of The Red Book Magazine.)
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1946, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 77 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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