# The Bartenstein Case/Chapter 12

CHAPTER II
FURTHER SURPRISES
Although Inspector Dwayne, from the very nature of his calling, was always prepared for contingencies, improbabilities, and other disconcerting affairs, and was accustomed to take them with an absolute sang-froid, he was on this occasion so much surprised, that for a moment he stood staring at the wine-merchant without being able to command a word. On his part, the wine-merchant, who held the Inspector's card in his hand, gazed at it, and then at its presenter, evidently wondering what had gained him the honour of a visit from the police.
"Señor Olivares, I believe?" said the Inspector at last.
"I am Mr. Olivares," answered the old man politely.
"Well, sir, I—the fact is, Mr. Olivares, I am in a bit of a fog," said Inspector Dwayne. "I did not expect to see you, sir."
Mr. Olivares looked an inquiry, and motioned the Inspector to a chair. The caller sat down and mopped his forehead.
​"May I ask, sir, if you have a partner—brother, son, relation?" said the Inspector. "Another Mr. Olivares?"
"No," replied the wine-merchant. "I have no partners."
"Then, sir, I have been imposed upon," said Inspector Dwayne. "A gentleman called on me at the Yard yesterday and presented this card. Is that card one of yours, sir?"
Mr. Olivares inspected the card with interest and manifest surprise.
"That," he said, opening a drawer and producing some cards, "is certainly a card of mine. You may compare it with these."
The Inspector satisfied himself on this point after a very brief examination.
"Then that card has been stolen from you, sir," he said. "The man who gave it to me evidently had some opportunity of stealing it, or you have given it to him in the way of business."
"You had better describe him," said the wine-merchant.
Inspector Dwayne gave an elaborate description of the soi-disant Señor Olivares. But the real Simon Pure knew nothing of him, and shook his head.
"I have no knowledge of any such man," he remarked. "Nor can I understand how he can have secured my card, which is seldom presented to any but well-known customers of mine with whom I have done business for many years."
​"A former employee?" suggested the Inspector.
"No," said the wine-merchant decisively. "Though a good one, mine is a small business, and I only keep the clerk you saw just now, who has been with me twenty-five years."
"Is he an Englishman?" asked the Inspector.
"No—he is a Spaniard," answered Mr. Olivares, "but he and I have lived so long in this country that though we have not been naturalized we may be said to be thoroughly Anglicized."
"This man who came to me, passing himself off as you," said Inspector Dwayne, "told me a long tale about a family legend which I will just epitomize for you." He went through the chief points of the impostor's story, watching Mr. Olivares anxiously. "Do you know anything of that, sir?" he asked, when he had made an end.
The wine-merchant smiled.
"No!" he said. "It may be so, but I make no pretensions to noble birth; as a matter of fact, my father and my grandfather were in this trade before me. I may be distantly related to the Count Duke of Olivares, but I do not know of it."
"Nor of any old documents about this sword-stick?" asked the Inspector.
"No. Of course, I cannot profess to solve the mystery, but it seems to me you have been cleverly imposed upon. My suggestion is that this man's object in coming to you with this story, was to engage your attention by telling it, ​while he made his observations and calculations as to how he could get possession of the stick, and unfortunately you let him see where you kept it."
"But what is the stick wanted for?" said the the Inspector.
Mr. Olivares shrugged his shoulders.
"Ah, what?" he said. "That's the mystery. But that somebody wanted it very particularly for a particular reason is very evident. I'm afraid that I can't help you any further."
Inspector Dwayne then took his leave, but on reaching the door turned and asked the wine-merchant if he had any objection to his asking the clerk if he had ever seen anything of the impostor about the building. Mr. Olivares said that he had no objection, and called the clerk, whose name turned out to be Fernandes, into the room. He was a sallow-faced, quiet-mannered person, with sad eyes and a gentle voice, and he answered the detective confidently and readily. No—he knew no one of the description which Inspector Dwayne gave—no one. It was very seldom that anyone called there—it was an old business and definite in its routine. It was seldom, too, that he had occasion to give his employer's card to anyone and he could not think of how possession of it could be obtained.
There was no further information to be got there, and Inspector Dwayne went away very full of thought. Although his immediate business, in plain words, was to prove who killed Marcus Bartenstein, he was much more con​cerned with the mystery of the sword-stick. He had no doubt—for there could be no doubt—-that the assassin had made use of that weapon, but what was all this mysterious spiriting away of the stick from his custody? What good could its possession do to him who had stolen it? The more he thought of it the more he was mystified, and by the time he got back to his office he was a little out of temper, for he could not hit upon an idea. Mitchell was inquiring for him—Mitchell, whom he had not seen since he deputed him to keep an eye on Grandfather Punctuality the night before. He sat down and asked what Mitchell had to tell him.
"Well," he said, "did you find out where the old man lived?"
Mitchell shook his head ruefully.
"No," he answered, "I didn't."
"A bit uncommon for you," remarked Inspector Dwayne.
"I'd a nice time of it," said Mitchell. "He and that other man, Marks, kept it up late. I kept taking a look at them———"
"That," interrupted the Inspector, "is why they kept it up late. They knew you were watching them."
"No," said Mitchell earnestly, "I'm sure they didn't—I was never more careful in my life."
"Well, I suppose they didn't stay all night there?" said the Inspector.
"He came out at ten o'clock," answered ​Mitchell. "He never saw me—I'd found a good place in that passage. He went into Holborn and turned towards the City. I was never more than twenty yards behind him—but I lost him."
"Where?" asked the Inspector.
"Well, he turned down Fetter Lane, and slipped into some of those small courts behind Fleet Street," replied Mitchell. "How he disappeared I don't know, but he did it in a flash."
"Psh, man!" exclaimed Inspector Dwayne. "He's evidently got a lodging in some of those old houses. However, I want him, or may want him, and as I understood from Abrahams that he makes a practice of passing his evening at Marks's shop you must be on to him again."
"All right," said Mitchell. He lingered a little, as if he had more to say. "Wouldn't it be better———" he began.
"Wouldn't what be better?" asked the Inspector.
"Why, if you want him at the inquest or the adjournment, to subpœna him, and let me serve him at Marks's, or wherever I can find him," answered Mitchell. "If he goes about with his curios I'm certain to come across him."
Inspector Dwayne considered this proposal. He also remembered Grandfather Punctuality's conduct towards Lauderdale.
"I want to know where the old man lives, and what his private life is," he said. "However, we'll think of that tonight, Mitchell. The in​quest won't be opened until tomorrow afternoon, and the adjournment at Bow Street was for a week, you know. Try to run this old fox to earth tonight—a hundred to one you'll find him burrowing in some of those Fleet Street courts; lots of 'em like him do—they can't keep away from the smell of paper and printer's ink—and rum. It draws them."
Then Mitchell went away, and once more the Inspector strove to think of some explanation of the things which troubled him. Better men than himself, he said, would not have bothered themselves half so much—they would have accepted the hypothesis of Lauderdale's guilt and have gone on to collect all the evidence they could against him. But Inspector Dwayne was a very obstinate man, and he had made up his mind that the young soldier was not guilty, and that he, Samuel Dwayne, was going to find out who was.
"It's a queer, queer case!" he muttered for the hundredth time. "And it's going to be queerer."
As fortune would have it, the case became queerer within the next few minutes. While he sat there, moody and speculative, the custodian of that part of the building entered, conducting a young man in the dress of a chauffeur, who expressed a wish to have a word with Inspector Dwayne.
"It's about that affair at Princes Gate, sir," he said when they were left alone. "The Bartenstein case, sir."
​"What do you know about it?" demanded the Inspector, wondering what he was going to hear next. "Anything really important?"
"I believe I do, sir, and I should have come to you sooner, but I had to leave town very early yesterday morning, and I never heard of this affair until late last night, at Salisbury," said the chauffeur. "I've only just returned from there, so I came to you at once."
"Well?" said Inspector Dwayne, who had been narrowly inspecting the young man and had set him down for an honest fellow. "Go on."
"Well, sir, night before last, at midnight, I was in Princes Gate, waiting for a gentleman whom I had driven there, and who kept me," replied the chauffeur. "I was about three doors from Mr. Bartenstein's. I know Mr. Bartenstein very well, because I've driven him many a time into the City and down to the House too. I saw a young gentleman arrive; then Mr. Bartenstein came up in his motor-brougham, which went round to the stables. The young gentleman and Mr. Bartenstein went within and the door was closed. About six minutes later they appeared at the door again, and the young gentleman walked away towards Knightsbridge. Mr. Bartenstein stood a minute or two at the door looking up at the sky, then he went within again. And . . . "
"Yes, yes?" said the Inspector, seeing the chauffeur pause. "Go on!"
​"I'm sure, sir, from the description in the papers, that the young gentleman I saw was the one who has been charged," said the young man.
"If so, it's lucky for him that you were there!" exclaimed Inspector Dwayne. "Now you're sure Bartenstein closed the door?"
"I heard him bolt it, sir—heavily," answered the chauffeur.
"How long did you stay there after that?" asked the Inspector.
"Half an hour, sir, exactly."
"I suppose your fare could corroborate that?"
"Oh yes, sir. It's Sir Ilbert Witherington—he often employs me."
"Then give me your name and address, and a reference or two, and don't say a word of this till you hear from me," said Inspector Dwayne.
When the chauffeur was gone the Inspector uttered an exclamation.
"Ha!" he said. "Whoever did it was hidden behind that curtain, and got in and got out by that private stair."